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vendetta-if · 2 years ago

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Please don’t take this the wrong way, because I still think you’re writing is incredible and I look forward to every update, but am I the only one who finds Takeshi incredibly weird? Like he’s got a wife and 3 kids and yet he’s still pining over my dad who’s been dead for years now. It’s time to move on dude, come on.

If he was younger and single then I’d understand, but the way it comes off, to me at least, is pretty emotionally unfaithful. It reads like Takeshi views Viktor as “the one who got away” which is kind of a shitty attitude to have when you’re married with kids. We haven’t even met Rins mom yet and I already feel bad for her lol, this whole situation is uncomfortable.

Anyways, sorry for my rambling and if you got offended I really do apologize, I wasn’t trying to be mean. Good luck on your future writing!

I appreciate you being polite when writing this and don’t worry, I’m not offended 😁 I have talked a little bit more about him and his feelings for Viktor and about his marriage with Azami in other asks, but I realize that some of them, I answered like in the early days of this blog being up (boy, time sure does fly because it feels like yesterday to me 😭) and not everyone will have read all of the related asks.

So, everything is a lil bit more complicated for Takashi than what it might seem like on the surface, and of course, I can’t really put all of this history and backstory in the main story because it’s not focused on Takashi, or Rin, or the Aikawa, and thus, I understand why some people end up seeing Takashi in a worse light. This is, of course, not to say that he is perfect. I feel like no one in my story is perfect, even Viktor himself, and I like to keep it that way. But I hope my long-winded explanation in this post will help you get a clearer picture on Takashi and his complicated love life 😭.

And right now in the story, I’ll say that he has actually moved on from Viktor. Sure he still remembers and mourns him around the anniversary of his death, and talking about Viktor (and Yvette) is still a sore spot for him, but as they say, you don’t really forget your first love. Also, he has fixed his relationship with Azami (thus their decision to have the twins) by the time of the main story and they’re at their best right now and I’ll explain more in details below the cut.

I’ll put it under the cut because it’s going to be a long one as I try to summarize Takashi’s and Azami’s history together and some additional lore stuff for those who are interested.

For starter, his marriage to Azami was an arranged one that both of them didn’t really have any say in it and it doesn’t help that both of them didn’t even have time to properly get to know each other by the time they got married. They were also pretty young (around early to mid 20s perhaps? I don’t have my notes open right now).

It was a… politically strategic wedding that Takashi’s father and Azami’s maternal grandfather arranged.

And additional info since I don’t think I have mentioned this anywhere actually, but Azami’s maternal side of family is a Yakuza clan/family back in Japan and by establishing some kind of family relationship with the Aikawas—who focuses their businesses in the US—they hope to keep the door open for possibilities of expanding their own business abroad in the US through the Aikawas. They haven’t really done that, but it’s nice to already have and secure the connection. And vice versa for the Aikawas if they wanna do some business in Japan.

It doesn’t help that Viktor was literally Takashi’s first love and that they’ve known each other since they were kids. So, by the time of his marriage, Takashi didn’t really have enough time to kind of, let go or grow out of his feelings for his first love and he was basically getting married to a stranger.

But to think that this means that he automatically becomes an emotionally distant husband and father is wrong. He spent time talking and hanging out with Azami (mostly initiating them first because Azami is the more introverted and reserved one in their relationship), trying to build a relationship—that should’ve been built naturally in normal marriages—with his wife. It did end up being more like a platonic relationship at first than a romantic one, but still, Azami appreciated that.

He’s also a good, caring, and warm dad for Rin and he did take care of Rin as much as Azami did. I’ve said this before in another ask, but when she got married to what is basically a stranger, Azami expected the worse and Takashi was a very pleasant surprise for her.

I think along the way, Azami fell in love with him for real first, but the fact that Takashi still saw her more of a platonic partner and still had romantic feelings for Viktor at the time… It did put a strain on their marriage.

But both of them didn’t really give up on their marriage and even though it took years, they slowly work on their relationship. It was not an instant progress but over time, Takashi ends up falling in love with Azami as well and that’s also the reason why they had the twins like more than a decade after they had Rin (The twins are still very young in the story right now).

Rin was born because of both of their families’ pressure and expectation, but having the twins is the decision that Takashi and Azami made themselves out of love.

While his feelings for Viktor is still there somewhere in the background, it’s waay weaker and fainter than when he was younger. Right now in the story, I would say he has moved on, although he still remembers his first love occasionally, especially around the time of his death. After all, they say that you can’t really forget your first love.

But yeah, in the story currently, his relationship with his wife is at its best and he’s living happily with his family.

And while a part of his motivation to get Rin to marry MC is in part to kind of fulfilling an impossible dream of his, it is also just for… practical reasons. The fact is that the Aikawas have a little bit more to gain by tying the Morozovs in an alliance based on blood ties than the Morozovs do. The Morozovs have the stronger manpower and raw force/strength and nowadays, they have decent connections too.

I mentioned this before in the past ask about the two families’ history, but their alliance started out because the Aikawas were having a pretty rough time protecting their turf from the other criminal groups and families back in New York. They mostly have power by accumulating and brokering information and connections, but they’re a bit lacking in like raw force and power, and that’s where Grandpa Morozov saw the opportunity for alliance and went to talk with Takashi’s father. And the rest we know how it plays out.

So, yeah… I think that’s all I have to say in this post and I’ll definitely be referring to this post again if I ever get similar asks. I don’t know whether it helps you understand Takashi a little bit more or not, but I do hope it’s not as black and white as it once was 😅

#asks #anon ask #lore #char: info #char: takashi #char: azami #if: vendetta #vendetta if #if vendetta #if game #if wip #dashingdon #choicescript #hosted games #choice of games #cyoa

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salixsociety · 1 year ago

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Botanical Folklore and the Divine

On using herbs in your relationship with the divine. Inspired by @adhdcatholicheretic's post about Marian Gardens.

As anyone who's ever had to listen to me talk for more than five minutes will gladly tell you, I am very passionate about folklore, and I think it is something that us contemporary practitioners of magic tend to ignore. Most of us using herbs find ourselves stuck repeating the same patterns of practical herbal magic: teas, poultices, soaps, tinctures. Maybe the occasional loose leaf smoke cleanse instead of some incense. But rarely do I see people use herbs in their encounters and connections to the Gods, and that's what I'd like to write about today; because it's easier than you think.

The Lore

Folklore regarding plants is rife with stories about divinity and its associates. Back when we needed stories not only to remember what plants looked like, but also to explain why they looked the way they did. If you look deep enough, almost any plant in your surroundings is bound to have some stories, a creation myth, an explanation for some peculiarity. Take Lady's Mantle, alchemilla vulgaris, native to Northern Europe, Iceland and Greenland. The large foliage of this herb have an interesting structure and soft texture, and tend to capture dewdrops around their edges and in their middle, which speak to our imagination to this day. The story goes that the old Teutonic peoples thought it to be the tears of either Frigga or Freyja, who were later syncretized into the Virgin Mary. Nowadays the name Lady's Mantle is in reference to the shape of the leaves and how they may resemble Mary's cape, which in turn is subject to much more folklore, as of Rosemary it is said the bright azure flowers got their color from the Virgin throwing her cape over one such bush to let it dry. The saints also get their share of lore, some more explicitly than others. Some got their lore because of pagan rites being Christianised, such as St. John's Wort (hypericum perforatum), which was usually gathered on midsummer's eve or day for its magical properties. That day was later Christianised into St. John's feast day, and the plant turned into a prominent folk-magical plant to ask for St. John's intercession. Others got their lore from their appearance, such as pansies, with their three petals, and then there are of course those with Biblical appearances such as palm and hyssop. But fear not, all my friends worshipping the infernal: Christian folklore regarding plants doesn't end at the Virgin or the Saints. Devil's Bit (succisa pratensis) is one of my favorite examples. A dainty, delicate flower with strong curative properties. What does the Devil have to do with it, then? Well, in his anger at how good it was at curing various ailments, supposedly he rose up from his seat in Hell and bit off the rootstock of every single one. And indeed, if you dig one up, you'll see how strange the root looks, almost as if it's not complete.

The wealth of folklore goes on and on and on. Not just covering Christian divinity: despite my failure to cover it, the lore regarding the pagan gods and their spirits is very much there! Look deep into the Christian lore, oftentimes it had to come from an already extant pagan story. But instead of droning on about examples, I'd like to tell you how to find your own and then apply them in your magical practice.

The Research

I highly recommend researching plant folklore, as its applications go far beyond this little snippet. But it can be overwhelming, so allow me to try and grant you a place to start.

Your first considerations should definitely be your location and your practice, and how they balance each other out. If you are a Danish folk practitioner but you live in the tropics, consider whether you value sticking to traditional plants or using what's outside your door, more. The question for you, reader, is: do you want to use what's traditional, or what's available? Work from there. Make a list. If you want to use what is traditional, make a list of some of your favorites (including herbs you already have!) and the ones you could easily get. Research those first. If you want to use what's available to you in your environment, make a list of plants you already like to use or know a bit about, or if you're a bare bones beginner, plants that stand out to you. See also my post about connecting with the plants in your environment.

The best places to start research are definitely peer-reviewed and academic sources, not something like Wiccapedia. Folklore has logic, and structure, and anthropologists, ethnobotanists and folklorists are by far the best at conveying it. Often Wikipedia will have some tidbits to jump off of, but if not, look regionally. Archives, books about certain regions or countries, museums, universities tend to have the best sources. See the end of this post for some source recommendations.

The Application

So how does one actually go about applying all this? That, of course, depends on your practice. But the idea is to use this lore, and the connection it gives you to your divine, their behavior, their motivations, their stories, etc, to bring you closer to your magic and your faith. Some ideas:

Plant a devotional garden, big or small, with plants that feature your divine in their lore, perhaps in combination with plants that remind you of them.

Burn or make incense with the plants and use it for rituals, during prayer, to invoke them, etc.

Offer the plants (ethically sourced) to your divine.

Use the plants for something practical (make food with berries, fiber with flax, syrup with flowers) and offer your labor or part/all of the finished product to your divine.

Make art with the plants of your divine (weave something, make dye/paint out of them).

Put in conservation efforts or donate to those making the conservation efforts to preserve the plants, if they are endangered or about to be.

If it is a tree or several trees, find a stand of them (or just a single one that you like) near you, and use it as a place of worship or make a shrine there.

But it could be even as simple as thinking of your gods when you see the plants in question. Ultimately, that is where the lore came from, and that is what the lore is for. Knowing the stories, and feeling what they mean to you, is an important way to connect with your Gods.

Just a Few Source Recs

Note: my practice revolves around Alaska and Europe, so that's what my sources reflect. But my ask box is always open for resource requests, and I may do a little looking around for you!

Compendium of Ritual and Symbolic Plants in Europe - M. Cleene and M. Lejeune (available on Archive.org)

Native American Ethnobotany Database

Forestry Service/U.S. Dept. of Agriculture

The Medieval Garden Enclosed

Masterlist of Ethnobotany/folklore/etc sources coming soon. ---- If you enjoy my work, please consider purchasing or commissioning some of my written resarch, ordering a reading, or commissioning my art. Click here to see the options. Thank you!

#ethnobotany #apothecaric allerlei #germanic pagan #folk magic #folk medicine #norse heathen #paganism #folk witchcraft #green witch #herbalism #witchblr

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howsitduud · 2 months ago

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SINNERS REVIEW

NOTE: I WILL BE SPOILING THE ENTIRE MOVIE. PLEASE DON'T READ THIS REVIEW UNTIL YOU'VE SEEN THE MOVIE FIRST. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU DO SO.

I don't watch trailers all that often. Unless it's for a movie I really don't want to watch, I prefer to remain completely blind when it comes to a movie's release. Sinners was no exception; I hadn't even heard of this movie until it came out a few days ago and everyone was talking about it. All I knew was that there were vampires in it. I am so glad I went into this movie completely blind because it floored me with both its content and just how damn good it was.

The easiest comparison I can make with this movie is to compare it to something like From Dusk Till Dawn: both are movies where the first hour of the movie leaves you in a false sense of security where it's devoid of any supernatural elements, setting up every character and getting them into a single location, where the movies shift into being creature features where vampires slowly pick off every single named character until a final battle where the 2 main leads survive and kill off every single vampire. Even though it's easy to make comparisons, it's where Sinners differs from From Dusk Till Dawn where the former starts to shine.

For one thing, I actually cared about all the characters in this movie. A fear I had going into this movie was that I wasn't going to like the parts of the movie without vampires, but the quality of the writing helps draw you into the movie and gets you to know every single character and their history with one another. One thing Ryan Coogler excels at is making it feel like all the characters in his movies feel more than just characters in a film, they feel like they're actual people with whole lives and histories before the events of the movie. You want to find out what happened with Smoke and Stack in Chicago that they seem to be running from. You want to find out why Sammie wants to be a blues musician and how hanging around criminals with affect him. You want to see why Remmick is targeting this group specifically.

Another pitfall this movie avoids is having the vampire portions of the movie feel like it comes right out of nowhere, but the two halves of the movie are integrated so seamlessly that it never feels that way. The prologue of the movie has some explanation of how vampires are drawn to musicians as well as a flash-forward to Sammie coming home after getting attacked. There's also the scene of Smoke seeing Annie and discussing her interest in the occult, which is why she knows all about vampires and hates later on in the movie. The lore in this movie is also so simple, yet so fleshed out. There's some typical vampire movie hallmarks, like vampires being affected by sunlight, garlic, and silver, and needing to be invited into somewhere, but there's also the bit where Sammie summons souls of past and future musicians and dancers with his music and how that ties into the core motif of music being a source of power, or how the vampires are unaffected by Sammie praying because Remmick was abused by priests and takes that experience with him.

I also love how the people who turn still have their normal emotions and memories and don't just turn into mindless monsters. When Annie and Remmick get staked, the other vampires mourn their losses, which honestly makes them scarier because they feel more real. The scariest parts of the movie aren't when people are getting turned, it's when the vampires are trying to manipulate people into letting them into the bar, using Smoke's fear of the mob or the Klan or speaking Chinese to Grace and threatening to turn her daughter. These scenes had my entire theater on edge, I swear.

There are so many other amazing elements of the movie, like the acting. I've always held onto the belief that Michael B. Jordan is a great actor, and this is easily his best role. He plays these 2 characters so convincingly and makes them each look and act so much differently from each other. Hailee Steinfeld, Jack O' Connell, Delroy Lindo, Wunmi Mosaku, they all bring their A-game to this movie, so it's more surprising that my favorite actor in the entire movie is Miles Caton, an actor who has never been in a single movie before this. I also adore the music in this movie, being a perfect mix of folksy blues music sung diegetically and a classic horror movie score, complete with electric guitars and synths.

Going into this movie, I had a lot of questions: Is this movie a musical? Is it a creature feature? Is it about racism? Is the length justified? Is the acting good? Is the music good? Is it campy? Is it scary? Is it good?

The answer to all of those questions is a resounding yes. It's also the best movie of the year so far.

9/10, I wouldn't mind being bitten by Hailee Steinfeld,,,

#media 2025 #movies #movie review #review #ryan coogler #sinners

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birdo-is-here · 1 year ago

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bit o writing bc yes, featuring Uriel because trust me i swear they still exist they are around they’re just avoiding Michael because they’re awkward but they’re alive they’re around

fun fact this one was originally meant to go on the actual Michael acc but it ended up getting scrapped because, eh didn’t involve enough lore, but i found the interaction too sweet to completely let go of

Set after Azrael lost half their eyes that time for trying to protect Michael

once again written like rp because yes

tw for discussions of missing eyes?? Idk felt worth mentioning yk

[Michael owed Azrael a new eye]

[It was still confused as to why it didn’t just say where Mike was. Like, it wasn’t like it’d heavily affect Azrael itself to say. In fact, new research proves that it would’ve saved it so much of the trouble if it’d just told them]

[It was even more confused about the strange feeling of guilt that had come over it when it did inevitably give up some information on where Michael was — though it was not an exact location, fortunately. ..Fortunately?? What?? This was its point. Why had it suddenly started caring about what happened to Michael? It made absolutely zero sense]

[The guiltiness specifically was a strange one. Being the angel of death you can’t exactly afford to have certain opinions and feelings on things, guilt being one of the biggest ones. It had been a while since it’d felt guilty. Strange]

[Correction to that first thought; Michael owed Azrael a new eye and an explanation]

[Their train of thought was cut off when they heard a soft knock at the door. They considered letting the visitor in, before sighing inwardly and waving a hand]

[The door swung open on its own, a frail, familiar figure stood on the other side, holding a large, linen bag filled with items. They waved, crossing the threshold to where Azrael was situated on their chair]

Hey Uriel

Hi Az, I picked up some more souvenirs while filling in for another Guardian

[They tossed the bag to Azrael, who reached out and caught it. It was fairly heavy, with several more boxy objects inside it this time. Xe placed the bag in xyr lap, already opening it and beginning to look through the items]

[Uriel made a small noise of surprise. Xe glanced up briefly, curious on what had happened to provoke such a reaction. Uriel tilted their head, mild concern in their features]

darl’ what happened to your eyes?

[Oh. Right, that.] Oh uh. Accident, it’s healing.

That looks like a punishment, what happened?

[They returned their gaze to the items in the bag, continuing to sift through the collection] Didn’t reveal enough information on something

[They picked out a random item, showcasing it to Uriel before they could question them further on the eye thing. It was rectangular, mostly grey with red and blue strips along the sides. The grey part appeared to have some sort of screen, the red and blue parts containing several buttons of different sizes. ]

What is this?

Oh, that’s a Nintendo Switch.

[Their eyes narrowed, flipping the item over and studying it closer] What’s it do?

It’s for like. Kids. Generally. You play games on it. method of entertainment. You might like it actually

[Azrael lifted their eyes to Uriel, squinting a little] I am not a human child

[They chuckled a little] Yeah I mean like. You might find it fun with the right games. There’s a few games for it in there, could take a look at the covers and see what you find appealing

[They turned their gaze back to the collection of items in their lap, placing the Nintendo Switch on the arm of the chair. There were multiple items they already recognised inside, such as a small figurine of some sort of winged reptile — Dragon, Uriel called it — as well as several box-like objects with coloured squares on them. Rubix cubes, they recalled. Strange names]

There are items in here I already recognise

Yeah I can’t get new things every single time

Why

There’s only so many human items

That’s stupid. There’s so many of them, why don’t they all make objects

[Uriel shrugged] I don’t know what to tell you, buddy. Do you want to hold onto that bag, or?

I will. I’m going to show Phanuel the dragons, I think he would like them

Alright, suit yourself. [Uriel turned around, stopping at the doorway] Also, hope your eyes feel better

.. Thanks

#birdo babbles #birdo’s silly little guys #angel goober shenanigans #birdo babbles for an extended period of time

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hatchetfieldtheories · 4 years ago

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Return to Hatchetfield-Town – The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals Part 1

Alright settle down kiddos. Get comfy, find a warm blanket and hug your favourite fwendy-wend as we start our Return to Hatchetfield-Town series.

I’ll be rewatching all the Hatchetfield scripted content (i.e. not livestreams or interviews) and jotting down what happens, explaining some concepts and delving into some of the key theories in the series (and using the word “implications” that often it will cease to have meaning).

Even though I’ll be doing the rewatch by show in order they came out, there will be spoilers for all Hatchetfield content that is available as of the rewatch.

I’ve also linked to a number of other blog’s theories here because they are amazing, but if you aren’t happy with your theory being included I will be more than happy to remove it! Just let me know.

[Part 2]

The Guy Who Really Hated Brigadoon

TGWDLM starts off with the greatest song ever to feature dancing zombies… at least I can’t think of any other notable ones.

In the title song, the cast of singing and dancing zombies explain to us that all great stories have to have a hero, someone who knows right and wrong and that the best way to do this is through singing and dancing in musicals. This with the later line of “they evoke the philosophical” make me think that Pokey took a class in Campbell’s Hero Myth in College and became that guy.

Hatchetfield Challenge: try not to shrug your shoulders along with the music at the chorus. Its impossible. No wonder the Hive spread so quickly. Literally killer dance moves.

So then they introduce us to an awful Grinch named Paul and we hit the first point in the show where I laugh out loud every single time I watch.

I know TGWDLM was not originally intended to be the first Hatchetfield show but starting this series with a song which sets up the story so well is truly spectacular. And is there anything more Starkid than introducing your main character by having other characters sing about how awful they are?

One thing I have noticed while writing, reading and collating Hatchetfield theories is that while most Black Friday and Nightmare Time theories are usually about the overall Hatchetfield lore, most TGWDLM theories are usually quite self-contained and focused on this one show. TGWDLM – while so fully within the Hatchetfield extended universe, is definitely the show that can best stand-alone without the others.

It’s the end of the world, Paul

If you don’t sing

This is the bridge, Paul

Where we globalize everything

And the words will come to you

We swear we will teach you

What it means to love

What it means to obey, Paul!

On a first watch this is very funny. On your 10th watch this is terrifying.

CCRP Technical: No-one here knows how to use their printer

Following the absolute bop of a title song we find ourselves in CCRP Technical and all feels very… normal. It’s very weird following all the revelations in subsequent Hatchetfield media, to be watching a show where there was genuinely nothing obviously fishy about CCRP. We’ll obviously discuss CCRP more when we get to Nightmare Time, but for now all we know is that Paul works in the technical department of CCRP – an unknown corporation, with some key characters, Charlotte, Bill and Ted.

We also find out more about Grinch Paul’s personality and honestly, Paul is me pre-pandemic just outright avoiding social interactions and suddenly going for coffee in the middle of the work day. (I have become a changed woman in lockdown – someone please invite me somewhere… anywhere!)

For all the dark humour and death in the Hatchetfield series, Starkid do know how to bring the joy – I love how excited the town of Hatchetfield are for a touring production of Mamma Mia.

Fake Fact: TGWDLM is actually an allegory for Europe in the 1970s, when we all became mind-controlled by Abba’s Waterloo. (Find me a better explanation for Eurovision, I dare you! The sequins were just too shiny!)

“The idea of sitting there… trapped in a musical. That is my own personal hell.”

Two words: Emma Perkins – need I explain any more?

Ah Hot Chocolate Boy. I really look forward to finding out more about him. Where does he come from? He just appears out of the ether. What’s his story? How old is he? How many hot chocolates does he have per day? I know we have since had some confirmation on who he is, but they raise more questions than answers. For now I will just point you to a gorgeous Mood Board by @hatchetfieldmoodboards which features a bit of a spoiler.

For real though – is it just me who would love a full version of “I’ve been brewing up your coffee”?

Hatchetfield Challenge: Try not to sing “Shut the f*ck up” along with Emma.

“Watching people sing and dance makes me very uncomfortable”- oh boy Paul… you’re not going to enjoy the next hour and 40 minutes. Also, Paul, you’re making me uncomfortable watching you throw your brand new coffee around as if you’ve just been given an empty cup. There’s imaginary coffee everywhere. Hopefully, HCB won’t slip on it before it’s cleaned up… he’s already having a bad day.

“Thunder and Lightning… very very frightening. But a big rock hurtling through the clouds is no biggie.” – all the residents of Hatchetfield apparently.

The next sequence happens so fast and we get introduced to a lot of characters. Notably Greenpeace Girl, Alice and Deb, Sam, and Hidgens (though we don’t find out his name until much later). This scene impresses me because they do such a great job of very quickly bringing out so many characters who nonetheless are memorable when they return later in the show.

Peanuts the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel is an Eldritch Being. I won’t go into Peanuts theories here as that could be a whole post in itself – and many a person more brilliant than I have written some fantastic theories on this. You can learn all about how a Squirrel took over the fandom in the following posts:

@dahlialupine : x

@frombothofmyhearts: x

@abiimaryy: x

And finally mine which is definitely a serious theory: x

It’s… A… Musical!

Now to remember we are actually watching a musical. La Dee Da Da Day is such a happy joyful song performed spectacularly by a throng of the undead.

The song is about the Hive singing about how much of a great time they are having now they are tap-dancing zombies, and trying to find ways to convince Paul he should join them too. So the grins on all their faces are not at all terrifying.

It’s worth noting also that according to the laws of the TGWDLM world, only those infected by the Hive can hear the music in the background. This becomes important later when it becomes clear some characters have started being infected before they are fully turned into zombies, but for now it just paints quite a funny picture of what Paul must be witnessing. I definitely think for him, this whole scene just sounds like this clip of Greased Lightning without the music: x

The important thing here however, besides Mariah’s singing, is that the Hive leave Paul alone. They don’t actually attempt to turn him at this point. I have a theory on the implications of this, but note this has big spoilers for the end of the show and Black Friday. It was written before we knew that the Hive (Pokey) was related to Wiggly but the content still stands: x

Charlotte, Honey, you don’t need that much sugar – you’re sweet enough

For reference:

@melchron noted that the lyrics for La Dee Dah sound very similar to the incantation for soul transferal read out in Jane’s a Car, which leads me to two possible implications.

The Freaky Furbies have a language other than English that they use for their incantations so this is why they sound similar.

There is soul transference happening to the souls of the bodies the Hive take over.

Or it’s just Starkid using similar sounding words for their content…. Three! There are three possible implications…

Paul – just print off another copy of the report

From this point on the musical numbers really do come thick and fast. We move on to the first instance of Jeff Blim encouraging Paul to talk about his feelings, which I am sure is not important and isn’t worth discussing. Paul goes through a musical rendition of a promotion interview, which is actually the Hive attempting to find out if he will be the “hero” of their story. They picked out Paul for the role from the start. That he was chosen was inevitable.

What do you see for this company? I'm looking for someone with strong ambition Someone to sell their specific vision Someone to share with precise precision their thoughts 'Cause I want you to want…To want

So it turns out these will be looooong, so I will end here and see you in part 2! I’m not sure yet what the upload frequency will be. It takes quite a while to go through the show like this but it is a lot of fun!

Hatchetfield High Homework:

Where do you stand on the Peanuts the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel debate?

Why do you think that the Soul Transference Spell and La Dee Dah sound so similar?

Go follow all the lovely people mentioned in this post!

Bonus points if you know the reference in the post title.

[Part 2]

#the guy who didn't like musicals #tgwdlm #return to hatchetfield town #starkid #team starkid

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moldy-mold · 4 years ago

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Hello! It’s already May... Life updates - a roller coaster of emotions

A tempestuous, tearful April... Aghh the struggle has not eased up a bit. Living is just too expensive to be shouldered by part-time wages, meager freelance, and fickle confidence. My parents are disappointed - I’ve always tried to dodge the questions about my uncertain future. After all, I don’t have any answers.

What nearly broke my spirit was the humiliating scolding I received on my birthday. “You’re almost 30. Stop playing around at the cafe, don’t you know your bank account is nearly empty? How will you pay for this? If you can’t afford car insurance then just bike to work!” I didn’t even have time to think about how inconsiderate that was. In a daze, I hung up and went to my second part-time job that day.

Well, Dad, those are the questions I asked myself every single day. All I can do is keep trying even if you don’t believe in me. Because, despite everything, I still believe in myself.

Nothing good will come out of asking these punishing questions. I don’t know if things will get better or worse. Just gotta do what I can to get by as a small creature existing in this universe.

I learned to stop blaming myself for not being successful. Given the circumstances, I think the odds are stacked pretty high against most of us right now.

“Banish the nonsense. Some questions will ruin you if you are denied the answer long enough.” - Annihilation

I’ve begun my investment journey! After studying how it all works I have come to understand the value of investing. It was one of my resolutions for this year and I’m glad I’ve achieved it.

My brother, a crypto enthusiast, knows my monetary plight and has been helping me out in the weirdest ways.

6 am text: “Hey Sis, you got $1000? Put it into Dogecoin... like NOW.”

I don’t like doing these kinds of high-risk-high-reward investments but what the heck, I was desperate. I applied for an account that can trade crypto.

In the end my account got rejected (there was no explanation) and I gave up. Because of course that would happen lol.

“Hey, do you have time to talk about the future?” “UM... are we breaking up???” “LOL don’t say it like that!”

My roommate / best friend decided she wanted to move to her own place and find her own way in life. Of course, my fragile heart, still tender from the previous month’s beating, took it very personally. I was reassured it wasn’t my fault - there are plenty of other valid reasons why.

We’ve been sharing an apartment for 6 years now, and although I knew it would happen someday, it was quite shocking to hear it being said to me in reality. At first, I laughed it off because I’ve been dreaming about moving out of the country anyway and it all works out. I’m an introverted, neat-freak, homebody! It’s perfect! But after a very pensive shower, I realized that I’m actually terrified to be without any companionship. Either way, I have to put my feelings aside because I don’t wanna hold her back from her dreams. I may have trouble accepting it now but hopefully I can genuinely be happy for her in time.

The Plant Life Please welcome Rokurou, the newest addition to my jungle.

It’s been a few weeks and he totally ate bugs already lol. Nice! I was thinking the smaller traps wouldn’t catch anything, but it turns out they’ve been doing the most work. The larger traps can’t catch ants or tiny gnats. They just crawl out after the trap snaps shut.

This venus fly trap is rather picky about what water he gets so I’ve been out there collecting rainwater in buckets JUST for him! Kind of a pain, but I will do whatever it takes to keep him alive.

It was a very tiny dream of mine to collect and care for carnivorous plants. If the shop had more varieties, I would probably buy them all.

I thought I was gonna die... Hostess for a day. One day while working at the cafe, this old Chinese man came in asking how much I made here. Then he told me if I work as a hostess/front desk person at his restaurant (which was next to the cafe, by the way), he will pay me more than the cafe. He slipped me $5 to go see him after my shift at 9pm. It was soooooo sketch. But I went anyway to at least hear him out after telling my roommate and my parents where I was going. You know... in case I die.

Luckily I didn’t die. It was a normal Chinese restaurant. I met the staff and they were all super cool and the mysterious old man goes by Mr. Lin.

Mr. Lin was very chill about it. He said I can have a trial run after my bakery shift on Saturday. If I don’t like it, I can just tell him no and he will pay me for my time.

I knew it was a bad idea to take another shift after a long shift at the cafe but I did it anyway. It was BUSY. Too busy for anyone to teach me how to be a hostess so I literally just had to guess what I’m supposed to be doing. It was kinda obvious though, showing people to their tables. I picked them at random bc I didn’t know if there was a method to seating people or not.

There are three different menus: Chinese, Korean and English and they’re ALL different. Depending on the nationality of who walks in, I have to decide for myself which menu to hand out. Uhhhhh despite being Asian myself, I cannot tell the difference between Korean and Chinese people lmao so I have to keep awkwardly asking people which menu they want. *screams*

The manager, Vincent, is so OP though. He knows exactly which menu to get every time. I was like HOW DO YOU KNOW?? He only responded with “working in the business for 24 years.”

Anyway, it was a long and confusing night of people thinking I am a waitress and me not knowing where the spoons are. But I don’t think this job is for me, even if it pays a lot.

There sure is plenty of demand for part-time food service workers and zero demand for full-time graphic designers... sigh. My journey doing random jobs in 2021 continues.

My brother graduated pharmacy school last week. In our culture, the older sibling’s shoulders is where all the expectations should rest. Maybe in another AU I would feel small and inferior to my younger and more successful sibling. But I don’t feel anything like that. In fact, if he can take care of my parents while I’m trying to figure out my own life, then I’m just more grateful to him. Maybe my parents don’t expect anything of me anymore, which is okay. Either way, my brother and I have each other’s backs.

Berseria I went into it with ZERO expectations because of its infamous predecessor, but I have come out pleasantly surprised. I liked it more than I thought. I’m at the end but I’m not done with the story yet.

I remember expressing my utter confusion about Zesty and everyone was like “play Berseria, it will answer a majority of your questions.” And boy, it did and I’m so glad. I loved all the throwbacks and references and lore that had to do with the previous game. Like, they really had something interesting going on here but it never quite came to fruition last time.

Is it just me, or did it take a very long time to understand all the battle mechanics? Like... I didn’t get the hang of the game until we got to Meirchio. Now I am quite good at playing Rokurou, my main. And it feels way more fun. I usually like mage characters in the old tales games but tbh I wasn’t really into it this time.

After we finish Bersy, we will be moving on to Xillia 2, our final Tales game! Gaius, I��m coming for you.

Xenoblade At the same time, I am also finishing up Xenoblade after spending nearly a year on it. I have weeks where I’m just grinding the side quests to unlock the skill trees. When I’m down, traveling and exploring in this game puts my worries to rest. Really though, the maps are so beautiful... And the music! T_T

This is one of the few games where I like every character pretty much equally, though Dundun and Riki win by just a little bit.

That’s it for now. Thanks for being here!

#diary

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osakasshitpit · 4 years ago

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I love Final Fantasy XIV

So I’ve been playing Final Fantasy XIV, and after playing for around 180 hours, I haven’t even finished A Realm Reborn. Normally, 180 hours is an insane time frame for a game to manage and hold my attention. Persona 5 Royal was 180 hours of game time, and that was slowly outstaying its welcome. FFXIV must be doing something right, because just recently I went to a convention and bought a Y’shtola Keychain in a heartbeat. I haven’t had time to play XIV a lot prior to this, since I was stupidly grinding Praetorium for days and got burned out. I haven’t played much in 2 months, and Y’shtola only really has a minor role during A Realm Reborn’s Storyline. Despite that, I started in Limsa and Y’shtola stuck with me since then. I just had to buy that keychain. My girlfriend asked me about it and despite me staying away from the game after being burned out, I explained to her in great enthusiasm why I loved Y’shtola and why I loved the game so much. I think that’s the first time I really realized how attached I was to this world, these characters, this game.

I came to FFXIV after having played WoW from Vanilla through WotLK, after having barely ever touched a MMO since quitting WoW. Honestly, I was very skeptical of XIV but holy fucking shit did it ever win me over. They are completely different games, mind you, but that is a good thing in my opinion.

So here is the longest tumblr rant post I have written so far, I think.

To be fair, the first 20 levels or so were kinda slow. You get thrown into the deep end and get bombarded with lore and characters, terms and phrases that you don't understand. For fucks sake, the opening cutscene shows Louisoix fighting Bahamut front and center. Its this big, epic moment of sacrifice, but to someone who has not played 1.0 and who doesn't know anything about the lore, this just zips right past you. During the main story of ARR, they keep talking about Louisoix and how important he is, but you haven't even seen the guy because he died before the game even started. I only really realized this today, it took me 180 hours and a look at the wiki to connect the dots. It really is a slow burn, but that slow burn was okay because everything else was so fantastic.

While the world can arguably be more subdued than Azeroth in parts, there is still this distinctive style that I quickly fell in love with. It’s fantastical, but it still feels grounded. Part of that has to do with how the game introduces you to the world, and how the main story quests explain to you the lore bit by bit. I feel like much of the world design of WoW was down to “the rule of cool”. Now, I’m not saying XIV doesn’t have that, but I feel like XIV always goes the extra mile to explain why this cool shit is here. Everything you see out there in the world feels like it has a purpose, a reason to be there and an explanation on how it works. The factions make sense, the political conflicts you get entangled in are believable. I feel like I am kind of biased to be honest. What got me to play FFXIV in the first place was seeing that Viera are a playable race. I’m a sucker for Final Fantasy, not in short part to my memories of Playing Final Fantasy Tactics and XII. XII is still my favorite game in the series, and much of that has to do with the world, Ivalice. Viera were always my favorite race of the ones seen in Ivalice. Seeing as you can play a Viera in XIV, I just had to try. Thinking about it, XII and XIV have a lot in common when it comes to world building.

One of the weirdest things to acclimate for me was how FFXIV handles story. I was used to WoW, where story was basically non-existent and you did what you did to see numbers rise and to unlock now content you could do. You are basically never involved in the story of WoW, you are just kind of there for the ride. In FFXIV, you are the main character. You are involved in what happens at all times, and that is kinda strange coming from WoW. At first I thought I wouldn’t like it, but the game made it work in my opinion. I also didn’t expect there to be so much of story to begin with. Kind of ironically the moment I realized just how much there was to experience was when I went through Ul’dah and saw a blue quest. Now, blue quest markers mean there is some content you can unlock by doing this quest. A lot of these are kinda short, with a bit of dialogue and some bits of lore for you to enjoy and I thought this one would be no difference. After all, the hook is basically just to help this lady mourn for the death of a friend. What I got was a fabulous detective adventure that spanned over the entire continent, where in I had to help the worlds most manly detective uncover the secret behind a mysterious phantom thief. To say the least, this 21 quest long quest line brought be hours upon hours of joy and had me in stitches throughout. And it was completely optional. I don’t think I even remember a single moment from any quest in WoW that made me this excited for it, optional or otherwise.

Ultimately these are very different games that try very different things.

Dungeons and Raids were a different thing. I remember when I rolled a new character for WotLK and wanted to do karazhan because I used to like doing that raid with my guild back in TBC. I could not for the live of me find a group willing to do it, because everyone was way more focused on the new content, so they could get better gear. Regardless, it just wouldn’t have been the same experience anyways I fear, because the new gear from the new Dungeons outclassed the raid gear from TBC, so karazhan would be way easier and a much different experience. In FFXIV, every dungeon is level synced by default, meaning if a higher level character joins, they get basically downgraded to the level the dungeon was designed for. Couple that with the Duty Roulette feature and suddenly, there was always someone to do any given dungeon with. I remember when I had to do the crystal tower raids and thought “why would they tie main story progression to a raid, I will never find a group to do that properly” but low and behold, I found a group within 30 minutes or less and raided through the entire set of raids within a day. Dungeons and Raids are generally a very pick up and play thing in FFXIV. To be fair, dungeons got easier and more pick up and play in WoW too, but Raids were always the endgame thing where you had to gear up and learn to play. In FFXIV, much more lenient. No corpse walking required. I say this, but I have yet to do the Coils of Bahamut or any Savage Raids. I have only heard that there is plenty of hardcore raid content for those who want that.

That’s nothing to say about the actual gameplay. FFXIV is a tab-target MMO, like so many others, but it manages to keep this kind of gameplay fresh by introducing a lot of mechanics that make the game more active than the typical “I stand here and hit my rotation a lot”. For starters, most enemies have special abilities that you can actually dodge by moving out of the way. There will a area marker on the floor and everyone within that area will be hit. It starts out easy, but later dungeons really start kicking your ass with this mechanic. You really need to say on your toes. In addition, every class is extremely different. They all have special mechanics unique to them, special meters and resources they will have to manage during combat and so on. For example, a Red Mage (the class I’m playing currently), has two meters that fill up as you cast spells. They generally have two types of spells, white and black magic. Each type fills its respective bar. Once they are both full enough, you can go in and do a more powerful melee rotation. However, if one bar is fuller than the other, the other bar will fill up slower. Since you need to fill both, you want to balance that out. You get instant casts for spells after performing a damaging spell, and you have some spells with a short cast time and good damage output that you want to cast and then use the instant cast of to cast a more damaging spell that has a long cast time. But these short cast, good damage spells require a you get from casting a spell of the respective type. So, in essence, you want to balance your use of black and white magic, but you also want to use the proc you get from casting your white and black magic, which means you cast more of the type which inherently unbalances your gauges. It becomes this micromanagement game you play with your procs and instant casts, so you can go in and do the big, flashy sword combo. And that’s just the red mage at around 50. Every class has something like this, and it’s all unique to them. Learning a class is not just learning the rotation and spells you have anymore, it’s really learning how to effectively play your class. Also, positioning. Some abilities do more damage from certain positions, so you will have to dance around an enemy to hit all the sweet spots with classes like monks. These complexities get introduced slowly as you level up, so you have plenty of time to learn the mechanics. My favorite feature might be the class system itself, though. In FFXIV, you aren’t limited to one class for the entire duration of your characters career. You can, from a certain point forwards, choose any class you wish and level that up instead. You can freely switch between classes outside of combat, too. If you are dedicated enough, you can level them all up to max, even. This means if you don’t like a class or the direction a class is going in, you can switch. I for my part started as an arcanist, so I unlocked Summoner at 30. I played Summoner up to 50 but I was just not meshing as well with the direction the summorer went in. So, I switched to Red Mage and after some getting used to, Its now my new favorite. Arcanists are special, because you actually unlock two classes at 30, so I also unlocked Scholars. Scholars are healers and that became my main dungeon class, since queue times are way shorter for healers. This would be unthinkable in WoW, and love the fact this is a thing here.

If I had to describe it, WoW is an MMO with RPG Elements, while FFXIV is a JRPG with MMO elements. I didn’t know I needed that, but in retrospect, it makes sense. The thing that really killed my progress in WoW was that I didn’t have anyone to play with anymore. My friends all dropped from the game and while I generally like doing solo content from time to time, I’m pretty introverted, after all... MMORPGs are usually most fun with friends. Final Fantasy XIV is a JRPG first, an MMO second. There is so much to keep your attention as a solo player, its nuts. All my friends who play this game, play on a different data center, so I can’t even visit them. Despite that, I had a lot of fun in my time with the game.

My experience with the game was incredibly positive, and I don’t think it will get worse from here. Everyone keeps telling me how great Heavensward is. I just have to finish 16 more quests and I’ll be able to see for myself what the fuss is about.

Honestly, if I had to say anything negative, it would be how longwinded ARR is. I mean, its not bad by any means, but I can see how someone could be turned off by this huge storyblock. Worst of all is, after you hit 50 and reach the end of ARR’s story line, there are 80 quests before you can even start with Heavensward. Since everyone keeps going on about how great it is, it’s kind of annoying how long you have to work to even get to it. In retrospect, it kinda makes sense though. These quests are meant to be played over months and months throughout a update cycle and bridge the narrative gap between one storyblock and the next, but holy fucking shit why did it have to be THAT long. They even cut like 20 of the quests from this already insanely long quest line. What the fuck. This is supposed to be an epilogue to ARR and it feels like I played a whole fucking JRPG in between ARR and Heavensward. Oh well. Thankfully, they learned from this and made the post-story blocks shorter.

I will just say that I can recommend this game. You should give it a try. Just... try not to drop the game before it gets really, really good.

#Rant #final fantasy #Final fantasy XIV

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fencesandfrogs · 4 years ago

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an abridged history/explanation of warrior cats if you didn’t read them as a kid and have questions (a primer)

welcome. i’m going to keep things to the point, this is not a plot summary, just, well, its a pandemic and people are seeking items of childhood comfort and its come to my attention that a lot of people didn’t read these books as kids and then they come up in conversation and they act shocked so! i felt compelled to write this.

[2.5k words, 10min read. section headers, no pictures. not a ton of helpful formatting. i don’t want to say don’t read this because obviously i wrote it and think it’s worth reading, but i’ll be honest, this is a lot.]

section one: about me

i was an avid reader as a child, most of which fits solidly into “stories for another time,” and some of which would necessitate me adding tags onto this post that are, well, not necessary. so i will skip over that backstory but for those aware of lexile scores, i had one that was too high for literally any book that was appropriate to give me. so reading in school was torture and reading for fun was excellent.

now because i was a first-ish grader and my mom was trying to keep the fifth harry potter out of my hands, she looked desperately for something else to pass to me. her friend, who had a daughter a year or two older than me, was into these cat books, and my mom was like “here honey you like cats” without thinking too much about it.

which is good, because as i’ll get into, it was a really good fit for me. but like a dozen books later she asked me about the plot and well. i think at that moment she realized that it might have been better to just let me read harry potter.

but yeah i continued to read them long past the recommended reading ages and still as a Young Adult will return to them for nostalgia, and also as i will get into, some really good books. (see a list of books for “morbidly curious but i don’t want to spend 56 to 168 hours reading this”)

i’m not fully caught up on the series but this is not a plot summary so that should not impact my ability to discuss this

section two: content warnings

these books (not this post) includes the following:

discussion of castration (1.1 series 1, book 1, i’m not including this on every item/discussion because this is a complicated series but i want to demo how up front some of this is)

teenage romance/sex/pregnancy (1.1ish-1.3 or 4, continues throughout the series quite a lot, comes up again in 3.4/5, 4.4-5, and a bit in 5)

death from childbirth (1.can’t remember which book, many others)

unwanted pregnancy (se super edition, or a longer one off novel, discussed in 4&5)

sex/implied, discussed, and very very very heavily hinted but never directly said/shown (1.1-3ish, se, other)

murder (constantly, 1.1, 1.4, literally every book, 3.5, i’m just listing the ones i remember off the top of my head that were particularly graphic)

disability/illness, esp. the debilitating and/or deadly nature of it (1.3-5ish, 3.1, but all of 3, 3.4ish)

dementia (1.3-5, i’ve heard in some of the later series?)

abuse (7/8 this is reported i haven’t read these books but based on what i know it’s def there)

child abandonment (1.4-5, 3.4/5, it’s also all over the place but i think those are the only major character incidents of it)

treason (1.3-5, all over the place)

the horror/tragedy of war (background, but pretty constant)

disagreeing with an integral religion/tradition (3, based on the series title, 8, and generally scattered)

the corrupting influence of power (1.4/5, possibly 7/8, others)

racism (1, 3-5, possibly others)

sexism (se, background)

patriarchal societies (se, seems to be somewhat softened based on what i’ve heard but i’m not entirely sure about this)

and more! but it starts to get stranger and this is enough to prove my point

basically everything that could go wrong does

oh yeah! child abuse also child abuse that’s a very major theme in the first series as well as during other points. and elder abuse in the first series.

okay i’ve made my point.

section three: the appeal

look. so. i think we’re kind of pastel-ify children’s literature based on movies. see, parents have to watch children’s movies with their kids, so they can’t be gritty and intense because a lot of parents will say “not for my nine year old! they can’t deal with treason!” and that seems to be bleeding into children’s literature.

but warriors is not that. it’s intense, it borders on “too gruesome for children,” and it’s from a time where kids books got to be serious and heavy and dark because they were about animals. which was great because i couldn’t find books at my reading level that weren’t too thematically difficult, so i got to read something below my reading level, but thematically too hard, so it kind of balanced out.

and then well. so. the series grows with the audience, but the books don’t grow in terms of like difficulty so new readers start deep into it and it’s a complicated thing, the fandom history is complex, but.

the appeal is that parents don’t usually read the books their kids read and so they see a book about cats and assume it’s fluff, and kids who are starved of complex content get to read hamlet-for-kids.

section four: worldbuilding/lore

oh yeah also there’s some really deep lore to explore. so there’s two bits of appeal.

i’m not doing a full world/plot summary, but i’ll explain some common elements here.

thunder/shadow/wind/riverclan: harry potter houses for cats (gryffindor, slytherin, hufflepuff, ravenclaw, except this doesn’t work for the last two but that’s fine because no one cares about them despite riverclan being pretty important in most of the books)

-kit/-paw/-star: naming conventions. everyone has a two part name. (we’ll use cinder as an example because i like the two cinders we know, even tho neither of them get to be cinderstar.) babies are -kit (cinderkit), then when they’re apprentices, which is like being a student, you know, elementary through high school, you’re paw, so cinderpaw. then you get an Official Name from ur clan leader (cinderheart). if you become clan leader, you get to be -star (cinderstar). i know i haven’t explained clan leaders bear with me. this is kind of important because i have the names burned into my memory so i cannot simply always call firestar firestar if he was firepaw at the time of the events i’m describing. it won’t be ambiguous, cinderheart/cinderpelt are a special case. if this is tricky for you it’s fine just only read the first part of the name.

clan (leader, deputy, medicine cat, elder): roles with in the clan. leaders literally have nine lives. deputies are next in line and chosen by the leader. leaders usually go through several deputies, because deputies don’t have nine lives. medicine cats are doctors. they also have an apprentice. those are all one per clan. elders are just retired cats. they’re not a special category per say, but i wanted to mention them.

warrior: adult.

warrior code: laws.

star clan: dead cats. this ties into the religion which is pretty important to the books but for the most part if you understand that dead cats get to give guidance and send their approval, you have the gist of it.

section five: so um, what the fuck

so we start with a cat named rusty who runs into the woods to join thunderclan and then his name is firepaw and we all forget that he’s named rusty except for like that one time it comes up again. bluestar is a great leader with some corrupt deputies but fireheart eventually takes care of it and becomes clan leader which is a big deal.

then a bunch of other shit happens and suddenly ashfur is possessing brackenstar and being (more) abusive to squirrelflight (who is on the outs with brackenstar anyway for lying about their kits jayfeather, hollyleaf, and lionheart because they’re actually the children of firestar’s other daughter leafpool who had them with crowfeather after she fell in love with him but he’s from windclan and she’s a medicine cat so that’s double illegal and apparently hollyleaf is alive even though she yeeted herself into a pit and died because she killed ashfur when he threatened to reveal this but couldn’t live with being the product of an illegal meeting and then it was all pointless because leafpool stopped being a medicine cat out of guilt anyway and jayfeather is just an ornery bitch about everything but especially all of this)

i’m not explaining any of that.

section six: i repeat: so um, what the fuck

so the thing about these books is they’re soap operas and dramas about cats and that means they get just as strange and chaotic as anything else in the genre. i think a lot of people like me, who read them as children, regard the series we knew as a child (usually either the first three or the first five, plus super editions) as something good and warm and comforting (despite being dark and gruesome) because they made us feel good.

they were also a breeding ground for young fandom because of all the the drama that exists and the nature of the books providing that.

section seven: super editions

the simple answer to what a super edition is has already been given (it’s a novel length one-off about a single character, and its usually either a side character - bluestar, crowfeather - or a event/perspective we don’t get to see - firestar, skyclan, greystripe - and they’re generally more mature)

my favorite super edition is bluestar’s prophecy. i read it at like 16, slinking into the children’s library with a stack of other ya fiction and a “children’s book” which dealt with unwanted pregnancy, grief, forbidden love, and more. still not sure why that’s in the children’s section.

section eight: about the drama

so there’s been a lot of fandom drama about these books. i can’t tell you about the nuances, because i am an old fan, so i watched but didn’t partake. the highlights reel that i can recall goes as follows (please note i will refer to characters by name without explanation. it’s fine. the point of this section is to convey the pettiness of this drama):

tigerstar: did he do anything wrong? (the answer is holy shit yes, this isn’t discourse, it’s okay to like a villain)

scourge: did he do anything wrong, also what color is his collar? (also yes, doesn’t matter)

was the new prophecy (2)/omen of the stars (3)/etc good? (yes, eh, no, yes, no comment, no comment)

should jaypaw or hollypaw be medicine cat apprentice (neither of them, but jaypaw’s employment opportunities are limited because he’s blind, so its gotta b him)

uhh a massive tangle around this parentage drama between squirrelflight, leafpool, brackenfur, and crowfeather, which i used as the crux of humor for how batshit the plots can get, so i’m not even going to pretend i can make it funny, but just know that it’s batshit and the correct opinion is as follows: no one is right, but squirrelflight has done the least wrong, brackenfur is an asshole to her where it’s unwarrented, and hollyleaf is an idiot

and the current drama centers around brackenstar and ashfur and is tied directly to the point above, which is why i’ve kind of given up trying to make jokes about this because this is the culmination of like 35 novels.

section nine: i feel like i need to have some conclusive point to justify writing all of this

but i don’t have one, because this was really an excuse to ramble about an old passion for like half an hour. i mean i guess i can say, like, i think younger fans are sort of embroiled in this drama they don’t really have context for, because i’m not kidding, the current drama centers around the grandchildren of our original cast.

it’s kind of hard to know why, say, mistystar matters if you don’t know that she’s the child of bluefur and oakheart and if you don’t remember the drama that surrounded that when bluestar was dying and tigerstar and leopardstar were ruling a combined shadow/riverclan.

(i really hope that’s intelligible i tried to lay the groundwork for it. basically, there’s a biracial kid in a very segregated society who becomes the leader of one of the clans. which is obviously drama, especially considering that that clan was part of a weird supremacy movement a while back.)

& you know? i really hope one of the new series gets to be like, a soft reboot. just. end the current drama and pick up again with the latest generation. a) we’re starting to run out of names, and b) i think that it’s kind of tipped over the edge of sane.

the series also used to be very low fantasy. the cat societies are reasonably close to feral cat colonies (the biggest detail is that toms don’t all have their own territory, but there’s honestly in-universe discussion of this and it’s basically a culture thing), and while star clan/religion is a real and legitimate thing, there’s also a discussion of its abuse and most of the early books don’t really use star clan/related ideas as a physical force so much as a plot device, barring, like, when a new leader gets their nine lives.

honestly, i’ll always adore these books for serving the role they did, and a lot of the series is fantastically well written. but the fandom surrounding it can be, uh, not great because 9-14 year olds don’t really have good brains to understand this.

also, i’m very sad that i can’t find the flash game that was for the great prophecy. it was not very fun, but i enjoyed playing it, so if anyone knows the url so i can search the internet archive for it, please let me know.

section ten: i’m morbidly curious but there are 56 hours of books to read, assuming a very fast reading pace, so is there something i can start with to experience this without dedicating 4 days to it?

yes, there is.

it’s called bluestar’s prophecy. it’s standalone, and i should have given you enough of a background on the lore that you don’t need to know anything else. i’ve already given away the twist in series 1 that it would spoil, so you’re all good on that front.

if you want more, or want the original experience, the first series is self contained and quite good. i’ve given the broad outlines of the plot, but trust me, there’s a lot of surprises and all sorts of things i skipped over because while i like it, it’s not exactly fandom primer material

i also enjoy firestar’s quest and skyclan’s destiny for super editions, but you’ll need to read the first series to understand FQ and FQ to understand SD, so it’s not exactly a starting point. also, SD especially deals with a very different set of themes as the other books.

also, if you were to, say, search “readwarriorcats” (no spaces) on duckduckgo, and then click on one of the first links, you know, not the official site, the one hosted on one of those free website things, you know, not wix, not wordpress, the other one, you would only find lists of the books with hyperlinks.

#warrior cats #fandom #txt #mine #1st #February #2021 #February 1st 2021 #essay #personal #long #q

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steve0discusses · 5 years ago

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Yugioh Season Zero: Seto Kaiba's First Kidnapping

It’s Christmas vacation, I have Mannheim Steamroller on repeat, so much chocolate just an arms reach away from me. And I have purposely given myself nothing to do as an attempt to teach myself to do nothing.

So lets watch something weird and revisit Zero.

For those new here, I have been also reviewing most of Season Zero. If you don’t know what that is, you can my recaps in order by clicking this link here.

And like last time, I am not actually affiliated with Team Millennium, and I hope they don’t mind that I am capping their episode. You can find them on Youtube where they are slowly redubbing this season into English, and um--this next episode is the last episode they have! So I don’t know how I’m going to recap the rest?

Probably the same way I did in the first episode where it’s a lot less dialogue and more just...my reaction to it.

And, as always, my disclaimer for the new people that this was made in the 90′s and based off of the OG manga and it is...not the same show. It’s problematic. Why wouldn’t it be? It’s a counter-culture anime from the 90′s. Though this episode is pretty tame, honestly. Weird, but tame.

So, we start off the episode with a very lovingly drawn sky, not sure why it’s on THIS show but it’s here. This post apocalyptic sunset.

And staring directly into this sun going supernova is Seto Kaiba in his green hair, just brooding...

Not sure how he has this view from his Pemberly style mansion, but I dunno, maybe the city is visible from the backyard, or Seto just has really good vision. Either way don’t worry about it, we see Seto vibe out and visualize weird stuff all the time.

So, spurned by his hate for his classmate that beat him in cards once, Seto decides it’s time to enact his revenge by...what sounds a lot like some weird Lord of the Rings Lore and I dunno if it’s a bad translation or I just don’t really know what the hell he’s going off about because I never read the Yugioh version of the Silmarillion. Probably both.

See, while the first couple episodes of this show have different variations on Youtube, this one really only had the Team Millennium version in English (which is fine, there’s just some confusing things) and then the other version I saw skipped half of the episode because I guess they decided this part was boring or something. So forgive the fact that I’m flying on the seat of my pants here and I assume y’all will know all the deets I don’t know. For once, my contribution will be...kind of a lot less words.

So lets get right to it.

(read more under the cut)

Seto, who is in so much denial from Seasons 1-4, that I’ve headcanoned is actually cursed to never admit magic is real, has decided to call upon the (checks notes)

4 Game Masters

Yeah, that’s a new mechanic, these are a thing now. Don’t worry if you never heard of them before, I’ve been capping this show and I also have never heard of the legendary 4 magical Game Masters either.

So at this point these statues start glowing all creepy, and because it’s Yugioh I just kinda assumed...they’d do something.

I’m starting to think that maybe that was supposed to be symbolic, actually. Maybe there was never actually magic in the statues. Maybe it’s part of Seto hallucinating, as always. This whole show kind of runs on being a sort of metal fever dream whenever people get intense about games, so I’m probably not supposed to align it with any established magic laws anyway. It’s just I never know when things are real or just aesthetics, which I enjoy, quite a bit, that it’s open ended--but still it’s somewhat confusing as to if these gargoyles are...a thing now or were just always set dressing to kind of remind us of the cards that come later in the episode.

But, remember the spooky indoor gargoyles in your mind, keep it there, these menacing gargoyles over a fiery sunset...

OK now lets meet the real villain.

There he is. Our villain. And his name? Ripley Sheldon.

MAN to go from spooky gargoyles to Ripley Sheldon. There’s a name. That’s a name all right. I’ve only seen one episode of Big Bang Theory but Sheldon is a name forever ruined for me.

So--sidestory--this one time, my friend was at a wedding in Santa Cruz, which is a pretty beachy hippie town that always smelled like weed before it was legal, and there was just...a doll at the wedding. My friend was seated at a dinner party table just right next to this doll, and the family was like “Ah yes, this is the doll, you have to speak to her. She’s a member of the family.” and my friend had to suffer roleplaying with this doll for hours.

So before you’re like...there’s no way grown ass adults are this weird with dolls in public.

Yes. It happens.

Ah, and it’s the first instances of the Kaiba Corp logo and it’s the same. Complete with helicopter, because that Logo is never done until it’s surrounded by a fast military vehicle of some sort.

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh great.

Yo remember that one episode where Yugi almost got his legs chopped off by Arcana and Arcana’s wife was being held behind a curtain, and at the end of the episode Arcana pulls back the curtain and his wife was a manikin the whole time and her head fell off?

Getting those vibes.

Back at school, Miho is busy being the most manipulative human being, this time with losing at cards. Like y’all I am TRYING to give Miho the benefit of a doubt here, but it seems even the translators hated Miho so much they had her refer to herself in the 3rd person. I am trying, really I am, sorry to everyone who loves Miho, I will leave that door open as I watch these--that maybe Miho will...grow on me.

But not this episode.

And then this happened. I guess from the breeze of Honda leaning over too far.

Believe it or not, Yuugi’s vertigo will come back later in this very episode. This whole bizarre scenario was just foreshadowing.

But for reals, Yuugi is so FRAIL in Season Zero. While I appreciate the contrast between Yuugi and Yami Yuugi, I gotta recognize how much Yugi has evolved over 4+ seasons because Yuugi is just...eggshells. Every part of him is polite little eggshells.

But in contrast, you have Anzu who is ready to fight in every single scene she’s in and I’m OK with that.

That and the very clear romantic direction that is just...simple. It’s very simple in Season Zero. That’s nice.

Anzu isn’t even possessed by two ghosts. In fact, between Anzu and Yuugi right now, there are 0 ghosts. So weird. So kosher.

Speaking of weird,

Y’all, I have no explanation for this. I only know so much Kanji.

The translation I watched tried so very hard to do what they could with this, and kudos to them, but...this is what happens with translation, it’s just a very hard job sometimes. So I get how they decided to form this joke into English, but if anyone is like a Japanese speaker and gets the pun that was clearly happening here, feel free to youknow, share the knowledge.

Unfortunately the undubbed episode that exists on Youtube that I found edited out this part so they didn’t have to try and translate it, lol. Either way, I appreciate Orange Jounouchi a lot, as well as the background squids on Squid Jounouchi.

Can you imagine just being in high school, and you get summoned to the Nurses Office? Can you even imagine what rumors would start from that? Like I know Seto wants revenge against Yuugi through cards, but I think he just did. I think he did like maybe one of the worst things you can do to a High Schooler just now. May as well page over the intercom that Yuugi has to pick up his yeast infection ointment.

And this is where we meet...a ridiculous satire. This 30 year old beautiful woman flirting with a child disaster who cannot balance while seated on a low chair.

And predictably, Yuugi lost because things just got THAT weird and awkward. Dunno if the translators put that in there for fun, or if that’s honestly how it was in the original. My bet it was probably exactly that weird in the original. Mostly because this show has a lot of “stranger danger” set ups to teach little children to never trust bad adults and this just seemed like exactly that type of set-up. Don’t trust the overly nice nurse or she’ll steal your cards in a game, kids.

After this really awkward card game (and I’m not going to bother to dive into it because I don’t talk about the card mechanics here), we find out...that Seto’s just been staring at them...the entire time.

Like it has such a voyeuristic vibe to it, it really makes you wonder about Seto’s whole deal just an awful lot. Like Season 1-4 doesn’t really ship Yugi/Kaiba, in my opinion (and just my opinion, I know how y’all feel about the ship and that is a-ok, all ships are welcome here)...but Season Zero ships A LOT. It’s not a serious ship by any means, it’s clearly a crack ship, but they...very clearly know what they’re doing with Seto being this obsessed with Yuugi in this way, omg. It just sounds like a kink to me.

So, ways to beat Yuugi Muto:

steal his stuff halfway through the game, try to kill yourself, rock paper scissors, try to kill Joey Wheeler, or dress up a sex doll like a nurse and have a gross old man have it play cards while he makes a sexy lady voiceover.

(Y’all I’ve been to my share of arcades in my life and I think I’ve only seen like 6 pinball tables total. Do good arcades only exist on TV? I think it’s all a lie.)

Then, because I guess this episode wasn’t going anywhere, Yuugi goes to the arcade to play some video games. The video game is unimportant, and it’s never been brought up before, but he’s dead set on finding it. Because unlike Yugi, Yuugi just doesn’t really have a goal in this series so he just kind of flutters around until someone tells him what to do.

TBH that’s a pretty 90′s thing for a show or a movie to do. To have characters just exist and have things happen to them, but in all, they’re just...wandering. So it’s not so much a knock on the show, it’s just that sometimes it’s a little of a transition to go from a goal being something physical, like finding the lost city of Atlantis before every human’s soul is absorbed into the great Leviathan, to the goal being more of a mental acceptance--Yuugi just learning to accept this curse he doesn’t even know he has yet, and trying to find acceptance in his group of friends.

With Yuugi, we’re kind of just watching his daily life, which is mostly watching him try and sneak games into every spare moment that his local adult has turned around. It has a very slice of life feel to it, but minus the near constant innuendo slice of life tends to have (at least the ones that have been recommended to me)

Now, because this is a show about people getting a real EXTREME comeuppance every time they break the law, what will happen to Yuugi for ignoring his Grandpa’s wishes and going to the arcade before going home?

First, we meet this mushroom haired person.

That’s right kids, NEVER stop by the arcade on the way home from school--1.) The local arcades are almost always 90% boring racing games and busted shooters that came out on the Nintendo 64 when I was a child and 2.) You will get abducted.

And then we get this face swap.

Kaiba just really loves dress-up. No wonder he was hanging out with a guy super into dolls. And like, I went into before how Seto Kaiba is always doused in facsimile energy. He loves faking it up, and apparently that’s been true since Zero.

He introduces that he will have four challenges from four Game Masters and uh so welcome to the...I don’t where this is, but a weird place full of dolls that must exist somewhere in Domino.

I guess this is to make it seem like they have an audience to watch Yuugi fail but even still...what?

So we get kind of a mirror to the scene at the beginning with Miho crying and Honda telling Yuugi to apologize for beating her, except replace Miho with Seto and Honda with this guy who really likes dolls (and Miho is a lot like a cursed doll). Like, if there were a theme to this episode it’s “grow up and stop apologizing when you beat someone in a card game” which isn’t a terrible theme, especially in this show that is about Yuugi learning how to adult.

In fact the “grow the hell up” theme is so strong we have a villain who is just...a big baby who carries dolls around. Kinda makes you wonder if the show would have eventually had Yuugi just...grow out of toys and games completely for the finale. Like in the Yugioh we have now, he can’t, because first off they licensed a hell ton of toys, but also because Yugi does games for his actual job. Even if Pharaoh was gone, Yugi still has to play games all the time. In this case, he could just...be using the games to learn how to do adult things, which is actually why we give kids games in the first place.

But, speculation aside, it’s at this point that a card play knocks Yuugi off of his chair and he passes out. Despite the fact that this isn’t a Shadow game and there...shouldn’t be any magic present. In fact, I don’t think any part of this game in this episode required opening the door of darkness. When he switches to Yami shortly after falling off of his own chair he’s like...yeah this is fine. Seems all above board. No need to kill anybody

And then apparently there’s a type of Dual Monster’s card I was unaware of.

A doll-type.

So I looked it up, is there a doll type card in Yugioh?

And it seems like there’s a lot of dolls, but not like...a type, as far as I can tell. Again, I don’t play this game, I’m only here for the plot and this one just seemed like they really had to reach for Yuugi to have just the right type of card to play.

And again, because this wasn’t a Shadow Duel, our loser just kind of walks away...all the way back to Britain, I guess.

And Seto just stands there behind a window in a rainstorm to allude to his many unshed salty tears, and it cuts to Miho who I guess has learned not to cry when she loses to Yuugi now.

And then she pulls out an absolutely winning tactic. This would win, actually. It’s actually genius.

And that is a very strong

From me. Wow. No thanks. I actually don’t want to see Yuugi do a kissy face ever again, thank you.

Half of you loved that though. This is fine. We’re all different.

Anyway, I assume the game was never played, or Miho won and the show just decided not to show it. If Season Zero Yuugi is a Yuugi that makes out then...that is...shocking. Then again, we’re only like...a third of the way through? I think?

Anyway, it’s...after Christmas because I went out of town for a spell, but I’ll just...post this now. Last post before the new year.

I’ll see y’all in 2020!

#ygo #yugioh #season zero #yuugi muto #anzu #jounoushi #seto kaiba #honda #dolls?#Like lots of creepy dolls?#ripley sheldon #miho #photo recaps #episode recap

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ncumenia-archived · 5 years ago

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POSITIVES & NEGATIVES.

fill out & repost ♥ This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm. - op

tagged by: no one

tagging: the person reading this ♥

MUSE.

MY MUSE IS: canon / oc / au / slightly canon-divergent / fandomless / complicated.

IS YOUR CHARACTER POPULAR IN THE FANDOM? YES / NO (She’s an OC LOL).

IS YOUR CHARACTER CONSIDERED HOT™ IN THE FANDOM? YES / NO / IDK.

IS YOUR CHARACTER CONSIDERED STRONG IN THE FANDOM? YES / NO / IDK.

ARE THEY UNDERRATED? YES / NO / IDK.

WERE THEY RELEVANT FOR THE MAIN STORY? YES / NO.

WERE THEY RELEVANT FOR THE MAIN CHARACTER? YES / NO / THEY’RE THE PROTAG. There is no main character

ARE THEY WIDELY KNOWN IN THEIR WORLD? YES / NO.

HOW’S THEIR REPUTATION? GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL. - Depends

HOW STRICTLY DO YOU FOLLOW CANON? —

To be fair, I try to be as canon as possible, regarding Targon’s lore, even though the content they give us is somehow gaunt. That’s why I try to add as much quality (?) content as possible with some worldbuilding stuff. Usually, I get helped by other people, especially about certain topics I’m not familiar with.

Beside this, I have my own vision of Targon, heavily inspired by pre raphaelite aesthetic, got stuff and Riot’s main inspiration source: ancient Greece and Rome. (I admit I don’t know shit because my brain makes me forget every single notion I learn, therefore it’s hard for me to track stuff)

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals. —

Do you like the Moon? Do you like freckles? How about kittens? Have you always wanted a cat, but your parents won’t allow you to have one?

If you’ve seen yourself in these questions, then Ernye is the woman you’re looking for. As graceful as full-starred night sky, she’ll make sure you’ve eaten you breakfast before you get into business, and she won’t make you leave till you swallowed the last bite. Beside the fact she’s a skilled cook, she loves stargazing, even better when you’re on her side while enjoying a lovely picnic surrounded by many fluffy kittens and cuccos.

Ernye gets sad pretty quickly, so make sure to give her enough attention and love.

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?). —

- Unpredictable: when she can’t control her emotions, there’s a high risk she might hurt your muse.

- Lunari extremist: She hates Solari, and I highly doubt she’ll change her mind.

- Morbidly clingy: She wants to make sure her friends/so are safe, so she might even stalk them, to the point she might threaten them if they don’t take care of themselves.

- Drugs addicted: She smokes. A lot.

- Not sun friendly: She can’t hang out when it’s sunny outside. It hurts like hell.

- Lunari come first: Do you support/justify Lunari’s slaughter? She’ll make sure to chop your head off your body in no time. This also means she puts her people needs before hers or her s/o.

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO RP YOUR MUSE? —

I don’t feel ready to fully talk about this OC’s story, but I might say some rl events inspired me to write her, and also many videogames/books. Oh, and a lot of art nouveau/pre raphaelite aesthetic :tm:

WHAT KEEPS YOUR INSPIRATION GOING? —

When riot releases Targon stuff, my hype skyrockets, but also knowing more stuff, reading more books and so on... I always find new inspo/hc/worldbuilding for my muse. Also because Nina is my life and I’d die for her.

MUN.

DO YOU THINK YOU GIVE YOUR CHARACTER JUSTICE? YES / NO / I SINCERELY HOPE I DO? -

DO YOU FREQUENTLY WRITE HEADCANONS? YES / NO / SORT OF?

DO YOU SOMETIMES WRITE DRABBLES? YES / NO.

DO YOU THINK A LOT ABOUT YOUR MUSE DURING THE DAY? YES / NO.

ARE YOU CONFIDENT IN YOUR PORTRAYAL? YES / NO / SORT OF?

ARE YOU CONFIDENT IN YOUR WRITING? YES / NO / A LITTLE BIT.

ARE YOU A SENSITIVE PERSON? YES / NO / SORTA.

DO YOU ACCEPT CRITICISM WELL ABOUT YOUR PORTRAYAL? —

I love constructive criticism, and I always accept it. However, I don’t tolerate insults or passive sexism/ableism criticism and so on. The only answer will be a report/permablock.

DO YOU LIKE QUESTIONS, WHICH HELP YOU TO EXPLORE YOUR CHARACTER? —

ALWAYS. ASK ME QUESTIONS, I NEED IT!

IF SOMEONE DISAGREES TO A HEADCANON OF YOURS, DO YOU WANT TO KNOW WHY? —

If they’re not going to cause drama, why not?

IF SOMEONE DISAGREES WITH YOUR PORTRAYAL, HOW WOULD YOU TAKE IT? —

Who am I to force people to like my portrayal/muse? That’s fine if they don’t like my OC.

IF SOMEONE REALLY HATES YOUR CHARACTER, HOW DO YOU TAKE IT? —

I don’t truly care tbh

ARE YOU OKAY WITH PEOPLE POINTING OUT YOUR GRAMMATICAL ERRORS? —

Yes, that’d help me a lot (As long as they’re not rude) Since my english sucks pretty much.

DO YOU THINK YOU ARE EASY GOING AS A MUN? —

I’m very anxious, I won’t lie about that. I need time to open up with people and I won’t lie, in this community I experienced ableism toward me because of my anxiety, which made me irk pretty much. I believe people should understand we’re not made with a cookie-cutter, therefore everyone has their personality, needs and time. And they don’t own you an explanation about certain sides of them, such as, in this case, anxiety.

However, I always try to be as understanding as possible, trying to avoid drama and such, mostly for my mental health. I’d just love to interact with everyone in this rpc, but I suck at socializing, alas.

#the sun is rising (ooc)#tw: drugs

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gryffinclawinthetardis · 7 years ago

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Fantastic Beasts Thoughts

Well, it’s been a while, my dudes. I literally saw the new Fantastic Beasts movie two days early at a special screening and am still only getting to this now. The thing is, I wanted to organize my thoughts and make sure I wasn’t being overly critical before I said anything and...I don’t think I was. The movie was a mess guys.

On the plus side, sitting with these thoughts also put me in a place where I actually think it’s would have been fixable, and I’m going to tell you how for literally no reason. Just stick with me, guys. And there will be spoilers.

1. Cut half the plots of this movie:

Credence looking for his family is all fine and well, but does not help this movie at all. Seriously, I understand they are trying to further the plot point of him wanting to be somewhere he belongs from the first movie, but couldn’t he just be trying to live a normal life in the wizarding world and learning to control his magic and Grindelwald constantly sending people after him is derailing that, making him a threat and causing the Ministry to also want him? Then we could have Credence back and not have the weird magic circus story that exists for no real reason and the moments where we stop the movie short to show a conversation with a random nanny who gives a tiny bit of exposition and then dies. We could also focus more on Grindelwald’s actual followers and power.

Also, the side plot of Dumbledore literally being unable to fight Grindelwald, totally pointless (I’ll get to more on that one later). He could’ve just had the Ministry watching him because they think he’s searching for Credence and they have conflicting hopes for him, and have sent Newt to find Credence before Grindelwald because Newt wasn’t being watched, and boom, reason Dumbledore doesn’t go after Credence himself.

So, basically, just have the movie about Grindelwald still trying to remove the Obscurial from Credence, and Dumbledore trying to cure Credence, and the Ministry trying to kill the Obscurial by any means necessary and you have one cohesive plot that you can show Newt using beasts to help him along the way and have Credence back, and have Grindelwald be a threat and all the side plots are pretty much flushed.

2. Better explanations:

So I’ve heard a lot of people confused about things that happened between this movie and the first. I, myself, don’t understand the sudden jump to Grindelwald telling his followers Credence is the lost Lestrange boy. I’m assuming he just went with the flow when someone brought it up?? But I’d love a clear answer to that. I’d love a clear answer to Why Credence joined a circus in the first place. Or why Queenie turned psycho so quick (That’s also talked on more in the next point). What’s up with Grindelwald’s weird hookah magic? Please explain the series of events that led to that opening escape scene. Why didn’t he just duck out on that dude who switched places with him? He certainly didn’t seem particularly useful anyway. None of these questions are answered, and I’d love if, for all the exposition in this damn movie, we could get useful answers.

3. Don’t 180 established characters for lazy plot reasons:

Okay, we all know who I’m talking about. Queenie was established first movie to be very empathetic and, mostly even despite her seemingly air-headed demeanor and whimsical attitude, an amazingly resourceful and adept witch. So why, when the second movie rolls around, is she suddenly crazy, and then triggered by the word crazy?? She literally kidnaps her boyfriend and tries to trick him into marriage and when he’s not even mad, makes solid logical points as to why they aren’t married, and thinks at her that she’s being a bit crazy (which she is as far as we can tell), she acts like he’s in the wrong and runs off?? The chick we see this movie is not Queenie. Even worse, there is no explanation for why she is losing it, and not being as understanding as we know her to be. Not to mention, making her crazy actually diminishes what they were trying to do. How much more terrifying and awe worthy would it have been if, instead of turning a crazed woman to his side, Grindelwald took our original Queenie and turned her to his side? Or, even better, how about that plot point not exist at all?

4. Let Dumbledore be gay:

This one is just annoying. Honestly, why couldn’t they have just let him be hesitant to go after Grindelwald because he’d loved him once? Why is that so hard to do? Why mention it if it means nothing to any of the established canon for mainstream audiences? I’m just disappointed in this one. If they had dropped the whole blood oath crap and just let him have the moment in the mirror where it’s just them, that would’ve been enough for me to not be as mad as I am.

5. Stop ruining established canon for pointless fan service:

I’m talking to you McGonagall and Nagini. There is a right way to do fan service, Nicholas Flamel and going to Hogwarts to see Dumbledore where examples of that. Giving us lore and then taking a giant dump all over it is not. McGonagall should not have been at Hogwarts, you literally have five movies to bring her in and this was the wrong one to do it in. You wanted to show through the raise of Voldemort, so wait for that to show McGonagall. Don’t shove her in early for literally no reason at all.

Also, let’s talk about how dumb Nagini existing this movie was. She does absolutely nothing to further this plot. She’s just there, making sad eyes at Credence and turning into a snake. She has so few lines, the movie would literally barely be any shorter if she never said anything at all. Every scene she’s in could’ve gone exactly the same without her, with the most minimal changes. Have Credence escape the circus on his own (or subscribe to my idea and don’t do that circus thing at all). Have Tina be the one asking him not to go with Grindelwald since they already have an established rapport, and boom, movie is literally hardly any different (once again, unless we go with my plot).

6. Don’t waste interesting characters:

Newt’s brother, Thaddeus and his fiancee Leda actually seemed to have pretty good chemistry with Newt, and they did this really clever thing where we see how uncomfortable Newt is with them which makes us realize how close he really is to Tina, Queenie, and Jacob in the first film because it’s a vast contrast to how he is with his brother and former best friend. Then they go and give neither of them anything to do the whole movie and cap it off by killing Leda off at the end. I’m not gonna lie, her talents were wasted, and to make matters worse, I don’t actually care enough about her by the end of the movie for the the death to cause me sadness. Something compounded by the fact that it comes in the wake of Queenie’s betrayal, which is by and large more upsetting. Explore Newt’s possible feelings of abandonment by Leda. Have her have a useful job, one that maybe makes her privy to info about what the Ministry is up to and pass it on to Newt or Dumbledore. Something! Anything but that dumb convoluted sibling plot line that reeked of ignorance and poor taste.

Also, give Thaddeus more to do. Explore his dynamic with Newt more. Have him more torn about siding with his brother and Dumbledore or siding with the Ministry. He does little else, besides telling Newt the Ministry is watching him (something that presents no hindrance to Newt and his travels whatsoever), and looking worried or strained in places with the other Aurors. Have his job as Auror conflict with Newt’s plans more. Have him chasing his own brother. Like, give him something to do.

7. Flashbacks or Exposition, not both:

I don’t have much to say other than it halted the movie to show us stuff we were already told. Either show or tell, don’t do both.

8. Make Grindelwald more of a threat:

He doesn’t actually do much in this movie. None of his speeches seem that charismatic. The way he interacts with his followers doesn’t seem very charismatic. We get a lot of people telling us he is, but I never see it. He kills some people who aren’t prepared to fight him, and he has a single fight scene which was actually pointless because he should’ve just escaped and left a dude to die in his place which would’ve shown his real menace at least a bit more than what we got. The running joke is, nobody really knows what the crimes of Grindelwald are this movie. I mean, yes there is the obvious stuff: murder, gathering without a permit, escaping police custody, maybe some secrecy issues?? But for a movie literally named for his crimes, there is still a surprising lack of actual bad stuff he does.

He has one really clever moment and it doesn’t happen until the very end of the movie so it honestly feels too little too late. I will mention that it’s a great example of how well matched he a Dumbledore were though, because we’re led to believe they both knew what would happen if the Aurors showed up at his rally. It’s honestly his best moment, in my opinion.

9. Don’t do that ending you did:

It’s dumb. It’s terrible. It better be a lie. Once again, it takes a dump on well established canon to do something that isn’t even necessary. i just...no. Don’t do any of that you did.

#fantastic beasts movie #the crimes of grindelwald #list #fantastic beasts and where to find them #harry potter movies #newt scamander #tina goldstein #Queenie Goldstein #jacob kowalski #albus dumbledore #grindewald #leda lestrange #thaddeus scamander #credence barebones

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lyntendoswitch · 5 years ago

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At the tail end of 2020 I discovered the video content of Tim Rogers who has inspired me to also voice my game opinions in an unnecessarily verbose and personal way. I don’t recommend clicking on the read more, but if you’d like to read a little bit about the best games I played this year, go on ahead.

10. What Remains of Edith Finch 9. A Short Hike 8. Disco Elysium 7. Personal 5 The Royal 6. Persona 3 Dancing In Moonlight 5. Vestaria Saga War of the Scions 4. Ring FIt Adventure 3. Final Fantasy 7 Remake 2. Hades 1. Animal Crossing New Horizons

2020 found me with an unprecedented amount of free time. I spent most of this year working for the government (a job with a very small brain effort that left me with evenings and weekends free to do whatever the hell). Additionally, I spent most of the year in quarantine with video games as my true, real friend and life companion. Compiling this list gave me more titles than ever to choose from, so I feel better about my list than ever. So here are the best games that I played this year.

Before I get into the top 10 I want to give 4 honourable mentions.

13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim This is the most recent game I played since making this list. I loved so many things about this game - the soft art style, the harsh music, the convoluted crazy plot. I love the aesthetic of this game and loved the characters - I believe it is rare to have an anime game where none of the characters irritate you. I even loved the combat, although I did not think I would. Something about shooting so very many missiles is so satisfying even when you don’t exactly know what is going on in the screen. The final battle in this game was definitely my favourite moment in this game - it was stressful, it was engaging, it was so extremely fun. The tragedy of this game comes down to personal taste. All time travel stories with complex timelines are bound to fall apart eventually, because no writer can keep all the threads together in a logical sense. 13 sentinels had so many story beats, plot twists, betrayals, and sci-fi tropes crammed into their storyline that I knew halfway through the story that there was no way they would be able to resolve all of it in a fulfilling way. I was, unfortunately, right - the ending explanation for all the chaos is, in my (correct) opinion, extremely lame. However, I certainly had fun on the journey.

Fire Emblem 3 Houses: Ashen Demons DLC I did not place this on my ranking since it is not really fleshed out enough to be considered its own game (unlike in previous years, where I have confidently but the Splatoon 2 Octoling Expansion as a separate title from Splatoon 2). However, this blog is, above all else, a Fire Emblem stan account, and I will not NOT talk about Fire Emblem. I do not care for the Abyss house. I think the characters are too close to being plucked out of the Fire Emblem Fates universe for comfort, and I mean this to be as profound an insult as possible. These characters are gimmicks above all else. I also do not care for the expanded lore that the sewer city brings to Garreg Mach. The idea of a centralized church school army is already so unstable, and to have a population of rat people living under it makes the whole foundation of the world crumble a little. However, the story and gameplay of the Ashen Demons DLC added something that the base game did not, which is challenge. (As an aside, I play on normal mode and am aware that there is challenge available to me if I wish for it.) FE3H offers you so many characters, so many paralogues, so many opportunities for training and stat increases, that eventually plot missions become completely boring. Ashen demons limiting everyone to new and interesting classes, limiting your available units, and preventing any sort of training made the chapters fun again. I found the chapter where you were supposed to outrun a golem before some gates closed fun as hell - it was my favourite part of the entire side story.

Kentucky: Route Zero I played this game in February, and I remember not liking it at any point. It is confusing, disorienting, and lacked a clear goal. However, it has now been 10 months and I still think about it constantly - both the vignettes presented in it, and the way it made me feel. The Besties podcast made an excellent point about this game when they said that no one who plays this game ever compares it to other games - only books, movies, or paintings. The whole game is so fascinating and sticks with you - the wretched circle of a highway, the horse funeral. My favourite part is the live performance you attend at a run down diner with your party of four as the only audience. It is so quiet and contemplative and melancholy, and the scene is absolutely perfect. Kentucky Route Zero might be my favourite high concept artsy abstract artwork ever.

Blaseball As with everyone, it is difficult to call Blaseball a game. As the website says, it is a cultural event that I am so happy to participate in. I am so happy to have found a piece of media to fill the aching void that left by Homestuck when it ended, then re-opened the wound with their awful post-epilogue novel. I deleted my Twitter account this summer because I was tired of being angry and doomscrolling. And then, after Chris Plante on the Besties told me about Blaseball, I happily remade a Twitter account that only followed the official Blaseball account, the devs, and the numerous RP accounts. The quality of life improvement that having simulated, pleasant, hilarious social media to check every day is indescribable. It helped me cope with a rough life transition. Thank you, Blaseball. My favourite moment of 2020 is the 11pm boss battle of Shoe Thieves vs The Shelled One’s Pods.

And now....... The List.

10. What Remains of Edith Finch The start of 2020 was incredible because games journalism websites were churning out endless top 10 lists for both the end of 2019 as well as the end of the decade. I religiously picked through all of these lists and wrote down a list of 30 best indie games of this past decade that I missed out on for whatever reason. It was my first and last experience with a backlog - previously, I would simply impulse purchase games I really wanted to play, and I would not rest until the game is beaten. Having a backlog of things to try stressed me out endless and it dampened the impact of almost all of these quirky 1-6 hour indie experiences. However, not even the stress of meeting a self-imposed quota could dampen the impact of What Remains of Edith Finch. Exploring this house and playing through its various scenarios was so fascinating and beautiful. For me, the most impactful moment of the game was playing as the little girl who became an owl who became a sea serpent. That was when I realized I was not playing something that I would be thinking about for a very long time.

9. A Short Hike A Short Hike was the very first game I played off my backlog list of Best Indie Games. And boy, is it ever. This game takes 2 hours to finish but is absolutely saturated with heart and the exploration makes those 2 hours feel like you have been on a much longer and more fulfilling journey than you believed possible with so few hours. It is Animal Crossing and Legend of Zelda combined, condensed, and polished into a beautiful pearl. I was so instantly in love with the characters and loved doing the little side quests. I also loved getting totally lost because I wanted to see how far I could swim and ended up on a different part of the island. The most impactful moment of this game is its finale, which I won’t spoil, but it is absolutely incredible.

8. Disco Elysium Many people more eloquent than me have said great things about Disco Elysium, and they are all correct. As someone who loves character building and creating a character to roleplay instead of playing as myself in a game, I have never been more enabled to do just that than Disco Elysium. The mystery was so cool, the mechanics are exactly what I like, the exploration is great. The one drawback of this game is that I literally cannot remember a single song from it. Maybe it had an amazing OST? Every game that is released nowadays has to have an amazing OST. There is so much reading in this game that the music really has to be unintrusive, and so it faded right into the background and out of my memory. I love that you could create your own persona in the game, but that you find your identification later and discover who you were before. Also, I would die for Kim Kitsuragi. The finale of this game also kicks ass - I will not spoil it but there is a moment that is so quiet and intimate that it took my breath away. What an amazing experience.

7. Persona 5: The Royal In 2017, I did something that is not the deciding factor, but definitely contributed to, my being sent to hell after I die. I was in an unhappy relationship and really wanted out, but my boyfriend at the time had a PS4 and I did not, and I really wanted to play Persona 5. As such, when he got the game and I borrowed it, I tried to finish it as quickly as possible so that I could give it back and break up with him. To my dismay, Persona 5 is upwards of 80 hours long, and I was burned out long before it was over. I finished the game with such resentment in my heart that I could not fathom why anyone would like it. As someone who is older, wiser, PS4-er, and in a better mental state, I decided to give P5R a try. Playing the remake at a much slower pace and really contemplating the story and characters made for a totally different and much more pleasant experience. I finally was able to shed my dislike for these characters who held me hostage 3 years ago and really appreciate them. Additionally, the new content they added to the original was SO good. The new music in Mementos makes that whole section bearable!! Akechi’s entirely reworked social link!! Maruki is one of Atlus’s most interesting characters, and the final dungeon was so so so interesting!! I am profoundly sad that I can’t recommend this game to anyone because 120 hours is just prohibitively long. Most impactful moment: when Akechi joins the party and he is like, totally feral, lol

6. Persona 3: Dancing In Moonlight Every once in a while my palms start to itch because it has been entirely too long since I’ve played a rhythm game. This palm itch feeling sunk me deep into Theatrhythm Final Fantasy back in 2017, and this feeling forced me to impulse buy Persona 3 Dance. I am furious that I liked this game so much, because I know it was created simply to extract money from fools like me. The story was so blatant about it! “It’s a dream, ok? We’re all dancing because it’s a dream and none of this matters. Go play a song, idiot.” I’m not even angry at this - I almost respect the hustle. Additionally, it was so wonderful to hang out with the Persona 3 crew again. I did also play Persona 5 Dancing in Starlight, but since I had already spent a hundred and twenty hours with the phantom thieves, there was no feeling of being reunited like with P3D. Also, in my mind palace, I consider P3D to have “actually happened”, and P5D to be the money grab hustle. S.E.E.S. is a cohesive unit. If Mitsuru Kirijo says it is time to dance, then dance we shall. I cannot be made to believe that Ryuji, Futaba, or Makoto will be compelled to dance even in a dream. Finally, having Elizabeth as your velvet room attendant did wonders. If there is a line between being a loveable eccentric and being annoying, Elizabeth tiptoes just around the former, whereas the twins are squarely located in the latter. The remixes in P3D also all kick ass (Burn My Dread Novoiski Mix? Deep Mentality Lotus Juice Mix?? Neither had any right to go as hard as they did), and I loved how they personalized the dance styles to the characters’ personalities. Even if this game was a money grabber, it was still made with love and respect for the series, and I loved playing it. Most impactful moment: That first king crazy ranking on all night difficulty... god damn

5. Vestaria Saga: War of the Scions I had mentioned earlier that I appreciated the FE3H DLC for adding challenge back into 3 houses, but then I played Vestaria Saga and I realized I simply did not remember what challenge actually was. Vestaria Saga, the game by Fire Emblem’s creator, is the hardest Fire Emblem game I’ve ever played. This game honestly rules - it closes its door to the waifus of modern fire emblem games and is a return to form with political intrigue and smart tactical decisions and well-rounded characters. Every single chapter has these wonderful and deeply stressful plot twists and you always have to scramble to get all of the objectives complete without dying. There is a moment in this game where the main Lord, Zade, scolds princess Athol for being so reckless, how he had to force the army to fight a losing battle to rescue her, and look at how exhausted everyone is. He gestures to his army, and for the first time in a tactical RPG, I felt it. In all the fire emblems I play, my units end up being able to dodge and tank any hits they receive, but in Vestaria Saga finishing a map was a stressful, long, and sweaty process. I loved every second of playing this game - it is so rewarding in its gameplay and so rewarding in its story. Most impactful moment: the kiss!!! And how all of them face consequences immediately afterwards!!! I adore this game.

4. Ring Fit Adventure Ring Fit Adventure is the most fun I’ve ever had with a gimmicky fitness game. This game finally understands that they key to continuing with the game and building good habits is the ability to unlock and equip beautiful athleisure clothing. I actually got gains from Ring Fit Adventure, and I know this because I stopped playing it for a month, came back, and was unable to finish the reps at the difficulty I set for myself. This game make gym stuff so genuinely fun in a way that no one else has been able to do. I also really like the feel of the ring con! I have a few moderate complaints about it (a fitness game will never be perfect, unfortunately): you always start reps on the same side, and if you kill enemies then you don’t get a chance to try the other side at all, the motion sensor on yoga poses is wack, and FUCK the robot baseball minigame game to hell. Despite this, I absolutely adore this game and what it stands for. I may never beat the campaign, but it will always have a place in my heart. Most impactful moment: the first fight with Drageaux

3. Final Fantasy 7 Remake I was so so so curious about the hype surrounding this game that in the month before its release I manically played through the original Final Fantasy 7 so that I would have enough background information to be able to play and enjoy the remake. I was very glad I did. FF7R kicks ass. It is my favourite Final Fantasy game ever, and maybe it will always be so. I take a lot of issue with most FF games because they get too cosmically big and ridiculous and nonsensical by the end and that ruins the immersion of the story for me. Since FF7R only covers the Midgar portion of the original, it is forced to create grounded characters and a grounded, smaller scale story. And it is AMAZING. I loved every single minute of this game. The OST is incredible, and the art in it is absolutely unbelievable. I love how they incorporated random encounter enemies in this more realistic version. Also the dialogue!!! The way these characters banter with each other is so life-like and true to character that it boggles my mind. Even the NPC side conversations - never has a city or town felt so alive and filled with people than in FF7R. The ending of this game filled me with PRIMAL fear for the future, but it is so clear that the team making this game loves the world and its characters so much that I cautiously say I trust them to take the story further in the later remakes. Most impactful moment: Cloud saying “bring it on bitch” to an enemy made me black out laughing

2. Hades I generally stay away from rogue-likes and from real-time combat because for a game-liker I SURE am bad at video games. However, everything Supergiant Games ever makes seems tailor made for me, so when Hades came out of early access I bought it, and then I didn’t stop playing it until 80 hours later when I had unlocked everything ever. This game is SO good. The voice acting and storytelling is phenomenal. They did a spectacular job blending the story with the core gameplay elements. They made dying in a rogue-like fun and rewarding. The music is (as always) transcendent. I cannot say enough good things about Hades. Most impactful moment: a tie between the first time you watch the sunrise after your first successful escape, and the romance social link between Zagreus and Thanatos

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons Of course... Death Stranding may have prophesized the pandemic, but Nintendo created it to sell copies Animal Crossing New Horizons. This game saved all of us. The experience of having so many people I knew playing the same game all the time for the entirety of March and April was so incredible. I have plenty of quips about ACNH with relation to old games in the series (I loathe crafting, I loathe printing out Nook Miles Tickets one by one, and I worry that the sandbox landscaping feel of this game makes me less inclined than ever to actually talk to my villagers), but while they are all valid criticisms, they certainly did not stop me from pouring 350 hours and counting into this game. I have loved slowly, carefully crafting my island into a replica of Garreg Mach. I have loved collecting furniture and making turnip money and completing the museum. There is simply no other game that can be 2020′s game of the year. Most impactful moment: checking your mail and having one of your friends mail you an item that reminded them of you

#adventures of big man

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coffeebooksorme · 8 years ago

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ICE MASSACRE & ICE CRYPT BY TIANA WARNER REVIEW

Ice Masscre Goodreads || Ice Crypt Goodreads

I’ve devoured these two books in less than three days so I’m just going to combine the reviews for each of them because I can. ;)

So, I found this series because @magic-in-every-book included Ice Massacre in a book rec post for mermaids. I’ll be honest, the cover drew me in and I really like the premise for the story so I added it onto my TBR on Goodreads. Every time I went to the bookstore, I’d look for this book and I just could never find it. After devouring the sample on Kindle, I bought both of them and I do not regret this decision one tiny bit.

THIS SERIES, Y’ALL! SERIOUSLY! I CANNOT GUSH ENOUGH ABOUT THIS SERIES! I have been dying to read a mermaid book for so long now and every single one that I’ve tried has just left me wanting or didn’t snatch my attention at all. This one was the answer because it is SO.GOOD!

As always, I’m going to put the rest under a cut because I’m sure I’ll get spoilery in my gushing so be warned! Before I do, though, I’ll give some quick, non-spoilery points:

W/W ROMANCE

ACTION/ADVENTURE

Reaaaaaaallly good writing!

Main protagonist is a person of color!

Fantastically written characters!

Humor!

World building that isn’t overwhelming to delve into but rich with history!

Trigger warning for lots of violence and death, though. Like, a lot.

THIS SERIES IS SO FREAKING BADASS AND AMAZING AND I LOVE IT SO MUCH! I am just so damn happy that I bought these books and read them. The story itself isn’t anything really original to begin with -- overbearing king of the sea that wants to rule the entire world, friends to lovers trope, etc. -- but it is so amazingly written and fleshed out and explained that not one bit of it felt trope-y, cheesy, or boring at all.

The first book is told entirely from Meela’s POV, which I enjoyed, and gave us a lot of history not only for Meela but her people and her burgeoning relationship with Lysi. The first 1/4 to 1/2 of the book is build up but it didn’t feel slow or boring at all. I loved the little touches she included to show just how affected Eriana Kwaii was because of the influx of mermaid attacks, but it never felt overdone or heavy handed. It was just enough for me. I was completely intrigued with the world, the characters, the interactions with the characters, and the more that I read, the more that I wanted to continue.

The last 1/2 of the 1st book is nothing but action, violence, gore, and people/mermaids fighting for their lives. It takes place on a ship at sea during the annual Massacre. To me, it felt a lot like The Lord of the Flies at sea with chicks. Mutiny, subterfuge, power mongering, etc. It was similar but not so similar that I was bored or side-eyed the book at all. I really enjoyed how Tiana managed to interweave 20 girls, their personalities, interactions between each other, and all the action that happened. Some of the action sequences were a little redundant but that’s how war is, imo. It’s one side vs the other and going balls to the wall to see who survives. Tiana definitely did not hold any punches when it came to showing just how brutal this war has been.

Dani, one of the girls included in the massacre, is just...whoa. There were so many times when she would do or say something that would make me sit up straight with wide eyes and stare at my screen with shock. She was our stand in villain for King Adaro, the mermaid king, and she was so incredibly written. Power hungry girl with a soul deep hatred of mermaids who seriously takes it to the next level. She freaking butchered a toddler mermaid and that scene left me so shocked and just shook to my core. I just...wow. I’m still kind of speechless with her actions in the first book.

The ending was just...KEYSMASH! It wasn’t a big bang sort of ending but we got to meet King Adaro and his fishy assholeness. After hearing about him through the book, it was cool to meet him but I wasn’t really inundated with just how bad of a bad guy he was because he wasn’t in it at all that much. We got just enough of a taste to intrigue, I think.

The 2nd book picks up right where the 1st one left off and it didn’t disappoint for me. I was pleasantly surprised to see that this one included the POV of Lysi because I was super curious about the mermaid world and how everything worked. Tiana did not disappoint at all in the way she so casually introduced the mermaid world and how it all worked. She didn’t over explain anything at all but I felt as if I really understood how things worked from the way they lived, interacted, ate, breathed, etc. It all felt so natural and not just some magical mumbo jumbo explanation for how these mythical creatures existed.

The puns, jokes, name calling, and just the culture felt so easily introduced that it didn’t feel weird at all. So many times I’ve read books with mermaids where they go overboard (heh) with the fishy puns or try to over explain things and there was not any of this with this book. Not only did we get an introduction to Lysi’s world but we also got hints of other cultures/territories within her world. It’s quite literally another world under the sea and Tiana hinted at a lot that makes me so excited for the 3rd book.

Most of the action/adventure was focused on Lysi’s chapters while Meela’s chapters gave me Goonies vibes with how she and her friends searched over the island for the lost lore of Eriana’s Host. Major Goonies vibes but still so much fun! We had more interaction with some of the grown ups of the island, but they were just so useless that I ignored them, tbh. They annoyed me way too much and were just so completely close minded when it came to even listening to any other idea than KILL ALL MERMAIDS! But I guess that’s pretty par to the course because a lot of grown ups in the world are like that.

I am absolutely in love with the extra lore Tiana included by including a leviathan as the host of Eriana. I LOVE IT I TELL YOU!! We got so much more history of Eriana Kwaii and it’s rich culture in this book. Again, it felt really natural and organic as if the country really does exist in our world. All of the explanation and world building honestly felt so effortless and easy, and I really must applaud Tiana for doing such a sublime job.

The leviathan added that extra bit of PUNCH that a lot of sequels need but lack to employ. It wasn’t over done or heavy handed but just enough. A lot of sequels either tend to underwhelm or go above and beyond what’s needed to equal the lure of the first book, but I never felt like that was the case with the second book. Tiana did such an amazing job by expanding on what she had already done without overwhelming or boring the reader.

At the end, Meela and Lysi are reunited and it is so amazing because this is where Lysi turns Meela into a mermaid. I’m not going to get into the why’s or anything because I don’t want to just summarize what happened, but the how was amazing. Naturally, I’d assumed that when Lysi kissed Meela in order to turn her, I thought it would be this bright shining light, a magical burn, and POOF Meela’s got a tail instead of legs. NOPE! It was a slow process that just happened gradually and naturally. I LOVED THAT! I mean, yes, magic is obviously a huge part of this series but it’s never used in an abracadabra, wave my wand and poof kind of way. It always feels organic and natural and I LOVE IT SO MUCH OMG!

Incredibly long story short, the first two books in this trilogy are absolutely amazing, fantastically written with a rich range of characters and world building. I seriously implore each and every one of you who suffered through this long winded review to go out and purchase these books if you in any way interested in any sort of novel containing mermaids. I promise you, you will not be disappointed at all.

#booklr #books #book review #book reviews #mine #text #ice masscre #ice crypt #tiana warner #bookish #bookish thoughts #bookworm #bibliophile #book dragon

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podcake · 8 years ago

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Podcasts & Structure

Every time I get around to sitting down and actually writing these articles, I have to seriously consider what I’m going to talk about. It seems the conversation of audio drama is becoming more widespread lately, oozing its way into mainstream media faster than I can keep track of.

And so many are being made at such a rapid pace, catching up with it all can be its own challenge. A lot of people are starting to see the power and potential of audio plays and it’s a slow burn revolution I am a hundred percent behind.

When I achieve my dreams of becoming a licensed journalist under that sweet, sweet trademark PodCake©, know that I’ll be somewhere in the front lines, keeping everyone up to the date and in the zone until I’m old and gray and still very, very pink.

So with this exciting idea in mind, I find it appropriate to do a somewhat different type of “Podcasts&”. This is still very much an article dabbling into my specific interests and experiences though also a guide of sorts to those who may be wrapped up in the creative hype. Allow me to pull you starry-eyed artists aside for some well-meaning advice. May you follow in the footsteps of your idols, though know you are above any of their common mistakes.

I had a few options in store to pick from when it came to another topic covering audio drama critique, though I felt that I wanted to address this first. This is another dabbling into the more specific structures of my podcast journalism and the consumption and creation of audio drama in general.

In a similar vain to my latest article, “Podcasts & Critique”, I’ll be talking about something that perhaps not many are willing to discuss out in the open but is certainly touched upon enough that I feel the merits to bring it up in more depth. What we will be discussing today is the element of effective story structure.

Get comfortable, this is gonna be a long one.

Let me start by saying that I adore and always will adore a nice, rich setting presented only through words. I adore lavishly designed dystopias and lively apocalyptic wastelands more than the next guy and the idea of a soothing, sweet voice cooing to us over a delicately designed world is a surefire way to ensure a fanbase. This is the popular set up known as The Newscaster or The Fake Radio Show or Handsome Male Character Headcannon Sitting in a Big Chair or whatever you want to call it.

I enjoy this format namely for its simplicity and ability to relay information to the listener all while still characterizing the narrator as an active part of the world. Though these shows might be more episodic, to a degree, the ideas are still being connected by one single thread. It’s such a regular aspect of the podcast scene that it’s nothing short of being a style.

This style places a lot of emphasis on lore and quirks and memorable little moments that arrange themselves into a little audio scrapbook. We’re given this collection of information, all gorgeously described in luscious detail.

That’s why it’s such a shame how boring it can be at times.

Don’t get me wrong here, my problem is not with interesting landscapes and rich lore, my problem is when a lot is being said but not enough is being done.

I fell out of love with Welcome to Night Vale for this particular reason, this inconsistency with stakes and conflict that made any enjoyment to be found quickly tedious. Night Vale is and always will be a staple in the audio drama community, though it doesn’t mean we can’t learn from its mistakes that may go over our heads due to its excellent writing and characters only sometimes overshadowing it.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: an excellent audio drama is the sum of many parts and only succeeding in one area won’t always make the cut. But today’s topic is less about writing and more about narrative pacing…which is still kind of about writing but in a different way.

The central issue with these types of single narrator driven shows, being that we are being presented with a setting, problems, and characters who can solve that problem, but an effort is rarely ever made to get to a satisfying conclusion that is worth the wait. Of course, there actually being conflict to resolve can be its own and even more disappointing dilemma.

A crowning example of this type of flaw occurred in what used to be one of my favorite audio drama comedies, Kakos Industries.

I promptly stopped listening to Kakos after a lackluster attempt at it’s first real arc after roughly fifty episodes of filler and build up that didn’t contribute much to whatever the arc was trying to get across. None of the past episodes helped create a central theme that the arc was meant to represent, making its conclusion lack any emotional stakes or a reason to get invested.

The primary mood of the arc was all over the place with rapid character changes, unclear motivations, and a rushed explanation behind multiple episodes with little to no foreshadow to back it up. Furthermore this supposedly crucial ending didn’t tie into the continuation of season three beyond the absence of the past antagonist who was the center of the whole thing and the victim of a bloated backstory that needed way more than twenty minutes to be summarized.

No one changes from the whole ordeal, not even the protagonist who goes about his daily life as if none of it ever happened, and nobody and nothing is lost from the whole thing besides the character we already knew was bound to kick the bucket because it needed to end somehow. Generally, it does everything arc is not supposed to do as it doesn’t act as a changing phase for the story and doesn’t give us any vital information that will effect any of the characters long term.

The problem also lies in that there are a number of interesting subplots that emerged within the show’s canon as of season two: some more details about head rival Melantha Murther that imply she may be older than she seems, the relationship she has with Corin Deeth I as well as his involvement with the company, and a theory about cloning being brought up to name a few, but we have yet to even gently nudge at these ideas yet for a good batch of episodes because we wouldn’t want all those penis jokes to go to waste.

This is content with potential to be interesting arcs on their own and functional ones as they key into new information about characters we’ve come to know and gives Kakos Industries the tension and mystery it desperately needs.

These little bits and pieces of information can keep a listener engaged long enough to keep tuning in, but it can quickly become a chore to go back to something that seems to have been forgotten in exchange for repeated jokes and some new standalone characters that don’t really matter.

These might be in the footnotes of the creators for episode whenever, though to us they feel like throwaway lines pitched as bait more than anything of actual importance. They’re just there to be there.

And when the show peddles back to its roots of everyday shenanigans and jokes, the luster is lost, no matter how funny or well executed they might be. In the end, a lot of gimmicks and a lot of chatter with no real weight becomes nothing short of a series of filler episodes with no purpose.

I understand that indifference and dissonant serenity is part of the Kakos Industries’ humor though it often comes at the cost of events not carrying any real weight because it’s already predetermined that it’s being treated like a joke or that things will be resolved and go back to status quo with minimal effort. It insists you don’t take it seriously even if the problem at hand would suggest otherwise. To anyone else listening, this makes the stakes nonexistent and the protagonist seem overqualified to handle any problem thrown at him, never giving him a chance to be vulnerable to the slightest misfortune.

The same could be said for Welcome to Night Vale, a show with many compelling ideas and character drama though one that loves to meander and reestablish how strange and bizarre their world is on repeat instead of doing anything of actual substance, at least as far as season three is concerned.

Night Vale has a much better grip on characters and conflict that Kakos Industries does, though it also suffers from some of the same problems. Night Vale also had arcs, one incredibly well done to the point it’s been considered a crowning moment of the series while another that wavered a bit too long and simply wasn’t intriguing enough to make a huge difference in the end besides being another case of the Put On the Bus trope. And when they concluded, we’re back to square one again.

Once again, we are given a lot of ripe material here: There’s instances of Cecil’s childhood that we must piece together, pretty much anything about Kevin is bound to be creepy and interesting, Carlos and his apparent involvement with a college university, and something about sleeper agents and traffic signs and blood space but I lost count.

The case here is almost as dire as this is something of a multiple choice scenario where there’s just piles and piles of plots being given to us but all of it feels for naught when something else is being added to the collection a second later.

The same way Kakos is so obsessed with its dark and sexy aesthetic to the point it under develops its characters and has an absence of stakes, Night Vale is the same with its surrealism and seems to pull the “it’s a weird show” card whenever something gets unresolved.

There comes a point where a show’s quirky nature can only be used for so long to avoid the big question about what it’s all in service of. If all the oddness has no meaning and the plots are just being pitched with no real agency, then they fail to provide the show with any real purpose.

The point of an arc ending is for another one to start later, namely by picking up leftover plot points from before or starting something else that still entwines with the story’s central lore.

For a good example of how to manage an arc, I’d recommend Wolf 359 that has at least four in the duration of about forty episodes. I’d go into more detail about exactly what made the individual arcs in Wolf 359 work so well though that would lean heavily into spoiler territory and I wouldn’t want to ruin anything for those who haven’t listened to it yet.

This too started as a sort of news caster from space format until it flourished into the characters offering their points of view on a scenario and developing as people as they are placed in tight spots.

We learn more about who we’re dealing with, what is at stake, and grow invested because we never know which direction the events can take us. Wolf 359 has become so successful in its run because of the writer’s ability to admit something is amiss which gives the listeners something to anticipate rather than just tolerate.

Listen here, I know that podcasts are all for entertainment’s sake and I will always respect that, but even something that is entertaining must have a hook-line-sinker mentality, as I like to call it:

The hook is the first impression: What made you want to listen in the first place? Did the general synopsis intrigue you? Maybe there was just an actor in the show that you really like. Simple.

The line is the plot: This is the thing that makes you keep coming back for more. You’ve gotten comfortable with the story and its characters, you want to know as much as you can about the lore and the stakes. This is very much literally “a line” the audio drama is following and encourages you to keep up with.

The sinker is the payoff: This is where all the accumulated information you’ve gathered really matters-the climax. This is where we get the hidden motivations of characters, know about the dark secrets and figure out who the heroes and villains might be. We have a winner and a loser or at least some kind of ending, be it good or bad for the protagonists.

Many podcasts are capable of the first two steps though tend to forget the third. And when we do forget to touch that oh-so crucial sense of conflict and resolution, it becomes the equivalent of a Breather Episode series.

To those who don’t know, a Breather Episode is a common trope that is put into place to remind the audience that all of the past problems have concluded and we can once again revel in comedy and lighthearted fun.

I am a big fan of the this trope, it’s an implication that the past troubles of our protagonists have been dealt with and they can now relax, getting back to basics, but it’s getting back to the old grind that really matters.

We as listeners are a bit bloodthirsty, to say the least, constantly seeking out what new thing might be out to threaten the characters and disrupt their tranquility. Though in the character’s universe, and, to some extent, the writers, this is a pleasant period to soak in for a bit for just a little while.

It is prone to overstay its welcome if the average episode is nothing to look forward to. In short, if there’s nothing to hold on to, people will drop your story knowing it was of no loss to them.

A constant barrage of drama can be very overwhelming to the story’s ability to stay surprising and believable, so it’s good to have that even blend of “the bleeder and the breather”, as I’d like to call it, to keep things balanced.

But Podcake, you might be saying. This is audio drama! Emphasis on audio. They’re just sounds! Why expect so much when we can’t get visual input?

And you have a point there metaphorical reader. I’m not saying every show needs this epic score, high budget, and groundbreaking editing, I actually encourage shows who rely on this minimalism to try even harder in the writing department.

It is actually possible to have a consistent sense of tension even with limited sound effects and budget.

A good example would be The Bright Sessions. The presentation is mostly contained in one room and only occasionally stepping outside of it to overhear conversations. Despite the format being mostly casual and calm, there is still a pressing sense of drama and conflict we keep coming back to. And when we do get “the breather” in between, it’s a welcome change until going right back to where we started.

This is because the show stands on its own two feet in the dialogue department to get their point across and let things flow naturally. No big pizzazz or flashiness, just saying what it needs to say.

And if you insist on the superb audio editing part of this, I’d say Hadron Gospel Hour is always an recommendation, as well as defining the even blend of episodic with tension combination.

Gospel Hour is a sci-fi comedy with multiple unrelated cutaway gags and strange characters that have events in episodes that may not always be highly relevant to the next. But this has yet to cripple the storytelling since there are always connecting threads our protagonists go back to that develop their backstory or truly emphasize the dire circumstances they’ve been put in, something I’ve begun to notice in later episodes.

And if you’re still concerned about arcs, The Once and Future Nerd has the decency to have well established and satisfying beginnings, middles, and ends to each chapter. They have a wide and vast world to explore and take any opportunities they can to remind you of the fantastical yet still dangerous and grisly setting.

And maybe you’re really stuck on the newscaster format. Fine, I like those shows too. From here I’d highly encourage The Bridge: a show with a rather complex world, decently sized cast, and a steady increase in drama that isn’t afraid to step back from the main character’s perspective to tell a complete story.

Sorry to name drop so much in this particular document, though this is a narrative problem I’ve seen so often and so poorly I want to save anyone attempting this style from the same shortcomings. If you enjoy these shows for that exact reason, that is completely fine, though don’t be afraid to ask for something more genuine than just empty world building.

A good story is what you make of it but a memorable story can be much more.

#podcast #audio drama #audio play #radio drama #radio play #podcasts and #welcome to night vale #kakos industries #the once and future nerd #the bridge #the bridge podcast #hadron gospel hour #the bright sessions #wolf 359 #wolf 359 podcast

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winchesters-imagine · 8 years ago

Text

Dean Winchester X Reader - Infected

Imagine Gabriel putting you and Dean into a horror game. tags: whats-the-matter-with-y0u, @the-angels-stole-the-tardis

Word Count:4,146 Warnings: swearing, mild violence

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You sit in front of Dean, who is reading a lore book in the library of the Bunker. You wait for him to notice you’re there, as he flips through the book, head resting on one of his knuckles. You begin to think that he’s completely oblivious, and you end up counting his freckles after you admire how they’re dusted so lightly over the bridge of his nose you almost have to squint to see them.

Between you and Sam, your feelings for Dean aren’t a secret - he teases you about it when Dean isn’t around, and you roll your eyes every single time.

You promise yourself that you aren’t going to get distracted by him, that you’ll build a wall between you and your feelings for him.

“Dude, I know you’re there,” He states, looking up slightly. You groan, losing count.

He lifts his head properly and makes eye contact with you. You see that his eyes aren’t just the apple green you saw most of the time - there are flecks of yellow, gold and brown.

“Hello? Earth to Y/N?” He waves a hand in front of your face and snaps his fingers, pulling you out of your daze.

“Yeah, sorry, what?” You ask, stumbling over your words. “What were you gonna ask me?”

You realise then that you had started a sentence, but you trailed off, leaving Dean in the dust.

“Oh, yeah. What was that game Sam was talking about earlier?” You ask, racking your memory to try and remember.

“What - The Last of Us. Why? Do you like it?” “Dude, yes. It’s one of my favourites actually,” You smile. “Do you like it?” You ask, raising your eyebrows.

“I think it’s -”

Dean is interrupted by a flutter of wings - you turn expecting to see Castiel, but instead you see Gabe.

You and Gabe have always been friends, and you loved him in a completely platonic way... which means that your secret crush isn’t so secret with him.

“Gabe!” You grin widely and jump out of your seat, before running into his arms. He chuckles as you tighten your grip.

“You still got the hots for hotshot over there?” He whispers in your ear. “Gabe!” You scold through gritted teeth - he may mean well, but you’re way too close to Dean to talk about this particular subject.

“...Yes,” You say reluctantly, turning back to Dean, who is reading the book once again with a soft smile etched onto his face.

You turn back to Gabe and notice his smirk. “Wha-”

He presses his fingers to your forehead, causing you to fall unconscious.

An unexpected gunshot sends a wave of fear throughout your body, causing you to wake up and flinch. You open your mouth to let out a short scream, but a hand was pressed over your mouth before such a thing could occur.

You freeze, analysing your surroundings. You’re sitting on the floor with your back pressed against a crate, in what looks like a small town.

A town that has been torn to ruins. Windows of buildings are boarded up, shop windows are smashed, and there are at least two large holes in every building, with a pile of debris underneath. Old, rusted cars are spread along the street, some with their wheels gone, some tipped onto their side. Leaves scatter across the floor, and the trees are bare. Must be late fall.

You turn your attention back to the hand over your mouth.

It’s not Dean’s.

When Dean covers your mouth with his hand on the occasional hunt, his hand is warm, and soft if not calloused. This hand is rough and cold, tight around your jaw.

It was then when you hear the familiar clicking sound. Your heart drops as you scan the area for any sign of Dean, but he’s nowhere to be found.

Deciding to stay calm, you slowly raise your arm and lower the hand from your face, turning to see who it is.

He has black, ruffled hair which is slightly greying, and is matched with a short beard covering his face. There are slight wrinkles in his forehead and you notice his soft jawline and the crease between his eyebrows.

He’s wearing a simple grey shirt, with a backpack on his shoulders.

“Joel?” You whisper. He says nothing but his jaw visibly hardens. You look to your other side and see a little girl, crouched behind another crate. She gives Joel a thumbs up sign and he nods, quickly checking over the crate before firing his gun one last time, and the clicking stops.

He puts his gun away before grabbing your shirt, and pushing you against a nearby wall.

“How do you know my name?” He demands, his accent exactly the same as in the game. He moves one hand onto your neck. You’re too stunned to choke out a reply, which makes him more insistent, squeezing tighter.

You bring your hands up and grab his wrist, attempting to pry his hands away.

“Joel!” the little girl, who you know is Ellie, scolds. She jogs over, with a look of worry etched on her face as Joel ignores her, a mixture of fury and fear in his eyes.

What you hear next is practically music to your ears.

“Y/N? Y/N!” Dean turns the corner, and spots you being hassled by someone who you only know to be part of a game.

“Hey!” Dean’s words are sharp, anger dripping from every one as protective mode kicks in.

“Get off her!” He pulls Joel away by the shirt roughly and shoves him against the wall next to you as you drop, holding your throat. You gasp, breathing in the sweet oxygen, recovering.

“Hey, are you okay?” Ellie asks, crouching next to you. You look up and nod, smiling softly before looking up at Dean.

“If you ever lay another finger on her I’ll-”

“Dean!” Your voice is raspy but loud, and he hears you, letting go of Joel reluctantly and dropping to your level.

“Okay, come on,” He holds your arms as he hoists you up, and you lean against the wall. “Are you alright?” He asks sincerely, his eyes staring intently into yours.

You gently grab his wrists and push them down. “Yes.”

You then turn to Joel, slightly upset that you’ve started off on the wrong foot with one of your favourite characters.

“I guess you want an explanation,” You say awkwardly, rubbing the back of your neck.

“No shit.”

Here’s the hard choice: To lie or not to lie?

Knowing you, your lie would probably be something like ‘Lucky guess - you look like a Joel,’ or ‘I though I saw your name on your shirt, I guess not. Great shot in the dark though, right?’

You decide against the idea as Joel doesn’t look like he would take any lies right now, and you know that Ellie has a built-in Bullshit Detector. You take the chance to glance over her features.

She has dark red hair, pulled into a ponytail with strands falling out in front of her ears. She has a button nose and a scar on her eyebrow, which caused the hair to stop growing. Her lips are full, similar to Dean’s, as are her eyes. They’re a bright green, darker around the edges.

“Okay, but please don’t freak out - I am pretty sure that one of our friends, who just so happens to be the angel Gabriel sent us here.” You see Joel open his mouth to speak but you cut him off.

“This is the please-don’t-freak-out part: in our world, this is a game, a video game,” You say, earning an uncertain side glance from Dean.

“Angels? They’re real?” Ellie asks in disbelief. You nod. “Do you not believe?” You ask. “I go back and forth. I mean, I’d like to believe it,” She starts. “But you don’t?” “I guess not.”

You nod in understanding. “I get that; it’s an ‘I’ll believe it when I see it’ thing, right?” You smile. She nods. You look up at Joel, who has a small smile on his face after seeing you and Ellie interact with each other so easily.

“The only question is ‘Why,’” Dean chimes in, directed at you and Ellie more so than Joel.

“Alright then. If you’re messin’ around with the people upstairs, you sound like you can handle yourselves. I hate to ask, but we could use the extra help. It could be something you two do as you figure out how to get back?” Joel shifts hi weight from one foot to the other.

“Why not?” You look at Dean, who shrugs. Ellie smiles brightly, before you hear a clicking noise.

“Shit, get down!” Joel pulls Ellie behind the crate gently, and you pull Dean, who crouches next to you with one arm around the back of your shoulders, although his body is in front of yours, shielding you,

You look over the top of the crate to see a group of Clickers wandering around aimlessly.

“The noise must’ve attracted them,” Joel says.

You watch as your three allies pull out various weapons, and your heart skips a beat.

“Dean.” “What?” “My gun. I left my gun in the Bunker,” You whisper, watching Ellie as she passes an empty glass bottle to Joel, who takes aim. Before Dean can reply, Joel throws the bottle about ten metres away from all of you.

The Clickers around it start screeching and flailing their arms in the direction of the bottle smashing, which of course, led them away.

You visibly flinch along with Dean at the high pitched noise.

“Alright, go!” Joel instructs, gently pushing your shoulder so that you would go slightly faster than him.

Otherwise, you move slowly, sometimes pulling Dean back by his jacket sleeve if he’s moving too fast, as you know that Clickers use their clicks to find out where you are as they are blinded.

Once you all settle behind a fallen pile of debris for cover, Dean grabs your wrist and shoves his pistol, the pretty one with the white handle, into your hand.

“Take mine,” He instructs. “Are you crazy? No!” You forcefully give it back to him, and peer over the top of the debris, spotting a metal crowbar near one of the Clickers.

You point to it just as Joel arrives. "I'll use that," You say. Both Joel and Dean look to where you point. "Like hell you will," Joel says firmly. "Hey, I can do it. Don't get bit. Got it," You begin slowly walking in a crouch, moving fast enough that you're moving at a reasonable pace but slow enough to not alert any of the Clickers that were nearby. You glance back every now and then to see Dean watching your every step, his jaw set hard. He’s watching carefully in case something goes wrong.

You creep closer to the Clicker, who was standing stationary, head low. You look up and see it close up for the first time.

“Sweet Jesus,” You breathe as quiet as you can.

The infection had pushed itself out of the Clicker’s head, causing some type of fungus to sprout from the eyes. It worked as a sort of barrier, protecting it with the price of being blind. Its teeth were much like a humans, if not yellow and spread apart.

You slowly move your arm across the ground, holding your breath as you close your hand around the cold metal rod.

You lift it up, straining against the weight that is put on your one hand. You make sure that you don’t drag it across the floor, and you grab it with your other hand. Slowly moving back, you realise that your balance is off and you topple over, making sure that your arm with the crowbar is in the air.

The Clicker hears the small thud of your body hitting the floor and immediately looks you dead in the eyes… well, it seemed like that at least.

Your breath hitches in your throat and you glance over at Dean, who stands up whilst pulling his gun from behind his back, holding it with both hands as his thumb rests on the safety of his gun with a stony expression on his face, as you pick yourself up.

You slowly move back over to Dean, keeping ‘eye’ contact with the Clicker, whilst looking back at Dean . Something about the glances is reassuring.

Your legs begin to ache after a while of excruciatingly slow movement, crouched down, and it takes extra effort to move one leg, let alone both.

You assume that your friends can see how hard you’re trying to stay silent, as you glance up to see a bottle fly over your head, the tailwind causing your hair to blow sightly as it lands about eight metres in front of you, startling the Clicker and making it turn fast and screech, as it moves towards the bottle which had shattered on the floor.

You stand up and run, holding the hard metal tightly, and you dive over the pile of debris that your friends were hiding behind. You pull the rod into your chest as you tuck into a forwards roll.

You sit up and lean against the pile of debris, but you see that Ellie has started running down the street, Joel in tow. Dean is pulling you up, practically dragging you along with him. This comes as a shock, and it takes you a moment to comprehend what is happening.

“Pick up your feet!” Dean pants. You do as he says, keeping up with him. Your legs ache and your chest burns as you hold the metal rod in your hand.

You see Joel and Ellie slowing down up ahead, and you slow down to a jog with Dean.

You bend over, resting your hands on your knees as you catch your breath.

“See? I told...you I could... do it,” You stumble as you catch your breath.

Ellie smiles. “Yeah, teamwork! High five,” She holds her hand up and you chuckle before high fiving her.

You look behind you to see the Clickers are a mere blur in the distance.

Joel starts walking down the street, and you jog to start walking next to him as Dean attempts to make small talk with Ellie, avoiding Joel at all costs.

“Hey,” You greet. “Hey.”

“I’m sorry we got off on the wrong foot,” You apologise, turning your wrist so that the metal rod is held just under your shoulder, against the back of your arm whilst you’re still holding it in your hand, which is a more comfortable position.

“Yeah - Sorry that I flipped my shit,” Joel apologies. You smile. “How did you find me?” You ask curiously.

“You were just lying on the floor, knocked out. You didn’t look like an infected, and I thought that Ellie and I would stay with you until you wake up - that was until that Clicker arrived,” He explains.

“And then the gunshot woke me up,” You figure. He nods. “Okay, last question; I promise. Where are we headed?” You ask once more.

“To my brother Tommy’s. He knows where the fireflies are.” “Right, of course,” You reply. “Excuse me a sec.”

You walk slower until you’re walking with Ellie and Dean. “Endure and Survive,” Ellie finishes what seemed to be a long explanation of what you figure is the comic series she’s collecting.

“Mind lending me a copy to read sometime?” Dean asks. Ellie nods.

“De, do you mind if I talk to you?” Ellie catches up with Joel, leaving you with Dean.

“Damn, that was eventful,” You sigh, rubbing your face with your free hand. “Gabriel,” You groan.

“That dick,” Dean scowls. “So I’ve been thinking; when Sam was in that endless loop of Tuesdays a couple of years back, Gabe only did it to teach him a lesson. And then when you two were sent into TV land. We just need to figure out what our lesson is,” You explain, watching your feet in front of you as you walk, sometimes stepping on leaves or small stones in the gravel.

“That’s- that’s not a bad idea,” Dean thinks about it for a moment. You bow mockingly, making him chuckle.

After a while of walking in comfortable silence and overhearing snippets of Ellie and Joel’s conversation, such as Ellie saying ‘I like them,’ the daylight seems to fade away and the sun starts to set.

“We should probably find somewhere to crash,” Joel states, looking around at the run-down buildings around you. “Over there.”

He points to one which is relatively intact with his shotgun, and he leads you inside after making sure that nobody is already in there.

There’s a large room on the second floor, and you all head into it and sit down.

It was dark and dry, the only furniture being the two large beds and a large dresser, which had pieces of wood splintering off of it.

The floorboards were slightly creaky, and you could hear the hollow space underneath as your shoes hit the floor.

You all sit in a circle and begin introducing yourselves.

“What did you do in your world? The one where you know for sure that Angels exist?” Ellie asks. You look over at Dean, who shrugs.

“We hunt monsters,” You state simply. “Not like the ones out there, though. I mean monsters like Vampires, Werewolves, Ghosts, you name it,” You explain.

“Oh man,” Ellie says in awe.

After a few other conversations like this, your group splits over to opposite sides of the room, you and Ellie on one, and Dean with Joel on the other.

You glance over at the boys, and you can feel the awkward vibes practically radiating from Dean as he fiddles with his pistol.

“Tension thick enough to drown in,” You comment, referring to them. Ellie snorts. “I can’t swim anyway,” She states. “That’s alright, we can avoid you falling into water,” You smile, finding your attention wondering back over to Dean, admiring his jawline brushed with a slight stubble, even his small quiff at the front of his hair.

“Do you like him?” Ellie whispers, grinning. “Of course, he wouldn’t be my friend otherwise,” You respond. “No, I mean like. like him,” Ellie corrects herself. You let out a small laugh.

“No way,” You deny. “Bullshit.”

You turn around to look at her, and see that her eyes are full of mischief and curiosity.

“I can see the way you look at him. You look at him like he’s the most important person to you in the world - you look at him like you love him. Man, I wish I loved somebody that much,” She states. Your jaw drops slightly as she speaks.

You feel heat rising to your cheeks. “I guess I do... I know you’ll find someone, Ellie. It’s impossible for anyone to dislike you,” You smile. She nods in appreciation.

“Have you heard of the comic I’m reading?” She changes the subject. “No,” You lie. “Tell me about it,”

Meanwhile...

Dean shifts uncomfortably next to Joel, who is reloading all of his weapons. Dean decides to fish around in his jacket, to see if there’s any ammo. He sighs when he finds nothing, and releases the magazine from the gun, checking the ammo inside.

Only 11 bullets. He shoves it back in with an annoyed grunt, but takes a breath to calm down. Joel fishes in his backpack next to him, and hands Dean a spare cartridge.

“Here,” He passes it to Dean. “Thanks,” Dean replies, glancing over to look at you.

He smiles when he sees that you and Ellie are having a deep conversation, laughing every now and again as Ellie explains something in vivid detail, complete with hand gestures.

His gaze lingers on you for a second too long as he admires your features. He loves everything about you, whether it’s your hair that suits you perfectly, your eyes which he sometimes gets lost in or when his eyes flicker to your lips when he knows you aren’t looking.

He knows you have him wrapped around your little finger, and you would both do anything for each other.

“You love her, don’t you?” Joel asks suddenly, snapping Dean out of his thoughts whilst making him jump a little in the process.

“No! Maybe...Shut up,” Dean defends himself. Joel chuckles. “She means a lot to you, doesn’t she?” He asks. Dean nods.

“It’s my job to keep her ass alive, and I know that she would do the same for me,” Dean responds, tucking the extra ammo into his jacket.

“I feel that way with Ellie, she’s only fourteen - I can’t believe she was dragged into this,” Joel sighs.

“If I didn’t know any better, she could pass as your daughter,” Dean comments. Joel smiles.

“Sometimes I feel that way... it’s complicated,” Joel stands up and makes his way over to you and Ellie, leaving Dean with his thoughts.

You see Joel approaching and smile at him. “I figured I’d let you guys know that we’ll be in Wyoming in two days,” He says.

“Wait, where are we now?” You ask. “We’re close to the borders of Colorado and Nebraska, in Kansas,” Joel explains.

Your head whips around to face Dean, who stands up and jogs over. “We’re in Kansas? Son of a bitch,” Dean runs his hand down his face and then through his hair.

“You’re from Kansas?” Ellie asks. You nod. “Geez, this angel works things out to the detail,” She comments.

You notice then that the daylight had completely faded away outside, and the only light is produced by the moon and the occasionally flickering streetlights.

”How are we sleeping?” Ellie asks. “Boys with-” You cut her off by looking at her and then flicking your eyes between Dean and Joel, who are standing a good two metres away from each other.

“Oh, okay,” Ellie winks. “Dean and Y/N can go together - I’ll go with Joel,” she smirks.

You resist the urge to facepalm and look over to Joel, who shrugs and walks over to the bed closest to the door, going to sleep on the side about a metre from the door. He drops his backpack from his shoulders and sets it on the floor, taking his shotgun and placing it on the table nearby.

You watch Ellie crawl next to him, giving you a thumbs up sign when Dean isn’t looking. You roll your eyes and grin as her head disappears behind Joel’s torso.

You crawl onto your bed, feeling every spring beneath your hands and knees as your weight shifts.

You find that the pillow has lost its comfort a long time ago, and so you rest your head on your arm, feeling the bed dip next to you as Dean lies next to you.

He uncomfortably rolls on each of his sides. You roll over to be met with Dean’s eyes.

Even in the dim light his eyes still sparkle.

“Were you just staring intently at the back of my head?” You joke. He smirks.

You roll over again and begin to drift to sleep, before you feel Dean put a protective arm around your waist and pulls you awkwardly into his chest. Your stomach flips and you smile.

You hear Dean’s breathing start to even out, and as he falls asleep you feel him subconsciously bury his face in your neck, his stubble scratching your neck slightly.

**SKIP IN TIME AND SPACE TO ENTERING WYOMING**

“Soo, you said we were in a video game - have you played it?” Ellie asks casually, sparking the first conversation for about ten miles. You’re all currently walking on a mountain trail, having entered Wyoming today.

The mud sticks to your shoes, and you hold your metal rod by your side, swinging your arms a little as you walk. Dean and Joel have only shared small comments like, ‘We’ve only got twelve more miles,’ or ‘Have you got any ammo?’

“Maybe,” You tease. “Do you know what happens to us?” She inquires.

“I don’t remember much of it - I remember Tess, Henry and Sam, but that’s all I can think of,” You lie. In fact, you remember every detail, and it scares you thinking what’s to come. Could you stop it? Would you even still be here when it happens?

You shake the thoughts from your head and continue walking the trail, your gaze wondering to the back of Dean’s head as you think about how you felt safe sleeping in his arms two days ago. The wind nips your face and you smile to yourself, watching your feet sink into the mud with every other step.

Part 2/Series?

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