#why is my style so inconsistent on a single page

[little-pondhead]

doodles of random Danny AUs

At this point these are all separate people😭😭

[bookofmirth]

Did you like cc3 or love? Neither?

oh hello, why don't you pull up a chair because I have finished this book and I have Thoughts. I was thinking for a good chunk of this book that I would give it 2 stars. I still might. It depends on how it sits with me over the next couple of weeks. I ended up giving it 3 because I did enjoy some parts.

I will start with the more positive thoughts.

I am glad that the crossover was limited. One of my fears was that the series be unavoidably intertwined from here on out, so that pleases me.

I really did like seeing how Nesta has grown, her friendship with Azriel, and seeing more interesting things with his powers! That was really neat.

I did laugh out loud a couple of times, at points where I was supposed to laugh out loud. I think Tharion is dumb as hell but he made me chuckle.

The scene with Ithan and Sabine towards the end was good, I was like Gordon Ramsay, finally, some delicious fucking consequences.

Ummm... I like Ruhn and Lidia still. They had some silly moments, but overall they are the only characters in this book that I still have a shred of respect for. Maybe Perry and Sathia. Everyone else is on thin fucking ice.

Shout out to the one (1) line Bryce said that I liked: “I’m sick and tired of people using 'girl' as an insult.”

Unfortunately, the list of things I didn't like is far longer. I'm actually going to put it under the cut if people don't want their enjoyment spoiled or simply don't care.

In my opinion, sjm is a good storyteller, and an okay writer. This book really, really highlighted that for me. The plotting was a mess, I was constantly going back a page because I was confused about what was going on, there were weird inconsistencies that only made sense if you stepped back from the book and thought "well, the author needed that to happen, I guess."

There were some typos and word choice errors that should have been caught - "every muscle in Bryce's body went taught" and then a missing quotation mark (But it was Aidas who answered, pride flaring on his face. Apollion slew her with his Helfire when she attacked him—he pulled her burning heart from her chest and ate it.”). Not to mention the 255 "could have sworns" and 50-something "as if". I noticed a few similar phrases to this. If I'm feeling spicy one day maybe I will go back and find them.

The number of times she says "by whatever power" or "somehow" in a book where she has spent a lot of time explaining the power, and we should know what the "somehow" is???

Who in the ever loving fuck thinks that splitting up two tense scenes by cutting them into bite sized pieces and then interspersing them together is a good idea???

There were multiple times when I laughed out loud at scenes that were not meant to be funny, because they just seemed so dumb. Like... Ithan "accidentally" beheading Sigrid. Excuse me?? lmao (I edited this one because in my annoyance I misrepresented that a bit)

The tone was so, so off. That was a big source of my inappropriate laughing. Like, Hunt thanking Urd that he had such a loyal, fierce badass mate. Or a chapter starting with Ruhn saying "nah". I think this is because the genre could not decided what it wanted to be. SJM was still writing like this was high fantasy, but then used the word "like" in the way that I use the word "like". I do get that this is urban fantasy and she tried to smush it with a high fantasy (a high fantasy with very little world building, but still), but I really do not think that this genre serves sjm's style of storytelling. At all.

Dear powers that be in whatever heaven that exists, please stop letting sjm describe every single character as the most strongest beautiful fiercest loyal badass tough unflenching etc etc etc. I fucking beg. One of the big reasons that I dislike pretty much every character in this series is that they ALL HAVE THE SAME PERSONALITY.

Bryce is annoying as hell. I could write a whole essay on her but she is easily my least favorite sjm character EVER.

I am bitter at feeling like I needed to read this book when, after hosab, I would have given up on this series if not for the crossover.

The crossover really did feel like a "teehee I can do this because I want to" with very, very little thought as to how it would actually make sense. A crossover like this should NOT be done by someone who doesn't outline, and who pantses their writing. Pantsing is fine in itself! Pantsers should be barred from writing this kind of book.

Hunt's dick is too big for his underwear.

[penbwl]

hii no pressure to respond right away!! I know you're busy xD

I kinda want to get into digital art and drawing and make a tumblr too but it all seems like so much at once. Do you have any tips on how to start? Or any art tips either xD I really like your art style and you're like a really impressive person and you've inspired me to try sharing my art skills.

Thanks!! Hope you have a good day!

Hiya!! That’s so sweet and I’m honoured that you’ve found inspiration in my work🥺 thank you so much❤️

I myself am still struggling to navigate being an artist online but I have a few tips that will hopefully be helpful to anyone else out there!

• Hashtags

Using tags on your posts is always useful to have your art get attention, especially when you’re first starting out and you don’t have an audience yet. If I’m not seeing posts from the people I already follow then it’s almost always because I’ve found the post by looking through a fandom tag I’m interested in.

• Interaction

Interacting with your audience is a big one! It gets people interested in what you’re doing and forms a bond between you and other creators that drives you to continue sharing what you make. Comment and share others posts, ask questions in your own posts that get people to engage. It’s just a nice genuine way to have fun and be creative - you may even make friends!

•Consistency

Okay so this one can be hard to upkeep honestly and I’m not the best at it myself. Being consistent with posting is always gonna be a huge thing to keep in mind. Sometimes I’m inconsistent with how much I post, sometimes I’m inconsistent with what the actual content is (Although it’s completely up to you wether you stick to a single category/fandom or not - I find it definitely helps keep your audience if you’re sticking to a single fandom. I can’t say much though because I never have the attention span for it😭 ) Wether or not your posts stay within the same category though it’s still important to keep consistency in how regularly you post if you want your audience to stick around.

•Presentation

How the world sees you! This can be anything from your username, bio or to the art itself. Keep it authentic and really try and get across what you want people to see when they first glance at your page. Presentation in the art itself is a big thing because that’s what’s gonna attract people in the first place. Think about why people are interested - does your style have a certain niche that may peak people’s interest? Is there any way you can expand upon that?

Okay so most of that I sort of just pulled outta my ass- hopefully it helps though😭 when it comes to actual art tips I could talk on this for a while so I may make a separate post if people want to know specific stuff. Generally though just make sure you find a software you’re comfortable with and get to know it well - practice your art and anything you think it needs improvement on! Hope this helps❤️

[treesap-blogs]

Review for “Ophelia After All” by Racquel Marie!

Hello, Tumblrians! I’ll try to publish at least 4 reviews this week. If I go on another unpredicted hiatus, at least I can have all this writing to make up for my sudden absence? 

Real talk though, I’m sorry about the inconsistent schedule. I get pretty self-conscious about this Tumblr account (there’s a reason I don’t use hashtags anymore), and also I’ve been kinda exhausted in the last week. I already told you guys about South Carolina. (There was originally gonna be a 540-word rant after this but I cut it. That was definitely for the best!)

I really gotta set realistic standards for myself. I keep thinking I’ll be prepared to upload reviews for this account but then I get hit with anxiety paralysis and just never upload anything. It feels like a chore sometimes, even when I made this for fun. I know not many people follow this, because I stay out of hashtags and the people who actually choose to follow me ‘cause they saw my reviews somewhere and liked them leave because I’m inconsistent. I’m sorry for repeatedly disappointing you all.

Okay! Time to actually start my book review! 

Ophelia After All by Racquel Marie follows 17 year-old Ophelia: daughter of an Irish English professor and a Cuban immigrant, she’s spent her whole life being a passionate rose gardener, gossip lover, and hopeless romantic with a crush on nearly every boy she meets. But a few weeks before prom, when she undeniably falls for a female classmate named Talia, she begins to question the identity she’s developed over time—and how much of it was because she wanted to appease the people around her. 

I really loved this book! Ophelia was a realistic teenage protagonist, and especially liked the dynamic she had with her friend group (which was one of many relationships paramount to the story). They teased and supported each other, called people out on their shit, fought and later made up, like a lot of friend groups do. While I get that not everyone likes to read about teenage drama, it was resolved by the end, and it didn’t take the melodramatic approach. There was also an interesting examination of Ophelia getting used to being around guys and not necessarily liking them romantically! Maybe it’s because I’m gay but I appreciated that too.

Anyhow! Other things I liked: Talia and Ophelia’s friendship! Ugh the embarrassment in the middle though😬 (WHY OPHELIA). I did like that even after everything they maintained that platonic relationship, though. I was expecting for it to be a romance because a lot of the YAs of this variety I read typically are, this is the first one I’ve read where the MC didn’t get the girl and learned to deal with that! (Also, Talia was sweet.) The multifaceted discussion of Ophelia’s identity was cool too, mixing together discussions on heteronormativity, culture, and dealing with the future in a coming-of-age story. I also just really love queer contemporary stories! It’s something about the light, sometimes snarky but overall honest writing style of basically every single one I read that leaves me whizzing through several hundreds of pages in under a day.

And of course, you can’t go wrong with the additional rose anecdotes sprinkled throughout the story.

(Sidenote, though: I was reading this the same week I was reading and listening to Bianca Torre Is Afraid Of Everything, so there was this weird coincidence between the two where both MCs had Shakespeare-obsessed moms who named their children after lady characters from his plays, assumed they were cishet, and initially weren’t trusted in their coming out journeys lmao?!) 

Uhmmm I don’t know what else to add on, except for that I just really liked that although everything was resolved there were still consequences and (eventual) self-awareness, and this and Felix Ever After are probably my favorites of the “messy coming-of-age” queer contemporary subgenre! (Which isn’t actually a real subgenre, but it should be considered one, right?!) My positive reviews are always very short, lol. Just look at my When The Angels Left The Old Country one, I remember I was going in circles? So I’ll cap it off here!

Book rating: (predictably) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 Finished 06/07/23.

(Book content warnings: Homophobia, lesbophobia, racism, outing, mentions of aro/acephobia and islamophobia.)

-Paz, signing off! ^^

[petruchio]

ugh so disappointing that the cruel prince Isn't good

i genuinely wanted it to be good because like i wanted a fun cool ya fantasy story and i was literally sitting there reading it like… what is this.

first off — what was that prose? the fact that i was literally sitting there going “huh. that’s a sentence fragment. weird” or “i think that comma should be a semicolon” LIKE WHO EDITED THIS. seriously how did this get to publication?! and it’s not like you can’t use sentence fragments in fiction — but they’re powerful stylistic choices? they shouldn’t be done so poorly that your reader is taken OUT OF THE STORY by how awkwardly deployed your sentence fragment is? WHAT?!?!?! that’s not style! that’s just bad writing and bad grammar!!!

second of all — just structurally the book was badly done basically all around. the pacing? horrendous. the beginning was so insanely slow and the ending so insanely rushed. the characters? not a single one was compelling or developed. what were their motivations? why did jude want to stay in the faerie world when all they did was bully and torture her? oh and also murder her parents? “it’s all i’ve ever known” YEAH GIRL AND IT SUCKS!! the plot? nonsensical, and half the stuff that happened didn’t even matter. all that stuff with her twin sister and the locke dude? literally WHAT was the point of that. it added *nothing* to the story or the themes. the random human girl who just like casually jumped into a lake and was then never mentioned again? WHY. and then the main character jude had essentially no discernible narrative voice, which is INSANE for a book written in first person. how do you take first person narration and STILL be such a blank character? i hated her the entire time i was reading. and then the language was all over the place?? contractions and no contractions in the SAME SENTENCE? insanely formal archaic language alongside words like “crappy” and “pissed off”?? is this a magical fantasy faerie realm or NOT? the language drove me INSANE. i was constantly being taken out of the world by the inconsistency of the language — a really BAD thing for a (fantasy!!!!) book to do!! and the descriptions of everything were so vague that i could barely form a picture of anything that was going on? which is wild because like it’s a lush fantasy faerie world? (now im realizing the spiderwick world was only as lush and beautiful as it was because of the magic of the illustrations because the descriptions here just kind of skipped around and never settled into the world they were supposed to be describing. tragic) and the love interest? or should i say the LITERAL BULLY WHO DRUGS AND HUMILIATES THE PROTAGONIST? how could we root for that?? he was awful?!! i don’t care if he has a “tortured past” he’s a horrible person! im sorry but HOW are we still doing this in ya lit and calling it “enemies to lovers” THATS JUST BULLYING! and did he develop? did their relationship develop? did they actually get to know each other? nope. he just randomly shows up on like page 300 after literally drugging her and publicly humiliating her for the first 2/3 of the book and suddenly he’s in love with her. WOW. what a ~compelling~ love story. thanks i hate it.

UGH. im SO disappointed and i can’t believe i wasted my time on that crap. time to read another classic or just read the hunger games again or whatEVER to purge that from my memory

[dashawfrostart]

This Week In "Time & Again" #2: Gettin' Technical Here! 😁

Now, since all the vector prep is done, it's finally time for me to start actually drawing every single frame for Chapter 5!.. Just like that! 👇😁

Oddly, as I started drawing the frames for Chapter 5, I feel extra hyper but also very relaxed and blissful at the same time. Maybe it's nostalgia, for as far as I remember, in winter days I liked to enjoy drawing at home, in the warmth, watching the snow outside. Seems like the work on the artworks is going exceptionally well - much better than when I worked on Chapter 4. I'm excited to go forward with my crazy undertaking; but on the side, I have a lot of non-"Time & Again" ideas, and I revisit my old writings, hoping to find extra spark for the other universes and timelines I have in mind, and all of that powers me up. I feel very active and positive. Aaaah, dis is the season, innit?.. Here, on this side of the globe, winter is halfway on. In the end of the last week it snowed in neatly and almost evenly, and the birds on our balcony look all fluffed up and fidgety, waddling from one little foot to another to keep themselves warm while trying to unbury the birdy omnomnommies from under the not-so-giant-yet heaps of snow. The snow has melted a bit by now; I watch them through the balcony window, sipping on my Earl Grey tea every morning and throughout the day, and it makes me feel at peace, and yet a little sad at the same time. For if I had knitting skills, I would've supplied all those cute little sparrows and the peanut-hungry blue jay family with some nice sets of hand-made sweaters, hats, scarves, and socks. But alas, I can only do that in the form of artworks for now. But I digress. Back to my graphic novel now.

For those who don't know how I usually work on "Time & Again" - and I presume, that's what I'll keep doing for the rest of my comic-type projects, that is, if there's ever gonna be any more - I do everything consecutively, starting from the lineart (including the backgrounds, especially if the frame requires very specific placement of the character on the background, or they interact with it in any way), then I do the flat colouring, and then I go for the shading. And by that, I mean that I do all the lineart for all the pages first, then, once that is done, I switch to colouring of all the pages, and then, once that is done as well, I finally get to do the shading on all the pages. Told you, there's definitely a certain system in the way I work on my stories. This is also a reason why I never ever post updates page by page: because there's simply nothing to post, since they're all incomplete. Deal with it 😎 It seems that this manner of work suits me best. I'm not certain why, but I've never been keen on sharing the works that are half-done or something - although lately I'm going through a certain metamorphosis in this respect. Moreover, it is important to me to keep the same steady, precise, and classy art style throughout the chapter. Consistency is what I highly value in my creations. People, who also draw, have probably noticed that, at times, their art style might wiggle and be, let's say, all over the place - and sometimes this just happens on its own. I can't really explain this. This must be some sort of hidden mysterious consciousness of our pen/pencil that simply does things on its own 🤪. Sometimes our mood contributes to how the art style changes in tiny little details - at times to better, at times to worse comparing to what we strive to achieve. Through executing everything consecutively and finishing up the "chunks" of different types of work one after another, my goal is to avoid unnecessary and unwanted art style inconsistencies that might occur otherwise.

But enough of this lengthy preamble! Let's finally get technical, just as the post title announced it! I see you're getting bored... (no, wait, what do you mean it's just my neighbours snoring?.. I don't know what you're talking about)

This time, since I decided on making a regular page-by-page PDF version of the chapter as well as its scrollable webcomic doppelgänger, I needed to figure out how exactly to simplify my work in order to avoid accidental complications (here, almost a quote from a character's line from the current chapter, lol!). Of course there's no way I want to do the same amount of work twice just because I didn't anticipate the outcome correctly. Not to brag about it, but I must admit, as far as I remember myself - I've always been good at this. There's always a place for being extra technical when it comes down to the artworks. It's not as simple as it might seem to you. Deciding on the technical aspects of creating artworks is kind of a puzzle, in a sense. It's almost mathematical 😁

So, as you can see on the screenshot just a little above, that's a layout of a comic page (in the regular format for now). To make everything work out in a simple way in the end, I decided to create layer groups for every each separate frame (red markings) that will include everything I need for the frame: the lineart, the colouring, and the background. That will help me to just copy-paste a certain frame on the new canvas optimized for the webcomic format - and that is all! All done in a few clicks. Automation 100% 😁 (having Minecraft flashbacks now for some reason...)

All the text-related material (speech bubbles, the text lines themselves, and all the possible written sound effects such as "Swoosh!", etc.; the green markings on the screenshot) is currently included into one group above everything else. I've been importing these layers straight from Inkscape in PNG. But I started to think now that I need to separate those elements in the end, too, for further convenience and simplicity of arrangement on the webcomic format canvas. But that will be work for another day in the future.

In terms of memory usage, I'm not certain yet how it will go for me, for sometimes Krita would randomly crash on me without anything in the error log, and every additional layer adds to the memory usage even if it's near empty - finally, considering fairly large size of the artworks pixelwise, it all adds up pretty quickly. But I'm not exactly running Krita on a potato either (mmm, potaties 🥔🤤), so I think I should be fine.

Previously, perhaps counterintuitively - but again, it worked just fine for me back in the day - I used to create a giant layer with all the lineart for the current page, and then the flat colours for the entire page were stored on a separate "flats" layer, and all the shading for the entirety of the page was stored on its own separate "shading" layer, too. The same went for the backgrounds: depending on the pictures overlapping or not, I would've drawn all the backgrounds on a single layer called "BGs".

This approach would've not worked this time though.

In the lineart work, I'm currently finishing up page 9 already. ALREADY! 🥳🥳🥳 Which indeed sounds pretty awesome, because it just goes ahead steadily. That is, however, keeping in mind that there are frames that I just left out and skipped for now, for they require extra consideration. You see... Chapter 5 is going to have a peculiar scene - something that I've never ever tried drawing before just yet, and it's gonna be pretty long. It's fairly stretched out across a few pages and it's almost represented in a slower-than-real-life pace (surprise, surprise, isn't it what I usually do anyway tho?..). As I work on it, I wonder if it's going to be too boring for the readers. But I think the time will tell, for, once everything is done properly and in colour, it's gonna be much more of an eye-candy than it is now. I sometimes have difficulties approximating the end result in my head. But often it just turns out a little nicer than expected, which is a bonus. Because screw perfectionism; that's in the past for me 🤣 (true story! did NOT enjoy it! got out with minimal losses!)

... Since this post seems to be stretching out in time and space as well, just as the certain scenes I'm working on, I think it might be time to wrap it up for today.

Happy Halloween everybody! And I foresee significantly more sketches and screenshots in the upcoming posts! Take care! See ya sometime next week! 👋

P.S. And, of course, for a nice holiday treat, I made a Halloween artwork, again. And this time it's not that simple (and for a spoiler: this year it's not gonna have Cacodemons as pumpkins, nope): it also serves as the first teaser for Chapter 5 and the second half of "Time & Again"! So don't miss out on it 😉 You won't though, because it will soon appear in my blog!

[firstdegreefangirl]

May 2023 Reading Wrap-Up

Total books read: 5 

Total pages read: 1,319 

Days read: 22/31 

Average star rating: 3.65/5 

Challenge Prompts Filled: 10 in May; 51 total. Popsugar: 3(17)/40.    Romanceopoly: 3(15)/36. CRAD: 1(5)/12. BTBL: 3(16)/52 

Sink or Sell by Margaret Rose 

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 

A five-star read, without a doubt! I picked this one up – literally – first thing on Indie Bookstore Day while I was browsing the shelves at my local, and decided that when the first thing I picked up on Indie Bookstore Day was a signed first edition of a self-published debut novel from a local author, there’s probably a law that requires me to buy it. Like, there’s not going to be anything more fitting for IBD than that. Lucky for me, the premise looked right up my alley, and even luckier, it WAS. This was a hefty book, and it took me 10 days to get through, but certainly not for lack of interest. I loved all of the characters, I laughed, I cried, there is so much security footage at work of me having to put the book down and get up to walk it off (and/or wandering around with the book in one hand and the other one clapped over my mouth in sheer delight, and at another point saying “oh NO, he’s HORNY!” out loud in a public lobby – mercifully, an empty lobby.). I can tell this is one I’ll love to revisit in the future – the ending was pretty easy to predict, but even the twists there were didn’t try to carry the weight of the whole story. I knew almost right away how things would end, but it’s the journey that’s the best part with books like this. I can’t WAIT for her next book to come out now, and there’s a local author event I’m going to have to work days off around next year, I think. So, so, so, so good, and I’m so glad I gave it a try. 

Prompts Filled: Popsugar – A book you bought from an independent bookstore, CRAD May– More pages than April, Romanceopoly: The Vault/A paranormal book with the main character on the cover 

The Do Over by Suzanne Park 

⭐⭐⭐⭐(¼) 

I was so excited to nab this one on a library trip! It kept popping up in my Facebook ads, and I’d read one of Park’s YA novels last year (The Christmas Clash, for those playing along at home), so this definitely felt like something I would enjoy. And I did! It plays a really nice line between YA/early adult (with the university setting, study hall, midterms drama, etc) and more adult contemporary (MC is in her 30s, dealing with all of the real-world problems of people being in their 30s) in a way that let me get the best parts of both genres. It’s fun, it’s cute, it’s everything a contemporary romance should be, with a side of quarter-life crisis of self-reinvention. The ending, if a smidge predictable (like all the best romance novels are, imo) really stuck with me in the sense of “it’s never too late to do something again and/or for the first time.”  

Prompts Filled: Romanceopoly: Campus Corner/Set in college/university 

American Housewife by Helen Ellis 

⭐⭐(¾) 

The goal here was “something non-romance, fiction, that I already own” trying to knock a prompt off of one of the reading challenges. It ... filled the prompt. Parts of it were really funny, and there are a couple of quotations that I flagged because I liked them. But it’s a collection of essays, and some of the writing styles felt pretty inconsistent. I knocked it out in a single sitting, so it couldn’t have been that bad, but writing this a few days later, not much of it is sticking with me.  

Prompts Filled: Popsugar: A book you bought secondhand; BTBL: Novel in verse, poetry or anthology 

Baby in the Making by Elizabeth Bevarly 

⭐⭐⭐⭐(¼) 

I’ll be honest: this was one of the shortest books on my shelf, and I was running out the wire to hit the five book goal for May. I don’t remember when I bought it, I don’t remember why I bought it, the series name is “The Accidental Heirs,” and that’s not usually a trope I go for.  

All of that said, this was DELIGHTFUL. I cleared it in one evening, because every time I tried to put it down, I picked it right back up. It was lighthearted and engaging and captivating and I don’t want to say too much more, because it’s giving me big AU energy. So I’ll leave it with that I went in with the assumption that I’d read this and put it in my local Little Free Library, but it went right back on my shelf.  

Prompts Filled: BTBL: A character is lost royalty 

Smart Boys and Fast Girls by Stephie Davis 

⭐⭐(¼) 

Another short read, knowing that I had a super busy week and needed a fifth book. This was published in 2005, and that makes sense almost as soon as you start reading. I got mid-2000s Teen Nick vibes, like Degrassi or Zoey 101 or something. VERY cheesy “Jocks vs. Nerds" style love triangle, with a heaping dose of “do my friends hate me?” B-plot. It’s a rough cut from a teen media era I really wasn’t intending to revisit this week, or ever. And yet, I ended up totally invested in the drama, picking sides and cheering people on and waiting to find out how it would all unravel. There are worse ways I could have spent my time, but definitely better books I could have read.  

Prompts Filled: Popsugar: A book about an athlete/sport; Romanceopoly: Free choice; BTBL: An author writing under a pseudonym 

[aflyingbrickington]

Lets talk about commissioning some emotes... and what not to do as an artist.

About an hour ago I posted this mass of keyword soup to bait some bots/scammers. More for fun than anything else but this lead to one DMing me on my private discord account. Which is why I feel this post needs to be out in the world.

First off that account isn't listed on my Twitter bio, only via my stream discord that is linked on my Twitch "About" page, right above to a blurb about how I do my own emotes/channel art.

The conversation was pretty normal, asking how I was but what got me was this.

Pretending that they are part of my community, gross to say the least. They then hit me with their marketing spiel about emotes...

No actual artist or human would see that original tweet and think that this person actually wants emotes. A couple liked my pinned tweet in an attempt to apear legitimate as well. Most of the accounts have a name/pfp of an "attractive" woman, probably recycled romance scam accounts.

Some people might ask, "why is this a problem?"

The most simple one is they're (most likely) scammers. They steal art or use free tools to produce their commissions, often AI art. You do not own the rights if that happens and by the time its an issue they've already closed those accounts and moved on.

Second, they're taking commissions from actual artists who put their hearts and souls into making high quality work.

Some of the red flags that you're dealing with one of these accounts are:

Stolen anything on their profile. Logos and emotes are the most common to see stolen. Reverse image seach is your friend but you'll start seeing the same generic ones out there posted across muliple profiles.

Lack of a public portfolio or presence online. As well as little other engagement outside self promotion. Or an account with a ton of followers but no post engagement. Or claiming to make art but none of their own work.

Lack of any work in progress or alternative versions of pieces.

Inconsistant effort/quality or inconsistant signatures and/or watermarks on posts. Watermarks will often not share the same name as the account.

Real artists, here are some tips to help you cut through the noise these asshats create:

If your commissions are open, put that in a single pinned post along with your commission info and portfolio. Folks don't want to go hunting for that information and don't like seeing it spammed in their feed. Make sure it's clear that you're open or closed.

Post often and show your work. People will follow if you make art they like and see often. Posting WiP work will show that you actually make what you claim to make.

Look at what is popular and what folks want in a commission and adapt accordingly. Don't copy other artists but learn what people are willing to pay for.

Watermark the living shit out of everything. Dishonest folks are trying to steal your work, period. Protect yourself.

If you want to get into Twitch emotes/thumbnails, then follow streamers/content creators you like. Be an active and possitive member of the community and they will have your back.

Ignore folks asking for free art. Fuck 'em.

Streamline your process so you can produce the best quality in the quickest time. If a style or technique is difficult or longer to do, charge more for it.

Never slide into random DMs/chats to attempt to promote/sell your work. No one likes unsolicited sales. Don't do it, it's scummy.

[grad505tobiasbouzaidblog]

April Greiman Article Design Text

Page 2 & 3

Wolfgang Weingart introduced the New Wave design movement which spread through his teachings. As we’ve seen in the previous post, Wolfgang Weingart was a lecturer at the Swiss design school. Weingart came to feel that the International Style had reached a stalemate. This means that he felt Swiss design could no longer progress and indeed it was time to change. He was interested in changing the way typography looked, whilst still retaining its meaning. The juxtaposition of type with the chaotic collage inspired by Dada was a constant in the New wave movement, developed by his students, as we’re about to see.

April Greiman was a student of his. Since now she was not restricted to his style she developed her own style while still keeping some of the general characteristics of the New Wave movement. She has used tilted axis, colorful montages, video imagery, typographic innovations, and blurring. Greiman was also one of the first to use the Mac to design. Having the floppy disk now meant that designers could manipulate work easier and distribute images how they pleased. Her work features other characteristics such as the use of cut-out and torn paper aesthetic inspired by James Reid’s Punk, abstract shapes, vibrant block colors, and Ben Day dot texture. 

In design, New Wave or Swiss Punk Typography refers to an approach to typography that defies strict grid-based arrangement conventions. Characteristics include inconsistent letterspacing, varying typeweights within single words and type set at non-right angles.The seminal, discipline-shifting “movements” that shaped a new wave in graphic design,  are close to the Swiss International Style, Bauhaus, punk, psychedelia, and maybe even Constructivism, De Stijl, and Pop Art on the more fine art side of things. New wave melded its influences into more than a sum of its parts, transforming niche visual reference points and repurposing them in a way that still feels decidedly “cult,” yet with one eye firmly on the realm of pop culture. 

Poster analysis page 4

“Does it make sense?” – April Greiman

April greiman pushes the limits of magazines by creating a poster that can fold out almost 3 by 6 feet. The cover displays Greiman and her naked body digitized with layered images and text. The back is where “colorful atmospheric spatial video images are interspersed with thoughtful comments and painstaking notions on the digital process – a virtual landscape of text and image,” (AIGA). At the time computers were very slow so when Greiman sent the file to print and left the studio in the evening, it would only just be finished when she returned in the morning.

Most of the design world back in the 1970s-90s found things like bitmapped type and images non suitable like something you would never do as it was too different from the International Style. But when Greiman’s piece Does it make sense? a good portion of the design world had a change of decision about using computers in design which started many debates about it. 

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April Greiman and her poster “Your Turn, My Turn”

From here April greiman calls herself a “trans-media artist” as her designs use both graphic elements and photographs. By using computers she can use multiple layers in her work to create a sense of depth and with the mix of geometry, bright colors, and layering type it also creates this feel of 3D and movement. With the New Wave design designers don't have to use the usual rules and grid systems which graphic designers use so the graphic elements were able to be arranged without hierarchies. 

Your Turn, My Turn (1983) was designed for a symposium in Los Angeles. The conference was to discuss the roles within the field of design for the possibility of multidisciplinary collaboration. This is why Greiman tries to innovate freedom into her work with its theme being the universe, using old colors like old sci fi movies. The poster feels like an optical illusion with its duplicate layers and vibrant colors that create a 3D movement effect. The details in Greimans work help to balance out her poster, like the illustrations in the empty space to the left with the planet and the faded circle used by her to balance the text in the opposite side of the poster. The text is Sans-serif typeface placed on a grid with a shifted axis which makes it more readable with the many other shapes surrounding it. Through its fusion of visual and experiential elements Your Turn, My Turn offers individuals the ability to connect to the artist and the ideals of the symposium.

Her background Page 8

April Greiman is an influential contemporary American graphic designer with innovative ideas and transmedia projects taking the world by storm. She was one the first designers to see computers in a different way as she realized its potential as a design tool. She introduced the ‘New Wave’ design style in the US. April was born in 1948 and grew up in NY city. April Greiman first went to the Kansas City Art Institute from 1966-70. There she was introduced to Modernist principles, which became her first serious design influence. In 1971 she went to the Basel School of Design in Switzerland where she was exposed to New Wave experiments in Wolfgang Weingart’s studio and where she learnt and started creating her hybridization of typography and imagery. During this time she exploited the digital tool. In 1981 she was appointed the head of the design apartment in California Institute of the Arts where she convinced the institute to rename the department as Visual Communications since Graphic Design seemed to limit the scope of the subject. In 1986 she bought her first macintosh and published her issue for a magazine, notable for its development of graphic design named Does it make sense? Through the 1990s she published many more things like some of her most well known pieces, like her Made in Space collection or the Latin America Summer 1995 Programs Poster.

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Photo of her

Timeline Page 10

time line poster

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Currently, April Greiman is appointed at the Woodbury University, School of Architecture as an art instructor. She also teaches at the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc). Her invaluable contribution to graphic design had the American Institute of Graphic Arts present her with the Gold Medal for lifetime achievement. Besides, four honorary doctorates were awarded to her by different institutes, including Kansas City Art Institute, Art Center College of Design, The Art Institute of Boston and Academy of Art University.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

hi I’m here to review the Clementine comic. it’s not good.

Does this even need an introduction? You know why I’ve gathered you all here today. You know the comic exists, and you probably know that it’s not great and we’re all upset about it. 

Myself included. I am not okay. At all. 

Skybound could’ve literally spit in my face and I’d come out feeling better than I did reading this comic, because this comic is an insult to the original Telltale games and Clementine as a character. 

This comic is a fancy fanfic. Glorified fanfiction. It’s not canon, and Skybound and Tillie can pretend that it is, but it’s not. Bold of them to assume we’d just accept this from people who didn’t work on the original games and never wrote for Clementine before, and based on this comic alone, any chance of us taking it seriously is gone. 

I’m gonna go through every single page, every panel, of this comic and give you my review. So I guess if you’re worried about spoilers [though at this point why would you?] then be warned, spoilers for the entire comic ahead. 

I also wanna add that I have nothing against Tillie Walden. I know a lot of dingdongs are harassing her on insta over this comic and that’s not okay. You telling her how much you hate her isn’t going to change anything. If anything, you keep being assholes to her and she’s just gonna block everything out, even things simply critiquing her work in hopes that it helps her improve. 

You’re allowed to be upset about the comic and share your feelings about it, but don’t take it out on the actual human being like that. Besides, like I’ve said before, if Tillie wasn’t gonna make the comic, Skybound would’ve found someone else to do. This was coming no matter what because Skybound wants that coin. 

That being said, I’m not going to hold back my opinions on this comic. Skybound and Tillie made this comic, they put it out there and asked for money for it, therefore I’m allowed to explain why it’s garbage as well as ponder over the questionable intent and whether or not Tillie actually has played these games. Y’know, it’s like how I have nothing against Kent, but sometimes he says things I disagree with and well, y’know how it goes. 

Alright, this is gonna be long, so let’s go--

The first few shots we get are of the school, two people sleeping, and Clementine’s empty bed. Nothing super note-worthy, we have no idea who is sleeping in the beds, it’s just there to establish that it’s early and everyone’s still asleep. 

The drawing of the school looks fine? Not super accurate, but I can give it a pass since it’s a few years later, I assume. What I can’t give a pass is how you managed to already mess up on the first page of your comic. 

Because..... why are you implying that Clementine’s room is upstairs? First of all, seems kinda dumb to put Clem, who has only one leg and has to walk with crutches, upstairs. Also, if you’ve played TFS and paid any attention to where her room is actually located [the dorms] then you’d know there isn’t any stairs leading to their floor. It’s the side building next to the admin building, you walk through the door, go down the hall, take a left and their dorm is right there sooo..... 

Oh right, it’s probably done this way so that we can have such a suspenseful moment where Clementine is sneaking out while the others are asleep and her foot makes a creeeeeeakk that could wake everyone up, thwarting her plans of abandoning everyone quietly so she doesn’t have to deal with any consequences. 

Because yeah, Clementine is sneaking out with all of her supplies because apparently, she’s been planning an escape from this place for a while. 

And just look at how gosh darn happy she is about it. You can’t see or hear me, but know that I’m laughing. Don’t worry, I will talk about her abandoning everyone later.

But first, I have a gripe with Clementine's design in this comic. It doesn’t look like her. This art of her right here is the most accurate we get throughout all 12 pages, and it’s the best looking, too. 

Moving on, she slams the door shut while this walker changes faces and hair between panels, so that’s cool. I will say, I like the idea of the Ericson crew putting spikes on the door. That’s fun. 

Though Clementine slamming the door shut while trying to sneak out seems counter productive but it fits with the theme this comic has of inconsistency, so it works. 

Next we have Clementine going to what I believe is the fishing shack by the river, and she’s going through some things that she’s stashed away, telling us that she’s been planning this escape for a while. 

Oh good, she has a map. Well at least now she won’t get lost out there in the woods while she makes her escape... also that last panel with her profile.... why does it look so funny? Like this page of the comic doesn’t look too bad, but there is something off putting about her eye there and how she has zero expression. 

And it turns out that rustle was a walker, and Clementine is super inconvenienced by this and gives us our first piece of witty dialogue.

Yeah you dumb walker, can’t you see Clementine is busy running away from home and abandoning all of her loved ones without a single goodbye so she doesn’t have to witness the consequences of her selfish actions?? Gosh, so rude.

Just a heads up, the dialogue in this comic is stilted, emotionless, and bland. The words have no flow, no charm, and never feel like they should be coming out of Clementine’s mouth. Then again, the upcoming graphic novels this is tied to are for young adult/middle graders so I guess we have to dumb everything down so their baby brains can process it. 

.....Why does her face look like that? Also, interesting that she decided to move her ponytail to the other side of her head.... which is a thing that happens throughout this comic, her hair will randomly change sides. 

I believe it’s a metaphor for her changing and inconsistent personality. 

So yeah, Clementine is just making off with the supplies she gathered [I’m sure Ericson doesn’t need ‘em anyway] and she’s just so gosh darn annoyed at all these small inconveniences bothering her.... because it’s just too early for this. 

.....Again, why does her face look like that?

I’m sorry, like I get it, Tillie’s style is supposed to be purposely messy yet minimal but it doesn’t work. When you do a comic in a more messy style, usually it has charm and heart put into it. Effort goes into the messy look, and when things are minimal, that usually means more clean, yeah? So you put them together and just..... that is nothing resembling Clementine’s face. 

Can we just--

Look at canon Clementine’s face. Look at the way her eyebrows are shapes, how wide her eyes are with her eye lashes. The dirt on her skin, the lines-- there is so much personality in her features. It doesn’t matter if she’s wearing a neutral expression or she’s expressing anger or joy or sorrow or whatever. 

Now, is it fair to compare a model of Clem from the games to the Clem in this comic? Well, I assume that if Tillie is doing this comic, she would use references from the game to ensure that Clementine is recognizable, especially now that she’s no longer wearing her signature hat. 

So why does she look like this? Why do I look at these drawings of her face and see nothing but a pair of eyes, a nose, and a mouth? You might as well draw me a simple smiley face. And I get that it’s a comic, and it’s a lot of work to draw the same character over and over again and you gotta cut corners somewhere, but maybe put some effort into the close up shots of her face so that we can actually see it’s her? 

Other fan artists have made comics in their styles that shine bright with Clementine’s personality, so what happened here? 

Anyway, surprise..... it’s not a walker annoying Clementine. 

........Why does AJ look like that??? I’m sorry, I hate to do the same thing I just did but--

Just because you put Clementine’s hat on AJ that doesn’t automatically make it him. I just.... wow. This feels like there wasn’t a single reference involved, like if someone gave Tillie a basic description of AJ and she just did this. 

But appearances aside, what is AJ saying? He says that he knew it, that Clementine’s leaving and I cannot stand this dialogue. It’s unnatural. Again, I know you wanna dumb it down for all of us because I guess we dumb.... but this conversation does not feel natural. 

“I knew it. You’re leaving.” “AJ....” “I’m coming.”

Even if you changed it to, “I’m coming with you.” it would sound more natural. Hell, he doesn’t even question WHY she’s leaving, he just stands there like “I’m coming” like??? I’m sorry, have you ever heard a single word this murder baby has said? I assume you have because I assume you actually played TFS, right? Soooo.... what happened here?

.....whY DO THEIR FACES LOOK LIEK THAT KSAJDLKJAS:LKDJLKASJD:L--

So now we’re getting into it.... into the bullshit. 

Clementine tells AJ to go back to the school, and AJ says that she wasn’t even going to say goodbye..... and then more bad dialogue that sound unnatural when you try to fucking read it. 

First off.... AJ’s reaction to Clementine attempting to leave is barely anything. Again, I hate to keep questioning if you actually played TFS, but AJ would throw a fucking fit if he caught Clementine out here ALONE like this, attempting to leave. 

And then he says “Like last time? You were going to come back?” this sentence makes my brain hurt. I just.... “Like last time, right? You’re coming back?” UGH

Wow, I feel nothing. 

I’m sitting here watching these two imposters with fucked up faces who are supposed to be Clementine and AJ and I feel nothing. 

I’m not even going to comment on the faces anymore. You can see it. You know. 

So yeah... AJ tells her the #1 rule, and reminds her that she promised.

Y’know.... she promised that she would never leave him again? Remember? At the McCarroll ranch? That flashback that was in TFS? The one you would watch if you played the game? 

Why is she looking straight at me when she should be looking at AJ as she says this? Is this Clementine’s way of telling me she’s sorry for what a shitty direction this is taking? I wouldn’t know because her face isn’t doing anything. Just because you draw a couple of tears that doesn’t mean I’m feeling the emotional heartbreak you’re attempting to convey. 

I don’t have enough middle fingers for this.

Well, my hat’s off to you. Ya did it. Ya fucked up everything single part of Clementine’s character in the span of two pages, I’m almost impressed. 

First off, the baby thing is weird. Why is she calling him that? She’s never called him that, which you should know.

Second, she’s not happy and that’s why she’s leaving. Clementine isn’t happy, and AJ can’t make her happy. Ericson can’t make her happy. So she’s going to go out on the road to.... what, be unhappy by herself? 

I’m sorry, but apparently we need a few reminders here of who Clementine is, because this isn’t her. 

This is Clementine. 

Clementine fought for years to find a home, something she hasn’t had since she was an eight-year-old girl before the apocalypse. The motor-inn wasn’t a home, the cabin wasn’t home, the ski-lodge, Howe’s, Wellington, Richmond, Prescott, none of them were home. 

She struggled for years, dealing with trauma after trauma while out on the road. She went from group to group, watching people she cared about die and she was powerless to do anything about it. Whenever she let her guard down and become comfortable, it bit in her in the ass and left her heartbroken.

She was there when AJ was born. She grew close to Rebecca while she was pregnant, she let herself do that even after everything she went through with Christa. Clementine had a bond with AJ even before he was born, and after Rebecca died, she did what she could to keep him safe, despite play choice. 

She cried when she thought AJ died and when she found him in that car again. She swore to protect him, to raise him right and love him. All they had was each other. 

And when she joined the new frontier and AJ got sick, she risked everything to save him and she was devastated when they took him away from her. When she found out he was alive, she is willing to go as far as helping Lingard overdose [INJECTING HIM HERSELF IF SHE HAS TO] to figure out his location. She did shitty things to find him, she killed people at McCarroll Ranch to find him again. 

Clementine raised him and he is her family, do you understand that? She went to hell and back for him, she taught him how to protect himself, and even though she made mistakes she sacrificed everything for him. She promised him that they would have a home of their own one day, she talked about how much she wished for a world where she didn’t have to worry about fighting and killing and AJ could just be a happy kid. 

She fought for Ericson, she watched her friends die or become mutilated by someone from her past. She allowed herself to be vulnerable enough to pursue a romantic relationship with Louis or Violet because she felt safe with them, felt safe at Ericson because it’s their home now. 

And when Clementine was bit, she thought she was going to die but she still fought to make sure AJ would be safe and happy without her and it was heartbreaking. She’s dying and the only thing she cares about is AJ. Not herself, not what’s going to happen to her after she dies or turns... no, she tries to make AJ smile again, she makes sure he remembers the rules, and she tells him that she loves him. 

Then he cuts off her leg, and she survives. AJ saved her fucking life, and she got to wake up at home and live to see her family again. She got to push AJ on a tire swing, she got to eat a hot meal and laugh with her friends, she got to make plans with her lover/best friend for what’s next for Ericson, and she got to talk to AJ and tell him the truth... and she asked him if she did a good job, and he’s honest with her right back. 

Hell, she tells him to keep her hat. Her iconic hat. The one thing she has left of her father, possibly her more cherished item. She lets him keep it. 

The last time we see Clementine, she’s happy. She’s sitting on the steps by herself, staring at her family with such fondness in her eyes and a smile on her face because she finally did it. She finally found a home where she can breathe. She has a bed to sleep in, she has AJ with her, she has a boyfriend/girlfriend who loves her and who she loves back, she has friends she can rely on. 

Clementine smiles, and lets out a small laugh. 

She doesn’t have to run anymore. 

And now you have the balls to tell me that AJ and Ericson don’t make Clementine happy anymore. 

She abandons everything to go back out on the road again, and that’s proof enough for me that you don’t understand a damn thing about Clementine or her journey. 

“ I don't even know the person I'm talking about... It's like all we have in common is the same name.” 

....Anyway.

Wow, Clementine found a car and kept is stashed. How lazy and convenient for this bullshit plot. 

And this is the part where I have to tell this comic to fuck off. 

What, you think if you throw in an incredibly inaccurate flashback next to a current pair of hugging Clem and AJ that I’ll feel anything but anger? That flashback is a slap to the face. It’s snowing, but the only time we’ve seen snow is in S2 when AJ was a literal new born, so why is he that big? Is that supposed to be from ANF because that ALSO doesn’t look like that AJ, and that’s not the outfit Clementine had on... AND there was no snow. This is cheap and meaningless. 

Any fan of the series who has played through the games could tell you this. 

So.... AJ runs into the woods and then we get this garbage.

This comic is awful. It misses the point of everything TFS, and the rest of the series, stood for. There is no heart here. I feel no happiness in reading it, and I don’t detect any passion behind it. It’s a lifeless comic that retcons everything in order to throw AJ away and start fresh with a new adventure for Clementine that makes no sense because the cow isn’t profitable unless it’s milked. 

This isn’t canon, and it won’t ever be canon, and honestly? At this point, I have no faith in the graphic novel trilogy. It will take a lot to do a turn around from this, and I don’t even know if that’s possible. 

Again, to reiterate, I don’t have anything personal against Tillie Walden herself. She’s just doing her job, and from what I’ve seen of her as a person, she seems like a sweetheart. I don’t want anyone giving her shit because I think the comic isn’t good or that you agree with me. All of my anger is directed at the comic itself, her work, not specifically her.... and a little bit at Skybound, because they’re the reason this is even a thing in the first place. 

So yeah.... there ya have it. 

[absynthe--minded]

Beren, the Nauglamír, and Editorial Oversight

this is gonna be a long one, guys.

so one of the things that makes Christopher Tolkien’s contributions to the greater legacy of the Tolkien Legendarium so complex is that he, as the posthumous editor of his father’s works, essentially was able to declare what is or isn’t “canon” in a way that no amount of scholarship (fannish or professional) will be able to truly successfully challenge. it’s his vision of Arda that was published as the Silmarillion, and his interpretations of the Professor’s works that have come to act as the standard and the baseline. after all, the Silm’s been traditionally published and translated into many languages; it’s far more accessible than out-of-print/print-on-demand copies of the History, and reading it doesn’t require you to slog through pages and pages of commentary or to have a good solid understanding of what the story is so you can follow along with lists of bullet points outlining events timeline-style.

of course, Chris also made mistakes, and those mistakes became enshrined in canon just as surely as anything else. I and many others have discussed the Gil-galad problem (namely, that Gil-galad’s parentage is oblique and strange at best and downright contradictory at worst, and Christopher’s choice to make him Fingon’s son was an admitted error) but it’s not the only case of a decision later proving to be the wrong one.

with that background, let’s talk about Beren.

Beren and Lúthien are in an unusual position in the Legendarium as a whole. Not only are they the sole author-insert characters, they’re also uniquely positioned as moral compasses - every other person in the Silm is morally ambiguous to some degree, or does bad or questionable things; not so with these two. If Beren or Lúthien does something, it’s explicitly the right thing to do, and this is confirmed by the narrative. If someone else opposes them, that is the wrong course of action. They’re not merely protagonists who make a lot of good choices, they’re good people, and the things they do are right because of their moral fiber and nobility. Of the active agents who are developed to any great degree, they’re the least complex and the most clear-cut, and the narrative itself treats them differently from other characters, validating them and framing them as the sort of spotless heroes that are in short supply in this Age.

This characterization runs headlong into the actions Beren takes in early drafts of the story and in the published Silm, where after dwarves kill Thingol and sack Menegroth, Beren (with the help of some allies, usually either Green-elves or Ents) ambushes them and duels the Lord of Nogrod for possession of the Nauglamír, a necklace originally owned by Finrod in Nargothrond that Húrin brought to Doriath after his release from Angband. Thingol commissioned dwarven artisans to alter the piece and create a setting in it for the Silmaril that Beren and Lúthien had won for him from Morgoth, and there was a dispute about payment that escalated to violence and ended in his death at dwarvish hands. The battle, later called the Battle of the Thousand Caves, was more or less a victory for dwarvish forces, as they escaped both with the Nauglamír and several other treasures from Menegroth and they defeated Sindarin forces that set out to stop them.

In most versions of the story, Melian sends Mablung to Ossiriand to warn Beren and Lúthien of what’s happened, and essentially asks them to do something to stop the retreating dwarvish forces from reaching Nogrod, where they came from. Beren does this, killing the Lord of Nogrod himself and taking the Nauglamír and the Silmaril home to Lúthien, who then gives it to Dior, who takes it back to Doriath when he takes the throne there. This is the version of the tale that’s in the published Silmarillion, and the one that’s consistent throughout the earlier drafts that Tolkien himself wrote.

But it’s not the only version that exists.

In The War of the Jewels, which compiles versions of the story written late in Tolkien’s life, we find The Tale of Years. This is not a cohesive narrative, instead functioning (like many of the writings that make up the bulk of the History of Middle-Earth) rather like a series of bullet points mentioning and summarizing key events. It progresses chronologically, giving a sense of passing time and organization to the First Age, and it has this to say about the Nauglamír and the battle at Sarn Athrad:

“The Dwarves of Belegost and Nogrod invade Doriath. King Elu Thingol is slain and his realm ended. Melian escapes and carries away the Nauglamír and the Silmaril, and brings them to Beren and Lúthien. She then forsook Middle-earth and returned to Valinor.

Curufin and Celegorm, hearing of the sack of Menegroth, ambushed the Dwarves at the Fords of Ascar as they sought to carry off the Dragon-gold to the mountains. The Dwarves were defeated with great loss, but they cast the gold into the river, which was therefore after named Rathlóriel. Great was the anger of the sons of Fëanor to discover that the Silmaril was not with the Dwarves; but they dared not to assail Lúthien. Dior goes to Doriath and endeavours to recover the realm of Thingol.”

(This quote is taken from the latest and typed version of the Tale of Years, an earlier handwritten version exists that is shorter but includes the same relevant details.)

Christopher Tolkien elected not to use this version of events, instead choosing to maintain the earlier tale where Beren had an active role; he was never truly satisfied with this, or with the Ruin of Doriath as a whole. In the commentary to the Tale of Years he wrote that “It seemed at that time that there were elements inherent in the story of the Ruin of Doriath as it stood that were radically incompatible with ‘The Silmarillion’ as projected, and that there was here an inescapable choice: either to abandon that conception, or else to alter the story. I think now that this was a mistaken view, and that the undoubted difficulties could have been, and should have been, surmounted without so far overstepping the bounds of the editorial function.” We have, for a second time, an admission of error, though unlike the Gil-galad question there is not a specific choice singled out as a flaw.

Why am I talking about this? Well, simply, I think that the version of the story where Celegorm and Curufin attack the Dwarvish host is the one that makes the most sense, and I’m here to make my case for its adoption as fanon. I’m not trying to take a purely scholarly view - I can’t prove that Tolkien’s true vision was for this version of the text, and of course it’s only in the one draft - but as a fandom we’ve reached the consensus before that specific versions of the story are preferred, even when they only appear in a single draft (Amrod’s death at Losgar stands out as the best example).

So here’s my argument. 

1. Beren is not a violent man, and having him act as a murderer is out of character.

This one is pretty simple - Beren is an outlaw fighting against Sauron, a defender of his family’s land, a nobleman in his own right, and a vegetarian who is keenly aware of what it is to be hunted and pursued. The man we’re introduced to in the other versions of the story is not someone who would answer violence with violence unless there was no other choice, and in fact he becomes less violent as the story goes on. Putting him in a position where he’s acting militarily against the Dwarves introduces elements to his character that simply don’t exist before this story. It’s inconsistent, and it also ends his life on a strange, sour note - he’s not an uncomplicated hero anymore, he’s also got blood on his hands.

2. Beren is one of the moral compasses of the Silmarillion, and having him be the one to spearhead the ambush of the Dwarves frames that act of violence in a very troubling light.

Like I said above, Beren and Lúthien are good people who do good things, and those things are good because of who’s doing them. If Beren kills the Dwarves and the Lord of Nogrod, that act becomes justifiable, and perhaps even the right thing to do, simply due to the fact that one of the two true heroes of the First Age is doing it. The narrative never frames this as a downfall or a moral event horizon for Beren, either - he made the correct decision and the consequences that come afterward aren’t things that can be blamed on him. But wholesale slaughter, even slaughter of people who do bad things, is not something Tolkien ever condones or paints in a truly positive light, so it makes more sense for it to come at the hands of people who aren’t solely positive forces. It’s thematically in line with what Tolkien does through the rest of the text, and it feels more like Arda, at least to me. I think an argument could be made that Tolkien realized that making Celegorm and Curufin the responsible party would achieve this end, and that’s why this version exists in the first place, but there’s no proof of it.

3. The Laiquendi are nonviolent, and it makes no sense for them to be involved in this fight. The Ents being involved at all is somewhat nonsensical based on what we know of them in The Lord of the Rings.

Another simple one - we don’t know much about the Laiquendi, but we know they’re not really keen on warfare or on any undue violence, so having them be Beren’s backup is a weird divergence from their presentation in the rest of the Legendarium. And the Ents are pretty universally depicted as uninvested in the wars of the incarnates, only taking action against Saruman when it becomes apparent they have no other choice - why should they care about Thingol’s death, or care enough to murder dwarves?

4. Melian’s actions make far more sense in a version of the story where she doesn’t merely abandon Doriath once she realizes Thingol is dead.

If Menegroth is already sacked, and she cannot hold the realm together on her own as its Queen without really fucking shit up with reality-warping shadow magic, her choice to abandon it after delivering the Silmaril safely to her daughter and warning her that Dior will be needed soon is far less irresponsible.

5. Celegorm and Curufin ambushing the dwarves makes more sense than any other alternative.

Of course Celegorm and Curufin were actively watching Doriath for any sign of weakness. Of course they noticed the dwarves leaving with stolen treasures, and heard rumors that Thingol was dead and his killers had the Silmaril. Given the choice of following Melian (if they even were aware of Melian’s departure) and following dwarves, of course they picked the dwarves. Their ambush and attack and slaughter is consistent with their past behavior, as is their refusal to attack Lúthien because they were scared as fuck of her.

What’s more, this also explains the Fëanorians’ refusal to attack Doriath immediately after the dwarves do - they were unsure of whether or not Lúthien was in Menegroth and ruling as its queen or acting in some capacity as Dior’s defender. Celegorm in particular isn’t the type to hesitate - he’s impulsive, and rash, and rushes into bad decisions without considering their consequences, it’s even in his name. But they waited for years, giving Dior time to marry and have children of his own, and then even sent letters rather than attack directly - and yes, some of this might have been Maedhros’s influence, or an attempt by all of them to stave off the Oath, but it’s also plausible that they were trying to figure out whether or not they’d have to take on the same woman who made fools of them before.

I, at least, think this version of the story makes the most sense, and I’ll be adopting it into my personal canon. I obviously think it’s worth advocating for on a larger scale, and I hope I’ve made a good argument for its widespread adoption.

[chicoriii]

Season 4, Episode 4 - Mr Pigeon 72

I have no idea where to start. This episode has some good things and some extremely stupid.

Marinette isn't still completely fine, but I prefer when she deals with it through being hyperactive than being a whining crybaby.

I know people don't agree with me, but personally I don't buy the whole revealing identity to Alya. It's not a problem with Alya herself, I would say the same about every single character who is not named Alix Kubdel at this point of the story. I haven't written anything in my post about Gang of Secrets, because I thought it would be undone in some way at the start of the next episode. The creators did nothing to explain why revealing identity of Ladybug to anyone was super dangerous and would result in a catastrophe in seasons 1-3 and the first two episodes of S4, but it's magically fine in episode 3. Only Alix made sense to me, as she will be the rabbit Miraculous holder, so she is destined to discover identities of everyone sooner or later and Marinette is aware of that. While it's not necessary to learn identity of anyone to other temporary Miraculous wielders, including Alya. Also that reveal hasn't been foreshadowed in season 3, while the show usually does it, especially if it's about something as important as that! More, in late S3, it's been shown that Alya still can't resist to not talking about Marinette's love life with Nino, despite she asked her to not do it. Now the girl, who is overly excited about superhero stuff, has no problems with even accidental revealing anything to Nino or someone else. She's even "stealing" Bunnix line that she's great at keeping secrets (sorry but you, the creators, haven't shown us that she's indeed is before!). This is why I think that reveal hasn't been planned before they started writing season 4.

But okay, I can deal with it, even if I don't buy it, but things these happened in Mr. Pigeon 72 are even more inconsistent with previous seasons. I have been worried about it, so it doesn't surprised me. For some reason Guardian related-things that have been kept in a secret before from everyone minus current Guardian and the future Guardian, are now fine being done in front of Kwamis (remember, they haven't been allowed to learn about making potions before!) and a civilian who is just a temporal Miraculous holder, not someone who is supposed to be trained to be a new Guardian. You can say - new Guardian, new rules, but why? Marinette has been portrayed as someone who respect authorities, she has never questioned any Fu's rules. It wasn't even said in the episode that she's going to change the rules. I hate that the writers don't even bother to explain us what's going on. Probably they don't bother about consistency, they think the audience is going to be too excited about Alya knowing Ladybug's identity and helping Marinette to question anything about it? How Alya could be allowed to learn the Guardian secrets? She is just best friend of the protagonist, she is not one of the main characters to get that special treatment. I makes zero sense to me. Especially since Su-Han will be introduced in episode 6 and he should help Marinette with understanding the Grimoire, Alya isn't necessary here for any other reason than fanservice.

In my opinion the way how they discovering how to make charms that protects from akumasitation was the most stupid thing that happened this season and one of the most in the whole show. Marinette who is the new Guardiand and portrayed as someone extreme intelligent and creative couldn't find the solution for days, but Alya with zero training magically discovered it in a few hours at worst. And when she told her the solution in not even very clear way, Ladybug did it immediately with no effort. That was so anticlimactic. At least the animation was fine, but other aspects of it was just a big disappointment, and I was looking forward for it. Thank goodness it's just the beginning of the season, I hope later important events of the season will be better written and portrayed.

Also I find it absurd that Rena Rough is walking with a page from the Grimoire like it's just an ordinary book and she's talking about it in front of a random civilian, like things that are written there are nothing special. She or Ladybug are not careful about Miraculous lore anymore. Not to mention that they are giving hints that Rena is very close to Ladybug in public, suspiciously close. And now with them being too careless, that's not hard to suspect that Rena Rouge is someone very close to Ladybug, maybe even as a civilian. Shadow Moth knows Rena Rouge's identity, and it's easy to him to learn who is Alya Cesaire's best friend if he doesn't know it yet, after all his son is in the class with her. Marinette has always been super careful and serious about her duties before, why that sudden change with zero explanation? It's just very out of character to her in my opinion.

I didn't like the akuma battle either, it's now the worst fight of the season in my opinion. It was so short and felt very lazy. I only liked that Plagg got some action and interaction with Ladybug (though it should be suspicious for her that he managed to reach to her that fast). He should be aware now that Alya knows Ladybug's identity but he acts like nothing happened. Not a word about it being unfair towards his kid or something, weird.

Thankfully the rest of the episode is generally more or less fun to me. It was nice to see Marinette and Kagami interacting again. I loved Kagami in the episode, although it was a bit weird to me that she isn't seemed to be affected by her breaking up with Adrien. Like her crush was very shallow, so she managed to recover herself from it very quickly. While it's been shown that Luka is hurt, despite Lukanette always seemed to be much more shallow than Adrigami in my opinion. But maybe it's because she's so down to earth, so being less emotional makes sense for her character. I liked how her attitude was opposite to Marinette's hyperactive: "No, I don't want to be in a relationship with Adrien again, he disappointed me, just let me live!!!". And she's another character who said that Marinette and Adrien are made for each other. I'm not surprised that Kagami sees it now when she tried to be with him and that didn't work. She's observant, sees more than many other characters. It seems she's an Adrienette shipper now. It's also good that her issue with Adrien wasn't resolved that easily and too fast. They need more time, but I'm sure they will be friends again.

So, we've gotten shirtless Adrien. I remember seeing a tweet of Thomas in which he answered to a question if there will be a beach episode and he said we will get something similar. I wonder if he meant this episode. Oh, they just remembered that Adrien is supposed to be allergic to feathers. It seems Adrien has allergic reactions only when it's somewhat related to the plot. When it's not, he's completely fine.

The reference to the famous Umbrella Scene™ out of nowhere in a random episode? It probably means something. I can see "reverse crush" supporters interpreting it as a proof to their theory, especially since this time Adrien did something clumsy and Marinette is laughing because of it (actually both of them). Or maybe because it's the first episode of season 4 with Marinette and Adrien interactions, they decided to be that much gracious for Adrienette fans, to compensate lack of it in the first three episodes. Oh wow, Marinette managed to propose spending more time together to Adrien without stuttering. Probably because she has done it spontaneously. Marinette is the most nervous when she's planning and thinking what could go wrong too much. This time she had no time to it, so it went more smoothly. It's like they building development of their relationship, but it didn't seem in Guiltrip (that's episode 11 chronologically) that something changed.

Seeing screenshot above, you can easily imagine how great friends they could be, being very comfortable around each other and laughing together, if not Marinette's anxiety. We need Adrienette development so much to get more moments like this.

Oh and I just realized that it's also one of the veeeeery few episodes with no real Ladynoir at all (the only other one I remember is Style Queen). So if there was no Adrienette it would be an episode without interactions of two main characters at all (although we almost got Ladrien). It could be another reason why this episode is that nice for Adrien and Marinette ship.

After seeing overly excited Marinette dancing in the rain, I can't believe she can manage completely give up on Adrien. It doesn't look like this at all.

Also we've seen three photos of Adrien wearing THAT scarf. It could not mean nothing different that foreshadowing that he's going to discover the truth about it somewhere this season. But I have no idea what Ladybug's mask with shining eyes could mean.

I don't know what to think about the episode. Despite absurd Guardian-related things, I still liked it much more than Gang of Secrets, but I have no idea if I generally enjoyed it more than other episodes of this season or not. At least it's an episode without stupid drama, which is amazing.

---------

I'm currently less active on social media, because my internet connection is very unstable, it often works very slowly to the point I'm not patient enough to visit Tumblr. Also I block spoiler tags again, because I don't want to see spoilers from the episodes those are going to be released very soon, as I feel that they reveal too much to me once more. We're currently in a marathon of the new episodes and since watching them is the more more enjoyable, the less I know about them, I decided to try avoid spoilers as much as I can. The only bad thing is that I can't be read discussions about the new episodes, reblog them and adding something from me until Optigami will be aired.

[melloian]

The Reboot Comic Expectations

Since am almost finish with the comic (on page 55 ;-; just at the middle-end) imma just talk about this. no this isn’t au introduction v2, this just what would be in the comics. (if you haven’t read it already click here)

Here’s some things that would be in the comics: Changes in dialog  Some episodes will be deleted

The following episodes going be deleted:

Copycat - am just uncomfortable

Gigatitan - am not trying to make Gabriel stupid or laughable that’s why

Santa claws - am not planning to make entire Christmas comic of this, maybe a Christmas special of something else.

Feast - because i changed wang fu backstory

Ladybug - am tired of doppelgangers... i know people liked her but yea.. Oblivio - i just dont like it lmao

All guest star episodes

All #2 version of akumantized villains (expect for stormy weather because she a separate villain) 

There’s be added episodes (and also replaced)

This will start in season 2, season 1 will just have the same amount of episodes (expect for copycat)

There will be filler episodes

Why? Don’t you just hate it when the heroes just fighting every single episode and never explore more about they normal life? it also just a break episode for me lmao. 

Some episodes will be either completely rewritten or slightly rewritten. 

None of the season 4 (and onwards) episodes will be here, it will be replaced with my own

Why? Its a massive spoiler so am just going keep it short and simple, i have different story am going to do with this (and it wouldn’t make sense because Marinette not becoming guardian no more) 

There will be long arcs

Don’t worry is not going be in the first 2 seasons.

Edgy, Dark and violence

Yes. idk am not complete child friendly person ;-;.

Anyways, it would happen in season 3. 

Episode Felix

Instead of the episode introducing Felix (cuz imma introduce him in the first episode but not completely), it going share his backstory instead in his pov.

Around the world specials would be done in mid time when i feel like doing it but it will very long time when its published....

There will be backstory like episodes  There will be episodes only featuring chat noir saving the day and episodes were ladybug saves the day by herself. This also goes for queen bee and other. The episodes will be in the original order Expect for bubbler because i wanted stormy weather to be introduced later.

Writing & Other

My grammar is not good so expect it to sound off

Am not good with fighting scenes so I'll try my best 

I’ll try to make things make sense.

My art style have inconsistent height and things, so am trying to even it off somehow. Am not so great with backgrounds

My comedy epically bad. 

Extras

Will lukanette be in it?

Even though its a good ship, was canon and all, no. I want to make love square believable instead of unbelievable. And i just want Marinette just to confess her crush already. same thing goes for adrigami.

However, luka still would have a crush on Marinette and kagami will still have a crush on adrien. 

Explores ms mendeleiev and other staffs of the school.

There’s be three redemption arcs 

Main one is chloe, the rest will be shown ;)

Pollen actually have a personality 

Power changes

Of course character developments 

Felix would be in some episodes. Will magical charms exist?

No, but in a different way. Its allowed in one of some other form. But its something else Will heroes outfit change? Yes  Future!Alix would be more important character later

Does chat noir gets more powers? 

Yes

There will be an adult heroes Even though i say it going be less heroes, they will be temporary heroes but it ONLY FOR THAT ARC! not for the rest of the comic trust me. (btw miraculous heroes will not be added as temporaries it will be something else. Miraculous heroes will still have the same amount of heroes because am not adding anymore.){besides they only going be called when necessary, they not apart of the team} 

Retcons (Both canon and in my own au)(also SPOILERS!!)

Kagami is a runaway child who been missing since 2 years

Luka and Juleka are not twins anymore, luka is an older brother. He takes care of Juleka because both of his parents are missing. He tries to find both of them.

Miraculous heroes cannot get akumantized unless the accessory is not on them. (nor can the miraculous object can be akumantized.)

Adrien will slowly start becoming less gullible towards Gabriel because he sees something is wrong (retcon in my au) 

The weapons are not toys, they literal weapons lmao. (yes even ladybug’s umbrella, you’ll see)

Nathalie not in love with Gabriel

Gorilla will be named Murice cause it sounds better tbh. Gorilla is just his nickname.

(retcon in my au) Andre Bourgeois being friends with Gabriel. I thought i wanted to explain how Gabriel became a terrorist in the first place. (its in Gabriel’s bio about him being a terrorist.)

Thinking what am going to do with these:

Anarka Couffaine and Captain Hardrock(am thinking about doing something interesting with these two) Bob Roth Mr Damocles  Le Grand Paris Audrey herself  Certain Locations Daroness Anyways that’s all i want to say cya!(this might be edited, also this will be re-blogged every time a new season starts)

[prettywarriors]

Fate The Winx Commentary

Good morning internet! Today is the drop of Winx: Riverdale edition! I sure hope you're ready for my aggressive and unnecessary commentary, because it is coming for you either way!

The netflix landing page lets us know:

Fate The Winx Saga

6 episodes, 48-53 minutes each

"Genres: Fantasy TV Shows, Teen TV Shows, Italian TV Shows"

"This show is: Emotional"

As mentioned elsewhere, my Winx knowledge is limited, so I will be coming into this fairly fresh and will try to be unbiased. As I have seen trailers, the keyword here is Try.

Episode 1

'To the Waters and the Wild'

CW: Animal Death, Swears, Implied Child Death, Blood, Implied Teen Sex, Burns, Weed, Fatphobia, Whatever the term pussie falls under

Episode 1 TL;DR: We meet everyone, learn their dynamics, have the basics of the magic system beat into us, meet our monsters, and name drop Harry Potter. Standard first episode stuff.

I do want it on record before we start that I got about halfway into the first season of Riverdale, and the first season of Netflix Sabrina. They were, well, bland and boring imo? I did get through a few seasons of Teen Wolf, but that's because it was capable of Fun and Jokes. My current expectations are a few unintentionally funny lines, maybe some almost decent magic effects, and because it's 2021, one whole gay character (I did hear one of the boys (there are boys?) is bi, but also an asshole so I'm hoping for some wlw)

TV-MA LANGUAGE AND SMOKING OH FUCKING BOY Almost full moon (waxing) in opening shot- I Will be tracking moon inconsistencies if it keeps showing up that is a pet peeve but hey look a bunch of sheep That's a good start (it's ominous though. don't hurt the sheep) Swears count: Feckin' 2 Mystical portal barrier. Oh yeah s5 of the magicians is on netflix now WELP THOSE ARE SHEEP GUTS RIGHT OUT THE GATE HUH For CW it's up a tree, and the dripping blood is a good warning of what's about to be seen :( oh and then the man who was looking for the sheep dies offscreen save for a spray of blood. THIS ISN'T YOUR CHILD'S WINX CLUB it seems to say. I assume. How much blood was in the original winx because this is already at least a full cup. (Also the monster noises for whatever was chasing the man (werewolf it was a werewolf trailers are bad guys) were not very good)

Opening credit scene is 5-6 different blooming elemental wings. They're pretty, but it's unclear if the last one is secret 6th member wings (because the second to last ones are fire which is the main character's element right?) so maybe we'll get a late 6th addition? (I am in I.T. please give me the most relatable character you cowards)

KIDS IN THE CORNER BY AMBER VAN DAY PLAYING I like where they shot this but that might just be european woods pretty. The opening location was nice and mossy save for the sheep blood Fancy big stone school establishing shots (it's nice, and huge) and we land on a red head who seems less than pleased to be here Courtyard shot of... whatever the name of the replacment plant girl is, holding a tray of various potted plants for an older man (father? first day of school send off maybe?) Aisha(?) walks by, not talking to anyone, Stella(?) is taking Magical!Selfies with at least 3 other girls, Musa(?) has a suitcase and headphones and smiles at a passing girl Oh boy a boy with a pocketknife doing little tricks with it! Nothing says edgy like an actual knife edge. Gonna take this moment to point out I have some level of face blindness and while the girls all look fairly different from one another, if there is more than one tall blonde white boy as I fear there may be, I WILL NOT be able to tell them apart. Not through maliciousness, just general incompetence, so anything I say about the boy characters (I want to say they're the knights to the girl's faeries? is that right? this whole thing smacks of gender) should be taken with a heap of salt I've come to accept tv just. displaying text messages on screen as a storytelling method. It's never my favorite but it just Is a modern story element. Also Bloom needs to meet stella at the alfea gates Alfea I presume is the school- does the name mean something? It sure feels like the word elf and therefore fae but I don't feel like googling anything this early in Oh look two more blondish tall white boys. Pocketknife was wearing something else i think, one guy has a brown jacket and pink shirt (bad combo), the other looks old even by tv highschool/college standards and his jacket has a jock vibe. Jock jacket also has an earring? Is this the bi character who is an asshole? From this one second of him, only in profile, I will assume yes, he is an asshole I like Bloom's backpack Pink shirt looks at Bloom from across the quad. I am already tired of this romance Cool he walks up to someone he has identified as lost, and is 'impressed with [her] confidence in the face of complete ignorance' COMING OUT OF THE GATE WITH A NEGG HUH PINKY He even states he wasn't offering help Then Why Are You Talking To Her Jackass Subs are going with the fairy spelling, and Bloom confirms she is a fairy and we confirm this is College. Unless this is a european thing where they call schools different things. I think that's just for public and private? And maybe just england? I'm American all they teach us is 1492-ww1 over and over for like. 10 years sorry Rest of the World 'What Realm are you from?' 'California' Speaking of ameri-centric, I'm gonna Guess that original Winx, the italian cartoon, didn't have their main character be from cali usa? I am presuming this is a side effect of making this property for a more global distribution than I'm guessing winx was originally conceived as back in the early 00s The Otherworld. I assume this is the fairy realm and whatnot? And the magic school. Seems to be located behind a magical barrier in the earth realm?? If that's right it seems weird if basically everyone who goes to the school is from the otherworld Pinky doubles down on his rudeness but in a Fun and Cute way because :/ and the Specialist hall is Very Pretty, oh and there's a fairy hall. Are specialists the boy...things? magi knights? bros of the blade? guys who wear those 'here come a special boy' sneakers from that one comic? Stella sees this conversation which is great because they drop the term mansplain. why would otherworlders know that term even??? Edgey(?) sees Pinky and they hug it out Stella knows Americans are the type to wander off so I guess there's a lot of inter-world connections?

Miss Dowling- is this teacher going to be like the pedo in riverdale who got *checks notes* killed off by one of multiple serial killers later on? Dowling is the headmistress, gotta keep the otherworld a secret from earthers, time and place for portal making. all standard fantasy stuff so far, nothing to make this stand out Stella has a gateway ring, and frankly isn't too nice? all the backgrounders clothing is Bland and very normal 7 realms of the otherworld, Solaria is where Alfea is, i like magic globe Incase you forgot this was a modern tale, people update their insta stories here. 'I was kindof bummed I didn't see a single pair of wings' YOU AND ME BOTH BLOOM 'We had wings in the past, transformation was lost, tinkerbell was an air fairy' This is either a cop out for your glittery cowardice, or a set up for the main girls re-finding transformation magic later. I did like the Tink bit Bloom is a fire fairy and the subtext of this conversation is that bloom's magic did Something bad. I hope it was burn down her old school's gym a la buffy movie I like miss Dowling but in the I wouldn't Be Surprised if you turned out to be Evil way, and I guess Alfea is a very privileged upper crust school. What types of college do normal fairies go to then huh? damn privileged fairies 'our students have gone on to do amazing things like re-discover long lost magics' We Get It. You will give me Wings, but Only If I'm Patient Dowling throws a jab at Bloom about power control, but I like her necklace so It's Fine

Bloom video calls her parents while unpacking in the dorm, which may have come pre-fit with a heck ton of board games? Love it. Or new plant girl brought them along with her many plants Stella has a fancy mirror and lots of jewelry and fashion photos and makeup, Musa has a laptop and apparently not much else, gotta get those establishing personalities down I guess 'Ladies of the Flies honey don't be sexist' Bloom's dad for feminist of the year (these jokes are bad but i guess we can call it a dad joke as justification) Asiha gives Bloom a look and saves her from the call with her parents- yay friendship step one achieved Blooms parents think she's in the alps because magic secrets and what not Aisha asks bloom if she's never read harry potter and I guess Bloom is a potterhead (that's the term right?). Is this self awareness that all magical school fantasy series have the same basic bricks?  Bloom is a ravenclaw sometimes slytherin, Aisha is a Gryffindor Stella is changing because she's the fashion one and has a fun pastel rainbow skirt, and uses magic to make a real aggressive lamp. She's also a mentor (maybe older than the others by a bit?) I am assuming Stella here is something along the lines of a diplomats daughter the way she talks about appearances. She better get down and dirty later on to show her growth about how some things are more important than looks yada yada Fairy magic powered by strong emotions, i am waiting for bloom's backstory to be movie x-men rogue style tragedy Terra! Which. Of course is the Plant Fairy's name. Stella is a little mean to her about the plants and she takes it with a smile and some subtle snark back using classic literature Oh that's fun Terra points out the name-plant thing, and name drops her cousin Flora. That's. The one they replaced with Terra right? Terra's dad works in the greenhouse at the school which explains earlier (and her mum is named rose) Stella is indeed a second year and Musa's eyes change for. Lie detecting magic? and loves her headphones (Overstimulation?) Aisha wants somewhere to swim and we cut to a 'pond' by specialist training. Assuming she wants to sim because she's a water fairy, why Don't they have a pool? also this pond looks. Unpleasant for swimming

Girl specialist! Does that mean we have boy fairies? Boys. Fighting. Talking about girls. All gingers are nuts. Thanks edgelord AMAZING SHAGS THOUGH 'I didn't realize your hand was a red-head' it's not truly edge if we don't talk about sex every 10 minutes Subtitles earlier only said boy 1 boy 2 but now pinky or edgy is Riv Edgy smokes weed, and pinky is a big brother figure to him, and the head? of the special boys doesn't like edgy. Me neither older guy Bit of swordplay, more girls, every specialist has black training outfits, very military Pinky is Sky who is son of Guy of Place. an important lad. without context this is meaningless to me There's a giggly boy who laughs at the idea of a war in the future and gets a talking to. I suspect this boy will be re-occurring enough to die- he has those tertiary character elements with his intro and such (and he's black so I am prepared for your standard racist murder choices) Burned Ones exist outside the barrier, which makes me wonder if dead shepard was in the otherworld? There was nothing establishing that he was in any type of Other place but :/ Oh look edgey is having a smoke cross the barrier while we learn about the creatures that live beyond it. Time to find out these creatures no one young has ever seen are still kicking Specialist leader had to kill his own pa after a burned one got him. They also. Used a shotgun when trying to fight it. Do specialists even have powers or are they just good with weapons? Edgey finds the shepards corpse. Mostly blood 'it's been 16 years since the last sighting' 'Rosalind killed all the burned ones' ahh magical creature genocide hey when is abarat 4 coming out. and is rosalind hot?

School, gossip, Aisha and Musa are snarking at Tera for thinking the guy died of natural causes because we need to have these characters not actually like each other to make it stand out when they do Aisha talks about how she eats a lot and if she didn't swim she'd be massive and we cut to the plus sized tera looking uncomfortable are we really doing this? Tera points out that Musa was ignoring her earlier and it's all just uncomfortable and not great character conflict (but I thought I saw Musa holding an honest to god ipod? it's blue but it could be a phone case. Her hand is in the way) tera and dad interaction is nice, i'm also convinced they couldn't afford more than 3 magic adults

Girl with braids and metal in her hair! There were witches in winx right? Like 3 minor antagonist girls? I assume this is one of them. Because she has alternative fashion and is therefore evil /s Beatrix. Names in this series leave something to be desired (that something is subtly. I get it, they're carry overs from a series for a younger audience, she-ra had the same issue, but i can still poke fun) Swear count: Arsehole 2 Bollocks 1 Shit 1 She's a weird ass kissing with clearly ulterior motives

Bloom is Studying and her notebook is just FAIRY MAGIC POWER = EMOTIONS LOVE FEAR? HARTED? FIRE FAIRY CONTROL? in case you weren't paying attention Oh a flashback already to the magic triggering event? Her mother had pointed out she's an introvert, and past!Bloom doesn't Party. She goes Antiquing and is a Weird Loner (her 'basic bitch' of a mom's words) Swear count: Bitch 1 Bad daughter count: 1 Bad mother count: 1 Magic glowy eyes for Bloom: 1

Bloom Hates Parties and asks Pinky I mean Sky where she can be Away from People and he fears he'll be Mansplaing to her to. vague that it's dangerous outside instead of saying 'hey there's monsters and someone was just killed by possible one of them stay in the barrier' Stella wants to talk to Sky because they have History. I did hear there was a love triangle between these three. I am bored and everyone at this party is a nosey bitch who is watching their tense conversation. Also Something? Happens when Stella gets upset [mystical warbling] Random magic effects in the (very pretty) forest Bloom is trying to practice her magic on her own, and to do that she's gotta look at sad teen pics. And look, her burnt bedroom from her first power usage The fire magic is pretty good. I think fire is like. the opposite of water when it comes to cg where it almost always looks pretty good, while I swear i've seen the actual ocean look like a shitty render Magic out of control, bloom can't control her emotions, Aisha can stop her with water magic which makes some nice steam Bloom is angry at aisha for saving her. So far 3 of the 5 girls are abrasive at best remember when people made characters likeable? Swear count: Shit 1 (but it doubles as the literal meaning because of flooded toilets) Swear count: Bitch 1 Ass 1 Taking away your teen's door is. Really shitty. Not almost burn down your house worthy but damn cheerleader mom I do not understand sleep shirts with buttons. That seems painful if you lie the wrong way? Her mom was seriously burnt by first magic usage that's a backstory Shit count +1 Main character aspect time: dormant fairy blood line? awfully strong magic for that. baby who died day after it was born and now she's here? ...I was going to say changeling thanks aisha A Barbaric practice loving hints at long term world lore Hell is a bad word for kids!! Cutting to headmistress and her secret passage after finding out bloom is secret pureblood? this really is a harry potter thing

edgelord offers giggly some booze, and says pussies twice because he's Edgey and does peer pressure Tera calls him out and knows he's a sad nerd in disguise not a 'badass' and he says she's 'three people in disguise' because fatphobia shit +1 arehole +1 tera. chokes out edgelord with a vine because she's had enough of this shit. good for her edgelord is Riv, and he lived

OBLIGATORY GOOGLE SEARCH FOR THE TERM CHANGELING REMEMBER BELLA'S VAMPIRE GOOGLE GOD I LOVE TEEN FANTASY AND THEIR INSTANCE ON GOOGLING COMMON FANTASY TERMS OH hey the lamp bloom brought with her is the one she was fixing at home that's a nice touch Stella bonds with Bloom about homesickness, and the takes a selfie Musa is a mind fairy. So she. Is a telepath with purple eye magic? Oh there's types of 'connections' Memory, thought (others but i am cut off from the lore) Stella did Something to someone who Talked To Her Man last year and now lent Bloom her teleportation ring to send her some because miss mentor really cares more about her shitty man then helping the girls she's in charge of First World- earth Old Cemetery? Very Sexy. and bloom sweetie don't leave a mystical gateway open, and how will you explain to your parents how you're back so fast Wait she's only 16? SO this really is some european college where that's a funny way of saying High School Fire guilt, bad feelings about life shattering revelations, better connection with mother. I gotta say I have low expectations of this show carrying the family connection through the rest of this. That conversation felt more like a Hey We Made These Movements Onto Other Stuff Now

Lighting choices are interesting, with green, orange and purple for creepy warehouse. THE Creepy Warehouse where she would sleep without her parent's knowledge wow right that GIRL DROPS THE DAMN RING AT THE FIRST SIGN OF burned one looked more alien than werewolf-y here Decent Horror movie looks, and dude stole her ring. Rude. Saved by the headmistress, and tera/aisha/musa are here to great her Stella can't be here though because she has to greet a half naked freshly showered sky because life is suffering and producers insist people like to see teens half naked (who. Who?) shit +1 and she dumped him. pity part of one and using it to try to get your bone on. HEY A SONG I KNOW. IT'S WHATSITCALLED FROM THE BAYONETTA COMMERCIALS WAY BACK WHEN. in for the kill la roux. I do wish netflix would either commit to telling you what song was playing or didn't tell you at all

Riv offers Beatrix a hit from his joint because what Is a Bad Kid hasn't changed in like 70 years Blowing pot smoke into someone's mouth isn't as sexy as ya'll seem to think it is Musa has cute sleep socks with little pom poms, and I love Tera's floral jammies Tera offers a bluetooth speaker so they can listen to music together Musa also calls out Tera's fake happiness this is the good shit character interaction i live for Musa Empath Mind Fairy 'somber indie music'

If you kill a burned one in the human world Something? Extra bad happens? So the headmistress knows Bloom's a changeling, and ohhh that's the last time a burned one was spotted. Is Rosalind the famed Monster Slayer the birth mother of Bloom? Tera text flirts with Giggly who IS NAMED DANE and has a thing for. Sky? Riv? I told you these boys all look the same to me so if it's a half naked pic on fairy insta i'm out of context clues. Crymeariv is the insta name that answers that. Is this the slow burn enemies to lover mlm i can't finish this sentence i don't care riv is a dick Stella and Sky are in a bed and she doesn't seem to have a top on so Implied sexy times? MYSTERIOUS HOODED AND ROBED FIGURE CROSSES THROUGH THE BARRIAR AND SHOOTS THE BURNED ONE WITH LIGHTNING MAGIC OH IT'S beatrix

alt-J – Adeline as an ending song

[godslayingenthusiast]

https://qgpennyworth.com/portfolio/people-are-strange/

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People are strange.

I often see people walking around, both in public and on the clock at their jobs, in the strangest costumes.

The guy walking around dressed like a Cowboy straight out of an old Western movie, who has never wrangled a cow or whatever in his life. Who lives in the apartment two doors down from me and doesn’t even know what a pasture smells like. He likes his theme so much he drives the big pickup truck, has a belt buckle the size of Texas (here in Wisconsin), and when he can, he carries a gun on his hip just in case Billy the Kid shows up one day.

The woman dressed like some sort of gothic vampire. With the “I <3 ZOMBIES" keychain. White powdered face with heavy black eyeliner.

The person whose gender I do not know, with their carefully dyed and styled hair and curated collection of buttons and piercings and shirts they stole from a 90s Xena fan’s closet.

The guy in the Businessman costume, not a tuxedo but shirt and tie and "very nice" shoes.

The casual Steve in his old hole-filled ripped up T-Shirt and wholly holey jeans.

The Princess in her stunning dress and accessories and make-up that had to have taken at least two hours to put together each morning.

These are all people I work with. Walking around in costume, covered with the marks of their respective themes. This is fully accepted for the most part. There are exceptions (the redneck likes to poke at the queer one and the casual steve is always ribbing the businessman and whistling at the Princess) but for the most part nobody is ever told to "go home and come back dressed normally". Why? Because that is normal. These are accepted normal ways to dress in modern society, even by supervisors and managers.

Don't misunderstand, I'm not judging or criticizing. Actually I think it's pretty great. But, as fucking ALWAYS, my problem is with INCONSISTENCY. GOD I HATE INCONSISTENCY. My brain latches on to it like a life raft and will NOT let it go.

If I show up to work today wearing a Wizard robe, a wizard hat, carrying a big magicky-looking staff, driving a car painted to look like a dragon, I'm the weird one. Not the Cowboy, not the Princess, me. What makes one theme more acceptable than another? A robe and hat and stick are much easier to set aside, take far less preparation, and are more likely to make people smile, than a full-on Vampire costume. However, if I go to work like that I have absolutely no doubt I would be sent home to change into "regular clothes". And If I went home and put on a cowboy costume and came back, that would be considered changing into normal clothes.

I would like to know who draws these arbitrary lines, and what kind of bribery would be effective on them.

I want to see more wizards, more Monks, more goofy Doctor Who outfits, more people dressed like Neo in the Matrix, driving around my workplace in a forklift. Operating the machine next to mine. Fixing my shear when it breaks down. Instead I get about 30 cowboys and a few of the other mentioned types, and that's it, because anything else is somehow "too weird". Worse, at least half of the fucking cowboys are of the openly racist, kill-animals-for-fun variety. At least the guy in the Wizard robe I know I'd probably get along with.

Or Kill Me.

- Trix

Marginalia: a large, ornate and friendly frame containing the text "Be assured I shall continue doing whatever the hell it is that I do."