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#Upa goes hard as always

fipindustries · 3 months

Note

not a question but basically any time i remember your art exists im looking it up and down and trying to take inspiration from it. your expression work is always top notch, and the way you depict faces is the perfect balance between cartoony and well defined

oh my god this is such an amazing compliment! thank you so much!

you know, i think this has been a long time coming. im going to take this as a chance to go in depth about how my style works, why i do what i do and how i do it. do keep in mind that none of this is me saying "this is the objectively correct way of doing art" but rather just how my own process works, what I like to see in my own art.

that balance that you speak of comes from a commitment to underlying structures. what im going to call the stylization sandwich

i start with a clear, well defined solid structure, i add whatever wacky cartoony features i want on top of it (none the less strongly tied and guided by the underlying structure) and then i refine by adding as many more realistic, grounding details i want, although you can go too far with it so i gotta be careful or ill end up with those shitty "cartoon character IRL would look scary!" clickbait drawings.

(quick aside, this trend fucking sucks, its obvious the artist went out of their way to make the drawing creepy, this pretension that "actually the character would look scary irl" deliberatly misundertands the principles of stylization, its as creatively bankrupt as jokes about mario eating mushrooms)

getting back on topic, the point is that, as long as the underlying structures are solid you can build whatever you want on top of them and it will make sense

a key tool here is internalizing the way the proportions on the face work. and i say internalize because obviously i dont actually have the golden ratio memorized inside my head nor do i stop and measure and calculate all the proportions in the features. i just read a lot about drawing, i drew a lot, i tried to always keep a critical eye to what im drawing and see if it "feels" disproportionate. once you get an eye for it then you know how far you can push things before they complitely break

let me give you another example of what i feel is a botched execution of this.

if you look closely at the face on the left there are a lot of things that dont make sense. the corners of the eyebrows dip down into the eyes when usually the eyes are enveloped by the eyebrows, the way the beard grows around the nose is just not how facial hair is distributed, the mouth is too big, etc. on the left i used photoshop to reorganize the factions into something that makes a bit more sense to me

(another quick aside, the real big problem at the heart of the original drawing were not so much the proportions but the tangents, when different lines touch each other like this that is usually a big no no but that is a topic for another day)

also a lot of it is just me cheating. yeah i cheat. you ever heard how people say there is no innate talent and its all practisce and hard work. well, yeah, that is mostly true, but is also true that some people are born with inherent advantages. either taller or more predisposed to being thin or with better facial structures or better innate hand-eye coordination. i was born with an uncanny capacity to visualize stuff. i have whatever the opposite of aphantasia is. i can borderline hallucinate things if i want to. and that goes coupled with the visual intuitions i developed through practisce and training.

so first come the learned wisdom, and then comes the innate talent that helps me exploit that learned wisdom to its full potential

on top of that is corporeality, i try to draw in such a way that it conveys depth and weight to the things im drawing, certain kinds of stylizations dont care about that and choose instead to have their drawing look flat, a classic one is the UPA style

is a very fun style! very cute, very dynamic, very expressive in its simplicity. it became very popular in the 60's and 70's. personally i choose to go in a different direction. i draw in such a way that if one were to turn my drawings into 3d models not a lot would get lost in the process.

whereas other artists....

...not so much

but yeah, ultimatly it all goes back to underlying structure. any drawing can work

as long as you have a strong foundation underneath.

PS: if you like my style i cannot reccomend enough the art of @rezuaq i feel they follow a lot of the same principles i talked about here but i could be wrong.

they have been my biggest inspiration as of the last 4 years, i shamelssly stole the design of one of their characters for jennyffer. go to their blog and give them a like

#art

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aplaceinthedark · 3 months

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Info dump about your UPA manual; Are you writing it in one of your many notebooks, or do you have a google doc for it? What medium do you prefer when starting a new story?

I want to know everything pleaseeee

This one is a bit of a pickle. The last time I wrote something solid, in early 2019, was The League of Cardinal Hunter's Manual. This was back when my current version (Agent Babyface) was my backstory for my character in a Supernatural fanfiction I was collaborating with two friends.

To make this monstrosity, the only way I had was to find a three or four hundred page journal and write down the manual part, leaving a chunk of the pages blank, because three characters took turns writing in the book.

Now, I have an outline for what information goes into the manual, and that part goes in a Google doc so I can have that done, but the hard part will be the commentary, since I'll now have FIVE characters taking turns writing in it. Though the hardest part will somehow be putting this on the internet, due to tumblr, Ao3, and even google docs not having the means to implicate it. Unless there's another way, I'd almost have to take pictures or screenshots to show the world.

So yeah, that might answer the question.

As for mediums, it's usually handwritten. I always have a notebook on me, even though I cpuld use my phone for that.

#ask answered #fern's wip weekend games #wip weekend #bad omens fanfiction

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thenanbakacorner · 2 years

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Hello! I love your writing! It's so hard to find Nanbaka writers. Can I possibly request a headcannon for Upa, Liang, and Samon with a S/O who is lazy and childish, but crazy strong and scary when protective?

Thank you so much!! Just doing my part to make more content for the underrated gem that is Nanbaka! And of course you can!!

By the way, for Liang and Upa, the reader is an inmate and for Samon, the reader is a Building 5 Guard!

* * *

🧘 Upa 🧘

At first, Upa isn’t very fond of you, your laziness and childish behavior reminding him of Qi’s own likeness

But after he gets to know you, and falls for you, he gets much more lenient about it

Although he cant help but shake his head with a hand to his face whenever you do something silly or embarrassing

Is very strict if you’re being lazy and putting off important tasks

”Y/N, you need to do it. Get up. Now.”

Can and will drag you to do the tasks if he needs to

Basically becomes your.. ”motivation” to do things, if having him hovering around and reminding you to do said things counts as motivation

Though this likely does help you to get out of your lazy bouts more easily after it goes on so long

When he first sees your protective side, he’s.. stunned to say the least

For someone who’s prone to lazing around all day, you sure are strong and scary when you need to be, and it totally caught him off guard

Needless to say, he gains a newfound respect for you, realizing that he probably shouldn’t be so quick to judge books by their cover.

🍑 Liang 🍑

Liang has mixed feelings about you at first. You’re not too bad, but your childishness and laziness could cause problems

That and you don’t seem very strong (Although he finds out otherwise!)

But he gets used to it, and ends up falling for in the end either way

He can’t lie, despite your flaws and occasional childish behavior, you’re enjoyable to be around!

Like Upa, he’s the one to make you to do things you lazily put off

Though he’s a smidge less strict about it than Upa is

He tries to motivate you to train more often, hoping to help you get out of lazy bouts and to get stronger

You can imagine his surprise when he finds out just how crazy strong you really are when you need to be, and just how protective you can be

May or may not fall for you even harder knowing this newfound fact

He’s thankful you are indeed strong when need be, he was worried that your seemingly unwillingness to be otherwise would serve to put you in danger

Given his appreciation of strong people, the two of you make a good duo

🐒 Samon 🐒

When he first meets you, he wonders how someone so lazy and childish was able to land a job here at Nanba

Then again, Inori works here.. and that boar is the embodiment of Lazy, so he isn’t too surprised

After a while of being annoyed with having to remind you to do your damn job like he does with Inori, he winds up realizing he’s falling for you. Who’d have thought?

Eventually he just lets you off the hook with your lazy bouts, but to an extent. He wouldn’t want you to end up fired after all, so he still has to drag you about to do your work every now and then

Inori definitely complains that he’s more lenient with you than he is him, but he just gets whacked for it

He’ll keep an eye on you when you’re working in the same area as he is, just to be sure you’re doing what you need to and that you don’t slip up anything

Like Liang, he’ll have training sessions with you to help you become stronger, and to get your adrenaline pumping, so it’ll be a bit easier for you to work

He first finds out about your scarily strong and protective side when you end up helping him (Or more less being the one to) wrestle down an unruly and aggressive inmate

Have you always been this tough??

Needless to say, he’s impressed with your skills and strength

Although it doesn’t mean he’ll be any less lenient on making sure you do your job!

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tabellae-rex-in-sui · 3 years

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What is Robespierre Gay Purr-ee??? 😂

UPA'S BOX OFFICE FLOP "GAY PURR-EE"!!!

It's a 1962 animated movie about cats. Mewsette gets bored of her life in rural France and moves to Paris. Her boyfriend, Jaune-Tom, and his friend, Robespierre, chance after her and try to stop her from getting manipulated by the villain which... I think was a brothel owner?? Am I remembering that right??? I looked it up to double-check and, yeah, I'm right. So Jaune-Tom and Robespierre have to save her from... being sold to an rich American cat to be his "bride", holy shit...

That dark blue kitten on the right is one of the protagonists, his name is inexplicably "Robespierre". (I say inexplicably because most of the characters have a cat pun mixed into a common french name for their name, like Mewsette, Meowrice, or Reubens-Chatte but this little guy's just called Robespierre. Given UPA's liberal alliance, being born out of the animator's strike on Disney, and the founder's communist sympathies, I don't think naming a character Robespierre was a coincidence. Like, it's not relevant to the plot or character at all, it's just a random reference.)

He's a little shit but he's great. I love Gay Purr-ee, like all of UPA's stuff, it's really not given the credit it deserves. I mean Judy Garland was in it!

But it's weird to hear the cats address one as "Robespierre". That's not a common name. Example:

#ask #anon ask #duuude i need to see this movie again #that was the plot?? a cat sex ring???#Upa goes hard as always #VIVA UPA!!!!

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reimenaashelyee · 4 years

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Ask Me Anything: Finding Your Art Style

I get this species of art question so often that I now think it’s worth making a blog post to answer it (for posterity). The question usually goes something like this:

“How did you find your style of art?”

Which is a valid question. Unfortunately, this is a question with extremely vague and mundane answers. Note: these answers are very rooted to my particular development as an artist, though bits and pieces can be applied generally.

Answer 1:

Just draw. Yeah there’s really no secret to it – just keep drawing. All that practice will teach you what your eyes and your hands like, and what you like.

Answer 2:

Do a lot of studies – gesture drawings, anatomical studies, style studies, composition, etc. There are plenty of online gesture drawing tools listed on Google.

Observe life with your eye.

Experiment with different tools.

Take a closer look at drawings from artists you like and ask questions: why do you like it? What has the artist done to make that work appealing to you? Is it the lighting, the colour palette, the inking style, the way they stylise hands? Identify and pick up those elements and do your own spin on it. (This is different from tracing/copying, because you’re engaging in critical and analytical thought)

Find out your favourite artists’ influences and study those influences’ portfolio the same way as above.

Answer 3:

Consume art from outside your field and medium and genre. Film cinematography, theatre, set design, graphic design, packaging, music, physics, history, architecture, the list goes on.

Answer 4:

Figure out who you are as a person first, then artist. Find what you love and indulge in it, and put that love into everything you draw, no matter how little.

Answer 5: (specific)

I’ve always had my style since I was… 9? I rarely ever had anxiety over “finding a unique style”. What I would worry about, despite my strong artistic voice, was the immaturity of my skills – anatomy was trash, I didn’t know how to draw humans, some elements could be improved… which made sense cos I was a new artist. So between the ages 13 – 17 I really went in hard on Answers 1 to 4. I wrote a monthly journal cataloguing each thing I wanted to worked on, and I did exercises. And it’s helped a lot.

If you can can bother going through my Deviantart from the first art to the most recent one you can see the learning journey.

Growing as an artist takes a lot of time and a lot of effort. Avoid comparing yourself to artists your age group or younger who already have clocked in more hours, and avoid thinking it’s a difference of talent. It’s not. The difference between you and the other person is practice.

Answer 6: (specific)

But what is an artistic voice? I think it’s the essence of yourself – the way you observe and interpret the world – that can’t be helped. It shows as the little quirks that persist – maybe it’s a particular line style or a repeating motif or a colour palette.

For me, for example, I tend to stylise shapes and emphasise clear silhouettes, even when I attempt realism. This may or may not have influenced me into being a highly graphical illustrator. You won’t see me doing highly-rendered conceptual painterly drawings. That’s just not me.

Honestly I’d recommend not worrying about your artistic voice, or trying to force it out. An artistic voice is something that already lives within you. And if you say you can’t see it, that you don’t have it, it may just be an issue of self-confidence, rather than an issue of non-existence. You just haven’t reached the level where you can see it. And how do you get there? Answers 1 to 4.

Focus on expanding your foundational skills, critical thought and inspiration toolbox instead. Doing this will gradually build up your self-confidence. One day you’ll find that you have clearer eyes, and you’ll be able to look back and admire how much you’ve grown.

Answer 7 (specific):

Here is a list of my foundational influences – the ones that inspired me as I was developing my art. Chris Riddell, Shaun Tan, Emily Carroll, Dave McKean, Joann Sfar, Milt Kahl, Tadahiro Uesugi, Alessandro Barbucci, Tom Oreb.

Nowadays, my influences are all over the place. I don’t think I can point to one specific illustrator that majorly influences me anymore. From the top of my head:

40’s to 60’s stylised book illustration and animation. UPA animated shorts, JP Miller, the Provensen illustrators, Golden Book series, Soviet animation, 101 Dalmations.

Illuminated manuscripts from different cultures and history.

Early 20th century Japanese woodblock illustration and its 21st century descendent. Hamui Kawase, Tatsuro Kiuchi, Tadahiro Uesugi.

Rifle Paper & Co.

Wes Andersen.

Stop motion animation, especially from Laika.

European graphic novels (bande dessinee)

In Conclusion

Thematically, my advice is similar to the one in my Where Do You Get Your Inspiration? post — just chill, pal. Don’t force it. Engage in the world a lot. Do your thing.

This ‘Where do you find your style/inspiration?’ question has been going on since at least 15 year ago, but it definitely feels more urgent in this socmedia era of the internet with a rush to produce art that gets shared and becomes capital (social and financial). There’s a lot of pressure to come out with perfect and consumable art. Like Athena out of Zeus’ head. And it can look like you either need A Style, or have a particular genre of style, to be successful.

As someone who’s been drawing for more than a decade and has gradually become more professional, I can assure you what matters more is that you’ve a good work ethic and you love what you do. Your style, whatever it is, will become more clear as long as you put in the hours and the dedication.

Good luck with your journey.

------

I keep a semi-active blog if you want to read more thoughts from me about craft (like this), my work, life, and all the things that bother me. (https://blog.reimenayee.com)

#art #art style #long post #ask me anything #I am always looking for more questions to answer so hmu #if you want something more long form

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engekihaikyuu · 4 years

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Hyper Projection Engeki Haikyuu – The Strongest Challengers

2.5D! Interview Translation with Matsushima Yuunosuke and Kamisato Yuuki

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At last we bring Inarizaki High together! Please tell us how you felt when your casting was decided. Yuuki (Osamu): Because I had the chance to see Engeki Haikyuu before, I was very happy when I was cast. But at the same time, I was also really nervous about being a part of such an intense show, and I just remember having a lot of mixed emotions about it. I also really felt the sense of “challenge” standing together with Yuu. We’re the “challengers,” that’s exactly right. My feelings have gradually become more about tackling this challenge. Yuunosuke (Atsumu): I’m continuing my role as Miya Atsumu from the previous production, but even back then I was looking forward to getting all of Inarizaki together more than anything. So at first, I was mostly just really excited. Right now we’re still in the middle of rehearsals, but I just want to show the audience the show already! Everyone on Inarizaki are really individualistic, so I really want the audience to see that charm about us!

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Full interview translation and more photos under the Read More! Please do not repost my translations or scans

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Tell us your image of Inarizaki’s team personality. Yuunosuke: Well Karasuno always seems really energetic, don’t they? Compared to them, Inarizaki might seem much more calm. Yuuki: But, the basis for that is that we’re full of great individuals. We’ve got a lot of great characters in our team!

Among those individualistic teammates, where do the two you stand? Yuunosuke: I’m the one that pieces together everyone’s opinions and pulls the team along. We get a little too serious when we’re working ourselves to the limit, and at those times, Yuuki-kun always saves us at the most perfect moments.

Just like Osamu. You complement each other. Yuuki: That’s right. But we might have times when we’re the opposite. Whenever I mess up, Yuunosuke will tell me, “No that’s not how that goes,” and I feel like we’ve worked out a great balance.

What do the two of you like about Atsumu and Osamu? Yuuki: Osamu is always looking at the big picture. He watches everyone, and then leads them in the right direction... it sort of feels like he’s watching over them. He’s not reckless, he doesn’t needlessly dash about, he feels more like an adult, and that’s what I like about him. Yuunosuke: Compared to Osamu, Atsumu does feel more childish. He can be simple-minded or even naïve, but during a volleyball match, he becomes this person that pulls his team along, and that’s what I find the most appealing about him. He’s really aware of his team as a whole, he loves them, he sets the ball in a way that pulls out the best of everyone’s abilities... like a puppet master. I find that really cool.

Are there any ways in which you feel connected to your character? Yuunosuke: Oh for sure, several! Yuuki: I don’t particularly think about the specifics, I’m not trying to force anything, but at rehearsals there are times when I do have that feeling.

Since this is your first show together, I’m going to ask about that now. Has anything changed between your first impressions of one another to now? Yuunosuke: It’s totally different now! My first impression of him was that he was this really cool, calm guy. Doesn’t Yuuki-kun have that kind of face? (laughs) But he messes around a lot more than I expected him to. I also thought he was a really good person and a really fun person, and that part hasn’t changed. Yuuki: I don’t think my impression of him has changed much. In a good way. Since my first thoughts were that he has a really wonderful smile, and that he laughs easily, and that he talks a lot. Yuunosuke: I’m not like forcing myself to laugh or anything, okay! I laugh and smile because it’s fun.

Do you have any particular episodes from rehearsals where you got along really well? Yuunosuke: We joke around, and we play-fight. Like we’re arguing in a bit. Occasionally that might get serious. There are times when we make each other crack. But I think that if we honestly didn’t get along, that I wouldn’t be able to say anything about what I’m thinking or feeling. But I’m able to say anything I want to! Yuuki: I talked about this when we did this one interview shortly after I first met Yuunosuke, but I really want to learn to like the parts of him I dislike. I think now I’m able to do that. I don’t want to just look at the parts of him I like. Even if it means arguing, I want us to develop the sort of relationship where we can really communicate anything we want to say. That would make me happy.

Do you have anything about him you dislike? Yuunosuke: What!? I’ll fix it! It seems like there’s more than just one thing. Yuuki: That may definitely be true. (laughs) Yuunosuke: I’m scared!! (laughs)

Okay now we’re going to have you take a quiz.

Both are asked the same question, they’ll write their answers, and then we compare to see how they match. A test of their newfound connection.

If the two of you were brothers in real life, would you be the older brother or the younger brother? Yuunosuke: This one’s easy. Yuuki: Ehh!!

Yuunosuke: Younger! Yuuki: Younger!

Yuunosuke: I need a surprise mark somewhere on my head; is that a thing? (laughs) Yuuki: Let me be the younger brother! I don’t like being the older one, it’s tiring. Yuunosuke: Everyone is definitely thinking that Yuuki-kun is the older brother here! Yuuki: But I want to be the younger one. Yuunosuke: But, I’m the younger one? I’m the one that works you really hard.

Yuuki: That’s what I hate. (laughs) Yuunosuke: I wrote younger because I thought it would be nice to be Yuuki-kun's younger brother specifically!

Is there a food you have fond memories of? Yuunosuke: There is! I feel like if I don’t write this, Yuuki-kun will yell at me to stop messing around! (laughs)

Yuunosuke: Curry! Yuuki: Curry rice

Is there some sort of episode around curry between you two? Yuuki: It was the first meal we went out to eat together. Yuunosuke: That was when we first really became friends I think. After we paid our bill, I was the one who stepped out first... but then Yuuki-kun, in this loud voice in the middle of the restaurant, instead of saying, “Thanks for the meal!” said, “Good work today!” In that moment, I thought, this guy’s okay to mess around with. Yuuki: It was really yummy, and it just came out. But it wasn’t a mistake! It was just before the place was closing. (laughs)

If you could describe the Miya twins’ appeal or charm in one word?

Yuunosuke: They understand one another!* Yuuki: Strong *This obviously can be one word in Japanese, but not in English

Yuunosuke: That’s such a dumb answer! (laughs) Yuuki: It’s hard to pick a single word. I’m sorry. (laughs)

This is the last question. Kamisato-san, what is something about Matsushima-san that you would like him to fix? Yuunosuke: If I think about it, there’s probably a lot. (while looking at Yuuki writing) Aren’t you writing a lot?

Yuunosuke: Noisy Yuuki: Reckless

Yuuki: Did I get the kanji right for ‘reckless’? Yuunosuke: No. (laughs) Yuuki: At first I did think, “Even though we’re at rehearsals he really talks a lot... he is kind of noisy...” (laughs) But no, it’s when he’s being reckless.

But, when you add it all up? Yuuki: I do like him. (laughs) Yuunosuke: They had to make you say it though! (laughs)

Lastly, please give us your final thoughts as you head toward the curtains rising. Yuunosuke: The match between Karasuno and Inarizaki is a power balance, and I think it’s become something really worth seeing. Everyone has real strength, and we’re all having fun while playing volleyball. I think that if we have fun while performing, then the audience can have fun as they watch us, so we’re going to be moving lots, sweating tons, having fun, and doing our best without injury up until the very last show. I want to give it my all so that I can face the final show with a smile as I think to myself, “It’s all over.” Yuuki: This is a really marvelous show with acrobatic elements, so first and foremost I would like us to be careful and avoid injury. It’ll be team versus team, a clash of challengers, but as fellow players, every single one of us has someone that they consider a rival, and it’s a really interesting production. If it’s Osamu, his rival is Hinata, if It's Atsumu, it’s Kageyama. There’s a rivalry between captains and between aces... we depict every one of those stories respectively on-stage, so I would love for people to look forward to that. And lastly I want to be able to show us having fun playing volleyball. Together we’re going to dash forward toward the final show, work upa lot of sweat, and continue performing with enthusiasm and passion. So please look forward to it.

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See the original interview online here: (x)

Please do not repost my translations! This includes screenshots of bits and pieces taken out of context, especially if they don’t link back to this full post. If you appreciate the work I do for this blog and want to support my translation efforts please consider donating a ko-fi! (x)

#engeki haikyuu #hyper projection engeki haikyuu #haisute #The Strongest Challengers #miya twins #interview translation #translation #matsushima yuunosuke #kamisato yuuki #some very cute brotherly moments in this interview

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britishassistant · 5 years

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Building 5! Feat. Musashi and Tsukumo for good measure

I decided to practice drawing some of the inmates outside of Buildings 3 and 13 in order to get a better understanding of their faces and general builds for some upcoming drawings.

I like how Upa came out the most. He’s being pouty right now.

Qi is just trying to get his cellmates to calm down before they pick a fight with Hajime again.

Liang is beautiful, as always. I don’t get why his braid splits into two though...

Musashi was a good muscle study, and very helpful in realizing that muscles are HARD to draw. He is also, probably, the most pierced man in Nanba.

Tsukumo’s hair is just. Why. Why do you do this. It goes back, and then forth, and layers and argh.

I’m proud of the “nin nin” gesture though.

Upa, Qi, Liang, Musashi, and Tsukumo all belong to Futamata Shou. I just drew them.

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duhragonball · 5 years

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Dragon Ball 061

Goku makes it to the top of Korin Tower! This whole episode was surreal to me, because I knew this structure existed, and that it was located below Kami’s Lookout, but I never knew much else about it, other than the fact that Korin lived here. For example, the weird thing about this tower is that you sort of have to hop up to one of four holes to get into the main building at the top. To me, that sounds like the hardest part of this. Imagine climbing all the way to the top, and then you have to do some bullshit double-jump thing, like a video game or something. I couldn’t even screencap it correctly.

Goku makes it inside though. This is actually the lower level of the place. Korin’s bathtub is back there. I was about to ask where his toilet is, but... I mean, how could he not just go over the side? I mean, Bora and Upa are down there, but what are the odds of actually hitting either of them?

I’m just kidding of course. Korin has a litter box.

Goku notices some pots of waer, and inside he sees visions of his past, present and future. Well, Korin actually describes them as “his world as it is, as it was, and as it will be.” It’s kind of a semantic difference, but it explains why the “present” water showed him Bulma and Krillin in Master Roshi’s kitchen. That’s their present. Goku’s present in this moment would just be an image of him starting into a pot of water.

The “future” pot is naturally bizarre. A giant centipede comes out of the pot and wraps itself around Goku like a snake, and then he sees visions of most of his friends, Mercenary Tao, and then two new faces, which will eventually be revealed as Fortuneteller Baba and the masked fighter she enlists to fight Goku in the next arc.

Every time I see this, I always think it would have been awesome if Raditz had appeared in this sequence.

At last, Korin reveals himself. Turns out he’s a cat. Goku asks or the Sacred Water, but Korin isn’t too eager to give it to him.

Back on the ground, some villagers see a flier for Tao’s 20th anniversary sale. I’m pretty sure he drew that himself.

A couple of men see Tao walking around town and try to shoot him, no doubt to avenge someone Tao killed. Tao doesn’t even seem to notice them, but he kicks off one of his sandals just as the bullet reaches him. This somehow deflects the bullet, not at the shooter, but through his turban, and into his partner. The icing on the cake is that Tao’s sandal then floats over his shoulder, lands just in front of him, and he steps back into it without breaking stride. It’s insane. I wanted to gif it, but it’s too complicated a shot. Just goes to show that you have to watch Dragon Ball for yourself.

Returning to his hotel, Tao orders a raw egg from room service and boils it in his bathtub. That’s right, Tao bathes in boiling water. I remembered this scene, and wondered how he got that much water to boil in the first place, but it turns out he stuck his arm in the water first and did some sort of ki technique to heat it up.

Stuff like this is where filler scenes really work best. There’s no particular need to show what Tao is up to while he waits for his new clothes. The whole point of this delay is that he refuses to do anything until he can be properly dressed, which gives Goku time to prepare for their rematch. Toriyama wouldn’t have wanted to use precious pages on Tao eating dinner, but Toei could spare the time, and they found a way to depict these kinds of moments and make Tao look like an even more dangerous opponent than we already knew.

As for Goku, he’s got to go through a bunch of hassle just to get a drink of water. Korin reads Goku’s mind to find out what he wants the Sacred Water, then tells him he can’t have any. Then he points it out and tells Goku to go ahead and take it if it’s so important to him, but as soon as Goku tries, Korin zips over and takes it away.

Goku is confused and outraged by Korin’s behavior. He tries to take the water by force, but he can’t even get close to it. Korin is just too fast and tricky. On top of that, the air is very thin at this altitude, so Goku gets winded very quickly.

It’s hard not to feel bad for the little guy, even when you know what’s really going on here. He got his ass handed to him by Tao, then he climbed up this tower just to get a chance of doing the right thing for Upa, and now he’s getting humiliated by a kitty, and he doesn’t even understand why.

But I like the moral here. Goku’s a good person, and he’s determined to do a good deed here. That alone won’t win him this battle. He needs more than determination and a noble spirit to defeat Tao and wish Upa’s father back to life.

Goku asks Korin if anyone has ever gotten the Sacred Water before, and Korin reveals that one one person has, and that was 300 years ago. That man’s name was Master Roshi, and it took him three years to pull it off. Goku’s got a long row to hoe...

#dragon ball #2019dbliveblog #goku #korin #mercenary tao #commander red saga

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thenanbakacorner · 2 years

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Yesss new Nanbaka blog!! The anime is so underrated like smh— uuuuh can I get some headcanons as to how the Cell 8 guys each spend the night with their s/o? Like, what routine do they follow and what positions do they sleep in with their partner?

DANG STRAIGHT IT IS NONNIE, YOU SPITTIN' FACTS (｀-´)> Nanbaka always makes me crack up no matter how many times I hear the same jokes and 4th-wall breaks, its so gooooood!!

Anyways, here we go OvO Was a bit limited with ideas here but I hope you like!

🍑 Liang 🍑

He doesn’t particularly care for letting another person brush out his hair, but if you give him puppy eyes enough, he’ll make an exception

That and maybe it’s just hard to say no to you..

He’ll gladly brush your hair if you ask him, though

But have you seen this man with his hair down— dude’s freakin’ pretty

Shares some peach buns with you before settling down if he has any on hand that Rock had given him

Conversations as you lay together usually consist of the day’s activities, and Liang will likely take the opportunity to brag and try to impress you about any training matches he had won that day

If you and him hadn’t been dating that long yet, he can be a tad awkward with any intimacy given his lack of experience; be patient with him

As he gets more comfortable with closeness, he comes to find comfort in having you laying on him or having your head against his chest

You usually start out by being cuddled together with your head on Liang’s shoulder or chest, but separate into more comfortable positions in your sleep. IE, you sleep in the unraveling tangle position.

🧘 Upa 🧘

He’ll usually do some meditation before he goes to bed, and doesn’t mind if you sit beside and join him

If he hasn’t done it earlier in the day, he’ll water the cactus his family gifted him, or even let you do it (And berate Qi if he complains that you can do it and not him)

He tends to stay up just a little bit later than the rest of his cellmates, but sits beside you as you rest

Not much of a cuddly, touchy-feely parter, but might let you lay your head on his lap or lean against him if you ask

Can’t help but reach out a gently pet your head if you do rest against him, though he gets embarrassed his you call him out on it

Tsundere boy is a tsundere

When he finally does lay down to join you in sleeping, he doesn’t lay too close, but just enough to reach out and rest a hand on you so the two of you sleep in the chasing spoon position

You would have to be the one to initiate any closer contact, such as rolling around to face him and move closer

Even if he gets blushy and seems unsure about it, don’t be discouraged. He may not be very fond of cuddles, especially if they are constant, but he really can’t complain if its you.

💐 Qi 💐

Being as laid back and relaxed as he is, Qi is always the first to get in bed and ready for a snooze

However, he still has other things to do, like the others, beforehand

This includes looking through books about plants to contemplate new medicines, actually working on said medicine, pestering Upa about wanting to tend to his cactus..

But of course, he can’t forget about spending some time with you

Out of his cellmates, Qi is the most affectionate, tending to give you light kisses on the cheek or back of your neck and making loving comments as you get ready for bed

If he has to work on medicine before bed, he likes when you sit next to him, either just watching or helping him out

He loves just laying with you before actually going to sleep, facing you and running his hands through your hair, giving you a little kiss on the nose here and there as you talk

Speaking of facing you, the two of you usually sleep just like that— facing and holding each other.

Doesn’t take long for him to doze off once ready to sleep, and is out like a light in a matter of minutes, yet never lets up his hold on you

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shinygoku · 7 years

Text

OG DB Anime - Mini Thoughts

I wanna have a little moment for an Anime Retrospective before I advance on to Z! Not much took me by surprise, having read the mangas cover to cover beforehand, but the anime is another beast...!

The first draft of this post went on and on, so if you’re sufficiently interested in a more deep version of my regards to a particular arc, feel free to ask, but I’m not good at writing for too much at once lol

So! My likes, my dislikes and if anything much was changed by the anime~!

PILAF ARC

Pros: It gets things started, which is always nice. A lot of important characters are introduced, as well as several elements that’ll reoccur, like Kamehamehas, Oozarus and speculation on what the heck Goku is (even if it’s clearly a joke instead of foreshadowing!)

Cons: I’ve always felt that this is the weakest offering by Classic DB, the characters being much flatter and the filler being tedious padding. Some is necessary evils, you gotta start somewhere, after all, but the crass jokes don’t do anything to help out here. I hate the pinball episode as it’s 20 minutes of precious time wasted. Goku is lacking a lot of his personality outside the iconic scene where he meets Bulma, mostly being a food-charged punching machine.

Anime Changes? Pretty much just more filler. And Goku eats a hamburger instead of a meat bun? Curious.

KAME SEN’NIN TRAINING & 21st TENKAICHI BUDOKAI

Pros: This is actually where DB starts to find itself and take off. Seeing Goku and Kuririn grow is satisfying and Lunch is also added to the roster. Kuririn’s growth from resenting Goku to becoming his bro is excellent. The Announcer Man is introduced. The Jackie Chun vs Goku fight is great and helps establish how strong and tenacious that little monkey kid is. A rad insert song for the Budokai!

Cons: Still rather lowbrow, cringy humour. Half the characters in the 21st are joke gimmics who bring nothing but quick yuks. Or yucks, because Ew, man, I can do without some of this stuff.

Anime Changes? Roshi gets cockblocked many times in karmic ways. Giran and Namu are expanded in filler, which makes their presence a fair bit more interesting. I’d list Namu as a Pro, but sadly he only makes a couple of brief appearances going forward after this, but at least we do have this filler!

RED RIBBON ARMY (Part 1)

Pros: Goku adventuring solo and beating up the weird jerky soldiers who keep getting in his way. All of Muscle Tower and Hachan. Bulma forcing her way in and getting more than she bargained for. Goku, Kuririn and Bulma in the Pirate Cave. Arale in Penguin Village.

Cons: Blue makes for some very uncomfortable watching. I don’t particularly want to go into depth here but hoo boy is this homophobic. Also Silver is boring. You’re boring me!!

Anime Changes? Boring ass Silver filler and a brief moment where they make Blue a pedo as well. Urrgggghhh. HOWEVER! Also some nice filler with the Jingle Village crew. We get introduced to the man who made Hachan (Jinzonigen Hachigou / Artificial Human #8) who will get forgotten about during Z where some ugmo is the new Jinzo maker guy, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

RED RIBBON ARMY (Part 2)

Pros: All of it. Bora and Upa’s relationship! Tao Pai Pai being the first villain to actually be high stakes and also does it while being entertaining! Goku’s character development when he resolves to avenge Bora and wish him back to life with the Dragonballs! Karin-sama! Goku obliterating TPP and the RRA base! The image song! The Baba Miniarc! Jiichan Gohan!! The first time Shen Long revives somebody...!

Cons: Almost nothing, really, mostly that dirty joke moment with the invisible man lol

Anime Changes? All for the good, expanding the characters and training to give it more substance. Goku’s character growth is really highlighted and he goes from a tough, nice kid who happens into foiling evil into much more of the bringer of hope and justice! He makes a very clear choice here which is still present in the manga but the anime really performs it better.

TENSHINHAN SAGA & 22nd TENKAICHI BUDOKAI

Pros: The filler, which I like to refer to as “Purple Goke Adventures” is all high quality stuff, and even makes the bold move of introducing Tenshinhan (and Chaotzu) early to give us a taste of what’s to come, and what will change! The 22nd Tenkaichi Budokai is Fantastic, with much less dumb gimmicks and much more interesting fights, personal stakes, gorgeous animation and that sweet, sweet character development. Also, Yamcha gets a rad image song.

Cons: Honestly nothing much is coming to mind lmao. I’m not saying it’s flawless but the dirty humour has largely been shed by now. I will say that Namu shoulda been a featured character instead of New Randos we don’t give a rat’s ass for, but that’s a small complaint.

Anime Changes? Great exclusive content here, and also Yamcha listening to the radio for a lot of it. Lunch also beats dudes up while holding an ice cream cone, which is amazing.

PICCOLO DAIMAO SAGA & HEAVENLY TRAINING

Pros: You thought the shit got real with Tao Pai Pai? Well boy, the shit gets so much realer here!! Damn though, this arc goes hard in all the right places! We see Son Goku at rock bottom and higher than he’s ever been before, while also having an interesting side story focused on Tenshinhan. After all that, there’s a bunch of training Goku’s gotta go through, which makes him again much more compelling, as even though we’ve seen him do what no one else can, we also catch a glimpse of how much further there is yet...

Cons: Some animation and filler antics are a bit of a let down, though only in a couple of episodes. Nothin’ too big, mind you.

Anime Changes? Filler, almost all of it is really good! Of note is Goku and Yajirobe searching for the Super Actually Real This Time Magic Water, which makes Goku’s Massive Powerup feel a lot more earned (hey, if it’s poison does that mean he Zenkai’d into more strength?) and the training he goes through with Mr Popo, which shows how much of a noob he is on the grand scale and makes the stuff he does in Z more noteworthy and well deserved, too! Also I sure love the Back to the Future Episode~

PICCOLO JR & GOCHI ADVENTURES

Pros: Another lot of characterization and beautiful fights! Watching Goku vs Piccolo really reminded me of how many notes future fights in Z, most of all Goku vs Vegeta, would take from this. Everyone (who isn’t Chaotzu) gets some time to shine, even Yamcha! After the tournament, we get the adorable pair of Goku and Chichi on their five-episode quest to put out the blazing inferno on Frypan Mountain, which really intensifies my love for them as a couple~

Cons: Not a whole lot, really. It’s main crime is maybe not being quite as rad as the adventures 15 year old Goku was having. Also no insert songs. And the Gochi pacing as a little odd, poor Gyumao is stuck in the burning castle in each of the eps as Goku and Chichi meander about (not wasting time, but it’s very fetch quest-y) and I was honestly really shocked to see all of 3 minutes dedicated to their wedding! What?! We don’t even get half of an episode?! Even 1 more episode would have been a lot nicer, imo.

Anime Changes? All the Gochi content after the tournament, smaller character moments during the Budokai, too. We even get to see Piccolo saving a young boy from a poorly-timed clock falling (haha), before doing a dick move by squashing something or the other the boy had, but it foreshadows his eventual Heel-Face turning in a neat way~!

There we are, I hope this sums it up nicely~

Coming soon: The Liveblogging of the second half of the story!! Which has rather overshadowed this one lol

Obviously I’m looking forward to most of Z, but it’s still bittersweet to be done with DB. Even when I knew the plot beats seeing it all in order and high quality for the first time was wonderful! I’ll return to it, some time after I’ve consumed all of Z and GT too, so it may be quite a while anyway. Maybe watch other things to make DB feel more like coming home? I’m getting rather ahead here, my main point is that

💕 I LOVE DRAGON BALL!! 💕

#DB Liveblogging #Firefly's rambling

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fughtopia · 7 years

Photo

by John Steppling

“When the prison doors are opened, the real dragon will fly out.”

— Ho Chi Minh

“The anti-war left’s attachment to the anti-Assad narrative is based in a colonial mentality which presumes that Westerners have the right to determine the destinies of peoples residing in what was formerly known as the Third World. It is the same mentality that drives the criminalization of Black America, reducing mass incarceration and police murder to products of the innate criminality of Black people.”

— Danny Haiphong

This is the week that Arkansas began its planned execution of eight death row convicts in eleven days. The urgency for this accelerated schedule has to do with the shelf life of certain chemicals being used in lethal injection. Ironically the makers of these chemicals asked that the state of Arkansas department of corrections cease and desist using their product in ways these corporate manufacturers never intended.

Whether this is just optics I have no idea. But there is a palpable glee from the ghouls in the Arkansas correctional community at the opportunity to act as they have always wished they could. And to think the justification is the use-by date of a few gallons of tranquilizers. Trump supreme court appointee Neil Gorsuch immediately lifted stays that allowed the execution of the first man on this abbreviated death orgy. Lendell Lee was pronounced dead at 11:56 pm CT, April 20th, after turning down his last meal to take communion. He had spent over 20 years on the Arkansas death row. Among the other convicts scheduled for execution are a paranoid schizophrenic named Bruce Ward (also having spent twenty years on the Row) and Jason McGee, a brain damaged sufferer of bi-polar disorder who was sniffing gasoline at age three and an alcoholic at age six. A man whose childhood is so horrific that none of us can begin to imagine it. Another, also bi polar, Jack Jones, has severe hallucinations and has committed himself twice before his crimes took place. He was also the victim of repeated and violent sexual abuse as a young boy. Another, Kenneth Williams, has an IQ of 70. That means he can barely tie his shoes. Don Davis, another, was described by a doctor thus: “Don also endured a serious head injury, which, along with his ADHD and low IQ, likely lead to ‘double deficits’ in cognitive functioning.” Don’s IQ score was 69. Marcel Williams is another with a long history of sexual abuse (his mother pimped him out at the age of 12). He also suffers severe cognitive impairment. And then there is Stacy Johnson who is probably innocent. We know for certain he did not receive adequate representation as his trial.

One has to step back and look at the culture of the United States today. There are 2902 men and women on death row . There are over two million in custody. The U.S. actively participated in (and continues to do so) in the Saudi assault on Yemen. A military assault that destroyed this poorest country in the Arab world and left mass starvation and famine.

The U.S. is covertly (via, primarily, the CIA) funding various jihadists waging a war against the Syrian state and its people. At the same time the U.S. is pretending to fight the Islamic State, and has recently now sent more boots on the ground into Syria. President Assad does not want the U.S. there. The U.S. may have been complicit in some fashion with the alleged sarin gas attack (how many false flags does the U.S. have to carry out before the general public grasps that this is SOP for the agency).

The U.S. defense budget is over three billion dollars a day. The U.S. send aid to Israel (in the neighborhood os 38 billion, but it depends on how you count it, and in reality it’s actually even more than that figure), a state that is currently carrying out the incremental extermination of the Palestinian people. An openly apartheid state. A state run by fanatics and virulent racists.

The largest amount of military aid (weapons sales and training mostly) goes to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. But also to South Korea, to Australia, Turkey and Taiwan. And of course Israel. What do these countries have in common? Obedience to the U.S. is first. Second is their willingness to serve as sub contractors in the global war on the poor…er….terror. Right, the war on terror. Now in year 16. These countries are all very high on the list of human rights violators. Never mind. They are obedient.

Now, who is the United States targeting next for “humanitarian intervention”? The answer is Syria, North Korea and perhaps even Venezuela. And if the wet dreams of the Pentagon and the neo con policy wonks at the various NGOs in Washington come true, Iran. What do these countries have in common? They are disobedient. Have any of them attacked the U.S.? No. Of course not.

Margaret Kimberley, writing of Obama and Hillary Clinton’s assassination of Qadaffi…

“Their deliberate destruction of Libya was a war crime by all standards of international law. That country was just one victim of the American plan to eliminate secular governments in the Middle East. Under the guise of a phony “responsibility to protect” and with cover from organizations such as Human Rights Watch, American propaganda gave an atrocity the appearance of a humanitarian act. Now come reports from media and the International Organization for Migration that African migrants are being openly bought and sold in Libya. This practice would not be taking place if Muammar Gaddafi not been murdered by American backed jihadists in 2011.”

The U.S. list of supported fascist dictators is very long. A short list, though, past and present, includes Paul Kagame in Rwanda, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow in Turkmenistan, Rafael Trujillo in the Domincan Republic, Papa and Baby Doc in Haiti, Jorge Ubico in Guatamala (and Rioss Montt), Pinochet in Argentina and Mobutu in Zaire. I mean the list goes on and on and on. In El Salvador in the 80s, the CIA trained the death squads that savaged the country (google El Mozote). Or Indonesia…as Nicholas J.S. Davis wrote…

“In 1965, General Suharto seized effective power from President Sukarno on the pretext of combatting a failed coup and unleashed an orgy of mass murderthat killed at least half a million people. U.S. diplomats later admitted providing lists of 5,000 Communist Party members to be killed. Political officer Robert Martens said, “It really was a big help to the army. They probably killed a lot of people, and I probably have a lot of blood on my hands, but that’s not all bad. There’s a time when you have to strike hard at a decisive moment.”

You get the point. The U.S. currently helped put in power the Svoboda Party in Ukraine. The Svoboda Party are ardent admirers of Adolph Hitler. But such stuff should not stand in the way of Imperial ambitions, now should they?

“Svoboda’s cause was championed during the Maidan protests by Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, who egged on the crowds while standing under banners celebrating Stepan Bandera. McCain’s appearance was no accident. Since World War II, the Republican Party has been closely allied with pro-Nazi exile leaders from Eastern Europe. Many of them were recruited and paid by the CIA, and given secret legal exemptions to emigrate to the United States despite their history of war crimes.”

Jonathan Marshall

This was the brainchild of Hillary Clinton, then Sec of State and her undersecretary Victoria Nuland. It is worth noting again that America’s sympathy with Ukrainian fascism goes back to the end of WW2. Russ Bellant, in a book that is now forty years old, writes:

“During the rise of European fascism after World War I, some Ukrainian nationalist groups tied their hopes to fascism as an ideology, and then collaborated with Hitler and nazism in World War II. One Ukrainian nationalist group was the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) which split into two organizations: a less militant wing, led by Andrew Melnyk and known as OUN-M, and the extremist group of Stepan Bandera, known as OUN-B.

The Nazis preferred the radical nationalist OUN-B. During the German military occupation, the Ukraine witnessed terrible atrocities against Jews and other groups targeted by Nazi policies. The OUN-B organized military units that participated in these atrocities.

With the collapse of the Third Reich, many Ukrainian collaborationists fled their homeland. After the war, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists-Bandera (OUN-B), a clandestine group financed in part by German intelligence and led by Stetsko, accelerated its work in the West. A secretive group, OUN-B’s tracks are difficult to follow.

“You have to understand. We are an underground organization. We have spent years quietly penetrating positions of influence,” explained an OUN-B member who insisted on anonymity. The positions of influence under discussion were Reagan Administration appointments. All of the OUN-B’s key Administration contacts were through an organization called the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA), headquartered in New York City. ( )

The White House had looked favorably on the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, appointing its chairman, Lev Dobriansky, ambassador to the Bahamas in 1983. Dobriansky is a longtime ASC official.”

The U.S. employed Croatian fascists (also admirers of Hitler and legatees of Ante Pavelic) during the destruction of Yugoslavia. The tentacles of European fascism also seems to always intersect with the Catholic Church. From Franco to Cardinal Stepinac , to the various Royal houses of Europe, there are always connections with the Church. And the late Pope John Paul, himself an ardent anti communist and CIA asset, was embedded in these various lines of association.

But to stick with Ukraine for a moment,

“In 2004 it rebranded itself as Svoboda and dispensed with its SS imagery. Nonetheless, Svoboda’s new leader lauded the OUN and UPA for having resisted “Jews and other scum, who wanted to take away our Ukrainian state.” He was decorated by veterans of a Ukrainian Waffen-SS division and championed the cause of Ukrainian death camp guard Ivan Demjanjuk. His ideological adviser organized a think tank called the “Joseph Goebbels Political Research Center” in 2005.

Svoboda became the largest party in Lviv in 2010 and today enjoys strong influence at the national level. It has also extended its influence by allying itself with other far-right and fascist parties in Europe.”

— Jonathan Marshall.

Eric Draister wrote in 2014…

“In an attempt to pry Ukraine out of the Russian sphere of influence, the US-EU-NATO alliance has, not for the first time, allied itself with fascists. Of course, for decades, millions in Latin America were disappeared or murdered by fascist paramilitary forces armed and supported by the United States. The mujahideen of Afghanistan, which later transmogrified into Al Qaeda, also extreme ideological reactionaries, were created and financed by the United States for the purposes of destabilizing Russia. And of course, there is the painful reality of Libya and, most recently Syria, where the United States and its allies finance and support extremist jihadis against a government that has refused to align with the US and Israel.”

Remember, too, that John McCain and Nuland when they happily visited Ukraine to share photo-ops with the Svoboda leadership were well aware of the Nazi symbols everywhere.

Conn Hallinan ..also in 2014…wrote:

“Three months after the April ceremony, Ukrainians re-enacted the battle of Brody between the Galicia Division and Soviet troops, where the German XIII Army Corps was trying to hold off the Russians commanded by Marshall Ivan Konev. In general, going up against Konev meant a quick trip to Valhalla. In six days of fighting the Galicians lost two-thirds of their division and XIII Corps was sent reeling back to Poland. The Galicia Division survivors were shipped off to fight anti-Nazi partisans in Yugoslavia. In 1945 remnants of the unit surrendered to the Americans in Italy, and in 1947 many of them were allowed to emigrate to Britain and Canada.”

It’s all linked.

Central American and South American death squads all had (and have) links (every single one of them) to U.S. intelligence, the U.S. military, and the American Security Council. The majority were trained by the United States, in fact.

Back in the 70s in Uruguay, there were torture sessions conducted against homeless men by government and police in order to teach how to apply electro shock properly. All this under the supervision of U.S.Agency for Development — not even the CIA or military.

Alex Henderson writes of Paraguay…

“Gen. Alfredo Stroessner, who was in power from 1954-1989, was a strident anti-communist—and that was enough for the U.S., which pumped millions of dollars into his regime in the 1950s and 1960s and had a close relationship with the Paraguayan military for many years. Torture, kidnappings and other human rights abuses were common under the Stroessner regime, which authorized Pastor Milciades Coronel (who oversaw Stroessner’s secret police) to commit numerous atrocities. In 1975, Stroessner even listened on the phone while Miguel Soler, head of the Paraguayan Communist Party, was being dismembered with a chainsaw by Coronel’s policía secreta.

More recently, in 2016, our aid to the Philippines coincided with a brutal escalation of death squad violence orchestrated by President B.S. Aquino (a favorite of the U.S.).

The point is that there are clear positions that almost anybody (outside of the John McCains and Hillary Clintons and Donald Trumps of the world) should support. An end to war is first. And from that one arrives at the reality that far far far and away the leading purveyor of violence in the world is the United States. Almost no conflict in the world is not mediated by U.S. power, weapons, and money. Ergo, the basic default position has to be an end to U.S. state violence, both at home on death row in Arkansas (or anywhere) and globally against all other nations. I don’t care if people don’t like Venezuelian Bolivarism, or don’t like the DPRK, or Syria and Assad. It actually doesn’t matter. The fact is that the people of these nations support their government. They are not children. They can solve their issues if they have them. Remember, too, that the CIA has fomented more conflict and instability than any intelligence organization in history. To not support Assad against the Imperial war machine that is the U.S. is simply irrational to me. And to conflate or equate Russian involvement with U.S. involvement is politically immature at best. It is mendacious and venal and destructive at worst. When Danny Haiphong calls out Jacobin as the new faux left, he is pointing to this new crypto Imperialism. The same people who applauded the U.S. bombing of Belgrade are applauding the idea of removing Assad. The same propaganda is being employed. If one cannot remember back a decade, let alone forty years of U.S. destruction and war and assassination, then you are purposefully forgetting. Remember Vietnam? Cambodia? The wholesale destruction of Iraq? But Hollywood awards an Oscar to the obviously fraudulent White Helmets. Why? Because that narrative positions the white Western bourgeoisie as paternalistic world saviour. White people as the ultimate decision makers. For white America you are only supported if you give the appearance of abjection.In other words, *we* will help, but only if you recognise and acknowledge the need for our support. Acknowledge your debt. The western bourgeoisie do nothing for free. And moral debt is the best kind for others to owe you. This is the algebra of Imperial power. Resources, and western capital matter, too, of course. But the deeper implications, the *narrative*, is one of white superiority.

Assad asked the Russians for fuck sake. How bad does that make HIM? I mean I ask you. He accused NATO and the US of supporting jihadis and ISIS. No wonder Israel wants him gone, too. It is colonial and it mirrors globally a kind of plantation system. The Arab and Asian world are seen as colonial subjects. The West won’t forgive Mao for turning the perception of the Chinese into something that did not fit with Charlie Chan. Chavez upset the stereotype of banana republic *caudillo*. Dignity is not allowed the non white world.

The question is really how has it happened that the very worst most sadistic and venal people come to control so much of American power. How is it that people like Mitch McConnell or Asa Hutchinson or Jeff Sessions or Jared Kushner or Victoria Nuland or Samantha Power, or McCain or Lindsay Graham are in positions that wield actual power? The fact is that most Americans live in near desperation.

“…the 20 percent of Americans who enjoy college educations, have good jobs, and sleep soundly knowing that they have not only enough money to meet life’s challenges, but also social networks to bolster their success. ( ) The FTE citizens (that 20%) rarely visit the country where the other 80 percent of Americans live: the low-wage sector. Here, the world of possibility is shrinking, often dramatically. People are burdened with debt and anxious about their insecure jobs if they have a job at all. Many of them are getting sicker and dying younger than they used to. They get around by crumbling public transport and cars they have trouble paying for.”

Lynne Parramore

The above quote is from a piece reviewing a new book by economist Peter Temin. The slug line for the article is that for most America is now a third world country. And economically this is true. But its worse, actually. Culturally it is worse. When I’ve spent time in central America or India or North Africa or Mexico, I find a kind of creative spirit and community even amid the poverty. In the U.S. I don’t find that so often. I find the denuded landscape of American suburbia the most depressing on the planet. These are hostile areas of atomized and isolated individuals, with families that seem to hate each other and children already on the way to one or another personality disorder. It is a selfish and hyper competitive place with a populace frighteningly unhealthy and addicted to anti depressants. And yet this competition is for almost nothing. The real affluence is locked up and kept at a safe distance from the working class. And it is a racist culture. A profoundly racist culture. And I don’t find that in the same degree other places (with the exception of perhaps Poland).

While Arkansas prepared its death chamber for overtime usage, in the South Pacific there was a gathering of the rich and famous rich, including former president Barak Obama. The three thousand dollar a night resort was also hosting Oprah and Bruce Springsteen, Speilberg and Hanks. And most were staying on jillionaire David Geffan’s 135 meter yacht. I mention this because the distance between the life (and death) of Ledell Lee and that of the former President is almost unimaginable. And as I sit back and look at my native country I think, what kind of nation has leaders who frolic in Tahiti while seventeen executions are being carried out in something like a week? Carried out according to judgements made by one of the most racist and irrational penal and criminal justice systems in the world (one in 24 now on death row is innocent). Not a thought for the broken lives of the men sentenced to die an agonizing prolonged death that masquerades as rational. Veterinary pharmaceuticals are often used in a junk science death factory that feigns rationality. Not a word from the political class. Not a peep. These condemned men, all of them, suffered such appalling and bestial lives as children, subjected to such abuse, that most Americans would simply rather not know. There are good guys and bad guys. That’s what they say on TV cop shows.

When a populace can so wilfully ignore historical record, so impassively accept the naked propaganda of their own government, then one does wonder how long such a people can survive. Nothing was learned from the Korean war, nothing from Vietnam or Nicaragua, or Panama. Nor from Iraq and Afghanistan. Nothing. I remember millions on the street to protest the invasion of Iraq. Bush and his friends ignored this. But when Obama continued Bush policy the protests stopped. I’m not sure how deeply anti war those protests were, but certainly it is different today.

The so called ‘voice of the left’ is defending the removal of a secular Arab president, a man who won his last election with large majority mandate. A nation whose people have defended their country heroically. And yet the voice of the left know better. Let us help the poor Arab. Let us bomb sense into him. And I am sure there is a cell in the Hague awaiting Assad. Maybe he can have Milosevic’ old cell. Then he can sit for a decade as his health deteriorates (as happens with EVERY Hague prisoner) and fade from the collective American memory.

Just as the Arkansas death spree will fade from memory. The leaders of the U.S. express their contempt for the working class on a daily basis. Absolute contempt. They blithely steal and plunder what is left of the social welfare system. And few really complain. Certainly not enough. Why that low wage sector seem unable to identify their enemy — why they seem to worship wealth and not hate it, is a complex question for which I have no easy simple answer. Although what I most return to is the legacy of the Puritan founding of a slave owning society. America wants someone in the stocks. America is accustomed to having someone lower than them in the food chain. And this is why communism was so despised by the ruling class. Sure it was bad for business, but perhaps even worse, it granted dignity to the worker. It erased class. And that was too terrifying an idea for the captains of industry.

Obama stands as pivotal in poisoning the last remnants of real anti war resistance. He was a genius bit of casting. Genius. And now the only protests are about Trump’s taxes. Not about war, or the creation of famine, or about illegal assassination, or giant bombs dropped into populous areas as a sort of test drive for the new weaponry, or the enthusiastic support for Nazis. No, it’s about taxes. Because, you know, there might be a Russian connection, I guess. Whatever that even means. I have no idea. Except that again, America loves to hate its enemies. It’s easiest if they are Arab or African or Asian. A bit harder if they are blond. But Putin is Russian and Russia was communist. And communists are even worse than Arabs. This is a very sick and dangerous country. My country, though I no longer can live there. But I am a citizen. Sick and dangerous the way rabid dogs are sick. The way jackels are dangerous. But it has always been so. From day one.

John Steppling is an original founding member of the Padua Hills Playwrights Festival, a two-time NEA recipient, Rockefeller Fellow in theatre, and PEN-West winner for playwriting. Plays produced in LA, NYC, SF, Louisville, and at universities across the US, as well in Warsaw, Lodz, Paris, London and Krakow. Taught screenwriting and curated the cinematheque for five years at the Polish National Film School in Lodz, Poland. A collection of plays, Sea of Cortez & Other Plays was published in 1999, and his book on aesthetics, Aesthetic Resistance and Dis-Interest was published this year by Mimesis International.

#donald trump #barack obama #hillary clinton #anti war #death penalty #brutes in suits #syria #russia #war propaganda #amerikkka #nation of lawless nazi psychopaths

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duhragonball · 5 years

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Dragon Ball 074

Goku’s about to get hit with the Devil Might Beam! Which raises the obvious question: Huh?

Master Roshi explains the Devil Man’s ultimate attack while Toei provides a flashback. Well, not really a flashback, since Roshi himself isn’t in it. Maybe this is just a hypothetical situation? Anyway, we see Devil Man stepping into the sanctum of a Buddhist monk.

His eyes go wide when he sees the Devil Man do the pose for the Devil Might Beam. This guy looks pretty awesome. Well, get a good look at him, because he won’t be around much longer.

Then he gets hit with the beam. Nothing happens. At first...

According to Roshi, the beam amplifies the latent evil in a person’s heart, and increases it to such an extent that the victim literally explodes. Toei tried their best to illustrate this, and I have to give them credit for trying.

I’ll spare you the frame where he finally bursts from the pressure. Bulma hears all of this and concludes that if Goku explodes, he’ll die. What a mind. Anyway, this is why even Fortuneteller Baba is so worried about this move. She didn’t want Goku to actually die in this fight, which is funny because she was totally cool with Yamcha getting thrown into the acid swamp a couple of episodes back.

But it’s too late now. Devil Man fires at Goku and...

Yeah, nothing happens. Even Goku is mildly disappointed, since he expected some kind of damage after all of that hype. Everyone flips out, and I have to say: was anyone surprised by this? Goku can ride Kinto Un because he’s pure of heart. Is it not reasonable to assume that anyone who can ride Kinto Un would be immune to the Devil Might Beam? I’d be curious to see a character who can do one but not the other.

“Purity of heart” is one of the themes of Dragon Ball. Goku has it, and it lets him ride Kinto Un, survive this battle, and later on it supposedly lets him turn Super Saiyan. Chi-Chi, Arale, Upa, and the Ga-Chans can ride Kinto Un as well. Krillin can’t because he gave Roshi all those porno mags or something. Bulma can’t because she’s selfish, or some other thing. Meanwhile Goku’s killed a lot of people at this point. They were all Red Ribbon Army guys, but he still killed them, and I think he could have spared at least some of them. I just don’t get how purity of heart is supposed to be defined. We might assume it’s being childlike, but Goku isn’t particularly childish most of the time. Baba compares his heart to that of a child or an animal, so maybe the idea is that he’s like a monkey? That doesn’t seem right either.

Anyway Devil Man played his best card and it got him nowhere, so he whips out a pitchfork and tries to beat Goku that way. Guess what, that doesn’t work either.

Briefly, it looks like Devil Man manages to knock Goku off the platform, but he just goes under it and hangs off the other side with his tail.

Then he kicks Devil Man hard enough to drive his upper body through the wall, and that’s the fight.

So there’s just one more fighter on Baba’s squad, and it’s this dude. He asks Baba if it’s okay to fight in the outdoor ring, since it’s bigger and will give them a chance to fight to their fullest. Baba agrees.

Outside, the masked fighter whispers something to Baba, and she gets all excited when she finds out what this fight is all about.

So excited, in fact, that she forgot it was snack time. The ghost who works for her made a bunch of stuff like mosquito eyeballs and toad eyeballs and I guess someone couldn’t think of another body part to use in gross food. Looks like a nice spread, though.

Turns out this guy is no pushover, and starting out, he and Goku are evenly matched. This makes sense, because according to Master Roshi, Baba always used Devil Man as the final member of her team. So this guy would have to be better, and apparently he is.

But there’s more to it than that. Roshi recognizes the guy’s voice, though he can’t remember where he’s heard it before. And Goku likes the way he smells, which is an odd thing to say. So what’s this guy’s deal? Suckas gots to know.

#dragon ball #2019dbliveblog #goku #devil man #fortuneteller baba #master roshi #??????#fortuneteller baba saga

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vivianrstuff-blog · 7 years

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New Post has been published on Healthy Cooking Review

New Post has been published on http://healthcookingreview.com/how-to-make-super-tomato-soup-in-a-vitamix-pro-750-blender/

How to Make Super Tomato Soup in a Vitamix Pro 750 Blender

Hey everyone, Claire here from Raw Blend.

Today I'm going to be making for you, a SuperTomato Soup! We've had quite a few requests for this recipeso I got in the kitchen and threw something together and I hope you like it.

We're going to get started with 1 and a halfcups of water.

It's just room temperature, filtered water.

And then we've got 410 grams of diced tomatoes.

It's a bit messy! Luckily I'm wearing black.

And then we're going to put in 1 medium carrot,so I've just chopped that up and put it right in there.

We've got 2 fresh tomatoes.

I've just cut them in half as well just tomake it easier.

One of the key ingredients to a good tomatosoup is good tomato paste, so we've got just a tablespoon of some yummy tomato paste.

Just to make it extra tomato-y, I've got somesun dried tomatoes here as well.

I've got probably about 6 of them here, andthey've been soaking in oil.

So yummy – one of my favourite things to snackon.

It's kind of hard not to eat them as you'reputting them in.

and then in here, I've got about 120ml of coconut milk with a teaspoonof flax seed meal.

This is really handy to help thicken it upas well, if you don't want to use nuts or anything like that so, just a little tip.

You could always use chia bran – I don't seehow that wouldn't work either.

So that goes right in there – I might getmy spatula.

We've got half a veggie stock cube, pinchof cinnamon.

This is me so I put a whole dash, going fora while, because I do love cinnamon.

Another one of my favourite things is garlic.

When you're making a soup in the Vitamix,you're not really cooking it, so 1 garlic clove does go a long way.

I made the mistake of putting 5 in once becauseI usually do when I'm cooking it.

No one liked me the next day.

But I wasn't sick or anything so it was good.

Then I've got about a tablespoon of dicedonion or a quarter of white onion or brown onion We've got some fresh thyme here, so get thatoff the sprig.

The exact ingredient amounts are all on thewebsite – so don't be alarmed – I'm just showing you how it works.

Then we've got some oregano.

If you want, you can add some salt and pepper,but I think we're pretty good with those ingredients.

The tomato paste, the sun dried tomato, we'vegot the garlic, the cinnamon makes it really yummy – trust me, I add it to everything.

I've got the Vitamix Pro 750, with a bit oftomato juice on top of it.

Make sure your lid is locked into place, andI'm going to be using the soup setting today.

That's one of my favourite things about thepro 750, you've got these preset functions.

The soup setting – you just flick it over,and make sure it is on the soup setting.

Once that's done, it will turn off by itselfso if you do forget about it, you don't have to worry about it running all day.

Alright, let's go! I'll get my tamper ready, just in case, butI shouldn't need it.

Alright and we're done! So I open that up, and its a beautiful steaminghot tomato soup.

Tomatos are so important – they're rich inVitamin A, Vitamin C, Vitamin K, B6, folate, potassium, magnesium, so there's a very goodreason why you should be adding them into your diet.

I'm getting hungry now so I'm going to tryand eat this – pour it into my bowl.

There's plenty of soup to go around.

If you want to make it a nice chunky soup,feel free to add some corn, some white beans, but it's amazing how the friction of the bladesis what cooks this.

It's heating but there's no heating elementat all.

Just the friction of the blades and the powerof that Vitamix motor.

Happy Blending everyone! Click here to watch my new Banana Smoothierecipe.

I think you're really going to enjoy it andmake sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Happy Blending!.

Source: Youtube

#750 #a #Blender:#How #In #Make #Pro #SOUP #Super #to #Tomato #vitamix

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