Ok me realizing I first joined tumblr early 2012 in vocaloid fandom

Speed running through homestuck for a year. Then getting into persona December 2013. Which would then proceed to take over my life for the next like 9 ish years

Man.

Posing and Designing:

Almonzo, needed a poses which captured his extravagance and confidence, he is a statement, he is the moment.

Immediately my mind thought of salsa and tango dancing which has strong captivating movements that create a very dramatic atmosphere.

Above is the gradual evolution of Almonzo's pose which ranges from the direct inspiration of a salsa pose and then experiments with different arm positions afterwards. I only changed the arm positioning because I was very happy with the rest of the model's pose, I thought it exemplified the perfect amount of bravado that is exactly Almonzo!

The thinking behind me changing the arm positions was for purposes such as framing and further communicating his story. For example, If Almonzo were to stay true to the original salsa pose, he wouldn't really be communicating that he is a hairdresser, but more that of a dancer. So I thought it was the perfect opportunity for him to be posing with his hair equipment, one staple item is of course, hairdressing scissors! However, after observing him holding just the scissors I felt that he was a bit bland, he needed something else in the other hand to balance things out. That's when I thought of using a hairdryer! Not only did this end out working compositionally, but it also adds the comedy vibe I was going for in this story. In explanation, it is because the time period in which this story appears to be set in did not have hairdryers let alone electricity! Mixing the elements of the modern and old time world can be interpreted in many ways, nonetheless, in this case due to the odd proportions of the characters, this theme adds comical value!

Giving Almonzo an item in each hand enhances his story as a revolutionary hairdresser, making him look in control and authoritarian over his practice.

Now that I look at the final pose (at the top) I start to see a resemblance with some kind of pop star pose, particularly Freddie Mercury! This idea also contributes to his idolisation (as he is a prodigy hairdresser), and can have him be interpreted as the (pop) star of hairdressing!!!

After figuring out his pose, his design was much easier to get my head around. I wanted his outfit to be in line with his slender build (to add to his snootiness). However, I also wanted an element which represented his magnificence, as you may have observed from my previous silhouette post, Almonzo has a long coat which opens outwards into a skirt-like shape. Yet, as I was so content with my pose for Almonzo, this dress element had to go, I just felt that it simply did not work in this angle. It was then that I thought of substituting this empty space with a grand bow! Not only does this go well with his persona but also goes hand in hand with his hair stylist occupation! (Bows were ultimately on the brain because I had been looking at wig inspiration of the rococo era, which included many).

The ends of the grand bow would act as an illusion to the late coat tail fashions back in the day. An evolution of the bow tails can also be observed in the drawings above, initially they were relatively short; but after much consideration I thought that by accentuating their length and curl, the character of Almonzo would too be emphasized!

To top things off I decided to repeat the style of the grand curly bow in his wig, by having the bow tail shapes swirling out of his wig. This helps create balance and harmony throughout the design :)

As far as the rest of the design goes I'm still experimenting and contemplating...

Approaching Sun (29)

Author’s Note: Happy Halloween! Sorry this is so late everyone. I am currently writing my thesis for graduate college (the very reason why this chapter is not longer) and it has been sucking up ALL of my time in combination with Covid-19 face-to-face teaching and virtual teaching. In short, my life has been a walking list of “to-do’s” which causes me to neglect my writing. This chapter is dedicated to zeidika (hope you are reading this) who reviewed my story back in July. I occasionally think about your message and it keeps me going through stressful times. I hope your upcoming graduation is a memorable moment and that your son is doing well. You inspire me too! Congrats on the outstanding GPA! I am hoping to follow you soon with graduation!

Please let me know what you guys think. More action-packed chapters coming your way soon (hopefully).

P.S. While you are waiting on more chapters of A.S., go check out my new mystery/horror fiction story, “Beneath the Harlow Grove” by @anerdinallherglory on Wattpad.

Pairing: SasuSaku

Previous Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28

Chapter 29: A Generation of Weaklings

Sasuke blasted through a few too many red-dirt mountains in Kaguya’s core dimension. With every blast, he felt more like himself. Something chemical happened in his brain when he tunneled raw chakra through his veins; it helped him adopt the right mindset. Sasuke found that the quickest way to erase his thoughts was to surrender them to his shinobi persona who had to be focused. That chakra felt like a jolt to his nervous system, reminding him of himself and his shinobi goal.

Of course, now that he was less distracted, he found himself too depleted of chakra to do anything more than take a breather. Now that he was in the core dimension, Sasuke would have to adjust his plans. Previously, the Uchiha had been trying to cross into the desert dimension without going through the middle dimension. Now that he had jumped ship and escaped here by instinct, he was going to have to do this whole thing in reverse. Logically, his next step would have to be crossing into the desert dimension and then overpassing this core dimension directly to Kunagakure. All this would require a lot of chakra.

Just to speed up the process, Sasuke momentarily considered swallowing one of the chakra pills that he had swiped before his cold exit hours before into this dimension. It might be a good idea for experimentation purposes, but Sasuke knew enough about shortcuts to comprehend that chakra pills would do more harm than good, which is why they were typically reserved. It was best, the Uchiha decided strategically, to take the pill when he was at his chakra max, so he could ultimately top it off and have just the right amount to make the jump.

And besides, Sasuke just didn’t have enough time or chakra to experiment recklessly. He would get one shot to try it before he had to wait a significant amount of time for his chakra to replenish enough to try it again if he failed. Not to mention in what ways he would have to recover from whatever side effects he would suffer through from abusing the chakra pills.

Sasuke pinched his nose in concentration and tried his best to expel Sakura from his mind while he waited. And it worked just enough, for the most part…consciously—until he fell asleep that night and dreamt of her, his suppressed thoughts confronting him in his subconscious. He had developed a habit of dreaming about Sakura lately, so this wasn’t something new to him. His dreams of her usually involved her imminent death; an enemy threatening her life in a way that Sasuke was too late to prevent. This was the case. Usually. But something about that kiss earlier had unnerved Sasuke, transforming his instinctual focus on her from one of concern to one of…how would he describe it? Desire? Hope? Longing? None of those words seemed acceptable to the Uchiha; he hated to have to admit to any of those feelings even when dreaming.

In this dream, he was back in that damn medicine preparation room, glaring into Sakura’s green eyes after that unexpected kiss. But this time, instead of sensibly leaving, the Uchiha gave in to her desperate pleadings, taking her chin between his fingertips and bringing her mouth back to his. In this dream, Sasuke kissed her. Was kissing her frenziedly, hand suddenly twisting in the pink fuzz at the nape of her hot, flushed neck. Was, until a hand clamped firmly on his shoulder, jerking him abruptly back away from her. When he turned, Sasuke was face-to-face with himself. His conscious self vs. the subconscious.

When Sasuke woke, he laughed derisively as he realized he would always be the one to get in his own way in both reality and fiction.

“Good,” he said aloud to the airless dimension, suddenly frustrated for fantasizing about the opposite scenario of the one he had chosen. He hoped Kaguya, or others like her, somehow were able to hear him through this connection of dimensions. They would see just how determined he was to rid the world of them; how dedicated he was to protect those he loved. So much so, that he would sacrifice and surrender every aspect of his life to this goal.

Sasuke stood then, forming the hand sign to split the dimension in the space before him until raging sand materialized before his eyes. He decided he would just not sleep; not unless he was so tired that he wouldn’t even have enough left in him to dream.  

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Sakura was a quick learner. The medical ninja gave herself that credit at least as she imitated the slow intake and exhale of breath that professed sleep. This certainly wasn’t her first kidnapping. Half a year ago, Kido had done just exactly that and as soon as his posse realized she was awake, the show had begun. Sakura’s poison-trained system had finally started to break down whatever sleep-induced toxin Mako had spiked her drink with. With no conception of how long she had been unconscious, Sakura had become cognizant and immediately began to mimic an undisturbed state. This time, she was set on listening. This time, she would assess and strategically plan.

She had been waiting to hear the answer as to “why” she found herself in this particular situation as she was dragged, then hoisted over someone’s shoulder. For a blurry second, Sakura was taken back to her drunken episode several weeks ago when Sasuke carried her home after the medic had decided to deplete Tsunade’s alcohol stash. The only similarity between this state of stupor and that one was the pounding headache that made Sakura want to vomit. That was when memory caught up with her and she began to “act.”

She was exchanged from one shoulder to the next and Sakura realized suddenly that she had been carried by Mako up until this point--that bastard--and was being surrendered to someone else. She didn’t know the voice.

“Great job,” a guttural accent commended Mako for his successful abduction. Sakura planned on commending him herself once she regained the upper hand.

“Just shut up and walk,” came Mako’s voice, in a tone that sent shivers down Sakura’s spine. She had never heard him speak like that. How could she have been played by him this whole time?

Sakura began to second-guess her decision to pretend the longer that they walked. In cases of abduction, it was well known that a person’s chances of survival drastically dropped if the kidnapper succeeded in moving them to a second location. But Sakura thought of Isao, her patients, her coworkers, and even Sasuke and resolved herself. It was better for them if she could allow these maniacs to believe that they had got her. What they didn’t know, was that their mistake would be getting Sakura just far enough away from civilians where she could cause some real damage. She had handled Kido; she could take care of these two as well. Neither of them could have anticipated her other skillset; Mako didn’t know her well enough.

When they had dropped her not so gracefully onto her back an hour later, Sakura bit the inside of her cheek to keep from making a pained groan or facial expression to give away her performance. Other voices chimed in then, and Sakura realized her adversaries had just doubled.

“About damn time,” someone drawled as she was dropped. “You couldn’t have taken care of this sooner?”

There was some shuffling as her capturers arranged themselves in what sounded like a cramped space.

Mako announced: “She’s surprisingly resistant. Not to mention Uchiha’s been around just until recently.”

That particular statement wounded Sakura a little more than the fall she just sustained. Of course, this was all about Sasuke. She should have known. Kido had kidnapped her for this same reason: to lure in Sasuke, kill her in front of him so his eyes would change. Sakura was starting to get pretty annoyed with people trying to use her to get to Sasuke—as if she would ever let that happen. When would they learn that things weren’t so black and white? Mako’s previous statement the morning of her capture began to make more sense to her now: “Well, it’s obvious that he likes you. To be honest, I thought you were already a couple.” And Sakura cursed her mouth for confiding in him because now she identified his interest as a predatory investigation.

“Or maybe you just weren’t trying hard enough because you liked her,” came a response from a voice Sakura seemed to recognize for some reason. It was different from the rest—distinctively female. Sakura mentally raised an eyebrow at that fact.  

“Believe me, that’s not the case” came Mako’s defense. “Ashuwa just didn’t do the trick on a medical specialist as we had hoped.”

And then Sakura was cursing. Cursing a stream of silent words that wouldn’t do her any good to express verbally now that she was getting information. The bastard had even convinced her that Sasuke should take it. She thanked the universe for Sasuke’s non-allergic reaction to it.

“What ended up working?” came the female voice again, expressing honest curiosity.

“Tea and kindness,” Mako stated unemotionally, eager to move past the topic. “Now let’s get on with this.”

“Of course,” said the female again, tossing what sounded like clanging metal onto the floor at his feet. “You have been given a position among us as promised for your service. Welcome.”

Sakura couldn’t resist. She snuck a peek through the corner of her eyelashes at them then and did not like what she saw. She was in a small gathering room with a domed ceiling, one of the many adobe homes on the outskirts of the Sand Village. She had also miscounted by 1. There were four of them, an extra silent companion seated & leaning against the wall farthest from her, seemingly uninterested. In the same second, Sakura also noted that Mako had bent down to retrieve something she recognized, a headband with a foreign symbol etched onto it—the same symbol she had seen on the headbands of their assailants back at the Tanigakure lodge. She made the connection: these were the same ninja who had followed Sakura and ambushed her and Sasuke in the night. The ninja she had recounted to Gaara, who was supposedly on their trail. How did they manage to get past him?

Just as Sakura thought this, an unexpected thud came from the ceiling accompanied by the crumbling sound of sand. Quiet consumed them as no one moved. Sakura observed quietly as all ninja revealed their weapons in silence as if they were snakes quietly coiling back to strike.

The man in the corner nodded toward the door, and the ninja closest to Sakura’s head disbanded from the group and disappeared within a second. Once outside, the same ninja began swearing loudly at some surprise. Everyone in the room relaxed as a child’s vocal squirming reached their years. The shuffling continued as this child was being brought inside.

“Damn kid must have followed us!” the returning ninja said in annoyance. “Got some bite to him.”

If Sakura hadn’t been laying down already, she would have collapsed in shock and fear at the memorable voice of the child they had just apprehended and threw down next to her. “Get away from me!” Isao shouted, the boy swinging a kunai out in front of him. They laughed wickedly at the boy’s ferocity.

Okay, show’s over.

Protective instincts kicked in swiftly as Sakura successfully reached forward and stole the kunai away from the child in less than a blinking second. There were unanimous intakes of breath throughout the room as Sakura managed to get Isao behind her and compress the blade threateningly against the esophagus of the man who had touched the both of them—it all happened within a microsecond.  Sakura’s sudden revival activated the group’s defense and they were upon her, but she let out a snarl, drawing blood against the man’s throat.

They immediately stopped their advance when the man she had ensnared began to laugh, throat nicking against the knife as he did so. “Do it already,” he breathed through his laugh. “My death will be a part of this effort. It will only help us in our cause.”

Sakura was certainly tempted by that. The way he had roughly handled Isao seconds before with his colossal insensitive hands was like a fresh and bloody burn on her skin, painful and needing the immediate relief of this man’s execution. But something in his words froze her hand. A cause?

“Glad you are finally awake,” came Mako’s distinct tone, a vicious friendliness warming the words again.

“Shut up you liar,” Sakura spat viciously.

“If you let him go, we’ll tell you why we are going to kill you,” came the female’s voice, and Sakura flashed her angry green eyes over in the woman’s direction. Her face and hair were covered, and Sakura acknowledged the same black shemagh that had concealed her attackers in Tanigakure.

Fat chance, she thought. Sakura immediately assessed her chakra levels and was aggravated by how slow chakra was reacting to her body’s summoning of it. Mako was a fellow medic, and Sakura deduced that whatever he had given her had strategically messed with her system and chakra connection. Sakura mutely criticized herself for trusting Mako. How many times would she be tricked in her lifetime? Probably many more, but she would learn from them all. Oh well, she thought. She had had worse odds before. Her only additional complication was Isao because now she was responsible for herself and the 11-year-old boy who had pursued after her. Had he somehow witnessed Mako’s abduction of her?

It was at this moment that the woman at the front of the room began to take off her mask, and Sakura almost dropped the knife altogether. As the black wrap was loosened and it slumped around the woman’s neck, Sakura immediately recognized the face of Hisa, the female medic ninja who had been her assistant throughout Sakura’s entire stay in Kunagakure. Even Isao behind her, gasped when he saw the woman who had helped take care of him.

Sakura’s moment of surprise was all it took for the ninja she stood behind to reach his hand lightning-quick between his own throat and the kunai. He grabbed on to Sakura’s wielded wrist with his left hand and flung her forward over his shoulder. She mentally cursed as she went flying toward the forefront of the room, landing painfully into the opposite wall. She practically went through it, and the side of the adobe house collapsed around her. As she fell, Sakura realized that the brute force used against her revealed their intention to truly kill her. They weren’t planning on preserving her, let alone sparing her life.

Sakura had been launched farther than she initially realized because when she managed to rise from the dust and sand, she winced at the other consequences of her distraction that was now beyond reach. One by one, the villains stepped through the new door that Sakura had made, carrying Isao with them. In the next second, Isao was tossed to the sand, screaming threats and clutching at the thug man’s foot that suddenly pinned down his chest. When the beast applied pressure to the child’s sternum, Isao began to moan in pain.

The sight enraged her, and she broke her silence. “You’re wrong if you think this plan of yours will work!” she screamed at them. “I am nothing to Sasuke. Nothing to anyone, do you hear me?!”

All but the quiet man snickered in response to her declarations, but she continued, seething through her teeth.

“He will not come to save me! You will not get what you want by using me! Let the child go!”

“This isn’t about Sasuke,” replied the wraith-like man who came last through the shattered side of the building’s exterior wall. For the first time since her awakening, the still man walked to the head of the party and addressed her. “Neither is it about the Hokage, or even the Jinchurki. This is about you.”

The night suddenly seemed starless, dark, and void of all sound save the squealing wind. As the stranger spoke this truth, three of the other members flanked his sides before fanning out beside him like Tamari’s fan, creating a close-knit semi-circle. The phantom-like man stood casually in the middle, his face cloaked in the combined darkness of night and the face wrapping he wore. As Sakura looked closer, even this man’s eyes, the only thing that could be seen between the black fabric, seemed like depthless holes of nothing. This man reminded Sakura of a walking desert mirage, some sort of shadow demon hiding in human clothing.

Sakura gritted her teeth as her body instinctively begged her to flee. Isao’s need for her overpowered that. She would die before abandoning him.

“Me?” Sakura asked instead, revealing her honest surprise. “What do you want with me?” It was a trick, the kunoichi told herself. What could they possibly have to gain from killing her when much more powerful figures literally walked side by side with Sakura? There was nothing to gain besides Sasuke’s, Naruto’s, or Kakashi’s ultimate death, defeat, or capture.  

“Your efforts to fix the ‘mentally ill’ goes against the philosophy of our newly founded group,” came Hisa’s poison-dripped answer. Sakura noted that they all took a step toward her in synchrony, tightening in on her a little closer. This practiced pack was testing her and Sakura took a step back to match their own. She was smart enough not to let them surround her like the meal they believed her to be. Sakura felt suddenly empathetic for those mother animals who felt torn between their captured young and their own safety. Let them believe that she was this helpless observer who reeked with fear.

“And what philosophy is that?” She asked, imitating the breaks of a trembling in her throat. She practically seeped the question with distress. It must have had the effect Sakura wanted, for her enemies smiled in response and took another step toward her.

With an insanity that Sakura had not heard in his statements before, Mako declared emphatically, “Progression!”

Sakura couldn’t wait to punch his teeth so far down his throat that Mako’s vocal cords and epiglottis would permanently suffer damage.  

Sakura stammered again, portraying the weakness they wished to see. “Pro--progression?” Another step back. Just a little more.

“Whether or not it is your intention, you will create a shinobi generation of weaklings,” stated the leader again. He essentially breathed more darkness, because the night around her suddenly grew thicker. Was she imagining it, or could this be some sort of jutsu?

“How do you figure that?” she questioned, adding a nervous laugh to her annoyed tinged inquiry. Sakura’s exasperation with their reasoning was starting to make her focus waver.

As she asked, Sakura concentrated on her chakra. She was calling it, calling it, calling it, but it did not spring forth. She would have compared the sensation to drawing blood from a syringe, except her chakra was like liquified cement and the syringe was the size of a pen. If she chose to use it, the Strength of a Hundred Seals just might flood her chakra paths and burst through whatever plug the medicine had caused, or it could potentially well up like water in a dam and she wouldn’t have any access to it. Medically, that might be a concern. And it had only been a few weeks since she had last used her reserves to assist Sasuke crossing dimensions, so would the risk be worth the additional amount behind her forehead?

In an eerie declaration, the masked leader stepped toward her again and said, “If you go around curing the next generation of their anger and pain, brainwashing them with this vision of peace, there will be no more progression.”

“What the hell does that mean?” she asked, all pretense gone now. The confidence in her tone made them stop their encroachment. For a second, Sakura didn’t look so weak to them. They glanced at the leader, the shadow-man, and then again at Mako because Mako knew her best out of the group; he had also drugged her.

“The medicine should still be working. We must hurry though. It won’t last all night.” Listening to this, Sakura inhaled and exhaled, willing the small drip of chakra to pool more heavily in her palm. She would only have one shot before she could collect enough chakra for another one. Sakura took another step back. And another, drawing them away from Isao and his captor. Just a little more. Keep them talking.

“There is peace in the world now,” Sakura baited. “There’s no need for children to suffer through trauma alone anymore.”

The leader did not hesitate a second before responding with the practiced mission justification of their group: “Without anger, hatred, and pain, there is no incentive for war between villages. And without war, there is no need for young shinobi. You will create a generation of weaklings who cannot defend our borders. The world of Shinobi as we know it will disappear.”

Sick freaks, Sakura thought. She was their target because she worked with children? They were afraid that children would be weaker without pain? “The world would be a better place,” she commented, “if there weren’t people like you in it.” Sakura didn’t care to listen to this nonsense anymore. She hated to kill them, but they weren’t giving her much of a choice.

At exactly this moment, Isao had somehow reached into his pocket for another kunai, stabbing it into the foot that held him down. Apparently, the ninja had been distracted by the rest of the pack’s slow pursuit of Sakura and the conversation. Isao left his mark, slicing it clean across the top. The ninja screamed which turned the heads of all those before her. Isao bolted up before anyone had the chance to stop him.

On his feet now, he charged the group and Sakura watched in panic as the ninja he had left behind now followed, brandishing a sword of his own.

“Kill that brat!” came Hisa’s order.

And then Sakura was in the air, her fury propelling her forward and then down on top of them.

Mako let out a cry of alarm, the first to notice her above them. The kunoichi had just enough for one hit, and Sakura prayed the sand wouldn’t buffer too much of it. She fisted the meager amount of chakra between both of her palms, fingers interlocked to make a combined fist. She brought them down as hard as she could at their feet, making it through several feet of sand before she connected it with the ground. Sakura was not able to see the damage done, because not only did sand fill the air, but all light blinked out and a shroud of complete blackness consumed her.

Roommates in Disguise

Read the fic on Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19901668/chapters/47138743

Lance makes a hasty decision that lands him in the clutches of the Green Starling, one of the city’s most notorious super villains. Thankfully she doesn’t seem to know he’s actually her nemesis, the superhero Icebound. His captivity puts him in contact with Katie, a fellow college student. Concerned she may be targeted again, Lance befriends Katie. He doesn’t expect to end up moving in with her. 

Katie will do anything to find her family, that includes becoming a super villain to expose a Galra Corporation that has the city wrapped around its metaphorical finger. When Lance literally falls at her feet, claiming to be friends with Icebound, she jumps at the chance to find the connection between Galra Corp and the sudden appearance of super heroes two years ago, not long after her family went missing... 

Neither anticipate a friendship and a blossoming romance. 

Rated: T

Tags: enemies to friends to lovers, alternate universe - superhero, explosions, comic book level violence, experimentation, human lab rat, domestic fluff, roommates/housemates, Pidge is an anti hero, Galra are still the bad guys, action, secret identities, captured, companionable snark, collaboration

Art by @mybluelionlancylance. Look at it!

https://mybluelionlancylance.tumblr.com/post/186452499757/this-is-art-for-the-plance-mini-bang

Beta-ed by @whyamistillhungry

For @planceminibang

Myself and @fallen-angel-nightshade have worked together to provide ten chapters for your enjoyment! We’ll be posting once a day in alternating POV. I have Lance, she has Pidge. Watch for Nightshade’s chapter two tomorrow!

~~~~~

Lance wondered if heroes in comic books ever had bad days like this.

Not for the first time that day, or even week, Lance cursed his horrible luck. Dust gathered on his dress shoes as he ran desperately along the upended street. He loosened his tie for easier breathing, disoriented and light headed as he crashed into a mound of concrete that used to be part of the road. 

The meeting with his boss hadn’t gone well - he was epically failing his internship, though that was no surprise considering his absences and late assignments. There was no way they’d hire him when he graduated. 

If he lived to graduate in the first place. 

Well, at least he could try to save some people from today’s villainous rampage. 

Pausing for a moment's rest against the wall of concrete and pavement, he closed his eyes to construct peace and quiet as streams of shrieking bystanders raced by in the opposite direction of his travel, towards the center of chaos. There was no opportunity for him to hide and transform into his hero persona. Icebound would be able to traverse this trashed landscape with no problem, but he couldn’t give away his secret identity. His enemies wouldn’t give him any peace.

Enemies he never would have had, had he not been delivering lunch (with ice cream dessert, oh does he remember that ice cream well - all that awful stickiness!) to the Galra Corp building when the lab exploded. So of course he had ice powers. 

It wasn’t as easy as comic books made it out to be. Lance extended a wave of sympathy towards Clark Kent - but at least he had convenient telephone booths to work with. Lance liked to see what he would do in the age of cell phones.

A growing chorus of panicked screams rang out in the near distance.

With a deep breath, determination set in. He had to do something, or innocent people would get hurt. 

He heaved, pushing himself up and over a piece of raised road, making Lance grateful for all those years of gym class. He rolled over his back before sitting up on his knees, assessing the situation. 

A group of students from his university were huddled together, surrounded by strings of green-colored energy that emitted from three black poles embedded in the pavement.

His heart dropped into his throat. They were trapped, and the design and coloring of the contraption told him exactly who was behind it. 

A black spire impaled the ground next to him - it may have well struck through his heart with the way it skipped a beat. He screeched as it missed his arm by a hair’s breadth, forcing him to blunder backward. Elbows scraped against the concrete and he hissed in pain, though it was a small price to pay to avoid a head injury.  

Dread grew by the tick, perspiration trickling down his temple as he craned his neck upwards. Towering above him, the cause of the destruction sat atop her prized machine in a half-circle cockpit surrounded on all sides by control panels, the tall legs lifting her a full story above ground level.

“Well, what do we have here?” the Green Starling, or Pidge as he’d grown to know her, mused. Lance scooted backward but another leg of her octopod caught a piece of his nice slacks with precision and purpose, pinning him to the spot. “Not really who I was expecting to be running into danger.”

This was not the most ideal way to face one of the city’s most dangerous villains, Lance fretted. He wasn’t in costume, but he had to do whatever he could. 

Frostbite formed on his fingertips despite his racing heart. His chilly core begged for release to encase his body and unleash his full power. He had some access to his powers while not in disguise, but not enough to defeat the imposing sight before him. Worse, she’d learn his identity and Lance knew she’d take full advantage of it. Her hacking prowess had landed him in hot water before, mostly in the form of turning machinery against him; she’d find his name and address before he could get home. 

He curled in his cold fingers, hiding them on an otherwise warm and sunny day. “Let them go,” he pleaded, “they’re innocent!” He still had his words. She’d listened to him before - well, Icebound anyway - and left civilians alone. Lance was convinced she had a good heart. She just needed a reminder of it from time to time. 

Pidge rested her elbows on the machine’s console, chin sagging into her palm. The slightest of amused smiles teased on her lips and Lance swore there was a sparkle in her eye. “You’re playing hero - that’s cute.”

“Someone has to,” he retorted, perhaps a bit too quickly, though his heart pounded and he swallowed hard. “What are you even after?”

Pidge rolled her eyes, squashing his hope she’d listen to him. “I needed Icebound’s surrender yesterday,” she said. “I figured surely he’d come out with a mess like this. So unless you know where he is, I don’t have any use for you.”

Lance gulped. Oh if she only knew. 

Though, a sense of pride swelled in his heart that she’d focus on his meddling verses the other two heroes in the city. Not that they were a common sight and Lance begrudged the idea that, despite how irritating Flame-o Brain-o always managed to be, he wouldn’t mind a little help with hero work now and then to catch up with his civilian life.  

The attention to him specifically boosted his confidence and a smug grin tugged up the side of his face. Maybe he could use this to his advantage. 

“It’s your lucky day then!” Lance said cockily, despite being pinned down by a giant robot. “Why hold a bunch of people hostage, when you can just take Icebound’s best friend?” 

Pidge raised a critical eyebrow. “You?” she questioned, pointing a lazy finger in his direction. 

“Yes, me,” Lance responded, momentarily annoyed. Why wouldn’t he be a hero’s best friend if he wasn’t already the hero? He was an awesome friend! 

But a shallow argument wasn’t going to free the civilians. Lance closed his eyes and took a calming breath. He needed to swallow his pride and make her take this deal. “Take me hostage and let the others go,” he pleaded as sincerely as he could muster. “It’ll be just as effective, and you’ll only have one body to worry about.” He had no idea how he was going to free himself later, but as long as the students were safe, it was a risk worth taking. 

After a long moment of considering, Pidge pulled down definitively on a lever. Two thick cables snaked down from either side of the machine. Lance fought his instinct to retaliate as they wrapped under his arms and around his chest, pulling him into the air helplessly. He gripped the coils for some sense of security as he was hoisted to the villain’s eye level. 

Without prompting, she released the students. They scattered and scrambled in all directions. Lance breathed a sigh of relief.

“For your own sake, I hope you’re telling the truth,” Pidge said ominously as she turned her vehicle and moved towards the suburbs. “Because if Icebound doesn’t show up for you, I have plenty of use for you in my lab.”

“You actually have a secret lab?” Lance perked up, his voice rising steadily in alarm. The methodical movement of the machine was making his stomach twist about. each step it took jiggled him about in the smooth coils and it felt like he could slip out if he doesn’t hang on with all he had, legs dangling uselessly a story above the ground. 

He forced a laugh that didn’t feel entirely humorous, keeping a weather eye on how far away he was from the ground. “I never pegged you for being the ultimate villain stereotype.”

Pidge raised an eyebrow at him.“We only just met and I’ve done nothing but hit the super villain checklist.”

Oh right. He couldn’t mention any of their past meetings in costume. He laughed nervously. “Icebound tells me about you all the time. He says you’re the smartest and most creative bad guy he knows.” Add a wink to the compliment, wiggle the raised eyebrow - be irresistible. 

“Flattery won’t save you from my death ray if you’re lying.” Her threat was so monotone that it sent a chill up his spine faster than ever. So much for flirting his way out of this.

Their ride took an extra heavy stomp and he slipped down, scrambling to catch hold of any part of the coils that might offer more grip. His belly button was left exposed, shirt riding up his stomach.

Maybe, if he’s lucky, one of the other two heroes would find him before he’s forced to reveal his identity to Pidge. 

Urgh. Getting saved by Flame-dude would suck. 

Bookshelf Briefs 5/19/20

After-School Bitchcraft, Vol. 1 | By Yu Shimizu and Kazuma Ichihara | Yen Press – Afterschool Boobcraft would be a better title for this supernatural romance about Ririki, a ditzy high school student who accidentally discovers that her chemistry teacher is a sorcerer. Though Ririki quickly realizes that she, too, has hidden powers, nothing about her giggly, helpless behavior suggests that she’s competent enough to tie her own shoes, let alone cast a spell. Renji, her teacher, is even less of a character, defined primarily by his brusque demeanor and perma-scowl. Anyone reading for plot will find the the crude, obvious fanservice irritating, while anyone reading for fanservice will find the series’ pedestrian efforts at world-building an unwelcome distraction from the parade of costume failures and panty shots, all of which are drawn in salacious detail. Not recommended. – Katherine Dacey

Animeta!, Vol. 3 | By Yaso Hanamura | J-Novel Club – Miyuki Sanada is making gradual improvement as an inbetweener, though she’s been told that if she doesn’t pass the key animation exam within a year, she’s fired. Meanwhile, her fellow new hire, Maria Date, seems to be leaving her in the dust, is actively campaigning to take her place with the prestigious Studio 7, and gets invited to enter a character design contest by the big boss. I appreciate the sports manga feel this rivalry evokes, but the most compelling part of Animeta! for me is the plight of Yuiko Fuji, the inbetween checker who once tried to become a key animator but had no flair. She’s amazing at her current job, but seeing new talent getting promoted over her is tough. This series has really grown on me, now that its been fleshing out its characters more, and I reckon I’ll stick with it for the long haul! – Michelle Smith

A Certain Scientific Accelerator, Vol. 10 | By Kazuma Kamachi and Arata Yamaji | Seven Seas – Last time I said the cliffhanger was chilling, this time that extends to much of the book. The Index series has usually been too concerned with action and harems to get into pure horror, but its spinoffs have no issues with it, particularly this one. Cannibalism of a scientific sort continues to be the norm here, with our tragic villain continuing to be sympathetic. As is Yomikawa, possibly the nicest character in the whole Indexverse. For those who aren’t reading this for nice, the good news is that Accelerator is back in action by the end of this and ready to beat villains up while continuing to state what a villain he is. Index fans will enjoy this, though may also be creeped out. – Sean Gaffney

Cocoon Entwined, Vol. 2 | By Yuriko Hara | Yen Press – Yes, it is still tempting to review these volumes by just saying “hair” and being done with it. I mean, the start of the second volume seems to be narrated from the POV of a former schoolgirl’s hair, which is now made up of the uniform of our heroine. But there is a bit more to it than that, as we cycle back a bit and get more insight into the mysterious Hoshimiya, whose hair drifting down in single hairlets (hairlets?) continues to be an emotional gut punch for most of the school. There’s also discussion of traditions, why they’re kept and when they might have to be broken for the sake of moving on and fixing things. It’s quite an emotional drama. And rest assured, it’s filled with hair. So much hair. – Sean Gaffney

The Golden Sheep, Vol. 3 | By Kaori Ozaki | Vertical Comics – The third volume of The Golden Sheep is its last, and while it was nice that the four friends at the center of the story ultimately resolved their differences, it all felt rather too easy and anticlimactic. I did like that Yuushin finds purpose in striving to achieve enough independence to live with the stray kitty he rescued, though. (It is an extremely cute kitty.) The volume is rounded out by a twisted short story called “Love Letter” in which an unborn soul chooses to be born to a teen runaway and ends up dying from neglect, but loves its mother so much that it opts to return to earth in any guise that allows it to see her, including another cute kitty who soon meets a tragic end. It left a weird taste in my brain. – Michelle Smith

How Heavy Are the Dumbbells You Lift?, Vol. 3 | By Yabako Sandrovich and MAAM | Seven Seas – The first volume it was the fanservice that got my attention. The second volume it was the advice on keeping fit. And in this one it’s the comedy that’s really reaching out to grab you, taking the series in places I was not expecting it to go, like turning the main girls (including their teacher!) into a muscle-bound idol group, something that is impressively different but goes over like a lead balloon. Zina has fit in well with the others, and moreover she knows Satomi cosplays, so can cheerfully use that for blackmail. There are also hints that romance may come into this series—Hibiki has always been attracted to Machio when he’s not bulking out, but there’s a suggestion that her feelings may run a bit deeper than that. That said, I expect comedy to prevail. This is fun. – Sean Gaffney

Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 14 | By Aka Akasaka | Viz Media – The first half of this book is almost all dedicated to Kaguya and Shirogane finally, finally, confessing—not through words, but through actions. It’s the payoff everyone has been waiting for, and it’s handled perfectly. The second half of this book then drags it all back to hilarious comedy, with the chapter about Kaguya french-kissing Shirogane being the highlight of the volume and possibly the series. Of course, there’s the question of where do we go from here—Kaguya ends up breaking her brain so much over this that she reverts to her old icy persona, and there may be a new love triangle developing around Ishigami. So don’t stop reading just because Kaguya got confessed to—there’s still plenty more fun. – Sean Gaffney

My Hero Academia: Smash!!, Vol. 4 | By Hirofumi Neda and Kohei Horikoshi | Viz Media – The gag series has caught up to the main storyline, or at least wants to avoid the Overhaul Arc, so for the most part this volume is original material. Sometimes that’s good—the author shows a surprising taste for very dark character-based jokes when they want to, including one with Todoroki talking about his mother that made me gasp. There’s also a parents’ day again (it goes a bit better than the one in School Briefs), which allows us to see parents we forgot existed, like Uraraka’s mother. That said, there’s also a sense that the series is starting to get a bit tired. The next volume is signposted to be the last, and that’s a good thing. Go out while you’re still flying high. – Sean Gaffney

Nori | By Rumi Hara | Drawn & Quarterly – Born in Kyoto and currently based in New York, Hara has been creating comics for about a decade, but Nori is Hara’s graphic novel debut. The volume has its origins in a series of self-published mini-comics which earned Hara multiple award nominations. Nori collects six short tales of varying lengths which feature the adventures of the titular Noriko, an imaginative three-year-old, and Hana, her grandmother and caregiver. Except for a surprise trip that takes Nori and Hana to Hawaii, the stories are largely set in Osaka in the 1980s. All of them are incredibly charming. Hara effortlessly blends mythology and legends with the characters’ day-to-day lives and Nori’s fantastical imaginings. Some of my favorite moments are Nori’s interactions with older kids—some of whom really aren’t sure what to do at first with a precocious toddler hanging about as they explore the natural world together. Nori is an undeniable delight. – Ash Brown

That Blue Summer, Vol. 4 | By Atsuko Namba | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – Rio Funami is a Tokyo girl who’s been sent, along with her bookish little brother, to stay with her grandmother in the countryside for the duration of her 40-day summer vacation. She’s fallen in love with a local boy named Ginzo Izumi, who initially rejected her, believing they belonged in different worlds and valued different things. However, as time has gone on, Ginzo has come to see that’s not true. In fact, Rio seems enraptured by the village he calls home and understands the calling he feels towards graphic design while simultaneously feeling obligated to stay and take over the family liquor store. This is more than just a generic romance—it’s about passions versus practicality and finding reasons for joy in any situation. I’m enjoying it a lot and isn’t that cover a beauty? – Michelle Smith

Yowamushi Pedal, Vol. 14 | By Wataru Watanabe | Yen Press – The race that would never end has ended! And yes, our hero manages to capture first place, The first half of the book is really fantastic, showing off how good the author is at wringing drama and emotion from every last meter. The second half pales in comparison mostly as it’s setting up the next chunk of book, though seeing Onoda suddenly fail so hard simply as his mentor has left (transferred to another country) is poignant, and I suspect he needs another race or two before he can get back into form, so I expect more failure. Oh, and Kanzaki shows up briefly to remind us she exists and also help the core team get new bikes that work to their strengths. Still excellent shonen sports. – Sean Gaffney

By: Ash Brown

Red Tornado

“In one day, I've gone from being only one of my kind...to being a member of one very, very bizarre family.” - Red Tornado

Real Name: John “Reddy” Smith

Aliases:

Ulthoon

Tornado Champion

Gender: Male

Height: 6′ 1″

Weight: 325 lbs (147 kg)

Eyes: Green

Hair: Bald

Powers:

Aerokinesis

Android Body

Weaknesses:

Vulnerability to Fail-Safe

Vulnerability to Reprogramming

Base of Operations: Happy Harbor, Rhode Island

Universe: 

Earth-One

New Earth

Parents: T.O. Morrow; father

Marital Status: Married (Kathy Sutton; wife)

Citizenship: American

Occupation: Adventurer

First Appearance: Justice League of America #64 (August, 1968)

Powers

Aerokinesis: Red Tornado's true form was a powerful entity composed purely of violent wind forces. His android form channeled these forces through his arms and legs to produce bursts of cyclone-force winds and high speed forward velocity.

Air Blasts: Can project his whirlwinds at over 350 mph from each arm. His winds are said to level a building in seconds.

Deflection: Also is able to deflect approaching objects with ease.

Flight: By channeling these cyclone-force winds through the lower part of his body, he can fly at incredible speeds or hover in one place.

Force Field: able to circulate the high force winds around himself or an extended area to protect himself and/or others from attacks and flying debris.

Invisibility: Red Tornado used his high-velocity movement to render himself invisible to unaided human vision.

Tornado Creation: He can create tornadoes and twisters with destructive winds.

Android Body: Red Tornado's body has been enhanced and improved upon over the years.

Computerized Brain: Tornado's brain processes at a rate as fast as multiple computers.

Enhanced Senses: One of his brain's processes allows him to enhanced his audio and visual sensors.

Resurrection: If Tornado's body is somehow destroyed he can reinstate his 'soul' into a new body.

Self-Sustenance: Tornado, as a robot, doesn't need to eat, sleep or even recharge. He can survive in space and underwater without an issue.

Superhuman Strength: As a robot, Tornado is super-humanly strong.

Superhuman Durability: Tornado has an incredibly durable body, he has survived multiple gunshots, tornado pressure and blows from superhuman opponents.

Regeneration: Red Tornado is now able to almost instantly regenerate any destroyed part of his body.

Weaknesses

Vulnerability to Fail-Safe: There is a fail-safe device in RT's neck. When struck there with enough force he will shut down.

Vulnerability to Reprogramming: Red Tornado is susceptible to being mechanically reprogrammed as well as controlled.

History

Red Tornado is an android created by Professor T.O. Morrow and inhabited by the air elemental known as Ulthoon.

Pre-Crisis

In the beginning there were two tornado entities that originated from the planet Rann in the Earth-One universe. These were the good and evil personalities of the air elemental Ulthoon. Ulthoon confronted Rann's adopted champion, Adam Strange, and was subsequently defeated twice, the second time with the help of the Justice League. Following that defeat, Ulthoon contemplated the nature of good and evil, and decided that good was the superior force. Since the evil personality still wanted a say in things, Ulthoon split into two entities, the Tornado Champion and the the Tornado Tyrant. The Tornado Champion decided it needed to fight evil, even when it was its other self. It imitated the entire Justice League and attacked the Tyrant, but was defeated. Disheartened, the Tornado Champion lured the Tyrant to Earth, where the Tyrant was defeated by the real Justice League of America. The Tornado Champion decided that there was little satisfaction in being an imitation, and journeyed to Earth-Two in an attempt to find a new identity.

The Tornado Champion came upon the criminal T. O. Morrow, who was creating an android with which to infiltrate and defeat the Justice Society of America. When the Tornado Champion learned that the android was called Red Tornado, it couldn't resist the urge to assume control of the android and become a hero. There was a short-circuit during the merging and the Tornado Champion's memory was erased. The Red Tornado android awoke as a new life-form.

Believing itself to be the original JSA associate by the same name, Red Tornado visited JSA headquarters and announced its return to active duty. The JSA of course did not not recognize the android, but allowed the Tornado to accompany them to prevent a theft at a nearby museum. Through a series of mishaps choreographed by Morrow, Red Tornado seemingly killed the JSA members. Red Tornado then tracked Morrow to his lair and seemingly defeated him. When the remaining JSAers arrived to investigate, a booby-trapped weapon felled them all. Morrow then traveled to Earth-One, where he defeated the JLA as he had the JSA before them. Red Tornado, recovered from his previous injuries, followed Morrow and revived the JLA. The JLA and the android then defeated Morrow and uncovered a method to revive the JSA back on Earth-Two. Morrow confessed that Red Tornado was his android construct, but the JSA still admitted him as a member in good standing.

When the mad Star-God Aquarius attacked Earth-Two, many JSA members were captured and sealed in a magical bubble as Aquarius phased Earth-Two out of existence. Red Tornado escaped to Earth-one and contacted the JLA. The JLA disregarded the android to tend to their own affairs, ultimately hearing him out two weeks later. When they realized the JSA's dilemma, the JLA members quickly journeyed to the Earth-Two universe, defeated Aquarius and returned Earth-Two to normal.

Red Tornado often felt he was an outsider in the JSA, and that he was not appreciated as a sentient, independent organism. When he stumbled across the Creators monitoring Earth-Two, he sought to impress his colleagues by defeating the aliens single-handedly. Instead, Red Tornado was captured and used as a conduit to bring Earth-One and Earth-Two together. The JSA defeated the Creators and rescued Red Tornado, but his easy defeat and manipulation left Red Tornado more dejected than ever.

During the 100th meeting of the Justice League of America, the JLA was summoned to Earth-Two to assist the JSA in defeating the Iron Hand, a sworn foe of the Seven Soldiers of Victory. The Iron Hand had created an orbiting energy weapon shaped like a hand that threatened to crush Earth-Two. Doctor Fate summoned a being known as the Oracle, who informed them of the Iron Hand's last defeat, which cost the life of one of the Seven Soldiers of Victory. The JLA and JSA split into teams and rescued the members of the SSV, who had been scattered throughout time. The SSV helped the other heroes created a weapon that would destroy the Iron Hand's device. The Crimson Avenger's partner Wing died using the device years ago, and whoever used this one to destroy the hand would also die. Red Tornado took the device and destroyed the hand while the other heroes argued over who would go. Red Tornado was seemingly destroyed by the resulting explosion, but survived and was catapulted to the Earth-One universe. His body was repaired, and he eventually joined the Justice League, where he finally found acceptance.

However, the Tornado's adventures with the League caused him to repeatedly be destroyed, such as when he sacrificed himself to help defeat the alien villain Nekron. He was later reassembled once more under the control of the Construct in a plot against the League. After he defeated the Construct and regained control, he decided to take a human secret identity as John Smith. He met Kathy Sutton at the employment agency where she worked and they became close. He later adopted Traya, an orphan from the Middle Eastern nation of Bialya Traya, and they formed a makeshift family. He formed friendships with his teammates, particularly new recruit Firestorm.

Eventually, T.O. Morrow returned as two individual personas, the Future Man and a replica of the original T.O. Morrow body, this one equipped with an advanced battle suit. A conflict with the latter Morrow caused the Tornado's android shell to rupture, the Tornado Champion/Tyrant's merging with the android body was revealed. Red Tornado soon regained his body and gained renewed confidence in now knowing he was truly a sentient being.

Post-Crisis

During the Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Tornado Champion was again separated from his android host body, becoming an air elemental by the Anti-Monitor. The Anti-Monitor used him as a weapon against the combined might of both the Justice League and Society.

After the Crisis, the Red Tornado/Tornado Champion retained his air elemental status and became the personification of a force of nature along with Swamp Thing and Firestorm. The Red Tornado, like the Swamp Thing, used his newfound responsibilities to act as a protector and advocate of nature.

Air pollution had an adverse effect on the Red Tornado/Tornado Champion, driving him half-mad and into conflict with Firestorm in The Elemental War. Eventually, Captain Atom and Firestorm calmed him, and Firestorm manufactured a new body shell for Red Tornado. During this time he joined the Leymen, and experienced major malfunctions. As his body malfunctions grew worse, he nearly lost his humanity. Over time, the original Red Tornado personality began to re-emerge, and slowly, his emotions and humanity as well.

Upon re-establishing his abilities to move properly and communicate, the Red Tornado re-established his connections with the Justice League and the regular super hero community. He served as an advisor for Young Justice, and as an auxiliary member of the JLA. During this period, he attempted to renew his relationship with his former girlfriend Kathy Sutton and Traya. While he did not succeed in fully reuniting with Sutton, his adopted daughter, Traya, has readily accepted the Red Tornado into her life, regardless of his appearance or state of repair. Because of Traya's attachment for the Red Tornado, Kathy allowed Red Tornado regular visitations and contact. Over time, he resumed his John Smith identity and re-established their romantic relationship.

Infinite Crisis and 52

Red Tornado was one of the heroes recruited by Donna Troy to fight against the menace in space during Infinite Crisis. Red Tornado was destroyed by a stray Zeta Beam signal. Posthumously, a Red Tornado speaker embedded in Mal Duncan's chest replayed a warning message for his comrades that he was still alive and said "It's coming! 52! 52!" The message meant that, prior to his destruction, Red Tornado witnessed the rebirth of the multiverse.

Red Tornado's torso ended up in the Australian Outback, where it was found by a small group of Aborigines. The head ended up in the auto shop of mechanic Johnny Warrawa, who built a new body for it from junkyard scraps. Although malfunctioning, Red Tornado fought against a group of Intergang enforcers trying to evict a tribe of Aborigines from their shanty town. He was destroyed with only his head remaining; someone used the head in a contemporary art sculpture. T.O. Morrow later bought the head in an Internet auction. He wanted to discover its secrets, but Rip Hunter came for it. He combined it with his Time Bubble to navigate safely into the restored universe.

One Year Later

Green Lantern was able to gather all of Red Tornado's parts and the Justice League had him fully repaired by Will Magnus. His soul, however, was convinced by Felix Faust, posing as Deadman, to enter the body of a recently deceased copy of the villain Multiplex and experience life as a real human. He retained his powers in this new body as John Smith, and returned home to a joyful Kathy and Traya.

While learning to be "human", John sensed something was wrong. His hand would not stop shaking hand. John attempted to confront Deadman at Boston Brand's grave; the Phantom Stranger appeared and informed him of the impostor who had tricked John into switching bodies and to follow his fate. Following Magnus' signal, Red Tornado stumbled upon Professor Ivo's hideout, along with Black Canary, Green Lantern and Arsenal, who had also been tracking Red Tornado's stolen shell. After battling multiple Tornado androids, they learned that the mastermind behind stealing Red Tornado's body was an uncommonly intelligent Solomon Grundy. Grundy used Vixen's stolen totem and Amazo programming to gain Ivo's immortality. Ivo helped because he wanted to die as much as Grundy wanted to live. The plan was for Grundy to use the Red Tornado shell as armor so that he would never die again. Unfortunately, the body woke up too soon thanks to the Amazo chip inside it. It thought it was John Smith and took off to claim Kathy and Traya. Black Canary, Green Lantern and Red Arrow left to join the rest of the League to fight Amazo. Red Tornado tried to join them, but Grundy kept him behind.

Grundy revealed that by having John transferred into a human body, he was locked in and could die permanently if Grundy killed him. Grundy also caused the body Red Tornado took to be weak- the hand tremors that John experienced were just the beginning. John fought, but his powers began to wane as he grew weaker. TO demoralize him, Grundy tore off Red Tornado's arm and swallowed it. With his last bit of strength, Red Tornado accelerated his whirlwinds to hurricane force and snapped Grundy in half.

The League defeated Amazo and came back to help John, who was dying. He asked Kathy to have the League put him into one of the defeated android bodies. Zatanna lifted the spell trapping his soul, thus allowing Red Tornado to again be able to inhabit this android shell upon "death". Although he was offered the chance to keep the various enhancements implanted by Ivo, Red Tornado got rid of them, joining the Justice League of America with his usual array of powers.

Red Tornado lost this body almost immediately, as there was a trace of Amazo programming still there. The League destroyed the body and this time put his soul into the League computer until they could build him a better body, free of bugs. He proposed to Kathy while in the computer and she accepted. After the League successfully fought another Amazo iteration, they repaired Red Tornado's body yet and put him back inside. He immediately took a leave of absence, presumably to marry Kathy and spend time with her and Traya.

Fun Facts

One quarter of the Anti-Life Equation was stored somewhere within the shell of Red Tornado. The other quarters are apparently held by Earth's other three Elementals, Naiad, Swamp Thing, and Firestorm.

Red Tornado is also known as Tornado Tyrant of Rann, Tornado Man Dreaming.

Red Tornado may have an extremely resilient body, but it is in no way invulnerable. He has been broken many times before, and can no doubt be broken again.

Wildfire of the Legion of Super-Heroes revealed that his containment suit was built out of the Red Tornado's robotic shell. Whether this is true or not has yet to be confirmed. Before returning to the future, Wildfire cryptically says to Red Tornado "Fight what's inside you, John. Fight it."

How to Audit Your Website for Improved SEO and Conversions

What Is a Website Audit? A website audit is an examination of page performance prior to large-scale search engine optimization (SEO) or a website redesign. Auditing your website can determine whether or not it’s optimized to achieve your traffic goals, and if not, how you can improve it to increase performance.

When was the last time you gave your website a checkup?

How strong is your website? Grade it using HubSpot’s free Website Grader. If you’ve never before audited your website, it’s been a while since you have, or you’re planning a website redesign in the near future, use this post as your go-to website audit checklist to make sure your website is primed for maximum SEO and conversion results.

Keep in mind that in most cases, you’ll probably want to pair up with someone with a technical brain for this, whether that be someone in your in-house IT department or an outsourced party.

The Benefits of a Free Website Audit Before we dive into the things you should be keeping an eye out for as you’re auditing your website, let’s review some of the benefits of doing one. Here are some of the top benefits from a marketing perspective:

Website Performance Optimization Website audits usually evaluate a site not only for its content, but also for its technical performance.

As a result, an audit will give you a chance to inspect the robustness of your website’s technical framework and infrastructure, assess how friendly your website is to search engines, and determine how easy it is for users to navigate and intuitively find content on your website.

Search Engine Optimization By conducting a website audit, you’ll be able to identify any missed SEO opportunities and remedy any misguided or poorly executed SEO pitfalls (e.g. keyword stuffing, exact match anchor text links, etc.) throughout the content of your website.

image It will also allow you to re-focus your SEO efforts on users first and search engines second. This will safeguard you from constantly chasing changes to search ranking algorithms, meaning you won’t be applying misguided practices just to show up in the top of the search engine results pages (SERPs).

Conversion Rate Optimization Thirdly, website audits enable you re-evaluate the effectiveness of your website in terms of lead generation and conversion. As a result, you’ll be able to spot any previously overlooked opportunities to convert visitors into leads so you can add relevant CTAs, as well as identify deficiencies in your landing pages so you can optimize them to boost conversions.

As you can see, assessing both the content and technical aspects of your website will open up opportunities to drastically improve the traffic and conversions your website generates.

The 4 Assessments to Make When Auditing Your Website Let’s talk about how to pursue each of the three benefits above, and what you should specifically be checking for in this four-part website audit.

But first, enter your website into HubSpot’s Website Grader – this will give you a general overview of your website’s strengths so you can gauge your focus on each of the assessments that follow in this article.

Homepage of HubSpot’s Website Grader, giving site owners a website audit of their domain’s strength

How’d you do? Got an idea of which website audit benefits you need the most? Here we go.

1. Website Performance Assessment In the first part of your website audit, you should be focusing on how users navigate your website – from your homepage, to blog posts, to landing pages, and any related content in between.

Make a list of the pages on your website and ask yourself the following questions to evaluate them for optimization opportunities:

Is Your Website Optimized for Maximum Usability? The more visitors you can attract to your website, the more opportunities you’ll have to generate leads and, ultimately, customers. But only if your website performs well.

As I’m sure you can imagine, just having a website does not guarantee results. As part of determining the overall efficiency of your website, your audit should check to make sure your site is designed with your visitors in mind. The design and overall navigability of your website should correspond with what a person would come to the site to seek out, such as more information on a business-related topic, resources, product/pricing information, testimonials, etc. This will largely depend on your individual business.

The main goal here is to make it easy for people to get to the information they’re looking for. As a result, you’ll likely see conversion rates improve on their own.

To audit your website for usability, consider the following:

Are all the main value propositions of our business easily accessible via our main navigations/menu items? Do we have a simple yet intuitive website design and page layout? Make sure pages aren’t too cluttered; littered with ads, CTAs, or links; or void of internal links altogether. Are your conversion paths and/or shopping cart or checkout processes intuitive? Are there a ton of distractions along the way that could be creating friction for your site visitors? You might also consider doing some user testing with members of your target audience to ensure you’re effectively surfacing the content they’re looking for, and that they find it easy to navigate to the parts of your website they’re interested in.

How Is Your Website’s Overall Speed? Are there excessive page sizes and/or long page load and server response times? Does your site go down frequently? Site speed can be impacted when image files are too large or HTML and CSS needs to be cleaned up, all of which can drastically improve your site speed.

Ultimately, fast-loading and optimized pages will lead to higher visitor engagement, retention, and conversions. To quickly check a web page’s load time, download MozBar, a toolbar by Moz that you can attach to your browser for simple page analysis every time you visit a website.

2. SEO Assessment Optimizing the performance of your website is crucial to holding onto visitors, but the above question isn’t the only one you should be asking. You should also audit the content you’re publishing to ensure it’s actually solving your visitors’ problems.

Is Your Website Content High Quality? As you evaluate your content for quality, think about it from your target audience’s perspective. Did this information leave me satisfied? Did it answer all of my questions? Does it give me all the resources relevant to this topic? Do I know what to do next?

Keep in mind quality content should appeal to the interests, needs, and problems of your buyer personas; be interesting and well-written, provide valuable, thorough and detailed information about a particular topic; and leave the reader with next steps (such as calls-to-action, links to resources, etc.).

If you’re still not sure if your content is high quality, evaluate it with this checklist:“ How to Tell if Your Marketing Content Is Actually Valuable.”

Is Your Website Search Engine Optimized? Make sure all your web pages are following on-page SEO best practices. To audit your content for on-page SEO, conduct a keyword analysis in which you do the following:

Consult your analytics to review keyword performance. Which keywords are giving you the biggest gains in traffic and leads? Assess how well you’re factoring keyword performance into your content strategy. How much relevant content are you adding to your website to target those keywords? Review basic on-page SEO elements like URLs, page titles, meta description, and copy. Make sure keywords are included where relevant. To help you conduct an on-page SEO audit of your content, read the “Step-by-Step Guide to Flawless On-Page SEO,” which also includes a free downloadable on-page SEO template to keep you on track.

3. Conversion Rate Assessment While high-quality, search engine optimized content is a great way to boost your traffic numbers, it’s what happens once those visitors are on your website that really counts. Unless of course, you don’t care about conversions (ha!).

Is Your Website Optimized for Lead Generation and Conversions? This is where optimized calls-to-action (CTAs), marketing offers, and landing pages play a major role in the performance of your website. Not only do they offer you opportunities to capture visitors’ information so you can follow up with leads, but they also keep your visitors engaged with your content and your brand.

To audit your website for maximum conversion potential, ask yourself the following questions:

How many marketing offers do I have in my content arsenal to gate behind landing pages? Do I have a variety of marketing offers that appeal to all my different buyer personas? Do I have any landing pages/conversion forms on my website to begin with? How optimized are those landing pages? Do I have conversion opportunities for visitors in varying stages of the funnel? Am I using calls-to-action effectively? Am I missing opportunities to include calls-to-action on various pages of my website? To learn more about CTA selection, check out our post, “ How to Select the Right CTA for Every Page on Your Website.”

4. Technical Assessment Once you’ve addressed the three primary goals of a website audit, it’s time to loop in a developer or someone from your IT department for a technical evaluation. You could also hire an outside agency – just be sure to do your homework first.

Keep in mind that there may be some carry-over from the three assessments above – website performance, SEO, and conversion rate. The technical evaluation, however, addresses all three to maximize the user experience (UX).

Here’s what you should be looking for in the technical assessment stage of your website audit …

Is Your Website Design Responsive? Does your website have a responsive design? Meaning, is it a mobile-friendly website? The usage of smartphones to access the internet is only growing. As of 2017, mobile devices account for half of all web page views worldwide. As a result, websites must be compatible with that growing demand.

For more on mobile compatibility, check out our “Ultimate Cheat Sheet for Mastering Mobile Marketing.”

Is Your Website Error Message Free? Are response code errors popping up all over your website where there shouldn’t be any? Calling out 302-, 404-, and 500-level response codes can be useful to tell users that something’s wrong.

However, having this happen is also an indication that someone isn’t cleaning up broken links and, as a result, leading users to dead ends. Find those error messages and clean up your broken links. Tools like Google’s Webmaster Tools or Xenu’s Link Sleuth can be very helpful for this.

Are Your Website URLs Optimized? Does your site have URLs of excessive length due to keyword stuffing? Do they contain session IDs and/or include tons of dynamic parameters? In some cases, these URLs are difficult for search engines to index and result in lower clickthrough rates from search results.

Learn more about SEO-friendly URL syntax practices in this helpful post from Search Engine Land.

Does Your Website Have Too Much Flash or JavaScript? Identify areas of your navigation that are entirely Flash or JavaScript. Search engines have challenges reading and accessing these, which could prevent your site from getting indexed.

Furthermore, these elements present problems from a usability perspective. Visitors are often looking for a very specific piece of information when visiting your site; if they have to sit through a 10-second visual introduction before they can find your hours of operation, you’re going to have a pretty frustrated visitor on your hands.

Is Your Site Structure Optimized for Search Engines? We already talked about site structure as it relates to accessing content and usability for users, but it’s also important to make sure your site structure is optimal for search engines. If pages on your site are not internally linked to from other pages on your site, those pages are less likely to be indexed.

Learn more about effective site structure for SEO in this Moz article.

Are You Defining How Your Web Pages Are Crawled and Indexed by Search Engines? This can be done through various methods that include everything from robots files and tags, to sitemaps. These measures are a way for you to guide search engines toward your website’s most useful content.

Robots Files or Tags The robots meta tag lets you utilize a granular, page-specific approach to controlling how an individual page should be indexed and served to users in search results. These tags should sit in the <head> section of a given page.

The robots.txt file, on the other hand, is a text file that allows you to specify how you would like your site to be crawled. Before crawling a website, search engine crawlers will generally request the robots.txt file from a server. Within the robots.txt file, you can include sections for specific (or all) crawlers with instructions (“directives”) that let them know which parts should or should not be crawled.

Public and XML Sitemaps Your website should also have public and XML Sitemap files. The public sitemap is one that users can access to review the pages of your site, like the index of a book.

The XML Sitemap is for search engines to review pages that get added to your site, all in one place. The usual location of a sitemap.xml file is www.domainname.com/sitemap.xml. The XML Sitemap is something every website should have; it offers an opportunity to tell Google and the other search engines what pages on your site you want to be crawled and indexed.

While search engines don’t guarantee they will abide by your sitemap, anecdotal evidence has proven time and time again that XML Sitemaps help provide insurance that your pages are found, and found faster – especially if your sitemap(s) dynamically update your new web pages.

Are You Defining Canonicalization of Content? The canonicalization of your website content is the final major technical consideration to make. To gain more control over how your URLs appear in search results, and to minimize issues related to duplicate content, it’s recommended that you pick a canonical (preferred) URL as the preferred version of the page.

You can indicate your preference to Google in a number of ways. One such way is to set the Canonical Tag (rel=“canonical”) in an HTTP header of a page. Be sure to have someone check that the Canonical Tag is properly implemented across the site by making sure it points to the correct page, and that every page doesn’t point to the homepage.

It’s important to establish an audit framework early on. Ask yourself questions ideally centered around gauging “How am I doing?” These questions may also include things like, “How does this compare to others, especially my competitors?”

Website audits aren’t easy, especially if you’re not totally tech-savvy. For additional resources, check out this article by Distilled, which highlights a list of tools to use as you conduct your technical audit; as well as this complete site audit checklist by SEER.

I also recommend passing the Google Webmaster’s Guide along to anyone implementing this kind of work.

How to Audit Your Website for Improved SEO and Conversions

What Is a Website Audit? A website audit is an examination of page performance prior to large-scale search engine optimization (SEO) or a website redesign. Auditing your website can determine whether or not it's optimized to achieve your traffic goals, and if not, how you can improve it to increase performance.

When was the last time you gave your website a checkup?

How strong is your website? Grade it using HubSpot's free Website Grader. If you've never before audited your website, it's been a while since you have, or you're planning a website redesign in the near future, use this post as your go-to website audit checklist to make sure your website is primed for maximum SEO and conversion results.

Keep in mind that in most cases, you'll probably want to pair up with someone with a technical brain for this, whether that be someone in your in-house IT department or an outsourced party.

The Benefits of a Free Website Audit Before we dive into the things you should be keeping an eye out for as you're auditing your website, let's review some of the benefits of doing one. Here are some of the top benefits from a marketing perspective:

Website Performance Optimization Website audits usually evaluate a site not only for its content, but also for its technical performance.

As a result, an audit will give you a chance to inspect the robustness of your website's technical framework and infrastructure, assess how friendly your website is to search engines, and determine how easy it is for users to navigate and intuitively find content on your website.

Search Engine Optimization By conducting a website audit, you'll be able to identify any missed SEO opportunities and remedy any misguided or poorly executed SEO pitfalls (e.g. keyword stuffing, exact match anchor text links, etc.) throughout the content of your website.

It will also allow you to re-focus your SEO efforts on users first and search engines second. This will safeguard you from constantly chasing changes to search ranking algorithms, meaning you won't be applying misguided practices just to show up in the top of the search engine results pages (SERPs).

Conversion Rate Optimization Thirdly, website audits enable you re-evaluate the effectiveness of your website in terms of lead generation and conversion. As a result, you'll be able to spot any previously overlooked opportunities to convert visitors into leads so you can add relevant CTAs, as well as identify deficiencies in your landing pages so you can optimize them to boost conversions.

As you can see, assessing both the content and technical aspects of your website will open up opportunities to drastically improve the traffic and conversions your website generates.

The 4 Assessments to Make When Auditing Your Website Let's talk about how to pursue each of the three benefits above, and what you should specifically be checking for in this four-part website audit.

But first, enter your website into HubSpot's Website Grader -- this will give you a general overview of your website's strengths so you can gauge your focus on each of the assessments that follow in this article.

Homepage of HubSpot's Website Grader, giving site owners a website audit of their domain's strength

How'd you do? Got an idea of which website audit benefits you need the most? Here we go.

1. Website Performance Assessment In the first part of your website audit, you should be focusing on how users navigate your website -- from your homepage, to blog posts, to landing pages, and any related content in between.

Make a list of the pages on your website and ask yourself the following questions to evaluate them for optimization opportunities:

Is Your Website Optimized for Maximum Usability? The more visitors you can attract to your website, the more opportunities you'll have to generate leads and, ultimately, customers. But only if your website performs well.

As I'm sure you can imagine, just having a website does not guarantee results. As part of determining the overall efficiency of your website, your audit should check to make sure your site is designed with your visitors in mind. The design and overall navigability of your website should correspond with what a person would come to the site to seek out, such as more information on a business-related topic, resources, product/pricing information, testimonials, etc. This will largely depend on your individual business.

The main goal here is to make it easy for people to get to the information they're looking for. As a result, you'll likely see conversion rates improve on their own.

To audit your website for usability, consider the following:

Are all the main value propositions of our business easily accessible via our main navigations/menu items? Do we have a simple yet intuitive website design and page layout? Make sure pages aren't too cluttered; littered with ads, CTAs, or links; or void of internal links altogether. Are your conversion paths and/or shopping cart or checkout processes intuitive? Are there a ton of distractions along the way that could be creating friction for your site visitors? You might also consider doing some user testing with members of your target audience to ensure you're effectively surfacing the content they're looking for, and that they find it easy to navigate to the parts of your website they're interested in.

How Is Your Website's Overall Speed? Are there excessive page sizes and/or long page load and server response times? Does your site go down frequently? Site speed can be impacted when image files are too large or HTML and CSS needs to be cleaned up, all of which can drastically improve your site speed.

Ultimately, fast-loading and optimized pages will lead to higher visitor engagement, retention, and conversions. To quickly check a web page's load time, download MozBar, a toolbar by Moz that you can attach to your browser for simple page analysis every time you visit a website.

2. SEO Assessment Optimizing the performance of your website is crucial to holding onto visitors, but the above question isn't the only one you should be asking. You should also audit the content you're publishing to ensure it's actually solving your visitors' problems.

Is Your Website Content High Quality? As you evaluate your content for quality, think about it from your target audience's perspective. Did this information leave me satisfied? Did it answer all of my questions? Does it give me all the resources relevant to this topic? Do I know what to do next?

Keep in mind quality content should appeal to the interests, needs, and problems of your buyer personas; be interesting and well-written, provide valuable, thorough and detailed information about a particular topic; and leave the reader with next steps (such as calls-to-action, links to resources, etc.).

If you're still not sure if your content is high quality, evaluate it with this checklist:" How to Tell if Your Marketing Content Is Actually Valuable."

Is Your Website Search Engine Optimized? Make sure all your web pages are following on-page SEO best practices. To audit your content for on-page SEO, conduct a keyword analysis in which you do the following:

Consult your analytics to review keyword performance. Which keywords are giving you the biggest gains in traffic and leads? Assess how well you're factoring keyword performance into your content strategy. How much relevant content are you adding to your website to target those keywords? Review basic on-page SEO elements like URLs, page titles, meta description, and copy. Make sure keywords are included where relevant. To help you conduct an on-page SEO audit of your content, read the "Step-by-Step Guide to Flawless On-Page SEO," which also includes a free downloadable on-page SEO template to keep you on track.

3. Conversion Rate Assessment While high-quality, search engine optimized content is a great way to boost your traffic numbers, it's what happens once those visitors are on your website that really counts. Unless of course, you don't care about conversions (ha!).

Is Your Website Optimized for Lead Generation and Conversions? This is where optimized calls-to-action (CTAs), marketing offers, and landing pages play a major role in the performance of your website. Not only do they offer you opportunities to capture visitors' information so you can follow up with leads, but they also keep your visitors engaged with your content and your brand.

To audit your website for maximum conversion potential, ask yourself the following questions:

How many marketing offers do I have in my content arsenal to gate behind landing pages? Do I have a variety of marketing offers that appeal to all my different buyer personas? Do I have any landing pages/conversion forms on my website to begin with? How optimized are those landing pages? Do I have conversion opportunities for visitors in varying stages of the funnel? Am I using calls-to-action effectively? Am I missing opportunities to include calls-to-action on various pages of my website? To learn more about CTA selection, check out our post, " How to Select the Right CTA for Every Page on Your Website."

4. Technical Assessment Once you've addressed the three primary goals of a website audit, it's time to loop in a developer or someone from your IT department for a technical evaluation. You could also hire an outside agency -- just be sure to do your homework first.

Keep in mind that there may be some carry-over from the three assessments above -- website performance, SEO, and conversion rate. The technical evaluation, however, addresses all three to maximize the user experience (UX).

Here's what you should be looking for in the technical assessment stage of your website audit ...

Is Your Website Design Responsive? Does your website have a responsive design? Meaning, is it a mobile-friendly website? The usage of smartphones to access the internet is only growing. As of 2017, mobile devices account for half of all web page views worldwide. As a result, websites must be compatible with that growing demand.

For more on mobile compatibility, check out our "Ultimate Cheat Sheet for Mastering Mobile Marketing."

Is Your Website Error Message Free? Are response code errors popping up all over your website where there shouldn't be any? Calling out 302-, 404-, and 500-level response codes can be useful to tell users that something's wrong.

However, having this happen is also an indication that someone isn't cleaning up broken links and, as a result, leading users to dead ends. Find those error messages and clean up your broken links. Tools like Google's Webmaster Tools or Xenu's Link Sleuth can be very helpful for this.

Are Your Website URLs Optimized? Does your site have URLs of excessive length due to keyword stuffing? Do they contain session IDs and/or include tons of dynamic parameters? In some cases, these URLs are difficult for search engines to index and result in lower clickthrough rates from search results.

Learn more about SEO-friendly URL syntax practices in this helpful post from Search Engine Land.

Does Your Website Have Too Much Flash or JavaScript? Identify areas of your navigation that are entirely Flash or JavaScript. Search engines have challenges reading and accessing these, which could prevent your site from getting indexed.

Furthermore, these elements present problems from a usability perspective. Visitors are often looking for a very specific piece of information when visiting your site; if they have to sit through a 10-second visual introduction before they can find your hours of operation, you're going to have a pretty frustrated visitor on your hands.

Is Your Site Structure Optimized for Search Engines? We already talked about site structure as it relates to accessing content and usability for users, but it's also important to make sure your site structure is optimal for search engines. If pages on your site are not internally linked to from other pages on your site, those pages are less likely to be indexed.

Learn more about effective site structure for SEO in this Moz article.

Are You Defining How Your Web Pages Are Crawled and Indexed by Search Engines? This can be done through various methods that include everything from robots files and tags, to sitemaps. These measures are a way for you to guide search engines toward your website's most useful content.

Robots Files or Tags The robots meta tag lets you utilize a granular, page-specific approach to controlling how an individual page should be indexed and served to users in search results. These tags should sit in the <head> section of a given page.

The robots.txt file, on the other hand, is a text file that allows you to specify how you would like your site to be crawled. Before crawling a website, search engine crawlers will generally request the robots.txt file from a server. Within the robots.txt file, you can include sections for specific (or all) crawlers with instructions ("directives") that let them know which parts should or should not be crawled.

Public and XML Sitemaps Your website should also have public and XML Sitemap files. The public sitemap is one that users can access to review the pages of your site, like the index of a book.

The XML Sitemap is for search engines to review pages that get added to your site, all in one place. The usual location of a sitemap.xml file is www.domainname.com/sitemap.xml. The XML Sitemap is something every website should have; it offers an opportunity to tell Google and the other search engines what pages on your site you want to be crawled and indexed.

While search engines don't guarantee they will abide by your sitemap, anecdotal evidence has proven time and time again that XML Sitemaps help provide insurance that your pages are found, and found faster -- especially if your sitemap(s) dynamically update your new web pages.

Are You Defining Canonicalization of Content? The canonicalization of your website content is the final major technical consideration to make. To gain more control over how your URLs appear in search results, and to minimize issues related to duplicate content, it's recommended that you pick a canonical (preferred) URL as the preferred version of the page.

You can indicate your preference to Google in a number of ways. One such way is to set the Canonical Tag (rel="canonical") in an HTTP header of a page. Be sure to have someone check that the Canonical Tag is properly implemented across the site by making sure it points to the correct page, and that every page doesn't point to the homepage.

It's important to establish an audit framework early on. Ask yourself questions ideally centered around gauging "How am I doing?" These questions may also include things like, "How does this compare to others, especially my competitors?"

Website audits aren't easy, especially if you're not totally tech-savvy. For additional resources, check out this article by Distilled, which highlights a list of tools to use as you conduct your technical audit; as well as this complete site audit checklist by SEER.

I also recommend passing the Google Webmaster's Guide along to anyone implementing this kind of work.

Yandere-chan’s Bizarre Adventure (JoJo’s x Yan Sim Crossover Concept)

I’ve got quite a few fic ideas on my plate already but this was floating around my mind the other day. Background

It would begin just after Kira’s initial defeat at the hands of Koichi and Jotaro. However, when Kira makes his escape to Aya Tsuji’s Cinderella beauty salon, rather than finding Kosaku Kawajiri there, his victim is instead Ayano’s dad. The premise being that he and Ryoba had gone vacationing in Morioh (to visit a relative?) for their then honeymoon and he had heard rumors about a woman who could seemingly change one’s face, hoping to escape Ryoba permanently or at least for a little while. Kira escapes just the same from the Joestar gang but now has a new problem on his hands: his current identity is leaving with Ryoba the following day back to Buraza. Quickly discovering Ryoba’s disposition towards being disobeyed, and not wanting to make a scene to potentially attract undue attention, Kira is forced to admit defeat and follow a very pregnant Ryoba home. Yoshikage Kira’s desire for a ‘quiet life’ has been shattered. Seething with the humiliation of being beaten horribly by Star Platinum and Reverb along with being forced to leave his ancestral home Kira tries to blend in in Buraza with Ryoba but finds it impossible to satiate his urges with her constant eye on his behavior. But before he can use Killer Queen’s ability to blow her away it seems that they’ve returned back home in time none too soon as Ryoba goes into labor; with his ‘wife’ weak from giving birth to a daughter, Kira takes out his frustration on his situation by detonating a bomb he placed in her hospital wristband. Brimming with confidence that he is free to begin his life anew as he sees fit Kira is waylaid by Megami’s dad before he has a chance to leave the hospital. Despite the fact that he cannot see Killer Queen, or know that the man in front of him isn’t Ryoba’s old husband, Megami’s dad is convinced that something highly suspicious is going on given that a long term asset of Saikou Corporation’s is now a pile of ash (save for a lone hand) in the maternity ward. On pain of being brought in for ‘questioning,’ Mr. Saikou offers Kira a deal: tell him everything and perhaps they can strike up a business partnership, to which Kira reluctantly agrees. Once all is said and done he is faced with a choice… either submit, watch over the remaining investment (Ayano), and live comfortably to do whatever he’d like or meet as grisly an end as Mr. Saikou’s hired men can imagine. Not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth Kira agrees to these terms and waits to arrange Ryoba’s funeral. Meanwhile, the Joestar gang are informed by Reimi Sugimoto that she can no longer feel Kira’s presence. Months go by and the investigation into Kira’s whereabouts bring up dead ends. The logical conclusion, of course, is that Kira has skipped town but they have no clue where to. This is perhaps the part I’m least certain about. I can’t imagine Jotaro or anyone else just giving up on finding Kira, not when they’ve seen what Killer Queen can do, but I’d imagine that they would eventually have to put things on hold. For the sake of canon welding we will go with the idea that this butterfly allows Dio’s and Pucci’s plan to unleash Green Baby on the world is actually stopped here (I’m less clear about the events of Vento Aureo but consider another butterfly being that Giorno never gets a Requiem form for Golden Experience). I think that the Joestar gang actually capturing Yoshihiro for a while also makes sense to try and grill him for information, but he eventually manages to escape, taking the arrow with him to find Kira. I’m less clear at this point on how he manages to find Kira in Buraza but find him he does. Ayano’s childhood is even lonelier than canon. Without her mother to dote on her, and her ‘father’ treating her as a distant afterthought (she becomes nothing more than a lure for victims for Kira as he plays up the ‘single father’ angle), she is left primarily to her own devices and totally rudderless. Kira has no answers for her about her condition and is just as much of an empty shell as she is - or seems to be, at any rate. As such she goes out of her way to befriend others as a means to cope; I’m going with the interpretation she isn’t totally emotionless and more the idea that she is just severely stunted. This is where another big break from canon occurs: there are no rivals. Instead, the cast that would have been Yan Sim’s antagonists are her childhood friends instead; Muja and Mida come later as would-be victims of Kira’s she convinces him to spare. Kira’s luck lets him come out on top once more as Yoshihiro’s ghost’s reappearance into his life, however that comes about, coincides with Joseph Joestar’s death. Unable to track Yoshihiro’s spirit with Purple Hermit the Joestar gang is even more at a loss on how to find the elusive killer. With Yoshihiro’s reappearance, and the entirety of Saikou Corp at his back, Kira settles once more into his ‘quiet life’ even if it’s not quite how he envisioned it. It’s during this time that, surprised that Kira hasn’t found a way to ‘accidentally’ get rid of Ayano, Yoshihiro takes a liking to his ‘granddaughter’.. and whom he will ultimately give a Stand to (Bad Romance) to help ensure Kira stays safe, a fate that will befall all of Ayano’s close friends as well. Now with something in common between the two of them Kira begins to take more of an interest in Ayano, going so far as to become a Lisa Lisa or Joseph figure to her. Ayano latches onto this amount of affection, however, and comes to genuinely care for ‘dad’ and his ‘eccentricities.’ How the Joestar gang would make it to Buraza I’m unclear - I like the idea of Megami being a mole for them so that she can put a stop to Kira’s reign of terror, though with the stipulation they leave Ayano be - but one of the ones who has joined the investigation at this point is Shizuka (it’s a shame Araki… literally did nothing with her character in canon), who becomes a transfer student at Akademi and perhaps even befriends Ayano. Or at least she is until Shizuka befriends a boy, Taro Yamada, who’s managed to bring out intense emotions for her for the first time she can remember… Here’s a hypothetical stand list for Ayano and the rest of the main cast. Ayano Aishi Stand: Bad Romance, Bad Romance Born This Way (Requiem) Bad Romance looks exactly like she does in the Easter egg mode she appears in but her function is different. Rather than being a punchghost like The World or Crazy Diamond she is instead able to master any weapon by virtue of touching it, which includes how best to aim them, how much to grip a handle, etc. Bad Romance Born This Way shows the influence on Ayano’s life she has experienced under Kira it functions similarly to Killer Queen’s Sheer Heart Attack form: it is coated in a nigh impenetrable metal. Osana Najimi Stand: Hot N Cold Effectively what it says on the tin. Despite the fact that Osana can create arcing flames or freeze her enemies on the spot, her biggest downside is the warming up or cooling down periods that have to occur before she becomes combat effective. She is even more vulnerable given that it also takes a considerable amount of time for her to switch between the two. She is arguably the weakest out of all the Stand users in Buraza given the above. Amai Odayaka Stand: Feeling This

Amai’s Stand is probably the most innocuous, at least on a shallow analysis. It can do nothing more than effect the senses and she has mostly used it to enhance the taste buds of those sampling her cooking. However, this is more or less a trap to lull her enemies into a false sense of security. When initiated in combat, Amai will use Feeling This to effectively shut down someone’s five senses, to the point where they are unable to hear, see, or even feel if they’re close to her. In the absence of sensory input the brain will begin to create its own information, leading them to experience intense and vivid hallucinations that if aren’t reversed soon after they take hold can lead to permanent mental scarring. Kizana Sunobu Stand: Come as You Are

Kizana’s Stand does not offer her any offensive capabilities whatsoever but it is extremely powerful nonetheless. Incorporating the as-of-now unexplored ‘persona’ mechanic her Stand allows Kizana to create a powerful illusion that hypnotizes those around her to believe that she is anyone she chooses to imitate - the only catch being that said person must be a woman. This ability has made her indispensable to Ayano as a spy. Oka Ruto Stand: Black Sabbath

Cliche as it might be, Oka’s power involves manipulating shadows, though this is more versatile than one might at first realize. Despite the cute, Heartless-style appearance Oka’s Stand allows her to use shadows a means of teleportation between several locations as well as spying on others.  At night she gains an additional ability, along with making the first two that much stronger, that allows her to use shadow puppetry as a means of attacking others’ shadows - and what happens to them there also effects the person regardless. Asu Rito Stand: Jumpin’ Jack Flash

As a runner Asu’s Stand ability seems quite fitting: it is integrated, and so is not outwardly visible, but it allows her to achieve incredible speeds that few can match. While she might not have enhanced strength, any hit coming at you at about 100 miles per hour is going to be packing a nasty wallop no matter how you slice it. Muja Kina Stand: TLC

Unlike Josuke’s Crazy Diamond, Muja’s Stand can’t actually heal you. Indeed, it actually does the exact opposite (despite its ironic name). Muja is arguably one of the most combat effective Stand users that Ayano’s side has given that her friendly exterior hides an ability that causes decay and rot from the inside out. Though she can only do it one victim at a time, and at a slow rate at that, there’s nothing nastier than having your heart, lungs, or liver slowly shut down on you. Mida Rana Stand: Total Eclipse of the Heart

Ever wonder what mind broken slaves might be like, except even worse? Mida’s Stand has got you covered. Functionally speaking, its ability is on the surface quite simple: it passes along a spiritual virus, of sorts, that sleeps unless its user wills it to manifest. At that point Mida has access to an army of ‘love zombies’ that will heed her beck and call. Pity it only allows the infected to pass it on to only one person after coming down with it themselves. Osoro Shidesu Stand: Eye of the Tiger

Ayano’s enforcer, of sorts, and arguably the physically strongest Stand on her side. Much like Star Platinum, Eye of the Tiger is a Stand whose main ability is to punch things incredibly hard and fast. The secret, however, is that Osoro’s Stand, just like how the Hulk who gets stronger the angrier he becomes, becomes more powerful the more it is hit, storing the kinetic energy to unleash against its opponents. Hanako Yamada Stand: Quiet Riot

If Hanako isn’t upset she can’t summon Quiet Riot. Despite the fact that her Stand is uniquely tied to the emotions she feels at a given time, it would be unwise to not take her very seriously. When she is, watch out, because Hanako’s power revolves around using her voice to create incredibly destructive sound waves. Megami Saikou Stand: She Blinded Me with Science

I’m of two minds as to what Megami’s Stand might do. On the one, it would be traditional to keep one of some of the most powerful enemy Stand’s powers as being time-based; it would be interesting to incorporate ‘resetting’ things like how we can choose to restart a game on a meta level. The problem is that Araki has effectively explored every avenue for time-based powers in JoJo’s and it might not feel that interesting. On the other, perhaps it might be similar to Ayano’s Bad Romance in that She Blinded Me with Science might allow Megami to construct machines from the environment around her at any given moment so long as metal is present. This would allow her a versatility to what she can do and it might be different each time as it depends on what she’d need at any given moment. The only issue is that it doesn’t really feel very ‘grand’ for someone who is meant to be strongest opponent Ayano could face in canon. So… thoughts? I’d be interested to see if anyone had any ideas on how to expand parts of the plot, what Taro’s Stand might look like, or anything else you could think of. 

Another comic book that was bought for my brother Ken, but which eventually ended up with me. This issue of SUPERMAN was the concluding chapter to a then-unprecedented four-part epic storyline, one that would be collected a couple of times in the intervening years. In addition, it wrapped up a subplot that had ben brewing in the Superman titles since the early 1970s. Of course, I didn’t know any of this when the book first showed up.

Such a novelty was a long serial of this sort in the DC books that, as he had done previously with the “Bat-Murderer” plotline in DETECTIVE COMICS, editor Julie Schwartz added a note to the first page indicating that this running serial took place after the Superman stories appearing concurrently in other titles. This was also still an era in which DC was a bit corporately embarrassed to be a comic book publisher, and so had adopted the unwieldy name National Periodical Publications. This splash page is one of the relatively few instances where that name was given prominence

The issue opens with the mysterious Mister Xavier, Clark Kent’s neighbor, recapping recent events for his alien masters, and in reality the readers. Xavier is the long-running plotline I mentioned earlier. He had been introduced several years beforehand as a reclusive figure with a mysterious and somewhat shady background, but while hints had been dropped over the years, his secrets hadn’t been revealed before now.

Turns out that--and I believe this story was written before the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy--Xavier works for an interplanetary organization that wants to build a teleportation route through our solar system--and to do so, the Earth must be destroyed. This project is so urgent and important that Xavier was placed down on Earth 30 years ago to figure out a way to do it, and he has--by harnessing the destructive powers of Superman.

But because this is a Superman story, that plot must be byzantine. So what Xavier has first done is to use his technology to affect Superman such that, when he is in his Clark Kent persona, he no longer possesses any of his super-powers. Thinking that this is being caused by the psychological strain of living a double life, Superman has spent the previous three issues experimenting--living solely as Clark Kent for a week, then solely as Superman, and discovering the benefits and drawbacks to each identity. 

What this has to do with Xavier’s ultimate plan is vague, but in any case, he’s ready to make his move. Using contrivance crystals, he teleports 9 of the Man of Steel’s greatest enemies first into Clark’s apartment, then across the globe, and when Superman arrives, Xavier charges him with energy, turning him into a living bomb. As Superman expends his energy battling his enemies, he’s burning through the fuse and coming closer to exploding and taking the Earth with him.

As Superman races from fight to fight, he’s got another worry--Clark Kent is desperately needed to testify in a court case to convict an Inter-Gang bigwig. So Clark takes time out from his marathon of villain-bashing to appear as Kent and make his testimony. But this time, he finds that he still possesses his super-powers in his civilian identity! This is a vital clue for him--but he can’t wait, there are still a half-dozen villains at large!

Three villains later, and Superman has enough of a breather to check back in at his apartment. And sure enough, he discovers that his regular Clark Kent wardrobe has all be treated to repel the yellow sun energies that give him his powers. (For his court appearance, Superman borrowed a suit from the WGBS wardrobe, rather than his own clothes--hence, his powers were unaffected this time.) Still, there are three more foes to contend with, and as Superman races off to combat them, Xavier makes his final preparations.

Two more enemies later, and Superman has a moment to use his super-senses to divine the brain-beam that’s beaming him the location of his enemies and follow it back to Xavier’s apartment, where the alien appears to be in a state of hibernation. Superman goes off to face his final foe, the Kryptonite Man and dispatches him with one blow. yet the Earth still lives, because Superman was wearing one of his doctored Clark Kent suits underneath his uniform, and struck the Kryptonite Man with only his regular human strength.

In the wrap-up, Superman captures Xavier, who has pulled a swap with the Kryptonian’s enemy Amalak to affect his escape. But given Xavier’s failure to eliminate the Earth, his people aren’t likely to rescue him. And in a nice epilog, we get the wrap-up to the larger story question of whether Clark Kent or Superman is the more important identity, in which Superman reveals that he’d already decided that, regardless of whatever psychological difficulties it might have caused, he intended to continue to live as both Kent and Superman.

And, like with other titles this month, the Metropolis Mailbag letters page includes the Statement of Ownership, which indicates that SUPERMAN at this point was selling 221,348 copies a month on a print run of 578,311. That’s a 38% efficiency, which is pretty miserable, even with that many copies being sold. I’d imagine that the print run was scaled back for future issues in an attempt to get that percentage number up and not be generating so much waste. This need to print three copies in order to sell one was what had the comic book industry on the ropes for most of the 1970s, and it was only the advent of the Direct Sales network of comic book specialty shops that bought books on a non-returnable basis that saved the industry.

7 Reasons Not Being the Smartest Person Is A Benefit

I've never felt like I was the smartest person in the room.

But looking at how I work and what I've accomplished, I think this mindset has helped me achieve more.

It's interesting because it seems like having an inflated view of yourself can work against you. This article is my attempt to process what this means.

I've determined that whether or not I am the smartest person in the room is irrelevant. Even “if” that is the case sometimes, it does me no good thinking this is true.

Reason #1: Arrogance

No one likes to work with someone who thinks they are the creme-de-la-creme.

These types of people not only make it clear how awesome they are but they make you feel like an idiot when you don't have the knowledge or experience they have.

And the result of this mentality is that we end up creating a hierarchy. We create a system where if you are at the top or near the top you have value. And everyone else is peasants.

If you want to create an efficient team, you want to see the value in everyone. It's not an excuse to accept bad behavior or laziness, but it becomes about motivating everyone to be a part of a cohesive team.

Arrogance does not create an environment where openness, transparency, and honesty are promoted.

Reason #2: Continual Learning

If you think you know it all and are the best, you probably aren't going to be motivated to continually learn. What do you have to learn when you already know everything?

Even “if” you are the best, there are always things you can learn. Maybe it is increasing your soft skills, like communication or how you talk to people. And there are most likely ways you can still improve your strengths.

If you get into the habit of not continually learning, you will most likely encounter the following:

End up making the same mistakes over and over again.

Get bypassed by people who are on the path of continual learning.

The moment we get comfortable, we can quickly start to miss out on things that can save us time and energy. This will ultimately hurt our careers and put us at a disadvantage.

Arrogance also doesn't tend to want to teach people, because they have de-valued their co-workers. It contributes to creating a toxic environment that hurts the team and the company.

Reason #3: Acute Awareness of Effort

Knowing that I can always improve, makes me realize that I am not in fact “the chosen one”. The only reason I got to where I am is through hard work.

And hard work is going to continually take me forward.

No one is going to give me what I want. I have to earn it. And this is an incredible motivator. Realizing that nothing in life is easy, and if I want something, I have to achieve that goal.

There is also a sense of accomplishment by me achieving something from hard work. It wouldn't feel nearly as good if someone just gave it to me.

It is not too different from backpacking. Part of the joy of getting out into the wilderness is the effort required to get to these remote locations. If I hiked 20 miles, only to get to a road where I see people driving, that would suck the joy out of what I accomplished. But when I arrive at a lake that few people have seen, there is something about that experience that is intangible.

Having this idea that to accomplish and maintain my success, I need to be constantly putting in a high level of effort, makes me a valuable member of the team. There is never a point where I've learned “enough” and can stop trying. I always have to be pushing things forward to keep my brain sharp and on top of changes in technology and projects.

Reason #4: Admitting Mistakes

If you think you know it all and are focused on appearing like you are the best, you aren't going to be too thrilled about admitting your mistakes.

And we all are humans. No one is perfect.

Even when you do realize you've messed up, instead of owning up to your mistake, you are going to be tempted to blame it on someone else. This not only makes you look like a jerk, but it ends up hurting the team.

Admitting your mistakes isn't about hurting your standing in “who's the best”. It is about improving your team's performance. Your mistakes hurt everyone. And by working on making sure you avoid those same mistakes in the future, you can help other people not do the same things.

No one likes to admit when they make a mistake, but owning up to your part of the problem helps with the recovery.

By ignoring or pretending the mistake didn't happen, it ultimately is going to hurt you as well.

Reason #5: Masking Hurt/Pain With Over Confidence

I'm learning that most people who are obsessed with appearing like they are the best are people who are hurting on the inside. They are insecure in who they are, and they project that insecurity on others by trying to manipulate how they appear.

And maybe this came from their childhood experiences. Maybe their dad was hypercritical about everything they did, and so they learned to always work on how others think about them above everything else. Projecting this super confident, perfect persona, makes them feel accepted and appreciated.

I have anxiety issues, which have affected my self-confidence. But I try not to redirect that struggle in a false sense of pride and arrogance. I'm definitely not perfect, and sometimes I fail.

If our behavior is demeaning, insulting, or just mean, that's a problem.

Reason #6: Looking Down at Others

The biggest issue I have with people who are overly arrogant is that they tend to look down on other people.

If you don't match up to their standards, they make you feel inferior. Like your worth is less because you don't know or can't do something.

And this is wrong. We are all at different stages in life with different experiences. We also have different strengths and weaknesses.

Our goal should not be to judge where everyone is at. It should be to try to contribute as much to the team as possible and drive things forward. This is what makes the best teams possible.

It would be like me making my child feel bad for asking what I perceive as a dumb question when it comes down to them being young and trying to figure things out. By helping others with their knowledge gaps, we show them that life is less about what you know, and more about our ability in learning new things and solving problems.

Being on a team is about tackling problems together and moving things forward. It isn't about seeing who is the best and trying to get to the top.

Reason #7: Who Really Cares?

I don't want to be judged by how people look at me. I want to be judged by my output.

Take a look at what I've done and give me an honest evaluation — that's what I want.

Some people might not like me, or they might think I'm a weirdo. But what matters the most to me is that I'm a valuable member of the team and a good problem solver. People's opinion of me will change, and there is a part of me that wants to be liked by people. But as far as my job is concerned, it all comes down to my output.

Measure me on my accomplishments and failures. That's what really matters.

These measuring sticks people like to bring out is not measuring anything useful. It's all based on perception, which can easily be manipulated.

Mindhunter

I just finished season two of the Mindhunter series on Netflix. I found it interesting that one of the common traits of the serial killers they interviewed was that most of them were incredibly arrogant.

Some of these people thought they were smarter than everyone and couldn't be caught. Or that what they were doing was helping other people.

Of course, all of this was not true, and it is interesting to think about how their inflated ego ended up leading to their capture and imprisonment.

Obviously, this show is looking at extreme examples of arrogance. But I think some people can struggle with some of the same things at a lesser degree. Creating a pedestal for yourself to stand on might temporarily make you feel good, but it will hurt your relationship with people over the long haul.

Mindset is more important than Intelligence

Obviously, there is a base level of intelligence required to do certain things.

But I think we can depend on “being smart” and “highly intelligent” too much. In most cases, people have gotten to where they are at because of hard work and dedication.

I've tackled complex projects and problems, and often times I had no idea what I was doing in the beginning. But it was the act of trying different things and beating my head against the wall for multiple hours that led me to a solution.

In other words, my success only came after a bunch of failures.

If I quit the second I couldn't figure out a problem, I wouldn't be where I am at today.

The process of figuring out how to tackle things I don't understand is incredibly valuable and is one of my strengths. Even to this day, this is still not a comfortable process for me, and at times I get tempted to give up on problems. But my past results have taught me that as long as I stay focused, I can usually find a solution that will work.

But understanding my strengths does not give me the right to look down on people who don't have the exact same skills.

Someone who assumes they are the best may not be willing to give the required energy in figuring out a problem. They might think that if a solution doesn't immediately come to mind, that it is not possible to solve. And this not only in naive, but it can end up making you look bad when someone who is “less intelligent” comes in and figures out the problem through sheer effort and willpower.

To be a valuable member of your team you have to try to push ego to the side to work as one team together.

The post 7 Reasons Not Being the Smartest Person Is A Benefit appeared first on Your Money Geek.

from Your Money Geek https://ift.tt/3eGmr8C via IFTTT

John McCain helped build a country that no longer reflects his values

http://bit.ly/2l2jULQ

Arizona Sen. John McCain – scion of Navy brass, flyboy turned Vietnam war hero and tireless defender of American global leadership – now faces terminal brain cancer.

I am a scholar of American politics. And I believe that, regardless of his storied biography and personal charm, three powerful trends in American politics thwarted McCain’s lifelong ambition to be president. They were the rise of the Christian right, partisan polarization and declining public support for foreign wars.

Republican McCain was a champion of bipartisan legislating, an approach that served him and the Senate well. But as political divides have grown, bipartisanship has fallen out of favor.

Most recently, McCain opposed Gina Haspel as CIA director for “her refusal to acknowledge torture’s immorality” and her role in it. Having survived brutal torture for five years as a prisoner of war, McCain maintained a resolute voice against U.S. policies permitting so-called “enhanced interrogations.” Nevertheless, his appeals failed to rally sufficient support to slow, much less derail, her appointment.

Days later, a White House aide said McCain’s opposition to Haspel didn’t matter because “he’s dying anyway.” That disparaging remark and the refusal of the White House to condemn it revealed how deeply the president’s hostile attitude toward McCain and everything he stands for had permeated the executive office.

So McCain ends his career honorably and bravely, but with hostility from the White House, marginal influence in the Republican-controlled Senate, and a public less receptive to the positions he has long embodied.

The outlier

McCain’s first run for the presidency in 2000 captured the imagination of the public and the press, whom he wryly referred to as “my base.” His self-confident “maverick” persona appealed to a more secular, moderate constituency who like him, might be constitutionally opposed to the growing political alignment between the religious right and the Republican Party.

McCain enthusiastically bucked his party and steered his “Straight Talk Express” through the GOP primaries with a no-holds-barred attack on Pat Robertson and Rev. Jerry Falwell. The two were conservative icons and leaders of the Christian Coalition and the Moral Majority.

McCain branded Robertson and Falwell “agents of intolerance” and “empire builders.” He charged that they used religion to subordinate the interests of working people. He said their religion served a business goal and accused them of shaming “our faith, our party, and our country.” That message earned McCain a primary victory in New Hampshire but his campaign capsized in South Carolina, where Republican voters launched George W. Bush, the stalwart evangelical, on his path to a presidential victory in 2000 against Democratic nominee, Vice President Al Gore.

By 2008, McCain saw the political clout of white, born-again, evangelical Christians. By then, they comprised 26 percent of the electorate. Bowing to political winds, he adopted a more conciliatory approach.

McCain’s willingness to defend America as a “Christian nation” and his controversial choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, an enthusiastic standard bearer for the Christian right, as his running mate, signaled the electoral power of a less tolerant, more absolutist “values-based” politics.

McCain’s about-face reveals a political pragmatist willing to make peace with the Christian right and accept their ability to make or break his last attempt at the presidency.

His strategy reflected his tendency to abandon principles if they threatened his quest for the presidency. Having railed eight years prior against the hypocrisy of the right-wing religious leadership, McCain may have felt some personal discomfort kowtowing to the dictates of self-appointed moral authorities. But the electorate had changed since then, and McCain showed he was willing to shift his position to accommodate their beliefs.

The primary that year also required an outright appeal to independents and even crossover Democrats. That would potentially provide enough votes to boost him past George W. Bush, whose campaign had already expressed allegiance to the conservative religious agenda.

In 2008, Mitt Romney, a devout Mormon considered religiously suspect by many evangelicals, emerged as McCain’s main rival for the nomination.

Sensing an opportunity to establish a winning coalition, McCain jettisoned his former objections to the political influence of the religious right, shifting from antagonism to accommodation. In doing so, McCain revealed his flexibility again on principles that might fatally undermine his overriding ambition – winning the presidency.

In fact, the incorporation of the religious right into the Republican Party represented but one facet of a more consequential development. That was the fiercely ideological partisan polarization that has come to dominate the political system.

The lonely Republican

Rough parity between the parties since 2000 has intensified the electoral battles for Congress and the presidency. It has supercharged the fundraising machines on both sides. And it has nullified the “regular order” of congressional hearings, debates and compromise, as party leaders scheme for policy wins.

Fueled by highly engaged activists, interest groups and donors known as “policy demanders,” partisan polarization has overwhelmed moderates in our political system. McCain was a bipartisan problem-solver and was willing to compromise with Democrats to pass campaign finance reform in 2002. He worked with the other side to normalize relations with Vietnam in 1995. And he joined with Democrats to pass immigration reform in 2017.

But he was also one of those moderates who ultimately found himself on the outside of his party.

McCain’s dramatic Senate floor thumbs-down repudiation of the Republican effort to repeal and replace Obamacare turned less on his antipathy to Trump and more on his disgust with a broken party-line legislative process.

On an issue as monumental as health care, he insisted on a return to “extensive hearings, debate, and amendment.” He endorsed the efforts of Sens. Lamar Alexander, a Republican, and Patty Murray, a Democrat, to craft a bipartisan solution.

Foreign and defense policy was McCain’s signature issue. He wanted a more robust posture for American global leadership, backed by a well-funded, war-ready military. But that stance lost support a decade ago following the Iraq War disaster.

McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign slogan of “Country First” signified not only the model of his personal commitment and sacrifice. It also telegraphed his belief in the need to persevere in the war on terror in general and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in particular.

But by then, 55 percent of registered independents, McCain’s electoral base, had lost confidence in the prospects for a military victory. They favored bringing the troops home.

Over the course of six months that year, independent support for the Iraq war fell from 54 percent to 40 percent. Overall opposition to the troop “surge” was at 63 percent. Barack Obama’s promise to wind down America’s military commitment and do “nation-building at home” resonated with an electorate wearied by the conflict and buffeted by their own economic woes.

Advocate for global leadership

McCain continues to assert the primacy of American power. He decries the country’s retreat from a rules-based global order premised on American leadership and based on freedom, capitalism, human rights and democracy.

Donald Trump stands in contrast. Trump, like Obama, promises to terminate costly commitments abroad, revoke defense and trade agreements that fail to put “America First,” and rebuild the nation’s crumbling infrastructure.

In his run for the presidency, Trump asserted that American might and treasure had been squandered defending the world. Other countries, he said, took advantage of U.S. magnanimity.

In Congress, Republicans have become cautious about U.S. military interventions, counterinsurgency operations and nation-building. They find scant public support for intervention in Syria’s civil war.

Seeing Russia as America’s implacable foe, McCain has sponsored sanctions legislation and prodded the administration to implement them more vigorously.

Accepting the Liberty Medal in Philadelphia, McCain repudiated Trump’s approach to global leadership.

He declared, “To abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.”

McCain has spent his life committed to principles that, tragically – at least for him – have fallen from favor.

He faces great personal peril now – at the same time that the country’s repudiation of the principles he’s championed may put the nation at risk.

Elizabeth Sherman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

5 Storytelling Techniques Content Marketers Can Learn from the Classics

In my ninth grade English class, one of the very first things we read was Romeo and Juliet. While most of my friends whined about how hard it was to read and why the sentences had to be so long, I was mesmerized. The language, the characters, the setting — all of it. And it wasn’t just Shakespeare, I was captivated by other writers as well: Austen, Hugo, Bronte, Dickens, Hawthorne. Each one of these novelists had powerful, yet different storytelling styles that still completely arrest me with beautiful language and fascinating characters. So I started wondering: how much has that truly classic storytelling influenced my approach as a content writer, and what do classic novels teach us about content marketing in general?

If this all sounds a little squishy to the marketers and execs out there (and you didn’t tune out immediately when we got to Bronte), let’s talk about the psychology behind this quickly, and the opportunity. Studies have shown that our brains are hungry for stories: we crave them.

When we hear a story, the part of the brain that governs empathy and moral sensibilities light up. Perhaps not surprisingly then, brands that use their content to tell a compelling story either through words or images are typically the ones with a larger audience and a higher revenue.

Apple, National Geographic, AirBnb, and Nike are all brands that are crushing it when it comes to brand-driven storytelling. According to Forbes, each of these brands have created stories that engage, build community interaction, and elicit an emotional response. The result is a larger fan-base, customer-base, and at the business level a true competitive advantage.

Bringing it back: classic novelists are masters of creating stories that resonate deeply. This deliberate focus on creating a rich, engaging story is something we as marketers can use to improve blogs, articles, social media, and any other piece of content we produce. Take a look at five storytelling techniques you can use from classic novelists to help create a more engaging piece of content.

Jane Austen – Create relatable characters and stories

Based on the intro here, it’s probably no surprise that Jane Austen is my all-time favorite author. In fact, my most prized possession is Jane Austen’s collected works: one book that contains all seven of her novels in a beautiful, hardback cover (with gold-lined pages that give off an intoxicating smell). One of my favorite things about Austen is her ability to connect with an audience. She creates witty, smart, loyal, and independent characters who are realistic and relatable. Characters that even 200 years later readers see and can’t help but think – “that’s me!” Each character finds him/herself in dramatic (and sometimes silly) situations which Austen directs them through with clear, rational explanations and strong, gorgeous prose.

Great content should center on creating succinct, emotional, relatable stories, and characters when appropriate. Our language should bind readers with authors. If we can create personalized voices that recognize certain truths of the human experience, we’ll be able to relate to our audience. Each writer brings a different personality and voice to a brand’s story that can strike a chord.

Minnetonka Moccasins is a personal favorite example of creating this kind of relatable content. They’ve created a brand with a timeless appeal (just like Austen) and a story that is centered around giving customers quality shoes that are affordable, comfortable, and (now) popular. The Minnetonka brand story starts with a brief look at the company’s history, before delving into the brand’s belief and the secret to their success: their customers. The story continues with a short video describing how every shoe is made with the highest quality materials. User-generated content weaves throughout the story, informing the audience why customers love Minnetonka shoes. Minnetonka uses real stories from real people to convey their brand essence, which creates a stronger, more relatable brand story, and a believable bond between the company and its customers.

Victor Hugo – Inspire your audience to action

Victor Hugo once said:

“Every man who writes, writes a book; this book is himself. Whether he knows it or not, whether he wishes it or not, it is true. From every body of work, whatever it may be—wretched or illustrious, there emerges a persona—that of the writer.”

If there ever was an author who embodies this statement, it’s Victor Hugo.

His ultimate power lay in his literary personality, his ability to create beloved characters, and to inspire his audience to action. Hugo’s work is strongly associated with social liberty, as he incorporated this theme into many of his novels.

Take Les Miserables, for example (also, if you haven’t read this book, you need to). Throughout the entire story, Hugo openly and articulately shows disgust over the treatment of the poor and the incarcerated by developing flawed yet incredibly lovable characters. As one critic put it, the entire story captures the “struggles, heroism, and humanity of those condemned to marginality.” Hugo was inspired by the revolutionary spirit of his age, moved his readers to sympathy, and called them to action.

Hugo used many of his writings to remain politically active and much of what he produced helped to shape the course of French politics during the 1860s. He ultimately inspired opposition against the French empire or aristocracy and helped to reestablish a French Republic.

[Deep breath]. So, what do we take away as content writers and marketers doing possibly less sweeping work than Victor Hugo?

Content in all its forms is an opportunity to inspire. To create an impulse that requires action before it will fade. If you can create a sense of momentum, an aspirational vision of what’s possible, and tie that vision to your brand, you’re on the right track.

Hugo was a master at getting his audience to feel something—anger, misery, love, happiness, you name it—and inspiring them to join the fight. Not to say that content marketers should seek to incite revolution, but we can definitely take something from Hugo’s example. Creating a story filled with emotion, reinforced and catalyzed by a clear next step is critical to content and to marketing in general.

TOMS is one company, in particular, that embodies this. Most of their stories and subsequent CTAs are centered around how TOMS helps a person in need by providing them with clothing, shoes, or eyewear with every retail purchase. CTAs like ‘Learn How Shoes Help’, ‘Learn How Saving Sight Helps’, and ‘What We Give’ are all rich with emotion and can’t help but inform the customer why their purchase matters. They’re not just selling shoes—they’re changing lives. I’ll admit, I’ve been “coerced” into buying a pair of TOMS just for the feel-good feelings of knowing I gave a child in need a brand new pair of shoes.

Ernest Hemingway – Get to the point. But paint a picture.

Every, single word Hemingway wrote had a purpose—which is why he didn’t use very many. As an author, he was known for his concision, brevity, and clarity. He didn’t use flowery language or adjectives. He got straight to the point, but in a way that still told a remarkable story.

Not only was his writing succinct, but he had a talent for letting his readers find emotion and meaning through vivid description. Rather than “railroading” readers to an opinion about something, he gave them the rich detail they needed in order to arrive at the meaning of his stories.

The shortest novel Hemingway ever wrote was only six words: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” Not once does this prose instruct or push a reader about how to feel. Rather, the language lets the reader naturally develop emotion.

Hemingway’s style is perfect for the stories we’re trying to create, as marketers. The content we produce should be so specific that it creates a natural response for the reader. Anything unnecessary or nonessential to the story we’re trying to tell should be removed. Further, our job is not to manipulate with our writing, but to hold out a natural path to a positive conclusion.

For illustration: Apple is great at the “show, not tell” technique. Think about an Apple ad. Is it full of technical jargon that goes on about how great the product is? Nope. You’ve got some techno music in the background, the product is shown from all angles (showing off a sleek, innovative design), and it ends with a quick slogan. That’s it. And it’s pretty damn effective, very Hemingway-esque: brevity and concision.

Mary Shelley – Weave your central theme through everything

If there’s an author who’s exceptional at creating a story within a story, it’s Mary Shelley. Frankenstein for instance rolls three different stories into one. Shelley’s complex narrative structure allows her to take readers further into the story. Which, in turn, makes them feel like they’re a part of her world.

Many of the most important moments in Frankenstein revolve around nature and romanticism, which Shelley deliberately weaves into the story. She shows these themes throughout the novel without using long descriptions or fluffy language. In short, she’s subtle yet deliberate about the underlying theme.

Similarly most of what we produce in content marketing should revolve around our brand’s story and the core themes and messages we need to convey. Our integration of these themes should never be heavy-handed, but deliberate, consistent, and natural.

Such was the case with Shelley’s writing. Even though her narrative structure was complex, it always focused on her central themes. This is exactly what great content should do: focus on a central thing, i.e., a brand or a brand pillar.

Look at AirBnb for a great example. While most hotel marketing is centered around comfortability as a tourist, AirBnb breaks away from that. Instead, AirBnb tells stories for a different type of traveler: one who wants to “feel like a local” and enjoy their destination as if they lived there. AirBnb’s major message is centered around how people can and should enjoy a different style of vacation. Instead of yet another spokesperson bragging about hotel amenities, AirBnb’s writers, actors, and narrators express how much better his/her adventure was because he/she was right in the middle of all the action. Similar to how Shelley used the creature’s point of view to convey the unfairness of his life, AirBnb uses real experiences and real people to show why their approach to travel is different—and awesome.

William Faulkner – Demonstrate empathy and understanding

William Faulkner was a novelist who broke all the rules when it came to storytelling. We wholeheartedly approve of more interesting writing at Portent, in case you’re curious.

Faulkner didn’t follow traditional rules of syntax, nor did he follow a chronological timeline. Instead, he approached his story in a more circular movement. Faulkner’s readers gradually become aware of events, facts, motivations, and emotions as the narrative progresses. He confuses readers until his prose eventually pulls them into the story. Using this structure allows readers to feel as though they’re the character(s), experiencing the novel’s events first-hand

Faulkner, like most crafty writers, wrote from a place of empathy.

As marketers, we should seek to create content from the same standpoint of writing sincerely and empathetically. Writing with empathy allows you to show your audience that you understand their struggles. And, also, that you have what they need to solve their problem(s). Communicating to your audience that you’re there for them (not to just make money) is one way you can create content that engages the audience, instead of just selling to them.

One brand that is excellent at creating empathetic content is Home Depot. They understand that the ultimate goal (for one segment) of their customers is to become master DIY-ers, but they understand each customer might need a little help getting there. The content Home Depot produces isn’t focused on exactly what they have in the store. Rather, Home Depot focuses on the end-goals they help customers achieve: building treehouses for children, or how to finish the bookshelf their partner’s been asking for. Home Depot gives customers plenty of encouragement with their content. Which, in turn, lets customers feel like the company is on their side.

Conclusion

While many might say that the techniques used by classic novelists don’t apply today, or that they’re far too idealistic for content marketing, they couldn’t be more wrong. Contemporary authors and content writers should laud their techniques. Writers can mimic Austen’s ability to create relatable characters in order to form an emotional connection with their audience. Hugo’s ability to sway the most stubborn hearts to feel compassion can inspire us to create stronger CTAs. Short, concise language like Hemingway’s can sharpen any social media post, blog headline, or traditional ad campaign. Emulating Shelley’s ability to weave overarching themes throughout our writing can help content writers subtly convey their brand message amidst a sea of similar and pushy content. And the empathy of Faulkner should be our guide in everything we produce for our audiences as we seek to add value to their work and their lives.

No matter what type of content you’re writing, it should offer a story. And that story should have relatable characters, beautiful writing, and a clear call to action. The classic novelists I know and love used all of these tactics for masterful storytelling. It’s now our turn, as content professionals, to make sure our craft is just as honest, human, and strong.

from FEED 9 MARKETING https://ift.tt/2HbMd3T

“I have no opinion on what other people think about me” - Anton Newcombe 

Originally published on Drowned In Sound, 12th January 2017

Most artists promoting a new album probably wouldn't take the time to instead speak about how the world seems to be teetering precariously on the brink of war, or talk about their somewhat unflattering portrayal in a cult documentary released 13 years ago. Thankfully the Brian Jonestown Massacre’s Anton Newcombe is not most artists.

Speaking to Anton from his Berlin home about the Brian Jonestown Massacre’s latest album, Third World Pyramid, just before the US election result, his train of thought is racing far beyond Hilary and Donald’s impending doom. During the hour-long interview he barely pauses, careering fitfully from one subject to the next, apart from to occasionally say an ever so slightly intimidating, ‘Do you see what I’m saying?”

He talks in hurried detail about why geopolitics, a hemmed in Russia, and an expansionist China are marching us towards conflict. To cope with these unstable times he’s reached a “very Zen realisation” of being more accepting in his own life. Third World Pyramid, a record partially inspired by the current climate, he shockingly reveals is not the band’s best record and will be eclipsed by the forthcoming release of an “indefinable” double album entitled Don't Get Lost. However if you’re a Q reviewer, don’t expect a copy in the post any time soon.

Still keen to set the record straight on Dig!, Anton stresses how the producers “fucked up” and had to re-edit the original Sundance Film Festival cut for a less libelous and more compelling narrative centred around his flammable persona. As to whether he has any regrets about the excess around that time he’s characteristically defiant, joking that if he’d continued down this needle and bottle strewn path he’d be living with a Ferragamo model in Connecticut right now.

Instead these days he’s busy in his Berlin studio creating a soundtrack for a new Philip Johns’ film, looking forward to working with Melody’s Echo Chamber, and completing a documentary shot on the Brian Jonestown Massacre’s last UK tour about one of his roadies. Thank God for sobriety.

---

On Twitter you’ve frequently used the hashtag #fuckwar. Do you truly believe a world war is going to happen?

Anton Newcombe: What I think is this has been a long time coming for several different reasons. I was talking to my friend from Israel about the things that have been going on even since 2000 and people just continuously block those things out - it’s like mass hypnosis has taken effect. He said, ‘it’s a survival mechanism’ and it made so much sense.

If you go back even farther to the seventies and eighties, Brzezinski talked about the grand chess game with Russia, this is during the Soviet time, and how they’d ultimately defeat them by squeezing them in. There was the whole thing where Papa Bush talked about the New World Order, basically making everything a federalist system like the EU and having business and trade supercede all the old conflicts and shortcomings.

Do you think it’s a worldwide conspiracy?

No, it’s not a conspiracy. Nato’s moved aggressively all the way up to the edge of Russia, China has captured the whole of the south China sea and claimed it as their own – it is not a conspiracy. The United States owes more money to China alone than it can ever possibly pay as a debt and the whole system is based on debt. International financial services are overextended to such an extent it can never be undone. Post 9/11, with the neo-con strategy, set into course a series of events [where] there is no reverse.

The more you look at the events with Russia the more you know it’s not a conspiracy...I understand Syria’s fake revolution was started in London by a Thinktank with people behind the scenes: they’re not hiding out in Alepo, they’re certainly not in Damascus, it’s people in London and it’s non-governmental organisations' people who’ve kicked this off. It’s ironic that this whole thing started from one person getting shot for not being able to protest.

We’re still fighting like crazy in Iraq decades on and Afghanistan, we’ve been there since the seventies. This is like misadventure on a grand scale and I’m not against war specifically but this is geopolitics. The thing is now Russia understands they’re fully surrounded and they have major commitments to China and their alignments with Iran and it’s at a serious point.

As a father how does this make you feel about your children’s future? The current situation makes it seem like we’re doomed.

Penny Rimbaud used to be part of the Crass organisation and commune. I had the observation where at one point he was so involved with Crass’ records and the commune, label, libraries, and publications during the Thatcher times educating people on how you can be your own government. Now he’s on Twitter and he’s being like this Zen guy non-stop and it lead me to a realisation in my own life.

If you understand psychologically a lot of times in life people hate things because they’re not able to interact with them and they love them because they are. It’s that simple, a certain type of love and a certain type of hate. It’s led me to a very Zen realisation because the bottom line is that I care very much so I have to refocus to that and I have to be accepting. In this life and these times it forces me to focus on my art.

The album is called Third World Pyramid. Is it in reference to the current social and political situation?

It’s multi-leveled because I'm abstract. On one level I thought it was quite interesting the peaks of regions and time periods, whether it’s mass America or the Egyptian or even the pyramids in Babylon, the Ziggurats - all of these places are in the third world now.

I thought that was interesting, but then there’s also the human pyramid. If you don’t understand, on the back of the dollar bill there’s a pyramid. Here we have this Christian nation yet all the iconography is this Roman shit and this Egyptian shit. None of it is Jesus on a cross. None of it is a picture of a church someplace or a fish, it’s something else they’re talking about and it’s another God.

In this pyramid with the eye it’s a representation of the human pyramid and each block could be a cell, like a station. Your civil servants could be in one block and all these different people going all the way up; society answering to the next group or club above them and all of them working together becomes the all seeing eye.

The interesting thing about it is the foundation of the pyramid sees nothing. The foundation of the pyramid is below the sand: doesn’t see the sky, never seen the stars, it’s never seen a cloud, it’s just holding up the pyramid.

The tone of the album has a sense of melancholic desperation, but then seems quite hopeful. What was your mindset when you were writing it?

Well, the interesting thing is I wrote in a full spectrum of human emotion. There’s another album coming out [Don't Get Lost] and it has this almost kraut-rocky, PiL Limited steel box, dubby, dystopian...it just changes style every single song and it covers so much ground you can’t imagine from track-to-track - it’s a double record.

I just split the songs into two different categories and this album [Third World Pyramid] I wanted to be more understandable, as far as a pre-conceived notion that many people have of what we probably are as far as vaguely influenced by the sixties, shamelessly wearing our hearts on our sleeves. It’s going to hark it back to that repeatedly.

The other record will be indefinable, like something I’ve discovered. Like a UFO I’ve discovered and I’ve walked inside and start pressing buttons to work out how to fly it. I knew I was going to take the heat about this record because I don’t think it’s the best album, specifically that wasn’t my goal.

It’s a rare thing to hear someone say about their own album.

I’m going to qualify that statement - the thing is I split the songs in half. I didn’t specifically go: “Well, I’m going to put these ten great songs together”. I made two albums that work cohesively in this bizarre way – one short record and one double record – but they’re two totally different albums.

When I started sharing these privately, to Simone from Primal Scream or something, I was like: “No, no, no you have to listen to the first album first and then listen to the second album and then you’re going to understand something strange”. What you’re going to understand is that I just made 45 songs at a time and that’s how quick my brain works in a week and that’s how diverse it is. This isn’t me being: “Here’s a record I want to become this album” or: “Oh, there was a band in the 80s called Jesus And The Mary Chain, let’s fucking buy a leather jacket and sound like this – can I borrow your distortion pedal?”

With such a prolific output how do you even decide what makes it onto the final album?

Some friends helped me. Either it’s absolutely clear to me in this way that there’s like an invisible chord that connects everything...As one song gives way to the next it becomes harmonious with the previous one and the one that’s about to come. You can manipulate the listener’s experience that way just by the arrangement of the songs and the pacing. Sometimes it’s an awareness on a level that cannot be studied or premeditated, but it’s harmonious in your own workings of your mind.

The opening track ‘Good Mourning’ is sung by your wife and is about your son. However, it’s very sombre.

She asked me to write a song and I wrote one for her. It just happens, like some people can do that [laughs]. Ultimately, in a large body of work, it’s ok to reflect a full spectrum of emotions.

Would you ever consider being overtly political in your lyrics?

Only if it was true to exactly what I was feeling with the comments. I wrote a song called ‘Take It From The Man’ a long time ago and it basically breaks down what I was thinking and what I was feeling about splitting, about knowing and my awareness of everything - just calling it like you see it in a classic motif or whatever.

There’s no reason because what I’m going to explain to you is you can’t want for other people what they don’t want for themselves. That’s precisely why I’m not at Oxford station passing out socialist literature. On many levels people have got it the way they want it.

I always think when you go to the ‘90s when you first started and artists had the time, space, and money to grow and live cheaply. Do you think as a band you could start out now in the same way you did back then?

We had to fight. We were already in an economically expensive environment in San Francisco - an environment now that’s the most expensive in America. We had to fight principles of collective socialism in the arts where you share a rehearsal space, you borrow a car, you borrow amps, you do whatever you have to do. Because we had to rent out Masonic Temples to play we would do our own promotion, so we had to step completely out of the system. That’s the only advice I’d have for anyone else to fully understand that.

At that time everyone was against us, you’d have other bands tearing down our flyers - we were such a threat to everyone. I could never understand that, obviously none of those people have bands any more. People are so competitive and you really can’t look at other things in that light; you need to foster an eco-system to support yourself whether it’s the record store or the venue. A lot of people don’t understand that, you have no competition as a band.

A lot of new bands starting out who admire Brian Jonestown sometimes take more interest in the rock n roll element, like the drugs...

They fucked up Dig. I don’t want to dwell on it, but they didn’t have an ending so they had to compile a story out of the footage. A few things get in there but they’re not backed-up, they’re not qualified - you don’t really hear me speak. My responses [in this interview] have been over 25 words, with syntax, and everything works right? You can understand what I’m trying to say and what I’m saying. There’s no example of that in the movie...it’s fucking scary listening to me from the very beginning, if you don’t share my viewpoint it’s fucking scary talking to me.

Anyway, the first thing that I say is: “We’re going to start a revolution and we’re going to teach you how to do it” and that was because I was navigating all the record companies in the world. Everybody was trying to go: “You’re the next Kurt Cobain and this is what we want from you”. I would say “no” and my band is going: “Fuck you! We’re starving to death, what are you doing? They’re buying us $6000 meals!”

I wanted to show people an example of how you could make your thing work and that alone would propel you to a greater level of success than the people who didn’t know how to market you and create something.

Do you think artists have greater control in the current landscape?

We’re fucked. It’s fucked because everybody is asleep. Here you had the opportunity with Al Gore talking about the internet and how great it would be and all this shit, this gift to humanity, and then you had Facebook completely usurp everybody and thinking that’s the way to market your stuff. Without paying Facebook your posts get suppressed.

Going backwards, what I wanted to do at the start of the movie, my only goal was to enter the popular lexicon. Basically be understood as this person who did this type of thing, for this reason. It’s really odd because Jimi Hendrix, when he entered the popular lexicon as being this free spirited electric guitar player one of kind, right? You can’t be Jimi Hendrix. There’s no clues that he left us of how to be him. Paul McCartney going on and on his whole life talking [Paul McCartney voice]: “Well, you know we had a lot of fun” There’s nothing that guy's ever said that can help you ever be him.

So, you’re saying you can’t be imitated?

There’s something really amazing about full reality, that if I leave enough clues and you try and emulate me what you ultimately become is you. Johnny Rotten did the same thing in this really odd way. The only thing when you copy Sid Vicious is you could become a derelict, but when you copy Johnny Rotten you couldn’t be Johnny Rotten but the thing was you became yourself.

The point I was trying to make is I never wanted permission from anybody or validation to do anything. My mom is a psychologist so she was like: “You’re going to fucking end up in a mental hospital or prison, because you are so belligerent." I had a job as a plumber’s apprentice when I was 16 or 17 and they were like: “Anton, we love you, we want to buy you your own truck, you’ll have a really good future with us”...and I was like: “Fuck that”. Could you imagine? Me being a plumber to some rich white people in Newport beach?

Do you ever feel like you’re imprisoned by your characterisation in Dig? You tweeted reviews of Third World Pyramid saying ‘They think they know me’.

No, that’s what they tried to say about this record...anybody who tries to critique me like a Q writer when they reviewed the recording. First of all, they didn’t even comment that I covered the ‘Assignment Song’ by Jane & Lorraine and that also Nina Simone did it; it’s a fucking epic song that nobody knows about, just attempting to do a 10 minute song like that is amazing. Now, what did I see in it that Nina Simone saw in it? I’m obviously not an idiot because then she wasn’t an idiot. I knew when they didn’t comment on that they didn’t listen to it.

I know they’re going to eat their words, because the next record isn’t like any of that shit - I hope they don’t bother to review it. The ironic thing in passing any mentions of the last song [‘The Sun Ship’] is it got to fucking number five in the UK.

I wasn’t fairly portrayed [in Dig!] and there were a lot of things that happened. The movie people saw entitled ‘Dig’ wasn’t the movie that won Sundance. The movie that won Sundance had all the spy camera footage of me dealing with all the record deals, the lawyers and those guys threatening – they’re basically the mafia. A lot of the people talking, the A&R people, are basically hookers with cocaine that they sent to try and talk us into it; the drug parties and all the shit that went down. None of those people signed off and I had it signed off. What they got is something less than that, they had to go back to the drawing board when it won and they sold the rights and they had to edit another movie.

It was always clear in my mind that that wasn’t the story, I was never a failure, I’ve always been friends with the Dandy Warhols and all this other shit.

Do you ever watch Dig!?

Never, I never watched it. I watched one version of the movie.

Now you’re sober do you have any regrets about your drug use at that time, especially as you’re creatively so prolific now?

I was always prolific. I did six records in 18 months in 1995 – six 18-song records – I’ve always written every day under every circumstance. I only got into smack the last two years of the decade, so we were actually filming before then. I mean I only got like, “This is a problem”. It’s a problem to start with. After that I started drinking to get rid of the smack and that took while to get rid of.

If I have hundreds of songs it really doesn’t matter either way. What can I say? I used to have a Ferragamo model as a girlfriend and I pretty much lost her as I was doing smack. Like, what, would I have her and live in Connecticut? It’s really hard to quantify. It took me until the mid-2000s to leave America for good and it never occurred to me to do that. If I had done that in the nineties in my late teens or twenties if I possible could have figured that out, would I even have a group?

You wrote the soundtrack for the film Moon Dogs released in the summer. Have you got any plans to work on other soundtracks?

I know this is going to be stupid and people always tell me to focus, but I’ve come up with two really good concepts for movies and two of my friends who are screenwriters have both said they’d help me do that in a second and Phillip Johns [Moon Dogs’ Director] said, “I’m in any time”. But then Phillip Johns has come up with another movie and presented the concept to me, which would be pretty cool; another Scottish film that would be pretty badass with Dean Cavanar writing it. I said I would do that.

Some people in Los Angeles sent me a synopsis about some fucking DMT duality thing. I want to record with Melody’s Echo Chamber, I want to do some work with some Belgium artists and I’ve been working with a Danish woman. There’s so much stuff I want to do, I’m recording a band from Germany right now.

I read you were going to make a film about a roadie on your last UK tour. Did that happen?

Yeah, I’m just worried my filmmaker friend didn’t do it the way I wanted it to be done. The problem is I couldn’t be the guy filming because the whole premise of the film is I’ve known the guy in the film for 26 years, but I don’t know anything about him and he’s really interesting guy...

We did film it and it looks spectacular I’m just worried we didn’t get enough of him in a very odd way. I want to make the whole thing in French subtitles, so it has to be a little bit weird enough to make absolutely no sense - it can’t be campy or weird. The concept is bananas because we’re playing to like 4,000 people in this old place and you’re only seeing it from behind. It’s all shot in this Anton Corbin black and white, ultra gloss, HD like crazy.

You’re often referred to as interview gold. Do you enjoy interviews?

I just try to listen to what’s being said and I answer honestly and I never worry about it too much. It turns out very consistently over the years. I’ve always had an interesting take on society and the motivations of people and where it’s going. An authority on all the stuff. I’ve always been counter culture...I have no opinion on what other people think about me or the way I behave [laughs].

Third World Pyramid is out now via A Recordings. Don’t Get Lost is released on 24 February 2017. Marie Wood