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mostofthingsmostofthetime · 12 days

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My thoughts on The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes movie

I don’t know if I liked it as much as the original films (maybe Mockingjay 1 & 2 as they are pretty emotionally draining), but I still enjoyed it.

I think where it fell a little flat for me is 1. The beginning was a bit slow (tbh I only really started getting interested when Lucy Gray stuck that snake down that girl’s dress & even then I enjoyed the story more when the setting changed from the Capitol to the district) 2. I knew Snow would survive 3. I’d already been spoiled online for a lot of stuff that happens & 4. while I know the director did his best to make Snow as “likeable” as he could for as long as possible, even before he started getting “a little too comfortable” with killing & snitching I didn’t find him as sympathetic as Katniss or Peeta (but that is probably again down to the fact that I know what he goes onto do & there’s no real way around that), this made engaging with him difficult for me.

The world is fascinating. Getting to see all the new locations we never had access to before as well as old locations now in a totally different light (for example district 12 which, while still clearly suffering, seemed like such a bustling industrial town compared to how it is in Katniss’s time). It might have a much more retro aesthetic but there's also just a more vibrant, natural, wild & lawless atmosphere to this movie compared to the others in the franchise. The whole scope of the film just felt more cinematic then I remember the others being yet also weirdly intimate. Maybe because it was one contained story & we knew the main character’s fate from the start. I also loved the title cards signifying the start of each section of the story like from the books & wished they'd done something similar for the other films. It just added a certain flair to the whole thing. Almost gave it the vibe of a tragic play.

The costuming was great. The bright red of the academy uniforms. Flickerman’s snazzy suits. Snow’s dapper black & white outfit. Both peace keeper uniforms (despite one of them giving very ‘1930’s Germany’ vibes) looked great. Grandma might have been a bigot, but at least she was well dressed. Everything Dr Gaul wore (except the top that looked like a used tampon, lol) was exquisite. The main ladies of fashion, Tigris & Lucy Gray slayed. Our Future Capitol stylist looked like some regal yet exotic bird & Miss Survivor was giving Bohemian, country girl realness the entire time she was on screen. Even the extras were serving (like that random couple Snow walked past on his way to the reaping ceremony).

The music was amazing. Every song that played was fantastic (shout out to Olivia for her end credit contribution). The lyrics & instrumentation were beautiful & my god does Rachel Zegler have pipes! Anyone who says the singing scenes are cringy is just stupid like I’m sorry you can’t appreciate art. Also, the words ‘ballad’ & ‘songbirds’ are literally in the title. Plus, Lucy Gray is from the poorest district, so what exactly do those people want her to do in her free time? She can’t exactly hop on an X-box for a few hours. Not too mention that (as the offspring of someone who’s musically inclined) I can tell you, it’s completely realistic for a musician to use their craft to help them deal with trauma & Lucy Gray clearly had more than her fair share of that.

The Grandma'am helped to paint a sadly very realistic background for Snow. As who among us hasn’t met at least one delusional old person who thinks that their/their group’s suffering (regardless of the severity of it or the reason behind their former/newer status in society) means that no one else are deserving of even the tiniest shred of humanity & there are some people who are unlucky enough to not only be related to these people but be raised by them.

Hunter schafer as Tigris is clearly the superior Snow when it comes to things like empathy & overall mental stability but I do kind of wish they’d been more for her to do. Credit where credit is due though her & Tom did actually look like they could be related & I did buy their familial bond (which makes her appearance in Mockingjay so much sadder in hindsight).

Peter Dinklage as Casca Highbottom was a bit of a mix for me just due to his purpose as a character & the limit of film as a form of media. Like sure the audience know that Snow’s going to become an irredeemable monster in the end but without a window into his mind it really does just seem like the Dean is just out to get him & even when we find out why it seems kind of unfair. Like sure his dad sucked but haven’t the Games shown that blaming children for violence caused by others is unjust (& like ok he hates Coriolanus & probably the grandma but Tigris hadn’t done anything to deserve living in poverty, as she can’t control who she’s related to)? Plus, it felt like he could have at least tried taking Snow under his wing at some point to try to hinder Dr Gual’s influence. Saying all of that, though, Peter Dinklage is great at playing an addict with depression & the idea that some drunken rambling could lead to such long-lasting suffering is terrifying. Also its pretty realistic that living with that kind of guilt & in such a cruel environment for that long would make most people jaded & bitter, even if they did have good intentions.

Omg we finally get a Mayor family on screen & they’re assholes! Madge would be so disappointed 😭. It was interesting to see how harsh & overall “boot licky” the mayor & his family seemed compared to decades later, which makes sense as the war wasn’t that long ago for them so the dad probably felt more incentive to align himself with the Capitol as well as not feeling very connected to the district people as 12’s decline probably didn’t fully set in until they really started running low on coal & Snow became president (oh I just know he wanted to blow that district off the map 😆). I also wouldn’t put it past Billy to come up with some sob story of how he really does love Mayfair but wicked Lucy Gray is somehow preventing them from being together. Still no excuse to try to send her to her death twice in one week, though. Definitely not a girl’s girl.

Ok, so a liar. Cheat. Drunk & someone who hits women. Is there anything good about Billy Taupe? Also, trying to get your ex back, while your current girlfriend is literally standing right next to you? Dude, have some god damn back bone! You made a choice, now stick to it. Also, fumbling Lucy Gray, for a girl like that? What’s it like having no brains or taste? Well, too bad, coz you’re stuck with her forever now, lol.

Viola Davies, the actress that you are. What else is there to say? Dr Gaul is almost comic book levels of insane. Like she is how the Right see women in STEM, on crack! I don’t know what she did to get into character, but whatever it was, it worked.

Jason Schwartzman as Lucretius Flickerman is a very interesting addition to the story despite playing such a small & seemingly insignificant role. He is strange in how unthreatening he is while also extremely blasé about the abhorrent violence he witnesses that it’s as funny as it is disturbing. Making him come across as more human yet harsher than his son, who at least pretends to care about the tributes (in a very Capitol way, obviously but still). There’s also a polish & confidence to Tucci’s performance that I think Schwartzman did a great job of avoiding copying (despite knowing what audiences were probably expecting) because not only are their characters in entirely different stages of their careers but the whole ethos of the Hunger Games is different in Snow’s youth than it is in Katniss’s. Caesar is a well established presenter & during his time, the games have always been a success (minus the year with the tundra) that the entire Capitol is invested in & seemingly in support of. On the other hand Lucretius had the unique task of not only coming into a job like this with zero experience (I mean imagine going from announcing the weather to presenting the fucking hunger games) but also there were no vibes to try to emulate let alone guidelines to follow because he truly was the first person to do this. On top of that, the "event" his presenting has been panned for years as both boring & unethical. Schwartzman brought a slightly awkward, experimental, yet try hard vibe (like a comedian who's desperate to get a laugh) that I think worked wonderfully for the character.

Tom Blyth's performance was great & he was visually perfect for a young Snow (the power of a good wig! Who knew lol). Even having the cool, analytical stare of Donald Sutherland, down pat. While his appearance was very Eminem during his peacekeeping days, his realisation in the cabin and subsequent breakdown in the woods were crazy. There was so much tension between him & Rachel in that scene that for a second, it literally felt like all the air had been sucked out of the room. I could almost hear the record scratch for both of them, & all that building paranoia finally coming to a sudden crescendo in the way that it did? Pure cinema!

Josh Rivera, as Sejanus, was honestly a mix for me. Obviously, I agree with his morals, but his way of going about it did seem a little dumb. However I do think it’s pretty realistic that a teenager, especially a rich one, would be rather naive. Also I’ve heard that he’s smarter in the book & I think at times my frustration with him is more just down to the fact that I’m seeing him from Snow’s point of view. Meaning scenes that would be portrayed as noble in any other film instead come across as almost painfully inconvenient because the focus is always on how they affect Snow rather than the actual victims of the situation. Lastly, sorry, Snowjanus shippers, I just don’t see it (especially on Snow’s end), but whatever floats your boat.

Rachel Zegler played Lucy Gray with the perfect mix of natural charm & emotional vulnerability with clear pride in her culture & a refusal to let the world around her change who she is. Yet there was also an air of mystery & a subtle resilience to her that makes her potentially surviving out in the woods for years without being detected actually believable (though I don’t buy the theory that she went on to become president Coin). Definitely the highlight of the movie for me.

PS. I'd love to know what you think of my review in the comments/tags & am open to criticism (as long as it's respectful) just remember that I'm only talking about the movie so please don't reference anything spersific to the book.

#some other things i wanted to mention but didn’t seem significant to put in the review (+ it was getting rather long) are:#Clemensia you were so pretty & did not desserve to die #like who hasn't cheated on their homework a little #may my hair look as good as your's if i ever get bit by a snake #dill & wovey rest in peace my darlings #Lysistrata it wasn't your fault #Arachane you got what you deserved tbh #reaper you have my respect forever king #lumina really said kill um with kindness #no but sersiously i love you girl & your 1950's farm girl aesthetic #marcus you did not desserve that & sejanus is sorry & in my heart you guys meet up & become boyfriends in the afterlife #treech you didn't leave much of an impression but at least your hat was cool #bobbin my little germin looking boy #at least you gave Snow a good scare before your demise #coral looks gay like that's a lesbian right there #thg #the hunger games #the hunger games the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the ballad of songbirds and snakes review #thg tbosas #thg tbosbas #tbosas #tbosbas #tbosas review #tbosbas review #thg tbosas review #thg tbosbas review #the hunger games the ballad of songbirds and snakes review #southern gothic is my new fravriote genre #review

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waffowo · 2 months

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Watching a fan-cut of World Enough and Time/The Doctor Falls which edits the two in black and white really does affirm my placement of this story as second in my Top 10 Doctor Who stories but also helped me realise that I was in a way, underrating World Enough And Time.

Of course, I’m in the camp of people who had a strong preference for the latter over the former (although I still did love WEAT) and still does, but the edit really just helped me appreciate the pure genre mastery of WEAT.

Already Talalay’s art direction becomes more prominent and notable once you strip back all the colour. The sharp contrasts in lighting, the framing of certain spaces such as the doorway to the conversion theatre, the shots to the outside of the hospital, the comparatively brighter control room etc are details I appreciate so much more on this watch. With her insanely precise direction, she achieves such a sustained sense of horror and dread that I never really fully realised on original few viewings.

This and probably The Curse Of Fenric are probably Doctor Who at its most stylistically driven. I do think that of course the tight screenplay does help but I do credit it more so to how much interplay there is between theme and style. I mean, we follow Bill’s perspective for most of the narrative, of course the underlying horrors of transhumanism would be explored in such a manner. I just can’t believe how I missed the strong thematic underpinnings of that horror and indifference towards the pain of others if it means one can evolve, perfectly explored through the lens of a young woman who doesn’t know what the fuck is happening.

I still maintain that my issue of how the pacing somewhat falters at the middle but with everything above and how the cut perfectly pulls that final twist punch in a way that made me squirm and yell ALTHOUGH IVE SEEN THIS THREE TIMES just made me raise my score. This is what I kind of miss as such direction is really only seen again in the trilogy finale of Series 12 (there is a good case that the trilogy is very much motivated by a gothic sense, specifically and more so Haunting of Villa Diodati) and I hope to see again, but tbh it might be a while.

#doctor who #peter capaldi #twelfth doctor #dw meta #bill potts #missy #pearl mackie #Missy looks so good #michelle gomez

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paragonrobits · 1 year

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tbh i think the whole ‘Midna’s true form doesn’t look enough like a gremlin so her imp form is better’ is kind of a ground zero for a particular type of discourse in character design that ultimately boils down to a single question:

should a character’s design be a visual summary of their personality?

there are pros and cons to this thing. on the one hand, i always appreciate a design where a single look at it goes ‘oh yeah you know EVERYTHING about this person’. a lot of the most iconic villains really lean into this (though a lot of heroes don’t, for a particular reason), and these designs are a very effective way to instantly communicate character.

The flipside issue of this, though, is that while it doesn’t INHIBIT nuance, it does make it harder to convey it, or at least if you assume that a design should always communicate the fundamental facet of this character, it also means that by default those facets will have greater significance to an audience than more subtle or less obvious traits revealed through characterization and plot. For example, if your character is a huge and brutish monster with a soft side, and the former is what their character design communicates (because the soft side is a subversion), than this approach to character design can be more of a hurdle.

Character design as character thesis also creates a problem with audience response; if the audience overwhelmingly makes assumptions about a character because of the way they look, even if that’s not at all what you intended, they can and probably will warp that character to fit their preconceptions. (For instance, all the male characters who happen to be attractive by the standards of the audience and get reimagined as brooding bad boys whose pragmatism and ruthlessness is them being dark and mature, even if the actual character is an explosive dumbass with zero maturity and too selfish to consider that other people have goals independent of what they want.)

This is where you run into another big issue with this whole idea: remember when i said that heroes and protagonists often tend to have less interesting designs, or at least that their characters are not often communicated as well? This largely boils down to a desire to have characters that you WANT people to like to be broadly inoffensive; if you’ve ever created OCs and you shied away from a particularly unpalatable character trait or design feature because you thought it would turn more people away, than you know EXACTLY what i mean. Heroes are often compelled to be more broadly likable, but this also means flattening out their potential concepts in favor of something more... marketable. Which sucks. It fucking sucks. Its why so many heroes come off as boring compared to villains, and while you can get some fun ideas by making your heroes just as extreme as villains, its very easy to screw it up and create unlikable characters. (You can honestly study a lot of discourse this way.)

Going back to Midna, she’s actually a prime example of a heroic character that does this right, but the thing about her is that while being a gremlin is a big part of her character, it isn’t what defines her. She is, after all, the protagonist (though not the playable one) of this game, she is THE titular Twilight Princess, and this role is ultimately what defines her, and her growing into her responsibility. She may be a gremlin, but its not the sole aspect of her personality.

Personally, I’ve always liked her true form more (though to be honest, she would probably have more facial elements from Imp Midna if she appeared in more games especially now, since the highly mature and regal look of her true form is kind of a stylistic element exclusive to Twilight Princess, while she’d probably look more like Imp Midna but Gerudo-sized and proportioned if she appeared in Tears of The Kingdom), not least in part BECAUSE its such a contrast to her actual personality. It’s very fun to get a character whose design expects you to think one way of them, but they turn out to have a radically different personaltiy, while it does seem limiting for a character’s design to indicate who they are. It might communicate things easier, but it also leans towards a much flatter character; if you convey everything that way, what’s left to tell?

for Midna, when we see her true form’s contrast against the gremlin cursed form we associated with her, its essentially the story of her character development and the depths of who she really is told in reverse.

#character design #midna #legend of zelda

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hyukabean · 2 years

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match(a) made in heaven !! – oneshot collec.

pairing – chan, felix, hueningkai, yeonjun, jake, niki x reader (+ ???, ??? x reader)

summary – welcome to ‘match(a) made in heaven’, a match making service, designed to find your ideal someone based on your boba preferences!

along with your order confirmation, you will be been sent a form and are required to fill in the following information: full name, age (birth-year only), profile picture, occupation (some will require a form of verification), social media account. (please ensure you have read our terms and services before proceeding).

please find the available options below. after scanning the qr-code on your receipt, you will automatically be paired and can interact with your match on their profile. in the case that you are not satisfied with your service, please reselect, or leave the store. enjoy your stay!

unedited.

[standard menu !]

『black milk tea』 — bang chan [coming soon!!]

(idol!bang chan x intern!reader) working part time as a jyp intern, in addition to being a college student meant two things; (1) you and nmixx’s lily have gotten pretty close, and (2) you freaked out when the person who’s profile popped up was none other than stray kid’s bang chan…

『honey dew milk tea』 — lee felix [coming soon!!]

(idol!lee felix x intern!reader) running a fan account for a group like stray kids is a risky business, not only because they snoop around stay content, but also considering your occupation; despite your work at jyp only being a part time internship, it would be extremely unprofessional if anyone found out. the form you filled out to participate required confirmation of some form of social media. not wanting to expose any more information to a potential creep, you listed your fan account. so imagine your surprise, and horror, when your match was lee felix…

『green tea strawberry boba』 — huening kai [coming soon!!]

(idol!huening kai x stylist!reader) you’d never excepted to be a stand-in stylist of all things, but, after witnessing the chaos backstage on your way to drop off bahiyyih from your boba date, you agreed to stay and help. more than a third of the staff had caught the flu, and so your help was greatly appreciated. throughout all the hectic, you completely forgot to check who you had matched with; once you did however, let’s just say hiyyih wasn’t the only one surprised to see her brother…

『brown sugar milk tea』 — choi yeonjun [coming soon!!]

(idol!choi yeonjun x back up dancer!reader) txt has gotten to know you pretty well after meeting you and hiyyih together so many times. though you were far from being a professional, you did enjoy dancing and free-styling every once in a while. so when one of the key back up dancers is missing for kep1er’s performance at an award ceremony, you jump in. as a thank you, hiyyih take you out for boba, and encourages you to find your match. coincidently, it so happens to be your her brother’s cute hyung….

『matcha milk tea』 — sim jake [coming soon!!]

(idol!sim jake x fan!reader) having attended your final few years of high school with sim jake, you were more than surprised seeing him on i-land and finally debut. you’d never forgiven your former best friend for embarrassing you about your crush on him on sns, but boy oh boy was it awkward meeting him at a fan-sign. grabbing boba with the friend after to celebrate all your interactions with everyone, you would never have expected to match with sim jake himself, let alone his first message to you being: “i bought atleast 38 cups in hopes i’d match with you, can we please talk?”….

『taro milk tea』 — nishimura niki [coming soon!!]

(idol!nishimura riki x translator!reader) working part time as a translator at hybe was probably the funnest job you’ve ever had; from being able to work from home or at the office, do seeing most content pre-release, there wasn’t much to complain about. after starting your job as a live translator from time to time as well, you quickly realized just how driven a certain japanese maknae really was. after turning him down numerous times for professional reasons, and him not relenting, you decided you needed a boyfriend asap. so you scan your receipt, hoping for good match. your jaw drops seeing riki on your phone screen. you slowly press the chat notification, “ah isn’t it great to have your friend running a service like this~? so y/n, when’s our first date??”….

[ secret menu ! ]

『velvet cheesecake milk tea』 — ???

to be announced…

『almond milk tea』 — ???

to be announced…

TAGLIST [💌] —

@bookishcalls @allisocks

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kuipernebula · 11 days

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Talk about your Exhalted characters, KP. This is not a question.

I appreciate the sentiment, but like. I dunno. I really wish I could talk about this shit in a context where people understood what I was talking about.

I'll shorten the list to just the shortlist of Sidereal Exalted I've developed to be played. I actually have more Sidereal PC's I wanna play than this but these 4 have received the most development and cook time in my brain. I need to make it 5 to hit the last Sidereal caste(/closest thing to classes the game has) but only one idea has hit me with any lucidity and it was like, a week ago, so it needs to cook some more.

Listed in order that the maidens are generally listed (Coincidentally, also the order of their planets)

The Journeys is a young man born in an independent city state in the jungles of the South East, one of the rare few cultures around the Dreaming Sea with few imperial ambitions. Here, members of [PC's] family were bonded to a tiger cub at birth, to act as their sibling and protector. Such was his life, until he came of age. Then, the Prasadi Empire sought to finally incorporate his home into its imperial regime. Guided by visions of a golden tiger, [PC] and his brother led his people to a hidden grotto beyond the notice of Prasad - but not heaven. Now, [PC] and his brother act as agents of fate, helping lead others to where they must be. Well. When they feel like it.

[PC] is loud, obnoxious, messy, and immature - but he's forceful, charismatic, and diligent, so he tends to get by just fine. His brother, by contrast, is serious, chooses his words(?) carefully, but refuses to raise a claw if its not in his or his brother's interest. At essence 2, [PC] gets a charm that lets him turn his brother into a God that works fro the Bureau of Destiny, meaning they're OFFICIALLY co-workers, and also his brother gets a human form and can talk.

His charms aren't as solid as the other ideas yet but he's a Tiger stylist, and fights in tandem with his brother. They're kind of attached at the hip. And if you try to say they're not brothers or bring up blood relation then they'll both probably try to kill you. (I need to pick a Sidereal Martial Art for him but I haven't found one I like quite yet.)

The Serenities is a former slave to House Cynis on the blessed isle. [Here there's some gray area in his backstory, as the specifics of his slavery and how he got there juggles in my head, and his exaltation isn't super clear.] Now he is forced to work alongside such figures as the Goddess of Slavery (who keeps calling him) and the Bronze Faction (set up a status quo that allows slavery to flourish.) To avoid killing his coworkers, he became a drunk, but became so enamored with wine and alcohol that he also became a legendary brewmaster. Most other Sidereals think of him as a laissez-faire drunk with a rude but friendly demeanor.

Though he works diligently for the Bureau of Destiny, he is largely entrenched in his own personal revenge project: burning all of House Cynis to the ground. The corrupt house that enslaved him cannot be allowed to stand. He will do anything to curry favor and allies to this goal, and will equally hide all his intentions about it until he knows for sure they can be trusted.

His fighting style is the Drunken God style, which isn't in the game yet so I haven't nailed down a lot of specifics. He also uses Augmented Implements of Strive to improve his use of Improvised Weapons, allowing him to turn any bar fight into a huge spectacle. (His Sidereal Martial Art could be a few things, but Sapphire Veil of Passions might lean the best into his Drunken Fist shenanigans, while the unreleased Amaranthine Chains of Samsara might be better thematically if it's about breaking those chains.)

The charm synergy I'm most excited for with him is that he gets a craft charm called Elemental Vision that gives you bonuses based on your Maiden's element; among other things, this includes that Elementals and Dragon-Blooded of the appropriate element have an automatic tie of Patience towards you. House Cynis is famously Wood aspect. Venus is the Maiden of Wood.

The Chosen of Secrets is a lightly Sun Wukong-inspired Super Thief. A huge adrenaline junkie that finds infiltration and larceny to be the height of excitement, he got his start in the Scavenger Lands, working under a Scavenger Lord picking apart First Age ruins. There he found his first true score: a seemingly-ordinary walking stick with a band of prismatic metal on his tip. He knew it, and himself, were destined for more than this particular Scavenger Lord, so he absconded with it. He was picked up by heaven shortly thereafter.

His various heists are viewed by most of his coworkers in the Bureau as an eccentric hobby and nothing more, mostly because he mostly sticks to Creation-based targets. Which isn't to say he hasn't considered Heavenly targets - he just needs the right plan. Either way, he has no interest in Faction politics, and regards the affairs of the Bureau as a day job he has to entertain for his salary.

His walking stick is the Starmetal artifact Gnomon, once wielded by a Solar Phantom Thief who famously stole it as a cutting from one of Heaven's Peach Trees of Immortality. Now it's our guy's, and it's main power is to stop time for brief moments, often to assist in a fight or in a heist.

He combines the above with Monkey Style Martial Arts, his Sidereal Charms (like most of the Larceny tree), and later on, Emerald Gyre of Aeons style. (It's the Martial Arts style about Time Loops, Eternity, and Time.) (Monkey Style and Gyre both styles that use Staves as weapons, and Gnomon is a staff. Synergy!)

The Endings is my Exalted character I've developed the most, Kyon Shi. Orphaned while still an infant in one of the Hundred Kingdoms, he fell in with other urchins. When he was learning to walk, he earned his name from a kindly old widow who would give food to the urchins. She found his awkward hops endearing, and thus called him "my own little kyonshi" in jest. The name stuck with the urchins, who found his pale skin and haunted eyes eerie.

As he grew, he became more and more enamored with death and funerals, consuming as much information as he could from the undertaker, from adults, from priests, whoever would let an orphan ask them questions. They, as with the urchins, found it off-putting, but sometimes humored him.

When he was still young, the other urchins decided they had enough of him. One of them - a boy that Kyon had once awkwardly expressed interest in - offered to meet him, alone, at the graveyard that night. He excitedly went to find his whole gang of street toughs. They proceeded to beat him half to death, stick him in a grave, and attempt to bury him alive. Kyon lost consciousness and the next thing he knew, he was above ground, with the boys having run away.

When he was old enough to make the journey himself, he hitched a ride on with a merchant caravan to the tomb-city of Sijan. There he, like many other morbid youths, joined the ranks of the city's mortuary students. He felt like he lagged behind many, but not all, of his fellows, but after much hard work, graduated top of his class.

His first assignment as a fully-fledged Sijanese funerist was to enter and clean one of the oldest tombs of the city. Inside, however, he found an old, dying man, who claimed that his sucessor was found, and it was his time. Kyon Shi felt compassion for the dying man, and performed a short funeral service for him. When he exited the tomb, he was greeted by a woman who introduced herself as The Green Lady.

Now he works for the Bureau of Destiny and is a key member of the Convention on the Dead. The Green Lady has taken him under her wing, and he has been given the impression he's being groomed to take over her position as Chair of the Convention one day, a position he'd be excited to accept. He trusts her implicitly, and would do anything to please or impress her, but since she's James Bond in The Underworld she can be... enigmatic. (In large part he views her so highly because she's the first person to see potential or promise in him; at every turn before hand, he had to earn it.)

His secretary is a ghost named Peach Blossom Princess, who lives in his manse in heaven and helps handle his paperwork. His manse, for what its worth, is contained in a folded space under a Torii. Enter it one way and you enter the Memorial of the Starless Soldier, a solemn and sacred place built by Saturn and Sol Invictus shortly after the Divine Revolution meant to honor the un-Exalted mortal soldiers of the Revolution. Enter the other way, and you are right outside Kyon's home, a temple-mansion-dojo where he (and his secretary) live (and train) between missions. (No matter which way you enter the Torii, it appears to be under an eternal starry, moonless sky)

Primarily he wants to build up relations between ghosts in the underworld and the bureaus of heaven; he thinks a future can be built where the dead can be part of the affairs of destiny, where all can be met with compassion. Secondarily, he wants to build relations with ancestor cults, as he thinks this, too, could be a valuable function of their alliance. This is idealistic, of course, but it's why he's tentatively aligned with the Gold faction.

He fights with the extremely deadly and unsettling Hungry Ghost Style, which emulates the movements and hunger of the angry dead. He is also a skilled necromancer, having been trained by The Green Lady herself; he maintains the ghostly bindings of his secretary himself. He also has most of the undead stuff in the Medicine tree, and also the charm where you become legally dead to heaven by performing your own funeral and thus get to be considered undead when it would benefit you (like if you are underwater).

He may eventually learn the Albicant Sepulcher of Extinction style, a Sidereal Martial Art made by one of the Deathlords. (How is up to debate...)

The other thing I've spent a ton of time on with him is that he has TONS of fun acts about various funeral practices around creation. I wrote down tons of them. I should write down some more.

#cw: long post

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sewercentipede · 1 year

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do you have any tips on fashion/dressing yourself? i'm extremely insecure i've never really dressed myself before i'm almost 25 wearing the same ripped & stained clothes from high school. idk how to start w/o having a meltdown. any advice?:( i don't even know what i look like ykwim?

Gonna keep this pretty bare bones cuz I think starting out is the hardest part/biggest step (and also im trying really hard not to make this longer than it already is, cuz it is long). As you figure out what you look like and start to appreciate your physical appearance and discover what you feel good in and what styles consistently bring you joy, you’ll be more adept at navigating these waters alone, and REALLY experimenting/pushing thru your comfort zone without needing guidance will be something you naturally look forward to doing.

Also I have a bunch of mutuals who have impeccable taste, so if anyone seeing this has their own input/tips/advice for this anon please, share them! <3

1. Look, feeling insecure is the most human experience like.. ever.. but theres a difference between feeling insecure doing something new because youve never done it before, and feeling insecure because youre not changing something youve grown out of and youre too scared to change. You will absolutely feel the difference; the former goes away and gets replaced with confidence and feeling good (looking good IS feeling good for real). The latter doesn’t go away, it’s what prompted you to want to make this change in the first place! You want to do this, you want to feel more confident, you want to wear clothing you deliberately chose because you loved it, because it was an expression of your creativity, because it looked good and you look good and as a result you feel good. Not because its just there, not because youve worn it for 10 fucking years so its all you know, not because youre scared to look at your body. Clearly youre sick of wearing the same shit. Youre sick of feeling insecure because of wearing the same shit what youre wearing. So expect and embrace the initial awkward footing that comes with change, and dont let it discourage you.

2. Get ur measurements (and record them on like ur notes app or whatever equivalent) so you know your sizing this way you don’t get overwhelmed by trying to figure out sizing by trial-and-error. Google "how to take clothing measurements" and follow a guide.

3. Make a side blog or a Pinterest or whatever for fashion and reblog/pin anything that makes you feel inspired. You’ll probably notice a pattern (or not, and that’s fine, there’s literally no rule that you have to dress one way all the time). Anything can inspire you fashion-wise, like for me, music is a huuuuge fashion inspo and it’s what got me into alternative fashion in the first place. Or perhaps you love the vibe of a certain movie or video game or a certain actor/singer/celeb/character’s style—put that on your fashion blog.

And honestly if you just want to stylistically (or literally) copy an outfit you see somewhere at first? Go for it, for real. The purpose of this is to begin familiarizing yourself with the mental exercise of deliberately choosing your clothing, branching out from what you’ve been wearing unthinkingly for years, and re-introducing yourself to what you actually look like ….. it is NOT to be an instant fashion guru with a unique style that you’ve magically come up with in your mind out of nowhere with no experience.

4. Avoid online shopping (and thrifting tbh) at first—instead of buying clothes right away youre gonna wanna actually see and feel clothes on your body. You need to feel what materials and fabrics are comfy to you, and what shapes and designs make you happy. Go to any clothing store like any outlet store and just pick out anything that looks cool or interesting to you of different styles or whatever styles you’re curious about trying. Try them on. If something feels like comfy and nice enough to where you could imagine wearing it on any given day, take a pic for reference (or hell, buy it if you like it! But only if you really think you’ll wear it!).

If that alone is too overwhelming literally just pick stuff at random to try on. Pick things that you think are crazy or ugly or boring. Try them on. Think of it like a dress up game. You’re not doing this to buy the clothes (unless like I said, you fall in love w smth). you’re there to see what different clothing looks and feels like on your body.

5. If that’s too broad, focus on one thing at a time, starting with staples, basics for daily causal wear; for an outfit you need minimum shoes, pants, and a top. Focus on one.

For example the pants you wear all the time are ripped stained and too big? okay try to find some pants that you could wear daily and could match with most anything and fit you properly. that could be denim or chinos or joggers etc in a basic/neutral color.

Would you rather start with shoes? I like recommending Reebok to ppl who don’t know where to start with shoes bc of how neutral/versatile they are both style-wise and utility-wise; a pair of black or white classic club c reeboks can match with any casual wear style and also can be for exercising in. Same with doc martens, if you can afford them, they’re super neutral so can match near anything of any style, yet theyve got just enough style to them to where they can elevate an otherwise plain outfit; and while they can’t be used for exercise you can wear them all day comfortably.

Shirts all ripped to shreds from wearing them for years? Find a neutral color cotton top that feels like a good fit and looks clean. Regardless of where you end up style-wise you’ll always need plain shirts. Keep it simple!

6. If you feel like branching out or there’s a particular item that has caught your eye (like a really specific shirt or pair of shoes) try to devise an outfit around one clothing item. Often when im deciding on an outfit it’s because I really wanna wear a specific top or something so I plan the rest of the outfit around that piece. It’s actually a pretty fun exercise cuz it can be kinda challenging creatively

7. Wardrobes take years to curate. Don’t expect to have a whole new wardrobe ASAP. You’re better off slowly replacing soiled/worn-out clothing items one at a time with new items that feel like an emotional equivalent and stylistically satisfying (ie, replace your go-to comfort shirt with something that you’d actually wear as a comfort shirt). Don’t get discouraged by the slowness of the process. Also tastes change over time. Go with it. I will never consider my wardrobe finished or complete.

8. Once you do have really specific stuff in mind and feel like you have a good grasp on what size you are then feel free to go online (like eBay, a specific brand’s website, depop, a bands merch site, Etsy, literally whatever). If you’re still at a loss hit up thrift stores now and just browse

9. Spend time experimenting with putting outfits together in the comfort of your home and just wear stuff around the house to feel it out. Usually what I do is when I’m in a creative mood I’ll just try putting outfits together in creative ways not concerning myself with whether I’d really wear them in public or not. I’m just trying to have fun. That’s when magic happens ! Take pictures of anything you’ve devised that you like for reference so later when you’re leaving the house you can just look at the pic. You can do this with your current clothes, clothes you’ve borrowed from friends or family, new clothes you buy, whatever

10. My motto with clothing is COMFY AND CUTE. I will not wear something I think is cute if it’s not also comfortable, even if I want to. I know myself too well. I go… “yeahhh this top is cute but it’s polyester and polyester gives me sensory issues”.. “this fit is so cute but too much of my skin is showing and I don’t feel comfortable with that” … well, that clothing sits in the closet and never gets worn. On the other end of the spectrum I will get really discouraged trying to wear something I know is comfortable but just isn’t flattering on me, and similarly, I won’t wear it, because it doesn’t make me feel like I look good, it makes me feel sloppy, so it doesn’t matter how comfy it is. Gotta have that cute/comfy balance so you actually wear the clothes.

Learning to dress yourself and cultivate your own style is a process, its an experiment and involves trial-and error. So keep your expectations realistic, focus on baby steps, don’t get discouraged! Like any hobby or art, fashion is a creative expression that has a learning curve and takes practice… but it’s for fun and it should feel like “you”. Fashion is only worthwhile if it make you feel good. its also something you can and should take breaks from when youre not feeling it. I never ever force myself to make up outfits or shop when I’m not in the mood. (Also? No matter how much of an expert in fashion you become you will ALWAYS have days where every single thing you try on looks and feels wrong and it just doesnt click… it’s just a thing that happens sometimes for no good reason).

#Anonymous #fashion #lmk if this isnt specific enough or you need more help!!!

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rickyschicky · 2 years

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💗Pink Bunny🐰

Warnings: bf!Ivan x gf!reader, tooth rotting fluff, brief moment of crying, use of king and real names interchangeably, former member mentioned, gentle kissing, use of pet name (honey)

King/Name:

-Dann/Seungbo

-Arthur/Yunho

-Mujin/Sungho

-Louis/Dongsik

-Ivan/Yoosung

-Jahan/Jihun

-Chiwoo/Seungjun

A/N: Yes, this is totally self-indulgent but after I saw Ivan perform with his new pink hair, I cried my eyes out remembering his pink hair pre-debut with the 8 Letters cover they did. I had to write this for my own sanity, so I hope you enjoy my emotional drabble that was TOTALLY not written at 3-4am... Feedback is always appreciated!!!♡

Looking at the tall idol in front of you, nothing could stop the gentle tears streaking down from your cheeks with light sniffles following behind. The panic on his face was so endearing and priceless in the moment. You couldn't hide the small giggle that escaped your quivering lips, making him worry even more.

"Honey, why are you crying?! D-does it not look good, i-is it that bad?" Yoosung quickly grabs your upper arms and pulls you closer, eyes darting all across your face with extreme worry.

This only caused you to cup his cheeks and press a gentle, soothing kiss to his. You could quickly feel his tense muscles relax as his hold on you loosens. Pulling away you quickly give a warm smile to your boyfriend, feeling Deja vu wash over you in the blink of an eye.

"Y/N! Look at me, my hair is really bright now!" Yoosung bounces over as soon as he spots you walking into the studio where their first official profile photos for Kingdom were going to be taken. His smile was bright, and the makeup was done beautifully, but the one thing that stood out was his bright pink hair. "Doesn't it look pretty? I'm so nervous for Kingmaker to see it..." He suddenly voices aloud.

"Nonsense, it looks so adorable on you. Just didn't think the corrupted King Ivan would sport bubble gummy pink hair." You tease, ruffling it totally forgetting he was getting pictures done soon. A stylist comes over and gently scolds you before fixing it. "I love it, this is going to be the start of your dream! You will be an Idol Yoosunggie!"

He beams a bright smile and giggles nervously, "Are you staying for the cover we worked on? I wanted to surprise you with it since we are going to film it for Kingmaker! It was our final evaluation song." He fiddles with his fingers nervously, praying you would have time since they really worked hard after such harsh criticism.

"Of course, I am! I was going to hang out at the dorm and help cook tonight, remember? Do you really trust Dongsik and Seungjun in the kitchen?" You scowl, chewing your lip nervously. Yoosung laughs, shaking his head in agreement that indeed, it was a terrible idea.

Soon enough Seungbo called everyone over to start the photo shoot. The group shots breezed by fairly quick with exellent and before you know it, it was time to hear your boyfriend sing with his group before they continued with solo shots. This would be the first time you got to actually hear him do anything with Kingdom. He was not at all confident in his skills in dancing, so you never saw him practice around you. He would sing for you all the time, loving to watch you smile and praise him for his high notes when he would belt out songs in karaoke for you. Yet he refused to show you anything he did with the group, excuses left and right. Now as you watch him focus on recording the cover with his members, you understand he wanted to make you proud and surprise you. He wanted to show you he was a king.

Once they got the okay for the recording, they disperse and you head straight for Ivan, wide smile as you tackle him from behind in a bear hug. He stumbles but keeps his balance as Mujin laughs from the affection.

"You did so wonderful, Vannie! I've never heard you sing like that before. It's like the hair color gave you super vocals!" you tease, giving him loads of praise before you turn and compliment Mujin and Jahan who were next to him, "And I didn't know you two have vocals like that, especially you Jahan!" They shyly bow in thanks until Arthur calls the two over, leaving you alone with Ivan and grinning ear to ear.

"So, you really liked it honey?" Yoosung asks, his voice even cracking out of pure nervousness. His hands find purchase around your waist to tug you closer, taking the alone time to get more intimate without being teased by the cloud king, Chiwoo.

"Liked it? Ivan, I loved it! It was perfect, you all sounded wonderful. The snow king has the prettiest voice to me, though..." You coo, arms around his neck to pull him down for eskimo kisses. He laughs, embarrassed before he gently presses a kiss to each corner of your mouth before pressing them your lips. From that day, you were utterly in-love and the proudest person of King Ivan.

"No Ivan, it's perfect..."

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spectrumed · 3 years

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5. sleep

It hardly gets dark in the Swedish summers. Between dusk to dawn, you’ve got about an hour to fall asleep before the sun rises again. If you struggle to fall asleep that fast, you can invest in some good window blinds. Or you can do as I do and place one big pillow over your face. Then the birds start singing around three o’clock in the morning. You can practically hear the sounds of Edvard Grieg’s Morning Mood playing at around four o’clock in the morning. Around five o’clock in the morning, it is as bright as midday. Did you have a good time sleeping? Or did you pace around in a circle having one hell of a panic attack? I thought you took some of those sleeping pills you got prescribed, they should have helped you fall asleep… wait, you did take them? They didn’t work? Oh, they did work, you just felt your body falling asleep while your mind stayed awake? That sounds terrible, real terrible. Very well. It’s morning now. Want some coffee?

You could form a religion out of sleeping. Let’s have sermons where we fill a whole auditorium full of beds and have our congregates take a big collective nap. Sleep for the sleep god! Pillows for the pillow throne! Sleep is a billion-dollar industry, there’s a plethora of handy products you can buy that promise to send you on a luxury liner to dreamland. Pills, mattresses, dreamcatchers, whatever your snoozy heart desires. You can go to a proper doctor and they might help you, or you can settle for the placebo effect and go to some fraudulent quack, instead. He might make you swallow some pills that contain arsenic, but hey, arsenic is a naturally occurring element. It can’t be all that bad for you if it is natural. And you do want to sleep, don’t you? If you take this pill in your mouth and swallow it with a glass of water, I promise you, you will sleep for a very long time.

The esteemed former president of the United States of America, Donald Trump, claims that he only needs four to five hours of sleep every night. While Mr. Trump is well-known to be a paragon of honesty, I do doubt he’s telling the truth. No, I actually do believe him when says that he only gets about four or five hours of sleep each night, I just don’t believe him when he says that is all he needs. He doesn’t look very well-rested, does he? And Margaret Thatcher, the similarly adored former prime minister of the United Kingdom, claimed that she also only needed about four hours of sleep every night. Yes, while researching the sleeping habits of famous monsters, I’ve come to the conclusion that amongst powerful individuals, not getting enough sleep has become a proper badge of honour. The belief is that if you don’t get enough sleep, that must be because you are living such a vibrantly successful life, and are so career-driven, that you simply haven’t got enough time to sleep for the full eight hours. People who sleep for more than four hours are lazy liberals. Go-getters like Trump has got to be out there, working, making decisions, raping women, and showing daddy what a good boy he is. Sleep is for the weak. But maybe I am weak. I sure like sleeping.

It’s the cultural hangover our society has had since the 80’s. Back when the yuppies wearing jackets with obscenely padded shoulders would happily chuck down eight to ten espressos in one go while A Flock of Seagulls was playing on the radio encouraging everyone to go running. And to be fair to them, with the constant fear of the doomsday clock hitting midnight, they really had no reason to think that they’d survive the decade. The new millennia, it seemed, would have no cities, no nature, no humans, only radiated mutants scouring the rubble that remains of civilization for cans of preserved something edible. Self-destructive behaviour was in. It was fashionable. Doubt people got enough sleep back then, between snorting coke and wondering if the next pandemic that hits the night clubs would start killing as many straight folks as gay folks. Well, here we are in the new 20’s, and we’ve got a pandemic that does appear to kill people regardless of sexual orientation. Sure, the looming threat of nuclear obliteration has been lessened dramatically, but we’ve largely come to exchange that anxiety for the fear of total environmental collapse, instead. No wonder 80’s nostalgia is a big thing right now. History doesn't repeat itself, but It often rhymes, said Mark Twain (supposedly.) I wonder how much coke Mark Twain would snort if he lived in the 80’s.

I notice a palpable difference in my mood and mental state when I’ve been getting good amounts of sleep. Lack of sleep results in lack of clear thinking. Caffeine, though it is something I am chronically addicted to, does not help fix a sleep-deprived mind. There are no tricks of revolutionary “life hacks” one can employ to get out of sleeping. To recover from depression, one has to sleep. Sleep often and sleep well. I cannot understate the importance of being well-rested. You cannot process information if you are tired. I am reminded of my teenage years seeing friends of mine who’d stay up all night, then come into school shuffling like agonised zombies. They got so frustrated when the teachers reprimanded them for snoozing in class. Well, dummies, it is your fault for drinking several dozen cans of Red Bull every day! I know that sleep does not always come easy. I know the terror of insomnia. But, c’mon! At some point, you’ve got to realise that sleep is essential. Maybe most of your problems stem from the fact that you refuse to get enough of it? Here’s where the tough love comes in. If you wanna get better, kiddo, then listen to me. It’s bedtime. Yes, I know you’d rather stay up late playing monopoly with your friends, but I’m confiscating your dice and I’ll only give it back to you when you’ve gotten some good sleep. Okay? You hear me, missy? You listen to your daddy now, and go to bed. No ifs or buts about it, princess, I’ve made myself clear. I know what is best for you, and you know that I am right. I’m your daddy.

But what if I can’t seem to fall asleep? Normally, it takes a long time for me to fall asleep. It is not uncommon for me to stay awake for two hours, maybe more, before I finally begin to sleep. Fearing that I won’t fall asleep gives me anxiety. That anxiety keeps me awake. I turn my body. I try lying on my side. First my left side, then my right side. I then try to lie on my back. I’ve got a song stuck playing in my head. Not even the whole song, just a ten-second segment of it. It’s playing over and over. I’m worried about the future, will I ever find security, will I ever find a wife, will I get to grow old? I worry about death. I keep hearing the music playing, it’s grating. I rearrange the pillows, in hopes that will make me feel more comfortable. But no, I keep tossing and turning like a fish caught on land. I’m getting frustrated. If only I could shut off my brain. I’m constantly thinking. I turn to my side again, but now I notice I’ve moved arounds so much that now the bed has shifted away from its position next to the wall. There’s now a gap between the bed and the wall. I almost fall down that gap. I get up and I push the bed back against the wall. I lay down in bed. The song is still playing.

How am I ever going to become a successful businessman if I am wasting so many hours just trying to get to sleep? This is the time I should be spending on the phone, yelling at people and making inappropriate sexual comments to my female employees. That is what good executives do. I need to get my life in order. I need to exercise more. I should practice mindfulness. I should get a life coach, a personal trainer, a stylist, an accountant, an assistant, a trophy wife, and a mistress. I need people in my life to take care of me. It’s funny how rich people create the sort of environment around them where people will take care of all their needs, effectively infantilising them. These people don’t even get to decide how to dress themselves. They’ve got fancy apartments, but they don’t choose any of the furniture. They’ve got art on the walls that they don’t like, but the art looks expensive, and that is all that matters. They’ve got kids, but they don’t raise them. Their spouses are cheating on them, but in fairness, they are cheating on their spouses. They don’t really even know what their jobs entails, as they’ve gotten promoted so many times that they’ve ended up in a position that is totally outside their realm of expertise. But they’re so powerful that no-one is able to fire them over their pretty blatant incompetence. They’re successful. They’ve made it. But they still can’t sleep at night. They only manage to successfully fall asleep at night after swallowing a fistful of pills along with a swig of vodka.

It must be easy being a self-help guru. Well, what I mean to say is that all you really need is charisma, which is something you need to be born with. But you don’t need to do any actual studying, any real research, or any kind of soul-searching or deliberation. All you need is to state what is obvious. You go on stage in front of an anxious audience, mostly composed of middle-class salesmen and miscellaneous white collar ghosts. You smile, show off your eerily bright teeth, and they clap. You tell them to go take care of themselves, to eat more healthily, to take walks, or go swimming, and love their partners. You tell them to drink less, or maybe, if they feel like it, they could drink more. I am sure you could spin alcohol as a positive or a negative, depending on what crowd you’re talking to. Tell them to appreciate family. Tell them to appreciate others. Live, laugh, but most of all, love. Tell them to go clean their rooms. Tell them to remember that if they’re on an airplane that is about to crash land, they need to put their own oxygen mask on before they can help others put theirs on. If you don’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else? Now, go to bed!

You know all this stuff. Me telling you that you should sleep more doesn’t really help you. You know that you should sleep more. It’s not like as if you’re too dumb to realise that. And it’s not like as if you’re too dumb to realise that it is better to drink in moderation, and that you should smoke less weed. There are many small little things you can do to improve your life, to stop being a terminally unemployed slacker. It’s like your grandpa who tells you stories about life after the war when you could walk into the biggest building in town, slam your fist against the table and demand to be given a job and a house and a wife and a couple of kids, and that was all you needed to do. He can’t comprehend the fact that society doesn’t work like that, any more. Most people my generation have given up hope of ever owning a home, at least if they happen to live in the vicinity of a larger city. It seems that, no matter where you live, the cost of homes has risen to an impenetrable degree. It seems just as likely that you will be able to afford your very own genetically-engineered pet dragon before you will get to be a house-owner. It’s the fault of those damn boomers, why bother changing your ways, when the boomers are still in charge? Others may accuse you of wallowing in your own depression, but you are perfectly aware that this is exactly what you are doing. You are self-aware. But self-awareness on its own is not enough to motivate anyone. You still can’t see the point in doing anything constructive with your life. Life just feels so aimless. It’s easier to sit, smoke weed, and watch cartoons.

Pop psychology is problematic. To say the least. Take all those self-help gurus suffering from their messiah complexes and put them through the shredder. Don’t buy books thinking that they’ll offer you the kind of treatment you would get from an actual psychiatrist. I know that, depending on where you are in the world, treatment can get very expensive, but you’re not going to get better reading the book of some self-aggrandising narcissist’s collection of wishy-washy platitudes. Dr. Phil has done great evil pretending to be a therapist on the TV, and Jordan Peterson (despite having once been an esteemed scholar) has turned a generation of young internet-savvy zoomers into proto-fascists obsessed with the monogamy of lobsters. Pop psychology has become a guise for cult leaders to reap new followers. Getting treatment should not feel like joining a new religious movement. Maybe I’m just one of those annoying atheists, but I dare say, psychiatry works at its best when it's secular. You should not look at your psychiatrist as a prophet speaking to God. They’re just a doctor, and you need treatment.

I do not aspire to create a self-help blog. I do not promise that reading this blog will help you in any way. I would be overjoyed if someone came up to me and told me that I had inspired them to seek help. You may tell me that reading my words have made you feel less alone, knowing that others have gone through all these things that you are going through. When I felt at my worst, I remember reading the memoirs of people I admired who had similarly struggled in their lives, and I felt less alone. But none of those books pretended to exist principally to help others. Those books did help me, through the candid descriptions of struggles that I thought I was alone in experiencing. Knowing that some people had pulled through, managed to find a light at the end of the tunnel, it made me think I could one day be like them. The books didn’t seek to fix me, but they offered me a perspective that came to be very valuable later on, when I started going to therapy, and when I later started taking medication. Sometimes that is all you need. Not someone standing over you and telling you to go to bed, or to clean your room, or to stop drinking. You know all that, already. What you really need is the reassurance that things can indeed get better. Sleep will come.

#neurodiversity #neurodivergent #autism spectrum disorder #autism #aspergers #mental health

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thepermanentrainpress · 2 years

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THE PERMANENT RAIN PRESS INTERVIEW WITH PETER BUNDIC

You may recognize him from Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, but Peter Bundic has a few more tricks up his sleeve – behind the camera and on several sports fields as well! We caught up with the charismatic performer to discuss his time on Sabrina, how athletic prowess carries over to his other bodies of work, and what’s next.

One of your more prominent roles to date has been football-playing jock Carl Tapper in Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. What did you find most challenging about playing this character?

I think the really cool part about playing Carl wasn’t necessarily that it was challenging, but that in playing this character, it really accentuated the growth of the other characters being hurt by the bullies and overcoming them in the show. Kindness and love always win – something I wish Carl learned a little sooner haha.

What was your favourite scene to be a part of, and why?

There were so many great scenes I can remember it’s so tough to choose just one! One of my favourites was when Billy (Ty Wood) and I got to trash the carnival and then got turned into pigs. I was really curious as to what our pig versions would look like and they were actually really cute.

Do you keep in touch with your former castmates?

It can definitely be tough sometimes with us being in different places, but it’s always a blast when we get the chance to reconnect. Such an amazing cast to be a part of and lots of memories to follow it.

You also appeared as Steve in Spontaneous – a coming-of-age dark comedy starring Katherine Langford and Charlie Plummer. Do you have a favourite memory from set?

Honestly, some of the funniest random moments happened in between set-ups during some of our long shoot days. Once you get past the feeling of being tired, you get really creative with activities to keep yourself occupied… Many times we made little flip cup obstacle games to keep us energized for the next scene.

Next up for you is indie short Cupid. What can you share about this project – and can we expect a release around Happy Heart’s Day?

Cupid was a really interesting one to shoot. It’s not your usual Valentines movie; let’s just say that for now. I don’t have an official release day to share just yet but I’ll be sure to post about it once it’s ready to go!

In addition to acting, you have screenwriting and directing credits. Where did this ambition come from, leaning into all aspects of the filmmaking process?

When making shorts, I’ve always tried to learn both sides of film to deepen my understanding of how a film comes to life. In that, I’ve found tons of love and appreciation for writing and directing. Every position in film needs watering like a plant, and those two jobs are definitely not simple but truly rewarding.

Are there any filmmakers you look up to in particular? Or stylistic techniques you’d like to experiment with in the future?

On Sabrina, the show runner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa amazed me with the amount of work he puts in to make all these shows come to life. It really takes an accomplished, driven individual to be able to do what he does. The list of great people I’ve worked with and would like to work with just goes on and on…

I’ve had the pleasure to experiment with different ideologies of performance on many platforms, but I think what I look forward to most is trying new things and always keeping an open mind. There’s always something new to learn and that’s great at keeping you humble.

Your older sister Janette is also an actor, and your initial interest in acting came from her. Do you run lines together – or did you growing up?

Janette’s credited with getting me started as an actor, and we’ve always been really close. Among enjoying our normal brother-sister time, always happy to run lines with each other.

You’re also an accomplished athlete, having represented BC/Canada at football events in Las Vegas and Miami. Would you say the discipline and team aspect of sports have carried over to your entertainment career?

I think it definitely carries over into life in general. I’ve spent some years learning martial arts as well and the discipline I’ve adopted has helped me stay on task, even when life seems super overwhelming sometimes. It’s a great way to stay grounded.

What is one thing readers would be surprised to know about you?

If you’re one of my close friends, you’d know that if a song I like comes on in the car there’s absolutely no holding me back. To the point where it gets annoying sometimes.

Who are you listening to on your playlist?

I’m one of those people who say “I listen to everything,” but actually don’t have a favourite genre. Rock and roll as well as R&B are up there – but when I like a song I really like that song.

If you could be any ice cream flavour, which would you be and why?

I’m way too tempted to say vanilla because that’s always my go-to flavour, but I’ll spice it up this time and say vanilla caramel. Caramel in chocolates were my favourite growing up, so why not combine the two?

Thank you to Peter for taking the time to chat with us about filmmaking, Sabrina and more! You can follow Peter on Instagram to connect with his upcoming work.

#Peter Bundic #entertainment #interview #feature #actor #Vancouver #yvr #NoodleHead Productions #Vancouver Actor #film #tv #actor interview #Chilling Adventures of Sabrina #Carl Tapper #sabrina netflix

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fly-pow-bye · 3 years

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DuckTales 2017 - The Shorts! (Part 2)

For completion's sake, let's look at the remaining DuckTales 2017 shorts as of this writing.

A few more shorts have come out since the big batch of shorts from before. Unfortunately, none of them are mini-adventures split up into segments like The World's Slowest Death-Trap or Dewey Dew-Night. However, as mentioned before, I should still bring these up for completion's sake. I did leave out the Top 4s and the Marshmello "Fly" music video, but that's because the former is self-explanatory and the latter is just cool and well animated. Let's go!

Theme Song Takeovers

There were two of these for DuckTales 2017. One of them is with everyone's favorite incompetent pilot, Launchpad McQuack. It does it in an interesting way: he's not taking over the Theme Song despite the title, he just wandered into it. He does have to act the part, not only singing his own version of the theme song, as he's certainly not one to memorize any lyrics beyond the Darkwing Duck theme, but he's desperately trying to catch up with everyone else in the best way he can. I like this feeling that this is what he was doing during the parts where he was off-screen. It has a pretty weird ending, too. As good as this one is, it is only of slightly lower quality than the next one. There may be a reason for that: because it was actually used in the show itself.

The other one is Glomgold's Theme Song Takeover, where he sings his own version of the DuckTales theme song all about himself and how much Scrooge stinks. One of the lines is "Scrooge stinks, Scrooge stinks, Scrooge stinks." Highlights include the first part being in the style of his infamous blueprints, the stylistically bad 3D render of him as a muscleman, and him running out of budget for the last part to where he had to use popsicle sticks and paper. It's no wonder that the theme song was used in the episode called "GlomTales!". Watch the internet version, too, it has a few extra scenes, including a scene where Glomgold curses copyright law.

Random Rings

DuckTales 2017 characters appeared twice in this series, and by characters, I mean just Launchpad. He sure was meant to be the breakout character. The first is a little chat between him and Big Hero 6's Baymax after he accidentally calls him instead of a pizza place. Baymax tries his best to be Launchpad's personal healthcare companion and tries to help him after Launchpad gets a bump in his head, not knowing he's referring to the head of the Sunchaser he just crashed, and Launchpad misinterprets his suggestion of using frozen peas as a recommendation of what to eat. It's about what one might expect from the not-too-bright character and a robot, but it does not last long enough to where it would be annoying. It's only a minute.

The other one involves Launchpad trying to call "Mr McD" only for him to accidentally call Cricket from the show Big City Greens. I should note that the vast majority of the segments involve this show, most of them involving Cricket, the show's lead character and trouble-maker. This does have a significant difference from the other one: Launchpad almost manages to realize he probably should not be talking to some random kid, only for that random kid to try to take advantage of him after he mentions the giant gemstone his plane is carrying. There's a different joke here other than Launchpad does not have a lot in the brains department, and I can appreciate this one a little bit more. I will admit: it is possible I would have appreciated this even more if I actually watched Big City Greens, but that is not this short's fault.

I should note that these shorts are also perfect for those who want to know what DuckTales 2017 would look like in Adobe Flash. Just wanted to point that out.

Chibi Tiny Tales

Chibi Tiny Tales was a series of cutesy little cartoons based on Disney Channel shows, itself loosely based on a series of shorts made for Big Hero 6. These are all simple concepts done in a very quick, no dialogue, gag-a-second way, all done in a pseudo-anime style as implied by the word "chibi", complete with the face faults they were not allowed to do on the real show. It's a little funny that they didn't make any Chibi Tiny Tales for DuckTales, a show with the word "Tales" in it, until the time the very last episodes of DuckTales 2017 were airing.

The first one has Scrooge McDuck, the nephews, and Donald raiding a tomb for some treasure. The second one has Magica and Glomgold trying to steal the Number One Dime while Scrooge is reading the paper. The third has Launchpad and Webby go on a quest for the ultimate burrito. All of these follow a similar pattern of them getting into different situations throughout the minute-long short. It is very Looney Tunes, funnily enough. There really isn't anything to say about these. They're cutesy, they are only sort of witty, but they do not overstay their welcome either. Much like the DuckFails shorts, I can imagine enjoying these during commercial breaks, and they are the perfect length for them.

This Duckburg Life

This isn't a short, but there is nowhere else to talk about this.

The newest addition to DuckTales 2017's canon is a parody of NPR's This American Life, and our Ira Glass equivalent is Huey Duck. The first episode, titled "Adventure Calls", is about Huey listening to Launchpad's answering machine, which ends up being filled with various calls. The vast majority of them are about an adventure involving Dewey and Louie getting kidnapped by the Beagle Boys. The Beagle Boys did not really make a major appearance in Season 3 beyond Ma Beagle in "The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck!", so this could be an apology for that. Eventually, this adventure gets into the strange when they find the Hand of Hammurabi hidden in the stash of treasures the Beagle Boys stole, and they end up getting teleported to Tibet and then another dimension. While all of this is happening, Big Time Beagle is trying his hardest to be a threatening kidnapper despite losing the people he was kidnapping.

Even without the images, it still feels like DuckTales 2017 in a different format. It uses the podcast format very well, with the sponsor featuring Webby and Scrooge and Donald Duck reading the credits like it's one of those "support for" segments on NPR, and it would be neat to see where this goes. Even if one wants to know how this would look animated, the YouTube video that has this does have an image that shows off some imagery that fills in some of what people might want to know. For example, yes, the Hand of Hammurabi does look like the Infinity Gauntlet. Oh, and it's important to note that it's likely this podcast takes place before "The Last Adventure!". I am not going to say why that is, and maybe that might change with future episodes.

And that's it for now. This Saturday, the least best.

← The Last Adventure! 🦆 The Least Best! →

#fpb dt 2017 #fpb reviews #disney #ducktales #ducktales 2017

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curious-minx · 3 years

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Review of the first episode of The Great North (plus some sad Bob’s Burgers’ news)

2021.

I was going to begin my review of the pilot episode of The Great North, the sister sister series of Bob’s Burgers, with my trademark snarky and slanted curlicue wit... Instead, I am reckoning with the headline of the death of Bob’s Burgers character designer, Dave Creek.

Dave Creek.

Type his name out and put it in comic sans and you can see it’s a name meant to be involved with TV. One of the rare individuals to pass away from something other than Covid-19 or our rising totalitarian government. The artist contributed to the show in many ways, most profoundly with the design of Lady Tinsel from the Bleakening, one of Bob’s Burgers most visually ambitious episodes to date. I am ill-equipped to eulogize the man like his fellow peers are doing, but as someone who writes and thinks about the Bob’s Burgers series it is impossible to not address his passing.

//////

The Great North.

“Sexi Moose Adventure”

Look up there! What Do You See? Nature and stuff Like a rock And a tree Oh, The Great North Way up here we can breathe the air Catch some fish Or gaze at a bear Wow! Oh, The Great North Here we live, oh, oh Here we’ll stay, oh, whoo From longest night To longest day In The Great North

An Alan Thicke bop or the wimpy Cheers theme this aint. A jarring theme. I had to transcribe it to lay it out in front of me to see how wordy it is, but to my surprise the theme song looks more concise on paper. Still, I am not sold on this theme song. Mainly because I prefer the misheard lyric of “Here we’ll say (it’s actually “stay”): oh, whoo,” digging further into the regional grunts.

1:24, One minute and twenty four seconds in and there is already a little bit of winking scatalogical humor by the ever youthful Paul Rust, or as I am sure he’ll be known for generations, Ham Tobin, the middle of the three Tobin sons. Compounded within these first two minutes is a stylistic swivel away from Bob’s Burgers comedic well with a Brokeback Mountain themed wedding cutaway joke with real-world celebrity cameos. Speaking of celebrity cameos, how about a side character conversation with an Alanis Morrisette constellation (and she’s a recurring character!) you’ve never seen that in Bob’s Burgers! In the first three minutes and thirty seconds we have two instances of explicitly expositional dialogue, the first is the cleaner introduction of eldest Wolf Tobin (voiced by Will Forte) and his fiance Honeybee Shaw who has just moved to Alaska from Fresno and helps set up the reverse All in the Family Meathead and Gloria dynamic. What comes next is once again another moment I can only describe as jarring when the inexplicably normal named Judy Tobin explains to Alanis Morrisette constellation exactly what is wrong with sweetly overbearing father. The reason involving a somewhat convoluted background story about the former Tobin matriarch's abandonment of the family and Beef, the Tobin patriarchy, is in denial of this fact. Beef prefers to live in the reality where no wife of his would leave him she could only have been eaten by a wolf.

What goes on throughout the episode is what I believe is a cardinal sin of episodic storytelling: Making jokes and observations at the expense of an off screen character. There are already WAY too many characters being thrown at me and not once throughout the episode was I able to identify any of the characters by any names other than the name of the celebrity voice actor. Minute six and yet again we are hit with Honeybee generating another celebrity name for a joke and I really hope that the writers develop more of a game for her. Oh wait a minute the episode reminds me again at the eight minute forty sixth second mark that she is in fact from Fresno. More diarrhea and fart jokes snaking their way back into the scene as well, but Jenny Slate has always relished in the poopier jokes (see: any of her stand-up, Kroll work, or Obvious Child).

At the ten minute mark there is a quality character defining joke when Wolf distracts Beef by pointing out an indoor potted plant in a mall, which causes Beef, ever the Nature man, to take matters into his own hands by trying to rescue the potted plant. Beef is basically a combination of the two Rons from Parks & Rec, the emotional frugality of Ron Swanson and a touch of Sam Elliot’s Ron Dunn Earthiness. Julio Torres’ mall juicer character is also introduced with a perfunctory but enjoyable deadpan exchange with the awkward Judy, but it’s the kind of performance Julio Torres could give in his sleep (and probably did).

The eleven minute mark introduces a character that I was initially pretty jazzed about, Judy’s boss at the mall photography store Alyson Lefebvrere (gosh I hated typing out that name >.<) voiced by long-time Molyneux collaborator, Megan Mullally. On paper, much like the theme song, a heated exchange between an emotionally vulnerable Beef and a character voiced by real-life wife Megan Mullally should be dynamite, instead much like their podcast it feels like a wet fart in the sheets. Mullally’s work on Bob’s Burgers as Linda’s sister Gayle is terrific and with the power of animation having her play an unconventional looking character really works to her advantage. Alyson’s character design is boring and conventional cartoon attractive as she’s clearly being set up as a potential love interest for our leading Beef man, but the whole thing in execution falls completely flat. The extended 69 joke between Beef and Alyson is supposed to be funny because we know it’s between a real life publicly beloved celebrity couple. You cannot coast on innate chemistry alone! The setting up of the love interest isn’t even coy, we see Beef get heart eyes and drool over Alyson, which is just the most predictable and least interesting choice. A route this show seems dangerously flirtatious with.

Finally, at minute:second mark 13:15 we get introduced to a potentially fun and quirky sitcom character, Londra the neighboring fish mongerer. Voiced by Judith Shelton, an actor I am sure we all remember as Sally from Seinfeld and Angela from the Gregory Hines Show. Instead she gets instantly shut down and shuffled by in favor of advancing the plot of the episode. Moving on to the birthday party. Yep Honeybee makes another pop culture reference this time the Minions (it was Squidward last time, but I was too faint of heart to mention it at the time). We also find out in a forced confession from Ham that he is gay. I am glad the show has hired an openly gay actor like Julio Torres to play a bit recurring character, but it feels weird having Paul Rust a thoroughly heterosexual actor portray a gay goofball character. I feel like there easily could have been an actual gay goofball Paul Rust type out there deserving of the job, but this show does do right by having Dulce Sloan as Honeybee and Aparna Nancherla as MVP, Moon Tobin (Who I’ll get into later). Therefore I should not let this irk me, but clearly this show and I are not seeing eye to eye. In an era of gestures towards meaningful representation I would just like to see some consistency. Rust will probably go on to join the ranks of the many other hetero men who have also portrayed perfectly competenent and sensitive gay characters, but with gay characters should come paychecks for gay voice talent. In the end of this dead end debacle I much rather Paul Rust have the role and be spared the unimaginative Randy Rainbow casting. Back on track.

There’s a four square action sequence of the four siblings that also feels like the show attempting another stylistic flourish to separate itself from Bob’s Burgers. The episode, all one straight ahead single narrative, comes to a happy ending to also establish that the Bob’s Burgers sister sister series is also interested in being a sentimental sitcom to its core. An unfortunately okay first episode that got worse for me with a repeated viewing. The only character and overall performance that sticks out to me is Aparna Nancherla playing what is essentially the show’s Tina and Louise lovechild of a character Moon Tobin, an animal identifying gender flipped peculiar savant-like child. She’s one of those comedians that I will always root for and appreciate whenever she pops up and I really hope that this show treats her right. She really elevates the material. Everyone else does just fine. The first episodes and first seasons of any sitcoms are rarely all that innovative or memorable so I am certainly going to allow this show to grow on me.

For the time being, this first episode of the Great North is deserving of Two Sexy Moose Antlers out of Five Forced Pop Culture References

#TV Series #Bob's Burgers #The Great North #Fox #adult animation #Animation Domination #Sitcom #TV Review

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canmom · 3 years

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Animation Night 36 - Sayo Yamamoto!

AHOY THERE friends! We are on Animation Night no. 6^2! Tonight we’re gonna check out another of those former Madhouse directors with a ton of style - Sayo Yamamoto, best known for her gay figure-skating series Yuri!! on Ice - yet as we’ll see, she has a ton of range...

(yeah, Madhouse again! between Takeshi Koike, Masaaki Yuasa, Mamoru Hosoda and of course Satoshi Kon, not to mention the various OVAs we’ve seen along the way, this might as well be (ex-)Madhouse Night at this point lmao)

We’ve briefly seen Yamamoto’s work before, back at the start of Animation Night in the Japan Animator Expo, where she directed the incredible animated figure-skating sequence “ENDLESS NIGHT” (which, don’t worry, I’ll make sure to run tonight!). But as a quick icebreaker (😏), let’s take a look at her career...

Yamamoto got pretty much the dream start to working in anime: fresh out of university, her samurai-themed student film caught the attention of Satoshi Kon, who liked her work so much that he invited her to work on Millenium Actress - though sadly, it didn’t go so well on the production. In her own words (from this interview):

Yamamoto: In my earlier years I created an animation that had to do with samurai, so yes. I used Toshiro Mifune’s pieces, his films, as an inspiration, and I animated it all by myself.

Sato: The same Mifune from all those Kurosawa Akira films?

Yamamoto: Yes.

Sato: So you made that film when you were a student?

Yamamoto: Yes, all by myself, when I was university student.

Sato: Were you going to a special animation school?

Yamamoto: No, just a design school and it had nothing to do with anime, but I didn’t like the other stuff they were teaching so I did my own thing.

Sato: And they let you graduate?

Yamamoto: Actually, yeah. Doing animation at a non-animation school!

Sato: By the way, did you ever show that film to Watanabe?

Yamamoto: No way! At that point I was looking for a job after I graduated. I knew I wanted to be a director. I was fortunate enough to be able to show that work to Mr. Satoshi Kon. I didn’t realize what I was doing at the time.

Sato: What were his thoughts?

Yamamoto: He clapped his hands laughing! But he had such a kind heart. Because of that he helped me gain some assistant type jobs, and it was my first entry into non-production management type work. The name of the project was Millennium Actress. However, a lot of stuff went on politically, and I ended up stepping down partway through, but that was my first step into the industry.

Despite these internal politics, Yamamoto remained working at Madhouse - working closely with Takeshi Koike (Animation Night 19) on Trava: Fist Planet, World Record and later Redline. At Madhouse, she worked on a few other projects and began directing episodes from a really young age, notably including work on Texhnolyze (kind of a sister show to Lain).

Not very long after, she learned of an opening for episode directors ‘with an interest in samurai’ from someone working on the Bebop movie. This turned out to be, well, Shinichiro Watanabe’s series Samurai Champloo at the sadly rather short-lived Studio Manglobe. Apparently she hit it off really well with Watanabe, very much appreciating the creative freedom she was given.

(Looking at her credits on Champloo, we have: the early one with the ukiyo-e painter, the one where Jin gets fixated on a sex worker and tries to rescue her, the one where Mugen participates in a graffiti competition... and the absolutely bananas, seemingly total non-sequitur late episode where the gang eat mushrooms and spend the rest of the episode working for zombies in a mine, before getting destroyed by an asteroid, which may be ‘canonically’ a hallucination but is definitely one of the strangest episodes of the show. As much as I roll my eyes at Jin’s ‘gallant’ rescue narrative, in terms of direction these are all extremely memorable episodes which do very creative stylistic things... a theme as we’ll see!)

(not 100% sure that’s from her episode... but fairly sure!)

Yamamoto would continue to work with Watanabe on future projects, like Space Dandy, but in the meantime, she finally got the chance to direct a fully original series of her own. After a visit to Brazil, she decided to set her series in a semi-fictionalised version of it, leading to Michiko & Hatchin (2008), a drama about a young girl Hatchin from an extremely abusive foster family. Her rescue unexpectedly comes in the form of Michiko, an endlessly cool, sexy escaped convict who declares she’s Hatchin’s mother and runs away with her on a moped. The two set off to find Hatchin’s real father, and from there we have the classic arc of two people from very different backgrounds building a meaningful relationship while being pursued by gangs, cops etc....

Beyond being a pretty unusual premise, the series is notable for sadly being one of the only anime I can think of to depict dark skin tones for the majority of its cast. I really wish that weren’t so unusual, although hopefully times will change with studios like D’art Shtajio getting more work...

I have at this point only seen one episode of Michiko, and I will say, the first episode does not pull its punches with a really extended sequence of sibling abuse that can be a bit hard to watch! From there, though, it sounds like it’s going to be a lot of fun: there’s a ton of energy and character to the way Michiko herself is animated that shines in every cut from this show.

I’m not sure how far Michiko goes into it beyond well, the character design lol, but a certain degree of explicit sexuality is something Yamamoto would return to again later with Fujiko Mine. But first, well, it’s time for Yuri!!!

Following Michiko & Hatchin, Yamamoto spent the next few years mainly directing OPs and EDs for other shows - among them, a Psycho-Pass OP, an Attack on Titan ED, and the Space Dandy ED.

youtube

OP/ED direction is basically music video direction, albeit with an extra goal of introducing the themes and characters of the show - and it means the director gets to indulge in more abstract imagery and create meaning through cuts, as well as having a very high animation budget to call on for unusual, complex shots. A good place for a creative director like Yamamoto to experiment!

Her next big project would head over to the Lupin III franchise. Lupin’s not got a huge profile in the west (outside of Hayao Miyazaki’s pre-Ghibli Castle of Cagliostro), but it’s an incredibly long-running movie/TV franchise about a scoundrel/gentleman thief lightly based on the literary character Arsène Lupin. The precise characterisation of Lupin himself has varied - in Miyazaki’s hands, he’s doing the thief with a heart of gold thing, while most other movies paint him as a total asshole! - but that is kind of what makes it interesting: each director who deals with the character has quite a lot of freedom to define their own version of Lupin.

Yamamoto especially wanted to do something different, centring the series on Fujiko Mine, who’s typically a secondary character in Lupin works. She remarks:

Q. What is your personal opinion of Fujiko Mine?

Do you mean, as a character? It’s a good question, and one I get asked all of the time as director. When I was growing up watching Fujiko in the original series of Lupin, I always watched her with anticipation of when she was going to take off her clothes.

Her series positions itself as a prequel to the first Lupin TV series, and draws on the character designs of the original Lupin III mangaka, Kazuhiko Katō better known by his pen name Monkey Punch. In the same interview, Yamamoto and screenwriter Dai Sato have a great deal of praise for other staff on the anime, like composer Naruyoshi Kikuchi:

Yamamoto: One of the main reasons is that I wanted to find someone who was not so serious, maybe kind of a delinquent, a rebel, and not someone who was very familiar with anime. He lives in a famous area of Tokyo called Kabuki-cho. The people who live there are kind of known as yakuza, strippers, host club workers, and that type of crowd. When I met him, my first impression was “you fit right into that district!”

Sato: So did that kind of rebel actually work hard for you?

Yamamoto: He was a rebel in everything but his work. In doing his job he was amazing.

Sato: As a matter of fact, during a pre-meeting, when I heard rumor that Kikuchi was going to do the music, I shouted “YEAH!” causing the rest of the staff to jump. I almost added to my contract that I was to be the first person to get the soundtrack. I made a special request to production staff, so that actually did happen. So actually I listened to the music as I wrote the scripts. Many people know that Mr. Ono Yuji’s music is the traditional music for a Lupin series.

...and prolific screenwriter Mari Okada:

Sato: When you worked with her, did you feel your dreams or wishes had come true having to work with her?

Yamamoto: Yes, she’s a very interesting person. It’s not always the case that an interesting scriptwriter can write interesting scripts. But I was really pleased with how amazing the script ended up being, which far exceeded how interesting Ms. Okada is, the script was even more so. She has an amazing reputation for memorable punch lines and memorable quotes that characters say. We felt that we needed to be able to execute good punchy lines, which is critical to a Lupin piece. And I think that we’ve been able to add so many of those punch lines inside the show is really just thanks to Miss Okada.

And of course, it has the work of Takeshi Koike, fresh off his six-year passion project Redline. Yamamoto describes springing the request on him right after the first screening of Redline:

Yamamoto: Mr. Koike is a very talented guy. I met him at Madhouse on the Trava project; which was my first real opportunity to do storyboarding. When I first decided to approach Mr. Koike about the Lupin project, it was right when we were premiering Redline for the first time. So, Mr. Koike spent 6 years working on the Redline project, and that’s a long time to be working on one project; so I figured it was now or maybe never to ask him. Maybe it’s a breach of etiquette to ask such a thing at a debut screening, but I did approach him and he did agree. He always said he admired Castle of Cagliostro. I thought maybe if I approached him to do a Lupin film he might accept, and he did. There was a little luck involved because just about that time Koike was ready to quit Madhouse and make some changes in his career, and things just fell into place.

The result was an immensely visually stylish series, with an unusual approach to rough linework and cross-hatched shading aiming to evoke the style of the manga, and the distinctive desaturated-but-varied colour palette typical of Koike’s work. It received a little controversy for, along with its dark tone, a lot of explicit sexuality, to a pretty unusual degree for the franchise. But it seems to have been a success, praised for its innovation and spawning three movies directed by Koike!

Next for Yamamoto, meanwhile, came Hideaki Anno’s Japan Animator Expo project in 2014, and this is where she started animating figure skating!

Her short portrays a routine choreographed by real figure skating choreographer Kenji Miyamoto, and remarkably elegant animation that does a great job of capturing and slightly stylising the motion of skaters. Figure-skating is interesting to animate, because it is so much about physics: a skater has to have immense control over where they place their weight and their moment of inertia, and know how to redirect their momentum into elegant arcs, which means it’s also a very satisfying kind of motion to animate! Yamamoto’s direction accentuates the movement with a lot of camerawork which I can only imagine was a big challenge to shoot, but the result is pretty great.

I don’t know whether this short was explicitly conceived of as a prototype for Yuri!!!, or if Yuri!!! came about because of its success, but in any case, a couple years later Yamamoto would be directing a full one-cour anime about figure skaters at MAPPA, a studio that’s had a fascinating but somewhat troubled history of overcommitment... in part, awkwardly, on the back of the immense success of Yuri!! on Ice.

The story concerns two young skaters coincidentally both named Yuri, one Japanese and one Russian. Yuri Katsuki suffers a crisis of confidence and retires from skating, but an impromptu performance accidentally makes its way to his idol, Victor Nikiforov. Nikiforov is so struck by it travels to Japan and offers to tutor Yuri... forgetting that he has already made a similar promise to the other Yuri, the Russian Yuri Plisetsky. The two end up as rivals, both for Nikiforov’s training and in competition at the coming Grand Prix series... and meanwhile, a romance starts developing between Katsuki and Nikiforov.

The series was a massive hit, praised as a gay anime that sidesteps some of the standard yaoi conventions but also a little controversial on that front because of the amount of censorship it faced. Despite being forced to e.g. obscure a crucial kiss scene, the message reached its fandom pretty clearly, attracting a vast body of fanwork - not to mention affection from real figure skaters, some of whom even produced routines based on scenes from the show. A lot of that has to do with the show’s subtleties of character animation (as discussed by animation director Tadashi Hiramatsu here) - as befits a skating anime, a great deal of attention is paid to what is communicated by posture and gaze. The figure skating sequences also received a great deal of praise at first, although apparently towards the end, Yamamoto’s ambition outstripped the budget so people groused about the later ones... but we’ll see!

With such a hit on their hands, a movie would naturally follow, a prequel titled Yuri on Ice!!! - Ice Adolescence... but it’s still yet to be released, and plot details are scarce! Presumably Yamamoto’s been working hard on that, but in the meantime, she produced a very impressive intro sequence for the game Persona 5, which also makes use of figure-skating movements...

youtube

Since then, well, it’s been pretty much radio silence, though we can expect the Yuri!!! film sometime this year... probably.

This night’s a bit tricky to schedule, because, well, Yamamoto’s work is mostly in TV so I have to show you samplings of episodes rather than full films with a narrative arc. I understand if that’s a bit too much of a tease but hey, I would love for more people to check out her work! Tonight I’m going to show a sampling of episodes from Michiko, Fujiko Mine and Yuri!!!, as well as some of Yamamoto’s shorter work on OP/EDs and the Animator Expo short.

We’ll be starting in about 40 minutes at 7pm UK time as usual, at twitch.tv/canmom - hope to see you there! ^^

#animation night #sayo yamamoto #yuri!!! on ice #the woman called fujiko mine #michiko and hatchin

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drunkcnsunlight · 3 years

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“damn. maybe heaven really is a place on earth” ( DEAN & PORTIA )

--- it made no sense, she tried to tell herself. it made no sense to execute her. she was a good person. she’d followed orders that she did not believe in, as she knew that her personal rebellion would change NOTHING. it was not until dissent grew and rebels gathered that something meaningful could be done. sadly, she had not lived LONG ENOUGH to be able to see the change that came about. she was executed, along with the rest of PEETA’S prep team, as an intimidation tactic, but also because.... SHE KNEW TOO MUCH. she cared for the boy, and they’d fostered a close friendship. just because their bond was less broadcasted than KATNISS and CINNA’S connection did not make it any less meaningful or moving. the former stylist was in the midst of nursing her second beer when a young male voice greeted her ears. “oh, cutie! are you talking to ME? i’m sorry! i appreciate it. i guess that i just wasn’t EXPECTING it.” she had been out of the game for a long time, and while she used to be, she forgot some of her self-confidence. she was not allowed to have a life outside of costume design or makeup or the GAMES. “i’m PORTIA,” she told him with a growing smirk. “and heaven only became a place on earth when YOU walked through the door, handsome.” there it was. there was her confidence returning.

@ragdclls

#💇🏾 ( PORTIA ) i spent a lot of hours gazing at fires.#death tw #murder tw #ptsd tw #mental health tw #grief tw

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pinknerdpanda · 4 years

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Dead Sea

Word Count: 4,317

Characters: Modern AU!Bucky Barnes x Reader

Warnings: Language, angst, fluff

SSB Square Filled: “Why the long face?” (Bolded and Italicized below)

Beta’d by: @shy-violet-soul - what would I do without you?!

A/N: Alright, here it is. My first attempt at MCU Fanfic and hopefully the first of more to come. I really love Bucky’s character and the ways parts of him can be expounded upon. This particular piece was written for @heli0s-writes 2K Challenge. My prompt was the song “Dead Sea” by the Lumineers. I kinda picked it apart and used bits of lyrics within the fic, which are highlighted. This is also the first fic for my @star-spangled-bingo card. Hope you enjoy! I’d love to hear your feedback!

If you’d like to be added to my taglist, send me an ask!

Dead Sea

“Why the long face?”

Four words, spoken with casual naivete and a breath of gentle teasing. Bucky froze, the unlit cigarette, now forgotten, dangling between his lips as he looked around for the source of his distraction. His gaze landed on her as she flicked her lighter, bringing the flame to her own cigarette and taking a drag. Her hair itself was like fire, brilliant red and vivid orange dancing around her face in the breeze. She smiled, smoke billowing in delicate tendrils from her nose and mouth as she held the lighter out.

Bucky blinked, glancing around once again. Surely she was addressing someone else? His eyes narrowed as his search came back empty and he looked at her again.

She wiggled the lighter in his direction and chuckled, the sound electrifying every nerve in his body and making the hair on his arms stand on end. A sound that pure and beautiful should be reserved for...well, anything or anyone except him. Bucky knew he should turn around and go back inside - leave her alone and untainted by his mere existence.

And yet as she watched him patiently, the sun overhead making her eyes and hair sparkle, he silently nodded his thanks and accepted the proffered item. It took a few failed attempts before he successfully ignited the tip of his cigarette and inhaled the bitter smoke, returning the lighter in silence.

“I’m y/n,” she offered, tucking it away again.

Dumbstruck.

It’s not a word Bucky would have used to describe himself in recent years. As a naive, fresh-faced kid 20 years ago? Sure. But a former soldier and recently retired enforcer for a powerful mob back East? Hell no.

And yet, there was no other word to describe it.

Bucky Barnes was dumbstruck.

He took a long drag and exhaled, hoping the cloud of smoke would provide some sort of camouflage as he spoke.

“‘M’name’s Bucky,” he mumbled.

“Nice to meet you, Bucky,” her tone brightening around her widening smile. “I haven’t seen you before. You new?”

Bucky nodded, hiding again behind his antiquated bad habit.

“I work just there,” she gestured behind her, cigarette carefully poised between two fingers. “At the salon. I’m a stylist.”

Bucky jerked his thumb to the door a few places down from where she’d pointed.

“I just started at the pawn shop.”

Y/n nodded, taking another drag.

“You said something. Earlier.” Bucky cleared his throat, his continued socialization a surprise to himself. “What did you say?”

Y/n grinned, sheepishly, dropping the cigarette to the ground and stomping it with the toe of her worn Converse.

“I asked ‘Why the long face?’” Y/n pulled her jacket around her, shielding herself from the chilly gusts of late winter air. “It’s just...well. You looked kinda sad.”

Bucky chuckled, flicking his cigarette away deftly. “I’ve been told that’s just my face.”

Y/n pressed her lips together and narrowed her gaze at him, nodding thoughtfully.

“I appreciate the concern, though.” One side of Bucky’s mouth quirked up, the ghost of the charming ladies-man he’d once been playing over his features.

“I’ll see you around, Bucky.” She laughed to herself once more before ducking her head and retreating toward her shop, the door closing behind her.

I hope so. Bucky thought to himself. I really hope so.

----

The next few weeks passed in much the same way; smoke breaks shared behind the strip mall, shy smiles and quiet comfort found in the low murmuring between them.

“But why did you leave New York for bumfuck Ohio?” She pressed gently one day, flicking ash into the wind. “This place is just so...boring.”

Bucky’s jaw tensed, having dreaded this question from the moment he put the Empire State in his rearview mirror. The dread compounding even more as the thought of telling her the truth flashed through his mind.

Bucky took another drag before tossing the butt on the ground and stomping it out mercilessly.

“New York lied to me. I needed the truth.” Bucky smirked in self-contempt, the irony heavy on his tongue. It wasn’t entirely false, but it wasn’t the honesty he wished he could give her, either. “Besides, boring isn’t so bad.”

He chanced a look in her direction and found her, nodding thoughtfully as she often did, her bottom lip caught between her teeth. To Bucky, that one gesture felt as though she saw through him, though the feeling wasn’t raw and exposed as he kept anticipating. It felt...reassuring, somehow. Like she saw him as someone he wasn’t even certain he was, and was just biding her time until she could reflect the image back to him.

“Well, whatever brought you here, Bucky,” she smiled, brushing the neon green and pink hair from her eyes. “I’m really thankful it did.”

Bucky cleared his throat, refusing to look at his watch, as though doing so would deplete their time together faster.

“What about you? If it’s so boring here, why do you stay?” His tone bordered on teasing, but as soon as the words left his mouth he regretted them.

Y/n blinked rapidly, the edges of her smile crumbling visibly. He could practically see her forcing her facial muscles to keep it place.

“It’s my dad,” her voice was barely a whisper. “He’s sick. Cancer. My mom left ages ago and I’m all he’s got.”

She shrugged, leaving him with more questions than answers. Bucky knew better than most not to press the matter. She never did with him, so he allowed her the same respect.

“I’m sorry.”

Y/n nodded, a silent acceptance of his sincerity. She took a small step forward - her warmth and vitality crowding his space in all the best ways - and, leaning up, pressed a kiss to his cheek.

Blood roared in Bucky’s ears and his heart thudded against his ribs almost violently. The feel of her chapped lips on his skin lingered as she stepped back.

“Have a good afternoon, Bucky.” She started to walk back inside, but turned to face him again. “You oughta come by sometime, let me get my fingers in that hair of yours.”

Feigning offense, Bucky scoffed, and pushed some of the long strands back over his ears. “What’s wrong with my hair?”

Y/n smiled, a renewed joy in the curve of her lips. “Nothing.”

Bucky watched as she retreated back through the door of the salon, finding himself, once again, dumbstruck.

----

“What about - ” she drew the word out, finger outstretched as she settled on the one she wanted, “that one?”

Bucky chuckled. Of course she would pick that one.

“That one is Vega.”

Bucky turned his head, finding her profile highlighted by the glow of the heavens above. He found her joy intoxicating.

He’d been nervous when he asked if she wanted to do something after work earlier in the day. Nervous and more than a little clumsy, having already convinced himself that she’d turn him down. But she hadn’t. In fact, Bucky thought she almost looked relieved. Though whether it was because she’d hoped he’d ask or because she simply needed a brief reprieve from the responsibility of caring for an ailing father, he wasn’t sure.

All he knew for certain was that sitting there, blanketed by an inky black sky dotted with shimmering stars next to her was the only place he wanted to be. He felt a bone-deep peacefulness he’d never experienced in his life and it had everything to do with the pastel blue-haired girl who’d agreed to go stargazing with him.

"You know," he began, swallowing thickly when she turned to face him. "They say that Vega was a goddess who fell in love with a farmer. She descended the heavens to be with him and promised to bring him back with her. Her father became so enraged with them, he banished them both to the sky, but far apart from one another."

"That's so sad," she whispered, her face scrunched.

Bucky nodded.

"But," he began, desperate to wipe the frown from her lips, "once a year - on the seventh day of the seventh month - a bridge of magpies forms across the milky way so the lovers can be reunited once more."

It worked.

Y/n's eyes glittered brightly with excitement again and at once Bucky's breath was stolen from his lungs. In that moment, Bucky would have lassoed the moon and brought it to earth if it meant being cocooned in her mirth for a few more seconds.

"That's so romantic, in a horribly tragic kind of way." She laughed, the sound knitting together pieces of himself he'd long assumed irreparable. "Thank you for this, Bucky. I needed some fresh air."

"Anytime, sweetheart."

The voice in his head bellowed that the blush gracing her cheeks was a figment of his imagination. But, as her hand linked with his, the roar of doubt and fear subsided for a moment. He closed his eyes briefly, meticulously cataloging the feel of her palm in his own.

"What are you thinking?" Her melodic voice vibrated through the night air.

"Sometimes," he started, unsure how to put his chaotic thoughts into words. "Sometimes I feel like I'm sinking and I can't seem to catch my breath."

Her thumb soothed gentle circles over his knuckles, sending a shiver down his spine.

"But for some reason - when I'm with you - I feel like I can't help but float." Bucky cringed. As often as he'd considered expressing his budding feelings for her, he had done a piss-poor job when the moment presented itself.

And yet...

Her lips were warm against the rough skin of his hand and it shot little jolts of electricity up his arm and throughout his body.

"I'll be your Dead Sea, Bucky," her breath tickled the hair on the back of his hand as she pressed another kiss there. "You'll never sink when you're with me."

----

“You’re insane.”

Y/n giggled merrily as the rhythmic swells of Latin beats carried on the breeze from the Puerto Rican restaurant a few doors away.

Bucky grinned. "Probably."

"It's raining!" Y/n protested, a whine lacing her words.

Bucky tipped his head to one side, his hand held out feeling the gentle patter of rain against his skin.

"’S’not raining, it's sprinkling. I know you're sweet, but I promise ya won't melt." His words were flat, but his lips betrayed the attempt at a deadpan retort.

Y/n simply narrowed her gaze at him, crossing her arms over her chest, though her smile muted the effect of her challenge.

“Aw, cah’mon, sweetheart,” Bucky drawled, Brooklyn accent thick and charming. “No one’s gonna see us.”

“I don’t know how!”

Y/n glanced nervously from Bucky’s outstretched palm to his face and back.

“Well, lucky for you, I’m an excellent teacher.” Bucky quirked an eyebrow as his lips drew up in an inviting grin.

Reluctantly - but only just - she released the air from her lungs in a dramatic sigh, throwing her hands in the air.

“Fine. But it’s only because you’re cute.”

Bucky’s smile widened as his pulse quickened, a rush of warmth heating his cheeks as she placed her right hand in his. He draped her other on his shoulder before planting his right hand against her back.

“It’s easy, just remember one, two, three. One, two, three.” He squeezed her hand encouragingly. “Now, when I step forward you step back. Just mirror my steps and follow my lead. One, two, three. One, two, three.”

Slowly, carefully, Bucky moved them both in a less-than-graceful rendition of a Salsa dance. He didn’t care when she stepped on his toes and cursed under her breath. All that mattered to him was the feel of her in his arms and the sparkle in her eyes as their steps became somewhat synchronized.

"So," Bucky mused, taking advantage of her gaze averted in favor of their feet. "Cute, huh?"

Y/n's steps faltered, her left foot landing hard against Bucky's right and her head connecting with his chin as she tried to jerk her eyes up to his. Bucky yelped in pain and y/n stumbled backward, her feet tangling with his as they both crumpled to the ground in a heap.

"Oh my God, Bucky!" Y/n gasped, hands scrambling for purchase as she tried to untangle herself. "I'm so sorry! Are you ok?!"

Bucky's deep laughter halted her efforts to climb off him. She laughed then too - high, slightly embarrassed giggles that she tried to cover with her palm. Her eyes widened as his arms tightened around her waist, drawing her in closer.

Bucky swept the faded purple hair from her face, brushing his thumb against her jaw as their laughter died. It was as if time stopped and the only thing that existed in that moment was the two of them. Her breath caught gently when he hooked his fingers behind her neck and began to pull her face to his.

Whether it was poor timing or just another way for the universe to screw him over, he couldn't be sure. But before their lips met, the skies opened up and large, cold raindrops pelted them, instantly drenching them both and ruining whatever moment it might have been.

Y/n squealed, jumping to her feet and ducking under the shelter of the awning. Defeated, frustrated and wet, Bucky slowly ambled up and joined her a few moments later. Bucky groaned running his fingers through his soaking hair and trying in vain to wring the water out. Y/n grinned, her cheeks and nose dusted a light pink that he was sure hadn't been there before he'd asked her to dance.

"Y/n," Bucky started but froze when he realized his voice was one of two calling her name in the same moment.

"Mrs. Perry's timer just went off!"

"I'll be right in!" She called back cheerfully, though her eyes shone with reluctance as Bucky stared into them. "Shit. I'm sorry, Bucky. I uh," she pressed her palms together and dropped her gaze briefly. "Thank you for the dance lesson and sorry for...ya know...being about as graceful as a baby moose."

Before he could protest her self-deprecating remark, she leaned up, pressing a kiss to his cheek and turned to go back inside. Bucky stared after her, his cheek warm despite the chill the rain had tried burying inside his bones.

----

Bucky’s thumb drummed nervously against the wooden surface of the reception desk as he did yet another visual sweep of the room. It was more quiet than he’d expected, though to be honest, he had little to base his assumptions on.

A few agonizing moments later, a tall, raven haired woman with blood red lips and a ring through her eyebrow approached. She smiled warmly at him, wiping her palms on the front of her black apron.

“Hi, can I help you?”

Bucky swallowed, his nerves making him jittery. “Yeah, I’m looking for y/n.”

“I’m sorry, did you have an appointment?” The woman frowned, a deep crease marring her heavily made-up face. “Judith was supposed to call all of her appointments last night.”

Fear prickled at the back of his neck and a shiver ran down his spine.

“I didn’t have an appointment. I’m Bucky. From next door? Is she okay?”

“Oh of course. Bucky.” The woman smiled and then sighed. “Her father passed away yesterday afternoon. I know she’d been expecting it eventually, but I don’t think anyone is really ever ready.”

His heart broke for her. He wished he’d known or that there was something he could have done. He’d make the earth spin backwards if it would make her happy.

“Do you know where she lives?” Bucky cringed knowing how stalker-y that sounded. “I just, I’m worried about her.”

The woman pursed her lips, her eyes roaming over his face, studying him. Whatever she’d found there must have been enough because she pulled out a pen and a slip of paper.

“If anything happens to her, Bucky From Next Door, I will not hesitate to kill you. I know where you work and I know that boss of yours better than you do.” She scribbled something on the paper before pushing it towards him. Her expression softened, then, a small smirk playing at the edge of her lips. “Besides, I think she could use a friend right now. If that’s what you’re calling yourselves these days.”

Bucky blushed, but nodded. He mumbled his thanks as he hurried out the door.

----

Bucky paused, his fist poised to knock on the bright yellow door as he sucked in a steadying breath. The setting sun stole the warmth of spring from the air and he found himself shivering. Just when he calmed his nerves, the door opened suddenly, startling him and forcing him to take a step backward. Y/n’s face was pale and her wide eyes were rimmed with red, but the visible signs of sorrow did nothing to lessen her beauty.

“Bucky?” She gasped a second before she lunged for him, wrapping him in a fierce hug.

He held her as she shuddered against him and buried her face in the crook of his neck. The sound of her broken sobs made his stomach churn and he rubbed small, comforting circles against her back.

She pulled back suddenly, rubbing her eyes violently and huffing a frustrated laugh.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blubber all over - “

“No,” Bucky cut her off. “Sweetheart, don’t apologize. Whatever you need, I’m here.”

Sniffling, she tried smiling, though it was little more than a faint upturn of her lips.

"You are, aren't you." Her nose scrunched in thought. "How did you know?"

Bucky ran a shaking hand through his hair, eyes focused in his scuffed boots.

"I, uh," he cleared his throat. "I stopped by to see if I could get a haircut. They told me about...what happened." He looked at her then. "I'm so sorry, y/n."

She nodded, arms wrapping around herself.

"I knew it was coming soon, I just," she took a deep breath and released it. She continued, voice soft. "I thought I would have more time, ya know?"

Bucky hummed in understanding.

"You want to come in? I just made some coffee." She laughed. "I don't even know why I came out here. I think I'm a little out of it."

Bucky followed her inside, shutting the door behind him. She led him through the small entryway and into the kitchen, dodging a small pile of suitcases stacked near the doorway. Glasses rattled as she searched for a pair of mismatched mugs and set them on the counter beside the coffee pot.

"You goin' somewhere?" Bucky tipped his head toward the bags when she looked at him.

Her eyes flashed with something Bucky didn't understand before she turned back to her task. The scent of black coffee was comforting as she handed him a mug. A frowning panda glared up at him from the surface of the cup below the words "I hate mornings." It made Bucky smile.

Y/n cleared her throat, drawing his attention back to her. She faced him, hip resting against the edge of the counter.

"He had been sick for so long, I started to think that this was all my life would ever be. I figured I'd stay, take care of him, maybe get a few cats." Cradling her own mug in one hand, she ran her fingers through uncharacteristically messy orange hair. "But, now that he's...gone…" her voice trembled on the words, but she continued. "I don't know. I think domestic life never really suited me. I kind of want to live for myself, for a change."

Bucky nodded, forcing down the lump in his throat before taking a sip of coffee.

Y/n smoothed her hands along the sides of her mug, her brow furrowed as she stared at the black liquid.

"His funeral is Tuesday," she sniffed. "I didn't really have any expenses here, so I've got some money saved. I thought, why not just get away for awhile, ya know?"

Bucky set his cup down and took a step toward her. Her breath hitched, though she didn't look at him. Carefully he tugged the mug from her hands and placed it beside his.

"Well, I'm glad," he smirked, placing his hands on her shoulders and squeezing gently. "Cause you and cats? That's just not right."

Y/n giggled, the sound oddly strangled around the sudden resurgence of tears.

"C'mere," he sighed, wrapping his arms around her and tucking her head under his chin. She breathed deeply, hugging him closer and fisting her hands in the back of his shirt.

This time when she pulled back, she kept hold of him, but her face twisted in confusion.

"Wait, did you say you wanted a haircut?!" Her voice bordered on incredulous.

Bucky shrugged one shoulder. "Thought it might be time for a change. 'Sides, you said you wanted to get your hands on it."

Y/n gaped at him and reached up to run her fingers through his chestnut locks. The feel of her nails against his scalp forced his eyes closed and he hummed lightly.

She tugged on one strand, not enough to hurt but enough to get his attention. When his eyes opened again, the soft look on her face startled him. Her hand dropped to the curve of his jaw, her thumb brushing gently against the bristles peppering his cheek.

"Maybe a trim, but there's no way I could deprive the world of this hair, Buck. That would be a travesty." She blushed. "I only wanted an excuse to run my fingers through it."

Without giving himself a chance to back out, Bucky dipped his head and kissed her. Her lips were warm and she sighed, pressing herself closer to him. His tongue licked across her lip as his nose brushed hers. He pulled back, tugging her bottom lip gently between his before sucking in a steadying breath.

She smiled, pressing her forehead against his. "About time."

Bucky chuckled, pecking her lips twice as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Come with me."

Her voice was so low, he wondered for a moment if he'd imagined it, but her gaze was pleading.

"Y/n," he sighed. "I don't know if that's a good idea."

Defeat, exhaustion, embarrassment and rejection played across her face as she nodded, her hands dropping at her sides.

"Sorry," she breathed, turning away from him.

Bucky caught her elbow and turned her back to face him.

"It's not because I don't want to, because God knows I do," he bit down on his lip, clenching his eyes shut in preparation for what came next. "There's just things about me that you don't know. Things I don't want you to know, because seeing disappointment in your eyes might actually kill me."

Her hand cupped his cheek, thumb tracing the edge of his mouth before gently tugging his lip from between his teeth. His eyes found hers again and his heart stammered at the tenderness there.

"Bucky, I don't have to know everything about who you used to be to know you are a good man. I could never be disappointed in you."

Her words lifted a small part of the weight he'd carried from the East coast, though he figured the bulk of it would likely remain with him forever.

"When I left New York, I didn't know exactly where I was going. I just headed west, kept moving, until I got here. This just felt right, somehow. I don't know why I stopped here, y/n. I needed someone I could trust, but it felt impossible. I felt like all I would ever do was sink under the weight of what I left behind." He smoothed a hand through her hair, watching the way the light danced over the brightly colored strands. "But then I met you and, I know I don't deserve it, and I'll never be worthy enough, but you make me want to try. Try to be better, try to be a good man."

She frowned at him then, and confusion jumbled his thoughts and burned his eyes.

"You don't have to try, Bucky. You are." She smiled. "And I already told you. You'll never sink when you're with me."

Bucky kissed her, this time with a fierceness. Her tongue meet his eagerly and once again he found himself sinking, but this time in all the best ways.

He pulled back, his lips swollen and his lungs aching for air.

"Come with me, Bucky." She plead again, her voice was rough and he knew he'd lost any willpower he'd once had to her.

He nodded and she rewarded him with the sweetest smile he'd ever known. Once again he found himself dumbstruck.

Curling her fingers with his, she tugged him out of the kitchen - away their already forgotten mismatched mugs half-full of warm coffee - and led him to the sofa. He sat down, pulling her onto his lap and resting his chin against her hair.

A comfortable silence fell between them as he stroked her back and breathed in the scent of her. If he could bottle up a moment in time to save forever, this would be it. He'd never felt such peace and while he struggled to accept his worthiness of such a feeling, knowing she trusted him meant the world.

She sniffed, pulling back to look into his eyes, and the sorrow he saw etched into her face was palpable.

"Would you stay the night?" Her lip quivered as she tried and failed to blink back tears. "I - uh- I don't want to be alone."

Bucky pecked her lips, brushing away the wetness trailing her cheeks. "Sweetheart, you don't have to be alone, ever again."

----

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