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the-stove-is-divorced · 2 months

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Okay. What are your opinions on these three things from the choose violence ask game:

the character everyone gets wrong

3. a screenshot/description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

25. common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing

If you want to ramble, I'll be listening!! Love hearing people's opinions!! Have fun!!

OMG TYSM for the asks!!! :D ALRIGHT LET'S GO!

1) I feel like in general comic characters will get the higher chances to being wildly out of character because their own comic authors won't even know what they fuck they're even doing, so Imma just say all Batman + Bat-vigilantes gt done so god damn dirty. Rest under the cut 'cause I ramble a ton, haha!

I can't speak for all of them, so I'll just speak for Batman because have you seen comics where they make Batman, of all characters, actually abusive? HUH. WYDM??? He's been one of my fav characters ever since I was young, so I feel so passionately about it! In terms of fanfic/fandom, people can have their fun with characterizations obliviously, I'm not a writing cop, but too good of a Dad!Bruce and too bad of a Dad-like figure!Bruce always irks me. He should be trying his best at his core but still fucking it up anyway.

(That and Jason Todd, I do not have the evidence to back it up but I want to someday, but I am squinting at his character and his dynamics with others. I can't speak on it though, I've fallen into writing fanon much to my distaste or just inexperience.) But a someone who tried to find literally every Bruce Wayne-centric fanfic on the planet,,, y'all do this man so dirty.

2) Unfortunately do not have screencaps because for my own sanity I legit blocked the user, but there is legit someone who watched Invincible and blamed the protag Mark for "not training". I don't know if you've seen the show, but if you had, you would know you'd have to be fucking brain dead to legitimately have that take or just rage baiting. To make a long story short, the plot is legit set up in a way where Mark's father barely trains him, Mark unknowingly enters fights WAAAAAY above his skill level and barely survives, and the only opportunity for him to train is to try not to die through his own experiences. You do see him improve, but it's entirely on his own because he has no other way.

25) I think I stick to my own little corners for a lot of fandom tbh, so I can't think of one! Maybe, like, "Bruce Should've Killed Joker" or "Bruce Should Kill Takes", if any!

I feel like people forget a) not killing is Bruce's thing! He doesn't see any use for it, and to me, is a fundamentally hopeful character who always wants someone have the ability to be redeemed. Who is he to decide to who lives and who dies? Where is the line drawn?

Then b) Bruce kills joker, okay now what? Joker could get replaced by a copy-cat wannabe who does even worse things. Batman is probably going to hang up his coat, because there is one line he's not going to cross and he crossed it. He's not going back to play a hero, it would fuck him up so bad. You ruined a perfectly good Batman, that's what you did. Where's the league gonna get their funding, now?/j

C) If he doesn't want to kill, why should he be made to? He has the write to set a boundary. Killing isn't the end all be all solution here, especially not for crime.

TYSM FOR THE ASK!

#asks #tysm for the asks btw it's such a lovely time to answer asks!! :]#i feel so passionately about so many things haha!

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acaplaya-musings · 2 months

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Voiceplay Visuals: Little Mermaid Medley

I already knew right from the start that this was going to be a long post, but how am I only just now realizing that the video itself is like nearly 8 minutes long? Like I knew the Wicked Medley was one of Voiceplay's longer-length videos, but somehow I never realised that this video is in fact longer by 10 seconds! (I guess it's just so good that I never noticed!) God I hope I don't hit the picture limit on this one, because I have a lot to talk about, so let's begin!

Bit of a far cry from the Moana Medley 3 years prior, hey? (This was released in September 2020 btw). I may be wrong, but I believe this is called "we have a bigger budget now" 😂

Right, so Eli (already doing a subtle Eyebrow Raise, might I add), is dressed as Flounder, Rachel is of course Ariel, J is repping Sebastian, Layne is Chef Louis (I think that's his name), and Geoff went freaking all-out as Ursula (aka "Geoffsula"). The hair! The necklace! The airbrushing on the skin! (Seriously that ain't just a standard layer of face/body paint, there is shading going on there!)

(Also what's up with the green wristbands which I've never really acknowledged till now?)

J and Rachel echoing the "heave ho!" bit to each other (gonna try and limit my screencap-taking just a little bit, because I'll probably end up including a ton anyway)

Rachel slipped on that bracelet really smoothly, is it just me? Like girl how did you do that so easily?

Love the little detail of Rachel throwing up the fork (aka "dinglehopper") and it not coming down again. No clue how they did it

(Also that is a very pretty bracelet. And cute necklace!)

I wasn't exactly searching for this screencap, but I felt like I had to include it when I paused on it!

Layne "blowing bubbles" out his mouth!

I love J's little dance moves here 😄

Geoff on air bass again! (representing the line "the plaice play the bass")

Whose idea was this? 😂 (Layne was in charge of both the arrangement and the video, I'm guessing it was him?) And then Voiceplay stuck it on a shirt and made it into merch! (And also for J's farewell party, they got him a cake that had a picture of snail!J on it!)

We're about to get into my favourite part! (Also cool painting!)

Eli and J hamming it up as Flotsam and Jetsam 😝

J's face makes me laugh every time 😆

Purple flames in his eyes! (Voiceplay used a very similar effect last year, on Geoff again, during the Hellfire video)

Hang on what was that little move that J just did there?

"This one longing to be thinner, this one wants to get the girl, and do I help them?"

"Yes indeed"

(Also fun fact: the woman shown here is Rachel Evans, one third of the singing group The American Sirens, who collaborated with Geoff a year later on his cover of Mele Kalikimaka, and the man is her husband!)

"They come flocking to my cauldron crying SPELLS!" "Ursula please!"

(Also shoutout to Eli for the lighting design! He always does such a fantastic job!)

The colouration/tint of the lighting does really interesting things to Geoff's blueish skin colour in this video. In some shots the skin is a really vibrant colour (e.g. see a couple of the shots above), whereas in others, like this one ^ here, it almost looks close to regular skin tone.

This little moment greatly pleases my drama/theatre kid heart 😁

Not talking about vocals not talking about vocals not talking about vocals not talking about-

Okay but the signature bit was very cool, and definitely feels like something Voiceplay would not have been able to do back in 2017

Pfft 😂

Also the lighting here is making Geoff's hair (which got coloured grey for this video) look almost blonde!

Cool smoke effects!

(Also the only reason I haven't done fanart of "Geoffsula" (other than the fact that I don't wanna keep drawing him in black outfits) is that I would not be able to do the skin colouration justice here. Shoutout to Rick Underwood for the makeup!)

"Sing" (sir you're not allowed to look that pretty while looking like that!)

Yeah nah yeah they really went off with the effects on this one

I am getting dangerously close to the image limit and I don't wanna have to split this into two posts, but Layne's whole Les Poissons bit is comedy gold and screencaps don't do it justice anyway

To quote Elizabeth Zharoff: "it takes a confident man to Seagull!" 😂

Love Rachel's awkward-yet-cute little wave at the start of Kiss The Girl (and her dancing a bit further into the song!

Confusion(tm) 🤣

Firstly, Rachel's acting is 100% on-point, and second of all, I love Geoff's evil smirk here, doubly confirming that Rachel is being Vanessa, aka Ursula in disguise!

And now that "Ariel" has got her voice back, everyone else is super happy/animated, while "Ursula" is very subdued. Visual storytelling!

Just managed to avoid the image limit, thank goodness! Also J pops a bubble right at the end 😁

It's hard for me to say whether this is one of Voiceplay's best medleys or not, because how can you compare it to the Boy Band Medley or Trapped or A Chance To Fly? But I will say it is very deserving of the 5.5 million views it currently sits at on YouTube. A lot of effort went into both the arrangement and the video (well done Layne!), and honestly when it comes to Disney stuff, Voiceplay never fails!

#voiceplay #acapella #little mermaid medley #the little mermaid medley #geoff castellucci #eli jacobson #layne stein #j none #rachel potter #acaplaya analysis #voiceplay visuals

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stormyoceans · 2 years

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your horny puen thoughts oh my god give me more

SFJKSGFJSGJKSH i swear i don't want to be that person but every time puen opens his mouth he ends up saying the most unhinged things and i just [HEAD IN HANDS] YOU CANNOT BLAME ME FOR ANYTHING IM GONNA SAY AFTER THIS TAKE IT UP WITH EVERYONE INVOLVED IN THIS SHOW THEY'RE THE DERANGED ONE FOR PUTTING THESE THINGS INTO IT

like, they honest to god put hints of sugar daddy/daddy kink in the show???? which admittedly took me by surprise but it actually makes SO MUCH SENSE for puen's character, because it's true that he never had anyone taking care of him so that’s something he craves, but he also never had anyone HE could take care of: no parents or siblings to dote on, no friends to cherish, no lover to spoil…. but now he has talay. and if there’s one message the show has REALLY been set to get across is that puen LOVES to see talay enjoy himself and the things he likes, especially when puen is the one to provide those things for him. a clear example is given by all the times puen buys talay food or just straight up feeds him. he also likes to drive talay around and give him flowers and buy him gifts

it’s not hard to imagine how this can translate into their sex life. i honestly genuinely sincerely truly believe that puen gets off on pleasuring talay. i really can’t think of anything that would give PUEN more pleasure than having talay under him and taking his time to explore every inch of talay’s body (touching it, kissing it, licking it, biting it), until he finds every single spot that makes talay moan and fall apart. puen would revel in the feel, sight, smell, and sound of talay, he’s been wanting to eat talay out for so long (and THEY CONFIRMED IT) im pretty sure the first time he actually gets to do that he’s gonna come untouched just from the feeling of talay’s body trembling through his orgasm all around him

puen’s scent kink also means that he’s gonna steal talay’s clothes all the time, especially when he’s travelling or spending the night out because of his job and he’s missing talay so much he needs to be surrounded by talay’s scent to help him sleep (and im pretty sure puen jerked off more than once while holding one of talay's shirt against his face but you haven't heard that from me)

last thing im gonna say before hiding myself out of shame is that puen clearly has a thing for talay’s neck and for manhandling him. i haven’t made a proper post about it, but i swear i have an embarrassing amount of screenshots (i swear im normal) of puen grabbing talay by the back of his neck. most of the times it happens when they’re kissing, with puen using that as a way to pull talay in. and then there is his OTHER favorite way to pull talay in, which is grabbing his arm. it’s hard to show this through screencaps, but go look at the way puen grabs talay in ep 5 (part 1) and ep 10 (part 4). it’s, frankly, a lot. i wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out that puen likes to push talay around a little and to squeeze and mark his neck a lot during sex, doesn’t matter if he tops or bottoms (i do think they switch btw, i mean the show is literally called vice versa. but srsly, even if puen is into the sugar daddy thing and loves to take care of talay, there are moments where he wants to be taken care of too, and when talay becomes more bold puen is definitely gonna be putty in his hands)

IM NOT EVEN GONNA TOUCH ON THE FACT THAT IN EP 10 PUEN THREW /REWARDS/ INTO THE MIX BECAUSE I NEED TO MANTAIN AT LEAST SOME SEMBLANCE OF DIGNITY JUST KNOW THAT HE IS HORNY AND INSANE

in conclusion:

#you know what makes me actually insane about all of this though?#the fact that puen is into it because it's TALAY #like im not gonna say he is not attracted to the body but whether it's tess' or talay's real one #the thing that actually does it for him is that it's all about talay #anyway @ vice versa writers LOOK WHAT THE HELL YOU'RE MAKING ME WRITE JUST PAY FOR MY THERAPY #and now i shall hide forever #but if anyone actually reads through this: you deserve a reward too so here's a cookie 🍪#vice versa #vice versa the series #puentalay #m: ask

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imogenkol · 11 months

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I’m curious about your thoughts on Bix in that leaked teaser because I’m VERY worried about her storyline 😞

!!!!! thank you for asking!!! I am hella stressed about it too and I've got some long winded scrambled thots under the cut here:

As we know, she obviously isn't in/never mentioned in Rogue One and sometimes that implies a prequel character is doomed by the narrative so my main fear is that her story is going to end in her death. There's also a few lines from Cass in RO that could reinforce that theory (ie: him telling Jyn she isn't the only one who lost everything). Apart from me being totally biased, I do think it'd be a waste of her character, especially since she was criminally underutilized in s1 imo

anywho, from the poor quality clips/screencaps I've seen (I will admit that it can be kinda tough to tell who is who and some scenes flash by so quickly) it looks like Bix might be struggling a lot with feeling like her life is out of her control, even after at least a year time jump from s1. I do think it looks like she is the one who goes after Gorst either as revenge or to regain the control she lost or both. Then that shot of her in bed with the blaster could be the aftermath of that encounter, whether she succeeded or failed. If that's true then it doesn't look like it made her feel any better. But I imagine she'll be a very broken version of herself from when she first appeared in ep 1 because she basically did lose everything and was tortured to near insanity

All of this must have radicalized her, but it's hard to say what kind of rebel she'll be. I hope her storyline is centered mostly on herself, her healing, and the kind of person she wants to be in the war against the Empire. Based on the trailer and some set pictures I've seen, it looks like she’ll thankfully be taking on a more active role and I'd really enjoy seeing her kick some ass. At least for herself considering she had to get rescued a couple of times in s1.

It also very much looks like they're putting her back with Cass and, my own personal ship biases aside, I don't really like that at all. I really love the history and dynamic they share and I thought they made it pretty explicit that any romantic ties between them were cut. I've seen people theorize that she isn't in the right state of mind and might be grasping for any physical connection that makes her feel safe - which can make sense given the trauma she went through - but idk I wish we could explore more of a nuanced friend/familial relationship between her and Cass. I know it’s his show, but I really don’t want to see her be reduced to a romantic prop for him or god forbid she’s that and he loses her to further fuel his storyline. Either way, Bix is in a very vulnerable emotional state and I'm not sure any love interest would be necessary for her (yes I know how ironic that is coming from me and my many oc x canon google docs lmao) at least not until she's had the proper time to heal.

All this to say that it looks like they're setting her up for another pretty tragic arc next season and I hope the payoff doesn't end in complete emotional devastation, but this is one of, if not THE darkest star wars stories out there 🙃

These thoughts of course are just based off a grainy one minute teaser trailer that could very well be purposefully deceptive considering the show hasn't even finished filming yet. But I'd love to hear other people's thoughts too!

#asks #anon #bix caleen #I could talk about this a lot more too 😬#but anyway if she dies Tony and I will be exchanging words

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ghoste-catte · 3 years

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I was curious what advice would you give to someone new to writing fics? I've been wanting to get back into it but haven't seriously written something since high school. I hope this isn't an annoying question or anything!

Not an annoying question at all! I'm just a little worried that I won't have terribly good or useful advice. To be honest, I also sort of stopped writing in earnest right as I finished high school, and didn't pick it back up until my late 20s. It's certainly an adjustment! But I think the few things that really helped me get back into writing fic as a hobby and something I spend quite a bit of time on would be:

Write for yourself first, then find your other motivations. My original inspiration in getting back into fic writing was that there just were not that many fics I liked for my favorite pairing, and I wanted more of them, and I especially wanted more with the tropes and characterizations I wanted to see. I think at the very core of anything you need that internal spark that drives you. At the same time, for me at least, if I just relied on my own drive, I would not get much done; I need some external guardrails. So having people send prompts, or writing for particular events, or writing stuff for friends really helps me to get my ass in gear and finish stuff. That may not be the perfect motivator for you, and that's fine! You just gotta figure out what is.

Be open to inspiration. Anything and everything can be spun out into a story with the right tweaking. Obviously stuff like music is a classic inspiration source, but I've also pulled ideas from poetry, from memes, from Reddit threads, from YouTube videos, from rambling conversations on Discord and from real life to make fics out of. So many times, someone will post a silly Twitter screencap, and I'll think, There's a fic in this. And a lot of the time, there is! Research is a wonderful thing, but so is serendipity. If you're out there actively looking for ideas, eventually one that you like will stumble past you.

Find your community. I can genuinely say I never would have finished more than one fic if I didn't have fandom friends to talk to about even stupid headcanons, to bounce ideas off of, and to encourage me (and to encourage them in turn!). Discord has been a godsend, and some of my closest online friends are people I met in the GaaLee discord server. As I've gotten more comfortable as a writer, I've also joined general writing servers and Reddit communities and have found them immensely helpful on both a motivational level (bingos, sprints, owe-me challenges) and on a craft level (plot workshopping and writing ethics and live grammar help). It's a lot easier to think about fic ideas and hash through problem moments when I have a constant stream of fandom-related chatter coming from the little people who live in my phone! Ao3 is an amazing website, and it's great as, well, an archive, but it isn't social media by design. If you want conversation and human connection and cheerleading, you've gotta forge out and find it.

Make it a habit ... If you want to produce anything longer than a couple hundred words, you really have to set aside time for it. And writing is just like knitting or dirt biking or painting little model figurines: the more you do it, the more easily it comes. When I was first getting back into the proper swing of things, I committed myself to 30 minutes of writing per week. Just 30 minutes. I didn't even hit that goal every week, but there were tons of weeks I got on a roll and went over that amount, and by the end of the year I'd written over 200,000 words. I used to spend an hour laboriously tip-tapping out 200 words, but now I can easily blow through 1k in a 50 minute sprint. It's all about training that muscle.

... But don't make it a chore. With fanfic, you aren't doing this as a job, and you aren't ultimately doing it for anyone other than you. That means you can take breaks when you need them, you can set deadlines and then fail to meet them, you can write stuff and then decide to never post it. When you start getting burnt out, when the practice loses the joy and energy, stop. There's no 'hustle' here. In our capitalist society we're so trained to push past our limits and keep going even when it hurts us, but the hobby you do for connection and relaxation and whatever else shouldn't be like that.

Ignore metrics. Sometimes stuff isn't gonna get hits, or kudos, or comments. There are some basic 'rules' as to the stuff that does and doesn't get traction, but every time you post something it's a roll of the dice. If you're focused on watching that kudos counter tick up, you will get bummed out fast. And any writer will tell you that the stuff you think is your best work will never be the stuff that gets the most accolades. So you have to find something else to give you a sense of success. For me, it's watching my wordcount go up in my stats and those occasional comments where someone has a lot to say and that one person who always leaves me a <3 emoji (and, shout out to @egregiousderp, having someone to have long one-on-one conversations with about the stuff that never made it to page).

Don't strive for perfection. It's really easy to want your first ever fic to be a complete showstopper, the best fic fandom has ever seen, hitting all the tropes and the ideas and the characterization that you just know fandom is missing and would be everyone's top favorite if only it was written. This is a trap. No one fic can be all things. Most people who want to write an epic as their very first venture will not see the end of that epic, because they haven't put in the practice hours to make something on that scale work. That's not to say you can't start out with a big, sprawling multichap, just don't expect it to be the greatest thing since sliced bread if you're just starting out, and be okay with abandoning it for greener pastures if you get to that point. Think of the first time someone makes a vase out of clay or bakes a loaf of bread. That's never their best vase or their best bread. If they keep up with it, they'll make more and better vases and loaves. Likewise, your first fic is probably not gonna be your best fic. See it for what it is: your launchpad.

You can't edit an empty page, but you can over-edit a full one. This kind of spins off of #7, but if the words aren't there, you can't fix them. Daydreams and headcanons are fantastic (and god, how many times have I wished for a speech-to-text engine that projected my falling asleep thoughts onto a Google doc for later perusal), but they aren't fic. If you want to write fic, you've gotta get comfortable with the idea of sloppy outlines and rough first drafts. You can't build a house without a frame and you can't build a man without a skeleton (I mean, you can, I guess, but he'd be one floppy man). The nice thing about fic is that it doesn't matter if that frame is structurally unsound or the skeleton has 18 too many bones, you can clean that up in the editing process. But you can't start hanging curtains and arranging furniture in something that doesn't even have walls. That's the process. But! Also know when to set down the editor's pen and say, "Okay, this is good enough for government work", and call it done. ("Done" doesn't have to mean "posted", but it does mean, "I'm done picking at this for now, and I'm gonna go write some more stuff".) Over-editing can make stuff seem laborious and forced, and it prevents you from actually improving. To continue belaboring the house metaphor, you can spend your whole life rearranging furniture in just one room, but the end result of that is a pretty narrow existence and a room with a lot of footprints and tracks in the carpet.

Write shit down. When you have ideas, jot them down--in a notebook, in a Google Doc, in the Notes app of your phone, in pen on the back of your hand. You think you will remember that brilliant line of dialogue or sparkling snippet of narration or genius plot that came to you in a dream, but you Will Not. Write it down. Write it down. Write it down! There have been so many times when a fic was completely saved by past!me having written down my shower thoughts about what happens next in the fic, that present!me had completely forgotten about and was floundering over.

Have fun with it! Try different stuff. Try stupid stuff. Try experimental stuff. Do stuff you've never done before that you aren't sure will work. It's important to get comfortable with your niche (for example, I know I'm never going to be the sort of person who writes intricate plots of intrigue or super long 100k epics or detailed battles), but you can't find that niche unless you explore lots of different niches! Figure out what you love and what you absolutely hate, and then keep doing the stuff you love.

Okay, so that was actually TEN things, but ... I hope you still found this helpful. Feel free to send another ask if any of this was confusing or unclear. Good luck with your fic writing and, if you want, send me a link to what you've written once you've written it! I'd love to read it.

#answered #anonymous #writing advice #i guess?#am i qualified to give this?#no #but im doing it anyway

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lokiondisneyplus · 3 years

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A review of “Journey Into Mystery,” the penultimate Loki Season One episode on Disney+, coming up just as soon as I paper cut a giant cloud to death…

Journey Into Mystery was the title of the first Marvel comic to feature either Thor or Loki. It began as an anthology series featuring monsters and aliens, but Jack Kirby, Stan Lee, and Larry Lieber were so smitten with their adaptation of the characters of Norse myth that the Asgardians gradually took over the whole book, which was renamed after its hammer-wielding hero(*).

(*) The early Journey Into Mystery stories treated Thor’s alter ego, disabled Dr. Donald Blake, as the “real” character, while Thor was just someone Blake could magically transform into, while retaining his memories and personality. It wasn’t even clear whether Asgard itself was meant to exist at first, until Loki turned up on Earth in an early issue, caused trouble, and Blake/Thor somehow knew exactly how to get to Asgard to drop him off. Soon, the lines between Thor and Blake began to blur, and eventually Thor became the real guy, and Blake a fiction invented by Odin to humble his arrogant son. It’s a mark of just how instantly charismatic Loki was that the entire title quickly steered towards him and the other gods.

But once upon a time, anything was possible in Journey Into Mystery, which makes it an apt moniker for an absolutely wonderful episode of Loki where the same holds true. Our title characters are trapped in the Void, a place at the end of time where the TVA’s victims are banished to be devoured by a cloud monster named Alioth. And mostly they are surrounded by the wreckage of many dead timelines. Classic Loki insists that his group’s only goal is survival, and any kind of planning and scheming is doomed to kill the Loki who tries. But this ruined, hopeless world instead feels bursting with imagination and possibility.

There are the many Loki variants we see, with President Loki, among others, joining Classic, Kid, Boastful, and Alligator Loki. There are the metric ton of Easter Eggs just waiting to be screencapped by Marvel obsessives (I discuss a few of them down below), but which still suggest a much larger and weirder MCU even if you don’t immediately scream out “Is that… THROG?!?!?” at the appropriate moment. And all of that stuff is tons of fun, to be sure. But what makes this episode — and, increasingly, this series — feel so special is the way that it explores the untapped potential of Loki himself, in his many, many variations.

This is an episode that owes more than a small stylistic and thematic debt to Lost. It’s not just that Alioth looks and sounds so much like the Smoke Monster(*), that it makes a shared Wizard of Oz reference to “the man behind the curtain” (also the title of one of the very best Lost episodes), or even that the core group of Lokis are hiding in a bunker accessible via a hatch and a ladder that’s filled with recreational equipment (in this case, bowling alley lanes). It’s also that Loki, Sylvie, their counterparts, and Mobius have all been transported to a strange place that has disturbing echoes from their own lives, that operates according to strange new rules they have to learn while fleeing danger, and their presence there allows them to reflect on the many mistakes of their past and consider whether they want to, or can, transcend them.

(*) Yes, Alioth technically predates Smokey by a decade (see the notes below for more), but his look has been tweaked a bit here to seem more like smoke than a cloud, and the sounds he makes when he roars sound a lot like Smokey’s telltale taxi cab meter clicks. Given the other Lost hat tips in the episode, I have to believe Alioth was chosen specifically to evoke Smokey.

Classic Loki is aptly named. He wears the Sixties Jack Kirby costume, and he is a far more powerful magician than either Sylvie or our Loki have allowed themselves to be. He calls our Loki’s knives worthless compared to his sorcery, which feels like the show acknowledging that the movies depowered Loki a fair amount to make him seem cooler. But if Classic Loki can conjure up illusions bigger and more potent than his younger peers, he is a fundamentally weak and defeated man, convinced, like the others, that the only way to win the game into which he was born is not to play. “We cannot change,” he insists. “We’re broken. Every version of ourselves. Forever.” It is not only his sentiment — Kid Loki adds that any Loki who tries to improve inevitably winds up in the Void for their troubles — but it seems to have weighed on him longer and harder than most.

But Classic Loki takes inspiration from Loki and Sylvie to stand and fight rather than turn and run, magicking up a vision of their homeland to distract Alioth at a crucial moment in Sylvie’s plan, and getting eaten for his trouble. He was wrong: Lokis can change. (Though Kid Loki might once again argue that Classic Loki’s death is more evidence that the universe has no interest in any of them doing so.) And both Loki and Sylvie have been changing throughout their time together. Like most Lokis, they seem cursed to a life of loneliness. Sylvie learned as a child that a higher power believed she should not exist, and has spent a lifetime hiding out in places where any friends she might make will soon die in an apocalypse. Our Loki’s past isn’t quite so stark, but the knowledge that his birth father abandoned him, while his adoptive father never much liked him, have left permanent scars that govern a lot of his behavior. The defining element of Classic Loki’s backstory is that he spent a long time alone on a planet, and only got busted by the TVA when he attempted to reconnect with his brother and anyone else he once knew. This is a hard existence, for all of them. And while it does not forgive them their many sins(*), it helps contextualize them, and give them the knowledge to try to be better versions of themselves.

(*) Loki at one point even acknowledges that, for him, it’s probably only been a few days since he led an alien invasion of New York that left many dead, though due to TVA shenanigans, far more time may have passed.

For that matter, Mobius is not the stainless hero he once thought of himself as. While he and Sylvie are tooling around the Void in a pizza delivery car (because of course they are), he admits that he committed a lot of sins by believing that the ends justified the means, and was wrong. He doesn’t know who he is before the TVA stole and factory rebooted him, but he knows that he wants something better for himself and the universe, and takes the stolen TemPad to open up a portal to his own workplace in hopes of tearing down the TVA once and for all. Before he goes, though, he and Loki share a hug that feels a lot more poignant than it should, given that these characters have only spent parts of four episodes of TV together. It’s a testament to Hiddleston, Wilson, Waldron, and company (Tom Kauffman wrote this week’s script) that their friendship felt so alive and important in such a short amount of time.

The same can be said for Loki and Sylvie’s relationship, however we’re choosing to define it. Though they briefly cuddle together under a blanket that Loki conjures, they move no closer to romance than they were already. If anything, Mobius’ accusations of narcissism in last week’s episode seem to have made both of them pull back a bit from where they seemed to be heading back on Lamentis. But the connection between them is real, whatever exactly it is. And their ability to take down Alioth — to tap into the magic that Classic Loki always had, and to fulfill Loki’s belief that “I think we’re stronger than we realize” — by working together is inspiring and joyful. Without all this nuanced and engaging character work, Loki would still be an entertaining ride, but it’s the marriage of wild ideas with the human element that’s made it so great.

Of course, now comes the hard part. Endings have rarely been an MCU strength, give or take something like the climax of Endgame, and the finales of the two previous Disney+ shows were easily their weakest episodes. The strange, glorious, beautiful machine that Waldron and Herron have built doesn’t seem like it’s heading for another generic hero/villain slugfest, but then, neither did WandaVision before we got exactly that. This one feels different so far, though. The command of the story, the characters, and the tone are incredibly strong right now. There is a mystery to be solved about who is in the big castle beyond the Void (another Loki makes the most narrative and thematic sense to me, but we’ll see), and a lot to be resolved about what happens to the TVA and our heroes. And maybe there’s some heavy lifting that has to be done in service to the upcoming Dr. Strange or Ant-Man films.

It’s complicated, but on a show that has handled complexity well. Though even if the finale winds up keeping things simpler, that might work. As Loki notes while discussing his initial plan to take down Alioth, “Just because it’s not complicated doesn’t mean it’s bad.” Though as Kid Loki retorts, “It also doesn’t mean it’s good.”

Please be good, Loki finale. Everything up to this point deserves that.

Some other thoughts:

* Most of this week’s most interesting material happens in the Void. But the scenes back at the TVA clarify a few things. First, Ravonna is not the mastermind of all this, and she was very much suckered in by the Time-Keeper robots. But unlike Mobius or Hunter B-15, she’s so conditioned to the mission that even knowing it’s a lie hasn’t really swayed her from her mission. She has Miss Minutes (who herself is much craftier this week) looking into files about the creation of the TVA, but for the most part comes across as someone very happy with a status quo where she gets to be special and pass judgment on the rest of the multiverse.

* Alioth first appeared in 1993’s Avengers: The Terminatrix Objective, a miniseries (written by Mobius inspiration Mark Gruenwald, and with some extremely kewl Nineties art full of shoulder pads, studded collars, and the like) involving Ravonna, Kang, and the off-brand versions of Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor (aka U.S. Agent, War Machine, and Thunderstrike, the latter of whom has yet to appear in the MCU). It’s a sequel to a Nineties crossover event called Citizen Kang. And no, I still don’t buy that Kang will be the one pulling the strings here, if only because it’s really bad storytelling for the big bad of the season to have never appeared or even been mentioned prior to the finale.

* Rather than try to identify every Easter egg visible in the Void’s terrain, I’ll instead highlight three of the most interesting. Right before the Lokis arrive at the hatch, we see a helicopter with Thanos’ name on it. This is a hat tip to an infamous — and often memed — out-of-continuity story where Thanos flies this chopper while trying to steal the Cosmic Cube (aka the Tesseract) from Hellcat. (A little kid gets his hands on it instead and, of course, uses the Cube to conjure up free ice cream.) James Gunn has been agitating for years for the Thanos Copter to be in the MCU. He finally got his wish.

* The other funny one: When the camera pans down the tunnel into Kid Loki’s headquarters, we see Mjolnir buried in the ground, and right below it is a jar containing a very annoyed frog in a Thor costume. This is either Thor himself — whom Loki cursed into amphibianhood in a memorable Walt Simonson storyline — or another character named Simon Walterston (note the backwards tribute to Walt) who later assumed the tiny mantle.

* Also, in one scene you can spot Yellowjacket’s helmet littering the landscape. This might support the theory that the TVA, the Void, etc., all exist in the Quantum Realm, since that’s where the MCU version of Yellowjacket probably went when his suit shorted out and he was crushed to subatomic size. Or it might be more trolling of the fanbase from the company that had WandaVision fans convinced that Mephisto, the X-Men, and/or Reed Richards would be appearing by the season finale.

* Honestly, I would have watched an entire episode that was just Loki, Mobius, and the others arguing about whether Alligator Loki was actually a Loki, or just a gator who ended up with the crown, presumably after eating a real Loki. The suggestion that the gator might be lying — and that this actually supports, rather than undermines, the case for him being a Loki — was just delightful. And hey, if Throg exists in the MCU now, why not Alligator Loki?

* Finally, the MCU films in general are not exactly known for their visual flair, though a few directors like Taika Waititi and Ryan Coogler have been able to craft distinctive images within the franchise’s usual template. Loki, though, is so often wonderful to look at, and particularly when our heroes are stuck in strange environments like Lamentis or the Void. Director Kate Herron and the VFX team work very well together to create dynamic and weird imagery like Sylvie running from Alioth, or the chaotic Loki battle in the bowling alley. Between this show and WandaVision, it appears the Disney+ corner of the MCU has a bit more room to expand its palette. (Falcon and the Winter Soldier, much less so.)

#Loki #spoilers #episode 5 #review #Rolling Stone #Alan Sepinwall

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tedturneriscrazy · 3 years

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Another Saturday, another episode! Let's take a look at Keeping Up A-fear-ances!

(Good lord I'm starting to make myself sound like some sort of content creator)

Oh, okay, we're just starting at that level of intensity, huh?

Chest gem origins

Gwendolyn not being satisfied with managing the curse and determined to cure it? I'm sure this won't be a real world allegory in the slightest.

Oh, so Eda literally just stumbles upon the portal? I could call that contrived, but honestly it's not dissimilar to how Dipper found Journal 3. For that matter, the entirety of Lord of the Rings is predicated on an accidental discovery like this and nobody gave Tolkien shit about it.

Was the eye on the portal cracked in previous episodes? I don't remember.

Seems like Gwen is the "well-meaning but ultimately misguided" flavor of mom.

As an aside, I am now quite curious about how Eda's first trip to the human realm went. Maybe a future episode will cover it? At any rate, I smell a new favorite fic prompt.

The screaming alarms in the Demon Realm will never not be funny to me.

Also, that is a worrying number of hearts. Eda is straight up murdering these poor creatures.

For some reason the gold fang being removable never occurred to me as a possibility, and now I feel like a kid who's discovered that Santa isn't real.

Oh hey, the new outfit! I'm also impressed how close to symmetrical that tearing was.

I need to get a screencap of Luz sleeping on that stack of books because she is adorable.

Also, staying up all night researching? This season seems determined to completely eradicate the notion of Luz being dumb, and I am here for it.

I have a feeling the Hexside mug will be making its way to The Mystery Shack in the near future.

Lilith's first experience with transformation and she seems understandably horrified.

The curse acting stronger when stressed? That seems...important.

Ah, so the dismemberment is from the curse! A surprisingly useful side effect from what we've seen so far.

Can I just say that I appreciate how Eda's reaction to Lilith's first taste of transformation is immediate remedy, explanation, and reassurance? And doesn't make any snarky comments along the lines of "now you know what it's like?" Whatever happened in that week and a half must have been cathartic as hell.

"Always. Always curious." Luz is the TOH fandom.

(Also, Eda, you know she is, considering how much she went on about your "mysterious past" at the Covention)

"Magic bird tornado?!" Luz has a way with words that's just *chef's kiss*.

"Gwendolyn." Eda is already just fucking done.

"MOM?!?!" Jeez, Lilith, you're just now hearing all this?

I was charmed by how motherly Gwen was acting toward Eda, but then she kinda just...dismissed Lilith, and now I'm somehwat less charmed.

(Sweet flea as a term of endearment is kinda cute, though might have some unfortunate implications depending on how you want to interpret it)

"Who knows what they put in those nasty concoctions?" OH WE GOING FOR THE ANTI-VAXXERS NOW YESSSS

Luz and Lilith's reaction to that whole exchange is priceless.

Everyone's perspective here makes perfect sense for who they are and what they've been through.

Poor Lilith. Her cursing Eda is beginning to make more sense.

Ah, thus begins the collaboration.

"We'll be consulting someone very special." Why does that seem so...ominous?

Is there anyone who watched this episode for the first time whose bullshit detector didn't go off immediately when Gwen mentioned finding someone who promised a cure?

Heh, Palm Stings.

Nonbelievers will be blinded by the power of the tome? I'm sure they will be, Wartlop.

I must say, as something of a scientist myself (okay that's not true, I'm a QA tech for a food manufacturer, but I do have a chemistry degree), I am 100% here for the swings being taken at faith healing/"miracle" cures/anti-vaxxers in this episode

Oh, we Wile E. Coyote now, huh?

Also, interesting how much apple blood is being played up in this episode.

Lilith please you're projecting your mommy issues on a literal child

OH WE REALLY JUST WILE E. COYOTE HUH?

You're right, Luz, Gwen's bicep game is goals.

(Somewhat disappointed the scars are from questing and not beastkeeping, but eh)

Why do I get the feeling there's gonna be a future episode where everybody stages an intervention for Eda's apple blood problem?

"Those feathers mean we're driving the beast out" Gwen no

Hooty is holding the brain cell? Oh no...

If that ice cream came from the Night Market it would explain why Lilith sounds drunk.

(Side note: I can't be the only one getting flashbacks to Mermista's ice cream binge, right? Different context, but still)

"Abomi-berry" "Franken fruit" "Key slime pie" These are A+ flavor names.

Oh, there's the transformation...

I must say that whole segment kinda rubbed me the wrong way. The way King's opinion on his dad was changed seemed...I don't know how to describe it. I get that they needed a trigger for Lilith's transformation, but honestly if any part of the episode is contrived it's this.

"¡It really is that good!" So that's what an accent slip in written form looks like. (The upside down exclamation point is used in Spanish, in case anyone didn't know)

I keep half expecting Eda to say "Beep! Beep!" at this point.

Luz is finally asking questions. Took long enough.

Ah, the classic "moving the goal posts to extract more money from a desparate family member" technique.

Luz channeling Scorpion, we love to see it.

There is an exquisite irony in Eda's mom being scammed, I must say.

Ah, so that's where the elixirs went. Dammit, Gwen.

Luz is definitely thinking "Are you fucking kidding me right now?!"

Beast!Lilith is massive.

"Sweet flea?" Gwen just realized she done goofed.

"I can see you still need a little time." God Luz is so fucking smart.

The con revealed.

OH DAMN SCARY MAMA

(Also I am terrified of bees/wasps, so extra scary mama in my book)

The scam is revealed, goblins, getting back into the Wartlop disguise is kinda pointless.

She joined the Beast Keeping coven entirely to cure the curse? That's dedication. A shame you couldn't have spared some of that for Lilith.

Still, I do like badass scary mama Gwen. I'd be down to see more of that.

Owl Beast fight!

I am slayed by the fact that the portraits are now officially a recurring gag 😂

Aw, here's The Moment™️

"My turn to drive" Does this imply cars are a thing on the Boiling Isles after all?

Lilith crying almost immediately💔 She was holding onto a lot of pain.

Yes, King, she was trying to do her best. I mean, road to hell or whatever, but at least Gwen got there in the end.

WHAT?! YOU'RE BREAKING UP LULU AND HOOTCIFER?!?!?!?

Terrace, that's just cruel. (Worthless brownie points for whoever understands that reference)

No, seriously, you can't just give me my favorite inter-character relationship in the series after Lumity and just...take it away like that, come on! 😭😭😭😭😭😭

I know I should remark on how Lilith told Gwen about the circumstances of the curse, how Gwen rightfully accepted responsibility for the whole situation, and how Luz finds the big hair aspirational, but...NOOOO DON'T END THE ADVENTURES OF LULU AND HOOTCIFER WHYYYYYYYYY💔😭💔😭💔😭

"BUT I CAN'T HOLD A PEN!"

I will never emotionally recover from this.

Okay, I think I got that out of my system. Anyway...

Not the only human, huh? Cue the "Belos is a human" theorists going into maximum overdrive.

That said, a tantalizing lore dump.

We certainly do have a lot of garbage. Some of it even holds office. HEY-O!

Setting up the next episode, too. Continuity!

Camp's over, huh? That means it's been three months.

Way to misdirect with Camila, guys. That said, we have now seen Camila cry and I HATE it. (In the right way, I think)

WHAT THE FUCK

HOLY SHIT

CREEPY LUZ IS REAL WHAT

OWJEIWHQGIWWOPQ

(It's hard to keysmash on a phone, even with autocorrect off)

That wraps it up! The flaws in this episode seem more pronounced than any others in the season so far, but the good stuff was really good! Overall a solid episode! I know everybody's looking forward to library Lumity in the next one (so am I), but I'm personally eager to see what they do with Gus. His part is the A plot, after all.

Anyway, I'll be back at this next week! Still hard to believe this is a thing, but that's life, I guess.

#the owl house #eda clawthorne #gwendolyn clawthorne #luz noceda #lilith clawthorne #king of demons #toh king #toh s2 spoilers #the owl house s2 spoilers #the owl house season 2 spoilers #toh spoilers #the owl house spoilers

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veliseraptor · 3 years

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got tagged for two fic writer memes yesterday! the one from @ameliarating first:

How many works do you have on AO3?

509.

What’s your total AO3 word count?

3,432,24. dang! that’s a lot of words

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

I have written for...counting the MCU as one fandom, on AO3 I have written for 32 fandoms, including at least one work in:

MCU, The Sillmarillion, Caliban Leandros, both DC and Marvel Comics, the book Barebacked by Kit Whitfield, Doctrine of Labyrinths, Doctor Who, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Wars, Black Jewels, Dragon Age, Lucifer, Dexter, Temeraire, Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Supernatural, A Song of Ice and Fire, Greek Mythology, Lymond Chronicles, Merlin BBC, Code Geass, Good Omens, Death Note, and White Collar.

this is not a comprehensive list of every fandom I’ve ever written for, because it is not including ones that live only on FFN or Livejournal.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Life In Reverse tops the list (11066), aka my 200k Loki-centric post-Thor AU fic that I wrote between 2012 and 2018 and with which I have a decidedly complex relationship at this point. I love it but also I no longer think it’s my best work but also I credit it with teaching me a fuck of a lot about writing and writing longer projects in general.

With Absolute Splendor is rapidly catching up, to my astonishment (6559), despite having been posted for less than half as long. Aka the wedding planning fic that’s really just me mucking about in my Jiang Cheng and my Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian feelings, at length.

some good mistakes (4618) was my first foray into the Untamed version of “characters who hate each other going on resentful roadtrips together, feat. Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng.” I have gone on to write others and will continue to write more.

Unraveling (3069) is a little bit of a surprise but also not - it was originally just sort of WWP stuff for my ‘what if people remembered that blunt force trauma is a really bad thing actually’ problem that pops up sometimes, re: Loki at the end of The Avengers, and then it kind of turned into a whole thing. I personally think it’s the weakest of the installments of the series it belongs to, but it is the first one and also the one that gets least into the broader family dysfunction and depression stuff that probably is less everyone’s thing (but is what came out this fic that mattered more to me, personally).

I am a little surprised to see Steve Rogers’ Halfway House for Notorious Supervillains (3068) here too! I was expecting one of the more...idk, mainstream concepts from the MCU to win out? But I also wasn’t expecting two Untamed fics to make it here, either. But I am stupid proud of this fic even if it is very extraordinarily unfinished. This is one of those unfinished fics that will nag at me unless and until I finish it, at least a little, because the concept - if I do say so myself - is so goddamn good and I think I was executing it pretty well, too.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

Pretty much never. I was never very good at it and now I’d feel like I had to go back and reply to all of them and I just. I can’t do that. and when I do try to just start at the beginning I get overwhelmed very fast and start avoiding it.

Basically I decided that if it’s a decision between wrestling with myself to reply to comments versus actually doing more writing I’m going to end up landing on the latter as feeling both more doable and more productive.

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

probably it’s The Worlds Forgotten, the Words Forbidden for sheer level of “so then what was the point” of it all. but like. I’ve definitely written a few extraordinarily miserable fics, and by “a few” I kind of mean “a lot.” Other nominees I’d put down might be nor autumn falter (for currently personally making me suffer most), once there was a way to get back home (for I think having the ouchiest summary), and Waiting for the Summer Rain (which remains one of my personal favorite Supernatural fics I wrote).

but like. there are 43 fics I have marked with Major Character Death warnings and every single one of those, pretty much, has a downer ending.

Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you’ve written?

I have written several though not in a long time! My craziest probably remains the Morgoth/Cthulhu short I wrote that actually got sporked because someone took it seriously (???) enough to do that. But the craziest that actually has any merit, (I’d argue) is probably the Maeglin/Viserys one.

not linking to either, if you want to go find them I don’t think it’ll be that hard.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Yeah, a few times on a few different things. More if you count “people who seem to like the fic but love telling you how much they hate the female characters you’re writing about in it” as ‘hate’ which I would but isn’t, you know, quite as straightforward. If I had a nickel for every time someone bitched about Jane in Life in Reverse, though...lots of nickels.

Do you write smut? if so what kind?

Sure do! But what does ‘what kind’ mean, I don’t know how to answer that question. I feel tempted to just put in my “Mike’s Hard Kinks” image edit in this space.

I guess usually I tend to write smut that at least involves a little bit of a kink? I don’t think I’d feel comfortable writing entirely kinkless smut. I think I’d feel weird about it, the same way I do when I write really nice fic, generally.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I think I did back when but I don’t remember anything about it. I feel like it was one of those mass data scraping things where my fic happened to be among those caught up in it.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have! several actually, mostly into Russian and Chinese. every time it happens I’m immensely flattered that someone wants to put in that kind of work on something I wrote.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I think I’d be very, very bad at it.

What’s your all time favorite ship?

Depends on when you ask me! I could probably give you a top five but then I’d remember six that I forgot to mention five minutes later. I guess if I were to think about ships that feel like they hold very special particular places in my heart... Xue Yang/Xiao Xingchen, Steve Rogers/Loki, and Min/Rand come to mind.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

oh god do you want the whole list cause honestly I could just like. screencap the entirety of my “in progress” folder with a crying emoji watermarked over it. and that’s not getting into the fics that are like...half formed babies in my consciousness but not anywhere on paper.

and also I just hate to admit that I might not finish something.

you know what? the Lucifer/Good Omens crossover I started would’ve been a lot of fun. I’m probably never going to finish it, but it would’ve been great if I had. I know other people did it too but my contribution could’ve been amazing.

I can say this very boldly with the near certainty that I’m not going to finish the fic so no one will be able to disagree.

(...also the Last Herald-Mage fix it. that was going to be a good fic too, and also will probably languish unfinished forever.)

What are your writing strengths?

I’m pretty sure dialogue is my strongest point. Dialogue and emotions, which is why I always end up just wanting to write about characters talking and having feelings at each other.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Writing action sequences throws me into conniptions every time I have to do it and I will take drastic actions sometimes to avoid doing it at all, which probably weakens the work as a whole.

Also, I don’t plan ahead and this means I write myself into corners kind of a lot. If I wasn’t writing long, dense fic it wouldn’t be a problem but here we are.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I tend to avoid it unless it’s in the context of, as in CQL/MDZS fic, leaving certain terminology untranslated. I’m pretty sure I almost never write full exchanges of dialogue in a different language than I’m using for the narration within a fic, and generally speaking my reaction to other people doing it is at least mildly negative.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Harry Potter was technically the first fandom I wrote for, but it was a crack fic I wrote to make my friends laugh more than anything; I tend to count Wheel of Time as my first actual fandom for which I wrote my first actual fic.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

some days the answer is “all of them” and some day the answer is “I don’t like anything I’ve written in my entire life” and I never like giving this a definitive answer. yesterday I reread efforts in a common cause (the bound copy!! thanks @spockandawe) and you know what, that was a good fic and I’m proud of it, so I’m going with that one, for this meme, today.

tagging: @mostfacinorous, @jaggedcliffs, @silvysartfulness, @mikkeneko, @kasasagi-eye, @curiosity-killed, how many people am I supposed to tag for this one anyway

#lise memes #confessions of a frustrated writer

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lee-scribbles-and-doodles · 3 years

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Episode 6 reaction

Let's fucking goooooo!

The episode screencap is Sam with stars in the background. He should make it his social media icon... y'know, if he trusted technology enough to know what a social media is

Sam staring out at the city like a pi and ruining Max's commercial 🤣

Sam's fucking reach in order to realize Hugh Bliss is the Big Bad is sending me

Sam and Max driving through a rainbow vortex is very mlm of them. Great way to start pride month

Love that there's just a visitor's center on the moon.

The moleman just straight up admitting Hugh Bliss is trying to enslave the earth.

His master plan is literally just... on the wall

Huh, the moleman's suit in the previous episode was a mech suit. I guess that's why he looks so whimpy now

AGENT SUPERBALL!

I believe in your door guarding abilities Superball 🥺

Oh cool a unicorn

"Rub it sir." "Rub it Sam!" "Harder. Harder."

"Oh boy, a pet unicorn! I shall call him, Horny." "You do that."

"I am one with the door."

Back to Earth, and to Bosco's

"Hey Bosco... Oh dear god!"

He's pretending to be his own mom now

Interesting how Max nearly gets violent when Bosco compares him to his father 👀

Bosco admitting he keeps making crazy prices because the boys keep buying is some king shit.

Usually these items do something in Bosco's so I'm just going to click the Unicorn on everything.

"I know one way to get Horny red."

The microwave helped us get to level red. I guess that makes sense???

"Hey Jimmy, wanna touch my unicorn?" "Beat it!" "No, just touch it." "Scram!"

Too, the office?

The donut mold left

Hubert the plant is gone too :(

Max prefers his tiny desk to the oval office desk ♡

Poor Leonard

Max fed him the deed to the usa

To Sybil's!

According the posters, Sybil lost her cat :(

Asdfgff she's Canadian now?!

"Is Sybil hearing the voices again?"

Sorry, she's the QUEEN of Camada.

Max forgot he's president 🤣

Max also apparently eats shoes???

And Sam apparently works with Canada's tourist brigade or some shiz

To the moon, Alice.

Superball is pretty

Game froze :(

Ok it's working again

And it froze again :(

I just wanna play before work ya'll

Ok it's working!

Max is so happy to be near Hugh Bliss

Love how Hugh just casually admits his plans for taking over the world

Mr Spatula is on the moon???

Bathe in yellow

Aw, Abe is in love with Sybil.

Aw, we get to help them get together ❤

Ew he threw up his talisman

Tic Tac... DOOM

C.O.P.S. won't sing for Sam :(

It took me way too long to figure out the stupid lunar lander puzzel

Oh, I have to let c.o.p.s. win.

Fuck it I'm riding the rollercoaster

Aw, they're having fun

Ok let's go get Hugh Bliss

Wait, what's he doing

What?

What!?

Interesting that one of Max's vices seems... unhappy with himself

"Max, I'll get your vices back or kill us both trying!" "I love you too."

Omg the look of shock on Red Max's face before he disappears 🥺

Lmao Max immediately trying to shoot Sam when he gets his red back.

Back to Earth!

Ok I've tried to use gastrokinesis on everyone except Jimmy and Leonard

No dice on Jimmy :(

Ew, he puked up the deed to the united states

Can I... Can I sell it? Sybil's loaded now isn't she?

Asdfghh it worked!? OK, well now I have enough money for Bosco (almost forgot about that actually).

Oh no, she's been hypnotized. No wonder Abe is so uncomfortable. I guess that means Bliss's beam thing actually worked.

Green Max's eating noises are gross. Let's get the earth quake machine.

He... ate us!? Ew, he puked us up!?

OH, that's how I get Jimmy off the parking meter. ...That actually makes a lot of sense.

Ok, on the moon, let's use the earth quake machine

...It makes earthquakes by making the satellite crash. Don't know what I expected. At least we got Max's tale back.

I'm assuming I have to use the magic hat on Green Max due to process of elimination.

"That's my boy!" 🥺💜💜💜🥺

The second Hugh Bliss threatened Max, Sam began unloading led at him. Good husband.

He's alien bacteria? Y'know what, sure.

Oh my God it took me way too long to figure out how to kill Hugh bliss

No, don't drink him! Why is there so much vore in this episode!?

Max looks so happy when Sam gives him the boxing glove 😭😭😭

I can’t believe it's over.

Oh I like these ending credits and song ♡♡♡

Oh to be Max, punching out the entire world one by one.

Sam is just super chill with the whole situation.

#sam and max #freelance husbands #sybil pandemik #hugh bliss #bosco #agent superball #sam and max freelance police #sam & max freelance police #sam & max #lee plays sam and max

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autisticshadowthehedgehog · 3 years

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Filmverse!Knuckles is gonna be Tikal’s Little Brother and if he’s not I’m suing Sega

[ID: Two images; one of clipart of Knuckles the Echidna beside a poster for Sonic the Hedgehog (2020), and another from Sonic X of Knuckles and Tikal together while Tikal is injured. End ID.]

Thankfully, this might be shorter than my last couple theory posts but unfortunately I am possibly more passionate about it because this could conceivably happen and if it doesn’t I don’t know what I’m gonna do.

So in this theory, I will endeavor to prove these points:

Knuckles will very soon be present in the filmverse.

In the Filmverse, Pachacamac (and by extention, Tikal) are no longer four-thousand years gone, but exist at the same time as Sonic.

Knuckles is going to be in this clan not just as any member, but as Tikal’s brother.

We’re going off the rails and I’m going to tie this all in to the Chaos Emerald Filmverse theory.

Who’s ready to go? Everything under the cut.

1. Knuckles is Coming #2k22

[ID: Another edited photo, placing clipart of Knuckles beside a promotional photo for Sonic the Hedgehog (2020). End ID.]

This will probably be a short section but... there’s no way Knuckles won’t be in the filmverse very soon. Likely, in the second fucking movie.

Let’s start with the basics: Knuckles was originally going to be in the first movie, but was cut in order to better establish the Sonic vs Robotnik rivalry. Director Jeff Fowler made the following statement:

“For this first film, we really were just looking at the 1991 game and just see where it all started and keep it simple…Just really try to nail Sonic and Robotnik and just set up their rivalry because you don’t…I mean, I love…There’s a lot of great characters in Sonic universe, but it’s the most important thing is just to get Sonic set up and just tell a little bit of an origin story with him, and just do it in a way that really makes everyone fall in love with him as a character and just be rooting for more.

And then, if all that goes well, then we can kind of open it up and bring in some of these other characters that fans know and love. And yeah, I mean, no one’s more excited than me to have that opportunity.”

[x]

As well as this, co-writer for the film, Josh Miller, has stated he really wants to bring in Knux.

“I will only hint that we wanna bring in some of the other characters from the games. But, really, it’s all about Knuckles’ love.” [x]

Second, voice actors have, reportedly, already been considered for Knuckles’s voice, including Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. [x, x]

And third, Mushroom Hill.

[ID: Two photos; one of the Mushroom Planet from Sonic the Hedgehog (2020). The second is a screenshot from Sonic & Knuckles, where Knuckles is running through Mushroom Hill. Both photos feature gigantic mushrooms resembling trees and an orange tint. End iD.]

The “Mushroom Planet” is a direct reference to the first level of Sonic & Knuckles. The first level of.... the game with Knuckles’s name in it.

So, you wanna hear something funny? What’s the first thing Knuckles does in the game timeline?

[ID: Screenshot from Sonic & Knuckles. Sonic is standing on the left side of the screen, beneath a mural of something holding an emerald towards something that looks like SuperSonic. On the right side of the screen is Knuckles, ready to fight Sonic. End ID.]

Well... Robotnik shows up, convinces him that Sonic and Tails are gonna try to steal his emerald, and sends him off to fight them.

And where’s Robotnik at the end of the 2020 film?

[ID: Robotnik on the Mushroom Planet in Sonic the Hedgehog (2020). End ID.]

While the Mushroom Planet may not be where Angel Island is in filmverse, the direct reference would definitely generate fan attention. And it implies that Robotnik, wherever he is or is going, is headed towards Knuckles. And with the game inciting incident of Robotnik having Knuckles fight Sonic for him... well, wouldn’t that be a wild introduction? Especially for casual fans who don’t have Sonic Lore memorized and may not know that Knuckles was originally an antagonist/rival to Sonic.

Oh, and there’s one more piece of evidence that Knuckles is gonna show up... the fact that his tribe already has.

And among them, by the way, are Pachacamac and Tikal.

2. Pachacamac and Tikal are no longer 4000 years old

So. Let’s talk about the opening scene of Sonic the Hedgehog (2020). As many of you have probably noticed, Sonic and Longclaw are attacked not just by any masked intruders, but by... the Knuckles Clan of Echidnas.

And we’re sure they’re not any other clan, because they have the trademark Knuckled Gloves.

[ID: Multiple gifs of the echidnas attempt to attack Longclaw and Baby Sonic. They are dressed in vaguely tribal wear, and have gloves featuring pointed knuckles, signifying them as the Knuckles Clan. End ID.]

Now, that’s not evidence of Pachacamac/Tikal itself; we know the Knuckles Clan lasted at least long enough to spawn our Knuckles. What is evidence, however, is in the specific Echidna who shot Longclaw.

[ID: Gif of the Echidna who shot Longclaw, isolated in the frame. End ID.]

Look familiar?

[ID: The echdina who shot Longclaw in the 2020 film next to a render of Pachacamac. The mystery echidna’s helmet has the same forehead markings as Pachacamac, along with a design that looks like his mustache. End ID.]

And fun fact: this isn’t me reaching for once. This was confirmed by Tyson Hesse, film character designer and savior of Sonic, on his twitter.

[ID: Tweet from Tyson Hesse, showing the pictures of the Echidna and Pachacamac. He says, “Late to the #sonicwatchparty but this is an easter egg I haven’t seen many people catch.” End iD.]

Pachacamac is canonically in Sonic 2020. As director Jeff Fowler has said he believes Sonic as ~13 during the events of the film, we could say he’s about three years old in that intro. And we know this because it is specified specifically that the main timeline takes place ten years after the prologue.

[ID: Screenshot from Sonic the Hedgehog (2020), the first shot following the logo. It is a landscape shot of a street in the middle of a green field, and the caption reads, Green Hills Montana: Ten Years Later. End ID.]

Meaning... Pachacamac was alive ten years before the film takes place. Quite the departure from the four-thousand year time jump in the gameverse. Seeing as Pachacamac is alive so close to this timeline, we can reasonably assume that Tikal is, too- she’s his teenaged daughter, canonically ~14 when she is turned into a spirit, which would put her as solidly alive during this timeline.

...wanna know who else would be alive in this timeline?

Knuckles, who is only a year older than Sonic.

And, um, obviously a member of the Knuckles Clan.

3. Where is Knuckles in this Filmverse Canon?

Okay “Knuckles” is going to stop sounding like a word so can we just call the Knuckles Clan the KC rn? okay? Okay.

Knuckles is canonically a year older than Sonic- listed as 16 while Sonic is 15. So if Sonic’s alive, Knuckles is alive. Basic logic there.

In the gameverse, Knuckles’s backstory is as thus, paraphrased from Sonic Wiki:

Knuckles was born and raised alone on Angel Island as the last surviving member of the Knuckles Clan, a long-lost race of echidnas devoted to protecting the Master Emerald from being abused. However, Knuckles’s own past was a mystery to him; he knew nothing how he came to be and believed himself to be the last of his kind entirely. The one thing he did know was that he had always been living on his island, protecting the Master Emerald. Knuckles knew from an innate knowledge that his duty was his fate, and he was content with that.

While we can’t expect his backstory to stay exactly the same, seeing as Sonic now has a dead owl mom and knows how to Fortnite dance, but Knuckles’s backstory does fuel a lot of his character and decisions in the games. Here are what I believe to be the two main points of this backstory:

Knuckles is, or at least believes himself to be, the last member of his race

Knuckles considers it his sacred duty to guard the Master Emerald

[ID: Screencap from Sonic X of Knuckles the Echidna holding the Master Emerald above his head. End ID.]

Now... if Sonic was three during that backstory, the KC was around at least when Knuckles was about four. Most children don’t develop long-term memories til then, but if 3yo Sonic could remember his backstory in Green Hills near-perfectly, then clearly mobians are a bit different. We can reasonably assume that Knuckles would then remember at least part of his tribe or family, so that’s a definite change.

Thing is, what would be the reason for this change? Even ignoring Pachacamac, it was definitely intentional for the clan attacking Longclaw and Sonic to be the KC, which does change quite a bit of Knuckles’s backstory. Which isn’t a problem, you see- it’s a drastic change, but character changes aren’t bad if there’s a reason behind them.

So what would be the reason for Knuckles having memories of his tribe?

Well... how easy would it be, then, to get that Sonic Adventure flashback via Knuckles instead of a glowing ball of Tikal/Navi?

[ID: Screencap from Sonic Adventure, showing Knuckles the Echidna staring down Chaos and the glowing ball of light that symbolizes Tikal. They are standing in front of the emerald shards. End ID.]

Would be an easy way to get any chaos emerald/Master Emerald exposition out of the way, as well as establish some basic and early Sonic Lore- Chaos, echidnas, chao. And if Knuckles, um, remembers his entire race being massacred by an elder god?? That would definitely affect him in a way that he’d consider protecting the Master Emerald, the controller of the power Chaos used to do such a thing, a duty for himself.

And... what would be the best way to get that backstory out?

4. Knuckles is Tikal’s Baby Brother

Here’s the thing- the KC citizens don’t seem to know much about what’s going on outside of Pachacamac’s orders. From talking to them in Sonic Adventure flashbacks, we can see they’re quite a bit... confused, I think is the best way to put it.

[ID: Dialogue screenshots from Sonic Adventure that I had to nab from a Game Grumps video because nobody else had these online. The echidnas say, “The daughter? I saw her in front of the shrine.”, “Well... I.... I just can’t sit still!” and “I think, therefore I am.” End ID.]

So if Knuckles was just an ordinary tribe member, it’d be unlikely for him to know enough to provide the necessary flashback details. And if Knuckles’s past was changed in order to provide an easier connection to the SA lore, he’d need to be very near to the action. Of course, he could just be a curious child, but even then, he’d likely be left out of several conversations surrounding Tikal.

Most of Tikal’s flashbacks are spent alone- she only has a few arguing with her father, but most of her scenes are spent with the Chao and Chaos themself in the Chao Garden. Considering Tikal seems to be the only echidna frequenting the Chao Garden- the chao are afraid of her when she first approaches, Pachacamac arriving is basically seen as a declaration of war- there’d be no reason for an echidna to be there unless she brought them herself.

Who would she bring with her? Perhaps... her little brother.

[ID: Screencap from Sonic X of Tikal, surrounded by flying Chao while at the Master Emerald Shrine. End ID.]

First off, let’s get over the age thing-- I know you’re gonna say “Knuckles is 16 when Tikal is 14,” HOWEVER, TIkal did not age while inside the Master Emerald. She could go in at any point in Knuckles’s life, which means she could be anywhere from ten years older than him to a twin sister to two years younger.

There’s no real concrete evidence of how old Knuckles would be in filmverse when the SA events happen, seeing as we have only seen Pachacamac existing and have no idea where this is in his timeline. However, from a writing standpoint, if you want to keep a bit of Knuckles’s backstory of living alone for a good chunk of his life, I’d say the massacre happening when he was ~8 seems likely. Old enough to have clear memories of the SA events but young enough to have his life completely sidetracked and feel like he raised himself.

It’d be very easy for the flashbacks to feature Tikal taking a baby Knuckles to the Chao Garden, just telling him “don’t tell Dad, he won’t understand,” to talk to him about the grandmother he doesn’t remember who used to teach peace, to explain Chaos and the Master Emerald to him.

And it’d be very easy angst for Knuckles being dragged along with the rest of the clan to take the emerald(s), watch his father basically doom his sister and his tribe murder innocent chao, and then see everyone he’s ever known murdered by Chaos, with his older sister stopping the rampage only by sealing herself and the destructive god in that emerald, leaving Knuckles completely alone. That’s all severe angst that pretty much no writer would pass up.

Especially because it means Knuckles guarding the Master Emerald has now turned into Knuckles guarding his sister.

[ID: Sonic X screenshot of Knuckles and Tikal looking up, surrounded by fire. End ID.]

So that’s the general theory. But let’s talk about something more fun: how it all ties into the Chaos Emerald Filmverse Theory.

5. It all ties into our Chaos Emerald theory shh

If you haven’t read Cori’s manifesto on the Chaos Emerald Filmverse Theory, allow me to summarize:

Sonic is definitely a living Chaos Emerald, meaning that there are six other living Chaos Emeralds running around that we’re gonna need to track down. At least one of them’s Tails.

First thing’s first... Robotnik going after Knuckles then makes perfect sense. If Robotnik somehow figured out exactly what Sonic was, he’d want a way to dilute his power. And the Master Emerald literally nullifies the power of the chaos emeralds. So whoever has the Master Emerald can severely nerf Sonic. Imagine Sonic getting within the boundaries of the ME and then immediately losing speed and falling flat on his face. Big oof.

Second, it’s possible that Knuckles will also know what Sonic is. Because, well... what was Pachacamac after in Sonic Adventure?

[ID: Pachacamac attempting to talk down Tikal, who is t-posing in front of the Chao Garden in attempt to keep them out. Behind him is an echidna army, ready to attack. Pachacamac is saying, “We need those seven emeralds to give us total power!” End ID.]

The Chaos Emeralds. In order to use their power as weapons.

And what was he after in Sonic 2020?

Sonic.

Interesting, huh.

Conclusion

Knuckles is gonna be the last member of the Knuckles Clan, guarding his older sister’s spirit inside an insanely powerful emerald, and will definitely be manipulated by Robotnik into using his Master Emerald to fuck up Sonic.

And it’ll be really awesome.

[ID: Sonic X screencap of Knuckles giving a thumbs up. End ID.]

#sonic the hedgehog #sonic 2020 #knuckles the echidna #tikal the echidna #sonic adventure #mine #connie theories

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thewhitefluffyhat · 3 years

Text

Featherine Augustus Aurora

What is this guide?

<< Previous (Lambdadelta)

Reading List: Highlights

Umineko Episode 6/Dawn “??? Tea Party” [ Video / Text ]

Featherine requests her old miko return to her service once more. (Everything to know about Featherine’s personality in one scene)

Umineko Episode 6/Dawn “The Witch of Theatergoing” scene

Video [Scene starts roughly 6:20 and continues to the end of the video]

Text [Search on “Amakusa ran his finger down my cheek.” Scene continues to end of the page.]

[Spoilers - this references several major twists from the previous two Episodes, though not the truth of the mystery.] Featherine ropes another human into acting as her miko. (A demonstration of the way Featherine/Hachijou blends the mundane and the magical worlds.)

Umineko Episode 8/Twilight “Magical Battle” scene

Video [Scene starts roughly 38:40, stop before 53:35]

Text [Start at top of the page and stop at the screencap of the key.]

[Spoilers - this is one of the battles at the climax of Umineko! It doesn’t involve the core mystery, but it will spoil which characters ultimately side with the protagonists.] A scene for if you’re curious what happens when Featherine gets serious.

Reading List: I want it all

(These are all repeats from the list for Bernkastel.)

”Whose Tea Party?” [ Video / Text ]

Bern gets invited to a tea party. (A simple and silly scenario, but also a window into the differences in how Featherine and Lambda think of Bern.)

”Bernkastel’s Letter” [ Video / Text ]

Bernkastel writes a letter to (maybe) Featherine, explaining what she’s discovered about the rules to Beatrice’s game. (This is a bit of a strange one - to me it feels like some details of Bern’s relationships in this early work were retconned by the time of Umineko Episodes 6-8.)

Umineko Chiru (Episode 6/Dawn, Episode 7/Requiem, Episode 8/Twilight)

Umineko Saku’s Last Note of the Golden Witch involves Featherine somewhat. Blink and you’ll miss it, but she’s in 07th Theater too.

-...And that’s it! On the plus side, it’s easy to read all there is of Featherine, since there’s so little. Unfortunately, as you can see from the Highlights, what does exist is often neck deep in spoiler territory…

Wiki Links

https://07th-expansion.fandom.com/wiki/Featherine_Augustus_Aurora [Some spoilers, though only the same as in the Highlights links above.]

Quick Facts

-As Hanyuu is in Higurashi, Featherine is the closest being to a god in Umineko. However, while gods in Higurashi are related to Shinto concepts (plus parasites and viruses and aliens), Umineko’s godhood is based on the idea of an author being god of their story, summoning universes out of the nothingness of a blank page.

-Featherine’s unusual name is probably a reference to Hanyuu. The kanji for Hanyuu (羽入) are “羽=feather” and “入=in”. And Augustus Aurora = Hanyuu’s “Au au” catchphrase. Hachijou (八城) can also be read “yashiro,” as in Oyashiro-sama.

-Physically, Featherine appears as an elegant adult woman whose exact age is hard to place. She does not have horns, but she does have that suspiciously horn-like memory device floating around her head.

According to that Umineko Episode 8 battle scene linked above, Featherine’s memory device once was damaged, leading to Featherine having a different personality and appearance for a time.

(As it so happens, Hanyuu has a chipped horn and a very different personality from Featherine, what an intriguing coincidence...)

-Long before the events of Umineko, Featherine ascended to the realm of the gods and returned. She also goes through a cycle of sleep/death and rebirth which can last centuries. All aspects that call to mind that ascension Hanyuu mentions in Saikoroshi.

-Outside the Meta-World, Featherine’s double is a mysterious and reclusive author who goes by many names. (Hachijou Tohya is just one of them.)

-Remember how Ooishi and Akasaka write a book called “Higurashi no naku koro ni” in-universe? Umineko does something similar, but explores the idea even further. Hachijou is the supposed in-universe author of some of Umineko’s arcs, and as such, some fans consider Featherine/Hachijou as a stand-in for Ryukishi07 himself.

Personality

-Much as Bern’s personality is similar to “dark Rika” but kicked up to eleven, Featherine’s personality is similar to Hanyuu when Hanyuu acts as a god. She’s calm, serious, and refers to humans as “child of man.”

-Lacking Hanyuu’s shy and childish mannerisms, Featherine comes across as intimidating and rather condescending. Though she’s more polite and reasonable than the average witch. (Which honestly says more about other witches than her, really...)

-Bern and Lambda are very fey-like, tricking and tempting mortals into doing what they want. Featherine, in contrast, doesn’t use tricks or threaten violence because she doesn’t need to. Asking for consent from mortals is a gesture of respect from her - you don’t have the ability to refuse.

-In almost the inverse of Hanyuu, Featherine has no problems getting other characters to perceive her; indeed, she’s subtle but often quite forceful about dragging others into conversations inside her realm.

-Also unlike Hanyuu, Featherine has no particular love of sweets (that’s Lambda), and does seem to enjoy alcohol.

-Featherine, an ancient being, suffers from the “disease” of boredom. Entertaining herself with stories is the only medicine for this ailment, and the relief it provides is only temporary.

-As such, Featherine enjoys stories as deeply and thoroughly as possible. Meaning, she doesn’t just appreciate mysteries and characters as they’re first presented - she also likes to “tear out the guts” to see what makes them tick.

...Not with her own hands of course! That’s Bern’s job.

What, did you think you were done with the Watanagashi imagery when you finished Higurashi?

-At several points in Umineko, Featherine a gets called a monster. While this may be yet another callback to Higurashi, unlike Hanyuu who hates that label, Featherine takes it as a compliment.

-So… is Featherine evil? Many characters, and even Ryukishi07 himself in interviews, call her such. That being said, in Umineko, Featherine can be callous, but she doesn’t revel in sadism the way other witches do. Although, presumably she was much worse in the past...

Abilities

-Featherine is the “Witch of Theatergoing” - she is primarily a spectator to the events of Umineko, rather than a player on the stage. (Just like Hanyuu.)

-Bern’s “Theatergoing Authority” may derive from her. She also has the ability to instantly promote a character to the position of Game Master.

-Featherine is an author and therefore a “Creator,” surpassing the level of even powerful witches like Bern and Lambda. Her powers function as her breaking the fourth wall and literally writing the rest of the script on a page.

-Like Hanyuu, Featherine can stop time. Though unlike Hanyuu, Featherine can act in the frozen time, including that aforementioned reality writing.

-Featherine’s home is the *deep breath* “Great Witch of Theatergoing, Drama, and Spectating's Noble City of Carefully Selected Books” - an impossibly large magical library filled with countless stories, each a universe of their own like a Fragment. (Everyone just calls it the “City of Books.”)

-Featherine’s servants are the main characters of these stories, now in the form of black cats.

-Featherine’s relationships with her mikos are also through the lens of an author. Featherine’s mikos are also known as “Readers” - they narrate the events of a game board to Featherine. As an author is a god, a reader is also able to put their own interpretation on the story they tell.

Featherine and Bernkastel

-As Hanyuu is to Rika, so Featherine is to Bern... more or less. They’re still a god and her miko.

-Unlike Rika and Hanyuu, Bern and Featherine do not share their senses.

-Rika and Bern have both lived beyond a normal human’s lifespan, but they both still consider themselves young in comparison to Hanyuu/Featherine’s ancient existence.

-When Rika would bully Hanyuu, Hanyuu did little but cry and complain. Bern still backtalks and is generally disrespectful of Featherine, but the result is different - Bern’s the one acting defensive and scared while Featherine is merely amused by it.

-Bern is also distrustful yet subservient toward Featherine in a way Rika never was to Hanyuu.

-However, when Bern is in danger, she will demand that Featherine help her, much as how Rika did the same to Hanyuu once in Matsuribayashi.

Featherine and Lambdadelta

-Featherine and Lambda appear to be on amicable, if not especially close terms.

-On Featherine’s side, she primarily seems to know Lambda as Bern’s friend and playmate.

-On Lambda’s side, she knows she’s completely outclassed by Featherine, and is very afraid of crossing her.

-Lambda does know quite a bit about Featherine - including that tidbit about Featherine’s personality change in the past.

Featherine in Higurashi Gou?

Is this Featherine? And what does that mean for the rest of Higurashi Gou?

Well, after reading this guide, what do you think?

Regardless, this is as far as I can guide you with my knowledge of Umineko. If you wish to go further, you’ll have to forge that path yourself, through the ravenous wilderness of unconfirmed theories and dangerous speculation.

Good luck!

PS: If you’d like a rough map of some popular destinations, I also have an old Bingo Card of Umineko-Gou connection theories.

PPS to folks from Reddit: If you liked this guide, I also do episode analysis/theory posts too.

#when they cry #higurashi #higurashi gou #umineko #featherine #furude hanyuu #my ramblings #higurashi guide to witches #I gotta say #even if gou ends up a disappointing mess #if nothing else #it gave me a reason to scream for weeks about these three assholes #something I thought I'd never have since I got into Umineko late #so thank you ryukishi07 #sincerely

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maleksrami · 4 years

Text

gif tutorial ✨🎥

I got a few requests to make a gif tutorial so here it is. hope it helps :) It’s quite long so I’ll put it all under a read more. If you have any questions, feel free to ask or PM me directly for help!

Alright....sooo, I don’t remember the last time I made a gif tutorial on this site, but I figured I would even though I use the same method a lot of gif makers have been using for years. I have never strayed from this process and I’ve been making gifs on this site for a decade.

There are a couple methods to making gifs. You can import your video directly into photoshop and cut your gif there. OR you can use a separate video player that has a screencapping tool, then import all your frames into photoshop; this is the method I use and it’s how I’ve adapted and perfected my giffing skills over time.

This post will be long, but I want to be as detailed as I can and explain it step by step. It’s really NOT difficult once you get the hang of it, which is probably why I’ve always done it this way.

Disclaimer: There are three programs I use and I highly suggest you look for reliable links yourself if I’m not able to provide one. I use pretty old versions of KMPlayer and Photoshop (I’ll explain why later), so be careful where you go looking for downloads. There are some photoshop downloads here, but I can’t vouch for them.

Let’s start :)

DOWNLOADING VIDEOS

I use a program called 4k Video Downloader to rip HD videos from Youtube. 1080p is the way to go, but obviously that’s not always possible. It’s ridiculously easy, all you do is click the “Paste Link” button and it’ll download your video. Clicking the “Smart Mode” button will let you set the default quality and the folder you want all your videos to be saved to.

As you can see, here are all the videos I’ve downloaded recently for my gif posts. You can clear this download history list at any time.

SCREENCAPPING

After your video is done downloading, I open the video in KMPlayer. Now, I use an OLD version of this program because this was exactly how I learned to do this back in the day. You can find old versions online, I don’t really know exactly which version mine is because I’ve had it forever, but it’s the old school one that looks like this.

When you open the video, it might stretch the player to full screen so I always adjust it by dragging the corner of the player inward so it shrinks to a more medium size. This will also make your screencaps not so GIANT, which will take longer to load into photoshop.

Anyways, you’re gonna open your video and right click anywhere on the video to select Capture > Frame Extract... (or Ctrl+G on Windows). This window will come up. Make sure all your settings look like this to ensure a really smooth gif.

The first thing you should do is click that little “G” button next to the window size at the bottom. That’ll lock in the dimensions of however big you’ve made your video window, and if you stretch it you’ll see these numbers change. If you start capping without remembering to push that and you make your window smaller/bigger, your caps might be a wacky size or look stretched and you’ll have to go back and do it again. Also note the extracting location at the top. All your caps will go directly to a default folder titled “Capture”.

Once all the settings are ready, go to your desired section of the video, pause it, and hit “Start”. Play the video, pause the video when you’ve got all your caps, then hit “Stop”.

Locate your “Capture” folder and doublecheck you got all the caps you want. This is where I take a moment to delete any caps I don’t want in my gif, that way you don’t bother loading them into photoshop and making it take longer than it needs to.

MAKING THE GIF

You’re gonna open whatever version of Photoshop you’re using. I hilariously still use CS3 to make gifs because the next script I’m gonna run doesn’t work in the free download that I have of CS5, but that’s what you get sometimes when you don’t pay for stuff. Hopefully whatever more recent version of PS you use, you have no problems.

Go to File > Scripts > Load Files Into Stack...

This window will come up.

Hit “Browse” and locate your capture folder. Highlight all your caps and press OK. You’ll see them all come up in a list as shown above. Press OK again. Your caps will start to load into one big stack of layers. This will take a minute or so.

When it’s all loaded in, you’ll see them all stacked in your Layers window (Windows > Layers). You’re gonna open your animations timeline (Windows > Animation) and click the little drop down button in the top right corner of the window and select “Make Frames From Layers”.

Click that drop down menu again and hit “Reverse Frames”. Click that drop down menu again and hit “Flatten Frames Into Layers” (this is so our sharpening action will work later). Click the drop down menu again and select “Select All Frames”. All your frames will be highlighted. This is where you’ll set your animation speed. Under each frame you’ll see “0 sec.” Click on that and select “Other”. Type in your desired speed. I usually go for 0.04 if it has a lot of frames. For less frames, 0.05 or 0.06. This is honestly entirely up to your preference. I actually made myself a photoshop action doing all these repetitive steps so it saves me a few precious long seconds of clicking around over and over. I just run the action after my caps are loaded. If you make gifs a lot, I recommend it.

Next it cropping. The reason I don’t crop right away after the files are loaded into a stack is because I like to see where the subject in the gif moves before I decide where I need to crop. I don’t want to accidentally cut anything off. The subject might sway in and out of frame or be off center if I crop it blindly before seeing exactly where the object moves around. So I’ll play the gif first to see exactly where to crop.

Anyways, you’re gonna set your desired width x height of your gif. I’m making this a big gif so you can see the details better. 540 px is Tumblr’s width for big horizontal gifs. If you’re making a photoset with two gifs side by side the width for Tumblr is 268 px.

Go ahead and crop your gif. It’ll resize itself as well. Play the gif back so you can see if anything gets cut off or it’s not where you want it. You can undo the crop and do it again until you’re satisfied.

Here is what my gif looks like animated and cropped.

As you can see, it plays nice and smoothly due to our screencap settings from before in KMPlayer and with our set gif speed (I used 0.05 here).

Next is sharpening the gif. I use a sharpening action that can quickly sharpen up to 120 frames. You can download it here. Open the action by going to File > Open and locating the file. It’ll be added to your Actions window. (Window > Actions if you can’t see it.) In order for it to run correctly, you have to have the first frame selected on your animation window, as well as “Frame 1″ in the layers window. Just like this:

Click the play button on the action and wait a few seconds for all the gifs to finish being sharpened. For any gif with less than 120 frames (which I hope is always, good God) a pop-up will come up when it reaches the end of the frames asking you if you want to stop. Click “Stop”.

Tip: If you think you want to delete more frames, run the sharpening action before you do it. Otherwise you’ll have to flatten your frames into layers again. The first frame and the “Frame 1″ layer should always be the same (the little eye will appear to the left of the layer to let you know it’s visible when you have that specific frame selected) otherwise the action won’t work.

Here is what my gif looks like now that it’s sharpened.

COLORING THE GIF

This is where all the fun (or pain) comes in. All your coloring will be done by using Adjustment Layers (Layers > New Adjustment Layer). I usually go in the same order of adjustments, but this is where personal style comes in and you do no have to do it in the same order I do. You can practice with this part all you want and see how you like to do it.

I start with brightening the gif first and fixing the white balance if a scene needs it. I chose this video specifically so you could see this next handy trick that a lot of people don’t even know about. It’s a dark scene and the white balance makes the subject look quite blue.

I can fix this by starting with a Curves layer. By clicking the third eyedropper tool, you can go and click on a white point in your gif (in this case, I clicked on a white square on his shirt) and bumped up the input number a bit for a little contrast (optional). My curves look like this. Click OK.

My gif now looks like this.

It’s much better, right? The white eyedropper tool will become a lifesaver sometimes, but it’s not always needed.

Next, I go in with a Levels adjustment to do some more brightening. This is all up to preference, but you can play around with this. I typically like to add more contrast with this layer. I just adjust the sliders until I’m satisfied.

Here is my gif now.

Onto yet another brightening layer. Brightness/Contrast. A couple teeny tiny more positive numbers and I now have this.

Next is Selective Color. I wish I could explain this in a way that makes sense, but this is the layer that takes a bit of practice getting down and boils down to how you like the colors in your gif to look. I personally don’t like a lot of yellow in mine, so I focus a lot on the Yellow and Black sliders in each specific tab. I start in the Reds, then Yellows, Whites, Neutrals, then bump up the Blacks a tiny bit.

Here is my gif now. It’s a bit more cool toned, which is what I like.

Next I’ll go in with a Color Balance layer and play with the Midtones and Shadows.

Here it is now.

This is usually my last step unless I want to adjust the brightness again (which I do), so I might go back into my Curves and Levels layers to bump it up.

And you can totally stop there, but I would like to mention a few more optional layers to add depending on your gif. If I wanted more saturation, I would add a Hue/Saturation layer at this point, but I think it’s colorful enough so I’m not going to.

Another layer you can use is Gradient Maps.

Setting a black and white gradient map overtop your gif and setting the layer to Soft Light and lowering the opacity to your heart’s desire (you might need to go to the little drop down menu in your animation timeline and hit “Match Layers Across Frames”) can give your gif a very contrast-y look like this.

Or you can change the black color to something else for a different tone, like a dark blue.

Here is my final gif.

If you want to add a caption to your gif, you can do so with your font of choice (Arial and Calibri are good) and add Stroke or a Drop Shadow to it by going to Layer > Layer Style. You can make sure the text is perfectly centered by clicking on your top frame layer under all your coloring adjustments, hitting Select > All, then clicking your text layer again and going to Layer > Align Layers To Selection > Horizontal Centers. Then hit Select > Deselect and go to your little drop down menu in your animation timeline and click “Match Layers Across Frames”.

Here is what it looks like with a caption.

SAVING YOUR GIF

Go to File > Save for Web & Devices...

A big window will come up where you can preview your finished gif by pressing the play button on the right hand side. In the bottom left corner will tell you what size your gif is. Tumblr’s gif limit is a whopping 10 MB, so we’re good.

Your gif settings should look something like this.

We always want to keep all colors at 256 (the highest). Lowering this number will make our gif file size smaller, but also decrease the quality of the gif itself. If your file size is more than 10 MB, I recommend going back and deleting some frames or making some more curve adjustments. Some users also like to set their gif to “Adaptive” instead of “Selective”. This is up to you.

Click Save and you’re done!

#this took me all day and half the gifs dont even move when you view this post on my desktop theme #LOVE THAT #please view this on the mobile view

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a-singleboat · 4 years

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Virtual Reality

Word Count: 2.4k

Request: hi! if your taking requests, i was wondering if you could write a damien x reader, where they meet through Twitch? add anything else you want i always love everything you write, thanks so much!! - anon

Warning(s): like, one swear

It was a Thursday night when you first met him, or rather, heard of him. You had been streaming for five hours heading into your sixth when you decided it might be time for you to log off for the night. As per usual, you took at least thirty minutes at the end of your stream just to talk with your viewers, usually about how their lives were going in exchange for a story from your own day.

Tonight, however, there was an influx of people asking if you’d ever heard of a streamer by the name of Damien Haas, which you hadn’t, and if you would do a collaboration with the man anytime soon. Apparently, your content was eerily similar and you were, and I quote, “Practically the female version of him, looks aside.”

“Damien Haas…” you rolled yourself back closer to your desk, hands settled on your keyboard. You typed his name into the search bar, patiently waiting for Twitch to pull up his account. You clicked into the first one, making an impressed face at the purple checkmark next to his name. You squinted at the screen. “Is this him? In the profile picture with the LEDs in the background?”

You glanced at your chat, chuckling as the viewers started spamming ‘yes’ and ‘oh my god it’s happening,’ and your personal favorite, ‘mom come pick me up the best crossover of 2020 is happening and im SCARED.’

“He plays a lot of Animal Crossing,” you observed, clicking on one of his videos and dragging the tab onto your main monitor so the stream could see it. You skipped through the beginning part, biting into a pretzel as you watched.

“He’s kinda cute,” you commented, laughing as your stream freaked out once more. There were a few people commenting what looked like it could be a ship name though you ignored it. “Shame I’d never meet him, though.”

You paused his video, taking note of the time, before rolling out your shoulders. “I think it’s time for me to head out so I’m gonna end this stream with a huge thank you to you all for sticking with me through this entire stream and if you didn’t stay the entire time, I’m glad you decided to join in on the ride even halfway through. I’ll see you guys next time.”

You ended the stream, waving goodbye to your viewers before the light went out and you could relax the smile off your face. Don’t get it twisted, you loved streaming and you loved your viewers but just like any other job, it could get exhausting at times. You shut down your monitors, the screens turning blue before fading to black. You stretched, taking your phone up from its charger and launching yourself into bed, opening your phone and clicking on Twitter.

Much like staying thirty minutes after you were done streaming to talk to viewers, you usually went on Twitter right after to answer questions and respond to DMs. This time, however, instead of opening the app to see a bunch of post-stream questions, your mentions were filled with the video clip of you saying, “He’s kinda cute,” as well as maybe a million people tagging both you and Damien in them.

Well, shit.

Soon enough, that was all that filled your timeline. You couldn’t move in one direction without running into another screencap of you admiring the man. God, you knew the consequences but something in the back of your mind was urging you to reach out to him.

After a few moments of contemplation, the lonely side of you won out, forcing you to message him against your better judgment. Without even thinking about it, you found his Twitter and sent this message:

Hey, I’m sorry about your mentions blowing up because of me tonight. My viewers recommended your Twitch to me and I spoke without thinking about it on Live.

And with no expectation of his response, you fell asleep right there with your phone on your chest and the DM still open.

You woke up the next morning with a sore neck and a dead phone, which was a terrible way to start your day. You rolled over, plugging your device into an outlet before crawling out of bed to start your day. When you weren’t streaming, you worked as a freelance editor for different YouTubers, helping their editors with their workload or even staying on as a Temp for different companies. Occasionally you edited the odd commercial here and there, but those gigs were rare.

Most recently, you had received some material from a group of YouTubers, Smosh. This job was different, however, because if you did well on this you could be looking at a permanent place of employment through their parent company, Mythical Entertainment.

You knew Mythical Entertainment, it was hard not to, especially since your aunt was one of the producers within the company, but tended to ignore everything the company did. The last you’d heard, they’d onboarded another YouTube group (which you did later find out to be Smosh, the same YouTubers whose video you were hired to edit).

After a quick shower and a half-assed attempt at a proper breakfast, you were ready to start your day. You situated yourself behind your monitors, opening the video clips that had been sent to you. The first was a sample video, something that gave you insight on what their editing style was actually like.

But imagine your surprise when you’re staring down the same man you have called cute the night before, his approximately five-eleven stance taking up one-sixth of the space. He was standing next to a blond, who had been marked as “Shayne Topp.”

Despite there being five other people in frame, your eyes kept moving back to Damien’s figure, watching his mannerisms through the screen and laughing along to his jokes when they fell upon deaf ears.

Your eyes slid over to your phone, now decently charged after sitting for so long. On your screen were dozens of notifications. There were maybe two from your mom, asking if you’d be coming home for dinner sometime that week but the majority came from Twitter. You picked up the device, unlocking and responding to your mom with a, “yes,” before opening Twitter.

Nothing much had changed from the night prior. Your mentions were still being flooded with the video from last night but newer content had been ushered in, namely fan edits using footage from your streams and, you assumed, his.

The only major difference, however, was the fact that Damien had responded to your DM from the night prior. The first message read:

It’s really no problem! My stream had mentioned your name before, too.

Followed by the second:

P.S. I think you’re cute, too.

You couldn’t believe your eyes. Mr. Damien Haas, the man that you had made a thoughtless comment on stream about, also thought that you were cute. Suddenly, the fact that you had been staring at him for the past hour seemed less stalkerish and more like a blooming crush. You wrote back:

Aw, thanks! Have you seen the newer fan edits? They’re all so talented.

You cringed at yourself. A cute boy started talking to you and you’ve suddenly forgotten how to be suave, not that you really were in the first place. But still, you liked to think you had some tact when talking to people that you found attractive.

Not even a moment later, there came a response.

Yes, I have, he responded. And I agree! They are all very talented individuals.

You looked from the monitor in front of you. You had about a quarter of the footage left to go through before you could start editing but this technically wasn’t due until the following night. Feeling emboldened by the fact that he had actually responded, you replied:

Are you going to TwitchCon on Friday? We should meet up or something.

Anxiously you awaited his response, taking his silence as an opportunity to watch a bit more of the footage and take down notes according to the sample they’d given you. Roughly thirty minutes later is when the next response came in, reading as an affirmative to both questions.

You didn’t respond, choosing to leave your social media for after you’d finished editing the video. Your heart still pounded, however. Just the thought that there was a possibility for the two of you to meet was, simply put, insane. You’d just heard of the guy the night before and decided that he was going to be your latest hyperfixation.

But who could blame you? He was a nice, funny guy that showed the slightest bit of attraction towards you. It didn’t help that you were a sucker for guys that were nice to you.

Fast forward to the Friday of TwitchCon, also known as the first day of TwitchCon. You and Damien had been talking steadily over Twitter DMs and just last night you had gained his phone number, giving you even more access to the man than you had before. But of course, who were you if you didn’t tease your fans with the prospect of you meeting.

The night before, at the end of your stream, you’d given your fans the little tidbit of information that you and Damien were, in fact, planning on meeting up sometime during TwitchCon and would be greeting fans together for an hour at your booth.

That sent Twitter into a frenzy, both of your combined fans getting your ship name to trend within the hour, which confused the hell out of a bunch of locals.

It was nearing the time you and Damien had set to meet up. The plan was you’d meet around twelve for lunch, take an hour for yourselves, before going back to your booth and meeting with fans for an hour or so as promised.

You had never been more nervous than you were in that moment. Not only were you about to meet your three-day-old crush but apparently a very popular YouTuber. You tried not to let the thought mess with your head. One of your friends, Wilbur Soot (who you played Minecraft with from time to time) was poking fun at you for being nervous about meeting a popular YouTuber.

After three years of streaming and gaining a solid following, you’d think you’d be used to meeting other popular content creators. But because it was him, you found yourself unable to think straight.

“What if I fuck up?” you asked Wilbur anxiously. He’d flown in from London for this event at your insistence and because you’d offered to pay half his airfare to get there and back. He didn’t have his own booth as his arrival was very last minute, but he didn’t mind. He signed the occasional poster though his main purpose was to provide you mental and emotional support.

“You won’t fuck up,” he comforted, leafing through one of the comics a fan had given you. The entire thing was hand-drawn, which was an insane fact in itself. It looked professional, which was what blew you away when you’d received it. “Well, you won’t fuck up as badly as you did when you first met Schlatt.”

You groaned in embarrassment. “Don’t remind me.”

Long story short, you’d dumped a red in color slushy on the man accidentally after tripping over an unmarked cable. It really wasn’t your fault but the boys hadn’t let you live it down since then.

Half a moment later, Wilbur was poking your side. “Is that him?” he asked, jabbing his pointer finger into your side while looking in the opposite direction. He was looking at a familiar figure walking down the hallway toward your booth. He stopped for a moment to take a photo with a fan, talking to them about something, before continuing on his way toward you.

Your eyes locked and you gave him a smile while trying to beat Wilbur into no longer poking you. He stopped when you slapped his arm the first time, sticking his tongue at you before going on his phone. You rolled your eyes at his half-assed attempt of pretending he wasn’t about to start listening in on your conversation.

“Hey, Y/n, right?” Damien asked as he approached. You nodded, reaching out for a handshake but becoming pleasantly surprised when he instead pulled you in for a hug.

“You ready for lunch?” you asked glaring slightly at Wilbur as he made kissy faces over Damien’s shoulder. Luckily, Damien hadn’t noticed your moron of a best friend.

“Yeah, I saw this sushi place on the way in if you wanted to try that?”

“I’d be down,” you agreed, reaching behind your table to grab your bag. Wilbur was set to meet with a few other Minecraft streamers, meaning you didn’t have to worry about him while you had lunch. You looked over your shoulder, making sure everything was set for you to leave before saying goodbye to Wilbur.

Over the course of lunch, you and Damien had gotten to know each other pretty well. Once the conversation moved away from your fans and, well, work, and more into personal details, you found that you actually weren’t all that similar. For starters, Damien loved watching anime while your guilty pleasure was Gilmore Girls. The one show you both had a love for, however, was Avatar the Last Airbender, which made sense.

Another thing was that he actually enjoyed being in front of the camera while you tolerated it on most days, really only putting on your face cam for the last thirty minutes on most days. Despite that, he still classified himself as an introvert.

You returned back to your booth much later than you anticipated, thoroughly shocked at the line that had formed with Wilbur at the front of it, entertaining the fans that had shown up early to meet both you and Damien.

“Y/n!” one fan called, pointing in your direction. Immediately, the entire line turned and gaped at the sight of you and Damien walking together. You greeted them happily, stopping for pictures and verbally promising that you’d stay until you got to meet everyone personally.

“You really love your fans,” Damien observed as you put your things back down behind the table. Wilbur had set up shop on your right side, chatting with a few people at the front of the line.

“I wouldn’t be anywhere without them,” you admitted, pulling a silver sharpie from your bag. You handed a gold one to Damien. “I also wouldn’t have gotten to meet you without them, which I’m still sorry about, by the way. Your feed must have been chaotic.”

“You have no idea,” he chuckled. “But everything happens for a reason.”

You nodded, grinning up at him. “Yes, they do.”

Permanent

@beautiful-holland @toms-order @starlightfound @grandmascottlang @positiveparker @bippity-boppity-boopa @caswinchester2000 @andreasworlsboring101 @imladylunaticbitch

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socialistsooner420 · 3 years

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lately i been seeing a lot of misinformation goin around regarding opositions to marijuana legislation as well as misconceptions of cancer that are just boiling my blood.

i think as both a cancer patient and as a marijuana consumer the most irritating arguments against weed are "THEY DONT REALLY CURE CANCER YA KNOW???"

yeah, i do know. if that were the case i wouldn't have cancer in the first place. but do you know what marijuana DOES do for us cancer patients? heres a little bit of perspective of what we have to struggle with

having cancer is not just "you have [x amount of time] left to live". thats only in the movies, its never as cut and dry as that. the sad truth is there's a LOT of uncertainty in the entire process, from discovering somethings wrong/finding the tumor, having the courage to go to the doctor and explain everything to them, having to endure many invasive, PAINFUL tests, waiting for the results (took 2 weeks to get mine back), then you have to figure out how tell your loved ones. Ya know what helped ease my panic during all that overwhelming shit? marijuana

fun fact: a lotta people leave when ya tell em ya got cancer! its an extremely depressing reality we have to face. a lot of people compare drug additcs to cancer patients, the joke usually being "you can yell at a person who got addicted to drugs, they chose that! but you cant make fun of a cancer patient, because they didnt!" well, unfortunately, people can and do "make fun" (more like bullying....) of us. people DO scream at us. for example: when i told my mom my diagnosis, she screamed at me, as if i chose to have cancer. she asked me "how could i do this to HER?". So not only is cancer a grueling painful process, its also stressful, confusing, heartbreaking, uncertain, overwhelming, and fucking DEPRESSING. Marijuana helps me get my mind off of all that. Instead of the constant thoughts such as "when will this cancer finally kill me so i can stop being such a huge burden on my family?" i can give my mind a rest and think happy thoughts instead.

a lot of cancers cause supressed appetites. thats why a lot of us are extremely underweight and gaunty. marijuana helps us regain our appetites and not have to starve and waste away! it also helps keep us at a consistent weight, another really dangerous problem for us.

In addition to having difficulty putting food down, its also hard for us to keep our food down. our supressed appetites come with the extra pain of extreme nausea and vomiting, which oh hey! personal experience i had today; i violently threw up 8 times in a row after only eating a bag of chips (supressed appetites make it VERY hard to eat actual meals), and i thought i was going to drown in my own vomit because i couldn't stop and breathe. i didnt smoke first 🤔 but i drank plenty o water and smoked some marijuana afterwards, and wouldnt ya know, no more nausea, and i was able to keep my next snack down.

cancerous tumors often become inflamed, randomly and for indefinite amounts of time. i cannot even begin to explain the unbearable pain it causes. it feels like there's a giant ball of itchy fire inside your body. Marijuana helps the inflammation go down and relaxes the body.

in addition to inflammations, tumors are just naturally painful. its a mass growing exponentially inside your body, compressing your internal organs, LITERALLY STRETCHING YOUR SKIN, and literally an extra weight to carry around. You know what can safely help take that pain away, without all the shitty side effects for pain medications such as oxys/percs (which is what they had me on before Oklahoma passed Medical Marijuana legislation)? Marijuana. Marijuana helped the pain better than oxy or percs, and Marijuana certainly didnt force me to become bedridden and sleep 20 hrs a day like oxys/percs did

Speaking of sleep, trying to sleep with cancer is also difficult. the pressure of anything even remotely close to your tumor area. I had a massive tumor in my breast that was almost 5 POUNDS, and even my shirt touching it hurt. imagine sleeping with a bowling ball extremely poorly ducktaped tightly to your chest. Thats what I had to do. you know what helped me sleep though?

you guessed it!

Medical Marijuana

there's so many more benefits that it has for different cancer types, as well as other ailments, but i wont go further because that would take forever to list. my point here though is that no medical marijuana advocate is saying its the end all cure all, just that there are many people that it could help who we're denying in favor of big pharmas opiod crisis.

its just plain ignorant and legitimately harmful to the people marijuana could benefit to deny that it helps sick people, especially cancer patients.

im so sick of hearing shit like "well pot ruined my sons life, now he's unemployed and plays video games all day" like bitch do you think i fucking care??

marijuana literally SAVED and continue to save my god damn life every day. its not pots fault you raised a shitty son with no rules or boundaries, i also know plenty of recreational smokers who hold down jobs and are well off, so its not weeds fault yr sons a loser.

im just glad oklahoma has pretty much the most liberal weed laws in the US. sq788 passed right after my surgery and i was so happy that finally i could legally and SAFELY get the medication that i had to do illegally for so long.

im ending my rant with this screencap of my favorite arch of archer when he had breast cancer which obviously hit close to home with me.

me too, archer, me too.

#ill.txt #rant #medical marijuana #marijuana #cancer #keep yr politics outta my medicine #legalize it #ok 2 rb if u want idc

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magaprima · 3 years

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Screencap supported scene breakdown analysis (requested by an anon)

Okay, let’s start with the opening shot

We see the whole of the throne here, and the fact Lucifer is clearly sat upon it, which tells us that despite Sabrina ‘claiming her crown’ after winning the Unholy Regalia, Lucifer is still very much in charge. He’s on the throne here and he’s comfortable, but look at how much Lilith is also leaning on it. She’s all over it. Lilith definitely is showing her claim too, not just by her own right, but by the child she carries inside her. They alll dismissed her because she wasn’t a Morningstar, but now she is one by proxy. Also I think this whole positioning is probably how Lilith was often stood by the throne in the pre-CAOS days when she was sitll in adoration and in love with the Dark Lord. She is playing a part here, after all, in order to survive, but what’s interesting is she’s not the one leaning in; he is. Showing that her ‘performance’ is working, that he is slowly, but surely starting to let down his guard, and believing Lilith is ‘back on side’.

I have to admit I’m surprised at how approving you are of your only daughter getting married

Lilith’s whole language is pushing the domesticity here. She’s talking to him as a Mother(Stepmother might talk to a Father, rather than as a servant to a Lord, making more of that connection.

And look at the body language here, the performance she’s making:

Head down, eyes down as she talks about how he should be more selective, managing to not only make herself look suitably servile, but she looks non-threatening and demure. Fucking demure. Something Lilith definitely isn’t, but she’s playing the role of ‘expectant Mother’ and ‘caring Stepmother’ and ‘concerned partner’. Lilith is doing absolutely everything to appear non-threatening, most likely with the intent of having Lucifer forget himself long enough for her to gain the advantage. I also feel the whole vibe here is, despite Lilith saying that they were definitely ‘not together’, Lucifer has started behaving as if they are. After all she was ‘Satan’s Concubine’, and he’s not going to give up those privileges if he doesn’t want to. And I suspect if that was the case, Lilith has been ‘submitting’ for the sake of survival and the long-con, but it also adds another layer to her downcast eyes and appearing non-threatening. It’s both a reaction and a defence.

She only meets his gaze to make her final point. And what’s important is she doesn’t shy away from that gaze.

She meets it and doesn’t waver, she is making her point and she’s not trembling or hesitating. Lilith may be trapped in a situation here, but she’s not without power and she’s aware of that, and she is actively using it. And it’s an interesting/funny side-note that the point she’s making is ‘Caliban is bad for Sabina’. Stepmother!Lilith activate! Which fits in nicely with the Just-doesn’t-like-Caliban!Lilith. And when she meets his gaze, challenging his decision to give his approve, does Lucifer get mad or angry? Does he tell her to remember her place? Does he punish her? Nope. He leans for gossip sharing opinions time:

He leans in to Lilith, talking with her in a very private and intimate way, and starts sharing all his opinions and reasons why he thinks Caliban is a good match. This is someone who he says betrayed him, who he said he plans to kill, and yet, Lilith has managed to make him forget himself and take her as is confidante again. I have no doubt that had the pregnancy not been sped up, Lilith would have spent more months encouraging this trust and faith in her, playing to his ego and presumptions.

But throughout this whole conversation we see Lilith consciously making an effort to look close, whilst always looking a little on edge, while Lucifer in his element, totally comfortable and absolutely happy to share his thoughts with Lilith. More than likely these moments are brief and we see Lucifer remembering her ‘betrayal’ and treating her as such (just as we saw his possessive anger when he noticed she was absent from the council meeting), but these are flashes of moments where Lilith is making him drop his guard and I would like to think over time they would have become more frequent and Lilith would have used them to her advantage.

However it’s interesting to note that when Lucifer makes this intense close eye contact, Lilith breaks her gaze away

In fact, she’s shown to be unable to bear looking at him (either out of fear or disgust or a mixture of the two) so much that as he talks, she actually physically turns away

Which when you go through the scene more slowly and with more focus Lucifer does seem to notice, if only subtly. But you can see above that Lilith literally cannot bear to look at him or listen to him. We have confirmation here that her whole leaning in, talking softly, standing close, is an all an act for her own survival and it’s one she physically hates. I would say it has comparisons to Zelda when she has to pretend to be still under the Caligari spell. Knowing it’s required, but hating every minute of it, and feeling trapped in a different way to how you were trapped before, but still trapped.

While he’s talking we see her eye roll secretly before offering tight and polite smiles, nodding in a display of agreement, pandering to all of Lucifer’s logic and ideas and opinions. Just as Zelda had to be seen to agree with everything Faustus said. We even see Lilith actively sigh with boredom and exhaustion at Lucifer going on and on with himself. And you hear the sigh too. I think this is interesting, not only because it confirms Lilith has not fallen back into old habits with him, she hasn’t become enamoured of him again and that she finds him tiresome...but that, at this point, Lilith feels confident enough in her own position and her own to be able to bored and tired rather than just afraid. And when you see how much she turns to just fear the moment she has Adam, tells me that she definitely did have a pregnancy-long plan to victory in place which was destroyed by the intervention of Caliban and the Plague Kings.

The thing that drags Lilith’s full attention back is when Lucifer declares the most important reason to agree to the marriage is because Caliban looks great shirtless

Lilith looks quietly and suitably horrified and confused. You can’t see it as much in a singular screencap but she does look at Lucifer like ‘what the fuck?’, because you’re not meant to be getting the hots for the shirtless wonder of your daughter’s future husband. Also, because in a political arena how good someone looks topless should not be the most important reason to have them around. And also, though Lilith admits Caliban is handsome, you get the vibe she means that in the same way you can stay a statue is pretty...you’re not actually sexually attracted to it. So now with both Lucifer and Sabrina liking Clay Boy, Lilith is clearly thinking she’s the only sane one left.

But the horror is nowhere near as much as it is when he mentions Grandchildren

Aside from the fact Lilith has no intentions of being a Step-Grandmother to any Caliban babies (literal personal hell), there’s also the added fact Sabrina is just sixteen and not even married yet and Lucifer is already mentioning her popping out kids. Considering how Lilith was treated in the beginning by the False God and Adam as expected to fulfil certain roles as a woman (wife, mother, someone who loves children and is nurturing and gentle and blah blah) it’s probably a wee bit triggering to hear the same things being expected of Sabrina. We’ve all (Michelle included, for that matter) already said that Lilith probably sees a lot of herself in Sabrina, a younger version of herself, so extra trigger point. But then the obviously main concern is ‘what the fuck was the point of me getting pregnant with your son to save my fucking life if you’re off already planning fucking grandchildren??’. Which is a fair and concerning point. Like as I said above, Lilith definitely had a pregnancy-long plan for her own continued survival and likely Lucifer’s defeat, and this talk of grandchildren is now throwing a big ole spanner in the works, And you see the flash of fear about this:

Microexpression of fear right there. And you see her quickly recalculating, trying to figure everything out, trying to ensure her own survival, and that of her child for that matter, isn’t going to be too effected by this...but in the end she’s forced to ask him outright. “And what does that mean for our child?” And she does deliberately use ‘our’, reminding him ‘you do have a fucking son to come remember??’

But she doesn’t manage to completely hide her fear and concern as she asks. You can see that in all likelihood her heart is pounding stressfully in her chest right now. Because right now all her plans are threatening to go right down the drain, and she’s thinking that carrying his child is going to do nothing except make her a prisoner all over again...and possibly dead eventually.

Lucifer, however, just grins and says ‘Competition, I imagine’

Competition. And what does competition mean in these sorts of circles? It’s the same sort of competition that the Princes in Stardust had, they all killed each other in an effort to win the throne. This is going to be the upbring of Lilith’s child; constantly fighting his nieces and nephews for his right to the throne, constantly having threats on his life, constant fights in general...all in the name of ‘competition’, which Lucifer apparently thinks is a good, healthy thing for a fucking child to have.

And you don’t have to be good at reading microexpressions to know what Lilith thinks about all this

High key horrified. And you also see elements of disgust. Lilith is genuinely horrified at the idea of her son just constantly at risk in the name of ‘competition’ and that Lucifer thinks this is perfectly okay. I think we genuinely see here the first flash of Lilith as Adam’s Mother. She was low key concerned before, but the moment Lucifer says this, her emotions get upped straight to horrified. I mean we saw in later episodes that she was perfectly okay with the idea of her son challenging Lucifer when he was grown, but that’s waiting till he was an adult and challenging one person for the sake of something important. Entirely different from ‘constantly fighting for your life, being attacked, never resting, in order to have some healthy competition’. A word which also implies, Lucifer would just have an attitude of ‘the strongest survive’, regardless of who suffers or who dies. I mean odds are Adam would be more powerful than the hypothetical grandkids considering his parentage, so the fact Lilith is horrified, enough so that she goes to SABRINA’S AUNTS in a effort to stop the wedding, seems to be much more linked to concern for her unborn child than any genuine claims to power. And I think foreshadows the rest of her part 4 narrative and just how far she’ll go for Baby Adam.

And look, you can genuinely see her recalculating her plans and what she needs to do next.

Like yep yep competition cool cool cool cool totes agree that’s great....must get to the Aunts.

#observations #long post

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