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monkey-network · 5 years

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‘Change Your Mind’ was a fun, messy anime hoot ‘n holler, I reckon. Is it my favorite episode of the season? Nah, that’s a different episode that I don’t wanna spoil. Is it the best episode of the arc? Nah, that’s still Escapism. But nevertheless, there is quite a lot to unpack that I wanted to express and if I did a play by play of this 44 minute special, we’d be here for several hours and nobody got time for that. And if I continuously jabber on about this in spaced out posts, I’d feel more like a SU Critical blog than I typically am and that’s pretty depressing. So, I’ve packed all my stray thoughts into one package to get it out the way. Spoilers ahead.

Small headscratch, but I question why it’s notably four episodes on the wikis but it’s essentially one episode and should count as one episode. Can’t really see one part without understanding everything else so I’m a bit confused. Then again, I’m not that encyclopedic on media production so it’s no big deal.

I liked Blue Diamond in the first part and this arc as a whole. In spite of who she generally is, Blue was a consistently good character in that her regret and more motherly nature never felt out of place compared what we’ve seen of her initially because her devastation over Pink’s “death” never felt superficial and the times when she got serious were eyebrow raising to me. And her turnaround in this felt reasonable compared to the others for she thought more of Pink/Steven beforehand and looked like she was more aware of how times have truly changed, even when the allusion to abusive families fall flat.... you know, if we were thinking realistic. Eh, Blue best Diamond, if that means anything.

I question why Yellow had what appears to be forced fusions or genuine crystal amalgamates if Diamonds were against fusion. I understand the ones on Earth, but why was she keeping them, probably for some time now, if she has no use of them? Again, maybe they’re born crystal amalgamates. It’s unclear.

I would say deep down I felt cheated that Lapis and Peridot are apparently cool now even when Lapis took everything in the divorce and did the reentering parallel to an Irish goodbye. But I guess dropping the barn counted as an act of apology, and maybe we’ll see them interact more in the future, so plbbt. At least they got to be badass and anime together while looking the part too.

In the back of mind, I forgot that Bismuth was in the episode sometimes. Beyond giving Connie her sword and raking up that star punch, I can’t say she added much to the story.

Speaking of which, wish the Diamond’s Pearls got to partake in kickassery of the sort. Homeworld was surprisingly empty in hindsight.

Loved Rainbow Quartz the 2nd. He’s beautiful and I would gladly get strong for him.

Only one thing bothered me about Sunstone, aside from the sunction cup summon. and it’s with their small arms. I thought those big arms were more for her shapeshifting since Garnet’s known to shapeshift her limbs to be enormous, but they’re always big so... what value do Sunny’s little arms serve? Least with say, Smokey Quartz or Malachite, their multiple limbs added to their ability but Sunny’s two beefy arms carry most of the way. It’s like adding two dormant legs to the side of a grasshopper. And seriously, what was the point of the suction cups.

Though I love Monty Python reference they added in. That got a huge laugh outta me.

Obsidian was a spectacle, being the first genuinely naked human gem of the series, and the design reminded me a lot of Asura’s Wrath. Though one small detail I wish they had was where Obsidian’s fingers dug into the mech, leaving large dents on the ship, which would’ve hit home the struggle of getting to White as opposed to somehow being able to grip onto the mech’s more or less smooth surface.

Overall I’d say the part between the Diamonds reconciling and finally reaching White was hit or miss if we’re talking writing. Like sacrificing logical flow more for providing the fan service isn’t nothing new, but time could’ve been utilized more for more to go on.

I couldn’t take White as a serious threat anymore, she was just too cheeky and Ebersole sounded like she was really enjoying herself with voiced. I just hope somebody dubbed Glados over her sometime.

Couldn’t take the moment where Steven got his gem ripped out either cuz as hardcore as that was, adding a sound effect sort of killed the tension for me and I laughed my ass off. I’m sorry.

But as much as I loved the scene that was well animated by veteran 2D animator James Baxter, I especially loved the scene where after Pink Steven forms, he turns to White and says, “You should’ve gone for the head.” Snapped his fingers and destroys Homeworld to finally end everyone’s suffering. Like holy shit, that was the best scene in the entire series, hands down.

Plus I like the idea that Pink’s gem... actually fused with Greg’s sperm. *wheezes* I’m the worst

As much I like the idea of White Diamond, having been told off by a child, reforming her viewpoint, being a less coerce being and making the family whole again, the fact that she’s still a mass murdering, mass torturing, mass colonizing, authoritarian Orwellian style villain rubs me the wrong way with how much of a 180 things turned out to be. It’s like if the Beaudelaire siblings immediately forgave and thought Count Olaf was a great person all along after he did that one good thing and then died. But I guess if Steven held White under a small lens of contempt, then it wouldn’t be Steven Universe. What also makes this feel hallow is that.... when you think about it, all this amounted to was the Diamonds doing Steven a solid. They don’t really quit being dictators, they never really claim that Homeworld should change its way, or think White should step down as leader thanks to her perfectionism affecting HW harshly. They’re just nice rulers now... like Kuzco except not as cool. This plot honestly could’ve fallen apart if White Diamond was more reasonable while still maintaining her villainous perfectionism. She was kinda stupid in a way but eh, whatever. Like yeah, she’s shiny... but she’s not

Then again, imagine White Diamond’s current position.

Imagine the sense of losing your entire worldview, ideology, and sense of self to a being the size of your big toe. Imagine everything you’ve built up, potentially taking centuries or millenniums to uphold to sheer excellence, all crumble before you in a instant. How would it feel? To lose your purpose and have nothing to show for yourself beyond your now shrill existence and status regardless of your stature, because you feel that if you were to try again, history could repeat itself but 10x worse. That small being that conquered you, could do it again if tempted and what would you do? What else would you do if you have some semblance that it won’t work out perfectly as before? What else would you do if you’re now capable of fearing something with which you don’t and potentially will never understand? You honestly don’t have anything now, you’re nothing now. So what could work out for you besides smile, wave off your loss with integrity, and feel comfortable knowing that you live another day while understanding now that any day could potentially be your last, given what you know.

You feel me? It’s like that.

And I’ll say that while the Diamonds suddenly having a change of heart can seem off putting, the fact that Steven went through all that shit with his real family just to do so is reasonably sound. Can’t say a redemption arc in the making ain’t all bad if the protagonist didn’t put in work as well. And if Naruto can forgive Sasuke after they beated each other’s ass, I feel that this ain’t too different.

“Change Your Mind“ was a good song, better than the new Crystal Gem extension. A nice cap on the sprite cranberry of an episode.

So it seems like this episode marks the end of Steven Universe. Now it’s time for Steven Universe 2. Because if this wasn’t anime enough... we’re gonna be time skipping, babey. Reasonable enough, this episode messy here and there but I have one counterargument to this, given that this show is five fucking years old.....

I’d be a bitter asshole if I said I didn’t genuinely enjoy this, both initially and on the rewatch. It is an all around entertaining finale and I’m glad it embraced the weeb trashiness in itself like I always knew it would. Funny thing about all this is that we’re going into hiatus and I’m willing to bet that excluding the movie, we’re gonna have the same amount of premieres as last year. But I believe the hiatus won’t matter as much since they certainly gave people quite the show and I can’t help but applaud along.

Now if ya excuse me, I’m off to marathon Kirby Right Back at Ya, an anime I believe is better than SU all things considered. Have a wonderful day.

#su critical #change your mind

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girlonfilmmovies · 3 years

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Welcome to Friend Island: "Love Island US Season 3" and the Gaping Sores of America

So I foolishly thought that in the new year of 2021, the world would be in a better place than it was the previous year. After all, we were coming out of the "worst" of the most horrifying pandemic of the past century, a middling presidency that at that point served only a wealth of TV soundbites and less actual damage to the political system, and we were looking forward to a brighter future and a return to what some hoped would be "normal". The past was the past, and this was going to be a new moment.

Oh how naïve we all were.

As of this writing Covid-19 cases are hitting staggering new highs in the southern US, with Florida (of course) somehow hitting a record amount despite vaccines being easily available in the country for months. The death rates are at almost the same as last year. The middling disaster of the 45th president had one more trick up its sleeve, a firebomb brewing for dozens of years that went off in one of the most embarrassing fiascos of American political history. Misinformation has already implanted itself so thoroughly among half the country that people would rather die than admit they were wrong; the spread of such chaos being happily spat out through the algorithms of corporations only intent on raking in dollar signs. All the potential benefits that could have come from this once-in-a-lifetime moment are being briskly swept away: offices demanding their employees come back, no respect given to science and healthcare workers, the country's clearly weak infrastructure forced right back into action as if we didn't just see its gaping holes. The earth is dying and the people who actually have the resources do something about it instead have kickstarted a capitalist space race.

2021 has gone to show that old, toxic habits die hard.

Sigh.

Yeah, I watched Love Island again.

Despite my... let's say mixed feelings regarding last year's shitshow, I couldn't help but admit that it was the closest thing that I've had to appointment viewing TV that I've had in a long time. In an era of streaming and DVR boxes, it's a bit of an actual feat to get someone who works a fulltime job (especially one with erratic scheduling) to go out of their way to watch something the second it premieres. Love Island brings the family together, so they can engage in our favorite pastime: pointing and laughing at young, dumb, fame hungry cis-hets.

Plus, the second season had offered a fascinating glance at how to contend with a pandemic while also trying to stage a typical dumb reality show. The tropical island villa was swapped for a luxurious hotel rooftop in Las Vegas -- a literal ivory tower of ignorant hedonism looking down upon a plagued nation. You could feel the sexual tension of the hot, hyper-sexual adults forced without physical contact for months finally allowed to relieve themselves the only way they know how: toxic relationships. It was trying so hard to be an oasis in a desert yearning for frivolous content, but the façade was clearly visible to the point of satire. It was a wonderful thing to experience firsthand as what I originally thought as merely me dipping my toes into the genre.

Season 2 was the show that we deserved at the time, a funhouse mirror reflecting all the callous stupidity that had led us to this moment in world history. It attempted to offer a happy ending, a look towards the future: a black couple finally winning a reality show, a first for such a mainstream program (both of them actually kind of turned out to suck, but shhhh...).

It also allowed America to completely break the hearts of people while watching them fall apart live on TV. It was cruel, it was stupid, but most of all, it was fun as hell.

Season 3 is not about torturing the competitors. It's about torturing us.

In all fairness, there were a couple of lovely positive developments for the series this season. While still struggling with racial diversity a little bit, as evidenced by them casting only one very specific kind of black man like five times, strides are being taken elsewhere in the lane of body diversity. Alana makes her debut as literally the first woman on this show who isn't a size 0-2, looking absolutely gorgeous in every single shot.

The almost aggressively heteronormative nature of the show is slowly being shaken by a more openly queer cast than previously expected -- multiple bisexual/pansexual contestants participated, even though there wasn't any overtly queer romance shown (also almost all of them were women, with them describing their sexualities being confined to streaming exclusive episodes, which isn't... great). It's certainly a step in the right direction for a show that unceremoniously shuffled off the only queer member of the Season 2 cast overnight once the internet found his gay porn shoot. Ironically, they also ended up booting off the most openly queer member of this cast too, the purple haired proudly pansexual TikTok-er Leslie, but for the more legal reason of smuggling weed into the villa.

It's not terribly surprising that both Alana and Leslie garnered a lot of positive attention both inside and outside of the villa -- they stand out so much against the otherwise predictable casting that we've come to expect from this show and white American media in general. Alana is a woman with actual curves who looks stunningly gorgeous in comparison to the monotonous supermodel figures of everyone else. Leslie almost falls into a stereotype from the way she appears: dyed purple hair, tattooed all over, obviously queer, vaping weed constantly, exuding the kind of chaotic yet weirdly fun energy that only a former stripper can. Yet she obviously grabbed the attention of the contestants because while people like her abound in real life, in the fantasy land of reality TV she's an absolute rarity, a far cry from the sanitized beauty pageant-esque standards that they seem to pluck girls from. The men are still dumb, bland, boneheaded idiots in this show, but by offering some actual variety, they get to actually pursue people they aren't "traditionally" supposed to, while an outsider audience member like me gets to see women like herself be offered up for titillation in the same way "conventionally attractive" women are.

It's kind of cool, even if it is just playing into the icky sexualization of everyone, but hey...progress?

In an odd "two steps forward, one step back" kind of situation, the show has somewhat dialed down the outrageously toxic relationships of last year into a more relatively subdued level of toxicity. Gaslighting/cheating is at least kept to a relative low in this season compared to the nightmare that was last year, although this year's ratio depends on how much of that corresponds with sexy Columbian boy Will's obviously flimsy grasp of the intricacies of the English language. He continued to be plagued by the cliquey-ness of the cast until the very end but his genuinely sweet couple with Kyra still did enough to sneak into the final two.

The actual main problem this year was an almost unbearably long love triangle between Cash, Trina, and Cinco that refused to solve itself for nearly a month. Cash and Cinco perennially kept flip-flopping in their feelings for each other, bouncing between failed partnerships despite so obviously being into each other. Trina ended up roped in as Cinco's partner for a while, a constant victim of his own lack of courage to make up his damn mind. Cash, freshly single and in horny jail (aka Casa Amor), coupled up with the handsome and mysterious Charlie.

Now we need to discuss how bizarre Charlie as a cast member. Not only is he the only member who is, looks, and acts like an actual adult, but he also seems to show no adherence to the rules of reality TV: he's very relaxed and unassuming, seems genuinely uninterested in the "game" aspects of the show, and only perks up during rare moments of actual romantic potential. He's a fascinating spanner to throw into the machine of Love Island, and once Cinco was eliminated in the competition, Charlie had to sit there while Cash only continued to openly and aggressively pine for a man who isn't even her current partner. Proving once again to be an anomaly in the cast, he actually decided to do something about this: he unceremoniously dumped fan favorite Cash like a sack of bricks, sending her home while hooking up with the previously mentioned Alana. This smart decision was met derisively by viewers, despite him being the only person there who actually acted like a fucking adult for once. Ironically, this got him and Alana into the finals, where they finished in last place with the same trademark lack of enthusiasm that we've come to expect from him.

I suppose now we need to uncork the problem of the season and by extension the franchise as a whole. You might have read that previous situation and thought, "gee, a fan favorite got tossed aside while a guy that everyone hated ended up making it into the final four? That seems weird."

But by that point it really wasn't at all.

See, the problem with the voting is that you don't usually get to pick who goes; the audience only gets to pick who to prevent getting kicked. At that point, the audience control is out of our hands and now into the contestants', and if there's one thing we all learned in high school it's that cliques are very much a thing. The contestants seemed dead set on booting anybody who was new the second they had the chance, so many potentially exciting people were so quickly thrown out. Instead of the exciting potential we could have seen, we got a love triangle sucking anyone nearby into doom, with everyone else being a relatively stable couple or part of the Jeremy/Korey wishy-washy railway. Casa Amor was an absolute bust, with people making half-assed couplings despite still being in love with somebody else (it speaks a lot to the weakness of the Casa Amor men that Olivia literally preferred to come back single than with any of those planks of wood).

Part of the problem did rely on factors that nobody could control at all though. "Romance novel come to life" Slade seemed like a threat with his rugged handsomeness, twangy accent, and classic southern charm, but had to quickly leave due to ambiguous family troubles. Similarly, the nearly perfect Josh and Shannon, who seemed like an obvious shoo-in winner by virtue of being probably the only actual relationship on the show, had to depart in the middle of the night due to the tragic death of Josh's sister. Aforementioned chaotic pansexual Leslie was unceremoniously removed in the middle of the night once they had realized that her classic vape pen was actually full of weed, an especially tragic circumstance considering she basically had Cinco wrapped around her finger and was about to bring that love triangle crashing down (also tragic because she has gone on record saying that she was fully crushing on Genny while they were both in there, robbing us of any potential of a queer couple).

But part of the pain as always has to do with how the producers control everything no matter what: what we see, what we hear, who gets the villain edit and who gets the hero edit. It's why they seem to play Jeremy as dumb hot surfer bro instead of the actual funny and charming guy he is. It's why Trina was treated as a bitch and Cash as a woeful victim despite the roles more often than not lining up the other way around. And most embarrassingly, it's how the biggest joke couple of the show ended up winning it all.

Now, look at this picture right here: the poses, the awkward hand holding, the very strange smiles between those two. No, this is not a picture of two teenagers going to prom together who just met only five minutes ago and are taking pictures on their parents' front lawn; these two are the winners of season 3, the supposedly "strongest" couple on the show. This is Olivia and Korey.

Korey is a charming boyish sweetheart by way of an absolute fucking dumbass. He's sort of like last year's beloved and wonderfully stupid Carrington: a very sweet and nice teenager who seems to have "13 Going on 30"-ed his way into an adult body. He's childish in a way that's very cute and friendly but also woefully unattractive to anyone who's an adult. Just like Carrington, he notched up a staggering amount of dates with pretty much every single beautiful woman that came into the villa, all seemingly very interested in him. Carrington, for as dumb and childish as he is, could bag anyone because he was outrageously confident too. Korey on the other hand seems incapable of making any decision, following any girl who pays him the time of day like a little puppy, constantly looking up to her with his big puppy dog eyes. It's very telling that for all the dates he had, almost none of them actually went anywhere because it's just not that appealing to anyone. If you're looking to win, he's not someone who can scheme and play the game. If you're looking for love, he's not going to cut it because he can't seem to even understand the concept of romance. If you're looking for a friend, he's probably the best damn one you'll get in that villa -- but as constantly established by everyone, this show isn't called Friend Island.

Olivia is a bit of a thornier subject. She habitually couples up with people that you can kind of tell she's not at all into. She started the first half relatively unassuming and not particularly interested in the men that she was supposedly attracted to. But you could basically see her panties drop when Slade walked in, ready for him to pull her up into the saddle and ride away into the sunset. But his sudden departure only left her more empty, desperately grasping onto whatever random attraction she could. She went off to Casa Amor single and had the gall to come back without coupling up with any of them (although once again, they really dropped the ball with the men compared to the stunning Casa Amor women). And somehow in the midst of all this wishy washy mess, she finally settled on the one single man who she hadn't coupled up with and supposedly suddenly had feelings for: lonely, little Korey.

As a watcher of two seasons of this shit, I've seen a lot of fake relationships, but this one is just ridiculous. The chemistry is really nonexistent; she seems more annoyed or at best partially amused whenever he tries to say anything genuinely sweet to her. She reacts like how you would when a little kid tries to tell you they have a crush on you, an adult: you just kind of go, "aw, cute, thank you!" and walk away chuckling. It's genuinely comedic in how tragic it is, a boy who thinks he's finally found someone when all she's found is a trip to the bank.

And what did the editors do? They tried their very best to sell this as genuine, as actual romance. We know what romance is -- we basically saw it with Shannon and Josh, and to a lesser extent Will and Kyra. And yet they whipped out that expert level edit to say, "wow, look at these two lovebirds, huh?" It's ridiculous, especially since only in the final episode did they suddenly remember that Jeremy and the stunning Bailey (aka the combination of Gal Godot and Ashley Judd circa-2001) were an actual couple and even they looked more real than the winning couple.

Love Island is, if nothing else, a reflection of America.

It's an outdated tradition desperately grasping to what's left of the typical western idea of romance. No matter how many beauty pageant contestants they pick, men like women who aren't size 2s, or with natural hair/skin, or with family-friendly occupations. Women are probably tired of the big muscle bound hunks they usually put on here, the nearly identical men that they seem to cast every single season who have all the looks but zero of the confidence or personality.

It's an example of how our choices are an illusion, how our influence can be easily overwritten by those in charge. Votes that don't matter when they change the rules on the fly, ripping out the actual choice of the people in favor of letting them decide what stays and what goes.

It's a testament that even in the face of a viral pandemic that's quickly turning into part two, as the lives of millions are being further destroyed across the world, there will always be some asshole who has more than you and looks better than you, vacationing on a tropical island stolen from its people, ignorant of everything else that's happening around them.

Love Island hates everyone. It hates it's contestants. It hates the viewers. It hates change. It hates me.

But I do still kind of love it.

#tv criticism #deepdives

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harvestgatenetwork-blog · 4 years

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The Harvest Gate Podcast - Episode 2

Below is a written transcript of Episode 2 of The Harvest Gate Podcast.

Now available on harvestgate.org/podcast , Apple Podcast or your favorite podcasting app or service.

New episodes posted Sunday.

Episode 2: Our Mission Statement

*Intro Music*

Greg: Hey this is Greg

Zack: And Zack

Greg: Welcome back to the Harvest Gate podcast. This week we'll be talking about Harvest Gate's missions statement. You may have heard it in the outro of the first podcast, that is of course, "Connecting Faith to Families, Communities and Marketplaces"

We're also going to talk about our first financial update, lay out some goals, our current timeline and some upcoming events to add to your calendar.

But Zack, to get started this week, since we're part coffeehouse, we should take a moment to talk about coffee.

Zack: Yea, so what are you brewing today, Greg?

Greg: Well, I'm brewing what I brewed yesterday, I'm drinking what I brewed yesterday, which is iced coffee or cold coffee. Emily and I like to brew our coffee the night before and stick it in the fridge so its ice cold first thing in the morning...refreshing! Wakes you up a little bit. No ice! Not so it's watered down. Full, high octane effect!

Zack: Okay, I am picking up what you're putting down.

Greg: How about you?

Zack: I am drinking from my local coffee house that I love, River Road Coffeehouse.

Greg: Shout out to River Road!

Zack: Shout out to River Road! I am drinking my regular, which is a regular latte with 2 packets of Sweet-n-Low. It is delicious, I recommend River Road, if you ever get the chance to go there in Newark or Granville, Ohio.

Greg: And we've, of course, had many of our conversations at River Road. I recall that being your regular order as well.

Zack: Yea, that's where our friendship, sort of, started to blossom.

Greg: Blossom, like the design on the top of your latte, if I recall.

Zack: That's true. They're that good.

Greg: Oh very good! Alright, let's dive in, we've got a lot to talk about this week. We want to really breakdown the mission statement of Harvest Gate. As I stated before, that mission statement is "Connecting Faith to Families, Communities and Marketplaces."

How did you...where did that mission statement come from, how did it originate?

Zack: Yea so, I think that our mission statement answers the question of why? Why generally tends to be...a question that people are...there's an issue and they want to know why that issue exists and how to resolve it. Our mission statement, "Connecting Faith to Families, Communities and Marketplaces.", answers that why questions.

It seems like so much in Christianity, at least in America today, seems disconnected from faith. We almost look at life in 4 different domains in America.

We have our faith, then we have things we do in our family. We have things we do in our community and finally things we do at our jobs or workplaces.

Greg: And those things are often disconnected, they are sort of independent of each other.

Zack: Yea. I've found that a lot of people who are disenfranchised from the church or who don't care about church all that much would say there's a disconnect between what people say it is that they believe and how they actually act in these places in life.

Greg: Yea!

Zack: Greg, as one of those people potentially, have you found this to be the case that sometimes people's faith is disconnected from the other areas of their life?

Greg: Yea, I think I've had friendships or relationships with people that, were it not for the fact that you maybe know they go to church or someone told you that they regularly attend church, or something like that, that you would have no idea based on their actions and how they live their life, that that is actually something that is important to them, or that their faith influences their everyday life or the decisions they make.

Zack: Yea, we would call that cultural Christianity, meaning that, "I am a Christian simply because I grew up in a place that has Christian values. Yea I don't really practice it, I go to church every once in awhile, maybe on Christmas and Easter, maybe I go more frequently than that. Maybe I go every Sunday but it is disconnected from the rest of my life."

Greg: Maybe its like a pick-me-up, a sort of feel-good message to start your message.

Zack: Exactly! So what tends to happen, or what I have seen even in my lifetime, I'm relatively young, I have seen that church is a place that you go on a given day of the week and that is the extent of our faith a lot of times.

Greg: Right.

Zack: And so I believe that, and this is rooted really in biblical principles, that everything we do should be viewed through the lens of our faith. We're told in 1 Corinthians 31, Paul says this, "Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of god."

Paul again tells us in Colossians 3, he says, "In whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the lord Jesus." And then a couple verses later in Colossians 3.23 he says, "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart."

This is all informed by Jesus' words when Jesus was walking here on the Earth. Jesus said, "In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and good glory to your father who is in heaven."

It seems, like I said Greg, that everything should be viewed from the lens of faith. What tends to happen is faith is relegated to a certain day of the week, at a certain place, maybe if you're really spiritual, someplace in the midweek.

What we want to do is we want to be a church, a network of people, who view all of life through the lens of faith. We say it, that we're connecting our faith to our families. How do we view our families in light of our faith? How do we view and live in our communities?

And that could be a really big community, it could be the town or the village or city that you live in.

Greg: Yea, your next-door neighbor.

Zack: Could be your next-door neighbor. It could be just your group of friends but also in the marketplace. In our vocation, in our jobs. Whether you are a stay at home mother, or whether you are a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, we think that all of life should be viewed through that faith lens.

Greg: So the connection between faith and trying to build those connections to those different places. Give me an example in your community let's say, or in the community around the coffeehouse in the future, where we're hoping to settle down, how do you take...or build that connection.

Zack: Yea, if you remember from our last podcast, we had talked about how the church is supposed to exist for the community. And this is kind of what informs our name of Harvest Gate. We say that the harvest is plenty and the workers are few. Then Jesus says, "I am the gate. None come to the father except through me."

But then there is a deeper meaning to the word gate, where the church was a gathering of people, much like the people who gathered at the gate to bring value, wisdom and clarity. There would be town elders who gathered at the gate, that gathering was meant to bring clarity and value to their city.

We are hoping that as a faith community, that we would bring value to our city. In this case, it's Columbus. Right now we live in Newark, Ohio.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: And we want to bring value to Newark, Ohio but we also want to bring value to wherever it is that we live. Our big goal, our big dream is that we want to have a transforming presence in every zip code in Columbus and there are 49 zip codes in Columbus.

So we believe that that means we should be joining in on what we call kingdom endeavors. Helping to decrease the illiteracy rate in Columbus. Helping to feed people who are hungry.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: Caring for the orphans and the widows and the strangers, these are all different people groups that God says throughout scripture that we should care for. On a more practical way, this could mean that I live in a home, my next-door neighbor is an elderly woman who is a widow and let's say her front porch is rotting out. We would hopefully come together as a community, as a faith community, and help her rebuild her porch.

All of the tithes and offerings that come in through the church, 40% of that would go to what I call local missions.

Greg: Okay.

Zack: 40% would go to foreign missions and 20% would be for operational costs.

In most churches today, if you're pretty healthy financially, roughly 40% of your budget goes towards paying staff members. Maybe another 30-40% goes to paying for your facilities.

Greg: Churches tend to be in very large buildings, those aren't cheap. Even just running costs, if you paid off your mortgage, to heat it, to power everything, that's going to cost some big bucks.

Zack: It is! You're left with, 20-30% to actually minister to people.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: I heard about a study, where people went and looked at church budgets. They did church budgets, how much a church budget was compared to how many people were baptized.

They found that they average cost, if you will, to get somebody baptized is around $1.5 million dollars.

Greg: That seems a bit steep...

Zack: It seems a bit steep! Our hope is that we can, through the generosity of those who are in our faith community, that we can bless our community.

We would take money from our local missions, of that 40%, and go and buy material and hopefully, in our faith community we would be able to have somebody who has expertise in building and all they need are hands.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So then we would go next door and build a new porch for her, or whatever the case might be, it might be raking leaves, it might be...it doesn't have to be a building project. It could be generally helping the community.

Greg: Yea! That concept of, or that scenario of, an elderly neighbor with something that they can't do, that needs to be done to help them. I think anyone, if you ask them would you be on board with supporting that personally, would you want your local government to support that, would you want local community members to help them with that. Or would you yourself help them with that, I think everyone would answer, "Yes.".

But in reality that so often doesn't actually happen. I think it is important to find ways...this is one of the things I connect with most about this project is that, it doesn't matter whether you believe or don't believe a certain thing. If you want to do good, just go do it. If you're, kind of, on the fence thinking, "Should I volunteer to help someone with something or support my local food pantry or homeless shelter?", make it happen! Get involved with that kind of stuff and make a difference in your community because we're the people that live there and we're the only ones that can make a difference.

Zack: Yea, exactly! From a pastoral standpoint, this is a great opportunity, in this elderly woman, she might say something like, "Why in the world would you do this?".

This is great opportunity for me to share my love of Jesus and to share the love of Christ with the world.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So I think that we have this perception that to share Jesus with people, we need to go and stand on street corners, and I'm not necessarily against those kinds of things, but I think through genuine love and serving of our neighbors, it allows to open up for really great conversation around faith.

So connecting faith to our community can take any kind of number of things and one thing that I want to make sure we're careful of within Harvest Gate, and this would probably just be a caution to all churches anywhere, is that we don't do things to grow the church necessarily, that is not our responsibility...

Greg: It can be a byproduct of the good work that you do. It can be part of...representing your faith through the actions that you take, representing your organization through what you do...showing people your character and that being the selling point, rather than a hard sales pitch directly to someone like, "Come join us."

Obviously we want that, but I think if you don't set an example to be representative of that then why should people want to follow you.

Zack: Yea, exactly! People hate feeling like projects.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: If I did something, if I went and...if we didn't know each other Greg, and I were to do something and you felt like I was doing it to manipulate you to believe a certain way, we probably wouldn't be friends.

Greg: Well, I think there was...I don't want to say there was ever a time in our relationship where that was a thing because it wasn't. But I think that there were times early on where I would talk to Emily about it, or I would think to myself, "Are we just becoming really good friends or am I a faith project?", like, here's not necessarily a vocal unbeliever but somebody who is very clear about how they feel and comfortable in that and, "Can I make changes to that?".

I really really respected the fact that that was never the case. We had many conversations about church and Jesus and religion and spirituality in general and there was never any pressure for me to believe something different than what I believe to validate our relationship or friendship or something like that. You kind of demonstrated that it didn't matter what my belief was, you were showing, I guess, your love of Jesus through just being a friend and a positive influence with no underlying motive.

Zack: Yea and I don't know if you remember this but I said, "Greg, I want you to believe what I believe. But our friendship is not relegated to whether you end up believing what I believe."

Greg: Yea, it's not conditioned on that.

Zack: So our hope is, is that through just loving people, they will come into knowing the love of Christ and the love that he has given for us.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So it's not our responsibility as a church to make sure the church grows. We can, maybe on a micro level, say, "I'm going to become friends with Greg so he can become a Christian." That might be, that might be one scenario.

But on a macro level, in the church generally what we do is, "Hey, we're going to serve these people so that they can come to our church." And if that happens its great, but that's not our, that's not our intention. We want to be obedient. Jesus said that, "The son of man came not to be served but to serve and give his life as ransom for many."

And so as a follower of Jesus, its my responsibility to be obedient to what it is that he said. He said to follow me, do as I do, act as I act. That means that I want to serve our community, in the same way it goes...talking about our other domains that we're talking about here, like Family.

How do we view our family through the lens of faith? To me this means that my wife and I are in a partnership together. We are friends, there's many things you could attribute to our relationship but we are co-partners. I help her with dishes, I help with laundry, we have a partnership in our family. With our children, when they clean up and they don't want to, we say, "Thank you for contributing to our family, thank you for being part of the Morgan team."

Greg: Yea. Shout out by the way to the Morgan kids who, Emily, my wife, and I, were hanging out at your place while you guys had date night last night. Which was great! And the kids cleaned up superbly. Maybe the only...the might have in fact done it too well because one of Eli's toys got cleaned up so well that we couldn't find it.

Zack: Yea!

Greg: So hopefully that turns up.

Zack: Thank you for that! Within our family, its not that we just sit down and...and there's nothing wrong with this and we do this..."Okay, now kids it's time to read our bible." We read the bible and we'll talk about those kinds of things. When issues of life and death and love and respect and whatever the case may be, happens in our family, and even discipline, we discipline through the lens of our faith. Not necessarily in a manipulative way, "Well Jesus would be very said about that."

Greg: That's kind of like how people use Santa Clause for Christmas.

Zack: Yea.

Greg: You're gonna be on the naughty list...

Zack: I'm going to throw one of your gifts away anytime you're bad...

So we don't want to do that but there's been many times where my kids have been...they've been deserving of some pretty harsh punishment. But I've said, "I'm going to choose right now to show you mercy rather than grounding you...", or whatever the case may be, whatever the form of punishment is, "This is what you deserve but I love you enough that I'm not going to do it right now. I'm going to show you mercy."

What happens a lot of times is the realization of the underserving-ness of that, it breaks them more than maybe the punishment would.

Greg: Like I deserved a greater punishment than I received.

Zack: Yea, I deserve this punishment but what I actually received was mercy and love. Now, this doesn't mean we don't punish our kids, we certainly do, but I believe this is the same thing that Jesus does. Jesus says...in Romans it says, "The wages of sin is death."

But Jesus came so that we might have life and have it abundantly, that is in John 10:10.

So we might be deserving of one thing but Jesus comes in and says, "I'm going to give you grace and mercy."

I kind of define grace and mercy this way: grace is getting what you don't deserve, mercy is not getting what it is that you do deserve. So we try to, in our family, we try to extend grace and mercy to everyone. Maybe that's how, a quick example, of how our faith plays out in our family context.

Greg: And that can be a challenge, in the heat of the moment, ya know? When the action that deserves some sort of discipline has just taken place. You have to have that, sort of, self awareness and control to think about, "How do I want to act in this moment? What example am I setting?"

I think you're teaching your kids a lot about your character and of course where you get that character from, in the choices that you make and the values that you have. I think that's really important.

Zack: And, you say that, I should be clear, far from perfect. Because in those moments, in the heat of the moment, I don't respond in the way my faith informs, I then have to do some repenting.

Repenting is, and you may have heard it before, repenting is simply the act of turning away from, turning 180 degrees.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So I might have to do some repenting. First, it might be to God. Then it's to my children and that's a humbling thing.

Greg: Yea, every parent listening is nodding their head, including me. And maybe not even recognizing the term repent, or exactly what it means but I've had plenty of instances where my initial reaction to something that Eli did is not the reaction that I would want and I'll almost immediately have to kind of stop, and sometimes even just sort of explain to him in that moment, "Daddy apologizes and is sorry for raising my voice.", or whatever it was to let him know that I can...I'm not perfect, I make mistakes but I can recognize those mistakes or be aware of those and just because I made the mistake doesn't mean I have to live with that, or commit to it permanently.

I can stop and say, "You know that was the wrong thing to do", and I acknowledge that and let's try to talk about that in a different way.

Zack: Yea, I think anyone who is a parent, which I have 3 children under the age of 6 and younger and you have a son...how old is Eli?

Greg: Eli's 4, he'll be 5 in April.

Zack: Awesome. Anyone who has children has probably done something and they go, "Well they'll be able to talk to their therapist about that in about 15 or 20 years.

Greg: Yea, yep.

Zack: Just simply saying, "Listen, Daddy did not respond right. It was not okay for me to respond the way that I did."

Greg: Yea

Zack: "It was not loving, it was not caring, I lost my temper, whatever the case may be."

What that does, is it helps our children to understand that it's okay to make mistakes, but it's not okay to live in those mistakes and to just perpetuate them.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: I've heard it said this way, "It's okay to not be okay but it's not okay to stay that way."

Greg: Right. There's a little bit of pride in that, where you don't want to admit you made a mistake, even though you know that you're wrong or you know that you want to change that behavior or that action or something but you're unwilling to admit that to the people that may have been affected by that or to yourself.

Zack: Yea, especially to your children. I don't need to do this to you because I made you! But throughout scripture, it says to honor one another and to submit to one another and I think that that's what that is. It doesn't mean that I give up all of the "authority" I have on my family...

Greg: Right.

Zack: ...but it does mean that when I'm wrong I need to admit it and I need to repent at that and ask forgiveness of my children. One of...from the time every single one of my children was conceived to the day that I die, this has been my prayer for them. My children's names are Lily, Isaac and Naomi, but my prayer goes something like this...

Father, thank you for Lily, Isaac and Naomi. May they know you from an early age and grow to know you. May their faith never falter. May they understand grace, mercy and love as I understand grace, mercy and love, but without having to go through all the stupid things that I went through to understand those things.

Greg: *laughs* Yea!

Zack: And then I pray over them. Let my children be a powerful voice in your kingdom. May there be millions of people who come to know you because of their obedience and their faith.

That's kind of the hope, we want our children to be better than we are, to do better in life.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: I want them to have a stronger faith than I do.

Greg: Well, that's a common sentiment that people have and I think everyone says that, but how many people are taking actions to make that happen. Investing in education and the community, safe places for kids to gather and be kids and not have to experience the reality of the real world, maybe earlier than they would be prepared for.

You know, there's a lot of things...

Eli already, at 4 years old, has had to go through these sort of...process of...

When my wife and I had our most recent miscarriage at like 20 weeks, Eli had already well understood that he was going to have a sister. That this whole process was ongoing and we were building it up and we wanted him to be a big brother and he was going to do great...and then the rug gets pulled out from under and we have to try and explain to him, when he's only just turned 4 at the time, what exactly all of that meant.

That's not something anyone would want to do, but we tried to do that...Emily did a great job of helping him understand that whole process and what happened and why things are different now and maybe as best as he can understand as a 4 year old. We always want to protect our children from these sorts of things that can happen or whatever.

I think, how can we use Harvest Gate for a platform for that? Living our family life, the way that we would want it to be lived out in every other facet of life in a positive, impactful way.

Zack: Yea, exactly, and I think what happens, especially in the church in America, we tend to leave the faith stuff to the children's programs on Sunday mornings.

I'm not against children's ministries or kid's church or anything like that. However, it becomes, it becomes essentially a babysitter for us and we go like, "Well, they're learning everything they need to know about faith, Jesus and all those kinds of things so I don't really need to."

I don't want to abdicate our responsibility as a family unit of sharing the love of Jesus with them.

Greg: So let's transition over to marketplaces. How are we sort of building...bridging that gap?

Zack: Yea, so, Jesus says a lot about money. The bible says a lot about money. Apart from God as the subject, money is spoken about most in the bible compared to any other topic.

What we see is the pendulum swing. We say things like, "Capitalism is bad and we should just give all our money away." It's so polarized, or, "God's blessing comes through financial blessing."

There's all these different kinds of things but the bible is not against prosperity.

Greg: Yea

Zack: But the bible, and God, is against the poor treatment of those who have less.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: He wants...again you can go to extremes on this. You can say, "Well, all of capitalism is bad because of this.", I don't believe the bible is against capitalism.

What I do believe the bible is against, is unfair practices that make the poor get poorer and that the rich get richer off of the backs of the poor.

Greg: Yea!

Zack: How do we take, what I would call biblical stewardship principles...stewarding, simply the act of handling something that somebody...if you gave me money and said, "Hey hold on to this for awhile, you know, do something good with it.", how I handle that is called stewardship...but biblical stewardship principles, how do we manage that.

And not only as it pertains to money but as it pertains to people. As a business, how am I treating my employees, am I giving them fair wages or am I paying them very poorly so I can get very rich?

Greg: I think we all know how that often works in our society today.

Zack: Yes. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the middle class...diminishes.

Greg: Evaporates.

Zack: Evaporates, yea. So I believe that prosperity should be for the entire city. Again there's...there's an ugly heresy within Christianity, the prosperity gospel, that God just wants you to be rich and he wants to, "Here's your jumbo jet!", and all those types of things.

What I find through prosperity gospel is it's usually only the people who are preaching prosperity gospel that are prospering.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: That's not what I'm talking about. When we use biblical stewardship principles, that it is good for everyone.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: In the bible, the old testament especially, it lays out for the Israelites, this system that is completely upside down from any world system that has ever been. And that is that every 7 years, your debts are forgiven. So everyone who has college loans, hey please reinstate that.

Greg: *Laughs* Yea.

Zack: If you and I had...if I loaned you money and it's not paid off at the end of 7 years, once that 7 years is up, it's done. Then every 50 years, the year of jubilee, what they would do is, all property would be restored to the original land owner, the family.

It's this process where we say, "We're not against prosperity but we are against injustice, we are against people getting rich off of slave labor or close to slave labor."

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So how do we take our faith and apply this to the workplace? On one level, as an entrepreneur and business owner, it means we practice good business ethics and that we're generous with our customers, that we're generous with our employees. Not only financially but that we treat them well and let them know they are loved and cared for. That our faith would inform all of these things. Just as I show my kids grace, mercy and love, I want to show my employees grace, mercy and love.

Greg: I think there's a lot of things to be said about business ethics on that because so many businesses are finding ways to eek out every penny they can from the consumer by cleverly downsizing the actual packaging, putting less in...

You know, I have a...I won't say where it's from...but I have a granola bar that we really like to get at our local grocery store, and the box very clearly, comfortably would fit 6 granola bars because that's how they fit into the box, but it only comes with 5 and there is a gap, a granola bar sized gap, where a sixth one obviously would be.

I am quite certain, if I went back to that grocery store 5 years ago, there were 6 in that box and its now the same price.

Those, sort of, deceptive, dishonest tactics that businesses use are the sort of thing that I look forward to NOT seeing at our coffeehouse because we want it to be an honest business, living out the same values and principles that we have in everything else that we do.

Zack: Yea, yea, yea! And then as an employee, what this looks like is, not only for employees but for the business as a whole, you practice really really good work.

Because that's not always the case. We generally do the bare minimum of whatever we do. But imagine what would happen if Christians around the world, if we practiced really good work.

If you are a plumber and you do really, really good work or if you are an IT guy and you do really, really good work or if you're a stay at home mother, you do really good work.

That to me says far more because, again, there can be a disconnect, maybe they are someone who is outspoken about their faith at work, "Hey, Jesus loves you!", blah blah blah, but they do really crappy work.

Greg: Hmm, not really setting a good example.

Zack: Not for their co-workers, not for their employer, not for the customer.

Greg: Right.

Zack: So there's a disconnect. Everything that we do should be done with excellence. Everything that we do, again, not perfection, there's a difference between perfection and excellence.

So, I think that a lot of it just comes down to how we're doing in our work. Just going back to those bible verses I pointed out earlier.

In whatever you do, or say, do it as a representative of the lord Jesus.

Whether you eat or drink, whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart. In the same way, let your light shine so that they may see the good work, your good works and give glory to the father who is in heaven.

We're called to do really good work and taking ownership of those kinds of things.

Greg: I think that, it's a good place to conclude on our mission statement.

Connecting faith to families, communities and marketplaces, and trying to see how Harvest Gate is striving to really build a connection between each of those and let faith and those values and the way that we live in that space, affect every other place that we're going to be involved in.

I think that is really a good way to explain what we stand for.

Zack: Yea, and I should just make a quick note here. This is not something that only Harvest Gate is doing, there's lots of businesses, lots of families, lots of community members who are doing really really good things.

Greg: Absolutely!

Zack: And so this isn't like, "Oh, we're the only ones who have this figured out."

We don't have it figured out. We're striving for these things, but this is just, kind of, the culture we want to create. We're not trying to belittle anybody or say that some businesses are bad or something like that. I just want to make that clear.

Greg: Except for the ones that are, you know who you are.

*laughter*

Greg: Alright, so let's talk about a couple things here to wrap up today. We want to talk financial update, maybe just a run down on our goals, our timeline. It is currently January 24th.

Where are we now? Where do we want to be?

Zack: Yea, so we have 1 big goal.

Greg: It is big.

Zack: It is big. When I think about it, it terrifies me, to be honest.

But that goal is to raise $150,000.

We believe that through that money, that we can launch Harvest Gate Coffeehouse, to start being a faithful presence in the community.

Greg: Yep.

Zack: But then that would also give us 6 months of operating costs.

Again, you might be thinking, "Why are we just funding your business?", it's a good question and a fair question.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: Yes, it is a business. I view it more as a mission. We are taking God's kingdom to Columbus. It is already there, it's already existing.

Greg: To patrons of coffee!

Zack: But we want to be another outpost of the kingdom.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: Often times, missionaries will go to another country and they will go and start a business there and that is there "in" with the community so to speak.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: So we view this as a mission. I've had people say, "Well why don't you just get a business loan?"

That certainly is a possibility. However, if I get a business loan, I've just relegated myself to the fact that this is just a business. I don't want it to be just a business. I want it to be more than that. I want it to be an outpost of the kingdom of God.

The other thing too is, we need partnerships.

Greg: Yea, can't do it ourselves.

Zack: We can't do it ourselves, I don't want to do it ourselves. If this is going to be a kingdom endeavor, I want kingdom people to have an investment in it.

Greg: Yea.

Zack: And so it doesn't just mean financial partnership, we need prayer. We need expertise, we need support, we need you to share this podcast with your friends and families and loved ones and even your enemies, share it with them too.

So, $150,000 is our big goal. We have a, maybe a benchmark goal of $80,000. We believe through conversations with our coffee experts that we can launch Harvest Gate Coffeehouse for about $80,000.

But again, we want to have about 6 months of operating costs so that we can have, you know, incase of a slow start or just learning...

Greg: Pay employees...

Zack: Yea, those kinds of things.

Greg: Those are important.

Zack: And that is important. We want to be good at business. Ethically minded in our business, there we go.

To reach those goals, we have monthly goals.

Our goal for January is to raise $20,000. Our goal for February is to raise $25,000.

Our goal for March is to raise $75,000.

We're hoping by April, we have enough where we can begin to secure a location for the coffeehouse and begin build-out for a launch in, hopefully, June.

So that's where we are there.

So a way that you can do that is go to our website, www.harvestgate.org/take-action

Greg: Not just take action.

Zack: Yes.

Greg: Take "hyphen" action, that's a dash.

Zack: Yea. Not the word.

Greg: Don't write out hyphen.

Zack: Yea, that would be weird.

Greg: Yea

Zack: If you go to www.harvestgate.org/take-action, you can find different ways to give, you can sign up for our newsletter, you can subscribe to our podcast.

Greg: Which we should point out is now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher and...

Zack: Coming soon, iHeartRadio.

Greg: And Google Podcasts.

Zack: Yes, so that's exciting. In May, we're going to be having the Harvest Gate Scramble, for those of you golf lovers out there, you can come out to The Trout Club in Newark, Ohio. We will be having a golf scramble for all you golf enthusiasts and there's going to be some cool hole in one prizes, some giveaways, of course all the usual accoutrements that come with that: longest drive, longest putt, closest to pin, stuff like that.

Greg: And we've also got, sort of early days planning an event over the next couple of months, Gently Used Women's Clothing sale, if you've got old clothes you'd like to donate, again it's women's clothing only, start going through your closet and we'll keep you updated on when that will be. Anything we don't sell will be donated for a good cause so anything you can do for that, we appreciate it.

Last note, other ways you can support Harvest Gate is supporting us through joining our prayer team on our website...where is that on harvestgate.org?

Zack: It is also on the take action page. Our goal is to have 300, we call them prayer and share partners by the time we launch, hopefully in June, so if you are interested in joining our prayer team, check us out, sign up for that and we'll be sending out updates as to how you can specifically be praying for us.

Greg: Awesome. Thank you very much for listening to The Harvest Gate Podcast and check out our website and social media, lots of stuff coming down the pipeline, we appreciate it. Thanks Zack.

Zack: It's been fun!

*Outro music*

Greg: Follow us on social media @harvestgatenetwork

Zack: There are several ways you can engage with us and support The Harvest Gate Network at harvestgate.org

Greg: You can subscribe to The Harvest Gate Podcast on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app. If you are as excited as we are about this project, please consider supporting us by sharing, joining our prayer team or donating on our website.

Zack: Thanks for listening to The Harvest Gate Podcast. Connecting faith to families, communities and marketplaces.

*fade music out*

#Columbus HarvestGate HowDoWeChurch Episode2

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shirtlesssammy · 7 years

Text

The Man Who Would Be King: 6x20 Recap

Then:

Cas Baby is just doing the best he can.

Now:

Well, here were are, at the pinnacle of Cas episodes (until season 12 came along and we had a gluttonous feast on our hands.) We open with Cas reflecting to the audience on his time spent observing Earth, and humanity; its successes and failures (dried dung can only be stacked so high after all), and he remembers the apocalypse that never came to be. When two boys, a drunk, and a fallen angel rip up the rules, well, how’s he supposed to know if he made the right choice? Goddamn, this monologue really sets up a beautiful episode.

Beauty Break:

Beauty Break Pt. 2:

After the title card, we find Dean cruising around at night in the Impala. Cas flaps in with a, “Hello Dean.” He wonders how Dean is doing, and Dean asks if there’s any news on Crowley. And despite there being quite a bit of very important news about Crowley, Cas says no. Dean says that he’s on his way to meet Sam, who’s tracking a Djinn in Omaha. Cas regrets his inability to help, but Dean gets it, and adds, “No worries. But, Cas, you'll call, right? If you get into real trouble?” Damn, I’m already starting to tear up here, guys.

Cas flaps away to Crowley’s torture den of torture.

Crowley is busy doing a very thorough autopsy on Eve (Fun fact: I didn’t know that was Eve until I read the transcript just now. I’m a fake fan.) Crowley gets a bit testy when Cas asks about Eve opening the door to Purgatory. Crowley doubts Cas’s loyalty and tells him to stay away from the Winchesters (after some heavily implied innuendo about Cas’s trenchcoat.)

Cas admits to the audience that Crowley is right, he still considers himself the Winchesters’ guardian. <Insert lots of sad imagery from Swan Song here> They taught him to fight, and they won, but at a terrible cost. So, our poor, loyal, misguided angel went back to the pits of Hell and retrieved --most of-- Sam.

Crowley tells Cas to kill the Winchesters, which Cas declines. Crowley loses his shit over underestimating the Winchesters (and in retrospect of season 12, what a weird, sad full circle to this. He never underestimated them, they came to be allies, and he still died --only because he was helping the Winchesters, not trying to hurt them.) Cas orders Crowley to find Purgatory, and to leave the Winchesters alone again.

At Bobby’s, Sam and Bobby interrogate a demon. Dean walks in and motions to Sam and Bobby to talk in private.

Dean tells the others that Cas popped in on him and he lied about what they were up to, and that they were getting close to Crowley. He adds, with great remorse, “You know, he's our friend...And we are lying to him through our teeth.” Oh, Dean. So loyal, so misguided when you let your heart muddle your instincts. The others are still worried he’s working with Crowley. As they admit their feelings, the camera cuts to Cas watching them, without their knowledge. Agghhh. As Bobby worries that they’re dealing with “Superman who's gone dark side”, Dean projects that Sam is Lois Lane (lol, Dean, it’s season 6, we see through your projection bullshit by now.) (And for the record, lying liar Castiel looks SO REMORSEFUL. I FORGIVE YOU!)

Cas knows Dean’s conflicted, and it’s heartbreaking. Bobby heads back to continue knifing info from the demon. Under duress, the demon admits that he doesn’t deal with Crowley. He deals with a demon called Ellsworth (Oh man, this is too good to not believe this is a coincidence. Jim Beaver will always be Bobby now, but there was a time -for a very long time- that he was Ellsworth. Sigh. #TeamDeadwood)

We then get to meet the demon version of Bobby. He deals with lots of bubbling blood phone calls, and the occasional real phone call, while Yeti demons sully his living area with trussed up victims. To neutralize the chances of the Winchesters getting killed, he smites the demons. He justifies to the audience, “I had no choice. I did it to protect the boys. Or to protect myself. I-I don't know anymore.”

Sam, Dean, and Bobby burst into the demon house, but find the place spotless --too spotless. Cas reflects on his motives. After he “saved” Sam, he went back to heaven (specifically his favorite heaven: an autistic man’s day at a park), only to be confronted about what happened in the apocalypse. The angel, Rachel, insists that God brought Cas back to lead the angels (she’s half right), but Cas counters that God wants the angels to have freedom. He then heads to find Raphael, who tells him that he will bow to him and swear his allegiance. After that, they’ll free Michael and Lucifer from the cage and get this show going again. Cas refuses, and tells Raphael he will stop him. Raphael then blasts him back to his heavenly park, and tells him obey or die.

Back at Crowley’s dispatcher headquarters, the boys and Bobby search for clues. Bobby notes that the place is “Mister Clean clean” and it’s...suspicious. Dean suggests calling Cas, to the eyerolled derision of Sam and Bobby. Fed up with their doubts, Dean lays out his argument: Cas broke ranks and laid down his life for them… Also, this is CAS. (I love that this is Dean’s habitual argument regarding Cas. “It’s CAS”)

Sam relents and prays, then Dean gives it a shot. Cas loiters invisibly in the background, too afraid to show himself. He knows he would buckle under their interrogation. Suddenly demons appear out of nowhere, attacking Dean, Sam, and Bobby. Cas recognizes the attackers as Crowley’s elite squad of killers. He’s faced with a choice: don’t intervene and risk losing the Winchesters or save them and face the consequences with Crowley. Castiel sweeps in and smites the demons swiftly and without mercy (starting with Dean’s demon - just sayin’).

*Fans self*

After the fight, everyone puts themselves to rights. Cas tells them that he’s come to the conclusion that Crowley is alive. Dean smiles in relief and prompts Bobby to apologize for doubting him. They confess to Cas that they were hunting Crowley without him, thinking that he may be involved.

Cas acts astonished and a little abashed at this. “Wonders never cease,” the voiceover intones, “They trusted me again.” And then...Cas earns a new nickname as the most foolish angel of the garrison when he goes on to chuckle, “It is a little absurd though. Superman going to the darkside?” Bobby and Sam exchange significant looks and Dean’s face just falls entirely. Cas just let slip that he was spying on them.

Oh, Dean Bean.

Later, Cas busts through the doors of Crowley’s weird little dissection chamber.

For Science:

Cas is pissed that Crowley tried to kill the Winchesters. Crowley is astonished that Cas could possibly be so blind. Cas, he maintains, wants the Winchesters to believe in the good and righteous Castiel so that he can believe it just a little bit longer. Instead, Cas needs to realize that he is down in the dirt right alongside Crowley. If he’d only take care of those Winchesters...

Cas takes him by the coat and shoves him against the wall so hard he breaks tiles. “If you touch a hair on their heads, I will tear it all down. Our arrangement. Everything.” He flaps out. GOD Cas is so smitey in this episode I love it UNAPOLOGETICALLY.

And we flap back in time to how Cas got into this mess in the first place. After Raphael beat the shit out of him, Cas went to Dean, who was raking leaves outside of Lisa’s house. He arrived invisible at first and as he watched Dean, he found he didn’t have the heart to take him from his well earned rest.

While Cas contemplates his options, Crowley pops in. He’d like to propose a little business arrangement. “It all comes down to the souls in the end,” Crowley says. “I’m talking about Raphael’s head on a pike. I’m talking about happy endings for all of us with all possible entendres intended.” CROWLEY, you absolute delight. Anyway, Crowley begs for just five minutes of Cas’s time. Cas agrees and follows Crowley into Hell, assuming he can outwit that lesser demon any day. After all, Castiel’s “an angel, you ass.”

Crowley leads Cas through the new Hell, an interminable waiting room line designed to torture even the most insatiable masochist. Cas insists that his only options with Raphael are to submit or die. “What are you, French?” Crowley asks. There’s another way, sunshine. Crowley 1) proposes that Cas start a civil war in Heaven and 2) that he loan Cas some soul power to get him started. Crowley expertly strokes Cas’s ego while offering him options to join his side. If they can get at Purgatory they can split the souls between them. They just need to figure out how to get there.

“Wouldn’t you rather have me in charge down here?” Crowley asks. “The devil you know?” Cas can save everyone. He can preserve what Dean and Sam worked so hard for. “God chose you to save us,” he says. And Cas buckles at last.

Cas, powered by the power of 50,000 souls and a hefty dose of pride, heads back to Heaven and blasts Raphael into next Tuesday. “There will be no apocalypse,” Cas announces. Angels are either with him or against him.

Back on earth, Sam and Dean hunker down in the demon dispatcher’s headquarters. Dean prays to Cas, asking for a meeting. Cas arrives promptly, convinced he’s in their good graces. They greet him casually, whisky glasses in hand. Sam tells Cas that they have a way to track down Crowley. It’s CAS...dun dun dun. He throws a match down and captures Cas in a ring of holy fire.

They ask him about spying. “You know who spies on people, Cas?” Dean asks insightfully. “Spies.” They interrogate him about the overly polished dispatcher headquarters and Crowley’s mistaken bones. Cas tries to explain his way out of the predicament but then Dean asks him to look him in the eye and tell him he isn’t working with Crowley. Cas can’t do it. He looks away.

(Me: tries not to clutch my heart at this. Fails.)

Cas tries to protest that he did everything he did to protect everyone. He tries to play what he thinks should be his ace up his sleeve. “Sam, I am the one who raised you from perdition.”

Everyone raises their heads at this and Sam sniffs, “No offense, but you did a pretty piss poor job of it. Wait. Did you bring me back soulless on purpose?”

Cas is appalled that Sam would think that and tries to back up, explaining his war against Raphael. “I had no choice.” Dean tells him that he had a choice and made the wrong one. He bites out that he shouldn’t have made another deal with the devil. Cas tries to throw it back on Dean. Maybe he was wrong, but where was Dean this whole time?

“I was there,” Dean tells him. “Where were you?” Cas reluctantly agrees that he should have approached the Winchesters for help but it’s too late now. From the distance, demons swirl towards the building.

“I can’t turn back now,” Cas says frantically. He shouts at them all to run. Dean looks back once, a world of pain in his eyes, and then they’re gone.

Demons smoke into the building and Crowley arrives. Oh lookee at the mess. He snaps his fingers and the holy fire ring whiffs out. “You know what I see here? The new god. The new devil working together.”

Cas has had enough and tells Crowley to GTFO. “You know the difference between you and me?” Crowley asks as a parting shot. “I know what I am. What are you, Castiel? What exactly are you willing to do?” (<-- Ah, the thesis statement.)

Cas flaps into Bobby’s cabin later and Dean wakes to find him standing at the foot of the couch. Cas tries one more time to explain to Dean his mission. “I’m doing this for you, Dean,” Cas insists.

Dean tells him he’s a “friggin’ child” and begs him to stop, merely on the strength of their familial connection. “You gotta trust me, man.”

“Or what,” Cas asks ominously. (Or stabby stabby.) Dean and Cas part without peace between them.

Flash forward again to Cas sitting on the bench finishing his prayer. “That’s everything. I believe that’s what you call a tragedy from the human perspective.” He looks at the sky and begs, one last time, for direction. “Am I on the right path? You have to give me a sign. Give me a sign…” His prayer breaks down, showing how desperate and scared he is. “If you don’t, I’m gonna do...whatever I must.”

Natasha: I’m never ready to have my heart broken by this episode. The framing device of a prayer to God for help is so beautifully done. It creates an air of desperation while threading together what is essentially a long running montage in a cohesive way. It ties Cas to Heaven, to Hell, to Earth, and to Dean. Everything builds to a crescendo and at the end we all sit, stunned, with what we had thought of Castiel in shards around our feet.

You Never Look Like You’re Quoting:

The stench of that Impala’s all over your overcoat, angel.

Sometimes we’re lucky enough to be given a warning.

Am I the only game piece on the board who doesn’t underestimate those denim wrapped nightmares?!

He is the Balky Bartokomous of Heaven.

If I knew then what I know now, I might have said. That’s simple. Freedom is a length of rope. God wants you to hang yourself with it.

Explaining freedom to angels is a bit like teaching poetry to fish.

You never look like you’re joking.

This is not how synergy works.

I wanna help you help me help ourselves.

I’m an angel, you ass. I don’t have a soul to sell.

Lucifer was a petulant child with daddy issues.

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#spn recap #spn rewatch #spn 6x20 #the man who would be king #castiel #cas #dean winchester #sam winchester #bobby singer #crowley #he was my ben edlund thing #supernatural season 6

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evenstevensranked · 7 years

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#25: Season 1, Episode 12 - “Deep Chocolate”

LET THE TOP 25 COMMENCE!!!

Louis and Twitty’s friendship is put to the test when they end up competing against each other in the school chocolate sale. Meanwhile, Ren has made a deal with her parents to be nice to Louis for a week in order to get her own phone line.

This one opens with Ren giving a presentation to Steve and Eileen on why she deserves her own phone line. Yes, phone line. As in... a LANDLINE. Crazy how today she probably would’ve already had her own iPhone since the ripe ‘ol age of 8! But, yes. It’s 2000 and Ren wants her own landline in her bedroom.

Louis interrupts the presentation by running through the kitchen like a tornado and Ren naturally starts complaining about him. That’s when Eileen gets the smart idea to give Ren some incentive “If you can not put your brother down for a whole week, we will give you your own phone line.” Good idea, tbh.

Cut to school where Louis, Twitty and Tawny are in the auditorium for a chocolate sale assembly. This is one of my favorite bits ever omg. A rip-off of the 20th Century Fox jingle plays as this scam artist with a rats tail hairdo(n’t) named Wallace Randall from Real Good Chocolate Industries walks out on stage. He tries way too hard to motivate the kids -- telling bold-faced lies like “Zeus sold chocolate!” Sounds legit. He announces that the grand prize is this fancy motorized scooter with a cheetah print butt seat. Snazzy. Mr. Randall says the person who believes they were put on planet earth to sell chocolate is the person who’ll be the top seller and win the prize. Louis' mind is so clouded by the scooter, he feels the spirit.

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I always crack up when Louis dramatically mumbles “that’s why I’m here...” to himself. I also love how Mr. Randall uses Shaq in “KAZAAM” -- a cinematic classic that boasts a 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes -- as an impressive example.

Louis really, really wants that scooter. So he decides that he and Twitty should team up to sell 400 freakin’ boxes, ensuring that they’ll be the top sellers. Yeah, I don’t remember chocolate sales working like that? I remember every student was given a suitcase-size box of assorted chocolates and that’s it. What the hell is this 400 boxes nonsense?! Then again, I mostly remember doing the Hershey’s Fundraising sale. Obviously, this episode is a spoof on the “World’s Finest Chocolate” brand -- which I definitely remember selling at one point, too. I checked their website and it seems like they cap it at 25 boxes, although you CAN order more than that if you want. But, who would??? 400 IS SUCH A STRETCH.

I tried to check out with 400 boxes, and it said “TOO MANY ITEMS IN CART” ..........ya don’t say. Imagine paying $12,000 for chocolate.

Ren struggles to be nice to Louis throughout the week. It’s pretty funny. She’s constantly yelling at him, and then following it up with an awkward compliment lol. She also thinks selling 400 boxes is asinine “You actually think you’re going to sell 400 boxes? You are a total and complete........ i...nspiration to all of us.” Good save, Ren.

The next day Louis and Twitty are at the Stevens house trying to come up with creative (and insincere) ways to sell their 400 boxes, trying make the product seem amazing to prospective buyers. I think this is freaking hilarious. Louis says “I hand you the chocolate, you eat it, and then you say...” Twitty looks at his hand for the words “It’s a miracle. I can see again” which he repeats super robotically. Louis kills me here. “No... that’s not what ya say. ‘Cause you were blind -- and now you can see. That’s a miracle!!! YOU CAN SEE NOW.” He says that Mr. Randall said you have to make people feel that chocolate has changed your life. So Twitty dramatically falls to the ground shouting “IT’S A MIRACLEEEEE! I CAN SEE AGAINNNNNN AHHHHH!” and I die every time.

I’m pretty sure if one bite of chocolate could restore your eyesight, it would cost a little more than $1 per bar.

Just then, Mr. Randall unexpectedly visits to personally deliver and congratulate them for setting out to sell an ambitious 800 BOXES. Yeah. Turns out Louis ordered 400 boxes and Twitty also ordered 400 boxes. So now they’re stuck with 800 boxes they obviously will never be able to sell. This is where the drama really strikes. I love Louis’ face when he realizes the problem:

That zoom in, lol. It needed to be gif’d.

Mr. Randall goes on to tell them they’re financially responsible for every box they ordered. Are you kidding me? That’s roughly $24k according to the World’s Finest prices. They’re 13. I love how Twitty says the title of the episode here! “Louis, we’re in deep...... chocolate” haha. Louis gets super angry at Twitty for ordering 400 boxes without consulting him because that’s how all the great duos work according to Louis Stevens: “Batman, he rescues people. And Robin... Robin... checks with Batman before he orders 400 boxes of chocolate!!!” I love that line. This leads to an all out war between Louis and Twitty. Louis takes his 400 boxes, and Twitty takes his. They’re officially competing against each other now. Twitty even says “this friendship is over!” Yikes. Let’s take a moment to appreciate Twitty’s face as he tries to talk while carrying large boxes tho:

The next day, Louis wakes up to find his family tap dancing in the living room. The usual. He’s up at 6am ready to start selling some chocolate, but Twitty is way ahead of him. Eileen already bought 6 bars from Twitty not knowing that they’re no longer working as a team! I love two things about this scene. Louis says “Me and Twitty had creative differences -- Because I’m creative and he’s different,” which is incredible. I’ve used this line irl before. And the second is Steve tap dancing while passive aggressively telling Louis to get his 400 boxes of chocolate out of the garage so he can have his parking space back.

“I’m not gonna ask you again... *jazz hands* GET THEM OUTTA THERE!” Tom Virtue is hilarious.

Louis then sets out on his chocolate selling mission and he’s absolutely terrible at it. He’s breaking into people’s homes, jumping on their beds... I can’t. Meanwhile, Twitty is THRIVING and coming up with much more creative ideas than Louis. Which is ironic because Louis just said HE’S the creative one, lol. Twitty’s ideas include a tricycle cart shop and a “Chocopalooza” performance -- a spoof on Lollapalooza obviously.

Not sure how his fake Jamaican accent and hat with mock-dreads would go over today though.

Twitty’s raking it in, and Louis has yet to sell one bar. He goes to Tawny for help but she refuses to buy from either of them because 1. The chocolate tastes like dirt and 2. they’re ruining their friendship over nothing basically.

I love how Louis has a girl take a bite of the chocolate and asks her “Is that the best chocolate bar you’ve ever eaten?” and she says “That’s NOT the best chocolate bar I’ve ever eaten.” World’s Finest happens to be quite nasty tasting too apparently. Well, according to their Amazon reviews at least. So this episode is pretty much true-to-life all around, lol.

Back at home, Donnie has turned their bathroom into a steaming hot sauna. This ain’t good because he blasted the hot water heater to do so. Which happens to be located in the garage.......... where 400 boxes of chocolate are stashed.

It’s like that trope where someone puts too much soap in the washing machine and then leaves it unattended... except with chocolate, because this is Even Stevens.

Louis and Ren notice some chocolate leaking into the driveway and panic. I mean, how do you stop 400 boxes of melting chocolate? “WE GOTTA EAT IT!!!!” is Louis’ suggestion, which is so funny omg. The chocolate leaks EVERYWHERE and we get this terrible CGI aerial shot to prove it:

Mr. Randall decides to conveniently show up here and demands money for the chocolate. Of course, Louis doesn’t have the money. Steve comes waltzing over as well and both he and Mr. Randall start slippin and slidin all over the place. It’s a little annoying but... hey. Steve, being an attorney, threatens to shut down Real Good Chocolate for being a scam. One thing I do not understand: Steve says that Mr. Randall will get his money back. (WHY?! I’d refuse.) And he also tells Louis that he’ll be doing chores for the next few months to pay for the chocolate. Does he mean he’ll be doing chores for the entire neighborhood? No amount of chores would raise the $1,000s of dollars Louis needs, lol. (Again, I’m overthinking this. I know.)

Naturally, everything works out in the end though. Louis and Twitty make up. Twitty ends up winning the sale and gets the fancy scooter, which Louis is cool with because he at least gets to ride it now.

The last minute of the episode is Ren talking on her ~new private phone line~! Except it ain’t so private. Louis has rigged her conversations to be broadcast through two megaphones outside.

I love how everyone and their cousin decided to walk through this residential neighborhood right as Ren declares she has a “major crush on Bobby Deaver.”

And that’s it! I just really like this episode. I always have. Idk what it is about it! There are quite a few things I find hilarious, which I’ve mentioned here. This one went by lightening fast when I was re-watching it, which can only mean one thing to me: It’s entertaining! I like how this episode actually deals with Louis and Twitty’s friendship as well as a bit of the sibling rivalry between Louis and Ren. I just think this one is solid all around and a good one to kick off the Top 25! Ayyyyy! Can’t believe we’re at the Top 25. Wow.

Thanks for reading!!

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rawbiredbest · 7 years

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The Lifeline of Tsukuyomi

Hello, and welcome to the first installment of Amrita Memories, a collection of crossover vignettes between the Yakuza (Ryu ga Gotoku) series and the game Nioh, re-imagining your favorite professional criminals as 17th Century samurai, ninjas, and mages, with a dash of demonic invasion and protective spirits.

IN THIS EPISODE: Saejima's found something precious, and could use some assistance.

WARNING: contains graphic, canon-typical depictions of violence, body horror, the supernatural, and war flashbacks.

Shoutouts to @taiga-saejima for putting up with me brainstorming this universe.

Read here or on AO3!

- - -

“You a magic man?”

Akiyama looks up from the pot of boiling broth. The new arrival almost fills the cave mouth entirely. Only the barest light, already filtered by the gloom of the storm raging outside, squeezes past his bulk. The ring of fur around his neck has long since drowned; rain drips from every channel of his armor plates.

“I prefer the term yamabushi,” Akiyama says, shifting to face the stranger, “But yes, I’ve been known to write the odd spell or two. That what you here for?” He suddenly chuckles, flashing a grin. “Sorry, sorry. I forget myself, it’s become so routine. Please, come in.”

The arrival stoops to fit inside the cave, tracking mud and wet behind him. Something nudges Akiyama’s hand. He looks down. It’s the white twin of his tonfa set. Hana, sitting nearby, pushes it closer. Shun gives her a comforting smile. He’s dealt with oni before.

The newcomer drops to the ground and Akiyama flinches, half-expecting the whole mountain to quake under his weight. By the campfire’s light, he can tell he’s a samurai. Was, at least. His garb is battered and broken in places, stained with the toils of a journey. What could be dirt is more likely blood. The enormous hammer on his back looks like it’s heavier than he is. Shun is glad it either hasn’t been used recently, or has been washed clean from the deluge. He doesn’t like the sight of brains.

“I have soup coming up in a second,” Akiyama says, “Why don’t you tell me about yourself?”

The stranger hesitates, grappling with his own thoughts. He climbed a mountain for this. Might as well trust the so-called yamabushi. “My name is Saejima Taiga,” he finally says, “I need your help.”

Akiyama glances at Hana. See? his look says, You were scared for nothing.

She shoots him a frown right back. The moment yokai know we’re up here, we're ruined, it replies.

“What kind of help? I have charms for money, luck, clarity of mind. I’ll tell you now, they’re not guaranteed to work. You can’t slap them on your head for an instant fix. You have to want them to work.”

Saejima shakes his head, spilling droplets across the cave. “Nothing like that. You can get crap like that from anybody.”

Akiyama’s eyebrow twitches. “I like to think they’re not cra--”

The samurai lifts his breastplate. Sitting inside, sheltered from the storm, is a spirit. The smallest one Akiyama’s ever seen, it could fit in his palm. Just a fuzzy ball of nigitama -- positive energy.

“How do I care for him?” Saejima asks.

Shun swallows his heart. “Put it back,” he says, nodding when Taiga tucks his armor back into place, “How long have you had it?”

“A day. Bad things were picking on him. That wasn’t right, so I stopped them.”

The yamabushi glances at the hammer.

“Couldn’t leave him behind,” Saejima continues, “He’s so little, you know? So I picked him up. Put him somewhere safe. Heard rumors you could help, so I came here. Can you?”

Akiyama touches his chest. “Did you know to put it there?”

“No. Seemed like a good idea.”

Shun thinks for a moment. Extracting three cups, he ladles soup into each. “Tell you what. Let’s sleep on this. I’ll have a better idea what to do in the morning.” He gives a cup to Hana and offers one to Saejima.

The samurai takes it, looks at the contents. Pieces of rabbit, plant roots, a few vegetables. He can’t be picky. Few people are willing to lend even wilted greens to a wandering disgrace.

“Cheers,” Akiyama exclaims. Everyone drinks. He spoons seconds and thirds for Taiga before he subjects himself to the shame of asking for more.

- - -

Hours later, when the storm has calmed and Saejima is twitching on a bed of straw, Akiyama goes to work. He feels a tad wretched for drugging his pilgrims, but how else can he judge them at their most sincere?

Tasogare bumps his fingers. Shun interprets it as comfort instead of the common sleepy wobble the baku calls a gait. He strokes down the pillars of stardust along its spine and feels the simultaneous sensation in the back of his mind. Touching his spirit is like putting his hand to a mirror and sinking into it like the surface of a pond. Touching himself and, at the same time, not.

Tasogare knows the drill. Despite the glow from its fur that paints the cave walls in shades of galactic violet, Saejima doesn’t stir as it approaches. It sniffs his skin, ox tail sashaying, and places the end of its trunk over his ear, mindful of its tusks.

Akiyama watches a bulge travel up its length. When Tasogare has collected enough, it slips its trunk into its mouth and swallows deeply. When it reaches for more, Shun kneels, extracting three talismans from inside his joi.

The first is for divination, for the wisdom and empathy. The second is for healing, for apologizing for what he has to do. The third is for protection, for a suit of armor around his mind. Just in case. They are far more potent than anything he gives his visitors, and he feels their effects the instant he casts them on himself. He is within and above his consciousness, watching it expand and drop roots, the cave and the mountain beyond coming into hyper-focus.

“Ready when you are,” he murmurs.

Tasogare turns to its host. Not a hint of a sway in its step this time. This is their duty, solemn and sacred. Akiyama gives the spirit’s paws a gentle squeeze. I’ll be fine.

The eye on the baku’s forehead opens and the cave is obliterated with consuming light.

- - -

It’s a battlefield. Akiyama has seen them before. A musket round sails past his face slow enough for him to spot the gases it trails from exploding gunpowder. He lets it pass, and wanders on.

Dreams are always slippery. A combination of his self-protective onmyo magic and the simple fact that the dream isn’t his makes them liquid and loose. This one is made worse from the smoke in the air, belched from cannons and untamed fires. Deep gouges made from stomping hoof and sprinting boot rake the earth into ash-topped waves. Men hide behind barricades, peeking out to raise their rifles. The bodies -- piles of corpses everywhere, thrown together to make way for soldiers soon to join the ranks of the dead.

Movement ahead. It’s Saejima.

He is fury incarnate. Swarmed by infantry, he pays no heed to the swords and spears clanging off his armor. Men fly with each swing of his hammer -- ribs crushed, limbs smashed, blood spilled. A soldier rushes in with his blade. Taiga knocks it up and brings the hammer down on his head. Red mud conceals the worst of the pulped skull.

Eighteen. Eighteen men destroyed for the sake of Lord Sakon, who doesn’t know he exists.

Saejima is on number nineteen when it happens, almost too fast for Akiyama to see. It comes from behind the yamabushi, the sound of flesh splitting open giving it away. He turns to face it. There’s no mistaking what it is. A snake the color of gore, tearing through the smog, whipping from one haggard soldier to another, bashing through their chests with jaws wide open, no hesitation, no remorse.

A spirit.

Akiyama raises his arms, braces himself, staring as the serpent barrels down on him with rows of fangs and a ravenous maw--

It blasts past him.

Shame flares hot in Shun’s chest. A novice mistake. This isn’t his dream. He isn’t here.

But Saejima--

The snake makes a lightning-fast revolution around Taiga, plowing through the men surrounding him, and it is out of sight, slashing over the battlefield for more prey. Ankle deep in the dead, Saejima tries to take hold of his thundering heart. He looks toward Sakon’s camp, toward some sign of order.

The ground jolts beneath their feet as huge crystalline spikes erupt from the earth. Akiyama stumbles to a knee and dirt grits against his palm. His breath catches in his throat -- if he can feel the dream, the protection talisman has worn off.

The sky turns crimson. From a crevasse in the earth the demon rises, bones from countless dead creeping together to form its six arms, its whip-like tail. Amrita lies caged in its chest and embedded in its skull. Two-thousand feet tall, born from hatred and magic blacker than midnight, the gasha-dokuro roars its rage.

Saejima flees.

Akiyama, shocked to his core, almost doesn’t notice. He turns and Saejima is gone. The pile of bodies shifts. It’s victim nineteen. Miasma pours from the ground, seeping into the gaping wound the snake spirit left in his chest. He looks at his fallen comrades even as aratama consumes him, swallowing his humanity in a thick case of orange hide, bristling horns, and jagged fangs. The newborn yokai bellows and lifts its blade.

Akiyama runs.

All around him, monsters are arriving. Soldiers rise to their feet, flesh sloughing off in thick, gray sheets until they are no more than skeletal wraiths. A one-eyed giant wrenches itself through a swirl of darkness. From the corner of his eye, Shun spots a heap of deceased mold themselves into an oni larger than a house. He tries to ignore the fire in his lungs. This isn’t really happening. He isn’t here.

Saejima--

He almost passes him. Taiga hasn’t found shelter -- the charred wood of a fallen tree is no barrier against devils. Still, he hides behind it as well as he can, curled into a ball. Akiyama kneels, reaching for him while around them the twilight of humankind looms.

Cannons blast from the Tokugawa camp. Saejima clasps his ears as four shots fly overhead. Three miss their target. The gasha-dokuro bats the fourth one out of the air. The round explodes uselessly against its hand. Shrieking, the demon counterattacks, spitting a volley of ghostly energy. Saejima bolts, scrambling as the air itself seems to harden around his feet.

Akiyama’s talismans splinter like twigs. He has no idea what will happen -- if the nightmare is so potent it will chew him up, if the underworld will rot him from the inside out. He bares his teeth, hands balling into fists. So be it, he thinks, If I die, I die helping my fellow man.

Golden eyes open as the the gasha-dokuro’s attack rains around him -- Tasogare’s eyes--

He’s in a forest. A dirt road. A decaying sign, nearly impossible to read in the mist that clings to his clothes and drips from the trees, points the way to the nearest towns.The only sound is wind through the leaves. It smells pungent with new, fresh growth.

Ten years have passed.

Shun breathes deep, reaching out with his mind for Tasogare’s presence. Cut it a bit closer next time, won’t you? he thinks. The baku stays hidden, but he feels it turn. He follows its gaze.

Saejima, walking through the undergrowth. Armor beaten and bashed, black hair slipping out from beneath his kabuto, the old soldier moves without destination, hammer leaving a furrow in the dirt as he drags it behind him. Anything to stay away from the aratama hounding him. Wriggling legs and a core of yellow energy propel them through the air. There are eighteen in total. One scurries ahead of Taiga, brushes against his cheek. Flinching with disgust, he slaps it away, and it joins the rest of the pack.

Lord Mitsunari is dead. Lord Sakon has vanished. Saejima is a ronin.

Akiyama follows him.

Emboldened, the aratama stage another offense. Weaving under and around each other, they nip at Taiga’s ankles, his fingers -- digging into gaps in iron plate and sinking needle teeth into his skin. “Enough,” he grunts, “Leave me be.”

We will never have enough, one of them whispers.

We had wives, another murmurs, We had children.

We became monsters, they say, So monsters we become.

Jaws find a tendon. Saejima chokes on a cry, crashing to the ground.

He imagines he will lie here forever. Perish and sink into the earth. He knows he is bound for the depths of the Sanzu River, for the cold waters to trap him for eternity. He deserves his fate, and so he stills, face in the mud, and waits.

Something growls.

Saejima knows he’s going to die, but he isn’t interested in being eaten alive. He lifts his head and sees a small shrine carved into a tree.

Within shines the prettiest light he’s ever seen.

A group of foxes circle the tree. The once holy creatures are shot through with amrita. The stones jut from their bodies like tumors. Their muzzles are coated in dry blood. Two of them are small, but the third is huge, easily the size of a bear. They snap their fangs and pant and whine, purple tongues swollen and hungry.

He reaches for his hammer. An aratama breaks a tooth through his fingernail.

Cringing, Saejima staggers to his feet. He’s already cursed. Nothing can worsen his situation. “Hey!”

The foxes turn toward him, hackles raised.

The ronin holds his hammer. “Pick on someone your own size!”

It’s over shockingly fast. Something activates in Saejima, a conduit wide open between his weapon and his soul, so blinding in its brutality that the foxes are defenseless. One catches a hammer to the back, spine broken backwards. Another is smashed upside the jaw, sending it crashing into a log. The third, the largest, spits an orb of foxfire.

Saejima reaches through it, oblivious to the heat splashing against his chest, grabs the fox’s throat, and slams the steel-hard horns of his kabuto onto its head, caving in its skull.

The corpses dissolve into shards of amrita and noxious gas.

Taiga slings the hammer onto his back. The little light in the shrine is unharmed. It’s truly beautiful, a pearlescent egg of a substance he can’t identify. Otherworldly and terrified.

“Sorry you had to see that,” he mutters, “That’s how it is.”

Realization hits him like a rock slide. He hasn’t felt this good in a decade. Even the blood dripping from his ruined nail isn’t painful. He looks over his shoulder. The eighteen aratama are staying away. Milling around each other in restless channels, and keeping their distance.

The light. They hate the light.

Saejima makes a decision before it even occurs to him to do so.

“Um,” he starts, unsure how exactly to speak to, quite frankly, the supernatural, “Listen. It ain’t safe here. You got lucky this time, but I have to keep moving. You want to come with me? If not, uh, smite me. Or something.”

He scoops the light into his palms. No bolts of lightning, no chasms opening beneath his feet. It weighs nothing and everything simultaneously. He slips it under his breastplate beside his heart.

If there’s a shrine out here, he thinks, there must be a village nearby. Somewhere to beg for a meal and pray no one recognizes an old enemy. He finds the dirt road, aratama trailing behind him.

“You have a name?”

No response.

“That’s fine. I don’t talk much either.”

Akiyama watches the reincarnated soldier until he fades into the murk of the dream. The forest comes undone. Trees and grass and ground meld into a hazy slime. Tasogare wraps its trunk around his hand, and as its third eye shuts, Shun knows what he has to do.

- - -

By morning, the rain has stopped. Saejima awakens to sunlight and clean air. He sits up and yawns, stretches his legs. Hana sits nearby, boiling water for tea.

“Mornin’,” he says. A hint of a smile twitches his lip. “Maybe there’s something to being a weird recluse. I haven’t slept that well in years.”

He turns deeper into the cave. Akiyama leans against a wall. The yamabushi’s face is pale, his eyes hang with shadows, and his clothes are covered in dust. His fingers are red and sore.

Taiga scowls. “What’s wrong with him? Get into some bad mushrooms?”

Hana purses her lips. “No, not this time. Must’ve been something he ate.”

The ronin stares at her, a hand touching his chest. Reacting to his heartbeat, the spirit pulses against his plate. “So now what? I came up here for noth--”

Akiyama startles awake with a cry. Hana nearly topples over. Saejima grabs for his hammer. They left it within my reach last night, it occurs to him.

Shun rubs his eyes, groaning. “Sorry, sorry. I...didn’t get much rest last night. Wanted to catch you before you left though.” He shifts to his knees, reaches into his joi.

The magatama is sunset orange. Though in the proper teardrop shape, its edges are rough and sharp. Freshly chiseled. There is a leather string through its hole.

“You don’t need my help,” Akiyama says, offering the charm with both hands, “You’re doing just fine. This is my gift to you. It’s a ward against evil, an enduring shield, and fuel for growth.” He bows his head. “And it will work, whether you believe me or not. Always. You have my word.”

Saejima hesitates. A purple thing sits behind Akiyama. Although it’s almost too sleepy to stand, tilting on its striped paws, the gleam in its eyes, open just a crack, is knowing. Taiga knows it’s a baku. And it’s been in his head.

He could kill them. They know who he is. If they squeal to Tokugawa’s forces, he’s as good as dead. He could kill them and throw the bodies to the crows and keep the cave as his lair.

Tiny mouths gnaw at his flesh.

He takes the magatama and slips it around his neck. It might be his imagination, but did the spirit kick against his chest? “Thanks.”

Shun looks up and smiles. “Don’t mention it. If you need anything else, you can always ask.”

“Yeah. How do I get out of here?”

The yamabushi explains. Turn right at that rock, make due west at that bush, mind the sheer cliffs and loose gravel. When he’s confident Saejima can make it off the mountain, he bows until the ronin leaves.

Then collapses face first to the ground.

A tug on his shoulder helps him sit up. “Nightmare?” Hana asks.

Akiyama sighs, pinching his brow. “The worst I’ve ever seen.” He stares at the ceiling. “I saw Sekigahara, Hana. The rumors are true. For a brief time, the yokai realm conquered ours. What does this mean about our shogunate? They’ve covered it up for years.”

“Is that a bad thing? Most people think yokai are just superstition.”

Until they turn up at their front door, he thinks. After a moment, he says, “Hana, would you hate me if I became a member of polite society again? Just for a while?”

Hana smiles, petting Tasogare’s trunk. The spirit leans into her touch. Akiyama feels it too, both as a comforting hand on his cheek, and a kind push to follow his dreams. “Only if you forget to bring me back a souvenir.”

#rawbi's writes #fic: amrita memories #yakuza #ryu ga gotoku #nioh #saejima taiga #akiyama shun #hana #a purple tapir elephant tiger...thing

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theperfectladiesman · 7 years

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Saiyuki meme part 2

34) What character do you think is least like yourself?

~Probably Ukoku. I’m not a psychopath or sociopath looking to snuff out life and light. And he’s super cunning and manipulative.

35) What is a shipping you’re not on board with? (Be respectful!)

~I pretty much ship nearly everything under the sun for the most part. Or can at least understand or respect a ship. I ship I wouldn’t really be on board with though would be Li Touten x Nataku. Or Dokugakuji’s mom x Doku/Gojyo. Just not my thing.

36 ) Which Saiyuki character do you think could easily adjust to modern times?

~I’d say nearly all the main cast. I think they’ve all been through so much & they’ve learned to get really good with adapting and rolling with the punches. But if I had to narrow it down, perhaps Goku. Followed closely by Gojyo. They seem the most easy going & quickly accepting & adaptable. Likewise, I think Kougaiji would be one of the ones who would struggle the most perhaps.

37) What is your favorite quote?

~There’s A LOT of good ones. Seeing as I have the opposite of a photographic memory... I can’t remember what my fav would be. A really good, memorable one though is where Kou overcame Ukoku’s mind control & gave him the whole speech where he wont be controlled again & his friends helped him to the light. Idk, something to that effect. Maybe I’ll come back to this question later after I find the exact lines.

38) Do you binge read the entire series or read selected chapters?

~Usually when I binge read or binge watch, it’s from start to finish on the entire series. If I just want to research something or remember a specific thing, it’s selected chapters.

39) Are you more a fan of Gensomaden Saiyuki or Saiyuki Reload/Gunlock?

~With the anime, Gensomaden. With the manga, its definitely Reload.

40) Your favorite character became a mythical beast. What would they be?

~This.... is a tough one. If I wanted to take the easy option, I’d say it would be Kougaiji and he’d totally be a dragon. Or if I wanted to be funny, saying Gojyo being a kappa. I could see Hakkai being the male form of a Dryad. But I think my favorite is Sanzo... and the only thing I can think of to liken him to is the Phoenix. Sanzo’s “like the sun” and Phoenix is a sun bird. Phoenix’s rise from the ashes and Sanzo got burned by Kou’s fire and still rose to his feet.

41) If you HAD to choose a character to die, who would it be?

~Well, this doesn’t say -MAIN- character. I wish I could say Ukoku... that would spare everyone so much misery... but I like the psycho bastard. So...Gyokumen Koushu. Then maybe Kou would get his mom back & he could team up with Sanzo!

42) Would you rather: Have all characters die or Have only one survive

~The question is.... would it be like Goku? Have them forget & then be reunited with the reincarnations? On one hand, it would be nice to have one survive to carry on the memory of everyone who died. But....I feel like there’s something incredibly unfair & cruel about having only one survive... so I guess I’d rather them all die.

43) If [character] got into a fight with [character] who would win?

~Lol its hard to do these ones when I’m just answering them myself.

44) What does Gojyo’s marking look like to you?

~I answered this one already, basically, a tribal flame

45) If Sanzo became a demon, what kind of marking do you think he’d have?

~I kinda wanna say something like the youkai Suika. Something small & round on his forehead in place of the chakra. Or it would probably be somewhere more discrete like his back or upper arm, a red color instead of black...idk the shape/design.

46) If [character] died, what do you think they’d be reborn as?

~I think Zakuro would love to be reborn in the golden age (Elizabethanera) cuz that’s when theatre, music, poetry & literature flourished. Perhaps Kougaiji/Hazel in the Victorian age and Ukoku in the Edwardian era... I know that’s not what the questions asking, but it is interesting to think diff era’s you’d put them in.

47) After the journey, what do you think [character] will be doing?

~Hmm... I’ll just stick with Gojyo for this one. Assuming he’s still alive after the journey. I think he’d stick with Hakkai. (grudingly)Helping out around the shop if Hakkai worked/owned a shop. I could see Gojyo maybe being a bar tender or an escort/host... or whatever those equivalents are in the Saiyuki era, or just keeps raking in money with his gambling while being domestic with Hakkai.

48) If [character] had a tumblr, what would they reblog?

~This one’s a fun question. I think if Gojyo had a tumblr, the majority would reflect the 3 things he likes most- women, booze, and smokes. Probably sprinkle in some selfies of himself being all sexy, cheesy pick up lines and puns, maybe some crude jokes, more scantily clad women, and gambling tips. Then there’s probably some stuff he’d reblog for the sake of Sanzo,Hakkai, and Goku if they had tumblr as well. Monkey posts to tease Goku, life hacks for Hakkai, & random stuff that would piss off Sanzo. Probably jokes about cranky old men or something.

49) What is your favorite animated scene?

~umm.... idk... all of Gaiden?

50) [Character]; Boxers, briefs, or commando?

~I feel like Gojyo would have an occasion for all three. Briefs when he’s planning to get with a lady or impress. Boxers when he’s lounging with the boys. And sometimes commando, mainly when sleeping if he has his own room.

51) What 3 or more tropes fits your favorite character?

~ummm.... running gag, ship tease, and funny moments. (gojyo)

52) What are 3 tropes that describe [character]?

~fiery redhead, the alcoholic, and jerk with a heart of gold (gojyo)

53) If Saiyuki got a 4th series, what would it be called?

~Well now that there is a 4th season coming out... Saiyuki Reload Blast XD (now we just need an Ibun OVA!!!)

54) If your favorite character could control an element, what would it be?

~Fav charater’s always been between Sanzo and Kougaiji... though recently I often wonder if it’s not Hazel now. I think Lightning suits Sanzo. Fire for Kou. And Ice for Hazel. Earth for Goku & Hakkai. Wind for Yaone.

55) Was there a character you used to love but no longer do?

~I dont think so actually. I think everyone I love I still do and everyone I hate I still do.

56) What has been the saddest moment for you in the series?

~Yakumo’s death. Yakumo’s whole chapter arc. And the end of Gaiden.

57) What is your favorite anime/manga genre?

~Psychological thriller/horror (but I also like romance & action & drama)

58) Name 5 other characters you like along with your fav Saiyuki character.

~Spike Spiegel, Axel, Seto Kaiba, Zelos Wilder, Alvin Svent, and Snow Villiers

59) Do you prefer subbed or dubbed anime?

~Dubbed. But most of the time subbed is 100 x’s better... obviously.

60) Did you watch the anime first or read the manga?

~Gensomaden anime came first.

61) Do you seek out spoilers or avoid at all cost?

~I avoid them at all cost, most of the time. Unless it’s something I’m not planning to watch or read.

62) Do you write fan fics or draw fan art? If so, link!

~I do, on both accounts. I don’t have any Saiyuki fanfics though. If anyone really want links, I’ll send them privately in IM’s. My Saiyuki fanart can all be found on my blog. Other fan art of diff fandoms is on DA. I only have a couple of completed fanfics on fanfiction.net... most of my work isn’t finished so that’s not really worth linking, I wouldn’t think.

63) What was the most pointless filler in the anime?

~I can’t really think of anything... maybe the sauna one where Goku thinks Sanzo turns into a demon. Or the kitty one. Don’t get me wrong, I loved both those episodes... but in regards to the plot, they don’t contribute a thing.

64) How do you describe Saiyuki to a friend who has never heard of it?

~Four guys travel west to stop the resurrection of a demon lord. Um... there’s lots of humor and action. It’s amazing. It’s.... kinda gay without actually being gay.

65) If you RP what is your favorite thing to Roleplay?

~answered this one~

66) What is your favorite Saiyuki Opening or Ending for the animes?

~The opening for Gaiden is very gorgeous, perhaps that one <3

67) What’s something you think would improve the series?

~HAVING MORE MANGA TRANSLATED AND PUBLISHED HERE IN AMERICA! And bring back some minor characters, that’d be cool to see.

68) Who, in your opinion, has the most tragic backstory?

~Geez... that’s like comparing a life time of stomach issues to someone who has a life time of mental illness... both are equally tragic. If I HAD to pick.... Yakumo.... I’m just gonna go with Yakumo. Technically, it’s not really a backstory but what’s he was presently doing. Having such a kind, soft heart... wanting nothing more but to save, shelter, and raise youkai kids... and choosing to kill them when they go berserk, perhaps with the whole mentality of ‘kill a few to save the whole’. It’s so tragic. Other than that, I can’t choose 1 over the other for tragic back stories cuz everyone has it equally bad in some way.

I guess I can say the tie would be between Gojyo, Sanzo, Hakkai, Goku, Dokugakuji, Hazel, and Nataku.

69) Who would be best at pleasing their lover?

~It kinda depends on what said lover wants most our of their partner and if it’s true love or a fling. If they both knew what they were doing, Goku & Kou would be very thorough, patient, and thoughtful lovers. Gojyo would be best at bringing the skill/pleasure in a pure sexual aspect. Hakkai’s difficult to pin down. He’d be gentle with the same qualities I listed for Gok/Kou.... but he’d have this wall up at the same time. Sanzo... just probably wouldn’t be the best, if he got intimate at all to begin with. Hazel’s so... antagonistic. I’ll just go with Gojyo or Dokugakuji.

70) What do you think Saiyuki would be like if Kougaiji and co were the main protagonists? Do you think you’d still enjoy it?

~A lot less humor and more dark because it would be more from the “villains” POV. Kou’s kinda angsty. I don’t think Saiyuki would be as well recieved and loved from Kougaiji’s & co’s pov... and there’s several characters we might have missed out on.... but I think it’s something I would still really enjoy. If its written by Kazuya Minekura, she’d make it amazing regardless.

71) What minor character had a significant impact on the plot?

~I think that would have to be Hazel Grouse.

72) On a scale from 1 - 10, 1 being not much and 10 being too much, how much does Saiyuki Gaiden hurt you?

~TEN

73) What character is still a mystery to you?

~Perhaps Koumyou or Ukoku (maybe even Yaone in the sense that we kinda know next to nothing about her... that I can recall). But with Koumyou especially, both of them are just so complex & different than I am that they’re difficult for me to understand.

74) What is the funniest moment in the series?

~It really says something about how much a perv I really am if the very first scene that pops into my mind after thinking about what my fav moment could be is.... Gojyo & Goku wrestling & arguing on the bed and that lady walks in & thinks they’re doing, or about to do, something naughty. Oddly, I Really like the scene where Gojyo mimics Sanzo too.

75) Who is your favorite minor character?

~Hazel or Banri or Zenon ...... Yakumo & Zakuro are p great too

76) Which character has had the most growth?

~I think that would have to be Goku

77) Which character needs more development?

~hmmmm........Lirin maybe?

#Saiyuki meme #part 2 #good lord this was long & took forever #but I wanted to do it for myself just for the hell of it & it was fun #when Im up all night with stomach issues & too tired to do anything else this was kinda a blessing

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