fuck man, newspaper time

just finished szn 3 of venture bros.. no one talk to me rn

i saw them in the cookbook pages and Immediately thought of this meme:

We will. We will.

This God Damn show, man. I really was not ready to cry and morn for that D&D loving, Master of Puppets playing, metal head. But, he died the way he wanted, by being a hero.

Poor Dustin though. I want to hug him so bad.

it’s fucked up that some of kevin’s descriptors in-book by aftg narrators include words like unparalleled, brilliant, beautiful, disorienting and that riko thought kevin was smart and sharp-tongued and could see potential from a mile away and that every conversation at the winter banquet stopped as soon as kevin day walked into them. my brother you are a force of nature

Something about the fact that these shots are all grouped together, one after another, visually giving them equal weight just gets me. The narrative knows what's going to happen between JGY and Huaisang at this point, knows how it's going to treat JGY at the end of everything. And it still takes time to show Meng Yao instinctively and immediately going in front of Huaisang and Huaisang instinctively and immediately hiding behind him. It takes the time--literally, showed it in the background and focused on it with the same general amount of time as the other shots--to show that this act of protection and trust are just as real and true as Jiang Cheng defending his sister, as Wen Qing defending her younger brother.

Like, I dunno! There are other Nie juniors there! They have swords and shit! Huaisang could have gone and hid behind the wall, but he hid behind Meng Yao! And Meng Yao could have moved back with Huaisang, but he steps directly in front of him!

There's a lot CQL did to JGY's character and narrative that I don't like and that flatten or just straight up erase his full complexity. But I really appreciate the lengths that it went to in Episode 4 to explicitly tell us that he does not hesitate to protect Huaisang, even though at this point he does not have a sword and definitely does not have anywhere near the same cultivation power (if any) as any of the rest of the people in the room.

Right now, after being publicly humiliated, unarmed and definitely outclassed, he is brave. Along with the rest of the characters, he's allowed to be uncomplicatedly young and loyal and just as innocent as any of the other students there.

Tfw you get random chest pains spaced a few seconds apart while you're at work and think your time is finally coming but you're still alive a minute later

it does me psychic damage evrytime i relate to harry- from the dumb ass mullet and bitchin style (terrible), or the scars on the back of his hands- like its cathartic in a way to see a story like his, im no where done with the game, all i know is that this man has been hurt, hes such a soggy papertowel

Growing older I've realized that it's not only people that leave ghosts, but things can too. Anything that was once important and vivid, alive as part of life, which was there and is now gone, can leave an almost physical shadow—at my family's lake cabin yesterday I watched my friends jumping off the dock, and noticed they were diving from a place I never do, my sister never does either. When we were children my uncle's boat was moored alongside there, as much a part of our summers as the man who drove it. He never comes to the cabin anymore, my aunt divorced him; the boat was sold. But my sister and I still by habit swim around the boat, as though the invisible frame of it were still floating there. We move through a landscape of the present laid on top of the past, with history and memory repeating in action as well as thought. My friends saw the dock with fresh, innocent eyes, and so they were able to dive right through the ghost of the boat that I saw. I think maybe a haunting is an imprint of love lingering in the fabric of the perceived world, no matter the form, beloved objects just as much as beloved persons lingering beyond their passing away from the present.

SO. TO KICK OFF THE WEEK OF SPECULATION BEFORE THE UPDATE DROPS.

last night i had a bit of a Revelation. literally. i borderline woke up in a cold sweat with this realization. the way i lunged for my laptop to scream at friends... ough. lets get into it

so. i do believe I've made a couple of theory posts about Barnaby not being quite as receptive to his and Wally's "forced" best friendship as Wally - since the show wrote them to be friends instead of it happening naturally. i thought it might be a point of tension for Barn. i thought a lot.

YES SO I'M TOSSING (almost) ALL OF THAT OUT THE WINDOW!

the bios state Barnaby as Wally's best friend multiple times over. it had to be regularly reinforced. their colors were chosen to mark them as friends.

but Barnaby - presumably - can't see the bios, he wouldn't know the scripts. the friendship would be natural from his perspective. how would he know otherwise? even if the relationship started out synthetic, i don't doubt that it became genuine. in the context of their world and perceptions, realistically speaking Barnaby probably wouldn't sense anything wrong.

the reminders to be best friends weren't for Barnaby.

they were for Wally.

i'm starting to suspect that Wally is Barnaby's best friend, but Barnaby isn't Wally's. i think that Wally's "best friend" is Home - or at least Wally has a closer connection to them / Home is more important to Wally than anyone else is.

i remember reading this livestream trivia (from theneighborhoodwatch's doc, if you haven't their resources yet what are you even doing?):

and i assumed it was for Barnaby's side of the relationship. but it's not, is it? it's Wally's? and it makes too much fucking Sense! it fits! i can see it perfectly! i can feel things slotting together in my mind due to this shift in perspective, and i'm scared

Barnaby probably thinks the relationship is natural, just like how he thinks he's a real person in a real world. Wally probably knows that the relationship is a role, just like how he knows he's a puppet in a false reality.

that leaves me wondering how much of it is genuine on Wally's side. i don't doubt that they really are friends, but how deep does that connection go? in the interview, Wally sounded excited/proud about having a best friend, but how much came from a place of feeling, and how much came from a place of Fulfilling The Role? how much of it is performative? how much of it is a mask?

i've been seeing everything differently. Barnaby poses for Wally the most because he has good balance and is good at staying still, not because of favoritism or because he's Wally's best friend. in the 14 (15 including the hidden halloween) audios, Barnaby consistently seeks out Wally and checks in on him. Wally seems more casual about their relationship than Barnaby is.

i'm worried that Wally values Home & You/Us over Barnaby. that Barnaby is second or third place in Wally's heart. that Wally means more to Barnaby than he means to Wally. after all, only one of them needed their relationship to be reinforced on a seemingly regular basis.

i'm confident that Wally cares about / loves Barnaby, but the question is how much? to what extent?

thinking abt these two again. i need to be sedated

knight!sugu who sacrifices you to save the world thinking he has no other choice. who instantly becomes enveloped by a guilt so heavy it crushes him.

prince!gojo who sacrifices the world to save you with a smile on his face. who tells you to find him in your next life as he watches the stars go out one by one.

fiona gallagher // the angry man in the house

I’ll never forget you,

My Love…

OHH THIS MAN IS WAY TOO IMMACULATE I FEAR!!!!

kind of obsessed with being able to see a visual glimpse of the past with the picture on Harry's badge from roughly '43-'41. something something despite everything it's still you ...