Working late

I am not joking when I say I genuinely think My Immortal has more artistic merit than any of the actual Harry Potter books.

DAAAAAAAAAAAAX <3 <3 (Patreon)

Like six months ago I made a sandwich that changed my life and I've been chasing that high ever since.

I have this tea cup I made in highschool (it’s really cute and was designed more like those Japanese ones without a handle than it was those fancy English style with even more elements to them) but I never actually asked if the glaze we used was food safe (we all used the same glaze on those cups specifically because the teacher glazed those ones in particular and I don’t remember checking. I glazed and painted every other project but only one of them was something you would use for food and that thing broke a few years ago and was honestly more decorative) and this has haunted me ever since. It’s a super cute cup and I adore it, but I have no idea if I can use it for its intended purpose and while I could buy a lead testing kit I’m not sure how I would check for anything else that might have been in that glaze. I know the color used but not the brand, so that’s not really a help either. The teacher I had left the district after that year because our school district paid art teachers a shit wage and we rotated through them like elementary school kids needing new shoes every year. I’m not entirely sure how I would contact her, but even if I did track her down (something not entirely impossible from what I know about her life outside of teaching us for a year, I would feel slightly weird about it though, even though she was my favorite art teacher) but I highly doubt she would remember something like the glaze she used on one project her students made at a school she taught at for one year. I’m not sure what other testing kits I would need besides lead to confidently say it’s safe enough for my personal use, and it’s annoyed me for several years now.

I still think about my fuckin creative mode minecraft save that I lost a while back switching out hard drives. it had a full walled city and an elevated highway, a giant cathedral, lore, I was midway through building the central tower of an even bigger city. and I did most of it by hand because I didn't learn about mc edit until I got to the fuckin tower. all the shops had detailed interiors and stories behind them. there was a market. I never really got back into minecraft fully after I lost that world.

Buckle in folks i'm gonna talk about Lost Galaxy doing a shot for shot recreation of my favourite Gingaman scene and why i think PR missed the mark.

FIRST THINGS FIRST this scene goes for about 2 and a half minutes in Gingaman but is stripped back to about 50 seconds in LG. Gingaman gives this scene time to steep in its apprehension, it makes you hold your breath and WAIT. LG on the other hand is a rapid fire shot to the conclusion that leaves very little time to actually build up the emotion.

The first big cut we see is in how much time the big brothers are given to come into frame.

We LINGER on Hyuuga coming up over the hill (where as Mike gets about 0.5 of a second). He's blurry, out of focus, framed by his brother and BullRiot as he stumbles over the hill. I'd love to tell you what Mike is doing, but the way Leo is holding the Magna Sword is just not working for the shot. It obscures Mike for too long, in a moment where him appearing is meant to be the reward for everything we've just been through.

Both these guys have spent months being possessed/controlled by a vengeful alien and have only just regained control of their own bodies. Hyuuga's still getting used to walking again, every step a struggle but he's not stopping. Meanwhile Mike is walking slowly through the sand like a triumphant action hero, which is FINE, but this scene is meant to be bitter sweet. Magna Defender DIED so Mike could be here, its not meant to feel triumphant.

Gingaman then gives us a great shot of Hyuuga, empty scabbard on his back (!!!), doing his best to keep staggering toward his team (very sad that LG cut this one out tbh)

I dont have an issue with this shots recreation - in fact i think it kinda nicely shows the differences personality wise between the two characters. Hyuuga is apprehensive, he KNOWS what he's put everyone (particularly Ryouma) through. Mike is relieved - its over, he finally gets to be home. Where I DO have an issue with Mike's reaction though -

is the complete disconnect between him and Leo. Leo missed his brother every single second that he was gone, he's still processing what he's seeing, and Mike just kinda... doesnt seem all that phased. It feels more like old friends seeing each other after some time apart, rather than brothers finally being reunited. Something else PR stripped from the scene was the camera angle differences. Ryouma is looking UP at Hyuuga, still not quite believing its really him - Mike and Leo are both on the same level.

Again, Gingaman gives us time to linger, it makes us hold out breath just that little bit longer before finally breaking the tension (I had to cut out a significant portion of the build up to Ryouma's sprint/the amount of time spent on their hug). Whereas this is all Mike and Leo get - a nice moment, but overall lacking in emotional weight.

Thats the crux of the issue really - the lack of emotional weight. There is a Hyuuga shaped hole left in Gingaman. Every character has history with Hyuuga, he means something different to all of them, everyone misses him. Him coming back was a DREAM to them, something they all wanted but assumed they couldnt have. Meanwhile half the Galaxy Rangers barely know who Mike is, he means literally nothing to them outside of "guy who pulled out the Quasar Saber and then died". Like can you honestly tell me Mike coming back meant as much to Damon and Maya as Hyuuga's return meant to Hayate and Hikaru??

What sucks is this scene COULD have been just as impactful in LG, but they didnt do the groundwork or give Mike the build up he needed. I love Leo, I wanted to see him get his brother back, I wanted him to get that closure, but instead all he got was a hollow, lackluster recreation of one of my favourite scenes in the whole franchise.

First Sonic Prime fanart let's go!

perseids. a thing for a Thing I help out with and a little love letter to Krita's watercolour brush engine (however snail-paced it might be on this poor laptop)

I'll actually be in a relatively light pollution-free place this year to watch them and I'm excited for it <3

aaaa

nice

ough I forgot to mention, she looks Like That because she's technically dead 🙈🙈 her body is locked in a symbiotic relationship with a demon, and her mind just happens to be caught in the crossfire 🐼

personally, i dont see the fundamental difference between deleting your account and making a new one and deleting all your old posts, if we're talking about "running from ones past", then what are you tryna hide there, bud?

Jesus christ the feeling of homesickness that hits after finishing a multichapter fic that rewires your whole internal neural network and gives you an involuntary heart transplanet with the main character's heart. This shit will never get easier and i wouldn't have it any other way

I have to have a chuckle at the Screenrant article posted recently about the Galactic Starcruiser, which totally wasn't about Jenny Nicholson's video honest.

In part, because early in Nicholson's video, she talks about how unnatural it is to have your influencers speak in adcopy and copyright rather than the more colloquial nicknames, and how it makes the people speaking about the product seem very insincere and, well, paid off. Because normal humans don't speak that way, but advertising does.

What's the first two lines in this article?

"As a life-long fan of Star Wars, there was nothing quite as exciting as finding out that I would be working on the immersive Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser experience. Located at the Walt Disney World Resort, the Galactic Starcruiser opened on March 1, 2022, and welcomed passengers to board a two-day, two-night cruise through the stars, during which they could live out their own Star Wars adventure."

No one talks like this naturally. No one writes like this naturally.

This is supposed to be your passioned defense of the place you worked at, the people you worked with, and the memories you made along the way. C'mon! Why don't you open with a story, perhaps an anecdote about the best moment you had working there, or the devastation of the day you lost your dream job. We need to feel your humanity! But there's nothing of that here, to the point where you can just hear the TM behind Galactic Starcruiser.

The first half of this article continues in this vein, reading like a press release Disney marketing put out, just with past tense rather than present or future tense:

"Essentially, the Starcruiser experience was a 48-hour movie that passengers were actually a part of. It was all facilitated through the "datapad," which was accessed through the Play Disney Parks app."

"To facilitate the overarching immersive experience and storytelling, the Starcruiser built a jam-packed itinerary for each and every guest that would consist of a variety of important activities: the captain's toast at muster, a bridge training exercise, lightsaber training, and more. These types of events were essential to understanding what was happening, as they would give passengers the chance to interact with characters and build their story. This is why the Starcruiser could never be just a hotel; every part of it was designed for enthusiastic interaction."

Like, c'mon. I used to work in television. I've seen and used adcopy in my former job, and this is some serious adcopy. It honestly wouldn't shock me if the author dredged up some old adcopy they had lying around about the topic and just transferred it over, changing the tense. You're not here to sell us this product, because there is no product to sell. It's gone, it's been gone for a year, you don't have to sell us on IT. Speak about your experiences.

The next part is yet another topic that Jenny Nicholson pointed out, the bad faith excuses that influencers and advertisers made for the extreme price point:

"What many people don't know, however, is that the price included much more than just a room. The passengers' food, park tickets, recreation activities on board, non-alcoholic drinks, and more were all included - with merchandise being one of the few additional costs on board."

Which is absolute bad faith reasoning, especially when there are plenty of other vacation options that are ALSO all-inclusive, but are MUCH cheaper and offer MORE amenities than the Galactic Starcruiser did! Including Disney Cruises, owned by the same company! Seriously, you can go on a halfway decent sounding cruise or all-inclusive resort somewhere warm for, like, a week or two and spend far less than GSC cost.

Then the last part is essentially: "All the workers liked working there and the bad reviews afterwards make the workers who worked on it feel sad. :("

Which, like, companies have been hiding behind that reasoning for ages. Curiously, the author never offers....any reasons or stories. WHY did working on it impact you so much? What set it apart, what were the people like, what did you like about working there, why are you so passionate about it even a year later? There's nothing, just a generic sort of "We worked hard." and "We're sad it's gone." Why? How? What happened? The video you're obviously writing this in response to is filled with personal anecdotes and stories, it's the backbone of the video! Again, you need to give us something to show your humanity!

Especially when you consider that Nicholson repeatedly points out that the only highlight about her experience, the only thing that kept the damn thing going was the workers.

She had nothing but praise for them, and nothing but contempt for the higher ups who wasted and abused that enthusiasm, to the point where one of her last points was "Hey, Disney is basically exploiting labor."

Much like Jenny, I'm also not condemning anyone who had a good time working there. Good! If you were having a good time at work, that's great. If you have good memories about the people, awesome. But I'll note two things:

a) That doesn't meant you weren't being exploited, and

b) That doesn't mean you have to be a useful idiot for the corporation you worked for afterwards.

I'm not conspiracy brained enough to go "Oh, Disney TOTALLY forced this article into being.", because a cursory examination of the author's prior works and such suggests a lifelong passion for Star Wars, she did work at the hotel, and she's a Star Wars Editor (whatever THAT means in this day and age) for Screen Rant. Apparently one of the heads of Screen Rant says that Disney had no hand in it either.

Though, I can see why people would think that way. It READS like a press release, not something a normal human being would write about an experience they feel passionate about.

•|Sad TWST headcanons

𝑯𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒔𝒍𝒂𝒃𝒚𝒖𝒍

𝑅𝑖𝑑𝑑𝑙𝑒 𝑅𝑜𝑠𝑒ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑠

If his mother calls him before or during eating a strawberry tart, he'd have a hard time finishing his tart after their conversation even if it has no relate to it. He would clutch his hands and just stare at his strawberry tart for a few minutes and eat it slowly. Still remembering the first day he tasted a tart, but not a good way

𝑇𝑟𝑒𝑦 𝐶𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟

Doesn't like it when people yell at him when mad as it reminds him when Riddles' mom yelled at him and his family for 3 hours straight. Although, he wouldn't react much if you yelled at him, but he will definetly hold a grudge

𝐷𝑒𝑢𝑐𝑒 𝑆𝑝𝑎𝑑𝑒

After Riddles' overblot, he'd not only get nightmares about it, he'd also get nightmares of Cater getting impaled with a spear from Riddle. In some dreams, Cater died, right infront of him and his roommates would have to wake him up. He pleaded them to not tell Cater but one of them slipped(It wasn't Ace. I refuse to believe he's THAT much of a jerk and clumsy)

𝐶𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝐷𝑖𝑎𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑑

Whenever his sister would call him, he'd just stare at it ringing. He doesn't want to talk to them but he also don't have the heart to reject it. Sadly, he can only do this when he's alone since people will point. But when he gets close to the prefect, he'd ignore the ringing and tell you to do the same. Just don't pester him and point at it more than 3 times

Comforts Deuce in a non-obvious way whenever his roommates accidentaly told him that Deuce had nightmares about his impalement

𝑅𝑢𝑔𝑔𝑖𝑒 𝐵𝑢𝑐𝑐ℎ𝑖

Tons of bite and scratch scars from his childhood due to fighting over food with another group of hyenas. As a male hyena, he's pretty tall in their book so he's the one to mostly go out to hunt and fight for food

Sometimes has to give up his food to female hyenas

𝐾𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑚 𝐴𝑙-𝐴𝑠𝑖𝑚

On the outside it looks like he trusts his siblings a lot but deep down he doesn't. He loves and trusts his baby siblings but once they reach the age of learning about the hierarchy, he'll start to doubt them but won't show it. So when they do end up trying to kill him, he'll be heartbroken but not surprised

𝐽𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑙 𝑉𝑖𝑝𝑒𝑟

He was 14 years old when he first killed someone to protect Kalim. One of the most traumatic event in his life but as he got older, it bothered him less and less. When he looks back at his first kill, he'll cringe. Thinking, "God why did I cry and puke that time? I should've expected it"

𝑂𝑟𝑡ℎ𝑜 𝑆ℎ𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑑

Somehow got a hold of a file full of old pictures and videos of H!Ortho and when he has nothing to do, he'd watch it privately. Observing how past Ortho acted and will try to recreate does actions.(It gives Idia tons of flashbacks)

𝐿𝑖𝑙𝑖𝑎 𝑉𝑎𝑛𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑔𝑒

Back when Silver wad a kid, he'd give Lilia every egg he found during Easter. But the moment Lilias' eyes spotted a black egg with bright green designs on it, he'd go quite and just stare at it. Remembering Meleanor and egg Malleus

𝑭𝒊𝒓𝒔𝒕 𝒚𝒆𝒂𝒓𝒔

After overblots, they really want to vent to their parents but they can't. Crowley pressured them to not tell anyone or their grades and the schools reputation will be at risk