ok i feel like. i feel like we're all ignoring the potential comedy of arthur's arm. like. yeah f in the chat and yeah he's incredibly terrified of mystery because of it. but like. once he gets over that. you're telling me arthur hasn't thought to try and hold it over the dog's head, like. at least once? like. "mystery i know you don't wanna help me do this thing, but like.... pleaseeeee? you owe me for the arm, you know."

anyway, semi-related to this– me and a friend had a silly little discussion(more like pseudo-roleplay,, sksjsksm),,, and it prompted me into making a little comic 'bout it,,, sksjsksjsk.

Astarion, Cazador and D&D vampire lore

Let’s talk about D&D vampires and some lore inconsistencies in Baldur’s Gate 3.

BG3 is not a game about vampires. It was obvious we won’t get a playable character who will be 100% vampire spawn from the handbooks - the mechanical balance would be disturbed in comparison with other characters. But we can list some weird stuff and missing aspects. For fun, for fanfiction, for nerdiness.

I still wonder why Cazador even asked Astarion if he wants to be turned. Sure, he could do that, so he could say later „ha ha you asked for it!” but still - weird. Anyway, a vampire lord doesn’t need to ask - he just bites his victim, kills it by drinking its blood and boom, a vampire spawn is made. Almost made…

… because at first the victim needs to be buried and layed in the ground before it rises. That’s the next question - how the hell did Cazador make 7000 spawns? Theoretically he needed to bury them all, dig them back/wait until they dig themselves out or something and transport them to his dungeon without being noticed. His servants could do that for him, but it still is a pretty big thing to cover. Besides…

… accordng to D&D 3.5 edition: "At any given time a vampire may have enslaved spawn totaling no more than twice its own Hit Dice" which means it was impossible for Cazador to create 7000 spawns. Sure, Baldur's Gate 3 uses 5 ed rules, but I'm sure they didn't change this one that much. (BUT! We can interpret this rule as: a vampire lord can create as many spawns as he wants, but the number of enslaved ones is limited. That's all right in this case).

That being said, Astarion is surprised when he discovers that all Cazador’s victims are spawns now. One of his dialogue options is „I thought Cazador was feeding on you”. Well yes, he had to feed on them to make them spawns Astarion, I thought you noticed that yourself 200 years ago. But let's say I understand your confusion, 7000 spawns mean Cazador's hit dice is 3500. Lol.

As a vampire spawn, Astarion should be able to regenerate even without biting someone. To be precise, he should get 10 health points at the start of every turn until he gets killed. But ok, this one doesn’t work in the sun, so let’s say it’s justified… unless the party is in the underdark, shadowlands or other dark place. But yeah, that would be too OP.

Astarion should be afraid of holy symbols, mirrors and garlic. That would be quite irritating, as he wouldn’t be able to even get near Selune's stuff or Lathander’s temple (Lathander HATES the undead, just ask poor Jander Sunstar). But let’s say the tadpole gave him immunity.

Spider climb. Imagine Astarion climbing walls or even ceilings like a damn Spiderman - this is what a regular vampire spawn can do. If the tadpole took away this ability, that’s not very nice of it.

Claws. Astarion should be able to transform his fingers into claws at will. That’s right, it works like another melee weapon.

Coffins, graves et cetera - bunk beds in Cazador's palace are a very anti-canon idea. Because D&D vampires have really traditional weaknesses, they always have to „sleep” in the ground they were buried in to recover - just like Cazador. Jander I mentioned earlier invented an un-lifehack, as he was traveling through Faerun by keeping some of the dirt from his grave in his pocket. He was scattering it in the place he wanted to rest for some time.

A vampire spawn can be controlled or banished by clerics like any other undead. That's right, when Shadowheart casts this one, Astarion should roll the dice, or else he will have to run away from her like those zombies you banished during your playthrough.

Last but not least, vampires get damage if they are in the flowing water, for example river, but you already know this one from the early access Astarion. Shame they removed it, in was a bit irritating but I loved it. It reminded me Astarion is a vampire not only in the dialogues.

That's all I can think of now. My knowledge is a mix of 3.5 and 5 ed, do with it what you want. I wouldn't mind more lore accuarte Astarion fanfics though.

Shocked Astarion reading D&D Monster Manual. Or Libris Mortis.

I felt that post of yours about the Dracula fandom and the way it talks about adaptations tbh, like, I'm someone who was very involved in DD last year and I've written critique myself about Dracula adaptations bc I love comparative analysis and really thinking about the choices adaptations make, for good or for ill, but from my personal experience, a lot of fandom commentary on adaptations isn't really thoughtful analysis, and don't get me wrong, I'm a hater sometimes too and enjoying venting, but I noticed that this year, there were so many posts that started out as thoughtful commentary on the book, then launched into bitching about the evils of adaptations out of nowhere, and people can write what they want, but it got tiring after awhile to be in a fandom with so much angry energy, not to mention the divergence in canon vs fanon that was much starker this year that made me feel like I had read a different book.

Also, every time I see people point at re: Dracula to be like, see, it's so easy to do a perfect 1:1 adaptation of the novel, why can't other adaptations do it?, it's like, it's an audiobook, a movie can't be that long, even a television mini-series would have to make cuts. And I might dislike a lot of choices adaptations make, but creatives absolutely have the right to take a public domain work and put their own spin on things beyond book accuracy as the number one goal - and like, do we truly want a 100% accurate adaptation when the novel is still ultimately a xenophobic reverse invasion story? Like, I would hope modern directors would seriously grapple with those aspects of the original story instead of reproducing Victorian bigotry unquestioned.

Hi, thank you for your response! I'm glad that my post resonated with a few people!

I definitely also felt a shift in energy with this season of Dracula Daily, and I'm pretty sure it is a direct result of the phenomena that is Re: Dracula. Don't get me wrong, I am a HUGE supporter of RE: Dracula, and I found it to be absolutely delightful specifically because it was a 1:1 adaptation of the book, but I also think that it has skewed the way people engage with all the other adaptations of Dracula. You are so right when you say that Re: Dracula's media as audiobook is what allowed it to be so authentic. Even if it was a long-form series, there would have to be creative liberties taken to account for visualising certain aspects of the text. I am 100% sure someone would be able to do it, but it would undoubtedly be a labour of love and expense.

I think the biggest thing that got lost in translation in my post is that I was speaking specifically on the rhetoric of "bad adaptation = bad media." I don't even like to use the term "bad adaptation" because it feels inaccurate and gives the connotation of being holistically terrible; "failed adaptation" or "inauthentic adaptation" seems more apt when discussing how close an adaptation relates to the source material. I think it is unfair for any adaptation to be written off solely on the fact that it does not strictly adhere to the original text. This can be in way of narrative, characterization, theme, etc. I don't think it's fair to say "x adaptation is bad because it ignores x from the text" because that fundamentally dismisses all the other attributes that contribute to whether or not a piece of media is subjectively good (because honestly that's all it is-- subjectivity). Media, especially film and stage, has so many dynamic and moving parts. There are so many attributes that contribute to the success of any one given thing, especially adaptations (which can claim the title with even the loosest references to the source material). I feel like the black and white thinking when it comes to this doesn't really allow for a dialogue to exist between people who enjoy Dracula adaptations for what they are and, forgive me for saying this, book purists.

Understandably, there is criticism against some adaptations that have claimed to follow the source text closely, but very distinctly did not (Ahum, Cappola). However, I think it does everyone a disservice to deny the impact of a lot of these (mostly) films. Someone in the reblogs of my original post did a good breakdown of the origins of the Dracula genre itself, and I think it goes to show that the story of Dracula has a life of its own outside of the pages of Bram Stoker's book.

The most annoying thing about the responses to my initial post was the refusal to believe that anyone was making these comparisons. I really would not have gone out on a limb to rant about this if I hadn't been consistently seeing vent posts in the main tag with mostly negative responses to a lot of different adaptations of Dracula based on the authenticity of them to the text. I admit I was frustrated when I wrote it, but it really was meant to just address the black and white thinking re: failed adaptations making bad media. This is not to say that criticism of adaptations isn't valid, but I think there should be more nuance to this conversation and that's what I wasn't seeing. It's not fun to dive into the broad Dracula tag and find post after post shitting on your favourite media because it isn't like the book.

Sorry this was a bit long! I am just really passionate about Dracula okay!! And I really really really like all the shitty little shows and movies and plays and comics and all other media that comes out of his name (because YES, a lot of adaptations really make vampire synonymous with Dracula and ROLL WITH IT). Vampires are really neat and the Dracula genre of film has been a huge influence on horror media. I think there is a lot to be said when analysing adaptations, but none of it can come from blanket statements against them.

@spider-xan

Satan headcanons because he’s babygirl and I think about him a lot

Satan is VERY expressive when he’s reading, almost to a comical extent. It started when he was little, and his brothers thought it was cute at the time, so nobody’s said anything. To this day, it’s very common to see him furrowing his brow or saying “No. No, actually, fuck you,” out loud at a book. He’s just too invested to hide what he’s thinking.

Because he’s so well-read on… literally everything about cats, he points out every single inaccuracy in the movies he and his brothers watch. By now, everybody can predict when he’s about to tell them that cats can’t actually have milk, etc.

Satan ABSOLUTELY has a fursona and no one can tell me otherwise. He's not super active in the community though, he just likes to think about it. He found out about the furry fandom through Levi, who jokingly drew him as a cat, and has been enamoured ever since. Sometimes Levi will gift him art of his fursona as a private birthday present. Nobody can know.

Satan occasionally boxes with Beel. It’s a good way to deal with anger and stay healthy at the same time, so why not?

I’m like 50% sure he canonically plays visual novels? He is at least aware of Danganronpa, whether through Levi or discovering it on his own.

This man is DYING to recite Shakespeare/Molière/etc. Give him the opportunity and he will give a spirited reenactment of whatever he’s reciting. It’s not to show off, he’s just passionate. Given that he’s usually composed (compared to everyone else, anyway), he also likes getting to be more animated once in a while.

This guy is so full of autism

Every now and then he goes shopping with Asmo to find clothes that work with his sensory issues.

He doesn’t really stim around others, primarily because he’s never seen anyone else do it before. Talk to him about it; encourage it; if you yourself do it, stim around him. Soon enough, you’ll see his happy hands.

Ever notice that in events, he’ll sometimes use words that seem out-of-character for him? (I still remember the whiplash I got when he said “yo” a few months ago.) He’s still figuring out who he is, and speech patterns are part of it. He’ll adopt words/phrases from books or his brothers for a short time to see what he likes and what he doesn’t. 

Introduce him to My Immortal and similar fanfics. He’ll hate them at first and tell you to get out of his room, but eventually he’ll crack and come to like them. He loves going back and forth, both of you reading to each other and doing silly voices for the dialogue.

Satan 100% has moments of thirteen-year-old snark. He got his ass handed to him for making the “blah blah blah” hand signal to mock Lucifer while Asmo was getting chewed out. Doesn’t regret a thing

More of an imagine than a headcanon, but hear me out. Young Satan got a cat plushie that he loved to DEATH. Like, he took it everywhere with him for decades. Now imagine him going to his big brother Levi, nearly in tears, asking him to fix it after the leg fell off.

Levi panics and is like, “Oh it’s okay!! I’ll fix it, don’t worry,” and gets out his sewing kit. Satan starts to calm down as he watches the plushie get patched up. Levi nervously hands it back when he’s done, and can’t help but feel soft when his baby brother smiles and thanks him

Also think about Satan still having that plushie after all this time, and occasionally knocking on Levi’s door to awkwardly ask him to fix it again

Levi can’t help but smile a little

Extraordinary vs Ordinary

so

i had originally intended to ramble for a while about how Dazai and Dostoy are both mega-geniuses able to make 100+ backup plans for their backup plans in case their first backup plan failed and then one of them whips out an uno reverse card to counter the other’s royal flush after one of them triggered the other’s trap card because someone played a blue-eyes white dragon against the other’s mega mewtwo EX and one of them only needs one more energy point to use keqing’s elemental burst as long as they have enough elemental dice to prevent the other from tapping enough lands to place a black lotus card

still with me? okay good

BUT i found something better to talk about thanks to some BSD Discord server members who pointed out some things from Crime & Punishment that coincide with what Dazai told Sigma in chapter 105, as well as an interesting theory that Dostoy’s ability only works on non-ability users. i’m not going to go too in-depth with the Dostoy ability theory since it’s already been done (not sure by who or where, sadly) and i don’t want to seem like i’m copying them, but it was worth mentioning before i get into my analysis

and also a little ‘side theory’ about Sigma’s involvement in the whole mess and why Dazai seems both wiling and reluctant to talk to Sigma while they’re escaping

🔺spoilers for chapters 105.5 and 105, minor spoilers for Dazai’s Entrance Exam, and very very minor spoilers Dostoyevsky’s Crime & Punishment🔻

So what is a ‘smart’ character?

I’m just going to talk about this briefly this because Dazai’s dialogue from chapter 105 addresses one of the problems I have with his character. It’s also the only time (that I can recall) Dazai has straight up called out his own intelligence. What’s more, he admits that he’s not above an average human, he simply observes and analyses more than an average human would. I don’t honestly know how to feel about this because we already have Ranpo, who genuinely uses deduction and analysis to solve mysteries. We also get to know Ranpo’s thought process during his deductions, since we’re either given his internal dialogue or he explains his methods of coming to a conclusion to another character. This is important in developing and writing ‘smart’ characters, because we get to know why they’re ‘smart’ and how their ‘smarts’ works, for lack of a better explanation. Ranpo is an example of a well written smart character in BSD.

Dazai and Dostoy are examples of… Less well written smart characters.

Obviously I can’t say that they’re not smart, because they certainly are, but the problem is we don’t really know how or why. Dazai’s 'smarts' could be attributed to his time in the Mafia under Mori’s teaching, since we learn in chapter 30 that Mori taught Dazai about war strategies and other miscellaneous things that all good crime bosses should know about. Y’know, as one does.

One of the reasons I don’t particularly like Dazai’s character is because we could be getting a similar treatment towards his thought process like we do for Ranpo, but we just don’t because his character is supposed to be more mysterious and unknown. That’s well and good and all, and has been done before in other mangas like Classroom of the Elite with Ayanokoji or Tomodachi Game with Yuuichi, BUT with those two we still eventually get to learn the hows and whys of their ‘smartness’ after the fact. With Dazai and Dostoy for that matter we kind of just, don’t really get to know. We’re left guessing why and how he knew this or that, or why he’s doing certain things certain ways or how on earth he could possibly predict this or that, etc. With Dostoy this is slightly more forgivable considering he is an antagonist and therefore we aren't really supposed to know everything, but a least a little explanation would be nice...

Well, in chapter 105, I suppose we get a very Dazai-esque explanation of why he’s smart…

No such thing as ‘superhuman’, apparently.

I think a lot of the time, we as readers attribute Dazai and Dostoy’s intelligence as just a product of them being more than ordinary humans. They’re the only two characters who feel ostracized for being ‘too intelligent’, and neither of them can have normal conversations because they can predict what the other person will say like some kind of Oda and Gide situation but without the precognition abilities.

However, Dazai straight up denies that he’s above average. In fact, he tells Sigma that there is no such thing as ‘average’ and ‘superhuman’, as no human are truly greater or lesser than another. This quote became extremely important to me when a member of the BSD Discord pointed out something from Dostoyevsky’s Crime & Punishment…

The main character, Raskolnikov, believes that people are divided into two categories; ‘extraordinary’ and ‘ordinary’. ‘Extraordinary’ humans were allowed to break certain laws, so long as they had a goal in mind that will benefit humanity as a whole. Raskelnikov goes on to claim that if these ‘extraordinary’ people had to sacrifice ‘ordinary’ people in order to reach their goals, that they could do so, but they couldn’t just kill randomly for no real reason.

In BSD, ‘extraordinary’ people could be equated to ability users, and ‘ordinary’ people is everyone else with no abilities. Another way of seeing it would be ‘smart’ characters and then everyone else, but there’s really only 3 or 4 ‘smart’ characters in BSD, so I think it’s more accurate to view it as ability users versus regular people.

Dostoy, similar to the main character of the novel which his ability is named after, believes that there is a such thing as ‘extraordinary’ and ‘ordinary’ humans. This is where the theory that his ability only works on non-ability users comes from, since the main character of the novel believes that ‘extraordinary’ people can kill (or sacrifice) ‘ordinary’ people, meaning ability users can kill non-ability users so long as they have a goal that will benefit humanity. Dostoy believes that ridding the world of ability users will benefit humanity, therefore legitimizing his reason to kill others. This is also doubled down on with the evidence that Dostoy has only ever killed non-ability users (Karma, and policemen) with his ability. When Nikolai touches him, nothing happens. He also manhandles the time-stopping ability user in the prison in chapter 105.5 and nothing happens, and he even goes so far as to get a gun to kill her with. This theory definitely has some solid legs to stand on.

Dazai, on the other hand, believes that this difference doesn’t exist. No human is above average, and therefore no human has the ‘privilege’ to kill others to further their goals. This is probably something he developed after he left the Mafia, for obvious reasons… i’m still sobbing a little

The fact that this is something he so readily tells Sigma, compared to how he speaks to every other character, shows that Dazai has something planned for Sigma in particular. He’s never mentioned this idea of ‘superhuman’ and ‘average human’ to anyone else in the story, especially in regards to himself. He admits that he’s just an average human, no better than Sigma or any other human in terms of ability or intelligence, he simply uses his average intelligence differently than others. I think it’s important to keep in mind that Dazai said this to Sigma, the character that’s been used and discarded by Dostoy. Sigma’s expression after Dazai tells him this is evidence of its importance. He seems almost sad or jealous, in a way that says “how could you possibly think that”, since Sigma thinks that Dazai and Dostoy are practically the same, especially in terms of intelligence. Sigma even initially believed that Dazai plans on doing the same thing to him that Dostoy has—using him for his ability and then discarding him. It’s actually exactly what he says in the next chapter, he says “I couldn’t believe that”, and tells Dazai that he is ‘superhuman’ because he defeated Dostoy.

I also think it’s interesting that Dazai calls Sigma a replacement for Kunikida.

Now, obviously Dazai doesn’t mean ‘replacement’ literally, I think he means that Sigma is replacing the motivation that Kunikida gives Dazai to do his work. Dazai even tells Sigma that he chose him to help the Agency in the long run by using Sigma’s ability to learn Dostoy’s plans. I feel like there’s really only one reason why Dazai would bring up the Agency here, and go so far as to mention that he’s on the Agency’s payroll… I think he wants to get Sigma into the Detective Agency. Why? Because he’d be protected under both the Agency’s name and its members, and the Skilled Business Permit and Fukuzawa’s ability as well, meaning Sigma would be able to use his ability as he wishes, and he wouldn’t have to worry about others using him for his ability and then getting rid of him. Dazai also becomes oddly reluctant to speak all of a sudden when Sigma asks him what the second reason for choosing him was, simply saying that Dostoy and Nikolai would’ve killed Sigma after the prison events to prevent him from talking. I think that, again, the reason why Dazai doesn’t elaborate further may be because he plans to give Sigma an entrance exam of some kind, so he doesn't want to say too much since Sigma is smart enough to figure something like that out if given the chance. I’ll talk more about this later because it took an exorbitant amount of time to read too many Bible verse analyses as a person who knows absolutely nothing about any of that stuff.

This battle of beliefs between Dazai and Dostoy will eventually come down to who is more willing to make sacrifices (go figure). Dazai was willing to sacrifice Chuuya in an attempt to kill Dostoy, which failed, possibly on purpose or possibly not. It’s hard to tell, considering Dazai should’ve definitely accounted for Chuuya being able to use gravity manipulation one way or another to escape the room. I think Dazai was trying to test how well Dostoy could utilize Chuuya, but that’s not what I’m here to theorize about. Dostoy’s sacrifice, I think, is a few different things. First, it’s Sigma considering the poor guy is currently trapped in the elevator with Dazai that’s filling with water. Secondly, Dostoy, as defined by his own beliefs as ‘extraordinary’, is allowed to kill ‘ordinary’ people so long as it benefits his goal, which benefits humanity in the long run. However, Dostoy kills an ability user, who could be considered another ‘extraordinary’ person. This prevents Dazai from communicating with Ango further. But, it doesn’t change the fact that he killed someone that wasn’t ‘ordinary’ just for the sake of stopping Dazai from communicating with the outside. However, Dazai defines himself as ‘ordinary’ because he doesn’t believe that there’s a difference, so does that technically mean Dostoy is given the right to kill him to further his own goals? Who knows.

Depending on who you ask, one might say that Dostoy’s ultimate goal of ridding the world of all ability users is more beneficial to humanity than whatever Dazai is doing. Others (and most of us readers) would argue that Dazai escaping and reuniting with the ADA would be more beneficial because they’re trying to stop the DOA from using One Order. However, there’s 2 other ‘extraordinary’ people to account for here.

Sigma and Chuuya

Chuuya is… A vampire? A human again? Under the influence of Dostoy similar to Hawthorne? Who the hell knows anymore. However, he probably doesn’t give a dick diddly fuck about whether there’s humans who are above average and others who are just average. He didn’t even consider himself as human in general for a while in the first place, so he probably has views similar to Dazai’s. But considering Dazai’s betrayal of Chuuya and soukoku’s bond of trust, I’m not too sure Chuuya is going to want to help Dazai anymore.

Sigma, however, might actually be the centerpiece around which the prison arc ends. He’s a wildcard—he no longer belongs in the DOA, his casino is gone, and the government would probably just use him for his ability like they did Mushitaro. I think Dazai is more painfully aware of this than anyone else, because not only has he both witnessed and experienced Mori use and discard mafioso (like Oda), but he also picked up Atsushi when the boy was wanted on the black market, by the government, and had gotten thrown out of the orphanage. Sigma is essentially Atsushi 2.0 in terms of circumstances, and he’s essential in Dazai’s plans for getting information on Dostoy’s and the DOA’s goals.

Going back to Dazai’s plans for Sigma, I think that Sigma is going to be responsible for either finding a way to escape the elevator, or at least a feat equal to that considering the requirements of the entrance exam to get into the Agency. I don’t think it’s going to be another Kyouka situation, since Sigma hasn’t done anything wrong and has been a victim of circumstance since he was created three years ago, but I think it’s going to be similar to either Dazai’s own entrance exam, or Atsushi entrance exam. Here’s my reasoning:

1. Sigma has to prove that he’s going to help the Agency without betraying them. His distrust of Dazai and unease about the Agency is something that Dazai is surely aware of, and knowing that, he’s probably going to put Sigma in a situation where he has to prove whether his alliances are still with Dostoy or if he’s going to try his chances with the Agency and Dazai. Or maybe Dazai might use Sigma to trick Dostoy into thinking he won, similar to how Kunikida “shot” Dazai under the pretense that he could’ve been the Azure Messenger, only to reveal that Kunikida used a gun made with his ability so the bullet would be nullified when it hit Dazai in order to trick the real Azure Messenger. Maybe Dazai is going to have Sigma do something to trick Dostoy into thinking he won?

2. Sigma currently has nowhere to go after this arc ends, really. Similar to how Atsushi has nowhere to go in the beginning of the story, Dazai mentions that he has an employment opportunity for Atsushi but doesn’t tell him where. Dazai has done the opposite with Sigma, mentioning that Dazai works for the Agency and is on its payroll even while he’s in prison, but doesn’t say anything about Sigma being allowed to join the Agency. However, Sigma does begin to contemplate what the Agency is, and the fact that Dazai isn’t using the Agency, nor is the agency using Dazai, unlike all of the experiences Sigma has had up to this point. Atsushi’s situation was similar in that he wasn’t wanted in the orphanage, and no one else seemed willing to help him because of the Tiger. But Dazai was different, and he helped Atsushi find a place to belong with the Agency. I think Dazai could be taking a similar approach with Sigma here, since he’s basically another orphan. And being on the side that protects the orphaned, is just a bit more wonderful, right? right T^T

Trial by Ordeal

Now, I’m not necessarily talking about the old trial system in 1100’s England that used trials by ordeals to figure out if someone was lying or telling the truth. I’m talking about the Christian belief that God made humans go through Trials to judge whether or not they were innocent, and if so, they were raised to heaven (since innocent people were supposed to float in water whereas guilty people sunk to the bottom). Dostoy talks about God a decent amount as a part of his character, including in this last chapter when he states that he is ‘a subordinate of God’. He calls Dazai’s trap a Trial by Flood, which is almost the same wording as the Christian Trial by Water that determined whether or not someone was innocent. Dostoy, having survived the trial, now tells Dazai he must go through the same Trial by Flood. I think this is an interesting way to look at it because we all know that both Dazai and Dostoy are guilty of a lot of heinous crimes that would definitely prevent them from being considered innocent, Chuuya as well considering he’s an executive in the Port Mafia, but what about Sigma? As far as we know, he’s never killed anyone. I’d argue he wasn’t responsible for injuring Taneda back at the beginning of the Hunting Dogs arc either, it was probably Nikolai, and Sigma just used his ability on Taneda as instructed. He is, for all intents and purposes, innocent. So, will he be able to make it through this Trial by Water? Saving Dazai, and thereby saving the Agency in the process and completing an entrance exam?

I guess we just have to wait and see.

Oh BOY this was a long one! Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed! I apologize if my part about Christianity and the Trials isn’t 100% correct, I had to do a lot of googling and reading to even find information on it, and even then I didn’t really understand any of it as someone who’s definitely not religious lol. I kind of hope we do get to see Sigma get an entrance exam and be given the chance to find a new home with the Agency once all this is over, because he truly deserves it at this point. He’s suffered so much. Just give the man a break pls.

I suppose there’s also a mini theory that sits in the back of my mind sometimes about what would happen if Dazai ever touched the Book or its pages. If Dazai touched, and thereby nullified, the page that Sigma is written on, would he cease to exist…? Does Sigma exist in the Beast universe, or would he not because Dazai has touched the Book in that universe??? So many questions and no answers in sight it seems. Also, what would happen if Dazai ends up dying at the end of this prison arc, either with or without Dostoy also dying?? Would he give Chuuya the Odasaku treatment and tell him to join the Agency? Would Fukuzawa’s ability work on Corruption????? Now that’s something I really wanna know.

#DINAH Masterpost: Rafael & Ronen's M&Gs

This is all from memory, lots of quick notes taken after the meetings and other fans’ contributions so I apologize in advance if some things/dialogues are not 100% accurate. Photo credits to xkeelyx1

Ronen's Saturday M&G: • He just recently hung out with Liv Tyler. He misses her a lot on set and he hopes she will be back for the tarlos wedding considering both Carlos and Nancy are very close to her.

• His favourite Harry Styles songs right now are "Cinema" and "Boyfriends". • He thinks TK got into his addiction the same way he did. Just being around wrong people and bad influences in high school especially considering how New York is the biggest place for opioids. He said TK was probably a bad boy. TK and him are so similar it's weird. After reading his first script he thought playing the character would be kind of therapeutic for him. • The first two things that are on his bucket list are: teach the same theatre program in his high school that he started in and work with the students and be one of the coaches; and start an opioid program in Staten Island because that's the worst borough in New York for drugs. • He owes his life to one of his high school teachers who was like a mum for him in high school. • He would love to do theatre and Broadway at some point. He wants to do "Streetcar named Desire". That's one of his biggest dreams. • He thinks TK and Andrea’s relationship has got to bloom at some point. TK doesn't have a mother figure anymore. Tommy is his captain so Andrea would be perfect for that role. He would love to get more TK and Gabriel stuff too.   • Roxana is hilarious and amazing to work with. • Someone suggested TK could sing to Carlos at their wedding and he said that the perfect song would be "Heroes" by Enrique Iglesias. • He thinks a crossover in season 4 is pretty much given. They couldn't do one in season 3 because Covid killed their budget but he thinks their budget is gonna get back to normal soon. • The plan for season 3 was to have a two episodes crossover. • Team Buck or team Eddie? Probably team Buck since they had some scenes together in the crossover. • He would like to shoot a scene with Angela Bassett. • He really hopes we're gonna see Jonah. If he's not mistaken Tim has said we're probably gonna see Enzo at some point too. Enzo is a massive father figure for TK cause he was there when Owen wasn't. He wants Alexander Skarsgard to play the part. "TK is gonna have a crush on his step daddy, or well, step zaddy". Timothy Olyphant or Josh Duhamel would be cool too. • We're getting a big tarlos wedding. Tim wants to make sure they earn that. Rafael and him want to see them being engaged and not rushed into it. Things are probably not gonna go smooth all the time for them. • He really wants to get more Carlos backstory. "I need to see more, I don't know anything about Carlos as Ronen." A fan was like "where do you come from?" referring to Carlos and Ronen went "heaven". • He thinks TK would be a hot mess if Carlos were to get hurt. He wouldn't handle it stoically as Carlos and he would definitely try to kill the person who hurt him. That could also potentially put his sobriety at risk. He would love to do another fight scene. • He thinks a 911 Lone Star convention with the whole cast is feasible. 

Rafael's Saturday M&G: • He thinks Carlos has sisters, he can't be an only child. He definitely grew up with a lot of women in the house. • He thinks they're still playing it very safe with tarlos and that they're still being generic with their storylines. • In the 3x08 promo we see Carlos on the phone while the plane was going down. Carlos was trying to reach TK and he left him a voicemail. He remembered what the message was but he wouldn't tell us. • The cut dinner scene from season 1 was Carlos making dinner and him and TK were talking about Iris. But production changed the storyline so that scene didn't really make any sense anymore so that's why it got cut. TK was also feeling guilty about something "as always". He finds it so ridiculous that they keep using the still from that cut scene to promote the show everywhere. • He wants to see Carlos get hurt too but he's starting to take it personally that so many people want him to be in pain. • He thinks there's a huge difference in Carlos getting hurt and in police officer Reyes getting hurt. Because if it's Carlos getting hurt then that's more exclusive to TK and his family and potentially the 126; while if it's police officer Reyes getting hurt then that involves the department and literally everybody else. • He wants TK to think he got stood up at the wedding so bad. It could go that Carlos is on his way to the wedding and maybe an accident happens and there's traffic and he could get hurt there.  • He really wants a Carlos begins episode. He wants to see what kind of mistakes he makes cause that man's not perfect. • He brought up fanfiction out of nowhere. He hasn't read any and he was shocked to hear there are graphic ones. "Are there some orgies happening? Is that why it's so hot in here?" He asked for titles but we all refused. • Shooting the tarlos proposal was the most fun he had shooting a scene. That was the last shoot of the second to last day. • He finds it funny that people focused on the "fucking lizard" line during the proposal. • He might write a script rather than a book. • He wants to get Ronen back for always posting videos of him sleeping. A fan called Ronen "a little shit" for doing that and he absolutely lost it. About him reacting with his famous "Ronen": "I love Ronen, I really do. I understand him and I see him so that's why I react that way".

Tarlos Saturday M&G: • Ronen: "you guys made us the highest selling couple of the convention. I mean it's not a competition but..." Rafael laughing: "It's not a competition but fuck them all" • They got asked if they have any lgbtq+ couples or tv shows/movies they look up to. For Rafael it's "Weekend" and "God’s Own Country"; for Ronen it's "Moonlight". • A fan asked them about tarlos wearing shoes in bed during 2x12. They tried shooting the scene with them taking off their shoes but it didn't flow and it was mostly a security/technical matter since they literally had to walk through real fire. That would have just been an impediment to get the scene out. • Carlos having longer hair in season 3 was all Rafael. • They got asked who breaks character more often between the two and it's Rafael. Cause he doesn't shoot often with Julian, Natacha and Brian and shooting with them is both the best and worst time ever. They're all funny and always make him histerically laugh. During the scene when he goes into the firehouse in 3x07, Julian, Natacha and Brian wouldn't stop making him laugh and they had to adlib during that scene so they would just keep saying the dumbest stuff. In that scene Ronen adlibs "I'm not even a firefighter anymore". Jim says some crazy stuff too and at times it's really hard to keep going during scenes. • They got asked if they could choose another actor to play Carlos/TK who would they choose and Ronen didn't miss a beat and said that nobody else could ever play Carlos Reyes. Ronen: "This is the guy and I can't even begin to imagine somebody else in the part."  Rafael: "I've never encountered myself wishing that another actor would play his role" Ronen: "Except when I annoy him and take videos in secret and he's just "Ronen". There are so many videos that you've never seen". Rafael: "I like this guy and I'm not just saying that cause he said it." • Regarding the audition tapes. Rafael said he never wants to see them but those would probably explain why they're here right now. Their connection was right from the beginning. They barely spoke and the chemistry was just there. Ronen said he doesn't want to be mean but once Rafael auditioned he went to the producers and said "Do we even have to see the other guy?" cause there was just another actor auditioning for the part. • Rafael talked again about how they're playing it safe with tarlos and Ronen went "in Station 19 you have Danielle flashing Stefania and I'm like "why aren't we doing that???" Rafael: "Are you gonna wear a sock?" Ronen: "No" Rafael: "No?! No sock?! Lord" Ronen: "I'll wear underwear, the camera just won't see it." Rafael: "Are we still talking about it?!" • The scenes in 3x15 with the lizard were added two days before shooting the episode. Rafael didn't know the lizard was real at first and just shaked the box it was in. It didn't move at all so he thought it was fake and he ended up traumatizing the poor animal. • Rafael said he can actually picture Ronen doing something like that too, just picking up a random lizard and bringing it home and Rafael would just have the same reaction as Carlos and go "Ronen NO" • A fan mentioned how they would love to see them both doing theatre and Ronen went "Tarlos: a Broadway show. Or Tarlos: the musical" Rafael: "It would be the gayest thing ever". • Lighting has been a problem for the past 3 seasons. The scenes are shot beautifully but the filter they use just make them all look grey and it gets frustrating for them too because irl they don't look anything like that. But it definitely improved from season 1. • They would love to have Liv back for the tarlos wedding. • They didn't notice that the time the proposal happened at (3:18am) was also the number of the episode. • During Carlos' hospital monologue Rafael improvised the "Believe people when they tell you who they are". They shot the dream sequence first so in order to add something for Carlos to appear really mad, he got mad too and added that line. The dream sequence was a crazy day of shooting cause they had to keep putting Rafael in and out of the scene while Ronen was walking around the living room. • They both want the wedding to happen at the right time and for it to not be rushed.

Tarlos Sunday Breakfast: • Ronen mentioned how he was waiting for Rafael to do the tarlos photos the day before and that he stood in line with fans. Ronen: "You were late and I was in line waiting for you." Rafael: "Ronen, do you know the joy I get in having YOU wait for me" Ronen: "I'm pretty punctual" Rafael: "Yeah, we're not talking about that" Ronen: "on SET. Not the make up trailer" • Ronen is an iced coffee guy and he didn't know what Rafael drinks, which is hot black coffee. When he suggested he likes tea Rafael was so affronted. He judged Ronen for liking iced coffee because it's such an American thing. • A fan brought them a gift and they joked that it's for both of them. Rafael: "You give Ronen something and then I meet all of you and you go "I gave Ronen something for you" and I go??? Where is it???" We learned Ronen doesn't share alcohol. • Someone was talking about the heat and went "where's a paramedic when you need one" and Rafael pointed at Ronen and went "She's right here" • Rafael loves the dinner scene in 1x03 cause that's the scene that made him fall in love with tarlos. • Ronen's favourite scene always changes. The engagement is number 1 and then he loves the scenes where they talk about TK's sponsor in 3x13. • Rafael really got mad at the "You know he's straight, right?" line in that scene cause that’s such a stereotypical line among queer couples. For Ronen that just made it more real.

Rafael's Sunday M&G: • Not many questions were asked during this M&G cause it was mostly a conversation about the convention, Paris, the videos he recorded for fans and the show in general and what it means to people and how it helped lots of fans during the pandemic. • He talked a bit about his trip to Ireland and how he risked his life there by driving too close to the edge of a cliff. • "Eveyone's a child. Everyone goes to bed having ice cream and watching Pocahontas" • He has watched Heartstopper.

i feel like i ought to note that sa.mpo's view of friendship is heavily skewed. he comes out calling people friend's pretty much right away in an effort to disarm them. this is done regardless of whether or not he's intending on dipping into their pockets

to be able to pick up on whether or not he actually cares about something is difficult because he could very much inadvertently lead someone to believe that he does care about something based on what he's said or how he reacts when the reality is that he really doesn't care one way or the other about the thing (or the person for that matter)

to say that someone that knows him well enough would be able to pick up on it is still tricky because the only demonstrated aspects i've been able to note or write myself has been with sparkle (of all people), giovanni, and then in his closest ship i've been able to write. though with the two Fools i think he's also not entirely buddy buddy with them, it's just a byproduct of working with them. recognizing some of what makes him tick and what he's drawn to by being around him long enough

caring and thinking of someone as a true friend isn't necessarily equal either though, he's still capable of doing harm to that person with intent or without intent. in the ship i've written with ayla, he never saw gep as a friend even though sa.mpo came to care about him. he also still hurt gep, 100% with the intent of hurting gep despite having some care for him

a real friend isn't a concept he can fully grasp in his mind because he's never really allowed it. you can think of yourself as his friend and he'll probably be ecstatic for manipulative reasons. i still believe that the closest thing in canon that we get to seeing a friend of his, outside the Fool (which again i don't think he's truly buddy buddy with any even if he is friendly) is ser.val. and even then that's saying something as that went pretty south

do i think he views the trailblazer as a real friend... mmm. so from an objective standpoint. no. the dialogue options given as they are seem pretty hostile to sa.mpo.. even if the TB can't get him out of their head lmao. he's very quick to remind them of how he's their friend and doesn't have it out for them. he's reliable and helpful but that's because he does get some return on that.

i also think there's a whole different reason for him trying to "get close" that's linked to ak.ivili and MF stuff that i've kinda mentioned in the past. he's never directly told the TB the truth about himself, just continues to mess with them. liking messing with and interacting with the TB is a whole other thing, yeah..

this was a long form way of me saying that he's not really sure what a friendship is meant to look like even if he has something close to that. and then on top of that he's 100% trying to use you if he's trying quickly to call you friend. caring in his mind doesn't necessarily equate to you being a friend. he could care just because he gets some form of pleasure or joy out of the interaction that hits differently. none of this means he can't have a real friend nor can his feelings be more... i've been able to explore that in writing... but he's fickle and difficult

the last bit is why i have an issue with people being quick to say "omg he really does care about ja.rilo!" ... how is that a good thing if his idea of a good time is crime? jkasdhgklj like i got my ship bias too but i'm being realistic

May Check-In

This is a bit late, because I've been debugging the past two days.

So I bought Tropico 6 during the last Steam sale. If you haven't seen me posting for a while, blame by wish to be a benevolent dictator of a fake Caribbean island.

Onto the usual index:

Recap of last month’s progress

IF Events in the Next Month (I won't do this anymore)

Plan for the next month

Still long post under the break. If you want a mini version, head on over to itch.io as usual!

April Progress

From last month, what did we do:

Play more games: ✅

I started so good, finishing reviewing the SeedComp! entries, as well as the Revival Jam and had started on the Spring Thing... then I got distracted by the TALJ and Tropico... I also need to update @manonamora-if-reviews at some point... It's at least 100 reviews behind.

Finish the Code of Ch5✅ of Harcourt and edit the Ending Chapter ✅

YES! IT IS DONE! I have finally fixed those godamn doors in the maze that were giving me so much trouble. Also MelS has gotten my edits on all the Chapters/files (and was given extra comments because I also fixed some code in previous chapters). He is hard at work dying editing the missing text.

The only thing left for me is to: - add the maze visuals (map, book/letter formatting) - settle on a design for the final maze puzzle (need to so some research) - include the missing chapter/text (waiting for MelS)

Finish fixing The Roads Not Taken. Or An Eggcellent Preparation. Maybe the other parser too (it just needs a smidge of polish).

LOL... This is the shameful failure that is following me around, ringing that darn bell.

Should i give up on it? Maybe one day...

Complete the TALJ entry. ✅

I have been battling this one the whole morning trying to fix so many bugs. But I'm pretty happy about it. For one: it was actually tested by someone (not like last year). For two: it's actually an easy parser (like you can't lose!).

And the idea had been ringing in my head for so long, I had the prompt submitted to last SeedComp!.

But yeah, this had been happening for a while already. And even though it doesn't have the level of polish I had hopped (future me problem with updates), it is probably one of the better one I've made.

Anyway, play Lysidice and the Minotaur (I'll have an official post tomorrow). (and you can vote for it if you want...)

What else happened this month????

Well, the SeedComp! ended, so I had to deal with all the admin, and making the cool stickers for the different entries. That took quite a bit of time... but worth it! Some really cool entries this year, yet again!

Well, this is more of it's been done last month but released this month: Les lettres du Docteur Jeangille has been translated into English, for the Spring Thing (in the Main Garden, if you feel like voting for games). You can find the post there!

I've been also drafting some post-mortems, one for Jeangille and one for Lysidice. They should come out during the month, at some point.

:/ I have to update my website again now...

I wanted to do an entry in the Dialogue Jam, but my idea didn't pan out on time (too buggy for release). Or eer... cough cough... I had enough will power not to do it? Anyway, also I made the Really Bad IF Jam, which starts today!

What’s happening in May?

As mentioned at the start, I'm dropping this section from my check-in. First, it's buried deep in a wall of text, so no visibility (it should have been a separate post, oh well). If people actually check the events out, I'm sure it would be a miracle.

But mainly... a zine has popped up recently, specifically about IF called What's New in IF? (@if-whats-new), releasing weekly. Since it includes events, like the jams/comps/conferences I used to mention here (and it looks more sleek than a Tumblr post), I'll just leave them do all that hard work instead 😅

So yea... as long as the zine is happening, I'm out 😅 Well, I'll drop them links to my jams and stuff I see, because they seem to be looking for help in finding stuff.

The PLANtm for May

I'm playing Tropico, so I'm getting and will probably going to get less stuff done. Which is not a bad think. Breaks are important. Will I go on a break this month?

Probably should...

But if I don't, where's what I hope to do:

Play more games: On my juicy list I have: the Spring Thing, the newly released Dialogue Jam and TALJ, the Locus Jam and Really BAD IF is happening this month too (so more gameses!), and a few non-comp releases I've had my eye on.

Code Chapter 6/Endings: I need to wait for MelS for this, since he's editing my comments. I'll prob look for visuals for the puzzle in the meantime.

Fixing an older games. Instead of new, do something old.

Write the next Chapter/Scene of a WIP, because it would be good to actually do that. And make some actual progress at seeing stuff being done. (I want to write some Razac snippets....)

Let's have a boring month!

~

The 2024 To-Do List:

LOL, I've only done the website! :D

The hopefully maybe easy to handle To-Do:

fix the bugs in EDOC + overall the French version to match (waiting for Adventuron to get the French language)

fix the bugs of TRNT + find a way to add the missing pieces (giving up on the translation)

fixing the interface of LPM and the popups + check animal interactions

figure out the One-Button JavaScrip/jQuery issue...

edit the loading screens of the completed tiny games to include the program/format logo at least.

The 'Need a Bunch of Content to update but it's planned!' To-Do:

Update my website (bunch new title - also I don't think the logo clicky thing work...) + redo my itch page

Finish TTATEH (MelS dependent)

Finish Exquisite Cadaver (half-way mark by this summer - manif)

Finish P-Rix - Space Trucker (main path at least)

Update CRWL (it's been almost two years... I'm ashamed)

The Unlikely But it Would be Dope To-Do

Finish The Dinner as it was planned (and translate)

Finish In the Blink of an Eye as it was planned (and retranslate)

Finish The Rye in the Dark City

Fixing TTTT (at least fixing, maybe try adding some storylets)

And finally The 'It's impossible, but one can wish' TO-DO:

Remaster SPS IH (if I managed to start this after completing the rest... I'm going to eat a whole sheet cake).

Start the IFComp project (2025? Might end up being a ST?)

So. I'm watching a playthrough of Silent Hill: The Short Message. And I've seen the Jimquisition episode about it, and a handful of critiques about it first, and having seen the trainwreck that was the first attempt made at a Silent Hill return, and my overall animosity towards Konomi as a brand, I was fully keyed up to be all negativity all the time against The Short Message.

But, it may be my Bias as someone who like. dropped out of high school due to bullying and Girl World and the way some friendships can form unholy triads that will fully destroy each other with jealousy and insecurity. (I have been in multiple Triad friend groups and either been the third wheel or accidentally instigated and insecurity uprising by joining a stable duo and throwing off the groove. I am not saying "three's a crowd" is a valid mindset. but when you have three insecure and unstable people trying to make sure they're still special and important to each other. It can become a volatile mess of feelings especially for teenagers and pre-teens. This isn't some sort of commentary on Poly relationships. It's a commentary on my specific experiences with insecurity)

When I was in Jr High I had a teacher who referred to the group of friends I was in as "the witches of eastwick" which given the movie is a year older than I am and a 14A slightly raunchy comedy I'm not sure if it was the most appropriate joke. But c'est la vie. The point is, I feel like I can definitely like. Understand the concept of Short Message a little more than some.

Along with the concept of growing up somewhere that feels fully hopeless. My parents never put money away for me for University, but constantly talked about how I needed to plan for university. But also where I lived cut funding to a lot of stuff that wasn't trades related because Alberta decided the most important things locally were Oil and Trades. (and then the oil industry kinda shut down locally due to trade deals and people throwing hissy fits over elections, which fucked our local economy but I won't go into that) I had to go to work 20 hours a week minimum while going to school, which did damage to my grades, which effected my options, which pissed off my family, which left me feeling hopeless about even the chances of going to any University. I was put in classes above my ability because "that's what you need to be able to have a future" while destroying my body early working long hours and failing those classes because I had bullying, abuse, work and high stress toxic friendships to balance along with Universities that didn't really offer any options that would give me a future that wouldn't give me more of the same. And eventually I broke under the pressure and I got a high school diploma through continued education courses but never officially "graduated."

My body is permanently damaged in multiple ways from the stress and strain of trying to balance everything in that world. I have over 100 self harm scars from cutting and burning myself. My pelvis is permanently deformed due to Ankylosing Spondylitis, and standing for hours and hours and hours as my body developed. My hips used to dislocated with such a startling ease that I would be bed ridden for months and months on end in the worst agony. It's an autoimmune disease it's not going away, and the damage that was done overworking myself is never being undone. One of my eyes is permanently damaged and cannot be repaired. I carry stress in serious damage to my body in multiple ways, and multiple chronic illnesses developed in my teenage years. The future I carried a responsibility for fell through my fingers because of the strain of working for it.

There's times where the dialogue in the game is on the nose or too hammy or like... kinda silly. But. I feel like living in a dead end place... with a dead end mindset, where everyone around you also similarly has a dead end mindset... it eats part of you. And Teens and Young Adults get caught in a haze of it. I remember watching people react to Canada's Worst Driver, and like 80% of the people who end up on that show come from Alberta, and are people in their early 20s. And half these reactors were people who never lived in a Dead End place.

I especially remember watching Hasan and Kurtis something react to the show, and I remember the way they reacted being so striking to me, because they fully had no understanding whatsoever of the reckless drivers they were watching. And like, as a 35 year-old now I do have a like. "tsk. that's shitty driving don't do that" kinda attitude. And also I have always been an anxious driver and didn't get my license until I was 25 and literally do not drive now due to vision and brain issues, but. I've been in cars with people who are reckless drivers, especially when I was in my early 20s and I know exactly what mindset causes it. It's "This probably only only really effects me, and it doesn't really matter if I die, I don't have a future."

There's a suicidal ideation to it mixed with a drive to feel literally anything if only just a little bit of fun in driving a truck really fast in a way that sparks some adrenaline at an age where the consequences part of the brain hasn't finished developing.

I know it's so American, and I'm Canadian, but Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen seriously is one of my favourite songs for this reason.

In the day, we sweat it out on the streets Of a runaway American dream At night, we ride through mansions of glory In suicide machines Sprung from cages out on Highway 9 Chrome wheeled, fuel injected and steppin' out over the line Oh, baby this town rips the bones from your back It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap We gotta get out while we're young 'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

It's iconic and I can't stop thinking about it sometimes.

I don't know that I exactly have a point, and The Short Message definitely isn't perfect. But. I think there's something to be said about what is being said in the game, and how it's being brushed aside. because I feel like it casts a really good spotlight on Dead End spaces, and the mindset that can take hold there, the almost contagious hopelessness of youths who don't feel like they have a future.

I feel like people in places like Toronto or Los Angeles lose scope of places that "don't matter." I've lost track of how many times I've heard Canadian Youtubers talk about how "nobody lives in the Prairies" or whatever. And that feeling of being somewhere that doesn't matter, and being the friend that doesn't matter, and having a future that might never happen... there's a reason for alcohol and drug use being such considerable problems in these areas, it's escapism people feel so intensely hopeless and without a future they just sink into any possibility of numbness. Plus since trades are most of the only jobs you can get most people have some kind of chronic pain. half the time undiagnosed and untreated.

“ go, go! save yourself! i’ll buy you some time! “ for anders and whoever you'd like?

there's an unofficial optional "100 word" challenge happening today, so this was attempt number one at that, which CLEARLY DID NOT MEET THE REQUIREMENTS as it's three times too long.

As usual, a thousand apologies for not using the complete dialogue prompt verbatim.

for @dadrunkwriting

~~~

Anders ignored the crash downstairs.  Things were always breaking in the Pearl.  Either due to drunk patrons just falling over or people who didn’t have the Maker-given sense to check stability before rutting like wild animals on tables or chairs or banisters or that one time in the chandelier.  But that’s why they kept a very pretty young man who just happened to be very good at ….. massage on the payroll.  

“Oh, right there, puppy, you really are worth every penny.”  The gorgeous woman below him hummed with pleasure as he continued to rub her back.  No really.  He wasn’t paid to sleep with anyone here.  Sure, he still did sometimes, but just for fun.  And only with clients that had already bought something else.  Sanga had been very clear that he was not to take business away from the rest of the girls.  Or the nugs.  

“Puppy?  Really?”  He laughed.   

“What would you prefer I call you then, hm?”  She rolled over underneath him, making several delightful things jiggle.  “Are you my fierce tiger?”

He kissed her forehead.  “Alas, I’m just a humble working girl, so ‘kitten’ is probably the best I can manage.”  The sound of cracking wood happened again, this time closer.  Probably nothing, right?

“No kitten I know can do that electricity trick.”  She pressed herself against him with an inviting grin.

Was that Templar armor polish he smelled?  Shit.  He gave the pirate a smile he didn’t feel as he climbed off of her and started to pull on his robes.  “So can a mabari?  Because if I’m a puppy, that would impl-”

“Open up!”

He flinched at the sound of a gauntleted fist pounding on a nearby door.  Warm arms wrapped around him from behind.  “Are they here for you?” She asked.

“Can’t very well go ask them, can I?”

She kissed the back of his neck.  “Go out the window and save yourself, I’ll buy you some time.”

my dad got his hands on a copy of Sonic 06 for the xbox and asked me to be his play-tester after having a lot of trouble with that speed level right at the beginning (catching up to Eggman's ship on the beach) and i got as far as the Silver battle before giving up, so here's my notes

DISCLAIMER this isnt an invitation to dunk on the game in the notes of this post alright we've seen enough of that. i dont hate the game. no, really, i dont. i respect everything it tried to be and feel bad for literally everyone working on it because, from what i gather, they were green and facing extreme crunch time. sucks for everyone involved. anyway:

the load times on xbox were VASTLY better, which makes a lot of sense, given from what i know the ps3 has a ... strange way of storing/retrieving/loading data, but they were still pretty long and a little too frequent for my liking. still, probably not anyone's fault, tbqh. i'll have to see if the emulator my dad's working on getting on his PC (finally, he's been trying to do that for years now lmao,) has the same issue to figure out if it's a programming problem or hardware. personally im pretty sure it's just hardware.

it's much easier to steer sonic if you use the camera and his movement, but the camera will still fuck you over. this isnt 06 specific though game cameras are Always hard to wrangle lmao

the animations for this game are so strange... i dont say this as a negative whatsoever. it looks like they were mocapped, which is fascinating to me, translating human proportions onto sonic--it doesnt always work, and i personally wouldn't've made the choice to do that, but it makes me want to study it lmao

the voice acting as well is strange, at least in english; im not knocking anyone's work, whatsoever. i still really love the performances. but i think back to this one tweet i made about silver's intro dialogue where i mentioned that i loved the performance, but the poor guy sounded like he'd done a hundred takes of the audio and was losing grasp of Words themselves (As happens to everybody) and Silver's english VA not only liked the tweet but started following me because of it. this was during the trend of not actually giving VAs context for their dialogue, and not really.. respecting them at all, and it makes me sad to think that maybe they did stick everyone in a box, hand them lists of lines, and make them say them over and over until the director got whatever they wanted--or, on the opposite end, were only given enough time for a single take out of the inherent disrespect for VAs that's present in Many fields

the environments are fucking gorgeous and i was genuinely surprised by how many things i could interact with in the levels. granted, i did get stuck on them sometimes, but i doubt the poor devs got any chance to fix that shit. i liked especially ramming Eggman's Cerberus into a statue instead of the wall and watching the statue completely shatter, that's genuinely pretty cool, they couldve just had it be like the walls, static and unreacting. i also liked how the Cerberus decimated those pillars, but thats mostly because the camera kept getting stuck on them

there's very little active direction in the game, save for the floating (?)s, which can sometimes be wordy enough that ive already fucked up and died before theyre done talking. that's probably on my dumbass though.

collision physics in this game ... sure is. i cant remember if all games from the 2000s were like this given i have more experience with older games (pre-00's) + brand fucken new ones so someone else weigh in on this s'il vous plait.

the pre-rendered cutscenes are still fucking gorgeous. delightful.

so much of this game is such a lovely awkward development-stage kind of thing, like awkward teen years. the homing-attack mechanics make me grateful for the auto-targeting of later games. the way he goes from 0 to 100 is in character but hard to play (unwieldy) and makes me glad for the more measured sliding scale of other games. the sprint parts of the game, where youre just steering him, are so fucking cool but i am so fucking bad at them and im glad that in future games the sensitivity of the controls was turned down. it took me some lives to get into a proper rhythm with it, get a sense of just how much of a hair trigger the directional changes were. tails' attacks in this game definitely felt like they could've been much better (throwing the bombs is So difficult to aim, thanks to the camera and how long the animation for it is) and i'm glad they're different in other games--the bombs is a cool idea, just needed to be implemented differently imo

if you knwo more about the development n shit of this game id love to hear it, all i know is they had serious crunch time to release the game alongside the ps3 as its flagship game and had to cut a lot of steps from the process/cut a lot of corners. i attribute a lot of its flaws (and "flaws") to that tbqh. sonic 06 is not a bad game, it's a game that was failed by its circumstances. i dont know fully, im just an animator, i have never in my life made a proper video game.

also this may just be me but i have a theory that this game was meant to be like the Shadow the Hedgehog game, and not rated E for Everyone after all. the darker storybeats (sonic's murder, elise's death, silver's future etc) all feel like they'd have been better-executed at a level closer to that. it feels To Me like they were developing the beginnings of this game (script, designs) in tandem with the endtail development of ShTH, and when it received pushback for the guns, swearing, and violence, they panicked and had to neuter the story. i have a lot of respect for what the game COULD have been.

how abouuut 9 and/or 10 for all fics (since some don't have dialogue, or just pic one fic randomly if that's too many haha)? 13 and 15 for comfortable truths? :D

Ohey! I can do #9 and #10 for all fics! 'Cuz why the heck not. (:3<

From the Fanfic Ask Meme:

9. Favorite line(s) of dialogue? 10. Favorite line(s) of prose?

Man, that parenthetical “s” is dangerous...

From "Pancita"—There are actually a bunch I'm proud of, but anyway:

dialogue: “I- I have my querida hermana mayor to thank for it, don’t I? Well, todos. Our family, I mean. But I feel like you’ve worked the hardest of all, Juli.” There’s an unmistakable tenderness in his voice. “To make sure I got this gut.” — Bruno, you adorkable doof. I wrote this line relatively early... it just went through a few tweaks to make it sound more like him.

prose: Bruno had given a cautious nod, color dawning across his face as they stood by a table in the church’s small kitchen; puppy eyes flicking about the space and hands fidgeting, while his sister peered at the entire state of him, paused to brush her fingertips across the front of his shirt, against his belly. — Sue me, I like long sentences 🥲

From "Comfortable Truths":

dialogue prose: Although he has no intention of retiring his ruana, whose faithful—obscuring, bulking, securing—service he’s employed nearly his entire life, Bruno might even be okay with, someday… maybe, trying to walk into town without slouching beneath it. Just let it enfold him without overthinking how it’s going to outline the discernible soft roundedness of his middle. — Oh, Bruno...

prose: Not that anything would ever stop Pepa from hoisting him into the air. — Hehe. True though.

From "Nothing, & Everything" (Julieta and Bruno):

dialogue: “It already is, Juli.” — *sighs* *cries* This whole drabble/Julieta and Bruno's exchange was an early idea.

prose: Her brother, who appears more pinched and thinner than ever; who looks at her with a heart-clenching mix of unabated love and unfathomable sorrow, out of eyes that still contain a spark of fire in their depths. — 🥺

From "Telling, & Time" (Bruno and Antonio):

dialogue: “…Can you tell me a story, Tío?” Bruno cocks his head at that, eyes softening further. “‘Course, kiddo.” — I love them.

prose: The diminutive, recently minted six-year-old giggles from where he’s latched onto Bruno’s side. As his laughter trails off, he begins to shuffle in place a little, swishing the ruana he has grasped in his hands. I get that, kid, Bruno can’t help but think over the next several seconds of quiet fidgeting. — Shy li'l Antonio 🥺 Goes with (before) the dialogue I chose.

From "Rise, & Fall" (Bruno and Alma):

dialogue prose: Because one more desperate glance, a word, and he knows he would have caved—would have spilled, like so much sand, what he’d seen; allowed a little girl to fall when it always should have been him. — *distress face*

prose: His mamá’s eyes have aged, and her body is chilled from the night air and the jewel-toned river. When she hugs him, it is every part of himself splintering, mending, in a single instant. — Me crying while writing this entire ficlet...

From "Full Hearts, & Full Belly" (Dolores and Bruno)—Ngl, this fic is one of my faves; I felt like punching the air when I finished it:

dialogue: “So then eat, Tío Bruno,” she whispers, not at all unkindly. “Because I don’t ever want to hear you going hungry again.” — I really like all the dialogue in this one, tbh...

prose: It’s the sixth he’s received in the past two hours. (The first had been given to him by Mirabel, innocent enough. Then came two from Julieta, who sat with him until he finished everything; one from Agustín, with a warm, if slightly shrewd, smile; while the last one was delivered by an apologetic Luisa, the package looking deceptively modest in her hand.) — Alright, Julieta’s being a tad sneaky, haha. Still above board, though! Bruno 100% knows what she and family are trying to do.

From "Good, & True" (Bruno and Julieta):

dialogue prose: Suddenly, Julieta is holding Bruno’s face and bombarding it with kisses: mushing her lips against the concerning little juts of his cheekbones and the persistent squishes of flesh below them that make him appear younger than he is, interspersing these smooches with pecks to his forehead and the nose that her babies had all loved to grab. — Squishy cheeks :3

prose: But here are the pinpoints of pressure on his skin, steadying; so familiar and loving that they bring him through the flash of panic. — I’m so weak for these two siblings.

From “Whatever You Knead”:

dialogue prose: So the larger man starts to press his own fingers into Bruno’s love handles, beneath his shirt, nudging out little crescent patterns with his thumbs. — It’s the “little crescent patterns” bit. Like, can’t ya just picture/feel it (hopefully, if I’ve done my job)...

prose: When he receives a gentle suck on his lower lip, Emilio slowly works his way inward, pinching at the softer padded flesh of his partner’s tummy. Bruno’s hands splay for a moment against Emilio’s broad chest before lifting up to cradle the sides of his jaw, drawing their mouths even closer together as the baker continues to mold and shape his belly. — Choosing this chunk of text that is 1/4 of the whole story really makes me appreciate how short it is, haha.

The next two questions are for "Comfortable Truths":

13. How many drafts did the work go through?

I didn’t keep track exactly... I felt like one long, continuous draft, though! I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to write and how it should feel, so a lot of it did just flow once I started writing. You, @seanettlles, saw one of the drafts! :D The part where Bruno’s thinking about how he might go into town one day with a bit more confidence was a late(r) addition; I’m glad I put it in.

15. What were you most worried about during the composition?

Probably just my usual fears... I felt really nervous posting the AO3 link on Tumblr! ...At one point, I think I did sort of wonder whether I should post it at all... That maybe it was too... indulgent?

I always tend to worry about “grounding” my stories, which is kind of subjective? Things have to at least come from weighted (not a pun) and rooted foundation, like the emotions and all. ...Sounds serious, but it’s not really supposed to be ;;; I’m waffling at this point. Anyway. I like how “Comfortable Truths” came out. Exploring Bruno’s, well, comfort with his recovery and where the weight has settled was really satisfying. I doubt he feels this way all the time, ‘cuz he’s still very much on a journey and also sensitive (the voice I gave him in the fic has that touch of self-deprecation)... but I also wanted to give him a moment of peace with himself. He deserves to rest and feel good about the journey, and himself!

Feel free to send me a number for the Fanfic Ask Meme! All of my fics are fair game!

Finished Rise, and I have thoughts! Mostly mulling over the pros and cons, as this was definitely a series that prioritized focusing in on new ideas and character directions. There are some spoilers too.

To note, I’m not a gigantic fan of the franchise as a whole. I watched a little bit of the original 80s series as a child, the live movies, the 2007 film and the 2012 series. I’m not 100% up on all the lore or characters. At this point I’m most familiar with Rise and the 2012 series.

Pros:

1. The animation - in particular the action scenes! I liked the addition of their mystic powers, because that added a fun twist to any fight throughout the series. Once the show hit its stride it’s probably one of the most artistic and creative iterations of TMNT. I love the work this animation studio has been doing!! Legit some of the best action-oriented scenes to come out of a Western produced animated series.

2. For the most part, I like how the characters were handled! For instance:

A. April just being one of the gang from the beginning with no explanation. Still a teenager like the 2012 series, but no longer Donnie or Casey’s love interest. (Am I still shipping her with Donnie? Yeah, obviously.) Also loved the nod to her majoring in journalism in the movie.

B. Raph being the leader and not having any rivalry or jealousy issues with Leo. Absolutely LOVED this version of Raph. His characterization veering off into the older protective brother of the group felt right, and I hope this version of him sneaks into other TMNT series.

C. My favorite character change here was Leo. Making him the cocky goofball of the group was genius, because we’re so used to him being significantly more thoughtful and leader-like. We get to watch him grow into the role we were used to seeing him in. This also makes Leo’s usual conflict with Raph super interesting, because RAPH is the one who is always in the right throughout Rise. He just wants his brother to put his family first and to stop putting them in unnecessary danger.

Leo refusing to listen until he’s thoroughly CURB STOMPED by the consequences of his actions in the movie was the icing on the cake of their relationship dynamic.

D. Donnie was my favorite in the 2012 series, and despite the fact that he feels like a completely different character is Rise, he still manages to be my fave in Rise as well lmao. It’s clear they wanted to mix up his characterization, and while they made sure he’s still the nerd of the group, he’s much more grumpy and sarcastic here. Also Josh Brener is so hysterical. Donnie was constantly cracking me up. Dude’s just a total mean girl in this series.

E. Rise’s Mikey was just so adorable. I liked that they really emphasized more on his traits outside of the “youngest, naive brother”. Like his artistic skills and ability to smooth out family conflicts.

3. Listen. The movie is just-!!!

SO GOOD.

It has been living in my head rent free since it was released. (Please please please release an artbook and maybe even a bluray I neeeed them.)

4. Shredder and the Krang in this series were...kind of terrifying. Love me some effective villains.

5. The (English) voice cast was amazing. Just overall very memorable and fitting!

Cons:

1. The comedy was very hit or miss for me, probably just due to the fact that it’s a series for little kids. Don’t get me wrong, there was clearly a pretty big effort in this area, given the overt comedic and episodic nature of Rise. The voice actors all do a fantastic job with range, comedic timing, and gave the dialogue an imrov-ish feel. That’s a lot of good things! Only problem was it just wasn’t grabbing me at all times. Still, the show has enough laugh-out-loud moments to make up for this imo.

2. Would have liked a larger emphasis on the plot. I’m guessing the powers-that-be just wanted a more episodic series (because ad revenue - and this is the current money-making trend of the industry). The series would have benefited from more serious, plot focused episodes. Which it EXCELLED AT when they popped up!

The movie gets exceptionally DARK compared to the series. I would have liked to see just a little more of that.

3. It took me so long to get used to Rise’s version of Splinter. I can see why older TMNT fans maybe thought this series was just mocking the franchise as a whole at the very beginning and bounced. Splinter felt off-putting until they gave him a little more depth as the series went on.

Spoilers: He does end up getting a great backstory, and I definitely loved him by the end of the series.

Really thought he’d have like, this big reveal moment where he tells his sons that he’s Lou Jitsu? But no, they've just always known ahahaha. (EDIT: I stand corrected on this! There was a reveal scene at the end of s1. Obviously, I need to watch this episode again.)

4. New characters and villains were also kind of hit or miss, though I DID love Draxum and Big Mama an awful lot :).

5. Girl!Casey was really just there for me. Like, I have no major thoughts on her. She should have been her own character, though I am really amused they ended up making her, you know, actual Casey’s mom in the movie. That was pretty funny.

6. I know I’ve heaped a lot of praise on the animation, however, some of the non-action scenes at the beginning of the series were very clumsy looking. Not sure if that was due to budget issues, green animators/boarders, or what have you, but it was distracting. Again, I can see why older TMNT fans jumped the gun immediately to hate or indifference early on in the series.

However, now that we can see what the team behind the series came up with down the line, those initial fears should no longer apply. The animation jumps up in quality so severely, that the movie really could have had a theater release. It’s just jaw-droppingly gorgeous.

Aaaand that concludes most of my thoughts. Overall it was a really fun series that deserved more attention. Would love another movie or season if that’s on the table. Fingers crossed the movie is doing well.

Pokémon QoL Improvements I Loved

Gen II (Blue to Gold)

The bag has pockets now! I absolutely cannot STAND the bag in RBY; you're limited to only 20 items, and there's no organizational system whatsoever. The Gen II games not only sort items into appropriate pockets, but also (according to Bulbapedia), only kept the 20-item limit for the main Item pocket and not the others. So you're still running to the PC occasionally, but not nearly as often as in Gen I.

The music seems more elaborate. I'm no game development expert, but as far as I know the first 2 generations use 8-bit, and thus have the same sound system to work with. But Gen II really seems to have more interesting music, with multiple instrumental "parts" playing at the same time.

Your Pokémon's Exp. bar is visible in battle. I'm not 100% sure why I'm so desperate to know how much experience my Pokémon have at any given moment--maybe it's just because it's a staple in future games and I'm really used to it--but it is so nice to have that information without combing through a bunch of menus.

When you close and re-open a menu, the cursor stays where it was when you closed the menu instead of resetting to the top. A super minor thing, but it saved me a lot of scrolling in the long run.

If your Pokémon has been affected by Wrap, you can still take your turn.

You can use HMs in the overworld by clicking on the object you want to use an HM on, instead of navigating through the menu. This saves so much time it's not even funny.

Registering an item to the Select button. Especially helpful to use on the bicycle, since you can't run.

The names of TMs are listed in the bag. I'm so glad I can see what moves my TMs are for without looking up a list or running through the dialogue to teach my Pokémon the move.

The move deleter! I was so surprised to find that there wasn't a move deleter in Gen I. I was teaching my Pokémon HM moves with the expectation that I could just change them later, and I couldn't!

Trainers have names in addition to their trainer class. It just makes the world seem more real to have Big Catcher Larry and Big Catcher Steve, as opposed to them all just being called "Bug Catcher."

And finally, the color! For a graphical jump that feels, to me at least, pretty minor (just going from black-and-white 8-bit to color 8-bit), they really made everything as beautiful as it could possibly be within the limits they had at the time. The color adds so much more to the world, and it seems the environments are a lot more detailed than in the previous game, too.

100 Blogs (Give or Take): FIGHT!

Hello! 

Welcome to my 100th* blog! 

*Or, rather, blog week 101 over on my website. In terms of actual blogs, I'm probably more in the 70s-80s? I try to update as much as possible, of course, but some weeks things've not uploaded properly. Occasionally, I've had just too much life stuff or I haven't really had much to write about. And sometimes, on the extreme ends, I've had way too much to write about and have been overwhelmed at trying to parse out everything I needed to. Last week, when I missed the actual week 100, was somewhere inbetween those: feeling uninspired because I was so tired from both stuff in my personal life and the many many many things happening in the world at large. 

I've, unsurprisingly, still got a lot on my mind. Like 200 organizations have pledged their support for KOSA and sounds like they might not all understand exactly what they're supporting (but you can still make your voice heard on why not to let it pass, namely the continued safety and security of LGBTQ+ folks online who might otherwise get explicitly banned from the most public online spaces, or at least implicitly banned through shadowbanning--as well as all the kids that could be harmed from the inability to access information that they might actually need.).

The U.S. blocked a U.N. call for ceasefire singlehandedly, despite the rest of the security council (minus abstaining U.K. and... that was noticed, guv) being in favor and, of course the overwhelming national and international support for a ceasefire (one progressive thinktank's polling suggested around a 60% US support for ceasefire, to whatever extent those kinds of polls can be trusted, however, the feet on the ground at protests, making calls, sending emails, trying to get into Senatorial offices with ladders, etc show a pretty vocal support for one).

The website formerly known as Twitter gave me just another reason to leave with their new AI. I don't want to see anything about it because I, y'know, get that it's like dunking on the people who wanted to use it for evil and that's funny or whatever, but it's also another AI system that's almost certainly just regurgitating things actually people said and thought and made and ought to be given credit and/or money for the use of. We shouldn't be letting our guard down around an AI just because it's telling transphobes to go fuck themselves--this is still the same shit that is stealing from artists or denying people their medical coverage!

And, also mostly on Twitter because it's a bad place (and I'll remind ya now, I'm leaving by the year's end. I'll be here on the blog and you can find me on Bluesky and I have a couple spare invites if you might need one, but my Twitter's coming to an end soon and I think my Facebook/Insta aren't too far behind...) multiple dirtbag comics guys decided to make the rounds again. They've had their airtime and I have no interest in giving them a platform, but boy, they sure were around. 

Plus, y'know, all the other stuff that has just been continuing, from the continued assault on Ukraine to Covid hospitalizations and deaths going up again.

It's the end of the year and cha'boy is tired. It has been a long, long year and I'm very much looking forward to it ending for whatever that is worth and the time of relaxation I get to have around that end. And so, I wasn't really feeling like writing... but then, I saw a post on Bluesky from Marcus Jimenez asking all comics folks about crafting fight scenes. And so I wanna talk about that this week because I don't often get a chance to talk about the mechanics of comics within comics, and that can be really fun! 

Squaring Up

As someone who has written and edited a lot of fight scenes, there are a lot of different ways to go about it. As I think I've said before, in my own writing, I tend toward a little more description and full dialogue so the artist has those space considerations in mind when working from my scripts. As an editor, I've worked the "Marvel" way where pages are more plotted with with less dialogue and specific action. I've worked with folks who do more of a rough pass where they focus on the concrete smaller moments and then leave a lot of the action up to the artist. I've worked with folks who're even more prescriptive than me. And there's something to finding the right balance on all sides with all these folks--from the writer and artist meshing in terms of what sort of detail they want from each other to having complimentary colors and letters. 

But for myself, and something I have sometimes talked to creators about, one of the first things I focus on when it comes to an action or fight scene is the specific things the character(s) can do. When I think about some of my bigger fight sequences in say Transformers vs. the Terminator or Transformers Wreckers: Tread & Circuits (both available from my webstore, *hint hint*), one of the most apparent things is that I loaded them with a lot of characters doing a lot of things, so... sorry to my artists (no, I know Alex and Jack loved working on them--again, if you can, write to the artist's strengths and I happened to work with guys I knew were excited about these sorts of big scenes). But in that, there are a lot of characters with specific abilities. Generally speaking, right, in TF/Term, we've got three different types of combatants: Sarah Conner is a human, the T-800 is a Terminator, and the Transformers are Transformers. So the skills Sarah has are different from all the robots and, obviously, the Transformers have the ability to convert modes which is something unique to them as characters that can make for really exciting sequences. And even within the Transformers, there are different combat capabilities: Skywarp can teleport. Soundwave has sonic attacks. Megatron has a huge arm cannon. Optimus has an energon axe. The Seekers can fly. And characters like Velocity are medics, who she doesn't really shoot to kill, she can hold her own after millenia at war, but she's not a fighter first and doesn't wanna do terrible damage to anyone. 

To me, it's the same thing as a fight with Spider-Man. You know he's got the proportional speed, strength, and agility of a spider. You know he has web-fluid (unless he doesn't and that sort of circumstance is interesting in a fight). He can stick to things and sense danger and all the standard Spidey tricks. And if you want a scene to be engaging, you wanna know what your characters can do in it that is unique--either to other characters and stories, or within this specific scenario. Seeing Spidey use his webs or his wall-crawling or his spider-sense is more interesting on a page than him just swinging his fists (generally). These are all sort of tools in the toolbox that determine what they can do in a fight. I also think that when you combine them with the circumstances of the fight, you start to see how they'll act in a fight. Why they make the decisions they do. 

So, to use TF again, in TF/Terminator, let's talk about the set-up to the big fight that runs through issues #3 & #4. It starts out with Bumblebee and Sarah scouting out the Decepticons who are up to no good. And the instigating question is, if Bumblebee's a good scout, how does someone sneak up on him? Well, Skywarp is a teleporter. So he just appears! But he's also maybe a little dumb, so he announces himself. Bumblebee's first priority is protecting Sarah, so the best way to do that is for him to shift modes around her as a running shield. They'll go faster. If he gets hit, it'll reduce the impact on her. Etcetera. He could do other things--he could stay and fight and blast at Skywarp, but because the option is open to him to change modes and to drive away, he's going to because that's fun and it makes sense with his character. Then he tries to do some fancy driving to trick Skywarp into ramming into Megatron, but because Skywarp can teleport, hey, he gets away in perfect position to take another run at Bumblebee. But because he teleported higher to get a better position, it also left him more open to get shot by Optimus in the heroic arrival of the rest of the Autobots. The characters' abilities made a really clear picture of the sort of action that could occur with the setting and are reflective of why they act the way they do. 

Throw a Punch A lot of the action is going to flow pretty naturally, from a writing standpoint, once you've got it started. If I know who my characters are, what they can do, and the basic scenario they find themselves in, as long as I've got that in my head, I can just sort of play them off each other and see how the action goes. But there ar some other practicalities I try to take into account as I go. 

1. How many characters do I have to keep track of? Like I said, a lot of my fight scenes have been bigger. I've got groups fighting each other, with civilians to worry about. And while you don't need to show every beat of every action, you do have to keep roughly in mind how everyone is reacting and to what extent you do want to switch between POVs and protagonists. I tend to measure my beats to either pages or page turns, rather than doing too much action switching on a single page unless I'm trying to convey just how hectic things are and just how simultaneous actions are occuring. 

2. How fast is your action moving? Two things I think about a lot when I'm writing action are that a round of combat in Dungeons & Dragons is supposed to be 6 seconds, and that the coolest fight I've ever seen on film is the almost 6 minute fight scene in They Live. (6 minutes later...) I'm back! Okay, so either way, I think what both of those are very representative of are how quickly action occurs in a fight and how much of the time in a fight is the other stuff. It's the non-combat movement. It's catching your breath or setting a trap or focusing on another problem or putting sunglasses on a guy. And in comics, you have the ability to dialate time as you'd like, so each panel can be a second or a matter of seconds, with the gutters allowing time to pass out of frame. You want your action to be logical and continous, but it's okay to have other things happening in the flow, and maybe more importantly, to chose which moments have the most impact.  In D&D, 6 seconds can take like 6 minutes. And on film, you're getting so many constant frames. Comics lets you be a lot chosier in how you expand and contract the time around those moments. 

3. How text heavy is the fight? Here's the other side of things. I know that I tend to be a talker. I mean... look how long it's taken to get to this point! I like dialogue in my comics and often have characters trading verbal jabs during the action. And that takes time and space. As do sound effects. So, I try to balance my fight scenes to the essentials. Much the same as the issue of time, I'm trying to select the moments of greatest impact with what we're "hearing". The more that's being asked of an action panel, the less text I try to give it. Let the art take over. But if I can use the action as a punctuation: If Optimus or Thunderclash or whoever is giving his hero speech and can toss a punch at a baddie to make his point, I'm going to use it. And if action is the visual punctuation to dialogue in this way, SFX are the visual punctuation to the action. They're an exclamation point on what sound is important. A lot of the time, it'll be no sound. But if it'll clarify the action or if it'll enhance the mood, go for it! 

Most important to a fight scene is that *generally* they're supposed to be fun. They're moments of fantasy where a side that's in some sort of right and a side that's in some sort of wrong clash and there's a victor and we all cheer because it's entertaining to see Rowdy Roddy Piper get his ass handed to him up until the end, but when he finally gets one over on Keith David, you know it's because he was right. So while you're thinking of all this stuff, if you give in to the fun, it'll propel you through a lot of it. Now, there're obviously also moments when the fighting is supposed to be building tension or showing the horrors of violence, but I think that goes to a lot of the same mentality as we've already got. It's about making the characters respond to the situation of the fight and if their responses fall in line with that, it'll still be smooth sailing because it'll be what makes sense.

I think that's it for me for this week, but maybe in a coming week, I can do something like a mini-version of something I did on my Patreon when I did an annotated version of the Wreckers #1 script and  do sort of a practical walk-through of a new original fight scene. 

Until next time. Happy Hanukkah to those that celebrate! 

What I enjoyed this week: Blank Check (Podcast), Dungeons & Daddies (Podcast), Reverse 1999 (Video Game), Nancy (Comic), Lego Masters (TV show), Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror (Short story collection), Factory Summers by Guy Delisle (Comic), It's Lonely at the Centre of the Earth by Zoe Thorogood (Comic), Slaughterhouse-Five (the Comic adaptation by Ryan North & Albert Monteys), being almost done with all gift shopping and wrapping 2 weeks early, Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Links (Video Game), Dandadan (Manga), our little mall Model Train Museum, Fire & Ice: Welcome to Smallville (Comic), Blue Beetle (Comic), Birds of Prey (Comic), Christmas lights, finding a good deal on a present for myself (I found the G.I. Joe Bishoujo Scarlett statue for a mere $40 at a local secondhand store and I think she's really pretty), not getting sick even tho Becca was, and I guess The Killer (Movie). Not my favorite Fincher by a lot. We're tentatively gonna see Godzilla: Minus One tomorrow, so looking forward to that and will try to figure out seeing Boy and the Heron, Eileen, Dream Scenario, and maybe The Marvels (tho it being a Disney film makes it a tougher sell) before they're out of theaters... and maybe Priscilla... and maybe FNAF on the big screen since Becca's really into FNAF right now. Too many movies! And I love movies! 

New Releases this week (12/6/2023): Sonic the Hedgehog #67 (Editor)

New Releases next week (12/13/2023):  Sonic the Hedgehog: Winter Jam (Editor)

Announcements: Look for a kind fun thing I contributed to this week! I'll share it when it's live! 

The Cartoonist Cooperative is still doing E-Sim cards for Gaza. You can donate a digital sim card so that residents can get access to the internet and have more functional phones and, in exchange, get some comics or a drawing or whatever else is available from the many participating artists. You can also give more directly. If you don't have money, and I get it, you can call or fax or email or show up at the offices of your representatives. There are a ton of demonstrations happening this weekend and you can see if you can put your actions in on one of those!

If you aren't a Patreon backer yet, remember, it's a great gift for someone or yourself. At my $10 tier, last month, I got Becca to record an Adults-Only podcast called "Abandoning the Premise" with me. You should be able to hear a short sample at the link. And if that seems cool to you, you can get the whole episode, but a bunch of other weird stuff on my Patreon! This month's "Something Weird"s are going to be a root beer review (I bought 6 different root beers and Becca suggested I talk about what I thought of them and there'll be a little more to it that that) and hopefully posting next weekend, a Holiday Gift Guide written, chosen, and designed by me (be careful if you're a person who might get a gift from me... you might see your present in there)! 

And keep an eye out for more news soon. Really hoping to have some cool news in the new year if not before! 

Pic of the Week: So, last Wednesday, I made a trip up to the IDW Los Angeles office. Because we have a lot of people spread out, we have a couple office locations. But the LA office happened to host some friends from SEGA and, specifically, some visitors from Sonic Team! We gave them the tour, talked about the comics, gave them some to take home, all the good usual visiting stuff. But Karasuno-san, Kanemoto-san, and Hoshino-san very generously did some sketches for us before they left. So, should you get a chance to tour the IDW offices in the future, you might see this sketch page hanging on the wall. 

Romance on the Farm 田耕纪

Runtime: 45 Minutes Episodes: 24 Dubbed?: All own voices, but the sound equipment is really good for some reason. Because I've caught a few redubbed lines here and there mostly from Joseph Zeng. The sound is really high quality and well controlled for live recording.

This drama (so far as of episode 10) doesn't lack of pacing. It's doing really well.

This drama has floated to the top of my list... but it's my own personal taste, so I'll tell you why I like it.

Feminism tests: It does pass the Bechdel test fairly easily. The woman has a goal outside of a man--the Mako Mori test? Yes. Is the female lead a Sexy lamp--none of the female characters are (though you might hate them for it at turns as their agency might be too wide for your taste *cough Hua'er *cough*).

Premise: Man'er goes into a farming game to pay off her student loans. In real life, she doesn't have that great of a family.

In the game she meets Shen Nuo, who is not her distant cousin or relative, but has a rather obvious secret identity, as long as you pay attention and read between the lines of the action. He kind of gets tacked onto the family--which Man'er's parents, maternal family, and Man'er know to be true, but her paternal family doesn't.

Over the course of the drama, you get to work out Shen Nuo's true identity and what he's doing there. In terms of being tsundere, I don't think he is, he's just a mysterious figure. He's too warm to be tsundere.

But Shen Nuo and Man'er work together to solve various problems around the farm, and give Man'er a chance to earn 1,000 coins. The drama tells you why she needs 1,000 coins fairly early, so I won't spoil it for you.

Production The costuming is actually pretty good, but obviously not expensive--it doesn't need to be. I like the directing choices, like long bits without dialogue which leads to visual jokes in the show. The music is probably better than usual with some jokes inserted along the way if you read the lyrics.

I rather like the cinematography, even if not "artsy" special, it still shows some thought in terms of lighting.

Even though there are two idols in the drama, I wouldn't 100% call it an idol drama--I mean it's not pure fluff with no logic in it. There's several points of logic and you have to pay attention. There is definitely a little meat in the drama (you'll get this joke once you watch it.).

The acting is fantastic--you hate everyone you're supposed to hate almost instantly. You love everyone you love almost instantly. And Tian Xi Wei is acting her socks off. I mean you thought you knew her range and had it down pat? Nope. She shows she has so much more to give you. Joseph Zeng is doing pretty well too, but the role needs to be given more umph, which they keep promising will come. The chemistry on screen is pretty good too.

Writing-wise... I think for some people they will find the paternal family too unbearable and quit, especially if they have family drama trauma. But it's not lacking in the writing department for what it hopes to be. Even the annoying characters, you can't quite skip over--they aren't useless. The twists and turns are entertaining. It gives a sense of farm life with the ups and downs very well.

Pay attention score: I think is 3/10--you can't just listen to it and get everything. You'll miss plot points. So it's a grade above the normal C-drama. I had to back up the drama a few times to catch some details. And the thing is if you miss those details, the drama kinda loses you along the way, though they still drop the rule of three so you really get the fact, but it won't silver platter it for you and spell it out and then hit you with the cloche to make sure you get it. If you do pay attention, the drama will pause to reward you along the way. You really should pay attention to episode 1-4 and maybe 5 and 6. 'cause there is pay off later for that. Skipping around will severely hurt you.

So I'd rate this a chicken stirfry with the grandmother super upset one of her chickens was used up, and the rest of the family arguing over who gets to eat the meat because the rest of the stirfry is vegetables. (You'll get this joke when you watch the drama) It's surprising at every bite once you get into it, even if it's a bit burnt because you taste a ton of bitterness, it's still entertaining. P.S. Hua'er arrrggghhh only in fiction I wish for people to be burned alive.