#this is my first time trying to compile the whole story into one thing
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just me ranting about s*lmare again,,, sigh
it’s kind of getting on my nerves seeing people getting mad at others for pointing out s*lmare’s shitty behavior. like, i get that people may not want to see negativity about the games/devs but acting like people aren’t allowed to be negative is a whole different thing.
look. i’m not trying to be seen as the like “ultimate s*lmare hater™︎” or anything (or maybe i am), but i’m just going to compile a quick and nowhere near exhaustive list for everybody so they understand why i and so many other fans are still so mad. because quite frankly i’m sick of people crying on twitter that i’m “just being mean” when what i’m really doing is calling a spade a spade.
for an ENTIRE YEAR before nightbringer was released, devs never told anybody that a new game was coming out. everybody grinded for an ENTIRE YEAR because we were kept under the impression that a new season was coming to OG only to be told “haha we’re going to make you pretty much redo the whole story again (but in the past :O !!!) only after which you’ll get a conclusion for OG :)” [the end of lesson 80 of OG literally said coming soon until AFTER nightflop was announced.]
devs waited until a reddit ama to even tell us that a new game was coming, but only when asked by a fan who’s question subsequently got buried in all the other responses. the only reason anybody else saw it is because it was screenshotted and posted to twitter and in its own post on reddit. no official announcement was made prior. the first official announcement we got was like a week or two before nightflop was released.
they keep pushing out terrible quality events back to back just to milk money from fans even though the vast majority of fans have said they don’t like back to back events because the quality of them are horrendous. most players would rather have fewer events with better writing then to have constant shit ones.
never told us that daily chats were ending in OG. we only knew this was happening because someone sent a ticket to the devs and it was then screenshotted and posted to twitter.
s*lmare has proved time and time again that they only care about whales. they’ve proven this by paywalling a lot of features in Nightbringer. and before anyone drops in with “but they give us more devil points in battles >:(“ shut up. haven’t you noticed the increase in need to spend devil points? whether for character outfits, sprite outfits, level up sales (that they’ve made more frequent by making leveling up easier), ap sales, etc… they’ve only given you more DP so you’ll spend more DP.
they literally shoved an ad down our throats as many times as they could (in NB) by putting it on the HOME. SCREEN. as well as making it one of the first things you see when you boot up the app and in the side news thing. they didn’t do anything about it until fans complains relentlessly for WEEKS.
they took away the 10x free pulls for HDD 4 (which is OG’s birthday NOT Nightflop’s). they have always done the free pulls since the games inception. they did this so that fans are more likely to use they’re own vouchers or pay irl money for the cards they want.
they lowered nightmare drops EVEN LOWER to force players to draw more if they want certain cards (this goes back to putting players in a position to use irl money to buy devil points for nightmare summons if they want certain cards).
wanderers whereabouts and fabsnap are lazy and unnecessary and from what i understand, most people barely fool with it. the models are cheap and horrendous. (i get it’s a mobile game and the graphics are not going to be like PS5 level, but come on.)
they took away birthday events without an announcement. people were saving AP and demon vouchers for their favorite boys’ birthday events only to instead be given ONLY a birthday nightmare with a pity OF 200. they also stopped doing birthday events before asmo’s 2023 bday, leaving him as the only brother without a prince card. never mind the fact that they’ve paywalled birthday items in wanderer’s whereabouts for $3.99 (usd).
they changed some devil grams (in OG) to please a loud minority of players that didn’t like having to kiss the brothers in the devilgrams. in a game about dating and kissing demons. they pandered to a small (but quite loud) minority of players BITCHING that they didn’t want to kiss the brothers. in a game about dating demons.
they’ve infantilized the game and lowered the age rating (to 12+) to make it more accessible to younger audiences which has significantly lowered the quality of the writing. this is a game about demons !! they are not child friendly and they don’t need to be written as such. a game about dating and romancing demons is a kids game now.
i want to express very sincerely that i absolutely adore obey me. i have for the past four years. (you should see my collection of luci merch LOL). it’s the first franchise i have devoted myself to so strongly. i just really hate s*lmare and how they keep getting greedier while offering NOTHING to fans but lukewarm content and constant money pandering. this franchise means a lot to me, and i know that rings true for most of the players, and it hurts to see it going down the drain like this considering it is so special to me. i love this community (except when people are crying over misinterpreting criticisms against s*lmare/devs as personal attacks) and i love what everybody creates. it’s all so so very special to me and it’s important that we all understand this. these games and franchise could be something so very special. it started out so different (in a good way!) than almost all other otomes i’ve played, but now it’s getting left in the dust because a multimillion dollar company is more worried about how to milk an extra $3.99 from their fans than they are making quality content that fans would be WILLING to pay for, instead of locking content behind paywalls.
i wish nightbringer was never a thing. the story they wanted to make could have easily been a 1-2 season arc in OG. but instead we were forced to essentially play the same game over again, just in a different setting and time, and pretty much be told that the time we’ve spent grinding and leveling up our cards and getting through all the battles in OG was wasted. all for a new game that nickels and dimes players while offering shit in return.
solmare was proven that they have no intention of being transparent with fans. that they only want to milk whatever money they can from us. it’s created a lot of distrust and aversion in the community. and believe me, after all this, and even after obey me is run through and isn’t a cash cow for them anymore, i’ll never play another fucking solmare game ever again.
❤︎ it’ll always be ‘one master to rule them all.’
#˗ˏˋ moody talks obey me ˊˎ˗#literally fuck nightbringer#and fuck solmare#obey me#obey me satan#lucifer obey me#obey me mammon#obey me diavolo#obey me leviathan#obey me levi#obey me solmare#obey me fandom#obey me! shall we date?#obey me lucifer#obey me shall we date#obey me!#obey me barbatos#obey me belphegor#obey me nightbringer
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compiled a list of some of my favorite text-based games & VNs that are specifically wlw:
another round - You play as Maddie, a woman in love with a woman named Agnes. Actually, she hates her. Actually, it's complicated. You definitely broke things off with her. And you don't regret it. At least once. Yes. At least once per day, you don't regret ending it with Agnes. Except tonight. You definitely regret it tonight.
such, such were the joys - It is the year 19xx in England. You are returning to the town of Grayling after your first year at university to meet your old school friends: Cicily Thomas, Fatima Khan, and Susheela Rajaram. As the only Indian girls at Grayling Towers, the four of you quickly became close friends, but you haven't seen each other in a year. You're not sure what has changed since then, but this is your chance to find out.
florence - Florence lies in bed, cold and still. You watch over her and wait.
perseids, or, all this will go on forever - Four trans girlfriends go on a road trip to a dark sky park, to see the perseid meteor shower.
winter - an interactive fiction about sex, trans insecurity, and a girl with a skull for a face.
butterfly soup 1 & 2 (VN) - A visual novel about gay Asian girls playing baseball and falling in love.
birdland - At night 14-year-old Bridget Leaside dreams of fantastic lands full of strange bird people. By day she's a miserable anxious summer camper, trying very hard not to think about her feelings for the mysterious girl detective in Cabin 22. And when her dream life starts bleeding into reality, things are going to get weird for her in a whole bunch of ways...
a summer's end: hong kong 1986 (VN) - Follow the story of Michelle and Sam, and how their chance meeting evolves into a deeper romantic relationship. Set in vibrant Hong Kong in the year 1986, it is an original story about love, family, and culture.
one day hike - You go on a hike in a familiar wood.
a year of springs (VN) - experience the stories of haru, erika, and manami in A YEAR OF SPRINGS, a visual novel trilogy about a trio of friends navigating their feelings of love, connection, and just wanting to belong.
pageant - Your name is Qiuyi (Karen?) Zhao, and you’ve just been signed up by your parents for a beauty pageant. You’re not ready, not even close, but you don’t have a choice. But perhaps you can make the best of it.
new year's eve, 2019 (sequel to pageant) - You are Karen Zhao, a senior in college who is home for winter break, and seeing your old high school friends for the first time in years. You are not ready, not even close, but perhaps you could make the best of it.
the revenant's lament - Way out west, in the most lonesome of reaches, strange things are afoot. Cowboys around campfires tell ghost stories and tall tales, speak of impossible, supernatural things. They say the devil walks amongst men. They say he'll grant you impossible wishes at the cost of your eternal soul. They say he can bring dead men back to life.
venus meets venus - Two women meet in a bar. This is not a love story.
#yes i put my own game on this list. sue me#anyways i know there are like a billion yuri games on itchio so this is a highly curated list#excluding dating sims and yuri VNs cus they're incredibly easy to find like just go in the yuri tag lmfao#interactive fiction#games#also most of the creators on this list have more games too that i recommend#draw everything here that's me and you (?) something like that by kaleidofish#anamika has quite a few games besides florence and such such were the joys#there's another sequel to pageant and new years 2019 & the archivist by autumn chen#npckc has a shit ton of games lmfao#there are some sequels to birdland too but ive never played any of those#communistsister has a massive catalogue of games and collabs with domino club#anyways. these are just some of my favorite creators#and some of their games that i really liked#i might add on to this but im having a hard time focusing to read games lately i only just finally read revenant's lament last night#so i could put it here. brigid your game will haunt me forever (affectionate)
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Creator Spotlight: @k-eke
My name is Kévin, but everybody calls me Kéké! I’m a 2D animator and illustrator, mostly drawing little bouncy animals and sharing them on the internet. I like cartoons and storytelling, trying to create stories where people can find themselves in, also trying to go further and develop stories that are rare in media, such as LGBTQ+ content, for example. I try to keep up with my 3DS to create my work and see how far I can go with it!
Below is our full interview with Kévin!
How did you get your start in animation?
I started animation back on September 4th, 2009, this is when I discovered Flipnote Studio on the DSi for the first time. I did try to animate before but solely on paper, and I had no knowledge about the medium at all, so it was an amazing discovery. I later became self-taught and could keep going by myself.
What is one habit you find yourself doing a lot as a creator?
I feel the habit that talks the most to me as a creator is communication. I feel it’s important to communicate with your public and fans to keep them updated and knowing how things are moving. It’s getting overwhelming to me the more I grow because the community is massive. Still, I keep up, and I thank many people for always updating me when something wrong happens (thieves, plagiarism, etc., etc.).
From idea to final piece, how long does it take for you to create something?
It all depends on the idea and process of the creation. For example, if my idea is just to animate a cat bouncing, this might take me a few minutes. Otherwise, if I want to animate 50 pigeons bouncing, this will take me around 5 hours or more! In general, an animation takes me less than a day or more if I’m busy on the side and can’t advance as much as I wish I could.
Have you ever had an art block? If so, how did you overcome it?
Art blocks often happen. I take them as good to rest and do something else. It’s not a must to draw/animate all the time or too often, and when it happens, I take it easy and try to entertain myself and see when it will be back. Also, I scribble sometimes just to feel like I’m still drawing but not with a point to reach a certain idea, just to let my hand go and make something silly. The mood can come back faster this way!
How do you use Tumblr to further your creativity?
I love Tumblr for the fact you can post 10 illustrations/GIFs as one whole post. This is not possible on other websites I know, so that was great for me to be able to make a compilation of GIFs and post it all there in one shot. It was really helpful and also allowed me to make a few little stories with this opportunity.
What is the hardest part of your process?
The hardest part is drawing on a DSi, 3DS literally! It’s so limited, with few colors (4 or 6 depending on the version), 2 or 3 layers, no zoom, and no options to make camera moves …… but I still love it haha. I’m so used to it that those don’t annoy me anymore, I accepted them, and people admire my art for it (I think!)
Have you ever wanted to dive into another medium before?
I did. Now I use TVPaint and Flash, toon boom more often, but in the end, I still come back to Flipnote Studio because it’s my favorite tool and program.
Who on Tumblr inspires you and why?
So many inspire me it would be hard to choose! But I did love Sarah Andersen, Owlturd comics a lot, visually and the humor. Also, the use of Tumblr to post multiple pages at once: it inspired me to try it as well!
Thank you for stopping by, Kévin! Check out more of Kévin’s work over at @k-eke!
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Do you ever shut the fuck up?
Matty's on one and he's doing your head in with his childish antics.
3062 words.
matty x fem reader
Warnings - sliiight shame kink/power play, minor substance use, cunnilingus, unprotected sex, romantic choking?? passionate hate fucking, mostly a lot of torturous grinding like teenagers
I have ten years' worth of Matty thoughts in my head. Please be kind this is my first fic! My friend made me publish this and I ended up accidentally deleting my 12-year-old blog trying to make a sub-blog so I hope it's worth it, that thing was my entire identity. Feel free to leave me your thoughts xx
He’d been on one since the Brits. Riled up from the backlash with the podcast, the stress of leaving the house in public after all the bashing from the press, and then having to be in the same room as the very people that spend their whole careers criticising him, it’s all compiled to Matty pacing around your house for days on end. But Yungblud’s newest show was it for him. He won’t sit down, he won’t talk about anything else. And it was starting to drive you mental.
“Who the fuck does he think he fuckin’ is? It’s not enough he fucks my old misses and steals my entire persona and aesthetic, covers my fuckin’ song and then smears me on the fuckin’ internet for nowt, now he’s gone and stolen my fuckin’ stage show?”
You breathe deep. Let it go. Let him get it off his chest.
“Yeah, babe. He’s so annoying.” You placate him monotonously, not taking your eyes off your phone. Scrolling meaninglessly through your Instagram feed.
“What a fuckin’ loser he is.” He huffs and leaves the room.
You relish the moment of silence however fleeting it is before he’s back in the room holding his stash box, and rolling another giant spliff in his hands as he sits right beside you on the couch when he starts again.
“I just don’t believe it, babe, honestly who the fuck does he think he is?”
You watch as he licks the edge of the rollie paper to enclose it and twists the top in his nimble fingers, your phone now discarded on the coffee table forgotten. Watching almost in slow motion as he drags his tongue across the paper. The action alone causing a light flush to heat the back of your neck, picturing the last time that tongue was pressed against your very core.
He takes you out of your reverie by lighting the spliff and handing it to you, an unspoken habit of his that you get first drag. Matty envelops himself around you on the couch, taking up your personal space and getting as close as possible. Usually an action that you enjoy, but he’s so irritating, so grating, at the moment that your skin crawls at the closeness.
You breathe deep, toking the weed into your lungs, inhaling most of it and hand him back the spliff; which he takes deep into his own lungs so close to your ear you hear the draw he makes. Spurred on by his perception of your silence to mean you’re listening intently to everything he has to say, every thought racing around his head, he continues ranting.
But you’re not paying attention. Instead, the growing irritation of him being so caught up on Yungblud, Halsey, and the press, whatever else the fuck he’s ranting about that you’re not following along with because he. Just. Won’t. Stop.
Pushing your anger down more, you snatch the spliff out of his hands and claim the rest as your own while he gets his phone out inspired by both his high and his anger and opens his Instagram. You watch off to the side while he goes on a rant on his Instagram stories, impersonating Dom’s accent.
You watch his exaggerated expressions, his lips moving in a way they don’t usually, and the horrendous but accurate impression of Yungblud’s ridiculous accent. While otherwise entertaining, the pettiness and ridiculousness is suddenly almost rather ugly to you. Annoying in the very least. It’s a side of him you’ve seen before many a time, sardonicism being a language and humour you both share, but it has never put you off quite like this.
The more he speaks the more you want to scream at him.
You draw yourself from his side and stand up from the couch, deciding a cup of tea is all you need. Spliff still in hand, you reach into your cupboard and pull out your favourite tea mug, the kind almost the size of a soup bowl that was perfect for rainy days and shitty moods, and turn the kettle on. Between the final drags of the spliff, you butt the smouldering empty roach out in the filling ashtray on the counter and pull out a bag of lavender destressing tea from the pantry and place it in your mug. You can hear him still ranting in the loungeroom, saying something about “the underrated youth, fucking, generation” and even in the muffled distance it adds to the annoyance.
You take a deep breath and turn and face the kettle now hissing at boiling point from its dock. The throbbing in your skull grows louder as you focus on pouring the boiling water into your mug when you hear him shuffle into the kitchen behind you, feet dragging on the floor like a petulant child.
Another deep breath and you take your first scalding hot sip, too annoyed to wait the minute for it to cool down as you usually do. If the weed isn’t calming you down, this tea is your last hope.
He just stands there, up against the kitchen sink looking at you, clearly expecting you to initiate conversation so when it doesn’t come he speaks again because he can never let the silence linger. Can never let there be a moment of silence in his own mind. You’re never allowed a single moment of fucking peace.
“Have you seen it, babe? Watch this git-“ you cut him off, slamming the full mug on the bench and scalding your hand, but you’re too livid to notice and turn around to face him seething and ignoring the searing pain of your now-burning flesh.
“Do you ever shut the FUCK up? You’re so fucking obnoxious, Matthew!”
Face flushed and eyes wide, your breathing deepens until your chest is heaving with the rage you’re feeling, the audible breaths filling the room. Unable to hold your ire back from the unwitting man in front of you.
He’s never seen you this angry before and for a moment he shrinks into himself, made several sizes smaller from the accusation and his own face flushing, before he steps up to you, toe-to-toe, face closer and eyes ablaze in mutual anger.
Finally silence. You’re practically nose-to-nose staring each other down intensely, looking for something in each other's eyes and finding only fire.
Until he snatches you by the neck pulling your face forcefully into his own. You kiss each other with such burning passion you become a mess of tangling limbs, clutching at his hair and pulling harshly, trying to get closer to him. He pushes you up against the counter, never removing his mouth from yours, hips grinding forcefully into yours allowing you to feel just how your intensity has him riled up as well. A growing heat between you as you gasp for the air he allows you to steal between tongues lashing. He wants to taste your anger, steal the breath from your lungs, feel you wreathing beneath him. You move together, two comets ablaze crashing into each other.
His hands roam your body under your rising shirt, never landing in the same place while still grinding his body into yours impossibly close. He kisses down your neck open mouth eliciting a sinful groan to slip from your lips from the combination of his mouth, his hands, his body. Him.
You feel your control of the moment slipping further away. The control you need to satiate your anger truly. So you take it back bringing his mouth back to yours and push against him off the counter and steer your entwined bodies to the lounge. He stops you in the doorway to the loungeroom and pushes you up against the cool cement wall and takes back the control he briefly relinquished. Continuing his vicious attack to your neck, your collarbone, below your ear. Unrelenting lips, teeth, tongue, claiming your skin and setting you on fire further. Moan's slip from both of your mouths, his shuddering breaths against your skin, hot and wet.
You break your shared silence, between struggling for air and giving over to the sexual deviant he never fails to bring out of you. Tired of always letting him guide the moments you share, you flip your positions so he’s against the wall and clutch his jaw, bringing him to look you directly in the eyes again and relinquish his claim from your body, your other hand pushing him further into the wall.
He doesn’t fight the position from the shock of the unexpected change of momentum. He’s never seen this side of you before. Dominant. Domineering. Taking possession of him.
“So, you can shut up.” You sneer, red and swollen lips curling in minor disgust. He groans at your tone and the position of helplessness he’s in, entirely enraptured by your fierceness. A shame kink he’s never expected to get off on emerging in the back of his mind. He wants to give in to you but his stubbornness tries to win him over again and he grabs your wrist holding your hand in place.
“You’ll have to make me.” He grunts back.
And that’s all it takes for you to pull him back into you and stumble the rest of the way to the couch, lips attached with fervour and fire. You draw away briefly, “Shirt and pants off. Now.” You demand. He complies, now free of all but his boxers he stands in front of you, reaching for you again but you step away and push him down to the couch with just enough force he doesn’t fight. You stand above him as he lies on the couch, taken aback for a second again, his own chest heaving, breath heavy and eyes hooded from lust before he drags you on top of him. Hands clutching your own shirt and tearing it off your body, buttons flying. You give him this, but only this, wanting to rid your hot flesh of the material clinging to your skin. It’s not what you want touching you. Not what you need touching you right now.
Your pants and now decimated shirt join his clothes on the floor. You join mouths again, lips and teeth resume clashing in a heated awkwardness you both ignore in your shared desperation. Hands roaming each other more, grinding like sexually repressed teenagers, edging but never quite relenting to ecstasy when his hands roam to your hips and clutch you against him, guiding your movements and force. Each clothed stroke brings a pant from his mouth you draw into your own mouth. He kisses down your neck again, his favourite spot. You take your newfound freedom to give him your next demand.
“If you really want to use that mouth as much as you insist, at least put it to good use.”
You take your body off his, him groaning from the movement and sudden disappearance of pressure where he wanted it most, and you lay back against the couch cushions expectant and waiting. It doesn’t take him long to clue onto what you’re asking and in a lithe move he shifts position and leans over your body, attaching his lips to your chest, your stomach, drifting lower and lower while drawing his hands up your legs enticingly. Inching closer and closer, drawing goosebumps over your skin. The feeling he brings you, even in your bad mood, is elating and you feel yourself slowly give over to his hands, his lips, and his gentle and worshipping touch. The exact opposite of what you want right now.
Between sighs and gentle brushes of his hair, your newfound dominant side kicks in again and you’re pulling the hair at the nape of his neck again. “Touch me properly, Healy.”
His breath hitches where he’s working on worshipping your stomach, every inch of your torso kissed and nuzzled by his face, taking in the scent of your skin when he finally runs his palm over your core. Feeling the sticky wetness pooling in your underwear already. Something primal snaps within him as he tears the remaining clothing from your body and attaches his lips to where you need him most. All lips, and tongue, and nose, and gentle fingers working themselves to satisfy you, he palms your now free breasts with his other hand. He eats you out like a man starved, barely coming up for air. Eventually adding a long and callused finger to your slick cunt, coaxing pants out of you and a slowly arching back.
You stroke his curls as he works, cajoling him. “I love it when you’re quiet. Such a. Good. Man when you’re not talking shit.” Your panting turns to moans as he circles your clit with his tongue, taking it in turns to suck, to lick, to bite. Equal parts humiliation and encouragement spur him on as he adds another finger to your soaking core, gentle spasms begin to surface from your well-attended clit. Your stomach tenses as his tongue and fingers work in unison to build you to a crescendo. The hand tending faithfully to your chest slowly moves down your torso back to its place at your hip, securing you in place firmly. Spurred on by the growing sensation in your belly, you clasp your legs around his head and begin moving your hips in response, riding his face from below. Your right leg hooked around his strong back, muscles rippling under your calf from the tensing of his movements, heel digging in, toes curling. Encouraging him further. He grows in pace and determination.
He will bring you to the edge. He will throw you off that cliff of ecstasy and then plunder your bones for his own sweet release. He adds a third finger, tormenting your g spot he drags from your body every shuttering ounce of orgasm that’s ever been drawn from you by anyone ever before. Earth-shattering raptures of bliss take over your body and mind, releasing from your consciousness the anger you felt for the very man that brought you to your current state. He laps your divine juices in his mouth, not wasting a drop of his reward for good behaviour. He kisses his way back up your overstimulated body still responding from his work, pulsing, undulating, and so very o-drunk, he takes advantage of your blissed-out state to reassert his own control. He kisses you deeply and you taste yourself on his lips. You thank him wordlessly, forgiving him momentarily.
“Am I forgiven, baby? Did I do well?” He asks into your mouth, grinding into your oversensitive core to remind you that work is yet to be done to bring him his own deserved release. You nod, mewling in response.
You bring a hand to his cheek and stroke it as he kisses your neck again.
“So good to me, Matty. So attentive.” He groans again, your words stroking his need to be appreciated, to be validated.
With your senses slowly coming back to you through shared kisses and soft touches, you trace your own way down his body and free his rock-solid cock from its cotton prison. The intensity of your tryst has bought him close to the edge multiple times without you having to touch him where he needs you to most, the desire to satisfy and appease you first is enough motivation to both fulfil and distract him from his own burning urges.
Your feather-light touch to his engorged penis sends a whole body shudder through him in his position above you. If you continued to touch him so sinfully he’d come undone in your hand.
Gasping he takes your hand in his shaking grip, “Babe, if you keep touching me while looking like that I’ll cum right here. I need to be IN you.”
And who are you to deny a man on the edge his only wish? You take a moment to lightly stroke his penis against your still-soaking entrance and make eye contact with him hooded eyes to hooded eyes, both of you with blown-out pupils from shared euphoria.
You both sigh as he enters you, taking a moment once he’s bottomed out, the base of his shaft against your labia. Hip to hip.
With one hand, he grasps your throat tenderly, your hand holding his wrist to encourage his movement. Eyes still locked, nose to nose, he starts moving his hips encouraging your own slow movements with his other hand back in place on your hips. Breathing through the other's mouths, lips barely touching in anticipation, sharing moans and mewls and groans, he picks up pace forming a steady rhythm. The pressure and force building with hips bumping off the others, pants and moans filling the air, each other’s sweat coating your bodies. Neither of you can tell where he begins and you end. Joined as one, you wrap your legs around his body to keep him close, your free hand drawing blood down his back trying to grasp for something, anything. The rapture he’s causing your body is intense again, places he’s never reached before in his many explorations of your body have been tormented and punished. He elicits a scream from your chest, his name falling from your lips like a curse, like a song. Toes curling again, you pant, you cry out. “Yes, Matty. Yes! YES! UGH!”
And that’s enough for him to let go with a grunt and pant. Sapping him of all energy, you feel his warm sperm fill you up as he collapses across your body, still inside you, pulsing.
He draws his arms around your body in a tender embrace and leaves a soft kiss on your still-heaving chest.
You both lay like that for a moment, just breathing. You playing softly with his hair and him drawing circles on your cooling skin.
He finds the strength to push himself up from you and remove himself from your vagina and then laying back in your arms and kissing his way back up to your lips.
“Where the fuck did that come from?” He asks in disbelief. Shock crosses his face when he comes to. And you both start laughing as the intensity of what just passed you both sets in.
“Sometimes you just need to be kept quiet.” You say laughing and he pinches your nipple in response laughing with you.
#matty healy#matty healy fanfiction#matty healy oneshot#matty healy x reader#the 1975 imagines#sub matty#he's so fucking annoying sometimes#i love it when he shuts the fuck up#matty healy one shot#matty x reader#Instagram
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THE HFJONE DEHUMANIZED AU
***BIG OL FUCKIN SPOILERS FOR THE FINALE AND SERIES AS A WHOLE***
Behold!!! The masterpost!!!
Overwhelmed by the amount of shit about this au that's scattered across my different social medias? Well I'm gonna compile all that shit here baby.
And now for the first time ever anywhere: the shit about Airy.
Basics:
The batch 1 contestants were all originally human. Everyone on their version of earth is human, not objects
Upon being brought to the plane, batch 1 contestants were transformed into their respective objects and stay that way until they can go back to their earth
The form characters take in the waiting room is reflective of their internal view of themself
General Story and How the Universe Works:
(Aka the Airy stuff)
Airy was a human on earth. He dies in the truck crash and goes to the waiting room.
Airy messed with the radio for a bit, and it turns out that in some universes, your form changes to sort of adapt to it.
Airy finds the forest dimension place. Here, inexplicably, he takes the form of a lamp. It's weird but he's been wandering around for so long and this place is nice so he goes with it. Eventually gets used to it, especially since there's not really any bodily needs to worry about now.
General plot of ONE plays out the same, he makes the plane and summons the first season contestants. Like him, in this universe they become objects and freak out about it. The contestants get killed by accident and Airy starts over.
Fast forward to the events at the start of One. Airy teleports the batch 1 people and they have to deal with being literally dehumanized by him. Which is like super jarring obviously cause they all have these new bodies suddenly so on top of the already weird competition, they have to adjust to not being human anymore
The Incident tm occurs and many contestants are trapped on the plane for a while. This makes Liam and Amelia notably lose their sense of being human and become content with being objects
Liam returns to earth after so long to suddenly being human again and doesn't know how to cope. He finds Bryce and even though they don't initially recognize each other, they figure out who they are and work together to do the rest of the shit.
When they get to the waiting room, since their forms are a reflection of the view of the self, Bryce is more human while Liam’s just. Backpack. Shenanigans and angst ensue
The rest of the plot is more or less implicit. There’s just another layer of shenanigans that oh so conveniently covers a layer of suffering
Some specific character things that are totally still up for interpretation:
As a human, Charlotte suffers from a fungal infection she got from a head injury
Julien spent so long trying to get home in the waiting room, he lost all sense of identity at all and just became a haze
Variants of this au that people seem to enjoy
Permabackpack: Liam (and sometimes other characters) stay in their waiting room forms after they get back to earth
Batch 1 + 2 earth: Batch 2 contestants also come from the Batch 1 Earth, but are living objects from that earth and not humans
I think that’s the gist of it. Sorry if the formatting on here is whack. Will update with other info if needed
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˗ˏˋ ♡ ˎˊ˗ vintage misery.
you've been married to him for a year now, but things have been anything but grand, in your eyes at least. how well have you settled in your marriage i wonder?
various! yandere! genshin impact men.
Just a tiny compilation of my favorite Genshin men <333 Tell you the truth I love them all but I was too lazy so take what I can offer! I might to a part 2 in the future if people are interested in it. Maybe even a female version...? And in case you couldn't tell, I can't wait for Cyno. Don't @ me for putting him on here!!
𓆩♡𓆪 CYNO. - The smell of old books and lit candles became a source of comfort for you once you settled in the Academia with your husband. Barely two years have passed but in your eyes it might as well been a flash. You would sit in the library for hours on end, mind immersed in the various stories and documents you could get your hands on but there were moments when you would go back to the day you and Cyno met. It was brief and curt, Cyno remaining stoic as ever but he was polite to you.
Maybe that should have been the first red flag.
In just a span of a few months Cyno had managed to find out everything he possibly could about you and thanks to the many strings he has and the favors he could cash in, he managed to get you into the Academia. Not as a student but rather as a humble librarian, something to keep you cozy, well fed, entertained and close to him.
Being a scholar, Cyno was naturally curious about many things and he would often travel to seek and explore the vast world. He would send you letters and various little trinkets, all of which meant nothing to you but still decided to keep them close as Cyno seemed to chipper up if he saw them on your desk. That's precisely why you wondered why he ever took an interest in you, but you never dated to ask him.
Cyno was many things, but affectionate was not one of them. At least, he wasn't used to it.
There were times when he would try to initiate something but he just gets lost. His face would be as cold as ice but by just looking at his twitching fingers it was painfully obvious that he was longing to touch you, to show you some love he was unable to show otherwise.
The only time you felt even remotely close to your husband was when the two of you would play games together.
It was during these sessions that you got to understand just what kind of person Cyno is and how his mind worked. There were times when he would even show a hint of a smile on his face, happiness written all over it as he would lovingly gaze at you as you kept your head down, too flustered to look him in the eye.
Your relationship with Cyno is a distant one and it leaves many people scratching their heads. This would be an issue for any other person but Cyno does not care about outside opinions. He only cares about your own.
𓆩♡𓆪 KAEDEHARA KAZUHA. - Life at sea should have been different for anyone to get used to but Kazuha was an exception.
Nothing in the whole world could ever tie him down in one place and he would wander wherever the wind would take him. It was cruel to keep him in one place, to force his mind and blade to go full as you did your daily duties in your cush little Inazuman home. Marrying Kazuha felt like a dream at first, but a dream was still a dream. He begged you to join him, to go out into the world and see its blinding beauty with your own two eyes and with him by your side. His gleaming red eyes still haunt you, the sheer eagerness of hive voice sent shivers down your spine.
Words cannot describe how much you missed him.
Kazuha missed you too, and you knew it.
Why else would he leave little marks all over your body if that were not the case?
Not wishing to limit your freedom, Kazuha begrudgingly made a deal with you - he would go travel the world and you could stay here at home. He promised to visit as much as he could and he would always being back so many gifts with him that you could drown in them.
The burning sensation down your leg continued to disturb your line of thought as your arm gently inched closer to it. Lifting up your skirt you were met with several flaming red scars that marred your skin, the sheer itch of it testing your ability of whether or not you could handle this sort of pain. In big bold letters, the name "KAEDEHARA KAZUHA" was carved in, an eternal reminder of to who you belong to and to whom you vowed to spend the rest of your life with.
𓆩♡𓆪 THOMA. - The news of his engagement broke fast in Inazuma and everything went without a hitch. Everyone and their mothers were excited about Thoma tying the knot because why wouldn't a dapper young lad such as himself not find a suitable partner to shack up with? He was the Inazuman golden boy, it really wasn't too surprised to know how many people were supporting him.
More than a year has passed ever since your wedding day and here you are, sitting on the floor of the Kamisato estate, a cup of hot tea in your hand as you gazed at the entire estate. It was a quiet day today as most of the workers were somewhere with their families while Thoma was out to do some shopping, an endeavor you'd usually join him in but you decided to lay low today.
The golden wedding ring burned your finger the longer your thought about him, the ring itself served as a constant reminder that you were no longer your own person. Whenever you would go out there would always be hoards of people asking where Thoma is and why isn't he with you. A "Property of Thoma" sign could might as well be carved on your forehead the longer you thought about it. Gritting your teeth in anger you tried hard not to shatter the precious porcelain cup in your hands, knowing full well that the liquid could burn you.
However, nothing burned more than the intense smile of your ever adoring husband, who's affections made your stomach churn for all the wrong reasons.
#yandere#genshin impact#genshin#yandere genshin impact#genshin impact x reader#genshin x reader#yandere imagines#yandere aesthetic#yandere x you#yandere x reader#yanderecore#yancore#yandere cyno x reader#yandere cyno#genshin cyno x reader#cyno x reader#genshin cyno#kazuha genshin impact#kazuha kaedehara#yandere kazuha#kaedahara kazuha#thoma x reader#yandere thoma#thoma#genshin impact thoma
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Aw hell.
Back up a bit.
So there we were, Venat and I, trying to enter Ktisis Hyperborea in order to track down Hermes, when who should we re-encounter...
Haha! It turns out that despite claiming to not believe my story, Emet-Selch has been (with Hythlodaeus' assistance) investigating the same things Venat and I have been. I am so happy about this. I was literally chanting "Yes yes yes!" When Hythlodaeus explained what they had been up to.
*Ahem*
We have uncovered similar facts and reached the same conclusion: since it seems unlikely that Hermes himself wants to bring about the Final Days, he may yet be recruited to help prevent them.
(ha... ha... in retrospect....)
And then Hythlodaeus laughs at him. I adore these two.
It's too late Emet! You've been contaminated with my friendship (highly contagious) now you'll never be rid of me! 12000+ years in the future you will care about me so much you'll plan for me to succeed after I kill you.
...oh no now I'm crying again...
Keep it together, you've got two whole posts to write to catch up with the plot. No way you're fitting this all in one.
Right. Right.
I find Hermes (and Meteion) in the depths of the Hungering Gardens and convince him to meet with our little group outside.
I tell him what I've told them.
Though reluctant to believe my tale, Hermes agrees to theorize based on his knowledge of dynamis. He concludes much as I have already suspected: that it is likely the varying densities of the people which produced the different effects in each Final Days - the warping of creation magics and the transformations of the people themselves.
But Hermes also points out something new: dynamis is itself only an energy, set in motion by emotion, which must have a source.
It would follow then, that this source... it must be a thinking being, in order to have emotions? Mustn't it? It's not a what. It's a who.
And as Hermes points out, the celestial currents form the outermost layers of the star. If the phenomena appeared first where those were weakest, then...
Someone out in the great expanse is trying to kill us.
Ah. But we have only a moment to reflect on this new horrific revelation, when...
Fuck. Oh, fuck. Hermes, you goddamn idiot.
But no, it's not a new "friend", it's Meteion's sisters reporting in. Meteion proceeds to "suspend" her individual consciousness and connect with the shared one.
Ah.
Oh. No.
Something has gone very very wrong.
Aaaaa!
Meteion is screaming inside my head, and only I can hear her. The rest can tell that something has happened, but they cannot see the truth of it.
And then, quite suddenly, she has disappeared.
Hermes explains that this is an ability Meteion has to avoid confrontation; she alters her aetheric density to blend in with her surroundings.
It's likely that I could hear Meteion's voice just then when the others couldn't because Meteion utilizes dynamis to speak in her mind and my comparatively thin aether left me susceptible to it. This means I'm the best chance we've got to track her down. We split up and search.
Danger music is playing! Danger music is playing! This is not a drill!
Several times I encounter Meteion or her voice and several times she runs away. Disappearing again. I glean from the brief snatches of dialogue that she is fighting her programming to compile and make her report. Something about the data her sisters have transmitted has frightened and upset her, and she does not want to present it to Hermes.
Our search party regroups to find a new plan; I will continue tracking Meteion via her voice, and Emet-Selch will follow, prepared to rain aether upon her to disrupt her vanishing trick. The rest of our party will work to blockade any avenues of escape, a task made easier in that it appears Meteion has fled towards Lethe.
Um. Lethe? The river of forgetting in the underworld? Can we uh... Can we not go into there? I have a bad feeling is all.
I am at once delighted and extremely distressed. The danger music is still playing loud and clear.
The plan works perfectly, for good or ill, and Meteion is cornered. Her voice in my mind begs me to protect everyone. She can no longer flee, and commences her report.
Everywhere Meteion has gone she has found the dead and the dying. Her dispassionate voice continues behind our mounting horror.
Emet-Selch points out the obvious problem in the mission Hermes tasked Meteion with: he did not account for a negative result. The premise of Hermes' question - what others live for, what gives their lives meaning - is flawed, if Meteion encounters only those who are dead or do not wish to live.
Venat orders Meteion to cease her report, suspend her mission, and return home. But Meteion is not listening. Emet-Selch determines to take Meteion back to Amaurot, as she will be needed in order to retrieve all of her sisters.
Hermes is still stunned from the revelation of both the answers to his questions and the astounding oversight in his instructions to Meteion. He kneels in front of her and seems about to acquiesce to Emet-Selch's demand, but...
Memories of Meteion and his promises to her fill Hermes' mind, and he resolves to accept the answers in her report, whatever they are.
Suddenly he transforms. Declaring that he will not allow Meteion to be taken from him until she has delivered her full report, he takes her in his arms and flies off towards Ktisis Hyperboreia.
We chase after them as quick as we can, but arriving at Ktisis we find a crowd of confused researchers outside. An alarum is sounding and the facility has been evacuated and put into a state of alert - a field of dampening magics is now in place effecting any who aren't Ktisis researchers.
Nonetheless, we must enter the facility.
OMG OMG OMG
(Of course Emet is a Dark Knight. He fights with love! In this essay I will...)
This dungeon is a downright delight. All the little bits of commentary and characterization!! HHHhhh!!!
Also I somehow managed to get Venat killed by double stacking a mechanic on her during Hermes' fight and Hythlodaeus res'd her. Hythlodaeus, my man, you are a Bard with a resurrection spell: you have got to stop saying how bad at everything you are because you are clearly not.
Yes, Hermes, you are indeed a mad, desperate fool, but you are a mad, desperate fool in serious need of therapy and someone to talk to. Your problems, to me, seem to stem from the fact that you feel so alone. Your compassion is hampered by the fact that you're entirely too caught up in your own head, and unfortunately, you do not seem to be much of an intellectual. You need friends, people you can share your thoughts and feelings with, and who you can bounce ideas off of so you don't send your emotionally fueled, vulnerable bird-daughter out into space with no means to shield herself from negative feelings. Bad idea, that. Also you need to calm the fuck down.
Together, we defeat Hermes, who returns to his humanoid form.
Emet-Selch declares he is taking both Meteion and Hermes into custody on behalf of the Convocation. As Emet moves to do so, Hermes turns to Meteion and apologizes to her, for being unable to hear out her full report. Hermes has just time enough to ask one final question of Meteion: was there happiness to be found in those stars?
Meteion's answer is long and features examples of failed civilizations that appear to hit close to home for each of our ancients. Those probably deserve closer examination, but that tangent got three paragraphs long before I realized there really wasn't time for it, because as she's giving us this answer Meteion is beginning to leak the black smoke that signals dynamis corruption.
A-
Ah. AH. Oh. It's not. It's.
It's Meteion.
The thing out there that's trying to kill us.
It's Meteion. The Meteia. Her sisters.
They are the source of the emotions behind the Final Days.
And Hermes...
You. YOU. You...selfish monster. You bloody hypocrite!
"If man can learn to value all life and retain his will to live he will surely find a way to avert his demise"
It's not enough that you throw your precious creations at us to slow our advance through Ktisis, no, in making your judgement on man you in turn curse every life upon this star to share our fate. Or, have you not considered the method by which you sentence us!? Perhaps you are too distracted by your own despair to truly hear what she is saying: Meteion is bringing death to the star itself, not selectively killing off Man. You know this from my own account of what the Final Days will bring.
You're just like the rest of us; how cheap other lives become in the presence of Man, whether you seek to better us or to destroy us. I couldn't see, couldn't fathom, how you could be the Fandaniel I met in the future. But you've been him all along, haven't you? When push comes to shove you crumple under despair and it's not enough to take your own life, no, you'll make everyone suffer with you. Everyone must feel your pain.
Hermes causes the Final Days. In full knowledge of what he will bring, the pain and the suffering. He knows, and he chooses this. Unlike Meteion, who has become corrupted, unlike the Convocation, who will never know against what they struggle, Hermes stares evil in the face and embraces it. A mental breakdown will not absolve you Hermes, in this moment you damn yourself.
No. NO.
I forgot about that thing!
Hermes orders Kairos to rewrite the memories of all within Ktisis Hyperborea, beginning at the point of Emet-Selch's arrival in Elpis. Our memories are to be replaced with a vague recollection of Meteion and her sisters' shared consciousness becoming unstable and exploding, triggering Kairos.
Kairos begins counting down.
A lot of things happen, very quickly, all at once.
With his back to us, Hermes bids Meteion fly to the far edge of the universe where none can reach her.
Venat breaks her bonds and launches herself at Meteion, intent on stopping her, but Hermes blocks the blow and Meteion leaps into the air.
The break in Hermes' concentration appears to have freed the rest of us from our chains, and as Emet-Selch summons his weapon to challenge Hermes, Venat leaps aboard Argos in pursuit of Meteion. As the two shoot skyward, Hythlodaeus leads me to the edge of the platform. He tells me that here, this is their fight to wage, but that I must take the knowledge I have gained here back to my time, to my own battle.
Meteion is rapidly approaching the bounds of the star, with Venat in close pursuit. Just before Venat can catch her, Meteion shapeshifts into an actual bird (Hey! My friend has that minion! What!?) and speeds away into space, but not before Venat manages to tag her with a spell.
Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus sacrifice themselves to allow Venat and I to escape with our memories intact. Kairos completes its final process as we soar above their heads.
In the final few seconds left to us, Emet-Selch proclaims that he still doesn't believe my story, but, if it must be said, to not squander the legacy he leaves to me. In futility I reach for him, feeling the weight of our history falling into place.
Honestly, I could barely manage to take screencaps of this part I was crying so hard.
But I caught his smile.
...
Outside again, Venat collapses on the grass, exhausted both physically and mentally by what we've just been through.
The spell Venat tagged Meteion with is a tracking spell, one with which we can track her. Though she is already unimaginably distant and beyond our current reach.
Venat uses Argos to check on our friends, now exiting Ktisis Hyperborea, with Hermes in tow.
As expected, they have no memories of the events that Hermes contrived to have us forget, and Hermes himself appears devastated at the loss of Meteion.
Wait, what? No. No no no no! You've just seen, literally just seen, that even when Emet-Selch believes something to be completely ludicrous he will do his due diligence to investigate it. Tell him. Tell them, the Convocation. Even if they don't believe you at least let them know about dynamis, so they can recognize it when the Final Days begins! We cannot reach Meteion where she is now, but you have time. Time to work to stabilize the aether currents. Time to find an alternative solution so that when the Final Days arrive it's not necessary to summon Zodiark. Don't you start this again. This information control.
Leaving aside her asinine view that public knowledge of the contents of Meteion's report would lead to some sort of further catastrophe... Venat is against telling the Convocation the truth because of her fears of what Hermes would do if he learned the truth?? Venat, have you lost your mind? Hermes is one man. The only reason he was able to do what he already did was because we had the deck stacked against us, we confronted him in his seat of power with our own abilities severely limited. It was a very specific set of circumstances!! Outside of these exact conditions what he did would not have worked! Hermes' greatest weapon is our ignorance, that's why he contrived to have us forget in the first place. You are wasting the opportunity our friends sacrificed all to provide us with!
You already know the key thing that Hermes will contribute to resolving the coming crisis! The knowledge of celestial currents! Share this knowledge and you will have no need of him!!
It needn't be senseless and seemingly inevitable at all if you would bloody well tell people! Hope is so much stronger when built on a foundation of knowledge. We cannot stop the Final Days from coming, but you can yet mitigate it. All needn't be lost. You can yet choose to do something different. I beg you, use this time to find a different path.
Please Venat, please do not let your future become my past.
#ffxiv liveblog#rhesh'a tag#meteion#hermes#venat#hydaelyn#emet-selch#hythlodaeus#ktisis hyperborea#I struggled with this post for literal MONTHS#this one and the next#I'm still not happy with it#i should have split it into two so I could add more pictures#for one thing#but it needs to go
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A note from Lorde
(27/03/2024) ("Take Me to the River" cover release)
Hey you, it's me
Today my version of "take Me To The River" from the Stop Making Sense compilation comes out.
Do you remember the first time you ever heard Talking Heads?
I'll tell you my story.
Ok, it's 2008. I'm twelve years old, eyes painted black, jaw blasted with acne. My bedroom is a nest of posters, broken toys, street signs. I've kissed with tongue.
Something's happening to me: i am beginning to ooze out in every direction. I feel a constant burning urge to express myself, to draw a map that leads to who l am. I can't get it right; there's deep discomfort in this, and I have no choice but to keep trying.
At the same time, I'm realising that if I look at a picture or listen to a song sometimes a surge of feeling will take over my whole body. In this way, I can remove my strange-feeling insides and replace them with whatever I want. I can't predict what exactly will do this to me, so I have to try everything. Things are either corny, or they're cool. Occasionally, the thing that replaces my insides is a total mystery to me, not corny or cool but somehow both, and through this feeling I have my first experiences with the divine.
My mother, an artist herself, sees the ooze. She brings her laptop into my room one night and puts on a Youtube video. It's grainy, 240p at best. In the video I see a band from another time performing on a TV show. The lead singer wears a suit, has high cheekbones and slicked-back dark hair. To his left a blonde girl plays bass. They stand in pools of light. The dark haired man is singing a song about wanting someone, not being sure why. He is a preacher, a controlled fire, a wild animal. He's moving like ive never seen anyone move, and his eyes are rolling back in his head. He knows how it feels to kiss with tongue. The wifi signal drops in and out from downstairs.
I feel a portal open between me and the screen. Humour, lust, rhythm and ritual course through me. I don't understand what I'm feeling, but I do understand that the band in the grainy video live with the same strangeness that I do. My palms tingle.
My insides are replaced.
This version of the first Talking Heads song I ever heard was done in a few days in Echo Park, L.A. with my friend Jimmy. It's my interpretation of that pixellated spiritual experience. We did it fast, I didn't let myself tidy it up too much, it had to feel young and imperfect, the peeling posters, the jaw of acne. It's beyond a great honour to be part of this compilation. In doing so, I am reaching
back through time and pinning something to that kid's wall.
Hope you like it
PS* Immediately after that Top of the Pops clip finished, I had my first of many, many viewings of Stop Making Sense. I am truly changed as I know you were too by that group of people on the Pantages stage moving together with warmth, strangeness and pure cool. It was so great to go to the theatre and feel that again on a big screen. Love to DB, Tina, Jerry and Chris, and to Lynn, Edna, Alex, Steve, and Bernie Worrell.
(source: A24 newsletter)
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POTENTIAL (spoiler free) HOT TAKES; DO NOT TOUCH STOVE 🔥
~
As I continue to scarf down Rebirth food like a rabid chimpanzee, I’m starting to come to an interesting realization:
I think I discovered a new reason as to why I love CC so much among the compilation. And that is bc it is debatably the easiest content in all of the 7 series to follow/digest. Don’t get me wrong- the writing is still messy and holey and did throw a bit of a wrench into pre-established canon. But chopping all of that off and looking at the game for what it is…? Idk! It’s not too rough to swallow. We have our steady main character who we see develop/grow tragically jaded, we have a villain we relatively follow till the end, we have our side character who we also see progress/regress/however you wanna put Seph’s cheese falling off the cracker. The only really boggler in the plot imo is admittedly Angeal, with his wishy-washy good guy-bad-guy conscience, but his sole presence is still not enough to completely muddy the story if you ask me. CC’s still a fun and memorable and enjoyable ride, and the plot beats are easy to process and hit just as hard as any other game in the compilation.
Now, OBV, Crisis Core has some canonical reasons for being more linear and objective: this is technically the “real” story, with Zack’s memories and all, and so it’s freed from all that ambiguity and haziness of Cloud’s journey in OG. But at the same time……. that’s kinda my point, lol? Like, again, don’t get me wrong- on one hand, og does a phenomenal job in creating tension and uncertainty and capturing Cloud’s identity crisis by making scrambled eggs out of his memories. But on the other hand, it’s also… a taaaadd much? Like to the point where it’s nearly impossible to actually understand the story on the first go. And there’s nothing wrong with it taking a few playthroughs to fully grasp things! It adds a sense of replayability. But if you don’t have that kinda patience, the whole thing can be a tad frustrating and confusing. And, idk, Ig my point is that Remake/Rebirth kinda falls into this same trap. The games are such, such, SUCH a fun ride (really! <33), but boy do I feel like I’m untangling tangled earbud wires trying to understand some of the game- especially in the homestretch. It’s just a real big meaty sandwich to swallow, and it can be a bit overwhelming lmao. Not to the point where it ruins its enjoyability- cause again, the story’s mainly a blast- but it’s admittedly hard to get 110% immersed in the world when I’m left trying to actively break down what’s going on. I won’t go into any specific details for spoiler reasons, tho I’m sure y’all understand from Remake alone where most of the confusion lies/in which elements.
The last thing I wanna do is be too negative tho. Needless to say these games and franchise is incredibly special to me, and I adore so much about Rebirth so far. The character interactions are near perfection, the stakes have never ever been higher, and there is soooooooooooo much to explore!! <33 And it’s also prolly worth mentioning that I’ma person who gets confused VERY easily lol. So it’s very possible that I’m struggling more than usual to grasp everything, and it’s creating some skewed judgment. But I thought it was worth sharing my thoughts regardless.
Thx for listening to my ramblings! Hope y’all are having a wonderful day <3333 Keep up the hype!!!
#ffvii#ff7#ff7 rebirth#ff7 remake#things#opinions opinions opinions#that no one asked for lmao#final fantasy vii
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Disventure Camp All Stars Power Ranking (Round 6)
And, we're back! I'm so glad that the leaking issue didn't wind up making the team have to delay their episode releases, both for their sake and ours. I've been highly anticipating this teaser release, and look forward to cracking into the next round of Power Rankings.
In case you didn't see my last power ranking for Episode 5, the Power Ranking Format is essentially a way of ranking how well each player is doing in the game. So, in essence, this is a long form way of predicting who I think will be eliminated from the competition in the next episode. There will be spoilers for last week's episode (obviously) and its power ranking, so make sure to read that first if you don't want to be spoiled on how I ranked our last boot. If you want more clarification on the rules, that first post will help you out as well. Furthermore, I'm going to be spoiling the preview for next episode, so if you want to go in TOTALLY blind, save this for later. Let's go!
Recap - Connor's Elimination
Current Point Total: 9 acquired/14 possible
'Cause now we have lore! >:D
Well, turns out that my assessment that the Season 2 cast was safe turned out to not be true. At least Connor was my second lowest positioned of the S2 characters, and my bad vibes about the Yellow Tribe were on point... Yeah, that's some copium right there. Seems this whole predicting business might be harder than I thought. Genuinely, though, I'm glad that Connor was at least in the better half of the contestants ranked (barely).
While I'm a little disappointed that Connor didn't make it farther this time around-- I think his placement was nearly identical to how he did in S2-- he wasn't particularly one of my favorite characters, so the loss didn't hurt me that deeply. Instead, he was an understandable sacrifice in terms of making the villains out to be more of a threat, much like what I theorized for Grett. Lesson learned that sometimes the most obvious boot from a tribe simply will be the boot.
Trailer Analysis
Looking back on the last power ranking, I feel like I could have done a lot better if I'd been paying more attention to what we were shown in the preview beyond the song snippet. So, combined with the fact that I'm just really excited to figure out what's going on next episode, I decided that this time around I'd take a closer look. I've never been a fan of analyzing a trailer so closely that you basically spoil the entire story before it happens, but, I don't think that'll happen here...? Depending on how accurate I am, maybe this section will suddenly disappear next time. Who knows.
So, a compilation of relevant things that I think will happen next episode:
Connor and Trevor will have a conversation. While I doubt that this will have anything to do with the elimination order, it is interesting. I'm guessing that Connor will give Trevor some sort of advice regarding his feelings for Derek? Or, even if it can't be counted as advice (given the L he took with Riya), Connor could at least relate. I don't think this is foretelling that Connor will reenter the competition now, though.
Somebody set up a trap to catch a squirrel. My guess is Tom, as a continuation to the drama between Gabby and the others over killing and eating animals. (Aiden confirms in Episode 5 that catching the chicken was "Tom's trap.") However, it could also be something related to Jensen and/or Trevor and Derek, if they started trying to kill the forest animals again.
Yul will take more orders from Emily to make Grett happy. This means that this is an ongoing plotline.
Tess and Ally will reunite at some point. Interesting.
Tom and Jake are definitely going to fight. Given that Tom looks surprised in one screenshot and regretful in the other, I think he's going to realize how much his relationship with Aiden has been hurting Jake.
The challenge will be contestants pushing balls of yarn(?) down towards other teams' arches, trying to score a goal, while other members of the teams try to block them. All teams appear to have arches and people pushing balls. This is definitely another challenge taken from Survivor, I think possibly Gabon...? I'm pretty sure that, in real life, they had to stop doing this challenge because it injured people too much, but that's the beauty of animation!
At least Yul and Aiden will be knocked down, which could be a good thing or a bad thing. Does that mean they gave it their all to stop a ball, or that the ball trampled their attempts to stop it...? Focusing on the second screenshot, though, the Cyan team is stopping yellow and magenta balls at the same time. Assuming the contestants have any say in where they aim, I wonder if the Yellow (Grett) and Magenta (Ashley, possibly Fiore?) teams will align to target Cyan because they have five members. That could be an in-universe reason to keep the teams even with a Cyan elimination, despite Cyan being pretty physically fit.
"Sure, princess. Whatever floats your boat~!"
Given Fiore's placement in both of these screenshots, it seems like one image must happen right before the other, so Fiore is probably addressing Jake. She sounds really confident and mocking... for some reason? Not saying that's out of character for Fiore, but did something happen to make that confidence warranted as opposed to her anger at being on the bottom? Here are my two guesses: 1) Fiore, Ashley, and Ally have made a girls' alliance, so Fiore is dismissive towards Jake because she knows he's on the bottom. 2) More likely, this might have something to do with Tom and Jake's fight. Jake ran in to urgently tell Fiore something, which could be about a development in Tom and Jake's relationship. Fiore doesn't care, so she gets sassy. I'm honestly kind of confused by this, but we'll see what happens.
Those are all of the scenes from the trailer that I thought were important/I was actually able to get something of value out of. Onto the main event: the actual Power Ranking!
Power Ranking
#1: Jake
Other than... being a S1 character, I guess? There really isn't anything that makes me think that Jake would be headed home this week. He's entrenched in drama, he seems to have the numbers on his tribe, and I don't even think that Magenta is going to tribal. To me, it's so clear cut that I don't have much to say. If he does go home, I'll be very surprised.
#2: Alec
Woah, check out that jump! From 12th to 2nd. Adventure Camp Dan wishes he could've had that when moving to Disventure Camp.
Now that Alec has survived one Yellow vote-- which turned out to be Connor-- I think he's pretty safe. The idea of Riya, Yul, and Grett suddenly now turning around and all working together to eliminate their leader feels laughable, given how dysfunctional the three of them are. Like, could Alec really lose that much social capital in the span of one episode, in a challenge he'll presumably be good at...? I'm kind of anticipating a merge at 12 (Episode 7), so I'm hoping this would confirm that Alec makes the merge.
#3: Ashley
Speaking of making the merge, I honestly think that Ashley will be there. After exploring some more of DC's behind the scenes content (the charity livestream they held 4 months ago and Silly Billy's S1 cast interviews), I've come to learn that the DC cast really likes Ashley... for some reason.
Look, it's not like I hate the gal! I just don't see her as the standout, heroic and hilarious character that a bunch of the voice actors seem to. Because I held this opinion, I was unaware of the possibility that Ashley was brought back because she was some huge fan favorite that everyone wanted to see done to justice. If that's the case, I have a hard time seeing the DC writers eliminating her as a premerger again.
I don't think Magenta is going to tribal, and I think that Fiore or Ally would be more natural boots than Ashley would be anyways. Congrats on ranking this high even though you're currently being hunted for sport, S1 girl. I still don't think you're going to win overall, but you'll probably make it through the day.
#4: Yul
Another big jump! Yul's new position is aided by two major factors. The first is that he's one of only two S2 boys left in the game, after James, Hunter, and Connor were eliminated (side note: I did NOT notice that the game only started with three boys from S1. I wonder what level of safety that grants them. Why did they bring back every S1 girl except Lill. That's so many.)
The second is that the plotline between him and Emily is clearly continuing to have relevance. Perhaps I'm relying too much on the rule of threes, but it would be strange, in my opinion, to have Yul lean on Emily for assistance more than once, but still only twice. Perhaps Emily's character was largely designed to assist a major Yul plotline, after all.
He also doesn't seem to have suffered too greatly from that stage light falling on his foot last episode, which bodes well for his odds. Unfortunately, it seems like the viewing public is going to be subjected to Yul for a little while longer (/lh).
#5: Aiden
Woohoo, the other surviving S2 boy. I honestly wanted to put him higher, but the fact that I'm really feeling like Cyan is headed for tribal couldn't let me justify higher than 5th place.
And, there are genuine reasons why I think he could go home now. If that conversation between Tom and Jake ends in them reconciling, the writers might not want Aiden around anymore to continue being a barrier between them. (And, now that the music episode has passed, they don't need to keep him around for his pipes, either ;).) It's been long enough now since Lake's elimination that I don't think Aiden's elimination would feel super weird. He's had a bit of a chance to play for himself, so if his fate now becomes to hang out in a cool hotel with his boyfriend and bestie for a couple of weeks, it wouldn't seem so bad.
...But I still think Aiden isn't going home, dammit! Knowing DC, I doubt Tom and Jake would make up so early unless one of them was going home, not Aiden. They love the drama. Tom and Jake's relationship is more likely to get worse before it gets better. Not to mention, I still find the "James returns" theory very compelling. Although the Cyan girls have plenty of reasons to eliminate Aiden, I still don't really think they would.
#6: Ally
Is it just me, or would Ally's elimination feel... really random right now? Like, how would it happen, and what narrative point would it serve? The show has very deliberately shown Ally bonding with each and every member of her team. She's had multiple one-on-one conversations with Ashley cementing their friendship, she grew closer to Jake by relating to him through song, and was always the one to defend Fiore from Hunter's attacks. All three of them have reasons to like her and want to work with her, so why would they let her go?
However, Ally doesn't cement a higher placement because I do think there are ways that they could swing her elimination. It's possible that the writers only established relationships between Ashley, Jake, and Ally so that there'll be high stakes and tension between which teammate Ashley and Jake will pair with if Magenta does go to another vote. For Ally to go home, they would have to choose to side with Fiore, but that's not totally unreasonable given how they voted last time.
The fact that Ally and Tess seem to reunite in this episode is also troubling. We have the dangling plot thread from last episode that Ally is worried that she and Hunter won't be able to spend that much time apart (which she believes is good for them) before they have to reexamine their relationship. If that fear turns out to be true, I could see that giving Ally an opportunity to quickly get some advice and closure from Tess would allow her to head to the Losers' Motel with a plan of how to handle Hunter in the future.
I still don't think that Ally or Magenta has anything to fear with tribal, though.
#7: Tess
A definite downgrade from last week, but still not that terrible. A lot of Tess' new placement is that, as I keep reiterating, I think Cyan is very likely to go to tribal, so it's hard to justify putting anyone on Cyan too high.
Having the opportunity to reconnect with Ally is also potentially bad for Tess, although probably less problematic for Tess than for Ally. If the writers were like, "well, Tess got one conversation with Hunter and one with Ally, now she's out!", that would be kind of silly, imo. But, still, that chat will eliminate the sort of "immunity" from getting booted that I gave Tess previously.
It's also not like there's no reason for the Cyans to take out Tess here. The swing vote is usually a fairly protected position, as both alliances should be looking to her for aid. But, if neither side finds her trustworthy enough, they could unite to take her out. I can definitely see a potential character arc of Tess' indecision taking her out from the game. If she can truly never make up her mind about whether to trust Ellie or not, everyone could unite to take out their unreliable teammate and save their own asses.
However, from a narrative perspective, this would further postpone the conflict between Ellie and Aiden, which could be kind of anticlimactic. It would also throw away Tess' character over a trait that wasn't even particularly pronounced in her original appearance. Then again, we saw what the writers did to Hunter, so we can't be too sure that Tess isn't headed in a similar direction.
#8: Grett
Much like Alec, I'm a bit less worried about Grett in this episode after we had the Yellow elimination last episode. She's also picking up points from (presumably) being involved in the ongoing Yul and Emily plotline, which could give her some plot armor moving forward.
If Yellow is headed to a vote, I don't really see why Alec and Riya would choose to eliminate Grett over Yul. Riya really dislikes Yul, he's still possibly injured, and Alec has a history of working with Grett, even if it ended on kind of bad terms.
Why put her so far below Yul, then? Well, first of all, Grett is a meta-threatened S1 girl, while Yul is a meta-protected S2 boy. Secondly, I do still think that Yul will probably be the cause of Grett's elimination at some point down the line, even if it's not this episode. Perhaps I should make an overall theory post talking about some of my thoughts on potential endings someday. And, third, I actually did think of one reason why Alec and Riya would choose to keep Yul over Grett... kind of. If Emily wanted to keep Yul in the show for whatever reasons, she could use the earpiece to instruct Yul on clever, strategic things to say that could also convince Alec and Riya that he turned over a new leaf. Basically, it's possible that Emily could girlboss her way into keeping Yul in the game, rather than Yul staying in due to his own merits.
There are other S1 girls (and others) that I believe to be in a spicier position now than Grett, though, so she lands at #8.
#9: Fiore
With Fiore, we enter the realm of players that I seriously believe could be in danger of elimination this episode. Yes, despite my claims that I think Fiore could be the winner, I do think that, if Magenta goes to tribal this episode, Fiore would be the boot. I just don't think Magenta really is going to tribal; ha ha!
It's really that whole, "whatever you say, princess~" that has me worried for Fiore. I'm concerned that, after getting a taste of power with the Hunter boot going her way, Fiore has become overconfident in thinking that Ally is definitely the next boot and that she will make the merge, whenever it is. (Basically, Fiore would think that Ally's presence gives her enough of a buffer that she thinks the merge is essentially secured.) If she goes back to demeaning Jake and Ashley, they could easily choose to turn on her and protect their newfound friendships with Ally instead. Fiore's status as a S1 girl isn't helping that read.
Again, I feel like all of the current Magenta team members are probably going to make the merge at this point, so Fiore should be safe. However, as (in my opinion) the most likely Magenta boot, Fiore winds up at #9 in case of emergency.
#10: Gabby
Thinking back on it, other than being a S1 girl, my reasoning behind Gabby's elimination wasn't that strong.
Or, maybe it was, before Ellie absorbed even more of the villainous energy last episode with her comments about torturing Jake. With comments like that, it becomes even harder to believe that Tom and Aiden would choose to target Gabby instead of Ellie. The farther Gabby makes it into All Stars, the less of an excuse there is for her to be eliminated with very little focus beforehand.
Still, I think Cyan is in trouble, blah blah blah. If some sort of twist does occur that gives Ellie individual immunity amidst her team-- and I don't think that would be a totem, as Ellie using a totem on herself and inadvertently sending Gabby home would basically require her to make her totem publicly known before the vote-- then they could target Gabby instead.
It is harder to predict DC than Survivor because DC has more of a penchant for pulling random shit out of nowhere, like that vote in S1 where Gabby just straight up obliterated Ashley. I wonder if that relationship will reemerge later in All Stars... Gabby would probably need to be around for it to happen, so, clearly, she should stay in.
#11: Tom
When I was drafting out my initial thoughts for this list, I originally put Tom really high. Like, top 3 high. But, the more I thought about it, the more I started to feel like Tom could be on the chopping block this episode.
For starters, the love triangle. I said last episode that, because Tom is the central leg between Jake and Aiden, he wouldn't be at risk of elimination. Well... I take those words back, sort of.
Let's look at it this way: if you eliminated any one of Jake, Aiden, or Tom, what would happen? If you eliminate Jake, Aiden and Tom are left. That's pretty boring, because then they could just be friends without any particularly strong (or at least personally motivated) opposition. If you eliminate Aiden, Jake and Tom are left. That's definitely better, because Jake and Tom could simply continue the will-they-won't-they plotline on their own, but you'd still lose Aiden as an obstacle without Jake having any hand in it.
If you eliminate Tom, Jake and Aiden are left. In my opinion, this is by far the spiciest option. Jake would probably be super mad at Aiden for not doing enough to protect Tom from getting voted out, leading to Aiden being justifiably angry that Jake has been so aggressive towards him despite Aiden not wanting Tom to go home, either. I think that having Tom's two "love interests" left to fight each other without him actually being there is the most interesting way in which one corner of the triangle could be eliminated.
But that's all about why Tom "should" be eliminated; what about why he would get eliminated? There are a couple of possibilities here, too. First of all, that argument between Jake and Tom in the preview, which ended with Tom pretty clearly being remorseful about what he did. If Tom gets super demoralized about screwing things up with Jake, it could cause him to be seen as a liability. Or, in an extreme case, Tom could feel so guilty about his and Aiden's kiss that he would ask the girls to target him instead of Aiden.
Alternatively (or even additionally), we also saw that squirrel trap in the trailer, which I said could be hinting at further conflict between Tom and Gabby over the team's diet. If Gabby got really fed up with Tom's carnivore side, she could ask Ellie if they could target Tom instead of Aiden, which Ellie might agree to.
Despite all this, I can also totally understand why the writers would want to keep Tom around. After his kiss with Aiden, his visibility and importance seem higher than ever. If James does return to the competition later, having him chat with Tom would be... interesting, even given James not caring that his boyfriend was stage-kissing another man. And, Tom potentially has a winner plot set up, given that the writers found it important enough to tell us what Tom would do with the prize. With Cyan likely going to tribal, however, the possibility of a surprise Tom boot felt more viable than ever. I'm not putting him in last place, but if Tom does wind up going home, I'm gonna feel pretty smart.
#12: Riya
Much like Fiore, Riya is here as my safety net for who I think would go home if Yellow does wind up going to tribal instead of Cyan. However, I feel like a third Yellow tribal is, on the whole, more likely than a third Magenta tribal, so Riya gets kicked all the way down here.
Without Connor as a shield, Riya is in a much worse position. Yul already dislikes Riya in general, but that only increased after she caused the light to fall on him, and would only increase more if he ever learns that Riya was the one to fire that stray vote at him. Grett would probably work with Yul, which is already 50% of the votes against her.
Alec is definitely Riya's best lifeline, and it could work out in her favor. After all, if Alec continues working with Grett and Yul, if they go to tribal again, the couple would most likely vote him out. However, I think it's really a question of how much longer Alec thinks he has before the merge.
Here's my logic: if Alec thinks there's still a long time until the merge, then, yes, it would be better to work with Riya to have a chance to eliminate Grett or Yul. That's because, the more team challenges there are, the greater opportunity Yellow has to lose again, and the greater possibility that Grett and Yul vote him out.
However, if Alec thinks that the merge is soon, it's better to vote out Riya. If Alec and Riya managed to eliminate, let's say, Yul, then Alec is essentially losing two members of his villains alliance-- one due to Yul's elimination, and one due to Grett presumably withdrawing. Alec has already burned her once before.
That would cause the villains alliance to go into the merge with a maximum of only four members: Alec, Riya, Fiore, and Ellie. The other teams have already been primed to believe that the villains are a huge threat, and with such small numbers, they would be very easily eradicated. Even beyond others, Fiore and Ellie might also be mad at Alec for him dragging them onto his sinking ship of a plan, and try to desert as well. My point is, sticking with Riya could go really badly for Alec.
So, combining that doomsday scenario with me at least thinking that the merge probably will be soon, and the fact that Alec choosing to side with Riya would only put them at a 50:50, NOT a majority, and I can totally see why Alec would choose to vote for Riya.
And, that's not even taking into account Riya's poor behavior! The Yellow Team did lose the singing challenge due to Riya's influence, and they suffered during the diving challenge due to her fear of the depths, too. She's a challenge liability. She was also shown hogging the shower, and is now sunbathing during camp life, proving that she's not a team player. She has way too much confidence in her "power position," as she put it last episode, for where her game actually is. If it's not Cyan that goes to tribal, I can totally see the threads coming together to lead to a Riya elimination.
#13: Ellie
It's just simple math for me at this point. I think that Cyan is almost certainly going to tribal next episode + I think Ellie is by far the most likely boot for Cyan's next tribal = I think Ellie is really, really likely to be the next boot. She's even a S1 girl.
My argument is pretty much the exact same things I said last episode, except now they're even worse. The screenshots from the challenge now make me think that Cyan will go to tribal next episode, as opposed to my confusion about why Cyan would lose a music challenge. We also saw that Ellie has begun to prioritize suffering over strategy, which both increases the odds that people like Tess would want to take her out and decreases the odds that she'd be able to pull off an intellectual move to save herself.
I'll honestly be pretty surprised if Ellie doesn't go home next episode... but, hey, I was surprised by Connor's boot last episode, too! If Ellie does manage to survive another episode, I wonder if I'll have to start reconsidering putting her so close to the bottom. Part of it would depend on how she survives, of course.
The only way to know for sure is to actually watch the episode myself, so, see y'all on Thursday! Thanks for reading!
#disventure camp#disventure camp spoilers#dcas#dcas power ranking#let's go i still finished this before the episode thumbnail drop#god knows what additional lore that will contain#i'm still waiting to get jumpscared by the announcement that a totem has been hidden#then again at least in s1 and s2 nobody found a totem and then immediately turned around and used it in the same episode#so hopefully my rankings would be safe from that happening#jake disventure camp#alec disventure camp#ashley disventure camp#yul disventure camp#aiden disventure camp#ally disventure camp#tess disventure camp#grett disventure camp#fiore disventure camp#gabby disventure camp#tom disventure camp#riya disventure camp#ellie disventure camp
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How Never Have I Ever Uses Music to Hint at the Future
I’ve always loved the way music tells a story, especially in movies and tv shows. These things usually go unnoticed unless you’re a college student trying to ignore homework on a Tuesday afternoon. I have been aware that NHIE has been whispering a secret story through its soundtrack for a while now but never had time to actually compile it into one monster of a post. So I’m doing it now!
This is where I try to convince you that the show has been hinting at Devi ending up with Ben all the way since season one. There are over 100 songs in the official soundtrack and of course, I can’t go through them all so I’ll just stick with the most important moments from all three seasons and lyrics that I think encapsulate the core message of the songs.
SEASON 1
The Pilot – Introductions
Paxton’s intro song (Dancing On My Own – Robyn) makes a lot of sense for both characters. It talks about trying hard to get someone’s attention and failing at it. It is a song with a dramatic, pulsating beat that plays over Paxton’s big entrance into Devi’s class.
I'm in the corner, watching you kiss her, oh
I'm right over here, why can't you see me? Oh
I'm giving it my all, but I'm not the girl you're taking home, ooh
I keep dancing on my own (I keep dancing on my own)
Ben is introduced with a softer melody (Rubia – Juan Wauters). It is in Spanish, a language I don’t speak as well so I won’t try to translate it but I will leave you with this Pitchfork review of it written by Steven Arroyo :
“Rubia” still succeeds wonderfully on these terms, a longing love letter to someone with a memorable nose in a far-away country…
Te guardo un lugar en mi corazon
No quiero irme, chequeo hora son
Me iré pensando que
Muy pronto contigo yo estaré
There is an important moment near the end of the episode when Devi goes to talk to Paxton (and asks him to have sex with her) in which Playing Games by Anna of the North plays.
I've been playing games with your heart
Left you thinking in the dark
Just to make you feel unsure
Then I know you want me more
This whole song is very interesting to me. The singer seems to describe a situation in which she has the upper hand in a relationship.
I’ve been playing games with your heart, so I know I’ve made my mark is a lyric I think perfectly shows Devi’s desire to enter a relationship. It is not because she actually likes Paxton. In fact, she doesn’t even know him yet. I think it tells of Devi’s reasons to have a boyfriend – to make a mark not just on him but the school, and her peers as well. She wants to stop being “invisible” as to somehow regain some power over her situation in s1 (the death of Mohan) as well as distract herself from it.
Episode 2
The song Dancing on The Limit (by Prizes) plays as Devi dreams of Paxton coming into her room to have sex with her. It is the first “love song” of Devi and Paxton which I find genius since it doesn’t actually depict reality.
I'm never gonna quit it
Back in love within a minute
We're dancing on the limit
But I love the way you're making me move
It is a fantasy, something Devi feels when she imagines what would be like to be Paxton’s girlfriend.
Episode 6
In Ben’s episode we get so much more insight into who he is, and not just that shell of an obnoxious overachiever he built for himself. We also get insight into his feelings for Devi when he is having dinner with the Vishwakumars where after choosing not to “nuke her back”, he actually has a fun time with her family as the song (Call Me by Sarah Rebecca) in the background goes :
Call me angel, I could save you
I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you
At the very end of the episode when Devi Venmos Ben so that he never has to “accept food from a pedo again” another love song can be heard (Lost – Boy Harsher).
I’m the one that holds you
In the middle of the night
I'm the one that wants you
Forever til we die
Episode 7
In this episode Devi and Paxton kiss for the first time to Fire For You by the Cannons which at first seems like a really sensual song… until you actually read the lyrics.
I could've died for you
How could you not know?
I was alive with you
But you brought in the cold
Was I being lied to? Wish I never met you
Started to regret you
Episode 10
Boys Like You - Kids at Midnight
We’ve reached my favorite NHIE song. I love the synths. I love the 80s vibe. I love everything about it (No wonder why that Malibu kiss got an MTV nomination).
Certainly the most interesting thing about this song playing during this scene is right as the camera lowers on Devi’s phone, we cut to Paxton leaving a voicemail with these lyrics in the background :
She said, "Boys like that should be in second place”
Now do with that what you will but this is the most intentionally placed lyric in season 1, in my opinion.
I know it hurts right now, one day you'll realise
There's no need to hide yourself from the world
All my life I've been hiding myself
Just waiting for a boy like you
SEASON 2
Episode 8
In the scene we see Devi apologize to Ben about the cheating when the song Up All Night by The Undercover Dream Lovers starts playing. The song is seemingly about second chances and not letting someone go. I thought the theme of driving was interesting considering Malibu.
Caught up on the freeway
You test my patience all the time
Find another exit, ooh
Blocking you from mine
Episode 9
Heat Waves – Glass Animals
During Paxton and Devi’s kiss Heat Waves plays and I have to admit the song as well as the scene are amazing. However, I’ve seen this song misunderstood by Daxton fans so much, probably due to the scene trending (mostly on TikTok where people enjoy quick content without much context).
The writer of the song, David Bayley says this about what it means, mentioning another song called Your Love : “They're both definitely two of the songs that are about relationships and sort of knowing that they're doomed,"
Bayley uses the term Heat Wave to represent an illusion of a highway mirage (the air that rises off asphalt on extremely hot days making it seem like the road is wet).
So the love that the writer describes is just like the heat waves – an illusion.
Now I gotta let you go
You'll be better off in someone new
I don't wanna be alone
You know it hurts me too
You look so broken when you cry
One more and then I say goodbye
Episode 10
GOLDEN – Running ; Ben comes into the girls bathroom to try and make Devi feel better after she is rejected by Paxton. As he is saying “When are you gonna to realize that that dick doesn’t deserve you” the lyrics playing are :
But I get these feelings
That I can't explain
It’s in my veins
being the underdog all the time
Hello Pongo – Summer Love
Another love song that plays when Ben and Devi see each other at the dance.
I've been lookin,
for you my summer love
forever summer love
Sam Smith – Love Goes
This song is – do you wanna guess? Not a love song. It is a sad one.
I hope you understand that I have to send you away
You may not understand, but I know that you will one day
You're broken, I know this
And if you knew it, you would love me a whole different way
But that's how love goes, goes
I also think it’s funny how just as Devi and Paxton are about to slow dance the DJ plays a different, more upbeat song which tells us they aren’t really that compatible with each other. They just never manage to catch that love song!
I wonder if season 4 brings us a Ben and Devi slow dance…
SEASON 3
Episode 1
Josha Daniel – Dream of You ; We finally get something close to a love song for Daxton in the first scene of season 3 even though it it pretty vague and repetitive.
We are never gonna waste our time again
I can't sleep when i dream of you
I can't sleep when i dream of you
Ilo Ilo – Clementine ; Devi and Paxton almost have sex
Clementine
Trying to erase you from my spotless mind
Hit fast-forward but I'm stuck in rewind
Episode 3
Afternoon Bike Ride – Before The Fall ; Devi tells Nalini she and Paxton broke up
After an autumn of ends lеd to silence
Winters cloak covered the tracks of the tyrants
Spring couldn't bring on the promise of June
With no voice to sing and nothing to bloom
I found the mention of June interesting even if it wasn’t intentional because it almost seems like an answer to Heat waves (Sometimes, all I think about is you, Late nights in the middle of June).
Mel Blue – Finding You; Ben tells Fabiola Devi broke his heart
I lost you love
You lost you too
I lost myself
I’m finding you
Episode 5
Carla Morrison – Eres tú ; Ben and Devi say goodbye to each other after their bet at the coffeehouse
(I found a translation for this one)
Today I woke up wanting to kiss you
I have a thirst to caress you
Entangle myself with you and not let you go
You're so intoxicating
It's you
Episode 10
“Because I’ll miss you. A lot.”
“Wait. There’s the stomach knots.”
Jaguar Sun – Car Keys
Oh, how you've grown
Look back now
And move on
Don't worry, about a thing
Just grab those car keys
And drive into the rain
Another song involving cars, driving… I’m starting to think all of this makes sense! Also I love how the song mentions growth because Devi did grow so much in season 3.
Prinze George – Take off
Saw you in the living room
You were wild with light and I wanted you
Tried to do the woman thing
I was eager, young and abandoning
I would force you to love me
I would force you to stay
I would force you to love me
I would stand in your way
And you can't take off without me now
After Boys Like You this has to be my favorite NHIE song. It also has an 80s vibe to it and the two songs feel very much connected in my mind. The lyrics talk about standing in a lover’s way. Preventing them from leaving you and closing that chapter of their life.
I am still in your way
This lyric that appears later in the song shows that after everything that happened to them in season 4, they are still in each other’s way. They can’t forget about each other even after actively pursuing other people.
After analyzing so many songs, I really have to give credit to the show. Most of these were chosen so carefully to fit certain moments. You can really tell the show was made with a lot of intention and love, at least soundtrack wise.
As far as proving who the main couple (endgame couple, whatever you wanna call it) in season 4 is, to me that is pretty obvious even without the support of the soundtrack. I’m very curious about the songs we’ll get to hear in the new season and I also wonder if we will hear some old ones again.
Let me know what you think!
#never have i ever#never have i ever netflix#never have i ever season 4#nhie#nhie s4#nhie netflix#ben gross#devi vishwakumar#benvi#ben x devi#music analysis
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Pilgrims Under The Field Of Stars
St. James, St. Christopher and Santiago de Compostela (part 1) (part 2)
This is piggybacking off of @bookqueenrules' excellent post about Daryl's pilgrimage. I mentioned Santiago de Compostela briefly in this post from the other day, where I promised that I would dig up my old notes and compile it into a post.
The symbolism around the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela was among the first things I started researching back when I became part of TD. I was trying to make heads or tails of the Sirius symbolism and all the astronomical references on the show, such as the Sirius and the Venus symbolism, the North Star symbolism and other things. The “Way of St. James”, or Camino de Santiago to Santiago de Compostela, the world famous pilgrimage under "the field of stars" seemed to fit the symbolism perfectly.
It all really started with Morgan. Who can forget the coda after 5x8 Coda? The thing was, he gave me major pilgrim vibes. His whole demeanor, his chlothes, his backpack, his apparent “peace of mind”. His bow staff always reminded me of a pilgrim’s walking stick…
We watched him reach Father Gabriel’s church, and it was almost as though it had been the goal of his "pilgrimage" all along. He placed a series of mementos/trinkets on the alter (relics?), and as we all remember, he “resurrected” the cross that many of us interpreted as a representation of the "resurrection" of Beth. He had a moment of silent contemplation, before he smiled in contentment.
The rabbit’s foot was one of the items he “presented” on the alter. It was originally gifted to him by Eastman in 6x4 Here’s Not Here. I’ve talked about how Beth’s connected to the symbolism around rabbits here.
In those early days of analyzing the symbolism, Morgan always struck me as something of a St. Christopher figure. Back in those days, TD was very concerned about what role Morgan would play in Beth’s “resurrection”. He was the first thing we saw after Beth’s “death”. There was also the fact he had "resurrected" the cross. It seemed plausible that he would somehow be involved in “resurrecting” Beth as well. Back then, we all assumed this would happen within a few episodes. Obviously it didn’t happen that way, but regardless, many of our theories around that time involved Morgan in some way.
St. Cristopher was the patron saint of travelers, especially those driving motor vehicles, which again seemed particularly fitting because of all the car symbolism around Beth. There’s an enormous amount of car weirdness around Beth, I’ve written about it here, here and here, but also in a bunch of other posts.
After I had started to see Morgan as St. Christopher, I couldn’t unsee it:
St. Christopher’s claim to fame was that he had carried a helpless child across a river, not knowing the child in reality was Christ. Beth, much like Rick, was always surrounded by resurrection symbolism on TWD, making them both Christ figures. If Morgan, a possible St. Christopher figure, had found her after 5x8 Coda, helpless in a car, and carried her to safety, it would have been a great parallel to the story of St. Christopher and Christ.
Another thing that lined up extremely well with TD's theories around cars and Beth's resurrection was this:
Yes, St. Christopher is the patron saint of travelers, “including motorists”…
Being kidnapped and thrown into the trunk of a car qualifies as being a “motorist” in my world… Good thing there’s a saint that protects against that stuff...
St. Christopher medallions are normally kept hanging from the rear view mirror of cars:
Which is interesting, because in 5x16 we saw this:
Morgan, making sure to grab his rabbit’s foot that was hanging from the rear view mirror of his car. I was always inclined to interpret him as a St. Christopher figure, and with imagery like this, it seemed like it couldn’t be entirely coincidental.
There were also other things about St.Christopher that seemed to fit perfectly into the symbolism around Beth, such as the fact that St. Christopher is sometimes shown as a dog in iconography:
Obviously, any type of dog symbolism would immediately be in my radar. It was the Sirius symbolism that put me on the path to Santiago de Compostela, to the pilgrimage under the field of stars in the first place, as Sirius refers to Sirius the Dog Star:
There were other things as well. Pilgrims along the Camino de Santiago like to place their worn out pilgrim boots on trail markers along the way. I thought that this type of imagery was quite similar to all the boot/foot/shoe symbolism we see in TWD:
My theory on the foot/shoe/boot/dismembered limb symbolism we’ve seen on the show, is that it’s a reference to the British English word “boot’ which translates to “trunk” in American English. Basically, it’s trunk symbolism. But I wondered if the themes around “pilgrimage” could be a part of it as well. Symbolism in TWDU is always multi-layered, so it was definitely a possibility.
Also, keep in mind that Morgan's rabbit's foot is also part of the foot/shoe/boot/dismembered limb symbolism. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if all the other dismembered limbs were foreshadows and callbacks to Morgan's rabbit's foot.
We saw Beth get her foot trapped in an animal trap, and through the years, we’ve seen countless examples of this type of imagery:
We saw Jadis steal Rick’s boots in season 6, we saw Father Gabriel step on a nail and get a minor crucifixion and a stigmata wound in 5x8 Coda, we saw Daryl examine and bandage Beth’s ankle in 4x13 Alone…
Further, it’s interesting that the symbol of Camino de Santiago to Santiago de Compostela is a scallop shell. It’s the same kind of shell we see around the Venus symbolism and the "Birth of Venus" painting:
We saw Botticelli’s “Birth of Venus” (or a replica, I would assume, seeing as the original is at the Uffizi in Florence, Italy) in season 3, when Merle tortured Glenn at Woodbury:
But even though there were many interesting coincidences, they existed mostly in my own head, and there wasn’t really anything tangible or groundbreaking in terms of the symbolism pertaining to pilgrimage, Santiago de Compostela and St. Christopher anywhere in TWDU….
…until season 6 of FTWD rolled around:
Daniel Salazar, seen here perfectly healthy after having been shot in the head, pulling out a St. Christopher medallion in FTWD 6x2 Welcome To The Club. I had been theorizing about St. Christopher since right after Coda, and suddenly a St. Christopher medallion appears in FTWD...
Let me say that again: TPTB placed a St. Christopher medallion on a character who survived getting shot in the head:
Now why would TPTB ever do such a thing?
Well perhaps because…
…it protects people who wear it! Yup, that’s why. The symbolism is about protecting travelers, remember? Motorists in particular, including kidnapped girls in trunks of cars...
We saw the St. Christopher medallion regularly from season 6 and onwards, It changed owner quite a few times, before it finally was gifted to Alicia by Victor Strand, and became inextricably linked to her.
At one point, Alicia and Strand had a falling out. Her boyfriend Will brought the medallion to Victor Strand, and told him he had taken it from one of the dead, knowing that Strand would recognize it as the same medallion he had gifted to Alicia, tricking him into believing she was dead.
The medallion eventually gets returned to Alicia, and she’s wearing it through her months long fever after her bite, which I’ve discussed here.
Later, Troy (I miss him so much...) showed up as a one-eyed, newly “resurrected” Sirius figure, wearing Alicia’s St. Christopher medallion. This was meant to be "evidence" that he had actually killed her (spoiler alert; he hadn’t, because Alicia was still under protection of the medallion. He tried, but did not succeed at killing her. He did however manage to snatch her medallion, and used it to torment her mother, claiming to have killed her).
Going into the series finale of FTWD I knew the medallion would be part of a “resurrection” of sorts, and I was right. At one point, Tracy, Troy’s daughter gave the medallion back to Madison, who placed it in the empty magazine of a gun and put it in her pocket. Some time later, Tracy shot Madison in retaliation for killing her father Troy:
... but Madison survived, because...
The medallion in the empty magazine stopped the bullet...
Say what you will about resurrection symbolism, but that medallion literally stopped a bullet. And remember, it was introduced to TWDU by a man who survived a gunshot to the head. I'd say its protective powers are pretty substantial, maybe in particular against gunshots.
And, remember how I made a point out of St. Christopher being a protector of motorists and people in cars? Wait till you hear where Madison was when she survived getting shot...
You guessed it, she was in a car indeed, and not just any old car, she was in a Ford Mustang, which I've talked about a few times already. Remember that we saw the blue Ford Mustang in the teaser for TWDDD season 2. Mustangs are absolutely resurrection symbolism, and we can clearly see why here (we can thank eagle-eyed @wdway for discovering that this was another Ford Mustang).
Later, Madison sacrificed herself by burning down the fort with a walker horde inside, something which made Tracy forgive her for killing her father. Madison's lungs were already in rough shape after her first death fake-out a few seasons earlier, when she burned down the Dell Diamond Stadium in a similar fashion. Tracy believed she was now dying, and was actually sad about it. She placed the medallion next to Madison, who then subsequently "woke up” from the "dead":
So, yet another resurrection there.
The next thing that happens, is the "resurrrection" of Alicia, last seen in seasson 6 after miraculously recovering from a walker bite. She is the first person in TWDU to get bitten, develop the fever and then subsequently recover from the fever, and that in itself demonstrates the immense powers of the medallion:
And if that's not enough resurrection symbolism for one day, Alicia brought Skidmark, Daniel's cat. Remember the cat symbolism from TOWL 1x6, when Michonne found Jadis' dossier in a cat sculpture...cats are said to have nine lives, and are known to survive the strangest things…
So Alicia "resurrects", there's a reunion between mother and daughter, and there's even a reunion between Daniel and his cat.
That's one powerful medallion if you ask me, reunions and resurrections for miles...
Now, how does this tie into the rumors about Daryl possibly going to Spain for season 3 of TWDDD, and what does it have to do with Beth? Well, remember this all started with Morgan bearing a striking resemblance with a pilgrim, and it was Morgan, who through subtle hints introduced the symbolism around St. Christopher to TWDU. It was formalized in FTWD 6x2, but it started literally right after Beth had been shot in Coda. The St. Christopher symbolism was brought on to FTWD by a character who had survived getting shot in the head, so idk, those types of injuries aren’t necessarily fatal I guess??? Especially not when you're protected by the patron saint of travellers and motorists...? I wonder who else this possibly could apply to…?
The symbolism around St. Christopher deals specifically with protection of motorists and people who travel by car…or who have been kidnapped and thrown into the trunk of a car, and potentially also been put in the trunk of a car to be protected from an incoming walker horde or something to that effect…
And the symbolism comes from a man who once assisted a helpless child in crossing a river, not knowing the child in reality was Christ. It would be interesting if Morgan, our St. Christopher figure assisted Beth, our helpless Christ figure in getting to safety somehow after Coda, like our early theories suggested.
In TWDDD 1x6 Coming Home, we hear Losang, leader of The Nest, explain how he first ran into Laurent and the nuns while returning from a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. It was the references to the stars of the Milky Way under which the pilgrims traveled that put me on the track of Santiago de Compostela all those years ago, we’re talking after season 5 here. And now we finally have the first explicit reference to the Camino de Santiago and Santiago de Compostela in TWDDD 1x6.
Likewise, it was Morgan’s appearance, right after Beth had been “killed” in 5x8 Coda that put me on the track of St. Christopher, and while the clues seen around Morgan were subtle at first, we finally got the first explicit St. Christopher reference in FTWD 6x2 Welcome To The Club. And the medallion symbolizes reunion, resurrection and rebirth, that much is abundantly clear.
Then there’s the fact that St. Christopher in eastern iconography is depicted with a dog’s head, something which ties him even closer to the Sirius symbolism and the astronomical themes around Santiago de Compostela, the “field of stars”.
To me, it’s very reassuring when symbolism stays consistent over time, and this has been a symbolism slow burn unlike any other. It’s been subtle at times, but it’s definitely been there, and now it’s getting more and more explicit.
So, will we possibly discover that Beth is explicitly implemented in the symbolism around St. Christopher and Santiago in TWDDD season 3? Considering that the working title of TWDDD was “Pilgrim”, and pilgrims are most definitely travelers, therefore protected by St. Christopher, I think we can say that at the very least, there’s thematic entanglement. Add to that, the Camino de Santiago, or the “Way of St. James” as it translates into in English, is all about pilgrims. St. James, or simply “Jacob” (Santiago), is the patron saint of pilgrims. I know that others, such as @galadrieljones have studied the symbolism around “Jacob” extensively, and would probably have a lot of additional insight on that.
So, as @bookqueenrules suggested in her post, is Daryl on a pilgrimage in Europe, and will he find Beth?
The symbolism seems to suggest "yes", so sure, why not?
#team delusional#bethyl#daryl dixon#beth greene#the walking dead#twd#ftwd#ftwd alicia#ftwd troy#twd daryl dixon#twd tboc#towl#twddd
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Undertale is 8 years old today, and Papyrus is still one of my favorite fictional characters of all time, and definitely the one that's still the most important to me. Thank you, Toby Fox, for everything.
Time to get sentimental.
I was in middle school when Undertale came out. I wasn't there for the release, but I was there before the new year, around November.
At the time, I was in the worst mental state I have ever been in. I was deep, deep in the depths of depression, and no one in my family believed me when I told them that, since I had always been the "dramatic child". Attention-seeking. My brother was still very young at the time, too, so y'know.
To put it bluntly, my life was in danger from my own mind. Without saying the word, you can probably guess what I mean. I was alone, when I tried to reach out for help I was either denied or made fun of, and I was getting increasingly worse.
Then Undertale came into my life.
I loved it instantly, watching Jack play through the game and then quickly convincing my parents to buy it for me once I got to the end of his pacifist route. And playing it myself took weeks, since I wasn't good at games and the bullet hell format was torture, but finally making it to the end and getting to hug Asriel for myself marked a change in my life's trajectory.
See, I did not have the courage to play through the genocide route on my own, instead watching Lets Plays and YouTubers React compilations. I remember latching onto Flowey and Chara immediately (and I was in the camp of thinking Chara was good until the fandom made me second-guess myself, unfortunately). I remember getting upset at Undyne's death and feeling awful at Sans'. And I knew what the game was trying to tell me, I picked up on the themes of love and mercy.
But that's not the part that stood out the most to me. That, instead, goes to Papyrus' death in the genocide route.
"W-WELL, THAT'S NOT WHAT I WAS EXPECTING. ST... STILL, I BELIEVE YOU CAN DO A LITTLE BETTER, EVEN IF YOU DON'T THINK SO. I... I PROMISE."
This single quote saved my life. I say that without exaggeration.
Whenever I was struggling in school, I'd ask myself what Papyrus would tell me if he were there. And then he'd comfort me. Lift me up. Encourage me. Told me I wasn't the terrible person I thought I was, and even if I was that person, I had the potential and capability of change. I could do better. BE better. Help others do better.
So I did. I used that energy to pull myself out of my depression (by myself, btw. no one came to help me except one (1) teacher, who finally convinced my parents something was wrong with me, and even then they didn't really do much to help so). I put forth a persona of kindness, one that I embodied more and more as the months and eventually years went on.
To this day, I still try to be like Papyrus.
He's not perfect, far from it, but he also acknowledges his flaws while lifting himself and others up despite them. He loves himself, and uses that self-love to help other people, which is something I still desperately want to embody.
Papyrus' encouragement was the one thing I had to cling to when I was deep underwater, and he brought me up high enough that I could start swimming on my own again.
Was it silly? Yeah. Was it cringy? Maybe at the time. Do I regret it? Hell no.
When I fell, Paps was there to catch me, even if it was just from my own imagination. But if he could help me out that much simply by existing and leading by example, then goddamnit, there's hope. Hope I cling to every day.
Thank you, Papyrus. I owe you my life.
Thank you, Toby Fox, for creating Undertale in general. The whole game helped me out to many, many extensions (like telling me lesbians and trans people exist lol), but I can't emphesize enough just how much it's helped others, too. Just how sincere the game is. Hopeful. I look at Undertale today and I see a better future. Thank you.
And thanks for reading. Surely this isn't the first story you've heard like this, as Undertale is just one of those games that touched a lot of people, so I appreciate you giving it the read. Undertale means a lot to me, and it always will.
We can all do a little better, even if we don't think so. I promise.
#papyrus#undertale#undertale papyrus#papyrus undertale#undertale 8th anniversary#happy birthday undertale#dimond speaks#dimonds456 art
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My New Boss Is Goofy Episode 10 Review - Autumnal Short Stories
This episode is a bit different from the rest in that it’s more of a compilation of short stories compared to one whole episode. Fortunately, these little stories revolve around the theme of autumn. Basically, this episode is summarized as Momose and Shirosaki doing cute things in autumn, ft. Hakutou, Aoyama and Kinjou.
The first story is about Shirosaki and Momose meeting up during work and then an acorn hits Shirosaki’s shoulder. He thought Momose was calling him, but since the latter didn’t want to embarrass him, he told a white lie by saying he likes acorns. The segment ends with Shirosaki giving acorns to Momose and Kinjou giving Shirosaki a squirrel kigurumi. This is a cute way to start the episode.
The second story is just a cute halloween-themed episode where Shirosaki and Momose stumble upon a halloween festival while out for work. Shirosaki gets scared as usual. There’s an instance where Shirosaki tried going left, but went right and smooshed his cheek against Momose’s. After kids were telling them how to differentiate left and right, they bought them candy as thanks. Cute. It’s okay, Shirosaki; I get my left and rights mixed up at times too.
The third story is about Momose and Shirosaki out on a drive for work-related purposes. Momose was amazed by Shirosaki’s driving skills, but he’s still a goof as he tried getting out without removing the seatbelt. Afterwards, on their way back, they saw a vending machine that only took small bills. So, as Shirosaki went to the convenience store to ask for change, Momose reflects on the difference between Shirosaki and Kurono, his old boss. When Shirosaki comes back, he has a bag of beverages and snacks; unfortunately, Shirosaki forgot he was supposed to ask for change and paid everything with credit card. I get you Shirosaki; that happened to me too! At least, Momose likes driving with his boss now. The little flashback with Shirosaki making a mistake at his driving test was hilarious; I just hoped he got his license on his first try—I got mine on my first try and I still wonder how I did so to this day. There’s also a small segment where Aoyama and Kinjou are in a car together. Aoyama even has a Kumatte-chan GPS!
The fourth story is about Momose and Shirosaki working from home due to a mass infection at Minette. Hakutou’s wondering why they’re at home today. Shirosaki makes a big goof by trying to drink something with his mask on. Since they’re at home, Momose reassures he can take off his mask, which he does. Drinking something with the mask on was something I did once. I think the biggest highlight of this segment was the fact that Aoyama was telling the others that he isn’t wearing any pants underneath. Aoyama, TMI!
The fifth segment is about the two going on a day trip. They decided to buy a book to keep themselves occupied on the train. As a book lover myself, it’s nice see what sort of books they chose. Momose chose a poetry book that contains healing poems; I feel like it’s perfect for someone who needs some mental healing. Shirosaki chose a mystery book with a cat on the cover; I bet he picked it precisely because there’s a cat on the cover. It turns out that Shirosaki already figured out the culprit…because he bought and read the book before. It’s okay, Shirosaki! Having multiple copies of a book is normal for bookworms.
The sixth segment is about taking Hakutou to the vet. Is it just me or has Hakutou gotten bigger? He looks a bit bigger than he did in previous episodes, especially the part where Shirosaki picked him up. Also, the cat noises Hakutou makes are so cute! Props to Hiro Shimono for having such a cute voice! The part about the stethoscope was cute. Also, the taxi driver from Episode 6 has returned!
The seventh segment has the quartet go to an autumn festival. They reflect over what they did in festivals in their youth. Shirosaki had danced but went off course due to his goofiness. Aoyama tried goldfish scooping but they all swam away from him. Kinjou tried flirting with a girl; it turns out he was just being playful towards his mom. Momose had always been kind; when he got the yoyo, he gave it to his mom. The story moved Shirosaki. I think the most hilarious thing is that the habits of their childhood was still implemented onto their adult selves as they repeated the same things they did before, with Aoyama failing at goldfish scooping again, but is given a yoyo from Momose and then Shirosaki getting lost, so Kinjou gets him back by playfully hitting on him. All of their childhood selves were adorable.
The eighth segment has the main duo go to another company to earn a deal. Momose is nervous because he had gone to that company in the past but failed to get a contract; Kurono blamed him for that. Shirosaki sensed his nervousness, and then told him how he managed to overcome nervousness. In the past, he and Aoyama went to another company to negotiate a deal, but his nervousness got to him that Shirosaki accidentally spoke in an arrogant tone. Fortunately, Aoyama was able to do damage control by saying that Shirosaki speaks like a haughty queen when nervous. Despite his mistakes, they managed to get a deal. The story warms Momose’s heart and they actually got a deal! The part where they high-fived was so silly. Momose was trying to call a taxi but Momose mistook it for a celebrating and did a high-five. Haha, never change, Shirosaki.
The final segment is their day off where they legit go on a date. They go to various spots like a restaurant, then the park where they proceed to explore and even go on swan boats! They were talking about how couples who ride swan boats break up, but if they ride the boat with the eyebrows, they’d be together forever; guess who rides the boat with the eyebrows? I think the funniest part about this segment is at the post-credit scene where Shirosaki was like “Wait, we didn’t need to ride the boat with the eyebrows because we’re not a couple.” MM-HMM! SURE!
While this episode was different in terms of formatting, the vibes were still there. We’re now in the double digits when it comes to episode counts. There are only 12 episodes, meaning there are two more episodes left. I’m sad. What was your favorite segment of this episode? I liked the final segment where they went on a date!
#my new boss is goofy#atarashii joushi wa do tennen#Yusei shirosaki#Kentaro momose#hakutou#Mitsuo aoyama#aigou kinjou#review#anime#anime review
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Mr. Rad Guy, I've wanted to get your opinion on something for a while now, and finally snagged what I was looking for on twitter. I normally don't pay any of those transphobic Bridget discourse peddlers any mind, but they bring up her appearence in the canon pachinko game Vastege as supposed "proof" that Strive's story direction for her is a contradictory retcon. This game's plot takes place just three months before Xrd's, and they claim that through her voicelines she is still insisting sternly that she's a man and not to call her cute, but also that she STILL hasn't broken her village's superstition at this point in time. This is the only image they ever have as so-called evidence, so I wanted to see if you know if these lines are legitimately in the game, scrapped content, or made up altogether. I don't trust these lunatics as far as I can throw them when it comes to telling the whole truth 🤨
This screenshot is from same manuscript of dialog that is in the lore server archives and in the GG VXT archive pack that I compiled and uploaded to Archive.org. As far as I know, these lines were all used in the game and no unused lines have been (or even could be) datamined. Two of the lines here are highlighted so I'm assuming they're the ones these dorks are using to try to prove their point. I've translated them.
First line:
I want to break the village's rule/law*, and return to the village as a young man.
*In the official localizations I think they might translate this as "tradition" or "superstition" instead of rule or law.
"Young man" in that line is 男の子 (otokonoko). Do not let anyone convince you Bridget is using the other otokonoko there (男の娘；"young man with a feminine aesthetic"). They like to do that a lot, argue that it's the one that uses 娘.
Second line:
Cute is uncalled for... I'm a man.
In conclusion: Yes. Bridget is using almost 1:1 recycled dialog in Vastedge that she used in XX and the spinoffs. The Twitter grifters' Google Translating was correct this time.
Vastedge's plot may take place only 3 months before Xrd, but Vastedge itself came out in 2013—8 entire years before Strive released in 2021. A lot can change in 3 months in real life, but after almost a decade most people are entirely different altogether (wrt Daisuke and his plot decisions). Also it's a friggin pachislot machine lmfao Like, are people really expecting something as earth shattering as a character as irrelevant to the general plot like Bridget suddenly stopping all of the action to explore her identity on a slot machine? I have no patience for these people anymore. They're just stupid and arguing because they have no hobbies.
There's also the fact that Daisuke originally planned for Bridget to be a cis girl until the very last minute. So if anything her coming out in Strive was just returning to the starting concept. He mentions this in the interview in the back of Artworks of Guilty Gear X 2000-2004. Translation by fairymisao.
(27)---The character Bridget, introduced in Guilty Gear XX, looks like a girl but is actually a boy, right? What was your intention in deciding on creating this kind of character?
Ishiwatari: The creation of Bridget as a boy happened at the very last second; during development I was drawing him as purely a girl. It's just that when there is a need to give a worldly backbone (to the game), in order for me to try to not forget each character, and in order to revive the character, I give them my very heart. As a result, the creation of Bridget as actually a boy instead of a girl was because I thought he could become my alter ego. [...]
It's also important to note that Vastedge was the first thing ASW made for Guilty Gear after getting the full rights to the IP back from Sega after the Sega-Sammy merger in 2011 (which they had started to lose a bit before Overture's release in 2004). They were absolutely more focused on making something that would generate income and looked flashy than they were a compelling cinematic experience.
#asks#bridget discourse#long post#VXT doesn't really offer anything meaningful for any of the characters outside of the immediate main cast tbh#Friggin Zappa and Jam both have more lines than Bridget does in VXT#Like I do actually enjoy Bridget as a character. She's fun and lighthearted in a cast of very serious & gritty characters#But My God are people vastly overestimating just important she was to anything at all until Strive#I mean come on she was introduced in XX. You know. The series with 3 story writers that isn't even canon?#Also I apologize if my tone comes across as hostile. It's not directed towards you I promise lol#The people on Twitter still arguing against this shit AFTER A YEAR have sent me more than 20 death threats *because of the Brisket meme*#My patience for them is thinner than wet tissue paper#They have no genuine human connections and it really shows#They weren't even good/entertaining death threats!!!#Anyway whipping this out into cyberspace and then going to sleep nighty night
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With the rise of Instagram Reels and TikTok videos, it seems as though blogging has become a thing of the past... or has it? Let's see if blogging is still relevant in the age of Instagram and Tiktok.
The Early Days:
Blogging first became a thing when Justin Hall created what he called his "personal homepage" on Links.net, where he reviewed HTML examples from other online links (Zantal-Wiener 2020). 3 years later, Jon Barger, a fellow blogger, coins the term "weblog", reflecting the process of logging the web. Another 2 years later, Peter Merholz, a programmer, shortens the term "weblog" into "blog", to which Merriam-Webster would declare as the word of the year in 2004 (NDMU 2018).
~ TLDR ~
1994 - Justin Hall's "personal homepage" on Links.net
1997 - Jon Barger coins the term weblog
1999 - Peter Merholz shortens "weblog" -> "blog"
2004 - Merriam-Webster declares "blog" as their word of the year
The prime time of internet exploration (for the masses) between the late-90s and early-00s are also home to the births of iconic blogging platforms such as Blogger and WordPress (NDMU 2018).
These early days were the chance for the readers and writers of the world to digitalise their bibliophilic habits as they ventured new ways to connect with bookworms across the globe.
The Evolution:
Right in the midst of blogging's mainstreaming years, the public launching of YouTube in 2005 sparked the evolution of blogging. With that, the wonders of blogging were no longer confined to the wordsmiths of the world.
YouTube's culture of video blogging, or vlogging, appealed to those who preferred audio and visual stimulation, thus continuing the reach of blogging as a whole (Maslanka 2017). This video blogging culture brought forth most of the blogging cultures still in tact today, such as the aforementioned Instagram Reels and TikTok videos, which are forms of blogging that invoke creativity in a different medium than what blogging first started as.
The Question:
lyrics captured from Spotify
So blogging evolved from choosing the right writing style to choosing the right background music, but what does that mean? Does no one do the former anymore? Is everyone just trying to accomplish the latter?
Take, for instance, you feel like cooking something new. Some people would turn to a cooking channel on YouTube, while some prefer clicking on the recipe blogs that their search engine compiles for them. My friend would rather watch a video about the newest technology, whereas I would like to read about it in a blog post instead.
It all comes down to personal preference.
Numerous blog platforms are still around and are home to a growing number of blog accounts that cater to different genres of digital communities; because just as many people there are on this planet, exists a vast range of interests, preferences, and personalities. These aspects result in the creation of digital communities that almost anyone can find a seat in. These different groups then evolve within themselves to create their own set of cultures, norms, as well as trends.
So perhaps someone who spends their days watching Instagram Stories and TikTok Lives may seem to think that blogging is a dying flame, but to someone who replies to tweets and writes fantasy fiction on Tumblr, would disagree. In fact, posting short snippets of your day or sharing your thoughts in a tweet is a form of blogging in itself, specifically known as microblogging. Microblogging is an example of blogging cultures trickling down to make room for the readers and writers of the world who enjoy doing so, but in a more casual setting.
It is also important to note that personalities are not a black and white thing. Preferences are not an either or situation. There are many people who enjoy both reading blogs and watching videos.
・・・・・・
Besides leisure pursuits, blog accounts can also be used professionally. Setting up a portfolio blog could serve as a digital gallery of one's work (ThemesKingdom 2019). For example, a programmer's portfolio blog could include the programs they have coded or their experiences with different programming languages. The inclusion of a portfolio blog to a resume helps future employers grasp the personalities, morals, and ethics of the potential employee.
And along the lines of career-oriented blogs are money-making blogs; a solid option for the adventurers who seek a non-conventional career path. These type of blogs often rake in revenue through brand partnerships, affiliate links, premium content or private consultations (Polner & Bottorff 2023).
The Answer:
Definitely! I would confidently say that blogging is still relevant in the midst of Instagram and TikTok's uprising.
While there is no denying that Instagram and TikTok may be more popular amongst certain demographics, the future of blogging continues to march on, because as long as there are bookworms around, blogging will remain relevant ⋆｡⋆☂˚｡⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆
︵‿︵‿ References ‿︵‿︵
Maslanka, M 2017, The Vlog Blog: History of Vlogging, MotionSource, 28 July, viewed 27 September 2023, <https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/history-of-blogging>.
NDMU 2018, History of Blogging, Notre Dame of Maryland University, 22 March, viewed 27 September 2023, <https://online.ndm.edu/news/communication/history-of-blogging/>.
Polner, M & Bottorff, C 2023, How To Start A Blog And Make Money In 2023, Forbes, 31 July, viewed 29 September 2023, <https://www.forbes.com/advisor/business/start-a-blog/#:~:text=Blogging%20Is%20a%20Fast%20Way,can%20start%20earning%20any%20money.>.
ThemesKingdom 2019, 5 reasons why you should include a blog in your online portfolio, ThemesKingdom, 29 May, viewed 29 September 2023, <https://themeskingdom.com/blog/reasons-to-include-a-blog-in-online-portfolio/>.
Zantal-Wiener, A 2020, A Brief Timeline of the History of Blogging, HubSpot, 19 October, viewed 29 September 2023, <https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/history-of-blogging>.
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