#very formative for my comics and art career :')
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Fuck it, can you expand on your thoughts regarding What Can We Know About Thunderman?
One of the funniest and most horrible things I've ever read partially because like 60% of it is just pages and pages of Alan Moore stating industry facts and names with the serial numbers filed off, and if you have enough comic book brainworms to be reading Thunderman in the first place there will probably be at least one or a dozen references here and there that will spring out of nowhere and hit you like a punch in the gut (the one I remember was the Jack Cole one). A lot of the stuff in Thunderman that reads as absurd funny parody or metaphors too stupid to be real are actual industry facts that Moore has knowledge of, and even the stuff that isn't you can trace a direct line of what exactly it's referring to or who exactly this is referencing.
This is a story in part about how horrible it is to be a sicko with comic book brain worms that is mainly understandable if you're exactly that kind of person. Besides all the references to real-life people and events, most of the modern stuff he's making up are still just as incisive and accurate because literally nothing changed, not even in regards to the movie paradigm ("At last he has attained a semblance to a religious figure. Can we stop now?"). Much of this is Moore dunking on Certain Industry Guys he probably knew and interacted with and indirectly bullseyeing on more recent guys, because a lot of these guys are the same. There are your extremes like the one con-goer here who is pretty much just Max Landis verbatim, but there's also so much that's brutally on-point for industry practices and writers ("What if we had Thunderman do something, and then something happened?") that you can fill in your own names.
It's also an incredibly personal and tragic piece because the core story of it, in between vivid descriptions of Greg Land's office space porn oceans and self-destructive daydreams and rolling catastrophes, is about a guy who deeply loves his art form, deeply loves the creators and artists who gave him so much for so little in his life, and deals with so much horrible toxic bullshit that the only way he finds to live, the only way he finds to not be complicit in the pigsty, is to leave it all behind and work the poison out of his system forever. Like he very openly talks about the protagonist leaving it all behind to go write the next big novel and writing that note, and the non-superhero ideas that will come after, as something that nobody is going to care about, but that he has to do. I don't think I could fully appreciate the sequence where he quits his job at comics and walks out of the office feeling better than ever, until I myself got fired from an incredibly stressful job that made a thing I love (video editing) into the bane of my existence, and no amount of money worries in the world could make me not feel at that moment like I was walking home to the sunniest day of the year.
It wasn't only how much better life was without comics that had startled him, but also how the comics business looked, viewed from outside. How small it was; how cruel and how ridiculous. All the warped personalities the industry either attracted, or else bent and fashioned for itself out of naïve enthusiasts who'd been expecting something else. He couldn't understand why he'd not bailed out of the business years ago, though in a way he could. Part of the answer was just plain human inertia, and part was the fact that, from the inside, comics people and their weird behaviour could seem almost normal.
Dan was grateful he'd escaped in time, though he'd admit that even that escape was qualified. Removing himself from the comics field was one thing, stopping thinking about comics was another. Constantly, he'd find his mind alighting on some decomposing gobbet from the mental garbage-tip of trivia that his career had left him with, when that was the last thing he wanted to be thinking of. He probably should have anticipated some sort of reaction - thirty-something years in any field would leave you with a lot of baggage, and especially an enterprise almost designed to be obsessional, like comics -
His fantasy that he could be a proper literary author, living miles from anywhere and shunning interviews like Salinger or Pynchon, had congealed over this last few months from idle dream to psychological necessity. He'd put his farewell dossier together, and it was published without eliciting much in the way of a reaction or response, but the important thing for Dan was that he'd written it. His lip was better and he could speak normally again, since, for some reason, having quit the comics world, he was no longer trying to eat himself alive. Dan was committed, now, to his new life, and there could be no vacillating. Change or die, those were his options.
And putting aside the fact that "Dan" is killed by the Vince Coletta stand-in and the story itself ends in a much bleaker and more horrible note, to me that feels like Moore being very honest, as depressing as it may be, that nothing else he ever does is gonna get the kind of buzz and following and money and praise that he did for his corporate superhero droppings, and he still doesn't regret one bit what he left behind, and he's going to make the weird magic lizard stories he actually wants to do until he dies and try to not think about superheroes ever again even though he will obviously never fully succeed. Not just because it won't leave him alone, but because it's a part of his life. He loves stories, he loves art, he loves comics, and if not now, he very clearly deeply loved superheroes once, and maybe he still does if he can put aside the sheer nightmare bullshit toxicity attached to them that he's dealt with. I'd even point to a recent occasion he did try just that, with the character of Captain Universe, who accomplishes maybe the only real heroic act in LOEG: Tempest when he stops an atomic bomb from leveling England and ends the story with his big heartfelt wedding.
LOEG is the dead last place you'd expect Moore to place a heartfelt send-off to his superhero work, and much of it gets obscured by that asylum sequence where he savages existing IP capes and the farcical elements of the team and other criticisms at the genre, but it's there, and it's maybe the only story that has a happy ending in the book even. With Captain Universe, a character who has no real history, Moore is able to put all feelings for superhero IP and the big two aside and do this platonic ideal of a superhero and the creative possibilities and hopeful fantasy of a superhero. He's willing to poke holes in the guy and ruthlessly make fun of his shitty allies and villains, but LOEG affords Captain Universe an almost shocking degree of dignity (plus the existence of the canceled Superverse, which was going to be a LOEG-esque project with superheroes done with Rick Veitch tying in to The Show, showing Moore had plans to try writing superheroes again on his own terms even after everything). I think Thunderman in large part is about conciliating these feelings with a large degree of autobiography.
That's one emotional core of the story, but mainly I remember Thunderman for being really fucking funny. The EC Comics hearing. The porn ocean odyssey. Stan Lee Stan Lee-ing so hard he nearly gets killed by gangsters over it and one chapter detailing his transition from person to Character. Marvel was all along a CIA conspiracy to promote radiation poisoning. The chapter that's entirely dedicated to Moore stopping the story to riff and review the Superman movies. This books swings widly and it's an incredibly entertaining read.
And maybe the most horrible thing about Thunderman isn't in the way it's protagonist meets it's end or in the final chapter or even *gestures broadly at all of it*, it might just be the chapter before Alan Moore drops his Superman movie reviews, because with it comes the realization that yes, Alan Moore has been to Reddit, and has looked enough into reddit superhero discourse to be able to plausibly imitate it, which means he probably has sat through at least one argument about him too many. The stand-out of that chapter is the bit where he's riffing on Cavill's mustache fiasco and the DCEU, but it also includes some bits that now read as pretty perfect bullseye jabs at the MCU's current state of affairs.
#replies tag#superheroes#alan moore#illuminations#what can we know about thunderman#comic books#superhero comics
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Kaiju Weeks in Review (September 10-30, 2023)
I adore Godzilla Final Wars, but it's a movie with an identity crisis, unsure whether it wants to be headlining a Toho Champion Festival or mesmerizing American teenagers at a mid-aughts multiplex. @spacehunter-m's Final Wars 2004: The Year We Make Corn-Tack gives it a strong tug in the first direction, whittling the runtime down to 77 minutes and replacing most of the music and sound effects. She was inspired by Space Warriors 2000, of all things; as she put it, both films are "largely comprised of nonstop, monotonous action." As in that bizarro Ultraman compilation film, the kaiju trash-talk each other. It makes you wonder why Ryuhei Kitamura didn't at least bring back the speech bubbles from Godzilla vs. Gigan. Kaiju fan edits are rare, and this is in a class all by itself. Download it here.
Shigeru Kayama's novelizations of Godzilla (1954) and Godzilla Raids Again are out—hopefully the first of many to come. My copy only arrived on Saturday, so I haven't had the chance to read the whole thing yet, but I've made it through Godzilla. It's interesting to see Kayama, who wrote the initial treatment, take another swing at the story after the film was finished. He puts back moments like Godzilla eating a cow and attacking a lighthouse, and is also more overt with the wartime allusions. There's an incredible moment where Dr. Yamane muses that studying Godzilla and learning his secrets could be Japan's way of redeeming itself after "caus[ing] a great deal of trouble to people throughout the world." Note that these are novella-length, so much less in-depth than the novelizations of American Godzilla films you might be used to (Godzilla Raids Again is less than 80 pages). The book ends with an afterword by translator Jeffrey Angles contextualizing the tales.
Godzilla: War for Humanity continues to be a standout IDW miniseries. There's a new and very weird monster in the second issue, plus a no-nonsense Mothra (she tries to recruit Godzilla to fight Zoospora by shooting him in the back of the head and dragging him into the ocean in front of Minilla).
I've also got to mention the solicitation for another Godzilla Rivals installment, due December 20. Nola Pfau is writing, Megan Huang is illustrating.
Jen Onça is not excited to start her new, fast-paced fast-food career at Minilla Burger, but she'd much prefer a mundane day to the sudden return of Megalon! The monster brings destruction, trapping Jen in a forgotten lab deep beneath the restaurant with only the half-built form of Jet Jaguar to help her get out! She must repair the robotic defender to save herself and the city, but first she needs to escape the rubble trapping her in this tense adventure!
Yuzo the Biggest Battle in Tokyo, Yoshikazu Ishii's follow-up to Attack of the Giant Teacher, has also been picked up by SRS Cinema. No release details yet. I can't really speak to the film either, since it screened at the same time as Yumiko Shaku's panel at G-Fest, but as you can see from the poster, it's set during the pandemic.
The GAMERA -Rebirth- Gyaos has joined Godzilla Battle Line as an unusual sort of swarm unit. Your first summon of the match calls forth two sub-adults, and by the fifth summon you're sending out two sub-adults and three adults, still for four energy. They're probably the best swarm in the game, though still highly vulnerable to AOE units like Godzilla '01. I'm having fun with them in the Challenge Battles.
Notzilla, one of the sharpest kaiju comedies out there, is unexpectedly getting the graphic novel treatment. Mitch Teemley is adapting his own screenplay, with art by Zumart Putra. The comic is already finished, although I'm not clear on how folks who didn't back the Kickstarter (which wrapped on September 11) will get it. Useless trivia: the terrific cover above (one of four) is by Ben Dunn, who wrote the How to Draw Manga book I poured over in middle school.
After Troll shattered Netflix streaming records (according to Netflix), it's not super surprising that the company wants a sequel. Priority one: coming up with a title that's not Troll 2. Screenwriter Espen Aukan and director Roar Uthaug will both return.
Toy highlights of the past few weeks:
After confusing everyone by teasing its silhouette the day before April Fools', Tamashii has fully unveiled an S.H.Monsterarts Godzilla '72, a rare Showa figure from the line. It comes with two heads, one of them bloodied (see above). Due at the end of February.
After finally running out of ways to repaint their mold of Hedorah's Perfect Stage, Bandai is making a Movie Monster Series figure of the kaiju's Landing Stage. A Godzilla Store exclusive, it'll be released October 25.
After over two years, Funko is releasing a trio of Godzilla Singular Point Pops. Hopefully they go all-out with this show—it's not like there's any other plausible way for a Satomi Kanahara figure to exist.
#godzilla#kaiju week in review#godzilla final wars#troll#notzilla#gyaos#yuzo the biggest battle in tokyo#kaiju
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RIP Keith Giffen. Where do you even start? An important comic book creator for my childhood-- he was everywhere for a time, at least for DC Comics, but in such an astonishingly peculiar way, at least from the modern era.
The way I remember it, Mandela Effect and All: Because it was a time when they didn't know how to move forward-- the pure fan era that I think Giffen came out of was ending, and the "let's deconstruct all this" guys had blown in and blown out of comics, and the "let's treat this all as Big Icons doing Big Iconic Stuff so that Hollywood Notices Us" era wasn't in comics yet. And Image had either just hit or was about to and people were saying "let's break everyone's backs and make them alcoholics and replace them with characters who have more pouches and put their girlfriends in refrigerators."
And people seemed lost, especially at DC, especially there because you know, they'd published Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns. So how do they move forward? And Giffen seemed to be the guy who maybe didn't know the answer to that question but wanted to find out! And so you had that Justice League run with Kevin Maguire where... if I like the DC characters at all to this day, that run is 90% why, and it's a big swing in the opposite direction. Anytime people are like "The Justice League must include so and so, there are trinities at stake here" , all that lame-o religious-y talk, I'm still to this day like "why isn't this person mentioning G'nort??"
And you had a Legion run that certainly had its detractors at the time, but that was very much trying to find how far he could push almost everything about what that comic could be to something new-- he had a 9 panel grid, it had characters with trauma, it had a massive cast it did nothing to help you with, , everyone knew each other by their first names. And then you had him as an artist, and not just all the different things he did at DC, but also trying to play ball with Image, with Trencher. And out there in Valiant comics, in one of its "What the hell do we do" phase with Punx. He's playing with the form, and he's making fun of the industry, and he's ... he's trying. He really was trying-- that is a career of trying, in a way I think you'd be kind of heartless not to admire, a little (or for me, a lot).
As an artist, Giffen I think has really aged the best, though just because he was someone ... who was trying to find out what other people were doing and how he could bring that into his own work and how he could find something new. Too much so famously, perhaps early in his career, but when you look at the whole scope of a career-- you know, there's a lot of Kirby to Giffen but he's definitely not a guy who stopped there. He was a guy looking for the next thing to study so when I see modern guys (Michel Fiffe or whoever else) talk about Giffen and admire him-- you know... it makes me... There's a way of viewing English-language comic art as a relay race that's to me very beautiful and it was ... Maybe getting lost?? when I checked out. I don't really know. But. But Giffen for me being in that relay race... I like that, I guess.
People talk about "loving comics" and usually I don't know what the fuck they're talking about. Batman? I don't fucking know. But Keith Giffen-- that guy fucking loved comics. At least, I think when you read his comics, he wanted you wanted to love them too, you know? He wanted you to love Rocket Red. And you know, I still kinda do...? Rocket Red was a good dad!!! Or he wanted you to really love what you could do with a 9 panel grid. Or what you could do with a weird ass squiggle. Or...
I don't know. This one makes me a little sad, maybe in a "it's not them dying, it's knowing you're also going to die" kind of way, maybe a selfish kind of way, but still. Nevertheless. I don't know-- I've not really fully processed this one yet so there's probably something better to say here, but.
My condolences to those who knew him best and loved him most. And I hope he enjoyed his time here.
(Pictured: a page from Victory #1 working with Kurt Busiek on Kirby characters, a page from Punx, and an ad for the final JLI arc).
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tuesday again 2/27/2024
this is the longest ive ever been unemployed and media is only doing so much to beat back the horrors. so let’s talk about the media instead of the horrors
listening
Come Up For Air by We The Commas, off i think one of the autogenerated spotify indie mixes?
youtube
sort of a rollicking modern little surf rock thing, they describe themselves as "surf and alternate rhythm and blue" which is pretty bang on imo. they're all brothers (their last name genuinely is Comma, which i salute as a fellow weird last name haver), and cite john mayer (i don't really hear it) and the beach boys (yes i hear this very much) as some of their influences. a song i had on loop for an entire forty minute drive and did not get tired of. spotify
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reading
three books that MUST go back to the library tomorrow bc their autorenew is up and i was emotionally unable to get a library card without tooling around and getting a stack of books a month ago.
thank you philip.
i really only liked the Carmilla adaptation by Amy Chu, bc it really gets at what i didn't realize was the heart of the original 1872 lesbian vampire novella: a toxic gay housing situation you have fallen into and can't get out of bc your area is so so so expensive and housing is so so so tenuous. i have read the original but not in a while, this is an excellent modern adaptation centering around a nyc social worker in the late seventies that presupposes no knowledge and intertwines the original novella in the form of a stolen rare book. (nonconsecutive pages)
i don't have much to say about the DC young adult comic about the circus career of one of the Robins (Dick Grayson). i didn't love the loose artstyle and am not in its intended age range plus it had a bit too much therapyspeak, but it did have a clever use of a very limited color palette.
let's yank the amazon description for the detective novel, which i grabbed bc it vaguely pinged something in my brain about one of the fallout 4 sidequests and i've picked books up for worse reasons (SPOILERS):
Jacob Rigolet, a soon-to-be former assistant to a wealthy art collector, looks up from his seat at an auction—his mother, former head librarian at the Halifax Free Library, is walking almost casually up the aisle. Before a stunned audience, she flings an open jar of black ink at master photographer Robert Capa’s “Death on a Leipzig Balcony.” Jacob’s police detective fiancée, Martha Crauchet, is assigned to the ensuing interrogation.
i simply fucking hated this authorial style and tone and ditched it two chapters in. i don’t currently have the patience for reading about a clinically insane mother and hate crimes against Jewish people. despite the fairly dark premise, the first two chapters veer into cozy mystery with very short sentences, which do not a noir make. now, it does not advertise itself as noir or neo-noir, but as an homage to noir. it is for me unbearably smug. in my most unkind heart of hearts i want to say it's like if wes anderson tried to make a noir. this is a book that wants you to know it has read other noirs. yes thank you ive read several others, that’s why im reading this one, stop reminding me of better books i could be reading.
there's some weird descriptions of womens' bodies in here. chandler (my beloved) is certainly guilty of this as well, but he lavishes a sort of equal opportunity eye on the men in his mysteries. cf the infamous daniel lavery description.
when i read a chandler description of someone’s physical appearance there’s a fruity bisexual aftertaste in my mouth. Howard Norman, below, saying a woman takes great care of herself puts my hackles up. i understand the difference between an author and a character believing something and i don’t want to read a book where either the author or the character have this sort of pitying condescension towards a woman’s body. im feeling extremely terrible about my own body right now due to the various maladies, and another sort of breaking point for me is when an author repeatedly describes "naked breasts" (exact wording) pressing against someone's torso. it feels so juvenile. that's the sexiest thing you can possibly think of??? that's the sexiest way you can think of to describe an early mornign moment of intimacy???? augh i read the NYT review and it gets worse.
shut the FUCK up. i left my apartment at 1130 PM to go put this book in my CAR. i don't want it in my HOUSE.
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watching
Bullitt (1968, dir. Yates, free on Tubi). the baddie in this is Robert Vaughn (who i know from cowboys), a guy i fucking love to see. i can take or leave Steve McQueen but he does such a killer job parallel parking in this movie and i wish all driving movies made their leads parallel park. shockingly realistic hospital, morgue, and police work scenes, apparently was one of the big films to popularize blood squibs. also love to see a haunted man splash water on his face and stare into a mirror.
youtube
if you asked me how long the famous car chase was i would have said like 2:30? substantial but snappy. no!!! eleven minutes!! (video a bit trimmed). also a rare movie that makes a foot chase through an airport as exciting as that eleven minute car chase!!!
the mob dodging plot was a little hard to follow, but i was operating on like four hours of sleep and a rum and coke. this has got to be a tremendous movie to watch when you’re home and sick on the couch huddled under a blanket. i mean this as a compliment, as someone who watches Escape from New York whenever i feel very sick
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playing
really wanted to get to 69 shrines before writing this post and finally did it. all the little divine beasts walking along the loading screen are SO cute i've never gotten all four before
all the divine beasts are unlocked and the champions laid to rest! im feeling some type of way emotionally speaking about all of them telling link IMMEDIATELY that it wasn't his or zelda's fault they died
rudania has the worst boarding mission (in order of ones i most enjoyed it's camel [SO fast and SO fun], bird [lots of time to think and plan and aim], elephant [did not make me do a tedious stealth mission but i am bad at locking on to rapidly moving things behind me, much like in real life], and lizard. the lizard stealth mission is simply unpleasant). however, my brain really clicked with the puzzles in rudania: i had to consult a walkthrough once for an optional chest. in order of interior beast puzzle enjoyment for me it's lizard, bird, elephant, and camel. really got stuck for a long time on the waterwheels with the elephant before consulting a walkthrough.
the yiga clan stealth mission was not as hard as i thought it would be. i don't know why i put that off for two real life weeks but i will not learn my lesson and i will never improve. this boss battle was just silly.
the vah naboris interior puzzles were not fun. idk what it was about them or my brain that made me have such a bad time, but i spammed revali's gale and skipped a lot of chests bc i was not having fun. this is why god invented the walkthrough but sometimes. shit is just too fiddly.
i did succeed on the thunder ganon boss battle first try, but i came in with extra hearts from mipha's grace, used another mipha's grace in the fight, went through five fairies and seven hearty simmered fruits that were 5x durians (which gives you 20 extra hearts or some shit). fucking nightmare. i was stuck on one hit left on ganon for like five minutes bc he got stuck in the very fast flurry attack cycle. unpleasant. deeply grateful it only made me smack him with the magnesis pillar once bc that was also really fiddly with my poor reaction time + poor fine motor skills + previously mentioned ancient controller with some drift. in order of boss battle enjoyment i think it's lizard (made me think and kept me on my toes a little but i did have to look up how to break the shield), elephant (you can just kind of tank it), bird (same), and camel (extremely not fun).
this was WITH a fully upgraded gimp suit btw. that shit (ganon) just hits hard.
shrine shenanigans:
crowned beast very fun, i have one or two of kass' songs left and then i hope i get to see him back in rito village with his family??? a little nervous bc i went right to the jungle spring without hearing his song first so idk if that will. count??? or softlock me.
the MOUNDS of failed cooking attempts around this shrine on the grasslands side of the gerudo barrier mountains were SO funny.
unlocked all the spring shrines. what a fun mission. what a fun climb.
went to my FAVORITE shrine!!! going into what you think will be a normal cave and discovering it is DEEP with a BIG WHALE INSIDE is top three video game whale moments (the other two are diving with the whales in ABZU and meeting the last whale in the first dishonored).
other bits and bobs:
eggman rocks???
this quest was really cute and i wish there was a corresponding quest for the guy hanging around the broken heart pond, but it always makes me laugh whenever a dragon shows up in the background of a screenshot. a really great touching moment but watch out for the elemental orbs rapidly approaching us
also made me chortle. get it together barta.
i wish the helm was upgradable but i think making me kill a molduga in order to borrow it is a pretty fair trade actually.
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making
i originally had a really long thing here about litterbox trials and tribulations but i have decided to spare you all. you're welcome.
many balcony improvements, including putting up trellises and installing bird spikes to hopefully keep a very persistent orange tom off my balcony and away from my girls.
there are a goofy number of obstacles in the way of me making a proper planting diagram (sketchbooks buried deep in closet. flung the seeds in a box on a shelf i need to find my stepstool for. can't find pencil sharpener) so for the second week in a row that's not happening. however, sprouts.
baby italian lettuce blend
bush beans in the front and cucumbers + sweet peas in the back.
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Happy three years everybody!
As always, there’s a lot to say on the occasion, so pop in at the end of the post for the tl;dr if you don’t have time for my detailed diatribes, haha
Boy, time flies, huh? Feels like the second anniversary was just yesterday, but maybe that’s just the several long hiatuses getting to me. I’ve been scarce on uploading anything anywhere for a while now, even though I promised I’d actually pick up the slack this time around. What gives? Well…
For one, college hell, and for two, a lot of unfounded anxiety about putting my art out there. Allow me some theatrics for a moment and I’ll actually get back to the comic at hand… I’ve never had an exceptionally supportive environment for making art. It wasn’t suppressive, not in the slightest, but it also wasn’t… encouraging. It was always treated as a hobby or a distraction rather than something I was allowed to be fully proud of, especially because a lot of my art focused on more cartoon-y and fantasy ideas, rather than still life studies and painting (which people generally outside of the art sphere tend to value more, arbitrarily). Couple that with a childhood full of being bullied over minute shit you hadn’t even considered could be an issue before, and you get a teenager hellbent on never sharing his interests or ideas with anyone, mostly due to the fear of rejection.
I’ve grown, thankfully, but that paranoia and fear doesn’t go away overnight. As I’m sure you all know, Meowchela was the one who originally encouraged me to post this comic, and the only reason she succeeded was because she was the first person in a long time who listened and engaged with my interests and my art in a meaningful way. It’s kind of obvious her friendship had a profound impact on me, and I’d cite her as one of the reasons I was even hopeful enough to apply to an art college in the first place! This comic, and that bond with another person, proved that maybe these things I’m so passionate about weren’t duds, and weren’t something I had to keep to myself.
So, fast forward a few years. About three years, in fact.
During one of my classes, right before this hellish two weeks of exams started, one of the class assistants talked me into showing my comic pages to one of my professors. He’s generally a pretty open guy when it comes to new mediums, but I’m always… apprehensive about showing my less “traditional art”-y things to professors, but, he ended up being genuinely proud of it. Specifically, I showed him pages 85-87 (because they’re my favourites) and, he didn’t read the text, just the visuals were enough for him to say “good job, keep it up” (which is HIGH praise from that guy). When I mentioned I’ve been meaning to simplify the visuals because I didn’t have time to work on the comic very often because of college and classes, he dismissed it on principle. I was honestly caught off guard. Heavily paraphrasing, he suggested that worsening the visuals for an arbitrary deadline was counterproductive to making something that’s Good™.
That’s kinda stuck with me. For a good few years now I was more focused on optimisation rather than visual improvement for the comic, and though it HAS contributed to better visuals in some ways (cutting corners sometimes makes for a less pointy and jagged end result), it’s kind of weird I’m treating an art project that way, isn’t it? I set a lot of… arbitrary deadlines and standards for myself, in the form of expectations and what I “should” or “shouldn’t” be doing at certain stages in my life. I’ve thought of Dread Not as a passion project second and a stepping stone first, if I’m being honest. As if it was too… fandom-y and derivative to be treated with more gravity than that, like it’s an immature project because I was still a child when I came up with it. As if it was something I’m making to Build Up to Something Else, something Bigger and Cooler and More Important, and… the more I think about the future of Dread Not, and even my future career options, the more I realised that’s, ironically, a really immature way to think about it.
If there’s one thing going to this art college has taught me, is that there’s no “right” way to make art, and there’s no “right” way to success as an artist. There’s no clear-cut paths, just more commonly treaded roads, but even those are heavily overgrown. Why should I try to box myself into thinking I have to make things from complete scratch to be taken seriously? What’s so bad about Dread Not as a story and as a comic that’s caused me to vaguely keep it under wraps when conversing with people in my day-to-day life? Why wouldn’t I put all these skills I’ve acquired to improve and expand this project that’s Right There, WAITING for me to finally get off my ass and get pages out there again?
I wish I could say I’ve used all this time away in a particularly clever way, but I really haven’t - at least, it feels like I haven’t. My art has undoubtedly improved over time (though admittedly the art for this post was Very rushed, fuckin exams), and while I’ve been working on projects in the background, chipping away at them in a VERY disorganised way, I haven’t been posting that progress anywhere, and I haven’t made any good progress on my biggest project, Dread Not, because of the other ones. And, honestly? Admitting that kinda stings. This comic means a lot to me, and I wish I actually gave it the time and attention it deserves instead of letting it sit out hiatus after hiatus because I keep failing at structuring my time.
So, my new plan is a little more abstract: find a way to work Dread Not into my school schedule, and slowly build a habit of working on it more often. No clue how long that’ll take, but I think it’ll be worth it to consider it as an option, and hopefully finally end these long, drawn out hiatuses with short bursts of uploads in-between. HOPEFULLY. Building habits was never my strong suit, so please bear with me while I figure this out in what will probably be the most hectic upload schedule in this comics history, which is: no schedule at all.
From now on (until the end of Act 1), I’ll upload pages when they’re ready, and depending on how the weeks go and how complex the page is, they could be weeks or days apart from one another. Hell, some might even take a month to finish if school stuff gets REALLY hectic (god knows Hellish Exam Week number 1 and number 2 won’t be giving me much time to work on the comic), but I’m determined to do this. I want to be able to put my all into this project again!!
(And hopefully finish Act 1 by the end of this semester…)
TL;DR: College is giving me life lessons I didn’t expect, and because of them I’ve decided to give myself a non-existent upload schedule for Dread Not: Pages will be posted when they’re ready, and the spacing between pages could wildly vary depending on circumstances and the actual complexity of the page itself.
As always, thank you for being here, thank you for reading, and thank you for being patient!
If all goes well, there will be new content very, very soon.
#dread not#dreadnot#dread not au#dreadnotau#not comic#kris#schedule update#again#apparently i was calling this last hiatus a pseudo hiatus?#oh silly past me. this was a full blown hiatus jesus fucking christ#but yeah no i love being at this college dont get me wrong#its just that i have like 3 exams to prepare for the next two days ALONE#so like!!!! wish me luck!!!!! for christs sake#yknow i was planning on actually Dedicating Time to the art for this post#but uhh. haha. a little thing called the consequences to my actions caught up to me#fuckin psychology exam today that i had to cram for last night#i think it went ok? who the fuck knows at this point#but for tomorrow and the day after that i have digital shit to finish some theory to cram AND an ENTIRE PAINTING#that i didnt even START YET#and its an autoportrait. as if i wasnt suffering enough i have to stare at my ugly mug for hours#AGAIN. BECAUSE I HAD A DIFF AUTOPORTRAIT TO FINISH FOR LAST WEEK#im in spain without the s yall pray for me
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Hi E-vay!
I’ve loved your art and it has been one of my inspirations to become a an artist and work on stories that I’ve been developing since I was very young but I’m not the most experienced person when it comes to those sorts of things. What would be your main advice for people wanting to take that direction in life?
By the way, your Sonic The Hedgehog is so wholesome, visually stunning and your comics is amazing x
Hello and thank you for the kind words! I’m so happy you enjoy my stories :)
I just draw/write for fun, not professionally, so I might not be the best person to ask about this as far as careers go.
But if you just want advice in general, I think the most important thing is to write/draw what you enjoy. Sure it’s a wonderful feeling when other people like your content too, but you should write for yourself, not for others. Readers can tell when you’re passionate about the stuff you’re writing and it’s infectious ❤️ And you’ll be less likely to experience burnout if you’re doing something you enjoy and not something you’re being forced to do.
Also I’ve said this before but I’ll continue to say it, you’ve got to practice. No matter what medium you use, no matter what form of art you do, you’ve got to work at it to get better. The more you do it, the better you’ll get.
A lot of artists (myself included) will avoid working on or avoid publishing a story because it’s not perfect yet or you don’t have all the details yet, or a million other excuses. Listen, it’s never going to be “perfect.” But that’s okay. Sometimes you’ve got to accept things as they are.
I hope this helps! Again, I don’t write or draw professionally so take my advice with a grain of salt.
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I got very longwinded so I put the rest under the Read More. But TL;DR of this post:
-Once my current queue is done, I will be taking an indefinite hiatus from accepting commissions. There will be exceptions in the form of sporadic specials and Patreon-exclusive slot openings.
-There will be a “final hurrah” special I will very likely hold for maybe a month before that hiatus comes into play. Will be the final time I will accept commissions before hiatus.
-Hiatus will be spent focused on personal projects, overall art improvement, and content creation. I miss making headcanons as often as I did, man. ;w;
-Hiatus will, at most, last for the rest of 2023. More likely, though, it’ll last for a few months, but regular commissions will return with certainty uwu
So ye! :)
But if you want the long version...
This week is Deload week for training before my PR tests, which means I am taking a recovery period from weightlifting before I go back to hit them goal numbers hard as I can. And with it comes a coincidental introspective on my career as a freelance artist so far.
When May rolls around, it’d be 4 years since I quit my day job and took on commissions as my official primary means of income, and making my art my near entire source of income. I’ve definitely taken commissions long before that, but it was very much both amateur and part-time for the most part with my focus being elsewhere: either on school, or a job.
4 years of being able to independently live on my own thanks to the support I receive from everyone is more than I can ask for. But it is also a decent amount of time to be drawing for others!
Lemme counter that though by saying I’m not actually sad or upset about it or like. Need any sort of condolences or anything of that sort. Quite the contrary; I love doing commissions! Money is a factor in it, yeah, I’d be a fucking liar if it wasn’t; I have to eat and pay those pesky bills to make art. But a large part of why I love commissions is because I very much enjoy drawing for people. To me, being given a commission is being given the permission and trust to handle a small fragment of the person with care. I’m given a glimpse into who the person is, what they like, what stories they have to tell. So I try to give them my best foot forward and produce a piece they’ll enjoy. I personally find the entire process of creating for others very sweet and fun and it makes me happy that I’m allowed the honor of drawing for someone. :)
But through a lot of trial and error I’ve also come to remember how much I enjoy drawing for myself too, and how much I miss it. I don’t really draw for myself much anymore. I don’t really have the time to, mainly, but that’s largely my own doing. Past rookie stumbles biting me in the ass, living and learning. ;w; But I’m only bringing it up now because I am finally getting fucking close to finishing the queue I have, and with it comes the decision of taking an indefinite hiatus away from taking commissions.
The hiatus will at minimum be a couple of months, but I’m hoping I’ll be able to take it for the rest of the year. Got a lot of plannin’ to do if I intend on taking it that long! One such thing is doing a “last hurrah” special. The commissions will have to be simple and small so I don’t like, destroy myself in the process, but the idea is to take as many simplistic commissions as I can before I go into hiatus. It’ll be the official final time I’ll accept orders on mass before it’ll become very sporadic at best, at least until I bring the hiatus to an end.
Another is finally making an official store front for merch. Already have ideas of what I’d offer; most of them will be small and relatively cheap, and others would be like P2U designs and refs you could use for OCs ;w;
Lastly is more time spent on energy toward my Patreon and streaming; more early access, more character requests, more comics, so on and so forth. uwu
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But ye! In closing, I’m just lettin’ my brain do the big think and I wanted to let ya’ll know the basic going’s on. As such, as you can imagine I will likely not be terribly active with art posting for the next few weeks ;w; I’ll still be around if you have questions and what not, but ye! Sorry for talking you ear off, and if you made it this far, you should treat yourself no cap. Thank you so much everyone, I’ll talk to ya soon! owo
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Walking home from school just before her 10th birthday, Tura Luna Pascual Yamaguchi (Tura Satana) was reportedly gang raped by five men. According to Tura, her attackers were never prosecuted, and it was rumored that the judge had been paid off. She reports that this prompted her to learn martial arts, such as aikido and karate. Over the next 15 years, Satana tracked down each rapist and exacted revenge. "I made a vow to myself that I would someday, somehow get even with all of them," she said years later. "They never knew who I was until I told them." Around this time, she formed a gang, "the Angeles," with Italian, Jewish, and Polish girls from her neighborhood. In an interview with Psychotronic Video, Satana said, "We had leather motorcycle jackets, jeans and boots...and we kicked butt." Because of frequent delinquency, she was sent to reform school. When she was 13, her parents arranged her marriage to 17-year-old John Satana in Hernando, Mississippi, which lasted nine months.
Satana moved to Los Angeles and by age 15, using fake identification to hide the fact she was a minor, began burlesque dancing. She was hired to perform at the Trocadero nightclub on the Sunset Strip, and became a photographic model for, among others, silent screen comic Harold Lloyd, whose photos of her appear in "Harold Lloyd's Hollywood Nudes in 3-D."
Satana returned to Chicago to live with her parents and started dancing at the Club Rendevouz in Calumet City, where she was known as Galatea, "the Statue that Came to Life." She was offered a raise to become a stripper.
"I started out as an interpretive dancer, but I was offered more money if I took my clothes off, so I did. I started dancing at the age of 13 years old. I became a professional dancer at the age of 15 years old. If the owners of the clubs I had worked in ever knew that I was only 15, I think that they would have had a heart attack."
After singer Elvis Presley saw Satana perform at Chicago's Follies Theater, the two began a romantic relationship that some reports say ended in a marriage proposal she declined (though she reportedly kept the ring). Satana eventually became a successful exotic dancer, traveling from city to city. She credited Lloyd with giving her the confidence to pursue a career in show business: "I saw myself as an ugly child. Mr. Lloyd said, 'You have such a symmetrical face. The camera loves your face...You should be seen.'"
Satana's acting debut role was a cameo as Suzette Wong, a Parisian prostitute in the film "Irma la Douce" (1963), which starred Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. Her next role was as a dancer in "Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed?" (1963), which starred Dean Martin and Elizabeth Montgomery; Soon after, Satana appeared in the television shows "Burke's Law" and "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." Satana then starred as Varla in the 1965 Russ Meyer film "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!"—a very aggressive and sexual female character for which she did all of her own stunts and fight scenes. Renowned film critic Richard Corliss called her performance "the most honest, maybe the one honest portrayal in the Meyer canon and certainly the scariest." Originally titled "The Leather Girls", the film is an ode to female violence, based on a concept created by Meyer and screenwriter Jack Moran. Both felt at her first audition that Satana was "definitely Varla." The film was shot on location in the desert outside Los Angeles during days when the weather was more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit and freezing nights, with Satana clashing regularly with teenage co-star Susan Bernard due to Bernard's mother's reportedly disruptive behavior on the set. Meyer said Satana was "extremely capable. She knew how to handle herself. Don't f*ck with her! And if you have to f*ck her, do it well! She might turn on you!"
Satana was responsible for adding key elements to the visual style and energy of the production, including her costume, makeup, usage of martial arts, dialogue and the use of spinning tires in the death scene of the main male character. She came up with many of the film's best lines. At one point the gas station attendant was ogling her extraordinary cleavage while confessing to a desire to see America. Varla replied "You won't find it down there, Columbus!" Meyer cited Satana as the primary reason for the film's lasting fame. "She and I made the movie," said Meyer. Meyer reportedly later regretted not using Satana in subsequent productions.
"I took a lot of my anger that had been stored inside of me for many years and let it loose. I helped to create the character Varla and helped to make her someone that many women would love to be like."
Santana legally owned her likeness and image. So, whenever Russ Meyer wanted to change the artwork or rerelease "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!," he had to get her permission and sometimes pay her all over again. (Wikipedia/IMDb)
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What projects are you currently working on? Both Undertale/Deltarune related and not related.
i got my hands in a lot of things always LOL
lots of stuff under the cut
Undertale / Deltarune
Fangames I Co-direct
- Fallen Fates - Undertale Prequel Full Fangame (?)
Fallen Fates is an Undertale Prequel that aims to follow the "What if you got to play as Chara when they originally fell into the Underground?"
Status: LONG Hiatus. Stuck on concept development as the lead project head is busy with his career. Hopefully, we can jump-start development soon! But we're not fully sure WHAT type of game it'll be. So despite being an old project, it's been rebooted and on hold. That said the team really does want to make this game regardless of how long it takes.
- Sensational Studio's Underswap - Undertale AU Full Fangame
An Underswap fangame that isn't what it seems... it aims to be an exciting re-imagining of Undertale with some Deltarune inspiration.
Status: VERY active development. While not publically discussed, the game has been in stead development this whole time.
- Alteration - Undertale AU (I'm a writer, NOT co-director)
On hold as the project lead is writing a draft. I help with the world-building and concept art. Not much I can say on this one as it's been rebooted.
My Projects
- Angel's Lullaby - Undertale Prequel Full Fangame
An ambitious Prequel that aims to be a "next console (DS) style prequel" that covers the Human and Monster War. Following a new protagonist, a Zombie, who is stuck between both sides of the conflict. Use your unique abilities to form a party and decide which side you'll join. Explore the Island of Monsters and uncover their past and secrets. Can you stop the war?
Status: MESSY. Ok so like. This is my fault 100%. We've switched engines MULTIPLE times and that meant re-coding things every time. Outside the battle system, the game's systems are 90% done. Cutscenes, dialogue, menus, save system, etc. So it's CLOSE to becoming a demo but I simply have been burnt out + don't have much time in the day to work on this. However, I DO think I'll keep working on this as the gameplay is fresh and exciting, and my love for the characters are coming back.
- NightFell - Underfell AU Full Fangame
Jackie is just a regular human teenager who stumbles upon a gateway into hell. There, they'll face the monsters who live on Mt.Crown and are stuck here. There's only one rule in this place: Kill or Be Killed!
A very different take on Underfell, that aims to place the Undertale cast and push them into an Underfell society instead of them having always been in one.
This is honestly my favorite project. It's built on the ideas I developed from a canceled fangame called Spookytale, with permission from Jevil to continue the concepts. My most favorite OC ever, Pumpkin, is in this game. While I am waiting for the DR engine my friend Lasers and I are working on to be made first, Nightfell is honestly the least ambitious and most fun game to make. While the story is a rough draft, it's the most complete. I ADORE this game. I'm so excited to make it.
- Fallen Royalty / New Royals - A webcomic / Video game Combo
An Everybody Lives AU that aims to take a hard look to what it'd be like to actually be resurrected. Deals with the themes of growing up, moving past trauma and accepting a second chance at life.
Originally an askblog from 5 years ago, Fallen Royalty is a rebooted comic that I work on. It has a video game adaption, New Royals, as well as video-game segments for the sidestories. Kinda stuck in development at the moment, as I got [redacted] to work on. But the newest Sidestory, DOWN, is in development and should be out soon-ish.
This is my magnum opus, my love letter to Undertale. I have to make a version of this story that's complete and to my best of writing. The tumblr askblog version, while finished, is missing chunks of the story. Follow me at @askfallenroyalty to see it's development
Danny Phantom
- Electrical Undead - my default AU full of headcanons.
In short here are the main ones: Danny has an electrical/light core + full inverted colorscheme + No clones, Ellie is an AU counterpart instead + Nonbinary Sam and trans Danny + sentient portal
- Lingering Spirits - Farmboy!Danny + Nobody Knows AU
When the weird new kid, Danny, moves into town, strange incidents begin to occur. Ghostly sightings, unexplained phenomena, danger around every corner... Can Sam and Tucker get to the bottom of it before the whole town breaks into chaos?
A Horror AU with an angsty, bitter Danny. When his parents are taken during the portal accident, Danny and Jazz move in with Aunt Alicea. After an incident, the family moves to Amity.
So basically: Fallen Royatly is my main thing. SS will require me every few weeks to work on things. FF and NF are on hold. Angel's is in development, typically worked on every Monday but has been on hold since I moved. When I'm burnt out on working on Undertale stuff, I'll work on Danny Phantom stuff. I always have something going on so I keep myself active.
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Salvage Showcase - Eichiro Saiyama
...And so I missed the Killer Killer anniversary like, well, a lot! My bad, but trying to find who to do next was pretty difficult. I didn't want to do a salty or disappointed Showcase like the last two, so was trying to focus on who I could write about that I liked.
So on that end I decided to do a Showcase on one of Killer Killer's better serial killers of the week (having a backstory will do that to you) - its Eichiro Saiyama!!!
Eichiro was a lonely and rather unpopular kid in his youth. The only happy moment he could gather was when one girl complimented his art and said he should be a mangaka.
And so he did!! That moment inspired him to be a manga artist that worked under Comic Ponpon...except the issue of people praising him persisted. While he's surviving the Tragedy enough to continue his work, it should be noted that his work was considered just...okay. Editors or readers, no one really cared for it.
Cue one day, Takumi Hijirihara shows up in a box, going over his work and about one he liked was Eichiro's documentary manga about the Tragedy. It had gotten popular with Takumi for its hyperrealistic graphic displays of death, but there was just one issue.
See, they were a bit too realistic.
Yeah, Eichiro is a serial killer that murders his victims to use as references in his manga. To be specific, he's a copycat killer that murders his victims in relation to past cases, such as stringing up people to look like Chihiro's corpse.
Takumi deduces his motives were in a vain attempt to gain some praise, and criticizes him for using murder to seek out approval from others, believing attempts like that won't ever sell well. Takumi ranks Eichiro's murder as being 20 points for his misdeeds, and notes that Eiichiro's manga, while he does like it, won't ever be a bestseller since it's just too ordinary (to the point he marks Eichiro's manga as just being 55 points, even though Takumi likes it)
Upon hearing this, Eichiro (who had been progressively losing his mind) snaps and attacks Takumi, trying to kill him with his Wolverine-eqsue pens. But, Takumi get's the leg up and kill Eichiro similarly to how Mukuro Ikusaba died.
Eichiro is a man that seeks out praise above all else since he sorely lacked that in life. Self-describing himself as dull, he believes his only redeeming quality is his artistic skills since it net him one praise he got in life. He is very sensitive to people dismissing him and his hard work.
Eventually, his need for approval escalated until he became a serial killer, killing others to use as reference for his work out of some desire to gain what he wanted the most.
Rundown
In Killer Killer's theme of Passion vs Shallowness, Eichiro represents Shallowness in the form of attention and represents the dangers of being obsessed with validation from others. He wants people to notice him, and gives him the praise he feels he deserves. It's what fuels him to become a mangaka and drives him to the point that became a copycat killer to try to get what he wanted.
But its all at a detriment to himself. He focused so hard on his artistic skills he neglected his personal life, be it making friends or enjoying life that he made his own self-esteem issues worse. And because what he chased after was something so brief, and in a career so demanding, it had become a cycle of toxic disappointment and desperation. It's basically a self-fulfilling downward spiral in a way.
Another aspect of Eichiro that's telling to his own 'dullness' is the form of manga he made, a documentary, and even his own killing: copycat murders. He's essentially recapping events that most people in the world at the time would be privy about, and committing the cardinal sin for those in the artistic world - plagiarism. No one really cares for his work because he's essentially just regurgitating common knowledge for the public. If he had made something more original, he'd probably would get better success, but given how much he shut himself away to 'hone his talent' he probably doesn't have the life skills or proper imagination for it (and never will thanks to Takumi).
Finally, he's killed in similar way to Mukuro's Spears of Gungnir, though instead of spears its his own pens that kill him. in Danganronpa, ironic murders are all the rage, so you can think of it as symbolizing his own talent - his own crutch and downfall in life - being the one to lead him astray and betray him.
Personal Thoughts
I really like Eichiro, because he's one of the few characters in Killer Killer to be fully fleshed out. In backstory, in motivations, in personality - he's brimming with it in one chapter, when most of the main cast lack it in all 14. (Probably since the writer for KK is speaking from their own feelings in the industry, but that's just me). He's one of the few gems that I can say are good about Killer Killer and wish the other killers replicated. Especially Ted, who debuted in chapter 3.
I also like Eichiro in how he fleshed out an established lore item in DR2, that being the Tragedy manga found in endgame. He's heavily implied to be the author of that, and I always appreciate it when the DR series tries to build upon past continuity. Same reason why I like Koichi or Another Episode! Or later on concepts like the Mukuro Cult. It's building upon and even expanding the world of DR in a pretty good way. And in a 'flash, but little substance' story that Killer Killer seems to tred, stuff like that needs to be treasured.
Also, even as a killer, I just like he's the sort that should have been promoted more - he feels like a realistic DR villain. He's not drinking blood due to thinking it'll make him younger, he doesn't have parasite monsters that break the world - no, he's just a copycat killer trying to use his murders to increase his fame and get him praise. That's it, and God is it refreshing.
In short: Eiichiro is a breath of fresh air in the Killer Killer entry.
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With that, another Killer Killer entry done! Hope it's a good read, with the next up being, again, the miscellaneous section of the DR novel side.
#danganronpa#danganronpa killer killer#takumi hijirihara#eichiro saiyama#drkk#killer killer#danganronpa 2#dr2#chihiro fujisaki#mukuro ikusaba
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Sorry, I see you already answered that question in 2021, found that post.
My new question is: what is “the shadow”?
(Art by Dan Schkade)
“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow Knows…” The maxim that the weed of crime bears bitter fruit, intoned at the start of every program, was biblical in its sternness. The Shadow was an Old Testament avenger, a ruthless slayer of the wicked, very befitting the Depression decade of his greatest strength. The Shadow was both the force for good and lurker in the darkness. - The Shadow Scrapbook
The Shadow, also known as The Master of Darkness, The Dark Avenger, The Master of Men's Minds, Weird Creature of the Night, Identity Theft Georg, That Guy Who Lives in Lamont Cranston's House, "Shads" and other many names, is a mysterious figure who fights evil by turning it against itself. He is a former globetrotting aviator-spy-soldier (revealed to be named Kent Allard, 7 years into the character's run) turned crimefighting paladin who fights to protect and uplift the innocent and bring justice to victims of strife and calamity, and he does so with the black-clad design, domineering charisma, sinister cackle, Machievellian theatrics and ruthless efficiency of a villain.
In action, The Shadow loomed as a cloaked figure, materializing from out of the night, rescuing helpless victims and striking terror into the hearts of evildoers. However, he reserved such theatrics for a logical climax. Between times, The Shadow proved himself a master of deduction as well as disguise.
While his major missions were to stamp out mobs or smash spy rings, he often tabled such routines in order to find a missing heir, uncover buried treasure, banish a ghost from a haunted house or oust a dictator from a mythical republic. The Shadow was such an incredible character in his own right that almost anything he encountered was accepted by his ardent followers. - Walter Gibson
The Shadow began life as the spooky narrator of publisher Street & Smith's radio program, whose sibilant, mocking personality and sinister cackle were dramatically more interesting than any of the programs he was narrating, and so when listeners started asking Street & Smith for a Shadow Magazine that did not exist, they had to make one of their own. To that end, they recruited a young magician turned newspaper writer and former associate of Houdini's fraud-busting network, Walter Gibson, to write the adventures. Gibson was extremely acquainted with the ins and outs of illusionism and sleight-of-hand and worked personally with many of the greatest magicians at the time, and would extensively use said knowledge in crafting The Shadow's character and adventures.
And so The Shadow Magazine began, reviving the "hero pulp" format that had died out in the pre-WW1 dime novels and redefining the mold of crimefighting "pulp heroes" from that decade onwards, as well as many superheroes from that time period inspired by him and his successors. He is currently more famous for being plagiarized by the chief inspiration for a certain guy who runs around with bat ears and for his general role as a highly influential forerunner and influence in forms of storytelling still extensively used today.
On the taxonomical chart of Western comics he’s a common ancestor for a sizeable chunk of the marketplace. Every street vigilante, every masked crime-fighter, every necessary monster: he’s in the DNA of them all. A living fossil, a coelacanth or goblin-shark for the comics world, swimming in waters of ice and ink - Si Spurrier
The Shadow maintained a fluctuating radio career over the 1930s to go along with his highly successful magazine, and he'd eventually reach newfounds heights of stardom from 1937 onwards thanks to the debut of a new radio show, initially starring Orson Welles in the titular role. Said radio show would become an audience hit well into the 1940s and would introduce new fixtures to the character such as friend-and-companion Margo Lane and an invisibility superpower, which were eventually integrated since into the comics and pulps and other media. You can still easily find many of the character's radio adventures online as well as his exploits in comics and pulps (harder to find now, but still possible if you know where to look). I'll pass along my personal recommendations here.
(Art from Matt Wagner's The Curse of Blackbeard Skull, in The Shadow #100)
In the taxonomical history of American crimefighters he sits in between the hardboiled detectives of the 1920s and the 1940s superheroes, and although the 1930s pulp heroes were in part defined largely by imitating him, he is no traditional square-jawed do-gooder: he is a tall, gaunt, cadaverous wraith with the mask of a Western bandit and a vampire's cloak and the clothes of 19th-century cartoons of saboteurs and anarchist bombers. The barest glimpse of the man beneath is that of a judgemental patrician's aquiline nose and intense, sharp eyes, like icepicks probing the back of your skull. He makes a point to show every now and then how easily he can reshape that face to suit his needs, and make it your own, even doing so in front of you to make a point.
He is Dracula meets King Arthur, Sherlockian brainpower and Lupin trickery joined forces, centerpiece to urban thrillers turned into fairytales as The Big Bad Wolf switches sides to save us. Though his setting looks the part, The Shadow is no gritty film noir creature: he is what happens when the cutthroat gangsters and invincible spymasters and predatory businessmen behind it all meet the actual scariest guy around: Death itself, as the ultimate master and servant joined in one, who found a higher calling fighting for us instead, breaking and bending and controlling the rules and tipping them ever so slightly in the favor of those who are usually in no position to fight back.
(Art by Giovanni Timpano, for The Shadow #25)
As we discussed The Shadow, I suggested an opening scene with a cloaked figure emerging from a night fog to prevent a desperate young man from taking a suicide plunge from a high bridge. Thus befriended, the young man would swear loyalty to his rescuer and thereby become involved in exciting adventures with otherp persons who had been aided by the same benefactor, all being united in a common cause against crime. - Walter Gibson
That is where the Agents come in. As The Shadow is a distant living puzzlebox, we are very rarely privy to his thoughts and feelings, he glides through many stories scarcely-seen until he needs to be, and so we frequently experience things from the viewpoint of proxies, whether they are agents or characters swept into intrigue that only The Shadow can save them from. The first Shadow story opens up with a broke and depressed young man named Harry Vincent, ruined by the Great Depression reality of the time and trying to commit suicide, who is saved from it by The Shadow, and upon accepting a new purpose in life as his agent, grows into a dependable and strong ally, friend and even leader to people once like him over the course of the following adventures.
Across his history The Shadow has had agents and allies among all walks of life: redeemed/pretend criminals who use their reputations to provide The Shadow with inside knowledge, war vets, police officers, prison reformists, troublemaking journalists, government agents, politicians, criminologists, psychologists, high society chameleons, streetwise cabbies, janitors, the homeless, even crooks who once worked for those that The Shadow opposed, with some stories dedicated entirely to The Shadow playing guardian angel or working to provide second chances to those who've turned to crime. Community leaders with opposing viewpoints, rebel spies, prostitutes, historical figures such as Amelia Earhart and Nikola Tesla, robots, political activists and freedom fighters, doctors, birds, boxers, actors, magicians, beavers, and a list too big to get into here. There was a crimefighting dog at some point also and he was a very good boy.
Said list also includes the guy most people initially assume is his secret identity, a wealthy globetrotting man-about-town named Lamont Cranston. The first on-screen meeting between The Shadow and his secret identity Lamont Cranston consisted of The Shadow showing up in the dark at Cranston's bedside, wearing his face and telling him in pristine detail how much he's usurped Cranston's life, and effectively blackmailing him into leaving town so he can continue being Cranston uninterrupted. It is considerably less known, however, that eventually Cranston and The Shadow became weird friends following this ordeal and worked together several times, with Cranston turning out to be a pretty entertaining hero in his own right even besides his designated purpose of being rich and useless, even he was not immune to The Shadow's ability to enact positive change on his allies. Which is one note I'll end this post on: that The Shadow and his surroundings can be a lot more layered than given credit for.
I make the argument again and again that The Shadow is an intriguing character with much more to him than simply the gun violence and spooky laughter and murderousness that he's frequently reduced to, even if he isn't quite consistently so (as expected of one who's been around in virtually every medium for over 90 years). He can be compassionate, thoughtful, cautious and consequence-minded in his approach to effectively combat crime and protect others, ridiculous, eccentric, flawed in ways big and small and humanizing, for better or worse depending on who's writing him. He is a versatile shapeshifter as well as an unassailable force of personality to throw into any gathering, any circumstance, any narrative, and remain unique.
(Art by Michael Kaluta, from Hell's Heat Wave)
With those other “masked avenger” pulp types, their masked identities are an act, at least in part. Underneath the hat and mask they are regular guys with relatable motivations. With the Shadow, the guy in the hat and scarf IS the real guy, and his motivations and feelings are largely kept from us.
When we see him in his “civilian” identity, THAT is an act. So there’s a kind of brutal simplicity to his dialogue.
He is what he appears to be, and says exactly what he means. - Chris Roberson
And that's about it as a summary. I have a masterpost pinned at the top because, evidently, I have a lot more to say about the character and more I can't cover here. If you want, feel free to shoot me any additional questions and let me work out my fixation on the weird crime spooky murder man. I have to go off about him at least once a month or else I start eating my furniture so, help me out here.
#replies tag#the shadow#the shadow magazine#shadow comics#shadow radio#lamont cranston#kent allard#pulp fiction#pulp heroes
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Here's a tiny comic based on cartoon the Penguins of Madagascar. Humanization, of course. The fandom used to joke that the characters have obvious psychiatric problems. Well, yeah, I made my micro-career on a Ficbook on this! :D
I've had this comic drawn for a long time, but I recently decided to redraw in digital form. I really love this cartoon, I have a huge amount of fanfiction on it, but very little art. Unfortunately, it’s not popular, so I won’t reach the top with this fanart, but it is just so comfy to return my thoughts to this world.
#penguins of madagascar#penguins of madagascar humanized#pom humanized#pom rico#pom kowalski#pom private#pom skipper#pom hans#humanized#madagascar#nickelodeon
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#girlsprotectinggirls one shot fic question! Sorta. Are you a fan of Marvel at all? Or any other superhero media? Because I love that forum system, and thought it would be amazing if it connected all sorts of heroes. What other fandoms do you think could use a support system for their heroes?
OKAY SO I absolutely am! Not enough of a fan to always know what's going on, but I have my series and universes (marvel rising is the most recent) and can recognize most of the art.
Have you read You have (1) New message by chipanddealer? Because it's very *mwah* and definitely affects my answer; but yeah! I think if I went around and just added in all my favorites, I'd find a way for there to be a SuperHero one and a Hero one, because I love the trope of 'hero of the story is overwhelmed and meets retired hero from another story and gets mentored'. I love it so much.
Specifically, I think my ideal chat fic at this very moment would include Jackie Chan Adventures, Miraculous Ladybug, (Harry Potter? maybe?) and Danny Phantom, but just a large one for fun would definitely be a huge mishmash. Harry Potter, Trollhunters, Marvel (rising), Miraculous, JCA, DP, some nice Kim Possible but she has to either be the youngest and just starting her website or the oldest and the mom hero, and maybe some Gargoyles? There's not really a Young Hero(TM) in Gargoyles but there are a lot of traumatized old as dirt men and women who have some nice commentary on loyalty, betrayal, and living through grief.
Oh and Scooby-Doo. A chatfic with any of the superheroes-gotta-have-a-plot and scooby-doo-we-invented-and-immortalized-the-episodic-formula would be wild in the best way.
As an actual 'heroes' forum I definitely want it- not quite open but very near to it? Like, there should be a spot for 'I just did a thing and now I think I might be starting a vigilante career what do I do' and a bunch of other new and old heroes can pop in with Things I Wish I'd Known When I Started (like a stretching routine!), and that's a lot more accessible than the rest, which in #girlsupportinggirls is for "vetted" heroes and vigilantes, and idk if I ever decided how they were vetted but it was a thing.
Oh and winx club should be in this.
So glad this isn't an essay there's probably no clear form of thought, but back to the original question of "what other media do I think could do with a support system" and the answer is All Of Them. Except Stranger Things, because while they absolutely do and I haven't watched the series through, I do have to forever give them props for having a parent who not only cares but actively involves herself in the things that are threatening her children, without being an oblivious/clueless/useless/gag character who just causes more problems.
Which is why a non "hero" forum would have a lot of people - Percy Jackson and Magnus Chase characters, for one, because they could do with support and - ooh DP/MC crossover - grow up to be some pretty sick mentor candidates. "I didn't wanna be a halfblood; I didn't ask to be a hero seeking praise," lives rent free in my brain and likely forever will.
I read a pretty awesome Trollhunters/Miraculous pen pal fic once back when trollhunters was the only Tales of Arcadia out, which was lovely, but since we're at it 3Below/DC would be a very nice crossover, there are plenty of aliens to play support and grief counselling.
Um. I lost where I was going with this, I'm very sure, but we should add a Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys/Scooby-Doo either chatfic or casefic to the list of things that exist in a perfect world and also maybe my to-do list.
Okay FINAL list for the current 'perfect' "someone support these kids who are doing their best/thrown in the deep end/need a hug desperately" is Kim Possible, Nancy Drew, Scooby-Doo, Hardy Boys, and maybe Winx Club for the well-adjusted and likely give the best advice, probably play a mentor role; Dectective Comics, Marvel, Danny Phantom, Miraculous Ladybug, Trollhunters/Tales of Arcadia, and Harry Potter for the 'have advice but as peers and also are definitely using solving your problems as a distraction from their own'; Winx Club (the anime), Gargoyles, and Jackie Chan Adventures could be in either of these, and technically I guess so could Marvel and Detective Comics, but Winx and JCA have much more 'they grow up and get their crap together' vibes than DC and Marvel. Harry Potter could also also go in the mentor category which would be lovely, a prophecy child who survived their prophecy travelling the world/the interwebs and supporting other child heroes and chosen ones however he can.
Gargoyles and Batman should definitely meet sometime, it's been a while since I watched Gargoyles but I feel like they could learn from each other.
...I forgot the riordanverse but you know what it's fine they can be there and just log in once every three apocalypses.
#Jaymeow Speaks#girlssupportinggirls#riordiverse#Winx Club#Harry Potter#jackie chan adventures#DC#Marvel#Danny Phantom#Crossovers#chatfics#Trollhunters#tales of arcadia#Nancy Drew#Scooby-Doo#hardy boys#Gargoyles#Silverwhiteraven#Ask Box Things
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Nana: A Review
"Nana Komatsu is a young woman who's endured an unending string of boyfriend problems. Moving to Tokyo, she's hoping to take control of her life and put all those messy misadventures behind her. She's looking for love and she's hoping to find it in the big city. Nana Osaki, on the other hand, is cool, confident and focused. She swaggers into town and proceeds to kick down the doors to Tokyo's underground punk scene. She's got a dream and won't give up until she becomes Japan's No. 1 rock'n'roll superstar. This is the story of two 20-year-old women who share the same name. Even though they come from completely different backgrounds, they somehow meet and become best friends. The world of Nana is a world exploding with sex, music, fashion, gossip and all-night parties."
This is actually the first review I've done for a manga and I'm kind of excited and nervous. And if you want to know why it is because this is one of my favorite mangas to date, but I'm also nervous because there are a lot of people out there who don't consider manga a form of literature. They use words like "kiddie stuff" or "boring comics" to describe what I consider to be one of the highest art forms that we have. Better even than Marvel and DC, which I don't consider to be very interesting or worthy of review because they have gone through so many changes and re-tellings and parallel universes for me to care. Also superheroes who aren't Sailor Moon bore me (sorry). Now you know my stance and those of you who don't appreciate my sentiment are welcome to leave if you are offended.
But to get back to the review. Where to start? Well, without giving too much away, I'd like to say that this series is perfect for any of you out there who really enjoy "slice-of-life" manga. Or just books in general that deal with people and their day to day lives where no magic or supernatural elements come along to gum up the works. It is also perfect for those who love rock bands and enjoy reading autobiographies about popular heavy hitters such as The Sex Pistols, Marylin Manson, and The Red-Hot Chili Peppers.
This story follows the lives of two girls with the same name: Nana Komatsu and Nana Osaki, who meet on a train and end up living together in Toyko while they each pursue their dreams of love and career choices. Again without giving too much away, the trails that each of the girls go through are things that many of us can relate to in our day to day lives. And I'm not talking about whether or not that cute boy in biology class likes us, as most shojo-manga and many teen novels seem to do. The story tackles real life issues such as abortion, sex, cheating, abuse, lack of parental guidance, underage prostitution, as well as what it means to be individually independent.
It is a gut-wrenchingly sad story that I think every young person should read because, even though the story has not been completed as of yet, there are pieces in it that will call to you and moments that you will have to revisit again and again as you grow older and begin to understand what it means to make adult choices.
That's really all I can say about it for now because this is one review where I don't want to spoil any bit of the plot. Be aware though that copies of the Nana manga are not sold in Barnes and Noble anymore and are becoming increasingly hard to find. But if you keep your eyes peeled in second-hand bookstores there is usually a copy floating around somewhere and if that fails the internet is a solid back up. I promise it's worth every penny.
#aiyazawa#nana and hachi#nanamanga#nana anime#ai yazawa#nana manga#nana osaki#apartment707#nanakomatsu#nanapod#manga review
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howdy all! kip here, am i re-introducing myself to you, not really. but kai's my main blog so hi, i'm them. hehe, anyways here is a post tour, organized and updated intro for infinite's bad, baby boy! you can find his profile, kprofile, and pinterest linked and all the updated information is bellow!
—— welcome to infinite entertainment! it's MALACHI 'KAISO' SOH, who is a SOLOIST. i’ve heard whispers that the 23 year old is pretty CHARMING but lowkey DISQUETED. also, doesn’t he remind you of KIM SUNWOO?
pre-debut
malachi was born to single mother soh jimin (jaime soh) in daegu. she moved to a suburb of chicago before he was even able to talk so he was raised there.
he grew up in a south suburb of the city that wasn’t the greatest place, malachi knew night sirens and metal detectors at the doors of his school the next morning.
his mother struggled with addiction most of his life, and kai often found himself surviving and gathering his basic needs on his own.
he has a love/hate relationship with his mom she was very much not a great woman but she tried.
they didn’t have a lot of cash and kai had to start working at a young age he excelled in school and this allowed him to go to a nice “private” school on scholarship later in his school career, with the extra resources he was able to really excel in the things he loved (art, poetry, music, etc).
with the help of the school and the community around him they budded his love for music and comics and things of that nature, helping get him the things he needed.
while at his new school he met his new gang of friends, and a shared love of music pushed them to form a small little band that took off by being just really really talented kids with a lot of spunk. (side note: fell in love with a girl in said band and well…he’s self destructive.)
but his time there was short lived as the moment he was scouted at a talent competition, (along with another band mate), as their front man he took the first flight they offered to korea and joined a pretty big, though relatively new company. never looking back and getting as far away from jaime as possible.
he came to korea subsequently alone as he does/did his best to cut all contact with the only family he had.
he never got to finish high school in a normal high school and despite being incredibly smart he finished at his performance school with subpar grades, mans was extremely depressed during his trainee days.
at debut
unlike a lot of idols malachi had the opportunity to technically debut 3 times.
his first debut was in 2013, he debuted as the producer, leader, main rapper and center of epik at starglass entertainment.
his time in epik was terrible to say the least, his social anxiety began to manifest in its full form. and of course like most companies back then they hadn’t really care and made little efforts to keep it at bay. instead they pushed him to be the face of the band as the only english speaker and member with performance experience and malachi, fighting his own demons was forced to take care of 6 other boys.
epik was the type of group with a boyish sound (i cannoned their disco to being nct dream and seventeen), they were known for their bright colors and fresh concepts and hard hitting, synchronized choreography.
they were known as a ‘clean group’ absent of scandals and korea’s pride but even in that malachi was not happy.
he did give his all and was granted the third gen ‘it’ boy, title shortly into his debut
even writing and producing most of the groups disco there were seldom any moments he was deliberately proud of the sound and style of the group, on top of his failing mental health and worsening depression. this pushed him to fall from his quiet but entertaining and personable idol to a more reserved, background character of his group even as the leader. while he was a popular member, the decline in his interacting directly led to the slight decline in his popularity.
to add to his work load he was asked to write and produce for his companies girl group at the time (canoned ex-iz*one) later in his career and helped produce a few of their hits
personally he felt as though because of this the company started to ‘neglect him’ a bit more. almost as a punishment for causing fan backlash from his change in ambiance as well as popularity, and eventually decided to prematurely terminate his contract with starglass in 2017.
during his time in epik he’d ground close with their manager, who essentially followed him into the purgatory that was being without a company. he stayed with that manager from the moment he left the epik dorm all the way through his trainee days in the new company.
it was also during his darkest times in epik that he became close with fellow soloist fleur, who resparked the fleeting flame of the job he use to love. she pushed his production career further by allowing him to write a few songs for her, resulting in his very first industry collab as a soloist later dien
during career
in the same year malachi found himself slightly homeless but at a new company (PSYCH Ent.) who was also pretty new themselves. they had two groups under their belt a girl group and a boy group who were popular but not as much (i guess the vibes of like??? g-idle before recently and maybe like stray kids in the very beginning?) but with his faith in them he re-debuted with a new concept, a new sound and something that was unapologetically him.
by 2018 he released a single, under a new name ‘kaiso’ and beneath the new company and it went viral as the ‘ace of epik’ was finally coming back to the industry
it took him a while to get fully back to it and for awhile he simply released one ep and a few singles and collabs before disappearing for a little. and he would continue to do that for awhile.
though he was hardly in the spot light between releases he gained popularity for a lot of things, and one of them was his ‘big change.’ the dopey leader had become stone cold, he showed his tattoos and faked smiles, he kept his fans close and very few other idols in the industry closer. leaving him with the reputation of being a ‘bad boy.’ backs would straighten and gazes would lower as kaiso entered the green rooms at music shows.
it was a rumor he didn’t care to clear up and honestly enjoyed how people would often not talk to him, leaving him in his little bubble with his fans and company. (think namjoon of bts or eric nam when it comes to fans).
after awhile, with malachi being psych’s biggest money pit, and sent him only on the first infinite tour. it was during this time that malachi met his current girlfriend, officially, and began to open up a bit more to the industry even as they used his past as the ‘biggest reason’ to his success.
but ultimately after the original infinite tour, kai’s company decided to participate in the acquisition for kai’s benefit,. he was their top earning artist and felt like a bigger company would do him good. they decided not to take the two former, veteran groups and while the boy group disbanded, the girls were taken on by a bigger company.
he still likes to refer to himself as a part of PSYC Ent. as the idea of being a part of a bigger company puts a foul taste in his mouth.
as he got bigger he began sending jaime money every month to make sure she was situated and also as an incentive to literally never talk to him again.
infinite tour
during the infinite tour as stated above kai had grown a lot. he acquired space in his friends lives and began to let them take up space in his.
at his current manager’s request he began therapy during the original tour and it had been helping.
he came out with tons of music both years, the constant moving keeping him in the writers room even if it meant he was over worked and overwhelmed.
during the first tour he began to struggle with his idol identity, wondering if he was doing himself a disservice to abandon his years of idol training to become this pariah of low eyes and low energy.
he essentially began retraining and trying to become the idol he was in epik, while staying true to himself unlike he was able to back then.
this led to a lot of uneasiness and malachi scrapping albums after albums over again and putting out more dance oriented tracks, attempting to fall in love with stage again like he’d had in high school.
with the help of some push from friends and a great choreographer (thanks mei) kai released tracks like ‘birthday’., ‘eye on you’ and even was recruited for an all soloist co-ed group by the company (called re:gn) as well as a subsidiary of said group (K!NG)
he quickly became infinite’s only in house producers who was also an idol and has written, produced and composed at least once for every group except tidal. he works the most with braveheart and indigo as their sound(s) are the closest to his style. he’s also the only producer for FLEUR (Kim Seonhwa) and has worked on/produced a lot of the solo releases for a lot of the idols in the company.
with the infinite tour gaining popularity and more idols were beginning to interact with him, he is now known pretty much to be a bit dark and mysterious and unapproachable, but he’s deadass just a ball of shy anxiousness.
during this time he also had come to the conclusion that he loves making music, but detests being an idol but takes the fame anyway because he likes what he does
notable moments include, an incident at a 'kick back' in his home town that would have brought his entire world crashing down. him breaking down into uncontrollable sobs on stage in chicago, and his mother showing up randomly at his seoul town home during a break in the first tour, forcing them to 'revive' their tumultuous relationship. and pre-maturely introduced her to his now current girlfriend.
canons/personality tidbits & quirks
you can call him malachi or kai, though mostly close friends (which he barely has) call him kai
his korean name is soh duri
he’s a scorpio (sun), aquarius (moon) and a taurus (rising)
If you ever work with kai on a song, it’s going to be a masterpiece. not saying it’s bc of his talent as a writer and producer but he’s super particular about music and how it makes people feel
some general aesthetics about him - think of him as, “the feeling of neo soul, marijuana smoke wafting around the studio, the neon lights of the city, the bad boy with a sweet smile, 90s-00s r&b”
he’s the type to be in the studio all night and run off of red bull and cigarettes for the next day
is a pot head and no i’m not sorry about it
if you manage to get close to him he WILL take care of you, always at all times. You well be fed, clothed, and loved through and through
can talk about music all day every day
loves fashion
loves tattoos has drawn all the ones he’s gotten
bi-sexual king, loves him some men and some ladies.
loves loves art so much
has so much respect for idols before him
quiet boy
give him sweets he’ll become your personal puppy
he’s a brand ambassador for dior but is wanting to possibly change that
he loves anime, manga and comics, fave superhero is spiderman, fave anime is one piece, fave manga is chainsaw man
overall kai is the resident bad boy with a heart of gold. his upbringing makes dealing with his anxiety and anger hard, and his shyness is just something he's working to over come. he's had a hard life in general but the addition of his hard time as an idol has really thrown in him in a hole he's struggling to dig out of. he finds tranquility in the smoke of marijuana or in the arms of the chair in his studio whether he be working on music or art and uses his life experiences to navigate his life in the future. he'll hang on to your every word even if it seems like he's not listening, take in all the little details about you and every gift you receive will always be special...you just gotta...yah know be let in first. so fingers crossed he talks to you!
updates post tour
not much has changed post tour, kai is still pursuing the merging of all the different versions of him, his chicago boy, his global superstar, and who he’s become now.
since coming back to seoul he’s brought on his girlfriend to live with him.
he plans on releasing more music for himself and with various artists by the end of the year
he’s strongly considering changing up his sound and experimenting a bit more out of his r&b wave.
he’s wanting to branch out a bit more, get in with some idols he hasn’t really talked with as well as mend some relationships he’s broken a bit.
also loathes the reality tv idea but is happy they’ll be stationary for awhile.
will add more as post tour goes!
connections/wanted plots
motive - kai notices that you’re getting close to him. he can feel the lingering eyes and notice the soft touches but you’ve always been some sort of loose canon. he can’t tell if this bad boy/girl/person demeanor is real and if it is what are you motives with a shy and quiet being like him? (open to anyone)
first love - kai’s relationship with music is something that can be admired, he gets accolades from interviewers and other artists and thats the thing you bond over. you often find yourselves sharing earphones or in some studio. whether you’re dancing, creating or singing its easy for night to turn into day just in each other’s presence. now your friendship goes beyond music. you’re each others confidants in your most stressful moments. (danbi)
pretty little fears - he’d grown a crush on you from afar, but after a chance encounter he seems to be infatuated. his shy and bashful demeanor battles with his want to play cool. and he finds himself lost in watching you speak and aching to hold your hand, wanting to sweep you off your feet but...his anxiety just wont allow it just yet. (dae)
midnight sky - malachi and your relationship was one full of electricity. but one thing he couldn’t handle was feeling small. you’re older than him and in the midst of the rendezvous he felt as if he was a baby toddling after you at all times. maybe it was the way you treated him or maybe it was his own insecurities, but sometimes he finds him self missing the security of your arms. breaking up was some form of rebellion in his eyes and he pretends to feel liberated but he’s not sure if his pride got in the way of something good, or if he dodged a controlling bullet.
nonchalant - to say you have a feud in the industry is maybe an overstatement but the boiling blood is still aroused. you’ve been an artist of your caliber for awhile and you think malachi is gimicky. his transfer from being in such a big idol group to kr&b was a large leap and the inkling that he’s riding on old fame with a fake image is a prickle in your mind. kai respects you too much as an artist and often finds himself trying to prove to you that he’s where he should be. even if that means muddling disses into his music.
best friend/patonic soulmates (can be plotted) (seungho)
industry friends ( 0/3 would be kind of like a clique of friends that are known in the industry similar to the third gens ‘97 liners )
produced for you/your group
smoke buddies (hanuel a friend he often takes care of/babies (ren)
older sibling figure (seonhwa)
old bandmate that he got scouted with (angel)
manager (ilsu)
mother figure (islu)
and literally anything else pls just love him
muse overviews and analysis & extra links
✘ character study #1 - 'a good boy's bad habits'
✘ character study #2 - 'the stage'
✘ the muse as zodiac signs
✘ favorite stage outfits - 2021 / 2022 / 2023
✘ general task #1
✘ character study #3 - 'the idol': photoset 1 / 2 / 3 / analysis & viral moments
✘ playlist #1 - 976 E. 132nd Pl. Chicago, IL (subject to be replaced/updated)
✘ komca credits
✘ through the eras - malachi ‘kaiso’ soh
✘ muse tag
#infinite:intro#here's kai's updated intro#again not much has changed just some updates#more details and some extra stuff that i added that i was sitting on but never announced!#i'll add more to the after tour tidbits and other canons as well!
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this is such a cursed combination of words,,,,,, but honestly no yeah i agree
bc the league of extraordinary gentlemen is ultimately just a very convoluted way for alan moore to take the readers' hands into his hands, look deep into their eyes and scream FICTION HAS CONSEQUENCES YOU FUCKING MORON into their faces and even just the idea of putting this deeply complicated, deeply flawed, and, as per alan moore's belief system, deeply magical work of art into the hands of the guy whose claim to fame is making twitter bros' favorite grimdark superhero movies is objectively hilarious
(especially bc one of those grimdark superhero movies is an adaptation of another moore comic book -- the very one whose success among fascist scumbags moore himself can't seem wrap to his head around, despite the fact he put a very cool and sympathetic fascist in it, and not even for the first or last time in his career, bc IRONY! turns out fiction has consequences you fucking moron)
(also IRONY! the guy who adapted the Whole of (Western, often Anglo) Fiction into a comic book keeps getting mad about his own work being adapted -- but that's another story)
and i know everyone only cares about the victorian volumes of tloeg -- which is more than fair, i would to if i were sane -- but at the end of the day if there's a living director whose attempt at the golliwog could change the direction of cinema forever it's zack snyder (in my nightmares mark gatiss is also somehow involved)
but does he have the range to do 'harry potter aka the antichrist kills allan quartermain by shooting lightning form his dick only to be killed by god incarnated as mary poppins'???
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