measuringbliss

[measuringbliss]

i hate when i send someone a meme in another language and they're like "uhm... translate? 😒" fucker i sent you a meme where 90% of the words have an english cognate and/or you don't need to know what they're saying to find it funny. can you at least TRY

[measuringbliss]

Spider-Man Read-Through 058: Somebody is Killing Them All! (SSM 44-45, SSM Ann 2)

MASTERPOST

With a cover like that, you can only do one thing: keep reading.

(Plus, there's gorgeous art in there!)

And here's our awesome first page as well:

Wow. Just... wow. The lighting, the shading, the view... Incredible. Maybe needs more cars but come on, that's a detail. *reads the text* Oh...

The pages are very dense. Basically, the mob has had... issues recently (I wonder if Silvermane's part of it, like last time) and a guy wants his men to find some items for his uncle.

It's the New Year for Chinatown! One of the men, Dolenz, tries to steal the jade there, but he gets gunned down.

MEANWHILE.

I'm pregnant! But also, great colors in the second panel. And the third one. And I'm pregnant!

Look at his cute little outfit!!!!!!!! I love that red sweater, holy fuck!

Holy fuck. The food is good. The food is delicious.

So one of Peter's pictures features the aforementioned murder. Time to investigate!

It's Alfred's turn to die mysteriously. Not yet though, Spidey's still investigating!

First off, that joke is funny. Secondly, that cake in the last panel???!?! Yes but?!?! Maybe a bit too much hahaha.

Turns out Alfred doesn't die, on the contrary, his attackers die! What a chad.

The art is all over the place in this issue, but the line art is so good I don't even mind. Love how it all looks. And I feel like there's a lot of ambition too!

See what I mean?

Anyway, Spidey finds out that Malachai Toomes owns the building he was led to... Toomes, as in, the Vulture. He's a relative, nice!

What the fuck did the artists smoke for this issue, because they made excellent art, I love this!

Spidey fights goons, finds Toomes, who informs him that Alfred is the culprit, then tries to kill him with deadly gas coming out of his carnation. It's not the green, but it's still very gay.

Spidey wakes up chained in a coffin on a conveyor belt. And next to him...

Fucking hell, how the fuck is this issue so gorgeous like that?! Bravo to the whole team because goddamnit.

On *that* website, the commenters really don't like the art, but it's a scan and not digital, which I think does sublimate how it looked. Damn, I loved it.

What the fuuuuuck.

So Malachai is the Vulture's nephew, nice.

Everyone thinks Spidey's dead, so they have a celebration. Good for them!

The Vulture isn't fooled by Alfred's plans though. It was actually his intention all along to let Alfred get rid of his rivals to weed out the weak. Smart!

The furnace explodes or whatever, and Spidey gets everyone out of the burning mansion (but not before showcasing his perfect butt).

Elsewhere...

Damn, I liked that creepy little bald guy, I'll miss him.

The Vulture gets angry and starts pummeling Alfred, but then Spidey arrives, they fight, the Vulture flees, Alfred asks the cops to take him in to get protected from the Vulture.

Spidey and Vulture crash in Grand Central Station, it makes for a nice environment! Loving this. Eventually, the Vulture crashes in a glass window.

Peter... doesn't feel so good.

What a great set of issues. What a solid ending. Loved the art.

And now it's time for the King-Size Annual! I'm hoping for more of Peter's life, but somehow, I doubt it.

Sure!

Our story starts as Spidey and Rapier fight together against some low-level goons, before Rapier takes off. Alright, I'm up for a... team up.

They're staying mostly consistent with his apartment, that's nice! And while I appreciate our pretty hero, these pajamas look a bit weird. Also, it feels weird to see May!

The next day, Peter and Ned go to the docks to do some investigating.

Oh Ned, that outfit... *sigh*

The goons steal Peter's press card, and our heroes leave the area. However, when Peter goes to the Bugle (I have no idea why he would go to the Bugle but not matter) and is about to become gay for pay.

Oh, his "bulge ain't a billfold?" Huh-huh.

Just as I predicted previously, Silvermane's back, right in Jonah's office! He's unhappy about Jonah's inquiries about the mob, and the same goes for Peter's photographies. Silvermane himself gives the card back to Peter, nicely threatening him and taking his camera. Peter quickly gets an advance from Jonah though.

Hahaha.

They have a fight, and Spidey tells off Silvermane.

Silvermane's not amused.

We get a scene at the Rapier's home, where he says he must kill Silvermane and his girlfriend pleads for him to stop his vigilante activites. Standard stuff.

More importantly, Peter Parker is a slut (good for him).

So Jonah's idea is to make people so angry they rile up and the authorities are forced to act. Alright, not bad!

Glory informs Peter that Jonah's behavior is due to Robbie being recently attacked and sent to the hospital. Makes sense.

At a church turned into a museum or something, Silvermane has an appointment with Rapier. This is a great excuse to show great art.

Oh they're sooooo exes. They fucked, they absolutely fucked!

I'm afraid, because now that we got this character's backstory (they were partners, Silvermane left him for dead, Rapier's future girlfriend saved him, there you go) and now he can very well die. Silvermane is going to be alright, he's a villain, they always come back, but Rapier is (kind of) a nice guy now, and that's why I'm scared for him.

Spider-Man arrives right on time to stop Rapier from killing Silvermane, and Rapier's so angry he challenges Spidey to a sword fight. Hell yeah!

TOO MUCH TEXT CALM DOWN STAN LEE

Spider-Man gets rid of Rapier's sword, but then--Clarissa, Rapier's girlfriend, throws it at Spidey to make him confused! Nononono she's gonna die is she? Oh, I know she's gonna die. Come oooooooon.

Rapier feels betrayed by Clarissa's intervention, and decides to start ALL OF THIS ALL OVER AGAAAAAIN because he has PRINCIPLES. JESUS. OKAY.

So what must happen... happens.

Ugh. Alright, that's not a bad ending.

Except he's not dead! He flees the scene. Hm.

Ok, not sure I'm a fan of this Rapier guy. Feels too much like Punisher, but a bit more quirky. Maybe if he gets some development... Who knows!

We'll have to talk about this one commenter at some point because they have... opinions. They are very opiniated. And we're reading issues almost synchronized? This is funny. Dramaaaaaa. Lengthy comments every issue! Fascinating.

Next time: A lot of ASM! Like, a lot! We'll see how that goes.

#peter parker #spider-man #peter parker thirst #comics #comic books #silvermane #the vulture

[measuringbliss]

Spider-Man Read-Through 056: The Frightful Four!!! (SSM 41-43)

MASTERPOST

The last time, Peter became a lizard for a while. Fun stuff!

In this issue, mysterious enemies try to seem menacing and utterly fail, homophobia, as well as special guests and the best villain ever!

Are you shocked, are you impressed, are you terrified yet? *snickers*

After using his powers to give his late paper to Professor Slater, Spider-Man interrupts Meteor Man at a microwave exhibition (...). We met this antagonist previously in Team Up, which shows you exactly how important he is. Bill Foster, whomst I know from Ant-Man and the Wasp (the movie) but who apparently has a different position, is giving a lecture nearby, but gets the opportunity to lend him a hand as Giant-Man.

The art actually has a lot of trouble trying to convey how big exactly Giant Man is supposed to be. There's perspective, and then there's whatever is going on here.

Meteor Man gets away, they track him down, and Giant-Man casually drops in his internal monologue that's he's dying of radioactive poisoning. Wow. Um. Alright.

They fight, Meteor Man gets to grow bigger, but...

Oh, between twelve and thirty feet? How audacious. How incredible. Show us, dude.

Okay, this is better! Actually a nice page.

That... was an issue alright.

Issue #42 has a neat cover!

Peter is trapped in traffic and ends up swinging to his class boat ride thingy.

I love this, because half the time I barely register that Marcy Kane and Debra Whitman are different characters. Digital issues (hey, have you seen these clean screenshots? Much better!)!

My opinions on each character: Philip is alright, I need him to have more of a personality. Marcy sucks, been there, done that (although I just read a spoiler about her and what the fuck, I'm curious to see how THAT plays out). Steve is hot and adorable. No opinion on Sloan and Debra.

I'm glad to see Peter's social life though. I still feel like these characters aren't anywhere as solid as the previous cast was, but I think jumping between both magazines really doesn't help either.

I missed you, hon.

No but seriously, I'd be interested to reread SSM only focusing on it, I think it's probably a stronger experience.

Marcy Kane immediately aggros Pete, but Connors interrupts them. Meanwhile, the Frightful Four aren't far away! We've got the Sandman, the Wizard, Electro and the Trapster (who even is that? :p).

They do a bit of mischief, and I'm pretty sure that cop is homophobic. "PARTNERS?", he says (lmao).

On the boat, Peter wonders whether he has a crush on Marcy (nooo) when Debra arrives.

Some depth? Wow.

Anyway, before Peter settles on whether he wants a relationship with our desperate lady, the Human Torch cockblocks him.

Why is this so funny?

She feels guilty about Peter getting away, and...

New, rare poses!

Hell yeah. Sorry for the amount of screenshots but I really enjoy looking at these!

It wasn't the Human Torch, however, only our Frightful Four! The Wizard created a suit imitating the Torch and gives it to Electro.

Our hero doesn't get fooled for long, and a fight quickly breaks.

A hilarious moment is Spidey trying to figure out who's attacking him. The Sinister Six? No, the Frightful Four after replacing Madam Medusa with Electro? No, it's actually the Frightful Four after replacing the Brute with Electro! What a mess hahahaha

In his own words, Spidey's fighting a "foursome". *snickers again*

The fight goes badly for Spidey, until... Electro interrupts everybody because now, he wants to know who's under the mask.

They sure are a bunch of idiots.

Their plan is to impersonate Spidey and eliminate the Fantastic Four. Uh-huh, sure. And the story continues in FF #218!

This is a really cool first page.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA ALRIGHT

The Human Torch acts extremely gay with "Spider-Man" in this scene. He gets knocked out. The Thing and the security system are also quickly neutralized, but as our villains enter the building, Sue wakes up... she finds her brother, but is quickly attacked and subsequently, knocked out. And just when Mr. Fantastic gets unconscious as well, Spidey arrives!

The ensuing fight is fun, and at last, all's well.

Anyway, SSM #43!

OH THIS IS GORGEOUS. THE SHADING ON PETER'S SHIRT. I LOVE IT. His face, not so much... Anyway, Steve and Peter being bros, hell yeah!

So bandits have broken into ESU and use Debra as a hostage. They get their stuff and get away, but not without Peter throwing a gadget of his at their car.

Handsome.

His spider-tracer leads him to a twink.

And what an ugly twink. Especially compared to this highly stylish Belladonna, what the heck, I love her.

I think I've been spoiled something on Roderick Kingsley, but we'll see how it goes.

Anyways, Belladonna wants to steal Roderick's ideas, apparently. Spidey decides to intervene. The villains get away, and Roderick's annoyed that Spidey ruined his apartment with the fight. However, our hero surmises that Belladonna wanted chemicals for her special gas.

The next day, at the Daily Globe, Sandy Jones is quickly charmed by Peter and she explains that Roderick is rumored to steal his designs. Plus, he has a show that night! Peter easily gets the assignment, and goes to his lab to work on countering Bella's gas.

I love that second panel, it's a very strong one.

Debra's here, she bought what was on Peter's list. He's so happy he asks her on a date, to which she obviously agrees. I would too, girl.

Turns out what Peter was searching for was vinegar. He worries about reactivating his ulcer, which is a nice callback to a storyline from like, ASM 80 something. That's cool!

This feels like a Pretty Little Liars storyline, I love it. Seriously, I love this issue! Also, Peter very pretty.

Anyway, Spidey stops the bandits, but Belladonna gets away!

Oh, I really went from bored at very excited throughout this post, wow! Hell yeah.

#spider-man #comics #peter parker #belladonna #fashion #fantastic four #comic books

[measuringbliss]

What exactly is going on with Taylor swift? Did she do something wacky or just release a shit album that's so bad it's funny?

okay i have done time as a swiftie and i now watch over those weirdos like im david attenborough so you’ve come to the right place.

ur correct about it being an album so bad its funny. but theres more. im very sorry but this will be long.

so basically since like 2016 she was in an apparently steady and normal long term relationship with a blond man called joe alwyn whose only character trait is knowing how to shut the fuck up (and i love him for that)

then in april 2023 it was announced that they broke up while she was on tour but bc the relationship had been uneventful and boring this whole time, the general vibe from everyone was “huh thats kinda sad, oh well”

i might be mixing up the timeline a little here but a couple weeks later there were some articles about how she’s now dating matty healy from the 1975. people were mostly just like “pfft its just tabloid shit it cant be true” and then at the next 1975 gig, marty pointed into the camera and said “this is for you, you know who you are, i love you” before playing a love song. THEN at the next taylor gig she did the exact same damn thing and the swifties hit the fan.

to make a very long fuckin story short, they dug up a bunch of dirt about how this dude is a nasty little racist misogynist rat and he needs to get away from their poor little innocent billionaire princess. some people get kinda heated about whether these accusations are true and tbh id rather eat glass than get into that shit myself

SO, swifties outnumber us all and raised absolute hell online while taylor brought this guy to all her concerts and let him perform with the opening acts. her publicist released some statements saying taylor knows what her fans are saying and she doesnt give a fuck. but also said they’re not super serious and are just having fun together.

during all this, theres a small group of swifties that have decided to break away and become very pro-marty and essentially pit him against aforementioned blond man joe alwyn. their general narrative is that because joe loves being quiet and doesnt really do Celebrity Things, that must mean he was ashamed of his relationship with taylor. this is where we get the beloved He Lets Her Bejeweled meme

this fannade narrative becomes more relevant in a bit

at some point during this relationship she releases the joe alwyn breakup song You’re Losing Me, which just describes some very standard long term relationship breakdown stuff. they have different life goals and they’re drifting apart and the communication is breaking down. she kinda wants him to do something to save it at the eleventh hour but that wouldnt be realistic. very sad oh well.

theres a small amount of kicking off from the fandom about he’s awful for this but only bc they’re addicted to the idea that their favourite billionaire is the worlds most tragic victim and honestly whats new

and here starts the very fucking weird trend of her publicist releasing statements that are very clearly deliberately backing up the weirdo fan theories. a lot of “taylor and matty are showing up for each other UNLIKE HER LAST RELATIONSHIP and he is proud of her UNLIKE JOE ALWYN” like..alright.

anyway ratty and taylor break up after about a month of publicly dating and she sings some sad songs and cries at her concerts but everyone mostly forgets about the whole thing.

about a month later travis kelce asks her out and they end up dating and the white women of america collectively cream. personally i dont get it because i dont know what sports are and the only travis im familiar with is the tractor from bob the builder but i digress. the 35 year old deadbedroom swifties are going CRAZY. they’re saying these two are gonna get married and have ten kids and global superstar taylor swift can finally achieve the only real success for a woman: marriage and motherhood. because football man is the only Real Man she has been with due to the fact that he is tall and wide and bearded.

its severely tragic and vicarious

once again the focus does not remain on the couple. they’re turning on poor puppydog joe alwyn again. this time he’s evil not only for being “ashamed” of her but also for wasting her time by not marrying and impregnating her, because as we have established, thats the only point to life as a woman. how dare he waste all that time locking her away in the six mansions that she owns.

and her publicist does the same shit as before with the “he supports her and shows up for her UNLIKE JOE” bullshit. all of these people are over 30 and have never experienced a real problem.

this creates a cycle that is honestly kind of concerning, where the fans invent a strange theory, the publicist backs it up, the swifties add to the theory, the publicist back up the new additions, and so on. taylor continues dating travis and they go to each others concerts/games and act like a relatively normal honeymoon phase couple. the narrative has massively broken away from the reality.

so this continues, people hyping up travis and hating joe. at this point i want to note that taylor and her team have spent a lot of years crying about how the nasty misogynistic media only ever cares about her relationship drama and ignores her art because they hate powerful women or something. the irony is that just about every bit of publicity she’s done over the last year+ has been directly linked to whatever breakup or boyfriend she’s going through currently. they’re definitely not hiding that this is the PR direction they’re going with.

so, with the weird fan rumours continuing to reinforce themselves, the swifties become very confident that their imaginations are telling the truth. they stalk joe alwyns social media presence, of which there is very little. but if you go out looking for mess you never come back empty handed. they find that he has been around women. because he is an actor. and some other actors are women. anyway they fully believe this is proof that he cheated, and they launch harassment campaigns against these relatively small actors, who end up having to private their accounts. then the swifties find another woman to harass for being “the other woman”. it goes on.

then the abuse and domestic violence accusations against joe alwyn are created. not from taylor or anyone close to the situation. only from the fans. her PR team have at least stopped reinforcing the fan theories at this point, but the ball is already rolling.

when she announces her new album, the swifties ERUPT with joy that finally she is going to end joe alwyn, the man who im pretty sure has just been chilling in his house this whole time. the harassment of anyone and everyone deemed in any way guilty continues tenfold. they are openly tweeting about finding him in london and physically attacking and/or killing him (he’s not a huge celebrity and is often just hanging around alone with no security team or anything. im sure these threats arent serious but they feel kinda more dangerous when the target essentially just hangs around as a private citizen)

the album promo is pretty much just.. “hey i dated this dude and he made me sooooo sad isnt that interesting, swifties?” over and over again. each new post brings a bigger wave of joe harassment. they’re champing at the bit for taylor to tell them all the many ways he hurt her so dreadfully.

then the album leaks and its all about matty healy, which is very funny on the dismayed swiftie-violence front but also just..terrible in that she used the harassment of joe as an album promo tactic when the album barely mentions him. the only thing she really says about him is that he suffers from depression and it made their relationship difficult.

..and yeah, the album is about how she’s been obsessed with marty for over ten years and she fantasised about him while in her long term relationship, and theres maybe some overlap of the two relationships. the irony. all the “this man hurt me so much!!!”-type lyrics that were released to promote the album were actually about matty, not joe. a lot of the swifties are continuing to double down on hating joe bc they cant accept that the matty relationship even happened. theres a song about how much she hates her fans for hating her relationship with rarty. its called but daddy i love him. its a whole embarrassing mess for everyone involved, including me for typing all this out.

and after all that most of the songs fuckin suck

[measuringbliss]

parksborn doodle for the soul :)

they are the overdressed/underdressed combo of my dreams !!

[measuringbliss]

I don't know if Harry Osborn drives but if he did he would be in his car scream-singing to "Caught Myself" by Paramore

#spider-man #harry osborn #Raimiverse #Can we go back to Gwen/MJ though #I hadn't considered it but I See It

[measuringbliss]

About that...

Ooooh...

THAT superhero game now has a playable build on PC... nobody told me... Ooooooooooh

#spider-man 2 #insomniac games #spider-man #lmaooooooooooo

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they will be freaks until the day, until the dawn

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I'm curious. Reblog this if you know how to cook

I don’t even care if it’s macaroni, ramen or those little bowls you stick in the microwave. Please, I need reassurance that most of the population on tumblr WOULDN’T STARVE TO DEATH if their parents couldn’t fix them food or they couldn’t go out to eat. 

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Ooooh...

THAT superhero game now has a playable build on PC... nobody told me... Ooooooooooh

[measuringbliss]

Yeah, I’d watch Muppets Lord of the Rings

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Yes!

It sucks that fandoms are obsessed with morality and purity, and I completely agree on your view of "redeemability" regarding characters, it never really made sense to me.

I feel like one of your points (feel free to correct me obviously) is that you don't like NWH's attempt to chalk up Norman's bad behavior to simply mental issues, which I understand, but I do remember feeling happy when it came out about the fact that a superhero movie said something else than "we can't do anything for them". It did simplify things, but I liked the idea of a Peter who kept trying like he should, as a hero. I don't actually know if that perspective on villains was rare, but in 2021's landscape, where people kept asking why Batman didn't kill the Joker and it felt like (emphasis on "felt like") the solution to any superhero movie was to kill and destroy, that idea felt refreshing.

I don't think the movie necessarily implies that ~the Goblin~ is responsible for all of Norman's issues, but I feel like this is a vaguely nuanced discussion that fandom (at least, currently) mostly cannot handle because it's easier and more popular to say one sentence to rile up everyone.

Anyway. Uh. I got lost too. Dammit, Norman!

Even I don’t know what this post is about and there’s probably no way for me to say this without sounding a little pretentious and for that I apologize but here’s some Norman meta analysis.

In terms of the Great Raimi Norman Discussion, something I thank a god I don’t believe in every day hasn’t yet escalated to Discourse(tm), among the things I wish weren’t a factor alongside the entire movie of NWH is the entire concept of a character being irredeemable. In my personal opinion, redemption is change. There is no point at which a person is not capable of some sort of positive change, so there’s no point where someone is irredeemable. This is simplifying for the sake of brevity, but it gets my point across.

However by the standards of larger fandom, there tends to be a collection of specific things that label a character irredeemable. These tend to be bigotry of most if not any form, any form of abuse, and sexual violence.

Raimi Norman managed to tick off all three.

Taking into account the authorial intent, Norman is very much meant to be sexist, an emotionally abusive parent, and I personally believe it’s very very likely that the comment the Goblin made towards MJ at the end of the first movie was intended to be a rape threat, especially taking into account him ogling her earlier in the movie.

The thing that tends to occur with those three topics in media is that they feel too real and too close to home and connect too much with people’s personal experiences. This can result a lot in people who generally like or enjoy a character with those traits sort of feeling the need to minimize, deny, or entirely avoid the topic of those things because it can feel like a reflection on their personal character to like a character who is those things or make them feel like they can’t enjoy the traits of those characters that they do enjoy. Norman’s behavior with MJ isn’t acknowledging and people tend to swing towards saying Norman was a bad parent or a neglectful parent because the word Abusive is a point of no return for most people when it shouldn’t be.

This is incorrect and anyone who tries to make you feel bad for this is incorrect. Personal preferences aren’t morality.

I broadly do not enjoy this for all the prior stated reasons but also because I feel this is also a root cause for a lot of Good Old Fashioned Norman Woobification. With denying these topics, in particular his child abuse and sexism because I’m aware the third is debatable, people end up implicitly taking the responsibility he has for his actions as a 57 year old man who made all his decisions on his own away from him or otherwise minimizing what he did or trying to make excuses, once again because modern fandom morality is a plague and people think any of the above means they can’t like a character.

And even besides that, I personally feel that to perform meaningful analysis of his character you have to be willing to embrace and openly acknowledge the very shitty things he does all on his own of his own agency. That sort of full understanding of a character is pretty necessary. You’re able to come to more complete and more defendable positions. And while I, me, tumblr user hawkogurl might not agree with them, they’re gonna be better developed. I don’t need to agree with them. I believe exposing myself to opinions I don’t agree with is good for me. It prevents the development of an echo chamber.

I continue to have no clue what I’m saying with this post so I’m gonna stop here. Because I’ll feel weird if I don’t say it, this post isn’t even directed at anyone specifically, we’ve come a long way from 2021 NWH era fandom and most people tend to be willing to acknowledge he’s kind of the worst and I don’t need to agree with you to respect you.

#I hope you don't take this post the wrong way OP #I wished to participate in the discussion. not. like. I don't know. Hopefully it's alright #I just thought your post was interesting and it resonated with me #Fandom is complicated

[measuringbliss]

reblog to meow at the person you reblogged from

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thinking about them finding stupid ways to be happier together

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... 24

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Best fandom history commentary ever, courtesy of @tardistara

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Made this for @kv-wisteria dtiys 1k celebration on IG 🎉🎊🎉

#OOOOOOOOOOH THIS IS SO CUTE #Bear #Bears #Miguel o hara #Atsv #teddy bear #THE BEAR IS SO CUTE