#I have a bunch of de comic ideas but I’m feeling a bit down in the dumps about my art lately

[ato-dato]

I don’t think they’re ugly. But I think the number of times Jean has begged him to buy new clothes is astronomical.

#and this is his work appropriate stuff. think about the stuff that’s too disco to even consider wearing to work. imagine. #I just love the idea of Harry rediscovering his apartment and finding out that green/orange combo was the most normal it’s gonna get #anyway #I have a bunch of de comic ideas but I’m feeling a bit down in the dumps about my art lately #so it thought I should practice drawing him a bit more #disco elysium #disco elysium fanart #harry du bois #harrier du bois #hdb #jean vicquemare #jean viquemare #which one is it??? #kim kitsuragi #de fanart #kimharry #kinda #kim x harry #harry x kim #art #artwork #my art #fanart #digital art #drawing

[invaderlynx]

Booker and La Campagne de Russie

I just watched The Old Guard and honestly, it was one of the best movies I’ve seen in a VERY long time. Of course, now I’m having all sorts of thoughts about the whole thing and particularly about Booker because his backstory intersects perfectly with my historical interests. I know that all the immortals in The Old Guard have experienced all sorts of terrible trauma, but because I am a history major with an affinity for the Napoleonic period, especially the Russian Campaign (and because Booker is my favorite character), I’d like to give you guys an idea of just what sort of torture he faced even before the pain of losing his family (also for fair warning, I have not read the comics):

Please place yourself in Booker’s shoes. You are one of over 600,000 men mustered to march into Russia. You’re serving in an army you never wanted to join, taking up arms for the glory of an empire that’s never done anything for you. You’ve been separated from your three beloved sons and your wife whom you love more than life itself, and have been sent off to fight in a foreign land that’s nothing like the home you’ve left behind. That much becomes evident immediately. 

The invasion starts in the summer of 1812 and it is hot, unseasonably hot. You feel it, laboring as you are under the thick heavy materials of your sweat-soaked uniform. Each step is its own torture in the heat as you struggle through mud left behind by hard summer rains. More than a few men kill themselves at this point and although this is just the beginning, you can hardly blame them. Some of your comrades get the bright idea to start discarding some of their extra layers of clothing—underthings and the like. Perhaps you join them, anything to lighten the load. You can’t be expected to carry all this over the long miles ahead. You’ll live to regret that decision.

The fighting itself is worse than the conditions. You never quite get used to the violence. No matter how many times you’re thrust into battle, your mouth still goes dry, your heart still thunders as loud as the military drums’ tattoo, you still choke on that thick gunpowder smoke. You nearly threw up the first time you killed with a bayonet. You remember sticking the man in between the ribs, a swift stab and he is bleeding out. It is only then that you see his face and realize just how young he is. He is a boy, maybe a few precious years older than your eldest. He cries as he falls. You didn’t speak Russian at the time but you didn’t need to to recognize the word “Мама”.

The only thing that makes it possible to keep putting one foot in front of the other (besides your family, of course) is your comrades-in-arms. Against all odds, you’ve found friendship here, men with whom you can share stories and jokes and drinks. You find a few men of around your own age with families, wives and children that they lovingly speak of, but many of these soldiers are young, young enough to be your sons, far too young to be out here slaughtering and being slaughtered. Over your meager meals you tell stories of home and it is enough to hold off the impending horror, at least for a moment. When that doesn’t work, you turn to drink. You drink an awful lot.

The conditions of this foreign land are mercurial at best and your woes are only compounded by your lack of proper supplies. The Russians have been scorching nearly everything in the wake of their retreat, making it difficult for you to forage for food. Your search parties turn up very little by way of provisions and your food supply continues to fall in tandem with the temperature.

Borodino is hell. You see the man to the right of you receive a cannonball to the chest and fall in a spray of red, you see the man to the left crumple as a shot rips through his handsome, hard-lined face. One of your friends, one of those boys that you’d come to regard as a surrogate son who was barely old enough to grow hair on his chin, catches a bullet in the leg. He dies in agony four days later, one of the thousands of casualties of that damned battle. In your lowest moments, you wish you would have joined him.

You were never a particularly happy man, even before the war. Prone to fits of melancholia, they would have said back then. Your darling wife and your three sons certainly helped to alleviate that heavy, aching emptiness that resided in your chest, but it never went away, not fully. It resurfaces with a vengeance now. Sitting with your gun in your hands and far too much liquor in your belly, you think about ending it all. How easy it would be to put a bullet in your brain and finally die. In the end, it’s your family that saves you again. You may not want to live for yourself, but for them- for them you can keep fighting. Besides, Moscow is only 70 miles away and once you take the ancient capital, Russia will have no choice but to surrender. That’s what everyone is saying and you force yourself to believe that it’s true.

Moscow was a lie. You took the capital but there was no peace. There was no food either. The Russians took it all when they abandoned the place, leaving almost nothing for your starving army. Nothing but liquor, which you are very grateful for at least. Your superiors probably aren’t, you think wryly as you raise the bottle to your lips and drink, drink, drink.

Moscow passes in a drunken haze for you. You drown yourself in Russian booze, drinking yourself absolutely insensate. There are entire days you spend propped up against the wall of some ramshackle Russian establishment, surrounded by empty bottles, too drunk to even stand. You remember bits and pieces, shattered memories drifting in and out of the fog. The looting and the things you took (a fine scarf, a silver flask, maybe more), a ladies’ fur shawl wrapped about your shoulders to keep out the chill, the burning heat of a terrible fire and the screams in French and Russian, the acrid taste of bile in your mouth as you splutter sick all over yourself only to raise the bottle to your lips again for another drink. In the end, you’re forced to leave Moscow as the position becomes untenable, the abandoned city burned to a shell of its former self. You never do learn who first started the fire, even years after the fact. 

The retreat is hell on Earth, worse than anything else that came before. La Grande Armée is hardly an army any longer, you’ve lost practically all discipline. By now, you’re just a bunch of exhausted, cold, starving men who want nothing more than to just make it home alive. Most of them won’t. The temperatures have dropped to below freezing at this point and you are wishing more than anything that you still had those infernal layers that caused you so much pain in the summer months. The clothing you and your comrades drunkenly plundered in Moscow—silken scarves stolen from abandoned trunks, heavy furs pilfered from store inventories, ladies’ shoes that hurt your feet but do a better job of keeping out the slush than your tattered boots—help, but not enough. Your fingers stiffen to near icicles in the cold as you try your damnedest to massage even a little warmth back into them, your face is wind-chapped and scabbed. You feel as though your very marrow has frozen, and you are one of the lucky ones. Men freeze to death in their sleep in less than an hour. Fifty men will sit down at a fire and only the twenty or so closest will ever get back up again. You all begin to loot the bodies of the dead and—as you grow more desperate—the dying as well. Corpses are stripped naked and left in the snow as the survivors squabble over their threadbare uniform pieces. Sometimes the corpses still twitch and moan but you try to ignore that.

There’s no food either. In addition to freezing, you’re starving too. The lot of you fight and quarrel over moldy crusts of bread, and in some cases even kill each other for them. The more clever turn to other sources to fill their writhing, empty stomachs. Some eat their boots, but there isn’t much leather left in any case. Some carve their meals off the horses as they walk, tearing bits of bleeding flesh off of the warm, moving flanks in a short-sighted attempt to get even a few morsels of meat in their bellies. Others, in mad desperation as the march (if you can even call it that any longer) wears on, turn to each other.

Perhaps you take part in this, perhaps you don’t. Perhaps you sidle a man out of the way to get closer to the fire, perhaps you take a coat off a corpse that you don’t know for sure is dead yet, perhaps you accept a piece of meat that you do not quite know the origin of. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps…

In the end it doesn’t matter. You die anyway. You don’t really remember how it happened the first time. Maybe you were finally picked off by the advancing Russians, maybe it was exposure, exhaustion, starvation, sickness, any of the hundred ways that you could die in this frozen wasteland. All you know is that one moment you were on your feet, shambling mutely forward, the next you were lying on the icy ground, gasping air back into lungs that had fallen completely still. Four faces are burned into your memory and from one you can still hear the gurgling, watery screams.

That’s when the dreams start, after that first death. Though, you wouldn’t classify them as dreams, they’re far more alike to nightmares. You see that screaming, drowning woman often. You feel her fear as she slams her body against her metal coffin. Even awake you can’t get the sound of her choking out of your head. Sometimes there are soft moments interspersed with the horror. You see a woman with short hair (it reminds you of a coiffure à la victime) laughing, you see two men resting in each others’ arms, foreheads pressed together gently, blissfully happy. To be quite honest, these ones hurt worst of all because they make you regret ever waking up.

You die a few more times before you finally decide to desert. You can’t take it anymore. That tyrant Bonaparte has abandoned this army, why can’t you? You take flight under the cold cover of night, trying to get to the Russian border. You don’t make it very far. You are dragged back—aching, tired, and hungry—and are hanged by the road as a deserter. Perhaps there still is a little discipline left in these ranks, at least enough to allow these soldiers to kill their comrades in the name of orders. You have to wait three days for the road to clear before you can finally run. In that time your body is almost entirely picked clean by looters. You continue your desperate trek back home in spite of it all and die many more times in the weeks (or was it months?) that follow. It never gets any easier.

 It’s near the border into Prussia that you finally meet one of the figures from your dreams. Perhaps it is the woman with the short hair who offers you a drink and a coat to put around your shoulders, and tells you bluntly but not unkindly that you’re immortal. Perhaps it is the curly-haired man who helps hold you upright when you stumble and is careful and caring with his words as he gently explains the situation. Perhaps it is his lighter-haired lover who catches you when you fold in on yourself from the weight of his words and offers you affirmations and condolences in a voice reminiscent of a priest. Whoever it is, they ask you to come with them and explain that there are others like them- like you out there.

“What about my family?” you stutter out, almost unconscious of the words as the tumble from your mouth “My wife? What about them?”

They favor you with a sad smile and try to explain, but you will hear none of it. They do not stop you when you tell them that you are going home, and you are glad for it.

With the supplies they give to you, you manage to hobble your way back home. You’ve been taken for a dead man, you realize, everyone you pass seems to think you’re a ghost. You don’t care. You only have one person on your mind.

Your wife answers the door dressed in black. She starts to cry when she sees you and throws her arms around your neck. You nearly crumple, weak as you are. “Bastien, Bastien,” she sobs against your shoulder “What happened?”

That question fills you with icy dread. Your stomach drops as you realize you cannot explain to her what you’ve been through, not in a way that she’ll understand. Even if you explain the immortality and she believes you, she won’t understand the horrors you’ve seen. No one will. A soldier’s burden.

You stay silent and instead cradle her closer as your boys appear in the doorway. You have them and, for now, that is enough. You won’t forget, you will never forget, but for now at least you have this.

#there we go #i made myself sad #you see what this poor bastard had to go through #it does not excuse what he did #not in the slightest #but it explains why he wants to die at least #there are very few things that i would want to go through less than the russian campagne #the old guard #tog #sebastien le livre #booker #andromache the scythian #yusef al kaysani #niccolo di genova #quynh

[stranger-who-writes-fiction]

Gonna make full use of my ‘comic rant’ tag and roast Future State: Superwoman.

Spoilers! And yelling! Of the disgruntled kind!

So a few things at the start here: 1.) I wanted to love this book. I wanted it to be great. I wanted to give it the benefit of the doubt, in spite of some iffy stuff in the solicit text. So this rant is not coming from a place of having decided this was going to be awful ahead of time. 2.) My tolerance for bad Supergirl comics is pretty high! Takes a lot for me to actually come out and say that a particular issue is trash. Reader: This story is trash.

It’s not ‘middle-aged white guys writing/drawing a story about sending a minor to a potentially hostile planet fully nude’ trash, mind you. It’s the compost bin, rather than the landfill. Slightly nicer trash, but it still stinks to high heaven. Allow me to expand!

PROLOGUE - SUMMARY: ...I actually can’t summarize this comic b/c it would devolve into a lot of senseless yelling. We’ll just have to tease out this terrible plot as we go along. 

PART I - DEAD DOGS TELL BAD TALES: The comic opens with Kara standing at Krypto’s grave. That’s not why this comic is trash, but it bears mentioning. Because why. Why would you do this. 

PART II - IN WHICH IT ONLY GETS WORSE: So, Kara has a running inner monologue, and the main thing we gather from Kara’s thoughts is that it was Krypto who taught her to be a hero. On paper, that sounds very sweet! In practice, it reads as Kara having no moral center whatsoever—whatever good qualities she might possess, she did not learn from her parents, or her foster parents, or friends, or fellow heroes. Nor do they come from within Kara herself. Nope, t’was Krypto who taught Kara not to be a jealous rage monster. That is not hyperbole--Kara’s walking around angry about her cousin all the time and she’s like, ‘It was you, Krypto, who taught me not to judge, and to let go of anger.’ Listen, I love Krypto, but this? This is, as the youth would say, a bad look.

PART III - THOSE CERTAINLY ARE...SOME THEMES: The set-up here is that Kara is on the moon, and has established a sanctuary for alien refugees. That’s a dynamite idea! I love that! Buuuuut Kara didn’t look at the plight of alien refugees and say, ‘I want to help!’ Really, she didn’t even look at herself and say, ‘I don’t want others to feel like I’ve felt.’ No, she said, ‘Earth won’t accept me as a hero, and Clark didn’t name me protector of Earth, so. I’m out!’ (Honestly, if your moral compass is so whack that you need a dog to walk you back from Hulk-Smashing...can’t say I blame Clark for not picking you, Kara!) But apparently, the people on the moon don’t really like her either. And it is literally never explained why. There’s a whole montage of Kara fixing stuff and saving lives and all the moon folk just glare at her. This makes both the moon people AND Kara look like a**holes, because they come across as ungrateful, and she comes across as a glory hound. Thanks! I hate it! So the ‘peace’ Kara’s found on the moon isn’t really peaceful at all, cause she still resents her cousin, and people still don’t like her, in spite of the fact that she’s constantly performing acts of service for them. 

Also, side note, I’m just now realizing this is an entire population of alien refugees...and Kara is somehow still the odd one out. Like, Earth I get, because everyone else is a human and maybe freaked out by the super powers. But a bunch of aliens? WHY. Why did you do this. Why did this need to be set on the moon with alien refugees if you’re not going to interrogate Kara’s identity as an alien refugee herself AND all of the aliens are inexplicably humanoid in appearance and utterly ordinary in terms of power levels.  

Like. This is not the CW show, where they have a budget, and a huge ensemble cast to serve. YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE. AAARRRRRGHHHH.

PART III CONT’D: There’s also this weird ‘birthright’ element introduced...like, Clark and Jon stole Kara’s ‘right’ to be earth’s defender which is...a terrible reading of Kara’s modern origin. It brings in the idea that Kara is a ‘chosen one’ and because she didn’t get to be that chosen one, all of her hero work is for nothing. Never mind the whole central conceit of what makes Clark and Kara heroic...that they have this incredible power, and choose to do good with it. Nah...it’s all about her ‘right’ to protect the people of Earth! And mean ol’ Clark took that away! THANKS. I HATE IT. 

PART IV - A POOR USE OF SPACE: So, all of the Future State books kind of struggle with the issue of too much exposition, which is understandable. They have to introduce an entirely new status quo in a very limited amount of literal page space, so you *really* have to have a handle on how you allocate your time and focus.  

Introducing a brand new, lore-heavy heroic character who gets all of the development and dynamic art and pulls focus away from the character you’re meant to be writing is a bad use of a two issue limited series.

Like, this is a crappy Supergirl comic but it’s a great backdoor pilot for a Lynari ongoing, I guess. 

Imagine if in the Jon Superman book, they introduced a random, brand new best friend for Jon, and he got the big character arc instead of Jon. That’s something you save for an arc in an ongoing title, NOT A TWO ISSUE EVENT COMIC.  

Back to said new character, there’s a lot of forced attempts to parallel Kara and Lynari, but Lynari’s backstory is so confusing, rushed, and poorly explained that it’s like: okay, they’re both...angry? And the moon jerks hate them? ...uh. Okay.

(I’m gonna bring back my ‘why is this set on the moon, even’ question so that my ‘poor use of space’ header becomes a better joke.) 

PART V - I'M HOLDING OUT FOR A HERO...B/C THERE SURE AIN’T ONE HERE: I’ve already mentioned that Krypto was apparently Kara’s conscience so when Lynari’s aunt arrives to...kill them? (again, everything about Lynari’s backstory is rushed and poorly explained) Kara gets real mad and basically pulls a Gothel: ‘You want me to be the bad guy? Fine! Now I’m the bad guy.’ But thank goodness Lynari is there to tell Kara no! Don’t murder the giant aunt eel! Lynari then steals Kara’s powers and gives up the swamp jewel that’s been hidden inside their body and now their aunt is less murder-y!

WOW. Couldn’t even give the big damn hero moment to Kara in her own book, huh?

So the day is saved. It takes Kara a while to regain her powers, and it’s only then, when she’s no longer ‘above’ the moon jerks, that they’re like, ‘oh, we like her!’ There is a bit of narration about how that attitude is awful. But that narration is provided by Lynari. See, the inner monologue is no longer Kara’s thoughts, but rather it has switched to Lynari’s point of view. They’re telling us this story. And do you know why?

PART VI - WHY THIS COMIC *SUCKS*: KARA DIES. SHE’S THE FRIGGIN’ ‘SECOND GRAVE’ OF THE TITULAR ‘TWO GRAVES’

Fudge this comic to heck.

See, Kara dies on the moon, presumably of old age. She’s buried next to Krypto. And this random character who we’re suddenly supposed to care about tells us her story. Not Clark. Not the Danvers. Not Brainy. Not even one of the supporting cast members from her solo title. No one from Kara’s life is mentioned at all, save for Jon and Clark, and they’re pretty much relegated to flashbacks of Kara punching them. 

PART VII - TIME TO COMPARE DEATHS, I GUESS: First and foremost can I just say that I hate that’s a sentence that I’m typing about Kara in the year of our lord, 2021. But okay: Kara’s big famous death in Crisis stopped the entire DC universe cold. Everyone paused in the middle of the destruction of the multiverse to mourn her loss and honor her (GENUINELY HEROIC) sacrifice. Clark and Barbara--two established characters with a strong connection/relationship to Kara--offered lovely eulogies. 

This one: Kara gets to die of old age in obscurity after a lifetime of striving to be recognized and only achieving it by de-powering and serving a population of jerks. 

Not the warm and fuzzy ending you think it is!

(Meanwhile, Clark lives for millennia and spawns an entire dynasty of Els, all of ‘em out there, protecting the cosmos. I was looking forward to House of El in the hopes of maybe seeing some Kara stuff but NOPE. Thanks to Superwoman, we’re probably not gonna see any future Kara stuff beyond this! G R E A T)

And like, the argument could be made that this ending makes Kara happy. This is the life she chooses! She wants to be alone and garden on the moon! Except, we get zero insight from Kara regarding the remainder of her life. We only have Lynari’s narration and some montage shots...nearly all of which focus on other characters. But honestly, even if we did get Kara’s side of things, I doubt it would shed much light on her feelings, bEEECAUSE...

PART VIII - SUPER BLAND: This Kara really has no personality outside of ‘detached and vaguely bitter.’ I like Sauvage, I think she’s an incredibly talented artist, but here, Kara is stiff and her expression often reads as aloof. She’s very pretty, but it comes at the expense of being expressive. (And I know Sauvage can do expressive stuff...because Lyanari gets to be expressive.) Like...I love that shojo manga vibe but this is a Kara devoid of spark and warmth. 

...Like...Melissa Benoist’s portrayal of Kara is right there... 

I’ve already sort of touched on this but her inner monologue doesn’t have much personality either. She’s just parroting the same, ‘I need to do as Krypto taught me!’ nonsense for both issues. Until, of course, we shift to Lynari’s narration, and lose Kara’s thread entirely. 

PART IX - LET’S WRAP THIS UP: This book frustrates me to no end because it had a lot of stuff going for it. It’s got a female writer and artist--still a rarity for the Supergirl book--it’s a limited series mostly free of continuity and character baggage, and it’s not tied down to the grimdark cyberpunk stuff happening in the Gotham books. YOU COULD’VE DONE ANYTHING. And, once again, DC goes with a pitch that’s: Kara is angry, Kara resents Clark...and Kara dies.

It’s also happening...right as Kara has no dedicated ongoing title, the movie’s been shelved, the TV show is entering its sixth and final season, and all promotion has shifted to new CW and HBO shows. 

*screams into the void* 

MAAAAAAN I hate this book. I hate that it retroactively makes me hate the Andreyko run a little bit--a run that I took to be about a traumatized young woman forced to confront her grief, and who leans on a beloved animal companion for comfort. Here, Krypto is L I T E R A L L Y the reason Kara’s not constantly frying folks with her heat vision. 

I hate that this book has made me use the word ‘literally’ so much in this rant.

I hate that this could possibly be more in continuity than Millennium.

Remember Millennium? Where Kara was in like...five pages? And she was warm, and kind, and promised to help Rose because it was the right thing to do, and oh yes, WAS PRESIDENT OF EARTH?!??! AND A CLASSY OLD LADY!?!?!?!?! WHO WAS STILL ALIVE AND KICKIN’ IN THE FAR FLUNG FUTURE!?!?!?!?!

I hate that I’m using my lunch hour to rant about how much I hate this comic.  

I hate that DC editorial seems hell-bent on erasing the interesting aspects of Kara’s character to sand her down to ‘the angry one’ or ‘Batman 2.0′

PART X - LET’S END ON SOME (?) POSITIVES: Don’t read this book! Don’t do it! Don’t waste your time and money!

Instead, check out ANYTHING ELSE. If you want mom!Kara, read Tom Taylor’s ‘Last Daughters of Krypton’ in the DC Nuclear Winter special. If you want heroic oldlady!Kara, read Millennium. Honestly? Pick up anything by Bendis that has Supergirl in it. It is miles away better than this. You want angry Kara working through her grief? Andreyko, Red Lantern, even Infected. ANYTHING BUT THIS. HECK, grab Superman of Metropolis instead! That has bad Kara characterization but at least she doesn’t end up dead. 

Anyways. This comic is bad. I wish it wasn’t! And this is now the SECOND TIME IN A ROW that Kara’s book ends on a terrible note before the character disappears from monthly comics for an unknown period of time.  

*screams into the void again*

#SG post #future state #future state superwoman #comic rant #and oh it is a RANT

[adultswim2021]

Space Ghost Coast to Coast #85: “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” | December 7, 2003 - 11:30 PM | S08E04

Happy 20th anniversary, Adult Swim. And, boy, what a momentous episode of Ghost do we have here to celebrate. There are a number of episodes where the guest is an event unto itself and this is truly one of them. Frequent punchline William Shatner is an absolute cunt... and a proper legend. His cuntiness and legendary status are two things that seem to be at odds with one another, and the Space Ghost crew have managed to come up with an artfully idiosyncratic episode to match Shatner’s weird-guy-ness. It’s a classic for sure, and important. But (making a “smug dipshit” face) is it funny?

YES! It’s FUNNY! I will admit though, the first time I saw this episode I didn’t quite know what to make of it. This is partially because I’m very much a Star Trek agnostic. I’ve never been into Star Trek. In the last few years I’ve watched most of the pre-Next Gen motion pictures for inane list-making reasons, and I enjoyed them to varying degrees, but Star Trek is truly not for me. I’m more of a... well, I’m not a Star Wars guy either. What’s the other one? Uh... Spaceballs. That’s it. I’m more of a Spaceballs guy.

But I feel like I’ve absorbed a lot of Star Trek lore through cultural osmosis. I vaguely understand that William Shatner has had some deliberately-paced choreographed fight scene on those rocks from Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey. When I hear music similar to the the music that Jim Carrey hums in The Cable Guy, I’m pretty sure whatever it is I’m watching is doing a Star Trek thing. And yes, I’ve watched every single Red Letter Media “Mike and Rich talk about Star Trek for 4 hours” video. But even today, after having picked up more Star Trek knowledge on my journey to the grave, I still have this nagging feeling of “I only sort of get this”.

Still, this episode has a handful of screamingly funny lines, and the episode ends wonderfully, with Space Ghost in his death throes, suffering the ultimate indignity of dying in front of William Shatner. There’s also the part where Zorak asks why everyone in Star Trek is black, and a part where Moltar nervously reads from his fan fiction (from a book labeled TARD WARS, hahaha). Shatner, who has a reputation for being arrogant and difficult, is as good a sport as one could hope. The show makes good use of his hammier moments, and only shits on him slightly in the process. The most notable moment is when Shatner says to Zorak “didn't you and I fight to the death?” to which Zorak replies “That sounds pretty dumb, man”. I’ve actually quoted this line many times. It’s one of the best.

Also, for those of you who like to track these things: the show features callbacks to other episodes and shows; the handimen at Zorak’s apartment are clearly extras from Sealab 2020/2021, one of the Leprechauns from Aqua Teen Hunger Force shows up, and there’s a poignant callback to classic Space Ghost episode “Banjo”. 

The title motif of this season is naming the episodes after Allman Brothers songs, and I always wondered about this one. Maybe I’m reaching, and it’s probably too disrespectful to be true, but I always thought that it was somehow a veiled reference to Shatner’s wife, whom he supposedly killed or let die. It’s simply too dark to be true, but it’s the first thought that immediately jumped to my mind when I first heard the title of this episode. Am I stupid for thinking this? Am I stupid because it OBVIOUSLY is a reference to that?? I simply do not know. I would like to know.

MAIL BAG

The big anniversary is upon us. What are your 20 favorite things about adult swim for 20 years going. Don't sleep on this question!

I gotta do SOMETHING special, so I might as well do this. More thought could have gone into this, but I spent about an hour trying to come up with episodes or moments from 20 different shows and putting them in rough chronological order. I limited myself to one episode/scene/moment/joke/whatever per show so it’s not all Space Ghost jokes. So, here we go:

Sealab 2021: “I, Robot”. Adult Swim proved it could be brilliant right out of the gate with the stealth premiere of “I, Robot”, but for Sealab it’s all downhill from here. (2000)

Space Ghost Coast to Coast: Space Ghost stops in his tracks to reminisce about the time Bobcat Goldthwait said "crack a window". The entire episode “Kentucky Nightmare” is brilliant, but this moment in particular so uniquely captures my sense of humor that it’s inexplicable. The dumb look on Space Ghost’s face when he stops in his tracks. Goddamn. (2001)

Aqua Teen Hunger Force: “Mayhem of the Mooninites” I tried very hard to make this all be individual jokes or scenes or whatever, but this is another episode where the entire thing is just line after line and I can’t really pick. This, “I Robot”, and “Kentucky Nightmare” is like a perfect trio illustrating how good Adult Swim really was right out of the gate. (2001)

Home Movies: Jason casually reveals that his parents have no idea who Brendon and Melissa are and that he spends most of his free-time making movies with them. This is the episode “Storm Warning” which is overall one of the best episodes of Home Movies, but this scene is probably my favorite. Illustrates how simple and hilarious the comedy is on this show. (2002)

Tom Goes to the Mayor: the end scene in “Undercover”, where they’ve shoddily reversed Tom’s various unnecessary surgeries and called him “Taumpy Tears” to boot. Positively sublime. (2006)

Metalocalypse: Dr. Rockso’s music video. From the episode “Dethclown”. I was never in love with this show as much as the true fans were, but there were a handful of incredible episodes. This episode basically tells one joke over and over and it’s very funny. It really ends with a bang showcasing Dr. Rockso’s shitty music video that celebrates cocaine use. His singing voice is hilarious. (2006)

Assy McGee: I am the only person in the world that defends Assy McGee as being “actually pretty good” and it’s all entirely due to this one line: Assy McGee (a pair of naked buttocks with legs, whose ass functions as his head) is forced to attend a black tie event and is just milling around wearing nothing but a black bow tie. Through clenched anus he delivers the line “I can barely breathe in this penguin suit”. The whole show is worth it for that joke. I don’t even know what episode it is except that it’s from one of the first few. I might not even have the line exactly right. But, I remember laughing so hard. I may not have laughed at Assy McGee again. (2006)

Saul of the Mole Men: The opening theme song. And nothing else. (2007)

Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!: Jim and Derrick. I should pick something more user-friendly maybe, since this episode almost entirely relies on being familiar with Tim & Eric’s previous episodes. But goddamn, this episode is such a funny concept (which is basically Tim & Eric doing an alternate MTV-ified version of Awesome Show) (2008)

Moral Orel: “Numb”. When Moral Orel suddenly stopped being a quirky Adult Swim comedy and suddenly started doing episodes that resembled art films. This episode is a fucking masterpiece. I remember sobbing the first time I saw it. There are a few in season 3 that are like that, but this one is my favorite. (2008)

Check it Out! with Dr. Steve Brule: Terry Bruge-Hiplo reviews “Dumpster’s Children”. Another bit of comedy that I’d describe as “inexplicable” and “sublime”, and it all hinges on an old man’s mouth. Holy fuck. I don’t think I’ve laughed harder than this at a TV show since. (2010)

Delocated: The ending of “Mole”, an extended Face/Off riff where Jon goes undercover as the scary mobster Sergei. In the final moments of the episode he marries a woman, fathers multiple children with her, and only then is pulled out of the mission. The episode is a tour-de-force of comic acting by Steve Cirbus, who is graciously allowed to shine for most of the episode. But man, that ending is fucking wonderful. (2010)

Venture Bros.: The ending of “Operation P.R.O.M.” a flurry of emotions hit me when “Like a Friend” by Pulp starts playing. The scene is so well done and weirdly touching. Brock realizes that deep down he gives a shit about the Venture family and is genuinely terrified something might happen to them. And then he gets to slaughter a bunch of Zorak monsters, which is also weirdly sweet. It’s even touching on a meta-level knowing that Jackson and Doc tried many times and failed to include licensed music in the show. I love Venture Bros, but I think we’d all be better off if this were the series finale. Sorry. I had to say it. (2010)

The Heart She Holler: The first scene with Patton being taught the way of the world posthumously by his father on a VHS tape. The first season of this show is amazing, but that scene, especially where Patton does a little Japanese bow and says “oh, hot dog!” is just hysterical. Literally every time a hot dog comes up in conversation my wife and I quote it. Please, do not scorn her, it’s not racist when SHE does it. (2011)

Eagleheart: The All That Jazz inspired finale. “Paradise Rising” is mostly a masterpiece, and how it ends is so fucking incredible. Easily the most under-rated show on Adult Swim and I’m not just saying that because... you know (mimes dick-sucking) (2014)

Rick and Morty: I watched the first two episodes of Rick and Morty, thought it was good, but for some reason didn’t become a devotee until my wife made me watch the Mr. Poopybutthole episode. It’s still my favorite episode, I think. (2015)

Brett Gelman’s Dinner in America: The “Dinner with” specials are all really good, but goddamn, this one hits. Should be shown in schools. I am going to go to every grade school in my county with an AR-15 (to get past the guards, of course) and I won’t leave until they call an assembly and they let me fumble around trying to find it on vimeo and play it for the students. (2016)

The Eric Andre Show: Eric interviews Steve Schirripa. The bit where he has an intern dip his balls in Steve’s spaghetti sauce is hilarious, naturally, but I’m here to showcase the running gag where every time Steve complains how hot the studio is, Eric just wordlessly hands him an ice cube until Steve explodes. It’s one of the most childishly hilarious things I’ve ever seen. It’s perfect. (2016)

Million Dollar Extreme Presents: World Peace: The Pick-Up artist sketch. I’m mostly unimpressed with MDE, and all but a few Sam Hyde bits leave me cold. But this sketch is a crowning achievement. I mean, I think these guys suck politically and are more mean than funny, but their sensibilities yielded one really incredible piece of comedy. Okay, I laughed at the blackface sketch too. There. You dragged it out of me. (2016) Joe Pera Talks With You: This show is beautiful and I love every episode. But the episode “Joe Pera Reads You The Church Announcements” Wherein Joe discovers a new-to-him song and can’t stop listening to it, is one of the most joyous episodes of television I’ve ever seen. A gateway episode. I tell everyone to please watch this one first. (2018)

#adult swim #space ghost coast to coast #adultswim2021

[salthaven]

Make a Change P15 (an Explanation and Summary)

Part Fifteen (An Explanation and Summary)

So, as I recently posted, I don’t plan to continue this story any longer. As much as I loved writing it, I also...fell out of love, I suppose. I just don’t have the time, passion, or motivation to try forcing myself to write it anymore, and it’s unfair to you guys to have to accept a sloppy second, something thrown onto a document for the sake of a word count and an update. I want to write stuff I’m proud of, and that just wasn’t happening with this story.

That said, one reader asked for a summary, so that they could get some closure. Luckily, I have some notes that I took as I planned the story and started writing it, and I thought you’d like to see some of them. This includes three things: 1. The schedules for most of the main characters 2. The heroes I was planning on bringing in and 3. All of the ideas I had for “Who on Earth will Marinette end up with?” (This was a doozy.) Along with this, I want to talk about other pairings I had in mind. 

With that all said, let’s hop right in!

The Schedules:

I really planned out their schedules, just so I could start figuring out who the Quantic Kids would be. I had a general idea in mind: Each student at Collège des Arts would have to take their four core classes (History, Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science), a language, and then their last period would be a two hour block that focused on their artistic talent. I set it up this way so that I could integrate the Quantic Kids into Marinette’s life. (Along with this, I made it so the whole school had lunch after fourth hour, so that the morning had four hours of classes, and the afternoon had three. I note this, because some schools separate lunches based on fourth hour, so that there is an A, B, and C lunch. I...did not feel like dealing with that, and I wasn’t sure how French schools do it but I doubt it’s like that.) 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s schedule: 

1. History (right next to Félix, later on stuck between him and Adrien) The original plan never had Adrien’s arrival, it was supposed to be a moment of comic relief where Marinette and Félix were just kind of half awake and barely conscious at any given time during first hour. This is why their history teacher, Mr. Marcel, was either wide awake or dead asleep. I thought it’d be a cute moment to show off the dynamics of their exhaustion or energy, depending on the day. I didn’t show this off nearly as much as planned, however, because I shifted my focus soon after.

2. Language Arts (with Allegra). A nice, calmer class seemed perfect for Marinette, who’d probably still be waking up. Allegra is calm and classy, so it only made sense to pair the two up for the second hour.

3. Science (Claude’s here!) Loud and exciting, just like their class seems to be, it was a perfect pairing. 

4. Math (with Allegra and Claude) I wanted to show off Allegra and Claude’s...chaotic dynamic. 

5. English (with Allan) Marinette wants to be a fashion designer, and she had to take a language, so she thought “hey, fashion is pretty big in America, let’s learn English”. (It was also the only class I could think of that she and Allan would take...more on that later.)

6. Fashion Design. Pretty self-explanatory.

Allegra: 

1. German. Allegra likes opera music, and wanted to mimic the sound of some German singers accurately. 

2. Language Arts (with Marinette, as mentioned above)

3. Science (a different teacher than Marinette and Claude, though. What a pity) (Also I apparently called it ‘physics’ in my notes and I just noticed.) 

4. Math (With Marinette and Claude)

5. History

6. Choir (She’s a singer.)

Claude Mercury:

1. English (It was for the theatre, but also for Shakespeare, but more accurately….for Shakespeare’s more inappropriate humor.) (and memes)

2. History

3. Science (with Marinette) (Lots of explosions and fires were planned)

4. Math (With Allegra and Marinette) 

5. Language Arts

6. Drama. He was just a simple thespian lad who wanted to have fun and make friends, what can I say?

Allan:

1. Math

2. Science

3. Language Arts

4. History

5. English (with Marinette) He likes hip hop and rap, and wanted to learn English rap, too. He, like Claude, also loves their memes, and I planned to have a few moments where he explained some to Marinette. 

6. Dance. Mainly hip hop, although the boy can break dance a little bit

Félix Agreste: 

1. History (with Marinette) He’s tired in the morning, but good at reciting dates. Again, had a lot more planned for this.

2. Math

3. Spanish. (“Come on, guys, it’s logical. It’s one of the most spoken languages in the world.” -Félix, probably.) I also planned for Félix to already know English. I wanted a cute chapter where he tutored Marinette, only for Claude to start dramatically monologuing because ‘why do you help her but never help me? The betrayal, Fe, the betrayal!’ 

4. Language Arts

5. Science

6. Music (he’s a piano boy in my heart) (maybe also good at violin) (a classy young man) 

Adrien Agreste:

1. History (with Marinette)

2. Language Arts (with Marinette)

3. Science (with Marinette)

4. Math (with Marinette)

5. Chinese (with Marin- oh, wait, we’re done with that!) This class, along with his next, is another reason Adrien relaxed so quickly at the school. By taking Chinese at school, he was able to convince his father to stop the at-home lessons, clearing up some of his schedule.

6. Music. Same as above, playing piano at school meant he didn’t have to do it at home so much.

The Heroes:

“But salthaven, you already introduced the heroes! Envision and Viperion, remember?” Haha, as if those were the only guys I had planned?

Yeah, I had more. Four more.

I wanted the Quantic Kids to be heroes. I had three of them for sure chosen, names and Miraculi assigned to them. (Allegra was my only problem child, but I’ll explain that below.)

The first was supposed to be Allegra. I was going to make her the Fox, with the name Mélodie. I’m pretty sure that was her original hero name, back during the PV stage of this show, and I wanted to pay an homage to her inspiration. But then Félix got it, because I didn’t end up giving him the Cat (yeah, I was really salty when I started this, and I was planning to go the same route that I do in my ao3 fic, Of Patience and Pettiness, and take away the Cat from Adrien to give to Félix.), as Adrien learned from his mistakes. So Allegra waits, and Envision springs to life with Viperion.

Next would be Allan. Miraculous: Bee. Name: Mellifury, based on Mellifura (aka the Africanized Killer Bee) + Fury. He was supposed to be an unexpected storm. A dancer, he uses rhythm in a way that throws off opponents. Uses the spinning top like it's another limb, throws the game way off when first introduced. 

Then we’d have Allegra. After a while, I decided that the Rabbit would be best suited for her. Messing with timelines is a tricky business, but Allegra has a knack for details and organization that would leave her cruising through her tasks with some practice. While it’s nothing musical, it would be fun to see. Name: Cottontail. 

Finally, after an interesting fight that would cause Nathalie to lose the Peacock...Claude would step in. Bold and flashy, the thespian knows how to strut his stuff. But again, he’s a thespian, and theatre kids know when it’s time to hide in the shadows and stay unseen and unheard. With dark blues that can hide in the name and stand out in the daylight, Claude would become Le Paon, turning the tide and becoming a major help for the team. [At first, he dealt with some sickness, but after a talk with Ladybug, who in turn talked to Fu, the Miraculous was fixed and Le Paon could fight as easily as the rest.] He’d use sentimentals wisely, although he’d have a bad habit of monologuing as he created them. 

The Ships:

The moment we’ve all been waiting for. Our first question: Who the hell was Marinette going to end up with? Well, that answer changed throughout the story.

The first choice: Félix. I wanted Marinette to move on from Agreste...and fall in love with Agreste. It humored me, and I was in love with a bunch of Felinette one shots at the time. (And, again, very salty towards Adrien at the moment.) 

But then I redeemed Adrien. No problem, I thought. Marinette could choose between one of the boys...and the other would date Luka! (I mean, did you see the Instagram picture of Luka and Adrien. Luka with either Agreste would be cute, just imagine the musical moments they could have together)

But then I Akumatized Juleka, and Luka was right there...and I made Marinette fall for all three guys. So I decided “Hey, she can just date all three!” And so that’s the final choice, because I’m apparently a sucker for poly ships. 

But I mentioned other ships, didn’t I? So let’s talk about those!

First: Luka with an OC. Yep, I was going to bring in a new girl. It was actually going to be one of my friends, due to a conversation we had that went as follows:

S.H. (Salthaven): So I’m thinking that I’m going to pair up Félix and Marinette. Thoughts?

F. (Friend): Okay, but what about Luka?

S.H.:  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

F.: Well then pair me up with him!

So I did. Or I was going to...but then poly ship idea happened. 

As mentioned above, I also considered Luka with either of the Agreste boys. Whoever Marinette didn’t date. Again, couldn’t happen because I went for that sweet poly route. 

Finally: Claude and Allegra. What can I say, they act like an old married couple in my mind!

And that’s everything! Once all the heroes were chosen, and romantic confessions set aside, the Miraculous Team was going to gear up and take down Hawkmoth once and for all. Fun times, the end, we all get a happy ending.

So I hope that makes up for my rather abrupt end to this story. Thank you all for the time you put in, reading my writings, and I hope you enjoy the other works I plan to create! Until next time. <3

#MakeAChangeAU #Make a Change AU #one last time baby #wow this feels bittersweet #i hope yall like it #<3 #thank you guys for following this story while it lasted it means so much

[whirlybirbs]

☄     -----    MOONRISE RADIO. 

summary: you’re hawkins high’s new science teacher, faculty advisor for the newly reinstated hawkins av club, and crazy townie who overhears a russian comminucae on a broken ham radio. chief jim hopper is into it. joyce is a good wing-woman and the kids just want to listen the the buggles.  pairing: jim hopper x reader, murphy as a placeholder surname. rating: t, some swears. word count: 3.8k a/n: this is a season three au! here’s the set up for all the drabbles i am going to end up writing for hopper bc he literally owns my whole ass, thanks, enjoy ;)

Hawkins, Indiana is a small town.

For this exact reason, Chief of Police Jim Hopper knows everyone.

... Seriously.

Everyone.

Hawkins is kind of like Saturn: try to leave its orbit and you’ll get caught in the rings -- literally. Y’know, high school sweethearts marry one another, settling down, and boom! Hopper winds up at their end-of-the-cul-de-sacs on domestic dispute calls and reunites with that shithead co-captain of Hawkins basketball team who keyed his car Sophomore year.

Life in Hawkins is a never-ending cycle of existence that renders everyone in the small town a familiar face. Everyone knows everyone’s business. Everyone knows everyone. 

And everyone certainly knows Jim Hopper.

So, imagine his surprise when after her first day of high school, over a ravoli dinner, El nudges a crumbled pink piece of paper his way with an excited look on her face. The paper is well-loved paper and home to her new class schedule, a point of interest -- she’s marked what classes she has with the boys and Max.

“I like science,” she says with a full mouth, “Fun.”

El points to her sixth period.

Imagine Chief of Police Jim Hopper’s surprise when he sees an unfamiliar name. Someone he doesn’t know.

And she teaches science.

Summer fades with a wave of heat and full moons.

The last week of August creeps up on you and before you even realize it, you’re moving into the cleared out room of a retired Mrs. Gomez and hanging your own name up on the door along with three planetary mobiles, a periodic table and a big exo terra tank for the freshmen class pet on the back windowsill. 

One period turns into six, and a week turns into three.

Your life begins again, Hawkins style.

“Miss Murphy!”

You’re wiping down the chalkboard, smearing drawings of ionic bonds into dust when the stampede begins.

Typical Friday.

You like Mike and Will and Lucas and Dustin and El and Maxine. The little squadron of hellions had managed to win you over easily within the first three weeks of school -- between the abundant D&D references and constant “curiosity voyages”, you’d seemingly become their go-to with questions, gossip, and over-all mentor-ship. 

The whole bunch of them sat together in your sixth period class, and the whole bunch of them were really the only ones excited about Dash, that aforementioned freshmen class pet that you’d scooped up behind the school and saved from being roadkill.

El immediately wanders to the tank and makes sure the heat lamp is on.

You can’t help but smile. These are good students. You like them. They like you.

Maybe it’s because when you were younger, you were just like them.

It’s like a sixth sense. They just... know. 

“We have a question.”

“Is it about reptiles again?” you chirp, wiping your hands, “I don’t know, like, anything about komodo dragons, Dustin, I told you --”

“No!” Dustin waves his hands, hopping up onto the edge of your desk, “No, this is about the AV Club.”

“AV Club?”

Mike rolls his eyes. “The AV Club!”

You blink. All six of them are looking at you expectantly. You deadpan.

“You lost me.”

“She’s new here, guys,” Will sighs, gently nudging Lucas who makes an O with his mouth, “Remember?”

“Right, right, right,” Dustin sighs, waving his hands with a charismatic no-front-teeth smile, “Sorry, Murph, my excitement precedes me --”

You shoot Dustin a look. No nicknames. He knows the rule.

“Make it quick,” you groan, waving an apologetic Dustin off your desk as you begin to collect papers from the previous period, “I have the open house tonight and I gotta get some grading done before -- you’ve got fifteen to catch me up on this AV Club thing.”

Lucas claps his hands. They all settle into the desks in-front of you.

You narrow your eyes.

Mike begins.

“So, there’s all this old radio station equipment in the top of the gym...”

You wring your hands.

You fiddle with the hem of your dress.

This is nerve-wracking.

For the first time in a while, you curse the fact you’ve got mostly freshmen in your classes -- with every new round of bright blue visitors stickers, parents are eager to pick your bones when you begin talking about your curriculum, expectations and the like. I mean, it’s good, you guess, that there’s parents who are engaged but... as a new teach at Hawkins, you can’t help but feel like you’re missing a part of the bit.

It’s nearing the end of the night now and you’ve noticed the parents don’t greet you like they do the other teachers. Like... like friends.

Maybe it’s because you’re new.

New to the town, too. Not just teaching high school science, you mean.

You wonder if all the news stories pouring out of that Hawkins Lab have anything to do with how cheap rent is in the area. The multi-family unit you’ve settled into is in a nicer suburb in town -- green lawns, a playground, neighborhood BBQs... You’d moved on the pretense of your hiring, excited at the chance to get out of the city for a while and live a quieter life.

You jump six feet in the air when someone knocks on the door-frame of your classroom.

“Oh my god --”

Your hand flies to your chest.

“Uh, sorry -- Sorry, is this... is this Miss Murphy’s room?”

The first thing you notice is the badge. It glints in the florescence.

The next thing you notice is... him. I mean, he’s tall -- tall and broad and intimidating but... soft. His eyes are tired and his voice is quiet and you’re staring, Jesus Christ, you’re staring --

Chief of Police Jim Hopper has never felt smaller.

You’re new -- definitely new. Hopper knows, in that moment, that you must be, He would remember someone like you. I mean, how could he not?

(Everyone knows he’s got a soft spot for beautiful women, but he’s damn near mush right now. Pudding. His knees are pudding. He is an idiot and his knees are pudding.)

He makes the doorway look tiny.

You sputter. “Y-yes! Yes, it is. Hi, I’m, uh, Miss Murphy.”

“I figured,” he chirps, lips quirking under his mustache. He waves the piece of paper in his hands, “Kinda... kinda said so on the schedule, y’know?”

“Jim!”

Immediately, someone shoulders his backside.

Right in the damn kidney.

“Christ, Joyce, ow --”

“Be nice!” she cries with a laugh, stepping around him.

The woman is comically smaller than the police officer before you. Joyce has a kind smile and sweet doe eyes and she excitedly rushes to shake both your hands in her own.

“It’s so nice to finally meet you,” she gushes, “Will has said so many great things about you --”

Your eyes widen. “You’re Will’s mother? Will Byers?”

“Yes!” she nods, “Yes, and, uh, this is Hopper --”

Joyce nearly snorts when Jim just blinks. She elbows him. He jumps.

He was staring.

“Jim Hopper,” he clears his throat, trying to regain any semblance of composure. This really knocked him off his game -- you really knocked him off his game. He was fully expecting some nasty old widow to be teaching, not a young, brightly dressed woman who’s smiling at him, Christ almighty, smiling, “Chief of Police.”

He offers his hand. You shake it and your lips quirk. “Are you... here to investigate me, or...?”

“Oh!” his eyes widen, “No, no, uh -- El is my daughter. Adopted.”

“Ah, right. Miss El. Got it,” you laugh a little, nodding, “Groovy.”

“Groovy.”

(Joyce narrows her eyes, grinning between yourself and Hopper. Groovy indeed.)

“She was nice.”

Jim’s cigarette glows red in the evening September air. Joyce, beside him, has this horrible, conniving look on her face -- the same look she gave him when she convinced him to ask Jenny Gonzalez out Junior year -- and Jim immediately goes on the defense.

“I dunno what you’re talkin’ about.”

“Miss Murphy,” Joyce grins, “I saw you staring.”

“I was not.”

“C’mon, Jim,” she chirps, “She’s pretty --”

“Yeah, a pretty bad idea.”

Joyce rolls her eyes so hard Hopper can feel it.

“Listen,” Jim says, flicking his cigarette into the pavement, “With everything goin’ on, I don’t have time for something like that.”

“Jim, stuff like that doesn’t care if you’ve got time.”

Joyce watches him climb into his truck. He slams the door shut,

“If it’s meant to be, it happens anyways!”

He narrows his eyes.

Then, cranks the window down and raises one finger.

“Not on my watch.”

Famous last words, Jim Hopper. Famous last words.

Happy Monday.

“I’m joining AV Club.”

“...What?”

“AV Club. Science. Fun.”

Hopper just takes a looooooong sip from his morning coffee. Eleven stabs her eggos. She forks a hunk into her mouth and chews.

Hopper takes another sip.

“AV Club.”

“Yes. Radios.”

“Radios.”

“Yes.”

You’re sweating.

The storage space of Hawkins High’s gym is ninety degrees at least -- and here you are, brandishing a flashlight in the dark as the Mighty Hellions dig through the space and pull box after box from the makeshift sauna.

“Think this stuff still works, Murph?” Maxine asks.

You ignore the informal nickname and pull open a box to eye a bundle of cables. They’re in good shape. The mic, at the bottom, is too if not a little grimy.

“I don’t see why not.”

After a grueling hour and a half, they finally set up shop in the closet across the hall from your classroom. It’s usually where they keep glassware and Bunsen burners but... with a little begging and a dejected look from Dustin, you grant them their plea and help them set up the impromptu radio station with relative ease.

The desk in the center of the room -- Mrs. Gomez’s old one -- is a little wobbly, but it works.

“And now,” says Mike, “The moment of truth.”

El flicks the switch.

And nothing happens.

Not so Happy Monday.

"How was AV Club?”

“Sad.”

Hopper’s mouth is full.

“Sad...?”

“Radio is broken.”

“Oh,” Hop hums, “M’ sorry, kid.”

“It’s okay,” El says slowly, looking out the window on the ride home, “Miss Murphy buying us new wires.”

Hopper blinks. “Miss Murphy?”

“Yes. Nice.”

Very.

Joyce rings you out the next evening at Melvald’s.

“I’m surprised you didn’t try Starcourt.”

You laugh a little. “What, that super mall?”

“I heard they’ve got everything,” Joyce chirps, “Will and the kids go there nearly every weekend. Ice cream, movies... you name it. A great place for a date, I bet.”

You laugh and pull out your wallet. “Oh to be young and in love.”

“No kidding,” she grins, taking the cash, “Speaking of... are you...?”

“Young?” you laugh, propping your elbows up on the counter, “Or in love?”

“Either.”

You like Joyce. She’s funny. 

“No,” you sigh, “Nope. No, not right now. Neither. I spend my Tuesday nights with wine and a TV dinner.”

“Y’know,” Joyce hums, a knowing look in her eye as she bags the radio supplies, “I know someone who does the same exact thing.”

It’s Miller High Life, actually. And Tostitos. 

That’s besides the point, though, because while Joyce is still very much on his case about the new science teacher, Jim is very much focused on the fact none of the stations god damn radios are working.

He could really go for a beer right now.

Something is jamming the signal.

Actually, to clarify -- the same fucking song on repeat is jamming the signal.

For the last two hours, it’s just been Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles over and over and over and over again. And then again, just for good measure. On the fourth round of the song, Jim had unceremoniously lobbed his walkie across the station. On the tenth, he’d yanked the chord for the radio out of the wall.

If Hopper hears that fuckin’ oh oh sound one more time, he’s going to lose it.

Callahan just shrugs when, finally, the music stops and the booming voice of Dustin Henderson comes over every walkie in the room.

“GOOOOOOOOOOD EVENING, HAWKINS INDIANA!”

Hopper peels into the high school parking lot.

Long strides carry him through halls that he knows way too damn well -- halls that wind and turn and lead him right to room 305. Your name is scrawled across the door alongside a picture of a constellation and a beaker.

But, the classroom is empty.

And then he hears it.

“-- OH OH! VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR! --”

“I am so sorry, Chief Hopper -- I had no idea that was the PD’s frequency.”

You’re wringing your hands but you’re also two beats from laughing and Hopper is really trying to keep it together because... I mean, it’s funny. 

Jim pinches the bridge of his nose. He feels bad. He... well, he probably shouldn’t have slapped the broadcasting mic out of Dustin’s hands. He’s got a short wire now-a-days, blame the whole Hawkins Lab incident and the fact he’s essentially harboring a fugitive and allowing aforementioned fugitive to go to high school and jam radio channels with Today’s Top 40 in her free time.

“No, no -- I... It’s fine. It’s fine, really, just...”

Hopper drops his hand. You’re trying your best to hide a smile that’s threatening to sweep across your whole face. 

“Do not let Dustin play any more of The Buggles, okay?”

You chew your lip and lean closer, whispering. “... Did it really play for two hours straight?”

Hopper’s nostrils flare. He nods weakly. You note the missing walkie from his belt.

And then you burst into laughter.

You buy more cassettes at Melvald’s the next week.

“Oh,” Joyce grins, holding up a Madonna album before scanning it across check-out with a beep, “Nice stuff -- is this for AV Club?”

You laugh. “Let me guess, Chief Hopper told you about ‘The Incident’?”

Joyce's lips quirk and she tilts her head, eyeing you carefully as you bite back a smile and muscle out your wallet from your bag. “... No, he did not.”

“The kids were on the wrong frequency,” you gesture, a bit sheepish, “And, I mean, I had no idea until Chief Hopper had to come to the high school and let us know that he’d been listening to Video Killed the Radio Star for two hours straight.”

“Oh god.”

“Yeah,” you raise your brows, pull a face and mimic the catchy hook, “Oh oh god.”

Joyce snorts.

“It’s not working!”

“Boys,” you sigh heavily, “Just... Just let me look at it.”

There’s a scramble and the sea of bodies part. Max and El are posted by the door, watching with a dejected sort of disappointment. Your knees hit the floor and you ignore the fact your jeans are going to be covered in nasty dust from the underside of Mrs. Gomez desk. Your necklace jingles and you sigh, settling on your back and waving for Dustin to pass you the flashlight.

“Did Hopper break it?” it’s Mike, “If Hopper broke it, I swear to shit --”

“Language.”

“Sorry.”

You squint, pushing apart the mess of wires and sighing loudly when you find the problem.

It’s... weird. Like... Like some of the wires have been chewed clean through.

“Looks like one of the wires is frayed.”

“Frayed?!”

You take the main component home with you.

It’s sitting on your passenger side seat when you pull into Melvald’s.

In the spot in-front of the store sits a Hawkins Police Dept. truck with a CHIEF decal on the side.

“She’s funny and smart and came in here and talked about you --”

“Talked about me?” Jim’s leaned against the counter, coke in his hands, “Hold on, what? You didn’t tell me that.”

“Yeah,” Joyce’s voice lilts, “She, uh, was telling me about The Buggles incident.”

Jim groans. 

“Oh, yeah, when I nearly drove my fist through the kids’ new hobby?”

“-- Funny, she left that part out --”

“I made an ass of myself, Joyce.”

“Hey,” Joyce coos, throwing her hands, “Maybe she likes that about you... y’know... your uncanny ability to be a... uh, an ass?”

“Nice.”

“I’m kidding.”

The shop door dings and Chief of Police Jim Hopper chokes on his diet coke.

You stop short in the doorway. 

The store is mostly empty -- it’s almost closing time, anyways -- and you can’t help but feel like you’re intruding on Hopper and Joyce’s conversation, especially when Hopper is cursing and wiping at the soda spilled down the front of him. 

Overhead, Movin’ Out by Billy Joel plays.

“-- Workin’ too hard can give you a heart attack-ack-ack-ack-ack --”

“Miss Murphy!” Joyce grins, “Hi there!”

“Hi Joyce,” you smile, nearing the counter. You can’t help but hide a smirk as Hopper sighs and stands. He drops his hands to his side and you get a full view of the coke down the front of his uniform, “Chief.”

(A little part of him dies inside then.)

(Joyce sees it.)

“Evening, Miss Murphy.”

“Rough night?”

“Little bit,” he heaves, downing the rest of his soda and crushing the can. He lobs it into the trash can beside the register with ease, “Well, duty calls, ladies.”

“Duty calls?” Joyce asks, crossing her arms. Suspicion paints her features.

She’s trying to get him to stay -- trying to goad him into a conversation with you, just like she always does, but the problem is that Joyce is a great wing-woman and honestly? 

That kind of terrifies him. 

It’s been a minute and a half since he’s considered anything more than a one-night stand with someone. He’s been busy, y’know, saving this dimension and keeping a top-secret government facility secret. 

“Yeah,” he deadpans, not feeding into it, “Duty.”

“Duty.”

You blink between them both.

Jim’s out the door with the tinker of the overhead bell.

Ouch. You turn to Joyce.

“I don’t think he likes me very much.”

Famous last words.

“Testing, one, two, three --”

You groan, switch frequencies one more time, and throw your hands.

Maybe the whole Hawkins High Radio Station idea was never meant to come to fruition. It hurts to admit it and you know the kids are going to be so damn upset, but no amount of soldering and wire replacements seems to be getting this hunk of junk to give out any sort of signal. 

You take a long drink from your glass of wine and collapse back onto the couch.

Then, you hear it.

"I’ll be sure to let Chief Hopper know, Miss Murphy.”

“Listen, I... Is he here? I’m kinda in a rush and this is sort of important --”

You’re pushing past Florence, the nice secretary, before you even realize it.

You’d known Hawkins was a weird town. That much was pretty clear from the odd disappearances, government labs and toxic leaks. But this... this is more than just weird. This is borderline panic inducing.

Hopper has a cigarette between his lips and his hat on his desk when you barge in.

He jumps six feet in the air and spills his coffee.

“Jesus --”

“Listen, Chief, I know you’re a real busy guy, but --”

“I am so sorry, Jim,” it’s Florence, moving to put herself between you and the Chief, “Miss Murphy, please, if you can take a seat, Chief Hopper would love to hear all about your top secret Russian communicae when he’s done his coffee --”

When Jim’s eyes widen a mile, you realize he knows something you don’t.

Jim feels small in your living room.

It’s a nice place -- furnished with plants and art and your TV has a stack of sci-fi movies atop of it. In the middle of your rug, though, sits the ham radio surrounded by a winding mess of wires. It’s off, and when you near it, you wring your hands. You’re nervous, he can tell. You can hardly stand still.

“Do you think I’m crazy?”

Hopper blinks. He clears his throat. “What?”

“This... Hopper, I swear, I heard Russian --”

“No, I... I believe you,” he says slowly, narrowing his eyes, “Hawkins is a...”

“Weird town?”

“Weird town.”

You nod slowly then, crank the on switch, and the radio hums alive in a language neither of you know.

Hopper just sighs. 

“... What do you know about radios?”

“It’s close,” you say finally, blinking up from the manual, “It has to be -- I mean, this specefic model only broadcasts and receives up to fifteen miles. That’s... what? Like, all of Hawkins?”

“Just about,” Jim hums, hands on his chin, “and what about the channels?”

“I mean, it’s messy -- I hijacked your frequency. On accident.”

Hopper smothers a smirk with a drag of his cigarette. You grin. His office back at Hawkins PD falls quiet for a moment and you catch yourself staring again. Across from him, you squirm a bit in your seat and turn your attention back to the Olympia Radio booklet. 

“There’s no way of tracking the channels,” you sigh, “I... I dunno. I’m kinda out of my element here.”

“What is your element?”

“Chemistry,” you chirp, “And biology. And some physics.”

“Chemistry, huh?”

“Speaking of which, I know you don’t like me much but,” you rush, blinking up at him, “Thanks for believing me.”

The moment would have been sweet if Hopper hadn’t reeled backwards, like he’s been punched. His face screws up in confusion and he waves, cigarette smoke halo-ing around his head as his mustache twitches.

“Wait... hold on --”

“It’s okay,” you console, “Seriously, I... I’m new around here, I... I get it a lot. Folks don’t really trust the new girl next door. Especially with everything that’s been going on.”

“I... I never said --”

You serve him a look.

“Duty?”

“... I panicked.”

“Panicked?”

Hopper sighs. “You’re just as bad as Joyce.”

Your brows raise. “Are you and her...?”

“No!” he cries, “No, no, I... I am single, I am very single, and I am very busy, but despite that, I still would like to ask you out to dinner, and that is terrifying, okay --”

You blink. “You... what?”

Jim’s about to try and dig himself out of his metaphorical grave when the radio flares up again.

You scramble to grab the recorder and Jim turns the volume up -- quickly, you record the repetitive sentence and when the line finally goes silent again, you spare Hopper a look.

“How about dinner and Russian For Dummies?”

#stranger things imagine #jim hopper x reader #chief hopper x reader #hopper x reader #jim hopper imagine #moonrise radio #stranger things headcanon #stranger things reader insert #jim hopper headcanon

[wwwafflewrites]

A Rewrite of History

Chapter 6—Phantom Traveler (Part 2)

The first ten minutes, you felt lousy. Lousy, and also scared stiff. Why shouldn't you be? This plane was going to take the plunge in a little over a half and hour, and these people had no idea, save you and the Winchesters. And even they didn't really know the extent of it. They probably thought they could exorcise the demon before much happened.

"Just try to relax."

"Just try to shut up."

The engines whirred, shaking the plane as it lifted itself into the air.

The plane was dreadfully quiet. There were some murmurs here and there throughout the plane, but you tuned into the conversation to your left. Dean was fidgeting in his seat, humming Metallica. “I hate freaking airplanes.”

You couldn’t agree with him more.

You had roughly thirty minutes until this plane began the skydive, and there wasn't much to do but wait. Wait for the Winchesters to fumble around and finally find the demon.

You actually knew the latin pretty well—the 'Rituale Romanum'. You had practiced it back in your younger years, being superstitious and all. It was a phase where you carried salt in your bag and whispered Christo to passersby. As cringeworthy as the phase was, it was coming in handy now. Now that demons actually existed outside of your dreams.

As time extended, you became uncomfortable. A ball of pain in your stomach like a little knot, which was slowly tightening. Then, you realised: you were on your damn period. Of all freaking places. You squirmed in your seat, wondering if you could sneak those pads from out of your travel bag.

"Hey, I'm sorry, miss. You just look very uncomfortable. Is something wrong?"

You stiffened, just barely turning enough to see a kind, concerned lady behind Dean Winchester. 

Hearing the question, Dean managed to suck in a breath and peer over at you, curious as well.

Nosy Winchesters.

You clenched and unclenched your fist, a nervous habit of yours. You needed to throw him off from looking at you anymore. He had too good a view of your face for your comfort, and you became self conscious of your disguise.

So, you told her the truth. "Just, uh, you know, feminine issues."

Dean looked away quickly.

You weren’t surprised. Sure, it could have partially been him realizing he was wrong to eavesdrop (no, who were you kidding), but this was 26 year-old Dean Winchester, who avoided chick flick moments better than he avoided monsters, and was very protective of his masculinity.

It was a good strategy: make him uncomfortable, and he was less likely to pay you any notice. Like how most people skipped over kissing couples in almost every spy movie ever. PDA worked to make most people overlook you, and so did periods.

This was probably the only moment in your life you could ever say bless freaking periods.

The lady made a little 'o' with her mouth and turned down the volume of her voice. "Oh, do you need something?" When you nodded, she kindly offered some supplies. 

You thanked her and headed over to the bathroom, feeling relieved to finally escape that little space. Your heart was fluttering in your chest, and you needed to calm the frick down before you had a demon cramming itself down your throat.

Brightside was that the Winchesters didn't know it was you. That felt good, at least. Your disguise wasn't anything that significant, but it was working nonetheless. You kind of felt like Clark Kent, in that way. 

And Dean is Batman.

You snickered to yourself, feeling a bit better. The hilarity of it all was helping.

Yeah, you thought, Dean is Batman.

///

The Winchesters were finally starting to ask the right questions. Who was it possessing?

You knew fully well, having watched the entire show, that the 'chink the armor' thing was a bunch of BS. Unless this demon just had its own rules versus other demons in the future. Or maybe it was just... weaker? 

Or maybe this universe just bent with the rules of the show—it didn't matter whether its rules in the supernatural were a constant or not.

The Winchesters started focusing on Amanda, which wasn't a terrible guess. It was her first flight since the crash, after all.

Of course, you knew that it wasn’t her, so the entire time you felt like rolling your eyes as you eavesdropped. Dean brought out the holy water and you nearly snorted. It was crazy to believe they, the Winchesters, were ever once amateurs.

Sam tells Dean to use 'Christo', and sends him to the back to speak with Amanda.

In the meantime, you tried to recite the exorcism in your head.

Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas... omnis incursio infernalis adversarii… omnis... legio, omnis... congregatio et secta diabolica.

That was the easiest part. You paused, concentrating. Was it argo or ergo? You couldn’t quite remember. ...omnis legio diabolica… something something decipere humanas creaturas.

So… you were a little rusty.

You glanced over, wishing you could just get your hands on that exorcism. Alas, that might look a little suspicious to Sam Winchester, sitting not two feet from the book on Dean’s seat.

You didn’t have to wake long for Dean to return. "Alright, well she has gotta be the most well-adjusted person on the planet."

You hide the small smile that comes along your face. You really missed Season 1 Dean Winchester.

Sam is talking with him in murmurs as you try to compose yourself and your love for these boys. Despite the fact that they’re pretty keen on gutting you the next time you show your face.

Some turbulence rattles the plane and Dean tenses. "Come on, that can't be normal!" you hear, then there are some angry hushes between them.

But you know what they’re saying to each other: "You are wide open to demonic possession."

With that, Dean takes a few exaggerated, deep breaths. It’s not very convincing, but the demon didn’t take him on, so. Yeah.

It was sort of comical that none of the other passengers heard their conversations. Like, Sam Winchester was literally talking about exorcism, and the rest of the plane was in La La Land.

Despite having a lower voice, you could hear them both pretty clearly. Rituale Romanum, two parts, blah blah, expels demon—manifest—more powerful. Second part sends it back to hell. You were pretty sure they used a shorter exorcism later in the show… but whatever.

Dean brings out his signature EMF meter he’d built out of a walkman. Man, you loved that thing.

And soon enough, he was trying to covertly scan the plane. Of course, he was terrible at hiding it. Any hunter could see what it was, and any passenger was more than agitated by the weird sweeps of Dean’s hands. 

The meter swept at your head and you looked up at him and tried to send him a convincing ‘wtf’ look. All the while, your brain was saying ‘scanny scanny’.

Your body was in a confusing state of boredom and anxiety, and you didn’t know how else to deal with it other than fidgeting in your seat.

Sam scared Dean by grabbing his shoulders, and you realize shit is about to go down pretty soon.

"Anything?"

"No, nothing. How much time we got?"

"Fifteen minutes."

"Maybe we missed somebody."

By cue, the EMF meter lights up red. Of course, you can’t hear it, but you swear you could feel the ‘whrhhrrhe whwehrrhhw’ sound of it in your bones.

The flight attendant comes out in sync, and the Winchesters freeze.

You couldn’t help it: you mouthed "Christo" just as Dean says it, and the flight attendant's eyes flash black.

///

There is twelve minutes left. Twelve minutes until the plane plummets and hopefully you don’t crash.

Frick. You weren’t ready for this.

You decide that focusing on what’s happening is the best way to focus, so you watch as the Winchesters go in the back to talk with Amanda. Who then are swallowed into the curtains, leaving you with the civilians.

You curse to yourself. Sam took the book with him. Of course, he did. Duh.

There are two knots in your chest now: one from your physical period, and the other from your anxiety, which weave together into one tangle. Suddenly, it's a little harder to breathe on the stuffy airplane.

Your heart rate spiked and you jumped a little as Amanda came out to go and fetch the flight attendant. Your minutes were dwindling. 

The flight attendant passed by and you weren’t sure what to do anymore. Should you go help? That would certainly defeat the purpose of a disguise.

Watching the show, you’d always thought this part was so much louder. After all, the commotion was only covered by some thin curtains. You had always wondered why the civilians weren’t more concerned.

In that way, you were partially correct. The fight in the back certainly alarmed most passengers, but Amanda nervously guarded the doorway.

And then, the book was thrown into the aisle. You snatched it, bracing yourself.

Your stomach dropped, and screams erupted from all around the plane. 

I’m falling I’m falling I’m falling.

You had a death grip on the seats around you as you tried to focus on the shaking words in your hands.

“Terribilis!” you shouted above the screaming. Oh my God, I’m falling. “Deus de... sanctuario suo! Deus... Israhel ipse truderit virtutem! Et fortitudinem plebi... Suae. Benedictus deus!” You barely kept your balance, bellowing the last words: “Gloria patri!”

Thunder shook the plane out and soon it was coasting normally again. If planes even coasted.

Everyone was shaken. The Winchesters lined their eyes up with you, glancing from the book to your face. You don’t see hatred, however, so they didn’t recognize you.

///

You were really hoping to leave the area without the Winchesters tagging behind. You did everything you could to disappear, but to no avail, they caught up with you.

Dean was at your side, just walking for about ten seconds before he said anything. There was no way the strategy they were using to corner you wasn’t creepy. At least you knew they didn’t really mean it like that. 

The vibes you were getting from them wasn’t all that friendly, though. They were suspicious and rightly so. A hunter just happened to be on the same flight as them? Coincidences were never coincidences, and you couldn’t agree more.

“So, how long have you been hunting?” Dean asked carefully. Not how, not why, just when. You could respect that kind censorship: respecting boundaries and avoiding triggers. The boys both knew how to charm people—that was for sure.

You sighed, blowing up your cheeks a little, “Oh… about a month.”

You could see their dad’s journal peeking out from Dean’s pocket.

Both of their eyebrows raised, rocking back on their heels a little. “And you could recite an exorcism? There was no way you could read that thing. I could hardly read the exit sign.”

You thought about your lonely ass watching Supernatural, trying to say the chantations as the Winchesters did. “You could say I’ve had some practice.” Hell, you learned it from them. “Anyway, there was only a little left to recite.”

You nudged Dean, knocking the journal from his pocket and into your trench coat. “You guys did most of the work.” 

You were despicable.

They look impressed. “You’ve hunted demons?”

That was a bit of a funny question, coming from the Winchesters. And also an unexpected one. In response, you got flustered. “Oh—no,” you said quickly.

Sam's eyes wandered, settling on your bag. First, his eyebrows twitched in recognition, and then he went rigid, bringing his eyes to meet yours in realization.

You felt your blood rush. "You know… I should probably get going." With that you turned tail and fled for your life. Again.

Why does it always go like this? Like, shit, c’mon already. This isn’t Tom and Jerry.

"Dean! She—!" Sam yelled and took off. "The bag!"

"What?!" Dean shouted in confusion. He was distant but loud.

"The bag! It's her bag!"

"Her—" Dean trailed off, panting as they both chased you. He knew, then. He recognized it, too.

You rounded a corner, then slammed into the chest of a man. You gasped, nearly falling on your rear, yet his hand got your arm and there was a distorted flutter.

You made out a blur of a beige trench coat just at your eye level, and you knew who it was. Dean was not kidding when he said angel travel sucked.

You curled into yourself, cradling your head. That had seriously messed with your ears, and now you just felt dizzy. You choked on a little bile, but you weren’t nauseous enough to actually vomit. You just really wanted to.

A stoic voice said, “I have transported you to your car.” Before you could respond he was gone.

You were alone once again.

///

Tag: @rosaren2498​ , @pillowjj​ , @busy-bee-angel-misska​ , @elle-r​ , @dagnylokisdottir​ , @omg-we-really-doo​ , @millieccino

#supernatural #supernatural series #supernatural fanfiction #spn #spn fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #slowburn? #slow burn #platonic? #platonic #idk really know #we'll see #in that case... #dean x reader #dean x you #sam x you #sam x reader #castiel x you #castiel x reader #reader #reader insert #spn reader insert #reader insert series #possible love triangle? #but probably not #love triangle would her my head

[flowers-creativity]

Sleepless

Fandom: The Musketeers Characters: Porthos du Vallon, Athos (Comte de la Fere), Aramis (René d’Herblay), d’Artagnan Warnings: Some violence, sleep deprivation as (mostly) non-physical torture Summary: Porthos doesn’t know anything about the Ambassador, and he just wants to sleep.

Notes: Written as part of @yuckwhump‘s Feb-whump-ary, Day 16 - sleep deprivation. This is pretty long and rambly and very unpolished ...

AO3 link

The hit in his back made him stumble forward and almost pitch down onto his knees, but a rough hand grabbed the rope binding his arms behind his back and wrenched him back. “What did we say?” the man said next to Porthos’ ear.

“No sleepin’,” he mumbled. “No … sleepin’.” His tongue felt too large for his mouth, and he swallowed dryly, though it didn’t offer any relief. He blinked gritty eyes at the other figure that stepped in front of him, outlined by the torches flooding his small cell with light.

“Not until you’ve answered our questions, at least,” the man said, his voice and whole demeanour so much gentler than the one behind him, holding him in place. “Once you do, you can sleep to your heart’s content. Don’t you want that?”

Porthos blinked again and then shook his head. “Not … gonna say anythin’,” he slurred. A part of him screamed at him that this was the wrong answer. Didn’t he want to sleep? Yes. Yes. Sleep was a distant memory by now. How long had it been? He had no idea. The cell was alight with torches the whole time, the men coming and going too irregularly to establish any pattern. But it was important that he did not say anything. He remembered as much. Even if he wasn’t quite so sure anymore what he shouldn’t say anything about.

“Where is the meeting taking place?” the man before him asked as if he hadn’t said anything at all.

Porthos shook his head.

“How many people are accompanying the ambassador?” the man continued.

What ambassador? Porthos shook his head.

“Who will meet with him?”

Porthos shook his head. If only he would stop asking him stupid questions, maybe he could sleep then … His eyelids drooped.

Another hit in his kidneys had his eyes snap open and him gasping in pain. “I’m … I’m not sleepin’!” he protested. Was that why he was being hit?

“You can sleep in a minute,” the man before him soothed. “Just one question, and you can get an hour of sleep, doesn’t that sound good? Two, and you can get two hours, think of that.” He sounded excited, as if two hours of sleep was Paradise. It actually was. He was so confused, in pain, his head aching abominably, and they kept hitting him … That wasn’t the most confusing part, he was quite sure he’d gone through something similar before. But at least then he’d been left alone from time to time. He had been allowed to sleep.

Not with this bunch of bastards, though. They kept prodding him awake, and once he no longer minded the pinpricks and kicks against the back of his legs, they’d started in on the beating in earnest. How ironic, that he was almost relieved at how normal that felt? Not that anything else felt normal because his skin was itching, he was hot and cold at the same time, and his sight was wavering.

“Don’t you want to sleep?” the man before him asked, drawing his attention again.

“Yes,” Porthos breathed, latching onto the words. Sleep sounded heavily, so much so that he could feel tears prick at the corner of his eyes. He was so tired …

“Then come on, what use is it to you to annoy us? Just one question,” the man cajoled. He was so nice, and it sounded so easy. Just one question … Where could be the harm in that? If only he remembered why it seemed so important not to say anything …

“Where will the meeting take place?”

“What meeting?” Porthos slurred.

“The ambassador. He’s meeting Louis’ representative,'' someone hissed behind him, and Porthos jerked violently. Where had that man come from? Rough hands yanked him back again, and he bit back a moan at the ropes chafing his oversensitive skin, at how his arms seemed to stretch longer than they should be able to.

“Don’ know about any o’ that,” he said, blinking desperately at the man before him, willing him to believe it. He didn’t know anything right now, it seemed, it was almost a wonder he remembered his own name. He was Porthos, right? He was Porthos. Porthos du Vallon, of the King’s Musketeers. Porthos, son of Marie-Cesette, friend of Flea and Charon, brother of Athos, Aramis and d’Artagnan. Wait, was he still friends with Charon? There was something there …

“Your friend killed me,” Charon’s voice said. He swivelled his head around, and there he was, his old friend, a large blood stain covering his side. “I saved your worthless hide, and that’s how they repaid me.”

Porthos blinked at him stupidly. Right, Aramis had killed him, because Charon had … He had …

A fist in his ribs interrupted his recollections and made him curl forward, only to be yanked upright again. “Speak, you dog!” the man behind him snarled.

The man in front of him was still smiling pleasantly but his voice had more of an edge to it. “I’m sure you know something,” he said. “But I can see we’re not getting anywhere right now. So, you know, if you don’t have anything to say, I’ll let you think about it a bit … Maurice will keep you company, so you won’t waste time sleeping, eh?”

With an almost polite nod, he left the cell, closing the door behind him. Charon laughed. “At least, I get to see this. Maybe dying was worth it for this.”

Porthos growled at him. “Let me be, I’m tryin’ to sleep here.” But a painful yank at his bindings made him almost fall backwards as the man behind him said: “No, you won’t.”

“Athos!”

At the hissed sound of his name, barely more than an exhale on d’Artagnan’s breath, Athos sped up to catch up with him. Their youngest was pressed up against the wall next to a cell door, his head turned to the side as he listened for something. Through a small window in the door, bright light spilt into the dim corridor. Athos frowned at the strange sight - most of the time, prison cells were not exactly kept well-lit.

He sidled up to d’Artagnan’s aide and was able to hear what he was listening to - someone was talking inside the cell. “You know, once I get off duty, there’s a wonderful bed waiting for me. With a freshly stuffed mattress and a warm blanket. D’you remember how that feels?”

There was a smack like flesh on flesh and a pained grunt, and d’Artagnan flinched almost violently next to him. Athos extended an arm to touch d’Artagnan’s, willing him to stay still just a moment longer.

“I don’t know what it’s supposed to help, anyway,” the voice continued. “You probably really don’t know anything, eh, do you, mutt?”

Another smack, and Athos grit his teeth. “Athos,” d’Artagnan breathed, all but pleading.

“Can you see inside?” he asked softly. The Gascon shifted, turning his face until his eyes were at the small opening, and he blinked at the light. After a moment, he turned away again, blinking to adjust his sight again. “One guard, can’t see any weapons,” he reported. “Porthos … he looks really bad, Athos,” he added.

Athos cocked his head, considering, then nodded. With a short gesture, he sent d’Artagnan to the other side of the door, then moved to the other side of the corridor, crouching down with sword and pistol at the ready so he would be able to move the moment d’Artagnan got the door open.

The young swordsman reached for the bolt and hesitated shortly. “Not locked,” he murmured, exchanging a confused look with his mentor. Maybe they didn’t think it necessary due to the presence of the guard within the cell … Athos shrugged and mentioned for d’Artagnan to go on. With a violent pull, the door sprang open, and Athos rose and was in the cell with two steps, rushing at the guard who stood in the middle of the room and looked at him with an almost comical expression of surprise on his face. Seeing no weapon on him, Athos dropped his own and instead plowed into him and drove him against the opposite wall, violently bouncing the man’s head against the wall. He withdrew, and the man crumpled down to the floor. With an almost satisfied smirk, Athos turned away from him and towards the upright figure of his friend in the middle of the room.

d’Artagnan was already there, stepping towards Porthos with his hands carefully lifted. “Porthos?” he addressed the man cautiously.

Porthos didn’t answer, and Athos frowned. He was awake, that much was clear, standing under his own power, though his hands and legs were bound, his arms drawn cruelly backwards.

d’Artagnan touched a shoulder, and Porthos flinched violently backwards. “I’m awake!” he swore. “Don’t--” But he did not continue, just stared around the room with wide eyes, confused and seemingly scared.

The two Musketeers exchanged a look, and Athos stepped up to his protégé’s side. “It’s alright, Porthos,” he assured him. “We’ll get you out of here. You’re safe now.”

Porthos blinked uncomprehendingly, swaying where he stood. “Yer just sayin’ that. Won’t answer any of yer stupid questions,” he mumbled.

“Porthos, it’s us!” d’Artagnan pleaded, slightly desperately. The captured Musketeer closed his eyes and shook his head. “Isn’t you. Charon isn’t him either.”

More looks were exchanged between the other two men, well past worried now. “Has he lost his mind?” the Gascon whispered. Why was he talking about his former friend whose death was almost a year past now?

Athos could do no more than shake his head, just as lost as the young swordsman. “Let’s get him out of here,” he decided. “Hopefully, Aramis can figure out what’s wrong.” He wished that the medic was with them right now but under the circumstances it had seemed prudent to leave the one with the sharpest vision outside to guard their back.

d’Artagnan nodded and moved behind Porthos to cut his bonds, murmuring words of comfort to calm him, even if it seemed as if Porthos was lost in a world of his own and barely registered that he was spoken to. Athos stepped close and held onto Porthos’ upper arms to stabilise him until d’Artagnan was finished. The contact drew another round of assurances from him: “‘m awake, ‘m awake, no need to hit me.” Athos bit back a curse. Whatever torture these men had devised, it had been quite effective at making him suffer, it seemed, though he did not for one moment believe Porthos had divulged anything under it.

He flinched and tried to pull away when they pulled his arms over their shoulders to lead him out of there, but weak as he was, it was not hard to hold onto him. Caught in his stupor, they were almost carrying, though he was aware enough to try and walk, and he kept talking, mumbling incoherently. Charon’s name was in there again a few times, and most distressingly, so were several attempts at protesting that he was awake, and pleading to let him sleep. Athos wished he would just pass out but he did not, lids at half mast but snapping open every few seconds to look around, wide-eyed and confused. Their attempts to calm him down, insisting that he was safe and could sleep if he wanted to, did not seem to reach him.

Finally, they made it outside, and Athos gave a low whistle. Only a moment later, Aramis’ figure coalesced from the shadows near the wall of the house, and he came over swiftly. “Everything’s quiet,” he reported. “How is he?” His fingers were twitching with the obvious need to check on Porthos but he knew that they needed to put some distance between themselves and the captors, at least get back to the place where they had left the horses.

“Nothing’s broken, just bruises, I think,” Athos replied. “But … I think they kept him awake the whole time.”

“He’s delirious,” d’Artagnan added, his voice hoarse. “Doesn’t know us and keeps talking nonsense.”

Aramis’ head snapped up, eyes widening in alarm. He took another look at Porthos while keeping pace next to Athos. With a deep breath, he took off his hat and rubbed a hand through his hair. “Sleep deprivation - that’s insidious,” he murmured.

“What does it mean for him?” Athos asked, trying to keep his voice level though Aramis’ reaction ratcheted his concern further up.

Aramis bit his lip, then shrugged. “I don’t have much experience with it - from what I know, sleep is pretty much the only thing that helps,” he explained. “There are a lot of things that can go wrong, though. Is he feverish?”

“He’s somewhat warm,” d’Artagnan said dubiously.

Aramis nodded distractedly. Making up his mind, he said: “I’ll go ahead to the horses, make up a bedroll and prepare what I can. We need to get him lying down and keep his temperature down. You get him there, right?”

Athos nodded. “Of course,” he told him. “Go do what you think necessary.” Even if it was only helpful to easing Aramis’ anxious mind, he would never get between the medic and what he believed to be necessary to care for a patient. Well, within reason - he had to do so to keep Aramis from running himself into the ground in the name of caring for others quite a few times.

The medic went ahead, and by the time they had made their way to the small clearing, he had set up camp, one bedroll waiting for Porthos who was still stubbornly, impossibly awake - or at least in a state that you could not call sleep, startling awake a few moments after he had seemingly drifted off and trying to walk on unsteady legs repeatedly, even though they were mostly carrying him.

They lay him down, and he went pliantly enough but then shot upwards again. “‘m not sleeping!” he assured them again.

Athos and d’Artagnan stepped back, giving Aramis room to work but standing ready to render any assistance he might need. If there was anyone who could get through to Porthos in his current state, it was his closest friend. Or at least Athos hoped so, since the delirious confusion holding Porthos in its grip was scaring him more than he cared to admit. Next to him, d’Artagnan fidgeted nervously, his gaze fixed on Porthos and Aramis.

The medic ran his hands down his friend’s body, checking methodically for injuries. When he had finished his exam, he told the others over his shoulder: “Nothing major, luckily - two of his ribs seem to be bruised, I’d strap those later. He’s running a fever but it’s not dangerously high yet. We just need to get him to rest.” Turning back to his patient, he cupped the dark face in a gentle hand and said: “Porthos, you are safe. No one will hurt you now. You can sleep. Please, sleep.”

Dark eyes blinked sluggishly up at him.”Charon?” Porthos asked, and the other man barely managed to avoid flinching.

“No, Charon is not here,” Aramis replied patiently. “You know me, mon ami. You know us, and we are here. No harm will come to you, I swear.”

The large Musketeer looked around, searching for something. “Charon was just here,” he murmured. “He … Wasn’t him, wanted me to stay awake. Sleeping hurt.” He sounded so lost, so helpless in a way none of the others had ever heard him.

“No one will hurt you,” Aramis repeated. “Porthos, please. Rest. Let go.” He stroked through the dark curls, looking around for the others with his own helplessness in his eyes.

“Maybe we should just knock him out?” Athos suggested in a low voice as he came closer and knelt down on Porthos’ other side, taking his hand and squeezing it. d’Artagnan hovered close by worriedly for a moment before he gathered himself and got down on his knees next to Aramis, laying a gentle hand on Porthos’ chest, careful not to restrain or exert any pressure.

Aramis frowned, then shook his head. “As a last resort, maybe. I’d still rather not hurt him further … Especially when he’s already frightened and confused.”

The sudden stillness under his hand in Porthos’ hair made him look down, and he met Porthos’ eyes. For the first time since Athos and d’Artagnan had pulled him from the cell, he seemed to have found a moment of calm - his gaze was still far away, not recognising them, but less frantic, less fractured. Aramis held his breath as he carefully let his fingers run over Porthos’ head, only taking another to voice a whispered: “Porthos?”

Porthos blinked, moved his head, then with a sudden sigh, he leaned into the touch, his fingers giving a weak squeeze to Athos’ hand.

“That’s good, Porthos,” Aramis soothed without stopping his gentle caresses. “Just relax. We got you.” He looked up to meet Athos’ eyes, a slight hopeful smile tugging at his lips. In the end, Porthos knew them.

They stayed that way for who knew how long, talking to him in gentle tones, touching and reassuring him, but it did not matter.

Because in the end, Porthos slept.

#fanfic #the musketeers #hurt/comfort #feb-whump-ary #porthos #athos #d'artagnan #aramis #flower writes

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh Season Zero: All Your Friends are Cursed

You know what? It’s been a while, lets revisit Zero.

For those new here, I’ve been also very slowly going through Season Zero alongside the show we are more familiar with, which is not at all the same as the other seasons. If you want to read just the recaps of Zero from the beginning you can do that by clicking on this link right here. I think I’ve only done like 3 or 4 so far.

OK. It’s been...a time since we ventured here to this very weird place, where were we?

So, first off you may have noticed there was a wee gap in updating, this is mostly because I burned up all my backlog when I got sick for two weeks (and I’m still hella tired) so...I’m playing catch up and this is a hobby, so it takes a back seat. But also, it’s partially because I was like suuuper conflicted with what I should do about that logo. Like, I did feel like I had to blur it just because I don’t want there to be confusion if the images ever get pulled away from this post, but I was seriously considering just repainting every cap because it sure bothered me a whole lot.

It was Illustrator OCD Problems that in the end don’t matter, but you can see my quandary of the right corner in the rest of these. Anyways, thanks Team Millennium for the fandubs so I don’t have to cap over subs. Y’all did a good job, and I get why they need to watermark since like...it’s Youtube so every random bot channel is stealing any other video getting clicks.

Also, this took a while because it’s like over 60 caps long. These Season Zero episodes are just...so much content. They’re so much. And I thought this one handles some interesting themes, so grab yourself a snack, because this is gonna be a little bit of a marathon. I could split it into two but like...I don’t know where to split it, so enjoy. This post is basically a 2 for 1.

Anyway, Shadi’s back. I didn’t really expect for him to be back so soon, but he’s here with a vengeance. He spooks up on Grandpa’s old Egyptologist friend (who’s name I have forgotten) and this guy kind of already knows what’s next.

In this episode, as you can see from the title, everyone is gonna get cursed. Except Miho, but like, I tend to forget she exists. We start off with Yuugi’s Grandfather’s friend getting tossed out a window, which is sort of strange because you figure that this guy wouldn’t let a girl drown down a well for a rare coin (which was the Shadi metric for if you deserve to be eaten by a chair). But apparently we were wrong and Grandpa’s friend has actually been a jackass this entire time.

"Your friend has actually been a jackass this entire time” is another underlying theme of this episode. What’s wild is that Yuugi and his Grandpa are not at all surprised by this revelation, nor do they seem to mind.

Shadi says something cryptic, decides he wants a rematch with the alter ego of Yuugi Muto, and then has the weirdest plan of how to do it. The rest of this recap is basically all of Shadi’s master plan and it’s...pretty...something.

(read more under the cut)

Since we haven’t gotten a Miho episode, I haven’t really gotten a chance to learn what she...is. Right now she just seems like a G rated Cheryl Tunt. Which is probably incorrect, I dunno maybe this girl will end up being their savior but for right now she just kind of uses Tristan for favors and enjoys spooky stuff maybe a little too much. I’m not sure she’s even aware what planet she’s on.

Shadi’s also looking more and more like a bird this episode with the artistic choice to join the brow to the nose with a deep shadow like this. If there’s deeper historical meaning to that, I have no idea. Went on a little deep dive through Google to see if it matches from art and sarcophagi from Egypt and Greece but like...nah. You do get a strong thin nose on golden sarcophagi that can give it a really cut look since it’s usually covered in reflective gold, so that could be it. But overall, joining the nose to brow is something more modern, I think. Just our own touch to make him a spook.

And honestly Yugioh really does enjoy putting a very heavy shadow between the eyebrows, but usually in the form of lots of lines and not a solid black shape.

Youknow we’ve never had the chance to enter anyone’s mind space before. I kind of assumed that no one other than Yuugi even had one. So Anzu’s mind, shouldn’t be too ba- oh

Just take this whole sequence, put some generic lo-fi on it, and you have yourself a youtube channel. It’s amazing how, since the 90′s anime style is back into fashion, this bizarre sequence just hit so many good notes. Those pink and blue flowers matched with a silver metallic tree with weird purple fruit? Not gonna lie, that’s some good inspo material. Maye not the weird bird and terrifying 90′s sun--I don’t know why he’s here--but everything else? Shoot.

This hasn’t come up before and the only guy with G in his name that I can think of is Gozoboro and he cannot be this guy. Maybe just a reference to some comic book stuff because he does have a Superman shape to that G, but I don’t know comics well enough to know if this was a manga Superman parody.

PS now that we know that Tea’s mind is just a lo-fi channel, we now know that Bakura and Marik have just been hanging out next to a weird silver fruit tree, staring at a horrifying green sun and avoiding eye contact with one single green bird for basically this entire Noah arc. Assuming of course that a piece of Bakura is still in there in Tea’s mind, which he may have decided to vacate at this point because what’s he supposed to do in there? Do barre?

Maybe they both just do barre workouts in the tea mindfort while a parrot awkwardly watches.

So Shadi has been just hanging out in Tea’s head for how long? Like half a day now?

She really has always been the ghost uber. From the very beginning. Wow.

Also, speaking of vaporwave, the pink to yellow tint on the irises? A+. That could be your lo-fi thumbnail, easy.

Anyway we are blessed with another tiny Yuugi this episode. I think I’ve mentioned it before but I’ll mention it again, I love it when artists have to draw their characters as small as ants because then the characters are given their rawest, purest form. Which in his case is just being very squat and having hair with spikes.

And then Anzu somehow hides in this closet and tips over a bunch of beams at him. Are these cross country beams? What are these? I did water polo and swim team so I just have no idea what you land people did.

When beams don’t work out, Shadi sets in play the next step of his super evil and sinister plan. Please remember that this guy is a 5000 year old very scary ghost with crazy OP powers.

So then Shadi starts his third phase. So far we’ve had a bunch of poles and a basketball, what will be next? Will Anzu come up with two chalkboard erasers and start pounding them together to make a sick chalk cloud? Will Anzu step on the back of Yuugi’s shoe so his foot falls out? Will Anzu unzip his backpack when he’s not looking so all his books fall out? What dick move will Anzu do?

SOOOOOO

This is a thing that canonically happened in Yugioh.

It’s like finding out that Big Bird once violently choked out Elmo in Season One but now they’re good and they don’t want to talk about it.

Like...this is a lot and it’s not even discussed in this very episode!

The one time.

The one time they should have just ditched.

This is the one time you should just find a boat/blimp, smuggle yourself on board, and then play cards for a straight week with an evil psychopath. The one time.

No wonder they go out of their way to avoid this school for the rest of this show. They ditch just to survive their 1st year of High School.

So they decided to split up which...they’ve made worse choices, and only Yugi finds Tea. What would Shadi’s plan have been if anyone else was up here first?

Reminder that in the second or third episode of Season 1, Joey and Yugi came up here to reminisce the good ol days. I had no idea at the time that the “good ol days” involved being dangled on the edge of whatever this weird contraption is called.

Eat your heart out Jeffree Star and Rituel de Fille, Shadi here did black highlighter first. In 1999. And that nose is snatched.

Appropriately, Honda is still embracing his janitorial duties. Maybe that’s why he’s not a janitor anymore? Because he was getting tooooo into being a janitor? Like if you go janitor while being a zombie that’s toooooo much janitorial.

Another thing Season Zero does that may either be a limitation of their budget or just a limitation of their experience is that, unlike most foreign films, the pacing of the cuts are really quick. Like REALLY frantic. (And yeah I’m generalizing a lot when I say that Western shows and movies have quicker cuts, but lets just say that it’s true about 90% of the time. Not better or worse, just different.)

And like, this was the 90′s, a time period I don’t really remember, but back then we were into bizarre editing. It was a very experimental time in film because suddenly there were a lot of computer and filming tools available for a decent price and people kind of lost their minds. They were getting into doing tons of dutch angles and tons of filters and it was just a real...interesting time in film. It’s gauche by our standards but like...art kind of lives in the time period it’s from and you shouldn’t pull it out and compare it to our current standards too much because--welcome to 90′s Xtreme cuts. Docking something for being too 90′s is like saying that medieval art sucks balls because they didn’t want to use perspective and all their cats look weird. This was the time.

It’s just interesting to me that they decided to attempt to copy this frantic editing style into a cartoon when it’s normally done splicing together live action shots that were done with three+ different cameras. They planned out each cut in a storyboard and drew every frame. It was a lot of work. And it didn’t age well, which is a shame.

And it could have been that because this is a horror show, they decided to experiment. It’s a pretty edge show based on a pretty intense manga. But, it’s...interesting. Can’t exactly cap it, you’ll have to watch it for itself but it’s...interesting. And overall, I honestly feel like I can’t come to any conclusions about the direction that Season Zero editing has taken since I’ve only seen four episodes, so these are just my five cents, don’t quote me on it. I may take back this opinion a few episodes from now.

Y’all this was never told to us until like Season 2. Season Zero told us this in like episode 4. Would have been really nice to have this information a little earlier.

So then we introduce the mummy mechanic of this “game.” Anzu’s plank contraption is tied to these baby mummies. Kind of looks like they’re chocolate mummies you get from the Egyptian museum store. In fact, They might actually be museum gift shop chocolate mummies that Shadi shoplifted up after he killed that fat guy.

Not sure how he set any of this up, especially when he totally botched it with the beams and the basketball and the strangling, but somehow, Shadi got this complicated knot system all ready to go. Weird how Marik was the one on the boat when Shadi has like a degree in knots.

So I said this in the last episode but we get this reoccurring theme in Season Zero where Yugioh is a little boy learning to grow up and be a man, and yet every guy he meets has just a pile of toxic misinformation about how to be a powerful adult. In Shadi’s case, he believes that weakness stems from caring about other people and relying on them for support, hallmarks of mortality. Which is easy for Shadi to say because he’s some 5000 yo undead (I think?) with no friends, unless you count Chair Barney. But Shadi’s pretty sure that attachment to living people will only ultimately hurt you, especially when they’re complete assholes, which most of Yuugi’s friends are. They’re good assholes, though.

It’s a pretty common anime trope and I’m surprised it took us this long to get to the power of friendship. Freakin finally. And there’s nothing wrong with tropes. It’s how stories are made.

Anyways, in case you thought this episode would not address the teachers, they actually did for about 3 seconds.

Neat that this is the most unsafe school in all of Japan.

I am a fan of the combo of blue, purple, green, and very large teeth. I will give Chair Barney that much. Anyway, lets see what game Shadi made.

Oh cool, it’s the game I made to go in my babysitting kit when I was like 11.

Granted, so were playing cards.

Wow everyone is just assaulting each other this episode, damn!

Back on the roof, Yugi calmly wins the game without ever flipping a tile.

Now for some reason I missed the part where he says “two feet” and so I was missing a pair of things and so I listened to this part again and either my sick brain missed it three times (cuz y’all I have had the plague and my recovery has been so sloooow) there were these shapes on the tiles that looked like kidneys and I thought--but it’s not two kidneys, right? and I was like what else is a pair and round and lobby shaped? and then I didn’t really want to go there, and assumed--FEET.

Knowing full well feet are not kidney shaped, but I’m gonna assume he said feet. If he actually said weird monster testicles, you’ll be sure let me know.

And then this happened and it’s pretty legit.

We have never actually addressed the fact that Yuugi forced his friends to like him. Like it’s a pretty effed up origin story that Jounouchi was like like “I feel like very strongly I should be his friend” but doesn’t really know it’s because he got cursed. Kinda figured the show would just breeze by it, but no, here we are, and Yuugi has to face the fact that maybe the only reason he’s not a loner anymore is because he won Jounouchi as a prize for finishing an accessory.

And whether or not Jounouchi would have been his friend no matter what isn’t really what’s being tested, it’s whether or not Yuugi believes that this friendship is actually real, or a curse. Like Jounouchi did try to defend Yuugi before Yuugi finished the puzzle, but does Yuugi know that? He was passing out at the time. It’s a real insecure spot for Yuugi since before Jounouchi he was just a little punching bag playing board games alone in the homeroom. Jounouchi was introduced as someone who was legitimately bullying Yuugi and tossing that puzzle out a window. There’s going to be the underlying fear that Jounouchi would go back.

In the S1 anime, they basically wrote that plot point out of the show or decided that because this was done in Season Zero they don’t need to retread on old territory. Joey, Tristan, and Tea aren’t cursed to be Yugi’s friends, as far as I know.

But this test between the friendship of Yugi and Joey is recreated again in S2 with Marik when they were both tied to an anchor and one had to choose to kill the other or live. But there’s some pretty major differences. This time, instead of Joey being possessed by Marik and being forced to kill his friend, he’s just Jounouchi sans curse.

Although Jounouchi is still somewhat mind controlled as he is just an illusion. He’s just...not as badly mind controlled as the whole Marik thing. This Jounouchi has more motor control and doesn’t seem to have any inner conflict at all. Because again, this isn’t so much Yuugi vs Jounouchi, this is Yuugi vs Yuugi’s fear of being alone again.

That’s a realllllly different takeaway. And honestly, it’s pretty interesting.

Also, instead of Tea with a shipping container over her head, this time Anzu is walking a plank. Really didn’t expect that Shadi would basically turn into Marik but without the cards. And without the underground bunker lifestyle where he kills his own Dad.

The game is kind of hard to show in caps but they have to drop the puzzle in the direction they want the other to walk. Mostly it’s just another reason for Jounouchi to steal Yuugi’s puzzle again and relive the trauma.

Remember that time that Jounouchi tried to get Yuugi to punch him and Yuugi broke out in tears because he didn’t like violence? I mean honestly, out of everyone Yuugi knows. Jounouchi was probably the nicest bully he had. Doesn’t mean Yuugi isn’t incredibly insecure about it.

Instead of fighting back, Yuugi decides to skip his turn. It’s a contrast to the other Joey/Yugi fight because instead of just throwing a fireball in his own face until Joey snaps out of it, Yuugi has decided to rely on trust.

And, much like Grandpa’s Blue Eyed Dragon that would not perform under Kaiba’s reign to kill Yuugi, neither would Jounouchi under Shadi. They even disappear into the aether with the same smoke effect.

And what I think is the most interesting part of this is that the question of “so would they have been friends without the puzzle?” is mostly left open ended.

And if the friendship were solid as a rock, then this whole debate Yuugi has with Shadi wouldn’t even be a debate. Shadi is certain that people will betray you because they can, Yuugi is confident that, even though they do walk you to that ledge, they can change although there is a history of hurt. Shadi was convinced Yuugi couldn’t overcome his lonely past, and Yuugi had to prove that the past can’t hurt him anymore, the past being also his best friend.

Like it’s just something never mentioned in the S1-3, that Yuugi has a lot of issues because all of his friends have been his bully at one point. And like, not to get too PSA, but every friendship has to be looked at by a case by case basis. You can’t generalize and say “everyone who betrays you can change.” But the message here isn’t about keeping any relationship that is toxic, it’s about overcoming the pain of the past.

Also Jounouchi is hella cursed so he won’t be back to his old ways anytime soon.

Kind of hard to tell, but Honda got covered in a layer of white fire extinguisher juice and it’s a look that uhhhh we would never illustrate this way in 2019. Times were more innocent in the 90′s.

Just kidding, they absolutely weren’t, I have no idea who allowed Honda to be drawn this way.

Reminder that Kaiba is just sitting pretty in one of these classrooms, maybe watching Joey’s ass scrape up against the window while Honda completely covered in mysterious white stuff screams bloody mercy. As the teacher teaching this particular class ignores all of this, Kaiba would just be thinking to himself “Aw. that’s fun.”

And so ends this really long but honestly, pretty interesting episode. Season Zero has a lot of rough patches, like I’m probably not going to do every episode of it, but when it connects to what we’re watching its neat to compare and contrast the two. Kind of wish we had more of Yugi facing his past in the current anime but instead it’s Kaiba facing his past. So we...kind of get it? Just with a different character?

Shadi picks up his key and walks away unscathed. Mostly because Yuugi does not currently know how to mind-wipe. Seems that that is mostly a Pharaoh thing and as far as I can tell Yuugi is still just one person with an alternate personality.

Off he goes, that bastard.

Amazing that everyone’s pretty much on good terms with Shadi by the end of S1. Like he’s just kind of a pal that shows up and “accidentally” leads you directly to kill your own Dad when in Season Zero he is...really outwardly evil.

Anyway, that was a hellton of content haha, next week it’s back to Joey dueling a lawyer while Kaiba gets lost in the woods.

#yugioh #yugioh recap #season zero #photo recap #yuugi mutou #jounoushi #anzu #honda #shadi #genuinely shocked that none of them had to go to the hospital at the end of this one. #Despite being strangled like 10 minutes ago #yuugi muto

[johnroycomic]

Entirely Free Comedy Class Week Two - Revised!

WEEK TWO

You made it!  You're alive and you're back for more.  That's great.

First, a huge round of applause for doing what the vast majority of people who think about doing stand-up never do. You did stand-up  Someone, somewhere, right now, is telling their friend at the bar how they always wanted to do it, and you have gone and actually done it.  The next time it comes up, you can be the only one in the conversation to say, “I've done stand-up”  And that's for the rest of your life. However it went, and we will delve into all the ways it could have gone soon enough, you deserve real praise for making it happen at all.  A character in Stephen King's “The Dead Zone” remarks on how the world is split into two groups: “bullshit people” and people who do what they say they're going to do.  It's a tough standard, but on this one thing at least, you're in group two.

It's a scary thing to do.  Those studies where people say they fear public speaking more than death aren't just something someone made up.  Even though stand-up comedy is far less likely to harm you than taking a shower, that fear is real.  Those of us who do this for a living felt it too, and sometimes still do.  It's just that our desire to do it is stronger.  And so was yours.  

Okay, that's enough. We have sufficiently admired your participation trophy.  Put it down, and get out your notes.  It's time to get to work. First things first:

The Answers to Last Week's Video Questions

I asked you to watch “Midlife Vices” and fill out the worksheet. There are many possible correct answers to these questions.  Everyone will be struck by different things when watching the special, and because the special is so good, there are a bunch of things you could've picked.   A highlight for me is The Obama/McCain bit.  His joke quickly cuts straight to the heart of the issue, and his exasperation as McCain is sold so well.

  But whatever your specific answers, there are two things I hope you saw.

I hope you recognized that this was the work of a true master.  You can’t get better than Giraldo.  Everything that makes up great comedy is on display here: a strong point of view, an energetic, compelling, and precise performance, and clear, engaging writing. “Midlife Vices" is a tour de force.

I also hope that watching Giraldo drew your attention to the performance side of stand-up. Reviews often focus solely on the content of a comedy special, as if only what the performer is saying counts, and not how they say it.  If that were true, why bother to perform the jokes at all?  Why not just print out the script and hand it out?  I wanted you to pay attention to all the movements and facial expressions that add up to create an effective stand-up act.  

If parts of it weren't your thing and you weren't feeling it, don't worry.  There are many clips of wildly different styles coming up and something will be sure to line up with your tastes.  Comedy isn't track and field, where you're either the fastest or you're not.  It's not even diving, where the judges all basically agree what a success looks like.  Lots of people can be equally good at the same time, and no one is going to like all of them.  Laughter is an involuntary reaction and there is no argument than can make something funny for you.  Just understand that there is a difference between comedy that isn't to your liking and comedy that isn't effective.  And if “Midlife Vices” wasn't your cup of tea, take some time to watch it again until you can understand why the people in that theater are going nuts.

Grinding

You should now have performed stand-up comedy three times.  Please wait until you have done that to continue.  You won't get anything out of reading ahead.  These lessons are just words until you can relate to them from experience on stage.

Ideally you were able to do all three sets in one week.  If that can't work for you because of your schedule or your area, you can space them across two weeks.  You will ultimately need to raise that to three if you intend to go professional, though.  Once or twice a week is fine for the purposes of this class, or to see if you even enjoy it. Beyond that, you simply will not improve quickly enough if you can't increase it to three or more.  Stand-up is a physical activity that relies on muscle memory.  The memory of how your last set felt must be fresh in your mind to learn from. Perform less than three times a week, and it fades.  You have to constantly re-learn lessons that don't stick.  You seriously handicap your rate of growth. You will have to consider changing your work schedule or city of residence if you decide to get serious about stand-up as more than a hobby.

However, if you are one of the lucky ones able to go up more than three times in week, don’t skip ahead to the next week of the class after three shots at it. Take advantage of your good fortune and practice the same lesson all week. You will have a really solid handle on it when Monday rolls around.

Give It Up, Everybody

It's best if you do your sets for this class free from any chemical influences. If you had a beer or a shot or a puff of weed before you went up this week, I understand.  I didn’t say anything about it in Week One because I just wanted you to get on stage and get started, whatever it took.  There is nothing wrong with having a small amount of a legal substance before you go up every now and then.  There is something wrong with needing it.  I’d like you to go up without it for the rest of the class.  

I understand some of you may like to calm your anxieties.  Fear of performing is natural.  I had it for years. Conquering that fear is part of stand-up, and learning to do it from within, on your own, is necessary to becoming a comedian. Using intoxicants to skip that step creates much bigger problems down the road, especially in a world that will never stop pushing free alcohol at you.  

I don’t care what you do after the show, but during this class’ duration, go up sober.  So many formative experiences happen here at the beginning. You owe it to yourself to observe them as carefully as possible.

This Mic Sucks

Hopefully at least one of your performances this week took place in a room that wasn’t empty, full of jaded comics who didn’t listen, or drunken patrons talking over the comedy.  Unfortunately, a lot of open mics fall in to one of these categories.  It’s something you are just going to have to deal with, the way a golfer accepts that sometimes the course is a goat track.  

The worse the circumstances, the harder it is to measure how well your jokes did.  When the audience isn't giving big laughs to anyone, you need to tune your ear to whatever they are giving out.  Watch comedy until someone on the show genuinely makes you laugh. Listen for the level of audience response to that joke.  That's what counts as a “win” in that room.  Get a laugh that big or higher, and your joke is a keeper.

Of course, difficult comedy nights don't need to stay that way.  Open Mics are direct reflections of the comics that populate them. If you want a more supportive Open Mic, be a part of that change.  If you want a great audience, work at being a great audience member.  Laugh when you think something’s funny. Watch the other comics’  sets. Keep your face out of your phone when someone’s doing their act. If someone you like is going up, tell the person next to you that this comic is funny.  They will be more likely to listen and laugh. Buy something from the venue.  Get to know the staff.  Tip well. Get them behind the show.  Just a couple comics working to foster the kind of environment where they would like to perform can make a big difference.

Assignment One

Think back on your experiences this week.  Answer these questions wherever you are writing all this shit.  As always, there is a copy in the Worksheets section.

How did it feel to go on stage?

What did you enjoy?

What did you not enjoy?

Who was your favorite performer of the night?

Why?

Assignment Two

Think of everyone you saw go up this week.  Which comic did you enjoy the most?  Fill out a Video Questions Worksheet about their performance. Compare the answers to the ones you gave for “Midlife Vices.”   Notice anywhere they were similar to Greg?  What did they do differently?

Assignment Three

Who was your least favorite performer of the night? Why?

Think back on their set.   Find the Unsuccessful Set Questions Worksheet in the back of the book, with all of the other handy worksheets.  They are like the Video Questions but flipped backwards.

Unsuccessful Set Questions

How would you describe the comic's stage character, that is to say, the personality they present in their act?

Were the jokes presented as true stories from life?  Or clearly false “jokes?”

Why do you think you didn't laugh?

Did anything work in their act?  Why do you think those bits worked and not the others?

How did the comic's use of their body fail to get laughs?

How did the comic's use of their face fail to get laughs?

How did their voice work fail to get laughs?

What did you notice that made their act uniquely unappealing?

How did the comic structure the jokes that they wrote?

Assignment Four

You are now the Head Writer for your own act and that act requires material.  Constantly.

Keep something to write in that fits in your pocket.  It could be a notebook, a journal, or an app on your phone.  Record anything you say throughout the week that makes someone else laugh. Record anything you think or see that makes you laugh.  You need to do this from now on. You cannot afford to waste anything that might become a joke.

I said this last week, but I'm saying it again.   Make sure you write the whole idea down.    You may think that one or two key words should be enough for you to remember what you meant.  Believe me, from experience, a lot of times it isn’t, and that idea never comes back.

Assignment Five

Once a week, look through what you have and try to form the writing into jokes.  Ask yourself why you thought it was funny, or why someone laughed when you said it.  Add in the information you would have to tell an audience for them to get it.

Assignment Six

Pull out the jokes you told last week.  Pick a title for each joke. Whatever feels like it will trigger the bit in your mind best.  The first thing you think of is usually the right one. “Lazy/Pot/Carl's Jr.” can now be written as “Carl's Jr.”  “Comedians don't hang out/Now I get it”  becomes “Comedians.”

Now list all of your jokes from last week this way, in the order you performed them in. Look them over.

Did any of them work?  Congratulations. You just did what most people who try stand-up never achieve. You got a laugh.   From scratch.  You thought of something, you performed it, and people laughed.  That moment is the basic building block of stand-up comedy, and you proved you can make it happen.  You can do this.

Did none of your bits work? Don’t despair or panic. You just had the same first set experience as some of the funniest comedians who ever lived.  It is so completely normal for your first set not to work that it isn’t worth a second thought.  On top of that, you just did the hardest thing there is to do in stand-up  You bombed. Congratulations, you just endured the worst thing comedy can do to you. You also found that it did not kill you. There is no longer anything to fear!

Now it’s time to figure out why the jokes aren't working.  I deliberately told you not to adjust anything last week, even when a joke didn't work on night one.  I wanted you to experience the frustration that only a bit that bombs can give you.  Now let's get under the hood and see if we can't stop it from happening again.

When a joke fails, the problem can only be two things: writing or performance.  Let's look at performance first.  Did you perform your material clearly?  Could they understand your words?  Let's find out.

Assignment Seven

Make an audio recording of your next set.  People often think they are talking clearly when in fact they are racing through their words, mumbling, or yelling. Make sure the audience can understand the jokes.  In our little corner of show business, that's the whole game. Green

Day can do a concert in Argentina and it won't matter if the crowd understands the words because the music carries the experience. Comedians need complete comprehension of our every word or the whole act is a failure.

Assignment Eight

Think about the audiences last week.  Were they comfortable with you? This is important.  Your friends laugh easily when you're hanging out because they know you and like you.  The audience just saw you for the first time.  They don't know how they feel yet.

Think about how you began your shows last week.  Did you start telling jokes from the minute your set began?  Just launching into your material at the top of the set can be jarring. You are a new element in the show. The audience needs time to take you in and get comfortable with you.

Next time you perform, take five seconds before you say anything at all. Let the audience get used to looking at you. Let them find a context for what you're going to say.  Then they will be ready to process your jokes.  If you have a specific character that you want them to see, you will want to be in character during this moment as well.  If not, just be yourself and let them get used to that.  

You may feel that five seconds is too long to wait at the top of every set.  I think I myself wait around two and a half.  But taking some amount of time before you start talking for the audience to get used to you can only improve their reaction.

Assignment Nine

At some point this week or next;  after you've done the five second pause; take ten seconds before opening your mouth. This is much longer than you normally would and will feel awkward in the room.

Doing this just once is fine, but I want you to watch the audience assess and scrutinize you.  It's going to happen every set for the rest of your life, and I want you to observe what it looks like closely without trying to tell jokes.  Study their faces.  Watch the wheels turn as they try to figure you out. They want to be comfortable enough with you to be able to laugh.

Maybe you can help them.  During this ten seconds, without using words, try to convey to the audience whatever you would like them to get about you or your stage character.  Act like the kind of person you want them to see.  You may even get a laugh or two from a facial expression.  See if you can see the audience's faces changed based on your actions.  

This exercise is also here as a toughness builder.  You need to get used to standing there in awkward silence so you're not afraid of it. Jokes will tank.  You will lose crowds.  Silences will occur and you need to be cool with that and not fear it.  

Silence can even be your friend.  A long pause like this can be helpful in the middle of a set

that’s gone haywire.  Say people in the audience begin talking to each other or a joke went down hard, a long pause can reset the table.  It can focus an audience’s attention. Silence and stillness can prompt people to look and listen more carefully.  Silence is a part of comedy, and the sooner you can tolerate it comfortably, the better.

Assignment Ten

Enough about the audience's comfort level for a second.  How about yours? Were you comfortable with your space?  Was the stool in your way? The mic stand? This can take you off your game.  A visibly annoyed comic is hard to enjoy.  

Next time you go up, before you start telling jokes, take time to ensure your performance space is how you like it. Hate that mic stand? Get it out of there. Want to sit on the stool? Do it.   Don't have a joke get ruined because you start walking across the stage and realize the microphone cord is three feet long, stop in your tracks, and flub the punchline.

We are our own Stage Manager as well as Director and Actor and Writer and everything else. Arranging the stage for your show is your job as well.  Even if that show is three minutes long on the middle of an open mic.

Check the tech as well. You may not have a sound engineer at an open mic, but if the microphone is off, broken, screeching, or covered in the spit of the last performer, deal with that before the set starts.  

Are You Joking?

If the audience could understand your jokes clearly, and you were comfortable enough and situated enough to give a competent performance and it still didn’t work at all, it’s time to look at your writing.  

If your approach isn't bearing fruit, you need to make sure your jokes are properly constructed. You may have just gotten a little nervous at that last bit.   Didn't I say there was no “right way” to write comedy?  Didn't I say I believed in letting you write whatever you like?  Of course.  A joke can be about anything in the world, it can be performed any way you like, but it has to be a joke.

All jokes have two things in common:  a moment where the comic sets up an expectation, and a moment when they fulfill that expectation in a surprising way.   What does that mean?  For a second, let's stop analyzing jokes and listen to one.  

“I used to drink a lot,” says Dave Attell to the crowd, in a knowing tone like he's over it now,“but that was way back... there.”  He points to the bar in the back of the club.

In this twelve word joke, it's easy to see both essential joke elements. Attell sets up the expectation that we are going to hear how long ago this drinking took place, but he surprises us by fulfilling it in a way we can't see coming.  His drinking didn't back in the past, but in the

back of this very room.  Our use of the word “back” to mean both time and distance allows Dave to hide the meaning switch until the very last word. All at once, our image of Dave turns in a second from brave recovered addict to a drunk so gone he's hammered right now.

A joke sets an expectation and delivers what was promised, but in a way you don't expect.  Once you know how to look for that, you will see these two elements at work throughout comedy.  In the hands of a master, it can be done so subtly, you can't see a joke there at all.  But if they said something and you laughed, those two things had to be present.  The trick was just done on too high a level to notice it.  But to get there you have to conquer the basics.  You have to learn to poach an egg before you can capture the essence of juevos rancheros in a foam.

Assignment Eleven

Let's dissect some jokes.  Anthony Jeselnik is an exceptional joke writer, and he works in a very old-school way.  His bits have perfect structure. Understanding what makes them work can help you diagnose why your jokes may not have clicked the way you wanted them to.

Google him on “Just For Laughs 2012” and a three minute clip will come up.

Answer all the Video Questions from the worksheet in the back of this book about Mr. Jeselnik's set.   The same way you did for Greg Giraldo. Asking these questions of each new comedian you encounter will deepen your understanding of the art form. Hopefully it will spark ideas on how to approach your own act as well.  All done?  This week let's take an extra step.

Write out Anthony’s jokes.  I’m serious. Word for word.  For each joke, circle the group of words with the most surprising element of the joke. This is the Punchline. This is where the audience’s expectations are fulfilled, but with an added twist they didn’t expect.

Now look through the other sentences in each joke you circled.  Answer these questions.

What did Anthony lead you to expect?

How did he do this?  

What did he give you instead?

What was the element in the resolution that was unexpected?

Now go back to your jokes from last week. Make sure what the audience is being told to expect is clear. Make sure the surprising element comes later, and after all the information they need to know for it to work. I am not asking you to Jeselnik-ize your own writing.  Be yourself.  I am simply asking you to identify the basic elements of joke structure. Then make sure your own jokes contain these elements, in whatever way you like. They gotta be in there somewhere, or you have written words, but not a joke.

Assignment Twelve

The elements of expectation and surprising fulfillment are not as easily identified in every comedian's act as they are in Mr. Jeselnik's. They are always there, however.

Google “James Adomian Just For Laughs Chicago” and watch the clip that comes up.

Adomian does not work in the strict set up/punch style Anthony uses. Stories and character monologues abound, all in a conversational style. Underneath it are the exact same elements.

Fill out a Video Questions Worksheet for Mr. Adomian's set.  Then go back through his act. Write down as many examples as you can of an expectation he sets up and its unexpected fulfillment.

See how many pairs you find. They will start to reveal themselves everywhere as you get better at spotting them. Once you have found such pairs in James’ act, write one of the jokes out as a two sentence joke.  In other words, strip away Adomian's conversational style and write his jokes in the most direct setup/punchline manner, the way Anthony Jeselnik might write it.  Do it a couple more times until it becomes second nature.

You can write any way you like, but the elements of expectation and a surprising fulfillment of that expectation are necessary for comedy writing to work.  They should always be present in your work. Even in the absurdist act of Steve Martin, in which a joke might simply be Martin standing there with a gas nozzle and gloating, these principles apply.

This is an actual Martin bit from Live at the Hollywood Bowl. For a long time, Martin stands silently, holding a gas nozzle.  No hose.  Then, looking smug, Steve says “I got this...”    

He pauses, very pleased with himself.

“For five bucks.”

Even here, you can find the essentials.  The silent pose with a bizarre prop is the set up.  Your expectations about a man with a broken piece of a gas pump kick in in your brain.  It's not normal.  Why is he doing this?  He’s going to have to address it at some point. Then he does.  He brags about the price.  The last thing you could have expected him to bring up.  Even in this strangest of comedy pieces, the two basic elements are there.

Assignment Thirteen

Get ready to do three more open mics.  Get out your jokes from last week. Write any that bits got a laugh down at the top of this week’s set list. I want you to open with those jokes this week.

Opening with something that you know has worked in the past is a good way to get the audience to trust that you are funny.  They are more likely to give your set a fair listen.

You will also get a quick read on the room. Open with something that usually works and you

can gauge what a decent joke gets from this crowd right off the bat.

You also start your set comfortably, not anxious from attempting something new.  You look confident, and the crowd gets comfortable quickly.

Assignment Fourteen

As you look over the jokes that work, think of ways you might improve them.

I hesitate to give you too much specific advice here.  I don’t want to influence the development of your own personal style.  Patton Oswalt said that giving a comedian advice only makes that comedian more like you.  That's not helpful.  After being funny, being unique is the most important thing in stand-up  I don't want to leave you completely in the dark though if you're feeling stuck.  I'll keep it as general as possible.

Could the setup line be shorter? Getting them to the surprise quicker?   Do you tell them more than they need to know to understand your joke? No one has ever said, “Man I wish that comic’s setups were longer.”

Punchlines should also aim for brevity.  The punchline is the moment our expectation gets its surprising fulfillment.  The quicker this happens, the bigger the punch.

  Here's a great example, by Paul F. Tompkins:  

”I love amusement parks…I think because I hate money.”

Quick wind up... and Pow!

He sets up the expectation with one sentence, and then surprises you with one word.  Nice and punchy.

On the other side of the issue, is the language colorful and specific? While brevity is your friend in comedy, bland colorless words are not.  Is “car” the best word for your joke? How bout “rust-bucket” or “82 Fiero?”  It seems contradictory to my last point, but it’s all about balance.  In general, the most vivid picture you can create in the audience’s sense memory, while using the least possible words, is the comedy sweet spot.

Assignment Fifteen

Once the words of a joke are as concise and colorful as you can make them, think for a moment about their content.

Look at the first joke on your list. What is your emotional point of view in this joke?  How do you feel about what you are saying?  Is this point of view clear in the writing?  Is it clear in the way you say it onstage?

  Do you love that “everyone has an Iphone,” or do you hate it?  Can the audience clearly tell? The audience must know this at all times, or they aren’t fully understanding you.  Make sure they can, with the both the writing and your delivery.

Apply these questions to the jokes that work, but don’t over-think it. If nothing obvious jumps out, let’s trust the jokes that worked to work again and not try to fix what isn’t broken. Just do them the way you did last week. If something from the above questions really strikes you, make the change. But don’t be afraid to go back to what worked if the change turned out to be a wrong move.

Assignment Sixteen

For this second week of open mics, make a list.  First do the jokes that did the best.

After that, do whatever unsuccessful joke from last week you feel you have the best shot at repairing. Whatever joke suggests the most obvious fix. Whatever joke you think you might best be able to help with the lessons from the James and Anthony assignments.

Fill up the rest of your set with new jokes. Make sure at least one minute of your set is all new, written this week.

DO NOT THROW THE UNSUCCESSFUL JOKES FROM LAST WEEK AWAY. Make a new file called “In the Shop” or whatever phrase you prefer. No idea is dead. There is always the possibility that you will return to it with a new perspective in the future.  We’re just putting them aside for now.

Go do three open mics.  Go to more if you can, and then turn ahead to Week Three.

I know I just put a lot of work on your desk this week, but I deliberately left the first week light. I didn’t want you to begin with anything guiding you but your natural comedic instincts.

I also didn’t want there to be a bunch of crap in your head that you were trying to remember while also trying to do one of the hardest things in show business. Some of the basics got saved for this week and you got it all in a big dump.  This is elementary stuff that you had to get eventually.  I would start the book with it, but I wanted to wait until you understood what doing stand-up felt like before dropping it on you.

Next week won’t be nearly as heavy in new ideas.  We will mostly elaborate on what we started here. I never want to add new elements beyond your ability to process them. Doing your act as a newcomer to stand-up comedy is hard enough.  If you ever feel like repeating a week, do it.  Move ahead only when you feel like you understand the lessons completely.

No go out there and make them laugh.  See you next week.

#comedy #comedy class #standup #John Roy #entirely Free Comedy Class

[theshijlegacy]

So many feels after Avengers: Endgame.  SO.  MANY.

SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT OF COURSE

Thanks to the Internet, a comic nerd husband, and my own musings, I had a solid handful of ideas about what would happen, and was right on most of them.

Hawkeye’s whole family got dusted: totally explains why he became Ronin.  Making that the first scene of the movie was a real gut-punch; well done.

Iron Man dies: fitting end for the character in so many ways.  I was so sure it was coming, and I held it together... until the arc-reactor light on the suit went out.  Tried not to cry.  Failed.

Thor doesn’t die but fucks off to wherever: one of my first thoughts was that he was a candidate for the Death List, but he’s a literal god, really hard to kill, maybe he’ll go walk the galaxy or some shit for a while.  But Asgardians of the Galaxy?  shut up and take my money

Time fuckery: yeah ok that almost doesn’t count.  “Trust Dr. Strange" has been my mantra for the last year.

All the heroes that got dusted came back: see above.  From a practical standpoint, you can’t kill off characters with sequel movies coming, and my pedantic ass won’t let that go.

Cap goes back to his own time and finally gets to be with Peggy: MY HEART.  ALL OF THE FEELS.  (Will probably lose my shit the next time I watch this.)  Cap was at the top of my list for probable deaths until the first trailer came out, and all the way until the end of the film, I was still convinced he’d be gone.  Time-traveling to 1970 to get more Pym Particles and he winds up hiding in Director Peggy’s office; oh okay, that’s the one last time he gets to see her.  The scene in the final battle where he’s struggling to get up, with the broken shield; now he’ll make his Noble Sacrifice.  Then when he was going to take the Infinity Stones back to their rightful times/places, I figured he wouldn’t come back and that would be it; I guess he’ll get an off-screen death.  But wait, is that Pre-Serum Steve on the bench..?  No, it’s Old/Appropriately Aged Steve, who found a wife... OH FUCK THEY ACTUALLY DID IT AND I CANNOT HANDLE THIS RIGHT NOW BUT THESE ARE TEARS OF JOY REALLY.  (Opinions are split on how Time Fuckery works, but I am of the mind that this is the past that couldn’t be changed and Steve was always going to marry Peggy.  Cap wore a mask in public so he could just change his name whenever he got back to the late 40′s/early 50′s.  He didn’t return to the future through the portal but “the long way” and obviously knew when and where to show up.  And there’s a scene in Winter Soldier where Peggy is talking with Cap about her husband, and she says “you saved him”; not sure how far in advance the storylines were planned or even outlined, and I know it was purposely vague, but I think it’s appropriate - and true.)

And of course there were great fights and one-liners and angsty characters and space stuff and all the things we know and love in the MCU.

And plenty of things I didn’t expect!  Standouts, for various reasons, in no particular order:

Holy returning characters Batman: The Ancient One!  Secretary Ross!  Agent Sitwell!  Alexander Pierce!  Valkyrie!  Korg!  Frigga!  Jane Foster!  1970 Hank Pym and Howard Stark complete with rockin’ de-aging CGI - and JARVIS!!  (How about another season or two of Agent Carter?  And have the show officially end with Cap’s time-traveling return??  MAKE IT HAPPEN DISNEY)

Thor, Lebowski edition: So unexpected and yet it worked!  Played for laughs at times but also a reminder that trauma and grief does different things to different people (compare and contrast with how Cap, Iron Man, Hawkeye, Hulk, and Black Widow deal with things in the intervening 5 years.)  And I’m glad he didn’t become suddenly buff again at any point.  Totally dig the braided beard and 10000% here for Asgardians of the Galaxy.

America’s Ass: whether this was for Chris Evans fangirls/fanboys, a meta reference to the Cap character poster for Infinity War, or just another light-hearted bit... it doesn’t matter.  It is America’s Ass, and it is spectacular.

Cap/Cap and Nebula/Nebula fights: “Perfectly symmetrical violence never solved anything!”  And I always love it.  Especially 2023(?) Cap getting tired of 2012 Cap’s lines.

“Hail Hydra”: definitely not the line I expected.  A nod to a recent comic arc and of course the MCU itself.

Cap wields Mjolnir: not only is he worthy to wield and throw it, HE CAN CALL DOWN LIGHTNING.  And Mjolnir/shield dual-wielding?  YAAAS.  The OP character that deserves to be OP.

Epic final battle: sling rings appear, in come armies and armies of backup from all over the galaxy.  That scene is going to need a frame-by-frame analysis with explanations of who all showed up.

2012 Loki vanishes with the scepter: welp, there’s your Disney+ series?  From what I understand about the movie’s Time Fuckery, changing the past creates a new timeline, and now we have a whole bunch of Loki’s All-New Adventures to explore.

Black Widow dies: COMPLETELY blindsided by that one and upset in ways I can’t yet explain.  When she and Hawkeye time- and space-traveled to Vormir, I figured there would be some workaround for the One Soul -> Soul Stone exchange.  And when that proved to not be the case, and both of them assumed they’d be the one to sacrifice themselves, I was so sure that Hawkeye would eventually be the one because of course he would, right?  Lost his family, became Ronin, nothing to lose but wants to do the right thing one last time?  Right?  NOPE.  I wouldn’t exactly call this fridging but it’s uncomfortably close.  And yeah, she had no real family (didn’t even know her dad’s name, ugh), and this was all being done so half the galaxy could be un-snapped, but it doesn’t sit right with me.  (I’m guessing her solo movie will be an origin story/prequel of some sort?)

Overall, a fitting and satisfying end to 11 years of the MCU so far.  Closure where there needed to be but enough open endings to keep things going for the upcoming movies/TV shows.  Two very exhausted thumbs up.

#endgame spoilers #avengers spoilers

[twiststreet]

Progresso Report -- ??? 2018

It’s been a long time since I did one of these (August?)-- things in 2018 got messy.

This is an ongoing series of charts that I keep to track my slow but inevitable ascendance to a higher and more eternal plane of existence than you, a frail normal person bereft of the life force that courses through me.  As I believe Paul Atreides once explained to a Reverend Mother of the Bene Gessit order, the First Law of the Mentat is that “A process cannot be understood by stopping it. Understanding must move with the flow of the process, must join it and flow with it.”  Or as I believe Tommy Lee once said, in The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band, “We partied like clockwork, bro.  You could check the clock in whatever time zone we were in and figure out exactly what kind of shit we were into.”  

I started new charts in September that I’m happier with, but then everything fell apart in that last half of 2018.  Work/regular-life exhaustion-- things just got especially tiring over here; people dying-- this year had a little bodycount there for me; a lot of chart confusion this year; my New Years plans falling apart; people getting sick, me with this cold; dental stuff; housing stress (I’m trying to find a new place) which has meant a resurgence in budgeting stress. 

I guess it’s been a long year.  But I don’t want to be one of those “oohhhhh 2018 how dare you” people much either, because (a) it’s the same assholes who are like “look how busy I am” on the internet, give it a rest, and (b) they say that every single year, and it’s not like Bowie and Prince died this year.  

 I stopped cooking sometime in November, so I’m going to skip the numbers.  Which means no number analysis for 2018 trends.  But things just ... yeah, things fell apart.  Except for writing, weirdly, where I’ve filled about two notebooks, since August (which is an unusual amount for me-- I’m usually pretty slow).  I think that’s been a lot of it-- when I get in a good place writing, it’s hard to not tune out everything else, but.  

So 2019 is going to be a dust it off and start over kinda year as it turns out.  

The Weekly Section:

Cooking:  I was cooking up until November and then stopped cold around Thanksgiving-- travel always discombobulates.  Recipe-wise, though, I fell off on trying new recipes.  Chicken oyakodon one night in August or September, which didn’t turn out too good.  A lot of messing around with hot pot recipes and a veggie stew, in November-- I was kinda into the hot pot, and want to circle back to that, when I get cooking again.  I have Thai Chicken written down for October, but no idea what that means, and I circled back to that Udon-Shrimp recipe again.  

Got a little better with tacos, but not fully great there yet.  Kept trying to make my own pickled onion, but never got it right.  

Project Work: If I added up all the numbers here, this would be the bulk of my time during this span.  A lot of writing-- almost every day.  Mostly on a comic project, so one of those things that might become nothing (and maybe should be nothing-- it stinky), but.  And a lot of reading for that, old comics mostly, the classics, revisiting stuff-- it all kinda devolved into me rereading Uncanny X-Men #260 a lot, though I couldn’t tell you why. 

Trying to remember what makes something good.  That’s a bit I never figure out how to deal with-- I have a thing when I’m in the middle of a creative thing, where I just kind of throw my hands in the air and go, “I have no idea what makes something good anymore.”  Like, what do you want out of a thing??  What makes a fictional thing good?  I don’t even know when I’m in the middle of all this.  

Or I don’t know what’s good for right now-- what feels hokey or what feels hip and modern; like, you don’t want to be the guy doing ... remember when some Iron Man guys came back with a new comic in the 00′s with like ... an 80′s Iron Man comic except trying to sell that exact sound in 2005 or whatever, and were like “Hey kids”? I think about that all the time.

Looked at a lot of the big hip popular (non-DC) books -- but just from a vulture-y place, so nothing I’d feel comfortable talking about.  I don’t know-- I don’t ... I’m a little lost at the moment, I guess!  Or I know that I’m not making something good, because I’m not that guy, so wheeee.

I did like a Image book I saw, called the Outer Darkness.  I thought that was kinda funny-- kinda cute.  I’m really into LOEG: The Tempest-- I think that’s really fucking good.  I scribbled down on a sheet that I liked some old John Porcellino comic where he plays football or something with his kids.  I finally read the ending of Sin Titulo, which it turns out I didn’t have to do.

Gym: This has been a huge improvement for this year.  Except for the last couple weeks while I’ve had a cold, I’ve managed to escalate the gym more. (A) Spending more money on it, (B) involving a trainer for a period of time, and (c) having the gym walking distance from my job so I could make it part of my “At work” time in my head and not my “me doing me” time, those all I think turned out to be the trick for me-- I was angrier about not going, when money got involved, especially.  These would have good numbers...

The Monthly Section:

New Restaurants: 

I had Okonomiyaki for the first time.  (These are mostly not my photos-- I had photos but just changed phones so most of my photos got lost).  I didn’t really feel strongly about it, though-- it felt like good hangover food and I don’t drink like that much anymore, so.  

A lot of time got invested in Korean fried chicken and chicken wings.  There’s a  place in Koreatown that I got a little obsessed with (namely, the vaue meals over at Kyochon).  Tried some Japanese fried chicken, that place on Sawtelle for comparison-- no question, the Koreans won that battle.  (Though, Honey Kettle over the Koreans, but-- it’s a different flavor profile, is all, so).  

New places around where I live and work.  A new taco place.  A new “Asian small dish” place.  A vegan Thai place that ... I can’t say I recommend.  A westside Korean place, so.  In November/December, I’ve gotten really interested in the Indonesian food in my neighborhood so I’ve been eating a lot of that-- it’s like Thai but different ingredients, so a fun little adventure there.  Some crappy 3rd street Asian restaurant I didn’t even write down the name of.  

Finally went over to Guerilla Tacos.  (That’s my photo).  I really enjoyed those tacos-- Jonathan Gold had talked that place up for years when it was a truck, but I’m lazy and hadn’t gotten around to it.  (I’m not really a truck fan!).  Boy, those tacos, though... That’s the (a) Pocho Taco (ground wild boar, pine nuts, raw tomatilo chile, chipotle crema, aged cheddar & pico de gallo in a crunchy shell) and the (b) Albondigas Taco (chicken meatballs, stewd tomato salsa, castelvetrano olives, and parsley).

LA Stuff or Travel:  Travel for Thanksgiving.

A Harlan Ellison memorial at the Egyptian theater.  They played his Outer Limits and Twilight Zone episodes, and specially cut together videos of him talking or his TV work (his Gidget episode or his Burke’s Law episodes or what have you).  LQ Jones talked about making the Boy and His Dog movie; Josh Olsen talked about co-writing that Twilight Zone episode; Leonard Maltin talked about seeing The Terminator for the very first time with Harlan in the audience yelling at the screen.  It was nice, getting to be there.

I had car problems so I took some hour-or-two long walks on nights when I was relying on Lyft, just seeing what walking in LA’s like.  (It’s fine!  I mean, it’s not ideal, but it’s fine). It’s nice knowing that’s an option at the end of the day, at least.

One time at lunch, I walked by Mel Brooks having lunch with friends.  I heard him say “I love that we’re doing this” but didn’t stand there and gawk or eavesdrop like I wanted to.  But I don’t know-- I was really really excited about that.  Mel Brooks!

I went to a comedy thing for the first time in too long-- Superego and Wild Horses did a team-up improv night, where they improvised a play about middle-aged white people, getting together at a house by a lake.   I need to see more comedy-- I know that I find that very calming and I don’t know why I haven’t been, but.

Went to another Indiecade, the indie game festival-- two highlights there.  One was Flight Simulator-- a game where instead of simulating being a pilot, you simulate being a passenger on a trans-Atlantic flight, in real time.  So it’s just a simulator where you sit in a seat and wait for a flight to be over...?  That made me laugh-- I really quite enjoyed the creativity of that, and getting to speak with the guy who was making it.  (I asked a bunch of questions-- yes, your character will have a book he or she can read-- but not “Why” since that seemed extremely gauche to ask).  

The other thing was as I was walking by a room, a guy was like “hey, want to hear a guy talk about making music for the Star Wars games.”  And I was like, “Fuck it, I don’t give a shit about that, but I want to sit down and I got no place better to be, so let’s do it.  I GOT NOWHERE ELSE TO GO.”  

But it actually turned out to be a really fucking interesting discussion because... because the guy had a job that coincided exactly with where my head’s been at with the stuff I’m working on, with just thinking about comics, old comics, balancing wanting to invoke old shit while still doing new shit, and how that job of writing for comics exists for so many people, especially people not working on their own shit, who are working with pre-existing properties with expectations around what those properties and that kinda experience should deliver.  

Which is-- they hire you to be you, but they’re also hiring you to do Star Wars, to do a thing that sounds like Star Wars.  

So he talked about having to break down all the different ways that he could approach that problem-- with one way just being imitating the melodies that came before you.  But he talked about the better route being how ... He put it in terms of like language-- like the music of Star Wars has a language to it (horns, woodwinds used against bloop blarps, whatever) and it’s about figuring out how to talk in that language, but that doesn’t mean you have to say the same thing once you speak the language.  I don’t know.  

I’m not doing it justice-- I found it very interesting, and weirdly on point to what I wanted to think about, way more than I expected.

Documentaries:  I think I mentioned them all on here.  That He-Man one.  F is For Fake.  (I saw the Lego and GI Joe episodes of the Toys That Made Us).  Fighting in the Age of Loneliness, which I was really, really into-- I thought that was really cool.  City of Gold.  Some Netflix movie I’m forgetting.  That last Star Wars video by the Red Letter Media guys, if that counts.

Oh, and ... one night I had a Twitch stream on for noise, because that’s what I do now I guess (???), and the people on the Twitch stream themselves put on a documentary about Logan Paul.  It was the Shane Dawson docu-expose of Logan Paul or Aaron Paul or whoever those assholes are.  I only saw the first one of those, via Twitch stream, but holy shit, that was... whatever the fuuuuuuck that was.  I want to watch the rest of those.  Just a window into a completely other dimension of humanity.  But the window itself had a history of blackface...?  Like, you lookup the host of the documentary, the guy DOING the expose, and it’s like online people going “why he do blackface?”  What????????  What the hell is going on with Youtube???

I definitely want to go back to those.  I want to see the Darkness That’s Coming.

Movies:  I don’t know-- I saw a bunch of movies.  

Let me see:  Personal Shopper (terrific movie!), Support the Girls, Crazy Rich Asians, Buster Scruggs, that El Royale piece of shit, that Spiderman cartoon, Sometimes a Night Is For Us All (?), rewatched the original Suspiria, a shitty Netflix horror movie called Beyond the Gates, the Other Guys again, a Simple Favor, The Predator, Destination Wedding, Mayhem, half of Rampage. Saw a lot of movies with my nephews (rewatched Knight & Day and MI: Fallout, the Tooth Fairy, Jumanji 2, Castle of Cogliostro, rewatched Ant Man 2-- I know people aren’t into it but I like the wannabe-Elmore-Leonard plotting, Jackie Chan’s Skiptrace, Daddy’s Home 2 (no!), School of Rock). 

I rewatched Buckaroo Banzai over Thanksgiving after people went to sleep and I didn’t have anything to do.  I fucking hated that movie as a kid-- almost got thrown out of a screening of it because I was yelling stupid shit at my friends during it and whatever.  But I always wanted to revisit since so it’s a touchstone for so many nerds -- it improved as an adult knowing what they were up to, at least, understanding better what they were trying to do, but I wouldn’t say that I was wrong as a kid either, not exactly... I’d put it down as “interesting” at the moment.  It’s helpful knowing the reason it looks like shit is they hired the cinematographer of Blade Runner, but then the producers made them fire that guy after only two or three scenes...

I think I’m missing some stuff on this list, but...

(Saw a few episodes of that Jack Ryan show with my family, too, since that’s their kind of thing, apropos of nothing-- it was not great!  Like, some guy’s in Vegas getting beat up because he wants pervy sex and then Jim From the Office frowns-- or I don’t know how to describe it, but ... not great).

Highlighter Videos:  I did a bunch.  I should do a separate video wrap-up for the year though, like people do.  That might be nice to have done.

Goals:

Three Scripts for the Project:  Technically I wrote way more than 3 but most of them got ripped up along the way.  But yeah, goal met.

Flowchart for Game: Still in progress on the flowchart-- kind of feeling inspired again to tackle all that, after Bandersnatch though.  The game within the game, not the show itself.  I love the fake games people imagine when they make shit like that, how vivid they always seem as compared to the real thing.  There’s a game that gets described in a Kelly Link short story that I think about more than I think about games I’ve spent 90000 hours on.

I didn’t do a favorite games of the year list, but this year was all about discovering the Yakuza series for me. And just... the way those games are all about excavating the same exact, relatively-understandable space, Kamarucho, year after year, game after game.  I think that’s really ... I don’t know what the right word to describe that is.  I just find that architectural obsessiveness really curious.  They’re curious games.  I could go on and on about them but instead, no.   

2019 Plan: My goal for this year was to create a good plan for 2019-- making a list of movies I want to watch, types of recipes to try, that kind of thing.  I think that’s what I’m going to do over the next couple days while I’m sick and have time off work.  

Finish Books:  I didn’t finish one!  Got too consumed by reading ... some comics I will never admit to having read.  Hoo-boy.  I have gone all the way down the rabbithole.

Cooking Class:  Nope.

Major Tidy:  Nope.  Smaller tidiness, yes, but I need to get rid of a lot of clutter.  But like I said, I think I’m going to have to move (and I’m thinking to a smaller place-- I think I have more space than I need right now) so that’s going to happen whether I like it or not.  

Finish Best-Of Assembly: I’ve been preparing a best-of this blog in case / when tumblr invariably goes down.  But in the course of that, a lot of things have to be slightly rewritten or edited down-- a lot of weird raving pared off things, so.  

Overall: There was more that probably I was too lazy to scribble down on the charts.  Things got lazy.  Things got derailed.  Things have to get put back on track. I’m not back at square one-- I feel good about having written as much as I have at least (even if I have a lot of work left before any of that’s... anything??).  But.  I’m glad a new year is coming-- it’s my favorite holiday; it’s the only holiday that promises anything really valuable.  A fresh start beats candy anyways, after you’re old enough to eat candy all the time because no one’s around to stop you.  A fresh start sounds nice...

#what gets measured gets managed

[kierongillen]

Writer Notes: The Wicked + the Divine 35

Spoilers, obv.

I suspect this may be shorter than usual. Or maybe not? When you've been working (and thinking) on something for a long time, you work past the need to talk about it. I've said it to myself so many times, I don't really need to externalise it. Whatever “it” is, is in the book.

I suspect this is going to grow as we progress across the final year. In a real way, we're at the point of the degree course when we're easing off. It's your project now. Make of it what thou wilt. Easy answers are a long way behind us. But there are answers, at least.

Jamie's Cover: with solicits going out earlier, we're always worried about putting something like this on a cover. Ideally, we'd want it to drop after Imperial Phase II dropped, so at least people would be suspicious of Minerva.

But it's a lovely image – I love what Matt's doing with the light, what Jamie's doing with the expression. Great stuff.

Yoshi Yoshitani: More great stuff. The playfulness of Persephone, the pose. It's just total joy.

Page 1-4

This looks familiar. Once more we return, again, right?

We were obviously planning this from the start, but by the time we've reached this point, Jamie's style has evolved to the point where the extra panels we need to add to the sequence would break the coherence entirely. So Jamie insisted on re-inking the whole sequence, and updating the Minerva panels (as she's seen in more panels later). I did say that if we were clever, we'd have drawn the whole thing back when we did issue 1. Jamie noted that he'd never have been happy printing four years old art in a book.

So yes.

I was originally thinking that this sequence would actually be the opening of Year 4, but when I did the tight plotting for this arc, I realised that you had to really start way back around 4000BC, to set certain themes in motion. I had the option to switch them until quite late though – they're similar lengths, and abstractly can be switched, with a few changes.

I didn't. It's the way to go. And it's a good way to make issue 2 hit hard, right?

It's an interesting thing to think about that those who are following this in singles will have read the 1923 special before this, so know exactly why everyone is here, while those following with trades will learn it in the NEXT trade.

Page 5

For those who follow the idea of page budgets, this counted as a half page.

When writing this first time I got the order the wrong way around, so Amaterasu survived rather than Susanoo. Always check this stuff.

It's another tour de force for Matt here, in terms of the intensity of effects going on. I feel terrible for all the people involved. Thinking through the psychology of this was always going to be the hard one. To pull the trigger, who had the hardest job?

Page 6

Yet again, just look at the reds. I've got an issue with a bunch of fire in, and this is really making me look forward to it. Susanoo is a sweet one. Poor fucker.

Minerva saying “Necessity” feels like a necessary beat, right?

Page 7

This counts as a ¾ page for page budget.

Was waiting for the “Minerva emerging from fire” money shot for 34 issues (plus specials) and Jamie doesn't let me down. Had me thinking of “Figure covered in fluids” being one of those recurring beats in Jamie and my work. Persephone in the fourth trade, America in issue 13 of YA, Emily in Phonogram and so on.

It's the billow of the skirt, innit? Nice, Jamie.

8-9-10-11

Oddly, lettering this so you could work out who was speaking and who to was trickier than you'd think.

Set still getting her digs in now is very set. And, yes, I'm sure people will have a theory on who the fourth head is by now. If not, don't worry, we'll get to it soon enough.

Getting a little quality time with Ananke/Minerva was one of the writing challenges here – this is a scene which is pretty much showing methodology. When the pages came in for this, Chrissy said “I've been trying to make sense of what you meant by this for four years, but now I get it.” So I hope it hits the core beats for most people.

I do love this push and pull between Ananke and Minerva though. It's quietly horrible.

Pop-art head death there, and a return of the flying eyeballs. Also, looking at the various expressions of the heads in the backgrounds on page 9 is pretty impressive. Set in the third panel!

10-11 is the ritual. Trying to work out how much space for this and what you actually needed to show was key. Plus the timing of it – there's an argument you could have taken this longer, or pushed it shorter. Two pages felt right.

Good eye-to-camera at the end, which allows us to...

PAGE 12

...Have an interstitial...

PAGE 13-14-15-16-17

...and segue to Minerva's eyes in the present day. Linking sequence between scenes.

Due to the repeated pages in the first half being “free” (They weren't – Jamie chose to kill himself) this means that the issue is considerably longer than usual. Even so, there are a lot of fish to fry. This is obviously the problem of the structure of this arc – yes, there will be past and present content in every issue. Balancing what we do in each is basically the key... but it also means we have to choose our scenes very carefully.

Anyway – Minerva and Woden, facing off. Just letting two characters push and pull against each other – and, for the first time, really being behind the curtain “with” Minerva. Previously Minerva has been presented as a supporting character, based on her interactions with others (1923 is an exception). Here, Minerva is protagonist, and we get to see her work.

Minerva! Love the dyed bangs. Strong look. Also, great thoughtful expression on the end of the last page... and her making her move on the next page.

Woden calling her “Sweetheart” seems to be a minor peak Woden move.

This sequence is making me think that Minerva would be great at playing the party game Resistance. Tricky thing in this sequence is actually signalling lies to readers. Lies are really hard in comics. Like irony (as in, characters saying things they don't believe) there's certain parts of the readership who have huge problems with it. Signalling what you want to do is paramount, and tricky. I'm not sure there's a right answer.

Last two panels of 15 are particularly good for Jamie and Matt – firstly, we get the time based upon the sun coming up, which gives it an odd atmosphere. Guns out in a room? You'd think nighttime. But no, it's something else.

Secondly, with the steady angle, with Minerva having her back to Woden, we get a chance to see her think about what lie to tell. That's an “Okay – Woden knows about the heads. How could he know about the heads?” think...

Then over the page, making the lie, expression hoping she gets away with it... and then relief when she's called it right. Great steady-angle work by Jamie and Matt, and the sort of performance you can get from them. I wouldn't write this for almost anyone else.

(Favourite detail – look at the shoulders. From Woden's perspective, she's not moving at all. She's only giving facial tells.)

This sequence was also particularly picked over with C, in a line by line way, in terms of what information is being imparted. Minerva and Woden are both absolutely drilling each other for all the information they can get, so what IS being implied.

I laugh at Minerva bundling over to the computer the second Woden is gone. Plus great final expression there by Minerva.

18-19

In an issue that's set half in the past, and the half the present day stuff is with Minerva, we're in danger of losing our lead – so I definitely try and write Persephone particularly present where she gets it. This is an advantage of the captions coming back in – we can slow sequences down and make them feel like they last longer.

It's fun to do Persephone captions. Well, “fun”. You get to hit certain things directly that normally I'd only ever approach obliquely.

The weirdest thing of rewriting was Jon's line about being trapped underground – which was originally “Buried alive.” The question was whether anyone would take that literally, as the lab hadn't 100% been established as being underground.   (and the stairs from the giant machine that lead to the lab go upwards, even though the whole thing is all underground.)

In short: in a plot as dense as ours, it's important to not confuse in any area except where you have to.

20-22

After a scene earlier of lying to someone's face, using the modern communication to do something exploring the same sort of thing seemed interesting. Also, efficient. For those following Page Budgets, the repeating panels of the phone aren't quite “free” panels, but they're relatively low energy panels. Plus it gets a LOT of information exchanged in a direct, quick way. Instead, we spend the effort on the expression panels, to show the journey that's NOT on the screen.

It's not stuff I'd do constantly, but I do like that we do it.

Nice Verðandi-shoulder-touch silent panel too. Yay Jamie and Matt!

23

I believe I originally wrote this for two pages, but with no captions. Jamie felt it was unnecessary, and they'd get a similar effect in a single page. The reason why I did it with two pages is that I wanted to slow the reader down in the process of discovery – there was a little bit more akin to the Rorschach scene in Watchmen, with the procedural exploration of the environment and trying to find a way in too.

In the script I said I may add captions at lettering, but reduced to a page, that felt like a necessary thing. It slows the eye, and lets us join Persephone in her internality.

(I actually wrote most of this as the opening of the next issue, before realising it didn't fit, which was nicely timed, as I realised that with some edits, it fits perfectly here.)

The mural introduced in issue 4, as coloured by Nathan Fairbairn.

Laura's glimpse back on panel 4 is one of my favourite minor moments – Matt's magenta behind the image really adds to it.

24-26

Minerva, in an issue of deniable manipulative shit, this is your most deniable and manipulative thing. Astounded, and I wrote it.

Last two panels call back to Imperial Phase I, for reasons which will become obvious.

Due to the way the pages moved around, Jamie suggested moving the reveal of the skulls to the previous page – they were originally on the final one, but the angle was nearly impossible to pull off, and worked better brought forward. You always want BIG information to be revealed on a page turn, but in this case, the panels are small enough to not register unless you're actively looking at them, plus the REAL meaning of them is only really get-able by those who recall a scene from issue 4.

Hence the flashbacks, to ensure people do recall them. We don't do a lot of this kind of thing, but as this has been a long time back, we felt it was worth really laying out the key facts, step by step. Also, free panels, for the page budget purposes.

(Of course, not for Matt, who is doing a really cool treatment here – the reds and blacks in one timeline, and the pink and blue dots in the flashbacks. Astounding. Give that man another Eisner.)

The “...but everyone else should be” has been sitting in my hard drive all that time too. Odd to hit this stuff as well.

I think I've said that Baal is one of my favourite characters in the whole series. Obviously much more to come here, and probably down the line. He was a character who was always going to become more central the further we got into this – you know I talk about knowing the characters arcs, but not always when the plots come to the top of the mix? There's certainly a take on WicDiv where this is revealed near the climax of Imperial Phase II along with the rest of it. I suspect that would have overloaded it – it needs space, and I'd hate to leave more than a month between this reveal and the What's-Going-On.

It always surprised me that more close readers didn't jump on a “Baal is Baal Hammon” argument, as there's stuff which I considered considerably more obscure that people were all over. He cries fire in issue 12, for example – though a lot of people were noting that 1920s Baal wasn't much like 2013 Baal after the Special. This stuff is fascinating, from my perspective.

Yes, Baal's hot stuff in the final panel. For those who are wondering about his Inanna tattoo, alternate covers aren’t strictly speaking canon, and gods have all kind of miracles available to them. 

Next issue is two weeks late. As well as being one of the hardest issues we've ever done, there's been several real life disasters. Sorry for the delay, but we'll see you next week.

#WicDiv #the wicked and the divine #writer notes

[frederator-studios]

Julian de Perio: The Frederator Interview

It isn’t everyday you meet an artist passionate about backgrounds - which makes chatting with unquenchably honest Houston-native Julian de Perio all the more refreshing. He got his first professional gig as a background designer on Costume Quest (Amazon, 2018) drawing some very spooky-cool settings, and has since brought his talents to Bee and Puppycat as well. Julian draws trees on the daily, and one might say that his own career sprouted in Frederator Forest; we’re glad to have had him. I caught up with Julian just a few weeks before his bittersweet wrap-up on Costume Quest.

Where did you go to school?

I majored in comics - the fancy name is Sequential Art - at Savannah College of Art and Design. I started out wanting to do storyboarding, but realized that I had a lot of fun doing backgrounds. And it was something that a lot of my classmates didn’t like doing. I started doing backgrounds for a bunch of my classmate’s student films, and people liked my work. So I stuck with it!

When did you go from wanting to storyboard to wanting to do BG art?

Junior year, I think. Because sophomore year was when my professor told me that I wasn’t putting enough attention into the backgrounds in my comics. So I started putting in more.

Hol’ up - you were actually less confident with backgrounds at first?

Yeah, it always seemed so hard! I was afraid that I wouldn’t be good at it. And when you’re a young artist, you avoid the things that you think you’re not going to be good at. That’s a generalization. But that is something in life, avoiding your weaknesses. Wanting to be good at things from the get-go.

Huh... and then it turned out your weakness was a strength?

With practice! I mean, no one’s great at something when they’re just starting out. It’s just that I enjoyed doing it. I can get totally lost in a background.

In high school, did you know that you wanted to work in animation?

I had NO idea what I was doing in high school. No idea. I went to community college because I didn’t have a plan. I figured out there that I wanted to do something creative, and with drawing. I drew a lot as a kid and then stopped in middle and high school, because video games. But I took art classes after high school, and that’s how I decided I wanted to do storyboards.

Applying to SCAD, how’d you choose Sequential Art over Animation?

I was torn between them for a while. I based it on curriculums - I picked the one with more classes that I wanted to take. For Sequential Art, the classes listed online were things like Perspective for Environmentalists; Anatomy for Character Design; straight up, Storyboarding and Character Design for Animation. And then with the Animation major, there were a lot of classes listed where... basically, I didn’t understand what they meant. So I opted for the major with ‘storyboarding’ in the class titles. I did minor in Storyboarding, though, which allowed me to take animation courses.

What’d ya do after graduating?

I went home and did freelance work until I’d saved up enough to move out to LA. I got a little bit more freelance work out here before getting my first test - which was for Costume Quest.

What did the test consist of? Multiple choice? Short response?

They gave me 2 storyboard panels. One was the kids standing in front of a store, and the other was an establishing shot of the inside of a mine. And I basically drew a complete (but colorless) background into those shots. It was a good fit for me, because the show took a lot of visual cues from Zac Gorman’s Costume Quest comic. And I majored in comics! So it felt like I was using a lot of the knowledge I got from my major. Especially with regards to inking, because the comic has so many spot blacks. And shadows, shading. I sketched it all in pencil, then when I was sure everything was lined up, and nothing was in a character’s way, I went over it in ink. I had 2 weeks to do it, then didn’t hear back for a month. I had figured that I didn’t get the job - then they called me!

What’s a typical day like for you?

Get in, sit down. I try to finish 1 to 2 backgrounds a day. Although the really intricate, detailed ones can go up to 2 days. Every now and then I’ll get notes back, a bunch all at once, in which case I’ll spend the day doctoring those backgrounds. Usually it’s things with continuity, covering bases - oh gosh, clocks. I’m always having to change the time that I put in.

Who are your favorite characters in the show?

I love the villain. Christopher McDonald gives such an amazing performance as Bob Dickerson. He’s so funny in his delivery. Bob might be my favorite character - him, or Everett. I’m totally a Reynold though. Reynold, I identify with painfully. I am definitely Reynold and Wren is DEFINITELY my sister. Oh, but don’t put that in! She’ll get mad!

How has it been working on Costume Quest?

It’s been pretty great. It’s been one of the most fulfilling half years of my life. Wait, no - that’s too corny! I just, didn’t know what to expect when I first came here. I still don’t really know what to expect from being part of a TV show crew, because I’ve only been part of the one. But Costume Quest is a really tight knit group. We go out to lunch together almost every day. My coworker gave me a haircut yesterday.

D’aww! What are your favorite cartoons?

Is this where I’m s’posed to name Frederator cartoons? 

No lmao you don’t have to!

(A long thoughtful pause) This is... so personal. Let’s see. Growing up, I didn’t have cable. So I could only watch like The Simpsons, the shows everyone had access to. I watched Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon at my friend’s houses until we got cable, and even then I basically watched whatever my sister or my best friend wanted to watch. That was a lot of Ed, Edd n Eddy, Fairly Oddparents - OH, Frederator, there you go. My sister had a VHS where she recorded every episode she could find of The Wild Thornberrys and Invader Zim, so I ended up seeing those shows a lot. Those are good ones. I watched a lot of anime - as you do, growing up in the 90s.

Do you think your next job will be in background design too?

I hope so. I like it a lot. I actually had two professors be like, “Why?” (laughing) I think it seems so unglamorous to people who don’t care about it! But I enjoy it. So, you know, I want to keep doing it.

Do you have a dream show to work on?

Well this actually ties into what I like about Costume Quest - I’m so thankful that my first show is action-adventure. Cause those are my favorite shows, despite all that stuff I just said about Ed, Edd n Eddy and Fairly Oddparents. I really like that with adventure shows, you get to go to really interesting places and draw interesting locations. So any story with fantastic environments would be great. But, yeah. I’m sure no matter where I go or what I work on, I’ll find something to love about it.

Follow Julian on Twitter and Tumblr: @jdeperio

Thanks for the interview Julian! I hope you survive the inevitable sister-whooping, because I'm excited to hear about your next gig :D

- Cooper

#The Frederator Interview #frederator studios #Costume Quest #Julian de Perio #background design #animation #SCAD #bee and puppycat #amazon studios #comics #Zac Gorman #Christopher McDonald #The Simpsons #ed edd n eddy #fairly odd parents #invader zim #action adventure #artists on tumblr #interview #wild thornberrys

[bewitchingallure]

Father’s Hands

J.M. Clark

Hydrangeas full in bloom, the softest purple invited us to pull up closer in the driveway. So many of them, lightly drooping in bunches, blocked the bottom of the window into the warm sunroom. My eyes traveled from the flowers and up the window only to see hand blown glass spheres of all different sizes and colors hanging from fishing line behind the glass. I wondered how they stayed so still, where Liam and Felicity got them. In that moment, I loved them so much I despised my mother’s decorative taste at home more every time I came here.

I continued to sit shotgun. Father already turned the car off, but I couldn’t go. As excited as I was, the chilled air was drifting away and the stale warm air returned to comfort me. I was stuck in the moment, a little nervous. Then I saw Ellie, Ray Bans pulling her hair back, as she shuffled to the trunk with a cumbersome laundry basket of clothes.

Ellie had always been my best friend. In one aspect we were two of a kind, in the other I looked like the Virgin Mary beside her. Ellie was an only child, I was the middle mostly fallen through the cracks. Her back was always covered in labels, mine in her hand-me-downs. I was her last season shadow but I didn’t mind. She made me feel like I belonged. Ellie showed me the ropes, let me in on a sliver of the childhood I never got. She was my sparkle. What I learned growing up beside her, collecting her left over sparkle, was that no matter how much time we spent together, no matter how much she shared, she was never threatened because she knew she was always going to be better than me. Her charity didn’t threaten anything. Sometimes I wondered though, if we hadn’t been cousins would we be this inseparable? When you’re short on friends though, and don’t know the secret to making more you don’t overthink those things. You just accept them.

She was a stretch of black pavement away, thirty minutes if you’re speeding, but it felt so much further. We had separate lives. Oxford Heights and Guilderland possessed vastly different atmospheres, there was an elitism I only heard about cross-town. Father said we moved out of there when I was young so he didn’t raise brats. Ellie and I briefly recollected our teenage angst every encounter we shared. Other than that we only reminisced on the memories we created, including the week’s worth we were about to remember for the rest of our lives. I had never gone on holiday without my family before. I didn’t have a single ounce of fear, just pure foolish excitement.

“Y’all coming or what? All of my stuff is already packed in the car,” Ellie threw her fists on her hips and waited to see us moving in response.

Her enthusiasm pulled me out of the haze and lit a fire under my ass. I scuttled with arms open wide to all of my possessions, so I could pile them into the Camry trunk. Little did I know, laundry baskets fit better than duffle bags, and I studied that trunk like a game of Tetris. As usual, Father was over thinking, over packing, over analyzing. Hydrogen peroxide, old baseball caps, and fishing line were necessities that we couldn’t leave behind in his mind. I don’t try to understand, but merely nod and smile. He’s Toula’s father from My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Broke a leg? Terminally ill? Family drama? Hydrogen peroxide will fix it.

At this point he was over talking to Liam and Felicity. Part of me always knew Father didn’t care for them much, he always thought they let Ellie get away with murder. He backed off for a week because he knew he’d never be able to take me on a vacation like this though. I appreciated it more than I led on.

Ellie and I were already strapped up in the back seat reading our Seventeen magazines. Now, Liam and Felicity were my mother’s cousins so Ellie was really only my second, but we were always excited to go somewhere new, having strangers assume we’re sisters. That’s what I liked about tagging along with them. I was an honorary daughter and sister. Our final goodbyes before our very underestimated trip, Father kissed my forehead through the low peeking window in between us. My hair anticipating blonde sunshine, my skin excited for a sheer layer of freckles, my legs thirsty for a tan - we were ready to go. The engine was running with that air conditioning blowing to the point where its uncomfortable frost clothed our knees alone. Sitting Indian-style I laid a pillow across my lap, half for comfort but mainly due to scarce room anywhere else. Whipping the car out of the driveway into the center of the cul-de-sac, Ellie and I could tell we weren’t the only ones excited to be smothered by the journeys of Delaware. I didn’t think twice about the feverish waves Father gave me through the tinted chamber of the Camry, but in hindsight I wish I could’ve held on to that hand forever.

His hands weren’t soft, but that’s what I loved about them. They were huge, perfect tickling war hands, ideal hair braiding hands. They had nails that grew precisely even, they were dry and dingy and cracked and they always smelled of nicotine. I never imagined them to be desirable hands but in between tears they were the only hands I wanted to hold. I took him for granted, I just didn’t know it yet. Daddy’s girl.

After seven hours, two movies, and countless sing-alongs to the best of The Doors we had finally arrived. Liam and Felicity were the parents every kid wanted: very hip, a little negligent, and a bit stuck in the ‘70s for comic relief. Bethany Beach, Delaware was our haven for the next week. We had nowhere else to go and that was exactly what the four of us wanted.

Settling in was one of my favorite parts. Walking into a gorgeous condo waiting for my touch of character, your shaving cream, brushes and make up bags to line the counter in the bathroom. Ridding the drawers of the old wood stench, like a weathered paperback book, I laid down a bathroom towel from home along the bottom and filled my folded shirts and shorts side by side. Sneakers for tennis and sandals for the beach lined accordingly beside the dresser and window. Now here was the debate - which gets the bed adjacent to the window? Ellie had her own bedroom and a separate playroom at home, so this week I just wanted a bed next to the window. Luckily she was too fatigued to state her case, and it was an easy defeat.

With things set to a tee, we headed off down the stairs and out to venture. It was like one of those villages you put atop your mantle at Christmas. Illuminated at night, the boardwalk was home to hundreds of shuffling feet in and out of restaurants and ice cream shops. Overwhelmed with its beauty, Ellie and I waited for the cameras to stop rolling and reality to set back in. As excited as we were, our bodies spoke louder crying for sleep, but our minds weren’t yet ready, time was flying too fast.

Felicity was always an early bird, said Ellie was wasting the day waking up at such late hours. Eight was her idea of a snooze, and off she was waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs holding a beach bag, and chairs while simultaneously struggling to put sunscreen on her back.

“You girls know you can sleep back at home! Lets go before the beach fills up! Ellie, your father has the snacks in his bag.”

“I’m not doing this shit every morning,” Ellie said, rolling her eyes over to me.

I would’ve agreed except I never really found justice in anything Ellie complained about. I shrugged. We were family, but I got the sense I was going to see her only-child flaws rise up this week. Soon enough our long blonde hair with waves to match the water, cotton cover-ups and J. Crew flip flops struggled behind. The Delaware sun shone upon us the entire mile we walked. I looked like a fool, switching my bag from shoulder to shoulder just to evenly strain them both. Shoulders back, leggy and standing tall, Ellie paraded ahead gracefully, as per usual.

We arrived at the private beach the first day, which was underwhelming to our judgmental side. We were satisfied tourists just people watching on the public beach from then on. Ellie and I loved nothing more than to people watch. Maybe we were too critical or too serious. When being politically correct was demanded more often at our heightening ages, it was nice to quietly analyze and giggle at strangers from a distance, to blame it on our naïve youth.

The days started to mesh together. Our mornings spent on bicycles through the villages, peak of the heat spent drinking Diet Coke in reclining sun chairs reading tabloids, nights experimenting with the local fare and live music. I always thought if someone took snap shots of our days they would be Polaroid, sporting a sunny faded tint over them. They were colliding in my mind, which night I had the catch of the day to which morning I ate two oranges at the beach while staring, trying to figure out how that fellow fit in his wet suit. Elastic never ceases to amaze me. Things were beginning to change though. It became apparent that Thursday afternoon that those coy stares weren’t only addictive, they were dangerous.

Allotted enough money for lunch and frozen yogurt, we made the getaway to Five Guys on the boardwalk. Ellie and I had an acquired style that followed us wherever we went. Not because we were flawless, but because we were merely insecure. The thing about thirteen and a half is you cover up all the things you aren’t with material things you wish you were. It was working so-so. We grabbed two chairs at the counter looking out the window, so we could eat and people watch as per usual.  Ellie and I ate our junior burgers side by side. That Thursday though was not like that Tuesday or even that Wednesday. They sat there innocently enough, on the bench outside directly across from us, taunting our teenage minds.

They were Ben and Jordan. They had vile intentions masked behind deceptive smiles. Fitting to our youthful immaturity, we scarfed down our meals quickly and while seeming cavalier, we sat on the other side of the bench from them. Obvious enough what we were doing, the boys spoke first.

My eyes were the only things that weren’t paralyzed. They darted over Ben like a pinball machine. He was certainly no chore to look at. He had that shorter sandy blonde hair that styled itself with salt water, and his skin. His skin looked soft and was tan but not tan enough where you questioned his ethnicity. I studied the freckles that sat on his shoulders, the ones his Celtics jersey didn’t hide. I wondered if he played basketball too, maybe he’d get a scholarship for college, maybe he was in college. I took turns looking at him because I didn’t want to stare, stole little glimpses of him, learning the curves of his face with every quick glance. Ben sure made Jordan look like charity. Jordan was a little sweaty, little doughy, and a little too talkative. You’d think he’d shutter looking at Ellie, but clearly his genetic setbacks didn’t stop him from trying to flirt. I felt those hazel eyes sweep over me whenever I was looking down, counting the nails in the boardwalk planks. I’d look up and see him looking at me. Ben looking at me. Ben’s eyes demanded mine back. As much as I loved the idea of him looking at me, wanting my attention, the reality was so much more nerve-wracking.

I let Ellie do the talking. If I spoke, I’d stumble over words like bad hopscotch and we’d never see them again. And when I say I let her do the talking, I mean she’s good with taking initiative. Her words make moves. A real go-getter. When I lump us together, it’s her abundance of confidence that averages out to mine being mediocre. I sat there, peering up occasionally, but mostly staring down picking at the hangnails decorating my nail beds. Inside our small talk we exchanged hometowns, ages, names, and Ellie’s number.

 Mistake One.

 The four of us went about the condo getting ready for the evening. Ellie’s dad, Liam, made a tradition of burning his dress shirts with an iron, and then his wife would have to salvage it with her secret cornstarch trick. Felicity took forever and a half to get herself ready for anything of importance because she usually meanders around the house with a glass of wine, getting drunk in the process, saying, “it helps me relax!”  With Ellie’s wise expertise, I had eyeliner on for the first time. Not having been introduced to contacts, my glasses were the humbling touch to my outfit of jean shorts, a white tank top, and a burgundy cardigan. Father just had to pick out the frames with butterflies with on the arms. Maybe that was his small effort to repel his daughter’s maturity. In the midst of organizing my ensemble I caught a glimpse from the corner of my eye of thumbs - moving quicker than ever. Jerking my head back, I saw Ellie texting Ben.

Yea for sure, we’re free after dinner. You?

Us too, we’ll be around the boardwalk. Meet at the beach by Sal’s shirt shop? 10?

Word. Your cousin coming?

Yea! She’s staying the whole week.

 Mistake Two.

 The center of the boardwalk was our meeting place. Liam and Felicity split to listen to some local talent. They were the type that considered live music a hobby. It was a stiff departure seeing as they were never physically affectionate to Ellie. More of a verbal “love you” rather than a hug and peck seemed to suffice. They headed west as we headed south down to the shore. My heart raced a little, that anxiousness rising up from my stomach, now sitting with its legs wrapped around my heart. This didn’t quite faze me, as almost everything incited that reaction. I simply thought we were walking along the water, forgetting about her racing thumbs from earlier. The straps of my sandals hooked on my finger we walked side by side down to the beach. The sand was cold but not that cold-it-feels-wet feeling, just cold. Gazing ahead to the barely visible horizon, I was startled to see those familiar smiles appear in front of us.

Wearing the same outfits as before showed that they weren’t trying too hard, but why were they there? Ellie quickly engaged in conversation like old pals, as I stood there puzzled. In another dimension I thought off, and thought, and wondered, and it clicked. It was planned and it wasn’t right.

 The Virgin Mary was isolated from the bliss and ignorance.

 We sat in a square behind the fences and grass that grew through the sand. Claiming to have taken part in the conversation, I was actually just an onlooker to the game. It was a game of risk. I just pictured us passing around a revolver, and the bullet was waiting for me. Who had done what, when, and how many times? All of the words quickly stirred together and topics changed too quickly for me to figure out the ones prior. How were there seeds and stems in buds if they hadn’t bloomed yet? My neighbor’s dog was named Molson, but I wasn’t aware you could drink him, and apparently I don’t need my softball uniform to get to third base. I couldn’t tell if Ellie was a prime liar or if she had been keeping a few untidy details from me.

Ellie was effortlessly popular, confident, and magnetic – her common knowledge was my astonishing discovery. I latched onto her like it was my saving grace from everything I was. She was less than a year older but worlds ahead. Ellie stood apart from everyone. She was the first to have a real bra, a real manicure, real experience. Boys loved that. We put her on a pedestal and they all climbed up to meet her. She spoke ambiguously enough so other girls could never steal her secrets. She never got lonely at the top. Her words spread like butter. So if she were lying, I’d never know. But she had the prerequisites, she had no reason to lie.

Then they look at me. They ask what I’ve done. I’ve done nothing. I kept my questions to a minimum to avoid the embarrassment. I responded with,

“Not much, woke up early had a parfait for breakfast, went to the beach with Ellie earlier.”

They laughed, and I think the boys had mistaken my sheer inability to adapt or socialize with quick wit, but I felt this pressure shining down on me in the pitch of night. I was embarrassing not myself, but Ellie. This nervousness had initiated that unholy muscle to press against my pea-sized bladder. The gates opened and the horses were off! I had to go like Seabiscuit and there was no stopping me.

 Mistake Three.

 Quickly hustling back to my designated spot in the sand you could say conversation was already winding to a finish. It was an hour young of midnight which was plenty for the youthful. We walked up back up to the boardwalk together and said our goodbyes. Timid, I simply nodded and smiled. It was a classic, my safety. Parting ways, Ellie and I met Liam and Felicity back at some restaurant down the boardwalk. We were exchanging nights, Ellie was pouring out lies, all believable - but still lies. While she was digging a hole of mistrust, I looked down on my phone.

It was a light that read an unknown number. That unknown number wanted to tell me that I looked so pretty. As flattering as it was, he was still a stranger. I responded.

 Mistake Four.

Ya know, there’s just something about you. You’re pure. And your eyes, I love them.

           Oh thank you, they’re real.

           Thank goodness, fake eyes creep me out. They always look so empty.

             The witty banter continued a while longer, and it made me wonder again how old Ben was. I wasn’t about to ask, as if I had a problem with it. Just made me wonder, why me? He must be five years my senior, an illegal difference regardless of chemistry. Pure?

My thumbs racing as fast as Ellie’s earlier that evening, I was blinded by the empty compliments and conniving plans being mapped out. I was never the hero, but always the sidekick. I was never the fries, but always the ketchup. Know what I mean? I had to seize a rare opportunity. Maybe what I reveled in most was making Ellie my ketchup for once. All of the sudden I was the one who was preparing a lie! The Virgin Mary doesn’t lie, but starting with Ben, there were going to be dozens of necessary lies to follow. Words flew from condo to condo, phone to phone, until the early hours of the morning. That led to a break in the cycle.

 Friday August 1:

 We woke up late. We didn’t ride bicycles. However, we did sit on the beach. The tabloids were in the bags, I had a better story instead. They wanted to meet up that night at the same spot. It was our last full day in Bethany and it was crucial. Our hearts raced with anticipation and wonder and excitement.

We told Ellie’s parents we were going to go to the local movie theatre down the boardwalk, a stretch from Liam and Felicity who were supposed to meet old friends for drinks. I wasn’t sure how they knew people there, apparently they were friends of Felicity’s from college. Odd, but figuring that out wasn’t on my list of priorities at that moment. It was to successfully spew lies out of a thirteen-year-old girl’s mouth. They were successfully spewed lies. Take my word for it.

Two tickets, fifteen dollars, and minutes later, we walked out of the theatre. Had to keep a paper trail in case there were questions later on. We met by the bathrooms, the four of us. Our conversation the night before hadn’t settled the awkward small talk, but only heightened it. We walked down to the beach, walked along the water. Jordan was quite fond of Ellie from the looks of it. Jordan was ketchup. I had Ben chasing after me. I didn’t know that it was a game, a literal chase with a literal prize. A revolver. Looking down listening to Ben talk, I watched my toes sink into the wet sand. I should’ve looked up sooner, but I didn’t. I looked up to see nothing.

 Where was Ellie? Where was I?

 Neon shirts can’t save you now

The blanket of night wraps around any light

The excitement of the beach, she understands the danger now

With his hand over her mouth, she put up a silent fight

 She squirms, he scolds

As she tries to escape, the tighter his hold

The sand’s comfort disappears

Pushing her against it unleashes her fears

 Excruciating, one word to describe the pain

Tears pouring so hard she’s about to faint

Dripping down in hope his hand will slip off her mouth

But he persists to invade south

 He finished, stood up, told her she was easy

Left there, stripped naked of her dignity

Barely capable of clothing herself

She trembles, she shakes, her body aches

Happiness for the rest of the trip she fakes

 Location couldn’t change what happened, and the only thing at home I missed were Father’s hands. Seeing his crooked smile as I pulled up in the driveway widen, I was hesitant to get out of the car, as if he could see the shame splashed across my face. He ran towards me, and those hands picked me up in the air faster than I could say hello. He spun me around, set me down, put my face in his hands and examined me. I could tell he missed me just by the reek of nicotine on his hands - quite the chain smoker when he’s anxious. He said freckles looked perfect on me, and how more grown up I looked after just a week. I just stood there with my face against his warm hands, and let myself cry. I let his palms fill with my wet apologies. My tears were no longer water, but thoughts and regrets. That was my home, the only man I could trust, the only hands that could ever hold me again.

How long does it take to deface someone? Seconds, minutes, hours? Something about being violated takes time away from you. It takes feelings, words, smiles away from you. It smothers you in silence, in shame, in questions you’d never dare try answering. Something about being raped ruins you. Something about logic feels like a mirage, a distant daydream. I still keep that denim skirt in the back of my closet, the one he broke the zipper on in his heat of the moment, the one he just pushed up instead, the one that used to be my favorite. I come across it every time I clean out my closet but never get rid of it. I’m not sure what good it does me, hanging on to my stolen virginity. Maybe that skirt is the only thing I do have control over. Whenever I pick it up, I always make sure to place my thumb over the edge, where that spot of dried blood lay. It looks brown kind of like chocolate now, all these years later, but it feels fresh. I rub my thumb across the stiff blood knowing Father’s hydrogen peroxide would probably get it out. I never get it out.

#short story #me too #times up #writers on tumblr #freelance #short stories

[justinmoviereviews]

The Class of 2019

As always, just trying to catalog what I saw this year. Let’s do this shit.

1917 - Sam Mendes

I’ve never seen a war movie like this. I’ve never seen something that was so empty, so decayed and lifeless. Usually these things are about honor or brotherhood or whatever. This one was a horror movie. Gothic. Disturbing. And credit Dunkirk for helping everyone else realize that war movies should be told in the present tense.

Uncut Gems - Bennie and Josh Safdie

Good Time was better because it’s rawness was more painful. Because it’s kineticism was more sociological. Because it physically hurt to watch it. And because Robert Pattinson is a better actor than Adam Sandler (my sincere apologies). But these guys have figured out to a science how to film desperation and visceral consumption and need; they chronicle the ugliest parts of the mind and shoot them in the ugliest parts of New York. 

Little Women - Greta Gerwig

Oh no, I’ve lost interest in writing these. Greta Gerwig is sharper than the average writer, and is going to get a lot of mileage writing interesting female characters, which will keep me occupied way longer than, for instance, JJ Abrams writing Strong Female characters so he gets to keep his third house. But look for this refrain whenever I see good movies that aren’t really made for me, my favorite character here was Timothee Chalamet, popping up sporadically to mack (suavely!) on all three sisters.

Bombshell - Jay Roach

Structurally it’s a little bit of a mess, but Megyn Kelly playing detective to an internal corporate scandal works surprisingly well.

The Two Popes - Fernando Meirelles

Some nitpicks: this movie engages with the child abuse a little bit, but it doesn’t offer any resolution--how could it? The scandal is ongoing, and has mired the legacy of Francis, the good Pope, just like it mired his predecessor’s, the bad one. And some of the dialogue is a little trite; was Benedict this much of a close-minded conservative? Was he really this bad at selling his own vision of the church? I also wonder if movies seem smaller now that we’re watching them all on our TVs. But mostly I thought this was fantastic. I love movies about ideas centered around conversation, and this one does it with so much humanism. The Pope as a role is one of the most complex, elite and fascinating people on the planet. This movie comes so much closer to showing that than I thought it would.

Marriage Story - Noah Baumbach

A cursory search of images from this movie for this post makes me realize how well it’s shot--maybe this really was meant to be his Scenes From a Marriage. It isn’t--he’s not a good enough director to ever be Bergman, he’s too burdened by the things he likes and thinks about, like hipster references and witty repartee--but this is the best movie of his I’ve ever seen. Funny, sharp, and if it isn’t a universal depiction of the disillusion of love, it’s empathetic and compassionate about two characters he likes and cares about. Adam Driver is the best actor working right now. Scarlett Johansson can’t quite keep up, but who could?

Ford v Ferrari - James Mangold

Fast cars and the manly men who build them. This could have been better--the writing is a little too beholden to a generic structure that’s beneath the A+ power of Matt Damon and Christian Bale, who are, straight up, two of our finest actors. Ideally this flick just lets these two dudes dick around for 150 minutes. But fuck man, this shit rocks.

The irishman - Martin Scorsese

This is the calm gangster movie made by a bunch of men who haven’t had to hustle in 30 years. Scorsese is a smart guy, so he probably knows that a de-aged Robert De Niro isn’t going to be as resonant as some young hotshot trying like hell to make a name for himself. It makes the movie weirdly low-stakes, and it only truly comes alive at the end, when De Niro is looking back on his life and facing his regrets, like a man in his 80s ought to be. But look, Scorsese is one of the best to ever do it, and gangster movies are where he lives. If this is mostly a retrospective on four of the best careers to ever track through Hollywood, and I sort of think it is, it’s still got ten scenes that will stand up against any of our man’s best.

The Laundromat - Steven Soderbergh

Steven Soderbergh does The Big Short. Turns out he’s also pretty good at it.

The Lighthouse - Robert Eggers

Robert Eggers is a formalist who understands that movies can be about whatever they want as long as they look good and sound good. This is a movie about, I think, madness. Just madness, just the idea of being isolated and going mad. If you’re wondering, like I was, if that’s enough of a theme to hang a whole movie on (I mean, these things are expensive), well, I think the point of this one is that it’s weird as fuck, it looks real good and it sounds real good. 

Parasite - Bong Joon Ho

This movie is at it’s best when it’s at it’s weirdest. I like Bong most when he’s using a heightened absurdity to point out the ways in which our political systems are unforgivable. 

Motherless Brooklyn - Edward Norton

I know it was in the book, but the Tourette’s syndrome of the main character seems to me like a postmodern tic, like making a straight noir in 2019 wasn’t enough for a studio that assumed audiences would need some kind of a 21st Century bent. I don’t think it adds much to the story, so I want it out there that this is just such a good fucking straight noir. I would personally finance it if they made like three of these a year. 

High Flying Bird - Steven Soderbergh

Soderbergh is gonna need to get over his love affair with the iPhone camera--someone needs to remind him that movies can look a lot better than this--but this is the kind of movie that could have been and maybe started as a play. Things happen off camera and all you see is characters talking about them after the fact. But the writing is phenomenal. Snappy and smart. Maybe my favorite script of the year.

Joker - Todd Phillips

Upon further review, I think this movie never should have been made, but I do like it. I’m not a purist, frankly I think comic book movies are for nerds, but what makes the Joker powerful is that he doesn’t have a backstory. This movie isn’t good enough to justify giving him one, but it’s so ambiguous and strange that it doesn’t ruin anything either. I spent a lot of time wondering if the events of the movie actually happened, or if they were all in the protagonist’s head. I guess the answer is that it doesn’t really matter: if it all did happen it would destroy the throughline of the Nolan movies, and if it all didn’t it would make the movie kind of lame. Ultimately it’s a story about a discarded man who learns that evil gives him a control he never had before. That’s a heavy topic to make a movie about, and a better movie would have been heavier. But  it’s still an interesting watch, and Joaquin Phoenix goes to the places the movie itself won’t.

Ad Astra - James Gray

I have nothing against pretentious movies. Some of my best friends are pretentious movies! But if you’re going to be as solemn and portentous as this one is, I think your thesis needs to be a little more insightful than that love is important. This movie looks fantastic. It’s got killer monkeys in it, and an Apocalypse Now meets 2001 pedigree. It should have been a lot better.

It Chapter Two - Andy Muschietti

Ugh, this one was not good. The writing is pretty bad, storylines open up and fizzle out without going anywhere, the structure is simple to the point of being lazy. The first one was so good, and this is just a crappy cash-in. Oh well. 

Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood - Quentin Tarantino

Look, Tarantino is probably my favorite director. Pulp Fiction is the movie that first taught me to love movies, and he’s never in his life made an artistic choice that I didn’t intuitively understand. I don’t think anyone else has justified their otherworldly self-confidence more than he has. If other directors are more artistically or technically accomplished, I’d struggle to find anyone who better put the thoughts and images in their brain onto celluloid better than him. If this had been made by some new hotshot named Chris Anderson or something, I’m buying a poster of it and telling everyone who will listen about the breakout auteur of the decade. But for the first time in my entire life, I wondered what Tarantino’s point was. Why did he make this movie? The highlight, for me, is Leonardo DiCaprio, who since Django Unchained has apparently realized that he’s at his best when he’s hamming it up and having a blast.

Midsommar - Ari Aster

Two movies in, Ari Aster has mastered tone. My man is in control of his movie from frame one, and the result is that his stuff feels smart. This one wasn’t as wild or unexpected as Hereditary--in fact the most surprising thing about it is that it really isn’t surprising at all; it’s about a sinister cult in northern Sweden, and it hits all the beats that tagline would suggest. But that’s not the same as saying it’s predictable--he still has a gift for ultraviolence, and he hovers in a space that forces you to prepare yourself for anything. My only complaint is that I wish it had been more of a mindfuck. It’s ultimately a simpler movie than you might hope for. But this guy isn’t going anywhere. He’ll be on the prestige list for as long as he wants.

The Perfection - Richard Shepard

If Allison Williams is going to make a career out of deconstructing overachieving white girls, I don’t want it to get lost that she is also insanely hot. Like, just so hot. Anyway, this is one hell of a grindhouse flick, all the way down to being a little less pleasant than you’d expect or even really want. Watch it on a Saturday afternoon and feel a little queasy afterwards.

Avengers: Endgame - Anthony and Joe Russo 

Look, I don’t know what to say to you if you take these movies seriously. You probably wouldn’t like my blog anyway. I thought this was a really good ride. If you have problems with the plot holes or the character inconsistencies, I might recommend catching something other than the final installments of global franchises that are obligated to gross two billion dollars.

Us - Jordan Peele

If Jordan Peele were a quarterback he’d be Deshaun Watson--a top level talent who’s going to be relevant for at least the next ten years. Get Out was a statement, a cheap little movie from one half of a decent sketch comedy show that blew the doors off the tavern and walked in so much smarter and better than anyone was prepared for. But right now, sitting on my couch, Us is the movie I want to watch. It was never going to be as surprising as Get Out because this time out our expectations were so much higher. But this is the kind of movie I ultimately want him to make his fortune with--funny, scary, worth talking about afterwards. A horror movie from a guy with interesting ideas who’s been given the keys to do whatever he wants.

Glass - M. Night Shyamalan

I caught this bad boy in January. At the time I figured there was no way I’d remember anything about it by the end of the year. I don’t.