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stripetkattelalala54-gf · 1 month

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Rainbow Madness

Summary: While riding a roller coaster, Mario gets a little bit too much reminded of a certain Rainbow Road incident. Takes place sometime after the movie.

TW: Panic attack

Characters: Mario, Luigi, Mia, Pio, Tony, Arthur, Sofia (Mario and Luigi's little niece)

“I wanna go on that one!”, Sofia exclaimed excitedly, bouncing on her feet as she pointed to a massive roller coaster that extended high into the sky towering over all the other roller coasters that were nearby. It was her 10th birthday so the whole family had agreed to do something a little bit more special than usual to celebrate it.

Since they all knew how much she loved the Mushroom Kingdom ever since Mario and Luigi took her and the rest of the family there to show them around and how much she loved amusement parks, they agreed that combining these two things together would make a good birthday present for her.

So, Mario had asked Peach if amusement parks existed in the Mushroom Kingdom. Peach had looked at him confused at first but after explaining the concept, her face lit up and she informed him that the Mushroom Kingdom indeed had something like an amusement park albeit under a different name.

Now it was him, Luigi, Uncle Arthur, Uncle Tony, mom, dad, and Sofia walking through the FunMush park. They played various games, went on different rides, and tried food which they had never heard of before. It was nice and everyone was having fun. Aunt Marie hadn’t been able to come with them as she had fallen sick. Sofia was sad at first that her mother couldn’t come with them, but that sadness vanished as soon as they set foot in the FunMush park.

Sofia was still bouncing on her feet as she looked at them excitingly.

“Sure, thing sweety we can go on that one”, Uncle Arthur said, laughing. “Who’s coming with us?”

“As if you even have to ask”, Uncle Tony responded with a smirk. “Mario, Luigi you coming too?”

“Of course”, Luigi said without hesitation. Just like Marilyn, Mario could see the excitement radiating off his brother. Despite of everything that Luigi was afraid of, his brother loved roller coasters. Mario normally enjoyed them too but today he couldn’t help but feel uneasy whenever they went on one. Up to that point, all the roller coasters had been relatively small. Still, memories of the Rainbow Road fiasco resurfaced whenever he found himself on one of those rides, but it was manageable.

Now looking at this big roller coaster that was a few feet away from them, made the knot in his stomach that had been there ever since the first ride he went on today, grow even more. It absolutely didn’t help that the roller coaster was very bright and colourful itself.

Mario swallowed thickly but immediately recovered when he saw his whole family staring at him as they still waited for an answer from him. He forced himself to smile. “Yeah, sure I’m coming too.”

It was probably going to be fine anyway. It was only a roller coaster. He would survive a ride on this even if it made him uncomfortable. He never told his family about the Rainbow Roadpart of his adventure not even Luigi. It was a part of his journey that he’d rather forget, the feeling of terror when the explosion threw him off the road and the feeling of hopelessness and despair when he and DK were swallowed by that eel was not something he was eager to voice out loud.

Besides it was probably nothing in comparison to what his brother had to endure during those three days. His family didn’t need to worry about him too when Luigi was already clearly struggling because of everything that happened. It was fine. He could deal with it himself. He pointedly ignored the voice that told him that he hadn’t slept a full night since he came back because he had nightmares about either the Rainbow Road incident, Luigi dying or Bowser beating him up or some combinations of those scenarios that way too often involved that Luigi somehow got hurt or died because he was unable to protect him. Or that he once almost had a panic attack when there had been a sudden loud noise. Or that one time when Luigi came back home a bit later than he’d said he would. Or-

“Mia, Pio are you coming as well?” Uncle Arthur asked, pulling Mario out of his racing thoughts. “I think we rather sit this one out”, his mom said with a smile. “But you go and have fun. We’ll be waiting just right next by the exit of the ride.”

“Well then let’s go!”, Uncle Arthur cheered. Sofia let out a happy squeak before she was running off on her own. Uncle Arthur laughed following her right behind. “C’mon”, Uncle Tony waved, signalling for Mario and Luigi to follow too.

They made their way through the crowd and before Mario knew it, they were right in front of the roller coaster. Uncle Arthur and Sofia were already standing in line waving them over as soon as they saw them.

Only now that they were right in front of the roller coaster, made Mario realize just how big it was; It was towering over them, its twists and turns extending high into the sky and the colours were dizzyingly bright. It made his heart beat faster but not in a good way.

Mario’s heart felt like it would stop when he got a look of the name of the roller coaster. “Rainbow Madness” was written in the same bright colours as the roller coaster was itself. This had to be a joke. Because of course the name would have a remarkable resemblance to the thing he absolutely didn’t want to think about. Just perfect. It did not help with his growing uneasiness at all.

The nearer it was their turn for the ride, the worse it got. He clapped his fingers together in a nervous manner and he could feel a cold sweat forming on his brows.

His uneasiness must’ve been more visible than he thought because Luigi suddenly nudged him gently into his side. “You okay?”, he asked in a concerned tone but silent enough so that others wouldn’t hear him. “I’m fine”, he waved his brother off. Luigi didn’t seem to be convinced. “Are you sure? You’re really tense”, he pressed again. “Yeah, of course”, Mario smiled this time in the hopes that it was enough to convince his brother that he was fine.

Luigi looked like he wanted to say something more but before he could do it, the line cleared up and it was their turn.

Mario climbed into the seat next to Luigi while Sofia and Uncle Arthur took a seat together behind them and Uncle Tony a seat behind those two. Then the safety harness clicked into place. His heart started to race even more now that he knew that there was no going back. It was okay. It was only a roller coaster nothing bad would happen while riding it, he told himself.

The roller coaster suddenly gave a jolt, and before Mario knew it, the ride began its way up the steep descent. His breathing quickened even though he tried to remain calm. It was okay, he told himself over and over again. It was only barely working. He gripped the safety harness tighter as the ride went up higher and higher. This had been a bad idea. He should’ve just stayed down and made up some excuse why he wasn’t coming on the ride. Just as they were about to reach the peak of the ride, a loud bang echoed through the park and Mario’s heart dropped and his breath got caught in his throat.

And then he was falling. His ears were ringing, he couldn’t hear anything. The explosion had been deafening. He was falling. He was going to die. He was going to die without being able to safe his brother. Luigi was going to die because of him. Their family would never know what happened to them. They would never know it was his fault.

He was falling and he was going to die and there was nothing that he could do about it and why was it so hard to breathe and oh god he was still falling, was this never going to end-

“Mario!”

Mario gasped for air as his surroundings came vaguely back into focus. He was on a roller coaster that was moving at a breakneck speed was the first thing he realized. The second thing, he realized was that he wasn’t breathing right. He was choking and he could barely get enough air in.

It’s gonna be okay, just hang on!”, a voice shouted next to him, but Mario could barely hear it over his own heartbeat. The roller coaster took its twists and turns, and Mario could do nothing more than to just hold on.

He squeezed his eyes shut, clutching the safety bar of the roller coaster as if it was a lifeline. His breathing was still too fast, making it hard to get enough air into his lungs. Dizziness was washing over him, and he felt like he would pass out at any moment.

Suddenly the roller coaster came to a screeching halt, and everything stopped. Somebody took him by the arm, nudging him to stand up but his legs felt like jelly. They only supported him for a few steps, and he would have collapsed on the ground if it hadn’t been for the person’s firm grip on him.

He was being led away a few steps before he was being gently lowered down to the floor. Everything was spinning, his chest felt like it was too tight making it impossible to get enough air in. His hands gripped at his chest, pulling at his shirt. He needed it off, he needed room to breathe, he needed-

A hand touched his shoulder shortly, but it was enough to make him flinch.

“Hey”, the voice suddenly spoke again. “Hey breathe with me. Just follow my lead.”

“In. Hold it. Out.”

Mario tried desperately to do as he was told, but the air just wouldn’t fill his lungs. He coughed and choked.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, try again.”

“In.” Mario took a shaky breath in. “Hold it.” He held it for a few seconds. “Out.” Mario breathed out again.

“Good, very good. Try again.”

Mario did. He did it again and again until he was finally able to breathe normally.

That was when his surroundings finally came back into focus. Luigi was kneeling only a few inches in front of him, concern and fear clearly written over his face.

A little bit more behind standing, were Uncle Tony, Uncle Arthur, his parents and Sofia. They had the same concerned expression while Sofia looked scared, clutching Uncle Arthur’s hand. Oh. Oh no.

“You back with us bro?”, Luigi asked in a soft tone.

Giving a shaky nod was all that Mario was capable of. His throat felt like it was on fire making it impossible to form any words. He felt completely exhausted. It was as if all his energy just got sucked out.

Mario could hear footsteps and then his mom was kneeling right in front of him too. She put her hand on his cheek which made him instinctively lean into it. He felt like he could fall asleep right there.

“What happened tesoro? Are you okay?”, his mom’ s concerned voice brought him out of his haziness. She gave him the same worried look as Luigi.

Mario opened his mouth to give a respond, but his throat still hurt too much to speak. And if he was being honest with himself, what would he even say? He didn’t want to tell what actually happened. He would only ruin Sofia’s birthday even more than he already had, and he would make his family unnecessarily worry about something that he shouldn’t even be struggling with. But he was also physically and emotionally too exhausted to come up with a lie.

“Mario?”

His mom looked even more worried than before which made Mario realize that he must have stayed silent for a bit too long. He gave her a smile and a quick thumbs up to signal her that everything was fine, but it was clear that she and Luigi didn’t believe him.

“Mario-“, Luigi started this time but Mario interrupted him.

“I’m fine”, Mario pressed the words out. It hurt but it was necessary to convince Luigi and his mom that he was fine enough to continue because he really didn’t want to ruin Sofia’s birthday completely and he certainly didn’t want to talk about anything that happened back there.

Luigi and his mom still didn’t look convinced, but they seemed to understand that Mario wouldn’t talk, so they didn’t press any further.

“Alright. Then let’s go back to the others”, his mom said. She gave his shoulder one last comforting squeeze before she stood up.

Luigi got up from his kneeling position too, extending a hand towards him to help him stand up as well. Mario gratefully took it. His legs still felt wobbly, but it wasn’t as bad as it was before. Together they walked to where Uncle Tony, Uncle Arthur, Sofia and his dad were standing.

They all looked worried but before anybody could say anything, his mom spoke up: “Everything’s okay now.” She gave them a pointed look that clearly said, “no asking questions” and Mario was glad for that. Then she turned to Sofia with a smile. “Say, Sofia what do you want to do next?” At that Sofia immediately brightened up as she pointed to the next thing she wanted to do.

The rest of the family joined and so the day continued. Mario tried to be joyful during the whole time, forcing himself to smile and laugh whenever Sofia pulled him and the rest of the family into new games to try out.

While he knew that Luigi and his mom could probably look right through him as they kept a close eye on him, he hoped that at least the others wouldn’t be able to. Though from time to time he could see that even his father gave him a concerned look, so it didn’t seem that he was doing a convincing job. He was so tired. All he wanted to do was lay down in a bed and sleep forever.

Finally, the day came slowly to an end. The sun had already begun to sink behind the horizon as they went back home. Since Aunt Marie was sick, it was his mom who took over with cooking. She prepared spaghetti with meatballs as Sofia had wished for her birthday.

After dinner there was cake that Aunt Marie had already baked the day before. Sofia was still in high spirits even though it was starting to get late and even though they spent the whole day at the FunMush park.

Mario though for his part felt very tired. Not having been able to sleep through a whole night, either because of his own or Luigi’s nightmares, since he was back plus the panic attack from today, really made the exhaustion catch up with him for good. So not long after the cake but also not too short to seem unpolite, Mario excused himself.

Nobody said anything against it, not even Uncle Arthur or Uncle Tony teased him about getting to bed ‘quite early for someone his age’, which probably meant that he must’ve looked as bad as he felt. They all just wished him a good night and then Mario was finally alone in his and Luigi’s room.

He put on his pyjamas, brushed his teeth, and crawled under his bed sheets, ready to just fall asleep and forget everything that happened today when the door to the room opened. Mario didn’t even need to open his eyes to know that it was Luigi.

The light was turned on, footsteps could be heard before he felt the bed dip beside him. A hand touched his shoulder.

“Hey”, Luigi began in a soft tone. There was a longer pause before he continued, seemingly needing to gather his thoughts first. “You- This afternoon on that roller coaster- you really freaked out there. It really scared me too. What happened? I’ve never seen you like this.”

Mario took a few seconds before he finally turned around to face his brother. There was nothing but concern written over his face. He knew he couldn’t lie. He was in no state to pretend that everything was fine, and Luigi already knew that something was wrong. But he also really didn't want to talk about it. He didn’t need Luigi to worry about additional things when he already had enough to deal with himself.

But then again, he knew that he would need to talk about it at some point because he knew that Luigi would absolutely worry if he didn’t talk about it. Mario sighed. Better get it over with now.

Mario sat up so that he was able to face his brother.

“I guess”, he started, “this roller coaster just reminded me of the whole Rainbow Road fiasco.”

“Cranky- DK’s father- suggested using karts to quickly return to the Mushroom Kingdom via a shortcut so that we could ambush Bowser and his troop during their attack”, Mario explained. “The shortcut was a rainbow road. Literally. It was a rainbow that served as a road. It was unbelievable.”

Mario paused and took moment to gather his thoughts. He didn’t know why it was so hard to form into words what happened back there. Still, he forced himself to continue.

“So”, Mario went on, “it turns out that Bowser knew we were going that route and his troop ambushed us instead. The whole chase was crazy. It kinda felt like being on a roller coaster.”

Mario took a deep breath.

“We did almost manage to escape them. But then a blue-shelled koopa flew towards us and exploded right on me and DK. I don’t know how, and I honestly try not to think about it”, he chuckled but there was no humour to it. “Anyway, the road broke and we were falling. I thought I was gonna- but then we hit the water. Which was good I guess until we were eaten by a gigantic eel.”

Not wanting to go into more detail, Mario just carried on. “But of course we made it out and yeah. That was that.” Not really knowing what to say anymore, he stopped talking.

“Whoa.” Was all that Luigi said.

“But it’s okay, I’m fine-“

“No you’re not”, interrupted Luigi. “Are you even listening to yourself? You had a panic attack today because of what experienced on that rainbow road. You are clearly not fine.” There was no anger in Luigi’s voice. It was like he was just stating a fact.

Mario’s first instinct was to protest that he was fine, but he paused. He did have frequently nightmares about it even though it was not the only event he had nightmares about. The panic attack today didn’t make things better. He was tired. He was so so tired.

Luigi took gently his hands into his. “I’m sorry I didn’t notice you were struggling this much. I-“

“No, Luigi, no!” Mario couldn’t help but stop Luigi right there. “It’s not your fault, you weren’t even supposed to know. You have enough struggles yourself you don’t need to be burdened with mine.”

Luigi gave him a sad look.

“We can take care of each other”, he said. “You don’t always have to be strong you know. I’m here for you too just like you are for me.”

Before Mario knew it, he started trembling. Everything was just too much. A lump started to form in his throat and his eyes started to burn. He swallowed but the lump didn’t go away.

Warm arms enveloped him. He was being pulled close until Mario was buried into Luigi’s chest. The trembling intensified, and before he could stop it, the tears started to trail down his face. A hand started to stroke through his hair while Mario tried to focus on Luigi’s heartbeat to help get a hold of himself. It wasn’t working.

His body shook with his sobs, so he gave up and just let it go through the motions. Luigi held him the whole time, never once letting go.

When he finally managed to get a hold of himself, he felt even more tired which he didn’t think was possible. Mario didn’t have the strength to protest when Luigi laid him down and covered him with a blanket.

“Sleep. I think you really need it”, was the last thing he heard before he fell asleep.

Later that night, he awoke again from a nightmare. He shot up, trembling and shaking. It was hard to breathe, his throat was on fire like he was drowning. Like he was back in that cold water waiting to die, knowing Luigi would die too because he wouldn’t be able to save him-

And then warm arms were suddenly around him, holding him close very similar just like a few hours ago. “You’re okay”, Luigi said as he soothingly rubbed his back.

Mario didn’t say anything, he was just clinging to him until he was able to calm down. He vaguely realized that Luigi must have anticipated that there was a chance that he would be having a nightmare tonight. Mario had gotten used to wake up quietly after a nightmare so he wouldn’t wake up his brother and tonight hadn’t been any different.

So, either Luigi stayed up the whole time or he was just sleeping very lightly which often happened when he was worried about something. It was probably the latter one.

Finally, after who knows how long, Mario managed to calm down again. Still, he didn’t want to let go. He wasn’t ready to lose Luigi’s comforting touch just yet. He didn't… he didn’t want to sleep alone. He also didn’t want to voice all of these things because he didn’t want to inconvenient Luigi any further than he already had. Apparently, it wasn’t even necessary.

As if Luigi could read his mind, he took Mario by the hand and guided him over to his bed. No words were spoken, and they didn’t need to. Luigi gently laid them both down on the bed in a way that Mario was now laying on Luigi’s chest with arms wrapped protectively around him.

It was a weird position to be in. Normally Mario was the one who held Luigi like this. Arms wrapped protectively around him, letting his brother know that he was always there for him, giving him comfort and a sense of being protected. Being the one who was receiving this kind of hug now was definitively something he was not used to.

It felt good though. It felt good to be able to be vulnerable and knowing that somebody was there to hold you through it.

Mario closed his eyes and let sleep wash over him.

#smb #mario #luigi #super mario bros #super mario bros movie #the super mario bros #super mario #braincellfic #slightly nervous about posting this but I've been working on this way too long so here we go #tw panic attack

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cookii-moon · 11 months

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@squib-2006 honkai IS amazing I love it so much the story the characters guehdhehhb

It’s mostly just a silly fun idea rn with barely coherent concepts tumbling around my mind, sadly I don’t think anything will come out of it bc I don’t think there’s much demand for it :( the curse of having a special interest and a hyperfixation that are worlds apart.

so obviously the origin story for ninjago would need to be altered a bit, like instead of the overlord it was some sort of herrscher-esque (though much more powerful) conscience that awoke and with it started the endless honkai as this AUs form of the balance yk yk.

Anyways just like in the game the honkai are a constant force that evolve and change, but instead of the silly abstract monsters and zombies we see in the honkai universe they take on other forms like stone warriors, nindroids (via corrupting the code or whatever) yada yada (maybe the serpentine?? Toying with the idea that a sentient species was born as a result of the honkai or even honkai infections in humans) with the battle between the FSM and the overlord and the first serpentine war being major honkai eruption events that resulted in the birth of the herrschers and their successors one by one, i e, the elemental masters.

I don’t really know how the fsm would work in this universe, maybe as like a fruit of like an equivalent to the imaginary tree or whatever and used his creation powers to craft the land and humanity was then born, but upon doing so the overlord (I feel like they’d have a different name since it’d be more of a sentient entity, maybe the overlord themself was like also a fruit of the imaginary tree?? And essentially the first herrscher??) also came into being and with it the honkai were born and spread across the island. The fsm saw this disaster and he gathered some people he saw potential in, gifting them temporary powers either in the form of artifacts or whatever to help him fight back the honkai spread. In this universe they were actually successful in killing the overlord (for good. Kind of.) and the honkai vanished

…until only a few years later when a massive energy spike disrupted the entire world, and one of his generals (I e one of the first elemental masters) became the first, well, originally human herrscher. The honkai came back in full force and more herrschers were born from both strangers and allies alike until the entirety of the dark island side of ninjago was compromised and the fsm made the decision to seal the herrschers and break apart the island to prevent the spread, essentially abandoning that part of the population (were there survivors? Is there still civilization on the dark island that managed to beat back the honkai and start villages and communities that are bitter and consider the currently sealed herrschers their chance at vengeance? Who knows!) and trying to forget.

fast forward to the serpentine war. The serpentine being either another group of people like usual or having smthn to do with the honkai, I dunno. I think the honkai approach is more interesting personally and like exploring a sentient and fully intelligent honkai being but I’m not sure. The serpentine and humans are afraid and tense and Chen pulls strings (Chen might be like a sort of herrscher Stan but for his own ambitions in this AU instead of anacondrai stan) and it erupts into a war. Wu had been preparing since in this AU Morro would become a herrscher host after the whole golden weapons fiasco and he, knowing the last time this happened was aware that it could signal an oncoming of honkai formed the elemental alliance as a countermeasure (with the elemental alliance essentially being Valkyrie equivalents given special powers, weapons, artifacts etc. to help the fight against the honkai) (also not fully related but this is honkai x ninjago so yeah wu kills Morro so now Morro is justified) though unlike with the FSM this alliance would be much less strained and more friendly, with many familial bonds being developed while they fought side by side. At first they just dealt with the occasional stray honkai and politics and such, until Chen initiated the war. At some point Earth (no clue what the master of earths name would be here - it’s worth noting that in this AU none of the EMs are inherently related since herrschers jump between hosts and don’t need blood relations to do so, though some might be for plot purposes) begins to feel sympathetic for the serpentine, jumpstarted by Chens influence, and defects to fight on their side of the war, at some point being awakened as a herrscher or causing a herrscher awakening (why not both? The EA (omg that’s actually the abbreviation for elemental alliance that’s hilarious) being forced to watch as one of their own becomes a herrscher as a result of betrayal (maybe they were super close to earth..) and getting caught in the middle of a massive honkai event that decimates the environment. No longer is it about the war, the humans and anacondrai are both trying to flee and save as many of their own as they can now that the herrschers are going ballistic at each other, having completely forgotten anything else around them… mmm… delicious angst)

Earth is eventually killed (The new host is chosen surprisingly quickly as a little girl… cough cough Lilly cough cough) and the serpentine are sealed (maybe alongside other ems? I dunno, the war is messy and I don’t feel like fleshing it out too much) using the same techniques the fsm used to seal the herrschers on the dark island and all is well until suddenly the time twins cause a massive honkai event and become herrschers - intentionally - and the ea manage to like I dunno subdue them boring answer or snap them out of it but realize they chose this route yada yada angst betrayal sadness trust issues blah blah blah after a long fight since they lost most of their numbers (I only highlighted earth and an anonymous em but there were probably casualties, not all ems will be herrschers simply because that’d be too many herrschers and it’d get stale) yeah it ends in the time vortex but Krux breaks free of it using herrscher powers or whatever Acronix was in a coma or smthn so that’s why he didn’t do the same and then Krux begins his evil master plan of conquering the world using an army of controlled honkai and his own herrscher powers (somehow Krux is able to control himself as a herrscher I dunno I told u this is ideas jumble)

yeah uh anyways Wu is like “finally it’s over” then Lilly in a far off city hears him and throws a temper tantrum to which he goes “OH MY GOD WHAT THE HECK NOT ANOTHER HERRSCHER” and he gets there and it’s just a child causing mildly threatening honkai quakes. Thought she might have caused her parents to abandon her. She’s not doing any massive damage right now and Wu knows that some people would argue it would probably be better for the world in the future to.. coughs.. LOOK GUYS THIS IS A HONKAI X NINJAGO AU I HAVE TO SAY IT it would be better to just to get rid of her now so that they don’t have to deal with another major honkai event in the future (plus she’s an orphan) …but Wu doesn’t have the heart to do that again after everything he lost to the war and with Morro and he can’t bring himself to ever be able to justify that action while looking at this abandoned child who just so happened to be a herrscher so Wu does what Wu does and that’s take her in and bring her to the monastery. (god Wu’s becoming the Fu Hua of this AU isn’t he… I mean he’d be a less cold fu hua but still)

Lilly is a unique case in that she’s been a herrscher since she was a child and Wu is likely trying to tutor her in either restraining or controlling it so she’d eventually grow to have more of a control over her powers somehow, though she’d still be capable of getting lost in them and basically tethers on a brink between the honkai influence and her humanity and physically can not tell the difference between them, so she’s still fairly destructive and can be dangerous. Lilly still does everything she does in canon though maybe with more like character arc n stuff but she still dies young. Either due to her unique herrscher case somehow or honkai infection or whatever. But it doesn’t pass to a new host entirely.

WHICH BRINGS US TO THE NINJA AT LONG LAST

Cole is one of the rare cases of being a blood relative to a herrscher (since Lilly is important to his character and Lilly has her own story so) He’s not.. fully.. a herrscher?? But also he’s not NOT a herrscher. He does have an inherently shorter lifespan because, yk, kinda human + kinda god of honkai thingy doesn’t mix well and he probably suffers some form of long term honkai infection that will slowly claim his body. Nobody really knows the extent of the whole partial herrscher or just honkai thingymajig (and that’s my way of saying I don’t feel like figuring it out.) it’d probably tie into his plot with Lou n stuff. Lou knows obviously, I dunno if the ninja (or even Cole himself) would. He had a honkai outburst after Lilly’s death and that’s how Wu found him (Wu wasn’t aware of Cole since Lilly cut ties with him before that so that she could lead a normal life and he wanted to honor her wishes as best he could, and also bc Lilly knows Wu knows she’s a herrscher and she wanted to protect Cole from the consequences of that if anybody else found out and decided to take drastic measures)

Kai and Nya are mostly ordinary asides from Ray and Maya being survivors of the EA who were proficient in creating weapons used by the elemental alliance. Oh yeah Ray and Maya were still kidnapped by Krux in this btw, and Kai and Nya still have the plots they have in the show. Just like most of the ninja they eventually become herrscher hosts (or just Nya so that Kai can be the token human in all universes, but I don’t know.)

Jay was still raised by Ed and Edna in the junkyard. Lib was probably turned into a herrscher after his birth and decided she couldn’t raise him or went missing for other reasons after the war, possibly went insane. Anyways I feel like Jay might have been a child herrscher kinda. He’d just randomly go full electric and his parents chalked it up to a weird quirk. Somehow. He has no clue of this and it only gets worse as he grows up and he starts feeling scared of himself and runs away without a goal except to protect his parents and then he meets Wu. He probably was given an herrscher core instead of being,like “natural born” since I don’t think he’d get to be in any major honkai events in the desert but I dunno, so he’d probably have an alternate persona.

Zane I have two ideas for: 1. He was a child from the serpentine war who survived but with severe honkai infection and had cybernetic replacements to prolong his lifespan, with a herrscher core being used to power him as some sort of experiment. The core and stuff made it so he didn’t age. 2: he was built entirely as a robot, the herrscher core being used as a power source but as a side effect caused him to gain a conscience. He probably doesn’t remember anything of the herrschers/his previous life beyond flashes. The herrscher core gives him his ice power thingymajig.

I’m gonna b honest I have NO CLUE about Lloyd. Like at all. Cshfhsf I’m sorry-

I feel as though with herrscher powers n stuff -

Cole would have powers for the most part since S1 but not really on a herrscher scale bc yknow. Lilly and what not. I think he’d have a herrscher awakening but not as the herrscher of earth but like an offshoot.. like maybe in S5 with his ghost thingy..? And obviously S13.

I think it’d be funny if Kai is the token human and just relies on Valkyrie weapons n stuff. No powers for him. :) but if he did have one it’d be s7.

Nya was ALWAYS a Valkyrie in this AU but she didn’t think she was a herrscher for like the longest time up until S5. Here she makes the choice to try and seal her herrscher self away nd keep going as just a Valkyrie but eventually gives into it during S14.

Zane regularly experiences snippets of his prev life that he’s forgotten or sights from his herrscher core as like a special nifty power or whatever but his first outbreak was during S3 and he had a worse one in S11 where his memories, ironically enough, were instead reverted back to whatever his old persona was and he became the ice emperor over the poor never realm and introduced the honkai to them.

Jay I dunno really since he’d have an alternate persona and it’s hard to cram that into his focus seasons. No clue how the seasons plots would go at ALL in general.

..this post was way longer than I planned but yeah scrambled mess of thoughts. Also might not make sense since I’m only on Taixuan Dream story wise so. Yeah. This AU would have a ton of hurt/comfort, angst and character interactions and stuff though bc yk it’s a honkai AU. I have no clue how the plot would go pls help this post alone took forever. I didn’t even mention garmadon and his whole situation because I dunno.

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geomimetry · 2 years

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Wheatley

SO, this sheet was really fun to fill out, but also really difficult since Wheatley is such a complex character. Literally on all of the points I was like... he's both though. He's a living dichotomy. So, on these different spectrums, I've placed him where I think he would be if he were just true to himself. Also some of these assume he's human post-aperture. But his personality otherwise is pretty much the same. I go into details under the cut about my reasonings for how I've filled out his chart because I love talking about this orb. Be warned, it's a long post. I have a lot to say.

———

Intelligence (Academic)

Okay, starting off... his intelligence. I've placed him slightly to the right of the middle because to be fair, no matter how much the game likes to tell us otherwise, Wheatley is not an idiot. I'd say he's of average intelligence, perhaps even a little bit smarter. He does a lot of things in the game that are smart, and the things he does that aren't can be attributed to high stress, bad mental health, impulsivity, and lack of attention—but not to a lack of intelligence.

Wisdom / Street-Wise

Wheatley is street-wise when it comes to Aperture. He's lived there for hundreds or thousands of years. It's the only place he knows, and he knows it like the back of his proverbial hand. Yes, he sometimes gets lost, but who wouldn't in a massive, ever-changing labyrinth. He's street-wise because he knows how the place and its inhabitants work, he knows how to survive, and he knows what it would take to get out, if he so wishes.

Physical Ability / Strength

As a core, he would be placed completely to the left. As a human, I think he would be between that and the middle. I just see human Wheatley as lanky. Not a lot of muscle definition.

Mental Strength

Wheatley's mental strength is pretty strong. I mean, he's been isolated in an underground facility hell-bent on killing him for an indefinite, but long, amount of time, and he's only mildly insane? That's mental strength right there.

Dominance

This one depends. I think, before his cosmic exile, he does act more dominantly, and he does want to be dominant. But I think after that whole fiasco, he's kind of turned off on the idea. He's scared to be anything but submissive again. Also I do think that he only wanted to be more dominant before because he'd been sumbissive all his life up until he'd had enough of the way people treated him.

Confidence

Wheatley acts as if he's very confident, but deep down he's not at all. I think after space, he'd stop the act, because he's not looking to fool himself or anyone else anymore.

Leadership

This one was difficult, and I'm not entirely sure if I'm pleased with the placement. In the facility, with Chell, he was the leader. But I believe before that, he was a follower. This kind of ties in with dominance, but not quite, since I believe he doesn't want to just mindlessly follow other people. He has a strong will of his own, but I think it depends on how dominant or confident he's feeling for him to actually take the lead. Post space, I believe he would just follow, because I think he'd just be very depressed and not have a will of his own, really.

Maturity

Wheatley isn't very mature, I think. He can be, but in a lot of ways, he's not. I think, as you mature, you start caring less about what others think and stop worrying as much about every little thing you do affecting your future. Wheatley cares a lot about other people's perception of him, so much so that it's one of his biggest flaws, I think. It controls him and his actions entirely.

Social

He's pretty much an extrovert with social anxiety. He loves being around people and longs for connection and belonging, but he's also deathly afraid of making a fool out of himself and being disliked or laughed at.

Agility

As a human, I think he'd be too unused to control his limbs effectively.

Endurance

If there's anything Wheatley does, it's enduring. This is kind of tied in with mental strength. He endures a lot mentally, but also physically. He's endured being bullied all his life, being given a cruel designation and purpose, social isolation, being hit by turret bullets, being crushed half to death, etc. He's endured a lot.

Temperament

This one's also pretty difficult. He's pretty calm, it takes a lot for him to actually get angry, but he does get frustrated or secretly angry pretty easily. I think he is a pretty angry person, but he tries his best to hide it, making some snide comments here and there, until it builds up and he explodes.

Physical Health

Hm. As a human... I really don't know. It depends on the story, I suppose. As a core, depends on where in the story. But his physical well-being isn't that good to start off with (bullet holes and such on his casing), but it's probably not too bad, though later on after he gets crushed and has his twitches and sparks and cracked lens... he's not feeling so good, physically.

Mental Health

Haha. Yeah, no, this guy's got no mental health whatsoever. He's very unwell mentally. He's delusional, mildly insane, in denial, has social anxiety, general anxiety, a debilitatingly strong inferiority complex, RSD, PTSD, c-PTSD, depression, and impostor syndrome. I've probably missed a few. Someone book him a therapist appointment STAT.

Patience

When he's not affected by the chassis, Wheatley is pretty patient. He would have probably waited for Chell to say apple for an eternity if the facility wasn't about to explode. Throughout the game, you as the player can choose to stall, and he will just nudge you in the right direction every now and then until you do. He does get frustrated sometimes, which is why I haven't placed him farther to the right. But I think his impatience is mostly because his life is in danger and he's depending on Chell to get him out alive, so all in all he's pretty patient. I think this is partly because he has no concept of time. If you've been stuck for an eternity in a haunted facility with no end in sight, time simply loses meaning. This is evident when he tells Chell she just had to do a couple of simple tests for a few hundred years for him. A few hundred years is nothing to him, so what is a few minutes?

Loyalty

I will start this off as yes, he does betray Chell, I'm fully aware, but he does so because he fully believed Chell betrayed him first (among other reasons). He actually shows very commendable loyalty before that. He came back for Chell after he got crushed, even though he didn't have to, even though the facility wasn't exploding anymore and he wasn't in immediate danger. He came back because Chell was in such danger, and in doing so he put himself in the same peril—despite his very strong sense of self-preservation. He came back because he felt he couldn't abandon her and let her get murdered by GLaDOS. He was loyal to her, even though they barely knew each other. I think he saw her as a potential friend and didn't want to lose her.

Disposition (Outwardly)

He's pretty kind to others, or at least he tries to be, even in times he doesn't really want to. Like when he's about to call Chell terrible-looking, but he quickly corrects himself to say she looks good. Like when he accidentally lets slip out that he thinks humans are smelly, and then he tries to make it up by saying he loves their folklore. He's very kind to Chell in chapter 5 when he's lighting the jumps for her, telling her to be careful, encouraging her. I haven't placed it completely to the right though, because he can be pretty mean, especially to easy targets and people he deems below him, like turrets and dead kids. I think this stems from being bullied himself, as well as needing to adopt a colder, harsher demeanor to survive in Aperture.

Disposition (Inwardly)

This depends on his stage in life. Inwardly, I believe he's a kinder person. He wants to be kind, he's naturally disposed to be kind, to allow for second and third chances when someone does him wrong, to give people the benefit of the doubt... but life in Aperture has kind of taken a bit of that from him.

Stubborness

Wheatley is pretty stubborn. He doesn't like being proved wrong, and he's adamant that he knows best. Probably because he sees it as an attack to his intellect, or proof that he's really just an Intelligence Dampening Sphere, if someone knows something better than him. I think this changes after space.

Courage

Wheatley is insanely courageous. Even though he does complain, and shows cowardice sometimes, he doesn't act on it, and instead he pushes on. He, a helpless, limbless little robot, faces the terrifying tyrant of Aperture after waking up the sixth test subject, having failed five times already yet holding on to courage and hope. He almost dies because of GLaDOS, but comes back for Chell, continuing his plan to escape together, even though the emergency has lifted, and to face off with GLaDOS once again, knowing fully well they're likely to die in the process. Wheatley is a very scared individual. A lot of things terrify him, and the odds are stacked against him. Yet he always pushes on. He doesn't give up.

Obedience

He's pretty rebellious. I mean, he goes against the authority of Aperture, GLaDOS. What more can I say. I guess I'll say that he's only rebellious once he feels he has a chance of succeeding. He only goes against GLaDOS when he feels he could win. Otherwise he keeps a low profile, trying to not get killed, but not necessarily agreeing with the authorities.

Attitude

He's outwardly pretty optimistic, and I do think he tries to trick himself to feel optimistic, when he's really a pessimist. He always thinks the worst is gonna happen, and he's just pretty negative actually. But he tries to fake it till he makes it, as you say. He wants to be optimistic, so he fakes it.

Emotional Openness

I've placed him in the middle because he can be an open book—if he wants to be. He speaks very freely, and oftentimes you understand where he's at emotionally... except you won't understand the full scope of it, because he doesn't let some things show. He deliberately keeps some of his emotions well hidden and guarded. We don't know that he actually feels really betrayed and hurt by Chell having failed to catch him until the end of the game when he's having a mental breakdown and can't be bothered to keep it all in anymore. He doesn't let show that he's attempted to escape five times before and failed, probably becoming progressively more discouraged but still pushing on, until also the end of the game during his mental breakdown. When he's decided they're well past the point of tasteful restraint. So, he is an open book when he wishes to be, when he has no reason to hide his feelings... but his deeper, messier feelings? They're buried deep underneath and don't see the light of day.

Friendliness

He tries to be pretty friendly. I think this is basically the same as Disposition (Outwardly).

Affection

He craves affection, I think. He would probably love cuddling. But I also think it would take a lot for him to get to the point where he's comfortable with such displays of affection, because he's lived his life without any at all and wouldn't know how to react to it.

Perceptiveness (Of others)

This one was also difficult to place, because while I do think he's pretty perceptive, he intentionally blinds himself to people's true intentions. It's tied to his tendency to fake optimism, practicing denial, and giving people the benefit of the doubt. Even if people lie to him, laugh at him, and mock him, he desperately wants to believe they're doing so in good humor, with him, with good intentions. He understands deep down that he's the butt of the joke, but he just wants to belong. I think he probably knew that Chell wasn't his enemy, and I think that's why he put away his worries after not being caught, because he thought of logical reasons for why that happened other than malice. Same with why she didn't warn him that she'd killed GLaDOS. He only acts on these suspicions when under the influence of the chassis, which takes away his ability to think rationally and amplifies his emotions.

Energy

He's pretty hyper. I do think he has ADHD, and hyperactivity is literally in the name. He has a lot of energy to spend, on talking, on walking, you name it.

Gender Appearance

This one is a little strange. I don't know how to measure "gender appearance" on a scale. As a core, he has no gender appearance, as a human, well, idk. He's male? I guess he looks male too, instead of looking female or androgynous.

Romantic

I think, when he gets to the point that he can comfortably show and receive affection, he would probably try being a bit romantic sometimes, but mostly he would just have no idea how to go about it.

Height

So, as a core, obviously small. As a human, though, I headcanon him as tall. Very tall. But I can see him being either very short or very tall, no in-between. Either way, his height is an insecurity for him. Either he feels he's smaller than everyone else, tiny and insignificant. Or, as a tall human, after the whole ordeal in Aperture, he feels that he's entirely too tall, and he doesn't like how it draws other people's attention to him, or how last time he was huge it ended disastrously. I like thinking he hunches over apologetically, trying to make himself smaller. Curling up into a ball when he's sleeping.

Honesty

Also hard to place. He can be very honest and blunt about a lot of things, but he can also lie lie lie. He does both, but I think perhaps he lies more than he tells the truth.

Manners

He can be polite, but oftentimes he accidentally forgets his manners and is just plain rude.

Independence

As a core, he's pretty dependent on others because of his lack of limbs, but for his disadvatages, he is pretty independent. As a human I think he would be pretty dependent, more so than as a core, because he's in uncharted territory and would need a lot of help to navigate it.

Opinions

He's pretty strongly opinionated. He likes giving his opinion on things. He dislikes having his opinion challenged.

Ambition

From the day he was given his purpose, he probably set out to prove that he can be and do so much more. He wants to succeed. He wants to do big things. He's very ambitious. He loses this after space. He loses a lot of things after space.

Moral Alignment

He's pretty morally gray, I would say, but leaning towards good.

Selfishness

He's pretty selfish. He mostly thinks about himself, and what's good for him, but I think that's a result of adapting to Aperture. He's not entirely selfish, since he comes back for Chell. The reason could be seen as selfish if you only see it as him trying to keep a potential friend like he's always wanted, but I don't think you'd go as far as almost certain death for that. I think he did care for Chell.

Stress

He's constantly stressed and worried.

Self-Admiration

He hates himself. He acts as if he doesn't, outwardly, but he does. Every person he's ever known has seen him as a stupid, annoying moron without any worth. He started internalizing it, believing it. He tries to prove to himself that he's not stupid and worthless, but post-Aperture he probably hates himself the most he ever has.

Wealth

From where would he have money? He's poor, either as a core or as a human.

Humor

This is subjective, I suppose, but he's pretty funny. Except he has to not try. If he tries to be funny he'll only sabotage his efforts.

Control

He's pretty bossy in the game, but I think this is because it's a necessity. He knows Aperture, he has a plan, Chell doesn't talk. He even tells Chell he's the boss after the betrayal. But I think this is because he wants to make up for being bossed around by everyone in his past. I also think he wanted to be the boss post-betrayal because all hope he had in befriending Chell was lost, and the next best thing he settled for was to gain respect by being the boss. By not being tiny and insignificant anymore. Having people listen to him and take him seriously. I don't think he'd be as bossy post-Aperture.

Manipulative

He's not really manipulative. He'll tell you what he wants from you. I think he can manipulate though, the four-but-actually-five-part plan is proof of that. He does try to use reverse psychology several times which I think is a form of manipulation, but he doesn't do so skillfully. All of this happens during the final confrontation, so I think he's just throwing things against a wall to see what sticks at that point, which is why the execution is flawed. Anyway, he doesn't really manipulate in normal circumstances.

Empathy / Tact

He's not very empathetic. He's grown kind of uncaring of others during his years in Aperture. I don't think he was always like that, I think he has the potential to be very empathetic and considerate, as he's shown to be in chapter 5, but Aperture has kind of dulled this quality of his. I think it was a coping mechanism, to not get attached to anything or feel for anything because they don't want anything to do with him anyway. So he's just sparing himself from getting hurt. Why should he care about people if people don't care about him?

Creativity

He's very creative. He always comes up with tons of ideas of every kind. Good, bad, outlandish, etc. I didn't give him full creativity because he's not very creative regarding password hacking haha.

Curiosity

He can be pretty curious, but he can also be completely uninterested, it depends. I think he would be curious if the situation allows for it, which it didn't really in Aperture. Curiosity never rewards you there, it kills you. The best example of Wheatley acting uninterested is with the oracle turret in the tube. He just wants to keep moving and not stop to see what that's about. Also, I think he'd be somewhat scared of showing curiosity because it means you don't know something and want to learn. He doesn't want to appear stupid.

Playfulness

He's pretty playful. He likes fantasizing and roleplaying. He likes turning a tense situation around by making jokes and telling spooky stories or other lighthearted stories or singing about what he's doing. I don't think he likes being too serious, but he can be.

Neatness

I think he'd be pretty sloppy. He is so as a core. He doesn't really do neat and tidy.

Sexuality

He's pretty innocent. As a core, I don't think he ever felt sexual desires or anything similar. It's not that I think he was incapable of it, just that he didn't experience it. As a human post-Aperture, I think his lack of experience in the matter has just made him unaware or uninterested in sexual pleasures, at least in the beginning. Later on I think it'd get kind of complicated. I don't think he'd feel as if he deserves to receive pleasure of any kind and feel good after what he did and after what happened last time he chased a good feeling. I just think he'd have a low libido, and if he does feel aroused, or engage in sexual activities, I think he'd be pretty innocent about it.

Ruled by...

Emotion, definitely, all the way. He thinks with his feelings. He can think with his brain as well, but he's ruled by emotions.

———

Anyway, my fingers are falling off and I really shouldn't make this post longer than it is. Wheatley's too fun to talk about, I just think he's neat.

#wheatley #portal #portal 2

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luuurien · 2 years

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Lupe Fiasco - DRILL MUSIC IN ZION

(Abstract Hip Hop, Jazz Rap, Boom Bap)

Recorded in just three days, Lupe Fiasco's latest album is his shortest to date that distills all his best qualities into one short, magnificent listen. Though its quick creation makes it difficult for many of its ideas to be fleshed out, what's here is already fantastic as is.

☆☆☆½

Born from a failed challenge to record an album in 24 hours, the fact that Lupe Fiasco made DRILL MUSIC IN ZION in just three days is still a massive achievement. Over the years, Fiasco's music took a significant turn towards the sanctimonious and haughty, grand and weighty album concepts held back by half-baked production and underwhelming lyricism that caused albums like Lasers and Food & Liquor 2 to somehow be both overstuffed and uninteresting. Whatever his reasons were for trying something more fast and fluid, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION benefits immensely from it, refusing to let Fiasco fall into the same traps of his past releases and forcing him to get his ideas out quicker than ever before. The resulting album is one of his best in years, a quick and memorable collection of bouncy, jazz-tinged boom bap and trap where his focus on reflection and clarity allows him to be more charismatic and powerful as a rapper than he has been in a long time. It's Fiasco at his most urgent and engaged, and that's always what's made his music shine brightest. Produced by himself and longtime collaborator Soundtrakk, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION stays within Fiasco's comfort zone while giving just enough definition to it all for the album to bring a whole new energy entirely. The beats are still driven by either chunky boom bap samples or oil-slicked trap drum programming, but he flows on it so confidently that it's in a whole different league compared to what he was doing in the past, coming out swinging with lead single AUTOBOTO, its stereo-shaking bass and elegantly placed guitar and synth one wild and exciting way to kick the album's release off. The good majority of the songs here manage to be just as strong and memorable, too, whether it's in the murky groove of GHOTI and its smoky woodwinds or SEATTLE's downtempo beat and driving electric guitar melody, Fiasco not worried about doing anything but making strong and powerful songs that are tons of fun to listen to. With less time to write than usual, his bars come out more varied and imaginative than ever, from the clever wordplay on PRECIOUS THINGS ("Give scissors to my paper, we not on the same page / We was bat, catcher, and pitcher, now you don't even wave," he sneers) to the devastatingly dark closer ON FAUX NEM where he contends with drill and rap culture - how he wishes that all the stories of murder and revenge in rapper's lyrics were all lies - and how the music industry and commercialized art play into those destructive cycles, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION not only a personal rumination on things for Fiasco but a larger crash course in how artists and their fans interact with one another. None of it ever gets touched on too deeply, but it's seeing him dig into these ideas without being so heavy-handed like on previous projects that makes it such an effective listen. That's also what holds DRILL MUSIC IN ZION back from greatness: though it's a good album, it feels more like Fiasco taking a step back from the many low points in his discography and trying something more slimmed-down rather than a full on reinvention. When he does try to branch out - say, on the conceptual KIOSK where a mall vendor is trying to trick people into buying needlessly expensive jewelry - it can feel a little cut and dry when he lays it on thick with couplets like "Diamonds only worth what you are willing to pay / A deceptive game you are killing to play" or "Where preachers can praise AIDS as God killing the gays / ...But when he dies from cancer, that's God's mysterious ways" that leave the message a bit too exposed for his storytelling to land. It's a bluntness unavoidable with an album made in just three days, but it leaves me wondering what DRILL MUSIC IN ZION might have sounded like if each of these songs had a little more time to cook in the oven, if Fiasco could figure out how to balance this brashness and force with more thoughtful and multilayered songwriting, or if it would end up ballooning like it has many times on his previous projects. He clearly has the skills as a rapper and writer on DRILL MUSIC IN ZION to do that, but rarely is there a time we get to actually see him put those skills to use here. It's a brisk, cohesive listen, but it lacks a sense of spirit and adventure. Still, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION is one of the strongest releases he's put out in a long while, trimming off the fat and focusing solely on the things that made Fiasco's music so charismatic and enjoyable in his early years. He's a smart, perceptive rapper who can balance darker topic matter with witty wordplay and crafty songwriting, and he's got the production ear for thick and padded beats to carry his stories well, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION having all the parts in place for one monumental release. The only thing holding it back is how raw and undercooked many of its moments feel, Fiasco's quick creation of all these songs leaving no room to breathe as he aimed to squeeze out as much creativity as he could within these 72 hours, a sense of messiness underpinning everything he does here. Nevertheless, DRILL MUSIC IN ZION is a potent reminder of what's made Fiasco such a strong player in modern rap for decades now, even when his albums were confusing and all over the place: he's an incredibly interesting and fun guy to listen to. And when he puts his mind to it, there's absolutely no denying how effective and engrossing an album DRILL MUSIC IN ZION is.

#lupe fiasco #drill music in zion #thirty tigers #abstract hip hop #boom bap #conscious hip hop #east coast hip hop #hip hop #jazz rap #trap #2022 #7/10 #album review #2022 albums

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sleepy-aletheas · 2 months

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Ok, the more I think about this, the more this drives me insane: What is up with Genshin and music?

(I really need to replay this game, cause finding stuff is nigh impossible, gives me migraines, and I swear I know these things, but it's hard to remember or name them correctly without double checking them)

The Aranara talked a few times about music and how it's like a great river that splits at points only to flood back together at the end. Everyone and everything has their own song, the Aranara just know theirs and can identify each other with it. You could almost see Teyvat as a massive symphony.

Khvarena was Nabu Malikata's daughter, and it was through the Goddess of Flowers that Rukkhadevata even learned about the Source Song (and that knowledge then lead her to have the Aranara). Even Sorush, who makes fun of the Aranara for not being as great as the Pari (because of her own insecurities), pretty much says that they could be the one and the same, because both derive powers from songs.

Then we got Remuria that was linked with music a lot -- be it for communication, prophecy or record keeping. We don't have a dedicated race of beings that have a natural inclination or even are made from it to wield it (or maybe we do and i'm absolutely blanking out), but it's good to keep an eye out for something to pop out.

And then we got Mondstadt, full of bards, love for poems and stories and songs. This is so far the one place in the game that music is their main thing, established and expected. What better place to use music that apparently can purify corruption, can use the power of memories, and was shared by a fallen seelie to another god, and then a god king also prominently using it for his own reasons, than a place that made its identity a home for such a thing?

And now that I think about it, weren't there some of Rene's notes that discussed the similarity of the Great Songs of Khvarena and abyssal energy? Like, they obviously are in opposition of each other (one purifies, the other corrupts), but they probably work within the same rules and limits.

(and now I'm going absolutely unhinged)

I wonder if Teyvat is stuck in a dream, and the songs are lullabies that create sweeter dreams or nightmares. "In the perpetual meantime of a sheltered eternity, most are content to live, and not to dream. But in the hidden corners where the gods' gaze do not fall, there are those who dream of dreaming." Dain's speech in the Travail video reminds me of Arama and Paimon's dialogue in For Fruits, Seeds, and Trees:

And if we take into account the whole Akasha fiasco of having dreams, but they were harvested all this time:

It wouldn't be so far fetched to think that it could happen on a massive scale across Teyvat. And if memories and dreams are interchangeable (with Aranara being dream beings that have memories of the world, if they didn't give them up for powerful feats), and Irminsul is the main hub of the collective memory of the world...

I'm going insane. Great.

#genshin impact theory #i'm rambling again #and going absolutely insane #i want to replay the aranara and pari quests so much. they were so fun and i love these little fellas. i miss them

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mythamongpeople · 2 years

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The Damnation of Immortality

Immortality has never been one of the greatest gifts of life, Dracula knew it far too well. Sure, it was all fun and games in the first few centuries, with all of its perks at his disposal: immense strength, shapeshifting, flying, hypnosis, ever-lasting youth,... Of course, there were some... minor inconveniences such as bursting into flames in the sunlight, or when he could not see himself in the mirror, which he found more annoying than the whole sunlight fiasco whenever he needed to brush up ( no, he did not allergic to garlic, he just didn’t like the awful stench of it. Brainless mortals made fictions about him and could not even make it right).

He had thought his life perfect, until his beloved wife fell into the hand of Death. Before her timely demise, she begged him not to turn her into a vampire and asked him: “Travel, my dear, so it shall smoothen the pain. Explore yourself, learn new things, and see the new wonder that you always dream of... And for my final blessing, may you find someone who will love you as much as I do”.

With the parting of his wife, he traveled far and wide, away from his home in Romania. He had many sexual intercourses during his travel, with both men and women alike, for a chance to find a warm embrace, but alas, it was all in vain. He fed on those people, but he never killed as he no longer found its meaning. At least until his hands once again stained with blood.

It was during one of the thousands of nights. He was in London, it was 5 AM and he was moving back to his lounge for rest, then all of the sudden, he heard crying in a dark alley. Hiding in the shadow, he saw a man, about 18, probably a slave since his clothes were all tattered and dirty, shielding his body with his hand, but his strength seemed to have left him as he soon fell unconscious.

The other man, somewhere in his 20s, dressing in fine clothing, with jet black hair, was laughing and spurting insults, all the while kicking the poor man on the ground.

Dracula, sickened by the brutality, appeared swiftly behind the man and snapped his neck. He was planning on bringing the poor man to a nearby hotel and then left, but he soon found the sun, rising at an alarming rate. Perhaps it was pure maddening desperation, he thought for a moment: if his cursed skin was so combustible, then how about a living, breathing, normal human skin?

With the idea set in his mind, Dracula made a quick work of the rich man’s clothing and held his limp body in his other hand. Using one of his sharp nails, he traced down the dead man’s spine and pull the skin off the body in one swift motion. Then using his magic, he made the corpse disappear in white smoke, which he then inhaled again some of the host’s memories, but barely since his soul had already been too far from the mortal plane. Stepping out of his own clothing, he began by observing the other man’s skin.

Once a warrior on the battlefield, Dracula’s body was massive compared with the other - well-built but lean. Even after reducing his own mass, the smooth white skin of the rich tyrant sliding against his body was still a very tight squeeze, very much like a bodysuit. When he pulled the cock skin over his own, it hugged his much longer and bigger manhood so tight that he felt as if he might cum all over the alley. However, with the clock racing against his life, he bid down his desire and pulled up the rest of the skin. His muscular, scarred body was soon covered in a leaner, smooth body. Finally, he pulled the face over his head like a hood. After some pinching here and there and a few neck-cracking, he looked at the nearby broken mirror and saw his reflection, even though it was borrowed, for the first time in forever.

“A handsome, well-maintained skin indeed...”, Dracula thought.

He picked up the man’s clothes and dressed up, then waited for sunrise. As the first ray of light touched him, he felt like a warm touch from god himself, and he was a fallen angel that once again bashing in the glory of heaven, even though he was even more damned than they were. In his blissful moment, Dracula suddenly remembered the beaten-up man and hurriedly carried him home.

.........................................................................

After what was like a long dream, the beaten man awake, his head still sored over the beating. He noticed his body had been cleaned, his wounds had been patched, and he was lying naked in a large bed in a master bedroom. Shamed by his own nudity, he was about the leave the bed. All of sudden, his master walked through the door with a tray.

“ I see you have made yourself very comfortable on my bed”, the dark hair man mused.

“ You are not really my master, aren’t you? My master Will will never speak to me with a soft tone like that”

“ Feisty, aren’t you? So... this skin’s name is Will huh? A beautiful name for such an ugly soul”, “Will” said, deep in thought. As he moved closer to the man on the bed, he can sense the other fear, yet bravery aura radiated off him.

“ I am not going to hurt you”, “Will” said firmly while setting down the tray, “ I only want to know your name”

“ Thomas, sir.”

“ Thomas, what happened to you was unfortunate. But you will be safe from now on and you will be free to do as you please.” “Will” spoke softly, like calming a scared rabbit. “While you are healing, you are free to stay for as long as you like. Now if you excuse me, I am in need of a shower.” “Will stood up and moved to the washroom while unbuttoning his shirt

“Please” Thomas yanked the other man’s sleeve “ Is there any way I can repay you?”

“As a matter of fact, I am in need of a little of your blood. It will be painless and you will feel good as well. I haven’t fed for a few days and I am famished!” “Will” said seductively, while crawling on Thomas’s body.

Then the bite happened, Thomas gasped for air. He had expected it to be hurtful, but the only thing he felt was the overwhelming sensation of pleasure. His own cock was hard, as he struggled to resist moaning. The truth was, however badly he was treated, Thomas harbored some feelings for his master. Now, after giving up on all appropriateness and dignity, he held his legs against the other man’s waist, as he grinned his hardened cock against his master’s. One hand held “Will”’s body closer to him, the other held “Will”’s head into his neck, he imagined this was what must have felt like to have intimacy with his master. In a sinful moment, he dry-cummed from all of his fantasy as he was dragged back into reality when “Will” sat up, wiping his mouth of blood.

“ My my, does the concept of sucking up blood by a monster arouse you? Or did you perhaps harbor some dark thoughts..” “Will” said while rubbing the half-limb cock of Thomas “... for this handsome, chiseled body?”

“ Yes, even though I know you are not my real master, I am willing to take a chance to grab this illusion, for a chance is better than no chance at all” Thomas confidently announced.

Thomas jumped on “Will” and the two hungrily embraced each other in a passionate kiss. Thomas then pulled “Will” cock out of his trousers and gently sucked on the tips, the tongue trailed up and down the shaft before fully taking in the entire thing in his mouth. “Will” threw his head back and his breath was heavy – he hadn’t felt this good for a very long time.

“Please let me cum inside you. Please....” “Will” pleaded.

“ Do as you wish, for your desire is my command.” Thomas murmured as he carefully held the cock in his mouth, the tips deep inside his throat.

And “Will” cummed, like never before, like all of his burdens had been erased, like the thousands of lonely steps no longer mattered. He fell back to the pillows, heaving heavily as he came down from high.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw Thomas was hovering over him, eyes full of curiosity. Then he looked down at his waist and the skin from his face down to his abs had been pulled off, most likely from his earlier movement. Now ironically, Dracula fell naked, like he had been pelt off the mask that shielded him from reality. There was no longer Vlad the Impaler, or Vlad the First Among the Dark,... he was now an ugly creature from the shadow.

“ Now that you have seen the real me, it is better if you left. For nobody’s allowed to know my secret”. Dracula growled, his fangs bore open, but he could no longer fathom a world without Thomas.

“ I know you won’t, you are a gentleman, unlike my master.” Thomas held up the facial skin of Will.

“ I know not of your name but you have a kind heart. Even when legend said vampire is barbaric creature, that their thirst for blood is never-ending, you have shown me restraint, you have proven to me that perhaps in the darkness of damnation, there still lingers the kindness from the past”.

Dracula hugged Thomas in his hard chest, yet carefully as not to break his little lover: “ Promise me you will never leave me! That you will come with me to see the world! That you will hold my hands till this day onward till the day the sun finally dried out”.

Thomas nodded slightly, and Dracula realized his lover had fallen asleep. He entwined his legs and Thomas’s legs together, laying down as he hugged Thomas. Perhaps life had not given up on him, and he himself deserved happiness. He knew that it would a lifetime worth, a very long time, but one day Thomas might choose to leave him like his wife once did. But in this very moment, he chose to embrace this happiness.

.............................................

Dracula woke up from the pleasure he felt on his chest. He looked out from the window and panicked momentarily as the sun touched his skin. But it did not burn, he realized that he was once again wrapped in “Will”’s skin. He moaned as Thomas was sucking on his nipples and stroking his cock. After the pace fastened up, Dracula roared as white cum splurted against the white blanket and onto the white sheet.

Thomas brought a handful of the milky substant up to his mouth and licked: “Bon appétit and good Morning, Master”.

Dracula was astonished for a moment, then he smiled before standing up from the bed and began pulling on his clothes. He was Dracula by night, and now with this skin, he could also work in daylight as the respected Master Will. With a new identity, he made his way onto the busy street of London. The immortal had been reborn and he was ready to embrace this new life with his Thomas.

.......................................................

It was now the one-year anniversary of the day he rescued Thomas, became his lover and made his forever home. He was wearing the most dashing outfits, walking on the street as he was going to the finest restaurant in town to make a reservation for their date tonight. As he merged himself into the hasting stream of people, a woman brushed passed him and smiled to his ears

“ I wish you a lifetime of happiness Vlad. I am glad to see you are happy”

He frantically turned around, but he was once again alone in the crowd of strangers. Smiling with fondness, like the memories of seeing a long-gone era, Dracula made his way toward the future.

#male skinsuit #male bodysuit #male transformation

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fandomfairyuniverse · 3 years

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🌸🍒Cherry Magic Ask Game🍒🌸

Tagged by @negrowhat and I literally finished the show like 2 hours ago so let’s gooo

1. Favorite character

Kurosawa. 100%. I love that man with my entire heart. Just a massive softie who’s secretly an equally massive dork and he can COOK I mean what more could you want.

2. Character you relate to the most

Adachi. If you want to know what I’m like irl adachi is a pretty accurate representation lol

3. Favorite quote from the series

“With or without magic, adachi is adachi.” If someone said this to me I’d just burst into tears like THAT is love

4. Favorite moment in the show

This is so hard but uh…. I really love the scene when adachi tells Kurosawa that he likes him and then they hug. It was so cute

5. A character you think is underrated

Maybe tiny blond (Minato). I adore that little dancey bean and I could watch an entire of him playing with the cat and teasing glasses (tsuge)

6. Which would you absolutely be friends with

Me and fujisaki would 100% be best friends. Add adachi and tsuge and you’d have the whole squad

7. The moment that you fell in love with the show

Somewhere in the first 5 minutes

8. Top so-soft-it-might-be-illegal moment

The first time Kurosawa cooks for adachi and his reaction like come on that was adorable (also I believe that cooking for someone is one of the best ways to show your love so that whole moment is just everything)

9. Favorite hands-are-for-the-gays moment

The scarf scene. Or Kurosawa fixing adachi’s hair after the whole thugs thing. Both are wonderful

10. Favorite Kurosawa making heart eyes moment

You expect me to pick??? We are talking about one of the kings of hearts eyes here

Okay maybe the scene where adachi defends tsuge during that whole fiasco I mean he looks so PROUD of him and in awe I can’t

11. Favorite adachi x Kurosawa moment (i.e. when they invented tenderness)

Ummmm the scene where they’re eating dinner together and having a serious conversation then Kurosawa makes a joke about nose hairs. That entire scene made me stupidly happy

12. Favorite friendship moment

Tsuge going to adachi’s house, saying “Merry Christmas,” taking him out to get food, and giving him relationship advice. He wanted his friend to be happy and I loved it

13. Favorite overall episode

Maybe ep 10. Or ep 1. Either of those

14. Top LMAO moment

Adachi and tsuge telepathically communicating while Kurosawa is just like “????”

15. A moment you could live without

I secondhand embarrassment like nobody’s business so anytime tsuge had one of his outbursts my brain went “EEEE” but other than that we’re good lol

16. One thing you’d change the show

More handholding, hugs, and kisses please and thank you

17. Someone you got to know because of the show or someone whose posts/works you enjoyed in the tags

Again I just finished the show so I haven’t looked through to much BUT @spicychipsdemon has amazing gifsets that are part of the reason I watched the show so yeah (also eboni aka the person who tagged me she’s awesome and her posts are also part of why I watched it)

18. Describe the show in 3 words

Lovely. Adorable. SOFT

19. One moment from CM that always stays with you

The proposal on the rooftop on Christmas with fireworks going off in the distance. What I would give for that to happen to me

Idk who tag so uh… if anyone wants to do it here’s your tag! Have fun dudes

#I DID IT YAY #thanks for the tag eboni! this was fun #cherry magic

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jakey-beefed-it · 3 years

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Sometimes it feels a bit like I’m the only person who actually *likes* D&D.

Some background. I used to play D&D (3rd through 4th mostly) with some folks, and while a couple of them were at least sort of willing to roll with things, the others were rather... focused on tearing apart the mechanics, criticizing everything that wasn’t as fine-tuned as a swiss watch.

My philosophy has always been like, it’s an imperfect game, sure, it’s made by mortal beings, that’s what the DM is for- when the rules break down or are unsatisfying, the DM is there to say ‘fuck it’ and do whatever best serves the group and story. Sure, other games are better at this aspect or that, but I have always liked the gestalt of D&D. It’s a fun game. I like it and want to play it. Obviously lots of other people feel the same way- 5th edition in particular is hugely popular to the point of being basically mainstream, which is fucking *wild* to a guy who started off playing 2nd edition in like 1992.

My old group also played a lot of Exalted, and I also ran a heavily modified Rifts game for them. Heavily modified because when I specifically started a Rifts campaign to blow off some steam and just play a mindless game with terrible mechanics I could handwave away as needed, one of my players literally roped me into coming up with developing an elaborate system based on 2nd Edition Exalted that would work for telling Rifts stories and playing with Rifts archetypes while avoiding the whole... Rifts rules fiasco. Which, okay, fair, if you guys are going to actually take your characters seriously then fuck it I’ll roll with making the mechanics less stupid, it’s a lot more work than I expected but I’m pleased you’re enjoying yourselves enough to care that the mechanics suck. (and Rifts mechanics absolutely suck- they were kinda bad compared to other games when it came out in 1988, and it’s never updated).

Two of those players eventually went on to literally run a reasonably successful podcast where they analyze and eviscerate tabletop RPG mechanics, so like, you get what their priorities are and why they’re quite different from mine. I recently asked one of them if he was interested in joining my 5th edition D&D game when it was undergoing a massive overhaul, and he basically said ‘I’m potentially interested if you run a game that isn’t D&D.’. Okay, not everyone likes D&D, and it’s a big time commitment, and I wouldn’t ask anyone to hold their nose and do something they don’t enjoy for the sake of hanging out with the best friend of 20 years before he moved away five years ago who you hardly ever talk to anymore, but I would resent it a bit that you didn’t even consider that.:p

Back on topic somewhat, more recently I’ve played in and run a couple games with a new group for the past couple years- more or less the same batch of people in both games. But then both games kinda exploded a few months apart for varying reasons, but one of the big underlying reasons was that at least a couple of the players were feeling it was more of an obligation than any fun. I get it, that sucks, and them departing the game, while sad, makes sense, and there’s no ill-will there. I only wish they’d been a little more outspoken about their reservations earlier, but people have anxiety, and I get that too.

I pulled my own game back together, recruited two new players to round out a party for the two remaining players, and have continued for what I considered to be a pretty successful forty-one sessions so far. There have been some rough spots, but I’ve done my best to be attentive and responsive and help to iron them out before any resentment could grow.

It kinda... hasn’t worked out so well. And at least part of the reason is that I’m not entirely sure most of my players are even really enjoying D&D. I do my level best to make sure they have fun, are challenged without being roadblocked, have rewarding impact on the setting and characters, etc. But even so, almost every session, somebody (and who it is varies) has a massive issue with something that’s making them feel awful about the game such that I’m not sure they’re going to continue, or even if they should for the sake of their own mental health.

For good or ill, anyone I play D&D with becomes a Friend in my mind pretty quickly, and that means I value their health way higher than my own fun and am much happier to see them admit there’s an issue they can’t overcome and they need to bounce than to struggle with worrying over whether they’re doing themselves active harm by continuing. I love my dumb characters, but I love my friends more, you know?

I bring this up now because as precarious as things have been for a while, they’re really starting to wobble, such that I’m not at all sure either my own game or the one I’m a player in are going to continue. Mostly due to people having issues with the game itself. Which, as I stated earlier, is very odd to me given my own approach, but okay, I get it, it’s not for everyone and I understand if you genuinely don’t like the game. And if that’s so, you should really probably not be playing it, right?

Somewhere out there are D&D groups who meet pretty regularly, have a good time, enjoy each others’ company and the shared story, and maybe even the game itself. There are lots of them, if the popularity of 5th is anything to judge by. Some weeks it feels like I’m running one of them, or playing in one of them. Some weeks it really doesn’t.

#Jake runs Dungeons and Dragons #Jake plays Dungeons and Dragons #boring personal bullshit

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breefrankelvo · 3 years

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Writing Update

I figured I'd write a cute little update, because in my time away from tumblr I've made a bizarre amount of progress on my WIPs (and because @kentonwrites wants me to do updates - here you go, pal)

The Essance Series:

Five years on, I'm still hammering away at the first book, Essance: The Liar. I took a massive break from writing and upon looking back at my work, I've decided it needs a massive rewrite. There's a lot that I want to change, pacing I need to fix, and some fancy new gadgets and aspects I want to add in.

I've currently got 5 documents open right now for the most recent copy, my rewriting copy, my desired additions and modifications to the story and some of its aspects (which is where the whole acid fiasco on my page stems from, if you were wondering), my notes of little details to add, modify or clarify throughout the series, and little prompts and lines of dialogue I've been yearning to add in somewhere but can't yet find the right places for.

Anyway, I'm currently 4 chapters in with the rewrite and slowly making progress around my work schedule and horrid sleeping patterns.

Hypocalypse:

I wrote this story when I was very young, and you can definitely tell. But I still really like the concept and want to make it work into a proper novel, and the motivation to actually start doing that stemmed from entering the prologue into a writing contest.

I didn't win anything, naturally, but it was a good exercise to go back and rewrite my old work, and that rewrite has given me some motivation to go back to it...

One day. My number one priority is the Essance series, but I know I'll get there eventually.

These Broken Lights:

My most recent WIP, stemming from my love for video games, is titled These Broken Lights. I'm not sure if that's a placeholder for now or if that name is going to stick, but that's irrelevant.

If you need to know one thing about me, it's that I love video games. The backstory for this story is that I was playing a game and thought about what it would be like to see the story from the perspective of one of the side characters. So that's what I have a basic plan for: a story following a side character in a video game.

But there's a twist, because this side character is a bit more self-aware. Typical video game aspects like random glitches, occasional jazzy background music, making the protagonist run in circles or into walls - it's all there, and only the side character notices.

Obviously there's going to be an actual plot when I think of one, but currently I've got a document with a list of video game glitches or fun little aspects to write into the story, and I'll get to the proper plot-related stuff eventually.

So yeah, that's all I've got for you today. This will probably be the only proper update for a while, but I'll try to get back into the old habit of posting snippets and edits and all the other fun stuff people post on their writing tumblrs.

#writing #writeblr #amwriting #writing update #writer #amediting #bookblr #update

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popculturebuffet · 3 years

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Amphibia Reviewcaps: The Dinner/Battle of the Bands “It’s You”

Hello all you happy people! And i’m almost to the finish line. 6 months (subtracting the ones where there were no new episodes) worth of weekly coverage and with next week i’ll have completed my second full season of reivews of a show as they came out, and my first full season of amphibia. If you’d like to see season 1 it’s up high on my stretch goals at 45 with reviews of Disney movies based on shows (The Proud Family, Recess and Kim Possible), Gravity Falls and more along the way if your curious. Check it out HERE. I’m also doing exclusive reviews eveyr month now with the coasional one thrown in randomly so check that out. New period starts in a week so please join before then.

So naturally with the big finale and all the tensions in amphibia close to reaching a boil next week, this week’s a bit more low key. Still not unimportant, with some massively good character work and in fact The Dinner is easily one of my faviorites of the season, but still nothing to move the plot too far forward. Just some nice character stuff to help inch us towards the climax next week. The calm before my heart is stillbeatingly ripped out of my chest. Which I will grant the show, having my heart ripped out Mola Ram style by some combination of Brenda Song and Keith David is how I wanted to go, i’m just not ready yet. So while I steel myself for the utter heartbreak of next week, I have my throughts on this weeks episodes under the cut!

The Dinner:

I did tip my hand a bit by saying this was one of my faviorties of the season.. and I stand by that. This one was excellent. It was rife with tension while still somehow being a fun breather episode before hell arrives.

As the title suggest the Plantars are having Grime and Sasha over for a fancy dinner, followed by games and such. Only Annearcy are happy about this though, Marcy still not getting quite how bad Sasha has gotten during her stay here and Anne hoping she has changed. The Plantars, Sprig in paticular, still resent them for the whole toad tower fiasco, which is fair. You don’t forget someone trying to murder you over night, let alone your whole town. Hop Pop is using Frobo as the Grill by the way which is just visually fucktacular I gotta admit. He does get some more use these episodes, being used as a Grill here and as the fog machine and Polly’ sminon next episode. Good work boy. That’s my robot frog soldier builder whatever you are.

Sasha and Grime are likewise not enthused. Sasha isn’t because her friends expect her to “Ugh” change and grow and stuff and isn’t happy about it and is confident she can return to rulling over them once her plan is done. Dude.. that’s not how a healthy throuple works. Or a healthy anything. Grime is more worried about her blowing it with her anger and control issues, but feels. this is VITAL to convincing the plantars to trust them long enough for their plan to go off. He even demands she remove her sword and all her knives... and she has a lot of them. Evne in her boot “How do you even walk?” Good question grime.

My answer?

So what follows is about 8 minutes of the most hilariously awkward dinner since that time Micheal Scott decided to have a dinner party even though his relationship was horribly crumbling, as everyone but Anne and Marcy shoves their foot in their mouth at some point or makes some sort of screw up. Oh and Polly I guess she’s more content to just watch the show. Seriously i’m not usually a fan of cringe comedy.. but the series makes it work here as our heroes attempt to interact with thier old eneimeis and vice versa.

For starters we have our guests arrvial, where Grime and Sasha both look objectively terrifying before things cool down. Then we have dinner itself where both Hop Pop and Grime prove to be the racist kind of grandpa as Grime asks what frogs they subjigated to get these turnips and Hop Pop makes an awkward lightbulb joke about Toads that Grime finds hilarious but everyone else was rightfully afraid would get the old man gutted by the other more violent old man. I imagine this happened a lot on the Lost Light once Megatron took over co captiancy. You just don’t fight a guy for a good hundered years without being nervous he’s going to blast you to fucking pieces.

Sprig dosen’t help before all this by taking a seat next to anne and marcy specifically to piss her off, and out of all of them is the most openly hostile to her. Given Anne’s his best friend and Sasha did a LOT of emotional damage to her.. yeah fair enough.

Things only esclate when it comes to frog pictionary. Suprisingly Hop Pop gets Grime’s Drawins and Sasha gets his, with both her and sprig trading escalating barbs and her barely containing her rage when Anne calls her on it since unlike her, Sprig has a reason to still be upset with her. This reaches a breaking point when Sasha attempts things, trying to desperatly win her friends back with the old times now they have their ownt imes apart.. only for Sprig to accidnetlay mock Sasha’s near sucicide,s aying she “slipped”.. granted I do think he geninely just can’t forgive her.. but it’s very clear she did not.. she let herself go to save them, and he’s just as in denial about it as Sasha and just as much a dick about it.

Sasha flips out at him, and gets penalized for talking which only pisses her off MORE and understandably so. Anne leaps to the plantar’s defense but honestly.. both sides are understandabliy angry here. The Plantars are right to still not trust her after everything especially since she hasn’t outright apologized to them and her and Grime’s general response to the incident is “One Time!”... which works for say, taking the last slice of pizza without asking or slamming their face in a car door, but not so much “Trying to murder all of you for personal and stupid reasons.”. But at the same time Sprig DID cross the line really bad when she saved his fucking life. It dosen’t automaitcally erase the bad things she did but it dosen’t give him lisence to mock her. WHile I get he’s 10 and dosen’t get it was part suicide, he still is blantaly ignoring her trying to do something selfless because he can’t admit there’s any good in Sasha. Sasha is not a GREAT person.. but there IS good in her. She just has to WANT to seek that out instead of her inherent seflishness and need for control and Anne and Marcy are absolutely right for trying to help her instead of just slamming the door in her face.

But soon eveyroen gets distracted by the cake which floods the room with molten lava. Hop Pop assumes it was some sort of trick.. but hilariously turns out no, Grime really was trying to be nice. That’s just how this works and it’s delcious once it hardens.. assuming you survivie the hornets, with fighting them being the best part of it. And yes hornets shoot out of the cake. Are you suprised at this point? They also paralize grime leaving our heroes without the one person among them who knows what their doing.

SO our heroines are forced to fight some hornets, with Sasha trying to take lead.. only for Anne to do so and succeed at it, figuring out that while weapons can’t pierce them their own stingers might and having Marcy use her crossbow to launch the stinger in grime at them, and then has Sasha distract the rest to take them out.

So our heroines reconcile with Sasha admitting she might not want to change and Anne admitting that’s okay.. she just has to accept things have changed with THEM and that her friends HAVE. And genuinely or not Sasha agrees to that, while Grime is bummed he missed the party and the lava hardens into chocolate, with eveyrone enjoying some cake and dead insects. As you do

Final Thoughts on The Dinner: As I said, this is one of the best episodes of the season> The tension is paltable, and it dosen’t fully resolve it, rightly as we still have one final season to go for that. More than that.. it’s hilarious. All the jokes land, and there were far too many to get into here.

Battle of the Bands:

Now this is a classic breather episode, our last chance to rest and get all slice of lifey before things go up in flames next week.

With the town all nervous because of Sasha and Grime’s presence, Mayor Toadstool decides to spin the wheel of fun to decide on an activity. I can’t remember if this is a new thing or not but I loves it. It lands on Battle of the Bands so the girls decide to get their old band Sasha and the Sharks back together. As for the rest of the cast, Hop Pop and Sprig join a Jug band and Grime has his own musical domination to plot out, so that just leaves us with the thropule, Poly and Frobo for an episode.

The group have fun... until Anne unveils her heartfelt song based on her time here. Well okay only Sasha isn’t having fun and quickly tries to take over, as you’d expect and Anne pushes back as you’d expect. Sasha takes her ball and goes home as.. you get it by now> The plot here is not very complex or unique.

But as with all the Sasha episodes this season including the last one, we get a deeper sense of her character. Here she outright admits she dosen’t know what to do when she’s not in control. She needs to be in charge of the situation. It also explains why unlike Marcy and Anne she didn’t change for the better: Her need for control shuts out any possiblity of self reflection and thus self improvment. Self Improvment, and I know this from experince, requires you to admit your flaws and face them. It’s something I can admit to struggling with as I fall back into old patterns often. Admitting flaws would be admitting a loss of Control and Sasha.. can’t. She honestly can’t.

Of all people i’ts TOADIE who convinces her sometimes i’ts better to let someone else take the lead and that it’s better to support the ones you love than subjugate them. Granted Toadie himself is too far in the opposite direction, but he makes a valid point.. something I never thought i’d say. Sometimes you just have to let someone do what they want.. and watching her two girlfriends perform up on stage.

I also will say I love a good talent show, battle of the bands what have you episode. One of my faviorite movies, True Stories, climaxes in one.

youtube

And yes that was John Goodman and yes he does indeed sing...

youtube

Seriously watch this movie. It’s fucking amazing. And yes that was the Talking Heads David Byrne, he wrote this movie and there’s two talking heads songs in it. Watch it.

Point is we get a great one, paticuarlly chuck.

He grows SINGIN tulips just a fun one.. but i’ts that finale with the girls that really makes it with Sasha realizing that them being HAPPY is better than her being in control..and they didn’t grow PAST HER or leave her behind just because they grew.. they simply should be free to be themselves. And that maybe trying to conquer a country just to do that ain’t right. IT’s really sweet

So she runs in to do the guitar solo, and its aweosme and they only don’t win because it turns out Grime is fucking MAJESTIC on a harp. But Sasha finally grows a bit admitting that having fun is what mattered...

And it’s abotu to burst as Mayor Toadstool, in a show of how far he’s come, points out Anne is leaving soon and Anne gives a heartfelt goodbye to everyone.. that said.... someone clearly has other plans.. and for once i’ts NOT Sasha.

There’s nothing but foreshadowing in that face. That’s a face that says “Uh.. about that”. And again SASHA is showing emotinal vunerablity and hapiness.. but it’s Marcy, whose pretty open emotiionally whose visably worried and clearly knows Andrias has other plans.. other plans he talked her into. Gratned he probably didn’t tell her said plans involve The Watcher with a Thousand Eyes, but she still KNOWS she’s plottingthings.. and know’s she’s about to betray the people closest to her.

Before we move on though those outfits ar esharp. Just damn. Especially Sasha’s punk look. The songs this episode are also both excellent and I had no idea Brenda Song and Anna Akana could sking like that. God damn.

So with Anne leaving for home she gets one last group photo. It’s majestic and we’re out.

Final Thoughts: This one is pretty good. Not a lot to talk about outside of Sasha but a really fun episode that both moves her foward and moves us toward the finale. ANd it’s nice to see the three just happy together... before the hell that’s about to arrive.

Next Week: War Were Declared, our heroes prepare to fight bravely against the hoard of toads... and both Sasha and Marcy come to the crossroads of destiny Tommorow ON This Blog:

So it’s up to Jean Grey and Emma Frost to go in and sort it out.. and then fight off the full might of an alien empire. No pressure.

Until the next rainbow it’s been a pleasure

#amphibia #the dinner #battle of the bands #anne bonchuy #sasha waybright #marcy wu #sprig plantar #polly plantar #hopidiah plantar #frobo #grimothy #mayor toadstool #toadie #chuck #he grows tulips #true stories #before the storm

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haechanhues · 3 years

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My Analysis Of Enhypen (From I-Land mostly) and I was going to do it straight out of watching it, but it was like 2am and the next day I was sick so today it is :) (Edit : It took a couple of days to even write it) and I also watched some Enhypen videos so.... yup but I’ll try my best to keep it to my observations with I-Land and like the behind videos

Sunoo

- My expectation of him : I thought he’d be the loud one like San/Wooyoung is in ATEEZ from the get go but he was so shy at first. Watching him open up and spread who he is as a person was one of my favourite parts of the show. He also became more confident in himself and his abilities. You may think differently but if you take the first episode and last episode as examples, you’ll be able to see his level of comfort in showing his qualities as a person.

- In saying that, his expressions, especially in brighter concepts astound me. Like in those concepts, he just has the spotlight. For real, for real. He can also do intense concepts too. Amazing. He also has a voice that surprises me, like you’d expect his voice to be slightly higher but it’s among the lower tones (I don’t know the tonal scale)

- He doesn’t really take too harshly to teasing or when the other people poke fun at him. He takes it in good stride (Though nobody should go overboard) He just accepts it as it is with a smile or maybe a little sigh or even just teasing back. He knows it’s all with a good heart. I find that really admirable - it’s not an easy trait to have. Also the fact he can joke with the others as well.

- I love the way he monitors others, especially his members, and like he can make a person feel good. Like the way he without any hesitancy will help style another person’s hair if they asked or whatever. He just wants to do well, together. He wants to share his happiness with other people and I think that’s such a reason to love him. He also is the first to emphasise the beauty in every person. He brings attention to it in such a beautiful, caring way. He also can see the bigger picture so easily and so thoughtfully. Always looking for others.

- In saying all this, I have a theory that he was chosen as the producer’s pick because he has this ability to him. Like a moodmaker is someone that keeps the team’s spirits up and provide the stress relief and I feel he’s more than that? He has absolute faith in other people and can bring out hidden components of a person they didn’t really know they had e.g Sunghoon during Chamber 5/ The Heeseung Aegyo fiasco. Like he has this flamboyancy and shamelessness to him that you can help but join in or that it’s alright to join in.

Sunghoon

- My expectation of him : I thought he’d be a refined person, with a real likeness to someone with a status of a prince. Regality to a tee. But he’s got such a dorky tender heart. He’s so incredibly handsome. I know this is a really shallow and obvious observation. Anyone with two working eyes can see the boy is incredibly gorgeous. But he just leaves you in awe. He’s arguably the prettiest boy I’ve ever seen. I also love how shy and bashful he can get.

- The way he cherishes the people around him. I feel from the very first episode, he’s not necessarily a social person, but you can tell he wants to get along with everyone. He’s so comfortable to be around and you want to try anything in your power to make him smile and laugh and be your friend or whatever. During I-Land, you can see it from the way he talks about his sister and his friendship with Jake and the other I-Landers.

- He’s a massive dork. Like he doesn’t know how cute he is. And because he’s got that Prince look to him and that title attached to him, when you see him being dorky and screeching you can’t help but like that paradox. I think Episode 10 was his episode and that one VR segment too. Like he’s so funny and just he’s a soft spot for me I think. The ‘Pork Slice’ part I want ingrained into what made my life a life worth living.

- As a leader, it was so interesting to see him work. He helped K a lot with his leadership when Sunghoon left the team. He takes a couple of steps backwards for other people, and at times it scared me, but it ended up so right for him in the end anyway and I’m thankful. It helped people see what kind of a person he is and I’m glad he had other people looking after him. He also is careful and accepts suggestions and sincerely works with each of them. He makes observations on his own too.

- This can be interrelated but I think a large massive part of why he’s in Enhypen is how hard he works. He works diligently and wholeheartedly. He’s a quiet powerhouse in that respect. He does his work without the need for attention but solely to improve his skills as a performer and for his future. He doesn’t care if his hands get dirty. As long as one person, even if it’s himself has faith in him, he’ll do it.

Heeseung

- My expectation of him : I thought he’d be known as The Ace and hardworking and etc. It wasn’t a wrong assumption but I think we can go into more detail. He’s a really talented person and I mean that with every fibre of my being. From the very first episode, he’s labelled as the ‘Ace’ and it continues throughout the programme so when he does debut, it isn’t too much of a surprise, if at all.

- Too be honest, I’m not really sure if this counts but I’m going to add it anyway. His relationship with his brother (so hilarious) is such a heartwarming moment. In I-Land he was one of the older ones (I think) and someone with a leadership role and so a lot of people relied on him. But it was great to see he had a good support system who he loves and adores with all his heart. The way his older brother is a source of energy for him really made my heart go into overdrive. So fucking cute.

- As a leader, I feel a bit like stupid for mentioning it cause it’s so obvious, but he’s got leadership skills. (Duh) But like as a leader, he works on the synergy of the team. He’s patient, stern and is usually almost on the right path. He’s someone very reliable and his objective is clear. He wants to fit the concept as well as he can and makes sure that everyone is on the same page without anyone falling behind.

- He also has the ability to let loose and have fun. He makes jokes and tries things out because it looks fun. He’s under a shit ton of pressure, especially on I-Land as the ‘Ace’ and I’m grateful he’s able to enjoy his time with the other contestants. He actually plays around quite a bit and his smile is so wide and bright, it’s so nice to see.

- Even though he’s not the leader in Enhypen now, he has a role of being a caretaker. He helps out when he’s needed (e.g Helped out Taki for the BTS performance) He’s a really thoughtful and understanding person. He’s always the first one to state problems and then come up with solutions. When someone feels bad for getting criticisms, he takes it as his own as well. He doesn’t want to succeed solely.

Jake

- My expectation of him : No joke it’s just Aussie, at first. He was the first Enhypen member/I-Land contestant who I ever learnt about. I also think he’s a little like Eric from The Boyz. Slightly. Just, not as crazy. Like it’s weird just seeing a not-loud Eric and/or a crazy Jake. Also, he’s really attractive. I don’t know exactly why he’s so attractive but there’s something about him you just can’t describe in words.

- His debut astounds me the most. Not because I didn’t think he could do it. But because he had such a short training period and even as a trainee he had to exceed hundreds of others (500 others/499 others?) to be let into the company. He’s just got this natural luck to him as well. Imagine that. He’s also quite an adaptable and fast learner. He always seems to improve with every little thing he learns and it always has such an impact.

- He’s got a charming way of performing. He may not be as rich in skill training as the other contestants or members and often gets criticism for it. But every time he had a performance where you forget about it. He’s got this irresistible charm on stage. You want to learn more about him, watch him more and he plays his role really well.

- His eyes are so sparkly and they just lure you in. He’s currently one of the only boys I’ll accept lip bites from (I usually find them cringe). But he makes it look natural. He gets so excited with new possibilities - new opportunities of fun, to get to know other people and know the people he knows more. He always engages with every situation with eagerness and acceptance.

- As I mentioned before, he’s the icon of growth. Yes, everyone knows it. But you don’t look at him and see his inexperience nor the lack of skills in comparison. You want him to debut immediately and grow with him. Out of all of them, I feel like you look at him and apply yourself in his shoes. You want him to succeed and to learn and to grow and you want to hold his hand during the whole process. You want to watch and do the same with yourself.

Niki

- My expectation of him : I thought he was going to be a mood maker of the team cause I saw a lot of compilations of him being groovy and weird. It’s a weird thing to say but he reminded me of seaweed in the game of Seaweed (I don’t know how to explain this game to anyone, it’s kind of like tag I guess except when you get tagged you have to act like seaweed in the ocean) or like those inflatable balloon people at car autos or something. Weird analogy but- He’s actually quite chic.

- From the very first episode and all to the very end, he’s a very skillfull dancer. He picks up the dances quickly and he’s such a small person but he has this way of performing large gestures that astound you. He was a really meticulous teacher too. A stickler for details. He’s very satisfying to watch dance. When he’s in the zone of dancing, it’s really beautiful and you just want him to perform more and he could do the same dance again and again and it’d still have the same impact it did the first time.

- In I-Land, in the earlier episodes he struggled with the team aspect. He was amazing individually and could lead the team well during dancing. But wanted to show the best version of himself and forget about the rest of the team. BUT, if you look at him now, he knows the importance of his teammates and strives for the best. He also allowed himself to open up emotionally and cried more and adored more. (I noticed this moment especially with Hanbin, Sunoo, Taki and those who were eliminated)

- During the show, it didn’t really show Niki enough being playful. I think we got to see cheery Niki when he received the hanbok from Jungkook. But you can see it better in the behind I-Land videos with the sheep costume that Jungwon wears and during Enhypen’s debut. But my favourite moment is when Jungwon wants to sneeze and he looks at him and he’s like ‘Jungwon hyung ANDWAEEE’ and his voice and everything is going to be stamped into my head.

- He’s practically made to be an idol. His dancing is one thing but when he takes pictures and has to fit concepts that his hyungs find awkward, he just does it with such a chic way of doing things. He knows where to angle his head and he’s gotten so good at expressions. Off stage, he’s chic yet playful and extremely loving with his hyungs.

Jay

My expectation of him : First of all, the whole reason I’m into Enhypen is because of him. He’s the reason I watched the show. He’s almost always my avatar on Rhythm Hive. I expected him to be confident and good at everything. He’s also really good looking. Like, the type of guy I’d have a crush on if he lived in my country type of crush.

- He’s a great speaker. His ability to give feedback and constructive criticism is an amazing feat. He points out problems carefully and constructs a solution. He does so in a way that he creates a feeling of trust and faith. I’m terrible with criticism, like I can accept it but I don’t know how to reply to it. But with Jay, I actually want him to provide feedback.

- He’s a really intense performer. He’s just constantly burning and his gaze is like a promise. He uses emotion to perform harder and to outdo himself and to prove to others that they’d regret making their decision. He is very emotional and it shows when he performs. A really determined person to do well in everything he does. He’s got this wild and untamed look in his eye but his body is very controlled and confident. It’s seriously a good look on him. It’s really attractive.

- His leadership qualities are amazing. He knows how to utilise everyone’s talents to make the team standout more. He has an in depth understanding of everyones personalities and talents enough to put them in the right position. (That sounds like a report card). He’s also not as hardheaded as I had expected him to be, he’s flexible and is able to listen to everyones opinions and communicate on an equal level. He helps out without taking complete control over the situation.

- He’s the moodmaker! Yes, he’s responsible for about 95% of the memes and quotes in I-Land. I don’t think I have to quote them. In saying that he’s pretty much the victim of Enhypen and I-Land pretty much.

- I think the way he is so emotionally driven is what makes him stand out. He is the epitome of a fiery personality. He’s so unapologetically him and also open about what he’s feeling and what he’s aiming for, which is considerably quite new considering how boys are kind of taught to suppress their emotions. He also doesn’t let his emotions dictate how he treats a person. He treats them fairly, even when he’s disappointed or angry at someone. Watching him succeed and sometimes fail and promise to come back, genuinely felt like he was destined for it and wasn’t waiting for Lady Luck to shine on him. He goes and does shit done himself. He invokes so many emotions and empathies in other people.

Jungwon

- My expectation of him : When I was watching KCON:TACT 3 I was really attracted to his voice and they way he talked and danced. Though I didn’t expect to end up biasing him to the point of no return. Never in my life have I loved a boy quite like this. I don’t know it feels different. It felt different with both Haechan, Kyungsoo and Sunwoo but this is all so different this feeling right here. Warning : This is going to be extremely biased. Like no joke. I’m sorry, this boy is just going to have longer lines but I’ll still keep to the same bullet points.

- He’s so lovely. So so lovely. He has this ability to smile and have fun and tease and make little comments. His eyes are like hypnosis. You’re able to look at him, see the uplifting of his smile and every one of his facial features are uplifted so it makes his expressions brighter, more welcoming and more trusting. He’s got broad shoulders and like someone you want to cuddle and watch with stars in your eyes. Like that chick is so right, ‘you’re someone I can’t live without now.’ The way he reacts to such comments, bashful smile and the whole hand over his mouth. He’s so pretty. I don’t want him to be sad or whatever.

- He’s so accepting of other forms of life and doesn’t care for status, wealth, age or whatever. For him, if they’re part of the team, they’re part of the team and he’ll look after them as a team member. He puts his importance on things that actually matter and looks to create an atmosphere where he can be relied on and that others feel comforted. He has fun and talks with others with softness and makes others feel engaged. He’s so fucking attentive. Like he understands other people well and has high observation skills. Like if one is upset, he’ll just quietly go to comfort them and give attention in a soothing matter. He’s also got a soothing voice. I love hearing him talk.

- The hidden ACE. He made an impact during the competition at significant times. I think the reason why many contestants and him, himself went down the ranks was because they were previously in the higher ranks and were believed to be safe. But as a vocalist, he has such a clear and stable voice. You can recognise his voice immediately, even when I wasn’t a Enhypen stan, I could recognise his voice even without knowing who he was. But as a dancer, he’s so amazing at it. Like, his popping and his ability to do intense choreographies. As a performer he understands nuances, meanings and the concepts of a song and understands his role in the performance. Him getting praises was my favourite thing ever. I think he was a favourite among the producers. Though when he did have stumbles, I was so worried for him. Like no, I refuse.

- He’s got an optimistic way of thinking, without being overcompensating. Basically when things don’t necessarily go the way it was set out to or when others suggest another way of doing things, he takes his time to think about it and decides. He basically uses it as a tool to grow and adapt in order to produce the best results. Now that I’m thinking about it, rather than being optimistic, I would say he’s an opportunist(?) in a sense. He’ll accept the suggestions and has this greed to live up to and exceed the expectations. This is easily seen when Jungwon isn’t doing too well doing part 5 and ends up swapping with Heeseung. And he also has this greed. It’s a greed I’ve never seen before. The goals are the same but in a way that’s different?; He doesn’t want his grandmother to be devastated if he is eliminated, he wants to be an artist that does music he loves, ‘it’ll be even more impressive if we can go beyond their expectation’. He uses the current happenings as a way to exceed them and to go beyond capacity. In short he’s a realist without being stuck, he’s an idealist without being too high up in the clouds, he’s optimistic but not unrealistic. It’s inspiring, he’s inspiring. They all are but Jungwon has my heart at the moment.

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currywaifu · 4 years

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𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: scouting dilemma 𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩: hyodo juza/reader 𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: sfw 𝐰𝐜: 1.7k words

𝐚𝐧: guess who was inspired by the 2020 gem heist? wrote a dumb little thing dedicated to all my fallen comrades bc juza won’t come home to them after the reset- sorry to the requests I have yet to fulfill! year 2 ages btw~

This was the moment you’ve been waiting for. You managed to save up a massive amount of gems, waiting to be spent on a banner with your best boy in it. For months, your fingers itched to pull but you were loyal (with a few caving exceptions) to the character who got you into the game in the first place.

When the developers finally announced a banner with him in it, an SSR of best boy in a summer outfit no less, it was as if fate decided to tell you now was the moment to splurge strike.

9:58 pm.

Staring at your phone screen, you made sure everything was prepared before you could summon. You decided to do your first pull at 10 pm (his favourite number was 10), and surrounded your phone with a summon circle made entirely out of candies still in their wrappers.

9:59 pm.

You sent your prayers to the gacha gods, counting down the seconds until the clock struck-

10:00 pm.

With a shriek, you nearly ruined your summon circle formation of sweets as you scrambled to your phone, clicking the bright, shiny button that had tempted you endlessly.

“Yes, I’m sure I want to spend! Come home, come home, come home…” you chanted, unable to decide whether you should close your eyes until the final results or keep them wide open.

Choosing the latter, you gritted your teeth at the sequence of cards arriving.

R, Event R, R, R, Dupe SR, R, R, R, R, Event SR.

Suppressing the scream that wanted to escape your throat, you tried to laugh it off. At least you got two of the event cards…? Maybe it would have been better to wait until 10:10 pm?

An SNS notification popped up at the top of your screen, and from the little summary, you could tell you were gonna get upset at the contents. Checking the chat, your mutual quickly followed up her message with a screencap of your best boy. Coming home to her.

You quickly sent your response before promptly returning to the game, ‘asdfghjkl im happy for u but like also muting u rn :’< brb soon hopefully yeet need to retrieve my boi from the game’s clutches cya’

Despite your initial optimism, as the pulls kept going, the lower your gem count, the worse your mood became.

Should… should you stop right now? Banner really said no rights to best boy, huh? Sure you were able to fully merge a bunch of SRs and even the event R and SR cards, but not once did he come home? Even his sworn rival’s initial SSR came home if only to spite you or him or both.

Mentally exhausted, you decided to sleep. Maybe your luck would be better tomorrow?

When you walked into the room with a frown visible on your face, Juza immediately knew something was wrong.

From even before he got together with you, he was always sensitive to the different expressions you made, and by association your emotions— to the little smile on your face as you ate desserts together or the eyebrow furrow-pout combo you did when the professor said something you didn’t agree with. He’d never say how fun it was, seeing the different faces you’d make.

However, while those were cute, this just made him worry.

He’d really rather not fight anyone, but if he has to beat up someone…

Juza found himself distracted during class, unable to stop himself from constantly looking at you every few minutes. With a faint peach staining his cheeks, he slipped his hand underneath the desk to grasp your own.

“… you okay?” he said, voice low and quiet as to not catch anyone else’s attention. The look on your face turns a little softer, even throwing him a quick smile but he knows you well enough to spot the traces of sadness still present.

You don’t reply, squeezing his hand back as you finally tried to pay attention to the professor.

He sighed, slowly releasing your hand from beneath the table. He’ll find a way to make you feel better later, but for now, he had to take notes— for the both of you, it looked.

It’s not every day that Juza does most of the talking, but that just so happened to be the case today. He’s getting restless, stuck between actively wanting to help you out with whatever you needed or just sticking by you and letting you overcome whatever’s troubling you on your own.

You’ll talk when you want to, he knew that, but even still he wanted to be more useful to you. Do you want him to just keep talking to help you take your mind off things? Do you want to rant to him so he can listen? Do you want him to get you something? He’s not the best at giving advice, but if you needed it he’d do his best.

He doesn’t know what to do. You’re responding to him, but your mind is all the way elsewhere.

The next thing he knew, he’s getting a spoonful of his frozen dessert and pressing it against your lips.

You get startled from your thoughts when a sudden icy temperature meets your mouth. You opened your mouth, cringing slightly at the cool before finally enjoying the shaved ice dessert.

While it wasn’t uncommon for Juza to let you taste the food he ate and vice versa, he was usually more reserved, too shy to feed you in public.

‘He must have been worried,’ you thought to yourself if he had to do that just to catch your attention. You immediately shifted your thoughts from the game to Juza, already about to apologise for troubling him before he interrupted you.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, and even though he had a scowl on his face, he looked at you with tight and worried eyes.

He knew you played games on your phone, but it was still a bit embarrassing to admit that you were upset for such a long duration because of your best boy not coming home. However, Juza deserved to know, so you pushed away your hesitance before explaining the whole fiasco to him.

Juza doesn’t get it entirely. He’s bordering between relief and confusion— on one hand, at least no one wanted to hurt you or fight you or anything; on the other hand, a 2D guy got you upset?

The concept isn’t completely foreign to him, what with Itaru-san and even Settsu constantly gaming, but usually it was his roommate being irritating and gloating while the salaryman got frustrated, eventually passing his phone to Sakuya.

He’s honestly shell-shocked that you’re upset, so even though he doesn’t understand why it’s such a big deal he’ll do what he can to make you feel better. He’s not the best at comforting people, he can never find the right words… but he’s good at listening.

He placed his hand on top of yours, grateful you don’t point it out verbally or he might actually combust. He can only hope the two of you are seated secluded enough that no one comes by.

Something’s starting to bother him though. The more he listens to you, the more he’s conflicted— if you’re dedicating that much of your… gems (?) to this guy he gets why you’re upset. Another part of him wonders what’s so great about this specific guy.

He’s not upset nor is he jealous, he’s just… figuring out what specific traits you like in this guy. For future reference. Who knew, maybe he’d get to play a role similar to the character you like so much?

“Why do you like him so much, anyway?” He asked, staring intently at you.

Your attitude quickly changed from being upset to being excited to talk about your favourite character.

“He’s just so kind and thoughtful! A total gap moe, you wouldn’t expect him to be so family-oriented because of his appearance but he totally is!” you began, barely catching a break to breathe before continuing on, “plus he didn’t start off as the strongest? But he’s constantly trying his best you just want to root for him and care for him?”

Unexpectedly, Juza finds himself a little flustered, though he’s unsure of why when you’re only describing a character. Perhaps it was the look on your face while you talked?

“Plus, he looks a lot like you! Obviously, I need him to come home, right?” you exclaimed, hitting him straight in the heart with your crinkled eyes and a beautiful smile.

The hand that was comforting you a while ago and gently rubbing patterns onto your skin stilled. You noticed right away, hoping you didn’t say anything too weird during your rant.

“Juza?”

He’s silent for a while, unsure of what to do and ultimately deciding to say the first thing that popped up in his head.

“… then why’d you need him to come home if I’m already-“

When he heard you squeal he stopped himself from continuing whatever he was going to say. Did you hear him? Dumb question, of course, you did!

You covered your face with your hands, unsuccessfully hiding the strawberry red colouring your face, and screamed internally. You can’t see how Juza is reacting but you just heard a bang on the table?

‘Juza? Who told you to- istg I’ll have you arrested for-‘

After a few moments, you’re the one who ultimately breaks the silence, knowing neither of you had enough will to point out the warm flecks that still remained on both of your faces.

“We should get going. Our class is all the way in another building,” you said, slowly standing up from your seat.

“… ‘kay.”

You’re not holding hands while walking, but if he noticed the frequency of your hand grazing his he doesn’t let you know.

Reaching the midpoint between your classroom and his, you turn to face him before splitting off in the hallway. You look to see if the coast was clear, and to Juza’s surprise, you enveloped him into a warm embrace, quick but heartfelt. Neither of you saw each other’s expressions, but Juza wondered if your heart raced just as fast as his did.

“Thank you for making me feel better… I love you,” you whisper the last part, before untangling yourself from him and speed walking away to your classroom. You miss the way Juza looks back at you, body frozen but face a mixture of shock and longing and love.

want to order again?

#a3!#a3! act! addict! actors!#a3! juza #juza hyodo #hyodo juza #cafe: dessert menu #a3! actor training game #a3! game #a3! x reader #juza x reader

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seventeendeer · 4 years

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Hey! Sonic question! What're your two cents on the Ken Penders(?) deal? I don't really know much about it so I'm curious about a Sonic Fan's opinion!

OH KEN PENDERS ... INTERESTING SPECIMEN, THAT ONE

so, the basic rundown is this: at some point in the past, this joker somehow got himself hired on the Sonic Archie comics as headwriter. a lot of the unpleasantness of the series can be traced back to him in one way or another. aside from being an atrocious writer and artist, he’s also antisemitic and a massive sexist, and has a lot of disturbing ideas of right and wrong. he’s also got no sense of what’s ethical to portray in a comic book for children. a cute cartoon bee dying of a drug overdose? overt and extremely disrespectful Holocaust references? child abuse framed as a-okay because it comes from a place of caring? making one of the primary romantic relationships incestuous? that’s all that Ken Penders brand flavoring, baby!

now, one of mr. Penders’ most unfortunate traits is that he is absolutely obsessed with Knuckles’ character. and I mean obsessed. he spent most of his time on the comics making stories about Knuckles. in his mind, Knuckles is quite literally the cartoon animal equivalent of Jesus (not a metaphor! yes, seriously). because he’s spent so long adding asinine lore to the character, he’s also convinced that on some level, he actually kinda owns the character. writing about Knuckles is apparently his life mission, copyright laws be damned.

then a funny thing happened back in the mid to late 00′s: real, completely decent writers saw his extensive work on the comics and thought “you know, maybe we can do something with this? we’ll dust off the sexism and the incest and the child abuse, and then we actually have a pretty cool plot! let’s see if we can salvage these ideas”

see, different Sonic media doesn’t tend to mix - the games are basically a source code that various spin-off stories pick up and alter to an extent to make their own stories. it’s extremely rare that anything from the spin-offs is re-incorporated back into the games, as I believe the copyright process gets tricky. however, back in 2008, a game called Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood was released, and unfortunately for everyone, it had the gall to try to adapt some of Ken Penders’ Knuckles-related lore in a copyright-friendly way that fit into the game series’ canon.

they never should have. Ken Penders, somehow furious that something he had created for a franchise he didn’t own was being used elsewhere in the franchise, filed a lawsuit against SEGA. and unfortunately for SEGA, the legal documents that stated that Penders didn’t have the rights to any characters he created for the comics were lost in a fire years ago.

the lawsuit was successful, Penders obtained the rights to his 100+ awful characters, the second Sonic Chronicles game was cancelled, and the Sonic Archie comics - a series which had been building up continuity and stories for over a decade - had to be rebooted with a giant chunk of its cast and stories missing.

since then, Ken Penders has been trying to make his own comics with his characters, and the art is uglier than ever ... also Knuckles is apparently still involved in the series somehow, because copyright only matters when it concerns characters that he made, it seems

on the one hand, the whole fiasco is a little funny. reading about all his horrible stories is entertaining and the man is now a laughingstock among Sonic fans. on the other hand, I feel really, really bad for the people who loved the Archie comics and followed them for years. I don’t like them, but other people do, and this one idiot single-handedly destroyed the entire series.

also, as much as I want to fist fight Ken Penders, the Sonic Chronicles adaption of his stories is ... good. it’s so good. it’s one of my favorite stories in the whole game series. I don’t know who the writers of that game are, but they took all the fun and potentially interesting parts of the comic lore and cut out all the bad stuff, and then added some really cool and creative elements, and I just

look. the central character introduced in that game - Shade - she really stole my heart when I was a kid and I still adore her. it’s been over a decade and the legal problems have never been resolved, her story was never finished, and she has never appeared in another game. she isn’t so much as referenced anywhere in later games.

Ken Penders is a fantastic source of unintentional comedy. he’s also a terrible person who, aside from being offensive, also just ruined a lot of people’s fun.

here’s a whole article about all the ridiculous shit he added to the comics, if you want to laugh at him with us. no existing knowledge of Sonic required.

#sketchertalkssth #antisemitism cw #sexism cw #incest cw #child abuse cw #morganzephyr #thesketcherasks

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bloody-fists-beating-hearts · 5 years

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It’s a Fallout76/Bethesda rant

Bethesda just released Fallout 1st, a horseshit pay-to-win subscription system for their absolute cum-bubble of a game, and while it’s getting the flack it deserves there are people already putting on their kneepads so they can gobble down Todd Howards entire turgid cock, and as someone who likes rpg’s way too much this irked me, so have a massive and barely coherent rant i took off the discord because why not.

I want to start off with this: Every good thing about current fallout comes from the fanbase. The stories people tell, the headcanons, the fanfics, the art, everything fans do for it is made with more love, and more thought, than anything Bethesda’s writing and games design team has done in the last 10 years

Now first of all, I haven’t bought or played 76. People are gonna stop me right there and go ”well you haven’t bought it how would you know its bad!!” yeah, I’ve never eaten dog shit either but I can pretty well guess that I ain’t gonna fucking like it.

I knew the second he said "there are no npcs" with actual enthusiasm that this game was gonna be shit. And if you give me 2 seconds to gloat, I never bought the game and I knew this was gonna happen and I was RIGHT so suck my fat hairy nuts all those fanboys who pre-order things mindlessly just because there's a brand name attached to it. If there is anything you take from this its DO NOT PREORDER. BRAND LOYALTY IS FOR BOOMERS AND BOOTLICKERS. FOR FUCKS SAKE BE SMART WITH YOUR MONEY.

Games like this are fucking 80-90 dollars or more in Australia so I actually have to think about whether this momentary distraction is worth almost an entire days paycheck, and I’m still looking for employment which means I actually haven’t bought shit in a while (side note, anyone wants to commission me for 10 dollars I’ll draw damn near anything. God I need to make rent)

Every executive at Bethesda seems to be playing catch-up to EA's monetisation scheme. Beth has abandoned their model of single-player rpg's in favour of a "games as a service" model. Fallout 76 seems to me like its a weird experiment for just how far they can stretch this and still make money. It actually makes me wonder if they are

a) just completely unaware of fanbase response [no idea HOW]

b) are running into financial problems and are doing this out of desperation

c) todd howard is still mad that obsidian made a better fallout than he ever could and he's doing this out of spite

Games as a whole has become much like the movie industry where publishers will throw big buckets of cash around to development teams, and those teams have CEO's and higher ups that throw lavish meet n greets and have nice fancy suits and cars and then treat their development teams like shit, overworking them to the point of exhaustion, because the product has to be on time for release dates that are scheduled to be the most profitable (christmas is a notable one).

And those products are consistently bland, shitty, shallow experiences. Narrative cum-dumpsters that are purposefully made to toe the line as safely as possible, to be open to as wide as an audience as possible so they can make the most money, and Bethesda is a huge offender. Skyrim was fun, sure, but it was watered down to fuck, it had shitty dialogue, it had bland one-note characters, it had a simplified skill system. It was impossible to lose. Seriously, try and fail a fucking quest in skyrim, other than one or two, it's a hand-holder of an rpg, but it has a huge community of fans that put in monumental effort, for free, because they like the Elder Scrolls, and they like the world bethesda made.

Then Bethesda goes "hey, that watered down thing we made got huge! lets release it about 12 more fucking times, with some of the SAME bugs, with the SAME content, with the SAME limitations and Yes, we absolutely expect you to pay for it, again. Then they release the remastered edition which, to their credit, is free to anyone who already bought the legendary edition (on PC), and does actually have updated 64bit capability and some graphical enhancements (that aren't anywhere near what some goober in his basement cooked up in his spare time, but whatever). Then, seeing that Skyrim was so popular, with kids especially, and made money, they turn their sights to fallout 4, a game that was so anticipated that someone made a fake countdown and caused a small meltdown on tumblr/social media when it was revealed to be fake (i was part of that fiasco, i remember the hype, i was there goddamnit)

So Fallout, a franchise that literally has its theme as its FUCKING TAGLINE, an ADULT game that is equal parts crude, gory and humorous. A game that satirises the cold war era of american my-country-tis-of-thee blind loyalty and openly mocks the way war was idealised, and shows that not even the literal end of the world could either stop humanity's lust for blood or its desire for conquest. Games that showed you the growth of the world - from shady sands to the NCR, from the vault dweller to arroyo, shit actually happened in the games, the world didn't just stop turning when the bombs dropped. A game where you you become a porn star for fucks sake, and it's funny.

So Bethesda sees that, makes something like it (fallout 3) which is good, but a little rough around the edges when you look at it too hard. But the way they suck you into the vault, the way they build a relationship with your dad and your way of life is immersive as fuck, so when you leave the place you actually feel like you're leaving something important, not just finishing the tutorial

then they outsource a Fallout game to obsidian, because hey, we saved your franchise by buying it off you, but if you can make an entire game in one year and get a metacritic score of 85 we'll even throw in a bonus. And fuck me sideways and in the ear, if the obsidian devs didn't work themselves harder than a 4-armed hooker. And they made a game that on release was a clusterfuck of bugs, because they were given an unrealistic time limit and missed the metacritic score by ONE POINT so bethesda goes "nhey heh sucks to suck" and fucks them off the franchise forever. EXCEPT (and I admit I'm biased here) the game is good. The game is actually really good when you remove those bugs, and people start forming attachments to it, and mentioning how bad fallout 3's writing is by extension.

So Todd and Co. in his infinite wisdom, decide that the only thing a fallout rpg needs is 50s aesthetic and fuck all else, and he releases a game so watered down it can't even be called an rpg. And its not. There are no skills. There are barely any dialogue checks. Instead of dialogue, Nate/Nora is a flat, samrish individual that is either "yes sir right away sir may i have another", "yes but i'm gonna make an unfunny quip about it" "this option pretends to say no but its gonna give you the quest marker anyway".

The game drops any pretence of difficulty by giving you a deathclaw, a minigun and some power armour in the first 10 minutes, allowing you to effectively reach late-game power levels with some minor scavenging for ammo or cores. Then the game ropes you into some inter-faction war that realistically you wouldn't give a shit about, because some spud in a cowboy hat fucking deputizes you into a military general because you shot like 4 raiders from a rooftop (with a minigun. in power armour. making you nigh-invulnerable to bullets). You're sad about your son about 3 times the whole game and then you're on your merry way to mowing down humans left right and center without a care in the world. God fallout 4's writing is so stupid it gives me an aneurysm.

Remember the part about resources wars and america only having the veneer of a strong country while riots, inflation, and resource shortages tore it apart from within? Bethesda doesn't, have an eerily stepford pastel coloured glimpse at a world that was totally fine, nothing wrong here, shame it got nuked oh well moving on

Your spouse? yeah you love them, they're said 2 whole sentences to you then they died, be sad because you totally loved them and it is totally sad that they are dead. Your weird play-dough son shaun, you love him so much, you even tickled him on the chin once, okay he's gone off you go to chase him - woah now, don't chase him too hard we have all these side quests for you to do! What would be the narrative reasoning for a supposedly distraught parent to fuck around boston instead of finding their goddamn child? fuck knows! just go pick up some goddamn wood and get to base building sonny-jim!

Companions? yeah, they're fun, we gave them a romance questline and it's thus: if you pick enough locks and pass a minor charisma check maccready will be ready and willing to tell you about his sick child, and then he'll ride you like a stallion. Talk to him like, 4 times, and he will be your bosom buddy for life in about 3-5 days if you just pick locks like a fucking madman, because character growth is hard and counting beans is easy.

Also your son is a part of the faction we were talking about! something about synths, remember that one questline from rivet city that barely anyone actually remembers and was an interesting time waster at best? Well get ready to do that same quest but about! 15! more! times! because we could not think of anything else to write about synthetically produced humans that assume peoples identities other than having them as a hamfisted metaphor for slavery. Why do they take over people's identies? Well because the institute needs them to aasdkfjdh kshshshsh t9oe of course.

Speaking of hamfisted metaphors, here's the underground railroad, named after the underground railroad that actually mattered, except this time its the same thing but synths. They are so top secret that the only way to find them is to follow the only bright red line in a street that is exclusively green-brown otherwise, and then enter their super secret password, which is "password"

They are then, like every other faction, absolutely willing to trust you, at face value, no questions asked, because have to actually do something or require a skill check might make this hard for people under the age of 12 to play. Then you go do whatever fuckin shit you do, I stopped playing at this point, and then you find out your son is actually 60, you guys have a tearful, 10 sentence reunion, then he diesthe whole reason you were out here in the first place dies, and you react appropriately, which is to say you say his name really sadly, and then go back to mowing down raiders with reckless abandon

And then 76 gets released, bethesda drops all pretense of fallout still being an rpg. You want a story? Fuck you, pay up. Its retro future and thats all that makes falloutSatirizing war mongering? You can nuke things in this game and its totally fine, its actually the goal, because fallout has nukes in it right? Pay us 10 dollars and you get army olive drab spraypaint because hurrgh war is fun and great, wasnt that the tagline from the first game?The more i rant the more angry i am because people put their heart and soul into writing this. The lore and dialogue is actual work that someone researched and loved and felt proud of and now it's becoming a hilariously meta parody of itself.

Honestly FUCK bethesda and and fuck todd howard for his pisspoor cash grab. Not even worth calling it a video game anymore

#good lord what is happening in there #meta #listen i fucking love fallout #but this aint fuckin it chief #fallout #fallout 4 #fallout 76 #fallout 3 #fallout new vegas

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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 5 years

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Michael After Midnight: TGWTG Anniversary Crossovers

I think enough time has passed where I can talk about these films without looking like I’m jumping on a trend.

Back when it was, you know, an actual thing, Channel Awesome would every so often gather together and make a big-as anniversary film to celebrate the site. The movies would always be these massive doorstoppers where everyone would be running around in Halloween costumes of whatever character they liked the most that fit the theme and fighting some random villain. None of this ever really tied in to their work, and none of this even remotely had anything to do with reviews. It was all just hanging around with friends and having dumb fun, and when I was younger I kind of just accepted that.

But certain revelations have made that dubious. No one was having fun making these. Everyone was miserable, except perhaps Doug Walker, who was just utterly oblivious to the plight of his coworkers. There was seedy stuff going on, people were pretty much being tortured and abused, and it’s a wonder anyone was ever able to feign enjoyment in any of their scenes. And looking back on these movies I used to remember fondly, I have to say… they kind of really, legitimately suck ass. These three films – Kickassia, Suburban Knights, and To Boldly Flee – are just legitimately painful and depressing to sit through, for reasons both meta and writing-wise.

The biggest problem with all of them is their humor, which is a pretty big problem when you’re starring a bunch of comedians, some of whom can be legitimately funny. The worst bits tend to revolve around the mind-boggling number of references they cram into each script; To Boldly Flee and Suburban Knights are much worse in this regard, as they have all of the actors literally dressed up as their favorite characters, but there are two examples of this sort of thing that shine as the worst examples of all. The first is Lindsay Ellis doing a Sarah Palin impersonation in Kickassia; Palin was such a flash-in-the-pan politician that it instantly dates the whole movie, and I don’t know if it was just bad writing, lack of direction, or what, but Ellis just fails to make this joke work at all. Like I know I can’t expect this to be as funny as Iron Sky’s Palin riffing, but still, it’s just sad.

The absolute worst, however, is JO in To Boldly Flee as Ed from Cowboy Bepob… at least that’s who I think he’s supposed to be playing. I know nothing about Cowboy Bebop and have outright refused to ever watch it because if Ed is anything like how JO played her, I’m going to fucking hate the whole show, Steve Blum and Melissa Fahn be damned. JO’s portrayal is whiny, hyper, annoying, manic, obnoxious… there’s not a single positive thing that can be said. His performance of the character is pretty much the poster child for just how absolutely awful these movies could get.

There’s also a lot of jokes where the punchline is basically just “this guy’s body/genitalia is funny, teehee.” Suburban Knights and To Boldly Flee have some truly awful examples of this, such as the numerous upskirts Doug Walker gets as Link and the infamous Spoony Dune scene. But even that isn’t the worst of it. The worst of it comes from the frequent states of near-nudity that Justin “JewWario” Carmichael would find himself in throughout these films. To Boldly Flee has him channeling George Takei and fencing without his shirt on, which is bad enough, but Suburban Knights has perhaps the worst scene of all, in any of these films, though only with hindsight.

For those of you not familiar, JewWario was outed as a creepy sexual predator during the whole #ChangeTheChannel fiasco. The guy groomed young women and did god knows what else during his time on the site, with none of his coworkers any the wiser and the management doing their best to cover it up; in fact, everyone only found out because the suits who owned CA made a huge blunder during their rebuttal of the claims of its former employees. With all of that context, please try and rewatch Suburban Knights’ climax in which JewWario helps save the day by revealing his penis to everyone. This right here is Keyser Soze levels of “uncomfortable in hindsight.”

The stories aren’t much better, and often fall into the same sort of issues that The Angry Video Game Nerd movie fell into, in that nothing in these films really showcases why we love the reviewers; Kickassia infamously has the Dr. Insano twist, as one example of how they botched this. All of these movies just feel too epic in scope and don’t really try to incorporate anything that we love about these reviewers into the films. Only To Boldly Flee really does anything right in that regard, as it throws back to everything from oneshot Nostalgia Critic villains to the Todd-Lindsay-Lupa love triangle to Phelous dying… the real problem is you have to actually sit through To Boldly Flee to see that. The movies go for these epic plots where the reviewers do cool shit like take over micronations (Kickassia), quest for powerful artifacts (Suburban Knights), or deal with extremely heavy-handed and hamfisted allegories for internet privacy bills (To Boldly Flee). You’d think maybe throwing a bunch of comedians into an epic plot like any of these could lead to some funny jokes, or maybe some sort of Monty Python-esque parody, but no, instead these comedians decide to revel in melodrama and try to genuinely act, with EXTREMELY mixed results. It doesn’t help that some of these people just aren’t even remotely funny when they’re trying to be.

Here’s the thing with The Angry Video Game Nerd’s movie, in comparison to these, though: it may have had this epic, ridiculous, goofy plot involving Area 51, kaiju, aliens, and crappy Atari games buried in a landfill, but the entire plot was building up to, and ultimately delivered on, the promise of the long-awaited review of the E.T. game. For all the film’s flaws, Rolfe knew what we loved about the Nerd, he knew what the fans wanted, and by god did he give it to them in the silliest, most epic way possible. Even if I didn’t love the film, the fact Rolfe knew why we’d want to see a feature-length Nerd film in the first place speaks volumes about how he understands that he can do what will make him happy artistically and still show the fans what they want to see.

These movies from the Channel Awesome crew don’t seem to get that at all. They don’t build up to a review. They don’t build up to them discovering the worst movie or song or whatever they review. They’re all very straightforward genre comedies where they can make a bunch of shallow, Seltzer & Friedberg-esque “Look at this thing that exists! That’s a joke right?” references. Aside from seeing your favorite reviewers in a goofy plot like this, where is there any bit of the reason you watch these people in the first place? Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if they were playing characters instead of them playing themselves, in their internet reviewer personas; at least then you wouldn’t be watching Brad Jones stumbling around in a Darth Vader helmet and think to yourself miserably “God I wish that poor guy was watching another E.T. porno.”

So there are some positives in these films, shockingly enough. Brad Jones is consistently good across the entire ‘trilogy,’ especially in Kickassia where he has the good sense to walk out on all the bullshit for a while. Maybe it’s just because these films got me interested in him, but I definitely think he does a good job. The same can be said for a lot of the actors, such as the bad guy in Suburban Knights and Ma-Ti’s actor; they manage to deliver at least solid performances in spite of the films. And then there are the James Rolfe cameos, and it’s just always good to see Rolfe in general.

To Boldly Flee, despite its reputation, actually has a lot of genuinely good bits. For instance, the distraction song is actually a really solid musical number. Linkara, Doug, and Spoony actually play really well off of each other, so when they have their three idiot villains team up they at least get some decently good moments. And other reviewers I generally like such as Phelous or Todd do a solid job, and frankly in To Boldly Flee Doug Walker does show some impressive dramatic acting… but it’s in service of a character who has previously been portrayed as a petulant, whiny, self-serving, egotistical manchild, so it almost feels like he’s playing a totally different character. Still, credit where credit is due.

None of these films succeed at what they want to. Ostensibly, they are supposed to be celebrating the site and the friendship of the reviewers, but as I mentioned, there’s no reviewing, there’s nothing that indicates what the site is about, and they all just come off as ego-stroking self-congratulatory wanking. None of these films were worth the pain and suffering that the cast and crew had to go through to produce these, and watching them at all these days is especially hard knowing that a lot of these people are smiling and joking through pain, stress, and abuse. It’s sick.

Kickassia may be the most competent, but that isn’t saying much at all. Aside from the whole Palin bit, this one has a simple, straightforward plot and is relatively down-to-earth, and it almost feels like it really was just a bunch of friends making a shitty low budget action movie in the desert… something sadly undermined by reality. Suburban Knights is probably one of the most uncomfortable to sit through due to jokes like Film Brain saying he’d eat Kinley Mochrie’s “pea-ness” (this was before she came out mind you) and the numerous jokes surrounding JewWario’s junk, but it almost works, like it nearly comes close to being a dumb epic fantasy comedy, but it just frequently shoots itself in the foot with the bad writing and acting and its overreliance on references.

To Boldly Flee is, to put it absolutely simple, a hot mess. This film is an utter trainwreck from start to finish. It is the Battlefield Earth of internet review movies, a bloated, messy, overly long dumpster fire with some of the most nightmarish behind-the-scenes stories and horrendous financial mismanagement you could ever imagine. But where Battlefield Earth is at least unintentionally funny, this film… is not. This film just makes you feel bad for everyone involved, it makes your heart ache for all the poor reviewers who had to suffer under the miserable conditions, it makes you question Doug Walker’s sanity in thinking he could turn his screeching manchild of a reviewer into some tragic martyr in a total 180 from how he had always been portrayed prior. None of these three films are worth sitting through, but I think To Boldly Flee is, with hindsight, the one least worth sitting through, which is a truly incredible accomplishment.

It’s kind of tragic. I still like a lot of the reviewers who took part in these – Todd, Linkara, Phelous, Brad Jones, and even Doug to some extent (though that’s an unpopular opinion these days) – but I just can’t muster up any forgiveness for these films anymore. And I don’t blame any of the people in it (except maybe Doug); most of them were there out of obligation or friendship or what have you. These films are just a monument to hubris, ignorance, broken friendships, horrible management, and wanton cruelty to those who called you friends.

See that picture up there at the top? With all of them gathered together like friends? God, how I wish that were the reality. How I wish that picture accurately reflected life, that they were all pals having a good time and that these films were something they were proud of. But behind that picture are stories all of them could tell of hurt, betrayal, resentment, anger, contempt, and some very unspeakable things in Carmichael’s case. I wish the sort of world a surface level glance at that picture shows you existed, where the crew of TGWTG all had a blast making these shitty movies together, because at least in that case I could find a sort of ironic enjoyment in them. But reality has gone out of its way to undermine any of that.

#Michael After Midnight #Review #Movie review #Channel Awesome #TGWTG #That Guy with the Glasses #Kickassia #Suburban Knights #To Boldly Flee #Internet reviewers

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