#always happy to bring you silly gay comics | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bamfdaddio · 3 years

Text

X-Men Unabridged: 109 (1978)

The X-Men, those plant-loving mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. We’ve been untangling that history for a while, but sometimes, you really want a more in-depth look. Interested? Then read the (un)Abridged X-Men!

(X-Men 109) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne

Ororo not noticing Moira casually drowning Banshee or Wolverine being punted around by some poutine-roided idiot because she’s too busy eating the Piotr-shaped eye candy is such a mood.

I wonder what my ethnic curse would be. Perhaps: ‘By Mata Hari’s bedazled bikini!’

Plot-wise, issue 109 is not that dense. Half the issue deals with the X-Men coming home from their space-adventures, the other half has Wolverine dealing with the Canadian government coming to claim their lost asset. I mean, Claremont uses three pages to tie up some loose Shi’ar ends through flashback because the last issue couldn’t fit it all in. It’s by its very definition a breather issue.

Doesn’t mean it’s not awesome.

WHERE TO START?! Why not with plant mommy Ororo?

Storm’s secondary mutation has to be that her hair always looks like a fabulous follicular cascade, even during an indoor spring shower.

Look, if I had weather powers, I’d probably be using it for mundane shit like watering my plants and ensuring nice weather at my friend’s weddings too. (Okay, maybe sometimes I’d zap dudes who tell random girls in bars to smile more.)

While Storm talks to plants and takes all her clothes off, Kurt does the other thing I do after a rough day at the office: he calls someone for some nookie.

I love that Amanda is so extra that she gives out signed photos of herself.

Kurt just looks so fucking cute here. Look at those little fangs! Yeah, Amanda, get it.

Like a lot of people to whom communication comes as easily as breathing, Piotr is defeated when faced with a blank letter. Look at that trash can: he’s tried this waaaaay too many times.

Anyway, I think “Sorry I haven’t been writing, was busy saving the universe. Weather’s lovely” has a nice ring to it.

Star Wars had been out for around half a year when this comic was published, and it’s safe to say Claremont was a huge fan. You can tell by the direction these comics are taken: the whole Shi’Ar space opera is obliquely inspired by Star Wars and Star Trek and their aesthetics. I mean, Corsair asks to be beamed up and there’s even references to a captain “Spo’ock”.

It was the end of the 70s. Everybody wanted to be a Skywalker: space was big, y’all. Nightcrawler loving the movies is not a coincidence - I wonder if Claremont was also a fan of Errol Flynn.

Anyway, we follow Kurt one more floor down, where he spooks Scott, brooding at the window. The result is an unintentionally hilarious interaction, where Scott and Kurt discuss Real Issues Like Men while Jean comes out to her parents outside.

“Mom and dad, I’m… the Phoenix.”

“Honey, we figured you might be when you introduced us to Misty Kn… Wait, what?”

To be fair, being possessed by a cosmic force for rebirth is almost the same as being gay: it imbues you with fabulous new insights, you start experimenting with your wardrobe and ever so often, you want to burn down the galaxy because some bitches in a gay club have slighted you.

But all that will come later.

Anyway, Jean’s kinda silly coming out leads to a pretty honest heart-to-heart between Nightcrawler and Cyclops. Scott tries to give Kurt grief because of his happy-go-lucky attitude, and Kurt gives him a deserved put-down.

Life can be unkind, Scotty, so embrace the kindness provided to you by a wise little devil.

Scott prefers to brood and Kurt is hanging with Amanda, so it’s a foursome - maybe even a double date? Moira and Sean, Piotr and Ororo. Logan asks for a ride - not because he wants to eat cheese and crackers among ants, no, he wants to blow off steam.

The X-Men’s chicken or egg: did Logan’s sideburns decide the shape of his headpiece, or did the headpiece shape his haircut?

I started reading the X-Men just when the Marvel Universe was starting to reach the height of Wolverine saturation: he was simply everywhere. Like, at some point, he was in X-Force and the Avengers while also being a Headmaster of the Jean Grey school. Add to that him being the face of the Fox X-Men universe… Listen, it was easy to get sick of him. I kind of did.

But this? Original flavor Wolverine, who’s still kinda short, kinda ugly and kinda stuck being a loner? He works as a character. Chris Claremont is beginning to explore his duality: the wild animal who has been experimented on vs. the honorable man who would do anything for his found family. He gives me major Granny Weatherwax vibes: he’s the kind of person who doesn’t need people, but he does need people to know that he doesn’t need people.

So yeah, he's still cool.

Also, his healing factor hasn’t been kicked to superhuman levels yet - you know, being able to regenerate from a single cell or whatever - so he actually feels kind of anxious when he’s about to toss himself off cliffs etc.

Not happy about that red belt, though.

Anyway, Wolverine is out doing the noble hunting-without-killing-thing, and then this motherfucker wrapped in a flag shows up. Look, I know I have something against dudes who brandish their nationality as their superhero identity, but this fool is just… ugh.

James MacDonald = the worst. Trust me on this.

Major MacMapleleaf then punts Wolverine across the forest, right into the other X-Men’s picnic, and now we’re all caught up.

Out of all the X-Men in this issue, Sean gets the least amount of screen time but, hey, at least I can steal a joke from him.

Don’t worry, despite the martyr/pièta pose, Moira will turn out just fine!

You weren’t worried?

Anyone?

Look, is there anyone who genuinely likes Moira as a character?

James Hudson, being the worst, doesn’t give a fuck that he just cross-fired an innocent woman - er, innocent as far as he knows, at least - and just nopes out of there, too outnumbered to fight the X-Men.

Yeah, you better run.

He vows to return with Alpha Flight, which… Eh, he’ll at least bring some more interesting characters with him. (Snowbird!) Now that he has sown enough seeds for a future plot to pick up on, Claremont calls it a day. I will also call it a day, after a little fashion watch. Out of all of these character, who has chosen the worst outfit?

Scott. It’s Scott. Look, I get that those ruby quartz glasses make the world a different color for you, but you’re wearing a mustard suit and a bespeckled yellow shirt underneath. Even when considering Moira’s attitude, it’s still the most stank thing in the doorway.

Sean, just what do you see in her?

#x-men #abridged x-men #x-men abridged #professor x #banshee #cyclops #phoenix #nightcrawler #storm #wolverine #colossus #moira mactaggert #chris claremont #john byrne #weapon alpha #alpha flight #lillandra #shi'ar #amanda sefton

46 notes · View notes

nomoregoldfish · 3 years

Text

I Promised You The Moon rant

Just binged it and this was from the episode by episode reaction/discussion with my partner in crime @glossyboy.

First of all, Oab stole the show, singlehandedly, which he's not supposed to. I don't think anyone expected it including himself. In the very top post when I searched his name on tumblr, he said this lol

But the truth is he played one hell of "villain" that required a very nuanced performance and he delivered it in a believable and graceful manner. Jai became the catalyst of the entire season and his rather complicated relationship with Teh was the highlight of part 2.

EP 1

From the very beginning it's clear that part 2 is very much a Teh's story rather than a balanced story about two young people's journey as a couple in the next chapter of their lives. It makes me uncomfortable they made Oh-aew clingy and pessimistic without giving him any character development.

The best part is probably the opening scene where they went paper-rock-scissors to decide who's gonna buy condoms. It felt authentic, the expectation, the hesitation, the mischievous act, all fits their characters well. Other times ep 1 was more like two adult kids playing house, literally in an empty giant ass upper middle class apartment.

EP 2

It's great that they poked the femininity vs. masculinity issue through Oh-aew, but stopped right there at the surface. Missed a perfect opportunity to go head-to-head with the controversial topic, start a debate, crush the stigma of femininity, bring something new, be a real game changer of the BL genre, and most importantly give Oh-aew some concrete character development. Part 1 showed us a gay character that's very comfortable with his sexuality and femininity, that's almost revolutionary in Asia, not as a comic relief but a leading role. Oh-aew questioned his own sexual identity once in that bra wearing scene, it's straight out of comfort zone, BOLD, and transgressive. So I expected more from part 2.

That's it? And they're already sophomores? Can't believe Oh-aew's character has been marginalized like this. It's pathetic.

But I love the brutally honest conversation at the end where Teh vented his rage and despair regarding his frustration of acting. He was acting like a dick because he's disappointed, and scared. Teh again was not afraid of showing vulnerability, making the reconciliation very realistic and touching.

EP 3

Dare I say I freaking love ep 3! The unresolved (partially sexual, but not entirely) tension between Teh and Jai was over the roof! And the built-up to their kiss was very authentic, which paled Teh and Oh-aew's much sidelined storyline, including the long anticipated sex scene (still can't believe it happened right after Jai explicitly instructed Teh to do it after the two spent a whole night bonding, like wow! Totally TRANSGRESSIVE and to some extent, kinky.) Teh looked up to the senior, idolized him, wanted to be good for him and make him proud, thirsted for the validation from him, which was mixed with affections. The workshop diary was a brilliant idea to let them open up to each other and eventually bring them close. This was what a meaningful arc of a story looked like. By contrast, there isn't a single moment between Oh-aew and Teh in part 2 that made me go "Damn it's soooooo hot!"

I know Jai/Teh wasn't the endgame but I appreciate the storyline so much. It's a very bold move considering it broke the over-glorified "one true love in one's life" fantasy of its target audience, mostly young cis women. The popular narrative of "you can only love one person through your life/one true love" in romance fictions/chick flicks was totally smashed. And it wasn't written just to stir up things between Teh and Oh-aew, it wasn't a silly fling. Instead, it's meaningful, complicated, natural, and realistic, delivered by nuanced and excellent acting from two young actors. It's hilarious that fans hate Jai with a passion and call him names.

And big news, Jai is bi?! Bravo! He's radiating bi vibes since his first appearance.

I kind of gave up at this point, the season wouldn't do Oh-aew any justice. Like my partner in crime pointed out, the costume design literally threw some "incongruous female fashion pieces" on Oh-aew, made him dye his hair red, without...making any actual point of his personality or his character development. Wardrobe was supposed to make a point in storytelling. Yes, PP wearing pink is cute, and? There's nothing else for Oh-aew. Unfortunately he's reduced to this sulky, crying, and wronged partner in a failing relationship.

EP 4

Oab again was killing it. The tension between Jai and Teh...from the rehearsal in front of Oh-aew to the dressing room pep talk, was incredibly intense and hot AF.

Was it a manipulative relationship after all? Oab was so good at conveying a character with many faces. Jai's a mentor to Teh, also a good friend, their relationship was genuine. He's also ambitious with his own goals, he used, challenged, provoked Teh in a way that benefited them both. It made sense the title of part 2, I Promised You The Moon, was from Jai's script. He promised Teh what the junior wanted the most, a bright future in acting. Teh's unconventional and unspoken feelings for Jai was the best part of the entire season in terms of creative writing, it's complicated, fragile, delicate and completely heartbreaking.

The after talk in the hallway was so well-written. It's funny (Teh joking about playwrights always write about their EXs is gold), intimate yet meticulously controlled, no one lashed out or wept. Both knew what they signed up for and Jai particularly made it clear about his motive and the purpose of the "special workshop" beforehand (or right away.) Yet it's no one's fault that Teh got carried away. He's younger, he's immature, he's more into it, it's totally natural. It's so romantic when Teh's singing karaoke in the bar with Oh-aew, yet he couldn't help but desperately staring at Jai on the floor, knowing he and the man who just turned him down were never gonna happen, they were done, but he's still madly attracted to him and his talent. He fancied Jai, at least the idea of Jai, a playwright, a director, someone knew him better than himself. That hurt beautifully.

EP 5

Teh/Oh-aew endgame at this point was pretty meaningless. Oh-aew as a leading character never got any solid character development over a span of four years. What happened between Jai and Teh wasn't just "cheating", though they surely made it look that way, like Teh's empty promise of "I won't see him again after the show ends". No matter how Oh-aew and Teh eventually reconciled, there's no emotional connection, no sparkle anymore between the couple.

But I knew for a fact they had to. Otherwise it's too much of a risk financially for the series. The creators had to take the easy way out like most traditional romances—one of the most contrived and formulaic trope where the male leading character made a mistake (usually cheating) and realized he's wrong, he deeply hurt the female leading character (Oh-aew was merely a girl substitute in part 2), then he completely changed for hell knew what reasons, started doing every nicest thing in the world to try to "win" the female character back. It has been feeding the emotionally-deprived cis female readers/audience who are frustrated with heterosexual relationship irl for decades. The formula that made romance outsell other genres of fictions combined in the 60s and 70s still sells today, under the name of boys' love. It's pathetic to see Oh-aew confess to Bas that he always "lost" to Teh. Love shouldn't be some kind of game or competition, there isn't winner or loser in love. Love is spontaneous. Oh-aew didn't lose because Teh developed feelings for someone else, and he didn't win when Teh begged him for reconciliation. People change, people move on.

And as predicted, they went for it. The ending was so absurd and tedious.

Overall, Jai's probably the hardest villain to play, he needed to be REALLY GOOD to be "the bad guy", to make his role conceivable. Oab absolutely nailed it with his talent and experience. He's not even my type or extremely good looking yet I'm 100% SOLD. I immediately re-watched the scene of him kissing Teh back hungrily at the end of ep 3 like I used to re-watch Teh/Oh-aew's steamy make out session at the end of episode 3 part 1. Coincidence?

I like some parts of both seasons for the same reason, each challenged and tried to break some outdated/contrived narratives in the BL genre. Part 1 took on the sexuality taboo by showing two same sex characters sexually attracted to each other, no more "I'm not into boys, I just happened to fall for someone of the same gender" or "pure love" bullshit. By staying true to the characters' sexuality and actually showing it with explicit, intense (and beautifully shot) scenes, the gay characters were normalized. They weren't just pure and innocent, no one was. And it created two of most unconventional gay characters in Asian pop culture, Oh-aew, a beautiful boy who's very comfortable with his own sexuality and femininity, not passive at all, taking initiative to pursue what he wanted; and Teh, a sensitive, caring and vulnerable boy who cried a lot, he's confused but also sweet and brave.

Part 2 tackled the "You can only love one person through your life" trope with a very nuanced story of "cheating". Yet neither carried out what they started. Part 1 fell short of a revolutionary piece that stayed true to "adolescent sexual turmoil", dismissing bisexuality and becoming a typical unrealistic BL fantasy in the end. And Part 2, ugh, forced a "happy ending" that almost no one digs. I understand it's extremely difficult and risky to disrupt the established norms of a genre. But sometimes being transgressive and progressive could be the same thing. A story, an artwork, has to challenge something in order to create something new and compelling.

#i promise you the moon #i told sunset about you #ipytm #oab oabnithi #billkin #pp krit #rant post #asian lgbtq dramas #lgbtq #i promised you the moon

17 notes · View notes

mrmallard · 3 years

Note

18 and 33

18: rant about your favorite musician

So I was bullied pretty badly as a kid at school and at home, and there was a period of time where I was drowning in a sea of age-appropriate content that felt extremely condescending and fake - it wouldn't ever engage with the idea of being sad or depressed in a serious and nuanced manner outside of the token "you're sad now but things aren't so bad!" message. Most adult media I had access to at the time, mostly shitty early-00's action movies airing on TV, was very vapid and about as thematically hollow as the age appropriate stuff. Nothing really represented me and made me feel heard, nothing validated what I was going through and the negativity I was feeling towards others and myself.

As a 12 year old, I found the media which finally validated the depression, hurt and general violent negativity that existed within me due to all of my negative experiences.

And that media...

was End of Evangelion, an anime movie in which the apocalypse happens in an immeasurably bizarre and fucked up way, where there's a bunch of overt giant robot violence but also very alarming and grounded person-to-person violence, and where the ending is unendingly bleak.

I then found the Mountain Goats through a show called Moral Orel when I was 16, and I lamented the fact that I hadn't found them before I found one of the bleakest anime movies of all time to cope with what I was going through. Because my Evangelion fandom ultimately did me a lot of harm - and while I was a stupid kid at times in how I engaged with the Mountain Goats (sending John stupid asks on Tumblr like a fucking asshole), there was a much more resonant catharsis that came with the music I heard, and it facilitated healing over time rather than escapism and outright nihilism.

I feel like had I found them earlier, I could have negated some of the harm I did to myself - like Tallahassee came out when I was 6, and I was pirating music all the time on LimeWire from 13 onwards. There's a hypothetical past where my music piracy led me to find the Mountain Goats way earlier than I eventually did, and it would have changed my life forever.

The Mountain Goats laid out a template for how I found all of my other favorite bands. There was the initial hook - the prerequisite "No Children" and "Old College Try" from Moral Orel - followed by immense overplay, followed by branching out into their other music. Once the connection has been made to a strong base of starter songs, I then get interested in listening to full albums, which is where I find the second wave of songs to latch on to after the first wave gets overplayed. Rinse and repeat until I've exposed myself to all of their music. TMG was the first band to facilitate this process, and I've done the same thing to every "core" musical act I've listened to since.

What I like about the Mountain Goats is that they're not afraid to broach difficult subjects? The Sunset Tree is a masterpiece in this regard, there's a level of vulnerability on that album that you don't get from most other artists - the closest equivalent I can think of is A Crow Looked At Me by Mt. Eerie, about the singer's wife dying of cancer.

There was a part of me that used to approach The Sunset Tree with a lurid voyeurism, a desire to validate my own pain by engaging with the pain that the album puts out there - but now when I hear songs like Hast Thou Considered The Tetrapod, I'm capable of seeing a broader picture and having more than just the desire to be validated by listening to another person's trauma. I would consume media like this to feed an unending hunger, but now I take it in bite sized portions and stay mindful of what it represents outside of my own experience.

One thing I want to talk about is John's early work, because when I started listening to the band I couldn't stand the lo-fi stuff. The whirring sound gave me a headache. But over time I've built up a strong base of his earlier material, even stuff he considers an old shame, that I absolutely adore.

The first "going to" song, to my understanding, is Going to Chino. And if you haven't heard Going to Chino, I recommend it - it's silly, it's overwrought and it's passionate. You'll never hear a more earnest commendation of a town's access to the 60 freeway in any other songs on earth. There's also Minnesota, which to this day might be John Darnielle's most romantic song. He acknowledges that he's a different person than when he started making music and he prefers to move forward as opposed to living in the past, but there's a lot of power in songs like No, I Can't or Yoga, regardless of how far removed he becomes from the self that made them.

My favorite song might be From TG&Y, because it hits on a very personal note - engaging in self-destructive behaviour to cope with a town that's sucking all of the life and goodness out of you. I've only ever drank to excess, but there's something very relatable about feeling how run down you are after a bender, having this awful manky taste in your mouth the whole time as you shift from place to place, and having this impulse of needing to run away and start a new life before this way of living kills you.

There's a lot of myself wrapped up in the Mountain Goats, and whether they're the primary band on my radar at any given moment or not, I can always spare a few words about how they make me feel.

33: what do you think about a lot

I think a lot about queer people in the past and how they've able to live their lives. I'll give you three examples.

Lately, I've had this pet idea about the anime/manga series Ranma 1/2. I haven't seen or read it, but I do know that it's about this young guy named Ranma who is afflicted with a curse or the like that results in him changing gender depending on the temperature of the water that gets dumped on him.

Ranma 1/2, from what I've gleaned, has resulted in a few gender awakenings - if I'm not mistaken, I think Dan Shive was one of those people, who went on to create the webcomic El Goonish Shive which deals with gender in a similar way at the start before taking more of a serious turn as the comic goes on.

But I have this idea in my head about early Ranma 1/2 fans writing stories about Ranma coming to terms with being a woman, and deciding to find a way to break the curse in a way that would leave the character as a woman. I wonder if there's anyone who tapped into their transness back then through their Ranma fandom, and whose journey is documented in their work.

It's like, there's people back then who Get It. Who came into their own in a time where the concept of gender transition was less accepted than it was now. And that's my people - geeky fanfiction writers. I want to know that there are people who found an innate truth to them, and who were able to be happy.

Another example I want to talk about is Robert Reed, who played Mike Brady on the Brady Bunch. I care deeply for Robert Reed. From what information is the most easily accessible about the man, he was apparently a pretty angry guy at times - he wasn't proud of his role on the Brady Bunch, and he'd get into arguments with the producer of the show. He was a closeted gay man playing the most sanitized TV dad in America, and if that news ever came out, it would sink his career and the entire show along with it.

But he was a good man. Notably, the producer of the Brady Bunch would tolerate his outbursts because his instincts would usually turn out to be right. And while he was upset with the material, he was never abusive to his co-stars. A bunch of them speak fondly about him to this day - he'd take the kids on day trips and stuff, and became something of a mentor and father figure to them. You don't hear wholesome stories like that from the 70's any more, but by all accounts Robert Reed seems to have been a decent man.

Robert died of colon cancer, but at the time of his death he had HIV as well. He was an incredibly private person - the only reason we know that he's gay is because he called Florence Henderson a week before he died to let her know and to get her to tell the rest of the cast. Apparently he kept in touch with her for years, and he saw fit to let everyone know before he died.

My understanding is that he had a partner at the time, though I'm not 100% sure. I hope Robert Reed had love throughout his life, y'know. I hope he had people who he loved and was loved by in return. I'm sad that he lived his whole life in the closet, and I hope he was able to find comfort and fulfillment in the relationships he did have in his life.

The last example I want to talk about is David Hyde Pierce - Niles from Frasier and the professor from Treasure Planet. I learned a while back that he had come out as gay in the late 2000's, getting married before Proposition 13 went into effect in California. I saw a topic about him on GameFAQs recently and I wanted to bring up that he was gay and married, but it had been a while so I googled him again to get my facts straight.

Not only is David Hyde Pierce still married, he's been in a relationship with his husband since 1983.

It means so much to me because people break up all the time in Hollywood. Whether it be the stress of the outside world gawking at them all the time, or the vice and excess of the entertainment industry corrupting people over time, or just falling out of love ala Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman - relationships in Hollywood don't last. And you don't hear much about gay celebrities and their love lives unless it becomes a point of controversy, ala Elton John's adoption issues or George Michael getting outed.

But the entire time David Hyde Pierce was on Frasier and doing voiceover - for all intents and purposes, at the top of his career - he was in a relationship with a man he'd already loved for a decade beforehand. And they continued to be together until gay marriage became legal, at which point they married each other, and they're still married to this day.

I'm really happy that they've been able to go the distance. May we all have what they have one day.

#long post

6 notes · View notes

viktormaru · 4 years

Note

Amma be honest my dude, expressions on my characters are always godawful. I can put them in the most interesting pose and their face is just •_•. So please, how do you do that so well.

OKAY, Ive talked briefly about this already but I’ll try going further into detail now. Please bare with my limited english and my limited knowledge as well, but this is a tiny crash course on how I do expressions

OKAY! First of all, I won’t go into detail on how to make sad or happy expressions or anything like that cause I think most people know what a sad or happy face looks like and there are great tutorials out there about it. I’m going a little on the specifics of how I HANDLE expressions.

Whenever I’m about to draw a face I think of a few things: what are they feeling? How intensely are they feeling that? and how comical is that feeling supposed to be to the audience?

And those are important points to see what kind of approach I’m going, here’s an example using the feeling Anger

This is an example of a character feeling anger

This is anger, but even more intense!

This is also very intense anger, but it’s supposed to be comical

Well, what’s the diifference? I think the details that help your expressions have more complexity to them are

1. CREASES AND PLUSHYNESS (i’ll explain)

2. SYMMETRY

3. SIZE

4.EXTRA EFFECTS (again, I’ll explain)

5. CONTRAST

SO!

1.CREASES AND PLUSHYNESS

Your face is a whole sheet of skin slapped over many muscles right (what the fuck), which meaaans that all your features in your face are somewhat connected, meaning that moving one part of your face will pull along other parts if you do it too hard.

Like above, how gai is squinting. His eyebrows are trying to meet in the middle and his eyes are following along with creases underneath. I wanted him to squint so bad I even pulled the mouth up into a pount just so it could meet that tension point as well, which is what that crease near the nose and shadow on the lips is indicating.

Thats one thing I put on smiles a lot too!

Whenever I’m making a genuine happy smile I want to bring the whole face up!!!! So the cheecks get squishy around the lips, I’ll often bring the lips further up into the face, the eyes get all squished up as well and the eyebrows are just shot up, like there something pulling everything up because!! happiness is up! its energy! its high!

Making your faces squishy opens room to try a lot of new things like cheeks puffed up from holding a laughter

or lips getting pulled sideways for a grimmacing expression

or even further down for… god who knows what this one is called

also remember about intensity!! if you go super hard in the creases you can create quite a humurous effect

like.. this is true despair

or go really soft to create a gentle expression

the cheeks are still a little squished and so are the eyes!

BUT THATS NOT ALL, CAUSE NEXT IS

2. SYMMETRY

Symmetry is fun (its not), by assymetry can help you convey even more complexity. Hell, even expression like disgusting or the feeling of superiorty come from assymetrical expressions. So those

smirks are a classic example. Lift one corner of the mouth more than the other, keep the eyebrows assymetrical, you get a smug face.

Or a cocky smirk…

I think they can keep the face interesting and puts a lot of character into a simple face, like, even genuine smiles that are a bit crooked to the side can look cute!

I also sometimes use assymetry to indicate where the emtion is direct towards?? if that makes sense? like, here obito is pouting at minato, directly

his pout is even aimed at him.

Or how in here tsunade’s smirk is already going for the bottle even though she hasnt put it in her mouth yet.

I think assymetry also works for separating part of the face to create strange or scary expressions, if that makes sense. Like, a maniac grin comes from wide eyes, a smile and basically a frown, those things are going in totally different directions in my head, so when they come together

it looks wrong, and thats why it works.

Raising one eyebrow more than the other, squinting one eye more than the other, pulling your mouth to one side or the other,those details make your expression look a little more complex, funny or human depending on how intensely you go at it

3. SIZE

So Okay, we’re human, we can open our mouths and widen our eyes and that will definetely have a different effect on hour our expression is read. But the best part is, we’re drawing expressions here, we don’t have to be limited by actual size restricions when it comes to face features!

SUCH WIDE EYES!

I can also blow a characters pupils to indicate something like

not being focused on whats going on at all

or to fill it with tears

I can also make them look like just dots or a single line to express surprise

or righteous anger?

or fear

You’ll also notice I make the mouths really big in many cases dusahdu

and it kind of ties up with the next topic which is

4.EXTRA EFFECTS

An expression is not the face alone! specially when we’re drawing! Sweat, blushes, blue shadows, those are all features we have at our disposal to help making an expression even more complex, as silly as it can be

This is awe and admiration instead of surprise because of the sparkle in the eyes and the deep blush in the cheeks!

These emotions convey anxiety from the sweat, the eyebags under the eyes, its soemthing a bit painful.

a simple blush can make an expresison contraditory to itself

am i intimidated or turned on?

am i angry or embarrassed?

Adding tears and even messing the hair also help in convey different things as well

and I like sometimes changing the texture of the eye to make expressions too! (like shown on some expressions above as well)

even snot can work

this looks dumb!

so , go ham my friends.

even text can help

LASTLY

5. CONTRAST

this one kinda only works if you either have more than one character or you’re making a comic. sometimes.. humor comes from contrast. Making an expression and then a completely different one can be really good, or changing how much detail goes into the expression, or even a sudden shift in style can have impact.

like going from drawing faces like this

to something like this

Or going from charming to … well

or go the other way around, from not detailed to too detailed

its a lot about trial and erro and having fun with what you have

make dumb faces as you draw them, break the rules a bit, find out what you’re comfortable with, go ham

OTHER NOTES THOUGH:

EDIT: forgot to talk abt this:

Heres some of the parts of the face i think of to make expressions

Eyebrows (how high are they? how close together are they? are they symmetrical?)

Eyelids (closed? open? half open? symmetrical?)

Pupils (dilated? small? shiny?)

Lower eyelids (squished? blown wide?)

Nose (creased on one side? nostrils flared?)

Cheeks (puffed out? pulled up? pulled down? squished? blushing?)

Mouth (This can go many places)

You said you know poses but I’m gonna say this anyway, body language does a LOT to sell your expression or emotion.

a hand unconciously reaching for something

or covering the mouth to convey (fake) innocence

she didnt even say anything but you know she wants to ask something

kunai in one hand, other reaching out, flowers indicating that yes he is happy about it and he will kill for it

hands especially can do a lot for a characters expression so try to always draw them when you can.

I think thats it for now though!!!! Hope it helps

#waffle art #tutorials #long post #oh my god im sorry mobile users ?#Anonymous #holy shit this took me more than an hour to do wHAT

252 notes · View notes

valor-selfships · 4 years

Text

dancing lights in your eyes [jjba rispro oneshot]

You can read this on AO3 here! Please like, comment, reblog, kudos if you enjoyed this! It fuels me to make more content.

Summary

"Prosciutto rubs his hands over his face. Of course it had to be him. The first man of the group he even got with, all those years ago, the first one he met besides Pesci, the first one he shared his home and bed with. Of course it would be that man, the one who made the lights dance in his eyes, who would be the father of his first child.

Risotto Nero."

Notes

so this takes place in my "everyone lives, but there's still Stands and shit, and also it's modern day and the Joestars are essentially all cousins so everything takes place in the same timeline" au! i'm just a little gay bitch who wants soft shit. i just got into jojo like 2 weeks ago but that ain't stopping me

i am a trans man myself! please don't accuse me of fetishising anything, as i am not. just projecting, babey!

also i should note everyone in la squadra is dating and the doppio situation is expanded upon later on in future stories so don't worry about that for now :3

remember to kudos and comment if you liked! it helps me want to write more.

Story

Prosciutto has had his suspicions. In fact, those suspicions began, almost comically, when the group found out about Doppio's unexpected pregnancy. Yes, Prosciutto has always known that, despite the testosterone and the protection he uses, there's always a chance that he could end up pregnant, by any one of his lovers in the group. It's kind of like how there's always the possibility that a tree will fall on you and crush you when you walk outside, or the possibility that he would go to assassinate someone and end up getting killed himself. It's always in the back of one's mind, but in Prosciutto's, it's not something he wastes time thinking about extensively because the chances are so low.

Even so, he can't deny what's been going on. His periods have always been incredibly regular, happening during the first week of every month like clockwork.

And then the first week of May comes and goes, with no blood, and he starts to worry. Combined with the intense nausea that even Pesci has noticed by now, the constant soreness of his body, the headaches, and exhaustion, that tiny chance grows.

But the reality of it isn't one that hits him until he's standing outside of the doors to the clinic, having just finished his appointment, staring at his reflection in the glass doors for a few moments before turning briskly on his heel and walking away.

Prosciutto is eight weeks pregnant. For two whole months, he's had a tiny human being growing inside of him, and he didn't even realize it until now. Or, perhaps, he didn't want to realize it.

Generally, for a man with four partners who could have potentially gotten him pregnant, Prosciutto would be in a similar situation to Doppio, not knowing exactly who the other father of this child is. But Prosciutto lives his life on a schedule, and that, strangely enough, includes his sex life. It's fairly easy to rule out most of the group (Melone, Doppio, Ghiacchio, Sorbet, and Gelato are out, as none of them save for Sorbet possess the necessary equipment to even get him pregnant, and Sorbet and Gelato don't sleep with anyone but each other anyway), and he's able to narrow it down further thanks to the appointment confirming how far along he is.

Two months. Who was he with two months ago? He doesn't have to check, because he already knows. He knows exactly who he was with and how this probably happened.

Prosciutto rubs his hands over his face. Of course it had to be him. The first man of the group he even got with, all those years ago, the first one he met besides Pesci, the first one he shared his home and bed with. Of course it would be that man, the one who made the lights dance in his eyes, who would be the father of his first child.

Risotto Nero.

His hands fall into his lap as he looks up from where he sits on his couch in his little apartment. He plays with the folds of his clothes for a moment, thinking about how it won't be long before he'll need to buy new ones. Something tells him that suits won't be terribly comfortable for him to wear for much longer.

But, more importantly than all of that, Prosciutto needs to speak to Risotto.

He checks his watch. Risotto's schedule is unpredictable, as are most of their's even now that they've split from Passione, but he usually makes it home on these days around the same time. The group has been talking about pooling their money to buy a house, a real one they can all live in, by the time Doppio's due date comes around, so at least they'll have the upper hand on the ex he refuses to name in case he comes around (and they all want to live in the same house anyway, all things considered), so Risotto has been working harder than ever to make it happen.

Despite everything, Risotto Nero is a good man, who will make an even better father. Prosciutto needs to speak to him, but not through a text or a phone. He needs to say this face to face.

So he folds his hands on top of his lap and waits.

///

Risotto walks through the door of the apartment at precisely 8:00 PM. It's been nearly six hours now since Prosciutto discovered the truth about his condition, and since then, he's effectively cleaned the entire apartment and re-organized his bookshelf, and by the time Risotto walks in, he's in the middle of fixing up the cabinets where the dishes are. As soon as the door opens, though, he nearly drops the glass plate he's holding, and has to fumble to ensure it doesn't fall to the floor and shatter.

Risotto doesn't miss the unusual jumpiness of his boyfriend. It isn't like him to be like that. Even so, he keeps his composure as he walks over to Prosciutto, who keeps his back turned to him for the moment while he closes up the cabinets.

"Tesoro," Risotto greets, leaning in to wrap his arms around Prosciutto's waist and rest his head in the crook of his neck. He trails a few kisses from below his ear down to his shoulder. "What has you so nervous?"

He's had six hours to think about how this is going to go, Prosciutto thinks, but now that he's facing the situation, all of his planning feels like it was for nothing. His clear blue eyes meet Risotto's black-and-red ones (the black sclera tend to throw off most people and make them nervous, but to Prosciutto they are enchantingly beautiful) as he turns around to face him, and everything falls away in that moment. It's just the two of them...

Well. The three of them, really.

Prosciutto takes a deep breath, while Risotto cups his cheek in one hand. He rests his hand on top of that one, laces their fingers together.

"I... well. It was silly. I had worked myself up for something that doesn't even frighten me anymore," Prosciutto replies, his voice soft. Risotto reaches up with his other hand to thread it through Prosciutto's blonde hair. He's worn it down for the past few hours, and without the gel keeping it in place, it's soft and silky. Touch has always been so important to Risotto, ever since he was a child. Autism and a natural want to be alone means that Risotto is rarely one for being touched by or touching others, but the team brings out a side of him that never wants to stop touching, being touched.

So many people fear Risotto's hands, but Prosciutto feels anything but fear when his fingertips meet his skin. His hands are cold, but that doesn't bother him anymore.

"Is that so?" Risotto murmurs in response. "Then, would you rather not talk about it?"

"Ah... well, it's still important," Prosciutto replies quickly. "I would have told you sooner, but I wanted it to be planned and perfect. I realize now that was foolish of me -- the planning, not waiting for you -- but what's done is done." With the hand that's still holding Risotto's, he carefully pulls his hand from his cheek down his body to rest on his belly. There's nothing there to feel, not yet, but that isn't the point of his actions.

It's the first time Prosciutto has ever seen Risotto truly speechless, his jaw dropped completely, normally stoic face painted clearly with shock.

It takes him a few moments to work out what to say.

"I -- amore mio, is it true?" Risotto finally says. His voice is breathy, quieter than Prosciutto's ever heard him, but so full of emotion. He can see the shimmering of his eyes, and Prosciutto feels a lump in his throat; however, it comes from a place of happiness. "Are you -- we -- un bambino?"

Prosciutto nods. He can feel the tremble in his own hands, in Risotto's hands. "Yes. I wanted to make absolutely sure -- I had an appointment, earlier in the afternoon. I'm eight weeks pregnant."

Suddenly, Risotto's arms are around him, pulling Prosciutto in close as he buries his face in his neck, pressing kisses to his neck and jaw while he speaks and cries at the same time: "Oh, oh cuore mio, a child -- our child -- you are la mia anima, la mia vita. You and our child will both want for nothing, I will promise that."

Prosciutto sniffs again, feeling the warm tears sliding down his face, making no effort to stop them. It's like everything is hitting him all at once, but in the best way possible. He holds Risotto as close to him as the other man does to himself, then he leans in to respond, close to his ear: "Mio caro, luce dei miei occhi, sei la mia vita. I trust you. Our child will love you, you - will be an incredible father."

Risotto squeezes him tighter, though not too tight, then pulls back a bit to look at his boyfriend once more. Tears shine on his face, but before Prosciutto can reach up to wipe them away, he kneels down in front of him, rests his cheek on his belly and his hands on his hips.

"Do not sell yourself short, either," Risotto says. "Our child will love you, as well. You will be an amazing father. There is nothing the two of us can't do for this child."

The truth of his lover's words are nearly palpable. Prosciutto knows as well as anyone else that once Risotto comes to a decision, he sticks to it. If he says that their family will be taken care of, then so it shall be. And Prosciutto doesn't mind the prospect of being pampered for the next few months (after all, growing a whole human inside of oneself is no small feat, he knows that much). Especially not if it means he'll get more moments like this with Risotto.

Prosciutto smiles through his tears when he feels the warm press of Risotto's lips against his lower belly. Yes, there truly is no reason to be worried, he supposes. Risotto loves this child, and the rest of the group will love them, too, of that he has no doubt.

He can only hope that, somehow, their child can feel the love their parents have for them already, and will return it with a love of their own when the time comes.

///

little translations:

tesoro - treasure amore mio - my love un bambino - a baby cuore mio - my heart (very romantic and old-fashioned, by the way) la mia anima - my soul la mia vita - my life mio caro - my dear luce de miei occhi - light of my eyes sei la mia vita - you are my life (in the context used, he's basically saying that he can't live without risotto because he's also his life)

#jjba #jojo's bizarre adventure #rispro #risotto nero #prosciutto jojo #my writing #fanfiction #fanfic #writing #pregnancy #pregnancy tw #tmpreg #mpreg #trans mpreg #trans pregnancy

17 notes · View notes

cordelias-bitch · 4 years

Text

Surprising Sarah characters with Lunch🌠

Sarah:

You visited Sarah while she was on set for AHS cult, you knew she loved catering, but she loved your cooking even more. You had made her favourite the night before and decided to bring the left overs for dinner.

"Hey baby! What are you doing here?!"

She ran to you, still in costume and pulled you into the biggest hug. Anyone would think you hadn't seen each other in a long time, when in reality you had seen her a mere few hours ago when she woke up in your bed.

"You know I can't resist the brown hair and this costume makes your ass look great love... oh and I brought lunch"

"You're so cute"

Billie:

You found billie at the murder house, you knew how long Billie had spent preparing for this new adventure and how much energy she was using to make her show almost as good as she is.

"Hey ghost lady"

"Hey babygirl, what brings you here? I thought you said this place was unsafe?"

"I've brought you lunch... and I did, I still think it is but I know I'm safe if you're here"

"Always baby"

Lana:

Lana was half way through a day full of interviews and she was exhausted, all she wanted was you. She decided to give you a ring, although you were probably too busy to talk to her.

"Hello love, how are the interviews going?"

"Hello sweetheart, they're exhausting. I wish you were here"

"I'll bring lunch"

"You don't have to drop everything for me, I'm sure you're busy"

You smiled gently through the phone, you had been planning on taking Lana lunch anyway, you missed her like crazy.

"Never too busy for you love"

Cordelia:

You knew Delia could get caught up in her work, so when she was absent at breakfast and lunch, you decided enough was enough. You found her office and knocked before entering.

"Delia?"

"Hm?" She didn't look up from her work, being a head teacher and supreme was tiring work you guessed.

"I brought you lunch, take a break for me"

"I don't have time y/n, I have to finish all this paperwork before tomorrow"

"Well take a break and I'll help you"

"I can't ask you to do that"

"You didn't, I'm telling you I am. You'll starve yourself if you're not careful"

"Have I told you I love you today?"

"Yes dear, but you can say it as much as you'd like, I'll never complain"

Bette and Dot:

You always brought the girls lunch no matter what day it was or how busy you were. It was just another way to show them how much you cared.

You always tried to make each day different, and today you had decided to make a picnic.

"How are my favourite girls?"

You walked over to the pair sat at their dressing table and placed a kiss on both their cheeks causing matching blush to grace their skin.

"Are we having lunch together!?"

"Bette..." Dot scolded her sister.

"Its okay Dottie, I love how excited Bette gets. And of course, I thought maybe a picnic would be fun today"

"Sounds awfully romantic! I cant wait!"

"Me neither Bette, me neither" You smiled at both the girls and pulled them towards you for a hug before lunch.

Sally:

You know that sally didn't need to eat because she was a ghost but that didn't stop you worrying that she wasn't taking care of herself.

"Y/n! I thought you wasn't coming back till later? I've missed you so much"

Sally was sat at the bar, the usual tears running down her cheeks at the pure sight of you. Happy tears of course.

"Well I brought food, I thought maybe we could have lunch together? I cant remember the last time you ate love"

"Thats sweet baby, but you know I don't need to eat"

"I know... you should still take care of yourself though"

"I love you"

Sally loved that you cared about silly things, although she didn't need the same things as humans do, that you did; she loved that you still wanted her to have them. Food, water, sleep. You looked after her, and she would be grateful for that forever.

Ally:

Both Ally and Oz were ill and you felt bad that you weren't there to look after them both. So you booked the rest of the day off and the day after and hurried to the shop for supplies before heading to Allys.

"Y/n? What are you doing here?"

"Well my favourite people are sick and need to be looked after"

"But you might get sick too"

"Then you can return the favour and look after me" you placed a kiss on Allys cheek and entered her house, finding Oz sitting on the couch.

"Hey little man, I brought you some stuff to keep you occupied. I'm sorry you're ill bud"

You handed Oz some comics and some sweets and retreated to the kitchen.

"What did I ever do to deserve you?"

"How about you contemplate that while on the sofa love, and I'll make some lunch"

"Thank you"

You'd do anything to see that beautiful smile on her face every minute of everyday.

Audrey:

Audrey hated catering food, said it tasted fake, so she always took her own. However, that morning she hadn't had time to do anything so went to work without her usual meal in her bag. You felt bad for keeping Audrey up all night and therefore making her sleep in for longer than normal. So you decided to make her one of your family recipes and suprise her at work.

You knocked on her trailer door and waited for her to answer.

"Hey babe, what brings you here?"

"I brought you some lunch, I know you don't like catering and you have nothing to eat so I made you an old family recipe... its nothing special-"

"Im sure it will be amazing babe, thank you. I hope you made enough for the both of us, or you'll have to find something else to eat"

She winked at you and made your cheeks blush. You always loved lunch with Audrey.

Wilhemina:

Mina had missed lunch and you weren't quite sure why, she had looked under the weather this morning when you left her room. But she brushed it off and told you she was fine. Being a high ranked purple you instructed a grey to bring you wilhemina's uneaten cube. You were always kind with the Greys, hating the fact that even after the end of the word there was still a hierarchy.

"Mina? Are you in here?"

"What do you want y/n" you never took her tone of voice personally, especially when she was evidently ill.

"I brought you lunch, I know you're not well love"

All that was returned was a grunt and you took that as a thank you.

"Let's get you sat up, you need to eat and drink some water"

"Thank you"

"Always mina"

Tammy:

You knew where Tammy would be, at the loft with debbie and Lou and the rest of the team. You were only a small part of the team so you weren't that involved in day to day things. However, you made sure to visit every day to bring Tammy her lunch. The women were always getting caught up in their plans, that you were scared Tam wouldn't eat unless you made her.

"Hello beautiful lady"

"Hello, hows my favourite fence?" You placed a kiss on Tammy's lips as you placed a Tupperware box within her hands.

"Better for seeing you. Did you bring lunch again?"

"Of course, can't have you starving while making important plans"

She smiled down at you and thanked you with her eyes.

"Hey love birds, how about you bring us all some lunch too, sharing is caring you know"

Lou was always teasing you for caring so much about Tammys lunch. But you'd still do it until the end of time if it meant you'd be looking after her.

Taglist:

@x-a-gay-disaster-x @rowenaslilwitch

63 notes · View notes

amysgiantbees · 5 years

Text

Avengers: Endgame Spoilers

Much like Avengers Infinity War, my feelings on this film can most succinctly be put that overall I found it average to infuriating but there were some truly wonderful parts in between that I’ll always enjoy. I’ll come to this later but here are some notes on my feelings on Avengers Endgame...

THE GOOD

Wanda and Captain Marvel (but I still needed more of them)

Wanda and Captain Marvel fighting Thanos

Steve wielding Mjölnir

Valkyrie on a pegasus

King Valkyrie

Carol’s haircut

Rhodney and Nebula bonding!

Nebula and Tony playing paper football!

Pepper fighting in an iron suit

Sam is Captain America! (He better be Cap in the films, not just this new show, I know the MCU has a history of keeping the TV shows and films separate but please not in this case!)

THE BAD

Bruce dabs. I just can’t.

Clint’s hair and tattoos

Thanos’ ecofascism being justified by the narrative in certain ways like with Cap’s look on the bright side about the environment line.

The time travel plotholes. I do not understand time travel at all in this, feel free to explain if you do. Also, Thanos not having knowledge of anyone due to time travel really took a lot of impact out of the climax for me. My biggest issue with the time travel logic in this though is how can Nebula kill her past self?

The limited time given to emotional character arcs is a real issue for me. For a movie that goes on for so long, I felt like more attention would be given to this and less to action. Like having characters that had rivalries with members of Thano’s Children never confronting against them again.

Thor never mentions Loki. He never grieves him. He was meant to actually legitimately be dead in this one so it would have been nice if not only there was more emotion and time spent on the scene with his mother but if he said goodbye to Loki during it too. Or told Freya to check in on Loki for him, make sure to tell him he loves him form him. I know she is destined to die but if they’d come earlier in the day and let there be time to do all of this it would have been more emotionally satisfying I think at least.

I HATE fatsuits. The fat jokes and the jokes at the expense of Thor’s panic attacks and mental health are REVOLTING. It’s just sad and frustrating that they decided to throw out all of Thor’s character development from Ragnorok for a few cheap laughs. His fat suit doesn’t even look real. It doesn’t match his neck and face and he doesn’t move right. Shockingly enough you move easier when it’s your own skin. This article and the author sum up my thoughts on all of this really well: https://medium.com/@kivabay/the-centr-of-controversy-cba6f23c692e. Also, Bay has a really great quote unrelated to Thor but also sums up another issue I have with the film and I just want to highlight it here, “ I also couldn’t help but view the movie with the knowledge we pick up on the internet about who is leaving the MCU, making the character deaths feel melodramatically goofy and like executive-level calculations.“

Also, somewhat silly critique but doesn’t Thor need special Asgardian beer to get drunk not “mortal” beer in a can. Damn, Thor was just poorly thought through. And I could almost find him fighting against Thanos with zero weight loss aspiring if the whole idea of Chris Hemsworth portraying him and every other way he was handled wasn’t disgustingly terrible. Fat Thor as an idea is amazing. I’d love to see him portrayed as such in the comics as long as he’s treated with respect.

They can’t just have the film be cathartically separate and contained they have to hint at more film’s with the “Where’s Gamora” mystery ready to go and Thor joining the Guardians. They have been advertising Homecoming for months and have the next few years of movies already planned, people aren’t under any illusions that there won’t be sequels. Just let it be self-contained. Especially since it’s already so long.

Just personal taste thing here but the “Avengers Assemble” bit was too cheesy and the ruin of the Avengers mansion was a boring background for the battle.

Dr. Strange was wasted stopping that tsunami. Did they need that? It was such a boring use for him in the battle. This battle had so many heroes but it felt like it really used their powers significantly less creatively together than any other battle previously.

Why weren't Fury, Carol and Maria all standing together at Tony’s funeral with their arms around each other like everyone else? It was really strange and took some of the emotion out of the scene, they’re close to each other. It could have been such a beautiful moment and tied the whole Captain Marvel “Where’s Fury?” scene together if they had them beside each other with her smiling sadly at him or leaning against him. They’re friends and it would be nice to see Fury further fleshed out and more three dimensional.

I don’t mind that Loki is dead but it does make me retroactively annoyed that “You... will never be... a god” was seriously his last line. He had nothing nice to say to his brother before he dies? So he really did die trying to use a knife on someone who can take on the Hulk. I hope that at least in his show that’s coming soon he’s genderqueer and given the opportunity to properly show off his magic. I feel like his magic has never been displayed properly or used in particularly interesting ways so far.

I would have rewritten the scene where Banner and Rocket look for Thor. Banner, Thor and Valkyrie’s interactions are stale and strange. It would have been better (so as not to erase all of his character development) if he was still dealing with his PTSD or the loss of his people poorly but was at least trying to help the Asgardians. But then show Valkyrie having to help him and being the clearly stronger leader due to being able to deal with this grief better after having experience working through grief from losing her Valkyries. She could also be helping him with his alcoholism instead of judging him since she has been there! It would have shown her mentor abilities and kingly traits. You could still have him join the Guardians in the end but now he’s just less negligent. Then he isn’t passing a burden for convenience but because he recognizes Valkyrie was there for his people when he couldn’t be and is the better, more loved leader. Instead of what should be a great moment for Valkyrie that she’s shown as earnt and is deserving of it just seems like Thor was like “Well it turns out ruling was too hard for me I’m going to f*ck off to space now look after them for me.” Still, love that she gets to be king.

Did I mishear her name or is Clint’s daughter not called Kate? Why aren’t we getting Kate Bishop? I know she isn’t Clint’s daughter in the comics but they’ve changed people’s backstories before and after seeing Clint training with a young girl in the trailer I was just really excited for her. I love her character in the comics, but maybe she has a name change here?

Also, why does Clint go overseas to fight people? I’m sure there are more than enough bad people in America for him to fight for YEARS. There are Neo-Nazis for F*CKS SAKE. It just seems racist to imply he’d have to look in places predominantly occupied by POC to find bad people. Also, that Sword scene was strange. It felt really unnatural and fake like it belonged in a completely different movie.

Also, little nitpick but I just found it to be a weird moment when that kid Ant-Man talks to didn’t say “What do you mean?” or “How do you not know?” I get not wanting to talk about the snap but how could he not be mildly curious or confused as to how someone seems to be ignorant to the biggest tragedy in world history.

Also, I really would have loved if the final battle had more consequences. More deaths and injuries. I think it would have been more realistic and added more to it. I especially really would have loved it if they had shown Clint getting injured in such a way that his hearing was permanently damaged. It would be nice to finally have him have that important comic book trait.

Also, that scene where Joe Russo, a straight man, plays a gay man is bullshit. Let us have gay superheroes. That is such a pathetic attempt at representation. Make Loki Genderfluid, make Carol a wLw, Give Okoye and Valkyrie a girlfriend or acknowledge they’re wLw.

Furthermore, I understand that the shot of all the women at the final battle was probably foreshadowing A-Team but I don’t think the creators realised that, One: it makes it look like they’re trying to hide that they killed the only original female member of the Avengers while giving all the men satisfying endings. Two: that there are A LOT fewer women than men but also that there’s enough of them that more of them really should have been featured before then and had more time spent on them. Just so many women yet so few films focussed on them. Furthermore, for those people who don’t know about A-Team it also just feels like a moment of pandering.

Look, Black Widow has never been one of my favorite characters but she deserved better. As soon as she was proclaimed infertile in Age of Ultron it was a death sentence because what use is a woman who can’t reproduce. She didn’t even get a funeral. Clint should have died. The snap forced Natasha to fully commit to her found family and lead the Avengers for years. The snap sent Clint into a debatably racist murder rampage. Natasha did something good after the snap it gave her more purpose. Clint’s purpose was to bring his family back and he could still do that by sacrificing himself. It’s honestly far more satisfying to see Natasha get her happy ending than Clint because Clint’s ending is just far too similar to his story in Age of Ultron. It is just hilariously underwhelming when everyone else has an emotional ending just to have Clint’s be a regurgitated version of him retiring with his family in Ultron. Also, Natasha dying for guilt over some vague bad that’s she’s done in her past that we know nothing about is so unsatisfying. This video I feel also sums up a lot of my feelings on this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A81p1N2gnNY&t=649s. Also from a monetary standpoint, not that Disney needs more money, but there’s way more demand for Black Widow films than Hawkeye. Just why Hawkeye, no one gives a sh*t.

More so I’m not against Tony using the gauntlet but I think it got in the way of Nebula having a fully satisfying conclusion to her arc. At least one woman should have had a satisfying, fully realised arc. It would have been great if Nebula got to finally kill Thanos but honestly, I wouldn’t be as mad at it if she hadn’t got wrongfully blamed for doing it by Thanos or had her arc conclude in an otherwise satisfying way. She gets abused further by Thanos for something she never did and never gets an opportunity to even just face him and confront him about ANYTHING.

Also, Vision is barely mentioned in the film. Which wouldn’t be so frustrating if he wasn’t the reason why an ENTIRE ARMY of predominantly black people was sacrificed in Infinity War. They had to save him because they all apparently cared so much about him but can’t remember to mention him more than once afterward.

I really hate that they were so scared of spoilers that they didn’t let all of the actors read their scripts ahead of time and cut out massive chunks of their scripts and didn’t tell them who they were playing against. I would rather spoilers than poor acting that ruins the timelessness of a film. This is meant to be epic!

#avengers spoilers #avengers #avengers endgame #my analysis #myanalysis #anti endgame #endgame #marvel #marvel endgame #endgame spoilers

9 notes · View notes

usedtobewerealpacas-blog · 5 years

Note

sylvando!

HI DID YOU KNOW I LOVE THIS GAY ICON BECAUSE NICE. TO. MEET. YOU.

i loved sylv from like, the jump, just because he’s just the most fucking extra of all time. he goes out of his way to be extra. he does everything he can to be the most extra he can possibly be. wants to tag along with the party? better announce it after LEAPING FROM A 50 FOOT STATUE. he’s amazing. i love too that he’s also capable. he’s the comic relief character, sure, but he’s also incredibly skilled at just about everything he tries (even moreso in cutscenes), really useful to the party, he’s silly but he’s never useless.

but mostly i love that he’s like. the moral fucking center of the team. sylv’s first act as part of the game was to try and bring character development to faris, because he not only cares a lot about knighthood and nobility and was clearly kind of annoyed by faris’s shirking his dutues -- but also because he cared, and he wanted faris to succeed. and he just… keeps it going? it’s sylv and sylv’s compassion that dora targets, and it’s sylv who drags the entire party into helping a little girl. he has the least ties of anyone in the main cast to the plot and backstory -- but he tends to be the most, or one of the most, affected by events, to be angry at injustice, to want to help. he’s not in it for destiny or revenge, he just wants to help people.

while also being as absolutely extra and ridiculous and dramatic as he possibly can be while he’s at it.

in universe everyone is going on all the time about how hot he is, so i guess he’s supposed to be, but his design is just so goofy. that said i love him and his weird slopey eyes and big ears.

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

he’s a fucking gryffindor. he’s brave and noble, sure, but he’s also a goddamn attention whore who loves the spotlight and loves the world knowing just how cool he is. whereas like, a hufflepuff will work hard and be kind but doesn’t need the spotlight, sylv demands the spotlight. he’ll be brave and noble, but he’ll never be subtle about it.

best quality:

his heart! sylv wants to make people happy. he didn’t want his knighthood because he didn’t just want to serve and protect and guard one person or family or kingdom -- he wanted to make people smile. and as the game goes on, he takes it farther and farther -- okay, he’ll form a parade and bring smiles to everyone! no: he’ll save the entire world so that the entire world can be happy again!

sylv does have a few moments of snark or impatience in the game -- his father tends to bring it out in him -- but on the whole his first impulse is always just to help others, in any way he can.

he’s also like… really skilled? at stuff? like he’s in universe a master swordsman AND horseman AND performer AND ship captain AND entertainer AND trains his parade in merriment and battle AND -- like everything he does he excels in, he apparently was even beating up hendrik when they were kids, and that actually takes a lot of work and diligence. so that’s neat.

worst quality:

he’s… perfect???

no - lol - it’s what his character development ends up addressing. sylv wants to do everything, but what he ends up having to learn is that he can’t just charge ahead and do it all alone. he’s alone on stage, performing and showing off, helping and protecting others, but he’s really not a team player. his best role in battle is supporting others, but he’s also constantly trying to take the spotlight for himself. so when he gets his chivalry tree — he immediately gets moves to protect others, take attacks in their stead, and give them the spotlight for himself. he cares about everyone and wants to help them, but he tries to do it himself, without opening up or inviting others along.

ship them with:

fucking hendrik. i don’t care. fight me. i could honestly happily ship him with anyone, the entire cast, but hendrik? best option by far. i mean, forget all the joint attacks, even the one where they fight back to back and absorb all the other’s damage and protect one another. they’re sudden childhood friends. they’re also now adults who haven’t seen one another in twenty years, have their own lives and experiences and goals, but are also so similar despite all their outward differences. they believe so many of the same things. they both just want to help people, but in different ways -- and like, hendrik’s development mirrors sylv’s and just. come onnn.

also, stoic awkward gruff tall loser + silly, dramatic, super cheerful = awesome.

brotp them with:

VERONICA. i love how veronica is like. so prickly a lot of the time, and then is just instantly like “yo this dude checks out” with sylv, and how they’re immediately just running around pointing at people and shit. i love how sylv’s first reaction to erik’s amnesia is ‘lololol can’t wait to gossip about this with ronnie.’ like together they are just petty and wear sunglasses and i love it. he totally brings her to pubs with him and then gets them both kicked out when he gives her beer.

also: ANYONE. tell me the luminary doesn’t think sylv is just. so fun. loves to get dragged into sylv’s shit. tell me that serena doesn’t think sylv is so gallant and cool and sylv doesn’t love playing that up. TELL ME THAT JADE AND SYLV’S CHARM STAT ISN’T INCREDIBLE.

needs to stay away from:

?????? no one he is great. literally don’t have an answer for this. there are probably characters who wish sylv would stay away from them, but that would honestly probably just encourage him. to be jasper’s new bff. like it or not.

misc. thoughts:

i also want to just shout out how well sylv got localized? like. japan has this awkward way of like… isn’t it sooooo hilarious, this character is buff and tall and gay, and so they make them speak in women’s language and act womanly, like lololol isn’t it so funny how gay men = teenage girls? and it’s PRETTY UNCOMFORTABLE? and so in the japanese version sylv talks like a girl and his skill tree is “maidenhood” and like -- we’re supposed to still read him as a man, it’s just funny? and it’s REALLY GROSS?

so i love how the english version just made sylv extremely, extremely latin instead, did make him incredibly flamboyant too, but just leaned into a completely different set of tropes, but did it without, i think, leaning into weird stereotypes? like i fucking love sylv, our icon,

11 notes · View notes

sweetfirebird · 6 years

Note

Also, and I'm sorry but I have to try, I honestly don't understand what you have against Voltron. I feel like shows that are actually diverse and inclusive are unfairly hold to a higher standard than others. I'm brown, bi and non-binary and god I wish I had a show for kids like Voltron when I was younger. There is a f/f pairing in s7, Shiro IS gay and Japanese and he very well could end up with someone in s8 like it's hinted, and there are many awesome PoCs with great development and potential??

This is complicated, and you have a second part for me to answer, and I don’t want to seem dismissive at all. So bear with me please. I think in a lot of ways, Voltron is good. For example, my friend has a tween child who is questioning or curious about sexuality/gender etc and fucking loves Pidge. Loves Pidge to death. Sees herself (possibly themselves) in Pidge and is elated and relieved and happy. That is great. Good representation is always so great. So I am not dissing that in any way.

I think though, that the thing with representation is that for many people, it is/was piecemeal at best. They have learned to live with one black/Asian/latinx/”foreign” character on a sitcom, for example, or to understand film code to read which characters are supposed to be queer even if it’s never said out loud. So they are/were so starving for someone like themselves they accept(ed) the crumbs. Then some more diverse (realistic) things started to get made, and... I don’t know, it might be holding them to a higher standard, or it might be exhaustion and frustration building up to critical mass. (You gave us this, why not more?) If anything is supposed to be possible now, why not make more storylines about Hunk that aren’t just comic relief? (For one example)

Holding them to a higher standard is also not unreasonable, to me. Maybe that’s because of what I do, though. When you aim higher, when you want to be more than a silly, cheaply made kids cartoon, then critics will expect that from you. They will look at your work accordingly. Critically examining a thing and admitting it’s not perfect is not necessarily dissing it. The questions being raised are pretty valid ones. Is it good LGBTQ rep if it took them seven seasons to bring it up, and then killed off the love interest? Is it good LGBTQ rep if only one main character is queer and isn’t shown with queer friends in their downtime? Why is Bury Your Gays still happening in 2018 ffs? Etc etc etc

Also something to keep in mind that the more diverse/inclusive shows have a more diverse/inclusive audience who are so so hungry to see themselves. So naturally, they discuss that online. That tilts the discussions and discourse you are seeing to criticism and meta from people who have waited for seven seasons, only to continually be told there will be more development for them later.

And also, though is just me speaking for myself, I don’t really watch mainstream television shows anymore. They have nothing for me. So naturally I’m not railing about them on here because as far as I am concerned, they don’t exist. (Except for the Big Bang Theory. I have seen a few episodes of that and fuck that show.) So it’s not that people don’t also criticize those shows, it just that I don’t think they are as invested in those shows as they are/were in shows like Voltron.

That emotional investment I think is the key here. People are/were emotionally invested, and they got hurt by a thing they were not expecting to hurt them.

(This also sort of shows a generational gap maybe. I’ve been through this with shows before, and I don’t have a lot of faith left. But I will discuss that in the next answer.)

Anyway, to sum up, I don’t hate Voltron. I’m sad it didn’t do better. I’m sad it promised some things and then delivered them in the worst way (another dead gay). I’m sad that it upset all the people hoping for more focal, serious storylines for Hunk and Lance. But if it makes you happy, and you feel represented, then it is still a good thing for you.

(I mean, I have also ranted a lot about Miss Fisher Murder Mysteries and I love that show, but it has some problems and there are many things it could have done better. Still rewatch it on the reg though.)

7 notes · View notes

carousels-on-fire · 6 years

Text

Let me tell you about the love I’ve been carrying in my chest for 9 years. But never felt like I was allowed to talk about because ‘I should have gotten over it by now.’ (Note: I changed names and pronouns of those involved, even if no one would know anyone mentioned anyway. I probably slip up and change from they to he, but both are correct. ) Looking at old photos pushed me back into a depressive spiral I’ve been drifting in and out of for 9 years now. I don’t think I’ve written out the full story yet. Of that one relationship that brings me back to this place. Not where people can see it. I always allude to it. Or I tell part of the story. Or I try to downplay it. I tell people: “It was just a thing that happened. It was a two week thing, not important.”But it was the most painful and definitive experience of my early 20s, and even now, nearly a decade on, I still haven’t recovered from it. It fundamentally changed me as a person, and like the earth blackened by forest fire, I can grow around it, but that blackened layer of soil is part of my history. In 2009 I started college. Two months after my mother’s suicide attempt. I was 18, freshly out of high school; and lived the kind of sheltered life where I was terrified to even use a crosswalk for fear of getting hit by a car. I was kept on such a tight leash that I hadn’t experienced much of life at that point. Naive, emotionally vulnerable, and terrified of the outside world. I was left at the curb of my new dorm and for the first time I was on my own, with no one to answer to. I clung to the one friend who made that high school-to-college transition with me, my best friend who was older and seemed much wiser than I was. But it was a crutch. Something to fill that void of authority I’d always operated under. I never knew what to do with myself because i’d always had someone dictating where I went and how I spent my time. On my first day of drawing class I got there early and had to sit out in the hallway to wait for class to begin. And while I was sitting there I saw a person walk, quickly and almost comically past me carrying a music case and a bag, and then comically walk back and ask me where the practice rooms were. I told them I didn’t know because it was my first day and they decided to stop and chat with me because my class had yet to start. This person, who I will refer to as Des from here on out, was equal parts baffling and charming. They were gregarious, punctuating each phrase with a hand gesture, their entire demeanor being slightly manic, but in such an earnest way that you couldn’t help but be charmed. At the time I was entirely unsure what to make of this person, but they were nice, and they were talking to me, and I was happy to have a friend in this strange new world. They mentioned that they saw me in our Sociology class and I made a point to look out for them. We started meeting after class everyday to go eat breakfast together in the dining hall. While they were still gregarious and charming and odd, they had a temper too. One that would manifest itself in a kind of righteous anger at one thing or another. There was a carefully hidden sadness there too, a kind of haunted edge to their countenance that you wouldn’t notice unless you happened to catch them in the stillness between words, in the quiet moments when they didn’t realize you were watching and they could pause the act and breathe. They were also the first gay person I met at college. I’d recently, a couple years beforehand realized I wasn’t straight and realized that I had a crush, not on the very pretty emo boy that I “obsessed” over, but his female equivalent in a new friend. And spent many years of unrequited pining wishing they would notice me. But they were straight and it wasn’t to be. Where most people entered college with a few relationships under their belt already or having married their high school sweethearts, I went with nothing at all. With the memory of never being wanted by any of the people I had ‘crushes’ on and determined to change that. I was so sure college would be it. College would be where I’d meet the love of my life and be married by the end of it. But once I got to college and was finally placed within meeting distance of other gay kids, I realized how out of my depth I was. How scary other people were and how scary this entire world was. So I kept pining after my highschool crush, praying that maybe, somehow they were interested and I’d misread the signs. But Des was the opposite of me, approaching relationships with a confidence and lackadaisical familiarity that I could never had. They seemed to find new people to experiment with at the drop of a hat, and at the time I didn’t register my jealousy for what it was. I simply listened when they described making out with this person or the other. Shrugging, but also subconsciously seeing them in a slightly different light. Though, because I was still pining, I buried that feeling, filing it away for future use. They were just Des, a constant presence that sometimes scared me with their intensity, but never in a way that I would consider leaving. Enough that, like with my parents, I managed their emotions and sidestepped as to not be in the line of fire. Though their rage was almost never directed at me. I soon introduced Des to my best friend, we’ll call them Lee. Lee and Des took to each other immediately, having more in common and being more similar in demeanor than Des was with me. I was immediately relegated from center of attention, when it was just the two of us, to side character, third wheel. Des always tried to include me, but the damage was already done, in a way. Des brought in his friend, Ria and the four of us became inseparable. I was always hurt that Des never seemed to care as much as he did at first, but I was content to be the third wheel as long as I could be with them, as long as I didn’t have to be alone. I couldn’t change the fact that the two of us had far less in common, and my quietness simply couldn’t compete with someone much more sure, much more confident, and better at speaking than I was. It was easy to be talked over so I let it happen. I looked away when they would be so physically near each other in a way that Des and I couldn’t. I tried not to be jealous. But I was. We formed a cosplay group, modeled after one Des found on Youtube. We all picked characters and started calling each other by our character’s names instead of ours. It went from being a hobby to something we did 24/7. We’d wear our cosplays constantly as casual cosplays, try to do things in character, and even do videos and photoshoots. Over time it became a crutch for all of us. All of us dealing with broken home lives, abusive parents, or whatever problems were going on away from school. And dealing with gender and sexuality issues that we didn’t even have vocabulary for. All we knew was that wearing the skins of those characters was so much more comfortable than our own skins. I was part of it, but also deep in my Emilie Autumn phase. They were the cocoons I wrapped around myself to protect myself from the world, and from them to an extent. But the first time I ever “realized” I felt anything for Des was when we did a photoshoot together in character. We were wearing our wigs and decided to pose together in ways that were sort of in character but not really. But it allowed me to be close to them or touch them in ways I hadn’t until that point. And while the tension was there, I didn’t recognize it for what it was. Unlike all my high school crushes where I obsessed over that person, I never once thought about how Des made me feel. It was going on instinct alone. Part of me knew there was something there, but I never obsessed over it beforehand. It simply was, an objective reality with no need for contemplation. The more time we spent together, the more I realized we made excuses to be close to one another, or excuses to touch the other, just innocently. But it frustrated me that every time we’d get close, Lee, our other friend would find a reason to join in or the moment would end. I couldn’t have their attention just focused on me. As selfish as I knew it was I yearned for it. And every time they gave me their undivided attention, it was like water to a parched man. I knew I was a goner one day when we were hanging out in Ria’s dorm room, and Des decided to put on her wig and dance around the room. It was silly, but I just remember making eye contact with him mid-spin, and he grinned at me in this way that was completely open and happy, and this realization just hit. But I still approached it so much more carefully than any of my high school crushes. For the first time I knew what it felt like to have someone reciprocate, and be almost sure. It wasn’t the carefully walled off no to avoid hurting me. But the apprehension of not quite knowing what this thing was. There was still jealously to contend with, but I felt like this thing we had was strong enough to win out against everything else. I had to content with my third wheel status, and that attraction I knew was there between me and Des. The relationship, as it were, started the night Des and I shared a bed, and a first kiss. It was never really decided upon, just something that happened. Des had been sharing rooms with each of us to avoid their roommate and roommate’s boyfriend. The twin bed was just barely big enough for the two of us. And unlike that moment we stayed asleep together in Ria’s dorm room bed, we had the room to ourselves. Well aside from my own sleeping roommate. But it may as well have been just the two of us. After that we couldn’t avoid talking about this thing we had. It was tangible now. We were awkward around each other for a week until I finally got the courage to ask if that kiss had been a one time deal, and whether or not we should try a relationship. I had never been in a relationship but always wanted to be. Des had, but didn’t want to deal with people in our friend group knowing about it. So we started dating, albeit secretly. I had to keep the thing I wanted to scream from the rooftops secret. We met when we could alone, held hands walking through the campus, but we could never be public with our displays of affection. And me, being me, was still a little afraid to show affection in public anyway. And it hurt, to have this thing I’d wanted for so long, but not be able to say anything and to have to act like we weren’t together when we were among the other members of the group. I hated having to share him, even if I knew it was selfish. Other people got to spend so much time with their SOs, and I wanted that too. But I had everyone else vying for his attention. As the year progressed that cocoon of cosplay and group solidarity started to unravel. All the things we had tried to get away from by being other people, were starting to bleed into our college lives. The breakdown of Lee’s mother, the violent fallout of Des’ abusive homelife, and the disintegration of our little cosplay group as we brought in more people was a powder keg of post-adolescent drama. As our friend group expanded and included people only interested in using our intense, fragile connections for their own ends, cracks started forming in the facade of our friendship. Des became more and more withdrawn, or equal parts fury and aloofness that I didn’t know how to handle. But Lee did. When handling my parents emotions it was always step back and wait for the storm to clear. But with Des, I wanted to help him, but was completely out of my depth. He was subject to a pain and helplessness so deep I didn’t have the tools to help. I lacked the kind of empathy that he required. And, as horrible as it was, I was jealous that Lee could comfort him in a way that I couldn’t. Lee had a similar enough situation to know how to help, and I didn’t. In a lot of ways, our relationship was shallow. Des never wanted to hurt me by handing me all of his burdens, so he handed them to Lee. They got closer, while we got farther apart, ironic if you think about it. They were physically closer as well, showing each other affection, even if platonically, in ways the two of us couldn’t. We spent a single night together at my parents house before returning to college after the winter break. After that we seemed to grow further and further apart, not for lack of trying, but because the problems Des was dealing with in their own life were so beyond me. They’d started counseling months before that, and seemed to be falling apart at the seams, as much as I tried to help. Finally, in some odd twist of dumb, teenage logic, I decided the only way to help Des was to give them some space so they wouldn’t have to deal with a relationship on top of dealing with home issues and abusive parents and trying to protect their beloved sibling long distance. I met them in the study room we’d always met in as a group, to have the talk that led to our separation. And I remember, holding them, and realizing what a huge fucking mistake I’d just made. For years after I’d replay that moment in my head again, and again, and again for years just wishing that I’d said “Wait, no, I don’t want to be apart, please stay with me, I want to help you.” I’d have dreams where things worked out, then wake to the cruel reality that was being alone. I never really wanted to break up with them, I still loved them more than I ever thought I could love another person. But I wanted to help them so much that I overrode all logic to do the only thing I could think of. It was the single dumbest mistake I’ve made in my life. I threw away something that, might have been fine if I’d waited until Des sorted their problems out themselves and been there to stand beside them. I still, through some convoluted logic thought that maybe they’d want to get back together later. What I didn’t expect is that my friend, we’ll call him Seth, who’d innocently asked me if Des and I were together would go on to ask them out before Valentine’s Day, two weeks later. I never really realized what I’d lost until I heard they were together. Lee told me. Lee called me up to their work office, to tell me about how they’d planned to confess their feelings to Des in this whole set up way. But hadn’t had the chance. I never even realized that Lee felt anything like that for Des. But it didn’t register until then. I finally told them about that short, month long, hidden relationship that I’d stupidly ended weeks before. I was crushed. My entire world seemed to stop and go still the moment he told me Des was seeing someone. Not two weeks after we broke up. I felt betrayed and had no right to. I really had no right to feel bad since I initiated the end, but I did. It was a kind of grief I never felt before. I realized the mistake I’d made and knew that it was too late to go back. I think somehow, in some twisted bout of logic I thought maybe if I broke up with Des, that somehow he’d say no, and say that they loved me and actually wanted to be together. I didn’t expect them to let me go. And so easily. I realized then that as much as I loved Des so much that it physically hurt to be apart from him for more than a couple hours, Des only saw me as maybe a fun brief relationship, but otherwise another blip in his life. Where I had to beg him to come spend time with me, they were sneaking off with Seth at all hours. They were allowed to be open with their relationship. They could write about it on facebook, meet the parents. Where we had to hide it. My heart sunk down into my stomach every time I saw them together, and it took all I could to not burst into tears every moment. It was then that the depression started. The first thing I did after finding out was sit at my dorm room desk and cry, and then I called my two other best friends and they asked me for Des’ number so they could call and reprimand them for making me cry. But even if he hurt me, I couldn’t bear for them to be mean to Des. I couldn’t do it. I carried my grief inside, trying to exorcise it with art or poetry or anything I was always told would help. But it was an open wound inside my chest, a crushing weight, a reminder that I was unlovable that played inside my head day in and day out. My grades started to suffer. And through it all, I was never allowed to tell anyone why. Because I wasn’t out, the relationship was a secret, and I’d been the one to end it after all. I had no right to be sad and yet it ate at me day in and day out. My friends tried to set me up with other people, but I was still so in love with them, or maybe the idea of him that it was no use. Later I wrote a love letter to him and met with him, because I knew once I saw them, I couldn’t hand them my pain. So I just gave them that letter. And they told me that one day I’d find someone. It was vague enough that I still had hope, but also that I had no closure. It hurt to be told to find someone else when I still felt so much for him. Des tried so hard not to hurt me, that he inadvertently hurt me worse because I was never really allowed to grieve. I couldn’t get over it, because I still had some vague hope that maybe one day Des would come back. Maybe they could feel something for me again. No matter how many people I told my story to, they didn’t get it. No matter how many counselors I told my story to, they didn’t get it. Because even with all my writing skill, I could never convey that feeling and the depth of it. I could never, out loud say that I loved him because it felt like too much. Like a harsh blinding spot light that I had to use words like “adore” or “really like” because saying love, saying I loved them, felt like a blowtorch melting my skin away and I couldn’t function under that pressure. I felt like if I admitted it, then I’d have to deal with the fact that I let go of someone I loved, really loved. Our group friendship kept unraveling. I remember sitting in a study room with our entire cosplay group, and Des, and Seth. Another friend of ours had a knife and I asked to see it. And I just thought “I could slit my wrists with this, right here, right in front of everyone and none of them could stop me.” Except they did. They must have seen something in my face and took the knife away from me. I was starting to fall apart too. Des and Lee and I started sniping at each other. Des would say cruel things to me. Things that he must have seen as some one off comment. But things that haunt me to this day. We had one big fight as a group. I said something cruel to Des that I will never forgive myself for, but luckily, another friend made us talk to each other and we made up. It was strained though. I still loved him deeply and could do nothing about it. I was too afraid to ever bring it up after the love letter, and he, wanting to spare my feelings would never say that he still knew I was in love with him. I think he knew, I would read him stories that I wrote or poetry, which were always indirectly about him, and not say anything. But his eyes always had this sad look, like he didn’t know what to say to me. We both played our parts of feigned ignorance. It was how we kept the peace. But the worst part is we stayed friends. I moved in with him a year or so later along with 3 or 4 other people. Even though it had been so long, and I liked his new partner as a person, it was an open wound. I had to watch them be a couple up close and personal, I had to watch them retreat to their room together, hear about their exploits from friends, and know that it could have been me but it wasn’t. Every time they touched each other it was like a cigarette being put out on my skin, a dull thudding ache in my chest that never seemed to go away. And I had to smile through it. Because still being in love with someone two years after they break up with you is something a crazy person does. So I kept it to myself, I wrapped my heart up in gauze and tried to keep anyone from seeing that it was still bleeding. I swallowed the pain down and tried to do other things. I tried to start a band. I tried to meet new people. I lost myself in new music obsessions. I dove into my Emilie Autumn obsession like never before. But in the back of my mind, through all of it was this voice saying: “You gave up the one person you will ever love, and it’ll never happen again.” I went and created an okcupid account. I exchanged numbers a few times, met one in person and accidentally met a new friend. But I just couldn’t connect with anyone. I would always compare them to Des. They weren’t Des, and I could feel nothing for any of them. I met a girl who I wanted very badly to love, because she was kind of androgynous, kind of loud and ‘fuck the world’ in the same way Des was. But, I just didn’t feel anything. We tried to be a couple, but eventually admitted that it was more convenience than anything and ended it after a few weeks. And stayed friends. The worst part was listening to Des excitedly tell me he’d heard that I was in a relationship, and having to tell them it was over. It hurt that he was excited for me, even if I appreciated it. Every time he’d push me to talk to girls all I could think was “It could be you, I want it to be you, I don’t want anyone else.” Eventually Des and my new roommates got into a huge fight and he moved out. As hopeful as I was when I heard Des was excited to be my roommate, it hurt to see him leave. No matter how much shit my new roommates talked about him, I could never see him as anyone other than this person I loved so dearly. But life went on, Des moved out to live in Vegas, and I created a new crew with my new roommates. We spent every moment together, along with Lee. But I never stopped thinking about Des. His name was a dirty word in our new accommodations because of the aforementioned fight, but I didn’t care. I held my love inside and tried to go on living. I started my band, got a lip ring, tried out that second and last relationship and tried to be a person. Later I found Des’ blog and went through reading whatever I could. Because as much time as we knew each other, I knew so little about him. I read that they were starting to question their gender and it scared me, not because I disapproved, but because I was so insecure in my lesbian identity at the time, that I thought if they transitioned to a gender that I’d swore up and down I wasn’t attracted to, could I still love them? This broke me anew because I was adamant in my identity, but so afraid of what felt like ‘losing them.’ But eventually I decided it didn’t matter. I loved them no matter what. I hadn’t yet heard the terms queer or nonbinary, but knew that my love transcended gender identity. Des started talking to me again after leaving town. It had actually been months, and while I was sad over it, I was determined to wait for him to text me first. I wanted to see if he cared. And eventually I got a message. He started telling me about his crazy life out in Vegas. His relationship ended around this time, and I had hope again. I never said anything, but I always had that what if in the back of my mind. We started talking regularly again. It was shallow, surface level stuff about life and comics. But that connection was there again. I always looked for clues that maybe he was interested again, but being a person who’s naturally affectionate and prone to speaking in character role play, I could never be certain. The crush started to wane a bit. Eventually I decided the college I was at was not conductive to either my fashion designer goals or my quest for a relationship so I put in paperwork to transfer. I began the terrifying journey to not only moving three hours away from my parents, but three hours away from everyone and everything I’d ever known. I was left right in the middle of a brand new city at an expensive college and was determined to start over. While I’d still, always, hold some love and hope that Des would return to me, I tried to be hopeful about finding love at this new school. In spite of whatever was going on in my life, I was always searching for a relationship. And I thought there was no better place to find other queer people than at an art school in a liberal-seeming artsy city. But eventually I’d learn it wasn’t. I moved to the city and was confronted with the exact same fears I had at the beginning of college. I thought that maybe I’d just run into someone, just like my first years of college. And I did, but no one like Des. The longer I spent at school, the more I realized that not only was my art not up to par, but the dream relationship I’d been searching for my entire life was simply not to be. Each new person I met was not who I was looking for. I looked for Des in everyone, but he was singular and unique. I tried to bury that disappointment and try to love someone, anyone. I kept at okcupid, installed dating apps, but still nothing. I started sleeping a lot. I stopped forcing myself to go to college events. Eventually everything started to feel like a chore. I sunk deeper and deeper into depression when I realized that while I’d changed schools, I brought all my pain, all my fears and everything else with me. I started gaining weight, I cut all my hair off. I looked horrible, I felt horrible. I ended up breaking my ankle over the summer and gained even more weight. I returned to college with a noticeable limp. I was embarrassed of every photo my new friends tagged me in because I didn’t look or feel like myself. I couldn’t bear to actually go on any dates because I felt ugly and unlovable. And the fact that no one had wanted to date me since him seemed to cement that fact. Then one day, out of the blue, I got a text that Des was back in my city. The city I’d chosen to go to college was actually his hometown. It had been years since we’d seen each other in person. I was apprehensive because it had been long enough that we were very different people. I met him in a coffee shop, and was delighted to discover that we actually had more in common now than we ever did in our early college days. Des decided to explore the wild side that you simply can’t explore in our middle of nowhere, wants-to-be-a-city where we met. And as much as I thought ‘ok, it doesn’t feel electric anymore every time you get close to me, but there’s still something there.” I was still hopeful, because at that point no other relationship had worked out. I still remember what it felt like to be loved, and wanted that again. Des avoided talking about his relationships while out in Vegas and I respected that. I enjoyed just listening to him talk about his exploits, knife fights, and everything else he’d been up to. I told him about college and art school. But one thing that had changed is our easy familiarity. While Des had always put a hand on your shoulder or had no concept of personal space while telling a story, it felt stilted, different. All his affection for me seemed completely gone. And it crushed me again in a new way I didn’t think I was capable of feeling. I was afraid that any shred of love, any shred of hope was gone now. I knew that love, real love, doesn’t fizzle out, so if I feel less now, then what does it mean? I was pretty sure that Des was in a relationship at that point, but until he confirmed I didn’t want to think about it. We had this stilted, but still close friendship borne out of shared trauma, in a way. But I could never shake that longing. Which ran the gamut from barely noticeable to this all-consuming pining. It went on and off for years. Buoyed by some off hand comment or touch, and sunk by suspicion that he was involved with someone else. I remember one meeting of being so convinced that the chance I’d been waiting for, for years was finally at hand,and I remember hinting at to Des in a noticeable way. But he deflected that comment and I didn’t bring it up again. I didn’t want to press further and risk shattering the illusion of hope I’d created for myself. So I went back to my old ways of pining, but trying not to make it obvious. I would take any shred of affection he could give me. And those shreds were what kept me going even as the depression that the original hurt had set in emotion was beginning to become noticeable in ways that even my closest friends were aware of. I started going to counseling regularly and started taking meds for depression right as my final year of college was at an end. I’d mostly gotten over the relationship, but not entirely. The fact that no other relationship with any other person seemed to work out was beginning to wear on me. It felt like something wrong with me as a person. It had been 7 years at that point, and not a single person after that second relationship, so much as looked at me. That combined with a future made bleak by student loan debt made me sink deeper and deeper. At some point I decided I’d kill myself right after graduation but could never bring myself to do it. I stayed in that city, worked horrible retail jobs and suffered through as best I could. And then, fate decided to bring us together again. My car had broken down earlier in the week, just stalled out in the middle of the road. And I took a bus to work that let out in the mall. And Des, just happened to be driving by and called my name. At that point it had been months since we’d seen each other, even if we lived in the exact same city. He a half hour outside, and me within the city. We started talking again. I was still hopeful, but less so. My suspicions he was with someone were confirmed and it crushed me at third time. At this point I was used to the heartbreak and it hurt less than all the other times. I decided, at this point, that as jealous as I was, I would try to be happy for him. It no longer mattered what I felt because I knew it would always be one sided. Even if I asked every tarot spread if we’d eventually end up together. Even if every wish on every set of birthday candles I’ve made since 2009 have been to bring him back to me. Even if I’m fairly sure I will never love anyone else the way I loved him, I still want him to be happy. So I decided I would try to be as enthusiastic about his new relationship as my heart could take. That I would try as hard as I could to make her feel included in our little friend group. Even if part of me dies every time I think about it. I dressed up and drank my sorrows on new years. I realized that he loved her in a way he could, and would never love me, and there was no changing it. And I was going to try as hard as I possibly could to support him in that. I was going to try so hard to finally bury these emotions and not let them hurt him. But they’re always going to be part of me. I think I had something once in a lifetime. Even if it must be platonic, we’re soulmates. There was a connection there once, and I don’t think that goes away, but he moved on a long time ago. And maybe, one day I’ll be able to move on too. But not now. Now I still think back on it all, and cling to it, because my present is such a depressing mess of pain and sadness and hopelessness. I still hope, but its a futile hope I realize. I’m still so happy whenever I hear from him, the way I’m not happy for anyone else. I’m still going to try to be there for him as much as I can. It still hurts, but he always mattered more to me than I do, so it doesn’t matter. I think I always wrote these things in the hopes that he’d see them and give me some kind of closure. But he doesn’t really read them, and I don’t blame him. He has enough to deal with, without the weight of my sorrows adding to it. And, I think, both he and I know it would be hard for me to handle the weight of that finality if he did finally tell me it would never work out. The vagueness of it seems like something warm and comforting to return to. A what if where there’s no other hope. He told me: ‘one day, maybe, when we’re different people’ and that is what keeps me going some days. I’m always torn between wanting to know, and not wanting to know. I do, but god, it’s going to hurt so much. But that’s the story of why I can’t move on. Why I’ll never love anyone as much as I loved him, and why every other relationship seems so shallow in comparison. This still isn’t all of it. But there are some things I want to keep for just myself. Some details that are ours alone. Maybe one day I’ll be able to love someone again.

#long post #please read it #its about the love i've been carrying around in my chest for 9 years #but never felt like I was allowed to discuss or feel #its basically lore for who I am as a person #I come with lore #lol #it makes me make sense #if you care about that sort of thing #or if you feel like peering into the lives of other people

7 notes · View notes

deadcactuswalking · 3 years

Text

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 21/11/2020 (Billie Eilish)

I’ve got an easy week ahead of me since nothing happened this week. Okay, that’s a lie because there are some big stories here but we only have six new arrivals, meaning that this might be a shorter episode and honestly I’m glad. We’ve had immensely busy weeks since I started this show, full of album bombs from 21 Savage, Ariana Grande and Headie One, bizarre new entries from years ago like “Train Wreck” or “All Girls are the Same”, interesting and intriguing new arrivals ranging from Clairo to Giggs and most importantly, a lot of comical mediocre garbage from D-Block Europe. This week, however, I’ve got half of my usual bargain bin of pop music and whilst some of these songs are notable and worth talking about... well, you’ll see. “positions” by Ariana Grande is spending a fourth week at #1. Welcome back to REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Dropouts & Returning Entries

Firstly, let’s run through the drop-outs, most of which are inconsequential considering this is a slow breather week between two massive ones – BTS are coming next, folks, and bringing Megan Thee Stallion with them. I think our most notable losses is how absolutely everything from Kylie Minogue, the Kid LAROI and even dutchavelli is completely gone here, including “Cool with Me” with M1llionz, the actual single from the record. I guess we can say goodbye to the top 10 hit “Breaking Me” by Topic and A75, as well as the drop off of one 2020’s biggest #1 hits, “Rain on Me” by Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande – we can wish a perhaps premature farewell to “Jerusalema” by Master KG and Nomcebo Zikode while we’re here. The bigger stories probably lie with our returns, many of which are peaking or returning to their peak like “Sofia” by Clairo at #75, “All Girls are the Same” by the late Juice WRLD at #73 and “Martin & Gina” by Polo G at #71. The Christmas songs have also started flooding in, one of which is a new arrival that we’ll talk about later, but so far we just have the controversial classic “Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues featuring Kirsty MacColl returning to #63, “Last Christmas” by WHAM! – the biggest #2 of all time – back at #44 and already, on November 21st, more than a month before the big day, “All I Want for Christmas is You” by Mariah Carey moving up to the top 40 at #30. I don’t see much competition that’ll block this from #1 this year. Also, speaking of all this holiday music, “Holiday” by Little Mix returns at #36 thanks to silly UK chart rules that meant it was traded off with “Happiness” from last week. I’ve already reviewed all of these songs – or close enough to all of them – but one I haven’t reviewed is “Yes Sir, I Can Boogie” by Baccara returning to #57 as it becomes the new Scottish football anthem. You know, that Spanish disco track from 1977. It did hit #1 that year, but this is such a bizarre return I felt the need to talk about it... but, never mind, I think I should take advantage of having less on my plate this week. In terms of fallers and climbers, “Straight Murder (Giggs & David)” by, you guessed it, Giggs and Dave, dropped out of its top 40 debut to just #56 this week, joining the biggest faller, “Dynamite” by BTS, presumably having its streaming cut or just finally running out of the K-pop steam, dropping from #21 to #52. Other songs backing away from the top 40 include “Deluded” by Tion Wayne and MIST at #49, “Confetti” by Little Mix at #42 and “Loading” by Central Cee at #41. What worries me is there’s not much that seems to be replacing it, other than maybe “Plugged in Freestyle” by Fumez the Engineer and A92 at #45 or our biggest climber, “Get Out My Head” by Shane Codd at #30. It should also be noted that strangely, the album at #1 on the Album Charts has no presence in the UK Top 75 – which I review because, really, who cares about those last 25 songs? – probably because of how many physical albums were sold instead of digital sales and streaming. It’s an AC/DC album so it’s expected that the audiences who stream songs and buy CDs from Australian rock legends don’t overlap, even with a big lead single that nearly charted on the US Hot 100. Well, let’s talk about the songs that DID debut finally, starting with... the revenge of the Sith.

NEW ARRIVALS

#65 – “Cut Me Off” – Yxng Bane featuring D-Block Europe

Produced by DZL and Akeel

The music I’ve been listening to has been pretty much all over the place recently, ranging from 1990s drum and bass to McAlmont & Butler to bitcrushed hyperpop to Ned’s Atomic Dustbin to... Young Thug, for some reason. That’s part of the reason I like doing REVIEWING THE CHARTS. It keeps me grounded to what music is actually popular, important and what I should be looking out for. With that said, I don’t think I’ve ever felt the need to look out for D-Block Europe, but they keep on popping up on the chart week after week regardless. Well, a collaboration between these two is never unexpected; after all, they have an entire album together, which has sometimes confused me since Yxng Bane has always been a smoother Afrobeats crooner whilst D-Block Europe make stiff, comical trap-adjacent emptiness type beats... whatever that means. The collaboration, I have to say, actually works and I’ll admit, I’m actually pretty fond of this track. It’s got a pretty minimal beat off of mostly dancehall percussion, sparse vocal samples and bass, but it picks up a lot of groove during the chorus and whilst Yxng Bane isn’t exactly the most interesting frontman, he does ride the beat fine and his sing-songy flow is pretty damn catchy. He takes care of the first half of the song, before D-Block Europe even come in, and surprisingly, the first other voice we hear is Dirtbike LB. No, Dirtbike isn’t interesting but he sounds a lot more engaged than usual and he actually sounds mentally sound and happy, so that’s good, even if he rids the song of any of Yxng Bane’s subtlety. His flows are pretty solid, even if they are sometimes copped from NAV on “Lemonade”, oddly. This beat can also handle Young Adz’s fascination with leaving empty space in his verses, as he has some pretty complex melodic and triplet flows over the beat, which never loses its funk even when threatened with how awkward D-Block Europe tend to be, and that final flow Adz uses over the pumping 808s is smooth as all hell and actually has some swagger for once. He doesn’t say anything embarrassing and there’s actually some wordplay going on here, so I really can’t complain about this track as much as I wanted to. Will it stand up to replay? Maybe not, but this is pretty great actually and a massive improvement from all three of these dudes, although this may just be a fluke like “New Dior”. If these guys want to show more fluke brilliance from now on that would be great. Just saying.

#60 – “HOLIDAY” – Lil Nas X

Produced by Take a Daytrip and Tay Keith

I like Lil Nas X. I enjoy his fun social media presence and meme-heavy persona, which may grow old to a lot of folks but I still like seeing him pop up on my timeline. I admire how he is openly gay and not afraid to discuss that in his music especially when he has the impossible platform of “Old Town Road”, one of if not the biggest songs of all time. I’m intrigued by his willingness to blend genres and break down boundaries in styles of music from sound, presentation and even race, even if it loses him some points on actually developing said tracks, mostly ending up as demos – the initiative is there. However, on that last EP, and especially this song, his charisma is the driving force and I don’t think Nas can replicate the magic of even “Panini” without more than his natural, jovial and playful tone. To start off with the positives, I do like the cold, icy beat that fits with the vague, pretty false holiday theme here, and they are some nice little details like that wobbling synth-bass differing from typical distorted trap 808s, the background keys replicating the melody of the second chorus throughout, and even the morphing of the producer tags to form a sentence. Tay Keith took it to ten instead for this beat, I suppose, and it is a good fusion of the two production styles. The problem I have with this song is, unfortunately, Lil Nas X. His delivery is checked-out and bored, and that makes these hard-to-sell lyrics about his career both irrelevant to the ostensibly Christmas-themed song and just not convincing in the slightest.

I can’t even close my eyes and I don’t know why, I guess I don’t like surprises / I can’t even stay away from the game I play, they gon’ know us today, yeah

This is the chorus and he’s saying absolutely nothing here. It’s just rhyming words that would have fit for a demo but are produced with some robotic multi-tracking and engineering to make it sound professional but also dull and manufactured. Sure, the verses and pre-chorus have more depth but this type of self-aware flexing and snarky one-liners only works well when it doesn’t sound like it’s being played completely straight (No pun intended). The song and artist exhumes character and optimism but both the beat and Nas here sound sour, mean-spirited and almost ugly. Most of the throwaway pop culture references are pretty pointless and awkward as well, with some really awful lyrics.

Ayy, and I’m sexy, they want to sex me

I call redundancy, Your Honour. Oh, and what a pre-chorus. “Hee-hee, I’m bad as Michael Jackson”? In 2020? It’s not like I expected anything lyrically superb from Lil Nas X, but less filler and... unfortunate implications would have been fun. Man, I do want to like this song, and I’m excited for that “CALL ME BY YOUR NAME” track he continues to tease, but for now this doesn’t work as a Christmas single at all, unless your idea of the Winter holidays is joyless cynicism. Okay, well, maybe in 2020, that’ll work out for you but any other year, this wouldn’t cut it.

#59 – “A Little Love” – Celeste

Produced by Josh Crocker and Jamie Hartman

This song is an advertisement. So much of an advertisement in fact that the full name of the song is “A Little Love (From the John Lewis & Waitrose Christmas Advert 2020)”. The John Lewis company is a brand of high-end department stores across the British Isles and have become kind of an iconic Christmas tradition in the UK for their heart-warming but often fantasy-adjacent advertisements they release every November or so. It always comes with a song, sometimes original, sometimes a cover, and nearly always a dreary piano ballad. This year they enlisted BRIT Award winner and British soul newcomer Celeste but not even new blood and an original song written for the advert can make this sound anything resembling interesting. A lot of people thought this John Lewis advertisement was disappointing – I don’t have an opinion because I do not care about the quality of adverts. I also do not care about the quality of the song which I’m sure you can tell is very little. This advert becomes increasingly irrelevant as the years go on and not even Celeste’s pretty unique voice can make this anything more than dull and half-baked. I mean, it’s well-mixed, but so is nearly everything that charts. You really can’t say this is anything but a product that serves as promotion for another product. It’s no surprise this didn’t debut high because in 2020 – and really any year – people would and should want more than this. Hopefully this doesn’t coast off of the advert and become a hit because, I don’t know, it kind of sets a bad precedent. Maybe I’m just pretentious. Probably.

#43 – “Flavour” – Loski and Stormzy

Produced by Mike Elizondo and Steel Banglez

Last time we saw Loski, he was going for a threatening and menacing “bad guy” drill track, but now he’s making room for the ladies in that drug trafficking route, rapping over a smooth Afrobeats instrumental courtesy of Steel Banglez, who’s still around actually amongst the waves of rip-offs and producers courting his style for their own, and it’s just a hook-up jam where the guys mostly trade bars about girls. Of course, Stormzy gets the first verse, but with the deadpan delivery of both of these guys but especially Loski, the somewhat shoddy vocal mixing on Stormzy’s voice, I find myself caring so little about absolutely any of this. This beat is kind of distracting in how it mixes Eastern strings with Afrobeats rhythms, early 2010s dance music synths (the main synth pattern sounds as 2014 as possible) and trap skitters. The hook is barely existent, neither of the guys have chemistry or charisma here, not even Stormzy, and the song’s about two Loski verses too long. No, the lyrical content isn’t anything but vaguely cute, surprisingly inoffensive and shockingly lacking in misogyny for once, and I don’t expect it to be. Honestly, Stormzy name-dropping Everybody Loves Raymond is probably the highlight. I’m sure Ray Romano is beaming.

#7 – “Stop Crying Your Heart Out” – BBC Children in Need

Produced by Brian Rawling, Mark Taylor, Anoushka Shankar, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Grace Chatto and BBC Concert Orchestra

When I did my Spring episode, I was met with a BBC Radio 1 cover of “Times Like These” by the Foo Fighters that was released to support the NHS workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and the first British lockdown. This “Live Lounge Allstars” single went to #1 and naturally, with a second lockdown we have a second single by a second BBC radio station with second-rate “Allstars”, which is probably why it’s just credited as BBC Children in Need this time. Oh, and for some reason, they credited every single BBC Child in Need on the Spotify page this time. Now last time we had you know, the actual Foo Fighters, as well as global superstars like Dua Lipa and Ellie Goulding, as well as Sean Paul, Rita Ora and members of Coldplay, alongside many, many others, all of which were or are relevant to this day. So for this second song, not only did they take an absolutely crap Oasis single from their early-mid-2000s years, way after they had stopped being worth listening to, and stripped it of any of its genuine orchestral backing and intriguing and iconic Liam Gallagher vocal deliveries. I’m not going to go in-depth like last time. It still butchers a classic, but a classic song I hate in the first place, just getting rid of any redeemable elements that Oasis still had in 2002, so I don’t care enough about the source material but really this is weak and boring, with questionable vocal mixing and unimpressive vocal performances from everyone involved. If you’re wondering who everyone involved is, it’s Izzy Bizu, Grace Chatto of Clean Bandit, Melanie C, Jamie Cullum, Ella Eyre, Paloma Faith, Rebecca Ferguson, Jess Glyne, LAUV, Ava Max, James Morrison, Gregory Porter, Nile Rodgers, Jack Savoretti, Anoushka Sankor, Robbie Williams and Yola... as well as some of the more bizarre additions, like Jay Sean riding high off of an uncredited sample of his hit last year, Kylie Minogue clearly only here to promote an album (In fact, that can sadly be said for most of the artists here), Lenny Kravitz and freaking CHER both being somehow completely unrecognisable, Goddamn Bryan Adams and KSI of all people, who doesn’t even get a rap verse like AJ Tracey and Sean Paul on the first cover. He’s just... there, I guess? None of these guys are in sync at all and the song was unremarkable in the first place but I can’t get mad at charity going to a good cause, even if all of these musicians could just cough up some of their own cash. I expect to see this fall dramatically next week.

#2 – “Therefore I Am” – Billie Eilish

Produced by FINNEAS

This, however, I predict will stick around. Billie Eilish bravely drops the lowercase for a brand new song – and maybe perhaps could possibly be a lead single – and it acts as an attack on the critics, particularly a response to all of the nonsense that has been thrown her way for being a confident young woman in the industry who decides she doesn’t want to conform to outrageous beauty standards set by the media. I think a very recent notable one was when she was photographed by paparazzi walking and looking like a completely normal 19-year-old woman (although, perhaps one with particularly vibrant hair dye) and was met with criticism from the news media and a lot of different narratives on social media, ranging from general body-shaming (which she already took a stance towards in March on her tour with a pretty cool short film) to weird professions of beauty when, no, she did not look like she was keeping up appearances and that is completely fine. That image displays a problem with how society holds celebrities and particularly women to a ridiculous fashion standard, even when they’re just walking from place to place, like they can’t look like your normal, ordinary, every-day adult woman, which, you know, they are. I think she really gets to that point when she says this:

Top of the world but your world isn’t real / Your world’s an ideal

Sadly, I think the rest of the song is rather underwritten and feels like a vague diss track towards critics, using arguments that really only apply when talking about cyberbullying and genuine toxic media press (which the UK knows well), and generalising them with all critics, making it seem like a human attack on mass-media corporations, which doesn’t really go down as well as she wants it to. The pre-chorus, chorus and even the second verse and bridge feel pretty underwhelming in terms of content too and whilst her carefree delivery is supposed to make the lines hit harder if anything it just weakens the blow. The minimal production from FINNEAS with a pretty nice 808 bass groove and distorted percussion, as well as a pretty piano flourish, does help to make this sound a bit less tired but honestly just makes Eilish seem out of place if anything, which isn’t true for anything else the two have made together, so I’m personally not a fan and think this is a rare miss for Billie and FINNEAS. I agree with the message, but this could have been executed in a much more impactful and aggressive way that would have made more of a point, in my opinion.

Conclusion

That’s not to say that the song is bad, though and I’ll give “Therefore I Am” by Billie Eilish an Honourable Mention even for just being interesting and more than the most basic, factory-produced equivalent of its genre that could be made, which can be said for most of the rest of the tracks here. Best of the Week does go to Yxng Bane and D-Block Europe of all people for “Cut Me Off”, and I can’t bring myself to dislike a charity single so I suppose Worst of the Week goes to Lil Nas X’s “HOLIDAY”, and the Dishonourable Mention will be brought to you after the messages. In other words, it’s “A Little Love” by Celeste. Here’s this week’s top 10:

I’ll brace myself for the upcoming week now, and you can follow me on Twitter @cactusinthebank if you want to see me Tweet complete nonsense the majority of the time. I’ll see you next week.

0 notes

lgbtfalloutwinterholiday · 6 years

Text

Ginger Cake (Fahrenheit/Daisy)

Happy Holidays!

Here’s @tommytonebender ‘s submission for @keycchan with Fahrenheit and Daisy.

Pairing: Fahrenheit/Daisy Summary: Written for the following prompt: “Fahrenheit has never experienced the holiday season in her life. Daisy wants to fix that. Cue fluffy date, or as fluffy as you can get with a painfully serious Fahrenheit and a centuries-worn Daisy. Bonus if there's angst thrown in there, but please, a happy ending? Thank you.” Work Count: 2,130 Rating: Safe For Work

“What the hell is a Christmas?” Fahrenheit held up the tree shaped card as if it were a hit order. Daisy gave a barking laugh. “Seriously, you give me a date and time and no description other than ‘come over for Christmas’?”

“I thought it was self explanatory,” Daisy said with a shrug, though she knew damn well Fahrenheit had never dabbled in yuletide cheer-- or any type of cheer, for that matter, that didn’t involve violence or heavy intoxication.

“I thought you were throwing down the gauntlet, Daisy, you better take more care.”

“No, no, I would never. I think you’d break me.” She smirked, then tilted her head. “How do you know what that means, but you’ve never heard of Christmas.”

“Gauntlets get thrown down every damn day, and I’ve picked up my fair share.” She lifted her chin as if asking Daisy to dare her.

“Oh I don’t doubt you do, but settle the hell down, it’s much more gay than that.”

“Is it...” She wrinkled her nose. “Are you coming onto me?”

Daisy cackled louder, making Fahrenheit start to fume. Being laughed at ranked high on her endless list of hair-triggers. “Daisy, you tell me what’s going on right now or--”

“Or what? Punch me out before you even get to try the dessert I’ve been slaving over to perfect?” Daisy said dramatically.

The lines in Fahrenheit’s brow vanished. “Dessert?”

“Ooh, I learned the magic word.”

“Shut up,” she muttered, but didn’t exactly protest, to Daisy’s mirth.

“Christmas is part of a series of winter holiday--, you know pre-war holidays right?”

“Like that day mid-summer where we blow shit up?”

“Sort of, yes. Winter does have a designated blow-shit-up day, but that’s after Christmas.”

“I think that first one sounds much more fun than whatever Christmas is.”

“Fun, maybe but not as rewarding.”

“Bullshit, there is nothing more rewarding than explosives.”

“Fine, fine, if you’re just going to blackball something deeply meaningful to a pre-war gal like me maybe I don’t want to spend Christmas with you.”

There was a beat of silence and Fahrenheit’s armor creaked as she shifted her weight in uncharacteristic awkwardness. “So, what... Like, what is it then?” she said, trying to hide her interest behind a deadpan.

Daisy waved a hand. “Oh no, it’s silly--”

“No, like... Out of curiosity, I’m just curious,” she deflected, but her darting gaze said otherwise.

“Oh... well, on Christmas in particular we used to give gifts to our friends and our loved ones... share a meal and spend time with people we cared about. But, of course, I haven’t had loved ones in ages.”

“So then why me?”

“Why not you?”

In a twist of Daisy’s expectations, Fahrenheit gave a honest, though slightly confused, laugh.

Fahrenheit’s youth saddled her with more inexperience than she’d ever admit. Daisy, on the other hand, was wise and unnaturally long-lived. She read people well, and Fahrenheit could be painfully transparent. The tough and disinterested exterior that she wore was as obvious as a Halloween mask. She lingered far too long around the shop during her rounds with the Neighborhood Watch, under the excuse that there were ‘rumors’ of a possible robbery. Daisy assured her the old ghoul could take care of herself, but Fahrenheit ignored each and every protest. And yet the only thing she seemed to watch was... the shopkeeper herself.

Daisy had no definitive answer on what Fahrenheit’s relationship with Hancock even was, or where the loyalty derived from, but whatever the case the scrappy young woman had some penchant for ghoulkind. It was novel, in a sense, and Fahrenheit was quite a dish in her own rough way. Daisy always enjoyed the kick of ginger.

“People...” Fahrenheit started, “don’t... invite me to ‘things’,” she ended with skepticism.

“Well my goodness, I wonder why?” Daisy asked. Fahrenheit again bristled. “If your reaction to RSVPs is to barge in demanding an explanation I’m sure you’ve scared off many a party host. But I don’t scare, dear, I survived nuclear fire and then some.”

Fahrenheit’s eyes almost glittered, as if Daisy recounted something glorious. She wouldn’t take offense; the girl was... bellicose, a little dissolute, but that’s what made her appealing. Also those damned freckles.

“So if I do this thing,” Fahrenheit said like she was accepting a hit job. “I have to get you a gift.”

“You don’t have to. They just say ‘to give is better than to receive’.”

“That sounds like more bullshit to me.”

“Yeah?” Daisy asked with a hint of combativeness.

“Sorry,” Fahrenheit promptly responded.

“Ha!” The girl’s swift submission was too comical to internalize. Fahrenheit frowned. “No need to be sorry.”

“I’ll do it. I’ll get you a thing,” she replied with averted eyes.

“Fine, fine. Don’t act as if it’s a chore, though, defeats the purpose.”

Fahrenheit flipped the invitation around in her hand, and jutted her jaw, nodding at nothing. “Right. Then. See ya, I guess.”

Daisy stood watching with crossed arms as Fahrenheit ambled away. Holding her breath til the other woman was out of ear shot before she let out another laugh; again surprised she’d pulled it off. It was a shot in the dark, and somehow it hit a weak spot in Fahrenheit’s seemingly solid armor.

“Daisy, you still got it,” she congratulated.

Haggling, flirting, was there really much of a difference?

---

The Christmas record, like everything in this world, was warped. Nostalgia that couldn’t quite be experienced in its pristine state. But instead of being a depressing aspect, the warbling tone lightened the mood, a smirk crossing Daisy’s withered lips whenever the singer was particularly distorted. And also because Fahrenheit presumably considered the ghoul positively mad by now.

She turned from the stove where she was braising a shepherd’s pie made of Cram and instant potatoes. “Oh, take that armor off, what are you doing?”

Fahrenheit stared back, with her chin tucked in and a death grip on a beer as she sat rigidly on the scrappy loveseat. “I need it.”

“From what? Am I gonna kill you with my spatula?” She brandished it menacingly. “Christ.”

“Not you, I...” She trailed off and then made an odd strained sound, before unfastening her armor. There was a good girl. Daisy had never actually seen Fahrenheit without it.

“Fascinating; you still have a human body under there. I would’ve thought you’d have molded to its shape by now.”

Fahrenheit’s mouth quivered and she gave a soft ‘hmpf’, which Daisy accepted as stifled laugh. She was softer than expected; sure, her arms were taught from hoisting such a weapon all day, but her middle was a bit more... pillowy. All in all, it gave her a sturdy frame. No wind would knock her over.

“Don’t ogle me,” Fahrenheit said, though it wasn’t exactly in ire.

“Oh, don’t mind me. I’m making a mental picture for comparison's sake, I’m about to ruin your figure with all these carbohydrates.”

“Is that what you’re cooking? A carbon... Uh--”

Daisy laughed, “I swear to God, you wastelanders would do well to read an encyclopedia.”

---

Ghoul physiology was slight, wispy. A small stomach came along with it, which was fortuitous tonight, as Fahrenheit ravenously consumed three quarters of the entire pan.

“Well?” Daisy asked rhetorically.

“It’s weird,” Fahrenheit replied, wiping sauce from her chin.

“And Merry Christmas to you too,” she snorted.

“Oh. Right.” Fahrenheit said with vacant realization. “I got you a book.”

“A book?”

“Yeah.”

“What kind of book?”

“Just... I dunno you were talking to that Vault Dweller about libraries and I don’t read, I just look at the pictures and stuff,” Fahrenheit grabbed it from her canvas bag and handed it to Daisy. “Hancock told me to wrap it in something. So I just put it in bandages, I wasn’t sure.”

Underneath the layers of gauze was a well-worn edition of The Wind in the Willows. Daisy let out a sharp laugh, and Fahrenheit frowned.

“No-- I--” She chortled again. “It’s funny because I recognize this one, is all.”

“Oh. Do... Do you have it already?”

“Well, not anymore. It burned up two-hundred years ago,” she sighed. Fahrenheit straightened up a bit. “Where’d you get this? This... Is this yours?”

“It’s not mine, I just look at it sometimes,” Fahrenheit replied, with near defensiveness. “It’s not like I’d miss it or anything.”

Something clicked in Daisy’s mind. “Would you like me to read this to you sometime?”

“I dunno. I guess. That’d be kind of cool. Just to know what it’s really about.”

The grin she suppressed danced on her lips and Fahrenheit’s pinkening cheeks told Daisy everything.

The kitchen timer rang.

“Oh, good. Just in time then.” Daisy slapped her knees and stood up. “It’s not truly a successful Christmas until you have dessert.”

Fahrenheit seemed nearly mortified, which was not a face she wore often, despite how cute it looked on her.

Daisy pulled out her gingerbread loaf from the oven and began heating a glaze. Bing Crosby started his turn on the distorted vinyl. And then it all smacked her like a shockwave. Images she hadn’t seen in centuries raced in her mind like a slideshow. Her stirring stopped.

“Heh. This is strange,” she said hoarsely.

“Yeah. It's bizarre,” Fahrenheit razzed.

“No, not that. I… I haven’t made this in...” Daisy trailed off, the words too much to say. She looked over her shoulder. “You know sound and scent bring back such memories, for a second I... I thought I was somewhere else.”

Fahrenheit stood up, surprising her. “You, uh... You ok?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Daisy smiled, genuinely struck by her concern yet, feeling foolish for almost losing her composure. “Our minds are funny that way. They play tricks on us, don’t they?”

Fahrenheit nodded, a somberness both in her eyes and gentle movement. There was unquestionably something deep in her too, that she protected behind a metal breastplate and gatling gun.

Daisy turned back to her dessert, and as she poured the glaze she allowed herself one tear to fall as well.

---

It verged on absurdity, a virtual zombie reading aloud a tale of talking woodland creatures to a woman so brutish, but Fahrenheit seemed to hang on every word. After the first chapter was complete Daisy slammed the book shut, making the other woman jump.

“Why’d you--”

“Cake should be cool by now. Have some,” she offered. To be frank, the smell was getting to her. Not because it was unpleasant, but it made her crave more than just dessert. Fahrenheit sliced herself a generous piece, and Daisy reclined back in her chair with a small exhale.

“It must really suck,” Fahrenheit said abruptly.

“What? The cake?”

“N-No,” she said hastily, her shoulders stiffening. “Everything you’ve been through. You’re... you’re a tough lady, I can admire that.”

“Thanks,” Daisy said with utmost sincerity. It may have been the only compliment she’d ever heard from the other woman and, knowing Fahrenheit’s values, a weighty one at that.

She ungracefully stuffed the dessert in her mouth. “This is good,” she said humbly with some crumbs falling down onto her shirt.

Daisy smiled. “Thank you, I had to improvise. I’m glad it’s not shit.”

She snorted. “No it’s good,” Fahrenheit said, again gently as if believing her volume possessed tangible power, and she wanted her words to caress for once instead of punch. What a funny girl.

Dessert was eaten quickly, and in profound yet comfortable silence. After chugging one last beer, Fahrenheit’s eyes blinked in a tell-tale fashion.

“You need to go home and sleep,” Daisy said, picking up the dishes. “You’ve stuffed yourself enough for winter hibernation.”

“Thanks for the food,” Fahrenheit said as she pulled her armor back on in a lumbering fashion. “And the weird Christmas bullshit. Cake was good. I’ve never tasted anything like it.”

“A ginger who’s never tasted ginger,” Daisy teased. “What’s that, poetic irony?”

Fahrenheit said nothing but almost seemed… tickled. Daisy walked her down the stairs and to the front door.

“Hey. Uh,” Fahrenheit turned to her. “You said there were more winter holidays, right?”

“New Years is next, but I’m sure you know that one.”

“Right. Do... Is there a pre-war way to celebrate?”

“Yes. You get absolutely wasted and then blow shit up.”

She cracked a smile. “Well I know that.”

“But when the clock strikes midnight, you’re supposed to kiss someone for good luck.”

“S... Sounds stupid.”

“Yes, well... I can be superstitious,” she sighed.

There was awkward silence.

“Me too,” Fahrenheit said suddenly, making Daisy’s eyes snap upwards. “I... S-See you then.”

The fire-haired girl bolted out of the shop, and this time Daisy didn’t try to hold back her laughter.

Daisy, even still you’ve got it.

#tommytonebender #keycchan #daisy fallout 4 #fahrenheit fallout 4 #daisy #fahrenheit #fallout #fallout 4 #submission #fanfiction #long post

14 notes · View notes

ask--angelicaschuyler-blog · 6 years

Text

HIATUS(?) UPDATE:

it’s been a few months and i ,,,, definitely owe some sort of word for my absence. |D

so after that discourse(?) happened with the “john is gay!!11!” person, i got heavily discouraged from making content for a minute. of course, right after that, i chose to make a huge-ass comic update (which i plan on continuing because holy shit that has??? 300+ notes?? h ow). i didn’t want to make answers until that was finished bc i wanted to have maria established, but the next update was a bunch of panels long and i was quickly losing motivation to finish it, and i therefore couldn’t do answers.

on top of all that, i’m a student still. this semester has kicked my ass so far and i’ve,, been really bad at handling the stress |D i’ve also been handling stuff for my local theatre bc i’m apart of the board. bc of these things i don’t draw nearly as much as i want to, and i haven’t at all been keeping up with this blog because i like drawing a bunch of answers in the row and making sure they’re quality bc i love y’all sm and u guys deserve Top Notch Quality™ . im not saying all this in a “waahh poor me” way but as an explanation as to why this blog sorta died for a sec

BUT!! ALAS! i am here again! i’ve slowly started getting better at my work management and i’ve been able to draw a bunch more (if u look at my main blog you’ll see my improvement, it’s wild) and i’m planning on being more active again. i don’t want to promise anything because things change really fast, but i’m really trying to stay alive. this blog is almost at two thousand followers, which is crazy. i was legit shook when my main blog got to like,,,, 100. omg.

sooo what does that all mean for now? the comic for maria is going to continue, however not continously one right after the other, hence why i’ve marked it in parts (i added the “1/?” thing in the descr.) i’m gonna start working through answers and deleting things that i can’t answer to filter the inbox ( ;_; i have stuff for halloween that i can’t answer now and i’m depressed).

i’m ALSO thinking about making an art blog so you guys can still see content if i’m not updating this blog!! i have a silly medic!angelica au that i’ve been wanting to draw for, so i’d finally be able to upload it there. i’d do it on my main but not a lot of people follow me there |D and as always i’m usually doodling general hamilton fanart bc why not

again, i’m really sorry for disappearing. this blog is really the first thing i’ve ever had a reason for continuing - all my rp accounts or accounts like this for other characters were always so obscure and i dropped them within days, but this one actually brings me a lot of joy and makes me happy drawing for c: the support y’all show for my weird art style and obscure pairings and characterization makes me happier than you could imagine and i’m so thankful for it. i’m going to do my best not to let y’all down.

i’ll post another little update if/when i make my main art blog!! <33

#it speaks #someone on my main sent me a message abt this and i thought now would be a good time to update #<333 #not a question

32 notes · View notes

insecure-hbo-recaps · 7 years

Text

hella shook

Previously: Issa wanted to get a roster going. Molly for some reason didn't know what it was about Sterling K Brown. Dro's marriage was open. Lawrence was used as a prop for a racist threesome. He lied about it. Issa and Daniel made amends.

Issa's in traffic in her fairly new model car I might add. She is on her phone at every red light and doesn't notice that she's on E. She's wearing a black and white cookie coat, look at this:

Ees! Jesus. She stops at exactly 9:45 cents because she's poor. She finally makes it to her destination, serving up a "special delivery, sir" for Daniel. They awkwardly joke about how silly she's being and he opens the door with a smug smile. They're very attuned and cute and happy and whatnot.

Hey! They got honeycomb towers in LA too, apparently. Unless this is a scene where Molly is skyping with Quintin in Chicago, which the immediate shot of an L lets me know it is. See?

God I fucking love my city. That's the green line by the way. (If you're not familiar with Chicago, this is what I mean by "honeycomb towers":)

They're downtown near State and Kinzie, where I once went out with a professor from Boston who I thought looked like Mark Zuckerberg. (Public House is the bar there.) We watched the world series where the red sox won that year and it had been such a fun date, I was really disappointed when I never heard from him again. Oh well - in hindsight whatever I wore is probably not something I would wear now.

Molly is actually in Chicago this time, and Quintin is helping her keep the associates straight. He's wearing a tan vest and Malcolm X glasses and is it this show or somewhere else where they make jokes about a preacher body? Because good grief if I don't think of an old timey Civil Rights Movement era preacher every time I see him, lol. Molly points out there's a lot of black people at this office, and Quintin says he doesn't understand how she could work in the LA office; it reminds him of why he went to Howard.

Quintin asks whether Molly has said anything about her pay inequality but Molly hasn't. He asks why she isn't considering leaving, because their firm is not the only fish in the sea. Obviously this has never occurred to Molly. It's like she gets blinders on about certain things she thinks are acceptable or that she should want or be doing, and is incapable of considering any options outside of that. Apparently Molly is stuck in a sunken cost fallacy, which means you end up sticking out a situation that has long since expired just because you've already invested so much time into it already. Quintin encouages her to consider her options. Oh, there's the "pastor's body" joke. He really does look like a pastor.

Back in LA, Issa is getting dressed while Daniel is still in bed watching Due North. He asks whether she has plans the next night, but Issa demurs, unsure of his intentions. Daniel's body is insane.

Elsewhere, Lawrence is on a run with his coworkers, the blonde and Arpana. He won't be at work the next day because he has jury duty. Another coworker shows up and we get the exposition that they are training for a marathon. I know people hang out with their coworkers like this but I am antisocial and weird so I never do and never have, which sucks. This is how most people make friends as adults.

Molly is back home now. At her apartment, she and Issa are preparing floral arrangements for Molly's parents' vow renewal. Issa can't make it because she has a "work retreat." Daniel texts, and off the look on Issa's face, Molly inquires about it. Issa tries to play it off, but Molly knows this is not nothing. "Daniel and I have history, but we always bounce back." Molly is skeptical that either of them can do this without catching feelings, but Issa insists none of that is on her agenda right now: she has Daniel, "Neighbor Bae," and a Latino man she is going out with that night.

Meanwhile, at jury duty, Lawrence gets a text from Derek inviting him to his birthday party. Lawrence hesitates, assuming Issa will be there, but agrees to go. Bored, he scrolls through his facebook and happens across a photo from the night of the Kiss and Grind party; apparently Kelli's pic accidentallycaught Issa smiling and chatting with Daniel in the background.

Now that is a stroke of bad luck. Lawrence is so distracted by this news he barely hears them call him for briefing.

Back at the We Got Y'all offices, the supervisor is expositing that they have a director position open. Naturally the overeager white dude thinks this is his time to shine. They are going to be having a retreat Saturday morning and wants everyone to partner up. Issa looks over at Frieda who awkwardly looks away. Issa decides to brush it off, but when she whispers a joke and Frieda continues to look uncomfortable, the smile slides off Issa's face.

She follows Frieda to the breakroom, asking to talk. Frieda tensely explains that she isn't comfortable with what's happening at the school, but Issa still doesn't see a problem. This was around the time I started to think Issa was in the wrong the first time I saw this season... not because Issa is siding with bigotry but because she doesn't know better than to talk frankly about racism with whites in the workplace. That fact that Issa was so clueless as to be straightforward with a Clueless White Person on the thing that they fear most - an issue concerning race where they may be even indirectly accused of being a GASP racist - just sort of underlined for me that she was compounding a wrong instead of fixing it. "It must be nice to have the privilege to choose to be upset over this," Issa says, and the fact that she doesn't back down lets Frieda get the moral high ground.

Inglewood. Molly is at her parents' place unloading flowers for the renewal. Dro is her childhood next door neighbor and he is there to a.) celebrate Molly's parent's marriage and b.) smooth things over about basically asking her to take part in his open marriage. He asks if she never thought of him like that; "I mean yeah maybe for a minute when you had your colored contacts on," Molly says. Light skints aren't still in style anymore are they? Exoticals for men is always kind of a weird area, I think.

Molly says she's thought about it, but the marriage thing "is just not how" she sees her life. Dro is cool with that and they agree to stay friends, ribbing each other like only childhood friends can do.

Jury Duty. There's black woman who answers a question about "bias against police" by standing up to reveal her Black Lives Matter t-shirt that I'm unclear whether or not she meant it or just wanted to get out of jury duty. "Not buying it," the judge says, but the juror is dismissed. Lawrence is scrolling through Daniel's gram while all this happens.

Back at Molly's, her mom is saying something about the dollar store champagne flutes she bought, and what is with moms and dollar stores? My momma loves her some dollar store home goods. They lightly push Molly, as you do your children, about when she's getting married. Mom wants to know what's the hold up but Dad knows Molly isn't going to settle. Apparently Molly has a brother, or two brothers, or a gay brother, I'm unclear. I think one of them is famous for something or other though.

Date night. Issa shows up at a low lit ambient bar looking for Mexican bae. "Come through, Tinder," she says when she spots him. She's wearing a tight blue dress and a TWA. Mexican bae seems like he's in his late 30s. Issa's inner monologue horndogs about horchata. Bruh, rumchata is delicious. I haven't managed to buy it myself yet because that shit costs like 20$ but it tastes just like Christmas. And like, really good bread pudding. I should try to buy it at least for the holidays. Anyway, Issa is fantasizing about boning him right on the bar.

We know he's a good guy because he says isn't a martini guy and they joke about comics. I can't with how comic book lore has taken over American entertainment. I liked the Tobey Maguire Spider Mans but now there's like 18 in-universe comic book shows on TV and like four comic book movies at any given time... I honestly thought the comic book thing would have faded a long time ago by now and we'd be back to some other mythical fan lore like angels and ghosts again. (Zombie lore is still popular, and I think vampire lore is still hanging ten, so we need to go to demons or the undead or something.) They eventually move to another table, signifying that the date has lasted a few hours. The waiter brings by the check and Issa does the fake purse grab. You know, I used to adamantly refuse to do that (and the one time I was *asked* to split was by a nerdy black dude I met in a hipster dive who approached me by asking if I was latina - I must emphasize that I do not look latina whatsoever), like even pretend like I was going to pay. Now, I just offer to split. I usually never have to still, which is good, but also, I'm not poor anymore either so. My thing now is taking care to note that the waitress puts the check on the guy's side instead of in the middle - that's when I know the universe wants me to feel good about myself.

Anyway, they have had a good night and Issa is clearly thinking about asking him back to her place. But, we know he's a Good Guy because he says he can't, "but this is an excuse for us to do this again!"

Saturday morning work retreat. There's a generic snack bar set up. Issa is texting with Daniel, after canceling on him because of her date the previous night. Anyway the work team does a boring team building exercise so that the Clueless White People can make Clueless White People assumptions about the kind of trouble kids might be having at home. Issa and Frieda take a few passive aggressive jabs at each other and when it's time to pair up Frieda quickly finds someone else, leaving Issa stuck with Sujata Day. I don't know if she's supposed to be Indian in this one.

Vow Renewal. Apparently Molly decided to invite Sterling K Brown who is wearing a crazy colorful suit like only a person whose body has been altered to look good in Hollywood could do:

Molly's wig actually does look good, don't mind the screenshot. Dro and his parents show up (his dad is latino, his mom is ambiguous brown). Dro hangs around as his parents walk off and Sterling K Brown possessively wraps an arm around Molly, who introduces them. Just so you know that this is going on:

Do y'all take notice of stuff like this or no? Men, even men who are supposedly friends with each other, I find pull rank like this in front of women all the time. I was seeing a guy and one night we were hanging out with his roommate. They went outside to smoke and I tagged along. My dude and I were sharing his cigarette (I don't smoke but I find this sort of thing cute) and the other guy offered me his. My dude didn't think anything of it, but it's little shit like that that always feels like to me men are playing ego games with each other and/or always prepared to slide in the DMs of someone else's girl. (I also tend to think everyone is hitting on me, so that bias tends to reinterpret things.) But, it's the subtlety. And I think if more people paid attention they'd notice things like this more often. At any rate, Sterling K Brown is clearly glad to be there with Molly and possibly senses that Dro is a threat. They all play polite and it's only mildly awkward.

At a bar across town, Lawrence is having drinks with Derek and grilling him for information about Issa and Daniel. Ha. That's way more straightforward than he usually is when he talks to Chad. Derek says that after Tasha, he and Tiffany had to stop discussing them because they always took sides. Lawrence is preoccupied and insecure about Issa seeing Daniel now... maybe she had been seeing him the entire time? Derek says Issa is too dorky to be sneaky. "That's exactly why you wouldn't expect it," Lawrence says. He clearly is reiminaging their entire relationship and second guessing what he thought it was.

"Honestly... this ain't all on Issa," Derek says. "You spent two years unemployed, not doing shit, letting your woman take care of you. Kinda left the door open." Lawrence does that thing of rotating his jaw and accepts this silently. He tries to say it doesn't justify cheating, but Derek says he understands why she would be attracted to someone who could make things happen.

Vow renewal. Molly's brother or whatever asks "is that you?" and HA! Haven't heard that in ages. "So it's a pity date?" he asks. Molly lists off his positive qualities and how she wants to give it a shot. Her brother says just because she dates a good guy that doesn't translate into a relationship. Her brother (no, her brother's best friend) apparently is married to a stripper that trapped him. He tells Molly if she isn't feeling him she shouldn't date him. And because Molly has no understanding of what she wants out of a relationship or from men generally, this is the point where she no longer understands if she should be on a date with Sterling K Brown. He doesn't deserve this.

Bathroom. Issa calls her brother to check whether or not she might be in the wrong with the situation with Frieda. Check out this gloriously dressed fashion forward ass nigga:

Issa's brother doesn't tell her what she wants to hear so she hangs up in his face. To make herself feel better, she responds to a random sext from Neighbor Bae, sending back a nude before she gets busted by Mrs. Frizzle. Issa, at least go into the stall.

Molly is partially hosting this party, so she goes to greet a couple of great aunts. As nosy older black women, they immediately start inquiring about the delicious slice of man she chose to parade around this family event. Which... if you're not sure if you want to date a guy, don't fucking bring him to a parent-centered family event maybe. The aunts start talking about how amazing it is that Molly's parent's marriage lasted 35 years "after what he put my sister through." This is news to Molly.

Issa is texting at a red light when she misses it turn green. A "Potential Bae" sends her a dick pic and she rear ends the car in front of her. This is where I stopped being on Issa's team. No woman, no self possessed black woman, has any business being so distracted by dick she would open herself up to litigation, the loss of transportation, and unspecified auto repair. Like, I can no longer abide this level of thirst. This was when Issa went too far. Also, I spared you a screenshot of the dick pic.

Back that the renewal, Molly is grilling her brother about the state of her parents' marriage. It turns out that Dad cheated on Mom and "they worked through it." Molly seems almost more offended that her mom put up with it than her dad cheated at all. And this is the part where Yvonne Orji had to do an emotional scene. And it was so bad it threatened to diminish my enjoyment of the rest of the series so what you need to know is: 1. the acting here is really really bad, so bad I don't know how they didn't insist on more takes and/or cut away often enough so that you didn't notice how bad it was and b. Molly can't deal with the reality that there is no such thing as a fairy tale relationship. Not all relationships have cheating but a fuckton of them do, so everyone needs to just chill. Also, remind me at a later date to tell you about how I recently found out a guy I had been seeing was married and his wife had their first kid earlier this year. It was fucking horrid. (This is not an endorsement from the "All Men Cheat" school of logic as I, personally, have never been cheated on in a relationship.)

Sterling K Brown tries to console Molly but she stomps away, leaving Dro to chase after her. Bitch move. Molly's being an asshole all around. Bitch, how are you whining about relationships when you left your fucking date at a party at your parents' house to leave with another dude? Molly is way out of line here, and her behavior deserves no sympathy at all.

Issa calls Daniel to let him know she can't make it tonight because she got into a car accident. He offers to pick her up. She tries to beg off but he insists, and his caring and eagerness to help is good to see. One of the worst things about being an introverted holier than thou asshole is that whenever I need help, it always hits me really hard that I really have no one to call.

Meanwhile, this is Lawrence's Saturday night:

GOD those are the worst, lol. He sits there ruminating for awhile and finally defriends. "I don't wanna see this shit," Lawrence thinks.

Dro is driving Molly home. So... she just gone leave her car (and her date) in the interests of her thirst or what? Because I'm not buying that she's so distraught she just needed to get home despite the common decency of leaving on no notice like that. You wanted to provoke Dro's dick and we all know it. No smoothing over on this ridiculous behavior, Molly. She continues being all "distraught," and while I have to offer points for the damsel and distress routine in principle, I believe in polite society more, so be thirsty on your own time, not when it inconveniences or hurts someone else. Molly laments how she spends all her time trying to find someone like her dad only to find out their marriage is bullshit. I suppose if I had grown up in a married two parent household it would come as news to me, too, that parents can be just as ain't shit as anyone else. Still. I find this childish. Dro lends a sympathetic ear and Molly eats it up.

Daniel shows up to pick up Issa and gives her a hug in reassurance since she's just been in a car accident. Instead of abiding this silently where even if she doesn't want it she can use it to her advantage at a later date, Issa decides to be clear that Daniel knows they are not dating only each other and are both seeing other people. Issa isn't sure if she was as up front about that as she should have been the last time they slept together. Daniel reacts disappointedly in a way that telegraphs he did not know that was what they were doing. On the other hand, I feel like men pull this shit a lot and maybe it was good for him to know he isn't the only fish in her pond. Idk. On this issue I have erred toward casual probably more often than I should have, to regretful effects, so for me the jury is out on that.

Dro walks Molly to her door and her building is so lovely. Oh, it turns out Dro drove Molly's car home. That kinda makes it even more shitty that she left Sterling K Brown? When Dro goes to leave, because we must be overtly aware of the stupid and ridiculous choices they make, she pulls him back and kisses him. Then we cut to them boning a second later. Excellent sex scene. Extremely poor choice.

#insecure hbo #issa rae

3 notes · View notes