#but also sacrifice in the name of real heroism

[theresattrpgforthat]

Got anything that lets you play as monsters (vampires/monsters/etc) in the modern world in the vein of VTM? Ideally something in the PBTA/FITD area of system, but open to others for sure (: Thanks as always for your recs!!

THEME: Urban Monsters

Friend, the difficulty with this post isn’t that I don’t have recommendations for it - it’s that I’m trying to find recommendations that I haven’t talked about ad nauseam to this point. So I hope you don’t mind a fairly extensive “Past Recommendations” at the bottom of this post, because most of the PbtA games I know of are going to be there. I have limited experience with Vampire: the Masquerade, but I’m a big fan of Changeling: the Lost and other World of Darkness games, so I’m going off of general knowledge rather than specifics.

Bubblegum Vampires / Bubblegum Wizards 2, by Gormengeist.

You're a vampire in an infinite urban cauldron of muck and rot, of psionics and wizards, of danger and shadows. Though you are surely terrible, great, horrifying, (etc.), half the day is an enemy to your people; so set forth through the night to make your coin, secure your dwellings, and vanquish your infinite enemies.

You're a wizard who chews bubblegum and collects trading cards. That is to say, cards with the trapped souls of items and enemies within, obviously. An insignificant wizard in an infinite city has lots to prove and you've got to get help somehow. Break heads, steal money, drive stupid, chew gum, trap souls. Simple as.

Neon-Bright art and d6-based rolls, that’s what’s common across both of these games. This is the same world, but you’re living in two different spheres of it, depending on which game you play. As wizards, you collect spell cards that hold the souls of creatures you’ve vanquished, and use them to get yourself out of sticky situations. As vampires, you accrue vampiric powers through blood sacrifice, and your opponents are usually folks with especially tantalizing veins. Both games have various factions that have different goals than you, so if what you like about Vampire: the Masquerade is the amount of different ideologies that have the ability to fuck you up, you might like this game. Thematically, it looks a little more upbeat and pulpy than your typical V:tM game, but if you like one, you have another game in the same system ready to go.

The Hidden, by Dragons Are Real.

As children our parents read us fairy tales, ghost stories and recounted local myths. We’ve always assumed these stories are told to entertain or scare….what if these aren't just stories….everything you have been told is true. 

The creatures from fairy tales, mythology and folklore all exist.  Have you ever thought you saw something strange out of the corner of your eye but when you look again all looks normal. These creatures live in plain sight, unseen by the majority of people, only those who know they exist see them in their true form. Every culture has a name for these creatures but we know them simply as The Hidden.

The Hidden is a modern urban fantasy game powered by the Breathless RPG. It is inspired by such media as Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Constantine and The Dresden Files.

Another pulpy sort of game, the Breathless system that powers The Hidden is great for replicating diminishing resources, putting your characters in more and more difficult situations every time they pause to take a breath. This makes this game great for horror-style stories, and World of Darkness games firmly find a home in the horror genre. If you want something that’s fast-paced and can cover a lot of ground in a short session, The Hidden might be for you.

Tween Wolf, by Ibi Deficit Orbis.

Tween Wolf is a micro-RPG about middle schoolers experiencing both the fantasy of being exceptional, and the fear of being humiliated. As these kids come to terms with their awkwardly developing human bodies, they will also be faced with lycanthropy. And in the process they will experience supernatural heroism and intense shame—and learn to manage both.

It is designed to be played with a bent towards exploring the unforgiving social cruelty of middle school, self-image, and dysphoria. It requires one Game Master, 1 to 4 additional players, a few hours, one six sided die for each player, and two additional six sided dice for the table to share.

This is a very short game, with very few rules and a big focus on trying to keep your wild side under wraps. If what you like about WoD games is the struggle between the monstrous and the human, this might be the game for you. There’s not nearly as many big moral quandaries as there are in typical WoD games - you’re middle schoolers, not eons-old bloodsuckers - but to a middle-schooler, your problems are massive. I feel like the movie Seeing Red might be a good touchstone for this game.

Glamour of Our Youth, by Yuri Runnel.

Glamour of Our Youth is a roleplaying game based on the Forged in the Dark system. Drawing inspiration from media like Riverdale, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Chilling Adventures of Sabrina among others, it works to tell stories of supernatural teenage adventures.

Building on the FitD framework, Glamour serves to tell exciting stories with high stakes, putting the youths through their paces as they try to make their way through a strange and hostile world, struggling with conflicts both internal and external, arcane and mundane. 

This game doesn’t cast your characters as specific supernatural beings, but the character options certainly make it possible. You cobble your character together from two different halves: Archetypes and Arcana. Your Archetype hails from classic high school cliques, such as Rebel, Outcast, Socialite and Athlete, while your Arcana details your supernatural ability, including Shapeshifter (which might translate to werewolf), Oceancaller (which you could turn into a selkie) or Shadow (which feels rather ghost-like to me). There’s also plenty of ways to play a teenage mage.

This game is in playtest, but it’s considerably far a long, with recent updates that indicate that the crew is hard at work refining the final product.

Protect the Child, by MintRabbit (that’s me!)

Humans have always been protective of their young, sometimes overly so. Humans have also always feared that which might make their young strange or different, and so insist that only humans can raise their own young. Monsters cannot raise human young. This is known. You have a human baby. You cannot find its parents. What is even worse, is that this child has powers, powers that others covet, and so everyone wants it. If you want to prove that you’re not the heartless monster that everyone says you are, that means you’ll have to raise it, at least until you find someone who is better suited to it than you.  You are creatures of fur, scales and fangs. You have claws that can rend flesh, faces that can crack mirrors, howls that can cause ears to bleed.  And your charge wants a blankie.

Protect the Child is a Forged in the Dark game about monsters caring for a young human, a human who contains strange and mystical powers that make them a valuable asset in any monster crew. The setting and factions present in this game are flexible: you might be aliens in a far-flung future galaxy, fantasy monsters from rival kingdoms, or even everyday wild animals that fear human society. 

So I’ve only just started play testing this game, which means that it’s very much in barely-playable mode. This game is also setting-agnostic, meaning that you can decide exactly when and where your game takes place - including as modern-day monsters trying to take care of a human baby with magical powers. The game is very specific in the themes of the story you’ll be telling - that is, themes about monstrosity, parenthood and responsibility, but if you all want to play different kinds of vampires, you can absolutely do that!

BloodLite, by ruan8000.

BloodLite is a role-playing game (RPG) designed to be played solo, but can be played in a group. In this game, you will create a Vampire following the rules and you will also create the world that this vampire interacts with, as well as the conflicts and obstacles that he will face. The world in BloodLite is like ours, but a little darker and more dangerous, full of supernatural creatures.

This game has no ties to PbtA or FitD, but it cites Vampire: the Masquerade as a direct inspiration, and you can see it in the Bloodline options available at character creation. You have a supernatural gift that give you advantages and also trigger your Hunger, which is your character’s thirst for blood. The goals of the game are represented through an Oath track, which fills when you fight enemies, overcome obstacles, and solve problems. This a fairly stripped-down game, but if you’re familiar with V:tM, then you probably won’t have a problem filling the world with factions, back-alley deals, and political wars.

Hearts of Yokai, by Lowell Francis.

So, this game isn’t out yet. But I can’t stop myself from talking about it a little bit. It’s the product of a Changeling:The Lost PbtA hack that Lowell has been working on for a very long time. I’ve been a bit fan of Changeling: the Lost and I also love PbtA games so I’m really excited to see more of this.

The link in the title leads to the current google spreadsheets that detail the current content of the game and the associated playbooks. The link for Lowell is to a blog post he wrote about the game, talking about the history, the changes he’s made, and the ideas behind what the current iteration is. What really intrigues me is how it incorporates "the actions of the Gentry through the lens of colonialism.” I’m really eager to follow the progress of this game.

Games I’ve Recommended in the Past

Urban Shadows 1e, by Magpie Games.

Bite Marks, by Black Armada Games.

Monsterhearts 2e, by Buried Without Ceremony.

Strays, by kumada1.

Eldritch Investigative Drama Rec Post

#tabletop games #indie ttrpgs #dnd #game recommendations #asks #urban fantasy #monsters #vampires #indie ttrpg

[killervelveteenrabbit]

Is this the end of Chloe Bourgeois?

She’s been exiled from her city after a brief but disastrous run as its absolute ruler. Her father has disowned her. Her mother is humiliated by her and seems intent on making her burn for it, now that she has sole custody of her. Her co-conspirator in her grand scheme has dropped contact, forsaking her to run her own game. Her childhood friend, the boy she once regarded as hers and hers alone, has washed his hands of her. Her only friend, whom she treated as an underling for years, has turned against her. And her favorite bullying target has just explained to her, in no uncertain terms, that she’s lost everything and has no power over anyone anymore.

Even from a Doylist perspective, there seems to be no place for Chloe anymore. She no longer lives in Paris, and Lila/Cerise has usurped her position as designated beta-villain. Some would see this as an opportunity to write Chloe out of the series entirely, and few people within the fandom would shed tears. 

And yet, Chloe does have her fans. Some of them object to the apparent beatification of Marinette, in-universe and out, or that Mr. Astruc and the writers have flanderized Chloe into the series’ hate sink at the cost of her character arc. Others sympathize with Chloe as a victim of emotional abuse and neglect who doesn’t understand how to be a good person because no one’s shown her how (although I would argue that Armand and Miss Bustier at least tried).

Putting Chloe on a bus (or in her case, a jet) while singing “Ding Dong, the Bitch is Dead” seems too easy and neat an ending for her. I would like to see Chloe return in season 6 with the increased capacity for empathy that often comes from losing something precious. I want her to learn that “nice” isn’t just an affectation one puts on to impress people you like. I want her to understand that true heroism takes effort and even sacrifice. I want her to experience the give-and-take of equitable relationships. I want to see her tempted to fall into old habits and make a few bad decisions, but ultimately prove herself to herself. And again shifting from the Watsonian to the Doylist, I would like to see Chloe become a powerful foil and counter to the increasingly diabolical Lila/Cerise.

The problem is that I don’t see how this is possible. Audrey seems intent on controlling Chloe’s every move to prevent her daughter from causing her further shame. Even if Chloe did return to Paris, everyone there seemingly hates her. The only way I can see it happening is if Audrey got tired of Chloe and sent her back, not knowing what else to do with her... and if someone, against their better judgment, agreed to shelter her... and if she adopted a new name and changed her appearance so that no one recognized her as the recently overthrown child-dictator of Paris.

Reinventing Chloe offers far more creative potential than discarding her. Also, it would show the kids for whom this show was created what it means to be a truly good person, that sometimes it takes real effort and hard choices but that it’s ultimately worth it.

#chloe bourgeois #lila rossi #ml revelation #ml meta #ml analysis #miraculous ladybug #audrey bourgeois

[cosmicjoke]

So, I'm just gonna give my thoughts here on the Loki series as a whole. I watched five of the six episodes of the first season. I didn't watch this second season, but I watched recap videos and all the clips that were released, so I feel like I can give a pretty good assessment here.

I like what they did with Loki's character at the end of this season, I like that they made him into a genuine hero who sacrifices himself to save the multiverse, but... the problem is, I just don't care anymore. I don't care about the MCU or even Loki within the MCU anymore, because they so mishandled his character for the last, several years. They made him such an unrecognizable clown in the first season, really building off the hatchet job they'd done to him in Ragnarok, that it turned me off completely and I wasn't able to finish the series. That lead to me not being able to watch this second season at all. And even though it sounds like they handled him better, from the clips I've seen, it still didn't feel or sound like Loki. He still didn't have the air of Loki from the first two Thor films. It just felt, again, like a completely different character. Maybe he wasn't being made a fool of every other scene, but he still didn't act or talk or hold himself like the Loki of Thor 1, or The Dark World, or The Avengers. And there's also still the massive loss of potential in exploring the actual reasons Loki went mad in the first place, namely, his heritage as a frost giant, and his complex, tragic issues with his adoptive family, growing up in a culture where he was taught from birth that the race of beings he belongs to is a race of monsters, etc... They didn't address ANY of that in two full seasons of a show about Loki. And I'm sitting here thinking, this material is RIPE for exploration. This would make an incredible, emotional journey for Loki, to be able to actually address these mental health issues that he has, rooted in his internalized racism, taught to him by the very culture he was raised in, a literal child stolen from another kingdom. It would have made Loki's journey toward heroism way more impactful and meaningful if he actually arrived there by coming to understand and accept that he'd been wronged by Odin and Asgard in that particular regard. If he'd been able to forgive himself and realize he was actually a victim.

Like, imagine if instead of berating him and calling him names and accusing him of being a narcissist, Mobius had actually helped Loki to realize that what his family did to him was fucked up, that what Odin and Frigga did to him, lying to him for literally a thousand years about who he was and where he'd come from, and letting him believe that frost giants were evil monsters instead of actual people, was fucked up. Imagine if Mobius had explained to Loki that he was suffering from trauma over learning he was a frost giant, that he was suffering from trauma over it because his own brother treated and regarded frost giants as monsters who's only purpose was for him to get his kill on. Or if he'd sympathized with Loki over the way the other Aesir generally treated him like shit. How Heimdall had no qualms about trying to lop his head off and commit treason. How the Warriors 3 had no problem committing treason against him. How even the servants that worked in the palace had such little respect for Loki, that they openly laughed at him. People don't remember, but Loki didn't forcibly take the throne after Thor was banished. Odin fell into the Odin Sleep, and Frigga PUT Loki on the throne to rule in his stead. And yet, still, you had his own subjects running around, not thinking twice about shitting on him, disobeying him and committing treason against him. Crimes for which, if Odin was on the throne, may well have resulted in their banishment, if not their outright execution. Imagine if Mobius had actually helped Loki work through these issues he has, if he had actually been a real friend to him, instead of an abusive, belittling asshole who blamed Loki for all his own problems. Imagine if Sylvie had done the same too.

It would have made a hell of a lot more sense, then, when Loki chose to sacrifice himself for Mobius and all the others at the end of this season. But instead, the whole season basically focused on Kang and the multiverse and the TVA, with minimal relationship building between Loki and the others. But we're just supposed to buy that these people, who more or less treated Loki like shit from the start, became so special and important to him, that he would willingly sacrifice his life to free them and save theirs. The same Loki who, in terms of time passed in this show, just a few weeks earlier tried to subjugate the Earth and killed hundreds of people in the process, by the way, something which unfolded BECAUSE of the above mentioned issues with his family.

Loki's sacrifice for Mobius and the others doesn't feel earned, because his relationship with them, his feelings of loyalty and concern for them doesn't feel earned. They never were actually good friends to him. They didn't help him feel validated in his feelings, they didn't help him work out his issues of self-loathing stemming from his heritage, or his sense of rejection from his father, etc...

It's just lazy, and another miss by Marvel to capitalize on one of their most complex and tragic character's actual story.

#loki series #loki series negativity #loki

[prolix-yuy]

What in the Actual Hell?

I don't know what to do with myself. This one got me by surprise! I passed 400 followers around my birthday and was like, "Aw, that's nice, you guys are too kind, I am a little gremlin who thrives on positive reinforcement," and then you come back and do this?! What's a girl supposed to do to deal with all these emotions?

Well, write, I guess.

I made the decision that IF I hit a crazy milestone (like 500 of you beauties being kind enough to follow me) I was going to open requests. So here I am, making good on my word!

LJ's 500 Follower Celebration!

Welcome to my little request celebration! To thank you all for being amazing and supporting me on this wild platform, I'll be opening my asks to requests starting now, July 25th, until July 31st, for requests!

Here are the request guidelines:

Send me the pairing you would like. It can be any character I've written before (including any versions from previous stories), or someone completely new! I work mostly within the Pedro Pascal cinematic universe, but other Star Wars franchises are welcome too.

Pick a theme from the list under the "Read More."

If there is anything specific you'd like to add to the prompt (a little flavoring for the story) or would not like in the prompt (Teen vs Explicit, fluff vs angst, etc) please feel free to include it! Otherwise I'll run with the prompt as the inspiration strikes.

I'll be keeping the requests under 2k words for my own sanity and ability to get them out with any sort of timeliness.

Requests will be posted...roughly over the next few weeks. It will honestly depend on how many come in. I'll give a posting update after the 31st!

The list of topics I do not write for is included at the bottom of the theme list. I will also reserve the right to not complete an ask if it is outside of my comfort zone content-wise.

Thank you all for brightening up my days with fun interactions, wonderful comments and so many new friendships. You make writing a joy for me, and I love sharing new stories with you.

Topics

Beauty of simplicity

Change of power – necessity

Change versus tradition

Chaos and order

Circle of life

Coming of age

Communication – verbal and nonverbal

Companionship as salvation

Convention and rebellion

Dangers of ignorance

Darkness and light

Death – inevitable or tragedy

Desire to escape

Destruction of beauty

Disillusionment and dreams

Displacement

Empowerment

Emptiness of attaining false dream

Everlasting love

Facing darkness

Facing reality

Fading beauty

Faith versus doubt

Family – blessing or curse

Fate and free will

Fear of failure

Fulfillment

Greed as downfall

Growing up – pain or pleasure

Hazards of passing judgment

Heartbreak of betrayal

Heroism – real and perceived

Hierarchy in nature

Identity crisis

Illusion of power

Immortality

Individual versus society

Inner versus outer strength

Injustice

Isolation

Knowledge versus ignorance

Loneliness as destructive force

Losing hope

Loss of innocence

Lost honor

Lost love

Love and sacrifice

Man against nature

Manipulation

Materialism as downfall

Names – power and significance

Nature as beauty

Necessity of work

Optimism – power or folly

Overcoming – fear, weakness, vice

Power and corruption

Power of silence

Power of tradition

Power of wealth

Power of words

Pride and downfall

Progress – real or illusion

Quest for discovery

Quest for power

Rebirth

Reunion

Role of men

Role of Religion – virtue or hypocrisy

Self-awareness

Self-preservation

Self-reliance

Temporary nature of physical beauty

Temptation and destruction

Vanity as downfall

Vulnerability of the meek

Vulnerability of the strong

Will to survive

Wisdom of experience

Youth and beauty

Topics I do not write for: explicit pregnancy content; motherhood; non/con, dub/con, or cnc without consent being explicitly given beforehand; incest; mommy kink; dd/lg dynamic; ageplay; sexual violence towards any character.

#LJ's 500 Follower Celebration! #pedro pascal cinematic universe #star wars cinematic universe #fic requests #thank you all for being the best

[tarisilmarwen]

Well I guess the stars have finally aligned correctly, here’s that post about all the things I don’t like about post-canon Adventures In Wild Space fic and headcanons and theories re. Ezra and Thrawn and why I’m hoping the Ahsoka show surprises me and uses precisely none of it.

1. The Grysk are boring and an unconvincing threat.

You want an extra-galactic adversary that packs a real punch, there’s really no topping the Yuuzhan Vong from Legends’ New Jedi Order series, who on top of being highly intelligent and charismatic fantatic religious crusaders had organic technology that was super freaky and completely alien which made them a much more interesting and legitimate threat.

The Grysk are cheap Walmart bargain bin Vong by comparison.  Do they even have personalities?  Have we even had any named Grysk at all?  The only thing they have going for them is their brainwashing mind control stuff which, again, the Vong did better and creepier.

2. Chiss politics are also boring.

I’m sorry I tried but my eyes glaze over every time.  Too many names to remember and it all just seems so tedious.

3. I am terminally uninterested in sympathetic/anti-hero/lionized Thrawn.

I feel like that should be self-explanatory but this fandom is notoriously bad at nuance so I’ll elaborate.

While I don’t mind Thrawn being a complex and interesting and slightly sympathetic villain I am not remotely interested in any storyline that makes excuses for, downplays, retcons, diminishes, or in any way tries to whitewash any of Thrawn’s crimes or misdeeds or otherwise allows him to get off scott-free from the consequences of them.

This is unfortunately why I have to be wary of Timothy Zahn himself as he’s reportedly suggested possessing a personal headcanon about the buildings in Capitol City being empty when Thrawn bombed them in the Rebels finale which... just... just no, Tim.  Just no.  That’s a stupid retcon and you know it.

Thrawn getting to go back to the Ascendancy as if nothing about his service in the Empire happened is not satisfying to me.  I am not interested in seeing him surrounded by sycophants singing his praises and saying what a good and brilliant commander he is.  I am not interested in making a sob story out of his motives for joining the Empire.  His motives do not matter.  It does not make one iota of a difference that he was doing everything “for the good of the Chiss”, none of that makes him a good person and I have zero interest in him being portrayed as such.

4. I don’t like Ezra’s heroism or sacrifice being made less important.

Tangentially related to the above.  I don’t like when fics have Thrawn be all, “Well I was planning on leaving the Empire anyway so really you did me a favor.”  I don’t like Thrawn immediately dropping hostilities and working with Ezra day one as if the whole purrgiling basically doesn’t affect or phase him at all.  I don’t like Zahn’s rumored empty buildings theory because it makes Ezra look like he’s stupid.  I’m... ngl... not especially fond of plotlines where Ezra’s reduced to basically the tagalong kid trotting on Thrawn’s heels around the Ascendancy, though it’s more tolerable than other plots admittedly.

I would flip an actual table if they have Ezra go evil.  Not even kidding.  I do not understand how or why anyone could actually want that.

5. I’m not convinced that Thrawn and Ezra would ever be friends.

Is it hilarious to do in fics/fanart?  Oh yes.  Do I want it in canon or anything that’s trying to be realistic or serious?  No, without some serious legwork put into Thrawn redeeming himself that would stretch my disbelief a bit too far.

Without seeing the legwork, the development, the character growth and growing respect between them, I just will not buy Ezra willingly going with Thrawn to the Ascendancy instead of amicably parting ways and making his way back home.

---

And there you have it, those are Tari’s Grouchy Fandom Lady Opinions about Adventures In Wild Space material and Ashoka Show theories, I would just like to emphasize and disclaim these are my personal thoughts I’m not trying to dictate what anyone should write, fic-wise, just trying to explain why I’m not interested in it and don’t wanna see it onscreen.

#star wars #star wars rebels #ahsoka show #ezra bridger #probably not gonna tag thrawn because i don't want his stans coming to try and convince me that thrawn is just a poor little meow meow #but i WILL tag #dunking on the blue bastard #because he is a bastard and i love him for it #adventures in wild space

[frameacloud]

Image description: A photo of a gravestone of a married couple. The simple gray stone bears this inscription below a small equal-armed cross: “Edith Mary Tolkien, Lúthien, 1889-1971. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, Beren, 1892-1973.” Description ends.

Photo source: Steven Gray, CC-BY-NC 2.0.

Today, January 3, is the birthday of J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. These novels changed how the world thought of fantasy literature. He drew from his knowledge of folklore and language, as a professor of Anglo-Saxon and English language and literature and an inventor of constructed languages. We can see Tolkien’s influence throughout the fantasy genre today. For example, whenever fantasy authors spell the plural of the word “dwarf” as “dwarves,” instead of the traditional spelling “dwarfs,” paralleling the spelling of “elves.” Tolkien invented these and other changes to English because they made sense to him.

There have also been various groups of people who drew inspiration from Tolkien’s legendarium for their own worldviews and spiritual beliefs, though they vary in how seriously they take it. For example, in the 1970s, there were some groups affiliated with Paganism who called themselves elves, such as the Elf Queen’s Daughters, the Silver Elves, and more, and they referred to being influenced partly by Tolkien’s vision of elves. In the 2000s, elf otherkin debated whether it was right to seriously identify with Tolkien-inspired fictional elves rather than strictly ones from folklore, mythology, and personal gnosis. Fiction, after all, must be the least real of any of these.

How seriously did Tolkien himself take his own legendarium? It’s only fiction, right? It’s complicated. According to him, the world of Middle-Earth was neither an alien planet nor altogether imaginary (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 283 (#211).) He said, “Middle-earth is not an imaginary world. ... The theatre of my tale is this earth, the one in which we now live, but the historical period is imaginary” (Letters, 239 (#183).) Though he acknowledged that the differences between the geography of that ancient world and ours is not very practical to reconcile, he set the events of the The Lord of the Rings about 6,000 years ago, but he chose not to be specific about it so that he wouldn’t need to make their calendars line up with ours (Letters, 283 (#211).

As shown in the photo above, Tolkien also put the name of his self-insert character, Beren, on his gravestone, together with that of his wife, Lúthien. That seems about as serious as any identification with a fictional character that I’ve ever seen. Especially considering how he would have thought of gravestones as a historian and as a Catholic. Gravestones are very permanent and spiritually meaningful records of who people were and what was important to them. In Catholicism, the gravestone marks where the body was buried whole, which they believe is necessary in preparation for the end of the world, when the body will physically return to life and stand facing the sunrise.

In Tolkien’s legendarium, Beren was a human, and so bore the Gift of Men: a greater measure of free will than other beings, as well as mortality, so that upon death, the spirits of Men leave the world and do not return. The Gift was originally granted as a blessing, but evil influences turned it into a curse. In the story, Beren’s wife Lúthien was an elf who became a mortal so they would not be separated, among her many other deeds of loving self-sacrifice and heroism.

I am not a Tolkien scholar, so with humility I hope I have done all right with this post, and welcome any corrections from those who are more familiar.

#tolkien #elf #fiction #gravestone #mortality #dwarf #humanity #death #j.r.r. tolkien

[sleepymarmot]

Seventeen Moments of Spring (1973): a review

Here is the non-spoilery review/introduction/recommendation I promised.

For many of us living in the post-Soviet states, this title needs no introduction. It’s impossible to remember how old I was when I encountered a Stierlitz joke for the first time — elementary school age, maybe earlier? What I didn’t realize was that the show had become such a hit not just because of its effective mythmaking or because the hero is absurdly badass, though both of these things are true. It is also genuinely brilliant TV that stood the test of time with ease.

Seventeen Moments of Spring turns 50 in a few months. That means that as good as the show is, it is of course also dated in several ways. The most noticeable is the pacing. This show was made for an entirely different attention span in mind. It’s not a problem of a slow start — the stakes are established within the first episode. But every individual scene takes more time than it would have taken in a modern show, and the addition of real newsreel footage slows down the action even further.

Another thing that is noticeable to the modern viewer is how gendered the story is. The nigh-untouchable (to a certain extent — no spoilers!) protagonist embodies pretty much every masculine virtue you can think of, and selflessly sacrifices his feelings for patriotic duty. There’s only one prominent female character, and she is given the opposite role: more vulnerability, more raw emotion, less opportunity for dashing heroism. The show’s director is a woman, and this might rightfully be a factor in you deciding to watch this show — but don’t let that give you false hopes for a feminist narrative.

The show is an adaptation of a single novel in a series, and that has certain effects on the plot. One of them is a huge benefit compared to what saturates the modern pop culture: the show wastes no time on establishing an origin story, opening in the final months of the war with all pieces already on the board. The main plot was perhaps better suited for a book format: I found it convoluted and difficult to follow, especially when the voiceover narration didn’t offer extra explanations. By the way, the show’s method of information delivery also needed getting used to: for me, plot developments were often confusing upon first introduction, and became clear as they were explained later.

But you don’t need to know anything about the plot beforehand. I didn’t. I was only aware of the premise — a Soviet spy in deep cover in Nazi Germany — and that was probably the perfect amount of knowledge. My viewing experience was a strange version of a completely fresh unspoiled first viewing where I had to guess where the plot was heading and concentrate hard on following it, except I’d known the protagonist’s name since childhood and so had to simultaneously observe another process: how it slowly ceased to be the name of just the joke character and became the name of a dreamy angsty hypercompetent hero I was forming an emotional attachment to.

One of the main factors of the show’s success are the attraction and sympathy the main character inspires despite — or, rather, because of — his emotional unavailability. The creators understood the appeal of a handsome man who is not only very good at his job but also represses his true self and creatively adapts it to the environment just as clearly as any modern day fangirl does. He is in tight control of not only his actions but also every emotion he allows to reach his face. The actor’s expression barely changes even in the most open, unguarded moments. And yet the hero’s exhaustion, loneliness, and homesickness are effectively conveyed with the help of the iconic music in the long, slow scenes, achieving the lyricism that became one of the most memorable aspects of the show.

Don’t look for historical accuracy here. According to several researches referenced by the Wikipedia article, the setting was more of a reflection of the USSR than a faithful depiction of the Third Reich. I assume that watching this will give you more insight on Soviet culture than on WWII.

You might want to check out this show if you are interested in:

hypercompetent protagonists

also very competent antagonists who act like three-dimensional humans and not evil cardboard cutouts

men who are emotionally repressed almost to the breaking point

Stoic Masculine Angst™

political intrigue and spy mind games

the unrelenting tension of working against some of the most dangerous people on the planet right under their nose

all sorts of people living in a totalitarian state, the roles they have chosen to play in it, and how they act when they know its days are numbered

excellent acting

black and white cinematography, intentionally chosen over color for stylistic reasons

beautiful theme music

On the other hand, here are some things that you might want to be aware of. The pacing is slow, the plot demands attention, and the material is often heavy — so it’s more of a “slow journey over 2-4 weeks” show than a “binge in two days” one. For me, the episodes usually took more time to watch than their actual runtime, and left me exhausted — and I suspect I’m not the only one. Important content warning: one of the episodes shows real concentration camp footage; you can notice when the narration starts going in that direction and prepare yourself. There are also scenes of physical and psychological torture inflicted on people of various ages starting from a very small child; they’re not gory but still disturbing. Some other scenes I found hard to watch because of how suspenseful they were. On the flip side, you might find the black uniforms and cars a tad too sleek and fashionable, and there are characters based on real Nazis who are written and played charismatically enough that you might be surprised by how happy you are to see them on screen. Don’t even try to apply any modern Western standards of representation, obviously — not only because the show is half a century old but even more so because of the setting. Ignore the colorized version if you encounter that, watch the black and white original.

Finally, I can’t not mention why I suddenly decided to watch this classic after having zero interest in it throughout my entire life. The last few months of 2022 were brightened for me by two works of fiction:

A star-filled, stylish cult 1973 drama about a Russian man in a violent Western European environment, featuring a time/clock motif and a major female character named Katya

A 12-episode TV show about the fight against fascism, notable for portraying the antagonists as humans as opposed to one-dimensional evil caricatures, and likely to irritate some viewers with its slow pacing

I started watching Seventeen Moments of Spring because it was a classic antifascist espionage TV show from 1973, and was amazed to discover that it also shared all other features listed above. It’s not often you watch something at just the right time mostly by coincidence! Shout out to the film that is definitely real and the show that might be a fandom’s collective fever dream (or is that the other way around?) for bringing me here.

#семнадцать мгновений весны #liveblogs and reviews #blah blah blah

[elektramouthed]

 History is the earthly paradise of the bourgeois idea of transcendence. This realm is accessible not through commodities but through apparent gratuity: through the sacrifice called for by the work of art, through activity seemingly undetermined by the immediate need to increase capital. The philanthropist does good works; the patriot produces heroism; the soldier fashions victory; the poet or scholar creates works of literary or scientific value, and so on. But there is an ambiguity in the very idea of “making a work of art,” for it embraces both the lived experience of the artist and the sacrifice of this experience to the abstraction of a creative substance, i.e., to the aesthetic form. The artist relinquishes the lived intensity of the creative moment in exchange for the durability of what he creates, so that his name may live on in the funereal glory of the museum. And his desire to produce a durable work is the very thing that prevents him from living imperishable instants of real life.  Actually, if we except academicism, artists never succumb completely to aesthetic assimilation. Though he may abdicate his immediate experience for the sake of appearances, any artist─and anyone who tries to live is an artist─must also follow his desire to increase his share of dreams in the objective world of others. In this sense he entrusts the thing he creates with the mission of completing his personal self-realization within the collectivity. And in this sense creativity is revolutionary in its essence.

Raoul Vaneigem, from Revolution of Everyday Life (tr. Donald Nicholson-Smith)

#raoul vaneigem #donald nicholson smith #revolution of everyday life #translations #nonfiction #essays #on artistry #2022 reads

[deflare]

After a bit of a run of successor chapters, we’re back to some First Founding lads. Also, tonight is the first night of Hanukkah, so it’s apropos that we get some boys strongly associated with fire. So for Day 18, we have the XVIII* Legion, the Salamanders!

Into the fires of battle, unto the anvil of war! 

Vulkan lives!

The XVIII was with the VI Legion (the Space Wolves) in the triad of legions that were created by the Emperor in secret for Secret Purposes. When they went to battle, the XVIII distinguished themselves in battles where they won by the skin of their teeth against overwhelming odds, becoming known as the Dragon Warriors. Unlike other legions, they usually weren’t sent out to claim new worlds in the Emperor’s name, instead focusing on sudden threats in the Imperium’s heart. The Dragon Warriors quickly gained a reputation for extraordinary heroism, at the cost of regularly taking nasty casualties.

It was during one of these desperate last stands that the Primarch returned to the legion. Vulkan had landed on the volcanic planet of Nocturne, where he established himself as a mighty defender of his people and a blacksmith of great skill. When the Emperor came to his world, he and Vulkan competed in a number of challenges to see who was the greater hero; after a series of ties, the Emperor lost a challenge in order to save Vulkan’s life, at which point Vulkan knelt and agreed to serve the Emperor. After years of learning how to be general, Vulkan rode in with a bunch of new recruits just in time to save his sons from a truly ridiculous horde of Orks. When his sons went to kneel, he told them to rise, for all his sons were equals; then he knelt before them to honor their heroism.

Vulkan was a pretty cool dude. He renamed his legion the Salamanders, after the flame-resistant dragons of his homeworld.

Vulkan was also immortal--one of a weird tiny subset of people called Perpetuals, who’re incapable of dying no matter how much they might want to. This proved to be kind of a problem for him during the Heresy. His legion was one of the ones fucked up by a surprise attack at the start of the war, and the few remaining Salamanders would spend the rest of the war struggling to be relevant. Vulkan himself would be captured and tortured by one of his brothers, his immortality just giving him the chance for more suffering. It sucked.

After the Heresy, the Salamanders agreed to Guilliman’s plan to split everyone up into chapters. They didn’t have any successors in that first round of chapters, though, because there were so few Salamanders left that none could be scrounged up to split off. The Salamanders wouldn’t have any official successors until the arrival of Primaris marines, as their geneseed had a high rejection rate. Vulkan himself would just mysteriously vanish one day; chapter legends say that when nine artifacts he hid around the galaxy were gathered, he’d return to lead his chapter to lead his legion to glory.

The modern Salamanders are considered some of the most compassionate of Space Marines. They’re willing to sacrifice their lives for innocent people in a way that few other chapters are. This inherent nobility stands in sharp contrast to their appearance and methods of war. Their geneseed causes all Salamander recruits to develop coal-black skin and glowing red eyes (yes, this is fucked up on several levels), which a lot of people find real frightening. They also have a somewhat disturbing obsession with flame weaponry. They really like using flamethrowers, and burning swords, and have burning backpacks. Nothing says heroism like dousing your enemies in napalm, I guess. The last major factor of Salamanders culture is their interest in blacksmithing. All Salamanders receive training in building and maintaining their gear, and their specialized smiths are some of the best in the Space Marines. However scary they might be, though, if you’re an Imperial Guardsman**, you’re going to be pretty happy to see a Salamander joining the battle on your side; they’re going to take more pains than any other chapter to keep you alive.

Aesthetically, Salamanders lean into their two major aesthetic cues of “fire” and “dragons”. They often have flame designs painted onto their armor, and will adorn themselves with scaly pelts of their namesake salamanders. I’d be remiss, though, if I didn’t mention their classic Badab War pain scheme, which took the idea of a ‘Salamander’ very literally.

Aw yeah. That’s the good shit.

*18 is the most annoying number to list in Roman numerals under 20.

**Imperial Guardsman? Whazzat?

I’ve mentioned several times that Space Marine chapters are only allowed to have 1,000 members, which is barely large enough to be any kind of useful fighting force. This raises the obvious question, who does most of the fighting in the Imperium? And the answer to that is: Regular people. Lots and lots and lots of regular people.

Every planet maintains a planetary defense force (PDF), a local militia that acts as first responders to emergencies; how well equipped these PDFs are varies wildly from planet to planet, depending how how wealthy the local government is. Every planet is also expected to give a tithe of soldiers to the Imperium at large, to serve in the Imperium’s main standing army: The Astra Militarum, also known as the Imperial Guard. How many guardsmen are there? Literally uncountable--intake and casualties both run in the millions per day. Easily billions, constantly being deployed to new battlefronts across the galaxy.

The Imperial Guard mostly resembles a late World War II army in how it fights. The bulk of its forces consist of squads of people with semi-automatic rifles (lasguns, very accurate, but not very powerful on the silly scale of power used by 40k), supplemented by specialist weapons like flamethrowers and machine guns. They’re delivered by APCs, fight alongside tanks, and can call in air and artillery support; the Imperial Guard’s vehicle pool is actually quite impressive, somewhat outclassing that of the Space Marines.

Guardsmen are organized into regiments, and each one has its own flavor and specialties based on its homeworld. The ‘standard’ template is that of the Cadian Shock Troopers, who look like Starship Troopers guys. Other prominent examples include the Attilan Rough Riders (Hun-like cavalrymen), Catachan jungle fighters (an entire army of Rambo references from space Vietnam), the Death Korps of Krieg (WWI German soldiers in gas masks), Tallarn Desert Raiders (Arabic-themed desert cavalrymen), and the Vostroyan Firstborn (poncy Russian noblemen). Most of these don’t have models made by Games Workshop anymore, which means that third party sites to gangbusters business selling them themselves.

The Imperial Guard uses several specialist forces. A few planets have produced stable human subspecies called ‘abhumans’; they’re generally discriminated against in the Imperium, but they still get sent to war, because of course they are. Two major strains are Ogryns (big, strong, not very smart), and Ratlings (small, very skilled snipers). These serve as auxiliaries to the main Guard regiment. There are also the Tempestus Scion, elite troopers who get better armor, better gear, and better training, dropping into the places where fighting is hardest. They’re like budget Space Marines.

The last notable thing about the Imperial Guard worth mentioning is the morale officer, known as the ‘Commissar’. The commissar’s job is to maintain discipline in the unit, keeping them from fleeing the enemy. There’s actually a lot of ways to do this job, but the way most commonly seen in the game and most often joked about is by shooting a fleeing soldier in the head. In the Imperial Guard, the only thing scarier than the enemy in front of you is the commissar behind you.

Life in the Astra Militarum is usually nasty, brutish, and short. You’re underequipped, undertrained, and being sent up against horrors beyond human comprehension. Survival is not guaranteed. But you have your fellows at your side, and your faith to guide you. Stories about the Imperial Guard are some of the most emotionally effective in 40k, as they’re just normal people put in horrible circumstances, as often the victim of their own incompetent leadership as enemy forces. No supersoldier serums for these folks, just flak armor and faith.

They’re doomed.

#warhammer 40k #space marines #advent calendar #text heavy #lore dump #40k advent #salamanders #imperial guard #astra militarum

[jaydonsjam]

Tomb of Dracula XII

Giant-Size Dracula #2

Giant-Size Dracula #2 - writer: Chris Claremont | penciler: Don Heck | inker: Frank McLaughlin

Alright I know I just said in the last ToD post that I don’t like when Dracula has to fight someone else who’s evil. But Chris Claremont pulled it off. This is definitely the best Giant-Size comic I’ve read so far. I loved the fight that Dracula had with Y’Garon and the fact that Vlad went insane and thought he was fighting the man who killed his wife. This explained why Dracula was trying to save Katherine and it worked for me. Katherine is a psychic that resembles Dracula’s second wife and love, Maria. Katherine is going to be the sacrifice to bring forth Y’Garon’s brothers and so she’s tied to a cross above a pit. After Dracula throws Y’Garon into the pit he goes to save Kathy and gets a glimpse of the Elder Gods but as a reader we don’t see what he sees, we just see his reaction. I loved that choice. It really goes along with the Lovecraftian gods which humans can’t comprehend when they see them. This felt similar to that. Anyways, I liked Dracula’s heroism being explained through him going mad at the sight of “Turac” sacrificing his wife “Maria”. This was a great issue that I thought I wasn’t going to like but it won me over. And it did move the plot forward by confirming to Chelm that Dracula isn’t dead.

Tomb of Dracula #24

Tomb of Dracula #24-29 - writer: Marv Wolfman | penciler: Gene Colan | inker: Tom Palmer

I loved this issue. Frank Drake makes the decision to leave and try to find himself now that Dracula is dead. I was a little confused at this development but I’ll have to see where it goes. Shiela Whittier is the new Clifton Graves except she’s in love with Dracula and she believes Dracula isn’t evil like everyone says cause she’s seen the “true side” of him. My favorite moment in this issue is Shiela talking about Dracula being misunderstood while he’s feeding on a victim. It was just pure hilarious irony. Vlad knows how to pick his familiars. Blade fights Dracula in bat form but isn’t sure if it’s Dracula or someone impersonating him. I loved this whole scene of Blade trying to survive the onslaught of attacks from the vampire bat. He does get a good stab on the bat’s arm. We also see Blade take out one of Dracula’s legion which was cool. I gotta say I love Blade and I wish he was in this series more. No Quincy this issue just a mention. Taj abuses his wife in India which was really annoying and made me like him less. Spousal abuse is shown to be frivolous so much in the 70’s that it’s so disgusting. But we find out that his son is dying so it’s definitely taking a toll on Taj.

Tomb of Dracula #25

HANNIBAL KING!? Hannibal King was the star of this issue and boy did he shine. Holy shit. I loved this comic and it’s my favorite ToD issue in a while. Hannibal King is hired by a woman whose husband got killed by Dracula and asks Hannibal to find out why he was killed. King has a great moment where he finds one of Dracula’s thralls and has to break his arm to get him to tell him where Vlad is having coffins sent. Hannibal then takes out 2 vampires with a wooden stake and an axe. There was great action with blood splatter and all the stuff you want from this book. Hannibal is already a great character and I can’t wait to see more. He’s a badass and the ending reveals that he’s a vampire. I was floored with how much I enjoyed this issue. One more thing: Hannibal mentions finding out vampires are real when he saw a long white haired man kill people. I have to think this is the vampire that Blade is hunting. So I guess we’ll see if Blade and King hookup and hunt that vampire together. Great stuff. My favorite issue from this bunch that I read.

TRIGGER WARNING: SUICIDE

Tomb of Dracula 26-29

I bunched these four issues together because they serve as the next arc. I don’t think his name is confirmed in this arc and only referred to as “The Master” but we definitely saw the return of Dr. Sun. Unless they did confirm it and I’m just a moron. I liked this arc a lot. It was cool seeing Shiela realize that Dracula had no love for her that he was just using her. She falls for David which I think helps her realize the truth but of course tragically David can’t return the love and just wants to be friends. And it’s such a tragic ending because once Dracula shows her that David is dead, Shiela not wanting him to control her anymore, jumps out a window to her death. It was such a tragic and heartbreaking end. Good horror trope here where Shiela answers the door and sees the corpse of David standing in front of her with Dracula holding him. She does the most heroic deed she can by destroying the Chimera statue after seeing the horrible things it can do in the wrong hands. So Shiela actually turns out to be a great character and I was saddened by her end. Dracula continues to be a piece of garbage and I continue reading this comic with the hope that someone finally kills him. But it also points out my main issue with the book when in moments where he has to fight another villain. I can’t root for a dude who just constantly murders and tries to take over the world. So it makes issues like Giant-Size Dracula #2 look dumb when he’s just doing evil in the regular book. I liked the return of Dr. Sun and I’ll be interested to see where it goes next with him cause again, there isn’t a confirmation that he’s The Master but I’m pretty sure he is. Especially when they never showed a body, we just heard his voice. There’s a great moment where Dracula is trapped in a metal room with holy water flooding the environment and he has to turn into mist to escape but still manages to get burned. I loved seeing Taj’s backstory and motivation for wanting to kill Dracula plus how he met Rachel. He had his throat slashed by a vampire which serves as the explanation of why he’s mute. We meet his wife who was paralyzed by a wagon when they were attacked by Dracula and two of his vampires. Taj’s son is then bit and turned into a vampire. I loved how Wolfman slowly revealed Taj’s sick son being afflicted with vampirism and honestly, as a father this was terrifying and gave a lot more depth to Taj. According to his wife, the villagers have stopped giving blood and now out of fear want to kill him. Just a note: why are Indians colored grey? It’s such a bizarre choice. We also saw Frank leave Rachel to find himself and ends up in Brazil. We don’t really know anything past that so I guess I’ll wait to see what happens. We got brief moments with Quincy and Rachel but there’s not much to get into there. This arc really served as a way to dive deeper into Taj and Shiela Whittier as characters. I enjoyed this one and I can’t wait for more! Next up is Doctor Strange!

#marvel #marvel comics #tomb of dracula #dracula #vlad dracula #count dracula #horror comics #hannibal king #blade #frank drake #Rachel Van Helsing #quincy harker

[anneangel]

In terms of preference: I like both Bilbo and Frodo. And don't make me choose. Another curious thing is that when people tend to compare them they compare their journeys, but I'm not talking about their journeys and trials throughout life, I'm talking about the individual PERSONALITY of each one.

═══

Bilbo 

is so good-natured, outgoing, sociable (but not in the usual, boring and tedious way), he is charismatic, funny and loyal, as well as peaceful and well-educated, but he can be very smart, persuasive, naughty and brave if required. Bilbo is a homebody, without much sense of duty or heroism, but he can go on an adventure if he is persuaded and thinks it will be worth it, and discovers that he can do anything, especially if it's for his friends and for the common good, which surprises even himself because he doesn't think of himself as a person with a sense of sacrifice, but he is capable of it.

He's the kind of person who gets attention not because he's looking for it, but because his personality is warm and attractive, the type that makes the people around him comfortable and makes them revolve around his endearing, friendly and common-sense soul, as well he as motivating the people around him to be better and see the bright side of things, how does he see and how he is.

He is like the sun, he occupies a place in the center and stands out even without doing it on purpose (And this is how the protagonist of his own book is, after all the name is “The Hobbit”).

In a circle of friends, I have the feeling that Bilbo would attract all the attention (whether he wanted to or not) with his mannerisms, charisma and manner of.

═══

Frodo 

on the other hand, is a more meek and withdrawn creature, introspective and introverted. He is loyal and has a great sense of duty and sacrifice, as well as being curious, reflective, friendly, relatable, and pure. He is that kind of person who is quiet in his corner and quiet with his things, but whose other people only know how to think well of him even if he is withdrawn, a good listener, good adviser, reliable in whatever is required of him. You don't know he's there until you need him, and he'll be all ears. 

He’s the kind of person who is shy but dynamic, the kind that is simply there for what they need of him, and he lets it be known without having to be fussy, he exerts influence on the people around him through his exceptionally kind and integrity soul, he leaves people in awe of how far he can go for what he believes in.

He's like the moon, he's essential even when we don't know it, he's not in the center and he doesn't need to because he's indispensable in the same way, even if things don't revolve around him. Frodo is not the protagonist, there are many. And the Lord of the Rings was indeed Sauron. But still Frodo is essential even if things don't revolve around him.

In a circle of friends, I get the feeling that Frodo is that kind and mature friend who stays quiet in his corner, without drawing attention, until his action is needed.

.

Bilbo or Frodo? I can't choose between them. Both have unique personalities, I love both the sun and the moon. We need both and we admire them for different reasons.

P.S: I'm not taking into account the "liar" and "cunning" Bilbo, because that was the influence of the ring. Just as I'm not taking into account the more "annoying" and "irritating" Frodo because that was also the ring's influence. The ring amplifies bad traits and corrupts people's good character over time, under its influence you can't say that the person's "real" personality is the one shown.

#JRR Tolkien #lord of the rings #the hobbit #bilbo baggins #frodo baggins #bilbo #Frodo #hobbit #LOTR

[poodleheadnv]

Poodle Head: Crafting Timeless Tributes Through the Best Military Tribute Songs

In the realm of music, certain melodies possess the extraordinary ability to transcend time and space, touching the hearts of listeners and immortalizing the sacrifices of those who serve. Poodle Head stands as a beacon of reverence and remembrance, known for curating the best military tribute songs that honor the valor, resilience, and patriotism of service members around the globe.

Poodle Head's collection of military tribute songs represents a heartfelt homage to the brave men and women who dedicate their lives to defending freedom and upholding justice. Each composition is imbued with sincerity and reverence, capturing the spirit of service and sacrifice in its purest form. From stirring anthems to poignant ballads, Poodle Head's repertoire resonates with audiences of all ages and backgrounds, fostering a deep sense of gratitude and respect for those who wear the uniform.

What sets Poodle Head apart is its unwavering commitment to authenticity and integrity in every musical endeavor. Drawing inspiration from real-life stories, historical events, and the rich tapestry of military culture, Poodle Head's tribute songs evoke a profound emotional response, honoring the bravery and heroism of service members past and present. Whether recounting tales of battlefield valor, expressing the pain of separation, or celebrating the bonds of brotherhood, each song serves as a poignant reminder of the sacrifices made in the name of freedom.

Moreover, Poodle Head's dedication to excellence is evident in the craftsmanship of its compositions. From meticulously crafted lyrics to evocative melodies, every aspect of the music is thoughtfully curated to create a powerful and unforgettable listening experience. Whether performed in grand concert halls or intimate gatherings, Poodle Head's tribute songs resonate with audiences, stirring hearts and inspiring unity in their wake.

In addition to its original compositions, Poodle Head also pays homage to classic military anthems, reimagining timeless favorites with a contemporary flair while preserving their timeless spirit. Through its music, Poodle Head honors the legacy of service and sacrifice, ensuring that the stories of courage and valor are never forgotten.

In conclusion, Poodle Head stands as a beacon of reverence and respect in the world of military tribute songs, offering a timeless and heartfelt tribute to the brave men and women who serve. With its sincere compositions and unwavering dedication to honoring service members, Poodle Head continues to touch the lives of listeners around the world, preserving the legacy of heroism for generations to come.

[thisisbeyond]

Beyond the Story

　　In 2001, Hong Kong director Wanting Cheung, perhaps out of curiosity, turned her camera on the rock youth in Shucun, a suburb of Beijing, and made a "rock movie" called "Beijing Music and Road". In fact, why did she sacrifice the near for the distant? Beyond is the good material around you.

　　The word "乐与路" that many people don't understand is an extension of "乐与路", which is the Hong Kong transliteration of Rock & Roll. But, is Beyond considered a real rock band, or is there rock music in Hong Kong?

　　People who have this kind of doubt will take European and American rock music as their standard. In front of it, Chinese rock music really pales in comparison. Beyond is not the most technically outstanding rock band, and even they prefer ordinary pop music. However, the Beatles are also simple and beautiful, which does not hinder their greatness. The bloodiness, undying heroism and idealism in Beyond's music are the essence of rock and roll. In their music, the great Great Wall is written as a broken wall, and the focus is on those innocent lives thousands of years ago; "The last sacrifice of war is children." The song "Amani" sung in Kenyan is a tribute to war. Accusation... Huang Jiaju's crying voice is a registered trademark of Beyond. It is different from today's pretentious voice. His hoarse singing carries contempt for power, sorrow for people's livelihood, and no distinction between truth and falsehood, right and wrong. The upside-down world needs a clear black and white. Boys born in the 1970s have all seen the video of Beyond's sweaty concert, where they would cross their hands to form a flying dove of peace - that was Wong Ka-kui's classic gesture when singing "Amani". In the era before Cui Jian, Black Panther, and band beaters, Beyond was the most friendly rock music for civilians.

In his last interview before his death, Wong Ka Kui said: "The biggest gain in the past 10 years is that some music fans know how to pick up the guitar and play music, know what drums are, what guitar is... It doesn't matter whether Beyond exists in the future, because we have sown the seeds The seeds began to sprout." To this day, some young people in Hong Kong still sing Beyond's songs to the stage when they form their own bands. Nicholas Tse and Lin Yilian will also sing "Glory Days" at their concerts.

　　For the Beyond band, they have been swinging between rock and business. The best-selling music may not be their favorite, and the many efforts in music may not get the greatest response. "When I first formed the band, I had a lot of fantasies and longings. I imagined that I would have my own recording studio, or even my own building or company in the future - but in the end, I only got a band room-like recording studio. This is a very difficult road to follow. ." Huang Jiaqiang said.

　　Joy and anger are also the music path of Beyond band for 20 years.

　　glory days

　　(1983-1993)

　　"Forgive me for my unruly, indulgent love of freedom in this life, even if I fall down one day." At 4:15 pm on June 30, 1993, 31-year-old Huang Jiaju fell in Japan and fell into a coma for 6 days and fell permanently. That day, that year, became the dividing line between the band Beyond’s 20 years.

　　The 10th year of Shangshuo lasted until 1983. In the popular "band" trend in Hong Kong, several boys, Wong Ka-kui, Yip Sai Wing and Wu Lin, in order to win the competition in one fell swoop, or perhaps to transcend themselves forever, they named their temporary band Beyond.

　　In the next two years, Wong Ka-kui's younger brother Wong Ka-keung and Wong Guanzhong, who designed posters for the band, joined one after another. Beyond's songs were included in the rock compilation album, and they held the "Forever Waiting" concert at their own expense, becoming the leader of Hong Kong's underground bands.

　　In 1986, when the concept of DIY had not yet been born, the Beyond band released its first album "Goodbye Ideal" with astonishing courage. The production, distribution and even the cover design were all handled by themselves. The emergence of Beyond was recognized by the mainstream music industry. It shocked the world and won a contract with a record company.

　　Going from the underground to the ground does not mean that it is finished. During the periods of "Forever Waiting", "Arab Dancing Girl" and "Modern Stage", Beyond was still lingering on the edge of the stage, waiting, until the double platinum-selling album "Secret Police" in 1988. "Earth" from the album was Beyond's first hit song and ranked among the top ten hits of the year, while "Like You" was one of the most radio-played songs in 1988. In the autumn of this year, the band was invited to perform two times at the Capital Stadium in Beijing. However, they were not very popular among Beijingers who could not understand Cantonese. Only half of the audience was left at the end of the show, and the most enthusiastic scene at the venue actually occurred when Huang Jiaju When singing Cui Jian's "Nothing". In the same year, early member Liu Zhiyuan left the group, and the four-in-one Beyond became a permanent member.

　　Songs such as "Really Love You" and "Days Gone" continued to gain ground for Beyond in 1989. They appeared in Johnnie To's movie "Lucky Star" and transformed from a simple band into an idol group. . In the early 1990s, Beyond was already Hong Kong's top band, combining the popularity of a mainstream band with the creative freedom of an underground band. 1990's "Glory Days" was a tribute to Mandela, and "The Face Party" pointed the finger at the bizarre entertainment industry. In this year, they released their first Mandarin album "The Earth", targeting Taiwan and the mainland, and its influence spread to Southeast Asia.

　　In 1991, Beyond finally got its wish and appeared in the Hong Kong Red Rocks Arena and starred in the inspirational movie "Don't Bully the Young and the Poor" (co-starred with Faye Wong, who was also a member of Xinyibao Records at the time), and "Beyond+Grasshopper", "Beyond Summer Vacation" and other obvious TV programs that leveraged the band's popularity to gain ratings also began to be popular. The company's image of "youth idol big boys" designed for the four boys reached its peak this year. At the same time, their seventh album "Hesitation" was accused of being the most commercial With a record, some people began to wonder, "Did we abandon Beyond, or did Beyond abandon us?"

　　A passionate rock musician is involved in the strange circle of youth idols. Behind his unlimited glory is a gray track, and business operations bring about split personality. Huang Guanzhong joked many years later: "Beyond won numerous awards back then. The climax of each award ceremony was not on the stage, but in the band room in the back seat on the second floor. Countless times we carried a video camera to film a certain channel." "Best Group" award, as soon as the camera turned, someone took a softball bat and swung it hard, and the exquisite rubber base burst into two quarters, and then the whole audience cheered. This is the only way to vent, and there are only a few short moments. Minutes, let us regain our self-esteem!

　　The radical behavior reflects Beyond's unwillingness to give in. They are unwilling to be just a pop rock band. Becoming an international band has always been Beyond's distant dream. "Beyond knows very well what kind of music the Hong Kong market needs. We can only lower the level as much as possible, so the ideal of breaking out of Asia is very slim." Huang Jiaqiang said. It is precisely because of this that they ended their long-term cooperation with New Art Treasure in 1992 and went to Japan to develop, almost disappearing from the Hong Kong music scene. "Our hometown cannot let go of our ideals." This phrase in "Paradise" was the cry of anger back then.

　　Beyond's dissatisfaction was not quickly healed in Japan, and initially there were big differences in music with the Japanese producers. Even so, in the first year, Beyond still delivered the "Continue the Revolution" album that was different from the past. Huang Jiaju's singing in the song "Peasant" became cold and deep, and the Japanese electronic music master Kitaro's arrangement for "The Great Wall" The music also gives this band without keyboards an ethereal and vast artistic conception.

　　"Joy and Fury" is the last record of the four-in-one Beyond. After many years of not daring to say loudly that they were musicians, Beyond broke out loudly in 1993, 10 years after forming the band. What they love is "Joy and Fury" is rock music. They were also actively preparing to hold a large-scale 10th anniversary concert at the end of the year.

　　On June 24, 1993, an accident occurred during the recording of a game show on Fuji TV in Tokyo. The Chinese music scene lost a music "revolutionary" and an era because of this program that had nothing to do with music. The four-person Beyond was written into history, and "Broad Sea and Sky" was the swan song of that year.

　　threesome

　　(1993-2003)

　　"Three monks have no water to drink" is the coldest description of Beyond after Wong Ka Kui's death, but the objective fact is that in the next 10 years, they almost did not sing any popular works. Lyricist Liu Zhuohui, who has collaborated with Beyond for a long time, said: "The music of the three of them is more self-contained, more like a Western band. They don't just sell one or two songs, but they sell the sound of a band."

　　The Doors recently regrouped, and some people mocked the veteran rock band without Jim Morrison as "the Doors." Indeed, an excellent lead singer is usually the soul of the band, just like Wong Ka Kui to Beyond. Will his departure also prevent the Beyond band from transcending themselves?

　　In the early years of Pink Floyd, Syd Barrett, the creative soul of the band, left the band due to drug problems. As a result, under the leadership of Roger Waters, the band later produced two rock music masterpieces, "Dark Side Of the Moon" and "The Wall"; Joy ​​Division's After Ian Curtis hanged himself, the remaining members reorganized New Order and also became important figures in instigating the Electro-Dance trend. We always hope that the same thing will happen to Beyond.

　　The death of Huang Jiaju made the three members feel like "we can't start before everyone is here" for a long time. To this day, they still put an empty microphone in every performance. There is a song called "We Don't Wanna Make It Without You" (We Don't Want to Play Without You) in the first album of the trio's period, "Back Seat on the Second Floor", and this sad sentence is repeated throughout the song.

　　After a year's rest, Beyond was back on the road in 1994. Anger and sadness are the keynotes of "Back Seat on the Second Floor". Wong Ka-keung, who replaced his brother as the lead singer, also intentionally or unintentionally imitated Wong Ka-kui's singing voice. Just like New Order's debut album "Movement", which still has a strong shadow of Joy Division, this is a transitional work that cannot escape the shadow of past stereotypes and sadness. After another rough "Sound", the trio of Beyond began to make new sounds in "Beyond is Wonderful" and "Please Let Go".

　　The album "Please Let Go", released in 1997, passionately describes the complex mentality of Hong Kong people in the context of the transfer of power. "Big Time" opens with a clear meaning and is full of confusion; "Please Let Go" is about the hard-to-leave mood before returning. This song won the Best Rock Song Award at the Metro Music Awards that year, and they also won the Best Rock Song of the Year. Favorite Band Award for the group and several other stations. In addition, the album also includes "Echo" written to the Hong Kong Deaf Welfare Promotion Association and "Who Named Me" written to the International Fund for Animal Welfare. They are still the Beyond who takes society as their own responsibility.

　　In the following years, Beyond successively released 5 EP records, and the pace finally seemed to be in a hurry. Wong Ka-keung said: "Although everything in Hong Kong is very advanced and developed, many places are regressing. People will not calmly appreciate the effort you put into every record. To survive in Hong Kong, if you hope to release an album every few years and be able to sell it, It's impossible for a long time." Throughout the 1990s, the idol music scene that "used waste as treasure" became more and more solid. Until the indefinite hiatus was announced, Beyond was still the only well-known band in Hong Kong. Signed to Rolling Stone Records, they once pinned their hopes on the Taiwanese music scene, but most of their Mandarin albums such as "Love and Life" received a mediocre response.

　　At the end of 1999, Beyond released the "Good Time" EP record. In the same year, their concert results were not satisfactory, and the band announced its temporary disbandment and independent development. Of course, whether a band has hits or not is not the only criterion for measuring the quality of a band, but Beyond, a trio, is in an awkward position. They are burdened by the achievements of the Wong Ka-Kui era, but at the same time they want to have more experiments in music. Wong Ka-keung said: "If Ka Kui was still with us, there would never be so much pressure, because his role in the band is like a chef in the kitchen, and we are the chefs responsible for the cooking process. There is no family Beyond is like U2 without Bono." In addition, the patience and tolerance of the music industry are no longer what they used to be. The choice of Beyond is somewhat of a helpless move.

　　This year, the three sons of Beyond reunited to release a new EP album "Together". The "20 Years of Anti-Japanese War" concert in early May was an unprecedented success, and three more performances were held in June. Beyond became a hot spot for several major record companies to compete for. Although this result is slightly ironic, it is consistent with their Appealing power is not unrelated to years of persistence. Ten years of life and death are uncertain. On the 10th anniversary of his death, Huang Jiaju, who is under the pressure of despair, should also smile when he sees the band's achievements today.

　　continue the revolution

　　——Solo years

　　There are too many bands coming out under the scary banner of revolution. However, after a year or two they fend for themselves without even the test of time. Do a group of men who have been rocking for 20 years still doubt the thoroughness of their revolution?

　　In 1998, when Beyond was 15 years old, a Hong Kong music magazine asked them to talk about their feelings. Huang Guanzhong said: "It's not that I plan to finish it after 15 years. 15 is just a neater number than 16." This can probably be read as the revolutionary slogan of these men. The belief of "Always be free and always sing my songs" has been integrated into the blood. Whether it is solo or creating for other singers, these brilliance are still the glory of Beyond.

　　Huang Guanzhong

　　Since the three separated, the former guitarist's development achievements have been the most eye-catching.

　　Wong Guanzhong set up his own recording studio and signed a contract with Universal Music. In 2001, he was the first to release his solo album "Paul Wong". His avant-garde style was staggering. The album still contains anger and agitation that have not diminished with time. Among them, "Hong Kong Must Have" and "Hong Kong Must Have" "Good Night Hong Kong" is a continuation of the social consciousness that was deeply rooted in the Beyond era. "I record my feelings about this era, rather than recording anything about this society. Although the final result is to record this society, I am actually recording myself."

　　The subsequent albums "Black and White" and "Same Root" were released one after another, both in terms of styling and songs. Their unbeatable masculine aura is clearly distinguishable from many records of minor romances, and his guitar skills and creative talents are also increasing day by day. Mature and rich, and showing signs of development towards jazz.

　　In addition to personal development, Huang Guanzhong also formed the band "Khan" with drummer Gong Shuoliang, guitarist Dino and LMF bassist Jimmy, and is committed to supporting new generation bands such as LMF. Mainland musician Zhang Yadong once wrote a song for Huang Guanzhong's first solo album. In his opinion, Huang Guanzhong's current music is much better than that of Beyond.

　　other works--

　　Nicholas Tse's "Everyone Is Stupid", Andy Hui's "Don't Let Me Drink Too Much", Karen Mok's "Oh My God", Chen Xiaodong's "Black Tie"

　　Jordan Chan's "Psycho", Stephen Chow's "Amazing", Lin Haifeng's "Diary of a Madman"/"Good Dog"

　　Wong Ka-keung

　　During the Beyond period, his younger brother Huang Jiaqiang was a silent and lovely bass player who created masterpieces such as "Cold Rainy Night". After his solo career, he set up his own recording studio at home to focus on expanding his personal space.

　　In October 2002, Huang Jiaqiang released his solo album "Be Right Back", in which he laughed, cursed, and criticized current ills. The record has both pop potential and a distinctive personal style, and is more gentle than Huang Guanzhong. "Panic Disorder", "The Letter Is There", and the collaboration with Lu Qiaoyin to perform the work "Guardian Angel" written for Faye Wong, all have good reputations.

　　other works--

　　Eason Chan's "Love Has No Control", Karen Mok's "The Believer", Leo Ku's "Intentional"/"Memory Highway", Li Huimin's "Love Breaks"/"In fact", Faye Wong's "Guardian Angel"/"Perfunctory", Jordan Chan "Good Decision", Kelly Chen "We will meet one day"

　　Ye Shirong

　　After leaving Beyond, drummer Ye Sai Wing signed a contract with EOL Records, but the company failed to honor the contract. As a result, the song "Scam" appeared on his first album "Beautiful Time Machine" released in August 2001. , although he composed nearly 40 songs, Yip Sai Wing only carefully selected 5 for publication. This record, for which he wrote, composed, and sang, was completed in the "back seat on the second floor" that brought countless brilliance to Beyond. The "back seat on the second floor" is the property of the Ye family and has been used as a rehearsal for the Beyond band for many years. ,Studio. In addition to his personal development, he also often makes guest appearances in some emerging bands. In 2002, he suffered the blow of his fiancée's unexpected death. After learning from his pain, he will produce more profound and moving works.

　　other works--

　　"The End of the World, a Cold Strange Land" by Lu Qiaoyin

　　2003.5.3 Let’s encourage each other tonight

　　Passed the ticket check, passed the security, passed the health inspection, and finally entered the Coliseum. The triangular stage echoes the harmony of only three people tonight, making up for the regret of missing one person. After a month of being deserted, it was now packed to capacity. I'm here, and I still have my mask. Are you welcome?

　　At 8 o'clock, the audience surrounded the front, rear, left and right positions. A carefree face, shaking colorful fluorescent sticks, laughing happily. What's surprising is why they...are all so young? Shouldn't I be the youngest? Are they all fans of Beyond? Don’t you know that those Beyond who still look like they are 20 years old are all middle-aged angry men in their late 40s?

　　Sitting in the front row not far from Miss Zhu Yin, seeing a group of reporters surrounding her and the spotlights flashing, everyone felt a little dizzy. Fortunately, the music suddenly started playing. Surrounded by heavy electronic music and screams, I entered another time and space. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to our show... A deep voice called out the band members one by one in English, and the last one called out crazily: In Loving Memory: Wong Kar-kui (黄家狐). The water is boiling.

　　Ye Shirong stands tall in the middle, holding a drum stick and has blond hair; Huang Jiaqiang and Huang Guanzhong each stand at a corner of the stage, wearing black battle clothes and dazzling red hair. The blank space is the center of the front desk.

　　There was a moment of silence, the melancholy blue light was revealed, and the guitar strings jumped immediately: "Today, I watched the snow drifting by in the cold night...", a heart drifted away in the joy: it was the summer of 1993, in the past On the winding road in Clearwater Bay, the same tune played on the radio. The shadows of the trees on both sides continue to recede, the blue sky and blue sea are blowing in the breeze, Beyond, the broken wings, the days that have passed, I am not yet 20, and I am as tall as the teenagers next to me. The speeding car and the depressed mood are my green years.

　　Like most people of the same age, what they are happy about is not the Beyond in front of them, but the horse of that day. Since he left, nothing has moved me. Maybe our requirements are too high, maybe Beyond is also feeling pressured by past achievements and it is difficult to surpass them. Their myth was inadvertently brought to an end 10 years ago. I tried hard, but only ended up in despair. Probably all I can remember is the 1994 "Second Floor Back Seat" album. What's left? A Paul (Huang Guanzhong)'s celebrity girlfriend (Zhu Yin)? Shirong's fiancée who died mysteriously? Or was it Jia Qiang who won an over-age newcomer award last year? In 1999, Beyond announced an indefinite hiatus, and the three of them developed their own careers. Four years later, the band reunited for their 20th anniversary and held another concert, which led to speculation that they came here to make money. It was also because of this mentality that I didn’t have high expectations for the concert. I also heard that in order to recreate the heartwarming scene of the four Beyond brothers on the stage, they would use electronic projection of Ka Kui's image on the stage. I kept feeling uneasy. It seemed that the Beatles had to electronically synthesize John Lennon's voice. Recording an album is like working hard.

　　I saw a blurry image on the stage. "Ka Kui" was wearing a red suit, playing with the strings in front of the microphone. He was standing in the center of the stage. Paul and Ka Keung were leaning on both sides of him. Sai Wing seemed a little far away from him. Behind and above. Under the dim light, it is unreal, as untouchable as a dream. When Shirong sang, "Jia Kui left early, he is young and never grows old, and the gray track is worn into a bloody road", I vaguely felt that the voice was hoarse, and my eyes were filled with mist.

　　During the break during the concert, the members talked about their feelings with everyone. Paul said that playing music is not to drive a sports car, buy a house, and make a lot of money. He just asked everyone to remember that there is a rock band called Beyond; Sai Wing would like to thank Ka Kui, Cynthia (passed away) His girlfriend) supports him in heaven to continue to move forward bravely for music; Ka-keung believes that the environment does not allow rock music to exist in Hong Kong, and it is difficult for the band to survive because there are so many fans who will never leave. It sounds so high-sounding that it almost sounds like a line, but it is true. It is not an exaggeration to say that Beyond's last 10 years have been like a war of resistance. Just by being sincere to music, knowing that it cannot be done, and leading this revolution, Beyond is worthy of our sweat and shouts.

　　The 120-second long thunder drum call for encore (encore) is crazy. Looking around, it seemed like everyone knew where they were coming from. Sure enough, the small stage slowly rose behind him, and the three people sitting in less than a hundred feet became the focus of the camera again. Because the stage was suspended in mid-air, only those who stood high could see it clearly. After a night of madness, we no longer had any worries. We all stood on the stools - even though those were just temporary folding stools. Music takes over the soul and controls the body. I was greedy for every note floating in the air, chewing every lyric, forgetting the distance from other audiences, filming together, and singing together - "The wind and frost can't blow out the fire, no matter how much bitterness it passes..."

　　There were no guests, no tricks, but the 3-hour continuous music was meticulous. War drums thundered when it was exciting, and rain hit the sycamore trees when it was low. Looking at it, Beyond’s music is not only for our generation who grew up with him, but also for the new generation. How can good music make people feel outdated? As long as the singer never loses his innocence. Although fans from all over the world have passed tonight and returned to unrelated worlds, they would not recognize each other when they met. Just because we spent a night together tonight when the world is in chaos and inflammation is spreading, let's encourage each other freely! 

0 notes

[rynn-1]

Denny Ja traces the footsteps of the heroes of the Pandemic era and poetry

Introduction: In difficult times such as Pandemi Covid-19, we often seek inspiration and strength from various sources. One source that can provide motivation is poetry. Denny JA, a famous writer and writer, has succeeded in tracing the traces of the Pandemic era heroes through his poems. In this article, we will explore Denny JA's works that describe heroism in the face of pandemic, as well as exploring the meaning and message contained in his poems. I. Denny JA: A poet and thinker Denny JA, who has the real name Denny Indrayana, is a famous writer in Indonesia. Born on June 2, 1952 in Yogyakarta, he has written many poetry and other literary works that greatly influence the world of Indonesian literature. Denny Ja is also known as a critical and vocal thinker in expressing his opinions about various social and political issues in Indonesia. II. Heroes of the Pandemic Era in Denny Ja's Poetry In his works, Denny Ja managed to capture the essence of heroism in the face of Pandemi Covid-19. One of the interesting poems is "Heroless Heroes". This poem describes the medical personnel who fight unconditionally to save the lives of others. Denny Ja beautifully expressed his salute and gratitude to these unsung heroes through a strong choice of words and depictions. In addition, the poem "staring at the sun" also reflects the spirit of heroism in the face of Pandemic. In this poem, Denny Ja describes how everyone must remain brave and strong even in difficult situations. Pandemic heroes are not only limited to medical personnel, but also to everyone who struggles with enthusiasm and determination to fight this plague. III. The meaning and message in Denny Ja's poems In his poems, Denny Ja not only describes heroism, but also conveys the meaning and message of deep. In the poem "Hero Without Services", he highlighted the importance of respecting and respecting the heroes who fought for us. This message teaches us not to forget their sacrifice and recognize their values and courage. The poem "staring at the sun" teaches us to remain brave and not give up in the middle of trials. Denny Ja reminds us that in every challenge, there are opportunities to grow and develop. This message is very relevant in this pandemic period, where we are faced with various obstacles and difficulties. IV. Inspiration from Denny Ja's Poetry Denny Ja's poetry works inspires many people in this Pandemic era. When we feel hopeless or tired, these poems can provide new strength and enthusiasm. They remind us that we are not alone in this struggle, and that there are heroes who continue to fight for us. In conclusions, Denny Ja's poems played an important role in tracing the heroes of the Pandemic era. Through his works, Denny Ja succeeded in describing heroism in the face of Pandemi Covid-19 and conveying in-depth messages. These poems are a source of inspiration for all of us in facing this difficult time. Let's continue to respect and respect the heroes without services, and look at the sun with enthusiasm and rigidity.

Check in full: Denny JA: Tracing the Footsteps of the Heroes of the Pandemic Era and Poetry

[betweenthetimeandsound]

WIP Tag Game (Iodine)

Thank you for tagging me @writingbyricochet! I already did this for Out There (you could find it here), so I'd figure I do this for Iodine!

addiction | beauty | betrayal | change vs. tradition | chaos vs. order | circle of life | coming of age | communication | convention vs. rebellion | corruption | courage | crime and law | dangers of ignorance | darkness and light | death | desire to escape | dreams | displacement | empowerment | facing darkness | facing reality | faith vs. doubt | fall from grace | fame and fortune | family | fate | fear | fear of failure | free will | friendship | fulfilment | good vs. bad | government | greed | guilt and forgiveness | hard work | heroism | hierarchy | honesty | hope | identity crisis | immortality | independence | individual vs. society | inner vs. outer strength | innocence | injustice | isolation | knowledge vs. ignorance | life | loneliness | lost love | love | man vs. nature | manipulation | materialism | motherhood | nature | nature vs. nurture | oppression | optimism | peer pressure | poverty | power | power of words | prejudice | pride | progress | quest | racism | rebirth | relationships | religion | responsibility | revenge | sacrifice | secrets | self-awareness | self-preservation | self-reliance | sexuality | social class structure | survival | technology | temptation and destruction | time | totalitarianism | weakness | vanity | war | wealth | wisdom of experience | youth

A lot of Iodine deals with family--biological vs. chosen, and in a particularly big way. Iodine goes through an identity crisis as a result (represented by how she has two names), and is forced to reckon with her real family, which I'll navigate in future books.

Of course, being a murder mystery, death is a major theme of the book. As she tries to figure out who murdered her friend, Iodine deals with a bunch of grief; her new roommate, Amy, also notices this when she enters the Bunker.

And there's the focus on politics. Seattle is part of a breakaway region of the United States, one which tries to develop a more progressive nation. However, the tolls of a civil war, along with the big earthquake put a hamper on plans. How do those influence how the vulnerable are taken care of, and solving crimes?

@forever-and-almost-always, @fragiledewdrop, @pineconeontheforestsfloor, what about you?

#wip #iodine #tag games #themes #writers on tumblr #creative writing #speculative fiction #murder mystery

[sabin-barto]

A Hero Among Us: The Remarkable Story of Sabin Barto

Introduction

In the tranquil town of Rock Springs, nestled in the heart of Naples, Florida, resides a real-life hero by the name of Sabin Barto. With his extraordinary strength, unwavering courage, and a heart filled with kindness, Barto embodies the qualities of a true hero. Having recently gained widespread recognition for his heroic actions in saving an unconscious man after a car accident, Barto's remarkable story is one that inspires and uplifts the spirit. As a retired Navy veteran and member of The Wounded Warrior Project, he has dedicated his life to serving his country and helping others. Additionally, Barto takes pride in being the proud owner and operator of Windy Ridge Gallery, a haven where art enthusiasts can connect with various forms of artistic expression.

The Heroic Act

Barto's heroism was displayed in a recent incident that unfolded before his eyes. As fate would have it, he found himself at the scene of a devastating car accident. With no hesitation, Barto sprang into action upon discovering an unconscious man trapped inside a vehicle. Drawing upon his military training and experience, he fearlessly approached the wreckage, disregarding any potential danger. In a display of immense strength and selflessness, Barto managed to extract the man from the vehicle, potentially saving his life. The news of his heroic deed quickly spread throughout the community, earning him the admiration and praise of all who heard his story.

Recognition and Award Ceremony

The extraordinary act of heroism performed by Barto did not go unnoticed. The people of Naples, Florida, along with various organizations, joined forces to acknowledge his exceptional bravery. In a grand celebration of his selflessness, Barto is set to receive a well-deserved award at a prestigious ceremony scheduled to take place this week. This ceremony not only honors Barto's individual heroism but also serves as a testament to the collective spirit that strengthens a community. It provides the people of Naples with an opportunity to express their gratitude and pay tribute to a local hero whose actions inspire hope and unity.

Commitment to Service

Barto's unwavering commitment to service is deeply rooted in his military background. Throughout his years in the Navy, he exemplified dedication and sacrifice, earning the respect and admiration of his comrades. Even after retiring from active duty, Barto remained steadfast in his mission to make a positive impact on the lives of others. As a member of The Wounded Warrior Project, an organization dedicated to supporting wounded veterans, he continues to extend his helping hand to those in need. Barto's involvement in philanthropic endeavors showcases his selflessness and reflects his belief in the importance of giving back to society.

The Artistic Journey

In addition to his noble military service and philanthropic contributions, Barto is also the proud owner and operator of Windy Ridge Gallery. This artistic endeavor allows him to create a space where individuals can appreciate and connect with various forms of art. Through his gallery, Barto shares his passion for artistic expression and seeks to inspire and uplift others. His dedication to the arts mirrors his unwavering commitment to making a difference in the world, as he believes that art has the power to transcend boundaries and touch the hearts and souls of individuals.

Conclusion

Sabin Barto, a retired Navy veteran, member of The Wounded Warrior Project, and the owner and operator of Windy Ridge Gallery, exemplifies the true essence of heroism. His remarkable strength, unwavering courage, and kind-hearted nature make him a hero in the eyes of those who have had the privilege of knowing him. Barto's recent heroic act has rightfully earned him recognition and a well-deserved award, highlighting his selflessness and unwavering commitment to making a difference in the world.

#sabin barto