#it's not realistic but in the end the aesthetic won
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✦ 3 PM ✦
#own art#own characters#CanisAlbus#art#artists on tumblr#Vasco#Machete#anthro#sighthound#dogs#canine#animals#modern au#sort of#mostly just wanted to do some hands holding cups#I don't think I've ever had many opportunities to practice them#also debated whether I should leave the steam out because it's not like you drink your hot drinks boiling hot#it's not realistic but in the end the aesthetic won
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WARNING: This one may be an uncomfortable read for some...
...They... They did something to her... To the fetus...
I... I don't know what, exactly... Some kind of gene manipulation, like with the Original Mewtwo...
It was about a month into the pregnancy... They brushed it off as tests... I didn't want to believe they'd do something like that to her... I chose not to believe it...
After... After they... A-altered the baby, it... It needed more energy to grow... More than Akoya's body could supply...
As time went on, she... She got weaker...
There came a point where she couldn't use telepathy anymore.
I... I was...
I was close to asking for the baby to be removed... However possible, whatever might... h-happen to it... I just wanted Akoya to be saved.
But then, she went into labor... It was too early...
...despite that, the baby was much larger than it should've been.
Between the energy imbalance and the strenuous birth... Akoya went into a coma.
I... I consider it nothing short of a miracle that she pulled through at all...
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This is a watered down version of these events. But hopefully it's enough to understand what Randy and Akoya may be feeling as they prepare for her second child...
And I want to specify, the only reason Randy is referring to Lav as "it" is to differentiate between her and Akoya. It would be very confusing for them both to be her in this.
This is the biggest hurdle I wanted to jump before I can fully focus on baby stuff! :)
@kioku-blue @violetjazz25
#Kioku-blue#Violetjazz25#Ask#but unconventional#Pokemon#Linden Family#Linden Mews#Realistically she'd have IVs and stuff#but aesthetic and laziness won in the end#Realistically she'd be a L O T messier as well :V#Situations like this is where my realism skills slide...#past#expecting#art#lab
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Step by Step Episode 8 Ramblings
Episode 7 Ramblings, here
Put is not even gonna let Pat say his piece? 2 minutes in and I'm already burning mad
"I haven't taken you for granted like before"
"I know, you've been really good to me" Oh Pat, you pathalogical people pleaser
I continue being impressed by this show showcasing how adults do and should handle relationships and everything that comes with it. This must be one of the most realistic breakup scenes in BLs. And it is done without compromising the emotions of the characters. Hats off, really
Jane is wearing two layers of pink. Our resident Tumblr color demon @respectthepetty has taught us that pink = love, so good to know that his feelings has remained unchanged or even intensified from last when we saw him
My god, Khun Jeng looks so fineeeeeeeee
And he's wearing a dark blue shirt underneath his neutral brown jacket. While Pat is in a dark blue cardigan. Interesting
Ohhhhhhh wow Jane is pissed and Jaab is too. The cat fight between these two is gonna be hilarious
Put, you insufferable snake, ya dumped. Stop misrepresenting facts
Jeng, how the fuck did you know? Are you really THAT perceptive?
Oh man, that is the worst takeaway you can ever have from a failed relationship
*jaw dropped* Oh Jeng is going for the jugular. Oh he's done playing games, he wants to fight
Oooooooooof. Put, you manipulative bastard
Oh it's still not over. Oh they're still going, holy shit, this is intense
Is that a threat, about coming out? Seriously, what the fuck
I CAN'T WAIT to read all the body language analyses y'all are gonna write on that scene. Woah, that really was something
Ae and Beam are here!
Well, Ae looks like a goddess, as usual. What else is new?
I love this scene and the commentary that comes with it. Keep your noses out of pregnant people's business, for fuck's sake! How hard is it to have some basic decency?
I love that Tae is calling out how quickly Jeng's mood changes from brooding to giddy and vice versa in this conversation.
We have a new stuffie. The shark is out and the tiger is in. YES I SEE IT AND I LOVE IT
Oh I'm sooo ready for this non-date date. I want the sweet, sweet fluff to drown me. Gimme all the blushing, all the eye contact, all the accidental brushing of fingers, GIVE IT TO ME
OH MY GOD, he planned the whole thing. He had people move chairs out of the way for aesthetics. This complete bitch (affectionate)
GUYS, THE FLIRTING, I know I said I can handle it, but this is too adorable ^^
Jeng just hung up on his brother in a flash, not even waiting for him to respond? Oh that's cold
Oh shit, Pat is drunk, again, Here come the truth bombs
Damn, Man Trisanu is nailing this. He is acting his ass off to show how restless Jeng feels before every almost-confession
This slowburn is gonna kill us all, honestly
Oh we are dancing, oh it's so gloriously awkward, oh make it stop
Jaab, my beloved, I've missed your melodrama. You look like a divorced sugar baby who won half the riches in the settlement, I love it
Jeng tells Pat he can be just a safe space for him, while Pat is sobbing on his shoulder about his ex. All while Jeng has been trying the whole day to confess his own feelings for Pat. Every atom of this man is a green flag, I swear
These drunk disaster gays, I love them so much
Pat, sweetie, no. Please, you must be joking. Don't tell me you didn't know, DON'T TELL ME YOU ARE THAT OBLIVIOUS!
Okay, now Pat has to rethink each and every one of their interactions to see if he has ever misled Jeng, or if Jeng has ever crossed his boundaries. And then recalibrate his feelings with this new information. Yeah, this could take a while.
I'm leaning more and more towards the possibility of a second season, or even a special episode, after the show ends. Because there is no way they can fit all the domesticity these characters deserve within the next couple of episodes.
Ahhhh I can't believe the slowburn is still not over. I love it and I hate it and I'm pretty sure this show has turned me into a sadomasochist.
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Listen.
okay this one is going to be long. The short answer is I imagine mammotts to be a distant cousin of Bowgarts, and the four nips are evidence that they both evolved from the same dude.
The long answer starts with me explaining my silly specbio for the Monsterum Sings. The element system is mostly disregarded, being only an aesthetic thing that acts more as a social phenomenon, like star signs. Should it crop up in any given monster’s biology is happenstance that won’t have too much bearing.
Prompted by my seeing that certain monsters share similar attributes even without being a breeding combination. It is not a huge leap of logic to think that ‘Oh, furcorns and Shugabushes share a lot of traits, perhaps they have a common ancestor much like the modern human and apes?’
Am I making sense so far? Oh well. They’re creatures. I know ingame they’re made of dimensional slime and good vibes but here I want to be semi-realistic. Entirely for my own enjoyment.
Since I've only gotten as far as Fire isle #1 ingame, that is as far as I'll go here.
Heres the hoedown:
Mammotts, Bowgarts, Deeges, Pompoms, Hoolas and Werdos all share a common ancestor - which I'll dub the Prefeapole - a furry bipedal mammal with two primary arms, two secondary arms, the beginnings of antlers, and a thick coat of fur.
Through a convoluted series of events that likely had something to do with colossal migration, the Prefeapole population scattered around the monsterverse and evolved into the Feapole we know today. Mammotts and Deeges were developed in the colder continents, while Hoolas and Pompoms were developed in dryer continents, And Bowgarts and Werdos were developed in the Mountains.
Bowgarts specifically are the strain of feapole that best resemble the Prefeapole, still retaining the standout attributes of 'antlers' and 'four arms'.
Should these connections not seem too feasible, I encourage you to look at the Rares and Epics, who I posit aren't even Rares or Epics but rather grey matter that fills in the gaps between dominant subspecies. Inspect this handy web I created in ms paint.
Does this make any sense? Am I talking logic? Do you see my vision? Theyre all the same primate, which is why I all give them roughly the same skull shape and forehead nostril (the latter aspect not being rooted in any reference, but rather just something I thought made them visually distinct).
So Mammott having four nips is not just a funny heehoo joke, it's a biological remnant of the ancestors they evolved from. they used to have four limbs, and thus four pectoral muscles. The bones may have worn away through time, but the nipples persist. A sentence I never thought I would write, but the future is hardly calculable.
Other miscellanious notes that relate to the feapole family web:
- Deeges are the most recent mutation. The 'Speaker in forehead' gene only cropped up in the past thousand years or so; As a result, the Deege population is the smallest of all the feapoles. Some Deege have small enough speaker indents that they can be hidden by their fur, and those who do are often misunderstood to be very strange mammotts.
- Werdos are an odd bunch. Much less of a subspecies and much more 'four people who got won the genetic lottery'. They have the large size of their Prefeapolean ancestors, but thats where the similarities end. Werdo antlers are more structurally similar to horns than anything, not to mention they've got the hand poofs of a pompom... made of anything *but* fur! Don't even get me started on the magical voices that can reach human ears, they're [SWEAR WORD]ed.
- What visually sets Poms & Hoolas aside from their other feapolean cousins is their peculiar bare limbs. This attribute is a direct result of the climate they spawned in. Dry environments like plains and savannahs lend themselves great to ticks, fleas and other parasitic bugs; And the Feapole's thick fur turned out to be the perfect breeding ground. Rather than leave the area they'd grown to live in, Poms & Hoolas started scratching off the infected fur on their limbs, some going as far to pull the fur out as it grew to prevent any bites. This got to the point where the bugs that were routinely attacking them went extinct, so the violent hairdressing was no longer needed. But even to this day, the fur on their limbs grows short and ribbed, a visual reminder of what they once had to tussle with.
Also to completely disregard everything I’ve just said what if they had four nipples because that’s the size of a typical mammott litter. Like pigs, or dogs. I’m so tired - I’ve done away with the element system that means the breeding system is out too. This is calvinball except every time i let go of the ball it ricochets back into my own face and noone notices.
#msm#mammott#bowgart#speculative biology#knave art#i am so. tired.#do you understand me am I being understood am I out of my gourd with this one?#Statqueue got me high
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We're 5 months into 2022 as of May 22nd. It's time for another look at just how fucked we are by checking in on
The Timeline
Elon Musk buys Twitter to own the libs. Wait actually he changes his mind. Maybe actually yes. Wait. What about all the bots? Maybe no. Lots of people are jumping ship
Eurovision happened. Something about banana wolves and pussy salad? Idk man, but Ukraine won
Square Enix sold a bunch of IPs for... NFTs. Like Deus Ex and Tomb Raider. For. NFTs.
BTW NFTs and crypto fell hard recently
BTW BTW, one of the biggest NFT guys behind those ugly monkeys tried to make a dating site for themselves, then called it off because of too many dudes
Speaking of dating, Dead By Daylight is making a dating sim called DBD Hooked on You, made by the same people that made the KFC dating sim. Now you can date your favorite serial killers and be the "I can fix him" girl you've always wanted to be
Chip n Dale Rescue Rangers came back in the weirdest possible way. Look aesthetics aside, I mean it when I say weird. Like Ugly Sonic makes an appearance weird. Like two characters got together that had no business getting together weird. Like Chip n Dale not sounding like Chip n Dale weird.
You know that bird that was in Lion King? Zazu? Yeah his species is going extinct. I thought it was a toucan or something but nah, thats a Yellow Billed Horn Bill, and climate change is wiping them out.
MCR is back- again! This time Measles didn't come with them
Unfortunately Monkeypox did. Yeah turns out it's was around before in 2003 or so, even 2021. Do some googling but try not to panic. There are treatments from the looks of things so we're already better off than we were with Covid, but educate yourselves on the matter to be safe, and don't brush off warnings.
Fairly Odd Parents has a live action Paramount+ series where Timmy leaves very 2d Cosmo and Wanda to some very not 2d and live kids when he goes off to college or something idk. Btw, Vicky works at the school now. Btw btw, Vicky has a crush on- go ahead and guess- no seriously try it you'll never get it- it's Crocker. Twitchy ass FAIRY god PARENTS ass ear on his neck ass Crocker. Yeah she was 16 during the regular show and he was still middle aged and yes this did come out of nowhere, why do you ask?
Digimon Survive survived development hell and is actually coming out in like 2 months, and seems like it might be a VN with Tactical RPG elements and a karma system- oh and teens will probably die, most definitely
Avatar actually put out a trailer for its new movie. No no not the fun one with the bald kid or buff tomboy- the one with blue people that have sex with their hair
Warner Bros really weren't joking when they decided to make a co-op Smash clone of characters like Batman, Arya Stark, Jake the Dog, and Ultra Instinct Shaggy. It's real. I swear I saw it. I stg Batman and UI Shaggy really fought against Bugs Bunny and fucking Arya Stark. I wish I was lying.
Kingdom Hearts 4 is announced, and Sora has gone down from a size 32 clown shoe to a size 13 as he steps into the most disturbingly realistic world in the franchise yet.
Oh and this was a couple of months back, but Robert Pattison and Zoë Kravitz were interviewed by a Vtuber named LaPlus (La+?) Darkness from the Japanese side of Hololive, where she asked him how he used the bathroom in the Batman suit, and he gave a fun answer. He actually looked happy
And to end it on a somewhat bittersweet note. Scrat finally got the nut. That fucked up squirrel from Ice Age that caused several natural disasters, broke the laws of physics, broke EARTH- he finally. Finally got his nut. His struggle is over.
Until we meet again
#the timeline#twitter#kh4#kingdom hearts#elon musk#digimon#fairly odd parents#avatar 2 the way of water#hololive#laplus darknesss#robert pattison#multiverses#ultra instinct shaggy#scrat#ice age#mcr#my chemical romance#NFT#eurovision#dead by daylight#dbd hooked on you#chip n dale movie#monkeypox#added that for filters#this was just a fun recap#im not a news source nor am i anywhere near it
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Top 5 designs from your formative years that defined your tastes
Bearing in mind that my formative years include a range that spans from "the moment I was old enough to understand concepts more complex than hunger and crying" to "the moment I started writing this post" and that a lot of designs have influenced my tastes over the years, here you go:
Goku and Vegeta, Dragon Ball Z
As a Latino I am quite literally obligated by law to put Goku and Vegeta on this list, but I was also huge into Dragon Ball Z as a kid and I actually think that show is what awakened the love of martial arts within me that still persists today. Toriyama's aesthetic is incredibly distinctive and had a great deal of influence over my initial forays into art and character design when I was much younger. These guys end up at #1 because DBZ has done so, so much to build my perception of combat and fight scenes and scale and and just sort of how a series should work that, like... I can't imagine myself getting into anime at all if I hadn't watched this show. Given how much of my taste is drawn from anime (although there's quite a bit coming from western media as well), my personal preferences would've taken a much different trajectory in that scenario.
Jotaro Kujo, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure
I don't think any character has influenced my tastes in the modern era more than Jotaro, to be honest. He's one of the reasons many of my characters wear a hat/long coat combo and why the men in particular tend to be tall, buff, and stoic and have deep voices. He also influenced my appreciation of cool poses and characters that just beat the shit out of people with their mighty fists, as well as intelligent and analytical heroes at a time when I was used to seeing heroes just be stronger or grittier or more determined than their foes.
Samus Aran, Metroid/Super Smash Bros.
I'm pretty sure that Zero Suit Samus was the start of my irresistible desire for tall badass blonde ladies with big boobs. I have a type because of her. Let's just leave it at that.
Charizard, Pokemon
I think dragons are super cool and Charizard is a big part of why. Kid me loved Pokemon, a love which extended into adulthood, and Charizard was my favorite for a very long time. I'm pretty sure he's also where my fascination with fire powers came from. Also, the narratives around Ash's Charizard's fights in the anime did a lot to shape my perception of storytelling in combat.
The Good Hunter, Bloodborne
The other reason a lot of my characters have hats and long coats and are very gruff and stoic. Bloodborne is arguably my favorite game I've ever played and had a huge influence on my tastes and aesthetic. I particularly loved the Gothic Horror aspects of it (never been as big on Cosmic Horror tbh) and it really reignited my love for big brutal weapons that just fuck enemies up. It's also the reason the ocean is fucked up and awful in many of my original settings.
Honorable Mentions:
So fucking many not gonna lie but I'll just list a few. Funnily enough, a lot of my western influences actually come from books more so than TV/movies.
Jackie Chan - DBZ started my love for martial arts, but watching a bunch of Jackie Chan movies when I was younger grounded that aspect of my taste in something a bit more realistic than aliens who could fly throwing around energy blasts and leveling mountain ranges.
Godzilla - This is how I learned I love watching giant monsters fight. Monsterverse Godzilla has had a lot of influence on my tastes recently because I love the way he fights and the way the people making the Monsterverse movies drew from real fights between animals to build his fighting style.
I had a huge crush on Cynthia Pokemon as a kid but I had to pick between her and Samus and Samus won by virtue of timing.
Brutaka from Bionicle is cool as shit.
Yang Xiao Long from RWBY and Nearl from Arknights did not build my tastes so much as reinforce them. Hard.
Arknights in general has been one of the big influences on my original work not gonna lie.
MCU's Iron Man, Halo's Master Chief, and the Marines from StarCraft all helped codify my ideas of what powered armor should look like.
Esdeath from Akame ga Kill heavily reinforced my desire to be femdommed despite most of the rest of that series being steaming dogshit
King Arthur - I read so voraciously and from such an early age that my family couldn't keep age-appropriate books stocked faster than I could read them, so at some point my dad said "fuck it" and handed a collection of Arthurian Cycle stories written for adults to an eight-year-old and I have loved chivalric romance and knights in shining armor ever since.
There's so much more but I don't think I can possibly list them all
Thanks for sending me this. Everyone please ask more, I had a lot of fun answering the ones I've gotten so far
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Oh, this was an unexpectedly nostalgic - and fun - show. I did not expect to go in and get a refresher course in “Pop Buddhism for Idiots”, nor the campy and breezy story. Neither did I anticipate the hilarity of watching Won Mi Ho (aka Lee Da Hee) run around screaming as demons chased after her in all her perfectly made up and fashioned stunning self, not one hair out of place.
It was funny, “unserious” and wacky. Just the kind of show I needed after a few heartbreaking and sobering crime/law procedural dramas.
It was far from perfect and made me laugh even when not intended, but as long as it did, I could care less whether it was fully intentioned or not. Not being a major fan of CGI or long action scenes, the less said about those on my part, the better. Overall, however, I think those aspects are acceptable for a show of this caliber.
Oh, I certainly did not expect another hot priest. Though this one is a bit too young to drool over, he is nonetheless extremely good looking and cute.
Kim Nam Gil, well, what else is there to say. ❤️🔥
The world-building is a somewhat interesting mish-mash of Korean shamanism, Catholic aesthetics, and “pop Buddhism”. Relatively predictable story/plot, but still had spots of surprising twists (mostly with regards to the Baeks), and moments of poignancy which I deeply appreciated.
It has been quite a while since I watched any show with an explicit world-building based on “folk Buddhism”, and that has been one of the main nostalgic factor. As was the affecting visage of Won Mi Ho in that ethereal white dress. She truly looked like “a fairy who has descended onto earth” and reminded me a lot of Joey Wang in her heyday of the “A Chinese Ghost Story”. I did not know exactly how Van felt but I was bowled over.
I know of Lee Da Hee from “I Hear Your Voice”, and always have a soft spot for her after her memorable role in that favourite of favourites. She was extremely entertaining here, with fantastic performances in many spots. She has truly grown more luminous the last time I watched her onscreen.
I completely enjoyed Won Mi Ho as a character, and given my obsession with The Guest and Kang Gil Young, just could not help but compare the two - in terms of stylistic/aesthetics choices between the shows - but not in any negative way. As much as I have enjoyed the more realistic, raw and gritty stylistic choices in TG (for KGY), I found myself marveling over the near flawlessness of Won Mi Ho here.
It was so entertaining to gawk at her clothes, the cars, the perfectly made up face, stylised hair etc. Won Mi Ho was fabulous in her chaebol-heir glory. (And few could carry the fashion choices like Lee Da Hee did in the show. What a body and posture ⭐️😍🤩). Also amazing as the selfless Saviour! (One dressed to the nines in couture fashion and high heels, what’s not to love? ⭐️😍🤩)
And I like her character a lot too. Lovely, adorable and easy to love!
The “almost-romance” (though it was basically full-blown romance in my estimation) was also extremely nostalgic and wonderfully moving. I am a sucker for romances of the chaste and yearning type, and they delivered here. 🥹 Roughly knowing how the ending was from lurking on socmed, I was prepared for the ending and was not too disappointed. Still, my poor babies. 😭
A show not to be taken too seriously, nor to have too high expectations of, it was overall an entertaining ride, and truly, I could not ask for more. Love it!
*Recalling the scene during the final showdown between Van and Gungtan when they were having their final “talk”, of Van’s words (paraphrased), “The only way to escape the Law of Causality is to cease to exist” made me chuckle/laugh a few times after the fact. That is basically one of the major pillars of Buddhist teachings, and he announced it as if he discovered that principle. It might be weird, but I found that assertion out of Van’s mouth hilarious.
*Won Jeong’s retelling of the parable of Angulimala was a very nice touch in the show, because I have always found that story illuminating and bittersweet, and it was indeed an important story of redemption and atonement in Buddhist lore. “Good job, show/writers!”
Edited on Sept 23, 2023:
*Read a comment describing this show as a hot mess, and won’t say I disagree, but I have enjoyed the mess, so I suppose there’s that. Especially since it felt true to what is simply a ‘fun webtoon’. There is literally little emotional core or narrative gravity to this show (or much of the original webtoon, I am arrogantly assuming) except a mix-and-match of tropes/lores, which veered from attempting to be angsty/dark to the cheesy and campy. So, I can see where the mess is. That said, the narrative was consistent and coherent, and the performers made me laugh, so I will give it credit where it is due, little as it was.
#tving island#island#kdrama#lee da hee#kim nam gil#cha eunwoo#such an unserious little show#entertaining for what it is#it made me LOL 😆😂 and weep#so it is good enough in my book#all the gorgeous people#the clothes and how well she wore them 🤩😍👍🏽#very nice to have another FC saviour too#and one in heels and can throw down a man and shoot#Won Mi Ho slayed in all her clothes#and as someone with very little interest in fashion she was a marvel#Won Mi Ho fangirl#self indulgent rambling
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Kage no Jitsuryokusha Episode 14
Today is the day we watch. (spoilers below)
Last episode ended in a really badass looking eye cliffhanger, I wonder what sort of insanely cool spell that will unleash this week!
Oh... okay. That's the unsexiest neck kiss I've ever seen.
Effective, nevertheless. After all few would expect the "chest to the blade" technique.
It's called 4D chess, look it up.
You did it, Shinji!
This is the second time I've seen this sort of bullshit villain OP asspull happening. The first was in Shinchou Yuusha (Cautious Hero).
Well, in Cautious Hero it doesn't work because the hero is Cautious enough to prepare for whatever happens 9 steps in the future.
Here it doesn't work because 9 steps in the future Shadow-sama is predetermined to win. How or why doesn't matter. It's an established fact before the fight even starts.
(I don't want Tumblr to ban me so no image lol)
DO YOU THINK ANIME CAMERA ANGLES ARE WEIRD SOMETIMES????????????
Low-level small fry: what artifact is that?
High-level rounds: IS THAT SLIME??????
I like that they just throw in these extremely cliched phrases all the time and they know it's just a throwaway cliched phrase so they don't even bother spending two seconds on it just "that's not possible for any human being" and "IMPOSSIBLE! That should have killed you, how are you still alive?" and
It's plot armor's offensive alternative: the plot sword.
Oh yeah, he's gonna do it!
Venomoth?
What, it's a different spell??
No, it's the same one.
He just loves this, doesn't he.
I hate it when they do this sort of scene where a character is disappearing and starts saying something that gets quieter and quieter until only the other character can hear their whisper and the audience isn't allowed to know what they said like it ends in 私を so uh she wants he to do something to her I guess until some episode later something happens and there's a flashback to this scene and she whispers the whole sentence and reveals all the secrets and viewers like me are supposed to be like "OOooooohhhh so that's what she said!"
OH MY GOD HE DIDN'T HEAR IT EITHER!!!!
I hoard all completely useless items I come across in JRPGs and this dude just... vaporizes the key quest item like it's nothing.
Speedrunners, man...
Hahahahahehohofuuhfuhfufhhfoahfoadhfiaçfqp834rhphdfiadfçakn.,fv.xcv.xcvnv
Shall I report my taxes? No need. The gov knows everything.
Shall I confess my sins? No need. The God knows everything.
So many isekai anime about having a "cheat" skill and this is the first one that sounds realistic: moderate knowledge about scientific breakthroughs in a pre-scientific method world.
In fact Shadow doesn't just have a cheat skill, Shadow is the giver of cheat skills considering all the knowledge he "seeded" in his Shadow Garden.
This is the moment you notice Shadow is really just a foster parent for a family of orphans used as test subjects by an evil organization.
And he's the chill parent who is always like "if you want to do that, do it. That's totally fine!"
Delta looks so funny jumping away!
ドＭ = masochistic.
ケツ = ass.
ハット = hat.
The naming sense of this series is brutal.
I see, so basically because she won the sword tournament or whatever was it called she thinks she's the strongest swordwoman in the world so when she saw Alpha's sword technique, which was in another dimension, she didn't even register that as being a sword technique but an artifact because otherwise she would have to admit she's weaker and she can't have that (Shadow's atomic isn't even a sword technique, I mean come on she does a thing with a sword but that's just for the aesthetic it's pure magic but they're mage knights so technically it's part of the job but
Anyway this is setting it up for her aspirations to be shattered and her turning evil. I completely forgot about it but Shadow also murdered a girl's dad some episodes ago so I don't think all characters (who by coincidence almost all happen to be female) will end up liking him you'll also have some antagonists (who happen to be almost all female by coincidence) too.
At first I thought this was some whip sound related to masochistic asshat but thinking about it again IT'S THAT SOUND OF A TOWEL SLAPPING CID TAUGHT SHOWED HER WITH THE EXCALIBUR ISN'T IT??????
Oh no, drills is too close to becoming more powerful than a human being is allowed to be! Thus her body suddenly got infected by something probably. I wonder if that's the thing that transforms them into Mitties and Shadow is going to save her and she'll become part of the Shadow Garden.
Also who is Omega. Omega sounds really cool as a letter. Hope there's an Omega.
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Richard Day: The Art Director who Brought Reality to Classic Films
Artist and designer Richard Day won seven Academy Awards for art direction and was nominated for his work on thirteen other films. At one time Day was the highest-paid art director in Hollywood. (1) “He worked on 265 films between 1923 and 1970”(2). Day also served in both World War I for Canada and in World War II serving the United States. Yet today, Richard Day is largely forgotten.
Richard Day’s Life Prior to Hollywood
Richard Welsted Day was born on May 9, 1896 in Victoria, British Columbia to Patience Day and Robert Scott. Scott “was an architect who began his career in South Africa” (1). Due to a physical condition young Richard was tutored at home and never had a formal education. Early on he loved to read and displayed “a natural talent for drawing”(3). Day served in World War I as “a captain in the Canadian Expeditionary Force” (1). He met his wife during the war while serving in London. (1) The couple married in 1918 and would eventually have six children. (4)
Richard Day inspecting a model with young actress Ingrid Bergman (c. 1935). Photographer unknown. Image source.
Day Begins His Career in Hollywood
After the war ended Day returned to Canada to establish himself as a commercial artist. At his father’s suggestion, Day traveled to Hollywood in 1920 to find work in the film industry. (1) Thereafter a chance encounter with director Erich von Stroheim, Day was hired as art director on von Stroheim’s 1922 production of FOOLISH WIVES. “Day served as art director on all of von Stroheim's [silent] films thereafter” including THE MERRY WIDOW (1925) and von Stroheim's masterwork GREED (1925) (4). In addition to von Stroheim, Day also worked for director Tod Browning on the films THE UNKNOWN (1927), THE SHOW (1927), WEST OF ZANZIBAR (1928), and THE THIRTEENTH CHAIR (1929). Day served as art director on several notable silent films: THE STUDENT PRINCE IN HEIDELBERG (1927), LAUGH CLOWN LAUGH (1928), OUR DANCING DAUGHTERS (1928), and ROSE MARIE (1928) (4).
In 1929 Day parted with von Stroheim and MGM, the studio where the two had been working, and began working for independent producer Samuel Goldwyn. “He served as Goldwyn's principal art director throughout most of the 1930s. During that time, he won Academy Awards for his production design for THE DARK ANGEL (1935) and DODSWORTH (1936)” (1). According to legend Day’s designs for the slum in the iconic film, DEAD END (1937) were so realistic and seedy that Goldwyn was outraged that “his money couldn't have been used to build a better slum (1)”! “In 1935, Day was the highest-paid art director in Hollywood” (3).
Richard Day, Dodsworth's Office Set from DODSWORTH (1936), Director William Wyler. Image source.
Richard Day’s Attention to Detail
Throughout his career Day excelled in portraying the harsh realities of life through his gritty set designs in films such as GRAPES OF WRATH (1940), A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1951), and ON THE WATERFRONT (1954) (5). John Ford’s production of HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941) was originally slated to be shot on location in Wales, but because of World War II, the film was forced to be shot stateside. Day along with Nathan Juran “won an Academy Award for their efforts in creating a [mining] community” (5) in Wales in the hills of Malibu, California on the Fox Ranch. (5)
Richard Day, Welsh Mill Town set from HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941), Directed by John Ford. Image source.
Day’s art direction was, however, incredibly versatile; his “films were lush with details.”(4) Sets Day created for the film DODSWORTH (1936) range from the modern aesthetic of Mr. Dodsworth’s corporate office to elegant European interiors, a luxury steamship stateroom, and include “a lavish Italian Villa” (5). During the 1930s Day even found time to produce lithographs, many inspired by the landscapes of Mexico (4). In 1941 Day’s photograph “Vacation in Tombstone, Arizona” was shown in “Image of Freedom” an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, along with other artists including Charles Sheeler and André Kertész (2).
Richard Day, Capilla No. 2, Lithograph (1930). Image source.
Richard Day's Service in World War II
In 1942 the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences awarded separate awards for color and black and white productions. That year Richard Day won Academy Awards in both categories: MY GAL SAL (Cummings) in the color category and THIS ABOVE ALL (Livak) in the black and white category.
After the United States entered World War II, Day became a US citizen in order to serve in the Marines (1). During his service Day used his artistic skills Day to “ develop camouflage designs and relief mapping techniques” (1). Day did not serve as art director on any films in 1944 or 1945, (4) but he did serve as a technical advisor on the Danny Kaye comedy UP IN ARMS (1944).
After the war Day received Oscar nominations for his work on THE RAZOR’S EDGE (1946) and JOAN OF ARC (1948). Other films he served as art director on in the late 1940s include MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET (1947), MOTHER WORE TIGHTS (1947), and THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR (1947).
Richard Day, Tibetan Temple set from THE RAZOR'S EDGE (1941), Director Edmund Goulding. Image source.
Day Works with a New Crop of Directors in the 1950s
“In the 1950s the ‘new breed’ of…directors found Day's work well suited to their needs. Richard Day could capture the brutal snap and underlying sensitivity dominating the works of such directors as Elia Kazan (4)”. Day would win his final Academy Awards for art directions on Kazan’s iconic films A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1951) and ON THE WATERFRONT (1954).
Richard Day, New Orleans courtyard set for A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (1951), Director Elia Kazan. Image source.
Day did, however, continue to work with legendary directors such as King Vidor on SOLOMON AND SHEBA (1959), Otto Preminger on EXODUS (1960), John Ford on CHEYENNE AUTUMN (1964), and on George Stevens’s THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD (1965).
TORA! TORA! TORA!
Richard Day continued working until he was 74 years old with his final film the 1970 World War II blockbuster TORA! TORA! TORA! In All Movie Guide, Hal Erickson describes the film as “a painstakingly accurate restaging of the Pearl Harbor attack, for which 20th Century Fox spent more money than the Japanese had on the original attack in 1941” (6). Day’s efforts in the film earned him his final Oscar nomination.
Richard Day’s Legacy
Richard Day’s award-winning Welsh Village set for HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY which had been used for several other films survived until 1962, when “it was bulldozed along with the rest of the [Twentieth Century Fox] studio backlot” (6). Day died on May 23, 1972 in Hollywood, California over 50 years after his father suggested he go to there to try his fortune (1).
In 2005 Richard Day was among the first class of inductees into the Art Directors Guild Hall of Fame. (7) Day’s papers are housed at the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Library. In a career that spanned more than a half-century Day’s attention to detail, realistic set designs, and ability to interpret film characters through the environments they inhabit earned him numerous awards and continue to influence contemporary film production design.
References
Wikipedia, (18 July, 2022). Richard Day (art director) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Day_(art_director)
Museum of Modern Art, (n.d.). Richard Day. https://www.moma.org/artists/1418
Annex Galleries, (n.d.). Richard Day. https://www.annexgalleries.com/artists/biography/531/Day/Richard
Lee, E. C., (n.d.). Richard Day. http://www.filmreference.com/Writers-and-Production-Artists-Ch-De/Day-Richard.html#ixzz7dwqYE1B4
Whitlock, C. (2010). Designs on Film: A Century of Hollywood Art Direction. It Books.
Erickson, H. , (26 November, 2007). Richard Day, New York Times Archives. https://web.archive.org/web/20071126135712/http://movies.nytimes.com/person/86980/Richard-Day
Wikipedia (29 July, 2022). Art Directors Guild Hall of Fame. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_Directors_Guild_Hall_of_Fame
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04.05.22
Individual Group Devising w Tutors
Hungover city: What does it say?
Is it set in goat major - setting up the goat and the story, the goat starts in the pub before moving to the hangover -
Is the head too masculine - reading as toxic masculinity - scene of the goat being perky and normal? Tiny goat on the screen then comes into the pub, rule of three (tiny, bigger, hangover)
Face paint puppet - hangover goat
‘Just won rugby’ sign is too much - show don’t tell
Is Eve a person with a hangover with a cloak - or is she the hangover - character vs puppeteer
Hooves for feet?
Ashamed goat - could be funny against the perky sober goat
Making it comfortable: so it does hurt to hunch over, covering sides and front - how it folds over
Make the goat head bigger?
What shoes? One heel and one rugby boot (change physicality), bare foot for lost clothes?
Is it laying on the ground? Is it part of the trash kraken? Nightlife rubbish? Where does it come from? Do we loose something when it comes out of something - hold the silence and the space.
TV and Daffodils: TV off the table - more free - possibility of it being moved and shown to the audience - does it hide the puppeteer?
Are the daffodils spectators or players - explore both, loads of people - goat coming onto the pitch (showing context of the goat - assume people don’t know) opportunity for commentary/sound, take recordings at rugby game.
Daffodil heads are funny - Could they sing the anthem?
Rugby players being toys/found objects.
How does it interact with the object - rugby ball coming out and being thrown back in
What do we need the puppets to do?
Can they turn their heads? Watch the ball, how would it sing - static becomes boring
Do the players have more mouth movement?
Don’t want the daffodils to be humanoid, they’re reasonable realistic
How many do you need? Everyone puppeteers three or four? Or a row that slides on. Some leeks in there? Can focus on the TV in toy puppetry workshop. Lots and lots of spectators
The flatness of it is funny - lots of possibilities
Does the weatherman or an advert appear at the end? Completely cut against image, advert for somewhere else in Cardiff ?
Play with the goat major outside/sign
Develop alone man character who sits by himself
Look into the people who work behind the bar as well
World of people? Visually rich characters and reference, rather than a story, conduits for the next section or a motif/passing of time. Play with scale - is the man with a paper the same size as the paper, looming man be big.
Communication with no words?
Want to represent a range of people? Is the contemporary rugby fan a woman
Not all completely human, the ideas of human e.g is the newspaper man actually just a newspaper with a hat
Priest just lifting up a pint, pull away from the face, just a pair of glasses and a cigarette etc.
Hat and a tie etc.
What says pub? Stools and table + carpets + glasses + tv, do we need the bar? Or does it pull away. Look into singular pump with the fabric beer pull - can serve the characters
Sign + screen + beer tap + tables
What could we use for tables - keep it moveable, maybe make some lightweight round tables - maybe cardboard // mock up a cardboard table - maybe link to the language of the TV - is the pub cardboard? Needs a clear aesthetic across the whole pub, needs to read as a coherent whole place. Play with the materials and different scales
Puppets be part of the audience? Stools have a practical need, human spectators in the space with the puppets?
Umbrellas as a motif?
Overall notes:
- develop the goat, goat on the screen/pub sign/goat in the pub interacting etc : where does he come from, goat goes on a little adventure to the boats?
- Hungover: sound and scale and comfort development, what’s on the feet? Does it have hooves, is there a double for the Kraken, change around some of the materials (flags, bunting, bin liners etc.) weight of the head - how is it controlled.
- Develop spectators, get a rugby ball (tiny one on a key ring?), daffodil - heads moving following the ball, is it a whole crowd of daffodils and leeks and a lone rose? Look at some footage. Does the goat turn it on? How does it turn on - big bloke in the corner turns it on? Look into players and the anthem (look into it in toy workshop), could the commentary be in Welsh? Is it lifted from tv.
- Where is the band of musicians, come in for a pint and start playing music? Are they seated in the pub - choreographic composed piece
- Specific gestures e.g the lifting of a pint - the movement of a pub, man taking a pint, sipping, turning on the tv, having a smoke etc.
- Develop the character: potential for a lot of puppetry; don’t get overwhelmed but amount of characters
- Pub is there at the beginning, entire space becomes the pub when we are ‘in the pub’
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Alright, alright, I caved.
After a slot opened up in me to be able to take on another show emotionally, I decided to invest in OwlHouse. I thought I would probably like it, but it won me over faster than I thought it would.
I’ve already watched a few episodes, but I realized that it might be more fun to do liveblogs, so here I am - with a liveblog...
I will be doing this episode by episode, and probably releasing them every once in a while. Everything will be under a cut, however, to save you all dash space.
If you’d like to follow, please track the #chekhov watches owlhouse tag!
(I’d also like to dedicate this post to the Tumblr Staff Rob, who did his best to restore this post for me when tumblr queue ate it.)
Without further ado...
Episode 1!!
Fair warning - this is technically not a ‘live’ blog, because I have already watched some of the show before deciding to do this, but I’ll still react to them to round things out.
Immediately, this reminds me of Little Witch Academia... Anyone? No? Only me? I feel like maybe I’m getting my wires crossed, but there HAD to have been some inspiration taken from there?
“No-- my only weakness! Dying!!“
Same, big snake monster. Same.
Oh, backup snakes? This girl is READY.
Please don’t mistreat the snakes.
Spider breath... This kid is on my wavelength. That griffin seems to be waiting to be put out of its misery though, and I don’t blame it.
My child... where did you get that pigeon head though.....
Nurse mother, do you REALLY think signing up your spider-summoning daughter for summer camp will actively make her antics slow down instead of ramp up to 60?
Awww, baby makes AMVs... But also, NO ONE TOLD YOU TO THROW AWAY THE BOOK??? I know it’s symbolic, but goodness, isn’t that a bit much???
wait a sec, is that Eda????
Love the realistic bilingual kid experience of replying in English when your mom talks to you in your native language. Universal.
Love this introduction of Eda’s character. She’s got that little green scarf on and everything. Like a tiny trash grandma.
Oooh, okay, let’s extrapolate...
Lots of bones everywhere. I kinda love the aesthetic here - it’s gross and visceral, kind of like what Luz was making with her school projects. Yet in the middle of it all we have a rather clear gothic looking structure. Is this a power imbalance in the supposed kingdom?
The five circles of stained glass seem to perhaps indicate something like Hogwarts houses? Several different types of magic?
But Luz has no reason to freak out as much as she is - she LOVES weird stuff! Haha... No, I kid, I kid. I get it.
“Am I in the bad place?“
Eyyyyy, gotta love shows referencing other shows. :)
“Oh dear child... I’m not like you.”
Wow, what a DRAMATIC reveal for some pointy ears. :) I love her.
We should all aspire to have such cool and stylistically well put together wanted posters. You can tell the commissioned artist really respects her craft.
Steven Universe fans watching this:
I’m looking too.
Okay, okay, enough shenanigans, let’s have some LORE.
I love this landscape. Teeth or bones, or whatever they are, this is one of the more unique settings we’ve gotten, though maybe I’m prejudiced because I love body horror and bones. The darker orange and red themes fit really well here.
Things I’m desperate for: Giraffe Lore
Things I’m more desperate for: Eda lore. Why do her limbs fall off? Is she a zombie?
Things I’m not quite as desperate for: Hooty lore. He can keep that to himself.
well hello there mysterious chekhov’s glyph which will DEFINITELY not be relevant in the second chapter (or end of season? Maybe? Idk it just seems important).
Ah, yes. That would have been my reaction as well, to be fair. Somehow I didn’t expect to see this guy so early on. I figured he would be a low stress early villain that got assimilated into the Found Family. Kinda psyched that he’s just there from the start.
....I’m just gonna presume this is all true and accept it at face value.
Old Escape The Cops Lady and Tiny Little Demon King, I need your backstory. How did you meet.
I love looking at background details, because like... you can tell the BG artists had fun. I particularly love how the 3 eyed toad doesn’t actually have any reward attached to her. Though the Knife Baby does intrigue me!
“I write fanfics of food falling in love.”
Why am I being called out...
“Noo! My weak nerd arms!”
Finally, a realistic portrayal of a protagonist thrust into a fantasy setting!
.....................
Okay but. If only humans could pass through the barrier... wouldn’t that mean a human had to have deposited those things in there? Do they have a human on staff in this weird pseudo-prison??? Suspicious....
Confession - when I initially saw ads for this show, I expected Eda to be a villain, not a loveable middle aged witch aunt figure. I am shockingly even MORE drawn to her this way. I expected betrayal. I expected her to be a lowkey threat?? But no. She’s just wholesome in the way a solid raccoon is.
“Eda, are you okay?!”
“Yeah, this just happens when you get older...”
“........does it..?”
If I had to pinpoint the exact moment this show won me over...... it would probably be this one.
I know it’s probably the wrong thing to focus on, but what is that insignia? Wings??? Like.... the kind OWLS HAVE?????
COINCIDENCE??? I THINK NOT!!!
I’m really loving the landscape here. And those fireworks are... hmm... intricate?
Gotta love the old tried and true Witch Apprentice Actually A Live In Intern trope. :)
Hold up...
Is that
Is that Hooty? I thought he was just a door....
Eda: This is my room for human stuff. I will also put my human in there.
. . .
Overall rating: I think this is a cute overall beginning. The prison break went hard! I enjoyed the characters and it kind of surprised me in a lot of ways. It definitely does a great job setting up a world with a lot more to explore while giving us a small taste of cool magic stuff and witchy battles. :)
Now on to Episode 2!!
Read the liveblogs in order by clicking here!
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Of needles and seduction
Genre: Fluff and smut
Words: 15.2k
Prompt: Johnny tattoo shop AU featuring best friends Yangyang and Jaemin
Warnings: contains smut, Daddy-kink, size-kink, mentions of mirror-sex
A/N: This is very self-indulgent, I’m sorry.
While I do have piercings myself, I know next to nothing about tattoos, so I’m sorry if anything is inaccurate. Also I don’t advise what some characters in this are doing for yourself.
Just a quick special thanks to @burtonized who has listened to me ramble about this story and Johnny and helped me write this by giving me ideas and support. Thank you darling!
This fic is a beast, I have never written anything this long,it’s insane. If smut isn’t for you, you can stop reading after the phone call and still have a pretty decent story.
If you feel like, you’ve seen this post before, you might have. I deleted the original one because tumblr decided to delete it from the tags.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” You asked for what you felt was the tenth time in the past five minutes.
“It’s going to be fine. The shop is clean and sanitary,” your friend Yangyang groaned while running his hands through his messy, blonde hair. It was getting way too long, hanging low into his eyes.
“I’m just saying that this doesn’t seem like a safe place,” you mumbled but followed your hyper friend through a more than dubious looking side street of Itaewon.
“Jaemin got his piercings done in the same shop and those healed just fine, stop being a baby,” the blonde said while rolling his eyes. He quickly checked his phone for the address of the (probably illegal) piercing and tattoo shop and took a sharp turn into an even shadier looking street.
“I still don’t get while you need me to come with you when you want to get your nipples pierced for god knows what of a stupid reason.”
“It’s easy,” Yangyang grinned at you, “Ten said I wouldn’t dare to do it. And I’m going to prove him wrong and you’re going to document the progress.”
“Do you ever listen to yourself talk? You’re literally paying someone to stab you into your nipples to shove a piece of metal through it just to prove a point.”
“It’s just one nipple though.”
“How does that make it any better, Yangyang?” You deadpanned.
Your friend groaned again. “I knew I should have taken Guanheng with me. He would have been supportive.”
“He would also be supportive of getting ‘I love Tacos’ tattooed on your ass.”
“He would,” Yangyang agreed with an exaggerated dreamy look on his face. “What a madlad.”
You sighed but couldn’t help smiling at his antics. You had befriended the hyper exchange student when you had been assigned to be partners for a group project for your mandarin class. Yangyang had only taken the class for extra credit and easy good grades while you were struggling like crazy and had seriously questioned all your life choices that had let to you taking the class. (But mostly you regretted listening to Renjun who had convinced you it would be an easy class.)
The group project turned out to be rather easy when you had a native speaker as your partner and you had become fond of the younger student, staying in touch with him and helping him find his way around the big campus.
If you had known that he was a package deal with a bunch of other equally hyper and questionably crazy exchange students, you might have thought a little longer about keeping in touch after the project was over. But who were you kidding, the other boys and Yangyang were incredibly dear to you and if Kun had his regular morning coffee, the others weren’t even that chaotic.
“That’s it,” Yangyang suddenly exclaimed, pointing at a small beat up looking wooden door that looked like it was ready to fall out of the doorway any second. But a little green neon sign that hang next to it flashed the word “open” onto the street indicating that a shop must be hiding behind it.
Your arguably best friend quickly grabbed your hand as if he had been sensing that you were about to complain again and dragged you into the shop.
A little bell jingled quietly when Yangyang closed the door behind you two. You took a deep breath to calm your nerves (hell you weren’t even the one to get stabbed with a needle) and took a look around the small room. It was small and poorly lit and every free space on the walls was plastered with drawings and photos of both freshly done and healed tattoos. You had to admit that whoever had done those had done a good job, they looked really neat.
You guessed that at least two artists must be working in the shop. A good portion of the art were very neat black and white works (some looking freakishly realistic) while others were very vibrant and artistic.
With a confident bounce in his step, Yangyang went up to the counter to a man with wild bubblegum pink hair wearing a black tank top that showed off the ink on his arms and torso, all kept in black except for a deep red rose on the side of his neck. His eyes were lined with dark eyeliner, making them seem like dark bottomless orbs, and they were fixed to the screen of a laptop that was covered in stickers that were a wild mixture of cute characters and various rock and hip-hop bands.
“And what brings you here?” The man asked with a surprisingly deep voice, turning his head towards your friend.
“A friend of mine told me I could get pierced here,” Yangyang spoke, his hands fumbling with the loose threads of his sweater.
“And if that was the case, what would you want to get pierced?”
“My nipple.”
At that the other man raised one of his perfectly arched eyebrows. “People usually start off with getting an earring or something.”
“Go hard or go home,” Yangyang grinned, making the other man snort.
“If you have 70.000 Won in cash, I can look if one of the piercers is free.”
When your friend got out his worn wallet and put a couple of bills onto the counter, the other man smiled for the first time. It didn’t quite fit his whole dark punk aesthetic but you couldn’t deny that he was really good looking.
“Don’t run away now kiddo, I’ll see if someone is free,” he grinned, “I’m Taeyong by the way.” When he disappeared behind a curtain made out of pearls into the back, Yangyang turned towards you with the biggest smile on his face.
“I told you it was going to be fine.”
You just hummed nonchalantly, still not entirely supportive of the whole idea.
“One of the guys is ready in a bit,” Taeyong said when he came back to the main room. “Are you getting anything?” He asked, looking at you.
“Oh no, she’s a scaredy-cat, just here for moral support and to document that I actually did it,” your friend answered for you.
Your face immediately heated up under the intense gaze of the pink haired tattoo artist. “Too bad,” he just shrugged.
“So technically you need to sign stuff for legal issues and whatnot. But since this place doesn’t exactly exist on records, we’re skipping that part. You’re not on drugs or any meds, right?”
“I’m not,” Yangyang shook his head, making his hair flop back into his face.
“Any issues with fainting or other medical conditions?”
“Nope.”
“Great. Had a good meal before coming here?”
“I had breakfast,” Yangyang shrugged.
“You had a slice of cold pizza from yesterday,” you groaned.
“That I ate in the morning, therefore it’s breakfast,” he argued.
“Well in that case,” Taeyong interrupted your bickering and threw a granola bar into Yangyang’s hands, “Eat that and let your girlfriend treat you to some proper food afterwards.”
Before the blonde could deny anything, you had already opened your mouth to tell the other man that in fact you weren’t dating.
“Sure, sorry for assuming,” he shrugged and sat back behind the counter, taking out an iPad and began drawing something, probably a tattoo design.
“Nervous yet?” You asked Yangyang who was uncharacteristically quiet while munching on the granola bar.
“Shit, I’m really doing this,” he replied, exhaling shakily.
“You don’t actually have to, Yangyang,” you tried to comfort him.
“And let Ten just get away like that? No way. I am doing this. I’m not his little baby Yangyang anymore,” he said like the stubborn child he was.
You could just sigh and roll your eyes at him. “He might have just been joking, you know?”
“One does not simply challenge Liu Yangyang like that and not expect consequences.”
“Kun is going to actually flip and pop a vein,” you tried to reason with your friend for a last time.
Kun was doing a lot of coordination work for the exchange students with a Chinese background and had taken on almost a fatherly role for the younger students that hadn’t been in Korea for long. And even though Ten wasn’t even that much younger than Kun, he almost lost his otherwise calm composure when the Thai boy had announced that he successfully had pierced his ear by himself yet again after he had convinced a poor med student to smuggle some equipment for him. And from there the situation had somehow escalated into Ten daring Yangyang to get a nipple piercing.
“Well he can’t do anything about it once it’s done. We’ll just make sure he’s with someone who can call an ambulance if he ends up having an aneurism.”
“Someone still wants their nipple pierced?” A new voice interrupted your conversation and a tall man with dark inky hair came into the room, making the pearls of the curtain clink against each other. One side of his head was shaved while the longer hair on the other side framed his handsome face beautifully. He was wearing a loose black T-shirt paired with ripped jeans with almost as many holes as there was fabric that hugged his long legs perfectly, showing that he had also ink on his legs. From his lobe dangled a little silver chain and of course his arms were covered in intricate designs, one arm strictly black ink while the other sported some colorful pieces as well. In the center of his plush lower lip sat a black ring and just beneath his left eye two little silver balls were reflecting the low light.
You couldn’t deny that the man looked absolutely stunning despite his unusual appearance.
“Yes, me,” Yangyang eagerly answered the man’s question and walked towards him, tugging you with him.
“Too bad,” the piercer grinned cheekily and winked in your direction, making your heart flutter in your chest and heat rise to your face, before he extended a big hand to shake Yangyang’s much smaller one. “I’m Johnny,” he introduced himself before leading you both into a smaller room in the back with a simple black padded bench in the middle of the room and a desk tucked into a corner. The walls were plastered with art and photos like the main room, showing that Johnny apparently was able to pull off a bunch of different tattoo styles. He seemed to have a thing for florals and roses though. The only free space was taken up by a full body mirror at the opposite wall.
Johnny sat down on the little stool that was standing by the desk and motioned for Yangyang to sit on the bench while you sat down in the only other chair in the room, made of worn looking black leather.
“Let me see your chest before we start this whole thing,” Johnny spoke to your friend after he had grabbed a pair of silver framed glasses that sat low on his elegant nose and slipped on a fresh pair of black gloves.
With only slightly trembling hands, Yangyang pulled his sweater over his head, keeping his hands buried in the fabric.
“Looks good to me. Left or right one?”
“Ehrm, I haven’t really thought about it,” he confessed.
Johnny chuckled. “Spontaneous decision to get your nipple pierced?”
“He does it to prove a point to a friend,” you supplied before Yangyang had the chance to answer.
“Seems like a valid reason,” the tattoo artist grinned, “You play guitar or anything where the strap could irritate the new piercing?”
“Just the violin,” Yangyang supplied, demonstrating how he would hold his instrument.
“Then I’d suggest we go for the left one,” Johnny concluded, grabbing a bunch of stuff he needed.
“Is it going to hurt badly?”
“No idea, mine aren’t pierced.”
“The first one is fine,” another voice chimed into the conversation and a pink mess of hair appeared in the doorway. “My client is there and Jaehyun isn’t back from his break yet, have an open ear for the door.”
Johnny just hummed but it seemed enough to satisfy Taeyong who disappeared just as quickly as he had appeared.
“You ready?” Johnny asked one last time.
Yangyang took a deep but shaky breath and nodded. “You better film this so Ten knows it’s real,” he said, holding out his phone towards you.
Rolling your eyes, you got up from your actually really comfortable chair and took the phone from your best friend’s hands while Johnny disinfected Yangyang’s nipple and drew two little circles where the bar would go through it before grabbing a small mirror to show him.
“Let’s do this,” your best friend nodded and you pressed record.
“It’ll be quick,” Johnny promised, disinfecting one last time before he grabbed a pair of tongs to hold the nipple in place and freed a needle from a foil package. “I’ll count to three and then I’ll start, alright?”
“A-Alright.”
“Last time to chicken out.”
“No, I’m doing this,” Yangyang gritted out, closing his eyes.
After that everything happened really fast: Johnny counted to three and steadily pushed the needle through Yangyang’s nipple, who bit his lip hard. He then let the needle dangle from the nipple while freeing a little barbell from another foil package to insert it through the canal he just had made.
“And that’s it,” he announced when he secured the little balls on either side of the barbell.
You ended the recording when Yangyang left out the breath he had been holding in.
“Now no sports, especially no swimming or sexual activities for a while. Clean it well and don’t worry if it gets sore, that’s normal. It can take a while to heal, so be patient and don’t let it get infected. You can get a smaller barbell or a ring once it’s healed. Just come back to get it changed to be safe.”
“Fuck I really did that,” Yangyang cursed and looked down to his chest, “I think I need a minute before I can get up.”
“Take your time, I don’t have any clients for another half an hour,” Johnny reassured him, putting the used materials into the trash. “Just please don’t vomit all over the floor or hit your head while fainting.”
“That has happened before?” You asked, eyes wide.
“Not on me but it’s not unheard of. You sure you don’t want anything?” he asked, turning towards you. His silver framed glasses had slid down his nose a little and you couldn’t deny that the man looked really hot, looking at you from beneath his lashes.
“She’s too scared,” Yangyang teased. He couldn’t feel too bad if he still could do that then.
“Too bad, I think you would really suit a little conch or something,” the piercer motioned around his own ear to indicate what piercing he meant.
“A conch?” You asked, turning towards the mirror to try to imagine it.
“Wait let me show you.” Johnny quickly got up to search through the drawers of his desk before he pulled out a little box with a bunch of jewelry, grabbing a small hoop. He stood behind you in front of the mirror. “Hold still for me,” he breathed and bend down to push your hair behind your ear before he carefully put the fake piercing in place.
For a moment you could swear that time had stopped. You felt his breath fanning over your skin gently and could smell the intoxicating smell of his cologne. You were so close to each other, you were sure that if you turned your head, your noses would brush against each other.
But before you could do anything stupid, Johnny pulled back and gently turned your head so you could see the little silver ring.
“I think I could put an even smaller one if you wanted,” he said, watching you through the mirror with an intense gaze from his dark eyes.
“I’ve never thought about getting a piercing,” you admitted shyly. While you did get your lobes pierced when you were a child, you never thought of it much.
“It looks good. Not so much like daddy’s good girl anymore,” the piercer grinned.
You almost choked on air when the words left his plush lips, feeling the heat rush to your cheeks.
“How much?”
“For you I’ll do it for free, darling,” he grinned, running a hand through his thick dark hair, making his muscles shift beneath his inked skin.
While your brain was still short-circuiting from the nickname, Yangyang seemed to be back to 100%, destroying whatever the atmosphere between you and the tattoo artist just was. “Are you really going to say no to a free piercing, dude?”
You could just groan and roll your eyes at your best friend. “Stop calling me dude, Yangyang.”
“Only if you get that piercing.”
“That’s blackmailing.”
“Just do it, it won’t even hurt right?”
“It’s just a bit of pressure,” Johnny assured you, his lips curled into a smile.
“I can always take it out if I don’t end up liking it,” you thought out aloud.
“The beauty of temporary body modifications,” Johnny sighed before he stepped in front of you to take the fake piercing off again.
With his face so close to yours again, your eyes traveled over the little silver balls beneath his left eye, over his elegant nose down to the black ring in his lower lip and you briefly wondered what it would feel like to kiss him.
“So what will it be?”
You looked over to your best friend who had put his hoodie back on and nodded his head enthusiastically, making his fluffy hair flop into his eyes. He really needed a haircut.
“Alright, let’s do this,” you decided.
“That’s what I like to hear,” Johnny grinned and moved to get his stuff ready.
“Need me to hold your hand?” Yangyang grinned when you took his place on the bench.
“I wouldn’t want to contaminate you with girl germs,” you teased, sticking your tongue out at him.
“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind some girl germs if they’re coming from such a pretty girl,” Johnny cut in when he rolled back over on his stool, his glasses pushed back up his nose again.
You couldn’t even fight the heat that crept onto your face at his words, he sure could feel it radiating off your cheeks from where his gloved hands were touching your skin.
“I’ll do it where I placed the fake one, just with a smaller ring, alright?” He spoke softly when he disinfected your ear. You could just nod, anxiety taking over, making your heart race and skin prickle.
When you heard the plastic bag that held the sterile needle rip, you pressed your eyes shut and balled your hands to fists.
“Take a deep breath for me, doll,” Johnny mumbled, gently caressing your skin where he had grabbed your face to stabilize you. “In and out.”
You shakily did as he asked you, his low voice comforting and calming your anxiety a lot.
“Now you breathe in and let me count to three, then you gently release that breath. Can you do that for me, darling?”
“Yeah,” you breathed, eyes still closed so you missed the soft smile on Johnny’s face.
“Alright, deep breath in. One, two, three,” the pain of the needle piercing through your skin made you clench your fists harder, “And breathe out.” You tried your best to release the breath evenly until the pressure of the needle was just a low thudding.
“You’re doing great, darling,” the handsome piercer reassured you, “I’ll just push the ring through and we’re all done here. Take another breath for me.”
This time the feeling wasn’t as painful, just a really uncomfortable feeling of pressure.
“All done, pretty,” Johnny concluded, clicking the ring closed. “Open your eyes.”
When you did open your eyes again, he held the little hand mirror from before in his still gloved hands so you could see the little ring that sat against your ear now. The skin was a bright red and you could feel your pulse throb around the metal but it actually fit the shape of your ear really nicely.
“Thank you,” you smiled at Johnny.
“It’s been a pleasure,” he winked before gathering the used needle and tissues to throw them away. “Take good care of it and try to not sleep on that side for a couple of nights and it will be healed in no time.”
“Let’s go home, big baby,” Yangyang chirped in, already on his feet to leave the room. “I’m starving.”
“There’s a good ramen shop a little up the street, not too expensive either,” Johnny recommended.
“Thanks for the piercings, man,” your best friend thanked the artist when he took you back to the main room.
“No big deal,” Johnny shrugged and sat down where Taeyong had sat before, putting his long legs up on the counter.
“Well, have a nice day, maybe we’ll come back for more some time,” Yangyang grinned, opening the door to leave the shop.
“Oh I’m sure you will,” the artist replied, locking eyes with you before winking. “Take good care of that piercing, doll. You know where you have to come to if you want more.”
You nodded shyly before bowing to the man. “Thank you, Johnny.”
“I’ll see you again,” it wasn’t a question.
Somehow you and him both knew that this wouldn’t be the last time you would step into the shady tattoo shop.
The next time that you found yourself in the shady streets of Itaewon came faster than you had thought.
This time you were accompanying Jaemin to his tattoo appointment after Jeno had ditched him because he had to take over a shift at the cat café he worked at. (That poor boy had to take antihistamines before every shift because of his allergies but couldn’t resist the charm of the kittens.)
“You’re a lifesaver seriously,” the hyper boy repeated while jumping up and down excitedly, “Sitting still for hours on end is really so boring if you have no one to talk to.”
“Can’t you talk to your artist?” You asked confused.
“He threatened to stab me with the tattoo gun the last time when I was trying to talk to him while he worked,” Jaemin pouted. You could only imagine how irritating Jaemin and his moods could be to someone who wasn’t used to him.
Ever since he had decided that he wanted to commit to what he had dubbed a soft punk look, he had been going to the shop somewhat regularly to start a collection of tattoos and piercings.
It had started a year ago when he first had dyed his hair to a light blue color. Shortly after that he had first gotten his ears and then his nose pierced. The two lip rings in his lower lip were his newest addition as far as piercings went. The tattoos came a little later. After much consideration he had made the decision to start a floral piece on his arm, the center would be a hummingbird, all with black ink for now.
After a little bit of Instagram stalking you had easily identified the intricate flowers that adored Jaemin’s upper arm as Johnny’s work and the thought of seeing the handsome tattoo artist again had made your heart beat faster in your chest. Not that Jaemin needed to know that you weren’t coming with him for his sake but rather because of your desire to see the dark haired flirty man again.
You had been thinking about his dark eyes behind his silver framed glasses and how he scrunched his eyebrows when he was concentrating a lot for the last weeks. (Not that you had replayed the video of him piercing Yangyang an unhealthy amount of times or anything…)
Every time you took care of your new piercing it reminded you of how his fingers felt on your skin and how his deep voice had gently guided you through everything. Not to forget how easily the pet names had rolled from his lips. And oh god his lips… His Instagram account featured a good amount of pictures of himself both casual and while working and the way his plush lips would curl into a confident smirk did things to your heart.
His latest update had been the actual death of yours though. It had shown the new tattoo he had gotten recently: It was an intricate eagle that spread over his muscled chest, the feathers of the wings blending seamlessly into the other art covering his strong shoulders and biceps. Did you already mention that he was freaking shirtless in the picture? And that he was hiding a seriously ripped body beneath the wide T-Shirt he wore the last time you were at the shop?
So to say that your thoughts had started to spiral after seeing that post was a little understated.
You still felt a little uneasy when you followed Jaemin through the backstreets of Itaewon but when the shabby door with the neon green ‘open’ sign came in sight, you felt the feeling disappear, only for it to be replaced with a mixture of excitement and anxiety.
Jaemin grinned widely when he pushed the door open and his good mood was always infectious, a smile creeping on your lips.
This time a new man sat at the counter, lazily rocking back and forth on the chair with his phone in his hand. His hair was dark and hung into his eyes and he wore a dark, long sleeved hoodie, so you couldn’t see if he had as many tattoos as his colleagues but if the tattoos on his hands and neck were any indication, he must be pretty covered as well. You recognized the rose on the back of his hand from one of Johnny’s Instagram posts. When the man looked up, you saw that he didn’t only have tattoos but piercings as well: In his lower lip sat two rings right next to each other, a ring dangled from his nose and two little silver balls sat in the hollows of his dimples that showed when he smiled at Jaemin.
“Back for more?” He asked with a deep, rumbling voice and got up to greet Jaemin properly, bumping their shoulders together.
“Got an appointment with Johnny for my sleeve,” the blue haired boy replied.
“I see the snake bites healed well.”
“Done by the best piercer of the shop.”
“You know it,” the man laughed, throwing an arm around Jaemin. “Brought your girlfriend?”
“I’m just a friend,” you quickly corrected the piercer. (Why couldn’t you just platonically join a friend for his tattoo session?)
“Alright, just a friend, I’m Jaehyun. Johnny should be ready by now. You know the way?”
Jaemin nodded and pulled you with him to Johnny’s room.
When Jaemin pulled the curtain to the room open, you weren’t prepared for what you were seeing: Johnny was standing in front of the full length mirror with his black button up shirt unbuttoned, applying cream to his still tender looking eagle tattoo on his chest, making his beautiful sunkissed skin glisten.
“You’re early, Jaem,” he spoke.
“Jaehyun said you were already ready,” the blue haired boy shrugged and plopped down onto the black bench.
“Oh you brought company,” Johnny turned around when he spotted you and grinned, “I knew you’d come back, doll. How’s your piercing healing?”
You had to summon all your strength to rip your eyes from Johnny’s strong and glistening chest to meet his dark eyes. “It’s fine as far as I know, doesn’t hurt anymore,” you stumbled across your words. Couldn’t he just button his shirt back up?
“Let me see.” Before you could protest he had made two big steps and was right in front of you, the intoxicating smell of his perfume filling your senses. He gently tucked your hair back to have a look at the piercing and you swore you could feel electricity buzz beneath your skin where he had touched you.
“You took great care of it, darling. Not regretting it yet?”
“No, I like it.” I like you. The words had laid on your tongue but you managed to swallow them back down.
“Stop flirting with her, I’m the one paying for your attention,” Jaemin whined from where he was sitting. You of course immediately felt all your blood rush to your head but Johnny just chuckled.
“I haven’t seen any cash yet, boy.” The tattoo artist gave you a last wink before turning towards his actual client, buttoning his shirt back up but leaving the last two buttons unbuttoned, letting the head of the eagle just barely poke out. Taking a deep breath you sat down in the worn leather chair while Jaemin handed Johnny a bunch of bills that the taller quickly counted.
“Alright, I’m all yours for the next five hours or so,” he grinned, “You saw the drafts I sent you?”
Jaemin nodded while he took off his jacket and rolled up the sleeve of his T-Shirt to expose the ink on his arm. It was already beautiful even though it wasn’t even halfway done. The hummingbird was still missing its shading and he hung in the air for now, the flowers and leaves stopping above its head.
“Yeah, I’m still not sure about the color though. Can’t we just do more flowers instead?”
“Sure but the inner arm and near the elbow is going to hurt like a bitch. So it’s either that or you let me color that hummingbird.”
Jaemin groaned dramatically, turning his arm to look into the mirror. “He does look weird just half-finished like that.”
“So color it is?” Johnny asked while rolling up the sleeves of his shirt a bit, exposing his own tattoos: A snake like dragon curled around his entire right arm, kept in all black ink.
“I really liked that green-blue watercolor thing you sent,” Jaemin supplied when he turned to lie down.
“Right, then I’ll do some flowers directly surrounding the bird and color that thing.” He snapped his black gloves on and turned to prepare his machine and the colors.
“Come closer with that stupid chair,” Jaemin whined, making grabby hands at you. After Johnny nodded, you pushed the chair closer with great effort.
“Are you going to whine for the whole time?” You groaned but smiled fondly at your friend.
“Most likely,” Johnny answered instead of Jaemin and rolled over on his little stool, his silver framed glasses back on his nose and a pen between his lips.
“I’ll freehand a bunch of flowers first to make sure they fit around that little guy nicely.”
“And I thought you liked putting others in pain,” Jaemin joked when Johnny adjusted a little lamp and began to draw flower after flower. It was really fascinating how quick his hand drew delicate petals and leaves, filling up the space around the hummingbird.
“Oh if I put others in pain, they usually like it,” he grinned, his voice dropping an octave.
You almost choked on plain air and had to try to mask it as coughing but if the way Johnny’s eyes twinkled was any indication, he had seen right through it and dared to be smug about it.
“Wow my third appointment and we’re already talking about kinks?”
“Sorry Jaem, not interested,” the artist laughed, “I’m more into cute girls.” He leaned back to examine his drawing, throwing you another quick wink. You barely held in a squeak. He really wasn’t even trying to be subtle about his flirting anymore.
“Ready for the big gun?”
“Oh dick jokes now, nice,” Jaemin chuckled while you were sure your head was about to explode from how much blood was collecting in there. You covered your hot cheeks with your hands in a hopeless attempt to cool them.
“Oh look Johnny, she’s getting shy already.”
“I haven’t even started yet, baby.”
That was it. This man was going to be the death of you. You really didn’t need to know what it sounded like when he spoke those words that were dripping with honey.
“Why did I agree to come with you?” You groaned, hiding your face in your hands.
“Because you missed me”, Johnny said at the same time as Jaemin said: “Because you’re a good friend.”
After a beat of silence in which Johnny arranged his actual tattoo gun and Jaemin stared at you while his smile grew bigger and bigger, he asked: “Now which one is it?”
“I’m not answering that,” you mumbled from beneath your fingers.
“No answer is an answer as well,” Jaemin singsang but luckily the low buzzing of the tattoo machine saved you from any further embarrassment… For now…
“Now hold still or I’ll actually stab you,” Johnny warned before he dipped the needle into black ink and began to trace the lines he had just drawn on with a fine needle.
“Yessir,” Jaemin joked, wiggling his eyebrows.
Johnny was unusually quiet while he worked, completely tuning out the chatter of you and Jaemin about shitty professors and assignments. You were absolutely fascinated by the confidence he radiated while dragging the needle over his client’s skin. He went back and forth between two different tattoo guns and rubbed Jaemin’s skin every now and then to get rid of excess ink.
Soon Jaemin’s whole upper arm was decorated with delicate flowers and leaves and Johnny leaned back to both take a deep breath while stretching his back and to look at his work.
“Let’s take a break before I do the color,” he proposed, wiping down the skin.
“It looks great,” you complimented his work, taking a picture for Jaemin so he could see it himself.
“Damn that pain really pays off,” your friend grinned, zooming in and out of the picture before posting it to his Instagram.
“Does it hurt badly?”
“You get used to it,” he shrugged, not taking his eyes from his feed, “It’s more like someone continuously scratching you.”
“I can show you if you want,” Johnny chimed in from where he was cleaning his tattoo gun from the black ink.
“I don’t think I’m spontaneous enough for a sudden tattoo.”
“Not even if I offer it for free again?” He laughed.
“I’m not mentally prepared for that,” you tried to reason.
“I can still show you how it feels though. Without ink.”
You shyly nodded and held out your arm for him that he quickly wiped down with disinfectant when he was done putting a fresh needle into the gun.
“Just don’t flinch, darling,” he softly spoke before the buzzing of his tattoo gun filled the silence.
You expected it to hurt a lot more when the needle touched your skin but it really wasn’t that bad. It was an odd kind of pain you couldn’t really describe.
“It’s not that bad,” you told him, looking into his beautiful brown eyes behind his glasses.
“It hurts more when it’s directly on the bone or at a more tender area,” Johnny explained and turned the gun off again, bending down to look at the slightly reddened skin of your arm before chucking the used needle into the nearby trashcan. “Let’s patch that up real quick, just treat it like any other scratch.”
You nodded and let the handsome man put a band-aid over it. But before you could pull your arm back again, he leaned down to press a kiss on the cloth
“For a good and quick healing,” he breathed and grinned smugly when you quickly turned your head away to hide your heated face.
“When you’re done flirting, will you finally put some color into me?” Jaemin interrupted, grinning widely.
“That’s what she said,” you mumbled under your breath, making Johnny chuckle.
“All you need to do is ask, darling.”
Before you could even wrap your mind around what the tattoo artist had just implied, he had already rolled back over to your blue haired friend to take a look at the hummingbird. “Alright let’s do this,” he grinned before wiping down the skin once more. The buzzing of a new machine filled the room and Jaemin scrunched his eyes shut when the needle dipped in turquoise ink met his skin. “This is nasty,” he complained.
“Don’t be a baby,” Johnny murmured, dragging the needle over your friend’s skin that accepted the ink quickly.
“You want to hold my hand?” You giggled. What you didn’t expect was for Jaemin to actually reach out to you with his unoccupied arm, making a grabby hand.
“Jeno always holds my hand,” he whined.
“You’re such a big baby, Nana,” you sighed but still laced your fingers together, yelping loudly when Jaemin squeezed down hard. “You said it didn’t even hurt, you big liar,” you squeezed out between gritted teeth.
“You’re not the one getting stabbed,” Jaemin argued, “That shit hurts different than the black.”
“It’s a different needle,” Johnny explained, “People usually say it hurts less than outlines though.”
“It’s not more or less, it’s just different.”
“Well it’s going to hurt more if you keep seizing up like that, relax.”
“You’re one to fucking talk,” Jaemin sounded upset.
“Don’t curse at me for giving you a pretty tattoo,” Johnny just said, dipping his needle into the little pot that held the color again. “Talk him through it,” the artist said to you, looking up from behind his glasses that had slipped down his nose again.
“Hey, remember that time when Donghyuck was so drunk he wanted to jump from the roof into the pool at that frat house?” You quickly said, the silly story coming to mind first. The memory made Jaemin giggle.
“Jeno and Mark had so much trouble holding him back once he managed to climb out of the window,” the blue haired boy chuckled.
“They were lucky they didn’t fall off.”
“That would have made for an even better story though,” Jaemin laughed.
“They could have hurt themselves,” you said, scandalized, “You’re hanging out with Renjun too much.”
Jaemin didn’t answer, instead he just hummed and wiggled his dark eyebrows.
“Did you ever go to college?” You asked Johnny out of curiosity even though Jaemin had said that the artist preferred to keep quiet and concentrate on his work.
“Do I look like I went?” He just laughed, cocking one of his stupidly perfect eyebrows at you when he looked up.
“Well, I didn’t want to assume,” you shied away under his gaze.
“I dropped out of high school to learn tattooing,” Johnny shared while painting Jaemin’s skin as blue as his hair, “I wasn’t good in school anyways. So art school or something wasn’t an option either. Not that I would have had any money for that.”
“What made you want to pick up tattooing then?” You asked curiously.
“Art usually is very temporarily and if you make a mistake, you can just erase it or paint over it with another color. Not so much with tattoos. I like that. It’s immortal as long as you don’t start shooting lasers at it.”
“I’ve never thought about it like that,” you confessed. Tattooing had never seemed like art to you but that was exactly what it was. Just not on a canvas but under your skin.
“Thinking about getting one now?” Jaemin teased, squeezing your hand that he still held.
“I haven’t even told my parents about the piercing,” you scoffed, “They would disown me.”
“Well too bad, I know a pretty good tattoo artist,” he joked and poked his tongue out.
“Do you now?” Johnny asked, a grin on his lips, wiping down Jaemin’s arm before going in with a lighter color.
“Yeah, he works in this shady ass shop in Itaewon and I am pretty sure you can buy drugs there as well.”
“Those are not for sale,” the artist chuckled when he saw your scandalized expression. “It’s just anesthetics for certain piercing procedures, calm down doll.”
“So sadly, it turns out you can’t buy drugs at their shop but it still looks shady and I’m pretty sure they’re paying part of the mafia so the police won’t come to investigate.”
“I know nothing of transactions of this sort,” Johnny commented before you could get an actual heart attack. Illegally tattooing and piercing was one thing but mingling with the mafia was a whole other thing.
“Anyways, he does pretty cool tattoos and pierces as well,” Jaemin continued, a grin on his lips, “Also talking male to male here, he’s pretty ripped.”
At that Johnny started grinning as well.
“Wanna know his name?” Jaemin asked you when Johnny turned to clean his needle and you just rolled your eyes but nodded, wondering what he was getting out of all of this.
“It’s Jaehyun.”
“Excuse me?” Johnny exclaimed with wide eyes when both you and your blue haired friend started laughed at his stupid joke. “This kid,” he mumbled and shook his head before putting the needle back to Jaemin’s skin who seemed to have forgotten to whine about the pain.
The rest of the appointment was spend with you and Jaemin chatting about this and that and a short video call from a red eyed Jeno who had finished his shift at the cat café and wanted to apologize and promised to buy you two dinner after you were done.
“I think that’s all I can do for today,” Johnny said after he had stared at the little hummingbird for a while, “Your skin took the color well but if I do any more, I’ll stress the skin too much. I can go in another time if I need to fix anything.”
Jaemin nodded, sitting up so he could inspect the colorful hummingbird in the mirror. “Wow that looks sick,” he commented, his eyes going wide, “Totally worth the pain.”
“That’s what I wanna hear,” the artist grinned, grabbing some paper towels to rub the tattoo down once more. “Let me snap a picture to post.”
After both men had taken about 20 photos each, Johnny quickly wrapped Jaemin’s arm in plastic wrap, reminding him how to take care of it.
“Text me for the next session, I think we could fit some pretty roses at the bottom. Maybe add a dash of color here and there or other animals,” the artist smiled, slipping the glasses off his nose, gently placing them on the table.
“I’ll think about it but first I gotta slave away behind the bar to make more money,” Jaemin sighed, shrugging his jacket back on.
“And you darling?” Johnny asked, putting on his confident smile again. “When will I see you again?”
You just stared at him, at a loss for an answer. Did he really want to see you again? But before you could even open your mouth, Jaemin had already pulled your phone from your grasp, unlocked it and shoved it towards Johnny. “Put your number in already,” he sighed and rolled his eyes dramatically. Laughing, Johnny did as your friend had said. “Very smooth, Jaem.”
“I- I guess I’ll text you,” you stuttered when Johnny gave your phone back, your fingers tingling where his touched yours.
“I’ll be waiting, darling,” he winked, raking a hand through his inky strands.
“Alright, time to leave, before you start drooling,” Jaemin destroyed the intense atmosphere and grabbed your arm to pull you back to the main room and out of the parlor, leaving a laughing Johnny behind in his room.
“I wasn’t even drooling, what the fuck Jaemin,” you argued when you were outside, your phone clutched to your chest.
“Stop complaining, I got you his number, you should be thankful,” he just grinned, absolutely shameless, tugging you along through the little street.
“I will not thank you for embarrassing me in front of him,” you pouted, unlocking your phone to confirm that Johnny had indeed put his number into the contacts with a little black heart behind his name.
“Is it too early to text him?” You asked when you and Jaemin sat in the subway on the way to his and Jeno’s dorm to take him up on his offer for food.
Your friend just laughed at you, making an elderly man scowl at the two of you, who shook his head in disapproval. Well, Jaemin’s visuals didn’t help him when he acted like this in public. But as long as he didn’t care, you wouldn’t care either.
“Text him after we’ve eaten,” he advised you. “Then you don’t seem as desperate as you are,” he added, which earned him a punch to his not tattooed arm.
All through dinner, Jaemin retold every embarrassing moment that happened at the tattoo parlor, making Jeno laugh so hard that he almost choked on his rice. You really needed to find new friends. These ones were just harassing you at this point. (Aside from the fact that Jaemin had indeed managed to get you Johnny’s number, you’d thank him later when he couldn’t make fun at you.)
Later that night, you laid in bed in your own dorm room, staring at the screen of your phone. Your fingers were hovering over the keyboard but you really couldn’t think of what you should text Johnny. You didn’t want to seem weird. With how confident he was, he probably did this a lot and you were too proud to make a fool of yourself.
Groaning you tossed and turned in your bed for a while, still staring at the empty chat box that by now must be mocking you for your cowardice. Sighing you typed out another short message to immediately delete it again. Should you just send him a simple ‘Hi’ or ask him if he had eaten? How the rest of his day went?
In moments like this you whished you were more confident in yourself.
The sound of an incoming message suddenly filled the room and made you jerk. When you saw Johnny’s name on the screen, your heart first stopped for a second before it started beating about three times as fast as it should. How did that happen? With shaking hands you unlocked the phone to see that you in fact didn’t delete the last message but accidentally send it. Luckily it wasn’t as embarrassing as it could have been and Johnny had just answered that he was glad that you had finally texted him. Before you could think of an answer he sent another text asking you why you were still awake this late when he expected you to be a ‘good girl’. You could practically hear his smirk and you couldn’t fight the heat that rose to your cheeks.
You replied that you were already in bed and were about to sleep if he was concerned about your sleep pattern that honestly wasn’t the greatest ever since the semester had started.
‘Oh, sexting already’ he replied, making you shriek in embarrassment. Was this what your message had looked like?
‘You alone?’ He asked and with a furiously beating heart you answered with a simple yes.
A couple of seconds went by with no answer from him which definitely didn’t lower your anxiety before the loud sound of your ringtone tore through the silence, Johnny’s name on the display. You quickly answered it to not wake up anyone on your floor, pressing it tightly to your ear. “Hello?”
“Good evening, miss,” you heard the rumble of Johnny’s voice, “Missed me already?”
“You’re the one who called,” you argued, making the man on the other end of the line giggle.
“That is true.”
“Why did you call?” You asked curiously, shifting to lie down on your back, staring at the ceiling.
“Just wanted some company. My last client just left and I’m cleaning up the shop for today, the others already left,” he explained.
“Jaehyun and Taeyong?”
“Yeah those two guys,” he sighed and you heard him rummaging in the background.
“Is it just you three at the shop?”
“Yeah, it was just me and Taeyong at first but Jaehyun is an incredibly quick learner once he had found someone who was willing to teach him a thing or two. So he quickly joined the two of us.”
You just hummed, your fingers playing with your hair, unsure of what to say. It was somehow easier to talk to him like this when you couldn’t see his eyes twinkle in mischief or his lips curling up in that confident smirk. Like this he was just a boy who wanted company and not an insanely handsome, heavily tattooed man who flirted shamelessly.
“Do you usually work this late?” You asked to fill the silence and out of curiosity as well. If the shop wasn’t legal there sure weren’t any laws regulating how long the artists were supposed to work.
“I don’t,” Johnny laughed, “But thank you for your concern. I was just tattooing a friend for free after my last paying client left because he was in the area.”
“You do that a lot? Offering up your services for free?”
“Just for friends and special people, doll,” he chuckled, “Why? Are you considering getting inked after all?”
Well were you? You didn’t even know at this point. Whenever you had thought of tattoos you had only ever thought about big bold and very black lines, of skulls, names of exes on your skin forever and warped pictures of people’s faces. But never of delicate flowers, bright colors and intricate designs. Johnny had made it obvious that it was art that he was doing and that it wasn’t just some technical procedure to get color beneath your skin.
“I- I don’t know,” you confessed, “I never thought much about tattoos until Jaemin started getting them.”
“I thought so,” the artist chuckled, “But I bet I could design a pretty piece that would compliment you nicely.”
“I don’t think I’m the type for it though,” you argued, thinking about the amount of ink on Johnny’s body and you hadn’t even seen half of it. (Not that you planned on doing so but you were curious to know if there was more hiding beneath his clothes.)
“It doesn’t have to be an obvious one. Just something only you know about.”
That really got you thinking. His tattoos were really delicate and you had seen that he could write in really pretty cursive.
“I don’t want to pressure you into anything, darling. But if you ever want one, you know who to ask.”
“Yeah, thank you Johnny,” you murmured, lost in thought about how you would look like with multiple tattoos.
“I like the way you say my name.”
“You- what?” You stuttered when he caught you off guard like that, making him laugh.
“You’re cute,” he said once he had calmed down. “Stop pouting,” he added when you weren’t answering.
“How did you know I was?”
Johnny chuckled again. “I just knew.”
“Thank you for keeping me company,” he said when you hadn’t said anything in a while.
“It’s alright. I like talking to you,” you confessed.
You could hear a door closing and his deep chuckle on the other end of the line.
“You probably hear that a lot…” you murmured, embarrassed at how the words had slipped past your lips.
“I actually don’t,” Johnny said, “I appreciate the words, darling. I’m all done cleaning up now, thank you for keeping me company.”
“It’s fine, no need to thank me.”
“You should go sleep now, it’s already late. Sweet dreams, doll. Maybe I’ll even visit you.”
“Goodnight, Johnny,” you squeaked. The last thing you heard before he ended the call was another chuckle and a hushed goodbye.
Smiling widely you turned your face into your pillow to muffle the scream you let out. How could this man make your heart beat faster like that with just a few simple words? And why did this short phone call make you so happy?
Sighing, you put your phone to your nightstand and cuddled tightly into your blanket, the thought of Johnny’s smooth voice guiding you to sleep where he indeed did visit you.
After that initial phone call, Johnny called you more and more often. Sometimes when he was on his lunch break and his colleagues were still working, sometimes later at night when your head was spinning from studying and he was cleaning up the shop. You two talked about your days, you complained about professors, deadlines and assignments and he told you about tattooing and his sometimes crazy clients. And every now and then Johnny would bring up his offer to tattoo you. Which made your thoughts spiral every single time.
In class you would scroll through Johnny’s Instagram account, imagining what some of the intricate, more feminine designs would look like on your skin. After much consideration you definitely ruled out anything big or colorful. But something small wouldn’t hurt, right? Well it would, you would be giving him permission to stab you with an automated needle a bunch of times which in itself sounded really scary. But Jaemin’s tattoo looked nice. And after his skin had peeled, the hummingbird truly looked absolutely incredible and you couldn’t wait for him to visit the shop again to keep working on the sleeve.
So in a whim of bravery and with the help of the little glass of wine you had drank you told Johnny that he should tattoo you.
“Are you for real?” He asked.
“I am,” you giggled, “I’ve thought about it a lot the past weeks.”
“I am honored, darling. What will it be?”
“Something small and no colors please,” you told him.
“That’s all you’re asking for?”
“Yeah, I… I like the simple black stuff you do,” you stuttered, suddenly really nervous and unsure if this was actually a good idea.
“I’ll design something that’ll match you perfectly,” Johnny promised, sounding very eager. You could hear some rummaging on his end of the line. “I could fit you in Friday evening after my last client. It won’t be too late and I need some time to come up with a design that’s worthy of being in your body.”
You swallowed dryly. If you said yes, you couldn’t back out anymore. You would be getting inked. Secretly. Without telling anyone. Not to mention illegally. In a reasonably shady shop that was owned by the most gorgeous man you had ever met.
Taking a deep breath, you nodded before you realized that he couldn’t see that. “I’ll be there,” you promised.
“I’m looking forward to it, doll,” Johnny said before he wished you sweet dreams just like every time when he called you late at night.
The neon light in front of the door to the shop was already shut off when you arrived the next Friday late in the evening but the door gave away when you pushed it open with trembling hands after taking a deep breath.
“I thought you weren’t going to come, darling, you left me waiting,” Johnny greeted you, jumping down from the counter he had sat on. He was wearing a simple black t-shirt with a little white rose design over his heart that fit him perfectly. His hair was elegantly swept back, exposing the freshly shaved part on the side.
“I’m sorry,” you mumbled, fumbling with the sleeves of your hoodie.
“Don’t be nervous, I’ll take good care of you,” he promised, quickly locking the front door before taking you to his room where he motioned for you to sit on the bench.
“Do you trust me?” He asked, tipping your head up so you would look into his dark eyes.
“I- I think I do,” you stuttered.
“I won’t tell you what you’re getting,” Johnny grinned and your eyes widened in shock. “You will like it and it’s not that big.”
“I’m not sure, Johnny,” you voiced your concerns but he just pressed his index finger to your lips before you could say any more. Your breath hitched and he could definitely feel your shaky exhale against his finger.
“You said you trust me, doll.”
Taking another shaky breath, you nodded and a smile spread over his plush lips.
“I need you to take off your shirt and lie down on your left side,” he spoke, his voice casual but you could feel something shift in the air between you.
At a loss for words you just nodded again and did as Johnny asked when he turned around to gather his stuff.
“Take a couple of deep breaths for me, darling,” he instructed you when he rolled over on his little stool, his glasses sitting low on his nose and his hands already gloved.
“It’s going on your ribs,” he told you so you wouldn’t flinch when he quickly dragged a razor over the area before disinfecting it.
“I’ll draw a quick sketch first. I don’t want to mess it up when it’s going on your beautiful skin.” You felt the tip of his pen meet your skin in a gentle stroke, tickling your skin so you had to giggle.
“Don’t make me mess this up, baby,” Johnny scolded, playfully slapping your back.
“It tickles,” you pouted.
“I’m trying to be gentle with you,” he said and you could hear the smile in his voice. While he was sketching, you closed your eyes, trying to figure out what he was drawing. But all you could figure out was that it was something rather small which calmed your nerves a bit.
“All done,” the tattoo artist announced after a while and quickly pulled his little side table with his tattoo gun and ink closer. When the low buzzing noise filled the air, you pressed your eyes shut even tighter, balling your hands into fists. Technically you knew it wouldn’t hurt badly, Johnny had shown you before. But you were still getting stabbed a bunch of times and fuck, you were really doing this. Letting this man put something on your body that was going to be there forever and you didn’t even know what it was going to be.
“Relax, darling. I’ll be as gentle as I can be,” he promised, running a hand up and down your back.
“It’s going to be on me forever,” you said.
“It is. Your own personal piece of art on your body. Just for you to have.”
That was a beautiful way to see it, you thought. It’s not just some pigment stabbed into your skin but art. Something unique no one else had. And Johnny would be painting it on just you for you and you alone.
“Okay, let’s do this,” you breathed.
“That’s my good girl,” Johnny praised and the words made your stomach twist with a feeling you didn’t want to further explore.
The pain was bearable. It was weird at first and the ribs sure hurt more than it had on your arm and the bones somehow seemed to amplify the buzzing, making it travel through your body. You had to grit your teeth when Johnny went over what seemed to be the middle part of the tattoo, where he grazed the skin in quick successions.
“That hurts.”
“I know, baby. But you’re almost done. You’re doing so well for me,” he soothed and gave you a small break to breathe before he went back in.
“All done, darling,” Johnny announced a little later, turning off his machine and rubbing the tattoo down with a wet paper towel.
“Can I see it now?” You asked.
“In a bit, keep your eyes closed,” he spoke softly and took your hands in his now ungloved ones to first guide you into a sitting position and then off the bench and over to what you assumed to be the mirror. He turned you so your side was facing the glass and put one of his big hands on your waist. It felt hot on your exposed skin and made goosebumps break out on your skin.
“Open your eyes, doll.”
You did and looked directly into his dark chocolate brown eyes behind his glasses. “I’m too scared to look now, is that silly?” You asked, losing yourself in his eyes and leaning towards his body that just seemed to radiate heat.
“It’s beautiful, just like you,” he assured you, squeezing your waist reassuringly.
After taking a deep breath, you tore your gaze away from him and turned to look at yourself in the mirror where a delicate, black chrysanthemum was awaiting you on the skin over your ribs. It indeed looked beautiful, absolutely stunning. It was small but looked so delicate and realistic and fit well with the curves of your body.
“It’s stunning,” you whispered.
“Thank you, Johnny.”
“No need to thank me, darling,” he chuckled and when your eyes met again, his were dark and almost hungry. “But I think I should reward you for being so good while I tattooed you.”
Before you could ask what kind of reward he was talking about, he had already connected your lips in a passionate kiss and pulled your body flush against his. You couldn’t help but sigh now that you finally knew what the metal of his lip piercing felt like against your lips.
Johnny was a good kisser and you were boneless in his strong grip not long after he had slipped his tongue past your lips after you had moaned into the kiss when he had started to push you backwards to the bench again, hoisting you back up.
“Let me make up for the pain I’ve caused you,” he breathed against your swollen lips when you broke apart to breathe.
“Just keep kissing me like that,” you demanded, burying your hands in his soft black locks to kiss him again. He chuckled and let you dominate the kiss for a while, toying with the black ring in his lip and exploring his mouth. Meanwhile Johnny’s hands started to wander from their place on your waist down to grope at your ass, pulling you forward against him, so you could feel his growing erection between your legs which made a spark of arousal shoot through you.
“Let me make you feel good, baby,” he breathed heavily while kissing down your neck, gently taking the skin between his teeth.
“Please Johnny,” you begged, feeling the arousal simmer low in your stomach.
Grinning he pulled back and raked his dark eyes over your figure before making quick work of your belt and sliding your jeans along with your panties from your legs, only shortly struggling with your shoes.
“It’s not Johnny now, baby,” he rasped when he kneeled down in front of you, pulling you towards him roughly, so your glistening core was exposed to him. “It’s Daddy,” he added before licking a broad stripe through your folds and flicking his tongue at your clit. You could just mewl and throw your head back in pleasure. You didn’t know that this would be such a turn on for you.
“Say it, baby,” Johnny demanded, lazily dragging his tongue over your sensitive bundle of nerves.
“Please Daddy,” you whimpered and you could feel his low groan vibrating against your core.
He wasted no time to attach his plush lips to your clit, gently sucking and grazing his teeth over the little nub, making you mewl and shiver in pleasure. He definitely knew what he was doing, altering between stimulating your clit to the point where it almost became too much before he focused on dragging his tongue through your folds, gently prodding against your entrance before it gave away.
When Johnny moaned you could feel it travel straight through you, making your head swim with pleasure. Looking down to the man kneeling in front of you, you were met with his dark eyes, staring straight up into yours. Moaning, you threaded your fingers into his soft hair and pressed his face closer to your core, not even taking the chance that he could move back.
“Feels so good, Daddy,” you moaned when he spread your labia with his fingers so his tongue could dive deeper into you, stimulating your velvety walls. When he hummed it send sweet vibrations through your core and you could feel your orgasm approach almost embarrassingly fast.
“Mmmh, so close Daddy.”
“You wanna cum, baby?” He rasped, his hot breath fanning over your clit that he was lazily rubbing with two fingers.
You bit your lip and met his dark eyes, nodding furiously.
“Then beg for it, doll. I could stay here for hours,” Johnny spoke before he turned his head to mouth at your thigh, gently biting and sucking at the sensitive skin until it bruised under his ministrations. “I would just keep you right on the edge for hours until you’re a shaking mess for me, begging for release.”
His lips split into a wicked grin when he saw how his dirty words affected you and he slowed his fingers on your clit until it was just enough to keep you stimulated but not enough to make the knot in your stomach snap.
“Please Daddy,” you whimpered.
“Please what baby?” He rested his head on your thigh, looking up at you from innocent eyes as if he wasn’t driving you insane with just his fingers.
“What is it beautiful?” He repeated the question, replacing his fingers with his tongue. “You wanna cum?”
“Yes please,” you whined, grinding your hips against his tongue to get more friction.
“Well if you ask so nicely…”
Johnny immediately slipped two fingers inside you with almost no resistance from how ridiculously wet you were and began pumping them in and out of your core fast, crooking them to search for your sweet spot.
“Come on baby,” he growled, locking eyes with you again when he closed his lips around your clit.
Almost screaming his name, you came hard when his fingers finally found your sweet spot, rubbing at it mercilessly to help you ride out your orgasm. Your thighs were shaking and you fell back onto the bench, the leather sticking to your back where you just laid for a while, your head spinning, breathing heavily.
“You look gorgeous like that,” Johnny complimented you, when he got back up from the floor, raking his clean hand through the mess that was his hair before he shamelessly took his fingers that were covered in your essence into his mouth, sucking them clean.
Through half lidded eyes you could see the way he was still straining against the fabric of his jeans and the sight made your mouth water.
“You’re still hard,” you said breathless.
“I am,” he said matter of factly.
You wordlessly let your thighs fall open for him, exposing your core to him.
“Oh baby,” Johnny cursed, pressing the heel of his palm against his bulge, “As much as I want to fuck you right now, you still have a fresh tattoo, doll.”
“Please, Johnny, I want it,” you begged.
“Shh, baby,” he soothed you rubbing a hand over your thigh, “Let me dress that tattoo and then I’ll take you upstairs to fuck you on an actual bed like you deserve.”
You nodded, amazed by his amount of self-control.
Johnny worked quickly and efficiently: Cleaning your tattoo one last time before putting some ointment on it to keep it moisturized. At last he gently taped down a small sheet of plastic foil to keep it safe.
“All done, beautiful,” he spoke before pecking your lips, “You still want to come upstairs with me?”
“Yes Daddy,” you answered and you swore you could see his eyes darken just from the word alone.
“Hold on tightly,” he ordered before scooping you up into his arms, holding you up by your thighs. Squealing you quickly wrapped your arms and legs around him, holding on tightly.
“I’ll get your clothes before we open up tomorrow,” he mumbled when he carried you through the back door of the shop that lead to a dusty staircase. You pressed your body closer to his, nuzzling your face into his neck where the smell of his cologne was the strongest, to have some of his warmth seep into your skin when you started to shiver from the cold air. Lazily you let your lips travel over his skin, sucking a mark next to a splash of ink.
Johnny quickly grabbed the keys to his apartment’s door from atop of the doorframe (not really safe) and unlocked his door while holding you up with just one of his arms, the display of strength making your head spin.
With quick steps he crossed the way to his bed and gently laid you down on the soft sheets, immediately crawling on top of you, crowding you against the mattress.
“I knew you would look good in my bed,” he rasped, kissing your neck while his hands made quick work of the bra that you were still wearing for some reason.
“You’re gorgeous, doll,” he breathed after he had sat up on his knees, looking down at you with dark eyes, his big hands roaming your body.
Feeling shy under all the attention and compliments he was giving you, you tried to hide your face behind your fingers but he wasn’t having any of it, quickly grabbing your wrists in one hand to pin them above your head.
“Don’t hide from me baby. Daddy wants to see how much you’re enjoying yourself.”
You could just nod, trying to force down the whimper that almost spilled past your lips, he hadn’t even done much yet and you were already feeling arousal pulse through your veins.
“I couldn’t hear your answer,” Johnny teased, gently grabbing one of your boobs to massage the soft flesh.
“Yes, Daddy.”
“That’s my good girl,” he grinned, releasing your wrists to slip his T-Shirt over his head, revealing his strong chest where the eagle majestically spread its wings and the hard lines of his abs.
“Like what you see?” He asked smugly, climbing off the bed to unbuckle his belt and slip his jeans off his narrow hips, revealing strong, muscled thighs. One of them was covered with the face of a growling panther while the other was decorated with a colorful koifish tattoo that disappeared beneath the fabric of his dark boxers that were doing very little to hide a prominent bulge.
“Let me,” you breathed and crawled over to hook your thumbs into the waistband. But before you pulled them down, you pressed a couple of kisses to the cherry blossom branch tattoo that seemed to stretch from his back over his hipbone and further down, mingling with the koi tattoo further down. With every centimeter of skin you exposed, more ink from the blossoms became visible and you kissed every single one of the delicate flowers. When his length finally sprang free, you had to swallow dryly: His cock was huge and hung heavy between his legs. Licking your lips you looked up to him, to find him grinning down at you. “Go to town, baby.”
He didn’t need to tell you twice, you were itching to feel his heavy weight on your tongue. You pressed a sweet kiss to his tip before placing a hand at the base only to find him surprisingly soft as you experimentally pumped your hand once.
“It takes a while for it to get fully hard,” he groaned when you moved your hand up and down his shaft a couple of times, feeling it pulse beneath your fingers.
Damn if he wasn’t even fully hard, how big would he be if he was? Holding him at the base, you licked a broad stripe up the whole length before you swiped your tongue around the pink head, pulling another groan from Johnny’s lips. Taking a deep breath, you finally took him in your mouth and hollowed your cheeks, tasting his skin. The weight on your tongue felt just right and you couldn’t help but moan as you slowly started to take more and more of him until you felt him hit the back of your throat. Shit, you were barely able to fit half of his length in your mouth like this.
“You’re so big,” you moaned when you pulled off of him with a wet pop, spreading your saliva down the shaft with both of your hands.
Johnny just hummed and grabbed a handful of your hair to shove your mouth back onto his dick. He cursed when the velvety heat surrounded him again and gently began to thrust in and out your mouth. “Fuck you look so good with my cock in your mouth,” he breathed heavily.
You could only moan where your lips were stretched around his length and hollow your cheeks when he pulled out, the grip he had on your hair keeping you in place while he snapped his hips.
“Shit baby,” Johnny cursed when he pulled out, panting while he rested the head of his cock on your outstretched tongue. “I could cum like this.”
You whined pathetically, looking up at him with pleading eyes.
He chuckled and gently slapped his cock against your lips, smearing them with precum. “But you don’t want that, don’t you, baby? You want my cock inside you? Stretching you out?”
“Yes Daddy, please. I need it so bad,” you blabbered, not even knowing where those words were coming from but you seemed to have said the right thing with how Johnny’s dick twitched in his hand.
“Then get on your hands and knees for me, baby. Ass up.”
It was almost comically how fast you complied, baring yourself to him.
“Such a good girl,” he praised, grabbing your asscheeks to knead and pull them apart. “Beautiful.”
“Please Daddy,” you begged him, arching your back further.
“Patience baby,” he chuckled.
A frustrated groan got stuck in your throat and turned into a drawn out whine when he pushed two of his fingers inside you, pumping them quickly and curling them to find your sweet spot again. Soon two fingers became three and he had reduced you to a moaning mess with how he abused your sweet spot once he had found it again.
“You think you’re ready for my cock, baby?”
“Yes. Oh god, yes please,” you begged while shamelessly grinding back on his fingers that he had stilled inside of you.
“Spread your cheeks for me,” he ordered while quickly grabbing a condom from his bedside table and rolling it onto his cock.
Balancing your weight on your knees and shoulders, you reached around yourself to pull your asscheeks apart so Johnny could see your core clenching around nothing.
“You’re such a good girl for me,” he rasped, running his palm along the curve of your body while lazily thrusting his cock through your folds, making it glisten with your essence.
Finally you could feel him nudging at your entrance with the thick head of his cock. “You want it, baby?”
“Yes please Daddy,” you gasped, trying hard to be good and not grind back against him.
“You’re such a good girl for me,” he chuckled, “And good girls get what they want if they ask so politely.” With that he finally sank into you in one agonizingly slow thrust until you could feel his hip bones press against your skin. You had to screw your eyes shut and bite your lip to suppress a whimper. You had never felt so full before.
“Fuck baby, you’re so tight,” Johnny groaned, grabbing you by the dip of your waist with his big hands, grinding you on his cock.
“I’m so full, Daddy,” you gasped when he slowly pulled out until only the head of his cock was inside you before he languidly thrust back in.
“Yeah? You like that? Being stuffed full of my cock?”
You could only moan and nod where your head was pressed into the sheets. His cock was so big that it seemed to press against every good spot that was inside you, setting your nerve endings on fire, the pain from being stretched like that only adding to your pleasure.
“You‘re sucking me right back in baby,” he cursed and gripped your waist harder, pulling you back on his cock as he picked up the pace, low groans falling from his lips.
Your moans got progressively louder and louder the faster Johnny snapped his hips.
“Hands behind your back, baby,” he ordered panting and immediately grabbed both your wrists in his hands to use them as leverage so he could fuck into you faster, the change of angle and pace making you moan his name. Your head was swimming with pleasure and you could only moan and mewl beneath him, imagining how he would bite his lip while watching his dick disappear inside you over and over again, stretching out the delicate skin of your sex.
“God baby, your ass looks amazing,” Johnny groaned, praise after praise falling from his lips that reduced you to a moaning mess.
With one particularly hard thrust he buried himself to the hilt inside you and draped his body over yours, his hot breath fanning over your face when he spoke, a deep rumble in his chest while grinding his dick right against your sweet spot that had you seeing colors behind your closed eyes.
“Wanna see you bounce on my dick, doll. Can you do that for me?”
Taking a deep breath, you nodded. Your ability to form coherent sentences had left you as soon as he had begun to fuck you in earnest.
“You’re such a good girl,” he purred and gently pulled out, making you whimper from the loss.
You felt the bed dip next to you and when you opened your eyes, you were met with Johnny’s pleased smirk as he leaned against the headboard of the bed, his cock resting against his hip, too heavy to properly stand up and you couldn’t stop another whimper.
“Come on baby, I know you want it,” he grinned, crooking a finger in a ‘come closer’ motion.
Dragging your limbs from beneath you with great effort, you climbed onto his lap, immediately claiming his lips in a messy kiss. You buried your hands in his stupidly perfect hair to mess it up and tug at the inky strands, causing Johnny to moan into the kiss.
“Hmm, my baby is feisty,” he chuckled when he broke the kiss, the pupils of his dark eyes blown so wide that they seemed almost black. “But you promised me to ride my dick,” he reminded you.
“And I’m gonna,” you slurred, reaching between your bodies to grab his cock, giving it a couple of strokes.
“But turn around for me baby. Wanna see how much my fat cock is going to stretch you out,” he rasped, playfully biting your lips.
“But I want to see you too,” you complained.
“Oh you can,” he grinned and pointed over your shoulder. You reluctantly turned around before you saw what he meant. Right across from the bed was a big mirror and you gasped because of how fucked out you already looked. A couple of tears had rolled down your cheeks and messed up your makeup and your lipstick was smeared around your lips.
You carefully grabbed Johnny’s cock again and held it steady so you could sink down on him, watching yourself in the mirror until you sat snug on his lap and had to close your eyes because the feeling was so overwhelming. He felt even bigger like that.
“You okay, baby?” He asked, grabbing your hips tightly to help you swivel them on his cock, making it press into your walls just how you liked it.
“How does your cock feel even bigger like this?” You gasped as you leaned forward and slowly started to ride him at first to get used to his size and figure out the best angle for you. Your legs shook with the effort to keep your rhythm but the look Johnny had on his face, his eyes glued to where you two were connected, made it worth it.
Suddenly a wicked grin spread on his lips and he snapped his hips up when you lowered yourself again, tearing loud moans from both of you.
“Fuck, do that again,” you demanded when you raised your hips again.
“What’s the magic word?” Johnny teased, holding you up so you wouldn’t drop down again.
“Please, Daddy.”
Groaning he started to snap his hips up every time you ground down on him, making your skin slap together with an obscene noise.
God you wanted to die on his dick.
“Do you now?” Johnny laughed.
Shit did you say that out loud?
“Want to feel how deep it goes inside you?” He rasped, wrapping his strong arms around your waist. You went lax in his hold and mewled helplessly. Who knew that a little display of strength and a big dick were such turn ons for you that your brain was reduced to mush. Grinning he carefully pulled you up and against his chest and draped your legs over his after he had planted his feet firmly onto the mattress. “Watch, baby,” he ordered as he lifted you off of him until only the tip was barely inside you anymore before letting you drop down again. You mewled and thrashed in his hold, the feeling just on the edge of too much. Feeling him deep inside you was one thing but actually seeing it was a whole other thing and it messed with your head.
Curiously you pressed your hand down on your lower stomach when Johnny had started to piston his hips up into you instead of dropping you down onto his cock every time and you swore you could feel him move inside you. A drawn out curse left your lips and you threw your head back onto his shoulder.
With the way he was snapping his hips up you could feel your orgasm approach at lightning speed and you were so far gone that you shamelessly reached between your legs to stimulate your clit.
“Fuck baby, you’re so hot like this,” Johnny groaned, grinding his dick inside you as you quickly rubbed your clit, toeing right on the edge.
“Please Daddy,” you cried out, not sure what you were even begging for.
“You gonna cum on my cock?” He rasped, snapping his hips harshly, “Wrapped around my big cock stretching you out like this?”
You nodded your head furiously, your eyes screwed shut. You were so close that you could already feel your toes curling.
“Show me baby. Show Daddy how good his cock makes you feel.”
That’s what pushed you over the edge, the way he was panting in your ear, his voice strained from how he was drilling into you. The coil in your stomach snapped and you almost screamed his name, your body curling inwards and thighs shivering as your orgasm washed over you, making a bunch of colors explode behind your lids.
In the back of your mind you registered Johnny’s curses and how he was grinding his cock inside you to help you ride out your orgasm.
“Such a good girl,” he praised when your body went lax on top of him, your chest heaving with heavy breaths. You briefly wondered if you had ever cum this hard and you couldn’t think of any other time.
“Thank you Daddy,” you panted, turning your face to press a messy kiss to his plush lips that were bitten raw. He chuckled lowly when you whimpered when his still hard cock shifted when you tried to turn around.
“Will you let me fuck you for a little longer, baby?” He asked, running a hand through your sweaty hair.
Instead of answering him, you lifted yourself off his dick to turn around on his lap, capturing his lips again. “Want you to ruin me,” you whispered between kisses, “Want you to ruin me for any other men. Want to only remember how you feel inside of me.”
Johnny growled deep in his chest before he pushed you down onto the bed, hungrily licking into your mouth. “You’re the one who is ruining me,” he panted, rising to his knees. He quickly grabbed your legs and threw them over his shoulders before he sank into you again with a low groan.
This time he didn’t waste any time with building up the pace and immediately snapped his hips harshly, chasing his own orgasm.
“You’re taking me so well, baby,” he panted, folding your thighs to your chest so he could push into you even deeper, making you see stars with how he was nailing your sweet spot with the new angle. And even though you had just cum, you felt another orgasm build inside your stomach. A row of curses left Johnny’s lips when he could watch his dick slide in and out of you again and he gripped your thighs so hard you were sure you’d have bruises there tomorrow. But that was something you’d worry about later, right now your world was only made up of the handsome man with his huge cock that was currently rearranging your guts with how vigorously he was snapping his hips, making your skin slap together with lewd sounds.
“I’m gonna cum baby,” Johnny grunted, his hips losing their rhythm.
“On me,” you managed to choke out, still lost in your own pleasure.
Another groan left his bitten lips before he quickly pulled out and ripped the condom off, jerking his cock with quick strokes, his eyes fixed to yours. All it took was a couple of jerks before he threw his head back and you could see his abdominal muscles contract before the first burst of white hot cum spurted from his dick and covered your chest and stomach. With parted lips he stroked himself through his orgasm, milking rope after rope from his cock until he hissed with overstimulation.
“Fuck,” he cursed before giggling when he saw the mess he had made of you, his cum dripping from your boobs and running down your stomach. He cursed again before claiming your lips. “You want to cum one last time, baby?”
“Please Daddy,” you whined, spreading your legs further for him.
“My good girl,” he sighed, sinking two fingers into your heat, quickly crooking them to stimulate your sweet spot while his thumb was putting sweet pressure on your clit, making you thrash beneath him.
“You look so good covered in my cum,” he rasped before he kissed you harshly to swallow your moans and cries of pleasure.
You desperately held on to his shoulders, breaking the kiss when your head was spinning from the lack of oxygen. While speeding up his fingers, Johnny began sucking bruises low on your neck and over the soft skin of your cleavage.
“Shit, I’m gonna-“ you didn’t get to finish your sentence because right that moment he had sucked one of your nipples into his mouth which was just enough to send you over the edge for a third time that night, your lips parted in a silent scream of his name and your thighs shaking and closing around the handsome man kneeling between them.
“That’s my good girl,” he praised breathily and gently rocked his fingers to help you ride out your orgasm before he pulled them out, instead winding his strong arms around your body, holding you to his inked chest.
For a while he just held you close, not caring that his cum was now also stuck to his chest.
“Fuck that was a lot,” you chuckled, burying your face in the crook of his neck, inhaling his calming scent.
“Not what you thought would happen when you get a free tattoo?” Johnny softly spoke, carding his hand through your messy hair.
“Not at all.” Another question was burning inside your head but you were too scared to ask it. You didn’t want to push him and ruin the mood.
“I should clean you up and see if that tattoo is still okay. Then we can cuddle, alright?” The tattoo artist said before he detangled your bodies from one another to get up from the bed. He looked around on the floor for a cloth and you could finally see where the cherry blossoms on his hip were coming from. A big samurai was stretched over half his back, surrounded by the pinkish blossoms. It seemed like it wasn’t a complete piece yet, the samurai staring at the still untouched skin of Johnny’s left shoulderblade.
“Your back tattoo is really pretty,” you mumbled to fill the silence while Johnny was wiping his chest clean before he gently did the same to you, taking extra caution when looking at your still fresh tattoo.
“Thank you,” he smiled, pressing a kiss to your forehead, the metal of his piercing feeling warm on your skin, “We should change that foil real quick.”
You just nodded and let him do his work, exhaustion settling into your bones.
“Do you do this with all your clients?”
Shit. You hadn’t meant to ask that, the question had just slipped your lips and you could feel Johnny freeze where he was dressing your tattoo again before he secured the last piece of tape.
He sighed and slipped beneath the covers, pulling you against his chest, so you could listen to his heartbeat.
“Not all of them,” he answered eventually, “I haven’t slept with a client in a while. It happens sometimes but usually I don’t think much about it.”
“And now you do?”
He just hummed nonchalantly, playing with your hair.
“They usually don’t come back after I fuck them.” He paused, holding his breath. “Will you come back?”
Your heart started to race and you could feel a bright smile spreading over your lips. “For more free tattoos and piercings?”
“Oh, yeah, I guess,” he sounded so deflated, the confident tattoo artist suddenly gone.
“You idiot,” you giggled, pillowing your head on his sternum so he could see the smile on your lips, “I like you Johnny. I’ll come back if you want me to.”
Now he was also smiling, his features softening. “Don’t make jokes like that, my heart is fragile,” he joked, wrapping you up in his strong arms.
“Which one was your first one?” You asked him when the silence between you stretched while you traced the scales of the dragon that wound around his arm.
“My first tattoo?”
Johnny shifted around for a while before he showed you his other arm that had all kinds of different designs on it, some in bright colors, some strictly black.
“That little guy over here,” he said with a smile on his lips and pointed to a little sunflower at the bend of his elbow, “To remind me to always look at the sun, at the bright side of life.”
“It’s cute,” you breathed, touching the yellow petals.
“And then it went downhill from there,” he chuckled, “It’s addicting.”
“Let’s hope I can stay abstinent.”
“What a shame, I’d love to cover you in my art,” Johnny confessed, tilting your face up so he could claim your lips in a kiss.
“Maybe one or two more,” you breathed in between kisses, making him chuckle against your lips.
#kafenetwork#johnny#seo youngho#johnny suh#nct#johnny smut#johnny fluff#nct smut#johnny imagines#johnny scenarios#nct imagines#nct scenarios#nct fic#johnny fic#johnny fanfic
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Some incorrect quotes cuz why not. Some spoilers.... okay maybe lot of spill until the latest chap.
And a few from the novel.....
Please read at your own discretion.
I mean this will be of heavy spoilers.
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Beru: Money... Is like president trading cards.
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Tusk: It's not ugly, just aesthetically challenged.
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Jin woo: Don't joke about murder. I was murdered once and it offends me.
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Jin woo: I’m sick and tired of being called 'mortal' like, you don’t know that. Neither do I. I have never died even ONCE. Nothing has been proven yet. Stop making assumptions. It’s rude.
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Jin ah: Forgive me Father, for I have sinny-sin-sinned.
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Jin woo: I keep a picture of all of us in my wallet. Whenever I face difficulties, I take it out and stare at the picture.
The Shadow army: Awwww-
Jin woo: And I tell myself "If I can deal with these idiots, then I can deal with anything."
The Shadow army: Oh.
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Iron and Beru: *making loud, shouty gorilla sounds at each other*
Hae in:
Igris, exasperatedly: We have a guest.
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Teacher: Your child was in a fight.
Hae in: Oh no, that’s terrible!
Jin woo: Did they win?
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Ashborn: Do dragons fart fire?
Antares: I don't know.
Ashborn: I thought you were the dragon monarch.
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Igris: Hopefully Beru has learned a lesson about respecting other people's feelings.
Beru: Oh, shut up and die Igris.
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Beru: A pessimist sees a dark tunnel.
Bellion: An optimist sees light at the end of the tunnel.
Igris: A realist sees a freight train.
Jinwoo: The train driver sees three idiots standing on the tracks.
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Hae in: My heart is guarded but like… very poorly. The kind of guards that would let 3 kids in a trench coat into an R rated movie.
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Igris: Why are you on fire?
Jin woo: This is just how my day is going.
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Bellion: There's nothing worse than someone using big words they don't understand.
Beru: I photosynthesize with this.
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*playing twister*
Juhee: Right hand red.
Hae in: *ends up on top of Jin woo*
Jin woo: You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?
Ju hee: I stopped spinning like 15 minutes ago. Honestly, I'm surprised you didn't notice.
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Igris, knocking on the door: Beru, open up!
Beru: kiek kieek kikiek kick kiek
Igris: That’s not what I-
Tusk: Let them finish!
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Hae in: I’ve never smoked marijuana. I ate a brownie once at a party. It was intense. It was kind of indescribable. I felt like I was floating. Turns out there was no pot in the brownie. It was just an insanely good brownie.
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Iron: *gets set on fire and screams in agony*
Iron: Nah, I’m just kidding. Fire does nothing to me.
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Beru: Can you be quiet?! I'm trying to think.
Igris: Don't worry. Doing anything for the first time is difficult.
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Hae in: I hope you have an explanation for this.
Beru: We have three actually-
Tusk: Pick your favorite.
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Beru: Iron isn't talking to me.
Igris: Enjoy it while it lasts.
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Jin woo to the monarchs: Could you maybe just like… stab me… right in the gut. Just REALLY twist it in there. ‘Cause that honestly seems less painful than this conversation.
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Jin woo: Are you a masochist or a sadist?
Ju hee, deadpan: I’m a Taurus.
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Jin woo: Hey there demons, It's me, ya boi.
Esil: Sir, NO!
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Iron, texting Jin woo: *sends a voice message*
Jin woo, texting back: I’m a little busy, is it urgent?
Iron: No, don’t worry, just listen later.
*later*
Jin woo: *presses play*
Iron's voice message: THERE’S A FIRE-
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Jin woo: What do rainbows mean to you?
Jin ah: Gay rights.
Jin hoo: There's money.
Hae in: The sign of God's promise to never destroy the whole Earth with a flood.
Ju hee: It is an optical phenomenon that separates sunlight into its continuous spectrum when the sun shines on raindrops.
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Hae in: Five little monkeys jumping on the bed. One fell off and…
Ju hee: Was diagnosed with mesothelioma.
Hae in: Mamma called the doctor and the doctor said…
Ju hee: You might be entitled to financial compensation if he or a loved one dies.
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Jin chul: Ayo, what the FUCK is this?!?
Jin woo, sitting down, surrounded by corpses: I won Mafia, that’s what.
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Igris: *slams books down in front of Jin woo*
Igris: Boil up some Mountain Dew. It’s gonna be a long night.
Jin woo: You could of said literally anything else.
Igris: Cauldron boil and cauldron bubble, Baja Blast to fuel my trouble.
Jin woo: I’m going to just stop challenging you when you say random shit. I won’t win. I realize this now.
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Jin chul: Everything will be ok. You can not stop it.
Jin chul: Everything will be fine. You have no choice.
Jin woo : What the fuck kind of pep talk is that?
Jin chul: Ominous positivity.
#solo leveling#sung jin woo#beru#tusk#iron#igris#cha hae in#Lee Ju-hee#sung jin ah#esil#jo jinho#woo jin chul#thomas andre#jinhae shipping#whats the ship name?#bellion#headcanon that juhee and hae in where in the same college#and that ju hee is hae in's doctor#bye
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The Ignition Trilogy’s Morality
(What follows is a tangent that transitions into an analysis on my main issue with the Ignition Trilogy; Specifically in that it fails to provide a proper rebuttal to the cynicism and cruelty introduced with characters like the Piraka or Order of Mata Nui, who basically exist to mock the Toa’s idealism and tell them to ‘grow up’. Which in turn, causes the story’s attempts to be more nuanced to backfire, and instead become even more edgily black-and-white, with one-dimensional villains whom we are supposed to accept as having always been pure evil, unlike our noble heroes who are good and thus could never become bad.)
Is anyone else miffed that the Piraka defeated the Toa Nuva? I think with characters like the Rahkshi or even the Bohrok-Kal, it didn’t really bother me because… Yeah, the Toa Nuva usually have their initial loss, their harsh learning curve- But the idea is that eventually, they learn to overcome this and win anyway, because that’s what heroes do, against all odds.
But they never defeat the Piraka- Instead, the Toa Nuva are helplessly shackled with no agency, and provide no bearing on the plot whatsoever, needing to be rescued by others. Sure, I can live with the idea that it was more Brutaka powered up by Makuta that defeated the Toa Nuva, but our heroes never did get their proper rematch with the Piraka.
In fact, none of our heroes did- Every time there was a full fight between the Toa and Piraka, it was always the Piraka who won, or kind of weaseled their way to victory because of dumb luck. And it really bothers me, because while I have professed to find the Piraka pretty hilarious… They’re my least favorite villains for a reason, and it’s because those obnoxious jerks never got properly put into their place by an actual team of Toa heroes.
The thing with the Piraka is that they basically kept bragging about how they were better than these goody two-shoes heroes, who were naïve to believe in heroism and whatnot. They were edgy and mean-spirited, constantly talking up how they always beat Toa, because Evil is actually smarter and better… And then the narrative doesn’t really disprove them much, because the Piraka keep winning against the Toa anyway, making our protagonists look like fools of themselves because good guys are apparently dumber, reactive, and naïve.
It felt like a mockery of our beloved tropes by twisting them around on their heads to be dark- The six-element island is evil, the ‘Toa’ are evil… And the worst part is that 2006 just generally had this vibe of ‘cynicism is more realistic’ that it never quite refuted, just sort of left behind in favor of the more tame and frankly less overbearing 2007. With 2006, there was this idea that heroes were a bunch of dumb and silly idiots, just pitiful fairytales- Our classic Toa Nuva are defeated to make way for more aesthetically-edgy heroes like the Toa Inika, because 2006 really was the angst teenage phase, hence its chain-link aesthetic and THAT rap.
All of it culminates when the Toa Inika fight the Piraka for one last time… And then the battle is anti-climatically ended because Kongu messes up, because heroes are silly idealistic, pompous, self-righteous fools who are caught up in bold maneuvers and aren’t really smart or practical. The Piraka are never shown their place by proper heroes, in the end they have to be defeated by themselves, and Vezon- Also a villain, derived from one of their number no less! And it was really dissatisfying- Because I guess I was just waiting for some proper heroes to show up and actually defeat them, once and for all.
I wanted to see heroes show the Piraka that Good and Kindness ISN’T weak, it isn’t dumb- It’s actually far stronger than any of their selfish backstabbing and cynicism. That should’ve been how 2006 ended, to balance out the darkness by reminding us that it IS worth it in the end- I mean, Axonn says as much! And while I do appreciate Axonn’s quote, the way the Piraka are just sort of forgotten and written out of the story, without a proper conclusion… Their mutation felt anticlimactic, after so much talk from Zaktan about how these Piraka were fugitives from the Dark Hunters, only for the Dark Hunters to never show up in their lives, ever again.
I honestly think the Piraka should’ve been captured by the Dark Hunters, and dragged back to Odina for some horrible, unseen punishment- Something vague yet final enough that it COULD be an ending, but if Greg wanted, he could still bring the Piraka back. I think it’d bring more closure to the constant fear Zaktan felt, the apprehension and paranoia, of their past catching up to them.
It’d show that for all of their cruelty and boasting, they really were just puny pawns, trying to play at things far bigger than them- Unlike the Toa, who they sneered and ridiculed in a manner almost jealous. And it’d just make The Shadowed One all the more terrifying and imposing as a villain… I think being dragged back to the Dark Hunters would’ve been a poetic end to the Piraka- After being thrashed by the Toa.
…Instead, we get the Piraka defeating the Toa Mahri yet again, and their defeat by Axonn is largely off-screen. The thing with delightfully nasty villains like the Piraka is that for all of their horridness, it’s supposed to make it all the more cathartic when karma DOES catch up to them… But it never really feels like it does. I mean, technically it does- But the execution leaves something to be desired, in that it’s done by more nebulous, unrelated outside agents, like the pit mutagen, or the Piraka themselves, rather than a hero showing them that for all their boasting, their evil and cynicism isn’t ‘realistic’, it’s transient and will never last in the face of good virtue. I think cheesy heroics like that at the end of 2006 would serve as a proper palate cleanser.
In the end, the Piraka are whisked off by Axonn, who… While generally heroic as I’ve mentioned earlier, is also kind of emblematic of the Order of Mata Nui- Who themselves represent a rather cynical take on heroism. I guess Greg was trying to go for something more ‘nuanced’ by having anti-heroes, but in practice, it actually felt more black and white, where it was okay for the protagonists to kill or lock up their enemies without a second thought, because their enemies were one-dimensional, evil for the sake of it, villains. Hence Dekar-Hydraxon, who is a cop who commits police brutality against Matoro no less- And it never feels like he, or the rest of the order, is properly called out for it.
Maybe the OoMN eventually would’ve been, had the serials not been cancelled- But so far, it really does feel like Greg trying to shift Bionicle away from its ‘embarrassing’ and ‘childish’ idealism, insisting the heroes and audience have to grow up and be ‘realistic’ and just kill their enemies- Hence that scene where the Visorak are completely wiped out, with the Toa Mahri duped into commiting genocide, and all Jaller can do is essentially shrug helplessly and decide “Okay I guess that’s how the world really works.” Maybe it’s just me, but I felt these darker tones were never properly countered with the necessary kindness, and the Order of Mata Nui bugged me a lot because they felt like the Matoran Universe’s CIA. There was a lot of horrible things they did that was never called out, like their murder of people who knew the location of Artakha- I’d have liked to see someone confront Tobduk over that.
And, I guess one could say that the OoMN had that similar problem that the Piraka did- As stand-ins for the author to cynically dismiss the fairy tale idealism of the heroes, who were too kind and thus weak and spineless to do the right thing and just kill their enemies; They had to toughen up and be ‘real’ heroes. And again, that ends up feeling less nuanced as a result, more black-and-white… Which, maybe was intentional since it’s canon that Botar has a black-and-white view of things.
That isn’t to say our protagonists couldn’t have benefitted from dispelling some naivete- That they didn’t need to learn that they weren’t automatically good and right. But in the end, this didn’t feel like a real and meaningful deconstruction of these Good VS Evil narratives, or else we would’ve had tropes like the Evil Race, in species like the Vortixx and Skakdi, challenged. No, it felt more like what adult TV shows mistake as ‘deconstruction’, when really it’s just making things more cynical and violent and hopeless. Mistaking darkness for maturity and cleverness.
In the end, we didn’t get our protagonists being forced to stop and question, and critically analyze their own actions- We didn’t see our heroes ask what puts them in the right, and focusing on that to do the right thing. We didn’t see our heroes realize they were acting presumptuously, and instead shift gears to be kinder and more open-minded, which would’ve been the perfect answer to cynicism. Instead, our protagonists are told that they should just kill the villains anyway, because the villains are conveniently more scummy and one-dimensional than past antagonists.
Our heroes weren’t forced to examine their enemies as more than just baddies, to critically ask why their antagonists became evil, what compelled them to do so- They didn’t deconstruct any power structures or narrative assumptions, like the Matoran are the Good and Default of the universe, and all other species are less important (How other species felt about this could’ve been explored through Ehlek’s vendetta against the Matoran). They didn’t stop to examine how every villain thinks they’re the hero too, that just thinking of yourself as a hero can be a slippery slope to extremism, because being a Hero isn’t how you label yourself- It’s what you do.
That would then justify the Toa acting more sneaky and using less heroic abilities, not acting in the open because Toa are expected to not hide themselves. It’d be a proper balance between less ‘honorable’ methods, but still with obvious well-meaning intent- And again, masks like the Tryna would be the perfect example of protagonists deconstructing what makes certain powers ‘evil’, to get to the root of what Good really is, beyond a palatable aesthetic. How ‘dark’ things can be redeemed, if they were ever really bad to begin with, that feels like real deconstruction imo.
But instead, we are introduced to the idea of immoral mask powers in the first place, without meaningfully examining why they’re immoral, and even going by arbitrary reasons- Like a Kanohi deemed evil simply because Makuta used it. And to add to what I said about questioning narratives about the enemy as just pure evil, having our own Makuta species humanized into a race of individuals, with motives behind their fall from grace.
That could’ve been a neat way of exploring how good people can turn dark, taking further what Krika provides. It could’ve been an educational moment for teens growing up and yearning to see the world in a more nuanced manner, after realizing life is so much more complex than they thought- And wanting reconciliation with stuff that seemingly disproves their assumptions of Good, hence the darkness ultimately being outdone by the persisting triumph of the heroic spirit.
It could help audiences realize that dehumanizing and reducing your enemy to just plain evil is such a horrible ideology that justifies all manner of terrible genocides, as well as imprisonment without a trial or due process. In the end, it feels like Greg wanted the conflict to feel more gray by having the heroes do darker things… But in the end, it just felt MORE black-and-white, which leads to the Order of Mata Nui’s actions not truly being critically examined, and thus having the narrative lowkey border on copaganda at times, especially with that whole mess that was the Pit and Hydraxon.
With Hydraxon especially, it feels like the story had a lot of fun with the aesthetic of a Bad Cop, without bothering to examine or analyze what a Bad Cop stands for, misunderstanding what a Bad Cop is about, and the social critique that trope started off as. Yes Hydraxon is a bit of an extremist, but only because he’s going after our heroes, who are obviously good because they’re not actual criminals… Which of course then assumes that if someone was convicted and imprisoned, then this must confirm they are of course evil and deserve it.
That just leads to questionable stuff like Nocturn, who is portrayed with far less sympathy than I think he deserved- All because he was an actual convicted prisoner, so obviously that means he’s absolutely guilty. Which, compared to the pre-Ignition year of 2004, which had our heroes fighting the evil law enforcement, being wrongly accused, branded criminals… It doesn’t sit right with me. It definitely hits even closer to home in more recent times…
And stuff like the Toa Empire, it feels more like a paltry attempt that is never applied to the main universe, and also problematic in that it reduces Toa we know and love to just faceless evil. Same with the Shadow Takanuva’s, because they’re antagonists and not OUR heroes and thus less important. It doesn’t really stop to examine how our Toa became evil, they just are now, and Tuyet as an example of extremism is never examined properly- Instead, it’s more about the subversive shock value of evil Toa.
We don’t compare the Toa becoming villains to the process that the Makuta went through- And thus we don’t humanize these villains by realizing they were just like our heroes, because according to Greg the Makuta were always arrogant and ambitious and only did good to avoid punishment. Not unlike our naturally noble heroes who never have any darkness to overcome, whose alternate actions in a timeline are never considered. Greg will sometimes hint at this type of actual deconstruction, dip his toes in briefly, but then never follow through with it with the full exploration and depth it deserves.
And this lack of self-examination is a shame, because someone like Brutaka could’ve been a compelling avenue, as a heroic scholar who critically analyzed the situation, and thus went down a dark path- A disillusioned warrior who shows our protagonists the flaws of the system, of the narrative’s assumptions of Good and Evil, and how that broke him… How the Order of Mata Nui’s zealotry broke him. How it convinced him that Good is just a sham and excuse to justify horrid atrocities, so Brutaka just gives up… But then Axonn and the Toa show that no, Good and Heroism IS real- It is meaningful. He can still be kind. Axonn doesn’t care that much about the OoMN himself, either.
The OoMN doesn’t reflect what a hero is- And Brutaka was right to think of them as wrong. This wasn’t proof that he needed to give up, but proof that he needed to keep fighting even harder for what’s right- Because it’s only the lost causes that are worth fighting for, right? Brutaka can define for himself what is Good and work with that, instead of blindly following Helryx’s black-and-white thinking; I think that would provide more grounds for a compelling redemption, and better transition Brutaka back to the side of good, while also providing more sympathetic context as to his disillusionment.
So in combination with my issues with the Pit, we could’ve had the heroes begrudgingly go along with the OoMN as necessary, to awaken Mata Nui… While also deliberately working to undermine their other actions. Critically examining the prisoners of the Pit, if they really deserve this just because they did something wrong. Realizing they’re being tasked with the genocide of the Visorak, and foiling that- And in Axonn and Brutaka’s case, willingly choosing not to kill off the Makuta species, by destroying their only means of creation.
Instead, they work with the Antidermis, and Miserix, in the belief of redemption for the Makuta- Because why wouldn’t Brutaka believe in redemption himself? Maybe the Federation of Fear is partly done because he believes, or hopes, that he can offer redemption to these other villains. In the end it doesn’t work out and they all remain evil, but Brutaka nevertheless affirms that it WAS worth a shot regardless- And it’s always worth it to try and hope anyway. So we have his renewed hope tested after it’s regained, and thus strengthened with further resolve.
And we could have a neat moment of Lariska, who does feel like an actual gray character, remarking this to Brutaka- And maybe observing how they at least gave a new chance to Miserix, who had been condemned to die. That has to mean something, and it eventually does, because a Makuta is given the chance to prove his species isn’t evil, as someone who never betrayed Mata Nui. The heroes giving Miserix this chance pays off for them and shows that kindness does help- And this outcome perhaps motivates Brutaka to spare the Antidermis instead of destroying it.
But yeah, those are my thoughts. I definitely got carried away from my intial point about wishing the Piraka got a proper defeat by the heroes- And then started talking about the Order of Mata Nui as well. And I guess the uniting thesis is that the Ignition Trilogy, for all of its strengths, often veered too much into the ‘cynicism is realism’ territory, itself a defeatist assumption that isn’t anymore mature than blind optimism. Our beloved heroes are just fools and puppets playing into the hands of our villain, who is smarter than everyone else, because Good is Dumb and Reactive, while Evil is Smart and Proactive- Because being evil and cruel is cooler, I guess.
It’s an undertone that felt sneering, and while Mata Nui does help to rectify that, especially with the Glatorian setting feeling a lot closer to that nuanced deconstruction I was talking about –how most aren’t good or bad, just trying to survive in life- it still leaves a bitter taste in my mouth… Because our idealistic heroes who are duped never get to triumph themselves, and personally prove that cynicism wrong.
Tahu and Takanuva help in the final battle, but they’re just kinda there, and we don’t have our protagonists in the Matoran Universe, the ones outmaneuvered by Makuta, showing how Good can still be just as clever, while still kind. We needed to be shown the triumph of the heroic spirit in spite of all these dark odds that insisted otherwise, through the actual characters who embodied that spirit they were mocked with.
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The Boyz college au
because i’m the worst and have spurts of radio silence when i want to be writing my aus but in my defense it is my last week of school for the semester and i’ve been working on getting my associate’s degree :))))))
but anyway uhhh yeah this isn’t ateez i know but i’m still thinking about the be your own king video the boyz released out of literal NOWHERE and i felt inspired today in the middle of doing homework and wanted to provide you with something i hope no one’s done this so i can be original but i wouldn’t hold me breath
Hyunjae
he’s on the swim team and really into animation, but his major is undeclared. he’s constantly being hounded about needing to decide on a major, but he really just doesn’t care enough. yes he cares about his education (as can be seen by his top notch grades), he just doesn’t know what he wants to do and doesn’t see a problem in that. but he’s into a lot of different clubs besides his swim team, like the art club he frequents with juyeon every week. hyunjae also played a cyborg in one of kevin’s short films, and because of that he’s known as ‘the arm guy’ to a lot of people around campus. everyone else knows him as the star swimmer who’s always at the pool
Juyeon
he’s an art major, his favorite medium being paint. he’s also really interested in modeling, so he will help out some photography and other art students if they need someone. most people go to him first though because he’s just so beautiful and fits so many different aesthetics and is overall just such a natural at this stuff like wow. he loves making messes for his art projects because it shows that messy can be good sometimes, and it shows he has fun! his social media is mostly pictures of his artwork, but the pictures of him are the most popular and always get the most comments
Q/Changmin
dance dance dance my guy, he’s a dance major on the dance team who competes in underground dance competitions. his major deals mostly with classical training like ballet and modern dance while the dance team does a lot of hiphop and theatrical dancing, and he mostly freestyles for his competitions. and in case you’re wondering, yes he always wins. honestly though he dances everywhere because it’s what he loves to do, and he loves theatrics and putting on a show. people will find him in really random places around campus practicing or recording covers or even just freestyling because he can
Haknyeon
he’s a theater major. he likes musical theater and all but his favorites are classic plays. he especially loves shakespeare and has starred in nearly every production of his that the university has put on. he’s just really good at portraying romance and tragedy and even the comedies and it shows. it’s partly because he just loves romance dude what a dweeb so he really puts his whole heart in those performances. he’s always trying to get kevin to make a short film about a reimagined shakespeare story but he has yet to listen to him
Kevin
he’s a film major with a minor in creative writing. really the guy just wants to write and direct his own movie because how much fun would that be! he stars in a lot of his student short films because a lot of his friends would rather die than do that, but it’s okay because kevin still has fun!! def the type to make iconic indie films by accident when he’s through with college. his favorite genre is fantasy because he loves being transported to far off places, and if he’s able to transport other’s to a place he created? that’s the dream
Sunwoo
majors in music despite a bunch of people telling him it’s not realistic and a bunch of “you won’t be able to get a solid job if you major in something like that” bullshit, and because of this he has to put himself through college because no one’s really helping him out. it’s hard but sunwoo works part time at a car wash place and a roller rink guess which he likes more. but he knows how to vibe and is able to make his work fun, and it’s very apparent to those around him. people are always asking for the cute one that dances while he works
Sangyeon
everyone expects him to be the most responsible with his schooling, getting a degree in something professional like business and joining a bunch of leadership and volunteer oriented clubs. while yes he’s done all of that, he’d much rather be at the arcade playing games :( in fact he’s joined a lot of gaming competitions through the arcade, and he’s won a lot of them too! as weird as it sounds, that’s his motivation - knowing that he can win these games and the glory that comes with it, though he’s not a sore loser about things because who does that help? not that he could ever let people on campus know about what he does after school, otherwise they’d just laugh at him. right?
New/Chanhee
mans is a fashion major and fucking rules at it. he was the kid in high school who was always dressed to the nines while everyone looked at him either like “bro chill out” or “lmao what are you wearing?” it was annoying sure, but he likes clothes and how they make him feel. a lot of people stereotype him because of this though and act like they know everything about him. it’s infuriating and hard to just brush off, but at the end of the day he knows he’s happy with himself and what he is doing. and he knows that’s all that matters
Younghoon
he’s a lit. major with a concentration in the classics. he and haknyeon honestly bond a lot in that aspect because they’re constantly reading and rereading classic novels and plays together. he thrives in history too, and he’s constantly seen in the library so that he can learn more things. he likes cultural programs and clubs too because it means he gets to learn more about his own and get to learn about others’ as well. his ultimate dream is to write a story that will become a classic one day, even if it takes hundreds of years for it to happen. he’s patient
Jacob
he’s another music major, but the main difference between him and sunwoo is that he’s not alone in putting himself through school. his family is supportive and helps him out with money, but they also give him a lot of freedom. he’s honestly pretty close with sunwoo despite all of this, and they’re constantly working on music together. jacob knows he can’t just rely on his family though so he works too. works part time at the local fair/amusement park which sunwoo just cannot fathom because “why would you do that to yourself? being around all those rotten kids sounds like a nightmare.” unlike sunwoo, jacob actually likes kids, and even more he likes to see people smile
Eric
he’s actually on a sports scholarship for baseball. he doesn’t technically need the money for school, but he works in a garage fixing up cars in basically all of his spare time. it’s kinda obvious that he’s on the young side because he’s very “cars are cool :)” and there’s nothing wrong with that, it just means there’s a lot of people younghoon telling him he should join more clubs and become more involved in things going on around campus. but he takes pride in his skill at baseball and in his work with cars and the fact that he just got his driver’s license! take that younghoon
#why do i do this to myself?#i already have wips AND THIS WASN'T ONE OF THEM#the boyz#the boyz imagines#the boyz au#the boyz scenarios#the boyz imagine#the boyz scenario#the boyz sangyeon#the boyz jacob#the boyz younghoon#the boyz juyeon#the boyz kevin#the boyz q#the boyz new#the boyz juhaknyeon#the boyz sunwoo#the boyz eric#i hope i tagged this correctly#i also forgot to mention sangyeon boxes
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THE PLAYLIST:
“The gist is this: Rue wants to die. Ali hopes to convince her to stay alive.
There are few dramatic premises heavier than this. And yet writer-director Levinson, aided hugely by his performers and cinematographer Marcell Rév, extracts a painfully human exchange without lapsing into melodramatics. Ali, who receives a welcome helping of character development, refuses to treat Rue with kid gloves – yet Domingo plays this role with an underpinning of warmth, ably challenging the stormy Rue. As Rue, Zendaya is essentially here to remind everyone why she won her Emmy. She expertly balances emotion and stoicism, wearing this character like a second skin.
There is minimal plot here, an almost whiplash-inducing change from the regular series, where high-stakes drama constantly crescendos. But this is a perfect departure, a welcome pause in the shimmering chaos. “Trouble Don’t Last Always” is uniquely suited to this moment, as the world finds itself at a standstill, paralytically powerless over disease and mortality. So many of us don’t know where we will spend our holidays, or who will still be here to spend them with us next year. So we sit, unbearably human. And though we may be separated from Ali and Rue by fiction and celluloid and screens, for an hour, it feels as though we are just one booth across, eavesdroppers on a conversation between two vulnerable, beautiful, sick people.”
THE INDEPENDENT:
“Domingo gives an all-star performance as a tough-love sponsor, but it is Zendaya who remains the show’s linchpin. She appears as she does in series one: a cynical waif with legs scrunched up, knees under her chin, and a hoodie pulled over her head. The 24-year-old gives a magnetic performance; she makes even the most cliched lines, such as “I just don’t plan on being here that long”, somehow stick. When Ali asks Rue how she wants to be remembered by her mum and sister, the next minute of acting is a reminder of why this year Zendaya became the youngest person to win an Emmy for best lead in a drama series. The episode closes on an extended shot of Ali and Rue driving; Bocelli’s “Ave Maria” thunders in the background. It is undoubtedly a diversion from the usual relentless sex and drugs of Euphoria, but this episode hints at a more thoughtful second series to come.”
INDIEWIRE:
“Rue and Ali wade through self-pity, self-blame, self-hatred, and plenty more difficult topics, and it’s a credit to writer-director Sam Levinson that the conversation progresses with substance .But Zendaya and Domingo get all the credit for making it watchable. From Domingo’s voice built on crackling embers to Zendaya’s elastic jawline, the two thespians give and take with a natural grace. Without going too big or dialing it down too far, the duo entrenches themselves in the reality of the moment in a way that “Euphoria” rarely did so sparsely until now. Clearly, shooting under pandemic guidelines resulted in some creative changes, but the episode still feels like a sturdy bridge spanning a wild first season and the studied sophomore effort coming next. Its calmness and maturity is welcome, after so many episodes that built up to a big, shocking reveal.”
ROLLINGSTONE:
“Verbally, the whole thing is much more a showcase for Domingo than Zendaya, as Rue mostly just listens to her sponsor’s lectures and deflects his questions. But then, her line readings throughout Season One — particularly for the show’s usual narration (another stylistic flourish that’s absent here) — were often underplayed and lacking affect, the better to contrast with the high drama all around Rue, and to illustrate how numb she has become to the horrors of this life. Her face almost always says more than her voice, and that’s true again here.
At one point, Rue quietly admits that she doesn’t see the point in self-improvement, because “I just don’t plan on being here that long.” It pains Ali to hear her speaking so openly about wanting to die, but rather than trying to talk her out of it, he simply asks how she would want her mother and sister to remember her after she’s gone. The camera stays on Zendaya’s face the whole time as the weight of her pain, and her understanding of how she in turn is going to hurt her loved ones, fully takes hold. As the tears begin to flow, she says she’d like them to remember her “as someone who tried really hard to be someone I couldn’t.” It’s a devastating admission, made all the more so because of how simple and unvarnished the presentation is.
Obviously, this structure isn’t something Euphoria can deploy in every episode, or even in many of them. There’s a huge cast of characters with stories to service each week, and the series’ hyperactive style is a fundamental part of its DNA. And going the full My Dinner with Andre is much harder than it looks, requiring actors like these two who can be so compelling while so little is happening. But with Zendaya and Domingo, in these extraordinary circumstances, it not only works beautifully, but suggests that, at minimum, Levinson can perhaps take his foot off the gas a bit more often whenever Season Two begins filming.”
THE GUARDIAN:
“As Rue, broken by what she sees as Jules’ betrayal, Zendaya continues to demonstrate exactly why she so deserved the best actress Emmy she won in September; as the older, wiser Ali, Colman Domingo is simply extraordinary. These needed to be good performances. Although this looks stylish, wearing its Nighthawks inspiration plainly and dwelling on blurry neon lights through glass, all Edward Hopper via a Lana Del Rey filter, it is essentially a conversation about addiction that has to sustain our attention for an hour.
When Euphoria is at its best, it is deeply empathic. I did not buy the criticism that it glorified drug-taking; I thought it showed how horrendous adolescence can be, particularly in the digital age, and that nobody could truthfully watch this show and want to emulate any of the behaviour in it. This episode, given space and time to breathe, is a frank discussion about how destructive and damaging addiction can be, all wrapped up in a smart and sympathetic plea for compassion for addicts. Ali and Rue talk about their personal low points. For Ali, this is a story about how many last chances a person can burn through. Rue, devoid of hope, is forced to confront the idea that there may be a little hope left in her yet.
It is a touch too long and some of the dialogue is eye-wateringly Euphoria – “For some people, there is no rock bottom, it’s bottomless” – but, for the most part, I was lost in its world and captivated by the back-and-forth, which is frequently as funny as it is grim. Ultimately, its message is one of forgiveness, of others and of oneself, of empathy and understanding. It quietly calls for good will to all men, even whip-smart, heartbroken, navel-gazing teenagers. Perhaps it is not so unfestive, after all.”
THE DAILY BEAST:
“The writing is strong but demanding—equal parts wrenching and humorous, and full of the kind of earnestness that can sound downright comical coming from the wrong performer. But both Colman Domingo and Zendaya, fresh off her Emmy win this year, are more than up to the task.
It feels fitting that Ali chooses poetry as his metaphor for a higher power. In a way, this belief feels like the heart of Euphoria—a series that, like poetry, focuses on meticulous aesthetics and (visual) metaphor to drive home truths that can at times elude plain language.”
ROGER EBERT:
“Spiralling through a brilliantly written conversation about addiction, revolution, and depression, this is one of the best hours of TV in 2020—an incredibly moving piece that hints at the limitless potential of “Euphoria”’s future. The conversation between Ali and Rue circles her addiction from multiple angles without feeling overly scripted. It’s like a great stage play, and it allows the two performers to really shine. Domingo is an incredible character actor who imbues Ali with just the right amount of earned wisdom and realistic skepticism.
And then there’s Zendaya. She was excellent in season one, but she digs even deeper here than in that Emmy-winning performance. She has a few beats near the end of the episode that are breathtaking, not only in the decisions she makes but in how much room Levinson gives her to feel her way through her own emotions. Rue is angry and demonstrative in parts of this conversation, but she’s mostly listening, thinking, and feeling. It’s more about what she doesn’t say to Ali than what she does. The emotions that she allows to wash over her face and then pull back before approaching melodrama make for such a finely-tuned piece of work.”
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