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petrichoravellichor · 3 years

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Title: A New Kind of Life

Wordcount: ~10k

Rating: T

Summary: What if, when Sam and Dean break into the Empty, Cas isn’t the only one they save? A post-15x19 fix-it fic in which Crowley gets a second shot at the redemption (and family) he deserves.

(Read on Ao3)

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Chapter 2 (of 5) (Ch. 1, Ch. 3, Chs. 4 & 5)

Days go by. Crowley remains in his room, keeping the door locked and stubbornly ignoring any attempts by Sam or Dean to gain entrance, although he does spare a breath to shout that if they want something to do, they can go ward the rest of the Bunker against further intrusions from certain Hell witches. In the end, the brothers leave him alone, and Crowley tells himself he’s glad. It nearly works; he is, after all, a very good liar, even to himself.

Then comes a newer knock, a softer one, followed by a voice Crowley recognizes as belonging to the new God-Kid, Jack: “Hello? Mr. Crowley? Are you still in there?”

And maybe it’s because he’s bored—it’s certainly not because he’s lonely— but Crowley decides to answer. “Why are you knocking?” he snaps. “Can’t you just blow the bloody door off its hinges?”

A beat of silence; then: “I...could, but it wouldn’t be very polite.”

Wouldn’t be very—?! Crowley gapes at the door; dear God, the boy really was Castiel’s son. Eventually, Crowley asks, “What do you want?”

“Do you know how to play chess?”

Whatever Crowley is expecting, it isn’t that. He goes to the door, unlatching the bolt and opening it a crack. “What?”

“Do you know how to play chess?” Jack repeats and holds up a battered old set. “I found this in the storeroom a while back, but I don’t know how to play, and neither do Sam or Dean.”

And it’s...strange. Crowley knows, logically, that this is the golden-eyed man he saw in the Empty, the supremely powerful being who is not only Lucifer’s spawn but also the new God; he knows this...yet somehow, as Jack stands before him and smiles almost shyly, Crowley can’t help but think Jack looks rather...small.

He frowns, opening the door wider. “What about Castiel?” Crowley demands archly. “Surely he’s familiar with what it means to be a pawn.”

Unfortunately, the jab appears to go right over the boy’s head. “He knows what all the pieces are called,” Jack says, nodding, “but he’s never played before. Have you?”

Crowley has. He actually rather likes chess, although it’s been some time since he’s faced a worthy opponent. As King of Hell, he’d of course been able to order other demons to play with him, but most of them were so abysmally bad at it that he’d stopped bothering after a while. “Why do you ask?” he says, instead of answering.

“Will you teach me?”

The request catches Crowley off-guard; he can’t help but feel it’s some sort of joke. “You want me,” he says slowly, “to teach you how to play chess.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Oh.” Jack’s face falls; he looks down. “Okay. Sorry for bothering you; I’ll leave you alone.”

Jack turns and begins to walk away, and the sight really shouldn’t bother Crowley...but it does. He feels a sort of painful pressure building in his chest, and suddenly, the thought of being alone any longer is downright unbearable. Bollocks...

“Wait!” Crowley calls, stepping out into the hallway as Jack turns to peer hopefully over his shoulder. “Just...wait. I’ve changed my mind. The answer is yes.”

Jack beams. “You mean it?”

And he looks so bloody happy that Crowley has to focus his gaze on Jack’s shoulder; looking too long at that smile feels like staring into the sun. “I said as much,” he grumbles. “What more do you want?”

“Can we play in the library? The lighting’s better there.”

Crowley flicks his gaze back to Jack’s face, fully prepared to say no, they’ll play in his quarters or not at all...but Jack is giving him these blasted, begging eyes that Crowley would bet good money were learned from Sam, and what actually comes out is, “Lead the way.”

*****

They take to having daily lessons in the library. Crowley demonstrates various openings and defenses, and when they progress to actual matches, he shows no mercy, checkmating Jack’s king in what feels like a record number of moves.

Still, what Jack lacks in natural ability, he makes up for with eagerness to learn and ample appreciation of Crowley’s knowledge, which is...actually rather nice, if Crowley’s being honest with himself; he can’t remember the last time anyone appreciated him for anything.

Sam, Dean, and Castiel look in on them from time to time, although Crowley pretends not to notice them. Once, he catches a glimpse of a woman Jack says is called Eileen Leahy.

“She’s Sam’s girlfriend,” Jack explains brightly as he takes one of Crowley’s pawns with his remaining bishop. “Sam brought her back from the dead after a hellhound killed her.”

Ah. That explains the dirty look...Crowley frowns, moving a knight to capture Jack’s bishop. He hadn’t been lying when he’d told Sam, years ago, that he hadn't known who Eileen was when he lent a hellhound to the British Men of Letters, and besides, they were the ones who’d decided to sic said hellhound on the woman, not him. It’s not his fault the bastards had apparently thought it sporting to use an invisible weapon against someone who couldn’t hear it coming. If Crowley had wanted to kill Eileen, he would have at least had the decency to use a weapon she could see. Still, what’s done is done, and Crowley does his best not to dwell on it. The topic of hellhounds is, after all, rather painful at present, given that he still doesn’t know what’s become of Juliet.

Not for the first time, Crowley curses himself for losing his temper with his mother before having learned the fate of his favorite hellhound. Was Juliet still in Hell, where he’d left her? Had she been well-cared for in his absence? What if one of his adversaries had harmed her out of spite? What if his mother had harmed her out of spite? Crowley has no way of knowing, not unless he wants to contact his mother again or just show up in Hell, and neither option inspires optimism. Rowena could very easily lie to him over the phone, and setting foot in Hell feels far too akin to walking into a trap: enough of Crowley’s enemies have probably survived the past few years that he’d be stabbed the moment he got through the gates, and for what? Only to learn that Juliet had been butchered years ago? At least as things currently are, he can still hold onto the chance, however slim, that Juliet is alive. If only there were some way to know…

Go on then, universe, Crowley thinks savagely, give me a bloody sign.

No sooner does the thought form than Crowley hears the click of paws against the Bunker's floor. He freezes, hardly daring to believe...but his hopes are abruptly dashed when a moment later, a tan, scruffy-looking mutt who is neither Juliet nor a hellhound enters the library. The dog pauses when it catches sight of him seated across from Jack at the table, then growls.

Jack looks over and smiles. “Hey, boy, it’s okay,” he calls soothingly, reaching a hand down to get the dog’s attention. “This is Mr. Crowley; he’s a friend. Come say hi.”

To Crowley's surprise, the dog scampers forward, apparently willing to take Jack’s word on the matter. It stops next to Crowley’s chair and sniffs him curiously until Crowley reaches out and hesitantly pats its head, at which point it starts wagging its tail and lets out a friendly sort of bark. The sound fills Crowley with a sense of unexpected warmth.

“When did you lot get a dog?” he asks, glancing back at Jack as the dog lies down at his feet.

“A little over a week ago,” Jack replies. “Dean found him after Chuck made everyone disappear. His name is Miracle.”

“Miracle,” Crowley repeats, looking down at the dog, which yawns back at him, apparently settling in for a nap. “Of course.”

After they finish their lesson, Crowley starts to return to his room, only to hear Miracle trailing after him into the hall. He turns to regard the dog with a frown.

“If it’s treats you’re after,” Crowley says, “I haven’t got any.”

Miracle cocks his head, seeming to consider him for a moment, then pads over, tail wagging and eyes bright. “Woof.”

Crowley arches a brow. “You don’t take no for an answer, do you?”

“Woof.”

“Right.” Crowley sighs. “Well, come on, then,” he says, turning and continuing the rest of the way to his room, Miracle trotting alongside him. “You’re no hellhound, but I suppose you’ll do for company.”

And to himself, with grudging approval: Well played, universe. Well played.

*****

More days pass. Crowley spends most of his time in his room, leafing through books borrowed from the Bunker library with Miracle curled up at the foot of his bed. The dog comes to visit him more often than not, scratching insistently at the door until Crowley lets him in. Having him around doesn’t make Crowley’s anxieties over Juliet fade away, but it does lessen the sting of her absence, if only a little.

Jack also stops by with increasing frequency, and Crowley honestly still doesn’t know what to make of him. Lucifer’s blood flows in the boy’s veins, and by all accounts, that should make Jack terrible beyond reason, a vicious, manipulative creature whose only goal is to bring about the downfall of mankind in the most horrible way imaginable.

Instead, Jack sits cross-legged on Crowley’s bed and talks cheerfully about Star Wars or whatever other interest has his attention that day, and his only vice seems to be an insatiable sweet tooth. During one of his visits, he asks about Crowley’s life before they met, and there’s something so maddeningly sincere about the way he does it that Crowley finds himself telling Jack more than he means to, about himself, about Hell, about his mother...

By the time he finishes, Crowley feels raw and a little embarrassed at having said so much, but Jack just smiles softly. “It’s okay, Mr. Crowley,” he says. “We can be more than the people we come from; my dads taught me that. We can choose to be good.”

Crowley isn’t so sure about that, at least not as far as he himself is concerned. His soul is about as damned as a soul can get, and besides, his choices have a nasty habit of blowing up in his face. Still, it’s...a nice thought, if nothing else.

He’s still thinking about it later that night, long after Jack’s gone off to Heaven for a bit to do whatever it is he and Amara do up there. Crowley’s sitting in the dark kitchen having a cup of tea—cheap stuff that comes in a bag, unfortunately, but at least there’d been a kettle—when Castiel appears in the doorway, an almost-silhouette against the soft glow of the hall light, and peers in at him through the darkness.

Crowley stares stonily back. Apparently, his assessment of the shift in Dean and Castiel's dynamic had been correct: Castiel is barefoot, wearing a t-shirt and sweats that were probably once Dean’s or maybe still are. Crowley can practically smell Dean’s scent on the clothes even from where he sits, and the low-quality tea does nothing to chase the bitterness from his mouth. Who would have thought that all it would take to tear away whatever final shred of heterosexuality Dean Winchester had been clinging to all these years was a deathbed love confession followed by a romp in the Empty? Not that Crowley cares a whit about that; he doesn't, not even a little bit, not at all.

“Hello, Castiel,” he says darkly. “Out for a stroll? You should try the dungeon; from what I recall, it’s lovely this time of night.”

Castiel raises an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t know,” he says evenly, “having never spent the night there.” Then, before Crowley can think of a suitable comeback, Castiel gestures at an empty stool on the other side of the table. “May I?”

Crowley shrugs. “This is your home, not mine. You don’t need my permission to do anything.”

“Even so, I’d like to have it.”

“Then consider it had. I’ll take my tea elsewhere.”

Castiel frowns. “There’s no need for that.”

Crowley lets his eyes linger on Castiel’s shirt, on Dean’s shirt, then snaps his gaze back to Castiel’s face. “Not for you, perhaps.”

Silence. Crowley is hyperaware of the clock on the wall, ticking out each passing second as they stare each another down, and he half hopes Castiel will charge, practically dares him to. Crowley’s not stupid—he knows his odds against an ordinary angel aren't particularly good, let alone a former leader of garrisons—but at the moment, he doesn’t care: worst-case scenario, Castiel kills him and he goes back to the Empty. Maybe if Crowley's lucky, he’ll actually get a funeral this time.

Eventually, however, Castiel’s shoulders relax, and he sighs. “You should know,” he says, quietly, “I bear you no ill will over our past grievances.”

Crowley bristles; for a second, he considers getting up and throwing the first punch himself. He isn’t sure what Castiel is playing at, but whatever it is, he’s not in the mood for games. “Of course you don’t," he growls. "They all worked out in your favor.”

Castiel regards him carefully. “You’re referring to Dean.”

“I’m referring to everything!” Crowley snaps, nearly shattering his cup as he slams it down on the table. “Haven’t you noticed, Castiel? Your choices are lauded, held up as grand examples of what one does for love, and mine?” He lets out a mirthless laugh that comes out closer to a sob. “Mine end with me on the business end of an angel blade, dying for a world where I’m not even missed, not by Dean or anyone else.”

No sooner does he say the words than Crowley feels like he can’t breathe. Which is stupid, because he doesn’t need to breathe, hasn’t for centuries, but the feeling’s there all the same. The place his heart would be if he still had one aches; it’s as though a well-healed scar in his chest has been sliced wide open and now Crowley’s choking on all the blood. He blinks back the bitter tears he can feel prickling at his eyes, staring fixedly down at the tabletop and wishing it would swallow him whole.

Eventually, he manages to get himself under control, and by the time the choking feeling subsides, Crowley is more exhausted than angry. Maybe Dean should have left him in the Empty after all, he thinks tiredly; it would have saved a good deal of heartache.

Through it all, Castiel remains silent; when Crowley finally looks up at him, he’s surprised to be met with something strangely akin to pity. Ordinarily, it would be infuriating, but right now, Crowley just can’t find the energy to give a damn; he slumps forward over the table and sighs. “What is it you want, Castiel?” he asks listlessly. “You came here to say something, so by all means, say it. There’s nothing you can take from me that I haven’t already lost.”

For a moment, Castiel lingers on the threshold; then he steps into the dark kitchen and sits across from Crowley at the table. Crowley waits, expecting to be told off...but when Castiel speaks, his tone is surprisingly, solemnly gentle.

“I wanted to thank you,” he says, “for the interest you’ve taken in Jack. What he’s been going through lately...facing Chuck, rebuilding Heaven...it’s been a great deal of change very suddenly. He’s trying so hard, and Sam, Dean, and I are supporting him as best we can, as is Amara, but it's still an incredible burden for a child to bear.” Castiel smiles sadly. “Especially when it’s so easy for others to forget that he’s a child.”

As he listens to Castiel speak, Crowley thinks back to that day in the Empty, at the cosmically powerful golden-eyed being who shielded him, shielded all of them, from the surrounding darkness. Jack is powerful in ways Crowley can only begin to imagine...but he’s also more than that. He's the boy who knocked timidly on Crowley's door and asked to learn chess, the boy who sits on the edge of Crowley’s bed and talks to him and smiles in delight when Miracle chases his tail. He’s curious and well-mannered and kind and—

And God, Crowley realizes with a start; bloody hell, when had he grown so fond of God?

“But, as I was saying,” Castiel says, snapping Crowley out of his thoughts, “the time you’ve been spending with him, treating him like he’s anyone else, giving him space to just be himself...it’s been good for him.” A pause, then: “You’ve been good for him. And while you and I have had our differences—”

Crowley can’t help it; he snorts. “That’s putting it mildly,” he says, and Castiel actually cracks a smile before continuing:

“—and while you and I have had our differences, Jack’s happiness takes precedence over all of them. He’s my son, and you matter to him.” He looks at Crowley intently, then adds, in a tone of absolute certainty, “And he would miss you if you were gone.”

The weight of Castiel’s words nearly knocks Crowley to the floor. He’s never mattered to anyone before, and now...now he matters to God. Crowley swallows; he doesn’t know what to say.

Castiel seems to understand, though. They sit in silence, and it’s not exactly amicable, but it’s not strained, either. Like for the first time since Castiel entered the kitchen, there’s enough space in the room for both of them.

Eventually, Crowley clears his throat. “There’s still some water left in the kettle,” he says, “if you’d like a cup of tea.” Then, because he doesn’t want to appear too agreeable, he gestures despairingly down at his cup and adds, “although what passes for Earl Grey according to Winchester tastes is, unsurprisingly, questionable at best.”

And Castiel, to Crowley’s surprise, smirks. “Leave that to me,” he says, rising and heading over to the cupboard. “I know where Sam hides the stash Rowena gave him for Christmas.”

#crowley #spn crowley #fergus macleod #crowley macleod #jack kline #spn #supernatural #spn fic #spn fix-it fic #spn spoilers #a new kind of life #my writing #this was supposed to go up tomorrow but i finished editing early and figured what the heck #one less thing to worry about tomorrow :)

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brightbeautifulthings · 3 years

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Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe

"'For the love of God, Montresor!' 'Yes,' I said, 'for the love of God!'"

Year Read: 2020

Rating: 2/5

Context: Starting two years ago, I’ve picked an intimidatingly long classic to read over the course of a year. I have a problem with trying to read books as fast as I possibly can, so if I set myself a thousand page novel, I’ll try to pound it in a week, and it will just be a miserable experience all around. So, a year is a nice compromise. I’ve hit the major Poe horror stories in the past, and I’ve been thinking about rereading them, but I couldn’t decide where to start. Reread my favorites? Read the ones I’ve heard of? What if I’m missing something awesome? As usual, my go-to answer is to read them ALL. For more thoughts on individual stories, see my monthly blog posts. Trigger warnings: character death, torture, live burial, cannibalism, decapitation, animal abuse, injury, severe illness, racism/xenophobia, anti-Semitism, ableism, slurs, mental illness, bitter ranting from the reviewer.

Thoughts: My edition, with an introduction by Wilbur S. Scott, is probably not the edition I would have picked, since I prefer more notes or even essays to help me out with books that are 100+ years old. Context is helpful. Somehow though, my dad and I ended up with the same edition, so we decided to read it together. My dad loves all things horror (I come by it naturally), and we’re both longtime Poe fans, especially if you happen to put Vincent Price in one of his film adaptations. Scott’s introduction is particularly pretentious for a book we probably found in the bargain bin, and he manages to criticize the horror genre for not being “literary enough”. This is an Edgar Allan Poe collection, right? Way to alienate 90% of your audience right from the start. You can’t snub an entire genre and then attempt to explain why people like it. Like a lot of critical writing, it tells us more about Scott than it does about Poe, and I was circling his typos to entertain myself by the end of the introduction.

It did not get better. In short, I actively hated so much of this collection, and it's my most arduous and least enjoyed year-long read to date. To be even shorter, the only stories I found worth reading for pleasure were the horror ones I had already read and loved, and I'm afraid to examine too closely whether that has more to do with nostalgia and pop culture than the stories themselves. Poe has a way of lingering on pointless descriptions and belaboring a point to its absolute death, alongside an aggressively pretentious tone that suggests the narrator (and, by extension, Poe himself), knows everything there is to know about everything and you're an idiot for even asking. His true talent may not be horror, but in turning what might have been a good story into an intellectual soapbox and hammering it the point of absurdity. It would be different if the stories actually were intelligent instead of ridiculous. I’m happy to talk Aristotelian ethics, but the point is never to intellectually engage the reader–-it’s to show how clever the writer is.

On the whole, it seems like Poe struggles with telling a straightforward story, and I can’t tell if it’s because the short story genre has changed so much since then or because he’s so busy trying to show readers how smart he is that he forgets that stories have very specific components like suspense, exposition, or rising action (or endings). Most of them consist of some narrator speaking the entire time (I have all kinds of problems with this, from, “You just ruined the twist of your own story” to “No human talks for thirty uninterrupted minutes unless some idiot gave them a microphone.”), and few of them have anything resembling action, plot/character development, strong themes, or closure. There’s an essay-like quality to some of them (“The Imp of the Perverse”, “The Premature Burial”) where he seems to be trying to tease out a concept on an intellectual level, sometimes for pages and pages, before he remembers that he’s telling a story with characters and what could loosely be called a plot. I could do without all the intellectualizing, verbal grandstanding, and narrative cartwheels; just tell a good story, please.

And he does, sometimes. It's clear why Poe remains an essential part of the horror canon because those are easily the best stories in the collection, and I don't think that's just because I'm a horror fan. Horror seems to age better than some other genres because certain things remain consistently scary over decades or even centuries--being buried alive, for example. “The Fall of the House of Usher” is permeated by a feeling of bleak foreboding, culminating in some truly terrifying images, and “The Tell-tale Heart” is one of the better examples of Poe’s rambling narrator who thinks a lot of his own intelligence and slowly unravels over guilt. Both scared me to death when I was a kid, and I’m happy to see that they still maintain a high creep factor as an adult. (I also had the Great Illustrated Classics Tales of Mystery and Terror as a kid, because all a story about being buried alive needs is an illustration!) “The Cask of Amontillado” has long been one of my favorites (because there is something deeply wrong with me, probably), and “The Pit and the Pendulum” and “The Masque of the Red Death” are both top-notch horrifying, the latter a classic plague story that's a little *too* relevant to the times just now (but, you know, also one of my favorites). The clock symbolism is some of the best in the entire collection. Why, pray tell, would you be afraid of time?

The tolerable stories are the detective ones and the adventure ones, in that order. I can see why Poe’s detective stories like “The Gold Bug” and “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” spawned a genre. I was getting clear Sherlock Holmes vibes from his character, Dupin. However, it reaffirms that something is a classic because of its effects on literature as a whole and not because it’s still all that accessible. Just because something is the first of its kind doesn’t mean it’s the best of its kind; in fact, it usually isn’t because that was only a starting place. I can’t help feeling “Murders” would have been more compelling as a horror story than a detective story. Murdering gorillas are cool; listening to someone talk about murdering gorillas, much less cool. I was extremely irritated by his hot air balloon stories ("The Balloon Hoax", "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall"), but apparently Jules Verne loved them, which makes a lot of sense. I was getting a lot of Verne vibes from things like "A Descent Into the Maelstrom" and even the utterly long, boring, and racist "Narrative of A. Gordon Pym." It's clear they had influence on other writers, even if they're not the best examples of their genres.

Which brings us back around to the bad. It's not worth my time or yours to list all the terrible stories in this collection, but I can briefly summarize what I found so terrible about them. First, Poe is tragically, emphatically unfunny. The things he seems to find humorous are either in very poor taste now (his tasteless descriptions of mental patients in “The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether”), or they’re outright ridiculous, almost slapstick, like the woman who gets her head stuck in a clock and is subsequently decapitated by it in “A Predicament,” which is an odd sequel to “How to Write a Blackwood Article.” I’m sensing that Poe is making fun of intellectuals or would-be intellectuals here, but with so much time and cultural distance, it’s hard to tell. In any case, it led to a running joke (“I’m going out for groceries!” “Don’t stick your head in any clocks!”). Somehow, I doubt this is the major takeaway Poe was hoping for.

Worst of all, they don't age well on representation either. Poe seems at pains to offend every single minority he possibly can throughout his oeuvre. There are a lot of horribly racist depictions of African Americans, snide comments about Jewish people (or the much more obvious anti-Semitism in “Four Beasts In One” where a mad king has a thousand Jews killed--really?), and blatant ableism (“Hop-Frog”). It's at its worst in "Narrative of A. Gordon Pym," a novella that spans over a hundred pages, that is basically a tedious, xenophobic setup to paint the native population of an island as the most horrific and duplicitous monsters imaginable. (The narrator previously ate one of his shipmates, so can he really afford to throw stones here?) For inexplicable reasons, that story isn't finished, and by that point, I was grateful.

Poe's poetry is a little easier to work through than his prose. I love "The Raven" with its lilting rhymes and dark message, and "Annabel Lee" is very pretty, both ubiquitous in popular culture. I also liked "Dream-Land," "Al Aaraaf" (where Ligeia makes another appearance), and "Alone." Most of the poetry has pretty simple rhyme schemes, the subjects mainly love and loss. There's an excerpt of an unfinished play, "Politian," included as well, but it didn't make much of an impression on me. TL;DR: I stand by my initial opinion, which is to read his horror stories for pleasure and, possibly, his detective and adventure stories for genre purposes, and to skip the rest. I'll probably be looking for a smaller edition of the stories I like. This one is a massive hardcover, more like a book you put on your coffee table to look impressive than a book you actually read (but I don’t have a coffee table, so it’s actually just taking up more room on the shelf than any one book has a right to).

#book review #complete tales and poems #Edgar Allan Poe #horror fiction #poe readalong #2/5 #rating: 2/5 #2020 #bookoween

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joecial-distancing · 4 years

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2019 in review in review:

A few years ago I started tracking yearly goals, books read, movies watched etc in a year, along with overview blurbs, in private posts. End of 2019/beginning of 2020 I was really frazzled/burned out about a lot of stuff and just never finished up making the thing. 8 months later, got the urge to read back what I’d got done, then figured I’d maybe go ahead and see about finishing.

Media tracking below the break. thoughts/blurbs written in 2020 italicized, 2019 not.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~_____________________________~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Didn’t do so hot on explicit personal goals, but had a lot of stuff go ok around them this year.

School’s been fine/better than fine.

Job’s probably the biggest failing. Still with same job, haven’t made the firm moves to jump off, dragging my feet too much on exploring stuff w/ Columbia/NASA GISS.

Did not get better with covid, lol

Dating life still non-existent, but I’ve registered on apps, gotten more comfortable with selfies, improved general social life dramatically, been flirted with, updated my wardrobe, and generally started to get comfortable accepting that I’m a hot person.

Somehow got extremely better during covid.

Books

Grant (finished)

We stan a taurus legend

Guy was good at exactly one job, and was fortunate enough to have been in the right place/right time to get to do it.

Mort (discworld)

Definitely best discworld I’ve gotten to so far.

Don Quixote p. II

Really entertaining in a way that part 1 wasn’t; I was shocked how much the meta element landed for me.

Consider the Lobster (DFW collection)

had zero context on who DFW is/was when I read, and still don’t exactly tbh. Wanted to wait for a pause in The Discourse before diving into more of him, but dunno if I’m ever going to get that.

Crime and Punishment (revisited)

Weirdly didn’t get much more out of this than I did the first time I’d read it

Better Than Sex (HST Gonzo papers)

Xerox/widespread fax accessibility opening citizen access to mass media in a manner really reminiscent of what social media would go on to do at a much larger scale. Has a much more deliberate narrative arc than the other gonzo papers collections, also has that excellent HST richard nixon eulogy

The Brothers Karamazov

SPQR

Slouching Towards Bethlehem (Didion collection)

Pet Sematary

Not my favorite King, but not bad

Sourcery (discworld)

still funny/charming, but Mort really made clear/reminded me how much the hapless sadsack Rincewind mold of protagonist wears on me after a while.

The Devil's Teeth

My Year of Rest and Relaxation

Liked it a lot more once I realized it was doing a Fear and Loathing thing.

Homage to Catalonia

This should be the Orwell that gets taught in schools. Make it a followup to All Quiet on the Western Front or something, jeez.

Lyndon Johnson I

Having now finished all of them, this one’s probably the least-interesting but sets up a bunch of important context that the others still then feel the need to retread.

The Razor's Edge

Recommended to me as a “white guy discovers eastern mysticism” book, but also is more interesting in its treatment of that than I’d expected (helps it was written in the 40s).

Cat's Cradle

There’s a part in this where Vonnegut’s making fun of people who try to bond with strangers over being Hoosiers, and my dumbass immediate thought was “ooh, Vonnegut’s a hoosier? Me too!”

Lyndon Johnson II

Robert Caro felt compelled to apologize for spending so much words lionizing Coke Stevens, segregationist opponent to Johnson’s senate run. His goal was pretty clearly to show lbj’s lack of campaign charisma by contrast, definitely definitely overcommitted in his own narrativising.

Libra

I want to go back to this after reading some more De Lillo.

Gravity's Rainbow

This book absolutely kicked my ass

Overstuffed and referential in a specific way that really keeps me hooked in instead of put off. When I learn about some piece of cultural context that I retroactively recognize as being referenced in this, I want to go back and reread the entire thing.

From Caligari to Hitler

Kind of fails both as film criticism and cultural analysis, but absolutely made me want to run for the hills when considering current relationship between mainstream movies and demands of pop culture.

I took a class on Weimar cinema in undergrad that I now realize was probably biting pretty heavily from this and never once referenced it.

Movies

Venom

Movie itself is not as fun as the Tom Hardy hype coverage. PG13 was the absolute worst space to aim for, PG- or R- versions of this could have been a blast.

Harryhauser Argonauts

Was tripping when I put this on, and it was all kinds of fun.

2001: a Space Oddyssey

First time seeing this, all-time classic for a reason!

A Good American (the NSA doc)

Dr. Strangelove

Mel Brooks History of the World p. I

Not my favorite Brooks, best joke was at the beginning.

In Bruges

Had been a while since I saw a proper dark comedy.

Spiderverse

Fukkin awesome!

Visually great, and extremely better than usual superhero stuff for being aimed at PG instead of PG-13.

You Only Live Twice

Highlander (Revisited)

I watched The Old Guard on netflix recently and it mostly just made me wish I was watching Highlander instead, because at least Highlander knows exactly how goofy it is

Moonraker

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Much like The Shining, I though this would have been 100% spoiled for me by cultural osmosis, but turns out it wasn’t, and even the scenes I had seen *totally landed* in-context still.

Kung Fu Hustle

Ichi the Killer

Really gross, really fun

Matrix Reloaded (watched thru highway scene) (Revisited)

The highway scene was not nearly as cool as I remembered it being.

John Wick 3*

Probably dumbest plot of all of them, best choreography. I like how every single fight had its own distinct flavor. “Knife museum fight” “horse fight” “halle berry dogs fight”

Akira

A classic

Pet Sematary * (ugh, bad)

Why can’t john lithgow be in good movies anymore

The Revenant

MCU Spiderman

Fuck this was awful.

MCU Spiderman 2*

Really weird, complete Rorschach Test of a movie: it’d be totally valid to read into this that global warming is Fake News, for instance.

Lmao this was completely awful

Rites

Dredd (non-stallone)

oh hey Lena Headey’s in this

For All Mankind!

Watched in honor of moon landing anniversary

Lion King *

Watched it way too stoned, was like dark side of the moon + wizard of oz except instead it’s a lion king script reading + nature footage edited for lip syncing.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood *

Many scenes of very long setups for really stupid shaggy dog jokes, which sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t. I do kinda want to rewatch now knowing more about manson, which I knew pretty much nothing about beforehand

Blowout

A good john lithgow movie

also I think I like travolta in things.

Lord of War

A Good cage movie

I like when Eamon Walker shows up in stuff.

Taxi Driver

A classic

Snowpiercer

Watched in a bar with only one speaker working, which is the correct way to watch. Weirder and funnier than I thought it was going to be, which still doesn’t make it good, but,

dbz big green dub

Exorcist III

Brad Dourif just tearing it apart

Deep Red (argento)

Suspiria (1977)

Watched the remake in 2020, which was ok, but nothing tops the Goblin score.

Elf Bowling

Thanks, Gnome

Parasite *

Interesting to me that this one seems poised to hang around people’s good esteem for a while

FMA: B

Rick & Morty

Saw some episodes, generally pretty funny, some misanthropy that’s probably appealing to a certain type of teen al a something like House, but ultimately I don’t totally Get the intensity of discourse about it.

Leterkenny

Mob Psycho 100

One Punch Man

Deadwood

Watchmen

Only watched like half of it. Was playing around with a lot of hefty imagery/thematics, but didn’t really seem ready to rise above playing (tho also I feel like it’s weird on some level to *expect* them to rise above that in the first place)

Music

New Avantasia

HEALTH/ show

lol remember concerts

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard/ show

Just learned about King Gizz in 2019 and got completely obsessed with them. I don’t tend to expand my music selection very readily, and a lot of what I currently *do* know is old/inactive stuff, so it was/is incredibly exciting to have an active group with good momentum just immediately win me over like that.

Mistimed the edibles and ended up with a really good finale and a really long subway ride home.

New Yeasayer

Sad they split up

Steve Wilson Tull remixes

Aqualung’s a good album and the sound mixing’s kinda bad, so I liked this project.

Stonefield

Opened for Gizzard. Really good as studying music

Video Games

Civ VI: Gathering Storm

Hades

Turns out Supergiant’s design proclivities all work *extremely well* on a roguelike

Baba is You

Untitled Goose Game

Cute, if maybe a bit overhyped

finally fucking finished Pillars of Eternity

Had fun with it, but too long, and really dour for how long it is.

Pillars II

Kinda drifted off it eventually, but I do genuinely like that the flavor of the fantasy is colonial era rather than medieval.

There’s a Balancing Bastard Factions element where it’s like the writers are just being smartasses after a while. Having to go extremely out of their way to make siding with colonizers seem like a competitive option.

Pokemon shield

Cuphead

pisses me off, which was a nice outlet when I was stranded by flight cancellations during thanksgiving

Celeste

Also very difficult, but really easy to stay patient with, which is nice.

Disco Elysium

None of the discourse made me want to play this, but people talking about the mechanical stuff it did got me extremely interested. Mostly Delivered IMO.

Breath of the Wild

You can approach the nodes of the main quest in the order you choose, and the second one I chose made ninjas start fucking spawning everywhere when I’m just trying to explore, and there’s no way to make it stop. May go back to it one day.

Podcasts

Relentless Picnic Patreon feed

The treats really helped me start distinguishing individual personalities, compared to the regular eps.

Picnic Discord!

FatT Counterweight

Fun, but also I think Mechs are not my shit.

FatT Spring in Hieron/ end of that particular world

8 months since I’ve last tuned into FatT. ah well.

Law School

He’s in everythiiiing!

You Must Remember This: Manson family

*There’s* the context

Misc.

Kindle train guy

Times Square sleeping guy + kids taking selfies w/ him

toddler singing along after Psycho killer (a, ya, ya ya, ya)

drunk and dragged to a drag show

Central park football family

Soft Steel Drum Subway Busker

Weird old lady going to grand central for oysters

2018 in review (cards):

MySelf (CC)

Self: Tower

Blocked: 10 Cups

Ethereal/subconscious: 8 Swords

Material: 3 Swords

Past: Justice

Future: Page Wands

Attitude: Sun

External: King Swords

Hopes/Fears: 5 Coins

Trajectory: High Priestess

Also Self:

Hierophant

7 Cups

7 Coins

Blind Spot:

(self & others): 5 cups || (others not self): High Priestess

(self not others): Moon || (nobody): 3 Cups

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kilekolache · 5 years

Text

Old Solo Survival Multiplayer Base Tour (Part 1)

Since people liked the last post I made about Minecraft, let’s continue to get this bread. Before I got a job and started University, I would no life the crap out of survival minecraft. (There are multiple servers where I have 500+ hours logged into them). One of them was a YouTuber’s semi-public server that I somehow got whitelisted too, and to this day I’ve spent more time on that server than anywhere else. And I’m going to show you the base I made on there, because in the summer of 2013 I literally spent 10 hours a day working on this thing every day all by myself in survival.

(The server died years ago but I did a world download of my base before that, so that’s where these pics will be from.)

Entrance

When new features like hardened clay would be added, I’d go back and edit this base to make it look better, this road was originally stone and sandstone.

(Old pic for reference)

This path goes down for a while.

Spectator pic for a better view.

Eventually we hit the storage complex. You can tell the point when I realized trapped chests were a thing. Was a major noob back then, and if I ever seriously played minecraft again I’d use a hopper sorter system.

I have roughly 248 double chests of cobblestone which amounts to roughly 857,088 blocks. I’ll show you why I have that much cobble later.

Some of the items I have nearly full double chests of. People on the server would often joke about the fact that “I had a double chest for every block in the game” and they weren’t entirely wrong. I would have had more Iron and Gold, but this server had a weird vendetta against automatic farms until near the end of its lifespan when they stopped caring about enforcing the rules.

Got about 2 dubs of chainmail armor, coal blocks, and redstone blocks each. Have about 12 double chest of nether quartz blocks. 8 dubs of lava buckets. Have many double chests filled with enchanted diamond tools of varying degrees of durability and about half a dub of maxed out diamond picks (this was before mending was a thing).

if you’re wondering why I had that boat in background of the last post that I made, and if you’re also wondering why I have nearly 1,000,000 cobblestone blocks.

That’s why.

Sometimes you just have to dig out a massive hole in the ground, and put a steampunk ship in it. Took me about a month to dig the hole (no beacons) and less than a week to make the ship.

Didn’t design the ship myself, I only re-made it in survival because it was the spawn of the server’s previous map. (Would have two minecraft windows up, one for the reference on singleplayer and one on the server, didn’t know what schematica was back then and I still feel like its cheaty to use today.) Was going to build a massive hangar for it but I was lazy and never finished it. Credit for the design goes to this person.

There’s a lot more of this base to show, but this post is getting too long so I’ll continue that later.

#kile's little red book #minecraft #mineblr #base tour

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superfamigos · 7 years

Text

los juegos de 2016 de oli

My inaugural post on el Super Famigos punto com! Cool beans! :D

So here's my 2016 games list. These are the games I liked most in 2016. In lieu of ranking, I'll list them in alphabetical order. I'll also add some honorable mentions, since I did enjoy them and don't want them to be left out. ;)

The List

Breath of Fire III

(heartthrob credit: BoF wikia)

Fitting that the first on my list would be a SuperFamigos classic!

I picked up Bofee ("Breath of Fire III" -> "BoF III" -> "BoF3" -> "Bofee") after some prodding from my friend Chris. I’ve wanted it for a while, and even played it once, but… I don't have as much patience for JRPGs as I used to, even ones as good as Bofee or Chrono Cross. This time, though, ♪ I had a little help from my friends ♫.

Since SuperFamigos was just starting up, I downloaded OBS and gave streaming Bofee a whirl. And sure enough, broadcasting and interacting with friends via chat is way better than grinding alone. Chris shared all his expert secrets, and I flew through the slogs that stopped me before. And we spawned a whole slew of inside jokes too (oh man Teepo's flowing locks *o*). I haven't played/streamed much recently, due to a combination of old hardware and busy schedules, but with luck I can fire it back up in 2017.

As for the game itself: it's great! Top notch pixel art, animations, and music. Story's a bit slow, though Chris assures me it gets better. Definitely more fun with friends. ...smells burnt

rating: "9/molotov"

Chrono Cross

(stunning opassa credit: Chrono wikia)

Frickin' Chrono Cross! What a sweet game. Beautiful scenery, amazing music, and a genuinely enthralling and mysterious story. I'm still not fully sure what's going on! The battle system can be intense too: trying to fend off the Fire Dragon with only two Revives? Are you kidding me??

I must confess, I got Chrono Cross three Christmases ago. The game has a couple of the same JRPG issues that Bofee has. So my tactic is to whittle away at it, every once in a while. And it's a bit like turning down the lights and sitting back and listening to Kind of Blue on vinyl; you come away feeling well fed.

So why is Chrono Cross on my games of 2016 list? Partly because the OSSC got me hyped to play it on my new HDTV (it was disgusting before) (and it handles the 240p <-> 480i switch quite well), partly because Chris again got me through some tough parts (he’s a boss, seriously), and partly because it's an awesome game and it won't come off my "games of <year>" list until it's beaten. So there.

rating: "poshul4mayor"

Downwell

I finally beat Downwell (normal mode) and unlocked all the palettes in 2016. Even then, I haven't stopped playing.

Downwell is the one mobile game I actually enjoy. For all the critically acclaimed mobile games I own, none have kept my attention like console and handheld games do. Except Downwell.

The mobile qualifier is important. Often I was chilling in a café, or waiting in line for a sandwich, or unable to sleep on a redeye flight, or trapped on a god-forsaken Snowpiercer Amtrak to Portland that was 6 hours behind schedule because snow somehow broke the signals and freight trains rule the rails and "we can't tell you if it'll be 30 minutes or 3 hours"

…Anyway. Downwell kept me sane in 2016. I don't even mind the touch controls.*

By the way, here's my fav strat: Floaty. Attract gems + popping gems + gem recharge. Laser if possible, or machine gun / burst / puncher. Combo as much as possible, but only to 25 each.

rating: "10/10/10"

Open Source Scan Converter

(razor sharp credit: Rex Warden)

I know, I know, it's not a game. But it counts as one, because it gave my PS1 a new lease on life.

And what a lease it is! I kid you not, I had serious goosebumps whenever I first fired up wipE'out" XL with this puppy. It was ｂｅａｕｔｉｆｕｌ. I noticed background textures I had never noticed before. Colors popped, not bled. I could read the menu text in wip3out! And no noticeable lag! Game after game, I was amazed at the difference. A major reason these old PS1 games are on my list is the OSSC.

Granted, YMMV; the results aren't nearly as drastic on other TVs I tried. But on mine… There's no going back.

rating: "I could cut my veggies with that PS logo"

Pokémon Sun

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (I really like this game.) AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (A lot.) AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (There's too much to say.) AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (Do yourself a favor and give Pokémon Sun/Moon a try.) AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

rating: "AAAAAAAAAA/AAAAAAAAAA"

Pokkén Tournament

(sassy credit: chipsprites)

Taking a step back for a sec.

Moving to Seattle was hard. It’s still hard. I live by myself, it's my first time working out of college, and sometimes even cooking food is a chore. My life has certainly gotten better now, but those first few months were…hard.

Pokkén was what I played when I wasn't at work. It's a great game, with bumpin' music and satisfying mechanics that I could really get into. But more than that, it was a game that helped me get through a rough time. For that reason alone, I would definitely recommend.

rating: "Weavile's playmate? HECK YES"

Splatoon

(manual or automatic credit: Syfy Games)

"But Oli, Splatoon came out in—"

Whoa there. Listen up. If you haven't already guessed, this is MY list o' 2016. It doesn't matter when such-and-such game came out. If I played it in 2016, it counts.

…but you do have a point. I didn't get Splatoon until Christmas 2015, which led to me missing a good amount of the summer unveils and hype and such. And online games stress me out, so I had the most fun when I stuck to my niche: off in the corner with my paintbrush, flinging paint errywhere, firin' off torpedoes to the other side, occasionally ninja-ing peeps.

In any case, still played it enough and had fun enough to include it! Very refreshing to see some color and friendly competition in a shooter. Good music and 1P campaign too. I even picked up my first pair of Vans Slip-ons because of this game. Fashion help 10/10.

Splatoon is also one of the Famigos' go-to online games! Several times we'd host a private match and not even battle, but just hang out on the stage, swim around, go explore, etc. Kinda like what we do in real life…except as squid kids.

rating: "18/12 overture"

wip3out

(let’s be friends credit: infoxicated via wipeoutzone)

Until I got the OSSC, this game was literally unplayable on my new HDTV.

Okay, not literally. Seriously though, wip3out** has some of the most succulent graphic design in the industry, and that stinkin' yellow composite cable rendes it muddy, meh, and unreadable. Yuck. wip3out was the second game I tested with the OSSC, and it's easily the best demonstration of the power of upscaling.

But enough about that. wipE'out" (the series) is the beez kneez. What's not to like? Cream-of-the-crop electronic soundtrack, mouthwatering tDR design, spicy-smooth tracks, and rich chocolatey weaponry. That feeling when you tear down the track, barely grazing the wall as you unleash a Quake Disruptor…

wip3out makes my list this year, not just because of the OSSC, not just because it's a filet mignon of a game, but because I freakin' beat Venom Tournament mode for the first time. Even with unfair AI in Sampa Run! ( *｀∇ ´ ) And I plan to keep playing for a long time.

Interestingly, although XL/2097 and 3 have very different physics and handling, I can maneuver them both just fine…as long as I don't play them both in the same night. I get so used to one game, that I can't immediately swap discs and play the other without crashing into everything.

rating: "Excuse me, I think I need to return this steak, it's too delicious"

Honorable Mentions

Digimon World 3 I inherited this from a neighbor. Popped it in to admire the pixel art with the OSSC. The battle system is confusing, the FMVs are loltastic, but it has some surprisingly good music.

Hyper Light Drifter I really want to like this game more.

I love the music. And the art and atmosphere seriously gave me chills. Absolutely beautiful. But I just couldn't get into the combat: too visceral. I felt...almost dirty playing it. I understand that's kind of the point, but…

Maybe with time I'll get into it.

Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime Had a ball playing this at a work game night. Don't have many others to play with though.

Nuclear Throne Lol both Sam and I got the Humble Indie Bundle this year, so we both played lots of Nuclear Throne. Fun (3D glasses Eyes is my man), but a bit too stressful/addictive for me. Had to stop playing for my health.

Pokémon Black 2 I grabbed Black 2 as a birthday gift for myself (I did the same for White in 2015), and to tide me over until Pokémon Sun. To try and mix it up this time around, I played with only three Pokémon for the entirety of my run: an Ice Punch Weavile (bred in White), a Dewott, and a Growlithe. I only caught maybe another five. In the end, though, I didn't level enough and I ground to a halt at the seventh gym.

I think one of the many, many reasons I loved Pokémon Sun was that I dived in headfirst, catching Pokémon, playing minigames, getting invested. Guess I didn't do that as much with Black 2. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

That being said, Black 2 definitely has its moments. There's schweet music, and I still, still prefer the animated sprites to 3D models. (Some of the new Pokémon's models are great, but some are horrible.) Super satisfying to wreck newbs with a Ice Punch to the face. Just sadly overshadowed by Sun.***

Pokémon Emerald Lots of Pokémon on this list, huh? ;)

Got this along with a Game Boy Micro from my friend Cole. Similar with Black 2, I only used a party of four. Again, the music is top notch, and some great battle animations. Unfortunately petered out at Ever Grande City when I stopped taking the bus to/from work (my main time to play).

River City Ransom Lolololololol

Seriously, so silly and fun. Didn't play it much though (maybe an hour when Sam was in town).

* That much. ** Yes, I'm going to do this for the whole article. I don't care. tDR 4 LYFE *** See what I did there?!? ;)

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aion-rsa · 6 years

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Venom: Who is Carnage?

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OK, Venom fans, break out your Green Jelly tapes, because it's time to learn all about Carnage, Spider-Man's evil double's evil double.

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Gavin Jasper

Marvel

Oct 16, 2018

venom

Spider-Man

Carnage

All right, so, a few months ago, when Deadpool 2 came out, we did an article called Deadpool 2: Who is Juggernaut? People were pretty annoyed because Juggernaut’s role in that movie as a major antagonist wasn’t advertised and they cried spoiler. And that’s a fair call. Apologies.

That said, if you think it’s a spoiler that Carnage is in any way alluded to in Venom, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s Carnage. Of COURSE he’s going to be at least referenced in a Venom movie. The movie just used Carlton Drake and Riot. Venom doesn’t exactly have a Batman-level rogues gallery to play with and only one of his bad guys is important enough to get a red SNES cartridge.

So yeah, Carnage. He’s teased at the end of Venom. Read more on that in this look at the Venom post-credit sequences.

The only real surprise is that it’s taken this long for Carnage to be in a movie. With so many comic book movies out there, we’re running out of iconic villains who haven’t been featured. We’re down to Darkseid, Kang, and...I don’t know, Arcade?

Much like in the movies, Carnage’s first appearance in the comics was a quick teaser. While Spider-Man was busy dealing with Cardiac in Amazing Spider-Man #360 (by Davie Michelinie and Chris Marrinan), we got to see a one-page scene of a man named Gunny Stein returning home, only to be smothered by an attacker who admitted to killing him merely because he was looking through the phone book and found a suitably stupid name.

While he would appear in full in the following issue (Mark Bagley on art), the wheels towards Carnage’s creation came far earlier. When trying to kill Spider-Man, Venom ran afoul of Styx and Stone, a villain duo only really remembered for this very story. Styx, who has a death touch, touched the Venom symbiote and seemingly killed it. Eddie Brock was thrown in a regular prison and I would make a Bronson joke if I had actually gotten around to seeing that movie.

Venom returned to mess with Spider-Man again, only this time on an abandoned island. Spider-Man pretended to die in an explosion and Venom was all, “Sweet! Our to-do list is done! Let’s just squat on this island, where there are no TVs or newspapers to let us know that Spider-Man’s alive!”

That worked out great for everyone, but then the Carnage storyline kicked in and after a single fight against the new villain, Spider-Man decided that he needed Venom to fight with him. I enjoy a good hero/villain vs. bigger villain story as much as the next guy, but the intent to make it a Venom team-up was laughably blatant. How blatant?

Knowing that Venom was going to go into a violent frenzy, Spider-Man confronted him with Human Torch as backup. After all, fire is one of Venom’s weaknesses. Makes sense. Only, like, WHY DO YOU NOT JUST CUT OUT THE MIDDLE MAN AND JUST BRING HUMAN TORCH WITH YOU TO FIGHT CARNAGE? Hell, the dude has three friends who would be extremely helpful in catching the loud and obnoxious serial killer. He can’t be THAT hard to find.

further reading: Venom Comics Reading Order

There’s a quick line in the end about how bringing them in would make things more dangerous, but I have trouble accepting that truth when their replacement is an irrational mass murderer who will kill Spider-Man the first chance he gets.

But anyway, Spider-Man and Venom teamed up against Carnage a few times, got beat up despite the odds, then beat him by exploiting his sonics weakness. Then Spider-Man and Venom went back to fighting. A solid enough story, but not really all that memorable.

No, Carnage’s more memorable story would come a year later with Maximum Carnage. Actually, even that story wasn't all that memorable. I read it several times and I can barely give you the gist of what happened. Just that Carnage got himself his own personal Harley Quinn in Shriek, then created a short-lived supervillain team alongside Doppelganger, Demogoblin, and Carrion. Spider-Man and Venom teamed up again, only this time with a bunch of Marvel randos on their side like Morbius, Iron Fist, and Night Watch.

Stuff happened, Captain America being there was treated like a huge deal, and...man, whatever. All I know is that there was a seriously sweet panel where Venom was tearing off Carnage’s eyes.

The real reason anyone remembered the storyline was because of LJN’s video game Maximum Carnage for SNES and Genesis. Considered “good for an LJN game,” it allowed you to play as Spider-Man or Venom as you beat up extremely 90s street thugs and Carnage’s crew over and over again. Even being the final boss, you end up fighting Carnage a handful of times throughout.

further reading: Complete Guide to Marvel Easter Eggs in the Venom Movie

The game had a red cartridge and featured a soundtrack by Green Jelly (including their song “Carnage Rules”), so it had that going for it.

There was a sequel (technically a prequel) called Separation Anxiety, which was based on Venom: Lethal Protector. Since the arc didn’t have any major end boss threats, they just threw in Carnage as the final challenge because what the hell. They had the assets. Even the ending was just a picture of Carnage with zero epilogue. Again, Carnage had absolutely nothing to do with the story.

And so, Carnage continued to make comic appearances throughout the 90s. Inspired by the Maximum Carnage game, there was a silly Venom comic called Carnage Unleashed where Venom and Carnage fought inside the internet and it was somehow broadcast on the big screen in Times Square. Planet of the Symbiotes had Carnage become a giant after devouring and absorbing an untold amount of invading symbiotes. There was even a Spider-Man/Batman crossover where Carnage teamed up with Joker and then got punked out and made fun of for being a one-dimensional Joker knockoff.

Oh, and Batman beat him down with just his fists.

Speaking of DC crossovers, when they did the Amalgam Comics gimmick, Carnage was merged with Bizarro to become Bizarnage. The albino symbiote wanted to kill and replace Spider-Boy. Hey, at least he got representation. Nobody merged with Venom during that entire event.

further reading: The 15 Craziest Venom Moments in Marvel History

Carnage even got a couple animated appearances during this time. He showed up on Spider-Man: The Animated Series as a henchman of Dormammu where he wasn’t allowed to do anything remotely serial killer-y. He was fine, all things considered, but then things got real stupid once the show spun off into Spider-Man Unlimited.

Instead of that, I’ll talk about his appearance in the Spider-Man video game for the PlayStation, Nintendo 64, and Dreamcast. In the plot, Carnage and Doctor Octopus teamed up in hopes of taking over the world with a symbiote army. This led to the pants-shittingly terrifying final level where Spider-Man is chased out of a huge tower by Monster Ock – the Carnage symbiote on Ock’s body. He wasn’t really even a boss because even if you were wearing the Captain Universe costume that made you invincible, you couldn’t damage Monster Ock and if he caught up to you, you’d instantly die. You just had to swing away until you were saved by a cutscene.

further reading: The Many Characters Who Wore the Venom Symbiote

The 90s ended and so began the era of being embarrassed by things that happened in the 90s. While we did get a Venom vs. Carnage miniseries that mainly acted as a launch pad for the Carnage symbiote’s spawn Toxin (it didn’t take), Carnage was soon taken off the board. In the pages of New Avengers, Brian Michael Bendis had the Sentry show off how OP he was by grabbing Carnage, slamming him through several prison ceilings, flying him into space, and tearing him in half.

Mac Gargan Venom was a thing around that time anyway, so we already had a 100% evil symbiote guy creeping around.

After 5-6 years, Carnage finally came back in a miniseries simply called Carnage by Zeb Wells and Clayton Crane. It was originally going to be called Astonishing Spider-Man and Iron Man, but marketing realized that putting Carnage front and center would probably sell better. It revealed that Carnage survived the Sentry’s stunt and Cletus was kept alive by a corrupt prosthetics developer who gave him metal legs in exchange for using his symbiote to enhance his prosthetics technology.

It all went horribly wrong and created another Carnage offspring in Scorn. She also did not take.

There was a sequel called Carnage USA by the same creative team and I absolutely recommend it. Seemingly building up to some symbiote-related event comic that never came to be (Rick Remender’s Venom was also guilty of this), the comic had to do with Carnage expanding to the point that he was able to take over an entire town in Colorado, along with Captain America, Wolverine, Thing, and Hawkeye.

further reading: Venom Deleted Scenes Revealed

This led to a lot of cool shit, including a Venom gorilla being chased by a Carnage-controlled stampede of escaped zoo animals, Venom’s Life Foundation children being used as military weapons, and a legless fight between Flash Thompson and Cletus Kasady. Oh, and the hilarious revelation that Hawkeye fucking HATES Ben Grimm and thinks all of his shtick is old and tired.

Starting with the ho-hum yet cleverly named Minimum Carnage, Carnage started showing up in more stories with different creative teams forgetting that he was supposed to be missing his bottom half. He ended up in a really fun miniseries called Deadpool vs. Carnage where Deadpool was able to defeat Carnage in a way Spider-Man and Venom could not by shattering his confidence and breaking his spirit.

This led to Carnage’s extremely fun turn in Axis, otherwise known as that event Marvel did where the good guys became bad guys and vice versa. Through magic mixed with psychic suggestion, Carnage was briefly driven to become a hero, but he didn’t exactly have a full grasp on what that meant. Him trying to punch a woman in the face just hard enough to knock her out but not crack her head, followed by boasting about a job well done was entertaining as hell.

further reading: The 20 Year Quest to Make a Venom Movie

Carnage then had a short-lived ongoing written by Gerry Conway with a story about a cult worshipping Carnage because he’d unleash some kind of Lovecraftian god or whatnot. All the while, a task force was put together to stop him. This was partially an exercise in removing the Toxin and Scorn symbiotes while setting up Eddie Brock’s return to being Venom.

Over the years, the Carnage symbiote has possessed many hosts other than Cletus. There was Ben Reilly, Silver Surfer, an alternate universe Spider-Man, the Wizard, and so on. Its most high-profile instance was Norman Osborn, making him the final end boss of Dan Slott’s very lengthy run on Amazing Spider-Man. As the Red Goblin, Osborn was powerful enough that Spider-Man reluctantly took up Eddie Brock’s offer to borrow the Venom symbiote.

As for Cletus, he’s back floating in space in pieces thanks to the events of Venomized. Long story.

Even though Carnage only made a quick film appearance just recently, he’s reached one height that not even the likes of Thanos have ever hit: Carnage was on Broadway. Back in 2011, the butt of jokes everywhere was Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, known for its immense budget, laundry list of performer injuries, and iffy take on the source material. So iffy that there are two versions of the show that existed. There’s Julie Taymor’s fever dream original and the more coherent second attempt.

further reading: Venom Director Wanted to Honor the Comics

I was lucky enough to see the former in all of its ridiculous glory.

Carnage appeared as a member of the Green Goblin’s Sinister Six alongside Kraven the Hunter, the Lizard, Electro, Swarm, and original character Swiss Miss. Yes, that’s seven characters. Just let it go. Carnage ended up being the best looking of the villains, since most others came off as looking like goofy sports mascots. He didn’t really do anything, but he was immortalized in this cringeworthy David Letterman performance.

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...did Osborn suggest Kraven is into bestiality?

Gavin Jasper writes for Den of Geek and still can’t believe Carnage never showed up in a single Capcom Marvel game. Read more of Gavin’s stuff here and follow him on Twitter @Gavin4L

Read and download the Den of Geek NYCC 2018 Special Edition Magazine right here!

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