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albino-whumpee · 3 years

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The Master´s party

A little teaser for you.

A grin quirked the man´s lips up when he held his chin in a bruising grip. Sann let out a pathetic yelp as the man pulled his face closer to his.

“You´re an awful liar”

(This one´s long, just heads up for that and just so you know what Albus is taking about at the end, read Of secrets and memories )

This is a series, here´s the Masterlist

Taglist: @castielamigos-whump-side-blog @giggly-evil-puppy @cowboysrappin @haro-whumps @burtlederp @neuro-whump @comfortforthepain @whumps-the-word @whole-and-apart-and-between @broken-horn @ashintheairlikesnow @rosesareviolentlyread @starnight-whump @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @as-a-matter-of-whump @whumpasaurus101 @grizzlie70 @twistedcaretaker

TW// Dehumanization, slavery, all the box boy jazz, past abuse, shock collars, defiant whumpee, torture, past abuse, conditioning, anxiety, desrealization, humilliation and dissoci@tion.

The invitation came in a golden envelope.

Albus silently waited for Zarai to read it. He didn´t expect her face to turn from taciturn to horror in the split of a second.

“Absolutely not” she shouted, taking her phone and furiously typing a number as she walked to the studio. Albus glanced at Momo who meowed to be fed.

He was petting the cat while it ate, when he saw Zarai steaming from rage and straightened up in instinct, bracing for a hit that never came.

Zarai let out a loud groan before putting her phone back on the table with a slam that made Albus jump. Slowly his muscles relaxed as he watched the woman rub her temples. He waited a second, just to be sure.

“I can’t believe it. They’re nuts!” She shot her hands up suddenly “Uniform etiquette? That’s- I don’t even know where to start on how wrong that is!” She continued before exhaling a loud, long sigh.

Albus extended her coffee and gulped when he saw her drink it in one go. “I-Is there something wrong with mistress Heleba’s party, ma’am?” He ventured, catching her attention and glad it didn´t come off as misbehaving. She had simply let her chin rest on her hand as she stared at the envelope.

“They want pets to attend the party with uniforms”

Albus frowned. Wasn´t that normal?

“Would ma´am prefer me to stay then?” he tried, picking up the cup to clean it. He knew she wasn´t exactly a fan of pets in the first place, but her discomfort was aimed more at their owners, so a party with too many of them around? He could smell her complaints from miles.

Albus was surprised to hear her sigh instead.

“No, I need you there. I wanted you to meet other potential clients and the agencies we will form partnership bonds with in the future. Especially Dune´s executives, but…” she tapped the envelope with bottled anger. His eyes drifted down to the letter.

“Pets are required to use shock collars as uniform etiquette and security measures to our dear guests”

The man at the party´s reception told Zarai as Albus lifted his chin. The man´s partner putting the leather white collar on Zarai´s hand, as the other checked the electrodes against his neck.

Ah, what a familiar sensation, he thought to himself.

“Is it really necessary? He´s not dangerous…” She asked putting the leather collar on her purse with a deep frown on her face.

“Orders from above ma’am” the security guard limited himself to answer.

Zarai whipped her head back at the boy when she heard the buckles click. His hands twitched but he clasped them tightly over his lap, directing a small smile at his owner.

“It´s fine ma´am. Is just a security measure” he said, but a lump formed on his throat when he saw the remote. Squeezing his wrists tight, he held back the impulse to take the collar off himself.

“This button allows you control the intensity and this one is to make it shoot the electricity. Like this” It was already on the lowest voltage so when the man pressed the button, the collar’s box little LED lights turned red for a second as a short wheeze was forced out of Albus.

You forced me to do this 778900. You keep trying to run off somewhere… Don’t be so impatient. Someone will buy you, eventually. This is for your own good.

Zarai yanked the remote from the man “Enough!” He stared at her in confusion as Albus caught his breath. “There was no need for a demonstration” she shot a glare at the man who offered an apologetic smile before she walked away, dragging the boy with her by the arm. “C’mon, Claude will be waiting inside” she whispered, not expecting to not hear a reply. She stopped a few steps away, noticing Albus trembling figure. She looked around the sea of people and dragged both to a small spot besides the pet’s bathroom.

“Can…can you lift your neck Albus?” The boy complied without fighting. Almost robotically. He blinked surprised, however, when he felt her fingers searching for something on his neck. “There” she said with a triumphant click. “They never said anything about it being on” she said, putting the remote into his own hands “I don´t have a use for this. Keep it hidden for me, would you?” she smiled.

Albus eyes softened as he clenched his hand on the remote. “Thank you ma’am”.

Zarai recomposed after giving him a short squeeze on the shoulder “Let´s go. I don´t want to be here more than necessary. Oh, Claude!” she said, calling the doctor talking with some businesswoman and waving at him as Albus hid the remote on his coat´s pocket.

—-

“Mister Serra! I-I didn´t know” some of the guests told him upon seeing the collar on his neck. He was glad none of the people he considered close was there to see him sport the tag he had tried so very hard to keep hidden.

“I apologize for the confusion” he would say in a bow.

“A pet that can read and work, quite unheard of” a man with a funny mustache said reflexively. Albus recognized him from the archives Zarai had made him memorize about the party´s guests. The vice-president of the adjacent company of the many, Rupert Glass owned. “Pretty interesting tactic from Miss Montenegro to keep your status hidden. Never understood her very well… I might try buy one like you. Normal pets are mostly just for show and I want one that can be useful” he said brushing Albus from head to toe. The boy knew better than to keep his eyes at the same level and shyly let down his gaze.

He wished they could go back home soon.

Even if Zarai treated him well, for most of the attendants he was at the same level of importance as the fine glass on their hands.

A luxury they could afford to break.

They only didn´t because it wasn´t theirs. He, wasn´t theirs. It would be rude if they injured or broke someone else´s property. But they didn´t shy from dragging around by a leash their half-naked, bruised pets.

Some of their eyes nailed on him with anger, but quickly lifted up at their owners pull on their necks.

Albus could still feel the glares the other pets shot at him and tilted his head only to catch a glimpse of light brown hair. Sann was wearing a tuxedo with a white rose on his chest. But as soon as he spotted him, Sann disappeared into the sea of people taking Albus´ breath with him. “I…It has been a pleasure to meet you Mister Darcy, but I must attend some…matters. Miss Zarai gives you her greeting and wishes you good health” he said, offering his hand to stretch. The older man only gave it a look before wrinkling his nose.

“I don´t handshake pets” he said. Albus backed his hand slowly.

“Excuse me. Thank you for your time, sir” he bowed as he had learnt back on the facility before he dismissed him with a flick of his hand.

He quickly walked away to scan the crowd, not finding the freckled boy among them. He tried searching by the special drink fountain for pets in the back, next to the bathrooms. It only served water and tasteless crackers. A clear contrast with the tables overflowing with delicious looking pastries and varied choices of drinks for their masters. But he wasn´t there or at tables, laying his head on Robert´s knees either.

The man sat with another man, carding his fingers through a shivering girl´s hair sitting by his knees with a charming smile on. Albus backed away slowly when the girl convulsed forward and the man next to Robert laughed along him.

He thought maybe he had imagined him, when he felt a tug on his neck.

“Hey, this one´s collar´s turned off” a man with a security uniform told his partner. The man tightened his grip around Albus´ wrist

“What? Did it turn it off?” the man harshly made Albus whip his head to a side. A whimper escaped his lungs. “Ugh, delicate pet alert” He slapped him repeatedly “Did you turn off your collar? Thought you could get away with it? Do you want us to tell your owner what you did? Hm?”

“N-No, no sir” Albus heaved as both men laughed like jackals “Please, let me explain-Ah!” The man holding him twisted his arms to his back.

“Stay, boy, stay. Don´t make us hurt you more than necessary” He yanked his head up so his partner had free way to the collar. He heard it click on again “What a good boy” he cooed, wrapping a zip tie around his wrists “We can´t let this slip, though. We got to tell your owner” he said, holding his head down by the neck and forcing him to walk.

The man roughly shoved him to his knees besides the guard station, a few steps away from the entrance. His breathing got shallow as his eyes darted through the crowd trying to find the familiar black long hair and the blue suit of her partner.

He saw the man talking to the microphone to announce him as if he was a lost child on a supermarket. No. It was more similar to the announcement of a lost wallet.

People stared at him with indignation. Pets stared with apologetic looks before they clung to their master´s arms.

He pulled his knees closer to his chest.

It was like he was back at the facility. Being disciplined in front of other trainees because his handlers were getting bored of him. Getting pushed to the front at the smallest inconvenience to make an example out of him to encourage the others to follow every order their handlers gave them through his own tearing screams.

He felt hands on his shoulders and jerked back so hard he banged his head against the wall.

“It´s me Albus, I´m sorry for scaring you” Zarai said, helping him up as a few spots invaded his sight “Didn´t expect this to happen…I´m sorry” she whispered as he felt the release of the zip tie on his wrists. He rubbed his bruising wrists, which infuriated the woman. “What´s the meaning of this?” She yelled at the guards.

One of them sighed “Ma´am, this is just standard procedure. It shouldn´t leave marks. Maybe albinos bruise too easily”

Albus heard those words and his brain turned off.

Everything was below a thick curtain of fog, the sounds were slurred and his limbs moved involuntarily. It was like living a dream. Was he actually awake? He didn´t know.

He felt his legs walk, his mouth speak and his hand write as Zarai talked. But he wasn´t sure if it was real. He wasn´t sure if the people around him were really there.

Their voices sounded as if they were underwater. Unclear and foggy. A fog, thick as a veil covered the world around him as he walked. After a while, he suddenly found himself leaning against a wall. Just hearing the noise of conversations on the distance, when he allowed himself to wrap his arms around his knees on the floor of a balcony.

He tried to pull air into his suddenly too tight chest.

He hated it.

He hated not knowing why exactly those words put him off like that. Having the feeling he hated to hear it in a certain specific voice. He hated the laughter inside his head that filled his senses. He buried his head in his arms.

“Fuck off” he hissed, not expecting to feel a hand on his back.

He jumped up when he saw Sann on his tuxedo, letting out a lame squeak that made the other grin.

The boy stood up “Sorry…” Sann signed with a frown, his hands twitching in front of his chest as if wanting to say something else but not knowing how, he only stared at him.

Albus waited, just in case, before he looked away and set his eyes on the city “Don´t be, you just surprised me” He opened his mouth and then closed it with a sigh “I´m sorry… Just...give me a second” he said, biting his lip when Sann held his hand.

He brushed his thumbs against his pale hand as if saying “It´s ok, just breathe”

Albus made his lips a fine line before letting it out.

“I might always say hello with food, but you always try to hold my hand” he said in a half giggle, squeezing on Sann´s hand slightly tighter. A smile came to his face and somehow, couldn´t shake it away.

“…Can we stay like this for a bit?” he asked, feeling the fog on his head dissipate slowly.

“Yes” Sann signed before curling his fingers around Albus´ hand.

Albus looked above at the night sky feeling the warmth of the boy´s hand leak into his before he took a deep breath. Despite the sound of the party inside where most likely Zarai was searching for him, it melted with the usual sounds of the city and the rumble of the sea in the distance. He let out his breath slowly, calm settling on his chest.

He wondered since when he had started to feel that way around the other boy. The other pet looked at the cars below with a little smile hanging on his lips. His hair was mussed up, pulled back in a way that framed his face and made his features pop. The sleek attire with the rose delicately set on his chest, was a look that couldn´t be ruined even by the shock collar on his neck intermittently lighting up.

“You look stunning” the words rolled out of his mouth and didn´t notice he had said it out loud until Sann turned to him with wide eyes. He pulled his free hand to his chin to sign a thank you with an even wider smile.

“You. Too” Sann signed as the albino felt his cheeks burn and tried to hide it by fixing his glasses. He squinted when he noticed something about his hand.

“What´s this?” he asked, fishing Sann´s hand and inspecting the new pink circles around his knuckles. Cigarette burns, he identified bitterly. “What happened? A punishment?” His tone urgent as he lifted his eyes and found Sann´s smile had ran away from his face.

He shook his head.

“No? Then why…” Albus asked as Sann pulled his hand away to lean on the balcony, watching the traffic below with a lost gaze and hiding the injured hand. Albus joined him a second later “…just because?” Sann nodded with a shrug that pulled a string on his heart. Albus wondered if that was normal treatment for Sann and felt a sting of guilt.

It was a possibility to end up with an owner like that, the handlers had told them as much enough times, but Sann deserved someone better as owner. He deserved to be able to smile without fear of not looking pretty and eager enough to avoid being hurt.

The thoughts raced through his head before being interrupted when Sann looked up at the fireworks popping in the distance, putting that beautiful smile on his face yet again. He turned to him and finding his worried frown, his gray eyes softened.

He moved his hands up to sign, but then had second thoughts and simply smiled with slightly worried eyebrows.

“I´ll be fine” Albus could almost hear him say as he pointed his head at the fireworks.

As Albus watched the show of colors a dread began to grown in his heart. He was to act as a person, but that didn´t change he was a Pet. Just like Sann and the many others inside. They looked at him with envy and resentment, but Sann...Sann didn´t. Despite the scars on his neck and the rest of his body; the sadness behind his eyes, he still would let him hold his hand and smile at fireworks. The pleasant memories of his time with Zarai began to pop into his mind like the blue and yellow and red lights shining in the night sky.

How could he even change that for him if he couldn´t be free from it himself?

Albus felt Sann tap on his shoulder and he turned, only to find him smiling at him holding the rose of his chest and gently put it on him. He blinked perplexed at the rose, now on his chest, before his eyes found him shrugging playfully.

“Gift. For you” Sann signed as he watched Albus take out his small notebook and pen and extend it for him. It took him a second, but Sann pulled it up so Albus could read it.

“My Master can be very explosive, but he´s a man of his word. He promised me he would give me a bouquet of roses if I could stand the burns…“ Albus eyes widened in horror before Sann smiled again and tapped on the note, urging him to continue “I only got one flower, but do you like it?”

Albus was speechless for a long moment that made Sann tense up and shrink into his shoulders. Albus hand gently guided him to look at him again.

“I love it” he said as Sann´s face lit up “But, the best gift you can give me is your smile” at that, Sann´s cheeks flared up. “S-So, please, don´t do something like that for me ever again. Please...” Sann was stunned by his words and only could looked down as Albus let down his hand and Sann noticed the wild blush expanding on the albino´s cheeks, right before he felt a shock on his neck.

Sann wheezed, bent over the balcony, before he felt yet another shock. As he gasped for air, Sann worried if his Master was hidden in the shadows. The terror of it being true made him step forward, a primal fear screaming at him to rush to his side.

“Wait!” Albus caught his wrist before he could run off. Sann stared at him for a second, heart drumming loudly in fear, agitated, so much more than the composure the albino put as front to his worry as he looked up at him could calm him. Ruby eyes full of determination nailed on him through long, white eyelashes. “Before you go, can I give you a kiss?”

Sann was thrown off the loop and glared back inside, darting his eyes through the crowd in fear of another shock, but when he felt Albus hand on his, his heart eased.

He asked.

He asked a toy like him who couldn´t say no.

Sann returned the squeeze and took one step closer. His hands were small and thin, a bit rough around the edges but so soft. Sann looked at his lips and waited for them to seal with his, but to his surprise, Albus pulled his hand and pressed his lips into his knuckles.

It was a light kiss. Soft and soothing, Sann´s heart melted when he didn´t step closer to kiss him somewhere else and instead only saw Albus pull away.

“See you later”

Sann stared at him for a moment, longing for more, but as Albus let go whispering, “Take care” he knew he couldn´t be greedy. He had to hang on to it until there was a chance they could meet again.

His Master glared at him when he came running to kneel besides him and then tugged on his collar, lifting his chin up as he checked his chest pocket and found it empty. He gripped on either side of his cheeks and pressed just enough on his throat with a severe look on his eyes that made Sann recoil before he clipped his leash to his collar and took him outside.

Sann slowed down when they passed through the security line to return the shock collar, but when the man only tugged on it for him to keep walking, he knew the collar would stay on that night.

When the man opened the trunk for him to crawl and sit on, he saw something grim shine on his eyes.

“Where did your rose go?” the man asked, stroking Sann´s cheek. “Did he like it?”

For the split of a second Sann stopped knowing how to breathe, but the next he was leaning into the man´s hand, shaking his head and then tilting it as if he didn´t understand the question.

A grin quirked the man´s lips

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allykakamatsu · 3 years

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Danganronpa V3 Smash Bros Tournament!

•Monokuma decides a good way to get everyone to kill each other is a Smash Bros Tournament, I mean, with all the salt someone’s bound to snap.

•No one kills each other, aside from Maki attempting to kill Kokichi, but it does become a weekly tradition despite the rage.

Kaede Akamatsu

• Get’s into a heated debate over who gets to main Rosalina with Kaito, but after a bit she caved and agreed to pick someone else.

•She end’s up picking Peach after Tsumugi makes a comment that they kinda look alike.

•Little did anyone know that Kaede is actually kinda a monster with Peach and frequently does really well in the tournaments.

•Favourite stage is New Donk city, and every time she gets to play on it she sings Jump up Superstar the entire match.

•Nobody is sure if they love or hate it.

•When not singing, she’ll make the stage music anything that has a dominant Piano.

•Favourite item is the Star Rod

Shuichi Saihara

• Acts like he’s never played before and decides to main Chrom due to him seeing easy enough to play and liking his personality.

•In actuality has played on and off for years and is a proud Dedede main but is too embarrassed to admit it.

•Also plays Pikachu but cause it’s Miu’s main he doesn’t usually use the electric mouse.

•Usually middle of the road in the tournaments.

•Prefers to fight on Battlefield but so long as the stage doesn’t move he can live with anything.

•Likes to keep items off.

Rantaro Amami:

•Good with all three Link forms, but has a bias for Toon Link.

•Can’t remember when he started playing, but given how he’s the only one who doesn’t panic by tripping they assume it’s Brawl.

•They also assume this because whenever someone picks Meta Knight he gets visibly distressed.

•Tournament wise he Can either do really well or really s**t depending on the day.

•Doesn’t have a favourite stage but tends to pick the Zelda stages cause he likes them the best.

•The only one who’s happy when a warp star shows up.

Ryoma Hoshi:

•At first played Incineroar cause its the only cat.

•After realising how bad his recovery was though, he kinda just tried anything to see what would work.

•Found a few semi-mains, namely Snake, Link and Villager

•Usually doesn‘t try to hard in tournaments so comes in last, or will even sit out, but when he wants to win, he will.

•Moral of the story, if he picks Villager, panic.

•No stage or item preference, but when it’s his turn to pick he tends to go with Shadow Moses island cause he likes the look.

Kirumi Tojo

•Mains everyone and is good with all of them.

•Like, can beat Mario with Little Mac good.

•Does have a slight preference towards Shiek though due to her admiring the ninja’s loyalty.

•Due to her skills, she tends to sit out with Ryoma to give everyone a chance.

•When she does play though, well, try not to loose too fast.

•Also usually the one who has to stop Maki killing Kokichi if he beats her.

•Always goes random when stage picking time comes, but also puts all the stages in battlefield mode in case it lands on something BS.

•For similar reasons tries to ignore items

Angie Yonaga

•Everyone expected her to pick Palutena, and while she does have her as a sub main, Angie usually plays Sephiroth. •Why? Angel (kinda), kick ass theme, and loves watching the others panic when they see him. Plus, Atua told her to pick someone unexpected.

•Also tried Pit and Dark Pit, and while she likes their personalities she isn’t big on their gameplay.

•To this day the only one who’s beat Kirumi in a match, and outside of that time she’s still good in tournaments.

•Atua told Angie to pick Big Blue one day, and ever since everyone dreads her turn on stage select.

Tenko Chabishira

• Always plays as a girl no matter what.

•Plays Min Min more often than not, but occasionally surprises everyone by whipping out villager.

•Why? “She’s Himiko cute!!”

•Pretty good at the game, but super competitive. Unless you’re Himiko, be prepared to get yelled at at least once if she looses.

•One day while everyone was playing random, she got Ken and kinda hated that she likes it so she occasionally plays him in private. •Shuichi caught her doing this while he was playing Dedede, and they both promised to never tell a soul.

•Punch Out stage or bust!

•Doesn’t have an opinion on items, but when she plays villager she hopes for the bunny hood cause she thinks it’s adorable.

Korekiyo Shinguji

•Lucario or bust (he likes the aura theme) though he’s also kinda a monster with Lucina

•Strangely though, whenever he uses Lucina he acts... different? (the class is convinced he’s possessed when this happens.)

•Outside of that though, tends to be one of the worse players.

•Second to none at recovery though.

•Hyrule castle has been his favourite stage since day one And that’s never gonna change.

•Always has items on, he likes the surprise factor (he and Shuichi are never allowed have a one on one fight)

Miu Iruma

•Has probably been playing the longest aside from Kirumi.

•Has played all the games, and cause Of this is decent with all of the OG 8, but will always pick Pikachu.

•Will only ever pick someone else if it’s a random match or someone makes her give Shuichi a turn, and in that case she picks Pichu as a backup.

•Despite her boasting, is usually in the lower end of the group.

•Doesn’t stop her from rubbing it in when she wins though.

•Tends to go for Wily’s castle for her stage, if for no other reason than she’s the only one who can handle the yellow devil.

•Super Hammer or bust!

Gonta Gokuhara

•Likes Donkey Kong the best, but also tries to learn how to play Joker from Kokichi cause he looks like a gentleman.

•Also likes all the Pokémon even if he isn’t the best with them.

•Honestly, aside from Olimar he likes everyone, and he only really dislikes Olimar cause he’s bullying the bugs!

•Everyone agrees to never touch the pikmin rep when he’s in the room.

•Tends to come in last with the only one he can beat kinda consistently is Ryoma without villager, but he still has a lot of fun.

•Tends to pick whatever stage everyone likes best, and has no clue how to use items.

Kokichi Ouma

•Always plays Joker because who else is a phantom thief going to pick.

•Actually he plays Villager in his spare time but Kaito is the only that knows and that was a mistake so shh.....

•Begrudgingly teaches Gonta how to play, if only from the horror on someone’s face when they get cocky only to loose to the guy who didn’t even know what a Smash Bros was a few weeks ago.

•Peak troll. Camps with gun, let’s people *cough* Kaito and Miu *cough* Hit fake smash balls, always picks the auto scrolling stages, he just loves making everyone groan.

•Only thing that makes him visibly salty is Miu on stage select cause f**k yellow devil.

Kaito Momota

•A proud Rosalina main. A badass space princess that protects the stars, what’s not to love?

•First time they all play, they all expect him to suck..... so you can imagine their surprise he‘a one of the best players in the class, especially at edge guard

•Despite that, is the most susceptible to stage hazards and bad items, especially fake smash balls. He has gotten better at recovering from them though.

•Never asks anyone to turn them off though, cause it’s worth it for the black hole and the assist trophies.

•Whenever Kiyo plays Lucina, he makes sure to sit at the other end of the couch.

•Always tries to give people pointers, though since he really only plays one character he’s not the best at it.

•Will ALWAYS pick either the Mario Galaxy stage or the Star Fox stages

Tsumugi Shirogane

•Tends to pick Kirby for A, the cute hats, and B, it gives her an excuse to rant about the lore. You know those Kirby fans who obnoxiously push how the series is super deep? That’s Tsumugi.

•Rants the whole match, leading to people preferring Kokichi obnoxiously joining in on Kaede’s singing to it. •Knowing they’re not safe when she’s not playing either, they all agree that unless it’s random’s to never pick a Kirby stage or character (another reason for Shuichi to hide being a Dedede main)

•She’ll occasionally rant about other series too, but Kirby is the biggest example.

•Despite this, she’s actually a pretty good player, even if she can be a bit to sadistic with down special sometimes.

Kiibo

•Refuses to touch ROB or MegaMan to avoid falling into the stereotype of the robot playing the robots.

•Instead picks Pyra and Mythra cause they’re great characters with a bit of computer theme that only Tsumugi knows about mercifully hasn’t ranted on yet.

•Plays very predictably, but just because you know a Lightning Buster- Prominence Revolt is coming doesn't mean blocking it is easier.

•As such is usually in the middle of the pack tournament wise. •Refuses to use side B as Pyra because one time he did and Kokichi did a stupid combo which took him from 30% to death so he’s not taking any chances again.

•Tends to put The stage on random, which he occasionally regrets if he rolls a side scroller.

Himiko Yumeno:

•Mains ALL the magic users. •Robin, Zelda, Hero, Sephiroth, so long as they have a big focus on magic she’s all in.

•Tends to use Hero the most, specifically Eight, because she likes the MP gauge.

•Despite seemingly never practicing and only doing okay with most moves, is the fastest thing in the freaking world at picking the right spell. If she gets magic burst or Kamikaze, prepare to die.

•Everyone assumes she’s probably played Dragon Quest cause of this, but she hasn’t confirmed and just chalks her skill up to magic.

•The only one who can make Tenko stop raging.

•Keeping with the theme, will usually pick the World Tree stage.

Maki Harukawa

•Messed around with everyone a bit but was only super good as Zero Suit Samus.

•Even then she’s mostly middle of the pack, but she doesn’t mind too much.

•Unless she looses to Kokichi, then it’s a struggle for Kaito and Kirumi to stop her from killing him.

•Tends to handle snacks cause Kirumi has to be in the room to keep order and she usually gets knocked out early. •The most frequent subject of Kaito’s tips, which range from helpful to ”Kaito I don’t have a f**king Luma”

•Tends to pick Shadow Moses island cause she likes the look, and though she won’t tell anyone she loves the music

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thanksjro · 4 years

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More Than Meets the Eye #22- If You Don’t Love Thunderclash, Get Better Soon I Guess

One last issue before we reach Comic Event Hell.

Time to use a dead man to set up the rest of the nonsense that’s got to happen, because apparently 14 issues of setup, including six issues of literal prelude, wasn’t enough.

The first bit of information we’re presented with is the fact that Chromedome and Swerve are on the opposite sides of the camera-shy scale. I guess that’s bound to happen when your spouse has had his video-cam literally connected to his brain for at least several thousand years.

The art may look really gritty and hardcore here, but this is actually due to a filter Rewind has over all his footage that he’s neglected to take off, because it made all the wartime propaganda he would stuff into people’s heads all the more brutal-looking.

No, this is the style of our artist for this issue, James Raiz, who we’ll be seeing a fair bit of over the next several issues. Raiz has worked on the Transformers franchise over the course of multiple license-holders, as well as contributed to both Marvel and DC comics. He also works in special effects, including matte painting and VFX. That’s just neat.

Anyway, the reason Swerve’s completely frozen in place isn’t because Rewind switched out his head-mounted camera for a gun that goes off if it hears you make a self-deprecating joke, but rather because he’s conducting interviews with everyone in the main cast. We get all their introductions, Cyclonus makes a statement about his political stances, Drift sounds like he’s high as a kite, First Aid strikes a sassy pose while not being bitter in the slightest, and Ultra Magnus makes a move that would get him murdered on any given film set in the universe.

You do NOT use your bare fucking hand to clean a camera lens, mister. Go get a microfiber cloth and try the fuck again, you complete and utter duffel bag of a creature.

We get a quick cut of the speech Rodimus made back in issue #1, with an angle that implies that Rewind was in the front row of the front row, then cut over to Rodimus asking Rewind to document their Capital-Q Quest. This is where we establish that this film doesn’t only contain footage from Rewind’s personal camera, but also that of the Lost Light’s security system.

Which feels like the sort of access you maybe wouldn’t want to give some nosy little film buff, especially when you have a secret giant serial killing sadist living in your basement like a disappointing adult child.

See? He was given the job to record the adventures of the Lost Light not five minutes ago, and he’s already using his powers for evil. Eavesdropping evil. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, Rodimus, and you just handed it to the guy with a massive Dominus Ambus-shaped chip on his shoulder.

So Rewind’s got permission to film just about whatever he wants, and Rodimus figures it’ll be nonstop action from here to the finish line! Fights! Intrigue! Mild hijinks and peril! Explosions aplomb! Oh man, I can’t wait to see what kinds of crazy shit will happen on this absolute roller coaster of a Quest!

Smashcut to Swerve literally falling asleep in the middle of a conversation. Yeah, as it turns out, no quest, capital Q or not, is nonstop action. Which is good, honestly, because that kind of seems like it would be exhausting after the first week or so.

Swerve, Tailgate, and Rewind are discussing cool alt-modes, which seems like an odd topic, seeing as Tailgate and Swerve have basically the same situation going on there, leaving Rewind alone in the camp of “does not have wheels”.

I worry about you sometimes, Rewind. Internalized Functionism is a very real problem. Uh, well, in your universe anyway. Us humans have to deal with regular ol’ classism and racism.

Rung gets brought up, and it’s revealed that the wheel on his back is almost purely cosmetic; it doesn’t even actually attach to his body. The lads decide that they’ve got nothing better to do, and set up a gentlemen’s wager- first one to figure out Rung’s whole deal gets 100 space-dollars.

Throwing shit at people’s heads will be a major plot point in the climax of this comic series.

Swerve’s go at trying to win the bet involved tossing a grenade at Rung to hit him in the neural cluster, which is rumored to be able to force an involuntary mode change if done correctly. Obviously, it didn’t work this go around. Then our narrative focus switches over to the crew’s hobbies.

You were listening to Prince, weren’t you, Magnus? Not even deep space is safe from the Cease and Desist.

Skids’ hobby is meeting new people, because he suffers from the terrible curse of being so fucking good at everything he tries, he always ends up dropping whatever he picked up, because what’s the point? This acts as a segue into another flashback, to even MORE bullshit that the fellas got roped into on Hedonia.

These are the Stentarians. They’re like the Cybertronians, if they were better in every way.

And by “better”, I, of course, mean “more bloodthirsty, warmongering, and driven enough to make their civil war last about as long as the Jurassic Period”. Also, they’re all combiners by default, and Whirl seems a little TOO into their whole situation. So much so, in fact, that when the Imperial Guard of their race show up to kill them, he decides to do them a solid by single-handedly ending their entire war.

You know, in most cases you’re supposed to show and not tell for visual media. This is way funnier, though, so it can be excused.

We jump back into the interviews, and Rewind’s just asked everyone if they’re happy. This might seem like an odd question, until you remember that everyone on-board this ship has crippling depression and PTSD, and Rewind’s married to one of the saddest motherfuckers to ever exist, so he probably has this question loaded into the proverbial chamber at any given moment. We won’t cover all of the answers here, because they’ll be more poignant to reflect back on later in the comic run, but let’s take a gander at the characters who’ve completed the first leg of their character arcs this season.

Drift, is that perhaps… an honest expression of your inner thought processes happening right there? Has Rewind broken through your carefully crafted persona, if even for just a moment, with his question? Perish the thought!

Because Tailgate outed himself as being baby in issue #21, I have zero doubt he’s not exaggerating here. He was a janitor, then he fell in a hole and became Dirt-Nap Supreme for six million years; even the most boring day on the Lost Light’s got to be better than that.

And it’s nice to see Chromedome on a good day for once. Hopefully he reveled in it while he had the chance, because this interview takes place maybe a couple weeks before he fucks everything up big time and has to blow up his husband with a missile strike.

Getting back to the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode plotline, we see Rung using his backpack as a wheelbarrow- no idea what he’s actually pushing in the damned thing- and wearing the most disgruntled face I’ve seen him pull in a hot minute. Someone yells for him to come down the eerily unlit and sinister-looking hallway, which he does. Rung would not do well in a horror film.

He winds up at Swerve’s, where Tailgate, Swerve, Brainstorm, and someone who is most likely Trailcutter, given the colors, are hanging out in their alt-modes. Tailgate’s ploy to find out Rung’s deal is to do what he does best- lie! They’re having an alt-mode party, and wouldn’t Rung like to join in? There are, of course, logistical issues with being a car in a bar, especially when your drink is on the table and your head is tucked up somewhere in your torso, but never mind all that! Let’s get crazy!

This doesn’t work either. Maybe we should cut out the middle man here and just get Rung drunk enough to agree to a wet alt-mode contest.

No, I don’t have any idea how that would work.

In our next vignette, Rodimus comes into the comms room, Rewind trailing behind him like a grim shadow of death, to see what the hell Blaster wants, other than just the hugest glass of water.

Raiz’s work is very detailed, and you really feel the weight of these giant metal space robots, but everyone looks like they’ve been put through a food dehydrator.

We get a lot of build up to the character who’s about to be introduced, with a common opinion being shared amongst everyone- even Tailgate, who hates successful people like his life depends on it.

Lovely readers, put your hands together for the ideal male partner for Autobots, Decepticons, and Neutrals alike:

A man with so much charisma and charm that only Rodimus could hate him, Thuderclash brings to IDW what everyone wishes Optimus Prime would, making our disappointing space dad even more mediocre by comparison. He fights for justice, and freedom, and the good of the universe- and he does it all while having a chronic medical condition that forces him to stay within a certain distance of his ship that is also a life-support machine, otherwise he will die. Despite his handicaps, Thunderclash seemingly brings to others what they need most, even if they don’t even realize that they needed it in the first place.

He also, in this one scene, appeals to Drift’s religious sensibilities, does a secret best-friend dance with Ratchet (who he helped to pass his medical exams- yes, Ratchet), and congratulates Rodimus on his questing so far.

Thunderclash is one of those characters that everyone in-universe is supposed to love, and I completely buy it- because he’s completely genuine and humble about all of this the entire time.

Compare this to the last time Roberts wrote Thunderclash, in Eugenesis.

Where he was an ex-Decepticon.

And kind of an abrasive asshole.

And then he died.

Y’know, now that I think of it, Eugenesis Thunderclash and MTMTE Ambulon being basically the same character makes a whole lot of sense, even without the horrors of Roberts’ Twitter getting involved.

Thunderclash reveals that he, too, is on a quest to find the Knights of Cybertron, much to Rodimus’ chagrin. But first he needs the Lost Light to break out the jumper cables, and then for his second in command to stop threatening his life.

Turns out, not everyone is as obvious as the Cybertronians with their naming conventions. Whirl assassinated the wrong folks; I’m sure the Galactic Council is utterly thrilled. Paddox wants to steal the quantum engine technology for the good of his people, so they can kick the ass of the up-and-coming Terradore leader.

Completely unaware of the situation unfolding here in the lab, Swerve is directing Rung towards the warm, loving aura of Thunderclash for another go at winning the gentlemen’s wager- through the power of lying about having friends, Swerve’s “agreed” to get Rung Thunderclash’s autograph, in exchange for getting to check that Rung’s transformation cog is still working. Then they bump into the nightmare currently unfolding. My, whoever will save us from this dreaded menace, who holds a gun to the head of the Autobots’ greatest warrior, confidant, friend, and perhaps even lover?

How about a bartender and a giant vape pen?

Okay, so Rung doesn’t actually turn into a vape. It turns out that the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode is also a mystery to the man himself. Because Rung is old as shit, the Functionists got to see this bullshit for themselves, and ended up testing him over and over and over trying to figure it out, lest he prove to be a flaw in their fascist ideologies. Fun fact: fascists HATE it when people they’re trying to oppress don’t play to their expectations.

The Functionists were the ones who gave Rung his little wheelie backpack, to make him at least appear useful. This sort of treatment tends to warp one’s head a bit, which would explain why he’s bothered to keep it for so long- internalized functionism’s a real bitch.

At least he’s not giving teenagers nicotine addictions under the guise of being somewhat better than cigarettes.

Back with Rodimus and Cybertron’s Autobot of the Year for 40,000 consecutive years, we get the unfortunate news that jump-starting Thunderclash’s ship is going to make the Quest go a bit slower for the Lost Light, much to Rodimus’ horror, though he does his best to put on a brave face; after all, that’s what heroes do, isn’t it?

It’s at this point that it’s revealed that “Little Victories” was being screened to all the Circle of Light members who didn’t get murdered or turned into Legislators on Luna 1, and man are these guys pissy. What was meant to be a recruitment video turned out to do just the opposite, because none of these guys want anything to do with what the Lost Light’s got going on.

Too bad Rewind didn’t have time for a cleaner cut for showing. Maybe they could have at least snagged a couple of these guys to tag along.

As all of the Circle of Light leave the theatre to go call everyone’s favorite Autobot to see if he needs a more crew members, the film plays on behind Skids, back to the interviews, as everyone promises more adventures just waiting on the horizon.

You’re not even on this trip anymore, you dork.

Chromedome gives us the title drop for the movie and issue, and we cut to Rewind organizing a group photo of all the interviewees.

And then Rewind died horribly like a week later. Thus ends season one of More Than Meets the Eye!

While I’m here, I’d like to take the time to cover a little bit of cut content from this issue, a scene between Drift and Ratchet.

Drift, during his interview, recalls the time that Ratchet called him into his office for a very serious discussion about his/Pharma’s hands.

Yeah, turns out they’re haunted.

Well, no, not really, because this is a prank. But Drift doesn’t know that yet.

Ratchet demonstrates this hand-haunting by punching Drift in the face, as he screams damnation at Pharma’s ghost. Drift, because he is a spiritual man, knows exactly what to do to deal with this possession; he draws his sword and chops Ratchet’s hands off, then throws them out the airlock.

This, too, is a prank, not that Ratchet knows it right away, yelling at Drift that he’s crippled him.

Clearly, these two belong together.

This bit of cut script was lucky enough to have gotten drawn by the colorist for MTMTE Season 1, Josh Burcham. Burcham’s line art is iconic- you won’t mistake him for anyone else. It’s rough and angular, and honestly just very charming. I’m a sucker for this sort of style. If you want to see his adaptation of this chunk of script- and trust me, you do- the link’s right here:

https://dcjosh.tumblr.com/post/107665292031/its-done-the-mtmte-22-deleted-scene-in-all-its

#transformers #jro #mtmte #issue 22 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

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lostonehero · 3 years

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Tw for slight body horror reference to self harm and parts are inspired by cave troll series

The news was soul crushing to the pair. They didn't know going back with giratina, they didn't know that the legend would do something. Now they got the news there dna is changing, and Guzma now thinks when it's done they won't remeber who they were. Cyrus hated to admit it but it had merit to the idea. He was curled into himself watching his admins go into panic mode trying to figure this situation out.

He got up trying to calm himself as he robotically headed back to his room not realize Guzma was following him. He was shaking when he got inside before he could start crying he felt two strong arms wrap around him. He just started to cry clinging onto the familiar scent of honey and moss. "I-." His words died on his tongue as Guzma shush him.

"We will get through this together." Guzma's voice was strained but strong. They were both leaning on each other for comfort and strength.

The words between them died as they just filled the silence with comfort in each other.

......

A few days go by the news finally sunk in, and it was like a silence between them that broke as they continued to lean on each other for comfort.

"So what kind of pokemon do you think you'll become." Guzma asked breaking the silence. "I hope I become a bug type."

"Of course you do, bug man." Cyrus sighs no real malice in his tone. "I don't know."

"Maybe you'll be your cleffa Cy."

"Maybe you'll be your bug Guzma."

"That would be great my partner woukd have me as a brother."

Cyrus sighs and a faint smile creeps on his face. "I can be a friend to my pokemon as well."

"I'm glad we are in agreement."

.....

"Get off of my trainer."

The soft hiss and malice of the voice made Guzma think of Cyrus, but Cyrus was asleep wrapped around him. They were just friends and just needed to comfort each other.

"Leave weird man don't need you" another hiss from the strange voice.

Guzma still not really registering who or what said that. "Mmh sleeping leave us be."

This silenced the voice for a second. "Understand me?"

"Mmh yeah sleep." Guzma yawns pulling Cyrus closer.

"No away from my trainer." The voice now louder.

Cyrus stirred awake. "Stop talking, you make a better furnace then a companion."

Guzma chuckles falling back asleep

"Trainer no get away from strange man."

Cyrus yawns "he's warm " and curls back to sleep.

The voice seems to pout and climbs onto the bed and lays next to Cyrus annoyance dripping off them.

......

Cyrus was the first to come too realizing his Wevile was released amd curled next to him. This was odd his pokemon knew to stay in there balls till he released them. He reached out and pet the small pokemon with a soft smile. "This better not become a habit of yours Comet."

"Protect my trainer"

Cyrus blinked and looked behind at Guzma who was still fast asleep, then returns his gaze to his own pokemon. "What?"

"I protect you "

"Right..." Cyrus rubs his temples realizing this must be an effect of him slowly loosing his humanity. He can now understand his pokemon. It wasn't a bad thing he just didn't know how to feel about this.

Wevile sat up looking at Cyrus. "Need to protect from that strange man."

Cyrus actually smiled and pet his pokemon again. "Let the strange man be"

His wevile looked up and nodded its been awhile since he saw his trainer smile like that. Maybe the stranger wasn't that bad after all.

.....

Guzma couldn't stop looking at his wrists, his old scars were still there but now he had matching open wounds on his wrists. He knew this was from his body changing, and it hurt so much yet he couldn't do anything but keep it covered. Cyrus didn't help much he was dealing with something similar on his head his hair had streaks of red from the blood. It just hurt so much.

"It hasn't been two weeks yet. Why does this have to happen in stages?" Guzma gave a frustrated huff then a soft oof when his pokemon Goli picked him up amd hugged him.

"Ok now Guzma nobody hurt my Guzma."

Guzma sighs and gives a soft smile. "Buddy you know I'm not there anymore I'm just in a little pain right now."

"Got to fix and protect Guzma."

He chuckles and was let down. "Alright alright I'm ok now Guli I'm ok."

Cyrus watched this curiosity now filling his mind. He wondered why Guzma pokemon was so protective like it knew how to calm down Guzma in an instant. How did it know?

"What ya lookin at space man?"

Cyrus rolled his eyes "you what else am I to distract myself from this pain."

Guzma let out another laugh. "Man Cy you always know how to lighten the mood."

Cyrus frowns not realizing that was a joke he said, but a red tint brushed across his cheeks as he saw Guzma give that smile at him. In that moment he felt no pain but only a warm feeling in his chest.

The next day....

"Are you going to keep poking your protruding spurs?" Cyrus huffed ignoring the new weight on his head.

"I have spurs on my arm like a heracross." Guzma's eyes sparkled. "I am becoming bug man"

Cyrus rubs his temples annoyed and sighs. "I'm so glad you're enjoying our impending doom."

"You've got matching horns with your cleffa, you should be happy, your hair hides most of it anyway."

"Thats not the point Guzma, I'm afraid of loosing you." He immeditally regretted the words that came out of his mouth in his panic. Emotions were never his strong suit yet he still let them get the best of him. He quickly sputtered. "I mean you're the first good thing and i..."

Guzma's face was bright red. "Ya really mean that Cy? I mean I like you too ok." He huffs amd leans in and pulls Cyrus into a kiss. Pulling away just as fast. "You could of stopped me if I crossed a.... line."

Guzma looked at Cyrus who had stars in his eyes. "That is not enough evidence for me I require another to deem it appropriate." This time he goes in for a kiss and pulls away red faced. "Inconclusive I belive we need to try again."

Guzma laughed and pulled the smaller man into a tight hug. "I love you too Cy, and you don't have to make everything so sciencey having emotions is ok."

Cyrus hugged him back like his life depended on it. "I fear now that I have something to loose I don't want our time to be up."

"Neither do I Cy, but I'm glad our fleeting time is spent together." Guzma smiles even though he can feel his own tears fall down his face.

........

"This is a awful idea Cyrus, and I can't belive I'm saying that." Guzma can barely hold his balance in the ice skates he was wearing.

"I used to ice skate a lot growing up when I was with my grandfather, I wish to make a new memory doing it with you." Cyrus explains trying to push the taller man onto the ice.

"You're lucky I'm not as cold as before atleast this weird dna thing is helping me adapt to the cold Cy." He looked back to see Cyrus huff amd go onto the ice himself, he had to admit that houndoom tail did fit him, and became a great excuse to look at his ass.

Cyrus was amazing on the ice and Guzma just wanted to get closer but as soon as he got on the ice he went face first into the cold floor. This caused Cyrus to start laughing which was the first time the taller man heard him laugh it was like the best music he ever heard.

"You really are bad at this, I guess destruction in human form only works in sneakers." Cyrus smiles continuing to skate.

Guzma smiles pushing himself up to just sit on the ice and watch him go. He wasn't angry for the first time after failing he was happy. Cyrus really did help him with his emotions.

......

It was getting closer to the final day and they weren't ready. Both felt as if they had no energy to do anything, and yet both have been eating like crazy. There pokemon have been showing so much concern they've been treating the two like they are baby pokemon that need help with everything, even Cyrus's little cleffa has been getting concerned.

Guzma stared up at the ceiling "your admins have been driving me...." he yawns cutting off the sentence, and he curls closer to Cyrus. "Can't blame them tomorrow is the day."

Cyrus held onto Guzma not wanting things to end, he wished he had more time. "I'm sorry."

"Don't.... be" he stifles another yawns. "Mmh too tired."

Cyrus was equally exhausted yet they haven't done anything for a week. All they've been doing is eating and sleeping so much. "Mmh Guzma?"

"Yeah..."

"I love you."

"I love you too"

The two embraced barely able to stay awake spending the final hours they had together.

......

Cyrus didn't expect to wake up, he expected to forget everything and live on as a pokemon. Yet here he was next to Guzma in a wet and sticky bed. His body did feel different though he could still see he had hands with sharp claws like comet, but still hands. He was able to wiggle his toes and move his legs so that was the same. Something had to be wrong. He looked over to Guzma who was still dead asleep and noticed it first.

Guzma had two prominate attena from his head along with clawed fingers like his own but different, he had spurs on the back of his ankles and what looked like armor speckled about his body which reminded him of different bug types exoskeleton. His teeth were sharper as well, and he swore it looked like Guzma back had a large shield on it covered the entire thing.

Did his body change that much as well? He couldn't really tell, but all he felt was hunger as his stomach growled louder then he was used to. He needed to figure himself out first, but he could smell something delicious from somewhere in this building. He wiggled free from Guzma and headed towards the smell.

....

Cyrus's former admins looked shocked when they saw him walk towards them as he sits at the table eyes locked on the food they were cooking. Saturn ran up to him with tears and thanked the higher powers at be that master Cyrus was still alive and here.

Cyrus wasn't really listening when a large plate of food was placed in front of him. It took a moment for him to use utensils with his new claws but once he got it he gladly ate until he was full.

It seems as if the smell attracted Guzma as well like a bug pokemon to honey. They both ate in silence not really registering that they both were ok.

When it did dawn on them they held each other's hand under the table and shared a smile. They made it together.

#harlockshipping #team skull guzma #cyrus #galactic cyrus #team galactic #team skull #ya boy guzma

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tornrose24 · 3 years

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My random thoughts about the CU holiday special

-I’m impressed by the restraint they had at not doing as much toilet humor this time. (Though CU using the tooth brush that the boys were using on the toilets was... yeah I don’t want to think about that one).

-Is it me or was there a cat hidden in Mr. Beard’s recliner?

-I think the boys would have loved ‘Home Alone’ or ‘Gremlins’ and then maybe they wouldn’t have fallen under ‘designated heroes’ in the special to change Christmas.

-Look, I know a lot of you like Melvin, but when the whole ‘putting others before yourself’ aesop came into play, I thought it would make more sense if it involved Krupp instead. The boys have already thrown Melvin plenty of bones throughout this series, and it’d be nice if we could balance it out a bit.

-Honestly, Krupp LIKING Christmas was really weird for me. Of ALL the holidays he’d tolerate, its the one he would be the least likely to celebrate. Also, I’d love to know HOW the writers missed the fact that he was Jewish if they know the books so well. (but on the other hand, I’m glad they didn’t do something predictable with him by reusing certain Christmas stories).

-Also, they completely forgot that Heidi exists, which really sucks. I’ve already expressed my frustrations about it in a previous post.

-OH GOD YES FINALLY! Edith exists in the series after all and Todd Grimes confirmed it to jackie-sugarskull! Christ I’ve been waiting for this for so long! I really hope we get more than a cameo from her before the series ends. However I noticed that she wasn’t wearing her gloves this time and her exposed fingers looked normal.... maybe she’s not an alien after all? (time will tell).

-I also love that we see that she does have a life outside the school and is involved with her community by being a caroler. And as someone who has been in choirs for several years, I highly approve it. Also, I’m betting she’s an alto or a mezzo. (If she appears again with a speaking part, I want to hear her sing).

-Ms. Hurd as a ghost made me think of Prof. Binns or whatever his name was from Harry Potter, but I guess she won’t be around next season. So I take it Krupp ISN’T going to look for a new music teacher if its an excuse to cancel the music program?

-Now all we need is for the lunch ladies to leave/die so that Edith can come into the picture....

-I love that Anthrope is so genre savvy that she KNEW Krupp making the boys directors for the pageant was a bad idea and gave him some grief about it. Actually I’m amazed Krupp lacked the foresight to begin with since he SHOULD have known what was going to happen by this point.

-Nice to know Meaner likes Christmas but it would have been funnier if Grace invited him over for Christmas (to Harold’s great horror).

-There was SUCH a missed opportunity to make an actor allusion involving Nat Faxon since he provides additional voice work for the show. If he also voiced one of the elves it would of made a perfect Disenchantment reference.

-It’s so awesome that they got the legendary Jim Cummings on this show and as three different types of Santa at that! I’m sure he had a lot of fun with this. (Though normal!Santa still sounds a lot like Pete from the Mickey Mouse cartoons.)

-Now that I realize it, this special was basically the Nightmare Before Christmas, except no kidnapping or Halloween involved.

-Jacked!Santa was terrifying. The ACTUAL version of Santa we get at the end was much preferable (and I liked that the show did its own design for him instead of something more common).

-As someone who loves Christmas, I appreciated that its regarded as a holiday you can’t mess with, especially when it involves spending time with your family (If it wasn’t for this stupid pandemic then my entire family could get together on Christmas eve like in the past). Though I wonder how the birth of Christ was acknowledged instead in that timeline.

-”Robot CU” was adorable.

-I loved that ‘How the Grinch stole Christmas’ reference near the end. But again, Krupp is the LAST person who’d be involved with such things.

-Santa, if there was something I wanted fro Christmas, it would be to finally end this damn coronavirus pandemic so that everyone can be together for Christmas.

-Called it on the stop motion references!

-I’m not overly excited about how everything was resolved because it involved yet ANOTHER new timeline, but I get why it was for the best.

-So Krupp spent Dec 25.... with the guy. Maybe he’s Pansexual after all?

-speaking of Krupp, since CU was with the boys during the time travel adventure, shouldn’t he have been... I don’t know... weirded out/horrified by the new timeline since it happened without him knowing?

-Nice to know that Bo DOES have parents, though that reveal was amusing.

#captain underpants #the epic tales of captain underpants #christmas

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tyrantisterror · 4 years

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TT’S GONNA RECOMMEND SOME SELF-PUBLISHED KAIJU FICTION

Because the mood struck me

(and also because I’ve been meaning to give these a full fledged reviews for a RIDICULOUSLY LONG TIME and I’m kind of embarrassed how long it’s been taking so I figure if I do some quickies I’ll feel less bad about myself as a person ok LET’S GO)

I’m gonna start with the Daikaiju Yuki series by Raffael Coronelli, because its first entry was also the first self published kaiju novel I read. This series is fun and fast paced, with wonderful characters and dynamic storylines in a highly unique setting: a post-post apocaylptic world, where humanity has rebuilt civilization after a kaiju war hundreds of years ago destroyed the old one (i.e. ours). The protagonist of the series, Yuki, partners up with one of the few kaiju who decided to defend humanity back in the kaiju war, a grouchy old bipedal lion named Narajin, and the two essentially fuse to fight various threats to their world with the other remaining members of the Pantheon Colossi (i.e. the protector kaiju).

(Our heroes, Yuki and Narajin, ready to conquer your kaiju-fan heart)

For newbies, this series covers a lot of kaiju tropes in an engaging and unique way that actually serves as a pretty decent primer for how this genre stands out from other monster fiction. For experienced kaiju fans, the new twists author Raffael Coronelli has put on the old tropes and the innovations he’s added solely of his own invention make for a take on the genre that is astoundingly fresh, managing the difficult task of paying homage to what came before while crafting something very new and distinct from it.

I also can’t stress enough how fun these books are. The characters grow on you very quickly, and the stories move at a lively pace that makes the books very easy to digest while still having a lot of substance. Also there’s a LOT of content to consume here, so if you find you like the first book, you’re in luck - because not only is there a lot more of what you liked in the other entries, but Coronelli’s writing has gotten even better with each installment.

Buy them here:

Daikaiju Yuki

Yuki Conquers the World

Yuki vs. Fleshworld

Mokwa: The Lifesblood of the Earth (a spinoff focusing on another member of the Pantheon Colossi - also has the best villain of the whole series IMO)

Scythian Frost (short story anthology in the same universe as Daikaiju Yuki)

Pharoah of Eels (novella in the same universe as Daikaiju Yuki)

BONUS: I’m gonna link Coronelli’s Big Egg here because while it’s arguably more of a Weird West story than a kaiju story and not part of the Daikaiju Yuki series, it’s nonetheless VERY GOOD and kaiju-adjacent enough to feel relevant.

If you love it when kaiju stories go dark and experiment with body horror - and I know a good chunk of my followers here do, both from the posts you make and from the sheer number of body horror-riffic entries you’ve submitted to my Create a Kaiju Contests in the past - you owe it to yourself to read All Your Ruins by Alex Gayhart. It is a bleak kaiju story that leans as far into the horror as kaiju stories can, while still retaining many of a kaiju story’s hallmarks. You’ve got experimental robots, you’ve got a big lizard who shoots lasers from his mouth and has a few suprisingly poignant and tragic moments of pathos, you’ve got scenes of massive property damage - and you’ve also got scenes of people being torn apart by swarms of giant bugs, poisoned by toxic kaiju blood, assimilated into piles of fungus, and all other sorts of horrifying demises. If you want a kaiju story to send chills down your spine, this is your book.

I’m emphasizing the grim aspects of this story, but I also want to note that it avoids one of the pitfalls a lot of modern horror falls into, in that it balances all the horrific shit by having characters in it that you actually care about. It’s a tragedy, you know from the start things won’t end well, but some of the people involved in the conflict are so lovable and try so hard to survive that you root for them despite the prevailing sense of dread. It’s a gloomy story, but it’s not the sort that makes everyone relentlessly awful - more George Romero Day of the Dead in tone than, say, the all consuming bleakness of The Walking Dead.

Also it’s got some killer illustrations.�� The main monster even takes the “bipedal lizard with dorsal spikes” visual in a direction so unique that it actually stands out against the progenitor of that design concept. That’s not the say the book depends on those illustrations, mind you - Gayhart’s prose isn’t afraid of laying it on thick every now and then to paint an appropriately distinct and horrific image with words. That might not be for all tastes, but as a person who’s read a LOT of classic horror literature, I personally appreciate it - a dash of melodrama in the description of the horrific, when used well, can make it very effective, and Gayhart put just enough in there to work very well for my tastes.

Buy it here:

All Your Ruins

BONUS: I’m going to recommend the two books in author Alex Gayhart’s Black Star Saga here as well. I haven’t actually fully read them yet - I bought the initial release where the two volumes were bundled together as one, and got sidetracked by LIFE BULLSHIT shortly after I started it (this happens to me too often while reading - I still need to finish Stephen King’s It and Marie Kondo’s books too), but I liked what I read, and from what I’ve heard the more recent editions made some big improvements to the story’s pacing. It’s the same quality of writing as Gayhart’s All Your Ruins, but with a less grim tone - more Ultraman and less Shin Godzilla.

The Black Star Saga Volume 1: 2525

The Black Star Saga Volume 2: Moonage Daydream

A lot of classic kaiju movies bring up the threat of giant monsters destroying all of civilization if they aren’t stopped, but almost none have shown them carry that threat through. In the Shadow of Extinction let’s that threat actually play out - you see the kaiju apocalypse begin and civilization as we know it end in the first third of the book. The remaining two thirds focuses on survivors picking up the pieces in a world now ruled by giants. It’s the kind of story you’d think there’d be more of in our genre, but outside of All Your Ruins and, uh, the Godzilla anime trilogy, there really aren’t that other takes out there.

While Gayhart’s All Your Ruins focuses on the horror aspect of a kaiju apocalypse, Kyle Warner’s In the Shadow of Extinction focuses on a political/crisis management angle. It’s like if Shin Godzilla had a baby with George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, and that baby had the “bureaucratic failings of big governments in the wake of national disasters” elements of the former and the “multiple different perspectives via a large cast of characters” format of the later. There’s no one protagonist in this one - you follow a large and diverse cast of characters from around the world and from pretty much all walks of life as they try to navigate a disaster that destroys society as it once was.

Once the civilization effectively ends in the first third of the novel, In the Shadow of Extinction transition from “disaster movie” to “post apocalyptic thriller,” like The Stand, Day of the Triffids, 28 Days Later, or, I dunno, a toned down version of Mad Max (but, y’know, with giant monsters, so I guess not THAT toned down). I bring this up because the content of the last two thirds takes after the tropes of post apocalyptic thrillers as much if not more so than kaiju stories - that is to say, there is some Triggering Content in this one. That’s not something to dissuade you - the characters and story remains very solid and unique for the kaiju genre - but it is something I feel you should be aware of, and if you want a more explicit description of what kind of Triggers I mean here, shoot me a message. Suffice to say, kaiju aren’t the only monsters when civilization breaks down here.

But Kaiju do remain prominent in the book nonetheless - it is ultimately a kaiju story more than anything else, and it’s impressive how the book manages to incorporate all those other influences as well as a heaping dose of political commentary without ever diminishing the presence of its monster stars.

Buy it here:

In the Shadow of Extinction

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to do what I should have done years ago and write some damn Amazon reviews for these so the authors can have a boost in Amazon’s search algorithms.

#Daikaiju Yuki #All Your Ruins #In the Shadow of Extinction

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spamela-hamderson · 4 years

Note

For the prompt! “You’re jealous”

For you ao3 link

:::

Robert comes up with the plans. It’s been this way for as long as he can remember; he used to plan minor distractions outside of the house when he was younger, so he could get a few minutes alone to dismantle a beloved home appliance with his mind while everyone else was out searching for a missing flock.

He’d come down once the coast was clear, with his trusty notebook in hand (to track his progress) and Victoria’s old baby blanket tied around his neck (‘WizKid’ scrawled across it in blue paint; he’d still wanted to be a superhero then), and get to work.

The problem, as it has always been, is that Robert never was the best at executing said plans.

You see, the plan was always to dismantle the appliance, and then put it back together in its previous condition. But he never quite managed that. As it turned out, building a working machine was a lot harder than taking it apart. And by the time he remembered that, someone would catch on to Robert being the only one not with them and rush back into the house, too late, to find bits of metal strewn over the countertop and footsteps banging back up the stairs.

:::

He succeeded just once before having to leave home. Slapped the radio back into form, (sans make-shift cape; he’d long grown out of it by then) and apart from a mystifying minute of ticking every time you pressed play, it had worked fine.

A month after that, he would play a stupid game with his stupid brother, wouldn’t be able to save Max King and would be sent away for not being worthy of his powers.

:::

Aaron had been planned as well.

Well. Sort of.

Robert had made his debut into the criminal underworld with a series of small jobs that went without a hitch. But things got complicated once he’d set his sights on riskier targets.

On his own, his powers and charm only got him so far. He needed someone who would watch his back. Someone who would help him finish what he set out to do.

What he needed, he thought, was his very own henchman.

The prospects had trickled through in stops and starts. Some, Robert worried were too stupid to keep up with him, and others, in their comic book villain ensemble and annoyingly peculiar affectations, were clearly too interested in a fantasy that Robert didn’t have the patience for. It was the exceedingly normal ones, however, who had unsettled Robert the most.

(Sanity is an illusion in their line of work. The really messed up ones, the sort who carved into innocents for fun in their underground dens of torture, were also the ones who seamlessly weaved mundanity through their to-do-list of horrors: calling out a neighbourly hello through the kitchen window as they scrub blood from under their fingernails, taking a ten-minute break from their day job to look up large plastic tubs (big enough to fit an adult), and installing an entertainment system in said underground den of torture so they don’t have to miss strictly while laying out tools, scared whimpers harmonising with Gymnopédie No.1 and the cheers from the crowd.)

When Aaron had slammed out of their first meeting with a glare more frightening than the rough scar running down the length of his face, his permanently bruised knuckles clenched tight in a blazing fist, and dislike lining every inch of him, none of it hidden away, Robert had been ready to try trusting him with his life.

By the end of his first day at work, Aaron had expressed plain doubt that Robert was a card-carrying member of the League of Nefariousness (Robert had threatened to show him the framed letter of acceptance, hung at pride of place on his office wall). By day three he’d slammed him into a wall, snarling into his face, and Robert had had to come to terms with the very confusing situation in his pants. It took till the end of day four, after too many hours of covert staring, to admit that he might have a problem.

By his second week, when shit had hit the fan in the middle of what was meant to be a simple intelligence-gathering operation, and Aaron had taken charge, flipped the script, and saved his neck,—literally, from a very sharp knife—Robert realised he’d gone and found himself a partner instead of a henchman.

There was no way Robert could’ve prepared for him.

And that brings him back to his current plan of action.

:::

Robbing the science facility while the gala is in full swing at the first floor of the building, instead of doing it days after that as they had originally planned, will mean they’ll be working on a tight schedule from now on, he decides. And he’ll have to make a list of other changes as well, taking into account all the extra pairs of eyes that’ll be scuttling around at an event of this scale, and the tighter security that’ll come with it. But it’s better this way, really; Robert’s always preferred performing to an audience anyway. And if he wants to get the message out, he needs everyone watching.

They’ll make their move late into the evening. Give the guests enough time to get bladdered, and the security complacent. It’ll work out, Robert decides.

Besides, he deserves a posh night out. It’s been months of clandestine weapons trades in grimy warehouse buildings and stopping for bad takeaway on the way back from rooftop shootouts, leaning heavy against Aaron under the guise of exhaustion. He wants an excuse to wear a suit and polish off flutes of champagne while he’s at it.

But the upper crust only ever throws their parties—with diamonds dripping down necks and camera crews parked outside to greet them—for Heroes. Nevermind that they’re also the ones secretly bankrolling half the evil schemes in play across the city on any given day.

Robert wonders if Aaron will let himself be talked into wearing a suit. He knows he won’t do it just because he’s asked, and Robert can make up a reason, tell him it’s an essential part of the plan, but Aaron’s got quite the knack for sniffing out his bullshit.

He sighs, feeling sorry for himself all over again, and watches a boxy suit jacket take form over his little digital doodle of Aaron running down the side of the updated plan on a loop, a mock-up of him on his way to empty out a heavily guarded vault, eleven floors below ground, where 35 grams of rare dryadrium is being stored; More than three times the amount Robert needs to finish building his killer robot prototype. But staring at doodle-Aaron’s over-serious eyebrows makes his chest too heavy to ignore, so he gives up and slumps back into his seat noisily, away from his tablet.

He lasts about six seconds before sending the offending item flying off the table and into his palm, a new window already open (and sharing the screen with his list) to the paparazzi shot of Aaron and the Red Rider for him to glower down at. He’s never been one for self-restraint.

COFFEE DATE WITH MYSTERY LOVER!

Will the darling of justice Red Ride off into the sunset with his new bad-boy?

To the undiscerning eye, Robert supposes they might look undeniably involved. They’re stood so close it’s amazing the two disposable cups of coffee clutched between them haven’t spilt, the Red Rider’s hands are around Aaron’s upper arms like he’s pulling him in for a hug, and his smile might be described as teasing, by some (Robert just thinks it makes him look like a tit).

But Robert sees right through it. He recognises the street they’re pictured on as the one between the abandoned power station they work out of and the cafe closest to it. The article mentions they were spotted yesterday morning. Probably right after Aaron had picked up their usual order of one americano and one regular coffee with a splash of milk, same as he does on the days he comes in before ten.

While Red‘s got his meticulously focus-grouped smile in place, Aaron looks totally baffled by him (though the article tries to pass it off as starstruck). And why wouldn’t he be? That is a lot of red lycra to take in before you’ve had your morning coffee.

So yes, Robert knows it’s stupid for him to be feeling so strongly about this photo when there’s clearly no truth behind what it’s saying. But he can’t help but find it extremely unfair that it’s the Red Rider who gets to be paired off with Aaron (even if it’s only in the eyes of bored commuters looking for a bit of morning gossip to get them through the day) when Robert’s the one wreaking glorious havoc across the city with him.

Of course, it’s not like the public knows who Aaron is.

But still. Of all people. It had to be a Hero. Ugh.

Thus, the plan. And he can’t wait to see it play out, too. The darling of justice, dancing the night away at a gala held in his honour, while 1.7 million pounds worth of precious metal gets swiped from right under his nose. Robert sneers down at the crude stick figure of the Red Rider sketching itself into existence, tears shooting out of his eyes in black dashes of ink as his adoring crowd turns away in disgust.

:::

He’s so busy trying to glare a hole into Red’s smiling face without accidentally blowing the tablet to bits, he almost misses the low hiss of the lab doors sliding open behind him. He blinks and the window closes, leaving him with only the details of the new plan to stare at, just as Aaron plunks his coffee in front of him.

He also gets a tired nod, a non-verbal hi as Aaron makes his way around the table, and already Robert feels better about the day.

He manages a mumbled thanks back, somewhere between grabbing at the cup and tilting its contents onto his tongue. It’s too hot to drink comfortably still, even after having weathered the icy spring air on its way here. He leans his mouth against the lid of the cup instead and thinks about Aaron seeping warmth back through its walls with his hands.

“You’re sure these are microwave safe, yeah?” he asks, eyes blinking wide in false innocence, but doesn’t hold back his chuckle at the devastating judgement he gets for it. He’d watched Aaron blow up his lunch once, food and cracked pieces of a bowl all over him and the floor, and hasn’t shut up about it since.

“Right, I’ll leave you with cold coffee next time then, shall I?” Aaron says. His voice is still rough with morning disuse.

Robert puts his coffee back on the table so he can rest his chin on his palm and look up at Aaron. It brings him a little closer to him. “You wouldn’t. I’d moan on about it too much.”

“You’d be a nightmare,” he agrees, smiling behind his own cup. He’s just finished folding himself onto the only other chair in the lab in a way Robert can’t imagine to be comfortable, coffee cradled close to his chest, when he snaps his fingers. A small flame floats over his thumb. He slumps even further into his chair.

Aaron bears his power like a spare limb tucked away too tight and always too long, even if it’s only been minutes, never fully comfortable until he can stretch it out, feel it break apart from the perimeters of his skin and breath on its own.

They watch it skip lazily across the back of his fingers and weave through them for a moment.

“Has Tate said what she wants from us?” Aaron asks.

Robert feels his stomach begin to sink. “That’s today?”

Aaron raises his eyebrows at him. “She’s sending her driver to pick us up at 10, Robert. Remember?”

Robert thunks his head against the table and groans. They don’t have the time for whatever Tate wants. At this rate, they’ll be stumbling through the job unprepared, and Red will come swooping in to save the day, and they’ll be the laughing stock of the city, another notch in Red’s shiny, crime-fighting belt, and Aaron will leave him for being a screw-up.

Robert groans louder.

“Robert?”

He takes a second more to hide behind his arms, then pulls himself back up.

Aaron’s hand is half extended towards him, his flame extinguished and his eyes worried.

No. He wants this to work. He wants the world to see them together, see that they work. It might not be as Robert and Aaron, not to anyone else. Maybe not even to Aaron. But it’ll be close enough.

Robert leans back into his chair to pull his phone out from inside his trouser pocket. He can fix this.

“How about we cancel the meeting with Tate?” he says, but he’s already typing out a ‘Something’s come up, can’t do today’ to send to her.

“You what?” Aaron laughs.

“You never liked her anyway.” Aaron had dragged his feet when they’d first taken a job for her. She’ll start thinking she owns us, he’d said.

But Robert had insisted. They’d needed the money, then.

Aaron puffs his cheeks out. “I’m not complaining, mate. But she’s not gonna like it.”

“Eh,” Robert shrugs it off. They finished their last job with her, clean and simple, and they haven’t agreed to anything new. There’s no reason for any business to be left hanging between them.

“You gonna tell me why?” Aaron asks.

“We’ve got enough on our plate now.”

That gets a confused head tilt. “Do we?”

“About that. I was thinking–” he stops to roll his eyes at Aaron’s cheeky wince. “What if we broke into the facility on Saturday instead.”

The head tilt stays confused. “Before the gala?”

Robert shakes his head. “At the gala.”

Aaron huffs out an unsure laugh like he thinks Robert might be pulling his leg, then sobers when he sees he’s being serious.

“Why?” he wants to know. “Did something happen?”

“Nothing, I uh.” Right. A reason. “I thought about it, and it’s better this way.”

Aaron looks at him like he’s gone mad, which. Robert should’ve expected that, really. He takes a second to wonder why he hasn’t prepared a script for this.

“I don't…" Aaron squints at Robert like he’ll find an explanation on him somewhere if he looks hard enough. When that fails him, he searches blankly around the lab, perhaps looking for a clue to where he should even start.

Robert waits.

“This isn’t what we prepared for,” he lands on.

“It’ll be fine.” Robert will make sure of it. “I know the mechanics of the security set up around the vault like the back of my hand by now.”

It’s a precise clockwork of systems designed by a Swedish company, and it’s kept Robert up for weeks trying to puzzle it out.

Aaron nods his head slowly, like a man who’s had to endure long hours listening to Robert mumble to himself in increasing desperation in their shared office space.

“I’ll get you past it. Trust me.”

Aaron nods more readily at that, and Robert’s heart finds a moment in all this to skip a beat. He urges himself to get a grip.

“There’ll be more guards, yes, but the gala should keep them occupied for the most part. The new guards aren’t there to protect the dryadrium, Aaron. They’re there to keep the high profile guests safe.”

Aaron still doesn’t seem convinced. “There’ll be cameras everywhere. Ministers, Heroes, tycoons, journalists… How’re we meant to get in? Or out, for that matter.”

It’s then that the idea hits him. Oh, he thinks. I’m a genius.

“We won’t seem out of place if we pretend we’re just another two names on the guest list…”

And here’s the tricky bit. All he has to do is be light-handed with the delivery. Just throw it out there, nothing to it.

“…We’ll fit right in in a couple of suits.”

Aaron barely gives him a second to hope. “Yeah, no, we’re not doin’ it on Saturday, then.”

“Wh–”

“I’m not wearing a suit, Robert. Not unless I’m stood in front of a judge.”

“But–” Robert tries not to panic. “But you have to.”

“And why is that?” Aaron leans back into his chair, comfortable as ever, and slips both hands into the front pocket of his hoodie. “You haven’t said.”

Robert’s been hoping he won’t notice. “Well,” he starts. “It’s like you said. There’ll be loads of cameras there. And reporters from major news networks. It’s time we introduced ourselves to the people. Officially. Don’t you think?”

It’s time they learn you’re mine, he tries not to think.

Because it’s not true, however much he wants it to be. He’s not… they’re not…

There’d been that one time, sure, that one kiss–

(Gold light filtered over his skin, cutting through the shadows of his face and making his scar dance. Robert had seen seasoned criminals give Aaron a wide berth, everything about him screaming: get any closer and lose your teeth. Right then, watching him watch flames rise up into the night from what was left of the hideout he’d just tossed a giant ball of fire into (killing, in the process, a jumped-up mobster who hadn’t known his place), soft was the only word that fit.

The tension he’d accepted as a part of Aaron had bled out. His lips had fallen open around barely a hint of a smile, and his eyes… they were drooping down the sides a little, tired after a long fight but still lit up by the beauty of the destruction he wrought.

Robert couldn’t look anywhere else.

He saw his hand on Aaron’s cheek before he realised he’d put it there in the first place. The tips of his fingers reached past an ear and his thumb smoothed against the rough beard under it. There was no force behind the touch. He didn’t want to interrupt, he just… he wanted…

But Aaron had turned to him anyway. Unwaveringly steady, where Robert was starting to lose his grip.

He’d caught Robert then, with his heart beating outside his chest, and his eyes had lowered to his lips, asking for more.

And Robert had gone to him.)

–but they don’t talk about it.

Aaron watches him. “You’re up to something.”

Aaron can prove fuck all. Robert’s always up to something. He’s the man with the plan.

“It’s just… we’ve been doing this for half a year now. We’re good at it. We’re not common thugs, Aaron, we’re Supervillains. We’re going to snatch the world from them one day and they should at least get to know our names.”

Their names. Tethered to each other for the rest of their careers. Inferno and The Operator.

“No faces,” of course not, “but our signature on the scene of the crime. For a real audience, this time.”

They’ve been trying it out, a network of gears scorched into the ground or up a wall, but the powers that be have been able to keep it out of the papers somehow, credit for their work—at least the ones they haven’t been able to hide from the people altogether—being sloppily assigned to gang disputes. “Let’s stick our names under it as well. They’ll have to take notice, “ he says, grin turning wild at the thought.

He can tell Aaron’s starting to give in by the sulk settling in in his cheeks and around his mouth. “Don’t know why you had to wait till now to decide that,” he grumbles quietly, and then stops.

Robert allows himself a small smile at the victory. His tablet screen unlocks.

Aaron’s on board, and he’d known that would be the toughest hurdle to get over, but they still do need a way to get on the final RSVP list. Robert starts another list for that. He wonders if Leyla will know anything. She’s had some experience organising events like these in the past, before she was found out to have swindled millions of pounds from investors and had to leave the country. Or maybe they could comb through the building plans again. See if there’s another way for them to sneak in–

“You saw the article,” he hears.

The digital ink stops its frenzied scrawl across the screen. Instead, it quivers in place, forming a nervous-looking black blob at the end of a half-written letter. “Hm? Oh! You mean the one from the tabloid?” he says to the blob. “Think I saw someone reading it on the train.” He could stop there. He should. But of course, he doesn’t. “You two make a cute couple.”

“You’re jealous,” Aaron accuses.

(So maybe they don’t talk about the kiss, but sometimes they do talk around it.)

Robert doesn’t flinch. He looks over at Aaron, schooling his face into the picture of incredulity. “Of you?” he scoffs. “What, you think I’ve been secretly pining after the Red Rider all this time?” Robert laughs, shaking his head at that. He knows he’s overdoing it, just a touch, but that’s kind of the point.

It works. Aaron looks thrown off for a couple of beats, and then his face falls, before a carefully blank mask gets put up in its place. “What,” he says, mouth tight around the word.

Wait, no. “No, no, no, I’m not,” he rushes to assure Aaron, serious this time, and feels like he can breathe again once Aaron’s shoulders start to lower.

He almost regrets correcting him so quickly, with the way Aaron’s back to squinting at him and making Robert want to run.

After painful several silent minutes of Robert avoiding his gaze in favour of animating an illustration of the pair of them cackling next to a mountain of stolen dryadrium (aesthetically more impressive than drawing them cackling next to a small, 35 gram pile, however accurate), he peeks up just in time to catch Aaron scratch at his brow and shake his head at the table between them like he can’t believe this is what his life has come to. Robert relates deeply.

“It wasn’t–” Aaron gestures uselessly with his hand, turning pink in the face.

Robert watches him struggle. “What?” he asks, around the grin on his face.

Aaron’s glare might be more effective if he isn’t still blushing hard. “He walked right into me outside the cafe, and then he wouldn’t stop,” more gestures at his face, which is pulled into a grimace, “smiling.” He says this the way only he would when confronted with a too-friendly, (allegedly) good looking superhero: with confusion and a healthy amount of dread. Robert tries not to smile. “You know how they lose their heads over ‘im.” He shrugs like Robert hasn’t been moping and plotting all morning over this.

He’s got a point, though. The tabloids were dead set on the Red Rider hiding a secret family in Spain only last month. Two weeks after that, they were speculating on wedding colours after a picture of him chatting with a cashier at the grocer’s started circulating. Why he felt the need to do his shopping in his hero suit is anyone’s guess.

Also, Robert possibly spends too much time reading the tabloids.

Robert clears his throat. “I wasn’t thinking that.”

“Sure you weren’t.”

He doesn’t know why Aaron’s smirking quite so much, because it’s true. He wasn’t. Robert knows Aaron can do miles better than that self-important twat.

“And you deciding to rob the facility during the gala has nothing to do with the Red Rider being there, yeah?”

“As if,” Robert says, verging on petulant. “This really is the best chance we’ve got of getting our names out,” he insists, which is also true. And that’s when another thought hits him. Oh, he thinks. You idiot.

Because what if being professionally tied to him is the last thing Aaron wants for himself? They’ll be sharing more than headlines. They’ll be sharing successes, failures, enemies. And even if (when an uncharitable voice in his head injects) Aaron decides one day that he’s had enough of dealing with him, the consequences of their partnership will stick with him.

“We can wait, if,” Robert shrugs glumly, “this isn’t something you want.” He hopes he doesn’t sound too miserable. “If you think we’re going too fast, or–”

“I already agreed to it, you muppet,” Aaron informs him. “But if you’ve changed your mind again,” he rolls his eyes, smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, “guess it saves me having to buy a suit.”

“I’ll buy you the suit.” Robert doesn’t need Aaron staring back at him in surprise to know how quickly he’d said that, and how embarrassingly low and rough his voice had gone then.

An eternity passes before Aaron finally mumbles out a “Sure, whatever,” at the table, his cheeks pinking again.

“Yeah,” Robert starts, eager to salvage some of his dignity. “Now that we’ve settled that, let’s go over some of the other details.” He lets his tablet float to the middle of the table and resolves to not look at Aaron, or his twitching lips, or his knowing looks, for the next 15 minutes at least. He has a plan to perfect.

#robron #theirdarkmaterials #*mine: fic #emmerdale

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twitchesandstitches · 4 years

Text

twitchy mass effect squad thoughts: 2

Kasumi Goto: It’s hard to get a read on her, but she’s a ton of fun; I genuinely like her a fair amount, and she definitely sticks out of the cast. Not the least because as she admits in the third game, she’s out of place in a squad of commandos. I can honestly see her as a support member, in all honesty.

Grunt: This giant super soldier is Shepard’s son. She has a family, it’s Garrus and her adopted krogan son. Grunt is fascinating to me for his very understated character arc of going from a bloody-minded berserker, to... well, a berserker, but one who wants a REASON to fight, a purpose to live for. Being born in a tank and educated in visions, he has no real attachment to anything and he feels lost; Shepard gives him a purpose and its really good watching him grow.

Thane Krios: I just, I love this guy so much. He gives me big Nightcrawler vibes; A religiously devout and sincerely compassionate man. Him being an assassin doesn’t take it away for me, as the hanar don’t seem particularly cruel about employing him. (The hanar are chill.) HE’s genuinely got some of the most badass moments in the game, for how understated they are, and he evokes some of the biggest teary moments for me; dying from sickness, working to make the universe brighter in his last days. he was my first romance in mass effect, and I’m still brough to emotional compromise by the letter he wrote to Shepard as a last testimony. “I will wait for you by the sea.”

Jack: remember when I said ‘most of the humans in this game are kinda boring’? Jack is one of the big, BIG exceptions to that, though I have a hard time befriending her because I can’t be mean in this game. She’s a loud, rough, tough and fundamentally broken woman who is the biggest example of how horrifically evil Cerberus really is, having been kidnapped as a baby and experimented on her entire life; her turnaround into a protective teacher and reformed figure in 3 is genuinely an amazing change for her, given her life of violence.

Miranda Lawson: I will be straight forward; for the most part, I really DON’T like Miranda, and I don’t care for how popular she is in the fandom. She is the 2nd in command of Cerberus, and endorses it wholeheartedly for most of the 2nd game, and this makes her a human supremacist by default, so I automatically have a great loathing of that. Her constant excuses for the worst of Cerberus’ horrors is grating, though I like her more in the 3rd game, when she becomes a lot more responsible and less ‘humanity first’. (I also think her fanservice-y ness is really weird and at odds with her character, though i attribute it to Cerberus having weird uniforms.)

Legion: MY ABSOLUTE FAVORITE CHARACTER IN THE ENTIRE SERIES, AND I AM NOT KIDDING AT ALL. Legion is absolutely the entire reason I got into this series at all; I am not even kidding. I prefer to call this robot buddy ‘they’, since they are literally a plurality of many small minds in unison; I’m not very happy with the 3rd game treating Legion becoming an individuality as personhood because they were already a person; different does not mean lesser, yknow. I love Legion for being one of the most moral and ethical people, in their own strange way, and reading between the lines, it paints the image of someone who greatly regrets the deaths of the war with the geth’s makers, while at the same time resenting the quarians a lot for what they did. I totally interpret Legion as an abused child at the hands of the quarians, hating their makers but at the same time longing to understand WHAT they did to make their creators stop loving them.

Zaeed Masani: He’s entertaining, for sure, though his moral ambiguity makes him... questionable, to say the least! His thoughts on revenge, hate and retribution really do speak to me, but he’s not in my list of favs. It says a lot that him being against torture is honestly surprising.

Samara: why isn’t SHE the fanservice icon of the series. But seriously, I love Samara lot; if I had a proper list of favorite characters in the series, she’d be at the top five, most likely. She’s a paladin-archetype, absolutely devoted to her code of honor while being willing to look beyond the letter, and willing to do what must be done; her story is deeply tragic, and she’s one of my favorite characters. Also, she’s an actual MILF; im surprised she’s not more popular.

Morinth: I’ve never actually played with her, because you have to murder Samara to get her, and FUCK THAT. But I do have some opinions on her as a character, and these are them: she’s a terrible person, and her reasons for being a mass murderer are insufficient. Let’s not beat around the bush here; she’s a sadistic serial killer, a sexual predator. and she relishes in the kill. Yeah, she’s like that because she is an ardat-yakshi, but its one thing for her to flee the monatstaries; its another for her to have such an astronmically high body count. she didn’t NEED to kill anyone, she just wanted to do it to make herself feel good, and I insist she absolutely deserved getting her head squashed like a melon.

Mordin: Mordin reminds me of me; I am not even kidding at all, I genuinely talk like he does. (I have the speed and lack of focus of Mordin, and the detached, straightforward speaking fashion of Rogal Dorn from Text To Speech.) He’s a really interesting look into the salarians, and similar to Wrex and Garrus, he’s largely critical of their broader practices. He’s also notable in having participated in updating the genophage, keeping the krogan trapped in their slow rot, and his character development from someone who fully endorses it, to someone willing to die to atone for his sins, is a really striking thing. His loyalty mission is deeply affecting, with the quiet moment in the hospital and the corpses of dead women who let themselves be experimented on just for the hope of curing what he did to them, fanatical krogan driven to madness by despair... because of what he allowed to keep happening. Mordin’s soft words hinting at his remorse and doubt genuinely get me teary eyed.

Jacob: I’m one of the few people to have actually said this, I think... but I actually LIKE Jacob. Specifically, I like him for a lot of reasons that other people don’t; he’s straightforward, honest, doesn’t let his feelings get in the way of his duties, stays on track and does his job. I like him more than Miranda as it’s made clear that he is NOT a supporter of it’s motives, and is largely making use of its resources to do things with expedience, and seems to be working as an internal affairs, chipping away at its corruption. (He loses points for being mean to Legion and Thane, though.)

#queued #twitchy!mass effect

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doktorpeace · 5 years

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Top 5 Games Of The Year Runner Up And Honorable Mentions

Runner Up: Doki Doki Literature Club (THIS SECTION CONTAINS BIG SPOILERS, IF YOU HAVEN’T PLAYED DDLC AND ARE INTERESTED IN MAYBE TRYING IT HERE’S THE TL;DR It’s good, it plays with your expectations in a very good way and in a multitude of ways, it’s a great little piece of media that brings to life an extremely good character. Also it’s free, go download it on steam.)

Look, maybe it’s because I don’t consume a lot of horror media but this game really stood out to me. Not only for it’s genre though, also for the high quality of its writing and with how great the game is at accomplishing the one and only thing it truly sets out to do: Convey Monika as a character. The horror elements themselves can be a bit hit and miss and some of them are quite predictable, but I feel the game is excellent at building a continuous sense of dread as the player continues through it. It rapidly ratchets up the intensity of its content after taking just enough time for the player to settle in and get comfortable and mixes in JUST A COUPLE of jumpscares (which honestly it probably shouldn’t) in order to keep the player unsteady enough in terms of expectations to keep that dread building. Regardless, throughout the game Doki Doki Literature Club does a great job taking advantage of player expectations both of dating sim visual novels AND of horror writing to ultimately become something just a little bit more. It becomes an excellent character exercise and exploration. Thanks to some smart programming in service of the game’s ultimate intent, to make Monika into a ‘real’ character actually ended up giving me one of the deepest scares any piece of media, video game or otherwise, has ever given me. And it did it without any secondary stimuli like sound or a jumpscare or horrifying visuals. No, in a completely calm moment all that was said was this:

And I REELED back in my chair because the suspense and the dread the game had been building all impacted me at once. You can’t deliver that kind of scare in someone without some smart writing backed up by some VERY smart programming and understanding of player expectations. Honestly Monika is such an excellent and fully realized character despite the game being so short it’s astounding. By taking care to give her a lot of special conditional dialogue, pages upon PAGES of missable content, and even meta-content such as her having unique dialogue that only appears while looking through the game’s files it really just all coalesces into making Monika feel almost real, real enough to give me the willies and to feel a bit sad for her by the end. DDLC is a divisive game and I understand if the game’s handling of certain themes or content doesn’t sit well with other people but for me, and I say this as someone who is no stranger to suicide attempts, the game never went to far. For me it all worked in service of the game’s narrative and Monika’s character growth. Honestly even just little details like how the piano in the soundtrack only starts playing for the first time once Monika is introduced and only ever stops when she’s not watching you or how there’s a lot of different horror elements that only occur randomly so not everyone has the same experience or how some can only happen in fullscreen or in windowed mode, it’s really amazing attention to detail and consideration of her character while also making the game more unique as a product. DDLC was really good. It gave me some good scares but it also gave me a good story and a GREAT character to appreciate. Even if, like me, you’re a bit of a weenie when it comes to horror content I’d wholeheartedly recommend DDLC as a read, assuming you both can handle a jumpscare or two and can handle game content that involves suicide and self harm. I know I didn’t get too in depth here but I wanted to avoid spoiling TOO much and honestly I already said too much as is! Please excuse me! Honorable Mention #1: Yo! Noid 2 - Enter the Void

It’s not often you get a game that’s developed explicitly as a joke that’s so good. Yo Noid 2 is a solid, fun, and funny platformer. It’s all pretty clearly built just to tell one joke right at the very end but the ends ABSOLUTELY justify the means. I can’t talk too in detail about this game without ruining why it’s special, but Yo Noid 2 is a legitimately fun 3D platformer, with good level design, a relatively expressive moveset, a very special Special Action Button, and honestly a great soundtrack to boot! Its difficulty ramps up in a good way across its very short 90-150 minute length culminating in a very fun final boss fight. PLEASE go download Yo Noid 2, if you like 3D platformers and want to have a good laugh it’s 300% worth your time. It’s even free, you have no excuses!!

Honorable Mention #2: Mega Man 11 Mega Man is back, again, and they really did a good job expanding the franchise. While I still like entries such as 9, 10, and 4 better personally there’s no denying MM11 expands the franchise in a positive way more than any other before it. MM11 takes the time tested side scrolling design of the classic Mega Man series and adds just enough of a new wrinkle with the Double Gear system to really expand the player’s horizons and to push their level design concepts. While Double Gear and in fact all of the secondary weapons are entirely unnecessary as is tradition for Mega Man games MM11 does a great job incentives smart use of these mechanics, keeping them balanced with a shared cooldown system between both gears (power and speed) and making every single one of the Robot Master powers actually useful! Also all of the robot master designs are really charming this time, I was initially worried about the addition of voice acting but the voice cast does a great job! The level design is also a treat, while the length of the levels varies DRASTICALLY and Wily Castle 1 is dramatically longer and harder than another other stage in the game overall it’s very easy to just jump into any level and challenge yourself. There is no obvious first boss, they’re all pretty tough, and I started with Acid Man myself. The only thing about MM11 that let me down was the soundtrack; it wasn’t bad it just wasn’t bombastic either, merely present during play but not sticking in my memory at all. MM11 is a great entry in the series and I hope it signals a true return of one of my childhood favorites with more games to come soon. Honorable Mention #3: Fire Emblem - Mystery of the Emblem (FE12) Taking the great concept of remaking FE’s earliest titles that Shadow Dragon started and actually putting in the elbow grease to make the game really good, FE12 is a stand out entry in the Fire Emblem franchise. While some aspects of its map design are somewhat held back by the original iteration, FE3′s age, the developers at IntSys really did a great job modernizing Archanea and paying good tribute to the characters and story that made this game an absolutely beloved classic in the first place. With overall good map design, modernized mechanics, the best use of an Avatar Character in the franchise, and massively improved unit, class, and weapon balance over the original FE12 polishes its source material to a razor shine. Top it all off with a decent story and great new content that adds a bunch of new dialogue to the characters and this is the definitive way to experience Archenea and its inhabitants. Except for Marth, he was better in Shadow Dragon. Besides Marth’s characterization taking a step back and the gaiden content being rather slapdash and forgettable, this game is everything a remastering should be; Taking what worked and polishing it, improving what didn’t, and adding all new content that fits in with the original game in a productive and fun way for fans. The addition of a wide variety of gameplay difficulties and including the until this game INCREDIBLY rare BS: Fire Emblem expansion chapters previously exclusive to the Super Famicom Satellaview this game cartridge is bursting with good content. It’s a fun, fun game with a lot to offer and great replayability thanks to its BULGING roster of characters and deeply customizable avatar character. If you like Fire Emblem as a franchise I’d heavily recommending finding a patched FE12 rom out there, harder though it is to do now. You owe it to yourself to experience this game. Oh, just play with the battle animations off, they’re REALLY ugly. Still, this game puts Shadow Dragon’s lazy near-direct port of an NES game to DS to shame. Honorable Mention #4: A Hat in Time - Seal the Deal This DLC has been getting some backlash and frankly I don’t get why. While I was a bit disappointed the new chapter was shorter than the base game ones the Death Wish side of things offered a TON of great new content and new ways to experience past challenges. For its modest price point this DLC really does everything I could possibly hope for out of a 3D Platformer expansion. New, tougher challenges to really push my skills, fun new content that fits right in with the base game in terms of quality and polish, and in A Hat in Time’s case GREAT new boss fight experiences. Taking every existing boss and turning them into a downright Superboss level difficulty fight, remixing all of their attacks, speed, patterns, and adding all new stuff to them is such a great idea and I really loved it. Seal the Deal is a ton of fun as long as you aren’t averse to an easy base game getting a VERY challenging DLC expansion. I can understand why the difficulty whiplash might turn some people off but for me it was just right and really hit the spot. A Hat in Time is just so good, I love it.

#Dok's GotY 2018

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sailingsoo · 6 years

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July Overview

Monthly Drama Review: July 2018 Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun -

warning spoilers!

Completed:

Lawless Lawyer: The chemistry was beyond great, I could not have asked for a better cast. By the time we got to the last two episodes, I did not even realize it was about to end. It really was great from beginning to the end. Every character got what they deserved in the end.

Secret Mother: This drama really pulled through by the end. While it was boring the first half, all the mystery just made the ending better. I am so glad that Eun Young ended up being alive and Yoon Jin did not betray her. Like Lawless Lawyer, everyone got what they deserved in the end. On a side-note, the three mothers redeeming themselves was a great addition. Usually in kdramas those type of people never change, but it was nice to see them help Eun Young out in the very end.

Miss Hammurabi: Every episode left me as an emotional wreck. Maybe because the show was written by an actual judge that I was able to experience a variety of emotions. This is possibly Go Ara’s best role as her character remains passionate throughout the whole show. Having 3 different judges gave us different perspectives and showed us that not everything is black and white. Overall, a well-rounded series that hit different problems ranging from drug abuse, sexual harassment, and hierarchy in the workforce and society.

The Undateables: Adding the typical tropes like the bet and the love triangle kind of ruined the drama from what it had in the beginning where Hoon Nam and Jung Eum would work together to solve the undateables love life. Still a very cute drama thanks to the wonderful cast. Joon Soo is the definition of perfection by the way. I’m starting a petition to finally give Tae Joon the main role he deserves. Anyways disregarding all the other unnecessary stuff that happened during the drama, remember no matter age, appearance, and quirky habits you will always be able to find love. <3

What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim?: I actually dropped this drama midway but picked it back up because my best friend told me too. Although it does have lots of scenes that I find cringe-worthy, this was still a fun and loving drama. It also got dark too midway, but I love how they were still able to balance the comedy and lightness alongside with their traumatic past. I still can’t get over Lee Min Ki’s and Jung So Min’s cameo appearance. I wish there were more on Ji Ah and Gwi Nam’s relationship they were really cute together too! Nonetheless, a cute drama that kept me laughing and crying.

Age of Youth: I’m starting college soon, so I thought I would finally start this drama. The reason why I avoided this drama was because I do not like Hwayoung. I think what was revealed in 2017 after five years serves as justification as to why lol sips tea. BUT I think this is my favorite drama ever??? It’s just so good and I feel like I can relate to all the girls. It kind of opened my eyes a little bit about everyone’s circumstances. You really learn life lessons when you watch this show.

Ongoing:

Goodbye to Goodbye: I’m kind of wary on Min Soo’s quick character change. Why did it take him so long to show that he actually loved his girlfriend? I don’t really know how this show is going to end, so I’m gonna save my thoughts for next month.

Are You Human Too?: Am I the only one who doesn’t really care about the romance between Kang So Bong and robo Nam Shin. I still can’t really get behind it. He’s a robot and she’s a human, how will the writers logically end this so it doesn’t end up tragically (unless they want it to end like that). I’m more interested on human Nam Shin’s future actions. I don’t really get the people saying they want him dead though. Imagine being taken away from your mom because your dad is dead and being treated like shit for 20 years with only one friend that is siding with a robot now and also finding out that robot was made by your mom to replace you. I’m not excusing his actions of being a total dick mostly to Kang So Bong who has nothing to do with him. But man, I just feel so bad for this kid, he’s being compared to a robot that can never make mistakes. This is quite lengthy, but I’ll add on more for next month’s review.

Your House Helper: I’m so in love with this drama??? It looks so boring on the outside, but it just gets better each episode. They have a wide variety of characters all going through different situations and just creates a connection with the audience

Time: I liked Kim Jung Hyun during School 2017 and loved him in Eulachacha Waikiki but after seeing the press conference and a few interviews I became really really disappointed. However, after seeing the first two episodes I think his character did have a toll on him. Nonetheless he could of been more professional. Anyways, I would have dropped this drama if it wasn’t for Seohyun. Her acting improved so much from when I first saw her in Scarlet Heart <3 I don’t how they’re going to form a romance between the two, I would rather they do not. The drama itself feels like Uncontrollably Fond except with murder.

Your Honor: I don’t really have much to say about this yet, but I’m really excited on how this show will turn out.

Kimi ga Kokoro ni Sumishita: I actually started this literally right now, but I think I can relate to the main character in some aspect. Also, the psychological part has me hooked.

Dropping:

Wok of Love: Yeah I was really close to finishing it, I know but I already have too much dramas on my plate and it’s not as interesting as the other ones I’m watching. The chemistry between the main leads are just meh. The revenge plot isn’t that gripping either.

Hana Nochi Hare: I ended up rewatching Hana Yori Dango with Matsu Jun, so I’m not that interested in this one anymore. I even tried watching Meteor Garden, but my mind just keeps floating back to the Japanese version whoops.

Risky Romance: I want to watch this, but I already have a lot of stuff on my plate. I’ll save it for later ):

30 But 17: ^

Let Me Introduce Her: ^^

Mr. Sunshine: Wasn’t interested in this drama in the first place

Upcoming:

The Ghost Detective: A spooky drama with Park Eun Bin yeet.

Familiar Wife: I don’t know why but I got Go Back Couple feels while watching the teasers (which is a great drama that everyone should watch!). Definitely watching this one.

Lovely Horribly: Rom-com horror, an interesting drama I bet.

Someday Until This Rain Stops: J-dramas usually take a longer time getting subbed, but I’m definitely going to try and watch this one.

Hide & Seek: Probably not going to watch. The synopsis is really lacking to me.

I’m starting school next month and I really want to do well this year so I’m probably gonna cut down my drama watching and my activity on tumblr in general.

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thecartoonarchivist · 6 years

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Weekly Spotlight #4

Week number 4 of the Weekly Spotlight! I apologize for the wait; I’m still working out the kinks in my schedule.

Alrighty! So! Our weekly spotlight winner is:

*an even more vibrant drumroll!*

My Life as a Teenage Robot

I have a lot of fond memories of this show, as I’m sure many others do. Before sitting down and rewatching a couple episodes, from what I remembered about it, it was a little bit of an odd-ball. It always skirted this line of being accessible enough that the average viewer could relate to it while also being straight up bizarre enough to remember just how different this world is from our own. This show would mix the 1950′s aesthetic with science fiction concepts to cement itself, at least in my mind, alongside other animations such as Meet The Robinsons, George Shrinks! and, oddly enough, Samurai Jack. It was a slice of life, mixed with action and adventure, and some elements of horror? Which... ended up distinguishing itself from other similar “crime fighting teenagers” like Kim Possible, Teen Titans, or W.I.T.C.H. As a result, this show dealt with a lot of common problems and themes that teenagers faced in very odd ways, all under the guise of an action, sci-fi show.

So let’s have a little bit of a history lesson, shall we?

Back in the late 90′s, Nickelodeon began to host a show that was called Oh Yeah! Cartoons which has been called TV’s biggest animation development program ever. Dozens of filmmakers were contracted by Nickelodeon to create 7 minute cartoons that would be spliced together into a half-hour time-slot. This “show” would then air on television and depending on the approval ratings of the audience, these cartoon shorts would then be commissioned into a TV show for Nick. Producing nearly 100 of these cartoon shorts, this “animation laboratory” would jumpstart many individuals’ careers in the industry such as Seth MacFarlane, Vincent Waller, Dave Wasson, and Butch Hartman.

One such individual would be a man named, Rob Renzetti with a short titled, My Neighbor Was A Teenage Robot. Due to very high approval ratings, Nickelodeon commission for the show and would later on be titled, My Life As a Teenage Robot. It aired in 2003 and was eventually cancelled after 3 seasons (ironically) due to poor ratings.

So for our premise!

Jenny (or, XJ-9, as her mother calls her) is a crime-fighting, superhero robot who dreams of being a teenage girl just like other human beings. However, she has to juggle her duties as a superhero and her social life as a teenager, which leads wacky shenanigans, problems, and overall, grief for Jenny as she attempts to fit in. She’s partnered with her friends Brad and Tuck as they tag along on her adventures, and she even has an admirer named, Sheldon, who tries to woo her in his own awkward way. She fights monsters, aliens, and a robot queen named, Vexus who is trying to recruit Jenny her robot world the planet Cluster Prime, while also dealing with the Crust Cousins who are out to destroy Jenny’s social reputation. Can a girl ever catch a break?

These episodes are broken up into 2 eleven minute segments with problems that are usually resolved by the end of the episode. There isn’t so much of a “continuity” per se, but there are episodes that reference earlier ones so while you can dive right in with any old episode you want, I’d keep in mind which one I’m choosing.

So on the whole how did this series hold up?

Well, the first several episodes are pretty shaky. Although the visuals were very unique to watch and the soundtrack was entertaining to listen to, I felt that some of the episodes weren’t all that entertaining. The problems felt fairly realistic, or at least believable for a “teenage robot,” however, it was easy to tell that the creators were still figuring out what they wanted to do with this series. What kind of character did they want to make Jenny? What kind of dynamic did they want the support cast to be like? What kind of bad guys did they want Jenny to go up against? And as a result, some of the early episodes suffered in quality. Overall, I felt like the first season, especially a lot of the first half, was simply establishing the status quo of the series. Yet, in spite of this, there were several episodes that I felt that the series really hit its stride and gave a solid balance of uniqueness and familiarity that left me both intrigued for more and very entertained with the product I’ve received.

There were some episodes that left me simply... disturbed. Two of them being Attack of 5 and 1/2 ft. Geek and The Return of the Raggedy Android. Some of you might remember the second one as the skin episode... (And if you don’t, consider yourself blessed...) With Attack of the 5 and 1/2 ft. Geek, Jenny has a screw loose in her arm and solicits the help of Sheldon to fix her problem. Having a large passion for robotics, Sheldon is not only happy to help but also becomes extremely infatuated with Jenny after she saves him. Extremely infatuated. To the point of stalking her. And showering her with unnecessary gifts. The others kids at school even laugh at her and bully her for her newfound “boyfriend.” Jenny is obviously embarrassed and uncomfortable and finds any excuse to get away from him. Eventually, she gets a call from her mother saying that there’s a gang downtown (the Lonely Heart’s Club, btw) which is causing havoc and requires her assistance. With Sheldon following her every move, the gang gets very jealous of Sheldon and Jenny’s “relationship” and kidnaps Sheldon. Jenny has to swoop in and save him, having also finally snapped at having Sheldon being called her boyfriend. She goes off, calling Sheldon creepy, a stalker, and a host of other things that are not only accurate, but legitimate concerns that any other teenage girl would have in such a situation. Sheldon is hurt and in a weird turn of events, he saves Jenny after she gets captured during her rant. The episode ends with Jenny apologizing about what she said and says that maybe they can hang out sometime... as friends. Just... friends. Sheldon goes on to be a recurring character of the series, causing a lot of shenanigans and other problems as a result of his infatuation.

Since the series ended with Jenny never establishing a relationship with either Brad nor Sheldon, many speculate as to which one she would have started dating. Although there aren’t any definitive answers from the team about who would have ended up with, the team appears to favor Sheldon as a candidate. Which... I find very problematic.

Sheldon stalked her, made her uncomfortable, and through the course of the series, lied to her, toyed with her emotions, and caused her much emotional grief. And yet, she’s supposed to apologize to Sheldon for being so “cruel” even though she was voicing some legitimate concerns about his conduct, and eventually end up with him as a boyfriend? Nuh-uh. No bueno. That’s not exactly something you should be teaching little girls. If she is uncomfortable being around him, she shouldn’t be obligated to hang out with him--- even if it hurts his feelings. And by remaining friends with him, she’s using him for upgrades her mother denies; stringing him along with the possibility of being “more than friends”; and overall, setting up an uncomfortable situation for both of them to be in. I don’t see how that’s okay to promote that kind of relationship to any kid. It’s just simple wish fulfillment and for a TV show that will be shown to children, that’s not okay. Keep it in your personal diary, or on your personal computer, because promoting this sort of relationship is extremely toxic and I don’t approve. At all.

Now... the infamous skin episode...

The basic problem of the episode is that Jenny wants to hang out at teenage hotspot called Mezmer’s. However, the owner of the shop won’t allow her in because she’s a robot. Remembering the freakish false skin that her mother designed her several episodes before, she attempts to reuse it after having received several upgrades to make it more believable. And it works! She becomes beautiful! More popular! She even gets to dance with Don Prima, the local heartthrob that Jenny has a crush on! Overall, she’s simply... normal. However, the second-skin seems to have a life of its own and puts itself on in Jenny’s sleep. It coaxes her to be more normal, to stop fighting crime, to focus on her beauty and her looks because that’s what a normal girl does. But once Brad becomes endangered by an intergalactic biker gang that threats destroy the shop, Jenny sheds her new skin and learns to accept herself for all her imperfections and unique personality traits. Because that’s what’s truly normal about her.

This episode was probably the most prominent that I remembered watching as a kid. And for a good reason too... This. Episode. Was. Horrifying! I’m not even kidding! Rewatching this as an adult, I kept thinking to myself “This is a children’s show?!?” One of the first interactions that we see with this new skin is that it claws its way up Jenny’s body while she shouts, “I can’t breathe!”

Later on, we see the exoskin crawl its way across Jenny’s floor and attack her like a snake while she sleeps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJjJmGv6ztY

(The video is pretty poor quality, but it’s the only one I can find.)

What. The. Fuck.

Oh, but it’s alright because she sheds the skin in the end and everything returns to a relative normal.

Except for the fact that the ending implies that the skin takes another victim and survives. Yeah. IT’S A REAL THING.

The message that the episode taught was great. It’s a message that teenage girls really do need to hear: that you have your own normal and that trying to be others’ version of “normal” can end up changing who you really are and up taking away all of the cool, badass qualities that make you, well, you. The problem is that this episode is so terrifying how the hell do you show this to kids?!? The fact that I remembered this episode so vividly despite the fact that I haven’t seen this show since it aired is a testament to the fact that it I probably shouldn’t have watched it as a child. I just... I’m baffled on how this got made! It’s... just... *shivers.*

I mean, questionable episodes aside, the show itself was interesting. The visuals were certainly unique and interesting to watch. The character designs were so original and iconic that going back and watching the original cartoon short, it’s kind of crazy that they weren’t always like that. The soundtrack, sound effects, even some of the voice acting was enjoyable the listen to. As I said before, it has a very 50′s aesthetic with a futuristic twist, which gives it this odd balance between feeling dated but also surprisingly modern. The backgrounds appear to be hand-painted, which is probably the reason for its dated look; I think it was a rather nice touch. I honestly have to give it to the sound effects department for being so on top of the little noises and such for every little movement Jenny made. It really created a sense of life in the character and I really did appreciate it in the small moments. I will have to say though, going back and watching this series, it didn’t exactly age as well as I had hoped. There were some nice episodes that I enjoyed but many of the episodes I found were pretty mediocre at best. Maybe it’s simply because I’ve gotten older and many of the jokes/gags just weren’t funny anymore. Maybe it’s because the characters themselves were simply 2-dimensional at best and dealt with stereotypical teenage problems. I’m not sure but really, I just wasn’t amused. Now, maybe I just need to watch more of this series as it appears to be a bit of a slow burn but really I’m just not that hype to jump on rewatching it.

If I had to rate this show, I’d probably give it a 6.8 out of 10.

I’ll probably sit down and rewatch all of this at some point; after all, it seems decent enough. But really, if I never watch it again, I wouldn’t be too upset. It’s pretty much what I’d call “bubble gum TV;” if I want to turn on something mindless for a little while, I’d probably watch it but I wouldn’t be too invested. It’s just pretty... bland.

I think a lot of people have a bit of rose-tinted goggles when looking at this show and as such, it becomes kind of hard to criticize it. Does it deserve to be forgotten? Not necessarily. But I don’t think that it’s really as great as a lot of people think of it to be.

As for me, I’m gonna put this back in the shelves of my vault to watch one day. But when that day will be? We’ll just have to wait around and see what happens.

[Edit 11/21/118: I’m testing out a new tagging system. Let’s see if this fixes the broken links issues.]

If there are any corrections you’d like to make in regards to this post, please feel free to send me a message with your corrections and I’ll get back to it as soon as I can!

Do you remember a cartoon your friends have never heard of? Got a scene from an animated film that you’re dying to know the name to? Send your questions to The Cartoon Archivist and I’ll see what I’ve got in the vault!

#my life as a teenage robot #nickelodeon #nicktoons #TEENick #SNICK #weekly spotlight #2005~2010 #cartoons #wow this one was popular with nick #I tagged it as 2005-2010 because it premiered during those years #but the thing is that it piloted in 1999 so...#It's just got a weird timeline I guess.

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echodrops · 6 years

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Voltron or Final Fantasy 7?

In my last Voltron post I mentioned that Voltron Legendary Defender is really just Final Fantasy 7 with robot lions, so I wanted to elaborate on some of the comparisons.

Obviously this is mostly facetious; there are still several note-worthy differences between the two series, and if you want to get technical, Voltron certainly existed before Final Fantasy 7. However, it’s pretty obvious that someone on the writing team for Voltron Legendary Defender has been influenced by the plot and characters of Final Fantasy 7.

I mean...

We start out our story with the world in the clutches of an evil dictator, who by all rights, has no logical claim to the parts of the universe he controls, except that he has consolidated access to a seemingly unlimited supply of energy, which gives him military and utilitarian power over the hapless masses. (Also, bonus for their outfit color schemes matching almost exactly.)

The energy that these two scumbags are powering their military forces with is not just any energy, no sir: it’s actually the lifeblood of planets, the force that keeps worlds and everything on them alive.

In one of the most blatant cinematic parallels of all time, they forcefully draw out and refine this energy, using it for various purposes from powering their cities, building massive weapons, to creating armies of typically monstrous super soldiers, usually hopped up hard on the energy drug.

Meanwhile, our evil dictators rule from the thrones of their conspicuously ring-shaped dark fortresses that continue to slowly drain the life and peace from everything in reach.

But everyone knows that any villain worth his salt is backed up by an even more morally bankrupt and terrifying Mad Scientist:

Whose preoccupation with a calamity from another world

and penchant for creating horrific chimeras of flesh and machine

is about to cause everyone to have a very, very, bad day. Now where else have we seen pink glowing eyes, hm...

Of course, evil never reigns without opposition, so we have to have the consistently-out-of-focus-for-the-rest-of-the-series band of well-intentioned extremist rebels:

Although they talk a big game, their biggest accomplishment seems to mostly be getting themselves blown up.

They certainly aren’t responsible for killing their respective evil dictators, for example. Nope, that honor goes to:

The mysterious light-haired pretty boy with weird bangs, cat eyes, a sword, and a big ass chip on his shoulder over his parentage. He seems calm and rational, even sophisticated and princely--but it’s a thin veneer hiding a life-time of trauma and horror, and one wrong reveal about the identity of his mother could tip him over the edge into no-holds-barred madness. A dangerous free agent whose loyalties are questionable and whose existence is inextricably tied to the calamity from another world. He thinks He is among the last of the ancient mystical race of Cetra Alteans, who were eradicated by the creature from the other world, who infiltrated their society by possessing some of their closest allies.

Lotor also has shades of Rufus Shinra: seizes command after his father’s death, possibly still evil but everyone loves him anyway, commands a Quirky Mini Boss Squad:

Featuring in order: the One Who Rushes Into Everything, the Most Competent Right-Hand, the Quiet One, and the Plucky Redhead.

Of course, when the world needs saving from certain doom, a most beloved band of bizarre heroes will arise to answer destiny’s call:

The Stringy Inherited-Sword-Wielding Hero With Wack Hair

It’s a running gag to refer to him as a lone wolf and disinterested in other people, but under his prickly facade is a much softer, confused boy who is struggling hard with identity issues. He’s forced into a leadership role for which he is particularly ill-suited, and even though most people will leave the game/the show with the impression that he really grew into his leadership, the sum total of his accomplishments is actually causing far more trouble than would have occurred if he had just stayed home.

His obsession with finding and defeating light-haired pretty boy causes everyone no small amount of grief and then he ends up siding with said light-haired pretty boy anyway...

Can’t overcome the fact that he is deeply connected to the very thing he must defeat; he has Jenova Galra genes that lead him to question his role in the universe and whether or not he is a monster.

Incurably socially awkward country boy. Let’s mosey!

He learned everything he knows from:

The Black-Haired Best Friend with a Scar on His Face

Older, wiser, and in every way more competent than the stringy hero, this guy, complete with noticeable black and purple color scheme, is REAL hero material. He’s been through it all: held captive for year(s) by the mad scientist, “upgraded” and experimented upon with intentions of creating a true Super Soldier, something-something clones everywhere something-something... He has the good attitude and the powerful loyalty necessary to be a shining example of a white knight for the princess and is the standard which stringy hero knows he will never exceed. Stringy hero looks up to this guy more than anyone in the entire world, and this guy would give it all--even his life--to protect the people who mean the most to him. Complete with dramatic mid-series meaningful haircut!

Despite being a fan favorite, the creators spend more time writing this guy out of the series than they do actually using him to his best potential...

Shiro also has some shades of Vincent Valentine: atoner who fears he has become a monstrous tool for the enemy, despite his deep-down incredibly good heart. Some people like to pair him with the Genki Girl.

Mostly seen in the company of:

Princess Last of Her Kind

Don’t let her soft looks and pink color motif fool you! The “princess” is a strong, independent girl who does what she wants, when she wants, up to and including sacrificing herself to save the day when all the other heroes fail at life. As the last of her mystical and mysterious race, she possesses strange magics that allow her to feel the life force of all living beings and tap into the very energy that Shinra the Galra Empire are harvesting. Capable of wielding a staff, her actual greatest strength is her healing magic, which has the power to bring an entire planet back from the brink of death.

Her people were destroyed from within by betrayal at the hands of the calamity, and their sole remaining Plot MacGuffin, the white materia Voltron is the only thing left that can save the world. Despite being technologically advanced beyond all reason, her people were ancient peacekeepers who still, inexplicably, built stone temples.

The Promised Land Oriande is not a faerie tale.

Strongly flower-themed:

Then we have:

The Brilliant Young Rascal

As a character, Pidge isn’t actually a one-for-one to anyone in FF7. Yuffie’s acrobatic stunts and mischievous Genki Girl personality embody one obvious part of Pidge, but Yuffie lacks Pidge’s tech-ish brilliance and competent follow-through. In that regard, Pidge is actually somewhat closer to Red XIII: smart, inquisitive, and usually mature, their deep inner-conflicts, especially regarding the fate of their fathers, reveal their weaknesses and the truth that they’re still young, uncertain people who fear for the future of their world and sometimes feel helpless in the face of the staggering tasks put before them. They are deeply attuned to nature but also raised by someone whose technology is capable of revealing incredible truths about the universe. Both of them are also fish out of water when it comes to befriending new people, and they often feel like they do better on their own than trying to rely on people who aren’t part of their trusted family.

Courage the Cowardly Cat

Although it’s certainly tempting to compare Hunk to Barret, based somewhat on appearance and even, to a certain extent, on personality--Barret is a huge softy underneath who just loves his family and wants to do right in the world--Hunk has much more in common with Cait Sith, the robotic cat/moogle combo who is secretly an alter ego for the brilliant architect Reeve Tuesti. Cowardly and often the butt of jokes from teammates and enemies alike, Cait Sith is frequently underestimated and flies under the radar, allowing him to keep his own secrets even while sticking his nose in just about everyone else’s business. Although he’s not initially sold on the heroes’ goal of saving the world, he soon has a change of heart that makes him into a fast and loyal ally. Despite the fact that he’s made of “fluff,” in the hour of greatest need, it’s Cait Sith who steps up to rescue everyone, essentially single-handedly saving the world.

His creator is an incredible and genius engineer who longs to use his creations to better the lives of common people, but he’s also sarcastic and unafraid to tell it like it is, even if that means he’s telling his own allies where they’ve messed up badly.

His predictions about the future always seem to come true...

The Emotional Backbone of the Party

Don’t get me wrong, both Lance and Tifa are formidable fighters on their own, whose talents shine in different areas of combat than the traditional sword-wielding heroes. But their greatest strengths actually seem to lie in their ability to support their allies. When stringy hero falls into despair and falters in his leadership, it’s this right-hand role who steps up to bear the weight and get the party back on track. The voice of reason and drive, Lance and Tifa are go-getters who won’t let anyone settle for giving less than their best, and they definitely aren’t willing to sit around listening to tired old excuses when they could be out saving the world. Razzle Dazzle time!

They are both influenced strongly by their families and tend to listen to the feelings and struggles of others much more than they are willing to share their own feelings and fears. The others come to rely on them as an emotional crutch, whose central job it is to reassure, validate, and empower the team, sometimes at the cost of their own happiness.

But they weren’t always this way, and in fact, in the past, they happened to be a bit shallow and excitable, with a penchant for throwing themselves into situations which were way, way too far out their league and for rarely, if ever, listening to good advice. Head-strong and romantic, they started out as dreamers before the war took its toll.

They definitely had a rocky beginning with their stringy hero--they were not friends--but, by the middle end of the series, have grown and matured as characters into a strong person who not only helps guide the hero but also holds up better in the face of all the trauma and suffering the party experienced.

Even being such a central character, they get a bare minimum amount of dialogue, leading many fans to interpret the character however they see fit, causing both Lance and Tifa to become common stand-ins for the fans themselves.

(Despite both losing their place as the “heart of the party” to the “Princess,” they never become jealous of her.)

And finally:

Coranic The Mechanic

Coran and Cid Highwind don’t have that much in common in terms of personality, except both being extreme dorks with notable accents, but I wonder how much of that is because Voltron is a kids’ show and Cid’s chain-smoking, curse-laden, women-abusing attitude just wouldn’t fly in a place like that. In terms of story role, they fill the exact same niche: the older male mechanic who advises and leads when needed to, despite his advice often seeming eccentric at best to those he’s trying to lead. He’s in charge of flying the ship while the others race off into danger, and if you lay one dirty finger on his baby, he will probably throw you overboard.

Tough as nails, despite all appearances, but also tried, true, and loyal to a fault. Won’t give up, even in the face of insurmountable danger, and gets a big kick out of killing bad guys. Impeccable timing for dramatic last second saves.

PHEW, got ‘em all!

In case you need anything else to convince you that you’re watching an at least partially repackaged story, don’t forget the:

Bizarre Egyptian-themed ancient stone temple where the mystical race of the Cetra Alteans kept the deepest secrets of their magic.

Really unlucky magic rock from space.

Gigantic killer robot beasts.

An overly-drawn-out and somewhat poorly explained clone plot line that just leaves the fans even more confused.

youtube

And OF COURSE: infamously long unskippable summoning sequences.

tl;dr:

If you’re in the game of predicting where Voltron’s future plot might go, you would not be misguided to go play FF7 as fuel for your predictions. And if you’re a Voltron fan who still hasn’t played FF7... What are you even doing with your life? Get out of here!

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jes-wan · 7 years

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An eye behind shattered glass - Black Mirror S1- S3 thoughts

I just completed a binge of Black Mirror’s three Seasons. It’s hard to say if this was mentally a great thing to do, as the show has a rather down trend with it’s stories, for the most part. My thoughts will be in Netflix order, for whatever reason they have the season’s backwards, although it doesn't mater too much with each story being standalone. I suppose that is what makes binging a series like this easy, because everything is different and you only notice a few actors returning to play different roles. I thought I would write down my thoughts on these episodes and how they relate to real life, I won’t be talking too much about the episode themselves, because I don’t think that’s exactly what the writers of Black Mirror are after.

Obviously spoiler alert, so read at your own peril, you have been warned.

Nosedive

The first episode I watched in this series was also the first to make me feel guilty in real life. Of course I'm talking about relating this to using Uber. Where we rate our drivers and they rate you. A friend questioned recently how wrong the system is to be so open and have no guidelines for rating. It’s a good point and exactly what this episode is based on. Out of all the stories this one is the most realistic to actually happen. It wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine cafe’s starting to adopt the same system as Uber, and it spiralling out from there. I did enjoy the actress’ journey to discovering what’s the point in this system where you can’t be honest, or a breakup costs you, your job, the ending of the two of them yelling in some sort of lockup was perfect. Where, the language was ugly, that didn’t mater, it needs to be apart of our life. Sometimes you just need to tell someone, look that’s really stupid, without loosing your social standing. Speaking of which, going back to Uber, after watching this I found out how a passenger can see their rating. Mine was 4.96, which means someone gave me a four star, the feeling that you weren’t perfect right there is the problem. In the end conversations shouldn’t be rated for being meaningful, regardless of their outcome it’s all about interacting with another human, taking the good and bad.

Playtest

Buyers regret, that’s what VR feels like after watching this episode, or at least what VR might do to some people. Okay, maybe it isn’t that bad. Yet, it does make you wonder how fears could play a huge part in someone getting hurt in VR. Yes, the point of this story is playing off fears in a horror setting. Although in reality fears a deeper than that. You could be playing an adventure game and you have a fear of spiders. One comes up close to you and gives you a real life heart attack. How will we in the future combat actual fears, safe environment or not, that’s what the episodes asks. Instead, the real underlining issue is leaving things too late, putting something off because it’ s too hard. Well for the main character, doing so proved to be fatal, if he had just answered his mum a long time ago, she might not have called during the test and he would still be alive.

Shut up and Dance

You hear about people being blackmailed all the time, I couldn’t say if anyone has ever gone this far, but it might have happened to some lesser degree. The real question to ask yourself, is the risk worth it? If he had gone to the police right away, yes the video would have been released, but he would have had some backup, heck even the media might have been interested in hearing his story. It’s taking a bad situation and turning it better. Raise awareness, because as far as I know the web cam hijacks do indeed happen. In the end the troll, who I suspect was the kid in the hotel lobby, just released it all anyway. Not surprising, because someone who would come up with the ideas they did, probably isn’t someone with social empathy anyway.

San Junipero

I have to say this story was beautiful, I wasn't expecting the twist with it being a cloud reality. At first I thought it seemed like an excuse for a writer to put every 80s pop song into one episode. Big lessons here, even when someone tells you a story don’t assume they are selfish or whatever the case might be, ask questions. How long were you married is a good one. I’m not sure I wouldn’t struggle with the idea that after being uploaded living there forever would make me long for those who didn’t make such a choice. The ending was a surprise happy though and it was nice to see Greg was just someone willing to help out and get nothing in return, seldom do we see this today.

Men Against Fire

I was thinking this might be straight out action and not too thought provoking, at this point I should’ve known better. After binging the entire Alien series before this, I was glad to be wrong. I’d never heard the stats before about soldiers shooting over heads and the hit rate was so low. It’s sad to think that turning people into what we consider a monster would make them easier to kill. Even if they are expressing the exact same motions as someone saying people don’t shoot me. Not much of a choice for the ending, either watch those people die in an endless loop or be erased, no idea to be honest, both are bad. He got discharged anyway and now lives in a fantasy world, still bad I guess.

Hated in the Nation.

First of all, please no one make mechanical bees! Just don’t do it. Secondly what’s happened to all the bomb shelters in the UK. They could have put the third victim in one, a house surrounded by FLOWERS seemed like a terrible idea! Of course, social media plays a big part again, how often do we see people hiding behind their computer screen, shouting hate or even death in this case, knowing there is no consequences. That’s the lesson here, you can troll under your fake profiles, hate the world, think it’s funny to condemn, but really if someone manages to program killer robot bees, you might be in trouble. So consider this next to you decide to call someone on twitter. :P

Be Right Back

Tragic story from the get-go, the regret of putting work ahead of going with someone. Then dealing with a pregnancy, under a self imposed isolation. If you were offered the chance to talk to a passed person based on how they talked on social media would you? I couldn’t even try, to me it would be like forever putting yourself though the loss, every second you would feel sad after the conversation is over. Even more so with the android version of her late husband. In some respects it is nice for your daughter to meet basically a ghost of her father, but as she gets older what kind of impact will this have on her? Tricky, but a choice I can say I would never make.

White Bear,

Not what I was expecting, brutal but brilliant acting. Being ignored is worse than being yelled at, in my opinion. That people will film someone getting hurt rather than help, is something that does exist now. It seems to be instinct to pull out the phone and take video/photos before calling emergency. I heard that police actually hear about public crimes on Facebook first as opposed to people calling their emergency line. I don’t want to get to into too much about how she filmed her partner killing the child, there are no words and it’s hard to fathom that probably has happened somewhere for the writers to come up with it. A park for justice though, I know I couldn’t be a part of that, but with the rise of reality TV, I'm surprised something like this doesn’t already exist.

The Waldo Moment

I’m hesitant to write too much about the theme of this episode, due to the pure politics as opposed to social themes. I will say, is this really how the disenfranchised feel? If so, oh...

White Christmas

Realised what was going on after the lady and the egg scene, although I thought he was a police officer looking for a confession, I was close enough. However, I'm keen to talk about blocking people. The feeling of blocking people rather than facing them, easy isn't it? But can be cruel. If she had just come clean, he wouldn’t have gone through years or torment. Wondering why she kept the child, after the argument was seemingly about that. She may not have died on that train, if she was honest and her dad would still be alive same goes for her child. Of course he’s responsible for his own actions, and he did commit murder. Yet, the real lesson is, be honest, not mater how much it will hurt. You can’t possibly predict what you might set in motion by lying.

The National Anthem

You could just slap the media, which really did a great job in making a situation worse, anything for a story! Would everyone actually stand/sit there and actually watch such a horrible humiliation? No where in the demands did it say people had to watch it, yet the whole nation stopped. People laughed and smiled forgetting all about the reason why he is doing this. As a species do we really have such little compassion until it’s too late? Do we want to watch the train wreck? Of course, humanity's super power and after a year it’s pretty much forgotten and turned into a political vote changer. Although only three points up? I guess regardless of heroes, it’s not a popularity contest, which probably isn’t a bad thing.

Fifteen Million Merits

I’m not a big fan of talent shows, especially music ones, I feel it’s turned talent into image. Regardless, after watching YouTube videos recently on comments made by judges, it’s no wonder we are turning into a society of people who do not question our idols. What people will do for fame, she said yes to a life of sex slavery and he sold out to preach something no one is even listening too! It’s almost not worth it and looking for a way to escape the complex would have been a better use of time.

The Entire History of You

Would you become obsessed with the past if you could just rewind it? As someone who always tries to find the truth, I know I would be overusing this system. I’m not sure it was really that bad of a system, because without it he would have never found the truth and would have lived in a state of ignorance. Been played as a fool is much worse in my books. Irrespective of having this technology people didn’t seem to worried a conversation could just be rewound back and still followed their ways of deceit, shame really. Of course this sounds like a conflict with Nosedive, but the difference is honesty not avoidance.

Well that’s it, my thoughts on Black Mirror and it’s very good attempts at making you think about the society we live in.

Thanks for reading,

Peace out

Jes-Wan

#black mirror #scifi #netflix

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