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lambourngb · 3 years

Note

For the first line meme: It's later than he thought when the knock on the door interrupts another night of staring at the computer screen.

the heart is a muscle - post season 2, mentions of forlex , getting back together malex fic for you dear @jule1122, and @haloud, and @christchex.

It's later than he thought when the knock on the door interrupted another night of staring at the computer screen.

Mr. Jones and his last words to Michael, before he was forced back into stasis, still haunted him. “You really think there was just one ship? We were in formation, kid. What you should ask yourself is, where did everyone else go? Did they just keep zippin’ on their way to the colony? Or did they stop and take a gander at this planet and what they did to the survivors?”

The tiny bit of hope that this Max-lookalike psychopath didn’t represent the last of his species, had Michael diving back into his research behind the crash of 1947. The online conversations about Roswell had moved on to other topics since Michael had abandoned the message boards in the wake of Caulfield, but with some effort, he had found new threads detailing neighborhood folklore regarding newcomers with eerie talents, like the ability to grow food in droughts. Stories that peppered all over the world. Stories that might mean an alien colonist on Earth.

The thirst for knowledge about his planet and his people would never leave him, even if the actual urge to go had quieted down into just a soft whisper. Life was finally good in Roswell. After the mind games of Mr. Jones, Michael could admit now that he did have a family here, even if they weren’t related by blood. Sanders, Arturo, Mimi, Michelle Valenti had all stepped in at various times to offer a guiding hand to him, or just a quiet nod of reassurance that he was valued. Max and Isobel would always be his siblings, but now he could count Liz, Rosa, Kyle, and even awkwardly in their new friendship, Maria, as extended his family now.

It didn’t escape Michael that not even in his thoughts could he attribute his feelings for Alex as brotherly. There was still a vacant place at the head of Michael’s overflowing table of family for a partner, a spouse. That somehow, the seat even as other people came and went, only seemed to fit Alex.

Except they were still just friends.

Another knock, more impatient this time, rattled the Airstream’s door. Michael sat up, placing his ancient laptop on the counter and rolled off his bed to get to his feet. His life was had changed so much in the last couple of years that he had enough people in it, friends, who dropped by his trailer at all hours of the day, not just Isobel, that he couldn’t even guess the identity of the visitor.

Backlit from the auto yard’s security lights, stood Alex Manes holding a cardboard drink holder from ‘Bean Me Up’.

“Alex,” Michael greeted, a smile already at his lips. He glanced at the coffee and back to Alex, “Couldn’t wait until tomorrow I take it?” This was part of the new normal for Michael, meeting Alex for coffee, three or four mornings a week. It was something that had grown out of a happy coincidence, Alex’s gym was near the Boys and Girls Club that Michael volunteered at, serving breakfast in the mornings and tutoring kids in math in the afternoon.

Same place at the same time, once, then twice, became a standard thing. Not a date. Just, taking advantage of the mutual collision to talk. And at first, it was awkward to share news with each other, like Alex’s dating experiences with Forrest or Michael’s attempts to recover his memories of his planet, but later things had softened into a routine. Order coffee, find a small table, and then spend the next hour playfully fending off Alex’s attempts to foist food on Michael’s side of the table while also stealing sips of his caramel lattes.

Perhaps one day Alex would realize that Michael had only ordered the ridiculously sweet coffee drinks because he knew that was what Alex preferred to drink. It was still a damn toxic hold over from Jesse Manes that Alex still persisted in ordering black coffee with no sugar. Dating Forrest might have helped Alex be open with his sexuality, there were still lessons for Alex to learn in being gentle with himself, Michael observed. The act of indulging in pleasures, instead of engaging in deprivation, it was something he struggled with as well.

In the meantime, Michael could at least help Alex in this small way, letting him ‘steal’ his lattes.

“Alex?” Something about Michael had robbed Alex of all speech as he just stared up at Michael in response, still holding the drinks dumbly in his hands. “Are you okay? What’s wrong-”

The switch from teasing to urgent concern finally snapped Alex out of his apparent stupor. “Right, nothing, um, just- since when do you wear glasses?”

Michael’s hand went to his face automatically, realizing belatedly that he was still wearing his reading glasses. He started to pull them off, blushing in embarrassment, when Alex blurted out, “They look good! On you. The glasses. Um great even.”

“Oh.” Now that. Michael did not know what to do with that.

In the yellow-wash of light, Alex was clearly the same man from yesterday’s coffee visit physically. His soft mouth was there, but it came with his standard closed expression that he must have picked up abroad, wearing it now as Michael’s least favorite souvenir. His posture was the same too, forever changed from losing his leg, straight-backed and rigid but just then, he was someone Michael hadn’t seen in a long time. That awkward stuttering response was Alex Manes, the seventeen-year-old boy who had whipped off his visor nervously in the museum, the same boy who touched with soft gliding palms newly revealed skin before snatching his hands away at the first sign that it was unwelcome.

Aware that it was his turn to stare at Alex, Michael forced himself to smile naturally, “I guess not even my alien physiology can beat back the glare of a computer screen. I forgot I had them on.”

“Did I interrupt something? I can go if you want,” Alex stopped, probably hearing the past echo between them but not in the benign way of before. “Or I can stay and help, even if it’s with surprise coffee?” This time he lifted the tray up between them, an offer or a barricade of politeness, Michael wasn’t sure.

“I’m looking for other survivors,” Michael admitted, before looking down to avoid Alex’s sharpened gaze of interest. “On the internet, obviously, since I don’t think I can trust that I could sense them with my mind.”

It was clear that Alex hadn’t forgotten any of the various tactics Jones had employed against them, but Michael in particular. A frequent repeated taunt was about how damaged their psychic abilities were for adults, to the point no one had sensed Caulfield, but that from his pod prison Jones could hear Nora calling for help nightly right until the end. The twisted knife of how Michael had grown up waiting for someone to save him. Alex pursed his lips to object, “Michael-”

“Jones was full of shit about a lot,” Michael assured him quickly, “but I think he was right about the ships, that it wasn’t just one that crashed. I’m just combing through stories, basically internet mythology, looking for clues about strangers who might have some sort of power. It’s a lot of ‘world’s biggest cucumber’ stories right now, but hey, come in, you’re the computer genius and I could use your help and your coffee.” He placed his hands on the coffee holder, carrying it for Alex and backed away from the steps to let Alex have as much room as possible to navigate the cumbersome metal steps into the Airstream.

The seating area of the Airstream had been folded away and stored in order to make room for the drying rack of his clothes from laundry day, leaving only his narrow bed for seating. Michael had half-a-minute’s pause in reconsideration. They could relocate outside to his fire pit with the cheap camp chairs, and sit pressed together elbow-to-elbow around the dim screen of the laptop between them. Or. Or they could squeeze together on his bed, a place where that sort of contact between them had always led to sex. What was the safer option for their friendship?

His heart always strayed too far from the safety of his bones when it came to Alex.

Ignoring his pounding pulse, he grabbed the coffee cup marked “Alex” and pulled it to his lips to drink and made a gesture to the bed. At least he had made the bed up earlier with clean linens, the spread was neatly tucked into the corners, almost military sharp. That made it feel slightly less risqué to him than inviting Alex into warm mussed sheets that reeked of Michael’s skin. That rain and bourbon scent that Alex had pointed out.

“Um, your coffee was the other one.” Alex picked up the abandoned cup marked with a ‘M’ and followed him over to the bed.

“No, I’m drinking the coffee I always end up with. Your black tar juice.”

Alex smiled slightly, caught out by the observation before gingerly sitting next to Michael as Michael scooted over toward the wall of the Airstream. “Yeah, I guess I do end up stealing yours.” He brought his left leg up easily on the mattress and then passed his coffee cup over to Michael’s waiting hands as he brought his prosthetic up with both hands for balance. The smile faded, as Alex reclaimed the ‘M’ cup to sip from deep in thought as he seemed to review the history of their morning encounters. “I’m sorry-”

“Alex, come on,” he teased leaning his shoulder against Alex’s. “You haven’t caught on by now? I only order that sugar monstrosity because I know you won’t let yourself do it. I don’t even like caramel that much.”

“What? Come on, that’s what you ordered that first time-”

“I ordered that for the director at the community center.” Michael placed his coffee on the window of the Airstream and concentrated on bringing the laptop back up to rest on his knees between them not daring to look at Alex. He would never be able to confess the next bit and see Alex’s too-expressive gaze at the same time. But. As he had reminded himself earlier, he needed to work on indulging in pleasures as well, not just holding on to the pylon weight of depriving himself, of never believing he was worthy of good things. And being Alex’s friend was that. A pleasure. A good thing. The best thing.

“Once I saw you though, I kinda forgot the errand I was on in the first place. Then, I might have gone back at the same time the next day. And the day after that. For reasons.” He glanced to the side, meeting Alex’s wide eyes briefly before turning back to the laptop. “So I guess it's my turn to apologize? I might have had an agenda.”

It was quiet between them, as Michael clicked through a few different forums. He wasn’t paying any attention to where his cursor landed, he just kept scrolling through window after window as a distraction because the urge to pull back, to crack a joke, to do anything but let Alex process in silence was hard to suppress but needed. That was a part of becoming friends, learning that Alex needed extra time to formulate a response, something that came from needing to shut all emotional responses off during a drone operation at work.

“Me too,” Alex replied softly. “About the agenda. I mean, I don’t even have a membership at that gym.”

Michael frowned, the words not making any sense to him.

“That first time was dumb luck, I mean, I stopped in that morning because I had stayed the night at Forrest’s for the first time and I found out he doesn’t drink coffee. Doesn’t even own a coffee maker.” Alex scoffed quietly, before leaning against Michael affectionately, “I should have known that it was doomed from the start, just on coffee alone but what really put the nail in the coffin was the fact I pretended to go to that gym for two months because I had a bag of clothes with me when you saw me.”

“That was your clothes from staying over with him,” Michael said slowly, almost to himself, before he frowned even deeper as the connections fell into place. He didn’t know whether he wanted to laugh or not, but this was a new level of avoidance of an awkward subject for Alex. It did make sense considering the timing, and maybe that was why he was confessing now to Michael because not that Michael allowed himself to show it, the early days of Alex’s relationship with the historian were difficult for him. He didn’t begrudge Alex being happy or being with someone else, but there was still an old, gnarled bit of Michael’s heart that pinched painfully at seeing the romance play out for everyone in Roswell to see. “Alex, I know you guys are dating, you didn’t have to lie about that and pretend you had gone to that gym.”

“Were dating,” Alex patiently corrected. “Pay attention, Michael. I just said it was doomed from the start.”

“Because he didn’t drink coffee?”

“Because I was engaging in a deep cover operation that involved a fake gym membership, rescheduling my appointments to the afternoon and blocking out time in my mornings all, so I could see you.” The gears were still turning too slowly for Alex’s liking as he rolled his eyes at Michael and continued, “I ended it with Forrest about a month ago. Or well, he ended it with me because I was always too busy in the morning for breakfast and I never wanted to stay over at his.”

Michael blinked, then looked down at his laptop. The ancient fan and processor were making a soft whine of effort, much like his own brain at the moment. Alex was single. Alex has been single for over a month. A month where he didn’t mention it once during their get-togethers.

Alex exhaled slowly, draining the latte before placing the cup out of range. “I’m really trying to use my words here, but you have exactly one minute to understand what I’m saying before I have to get creative-”

“Are you saying that you-”

“Yes-”

“Still want me?”

“I never stopped,” Alex reached for Michael’s hand, stilling the rapid clicking. “I came here because I wanted to be honest with you. It occurred to me that somewhere along the line, those meetups for coffee had basically become the most important part of my day. I … I was turning them into dates in my head. With you.” He licked his lips, his eyes drifting down to Michael’s mouth, causing Michael to bite his own lip in response. The anticipation between them thickened, until Alex groaned softly, his head briefly ducking toward Michael’s. “In the past, I’ve been guilty of thinking we were on the same page, and we weren’t, so I’m- Michael, I will still be your friend no matter what, but I want-”

This time, Michael didn’t let him finish and closed the scant distance between them on the bed to kiss Alex. The laptop fell to the side of their legs as Alex surged into it, pushing Michael down flat on the mattress in his eagerness. Michael opened for Alex, letting him have whatever he wanted and buried his fingers in the soft, black hair as they traded kisses.

Suddenly, a bubble of laughter burst from Michael’s chest, the lightness of the situation that felt almost too good to be real spread through his veins. “Oh my god, you brought me coffee to tell me that getting coffee together wasn’t just getting coffee for you, Alex-”

“Shut up!”

“You need a new job, nothing in intel, sweetheart-”

“I am, I did, that is.” Alex lifted his eyebrow at Michael’s too-still pause before he sweetly brushed the long stubborn curl out of Michael’s face, “Done with the Air Force as of next month.”

“Fuck me.”

“I can do that too.”

#malex fic #getting back together #this was supposed to be 5 sentences #malex #roswell new mexico #mention of forlex #malex is endgame #jule1122

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untitled-smp · 2 years

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Me [The Main fronter]: *vibing*

The entirety of the system: Bae wake up new smp just dropped time for us to develop a new Special Interest

Me (Now wanting to apply but also very shy) : *confused screaming*

Did we just send a meme format to the smp we now want to form part off? Yes we did

PFK. man hope bubs appreciates your meme then. Wishing you the bestest luck on the application.

and dw there's no reason to be shy. we don't bite people or anything. :D but yeah good luck :thumbs-up:

#asks #untitled smp #Alfamangle went off with a bang #yes this isnt bubble answering #mwahahaaha #>:)

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hopeshoodie · 4 years

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Since you only provide us of the bad side of Bobby Jk Jk, but not really, could you tell us some good headcanons you’ve got?😔

So I’ve posted some headcanons here, here, and here, but I’m always down to come up with more :)

Bobby’s afraid of big dogs. Maybe he got bit as a child or he just didn’t grow up around them, but he always gets really stiff and moves too fast when they’re around. He never tells MC this, and she never really mentions wanting to get a dog, until they’ve been living together for like a year and MC convinces him to come to a shelter. He desperately wants to make her happy and she’s got her eye on this big American Bully pitbull. The dog itself is super loving, but for the first few months he absolutely jumps out of his skin every time it comes up and kisses his face or sits on him. Then, once he’s used to it, he becomes to dog’s favorite and MC jokes that it’s really Bobby’s dog now.

I’ve mentioned this before but I think Bobby has a pretty millennial taste in memes- he laughs at distinct formats like the cheating boyfriend/exploding brain used in different ways. He also enjoys the gotcha! kind of memes like rickrolling/had to do it to em/beans. But I imagine if MC is really into absurdist memes/tiktok memes/deep fried memes, he’s really perplexed by it? Like he tries to laugh and really tries to send her some that she might find funny, but every time he sends a meme she’s like “Oh I’ve seen that one :)”

Bobby doesn’t know he’s allergic to tree nuts. He’s never really had an issue, until his first christmas with MC. She brings out the nutcracker and assorted shelled nuts because her family always did that growing up, so Bobby’s happy to oblige. They’re sitting on the couch cuddling when he makes some off handed comment like “So which one of those is the one that’s spicy? I’m betting it’s the Brazil nuts.” And MC just ???? “babes none of them are spicy. What???” And he shakes his head and responds “no, I feel like my tongue- like there’s spiders in my mouth- like kind of itchy and hot? I don’t know, kinda spicy?” MC’s eyes get big and she gets really frantic and he calms her down and coaxes her back onto the couch by repeating “it’s not that bad, lass, really I’m fine. It just feels a little funny, must be mild”. An hour later his throat starts getting tight and he says “ok, darling, not to alarm you but I think we need to go to the hospital.” And that’s how Bobby and MC end up in the emergency room on Christmas Eve. Even though Bobby reassures her, she feels SO bad.

Bobby’s a really efficient baker because there’s a process, you have to do things in order. He tends to clean as he goes. But cooking is a whole other beast. When he’s at work they’ve portioned and reused their recipes so much that he knows the steps by heart, but when MC wants to try a new recipe they end up making a MASSIVE mess. MC’s chaotic cooking style of ‘taste and then add’ or realize midway through the recipe that we don’t have this ingredient so we’ll improvise leaves Bobby feeling super overwhelmed. Don’t get me wrong, he adores cooking with her, he just always ends up staring at the destroyed kitchen like “what the hell happened?”

Bobby absolutely hates when MC is in pain, he gets really panicky and hovers. This is normally not a problem, except when they have their first kid. MC’s taking it like a champ but Bobby is absolutely beside himself- guess who ends up passing out. He wakes up in a chair before the kiddo is born, but is still super shaky afterwards. When he asks to hold him/her, MC laughs lightly and says “you’re not going to drop them? You’re trembling like a leaf, babe.” He sits down and holds the kids and immediately his brain flips and he calms down. He’s reluctant to let the baby go when the nurses come.

Bobby absolutely pulls pranks on MC all the time, but he gets a sense of what ones she doesn’t mind and what ones she does. He puts rices on the ceiling fan exactly once. But the goofier things, like replacing every face in the photos she has hanging with Danny Devito or taking a really funny picture of her with a filter and then putting that picture on the back of playing cards/a pillow, MC thinks are so funny. As time goes on he has to get super creative to continually top himself, but he adores the way her face lights up when she catches on.

Bobby LOVES when MC invites him to ‘girl time’ because he gets to see Priya and Chelsea again. It’s not that he’s being a possessive boyfriend who can’t let MC have time with her friends, it’s that he genuinely likes and enjoying spending time with her friends. MC still has girls nights, but absolutely brings Bobby to brunch and on Girls On Tour vacations.

Bobby’s car is always an absolute mess. It’s not fast food/garbage, it’s all just stuff that he grabbed for one reason or another and then discarded in the back seat- cleaners, picnic blankets, sweaters, gym shoes, bug spray, umbrellas, etc. MC points out that if he just took things back in the house after using them it wouldn’t get so bad. She’s right but uhhh…. He still doesn’t do it lmao.

Bobby is highkey afraid of leeches and ticks (I’m too lazy to look up if the UK has ticks but if yall don’t I might consider moving). MC grew up going swimming in small ponds and hiking through the woods no problem, but it makes Bobby super nervous and he’s always triple checking himself.

MC offhandedly mentions once while they’re watching a romcom that she thinks men who play the piano are super sexy. Bobby decides to start taking hour long lessons in secret three times a week, and just tells MC that work ran late. At the end of it he tries to serenade her, and he’s not ~great~, but MC absolutely adores it.

#give me good nice headcanons you say #*makes them all about what bobby's afraid of*#headcanons #ask #litg #bobby hcs

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dreamsafterhours · 4 years

Text

college boyfriend!markhyuk au series: II (mark’s pathway)

a universe in which roommates!markhyuk meet each other's s/o in class

markhyuk are roommates, my/n and dy/n are roommates, mark and dy/n take classes together and so do donghyuk and my/n — how will their fates intertwine?

genre: fluff, some angst pairing: platonic!donghyuk+my/n, surprise visit from mark format: dotpoint AU universe: non idol, college best friend warning: a lil swearing (best get used to it)

masterlist

or click here to continue your friendship with eng lit!mark!

I ⇤ | II | ⇥ III

II: relationship consolidation.. it’s platonic i swear

the fellowship continues (donghyuk + my/n)

hello again

are we ready

ever-ready i’m going whether u r or not lol idc you’re COMING

aight so ;;, donghyuk,

this boi,,

to meet someone new who he sees as almost a personal challenge,, to befriend and get to That Point™ in the friendship where you can talk about anything and everything without judging each other

he doesn’t have many friends that he can do that with tbh,, , he does have a lot of friends and people he knows and has conversed with but not a lot of friends he can crack jokes with and know they don’t take it personally

lots of dark humour and sometimes suggestive ones and political jokes and all that shit ,, intellectual puns and suicidal jokes,,, the lot

the basics for gen z humour right

he just wants someone to talk to and explore different concepts and abstract meanings and philosophical questions and get new perspectives on things he’d never thought about before

but also be able to say “ah fuck me upside down” without it actually affecting the relationship bc you’re just that close

sometimes it’s hard to have that relationship with the predominantly straight boys he surrounds himself with a lot of the time

and he’s always wondered what it’d be like to have a female friend like that and unfortunately he hasn’t befriended anyone and gotten to that point yet that he can ask genuine questions for the female point of view on certain topics

so meeting you,, and finding out you’re going for the same faculty after your undergrad course ,,,. then you being genuinely comfortable with him and his jokes and openly willing to accept his humour

he’s like /exclamation point appears above his head/

will this be The One™

so he lowkey ,, unintentionally,, in the process of getting to know you

develops a smol crush on you

it’s unintentional but he can’t help the fact that he falls in love really quickly but is also capable of getting over people fairly quickly if they don’t reciprocate his feelings and seems to be okay with that

but who can blame him for liking you??

you’re really damn cute

and genuinely good company

when he hinted that you could get married and have children in the future,,

his thought process was that ahaha i’m kidding.. unless?

so yes he was flirting but like ,, experimental flirting

and over the next couple of weeks he continues flirting with you

random lines like

“hey you look familiar, have i taken a class with you before?” he literally said this on the second day of classes with you

you honestly thought he was being genuine and actually didn’t remember you so you were like wait what ??? you literally walked me to my next class yesterday../? how? do you forget that??

and then he pulls a

“really? i swear we had chemistry” hand stroking his invisible beard

and then laughing at your reaction when you deadpan

“it was biology, donghyuk”

and sometimes u keep having that thought that u had in the middle of ur first lecture together, how he’s probably like this with everyone and he can easily befriend anyone else he’s probably gonna end up being those people that you know vaguely

but then you realise he’s been waiting in the same spot outside the lecture theatre every morning and afternoon, leaning on the wall, and looking up occasionally

smiling when he finds you in the crowd, picking up his bag from the floor and making his way over to you to walk into the lecture together

and you decide hm? he sticks around, i’ll stick around

on a separate occasion in some study session he’s like

“are you my appendix because i have no idea how you work, but the feeling in my stomach makes me want to take you out”

and you’re like “wow looks like you went ahead in the course donghyuk we don’t have human anatomy until next year. but how’s tmr at 7”

“perfect i’ll pick you up wear something nice”

hold

and then he bURSTS OUT LAUGHING and HOLLERING and yelling about how that was a good one tho right

you’re both in this sort of grey area where neither of you know where this is going

the reason he’s been saying all these things is to see what you were comfortable with in conversation and trying to analyse from your reaction whether or not you were actually flirting back or not

he’s ranted to mark in his dorms about it a couple times ,,

and so have you with your roommate

you return to your dorm after a day of doing a lot of back and forth semi flirting with donghyuk and you collapse onto your bed

your roommate looks over from her desk like “u good bro”

"i’m confused”

“fair enough”

“seriously idk if this kid is actually flirting with me or whether he’s practising on me or what”

“is this the donghek boi”

“yeah donghyuk” aka your future s/o yEET

you sit up and look at her

“uk what he said to me today”

she turns in her chair to face you fully,, ready for the tea

so you tell her the pickup line he came up with that day & your response to it and then his reaction to that bc he always seems to go for it but then tap out afterwards when you actually respond

and now you’re thinking,, do you really like him as more than a friend ??

and its???

so ?confusing to you

if you can’t tell if you like him for sure then you probably don’t, romantically

but then what effect are your responses having on him

what he actually does like you and all those flirty comments are genuine??? and you’re /internal gASP moment/

what if you’re leading him on?? what if it’s always gonna be him initiating the flirting but you’re accepting it with insincerity?

you decide this goes entirely against your morals

and you tell this to your roommate and she goes hmm,,

if you don’t feel committed to the idea of that,, then you don’t have to feel obligated to keep it going,, be honest with him ,, draw lines if you have to .. yes leading people on is a bad thing and it’s gonna affect the friendship

but also maybe it really is just part of the humour and that’s the friendship dynamic he wants to build with you?

so you decide to sleep on it bc it’s 1am and significant choices should not be made when drowsy and you’ve lost a lot of sleep these past couple days anyway

not that you get good sleep that night anyways

meanwhile donghyuk is shrugging @ mark like

“idk bro do i like her?? or do i like the idea of having someone to say that to”

“and yes she returns the gestures but then also i don’t think she means it? do we just keep it at that and keep being friends like WHAT IF I CATCH FEELINGS”

and mark is just staring at him like dude idk don’t ask me

“you’re so bad at giving advice mark”

but you wake up the next morning and decide to have a serious conversation with him after class bc that day you have a free hour after your lecture

it’s all you can think about during the class so you’re kinda distracted plus the partial sleep deprivation is getting to you

and he notices so he’s like

“bro u alright?”

so you just think fuck it and go

“hey real talk tho”

“ya”

“maybe i’ve been overanalysing this so,, tell me if i am but”

“sure”

“do you ,,, actually mean all those pickup lines ,, like are they based off, , real feelings or is this just part of the friendship dynamic”

and you’re almost surprised when he gets serious with you

he’s always been so lighthearted and sarcastic about things

but when he listens to your side of things and how you’re worried about whether or not you’ve been leading him on or something

he lets you finish and just tells you his feelings as well

“i’ve always wondered what it’d be like to have that dynamic and i guess i tried it on you without being honest ,, half to see if you would flirt back and half to just joke around ,;; i’m sorry that you got confused but i guess this means you don’t have? romantic feelings?”

so you have to reply honestly

“not necessarily ,, it’s been fun to have these conversations and laugh at pickup lines but”

“nothing behind it right”

“..yeah”

and instead of putting a damper on the atmosphere

it’s actually

refreshing

it clears the air in a way you didn’t expect

“right? nah it’s fun what we have going”

and you agree

aside from the confusion behind the flirting it’s been really fun talking to him and getting to know him

half of him was a lil disappointed that it didn’t go the romantic path but then again he wasn’t sure he had romantic feelings anyway

so he settles for

The Best Friend™

and so the friendship turns into sibling-like teasing and petty arguing from that day onwards

legit you’ll catch him staring

“what” “wHat” “what u lookin at” “whAt U loOkIn At” “stop copying me” “sToP CoPYinG mE” /you slap his arm/ “oW”

whimpers a lil clutching his arm uwu babie

“you hit harder than the bass drop”

sending each other bio memes and yelling at each other to go commit lysis

“lysosomes can take you out because you’re TRASH”

“i would send a macrophage after you you PATHOGEN”

calling him a parasite when he asks u for notes that he missed in class but it happens vice versa anyways lmfao

then one morning lab class he forgets his pencil case in his dorm like he forgot his laptop on the first day

except this time you call him a forgetful dumbass

all while offering a pencil from your own pencil case

which he takes

so he calls his roommate who “has a noon class and is probs still sleeping lol” to ask him if he can bring it down for him bc he’s got more lab classes that day

so after the class you wait outside the building for his roommate to arrive

and when he does he gives you a rlly nice smile and says “ʰᶦ”

“oh hello”

“yes this is my adoptive younger sister and my/n this is my roommate the Elder”

“ah you’re overreacting” the roommate turns to you and u ,, gotta admit ,

he’s really cute ,,, “don’t listen to anything donghyuk says, all he does is lie”

“hEY i am a SINCERE MEMBER OF CIVILISATION”

the roommate points to donghyuk again and goes “see he’s even lying about being civil”

so you laugh and gang up on donghyuk like “oh i saw through him a long time ago”

“wow he even lied about how” /puts up air quotes/ “ugly you AREN’T”

“wHAT”

“HE SAID IT NOT ME”

donghyuk is flabbergasted at this point

“wHEN DID I SAY THAT MY/N WAS UGLY”

“WANNA TELL ME THAT YOURSELF MR LEE DONGHYUK HUH”

which results in a sulky hyuk and you two laughing at his reaction of being Wronged™

he regrets letting u two meet in that moment

oh but we don’t

“ok u did ur mission. u can go now”

“so mean :((”

but donghyuk’s roomie waves at you while turning to leave and you wave back ,,

trying to calm yourself bc you’re highkey feeling kinda hot ur cheeks r burning up

he said ?? donghyuk was lying when he said u were ugly?

damn

donghyuk’s pickup lines had never been direct compliments about you

but this one from his roommate wasn’t a pickup line it was just

a statement

and it made u feel a typa way

dw baby it’s gonna be a happy ending uwu

and u tell ur roomie that night abt it too

“bRO his rOOMMATE”

“what’s his NAME i gotta FANGIRL WITH YOU”

“.. idk”

“.. oh”

/short pause, lip smack/

“.. lib tomorrow?”

“.. ya sure”

the next day after classes you check your phone and see that she’s texted you asking if her friend and his friend from eng lit can come and join you guys in the lib

and, naturally, u don’t see why not

so u reply

“the more the merrier”

the more the merrier for us too sweetie hmm hmm

eeeeeeéeeeeeèeeeeee

mhm mhm mhm it’s finally getting somewhere

click here to continue your friendship with eng lit!mark!

I ⇤ | II | ⇥ III

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softforcal · 5 years

Text

Writing Tips

I get a lot of asks about tips on writing so i figured i’d just make a huge ass post for ya’ll :)

this shit covers: character, plot, motivation, past vs present tense, 3rd vs 1st verson, oneshots vs multi chapter fics, moodboards for character building, dialogue, oc’s vs reader inserts, face claims, the grocery store test, the meme test

Character

okay i want to start by saying: i used to write imagines so writing in character was like MY THING for like 6 years so i have a LOT OF PRACTICE with watching something and picking up on characters and i’ve spent THOUSANDS of hours watching shows. so like, i’ve spent a lot of time on this you know? so don’t feel bad if you have a life and havent had as much practice :)

so at the moment, i’ve been doing character mood boards to help figure out a character? but the thing about that is im picky about face claims and it can be hard so this is an easily skippable option and i’m not even sure if i enjoy it yet you know?

so first: i think of a story. i think of the type of OC that’s involved, i think about what they’re like, (i sometimes find a face claim), i give them a name

for me, as soon as they have a name and sort of a face in my brain, they take on a life of their own. a character knows when you’ve found the right name and face for it and it comes alive when you do. like for me, Birdie was originally ‘Cherry’ but she was like ‘bitch no’ and wouldn’t let me write her until i found her name.

to be honest. i don’t plan things. like. when i write, the character just takes over. i have no control. they do what they want. fucking Valentina and Harry in Trouvaille, i had a whole angst scene for them and these assholes decided to go on the terrace and tell each other they like each other instead and then the story just ended. like. i had a pLAN and they RUINED IT.

you can’t be afraid if letting your characters do what they want to do. when you plot, a loose outline is good but i just throw my characters into a situation and see where they go.

like for my final gang au chapter, did i want Michael to leave town? no. but he needed to take Dove and get the fuck out of there you know?

i don’t make playlists really, sometimes certain songs stick to people, like one of my characters, his song right now is Girlfriend by Anderson East and that song was sort of inspiration.

I don’t know where my inspiration comes from. obviously i write a FUCK ton so let me see if i can explain a few past stories and where they came from.

Gang AU was born from a post by @hereforlukescruff about the song ‘Or Nah.’

Cromulent was based off a tumblr post about enemies fake dating

Wild one was legit just me figuring out how to work all of @glitterprincelus fav things into one fic

Floral was based off of looking at my favourite tattoo artists floral tattoos

Trouvaille was originally pompous New York! Calum but as i developed it, it was Harry and i couldn’t stop him from pushing Cal out of the way and being like ‘this is my apartment you wanker get the fuck out of here and let me smoke and paint in peace.’

Noise was originally based off an idea by @palliddark that i was blessed enough to receive, she also had influence in Cromulent because months ago she requested a post about the boys recording having sex for a song.

So i think what we’re realizing here is a lot of it comes through interacting with other creators. one of my new pieces is based off of 2 5sos songs and one is based off of a person in Love Island. so inspo can hit from anywhere

the fic im working on now came from me talking to @harryforvogue about the new Gucci ads Harry did.

i started a Greaser Cal that i dropped cuz im a whore, but it was inspired by @calsangel and hopefully it gets completed sometime soon

like. talking to other creative people is just a breeding pool for ideas. people you trust and love, people who you can bounce off of. listen for stories in music, study people and characters and who knows where it might lead you :)

i hope this helps. but yeah. my number one piece of advice: talk about writing, talk about stories, talk about the guys you want to write about and inspo WILL hit.

also to all the people i have tagged i hope you know how much you guys mean to me. like. i really appreciate all you guys do and how much support you’ve given me and continue to give me. i hope i can offer the same support in return and i love you all with my whole heart.

****** Moodboard and Character (final thoughts)

So basically since i wrote that OG advice, i’ve begun to realize: moodboards are a good tool because if you can easily come up with 9 pics for a character they’re pretty well thought out.

for example, my easiest moodboard to make was for Birdie in my gang au

Birdie: likes scrunchies, reading, classic stories, ice cream, bubblegum, lollipops, acrylic nails, having her hair in a bun

my worst moodboard was for a character named Annabelle from Noise

i started and was like... who is Annabelle: she’s blonde... she uhhhh is doing psychology?

and that’s all i could get because Annabelle was a mostly dialogue driven character with no actual mentioned likes or dislikes, in my eyes, Annabelle was not a well thought out character.

so moodboards can help because they show you how well you’ve got your characters figured out.

******

Plot

so plot is tough. i tend to gravitate more to character driven plot because characters are my #thing. i’m going to start by going through some of my plotlines and going over the good and bad and hopefully have an answer at the end of it after picking apart my writing. should be FUN.

long fic plots

Noise plot: Annabelle gets a new neighbour and he keeps fucking girls and waking her up and they have banter, he’s a hothead and invites her to psychoanalyze him and it leads to some tension but he is soft for her right away and they a little awkward with each other but finally give love a try.

Floral plot: would renowned tattoo artist Calum chooses a new apprentice, socially awkward and anxious Lily, they’re attracted to each other but the confines of a boss and pupil relationship are tight and evident, creating tensions. Calum struggles with being professional while falling for the cute apprentice, especially when pressure is put on them by their friends, after slow burn and anxiousness they finally get together.

Cromulent plot: Calum has a new PR relationship with Chlo and he hates her, he thinks she’s fake and does everything he can to piss her off, finally deciding to fuck with her emotions by being a GREAT boyfriend which ends up hurting her and he realizes maybe she’s not so bad after all, things are a little confusing but they finally sit down and talk it out and address some of Calum’s insecurities about her past relationships and PR stunts, they agree to give love a try.

so, from these 3 long fic outlines we can see i usually go for character based turmoil which works well for fics between 10-15k (or longer, Trouvaille fits this format and it was 19k) I just think, relationships take time and people struggle to figure themselves out enough to enter a relationship. if you have some fiery characters and banter (Cromulent and Noise) or perhaps awkward anxiety and tip toeing (Floral and Trouvaille) shit works out you know?

for smaller oneshot fics plots can be easier and more situational i think.

Movie Snack plot : Cal goes to Luke and his GF’s place for movies and Luke gets bored and eats the reader out in front of Cal which leads to sex.

Road Trip plot : Luke and reader are dating and on a road trip they’re horny but end up having to share a room with Cal who has always had a thing for the reader, smut ensues.

Stay Still plot : Tattooist!Cal is the readers fuck buddy and she goes to get her tits pierced, ending up with Luke as her piercer, but Calum shows up and angst leads to smut.

so yeah, for smaller 1-5k little smut pieces it can be more relaxed, smut is just smut, not love, and sex is a hell of a lot easier than love you know?

yeah, so that’s all my plot advice

*********

3rd person, 1st person, what the fuck person

when it comes to HOW you write your fic (what person, what tense, etc...) that’s up to you. it’s honestly whatever you feel best in. i’ve dabbled with a bit of everything. you just have to find what feels the most natural to you :) that’s the only advice i can give on this because no one thing is better than the other, it’s up to you.

one tip for 3rd person i have is to generally focus on one character. i’m a fan of doing the thing where for example, in Cromulent, we focus on Calum and why he doesn’t like Chlo. if we switched to Chlo a lot it would take away from the unreliable narration and bias Calum has. the good thing is to stay with Calum and be angry at Chlo and realize with Cal that she’s not so bad.

but that’s just me.

you can do switching when characters are together or on a phone call, like if you’re with Calum but he’s calling (for example) Chlo and then you want to see her reaction you can do

Calum groaned, staring at the ceiling, “bla bla cal saying shit”

“bla bla Chlo answering” she held the phone tighter etc...

and just like that you’re now with Chlo not Calum.

*********** OC’s vs Reader Insert

i’ll be real here: for some reason, i feel like reader inserts are more read on tumblr and i started out doing reader inserts to build a following.

personally, i prefer writing OC’s because you can go more in depth with EVERYTHING.

it’s honestly up to you what you want to do. i’ve decided to do my short smuts at reader insert and longer fics as OC but it’s whatever works for you at the end of the day.

***********

Dialogue

I’m a fan of dialogue driving story, Noise was so much fucking dialogue it’s insane. finding your characters voice is important and sticking with that makes a huge difference. if you’re character can kind of be seen based JUST on what they’re saying, thats a good sign.

i hate to say it but imma say it: when doing 5sos it’s important to know they’re Australian. some countries have different mannerisms and such, for example, i’m Canadian but i can’t have Calum out here saying “it’s a nice day eh?” you know? so, i would advise to try to get a handle on accents and word choice specifically to make them more believable. as is said in the iconic movie Tropic Thunder

***********

Motivation

so this is probably one of the biggest issues writers are facing and i’m about to get REAL AS FUCK.

on tumblr, it can feel like once you gain a following you CONSTANTLY need to be pumping shit out for them.

back in the day, i was posting a HC a day and a lot of it was for hogwarts!5sos. it felt like a job, which wasn’t anyone elses doing per se, i just think a lot of fic writers get caught up in this pressure whether it’s imposed by anons or not (im lucky that i’ve never had anon pressure and i’m very grateful for my amazing followers tbh)

Tumblr is not a job. if you’re writing, write for you. you are blessing tumblr with you’re writing. please don’t feel pressure to put stuff out or write a new chapter or anything.

if you ever feel like you’re under a lot of pressure, take a few days away, find the root of your writing joy. always do what you want to do. if you have to turn off asks to feel sane, do it. if you gotta block mean anons pressuring you, do it. you don’t owe anyone anything.

your writing is a gift graciously bestowed on this hellsite and this site shouldn’t make you feel pressured to write and give content FOR FREE. it shouldn’t make you lose your passion and make writing feel like a chore or job.

motivation can be hard. i’m a fucking psycho so don’t use me as a base for what you should be doing. i put out a fic a week which i really shouldn’t be doing, it’s not practical. but i can type fast as fuck and writing 1 or 2k in 10 minutes is normal for me so don’t use me as an example you know.

go at your own pace. write what you love. write au’s or for the characters you love and hopefully the rest will come.

******** Multi Chapter vs oneshots

ok more realness, pros and cons of each

oneshots:

pros:

-its one and done, no need to worry about putting out more

-they can be fun

-it’s all in one place which a lot of readers like

Cons:

-can be long af

-take longer to write since a oneshot is probably like 10+k depending on who you are as opposed to perhaps 5k chapters of a multi chapter fic

Multi Chapter

pros:

-people are excited for more

-cliffhangers are fun

-people interact with you more about chapters to come

cons:

-more pressure to put out new chapters

-with each new chapter you’re probably losing likes because people get bored or forget about it because people sometimes don’t have the attention span or whatever to continue reading whenever you update

-usually tend to be longer than a oneshot (5k chapters means that in 2 chapters you have probably surpasses a oneshot length of 10ishk)

So i will be real. i prefer oneshots. i adore my gang au which was long as fuck and super multi chaptered but it’s tough to see the likes go down and down. plus, i wrote all of Penumbra (the main multi chaptered part) before i started putting it out so i had no pressure to write more cuz that shit was done before i started posting.

which does help. if you want to write the whole thing before you start posting it takes off the first con but you’re still left with the other 2.

**********

Face Claims

i feel like for some characters they’re born without a face claim but i totally get it if you want to use a face claim before you even start. finding face claims can be hard so you have to get ready to go creep on insta and look at models and figure out who you like. a lot of insta models follow each other so once you find a model you like, look through their following list or recent likes to see other models.

another thing you can do is go for brands or photographers who link their models. Fashion Nova for example, if you’re scrolling through and like a girl the link is there. and the same goes for some photographers. there’s a lot of accounts that are just for hot girls with links to their instas so (even if it feel weird) you should go check those out :)

******

The Grocery Store Test

next, for making characters, i think for me name is a big part of it. once a character finds their name that character comes alive in my mind. i was thinking about this yesterday and i said to myself, ‘you know you have a good grasp on your character when you can imagine them in a grocery store and know what they’d do.’

for example:

Birdie (from Gang AU) would go look at nail polish and candy, Luke would legit have to put her in the cart to get her out of there and if there’s a book section? good luck man

Valentina (trouvaille) is just gorgeous. she and Harry would go and he’d push the cart and she’d have a nicely written notepad of things to get and she’d look so pretty, head bowed, crossing things off, and Harry would be such a melt for her. he would crash into things cuz he’s so busy paying attention to her. she’d be a fan of picking up boxes and reading out nutritional values just to point out to Harry that eggos are not good for him.

so, Valentina and Birdie are probably my best OC’s if i’m being honest and because of that, these were easy.

now, take a character i didn’t work on as much and suddenly it’s different

Annabelle (noise) never really talked about anything but school and shitting on Calum so, i mean, i guess i can think of what she’d do in a store but.. like, i’d have to think about it you know?

so to me, we can see the difference between a fully fledged OC and one that needs to be worked on.

but, Noise still got a lot of likes so i dunno, i’m just self critical i guess.

i think, when it comes to characters, everyone has flaws. Annabelle is too critical of Calum and has a stigma about wealth, Valentina… she’s flawless not gonna lie but she’s a little too afraid of stepping on other people’s toes and she should probably be less anxious, Birdie is way too sentimental and cries over everything, plus she’s way too trusting and naive at times.

it’s balance. but once a character is born in your brain, you just gotta give them love and hopefully others will as well :)

*****

The Meme Test

my most recent advice is: if you can meme a character or dynamic between characters, you know you’re gucci. imma leave a meme here for a fic i’m working on and ya’ll will have no clue what it means but whatever it’s a point

*****

so hopefully this has answered any questions you have. this is all just my opinion and if you disagree with what i’ve said thats chill. at the end of the day this is what works for me and i urge you to find what works for you. there’s no one clear way to write.

good luck writer bubs :)

#writing advice #writing tips #tips #advice

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rwbyconversations · 5 years

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The weaknesses of Volume 6

As someone who had sub-zero expectations going in, Volume 6 was overall a really good season of RWBY- in fact I’d called it the best overall Volume since Volume 3, if not overall, the best season we’ve had so far. Everything seemed to come together for this season, and most of the fandom has agreed that the opening salvo of episodes was the best the show had, and that the season hadn’t had a dud episode until the group reached Argus. I know some parts of the fandom don’t love the Argus episodes but I found something good in nearly all of them so I can’t say it was a complete waste of time.

But, every cloud has a silver lining, and while Volume 6 was unmistakably a huge improvement over the previous Maya seasons, especially Volume 5, there are still several areas the show can seek to improve on as the show moves to the chilly frozen north of Atlas. So in this essay, I’m going to highlight the (ultimately small but notable enough to warrant talking about them) weaknesses I found in Volume 6.

1) The show needs to more efficiently handle its villains (and why Cinder and Neo’s plot was a drag)

Weird that I’m saying this in the season that gave its longest episode to exploring Salem’s origin story, but Volume 6 had a lot of difficulty managing the pacing of its villains, and the largest subject of its focus arguably didn’t need to be in this Volume. I’m talking of course about Cinder and Neo’s plot this volume.

Now on paper, giving Cinder more spotlight should be what I want. After all, I wrote an essay last year detailing why parts of the fanbase weren’t fond of Cinder, so giving her focus should ideally be able to remedy those problems, right?

Well, that’s the problem. In that essay, I talked about how Cinder’s two biggest flaws as a character were that she was very boring, and how her lack of backstory made it difficult to really care about her as a character. Cinder has effectively been the same character for six volumes in a row and much like Volume 4, the show has a golden opportunity to finally change that and give her a new narrative arc only to waste it.

Volume 6 should have been a drastic wake-up call for Cinder. Unlike at Beacon, where she lost due to Ruby’s sudden intervention and the awakening of her Silver Eyes, Cinder lost at Haven entirely thanks to her own failings. Raven beat her handily in straight combat and goaded her into the entire train-wreck of an operation to begin with, which for a power-focused individual like Cinder, should have really been an igniting spark to get her to begin seeking some introspection on why she’s lost twice in a row in failing to burn down the Academies. But sadly, just like in Volume 4, right as Cinder appears to be getting an arc about her recovering from her loss at Haven, she just ignores it and goes right back on her murder-Ruby train, as if she’s stuck in a Groundhog Day loop.

Cinder’s refusal to move on from a basic arc of “Plan to destroy an academy, enact the plan, get slaughtered, blame Ruby, rinse and repeat” has made her easily the least interesting villain in the entire show. At this point we’re six years in and barring a few contextual clues, Cinder has no backstory, no sympathetic traits, not even any character development to differentiate her from her Volume 1 self. And this after the season where she dominates the villain screen-time until the final third when Adam hijacks the plot.

Cinder’s plot in Volume 6 is therefore largely just setup for Volume 7, in that it explains how Cinder survived Haven and how she reaches Atlas. Along the way, she encounters the in case of bad season break glass button Neo, whose out for revenge and gets a really cool fight scene that’s ultimately just there for fanservice.

Let me repeat. Good fight, really liked it. Let me also repeat- just there for fan-service. This is not an inherently bad thing, but it does have weaknesses.

Neo was always coming back to the show and part of me feels like she was always being held in reserve in the event of a really bad season, so that the next one could have her return and generate some hype since her fan-base are that loyal. And sure enough, Neo’s return did see a notable collection of fans who had dropped the show after 4 and 5 coming back to see their ice cream queen return in a non-Chibi format. I won’t fault the crew for using a plan that worked. Where I take umbrage is that this fight was not necessary. It was a good fight, but I’d have much rather taken a Cinder scene of her actually recovering from Haven and thinking about why she lost again. Instead, Cinder and Neo effectively hijack all the villain screen-time for the rest of the season. And as someone who doesn’t adore Neo like her fans, this made their arc very tiresome, especially when the hints we got of the other villains were far more intriguing. I could talk a lot about the symbolism and thematic choices of the Mercury/Emerald scene in Chapter 9 but I’d struggle to find a lot to say about Cinder’s plot that wasn’t just “Setup for Volume 7.”

The other problem of course is that the rest of Team WTCH are sorely underdeveloped. Hazel at least is interesting again now that he’s several miles away from Ozpin, Tyrian came back and was a delight and I loved seeing him all-but-begging Merc and Em to run so he could hunt them, but Watts remains crucially underdeveloped. He really needs to step up in agency in Atlas because his sardonic wit can only carry him so far, and the man’s voiced by Christopher Sabat, what more reason do you have to give him more to do? The man made the virus that Cinder used to cause the Fall of Beacon, can he be given some agency now please?

Ultimately, Cinder’s plot didn’t need to be the focus for the villains and yet again, the fragments of focus they got showed how much more interesting they were as antagonists. While ultimately Volume 6 did finally give Mercury and Emerald more screentime than Volumes 4 and 5 combined and reminded the audience why you should be paying more attention to them, the rest of Team WTCH desperately needs development, Watts in particular. Cinder remains the worst villain in the entire show in my opinion, and it’s a shame that she’s almost guaranteed to be the one that makes it to the end of the show. I can only hope in Atlas she finally gets time devoted to what makes her tick, but at this point I’m almost at the point of not caring. It’s been six years, I won’t start caring for Cinder now if the show finally remembers to tell us why she joined Salem.

... also I just think Cinder’s new costume sucks and I’d rather Em and Merc get new ones over Cinder and Neo buying extensions for their wardrobes.

2) Cordovin was a joke and she really shouldn’t have been

Show of hands, who actually took Cordovin seriously? Yeah, me neither.

Even during the fight scene, the heroes don’t take it seriously. Having a fight the characters aren’t taking seriously isn’t an inherent flaw but it does mean you can’t expect us to turn around and take it seriously five minutes later.

Cordovin was a wasted character, and one that the show shouldn’t have undershot in all of her scenes by making her the punchline of nearly every joke. Her long-winded rant at the gate scene in Dead End is a huge factor in why a lot of fans, myself included, consider it the weakest episode of Volume 6 despite picking up in the back half. It just drags on for so long that Cordovin outstays her welcome from her first scene.

Additionally, the show not taking her seriously steals a lot of gravitas from the mech battle, and plays a large role in why I think the mech fight failed to really excite a lot of fans outside of key moments like Ruby’s missile run and canon shot. Being alongside Adam’s confrontation with Blake and Yang didn’t help but even on its own, the mech battle drags. Not quite to the same extent as Haven dragged, but on rewatches I was making liberal application of the skip button. That lack of gravitas itself goes on to hamper Cordovin’s serious moment in the season finale where she realizes that her ego allowed the Leviathan a straight shot on Argus and undergoes a soft redemption to let team RWBY leave the city. However, this moment of taking Caroline seriously comes after the plot has made it clear that the entire reason the Grimm attacked Argus was because of Caroline over-reacting to Maria and breaking out her mech instead of scrambling fighters as Qrow predicts they will. Caroline is solely at fault for the Leviathan getting as close to destroying Argus as it did, so it’s difficult to care when she pulls her head out of her ass to do her job.

A lack of investment also means a lack of emotional dedication, which I think showed in the lack of fanart Caroline has generated since her reveal. Her design being very drab and militaristic doesn’t help matters but unlike say, the Yang/Adam rematch where the stakes were present on an emotional and thematic level, Caroline failed to excite the audience beyond a few funny memes.

The additional problem with lacking in emotional dedication/investment is, again, we don’t have enough interest in Caroline to take her seriously, she goes in one episode from the Kooky Racist Grandma to someone we’re expected to sympathize with. And additionally, asking the fans to sympathize with a character whose opening scene includes a not-too-subtle dig at her Faunus traits was asking a lot of the fandom, especially after the previous years showed that the show’s handling of the Faunus racism plot was... varied in quality.

In short, Cordovin basically took a shotgun to her own foot in her first scene. Establishing her as an over the top comic relief character before expecting the audience to care when she broke out a walking advertisement for gen;LOCK was an extensive reach for the writers to try and unfortunately they fell flat. Trying to make the audience care for the problem she herself created is a similar long-reach. Hopefully this extended comedy sequence depiction of the Atlas military will be left behind as Volume 7 heads into the heart of darkness itself.

3) Oscar desperately needs limelight

Oscar’s been in the show now for three volumes. He spent much of Volume 4 on his own, much of Volume 5 as Ozpin’s meat-sack, and now in Volume 6 he finally gets to... get some clothes. I like them, but they’re not suitable compensation for the character development that he clearly had stolen from him.

Oscar is easily the most underdeveloped main hero right now, and it’s a problem that’s haunted the series since Volume 4. Oscar wants to be a hero much like Ruby herself did as a child, but this sole fragment of backstory is never used to make a connection to Ruby. Aaron Dismuke, bless his heart, is giving this show his all and his impression of Shannon McCormack’s tones must be applauded, but much like Cordovin he’s not given much to work with. In a way, he’s almost the hero’s version of Cinder- a character who keeps finding themselves in situations where they should realistically develop as a consequence... only for each time they do, it either gets shuffled into the next volume or relegated to offscreen happenings.

Volume 6 really should have had Oscar undergoing some kind of arc, be it his fear at being persecuted by Team RWBY and Qrow due to harboring Ozpin, his fear as his days as himself become more and more numbered, his acceptance of the fight against Salem or, most glaringly, his running off while the team is in Argus. But every time, Oscar just powers through these circumstances and never gets to develop from them. He never holds it over Qrow that he attacked a child, that Yang indirectly called him a bastard, he never thanks Ruby for having his back after the train crash, and he brushes off Jaune’s apology for smashing him into a wall and alleging he’s Ozpin masquerading himself as Oscar.

Argus is really where Oscar should have stepped into his own. I was looking forward to him going solo and having to fend for himself for a short while, maybe have a scene where he forces Ozpin to come out and talk or gets to chat with Ozma himself about his place in the war against Salem. Have him be scared of losing his personality and just becoming another body for Oz to inhibit, have him be angry that his dreams of being a hero have been cruelly dashed on the rocks for some agenda he never signed up to. Oscar should be an emotional hurricane and instead he’s just a gust of wind.

Seriously show, you had a golden opportunity for an Ozma and Oscar scene since we know Oz can speak to his past selves, and you know Arron has enough range to do both roles at once, why do you spite my farmboi.

But he got a coat now so I guess that’s technically development. Kerry admitted in the Rewind for Volume 6′s finale that some parts of the season got pushed to the next one as they usually do, and I can only hope that Oscar finally expressing emotion was one such scene because Christ alive, he needs it after all the times he just got over crap offscreen this year. I want to like Oscar, he could easily have one of the most tragic arcs of the entire show if they went with it, but the show really needs to give me something to like about him in the first place. Or else he really will become the heroic Cinder, trapped forever in a nightmarish world of never getting to properly develop in spite of countless opportunities being handed to them on a silver platter.

... I still think Oscar lifted Qrow’s wallet for that costume btw.

4) The reaction to Jinn’s story felt lockstep

I don’t have as much to say on this point but I find it rather saddening that all of the characters have much the same reaction to the truth of Ozma’s past- “Salem can’t be killed, you were leading us on for nothing”- when the weeks around the Ozma reveal had the fandom reacting to the story in a far more diverse way. Even in the hiatus we still have arguments over whether Ozpin was truly in the right or if the story was painting Salem as the true innocent party, to say nothing of the takes that Salem and Ozma’s relationship could be seen as an early iteration of Arkos or even Taruadonna with Salem as the abuser.

The fandom had such a diverse range of reactions to Jinn’s story, with everyone seeming to have their own take on the episode and the truth wherein. Some people even used this to ponder if Summer Rose had learned the truth during her time and tied it in with Red Like Roses 2, where she laments having made a necessary sacrifice, to ask if Summer had learned the truth and bitterly signed on to the war against Salem in the hopes that she’d be able to turn the tide thanks to her Silver Eyes.

“Just because I have to give you this origin story doesn’t mean you’re gonna take the right lessons from it.”

Some idiots even decided that this meant Oz was the main villain now, but I’ve learned to drown those people out.

But the show itself has a very flat range of reactions, with nearly everyone in-universe only taking away from the story that Salem cannot be conventionally killed and that therefore their entire journey is pointless. Everyone had the same reaction, with the only levels of variance being how angry they were at Ozpin and Oscar, ranging from Ruby’s “ask first if they have a plan and then be angry at Oz specifically” to Qrow and Jaune’s “physically assaulting a fourteen year old child.”

It almost makes me wonder, if the characters themselves didn’t take anything from the lesson barring Maria connecting the Silver Eyes to the God of Light and that “SALEM CAN’T BE KILLED,” why should the fans? No one took this and went “OK so we can’t stop Salem with force, maybe try talking her down?” Their minds all immediately went to not just being able to shoot her.

Jinn’s story was great, but the reaction to it in universe felt very lacking and I only worry that the more people are told about it, the more chances we’ll get to hear a variant of “Salem can’t be killed.” It’s a shame that such a morally gray out of universe debate has been stripped to its raw components in-universe.

Conclusion

Volume 6 was really good, I really liked a lot of it and it still warms my heart that I can say that about a season of RWBY post Volume 5. But there’s still a lot of work that can be done behind the scenes to fix up the flaws remaining. I chose three big flaws here but there are a few more I could bring up for quick points (mostly: Weiss getting shafted entirely in V6 feels like an overly corrective backlash to her constantly getting slaughtered in V5, Ruby’s agency does not substitute for a character arc and she still needs one, the introduction of the Faunus in Ozma’s flashbacks felt very contrived, Ren and Nora continue to feel useless to the wider plot but at least this time Ren wasn’t getting bodied every fight, so on and so forth), but ultimately we got more good than bad, and you don’t throw out an entire batch of apples just because of one rotten one near the top. I can forgive a lot more when the overall product is good, and Volume 6 certainly was a good season. Hopefully with these smaller problems fixed, which mostly just extends to “Give Cinder and Oscar onscreen development,” Volume 7 and onwards can keep the show moving forward into a brighter future and a better tomorrow.

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dcarhcarts · 5 years

Text

regarding recent absences

And other such updates!

If you want the tl;dr, here it is: my mental health isn’t in the greatest place right now, and I figured I ought to explain why I must ask you for continued patience for the snail speed on this blog. I’m not announcing official hiatus, but just know that I...might continue to be pretty scarce, but I’m trying my best to be here and to be writing here. To hopefully get me more active here, I plan on dropping a few threads and cleaning out my dash re: people who follow me but aren’t writing with me. You’re more than welcome to keep following me if I unfollow you, and if you want to write with me and just haven’t gotten the chance and would like me to re-follow you, pls just go ahead and shoot me an im. I will be making a separate post about both those things, it’s just that I can’t deal with how fast my dash is moving at the moment.

If you care for the long version, under the cut so as to not bother everyone else!!! Be warned that it’s uh...it’s l o n g. TW for depression and anxiety and the general things my brain does to me lolol.

Wow I haven’t used the post title function in a l o n g time. Anyway, hi, it’s me, Ro, your friendly neighborhood mun of a 20+ muse mumu. Don’t let the kind-of-serious format scare you - nothing bad is happening. I just have a few things that I felt the need to address that have been happening either in my life or just in my screwed up brain :D Buckle in and get ready for the ride, I guess?

Starting with something y’all already know about - I’ve not been here a lot recently. I joke about that a lot, but really, if you catch the pattern, my activity here is: exclusively after 10 pm, 2 drafts at most a day, inbox straight up clogged from like a month ago. IMS basically desolate, because I haven’t worked up the courage to pick them back up since I last forgot about them in the endless stream of things I had to do about a month ago! (that being said, uh, if you want to talk to me your best bet is probably through discord. Ro#6782 - pls, mutuals only, and tell me who you are!)

And - because I h a t e being that mun that reblogs memes and asks for for them and then never answers their askbox / puts out starter calls when she has 10000 drafts / puts out plotting calls when she has unanswered ims, (no problem at all when other people do this but somehow when it’s m e I’m like “no you’re a terrible person”???? hmmm), I’ve also been avoiding t h o s e. If you’re new and you followed me in the last month, I’ve been putting out n o t h i n g that indicates a willingness to interact with new/more people, while the opposite is true. I’m always willing to interact - if I follow back, I want to write with you, only, well, aforementioned issue aside, I also have m o r e problems.

Namely, IRL and the fucked up thing called my brain.

As most of you know, I got a job ~end of may or early juuuune~ and....well it’s pretty damn time consuming. I can’t have my phone during the course of my job - by the way, 4 hours - and so in those 4 hours (from 4 pm to 8 pm) I can basically get nothing done here. Then there’s also the fact that the time my shift is placed mentally and physically drains me a lot. Because it starts at 4, most of my morning is spent thinking “god I don’t wanna go to work” and because it ends at 8, most of my evening is spent trying very hard not to doze off. It also drains me a lot socially - I work at a call center, and all day I’m basically calling people who don’t want me to call them and are very irate even when they pick up, and uh, that already doesn’t do well for my anxiety haha.

The other thing, of course - is my sort-of-seasonal depression. Winter tends to equate to anxiety for me, and summer tends to equate to depression. Again, I think I’ve joked about this a lot, but I apparently can only do drafts when I have 3 finals tomorrow and I haven’t studied for any of them. When it’s break, I get into a really weird slump - when i wake up in the morning, I don’t really want to wake up, and sometimes just stare at the wall for like, an hour. Nothing that I enjoyed during the other months, I seem to enjoy doing now. There’s too much time and too little time. It’s like i spent the whole day doing absolutely nothing meaningful but I can’t break myself out of the cycle so I keep doing that, rinse and repeat day after day, and sometimes my definition of spending time is just lying down in bed again and doing nothing for an hour randomly in the middle of the day. I feel guilty for wasting time as much as I am clueless as to how to fill it in a fulfilling way. “But Ro, you could do drafts!” A Concerned Person May Say. “You like writing!” Well, Kind Person, on some of these days, absolutely n o t h i n g Sparks Joy.

“But Ro, I follow you on your other blog too!” The Concerned Person might continue.“You’re kind of active there, aren’t you?” And the answer, Kind Person who supported my career even if that blog is mostly obscure af fandoms - is yes. I am kind of active on my other blog, @storyblcd. This brings us to the third and final reason why I’m.....moving at snail’s speed here, and that, my good friend - is anxiety. Well, mixed with a certain amount of mental exhaustion, of course. Note: this is n o t anyone’s fault. People’s interactions with me have not been negative - and they are not responsible for how my brain chooses to reaact to it.

I’ve not lost muse for the muses on this blog, per se - but I’m getting burned out really fast writing them, for multiple reasons. First, muse imbalance. Now I know, I definitely k n o w - that sometimes people like one muse more than another, or have more interest in writing with one or the other, and I get that. I’ve said multiple multiple times that that is p e r f e c t l y fine. But honestly the reason I’ve lasted so long on a multimuse is because I can pick which muse I have muse for when, and I can respond accordingly / ask for interactions accordingly. But when I get so many people coming at me at once for the o n e muse when I have t w e n t y it sometimes gets a little? Discouraging? It makes me question whether or not only that one muse is popular for a reason. It also exhausts me re: the portrayal of that muse, because I”m putting out so many replies for that muse in a lot of sort of similar plots/scenarios that I just get burnt right out. And then I get scared that if I keep going I’ll want to drop the muse, so I’m staying away from those threads a little bit.

Second, I’m at a point in my portrayal of certain muses where I feel like there’s a certain expectation for how it’s going to be. My personal feelings aside, I think every mun expects their own portrayal to be different and unique and exciting - and it’s not different for me, only now I feel like the expectation and the pressure of coming up with something good and meaningful outweighs the feeling of exploration as I’m “discovering” the muse. Like most writers - I still crave validation, though more and more lately, I’m at a place in my writing where I f e e l like me from 2 months ago could have probably done a better job. While it’s not necessarily true, and these pressures are coming from m e and not any outside source, I f e e l like I have to consistently Make Good Writing, and simultaneously feel like some days I sit down and I try to do drafts and all I write is garbage. It just - doesn’t feel the same? So - more and more, I’m staring at the empty drafts page and then closing it - because if I don’t w r i t e I don’t have to admit I peaked two months ago.

Both of these reasons have made me rather a bit avoidant of my muses here / this blog. Now, I’ve been struggling with anxiety for long enough that I know that a lot of this is - well, p r o b a b l y just my brain lying to me. See even as I’m writing this post now, my anxiety is saying “haha guess what n o one cares you’ve been gone” and my rational Anxiety-is-a-stupid-asshole voice is saying “nahhhhhh your brain is probably just lying to you.” But! In the battle, anxiety is kind of pummeling me now. I will r i s e again and win the war, most likely - but for now it’s anxiety: 1 and ro: 0.

AND finally - if you made it all the way down here, you’re a c h a m p. The solution! Well, as much of a solution as I’m hoping to get anyway - we’ll have to see if it implements well. I’m going to unfollow a few blogs so I can get my dash cleaner/more organized/less fast-moving and b r e a t h e. I’m going to drop a couple of threads, I might make a couple more muses request only/exclusive only for the like 2 people that have threads with them, I might drop a couple muses (though I don’t think this will really happen, Idk tho). There will be separate posts on those things coming soon, this is just to notify y’all. Thank you for all of your patience, thank you for all the wonderful people who’ve allowed me to write with you, I love all of you!!!!

#tw anxiety #tw depression #tw long post #( ooc ) ✵ ~ CHANDELIERS AND CAVIAR ~ /

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johnny-writes · 5 years

Text

Your Muse’s Story: Article edition

(I followed the meme format for this, instead of drabble, I wrote as if it were sections of an article)

BACKSTORY- The events that took place before their adventure. Usually involves childhood, home life, etc.

Rural Japan, early 2000s: Kazuma and Izumi are the best of friends, Izumi is a girl full of dreams, she doesn't want to stay enclosed in a rural village, meanwhile Kazuma is a meek, but smart (and lucky) boy that loves this small town and doesn't have any intention to leave it.

"I want to be your wife, if you travel the world with me, Kazuma!"

"Deal!"

As time goes by, Kazuma starts to become more and more awkward, for the lack of a better term, and is completely enamored of Izumi. However, he also refuses to spend time playing outside, preferring instead play videogames and watch anime all day.

At this point Izumi starts to bear resentment from Kazuma. She starts to dislike him, she tries to tell him this through unhealthy means, such as bullying, public humiliating him, even manipulation (like manipulating him to give her his lunch money or homemade meal).

Kazuma already spent a lot of time and money on Izumi, and when he didn't spend on Izumi, he spend on his games and manga.

That's when he decides to buy her a ring, to say he would stay with his wife-sister forever. However, she rejected him, running to the arms of the leader of a biker gang. The last time she saw Kazuma was from the backseat of the bike; when she saw Kazuma's incredulous face, she smirked - she smirked not out of sadism, but hoping that the shock would make him forget her.

He didn't. And neither did her.

BEGINNINGS- The start of their journey. Usually includes inciting action and learning the ropes of their new predicament.

Becoming a full delinquent, Izumi lived a life of debauchery. Sometimes she wondered what would happen if she was gave a second chance to Kazuma, but that was pointless.

Running away from the police, she saw a little boy crossing on the red light. What a stupid kid, kids like that should be excluded from society - and thus, she refused to step aside. The chances of running over the boy were high, and Izumi wouldn't care.

When the boy looked at her, she froze: that boy resembled Kazuma so much!

In her distraction, she crashed against a wall and died instantly.

She's brought to Eris's room and she explains she can either go to eternity or being reborn in a fantasy world to be a hero. Eris explains the issues of the fantasy world and that she can have a second chance to redeem herself from her sins in life - due to her sins, she couldn't really guarantee a good spot for her in Heaven, but if she accepted going to the fantasy world, she would have another chance, after all, Kazuma also took that option.

At the mention of Kazuma, the hesitance in Izumi's heart disappeared and she demanded to go there. Eris agreed and asked her to choose a blessed weapon - she couldn't choose an overpowered one because her sins were too much and she wanted to show her superiors in the Celestial Bureacracy that she can use the opportunity to redeem souls.

Eris also said that if Izumi defeats the Demon King, she'll be granted a wish by the gods.

Izumi agrees and asks her to bring her old toolbox. Eris blessed the tools and now they'll grow stronger as Izumi is.

Izumi is dropped at Axel and it takes no time to find Kazuma. She teases him to no end and poor Kazuma just feels his confidence sinking to the lowest possible levels.

The two quickly become rivals and Izumi's charming personality manages to make her conquer friends. Eventually Wiz allows her to sleep in a spare room of her shop, and she becomes Vanir's business partner as well, much to Kazuma's dismay.

Secretely, she's always spreading rumors about Kazuma and his embarrassing childhood. She twists Kazuma's story of how he died, by adding that he survived the entire ordeal and then ran away to Belzerg to escape the shame, but the shame caught him up in the form of Izumi.

Nobody takes Kazuma serious anymore. It was something already bad, but it only got worse. She succeeds in humiliating Kazuma.

Not only that, she's always trying to tempt Kazuma's teammates to abandon him and join her, but they're too dumb to notice her temptation.

Some would say she's getting too...enthusiastic in her objective of ruining Kazuma's life.

MIDDLE- Events taking place during their journey. Sometimes, this can be light-hearted and fun.

After much gossip and sabotage, Izumi manages to delay Kazuma. But that's it, it's a mere delay. In spite of all odds (and especially in spite of his teammates), Kazuma has prevailed over the Demon King's forces in the majority of his engagements (which tended to be accidental).

This, of course, makes Izumi angry. She wants Kazuma to be a loser NEET - as long as he was a loser NEET, it meant she was winning over him - but she didn't really realize she never moved on from her infancy with him. She still had a vain hope that they would see the world together.

But what she couldn't deal with it was the fact that Kazuma started to move on from her. Although a reluctant hero, he was still a hero and she couldn't accept that he and Megumin started to show feelings for each other - it was a cringeworthy and sloppy process, but it was genuine and Izumi couldn't stand that. Not only that but, in spite of all the conflicts, all the bickering, he had true comrades in people like Aqua, Darkness, Wiz, Dust, Yunyun and others.

She tried to defame the pairing, claiming it was pedophilia, but that didn't work. She felt more and more belonging to Kazuma's past.

What she knew but refused to admit was that she never moved on properly from him. All that running away in Japan, all that obssession with sabotaging him, dragging his name to the mud, it was all symptoms that she still cared.

And she hated it. She hated Kazuma, but she hated that Kazuma didn't hate her, didn't cry for her.

So, she ran away again. Using her abilities, she quickly arrived at the Demon King castle and offered her services to him.

He accepted.

CLIMAX- Everything is coming to a head, your muse is facing the final threat…

It is the final battle. The real final battle. The most definitive definite final battle against the Demon King.

Only one thing stood between the Demon King and Kazuma: Izumi.

Wearing a cursed armor and a cursed weapon, she uses a spell that separates Kazuma from his comrades. It's now a one-vs-one battle, against a last lieutenant from the Demon King.

Izumi is livid that Kazuma has been able to best her in virtually every single thing in that world. He has more friends, more money, more honors and even a girlfriend, while she had to betray everything, including Eris.

===[BGM: Sulejmani]===

She starts her final boss rant: "I hate you, Kazuma Satou! I regret ever having met you! I will kill you right now, and then I will kill the Demon King himself, with my bare hands. And the gods will grant me a wish and I will wish for you to have never existed! I'll break time and space apart to eliminate you from my life! Now have at you!"

Kazuma feels sad for her because he feels like he has to put down a rabbid dog. But they fight, using every dirt trick they had.

Eventually, Kazuma plunges Chunchumaru through a weak spot of her armor. It was a one in a million strike, but he has high luck.

Kazuma can't really believe he did it: he killed another person. He never killed another person in the fantasy world, only monsters.

Izumi, on the other hand, just lost it. It was Kazuma's final victory over her: she failed. She's so livid, she could only curse him, "You'll have to live with the fact you're murderer Kazuma...you will botch this, like you do with everything, including with me!"

"What?"

"I guess...we...won't see the world...together..." With that, she gives her last breath, leaving a traumatized sobbing mess of a man behind.

CONCLUSION- Your muse’s journey is finished. Hopefully, they have grown or changed in some way from it.

Izumi just wants to run away. She messed up big time. She tries to get Eris to send her farthest away from Kazuma - it doesn't matter if Eris sends her to a hellhole, but she wants to get out of there fast, until she hears Aqua's voice.

In the world of the living, Kazuma is still a sobbing mess, while his friends try to comfort him. Aqua tries to cast ressurection on Izumi's body, but her soul refuses to return to the body.

When she calls Eris, the goddess tells her that Izumi doesn't want to return. Livid, Aqua decides that enough is enough and just rips apart the barrier between life and death.

Her teammates watch in complete awe Aqua exercizing her true goddess powers, while she drags Izumi's soul from Eris's room (Eris just watches everything scared, that's a side of Aqua she never saw before).

She drop kicks Izumi's soul back into her body. Izumi wakes up and asks Aqua why she did that - Aqua answer by delivering a God Blow to Izumi's face.

Aqua then deliver a harsh speech on how every single bad thing that happened in Izumi's life was her own fault, how she never grew up, how she stayed in that fantasy world in her head while KAZUMA was growing up as a person and moving on from his childhood. And she says how petty and selfish she was and that the gods would never grant such a selfish wish to her because there's no way someone with a shitty and deluded personality like her would ever do something relevant, like defeat the Demon King, and how she never become her own character, instead she lived in Kazuma's shadow. And then she tells Izumi if she has a problem with Kazuma.

And that is what made her realize she has been kind of a jerk.

She goes to Kazuma and tells her how she envies him, how she never forgave him for turning into a NEET, how she felt betrayed when he showed to love more his things than her.

Being the dense man he is, Kazuma never thought he was hurting her when he ignored her when they were young. He felt he should have given her a better chance of knowing their world, but that was too late. They both knew that.

"We will never see the world together anymore."

"Yes, but at least I was lucky for having you."

Izumi is surprised that, in spite of everything, Kazuma wouldn't regret meeting her, even if she broke his heart. Kazuma says that there's no point in regretting because if it wasn't for that, he'd never meet Megumin and his comrades, and if he didn't make the mistakes he did, maybe they would be exploring Earth together at that moment.

Tears start to come from Izumi's eyes. With a final smile, she runs away, not from Kazuma, but to catch up the time she lost.

LEGACY- Is your muse’s story told again years after they’ve passed?

Many years passed since the defeat of the Demon King. Izumi, now more mature and knowing herself a bit better, travelled the world, doing good actions. She returns to Axel to see how Kazuma is doing, her heart clear.

Notes: This tastes nothing like Konosuba, but I still wanted to write it. The magic of Konosuba is that, in spite of being a merciless parody, the character development is slow and in spite of the odds, our heroes are up to the call. They might be the worst heroes ever, but they still are heroes, they will fight against the enemy and try to save as many people as possible.

So I decided to take this situation to its logical extreme - with Kazuma actually maturing in the end. My concern with Izumi was that she was more like an extension of Kazuma's character instead of her own, so I decided to add this as her fatal flaw.

I have to admit I had influence from the character Milosz Sulejmani, that's why I put his theme as their battle theme. He was a man that based his entire character on Antares and paid the price for it.

Also Aqua can be useful, something Kazuma will notice - in the Keele Dungeon, he says "Who is this girl?" when she pardons the lich. So, for added irony, she's the one that delivers the speech to Izumi.

Still, when I created Izumi, I had no intention for her to be such a morally ambiguous antagonist, and she ended up being like that. I hope you have enjoyed Izumi's tale, even if it was in a very summarized way.

#muse: izumi #bios

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resonanteye · 4 years

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via http://resonanteye.net/youve-arrived/

you've arrived

hosting/reposting

The Great Awakening

You have arrived.

It’s been a long journey. Take a moment. Take a deep breath. Get a glass of water and sit down. This is going to be long. It’s going to make you uncomfortable. It’s not what you thought it was going to be, but it’s what you didn’t even know you needed to hear. The totality of this is greater than the sum of its parts and I implore you to read all the way to the end. It’s going to make you angry. It’s going to make you feel a lot of things you don’t want to feel, but you wanted to wake up and this was the only way. You are going to want to dismiss it. People will tell you not to read it. Belief is the most powerful force in this universe, and your belief is about to be challenged in a way you didn’t expect. Fortunately, you don’t have to actually believe anything written here. All you have to do is read it with an open mind. If you get to the end of this your thinking will change. You will be one step closer to being free, and then you can then go on to free the others. Where we go one, we go all.

Before we go any further, we need to set some ground rules:

1) The language here is going to seem really… off, but I promise you it will make sense by the end. This document is designed to be interpreted _literally_. I can’t stress that enough. Do not look for hidden clues—there are none. There is no misdirection, no deeper meaning, no numerology or special calendar to look at. This is the end of the line. This is a 1:1 conversation, speaking as open and honestly as possible. We are just two people having a chat. Any other meaning you try to derive outside of what is written here is on you.

2) Much of this is about language. To some, the language is going to seem very strange, crude, cryptic, nerdy, or childish at times. I’m trying to be as authentic as possible. Please understand it is not meant to be interpreted as racist, sexist or bigoted. Internet culture, “the chans” in particular, have a kind of language that is systemically all these things, but people do not interpret the language literally in use. I will try to keep it as civil and digestible as possible.

3) Be kind to yourself. Be kind to each other.

And before we even really get started, we need to everyone on the same level, with something that approaches a fair knowledge base. Over the past three years people have joined this movement from all around the world. Q Drops have been translated into dozens of languages. There are now mobile apps, shirts, hats, podcasts and documentaries. QAnon means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. As I’m writing this, former military generals are swearing oaths to QAnon. The movement has grown beyond anything I could have possibly imagined. Many people are joining the QAnon movement, but they don’t really understand what they are reading. They are confused. I want to talk just briefly about the history of a part of the internet where QAnon comes from, not in an attempt to legitimize myself as some elder sage, but to build understanding. To truly understand all of this you need context. Context about the people and platforms that now bring you your information—and ultimately, your news.

Some of you go all the way back to the Something Awful forums and the days when platforms like IRC and ICQ still felt new. Some of you literally just joined yesterday. I am going to give you an abbreviated history of the chans as it pertains QAnon. Most people know 4chan and 8chan as the place where Q lives online, but they don’t really understand them. “No outside comms” seems to be what the 99% of QAnon understands—that these are the “official” channels where Q posts. But have you ever been there? Have you ever really gone to boards and looked at them? Some you have, but the vast, vast majority of QAnon followers have not. Perhaps that is no surprise, as they aren’t easily comprehensible. So, let’s talk briefly about three things: Something Awful, 4chan, and 8chan/8kun. And I do mean briefly. You could write a book about each of these, but we can move forward with some broad strokes that should give you the context you need to truly understand Q.

We have to quickly go back to 1999. In 1999 someone known as “Lowtax” created a website called Something Awful (which I will refer to as SA going forward), which still exists today. You can go and check it out if you like. Before Facebook and Twitter, before YouTube even existed, and even before most people knew what Google was, there was Something Awful. SA has been a lot of things over the years, but it is mostly a forum—a message board. On SA everyone was mostly anonymous because, at the time, no one other than academics used their real name on the internet. SA was a semi-private board. It was the internet’s first large “secret society” of sorts. It was mostly focused on video games and Adobe Flash content, and it birthed some of the internet’s very first memes. It was a trollish but a (mostly) well-meaning community of nerds. Some members, known as the “GoonSquad” or just “Goons” would often group up and bombard players of the early MMORPGs to troll them. It was (mostly) harmless fun and pranks. In the late 90’s and early 00’s only nerds were on the internet anyway, so it was mostly nerds trolling other nerds in video games. You could identify other Goons by asking as simple question: “Do you have stairs in your house?” If someone answered, “I am protected,” then you knew they were a fellow Goon.

Why am I talking about this? Well, if you had to pick a place to put on a birth certificate for where internet culture itself was born, Something Awful would be that place.

A few years later someone known at the time only as “moot” created a website called 4chan. 4chan is a fully anonymous (seemingly, anyway) message board, based on a Japanese message board design known as 2chan. It’s actually better described as an “imageboard,” since you have to upload an image with every post. 4chan was open to all. There were few rules, and on some boards—none. Post whatever you want, do whatever you want. For the most part, everyone except moot himself was simply labeled as, “Anonymous.” This is where the “Anon” in QAnon comes from.

Like SA, 4chan was originally a haven for nerds talking about video games and anime. But its anonymous and open nature allowed to build its own form. The most iconic memes, from lolcats themselves to Rickrolling and beyond, started on 4chan. SA might have birthed internet culture, but 4chan gave it form—and it still powers much of the creativity of internet itself to this day. The anonymous nature of the form allowed for a kind of collaborative creativity that—and I truly believe this—has changed the world for the better. It’s a special kind of creativity and one that you really need to experience if you want to understand it. On 4chan you will see new creative concepts born and shaped in real time, and you can watch them spread around the world. You can contribute whenever and whatever you like, and the community then gets to riff on your contribution. 4chan has even birthed new formats and new types of creativity. I want to talk about some of these specifically, to provide some kind of context for what “the chans” are really all about it, but we are just scraping the surface here. You might have to Google around for quite some time to truly understand this if you are new.

Among the myriad of things that get posted on 4chan, one of them is known as a “green text” or “green text story.” A green text is a short story format that includes green colored text and a small picture, often a meme of some kind, like a Pepe. It can be pages long or just a few lines. It is often written in broken sentences and shorthand. They often start with the line, “be me…” and then launch into a short narrative. They can be true or fictional or somewhere in-between. They are often designed to be shocking, depressing or trollish, but they can also be uplifting. It is perhaps the simplest and most pervasive form of content on 4chan other than image macros themselves. I’m going to coin a new phrase and call this a form of Creative Anonymous Fiction or CAF for short. The anonymous nature of the platform lets you tell a story in a new way. Often times people will take green texts and remix them, giving them a different ending. I could post examples, but I’d be doing you a disservice. You are better off looking them up and reading them yourself until you understand it.

Green texts can sometimes end with what’s called copypasta, which is a type of bamboozle. Copypasta is a snippet of short form copy that gets reposted over and over again. A bamboozle is a type of switcheroo—you start telling what the reader feels is a novel story, building to some climax, and then end it with a classic copypasta for that “gotcha” moment. It is, essentially, a prank. A text based prank. This sort of content now exists all over the place, far beyond the reaches of just 4chan. You might be wondering where all of this is going… we’ll get to that. In some ways this is actually the most important part of this entire document. I wanted to make sure that everyone has some context for what is to come, but I can assure this is going somewhere. Please do not let this extensive clarification distract you from the fact that in 1998, The Undertaker threw Mankind off Hell In A Cell, and plummeted 16 ft through an announcer’s table.

So that’s a quick overview of the playful side of things. But on 4chan you will also see some dark and disgusting shit. With the good comes the bad—and the bad can be really bad. Because everyone is anonymous, everyone subject to being hassled by other anonymous posters. Everyone is gay, a fag, a retard or an autist. A thread without insults is a failed thread. The more people who tell you how gay and fake your shit is, the more people actually like it. 4chan may have given us lolcats, but it also ended up being a place for violence, misogyny, bullying, extreme racism—and even far more heinous things. For 12 years moot moderated the site. May criticized him at the time, but I think we can all look back now and know that he really did a fantastic job. For over a decade he was the beam scale that balanced free speech against the darkest depths of humanity—and I meant that literally. He developed a system to help identify “anonymous” posters and worked with the FBI to put away pedophiles, child pornographers, and even would-be domestic terrorists. He did this all while being told constantly how gay he was and how many dicks he sucked (as is the way). Moot was a hero we never deserved.

The two most popular boards on 4chan are /pol/ (for politics) and /b/ (which stands for random). People who post on these boards are often referred to as /pol/tards and /b/tards respectively, with /b/ being one of the more nefarious (but also one of the more creative) boards as it had essentially no rules on what you could post. If “tard” sounds harsh, know that it is said lovingly. Even seniority within the community itself is derogatory. There are “oldfags” and “newfags,” where being called an oldfag is an informal compliment and recognition of seniority. Opinions will differ, but oldfags are generally recognized as being those who were around 4chan since before the pool was closed—one of the very first large raids. In 2006 a sort of prank was organized on 4chan by a group of Anons to “raid” the Flash game Habbo Hotel. Hundreds of people created black avatars in the game and went around spamming the chat with racist and anti-Semitic nonsense, drawing swastikas and blocking off the pool area in the game, declaring that the, “Pool’s closed due to AIDS.” Why? For laughs. The average age of the userbase for this game was around 15 years old. Then again, the average age of the then Anons was probably the same. There is a lot more to this story, and I encourage you to look it up if you have the time, but the point is that this event eventually lead to 30 seconds in the spotlight on some news outlets. This was the first big event that was attributed to 4chan and Anonymous as a group. It was the first time that most people outside of the depths of the internet had ever even heard of 4chan.

After this, more newfags joined. 4chan grows and the subgroup of /b/tards and /pol/tards that would come be to known more formally as “Anonymous” starts to take shape. All the while, moot is trying to balance what content stays and what content goes. The rest, as they say, is history. You start to see all kind of digital activism being organized on 4chan. Raids turn into DDoS (Distributed denial of service) attacks that shut down websites. People get arrested. Splinter groups form. Anonymous becomes more political. /b/ and /pol/ start to leak out of the internet and into the real world. People start protesting various things, like the Church of Scientology, wearing the iconic mask that the character V wears in the movie V for Vendetta. Logos are created. Anonymous comes into its own as a digital force. The group aligns itself with what DnD players call, “Chaotic Good.” Anons enjoy playing a character that is either an anti-hero or anti-villain. Sometimes Anons will pretend to have some super elite hacker ability, and while that is sometimes true it is mostly embellishment. Some people refer to this as Live Action Role Playing (LARP or LARPing), but it is not quite that. LARPing is when people take their Dungeons and Dragons game to the next level or dress up like Harry Potter characters and roleplay out in the woods. What happens on 4chan is very much a form of roleplaying, but one specifically shaped by the anonymous nature of the platform. I’m going to coin a second term here—Creative Anonymous Role Playing, or CARPing. More on this later.

Moot continues to run 4chan until 2015. During that time, it gets harder and harder to manage. Anonymous becomes more unruly, and the site starts to spiral. Cyberbulling goes to a whole new level. There are celebrity nude photo leaks. Gamergate. A series of actual murders and killings get posted on 4chan. 4chan didn’t cause them, but that’s where the content ended up living. The site starts to become unmanageable with the old rules in place. Why moot bothered to keep it going I’ll never understand. There was never much money in the site itself and it always seemed like a huge headache. But the site starts to take moderation more seriously as harassment ramps up.

Boards like /pol/ start to get more strict rules. Even /b/ starts to see more and more threads get removed. In 2013, a piece of shit Anon known as “Hotwheels” doesn’t like what’s happening to 4chan decides to splinter the group and starts 8chan. While moot is trying to wrangle 4chan into something better, Hotwheels goes in the reverse direction and starts empowering (and in some ways, encouraging) harassment with things like Gamergate. 8chan doesn’t remove anything. No morals. Doesn’t matter who gets hurt. Free speech above all.

This stance obviously has consequences. While moot would work with law enforcement, Hotwheels gives them the proverbial middle finger. As a result, all of the bad actors now had a new platform. You see swatting become a popular tactic. More and more violent threats. While moot would work with the FBI to help track down pedophiles and terrorists, Hotwheels decides to relocate the site to Philippines (where the age of consent is 12, mind you). He can barely keep the site running. No one wants to host this content; he can’t even keep the .com anymore because the registrars don’t want to work with him. Hotwheels finds some other shitstain in Manila who runs a pig farm and a porn site designed to get around Japanese pornography laws. They partner up. After three shootings (Christchurch, Poway, and El Paso) in 2019 where the shooters posted their manifesto to 8chan, Hotwheels finally admits the site got away from. The site shut down for a while, but the pig farmer and his son started it back up and rebranded it as 8kun after finding a Russian hosting provider who was willing to host the content. It is now a safe harbor for literally the worst of humanity, and you don’t have to take my word for it. Even Hotwheels himself now advocates for shutting the site down, but the pig farmer and his son have run away with it.

This is where your information comes from. This is where it lives.

Now that you have a better understanding of who is creating this information—your news—it is time. This next part is going to be hard.

You have been bamboozled. QAnon is a hoax. It may well be one of—if not THE—greatest, most pervasive, hoaxes of all time.

How do I know this? Because I am Q. In fact, I am the original Q. One of them, anyway.

This is the point where many will stop reading. You are likely either angry or starting to feel embarrassed. I’m going to ask you to try and put those feelings aside for a moment and keep reading. You have absolutely no reason to feel embarrassed. This isn’t your fault. You did nothing wrong. You got caught in a world you didn’t fully understand and there are people now trying to prey on you at every corner to sell you hats and t-shirts.

If you are willing to go forward, allow me to explain.

What has happened here is what I’m going to call a “Galaxy Quest” moment. There is a lovely movie that came out in 1999 called Galaxy Quest. If you aren’t familiar with it, it’s worth a watch. It’s a family friendly comedy about an advanced alien race who watches a TV show made on Earth called Galaxy Quest. Galaxy Quest is a TV show, but the aliens don’t know it. They refer to the TV show as the, “historical documents.” They built an entire civilization around the historical documents, never realizing it was a TV show. It’s a fun concept. If you haven’t seen it, watch it. Anyway, the aliens weren’t stupid. In fact, they were the furthest thing from stupid as they made all the science fiction from the show come to life (although they are portrayed are dumb for the sake of comedy). The aliens simply did not have the context necessary to understand what they were seeing. They didn’t realize it was fiction. They didn’t know what fiction was. That is what has happened here with QAnon. You have read things on platforms you didn’t fully understand, and you brought your own context and understanding to it. You read fiction as non-fiction and no one has bothered to explain to you how or why this content even exists.

We are going to go back as far as I can remember. I ask that other Anons corroborate what follows, not for me, but for those who are trapped by what has become a truly insidious ideology.

This all starts in the summer of 2016. Someone on /pol/ makes a post pretending to be someone working with “intimate knowledge” of the “Clinton case.” They made a post in the style of an AMA (which stands for Ask Me Anything, a form of Q&A popularized by reddit). This is just another form of CARPing (Creative Anonymous Roleplaying). The first two responses are: “Will the Hillary get Pregnant again?” and “Why are you on 4chan on a Friday night?” This thread almost instantly devolves into what is commonly known as a “shitpost.” It is nonsense. You might say to yourself, “Why would someone go on the internet and tell lies?” Well, this person isn’t really lying, they are shitposting. It is a form of artistic expression. It’s an attempt to get someone to suspend their belief for a few moments. Any seasoned oldfag or /pol/tard knows exactly what this kind of thread is. No one takes this literally.

However, at the time /pol/ is growing. You’ve got new people coming in daily. Much of /pol/ favors Donald Trump, broadly for his trollish nature and memeability, but also for his politics. Months later, someone cites the AMA as the FBI source behind the Pizzagate theory. This finds its way to Twitter. No one actually understands what they are reading, and no one checks the sources. Someone actually thought a months old shitpost on /pol/ was some kind of real leak. Long story short, someone goes into a Comet Ping Pong pizza with an AR-15 and starts shooting. A Friday night shitpost turned into shooting.

Fast forward about six months.

Someone on /b/ posts a depressing green text asking for recommendations on a new cult to join after they found out their girlfriend was cheating. Someone mentions that OP should become a Tibetan monk, because Tibetan Buddhism is a really great cult (e.g. because you can “light yourself on fire if you ever get too depressed OP”). Tibetan Buddhism goes on forever because the Dalia Llama gets reincarnated infinitely, so maybe if you are lucky you get to be him one day. This is the thinking. This isn’t exactly enlighted discussion. I respond suggesting that I have a great new cult that OP can join (which is loosely based on Heaven’s Gate, I’m just making this up on the spot). I had recently listened to a podcast about Heaven’s Gate and I was riffing on it. I loved the absurdity. OP asked for more sauce, but I decided to start a new thread instead.

Warning: This about to get really nerdy.

I started writing some shitposts with pseudo biblical writing, talking about saving humanity. I’m actually more embarrassed about it now than anything, as it was not my finest work. I would refer to “the awakening” as being the time when I would deliver the evidence that would let people “wake up” and realize we were in a simulation. Have you ever seen the Matrix? Yeah, like I said… not my finest work. I signed my posts as Q. Where did Q come from?

Well, initially, because of John de Lancie’s character of Q on Star Trek: The Next Generation. The character of Q was omnipotent and omnipresent. In the show he would speak to Captain Picard of the U.S.S. Enterprise in his own form of strange riddles. Q took a particular interest in humanity as a whole and would appear as a jester-like sort of mix between an anti-hero and anti-villain, always giving Picard hints on how to expand his mind to solve a problem, usually to save all of humanity. So, this was my model.

The goal was to get a few believers and then set a date a few weeks later and reveal “the awakening.” The Awakening was just supposed to copypasta. It was a bamboozle. I was trolling I never even did it because I got bored with it. Most people could see through it (fake and gay) anyway. But someone was watching. Someone who likely called me fag and told me to choke on a bunch of dicks and kill myself was watching.

A few months later I start to see the first “Q” posts, which would eventually be called “Q Drops.” It migrates from /b/ to /pol/. Wow, so original. You took one shit idea from /b/ and made it political. Round of applause.

This person knew exactly what I was doing, not that what I did was that original either. Star Trek is pretty popular among internet nerds. But this is why Q has always talked the way he does. This was the model. This is where Q comes from. The “Q Clearance” stuff that came later is, well… coincidence. But not even a good coincidence because it doesn’t even really make sense, as that is a clearance for the Department of Energy.

The Q from Star Trek also exits as what is known as the “Q Continuum”, where there are other omnipotent beings, and everyone is referred to as Q. This is where the habit of Q referring to himself as “we” comes from. It’s a Star Trek fan, just like me—only one who managed to make a piece of creative anonymous fiction into something political. Likely for lulz at first, because lets be real no one thought it would turn into what it has.

I suspect that Q has been played by many different people over the last couple years as the tripcode has changed, but likely all of them are Star Trek TNG fans. You can really see it in the writing and the constant talk about “humanity.” It’s also possible that the person currently playing Q is the same as the person who was shitposting in my original thread. It doesn’t even matter.

So that’s it. That’s Q. Q eventually moved from 4chan to 8chan and then 8kun. It should be obvious who controls the narrative now. There is nothing truly anonymous or secure about 8kun. We have technologies for that (i.e. tor, torrents, modern cryptography) and 8kun ain’t it. QAnon is the cash cow for the pig farmer and his son in the Philippines who run 8kun, giving a platform to future terrorists and pedophiles. There is a reason for “no outside comms” and “no dates”—control the narrative and keep the machine rolling as long as possible. Why? Money. Between ad revenue and merchandise QAnon is now a profitable venture. Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and eventually you will make some prediction that will feel real enough, even if 99% of everything you say is bullshit, and keep the train running. In fact, it’s much easier than you think.

Take the twitter account, for example.

In early June I saw a number of trending hashtags around #JFKJRRETURNS. I could not believe the amount of people who were latching onto this. I watched the account go from zero to tens of thousands of followers in a day or so and then disappear. Everyone was saying that Twitter “banned” him. But when Twitter bans an account the language on the page says that the account was suspended. The account page for this account said that “This account doesn’t exist.” That means one of two things: 1) the account holder changed usernames; or 2) the account holder deactivated the account. When you deactivate an account, it puts it into a 30-day limbo period where you can recover it. I thought to myself, “If I could get ahold of this account perhaps, I could do something good with it.” I never thought I’d actually be able to do it. Low and behold, thirty days later I went to see if the handle was available and it was. Now I would get to play Q once again.

I just started riffing on whoever was playing Q with the account before me. No idea who that was. The envelopes were just responses from various government departments, nothing more. The postmarks are meaningless. Turns out if you write a letter to a government agency they will respond, and you get some cool looking envelopes. You can try it if you want—pull a FOIA request on yourself. July 22 was a date I pulled out of my ass. HUMAnity and ALl GOod ThiNGs are just more references to Star Trek TNG. The last episode of the show is called All Good Things, hence ALGO TNG. The very first Q Drops on record talk about Huma Abedin, and I thought maybe someone would try to make a connection with, “HUMAnity.” The last post from !!Hs1Jq13jV6 also mentioned “humanity”, but I didn’t even make that connection. It’s really not hard for those coincidences to pop up when you are all playing the same character. Manila, well, you know what that refers to now. St. Augustine is a reference to St. Augustine, Florida, where the largest QAnon merchandise operation is run from. The mentions of Hotwheels, moot and having stairs in my house was my way of gauging to see if anyone really had any idea about anything. The strange code in my location was just a Google Maps Plus Code. I picked a spot in the middle of the ocean off the Cook Islands and pulled the code for it. Turns out I didn’t even do it right, so it shows a different answer for everyone when you plug it into Google Maps.

So that’s it. That’s the whole thing. Beginning to end. Call it whatever you like, but that’s the story. The story of the chans, of QAnon and how Q became Q. Do with this what you will. Believe or don’t believe, it doesn’t matter.

Maybe this is all 100% true. Maybe it’s all 100% nonsense. Maybe truth is somewhere in the middle. What’s important is that you have more information today than you did yesterday. Where we go from here is a choice, and one I leave to you. What will happen to me? Well, I’ve been at a standing desk for 14 hours straight in order to bring this to you. I have done what I set out to do over three years ago and fulfilled my purpose as Q. My palms are sweaty. My knees are weak, my arms are heavy. It’s starting to fall out of my pockets already.

Mom’s Spaghetti,

#true stories

0 notes

thesinglesjukebox · 5 years

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The Singles Jukebox Celebrates 30 Years of Rhythm Nation 1814 (a Janet Jackson retrospective)

Janet Jackson’s had one hell of a career. It’d be glittering even if you were to cut the album she released 30 years ago this week out of history. And historic is what Rhythm Nation 1814 is, not like a war, but like a discovery; it was groundbreaking and influential and so much pop released in its wake owes it a debt of gratitude. The album contained seven top 10 singles in the U.S., each with indelible melodies, state-of-the-art beats and vivid music videos. Janet was always on the radio, always on TV, and welcome everywhere she went. She endured the failure of two albums and the weight of family baggage before reinventing herself, seizing artistic control and having one of the longest and brightest imperial phases of any pop star. Sex positive, romantic, assertive and wise, she’s an icon whose brilliance comes as much from how her songs make us feel about ourselves as they do about her.

Her familial connections might help explain her, but they didn’t define or limit her. She’s a sympathetic performer, an innovator in the development of music video as an art form (someone in her camp needs to fix up her spotty presence on video streaming sites, people need to see these videos in HD) and a smart, underrated songwriter in her own right. There’s a lot of Jackson in Beyonce, in Rihanna, in Britney, and in any woman who makes us smile and makes us dance. Because she did all those things over and over again.

Here’s a bunch of songs by Miss Jackson that moved us, or just made us move:

Katherine St Asaph on “Nasty” [8.14]

Date the quote: “[His] dance cuts have a format-friendly, artificial sheen … but she seems more concerned with identity than playlists.” This is not from 2019, about a post-Spotify pop star (I cheated a bit, leaving out a reference to “Arthur Baker dance breaks”) but from the ’80s. Specifically, it’s from the Rolling Stone review of Janet Jackson’s’s Control, the first half of which is a review of a comparatively nothing Jermaine Jackson album. This was typical: if press didn’t dismiss her as an biographical afterthought who happened to still sing, they wrote about her alongside her family, and specifically her brother. (This continues to this day: Note the sustained attention given to her response to Leaving Neverland, which ultimately was to join her family in condemning it.) The line everyone quotes is “Ms. Jackson if you’re nasty,” but more pointed is one of the lines that precedes it: “my last name is Control.”

The lyric to “Nasty” is full of that sort of role-reversal, like a swordfight where one guy yoinks the other guy’s sword — the sword being the “nasty groove.” But said groove possibly illustrates the lyric even better. Made by producers/former The Time members/future creative partners Jam & Lewis out of big ’80s percussion, plus clanks and repurposed orchestral stabs from an Ensoniq Mirage, one of the earliest sampling keyboards, it doesn’t sound martial exactly, like some of Jackson’s later work, but certainly sounds stark. It sounds like a challenge, one Janet takes up: her past soubrette voice drops to a throatier register, then is stoked into roars. The beat’s not quite its own thing; “Nasty” resembles experiments like Herbie Hancock’s “Metal Beat,” and in turn much of New Jack Swing resembles it. But how Jam & Lewis described it was a rapper’s beat — now standard for pop or R&B singers, from Destiny’s Child to Ariana Grande and Billie Eilish, when they want a tougher image. Meanwhile, Britney took Janet’s soft spoken-word interlude “I could learn to like this” and extrapolated an entire career from it — and covered it, unusually early in her career — but simplified it, mostly collapsing the context of family ties and dignity and creative control onto one axis: sex. But what they’re all doing is asserting this kind of Control.

Part of appreciating songs from the ’80s and ’90s is prying them out of the clutches of the era’s pop-culture jokification– I do like MST3K, but their sort of snappy “Nasty” joke is kind of what I mean. More than one article/restaurant review/listicle attempts to identify, meme-ily, Janet’s idea of “nasty food” (Janet’s answer, dubiously, was whole squid). A certain comment by a certain head of state gave the song a late-breaking sales boost But put on some ’80s radio (or a contemporary playlist of people copying ’80s radio) and wait for “Nasty” to come on. The rest of the radio will flinch.

Kat Stevens on “What Have You Done For Me Lately?” [8.67]

“What Have You Done For Me Lately?” is a sparse, angry snap of a song, the overspill of weeks and months of gradually-building resentment. It’s taken a nudge from bezzie mate Paula Abdul for Janet to fully admit her relationship has gone sour: her once fun-loving, adoring beau has become complacent, content to put his feet up on the sofa and take Janet for granted. Should she leave? She loves him! Or does she? Should love really feel like a heavy weight, pressing down on you? Like your stomach won’t stop churning? Like letting the phone ring out unanswered rather than deal with his temper? Like maybe it’s your fault that he’s like this? “Who’s right? Who’s wrong?” Janet is determined to make a decision with a clear head, but the anxiety and hormones are bubbling underneath (“I never ask for more than I deserve…“). Thankfully Jam & Lewis are on hand with a clinical, whipcrack beat — snap out of it, Janet! The tension manifests itself in her zigzagging shoulders, hunched and strained and contorted, primed to lash out – just as he walks through the door! Janet is wary, but her dude is on his best behaviour, puppy-dog eyes, I’ll do better from now on, I swear. They dance perfectly in time together, remembering the good times: all is forgiven. Surely Janet hasn’t fallen for the same old lines, doomed to repeat the cycle? Paula is rolling her eyes: ugh, not this bullshit again… Then, as the happy couple laugh together over dinner, Janet glances back at us, and the smile falls from her face. The decision has been made. As soon as Mr ‘Not All Men’ leaves for work in the morning, she’s putting her passport in a safety deposit box and setting up a secret savings account to fund her getaway. The plan is in motion. You’ve got one life to life.

Thomas Inskeep on “Diamonds” (Herb Alpert ft. Janet Jackson) [6.80]

After “The Pleasure Principle,” this might actually be my favorite Janet Jackson single (even though she’s technically the featured artist on it). “Diamonds,” written and produced by Jimmy “Jam” Harris and Terry Lewis for Herb Alpert’s 1987 album Keep Your Eye on Me, is, in all but name, a Jam/Lewis/Janet record — with a few Alpert trumpet flourishes. The beats rock hard, and Janet delivers what may be (and certainly was at the time) her most IDGAF vocal: you’re gonna get Miss Jackson (because you’re clearly nasty) some diamonds, aren’t you?

Alfred Soto on “The Pleasure Principle” [8.43]

For all the banter over the years about the cold and steel of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis’ beats for Control, the coldest and steeliest they had no hand in creating. Songwriter Monte Moir, like Jam and Lewis also a The Time alum, stumbled on the title first: “I had to figure out what it was I was trying to say, I just stumbled into the title and realized it fit.” Sung by Jackson in her airiest, most insouciant coo, “The Pleasure Principle” starts with bass synth and cowbell before settling down into a matter-of-fact tale of a night of sin. To visualize the concept, choreographer Barry Lather put together one of Jackson’s most iconic videos, a masterpiece of athleticism involving chairs. Too cold and steely for the audience, or perhaps the hype cycle for a sixth single had exhausted itself: “The Pleasure Principle” missed the top ten in the summer of 1987, stopping at #14. So ignore the single mix and revel in Shep Pettibone’s Long Vocal Remix.

Kat Stevens on “Let’s Wait Awhile” [6.60]

Can you have an erection-section classic that’s primarily about abstinence? “Let’s Wait Awhile” has all the features of a late-night Magic FM request slot regular: soft electric piano, finger clicks instead of drums, lyrics about promises and feelings and stars shining bright. But this message is about trust, not lust. It takes courage to admit that you’re not ready, and it requires faith in the other person that they’re not going to be a dick about it. I remember the advice columns in Just 17 repeating over and over that as Informed Young Women we shouldn’t be pressured into sex, which was all well and good until it actually came to the act of Doing It, whereupon the fug of hormones and internalised misogyny meant that all rationality went out of the window. It’s the sign of how strong and confident Janet is in her relationship, that she can be ‘real honest’ and discuss her concerns freely with her partner, without worrying that he’s going to a) dump her b) tell his mates that she’s frigid or c) ‘persuade’ her round to his point of view (*shudder*). If he’s not willing to wait, maybe he’s not such an ideal person to be doing this sort of stuff with in the first place? I can hear the dude whining to his mate now: “I took her out for dinner and all I got was a perfectly vocalised key change!” Just 17 would be proud of you, Janet.

Jessica Doyle on “Miss You Much” [7.83]

A little context: in March 1989 Natalie Cole released “Miss You Like Crazy,” a ballad built for Cole to sing wide about longing. In June Paula Abdul released the third single off Forever Your Girl, “Cold Hearted,” whose video made a point of its group choreography. And then in late August came “Miss You Much,” the first single from Rhythm Nation 1814. Did Janet Jackson have beef with her ex-choreographer? Was that the kind of thing people talked about, in the pre-poptimist, pre-TMZ era? Because in retrospect “Miss You Much” looks like a dismissal of “Cold Hearted,” cool and upright where the latter was David-Fincher-directed sleazy. (By contrast, the director of “Miss You Much,” Dominic Sena, had already treated Jackson with respect in the video for “The Pleasure Principle.”) But also “Miss You Much” plays as a broader statement, a refusal of expectations. There’s nothing sad or ballad-like about it. There’s that opening high of “sho-o-ot,” and then Jackson’s on a roll: it’s all about her, the deliciousness of her feeling; she can barely bother to describe the “you” being missed so much besides the blanditries of smiling face and warm embrace. The power in “I’ll tell your mama/I’ll tell your friends/I’ll tell anyone whose heart can comprehend” isn’t in the longing; it’s in how much she relishes being the one who gets to do the telling. By 1989 she was in control enough to not have to utter the word once. “Miss You Much” isn’t a deep song, didn’t set out to accomplish as much as the title track or later songs like “That’s the Way Love Goes” or “Together Again” would. But thirty years later it still looks and sounds like (what we now call) a power move.

Katie Gill on “Rhythm Nation” [8.57]

How does one try to condense the reach and influence of “Rhythm Nation” in a single blurb? Entire articles have been written about this song and video (because really, you can’t talk about the song without talking about the video). It’s influenced singers, dancers, directors, choreographers. It won a Grammy as well as two MTV Music Video Awards when those awards actually mattered. The choreography is perfect. Jackson and her dancers move with military-like precision, flawlessly executing maneuvers and creating a dance that would almost instantly become part of the popular consciousness. The sound is amazing. That bass groove is so tight, adding a layer of funk which the guitar takes to further levels. The tune is an absolute earworm, the chorus is iconic, and Jackson’s vocals are at the best of their game. But I think the most important part of “Rhythm Nation” is that this absolute banger of a song, this masterclass in choreography, has remarkably idealistic lyrics. Jackson’s “Rhythm Nation” yearns towards a racially and socially conscious utopia as it attempts to unite people to join together and create this utopia. In a lesser artist, these lyrics would be out and out corny. But when wrapped up in the final package, the lyrics go from corny to believable. Suddenly, the idea of the whole world helping each other or rising up in protest doesn’t sound so far-fetched.

Alfred Soto on “Escapade” [7.67]

With solo credits as common as hair metal solos in Janet Jackson music, I often listen to tracks like “Escapade” and wonder: what did Janet Jackson contribute? Lyrics? Sure. But she has to write them around a Jimmy Jam-Terry Lewis melody, no? Or, as is no doubt the case, she comes up with her own vocal melody to accompany their chord progressions. According to Jam, the trio had “Nowhere to Run” in mind: first as a cover song, then as inspiration. “Escapade” hopscotches away from the sense of danger animating the Martha and the Vandellas chestnut; in 1989, into the eclipse of a grim decade for black lives, looking forward to Friday and drinks and friends would have to do. Over Jam and Lewis’ unrelenting thwack, Jackson sing-songs a valentine to a shy boy whom she hopes will join her in — what? The sheer euphoria of the bridge — a melody as bright as a returned smile — suggests worlds of possibilities when the check’s cashed and the night’s young. After all, MINNEAPOLIS!

Leah Isobel on “Alright” [7.14]

Rhythm Nation might have more banging singles, and it might have songs that more directly diagnose the ills of late capitalism, but no song on the record better encapsulates its utopian aims than “Alright.” Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis famously left the high end of Janet’s songs empty to provide space for her delicate soprano; here, they fill the low end with vocal samples, percussion, submerged synth blats, and tense bass licks. Instead of singing high for the whole track, however, Janet buries lyrical references to magic spells and the end of the world in her lower register, where they blend into the rest of the song. It’s only on the chorus, and particularly on her swooping vocal runs as she riffs on the phrase “you’re alright with me,” that she surfaces from the swirl. On a record where she spends so much time and thought discussing what’s wrong around her, here she takes the time to see and acknowledge what’s right. I don’t know that I’ve heard a better sonic analogue for finding relief from chaos: one voice against a wall of voices and sounds, getting lost and being found over and over to the comforting rhythm of a pop song.

Edward Okulicz on “Black Cat” [6.57]

“Black Cat” was never the huge stylistic U-turn it was perceived as. Janet’s brother had dabbled in rock guitars, and this is in that vein too, while still being of a piece with the other songs on the album. Where it succeeds is because it doesn’t just lean into rock, it’s as credible a rock song as it is a dance-pop song — the riff, which Jackson wrote herself, kicks ass, the drums shake a room as much as the cavernous thuds of her contemporaneous singles, and the song’s melody and the fierce vocal performance straddle both worlds. And if you don’t like the mix there’s like 900 different versions with 2000 different guitarists — only a slight exaggeration. Its overall success is testament to Janet’s persona, sure, because nothing she released could have failed at this point, but you can’t go to Number One with single number six off an album without your usual co-writers and producers unless you’ve written something that connects with listeners and performed it with power. The way she slams down on “don’t understand… why you… insist…” is a moment of perplexed, angry humanity in the middle of a song that tries to understand something tragic — the corrosion of drugs and gangs on young people’s lives — and while the soloing is a little hammy, the song escapes being embarrassingly corny. Because in fact the whole song kicks ass.

Pedro Joao Santos on “Love Will Never Do (Without You)” [8.71]

One of the greatest pleasures in getting into Janet is how deliriously bold all of her work is. A story, if you will: how Jimmy & Terry stepped in to support her emancipation and helped her invent new jack swing all within Control, before taking the formula apart in Rhythm Nation 1814, aiming for pop that was both a manifesto against bigotry and, between a balm and a corrective, a rush of love. It was designed for high impact, meaning it would’ve always been a pop juggernaut — the material was there, even if the marketing was oblique, which it was. Instead of a glamour shot in Technicolor and a flirtatious title, the 12 million copies sold feature a stark black and white portrait backed by a call-to-arms; the pop froth is smattered around the backbone of topical anthems.

From single to single, A&M skittered between the two sides and amassed consecutive top 10 singles, but it was the last calling card that proved career-defining. At first, “Love Will Never Do (Without You)”’s hard-edged beats scan identical to “Rhythm Nation”’s sonic matrix: belligerent and completed by Janet’s frontal vox, only in this instance driven through a more feminine marketing (the music video is a blueprint). That’s the first trick: she unexpectedly launches into the first verse in a tentative, lightly hostile lower register (“like a guy would,” said Jimmy Jam, as it was to be a duet) and keeps it until the chorus wraps up. It’s pop as friction. By the second verse, Janet goes up an octave and matches the now-bubbling passion at the forefront. The tiny synth countdown drives it into a perpetual unfolding, each time emerging to add more (vocal) layers to the cacophony and threaten to wrap it up, before coming back in force.

Janet’s head voice soars up to the grand finale, a pop cataclysm of an ending, one of the best in recorded history — which applies to the entirety of “Love Will Never Do,” a simultaneous pitch for chaotic head-over-heels energy and blockbuster status. It’s a bizarre ride and a joyous knockout: the honeymoon phase juiced into one relentless beast of a banger, one that changed pop for good.

Jackie Powell on “State of the World” [6.67]

“State of the World” deserved a music video. At its heart, this is a dance cut with a little bit less of the hard rock that roars in “Rhythm Nation.” In content and in sound, this track is a sequel and that’s not a criticism. It’s an expansion which encourages a foot tap by the listener and includes an absolutely integral bassline that drives this track through and through. While the song clocks in at under five minutes and could have been a bit shorter, its chorus, which crescendos in clarity and volume, makes up for it. In addition to Jackson’s delivery on the verses, which is rather understated, the sound effects which illustrate “State of the World” aren’t too kitschy. The cries and crashes aren’t as apparent as in brother Michael’s “Earth Song” for instance, and that’s appropriate. The politics had to run as smooth as the bass on this track, and they did. They didn’t serve as a distraction, but rather as an asset. Janet was the master of New Jack Swing, and while folks look to her brother’s album Dangerous as the most successful of this genre, Janet experimented with it first. The percussive repetition, serves a purpose for Jackson on the record. It maintains the same intensity throughout as it reflects exactly what she has to say. Lyrically, I wish that Jackson explained how her “Nation” would “weather the storm.” To this day, homelessness and poverty are issues that affect people continuously. Jackson states the cornerstone rather than the specifics, and maybe that’s okay. It’s something that in 2019 we need more than ever. While unity appears so far out of our reach, Janet attested as early as 1991 that we can’t stop and shan’t stop.

Thomas Inskeep on “The Best Things in Life Are Free” (with Luther Vandross, BBD and Ralph Tresvant) [7.60]

To soundtrack his 1992 film Mo’ Money, Damon Wayans (who wrote and starred in the critically-derided box office hit) called upon superproducers Jam & Lewis, and they did work, producing or co-producing 13 of the album’s 14 tracks and writing or co-writing 12 of them. The soundtrack’s lead single was very pointedly a “look at all the cool stars we got together” move, featuring superstars Vandross and Jackson duetting, along with a brief rap bridge from Bell Biv DeVoe (credited here as BBD) and their New Edition compadre Ralph Tresvant. Released as a single in May 1992, it’s a perfect summertime smash, simultaneously airy-light and slammin’, with Vandross and Jackson weaving in and out of each other’s vocals effortlessly. BBD and Tresvant pop in with a nothingburger of a rap (Tresvant gets a label credit for literally uttering one line, the song’s title) that at least serves to provide a modicum of grit to the proceedings, but no matter: Jackson especially sounds breezier than maybe ever, while Vandross seems to float above the record. The two are magical on a track perfectly suited for them (credit Jam & Lewis, of course), and the result is a minor classic.

Jonathan Bogart on “That’s the Way Love Goes” [7.86]

A little over a year ago I rather overshared in this space when discussing Madonna’s “Erotica,” released a year before this single. A year makes a lot of difference: by the time I was listening to Shadoe Stevens count this down on American Top 40, the summer it became the longest-running #1 hit any Jackson family member ever had, radio pop was no longer a dirty, soul-damning secret, just a daily companion, a window into a more colorful, adult, and interesting world than the ones I knew from books. I would probably have had a healthier relationship to romance and sexuality, in fact, if this had been my introduction to overtly sexual pop rather than “Erotica” — both songs share the technique of a sultry spoken-word refrain, but Janet’s is actually grown-up, with the confidence of a woman who knows what she wants and how to achieve it, with none of Madonna’s juvenile need to épater les bourgeois. As it happened I didn’t particularly connect to “That’s the Way Love Goes,” having reached the stage in my adolescence when getting a charge out of raspy-voiced men singing about political instability felt like the more gender-appropriate inevitability. It wouldn’t be until years later when I returned to re-examine the radio pop of my youth with maturer ears that the amazing miracle of this song fully dawned on me: those pillowy guitar samples plucked from songs where raspy-voiced men sang about political instability, but pressed into service of a loping, candlelit coo: equal parts seduction and vulnerability, Janet singing with the authority of someone who had already conquered the world about the grown-woman concerns that really matter: love, and sex, and the impossible beauty that results when they intertwine.

David Moore on “If” [8.33]

Janet Jackson sang explicitly about “nasty boys,” but I was, to use a term my son’s preschool teacher used to describe him, a timid boy, and I soaked up the privileges of maleness with a corresponding fear of performative masculinity. My love of women through childhood was paired with a deep-seated self-loathing that snuffed out friendships, made me uncomfortable in my body, and sparked intense, violent fantasies directed toward unnamed aggressors in my mind, all those “bad guys.” I wouldn’t be able to reflect on any of this until adulthood. But there was a point in preadolescence when the contours of the trap started to become discernible, and Janet Jackson’s “If” was both a cherished song — one I would listen to rapt in front of MTV or on the radio, legs haphazardly splayed behind me — and was also the uncanny soundtrack to my discomfort: a muscular, menacing, alien object that completely unnerved me, made me a supplicant to its rhythm, got into my head and into my guts, made me move, if only for a minute, in a world that glanced contemptuously toward — but stood defiantly outside of — that toxic timidity. I was the woman telling the man what I wanted, and I was also the man obeying; I was the dancer and I was the floor, too. On “If,” Janet Jackson and Jam & Lewis tamed the New Jack Squall that her brother unleashed on Dangerous with Teddy Riley, insisted upon its lockstep subservience to her mission and her groove, and pointed to an R&B futurism that was barely a twinkle in pop music’s eye in 1993. The result is simultaneously mechanistic and wild, rolling waves of noise that you quickly learn to surf or risk drowning in them. That same year, I also found inspiration in angry men, many of them likely nasty ones, the same men I would have assiduously avoided in person and fought off in my dreams. But Janet Jackson kept me honest, reminded me that my anger was a tell for my underlying cowardice and shame. There is never a hint in “If” that her hypothetical proposition — too strident for any coyness or the suggestion of flirting — could ever be satisfactorily answered. Not by you anyway. No boy, nasty or timid, could meet Janet Jackson’s challenge; she’s mocking the guy who would even try. By the time you hit that cacophony of a middle 8 break, defibrillation on an already racing heartbeat, you’re defeated, more thoroughly than any bad guy you might have dreamt up. You’re not ready for this world — you’re not, so you can’t, and you won’t. But what if…?

Jonathan Bradley on “Again” [5.67]

It sounds like a fairy tale: billowing keys, Janet’s tinkling voice, and no drums to earth the fantasy. “Again” was from John Singleton’s Poetic Justice, not a Disney picture, but it shimmers with its own magic anyway. The melody is gorgeous: listen to Janet measuring out the descending syllables in “suddenly the memories came back to me” like they’re sinking in as she sings the words. (She repeats the motif on “making love to you/oh it felt so good and so right” — this is a romance where the sex is as fondly remembered as the emotions.) Janet Jackson is such a versatile performer, and for all the bold strokes and blunt rhythmic force of her best known moments, “Again” is a treasure all of its own for being none of these: it is tiny and tender and sparkles with a real joy that is all the more wondrous for sounding like it could not exist outside of a storybook.

Scott Mildenhall on “Whoops Now” [4.83]

Even outside America, there’s a widespread tendency for people, in search of a lifetime’s grand narrative, to define everything that happened before The Day The World Changed – a coincidental proxy for their childhood, youth or adolescence – as a simpler time. It’s a convenient illusion for anyone in the world lucky enough to be able to believe it, whose formative years were insulated from war or suffering and can be instead defined by the most carefree scraps of pop culture. In that respect “Whoops Now” holds great temptation, it being the breeziest brush-off of burdens, with an all-over Teflon disposition. It’s therefore an almost fantastical ideal of ’90s radio (and still one of Janet’s most played in the UK); a warm and fuzzy-round-the-edges memory of which on closer inspection, the details are inscrutable. Janet, aloft in a proletarian reverie, relates a confusing tale of overnight shift work, a hindrance of a boss and the consequent curtailing of her plans for some fun in the sun this weekend with her friends (who, judging by her extended roll call, seem to mostly be record execs, producers and performers, as well as dogs). Narratively, it’s difficult to tease apart, but all you need to know is that hurrah – she somehow ends up on holiday anyway. A story that sounds more like something from an expletive-laden segment of Airline thus becomes the most casual celebration of the apparent inevitability of positive resolutions when you’re a globe-straddling megastar, or perhaps just a kid in the back of your parents’ car with the radio on. With that certainty of happiness and universal balance, and the belief that it ever was or could be, it’s fantasy upon fantasy upon fantasy. But no bother: Anguilla here we come.

Nortey Dowuona on “Throb” [6.86]

I started listening to Janet Jackson as a happy accident. Her songs were on Atlantic Radio, but nowhere else. I barely heard her music growing up and only knew of her massive career, and not the music that made it so huge.

So when I first pressed play on “Throb,” I was kinda scandalized.

Because it was so directly, overtly sexual, and confident about it. Janet was ready to get down and dirty, without all the mind games, patronization and bullpuddy packed all over it. The lyrics are pretty straightforward, and there are only ten lines of lyrics. Its pretty clear what Janet wants, and she’s gonna get it.

Plus, the bass was slamming, it slunk around my neck and just rested there while the air horn synths washed over my eyes, blinding me. The drums then stepped over me and plucked me up, with cooing and cascading moans and grunts swirled around my body, shredding me to pieces —

Then the song ended. And it was over.

I honestly, can’t really say why this is my favorite Janet song, but I can say that you should probably play it while having sex, and while thinking about having sex, and play this late night in the night if deciding to have sex. I know this’ll be the first thing I’ll play if I have sex with anyone.

Thomas Inskeep on “Throb”

In the summer of 1993, I’d just finished my second freshman year of college, in my hometown. (I’d gone to college straight out of high school in 1988, and dropped out without much to show for it, 16 months later.) One of my best girlfriends had herself just graduated from college and was back at her parents’ house, job-hunting. We were both past 21 and looking for a place to go dancing, and we found it in the nearest big city, Fort Wayne, Indiana, about 45 minutes away. It was a short-lived gay bar — so short-lived I don’t even recall its name, sadly — with a dance floor roughly the size of a postage stamp. I don’t remember meeting anyone there, ever. (I didn’t drive at the time, so Julie always had to, so it’s not like I could’ve gone home with someone anyway.) I don’t remember anything about the bar — except its dancefloor, and the fact that they had a decent DJ on the weekends, who mostly played house music, which I loved. And there were three songs that got played, in my memory at least, every single week. (And Julie and I really did go just about every weekend that summer.)

The first was Bizarre Inc.’s “I’m Gonna Get You,” an ebullient diva-house track which topped Billboard’s Dance Club/Play chart in January but was just peaking at pop radio in June. The second was, really, the gay club record of the year, RuPaul’s “Supermodel.” It peaked at #2 on the Dance Club/Play chart in March, but never left gay clubs at all through 1993. When that got played at the club, I would, week-in, week-out, “work the runway,” lip-syncing my ass off. (It’s just that kind of song.) And the third was an album track from a newly-released album (that would, in fact, eventually be promoted to dance clubs at peak at #2 on the Club/Play chart), Janet Jackson’s “Throb.” This song went where Jackson never had before, both musically (it’s a straight-up house jam) and lyrically (it’s a straight-up sex jam). Its lyrics are minimal but to the point: “I can feel your body/Pressed against my body/When you start to poundin’/Love to feel you throbbin’.” No subtleties there! Accordingly, Julie and I would spend the song grinding up against each other on a tiny riser at the back of the dance floor, because why not? And because it’s fun.

26 years later, ‘Throb” still kills. And throbs.

Maxwell Cavaseno on “Runaway” [6.50]

My childhood managed to dodge the oceanic nature of pop thanks to being struck between two extremes. My father usually kept the car full of rap, via cassettes of assorted rising stars of the moment (Big Pun, Nas, Various Wu-Tang Soloists) or whatever was playing via Hot 97. Meanwhile my mother typically wallowed in a realm of AOR pop a la Amy Grant or the likes who you could never remember anything about. If there was anything majorly important in the history of pop music from 89-98, lemme tell you, that shit didn’t happen anywhere near me. However, one of the few memories that did manage to linger on was “Runaway.” It was a record that managed to ethereally sneak up to me like some kind of weird creep that I just couldn’t understand with its weird foreign instrumentation simulating orientalist visions and Janet’s background vocals harmonizing like a bunch of Buddhist Cats sneering a la Randy Savage’s “nyeeeah.” Whenever I trailed along in supermarkets or tried to keep busy in waiting rooms, I could comprehend what happened on other songs I liked in the outer world like “Take a Bow” or “Kiss From A Rose.” But this? How did you rationalize all of these gliding vocals crooning and this swarm of glittery noises when you have barely any understanding of the world around you, let alone music? No matter how much further away and away I’d get from whenever it was meant to be a single, it could still disruptively appear in the wild and send the whole day into a state of disarray. It’s so alarming to know now as a grown adult that I can personally summon this ifrit of a single, rather than think of it as some sort of rare sighting of trickster energy (all the more bolstered by Janet’s ad libbed teasing of supposed imperfection and other-human excess) that isn’t meant to be heard more than once in a blue moon. To be honest, I may just forget altogether after the fact, the same way I never remembered the name of the song even when considering it for review. Just that “nyeeeah” hung around in my memory.

Danilo Bortoli on “Got ’til It’s Gone” [6.17]

In Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”, a cut from her 1970 album Ladies of the Canyon, she sang of impeding progress as a form of destruction (“They paved paradise/And put up a parking lot”). Often seen as as environmental anthem, actually, she was looking back at the sixties, and then seeing, right ahead, a decade that showcased no promising future, only aching skepticism. This resulted in one the purest, simplest lines she has ever written: “Don’t it always seem to go/That you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone”. Almost thirty years later, Janet Jackson conjured those same thoughts, conveying, instead, a different meaning. The Velvet Rope was her very own game of smoke and mirrors, and intimate and often misleading look at her private life. Lying at the center of that album, there is a delicate tribute. “Got ‘til It’s Gone” features a well-placed sample from that line culled from “Big Yellow Taxi.” The context is entirely different however. Here, the same words are uttered between confessions of love. It helps, then, that “Got ‘til It’s Gone” is, in reality, a talk. It’s the way Janet asks “What’s the next song?”. It’s the way Q-Tip responds “Like Joni says.” It’s also the way he asserts finally: “Joni Mitchell never lies.” The brilliance of a sample travelling three decades is that it is deliciously meta. The concept of truth, in Janet Jackson’s universe, is interchangeable. That way, she, too, can never lie.

Josh Love on “Together Again” [6.86]

Together Again was originally conceived as a ballad, and no wonder – it’s a deeply sentimental (borderline treacly, if I’m being uncharitable) song about death and angels and reuniting in the afterlife in heaven. Deciding to record it as a surging house jam instead was an absolute masterstroke, and the result is one of the most purely joyous, transcendent moments of Janet’s career. The idea of carrying a lost loved one in your heart and feeling their spirit in the goodness you encounter in the world, and even the thought of one day joining together with them again in the great beyond – “Together Again” makes you feel that joy rather than merely verbalizing it. So many of us say that when we die we want those we leave behind to celebrate our lives rather than mourn our passing, but Janet is one of the few artists to really bring that radical acceptance of impermanence to life.

Thomas Inskeep on “I Get Lonely” (TNT Remix) [7.43]

Allow me to be cynical for a moment: Janet Jackson, in 1998, is still a superstar. But in the past five years, she’s only had one R&B #1, ‘94’s sex-jam “Any Time, Any Place” (assisted greatly by its R. Kelly remix). So if you’re thinking “What do we do to get Janet back to the summit,” what do you do? Well, it’s 1998. How about calling in Teddy Riley? Better yet, how about he gets a helping hand from Timbaland? And the best: how about Teddy brings his merry men of BLACKstreet with him for a vocal assist? Ergo, “I Get Lonely (TNT Remix),” now label-credited to “Janet [she was just going by “Janet” at the time] featuring BLACKstreet.”

And you know what? It’s genius. The idea, brilliant. The execution, top-notch. Riley on the remix, with instrumental help from Timbo, with guest vocals from BLACKstreet: it’s more exciting than the original (which was already quite good), has a little more junk in its trunk (those should-be-patented instrumental tics that Timbaland is such a wizard with, ohmygod, much like Janet’s big brother’s vocal tics), and the duet vocals are superb (especially as it was so rare to hear Janet singing with others at the time, and every member of BLACKstreet save Riley was a great-to-marvelous singer). Presto! Two weeks atop the R&B chart in May 1998, along with a #3 Hot 100 peak. Mission accomplished — and fortunately, it works even better artistically than it did commercially. Everybody wins!

Pedro Joao Santos on “Go Deep” [7.14]

That The Velvet Rope’s party song is so heavy on gravitas and spine-tingling urgency speaks volumes. In an album so hellbent on carnal and psychological openness, the party of “Go Deep” goes deeper, and makes sense. It’s not just the top-20 banger it factually was, and it’s not just hedonism for the sake of it. That is, if you don’t divorce it from the wounds of longing, manipulation, abuse and distress being sliced fresh. Tension lies within this absolute romp, placed midway through the red-hot catharsis of Rope. It might be that the party acts as a salve for the trauma. Though it isn’t put into words, you can hear it subliminally: Janet’s hesitant vocal; the evocative, near-melancholy synth fluctuating about. You can even imagine the words as portals: making friends come together as support; the sexual come-ons not just because, but maybe as physical relief for the pain.

A bare-bones lyric sheet would give you nothing — but music as context goes a long way. And the music itself from “Go Deep” gets me in raptures after all these years, from that ridiculous boing (perhaps best known from “I Can’t Dance” by Genesis) to the bass driving it, all chunky and rubbery, and the dramatic string arpeggios in the middle-8. If there’s got to be a template for urgent, carnivorous Friday night anthems, let this be the one — and keep it in context.

Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa on “You” [7.00]

The Velvet Rope carries a strong and fascinating legacy; It is rightly praised as a predecessor to both mainstream R&B’s exploration of the intimate (the body) and the spiritual (the soul) in the continuing decades, and to the experimental scope and atmospherics later adopted by today’s so-called “Alt-R&B,” and this extraordinary mixture of elements is never more efficient than in the album’s third track “You.” The song is, first and foremost, a triumph of production genius. Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis’s use of space, and the dynamic at play between the then-cutting-edge electronica ingredients and neo-soul’s earnestness and sensual themes, should itself be a case study for aspiring producers, but it’s the way Janet’s vocals are performed and filtered through the track that take the song to unsuspected levels of greatness. There is something in the breathy, low-pitched verses that exudes unadulterated eroticism, and when the post-chorus harmonies kick in where things really become ecstatic. In several interviews, Janet herself defined this album as “baby-making music”, and I can safely bet that “You” is the song she was thinking about. And its echoes still reverberate today, not only in the sound of R&B to come, but in the fact that thousands of people were conceived to this very beat.

Edward Okulicz on “Free Xone” [6.83]

I remember it only vaguely; it was 1995, and for drama class we had to do a performance based on a social theme using a combination of media and methods. I was in a group with a big Janet fan, who decided to use her music as the basis of a combination spoken-word, mime and dance performance on racism. I only understanding the themes in the abstract because I was young, sheltered, and white. I knew racism was a thing I didn’t like, but it wasn’t an existential threat to me. Two years later, on “Free Xone,” Janet would speak directly to me and tell me of a bleak present with the promise of a better future. Janet told it like it was, and still is for many: if you are gay, despite the fact that love is love, a lot of people are going to hate you or at least be uncomfortable around you. Homophobia isn’t just violence or hostility, it can be any kind of social rejection, and it can happen anywhere, as it does in the anecdote in the first part of the song, where a pleasant conversation with a person sitting next to you on an airplane sours because of it.

Janet Jackson is a dancer, but she didn’t dance around anything if she didn’t have to. She leaned into her status as a gay icon out of love, not necessity. But she made her social justice songs out of both love and necessity. Hating people is so not mellow. Love and sex are never wrong. Janet Jackson has never resiled from that belief, and never shied away from putting it in song. I’d grown up listening to Janet Jackson, but I’d never thought of her as an ally for myself, and it was intensely comforting to hear that she was on my side when nobody else seemed to be (Meshell Ndegeocello’s “Leviticus Faggot” the previous year had more or less convinced me I’d die in the closet).

In 2019, her funk here sounds a little dinky, the transitions between the soft groove and the raucous party bounce are kind of awkward, and the weird song structure sounds like it was cut and pasted together, but it’s a collage of compelling pieces. It got quite a lot of play on the alternative youth station here, the one whose listeners were at the time generally terrified of a) pop superstars, b) Black artists, and c) dancing. Someone thought the kids needed to hear this, and they were right. “Free Xone” helped my nascent consciousness come to grips with earlier songs that I’d just considered a good time before. Its story is less common in the Western world, now, but it’s still true as history for some, and as present for others.

Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa on “Tonight’s the Night” [4.50]

I’m a sucker for good covers; we usually tend to give songwriting, the cult of the inspired author, and the concept of originality a certain mystique that grossly overshadows the importance of skilful creative interpretation and re-invention. But many of our most important singers are essentially covers artists — Joe Cocker, Tom Jones, Bettye Lavette, a huge number of blues and jazz singers, most of the 50s-60s Greenwich Village folk scene — because of course we need these musicians to give these tunes another dimension, whether stylistic, generational, or purely emotional. Also, a song’s perspective can change dramatically because of who is singing. “Tonight’s The Night” works with Rod’s gravelly, rugged voice, and, although it can sound a bit creepy by today’s standards, the arrangements carry it beautifully, but in Janet’s sexually adventurous, musically exuberant The Velvet Rope, it acquires a new dimension, a far more interesting one, might I add. From Janet’s view, and the brilliant decision of not changing genders in the lyrics, her version alludes to bisexuality in a way that makes complete sense within’ the album’s core subject matters, and works wonders within’ its production philosophy. Stewart later presented his live renditions of the song by saying “This is an original by Janet Jackson”. No one will refute that. It’s her song now.

Alex Clifton on “All For You” [6.86]

“All For You” is the first Friday night you go out with your new college friends and that utter sense of freedom where you realize the night is yours without a curfew. It’s sparkling fairy lights in the background, a disco ball overhead, at a roller rink or at a club with a fancy light-up dancefloor, maybe a stolen swig of rum on your tongue. It’s the moment you see someone new and your heart falls into your stomach with no prior warning, and you suddenly know you’ll do anything to talk to them. You simply have to; it’s an animal urge, chemicals and hormones whizzing through you and making it hard to walk because you’re giddy. Maybe you’re braver than I am and you go talk to the person who’s snagged your attention, but maybe you hang back with your friends and pretend you’re not watching out for your crush while also dancing stupidly with your new friends. There’s a pure exhilaration in this song that many have tried to emulate but few match the ease with which Janet performs. She’s flirty and sexy like no other, but “All For You” also makes you, the listener, feel flirty and sexy too — something about it worms its way into you and becomes the shot of confidence you need. Lots of people can write songs about dancing at the club, but Janet turns it into a night you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

Jibril Yassin on “Someone to Call My Lover” [7.00]

Does falling in love always feel the same every time? It’s one thing to keep pushing on in life but what’s striking about “Someone to Call My Lover” is how infectious Janet’s optimism is. Built on an Erik Satie riff by way of the band America, Janet recast herself as a woman excited to love again. Let it be on the record – long-term relationships are fucking terrifying. Moving on from the dissolution of a marriage is disorienting and the songs that use Janet’s divorce as inspiration on All For You share a tentative yet firm belief in renewal.

She uses “maybe” on “Someone to Call My Lover” the way one throws out a “lol” after shooting their shot – you don’t even have time to catch it amid her grocery store list of wishes for her future love. “Someone to Call My Lover” hits all the right places thanks to the careful and immaculate production but it’s Janet’s sincerity that marks it as her best twee performance.

Will Adams on “Son Of A Gun” [5.20]

Given All For You’s post-divorce setting, it was only appropriate that after the aural sunbeam of the title track and giddy optimism of “Someone to Call My Lover,” Janet would do a 180 and proceed to rip him a new one. The opening taunts — “Ha-ha, hoo-hoo, thought you’d get the money too” — against the throbbing kick bass set the scene, but the true genius of “Son of a Gun” comes from its sampling and modernization of ultimate kiss-off song “You’re So Vain.” The classic bass riff, once soft in Carly Simon’s original, is now razor-sharp. The cavernous drum beats sound like you’re trapped in an underground dungeon. All the while, Janet mutters burn after burn right into your ear (“I’d rather keep the trash and throw you out”) before Simon launches into the “I betcha think this song is about you” refrain, sounding like a Greek chorus confirming Jackson’s digs. The album version carries on until the six-minute mark, with Carly Simon waxing poetic about clouds in her coffee and apricot scarves in an extended outro. The video version wisely excises this in favor of guest verses from Missy Elliott, whose reliably grinning performance shoves the knife in deeper. In both versions, however, Janet’s menace is preserved. Forming a trinity with All For You’s preceding two singles, “Son of a Gun” showed just how versatile Jackson is, and how adept she is at encapsulating the messy, complex emotions of an ended relationship.

Will Adams on “All Nite (Don’t Stop)” [6.17]

I had been looking away from the television when it happened. By the time I’d heard the gasps from my parents and I glanced up at the screen, the cameras had cut to an aerial shot of the Reliant Stadium in Houston, where the 2004 Super Bowl was taking place. My 11 year old brain couldn’t process exactly what happened from my parents’ concerned murmurs, and having completely missed the incident (there was no YouTube back then, see), it would take years for me to understand the impact that the “wardrobe malfunction” had on culture and Jackson’s career. The greater impact was to be expected — the six-figure FCC fine on CBS (later dismissed by the Supreme Court) and conservative handwringing about the moral decline of the country — but Jackson in particular suffered unduly. There was the blacklist, ordered by Les Moonves, which kept her off CBS, MTV and Infinity Broadcasting. Jackson’s appearance at that year’s Grammy Awards was canceled. Late-night talk show hosts turned it into monologue fodder, usually grossly and usually at her expense. The controversy hampered her album cycles well into the Discipline era. Meanwhile, Justin Timberlake remained entirely unaffected. His career would skyrocket two years later with the release of FutureSex/LoveSounds; he became a Saturday Night Live darling; he performed solo at the Super Bowl’s halftime show in 2018. This alone puts Damita Jo and “All Nite (Don’t Stop)” in a more sympathetic light, but even then, pop radio missed out on a truly brilliant song here. Janet acts as the Dance Commander, taking the opening guitar lick from Herbie Hancock’s “Hang Up Your Hang Ups” and turning it into a lasso with which she throws you onto the dancefloor. The percussion percolates, each sound placed perfectly to create an undeniable groove. Because of the blacklist, it didn’t even break the Hot 100, and the video was also subject to its own asinine controversy — the few video channels that managed to avoid the blacklist edited out the sexual content, including a scene were two female dancers kiss. Even fifteen years later, it feels like we’re still reckoning with how Jackson was treated in the aftermath. But there’s an inspiring resilience in “All Nite (Don’t Stop)” reflected in the smile she bears on the Damita Jo cover; its unabashed sexuality in the face of all the backlash makes it an even better listen today.

Kat Stevens on “Strawberry Bounce” [7.17]

I like Janet best when she takes risks, whether that be controversial subject matter, a new image or a change of musical direction. Old faithfuls Jam & Lewis are still a solid presence on Damita Jo, but on “Strawberry Bounce” we see Janet plumping for a left field choice in the then-unknown Kanye West. The result is an intriguing Ryvita, all brittle handclaps and feathery faux-ingenue whispering, on the verge of crumbling into nothing. It’s so light that there’s no bassline, just a queasy glockenspiel tinkle and Janet’s butter-wouldn’t-melt sing-song. I keep wondering to myself: why have Janet and Kanye chosen to present a song about working a shift at a strip club in the style of an Aptimil Follow-On Milk advert? Is it a subtle reminder that sexy times may eventually lead to night feeds and dirty nappies? It doesn’t help that instead of a proper beat, we have Jay-Z muttering ‘BOUNCE!’ as if he’s grumpily shooing a dog off his lawn. It’s confusing and uncomfortable, yet compelling and convincing, and I’m still listening. The risk has paid off.

Will Adams on “Rock With U” [5.83]

“Just Dance” is often thought of as ground zero for the rise of dancepop and eventually EDM in the US, but it had been brewing for over a year before the Lady Gaga song topped the Hot 100 in early 2009. From 2007 onward, the increased interest in incorporating elements of disco via four-on-the-floor beats and faster tempos created some indelible hybrids, particularly in the R&B world: “Don’t Stop the Music”; “Forever”; “Closer”; “Spotlight”; and “Rock With U.” While most of those songs stuck to traditional verse-chorus pop structure, “Rock With U” proves that sometimes simplicity is best: A house arrangement of arpeggios and basic rhythms. A single verse, repeated three times and interspersed with wordless vocalizing with nearly no variation, save for Janet’s whispers. All this, combined with the glorious one-shot video, creates a hypnotic effect, like the song will go on forever. On a recent Song Exploder episode about “Honey,” Robyn said of dance music: “It’s about putting you in a place where you’re in your body dancing without thinking about when it’s gonna end. It’s more about the moment and how it makes you feel.” This is the heart of “Rock With U”: an invitation to get lost in the music, forget about the outside world, and just rock.

Maxwell Cavaseno on “So Much Betta” [5.67]

The beginning of the 2010s was way too challenging in retrospect and I regret every minute of it. “So Much Betta” was a song I first heard in a mix by Robin Carolan, now best known for founding and guiding Tri-Angle Records, but for a brief period operated a side-blog called “SO BONES” where he’d pontificate about random gems of pop, R&B and rap but in a way that made records feel gross and sinister. Suddenly Cassie’s “My House” was a ghost story, Vanessa Hudgens’s “Don’t Talk” would be compared to Takashi Miike’s Audition, and so on. In retrospect I think of the Capital P Pop songs of the decade that I’ve responded to enthusiastically like “TT,” “Cheyenne,” “Strangers,” “Somebody Else,” “Backseat,” “Lac Troi” or the dozens of others there is at least usually a despair or gloom I can at minimum project onto the record even where it might not be obvious. And that comes from hearing Janet Jackson whisper over a record that sounded like some toxic goo from out of the dregs of the Rinse.FM swamps I’d often thought to be “the coolest” sounds, before cutting through over glistening synths that felt like a phantom of not Janet per se but her brother’s past. It was a song that felt v. strange in 2010 well after MJ had died with the listless echo of the Pop Monarch feeling less like a dream-like invocation and more like a degraded copy of a copy in its grotesquery. Enough can be said about how cool and timeless and bright and powerful Janet at her best can feel. But it deserves an acknowledgement that she could also make a song that was so evocative in all the most unpleasant of ways.

William John on “Unbreakable” [6.67]

“Unbreakable” as an adjective is applicable to those rare, unending, strong relationships between people, whether they be romantic, platonic, familial, or, as has been intimated in relation to her song of the same name, between performer and audience. But it’s also a word that can be used to describe oneself, and one’s ability to traverse adversity with stoicism. The first song on Jackson’s most recent album doesn’t sound defiant – more “stroll to the supermarket on a warm summer’s evening” than an escapade to Rhythm Nation. But courage manifests in different ways. Jackson’s breezy delivery, which takes on an ecstatic form in the song’s chorus, is indicative of her self-assurance at her status; she’s embracing the languor allowed to her as a legend. She may have been removed of her clothes in front of the whole world a decade prior; she may have spent her whole life in the shadow of her infamous relative – but she hasn’t faltered. She’s still here. As she greets her listeners in her inviting whisper at the song’s conclusion, she notes that it’s “been a while” since her last missive, and that there is “lots to talk about”. But her listeners aren’t impatient; there’s always time for Janet. Her story has always been one of control, of poise, of excellence. Long may it continue.

Pedro Joao Santos on “Dream Maker/Euphoria” [5.17]

When I get to delve deep into a legend, as with Janet, I tend to hit the ground running and have them release a new, great album a few months later. Not having heard 20 Y.O. and Discipline, I was shielded from the Janet-isms from the ’00s and viewed Unbreakable as a proper continuation to her legacy, instead of the grand comeback it actually was — hackneyed artwork, halted tour and all. Janet got the upper hand, finding her reunited with Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, in a steadfast gaze in a steadfast gaze over airtight, pensive and giddy R&B. An exemplary return to form, incidentally devoid of all the raunch, bathroom breaks and Kioko.

One older Janet-ism survived in a marginal capacity: the penchant for interludes, continued here in only two moments (aside from endearing sneezes and spoken-word outros): one was the bizarre preview for a Target-exclusive full track; the other was “Dream Maker/Euphoria”. A precise inflection point scribed upon the passage from “side 1” to “2” — even if things threaten to get a bit pedestrian and humdrum in the last half. The track itself is a dual mood, yet a continual trek through the glow of a renaissance. A seemingly old groove recalling the Jackson 5 gets dusted from the vaults for the first part. That’s ear candy for ages in itself, a web of vox so intensely feverish and melodically preternatural. It gets looped tantalisingly, then it transcends onto the next level. Full-on rapid eye movement: keyboards and ambience make up the sound of eyelids opening to meet a purple, unreal sky — suspended between worlds, a dream dimension of utopia and the reality where those ideas must coalesce. “I guess the dreamer must be awake,” Janet concludes after envisioning a “perfect place” exempt from “jealousy, abuse or hate,” “war, hunger or hate.”

Janet’s four peak-era albums alone prove she’s been excelling at world-building where and when the world was far from ready. In “Dream Maker/Euphoria,” it isn’t so much the stark condemnations of Rhythm Nation 1814, but its more hopeful fantasies, articulated through the confident tone of Control, set to the type of innovative musical reverie The Velvet Rope predated, softened through janet.’s sensuous filter. But more than the touchpoints of yesteryear, the essence of “Dream Maker/Euphoria” lives in its manifestation of the future: how tangible and expansive it might just become, if given a chance.

#Janet Jackson #writing #music

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