#i can finally say i loved the ending for all the callbacks and stuff but I NEED THIS MAN TO BE HELDDDD!!!!! *everything explodes around me*

[pineappical]

in light of tedtrent becoming so real, im also jumping on the tedtrent epilogue 😊

there's just no way ted wouldn't keep in touch with the others (and have weekly zoom meetings just like in the christmas special) and I just love the thought of the whole team having reunions once in a while.

and going back to trent's arc in s3, the sunflowers conversation, "And your daughter?" "She's never been happier." I think it could go the same for ted.. we've never really properly saw how henry felt about his dad being in london, it's always other people that told ted his son misses him, who's to say henry would rather see his dad happy because that in turn would make him happy too? he was there to win the whole thing, right? I just know ted’s story isn’t done yet when he still hasn’t learned to let others take care of him in return and who else to pair him with than the man who blew up his career because a man was nice to him (and also because they were so. so cruel for the fakeout tedbecca scenes for that finale) 🥺

I'm no writer so just pretend these are snapshots of a slow burn fic where ted visits london for their team reunion and slowly realizes that trent has a crush on him and they kiss about it 💛

#ted lasso #trent crimm #tedependent #ted lasso fanart #tedtrent #ted x trent #I HAVE SOOOOOO MUCH MORE THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS BTW its just that its 4am rn and i cannot type down my thoughts for the life of me </3 #im just so not over that ending and how weird it felt for ted to end his story like that.. not like he can turn back to michelle since #dr. jacob is right there.. i want this man to feel loved and cared for and actually have a place he knows he can call home and that was #richmond for me.. to the family we were born with. and to the family we make along the way etc etc etc #ted lasso spoilers #<- FORGOT ABOUT THAT. #i can finally say i loved the ending for all the callbacks and stuff but I NEED THIS MAN TO BE HELDDDD!!!!! *everything explodes around me* #he even went back there WITHOUT BEARD :( his bestfriend for sooo long who was there for all their ups and downs. i dont like beard and jane #being together but the fact ted didnt even go to their wedding too like ...??! what is going onnnn #also graying lasso is just something so indulgent for me . hush #pn.art #JUST YKNOW!!! I HOPE YALL UNDERSTAND WHAT IM SAYING ITS REALLY REALLY LATE I PROBABLY SHOULDVE WAITED TILL LATER TO POST THIS BUT JAHJVAKDG #my memory is really bad too so i could also be misremembering scenes and im too eepy to check the scenes i had in mind so u_u #ALSO apologies that its taking me sooo long to draw things i recently joined a mc server and ive been playing it all day and night HFSJGFSH #im sooo scared of making these type of posts because i dont have the balls to make the wrong choices in other people's eyes but GRAAH!!!!! #<- i love tedtrent bUT WHAT IF PEOPLE THINK IM CRINGGGEEEE!!!!! #THATS ALL.... i have more drawings in mind that ill get around to later.. for now goodnight <3

[monkey-network]

Good Stuff: Bluey's The Sign

Bluey is still great and I don't need to go into why again. What's most important is that even in such short time of knowing this cartoon, you can see the growth of it all. Joe and the crew share how the world of the Heeler family gets to learn, adapt, and grow without rapidly warping the status quo. You go through and see how everyone is able to work through rough and weird times with sincere maturity. Season 3's Finale is where this all comes to a head and it's as beautiful as I expected, MORESO.

Brandi got to be happy would've been enough for me

The Sign deals with the idea of hard ideas. Those hard ideas that aren't inherently about change, but issues that when faced with initially, it feels like a bad ending. A bad ending which can't be easily fixed and you don't know where to go from there, and it hurts. It hurts when hard ideas swoop in, ruins your mood, festers your mind, and leaves you aimless. Bluey shows that it happens, this is the rare time where a ton of crap hits the fan in one day and it's not something Chili or Bandit or any adult can fix right away. I've never experienced this, but I felt the pain Bluey, Bingo, Frisky, and Chili went through where they're bargaining, burying, and avoiding confronting a potential reality they didn't want. This is where the real hero of the special comes in...

Haven't said before, but Calypso is a masterful teacher

The parable of the farmer works as an incredible seedling thought for Bluey when she reveals her moving. It's not a story I ever heard, but known the message all too well. The message of not just accepting bad things that happen to you, but know that it'll never be the end of the world because of them. Don't think of it as deep, but a natural motif to grow with. This is where a debacle regarding the episode churns with me. It can seem like a cop-out that every character gets what they wanted by the end, as I said before the cartoon can be more idealistic than what our real life allows. Then again, the true beauty of Bluey I believe has always been if it's possible, the family will find a way and do it responsibly.

If happiness can be achieved, they'll know how to get it

Beyond all this, the special is great. They waste no minute here in art and storytelling, and as said before, it's like Smash Bros Ultimate where everything is here. There are great callbacks to episodes you probably wouldn't have thought about, on top of getting to see the whole Heeler family on Chili and Bandit's sides like that blew my mind. Plus I love seeing weddings, dude, like I wish I was there with them. The feels are tsunami-ous like it's unfair to say this is the all-time best episode of the show, but darn if it wouldn't be earned.

When else will I see the epicness of riding shotgun?

But to conclude, it's been said that after this the Ludo crew will take a indefinite hiatus from Bluey the series, especially when they have a new project underway. And honestly? I'm more than satisfied. The show could've ended here and I would've been somewhat at peace with them giving us this beautiful episode. I of course didn't get into this series since its beginning, but I came around the right time to enjoy it myself, to see others recognize its greatness, and to finally make it here. It's great to know this was only another chapter in the book, and I'll see to be around when it gets to come back. As for The Sign? What else is there to say?

It was Beautiful. Cheers to the crew for everything.

#Bluey #bluey cartoon #bluey the sign #the sign #cartoons #reviews #Good Stuff #long post

[dee-is-for-lots-of-things]

An Unnecessarily Comprehensive Sandman Reading Order

Having now read EVERY comic that I could find based on, using characters from, or tying in with @neil-gaiman‘s Sandman series, I thought I should provide what is, as far as i can tell, the definitive list of everything Sandman, in roughly the order of publication, and also what I thought of them. Warning: there’s a lot of it (over 580 issues in two and a half months).

Sandman (1989) #1-28 [Neil Gaiman] (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x)

Obviously we start at the beginning (I hear it’s a very good place to start) with the first 3 main arcs of Sandman plus some single issue stories. This is where the series really leans into the horror side of “dark fantasy,” and I for one love it. Idk, there’s not really much to say here. This is a Sandman blog, we all love this series here, or at least like it enough to talk about it. Go reread this stuff. It’s fuckin good.

The Books of Magic (1990) #1-4 [Neil Gaiman] (x)

The original Books of Magic series is essentially a guided tour of the DC universe’s magic side. Each issue focuses on a specific part of the universe, most of which are callbacks to comics that, I promise, you do not need to have read. The main three reasons to include this is: a) it’s fun, b) Tim as a character gets his own series which becomes part of the Sandman Universe relaunch, and c) it’s a nice place to learn a bunch of DC magic stuff which might show up later without having to drag yourself through the wiki and or read a thousand other comics. Then again this list is over 570 comics long, so maybe that second part’s not much of an issue here.

Sandman (1989) #29-31, Special #1, #32-50 [Neil Gaiman] (x) (x) (x) (x) (x)

This begins with the Distant Mirrors collection (rather than placing them in the Fables & Reflections TP) and runs all the way to the end of Brief Lives and the Ramadan issue (essentially the end of Distant Mirrors, albeit two years later). Brief Lives and A Game of You are still my favourite Sandman collections, the best examples of what I call “human Sandman,” focused on dreamers and their lives and all that, and “Endless Sandman,” focused on the affairs of Dream and his funky family.

Death: The High Cost of Living #1-3 [Neil Gaiman]

The first Death spinoff! It’s based on the one-day-as-a-human thing she does, it’s a lot of fun, and other side characters from Sandman make an appearance! Look, we all know these are good. I don’t have as much to say about them as I do about the obscure comics from the early 2000s that it feels like only I read.

The Children’s Crusade: The Children’s Crusade #1, Black Orchid Annual #1, Animal Man Annual #1, Swamp Thing Annual #7, Doom Patrol Annual #2, Arcana (The Books of Magic) Annual #1, The Children’s Crusade #2 [Neil Gaiman, Nick Foreman, Jamie Delano, Nancy A. Collins, Rachel Pollack, John Ney Rieber, Alisa Kwitney] (x)

This is a crossover between all the big Vertigo titles, focused on the children of each series. Don’t worry about what’s actually going on in the individual series the annuals are from, but the overall plot (by Neil Gaiman) focuses on what the Dead Boy Detectives (Charles and Edwin from Sandman #25) have been up to since escaping Death. They get more very good spinoff content later on, and apparently they’re getting a tv show soon which should be fun.

Death Talks About Life [Neil Gaiman] (x)

This is the short AIDS educational comic. John Constantine has a banana. I like it, I think it deserves a place in this list. Apparently Neil Gaiman almost got arrested for it which is some king shit honestly.

The Spectre (1992) #19-22 [John Ostrander]

This is a very meh arc of a Spectre series that I have not read anything else of. But Lucien is in it briefly so I did read this bit. And in my opinion? Completionism was not worth this boring comic.

Sandman (1989) #51-75 [Neil Gaiman] (x) (x) (x)

The big finale! Worlds’ End and The Wake bookend the massive 12 issue The Kindly Ones arc, so I think keeping all of them together makes a certain amount of sense.

The Books of Magic (1994) #1-20 [John Ney Rieber] (x)

The start of the proper Books of Magic ongoing series (this series being one of my favourite things I’ve read for this) expands nicely on what we know about Tim from the Neil Gaiman miniseries. A lot of plotlines also get picked up from the Children’s Crusade event, and stuff from there is explained and expanded upon. Look, I love this series so much and I think that, while what the Sandman Universe reboot did with it was entertaining, this is still much better.

Sandman: Midnight Theatre [Neil Gaiman, Matt Wagner]

This explores the golden age Sandman, Westley Dodds, and also gives a look at Dream in captivity. The actual Sandman content isn’t a huge part of it, mostly focusing on character that are presumably a part of Vertigo’s Sandman Mystery Theatre series of which this is technically a spinoff. Still, it’s enjoyable, the art is nice, and we get a nice look at the Order of Ancient Mysteries that we don’t really see in Sandman.

Death: The Time of Your Life #1-3 [Neil Gaiman]

Death spinoff 2! This one focuses completely on Hazel and Foxglove after A Game of You and The High Cost of Living, and is less about Death herself (although this isn’t the Death spinoff with the least Death in it. We’ll get there).

The Books of Magic (1994) #21-32, Annual #1, #33-38 [John Ney Rieber] (x)

More of a transitionary period in the series, Molly gets sent off on her own subplot while Tim wanders aimlessly around America for a bit. The America stuff can get confusing and disjointed and doesn’t quite fit into a compelling coherent narrative, but Molly’s plotline more than makes up for it

The Dreaming (1996) #1-16 [Terry LaBan, Peter Hogan, Alisa Kwitney, Bryan Talbot, Jeff Nicholson] (x)

While the best bits of this series are yet to come, there are some good stories in this first, more loosely connected section. That being said, the first 3-issue arc in particular isn’t exactly a perfect example of what the strengths of this series will be, and really it’s just treading water waiting for a writer to come along with a good overall vision for the series. Don’t worry, that’ll come.

The Books of Faerie #1-3 [Bronwyn Carlton]

This seems like a fairly standard telling of an origin story, but it actually ends up providing insights into Tim’s actual true parentage which was left entirely up in the air in the issue of Books of Magic that this picks up from. Which is nice, because I was kinda confused.

The Dreaming (1996) #17-25 [Caitlin R Kiernan, Al Davison, Peter Hogan]

This is really where this series starts to show what it’s gonna be good at. The arc that begins in #17 is the first to be written by Caitlin R. Kiernan, and introduces characters, concepts, and themes which will become very important when they eventually take over writing the series, as well as just being really fucking good.

Vertigo: Winter’s Edge #1 [Neil Gaiman, Caitlin R Kiernan, John Ney Rieber]

These winter specials are always something of a mixed bag. For what’s relevant here, Neil Gaiman offers a Desire-based story which is confusing and vague and has little to do with Sandman aside from featuring an Endless, the Books of Magic segment is just a short and inconsequential adventure for Tim, and Caitlin R Kiernan clealy shines when they provide a Cain and Abel short which is both a fair bit of fun and establishes concepts and themes which will become very relevant for some of their later writing.

The Books of Magic (1994) Annual #2, #39-50 [John Ney Rieber]

It’s time for a big ol’ finale for the John Ney Rieber run on this series! A whole bunch of characters return! Excitement! Action! Magic! Chocolate! A surprise twist involving a character from very early on in Sandman! What more could you want, really?

Destiny: A Chronicle of Deaths Foretold #1-3 [Alisa Kwitney]

This is essentially a series of historical stories that loosely connect to one character who is somewhat linked to Destiny. It’s good, even if the stuff about a huge plague in the 21st century is a weird read now, and the individual issues are also pretty long. Don’t go in expecting a spinoff starring Destiny or providing insights into how all his shit works. The story is rather built around him, like a lot of Sandman around Dream, or the next-but-one item on this list around Death, and if you take it with that in mind you’ll enjoy it more than if you expect something it’s not.

The Dreaming (1996) #26, Special #1, #27-34 [Caitlin R Kiernan, Len Wein, Peter Hogan]

The Many Mansions arc, beginning with #27, is the first section of The Dreaming that’s felt like it’s really shaken up the status quo, and has taken big risks with the characters in service of the story. One of the main strengths of the series, in my opinion, is the fact that it allows what were simple running jokes, exaggerated horror hosts, or side characters to Dream’s angst a time to shine, both in the sense that they get the spotlight, but also that they are allowed to change, grow, and don’t end up in the same role as the series continues.

The Girl Who Would Be Death #1-4 [Caitlin R Kiernan]

This is a spinoff of The Dreaming and ties in with characters that Caitlin R Kiernan has already established, as well as establishing a few more, rather than being a sequel to Gaiman’s previous Death series. As with much of their writing in this universe, it’s got a brilliant atmosphere and fascinating characters. Also, it’s now canon that Death was at least one lesbian’s gay awakening which I think is the most realistic thing that’s ever been shown in any Sandman comic.

Vertigo: Winter’s Edge #2 [Neil Gaiman, Peter Gross, Caitlin R Kiernan]

The Sandman segment in this one is much stronger in my opinion, pulling on threads that are hinted at and explaining things from Sandman to give a good look at Death as an actual character. The Books of Magic story is the same sort of thing as the previous years, just a nice inconsequential short story with Tim. Again, though, Kiernan’s The Dreaming story is the best of the ones that I bothered to read, setting up things for the future and also providing some down-time to acknowledge the way that the status quo has shifted.

Sandman Presents: Lucifer: The Morningstar Option #1-3 [Mike Carey]

The beginning of another major spinoff line! This one’s fun, and also the start of the Sandman Presents collection of miniseries that came out from 1999-2004. Its plot also sets up the events of Mike Carey’s subsequent Lucifer series, so read this is you want the start of that to make any sense at all.

The Books of Magic (1994) #51-56, Annual #3, #57-63 [Peter Gross, Peter Hogan] (x) (x)

Idrk what to say here, I’ve already talked at length about how much I love this series. The exploration of private school culture is interesting even if it doesn’t last, and the multiversal implications of the Other are also very fun. That being said, sometimes the Peter Gross run does feel like it’s repeating what happened earlier (awful things happen to Tim’s dad, Tim gives away his magic, an imposter Tim takes his place, idk).

Sandman Presents: Love Street #1-3 [Peter Hogan]

I have no idea if this miniseries contradicts any of John Constantine’s established backstory from Hellblazer but personally, I really enjoyed this one. It finds a way to involve itself in the Sandman universe that justifies its Sandman Presents title, even if the fact that it’s a Hellblazer book could have been more clear. It’s also good to see more of the dreaming during Dream’s absence, and show what the dreams themselves actually did then.

The Books of Faerie: Molly’s Story #1-4 [John Ney Rieber]

IF you can get past the fact that this series has the ugliest art out of any comic I’ve read, the story here is really neat and it’s always nice to see Molly back, and any exploration of Faerie is usually enjoyable. Just, give yourself a second to get used to the art. Molly really doesn’t look like herself.

The Dreaming (1996) #35-43 [Caitlin R Kiernan] (x)

The culmination of Echo’s story has a big ol’ pile of transgenderism, and despite what certain other sandman blogs will tell you, the ending of Fox and Hounds is not just a repeat of The Wake and really, I don’t know how one might come to that conclusion. For one thing, it’s not the end, nor is it as grand in scope, and for another, it scratches my brain in a particular way because, on a more meta level, the ending grapples with how the concept for The Dreaming differs from the concept of Sandman, and how that difference impacts the story and the characters.

The Books of Magic (1994) #64-67 [Peter Gross]

While I know that part of the whole point of this series is that Tim can’t really settle down anywhere for long, this little home he makes in these issues is by far my favourite and I wish it had lasted longer than the Peter Gross run on the series. Also, this is where I started my “hey Tim... you ain’t cis” crusade and I need everyone to know that this child is very very queer.

Vertigo: Winter’s Edge #3 [Neil Gaiman, Caitlin R Kiernan, Peter Gross]

Another weird Desire story that I’m not too fond of from Neil, and Kiernan’s Dreaming segment is nice enough, but my favourite is the absolute pure fluff of the Books of Magic part, which crosses over with Sandman again and also seems designed to make me ship Mary and Joh as hard as humanly possible and, believe me, I do.

The Books of Magic (1994) #68-75 [Peter Gross] (x) (x)

Another big finale, and this one actually represents more of an end of an era than #50 did. Gross ties it back in with the very beginning and resolves a bunch of loose plot threads, as well as giving cameos to a bunch of characters from the John Ney Rieber issues so that The Names of Magic can transition to a different sort of story. It’s just a shame that we have to ditch the entire recurring cast again. Ah well.

The Dreaming (1996) #44-49 [Caitlin R Kiernan]

This is just the Trinket arc which resolves, or at least brings back, most of the loose ends to do with faerie, with Cluracan and the Nemesis and Nuala returning, and also brings back everyone’s favourite transphobic witch.

Sandman Presents: Petrefax #1-4 [Mike Carey]

Look, word of warning, there are a lot of slurs used here by a writer who evidently does not know that’s a slur for romani people. Gritting my teeth and putting that aside, when this series actually gives Petrefax something to do that’s relevant to his skills it’s quite fun. But that only happens a couple of times in the whole series, a significant proportion of it is just fantasy worldbuilding I really don’t care about, and also did I mention they keep saying a slur? Because they do.

Lucifer (2000) #1-13 [Mike Carey]

I wasn’t immediately a fan of this series, but once it starts building out its recurring cast and gets into the characters a bit more, this is really fun. I was 100% sold by #4.

The Dreaming (1996) #50-60 [Caitlin R Kiernan, Bill Willingham] (x) (x)

Another series draws to a close, and while the last arc could have maybe done with another issue just to give it a little more time to flesh things out and provide a satisfying conclusion for every character, this series is so good, if you don’t mind it the fact that it all basically gets erased from contuniuty by the time of the Sandman Universe publishing line (I guess due to the New 52 or some other DC relaunch, or at least that’s the excuse that I expect they used) I would absolutely recommend it as a followup to Sandman, especially if you don’t want the shift to modern comic styles that the other option leaves you with.

The Names of Magic #1-5 [Dylan Horrocks]

Since Books of Magic #75 ended with Tim proclaiming that he finally knew who he was, was free from his destiny, and wasn’t going to be looking for someone to lead him, and now he was meeting his future on his own terms, having his first move be “ask for help” and then have him shoved in the direction of school by a bunch of more established adult characters seems kinda antithetical the the whole point of that last series. Still, this sets up the next series neatly and isn’t too annoying to get through.

Sandman Presents: Merv Pumpkinhead, Agent of DREAM [Bill Willingham] (x)

This book is one long extended James Bond joke. I do not care about James Bond. What’s going on? Why should I care? Why did the woman have sex with a pumpkin man? Help.

Lucifer (2000) #14-32 [Mike Carey]

Ahhh, now we get to the good shit. The Lucifer series reaches its first Big Event Where A Bunch Of Shit Goes Down in the Paradiso, Purgatorio, and Inferno arcs. I don’t know enough theology to tell you if most of this comes from Jewish or Christian teachings but it’s interesting and probably at least slightly heretical so I’m down.

The Little Endless Storybook [Jill Thompson]

This is cute. No other reason needs to be provided. Read it, it’s cute. (Also if you can find a copy I imagine it is a much better experience if you have a physical copy)

Sandman Presents: Dead Boy Detectives #1-4 [Ed Brubaker]

If slightly frustrating with its actual detective side, this is a fun series that explores the boys and how their ghost powers actually work, and I look forward to what the next writer decides to do with them (and apparently they’re getting a show!! fuck yeah) (also uhhhh more like gayboy detectives amiright gamerz?)

Hunter: The Age of Magic #1-11 [Dylan Horrocks] (x)

It seems the little nosedive Tim’s story took in Names of Magic was only a short one, because right out of the gate Age of Magic is fantastic. The timeskip is slightly disconcerting, but it means we can skip all the “Tim learns magic” “Tim fucks another girl” “Tim discovers things” stages of his schooling and just have him finish and leave as quickly as possible, after using the setting to establish all that it needs to, and Tim can be free to do his own thing rather than being stuck in a “misadventures at the magic school“ style story.

Sandman Presents: The Corinthian #1-3 [Darko Macan]

This one’s mostly atmosphere, but it’s good atmosphere. It’s nice to see a little of the original Corinthian (rather than the rebooted version from The Dreaming) and how exactly he went bad, and what he was doing while Morpheus was imprisoned. Apparently elements of this (with the Corinthian’s experience in WW1) will be involved in the show, which is good because I can point at the screen and go “ooh! ooh! I know this one!” while my dad’s trying to watch, which is always fun.

Sandman Presents: The Thessaliad #1-4 [Bill Willingham]

I really wish I could like the Thessaly spinoffs. I love the character (despite her being claimed by TERFs apparently) and I wish we got more of her history, more of her being ruthless and cold and calculating, I’d especially love it if we explored how her normal life functions and how she does magic, but no, instead we get comedy hijinks with Fetch, the most annoying character to be introduced so far. Also the art is by Shawn McManus who is by far my least favourite Sandman artist and the only thing I actively dislike about A Game of You.

Lucifer: Nirvana [Mike Carey]

This is one of those fancy graphic novels with painted art and so on, but all that achieves is making it harder for me to focus on the story really. Tethys the Raven shows up which is neat. At least The Dreaming is still canon at this point.

Hunter: The Age of Magic #12-25 [Dylan Horrocks] (x) (x)

Big wrap-up of everything established from Names onwards, and a good end to the series, even if bringing back Molly again starts to get slightly tiresome (just let her live her life away from Tim. She’d be fine).

Sandman Presents: The Furies [Mike Carey]

Some of the Sandman Presents stories are spinoffs, or stories that happen to be set in the universe, but this really does feel like somewhere between a sequel and an epilogue to The Kindly Ones, giving Lyta more resolution than she got in the few pages she showed up in during The Wake. The “fancy graphic novel” problems I mentioned with Nirvana do make it a bit annoying to read, but it’s a good and interesting look at a character who got slightly left behind by the story once she’d succeeded in killing Dream off.

Hellblazer: Lady Constantine #1-4 [Andy Diggle]

I’m sure there’s parallels and references that I don’t get because I’ve only read the first few dozen Hellblazer comics, but this was really fun! Johanna is such a fun character and I loved her dynamic with her kid even if I knew they were gonna snuff it the minute they showed up.

Lucifer (2000) #33-40 [Mike Carey]

The Naglfar arc is my favourite sort of comic arc: every recurring character thrown together on a mission and forced to get along. Also, shit goes down with god and while I’m not gonna pretend to know what the precedent is for all this in the Tanakh or in the christian Bible, I’m enjoying whatever is happening immensely.

Sandman Presents: Bast #1-3 [Caitlin R Kiernan]

This is Caitlin R Kiernan’s last offering to Sandman, and it’s also one of their best. The exploration of Bast as a character and how the death of gods actually works is really good, honestly just read it, I’m not sure what else to say except it’s a shame this is the last comic of theirs in this universe.

Death: At Death’s Door [Jill Thompson] (x)

This one’s just a fun look behind the scenes of Season of Mists with Death, Delirium, and Despair dealing with all the dead that have just turned up. The style is so fun, I love the vibes, and also anything that gives Delirium a lot to do is an instant favourite.

Sandman: Endless Nights [Neil Gaiman]

The first of Neil’s followups, and while some of the more abstract or disconnected stories like Desire and Despair’s feel like they’re just there to fill space and give a chapter to every Endless, the (small) through-line of Delirium’s grief is really nicely done, and, again, this captures the consequences of and provides a followup to the ending of Sandman in more depth than The Wake did

Lucifer (2000) #41-49 [Mike Carey]

This part of the series splits its time, mostly focusing on Elaine and Mona’s fates, along with the rest of the supporting cast, while Lucifer does important overall plot things with the angels. I’m not complaining, though, this series has such a good cast of characters and I’d happily read a spinoff with any of them.

Sandman Presents: Thessaly: Witch For Hire #1-4 [Bill Willingham]

Reaching the end of the Sandman Presents series and this is how the original line of spinoffs ends. Not with a bang, but with an aimless and annoying whimper that really isn’t doing any of the things I want this character to be (except murderous. I do enjoy when she kills people). But I think Bill Willingham is somewhat allergic to writing a story with a dark tone that isn’t filled with constant jokes. Like, yes, having comic relief is important in every story lest it become grimdark edgy nonsense, but I would rather see Thessaly at her most fucked up and evil without a ghost trapped in a mirror doing a Funny Bit every other page. Maybe that’s just me, though.

Lucifer (2000) #50-61 [Mike Carey]

Reaching the endgame of the series, and almost every element that was set up gets involved in the last few dozen issues. Not sure what to say, this shit’s just really fucking good. Go read it!

Dead Boy Detectives (2005) [Jill Thompson]

If your detective story ends with the detectives putting together the clues to solve the mystery and publicly confronting the villain and then the villain explains that actually it was all innocent misunderstandings and they’re not guilty at all, I think maybe you shouldn’t be writing detective stories. Also all the crossdressing jokes got old very fast. This is by far the worst of all of these, and there��s some bad shit on this list at points.

Lucifer (2000) #62-75 [Mike Carey] (x)

The gert massive finale of this fantastic series really doesn’t disappoint. Characters get their arcs resolved in a mostly satisfactory manner, it does what DC did a few decades earlier in Crisis On Infinite Earths with resolving a multiverse in a much neater and less confusing way, and we learn that the god of the DC/Vertigo universe looks like the stereotype of a tory civil servant from the 1970s.

Madame Xanadu (2008) #6 [Matt Wagner]

The way Death is used in this is really interesting. For one thing, according to Death the whole “i give you a __” ritual is just set dressing for the intent which summons the Endless, so either Burgess did something really wrong or Death can tell when it’s a trap and tell when someone just wants a chat (and Dream is too stupid to tell and was also understandably destracted in 1916).

The Brave and the Bold (2007) #1-12 [Mark Waid]

The "Lords of Luck” arc, if kinda confusing, is interesting and brings in the Destiny elements in a cool way, even if the way they write Supergirl is sometimes uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh gross. The “Book of Destiny” arc, by contrast, is just a series of tangentially linked stories and some of the most generic superhero comic stuff I’ve ever read, and the Book itself is only an afterthought in #12. Also, they gave Destiny the fancy Desire font instead of the harsh bold italics. Come on guys.

Action Comics (1938) #894 [Paul Cornell]

Another standalone Death issue within a broader series I have no interest in reading. She’s fun here too, and I always enjoy someone making Lex Luthor have a little bit of an existential crisis. This also seems to be the first significant appearance of Death outside Vertigo since the imprint began, as TBATB is for Destiny and Metal is for Dream.

Sandman: The Dream Hunters #1-4 [Neil Gaiman]

The story that Neil Gaiman accidentally trolled a bunch of academics in a tiny afterward to this story is very funny to me. I read the comic version rather than prose, I’m sure the prose is also very good because (shocking) Neil Gaiman happens to be a good writer.

House of Mystery Halloween Annual #1 [Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham]

Not much here innit just a fun merv story. If I wasn’t going for 100% I would not have even brought this up.

Dead Boy Detectives (2014) #1-12 [Toby Litt, Mark Buckingham] (x)

This is THE Dead Boy Detectives series, it’s the best by far because, amazingly, if you let your detective characters do detective work, the story is more engaging! Also, the series introduces a fantastic supporting cast, and actually delves into Charles and Edwin’s characters and all their masses of trauma from, y’know, being murdered. Also got me excited about the tv show they’re apparently making. Please let it be like this series and not like the shitearse Jill Thompson one. Please.

Sandman: Overture #1-6 [Neil Gaiman]

I have no idea why the reading list on the back of my copy lists this before Preludes and Nocturnes. Like yeah it’s a prequel technically, but if you hadn’t read Sandman before, reading it first would be a very bad idea since it hinges on lore from the series and also spoils the ending if you didn’t know what happened. If you have actually read Sandman though, yeah it’s fucking good idk what to say. It slaps.

Lucifer (2016) #1-19 [Holly Black, Richard Kadrey]

Honestly, I would have enjoyed this regardless of the writing because it has my favourite artist from my favourite Marvel series, Loki: Agent of Asgard (go read it. do it.), but the writing is also fantastic. It’s the perfect example of a followup that on the whole respects the original series, the themes established, and where the characters were left, before bringing things back into the fold in a realistic way to do something new with them, instead of just resetting continuity so that you don’t have to deal with somebody else’s recurring cast, *ahem*, the entire Sandman Universe reboot you do good things but you could leave some of this in canon, *ahem*. (Speaking of The Dreaming, the inclusion of Matthew makes this the first concrete confirmation that the 1996 series isn’t canon any more, which did make me a bit sad). Well worth a read if you’re a fan of the original!

Dark Nights: Metal #1-6 [Scott Snyder] (x)

It’s your usual boring comic book crossover event. Dream shows up and it sort of sets up the Sandman Universe series, but mostly this is about the usual multiverse bollocks that DC always does. "Batmanium” did make me laugh, though.

Sandman Universe #1 [Neil Gaiman, Simon Spurrier, Kate Howard, Nalo Hopkinson, Dan Watters] (x)

Plenty of setup here, but since I have no idea where any of it’s going I think I’ll just... Let my reviews of the series themselves do the work here instead.

The Dreaming (2018) #1-12 [Simon Spurrier] (x)

The issues with the start of this series are a lot more complicated than just “bad writer” or “incorrect characterisation”. In some cases the old characters are spot on, and the new characters are all fantastic, but something about the way Merv and Lucien develop in the first few issues feels a little forced. This series could have absolutely benefited from what the original Dreaming had - short story arcs focusing on specific parts of or people in the Dreaming that slowly, slowly come together to form a larger whole - and just slowed down the breakdown of Lucien and whatever they were going for with Merv enough that we get a good sense of where it comes from. Instead (probably more due to editorial rushing and a need to get the Big Threat of the first arc in the picture by the end of #2 to appease convention in modern comic storytelling, than the intentions of the writer), the political commentary and character progressions end up a bit hurried and I’m left with a feeling of “Yes logically I get how we got here, but like... how did we get here?”.

All of that being said, once it manages to get into the swing of things, this series is honestly a worthy successor to the original, even if I’m still annoyed about it replacing the original continuity entirely. The way that other Sandman characters are slowly brought in is really nicely done, and the development of the central mystery is intriguing and develops at a perfect rate to give answers, but also keep my interest going.

House of Whispers #1-12 [Nalo Hopkinson, Dan Watters]

Now this feels like Sandman. I love the characters, both human and godly, and the Ananse storyline makes me fall victim to my greatest weakness once again: stories that are about stories, that acknowledge that they’re stories, that twist the narrative of the tale it’s spinning and in doing so acknowledge the consequences of the characters existing in a world defined by narrative conflict. That’s my shit! Also I think it’s really cool that a comic published by one of the big two comic companies has a nonbinary character that uses neopronouns who also defines zirself as queer. Ze are iconic.

Lucifer (2018) #1-13 [Dan Watters]

The style and tone of this is very different to the other two Lucifer comics, and it exists outside of the continuity established by them (hence Lucifer having no scar, Remiel and Duma still ruling hell, Mazikeen’s dialogue takes a while to get used to, etc). Instead of being about the end of the universe and Lucifer’s attempts to get out from Yahweh’s rule while also saving the world surrounded by a huge supporting cast of characters we sympathise with instead of him, this series makes Lucifer pathetic in the best way. It’s much more introspective, and focuses on Lucifer, his ex-lover Sycorax, and their son Caliban, and how their relationships evolve. Also, the art is by far the best out of any of these Sandman Unvierse comics.

Books of Magic (2018) #1-13  [Kat Howard]

Again, a very different take on the same character. I’m not sure I like this one as much as Lucifer though. The focus is on the Cold Flame and Rose from the original Neil Gaiman series, although some elements from the Rieber/Gross series make it through, in particular some interesting things are being done with Tim’s dad. This is fun enough, and I’m interested to see where it goes, but I still much prefer the style of the original.

The Sandman Universe Presents: Hellblazer [Simon Spurrier] 

This one-shot spins out of the 1990 Books of Magic miniseries, and explores what the fuck was actually going on in that potential future they showed. I’m sure it also ties into various bits of Hellblazer but, as already mentioned, I haven’t read more than a couple dozen issues of that series yet and it still made sense.

The Dreaming (2018) #13-20 [Simon Spurrier] (x)

The finale to this series is so good! Like I said earlier, the way that the mystery is slowly revealed works so well, and bringing all the threads together slowly is so satisfying when a writer can do it well. Also, the things it does with Lucien as the narrator in a meta sense is very fun.

House of Whispers #13-22 [Nalo Hopkinson, Dan Watters]

The way that this series builds its characters and worlds is so good, the balance between the human and godly characters especially. I’m also a big fan of how weird-looking the Corinthian is, I think some artists forget to draw him like a nightmare who’s slightly out of sync with reality in a “he looks creepy as fuck sometimes” kinda way.

Lucifer (2018) #14-24 [Dan Watters]

Word of warning: you will need to find the 3rd TPB collection if you want to read the actual conclusion of the Wild Hunt arc, because #19 was never published and the next collection was #20-24. I think it had something to do with covid, idk. Putting that aside, the art here is great and I love the way Lucifer works in this series. Probably the best of the initial four Sandman Universe lines.

Books of Magic (2018) #14-23 [Kat Howard, David Barnett]

The second half is much better than the first (as it seems is the case with a lot of these) , and the finale arc pulls in a few other Sandman related characters which are all fun (even if they don’t always make sense entirely). It’s still nowhere near as good as the original Rieber/Gross series, but it’s fun in its own way.

John Constantine: Hellblazer (2020) #1-12 [Simon Spurrier] (x)

I have not read enough Hellblazer to compare it to what came before, but this is an absolutely fantastic series. The tone is brilliantly managed, the supporting cast is endearing, John’s arc is engaging, and the series knows when to be funny, when to be brutal, when to be horrific, when to be tragic, when to be political, and when to force me to look at a drawing of Boris Fucking Johnson.

The Dreaming: Waking Hours #1-12 [G. Willow Wilson] (x)

This is the most Sandman-feeling SU series, and I mean that in a good way. We get a good amount of seeing Daniel in action, the cast of new characters are all fun, and it feels like a good followup to The Dreaming without stepping on its toes - it uses the new characters as a natural part of the universe, and utilises the plotlines left hanging in a good way. My only real problem with it is a problem I have with a lot of comic series that only run for a dozen issues - the wrapup is a bit rushed to fit it all into one issue, we don’t really get time for the characters to settle into their endings before it’s over.

Locke & Key/Sandman #1-2 [Joe Hill]

The first three-quarters of this are very fun, but it does get a bit boring once they go to hell. Lucifer feels out of character, and I do not have any idea what the normal Locke & Key series is about, so there’s no way for me to be invested in these characters. The stuff that actually takes place in the Dreaming itself is fun, though, and I like the look into Fawney Rig during Sandman #1. Also, it’s always very funny to see a series have to write itself around continuity and go “hey hang on, why don’t the various dreams go rescue Dream?” While we don’t get a satisfactory answer to that, it’s not really what they were focusing on anyway so I have no reason to get angry about it like some people might.

Nightmare Country #1-? [James Tynion IV]

This series is only four issues in at the moment so I can’t say anything conclusive, but it’s got some great creepy shit in it (some of it reminds me of Caitlin R Kiernan’s work with the Corinthian in the original Dreaming) and I was convinced enough by it to pre-order the next two issues, which I look forward to reading!

---

I’m probably meant to put a conclusion paragraph here but my English teacher would probably agree when I say I’m kinda crap at them. The best long series to spring from Sandman are Lucifer and Books of Magic, Caitlin R Kiernan was the best writer on The Dreaming, and Waking Hours is probably the best of the Sandman Universe books but you’re absolutely in safe hands with any of them. The Sandman Presents comics are good for the most part, but the quality varies wildly. Every time there’s a non-Vertigo series which involves Sandman characters it’s probably not worth it. Don’t bother with the Dead Boy Detectives graphic novel, read the Litt/Buckingham series instead. And most importantly, don’t tell me that I forgot that one 2008 (?) House of Mystery series. I did indeed forget it, but to be fair I didn’t know it existed until I saw a copy in the library the other day and I cannot be bothered reading it now.

#sandman #the sandman #sandman netflix #comicc #books of magic #dead boy detectives #the dreaming #nightmare country #sandman universe #hellblazer #house of whispers #lucifer #lily liveblogs #dream of the endless #death of the endless #the dreaming waking hours #vertigo #dc #lily dot tee ex tee

[sicklyseraphnsuch]

Episode 9

Let's give Simon an earlier realization of the problems in his relationship. Let's dedicate episode 9 to Simon coming to terms with those problems instead of literally spoonfeeding it to him in one episode. So let's say Simon goes into episode 9, taking Fionna's comments about Betty to heart, and so we revise the Betty scenes.

Fionna and Cake have their nightmare and return to their world like in the show. But when we cut back to Simon...

We see the Scarab wakes up before Simon in that endless void. He sees Simon fully unconscious and he rushes to him. But before he can end him, he looks up and freezes in place. The camera never shows what he sees but he yells at whoever to stay out of it. He tries to finish his job but inexplicably, he turns into tiny bug versions every single time he tries to hurt Simon. Until finally he skitters into Simon's world to escape whatever keeps thwarting him.

Zoom in on Simon's face. Eyes twitch almost as if their fluttering open. Smash cut.

A bus stop. Simon blinks and sees himself standing before Betty, her letter clutched in his hand.

Simon does the same thing he did in the show, he offers to go with her. Then he realize this isn't how it went. And Betty smiles. The world slowly dissolves to the black space. Tetris shapes begin to fill the void.

"Hi Betty, long time no see. It seems I haven't been fair to you. I kept looking to you like you're supposed to be everything. But being someone's whole world is… exhausting." Simon laughs wryly as he scratches his head with the back giving off a telltale sparkle. " I shouldn't have put that on you. And I should have noticed all that you were doing for me…"

Simon begins to transform from his professor looks to his post apocalyptic looks.

"You remain the great love of my life. Nothing can change that. But... we've changed, haven't we?"

Betty in turn begins to change, first into Simon's fiance then into Magic Betty.

Smash cut to Fionna and Cake desperately fighting for their lives.

"It was a long road to get here. And I have found more people to love."

Simon cycles into Ice King before finally transforming into his present self.

"And I should be so lucky that they love me back. I can't... I can't just leave them like this. I'm a sad old man that kept looking for lost things and missing the stuff right in front of his face. I want to do better, Betty. I have to."

Smash cut to Fionna and Cake again.

And Betty makes her final transformation into Golb. Simon finds himself standing in front of her in all her new glory. He feels his pocket buzzing and he realizes that they're in trouble.

"No, no, no. What was all that for? If I just keep going back?" He eyes the Crown before tossing it at Betty. "There has to be another way. I'm not done yet."

Betty's eyes lift up. She pulls out Fionna and Cake's world as in the show.

"Oh. Always rescuing me, even now..." Simon is more than a little bitter. But he takes the world and he gives it to Fionna.

Smash cut to Fionna and Cake as in show.

After, Simon looks up at Betty. The faint image of their past selves lurk over their shoulders as the same moment a thousand years apart repeats itself. With Simon looking up as Betty readies herself to leave.

"I can't do much for you now. But I will tell you what I should have told you then. Thank you for everything. If only I could come with you where you're going but since I can't... Then I hope you find your happiness wherever you go... Goodbye, Betty."

And then Betty does as she does in the show. Episode 9 ends with Simon in the flower field.

Episode 10 is a flashback to present Ooo. In the time since Simon's departure, his family and friends have worked themselves up, crazy with worry. It's a comedy of errors as each callback character comes up with worse and worse ideas to find Simon. Until mid episode Simon comes back to his house with a crown - a flower crown.

"Hey gang... uh... what's going on? are we having a party? ... At my house? Without telling me?"

"SIMON!"

Cue dogpile.

Cue epilogue.

#adventure time #fionna and cake #simon petrikov #betty grof #fionna and cake spoilers

[bugtransport]

WARNING! DO NOT READ THE REST OF THIS ASK UNTIL YOU ACTUALLY FINISH KUUGA! I AM SENDING THIS PREEMPTIVELY BECAUSE I WANT YOU TO HAVE IT WHEN YOURE DONE.

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Ok so I wanna hear your thoughts on the final fight specifically. I really adored how after all this hyping up of Ultimate Kuuga’s destructive power, rather than it being something flashy and explosive, it was… down to earth. Brutal. Just two dudes punching the shit out of each other in a way that was Difficult To Watch.

The final battle of Shin Rider felt like a callback to this, honestly. Just heartwrenching impact after heartwrenching impact. It’s not big or extravagant, but instead it shows that having to fight… sucks.

Sorry, I think about this particular fight A LOT.

YEAH YEAH i completely get what you mean. your buffer worked - i didn't see this at all until i had already finished the show and compared it to that one part in black (you know, The One). i think, as i chew through everything that happened in this show, that there's more i have to say about kuuga on the whole than i've managed to render right now, mostly about how it feels like they did really manage to distill a lot of the core feelings i've gotten from showa rider into something new and interesting and fun that they could do now that it's in vogue and possible to have the episodes a little more interconnected than they were able to get away with (sans a couple areas, like the 4-episode demon world stretch in black rx) previously.

the setup to the fight really worked for me. i think it was the right choice to watch the last 3 episodes on the same night so that we could start with ichijou, just some guy, just some human guy being the one to kill... that rose lady. you know the one. the one who has been around as a boss from the start of the show and who had a couple faceoffs before with him? you know, the one who, with her dying breaths, told ichijou that she realized humans could be equals to them, capable of the same destruction that they were? that she wished she could have faced off with ichijou again? that lady.

they had been setting the grongi and at least godai up as equals for a while there - there's the obvious stuff with the back and forth "i need to get stronger!" moments but the one in specific that stood out to me was when tsubaki was doing autopsies on the bodies that they were able to recover and he was like oh shit... these guys look just like kuuga on the inside?

kamen rider has this feeling running through it, this essence of "that could have been me, but it wouldn't have been me, couldn't have been me, because i love humanity too much, but i can only say that because after experiencing this, i'm still me," which is an odd feeling to put into words, but i think it's one that many people are familiar with. to come out of something on the other side feeling worn down and miserable but victorious and look back and see other people who have been through the same or similar things to you and for whatever reason, came out the other end differently.

hongo escaping being borged before they were able to complete his brainwashing, yuki being the one picked as a scapegoat and therefore realizing that what was going on around him was wrong, shigeru just straight up being confident enough to manage to trick people into borging him, nobuhiko being chosen as the favorite son just because he was the one who stuck around for a while leaving kotaro able to make his own decisions about what is right and wrong. these are all things that each of the riders did have an active say in, but they're also a bit dependent on luck to fully and correctly pull off. and i think godai also kind of picked up on that vibe. he's both reassuring people that everything is going to be okay because he believes in himself and his love for the people around him, and he does, but he still plans for the off chance that things can go wrong by telling ichijou how to kill him should things really go to shit.

that's it think the thing i took away most from this fight. the visuals are great, the whole thing just feels raw and uncomfortable to watch, which it should! this is the reality of everything that's been going on here behind the suits. we should feel glad that kamen rider doesn't have to fight anymore once this is over. kuuga flirts with this level of reality through the show and they completely full on commit to it at the end. but i think everything leading up to it and the context of the fight really helped me to put my finger this feeling that i've been feeling through the entirety of the show.

so. there you go. those are my stream of consciousness thoughts the morning after finishing kuuga... so much more to think about later!!

#you can see why i had to sleep on this one lol #it's a feeling that's been on my mind a lot recently for various reasons that i will not be discussing. so when i noticed it #i was like OH SHIT!! THAT'S IT! #making spaghetti

[litterateur97]

I watched Zoey 102.

SPOILERS!!!

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Okay so I have quite a few thoughts. First of all, it's actually not as cringe as I thought it would be. There were several hilarious one liners and honestly most of the best acting and comedic moments go to the side characters. There were a lot of "omg lol so relatable" moments that were ehh, but they did nail quite a few things about being an awkward 30 year old. I have to say I actually really liked the actor who played Zoey's boss and the actor who played her fake boyfriend.

Now Quogan. They do get married!!! They do have a callback to their sweet first love confession!!! And they spend the majority of time on screen together holding each other or calling each other babe or just generally being really affectionate. Tbh, it still wasn't enough for me, I still wish Quinn and Logan got more screen time, especially to make their storyline clearer.

As most people predicted, Zoey was like 90% responsible for ruining the wedding, but Logan takes the other 9%, and there's an awkward moment with Stacey and Mark accusing Zoey's fake boyfriend of being a murderer that takes the last 1%. However, I think we'd view Logan as more responsible if there was more screen time actually focused on that, but the majority of the screen time is focused on Zoey ruining the wedding, half assing her job, and having romantic troubles with Chase. The storyline they tried to set was Logan being a groomzilla trying to make everything perfect to the point that he doesn't spend enough time talking to Quinn about everything, but that doesn't come across very well considering most of his screen time is him... with Quinn. I mean I get what they were trying to go for here, but the way everything goes in the film it is so much more obvious that Zoey is the main one ruining the wedding. If things were just a little more focused on Quogan, I think we would have been able to see more clearly Logan neglecting Quinn in favor of giving her the perfect wedding.

They make up rather quickly too. I also don't like that they had Zoey help with the fixing by reminding Logan to go and actually speak with Quinn. That to me was out of character. Logan and Quinn were always great at communicating with each other, I don't think he would have just showered her with presents and forgotten to try to actually speak with her as he does in the movie. At least the two aren't separated for long, but still that moment just bothered me a little, and it was like a two second scene that could have easily been cut.

Now here is the biggest thing that bothered me. Yes, Zoey and Chase finally end up together for reals, whatever, but they have their big kiss at! the! wedding!!! I mean there's two kisses before this between them, but the big "oh we're finally going to be together" kiss happens at the wedding right in the middle of Quinn and Logan's first dance! And the crowd fucking claps for them!!! Wtf??

Anyways. Oh and also they don't show the full wedding ceremony. They have Michael begin and then suddenly cut to someone telling Michael how beautiful the ceremony was. Lazy writing.

At least Quinn and Logan are adorable at their wedding. The kiss, the cutting cake together, and her teasing him. Very cute. I will never get enough of that kiss scene! It is actually so good, y'all. You can tell the actors still have great chemistry with each other!

Overall, the movie is perfectly fine. I wouldn't say it's great, but I wouldn't say it's bad either. There's stuff I wish they had done differently, but it's cute for what it is. I just really wish we got more Quogan screentime because they are my faves!

Final note: They mention every single character who couldn't be there except for Nicole. Yikes. That just kind of annoyed me, especially hearing that that actress wasn't treated very well during the original show.

*Bonus note: I like that they implied at the end that the fake boyfriend was indeed a murderer lmao! If there's any spinoff from this spinoff, I wonder if it will be about him!

**Bonus bonus note: There's a line where Mark comments on Logan being quick on the rebound and sloppy seconds, and Logan's just like "yeah man," and idk why it was so funny to me, but I just feel like the actors added that in themselves lol.

#zoey 102 #quogan #sorry this is not super well organized lol #i literally just watched it #I'll try to add some gifs of the cute quogan scenes soon unless someone else gets to it before me #quinn x logan #quinn and logan

[shizucheese]

I was doing so well on staying on top of things and then Life just kinda...happened to me. (I wouldn't normally include stuff like this on these posts but like....if you're a writer and you're in need of an editor check out the pinned post on my blog). Today is 4/5/24. Episode 10 came out on 3/14 and since then the podcast has been on hiatus (so at least I don't have multiple episodes to get caught up on...haha...). I'm finally getting my ass in gear on this because @kazooyay asked me what I thought about this episode and I'd like to give her an answer to this question. Also figured I'd directly expose her to the chaos she has unleashed. :)

As always you can find the full reblogged spiral into insanity here!

“Talkers”

Norris (Voice: Martin?/ Alex)

Episode 1: “Reanimation (Partial) -/- Regret [Email]”. The Stranger? The End? The Dark? The Lonely? The Flesh? Arthur (Nolan?).

Episode 3: "Infection (full body" -/- Arboreal [Journal entry]". The Spiral? (Paranoia? Auditory, visual and olfactory hallucinations) The Lonely? The Corruption. The Flesh? (Callbacks to the Flesh Garden from S5)

Episode 8: "Architecture (liminal) -/- hunger [coursework]". The Spiral. The Lonely. (Statement giver has an ex-wife. Witnesses strange mist. Fog?) The Stranger? The Vast. The Flesh. The description of the space reminds me a bit of Mag 150: Cul-De-Sac. The description of the diners and the way they were speaking reminds me of Mag 48: Lost in the Crowd.

Common Themes: Hearing the voice of a dead/ missing loved one? Loneliness

Chester (Voice: John?/ Jonny)

Episode 1: “Transformation (eyes) -/- Trespass [chat log]”. Magnus Institute, The Eye. (Involves a forum; the Web?).

Episode 5: "Disappearance (undetermined) -/- Invitation [Internet blog]". The Eye (Movies. Movie name: "Voyeur" "Must be seen to be believed"...). The Web? (Another website?). (Very reminiscent of Mag 110: Creature Feature.) The "poor old guy" at the theater is totally an Eye avatar, right? Kinda gives me "Simon Fairchild when he was first introduced" vibes.

Episode 7: "Agglomeration (miscellany) -/- congregation [email]". The Stranger. The Buried. The Desolation. Possibly all of them if my theory about the items the Volunteers brought in is correct...

Unsure if this is Eye related like the other statements were. This is also the first "Chester" statement where the source material wasn't from a website or blog, which don't have the same expectation of privacy that the sources of the other statements do. Email, though, so still internet related, and this seems to be an open letter rather than personal correspondence, so it still might align with the theme.

Episode 9: "Dice (bone) -/- fate [Magnus Statement]" Flesh (blood)? The Dark (blown lightbulbs)? Web. (The dice aren't random. Nobody ever says no to rolling them. The way the statement giver describes his experience almost sounds like addiction, which is also Web affiliated).

Are these the same dice that were in the bag of The Merchant from TMAGP 4? Common theme continues to be Eyes/ The Magnus Institute and The Web (either internet-related or an artifact of The Eye like in TMAGP 7)

Agustus: (rare?)

Episode 4: “Collection (blood) -/- musical [letter]” The End. The Lonely? The Slaughter.

Letter writer thinks passing on his violin might allow a part of himself to live on in his nephew. Very Jonah Magnus of him.

Music teacher hears “faraway music”, then goes crazy and throws himself out of the carriage and dies. Reminiscent of Mag7 and the Piper? The merchant’s wares include dice (Mag 29?). Got the violin from him (took his blood?). Effect of the violin reminiscent to Grifter’s Bone (Mag 42).

(Oliver Bardwell lol very funny guys)

Non-Talkers (?)

Episode 2: "Transformation (full) -/- dysmorphic [video call]". The Spiral? The Flesh. The Stranger. Ink 5oul (avatar/ entity?)

Episode 6: "Injury (needles) -/- intimidation [999 call] "Corruption? The Spiral? The Flesh? The End?

"Needles" reminds me of Michael!Distortion.

Episode 10: "Mascot (kids) -/- murder [TV interview]" The Buried? The Stranger. The Flesh or a light version of The Slaughter (injuries)? The Slaughter. (Would feeling trapped like Nigel does be The Buried or The Web?)

Notes and Thoughts:

Oh they're totally using Bonzo as a hitman aren't they....what the fuck.

Also I heard that tape recorder turn on and off. In TMA the tape recorder turned out to be a tool of The Web. Is that still the case here? What's that damn Spider up to? I swear to god if Annabelle shows up I'm going to scream. And now I can't tell if some of "crawling sounds" are just for the environment or if they really are spiders.... Pattern on the floor? Also Alice is saying a lot of things that she makes sound like she's joking but like....."Maybe Archie stands for Archive" "Worm tracks?"

I so cannot wait to learn more about Sam's past and what he was involved in. Chosen for what? Did he want to be chosen? Why?

Okay okay okay, so obviously Sam and Alice let something out of the Institute. Is it John or Martin? Annabelle? Jonah? Something else entirely? This might be nothing but whatever "[Error]" is was credited to Beth Eyre, who previously voiced the lady who witnessed the Flesh Ritual in MAG 130: Meat. Is this her in this world (she gave a direct statement in TMA...)? Or are they using her for this character right now to throw us all off?

#the magnus protocol #the magnus protocol spoilers #the magnus protocol speculation #tmp #tmp spoilers #tmp speculation #tmagp #tmagp spoilers #tmagp speculation #tma spoilers #shizu's red string board

[murdockbuckley]

i watched the 911 promo clip and here are my thoughts

captain hats - obviously one them becoming the interim captain

i know a lot of you on tumblr don't like the idea of it being buck but i think it could be him

hen will be settling in with the new child and that requires a lot from a person

chim is busy planning the wedding with maddie and literally every time a wedding has happened the person planning was not captain

it could be eddie but we've never really seen him want to be anything more than the role he has at the fire station currently

we saw how buck took charge in the bridge collapse and it's made him think his ready to actually be a captain but the cruise will make him realise he still hasn't properly dealt with his trauma and maybe he isn't actually ready for (or doesn't actually want) the captain's title

wedding ring - madney wedding

like i said chim is busy helping plan the wedding so maybe he won't actually be on call for the cruise

everyone he knows, all of his family, is working on it except him

it'll be a fun callback to season 2 after he got stabbed and called tommy(?, an old member of the 118 who transferred) in for extra help

this is how we get guest stars of previous characters (like lucy or tommy) that i mentioned in a previous post

the keys - buckley-diaz boys

this one is purely delusion okay

buddie having keys to each others houses is such a big thing to the fandom and if abc want to be great they definitely would've picked up on it

linking to the captains hat buck or eddie (or both) have panic attacks because of how much fucking trauma they have because of the water (the plane in s1, the tsunami, the well, the lightning strike - you could probably find something im every season) and they end up staying at eddie's together for awhile so they don't have to be alone

of course they both have their girlfriends (marisol and natalia) but they just don't understand this situation and the trauma they shared together and how bad it affected them

(alternatively the loft burns down and buck moves in with eddie, they share one set of keys)

also the anchor keychain?? buck and eddie are there for each other no matter what, they ground each other and have each others back

the watch - the time is right

i think the time on the watch is at 7:30 (obviously i could be wrong) and y'know what else had 7 and 3?? 3 minutes and 17 seconds

the number has been such a big part of tragic/traumatic storylines throughout the show i wouldn't be surprised if it was here now

timing is such a great them and goes perfectly with the already set up storylines for this season

madney wedding - there's no time like the present, lets gather everyone we love and have a wedding in a meaningful place (bathena backyard) and be happy together forever as soon as possible

baby wilson - they're finally ready to grow healthily, they've had a lot of things test their marriage (hen cheating, ivf, hen's kidnapping, karen losing her job, hen going to med school, karen almost dying in an explosion at her work) and now they can finally say they're at a place where they want to expand their family properly and permanently

buddie's girlfriends - the issue with their girlfriends had always been timing and when they meet, did marisol and natalia come at the right time? will they stay and be permanent for the boys? will they break up? will the break up still leave them as friends (i hope so)

bathena cruise - i don't need to say much. they thought they finally had time to relax and be themselves and be with each other. it seems the only way they're going to get that is retirement

some other fun stuff/thoughta:

you can see a helicopter light, could be lucy or tommy flying - we know they both can

the time duration on the call being 1:18 is great 10/10

the keys could also be about may? her being on college/uni, no longer being at dispatch, she wouldn't know what's going on other than through the updates on the news and anything she can get out of whoever is at the call/maddie (but then anyone at the cruise is highly unlikely to answer their calls/messages)

#911 abc #911 #evan buckley #evan buck buckely #eddie diaz #chimney han #hen wilson #bobby nash #athena grant #may grant #ravi panikkar #firehouse 118 #station 118 #118 firefam #118 fam #118 #fire family #firefam #lou🪼rambles

[the-fandom-queenxox]

So I made myself wait to watch the witchcraft smp finale till all the povs were out, which means I waited for Cleo to upload and also my college decided to allow offline/traditional classes to be back so it took me a bit longer to finally sit down and watch the povs. So here is some of my thoughts while watching the witchcraft smp finale episodes:

(Spoiler warning)

17/04

Lauren:

-Yeah Lauren you kinda did drop the whole competition just to vibe, but that's okay I still love you!

-Omg her wings look like thicc slices of bread!!And the colors of it are real pretty

-Yeah Joey!!! You were the worst best friend ever, screw you!

-Scott to the rescue!!!!

-YOOOO Joey's out first!!!!!

-CLEO NOO!!

-Hi supreme Lizzie

-Scott's the new supreme!!!

-Oh yeah they all do have her autograph in a way huh?

-Everyone reaction to finding out Cleo was an undead this whole time is really funny

-OH I KNEW THE DEMON WOULD BE BACK TOO!!!!

-Lauren just dipped lmao?!?!??

Eloise:

-The "Yep that's me, you are probably wondering how I got here." Bit to start the episode was good

-Training montage

-Damm Shellby's strong af, she really giving them a hard time

-Ohhh her artifact exploded on her because of the reset, alright that makes a bit more sense

-Oh she skipped the demon fight hmm

-Lol she became a witch content creator after the competitions?!

-Oli and Sausage got bailed out by El

-They made wcsmp's version of love or host lol

-Did she steal a award!?

-Someone get Scott I found his supreme crown

Joey:

-Oh that ice blast spell is cool(pun wasn't intended)

-Bro not the Stacy callback!!

-Cleo's time freeze ability <3

-Okay demon battle time

-Gods why was it that Joey give the "If we work together we can defeat the villian." Speech, it's not at all a thing his character would say

-Bro the demon's not even taking any damage lmao

-Scott's new to his supreme witch powers leave him alone

-Dude what home the mages won't accept you ba- oh that one right...

-I mean yeah screw those ice mages and all that but how is Joey's story gonna end now?

-You don't have any best friends le- oh yeah Tiff would be your best friend after all the demonic and botania stuff the both of you bonded over

-Where's Tiff?! Did mother earth take her back or smth?!

-No Joey she couldn't have gone through the elf portal, she has told you before that the portal works only one wa- aphgkgdj?!SURE JUST GO IN JOEY BYE WITCH!!!

18/04

Prismarina:

-Okay so at this point I'm pretty sure that there many chests in the area but not all of them have stuff in them and are there for decor

-Where did that blaze come from?!

-Lmao Cleo saying "Do we have a cool name?"

-Cleo and Scott are not giving Pris a chance to breath lol

-"I can't see it but I'll pretend I do"

-Bertha's curse got broken!!(see Bertha you didn't even have to bring back your dead sister and the demon she took down with her to break your curse you just had to wait)

-Is Bertha immortal?? Also do they not have a job outside of being the supreme witch competitions referee(???)

-Is Mertha's curse also broken now?

-Lol the demon fight crashed Pris' computer

-ARE BERTHA AND MERTHA ENGAGED NOW?!??!

-Is Pris a siren of some kind?

-Oh her dead sister is there, I'm going to assume that's her spirit coming for a visit or something

Shubble:

-Oooo we are finally meeting this "she" Shubble keeps mentioning

-My girl saw the weird dead deer skulls and said "Ew"

-*Big gasp* *choking noises* *literally dying* *it was nice knowing you*

-*In a nerd voice*Uhmm actually those look like shiny charizard wings thank you very much

-Her immediate respons to seeing Cleo was zap-teleport out of there

-Love how Tiff, Shubble and Pris are just watching Lauren and Joey "attacking" eachother

-Shubble leaving the scene when Scott shows up lol

-I love hduo, found sisters <3

-So is Tiff's first death not counted?

-"He is already dead let it go" SHELLBY?!!?!!!KAGLZHSK

-Why is it always these 2 in a fight to death

-Oh she just flew away?!!

-"Aren't you like dead though?" Shellby you need to stop!!kdhdhchbj

-Oh come on!! We are not meeting "her" aww man :(

Cupquake:

-Witch Tiff's grandma used to make nightsade berry pies. Good fact to know

-Oop the Bertha clone is back

-Oh her sneaking behind Cleo was so cool

-"Our leader!"

-"Yeah I want a piece of that. Equality!"

-The voices are back

-Oh, so she did went through the portal...huh

-This is just a random thought, but are we getting a fairies smp next? Cause I feel as though both witch!Tiff and witch!Joey 's stories are meant to continue in a way? Guess we'll have to wait and see

Cleo:

-Oh this is the longest episode, kinda nervous...

-The voices of all the Cleo's?! Excuse me?!??

-Gods, to get any of the end armor set pieces is so expensive

-Oh here is Pris making her amends, yeah I know this already I watched Pris' pov

-"I'M YOUR MAKER!" It's great to finally understand what she said at that time

-Yeah, I think "the coven" does sound cool and ominous

-Did Cleo just pledge herself to Scott? I-yo-I can't understand what their saying from everyone talking over eachother

-Damm has she not liked any part of being a time witch...

-All the skins!!

-And she's human again!

-"And they lived happily ever after." That's a poetic end to Cleo's story. Since she did introduce us to her character with "once/twice a upon a time" and had kind of a storybook structure from then on

19/04

Scott:

-He sounds so annoyed that he's only allowed to take 20 items with him lol

-I don't like how Scott said that he feels like he was going to "burst" and green particals started coming out of him...

-"Wow, you can't just say she's big!"

-"It encapsulates how weird and wonderful we are but it all still works together." Whatever you say new supreme!

-Frank and Agatha were in a 20 buck bet lol

-Agatha what other stuff is down in your secret lair??

-HES LOSING HIS POWERS TOO?!?!!

-Oh he is really going through with it!! Anything for his love ig

-HE DID IT!!!MILO IS BACK!!!!

-Oh he drowned to save Maxwell(I still don't know who that is. Their dog maybe)

-4 years?!

-Maxwell passed away a year later?!

-"Moonlight" "My little shadow" aww Milo is soo sweet, I love him already

-So he left the crown behind willingly. I mean I guess it make sense he just needed the power of the supreme witch to finally bring Milo back and since he lost all his powers he's not fit to have it anymore...

-Wait does this make Eloise the new supreme or do we need a new competition to be held pronto?!(in my opinion Shellby should be the new supreme cause she came in second place)

Bertha:

-So the supreme cursed Bertha and Mertha because she looked into the future and saw terrible things were to happen if anyone else were to become the supreme witch? Yeah that's fair ig :/

-Oh wow that was a quick forgivness lol

-Mertha did get the worst of it

-Her nap got interrupted that's so rude

-Time for the supreme games to begin!! But were skipping that probably cause I already watched it 8 times before this

-Oh quick run down of the events?! Sure...

-Oi!! That's so mean to Lauren she did her best!!

-That was an accident though!

-Oh when Joey asked to break the crown to have all of the being the supreme witch Bertha said "Me too?" Hehe

-Where is Mertha?!

-All "-ertha named" mobs lol

-I'm getting nervous, where is Mertha?!

-Why was she on top of a ice mountain?!

-Mertha's uncursed!!

-"666 hours later" sihdudynxtwhAT!?!

-WHY IS EVERYONE GOING THROUGH THAT DAMM PORTAL!??!!?

-Also why were you 2 spying on Joey and how did he not see the 2 of them, they're not hiding all that well

-They have a witch police?!

-Oh Mertha looks so sad waiting for Bertha...

-"Bertha will return" well yeah I sure hope she does!

And just like that it's over...how do I feel about it? Well...I think the smp had a strong start and a strong middle the ending though...is fine I guess...just wasn't my cup of tea, but I still liked the smp

#witchcraft smp #witchcraft smp spoilers #wcsmp #wcsmp spoilers #zombiecleo #scott smajor #laurenzside #joey graceffa #shubbleyt #ihascupquake #prismarinaplays #soupforeloise #bertha #wcsmp bertha #my opinions about all the characters endings will probably change over time but this is how I feel right now #long post

[inverted-flowers]

Secret Life Tarot Reading no. 6!

It's Scott's turn!

Quick reminder that as of reading number 5 with Tango these are done after episode 3s have come out. Also! You don't really to know anything about Tarot Cards to enjoy this post. Just understand that I'm using them to predict how our lovely ccs are gonna do in Secret Life.

First Card - Start

So to describe the (now passed) start of Secret Life for Scott I drew The Hanged Man. This card feels like it's more so saying he did well in terms of avoiding rash descions. How? My thoughts are on how while everyone else was taking silly bits of damage, from falling off of things for example, Scott didn't really do that. He did very well in thinking through his situations to avoid losing hearts.

Second Card - Individual

This card is meant to describe how Scott plays this season. I drew The Lovers. This card talks about positive collaboration and how trust in your team provides strength. I'm thinking this is saying Scott plays with a strong bond with his team or at least intends to. He wants to be able to work with his team and trust in them.

Third Card - Social

This card is supposed to describe how things go for Scott on the social aspect. I've drawn Justice in Reverse which discusses dishonesty and one-sidedness. It's funny because at first I was just looking at this card and the one before it and wondering how the heck that could make any sense. They're kind of difficult for someone to have at the same time here ya know? But then I changed perspectives a bit and it makes more sense.

There's a few ways we can take this. Usually when I'm drawing this card when someone's I'm got a team assuming that it's going to refer to their team first and the rest of the server second. Since we're looking for the more major kinda baseline stuff it just makes sense. So I suppose the first idea here is that this card is referencing Scott's social experience outside of his team. I'm not really feeling that theory but it felt best to mention it anyway. The next idea is that the dishonesty is coming from either Gem or Impulse. I'm also not going to completely shoot down the idea that Scott is the perpetrator in either of these. I just think the cards are saying he gets deceived- maybe marinated if we don't mind using Among Us terminology lmao. Someone pulls the wool over his eyes and keeps it there.

Fourth Card - Big Impact

This card is meant to tell us about what has the biggest impact on Scott's season. I drew The Chariot for this. This sounds like he survives something by the skin of his teeth. That or it's describing something like what usually happens to the last green (which Scott has plenty of experience with). If that's the case I'd reckon he sees it coming from a mile away and narrowly avoids it.

Fifth Card - End

I drew The Emperor in Reverse. This card talks about being blind to others needs as well as hiding one's true intentions. This sounds like it could be a callback to our 3rd card. Someone, whether that be a teammate or someone else, decieves him.

Final Thoughts and Theories:

I somehow drew all Major Arcana cards for this reading? Also as I was interpreting this the song Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine by The Killers popped into my head which was ironic with some of these cards. (I always have a song stuck in my head at this point I swear.)

Is he gonna win a second time? This reading certainly doesn't sound like it's giving a definite 'no' but I'm not sure it's a 'yes' either. If I had to make a guess as to how it unfolds I'd say he trusts someone he gets deceived by (cards 3&5) and it does him in. Could he pull a gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss? Sure but thats not the vibe I'm getting. Maybe he gets decieved and it results in him being unable to help his teammates. That would leave him alone after he builds his game around working strong together. If we wanna go back to my previous reading with Impulse, I said there's a chance he betrays or just overall messes things up with Gem & The Scotts. Maybe Impulse stabs him in the back for a task? The task would be the need Scott is blind to here (card 5). There's also the whole thing with how Scott is usually one of the last alive. Those who will be around towards the end of his season are likely to all be red. Yeah we'll see I suppose!

'Til next time! :D

#secret life #traffic light smp #life series predictions #traffic life series #life series smp #scott smajor #tarot practice #traffic smp #life series #life series scott #secret life tarot prediction

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball Super Manga Ch.100

Yes, Cheelai, we have finally reached the end of the 2023 Dragon Ball Apocrypha Liveblog, but in particular, we've also finally reached the end of the seemingly endless manga adaptation of the Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero movie.

And yeah, this seems like an anticlimactic place to close out the year, but that's kind of how this entire liveblog has been, when you get down to it. I've had fun going through all this stuff, but there's a reason I'm referring to it all as "apocryphal". The Tournament of Power is a lot of fun, and the two DBS feature films are instant classics, but none of it really feels essential to Dragon Ball. From the OAVs to GT to Super, the main theme here is "Hey, remember Dragon Ball? Let's make more of that!" Everything ends up being a sequel or a callback or an easter-eggy kind of deal. And that's not the worst thing that can happen to a franchise, but it's probably fitting that we're closing out on the final chapter of a comic book adaptation of a movie that serves as a sequel to the Android arc that was a continuation of the Red Ribbon Army arc.

Chapter 100 just retells the last several minutes of the Super Hero movie, and I already went over the film, so let's just concentrate on how the manga depicts it differently. We'll start with Gohan's right arm, which got some heat a few days ago when the previews came out.

I refuse to dogpile on Toyotaro, since he's a far better artist than I'll ever be, and I've genuinely enjoyed his art through this entire read-through, even when the writing has been bad. That said... yeah, Gohan's arm looks kind of weird. Maybe while Gohan was teaching himself the Special Beam Cannon, he learned how to do Piccolo's stretchy arm thing too.

I do think it's pretty dumb how chuds on Twitter will nitpick Toyotaro's art as though the original Dragon Ball manga was some kind of showcase of photorealistic anatomy. I've been a fan of this thing for a quarter-century now, and the key to loving Dragon Ball is to make peace with the fact that it's fundamentally goofy and stupid. Sometimes a guy's arm gets drawn longer than his other arm. Sometimes characters scream so loud that their jaws unhinge like when a snake swallows an egg whole. Bulma wasted a wish on the Dragon Balls to make her ass look hotter, because if she didn't, then Frieza would come back and use the wish to make himself taller. Goku grew his tail back by having a guy tug on his ass with a pair of pliers. This show was always a hot mess, so don't blame Toyotaro. It was like this when he got here.

Anyway, Cell Max tries to block the Special Beam Cannon like he did in the movie, but Gohan has a harder time punching through, so in this version Goten and Trunks jump in to distract Cell and give Gohan a boost. In the movie, they were still Gotenks until after the fight ended, but in this version the battle must have taken a little longer, since they de-fused a little earlier.

Of course, this is just a way for Toyotaro to show off the Great Saiyaman X-1 and X-2 costumes one more time. It's kind of pointless, because all of the added Goten and Trunks scenes in this arc have been pointless. Also, Trunks' pose looks really awkward here. He looks like he got sawed in half, and both halves are still kind of flying forward in the same direction, but he's no longer connected.

I will say that I'm grateful for this final appearance of X-1 and X-2, because it gives me a chance to critique their outfits one last time. I hate the superhero undies they wear over their tights. They look baggy and puffy for some reason, which make it look like Goten and Trunks are wearing diapers. I'm pretty sure that's the exact opposite of what the boys were going for.

I mean, the outfits aren't that bad, but what irritates me is how Toyotaro keeps showing them off like this is the coolest thing going on in this story. The designs are presented like they somehow connect all these different things. Goten and Trunks were inspired by Cleangod, and they named their personas after Great Siayaman, and then Dr. Hedo saw them and supposedly based the Gammas' costumes off their look. Except X-1 and X-2 don't actually look anything like Great Saiyaman, or Cleangod, or the Gammas. It's just frustrating.

Anyway, we get the same bit about cosmetic skin alteration from the movie, except Gotenks has already separated in this version, so Bulma can address Goten and Trunks separately.

I also like this part after Pan shows off her flying ability. This segued into the credits of the movie, but here we see Gohan calling out for her to stay closer to the ground. It's pretty cute, since it kind of calls back to when Gohan was a timid child way back in the early days of DBZ. Now he's older and braver, but I bet when he sees Pan up so high in the air he thinks about how scared he was whenever he was up really high.

Meanwhile, some Red Ribbon goons have survived the battle and appear to be slowly getting away. This is nice because I noticed these guys escorting Carmine to safety in one of the previous chapters, and I've always wondered if any of the Red Ribbon guys made it out of the base alive. Pan knocked Carmine out, so it seemed reasonable to assume that he was vaporized during the Cell Max battle. Actually, in the movie, it looked like the entire crater was flattened, but here it looks like the destruction stayed confined to that area.

Anyway, the implication is that Carmine will return to Red Pharmaceutical and try to figure out his next move, but it seems unlikely that he could be much of a threat. Magenta's dead, the base is destroyed, and a bunch of their soldiers either died or deserted in this battle. Remember, even with the base and all those soldiers, Magenta still wasn't ready to make a big move. Dr. Hedo's androids were supposed to be his game-changing weapon, and now Hedo's turned against the Red Ribbon, so what can Carmine possibly do from here?

We get some additional material of the Goku/Vegeta fight in the movie. In the post-credits scene, they were practically moving in slow-motion and we only got to see the final blow. Here, we see Goku and Vegeta each land one last punch before the one that ends it all. These boys look all rowdy and badass and it's great.

When Whis finally responds to Bulma's messages, we get this cute shot of everyone sleeping in the back of her aircraft. Gohan talks about taking her to the amusement park, which seems kind of random, but it occurred to me that this might be setting up some filler story for Chapter 101. Like Gohan and Pan go to the amusement park for the day, and Carmine tries to kill them or something to avenge the Red Ribbon Army. That probably wouldn't be a bad idea, although I really don't want that to happen, because it sounds similar to the "Hedo vs. Goten and Trunks" stuff we had in Chapters 88-90. Everyone thinks Toyotaro has been champing at the bit to get done with this arc so he can return to his Black Frieza business, but for all we know he's been enjoying this whole bit, and he'll blow the next six months on filler stories with Goten and Trunks goofing around with Sgt. Nutz.

Anyway, this is the last page and this was the last little bit of the movie too, so Toyotaro has definitely run out of movie to adapt. Also, Bulma looks really cute on this page, so I wanted to add that to the record.

So that pretty much wraps things up, except for one minor detail. Where's the big twist?

I ran across this last month when I was checking to see if Chapter 99 would wrap up the arc or not. CBR.com did an article entitled "Dragon Ball Super Chapter 100's 'Unbelievable' Twist to Lead to "'Crazy Developments'" The story stems from comments made by V-Jump editor Victory Uchida, who was hyping DBS chapters 99 and 100 while appearing in an unboxing video for some reason.

The video is in Japanese, so I can't just pull out direct quotes from the man, so maybe this was all some big misunderstanding. Maybe it was a mistranslation, maybe Uchida got confused and was referring to material that wouldn't see print until Chapter 101. Or maybe he was just doing a standard hype job for his publication without thinking about what was actually in the magazine. After all, how can Chapter 100 have an "unbelievable twist" when it's doing a shot-for-shot repeat of a year-old movie?

So I assumed this meant there would be some sort of epilogue scene in the final pages, designed to set up the next arc. Sort of like how the last chapter of the Tournament of Power arc had the scene where the Galactic Patrol kidnaps Majin Buu. But Chapter 100 had no such thing. No Black Frieza, no Cell Max suddenly turning the tables on Gohan to win the movie, no mysterious appearance from Purple Turles or Red Bojack. Not even a lousy cameo from Platinum Cooler.

Does this make Victory Uchida an unreliable source of information? Or has he simply been misunderstood? I feel like his ridiculous yellow wig/hat thing kind of holds the answer to that question.

Anyway, the ultimate fate of Dragon Ball Super lies in Chapter 101 and beyond, but those stories will be printed in 2024, which means they fall outside the scope of this liveblog. So unless Toei or Shueisha has a new movie or anime coming out in the next eleven days, I'm done. This has been the 2023 Dragon Ball Apocrypha Liveblog. Good night, everybody!

#dragon ball #dragon ball super manga #2023dbapocryphaliveblog #cell max #gohan #piccolo #bulma #krillin #goten #trunks #whis #android 18 #victory uchida #pan #son pan #goku #vegeta #dr hedo #gamma 1 #cheelai

[enumchase]

Okay as my all-time favourite Ted lasso artist and blog; what are your honest thoughts about the finale episode??

i've still only seen the episode once but just for you, sweet nonnie, i will rewatch it for more thoughts, but for now:

LOVED probably 80-90% of the episode and it was bittersweet and emotional af

every single one of the callbacks made me so happy especially the offside and nate's play

the so long, farewell scene?? are you kidding me???

trent. TRENT. my sweet gal. my little guy. i'm glad we got a final few ted/trent scenes in there and so grateful for the crumbs and mr lance's wardrobe.

i'd hoped for the whole season they weren't gonna do the love triangle thing with roy & jamie again, but unfortunately they did and even left it till the finale which was disappointing, but i did like how they resolved it, even if the throuple didn't happen (:/ or at least didn't happen onscreen)

i needed more nate this episode - i was hoping he wouldn't return just as a kitman and i wanted to see how that conversation went, but as always nick delivers on the stuff he DID get and i'm eternally grateful for his presence in the show

seeing the full diamond dogs just brings me so much fucking joy god i love six (6) men

barbara is such a little freak i love her and everything about her

one final triumph of tony head's rupert was incredibly satisfying to see i love old men. but WHERE IS BEX. i needed to see the rebecca/bex/ms kakes revenge storyline

re. the tedbecca of it all, i really thought they were gonna do it till the airport scene and am still surprised they didn't, which meant that the first fakeout scene was absolutely uncalled for and felt really in bad faith after the fact, even as a person who does not actively ship them

now for the stuff i REALLY. really. did not like, as evidenced by a number of dozens of tweets and two long stern worded replies in brendan's ama: absolutely unbelievable that beardjane were endgame when basically no other established ships/relationships ended up being endgame. very disappointed about the direction the show took them in and the writers' not realizing how harmful it can be to celebrate a toxic and abusive relationship. most important i think beard deserves better than jane but maybe that's just the beard fan in me talking.

i wish ted & beard would've had a deeper conversation re. jane & leaving london before they literally got on the flight, and gave us more resolution with these two men whom i dearly love and want to see more of - it does NOT help when brendan says they "don't see each other for years" because cmon. this is a feel good tv show. you don't have to bring your "real life friendship" stuff into here. make us feel good about ted leaving please.

and finally, ted leaving, which i definitely expected. i just didn't expect that the people trying to make him stay to not have any effect on him at all. i agree with others that ted seemed quite distanced and detached for the whole episode, but they'll most likely never end up addressing this ever again. i wish he'd explored more options than just "leave permanently and never come back" - and ended up being the same place he started before he came to london, but i appreciate the effort he is making for henry.

as for the future of the show, i hope there'll be a spin off with maybe some of the existing characters but definitely a whole new showrunning/writing/creating team, i would love to see other's interpretations for the characters & universe i've grown to love over the past year and a half.

so yeah, that's about all i can think of re. the finale. i was holding out for the last 15 mins of flashforward montage to be a dream sequence but brendan debunked that theory pretty definitively yesterday, so there's that. i appreciate the show for what it was to me and forgive it for what it wasn't, and i will still be enjoying the bits i enjoyed from it wholeheartedly - it was not a perfect show, but it was a great show to have enjoyed over the past year and a half and to have shared with the rest of y'all. i cannot wait to see what the universe, and everyone who was involved with the show will go on to do next and you'll be damned if i wasn't gonna follow jimmy lance's career until he is fully out of work. richmond till we die <3

#ted lasso #ted lasso spoilers #chase replies #anonymous #thank you for the ask nonnie ily i'll add more if i think of anything <3333

[ncisfranchise-source]

With Part 1 of its freshman finale, NCIS: Sydney uncorked quite the callback, by revealing that the “pregnant” woman who nearly got Mackey, Evie, Blue and dozens of others suffocated to death in an old bunker was in fact the blonde spy who eluded capture at the end of the series’ pilot.

Yet while it might seem as if Special Agent Mackey (Olivia Swann), Sergeant Jim “JD” Dempsey (Todd Lasance) et al now have the upper hand, the abduction of JD’s son Jack, in Part 2 of the finale (airing Tuesday at 8/7c on CBS), will thoroughly and harrowingly complicate matters. TVLine spoke with Lasance about JD’s imminent dilemma, Season 2’s “big finish” and his hopes for any possible Season 2.

TVLINE | I have been enjoying the show, and the first part of the finale was gangbusters. TODD LASANCE | Oh, thanks, brother. Honestly, and I don’t want to be biased, but I think [the finale] is going to be my favorite episode. And here’s a bit of an interesting note: one of my audition scenes was from the final episode. We had a couple of scenes from the first episode, but then some of the big, heavy, emotional stuff was in my audition scene before I even got the role. It was interesting to see how they had plotted that and where that scene ended up fitting in.

TVLINE | Looking ahead to Part 2 of the finale, what kind of a prisoner is Georgina’s “Ana Niemus” going to be? Oh, she’s not going to be a very compliant prisoner — that’s for sure. What I love about what Georgina did is there’s something under the surface that you know is unsettling. In the final shot of Episode 7 and the opening elements of Episode 8, you’re like, “Something’s not quite right here.” The team can sense it, as well. And when I played it as the actor, there’s an unsettling element for JD. When he’s watching her, you can see behind his eyes that he’s like, “Something’s not adding up.”

The payoff is huge in this episode. Even if, say, you haven’t watched NCIS ever in your life or never seen any of this season, this episode is such an amazing piece of what we did and what the showrunner and the writers and the directors did, as well. The tone of this show within NCIS is usually a lot more lighthearted and fun, so to delve into this kind of emotional realm was super exciting.

TVLINE | Talk about the personal element for JD that’s teased in the promos, involving Jack’s abduction. Being a father myself — I have a daughter who’s 7, and we had our son while I was shooting [Season 1] — there was a lot going on for me, personally. What I love is where JD crosses the line between the badge and what’s right as far as law enforcement, and what it is to be a father and family man. It makes the audience question themselves: “What would you do? What would you sacrifice for the ones you love, whether it’s a brother, sister, son, daughter, best friend…? What would the lengths be that you’d go to, to protect them, to save them?” All while knowing you took that oath as a law enforcement member, and the obligations that go with that. But every decision that JD makes — and a lot of things do cross the line — I personally would also have done, too.

TVLINE | Without spoiling anything, what kind of a cliffhanger will this finale leave us with? Are lives in jeopardy, or is going to be like, “I can’t believe what I just saw/heard”? It’s everything. Lives are in jeopardy. “I can’t believe what I’ve just seen.” The enemy is revealed on such a larger scale than what I think people realize.

TVLINE | Morgan O’Neill, the showrunner, is from Sydney, but I’m wondering if for you as a fellow Australian, did the dialogue and slang always pass muster? Were you ever like, “I wouldn’t quite say this”? Or did you ever add in a little Australian flavor? Adding is the biggest thing. Morgan’s writing has been phenomenal, and we also have separate writers who write each episode or a block of episodes. What’s been exciting for me, as an actor, is allowing to trust myself, but also Morgan trusting me with the improvisation that I add to a lot of the scenes, particularly with comedy. I like to see what I can get away with on-camera, and they tend to keep most of it in.

To add to the question that you’ve asked, the writers and Morgan actually start writing for you. They see the dynamic that you’re starting to bring, the little nuances, the comedy. Same with with Sean [Sagar as DeShawn]. He is funny, man, and we’ve got a great brotherhood in real life. Because of the improvisation that we bring as actors, they’re starting to write a bit more toward that. If we have series (seasons) onward from this, it’ll get even more nuanced, and that chemistry and characters will build even more.

TVLINE | Do you have anything on your wish list for any possible Season 2? Like, do you want to know the results of the ladies’ Kiss-Marry-Kill game? [Laughs] That’d be great. I’d love to know that one.

Obviously, I want [the finale’s big reveal] to come to fruition and we work all that stuff out, but I also want to get into action sequences again. I want to get into some shootouts, car chases, some big-scale action things, because that’s what NCIS is known for.

I also want to explore the family dynamic side of things. This is a dream series for me because I get to play with the comedy, with that cheeky “ribbing each other” element, and also be the straight cop/leader, and then I get to go with the emotional element of the relationship with the son and my ex-wife and the breakdown of that relationship. The sky’s the limit for us.

TVLINE | As we speak, we’re still waiting on any Season 2 news. What’s the best time of year to be shooting in Sydney? Isn’t it, like, 108 degrees for you all right now? Look, I’m not going to lie. Where we are — I live in the Gold Coast — it is hot today, but it’s always hot and humid up here. I love it because it’s so tropical. I think mid-year is usually fairly controlled because it’s sort of winter, but our winter isn’t like Georgia’s or anything. It’s not, like, snowing in Sydney, so we can still get the beautiful days!

#ncis sydney #interview

[shiro-s2e2-erukinzu]

Anime only watchers and people who aren't caught up with the Manga, BEWARE... Cuz I'm about to discuss Spy X Family Short Mission 9... You have been warned...! 👌

[SPOILERS AHEAD FROM THIS POINT ON]

You know what's funny? Last night, before I fell asleep, I just had a feeling that today's chapter was either gonna be a Short Mission or another beautiful illustration... Turns out...

I WAS RIGHT ABOUT BOTH!! 😆

So let's get into them, shall we...? 😏

First, the Special Illustration...

I LOVE IT SO MUCH!😍

It's autumn themed (like the new opening for the anime) and it's the first time in Spy X Family manga history that a Special Illustration was paired with a chapter...! And I just think that's neat! 😄

And now, on to Short Mission 9!

It follows our favorite "For The Mission™" father, Loid Forger, trying to make Anya get better at school...

And he finally remembers that Anya can learn from her favorite cartoon, Spy Wars (as seen in Mission 11 of the manga...!)

So what does Loid do with this recently rediscovered information...? 🤔

THIS MAN DOES A THANOS AND SAID: "FINE... I'LL DO IT MYSELF!" AND DECIDES TO MAKE MORE SPY WARS...!! 🤣(You can't make this stuff up...!! 😂)

Twilight adds drawing, voice acting and animation to his skill set, cuz y'know... IT'S FOR THE MISSION™... 😌 (Also, Franky's there to help out...!! 😁)

And after all their hard work... IT IS DONE!😆 (Seriously though, Twilight and Franky couldn't get any of the other agents to help out...!? Twilight is truly carrying WISE!! 😌)

AND THIS IS PROBABLY MY FAVORITE PART IN THIS ENTIRE SHORT MISSION: 🤣

I swear, Franky be sounding like Doctor Bones McCoy from Star Trek: 🤣

Anyway, it's time for Twilight to show off his hard work to Anya! And, well...:

DAMN...!! NOTHING HURTS WORSE THAN THE HONESTY OF A CHILD...!! 😂 (I also love that this is a callback to Mission 48's ending!)

AND THAT WAS SHORT MISSION 9...!! 😄 And I gotta be honest... I've loved every single Short Mission thus far, but this one is probably my favorite now!!! 😁

This chapter was just so damn funny and it made me love Twilight even more!! 😄 (I sure love me a man who can draw and animate...! 😏) I really want to see this chapter animated because of what it's about...!! 😆

And that's all I gotta say about it!! I'll see you all in the next mission, which will be next week since the anime's back...!! Until next time!! PEACE!!! ✌😁

#spy x family #sxf #spyxfamily #spy x family manga #sxf manga #spyxfamily manga #Short Mission 9 #loid forger #anya forger #franky franklin #TWILIGHT WILL LITERALLY DO ANY THING FOR HIS FAMILY-- #I mean... MISSION™ #Twilight knows how to draw and animate... #WHEN CAN I MARRY HIM...!? 😍 #manga spoilers

[ncisladaily]

NCIS: Los Angeles ended its 14-season run on CBS with a finale all about “New Beginnings” (hence the title), and while it was a mostly happy ending, everything wasn’t tied up neatly with a bow.

For example, yes, Callen (Chris O’Donnell) has learned quite a bit about himself over the years and did marry Anna (Bar Paly). Yes, Callen and Sam (LL Cool J) went to Morocco to join Nell’s (Renée Felice Smith) team in a mission to rescue Hetty (Linda Hunt), and we can assume that will be successful (especially with LL Cool J recurring on Hawai’i in Season 3). We know that Kensi (Daniela Ruah) and Deeks’ (Eric Christian Olsen) family will soon be one of four, with her pregnant.

But what about the storylines that weren’t wrapped up or the callbacks we didn’t get (like we did with Switch and Mr. Carl? “We’ve had fun over the years, no doubt about it, and so when you do come to have to wrap it all up, it’s a big task because it’s like coming into a hoarder’s house, you don’t know where to start cleaning,” executive producer R. Scott Gemmill told TV Insider with a laugh.

Below, he shares where some storylines could have gone next and more.

Is there anything you can say about where you imagined the Kessler (Frank Military) story going?

R. Scott Gemmill: I’m not sure. I imagine we would’ve finally brought him to justice. That would’ve probably been something we would’ve resolved in another season. Same with — we were really looking forward to doing an arc with Kilbride [Gerald McRaney] and his son [Christopher Gorham], and we had set that in motion, but we didn’t have enough real estate to finish that because that would’ve been a longer story. We would’ve probably got a good season with him story-wise out of that.

The scenes with Gerald and Christopher were so good.

Yeah, I love Gerald. I tried to get him on the show for years, and when I finally did, it was great. And that’s the worst part of having the show be done is not getting to work with these people and tell the stories that they were so great at bringing to life.

What about the resolution for the Body Stitchers case? That was the most disturbing case of the series.

Yeah, that’s 100 percent Frank Military. We always tease Frank that we have to let him write stuff like that so that it doesn’t happen. I don’t know; I’m not sure how we would’ve resolved that. I would have left that in Frank’s capable but sort of deranged hands.

I have to ask: Could Deeks’ mom (Pamela Reed) and Arkady (Vyto Ruginis) actually go somewhere if only for Deeks’ reactions to it?

I think we would probably do that. I think that was a given because Deeks would just be totally appalled, and that alone would be worth doing that. So I think if we were to have had another season, we definitely would’ve gone that route.

Was there anyone you wanted to bring back but couldn’t this season, especially once you knew that the show would be ending?

I would’ve liked to have brought back Barrett [Foa]. I would’ve liked to have brought back Linda. I would’ve liked to have brought back John M. Jackson and that crew that used to be Hetty’s sort of gang that she ran with when she was younger. If it was up to me, I’d have had everyone who would’ve ever been on the show back on, but it’s just not practical. But especially when you’re going out, and you’re starting to think about everyone who was on the show and who brought great stuff to the series, you wish you could have one big giant family reunion.

Are there any storylines you would’ve liked to explore in the final season that you didn’t get to explore?

Certainly why Hetty was overseas. In the end, our boys go to Morocco, but that story was set in Syria. I would’ve liked to have finished that storyline out, but we didn’t get a chance. And like I said earlier, I would’ve liked to follow through with Kilbride and his son, and I’m sure there’s a dozen more.

Kilbride had given Sam that envelope. How much longer do you imagine the team operating it as it has been before something changes?

Sometimes we use those as a bit of a throw-a-monkey wrench into the characters’ lives, and a lot of it depends on the actors, too. We’ve been on the show for 14 seasons, and if you look at any other shows that have gone that long, very, very few, if any, have all the original members. We have our four basically from Season 1. So eventually, some actors feel they want to go do something different. So we always have that option. If somebody wants to leave, we’re never going to stand in their way. So if somebody decided to leave then we would make a change, but as long as people wanted to stay on the show, we would accommodate that, obviously because it was such a great recipe for success.

Where do you imagine life taking these characters going forward? Especially now that we’re not going to see it, so you don’t have to be beholden to availability.

[Laughs] I don’t know. I could see Sam going into the private sector or Callen. I think all our characters love what they do. I could see Kensi staying with NCIS and Deeks becoming a stay-at-home dad. I think he would be quite content to do that for a while. Fatima [Medalion Rahimi] and Rountree [Caleb Castille] would probably stay with the team and be upgraded to the higher echelon of the team. And then I could see Kilbride retiring, especially if Sam and Callen moved on. Hetty, I think, will do this until her dying breath.

I have to say that the addition of the younger agents was so good.

Yeah, we wanted to see some sort of younger people in the capacity of what our guys do. And it gives you an idea of what maybe our guys were back in the day even, in terms of what they were like when they were young agents because our guys are so adept and have been doing it for so long that it’s nice to see sort of fresh set of eyes in that position.

#s14 #ncis la

[caffernnn]

as a folie a deux stan, would you share your thoughts & feelings about the album

A chance to ramble about one of my all-time faves?? ooOOO SAY LESS MY FRIEND ♥️🧸💛

I think Folie finding a place in my heart was a perfect storm — I’m a new fan falling into obsession with FOB during my mid-teens, and they’re starting to get into the hayday of the post-hiatus SR&R era. So of course, I’m looking through wiki pages, poking through fan pages, seeing interviews here and there (doing research for my sophomore year’s mandatory big research essay, and also satisfying my need to Know Everything™️ ), and I start wondering about how hiatus happened. What’s up with Folie? Why is it listed as not being well-received by fans and painful for the band (at that time)?

It becomes this situation where you’re handing 16-year-old me this misfit outcast album, one with bears on the cover (I’m predictable and easy to please shhhh) and an openly experimental vibe set apart from their previous work (more collaborative iirc, the four of them drawing on stuff they were inspired by to try new things). Pair that outcast magnetism (impulse to show love to wounded birds and rejected things) with lyrics that speak to the liminal space I existed in with my own adolescent identity (lyrics speaking to madness in complex dependent relationships, to not knowing yourself, to wanting to know yourself, to wanting to know the world, to trying to figure out morals and love and worth amidst your missteps and lost sense of self and unspeakable depression), and I was sunk. Listened to some YouTube video rip of the full album (or playlists that also included pavlove and lullabye) to fall asleep at night, while showering, really whenever I had a chance in my downtime (since I didn’t have headphones and listened to more of the futct/ioh/sr&r hit singles when with friends). Something about Pete’s devastating lyrical angst and Patrick/Joe/Andy’s artistry and the heavy feelings surrounding the album (from the minor bits the fans/public know about the time and the stories weaved throughout the album) started hitting in a specific way that had me imprinting on Folie and the band like a baby bird. Yeah, I started having that feeling of being understood by music with other bands (MCR, Paramore, P!atD, classic emo trinity stuff) along with some of the more pop punk stuff I was already into (PtV, ATL, you know the era), but for whatever reason, Folie maintained its place as my heart and soul album (along with Soul Punk for PStump-related reasons, but we’re not talking about her right now 🏃🏻‍♀️)

We’d be here all night if I tried to list favorite songs or lyrics, but I can ramble a bit about what hit me most when I started going “oh yeah, this is my album” as a teen:

I mean like, of course, right? “What a Catch, Donnie” is the pinnacle ballad, from all the lyrical callbacks and cameo features to the somber/hopeful music video, plus the interviews out there noting the song as lyrically important to the band. I think you can find stuff from back in that era (‘08-‘09) talking about it as almost a “swan song,” a final message that’s as close as you’ll get to personal convictions in a less-autobiographical album. For me, it felt like a love letter to their past selves in the unstoppable march forward in time. It felt like grief, the kind that comes with change and it’s inevitable losses, but it also felt like hope. Imagine not seeing goodness within you, not recognizing yourself, feeling stranded and pushed by the tides and not sure where you’ll end up. Then, imagine finding a lifeline through hanging on to someone else with the same type of stormy muddled mind, finding them and becoming their looking glass, their mirror, their guide — helping someone apathetic and listless find a spark again after giving up on themselves. It makes you wonder if you’ll find clarity through connection too, if you’ll be saved over and over again by people who see you and make sense of it all, or maybe don’t make it all better/comprehensible but care for you anyway. It became an anthem for me to hang onto my friends and budding new interests to help make me feel whole and keep going at a time where everything felt overwhelming and impossibly complicated (the curse of being 15/16/etc). Something about learning about hiatus, learning about the peaks and valleys of the band, looking at it all while having the fortune of knowing they find their ways back to each other to create more music and memories and get to keep growing together — that was big for me in a way I couldn’t articulate at the time but still felt deeply. We can be lost, but still found; flawed, but still loved. That’s important to hear when you’re stumbling through those early formative years, and important to be reminded of when we stumble through evolving our identities again and again and again.

There’s a lot of nostalgic love for the album now that I’ve held onto it for a decade, but it’s still so fun to revisit and holds up for me amidst all of the new music I listen to now. SM(f)S wriggled it’s way into my heart this past year and sits in there holding onto Folie’s hand, speaking on heavy themes and channeling that same motivation to experiment and create a legacy through music. Getting to see FOB live this year (!!!) playing Folie songs live (!!!!!) and eventually revisiting the whole album throughout the duration of tourdust (!!!!!!!) was an amazing experience, and it’s great to see Folie get her flowers in the many years since her release. Happy 15 years, Folie!! 🩵🐻💙

#folie a deux #late night catherine lore time #hold on let me just talk your ear off real quick <3 #tldr: I just think she’s neat #unrelated side note: folie a bleu recolor is so pretty. like yeah the original deep reds are everything but BLUE!!!! #song stuff #I should probably have a FOB tag. since. y’know. I’m so casual chill normal about them #anyway #thanks for asking! #celesteeal