#i honestly have no memory of this performance whatsoever so it was fun to see and gif

[yangjeongin]

HYUNJIN in every BACK DOOR PERFORMANCE: 200918

#hwang hyunjin #hyunjin #stray kids #bystay #createskz #a9gifs #malegroupsnet #flashing tw #*gif #*ccarly #*hyunjin #*carly:hyunjin #*series:hjbackdoor #yeah have another one why not i didn't feel like doing anything else even after i was off puppy duty #went back to my roots for this accidentally if you notice that these look messed up mind your business. it's a stylistic choice #i honestly have no memory of this performance whatsoever so it was fun to see and gif

[collected-sports-bra]

Elisabeth’s ESC Semi-Final 1 Recap (Part 1)

Now that I have slept and I had my coffee, I can finally sit down, go through the evening again, and give a few thoughts about yesterday’s first Semi Final:

Atmosphere and Hosts:

First of all, the event location is AMAZING, the hosts were really good and charming. I had no doubts Torino would organise an amazing show and they did, chapeau already I am looking forward to Thursday and Saturday!

If it weren’t for the results of the Semi Finals, this would have been a near perfect evening, not gonna lie!

Intro Song:

The whole intro act was loud, over the top, cheesy, just like I like it. Well done, nothing to complain about, a big spectacle and a solid start to the Eurovision Week.

Albania (Ronela Hajati - Sekret)

It was quite catchy, but also not amazing. The singer missed her notes quite a few times (probably due to nerves which I totally understand) and overall it was just not doing it for me.

Latvia (Citi Zeni - Eat Your Salad)

Clear winners of this first semi finals, and I can’t wait for them to release the audience voting numbers. The song is catchy, it’s fun, the outfits were ON POINT, their stage performance was great, they just had so much fun, and it’s one of these songs that will live on in the collective memories of Eurovision Fans, for years to come.

Also, they got the whole hall to sing “Pussy”. I will forever be bitter. I am so so sorry Latvia, we let you down, you should be very proud of them.

Lithuania (Monika Liu - Sentimentai)

I do like that song, despite it being slow (usually a big minus for me). It was well sung, well performed, and ... kinda cute. Not mad she made it to the finale, not at all. Well done. Not my favourite of the evening, but happy to hear it again.

Switzerland (Marius Bear - Boys Do Cry)

Boring. So so boring. Sorry Switzerland, I usually like your entries, and I have heard other stuff by that artist that I liked, but that was just really boring and I do not care for it at all.

Slovenia (LPS - Disko)

I liked it, it was a solid entry, the keyboarder had SO MUCH FUN and I’m into it! Liked the outfits, liked the artists, the song was good. Nothing too special, but I would have liked to see them in the finale. But alas, they didn’t make it. But well done, guys, and special shout out to the enthusiastic keyboard player :)

Ukraine (Kalush Orchestra - Stefania)

A lot of people will say they will win just because of sympathy points. Maybe they will, who knows. That said, I did like that song. I liked last year’s entry more (one of my all time favourites!) but this year’s song is really good as well. Loved the chorus especially, the wild outfits, and the random flute (?) solo. Great overall, so if they win it won’t just be for sympathy that’s for sure.

Bulgaria (Intelligent Music Project - Intention)

Any entry that is a rock song is a win in my book. That said, I felt pretty “meh” about that one. A pretty standard rock song that I wouldn’t mind hearing on the radio, but probably wouldn’t seek out intentionally. Not surprised they didn’t make it, but I would take that song before any of the ballads without a second of hesitation.

Netherlands (S10 - De Diepte)

I honestly don’t know what to say about this. I forgot every note the moment it was gone. I cannot even say that I like or dislike or hate it, this song leaves no whatsoever impression to me. I have zero feelings about that song. It was well sung I guess? I don’t remember any wrong notes? How this made the finale is a miracle to me, (how anyone remebered it even existed is a mircale to me!) but good for them I guess? But don’t expect me to like or even remember that song the second it is over...

Moldova (Zdob si Zdub - Trenuletul)

Yes. Yes yes ALL the yes! It was weird and crazy. Focus on ANY one of that group at any point of the song and you will be entertained (the drummer, by god the drummer, I cannot stop staring at him he is amazing!). I didn’t expect them to make it to the finale because I thought it could be TOO weird, but they made it and I am very happy. I will be rooting for you, Moldova, good luck in the finale!

Part 2 will come in a separate post :)

#eurovision #esc #eurovision 2022 #eurovision recap #esc semi final 1 #so so sorry #latvia #i am truly heartbroken about this

[photolover82]

The Masked Singer Season 6 Episode 7: Group B Thanksgiving Episode ft. the last wildcard of the season (Commentary & Guesses)

Hello my fellow Internet peeps! Welcome to Ana’s Masked Singer recap, where I, Ana, recap every single episode of The Masked Singer. Last week we had a bit of a break because of the World Series but we are finally back and so is Group B! So, yeah, let’s get started because this episode was a wild ride…

This time around we had the following perform: Banana Split 🍌🍦, Caterpillar 🐛, Queen of Hearts 🫀, Mallard 🦆, and Beach Ball 🏖.

So, this episode, our eliminated contestant was…

*DRUMROLL PLEASE*

Beach Ball 🏖

Performance: This result I expected, if they weren't eliminated, it would be a crime against music. Like, damn, they were bad… sorry lemme be nicer… they were um… let’s just say they are absolutely not professional singers whatsoever, and their talent lays elsewhere (yeah, let’s go with that, does that sound nice?). I legit was trying to watch their performance to refresh my memory and write this correctly and I couldn’t even sit through the whole thing. They sang Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus, which song choice kinda gave away her age there (or at least one of their ages… oh wait I didn’t even mention, it’s a duo!). Yup there’s 2 voices under there and I was sure was young for sure.

Anyways, having said that, they were revealed to be…

Honey Boo Boo and Mama June

It wasn’t the performance nor the clues that made me guess them, it was their accents under that voice modulation, and I was like wait a minute… that’s Honey Boo Boo and her mama, I know their talking voices pretty well but never heard them sing a day in my life. So, yeah, I’m glad that mom and daughter are together again and mom is sober 2 years 👏, but they gotta go sorry ladies.

Anyways, onto the remaining contestants and their performances (this time around I don’t wanna be repetitive so I’m just gonna tell you who I think it is and what I think of their performances, boom, no explanation/clues because the clues take forever and I’m trying to make this snappy):

1. Caterpillar is Bobby Berk from Queer Eye

Performance: He sang It’s Gonna Be Me by *NSYNC and it was really great wow the guy has vocal chops, idk Bobby can sing like that I’m really impressed. I learned he used to be in a Christian rock group, so you know my mans if home renovating/interior designing doesn’t work out, you got chops, com dour with a boy band rock album. I would buy it in a heartbeat! Anyways, I wanted to touch on Jenny almost pressing the Take it off Buzzer for him and thinking it’s a member of *NSYNC, JC Chasez singing a song by *NSYNC like come on girl. Everybody hated that guess, even Ken, but I kind of wanted to know what would have happened if she did press it and got it wrong… would the person still stay? Thank God she didn’t though because I really didn’t want him to go home.

2. Banana Split is David Foster and Katherine McPhee I’m so sure

Performance: So, the picture above is them with like the cool looking piano 50s car thing, which shoutout to the design team on Masked Singer because wow that thing is beautiful I couldn’t stop staring at it. Anyways, they sang Let er Rip by The Chicks and the vibe was very 50s/60s. Even though vocally it wasn’t their best performance, it was their most fun and it was explosive/memorable. She really showed up and out with the choreography and I absolutely loved it. Probably my favorite performance of the night!

3. Queen of Hearts is Ms. Jewel!

Performance: She sang River by Bishop Briggs and that’s a big song and she delivered in a huge way! She’s got an amazing voice, like she doesn’t have to do too much choreography wise and she kills it every time. I really think it is between her and Banana Split at the Group B Finals. I really think she’s Jewel, like the voice matching is spot on, I’m really excited to see what she does next.

4. Mallard is Duck Dynasty’s Willie Robertson

Performance: he sang Play Something Country by Brooks and Dunn, and again much better suited for his voice but he did kind of choke up on his words in a few places. Honestly, I’m not a big Duck Dynasty fan nor a redneck country girl… like I ain’t from Texas, Louisiana, or any of those places where country like that is the thing. It’s just not my type of music, some country I do like but the type he sings isn’t my jam. I’m more of a soul, pop, R&B, Latin pop, Broadway music kinda girl. So, he was for me my least favorite besides Beach Ball (nobody can beat Beach Ball for the worst spot).

So yeah that’s it! Let me know if you guys like this style or having the clues included… comment down below, like, reblog, and do all the Tumblr things hehe. Also, I feel like a broken record apologizing for this being late but I swear I have been super busy and am better at live tweeting on my Twitter @photolover82. Anyways, bye guys! See you this weekend hopefully 🙏

#the masked singer #themaskedsinger #celebrities #music #hollywood #tv shows #the masked singer season 6

[mihidecet]

Sbi&co: D&D AU: Rivals and Friendships

New chapter POG! This has been a long time coming, friends! I do hope you enjoy <3 Lemme know what you think, and as always thank you so so much for reading!! <3

If Dream had to be honest, he’d say that this team seems to be quite fun. 

They appear to be very close friends, from the way they rely on each other and joke around despite the huge Cloaker trying to wrap around the bard hurling insults at him. He does also remember the kid, the one he’d seen at the training grounds, and he’s happy to say that he was wrong to doubt his place in the tournament - he can surely handle himself quite well, and on top of that he clearly has a well established supporting structure built around him. 

While the tiefling makes sure to make light of the situation, no matter how much he gets thrown around, Dream still remembers how he’d stepped between the younger teammate and danger before; the half orc greatly respects that, heaven knows how many times he's stepped between something aimed at Sapnap and vice versa.

On top of being a well oiled machine, this team also knows what they’re doing, both in terms of fighting and in terms of performing; he can’t deny how he’s been at the edge of his seat ever since they first entered the stadium, despite how his body is still a bit sore from fighting a Barlgura earlier that day - who knew ape-looking demons could hit that hard? 

Sapnap's voice has been turning rougher and rougher too: he had been yelling insults at their opponent all fight, and now he hasn't stopped loudly whooping once ever since he'd seen the kid swoop into the stadium looking like a bolt of fire - the two of them would probably get along, if given the chance; that or they'd murder eachother after just a handful of seconds.

The only thing that's missing from this party is their fourth member who, if memory serves him well, is a rogue - the tall hooded figure he'd seen hanging around with the (maybe?) two tieflings. 

He has been seeing the Cloaker they're fighting flinch back from ranged attacks that seemingly come out of nowhere, but as of now they haven't shown themselves yet. Either that or their fourth party member is constantly invisible, which George has assured them would be a pointless waste of arcane energy - Dream and Sapnap agree that it would still be very cool, but they have a mutual agreement regarding trying to stay on the wizard's good side, since they convinced him on sticking around after their round to watch everyone else instead of going to rest. 

He is in fact in the process of turning towards George - he'd seen the tiefling kid surround himself in flames ever since the start of the fight and he wanted to ask if that was a common tiefling trait - when a light blue reflection catches his eye. A figure leaps from a stone pillar and disappears mid flight, as if vanishing in thin air, and reappears over the Cloaker's body, since the beast had managed to free itself from the arcane shackles that held it firmly to the ground.

In line with the dark, hooded figure that he’d seen that day at the training grounds, the stranger lands in a crouch, surprisingly stable, cape flowing behind them in a way that almost feels too elegant for the yelling-filled dirt stadium. 

One raised hand holds what seems to be a weirdly shaped dagger - it’s a bit too far away to see correctly - before it plunges into the beast’s back, tearing a furious cry from it as it shudders in pain. Its movement jostles the figure around, but they don’t seem to care that much, holding steadily their ground - it awakens old memories of afternoons spent training and refining balance with Master Calvin, because what good is a fighter if they can get knocked on their asses at the first kick in the shin, but he figures the stranger might have served on a ship. After all, that is where Master Calvin picked that important lesson from.

The Cloaker, evidently not glad to have a knife stuck to its back, decides to take matters into its own … wings? and wraps them around its body before quickly and sharply twisting on itself, probably intent on flinging the hooded figure away. 

And in its defence, the figure does get thrown off, but as their body flies up towards the sky, it follows a weird trajectory - a hand suddenly grabs his bicep as Sapnap lets out a breathless “holy shit”. That’s when he notices the thick chain the stranger is holding onto, and the weird curvature of the “dagger” they used suddenly makes a lot of sense. 

He can’t help but laugh as the figure folds on themselves in order to sail towards the ground, the chain wrapping itself around the Cloaker - whose wings are still wrapped around itself, leaving Dream to wonder how much preparation went into that, or if the four of them have travelled the Underdark and fought one before. 

Back on the ground, the kid is hopping from one foot to the other, staring upwards as his teammate descends; he then starts running and leaps, definitely more than should be possible, and grabs the figure’s leg as the chain is starting to curl back upwards, guided by its own momentum, furtherly pushing it forward. 

The two struggle for a moment as the kid climbs his teammate’s body, reaching the chain himself moments before the other lets go; then, with a sudden burst of flames, the tiefling pops out of existence, only to reappear a split second later once again over the Cloaker’s back. 

But Dream misses what happens on that side of the battlefield, because his eyes follow the movement of the cloaked figure as they fall - he expects somebody to catch them, to throw a spell to prevent them from crashing to the ground, but it never happens: the stranger lands on their feet and immediately propels themselves forward, rolling on the ground and quickly standing back up, as if they hadn’t just fallen from way too high up, and unsheathing a stunning looking shortsword. 

Before he can stop himself, Dream hits Sapnap’s side with his elbow, eyes wide open because he is so sure. He know that, he’s seen that move so many times it’s been seared into his brain - his ankles still ache with the phantom pain of trying to achieve that specific landing technique. 

Master Calvin’s pride and joy-

“That’s him- Sap!” He whispers in a hush, urgently patting his best friend’s side, trying to catch his attention; the beast’s angry screams are loud now, the chains around its body red and flaming, constricting its movements as it slowly descends to the ground again, thrashing against its restraints, but Dream can’t find it in himself to care about it that much at that moment, eyes trained on the cloaked figure that he’s heard about for years and years of training. 

Still, Sapnap doesn’t look, all of his attention focused on the actual fighting happening, giving a questioning grunt before yelling out in glee as the Cloaker crashes to the ground, its tail lashing out wildly and almost crashing against the bard’s body. So Dream insists, quickly pinching his side, instantly finding himself face to face with a very unamused monk. 

“What the fuck?!” Sapnap asks indignantly, only for his brows to furrow in confusion at his friend’s elated expression, Dream leaning forward to whisper urgently:

“That’s Techno.”

He waits for him at the exit. 

He doesn’t really know why he does, since they will be both tired and beaten up - he’ll still surely be high on adrenaline after his team’s quite honestly glorious win - but he doesn’t really want to wait, he can’t really find it in himself to do so. 

And also, he does it simply because he can. All participants have access to the same parts of the stadium, so there is nobody trying to stop him and Sapnap as they move towards the exit. Well, of course there are guards that check their identities, and guards that watch over all corridors. But still. Nobody stops them or questions them while they wait. 

Loud chatter and laughter announces their incoming arrival - a bright, almost wheezing laugh is almost completely covered by a strong and high voice quickly recounting “that absolutely badass move I pulled, they’ll be talking about it for years, you’ve got to write a song about that!” - and when they turn the corner and appear at the end of the corridor Dream can’t help but feel himself stiffen. 

Either from the sight of his hooded … rival? from across the corridor - he looks definitely much taller now that he’s not so far away - or from how the druid’s eyes zero on him instantly, pinning him down with a neutral stare and a cryptic smile. 

“And the jump! Why don’t you use that spell more often, I love it so very much... Ph- I mean Flinar?” The kid stumbles on his words as he notices the elf has stopped laughing, following his eyesight with a confused expression that turns even more perplexed when he sees him and Sapnap standing there, evidently waiting for them. 

“Oy! You two got a problem?” The kid asks, loudly, shooting looks towards the guards - counting them, making eyesight as if to check if they’re on a specific side, the kid has evidently been through some stuff - so Dream raises his hands placatingly, displaying the lack of weapons in his hands. 

“No problem at all! Just wanted to congratulate you on the fight, it was spectacular!”

Behind the kid, he sees Techno’s shoulders sag with a silent sigh before he steps forward. 

Oh, so he does know him.

It’s actually quite sweet how the whole group moves as a single unit, following behind Techno despite the fact that he probably intended to be the only one getting closer to the two of them.

Dream forces himself to display a relaxed attitude as he moves to meet him halfway - which he is, relaxed, he is calm, he has nothing to worry about, there’s nothing as normal and boring as meeting one of the best fighters there is in this whole region. 

Up this close, Techno is definitely taller than him, which is something that doesn’t really happen much, with Dream being a half orc; once again, that has no effect whatsoever on his mood, nor the confidence he has regarding this meeting. The positive thing is, being shorter than him allows him to have a clear view of his face under the hood - if he hadn't been sure before, the bright blue eyes, pink toned skin and tusks would have surely confirmed his suspicions. 

“I’m Dream, this is Sapnap. I assume I shouldn't be naming any names, right?” He quips, a smirk on his face that gets slightly bigger when the shifter in front of him huffs out a silent laugh, apparently amused, and extends a hand towards him. 

“Jerry.” He grumbles out, prompting Dream to use all of his existing willpower to avoid laughing over the clearly fake name as he grips his hand in a handshake; Sapnap has much less restraint, bursting into a wheezing laughter and doubling over - he swears he hears the bard snort a laugh too, but when he looks at him his face is blank. 

“So, who is this?” The kid asks, looking puzzledly between the two of them. 

“One of Calvin’s students.” Techno answers quickly, prompting an understanding “oh” from the young tiefling, before pinning Sapnap down with a calculating look.

“And I guess you trained with Fruit.” The monk nods with a grin, turning his face towards the youngest of the group. 

“I loved your fire tricks, I deal with fire too.” 

“Well, mines are definitely better.” The kid replies instantly, so sure of his words that Dream is immediately wheezing, leaning onto Sapnap for support as the monk gapes, shocked.

“Oh my- Oh Sap you just got destroyed by a child!” The half orc wheezes out, which is an even worse choice because the kid explodes into literal fire, flames licking at his body as anger fills his eyes.

“I am NOT a fucking child!” He yells out, furious, but what frightening factor he could have had is very much dampened by how the rest of his team is laughing about it - the bard, which at this point Dream is half convinced must be the Wilbur Soot, is vehemently agreeing, laughing as he insists that yes, that is a child, a youngster, and the two quickly lose themselves into a heated debate. 

After a moment, the druid steps in - that’s gotta be the Wandering King; they’re in the presence of legends, watching them squabble with a tiefling kid, shaking hands and playfully trading quips - placing a placating hand on each of the two tieflings’ shoulders and prompting their fighting to quiet down. 

“We should be going, it’s late and we need to rest. It was a pleasure to meet you two.” 

“Likewise. We’ll see eachother on the battlefield, then, I assume?” Dream asks, shooting Techno a glance; the man simply raises an eyebrow, crossing his arms over his chest. 

“If we must.” 

With one last chuckle, Dream turns on his heel, him and Sapnap moving back towards the viewing stands where they had previously left Eret and George. 

“We’re gonna kick your asses!” Yells the kid a moment later; when Dream turns back he’s got a daring expression on his face, but he looks excited - it reminds him of himself, and he can’t help but laugh. 

“Not if we destroy you first!”

#sbi au #sbi dnd au #now sbi&co #dreamwastaken #sapnap #georgenotfound #technoblade #tommyinnit #philza #wilbur soot

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #423

“i won’t think about you when i’m older  /  ‘cuz we never really had our closure”

Are you better at cooking dinners or making cakes/biscuits/sweets? Neither. Have you ever cut someone else’s hair? No. Who was the last guest in your house and what were they staying for? My late grandmother's husband stayed overnight when he was driving from New York to Florida or the other way around, idr. How many long term relationships have you been in? Two. Do you sleep with all the lights out, or do you leave a lamp or even the television on? My snake's heat lamp stays on. Who is one person you have forgiven, but still have not “forgotten” what they have done? My dad. Are you a fan of Lana Del Rey? I don't think I've even heard one of her songs. Do you know your blood type? A-. Do you know your mother’s birthday? Yes. Have you got your period at the moment? I haven't had my period since I started TMS. It's honestly so fucking frustrating that it obviously had an effect on my body, but not my depression. I've officially finished TMS as of a few days ago and now I just feel so void of hope. Have you ever been pregnant? No. How old were you when you first went on a plane? Idr, I was a little kid. Have you ever had to take out a loan for anything? Not me personally, but my parents have for my education that I threw away. Are both of your blood parents still in your life? Yes. I don't see my dad a lot, but he's still in my life regardless. When was the last time you went apple picking? I’ve never been. Someone asked you what you wanted, what would you say? Happiness. Have you ever been drunk at school or work? I have not. How many bedrooms are in your house? Three. Are you smart about computers? Not really, no. Have you ever played Just Dance for Wii? Yes. My sister loved them, so we have a few. Do you own a Xbox 360? No. I'm a PlayStation girl. Would you ever do a sex tape for a million dollars? No. I'd be mortified. So, do you need a nap? I really should take one. I slept like... maybe three hours last night. I was up most of the night having a fucking life crisis. What would you rather be doing? Something fun. What sport are you the best at? I haven't touched any sort of sport since I was a teenager. Do you have a little sister? What’s her name? Yeah, Nicole. Do you complain a lot? Kind of, but I generally try to keep it in surveys nowadays. I'm just tired of shit. Would you rather go to an authentic haunted house or an ancient temple? Ohhh, tough pick, but I've gotta say the ancient temple. Do you like fruity or minty gum? Both, really. Are you looking forward to any day of this month? Well July is practically over, so I'll answer for August. I'm looking forward to my nephew's birthday. Have you ever gotten detention? A few times for getting too many morning tardies in high school. Is there a traumatic event that you’ve experienced that’s changed your life? Definitely. Do you buy a majority of your clothes from a certain store, or do you just pick out items of clothing you could see yourself wearing, not caring about the store it came from? The latter. Have any of the artists you’re fond of released new albums recently? Powerwolf did recently. Would you ever keep your favorite animal as a pet? I could write a college-length essay on why meerkats do not make good pets whatsoever. Do fucking not get one. I can barely fathom how it's legal in some countries. Ever cried so much you threw up? No, but I've gagged. Who is your best guy friend? Girt. What do you two do when you hang out? Mostly just watch TV and play board games. What is a movie that you thought you would hate but you ended up loving? I dunno, really. Do you even like horror movies? I love horror movies. Do you live in the country? I wish I still did. :/ Me and Mom hate hate hate living in these suburbs. What is your favorite accent? British. Have you ever had a boyfriend your parents didn’t like? No. Do you drink Pepsi or Coke? Coke. Pepsi is gross. What do you plan to do on your 21st birthday? I was literally in the psych hospital for my 21st birthday lmao. It's kind of a painful memory, but I also won't forget the love and kindness people showed me. I especially remember the friend I made there getting the lunch lady to literally go and buy me a slice of cake. Everyone also sang happy birthday to me and gaaaah I'm getting emotional. Do you have any person in your family with an addiction to beer? That was my dad's drink of choice when he drank. Do you take a lot of pictures? Unless I have my camera and am somewhere pretty, no. What kind of face wash do you use? Water, lol. Does drama always seem to follow you? Nah. Does anybody in your family race? No. Are you closer to your mom or dad? My mom. How much money did you used to get from the ”tooth fairy?” Uhhh... I want to say $2 or something? I might be way off, idr. How long do you want to live with your parents? I WISH I could have moved out with an s/o already, but that's just not how life's worked out. Do you have a laptop or desktop? I have a laptop. Do you like your parents? I love them. Do you secretly like someone? It's not a secret, no. Would you ever date your best male friend? Tried that once and it didn't work out. I liked him more as like a brother. What are you currently listening to? "Better Than Me" by Hinder. I really need to turn it off, but I can't make myself. Do you want to be single? I really wish I had a partner to love and motivate me to strive to do better, but I know it's better I'm single right now. I'd just relive the Jason situation, I'm sure. I'd just drag the person down and lose them. Did you go out or stay in last night? I'm almost always at my fucking house not doing shit, so. Have you pretended to like someone? No, that sounds pretty stupid... How is your heart lately? Hurting. A lot. Are you wearing socks? I hate wearing socks and I'm in bed anyway, so no. What do people call you? Britt, mostly. Do you get stressed out easily? VERY. Have you ever been taken to the emergency room in an ambulance? No. What is wrong with you right now? Where the hell to begin. Do you own something from Hot Topic? A lot. Would you rather sleep with someone else or alone? With someone, so long as the bed is big enough to comfortably fit two of us. Do you still talk to the person you last made out with? No. I'm certain he wants nothing to do with me. Have you ever seen your best friend cry? Sadly. Did you get any compliments today? Definitely not. I look and feel like a wreck right about now. There's nothing to praise me about. Have you ever gone to a beach? Many times. What would you say if someone asked you to get high right now? Unless it was an edible, no. I'd do almost anything to try and make me feel better right now, even if just for a little while, but I'm unwilling to smoke anything. Do you believe that everything happens for a reason? HELL no. Have you ever done volunteer work just because you wanted to? Honestly, no. Do you have long nails? No; I never do because I have an awful habit of picking at them. Do you like the gender you are? I don't like or dislike it, honestly. I'm just neutral. Do you generally look nice in photos? HA. Have you ever had a stick insect as a pet? No. What colour are your father’s eyes? They're dark brown. If I handed you a concert ticket right now, who would you want to be the performer? Ozzy, duh. Name three facts about your family? We're very, very spread out geographically, some of us (in other words, me) are emotionally distant, and uh... idk. Would you ever get into a long distance relationship? Only if it was a certain person, our lives were more on track, and we were making plans for either of us to move soon. What’s the most thoughtful present you’ve ever received? Probably this really long letter my mom wrote for me on my bday a couple years ago. What’s your favorite hot beverage? Hot chocolate. Did you ever play an instrument? If so what? I played the flute for many years, all through middle school and through much of high school. Would you rather carve pumpkins or wrap presents? Carve pumpkins, for sure. Do you think you’re important? I don't fucking know. Probably not. What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received? Idk. Have you been diagnosed with any mental disorders? *hands over thick book* Have you ever moved to another state or country? If so, how did it feel to be new? No. Do you know how to properly eat food with chopsticks? No. My hands are way, way too shaky to ever accomplish that. Are you more of a leader or a follower? Definitely a follower, but I can step up in certain situations. What was the first thing you ate today? Well, I was seriously depression-eating last night, way past midnight, and had a peanut butter sandwich. If you could spend the day, doing absolutely anything, with anyone, anywhere, what would it be like? LET'S NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT RIGHT NOW. If I were to ask you how you are doing, and you were only able to answer completely honestly, what would come out? "Falling apart." I've lost direction, motivation, strength, hope, just everything. What is the one thing that you have been avoiding that you should do? I need a fucking shower so bad that it's embarrassing. I just can't move. I have no energy, emotionally or physically. I just can't make myself do it. Is there anything that you wish you could take back? So, so badly. What, in your mind, could make you truly happy? Actually reaching goals. Losing weight. Healing my legs. Knowing with certainty that I wasn't emotionally abusive to Jason. Moving out of this town and back into the country. Financial stability. A job I thoroughly enjoy. I could go on, but let's not. If you could change one conversation in your life, what would you say differently? Would it have REALLY made any difference? God, let me take back shit I said in that fucking letter to you-know-who. It's so hard to believe I once thought it perfectly justified and realistic. When is the next time you’ll change your hairstyle? Will you color it? I don't have any plans of changing the style in the foreseeable future. I want to color it BADLY. To just SOMETHING. Do people normally say you’re a fast typist, or are you rather slow? I'm like, a lightning-fast typist. Have you ever been considered the ‘smartest person in school?’ No; my best friend in HS was, though. Her GPA was fucking insane. I was in the top percentile, though, so I was up there. What the hell happened to that girl. How many drugs are in your system? If we're including prescriptions, a whole hell of a lot. What’s on your schedule for tomorrow? Jack shit. Like usual. Do you currently have any bite marks/hickeys on your body? No. Do you call anyone baby? Excluding my pets, no. What’s your current mood? lol if you've gotten this far reading, you can make an educated guess. Do you think you are a good person? Bro I just don't know. What were you doing before filling out this survey? I was playing WoW. How late did you stay up last night? Like, 4:30 or so. When was the last time you cried really hard? I wanna say like a week ago? Is your hair longer than your shoulders? No. It still badly needs a trim, though.

#survey #surveys #random questions #lyrics: ''better than me'' by hinder

[amandaklwrites]

Movie Review: The Mummy Returns (2001)

Genre: Historical Fantasy/Action, Adventure/Family

Rating: 8.5/10

Movie Review:

Let me start off this review by saying I love this movie. I don’t love it as much as the first movie, but I do love, love it! It’s just another fun addition to the franchise and adds more to the story that I had loved so much about the first one.

However, as I had said moments ago, I didn’t love it as much as the first. And you can see by the rating that I don’t love it as much either. I’ll start with some of the things I didn’t love about this movie, so I can close with the aspects that I did love.

My main problem with this film is how they used Egyptian mythology and twisted it with Hollywood edge with how most movies have been used—that death/underworld is instantly evil (think Disney’s Hercules: though I LOVE this movie, of course they made the god of the underworld evil, when in fact, the shittiest person in mythology is actually the “head god”). I didn’t like how they portrayed Anubis in this movie, like, at all. He looked SO COOL, but why the hell did they make him so evil???? To me, it was like the creators had just used an excuse—oh okay, he’s connected to the dead and the afterlife and he’s a giant jackal-headed god, let’s make him chaos and evil! If they did a little research, they’d see that the actual god of chaos and would have made so much more sense in this movie was Set (or Seth). He’s literally chaos. And… he wouldn’t have an army of undead-like things that would start wars… *head shake* I could rage about this all the time, I could write a whole term paper on it. The bottom line is that Anubis is not evil whatsoever, and he doesn’t have any powers that they associated with him in the movie. He’s the god that would help with the burial practices in Egypt (like mummification and such), and would help lead the dead to the underworld/afterlife and the trials with Osiris. He’s not even in charge of the dead! He’s just a part of the system! Ugh, I have to stop talking about it.

My other thing was how they used Anck-Su-Namun in this story. I liked the idea of reincarnation and that Evie was Nefertiti in another life (though… why did they have Evie say she was half-Egyptian in the first movie? To me, it felt so subtle and just used to explain her connection and love for ancient Egypt?). It was interesting! Though I personally don’t think we always look the same in reincarnation instances, I know they used Rachel Weisz because it would explain the movie/idea easier. However, I didn’t like the whole thing with Anck-Su-Namun/Meela. Why couldn’t they have done the same as they did with Evie? Evie didn’t even remember her past life until certain memories came back! Why did it have to be a woman that looked like Anck-Su-Namun and they had to get her soul from the afterlife and put it in her body? That whole aspect didn’t make sense to me and frankly, added nothing interesting to the story. It fell super flat to me. They should’ve done it like they did with Evie—Anck-Su-Namun had reincarnated as Meela and couldn’t remember her past life, but Imhotep brought the memories back. It would have made more sense. Was it supposed to be because she had done something bad in her past life, so her soul couldn’t reincarnate? I don’t know, but that whole part of the plot was just silly to me. And I felt like that they didn’t even explain much with Meela. How did she found out about all this, why was she okay with giving up her soul to another soul to take her body? UGH, WHY! I just wanted to scream.

Another last add on—the Scorpion King? What???? It was so random and weird, and I get the idea for the plot, but it wasn’t interesting to me. Though, since I didn’t like how they used Anubis, so I guess the whole point of storyline just didn’t work for me. I was so annoyed with most of the story arc itself for all these reasons.

Okay, it sounds like I didn’t like half of this movie. But it was those plot points/aspects. The rest of it, I LOVED. I loved seeing our favorite characters again—Evie, Rick, Jonathan, Ardeth, and even Imhotep!

I think my favorite thing was to see how Evie and Rick had developed as a couple. They had been married for a few years now and they had a son, Alex, who is such a delight. I liked that their relationship hadn’t changed much, other than they seemed more comfortable with one another from their years together and their love had deepened even more. I love the two of them so, so much. That Rick and Evie would still fight to the death for one another. And Alex! What a kid! I liked how they made him a great balance between his parents—his smarts from his mother, and his sheer will to rush into danger like his father.

What I also liked was how well they kept the humor. They even reused old funny moments but changed them slightly (i.e. Alex knocking over the pillars like his mom with the bookshelves, Alex not knowing one word in the spell like his uncle—who was the one to give it to him!). I thought it was cleverly done and they did it in such a way that it didn’t feel like they were beating an old joke and we didn’t laugh. I sure did anyway.

Evie’s death was devastating (give Brendan Fraser an award for that performance, sheesh!), but her revival was even more brilliant. And I liked that when she came back, she seemed to remember her old self even more—her fighting moves were so cool! I think that Evie developed even more in this movie, but not in a bad way. She became more of a badass than she was before in the sense that she could kick so much ass. I don’t think she changed much as a person (still silly, clumsy at times, her charming and smart self), other than she had grown up a bit and she now had that feral love for her little boy. Don’t mess with a woman’s son, please. Same for Rick though. His will to save his son (scooping him up and taking off running was the best) was just as strong as he would do for Evie, and that I loved. A good husband and a good father. Especially with the personality of his. He’s the type of man that is gruff and strong and easily annoyed, but when it comes to his wife and son, he’s a complete softy. I love it!

The whole jungle thing was okay and interesting, but I missed the desert. I’ve come here for ancient Egypt, give me Egypt! But I liked the mythology behind it, and it made for a fun new adventure.

One of my other favorite things was the ending with Imhotep and Anck-Su-Namun. Imhotep and Rick were falling to their deaths, and Imhotep watched as Evie literally dove through danger for her husband and love. But Anck-Su-Namun looked and then took off. You learn about her—that she only thought about herself. It had never been about love, but maybe the love for power. The look on Imhotep’s face was absolutely brilliantly done, as you watched a man crumble. As he realized that all he had done was for nothing. He had promised hell on earth because he raged that his love had been taken from him. And then she ran away from saving him to save her own ass (though she dies in the end, which, too bad, so sad *sarcasm*). It was kind of an interesting way to end his legacy honestly—that he gave up. Which, to me, signifies that he would never come back. Because what’s the point? His reason left him to die without a backward glance. What incredible storytelling!

Overall, I loved this movie, but I didn’t LOOOOOOOOVE it like I did with The Mummy. I liked how much new aspects this movie brought, the return of characters that we had loved (Jonathan and Ardeth were as badass as ever!), and that we got to see places outside of Egypt—London, the jungle. This is a fun second movie, but it isn’t as anywhere near perfect as the first movie. That one is my love and joy, while this one I just watch to enjoy.

It’s a great series, honestly. It is interesting, it takes concepts and turns them into something new (even though I don’t like all of them), and makes for a fun adventure movie (a horror??? Really?? That was what they were trying for?).

I love these movies. I really, really do.

#the mummy returns #the mummy returns 2001 #the mummy movies #Movie Reviews

[canadian-riddler]

Borderlands: Cat-trap

By Indiana

Synopsis: Claptrap has some special, special friends.  With credit to @hugsforvillains 

 Claptrap had, at some point in time, acquired a great deal of kittens.

  … or perhaps he only had two or three (or maybe four), and it simply seemed as though he had a great deal of them.  The furry little things seemed to be everywhere.  When Claptrap was around, you were guaranteed to find a kitten someplace you didn’t want one. Or, at least, a great deal of cat hair. And pee.  There was a lot of that too.

Yes, those kittens seemed to think Claptrap was some sort of metallic and very thoughtlessly shaped cat tree.  Not that he made any indication he cared.  No, Claptrap was apparently quite content to stand there with his arms out, letting the cats crawl all over him like some sort of massive, noisy caterpillars.  The upside was that when he was talking, he was talking mostly to the cats.  The downside was that he didn’t see proceeding with life as usual covered in cats as a problem.  Whenever somebody brought it up, his go-to response was, “But they’re so cuuuuuute!”, which he said whilst holding out a squirming cat, following it up with, “C’mon, pet him!”

Well, the goal of getting rid of them was just a lost cause when there was a double handful of soft and tiny kitty in front of one’s face.

There was honestly no getting away from those cats.  They were underfoot, over-foot, and on-top-of-lap.  Claptrap, having no grasp of any kind of boundaries himself, had obviously not attempted to curb their behaviour in any way whatsoever.  “Claptrap,” asked Moxxi rhetorically, removing a kitten from the beer pitcher she had found it in, “is this yours?”

“Captain Sexyboy!” crowed Claptrap, throwing his arms in the air whilst simultaneously not moving to accept the cat.  “I have been looking all over for you!”

“You named your cat Captain Sexyboy?” Moxxi asked, squinting into the pitcher, taking note of the voluminous collection of cat hair, and then electing to pour the draft into it anyway.

“Well, duh,” Claptrap said, ignoring the animal as it jumped off the bar and onto the counter holding the moderately impressive collection of mismatched glasses and tumblers. “Look at how sexy he is! He’s gonna have so many kids when he grows up.”

All Moxxi saw was a cat enthusiastically making a mess of her clean(ish) glasses, but she obviously didn’t know anything, as Captain Sexyboy was indeed very handsome.

Eventually (to everyone’s immense relief) the cats gradually tagged along with Claptrap less and less. Which meant (to everyone’s immense chagrin) that Claptrap went back to talking to them instead of the cats. And that, if you didn’t know, is one of the most unacceptable forms of torture listed in the Geneva Convention, right up there with waterboarding and sensory deprivation.  The latter, of course, being far preferable to whatever noise Claptrap happened to be making on any given day.

At some point he had acquired a very deep gouge in his chassis (which had conveniently managed not to sever anything important (if there was indeed anything important in there to sever)), but nobody knew where he’d gotten it from or when.  Not because he hadn’t told them all several times each, but because nobody cared.  Until Hammerlock, damn his insatiable curiosity about the beasts of Pandora, actually did ask him about it.  Everyone in their vicinity knew that was a terrible, terrible mistake and immediately chugged whatever drink they had in front of them in the hopes of ushering in the blanks of memory infallibly produced by excessive amounts of alcohol.

“It’s those cats,” Claptrap lamented unnecessarily loudly, waving one hand over what he thought was a drink but what was actually a cup of whatever was dripping out from under the dishwasher.  “They just do not understand they’re too big to climb on me!”

“Oh, my dear boy,” Hammerlock said, too polite to withhold a response even though he really should have at least tried, “they understand. But if you thought they would care, well, that’s where you’re gravely mistaken.”

“They just are not good listeners!” continued Claptrap ironically.  

“I see,” said Hammerlock, wishing fervently he had not started this conversation.  This wish followed him for the rest of the day.  Mostly because Claptrap followed him for the rest of the day.

Claptrap continued telling outrageous stories about the cats, from things such as, “They keep thinking I’m some kinda toy!  Who would think that, right?” to, “One ‘a them ruined Brick’s garden, but you guys’ll keep that to yourselves, right?” and concluding with, “They ran off into the desert to live their lives without meeee!”  This last one was accompanied by hysterical sobbing, which might have garnered him more sympathy if he hadn’t done the same thing the day before when someone changed the song on the jukebox before his had ended.

“Moxxi!” Claptrap hollered as he entered the bar one afternoon, causing several patrons to scramble for the exit complete with chair-tossing, drink-spilling, and table-overturning. At least one of them was skipping out on his bill, for which he would probably be catching a bullet in the head for. “The things I have seen today!”

Moxxi rolled her eyes and, because she was out of dishwasher juice, provided him with the sludge that was coming out of the bottom of the sink.  What she gave him turned out not to matter, because as soon as he got up on the barstool he waved his hand dramatically and it flung the foul mixture across the bar, which of course hit some poor bastard in the face. Unfortunately, he was far bigger and stronger than Claptrap.  Fortunately, he had fallen fast asleep in a puddle of his lite beer some time ago. That’s what happens when your bartender doesn’t cut people off.

“I couldn’t believe my eye!” Claptrap shouted to no one in particular.  “They ate him!”

“What?” asked the man next to him, merely because he was drunk enough he couldn’t shut up.  Claptrap immediately turned to face him.

“Phantom of the Opera!” he explained, leaning over far enough a few people began to hope he’d fall off the barstool.  It wouldn’t stop him talking, but it would be funny.  “They just tore inta him!  Ripped him apart like he was an imitation condom!  It was… it was… well, it was pretty cool, actually.  I was gonna say I was horrified, and I was, while it was happening, but now I’m thinkin’ about it… yeah!  It was pretty lit!”

“You named – you know the Phantom of the Opera had a name, right?” the man asked in exasperation, as he happened to be a massive theatre snob and had memorised everything about every Phantom production that had ever been made.  And if you thought there were a lot where you come from, well, you haven’t seen Phantom performed solely with live skags, have you?

“Of course I do!” Claptrap somehow snorted, because he, too, happened to be a massive theatre snob who had memorised everything about every Phantom production that had ever been made, including the one that was performed solely with live skags. “I just liked the name Phantom of the Opera better!”

If Claptrap had been any other person, the man would have smashed his glass over Claptrap’s head and left.  Since that would have absolutely no effect, he smashed it over the head of the person on his other side instead.  That was how Claptrap started his eighty-ninth bar fight, despite not actually fighting anybody.  That got Claptrap kicked out of Moxxi’s for the hundred and seventy-fourth time, despite his protests that he’d done nothing wrong.  Surprisingly, he hadn’t, but that had never mattered before and so it absolutely wouldn’t now nor any other time in the future.

As they often did, a bandit spotted Claptrap rolling obliviously along through the dust by himself.  And again, as they often did, he decided now was a good time to put the robot out of his misery.  Wait, no.  To put everyone else out of their misery.  From having to put up with him.  Because he’s – yes.  Moving on.

The bandit sauntered across the dirt, both hands holding a shotgun that was mostly built out of other, discarded, crappier shotguns, and thought about what he might like to do with Claptrap once he’d caught up with him.  The bandit was both too stupid and too ignorant (mostly ignorant) to know quite why the little robot reacted to even extremely unpleasant experiences such as being set on fire and electrocuted with exuberant good cheer, but he didn’t really need to know.  All he needed to know was that it was pretty funny.  He was cool with just knowing that.

As he ambled along he pondered just how he would do it.  He could always shoot him, of course, but then there was the risk that he would ruin something important and then Claptrap would die, and that wouldn’t be worth his time.  He could try demanding the robot turn himself off, which he would probably agree to do, but then the bandit would have to drag what looked to be a very heavy robot back to camp, and that just didn’t sound like fun.  He decided that his best bet would be simply to ask him to come along.  From what he’d heard, the stupid thing would probably do it, too.  And he’d heard right, unfortunately.  

“Hello, Claptrap,” the bandit announced, in a voice that he probably thought sounded friendly and welcoming, but really sounded like that obnoxious stranger who opens their screen door on Halloween and thinks it’s clever to hand out boxes containing about eight sour raisins or pint-sized toothbrushes with bristles that make it feel like you’re sucking on a soggy, fuzzy hairbrush.  “Where are you headed?”

“Good day, gentle sir!” returned Claptrap, who had never been trick-or-treating and so had no idea what voice the bandit was using.  “I’m searching for my friend!  He’s around here somewhere, but you know how friends are.  Always running off on you!”

The bandit stifled a laugh and a gleeful smile.  Or at least, he thought he did.  He actually looked mildly like he had been holding his breath for a very long time in a strange attempt to impress someone.  A woman, probably.  Or perhaps a man.  Or possibly himself in the mirror.  “Friends?” the bandit said, in a way that conjured up visions of screaming doormats and someone sitting in a rocking chair on their porch breathing very slowly into a Darth Vader mask in the minds of everyone within a one-hundred kilometre radius, excluding Claptrap.  “Why, what a coincidence!  I got lots of friends back where I’m going!”

“Really?” Claptrap asked, jumping and spinning around about ninety degrees which, if you didn’t know, is very impressive for a robot that clumsy.  “Lots of friends, you say?”

“Oh yes,” the bandit nodded. “If lots were a number, that’s how many friends I’d have waiting!”

“Ooh!”  Claptrap rubbed his flat little hands together, which produced the exact noise a violin makes when someone who has never played it before believes they are in fact in the beginnings of the next great concerto. “Hey, if we’re all getting our friends together, mind if I bring my friend along?  It won’t take long!  He’ll be here any minute!”

“Of course,” the bandit replied, because he did not for one second believe Claptrap had a single friend in all the universe.  Even rust seemed to be avoiding him, somehow.  Even the organic process of oxidising metal couldn’t stand Claptrap!  The bandit thought he was clever for knowing this information, which he was, but only because of the company he was with at the moment.  The company in question raised himself as high as possible, cupped his hands around the mouth he didn’t have, and hollered so loudly he disturbed a nest of rakks about two hundred kilometres away, “Mrs Fluffers!”

Yeah.  The friend definitely did not exist.

That was when the eclipse happened.

The reason I didn’t tell you there was an impending eclipse was because it didn’t make it into the weather forecast.  It hadn’t been predicted by any satellites, or meteorologists, and even the prerequisite crazy-haired man with the apocalypse sign was pretty sure the end of the world wasn’t nigh until at least next week.  And that was because it wasn’t really an eclipse.

The bandit looked toward the shadow blocking out the sun, and then he looked up.  And up.  And up farther.  So far that his jaw kind of fell open without his permission.  He honestly wished that the predicted fire and brimstone would happen right now, or at least that there really had been an unexpected eclipse, because Claptrap did have a friend.  The very worst kind of friend, in fact.

This friend was some massive, unholy beast.  It was covered head to whip-like tail in mangy orange fur, sported ears that resembled Swiss cheese, had four-foot fangs bordered by an expansive tangle of eight-foot whiskers, and eyes that were definitely being used by the soul of some hellspawn to scare the everloving shit out of him.

It worked.  Both literally and figuratively.  

Most bandits, this one included, prided themselves on being tough-as-nails badasses that would go up against a Vault Hunter with their bare hands.  A high percentage of them would even actually do that.  So when I tell you that this beast was terrifying enough to make this man turn around, hitch up his freshly soiled pants, and run screaming back to the hive of scum and villainy from whence he came, you know it was pretty darn scary.

“Oh, Mrs Fluffers,” lamented Claptrap, looking sadly at the tire tracks he’d made in the dirt, “I just don’t understand it!  Every time I bring someone to meet you, they piss themselves and run away!  They don’t even try to get to know you. Rude!”

Mrs Fluffers purred quietly, which only caused one or two minor rockslides.  Claptrap petted an area on his leg approximately the size of the cat’s toe and held his other hand up thoughtfully beneath his eye.  He had a surprisingly wide range of facial expressions given that he didn’t have a face.  “Well,” he said finally, straightening, “I guess he’s just gonna have to come to your place!”

Mrs Fluffers licked his shoulder, which would make it a good time to mention said shoulder was matted down with a thick layer of some dark, hardened substance.  Blood.  It was blood.

“Mrs Fluffers!” Claptrap shouted up in the direction of the cat’s very distant ear.  “Invite him over already, willya!?”

Mrs Fluffers gave a meow that would have only been about seventy-five decibels if anyone had been measuring (which no one was) and looked over in the direction of the fleeing bandit with mild interest. He didn’t care very much for the bandit, but he was holding something that glinted temptingly in the blazing sun…

“Finally,” groused Claptrap as the cat ambled to his feet and collected the bandit, who had not even managed to run the length of the animal.  Mrs Fluffers contained the hapless idiot inside of his teeth with remarkable gentility and turned to face his beloved master again.

“Hooray!” Claptrap shouted, jumping up and down with his arms in the air.  He actually had impressive height for someone with a suspension that old.  “Oh boy!  Mrs Fluffers, try an’ take care of him until we get back, huh?  You always wreck ‘em before Jerry gets to meet ‘em.”

“Who’s Jerry?” sobbed the bandit, whose bladder tried and failed to empty itself a second time. Claptrap spun around and continued rolling forward.  But backward. Forward but backward.  Like his life as a whole.

“Oh, you’ll like Jerry,” Claptrap said enthusiastically.  “He loves playing.  But he’s shy! So we gotta bring him people to play with!  Or we would,” and the robot paused here to fold his arms indignantly, “if Mrs Fluffers here didn’t hog all the friends.”

“I don’t want to play with Jerry!”

“Oh, you,” scoffed Claptrap, waving one hand in airy dismissal, “you haven’t even met him yet!  You really should get to meet people before you write ‘em off, y’know.”  And he hopped in an attempt to spin himself front-facing again, which he was very successful at doing.  What he was also very successful at doing was falling down.  “Gingersnaps!” he yelled into the dirt, because he was only allowed to use K-rated profanity (and even that was pushing it), and Mrs Fluffers immediately dropped the bandit, to his immense relief.  That was, until about five seconds later when he hit the ground and broke his leg in at least three places.  At least.

He was too busy screaming and staring with comically bulging eyes at the brand-new configuration his leg was now in to look over and see that Mrs Fluffers had ‘helped’ Claptrap by batting at his chassis as though he were some tiny prey to be joyfully toyed with. “Now, now,” Claptrap was saying (which the bandit also wasn’t listening to, since he was screaming so loudly).  “We have talked about this, young man!”

Mrs Fluffers proceeded to drag his tongue, the size of which rivalled a full-sized van, up Claptrap’s chassis so hard it actually stood him back up again.  It also removed an impressively-sized stripe of years-old dirt, which revealed that Claptrap had once been quite a different, but still obnoxious, shade of yellow.  “Thanks bunches!” Claptrap said.  “Now, you wanna help our – oh, crap.  You broke him!  It’s gonna be real hard for Jerry to play with him now.”

The cat retrieved the sobbing bandit and deposited him in front of Claptrap, who smacked himself in the eye with the palm of his hand solely because he didn’t have a forehead to smack.  “No!  I don’t want him!  He’s for Jerry!”

Mrs Fluffers looked expectantly down at Claptrap, bony tail sweeping the dirt in such great swaths he was probably unburying some long-forgotten skeletons.  Claptrap sighed and turned around.

“Come on,” he said, rolling onward.  “I don’t wanna hang out here all day.  There’s scary monsters around, y’know?”

Mrs Fluffers purred.

  Author’s note

hugsforvillains suggested that the cats of Pandora grow up to be vicious beasts. Usually I just said cats didn’t exist on Pandora anymore.  

One of the people I know from work came up with the name Captain Sexyboy.  For himself.  He calls himself that.

This is also on AO3 and FFN, but no linkies allowed.

#so says Indy #Claptrap #Borderlands #fanfic from Indy

[placesthatchangedpeople]

Testimony about Vista RTC in Utah

Hi, my name is Paloma, and I am a survivor of Vista RTC located in Magna Utah. I am writing this now as a 23 year old, married with a child, and expecting another one next month. The life I lead today is uncomplicated, but that was not always the case. I was a “troubled teen” and had started drugs- my parents sent me to wilderness and Vista RTC as a way for me to get help. Only help is not what I got. The moment I was forcibly put on a plane by a company called “Crisis Interventions”, my life was changed forever. Here I am all these years later , just so fucked up over what happened to me. There’s so much that went on I can’t even begin to tell it all today but I will outline some of the abuse I endured.

I was not allowed to speak for weeks and weeks at a time. This is a punishment called RO (also known as re orientation) where you are not allowed to speak with any of the other kids. If you get caught talking to the other kids, they will also be put on RO. Being a young teenager and not being able to speak for weeks on end would drive me crazy. It was the worst thing they could do- take away your voice. I fought for a long time , tried to engage in small acts of defiance, but after not being allowed to speak for about 3 months I gave up and submitted. You should see my journals and how fucked up they are. I literally prayed for anyone to come save me but no one did.

if you try and leave they will strip you down, put you in bright pink scrubs and put you on something called “10 foot” it means you have to be 10 feet away from all the other kids at all times, no speaking and no eye contact. If you are caught looking at a 10 foot you will be dropped to RO. You can speak with your fingers only (1 I believe is bathroom , 2 is emergency, and I forgot what 3 is) oh and a staff member has to be within arms length of you at all times, to watch you shit, shower , dress, everything- for weeks , sometimes even months. My mind blanks out about some parts of vista. Another punishment they use is isolation rooms. I never recall being put into isolation but weirdly enough I have letters from staff reminiscing about how when I tried to leave and was put in the isolation rooms. It was in my graduation letter where this was mentioned- as if this would have been a fond memory or something. I remember the staff member made a joke like “all the fun times we had while you were in isolation” but honestly so much happened that I tried to block out I’m honestly not surprised.

the way they abuse you the most is with therapy. They make you have 2 hour groups every day. These are INTENSE groups where they force you to feel sad or ashamed about things you don’t feel sad/ashamed about. They make you recount your sexual traumas even if you aren’t ready. They literally force you to cry about situations you aren’t sad about. If your not “beleiveable” enough , they have the group rip you to shreds and say they “aren’t connecting”. If people “aren’t connecting” then you can’t go up levels which extends your stay. I tried fighting and being my authentic self for a while until I realized I would literally never go home unless I played their game. You literally have to go into group and give an Oscar award winning performance, tears , snot the whole nine- about something you literally don’t even feel that way about. I would be “crying” reliving all these sexual traumas that happened to me that I really felt different emotions about , but be forced to only be sad and cry. I would literally be so focused on whether I was believed or not that I got nothing out of the “therapy” whatsoever , except for more trauma.

They train the group of girls to be like a pack of dogs, constantly berating the newer people and constantly telling other girls they “aren’t connecting” in group. This is called “holding others accountable” and it gives you extra brownie points and is necessary if you ever want to walk out that door. The girls will snitch on you for the most minute things just so they can get moved to the next level. I remember after FINALLY making it to a higher level, being dropped to RO because a girl snitched on me for sharing a spoon with my friend. We were eating a banana (separate ones) and using a spoon to put peanut butter on said banana. I was dropped to RO and not allowed to speak for weeks because of that. I’m guessing that because they were super Mormon that they think sharing utensils is like lesbianism or something- I really don’t know. They had a ton of these rules and everything we did was regulated down to the minutes we could shower.

They made us feel ashamed and terrible about ourselves at all time. I was not allowed to see my parents for months at a time. All out phone called were monitored and if we started asking for help they would hang up. (Like we literally had someone next to us while we got our phone call there to listen and hang up if you said anything negative) you had to stay in character during calls if you ever wanted to go home. -I once wrote a letter starting each line with a different capital letter so that when you read it it would read “AYUDA ME” down the side of the paper (my mom and I speak Spanish) this letter was confiscated and thrown away (all mail is read before it’s sent out)

these little ass girls were getting strip searched and literally made to cough and squat any time they came back from a pass. Literally little ass girls forced to strip for adults - how fucking horrifying. It’s like they were preparing us for prison.

I actually got out and went straight to IV drugs. I used this experience to fuel my self destruction for a long time. I actually spent about a year in jail altogether right after vista , and let me tell you- jail was HEAVEN compared to Vista. At least they didn’t abuse us with therapy and make us keep some fucking ridiculous character all day.

Anyways that’s all I’m going to write for now as it’s getting late, I will write more later and encourage anyone who has been to Vista to share their experiences. Even writing this I feel like a weight is coming off my shoulders. I still die inside every time I think of being sent here - even all these years later.

Edited to add- We also went by a point system and were graded for each thing me did such as “20 minute snack” “one hour school” “15 minute morning chore” “bed made”. Literally every aspect of our life was graded and we were constantly docked points and given zeros for the most minute things. The thing worth the most points was group therapy (yes we were graded on fucking therapy) so if you didn’t preform well enough or cry hard enough about someone random then you would get a 0. If you didn’t score high enough at the end of the week you would be dropped to RO, then the next week if your points were high enough you could get off RO. This was a big threat and reason a lot of us stayed submissive. RO sucked and meant you weren’t going home for a long time so you had to try and be perfect at all times. If you lost one of these point sheets you were immediately dropped (to RO) for a person with ADD this was a constant problem for me and I was dropped multiple times for it.

I would also like to add that every person that ran was tackled and severely restrained (possible beaten but I’m not sure) you would hear the screams from outside the doors of the girls being caught. Harrowing screams, like they were being killed. To this day I don’t know if they were being hurt or if they were just so fucking upset they were being dragged back.

My roommate got out of Vista and immediately shot herself in the head (and lived) most people from Vista got much much worse and have a hard time taking about it. I did too, and honestly this thread is the most I’ve ever shared.

#Vista #residential treatment #Utah

[purplesurveys]

608

1. What did you do in 2019 that you’d never done before? Lots of different things! I had an Actual™ photoshoot :o, I celebrated my girlfriend’s dad’s birthday with their family, I touched an Adobe app and learned that I’m pretty decent at it, I had a tooth extraction, I did shisha and vape (and found out I liked them, giving me an identity crisis for a while HAHAHA), I had my internship, I was fined by a traffic officer, etc. I had lots of grownup stuff to face this year, and it was all fun.

2. Did you keep your new years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I don’t make New Year’s resolutions... if I wanted to do something I’d plan them any time of the year. Plus making them at New Year’s just gives me a whole chunk of pressure, and I’d rather not live with that pressure.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? I had a high school classmate give birth this year but I wasn’t close to her; Gabie was, though. Other than her, I don’t think there’s been anybody who had a kid in 2019.

4. Did anyone close to you die? Nacho. I still see him in everything, everyday.

5. What countries did you visit? Didn’t get to go out of the country this year. Hopefully that’ll change next year when I graduate!

6. What would you like to have in 2020 that you lacked in 2019? I dunno, this year was already suuuuper hectic enough. I’d ask for more time to rest, but I’m literally graduating in 2020 and it will only get busier from there. The two things I’d ask for is to get to go to a different country again, and to have a road trip that isn’t going to Nasugbu for once (I’ve only had two long drives ever since I was allowed to have em, and both trips were to the same beach in Nasugbu).

7. What date from 2019 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? Evening of September 28; it was when everybody was notified of Nacho’s passing. Toughest pill to swallow in my entire fucking life. My social media had never seemed so angry, so scared, so chaotic, so bleak, all at the same time. 8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? If we’re gonna be serious about ‘biggest,’ then probably not killing myself. Other than that, I was pretty proud of the way I handled and performed at my internship! I was never late to get to their ORTIGAS office (a tiny traffic hellhole in Metro Manila), I had a good relationship with everyone, and on my evaluations I saw that my supervisor wrote a lot of nice things :)

9. What was your biggest failure? I was a bad girlfriend on significant occasions. I also have two classes this sem in which my final grades are going to be held back because of supposed ‘deficiencies’ – but honestly I blame that on the prof because I think she held back final grades FROM EVERYONE ON ALL HER CLASSES this semester. Seriously, if you do that as a prof, don’t you think the problem is you and not us? I won’t call it a failure on my end, but I am pissed about it and needed a space to vent.

Another failure would be never getting to take out Gab’s mom out on a date. I already took her dad to an MMA pay-per-view and we had a lot of fun, but have never been able to do the same for her mom just yet. I really need to step up next year.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? I had a bad slip in school early this year and I sprained my ankle. There was also one day I felt bad enough to have to skip class but it never became a full-blown fever, so I don’t know what that was.

11. What was the best thing you bought? I bought tooooooons of new tops this year and totally upgraded my wardrobe, so I was really happy about that. The other is a day pass to a beach resort in Nasugbu that I went to with Gab, Angela, and Sofie.

12. Where did most of your money go? Food to keep myself in school. That and gas.

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Lots of things...I mean 2019 was a long-ass year. There was turning into a senior, doing my internship, getting invited to Gabie’s dad’s birthday dinner, going to my first few events to get me accustomed to the PR world, seeing my senior friends graduate college, I also went back to the National Museum this year so that was great, the aforementioned Nasugbu trip, etc etc blahblah.

14. What song will always remind you of 2019? Wonderwall by Oasis or Buwan by Juan Karlos, both because of Nacho. 15. Compared to this time last year, are you: Happier or sadder? Older or wiser? Thinner or fatter? Richer or poorer? (I don’t earn money yet, lol)

16. What do you wish you’d done more of? Seeing Angela. I probably saw her a grand total of 10 times this year, which is pretty fucking tragic.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of? [trigger warning: self-harm] Hurting myself. It’s been a while since I’ve seen my skin clean for a full year.

18. How did you spend Christmas? We will be spending Christmas Eve with one of my grand-aunts’ family. My mom is very close with her cousins on that side plus family from Vietnam is also coming over, so a get-together is certainly happening. On Christmas Day, we’d be spending the day with my mom’s sister-in-law’s family. They have a giant house and host the best party games which is why we like hanging out there. We’d spend the day with ALL of these people, but my grand-aunt and my tita (mom’s sister-in-law) have some weird friction going on so they can’t ever be in the same gathering lmfao.

19. What was your favorite TV program? I resurrected my love for Breaking Bad mostly because El Camino came out this year, but I definitely watched Friends the most. I have it on autoplay on Netflix 12-14 hours at a time these days because Netflix is taking it out on the 31st.

22. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Yes, the aforementioned professor who gave me two Incomplete marks this semester. Last year, she was just my enlistment adviser; now she’s a witch who is keeping me from having a decent Christmas.

I also stopped talking to my younger brother around February or March after he slapped me in the face, so there’s that. No plans to forgive him or talk to him any time soon whatsoever.

23. What was the best book you read? I didn’t read a lot this year :( 2019 was all about readings for my classes.

24. What was your greatest musical discovery? THE JAPANESE HOUSE. Without a shadow of a doubt.

25. What did you want and get? My dog living another year, my relationship still healthy and intact, good grades, my teeth finally treated hahaha, new members in my org!

26. What did you want and not get? Courage on my end to go to a therapist or psychiatrist. More travel.

27. What was your favorite film of this year? Portrait of a Lady on Fire will easily take the cake. That was just breathtaking.

28. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I spent it internally disappointed in Gab for not making it. Outwardly, my mom took us out for sushi (my request) for lunch, then we went home and in the evening, Angela and I went to Feliz so we can have Yabu for dinner then played at Timezone until the mall closed. Not a birthday I want to remember but Angela went above and beyond to give me a good time, and that I’ll always appreciate.

29. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? More opportunities and time to travel. I mean we did go out of town a lot, but I just can’t get enough of travelling to different places.

30. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2019? Chic with a hint of haggard.

31. What kept you sane? My dog, my orgmates, my best friends, and good food.

32. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Kristen Stewart.

33. What issue stirred you the most? Duterte as a person is just one big fucking issue that riles everybody up in this country. I’m just waiting for him to die.

34. Who did you miss? Nacho.

35. Who was the best new person you met? My social history professor, Ma’am Luisa. I had always wanted to take a class that she handled, and she went above and beyond my expectations. I’m taking another class of hers next sem – history of women in the Philippines – so that ought to be fun. :)

36. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2019: Call-out culture is bullshit. I haven’t done it much since Nacho passed, but I wish it did not take me this long to realize how bad of a strategy it is. 

People who mourned him went back to their old habits soon enough and are again publicly shaming people whenever they make a misstep on social media, and it’s embarrassing and infuriating.

#survey #surveys

[saigebeaumont]

- ̗̀ * ( robert sheehan + cismale + he/him ) have you seen ( benjamin ‘benjy’ magwitch ) walking around campus ? they are a ( twenty-three ) year old, studying ( political science ). we hear they are in ( rho pi rho ), and can be ( magnetic & irresponsible ), maybe it’s because they are a ( leo ). they sort of remind us of ( shiny red apples, walking on ledges, kaleidoscopes ), maybe we can find out more ! ( james + 19 + est + they/she ) *  ̖́-  + theatre/track

hi hello as u may have seen my name is james and this is my baby, benjy. i dont know how long this is going to get so pls bare with me

tw; fire? 

gen. info

full name: benjamin ‘benjy’ henry magwitch / joshua hollowood but u will never catch him actually using his real name tbqh

nickname(s): think of a random name. any century, any gender, any amount of letters or lack thereof. that’s it that’s his nickname. previous aliases that he has claimed to be are - thaddeus, balthazar, dante, romulus, etc., etc.

b.o.d. - july 31st, age 23

label(s): the icarian, the blackhole, the insouciant, etc. etc.

height: tall

hometown: ???

sexuality: chaotically bisexual

bio. info

let’s try and make this short n sweet

so like. y’know when a faerie steals a human baby and replaces it with it’s own, weaker, inferior baby? benjy is the human baby in this case

except they weren’t faeries

dorothea and fawley were two...somewhat, in love, folks--who had really wanted to have a child of their own. when they did, finally, have their child--he was very sickly and small and neither of them wanted their child to be weak goddammit

so they did a switcharoo, like...switched at birth except i’ve never ever seen switched at birth, and ran off with this extremely rich family’s newborn baby instead!

dorothea and fawley were part of a circus, and thus, lil benjy was raised in a circus !! how cute.

needless to say he was raised in a very nontraditional setting, like, homeboy was homeschooled bc they were literally always travelling, around the country and once or twice out of country.

despite that, he never doubted that his circus family didn’t love him or anything like ?? yeah he never called his ‘parents’ mom or dad, but that’s bc it was like...everyone was his parent.

dorothea and fawley told benjy that his name will never define him, and he could be anyone or anything he wants to be.

this caused a tiny benjy to be CONSTANTLY changing his name. like, almost everyday he’d just declare a new name and everybody in the circus would call him that specific name. even when he did acts, he’d go by a different name every single time

this carried onto adulthood and benjy still doesn’t tell people his real name very often. sometimes they’re sort of normal names n other times they’re fucking bizarre.

when he was seven he declared his name was ‘sock’ for an entire month.

grew up doing a buncha odd lil jobs and roles in the circus, from being a lil handyman like fawley to being a magician’s assistant like dorothea. t’was a lil tiny animal tamer (before the circus stopped using animals in their acts because we don’t stan circuses like that no we do NOT) at some point but reeeaaally liked tightrope walking and things as such

also tried his hand at fire-throwing/etc. etc. but the like eighteen (minor!) burn scars across his body will tell u that it was not for him and he gave it up to pursue knife throwing tricks and juggling

wasn’t rly ever around ppl his own age, also never had a smartphone before he was like eighteen or so--he’s not old fashioned but he can definitely be behind on the times

also grew up listening to primarily older rock/folk music/whatever the fuck music his family created/his own music

that being said benjy is good w a guitar but bitch cannot sing. he sounds like a dying frog.

he also did a bunch of petty theft but that’s bc some of the other folk in the circus did it and he was like huh. looks like fun. bc benjy is thoroughly an idiot but more on that later. so he got some shit on his record but he got them sealed when he turned 18, like, asap

but. benjy is a dumbass. he committed ANOTHER petty crime, because the boy has addictive qualities, and he left some dna evidence bc boy’s got some mf hair

surprisingly, it wasn’t through his records that they found him via his dna  but, rather, his real parents who did a whole ass dna kit thing for fun one day

this came as a shock to everybody involved, honestly, though tbh ? benjy didn’t care that much that he had parents who weren’t the circus, but that’s bc of his entire upbringing.

either way his birth parents wanted to like. y’know. meet their delinquent biological son and when they did they were like ‘woah woah woah wtf ur in a circus’ and he was like haha yeah

n that was...sort of it, for a while. benjy was 18, had his GED, n wasn’t planning on going to college at all.

the circus was still traveling, the world was all right, etc. etc, benjy maintained contact with his bio parents bc it was Polite to do

and then the circus burned down! somebody did a flaming knife trick when they weren’t supposed to and, long story short--the entire circus went up in flames. there were no victims, no worries, but their entire livelihood was gone and they were all effectively displaced.

when his Rich Biological Parents found out about benjy’s newfound predicament that he 100% was not responsible for whatsoever, they were like . . . . listen. we’ve got a Reputation to uphold, but we’ll send you to college.

he’s been here since he was like, 21, so he’s a junior i think ??

he’s majoring in political science but it’s like technically his first year as the major bc his freshmen yr he wanted to do anthropology and then he switched to mathematics and homeboy was nvr satisfied but now he thinks he wants to do smth w social welfare so he’s doing political science w theatre and public affairs as minors

personality

he’s got. a big personality

he’s got this sort of energy that attracts others but they don’t really know why bc holy shit benjy can be annoying

he’s just super intense ?? like the boy does not know how to calm down, he’s constantly moving around and being dramatic and sometimes whiny

pouts more than a person should averagely pouts

i wouldn’t call him a liar because he can be, very very blunt, and doesn’t know how to beat around the bush, but he likes telling half-truths simply to either confuse others or to just b a lil bitch tbh

he’s got big dumbass energy like okay he’s smart he just doesn’t apply himself very often and he just. does dumb things

gets into fights bc he’s a dumbass. like. he will purposely provoke ppl he doesn’t like, n when he’s drunk he’ll do it to literally anybody esp ppl he likes

also just. doesn’t know when to stop talking. can find ways to ramble about nothing, asks questions w the intent of being annoying, etc. etc.

his ~parents~ didn’t rly believe in modern medicine n they were just like ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away!’ so he’s got this obsession w apples. literally is always chewing on an apple or a toothpick or anything he can get his hands on. he’s like a teething toddler, essentially

probably the dumbass who plays wonderwall at a party tbh

okay but fun fact! he’s super nimble and just. cat-like, from all his yrs of practicing n performing tightrope walking. if he falls over it’s because he wants to fall over and if he falls over it’s bc he wants ATTENTION

he loves. being the center of attention? but he’s also content with being in the background if it makes sense. he just wants to be doing something, anything

anyways he doesn’t take shit seriously at all like, i don’t think he’s ever had a serious conversation in his life ?

big slut for parties. he loves partying, he nvr knew he loved partying until he went to ucla but he loves it

he’s got an addictive personality so like okay. he’s not Addicted Addicted to anything specific (besides nicotine) but he definitely has no problem with drinking n doing drugs Often.

i mean he’s reckless too he never knows when to stop, feels like he’s tryn to be the Superior boy but he’s not and he’s probably overcompensating nowadays to deal w the guilt of accidentally burning down his entire life

drives cars too fast, drinks too much, has no problem getting into heavier drugs

also okay on a lighter note the boy used to be addicted to cigarettes bc he started fairly young but hoo boy he’s now on that juul game

literally he always has a juul on him. spends all his money on juuls

he works as a florist n a gardener for extra cash even tho his bio parents send him money, just bc its one of the only things that really calm him down tbh ??

also i meant it when i said he doesnt tell ppl his real name, like, ever. at least his first name bc he loves his last name but ? u probably dont know him as benjamin or even benjy, just smth stupid like marcellus the magnificent or booboo the fool hahahsdfgh

did i mention he casually juggles bc i genuinely cannot remember lmao

uuuhh there’s more i’m sure but !! i have a really bad memory!

i also dunno if im keeping his fc but we will SEE

he’s basically like....still a five yr old child

OH okay so i remembered smth else

he’s essentially a nomad which means he hates being rooted to ucla so he’s usually off drivin’ around the coast bc he’s bored goddammit but he always comes back bc he’s a loyal dog

speaking of loyal dogs. he’s got commitment issues. but not commitment issues? it’s sort of like. he gets really interested in things/people, kind of focuses all his energy on that thing or person, and then one day wakes up and is just. terribly bored. tends to drop ppl like that, esp relationships, and he doesn’t think much of it bc it’s Normal for him

but believe it or not, if u call him in the middle of the night he WILL show up, or if u wrong him instead of him wronging u, he’ll still b endlessly loyal

like he’s shitty but he’s got a heart ?

also like i said. he is chaotically bi. both chaotic and bisexual and also the two combined.

he’s chaotic neutral in general

wanted connections ?? possibly ??

frat bros - [hulk hogan voice] brother. he needs them

general friends ! - if u dont hate him then u just. love him, man. no inbetween

exes - he’s probably got...a few of these, because his attention span lasts like a max of two weeks

hookups - they also dont tend to last very long just bc of how he is as a person, but y’know. they good while they last

ex-hookups, specifically

ex-friends - bc he’s an idiot

if u really want to u can bring in a circus pal but firstly idk how they’d afford school but honestly. we can work smth out. hmu [kissy face]

roommate - do they hate each other ?? who knows

bad influence - they only egg on benjy’s dumbass behavior

good influence - probably forces him to study for once, or take care of his dumb ass

idk what to call it but like. ppl who HE eggs on to be bad, is generally toxic to the other person

anything else u want [another kissy face]

#uclas:intro #hi sorry benjy and i are both messes

[mymoonjin1]

My thoughts on Crimes of Grindelwald

I know there are loads of comments on this already but I too need to rant for a while. I’ll try to finish this off with some constructive criticism, though. (I’d like to add that it’s perfectly fine if you did enjoy this film, this is just MY opinion.)

I don’t even know where to start. Listen, I am a huge Harry Potter fan, always have been, even considering a tattoo. And I actually really liked the first Fantastic Beasts movie. It had its flaws, but overall it was a good story. But most importantly: the movie can stand on itself. It has its own plot. Newt arrives in New York and accidentally lets loose a few magical creatures. The goal: finding the creatures whilst figuring out who is causing the muggle attacks. Simple, fun. They mention Hogwarts and Dumbledore, stuff we’re familiar with, but not overly so. It’s done cleverly. Now. Cut to Crimes of Grindelwald. Oh, boy. From uncomfortable close-ups to just plain weird editing this film is a goddam mess, not to mention the nonsensical storylines. No matter how effing cute nifflers are. Let’s break it into themes. 

Grindelwald

The movie ended and I still had no idea what Grindelwald’s crimes were. He “escapes” (He had already switched places with Abernathy, so why was that whole scene even there? A dark, evil wizard like him surely would just call Abernathy's sacrifice necessary for the cause or whatever), his French sidekick kills a family in order to keep their house and then he gives a speech. That’s it. What were his crimes?! He’s already a “notorious" dark wizard, what has he done besides spreading the word? Also, what is his actual ideology here? I’m sorry but that speech was a bit lame and again, confusing. Is he opposed to World War II or is he gonna take advantage of it? Kill all muggles or only those responsible for the war? But most importantly, we see Grindelwald for like ten minutes during the whole movie, why is his name even on the freaking title? I liked when he held his wand like he was directing an orchestra whilst killing everyone with the blue fire. That’s pretty much it.  Also, I’m not getting into Johnny Depp’s controversy cause that’s a whole other issue, but I think it reflected on his performance, like he was being too cautious, or something, at least that was my perception. I mean, whatever the circumstances, you’re already playing the role, then play the goddam role. 

Queenie

*Sigh* I honestly do not understand how they managed to turn a sweet and caring character into this whiny and annoying person, doing things so out of character. The love potion crap. Are you freaking kidding me?! Why was this necessary? Never mind about Jacob’s consent when I can just roofie him, kidnap him and force him to marry me! I’m the victim here, I just want to marry the one I love! Just… whyyyy? Also, she’s a freaking mind reader. How could a mind reader get brainwashed into joining a dark wizard? Because he preaches... free love? Ummm, does he?! Also, why did she freak out on the street? It was never mentioned before that her mind could get overwhelmed in crowds. It would make sense, but it was so out of nowhere it came out weird, and that scene just takes too damn long. Then the movie forgets about her for like twenty minutes to suddenly show her at the French witch’s house, like sure, I’ll go for a cup of tea with a total stranger, why not? Ugh. 

Dumbledore 

Ok, I actually liked Jude Law’s performance. The issue is that he, just like Grindelwald, is barely in the movie. We already knew that their relationship wasn’t going to be explored in this film, but it was still disappointing. We only got a “we were closer than brothers” and some hand-holding seen through the Mirror of Erised, WHICH APPARENTLY CAN NOW SHOW MEMORIES TOO, BUT OKAY. And please explain to me how is a blood pact different from an Unbreakable Vow? I get the aesthetic but surely an Unbreakable Vow is more convenient since it can’t be undone. Dumbledore suggested at the end of the movie that he might be able to destroy the blood pact. Wouldn’t have Grindelwald made sure to not leave anything to chance? Also, when did they make this blood pact, before the duel that killed Ariana? Why were they able to duel then? It can’t have been after, they wouldn’t have been exactly on speaking terms after that. That blood pact storyline took away the complexity of Dumbledore’s motives about not wanting to go after Grindelwald. Why wasn’t it enough that he once loved him and couldn’t bear to confront him after all that happened between them? That was a perfectly good explanation. This whole thing completely downplayed their relationship, like “yeah, now I just need to figure out how to destroy this necklace and I’ll be free to duel and possibly kill him, yay!” *Sighs*

Leta and Yusuf

What was the real purpose for these characters? We were lead to believe that the Lestrange family history was going to have this awesome revelation/plot twist and it ended up going nowhere. Also, the (insufferably long) scene where they finally explain the whole thing was so overcomplicated and confusing AF. For some reason, Leta’s dad (a rapist) sent her and her half-brother to the US, but since the baby wouldn’t shut up Leta switched him with another baby who happened to look exactly like him, and that baby was Creedence. Uh…okay? But then Leta returned to the UK and studied at Hogwarts? Sooo was that meant to be only a cool summer abroad? And how did she know about her half-brother Yusuf? How did they meet? Who made that freaking prophecy? Yusuf made that unbreakable vow with… whom, exactly? Himself? Arrgggg. Yusuf seemed to be an important character, I mean he locks Tina and Newt in a dungeon (they escape immediately but ok), but no. He spends almost the entirety of the movie unconscious only to appear conveniently at the cemetery to reveal he’s Leta’s half-brother. Just. Why ANY OF IT if later on we’d find out Creedence isn't even a Lestrange? GOD. 

So, back to Leta. She switched the babies (in the Titanic?) and also befriended Newt at Hogwarts. What was her relevance in the present? Why wasn’t the whole "ending up marrying his brother" explained? That’s a flashback that would’ve been useful, unlike the other ones. It could’ve added so much more to the relationship between the three of them, specially Theseus and Newt. But it was never mentioned. Also, why was she hated by everyone at school? Were all the Lestrange hated or was it only her? And THEN, FFS what was she even trying to attempt when she approached Grindelwald? Was she like tempted into joining him but regretted her decision last minute and tried to kill him instead? WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT ALL ABOUT? I liked the part when she said “I love you” and you’re not quite sure if she meant Newt or his brother. That was interesting. Would’ve been even more interesting had it been developed properly. But the rest of it? What a mess.

Newt, Tina, and Jacob

I actually adore Newt as a character. He’s a refreshing male lead who’s unapologetically himself throughout the story. I read a Vox article that called him amazingly neurodivergent, and in an interview, Redmayne also said he thought of him as having Asperger's. What an extraordinary thing to see in a male lead in a multimillion-dollar franchise! He’s awesome and doesn’t need to change the way he is in order to be cool. And yet in this film, he’s sooo relegated. He could’ve done SO much more, instead, he’s just lost in the sea of subplots with no real purpose. As for Tina, she has absolutely no character development whatsoever and Jacob is just there for comic relief. Also, how did he get his memories back? I’m sorry, but “the potion only took away the bad memories” is lazy writing. They are great characters but did absolutely nothing in this movie. Totally underappreciated. 

Nagini and Creedence

I don’t get why they made such a fuss over this since she has like THREE lines in the entire movie?! Seriously, why was she even there? She brought absolutely NOTHING to the plot. She just stands there next to Creedence when she could’ve been a super badass character. I’m not getting into the whole controversy, but I mean, if it was already happening, she should’ve at least had a kickass introduction. A backstory. ANYTHING. Why is a woman turning into a snake a circus attraction when anyone in this universe can become an animagus with enough practice? She was sooo mistreated here as a character. I get that there’s gonna be three more movies but COME ON, you can’t just make a huge ass preamble to another film without ANY sort of character development. It needs to have a plot of its own too. Like each of the Harry Potter books/movies. GEEZ. Now, Creedence. How did he survive? We saw a little remnant of the obscurus at the end of the first film, but hey, a little more context would’ve been nice. I thought the host and the obscurus were different things. Care to explain?! Also, how did he end up in Europe working at a magic circus? That circus thing could’ve been a very interesting plot but it goes nowhere. Again. And then... the ending. I hope the theory going around that it’s actually Ariana’s obscurus that somehow got attached to him and not actually him that’s a Dumbledore (and that’s what the phoenix was attracted to) is real because otherwise IT DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE. Kendra Dumbledore died in 1899. Crimes takes place in 1927. That’s 28 years. I HIGHLY doubt Creedence is 28. Why would he still be living at an orphanage at 28 then? Or did Dumbledore’s dad knock someone up in Azkaban? Just. So. Many. Plot. Holes.

Nonsensical stuff

-The lady guarding Leta’s chamber. What. The. Fork?! She lets them through even though she clearly knew Tina wasn’t Leta, and only after they’re already inside she unleashes those weird cat things with Leta being there, the actual owner of the chamber who clearly doesn’t have a problem with the “intruders”. Just… WHY? 

-Jacob being able to go through the statue. Ummmm?! 

-McGonagall. SHE WAS BORN IN 1935! WHAT?!

-Also, I get the whole 1920’s vibe and I mean no disrespect towards Colleen Atwood, because the costumes are actually gorgeous, but like… no robes? NONE? You can’t tell muggles and wizards apart. That was a key aspect of Harry Potter, at least with the older generations, so you’d think in the 1920’s they’d be even more traditional with their wizard clothing. I mean, Lupin wore both suits AND robes. Just saying. 

-Out of hundreds of people at the cemetery, the niffler somehow knew precisely what item to steal and from whom. Ok???? 

-Nicholas Flamel. What was the point of him? All he did was talk with a random woman through a book and then conveniently appear at the end to tell everyone what to do to control the fire. I mean, cool, but care to elaborate?

-And that blue fire eagle thing. It’s a very, very long sequence that could have been way quicker. It was time wasted on CGI, time they could’ve spent more wisely elsewhere. 

-Another thing that has been rubbing me the wrong way is the mention of Creedence’s nanny being half-elf. I know it’s probably stupid for me to be weird about it but listen. This is a universe with house elves and goblins, and that’s totally fine, I like the part they play in the story. But then we also have Professor Flitwick, who’s never mentioned to be either of those things; he’s just little. That’s it. And he’s a total badass. So why did the nanny had to be half-elf? I remember an interview with Peter Dinklage in which he said he didn’t like playing roles that cast little people as magical beings, which is why he loved Tyrion in Game of Thrones. Then why couldn’t the nanny just be a regular witch? Why half-elf? How did that come about? Think about it: a human witch/wizard… with a house elf? Which are, essentially… slaves?! I don’t even want to know. And I’m probably overthinking it, but seriously. It wasn’t a necessary detail to mention. 

The Fanservice 

Ok, I get that they’d include certain Potter related stuff. Nostalgia is fun, right? AS LONG AS IT MAKES SENSE. McGonagall being there makes no sense. RESPECT. CANON. PLEASE. I get retconning stuff like classes taking place on different floors at Hogwarts but dude. This was kind of an important detail. The Philosopher’s Stone casually being shown at Flamel’s house. I mean, fine. But we get it, we know who he is, it’s not like we are idiots who need reminding of this. Also, the music. I adore Hedwig’s Theme, but this is a different story. I get like a few notes here and there, but the WHOLE damn theme during that Hogwarts shot? It actually kind of threw me off a little. I couldn’t pay attention to what was actually happening. 

Conclusion 

Ok. I honestly don’t understand what went wrong. I don’t know if Rowling should just stick to writing novels or if it was the editing, the directing or-or… I just can’t even. JK Rowling is amazing at writing mystery. In all of the Harry Potter books, there were mysteries to be solved: who’s after the Philosopher’s Stone? Who opened the Chamber of Secrets? Why is Sirius Black after Harry? Who put his name in the Goblet of Fire? And so on. And in the first FB movie, the mystery was who was responsible for the attacks, and it made you believe it was Creedence’s little sister. That was still a good plot twist. Please, do tell, what was solved in Crimes? What did they actually accomplish? They spent the whole movie going in circles. Like I said, you can’t just have a huge ass preamble to a different movie. It needs to stand on its own, have its own arc. Otherwise, what’s the point? I genuinely wanted to like this film, but its narrativity makes it impossible to enjoy the actual plot, even with likable characters and appealing visuals.

Listen, I will forever be grateful to JK Rowling for the impact Harry Potter has had in my life. They are to this day my favorite books. I loved the original book for Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, as well as Quidditch Through the Ages and Tales of Beedle the Bard. They added fun details to the main story, a little peek into the Wizarding World. But then the whole expansion happened. And I used to get mildly excited whenever a new story was published on Pottermore. But eventually, I lost interest. And whenever someone said “I wish there was another book” I immediately cringed at the thought. Why ruin something that had ended in such a perfect way? The Harry Potter world ended with the seventh book. And that was ok. You need to let things go. That’s life. But then for money some reason, Cursed Child (aka That Which Must Not Be Named) was allowed to happen. And then, Fantastic Beasts happened, but it was a whole different story with brand new characters within the same universe, actually written by JK Rowling. Well, that actually sounded promising. Because it was a separate thing. A few references here and there. What could go wrong? Right. 

There are millions of reasons why the expansion hasn’t been working, but I think part of the problem came from social media. When we were kids we’d send letters to our favorite authors, but now they are just a tweet away. Which can obviously be wonderful. But you have to know where to stop. And I don’t think JK understands that. And I don’t mean it like she’s not allowed to have her own opinions and versions of certain things that didn’t come up in the books; she created the universe. But altering canon isn’t right. Forcing narratives that don’t make sense with what’s already established is weird. That’s why it’s important to leave things to the imagination/each reader’s interpretation. You want to write a different story within the same universe, that’s amazing, go ahead! As long as it’s properly developed and has its own merits. I genuinely want to like FB. And I did. But I don’t know what went wrong with this one. You’re capable of SO much more, Jo, I know you are. Sorry if I’m being too harsh. 

#fantastic beasts #crimes of grindelwald #crimes of grindelwald spoilers #rant #opinion #fantastic beasts movie #fantastic beasts and where to find them #jk rowling #twoheartedslytherinwrites

[punchmedanny]

Chicago II July 25, 2018

Alright strap yourselves in cuz this is gonna be a long ass post WITH SPOILERS for Interactive Introverts. I will mark where spoilers begin if you want to read about pre show stuff. If you don't want any spoilers whatsoever, don't feel obligated to read this even if we're buddies! Feel free to send me an ask/dm instead 😅

Alright folks, let's go!

Playing the Waiting Game

I was supposed to get to the venue at 4 for m&g, but I got there before 3 because a) i'm terrified of being late and b) my uber driver made excellent time.

The venue was not open yet, so my bf and I walked to a nearby mall. We passed by the tour buses (presumably dnp's plus other performers'). There was a group of people hanging around them looking v stalkerish (please don't hang around the buses before the show)

We got back to venue around 3:50 and waited in line outside till 4 when the venue let us in. We were near the middle of the line, so if you want to be closer to the front, get there sooner lol

Turns out I was behind the lovely @noodlephil in line (although I didn’t know till after!)

Two internet friends were meeting for the first time and crying (it was adorable)

Inside, there was a table with staff that checked and marked our tickets then gave us silver paper wristbands

We got in a second line where we had a bag check (our venue allowed sealed water bottles, but that might vary) and were scanned by a wand metal detector. After that, staff scanned our tickets 

We went to a third line which was the actual line for m&g and were told the m&g itself would start around 4:30

Marianne came by and said we would be waiting a bit longer for "latecomers" (im p sure dnp were the latecomers because most people were there at that point haha)

Marianne walked like a frickin goddess and her voice was beautiful

She made a speech giving us a rundown of how m&g would work, which I recorded

The m&g area was set up in the lobby to the side of the theatre doors

Dan and Phil entered from our left (towards the back of the theate)

They jogged across the m&g backdrop where we could see them better and waved. Dan did the cutest bouncy jump ever while waving. He stayed out longer than Phil

There was a table to set your bag on as you approached the backdrop

The music was loud af and there was NO WAY to see or hear other people's m&g - it was v private even though there were tons of people

Marianne was at the very front of the line and asked what she could do to help. I was like uhhh (because I'm eloquent like that) and she asked if we had anything for them to sign. My bf had golf balls lmao and gave them to her. I said I wanted to take a Polaroid for them to sign. She had me turn the camera on because apparently they’d had issues with Polaroid cameras in the past

I thanked her for the way everything was being run and joked a bit while we waited

When it was our turn, the people in front of us were completely gone (I repeat: v private). Marianne gestured and verbally told us to go on in

Meeting Dan and Phil

Phil was wearing his red jacket and good vibes t-shirt just like the beginning of "week in the life" He welcomed us with open arms and I went in for the Phil Hug. Wow. Phil is an excellent hugger and his arms felt a lot stronger than I imagined. And, yes, he waited for me to let go first

As soon as I let go of Phil, I stepped to the side and and looked at Dan. He was wearing his II denim jacket over a white t-shirt. He also had his arms wide for a hug. And lemme tell you, that boi has a fuckin wingspan. Dan gave a more gentle hug than Phil and we let go at like the same time

I am not a hugger and wasnt even 100% sure before I went in that I would hug them tbh

After the hugs, I stepped back and took them both in that's what she said. My initial impression was confidence and class. Literally, the most confident people I've ever encountered irl

Everyone says they're tall, but they are, as my bf said, taller than advertised. He's 6'2 and still looked up to both of them. I feel like they're both close to the next inch up honestly

They are wide. Like we've all noticed the Phil is wide, but Dan is too! They are literal giants

The cameras do NOT do them justice. Phil looks his age irl and I mean that in the sexiest way possible. He does actually have pores and tiny wrinkles (gasp), but I think they only make him more attractive. He oozes understated masculinity. But he also has serious nerd energy and idgaf attitude. Basically, he seems kind of badass

Dan looked flawless. Like I know every so often people wonder about if he wears makeup and all imma say is either he does OR he has the best damn skin care routine and/or genetics ever. He looks like someone after they use a filter

I'd say dan is suave and phil has swagger

(I'm about to sound real fucking weird) They both had such strong auras or energy or whatever you want to call it. It was palpable and BIG - like it extended off of them a couple feet. Dan's felt more static-y, while phil's felt more like balloon about to burst. It merged together between them to where I couldn't tell where one stopped and the other started

Marianne handed Phil the golf balls and he and Dan just stared at them in his hand in confusion for a second then Phil said "golf balls?" before my bf explained it was because they were the caddy lads. They chuckled and Dan said it was "the only series that has any value"

I am now the proud (?) owner of photos and video of phil holding two balls in his hand and I feel really weird about it

Dan asked if I had anything for them to sign, so I told him I wanted to take a Polaroid to which Dan replied, "D'ya want me to attempt the rare Polaroid selfie?"

Then I actually gently teased Dan (!?!?) because I'm a little shit lol I said, "I successfully did one this morning, so I hope you can"

They both seemed mildly amused and he did the thing where he touched his chest lightly in mock offense and said, "Well, let's see"

Tbh I think this was why I got genuine smiles in my pic

Dan said, "Beautiful" and Phil said "Amazing" lol (it really was tho)

Dan described the signature he'd be doing as "the tiniest little dan" and he used the highest voice ever

Phil's signature was so bad im pretty sure dan laughed at it lmao

Dan offered another selfie with my phone (i love him)

I shook their hands before I left and they seemed surprised, but appreciative. They both had excellent handshakes: firm, but not too hard. They both had soft, warm hands with Phil's being about average and Dan's being warmer than average

Overall, they were incredibly kind and professional. The vibe to be was sort of like talking to a boss who isn't your direct boss at a work party: fun, but still guarded

The saying goes "Never meet your heroes," but whoever said that obviously never met dan and phil. This was one of my happiest memories of all time

1500+ word description of the meeting including a sommelier worthy account of how the boys smell

And here’s the (real shit) video of my m&g

The Pre-Show

After meeting the bois, we were immediately given our goodie bags (one of them was double stuffed, lucky me)

Staff asked if we’d be staying in the theatre or not. Upon telling them we’d be leaving, they let us know we’d need to scan out so we could re-enter later

We bought merch (tie-dye/marbled look tee, long sleeved tee, and denim jacket). The line was basically non-existant, so if you have VIP 100% get your merch at this time

We scanned out and were told we could re-enter at 6 along with general admittance ticket holders

We had dinner then got back around 6:10. There was no line this time and we went through security and ticket scanning again

There were so many people everywhere and everyone was so cute! Why are we such a good looking fandom??? The line for merch was EXTREMELY long. RIP those folks

So was the line for the restrooms (and multiple men’s rooms were turned into ladydoors women’s restrooms)

We got 2 drinks (both for me) then went to our seats. We were front and center - I could literally touch the stage with my shoe from my seat. At this time I met @phandommom and @crunchytoasted1

The pre-show music was loud af where I was seated (I actually put in ear plugs lol). Lots of people were dancing and I got to witness crunchytoast dance to “Ladydoor” live which was a treat. At one point various people were running across the theatre with various LGBT+ flags to plenty of cheers. ‘Twas glorious. People did the whole waving the phone flashlights thing and sang along during “Welcome to the Black Parade”

My bf got me 2 more drinks

Showtime! 

THIS IS WHERE THE SPOILERS START!!!

It was so, so weird to see them onstage after having the m&g. I legit wanted to climb onstage and like be close again, but, ya know, I didn’t cuz I know what’s socially acceptable

We were called Susan. Classic

Phil was wearing waffle socks. As in socks with tiny waffles all over them

We sacrificed Phil to Satan and Dan died in a furry nightclub

None of mine or my bf’s answers got chosen and I’m a bit salty lol

We sacrificed Dan (the only correct choice fite me)

At intermission the line for the bathrooms was sooooo long omg. I got myself 2 more drinks at this point and called @h-owllslide to gush about the show. I spilled one of my drinks on my bf a little when I sat back down.

Danny was 3 centimeters away from loosing his dick and he got paint on his shoe. He seemed legit irked lol

Nick Jonas was in Dan’s box, but I don’t recall the other two cuz that was the only one that mattered imo

I got a piece of the sign and when they threw it into the audience it was a bit disturbing how everyone tore into it like a swarm of pirahnas

They wore Cubs baseball shirts over their usual shirts during the rap/song finale which was absolutely precious. I LOVED the finale so fucking much - it was magnificent

END SPOILERS!!!

Closing Thoughts

I wish I hadn’t drank so much (6 wines for those of you keeping track at home). I was getting real embarrassing by the end (as in screaming excitedly too much/ too often) and I don’t remember it as clearly as I wish I did. I was just freaking tf out and my anti-anxiety meds weren’t cutting it

I was struggling incredibly hard not to disassociate the entire time

I wish I could go to another show. It was so fun!

The following day, I had a major mood drop. If you’re prone to this, maybe have a plan to hang with someone and do something nice, but lowkey the next day

This was literally the most fun thing I’ve done in at least two years and was one of my happiest memories ever. We’re talking patronus conjuring levels of happy

If you can go, go. If you can’t, don’t feel too bad. It was EXTREMELY intense and not for everyone (especially m&g). Plus they are putting it up later, which I’m looking forward to because I think I’ll be able to better absorb it

Please feel free to ask me anything about the show! I’d love to go on about it lol

#omg this is so much longer than i anticipated #i mean i aint apologizing lmao #i will be legitimately surprised if anyone reads this in its entirety #it's mainly to help me remember because i have some memory issues #Dan and Phil #dan howell #daniel howell #phil lester #amazingphil #DNP #interactive introverts spoilers #interactive introverts #ii spoilers #ii m&g #text post #punchmedanny #tw: alcohol

[preserving-ferretbrain]

Not Exactly T.H. White

by Viorica

Wednesday, 14 January 2009

Viorica's review of the BBC's cracktastic Merlin.~

After what might be called a bitter breakup with BBC’s Robin Hood, I promised myself that I’d avoid any further TV shows that were more enjoyable for their badness than their quality. So when the majority of my Livejournal friendslist began squeeing over Merlin, I swore I’d avoid the temptation. No matter how shiny and cracky and homoerotic it appeared, I was not going to watch it, because I knew that if I did I’d be sucked into shiny-cracky-homoerotic-bad TV land. But eventually the temptation grew too strong, and I downloaded the first season to watch over Christmas break. I expected bad special effects; I got that. I expected inaccuracy; I got that in droves. I expected mediocre writing and acting, and I got . . . something else.

If you assumed from the title of the show that Merlin is based on Arthurian legends, you’d be better off abandoning that idea right now. The series revolves around a teenage boy named - you guessed it - Merlin who is sent to live at the court of Camelot by his mother, because he’s manifested magical powers, and she has an old friend, Gaius who lives at Camelot and who is better equipped to train Merlin than she is. Unfortunately for Merlin, magic is outlawed in Camelot, and has been since the birth of Prince Arthur about twenty years earlier. Yes, Merlin and Arthur and the same age, and that’s only the beginning of the divergence from the original stories. Merlin manages to land a job as Arthur’s manservant, much to Arthur’s chagrin, as Merlin has a tendency to call Arthur out on his bullshit. From there on in, it’s up to Merlin to protect Arthur from various pissed-off sorcerers (Arthur’s father Uther Pendragon has ordered all magic-users burned at the stake, which has naturally rubbed them up the wrong way) while simultaneously trying to hide his own powers and protect innocent people from Uther’s wrath. He’s helped by Guinevere, aka Gwen, a maid at the castle, and her mistress Morgana, Uther’s ward, who disagrees with his policies. Merlin is also mentored by a dragon being held prisoner under the castle, who has an irritating tendency to intone “Protecting Arthur is your destiny, Merlin!” at least once an episode.

If you think it sounds cheesy, you’re completely right. It’s intended as a kid’s show, and filmed with the audience in mind - despite the rather high amounts of violence (at least one person dies per episode) the camera always cuts away from the nasty stuff. The main conflict is Merlin’s need to hide the fact that he has magical powers, and the fact that this keeps conflicting with his need to protect Arthur, which obviously has no basis whatsoever in Arthurian legend, but then neither does anything else. As the series progresses, Arthur and Merlin’s relationship evolves from that of mutual resentment to comfortable partnership, and eventually friendship (which comes off as very, very very homoerotic, probably due to the fact that it involves a lot of hugging and acts of unwavering devotion. The cynical part of me thinks that the writers are playing to the crowd.) The actors playing Merlin and Arthur are actually quite good, and what they bring to their roles - quiet goodness in Colin Morgan’s case and brash testosterone in Bradley James’s - helps establish the boys as genuinely likeable people, struggling to figure out their place in the world. Angel Coulby is incredibly sweet as shy, blushing Gwen, who spends most of her time trying to make everyone as happy as possible. The weak link in the cast is Katie McGrath, who plays Morgana with a maximum of two facial expressions: smug and perturbed. The older actors are obviously having fun with their roles, and bringing some gravitas to the characters as well - Anthony Stewart Head’s Uther is unlikeable by virtue of his actions (this is, after all, a man who ordered all magicians put to death over a mistake he made) but thanks to Stewart Head’s talent, you can see a bit of humanity shining through from behind the throne. Richard Wilson’s Gaius is your standard mentor/father figure, with a dry sense of humour that managed to make me laugh at least once an episode. John Hurt voiced the Dragon, and there really isn’t much to say about his performance - given the fact that all he gets to do is blather about destiny, there isn’t much room to stretch. The guest stars are touch-and-go - Santiago Cabrera, who played Lancelot, was absolutely awful, while Asa Butterfield was suitably creepy as an eight-year-old Mordred. No one is giving Lawrence Olivier a run for his money, but they’re a very talented bunch, especially considering that most of them haven’t hit thirty yet.

I’m not entirely sure what I expected from the writing. Before watching it, I’d heard the show referred to “crappy tweenager fantasy” so I assumed it’d be a lot of rambling about Destiny and True Love and The Power of Friendship. While that is included (see my note on the Dragon of Destiny) it’s not as wearing as you might expect, mostly because the characters point out the stupidity of doing something because it’s My Destiny at least once an episode. No one wants to watch a show about people who do things because they’re told; most of the struggles come from Merlin and his friends struggling with the expectations they’re being held up to versus their own inherent sense of what’s right. My personal favourite episode revolves around a young boy who Uther wants to execute because he’s a Druid-in-training. Merlin, who obviously takes the stance that killing innocent children is wrong, enlists Morgana’s help to hide the boy, and Arthur’s to smuggle him out of Camelot. For this he is repeatedly chastised by the Dragon, because the boy is eventually going to kill Arthur. Merlin and co say “Screw this” and smuggle the boy away to his own people. At the end of the episode (spoilers, obviously) Arthur asks for his name, and the child replies “Mordred.” It’s a deliciously eerie moment (helped out by Mordred’s creepy stare) and an interesting message about Destiny v. Free Will: the choices of Merlin and his friends will make or break Camelot, but it’s up to them to decide what it’s worth. Fortunately, not all of the destiny-related storylines are that gloomy. For example, one of the show’s most endearing points is the relationship between Merlin and Arthur, which begins with Merlin flat-out chastising Arthur for taunting a servant. Although Merlin is repeatedly pushed towards the prince by the dragon (for this reason, he’s acquired the fandom nickname “Slash Dragon”) their relationship eventually becomes that of friends. When Merlin goes to protect Arthur at the potential expense of his own life, he’s doing it out of affection for the prince rather than a sense of duty, and that - the inherent nobility of the main cast - is a big part of what makes the show so endearing.

There is, of course, the problem of the show’s title, which I’ll have to address or risk this article becoming unadulterated gushing. I’m not especially familiar with Arthurian legend - I know the basics, and I’m about thirty pages into The Once and Future King, but I’m far from an expert - but from what I do know, I honestly can’t understand why they decided to tack the name “Merlin” on it at all. There are references to “canon”, such as it is - in one episode, Arthur is wounded by the Questing Beast - but overall, it plays out like an original story with occasional allusions to Thomas Malory or T.H. White. As I’ve said, it’s good enough to stand on its own, and I think the attempts at labelling it an Arthurian adaptation are going to be detrimental in the long run. Instead of being remembered as a well-written original series, it’s going to end up being dismissed as “that crappy Arthurian adaptation that screwed up the stories”. Actually, the fact that they felt the need to try and slap the name of a pre-existing story on it kind of makes me sad, because it implies that they felt they couldn’t market an original series, and that’s just depressing. Aside from the rage-inducing potential for Arthurian enthusiasts, there’s some holes in the writing - in one episode Morgana says that Gaius has been caring for her since before she can remember, then later claims that she came to live in Camelot when she was ten, implying either than she has long-term memory loss or that someone didn’t proofread closely enough. Still, the small slipups aren’t enough to detract from a genuinely enjoyable show. And if all else fails, you can always hit mute and enjoy the eye candy.Themes:

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Wardog

at 10:16 on 2009-01-14Hello, welcome - and thank you for this wonderful review. I no longer need feel ashamed of my secret love for Merlin. When it first came on, I dismissed it after about 10 ten minutes (Uther's first 'by the way, this is the backplot' speech didn't help) but a few weeks later my LJ friendslist also exploded with squee and joy, so I gave it another go and, lo, it was simultaneously awesome and awful and utterly utterly watchable.

You're absolutely right about Morganna not being quite up to speed on, y'know, this 'acting' thing ... but she is very, very beautiful, so I don't mind. And the dragon is a bit repetative, despite being voiced by John Hurt.

The weird thing is I don't really get any slashy kind of vibe from Arthur and Merlin, despite the fact that these two boys finding friendship and making sacrifices for each other ought to be very homoerotic. I suppose I find it slashy in principle but there isn't much a spark between the actors (I mean in terms of teh gay) to make it stick. Possibly I am just missing.

As you say in your conclusion I do find Merlin's status as an adaption interesting - I actually rather enjoyed the complete lack of respect with which they treated the mythos, once I got over myself about it. The Arthurian background does give it all a familiarity and a resonance that might have been lacking if it was just Generic Fantasy Story About Friendship and Valour. Although it is a bit dodgy I have come to think the Arthurian dimension does add something - there's always something joyous about watching people play in the paddling pool of literature and start a water fight.

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Rami

at 10:49 on 2009-01-14Yay! I somewhat guiltily enjoyed Merlin myself, including the not-quite-aside allusions to actual canon / legend (the court genealogist appears to be Geoffrey of Monmouth ;-)). Arthurian legend, historically, has been pretty flexible and as far as I know there isn't any real canon — so I'm all in favor of going in a new direction with it, and I'm quite willing to forgive the writers for taking advantage of all the gravitas and popular awareness that Arthur's story gives you. As you said, that moment when the little Druid boy tells Arthur his name is eerie -- but it would have been meaningless if it hadn't been Mordred talking to Arthur, and / or you didn't know who Mordred and Arthur were.

About the cast — Anthony Head and Richard Wilson are brilliant, of course, I can't disagree, but I have to admit I don't share your reservations about Katie McGrath. (But maybe that's because of the eye-candy factor.)

Perhaps it's my lack of slash goggles but I don't see the "very, very homoerotic" between Merlin and Arthur? I wonder if it's just 21st-century cynicism that makes "heartfelt and sincere" have to mean "Twu Wuv"?

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Rami

at 10:52 on 2009-01-14Oh God Kyra and I have just posted very nearly the same comment.

Resistance is futile

I mean, no, FerretBrain doesn't have a "Collective Consciousness" feature...

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Wardog

at 12:06 on 2009-01-14You will be assimilated....

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Viorica

at 22:18 on 2009-01-14I suppose the slash question depends on what you go in expecting. I was told repeatedly before ever watching it that the boys were the slashiest slashy things that were ever slashed, so I went in with slash goggles firmly strapped on. And I suppose there's an interesting study to be done on the way men show affection v. the way women do and how it's interpreted by outside observers . . . but as far as fandom's concernd, it's all about the pretty and the gay.

As for Katie McGrath, she is pretty, but there's always this irritating feeling that I'd like the character so much more if she could emote properly. As it is, she tends to grate.

Apropos of nothing, have you watched the video diaries? They're screamingly hilarious, and both Bradley James and Colin Morgan act uncannily like their characters. It's a little creepy . . .

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Wardog

at 11:35 on 2009-01-15That's the thing, although I'm not a slasher myself, I do occasionally find myself on the outskirts of fandom enough to have some slash goggles of my own. I was prepared for slash, I looked for slash, I saw ... the motions of slash ... but I didn't *feel* the slash. Sometimes there's a genuine spark between actors or something about the way a relationship is portrayed that makes me secretly believe something could conceivably be going on between them. I was re-watching DS9 (sad bastard that I am) recently and, despite knowing not a damn thing about the DS9 fandom, I became immediately and increasingly convinced that Sisko and Dukat were having incredibly hot hatesex... (Dan holds out for Dax/Kira girlsex, however, - they are certainly very giggly together).

I watched some of the video diaries - Bradley James is so adorably silly. I mean this in a maternal way, not a sick way. I particularly liked his musing on the cockatrice.

By the way, I meant to ask, what caused things to sour with Robin Hood? I never watched it so...

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Gina Dhawa

at 16:04 on 2009-01-16

Arthurian legend, historically, has been pretty flexible and as far as I know there isn't any real canon — so I'm all in favor of going in a new direction with it ... that moment when the little Druid boy tells Arthur his name is eerie -- but it would have been meaningless if it hadn't been Mordred talking to Arthur, and / or you didn't know who Mordred and Arthur were.

This is my justification for liking

Merlin

the way it is. T.H. White took some pretty big liberties along the way (though if you're thirty pages in, I won't spoil that), as have any of the people who have written the story down over the years. The trouble is convincing people there's not really a canon to be followed, that if you take the earliest versions of the stories and put them to what you might find in a modern collection, there are so many differences that you might think you weren't reading the same story at all.

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Viorica

at 19:51 on 2009-01-16Well, it could be argued that there are some basic plot foundations- Merlin being Arthur's mentor, Guinevere as his wife (though they still have time to do that), Morgana being his half-sister, etc. I think the reason some people don't like it is because they grew up on "The Sword and the Stone", so the show is effectively stomping on their childhood memories. I don't have any such memories to get stomped on, so it doesn't bug me.

Re: Robin Hood. It started out as silly fun, but it as it went on, you realized that the people running the show didn't know or care what they were doing. There were no efforts at making the costumes or scenery look nice, and virtually none of the characters were likeable, or even tolerable. Their Robin is the kind of guy who whines at an ex-girlfriend for "betraying" him when she's forced into marriage with another man. The urge to punch the title character in the face was stronger than any desire to keep watching.

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Sonia Mitchell

at 22:16 on 2009-01-16Great article. I didn't catch all the episodes, but definitely enjoyed the ones I did see. I like your point about the gravitas the older actors bring, particularly Head (in what could have been a pretty thankless role given his character's lack of humour).

Interesting discussion about the appropriate amount of reverence for the source material, too. I quite like the way Merlin did it, with plenty there for people who do know a bit about Arthurian legend but not so much you know for sure what's going to happen. I never saw Smallville, but I think of Merlin in much the same way - you know what happens down the line, but these are the gaps in between. And knowing what lies ahead is an interesting experience, because you're watching for it and everyone involved in the show knows you are (of the ones I saw, Lancelot's episode was the most willing to play with this).

It's also pretty dangerous, of course, because unless they're willing to go down the rejected destiny road the main young characters all have to live. I think they've got a nice balance - there's plenty of peril, but the real danger is more often disgrace than death (though I missed the last few episodes, so for all I know there was a dramatic and bloody finale).

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Viorica

at 01:30 on 2009-01-17There was *almost* a dramatic and bloody finale, but it was averted. You should really watch to see why, though- that episode actually managed to make me tear up a bit.

"Great article."

Thanks!

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Rami

at 12:44 on 2009-01-17I never saw Smallville, but I think of Merlin in much the same way

Yes! It's not all that different in many ways -- Smallville takes a lot of liberties with Superman canon (Lex Luthor and Clark Kent being friends, for instance), and I guess one of the reasons that it's more or less accepted is that Superman canon has been retconned so many times nobody's sure what *is* canon anymore. I think much the same is true for Arthurian legend ;-)

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Arthur B

at 15:05 on 2009-01-17I think in comics continuity Lex Luthor and Clark Kent

were

friends until Clark mistakes a controlled explosion in Lex's lab for an actual fire, and horribly injures Lex as he tries to put it out.

Six nerd points for me.

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Wardog

at 19:39 on 2009-01-17I have come late to the party...

The trouble is convincing people there's not really a canon to be followed...

I think this really nails the issue; perhaps, for a lot of people T.H.White is "canon", although it's Roger Lancelyn Green for me, personally - I have no idea who that guy is but basically every book available for kids about anything vaguely mythic, Greek, Norse, Egyptian, Celtic, was written, semi-turgidly, by this dude. Anyway, what I've got distracted from saying here is: a lot of those things we associate with the Arthur Legend today have very little in common with the early source material. Guinevere is barely in Malory - he just wasn't into chicks - and there's a sense that a lot of her bad press comes from the fact he decided to situate the fall of his macho martial ideal in damn women with their lack of appreciation for war, dammit, war. There's very little actually 'romantic' about Le Morte.

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Wardog

at 19:43 on 2009-01-17Also I am now definitely avoiding Robin Hood. I heard it was rubbish but fun, but that sounds like it's moved into "just plain rubbish" territory.

#Ferretbrain #Merlin #Viorica #BBC

[rofics]

Come Together pt 10

Bts gang au x hubrid reader and friend

Warnings: cursing, angst, violence, arguing,

http://rofics.tumblr.com/post/171547795932/come-together-pt-11-bts-gang-au-x-hybrid-reader

Damn gut feelings

I have no idea in hell how I'm supposed to fight in this damn maid costume, it doesn't move! I'll probably rip it in half, then all of me will be exposed.

Leo lunges, claws out to rip my costume but I dodge at the last second, finger barely grazing my arm. The party goers started to scream and fled the ballroom in panicked groups, pushing and shoving each other. I land kick after kick on Leo but they don't seem to phase him at all, fucking Jax.

"Y/N switch! I'll take Leo!" Eli yells, finally springing into action. I nod and kick Leo in the back, right into Eli's fist.

"At long last, I've wanted to kill you for so long Y/N" he spits out my name, and I crack my nuckles.

"I can assure you that I won't be the one to die tonight, Jax" I retaliate, kicking my platform shoes to the side and ripping off my stupid headband.

"You can't win, you don't even know how to use those pathetic powers that you inherited" he states smugly and a tiny hole is punched in my confidence. He is right about that, but I will not lose. I have to avenge Kyra and all of the hybrids he's killed.

I feel a calm settle through me 'I'm with you Y/N, don't worry. I have experience and you have heart, well kill this bastard once and for all' Kyra's voice floats in my head and I nod, clenching my fist.

An ice shard is shot at me so I put up a fire shield that makes the shard fizzle before it can even reach me.

"Of course a piece of shit like you would use ice magic. Who do you think you are? Fucking Gray Fullbuster?" I question with a snort. Jax lets out a human growl that makes me snicker, hand over my mouth.

"You want to growl at a dog? Are you for real? Bro you ain't shit, your bitch ass needed help to escape! I thought you were some big bad wolf, but you're a pitiful excuse for a wizard." I retort, taking steps towards him, fear non existent. He backs up, scary facade seems to wither as I let out an actual growl. One from the bottom of my stomach, deep, feral, ready to attack.

'We're going to remove his magick' Kyra says and I nod, following her voice

My hand reaches out, finger touching his forehead, apparently you can remove someone's power this way. I can only do this because Kyra's family work for a the magick council, like THE council. She was the heiress of their position, posessing the responsibility to take people's powers if they used them the wrong way. It was torture, but it was better than death, the other having no memory of magick, only slight knowledge of who they are. Jax's body crumbles to the floor as a gold essence floats in the air, his power. The beautiful power is tainted by black specks, meaning an abuse of magick. I wave the same hand that was placed on his forehead and the power disappears, going who knows where.

Jax lies on the ground for a bit, the fight between Eli amd Leo stops, luckily they weren't hurt too bad. Jax sits up from the floor and looks around

"Where am I? Who are you people?" He questions, staring at us

"You wandered into a private estate and passed out, we brought you in here so you'd be safe" Sacha says before I can reply so I nod kindly. He stares at her, then stares at me. He nods and slowly gets up, walking past everyone with his shoulders slumped.

"Why'd you let him leave?!" Eli shouts so I turn towards him

"He had no memories of who he was, he's not a threat anymore. He has no more magick" I explain, slipping my shoes back on.

*rumble rumble rumble*

More lightning lights up the sky, thunder roaring and the skies open. Big heavy drops of water pour down, this was strange. The weather was never like this normally. I got another feeling in my stomach, this night was not done. I walk out of the ballroom, Sacha and the others following me in confusion. I get to the main entrance and see Kyra?? At the bottom of the steps. No, no, this isn't Kyra! She had purple hair, this person has blue. The look a like stares at me, lightning flashing behind her, red eyes. She's the one truly responsible for all of this.

"I'm glad we can finally meet. I've heard so much about you form my dear sweet sister" she says, going up one step so I go down one.

"Kyra never mentioned a twin, you must not have been as important" I reply, taking another step down. A bolt of lightning strikes the step behind me but I don't flinch

"I'm the older one, Moira. And I'd watch your tongue mutt, you may have my sisters power but I'm stronger than her" Moira threatens, taking another step up.

"You know, I'm really fucking tired of people calling me a fucking mutt!" I growl, taking another step down, fire licking at my fingers despite the rain. Moira forces another lightning bolt down, it doesn't hurt as my body absorbs it. The twins are elemental witches. I counter with a gust of wind as strong as an f5 hurricane, blowing that bitch down the stairs. She lands on her feet and launches a fire ball at me but I catch it and throw it back, ten times hotter. She yelps and stumbles back

"You may have been stronger than Kyra, but the two of us have merged souls. It's her power with my will, you never had a chance" I say, metal overtaking my body as I clank down the stairs. She makes a fist out of metal and swings but I grab her wrist, forcing it backwards.

"You're not going to win, just stop fighting" I plead, all of this hurting people wasn't fun on my conscience. Moira doesn't listen and keeps throwing weak attacks that bounce off of me, it was pathetic really. I didn't want to do this twice in a row but I grip Moira with my right hand, finger on her forehead.

"This is for your own good" I whisper as I see the horror in her eyes, she tries to break free but I keep her in place. She screams and fights but sags when her power is finally out, the sight disgusts me. Her whole essence of power was pitch black, no gold whatsoever. I wave my hand twice for good measure, that darkness does not need to go into anyone else. The rain and thunder stop, my costume now soaking wet, cold seeping into my skin. Moira straightens up after another minute and stares at me in confusion

"Who are you?" She asks, staring at me so I force a smile.

"You got caught up in the rain and almost collapsed, I stayed with you to make sure you were alright" I explain as her confusion stays. She steps out of my grip and turns around, unsure of where to go until she decides to go left. Her shoulders are slumped as well, head looking in multiple directions. My head droops down, I didn't know how much power it took to remove other powers. Not to mention I was fucking freezing, that wasn't normal rain, it was laced with power. I plop on one of the steps with a groan

"You alright Jinx?" Sacha questions, standing in front of me and I nod.

"Why do the crazies always want me? Why can't people ever go after you?" I pout and she laughs at me.

"Because hares aren't threats to people. Big fluffy Malamute hybrids are" she retorts with a smile and I huff at her with a shiver. A large warm jacket is placed on my shoulders that makes me sigh in content. I slip my arms through and hug myself, sweet sweet warmth. It was Jungkook's jacket, Sacha helps me up and I let out a loud yawn.

"I'm honestly so confused on what happened" Jin sighs, staring into the distance where Moira disappeared.

"I've stopped trying to understand honestly" Tae confesses, leaning on the stair railing.

"Jax was being controlled by Moira, Moira was the older twin of Kyra. Moira was the evil one but was weal against Y/N and Kyra because their souls merged together. Y/N took Moira and Jax's powers so they can't do anymore damage" Yoongi informs matter of factly making Jimin shake his head.

"Still not going to try" he mutters making me giggle.

"Sorry if you guys get roped into this stuff, I really don't know why people have something against me" I apologize sheepishly, looking at them.

"It's because of our family Jinx. They put a lot of people in jail and underground, so their families have grudges" Eli chimes and I groan.

"Come on, we've had way too many eventful days in a row. Time to stay home officially" Namjoon declares, ushering everyone to the limo so I cheer.

"I agree! Let's just stay inside, nobody can mess with us there" I laugh, linking arms with Sacha.

"Wait!" A voice shouts, N? Namjoon turns around to stare at Vixx's leader with an eyebrow raised.

"Yes?" He asks, Jin standing tall next to him.

"I want to thank your bodyguards, for not forcing Leo up on stage in that embarrassing outfit. It was humiliating to my second in command" he says, Leo apparing next to him.

"It wasn't a problem, we're used to making fools of ourselves" Eli says with a smile and I nod.

"It's true, it may have been humiliating at first but we have no shame when it comes to being stupid" I add, sticking a hand out to Leo as a truce. His slender fingers wrap around mine in a slight shake, we pull apart and I stick my hands in Jungkook's jacket.

"Well, we'll get going now. You know how to reach me if you ever want to change sides" Namjoon says, slightly bowing to N. N nods, slightly bowing back as we pile into the limo.

"Anybody want food? I'm starved" Jin asks out of the blue and Eli nods vigorously

"Yes please! I didn't get to eat anything because of that damned performance" Eli whines, pulling his skirt down.

"Speaking of which, you were hilarious up there. I couldn't keep my laughter down" Hoseok praises with his sunshine smile and Sacha beamed at him.

"It was a skit Y/N and I used to do when we were younger, it's a great remake of a great song" She replies happily and I side eye her. She is so damn whipped by him, they for real needed to start dating. My nose picked up on food and I realized that our driver was ordering food for us and boy was I excited! None of us ate dinner because we didn't plan on getting interrupted twice by evil witches. Multiple bags are being handed to us, each picking something to munch on. We made chatter around full mouths and I'm surprised food didn't get everywhere. I stopped mid bite because I was hit with a bad feeling once again. I swear, I'm gonna fight myself if these damn feelings don't stop.

*pop*

The limo began to shake as if it was uneven, a tire went out! The drive wasn't getting any better so I broke through the screen and saw that the driver was, you guessd it, dead! He was fucking dead and we were headed right into a lake. I tried to reach the wheel but my dress got caught and the limo plowed through the guard rail to plummet into the freezing waters. I was thrust right into the windshield, arms out to protect my head. The impact shocked me a bit and I knew we all had to get out of here before we drowned. It'd take too long for this big ass limo to equalize with the water, we'd have to break through. Sacha couldn't swim so she was my main priority as I swim back through the tiny window. I suddenly thought of a spell and whispered it through the water, a breathing spell.

Everyone who was stunned freaked out since they could breathe but I was still in action mode, swimming to the car door to get out. Eli gets in front of the others since the water was going to rush through the door.

1 kick, 2 kick, 3 kick, *clank* the water floods through, but I use my elemental power to ease it, allowing everyone to get out easily. I grab onto Sacha and swim out with her, she clings to me, dress floating in the water. We're almost to the surface but something grips my ankle, yanking us back down. Sacha screams as I yelp, looking down to see some type of sea monster with red eyes. It has crazy sharp teeth and I kick it with my other foot, making it's head snap the other way. Eli's face dives back down into the water so I shove Sacha towards him as another sea creature reaches for me.

They try to drag me down again but I keep kicking, breathing spell reaching it's last minute. Another one sneaks behind me, pinning my arms behind my back. I'm sinking and can't move, I'm trying to wiggle but these fuckers are inhumnaly strong. The spell wears off and panic hits me, I summon a water current under me and knock one away allowing me to kick the other. I'm almost to the bottom of this fucking lake and I really need to breathe. I will my body to heat up despite being completely submerged and it works, their skin starts to sizzle and I get my arms free. I morph my arm into solid metal, swing a little slow in the water but it works on knocking them off of me. When they're all stunned I use water to boost me up to the surface but those things are right on my tail. I see the figures of everyone else, land is right there.

My head breaches the surface of the water and I suck in a huge breath, resching out for Eli's large hand. He grips mine tightly and yanks me out just as one of the creatures was about to grab my leg. Three pairs of red eyes peer out of the water at me, making me shudder as I I feel the ground around me. I'm soaking wet and break out into a fit of coughs, some water comes back out and I shiver.

"Are you okay?" Jungkook questions, kneeling in front of me and I shake my head.

"What in the hell happened?! What were those things?!" Sacha yells at the water, throwing a rock in.

"I have no fucking clue Bee. They were some kind of sea creature with red eyes, after I handed you to Eli another came and had me by my arms. My breathing spell wore off so I used the water and fire to get those things off of me." I explain through shaky breaths.

'I think they were associated with Moira, they're eyes are the exact same color as hers. I don't know how her power held but it's possible we didn't extract all of it' Kyra's voice says and I scoff

"Kyra says Moira may have excess power, because the eyes color of the crestures was the exact same shade of red as hers." I simplify, ringing out my skirt.

"Well shit, and how are we supposed to get home? All of our phones won't work" Sacha questions but Eli snaps his fingers.

"Mine will! I customized it so it can withstand any climate, even being drowned in water" he states proudly, pulling it out of somewhere I probably don't want to know about. He hands it to Namjoon who punches in a number

"Hey, yeah we need a ride. Yeah, it crashed, we're by the giant lake on the way home. Okay, make it quick, it's fucking cold." He says, ending the call and hands it back to Eli. The sky was already dark, wind freezing our soaked clothes. Regardless of the cold, we climb up the small hill back up to the road and wait. I try and warm my body up with fire but nothing happens, I must be too tired to conjure it.

A few minutes go by in silence and another black limo pulls up, Namjoon opens the door and we all get in, sighing at the warmth. The ride is silent until Jin breaks it

"You know we're a gang right? We don't deal with this kind of stuff, witches, brain washed hybrids, sea creatures! We deal with humans, and we've been in wave after wave of supernatural shit because of these three. I'm tired of it, you three are such bad luck it's insane" he says, making me lower my head in shame, ears dropping down and causes Sacha's eyes to water. Her ears twitch before curling down in sorrow.

"Really? You want to say that after those two have saved you on countless occasions?! You think we don't feel like shit because we've brought this on you? Do you know how many times Y/N has sacrificed their body for you?! To protect your selfish ass from creatures and humans! Who wakes up early every morning to help you cook! We didn't have to accept the offer to protect you, but we did. And if you want to act like this I'll gladly exit this limo and walk my ass back to my own house." Eli yells, temper flaring as he stares Jin in the eyes.

"Don't waste your energy Eli. He's right, I'm a bad luck magnet. If this is how you feel I'll leave, I do feel bad for bringing all of this stuff to you. We can stay with Eli" I whisper, not taking my eyes off of the ground.

"Jin shut up, I don't care if you're the oldest. I'm the leader and you three are staying, that's final" Namjoon growls, staring at Jin.

"He's kind of right Joon. All of this supernatural and hybrid craziness is getting out of hand" Jimin mumbles, chewing his lip. Yoongi gives the faintest of nods and I feel my heart rip in half.

"Okay. If we're that much of a burden we'll leave you alone. Drop us off right here!" I say to the driver, voice holding no emotion.

"No please! You don't have to go!" Namjoon pleads but Sacha shakes her head

"It's obvious that we cause too much trouble, I'm really sorry but this will be the best for you all" Sacha says, voice wavering as a tear rolls down her cheek.

"Bee please don't go" Hoseok begs, grabbing her hand.

"I'm sorry Hobi, but it's what they want. I'll keep in touch with you" she cries, tears pouring down her face. I'm the last one out and shut the door gently, holding back a sob. Eli whips his phone out and barks at someone on the otner end, his house was about a block away but our clothes were still damp and it would be bad to walk. A black Camero comes into view, the window rolls down to show a young male with purple hair.

"Get in" he says and Eli goes to the passenger side. I open the back door for Sacha and slide in next to her, pulling her to me. I bury my face into her wet hair, tears falling down silently. Minutes pass by and the car stops so I get out, Sacha close to me. She's a sobbing mess so I carry her bridal style, walking her into Eli's old house. Eli shows us a room so I set her down on the bed, rumaging for some warm clothes. I make her get changed, finding something new for myself. I crawl into the bed, opening my arms for her to join me. She sniffles and lays on my side, head buried in my neck. I pet her hair and sing soft melodies to her, hoping she'll calm down. Her breathing slows eventually, she's alseep and I let out a hurt sigh.

Why?

*bts p.o.v*

"I can't fucking believe you guys! How rude can you be hyung?! How dare you call them bad luck! They've been nothing but helpful and you three boot them out!" Hoseok bellows, throwing his hands up, everyone flinching at the angry sunshine.

"He's right, that was uncalled for. Especially when you were the one who so desperately wanted to be protected. I'd be dead if it weren't for Y/N! But all you can think about is you! We're a gang, a team. And those three were family! You don't throw away family hyung! You just don't!" Jungkook adds, same intensity as Hoseok.

"Watch your tone Jungkook! Besides, if you two didn't like Y/N and Sacha I doubt you'd be defending them" Yoongi retorts.

"Hoseok hyung is right...you're being selfish and unjust. Y/N makes me feel safe, they're kind and warm. Sacha is so small and innocent, and Eli is so funny. They're not bad luck, they're family like Jungkookie said. And you guys broke up family" Tae murmurs, staring at the three.

"When we get home, you will look up their locations from the tracking bracelets. No ifs, ands, or buts. And that's an order, not an order as your friend. An order as your leader who doesn't care if you're older because all three of you are acting like children! You're grown men, and you claim three hybrids who would sacrifice their lives for you bad luck." Namjoon demands, making Yoongi stiffen but nod. Jin sits back and shuts his mouth, Jimin sinking into his seat. Jungkook storms out of the car as soon as it stops and slams the house door open, marching to his room. Tae shuffles out at the back, not wanting to be in the tension. Hoseok is huffing and puffing, face set in a scowl.

Yoongi sits at the computer and pulls up trackers 8,9, and 10. The computer flashes once before the signals cut out one by one. Yoongi zooms in on the map, Eli's house comes into view.

"We're going over there first thing in the morning. And if you want to complain you can leave the gang" Namjoon says, standing tall with his arms crossed.

All according to plan

-Ro! Ahahahah, can't get away from this angst...i straight up made myself cry again >< and it was hard to determine who would be the 'bad' guys but I hope you all like it <3

#bts #bts gang au x hybrid reader #bts gang au #bts gang au x reader #kpop gang au #bts angst #come together #admin ro #vixx gang au #got7 gang au

[mrbillgeorge]

WW84 - Rewritten

The movie is a fucking trainwreck. It’s honestly a nightmare. If anything in this movie works whatsoever, it’s a credit to the performers. 

This is the role Gadot was born to play and Pine is always great and their chemistry remains palpable. And Wiig is great addition. 

But the movie is a mess. The running time is nonsense. The pacing is criminal. Most of the movie you’re just sitting there going, ‘what the fuck is even happening right now?’ There’s no consistency of story or conveyance from scene to scene or character motivations. It’s really, really bad. 

But there are elements that work! Gadot! Pine! Wiig! 

You could use the bones that are here to make a really touching, incredible movie. This is that movie:

You open similarly. Flashback as setup is fine and expected for movies like this which have big mythologies. You use the opening to establish that there is an artifact from the gods that grants wishes but ‘at a cost.’ Sure, we get it, fine. 

You go to 1984. Establish what Diana has been doing. Here’s an action set piece moment. Do the mall thing. Whatever. Continue to push her loneliness. She misses Trevor. She hasn’t made connections with anyone else. She’s not of this world so to speak, so she’s a man without a country. Let Gadot really chew on it. 

Introduce Barbara. Give her more backstory. Her not fitting in. Her being awkward. She runs into Diana the same way. She sees how effortless it is for her and is envious but they’re both lonely in their own way and are kindred spirits. They become friends. 

*This* should be ALL of act one. Building their relationship. Maybe even add an action set piece where Diana has to save Barbara and she figures out Diana is the mysterious woman on the news that’s saving people. It makes their bond even stronger. Diana’s first REAL friend! 

Then, end of act 1, the artifact shows up. At their office. Diana realizes it may bring back Trevor. She is torn but decides it’s worth the risk. Secretly, Barbara wishes to be like Diana. Pull that from the existing movie. 

Act 2! Wishes come true, slowly. Trevor shows up as Trevor, no need for the shenanigans. We get a beautiful shift in the fish out of water comedy. First movie he was showing her around, now she shows him. They fall back in love all over again. 

Meanwhile, Wiig becomes more confident. More powerful. More popular. Let Wiig dig into this. She’s a gifted comedian and actress. She can have a field day. Tons of great comedy potential, as already shown within this movie. 

Throughout this, Diana still needs to fight crime, but she realizes she’s slowing down a step. Getting sloppier. Weaker. Not sure what’s going on. Then realizes it’s due to the wish. 

End of act 2, transformations complete. Diana has essentially lost her powers. And if you want to make it dark, maybe she can’t save someone she normally would be able to and some innocent person dies or is paralyzed or hospitalized or whatever. (Maybe this occurs in a fight against Harley Quinn or something. Pull in other DC stuff to placate the fan base.)

So she is overcome with guilt. Because, we know from the first movie, her driving force is saving and protecting others. She crossed no man’s land for it in WW1. That is who she is. And now she can’t do that. 

Wiig loses that warmth. Loses her humanity. As hinted at in this movie. Diana notices and because they’re friends, confronts her about it. A fight ensues. Small action beat to keep pace up. 

This story creates a consistent theme for the film, which is: what are you willing to sacrifice of yourself for your aspirations and desires? 

Now decisions have to be made that our characters can’t come back from, AKA Act 3. 

Diana needs to give up Trevor, but it will only work if Wiig also gives up her wish. Has to be both. But Wiig won’t go that easily. And thus we have the final showdown between former friends. Maybe she’s Cheeth by then, or maybe she just wears animal prints and you leave it at that. (She doesn’t *have* to be CG cheetah.)

They fight and eventually Diana triggers a memory or something, whatever, that gets Wiig to see the light and they go through the pain of the wish renouncement together.

It could have been a fun, poignant movie at two hours, max. Instead of what we got. Which was outlandish and garish. 

Make sure to follow Should I Go See It? on Instagram for all your movie review needs! 

[simonaott904-blog]

20 Resources That'll Make You Better at digimon world dawn

Digitize PSP Cheats And Methods ~ Cheathunter

Following a success of Disney's 1937 film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the Japanese domestic anime market confronted severe pressure from international filmmakers. Nelson Chitty can be a Venezuelan expat residing in Argentina. He's a writer and translator passionate about background and foreign cultures. His ideal weekend is definitely spent between leisurely games of Civilization VI and looking for the next seinen anime to marathon. Not only was it a switch of pace when it comes to the Digimon themselves, however the human heroes also get a lot more tale than most seasons. There are some actual heart-tugging occasions and hints throughout of impending tale beats that produce rewatching a lot of fun.

Honestly, there is little reason to play this title today. Regularity with the parameters established initially by the series redeems Digimon Globe to a certain extent, emboldened in the eye of fans who appreciate simulation type games; however, that is easily one of the worst titles to try and grab today. Online. A players shuffled deck is placed face down right here. Cards drawn into the player's hand are extracted from the Online pile. I love the Assassin's creed series along with both Dead Space games. In modern times, butterflies are extremely common in Japanese anime and manga. Most often, butterflies represent a character's fleeting thoughts or dreams.

Digimon Globe for the PS1 is a great game if you enjoy Tamagotchi style gameplay. You need to raise and train them carefully in fact it is better to follow a information so that you can train the correct stats to make sure your Digimon digivolves into the particular monster you want. Once you have them digivolved you possess a certain amount of gametime before they will die and then you have to retrain the hatched Digimon. The main storyline revolves around you exploring to find a specific Digimon and recruit it back again to the village.

The English dub cast is fantastic and they are the reason I blind bought this anime without seeing it on legal streaming in Japanese. In the movie, Digimon Adventure which was a prelude to the Digimon series, no one knew the way the gateway between the Digital World and real life was activated. All they saw was just a moment when Digimon could travel from one to the other. Pokémon fans will immediately recognise the gameplay method of Best Fiends and can enjoy what it has to offer. When you begin out, you'll have the option between three different starter creatures (audio familiar?), and from there, you will http://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=digimon start your journey to be the best.

Digimon Globe: Data Squad exists predominately as a tie-in for the recent Digimon: Data Squad anime series, so it shouldn't be too astonishing that the overall game spends short amount of time on character introductions and cuts straight to the flimsy plot. There's a great evil in the digital globe that's causing Digimon to do something all crazy, threatening to break through to the real world, and it's really up to the spiky-haired, androgynous Data Squad to investigate. Making things personal, younger sister of one of the associates of the info Squad, along with a bunch of additional young girls, has gone missing, plus they believe there's a connection. Characters will occasionally pop-up to shout some awkward dialogue, but once all the parts are set, the rest of the game is mostly simply a long, tiresome dungeon crawl.

It's hard to just go through the game at start state and realize the scope of what it was doing, the way that it had been forcing the industry to rethink several long-held assumptions about grouping and leveling. Certainly it wasn't noticeable to the devs at Blizzard, who (if memory serves) implemented the solo-friendly leveling framework because they wished to allow players in to the raiding endgame quicker and more efficiently. It had been only later that they realized just how much people recommended a more accessible framework and what that actually meant for the game's development.

I've only performed the first Digimon Globe, so I have no idea how it prices alongside the others. But I could say it's lots of fun. You teach up your Digimon, travel the island discovering new Digimon to provide to the town which grows the more people join. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary Content material in this edit is normally translated from the existing Russian Wikipedia article at :ru:Digimon Adventure; see its history for attribution.

On the Android side, Google's fiercest competition originates from - who else? - Samsung. The Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus had been released at the start of the year, and they utilize the same Snapdragon human brain as both of the PIxel 2s. Beyond that, their expansive Infinity Displays are almost beyond reproach and conveniently outshine the panels Google used this year. Both likewise have excellent cameras, even though I prefer what Google has achieved with the Pixels, the S8s have hook edge in low-light photography. Honestly, the decision boils down to software program: The S8s still run a version of Android 7.0 Nougat painted over with Samsung's custom interface. It's swimming in Samsung apps too, including the lackluster Bixby virtual assistant. Google's cleaner approach, coupled with the guarantee of software updates for three years, can make the Pixels more attractive to some.

I by no means claim this is a blacks versus whites issue. Multiculturalism could be applauded by blacks, since they get black background month, etc etc etc. Nonetheless it was created, promulgated, trained, and defended by whites who are ashamed of their own competition; ashamed by their very own country; and who would like everything America has stood for to become turned upside down-deconstructed. If you feel "popular 'old college' samurai anime," you imagine Rurouni Kenshin. The anime adaptation was manufactured in 1996, and was directed by Furuhashi Kazuhiro. Originally a manga (Japanese comic) series, Rurouni Kenshin follows the tale of Himura Kenshin, a wandering samurai through the Meiji period who utilized to be a skilled assassin working for the Bakumatsu government.

Digimon Globe Championship on the Nintendo DS is sort of like an upgraded type of the original Digimon games that were virtual-pets. You feed and care for your Digimon, and help them digivolve into more powerful forms. Championship is also very, very, VERY dull. There is very little gameplay in this game; your Digimon pals do all your work for you. All you have to to do is be sure that they are taken care of, which isn't exciting whatsoever. Championship looks wonderful for a game on the DS, and it does provide good nostalgia for individuals who grew up with the original Digimon virtual pet playthings. Notwithstanding that, Championship is certainly virtually Digimon for babies.

Stingmon is one of the more recognizable Digimon to anyone who was raised viewing the anime. Stingmon 1st showed up in the anime in Digimon Adventure 2 where he served as an antagonist for the 1st part of the time of year. Although Stingmon seems to be a Digimon with a cool head that's ready to battle at any time, his rookie type Wormmon is certainly a wimp and may never state what's on its mind. One of the major factors that produce Stingmon so cool is the drastic transformation in personality after digivolving. Stingmon's character is a key factor down the road when Stingmon becomes an excellent man and pairs up with his former rival Veemon creating an ideal balance between the two. Stingmon may not become the coolest Digimon on appearance alone, but he is certainly one of the coolest in the Digimon Universe all together.

What does inspire though, may be the video game that accompanies the cartoon. You play it in real life pretty much exactly as you see it performed by the individuals on the TV. Minus the huge battling monsters. The game includes magnetic transforming Bakugan monsters that start out as spheres, but when they encounter the magnetic Gate cards they unfold to reveal the creature inside. If you want to discover ways to play Bakugan, you can try the official website. There are all types of trick shots and in depth strategies you can devise when playing this video game. It's so popular Toys R Us provides been hosting tournaments around the US.

The anime is based on a Capcom video game group of the same name, and takes place during the digimon world 4 agumon digivolutions Sengoku, or the Warring States Period, in Japan. Two young warlords from rivaling regions form an alliance to bring down Oda Nobunaga, the Devil King. A Chinese manhua was written and drawn by Yuen Wong Yu (余 遠鍠 Yu Yuen-wong), who based its storyline on the television series. This adaptation addresses Digimon Experience in five volumes, Digimon Adventure 02 in two, Digimon Tamers in four, and Digimon Frontier in three. The original stories are seriously abridged, though on rare occasions events play out differently compared to the anime.

In Japan, nine Digimon anime movies have been released. Seven of these are related to their anime series. Of the nine all but two have been released worldwide. Ultimate Power! Activate Burst Mode and X-Evolution are the two that have not really been released internationally. Minato Sahashi is an intelligent son, but because of his inability to deal with pressure he's unemployed and failed university exams twice. One day he meets a girl named Musubi, who actually falls from the sky. Minato learns that she is a Sekirei who chose him as her Ashikabi: a human which allows a Sekirei to bring out her full powers and participate in life-threatening battles.

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