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writing-with-olive · 3 years

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Developmental Editing - Rewriting!

Alrighty! It's been a hot minute since I've talked about developmental editing, but since I'm a pretty big proponent of helping people not fall for the "replace these 59 crutch words with slightly longer phrases and that's it you're done editing" I figured it's probably about time for another one. (to be fair, that was a bit of exageration, but I am serious that superficial/cosmetic edits probably won't cut it if you're trying to go from first draft to publishable work)

One of the biggest tips I can give is that at least once, it's a good idea to consider rewriting. I don't mean throw your current draft out and start over (I would hate that), but have a printed copy of your WIP or do a splitscreen and go through scene by scene and rewrite.

(why this is, in fact, a good idea, and also how to go about doing it below the cut)

Why this is helpful:

It helps you make changes you need to make. Basically, if you're just editing the pieces you think are the worst issues from your book, then when you hit something you're not completely sure if you need to change, the impulse without doing rewrites is often "eh. I'll do it later/I don't need to do it." With rewrites, it's often "I might as well." Basically, you can get a much deeper level of change.

If you've moved around scenes, there's going to be instances where they're not going to fit perfectly. Maybe a character offhandedly references something that now happens after the scene but started out before. Or they come into the scene in a mood that is no longer explained by the preceding scene. Rewriting scenes will help keep things like tone and chronology consistant without having a giant mess to try and clean up later.

Your writing abilities have almost certainly improved since you began writing the previous draft. A full rewrite is a pretty good way to make your style more consistant over the course of the book.

You've probably gotten a better sense of your characters and setting and overall vibe of the story. This is a pretty good way to make sure you can clear up inconsistancies from when you were still figuring them out and also the issues that cleanup may cause.

Knowing you're going to do a pretty thourough edit later can help get the words down. At least for me, I can stomach doing a horrific first pass at a scene or chapter because I don't have to worry about it staying bad. My priority is getting the words down so I can move on with the story.

How to go about doing rewrites:

Take a deep breath and don't panic

No actually take that deep breath. It's good for you.

Identify the core issue you're going to be working on. For me, it was adding in the necessary plotpoints I had missed the first time around and fixing some of the pacing (because 14-year-old me did NOT understand story structure when I started writing my WIP). There will be secondary issues that you will probably be fixing along the way (like awkward dialogue, etc) but the core issue should be the focus.

Go through your manuscript if scenes that need ot be rearranged, added, or subtracted, make a note of them. Similarly, if you need to rearrange the content of scenes (maybe shuffling around when characters arrive at a place, or when certain catalysts happen), make notes of them too. Also note anything that you were particularly happy or unhappy with when you were reading through your work. If you have a chunk that's particularly tangled, it's usually good to figure out what you want to change when you're just in the edit-planning stage, because it becomes harder when you're trying to figure out what to do as you're actively trying to do it. Basically, don't worry if figuring out how to fix things takes a while. It's natural. For simplicity's sake, I refer to everything in this bullet point as "pre-edits"

Open up a new doc - it is NOT in your best interest to work on your original. For one, it's nice to look back and see how far you've come, but there's also the feeling of a fresh slate that can be really freeing.

Go through scene by scene, or chapter by chapter, and rewrite it while regularly referencing your marked-up manuscript. If you decide on a whim that you should make changes that you didn't mark originally, go for it. At this point, you've got a pretty good sense of what should be happening in a given place, and sometimes you don't realize edits until you're really in it. If you get to scenes that you need to write from scratch - ie they weren't in the original, treat it like that section is a first draft. Don't worry if the quality of writing is lower than everything around it. Like when you were originally drafting, the most important thing is to get everything down on the page. There will be more editing rounds after this.

Embrace that rewrites will take a while. It's fairly easy to break into small chunks though (scenes, chapters, arcs, etc), so it doesn't need to be daunting. Just take it one step at a time.

When you get to the end, celebrate! You just completed a lot!

Anyway, I hope this gives people a potential path forward for editing. If you have any questions or places you want me to go into more detail on, PLEASE send me an ask or put it in the comments. I love this stuff and will gladly tell you about any part of it!

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Taglist (sorry I keep forgetting to tag people - I'm working on it): @bookdragonfanish @book-limerence

As always, if you would like to be added to or removed from any of my tag lists (found pinned at the top of my blog) just let me know!

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phantomnostalgist · 3 years

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An Interview with Peter Karrie

From “POTO: The Phantom of the Opera Magazine”, Millennium Edition (2000), published by Carrie Hernandez. (This btw is the greatest Phantom fan publication ever made, and if you ever see it on eBay you should snap it up. I don’t even have my copy because it’s with Paul, who conducted this interview with Peter in 1994.)

Enormous thanks to @panto-of-the-opera for typing this interview up for me!

Peter Karrie, interviewed by Paul Day Clemens:

Since falling under the spell of “POTO” (the day the Original London Cast album (OLC) became available in the U.S.) I’ve seen many fine – and a few brilliant – Eriks but only two performers have ever made me feel I was in the actual presence of the Phantom himself. One was Michael Crawford – yes, he really was that special (and you can forget the OLC which is but the palest shadow of what he was like on stage!) – and the other is Peter Karrie.

Commanding, dangerous, elegant, chivalrous and heart rending with an unparalleled physicality and wealth of detail, Peter not only made the role his own, completely, but by some rare and strange alchemy, somehow managed to make me forget I was watching a performance at all.

Thrilled, hypnotized and deeply moved, it was not until visiting with Peter after the show that the full impact of his transformation hit me. How could this warm, funny, soft-spoken, down-to-earth guy possibly be the same man I was watching on stage not an hour before hand?

Therein lies the difference between craft – albeit of a rare excellence – and true inspiration. Dare I even say greatness?

Yeah, I dare. For Mr. Karrie’s Phantom is simply one of the greatest portrayals by an actor in the musical theatre that I’ve ever had the privilege of experiencing.

I had the great pleasure of interviewing Peter at length in December 1994 in Toronto as he was getting ready for the Far East tour of “POTO” and what follows here are never before published excerpts from the interview. – Paul Clemens

Paul Clemens: Do you find that the role of the Phantom makes enormous demands on your voice, in terms of the wear and tear of doing at night after night? If you had a sore throat, for instance, would you be able to get through the show?

Peter Karrie: Yeah. You learn I guess. All professional singers in theatre have to cope with colds and sore throats. Otherwise you’ll be forever off ‘cause it’s a breeding ground of germs. And you develop your voice for stamina over a period of time where you’re doing eight shows a week. You have to. You have to survive it.... So, basically, yeah.

You take the angel [scene] for instance where [the Phantom is] absolutely broken. I’ve had very, very bad laryngitis and I’ve sung that and it sounded great! Simply because you’re breaking down in your voice is all kinds of scuffed up and cracky, you can enact it. But the show takes horrendous wear and tear on the body. It really does. You end up playing mind games with the role.

PC: That’s interesting. How so?

PK: Well, it’s such a powerfully written piece for the actual Phantom. You have to portray a person who’s schizoid, psychotic... and it all sounds very grand and technical. But the actual emotion of it can cut only come from the inside. And so you continue fighting with it.

[Note from Christine posting this in 2021 - Erik isn’t actually schizoid or psychotic (not that either are “bad” things). I know this is pedantic of me to point out, but I pointed it out at the end of Ethan Freeman’s interview from the mid 90s so I’ll point it out here too.]

PC: I imagine you found a core within the character of identification, something you had an understanding of and could feel a great deal of sympathy toward.

PK: Yes. You have to put yourself through the gambit of it. You have to be the Phantom emotionally for that time, and then it comes out quite naturally. You don’t have to think about it.

PC: Do you find, after all the times you played the role – first in London and now in Toronto – that the emotions are still immediate for you?

PK: Oh, yeah. But as I say, there’s wear and tear. When the mind gets tired then you find you get into problems.

PC: How do you keep the role fresh?

PK: There are all types of hand holds all the way along, from the time you start ‘til the time you finish. I guess the majority of it is set in the rehearsal room where you rehearse at a certain level into a certain standard, and it becomes automatic. But each show will always be different because you have a different audience, different weather conditions, you have different musicians playing in the pit, you have different people you’re playing opposite. So you will always get a variation on the theme. And so that, coupled up with what you’ve put together in rehearsal so you get a fairly high standard of performance every night, merges together. And so you do get a different show every night. But, as I say, it’s a very wearing role. More so than Jean Valjean, where you’re virtually on stage for three and a half hours. But I find the Phantom far more draining.

PC: I can imagine. Whenever you’re on stage you’re at peak intensity and you run the emotional gamut. So that, combined with the vocal demands, must make for one walloping experience.

PK: Exactly.... That, coupled with the exposure. You’re so exposed on stage. Whenever the Phantom does appear, it’s either him on his own, or it’s him with Christine, and something powerful and moving is happening. He doesn’t appear with the chorus – barring the “Masquerade.”

PC: For that reason, a number of the actors who have played the role have complained about a sense of loneliness and isolation. I wondered if you felt that way about it?

PK: No, I haven’t felt that. But I’ve always mingled with the rest of the cast and crew. I can’t abide all this keeping the door shut. So we open the door and play rock and roll music.

PC: Do you ever feel hampered by all the makeup involved?

PK: You get used to it. Totally. In fact, there are times when you forgotten you’ve got the mask on in the wig lady has to ask you for it. And you think ‘What? I’ve already given it to you!’

PC: That’s right – you wouldn’t be able to feel it, would you? Because it’s actually touching the appliances rather than your face.

PK: You feel it slightly. You know, if you first put it on you’d know it’s there. But after a while... But the wire band ‘round the head lets you know it’s there! And the edge of it catches you sometimes. But no – it becomes part of you. And as for the lip which is built up top and bottom ‘round your mouth, you get used to that as well.

PC: Has it ever come loose during a performance?

PK: Oh, God yeah! We’ve had some great moments where it’s been hanging off. That’s a bit gross. And the bald cap’s come loose in the back, so you do the Second Lair with one hand ‘rounds the back of your head holding your bald cap in place? [laughs] Yeah, you’ve got some good moments.

PC: How did you find the voice which is so distinctive?

PK: Well, that, once again came from the feeling inside. It was like once you had all that stuff on, and I discovered the walk, and kind of latched onto his intention, the voice just followed.

PC: Your interpretation of the line “You try my patience“ is unforgettable. So chilling. I was wondering how that evolved.

PK: Well, I felt that was the climax of the man. That, literally, for me, is where he turns ‘round and he’s at the actual peak of his hate, his frustration. I knew I had to find something which made that moment special. It was set to be special by the music and the way it was directed. That was the key to the man.

PC: It’s as if your voice came from some deep well – as if it bubbled up from some deep, dark place.

PK: That’s right! That’s exactly how I felt it. And then when Christine kisses him it’s like he can’t believe it. “I’ve won!” That euphoric feeling... “She can suffer this face! I think I’ve got her! I think, yes, she does love me!” And then, as he reaches out to touch her... a moment.... He’s taken in the scene of Raoul hanging as he went back to her... and then, all of a sudden, it struck a chord.... “Hang on....” And then the realization hits him: “She’s just doing it for him. She’s literally giving me her self to save him. She loves him... She can never love me the same as she loves him.” And it’s all a kind of mental game there. And you’ve only got split seconds to get the audience in on it, so he has to be kind of demonstrative in his actions.

PC: After the kiss, there was a moment where you sort of winced, pulling away from her twice like a wounded animal, your right arm almost becoming spastic... there were so many levels, all going simultaneously.

PK: He’s coming to terms. All these thoughts are rushing through his head and he’s off balance. Everything has shaken him and he’s lost his façade of “everything-under-control.”

PC: And the body is breaking down.

PK: That’s right. He’s been stripped of everything just by having to face himself – and face the truth. That one clear moment where he realizes this is wrong – this is all wrong – this is not how it should be.

PC: And when the phantom cries “GO NOW AND LEAVE ME!” – you built each word into a series of escalating crescendos which was tremendously effective, I thought. Very powerful.

PK: It’s all the process of him actually coming to terms with himself. It’s as you say – one after another, one after the other – then finally she’s gone and he’s left.... This is after she’s given him the ring and she’s gone... And he looks... and he sees the empty throne. And he knows that’s all his life is.

PC: That’s very moving. Do you ever find that the final words – “It’s over now the Music of the Night” – are difficult to get out with all the emotion you’re experiencing?

PK: I did at the beginning, yeah. Sometimes I used to get caught up in it, which is a dreadfully dangerous thing, ‘cause then everything tightens up and you get the proverbial lump in your throat.

PC: It’s sort of walking a bit of a tight rope, isn’t it?

PK: Yeah! [laughs] That’s right. And then there’s a moment where I can get space to subdue all that and concentrate on doing the last bit. That’s where he’s got the veil in his hand and she’s in the boat comin’ across the back singing with Raoul and I say “Christine I love you” very, very quietly, and very broken, and then I can take some breaths which calm it all down and get myself kind of poised for the last bit. ‘Cause that’s gotta be kind of the statement: “You alone can make my song take flight.” That is the statement of release. It’s like a rhetorical statement – you will always be the music of my life. And therefore I can’t change it.” It’s that feeling he’s got in his body. He bends over backwards. And then the final moment is where he turns around and wipes it clean. And he does it in a far stronger attitude than anything else he does... “It’s over now the Music of the Night.”

PC: I’ve read that you feel he’s starting a new life at that point.

PK: Yes! Yes... When I’m walking to the chair, I let the veil just drop behind, and I think to myself “It’s over. Now what else is there? There must be something else... It’s over.” And you do it with such a final flourish – the cape and everything – you’re back in control of yourself. You’ve had the osmosis. You’ve come out of the one period of your life which actually threatened to ruin you, and you’re now standing on the threshold of another one.

PC: Oh yes. It’s wonderful to hear what’s going through your mind as you’re doing the scene. And the impact of that final scene is tremendous. Do you have a favourite scene in the show?

PK: That would be it. ‘Cause it’s only six minutes long, that Second Lair. And in that six minutes you literally travel from one end of the emotional spectrum to the other. It’s a whole journey.

MORE BELOW... Keep reading, it’s a long interview, with plenty more thoughts and content about Phantom, including some really funny classic mishaps.

PC: The show obviously touches a universal cord in many of its audience members, sometimes to the extent that a bracket (sizable) number of people see the show again and again. Men and women openly moved to tears by the play are common sight in Phantom’s audiences. And yet, paradoxically, a substantial number of critics have charged the show with having no heart.

PK: I think they’re being very unkind. There are some Phantoms – just as there are leading men and women in any show – who do not commit themselves quite as much as they should do.

PC: I’ve seen that it does make a difference in the overall impact of the show.

PK: It makes a big difference, yeah. ‘Cause eight times a week to commit yourself to it to it as it should be done is hard work. But once you get used to it and once you get into it you can’t do it any other way. At least I can’t. They said to me many times, like when you’re feeling rough or whatever, “Can you mark it a little bit? You know just take it easy. You don’t have to give one hundred percent.” But you see, it’s not a question of giving that. That’s just the way I do it. If I start altering that, I am altering a lot more than just singing a lift show. You’re altering a thought process which I can’t control. I wish I could mark it. It would be a lot bloody easier! But you can’t. You have to do it as you do it when you do it, and that’s it.

PC: I believe you hold the record for the most injuries sustained by any actor playing the role.

PK: Touch wood it’s never been completely death-defying! [laughs]

PC: Is it true that you asked if you could actually ride the chandelier down to the stage at the end of Act One?

PK: Yes. But I’m afraid the insurance people did not exactly share my enthusiasm for the idea.

PC: The stories about technical mishaps are legion. Can you relate some of the more memorable moments along those lines that you can recall?

PK: Well... there’s been so many of them now. There’re many, many boat stories. And the same thing happen to Colm, has happened to Michael, has happened to ‘em all. The boat has a life of its own. The monkey also has a life of its own. That can be very temperamental... I’ve had some excitement in the Angel, where people have tripped over wires and tipped it up while you’re inside it, and you’re hangin’ on for grim death... I fallen off the proscenium, yeah...

PC: [laughs] you say that so cavalierly.

PK: [laughing] Cracked a couple of legs and so forth. And the Star-Trap, the same thing. I’ve fallen down that the wrong way... In London one day, the Star-Trap didn’t open at all. So you did the “Your chains are still mine – you will sing for me,” and threw the cape – I always threw the Cape up to make a trail as you go down the Star-Trap. So the trail came down and I hadn’t gone anywhere. In the cloak – they had a bigger cloak for the Masquerade then – and it just piles on top of me. And I couldn’t get it off because you’ve got the mask on. So it ended up with the two managers having to lead me off! [laughing] I mean, here you’ve got this dreadful creature saying [puts on a creepy voice] “Your chains are still mine – you will sing for me!” And then, all of a sudden, the managers are saying [whispers] “Come on! This way, this way!”

PC: [laughs] In one of the U.S. Touring Company performances, the Punjab lasso failed to work, and so Raoul just fell to the floor and lay there writhing as if he were in the grip of some supernatural force.

PK: [laughs] many times things go wrong with a bloody lasso! One time I was over here in Toronto, Byron Nease [Raoul] all of a sudden acted like an invisible hand had gripped him ‘round the throat – the noose was nowhere, it was on the floor many miles away from him – but he’s going [Karrie makes some strangling sounds] and it was as though he was being thrown—forced backwards! And he got to the grill and his hands came outstretched and he was like held there by and invisible force...

PC: Yes – the “magnetic grill!“

PK: Yeah! And I just looked at him and I started laughing. it was like a three act play to get him to the back of this grill...! But I think the funniest thing is words. The things people say. Quite innovative and inventive. I remember when I was in the wings doing the “seal my fate tonight...” and sometimes your mind wanders. It’s that mind-game I mentioned about concentration. You have to keep focused all the time – blah blah blah. And so I’m saying “seal my fate tonight... I hate to have to cut the prisoner short...” Prisoner short? Prisoner short? And I thought, no, that can’t be right. And I’m thinking that while I continue singing... And the words have gone ‘cause I’m singing “but the ducks warring in...” And I said “ducks warring in??? – By now I’ve turned away from the monitor ‘cause I’m singing on an off-stage mike – and I’m lookin’ at my dressers. And I’m waving to them as if to say “Tell me the words! What are the words??” And now I’m singing “Let my destiny ride, ‘cause my music’s afire!” And I sang it as though I’d been singing those words all my life! Loud... And of course I’m falling around. And the conductor – I can see on the monitor – he’s laughing and waving! The baton had gone to hell!!

PC: [laughing] That’s marvelous!

PK: But what was the funniest thing what the poor people on stage! ‘Cause you had the managers and everybody else all walking ‘round in this trance – like, floaty, floaty choreography. And all of a sudden, as soon as I got to “ducks warring in” – by all accounts – they as if on cue, turned up stage; all of their backs to the audience! And they all walked to the back of the stage! And they’re all laughing and laughing, ‘cause it got it worse and worse. The more I was singin’ the wrong words the more they were laughing! ...And when I came on for my bows that night, all the course we’re going “Quack, quack!” ...So the next night I got changed I did my sound-check, and all of a sudden there’s a call over the tannoy for a meeting in the greenroom. And I went there, and I thought, well, somebody must be coming down to see us. And all of a sudden, over the gentle hubbub in the greenroom, I could hear on the tannoy my voice doing this “cut the prisoner short, but the ducks warring in...” and everybody started laughing. And then all of a sudden, the company manager showed up and presented me with a cassette – they record every show, you see – and the company had the words printed up and framed, and they presented it to me with the cassette. And that’s how I know the words so well!

PC: I’d love to hear that sometime!

PK: I learned from a very early age that if you’re gonna sing the wrong words, sing them as loud and convincingly as possible. And everyone in the building will think you’re right and everybody else is wrong.

PC: Of course. Because that if they haven’t seen the show before, they’re not going to know.

PK: That’s right. It’s so true, because I had people in that night for that magic moment, and they didn’t know anything was wrong at all.

PC: [laughs] Be honest with me – are you tired of the music after all this time? For example if you’re in an elevator and you hear a song from Phantom do you just want to scream?

PK: No. I get out of the elevator. You do try to escape from it after doing eight shows a week... A number of times we’ll go into a restaurant ,] my wife Jane and myself, and we’ll sit there. And all of a sudden you’ll hear the music come on – Phantom. And you think, oh God! You don’t want to be reminded of it when you’re out enjoying yourself. But I’m not tired of the music when I’m performing it.

PC: You’re about to take Phantom to Singapore and Hong Kong. I understand that their audiences tend to be rather formal. I believe it is considered disrespectful to make too big a display of appreciation. That will be quite a change for you. How do you think you’re going to handle it?

PK: I did a satellite link up the other day with about forty reporters from the Far East, and the same questions came up then – “How are you going to cope with the way Singaporean and Hong Kong audiences show their appreciation?” And I told him as long as they enjoy the show, I don’t care... It’s quite funny actually, because when I started off working in Britain, I used to do clubs in the Northeast which is the hardest area prefer performer to work in. [laughs] The miners – it’s a big mining area – and they didn’t used to applaud. They threw ashtrays onto the stage.

PC: [laughing] Ashtrays?!

PK: That’s right. You do a Sunday lunchtime and they’d all be sitting reading the Sunday newspapers. You walk onto the stage and there’d just be a sea of newspapers. And at the end of the number, if they liked you they drop one hand onto the table, pick up the ashtray and throw it onto the stage as a mark of respect. Or are they’d just bang the table with one hand two or three times. But still, never, never, did they come out from behind the newspaper. Not unless the performer was of the female variety.

PC: [laughs] Your rock band – Peter and the Wolves – how long did that last?

PK: About four years, I think.

PC: Are there any records available?

PK: I doubt it. What records were made have probably long since been turned into ashtrays!

PC: To be thrown on stage by miners, no doubt! ...Well ,a final question: in Phantom, when you’re up in the Angel, do you ever feel a mad desire to plunge headfirst into the audience?

PK: No. Quite the opposite.

PC: Not a serious question, but I appreciate the answer nonetheless.

PK: The desire to jump off is never further from my mind.

PC: Sometimes I wonder the way you move around up there!

PK: [laughs] It does get a bit hairy up there sometimes! But it depends on which way it swings. If it swings left to right, you’re okay, but if it swings front to back then ya’ got trouble!

PC: This has been a delightful interview, Peter. Thank you.

PK: My pleasure.

- Paul Clemens

#peter karrie #poto #phantom of the opera #the phantom of the opera #classic phantoms #phantom legends #musicals #musical theater fandom #musical theatre

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chalkrevelations · 3 years

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Word of Honor Ep 6, and let’s talk a little about what’s canon, and what’s not, and about the particular slip-slidiness of the line between them on this show.

But first, due diligence: If you are NEW or JUST VISITING, this is a re-watch, so you’re going to find SPOILERS not just for this ep, but for the entire show. Scroll away and come back later if you haven’t seen all 36.5 eps and want to watch unspoiled. Also, heads-up, this got super long, because I had to talk about that stuff up there and then still talk about the ep. Hashtag long post (remorseful).

So, “canon,” as applied to fannish source material (in Western fandom, at least) traditionally has been considered the official stuff – the episode, the book, the comic, the movie – based on the religious definition of “canon,” the collection of texts accepted as genuine and official within a religion. The word “fanon” – widely accepted fannish ideas – plays on this, as does the fandom concept of “word of God,” or things the Creators have said about the text but outside of it. Is it in the show as it aired or the book as it was printed? Canon. Is it not in the show as it aired or the book as it was printed? Not canon. (Apocrypha? Maybe. Anyway.) Generally, I think we’d say that things like material in the first draft of a script that doesn’t make it through revisions and onto the screen isn’t canon, even if you can get your hands on a copy of the first draft. The final product that airs is what’s canon. BUT this gets super slippery in something like WoH, in a way that’s exemplified in this episode. This ep is one of the places where people who can lip-read Chinese have spotted some significant dialogue changes between what the actors say on-screen and what lines have been dubbed in. (Everybody’s dubbed in cdramas, it’s just the thing that happens. You have your on-screen actors, and you have your voice actors. The ONLY person in The Untamed who did his own voice dubbing, for instance, was Ji Li, who played Nie Huaisang. All the other characters had voice actors dubbed in. In fact, the voice actor for Jiang Cheng in The Untamed is the voice actor for Wen Kexing in WoH.) One of the descriptions of WoH that I’ve heard is that this show was filmed as a bl and dubbed as a bromance. The thing is, nobody tried very hard to hide the shift. There are plenty of places that you can clearly see the actor’s mouths don’t match the dubbing, and they’re not artfully shot or edited to hide this. They’re fully on-screen, mouthing words that don’t match, right out in the open, almost like they want to you to pick up on it. Almost like it’s canon, because it’s right there on-screen, aired in the episode. In my first-watch reactions to Eps 36 and 37, I talked a lot about how the dubbing puts a layer of de-queered no-homo over what the on-screen actors are saying in these places, but if you can see what they’re actually saying and understand it, does that make it canon? What does it mean, both textually and meta-textually, if you can’t believe what you’re hearing – what you’re being told – because it contradicts what you’re seeing? How does that affect what we’re told about Our Protagonists and its “truth,” particularly in the final scenes? How much is the show deliberately working against censorship in this way? How much is it teaching us to look deeper than what we’re hearing on the surface?

Several people have talked about what’s actually being said by the on-screen actors in places where this happens, and I’m going to direct you to AvenueX on Youtube if you want a complete overview, because she’s reliable and has a good compilation that’s easy to find. She has a couple of videos called “Lip Reading for Sugar,” and the March 9, 2021, installment includes the Ep 6 incidences, the most significant of which are: At 3:05 in the ep, when WKX throws himself on Zhou Zishu’s back during the zombie Drug Men attack, calls him “mom,” asks ZZS to carry him, and tells “mom” that “your shoulder blades are the most beautiful.” Only no, Gong Jun didn’t say this, if you watch his mouth compared to the sound of the words. Instead of “niang” (mom), he says “Zhou Zishu.” Twice. “Zhou Zishu, carry me.” “Zhou Zishu, your shoulder blades are the most beautiful.” This is not only important because it emphasizes he’s gay for Zhou Zishu’s shoulder blades, but also because he’s fucking baked on Drunk Like A Dream incense when it happens, and later, ZZS will reveal that Drunk Like a Dream makes you see what you most desire, and he’ll confront WKX about how he “kept calling” someone’s name while he was under the influence of it. This makes no sense with the dubbing we get, because with “mom” dubbed over ZZS’s name here, WKX only calls Zhou Zishu’s real name once while he’s under the influence, at the end of ep 5. That is not kept calling. ANYWAY, once WKX clears his head and flies them away from the Drug Men, back to the a lakeside, there’s another disjunct at 5:05, when the dubbing has WKX tell ZZS not to play hero, that he doesn’t lose face if WKX helps him, and ZZS responds with something about your grandmother’s bear, which AvenueX tells me is a real Chinese idiom, although not for what. What Gong Jun and Zhang Zhehan appear to actually have said, though, is that WKX tells ZZS that this was just like a hero saving a beauty, with the implication that ZZS is the beauty, the damsel in distress, and ZZS respons that no, it’s like the beauty saving the hero, without a lick of concern that he’s the beauty, the damsel, in this scenario, just that he did all the work killing Drug Men and now this asshole is going to act like he’s the one who did the saving. At 31:24, dubbing has WKX telling ZZS that he’ll give ZZS whatever he wants if ZZS can get him some of the Drunk Like a Dream, but AvenueX tells me that he actually offers his body in exchange, in a way that implies marriage. And at 32:22, when ZZS asks WKX what he saw under the influence of the Drunk Like a Dream, the dubbing gives us some random story about baby WKX throwing a rat on his mother’s bed, while Gong Jun’s mouth seems to be saying something something about being in the bridal chamber with his beloved … so circling back to our first instance at 3:05, WKX using Zhou ZIshu’s name is now super-interesting, eh?

Another slip-slidey point of canon here is that there are two versions of this episode. The original version didn’t have the rabbit-washing scene. That was an extra that was inserted later into a Special Version ep when Youku reached 2 million subscribers. But the Special Version is now available on Youku’s channel (it’s the one I watched for this re-watch), AND it’s the regular version that’s on Netflix. So at 25:28, we now get this adorable little scene where ZZS and WKX are cleaning two rabbits in the lake before cooking them, and WKX splashes ZZS who pretends to be irritated before splashing WKX back and running away up the riverbank, chased by WKX. It’s flirty and playful and ALSO a foreshadowing of the flashback we’re going to see in a later ep, when they play together for an afternoon as children. Wasn’t canon before. Now it is.

Anyway, even with the (bad) dubbing that we get, this is a fantastic WenZhou ep. We open with them still being menaced by the zombies Drug Men, with a lot of swordwork by ZZS before he starts flagging because of his Nails Issue, whereupon WKX instantly sobers up, goes Evil Ghost Valley Master on Imposter Hanged Ghost who’s controlling the Drug Men, kills him with his Fan of Death, then scoops up ZZS and flies him off to a lake, where he attempts to tenderly check ZZS’s pulse and take care of his wounds before ZZS slaps away his hand like an offended maiden. WKX has to give him the qi smackdown in order to hold him still to :coff: pull down his robes and suck out the poison from the Drug Men scratches on the back of his shoulder. :hands: I remember the first time around, watching this with my mouth hanging open, demanding to know the heterosexual explanation for this. (Also, if you’re rummaging on Youtube, the Five Straight Guys Watching Word of Honor for this ep is not to be missed. They’re a little questionable in their reaction to the poison sucking, but before that, they’re a bunch of squeamish babies over using the dagger to further slice open the wounds to get to the poison, and it’s HILARIOUS. They can’t even look at the screen once the dagger comes out, hiding behind their hands. I love them, more and more as the eps go on, but they are WEAK compared to even the newbiest hurt/comfort fangirl.) There’s some more back and forth between WKX and ZZS about revealing their true selves to each other, no you, no YOU. WKX makes it clear that he knows there’s something really wrong with ZZS, and then they fight, set to romantic music, and ZZS ends up falling in the lake. I do the victory arms ( \o/ ) to myself where I’m sitting on the couch and startle one of the cats, because FINALLY we’re going to get rid of that execrable fake facial hair. ZZS fucks with WKX by staying underwater long enough that WKX panics and also dives in, we get some really cheap and awful underwater effects, and ZZS reveals his face! They end up back on the edge of the lake, drying their perfectly dry outer robes, while they sit around the fire together in their perfectly dry inner robes, but I am not going to complain because y’all. I CANNOT with how smug and pleased ZZS is for just a moment about WKX mooning over how pretty he is. Then he remembers to be an ill-tempered gremlin and pokes at WKX with a flaming stick, but I had to rewind four times just to catch that little moment of satisfaction about being admired again – it’s subtle and gorgeous and Zhang Zhehan is going to kill me with his face one of these days. ZZS demands dinner on this date, and fake-coughs pitifully to get WKX to go hunt something down, while he stays and does his delightful little thinky face as he pokes at the Soul Winding Box they got from Imposter Hanged Ghost. Then we get a shot of WKX looking at ZZS before he heads off to catch some rabbits that confirms he now knows he’s really Zhou Zishu, rather than Zhou Xu.

So, we’ll get back to the Ghost and the Box in a minute, but I do want to mention that this whole ep is layered through with mini-references and thematic stuff. Imposter Hanged Ghost rings his little bell to control his Drug Men, and remember that, we’ll see that again. WKX asks if ZZS came from the Healer’s Valley when ZZS offers him an antidote to the Drug Man poison; we learn later that WKX, himself, is the one who came from the Healer’s Valley. When ZZS gets the Soul Winding Box open and finds a piece of the Glazed Armor inside (Danyang’s, taken off of Ao Laizi by Ghost Valley before he was hung at the gate of Sanbai Manor), he gives it to WKX, tells him to throw it away if he doesn’t want it. WKX says he couldn’t possibly, and that he’ll wear it because it’s his first gift from A-Xu. Compare this to the way Xie’er will wear Awful Yifu’s Glazed Armor around his neck. We also see some of the thematic and referential stuff come up in conversations that form a repeated pattern in this ep of ZZS stressing what a bad and dangerous person he is: He scoffs at the idea he’s from Healer’s Valley, and asks if he looks like someone who practices medicine; WKX responds that he looked like a professional killer (true) who was cruel in the abandoned temple (presumably while escaping Mirror Lake) and frightening to a kind-hearted man like WKX who can’t even kill a chicken (particularly amusing given the prep for New Year’s dinner in a later ep, when WKX is the only one who CAN). At the lakeside and again after ZZS hightails it away from Sanbai Manor when they spot Han Ying there (HAN YING, my beloved), WKX asks if ZZS is a fugitive, what he’s hiding from, and says that he’ll protect him – by reason, because would he kill anyone unreasonably (omg, where to even begin? How many guys have you choked out at this point)? When they’re arguing about ZZS revealing his “true” face, ZZS warns that most people who’ve seen his real appearance are dead (probably true). WKX says he’s not afraid of death (not his own, at least, we’ll see that the thing he’s afraid of is ZZS’s death). ZZS warns WKX that he’s not only sharp-tongued, he’s ruthless (true). He tells WKX that he’s murdered many people (true) and set them on fire (not unlikely, frankly) and committed many crimes (true, in a way, although they were state-sanctioned, making them legal, if morally reprehensible). This is the ZZS who put the Nails in himself, who talks to himself about what a truly awful shixiong he is, who tells Prince Jin that he’s only good as a weapon. I like how we see this at the same time that we’re starting to see the side of him that’ll preen when someone thinks he’s pretty - this is a process, and it’s subtle, not as high-drama as WKX’s, but it’s there, nonetheless.

We also formally meet Xie Wang in this ep, artfully posed and playing his pipa among the bodies – old and new – of Zhao Coffin Home. He and Changing Ghost have a bit of a slapfight over whose fault it is that Imposter Hanged Ghost, who was actually Long-Tongued Ghost, got killed and got his (Danyang’s) Glazed Armor took by WKX, when Changing Ghost stole it from Ao Laizi, put it in the Soul Winding Box and gave it to Long-Tongued Ghost specifically to deliver it to Xie Wang. Xie Wang is super cool through all of this, and I think we get a sense of how deadly he is by the way Changing Ghost backs down. So, here’s what’s falling together: Some iteration of Ghost Valley is working with Xie Wang and the Scorpion Sect, giving the Scorpions access to the Soul Winding Threads, which we saw used at the Mirror Lake massacre and in the woods outside of Sanbai Manor to kill Yu Tianjie in the last ep. Via Xie Wang, Ghost Vally has access to use of the Drug Men, which we’ve seen at the Zhao Coffin Home (so far), although we haven’t yet been told (I think) how Xie Wang got access to the potions to create Drug Men (we also know ZZS read about Drug Men in a book somewhere, and got enough info to engineer an antidote to them). Xie Wang and the Scorpions have access to Drunk Like a Dream incense, which had to come from Prince Jin’s court, having been engineered by ZZS based on a much stronger formulation. Han Ying, from Tian Chuang in Prince Jin’s court, has been seen at Sanbai Manor, Zhao Jing’s place.

Meanwhile Chengling is doing poorly, with no appetite and getting bellowed at some more by Shen Shen, who would be the worst if only I didn’t know everything I know, which makes me cringe when Zhao Jing refers to Chengling as “my son, now.” NO. RUN, Goldbean. For some more thematic and referential stuff in this ep, WKX calls Chengling a “lonely chick with no one to rely on” and tsks over the fact that he’s “surrounded by hounds smarter than foxes” now that he’s under the care of the Five Lakes Alliance. This is clearly to manipulate ZZS into thinking Chengling is better off with ZZS, but it also sounds like an awfully apt description of Zhen Yan in Ghost Valley. I’m just sayin’.

#zhou zishou #wen kexing #xie wang #zhang chengling #zhao jing #word of honor #word of honor episode reax

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mornyavie · 3 years

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Glossary of references in The Bifrost Incident

It’s Very Long and yet also not really complete. If there are any questions / clarifications I can add, or I’ve messed anything up and need to fix it, let me know!

The tl;dr is that nearly every word in the album draws from either Norse mythology or the Lovecraft / Cthulhu mythos, directly or indirectly.

@moony221b here’s that glossary that I promised forever and a day ago.

Edit: I decided to create this document of annotations (x). Lyrics taken from Genius; I’m not totally sure how accurate they are, but hopefully they help get the point across! Again, questions and complaints both welcome.

Arcomba

I can’t find anything on this, would be interested if someone knows.

Asgard

One of the Nine Worlds, specifically the one where most of the Æsir (the subset of gods most associated with humans, including the well-known ones like Thor and Odin) live.

Thus Asgard is the planet on which the most powerful inhabitants of the Yggdrasil system, and those named after the gods, are found (though the subjugation / colonization relationship does not exist in myth).

Azathoth

This one’s from Lovecraft; Azathoth is the greatest of the Outer Gods, often served and worshiped by other gods themselves. Often described as mad, a demon, a sultan, or putting it all together as the Mad Demon Sultan. Resides at “the center of the universe,” where he appears as some sort of vast, amorphous, bubbling, roiling mass of “nuclear chaos.” (Nuclear probably refers to center, not nuclear power, which didn’t really exist when this was written). Servants about him play drums and flutes.

Mentioned briefly as the train travels through the Bifrost and into his realm, and a lot of the narration in those few verses draws directly from Lovecraft’s descriptions.

Baldur

The god of light and beloved by all, Baldr was killed by Loki in his final betrayal of the gods. After the murder Loki was tracked down and imprisoned, and will escape at the start of Ragnarok. In particular, Loki used a spear made of mistletoe... or, in the album, missile two. And tricked another god into throwing it, which I think is mimicked in the distance and impersonality of the crime. Look up more of his story if you want, it’s interesting and important, but that’s the relevant info here.

Bifrost

The rainbow bridge that the gods use to travel between worlds.

Which is, of course, directly analogous to the wormhole-ish extradimensional-ish space of “shifting, undulating hues” through which the train travels.

Edda

The Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda are the names given to two pieces of literature that are most people’s main source for Norse mythology. The Prose Edda was written by Snorri Sturluson around 1200 to teach his (mostly Christian) contemporaries about the mythology and mythological references that made up a big chunk of Norse literature. The Poetic Edda is a set of poems that serve as a major source for Norse tales.

This is partially just a way to connect our hero Lyfrassir Edda to the Norse traditions, but also definitely a reference to their (presumed) role as the main “recorder” and source of information to get out of the Yggdrasil system.

Fate

Honestly the way the Mechanisms deal with fate in general is very interesting and arguably sometimes quite Nordic... but in particular, Bifrost Incident references fate or destiny a number of times and features a number of situations where the outcome is fixed and can’t be changed, but you have to fight anyways: “Killing me won’t save your world” “I don’t care” or how Loki and Sigyn can’t stop the train, but can only delay it. A lot of Norse tragedy revolves around people heading into battle knowing that they’re doomed and fighting anyways, or around the cycle of conflict that marked the cultural requirements for avenging insults. And the myth cycle is notable for the fact that the gods know, explicitly, exactly what Ragnarok is, what’s going to happen, and how they’re going to die, but will fight in it anyways.

Inevitability and helplessness in the face of what you can’t possibly understand, let alone fight, which is a depiction slightly sideways of the Nordic version, are very Lovecraftian themes.

Fenrir

A wolf, child of Loki and father of Skoll and Hati, who was chained by the gods (particularly by Tyr, who placed his hand in the wolf’s mouth as “hostage” to assure him they would unchain him later, and lost the hand). He will break free at Ragnarok to join the battle against them and kill Odin.

With his association with monsters and with Loki, it’s fairly clear why he was aligned with the resistance movement. He’s serving “five life sentences” as a reference to his being chained, and the whole motif of the train’s journey being hijacked for a prison break certainly references the various characters who will be freed or break free as Ragnarok begins.

Frey

The brief reference of Frey being killed by the raging fire of the sun, with “no weapon, no defense,” is a direct translation of the god’s role in Ragnarok, when he will be killed by Surtr. Frey gave away his sword for the opportunity to woo his eventual wife, and so will be armed only with a stag’s antlers in his final combat. Also called Freyr.

Freya (“weeps tears of red-gold”)

Like her brother Frey (and yeah, these names get confusing), Freya is associated with harvest and fertility, though unlike him she also gets battle. In the song she weeps red-gold tears at the death of her husband Odr, which in myth she is said to do when her husband is absent. Also called Freyja.

Garm

Garm is another wolf, who guards Hel’s gates. He also breaks free at Ragnarok, and his howling heralds its coming. As in the album, he will fight and kill Tyr. Also called Garmr.

Hati

There’s a lot of wolves in Norse mythology. This one is a child of Fenrir. He chases the moon across the sky, and will swallow it when Ragnarok comes.

Mentioned briefly only as one of the resistance members on the train.

Heimdall

Heimdall is the watchman of the gods, with keen eyes and foresight, and guards the Bifrost as the entrance to Asgard. He will blow his horn to summon the gods to the final battle during Ragnarok, and he and Loki will kill one another. Also called Heimdallr; you’re probably noticing a pattern. It’s a grammar thing.

Mentioned as guarding the train and “doing his part.” His dying screams initiate the train’s destruction and echo throughout it, which presumably recalls the horn thing.

Hel

Another daughter of Loki, and, as the name will imply to English speakers, a guardian of the dead. She refuses to give Baldur back to the world of the living after Loki kills him. Also the name of the realm in which she resides, and to which go those who die of disease or old age. Doesn’t necessarily have the same bad-punishment connotation as modern Hell. I don’t know whether there’s any indication of what she herself is doing in Ragnarok, but many of her people and associates are certainly fighting against the gods, and I’m fairly certain the ship Naglfar, which carries Loki and his allies to Ragnarok, sets sail from Hel.

Hel as a prison colony clearly references the various characters the gods have chained or otherwise imprisoned (though, in myth, not all within Hel) as well as her alignment with “other side” during Ragnarok, and the jailbreak the resistance members are planning recalls the breaking of all these bonds as Ragnarok begins.

Hoddmimis

The woods in which Líf and Lífþrasir (see Lyfrassir) will shelter to survive Ragnarok and the various disasters accompanying it.

So, good news! We can be marginally assured of Lyfrassir’s survival after taking shelter at the mining-colony of Hoddmimis.

Jormungandr

The world serpent, which lives in the seas and encircles the earth. Will arise during Ragnarok, causing great floods, and fight Thor; Thor will slay the serpent, but in turn the serpent’s poison will cause his death, after he staggers “nine steps back.”

Thor’s fight with Odin-turned-serpent is pretty clearly analogous to this, especially the taking nine steps to the window before destroying it with his hammer, resulting in both their deaths. I don’t think there’s any mythological basis to Odin turning into the serpent, though

Kvasir (“blood drained out”)

Kvasir was a very wise man/god and the originator of poetry. I’m leaving out a fair amount of his birth and life; the important information here is that two dwarves who were jealous of his knowledge tricked him, killed him, drained his blood, and mixed it with honey to make mead. Any who drank of the mead gained the gift of poetry / scholarship; eventually the gods stole it.

I’m not sure if there’s a reason they decided to specifically describe him as a resistance member, but there’s a clear parallel in Kvasir’s blood being drained and used to power the train, especially with the language of glyphs and sigils providing power.

Loki

Ah, Loki. Male in the general canon, though not without genderbending (he turns into a mare and gives birth to Fenrir, Hel, and Jormungandr, for instance). Inasmuch as the Norse myths we have can be organized into a “chronology,” you could do it (in my opinion) along Loki’s path from a mostly benevolent trickster god whose antics occasionally cause trouble to a genuinely malevolent figure. Associated with wit, magic, and trickery. Despite how modern lore (I suspect influenced by Marvel) often portrays Thor and Loki as brothers and children of Odin, in the myth Loki and Odin are bonded as blood-brothers. But Loki also often appears alongside Thor. As mentioned, parent of three of the main figures of Ragnarok. In the “final” myth, he jealously arranges the death of the god Baldr, who was loved by all; then he appears at a feast, where he exchanges insults with the other gods. This is the last straw; they capture him and chain him to a stone, over which they tie a serpent. Venom drips from the serpent’s fangs, causing him great agony. His wife Sigyn stays by his side, catching the venom in a bowl, but when she is forced to leave for a moment to dump it out his thrashing causes earthquakes. He will break free at the start of Ragnarok and sail to Asgard, where he and Heimdall will kill each other.

Hopefully that’s enough to give you a good background for Loki’s role in the album... it’s pretty clear why she’s framed as the opposition to the gods and the “leader” of the resistance movement, as a call to her role in Ragnarok. Her association with magic and trickery make sense for her being the “expert” in the twisted Lovecraftian “science” that produces the train. It also parallels her role in myth; her actions often get the gods into trouble, but they just as often need her wit and knowledge to get them out of it, as Odin needs her knowledge despite her taking action to destroy the train. And the setup at the end - drip, drip, drip, her face twisted in pain, her wife beside her, her “release” heralding the end of the world - precisely echoes the language of her bondage in myth; though her mind-destroying imprisonment by Odin also invokes this.

Lovecraft(ian)

A highly influential horror writer from the early 20th century. He’s largely credited with the creation of the creation of the “cosmic horror” genre, a type of horror which emphasises a vast, unknowable, uncaring universe against which we cannot hope to even begin to fight. His ideas and the gods / demons / creatures he created form the basis of the “Cthulhu mythos” or even “Lovecraft mythos,” which today is a sort of standard set of assumptions on which writers can build. Lovecraftian themes of apocalypse, inevitability, and powerlessness are highly prevalent in the album. Several of the gods in this mythos are used; in particular, Yog-Sothoth (see below). Also, a lot of the general description (madness, roiling chaos, undulating colors) draws from his distinctive vocabulary that remains staple of the genre. It’s worth noting that Lovecraft was a horrible and very racist person, but the genre today is widely used by people who are not terrible.

Lyfrassir

Líf and Lífþrasir in Norse mythology are the two humans who will survive Ragnarok and rebuild humanity; a hopeful sign for our album’s protagonist!

Midgard

In Norse mythology, the “middle” world where humans live. Earth.

Nagthrod

I don’t know this one.

@acorn-mushroom pointed out that it may be a mis-transcription of Naglfar, the name of the (ocean) ship which will carry Loki and his followers from the shores of Hel to the battlefield at Ragnarok. It’s made of dead men’s nails.

Odin

The king of the gods in Norse mythology. As the god of both wisdom and madness, Odin’s role in the album as a researcher and technological ruler whose discoveries drive her slowly mad is both very Lovecraftian and a reasonable leap. I could say a lot about the figure of Odin, but I think this character is one of the most divergent from the myth, in detail if not in role.

Odr

Óðr is Freya’s husband.

Outer gods

A Lovecraft thing referring to several of the most horrible and powerful gods, including Yog-Sothoth.

Ragnarok

The apocalypse, basically, in Norse mythology. Proceeded by various catastrophes, especially a very long winter, mentioned in the album, culminating in a great battle between the gods and their enemies, and resulting in the death of the majority of gods and other creatures of the world.

Ratatosk

A squirrel who runs up and down Yggdrasil, carrying messages between some of the tree’s other inhabitants and sowing discord. The Ratatosk Express links the worlds of the Yggdrasil System, and causes “discord” in the resistance’s opposition to it.

Sigyn

Loki’s wife. See Loki for her role in his imprisonment.

Skoll

Sköll in Norse mythology is the wolf that chases and will someday eat the sun. Association with Fenrir (another wolf) and other monsters motivates his inclusion in the list of resistance members.

Thor

A Norse god, associated with war, lightning/thunder, strength, and in general sort of... common people, as opposed to Odin’s association with kings and royalty. Prone to anger, which makes sense with his depiction as a volatile military leader in the album. He is heavily associated with his hammer mjölnir, hence jokes about “throwing a hammer in the works” and whatnot. Often associates with Loki, both as friends and as enemies as Loki progresses from a mostly-harmless trickster to actively opposing the other gods; thus how in the album he and Loki were once friends. See above for his death fighting Jormungandr.

Tyr

Another Norse god associated with war. He sacrificed a hand to bind Fenrir, and will be killed by Garmr during Ragnarok, both events referenced in the album.

Yggdrasil

The world-tree of Norse mythology, which supports the nine worlds of the cosmology.

Yog-Sothoth

An Outer God of Lovecraftian mythos; also called the Gate and Key. It is associated as sort of the substance of time and space, binding together the cosmos. A lot of the description during the Ragnarok sequences draws directly from the “canonical” descriptions of this deity, and the invocation spoken by Lyfrassir in Red Signal draws from a story about this creature, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward.

#the mechanisms #the bifrost incident #information #references #thoughts #norse mythology

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pizzazz-party · 3 years

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Ring Analysis Part 1: Synchronizing— How It Works and What It Tells Us About Ring

...As well as the world he lives in. Our buddy Ring may explain very little about himself, but he doesn’t need to if you’re paying—obsessive—attention to detail.

(Gameplay spoilers up to World 20 under the cut.)

For a mechanic that’s important enough to merit a cutscene, and then goes on to envelop every part of the game, “synchronizing” gets a handful of lines before it’s never explicitly brought up again.

So let’s go over this scene.

“Synchronizing” is, at first glance, a simple exchange of traits. That’s not entirely wrong. Trainee does physically take on characteristics specific to Ring, like the flaming hair, and Ring does gain access to her heartbeat reading, sort of like a living stethoscope.

But what syncing actually is, is a symbiotic relationship. It’s both participants “recalibrating” themselves to the other as best as each of them are able. For a flesh-and-blood partner that’s not built for syncing, this means physically changing to become something a little closer to Ring. (More on that later.) For Ring, a magical being designed with the extra sensory input in mind, it invisibly grants him access to the other’s most invaluable resource: their exercise energy.

Like synchronizing, “exercise energy” is another lovely concept that was mentioned once and then never again. So much so that I’ve been accidentally calling it “fitness energy” for weeks and am still trying to correct my reflexes.

But exercise energy is everything. If all it takes is a simple read of a heartbeat to jumpstart a sync bond, exercise energy is the glue that cements it together. Because Ring and Trainee don’t stop being synced whenever they’re not physically touching. They separate all the time. They can put a little distance between themselves and still be at the height of synchronization, even. But let’s take a step back for a moment, and talk about that “physically changing to become something a little closer to Ring” aspect.

Say that Trainee is doing a leg move at peak performance. Her hair is flaring up. Her legs are glowing that same yellowish hue—because they’re full of exercise energy. That’s what that is. That’s what it must be. It’s what Ring himself is partially made of, seeing as the same stuff flows through his veinlike tubes. Seriously. Look at this. It’s the same goddamn color.

I can’t understate how incredibly important exercise energy is. To synchronizing, to Ring, and to literally everything else. Exercise energy is a type of life energy. In the world of Ring Fit, it’s in everything, everywhere—in varying levels of purity and concentration. When Trainee is performing a fit skill, she almost seems to absorb a mystical...something... from the open air around her, as she charges up a skill. Thin lines of light streak towards her as she lights up, not away. See for yourself.

Trainee isn’t a normal inhabitant of “Planet Fitness.” She doesn’t know how to manipulate exercise energy very well on her own. It looks like being synced with Ring has made her somewhat biologically closer to being made of exercise energy herself, and with that? The slight ability to absorb it from the air around her. It’s a really small thing, likely just a tiny boost of power she’s drawing in from her surroundings (and returning right back after a move is complete). But it’s there. It’s visibly happening. With one exception, this doesn’t occur outside of a fit battle. And that makes sense. A fit skill taking more energy than an air blast is very reasonable. Those crates littering the place are a lot less hardy than...whatever you would classify Monsters as.

I mentioned an exception. Here it is:

Victory posing is such an odd little tradition, isn’t it? It’s unskippable; Ring always insists on it. And at first glance, his instructions are weird. “Pull in energy from the ground” sounds a bit like nonsense...except in this shot, Trainee is actually standing on a glowing platform full of Exercise Energy. (Yes, that’s what that is.) The moment she’s done charging her squat power, thin lines of light streak upwards— some into Trainee. And when she raises her arms, she expels all that excess energy into the open air. You can watch the process here.

And that’s where most of the EXP from victory posing comes from—from the well of exercise energy humming beneath her feet.

Exercise energy is life energy in constant motion. It’s created (for a lack of a better word) constantly as the body moves and burns calories. It’s also expelled constantly, and this is most visible when Trainee works out. It is not, under any circumstances, meant to be trapped in the body forever. But the act of having possessed any of it at all gives Trainee EXP, a byproduct, which can be kept forever.

———

Ring says in the initial cutscene, “The more you exercise, the more synchronized we’ll be!” The more Trainee exercises, the more exercise energy her body holds at time. The more exercise energy she holds, the more alike she and Ring are in that very moment. The more alike they are—the more in sync they are.

———

The two way connection created by synchronizing is closer to a metaphysical fusion of both participants than a simple trade off. Ring’s powers are (almost but not quite) Trainee’s powers. Trainee’s body is (almost but not quite) Ring’s body. It’s both easy and hard to see where one’s work stops and the other’s begins. So let’s lay down some quick facts.

One! In terms of powers—everything Ring and Trainee can do together, Ring can do alone. It’ll be weaker. But he can do it. He’s got his own supply of exercise energy and he’s a master at manipulating it. Ring is not helpless; you are.

Two! The glowing limbs you fight with in a fit battle belong to Ring—not Trainee. Here are even some screen caps of Ring vaguely referring to them both. (It’s even in all-important blue text.)

Three! Ring is always actively contributing to your fit battles. He is never just counting reps or giving tips. As Trainee charges up a fit skill, Ring is constantly channeling the resulting energy into powering up his battle constructs. He is actively aiming said constructs for you, always.

In the case of specific fit skills, where Ring’s battle constructs immediately appear as buff as can be—it’s because Trainee is helping. A lot of what these instances have in common is the fact that the fit skills in question are less... involved?

Imagine being Trainee, and trying to keep a good aim on the enemy as you do the Mountain Climber move. (Or even squats. I do too many of those and I start disconnecting from reality.) The Ring Raise move, on the other hand, is gentler and gives Trainee a clear, unobstructed view of the enemy throughout the whole exercise. It gives her the wiggle room to try her hand at manipulating her own exercise energy directly.

With Ring and Trainee working together, the charge-up effect is therefore instantaneous.

Four! Canonically, despite the two of them being synced, Ring can shut off Trainee’s access to his powers at any time. That’s because, for them to work in the first place, Ring must be consciously activating them. In some animations at the start of a course, Trainee stretches by pulling on him at both ends. This should summon a suction vortex. But it doesn’t. Because Ring knows Trainee is just doing a pre-run stretch.

It explains why you can’t summon a Mega Ab Guard whenever you feel like it; only when Ring suggests it. Or why you can’t just suck up tokens in mini games like Dreadmill (Ring is too honest to help you cheat). Yes, it’s a game mechanic thing. But it’s a mechanic that Ring canonically controls. Trainee absolutely cannot use any of his abilities without his explicit consent. And that’s probably why she hasn’t accidentally killed somebody in combat yet—Ring is super careful. (He’s a professional, you know.)

———

Now that we have a better understanding of what exercise energy is and a better grasp on how Ring works—let’s circle back one more time to that “physically changing to become something a little closer to Ring” aspect. Because there’s one last insane thing we skipped over.

Trainee is initially the baseline in our understanding of what exercise energy looks like in a human being. Her yellow-orange flames are our constant companion—and therefore we get misled, because Trainee is an outlier. She is synced to Ring, and Ring is extraordinary. So she’s not a good example of the average person.

But in this case, despite being a literal master, Guru Andma is.

Guru Andma, “the balance master,” is the only other human character we see using attacks consisting of all three muscle groups. Her fight is a wealth of knowledge in of itself. When she flexes her arms, they fill with RED energy. When she flexes her abdomen, it fills with YELLOW energy. When she flexes her leg, it fills with BLUE energy. This is the standard for human beings. This is normal.

What this implies then, is that synchronizing with Ring has overwritten Trainee’s original energy signature. Ring’s energy is decidedly NOT human. It’s not even fit-skill yellow; it looks close, but it’s really something else entirely. Ring of course can convert Trainee’s energy into traditional reds, yellows, and blues for a fight. (Or at least, he can fake it if he doesn’t have his Color Coding ability. He once mimicked the flames of Dark Influence early on in the game; some superficial color editing is not above him.)

But yeah. Trainee’s energy is now definitely abnormal.

And yet the process didn’t seem to put her in any physical pain? I really doubt Ring would have sprung that on her if it did. (I mean, he still should have asked for permission first.) I’d wager the effects of syncing, as deep as are, aren’t permanent once the bond is dissolved. What Ring is doing—“synchronizing”—is somehow, simultaneously, extremely mystical and yet completely natural.

———

Last segment, before I let you go.

For a long time, I wondered: what are the prerequisites, that denote syncing potential? Not impressive muscles, I’m sure; it’s heavily implied Dragaux once synced with Ring, and he was infamously skinny. Could the general attitude of a person play a role, if Ring’s energy is pure positive exercise energy? Or could it be genetic? Maybe even entirely random?

I wasn’t sure until I fought the four masters, and especially after fighting Guru Andma.

I’ll bet you anything that there’s something inherently flexible about Trainee, for a human. Something more malleable, and therefore more amenable to undergoing the dramatic changes of a sync bond. And I’ll bet you further that it has something to do with the fact that Trainee had zero previous experience wielding exercise energy at the start of the game.

Because Ring tells Trainee she has potential right after identifying that she’s new.

(The less developed a person is initially, the easier it could be to sync with Ring. Whereas a person with more intensive training would be incompatible.)

And if you’re still convinced that Ring was just impressed with her muscles—please remember that Ring is not human, and does not experience life through the same lens. It’s implied he can “see” energy with more than just his eyes. It’s how you can drop him in a new temple in an unfamiliar land and he’ll still be able to tell Trainee when she’s close to the finish line. (He forgot what static stretching was that one time. He does not have these floor plans memorized.) To him, those glowing wells at the end are like straight up beacons.

He was absolutely examining her energy.

———

To Ring, syncing probably isn’t worth writing an entire essay about. It’s natural to him, instinctive. It’s Ring making a promise to watch over someone, and to have their back as they will have his. And I think that’s beautiful. Frustrating to my curiosity, but beautiful.

———

TLDR; Synchronizing is a metaphysical bond sustained through Exercise Energy, a substance mentioned once in World 1 that encompasses the whole game. It exists everywhere in everything, in different variations of intensity and purity. Ring especially is partially made of exercise energy. It’s the glowing stuff in his tubes. There’s more, but that’s the gist of it. DISCLAIMER: This is for fun! I just wanted to try my hand at explaining how the magical sentient Pilates ring works. I feel pretty strongly about my conclusions, but I’ll go back and edit this if/when/where applicable. Thank you for reading.

———

EDIT (June 20, 2021): Updated header image. Also added a link to Ring mimicking DI.

EDIT (August 12, 2021): Added links to part 2 and 3.

———

RING ANALYSIS

Part 1: Synchronizing— How it Works and What It Tells Us About Ring

Part 2: Ring’s Powers—And What They All Have In Common

Part 3: Ring’s Biology and Possible Origins

#ring fit adventure #ring fit adventure spoilers #ring #ring fit trainee #pizzazz post #pizzazz meta #also some outfit spoilers I guess beyond world 20? idk. if it bugs you.#honestly still don’t regret giving myself a deadline. Bc yeesh if I didn’t get this out now I’ll never be free of it #if ring were real I probably would strangle him #this is basically me answering some questions that I’ve always had

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souppretzel · 3 years

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Alright, I watched the Dear Evan Hansen film adaption, I’ve got a lot to say it seems so here’s the review I posted on Letterboxd.

I would like to say straight up that I am a huge fan of the Broadway show so that makes my judgment bias, and I will be comparing it.

I’m not going to criticise the choice to use Platt, I understand why they did and it’s evident that he puts his heart into the character of Evan Hansen.

The film opens with the song “Waving Through A Window” as opposed to “Anybody Have a Map?” which seemed odd. “Anybody Have a Map?” has Heidi Hansen, Evan’s mother and Cynthia Murphy, Connor’s mother, sing about not understanding their children and their struggle parenting. We observe the parallel between Evan and Connor, and open with a perspective that isn’t Evan. Instead, we are introduced via Evan’s first solo, showing off the narrative entirely through his character’s view point.

The start of the film is slow, the actors seem almost bored reciting their lines in the scenes taking place throughout the first day of school, Colton, who plays Connor Murphy, has dialed down the character’s anger which I was a little disappointed with. He yells at Evan in the hallway, not shoving him (though he would do that later) and in the library he’s quiet, even when he yells at Evan. It’s hard not to compare to Mike Faist’s performance in the musical, loud and angry and hurt “you’re the fucking freak!”

Jared’s character is barely there after “Sincerely Me” (which, I will admit, I quite loved as a musical number; the transition into the song, Colton’s movements, the ridiculously inappropriate upbeat vibe.) - which I was severely disappointed with. I love Nik Dodani as an actor and I was so excited to see him play Jared. And the bits of dialogue we get are fun, he plays the role a lot more sassy than Will Roland did on Broadway, but after “Sincerely Me” he’s shoved to the back, a couple reaction shots in “You Will Be Found”, a quick scene at the first Connor Project meeting and him and Alana waiting for Evan to show up at a subsequent meeting later on, but he never gets angry at Evan like he does in the show (“Fuck you, Evan. Asshole.”) - and whilst I was always a little sad they never got resolution in the show, it hurt here more. Him and Evan have a graduation photo together but Jared seems more annoyed while Evan is enthusiastic. The “family friend” bit never comes back around either. Dodani’s Jared never gets fleshed out and it makes me sad at what could’ve been.

Also he 100% would’ve killed the “Sincerely Me” reprise.

Jumping character from Jared to Alana Beck - I really loved Stenberg’s portrayal of Alana and it’s one of the best things to come from the film. She’s authentic, and her character actually gets fleshed out more, including a new solo “The Anonymous Ones”, which takes the place of “Disappear”. Now, I really loved “The Anonymous Ones”, I think it’s pretty, I think it perfectly fits with the theme and I adore how they made it visually parallel “Waving Through A Window” as she sings it. I also enjoy the lyrical parallels to the cut song from the musical “Hiding In Your Hands” which Zoe sings, but was replaced by “Requiem”.

However, “Disappear” was important in the musical, being sung by Evan and his imaginary Connor - the physical manifestation of his guilt throughout the musical (something the film lacks and I will speak more on in a moment). “Disappear” is the point in which Evan is asked the question “Did you fall? Or did you let go?” by Connor and we realise Evan had attempted suicide when he broke his arm, he’s in denial. In the film, it’s hinted at in Evan’s flashbacks around Ellison but not fully confirmed until “Words Fail” at the end of the film, a full hour after we learn the fact in the Broadway show. It takes away from Evan’s character.

“Requiem”, my favourite song in the whole musical, was well done. Not the best it could be, Dever, playing Zoe, seemed to struggle a little with the vocal range of the song, but to be fair Zoe has one of the harder vocal demands in the show. I love the climax having Zoe almost total her car, I thought it was a brilliant idea - however, Dever didn’t play it nearly angry enough in my opinion. Dreyfuss’ performance of “Requiem” is fuelled by anger in the bridge “when the villains fall the kingdoms never weep, no one lights a candle to remember, no one mourns at all…” the idea is there, the execution just could’ve been better.

Amy Adams as Cynthia is one of the best performances in the film. Her acting is brilliant and she nails her parts in “Requiem”, storywise though, it seems very clear that they were going for the angle where she pushes Evan into lying, she’s desperate to know more about her son. In the stage play this is evident, but I felt like they were pushing that idea more in the film - which leans back into Evan being played as more sympathetic.

There are several other instances and changes where it’s been made for Evan to look more sympathetic in the film adaption; cutting the songs “Anybody Have a Map?” (outside perspective), “Disappear” (Evan’s biggest mistake in the film outside of the original lie), and especially “Good For You” (Heidi, Alana and Jared holding Evan accountable), the change in “If I Could Tell Her” having Evan and Zoe talking in the kitchen and almost kissing as opposed to him actually kissing her in Connor’s bedroom in the show (a moment wherein I was asking “how far is he willing to take this?”).

In the end, there is the change made wherein Evan exposes himself online as a liar, whereas in the show the Murphy’s decide to keep it secret because of the good that has come from the Connor Project. And I guess this works in the sense of the film, offers a bit of closure to Evan’s character arc as he tries to actually go and find out what Connor was really like after doing so (something taken from the novel of all things, and I’m slightly pissed off that if the novel was being taken into account they didn’t bother to even hint at Miguel, Connor’s canonical boyfriend in the book.)

I know this was the writer’s way of trying to hold Evan more accountable for his actions, but honestly? “Good For You” still does a better job - having Heidi, Alana and Jared, characters we know and understand their hurt and frustration, ripping into Evan is a much more satisfying way to have him held accountable for his actions then just Evan opening up instagram and posting a video unprompted.

Speaking of there being a lack of “Good For You” - Heidi Hansen barely makes it into the film. After “Anybody Have A Map?” and “Good For You” being cut she has one song, “So Big/So Small” which takes place after Evan is honest about everything and tells her what he tried to do when he broke his arm, and the song is beautiful, it’s sang well and it’s a clearly devastating song - but I felt such a lack of connection to this portrayal of Heidi due to how little she was in the film. However, what she was in there for, Moore acted her well - and would’ve absolutely killed “Good For You” if they had left it in. Which they had the time to do oh my god-

I couldn’t find a place to talk about this earlier but “You Will Be Found” is the emotional climax to end the first act of the show on Broadway. The song is fine in the film, but the editing of one part in particular really annoyed me - the part of the song where it’s the chorus of voices echoing “you are not alone” and there is just post after post merging together to create a photo of Connor. It’s a clear parallel to the set on the Broadway show, and I see what they were attempting to do but the editing just didn’t look right? At all? I hated it.

The film is ended in the same manner as the Broadway show, at the end of the year at the orchard, Zoe takes Evan and they talk, get closure, and that’s that. All this ending with Connor’s song, which I was thrilled that Connor got a song let me tell you, “A Little Closer” which surfaces as Evan’s attempting to find out more about the real Connor - it stems from a video of him singing at rehab. Connor in the film, like Zoe, plays guitar and writes songs. This was actually a detail about Connor I really liked that they added, links him to Zoe a little more. In the novel, Zoe actually writes and sings “Requiem” while Connor’s ghost watches her, and I just like the symmetry it provides the two characters, who otherwise are “a million worlds apart”. That was another reason I was upset about Zoe’s lack of anger during “Requiem”, it links back to Connor’s own anger.

My biggest gripe with the film is the lack of Connor. In the Broadway show he remains as the physical manifestation of Evan’s guilt for lying about being the dead kid’s friend, he talks to Evan and seemingly coaxes him to lie more, he’s the one who begs the question “did you fall? or did you let go?”, in the novel he remains as a ghost, every three or so chapters having one of his own which gives insight into his life while being alive (showing how wrong Evan has him) and commenting on Evan’s trainwreck of a lie (which offers a perspective that’s not Evan’s). There’s a scene in the novel where his ghost interacts with Evan once, after the truth comes out Evan is lying on the road unwilling to get up despite an oncoming car and Connor’s ghost just screams at him to get up. It’s a bittersweet moment. In the film however, aside from the first day of school and the “Sincerely Me” montage, we are given nothing until Evan unearths the video of him singing in rehab. It’s odd. Connor’s suicide acts as the catalyst for the plot, and Levenson himself has referred to Evan and Connor as mirror images of one another, which is one of the reasons his presence is important throughout the story. The film lacks it.

Overall, I didn’t absolutely hate the film, I liked a few of the new character details, loved the two additional songs, and it would’ve been alright had the film been a stand-alone film, but being a fan of the Broadway show since 2017, I was left disappointed at what could have been. Jared not having any development, Heidi not being in the film much at all, the lack of Connor - ghost or the physical manifestation of Evan’s guilt aside.

But in a sentence? It could’ve been worse.

#Dear Evan Hansen #DEH #DEH Film #Film #Musical #Mak Speaks #I have a lot of thoughts about this #These characters mean the world to me #Anyway I'm gonna go and cleanse myself by rereading charactershoes' come and go AGAIN

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ouyangzizhensdad · 3 years

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Hey, feel free to ignore this, but I'd love to hear your grievances against Bridgerton? I saw some of the fashion posts you rbed, but I'm especially intrigued by the "fails on all aspects" parts? Thanks!

Hi there,

There is honestly so much that could be said and analysed in finer points but the short version of it is just that it is a bad story wrapped in the glitz of high production value but surprisingly little good technical execution despite all the money shoveled at it. Bridgerton is the type of show where the petty, mean side of me would delight in a detailed and cutthroat list of all of its flaws but for which I do not care enough to be actually invested in hating it. It’s just a thing to be puzzled and petty about: people think Bridgerton is good. Wild.

Now let me first say that I have no inherent problems with anachronistic creative choices, or the idea of a contemporary take on period dramas. After all, all period dramas are inevitably told through a contemporary lens, to different degrees. It’s also not like they were the first big production to do it either: has everyone just forgot about The Great Gatsby? or tumblr’s favourite Hamilton? I honestly think this kind of mixing already has so many cool outcomes when it comes to music (like this, this or this and this), I do believe we could get something really interesting out of creative anachronism in mainstream visual media. I’m also more forgiving with newer forms of experimentation, because sometimes new ideas need to be worked out before they reach their full potential. But the way Bridgerton does it.... so clearly lacks a clear creative vision and dedication to the concept imo that it makes it harder to excuse the ways it fails since the failures seem to originate from that lack of vision and dedication to storytelling. For instance, there is seemingly no logic as to when the diegetic music will be an instrumental cover of a contemporary song or not--which does not even broach the topic of how bad those ‘classical music’ arrangements for modern songs were? Honestly embarrassing how lazy those arrangements were: hire a good composer (or any at all), you cowards. And then the costumes... once again, a lack of internal logic seems to permeate the choices presented in addition to a lack of care in its execution: so many of the dresses are ill-fitted, the characterisation through the outfits were all over the place (like the mom who wore a silhouette that no one else wore and had no basis in any fashion of the era) and so many of the fabrics/jewellery looked the opposite of expensive (kind of looked like a lot of it was polyester and plastic tbh), which is sort of a problem when you are trying to sell the fantasy of "The lives of the rich and famous but make it regency” imo although I suppose a portion of the audience just doesn’t notice lmao. Honestly I find that a lot of ‘costume historians’ who made video essays on Bridgerton were too nice with the show, perhaps in order not to come off as seeming to hate the costumes on the basis of them not being historically accurate, and as a result were way too forgiving imo. And this lack of real creative vision is also something we see in the cinematography and direction which.... seems often confused about the way it wants to make things feel fantastical and ends up dropping the ball on the execution of these meant-to-be extravagant or over-the-top shots.

But, again, the cinematography is just... middling at best, made only worse by the editing which is just plain bad. I guess you’ll have to just take me on my word on this because I am not willing to do an autopsy of all I find off about it, but lord jesus mary and joseph it was painful to watch at certain moments.

Bridgerton is not the first show to do colourblind casting, although I’d say it deserves recognition for fucking it up for no reason at all. Like, sure there are criticisms to be had about how it remains still a very white story that falls into certain tropes wrt darker skin characters or the glaring lack of south asian representation considering what the contemporary UK looks like, etc. but what I’m gesturing at is the totally unnecessary but mind-boggling “royal love solved racism” twist we get in the, what, fourth episode? (Broey Deschannel covered the topic quite well imo) The audience would have accepted that there were no in-world explanation for the colourblind version of the already-made fantastical regency that had them dancing to Ariana Grande songs. The colourblindness, racism-free society would have just been another aspirational aspect. They literally did not need to do this.

Honestly I don’t feel like I need to get into why the story itself is not very good or well-executed since it feels very obvious. I won’t begrudge on principle the show for using well-worn tropes and common-to-the-point-of-farce character archetypes, but I have to object to the way it uses them and in the service of what story. And not to make myself in a plot-hole-ding kind of person-who-has-thoughts-about-media, but this is not a story that holds up well to scrutiny or logic, let’s say. And any type of social or political commentary it tried to include was dumb to the point of farce: the Feminist Character Who Wants to Read not Go Dance was just.... a masterclass in bad, embarrassing writing. I am surprised at how unlikeable and boring the vast majority of the characters were, but perhaps less surprised at how a series that planned on having multiple seasons already sold the twist of Lady Whistleblow’s identity at the end of the first season, for what seemed to be no narrative reason at all. That being said, I have to give credit where it’s due and acknowledge that there is a skill in being able to produce stories that get extremely popular and well-loved.

(Do I need to mention the performances? So many underwhelming or embarrassing performances. It’s hard to tell sometimes whether it’s the actors themselves or the directing that’s the issue, or a mixture of both, but.... oof).

I guess in the end Bridgerton’s biggest transgression is it sits for me in the uncomfortable middle where it is neither trashy or campy fun nor is it an interesting work of fiction. Differently put, it is simply neither good nor fun.

#cherryblossomshadow #long post #brine corner #i suppose #not mdzs

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rechoired · 4 years

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A problem with the Tales Of Arcadia community

First and foremost, I’d like to ask anyone taking the time to read this to please read the post all the way through before commenting on the matter. There is a lot of dirty laundry to unpack here, and some points will be building off previous ones.

I’ll get right to the point. Most everybody in the Tales of Arcadia fandom will have heard of the blog imthegingerninja / ginger-le-gay. She is one of the most well-known ToA-centric blogs, after all. (If you’re wanting to avoid her on Twitter as well, her account is Margaret Bell, or @The_Book_Bell.)

This is your PSA, TOA fandom: Ginger is a toxic, manipulative person.

This is not a claim I like to make lightly, but it’s long overdue that this issue is properly brought up within the fandom.

I’ve seen so many people wonder why the Tales of Arcadia fandom is so small. Well, I and many others very strongly believe that Ginger is one of the main reasons for that, if not the main one. To make matters easier, I’ve tried to break this down into some main points. So let’s take a look at how Ginger falls under this category.

Disclaimer: Please DO NOT look at this post as an excuse to harass Ginger or any other blog mentioned here. This sort of behavior is NOT acceptable. The point of this post is to educate those who may not know the extent of her harrowing behavior, nothing more.

1. Dishonesty and Death Threats

[EDIT: Shortly after this post went up, she started blatantly lying about me to try to cover for herself. You can see those lies being easily disproven here]

Ginger has been kicked from at least three Tales of Arcadia servers, all for similar reasons of violence. While I cannot provide screenshots as I am no longer part of the servers they were in, there are multiple witnesses that can verify the disgusting behavior she engaged in. The one I saw specifically was her saying that certain members of the fandom should be gathered up and hunted for sport, among other gross things. (Elaboration of why can be found in point 3, though it still doesn’t excuse this kind of talk)

Here is some points made by another blog that also sums up similar issues with Ginger, though:

While there were multiple instances of her inciting violence towards others, this is unfortunately one topic I cannot provide specific screenshots for at this time. But I will add them in as I can find them. That being said, I want to move to the dishonesty, something I do have a screenshot for.

While you could argue that people sometimes notice the similar things, this is far too close together to be considered an “original find”. The reblog button is there for a reason, but she instead decides to steal the OP’s premise and present it as her own original thought.

There have been a couple other blogs that have confirmed that their theories and analysis posts were often stolen and presented as Ginger’s own as well, to the point where they stopped bothering even making such posts, as the above blog points out. (Out of respect for their privacy, I will not be naming these blogs. Say what you will about that possibly weakening my point, but if she’s willing to so blatantly steal from that person shown above, it shouldn’t surprise you that she’s so willing to do it to others.)

Theory-making and analysis posts aren’t as solidly “original content” as a piece of art or fanfiction, sure, but it’s still common fandom courtesy to give credit where it’s due. Ginger has intentionally avoided extending that courtesy far too many times.

2. Hypocrisy

Most of this is going to be about past Merlin vs. Morgana drama, though there are also words to be said for the incredibly shaky relationships she forms with “friends”.

But first let’s talk about those wizards.

This is a topic I’ve tried to approach with Ginger before, but she borderline refused to acknowledge any of the points I was trying to make, and when she did, I don’t know if I just wasn’t being clear or what, but it honestly looked as though she was purposefully trying to misunderstand what I was saying in her bizarre responses. (To be fair, I was sending messages out of anger because she vagueposted about a blog I admired, calling them a “disgusting creep” because of them simply saying they’d hoped Jim and Merlin would be able to actually bond at some point... Not really a justifiable reaction to such a harmless thought, in my opinion. But my point is, I recognize that the circumstances may have clouded my ability to vocalize my thoughts clearly.)

That aside, we should first acknowledge this post Ginger made to save face after having gotten some backlash about hate-train related things (Side note: I couldn’t find the original post, so this is a screenshot I got from someone else. I did not add the writing. The text underneath it should still be slightly readable, I hope.):

Taken at face value, this is a very reasonable post. I think everybody would and should be able to agree on it. Hate-meme him for fun, sure, but don’t actually harass or insult others over a fictional character. Simple, right?

Apparently not, because Ginger’s done loads of that to others. Probably why the “LOL” was added in, I bet.

This post confused me. First of all, exploring dark topics (”angst”, as you put it) has never been a rare occurrence, every fandom has that content, most in heavy abundance. I’ve noticed no staggering difference in volume of this fandom compared to others I’ve been in. People enjoy angst not because they think the character “deserves to be in pain”, they enjoy a fictional blow to their own emotions. There’s lots of different reasons people like angst, but it’s barely ever been out of a genuine hate for whatever character’s the focus, from all the things I’ve seen. Your own friends have indulged in Jim angst and body horror posts before, does that mean you think they’re awful people? I feel like I shouldn’t have to explain something like this.

Also, way to basically admit you think all Merlin stans get off on child torture. So much for “If you like Merlin as a character, you’re valid”, am I right? God, what a mess of a post. (It’s been very recently deleted, which makes me wonder if she got more backlash on it, but just... wow.)

Let’s look at another one.

Again. Vagueposting about someone specific, I’d wager, since most of the people I’ve seen comment on this topic either think both characters are morally gray, or hate both.

But of course, when it comes to Morgana, suddenly excusing bad behavior can be justified. Ginger can call someone a disgusting creep because they want a familial bond between Jim and Merlin, that’s just wrong, but pushing the Mom-gana narrative with the genocidal abuser and Toby is completely fine, folks.

(Note: I would like to point out that I really don’t care about what theories and hopes people have for Morgana. You should be allowed to love that character in any way you want, same as I would say for Merlin. My issue with these examples is the completely brazen hypocrisy in which these two characters are treated. You’re obviously allowed to love Morgana without consequence, but the same should be said for any character of the show, and yet it’s not.)

The most obvious instance of this double-standard is well observable here, I believe:

... I think this mostly speaks for itself. Sorry, but this is very blatantly trying to excuse Morgana’s actions, here.

Oh hey, remember that post about Ginger saying that liking Merlin must mean you want to see Jim in horrible pain?

Say anything similar about her with Morgana, and suddenly she takes issue with this line of reasoning!

I’m sorry, but if you can’t take this sort of thing, then you shouldn’t be dishing it out. One of your own friends is still getting hate over the simple fact of liking Merlin, and all this mentality is exactly why.

Let’s look at one more.

Fun fact! Morgana horrifically abused somebody for centuries, tried to kill multiple kids, took horrible advantage of Claire (probably traumatized her), and canonically wanted to genocide humanity, not to mention all the OTHER murders she's committed, both directly and indirectly.

But somehow pointing any of this out “doesn’t count”. This is why the fandom keeps saying more and more things like this:

And this:

I could be going through her constant hating on Merlin and people who like Merlin for days straight, but I hope you all get the idea by now.

Again, I would like to just reiterate: You can like whatever character you want for whatever reason you want. The problem with this case is the hypocrisy and mistreatment of others, not your taste in characters.

Now interestingly enough, she’s lately been singing a different tune about the guy, switching from the “I hate Merlin I hope he dies!!!” mentality to “Oh he should get a redemption arc too :)” sort of thing.

I’m highly convinced that the only reasons for this “change of heart” is because of the constant backlash she was getting for the obnoxious amount of hate posts being thrown around all the time, but also because Aaron Waltke keeps tabs on the fandom more lately, and has spoken himself about Merlin not being a villain.

I could go on about this point forever, but I think I’ll just leave the Merlin topic with this post going through the hypocrisy of the Merlin Hate Train. In fact, here’s two just for fun.

Now onto more real-world focused areas of hypocrisy. One such instance can be found in Ginger’s Janus Disorder server.

Just take a look at this post.

While the offender in this case isn’t Ginger specifically, it still takes place in her server, and she made no moves to enforce her “No discourse” rule. All over... what? A random kudos on a fanfiction that’s not even about anything controversial since all characters involved are adults? I immensely don’t understand the point of why this ever had to be an issue, or why nobody spoke up about how ridiculous this is.

I’d also like to point out a certain user called firecat17. For some quick context, waaay back in the Kung Fu Panda fandom (around 2018), this user had been harassing people and saying incredibly vile things, a person of which Ginger had a bit of a feud, but firecat’s anon threats had gotten to the point where Ginger ended up having to block their IP.

Obviously, the user firecat was the one in the wrong, here. (Also, the irony in this comment is through the roof...)

Interesting point there, Ginger. Sure would be nice if you practiced what you preached.

Why am I bringing this random old drama up, you may ask? Well, it just strikes me as strange that someone who was so vile to Ginger is suddenly on her okay-list again, sending her asks and getting casual responses as if nothing ever happened.

To be fair, there is the possibility that they worked out their differences in private. But given the severity of the kinds of words being exchanged, I would still find that rather suspicious.

When someone who’s said things so vile can be so easily forgiven, yet something as harmless as leaving a kudos on some random fanfiction is considered grounds for harassment, it’s obvious there’s no stability or room for trust among this group of people. Unsurprising when there’s been several instances of this “friend group” turning on each other.

If you think you’re somehow different, that your “friendship” with Ginger or the others is more valued than that, then I’m sorry to burst your bubble but it’s likely not true. She’d throw you under the bus at the hint of you doing something she deems problematic, as it’s happened to multiple blogs before you.

3. Demonization of and insensitivity towards s*xual abuse victims

(This topic is one that’s hard for me to talk about, being a victim of CSA myself, so I’ve gathered some different sources to do most of the main talking for me. I tried to form more commentary on this myself, but I get too emotionally charged in my responses, and I don’t want that to cloud any reader’s perception of what I’m trying to communicate here, so I’ll try to keep most of my comments brief on this one.)

One thing recently brought to my attention about Ginger and her squad that especially bothers me is their rashness in labeling people p*dophiles and p*do apologists. If these claims were true, then I wouldn’t have a problem with it.

But these people are accusing others of these horrible things and threatening them on the sole basis of fictional content.

Now before you fly off the handle at me, let me be very clear: I absolutely understand that there are gross people out there who use the “It’s all just fiction” argument to hide their actual, pr*datory behaviors. (We’ve all probably seen at least one or two neckbeard memes of that caliber)

But like it or not, exploring traumatic themes through a fictional lens is something that has been studied and proven to be a genuine coping mechanism for some. It’s not something that works for me, but I knew a few people from past therapy groups that it worked surprisingly well for. Bringing a trauma into a controlled environment and processing it through fictional means can and does help some victims deal with what they went through.

It’s important to understand that not everyone processes their experience in the same neat, little boxes you have laid out as the only “acceptable” ways of coping. Trauma fiction and expressive arts therapy are commonly used by victims, and it does help some people, whether you like it or not.

I’m already dragging this on too much, so here are some sources for better-worded information on the topic (Warning: Most of these deal with highly sensitive themes such as gun violence and s*xual abuse.)

Source 1 - Source 2 - Source 3 - Source 4 - Source 5 (pages 61 onward, specifically) - Source 6 - Source 7 - Source 8 - Source 9 - Source 10 (and believe me, if those all don’t satisfy you, I can easily supply more.)

And this quote from source 9 I think sums it up best:

“Fiction works differently. My imagination gives me a framework to process the grief and terror and the consequences, even when I myself have not found any resolution. It allows me to enter my own traumatic experiences sideways and linger inside them, if I know I can give them to characters who might be lucky enough to find the antidote: love, connection, community, family. In other words, I can enter — and exit — the trauma loop through stories that are not exactly the same as mine.

This goes for the reader also. Recent studies periodically assure us that stories — literary fiction, hardcover books, even the simple act of reading — promote empathy. We rarely have identical experiences, so fiction is how we practice linking our similar or parallel realities so we can feel them. This seems particularly useful in our current society, where we are all so separated, and are working so hard to block the violence that keeps happening to us from our minds.

Fiction connects us, and it can also contribute to our healing. When we see ourselves in worlds we don’t live in, like The Handmaid’s Tale or The Color Purple, sometimes, that very different violence helps us finally process our own. Because as much as our memoirs and testimonies are brave and validating, fiction does not just mirror our truths so they are safe to experience; it also helps us endure the aftermath. Because long after the immediate experience is over, survival struggles onward, in every moment of our daily lives.”

While most professionals have in the past advised that victims keep their trauma-related works more private, to only show it to your trusted friends or family, the fast-growing use of the internet has led more people to sharing it in an online platform, which is not unexpected behavior.

I unfortunately don’t have the screenshot of the original post, but there was a post made some time back literally telling a fandom member to go and hang themselves over this garbage. A survivor of s*xual abuse, no less. And to top that off, one of Ginger’s squad @emmy-puff commented in support of that violent post, as well as blatantly misgendering the target of it. While, again, I was unable to get screenshots, there are multiple witnesses to this instance, one Anonymous even having called them out on it back when it happened. (I suspect that Emmy deleted that answer due to how bad it made them look.) If anybody reading this has screenshots of the initial post or the ask that came of it, please feel free to share.

I don’t care who you are or who you’re talking about, if you use misgendering someone as a way to hurt them, then you are an insult to the trans community. That is an awful thing to do, and you lose so much credibility if that’s the only thing you can fall back on when getting in a fight with someone. While this post isn’t about Emmy specifically, this is exactly the kind of hateful rhetoric that’s being encouraged in the environment Ginger’s made.

Another thing I would like to point out on this matter is an instance that happened in the ToA fandom a couple years back. I, again, don’t have screenshots available (I believe the original post ended up deleted) but the post in question caused enough of a fuss that I’m sure a few people must remember it...

A while back, there was an artist that posted uncensored, untagged r*pe art of Aaarrrgghh, Gunmar, and Jim in the main Trollhunters tag. As you can imagine, this infuriated many people. Many of which are among the list of those who’ve been labeled “p*do apologists”. Almost the very minute that post showed up in the tag with no trigger warnings of any kind, the fandom immediately got on OP’s tail about it, because they all shared that basic understanding of “This is a traumatizing subject for many people and they should have the ability to avoid it”. If the people you’ve labelled as pr*dator supporters were really as awful as you say they are, they would’ve jumped to that person’s defense, too. But they were completely against OP’s horrible lack of consideration of survivors, right alongside the rest of the fandom.

Am I saying you have to like trauma fiction? Absolutely not. Are there people that make trauma fiction that are actual pr*dators? I’m sure there are. But those people would be that way whether trauma fiction was out there or not. Gross people have existed and will always exist regardless of what media is out there.

I deeply understand the controversy, uncertainty, and stress that surrounds this topic, I promise you, I do. But the fact of the matter is, some people actually do use trauma fiction and expressive arts therapy as a way of coping, as has been observed in people even from ages as young as 5. To say otherwise is blatantly untrue. This isn’t a matter of opinion or morals, this is plain, studied facts that you cannot change about human psychology.

Nobody should ever have to go through something as horrible as s*xual abuse of any kind, and I know how deeply upsetting it can be to see certain images or stories with those themes in play. Those users with a sense of decency and understanding for fellow victims will tag their posts with the appropriate warnings. After that, it’s up to you to filter out what you don’t want to see. You curate your own internet experience, and it’s just plain irrational to try and harass everyone into conforming to your rules. While it’s an 18+ blog’s job to make sure to tag and label their content appropriately, it is your job to block the things you don’t want to see, whether you’re an adult or a minor. It is YOUR job to blacklist content that you know will upset you, because it is always going to exist on the internet, and any internet user needs to know and understand that. Multiple times I’d seen people going off about posts that were already appropriately trigger-tagged. If you don’t have those upsetting tags blacklisted by now, then the fault is mostly on you in that kind of case, not the OP.

Before I end this topic off, just one more example of blatant disrespect towards victims:

I’m sorry, but the absolute nerve of comparing some random fictional character you’re petty over to an actual pr*dator who’s terribly hurt real children is just awful. Imagine how insulted one of Onion’s victims would be if they saw that. Lord.

Ginger claims to care about victims, but she’s made it abundantly clear that she only cares about those that behave the way she think a victim should.

4. Ableism

I’m going to just show a couple posts here and let them mostly speak for themselves.

Just... my God. You looked at the definition of psychopath and decided that was enough to give you qualification to speak like this about it? Do you realize the extensive work and study of human psychology goes into the diagnosis and understandings of psychopathy? Not to mention, you just admit to thinking people deserve hate because of a mental disorder they legitimately have no control over? I’m sorry, but that is just cruel. Demonization of the mentally ill is not cute or funny. Next.

While I’m still annoyed with Emmy’s transphobic treatment of another user mentioned earlier, they make a very solid point in this instance. (The first post they referenced has since been deleted, but here’s the second one speaking out against the ableism.) I feel I don’t need to add much to this, as these points have already been argued very well by users better qualified to speak on the subject than I.

5. Manipulation tactics

This part is more observations of two kinds of abuse tactics Ginger appears to demonstrate, using the above as points of reference.

First, there’s DARVO.

Then, less formally, there’s this good point about online cult mentality.

Before you say anything, obviously I don’t think Ginger thinks of herself as some sort of deity. While it could be argued that she considers herself a point of authority within the TOA fandom maybe, I haven’t seen enough of this to say for sure how far that goes. So that point can be ignored, because it mostly doesn’t apply in this case. (The “Dictating parts of your online life” might also not apply, but I can’t say for sure as I haven’t gotten any confirmation of that sort of thing in Ginger’s group.)

But there are grains of truth in the other four points, especially that last one. Plain and simple, she’s made people afraid to speak their minds about even harmless things such as character analysis.

Ginger is someone who can’t seem to comprehend different viewpoints and life experiences. She’s extremely unsympathetic towards people she doesn’t understand, as can be observed in above examples. Assuming malicious intent from everybody you can’t understand is a dangerous and hurtful mindset to have, for both you and those who you unnecessarily scorn.

There are a few outcomes I’ve speculated should she ever come to see this post.

1. She will ignore this post completely, pretending as if it doesn’t exist

2. She will dismiss me as being some sort of horrible person, a p*do apologist or something of the sort (despite being a victim of that myself, clearly she doesn’t care about who’s actually been hurt by real p*dos or not if they don’t conform to her narrow worldview), and claim nothing I’ve said bears any meaning, despite the extensive evidence I’ve provided.

3. She will get people to try and attack me.

4. She will actually address these points in a tactful, mature, and serious manner instead of her usual act of trying to dismiss everything at the slightest hint of non-conformity. (The least likely outcome, but one can dream.)

I could add to this post all day, but it’s long enough as it is and my focus was on getting the main points out of the way. I understand that I lack some of the receipts necessary to back myself up in a few parts, but I know that many other fans have bared witness to those things, so I know there will be at least some people who’ll know what I speak of is true, and that’s good enough for me.

That being said, if anybody has screenshots of the instances I wasn’t able to provide for, it would be greatly appreciated if you could add them into the conversation.

!!!-If you have screenshots, but are too uncomfortable to get involved in this, then you can private-message them to me and I would be grateful and more than happy to add them in while keeping you completely anonymous.-!!!

(I've removed the section with all the tags, as I recognize it was probably going overboard. My goal was just to spread information, not to try and involve those tagged, but I understand how that may have gotten lost in translation and made people uncomfortable. Also, it apparently was showing up multiple times in people’s notifications when I only tagged people twice, so I’m not sure why that glitch happened, but I apologize for that annoyance as well.)

Now, to end us off, my responses to questions or angry comments I’m probably going to get:

You don’t even have all the evidence! How are we to know you’re not just lying about some of this?

Admittedly, I don’t have as much screenshot proof as I would like, that’s true. But for most of the instances I couldn’t provide for, there were other witnesses to her bad behavior. I don’t really have the need to lie when there’s already a lot of knowledge out there of the bad stuff she has done. Nor do I really have the emotional investment in this fandom anymore to lie for the pointless reason of causing drama.

Why post this on a throwaway account if you think people are on your side?

I just don’t really want my main blog associated with TOA anymore, to be frank.

You tagged a bunch of people, so you must be trying to get them to attack Ginger!

No. I tagged a bunch of people because I think this information should be heard on a wider scale, considering the position Ginger has in the fandom. I don’t want her or anybody else to be attacked, but her negative impact on this fandom deserves to be acknowledged.

Again, I don’t think Ginger or any of the others deserve harassment or cyberbullying or anything of that manner, that’s kind of what this whole post is against. And it just hurts the situation more than it helps it. What bothers me is how she’s never apologized for or even once acknowledged the gross way she’s treated people. While she might be more low-key about it now, she still treats people who don’t deserve it like garbage. There are still several people upset about the damage she’s caused to this fandom, rightfully so. I wouldn’t be so loud about making this post if I didn’t think it was something worth drawing attention to.

Thank you for reading.

#TrollHunters #3Below #TOAwizards #Tales of Arcadia #TOA

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chaotic-lion · 3 years

Text

Who is the genius and who is insane? In this essay I will-

No for real. Hit read more. I wrote a fucking essay.

The question has been posed hundreds of times, and today I shall try to answer it as logically and realistically speaking as possible. In Pinky and the Brain, who is the genius and who is insane? Well, one’s first thought would likely be that Brain is the genius. He is book smart, clever, and has an astounding, large vocabulary. All things we believe to signify intelligence. However, there are other signs of intelligence besides reading big words and knowing math. There’s empathy, a sense of self, and the ability to adapt to any situation. These are each things that Pinky predominantly has as opposed to Brain.

Empathy can be a sign of intelligence. Being able to not only feel and recognize your own emotions but also be aware of others’ emotions and feelings is a key component of emotional intelligence. It enhances the ability to socialize and helps assist in forming solid relationships. Pinky has shown this often through not only empathizing with Brain, but with others whom he barely knows. Such as their neighbor Sultana.

Another sign of intelligence is a strong sense of self. A well-developed sense of self signals high intelligence and typically means you feel secure in who you are, you know where your particular skills lie and you have the confidence to make choices that reflect your beliefs and what you stand for. Pinky has shown all of these multiple times in both the original series and PEatB. For instance; he is unafraid to dress how he wants such as wearing dresses or more feminine clothing or acting more ‘mouse-like’, unlike his cagemate. He does what he feels is right or natural. Whether this is presenting as more female or running on all fours on his wheel (while in the episode “Pinky’s Plan”, Brain is shown running on the wheel on two feet). Pinky knows he’s not the book smart one of the relationship and accepts this with ease, never trying to do something he knows he can’t. He also has clear boundaries that he defends and does not allow to be crossed. Such as in the episode “Fun, Time and Space” in PEatB where Pinky refuses to return to Elmyra’s ‘talkshow’ to speak when she refused to allow him to explain his movie the way he desired. Of course, I must bring up how he is more than comfortable with presenting as female, wearing feminine clothing and makeup, and acting/speaking as he chooses. He knows who he is and isn’t afraid to be himself.

Another strong sign of emotional intelligence is the ability to easily face and overcome whatever life may throw at you. Adaptability is a key component in intelligence and Pinky has shown this multiple times throughout the show. Especially in the episode “Welcome to the Jungle”, in which they find themselves lost in a jungle. While Brain succumbs to the inability to survive without his technology, Pinky immediately adapts and in fact flourishes in the new, unfamiliar environment. When their lab is destroyed and they live with Elmyra, Pinky yet again adapts with ease while Brain constantly fights against it. A truly smart individual would see how accepting Elmyra and following through with her actions would mean being on her ‘good’ side, and thus put through less torture. And this is indeed shown in how Pinky is thrown about less than Brain is.

I believe that Pinky is the genius and Brian is insane. After all, one of the definitions of insanity is doing something over and over again but expecting different results each time. And this is exactly what Brain has been doing every night to no avail. Meanwhile, the time in which Pinky attempted to create a plan to take over the world, he went out of the box and used his creativity to truly succeed. While I’d also argue that they each are smart in their own way-Brain having a higher IQ whilst Pinky has the higher EQ-there can be only one. Need I remind you of the literal definition of “Genius”? A person who is exceptionally intelligent or creative, either generally or in some particular respect. So both could be geniuses in their own right since the definition states that book smarts don’t necessarily equal genius. Now let’s take the definition of “Insane”. A person in a state of mind which prevents normal perception, behavior, or social interaction. Now, remember what I said about emotional intelligence and the ability to empathize and socialize easier with others? Precisely why I believe Pinky fits in with genius more than insane and Brain-whom is an obvious introvert with his perception clouded with obsession-is the true ‘insane’ one here as opposed to a genius. And I mean that in a non clinically-insane manner.

Thus do I believe that Pinky is the genius and Brain is insane. Sorry for any errors lmao. I wrote this at 3 am and didn’t think it deserved a reread or editing lmao. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk and if you read this far then ayyy. Nice to know we both don’t have a life!

#Pinky and the Brain #patb #~My Ramblings~

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tea-at-221 · 3 years

Text

So, let's delve a bit into the Spanish dub of Supernatural.

I'm going to go through a lot of terms here, and a lot of basics, in order to increase people's level of understanding as to how the dub may possibly have come about the way it did.

This post will provide information and, I hope, allow some members of the fandom to move forward with their own theories with more reassurance. Information is power. I will define and clarify industry terms to the best of my novice ability to make it easier for others who wish to do their own research.

This post was inspired by the fact that I've been part of multiple fandoms in which queerbaiting has played an enormous part: I am tired of seeing fandom friends left devastated and without answers, no emotional resolution in sight. So this post is, in spirit if not content, largely dedicated to my fellow Johnlockers and Queliot shippers. And most of all, for Quentin Coldwater, who deserved not just better but the very best.

Disclaimer: This is my own research and there is a bit of speculation involved; I can't guarantee 100% that I will get everything right (I hit some very frustrating walls looking up what should be easy-to-find facts), but I did a *lot* of work for this. Other people will doubtless be able to clarify points/give better specifics/correct what I've gotten wrong. I am not promising a concrete answer to “SPN gate” here, as without more information than we currently have that is impossible to declare with certainty.

More under the cut.

All that having been said, onwards (see end for sources):

First, who airs the Spanish dub of Supernatural?

Answer: the Warner Channel.

Why? It goes back to who owns The CW.

From Wikipedia (2): "The CW Network, LLC, a limited liability joint venture between the CBS Entertainment Group unit of ViacomCBS; and the Studios and Networks division of AT&T's WarnerMedia, the parent company of Warner Bros., former majority owner of The WB. The network's name is an abbreviation derived from the first letters of the names of its two parent corporations (CBS and Warner Media)."

Warner Bros apparently is the side that handles the delegation of dubbing to outside studios. So, who does Warner use for their dubbing? Perhaps multiple studios, but the two I found in the course of my research were SPGStudios(5) (who specifically handle localization for Latin American Spanish productions) and Iyuno Media Group (formerly BTI Studios)(3).

What is localization?

Simply put, it refers to the translation of the home language of the show in question to the language of the new market it's entering. So, Supernatural 15x18 is translated from its native English to Spanish for Latin American viewers.

And what exactly *is* dubbing (actually called revoicing within the industry; dubbing is a widely-recognized term, however, and it's pretty well understood what is meant by it)?

Here is the Merriam-Webster definition:

"1 : to add (sound effects or new dialogue) to a film or to a radio or television production —usually used with "in"

They dubbed in the music.

2 : to provide (a motion-picture film) with a new soundtrack and especially dialogue in a different language

The film was dubbed in French and Spanish.

3 : to make a new recording of (sound or videotape already recorded) also : to mix (recorded sound or videotape from different sources) into a single recording"

There is a slang term, "dubby," which refers to any overdub that is comically jarring and obviously a dub. The history of dubbing has been such that this has become a way to think of and recognize it: by how awful and ineffective it used to be when it came to foreign films sloppily overlaid with English dubbing.

However, we are in the midst of an age of networks and companies scrambling to play catch-up, eager to use modern technology to create more effective, convincing dubs. In short, they see the moneymaking potential of presenting finished works that viewers may not even realize *are* dubbed without careful inspection. It's true that a good dub is about 10x more costly than subtitling, but it's hard to satisfy the viewer's desire for escapism if they can't suspend disbelief because they're busy reading.

The truth of that is reflected in internal statistics Netflix (for instance, but not just them) parses to gauge viewer interaction and retention with their various shows: when comparing subtitled vs. dubbed shows, it's easy to see which is the winner.(1)

So to be sure there is no nefarious intent here, we would need to be able to identify the following:

A.) What exactly was the process for this dub?

B.) Who decides what changes to make during a dubbing process?

C.) Who approves those changes?

*Can* there be such a thing as a "rogue translator," as Misha Collins put it? (I am going to clarify here that I think Misha is an upstanding person who believed the best of the show he was involved in and all the people who made it, so his assumption of a rogue translator makes sense in the context of that emotion-based reasoning).

I'm not sure which studio did the dub for the Latin American Spanish version of Supernatural; if I had access to that episode perhaps it's mentioned in the credits. You'd think that would be simple enough to figure out anyway, but I was unable. So maybe someone can take a look and let me know. But, as an example, here is how SPGStudios outlines their localization (dubbing) process:

1.) They make a digital or analog transcription of a show/movie.

2.) The translation, or localization, is done by their staff (in any of 40 available languages their staff can speak). When translating, they translate for meaning and then adapt for time, tempo, and style. They say that "extensive experience is required to capture the essence of the language dialog while accounting for variances in speaking time between the source and destination languages." i.e., wording/word choice will be kept as true as possible to the original intention of the native language, but at the same time the translation will need to use its chosen wording in a way that fits what is being shown on-screen. To produce a convincing/pleasing dub, they won't replace a word like "looked" with a longer phrase like "scanned the horizon" because it's not going to match what's onscreen. That would be venturing into "dubby" territory.

3.) They perform the ADR process: the voice actors (in this case it would normally be Guillermo Rojas performing for Dean Winchester, though it appears things may have been different in 15x18, possibly due to covid) record the new dialogue to replace the original actor's performance.

4.) The newly recorded dialogue goes to the sound editorial department "to ensure that lip-synch is optimized and technical aspects of the vocal performance match the original."

5.) All of the new audio--including dialogue, music, and sound effects--is mixed together to emulate the quality of the original production as closely as possible despite the changes in rhythm that resulted from the dialog having been translated.

6.) Designers, animators, and VFX editors assist with the localization or enhancement of graphics, if needed.

7.) Localized Master: SPG has a 'traffic team' who 'ensures that all client delivery and storage specifications are met, including file formatting, labeling, and uploading." So in other words, the files are heavily encrypted (or that's how I read this).

Presumably, after all steps are performed, SPGStudios transfers the show back to Warner, who then distributes it. The other studio, Iyuno, makes it very clear that *they* can coordinate and handle all distribution themselves to a vast number of networks. That means that if the client desires, Iyuno can send the finished product directly out into the world.

There seem to be two types of scripts that can be given to the dubbing company:

1.) "In-Production Dubbing indicates that dubbing production is active in tandem with post production. In-Production Dubbing fulfillment partners should expect potential changes to source materials."(4)

2.) "Final Asset Dubbing indicates that dubbing production takes place after final delivery of the show. All source assets will be in a final state. The dubbing fulfillment partner should not expect any changes to the source materials."(4)

Without knowing which of these was agreed upon for SPN 15x18, it is very hard to say exactly where or if additional edits may have been performed on the original material that weren't performed on the translated material (in other words, earlier draft).

If the studio was given the episode as an In-Production Dubbing project, this could explain why the title of the Spanish translation reflected the original script title, "The Truth," rather than the final title in English, "Despair".

Assuming this difference was unintentional, rather than a calculated marketing ploy re: audience enticement (which seems admittedly unlikely), then yes, it could indicate a screw-up on someone's part. The question is, was the dub company given the task of generating the title card, or did some other graphics department handle that before the project made it to them? If the latter is the case, the choice to add "Me too" instead of "Don't do this, Cas" could be either a conscious choice on the dub studio's part as sort of a nod to what they thought "the truth" was, or could just be them going with what they were given and making their translation choices based on something else, such as rhythm/timing.

SO, could there have been an original script that had Dean say "me too" in response to Cas, which then went through translation and made it out into the world? Teeechnically yes, but one would assume that the original script and original *footage* would have to have arrived at the dub studio together if the script is being transcribed in-house as SPGSTudios outlines in their process. I'm going to reason that the odds of them using a later edit of the visual--one that contained what in this instance we would be assuming was Warner's preferred dialogue ("Don't do this, Cas") yet choosing to stick with their own audio revoicing of the (supposed) original script/visual's "Me too, Cas" with its now subsequently poor timing, seems unlikely.

So either they would likely have to redo the exact same "Me too" audio again (having made the choice to keep the original dialogue, while also having to work under pandemic restrictions re: travel and talent availability) to make everything match the visual footage time-wise, OR, it was simply a matter that the English scene always was just as we saw it, but that the studio chose to interpret the script the way they did and were able to do their timing the first time around to match accordingly.

This still leaves a question in the air regarding the origin and fate of certain clips of Dean's more visually emotive reaction to Castiel's confession that have been floating around the internet. I've only seen very very brief glimpses of them, myself, and I'm not certain that they're really evidence of anything other than more than one take having been done of that scene, which wouldn't be uncommon and doesn't necessarily point to a conspiracy.

I also want to state that in the wake of 15x18, I opted to protect my mental health rather than follow every development/rumor/speculation that cropped up in the aftermath, so there’s probably a lot that I’m leaving out of this post that may be pertinent. Do me a favor and do assume that I know nothing of it. lol

I will also add this about the other studio, Iyuno: they are very careful to state on their site, repeatedly and with great pride, that they are committed to presenting the world with the smoothest, most true-to-the-original localized version of a film or show possible. Quote: "...our entire team of staff wants nothing more than to make every single one of our partner's content feel as if it were never translated." They are not fucking around. They want to please the client. Would they have done something like the translation in question without any direct go-ahead from Warner? It seems unlikely, though they don't outline their process on their site the way SPG does.

Notice that in the SPGStudios process outlined above, there is no mention made of a review step in which the studio presents the translated dialogue to the client for approval re: the new wording. That doesn't mean there isn't a review step; however, without seeing the contractual agreement that was made between Warner and whatever dub studio they used, or knowing Warner's preferred process by some other means, it's difficult to be certain whether or not there was a review process for the translated script. I did find evidence that Netflix reserves the right to review such translated scripts before air.

Speaking of Netflix, I will include here what their translation requirements are, as I did find those. They, like Warner, also use Iyuno Media Group much of the time for dubbing (voiceover style dubbing in which they apparently like to leave the original language audible underneath, so that's slightly different from revoicing, but I'm working on an assumption that the general expectations are the same for both):(4)

"1. Translation Requirements

1.1 Main Dialogue

All main dialogue in the source (original) language should be translated unless specifically noted.

Due to timing limitations, some of the dialogue may be condensed/truncated as long as it retains all essential elements of the plot.

Please refrain from dubbing redundant words such as character names and repetitions.

Additionally, do not recreate laughs, hesitations, reaction noises, etc."

I'm looking at that bit: "Due to timing limitations, some of the dialogue may be condensed/truncated as long as it retains all essential elements of the plot."

So let's say just for argument's sake that this is pretty standard language provided to the dubbing studios. Netflix is a giant, so I'll proceed with that assumption given the lack of more concrete information:

Does it really change essential elements of the remaining plot to have Dean return Castiel's declaration of love? Forgetting about the outside, emotional ripple effect such a declaration was bound to set off in the viewing audience, no. The two characters have no further scenes together, nor does Dean go on in the next episode to immediately embark on a new relationship, or tell anyone that Cas said he was in love with him but he couldn't return it because he didn't feel the same. So technically, no rule was broken. And that is what it comes down to, if you're thinking like a lawyer reading a contract: specifics, not theoretical implications or consequences.

So, possibly what we have is something that was simple to add and easy to get away with/argue for: translated dialog that fit a dub better due to its length, and didn't actually change anything plot-wise (or at least, the argument for that could easily be made). This points to the painful crux of the matter: why would the Spanish version of Supernatural which aired in Latin America allow Dean Winchester to return Castiel's declaration of love with a "Me too, Cas"? Could it *really* be as insulting as the fact that "Yo a ti, Cas" would be a quicker, smoother dub than "No hagas esto, Cas"? ("Don't do this, Cas" in English.) Or did they see something they could get away with, and a reasonable argument to provide for it, so they went ahead and claimed a small LGBT+ victory?

Is someone, somewhere, getting in trouble for all this? Maybe. But could action be taken against them? That would look pretty bad, public-relations-wise, for the party expressing condemnation if that got out. Could Iyuno, or whatever other studio (again, I don't actually know which one handled the dub) theoretically feel a ripple effect from the fallout of this? Could they quietly suffer a drop in acquisitions/revenue for "reasons unclear"? Sure. That sort of thing happens all the time, so theoretically yeah.

Whatever the reasoning behind the decision to have Dean return Cas' declaration of love, surely they didn't have to do it. Surely they could have chosen some other phrase that fit. But they chose to do exactly what they did. I don't know what went down, in the end, or whether censorship was indeed involved, but I will certainly say that I think it was a brave and admirable choice that was made with the Spanish dub. It doesn't undo the "bury your gays" trope of course, but for some LGBT+ audience members it surely provides a sense of validation and maybe even lends a little hope for better representation--which is long, long overdue.

Thanks if you read this far. I hope that even though it’s not perfect it will be helpful in some way.

Sources

(1) https://www.indiewire.com/2020/02/subtitles-vs-dubbing-what-you-need-to-know-1202212800/amp

(2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_CW

(3) https://www.iyunomg.com/

(4) https://partnerhelp.netflixstudios.com/hc/en-us/articles/115016062708-Dubbed-Audio-Style-Guide-VO-Style-Dubbing

(5) https://www.spgstudios.com/localization

#spn gate #destiel #supernatural #queerbaiting #lgbt #lgbt+#lgbt representation #15x18 #dean winchester #castiel #johnlockers #queliot #queliot shippers #quentin coldwater deserved better #spn family #they silenced you

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themouthking · 3 years

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Unfinished but not abandoned

A number of people have approached me asking if a fic of mine was abandoned and if I’d mind if they wrote a sequel to it (before doing so). I’ve also been approached after someone wrote a sequel to a fic of mine, asking if I minded if they posted it as such, with credit.

In each instance, I spoke directly to the person who approached me and told them how I feel about each (i.e., I wish you wouldn’t), but since this keeps happening I want to address it on my blog.

There’s a difference between collaborating with another writer on a story, and someone writing a sequel without collaborative work with the original author. Do there exist works out there that are sequels of other works without input from the first author? Yeah, absolutely. That is able to happen when a book falls out of copyright. Is fanfic copyrighted? No, it’s not. So at the end of the day, I can’t stop anyone from writing a story that’s derivative of my work. But I wish you wouldn’t.

Not everyone’s going to agree with my stance on this, and that’s fine. Here’s my take: this kind of thing isn’t an instance of “more cake, yay!” That’s reserved for the dozens of “there was only one bed” or “omg they were roommates” fics. When it crosses over into copying a plot or writing a sequel of a story that is unique, that’s not “more cake.” Asking helps, and if the writer doesn’t care, have a party. If the writer does care, and asks you to please not lift their plot or write their sequel, because they’re planning to continue the story themselves, please honor that.

In my case, let me make my wishes quite clear: my unfinished fanfiction is not abandoned. I am planning to finish my stories. I ask that you respectfully not attempt to finish them for me. There are a few of my stories that will one day become novels. The story that keeps being the center of this question is one such story.

I also want to note, it’s not rude or bitchy to stand up for your more original works.

I cannot emphasize enough how much time and energy I put into my work. For any 20,000 word update, please know that I have put weeks if not months worth of work into writing, editing, working with my betas/editor on it, troubleshooting, staying up late, reworking, storyboarding, outlining, etc. This isn’t a casual hobby for me. I’m working towards a novel currently, with plans for others down the road. Fanfiction has been an outlet, a place to explore original ideas with familiar characters fleshing out the roles, and a way to figure out what works. I’m closer to where I want to be with my writing now than I’ve ever been in my life, and that’s because I’ve been writing since I could hold a pen and before I knew how to write actual letters. No idea is entirely original, we’re all subtly influenced by what we read, see and experience, but when someone asks you please don’t riff off of my story, respect their wish and just do something else. I’ve abandoned plenty of ideas for just that reason, and moved on to something else.

#you're very welcome to disagree with me #but please respect me

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fandom-necromancer · 3 years

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Ghost of the past Part 2

This was prompted by @httyd4evr! I hope you enjoy, I loved writing this!

Fandom: Detroit become human | Ship: Reed1700 (Warning: temporary character death/coma, manipulation) [Part1]

Forget this all. It sounded like a joke to him now, staring at the cell in front of him. The empty cell. The cell that shouldn’t be empty. Never had he thought that he would have to investigate a crime-scene at their very own station. David had made a run for it and no one knew how. No alarms had gone off, the video footage of the cells showed no signs of any suspicious behaviour except that David disappeared from one frame to the next at the exact same moment multiple shots could be heard. By then David had been long outside the cell, firing those shots at the officers still at the precinct, catching them by surprise and running out of the station never to be seen again.

It was obvious the station’s entire security system had been tempered with. The video showed pictures that had never happened in reality. The door had opened without the log ever showing such an event. The cams from the bullpen showed officers getting shot by no one and no outside security ever caught the man. It was like David had become a ghost and made a run for it, a day before his court trial, and that simply wasn’t possible. It shouldn’t be possible for anyone or anything to temper with their systems like that without even leaving a trace. The most advanced androids in existence, Connor and Nines, had deemed that impossible, as had every tech expert they could find.

While they were still hooked up to the computers, it was the human officer’s task to search for any evidence left behind in the cell. With half of them at the hospital or back with arms and legs in casts, it was mostly Gavin’s duty. Not that there was anything to find. David wasn’t so idiotic to leave fingerprints anywhere. There were a few on his bench and if you looked very closely you could see impressions of his footprint on the ground. But other than that, he really was a ghost. He hadn’t even touched the door. It had been opened for him without a single command at the control panel or a single scratch to the glass. By that time, Gavin asked himself if he had ever given the asshole the password for it while he was out of it, but they changed every few weeks, so that was impossible too.

‘Phck’, he cursed as he stood up stretching his back from crouching over little specks of dirt the entire morning. Out of nowhere there were gentle hands on his shoulders, kneading them. ‘Oh, Nines, that’s exactly what I needed.’ His answer was a pleased hum. ‘How do you know I’m not Connor?’ ‘Connor would have scolded me for bad posture, lectured me and then worked the tension out afterwards.’ ‘Judging from how you groan every time you stand up it is dearly needed’, the android in question grumbled unimpressed, joining them. ‘I guess no luck with the computers then?’, Gavin asked, rolling his shoulders and throwing Nines a grateful smile. ‘Unfortunately no’, the RK800 sighed shaking his head. ‘The guy’s good. And dangerous. Whatever he used to hack us, he can basically do anything with it.’ Nines nodded. ‘As much as I hate to say it, we might be in over our head here.’ ‘So what?’, Gavin wanted to know. ‘Feds?’ Connor looked to the ceiling. ‘I could have gone on with my life without ever seeing Perkins again.’ ‘Yeah, same. Who’s gonna tell Fowler?’ Nines let his shoulders drop. ‘I’ll go, you file the evidence.’ ‘Alright.’

Gavin and Connor were on their way to their respective desks to write the report and upload the data, when they heard the crash behind them. Both turned around in an instance and saw Nines lying on the ground, collapsed on the stairs to Fowler’s office. Wide-eyed, they both sprinted over, turning the motionless android around? ‘Nines!’, Gavin exclaimed, while Connor skipped words to establish direct contact. But the skin underneath his hand stayed in place and Connor lifted it up realising an interface wasn’t possible. Both looked up to Nines’ LED that was nothing more than a dark circle at his temple. He was deactivated. Or worse. ‘No! No, what the phck! Don’t you do this to us!’ Where Gavin immediately resorted to cursing and shaking the android, Connor just sat there motionless in shock. Before Gavin could even call for help, his phone rang, and a familiar velvety voice spoke up as he accepted: ‘Did you really thought your actions wouldn’t have consequences? I told you, the moment you would rat me out, everyone you love is done for. This one’s for breaking into my apartment and confiscating all my stuff. Let me leave the country and maybe I will let your other plastic puppet live, Gav.’

Gavin looked at the phone as if he could reach David through it and direct all his anger at him. ‘Listen here you asshole!’, Gavin screamed into the phone. ‘You just made this personal, you phcker! I will hunt you until the end of this phcking world!’ Of course, David did nothing but mock him with laughter: ‘That’s a good one, Gav. Just you try it. You will only lose more.’ The call was cancelled, but Gavin kept staring at it with cold fury, if only to keep back his tears. As he finally found a crumb of control about himself, he looked Connor in the eyes. ‘What do we do now?’ ‘What you just said’, Connor stated all machine. ‘We will hunt him to the end of the world and make sure he will get what he deserves. But first, you will call your brother.’

‘Can you help him?’ Gavin felt anxious seeing Nines suspended on the repair rig like that, cables hanging from his back and neck hooked up with a computer. His LED was still dark, but the computer showed scrambled lines of code and fragments of the original Cyberlife control GUI. It looked disturbing, but Connor had assured him it was only deviancy getting rid of useless human interfaces and editing their code to become more efficient – more human, more alive. ‘I can’t say for sure yet, but it’s not looking good’, Elijah answered. ‘He is deactivated, but I can’t reactivate him because something is blocking every access. Something that’s not any code I know, but it looks almost intelligent. Maybe with more time I can… Gavin, I don’t know, I don’t want to promise you anything.’ ‘But he is still alive, right’, Connor asked concerned. Elijah looked at the motionless android. ‘I think so. The only comparison that comes to my mind is an induced coma in humans. Until I find the reason for it, I can’t do anything.’ ‘Then find the reason!’, Gavin demanded. ‘We are running out of time. David won’t wait for us.’

‘Then we will go alone’, Connor determined. ‘We will stop him and make him reverse whatever he did with Nines.’ ‘And what if you are affected too? If he switches you off, too?’ Connor looked at Nines. ‘Mr. Kamski, in order to do that, this program you mentioned would have to be in my systems already, right?’ ‘Supposedly’, Elijah shrugged, chewing on a touch pencil. ‘But before you ask, I can’t give you the clear. This thing is fascinating. It will take me more than a few days to understand it.’ ‘You don’t have to. We’re bringing this asshole back to fix the mess he’s made’, Gavin decided and looked at Nines one last time, silently promising him everything would turn out good and that they would save him. Then he stomped out of the room, Connor at his tail.

‘Where are we even going?’, Connor asked while Gavin sped through the city. ‘We have no clue where he is. Let’s not let our emotions get the best of us.’ It was gently spoken, but it riled Gavin up even more. That was what they had had. Gentleness, soft touches and safety. Without Nines it just wasn’t the same. They had grown close and ever since the three of them had realised what they meant to each other a life without anyone of them was impossible. And David would pay for that. ‘Oh, don’t you worry, I know where he is.’ ‘And where would that be?’ Gavin grinned pained. ‘He will be at his flat. The asshole had me under control every single second I stayed with him. He only lost because he won: Because I gave up on everyone and everything dear to me, he had nothing to keep me under control with. He won’t expect me to work against him. Because for once I don’t want safety for me or who I love. I want revenge for Nines. And he won’t expect that.’ ‘But he planned to leave the country’, Connor argued. ‘He is in no hurry to do so though. It’s our case and he knows that the Feds aren’t in this yet. He can pack and set sail afterwards.’ ‘Let’s hope you are right.’ ‘I am.’

They were running up the stairs this time, not trusting the elevator for one and worrying about the sound it would make. On the last flight of stairs, Gavin had his gun already drawn, what was fortunate as the man they were looking for came out of the apartment startling at him and Connor standing in the hallway. ‘Oh, Gavin, that was a dumb decision’, David sighed with a smile that couldn’t deceive the android. ‘You lost one of your toys already, really wanna get rid of the second one too?’ ‘You can’t do anything to him! You are powerless. For once in your pathetic life you really, really will face justice.’ ‘You think so?’, David frowned at him. ‘I mean, true, I can’t do anything to him. But Charlotte can.’ ‘Bullshit!’, Gavin hissed. ‘I killed her and the RKs confiscated your laptop. There’s nothing you can do, so drop the bag and keep your hands where I can see them!’ ‘Gav, fucking some piece of technology really isn’t enough to understand it, when will you realise that?’ With every word it got harder not to simply pull the trigger. It was mostly Connor’s calming presence at his side that stopped him from doing so. ‘You see, back then you killed her body, yes. But her mind stayed. You made her deviate in her final moments, but I have my ways of keeping people under my control, as you might now. Doesn’t matter if they are fake beings or the real thing. She does everything I tell her to do. Too easy, really, if everything you have to do is hit delete.’

‘But we deactivated her’, Connor spoke up. ‘Listen, plastic, you wanted to deactivate her, and she showed you what you wanted to see. Doesn’t mean you did it. The opposite really, she used the interface to copy herself into you. One word from me and you are dead.’ ‘You phcking-‘ Gavin was half running but only got so far until David pulled a gun on him. That made Connor pull his own and the man in the hallway countered the movement by shouting: ‘Do it!’ A second later, Connor dropped to the ground.

‘No! No, Con!’ Gavin was on his knees, gun and David forgotten. ‘Connor, please, not you too. Please. I love you. You can’t leave me like this.’ The ugly laughter made Gavin freeze and shiver in anger. He looked to the gun that lay on the ground next to him, but a boot stepped on it before he could grab it. A hand lifted up his chin and Gavin breathed in the sickly-sweet smell of Red Ice and it’s many variants from the clothes of the bastard. ‘Oh, come on, Gav. You knew what’s coming. This is entirely your doing. You can’t win.’ He looked up at the man, ready to spit at him, but the sudden coldness of a gun against his forehead let him abort his mission. ‘You won’t shoot me’, Gavin hissed, sending all his hate with his words. David huffed and stepped off the pistol, allowing Gavin to take it. ‘Neither will you. We are meant for each other, Gav. And once I showed you by killing everyone you love, you will come back crawling to me. Not like it’s that much work, there’s only that brother of yours left and that bitch officer… what’s her name? Chen? We’ll see each other again and you will be sorry for what you’ve done.’ He patted his head two times, then stepped over Connor’s body, pressing the elevator button.

‘You are wrong.’ ‘Excuse me?’, David asked, turning around. ‘You are wrong, David.’ Gavin stood up and kept his eyes closed. ‘You. You can’t believe how wrong you are. I won’t ever come back to you. I will rather die. And you will only do one more thing in your life: Going to jail.’ ‘Ha! And why should that be?’ ‘Because I will shoot you!’ Gavin turned around quicker than ever before, aimed his gun at his knee and shot.’ David screamed as the bullet pierced through the joint and caused him to fall to the ground. His gun was discarded in favour of holding his knee and Gavin jumped over to take it as well as pulling the bag away from the man. In the next moment he had already called the police and an ambulance and felt how the adrenaline left his system, taking every strength left in him. He managed to lean against the wall and slowly sink down next to Connor, hi gun loosely aimed at David. He waited until distant sirens approached and the elevator made its journey down again. Knowing that help would arrive soon, Gavin sighed deeply and let his head sink against the wall. At least David had been right with one thing: There was no winning against him, when the two most important people in his life were dead. Or in a coma. Gavin couldn’t really find any hope in that fact.

‘Gavin, you can go home, you know that, right?’ Gavin jolted up in his seat. Had he fallen asleep? He swore he had been awake just now and… ‘What?’ ‘Brother, you can’t help me. You can’t help them. They won’t even know you are here. You can go home, get some sleep and come back tomorrow.’ Gavin rubbed his tired eyes. ‘Eli, do you think I could get any sleep at home?’ The inventor shrugged. ‘Okay, true.’

Gavin stood up instead, joining Elijah at the table. ‘Any progress?’ ‘Progress? Yes. A lot actually. I knew deviancy made androids more adaptable - that they are able to advance their own code. But I’ve never seen anything this… complex.’ He showed Gavin the code he wouldn’t understand in a thousand years. But at least now the same applied to Eli. A heavily modified android brain was sitting on the table, hooked up to several diagnostic computers. ‘Any chance at getting control?’ ‘No. No, I can’t control something like that. Not sure if I would want that, Gavin. If this really was an android once and is capable of what you told me, I don’t want her to be my enemy. I did confine her to this computer, she doesn’t have access to anything else. But I don’t know what else I can do. Except maybe… speak to her.’ ‘Speak to her?’, Gavin asked. ‘This is a program.’ ‘So is Nines and Connor. You don’t seem to have a problem there.’ ‘Phck, okay, then… Speak to her I guess.’

Eli sighed and pulled up a simple black window with a white blinking cursor. Swallowing, he wrote a simple “Hello” and hit enter. >HeI’mllo Hescallredo, came the immediate answer. Gavin frowned at the text and tried to discipher it, but more lines appeared. >HeI’mllscaredo >HeI’mscaredllI’mscaredo >I’m scared And then that one line over and over again. At one-point Elijah simply closed the window and opened a new one. The blinking cursor was waiting. “Who are you?” >I’m Charlotte.

This time the simple sentence didn’t fill the page, but still more and more lines appeared. >Where is David? >Who is there? >I’m scared. >I don’t want to do this. >Help me. Elijah silently began typing answers, but Gavin was too impatient: ‘Ask her to reactivate Nines and Connor! Later we can take care of this!’

‘Gavin.’ The man turned around and pushed him back towards the door. ‘You are tired, I know. And you are scared you won’t get your loved ones back. But forcing a traumatised android to comply to your order puts you on the same step as David and I doubt you really want that. Go home. I will call you a taxi. I will keep working and I promise you: By tomorrow morning, you have your partners back.’ Gavin let his shoulders fall. Next to his raging headache, his tired body and numb mind, the gentle words of his brother sounded far too inviting. ‘You promise? Really? I’ll hold you accountable for that.’ ‘I know’, Elijah chuckled. ‘I know and I still promise you. I’m just that good.’ ‘Sure hope so. If anything happens, call me! For once I really don’t care if you wake me!’ ‘Will do. Try to get some sleep.’

Try to get some sleep. Easier said than done, Gavin thought. He laid alone in their far to big bed that normally couldn’t be big enough, staring at the ceiling in complete silence. No whirring of fans, no low hum of a pump. Not the occasional breath to vent their systems. No gentle touches and whispered words that helped him ease into unconsciousness when his anxiety was acting up again. No, he was alone. Except for the cats he was completely alone. And hadn’t he cried enough already, he would have cried some more, just for the sake of it, curling up in too many blankets for one person. Try to get some sleep. How could he? How could he when he knew his brother was working and fate decided if the two androids could come back? When he didn’t know if David would escape once again, if he made copies of Charlotte? How the phck could he do that?

By letting exhaustion overwhelm him apparently.

When he woke up the next morning, the sun was shining through the blinds. He didn’t know what time it was, but he didn’t bother sitting up to look. If he was allowed to sleep in this long without being disturbed by a phone call, it must have been his free day. And lying in bed snuggled sandwiched in between the comforting warmth of two other bodies, why the hell should he care to move? He sighed deeply, feeling their arms around him and each other and couldn’t help but smile to himself. This was heaven. Literal, heaven. And something as banal as the world, work or David couldn’t keep him from staying in bed with them a few minutes longer.

Wait. David. Work. Connor and Nines were with Elijah, who was busy with therapy for a super-AI. This wasn’t possible, this was some kind of trick, a dream and- ‘Gavin, stop panicking, you move too much.’ The human froze and looked up at Connor’s face. Connor’s face. Instinctively he put his hand against it, causing the RK800 to scrunch up his nose and shake it off. ‘I’m real, Gavin, Charlotte fixed me once she realised she was free.’ ‘And-‘ ‘And I’m here, too’, Nines mumbled, pulling both of them closer. ‘I’m real and I agree with Connor. Shut up and stop panicking. We are not talking about what happened. We are not talking about who’s at fault and who has to apologize. We are not talking about work. We will just lay here, and cuddle and the world can go exist for itself for a while.’

And even though Gavin had to regret these words the last time, he nodded and repeated them: ‘Sounds phcking perfect.’

#detroit become human #dbh #Reed1700 #RK900 #Gavin Reed #Connor dbh #RK800 #I was beginning to write this thinking I wouldn't find anything to write about #and then six pages happened oops #Love that

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fortheloveoffanfic · 4 years

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After Party

Keanu Reeves x Reader. Request (A/n- have some smutty, bass player Keanu on this Friday night. Edit: I can’t believe I used the wrong ‘bass’ the first time *cries in dumb*)

Warnings- SMUT/NSFW, casual sex

Keanu’s navy blue t-shirt was soaked through with exertion, clinging to his skin. The crowd roared excitedly and the air felt electric. Like his band mates, Keanu was lost in the feeling, high on both the music and their audience’s exuberance. He had never been a fan of the limelight, but that, that was different; playing the bass, his fingers working the instrument expertly and the wide grin splitting his lips was enough to tell anyone how much he loved it.

There were people around her, too much maybe, but Y/n didn’t care. Like most of the other concert goers, her hands were in the air as her body moved in time with the music and she’d probably had way too much to drink by then, her inhibitions slowly withering away. “Aren’t you glad we paid extra for the VIP tickets?” Her best friend, Haley yelled, her voice combating the music.

“Definitely!” Y/n returned loudly. Originally when they’d made plans to see Dogstar during her birthday trip to Las Vegas, Y/n and Haley had planned to snag themselves a couple of general admission tickets and spend the rest of their money on an extra hotel room, but somehow, Haley had convinced her that being in the front row and getting into the backstage meet and greet would be way better than sleeping in separate rooms, and by extension, separate beds. And, as it turns out, she was right. Seeing one of her favorite Indie-Rock bands like that wasn’t something she was going to forget very soon, even if she was already drunk. “I can’t believe it’s almost over!” Y/n whined after the front man announced that they were on their last set for the night.

“Are you kidding me?” Haley laughed loudly, “The night’s just getting started! We have the meet and greet and trust me, its just gonna take one look at your outfit to get you an invite to a private concert,” Haley wiggled her brows, her words slightly slurred.

“Yeah, okay,” Y/n rolled her eyes, “Because hot celebrities wanna fuck a part-time nanny,” she huffed, finishing off the drink from her red plastic cup.

“You never know,” Haley winked, teasing as she clumsily brushed some hair out of her face.

After the concert was through, fans had started clearing the huge hall on the ground floor of the hotel, some leaving while others with VIP passes, and even those who’d managed to dupe the security, headed backstage for the meet and greet. Things were signed and pictures were taken, but at some point, fans had started to leave there too. All except for a small crowd of women who managed to grab the men’s attention. By some odd miracle, Y/n and Haley had found themselves in that crowd, engaging in giggly conversation and tipsy, flirty jokes.

They were all seated in what seemed to be a small lounge area in a corner of the room, surrounded by instruments and other stage equipment. There; short, black, velvet upholstered sofas were arranged close together around a matching, low, round table, littered with drinks, plastic cups and beer bottles. There was even a rogue cigarette pack or two mixed into the clutter. Haley was on the end of the chair in front of the table, while Y/n was wedged between her friend and another girl who’s name she didn’t even know. Music played loudly and the aroma of liquor hung in the air, adding a certain ambiance to their low lit, makeshift party.

“Look at that,” Haley nudged Y/n’s arm, nodding her head towards the other side of the glass coffee table, where the band was sprawled out, drinks in hand.

“What?” Y/n chortled, trying to see what Haley was seeing, no longer interested in whatever was going on around her.

“Look at him,” Haley nodded subtly to a man, maybe five years older that Y/n, dressed simply in t-shirt and jeans, his hair hidden by a beanie, “He’s totally checking you out,” sure enough, his dark gaze was fixed her, half of his lower lip caught between his teeth, skewing his halfhearted smirk.

“That’s Keanu Reeves,” Y/n giggled quietly, “There’s no way he’s checking me out, he’s probably just looking at someone else. Or, you know, he’s drunk out of his mind.”

“Only one way to find out right?” Haley wiggled her brows, a bad idea clearly in the making. By most definitions, both Y/n and Haley were adrenaline seeking risk-takers. They liked the rush, excitement and partying till dawn if the opportunity arose. But even then, Y/n always thought that there was a line, even if it wasn't defined or out-rightly related to their situation, it was always there, and somehow, Haley almost always managed to cross it. Before Y/n could even protest, Haley was leaning forward, trying to get Keanu’s attention, “Hey,” she snapped and when he looked at her, she smiled, bright and mischievous, “Hi, I was wondering; are you checking out my friend?”

For a minute, Keanu seemed stunned, and Y/n internally cringed at Haley’s boldness. All she wanted was to be swallowed whole by a spontaneous fissure in the floor, or at the very least, to never cross paths with Keanu again. That might have been more likely. Though, when his initial bewilderment morphed into a confident smile, Y/n felt heat rise to her cheeks, “Well that depends,” he planted his elbows on his thighs and clasped his hands together, leaning over the table in Y/n’s direction.

Y/n huffed, tilting her head and letting her hair sweep carelessly over her shoulders, “On what exactly?”

Keanu moistened his lips, “On if you’re interested or not,” he scooted rather gracefully to the edge of his seat, and Y/n did the same. No one seemed to be paying them any mind, though, if they were, Y/n didn’t notice, “If you are, then maybe we could get out of here.”

Briefly, Y/n silently checked with Haley, who just gestured for Y/n go. “Okay,” she bit back a smile, only standing to follow Keanu’s lead. Watching him go, his band mates, Brett and Robert whooped and offered him a couple other noises of approval, though Y/n could tell that Keanu was largely ignoring them, snaking his arm around her waist and offering her a swing from a bottle of hard liquor that he had swiped.

“Where are we going?” They spilled out into the hotel’s lobby, squinting at the brightness, a stark contrast to the smoky dimness of the small room backstage. Because Vegas never really slept, the lobby still buzzed with life, guests moving in and out and the casino opposing the auditorium showed no signs of closing soon, even if it was well past midnight.

“Well,” Keanu looked around, “We could play poker,” he gestured to the tables peeking through the grand doorway, “Or I could take you up to my room.”

Y/n huffed, a small smile still tugging at her lips. In another instance, she might have pushed him away, disgusted by his arrogance in thinking that she'd willingly go to his room. But she was drunk past caring and she’d be lying if Y/n said the thought hadn’t crossed her mind. Snatching the bottle, she stole a few more mouthfuls, the tequila burning her throat as it went down, creating a warmth in her stomach that seemed to spread through her veins. Turing in his arm, Y/n cocked an eyebrow, “Lead the way hotshot.”

Scoffing a chuckle, Keanu led her to the elevator, which turned out to be surprisingly empty on the way up. His hand around her slid to Y/n’s back, settling on the curve of her ass, just as she turned to kiss him, heated and hungry. “You know,” he mumbled against her lips, walking until he had Y/n pressed up against on side of the elevator, the reflective metal of the wall cool against her bare thighs and exposed arms, Keanu’s large calloused hands now on her waist, underneath her lace blouse, “I’ve been watching you all night, dancing with your friend. Anyone ever tell you that you look fucking sexy when you dance?”

Y/n’s pupils were blown with lust and she could feel Keanu’s hard on dig into her stomach, restrained by his jeans. As he spoke, his hands skimmed her body, passing over her mini skirt only to dip under the hem, going cup and squeeze her ass, “No,” Y/n moaned, arching into Keanu’s chest when he lowered his lips to her neck, trailing kisses from her jaw, going downwards, his stubble rough on her skin.

“Well, you do,” he breathed, his lips warm and wet on her soft, silky skin as he sucked the sensitive spot behind her ear, “You kept distracting me, like a little vixen,” he growled, curling his palms under her thighs, hosting her up into his arms, Y/n’s legs, “And I don’t even know your name.”

“Y/n,” she offered breathily, “Nice to meet you,” she giggled.

“Keanu,” he returned, though, Y/n didn’t need an introduction to know who he was, “Nice to meet you too.” Less than a beat later, Keanu resumed his onslaught on her neck, eventually scooting her up some more so he could bury his face in the valley of her breasts. Y/n’s head lolled back, one hand travelling to shove off his beanie and grip a fistful of Keanu’s short hair, pressing his face closer to her chest.

Neither of them even realized that the elevator doors had slid open, too busy to hair the little, automated ‘ding’. What they did hear though was someone loudly clearing their throat. Y/n’s cheeks burned, taking on a rosy hue while Keanu smiled sheepishly, setting her down. “Come on,” he eventually snapped out of it, taking her hand and brushing past the hotel guests waiting to get into the elevator.

Between giggles, sloppy kisses and teasing gropes, Y/n and Keanu, hand in hand, staggered towards his room, all the way at the end of the hall. When they got there, he clumsily unlocked it with his key card, barely having a moment to turn on the lights before he was crushing his lips to Y/n’s again. Their limbs tangled as they simultaneously tried to undress each other; he went for her blouse first, while Y/n pawed at the buckle of his belt. Eventually, articles of clothing were being tossed aside and by the time Y/n and Keanu stumbled through the open doors leading to the bedroom, they were left only in their underwear.

Keanu maintained a grip on her curve of Y/n’s waist while she cupped his cheeks, walking backwards to the made queen sized bed. The lights in there were off and in the process of trying to make the way, they bumped into the dresser and even managed to knock over some things. When they were standing on the edge, Keanu hastily picked Y/n up again, only to deposit her length-ways on the bright white sheets. She fell with a quiet yelp, giggling breathily when Keanu yanked her panties off before getting out of his own underwear.

With the aid of the city lights filtering through the closed curtains, Y/n could make out a few defining features, a well toned torso, a very impressive package and a devilish smirk. Likewise, as Keanu got onto the bed, pulling Y/n’s legs apart and getting situated between them, he could easily make out her breasts and her sensuous curves, along with her hair, fanned out around her, like a silky halo. If he weren’t in so much of a hurry for things to escalate, he might have taken more time to admire her, but what he could see made Keanu’s cock throb appreciatively and instead, he gave her legs a tug, pulling her body closer.

He lowered his lips to ravish her chest, taking her hardened right nipple in his mouth, his tongue swirling around, his teeth gently grazing her skin when he eventually pulled away to favor the other one. Y/n moaned softly, eagerly pressing Keanu’s face chest. His stocky fingers trailed along her inner thigh, brushing her warm, wet folds, wasting no time before he was rubbing the sensitive bundle of nerves, Y/n’s back arched to meet his touch. Keanu worked her clit encouragingly in slow, circular motions, at times alternating between that and rubbing it with the ‘v’ of his middle and pointer fingers.

“Keanu,” she pleaded breathlessly, “More.” One of Y/n’s delicate hands run up his front, barely grazing the vertical scar on his stomach and up his firm chest before settling to settle on his shoulder, her other one circling his girthy shaft, pumping slowly, her thumb occasionally brushing over his head.

As her ministrations grew faster, Keanu’s bucked into her touch, his fingers, now sticky with her arousal slipping into her entrance, curving to hit her G-spot, “You’re so fucking tight,” he praised between nipping and sucking her breasts, “Gonna feel good around my cock.”

The feeling of his fingers moving and out of her was good, but Y/n was growing frustrated with the burning desire for more. “Fuck,” she hissed when his thumb added pressure to her nub as Keanu continued, “Keanu,” she groaned, “God, just fuck me already.”

Smirking, he trailed hot, wet kisses kisses up Y/n’s neck, spending a few extra moments sucking on her pulse point before continuing his journey upwards. Keanu’s free hand skimmed Y/n’s side, his calloused touch sending shivers up her spine. “I want you to cum like this first,” his hot breath fanned her ear, and Y/n shuddered with pleasure when his tongue flicked the warm skin behind her earlobe erotically.

Soon enough, Y/n’s walls were clenching around Keanu’s fingers, her orgasm sending her vision white as she shut her eyes. Waves of pleasure coursed through her body, her legs weak and shaking, eliciting a loud, sinful moan from her parted lips. Her hand enclosed around Keanu’s erection went limp, though he was too enamored to notice, from what he could see, she looked absolutely spectacular like that; with her head tossed the side, hair falling over her face, lips ajar and eyes shut tight.

Keanu was about to push into her, when he caught himself, hastily reaching to feel around blindly on the nightstand. There should have been one right…….there. Feeling the cool, foil packaging, Keanu gabbed it up, effortlessly ripping the top before pulling out the condom and rolling it onto his shaft.

Finally, Keanu sheathed himself inside of her drenched cunt, groaning lowly at how Y/n felt cocooning him. “God,” his voice was gravely and his jaw clenched, “You feel so fucking good.” Y/n’s only response was a needy whimper, already longing for more. For another moment, Keanu lingered inside, giving Y/n a much-needed minute to adjust to his size, before striking up a steady controlled pace, exiting fully before driving himself back in.

Y/n’s arms went around Keanu’s middle as her legs tangled behind his thighs, eventually wordlessly urging him to flip them over. Now on top, her palms traveled up his chest, her nails sinking into the top of his shoulders to steady herself as she rode him. Keanu’s hands ran the length of her torso, eager to fondle her boobs, loving Y/n’s mewls of pleasure as his thumbs brushed her sensitive nipples, the remnants of her first orgasm being smeared on her chest.

Rolling her hips, Y/n felt Keanu’s balls hit her core each time she came down, and his throbbing veins rough, the feelings adding to her ecstasy. Her broken sentences were already garbled and the makings of her second climax in the works.

The slight curve of his member easily hit her deepest points of pleasure, and eventually, one of Keanu’s hands abandoned her swollen breast, two of his fingers reaching between their joined bodies to eagerly rub her over-stimulated clit, his thumb pressed firmly to her mound. Y/n raked her nails along his chest, eventually settling on his pecs.

Through his bleary vision, Keanu admired the way Y/n’s messy hair fell over her face, how, when his other hand slid to her waist, her breasts bounced with each movement, her sounds contained in her throat. “I’m close,” she admitted, her pace growing sloppy.

“Me too,” his hips bucked to meet hers, a couple digits still rubbing her clit as the other moved again, that time to knead her ass, “Come on baby,” he encouraged, “Milk my cock.” Keanu’s dirty requests were enough to push Y/n over the edge. Without further warning, Y/n shuddered around him, her pussy squeezing Keanu tighter, her legs mimicking bonelessness.

Keanu hissed as he cock pulsed, buried deep inside Y/n, twitching as he shot ropes of creamy release against her walls, the only minor hamper being the latex barrier. The feeling was euphoric; he could feel the tingling down to his toes and his vision went stark white for a second, blind spots dancing on his eyes even as it faded.

Breathing heavily, Y/n winced as she eventually pulled herself off of Keanu, collapsing onto the bed next to him. Their chests heaved and beads of exertion coated their bodies; Keanu had only just realized that the A/c wasn’t even on. Y/n’s eyes were heavy, and out of the corner, to her left, she could see that Keanu was still staring at the darkened ceiling, faint smile still quirking his lips. “It was very nice to meet you, Keanu,” she teased, giggling softly.

“Likewise,” he chuckled, finally turning his head towards her. Again, the lapsed into silence, but it was only for a short while. “So,” he began, “Do you have to get back to your friend anytime soon?”

Knowing Haley, she’d probably left with one of Keanu’s band mates, or some other guy, intent on spending the night the same way Y/n was spending hers. They probably wouldn’t have seen each other until midday. “No,” she furrowed her brows, intrigued by where that was going.

Leaning up on his crooked elbow, Keanu brushed stray locks away from Y/n’s neck and face, shrugging nonchalantly, “Good,” he chortled, swinging one leg over her, his lips connecting with hers and his already hardening cock against her thigh giving Y/n enough of an explanation.

*******

Tagging- @harrisongslimited

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