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thanksjro · 4 years

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Dark Cybertron Chapter 7: Simon Furman and His Lack of a Relationship with the Singular They

The Lost Light is still being attacked by Ammonites, like it has been for the last few issues. Hound’s taken over as acting field commander and is calling all the shots. Chromedome uses his stupid beefy arms to punch things. Trailcutter is screaming. Swerve’s got his My First Blaster™ strapped to the top of his alt, and saves Crosscut.

Crosscut is our toy tie-in character for this issue. He’s a senator, and drafts play scripts. Arguably one of the more interesting tie-in guys, at least in theory. In practice, all he’s doing is forgetting Swerve’s name, which isn’t going to help the guy with his through-the-floor self esteem.

Crosscut points out that Swerve’s communicator is flashing, and while he’s checking his voicemail, all the Ammonites seemingly vanish… at least, until the gang realizes that they’re instead heading for Metroplex.

Inside, it would appear that the Rod Pod Squad aren’t actually dead, though their ride is probably toast. Before everything went to hell, a wall slammed down from the ceiling, protecting everyone from being utterly destroyed. Skids has figured out what all the arrow graffiti is about, earning himself a BOMP from Getaway. Looks like the internal structure of Metroplex has been shifting, and that’s why they got the runaround last issue. Also, Whirl’s gone missing, but we don’t have time to worry about that, because Swerve just called back with some bad news: the admium flakes they saw earlier mean that Metroplex has an alchemical virus.

Don’t you look at me like that, I’m getting to the explanation.

Alchemical viruses turn the metal of the body into admium, a rare, incredibly soft metal that will break down very easily and also kill you. It’s pretty bad to have. Also, contagious. Fellas better get outta there, posthaste.

The Ammonites are also storming Metroplex, so that’s an additional issue. God, it just never stops, does it?

Over in the Dead Universe-

Is that a fortress of evil in the shape of Nova Prime’s head?

Is that a goddamned fortress-

Anyway, the center of Nova Prime’s universe is Kup, who was the guy who got oh-so-dramatically revealed at the end of the last issue. Unfortunately, Orion Pax also considers Kup to be very near and dear to his heart, and the whole “being turned into a space bridge” thing is going to be an issue.

This is the weirdest love triangle I’ve ever seen.

How the hell did Kup even get here? Well, in order to know that, you’ve have to had read Infestation, the bullshit zombie crossover comic miniseries that ran in 2011.

But I’m not going to do that.

Because I don’t want to.

After a bit of showboating, Nova Prime orders Nightbeat to take Team -Imus to their cell.

Over on Cybertron, Shockwave is getting real sick of Galvatron’s shit, but Galvatron is too busy posing dramatically to notice. Waspinator, Metalhawk, and Dreadwing float in the air. I’m not sure what they’re up to, but I’m sure it’s important. Jhiaxus shows up with a gaggle of goons, one of which seems to have forgotten his face in the jar by the door.

Galvatron gets shamed for tearing Megatron in half, since that sort of broke the space bridge in his torso, but he’s too busy being classist to care. Waspinator floats in the background. What are you doing back there, pal?

Shockwave orders Waspinator to carry Megatron to his quarters, but Galvatron’s decided that he’s going to be an asshole about everything today, even when he’s being helpful.

…Okay, Boomer.

Waspinator still ends up hauling Megatron’s ass away, and Shockwave and Jhiaxus have a little chat.

Back in the dead universe, Team -Imus are in their cell, as Nightbeat double-checks the locks or some shit, I dunno. They’re gonna get their sparks ripped out later in the day, so that the space bridge Kup’s got running in his torso finally has enough juice to actually friggin’ work.

Then Rodimus flashes his mystery hand at Nightbeat and makes him fall down. In order for the whole brainwashing thing to work, Nightbeat’s true nature had to be suppressed; however, whenever Rodimus shows off his mystery hand, it makes his brain kickstart back on, messing up the brainwashing.

Well, you know what, Cyclonus? That’s not my fucking fault. Blame Roberts and Barber. I certainly do.

ORION PLEASE.

We finally get a look at what Rodimus’ hand mystery is, and if you read Eugenesis, you might know where this is going. It would seem Nightbeat has not- which is for the best, really, given what happens to him in it- but he’s still a pretty smart cookie and can suss it out through the power of deductive reasoning. Here’s what he’s working with:

After a moment’s deliberation, he asks Rodimus, who he knows to be the captain of a ship, how many folks are riding around in the space yacht. Rodimus tells him 190, and shows off that he’s got his lipgloss on, and it would seem that Nightbeat’s a free man again. He lets everyone out of the cell, and they gear up to go pick up Kup. Orion Pax is confused as to what the hell just happened here, and Rodimus promises to explain why he’s carved a division problem into his palm once they aren’t in immediate danger.

Back on Cybertron, Galvatron and Waspinator are dragging Megatron’s halves towards Shockwave’s quarters, when Bumblebee pops out of nowhere with a gun and a mouth full of swears. He’s here for Megatron, and he’s not taking “no” for an answer. Galvatron thinks that this is super fucking funny, and tosses Megatron like an empty soda can into the wall so he can squash a bug.

It looks pretty grim for ol’ Bumblebee, but suddenly Galvatron realizes he left the oven on that Megatron’s gone missing.

Oh, there he is!

Megatron blasts Galvatron in the torso, then- in a surprisingly polite manner, at least for him- tells Bumblebee to grab his legs so they can get out of here. As the two of them traverse the burned-out husk that is Cybertron, Megatron decides to be a complete bastard, as he smiles at the idea of Starscream suffering. Like, dude, I know he kept you in weird hamster ball jail and spouted soliloquies in your general direction every single day you were there, but folks are dying right now.

Speaking of Starscream, he’s having a moment, as he sits on his knees and stares at the sky in abject horror while the world burns around him. Scoop comes by to yell at him for being a harbinger of death, and generally being a less than stellar leader, and Starscream halfway calls himself a dumpster fire.

Back inside Metroplex, the Rod Pod Squad are fortifying their defenses against the Ammonites, even though they really need to be getting the hell out of there before they get turned into talcum powder through the power of alchemy. Whirl shows back up, the Ammonite hanger-on in his grasp, and we get the skinny on why the hell the Ammonites are involved with this whole debacle anyway.

The answer is Shockwave.

The answer is always Shockwave.

Then the little dude explodes. It’s fine, they do that sometimes.

Before he went kablooey, little dude uttered the phrase, “if the dead are not enough.” We’ll get to what all that’s about later. Right now there are far more important things going on.

LIKE MOTHERFUCKING LADY ROBOTS.

But why is this such a big deal? Why is it that non-male coded robots who aren’t Arcee haven’t been seen up until this point? What’s up with that, huh?

Well, in order to understand IDW’s complicated relationship with gender, we’re going to have to do some digging into the history of Transformers as a franchise.

We’re going to have to talk about Simon Furman.

We're going to have to talk about Prime's Rib.

And we’re going to have to talk about Spotlight: Arcee.

Simon Furman wrote a lot of Transformers. You cannot get away from Simon Furman, because the man is so ingrained in the franchise. He was there for Marvel UK, he was there for the back half of Marvel US, he wrote for several other publication runs of Transformers, he worked on the Earth Wars mobile game-

-and, of course, IDW publishing.

Because Furman is so very well established and known in the industry, he gets the benefit of not being questioned on a lot of the calls he makes.

Which is a problem, because the man is a massive misogynist.

In 1989, Marvel UK #234 came out, containing the story entitled “Prime’s Rib!” in which the Autobots built Arcee in order to appease a group of strawmen feminists. Of course, one female Transformer isn’t enough for them, and they yell at poor Optimus Prime for trying his best. This is the point where Hot Rod is used as a writer avatar to try to smooth things over with the reader, because you see, the Transformers don’t even know what sexual dimorphism and gender identity even is, so of course they wouldn’t have female members of their race! Jazz is used for a breast joke. Arcee acts like a massive, stereotypical bitch the whole time, despite not having been written like that at all in the other issues. It’s a bad comic with hideous ideology leaking out of it, and I'm halfway sorry I read it, so I’ll just give you the essence of this nightmare.

Oh, those big, mean, scary feminists are bullying the robots for living their lives, huh Furman? Life is just so goddamned unfair when a woman exists in your fucking line of sight.

Furman has gone on record saying that he doesn’t see the point in including the concept of gender in a race of non-sexually reproducing robots. He sees them as “genderless.” Which, if that statement existed in a vacuum, I could perhaps see where he’s coming from.

But Simon Furman does not exist in a vacuum. He exists in a world where sexism exists, something that he’s willingly participated in.

Let me back up that little tidbit with a bit of a disclaimer: I’m not in any way an expert on gender. I didn’t study it in school, I’ve not read an obscene amount of pieces on the topic. I’m not even sure about it on a personal level.

Maybe some of y’all have noticed the whole other set of pronouns I slapped into the bio in the last month or so. It doesn’t really matter, 90% of people don’t read the FAQ/About, I know that, and then 95% of those people only read it once, and this has been a relatively new self-revelation.

BUT ANYWAY.

Let’s be… fair about this. 1989 was a while ago, a lot of research on the concept of gender has taken place, maybe he’s ch-

Oh, what’s that?

Misogyny?

Transphobia?

Transmisogyny?

Treating women as an aberration being forced on Transformers as a whole?

And the writing is clunky and overstuffed?

Well, that’s just fucking fantastic, Furman, thanks so much.

This was in 2008. Because Furman established that female Transformers weren’t something natural, but rather made, and forcibly at that, and nobody fucking smacked his little hands away from this terrible idea, AND nobody tried to fix it for years, there was a lack of gender diversity within IDW until 2014, with the release of Dark Cybertron Chapter 7. Because we waited six years to fix this nightmare, things couldn’t be done quite the way that Roberts had been hoping, in that he intended for our female robots to not have the whole… fembot build happening. IDW wanted them immediately clockable, because this was very clearly a problem that needed rectifying.

So, in short: because of boys’ club mentality and a lack of understanding of what gender means or why it’s important for roughly 50% of the world’s population to have representation in media, Nautica and Chromia are here now.

And despite the convoluted road they had to take, I love them very much.

#transformers #jro #dark cybertron #issue 7 #rid #exrid #issue 25 #maccadam #Hannzreads #overthinking about robots #incoming analysis #text post #long post #comic script writing

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cherryblossomshadow · 3 years

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Wonder Woman 1984 review

Long, rambly, and spoilery. You’ve been warned.

I saw WW84. I had thoughts. Let's talk about it.

I want to preface with the fact that it's amazing that we have another female-led superhero film! I loved Patti Jenkins' work with the first Wonder Woman (and this one too) and I'm so glad she's back for this one. There's obviously a lot to pick through, but first, a couple reminders.

No film will ever be "perfect."

Not every film is made specifically for you.

It is okay to vibe or disvibe with something. But that does not make it trash.

Also, please, keep in mind, what I'm expressing are my opinions. I'm entitled to mine as you are entitled to yours. I hope you have a lovely time on the internet, and I hope you wish the same for everyone you interact with.

Oh, and spoilers obviously.

Okay, with all that out of the way, let's dig in.

My overall experience with the film is positive! I had a great time watching it, it got me emotional, and I definitely want to watch it again. That said, I don't think it's better than the first one (although that would have been quite a feat), and that's ok. It's a continuation of a story we've already started, and it doesn't need to outshine the first.

Okay, after all the hyping up and disclaiming I've done, let's dig into what I didn't like about the film.

Number one is pacing. The storyline felt very erratic to me? Part of that, I feel, is because we have three (four?) main characters, and we jump between them pretty abruptly.

Number two is the themes. Now I do like the themes of WW84 (truth and sacrifice), I just don't think they were worked into the film as cohesively as I would have liked?

Number three is perceived character changes to Diana. And really, some of this is kinda circumstantial, I just thought it deserved its own bullet point. You'll see what I mean.

So, on Pacing.

We jump between Diana (and Steve), Barbara, and Maxwell pretty frequently. And before I talk about that, I have to talk about my view on the characters.

a. Now, I love the Mandalorian, but I was not personally invested in Maxwell's arc at all. Again, this is my take, and I know people disagree. Many people feel like Pedro Pascal carried the film on his shoulders. That's cool. He's a great actor. I'm glad he was in it. I just kinda checked out of every scene he was in (when he wasn't with his kid) because I wasn't invested in him. He played a sleazeball on purpose, and it worked. I was sleazed. So the movie kinda dragged for me whenever the camera panned to him.

b. I loved the focus on Barbara. I don't know Cheetah from the comics, so this is from a movie-only perspective. But I know one of the criticisms of the first film was that Diana didn't really talk to women after she left Themyscira (even though there was a perfectly good villainess sitting right there for her to converse with and have morality debates/fights with! Even Steve Trevor got to talk to Dr Poison!), so I thought it was great that 1) they set up a villainess for her to fight and 2) it was a villainess that she knew, she had talked to, she had formed a relationship with. It honestly surprised me that Barbara was helpful for so long (bc I had seen the trailer and got spoiled that she would become a villain), but I love that she genuinely did want to help Diana, up until she hit her hard limit (giving up her powers). Now, that being said, the Nerd Girl Makeover has been done a thousand times. I knew what her vague trajectory would be from the second she appeared on screen with frizzy hair. I did like that her motivation was not solely "pretty people are mean to me, and I want revenge and/or for this hot guy to like me," but specifically, "I want to be like this really cool girl" and then "I don’t want to be like anyone else; I want to be the best/number one" for myself." But I felt like the absolute inattention that she was shown at the beginning and the absolute worship Diana and later Barbara would get was ... highly exaggerated? And I know this was another criticism of the first film, that yeah "Diana did so well in the real world because SHE'S HOT and that's actually not empowering to women" or something. But like. Watching that part made me uncomfortable instead of seen. Pandered to, instead of impacted. Showing how looks change how society treats you is important, but not to this caricaturized degree.

c. (and d?) And lastly, Diana and Steve. Or more accurately, Diana and Steve's soul or memories or ??? that has been transplanted into some random man's body with absolutely no one's consent (I don't believe that Diana "consented" when making the wish, because she didn't know 1. That it would even work or 2. HOW it would work.). So ... Yeah. The first problem with this (chronologically, not by importance) is that it's really unclear what's going on? Some rando is reciting Steve's lines from the first film, then all of a sudden he turns into Chris Pine? (Fun fact: my aunt actually recognized the actor from Hallmark 😂 Could you imagine being the guy who gets replaced by Chris Pine for half the movie? Like "yeah, I played Steve Trevor, but they had Chris Pine do all the important parts" 😂😂😂). So, Diana and Steve finally figure out that he's inhabiting some engineer's body because of the wish she made. And then they bang. Or do they bang before they figure it out? Either way, yikes 😬. Not a good look.

To be clear, the yikes part is that Steve is inhabiting Engineer Dude's body without their consent (without his own either tho so that part's not really his fault), but then he chooses to do things sexually with that body that Engineer Dude didn't consent to (because he's like, literally not home. Whether he's been subsumed into Chris Pine or taken out or dormant or whatever). Oh, and then like, probably doing death-defying stunts with his body is also yikes. I'm not really sure what the rules around body possession are. Cuz you know.

Anyway, that is a huge issue that is literally not addressed. At all.

Again, I think they may have been trying to address some criticisms from the first film about Diana "getting rid of the dreaded V-card so quickly in Wonder Woman and then pining after Chris Pine (lol) for the rest of her long life" and how that sets back female sexuality and stuff. Which I get. They actually lampshaded it in WW84, how Chris Pine wants her to move on because "the world deserves her." Which I know what they were going for in the scene, but I feel like they didn't flesh out the journey from Hippolyta's "the world doesn't deserve you Diana" to Steve's "the world deserves you (to date them)" enough. But I digress.

I'm gonna talk a little bit more about the possession and that "the world deserves/doesn't deserve you" line in my Themes section, but honestly? From the previews, I assumed that Chris Pine was revived from the dead via time travel or something. Body possession was NOT in the the trailers. I think the Dreamstone could have created a body for him out of nothing. Or like "time-traveled" him into the future. So like. Why didn't they? Why introduce body possession at all? So they could make fun of the dude's clothes?

Okay, back to the pacing part of the pacing section. These three (four?) characters have completely different things going on in their lives (I actually forgot to talk about Maxwell, but he wants to "be the best," and he's gonna do it by giving people what they think they want (maybe) and then taking from them whatever he wants. Yeah idk). And all three do interact at the beginning (brownie points) even if the attempted seduction of Barbara by Maxwell makes me want to throw up. But the themes aren't worked in as cohesively as I would have liked, and the tone changes were jarring, as the film switched between them all.

Another facet of the movie is that the Dreamstone is kind of a mystery. And that was a deliberate Choice™, not a mistake. We're guessing at what the rock is doing and how and why and by who and all that stuff, and that's on purpose, but that makes for a confusing experience. Their approach is to throw something confusing at you and then explain it later. Which is great for worldbuilding. But not always for the Movie-Watching Experience™. So to recap, we're switching tracks and characters with their own separate stories while also setting up several confusing plot points that take a while to unravel. This all contributes to the Experience™, good or bad.

Honestly, I wonder how much Covid affected this movie? My dad felt like a lot of scenes probably got cut for various reasons, and it probably affected the flow of the movie. If so, it could have affected thematic coherence, too. Speaking of...

So, Themes.

The themes that I got out of this film were Truth and Sacrifice. Maybe I missed some; I'm not an experienced Media Critic™. But these are the ones I noticed.

And actually, these themes are really strong. Universally applicable, and used in all three character arcs. It's just tied in a bit ... erratically?

So working backward, knowing that the Dreamstone is giving you a lie, you need to renounce your wish and accept the Truth™. This is echoed in Diana's flashback, where she needed to accept that she didn't win.

Working backward again, Sacrifice was a big part of the story for all three characters because Diana was willing to sacrifice her power to keep Steve, but he wanted her to sacrifice him so she could save the world. Barbara was willing to sacrifice her "humanity" or "empathy" or whatever she lost for the power and influence she got by emulating Diana, and she was unwilling to sacrifice that to save the world. Maxwell was willing to sacrifice time with his son to "become the best," but he did sacrifice that to save his son's life.

And then, full circle, he confessed to his son that he wasn't the best, he's actually a filthy liar. Which, yes, kudos for the themes, be honest with your children, but you can still sanitize it a bit. That speech alone would have traumatized the kid.

Speaking of speeches, Antiope's speech confused me in a similar way? Like, she stops Diana from "winning" the tournament after cheating, and goes on this weird rambly rant which goes from "accept that you're not a winner" to "cheating is bad and so is lying." Which yes, cheating is bad, but it's weird that she wouldn't have been disqualified at this point for not shooting that last target? Like, did she need to be tackled? Idk, I felt like they came up with the line they wanted Antiope to say first, and then just made her say it. (And also, in other stories, Diana would have been praised for being "clever" and "never giving up without a fight." So like, I needed a bit more preparation for which take they were going for, because the anti-cheating spiel felt jarring to me.)

And again, I wonder if this is a response to a criticism of this first film. (Warning: WW17 rant gearing up)

When Diana has her big motivational flashback during her fight with Ares, she thinks about Steve, this dude she just met a week ago, saying he loved her. When she could have been thinking about literally any of the women who had raised her. I personally think it would have been cool to hear some of Antiope's words at that point. Since they set up Hippolyta and Antiope to have conflicting ideas over whether Diana should fulfill her humanity-saving destiny, it might have been cool to see her saying something about humans and how they need her or how she should help them or something. They could even have done the whole thing with not being able to hear Steve's last words, but with Antiope since she dies earlier in the film and doesn't finish speaking. I also think it would have been cool for them to expand Hippolyta's earlier line about "They don't deserve you, Diana," here to like "They need you, Diana," or something. And then Steve's line in WW84 could have been something like "They're with you, Diana," or "They could get to know you, Diana," and her character arc could have been about actually living among society and maybe getting to know these humans that she's saved so many times (which they kind of alluded to when she and Barbara had their little date at the beginning of the film). But I digress.

So, yeah, I found both of these speeches to be ... Not great? Like I can tell what they're going for and how they tie into the themes, but they're so heavy-handed and they don't actually fit in too well to the moment they happen in. Like as soon as the speech starts, you realize that they started going meta on you. The character isn't really speaking to the other character, they're speaking to us, and they're telling us how this scene ties into the greater themes of the film.

Oh and they have this great quote from Antiope "greatness is not what you think" and then Maxwell's son wishes for him to be "great." And they do nothing with it :(

As promised, I want to talk about the body possession a little bit more. So again, one of the recurring themes is Truth™. Which is a great choice for Wonder Woman, what with her Lasso of Truth.

But it's tied in a bit haphazardly. They force it into a conversation about cheating in a flashback at the beginning of the film. And then they talk about how you need to accept the Truth™ in order to defeat the Dreamstone. I already talked about the cheating, and how the "accept that you're not a winner" was kind of a weird path to take to get your point across to a ten year old girl.

But the Dreamstone. Oh, the Dreamstone. I said before that the movie is a mystery. It shows you things but doesn't explain them. Well, this is a bit of a problem. Because they never actually explain that the Dreamstone is giving you lies. To my eyes, the Dreamstone is changing reality. Steve is back, Barbara is powerful, and Maxwell is doing whatever he wants with the powers of the Dreamstone. THIS DOES NOT LOOK LIKE A LIE TO ME. THERE IS NO "TRUTH" TO ACCEPT, JUST YOUR NEW REALITY. And that made the film less thematically strong (to my eyes, anyway. Other people probably picked up on stuff I didn't). But I feel like this might have been an easy fix? Like you already have Chris Pine in someone else's body (oh! So that's why they chose body possession! Because he's a Lie™! ... Still don't like it) I still think he should have manifested his own body or something but whatever. Barbara's appearance hardly changed at first. If they had people reacting to her as if she was hot when she really looked the same as she always does, then I would have bought your "but the Dreamstone only gives you lies." Instead, Barbara gained the power to walk in heels and then hotness and then the literal power of a God™ (a la Diana) which makes me think the Dreamstone is changing reality. Not bringing lies.

Oh, also, they could have had Diana's Lasso of Truth stop working for her. I thought that's what they were going for at first, but it turns out that Diana is just losing her powers. They also started with "the Dreamstone will give you what you want most," but then Maxwell started using it to clear traffic? Which by the way, is NOT an illusion. That is reality-bending.

There were just so many ways to make it obvious that "the Dreamstone is giving you lies," but they didn't use them. Or at the very least, they didn't commit. I felt like they used a little bit of "be careful what you wish for" (mostly on randos that Maxwell is duping), a little bit of "what are you willing to sacrifice," and a little of "you can have what you want, but it won't be real." All of which are valid ways to take a Dreamstone kind of story, but if they wanted to rely so heavily on Truth™ as the main theme, then I feel like more of the wishes should have been showcasing that. Instead, it felt like a jumble of all the kinds of messages we're used to seeing with Wish-Granting Objects, with no emphasis on specifically the "it's all a lie" part.

Ugh, I'm actually mad now, because I'm trying to think of a story I've heard where this magical thing is granting wishes but they're Explicitly Not Real. Like all the money gets turned back to leaves or whatever (kinda like Cinderella's pumpkin lol). Oh, Aladdin does this, too, because yeah Genie is granting wishes and changing reality, but not permanently? Like, almost all of the stuff he uses magic to do dissolves as soon as we're looking away from it or gets fixed by the end of the movie? And the film is very very clear on the fact that Aladdin is not factually a Prince.

But this film doesn't do that. They make it seem like the Dreamstone can change reality, then berate the characters for not Accepting the Truth™ about themselves. Maybe if they had made a bigger deal out of Steve coming back in someone else's body, it would have been 1) less confusing, 2) less icky (provided they don't do the sex in Engineer Dude's body), and 3) more thematically coherent.

Lastly, Diana's perceived character changes.

This one is probably the most subjective. Diana, as a character, in the first film was very morally grounded and motivated. The Diana in this film felt ... different. Again. Subjective. And also circumstantial.

Diana is still morally grounded in this film. But she's also willing to sacrifice the world to keep Steve Trevor around. Which feels like a jarring change from her characterization in the first film. She was so idealistic and optimistic in that first film, I couldn't imagine her making that choice. It just felt like such a tone change for her character. How did we go from "Who will I be if I stay?" to "Why, for once, can't I just have this one thing, Steve? ... I can't give you up. I can't. So I won't."

Also, her motivation in this film seemed to center around her loss of Steve Trevor and wanting him, and less around "save the world." Which, to be fair, I'm all for women being selfish in film. Give me women of all motivations and desires. I don't want Diana to be Perfect™. I just want her to be consistent. And I didn't think this characterization was as consistent as I expected. Was her life so terrible without Steve (even though they only knew each other for a short time)? Not to say this couldn't be a valid take on Diana (reminder: I haven't read any comics, so maybe it's not in character at all 🤷‍♀️), but if that's what they were going for, they should have developed the journey from naive idealist to jaded romantic more in order to justify this character change.

Also, the body possession thing. She's really okay with her boyfriend possessing somebody else's body. I did like the "All I See Is You" line, since it's romantic, but up until that point, we as viewers aren't really sure why Chris Pine and Hallmark Dude are both playing this guy. Then we find out in a romantic line that Chris Pine is just Wonder Woman's view of him. He still looks like Engineer Dude because he is Engineer Dude. At first, I thought that they used a different guy for the first meeting because Diana didn't recognize him. That this was her perception of him until she realized who it was. (I thought this was supported by Chris Pine's more rugged look in this film. But actually they were probably matching him to the body he was inhabiting, since the character really didn't look like himself). Leverage does a similar thing in the Rashomon Job. All the characters saw each other at the same event, but they didn't know each other back then, so they had different actors play their parts until it's slowly revealed that actually the random people at the event were the characters we know and love. It's great. Anyway, that's not what they're going for here, and the ambiguous framing along with Diana and Steve's chemistry is supposed to make you forget that he is possessing someone else’s body! Against their will! (Again, Steve and Diana didn't consent to the initial possession either, but they absolutely consented to what they did together. Engineer Dude did not.)

Yikes 😬

I will say, she didn't kill innocents this time. One of my critiques of the first movie was that she was so willing to kill Germans. And I get it, Nazis are usually an "acceptable" target in American media. But as a character, she believed that they were innocents who had been manipulated by Ares. And yet, she was slaughtering them en masse. But, in this movie, they're really careful to make sure that she's nonlethal.

And yeah, that's it.

Asteria was of course awesome. That bonus credit scene was 👌

I'm glad they got Linda Hemming back for costuming after the disaster of Justice League. Unfortunately, being set in the 80's, the outfits are not quite so modest as the first movie. But the important thing was the lack of male gaze in those shots.

The movie definitely hit me in my emotions. I cried three times: first during the tournament, watching the Amazon's being awesome. Then during Diana and Steve's fight, and when Steve convinced Diana to let him go. 😭

As I said, I definitely plan on rewatching. It makes me sad to see how much negative press that the movie is getting when it's one of so few female-led blockbusters. A lot of people are comparing it to the original or to the comics or TV show, when those are just not valuable comparisons. Comic books and TV shows are completely different mediums. And a successful sequel CONTINUES a story, instead of rehashing it. And also, not all films are created specifically for YOU. A lot of the 80's references went over my head, but that's ok. They weren't for me. I don't begrudge their existence just because I don't vibe with them.

Again, no film is perfect! I think I talked through a lot of its weaknesses pretty thoroughly, but I still think it's a strong film, and I want it to succeed.

Anyhoo, I hope you had fun watching the movie (even though it's not perfect) and I hope you had fun reading my commentary.

(Fun fact: I actually ran out of space in my notes app and had to stretch it across two notes)

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cxhnow · 4 years

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Chloe and Halle Bailey, Jeremy Scott’s Newest Front Row Stars, on Beyoncé, Their New Album, and the Black-ish Spinoff

When they first entered Jeremy Scott’s New York showroom Friday, Chloe and Halle Bailey were a bit overwhelmed. They were confronted by a kaleidoscope of colors, a daunting array of garments, and a wide mandate in the designer’s archives. That is, the sisters—who are musicians, actors, and protégées of Beyoncé signed to her Parkwood Entertainment label—had arrived with a deceptively simple assignment: to select looks for the designer’s Spring 2018 show, which they planned to attend that night. But that left them with a lot of choice.They eventually emerged, as they often do, with coordinating looks. “We’re the same, but we’re different as well,” Chloe said. “We like to incorporate that through our fashion.” She opted for a black sleeveless minidress printed with trompe l’oeil butterflies formed out of two pistols in blues, pinks, yellows, and greens, with blue and black calf-hair platform shoes, while her younger sister selected the same print in a silk motorcycle jacket, paired with distressed Levi’s and platform heels in black with yellow flowers—“our favorite pieces, and the ones that were cohesive with one another,” Chloe described.These were the looks that hung in the wardrobe of their Midtown hotel room Friday evening, just more than an hour before the show was scheduled to begin. It was a crisp, early fall night, and as they explained their selection, the doorbell rung a couple times—at one point, to let their dad Doug, who is also their manager and frequent fashion show companion, in, and then to welcome in a room-service delivery of spaghetti. (“I love carbs,” Chloe later said enthusiastically—especially as vegans, which she and Hall have been for more than two years now.)

Though Friday marked their first time at a Jeremy Scott show—and their first show of the Spring 2018 season—the sisters are now nearly fashion week veterans. They attended their first fashion show, Tory Burch’s Spring 2017 runway, almost exactly a year ago, proceeding to sit in the front row at the Louis Vuitton show later that season (along with Sasha Lane, their “dear friend,” as Chloe described her). Then, earlier this year, the sisters got a glimpse of the other side, making their runway debut at Dolce & Gabbana’s Fall 2017 show. They sauntered down the runway in minidresses, tiaras, and red boots—holding hands all the while.“It’s like a different stage,” Halle said, comparing walking a runway to performing music. Still, “it was very different for us because we’re used to, we go on stage, we sing, and we feel this, like…” She exhaled with a sigh, a release of tension. “We worked so hard.” When they finished their brief lap of the runway, by contrast, “We were like, ‘Oh, that’s it? Cool.’” (She added, as a disclaimer, “but it was really fun.”)The sisters had just arrived in New York the previous day, fresh off a week of filming the first few episodes of Grown-ish, the new Black-ish spinoff in which Yara Shahidi’s character Zoey Johnson departs for college. Chloe and Halle already get mistaken for twins “all the time,” they told me in unison (perhaps an understandable misconception, considering they speak in unison, often finish each other’s sentences, and dress in coordinating looks), so it probably won’t help that, in the series, they play twin track stars Skylar and Jazz.The Bailey sisters were already close friends of their co-star Shahidi—last year, she described Chloe and Halle as her “BFFs”; they also share a fan in Michelle Obama—so being cast alongside her, as well as fellow Dolce & Gabbana model Luka Sabbat, was “a great feeling.” And though Chloe and Halle are now best known as musicians, they acted on screen as children growing up in Atlanta, making Grown-ish something of a return to form for both. (Indeed, as we drove to the show later that night, the sisters’ mom Courtney pulled out her phone to show me an image of Chloe, at age three, with Beyoncé, then 21, from the 2003 movie-musical Fighting Temptations, in which Chloe played a younger version of her eventual mentor’s character.)Chloe and Halle were making the most of their New York Fashion Week sojourn. In addition to the Jeremy Scott show, they stopped by a party hosted by Refinery29, where they finally met Issa Rae, the creator and star of Insecure, for the first time. They both avidly watch the series, which featured their song “Red Lights” in its first season, and it appears the admiration is mutual: On Thursday, Rae told them she was “so excited to see you guys’ acting debut,” Chloe recalled with a small gasp. “I was like, You know?”

But for all the activity in New York, by Sunday, they would return to Los Angeles to continue filming Grown-ish. The Freeform series, which is slated for premiere early next year, was just one of several projects Chloe and Halle were juggling. For example, back in Los Angeles, the sisters had the opportunity to pay homage to their mentor (and rumored fellow vegan) for her recent 36th birthday. Her mother, Tina Knowles, “wanted to do something spectacular for her daughter,” Halle said, so she recruited some of Beyoncé’s closest friends and collaborators to recreate a now-iconic image from the Lemonade visual album—Beyoncé in a wide-brimmed hat, a black dress, a bib necklace, and two thick braids. Knowles provided each of the participants—including Serena Williams, Michelle Obama, Ingrid, and even Beyoncé’s daughter Blue Ivy as well as Chloe and Halle—with a hat, braids included. She photographed the whole thing on an iPhone.Plus, earlier in the summer, they released a new project entitled The Two of Us that they described, upon its debut, as neither album nor mixtape, and that presages a full-length album they hope to complete soon.“All of the songs were rejects we knew weren’t going to make the album, but we still kind of liked,” Chloe explained as a makeup artist blotted electric blue shadow onto her lids. “We warped them together into one long song. It was really fun to create, because it’s, like, 25 minutes long.” But their album is coming, too: “It’s like, 85, 90 percent done,” Halle explained, adding that they were hoping to begin releasing new music early next year.They write, record, and produce their own music at their home studio in Los Angeles; once in a while, Beyoncé will drop in like a fairy godmother with feedback.“She allows us to have our own mind and our own thoughts and creativity,” Chloe said. “Her main thing, she wants us to do what we want to do,” Halle added. “She’s like, ‘Let the world catch up to you. You girls’ talent is so immense, don’t dumb it down for the world.’” It’s a message they also communicate on “Simple,” one of The Two of Us’s standout songs:

“No, I’m not calling anybody out, it’s just people telling us, ‘Oh you know your stuff’s too complex for the average ear to get it. Maybe you should just be simple,’” Chloe murmurs, singsong.“We hope that one day we’ll be legends, because legends break barriers and don’t follow the rules, you know?” Halle said.Though Chloe and Halle had just met designer Jeremy Scott earlier in the day, he has long cultivated relationships with musicians: Björk was reportedly his first celebrity client, and his inner circle currently comprises Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus, and Madonna. The sisters slipped into their Scott-designed looks—“Oh, come on,” their mom, Courtney, cried approvingly when she saw her daughters transformed—and Chloe daubed her favorite oil, which she dubbed “the smell-good” and smells of cotton candy, onto her wrists. A last-minute change of hoop earrings for studs, and they were ready to go: The four Baileys hurried out to the car that would shepherd them downtown to Spring Studios. (Back in Los Angeles, Chloe had just passed her driving test and obtained a bright blue Mini Cooper she christened Cleo, making her her own chauffeur.)When they arrived at the show, Chloe and Halle took their seats just down the front row from Lionel Richie and Jimmy Iovine, who their mother introduced as a “legend.” They sidled up to Erika Jayne of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, of which, apparently, they are big fans, and began chatting animatedly with the reality star. The lights dimmed, and Scott’s retrospective of a show got underway, with models like Karlie Kloss, Sofia Richie, Gigi Hadid, Devon Aoki, Coco Rocha, and even Liberty Ross, the ’90s supermodel married to Iovine, making their way down the runway in Scott’s silver-sequined club kid attire.After the lights came back up and before Chloe and Hall dissolved into the crowd, they offered their final review: “It was fantastic,” Chloe said. “I loved how it shined under the lights.”“I liked all the sparkles,” her sister echoed. “Beautiful.” [s]

[more photos from this event]

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loretranscripts · 5 years

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Lore Episode 2: The Bloody Pit (Transcript) - 23rd March 2015

tw: death, claustrophobia, racism (H. P. Lovecraft), ghosts

Disclaimer: This transcript is entirely non-profit and fan-made. All credit for this content goes to Aaron Mahnke, creator of Lore podcast. It is by a fan, for fans, and meant to make the content of the podcast more accessible to all. Also, there may be mistakes, despite rigorous re-reading on my part. Feel free to point them out, but please be nice!

Most people are afraid of the dark, and while this is something that we expect from our children, adults hold onto that fear just as tightly; we simply don’t talk about it anymore. But it’s there, lurking in the back of our minds. Science calls it nyctophobia, the fear of the dark, and since the dawn of humanity our ancestors have stared into the blackness of caves, tunnels and basements with a feeling of rot and panic in their bellies. H. P. Lovecraft, the patriarch of the horror genre, published an essay in 1927, entitled “Supernatural Horror in Literature”, and it opens with this profoundly simple statement. “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown”. You see, people fear the unknown, the what-if, and the things they cannot see. We humans are afraid of the dark. We’re afraid that our frailness and weakness might become laid bare in the presence of… whatever it is that lurks in the shadows. We’re afraid of opening up places that should remain closed. We fear what we can’t see, and sometimes, for good reason. I’m Aaron Mahnke, and this is Lore.

The Berkshire Mountain Range in Western Massachusetts sits in the very top left corner of the state. It’s not the Rockies by any stretch of the imagination, but in 1851, those hills were in someone’s way. The Troy and Greenfield Railroad Company wanted to lay some track that would cut through the mountains, and so they begun work on a tunnel. On the western end sat the town of Florida, with North Adams holding up the eastern end. Between those towns was about 5 miles of solid rock. This building project was no small undertaking, no matter how unimpressive the mountains might be. It ultimately took the crew 24 years to wrap things up, and came at the cost of $21.2 million. In 2015 money, that’s $406, 493, 207. See? It was a big deal. Monetary costs aside however, construction of the tunnel came with an even heavier price tag. At least 200 men lost their lives cutting that hole through the bones of the earth.

One of the first major tragedies occurred on March 20th , 1865. A team of explosive “experts”, and I use that term loosely because nitro-glycerine had just been introduced to America about a year before, entered the tunnel to plant the charge. The three men, Brinkman, Nash and Kelley (who, by the way, his first name was Ringo, which I think is just awesome) did their work and then ran back down the tunnel to their safety bunker. Only Kelley made it to safety. It turns out that he set off the explosion just a bit too early, burying the other two men alive. Naturally, Kelley felt horrible about it, but no one expected him to go missing, which he did, just a short while later. But the accidents? They didn’t end there.

Building a railway tunnel through a mountain is complex, and one of the features most tunnels have is a vent shaft. Constant coal-powered train traffic could result in a lot of smoke and fumes, so engineers thought it would be a good idea to have a ventilation shaft that extended from the surface above and allowed fumes and water to be pumped out. This shaft for the Hoosac Tunnel, as it became known, would be roughly 30ft in diameter, and eventually would stretch over 1000ft down and connect with the train tunnel below. By October of 1867 it was only 500ft deep. Essentially it was a really, really deep hole in the ground. To dig this hole they built a small building at the top which was used to raise and lower hoists to get the debris out, as well as a pump system to remove ground water. Then, each day, they would lower a dozen or more crazy, Cornish miners (not underaged kids, by the way, the other kind of miner) into the hole, and set them to work. You see where this is going, right? Please tell me that you see where this is going.

On October 17th, a leaky lantern filled the hoist house with natural gas, a naphtha, an explosive gas found in nature, and the place blew sky-high. As a result, things started to fall down the shaft. What things? Well, for starters, 300 freshly sharpened drill bits. Then, the hoist mechanism itself, and finally, the burning wreckage of the building. All of it fell five stories down the tunnel and on top of the 13 men working away at the bottom. Oh, and because the water pump was destroyed in the explosion, the shaft also began to flood. The workers on the surface tried to reach the men at the bottom, but they failed. One man was even lowered into the shaft in a basket, but he had to be pulled back up when the fumes became unbearable. He managed to gasp the words “no hope” to the workers around him, before slipping into unconsciousness. In the end they gave up, called it a loss, and actually covered the shaft. But in the weeks that followed, the workers in the mine frequently reported hearing the anguishing voice of men crying out in pain. They said they saw lost miners carrying picks and shovels, only to watch them vanish, moments later. Even the people in the village nearby told the tales of odd shapes and muffled cries near the covered pit. Highly educated people, upon visiting the construction site, reported similar experiences. Glenn Drohan, a correspondent for the local newspaper wrote that “the ghastly apparitions would appear briefly, then vanish, leaving no footprints in the snow, giving no answers to the miners’ calls”. Voices, lights, visions, and odd shapes in the darkness, all the sorts of experiences that we fear might happen to us when we step into a dark bedroom or a basement.

A full year after accident, they reopened the shaft, drained out all 500ft of water. They wanted to get back to work, but when they did, they discovered something horrific. Bodies… in a raft. You see, apparently some of the men survived the falling drill bits and debris long enough that they managed to build a raft. No one knows how long they stayed alive, but it’s pretty clear they died because they had been abandoned in a flooding hole in the ground. After that the workers began to call the tunnel by another name: the “Bloody Pit”. Catchy, right?

About 4 years after the gas explosion, two men visited the tunnel. One was James McKinstrey, the drilling operations superintendent for the project, and the other was Dr. Clifford Owens. While in the tunnel, the two men, both educated and respected among their peers, had an encounter that was beyond unusual. Owens wrote: “On the night of June 25th, 1872, James McKinstrey and I entered the great excavation at precisely 11:30pm. We had travelled about 2 miles into the shaft when we finally halted to rest. Except for the dim smoky light from our lamps, the place was as cold and dark as a tomb. James and I stood there talking for a minute or two and were just about to turn back when I suddenly heard a strange, mournful sound. It was as if someone, or something, was suffering great pain. The next thing I saw was a dim light coming along the tunnel from a westerly direction. At first I believed it was probably a workman with a lantern; yet, as the light grew closer, it took on strange, blue colour, and appeared to change shape, almost into the form of a human being without a head. The light seemed to be floating along, about a foot or two above the tunnel floor. In the next instant it felt as if the temperature had suddenly dropped and a cold, icy chill ripped up and down my spine. The headless from came so close that I could have reached out and touched it, but I was too terrified to move. For what seemed like an eternity, McKinstrey and I stood their gaping at the headless thing like two wooden Indians. The blue light remained motionless for a few seconds, as if it was actually looking us over, then floated off towards the east end of the shaft, and vanished into thin air. I am, above all, a realist. Nor am I prone to repeating gossip and wild tales that defy a reasonable explanation. However, in all truth, I cannot deny what James McKinstrey and I witnessed with our own eyes”.

The Hoosac tunnel played host to countless other spooky stories in the years that followed. In 1874, a local hunter named Frank Webster simply vanished, and when he finally stumbled up the banks of the Deerfield River three days later, he was found by a search party without his rifle and appearing to have been beaten bloody. He claimed he’d been ordered into the tunnel by voices and lights, and once he was inside, he saw ghostly figures that floated and wandered about in the dark. His experience ended when something unseen reached out, took his rifle from him, and clubbed him with it. He had no memory of walking out of the tunnel. In 1936 a railroad employee named James Impoco, claims that he was warned of danger in the tunnel by a mysterious voice, not once, but twice. I’m thinking it was Ringo, trying to make up for being an idiot. In 1973, for some unknown and god-awful reason, a man decided to walk through the full length of the tunnel. This brilliant man, Bernard Hastaba, was never seen again. One man, who walked through and did make it out though, claims that when he was in the tunnel, he saw the figure of a man dressed in old clothing of a 19th century miner. Again, not a kid. He left in a hurry, from what I’ve read.

Stories about the tunnel persist to this day. It’s common for teams of paranormal investigators to walk the length of the tunnel, although it’s still active with a dozen or so freight trains that pass through each day. There are rumours of a secret room, or many rooms, deep inside the tunnel. There’s even an old monitoring station built into the rock about half way through, though few have been brave enough to venture all the way there and see it. Those that have report more of the same: unexplained sounds and lights. Oh, and remember Ringo Kelley, our sloppy demolition expert who got his co-workers killed in 1865? Well, he showed up again. In March of 1866, one full year after the explosion, his body was found 2 miles inside the tunnel, in the exact same spot where Brinkman and Nash had died. He had been strangled to death.

Lore was produced by me, Aaron Mahnke. You can find a transcript of this show, including links to source materials, at lorepodcast.com. Lore is a biweekly podcast, so be sure to check back in for a new episode every two weeks. If you enjoy scary stories, I happen to write them. You can find a full list of my supernatural novels, available in paperback and ebook formats, at aaronmahnke.com/novels. Thanks for listening.

#lore podcast #podcasts #aaron mahnke #hoosac tunnel #h. p. lovecraft #massachusetts #hauntings #2 #transcripts

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anthonybialy · 2 years

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Indecent Weakness

You'd think those who want politics in everything would know how specifics work. For one, advocates should be able to discern between goodness and hegemony. But thinking swell intentions solve anything leaves everything busted. The conflict between those too monstrous to stop hassling others and too soft to intervene has left humanity as the losers.

Raw strength is an indifferent quality. Results and ethics have everything to do with how it's wielded. The method preferred by bullies requires neither consideration nor concern for the soul's ultimate destination. The righteous must stick to a push-ups regimen in order to dissuade cafeteria jerks.

Power without justness and justness without power both lead to tyranny. Countries with no interest in conquering others spend treasure on arsenals they hope not to use for the same reason citizens have the right to arm themselves. Discouraging fiends is easy when you have your own barrels to point.

Audacity is not to be praised on its own. Research whether those acting with uncommon confidence are defending borders or ignoring them. The refusal to verify which explains why Vladimir Putin doing as he wishes.

Noting ignoring autonomy makes the invader formidable is not an endorsement any more than a retweet is. You don't have to put the disclaimer in your bio. Those unable to determine why the two don't necessarily overlap may as well shriek upon noting Rommel won a few battles. Lunkheaded airplane armrest sizer Putin only has brute force at his disposal like he's commander of an Imperial Star Destroyer, and the distinction between strategic brains and brute force is yet another lost in our very subtle world.

Having no rules seems awesome. In reality, it's less awesome to learn why there are rules. Rueful comeuppance is part of growing up. Those seduced by the childish fantasy of nobody enforcing a bedtime wonder why they're constantly exhausted. The world is full of goons who feel entitled to take toys belonging to nice children. With innate consciences in short supply, property respect is the task falling to adults on the planet who are willing to be what kids ironically think of as the bad guy.

There's a world of difference between admiring KGB thug twerp Putin and noting he does whatever he can get away with in a world where immoral aggression goes unchecked. Those conflating the two while railing against anyone who notices Russia disrespects property lines are actually admitting to how they see the world. Inadvertent declarations are the only times many people are honest.

The sect of Americans who plague themselves with their own commitment to worshiping authority in a moral vacuum are confused by principles in action. We're still coping with the remnants of the Trump faction who proved what vigorous alpha males they are by worshiping an authority-hungry beast who didn't win at all costs. It's no wonder their very virile kingpin can't manage to avoid ambivalence about a villain too cartoonish for Marvel movies.

Let's at least ascertain lessons from an entire presidency composed of the inability to distinguish between authority and how to not be a horse's ass while applying it. Otherwise, we suffered for no reason. One of these years, the professional boaster will convince others he dominated in business even though the practical result amounted to a couple hideous skyscrapers clad in black glass and identified by a rather unpalatable name in tacky gold. Wait until you see how much pink marble is in the lobby.

Conflating strength with rectitude was bad enough. Faking owning the former merely makes the toxicity more annoying. Not coincidentally, Trump also places winning above what's being won, which continues to make his loss extra amusing.

The only bad part was who beat him. Joe Biden offers neither the willingness for boldness nor the conviction to do something worthwhile. But at least he doesn't possess any sense. It's apparently asking too much to get one president who's willing to address how Russia sucks.

Suckering those begging for it takes the fun out of the grift. The adorable presumption that everyone is decent explains the worldview of those allowing cartoonish demons to rampage. This seems like a good time to remember Biden was vice president while Barack Obama decided bribing Iran with funds plundered from American taxpayers would keep maniacal mullahs from dreaming of nuking Tel Aviv.

By astounding coincidence, international attempted placaters are the same ones whose ideology leads them to presume those arrested domestically are society's victims. Ending cash bail has shown who the real threat is. Nobody ought to be surprised even if they're not presently being stabbed. Meanwhile, the only villains unofficial advocates of repeat offenders can find are cops.

Our globe's villains attempt to be amoral and muscular, although Ukraine's stubborn resistance exposes the latter's flaccidness in Putin's doughy case. Storming into private territory isn’t clever any more than it is honorable. It's too bad Russia hasn't spent as much time developing a market economy as they have trying to convince exhausted neighbors that they should unlock their doors.

Biden is both dissolute and enfeebled. He offers the best of both worlds aside from that. The doddering evader is doing something to discourage wickedness after barbarians advance again as long as pouting counts. Meanwhile, your American business is guaranteed to get harassed. There's surely plenty to cover insane taxes thanks to Treasury checks falling from the sky. The best hope for world peace is destabilizing Russia by letting Biden commandeer their economy. War inflation is dragging down the whole globe.

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sxpiosexualx · 6 years

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Some Jonsa fans care about Jon, sure. But not the ones who call him a traitor for betraying the north, or think Sansa should overthrow him and become QitN, or, say that the show has “butchered”his character for allying with the (admittedly annoying/entitled) person with DRAGONS. Some Dany fans are just as bad, but don’t tell me you won’t cancel Jon the minute your S8 hopes don’t pan out.

Hey mate I’ll admit I stared at this message, pondered on how I’d tackle answering this seriously, went on Twitter, scrolled through my entire Tumblr dash, went downstairs and got myself ice-cream, sat back up and finished my bowl of ice-cream, and then took another look at this message and I’m still having trouble understanding why I feel the need to reply to this. Life would be that much sweeter if I could ignore some things but…

it’s gonna bother me if I don’t.

**before we proceed let me just make a disclaimer that none of the points I put forward are exclusive to Jonsa - whether you ship jon x sansa or stan them both separately without hoping they get together, most of my points still stand.**

I’m with you for the most part, for admitting that some Jonsa fans do care about Jon because a few of us are more Jon stans than we are Sansa stans. Past that, I think you need to understand that OP was exaggerating the Jon hate coming from a small corner of our fandom, because like the others have explained in this thread, the majority of us are upset at the turn of events and more so at Daenerys than we are at Jon. Like @lostlittlesatellites mentioned, it’s the difference between having an actual choice, and being coerced and pushed into a corner.

Before I dive deeper into illustrating why different sets of people have different reasons for the way they’ve reacted to Jon bending the knee, you need to understand that there are a fraction of us who:

Stan Sansa more than Jon, or was a Sansa stan before a Jon stan, and are understandably upset at Jon giving away the North without first discussing it with Sansa.

Stan Jon more than Sansa, or was a Jon stan first, and are understandably upset at how him giving up the North was framed because yes, it did assassinate some things he stood for.

Those of us who stan either one more, or equally, and understand both stances taken from the two fractions above, i.e. people who understand that other people in the fandom’s feelings are valid.

The first group.

Let me try to best explain to you why the first group of people are upset: because we all were made to believe Jon was different, because he’s supposed to be different. Different from all the other guys in Dany’s arc that have fallen for her, different from Jorah, Daario, Tyrion, different. When people throw out words like “betrayal” and that Sansa should just take over, it’s because of how the narrative was built up and framed to us:

Jon gets proclaimed King in the North(despite not having a birthright, to which none of us were complaining because Sansa’s birthright as Lady of Winterfell was still respected).

Sansa is happy for him, tells him he’s a good ruler, tries to get him to consider her counsel as well because she doesn’t want him to make the same mistakes Robb and Ned did, and then defends his position in front of the Northern Lords who have made it clear they would rather have Sansa leading them at this point - this is where the “Sansa should just be QiTN” discourse comes in but for the most part, it’s wishful thinking and banter.

Sansa warns him of making the same mistakes ROBB did, and then warns him of Cersei and how much her word is worth. What does Jon do? Or rather, how does the show frame Jon giving up his kingdom? By doing so because he’s infatuated with Daenerys(I would argue and hope that this is not the case but the show sure made it seem like it was considering he pledged himself after she agreed to help). Then he blurts out that he’s pledged to Daenerys in the dragonpit scene, in front of Cersei - and the audience is made to believe that Jon and the dragon team believe Cersei’s word on her truce even after that whole fiasco.

Worse yet, people are pissed because he gave up The North without first heeding counsel or even checking in with Sansa. Jon and Sansa went from having strong communication - yes, they argue but they work through it by communicating - to Sansa not hearing anything from Jon for weeks and then suddenly receiving word that he’s bent the knee - where does that put Sansa?

People who stan Sansa of course feel betrayed because he left the North in her hands, only to go to Dragonstone and give it up without so much as an explanation to her. Does that not feel like betrayal? (I know at this point you’re sitting there wondering, well he had to!!! I’ll address that in a moment)

Moreover, it’s not hostility coming from a place of people thinking Sansa should be Queen, it’s hostility coming from people who understand the importance of Winterfell to Sansa - she fought for it as much as Jon did, she made him get back up and fight for it. It’s their home, her home. You would think a decision as large as getting yourself subjugated once more by Targaryen rulers would at least be discussed but Jon, as king, didn’t bother. They fought for it together, a place that Sansa has spent the entirety of her arc post Ned’s execution wishing to go back to, and he gave it away. That’s the betrayal, it’s a betrayal of trust. One second he’s entrusting it in her hands, the next he’s snatching it and “gifting” it to Daenerys as if it were a consolation prize for losing a dragon.

So if Jon wasn’t the guy we thought him to be, i.e. he’s just another guy that will fall to his knees at the sight of Daenerys and fight for her because he’s infatuated by her, then yes, a lot of us would gladly give up our “Jon snow stan” cards. This group of people, upon the prospect of Jon revealing himself to be just like any other character, is of the opinion that Sansa deserves better.

The second group.

Now onto the second group, the majority of us who are upset but haven’t gone full on “Jon can choke”(which tbh is a valid thing to feel considering how he did Sansa dirty due to a lack of communication and how the narrative has been framed). This tackles the “butchering” of Jon’s character, or as we call it “character assassination”. From experience, this comes mainly from people who value Jon and understand him, the people who have supported him since season 1/book 1 or who have come to appreciate his character for what he is along the way. So if they stan Jon, why are they upset too? Because his actions were OOC.

Yes, Jon would do anything to secure safety for the realm, and he did that - but how he went about doing it is what made so many of us displeased with what the show has turned him into. He went from King in the North to Daenerys’ “pet northerner.” It’s the same way some Sansa stans are upset that the show would make her go to Petyr Baelish - the slimy abuser she already denounced - for advice on what to do with Arya, painting her as naive for the majority of the season.

But we don’t hate Jon, we’re upset because of how it went down. Most of us don’t blame Jon because whatever OOC things he did “how about mY qUeEn u deServe it even though u coulda just flown in and avoided more deaths to begin with haha here’s the north” could be explained as him trying his best to ensure he’s secured her aid – because how much is her word worth when she went from “I don’t(regret it). I had to see.” to “My dragon died so that we could be here. If it’s all for nothing, then he died for nothing.”

No, we’re more disgusted with Daenerys. Mind you, not all Jonsas hate Dany, and not all anti-daenerys people ship Jonsa. We’re disgusted, because this far into the series, after years and years of people hailing Daenerys as some heroine saviour - we didn’t get that. No, what we got was her insistence of a truce with Cersei, and her insistence on Jon bending the knee. Why couldn’t she just ally herself with the North, why must she have it all? She allowed the Iron islands their independence, why not the North? What sort of heroine asks for something in return for saving lives?

Jon bending the knee was never necessary as how pro-dany stans try to make it seem, Torrhen Stark bent the knee to save his people from dragonfire, Jon bent the knee because he has to, not because he wants to. Neither of the two would have had to give up their kingdoms if the Targaryen hadn’t insisted on it in the first place. Then they pull up “isn’t their survival worth more than your pride?” as if it wasn’t the most ironic line coming from Daenerys “I’ll fight for you… when you bend the knee,” Targaryen because it was never necessary. Jonerys stans expect us to believe they take them as two equals in a relationship when Jon never met Daenerys as an equal. Since the very beginning, he’s respected her title and referred to her as Your Grace despite herself being a self-proclaimed Queen, and what did she do? Strip him of his boat, weapons, and title. Daenerys is the super power with not one, but three weapons that could easily stop the threat coming for her people as well, and yet she is adamant about making the North - a new independent and developing kingdom by right - give up their independence. Why? Why?

Why am I mentioning Daenerys? Because she plays a central role in coercing Jon into bending the knee. If she proved herself to be worthy of the throne then perhaps no one would be upset but the thing is, she stands for everything Jon doesn’t and yet he willingly gave up his kingdom to her and we’re expected to believe he genuinely thinks she’s fit to rule as opposed to doing to because he had no other choice? That’s not my Jon Snow, that’s not the one I grew to love.

The third group.

The third group clings to the hope that Jon hasn’t completely done a 180 and is instead doing what he has to do to ensure the survival of his people, and acknowledges that it was good of him to bend the knee though we still hate how it happened, and understand the backlash coming from people who support and love Sansa as well. That’s me included.

BY THE WAY:

don’t tell me you won’t cancel Jon the minute your S8 hopes don’t pan out.

ummm ok? We have a right to stan Jon and unstan him just as many of us started out rooting for Dany only to realise she’s not at all who we first thought she was. The Jon Snow I know could care less about who sits on the Iron Throne, because he’s more concerned about the threat to the North. The Jon Snow I know, put duty over love, no matter how hard it was. The Jon Snow I know, didn’t falter, except for when he thought it involved his family i.e. going off for fake!arya which consequently got him stabbed. The Jon Snow I know wouldn’t give up his kingdom, his home, his family’s home, unless he knew it was the only way to secure aid and protect them because Jon Snow loves his family more than anything. So if season 8 happens and it turns out Jon Snow really genuinely only bent the knee because he’s in love with Daenerys and doesn’t mind giving up his kingdom to get subjugated despite knowing full well the history behind his people’s trauma, because he’s just that in love with her, then yes, plenty of us would cancel Jon Snow because that’s not who he is.

I’ll also argue that it’s rich to see people from the Jonerys corner or any corner really, claim Jonsa’s don’t care about Jon’s wants when his wants have always surrounded having a place at Winterfell and being accepted as a Stark. If anything, him gladly giving up the North and its people to a Targaryen is going to drive a further wedge between that, and going off into the sunset to marry Daenerys and sit on the iron throne with their incest baby i.e. taking him away from the North to sit in Kingslanding, a place he’s made clear he doesn’t want to live in, sounds more like disregarding his wants than what we’ve proposed.

Thanks for listening, don’t tell us how to feel.

#jonsa #jon x sansa #political jon theory #anti daenerys

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seatsbythepit · 7 years

Note

thoughts on ornstein's summary thing?

Okay, anon, I gotta admit my head has been whirring on this one, I’ve been thinking about your question the whole time I was at work - and I would like to apologize in advance, because it was 100% more eloquent in my head than in the words I’m about to write.

First and foremost, I have to make two “disclaimers”:

The first being that we should all keep in mind that David Ornstein is, at the end of the day, a reporter with sources at the club. He has often been reliable, tends to post only when he’s fairly certain of his information, and probably takes his info in good faith, however we do have to take any and all information (i.e. how certain deals happened, mood of the players/club etc.) with a pinch of salt, purely because only the people who were actually there would know what was said and done etc. But we can of course draw our own conclusions from the actions of the club, past experience, etc.

The second: I am not particularly a good stats/data person, nor do I have a great capacity for economics, I have basic understandings but I can’t venture too deep - so my thoughts come from a more observational/analytical perspective purely from what I’m seeing/hearing/understanding. So, apologies again to anyone who wants me to delve into the mathematical and statistical minutiae of our club, I don’t feel I could do that justice.

So, let’s proceed under the cut because this is going to be fairly long I imagine.

🔽🔽🔽

To address what I think of what Ornstein has presented us with: It is nothing too surprising or shocking. For some this will warrant an eye-roll, for others it may it reignite anger/frustration at the absurdity of our board, there will be some hurt/disappointment with certain players or certain transfers, or the lack thereof in particular positions - and perhaps even some room for consolation or reasoning. But ultimately: Nothing totally new.

(And I have to stress, we will all view the First Team’s situation, and in part some of the academy’s involvement, in different ways - we will come to some similar and some different views, all of which may be right/wrong to different extents. I can only speak for myself when I discuss this.)

I think the transfer window started out fairly well, we sealed Lacazette and Kolasanic in time for summer tour - two very good players, both high achievers in their former leagues. We had some backroom changes too, to coaching staff and to our legal team - nothing too spectacular there, but a little “fresher” to start the window’s activity.

The disappointment comes where deals/transfers were dragged out, things kept getting changed, and ultimately, we perhaps lost/gained in places where we were looking to do the opposite. There of course will be the January window, but I think accompanied with the context of losing our last two PL games a lot of people do not take kindly to indecision and hesitation - though it is granted the influence of other clubs/players on the other side of business will have contributed in certain areas.

All in all, I don’t think too much else would have happened in the window even if we had got 3 wins in a row, maybe one more signing of some notoriety, but nothing too big. (As the Ornstein Recap alludes to, without Alexis’ sale there was no room to budge in terms of a “big” signing [in all honesty I don’t subscribe to the idea that it has to be big or expensive to make a difference, but we could have done with a midfielder or a defender - as some players seemed to have fallen out of favour], again due to the fact that Stan won’t splash the cash.)

I’ll briefly touch on the talk of Hector Bellerin and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain in Ornstein’s Recap:

Hector wanting to go back to Barcelona seems to be part truth and part self-fulfilling prophecy, and as Hector said before he is committed to Arsenal and I guess we can only really take his word for it. Not to mention I feel that if you commit to such a long contract as he has, you should honour it - you should honour your commitments unless there is an extreme circumstance that requires you to leave. Note: Losing CL football does not qualify as extreme, no matter how unappealing or shit it may seem to some professional footballers and to some fans.

Perhaps the biggest controversy of the window was the departure of Oxlade-Chamberlain. Again, I am only speaking for myself so: I was disappointed, yes. I didn’t like the way it had been dragged out, I didn’t like the fact that he got to play against Liverpool as it seemed so clear his time was over at the club, it just all felt so unnecessary. I am sad that he chose not to commit himself any further to us - we of course had many years of hoping for “his year”, and last year seemed to be the beginnings of having that only for it to be cut off during this window. He had/has his reasons, what else is there to say? Bitterness has turned to resignation and now to indifference, I have other players at my club that require my support and attention.

I think the real crux of our issues does lay outside of transfers, and more in the boardroom - as I’m sure most will agree. The on-pitch performance/player attitude and fan influence are all (partly) side effects/symptoms of the deeper rot that is our (majority) owner and inactive board. (

All current members of our board have become active between 2005 - 2013.

Sir Chips Keswick was first appointed as an Arsenal director in November 2005 and replaced the outgoing Peter Hill-Wood as Chairman of Arsenal Holdings plc in June 2013.

Ivan Gazidis was appointed as Chief Executive Officer of Arsenal Football Club in January 2009.

Arsenal Football Club’s longest-serving director, Ken Friar OBE has been a mainstay of the Club for more than 60 years. (Honestly won’t really include Ken in this, he still serves our club in 23847724 ways and I will fight for him.)

Lord Harris of Peckham was appointed to the Arsenal board in November 2005.

Stan Kroenke became a shareholder in May 2007, was appointed to the Board of Directors in September 2008 and became the majority shareholder of Arsenal Football Club in April 2011.

Josh Kroenke joined the board of Arsenal Football Club in December 2013.

The reason I make note of this is because this coincides fully with the time (10 years) where we were emphatic that we could not/would not be able to compete with our rivals as the Emirates Stadium needed to be paid off, leaving little else for club business. In fact, it required Arsene Wenger reassuring the banks that he would stay for a further 5 years to see that there was a consistency within the club (i.e. making CL every year, which we did.) in order to repay the loans. (It was partly his idea that we move to a bigger stadium in the first place.)

So, for those years I suspect the board didn’t have too much to do, sure there would be fan discontent, and there really was (“Spend some fucking money”, ring a bell?) - we made a few goes at the title and progressed only a little in the CL, no FA Cups, no nothing - but hey, they were in the Bubble of Time, they told us about that time, so we just had to suck it up, right? Fair enough, I suppose. We still did very well to maintain top 4, especially in a time where that money did actually matter a lot.

2013 rolls around, we start to defrost, and fans think “We should really be doing something by now, ffs” But we have to bear in mind two crucial things:

The lucrative nature of the PL, the value, the cash flow, whatever you want to call it - it had grown exponentially in that decade, this meant that “lower clubs” had tv money, advertising and sponsorship that allowed them to be on a more even playing field, the divide between the great, good and mediocre was allowed to shrink.

Stan Kroenke was (and is) the tache with the cash.

I think we know how the rest goes, we got some great players, both known and unknown, big shiny toys and hidden gems, and everything else in between. We won an FA Cup, two…three in fact - but at the very core the slight patch of mold started to grow, the Kroenke effect. We’re held on a tight leash, our system dictates that we can only use what we make in profit to deal with everything, Stan doesn’t want to give us anything, but hey! Apparently, he wants us to do well!

And you can imagine the fan discontent grows and grows, it’s daylight robbery, we pump the club full of cash in the form of shirt sales, tickets, programmes, magazines, merchandising, our tv subscriptions and so forth (because we love it and want to see it thrive.) - and receive very little in return, no desire, no ambition, falsehoods and unfulfilled promises. That is the first boil of anger festering.

The second boil, and the worst casualty, is Arsene Wenger. Arsene loves us, he loves Arsenal Football Club. And because of this he has not only contributed to our stadium, he has declined offer after offer from other clubs, he has taken the full force of any and all criticism/abuse directed at the club and has protected those that sit at a desk (or relax in a different country entirely) above him.

The reason he is a festering boil is because he becomes a way to channel any and all anger, not just the criticisms he receives as manager. The first boil (The Board) can remain subtle, silent and deadly, but the second is pickable, burstable, it is pumped full of bitterness and entitlement, sadness and despair. But Arsene, despite a few words of displeasure, takes it - he allows it to happen because [read the first few sentences above].

So when you take Arsene for what he is, he is brilliant, he is infuriating, he is wise, he is stubborn, he is intelligent and he is heart breaking. Arsene has made mistakes, foolish decisions, perhaps he has been secretive, perhaps he really does need to let loose and expose our board for what we already know and more - but he won’t, at least I think he won’t, because (excuse my strange analogy) I see it like this:

The club is hanging over a cliff edge (within the context of the expectations and demands of a club our size, I know there are 100s who have it worse off than we do.), and Arsene is holding onto us, he won’t let go, because the way he sees it is that if he drops us (if he leaves) we will fall, fall hard and it could be some serious damage to us - this is because of instability the board has given us - BUT in all of this Arsene is getting older, he is under strain, it is getting harder and harder to hold onto us, the magnitude of our plight is no longer manageable the way it was in the late 90s/00s.

He does make mistakes, he does get it wrong, but perhaps it wouldn’t feel so terrible or be so exacerbated if the system above him had the decency to take him away from the pressure, to say “No, this needs to happen”, “It’s okay we will do this”, “We have decided this”, “You need to do this”. For as long as he tries to keep it all together without letting them be held accountable he is going to be hurt and be the cause of hurt, whether that’s fair or not.

Maybe he could let go and nothing too terrible would happen to us and he could go home and rest or turn his work elsewhere, but there’s this sense of responsibility, that deep love, that relentlessness. He doesn’t trust that if he lets go that somebody will come to pick us up and mend us, not under Stan Kroenke, he would not forgive himself if it were to be damaging to his life’s work and life’s love.

So… we’re in a rut, Stan won’t move, Arsene won’t either. And together it creates this friction, this resentment that oozes and pulses in many factions of the support base, we can use social media to micro-analyze and overanalyze, to pick and pick and pick at our wounds with no healing to come with it, only botched plaster jobs and short term solutions, maybe some pain relief in between (trophies/big wins/good team performances/exciting players).

And then the third boil comes from the media who love their clicks for money, the supposed fans who deliberately create more issues with little room for reason or debate, and the pundits (ex-Arsenal players sometimes) who apply logic/expectations/experience from when they were footballers to a vastly different environment of modern football - anything that’s bad is really bad, and anything that’s good can only last for a week. It’s the culture of hyperbole, sensationalism, dramatics, and hypocrisy.

TL;DR: We are burnt out. Something has to give.

In all of this nonsense that has gone completely off topic, we are stuck. Ornstein’s words are only a mirror being held up to remind us that we are still frail as fuck underneath, we are trying hard in some ways and utterly stagnant in others. But it won’t stop me from coming along with my glue and my bandages, it won’t stop me from wishing someone would heal the infection, that someone would remove the rot and start again, and that the most special someone, Arsene Wenger, could move on and not feel like he let us down. He deserves that at least.

#ask #anon #aa #long post #football

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duhragonball · 7 years

Text

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (60/?)

Disclaimer: This story features characters and concepts based on Dragon Ball, which is a trademark of Bird Studio/Shueisha and Toei Animation. This is an unauthorized work, and no profit is being made on this work by me. This story is copyright of me. Download if you like, but please don’t archive it without my permission. Don’t be shy.

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[5 August 238 Before Age. Planet Wist.]

Tobiko's sanctum was a large hut made of peat and muck, submerged beneath a swamp. Long ago, he was part of the Mystic Council, the ruling body of Ancient Wist. When he fell out of favor with his peers, they put a terrible curse upon him, transforming him into an amphibious creature forever bound to the swamps of the planet. They had also made Tobiko virtually immortal, in order to prolong his exile.

Ironically, their punishment had been a blessing in disguise. Cut off as he was from their civilization, Tobiko was a living witness to its decline. Now over five thousand years old, he possessed great wisdom and expertise about his homeworld. He had found ways to teleport himself and others to almost any fen or bog on the planet, and he knew of secrets that had long since been forgotten by others. He was a valuable ally, provided one was willing to see past his fearsome appearance.

M'ranga, otherwise known as Ensign Liberty, was more than willing. Her critics called her a revolutionary and an idealist, but she embraced those labels. She had fought for freedom on dozens of worlds oppressed by tyranny, and she had learned long ago that courage and skill came in all shapes and sizes. Others might have balked at the idea of using his underwater home as a base of operations, but she was honored by his hospitality.

Besides, the place didn't smell nearly as bad as one might have assumed. She had expected an odor like sulfur mixed with rotting fish, but instead there was an aroma reminiscent of an incense shop. It was possible that this was an illusion brought on by Tobiko's magic. He normally spoke in a slurred and gargled voice, but he had a spell to sound more normal whenever he had a lot to say.

Tonight was such an occasion, as he was telling her what he knew of the origin of the Shockmaster, in the hopes that this would provide the key to defeating him and freeing Planet Wist from his control. While she didn't mind the way his voice usually sounded, she was grateful for the clarity the spell provided. The story spanned more than seven thousand years, and she was having a hard enough time following along as it was.

"All right, so the Ur-Ember powered the Golden Age of Wist," she said, "But that ended about seven thousand years ago, when Wist's moon, was destroyed, and the Ur-Ember was lost along with it. But the Mystic Council still had a lot of magic power left over to work with, so even though it was a serious blow, it wasn't enough to collapse the Wist Hegemony right then and there."

"Correct," Tobiko said patiently. He was examining a gemstone M'ranga had obtained for him. He claimed that it possessed an even more detailed historical record than his own long memory. Though now that he had it, he seemed uncertain of how to use it.

"Then, you could call it a Silver Age, where the Mystic Council relied more and more on conventional resources," she said. That's why they gave the Shockmaster his Helm of Power, so he could lead a whole group of super-powered champions to defend the planet. Without the Ur-Ember, that was the best they could manage, but it still worked for a long time."

"Indeed," Tobiko said.

"So what went wrong?" she asked. "They chose him because he was such a noble man, so why did they seal him away? The Shockmaster of today is so brutal and ruthless. I don't see how he could have lost his way so completely."

He chuckled quietly. "The Shockmaster’s greatest flaw was his over-zealousness. In his youth, it was his strength. Those were perilous times, and the world needed a principled, uncompromising standard-bearer to show the way. Someone rather like you, M’ranga."

"We’re nothing alike," she insisted. "I’m fighting for Wist’s freedom. The Shockmaster’s nothing more than a petty tyrant."

"In my experience, today’s liberator often becomes tomorrow’s oppressor," Tobiko said. "Long, long ago, you might have found a kindred spirit in the Shockmaster. But as the years passed, he became disillusioned with the world around him. Wist was changing. Indeed it always had been changing, but in his mind it was changing for the worse. Perhaps he was right, but it didn’t excuse him from his duty..."

*******

[7 January, 7018 Before Age. Wist.]

They had rejected his proposal. He had waited three years for an answer. Three years of dithering and useless protocol, designed to make bureaucrats feel an illusion of importance. And in the end, they told him no. He shouldn’t have been surprised. No one took action in this day and age. It was all about gathering signatures and countersignatures, making sure no one rocked the boat, or upset the status quo.

The Golden Age hadn't been like this. In those days, Wist had been strong, and its leaders hadn't wasted time fretting over every little detail. When something needed to be done, it was done, and with the full confidence of the people.

But the Golden Age had been over for centuries. He was the only one left who even remembered it, and he had been born at its very end. To have never known the beauty and glory of Wist as it should have always been! That was true blindness.

The Shockmaster had found a way to restore that Golden Age. It was there for the taking. He only needed the Mystic Council's approval to proceed. It should have been a mere formality, an obvious decision ratified by a unanimous vote. Instead, it took three years. And they said no.

He wondered if they even knew what it was they had rejected. The Mystic Council wasn't what it once was, after all. He respected that great body, but the sorcerers who served today were but a pale imitation of the great leaders from fifty years ago.

He had found the Ur-Ember. There was a way to bring it back! And with it, all of the splendor of Wist's Golden Age would follow! The last four-and-a-half centuries of decay would be wiped away, like a bad dream forgotten in the light of a new dawn. But for this generation of Wistians, the bad dream was all they knew. They feared losing the meager prosperity they had, simply because they couldn't understand what lay ahead.

"Penny for your thoughts, Shockmaster," asked the Groundshaker. Like himself, she was a warrior specially empowered by the Mystic Council, though she had only entered the service eighty years ago. She was formidable and skillful, but terribly naive. And like so many of Wist's youth, she lacked the proper respect.

"THE WORLD DOESN'T MAKE SENSE ANYMORE, GROUNDSHAKER," he replied. He saw no need to share details about his disagreement with the Council's ruling. It would be unseemly, and besides, she wouldn't understand his position.

"I know what you mean," she said. She wore a pair of massive gauntlets and a mask that covered most of her head except for her eyes. Though her function was similar to his own, she had different abilities, which mostly involved power over the earth. They and their other colleagues patrolled Planet Wist on a regular basis, and the two of them had worked together for decades. She likely considered him to be a friend.

The feeling was not mutual.

As they flew across the western continent, she shook her head sadly. "It's not like it used to be, is it?" she said. "This whole area used to be factories. Back when Wist used to make things, you know? Now it's all being converted to farmland."

The idea of Wist growing crops from the ground was appalling, to be sure. But what disgusted the Shockmaster was that she actually missed the factories, as if they weren't just as bad. He remembered a time when Wist didn't need to export manufactured goods of any kind. Everything was produced through sorcery, but with less and less magical power to work with, the Mystic Council had to focus on matters of defense and infrastructure. Using magic to produce food and goods was a luxury in this benighted era.

"And children these days are so entitled," she went on. "They don't know what it means to work for a living."

She was right, but he couldn't help but be reminded that she had been approved by the Council for empowerment with less than a quarter of the training he had received. The standards for excellence were already low a century ago. That they had gotten bad enough for her to notice was especially dismal.

"And they wear such salacious clothing!" she whined. "The loud colors on their kilts are just atrocious. And if they wore them any shorter, they may as well be belts!"

He stifled a groan. The Groundshaker's kilt barely covered her calves, but that hardly mattered to him, since he found the very notion of kilts revolting, regardless of their hemline. Pantaloons had been proper Wistian attire for tens of thousands of years. Kilts and dresses were a sign of foreign ideas contaminating the culture like a blight. If the Groundshaker and her generation didn't like the way things were going, they only had their own poor example to blame.

He continued to brood as they went about their patrol, until suddenly a giant image of a man's head appeared before them both. They immediately recognized him as the intelligence chief of the Mystic Council. Privately, the Shockmaster resented the office, as it was an overt admission that the Council no longer had the raw magical talent to divine information through sorcery. However, the conventional method used by the chief were sound, not even the Shockmaster could dispute the chief's effectiveness in exposing threats to the Hegemony.

"Shockmaster! Groundshaker!" he called to them. "Are you receiving this psychic transmission?"

"WE ARE," he replied. "HOW MAY WE SERVE THE COUNCIL, MY LORD?"

"A new lead on the Kashvar attacks," he said breathlessly. "We've found their secret base!"

*******

The Kashvar’s latest weapon of mass destruction was a monster called Vorshiki, which resembled a hideous flying lizard of enormous size. It could teleport across interstellar space, an ability the Kashvar used to launch attacks on various planets in the Wistian sphere of influence.

Naturally the Mystic Council launched an investigation to track down the Kashvar, but they were shocked to discover that the enemy had been had been controlling Vorshiki from a secret base on Planet Wist itself. When the Shockmaster and Groundshaker exposed their lair, they summoned Vorshiki to protect themselves.

The battle had been ferocious, but the Shockmaster had won the day. The Vorshiki was utterly destroyed, and the Groundshaker had captured the Kashvar before they could make any more trouble.

Now, as work crews arrived to begin repairing the damage to the city, the Shockmaster stood alone, and looked pensively at the crater in the road where Vorshiki had met its end. Nearby, the Groundshaker was giving an official report to a representative from the Mystic Council.

This never should have been allowed to happen, the Shockmaster thought to himself. The Kashvar were a fanatical race of black magicians who believed the universe was theirs alone, and that all other species were to be eradicated. They had menaced the galaxy since time immemorial, but they had never dared a direct attack on the Wist Hegemony or its interests. Until now.

Now, the Kashvar were bold enough to wage their genocidal war from the Wistian homeworld, right under the noses of its citizens! And when discovered, did they cower in fear and beg for their lives? No, they went on the offensive, bringing their monster here to fight. It was the first such battle fought on Wistian soil in over a hundred centuries!

And the Shockmaster had won, yes. The people were grateful as always. But the battle should have never been fought!

How he longed for the days of old, when Wist was unchallenged in the universe! He dreamed of restoring it to that stature, though with each passing day he wondered more and more if it was too late. Perhaps the decay was irreversible. Other enemies would brazenly attack Wist, and her people would simply be grateful for men like the Shockmaster who protected them. And in return for that protection, they would perpetuate Wist’s decline, until there was nothing left of value.

"Oi, Shocky-baby. Grand bit of work out there, brah. Anytime you’re in the borough an' you want to have a brew, just give me a shout, hey?"

He turned and saw a man smiling at him, offering his hand in friendship. He was wearing a lime green kilt with a slit that exposed his left thigh, and his upper body was wrapped in what looked like a series of interconnected belts. The Shockmaster was familiar with the fashion, but too revolted to learn its name. As the man grinned and looked up at him, the piercings on his lips and eyebrows glinted in the sunlight. His hair had somehow been artificially colored, arranged to form three peg-like columns that were lined up in a row that ran from his forehead to the back of his neck.

Perhaps it was the recent battle, or centuries of pent up frustration, or the Mystic Council’s refusal to grant his request, or the way this man spoke to him like an equal.

Whatever it was, in that moment, the Shockmaster didn’t see the man as a fellow Wistian, or as an innocent person, or a grateful admirer. In that moment, the Shockmaster could only see an enemy of everything he held dear. A threat to the continued safety and prosperity of Wist. A monster just as insidious and destructive as the one he had just slain.

In that moment, the Shockmaster unleashed a torrent of lightning upon the man.

It was only a brief indiscretion. He came to his senses almost immediately and ceased his attack, but the damage was already done. The man collapsed to the ground and started convulsing, and passers-by noticed the incident right away. The Groundshaker turned when she heard the crackle of lightning, and gasped with horror.

The woman from the Council sprang into action at once, rushing to the fallen civilian’s side and weaving spells to ease his pain and heal his injuries, but there was only so much she could do on the spot. There were burns that would require more extensive treatment, and the Shockmaster could only speculate on what internal injuries he had inflicted.

"What happened?!" the Groundshaker shouted. The answer to that was obvious. What she really wanted to know was why. No, what she really wanted was for him to reveal a perfectly logical reason for what he had done, to say that this man was a powerful enemy disguised as a helpless, unarmed civilian.

But he couldn’t tell her this, and so he simply stared down at his victim, and awaited the consequences.

*******

[5 August, 238 Before Age. Planet Wist.]

"They tried him, of course. Not that they had the power to compel him to stand trial. By that time the Mystic Council was far weaker than in the era that birthed the Shockmaster. If not for his respect for jurisprudence, no force on the planet would have been enough to stop him. And he did save them all from the Kashvar, so there was that."

"How can you say that he and I have anything in common, Tobiko?” M’ranga asked. “He was sworn to defend his people, and then he assaulted one of his own countrymen? Without the slightest provokation? He was as brutal then as he is now, only this time he doesn’t have the Mystic Council to answer to. Not that they had much control over him in the first place..."

"I say you are alike because of your idealism," Tobiko explained. "This isn’t your home world, yet you fight for its people as if it were, because you consider it to be the right thing to do. The fact that many Wistians object to your intervention is unimportant to you.

"The Shockmaster was driven by similar ideals of right and wrong, and eventually his ideology overshadowed his reality. In the end he was more focused on the Ideal Wist of his imagination than the one he was supposed to be protecting. I cannot tell you why he attacked that man, but I’m certain his discontent with the world had something to do with it. In the end, Wist had changed, and he had remained the same, until he could no longer recognize his own people."

"And you think that could happen to me someday, is that it? I either die a hero or live long enough to become a villain? I refuse to believe those are our only choices."

"Nor do I," Tobiko said. "I merely submit that the Shockmaster’s fall from grace can serve as a cautionary tale against rigid adherence to a cause. The Shockmaster craved a new Golden Age, but gold is soft, flexible, and ductile. Now that he has power, we see a reign of antimony, brittle and dubious."

"Is that what happened to you?" M'ranga asked.

"My banishment provided me with a change of perspective," Tobiko said. "Like the Shockmaster, I feared that Wist was losing its way, sacrificing long-term political stability for temporary security. I was born some twelve centuries after the Shockmaster's sentencing, and in those days Wist was relying more and more upon private mercenaries to bolster its military. I spoke out against this, calling for Wist to end its policies of military adventurism, and this offended enough special interests to seal my fate.

"Their punishment was cruel, but it allowed me to see the bigger picture. Over time, the sorcerers ceded more and more power to the Wistian generals, who relied more and more upon the foreign fighters, until eventually a powerful faction of mercenaries were ruling the planet through Wistian proxies. Eventually, they dispensed with the proxies, and the Lords of Goldwall claimed sovereignty outright. But to see it all happen so gradually, I realized that it wasn't the disaster I had feared during my political career. One day the last traces of Wist were gone, but life went on. And my agenda was fulfilled. The military adventurism did stop, after all. Not because anyone listened to me, or because it was the right thing to do, but because Wist and its military had ceased to exist. I could do very little to alter the course of events, and in time, I learned that it might be better that way."

"Then why did you help us when the Shockmaster first returned?" M'ranga asked. "You could have stayed in your swamp and waited for things to play out like always."

He rose from his seat and glanced down at the gem in his hand. "Like me, the Shockmaster is a living relic of a bygone, a man out of time. Unlike me, he does not recognize this. The Mystic Council preserved him like a fly in amber, sealing him away in suspended animation. They feared he might turn against him someday, but what they feared even more was that they might need him even more in the future. The idea was that there would come a time when the Mystic Council could summon him once more in their hour of need, but that time never came. Now he stands unleashed in a world that has forgotten his values, and he remains as embittered and uncompromising as the day he was sentenced. I feared that he was too anomalous, that he would cause far more suffering than I was willing to ignore. At first, I was unsure how to proceed, but then I found you and Scotch Woodcock bravely opposing his takeover. It reminded me of myself when I was younger, back when I was willing to take a stand even if I didn't have all the answers."

He held up the gemstone and showed it to her. "That is why I asked you to retrieve this Crystal Chronicle for me, Ensign. The Shockmaster lacks historical context, and while I can fill in some of the gaps, we need more information before we can act. Unfortunately, my cursory examination of the Chronicle reveals that it would reject my attempts to use it directly."

"Because of your curse," M'ranga said. "There has to be another way."

"I believe there is," Tobiko said, "but it will not be easy..."

*******

[9 July, 7018 Before Age. Planet Wist.]

It was appropriate that he be sentenced here, in the Great Hall of the Mystic Council. This was where his father had saved the gutless cowards from Beerus the Destroyer. This was where they had begged him to don the Helm of Power and rescue their decrepit empire from their own ineptitude. This was where he had stood to receive orders every day for the last four hundred seventy-three years. Orders to ignore the decay of society while he propped up their failing regime. This was where they had denied his simple request to put things right again.

"I pray, noble Shockmaster, that this will not mark the end of your service," the Council Elder said solemnly.

"MY DUTY IS EVER TO WIST," the Shockmaster declared. To himself he added: the true Wist, not the pathetic joke you have allowed it to become.

"Know that should our successors ever have need of a great champion, they shall summon you to aid them, as you have aided us for so long."

"I SHALL AWAIT THEIR CALL," he replied. It was only a matter of time, after all. They were fools, and their descendants could not help but become even more foolish. Without men of conscience like himself and his father to help them, they would be lost and helpless. At least this way he would awaken to a world that actually wanted his help.

The Elder nodded and joined hands with two of his colleagues. They performed a series of ritualistic chants, and he felt himself fading, as if into a deep sleep.

His last conscious thought was that when he next awakened, he would let nothing stand in his way.

*******

[7 August, 238 Before Age. Planet Wist.]

"You’re certain you wish to do this?" Tobiko asked. He had spent the past forty hours devising a workaround that would allow his magic to decrypt the Crystal Chronicle without directly accessing it himself. She had no intention of backing out now, although she supposed she could understand why he was asking.

"It’s the only way," Ensign Liberty said. "Your curse prevents you from using the Chronicle, so it’s down to either me or Scotch, and it might reject Scotch because he’s an alien."

"Yes, but you’re an alien too, Ensign," Tobiko reminded her. "I can’t be sure of the risks..."

"Risk is my business," she insisted. "If there’s a chance of discovering the Shockmaster’s plans in that gem, something that can help us defeat him and liberate your people, then I’m willing to try."

"Very well," Tobiko said. Sitting in a lotus position, he began to wave his webbed hands, making a series of esoteric gestures until he Chronicle floated from its pedestal and hung in mid-air, directly in front of his face. "I shall need but a moment more to align the mystic fields. Please stand and focus your attention on the crystal."

She did as he asked. For a few seconds, nothing happened, and she wondered if something had gone wrong. Finally, he spoke again.

"Good, now hold out your arms," he said. "No, lower. A little lower..."

She brought her outstretched arms down until her hands were roughly level with her abdomen, but he said nothing further. She wasn’t sure what to do with her hands. After another delay, she finally asked: "Is this righ--?"

And then suddenly the crystal glowed bright green, and her mind was flooded with so many images and sounds that it felt as if she had been struck by a physical force. For a moment, M’ranga worried that the unexpected blow might have caused her to flinch, disrupting the pose Tobiko had requested. Then she realized that she was no longer aware of her own body.

It seemed that she now existed as a being of pure consciousness, surrounded by pure information. Tobiko had spoken of "accessing" the Chronicle’s records, but this was nothing like what she had expected. It was as though her mind had somehow entered the gem’s very memory... or it had entered hers... or perhaps it no longer made a difference.

She found that if she concentrated, she could filter the deluge of information and focus on key points of interest. Slowly, the swirl of images and words began to make more sense. This was the Crystal Chronicle, an artifact used to record the history of Wistian Civilization. It contained thousands of years worth of knowledge and wisdom, covering topics from all walks of life: governance, agriculture, technology, magic, science, engineering, philosophy, bureaucratic data, art, and many more. The answers to her questions seemed to spring into her mind almost as quickly as she could ask them.

As she struggled to express the purpose of her visit, she found that the exchange of information went both ways.

Are there records on the Shockmaster?

[Yes, over one hundred thousand individual files. Who are you?]

My name is M’ranga. I’m a revolutionary trying to free your planet’s people. I need to know what the Shockmaster wants from Planet Extraliga.

[You are not of Wist. What is your world of origin?]

I’m from the Planet Basteel in the Gallis Sector. Please, I need to know--

[Is your attire typical of your culture?]

I designed it in honor of the spirit of the Great Revolutionaries of my homeworld. It’s made from a special material that repels--

[Are the colors symbolic?]

Yes. The red represents the noble blood of patriots who died in the name of--

[Why aren’t you wearing pants?]

It’s the style of costumed freedom fighters of my world’s history. Why does it matter what I wear? Tobiko only wears breeches made of seaweed.

[Tobiko was banished from the council of Elders in Year 29,874 of the Wistian Reform Calendar. He was cursed to live in exile as a swamp creature for not less than--]

And on it went. The Chronicle asked questions faster than she could answer them, and the answers it gave her in return seemed to distract her from the matter at hand. Curious about the nature of Tobiko’s curse, she found herself learning about the Wistian legal precedent behind it. Then she became engrossed in the sorcery that had transformed him into a swamp creature, and how it might be possible to reverse the effect. As she researched this, the Chronicle interrogated her on the cultural and historical background of her tricorne hat, and the physical properties of the special material of her costume.

And then, in the middle of researching political theory of Wist’s Third Dynasty, while informing the Chronicle of her planet’s attitudes on gender as a social construct, she remembered why she was here in the first place. With great effort, she struggled to separate herself from the Crystal’s immense flow of information, and she forced herself to formulate a specific query:

What did the Shockmaster want on Extraliga?

It wasn’t that simple, of course. She had to ask a dozen follow-up questions to narrow things down, and each time she had to resist the urge to respond to the Crystal’s questions about her own knowledge.

And then, as she felt she couldn’t go on any longer, and it seemed that her very sense of self would be absorbed into the Chronicle’s endless stream of information, she suddenly found herself back in Tobiko’s inner sanctum, standing before him with her arms held out at a particular angle.

Disoriented, she took a step forward and grasped at her forehead with one hand.

"How... how long...?"

"A few seconds," Tobiko replied. "I sensed your consciousness becoming overwhelmed, and terminated the spell."

"Seconds?!" she exclaimed. "It felt like... like...!"

With a wave of his hand the crystal returned to its pedestal and he rose to his feet. "I apologize," he said as he gently took hold of her shoulders to steady her. "Though it seems you were able to link with the Chronicle, you had no way to navigate its archives."

He led her to a cushion of moss, where she sat down and tried to collect her thoughts. The sensation of her body against the cushion, of Tobiko’s hands on her, even her own hand on her face was strange. Gradually, it became more and more reassuring. She was alive, corporeal, individual.

"Don’t apologize, Tobiko," she said after several minutes. "It didn’t go quite the way we planned, but it worked. The Chronicle told me about Extraliga. It showed me what the Shockmaster wanted from that world."

"What is that?" Tobiko asked.

"I’m not completely sure," she said. "I’ll need your help to sort out what I learned, but I know this much: If someone don’t stop him, a lot of innocent people are going to die."

NEXT: The Triumph of Wist.

#dragon ball #fanfiction #lssjluffafic #tobiko #m'ranga: ensign liberty #the shockmaster #wist #groundshaker #think that's it #all right that's the origin of the shockmaster i'm going to bed folks

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mlmshadowhuntersource-blog · 7 years

Note

i've never written sexual alec/lydia, period and anyone who is perpetuating that has not read the fic in question. i am a queer woman but not mlm, so i can't speak faithfully to whether any of my fics have come across as fetishistic, but if they have i would welcome the feedback on how to grow and improve

Hi! I (mod Ira) have taken the liberty of providing some pointers to your writing. First, and most importantly, I’d like to discuss non-platonic Alec/Lydia in fic. Something much of fandom seems unable to understand is that Lydia and Alec’s relationship is inherently toxic. In the beginning of season one, we see Alec as a terrified closeted gay man, willing to commit suicide before being outed to anyone. Lydia knows he has feelings for Magnus before they get married, and goes through with it anyway. She was in a position of power over him, because she never expected him to back out of the marriage, and so takes advantage of him. After the wedding kiss, Alec says that Lydia letting him go saved his life.

Many non-mlm have trouble understanding that writing non-platonic Alec/Lydia is inherently homophobic. Lydia was more than Alec’s temporary beard. Lydia was a manipulative person who took advantage of Alec’s trauma to gain an Institute. Creating au’s in which they are planning to marry is trivializing the trauma and internalized homophobia from Alec’s experiences of living in such a deeply homophobic society. Mlm can write this in order to relate it to their own experiences, and some even find it helpful to work through their own related trauma. People who are not mlm shouldn’t use it as a plot device to further Alec and Magnus’s relationship.

I’d also like to discuss a common trope in malec fics. The infantilization of Alec Lightwood in order to make him more desirable for sex is fetishistic. This is seen in your fics No Sweeter Innocence and blow me (one last kiss). Sexual inexperience is different from being bashful, blushing and embarrassed, especially when the Alec we see on screen is nothing like that. Alec in canon would resent being coddled and being seen as an innocent baby who doesn’t understand what he wants enough to articulate asking to be taken to bed, why do you write him that way?

Another issue we see is Magnus as the Ever Giving Partner while Alec sits around sucking him dry of affection. The balance between their affection is concerning. Why is Magnus the one constantly smothering Alec in love and pet-names while Alec is allowed to eat it up and never give back? Furthermore, there is again not much evidence in canon to support this. Alec is the one seen giving Magnus gifts, initiating intimacy, confessing his feelings first, and seeking Magnus out for company. Rarely is it the other way around. Why do you see Magnus as the one who lives and breathes affection and waxes poetic about Alec, and why do you see Alec as the one who has most of the orgasms and let’s Magnus coddle him?

On a more personal note, we never said your fics were garbage. Many of your fics are very sweet, I enjoyed your Found Family ‘Verse quite a lot! And yes, we’re giving you feedback to improve your writing, like you asked, even though mlm don’t exist to keep non-mlm from being fetishistic. The amount of entitlement to ask for an explanation and then vague us on your blog before actually receiving a response is astounding. I hope this was helpful!!!

Hey, it’s Tyler here. If you’re still reading I have commentary, too. First off, I am going to say that I am at fault - I should have read your works before taking the word of someone else (who was a mlm so I did trust his word, and still do). It is totally on me for not fact checking and I will remember to fact check before I state things as fact. However, he was not wrong to say your works were fetishistic nor was he wrong in suggesting we not rec your fics. (There was fetishization in your fics and while there was not sexual Alec/Lydia, there was romantic Alec/Lydia).

Onto your fic: First Comes Love. As Ira mentioned earlier, Alec is infantilized a lot. But most notably is how you write him as if he’s unable to make decisions or do anything for himself when that isn’t the Alec we see on screen. You make Lydia the decision maker (which she is, canonically, but so is Alec) and you make Magnus… well, I wouldn’t call it predatory but it’s really uncomfortable how he flirts with Alec, notices Alec’s uncomfortable, stops briefly, and then starts flirting again. Yes, Magnus is flirty but I don’t believe he would flirt with anyone when he knows they’re uncomfortable. (I mean, canonically Magnus told Alec he would back off if he [Alec] could say he was in love/loved Lydia and canonically Magnus did tell Maryse he would leave if Alec told him to).

I know Ira didn’t read “First Comes Love” but the whole dynamic between Alec and Magnus was… well, I wouldn’t say it is predatory because I’m not a 100% sure it is but it is uncomfortable. I think what makes it uncomfortable is how Alec has been infantilized to a point where it is completely out of character for him.

However, I’m not here to tell you how to better that fic because I actually discourage it. I read your disclaimer but ignoring canon, the relationship you have written is extremely unhealthy. It is very one-sided, Lydia seems to be the voice in the relationship and the one who ‘runs’ the relationship to the point Alec doesn’t really have an opinion on anything.

Anyway, I want to talk about your disclaimer.

Updated A/N: Just to clarify, I tagged this fic as ‘alec/lydia’ and added an extra warning tag because I know some people don’t want to read alec/women regardless of context and I want to respect that.

Ask yourself why do people not want to read Alec/women regardless of context? It’s not just a matter of it being uncomfortable. Yes, it is uncomfortable but it is also extremely disrespectful. It is disrespectful because it is taking an experience that a lot of gay men relate to and may have been through and turned it into a plot device. Our lives, our experiences, are not meant to be used as plot devices in fanfiction and they are not meant to be used by non-mlm.

And furthermore, if you wanted to respect us not wanting to read Alec/women (or, for some, not even wanting to see Alec/women) you would not write it. Period. Full stop.

As a gay man, when I watched that episode I can’t even describe the amount of pain and discomfort I experienced because I thought Alec was going to marry Lydia. Just imagine the pain and discomfort I experienced as an outsider, as someone just watching a tv show, now amplify that by a 1000 and you probably have the exact feeling that Alec felt, that every mlm who was forced into a straight marriage/relationship.

However, two things about this story, 1) Alec is gay, 2) the only pairing presented romantically is Alec/Magnus. Not offended if it’s still not your cup of tea, but just want to make that clear if people are trying to judge from tags alone.

It isn’t, though. Alec/Lydia is presented as a romantic pairing. In the fic, they are engaged- that is an inherently romantic relationship. You cannot write a relationship where two characters are engaged or even married and then turn around and say, “oh but it’s not romantic” because those are romantic relationships.

That’s all I have to say on that and if you’re still around I also read “Blow Me (One Last Kiss).” But I have to agree with Ira on literally everything that he said. Also one thing they didn’t address is… please if you’re going to write smut, please say ‘dick’ or ‘penis’ - not length.

Also not to critique a smut scene because that was the last thing I thought I’d be doing at 6 o’clock on a Monday morning but I feel like it would be physically impossible for Alec to do what you’re saying he is doing. Unless Alec just doesn’t have a gag reflex.

On a personal note. I would like to say something about the vaguing which I didn’t really appreciate when I saw your blog. You messaged us, probably seeking an apology, and feedback. Which we were both very happy to give but after we saw your blog we were kind of… thrown. I can’t speak for Ira but for me, personally, I found it childish. Why message us then vague us or vague us then message us? I get vaguing, I vague people all the time, but I don’t turn around and message them - or vice versa.

I’m gonna be frank, had you not messaged us we never would have seen your vague and you know what that’s perfectly fine. You can talk shit about us and spread lies and over-exaggerate what I said (not Ira, because they weren’t a mod at the time) and I frankly don’t give a fuck. I would rather someone not message me giving off the air of politeness and civility and then turn around and talk shit. That’s fake as hell.

But onto your vague posts which I have some problems with because some of the things really rubbed me the wrong way. Specifically the amount of entitlement.

“apparently a sh mlm blog rec’d one of my fics but then removed it and like made a recant post basically saying someone had told them i write fetishistic fic and ‘sexual alec/lydia’ so they would never post any of my fic again.”

Specifically the “so they would never post any of my fic again” part rubbed me the wrong way. You are not entitled to our spaces and we do not owe it to you to promote your fic, especially if we don’t feel the material you are writing is something that should be promoted. We are not here to promote the fics of people who fetishize mlm or portray Alec/Lydia. Actually, our blog’s purpose is to raise up the voices of mlm and we aren’t obligated to promote anyone who isn’t mlm. But the fact that you felt entitled to our spaces is just beyond infuriating.

i dunno how many followers they have but they posted my ao3 tag and everything

As of this posting we have 108. And I didn’t “post [your] ao3 tag and everything.” I stated your ao3 username, yes, but I hardly call that “everything.” I posted what I did because I choose to try and take responsibility for my actions - as I am doing right now.

(and like, tbf i would try to be open to whatever criticism this person has on the first point because i’m not mlm obvs so i’m sure i’m not perfect by any stretch, but the second point could only be made by someone who’s literally never read my fic so..)

On this part… if someone asks us for feedback, I will give it to them. However, it is not our job to go out of our way to educate every single fetishistic or homophobic fic writer. Your job, as a writer and as someone portraying mlm when you are not a mlm, is to go out and do the research and educate yourself and make sure you’re not portraying us in a negative/fetishistic light. Not to sit back and publish your work until someone comes along and tells you, “hey this is fetishistic” or “this is homophobic.” Your job, as a writer, is to make sure that doesn’t happen.

And our job, as mlm, is to make sure we aren’t promoting fics that are homophobic and/or fetishistic. (And yes, you can be homophobic despite being a queer woman and stating that you’re a queer woman is not a get out of jail free card).

if you don’t want to read my fics that’s awesome but since you haven’t actually read them can you maybe not tell everyone else they’re garbage? thanks

Neither of us has said your fics are garbage so again with the twisting of our words and over-exaggeration. All I said was that someone brought it to my attention that you write fetishistic portrayals of mlm (which you do) and sexual Alec/Lydia (which you don’t, but you do write romantic Alec/Lydia) and that I would not rec your fics on a blog by mlm for mlm. And that is fully within my rights. We do not have to cater to you or any non-mlm.

I said anyone could follow as long as they are respectful of the fact that this is a safe space for mlm because I feel non-mlm should be able to hear our thoughts on how mlm are portrayed and see proper portrayals of mlm.

But I will not tolerate people feeling entitled to our spaces because the only people entitled to this space is mlm.

#ithilien-writes #mod tyler #mod ira #commentary #long post #fetishization #infantilization #homophobia

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sttngfashion · 7 years

Text

True Q - 6.06

Oh, Q, you rake, you scalawag. You’re so mischievous that you’ve snuck into one of these mostly-unis episodes like the scoundrel you are. Also I believe this episode title, much like Return of the King, contains a spoiler within the title. But we’ll get there.

“Don’t even try to out cheekbone me, girl. I’ll eat you for lunch.” —Bev

This blondie is Amanda Rogers (and boy does she look like an Amanda Rogers), and she’s an... intern? She’s 18 years old and is eventually supposed to go to Starfleet Academy but has somehow beat out a bunch of other youngsters for the opportunity to work on the Enterprise before she goes to study. She’s perky and a know-it-all and wears colors that must have been picked out by a girl who grew up idolizing Glinda the Good Witch. She’s rocking that square neck that we’ve seen before, but it’s doing a weird thing with that waffle undershirt she’s wearing, and I’m not convinced any of these colors works with her skin tone.

RIKER, SHE IS EIGHTEEN YEARS OLD. Get out of her personal space.

Riker is showing her her quarters which, to be fair are pretty lush for someone who should be preparing for the horrors of dorm life. On the other hand this room is definitely not meant for youngsters.

Yes that is a tall skinny bottle of curaçao with matching glasses on the coffee table.

Anyway, after Riker is all up in her personal space, he leaves Amanda alone and suddenly... puppies appear. No, really.

Is it just me or is she wearing Jellies?

Who cares, PUPPOES! They are so floppy and foldy and adorbz central. (Side note: that desk chair is def from Staples.)

Behave? More like BeeHIVE, amirite?

I don’t really understand what is happening here as for most of the rest of the show her hair looks normal. Maybe her hair just got excited by the PUPPOOES!

So after these puppies mysteriously appear, she tells them to disappear, and they do, though kind of reluctantly. And that’s the end of the Teaser. That’s right: after the last puppy disappears, we get the DRAMATIC MUSIC because DISAPPEARING PUPPIES. I may have guffawed.

Okay, plotdump: later on, Amanda saves Riker from getting bonked on the head by a falling barrel or something, and then after that, stops a warp core breach with her hands. WHAAAAAT? Also, this is hand motion she makes when she saves Rikes.

Oooh, I love shadow animals! What is it... an elephant?

Anyway, because this GIRL has magically SAVED THE WHOLE GODDAMN SHIP there needs to be a MEETING.

“Her hooters were like, this big.” —Geordi

Sorry, sorry, I’m being base. Have Deanna’s eyebrows always looked like they were made out of smoke?

Obviously though, this meeting is dumb because we know who’s behind this.

Who decided to design the conference room chairs with an omnipotent douchebag recline setting?

I mean, you gotta give John de Lancie his due: no one can do all-powerful schmuck quite like he can. But he’s only wearing his “I’m crushing so hard on you, Picard” command red uni, so blah.

How’s the rest of the senior staff feel about Q’s arrival?

From left to right: not having it, pissed, I can’t believe this, are you kidding me, and uuugggghhhhhhhh

Everyone is earning their episode rate in this shot, but Beverly and Geordi are owning it.

So it turns out that this girl is Q, but Q has been sent to find out if she is TRUE Q. I think if she’d turned out not to be, the episode would be called True Q? or Untrue Q or FALSE Q. But you know now how it’s going to end.

Still, we have to go through the motions.

Okay, Q, now you’re really in her personal space.

I suppose there might be some perfect metaphor of discussing Q-privilege but frankly I don’t think I’m smart enough to do it.

OH NO NOT THE DECORATIVE PLATE AND BOWL!

Also it’s amazing the extent to which this is clearly a stunt double. Also also: no more decorative spotlight on the artifacts. The computer was able to sense what was coming, I guess.

I can’t remember exactly what happens here but Gates just looks so awesome and sassy that I had to put it in.

Sorry guys, it’s a low-fashion episode. Oh, but hey, here’s a fashion!

Ghost Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamsweater.

It’s hard to make out exactly what’s happening here, but as best I can see, from left to right again: block gray, block plum, block grape, block grilled peach, block mocha, AMAZING SWEATER OF ALL YOUR MOST BEAUTIFUL COLORFUL DREAAAAAMMMZ.

These are Amanda’s parents, who it turns out were Q also? I can’t remember what the release of information is like in this episode but basically the Q Continuum MURDERED Amanda’s parents because they wanted to live in Nebraska or something. Which, like, that’s not nice, but also... Nebraska? They were killed by a freak tornado which was engineered by the Q but also IT COULD HAPPEN.

In other news, I have four nostrils and this one dope chain.

Also, this individual has Bea Arthur’s hair. I am 100% not mad at it.

Oh man, I’m really murdering the plot of this ep... these people need help of some sort and Amanda and Q are NOT HELPING. There’s a whole thing where Q wants to take Amanda on Q lessons and so they speed up some experiment that Bev has Amanda doing, but that ruins the experiment or something? I wanted to be like “listen, Q, either you’re doing omnipotence wrong or the writers are” but I love this show so I kept quiet.

What’s Q lessons mean, btw?

WE’RE STANDING ON THE BACK OF THE SHIIIIIIIP

So this is one of those shots that I have basically remembered pretty much exactly since childhood because WHAAAAAAAAT. Looking at it now I’m skeptical as to whether they’ve gotten the scale right, but I guess they’re Q so they can be big as they wanna be or whatever.

Speaking of other things they want.

Welcome to my weird Pride and Prejudice fantasy, complete with gazebo

I mean, everyone is entitled to their own fantasy, but you are wearing lacy pink things and the strangest tartan belt ever seen, and your hair seems to be fashioned after those vines growing up alongside that latticework. Who’s your Mr. Darcy?

WORLDS COLLIDING

Where to start? The velour jacket is great, but the fancy lapelwork there is something I’d more expect to see alongside the jacuzzi that Lwaxana Troi and Worf’s son Alexander were hanging out in. Really the only thing that’s okay about this scene is how uncomfortable Rikes looks in it.

Of course, since the first scene with Riker and Amanda we’ve all been feeling that if anyone is feeling some kind of way about anybody, it’s Riker for Amanda (ew). Still, though, he does the this is not appropriate routine, until she realizes the full potential of her Q-ness and makes him fall madly in love with her.

Disclaimer: I am a gay man. But what is happening to her breasts.

I mean, that just cannot be comfortable. Also, bless Frakes for being like “well, I guess the script calls for me to get all up on this 18 year old.” Anyway, she knows that it’s not real so is not into it. Unanswered question from the episode: DOES RIKER REMEMBER ANY OF THIS?

Okay, so basically it comes down to: does Amanda stay and finish her internship or does she go with Q to join the Continuum and basically become a god? Let’s take a look at Amanda one week after her internship starts:

This job has destroyed me

So first of all, why she gotta always wear unitards with weird textured minidress operations on top? Second of all, though, at least this color is not quite so bubble-gum flavored. This is a lima bean and overdone spinach combination here, which, okay, not super appetizing, but at least she doesn’t look like she just jumped off the Candyland gameboard. Also, those tendrils of hair! That’s how you know she is not playing around anymore.

This planet is burnt

Listen, you guys, some other stuff happens, but I had several glasses of wine while watching FEUD so I’m just gonna wrap it up with this little side-by-side: this is the planet 4-nostrils Bea Arthur was from and that the Enterprise was trying to help, and Q is basically like “Amanda, if you can stop using your Q powers then you don’t have to come be part of the Continuum, oh but here’s a planet with a whole lot of people that are about to die, SHRUG.”

I mean, of course she saves it. The show didn’t have enough budget for an intern character.

UGH FINE I GUESS I’LL GO BE A GOD.

Still, she gotta say goodbye.

“Good luck girl, but don’t ever come for me the way Q comes for Jean-Luc. Because I will own you so hard.” —Bev

Have a great week, everybody!

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theculturalkrusader · 7 years

Text

On Hillbilly Elegy: 3 Stars

I read J.D. Vance’s bestselling memoir in less than a day, so I can’t say it wasn’t a good read. As a native Staten Islander, I have long been torn between the ultra-conservative Island culture (I’ve realized since reading Elegy, SI is more akin to Vance’s beloved “hillbilly” culture than I could’ve imagined) and the more progressive, liberal politics of the City and state of New York encompassing the Island. I was interested in what Elegy had to offer me in the way of insight into things like Why Trump won, Who these people I couldn’t stand to live among really are beneath the surface, and most urgently, How to rectify these two cultures I’m constantly caught between. I was eager, thanks largely to the overwhelmingly positive press the book has received since its release last year, to read this book and gain new insight into this self-obsessed, isolationist, myopic, white [middle-to-lower-class, in this case] patriarchal culture I’ve spent my life amid and relatively appalled by.

I didn’t.

Vance, foremost, struck me as macho. Clearly not one to have dabbled in Buddhist teachings despite his Ivy League education and pedantic obsession with self-responsibility, Vance’s language betrays a lack of compassion beyond the scope of his own fragility. One example that really struck me was in an anecdote he told about overcoming hillbilly fight culture in the outside world: Vance had been cut off by another driver, and planned to get out of his car at a red light and demand an apology, if not fight it out with the guy. But he stopped himself. He acknowledges he had acted appropriately in forgoing a fight, but rather than forgive himself for getting angry in the first place (compassion), he spent the hours afterwards “[doing] the right thing, I silently criticized myself.” (p.247) This admission strikes me as of precisely the same mindset Vance spends his book proselytizing against: that beat-down, my-choices-don’t-matter-and-neither-do-I schema that supposedly separates the more typical hillbillies from one of his success. In one sense, his choice here did prove significant, because no fight ensued, and everyone walked away unscathed.

In a much deeper sense, though, I can’t help but feel these ‘proper’ choices he’s making still resonate with him as somewhat useless, given his reaction to his own flaw in this case is still criticism. Why does one criticize the self? To deprecate, to beat down - the very things Vance can’t stand to see his hillbilly neighbors constantly excusing their lack of accountability with.

I don’t think Vance is terribly self-aware. Disciplined? You bet. Conscientious? Certainly. Intelligent? Absolutely. But self-aware? I’m not convinced. He claims to be self-assured now, but how self-assured are you if you can’t even make a mistake without staying mad at yourself about it for hours upon hours? Moreover, how could a truly self-aware grown man - who’d spent four years in the Marines and three in the Ivy Leagues - really believe that his folk don’t hate President Obama for the color of his skin, but for his difference in class, as Vance lamely tried to argue on p.191? What self-aware scholar says that?

In this one inadvertent clue, I find an entire argument essentially made moot. How can someone claim to have overcome a mindset, want to preach on how he’s done so and why you should too (and why not doing so will doom all affected to depravity and depression), and then, without any sense of irony, continue to employ this mindset as he writes the very work composed to deride it? While Vance’s story was, for the most part, genuinely compelling, his larger narrative fell flat in conveying clear and defined insight, and instead read more like a successful white american male haranguing his people for not being as wise, as strong, as willful, or as great as him. Here I was, thinking I’d be reading a book full of carefully-described bullets delineating why this culture should concern and compel me; a book dense with information and wisdom and well-thought-out insight; a book like Evicted, or We Should All Be Feminists, The New Jim Crow, or Between The World And Me. To my disappointment, it didn’t hold a candle to those works, and certainly did not deserve the level of praise and literary prestige it received, in my mind. To say, “You will not read a more important book about America this year.” (-Economist) feels obsequious and plain untrue. What insight have I gained?

Here are some bullets:

-Hillbilly culture is rooted in the Appalachian mountains and surrounding regions. Sometime in the mid-19th century, a mass emigration in pursuit of better job opportunities made its way from the poorer regions of Appalachia up to northern states like OH, PA, IN, IL, and MI, and pushed this culture up and out of just the Rust/Bible Belt. Hillbilly culture subsequently spread far and wide within middle America, and remains heavily entrenched there to this day. These folks are traditionally Scots-Irish, and are generally considered distinctive in their “persistent and unchanging regional subculture in the country. Their family structures, religion, and politics, and social lives all remain unchanged compared to the wholesale abandonment of tradition that’s occurred nearly everywhere else.” (p.3)

-In describing these Scots-Irish and their culture, Vance weighs the good - intense sense of loyalty, fierce dedication to family and country - and the bad - distrust of and disdain for outsiders; and disclaims himself as Scots-Irish at heart - presumably to allow for wiggle-room in his misguided arguments about self-responsibility, political culture, and overall cultural climate. Of the latter, he conveniently made almost no thoughtful mention, despite drawing a direct comparison between poor whites and poor blacks in their overwhelming cultural similarities more than once. This struck me as incredibly odd, since so much of the 2016 election revolved around racism, racial tension, and shamelessly racist hillbillies punching black people at rallies and threatening to kill them. Given Vance’s task, this should have been explored.

-These qualities he mentions - “good” and “bad” - are exactly the qualities I’d assume drove the majority of hillbillies to vote for Donald Trump. E.g., intense sense of loyalty (to America, however misguided); fierce dedication to family and country (however egregiously misguided here as well); distrust of and disdain for outsiders - in this case, the majority of “outsiders” happen to be non-white…and women (sexism is yet another extremely important factor in assessing both the 2016 election and this culture that remains conspicuously unaddressed in Vance’s book). And who did Donald Trump tout as the biggest enemy of them all? Others! Mexicans are rapists - other. Blacks are thugs - other. Women are fodder for men - other. Hillary is a criminal - other. 2016 was the election of Trump versus The Other. (Vance did not explicitly state this, but since Vance’s non-explanations leave much to desire, the reader is left to deduce for herself, and this is a conclusion I have come to. In fact, I’ve deduced every point on Donald Trump made in this essay so far, because Vance did not give me straight answers. I was sure he would.)

But, Donald Trump was an outsider too - if Barack Obama was intimidating to hillbillies because he was too upperclass, then why are these same people toting Donald Trump as the next greatest thing, when he’s far more ostentatious in displaying his status than Obama could or would ever be? This takes me back to labeling Vance’s aforementioned claim on Obama’s lack of appeal to hillbillies sheer and utter hogwash.

——————————————————————————————-

The bullets above together may explain why:

1) Trump won office at a time when most of us couldn’t understand a vote cast in that direction (which, ironically, Vance made absolutely no effort to himself address or deconstruct…an incredibly lazy cop out, if you ask me). Wasn’t the election what compelled Vance to write this book? What happened to all that sociological insight his book promised? Anecdote - Vance’s narrative tool of choice - here lacks insight; Vance tells anecdote after anecdote, but makes hardly any effort to tie these stories back into the larger picture for which they served as an example, and therefore does not outright explain their significance in relation to our country’s cultural climate; all he does instead is offer reasons to pity these hillbilly people - the very same people he himself lambasts to do better - as if to say, They know not what they’ve done, so forgive them for putting our country in such indescribable danger. It’s an incredibly entitled approach, saturated in what I could only register as white privilege. This takes me back to arguing against Vance’s self-awareness: Vance does not seem at all in-touch with his male white privilege in posing these arguments.

2) Vance himself struggles to narrate from outside his experience, and consequently lacks an objective tone; the subjective tone we’re left with is again, heavily proselytizing instead of plainly informative. Even he doesn’t really understand the WHYs.

3) These people are so goddamned hard to get through to; they’re all absorbed in the same mindset as Vance: I have done this, while I watch others do that. That is wrong because this is right. This is right because look at how much I have to humblebrag about now. All other problems must just be the result of laziness and lack of discipline. Vance argues it’s not the govts. fault (but it is!), it’s not society’s fault (but it is!), it’s your fault, and there is no way to fix it. Except, what Vance does not seem to grasp, is that this culminates exactly the kind of defeatism his people must move away from. He is clearly still immersed.

J.D., I really wanted to tell everyone I know that your book was brilliant, and required reading. I can’t do that, though I will recommend it to anyone seeking a readable hillbilly memoir.

The book was good, but not great. It informed but did not teach. If Elegy exists to inform on what hillbilly culture looks like, acts like, and moves like, I already carry all the info I needed on this topic from growing up on Staten Island, where hillbilly culture is uncredited but very much present. Sass aside, I found this book frustrating, and incredibly overrated. His story is interesting, yes. I read the book in a day without getting bored or restless, and even enjoyed it, yes. His success with self-discipline genuinely inspires me, and I give him credit for making his way out of poverty and into the Ivy Leagues. I respect his unique transition from dejected nobody to Marine, but I respect it as just that - UNIQUE. I wince at his idea that he can extend his narrative to encompass - and shame - all hillbillies not following his lead; his experience is not universal, as demonstrated by his holier-than-thou tone. So how does reading about his non-universal experience actually help me to deeply understand this culture?

It doesn’t.

Did I really learn anything, take away some insight I was certain going into the book I’d come out with? No. This Hillbilly Elegy felt less like a tribute to the dead, and more like a tribute to Vance himself. He cites only 21 sources in a 257 page text. This is not a sociological evaluation, a philosophical text, or even an academic work. This is a memoir, of a hillbilly boy, who, despite an unusually-education-centered upbringing, an Ivy League education, military service (God bless), and what he calls perspective, still sees the world through questionable lenses.

But he married a woman of color, so I’m sure he believes he’s better than his kin in Kentucky and Ohio, even as he still wears their uniform on the pitch.

#hillbilly elegy #j.d. vance #culture #society #american culture #hillbilly culture #white supremacy #conservatism #book blogging

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