#with the way it seems to singlehandedly throw everyone off the actual nature and point of that character

[six-of-cringe]

i am fuming about so much real shit right now but a sudden influx in "we could wake them up"-posting is about to be the last fucking straw so i'm trying to channel my hate into that instead

#i hate that quote so much it was a fucking mistake to even write it #with the way it seems to singlehandedly throw everyone off the actual nature and point of that character #like that single [somewhat nonsensical imo] quote is the sole foundation for this completely fabricated and pointless version of wylan #and its driving me nuts am i the only person out here with critical thinking aaaaaaaaa #and perhaps this isnt the best way to cope with my family problems and friend problems and world issues #but on the bright side i am more motivated than ever to finally revisit the bfwp in my drafts #even though at this point i've essentially said all my points scattered throughout many posts but it will be nice to collect them #anyway i hope every queer person specifically has a nice day today. straight people are making me mad so please have a good day. for me. #OUGH #delete later #bfwp

[venusinverted]

Oops this became an essay

Day 2: Favorite Symbiote @symbruary I gotta say, my favorite Symbiote is a mix. Sometimes it’s Venom, sometimes its Sleeper, and sometimes its Scream. But, really, I think what makes me think of a Symbiote as my ‘favorite’ is how they’re portrayed.

Symbiotes have had a bad rep since the 2000s, whereas before 99% of the time they were viewed as either evil because of their nature (needing hosts to survive, but being mostly uncaring towards their hosts, leading to the host dying. Venom was the exception to the rule, and his children were not) or because of who they were bonded to (Donna, Cletus). Once the 2000s hit, and I suspect this is mostly because of the 2003 The Hunger and Venom run, where Eddie is functionally the victim for no reason, and Venom literally overtakes his personality, I believe in the case of the Venom run. Writers took this notion of what we in the fandom call “muh evil Symbiote” syndrome and ran with it. Venom became a villain not only to Spider-Man, but also to Eddie Brock, who was once it’s love interest and partner. Anti-Venom and Agent Venom were created from this, and while I do love both (and consider Agent Venom/Space Knight/GoTG Venom my favorite Symbiote-host combo), they’re just... Not Venom.

What I mean is, they don’t have that feel that the late 80s and 90s Venom had. Venom was harsh in their judgement of whether someone was innocent or not, sure, but they also were fair and kind to those who deserved it. Anti-Venom, being one-half Eddie and one-half non-sentient Symbiote, carries that same harsh judgement and compassion, yet he is misguided in his attempts and overall comes off as a prick. We can understand why, but it still doesn’t make much sense. Agent Venom, being one-half Venom Symbiote and one-half war veteran and ex-bully Flash Thompson, is also harsh in judgement but doesn’t exactly hold that compassion, at least on Flash’s end. He does have moments of being softer, especially towards the end of Venom Volume 2 and during Space Knight, but overall he takes a “shoot first, ask questions later” mindset when it comes to fighting. This makes total sense for a soldier, knowing that if he doesn’t take the first shot he will in turn be shot instead (especially knowing how he lost his legs), but it doesn’t make sense for Venom.

When it comes to Venom Volume 3, it was a breath of fresh air. We get the Symbiote being vindicated, leaving Flash due to the government’s involvement and finding someone who ends up abusing it, showing the host is the one who influences the Symbiote, not the other way around. Then Eddie, having moved past his “fuck Symbiotes” phase, and having lost his technically-grandchild, Toxin, seeks out his old partner and they immediately reconnect. It’s a rocky return, sure, but Mike Costa brings back the genuine feel of the 90s Venom comics. They’re loud, proud, caring yet harsh, and most importantly, happy together. They show the side that’s been missing for a decade and a half, and this is what I love most about Venom. This was when Venom was my favorite, along with the 90s. And then... Well, we all know what happened next.

Sleeper was a natural progression for the series. Venom and Eddie were happy, content, and in a routine they were both doing well in. Throwing a wrench into the formula is a great idea, to stir up drama. And, well, a baby is a great way to stir up drama. How will Eddie deal with it? How will Venom? Will they seek help, or try to do it themselves? The set up was amazing, subtle, and until you’re told the twist you don’t fully comprehend why Eddie’s acting so strange. But when you do, oh it’s a big eureka moment. Sleeper’s birth was done perfectly, with both putting in the effort and protecting their new child. Sleeper themselves had very little time to be a child, but all the same they were an adorable little blob-son.

First Host furthers Sleeper’s character, giving him ambitions and a goal to work towards with his father. When Sleeper bonds with Eddie, one might be scared that this will take a turn for the worst, especially considering what’s happened to Symbiotes bonded to Eddie in the past. Yet, nothing bad happens. Eddie tries his best to be a good host, while also saving his partner. When Sleeper bonds to the Skrull (sorry, I forgot her name), he does gain a more soldier-esque mindset, but that isn’t such a bad thing. Sleeper singlehandedly saves his parent, and is shown to be strong enough to take over and fully lobotomize a hundreds of years old Kree. He leaves for space, but we eventually find out he was a mercenary for a while. When Tel-Kar dies, he seems genuinely upset over it. Showing some remorse for having gotten him killed tells us he may actually fall into some of the pitfalls Symbiotes tend to do, despite how unique and independent he is. His wild protection for his family, especially during and after Absolute Carnage, is great to see. He goes out of his way to protect Dylan, and isn’t exactly the angriest when Dylan uses him to protect others. He takes the form of a cat to be non-threatening, and be able to slip past everyone and spy on him. Everyone assumes he’s just a house cat now, including the fact that he stops talking. Yet, when he’s needed, he’ll immediately stop his disguise and come to the rescue. I love Sleeper, I love that he’s independent and doesn’t need a host if he doesn’t want one. I love that he’s smart and cunning, and will voice his opinions loud and clear. His spunk and strong-willed nature makes him a very fun and interesting character. He may even be my overall favorite, edging out Venom with his uniqueness, not even going into his chemokinesis.

On the other hand, Scream is only a recent favorite. She, along with the other Life Foundation Symbiotes, were mostly ignored both by writers and the general public. They were created by extracting eggs from Venom, and forcefully growing them into adulthood pre-maturely. They were then forced to bond with several security guards who worked for the Life Foundation. While Eddie did try to be a father to them (read: Eddie standing completely naked with his arms outstretched going “COME TO ME, MY CHILDREN!” only to be knocked out by all 5), he could never truly come to see them as his own. Venom didn’t seem to care for them, probably not seeing them as their own children (and back then they didn’t care about their children, anyway). When Donna, the Foundation member who was bonded to Scream, was murdered, that was the end for Scream. She was buried with her. No-one expected her to ever come back. That was, of course, until Absolute Carnage. Scream came back, albeit under Carnage’s control, and found herself bonding to Patricia, who once had the Mania Symbiote. Scream came to her senses, and tried her best to protect her new host, her second chance. Until Carnage killed her, and threatened to kill the only other person to show her compassion, Andrea Benton. Seeing this as another chance, however slim, she took it and bonded to Andi. Andi managed to break free, escape, and survive Absolute Carnage, however she was now alone except for her Symbiote. She fell into a depression, to the point that she tried to commit suicide (that Scream stopped her from, saying she was there for her). Andi and Scream slowly grow closer, until they’re actually good partners. Andi clings to Scream as her only company left, and Scream clings to Andi as her new start, a chance to be a real hero now. Though Scream was not originally sentient, she grew to have her own personality, a cobbled mess of Patricia and Donna and Andi’s wants and passions, but very scared of losing her partner because of how her last two bonds went. So, when she’s threatened with Andi’s death, she takes it very seriously. Though right now we’re left on a cliffhanger, I can’t wait to see how Scream saves Andi (or, alternatively, how Andi uses the Hellmark to save Scream). Scream is a special case. She was originally a Symbiote I was indifferent towards, not really caring much about her or her host. However, when I heard of Patricia returning, I was very excited to see it. When she bonded to Andi, I was a bit apprehensive, but now I can honestly say I absolutely love Scream and Andi’s dynamic. I can’t say she’s my favorite overall, but she’s one of my top three.

I can’t choose a favorite, I feel like it’d be hard to decide for sure who I like most. It’d be like choosing a favorite child. However, I can say for sure that I like a certain type of Symbiote. I like Symbiotes that are emotive, expressive, open and honest, and actually have a voice and feelings, fears and passions. Symbiotes that aren’t just a plot device or tied entirely to their host. Symbiotes that are a little unique in the best way.

#my writing #Venom #Symbruary #Scream #Sleeper

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Part 4.12

Be aware that this is not a blind playthrough! This will contain spoilers for the entire game, regardless of the part of the game I’m commenting on. A major focus of this commentary is to talk about all of the hints and foreshadowing of events that are going to happen and facts that are going to be revealed in the future of the story. It is emphatically not intended for someone experiencing the game for their first time.

Last time in trial 4 (trial 4!!), Kaito’s increasingly desperate attempts to be helpful were wrong again, Gonta was still trying his hardest in the background to keep up with what was going on, Kokichi would not stop subtly jabbing at Kaito’s jealousy of Shuichi oh my god (and it was great), and Shuichi did indeed singlehandedly save everyone by… taking frustratingly long to figure out the nature of the Virtual World and deducing it all in a backwards order that made no sense.

But he did figure it out in the end, somehow, so we’re starting from the intermission and moving onto discovering who used Miu’s plan against her for murder.

Kaito:  “More importantly… let’s continue the conversation where we left off.”

Kaito is once again doing his thing of trying to guide the conversation, getting everyone on the same page and knowing where they’re heading next. It’s the best kind of contributions he can give in trials since he’s not great at the deductions themselves (and since Shuichi apparently doesn’t need his encouragement any more). Even though he’s also been trying too hard to prove he totally is good at deductions this trial, at least he still realises he can do this.

Kokichi:  “And in order to figure that out, we need to understand Miu’s actions… So, let’s discuss her murder scheme step-by-step!”

Kaito:  “I know that’s important, but hearing you lead the conversation really pisses me off.”

…But then Kokichi happens to be trying to even take that away from Kaito here, and is doing it better than him because he’s mentioning more specific things that they need to discuss, and Kaito is Not Happy about that.

(I imagine it would also bother Kaito a little bit if Shuichi were the one to be leading the conversation here, but there’s no way he would ever admit to that. At least Kokichi is a target at which he can openly vent his frustrations about everything he’s been made to feel lately.)

Kokichi:  “Let’s see, Miu manipulated the Virtual World to use it as part of her murder plan…”

Kaito:  “Don’t just ignore me and start anyway…”

Kokichi:  “If she had succeeded, she would’ve gone past the wall between the chapel and the mansion…”

And then Kokichi knows exactly how to continue to get under Kaito’s skin – by completely ignoring him like he’s insignificant. All of the times he did the thing by praising Shuichi while not even mentioning Kaito at all were perhaps arguably a better way of doing so than the times he did mention Kaito – because Kaito is so unimportant that he’s not even worthy of mention, right?

Kokichi:  “…Then secretly passed through the wall she installed and took advantage of the loop. […] Oh yeah… Kaito was probably logged out around that time, too.”

If Miu had any sense, she’d have logged Kaito out before walking through the wall to remove the chance of him seeing her on the mansion side. (Especially since she did end up getting seen on that side by Tsumugi and, as it turns out, also Gonta.)

Himiko:  “She was smart… But she was also really, really dumb.”

This is a very good way of summing it up. Miu had the creative, technological kind of smarts to make inventions and come up with this plan, sure, but in almost every other way she was a gigantic idiot. Especially when it came to interpersonal intelligence. All of the mistakes that led to her plan failing, or to the fact that she would inevitably have been found out even if she’d succeeded in killing Kokichi, were down to her massively misunderstanding the people involved. She was completely oblivious to the fact that obviously Kokichi never really trusted her enough to walk into her trap, and that obviously Kaito is not the sort of person to commit murder and no-one would be willing to believe that, and that obviously Shuichi was going to figure out everything in the trial especially if the scapegoat was Kaito.

Gonta:  “N-No say such mean things. Killing game bad, not Miu. Miu not bad person. Gonta think we coulda been friends, if things different.”

Aww, Gonta. I get what he’s trying to say – it was only the killing game that drove Miu to murder and she wasn’t inherently a bad person. But she was still incredibly self-absorbed and unpleasant to be around and nobody would have wanted to be around her if they weren’t trapped in a school with her. Sorry, Gonta.

Kaito:  “But how did the culprit send Miu’s avatar through the wall? I mean, it’s not like they coulda thrown her.”

Gonta:  “Gonta not throw her!”

It’s okay, Gonta, nobody is around any more to be a dick about you throwing dead bodies just because you’re strong, you don’t need to jump to defend yourself on that matter.

(…even though it… actually is pretty close to what happened.)

Gonta:  “Physical strength… equalized? That problem! Gonta no can protect everyone if that happens!”

Another big hint at what’s really going on. He had pretty much this exact reaction in the Virtual World when he first heard about this, and yet here he is, having it again as if he’s only just hearing this now for the first time. Gonta may be slow to pick up on things, but he’s not forgetful like this.

Himiko:  “Geez, keep up with us.”

But everyone else basically is just putting a blanket judgement of “stupid” on Gonta and assuming that justifies him being forgetful too.

Shuichi:  “I think the sound came from Miu’s avatar hitting the chapel wall… The hammer, cell phone and lattice were there, but they were too small to make that noise.”

This is Shuichi’s answer to a multiple choice question in which you’re meant to state which out of Miu or the three objects around her hit the wall to make the loud sound. Which is pretty silly, because all four of those things hit the wall; does it really matter which of them was the one that was big enough to make a noise when it did so?

Kokichi:  “But why did it hit the wall with such force? Can you guys figure it out?”

Kaito:  “Hold on, Kokichi. What’s up with the way you’re talkin’? Why are you talking like you know everything?”

Kaito’s intuition strikes again! …Okay, to be fair, in this particular instance it definitely does not take an Official Luminary of the Stars Hunch™ to realise that Kokichi has clearly been talking like he already knows exactly what happened (and Gonta also noticed a similar thing from Kokichi last post), but still, this is Kaito doing one of the things he does best in trials and it deserves to be pointed out.

Kokichi:  “More importantly, we gotta solve the mystery! Fighting among friends is a waste of time.”

Kaito:  “‘Friends’? Us?”

And this is Kokichi doing his usual shtick of giving empty words about teamwork and co-operation to try and make everyone else’s words along similar lines sound just as empty.

Honestly, Kokichi, you had an opportunity right there to yet again make a point of how only Shuichi can solve this mystery, and you didn’t? At least jabbing at Kaito’s jealousy is a recent thing that makes a refreshing change from what you’ve been doing non-stop for the previous three chapters, come on.

Kokichi:  “Hey, Shuichi… As your partner, I’ll give you a little hint.”

Shuichi:  “…You’ll what?”

Kokichi:  “Since the mansion was on top of a hill, the roof was pretty high up, right? Past the brick handrail, the roof was at a pretty steep slope. And the slope faced the chapel wall. On top of that, there was snow on the roof. If the culprit needed force to move the body, I wonder how they did it?”

That’s barely a “hint” so much as it’s just a lengthy description of the roof, including the brick handrail that Kokichi couldn’t possibly have seen unless he’d been there, thus proving his earlier claim of not having gone there to be a lie. Which, considering Shuichi has perfectly well seen the roof himself and doesn’t need this description, really seems more to me like Kokichi is deliberately trying to give Shuichi the ammo to prove that he’s been up there.

(also, again, fuck off Kokichi, “partners” don’t withhold the things they know like this. What you’re doing with Shuichi right now is not “working together” with him, it’s patronising him.)

Shuichi:  (Kokichi’s talking as if he’s got the whole thing figured out already… But I can’t let him distract me. I need to solve this case.)

That’s not a “distraction”, Shuichi! Kokichi’s jabs at Kaito last time were one thing, but the fact that Kokichi clearly already knows how the body was moved is a meaningful point related to the case that should be included in your deductions and not just disregarded! Turn down that Ultimate Detective tunnel vision just a little.

Kaito:  “Nah, man. Even with the slope and the snow, Miu’s body wouldn’t have slid—”

Kokichi:  “Wrong. It would slide.”

Kaito tries contributing an actual idea again – one which is perfectly reasonable given that he hasn’t figured out there was anything that could have been used as a sled – and Kokichi just immediately cuts him off and tells him he’s wrong without actually telling him why. (Because he’s leaving the “why” part for Shuichi to figure out.)

Kokichi:  “Non, non! It would slide!”

Kaito:  “It wouldn’t slide! Just like Maki Roll said!”

Kokichi:  “It would slide! Just like Shumai said!”

Children. Calm down.

Gonta:  “Lots of snow piled up on roof… but not frozen solid, right?”

(Gonta is still trying to make sure he’s got a good mental image of everything they’re talking about so that he can help!)

Kokichi:  “You just need a sled or skis to cut the friction!”

Kaito:  “There was nothing like that around, though!”

Kaito Refutations: 3!

It’s pretty notable here that the game makes you refute Kaito and not agree with Kokichi when it would also have made perfect sense to put an agree spot on Kokichi’s statement there. The writers don’t just want to make this part about Shuichi having to seemingly be on Kokichi’s side, they want to make it about him seemingly not being on Kaito’s side as well.

It’s also… questionable that Kaito makes this claim in the first place. He searched the rooftop before the murder and then investigated the chapel after; he should know that the lattice was there. Clearly he never figured it was used as a sled during the investigation, but it shouldn’t be too hard to piece it together now. So apparently Kaito doesn’t want to try and piece it together because he’s annoyed at Kokichi having butted in and called him wrong and argued with him about this and he just wants to be right about something for once, dammit.

Kokichi is still not praising Shuichi about how brilliant he is for having figured out the sled thing and I am very disappointed in him. Or rather, I’m disappointed in the out-universe writers for not continuing with the subtle jabbing at Kaito’s issues that I was greatly enjoying last time and see no reason not to continue with here. Especially since this time Shuichi figured out the truth while directly refuting Kaito! That’d be the perfect opportunity for it!

Not that Kokichi hasn’t still been getting under Kaito’s skin plenty in other ways, but, like, The Thing! I miss The Thing and its delightful subtlety.

Kokichi:  “Also, I never went to the roof, not even for the meeting.”

…

Kokichi:  “It all began when Miu showed us the map.”

…

Kokichi:  “That’s probably what happened. The culprit killed her on the locked roof.”

The game makes you do a Mind Mine to select which of these three past statements of Kokichi’s was a lie. For one thing, this is a really weird excuse for a Mind Mine because that’s supposed to be about images, but the much sillier thing about it is the three statements it makes you choose from. The two incorrect options here are just Kokichi stating assumptions about what happened in the case and therefore can’t even be lies. Only one of them is an actual testimony about something he did that he therefore could have lied about! It could kind of be a fun puzzle to be shown multiple statements Kokichi made about his actions and have to figure out which one of them you can prove to be a lie. But the way this is, you don’t even need to remember the information that proves he did go to the roof in order to know that that’s the only statement that can even be false.

(also noooo Mind Mine has four colours now; I get really addicted to the version in the casino with only three colours, but the hardest difficulty adds a fourth colour which makes it way too easy to mess up and therefore not as fun any more. Not that the trial version is as fun anyway since you can just break the single pieces which means there’s no incentive to think about things, but.)

So anyway, Kokichi’s lengthy description of the roof, particularly the part about the brick handrail, is what proves he was lying about never going there.

Kokichi:  “I-I-I… d-didn’t… I already t-told you that b-before…”

Gonta:  “Why you look so nervous?”

Keebo:  “Is this a sincere reaction?”

It’s not, of course. But the thing is, Kokichi has never had this specific kind of reaction before, so it actually seems a little bit more plausible than it usually does that this could be genuine and this is what he sounds like when he’s truly been caught out. What I would want to say Kokichi is doing here is that he’s trying to make it seem like he genuinely has been caught out – because if he really wanted the mercy kill outcome, then the best way to do so would be to have everyone eventually decide he did it, but for him to put up enough resistance to it that it seems like this isn’t the outcome he wants.

Of course, since Kokichi really doesn’t want the mercy kill outcome at all because he’s been gradually sabotaging it this whole time by being helpful and is shortly going to completely shatter it with his own two hands, I don’t quite understand why he’s bothering to act this way. For fun, I guess.

Kokichi:  “Oh, wait! I remember now! That thing Himiko said!”

Himiko:  “Nyeh!? M-Me!?”

Kokichi:  “At the start of the class trial, I remember you saying the handrail was made of bricks.”

To anyone who’s uncertain, nope, Himiko very definitely didn’t say that. I’d have pointed it out if it’d been there.

Kokichi:  “Gotta be more careful there, Himiko!”

Himiko:  “I-Is it my fault…?”

No, Himiko, because you didn’t say it! Stand up for your own actions more! Be more sure of yourself!

Gonta:  “Himiko really say that?”

But here’s Gonta – who’s the worst at being sure of himself and would definitely have doubted his own actions if he’d been the one in Himiko’s position right now – being pretty damn sure she didn’t say that. Like I’ve been saying, he’s confused as hell about the Virtual World, but he’s still been paying attention to everyone around him. And especially because his only source of information for what the Virtual World is like has been the descriptions people have given of it, he would know that he didn’t picture that roof as having a brick handrail until Kokichi said so.

Kokichi:  “She tooootally said that!”

Kaito:  “No she didn’t!”

Kokichi:  “Yes, she did!”

Kaito:  “She did not!”

Kokichi:  “She did too!”

Kaito:  “Then when!? Tell me how long ago! In hours, minutes and seconds!”

Whoa, geez, again, children. Kaito just really wants to be right about something – which he is this time, but unfortunately this one is basically impossible to conclusively prove.

(I suppose Keebo’s recording function wouldn’t help much either, because to prove Himiko didn’t say a thing would require listening to the entire trial up to this point.)

Maki:  “How much longer are you going to behave like this?”

And in comes the Ultimate Child Caregiver to break up the argument. Seems appropriate.

Shuichi starts to think as if this isn’t enough to prove that Kokichi went to the roof, but the thing is, it kind of is. This isn’t like an Ace Attorney trial where conclusive evidence is necessary. The only thing that’s necessary here is to convince everyone else – and everyone else is pretty damn sure that Himiko did not say that and Kokichi is lying through his teeth right now. No matter how stubborn Kokichi decides to be, it won’t change that fact. If he wanted, Shuichi could just continue the discussion all like, “Okay, so we all agree Kokichi went to the roof, right? Which means…” and completely ignore Kokichi’s obviously-lying protests that he didn’t, and there’d be nothing Kokichi could do to stop them.

Shuichi:  (But if he’s being this stubborn, it makes me think he has something to hide. To get him to show his hand, I have to prove he was on the roof.)

This reasoning does kind of make sense, though. Shuichi wants Kokichi to tell everyone whatever it is that he’s hiding instead of having to painstakingly try and figure it out himself (which he could still do, if he thought about it and realised that oh wait, Kokichi couldn’t physically touch Miu could he). So he wants to force Kokichi out of the “la la la I can’t hear you” state he’s in and get him to stop messing around.

Kaito:  “I’ve had enough of your lies, man!”

Kokichi:  “I’m not lying!”

“Are you done arguing yet?”

Heh, Maki’s still trying to play child caregiver here.

Kokichi:  “I didn’t go to the roof!”

“Just fess up already!”

…

Kokichi:  “The rooftop door was locked and I couldn’t open it!”

“That’s enough lies!”

And Kaito is still furiously trying to get Kokichi to confess even in the white noise.

(Trying to get Kokichi to confess is also Shuichi’s goal during this debate – he just has a rather cleverer way of going about it than simply yelling at him and hoping it’ll work.)

Kaito:  “Liars burn in hell, y’know?”

Kaito. Calm down and think for a second about what you’re saying there.

His thing two parts ago in which he denounced specific kinds of lies that Kokichi tells was not that hypocritical, because Kaito genuinely never tells the kind of lie he was talking about there. But this is just referring to any lying, and… yeah, you’ve been telling a few lies of your own lately, Kaito. Not to mention the lie he and Shuichi told to protect Maki back in trial 2.

(Still, he’s saying this here because he’s riled up. This is very much not a properly-thought-out statement of his principles.)

Shuichi lies about having been to the salon and not seen Kokichi in there, which kiiiinda begs the usual “why didn’t you mention this sooner” question that a lot of this game’s required lies have. No-one points that out, though.

Kokichi:  “I see… You use underhanded tactics too. Huh, Shuichi?”

Kokichi, you are the one who was baiting him into lying about this when you discussed during the investigation how there were no witnesses to prove you were or weren’t in the salon. You have no right to be calling him out on doing exactly what you wanted him to do.

Kokichi:  “So, who are you guys gonna believe? Shuichi… or me?”

This is a misleading false dichotomy. He’s presenting it like one of the two of them must be telling the truth and that therefore if Shuichi is lying that means Kokichi definitely isn’t, which of course is not the case.

Kaito:  “Well of course I’m gonna believe Shuichi!”

Keebo:  “I believe Shuichi 100%!”

Maki:  “The one who’s not Kokichi.”

I love Maki’s response here. To everyone else, it’s more about how much they believe in Shuichi, but Maki, while she of course does also believe in Shuichi, doesn’t care that it’s specifically him and would rather make a point of how she’d believe anyone over Kokichi. Maki is so blunt and it’s great.

Tsumugi:  “But to go to the salon, Shuichi would need to pass by me in the dining room… Umm… I wonder why I didn’t notice Shuichi there…”

Shuichi:  “…”

Tsumugi:  “Oh well. I’ll believe Shuichi anyway. He’s usually right about stuff.”

And here’s a delightful little hint towards the mastermind’s identity! Tsumugi is only pretending to be confused and vague and really knows full well that Shuichi must be lying. She lets it slide because this situation that’s playing out is an interesting story, and she’d rather see where it goes than just cut Shuichi off and go back to the stalemate things were at before.

I actually caught on my first time through just how suspicious Tsumugi is acting here – there’s something different about her voice that made me suddenly feel, at least in this moment, that her vagueness was just an act and she was a lot more cunning than she seemed. Even if she is genuinely just doing this because she knows Shuichi is onto something and doesn’t want to get in the way, her going about it this underhandedly reveals a side to her that’s completely different from the person she usually seems to be.

At the time, though, I just thought this was a hint that she’d killed Miu (my brain went on to make up something about how the sled had a delayed-release mechanism so she could fake her alibi with Shuichi, despite there being zero evidence for such a thing). When this case was over and that was wrong I temporarily forgot about this bit and only remembered again during chapter 6 once I realised she was in fact the mastermind, but I am still proud of myself for sort of noticing it here.

Also, this behaviour from Tsumugi is in fact very Kokichi-like. The whole “that’s weird but I guess Shuichi wouldn’t lie to us right” with the subtext of “I totally know you’re lying and just don’t want to bring it up” is precisely the kind of thing Kokichi has done multiple times. You’d think that if anyone could pick up on this clue to the mastermind’s identity, it’d be Kokichi. If he truly cared about figuring out who the mastermind is, I feel like he’d be paying enough attention to the others’ behaviour to notice this. But apparently not; he’s too wrapped up in his own plan which doesn’t actually require him to know who the mastermind is in order to “defeat” them.

Gonta:  “Sorry, but… Gonta believe Shuichi, too.”

Kokichi:  “Ah, I see… I wanted at least Gonta to believe me…”

I went over this before when a similar thing happened: this is Kokichi hinting at him and Gonta being in on this together, but if Gonta really did remember then it would help their cause for him to act like he thinks Kokichi did it. Stop being an unnecessary dick, Kokichi, that’s all you’re doing here.

Kokichi:  “Why do you guys hate lies that much?”

…Nobody ever really said they did. Nobody other than Kaito, who hates a specific flavour of lying and has already made his stance on that apparent – but he clearly doesn’t hate all kinds of lies, for obvious reasons. The other people Kokichi is saying this to include Shuichi, who has lied multiple times to try and reach the truth and Kokichi has been aware of every instance of that, Maki, who lied about her talent in order to protect herself, and Himiko, whose entire talent involves lying to make things more entertaining and fun for people. (And Tsumugi, who is constantly lying through her teeth, but that one Kokichi isn’t aware of.)

Kokichi:  “There’s only one truth, but endless possibilities for lies, y’know?”

So here he’s basically trying to say that the infinite possibilities of lies are more interesting and fun than the singular truth, and I can see where he’s coming from, since that’s the point of fiction. But that kind of lie is harmless because people know they’re really lies and just choose to pretend to believe and invest in them anyway because that’s more fun. That’s why Himiko keeps insisting her magic is real. That’s why Kaito pretends his childhood games were real, and why he wanted to buy into Himiko’s magic – until people’s lives started riding on knowing the truth, that is.

Kokichi:  “And some of them are only white lies, or lies to be kind to people…”

Like the lies Kaito has been telling to hide his illness. Like the lies Shuichi has told in trials to protect innocent people and reach the truth.

(Also, remember Kokichi insisting back in trial 3 that you never know how malicious people’s reasons for having secrets could be and so you might as well just assume everyone’s malicious? Does he really believe it’s possible for others to lie for a good reason, or is he just saying that to justify his own constant lying?)

Kokichi:  “If you deny all of that *just* because it’s a lie…”

No-one ever did. All they’re denying is your lie right now about not going to the roof, because it’s getting in the way of reaching the goddamn truth and letting all but one of us not freaking die.

Kokichi:  “Then that means you guys are just terrible at being lied to! Seriously, the worst!”

Kokichi’s putting on an evil face here, like suddenly he’s happy that everyone doesn’t like lies because this lets him trick them more. Remember the most recent Monokuma Theater about how liars supposedly keep encouraging honesty so there’ll be more gullible honest people they can deceive? This kind of reminds me of that.

This is Kokichi backpedalling as usual. His speech up to this point was acting like he was upset at people hating lies (even though nobody does and he was really just throwing a tantrum because they’re refusing to believe his one extremely obstructive lie here), but now he’s turning around and claiming that actually this is fine, he’s not upset about anything at all and never was!

Kokichi:  “Okay, fine! I’ll tell you if you wanna know that badly. Consider this my revenge.”

Gonta:  “Revenge?”

Yeah, revenge. Aside from his massive trust issues and pathological conviction that everyone is secretly a terrible person, the other force that drives most of Kokichi’s actions in this story is his desire for petty, vindictive revenge against people he feels have wronged him in some way. That’s why he’s doing this entire elaborate scheme to eventually try and beat Monokuma at his own game, which getting Miu and Gonta killed here is only the first step in.

Kokichi:  “You got some balls lying to me. I’m gonna take away your fun for pissing me off, Shuichi. I won’t let you do any detective work, or deduction, or mystery solving, or anything!”

Shuichi was never here to have fun, you moron. He doesn’t care if you solve the mystery for him just so long as it’s the truth and therefore the maximum number of people can survive. You already know that he only cares about saving everyone; you’ve mentioned it before! (But of course everything’s got to be about fun, because Kokichi is obsessed with how much fun he’s very definitely totally having with this, so that must be the first thing on everyone else’s mind too, right?)

It’s also ridiculously hypocritical of him that he’s so annoyed at Shuichi lying to him. When that’s what Kokichi does all the time. When he was just claiming that lies aren’t inherently bad if they’re told for good reasons. When during previous trials he’s tried to insist that the lies he told would help to find the culprit (even though they didn’t and Shuichi is better at using lies to reach the truth than Kokichi has ever been).

But it’s not all that surprising, because it’s been a recurring idea a few times that Kokichi can’t take what he dishes out – that things are all good when he’s doing something to other people, but when someone does the same thing to him, it’s suddenly not “fun” any more. His reaction when Gonta turned the bugs against him during the Insect Meet and Greet comes to mind, for example.

So Kokichi confesses to his plan to sabotage Miu’s murder plot with his own, including his co-operation with Monokuma. It would have been appropriate if this had been the moment where Monokuma dropped the weird pretending-to-be-depressed thing he’d been doing for the first half of this trial (or, at least, it’d have made it seem like there was some actual point to that being a thing in the first place)… but actually it’s not, because he dropped that act a little earlier for the sake of doing a pointless non-sequitur bit about Sonic the Hedgehog of all things. Why.

Monokuma:  “Kokichi and I had a “quid pro quo” relationship. Technically, that doesn’t violate the rules!”

Indeed, it doesn’t. The rules only state Monokuma can’t directly participate in a murder, but all he was doing here was essentially redoing this chapter’s motive presentation in a way more likely to make an interesting story, based on Kokichi’s suggestion. It could be argued that it’s unfair for him to present a motive in a way that clearly favours a specific person becoming blackened as a result – but all of the motives have done that.

Kokichi:  “I told you, I’m gonna get in the way by taking away the mystery-solving fun. If I can’t win this game, then I’ll make it boring for everyone! That’s my revenge!”

Yeah, except the only people who are having fun solving the mystery right now are the audience. If you wanted to take away their fun (and they really, really should be your targets for revenge right now), then you could have, I don’t know, not created a fun mystery for them to solve in the first place? Revealing the truth here may cut short the mystery-solving, but it still gives the audience an interesting story. Nothing about what’s about to happen from here is in any way boring.

In fact, the most boring outcome possible as things stand is probably for Kokichi to insist that he did it and then for everyone except Gonta to get abruptly executed, possibly without anyone ever understanding why. That’d be a hell of a frustrating rocks-fall-(nearly)-everybody-dies ending for the audience.

(Still, while he’s going about it in a terrible way, note his focus on revenge again. That’s a major thing for him.)

Kokichi:  “Well, then… The culprit is Gonta.”

So… Kokichi doesn’t want the mercy kill outcome, right? That should be self-evident, right?

If I were writing this commentary in a vacuum and had never seen any of the fandom’s thoughts on Kokichi, then I wouldn’t have even been mentioning this as we went along because it shouldn’t even be worthy of dispute, purely because of this line here. There are plenty of other parts that also support this, some of which I’ve mentioned as this case went along (he’s been deliberately leading Shuichi to the truth this whole time), some of which I brought up back when he saw the outside world (he knows it’s all a lie), and some of which will come up later. But regardless of all the other evidence, this moment alone should be more than enough to confirm it. Yet apparently there are a reasonable number of people who genuinely believe Kokichi actually wanted the mercy kill outcome, and I just… ??????????

(To be completely clear, I’m not at all upset at anyone who thinks that, just… extremely confused. I understand the desire to believe it, because it would be a pretty interesting story, but it is very clearly not the story we have here.)

I admittedly haven’t delved too deep into trying to find people’s reasons for thinking this, but there’s one argument I have seen attempting to justify this moment here. The argument is that Kokichi genuinely wanted the mercy kill up until this point, and then this was him realising that oh no, looks like it’s never going to work and Shuichi is definitely going to find the truth no matter what he does, so he might as well bail on it and move onto Plan B of pretending he’s evil so he can pretend to be the mastermind.

But if Kokichi really was going to feel and act that way, this wouldn’t be the moment to do it. Shuichi is not at all close to finding the truth right now – currently he’s zeroing in on the idea that Kokichi did it, which would be good for the plan. It’s still possible that at some point down the line Shuichi will figure out Kokichi couldn’t have murdered Miu and then use a process of elimination to point to Gonta, but that hasn’t even begun to happen yet! Now is not even remotely the time to give up! If Kokichi really, genuinely cared about protecting everyone from the despairing truth, like Gonta did so badly that he was driven to murder despite being the sweetest loveliest person ever, then there is no way he would ever give up this easily. Anyone who truly cared about this would keep on fighting for that outcome with everything they had until the last possible moment, because even the tiniest chance of success is better than the alternative.

So basically, if one does decide to take the interpretation that Kokichi cares about mercy-killing everyone to save them from the despairing truth, then he is also evidently absolutely terrible at actually following through on that desire to save everyone, because this would be him giving up not even at the first hurdle but before he’s really reached any hurdles at all.

---

[Next post]

#danganronpa #danganronpa v3 #drv3 #ndrv3 #chapter 4 #class trial #commentary

[incarnateirony]

Terms, uses, and semantics

So, I’ve noticed a lot of terms get used in one wing, and interpreted differently by another wing. And then wing 2 bounces back wing 1 and it swings like an ever increasing, extremized pendulum. I figured I’d put down a couple of points I (personally) hold about these terms, such as:

“Toxic Codependency” and my feelings on it, when it’s misused, and when the word is reflexively adopted in “defense” by another party that isn’t necessarily an extremist,

“Performer Dean”, potential overapplication, and defensive reactions I’ve seen people take in occasionally misunderstanding the general idea *most* people are trying to get at with it,

“Canon,” “Romance,” and maybe a few others. If any of these words have ever triggered you, even quietly, when I’ve crossed paths with them, I’d like to clearly emphasize my personal intent with these, and a few points I think the whole “road to hell with best intentions” has flared up with others based on serial misunderstandings and reactions.

So, let’s start.

Toxic Codependency

We all know the term. Most of us hate the concept of it; followers of a ship in a certain wing praise it. Sometimes it doesn’t have the “toxic” applied but, by nature of “codependency,” it is in fact a toxic form of relationship. However, I do find that this swings into extremes.

Yes, there are periods - large ones - where Sam and Dean’s brotherhood was toxically codependent. There’s times they stepped back from that as well. People who support the brother bond have seem to adapt “I’d like to see a permanent end of codependency” to “I’d like to see an end to the brother bond,” which generally isn’t the intent.

On the other hand, I find that people are so reactive that at times, they have a difficult time discerning between “honest loving sacrifice in a horrific life” and “codependent decisions,” and this word has become so THICKLY adapted into discussion that it seems to rear its head almost any time a decision between the brothers is made.

An example of this is season 13; season 12-13 made a due point to give them everything, then take everything away, and show Dean was not okay just being there for Sam anymore nor did he feel suited to play the caretaker anymore. Season 13 became a mad dash to restore everything, to get everyone back, to have more than just each other. Both brothers featured this: Sam’s familial dream, Dean’s need for Cas and outright desperation to get Mary back; the mutual Team Free Will adoption of Jack. They need and want more. 

But people wary of the codependency started panicking at “if we die, we die together,” and simultaneously at Dean sacrificing himself (ergo not “together” but we’ll just slip away from that) as a sign of “them restoring the toxic codependency,” and I think this level of extremism really strips our ability to discuss the evolution of their relationships without crossing our arms in some sort of Ward Against Evil for impact from someone that’s going to get upset about the need for/hate of codependency.

Because that wasn’t codependency; he had Sam - and Jack; Dean’s mind didn’t singlehandedly whittle itself down to Sam. It saw big picture; Dean didn’t do much but nod numbly at Sam’s fateful line (that he ultimately refused the concept of with his decision), maybe with that token sardonic, reserved near-smirk he does when you know he’s turning over something darkly in his head (and generally about to do something radical - that smirk told me Dean had no intention of letting them die together, in the instant). This was a choice for not even just his brother, but his family (and, beneath that, the world.)

But the use of this phrase seems to be strapped on to so many aspects of the brothers’ relationships that it’s almost inescapable.

Yes, there are lots of toxic, codependent aspects they’ve waxed and waned into and out of over time and yes, from the view of someone who wants these characters to find happiness, I’d like them to grow past that. But not everything they do at any moment makes a toxic codependent theme. Two moments (that CLASHED with each other) don’t disrupt two years of cohesion. Sometimes, codependent or not, we make sacrifices, and that certainly wasn’t a single-minded purchase into it. Pressured, and rushed due to plot accordion, but-

That’s just the most recent example at the top of my head. Personally, my use of “toxic codependency” tends to be in extreme reservation, and more often than not, you’ll find me sifting down why I don’t feel something is that.

On the other hand, there’s the argument from one wing that it’s the premise of the show, and that’s deadass wrong. And I hold no bars in saying that. The brother bond is the premise of the show (and now extending into Found Family). These things do not demand the dependency. They break out of it eventually, ESPECIALLY with the Found Family evolution, the gained stability of the bunker as a home, and more. 

But I think the fandom pendulum has become so strong in that, for example, One wing says they hate the codependency that hurts them; an extreme opposite wing says it defines the show; the first wing says no, it doesn’t, and they can break out of it; the opposite wing extremizes one way, the first wing does the opposite, until both ends are reading toxic codependency into the first fart in a room, when the real question is “At what point is this healthy support and loyalty, and what point is it toxically codependent?” 

Mind: some meta authors etc in the fandom *do* approach it from this angle so it’s not a unilateral statement of “screw everybody,” but I felt the need to put that out there for anyone reading my stuff.

“Performer Dean” IS NOT AN INSULT. 

It does not “minimize” any part of Dean. Each and every one of us has performer attributes in the real world, some of us more than others. Performer Dean simply identifies the difference between his surface personalities and hidden enjoyments. This is something the show gave to us only a few episodes into season one. 

It’s a safety wall he’s built - and yes, he needs that - but the point of people generally talking about the sublimation of Performer!Dean is that they want Dean to eventually be able to grow to a place where he doesn’t feel the need to perform to his closest companions. It’s similar to growing past codependency.

Dean liked the vegetable water, despite gruffing at it. Something something manly. Dean scoffed and refused shorts, but there he was showing them off later. Illusions of who he needs to be, both for his little brother and the world, are a literal part of canon and discussing this is not necessarily an insult.

HOWEVER,

There’s likely some people that take it a little too far - maybe in wanting Dean to completely drop the points they’ve personally decided are his toxic masculine lines, rather than his personal repressions. And in a world of people with varying opinions, this is an infinite rabbithole of potential overstep. By and LARGE, not many people want to woobify Dean though. I’m of the brand where I’m happy with most of Dean’s current aspects, a few repressions and walls I’d like him to drop over time, but I actually enjoy his masculine attributes as part *of* why I like him as a Bi!Dean stan - because he’s not your “gay man stereotype,” he’s just like a lot of bi/gay dudes around the world are, that are left to throw up walls on the things that make them cautious about being too... well, “not manly.” You know, the over-reactive dudebro that doth protest too much... and then later you find him Doing The Thing.

Because that’s Dean, and that’s what a lot of people talk about with Performer!Dean. If anyone takes it too far, my apologies; but the concept of discussing performer Dean, and repressions of things that are too kiddish/feminine/whatever, are actually substanced in canon, and many meta authors want to see positive progress into happiness for a character rather than stagnance or, worse, regression.

These two major points minded,

despite my occasional use of terms like “toxic codependency” and “performer Dean,” or maybe *because* of them, my ultimate end hope for Dean is a man who’s comfortable to be who he is, with the people he cares about, without surviving on reactive desperation and clinging to “the one thing he has left”, but rather, in support of a growing family unit as he seems to yearn for, without fear of being judged for them - be it over shorts, vegetable water, Elsa, or maybe - depending on your read - who he’s attracted to and what that means to him and his “manliness.” It’s a release of the “toxic” edge of masculinity that just leaves... self-comfortable masculinity.

Supporting bi!Dean and Performer!Dean is in no way intended from me to ever be denigrating to his manliness (and frankly, I find the direct correlation of these ideas to be queerblind at least, lowkey phobic at worst); rather, wanting him to understand that there is no threat to that if he enjoys these things, and that he’s still a powerful individual and as masculine as he wants to be, even if that’s in friggin’ gym or car-washing shorts.

Canon, Romance, Subtext

Okay, so, I’ve gone into this at length in another post before, but I feel the need to do the ELI5 repeat while on a “how I talk and what I mean” post in case anyone missed it:

I adhere to the literary standard of what defines fictional canon (including subtext with authorial intent), and the dictionary definition of romance; to both of these I will always apply pillarings of existing examples, sometimes even from intertext used in SPN like On The Road, sometimes just in basic literary discussion. So if you see me using these words, understand it’s by the definitions in the link (or this shorthand version).

According to basic literary theory, Destiel is canonically romantic; this is different from canonically consummated or being an established, existing, metaphorically betrothed couple. If anyone reblogs or comments on this just to argue with me, I’m going to deadass ignore you, because you’re arguing with the dictionary and pretty much the entire literary field. Spamming an old gif running on two years outdated won’t fix that.

And yes, I would love to see that get a happily-ever-after too, just like the above points for codependency and performer attributes.

UNDERSTAND, HOWEVER,

That this is *not* to be conflated with the concept of representation/LGBT/etc. I understand everybody’s exhausted of the “hide your gays” thing. I personally understand that. I also speak about that as a problem. That does not, however, necessarily attach to any of the above-dressed issues. It is a separate, equally valid issue - distinct and separate, because social biases are a different beast. Just because I hold to “The dictionary and literary field defines X as Y,” does not mean I'm saying, “People who enjoy Y should settle only for X value,” and if you want to pursue Z (better on screen rep/completion/don’t Hide The Gay), that’s great. Doorkicking into any literary discussions I’m having with this blatant conflation and, frankly, sea lion, doesn’t really add to discussion integrity. When I’m talking about issues with “Hiding the Gay”, I invite you to related discourse; if I am holding discussions about literature through the ages, and intertext parallels, please reserve that for the appropriate conversation. If you insist on conflating all problems into one central problem, we just end up with 99 problems that are indiscernible from each other. And that’s just... I ain’t gonna humor that.

I have plenty of discussions out there about the problems with the Hide Your Gays in modern media; I’m not saying it doesn’t matter to me - as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, it does in fact matter to me. But rather than us having a trash-heap of 1,000 problems, I’d like to be able to sort and approach them individually.

More on canon, “fair interpretation”, and even “Death of the Author,”

So I’ve read things like “I have this idea and this reading out of this scene but I’m a realistic viewer and know the authors are probably going to go this direction with this, which is different than what I read/want.”

This is fine as long as we recognize you’re building an alternative canon. The first idea of canon structures is listings of books (or in our case, episodes/incidents) that build a complete work (or genre for review.) If you have habitually “missed the mark” on what the authors have been doing with the show, and where they’re going, you are free to continue to build your own interpretations and try to apply concepts like “Death of the Author” (although like I’ve gone on a tear about before, people generally do that wrong.)

That does not, however, contend with the application of authorial intent WRT subtext and thematics in central canon. You are free to build your own. If you are aware your own is not adhering to what the authors are doing in still-living progression, if you’re at peace with that - that’s fine. On the other hand, if Meta Author B has a habit of nail-on-the-head-ing projections well in advance while your expectations lend the other way, you pretty much have zero room to try to drop a Deuce on Meta Author B. 

Literature and entertainment is all interpretation, but if one interpretation continues to hold true to the test of time, and you recognize your interpretation or projection is not holding water to what the authors are doing, well - that kind of says it all? And you’re free to build new canon constructs and interpretations, but if we’re about to line up what authorial-intent-subtext we consider canon, The Way This Works is that the people who are generally right... are generally right, until they’re wrong, and the next applicable lit theory that resonates with existing author statements is the strongest front runner.

Cuz That’s How This Works.

And it definitely doesn’t work by screaming “OOC” at whatever points You Individually Don’t Agree With. Especially if, rather than a single fluke of dishinged ideas, you’re deleting entire recurring ideas or thematics or other expositions. 

In short: You’re free your own interpretations and rearranged canons, as long as you’re individually aware and own the fact that That’s What That Is. If you have to delete scenes, content, episodes, decisions, or creative-capacity statements, you are now operating outside of the range of actual authorial canon (and, by nature, the things you see/read/expect/want probably get shattered progressively more often until you adapt). You are free to enjoy your canon. You are free to build as many branches of that as you want. But trying to take a fractured side-canon to joust against consecutively more routinely accurate canon-analysis is just a recipe for a lot of butthurt, so just don’t, in that case?

#supernatural #terminology #what I mean when I say certain words #cuz I've been reading a lot of talk people have about these words #and this is eating at me

[eraniriel]

[Exerpt taken from RP]

What happens next, happens very quickly and there is no way for anyone to predict it. Like a tripwire, there is a line in the stone. Scraped there, carved by obsidian and entirely invisible against the onyx ground it spans from the place where the plateau rises and out of sight. Passing over it, that line suddenly flashes green and the air buzzes audibly,

the cats - already so edgy - react nervously and some even become unruly under the steady hands of their riders. There was a reason those demons were torturing, and spilling the blood of the Alliance soldiers, beyond even the cruelty of their sport. The air shivers and sparks, like the ripples of heat on a hot summer day and the ground cracks. A starburst of fel ripples out as something very big collides with the ground - an audible crash and rumble sound with it and a heartbeat later it blinks into sight only briefly; a horror of stone and fel cobbled together and drooling the green poison everywhere. The infernal vanishes for a beat and then refocuses, as though there is something that makes it difficult to focus in here. Beside it, a trio of Eredar appear in much the same manner and a blink later, two fel-lords standing behind them come into focus. The entire scene seems to shiver for a moment, as though the very fabric of the reality is fighting against their presence; and then the infernal roars and everything becomes very solid, very quickly. Like the heat from a furnace, stinking of fel the breath hits with a tangible force and the demonic golem charges forward - the ground rumbling with every step. That trip wire? That line carved into the stone that pulsed and came to life when the last saber past over it? Fel blooms within it like melted metal into a forge, it steams and bubbles and then in the very center of this trap it coalesces, forms up and fires with an ear shattering scream straight into the gun metal sky.

 The warrior grips Winterlance tightly, her eyes jerking to the splintered ground and then to the cathedral of black iron and green fel. Her sight, however, is impaired by the flickering appearance of those vast monstrosities and the honor guard that flanks the vast infernal. The saber beneath her hisses and chivies to the side, bumping into Nythea's Ashen and pulling from her throat the sound of a horrible growl. A trap. The breath hits her with nauseating force, churning her stomach and burning at her eyes. Eraniriel pulls her blade up and speaks, her voice hard as iron and unwavering, defiant even in the face of death. There are eight of them, and though they are mighty they are small and mortal. There are six legion soldiers, and one of them will take the combined might of the group to bring down. Eraniriel knows with a sickness in her stomach that not all of them will make it out of this alive, and so as she speaks she looks to them all, one by one, memorizing those faces and attempting to bolster their confidence and conviction with the sight of her own. "Our objective does not change; through victory or death we will see it done, or we will pave the way for those that come after us, as those who came before us have done." She turns her chiseled face to the charging infernal and raises her sword up high so the moon white runes gleam over them all. It offers nothing to the company beyond what minor comfort glowing runes can. "Bare your blades," she calls loud above the rumbling earth, "and raise them high!" Her voice grows louder with the shout of command and battle, but her words are not frenzied. "Stand your ground - this threat will break apart against us and the moon with rise anew!" She then jabs her heels into Winterlance's sides, and the cat springs forward, sprinting across the black ground like she's chasing game. Her movement is fluid, and her rider too is liquid and gleaming, like a sword taking shape from molten metal. She raises her fierce blade as she slips like silk through the sulfur, rising up in her stirrups mere moments before she's upon the infernal. Her blade strikes the stone boulders of its churning legs with a shattering shower of sparks, and it's a miracle her arm does not break. It's a miracle her blade does not splinter. Turning Winterlance sharply on the spot, Eran spurs her hard after the monstrosity, reaching out to grab a shard of stone splintering off from its leg. The white gold runes leading down that arm begin to glow and then blaze with bright white light, and with inhuman strength granted to her by her armor enhancement, she yanks the shard clean off and follows the motion of fate by driving her blade into the hole the shard leaves, and using that leverage to pull herself from the saddle and cling to the filthy stone of that churning leg.

 No words go up after Eraniriel's own of encouragement - there are none that could do so well to bolster the spirit of the women around her. Even if she has not fought with the twins nor the others strangers in present Eraniriel Snowfall carries a legacy that stretches generations of Kaldorei warriors, and if there is anyone they could follow to their deaths this is the sort of woman that it will be. Just as, if there is anyone to lead to them to such an impossible victory, it will indeed be Eraniriel. There are roars, both from Kaldorei and saber alike as they flood into battle behind their Commander. Naturally the infernal is the largest, most dangerous target so Eran is not the only one among the number of elves to rush it. Kyn'ra goes with her, as do the rogue and the sentinel. Eraniriel strikes the most decisive blow among the bunch, latching onto its leg and as she scales the moving mountain, the warrior has actually, legitimately and perhaps accidentally done excellent work in compromising the soundness of its structure. That moon-guided blade, blessed by the Mother herself carved deep and like a surgeons tool or a torturer's prod it seared clear through the appendage. The infernal roars in what might be agony, might be rage, but one thing is for certain - it cannot quite make up for that lost bit of leg and it throws the entire thing's gait horribly awry. So instead of adding to the battle and doing work of their own, the others in the party are forced to scatter out of the way or get crushed. All the momentum the thing carries is far too much for it to deal with, all while pale white rivulets crack up through the leg from the place that holy sword touched. More of the leg comes loose, the infernal shudders and stumbles and it has lost all control of its own path - it is going to fall, and attempts to correct it, to stave it off; the result is a mad, flaming charge across the plateau with Eraniriel going along for the ride. Just the runes upon the sword, upon the Kaldorei's armor scorch the creature and for a moment Eraniriel is caught in gleaming white light that does not suit the plateau, it flashes and winks and the Eredar and dread-lords alike look on in confusion while her company stares on in wonder. One final slash of the blade, and as Eraniriel predicts the path this creature is going to take she has a heartbeat to kick off of the shell of the infernals back just a half a breath before it has plummeted right off of the cliff and into the rocky sea below. It hits the rocks and explodes, and a gout of felfire goes skyward - sending a shockwave of blistering, wild heat back over Eraniriel and everyone on the plateau. There is a moment when Eraniriel hits the ground, creating a small crater beneath her feet that -everyone- falls still and silent, looking on to this warrior who just singlehandedly destroyed an infernal. Then, the Eredar begin to channel, the smaller of the two very large dreadlords charge and Nythea screams something that may or may not be Eraniriel's name in a tone that may or may not be absolutely ecstatic.

 Breathless from the destruction of the infernal, and the absolutely implausible reality that she, alone, took out one of those massive creatures, she spares not a word for the group watching her, and instead guides them with the edge of her sword. She lifts her blade and points towards the channelling Eredar, keenly aware of how hard her muscles are shaking beneath the plate. None of that shows, however, and within seconds Winterlance is at her side, bumping up against her to urge the warrior back into the saddle. Mounted once more, Eraniriel need barely touch Winterlance to send the saber forward, her mouth open and fangs bared. She flies across the ground, and Eraniriel crouches low over the cat's back, finally finding her voice enough to shout in Darnassian. "Loose your arrows into the Eredar, sisters!" she calls over her shoulder, glancing to the twin archers before turning around once more to the charging demon. Uncurling from her position crouched low over the saddle, she stabs her blade upward so that its moon bright glowing light shines like a beacon in the dark, and she cries a growling, strident, and wordless shout towards the charging demon, urging Winterlance to go wide so that the demon will turn its eyes upon her, leaving its back open for the others to strike it.

#Eran writing #excerpt taken from rp

[theconservativebrief]

The tale of Halloween in Haddonfield, Illinois, has been told and retold: the night in 1963 that an angelic 6-year-old Michael Myers, dressed in a clown suit, brutally murdered his teenage sister, followed by the night 15 years later, again on Halloween, when he broke out of a mental institution in his famously mutilated William Shatner mask to terrorize the virginal babysitter Laurie Strode, a.k.a. Jamie Lee Curtis in the role that would make her the ultimate scream queen.

As Laurie, Curtis has battled the unkillable, silent but single-minded Michael Myers across five of the 11 films in John Carpenter’s Halloween franchise — including the newest entry, a sort-of sequel, sort-of remake directed by David Gordon Green that’s out this weekend.

Of all iconic horror franchises, none is quite as quirky and erratic as this one. Though the original film, Halloween (1978), is Carpenter’s signature film, it’s the only one in the series he directed. He then co-wrote and co-produced a sequel with his collaborator Debra Hill, but their subsequent attempt to keep the series from becoming formulaic would end up sending it meandering off in random, truncated directions.

As a result, where most horror franchises stick to their main story concept and expand it over time, the Halloween franchise keeps getting lost and restarting itself — hence the shaky continuity of the latest film. The only thing we can say for sure about the timeline is that the first two films are paired and occur in sequential order on the very same night. After that, the franchise goes haywire, spinning through one-offs, sequels, and remakes that perpetually overwrite each other.

Of course, this cyclical quality may also be why Halloween is so enduringly popular — you definitely don’t need to have seen every film in the franchise to understand what’s happening, or to enjoy the next one.

Of course, there’s another facet of the series’ enduring popularity that can’t be overlooked, and that’s the cat-and-mouse game between Laurie and horror’s most implacable killer. So if you’re a fan of Michael Myers, you came to the right place: Let us walk you through the movies and tell you which are indispensable for the casual Halloween fan and which are skippable (most of them).

Before we get started: With a franchise this inconsistent, it’s good to establish which parts of the films are consistent. That way, when you brush up on your Halloween movies, it won’t matter if you skip a few. Here are the main rules of the franchise — all of which, unsurprisingly, involve its iconic villain.

1) Michael Myers always wears his mask — and he never, ever speaks.

You rarely see him without his mask in any of the films. The Shatner masks have become the stuff of horror film legend. As for his voice, you only hear him speak in one film in which his childhood is explored — before he became a monster. Beyond that? Nada.

2) Michael is usually credited as “The Shape” and is always referred to at some point as the Boogeyman.

A crediting tradition begun in the first two films and intermittently revived over the years, “The Shape” is back for the 2018 sequel. The Boogeyman has remained a constant.

3) Michael is always obsessed with Laurie Strode or her nearest relations.

The reason for this is revealed in the second film, and all the following films have retained this explanation for their connection.

4) Michael never runs. He always walks slowly after his victims, and he’s never in a hurry.

Part of the terrifying thing about Michael is that he’s surely the most casual serial killer in history. He never picks up the pace beyond a leisurely stroll, and he often seems to be nearly lackadaisical in his attempts to off his prey. Of course, he nearly always gets them in the end.

5) Michael can’t be killed.

This one is obvious, but it bears stating for the record. Throughout the franchise, he will survive multiple gunshots, stabbings, explosions, car crashes, electrocution, being run over, having his skull bashed in, being set on fire multiple times, and (sorta) being decapitated.

Got all that? Great. Let’s go trick-or-treating!

The Shape having some fun.

Tagline: “The night HE came home!”

Is it a trick or a treat? Definitely a treat.

Halloween is famous for lots of reasons. It singlehandedly launched the era of the slasher film. It’s John Carpenter’s debut film, a low-budget indie that made an astronomical profit and launched his career. It’s got one of the most famous film scores and horror themes in history, written by Carpenter himself. It remains an incredibly creepy film, full of lingering and now-iconic shots of its killer stalking through idyllic suburbia, biding his time or casually observing his kills. And, most crucially, it introduced us to one of horror’s most famous villains, destined to be eternally mentioned in the same breath as Freddy and Jason.

Halloween is often credited as being the first example of the slasher subgenre of horror, and for introducing the world to the concept of the Final Girl: the one girl, usually singled out for her virginal qualities, who gets to survive the cinematic massacre of all her counterparts.

Except neither of those things is true. The slash-happy Giallo genre of Italian noir thrillers predates Halloween by about a decade, and two earlier slasher movies gave us the prototypical Final Girls: Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the Canadian cult classic Black Christmas, which were released a few months apart from each other in 1974.

However, Carpenter’s tale did serve to mainstream both the slasher film and the Final Girl, thanks largely to the magnetism of Jamie Lee Curtis as the canny, if mostly helpless, Laurie Strode.

Laurie typified the Final Girl trope from the start: She was “too smart” for boys and dressed like a dowdy homemaker, in contrast to the other girls with their trendy fashion and sexual exploration; in other words, she embodied the kind of chaste virtue that ensured her survival. But Curtis managed to pull off this role with a kind of fierce, gleaming shrewdness beneath the passive exterior — and two decades later, in her return to the franchise after a long hiatus, she would really throw off the helpless act once and for all.

The other main character of Halloween is an unlikely one, but nonetheless a fan favorite: Michael’s zealous therapist Dr. Loomis, played by the ever-zany Donald Pleasence, who would remain the heart of the franchise until his death.

Then there’s the specter of Michael himself, who’s played mainly by the actor (and later established director) Nick Castle. As horror villains go, Michael is ranked very high on the “too unbelievable to be effective” meter, but there’s something truly and indelibly terrifying about him, from the moment he shows up for his first killing spree as a kid, dressed in a Harlequin costume, to the time he returns to skulk silently around Laurie’s suburban neighborhood, dangling a knife and wearing a mask that’s dirty, mottled, and still creepy as hell.

It’s a little-known fact that the Halloween franchise is actually sponsored by jack-o’-lanterns. Universal/IMDB

Tagline: “More of the night HE came home.” (I guess modern horror was still working out how to really market this franchise thing, huh.)

Is it a direct sequel? Yes.

Is it a trick or a treat? For true Halloween fans, it’s a treat, albeit a plodding one.

Halloween 2, also written by Carpenter and Hill, picks up immediately after the first film, still on the same Halloween night. With Loomis leading police all over town looking for Michael, our killer naturally hightails it to the hospital where Laurie is recuperating from her injuries and proceeds to kill everyone on staff in order to get to her. The movie concludes with the shocking revelation that Laurie is Michael’s other sister, born too young to know him and sheltered from the truth all her life — until, of course, her past literally catches up with her on Halloween.

What makes this film notable among the franchise is that it establishes the central conflict of Michael versus the town of Haddonfield itself. Haddonfield is the only “character” that consistently appears throughout the Halloween series (minus the outlier that is the third film), and its relationship to Michael changes in interesting ways over the decades.

As films go, however, Halloween 2 isn’t very good. Laurie is relegated to an even more useless role than in the first film, spending the movie disabled due to her injuries. And even though we’re only on the second film, the murders already feel formulaic and perfunctory; gone are the creatively displayed bodies and carefully arranged murder tableaus, staged to increase the horror for everyone who finds them.

Perhaps because it’s the same night and he’s been on his feet all day running from the law, and, oh, yeah, at some point he apparently absorbed six bullets to the chest and head, in Halloween II Michael’s pretty “whatever” about how the bodies fall. He does get to fake out a really dumb cop by pretending to be dead, though, and he clearly enjoys that bit, so you do you, Mikey.

I’m angry that this still shot makes this film look so much cooler than it is. Universal/IMDB

Tagline: “The night no one comes home.”

Is it a direct sequel? No, it has nothing to do with any other Halloween movie.

Is it a trick or a treat? This movie is a dirty trick on all Halloween fans, but worth checking out just for the weirdness — especially for John Carpenter completists.

After Halloween 2, Carpenter and Hill had a combined vision for the future of Halloween: turn it into a series of anthology films rather than continuing the story of Michael Myers. As such, Season of the Witch, directed and written by Halloween’s production designer Tommy Lee Wallace, has nothing to do with the prior two films apart from recalling a single vague line in the second film about how Samhain, October 31, was a Druidic holiday often accompanied by ritual sacrifice.

Today, we’re used to horror franchises that expand out from their original storylines and go in different directions, thanks to more recent series like Paranormal Activity and The Conjuring. But Season of the Witch lacked any connective tissue with its predecessors and strayed too far from the formula fans had come to expect. In fact, Season of the Witch actually made the original Halloween a movie that exists within its storyline, which totally destroyed any semblance of continuity.

Season of the Witch instead treads a line between Lovecraftian horror and a corporate sci-fi dystopia, planting itself in California instead of Illinois and insinuating a terrifying global Halloween night conspiracy, all originating in a tiny rural company town. Frequent Carpenter collaborator Tom Atkins stars as a middle-aged doctor drawn into the madness after a patient dies at the hands of mysterious suit-wearing shills for a corporation that sells Halloween masks. Yes, that is a real sentence I just wrote.

The film meanders between Atkins’s frequently far-fetched sleuthing and sinister happenings around the factory and its town, while the company owner, a cross between an evil Willy Wonka and Lord Summerisle, oversees all. The whole ridiculous plot comes to a head with about as much incoherence as you’d expect based on everything I’ve just written.

Predictably, Season of the Witch was a box office flop and ended Carpenter and Hill’s hopes of turning the franchise into an anthology series. But then it gradually became a cult classic among horror fans; you can see its influence on modern horror films like Cabin in the Woods, and its fans argue that if it had been a standalone film called Season of the Witch, its reception would have been much different.

Also, the soundtrack to Season of the Witch, again scored by Carpenter, contains a theme titled “Chariots of Pumpkins,” and it is fantastic.

Donald Pleasence reacts to the news that he has to keep making these films. Universal/IMDB

Taglines: “Tonight, HE’S BACK!”; “Michael lives. AND THIS TIME THEY’RE READY!”; “Terror never rests in peace.”

Are they direct sequels? Yes, very loosely.

Are they tricks or treats? TRICKS, don’t be fooled — we watched these films so you won’t have to.

I need to state for the record that Donald Pleasence is a truly great actor. His performance in the Outback horror Wake in Fright is unforgettable. He was a perfect Bond villain. He was nominated for four Tony Awards! But he also loved to chew the scenery, and the middle period of the Halloween franchise gave him plenty to sink his teeth into.

The fourth and fifth films, churned out in 1988 and ’89, attempt to carry on the saga of the Strodes and Michael Myers without Jamie Lee Curtis. A slew of new writers and directors dropped into the franchise, and the fourth film replaced Laurie Strode after killing her off in a car accident, sight unseen, by inventing her 8-year-old daughter, an annoyingly cherubic little girl named Jamie.

Nothing that happens in Halloween 4, 5, or 6 ultimately matters because they’re all generic teen slashers with Spielbergian little kids and a raving Pleasence at their centers, and because the sixth film promptly kills Jamie to make way for a new set of victims (including Clueless-era Paul Rudd) and a whole lot of wacky new plot: Michael apparently fathered a son by his niece Jamie (wtf) while she was being held hostage for, like, a decade (wtf!) in a full-on goth cult(!!!) as part of yet another vast Druidic conspiracy orchestrated by the head of Michael’s sanitarium to mystically implant Michael with superhuman sociopathy, because HALLOWEEN.

But none of that matters either, because Halloween 6 was widely hated, it flopped at the box office, and then its dumb plot was also totally ignored by every other film to follow.

However, one thing that is interesting in these films is the development of Haddonfield as a self-aware character in the tale of Michael Myers. The police force evolves into an overeager, hapless army pitting itself against Michael’s eventual return, while the townspeople, believing he’s finally gone, turn him into a proper urban legend.

The main draw of this misbegotten middle part of the Halloween saga is Pleasance’s Dr. Loomis. Armed only with a pathetic and paltry pistol, Loomis seems to be the only character capable of facing down Michael again and again and surviving to tell the tale. And Pleasence always manages to walk a line between stone-cold sanity and madness that keeps Loomis vulnerable and endearing even at his campiest.

Unfortunately, Pleasence died after filming but before the release of the sixth film, which is dedicated to his memory. And without him, there really was only one other person who could keep the Halloween flame burning.

We stan a scream queen with a kickass haircut and a survivor’s outlook on life.

Taglines: “The night SHE fought back!”; “This summer, terror won’t be taking a vacation.” (This one makes sense when you realize the film was released in August.)

Is it a direct sequel? Yes, as the title implies.

Is it a trick or a treat? Honestly, this one’s a treat.

Director Steve Miner wisely brought Jamie Lee Curtis back to the franchise for H20 by completely ignoring anything that happened in films 3 through 6 aside from the barely mentioned car accident used to kill off Laurie Strode to begin with. Here we learn she faked her own death, moved out to California, and became a prep school head under an assumed identity. Michael tracks her down anyway, just in time for her son’s 17th birthday, and the madness begins again.

Two things are apparent when you watch H20. The first is how much the ’90s did to advance the treatment of women in horror films, and how markedly different adult Laurie is from her tepid, terrified younger self. Though she’s still clearly traumatized from what happened to her, she’s also built an amazing life for herself as an academic and a mother — and now she’s prepared to do battle to keep that life. H20 is the first film where any of the women targeted by Michael, or indeed any of the victims at all, really attempt to fight back instead of just running around in terror for most of the movie. And the film goes a step further by having Laurie choose to stay and confront Michael even when given the opportunity to escape.

The second is how much of an immediate impact Scream had on horror films of the late ’90s. (At one point, the film shows its group of teenagers watching Scream 2 on Halloween night.) H20 is far more character-driven than any of its predecessors, and it pivots around Laurie and her relationship with her son (Josh Hartnett). This is the moment you can see the Halloween producers finally figuring out that horror franchises can be about more than just horror.

Please, let the white dude cosplaying as Samuel L. Jackson tell you everything you need to know about this movie.

Tagline: “Evil finds its way home.”

Is it a direct sequel? Supposedly it’s a loose sequel to H20, but we reject this premise.

Is it a trick or a treat? The WORST TRICK, stay away unless you like kitschy early internet nostalgia and lots of blurry found-footage trickery.

Halloween: Resurrection is so on-trend for summer 2001 that it’s almost worth watching for the cheesy time capsule aspects: the impact of early reality television, the advent of online relationships, and, of course, the way both Scream and Blair Witch Project had led to a trend of so-meta-it-hurts horror films experimenting with found footage and shaky cams. This one sees a bunch of college students watching and cheering on a bunch of other college students — and Busta Rhymes, for some reason — as they invade the old Myers house for a live televised reality show that of course turns into a house of horrors when Michael shows up for some slice-and-dice.

Where is Laurie during all this, you ask? Gone is the assertive survivor Laurie from H20. The film strips her of her new life and plants her in an institution as a result of the ending of that previous film. Then it kills her off within the first 10 minutes, giving the series its low point when she kisses Michael on the mouth and promises to “see you in hell.”

What Resurrection misses completely is that Halloween just isn’t Halloween without Michael battling a specific set of characters. To the extent that Halloween 4-6 worked, they worked because Michael was still pursuing the Strode family and still combating Dr. Loomis. Take away that connection and you’re left with a formulaic slasher movie that no amount of clever stylization can cover.

Taglines: “Evil has a destiny”; “Family is forever.”

Are they direct sequels? No, these are spiritually faithful remakes of both.

Are they tricks or treats? Very sharp treats.

From the emotionally violent opening scene, in which we gradually realize we’re seeing a picture of Michael Myers’s deeply dysfunctional home life before he snapped and went on his childhood killing spree, Rob Zombie’s take on Halloween announces itself as something different, a cut above all the other films in the franchise, bar the first one.

By giving Michael a backstory similar to the ones that often breed real-life serial killers, the film humanizes him and belies the idyllic “terror comes to suburbia” aspect of all the previous films. The film also delves into an aspect of his story that to this point had only been described after the fact: his psychotherapy sessions with Dr. Loomis, here played by Malcolm McDowell. The second film, Halloween II, also extends this interest in psychology to Laurie Strode (played this time by Scout Taylor-Compton), plumbing the emotional and psychological connection between her and Michael.

Like all Rob Zombie films, these are steeped in violence and obscenity, but the deranged atmosphere does more to make Michael feel interesting than all the previous films — he’s both a superhuman killer and a boy plainly driven by the sociological factors that turn people into sociopaths. As horror films go, these are among the better offerings of the aughts’ crop of gritty slashers, à la Wolf Creek. And because it’s still about Michael Myers, it all feels epic and larger than life in a way few of those other films do.

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Of course, we can’t tell you too much about the new film, except to say that it will feel very familiar to Halloween fans. Curtis’s Laurie is back in full-on survivor (and survivalist) mode. And this time, her whole family has to face down Michael with her — whether they’re ready or not.

This version of Halloween pays direct homage to the original Halloween in numerous ways. It expects its viewers to know and love the original film, and to react to its echoes years later. Above all, this Halloween is fully aware of what Halloween films do best: let Michael Myers terrify viewers as he conducts his regularly scheduled eerie rampage through Haddonfield. So prepare to meet the face of pure evil — for the 10th time in four decades.

Original Source -> Halloween: a complete guide to horror’s quirkiest, most erratic franchise

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

[junker-town]

NFL Dad, Week 14: Snow makes everything beautiful, even Colts-Bills

One father tried to watch seven hours of RedZone channel while parenting two young children. Here’s how it went.

The year my daughter was born, the ensuing winter broke me. Newborns have a way of giving first-time parents cabin fever, and a prolonged snowy winter (I remember three separate snowstorms in March) only worsened that feeling. Having kids changed me from one of those people who says, “I like seasons!” to one of those people who says, “I swear to God I’m moving to California.”

It’s three years later, and I’m still in the same dumb place with winter. Occasionally, I’ll pitch a Fermi problem to myself: How many man-hours have my wife and I lost to winter since we had kids? How many cumulative hours have we spent cajoling my daughter to wear her hat? Or outfitting the strollers with those comfy little sleeping bags that keep the kids warm? Or just squeezing them into the boots and jackets and extra layers that the season requires? I figure I’ve lost entire days (weeks?) of my life to swearing under my breath while wrestling little toddler arms into sweaters.

Then it snows. A wet snow, clean and pristine, that sticks to trees but melts in the street. The city’s pace slows, its noise muffled. It’s beautiful.

And my daughter, to whom we’ve read The Snowy Day dozens or maybe a hundred times, picks up a stick and, like the protagonist, uses it to smack a snow-covered tree. When we go back inside, again influenced by the book, she tries to put a snowball in her pocket. I wouldn’t trade the moment for anything in the world.

Except California. I would definitely still rather live in California.

EARLY GAMES, FIRST HALF

— I turn on the games around 1:15 p.m. It’s better to wait a few minutes to let RedZone warm up. At the top of the hour, Scott Hanson is always showing off the Octobox while opposing quarterbacks shake hands and sideline reporters give final updates. I’d rather squeeze in a few extra minutes of parenting, and today it gives me the chance to put my son down for his nap.

— The kids are worn out from my sister and her family visiting this weekend. My nieces are 12 and 8 years old, and they are GODS to my daughter. So on Saturday night we let her stay up 90 minutes later than usual, which gave her a chance to spend time with her cousins and feel like a big girl. The fallout is that she’s cranky as hell today, and not rested enough to communicate her feelings with words.

— Eli Manning gets a raucous standing ovation from the home crowd. The first offensive play for the Giants is an Orleans Darkwa fumble. Erick Flowers recovers the ball, though, which is probably the first Erick Flowers play that Giants fans have appreciated this season.

— Touchdown Josh Gordon! His grab evens the game at 7, and afterwards he sports some sunglasses on the sideline.

Why don’t more players wear sunglasses on the sideline? Everyone looks cooler in shades. (This is rhetorical, I don’t need to be reminded of the NFL’s stentorian uniform regulations.)

— HOLY SNOW IN BUFFALO. YES. GIVE IT TO ME.

watching the game http://pic.twitter.com/smbTyWa2Os

— Jon Bois (@jon_bois) December 10, 2017

The visibility is so poor that the broadcast shows an Adam Vinatieri field goal attempt from the sideline view, rather than the usual view from behind the play. Vinatieri misses, because he’s only the best kicker in NFL history, not a god.

With the miss, the game remains scoreless. This should be a wild ride: I took the Bills as three-point favorites today without realizing that (A) the game would take place in a snow globe or (B) Nathan Peterman is starting for Buffalo. Never bet on anything.

— I read my daughter a book while she poops. Since last week, she filled up her poop chart, so we watched Moana together. It was a hit, of course. But now the poop problem has been flipped: Instead of holding it in for days at a time, she’s eager to squeeze out a poop even when she doesn’t have to go, because she knows she’ll get a chocolate and think it will lead to another Moana viewing, though my wife and I haven’t consented to that yet.

So it takes her 10 minutes or maybe more in the bathroom — time kind of dilates when I’m sitting on the floor of a bathroom encouraging someone to poop — and when we finally emerge, Kareem Hunt scores a short touchdown to put the Chiefs up 10-0 over the Raiders.

— It’s Week 14, which makes it the fantasy football playoffs for three of my four teams, which means I am ready to be filled with regret about every decision regarding a flex spot. Right now that means bemoaning my benching of Duke Johnson, who scores on a shovel pass to give the Browns a 14-7 lead over Green Bay.

(pokes Packers with stick)

— After my daughter goes down for her nap, my body starts shaking with hunger. A cool thing about parenting is tending to every whim of your child while ignoring every fundamental need of your own body. I make myself a grilled cheese because we have no other food in the house. I swear we JUST got groceries. Why have kids when you can invest in locusts?

— LeSean McCoy already has 15 rushes for 97 yards, and seeing him dance through the Colts defense reminds me of the 2013 snow game when he singlehandedly carried the Eagles past the Lions. McCoy’s built a career with jukes, but there’s something more refined about his style in the snow: He tends to make a single, decisive cut, and it devastates defenders. It’s like a pickup game where everyone’s wearing old sneakers, and McCoy’s the only player who brought cleats.

McCoy’s work sets up the first score of the game, a short fade to Kelvin Benjamin, who holds on to the ball as he falls into a snow bank. After the score, six Bills gather around the spot where Steven Hauschka will kick the PAT, which seems ill-advised. Nevertheless, Hauschka’s kick is true, and the Bills take a 7-0 lead.

— My daughter doesn’t want to nap. I explain to her that it’s time to rest, that it’s not time to get up yet. She says no, but I’m firm. As I walk out, she yells, “DADDY! DADDY!” Then she screams it.

I don’t go back in. I am resolute. I am a rock. I have missed a cool Dez Bryant touchdown.

DEZ! #DallasCowboys http://pic.twitter.com/BlOwe31V0B

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

— My wife leaves to get us groceries. With our daughter fighting her nap and our son already asleep for the last 80 minutes, I am definitely going to have to do some actual parenting today. But the other option is we all starve, and I don’t want to hear that much crying.

— With 10 seconds left in the half, Adam Thielen catches a four-yard touchdown on a fade in back corner of end zone with the sun directly in his eyes. It’s an incredible catch, and the Vikings lead Carolina 17-14 at the half.

A few minutes later, I look at scoreboard and the Panthers leads, 14-13. WTF? They overturned it? (shakes fist at sky) CAAAAAATCH RUUUUUUUUUUUULLLLLEEEE!!!

By the way, any time a catch like that gets overturned, some Johnny Mansplainer emerges from his toilet home to be all, “Actually, if you read the language of the catch rule, it’s obviously NOT a catch.” YEAH MAN, WE KNOW THE RULE. IT’S BAD. EXPLAINING THE BAD RULE DOES NOT MAKE IT GOOD.

— My wife has barely been gone when my son wakes up crying. Usually, when he wakes up from a nap, he’ll chirp a little bit but take his time waking up quietly. Not today. “DAD-DEE! DAD-DEE!”

I’m getting tired of this phase where he only wants Dad, and never Mom. Like, it’s great to be wanted, but I’m starting to feel more like an abused personal assistant than a beloved caregiver. Ask for Mom! She gave you LIFE. Show some gratitude, dude.

EARLY GAMES, SECOND HALF

— With my son cuddling next to me on the couch, Cam Newton dances away from pressure on 3rd and seven and flings the ball to Devin Funchess for a touchdown.

.@CameronNewton making a little magic happen! #KeepPounding http://pic.twitter.com/QhXcdHNu6L

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

Cam may struggle with accuracy and consistency, but when he’s at the top of his game, there’s nothing a defense can do. Just tip your cap and take the L.

— Ugh, RedZone just showed the replay of the horrifying fencing response Tom Savage exhibited after a hit. Naturally, he came back into the game five minutes later.

The NFL concussion protocol would of cleared JFK to reenter the parade

— PFTCommenter (@PFTCommenter) December 10, 2017

So now TJ Yates is under center for the Texans, and there’s really only one rule to playing quarterback for Houston: Throw it to Nuk.

Crazy @TJ_Yates pass. Unreal @Deandrehopkins grab. That's six. #Texans http://pic.twitter.com/ljSpNybwpY

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

The touchdown gives the Texans a 16-13 lead, but no lead is safe when Jimmy Garoppolo is on the other sideline. That’s where he was when his team came back from a 28-3 deficit in the Super Bowl. He does his best work there!

— Browns?

The Browns have a two-touchdown lead in the second half for the first time in the Hue Jackson era.

— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) December 10, 2017

Browns!

Yes, it’s the 4th quarter, and Browns lead the Packers 21-7. But it doesn’t last long: Brett Hundley capably leads a drive that ends with a short scamper by Jamaal Williams to cut the lead to seven. There’s still PLENTY of time for the Browns to Browns this up.

— With less than four minutes remaining in Buffalo and the score still 7-0, Jacoby Brissett scrambles for a first down on 4th and six to keep the Colts’ hopes alive. We’re gonna have a fun finish in the snow!

— My son has gotten antsy. After climbing down off the couch, he closes my laptop and says, “All done!” So that’s it, everyone. That’s the end of the column.

No, I join him on the floor for some coloring, although mostly he just takes crayons out of the box and puts them back in. I take game notes on my phone when I can.

— The Bengals are getting OWNED by the Bears today, and MAN would I hate to be a Bengals fan. The sheer breadth of ways that they can disappoint is incredible. Like, being a Browns fan is fine: you just lose. You can insulate yourself from losing when there’s no expectation of success. But the Bengals manipulate their fans with tiny glimpses of success, constructing a grand stage before falling through a trap door of their own design.

I have two friends from the Cincinnati area who grew up Bengals fans. One of them stopped following the NFL this year; he said the best thing about it is not following the Bengals. The other texted me after the Bengals lost that ugly, vicious primetime game against the Steelers: “This is definitely my last year watching NFL. Just can’t watch that shit any more.”

— The Colts score a touchdown somehow (look, I’m parenting, OK?), but a PAT is too risky. Chuck Pagano opts to go for the win, and Jack Doyle catches the two-point conversion. Bills fans throw snowballs at him, probably because the three-point cover is hopeless now.

But wait. There’s a flag on the play, and it’s offensive pass interference. It’s too far to go for two, so the Colts will have to kick after all. And let me just tell you with complete sincerity that this is the most exciting PAT I’ve ever seen in my whole life.

Oh my goodness, @adamvinatieri. Got it! ❄️❄️❄️ #Colts http://pic.twitter.com/mQAhS5jjBe

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

TIE GAME! The Bills can still push with a field goal or cover with a touchdown. GAMBLING IS GREAT, EVERYONE SHOULD DO IT.

— The Vikings have staged an incredible 4th quarter comeback, but Cam successfully unlocked FULL CAM MODE.

.@CameronNewton, are you serious?! Just watch. #KeepPounding http://pic.twitter.com/y8FiDBju91

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

— I haven’t mentioned the Lions-Bucs game at all, so here ya go: With the game tied at 21, the Lions put together a drive that ends with a game-winning 46-yard field goal. You didn’t miss much besides a FAT GUY TD when the Bucs ran a tackle-eligible red zone play.

— DeAndre Hopkins may have had a monster game, but he also fumbles with his team trailing 23-16. The Niners recover and kick a field goal to go up 10. Ballgame.

— With time running out in overtime, LeSean McCoy breaks through for a touchdown, the win, and the cover. SNOW ANGELS FOR EVERYONE.

.@CutOnDime25 in the SNOW... Unstoppable.@BuffaloBills WIN! #GoBills http://pic.twitter.com/WnNmeYQXXc

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

Gotta love a good snow angel http://pic.twitter.com/AD4VHZDl7B

— CJ Fogler (@cjzero) December 10, 2017

— Moments later, Davante Adams scores a walk-off touchdown in Cleveland.

.@tae15adams. For. The. WIN! #GoPackGo http://pic.twitter.com/oxnkqC24yz

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

I know I’ve ridden hard against overtime in this column throughout the season, but these two overtimes gave me extra snow football and the possibility of Aaron Rodgers coming back and running the table to get into the playoffs. I can’t be too mad about it today.

LATE GAMES, FIRST HALF

— Five games on the late docket today: Titans-Cards, Jets-Broncos, and Washington-Chargers have already kicked off, while Seahawks-Jaguars and Eagles-Rams kick off at 4:25 Eastern. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that I probably won’t be taking many notes on those first three games.

Before the last two games start, I leave to take my dog for a walk (It’s my last chance for a clear head before I get mad about the Seahawks). My wife is unloading the dishwasher, and as I exit the front door, I see my son pull a paring knife from the silverware rack. There’s a reason this video went viral:

"let me see what you have.." "a knife" "NOOOOOO" http://pic.twitter.com/hJXO3YpO7Y

— no (@tbhjuststop) September 22, 2017

It is universally relatable to anyone with a son.

— Todd Gurley caps the Rams’ opening drive with a touchdown, and the Eagles respond by stringing their own scoring drive together. Carson Wentz caps it off with a short pass to Zach Ertz.

— While my wife prepares dinner for the kids, she hits the nuclear parenting button: She plays “How Far I’ll Go” from Moana on repeat. Now, I listen to the entire soundtrack from start to finish almost every day, but this is madness. We make it through the song three times in a row before she advances the playlist to “You’re Welcome.”

When my daughter and I watched the movie, she got upset when the credits came on the screen. “I can’t see Moana! I can’t see Maui!” I had to explain to her that the movie was over: Moana led her people on new voyages, and Maui went off to have other adventures.

It didn’t soothe her at all. She got up off the couch and started to walk away. As she started to turn the corner for her bedroom, she stopped and turned to me with her eyebrows raised. “Daddy, can we talk about it?” Wait ‘til I tell her about the internet.

— The Chargers are cruising. They already lead by 10, and they just picked Kirk Cousins, which leads to another field goal.

— Here are all of the notes I took when Josh McCown threw an interception with the Jets trailing 10-0:

Jets-Broncos: no

— Trailing 20-6 and facing 4th and four, Kirk Cousins has a receiver open but the ball falls off his fingertips, just out of reach. This isn’t Washington’s day.

— My daughter throws a tantrum at dinner table that is wholly the result of her exhaustion. She refuses to eat and demands that my wife turn off “Despacito.” BEFORE THE CHORUS. Come on! Can you just let your parents LIVE for four minutes?

— Trey Burton scores his second touchdown of the game to put the Eagles up 21-7. I like to make fun of Doug Pederson’s golf wig, but the Eagles went for it on 4th and one when they could have settled for a field goal on this drive. They have an aggressive game plan, and they’re executing it well.

— Before I had kids, diapers were the thing I feared most about parenthood. Which is stupid, because the thing you end up fearing most is entire world and your own mortality. Diapers are fine.

That said, I just changed a diaper filled with the scent of death and campaign promises. I’ve changed several diapers almost every day for more than three years, and there’s about one per year that makes me gag. This was it. A tip of my biohazard hood to my son for that one.

— Russell Wilson takes a deep shot to Doug Baldwin that gets picked by Jaelen Ramsey. Can’t say that I thought Wilson would throw an INT in this game before Blake Bortles, but hey, sometimes you have to ignore the tape and challenge one of the best cornerbacks in football by throwing a jump ball to a 5-foot-11 receiver.

— I play with the kids as Seattle finally puts a drive together at the end of the half. It’s a totally cliché act of dad-ness, but I chase them around as the Tickle Monster. In moments like this, fatherhood feels less like something I do as an individual and more like a series of shared experiences. I am Everydad.

Oh, and Blair Walsh misses wide right on 38-yarder in perfect conditions. The Seahawks trail 3-0 at the half. No problem, Seattle gets the ball first in the second half.

LATE GAMES, SECOND HALF

— My wife has the kids in the bath, and I take the opportunity to change out of my Seahawks t-shirt. Gotta change up the juju! When I come back out of my bedroom, it’s 30 seconds into the second half and — wait. Why do the Jaguars have the ball? AW HELL, RUSSELL.

Et maintenant c'est AJ Bouye qui intercepte Russ ! #Jaguars http://pic.twitter.com/hRK6l1em8n

— NFL France (@FirstDownFR) December 10, 2017

That interception leads to a Dede Westbrook touchdown, and the Seahawks trail 10-0. (I find that French commentary helps me deal with an opponent making highlights at my team’s expense.)

By the way, I have three Seahawks jerseys, four Seahawks tee shirts, and a Seahawks hoodie, and none of them are the prototypical “lucky” piece of fan gear. Every single one of them has been taken off at halftime after 28 minutes of ineffective running plays on 2nd and 10 before a two-minute drill to set up a field goal attempt.

— The Chargers get a short rushing TD following a flea flicker bomb to Keenan Allen. That makes it 30-6, Chargers, and I can happily ignore this one the rest of the evening.

— I have come to grips with a Seahawks loss, so I crack a beer to celebrate giving up. Wilson immediately hits Baldwin deep beyond the double coverage. An absolute dime of a throw, but the Jags defense stiffens, and Seattle settles for the field goal. Stupid Seahawks. Just lose! Stop trying to make me invested in this game.

— I help get the kids out of the bath and into their pajamas. I give my son his milk and read him “Where is the Green Sheep?” Sammy Watkins scores on a short pass play to cut the Eagles lead to 24-21, and my son hands me the book again. He wouldn’t sit through an entire book for the first year and a half of his life, and now he wants a reprise? It’s not even CLOSE to one of Mem Fox’s best books. “Seep, Seep,” he says. Oh, fine.

— RedZone cuts back to Jacksonville, where it’s 10-10. Wait, how did Seahawks score? What happened? I don’t get to enjoy the tie game, because the play is a 75-yard catch and run to Keelan Cole.

— I take an antihistamine, because sneezing fits are dangerous at my age. You can throw your back out sneezing, dislocate a rib. Getting old is the pits.

I come back to the TV and the Rams have taken the lead, 28-24. I only see a brief close-up of the guy who scored entering the end zone. It was a skinny player with a jersey number in the 20s. Did Carson Wentz throw a pick-6? That hardly seems possible.

Luckily, Twitter is always there for me*:

BLOCKED PUNT ALERT! And the @RamsNFL turn it into SIX! #LARams http://pic.twitter.com/CdxONvXdbg

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

*Twitter is always there for everyone, waiting to ruin your day. I deleted it from my phone, and the quality of my life improved dramatically.

— RedZone shows the Seahawks punting, and my blood runs cold. RedZone only ever shows a punt for three reasons, and two of them would be bad for me:

Huge return

Blocked punt

Returner muffs kick

It’s option 1: The Jags returner gets tackled at the 1-yard line, and Leonard Fournette punches it in on the next play.

I am only just learning that Bobby Wagner is out of the game with a hamstring injury. The Jags have scored three touchdowns on the three plays he’s been off the field. Cool. Cool cool cool.

— With the Cardinals leading 9-7, Marcus Mariota gets picked off, leading to an Arizona field goal. This is already too much information about this game.

— Carson Wentz gets hit hard while scrambling in for a touchdown, but there’s holding on the play, so it doesn’t count. Four plays later, he throws a touchdown on 4th down to Alshon Jeffery, who makes an incredible catch.

He caught it! This TD grab by @TheWorldof_AJ gives the @Eagles the lead! #FlyEaglesFly http://pic.twitter.com/6dOWB4Ne5m

— NFL (@NFL) December 10, 2017

The Eagles lead 31-28, and this game is delivering SO HARD.

— My daughter’s sitting on the toilet before bed, again convinced that she can poop even though she just did it a few hours ago. She wants to count all of the hearts on a house in a book, and she nails the first baker’s dozen. Then: “Thirteen, fifteen, eleventeen… Daddy, you can count the rest.”

I come back to the TV after putting the kids to bed, and the Rams are back in front, 35-31. Carson Wentz is limping into the tunnel, and Erin Andrews reports something with a look of gravity. It would probably be useful if I listened to RedZone with the sound on, instead of a playlist of Christmas music.

— The Seahawks, by dint of a bomb to Tyler Lockett bomb and a subsequent defensive stop, will get the ball back with a chance to win the game. They absolutely have no business being in this game.

— Chris Long gets to Jared Goff for a sack-fumble, and the Eagles get the ball with short field down 35-34. Time for Nick Foles to do some handoffs!

— The Seahawks don’t get an obvious call, and their drive stalls before it can really threaten the Jags. Then there are fights and ugliness that I don’t care to explain, defend, or even really think about.

— Sometimes I get sick of RedZone by the end of the day. When there are only one or two games still in play, RedZone’s assault of highlights I’ve already watched feels drains what energy and attention I have left. I’d rather have the steadiness of one booth calling a single game, cutting to commercials I can tune out.

So I click over to FOX for the last bit of Eagles-Rams, where the Rams’ last-ditch attempt to score via rugby laterals ends up as a defensive score for Brandon Graham. It’s a Pyrrhic victory for Philadelphia, which tightens its control on a playoff bye but loses its star quarterback to a torn ACL. The sky darkens over the L.A. Coliseum and the surrounding wildfires, creating a palette of red and purple that awes the fans.

Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

It isn’t beautiful the way that snow football is, but it doesn’t need to be to inspire awe. In a way, it’s all the same: The sun sets, snow melts, bodies are broken, and everything beautiful comes to an end.