Phantom of the Opera but with lesbians

sign me the fuck up

Will Takarazuka Revue’s all-female production of Yeston and Kopit’s Phantom suffice?

S I G N 👏 M E 👏 T H E 👏 F U C K 👏 U P

GAY POWER MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE ACTIVATED.

If you like that I highly suggest you should check out Wao Yoka as Dracula.  Not only is she a great female Dracula but she’s one of the best Draculas period.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cN-CPrEuuJY

It’s in Japanese but the refrain there is essentially

“It’s over. It’s over. The battle’s done. Why don’t you just surrender to me? You can see I have won.”

@catpella I feel like we should hunt these down and watch them

8 Character Creation Tips (for DnD or just writing in general)

1. Have a goal

While it may sound like I’m stating the obvious here, your character needs to have something they want to accomplish. Maybe they want to be the best at something, see a place, fall in love, conquer the world, or something else. Whatever it is, they need to have something that they desire beyond all other things. Ideally, give them more than one goal. Make them have to sacrifice one to achieve the other, to add extra drama

2. Have a reputation

Maybe they’re the best artist in their class or they’re great at juggling. Perhaps they slipped on the stairs in front of their whole village. Either way, give something for the locals to remember about them. That way it can give you a starting point for the interactions with other characters

3. Have a friend

Whether a friend, a coworker, a sibling, an army buddy, or someone they saved, have someone close to your character whom they’re close to and wish well. Yeah, angsty “I have no friends” characters can be fun, but in small doses; eventually the reader gets fed up with them. At the very least the character needs someone to talk to or bounce ideas off of

4. Have a home

It may be a neighborhood they grew up in, their parents’ house, or a room they’ve been renting in a tavern. Hell, it could even be a person if you so choose. Everyone needs to feel secure at one time or another

5. Have a signature item

Now, recognize that this may not work for EVERY character, but it’s up to you to decide what will fit and what won’t. In many cases, it can work. A signature item is something that is recognizably YOUR CHARACTER’S, be it a weapon, a scarf, a toy, or a piece of jewelry. It’s something that makes them feel like themself

6. Have a problem

This should be something other than the problem addressed in the main plot line. Maybe a member of their family is sick, they are broke, or they’re failing their classes. This helps make your character seem more realistic because NO ONE has one problem at a time

7. Have a secret

This can affect the plot or not; either way, it helps make your character more well rounded. Maybe your character can’t read, left their crewmates to die when a kracken attacked their ship, or made their long lost sister run away. If you choose to have it affect the plot in any way, this secret should embarrass your character, make it so that other characters don’t trust your character, or somehow endanger them and the people they’re close to if found out

8. Have a reason to be brave and to fight

Maybe it’s because your character wants to be like their hero, maybe it’s so they can repay a debt (like if someone saved their life previously), maybe it’s for their child, but your character needs to have a reason to occasionally face their fears

Have fun!!!

I understand that this is meant to be simple, but GOSH DANG, is it so helpful! This came at the perfect time for me, as I am in the process of creating characters both in the realm of fictional writing and tabletop roleplaying. I’ve been seriously struggling with one of my characters for a long time now and always felt something was missing. Only now do I realize - I had all of these, except for a secret! Well, I gave him a secret to keep, but not one that would make him fearful, embarrassed, or ashamed! And what point is there in a secret without a price attached to it’s exposure? There was no cost, no blow to his own worth or self-esteem or ego, to keeping that secret from his friends and allies. Now I know I need to sit down with my DM and work out where to interweave a potential secret into the plot. 

Thank you for this, OP! May it genuinely help all of my followers as it has helped me.

More excellent character-building advice. I know the hardest thing I’ve ever had to get across to players is to have a goal, some reason beyond “being in the game” that their character is adventuring.

ah yes, my favourite foreign language feel, “I know what all of those words mean individually but not together like that”

not to forget its twin “i know (roughly) what you’re saying, but what are those words?”

Plus the secret triplet “I managed to get your drift but I don’t know how to answer you”.

I keep thinking about that post about the whole genre of movies about a white guy getting into an asian philosophy, matrial art etc and then proceeding to surpass his teacher and be the best ever at it, and I started thinking about the opposite of it.

 I want a movie about a chinese dude who comes to Finland, downs an entire bottle of Koskenkorva, tries to fight a nearby cow and ends up lying face down in a ditch while sobbing about his ex wife and having like 5 finnish dudes staring at him in awe like

 “That’s him. That’s the chosen one.”

This is for all y’all who don’t understand how terrifying these suckers are. 

OHMYGOD IT’S ATTACKING THE STATUE OF LIBERTY SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING

I know just the man for the job.

This is a good joke. This is such a solid, quality joke.

@explainingthejoke ?

The initial image is a size comparison between the statue of liberty and a wind turbine. The wind turbine is over ninety feet (about 28 meters) taller.

A commenter pretended to misinterpret the image as one of a wind turbine attacking the statue of liberty. The next commenter answered with an image of Don Quixote, a literary character who once thought a windmill was a monster and announced his plans to fight it. They are joking that if a wind turbine attacked the statue of liberty, Don Quixote would be willing to fight the wind turbine.

Incidentally, that scene led to the English idiom “tilting at windmills,” meaning a person who has not only disproportionate reactions of anger, but disproportionate reactions of anger to nonexistent challenges.

So all those people who are fighting to preserve coal jobs and the fossil fuel economy are….

actually…

tilting at windmills.

I feel like this is one of the very few times where explaining the joke leads to another one that everyone can now understand and laugh at

Monster Stand-Up Comedy by Lee Gatlon

Me playing Pokemon 10 years ago:

Oh man if only pokemon was real I WOULD BE THE VERY BEST my fucking overlevelled team of 6 dragons eats these pussy-ass NPC youngsters for breakfast, I would be a fucking GODDESS among men, I would tame the fiercest legendaries of every region and scale the ranks of every league and maybe one day when I’m older even settle down somewhere and open my own gym-

Me playing pokemon now:

Dude how amazing would it be to just. .. own a tiny house somewhere near the Kalos flower fields. Have my Poliwrath help me water my crops. I wish I could wake up and comb my alolan Dugtrio’s mane before I start the day…. My Sunfloras may not be that great in battle but look how happy they are, greeting the first morning light…!

Hey is that a young trainer coming this way? His team looks tired, I bet one of my freshly-baked Tropius banana pies could heal ‘em right up… he’ll probably need this TM more than I do, too…

you either die the hero or live long enough to see yourself become the NPC

tumblr’s relationship with Natalie Dormer

@catpella

Rule one of fandom: there are some things that only exist for us.

Don’t send actors fics

Don’t give them explicit art ever

Don’t tag them in rpf questions or theories

Don’t try to bring them into fandom drama of any kind

Don’t hold them responsible for what the producers and writers decide

They’re still people.  They have private lives, which do not include fandom.

louder for the people in the back!

For fandoms that don’t have actors? Don’t do this to the content creators either.

Don’t bring them your discourse about characters.

Don’t bring them into your shipping wars.

No matter how much interaction they have with fans, they aren’t your friend. They are the content creator and you are the fan.

Yes, hold the people responsible for writing and creating content responsible for things that are racist, misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic, classist, etc. And encourage them to do better.

Do not expect them to cater to your desires regarding character arcs and canon ships.

There are actors and some content creators, especially in film, who adore fandom and think it’s all wonderful.

THEY WILL FIND US.

You don’t have to send things to them. The fact that fanfic and fanart exist are no longer fringe-group secrets. Everyone in the entertainment industries know that fanworks exist. You don’t have to tell them. You don’t have to tell them that some of it is explicit; you don’t have to tell them that a lot is not. You don’t have to show them that some is adorably cute.

If they’re interested, they’ll seek it out. Don’t inflict fanworks and fandom drama on them; you don’t know what squicks them, what reminds them of some personal trauma - and what they are contractually, legally required not to acknowledge. (Or what they are legally required to report to someone else, which is worse.)

If they like fandom, they can find it. You don’t have to let them know it’s here, and you don’t know enough about their tastes to recommend “the good stuff.” 

A quick sketch

Pls enjoy

((click for better quality))

(this is directed at burr if you can’t tell)

Momentarily reviving an old meme, because I’ve been listening to a lot of Hamilton lately while I work and this just popped into my head listening to Obedient Servant.

I’m really hoping nobody beat me to this  :’D

Good morning gremlin. (Sound up for Harlan’s…umm…meows, I guess.)

That’s a squeaktoy that went through the washing machine but kinda still works

Someone else on tumblr pointed out that PASSENGERS might have been a more meaningful movie if it was about just THE ONE person dealing with being alone on the ship for the rest of their life.  And if, to cope, they go through and make it a point to learn everything they can about all of the other people on the ship.

And I just keep thinking about this idea.

There are 4999 other people on that ship and what if the protagonist spent the remainder of their life (and they do live their full life) learning about each of them.

They took an interest in their hobbies so that they could have some sort of connection to them.

As their sanity flexed in an effort to cope, they could have had these really involved imaginary conversations with the crew about their interests. And by the end of their natural life they will have known everything they could have ever known about these other 4999 people.

…

AND THEN THE REST OF THEM WAKE UP. And they have some 90 odd years of security footage of this one crew member talking to each of them in turn. And it goes far beyond ‘I have figured out how to cook that one dish you were struggling with’ or ‘I have read THE SILMARILLION at your suggestion and Jesus Christ I have thoughts about it.’

They actually start making connections between all of the crew.

Like ‘You like bugs! You should totally talk to Cindy! She’s an entomologist!’

Or ‘Did you know that you and Said’s grandfathers were both in the same infantry?’

Or ‘You and Jamie are both avid bee keepers and I think you need to meet.’

Or ‘I know you’re really struggling with this, but Aneesha said she went the exact same thing and I think talking to her can help.’

And because all of these crew members are watching the videos that have been individually addressed to them (Because why not? They’re colonizing.  There’s not a lot yet available by way of entertainment) they sort of start talking to each other at the Protagonist’s suggestion.  And within a year they are THE MOST unified interconnected colony of any of the colonies because this one crew member broke the ice for them a lifetime ago.

Several of them are engaged.

Two are about to have children named after the Protagonist.

…

AND BECAUSE EVERYONE KNOWS EVERYONE NOW they notice when one week a crew member isn’t out and about and no one can get in touch with them.  So finally somebody goes to check and they find them huddled in a ball and mourning.

Because Protagonist is dead.

And the other people are like: ‘Yes. We know.  This is literally the first thing we knew about them.’

But Mourner is like: ‘You don’t understand. I got to the end.’

And then everyone realizes that the mourner has basically been BURNING through all of the videos Protagonist has addressed to them and got to the last one they made to them before they died. And Protagonist left a final message for each of them.

Suddenly everyone’s having a real frank conversation with themselves about how fast they’re going through their videos and if they’re prepared to keep going at that rate and get to the end, or if they should put it off indefinitely.

And one by one, in time, each of them realizes they can’t put it off.  Not only are they invested in the end, but they care enough about Protagonist to really acknowledge their death.

Each crew member does this at their own pace.  It becomes a rite of passage of sorts. And Protagonist is given some sort of proper memorial so the colonists all have a place to go when their time comes to grieve.

…

BUT BEFORE EVERYONE GETS TO THE END, someone has started noticing how Protagonist treated the robots on the ship over the years. And surprise, surprise, Protagonist named all the robots too and treated them like individuals depending on their quirks.  So now someone has finally solved the mystery of why droid 808 insists on being called ‘Bob,’ and why 239 knows ASL, and why the auxiliary robots are so salty about nobody ever being able to tell them apart.

Not only that, but security logs shows that the robots were about 19% more efficient when Protagonist was alive than they are now.  And THE VERY SECOND the rest of the crew starts observing the same habits Protagonist used in treating these robots ALL OF THAT EFFICIENCY COMES RIGHT BACK.

Because they missed Protagonist too.

…

And things settle.  Everyone thinks they’ve reached the end of Protagonist’s surprises.

…

THEN THEY ARE FINALLY ABLE TO START TRANSPORTATION BETWEEN THEMSELVES AND THE OTHER COLONIES.

And a visiting party shows up.

The visitors are surprised to see HOW WELL everyone on this colony is getting along, because, wow, people are civil where they come from but GODDAMN.

And one of these visiting members is really excited to see their sibling. 

And ‘Oh, that’s so nice!  Who is it?’

And then the visiting member says a name every single person on this colony knows.

The colonists have to tell them what happened to their sibling, Protagonist.

But they also HAVE to tell the sibling what knowing Protagonist MEANT to them. And what Protagonist knowing THEM, meant to them.

And it’s sad.

The colony pretty much wholesale adopts Protagonist’s sibling as a part of their family because they don’t know what else they can do to fill that void.  But just in case, they give the Protagonist’s sibling THE ENTIRETY of Protagonist’s security footage.  Because there is 90 years of it and that way they can carry their sibling with them for the rest of their life even if only in video.

And then the colonists think:

‘This. This was the end of Protagonist’s story. And this was a good a proper way to observe it.’

…

AND THEN ONE DAY A SHIP SHOWS UP THAT IS NOT LIKE ANY SHIP THE COLONISTS HAVE EVER SEEN.

And the people driving it aren’t human.

They speak English and passable French.  They can chicken scratch Urdu, Mandarin, and Swahili.

Everyone is stunned and wants to know ‘why…?’ and ‘how…?’

And the aliens are just, like, ‘Oh. Protagonist.  We ran into them while you were in space. They told us you’d be settling here and asked that we check up on you whenever we were rolling by this quadrant next.’

‘They were really nice. Taught us English. Gave us the files on a couple of your other popular languages as well just to be safe. How’s the colonizing going anyway?’

And everyone thinks back to THAT ONE MONTH of security footage where Protagonist was NIGH IMPOSSIBLE to find.  And when they finally did come back to their normal routine they were really quiet and thoughtful for about a week before really getting back to themselves.

The linguists all suddenly remember that IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THAT REALLY WEIRD MONTH, Protagonist had a new coded language saved to their personal affects and was very insistent that they LEARN IT.  ‘FOR REASONS.’

And very quietly, the entire colony makes peace with the fact that Protagonist established a very successful first contact while they were all asleep.

Because of course they did.

scottish twitter strikes again

In a shitty society that is built on taking as much as you possibly can and giving as little as you possibly can, compassion is punk-rock as hell.

^^^LOUDER