fanning the flames

The way Murderbot Book Seven really went "The Power of Friendship? WRONG. The power of Media Consumption" 🤣🤣🤣

#Ratthi: and ALSO the power of friendship #ART: Ratthi raises a strong point. You are disregarding prior experience #MB: I'm not talking to either of you right now

it's gauche to peer review your own tags but whatever it goes with the previous post <3

you know what i'm gonna get sappy for a second bear with me

there are a lot of posts and memes for writers about how hard writing is and how annoying it can be and how dispiriting it can feel when we don't make progress the way we'd like to. and those are true, and relatable, and funny! i've been there!

but maybe it doesn't get said enough in the other direction, so I'm gonna say it: I love writing. i love the process of putting phrases together and testing them for cadence and flow; i love knowing that there is a word for exactly the thing I want to convey, even if I just can't think of it right now, and going onto a thesaurus and being like there she is, that's the one!

but more than anything, I love the ritual of constantly asking myself "okay, and then what happens?" and feeling the same sense of delighted surprise every single time when somehow, a part of me I wasn't consciously aware of knows the answer. that experience, where my brain provides me solutions I didn't know it was working on, feels like a miracle every time. and getting into a productivity groove where I keep knowing the answers is one of the best feelings on the planet.

and sure, sometimes I don't know the answer, and it's hard and unsatisfying and see above about how easy it is to joke about how writing's the pits, but... that just makes it even more special when I'm firing on all cylinders, you know?

anyway, yeah. w r i t i n g.

Writing is magical. Sometimes you feel blessed, sometimes cursed, but nothing beats chaining together words and producing feelings as a result.

Insane things that Will did that make him much worse than Hannibal:

come into my cargo hold, i totally believe you’re a free robot trying to return home. i could melt your brain btw. you’re lucky to be alive. can i watch your tv

goat fight. non-negotiable.

#LISTEn listen most marvel fights feel so contrived and fake and like la-dee-da-superhero#but this one was REAL and had me on the edge of my seat and still does#partially bc of the street clothes not costumes#partially because steve is fighting 1 on 1 and gets stripped of his shield quick#and he has to show like his physical combat skills#and the ACTING on both their parts.. fucking ace#esp chris evans tho like his face looks PANICKED how often do u see captain fucking america panicked??#anyway in this essay i will (tags via @asterlark)

I think it’s also very important that this is a fight in which the characters *actually interact with their environment* in a way that feels real. Like, yes, have superpowers but there’s no cartoon physics involved, no obvious sense that this was filmed on an empty set with a greenscreen and the background was added later, or that they’re filming without even the people they’re fighting being present, just ‘look over here and make a hand gesture’. The shield gets stuck in a car, there’s that awful moment of the knife sliding along the side of the van that cues up with the mounting tension in the soundtrack. Bucky’s arm impacts the pavement and actually dents it, etc. They’re jumping over/behind the cars and getting thrown into them/into the pavement in a way that feels more visceral than just ‘whoosh there was a wire & we CGI’d in the rest’. t has a sense of real world space to it, and that adds to the feeling of real world stakes.

This is one of the few fight scenes I can recall seeing that makes a little knife look like a real threat. Like I am legit scared for Steve when that thing darts in, because he’s not wearing armor and it really feels like the WS could open him up like a can. I feel like movie fight scenes don’t usually hit that note with knives.

not enough stories go for the lycanthropy-as-menstruation angle tbh. sure I see plenty of "time of the month" jokes but there's so much unexplored potential. scatterbrained werewolf feeling cranky and exhausted for no discernible reason before checking their phone and seeing the "your transformation is in two days" notification like "oohh right. the horrors." werewolf girl losing her whole mind trying to excuse herself from a function so she can go transform but noooo she can't just say that's what she has to do because it's "impolite" or whatever and she has to keep making vague excuses with weird euphemisms. werewolf guy having an awkward conversation with an acquaintance who keeps talking about the divine lycanthropic and the mystic properties of the wolf and moon, and like, he's not going to tell them that their relationship with their own transformations is wrong, but for him it's just this kind of annoying kind of painful thing he needs to deal with sometimes? and it feels weird elevating this basic bodily function of his to something quasi religious?

@thenightfolknetwork

just a bit of goat-dad eskel (not my design) and sassy ART/perihelion (my design)

love the way the quote turned out as a transparent sticker - you can order one, toooooooo

Also love how Murderbot is like "ART doesn't like violence, it just likes to get its way". "My bestie doesn't enjoy murder, just manipulating people to get what it wants."

Truly a morally grey girlboss (no gender).

In fantasy/sci-fi worldbuilding, I am so delighted when the author takes the opportunity to do some gender fuckery. And the more books I read that do this, the more I’m like, yes of course! You’re making up a whole civilization—why wouldn’t you fuck around with gender?

One of the best shot of Total Solar Eclipse from 08-04-2024.

Via @nasa-official

HEY NOW

Concept: Vampire/werewolf wives, but the werewolf is a hyper-femme with purse dog energy and the vampire is a leather butch.