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voiceofsword · 1 year

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every1 that voted rinne as worst husband is so wrong... its literally canon that he cares SO much and fakes his insane persona hes just awkward and embarassed when he gets noticed

i have so many things i can say about this but im really bad at words but theyre stewing around in my brain explodes

what were your thoughts?

i do agree with the ones that mention niki haha those are true rinne is absolutely smitten but the ones that say its like. because hes rinne amagi. and others thay were probably filtered out by the OP... people that either didnt read the main story or just dont want to look further lmao

(cracking my fingers) okay. this may or may not be long. i fear you have struck a bit of a nerve with this (NOT YOU but just as like. a general statement. i feel like u dont know what ur asking. but that is ok)

this whole thing might seem really aggressive at times bc this situation did get me a little heated... plz keep that in mind going in! AGAIN IM NOT ANGRY AT YOU ANON ILY AND THANK YOU FOR ASKING you just happened to ask abt smth i feel very sourly about – not the poll itself but the answers to it – but i tried to be as. tactful as i possibly can while talking abt this

overall im very disappointed in a lot of the answers given for the voting so ive stayed off twitter almost all day today and yesterday. i fear like with stuff like this a very silent population of eng side shines through, the one that specifically Doesnt actually engage with the story and goes off fanon interpretation. look, im not saying its necessarily a bad thing. but when it comes to stuff like this, where people grossly mischaracterize a grand majority of charas or narrow them down to be the butt of a joke, or use it as an excuse to be plain racist/ableist, i feel like people really need to reassess where all of this is coming from. like. not rinne, but KANAME couldnt even be included because the answers used for his votes were, in their majority, apparently ableist, and op (definitely in the right, i think this was the right choice to make) chose not to post at all because they feared the qrts would be just as bad. because for some reason people seem to think that because they're fictional characters that being ableist is somehow ok, that saying they would "pull the plug" on charas like him and eichi is fine because theyre not real people – as if there werent disabled or chronically ill people in this fandom, in every fandom, or hell, around you?

and lets not mention tatsumi and people blatantly misinterpreting his christianity as something he would force upon others – first of all, western christianity does not apply to tatsumi. at all. i understand that people might find it easy to just associate him with that and make "haha, he would make me convert" or "haha he would be a homophobe" quips, and obviously its not necessary to have extensive knowledge on kirishitan history in japan and how they are, to this day, a minority that was persecuted for a lot of japan's modern history. LIKE, EVEN FROM HIS DIALOGUE IN ANY STORY.. when has he given off that impression? cite your sources, he's literally one of the most inclusive and accepting charas in the whole cast! not a prejudiced white christian middle aged mom...

i think that if you absolutely must reduce a character to tasteless jokes, stereotypes that arent even funny to begin with, and you refuse to even read the source content at all to correct yourself, you really need to think about how you engage with any media, not just enstars. if you want to look at the pretty characters just say that! but dont be like this, and don’t speak on things you don’t fully understand as if you did just to make a point or be funny!

OKAY RINNE SORRY LOL i hate it. i hated all of it and judging by the ratio many people seemed to dislike it as well (god bless!). if you havent seen it i wont link it bc tbf i dont feel like looking at it again (peace and love) but the answers summed up are like "oh he would steal my money" "hes selfish and would take stuff from me and not gaf about my wellbeing" "hes married to niki already" the last one being the only one i agree with. and it makes me think about a lot of issues with how a good portion of the fandom sees rinne. ive seen a lot of people read rinne in bad faith, regardless of whether theyve read main story, hot limit or any story rinne is in. and i dont get it, genuinely. YES he can be upsetting! he can be an asshole, he can be rude, he DOES steal money from niki! but these people neglect to see or mention that he gives it back and then some. they fail to talk about how he spends a lot of his time trying to make niki see his self worth!! since hiiro was BORN he's been trying to get him to understand that he's deserving of love!! that YES he can be a dick but ultimately treats crazy:b and his friends with love and wants what's best for them! these are the same ppl that think he's abusive or something idk i can only assume. like yeah rinne has a carefully crafted persona where hes a complete dickhead and ig some players cant really bother to see past that act

unfortunately rinne himself is built on a few harmful stereotypes of ainu culture irt the drinking, being portrayed or viewed as more 'uncouth' by other characters, etc which is why the initial more explicit ties to ainu culture were removed altogether from his and hiiros design and background. it is understandable, which is for example why it's not really my place to say whether he can be interpreted as ainu or not, and even so, i try not to rely on those aspects of him because it still veers into sensitive territory. and its an unfortunate part of his character, but undeniably, rinne amagi DOES drink, (he's one of the only characters in main cast of drinking age anyway) does partake in harmful behaviors, but fsr suddenly that means hes nothing but a drunkard, to a lot of people. when reading rinne you really have to take these things and ofc, consider that theyre relevant to his character, but it's not all there is...? in the slightest..? there used to be a tweet thread explaining this link further but it's either been taken down or the account has been locked. either way, just a bit of googling goes a long way. i'd rather not go into too much detail here because i don't feel informed enough beyond pointing these issues out, and i personally feel like it's not really my place. if anybody wants to add onto this post to cite more specific sources please feel free

he's such a fun loving, cunning, caring guy who helps people get jobs (dance of the white tiger), who volunteers to play with kids at a daycare (asobi), and wishes so badly to become an idol and grant everyone the same opportunities if theyd like to be, as well (main story, sudden death SUDDEN DEATH IS MY FAV STORY AFTER HL BUT THE TL IS DOWN....SORRY. but i really really think it's one of the most important ones when it comes to rinne's character and motivations. also if u can read it in app it's even better bc it's voiced and theres a line where he's like "oh this guy's [niki] is engaged to me" when talking to kohaku's sister AND HE SOUNDS FULLY SERIOUS TOO....)

don't get me started on people who dumb him down as if he wasn't one of the most clever characters in the game. and unknowingly, people that continue to make rinne's character out to simply be a gambling flirty drunkard who doesn't know how to control himself, as if there weren't other facets of him – they lean into stereotypes, bordering on racism, even if its not malicious or theyre not aware. and it makes me so sad. a lot of the time these interpretations are spread around and then liking characters like him becomes some sort of moral debate, esp in current fandom (which is one of the reasons i think this stereotyping? happens? b/c ive found that fandom sometimes has the tendency of grabbing characters and mischaracterizing them so BADLY that liking them makes you a bad person..? not necessarily villains either! i promise it's okay to just dislike characters without making stuff up!)

that aside also suggesting he'd be an awful, neglectful spouse is simply incorrect. i very firmly believe that if rinne is devoted, he will drop every vice, every pretense, to make the other person happy. he's Like That in the story and towards niki because they keep tiptoeing around the subject but the second he gets an inner monologue, or is truly being genuine, you can tell he would do anything for him, if niki would just let him. to say that rinne isn't capable of being a good partner because he'll treat you badly or not care about you just proves to me that you're not reading any scene he is actually in. if rinne loves you, romantic or not, he will go big or go home. read hot limit btw

im not about to pull the story caps out no wait yes i am lol rinniki4ever ✌️

these arent in order bc i had to scroll up like 2k pictures because i take caps of this game every time i blink. i was considering adding hiiro caps, to show his dedication to him as well, but given that this is for like a marriage poll id rather not. either way he cares about his family and loved ones a lot. read chapter 155 if you want to know the exact scene i was thinking about/referring to while typing this

um ok (breathes out) im fine now. theres things i didnt address because it's 1 am and i want to go to sleep. congrats kuro on getting #1 most marriageable tho u deserve it KURO NUMERO 1 CAMPEAO DO MUNDO 💯💯💯🔥

#im not tagging this with anything else #im sorry if i sound snobby or just. idk. mean at all. it isnt even a matter of media literacy anymore its more like #sometimes interpreting stuff on such a surface level and having to make jokes out of everything is not the best way to go #especially when the jokes are harmful/offensive. you dont really see this behavior outside of eng fandom #this isnt meant to be scolding i just wish people understood!!#but like if people say something is offensive rather than just doubling down...listen? please #im not an authority on enstars obviously i havent caught up on anything non alkakurei since like 2018. these are just my thoughts #if you read all of it i appreciate you :)#its not that serious. unless youre being purposely ableist and or racist which in that case it is that serious #mimthinks

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friendshapedplant · 1 month

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🔫🔫get go go gadget autisgmed again heehoo B] thoughts and interpretations on the Forgotten Land timeline? 👀

I don't got much but there ain't all too much to go with and I don't fw specififc times so don't expect no numbers jus sequences

Obviously the events we have established are Elfilis invades New World, is captured, tested on, Elfilin escapes, everyone leaves, Forgotten Lands Events. Can't quite remember if it's established they figure out the Warp Tech before or after Filin escapes or not and dont feel like checkin!

I'd say it took the people of the New World a few days to a week to subdue Elfilis and put it in a tube by Discovera. Invasive testing didn't start immediately as they didn't want to risk it escaping so soon after it's capture, they wanna rebuild shit first, but things like vitals and surface level samples were taken from Filis.

Give it a year or so and they in the Real research bizz! I feel they did more than just Warp Tech, likely not where they started, but they get there eventually, working with what they know bout this guy and buildin upon it. Willing to bet Filis was not a compliant test subject though and if not tranquilized shit often happened, but sometimes it needed to be conscious for things so! Risk n Reward.

Elfilin is born 30 years after Elfilis is captured (only actual timespan we have and I just learned is a ref to Kirby turnin 30 that year) during the first attempt to execute warp travel. I think something about either the shit they were puttin Filis thru or the sterile environment or an attempt at malicious compliance/escape caused the split. Elfilin is spawned not far outside the facility, first thing he sees is a bunch of people tryna grab at him which is scary! Thus he runs off to never be seen again, and Filis regresses into Fecto Forgo.

Some years after this event, the warp tech is perfected, and Lab Discovera finds the "Land of Dreams." What the hell that is I'm not sure but maybe its Everhood (joke). Research teams are dispatched to determine hospitality, then settlers are sent to establish colonies, and the population moves there in waves over afew years until no one's left but the animals, Fecto, and Elfilin.

About half a centruy later is where Forgotten Land picks up, enough time for the buildings to be overgrown but not entirely destroyed by mother nature. The Waddle Dees and a buncha Pop Star junk arrive and Filin aint too far! He never seen these guys before but knows in his heart they need his help.

The New World experiences time slower than Pop Star does, so over the course of a month or so, they set up a little town and make themselves comfortable with their circumstances, they're just Dees after all they can't do much, esp with no King around. There are many that also choose to explore the New World, but are unfortunately slowly captured.

Then of course their little town is located by the Beast Pack and the remaining Dees are capturing, Kirby finally making thru the portal and locating the village. And then the game starts from there yknow!

I think the entire game of Forgotten Land (about 10 hours) takes more like 10 minutes back on Pop Star. Everyone still over there just chilling until BOOM another portal opens above the planet and They get to witness Truck Kirby Live.

Also regarding Meta Knights presence, the English figure says he arrived before Kirby, while the Japanese says he arrived after, and yknow we prefer our primary sources here, the localizations are dodgy sometimes. (Susie I'm so sorry what they did to u girlie....) Bro came in a couple weeks late, set off on his own for a bit, but after findin nothin he left that to Kirb and decided to protect the Dees from attack. And beat up Gorimando one million times. For the Dees' safety.

Everything said here is Subject to Change in the future I've only been thinkin bout this stuff for like a week so yeyeye but thats it rn

#asks #ascelhire #atlas.txt #original post #kirby #kirby series #kirby and the forgotten land #kirby forgotten lands #kirby headcanons

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empty-pizza · 11 months

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thoughts on harrow the ninth chapter thirty-three

swear on my heart, as soon as harrow noted she was being followed i immediately knew it'd be camilla. not much of a prediction to brag about and from your perspective i could be lying. but i have a habit of just, sometimes, calling the twists only when i notice that it's tonally setting it up but right before it happens. the moment harrow noted she was being followed i just immediately knew it was camilla; that is the person it would be and this is the right time in the book to return to past matters through her.

anyway YOOOOO IT'S CAMILLA!!! she's so based

thank FUCK we're finally taking out one of the letter like i'm sorry but that's way too cool of a plot concept to fucking ignore for the last two-hundred chapters shaking my head

wtf does "invoke the rock that remains ever unrolled" mean here. like this is a statement where the surface level meaning is fairly clear but the actual implications are not. does that mean ally with harrow? bind harrow to do what she says? go do something else?

nice to see palamedes again. wouldn't feel like a locked tomb book without him.

...

okay i said that as a joke about seeing his skull but now we're actually seeing him which is BALLER and it's awesome that he had a contingency for this own death.

i like how we're engaging with the memory stuff a little more. harrow wondering why she'd account for one dead person living but not the other (it's because before fucking her memory she knew camilla was alive but not palamedes). i wonder if one of them will say something that makes the other go "what the fuck are you talking about" now and we can dig into it more.

we aren't fully calling it out, but he's surprised that it's been eight mouths, and he's confusing harrow by implying they were once allies. not sure exactly what he means by "tell me you finished the work" though, if it's just something i should remember from gideon or a new mystery. i think we can probably assume most of the relevant current plans, most of the irons in the fire, were put in after palamedes died.

it's the sleeper and i don't think palamedes should know what that is. why is it showing up? spooky, and i wonder how much of an explanation there is. does harrow entering the river like this allow an entity that only exists in her mind to manifest? if it's gideon, it's not just in her mind, it's the soul alongside hers. but would or should this have happened in prior times harrow entered the river?

when harrow gets out is she gonna turn palamedes's skull into a jaw that can talk? hmm.

OOH! THAT'S A CHAPTER ENDING! A FIRST PERSON PRONOUN IN THE NARRATION! it's gotta be gideon then; her soul dormant, narrating to harrow what she sees, even if her voice is not heard. the question is, why is she here and what is her intention? in the memories, though i had guessed it was gideon, i had interpreted it as just some weird way harrow locked away the memories of her. but this is an action in the present, a choice to show up and threaten harrow and palamedes. funky.

#pizza reads locked tomb #the locked tomb #tlt #harrow the ninth

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mahalshairyballs · 2 years

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Some Jake stuff coming from my interpretation of him.

I might have mentioned these things before but I don't think I made any posts meta about them.

It will be separated into two main points : Emotions and Physical Touch

Emotiooons

Jake has *a lot* of emotions. But he has learned to hide them. Not by being stoic, he was far from it, but by looking to the outside world like he was well balanced he was also far from that.

To people interacting with him he was social, nice, even polite, warm, flirty, charming, he joked around, smiled more than Marc did (Marc your dark humor needs to come back!). He was just a joy to be around. No need to wonder what Frenchie saw in him.

With Layla it was a bit different since she lived with them. She saw him a bit more grumpy, snappy and contrarian (mostly when Jake fronted right after talking to Marc...). But she still had no idea how he really felt and what Steven and Marc had to deal with.

Inside Jake was boiling with emotions, sometimes totally opposite to what he was showing. He had been training himself a lot to do that, to 'pretend', to show whatever feelings he wanted to show, he'd perfected it.

Jake had to do something like that since almost day one, at least since Marc left their home. Because of what Jake's been through, every time he took control of the body - whether consciously or not, whether it was warranted or not - he was in a heightened state of alert. In a constant fight or flight mode - so in other words panic.

It took him a lot of time and a lot of work, but he managed to not always feel like that every time he fronted - especially when there were no imminent threats he had to deal with. This resulted in him having great control on his stress level, and how he showed his emotions (but didn't change how he really felt). Just existing didn't make him feel high anxiety anymore, but there were some things that could bring that anxiety back (see the 2nd main subject of this post below).

Which in turn made him the best at manipulating being social out of the three. It also made him an excellent liar. So much so that Matt (Daredevil) had the hardest time reading him. His heartbeat barely even changed - changed so minutely - when he lied that even Matt had a hard time noticing it (while Steven's heartbeat accelerated even when he was telling the truth ahah anxiety...)

Even when he killed, he didn't show any intense emotions. I used the word 'going bersek' as a shorthand one time before, but that's not accurate at all. Jake doesn't do that. He might feel anger or hate or whatever else, but he'll just show ruthless, surgical efficiency while doing the kill. And he could talk about the weather with you just after having killed someone.

In their innerspace it's waaay more difficult for Jake to hide or show something else to what he's really feeling. Their innerspace is like where their 'soul' coexist, so they're all pretty much open books there.

So when Steven once said to someone that Jake was 'very emotional, petty, immature, easy to anger, a lot to deal with'

Layla & Jean-Paul : He is ???

This was not their experience with him at all.

Jake and Marc were both quick to anger in their innerspace and quick to blame the other for anything. When they interacted tension could rise pretty damn fast. So Marc and Jake fought a lot in their innerspace. Jake and Steven did too initially, but it calmed down pretty quickly and they mostly got along well. So Steven found himself often in the middle of their fight like this :

(Without the blood and without Khonshu lmao)

Jake didn't mind doing small talk, he actually did it a lot. Surface level, flirty conversations were almost his specialty by now. Both because he couldn't bond with someone long enough to do more and because it helped him get what he wanted out of people. He flirted without intent other than manipulating people all the time. So here you could see how he could evolve into being the intel collector for the system, just like he is in the comics.

He didn't know how to deepen relationships however, he never had the chance to, and he didn't really want to by now. He didn't want to share anything personal or show his real emotions. He was inexperienced with that and didn't know what to expect. He didn't even know if he could love (he definitely can, but his feeling of love is in itself quite different, it's almost painful).

If he did open up though, he'd talk about most of the fucked up things he lived through in a very casual way. He had weird priorities and views of the world. He could be upset by small things but then brush off very awful things. I think there was a meme like that once. The meme enumerated three things, the first two weren't that bad while the third one was significantly worse than the first two but said as if it were equally bad (or was it a trope? ). That's Jake. He would be the kind to do that.

The only emotions you'd see him show outwardly when he felt them would be emotions that he was unfamiliar with. There's not a lot of those but there's a few, like love (or jealousy...). They would show in his behavior and body language because he wouldn't be able to deal with them. Being new to him, he hadn't practiced dealing with them and/or dissimulating them under another emotion. So maybe he'd look like he was feeling that emotion, but he'd mostly look lost or anxious...and then he'd leave control of the body to Marc or Steven.

Physical touch

Jake didn't like being touched, it made him very uneasy and brought his panic anxiety back.

However short or innocent the contact was, he wouldn't like it.

Especially if the touch was supposed to be good and innocent. It also didn't matter if it was under or above clothes, it felt the same to him.

Because :

1) he wasn't familiar with those feelings, both the physical sensations and what they did to his emotions. He didn't know what to do about it, how to react to it. So it made him uneasy and dislike the interaction.

2) he was used to all touches being painfull (except during sex*). Whether it was in his childhood, or later fronting to defend the body, while Marc was a boxer or in the army, or a mercenary, or Moon Knight. That's all Jake knew. So when the touches weren't painfull, his brain still thought it was going to be, any time now. So it prepared him by giving him this very intense anxiety, like a very loud alarm bell in his head.

As a cab/limo driver, he didn't have to be touched by anybody, and Khonshu couldn't touch him. So right then he was living his best life.

Jake wasn't making a big deal out of it either, like for everything else. If an SO tried to hold his hand, give him a hug or cuddle he'd find an excuse to get away from that physical contact as soon as possible. He usually pretended that he had to go somewhere to then put more distance between them, or subtly brushed away the hand on him. If the person did it again or insisted however, they'd get that direct rebuff.

It could be hard for some people who needed physical affection to be Jake's partner. For Duchamp, they were in a strange position. Jake was flirty, funny, teasing him, he was there for him and generous and helpful, but he never ever tried to touch him in their day-to-day life together. Not even a small casual touch on the shoulder, or a hug or anything. The only time Frenchie felt like he could touch him was when they had sex.

Jake never wanted to just make out, or cuddle while watching a movie. He did, however, do one thing. He gave little kisses. Dry closed mouth kisses of a few seconds, that he could do. And he did that often enough to show affection.

* The one major exception to that was during sex. Mostly because those touches were context specific and Jake usually concentrated on his dick and pleasuring his partners. So he managed to ignore or to deal better with these touches. The touches usually didn't last that long and it was mostly people gripping him or things like that so it was fine.

It made him a really good lover though. He had no problem touching other people, with his hands, with his mouth, with his cock, and he liked doing it. So he was very attentive to other people's body. He didn't really do foreplay either, except when he could treat his partners like that (ask Layla...).

If you wanted to treat him, or 'worship his body', or anything like that, he'd politely decline the offer, usually changing the focus on the partner.

Let me make it clear though that Jake only appears to be promiscuous out of necessity but he wasn't really. Sex was the best way he found to have physical intimacy with someone. He didn't need to be particularly close to the person, could do it quickly - since he couldn't front for long - and could get his physical intimacy needs met there.

He also didn't do French kissing, and he was fine with pillow talks...as long as there was a reasonable distance between him and the partner on the bed.

With Layla, he initially didn't even take the chance. He kept sleeping in the spare bedroom, even after she knew who he was and got to know him.

Jake knew he could learn to get used to the nice touches, like he got used to live without being in panic mode. He didn't see the benefit in doing that however. Controlling his panic mode had been a necessity, because he felt like that just by being. The panic he felt when someone touched him however could be stopped by simply...stopping that contact. It was easier than enduring countless of high-anxiety inducing interactions just so his body could be used to them. And since he wasn't familiar with what 'nice' touches actually felt like, he didn't miss them.

He didn't think he needed those for a fulfilling relationship. He saw though, that Frenchie really missed doing that kind of thing with his partner...

Steven doesn't mind touches all that much for someone on the spectrum. He actually really liked touches...but only with people he was really close to. He had two modes 'ew no touchy' and 'let me be all over you all the time'.

Marc has no issues with touches. It's surprisingly one of the few things he has no issues about. He liked touches well enough, he could be tender and physically affectionate when he wanted to be - and he usually did.

This is also why Matt and Jake would make a good fit. Matt is also super-sensitive to touches (for a different reason : his super-senses) so he'd understand Jake's boundaries there.

Bonus: relationship with Khonshu

Out of the three of them, it's definitely Jake who has a better relationship with Khonshu and who doesn't need to be as manipulated as Marc was.

There were many ways in which Jake's relationship with Khonshu could be important to him.

Khonshu acknowledged him without telling the others. Khonshu might've been the first other person to actually call him Jake. It definitely had an effect on Jake. Gave him respect for the ol' bird at least.

Khonshu didn't probe him about things Jake didn't feel like talking about. Khonshu didn't care about the Marc system's traumas, he already knew everything that was in their head anyway, so he never brought it up with Jake and Jake was appreciative of that.

Khonshu is immaterial in our dimension so he couldn't touch Jake. Jake was glad for that.

Khonshu trusted his skills, and appreciated him for who he was.

And Jake truly believed in what Khonshu was doing. He also wanted revenge, didn't mind killing or hurting people to protect others. He wanted to defeat the bad guys.

Marc might also have wanted revenge, an outlet for his rage, but the killings took more of a toll on him than it did Jake.

So if Steven & Marc try to convince Jake to break things off with Khonshu....eeeeeeh, they might encounter some strong opposition.

Tl;dr - So this is how I managed to combine both of the main portrayals of comics!Jake with what we got of MCU!Jake while still making sense character-wise, tadaaaaa : D

Thank you, thank you !

Have a nice Jake-filled day everyone!

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iwritenarrativesandstuff · 1 year

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Year in Review! Thank you so much for a wonderful year!

Hey! So this was my first year with... any kind of social media actually. I finally plucked up the courage to make an account and post stuff instead of just looking at other people's stuff and wishing I was more involved haha... I'm really glad I did! You people are so nice and I've seen so many incredibly creative ideas - I can't wait to see more. :)

I have a few things ready to go for the new year and I'm excited to get back to answering asks again!

Tags (not surprising):

#bsd - 605 posts

#bsd dazai - 220 posts

#random - 208 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#fukuzawa wanting to ditch most everyone he meets and only begrudgingly taking in these kids but helping them find their footing and do good

My top posts... you know I never expected any analysis I did to get too much attention. The Dazai and Q chapter one (#2) was especially surprising to me... never expected that to blow up like it did.

Fjfnfjvns and my #1 post being my stupid joke post. Sounds about right hahaha!

I've been thinking a lot about the one-dimensional kinda fandom interpretations of Dazai and Chuuya in particular - the overemphasis on Dazai's weird brand of mischief/manipulation and Chuuya's anger and tendency to lash out and how it's not like these traits are... wrong, per se - these are their surface level/immediately notable characteristics - it's just that it misses the nuance as to why these traits likely exist.

What these interpretations don't fully capture is their very similar cores deep down - two people plagued by feelings of alienation, human inadequacy and repeated loss. Despite starting from these very similar places, they both dealt with the issue in near opposite ways. Dazai numbed himself to pain (remember: he hates pain! I cannot emphasize this enough!) and rarely gets close to anyone for fear he will lose them - his loss led to apathy, a withdrawal from humanity, a fear that he will always be empty inside - his ability: No Longer Human. Chuuya, on the other hand, refuses to numb himself and instead feels every single emotion in full and values his bonds with others over anything. He wants to belong and makes efforts to be perceived as a part of his group. Underlying this, however, is a kind of tired grief paired with resilience - remember that his ability is Upon the Tainted Sorrow. Not anger, or rage.

Sorrow is what results from this kind of heavy identity crisis and loss - for both of them. Think of Odasaku's read on Dazai as someone who looked close to tears when "acting" in front of the sniper poised to shoot him, describing him to Gide as a too-smart child left in the dark, or the way Stormbringer constantly reminds us that Chuuya is 16 and the desperation he feels in the scene where he holds his own dying clone, unable to help him.

Both characters carry a melancholy, resulting from their respective issues with their own humanity - I know I'm not the first one to comment on how their abilities could just as easily be referring to each other as well as themselves. This reads as very intentional to me - much like Atsushi's story begins as a clear parallel to the short story Rashoumon and Akutagawa sometimes being referred to in more beast-like terms than man, it makes sense that Dazai and Chuuya would reference each other in a similar vein.

And if that was the end of it, then we would expect that deep sorrow to shine through in both characters, but it rarely does except in pivotal moments. That's because the both of them have had to constantly deal with external threats - they believe they cannot afford to show vulnerability.

So, what you get instead is Dazai taking a kind of twisted ownership over his inhumanity and using it to make people afraid of him and to control everything so that he is never blindsided and hurt again, in the process, further alienating himself and making his issues worse. He inflicts fear so he doesn't have to be afraid. He can relax and be as silly as he wants - so long as everything around him is completely according to his predictions. There's a bonus to his foolish demeanour as well: hardly anyone can read him well enough to get close.

Then you get Chuuya, who feels so strongly and so much that it has no choice but to boil over, and due to never being able to or feeling comfortable with being anything but "the strongest", he hides moments when he is touched, or worried, or grieving, with anger and violence and defensiveness. As such, he is always seen as more weapon than person, a cut above the rest, forever standing out to others no matter how much he tries to integrate. The closest he came to true belonging was wrenched away from him before he could have a chance to know what that would actually feel like with the death of the Flags.

These surface traits are defense mechanisms. And the amusing thing to me is that likely means these two would love if that's all most people ever saw of them. (Of course, they clearly do want to be seen and accepted, but defense mechanisms become automatic over time because they often feel much safer. Likely another reason they clash so much - they see each other, and it is deeply uncomfortable for them both.)

So, you have Dazai defending himself with his two-faced nature, making jokes and/or manipulating everyone in the vicinity, and Chuuya defending himself with intimidation and anger, never letting any vulnerability show through because anger is easier but at the core of all of this is that loss and that grief and the sorrow and fear that pervades from it.

885 notes - Posted October 30, 2022

Dazai and Chuuya are two people who don't need to talk to each other to communicate but who also really should

1,372 notes - Posted October 30, 2022

Not to skk post on main but that scene from Dead Apple made me insane for I think a slightly different reason than most...

Ok so. Gonna be honest. When I first watched this, the ah... positioning... did not occur to me at all, other than thinking "that looks really uncomfy :/".

I was too focused on what Dazai's hand does here. He first pushes him. Ok so he was trying to stop him from getting up and losing contact due to the fog. Cool. That serves a practical purpose.

But then Chuuya falls unconscious and Dazai's hand loses that contact for a second before he lowers it back down to rest on his head.

The thing is, there's no need for him to do that. Chuuya is already in contact with Dazai's legs and his ability works through clothes. Moreover, it wasn't just a continuation of pushing him down - there's a slight delay before he sets his hand back on his head.

He sets his hand there just because. And, due to the delay/hesitation, it appears to be a conscious choice to do so as well. Chuuya's out. There's no one around to act for.

I watched that and went holy shit that's genuine, isn't it? It's such a simple gesture of fondness, maybe even a bit of protectiveness, but it means a lot from someone as emotionally closed off as Dazai.

It's... weirdly sweet. He appears to have done it after Chuuya lost all his friends (again...) during DHC in the manga adaptation too, which is... :(

And now, with seeing Dazai immediately start playing with Chuuya's hair in the latest Fifteen adaptation, it also doubles as really funny to me. He saw a chance to touch his hair again and took it. What is wrong with this man.

1,565 notes - Posted December 12, 2022

Genuinely don't think I've seen anyone talk about chapter 25 as a pivotal moment for Dazai so I'm gonna put this out here because I think his reactions here kind of negate that whole omnipotent Dazai interpretation which I hate with every fibre of my being.

Firstly, he's like, clearly caught off guard here. And don't try to tell me he wasn't, because this is just one instance of his genuinely horrified reaction to Q's release and when he realized what was actually going on with Atsushi, Naomi and Haruno.

Him being caught off guard carries significance here because you'd never catch him screwing up this bad later in the series - which is exactly my point.

I wrote a post earlier about how I don't think Dazai really is very much like Mori or Fyodor at all, and I stand by that, because their motives are different. Tldr for that post: Mori and Fyodor are ambitious and proactive, while Dazai is empty/numb and reactive.

What this leads me to believe is that Dazai is less a chess master like those two and more of a contingency planner - he's so good at "predicting" because he is uncannily good at thinking like his opponent and then planning for literally any possibility under the sun he can come up with. He's no gambler. Everything and everyone is practically (and unknowingly) micromanaged. It's almost paranoid in a sense, and I definitely think it's a trauma response to something he went through that we don't know about yet - after all, he was more than capable of this before he even met Mori.

...which brings to me to Mori's influence here. It's straight up like Dazai forgot how willing Mori is to gamble huge risks for a good outcome. It's like he forgot the mafia could be a real threat to his best-laid plans.

Going to throw out a wild claim here that I don't think is actually all that baseless - I think it's widely assumed that Dazai molds himself to what he needs to be (true!) but I think this misses the idea that he is also easily influenced by the mindsets of the people around him (see: the difference between Entrance Exam Dazai and early manga Dazai, the whole "the longer he was in the mafia the darker and more incomprehensible he became" thing from Stormbringer, how dark his eyes get in the prison sections with Fyodor, etc.). I could go on, but for the sake of not making this post too much longer, let's assume this is true because it suddenly makes sense as to why he failed to predict Q but predicted other events much later that were inherently more difficult to predict:

He was in the wrong mindset. He was thinking like an Agency member, and dare I say, he even got a little complacent. He started to get used to not having to manipulate every last variable - he was removed from a toxic environment - only for Mori to pretty much instantly fuck that up in one scene.

Let's also not forget what happened the last time he miscalculated Mori's intentions.

The consequences of this blunder could've been a lot worse and he knows it.

In his mind, thinking like an ADA member wasn't good enough to stop a potentially awful outcome - awful outcomes that could bring him pain. So, he goes back to what he knows - think like the demon prodigy. Think like Mori. Later on, think like Dostoyevsky. Because it seems to me that he believes as long as he is still working for the light that it doesn't matter if he uses these horrifically manipulative and inhumane methods of getting there. But he is wrong. Darkness within the context of good intentions is still very much darkness, and it hurts people all the same.

In the very next chapter, Dazai arranges Ango's car accident. And he only gets worse and worse throughout the series as he regresses back into his paranoid darkness that manifests as this omnipotent facade - his safety net that ultimately prevents him from developing in a positive, more human direction.

1,999 notes - Posted October 6, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

live mafia reaction

2,124 notes - Posted November 26, 2022

Cheers, and have a happy new year! I hope you can find something to be proud of, even if that was just making it through another year. See you in 2023!

#tumblr2022 #year in review #storyrambles #bsd #happy 2023

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insanetwocubes · 1 year

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Four and I were talking the other day and we figured out that the human social rules is what leads them towards fascism. Not lyke in a doomer way but more lyke fighting fascism is like fighting entropy. It should still be fought but y'know, you have to do it continuously and in an organized way or else you're just pushing dirt around.

So lyke for example, a social rule is not correct someone if they're wrong. Y'know, so anti intellectualism. And another is to give people a polite laugh when they make a joke, but sometimes that joke might be offensive and under a false premise and your laugh could be interpreted as you agreeing.

Also, going to a suitor's house implies sexual activity. Consent is still supposed to be asked but it's lyke... idk unclear. Kind of drives in the fact that people are only safe at a distance.

Okay I know that's not fascism, not exactly. But it's lyke sketchy, right? Lyke a dog whistle almost? The implication of things beyond the surface level with the intention of being ambiguous and misleading?

And social rules are filled with this stuff.

Four and I will probably outline them one by one in the future. That's what we decided to do.

We decided to not completely throw it all away. Just be more careful with it.

But yeah, hey, this just goes to show that our instincts right off the bat were always right. That these social rules are debased of dignity and honor.

But oh well. I guess we just didn't communicate this well. And I'll surrender that point. But we will work on communicating it. Because we know we're right. And our words deserve to be heard and understood.

#Thingseysaid #Txt #dicerolls #txt

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you-cant-spell-subtext-without · 3 years

Note

Hii, responding to your post, I hope you’re doing well!

————

I tend to interpret most “spn is a terrible show” posts from spn fans as just joking around, unless they’re going into actual analysis of it, but I don’t see everything you see in your corner of the internet, and I also am not all that great at interpreting stuff (insults directed at me go over my head sometimes 😂 )

I agree, I love Mary being brought back! I really loved the fact that they turned her from a generic tragic figure into an actual character with nuance, and made the boys confront seeing their mother as an actual person.

I tend to describe Supernatural as simultaneously awful and freaking amazing, and overall an enjoyable and unparalleled experience.

My main criticism of the show is how it starts building a theme, an idea, having some foreshadowing, and then not following through with it, and possibly even contradicting the theme later.

However, Supernatural is such a freaking cool show with so much to analyze and oh dear lords LAYERS of subtext!

And Dean Winchester is probably one of the most complex and nuanced characters I have ever seen—

But the thing is, the show doesn’t dive into the subtext all that much. It doesn’t follow through on stuff that should probably have been explored deeper.

On the other hand, that fact, plus the existence of Chuck and the Ghostfacers Effect, makes Supernatural the PERFECT sandbox for creators and literary analysists!

Hmm… I’m wondering- maybe that’s why we have such a vocal and active fandom that actually makes things happen; the construction of the show means that the majority of people who enjoy it are the ones that can think on more than just the surface level, and enjoy putting the effort into understanding the subtext. That means that the show attracts passionate people who think critically about things. And that passion, that is what makes us able to achieve things on such a big scale.

I guess what I’m saying is, on the surface, Supernatural is a mediocre show. Dive down a level and it becomes amazing. Another level, and you spot all the stuff that makes it awful. Dive down even further and you can suddenly see how utterly brilliant Supernatural is. Then, dive further still into the meta, and notice how- heck I don’t even know what to call it, outside forces influencing the plot in ways that mirror real life (like how the writers strike, something out of authorial control, caused a domino effect that led to Destiel coming into being despite efforts to suppress it, mirroring how Cas was outside of Chuck’s control, aka outside of the control of the writers’ self-insert)… yeah there’s a reason we all have brainworms 😂 and it’s so amazing and profound, and honestly it’s a perfect example of the phenomenon of characters coming to life and the story going where it wants regardless of the author’s plans. Happens with me all the time on little levels, but Supernatural… yeah. It’s awesome.

Heck, my reply was a lot longer than I meant it to be, I apologize for that! This is supposed to be a “cheering you up by reminding that you’re not alone” post, and it did end up a bit of a ramble. Anyways, in short, Supernatural is overall a good show in my opinion, you’re not the only one that thinks that.

Hope you have a wonderful day/night, and whenever you next sleep, sleep very well 😊💜🌸

all of this is very accurate :)

honestly I've been having a bad week so my salty little post was probs a result of that too, but I like all of your points and you are very right :) and I agree without its flaws the show wouldn't have spawned such a flux of creativity and passion and drive here, and that is truly the best part of it!

#you-cant-spell-subtext-without-asks #ender-baggins

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tamamatango · 4 years

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Let’s talk about Kururu, again

Apparently the fandom is growing all of a sudden so I feel like talking about Kururu again cuz that’s all I know how to do and it’s been a while

First off disclaimer that fandom is fandom and anybody can interpret any character any way they want and if you like to portray a character a certain way for whatever reason go for it, more power to you (unless you put them in pedo/incest relationships that are displayed as good in which case fuck you). But in my personal Kirbpinion(TM) the Funimation dub was a fucking mistake because so many fan content creators write a way different Kururu than what he is in canon cuz the dub never got to his best episodes and also upped the sadism to ridiculous levels. Listen I know it’s funny to joke that he’s the kind of guy that has 3 medieval torture chambers but hear me out. Kururu is by no means a perfect person, he’s genuinely pretty rude/blunt (though sometimes his straightforwardness is justified :P), has an ego, sometimes acts pretty gross around others and likes extreme and elaborate pranks way way way too much BUT.

Assuming you’ve watched far enough into the series (like 100+ eps) I do not really understand the interpretation that he doesn’t care about anyone and that friendship and love are things he is totally incapable of. He says that yes but if you pay enough attention to his dialogue it becomes pretty apparent that he displays this attitude for multiple reasons. One is that he does genuinely have a hard time expressing the emotions he feels and often has awkward/guarded ways of doing so. But also he says many times over the course of the series that he has a “reputation” to keep up and wants people to call him a jerk; he wants to look cool and rebellious all the time and he thinks a nasty apathetic attitude is what earns him that status (not claiming that’s a healthy mindset, mind you). He wants to have full control over the way people see him and he gets super frustrated and humiliated when he can’t. This is probably why he gets so upset when people talk about how unpopular he is, because he’s spent so much time honing his image to a T and is like why the fuck isn’t this working?! In other words even though sometimes he is just an actual pain in the neck a lot of his asshole antics are part of a carefully manufactured persona, and he will do anything down to labeling his own memories to prevent other people from seeing through his facade and discovering the parts of him that are vulnerable.

And God forbid anyone does figure out that he does care quite a bit for the people around him, or at least if he didn’t at first he does now. Early on in the series he was commonly referred to as “depressing” and while the meta reason is probably just the anime writers just didn’t know how to adapt the character yet (he started out a little differently in the manga), in canon I believe he was just even more inclined to push everybody away from him, and as he began to get used to working in a group he gradually opened up. He commentates on how “soft” he’s gotten since he came to Earth a couple times, and the fact that he’s surprisingly one of the most loyal to Keroro out of the whole team (in many episodes where everyone abandons Keroro for being dumb he leaves last) and goes out of his way to help when he thinks it’s warranted (he asks for money when things aren’t dire yeah but hey labor deserves compensation :V) shows that he is dedicated to his team. There’s even episodes where he doles out some kind of moral lesson to the squad in his own Kururu-y way, especially to Keroro and Tamama. Even the Hinatas he’ll pitch in to protect when he has to, and we all know he’ll pretty much drop everything if Saburo needs him.

Speaking of which. I think the unspoken reason why he’s best friends with Saburo (besides the surface-level stuff like they’re smart and nerdy and seen as enigmas by everybody else) is because Saburo is the only other person in the cast who understands Kururu’s particular struggle of putting on airs as a means of self-defense all the time. He basically has a carefully managed celebrity life (that he has to constantly work to hide in anime canon), a somewhat formal/reserved public life, and the more quirky enthusiastic side of himself he only shows when alone and to the few people he’s close to and god damn that just sounds like the most exhausting juggling act ever. He has an outlet to free himself through his art but he still has to live with nobody quite knowing what he goes through on a daily basis, which is probably why we see him off on his own for most of the series (until he gets to warm up to everybody better...wonder who that sounds like) and occasionally have his bouts of frustration and insecurity like in 229 where he says “fuck it I’m gonna fight the apocalypse alone because I need something to do,” 354(? I think that’s the number) where he talks about just dropping everything and starting over, and I think one of the Christmas eps where Giroro has to like beg him to go to the Hinatas’ party cuz he says he’s “busy” even though he’s just sitting around pretty much (UPDATE: it’s 294 the implication is probably that he has his show or something but cmon that’s only like an hour lol). I am going off on a tangent now but anyway the point is he and Kururu are the most complicated communicators of the cast and they share feelings only they understand which is why they can more or less read each other’s minds and know exactly what to do when the other is in trouble.

Back to Kururu. Keroro, from what I can tell, is the closest to him out of the Platoon; Keroro gets freaked out by Kururu’s pranks sometimes yeah but they have a lot of common interests as the fun-lovers of the group and Kururu’s also kinda been interested in Keroro enough time follow him around for almost his entire life up to this point so there’s that. He also gets along with the other people he‘s around; we know he and Aki get along from the beginning because of how dynamic their personalities are but later on he gets close to Fuyuki to the point where they just hang out for the heck of it sometimes, and even though Natsumi is very justified in generally disliking him (many of Kururu’s more Eugh moments tend to involve her) even she seems to rely on him often, and in the cursed puppy episode she knows all his favorite foods by heart so she must care in some fashion lol. Dororo and he aren’t evidently super close but I think they get each other on some level as the (in-universe) least popular of the platoon and Dororo at least respects his abilities, and has clearly come to figure out his subtleties based on 229. Giroro and Mois...things get complicated. Just putting on record that I’m not a fan of either ship between Kururu and them. I’ve said this before but I think Giroro and Kururu are in a turbulent sibling-adjacent relationship in that they have completely opposing attitudes but they have a begrudging sense of respect for each other and, ultimately, they’re teammates, so they’ll defend each other when someone they don’t know tries to mess with them. I really don’t think the flirty stuff on Kururu’s end goes beyond teasing and I got kinda sick of that running gag if I’m being honest. (You can probably tell which frog I ship Kururu with by now :P) Mois went from something of a rival to Kururu to his lab partner, which is probably why he goes easier on her than he used to and even strikes up something of a friendship because the only other person he knows that might be capable of handling his technology is an Earthling who’s still against the invasion despite his lax attitude so. She helps :V

Now the question is why Kururu acts like he does if his relationships really aren’t all that bad and I think there’s two components to this. I’ve made it clear by now I think he’s autistic but your mileage may vary there. I think personally his childhood did something to the way he processes things as well. In Secret of the Kero Ball, he’s got a bandage on his head which may imply he got hurt somewhere and then he almost drowned which canonically definitely did something to him lol, was mostly seen alone so who knows if he has a family he still talks to, and then he got drafted into the army and placed into a high-ranking position of great responsibility at a very young age; it’s kind of a no-brainer why he rebeled and got demoted eventually. I’ve got plenty of headcanons about what his early days in the Military did to him but that’s for another day because good God this post went on too long.

In short: Kururu is possibly the most complicated character in the show and the F in Flanderization stands for “Funimation.” That’s it I’m never writing another essay about pee-color frog again I will make real content again at some point I promise

#keroro gunso #sgt frog #kururu #kululu #long post #i sure spent 2 hours on this #imo kururu is a more compelling tsundere than giroro there I said it

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floofiestboy · 4 years

Text

Haruhara Live Q/A Session via Text

Translations of past question corners:

- Question Corners #1-10

- Question Corners #11-20

- Question Corners #21-30

- Question Corners #31-40

- Question Corners #41-50

A couple days back, Haruhara asked people subscribed to his channel to send him questions via email. These are the answers.

Haruhara’s comments:

In this article, instead of a live Q/A session, I answer all the questions I got via email in text form.

Just like in an actual live session, I’ve answered the questions without carefully double-checking my notes and past chapters, so please take this as entertainment. Treat it as non-canon. Anything I haven’t explicitly talked about in canon shouldn’t be treated as such.

Senyuu has technically ended, and so now that’s it’s been over ten years, I’m even answering questions that made me think before, “If I answer this, it’ll affect how they read the main story...”!

Treat it separately from canon! These are just backstories, settings!

source: ch.nicovideo.jp/haruhara-ch/blomaga/ar1939122

Q. I love the BGM on the chapters on NicoNico, so I was wondering who composed them?

A. I don’t know either. Similarly, I don’t know who designed the logos either. But they are nice songs, aren’t they?

Q. Has Alba’s father been journeying since he was young? Did he live apart from Alba?

A. While he’s always been journeying, he came back regularly. If I compared it to a modern-day job, he’d be like a long-distance truck driver or a fisherman.

Q. Does Rchi still have her Mark of a Demon Lord? Do Rchimedes and the Second have the same mark?

A. She still has it, but since I keep on forgetting to draw it, I’ve decided it only shows up when she prays for it to appear. Rchimedes and the Second do not have it.

Q. What sort of job does Justice do in the Demon World?

A. Her job is to be cheerful. Since she’s strong, she has no problems living the way she does. Since the Demon World is still kinda a lawless land, being strong is enough to keep on living on.

Q. Are there only three Four Great Demons?

A. Yes, I just wanted to do a joke where there were a fewer (or greater) number of actual members than a title would make you think.

Q. Is the hole in the world still there?

A. To be honest, when I said that a hole had opened up in the world, what I actually wanted to say was “Something strange happened to the world.” I hadn’t thought about what the hole would be or anything. I bet a giant gate or something opened up for a moment, and monsters and stuff came over here from there. In that case, the hole would’ve closed already.

Q. Please tell me how demons age!

A. It really depends on the demon. Since demons are a race created by Rchimedes going like “Eh, whatevs”, their characteristics aren’t really consistent between each other. I think that demons have long lives because somewhere deep inside Rchimedes, he hated the idea of death and losing loved ones. Though he did play around and had demons fight each other and stuff. While on the surface level, it may have seemed like he fell into despair and raised havoc, I think he really did grieve about losing loved ones deep down.

Q. I’d like to hear more about the Loli 12 Organization and Loli Master the 5th (Master Go Rori).

A. To be honest, I just wanted to say gorori (T/N: onomatopoeia meaning ‘to lie down’). I’m sorry!

Q. Can we no longer see the BL route?!?!!?!

A. Huh?! What do you mean?! - was my first thought, but ah, I remember now. You’re talking about when I drew Ros getting jealous of Alba sleeping with Grandpa during season 2. Since you’re asking if you can no longer see it, I’m guessing you mean that you can’t? I myself have forgotten where I drew it and don’t have the file anymore.

There was a time in the past when I was super into AUs - I drew anything that hit my mind. But then I realized that readers tend to take anything the creator draws super seriously, so I stopped really doing it.

Though lately when I still really want to draw something AU, I always make sure to put a disclaimer stating “This is unrelated to canon!” before it.

(T/N: Please tell me someone has the drawing mentioned here saved somewhere I need this I beg of you.)

Q. In Senyuu Season 2, Rchi keeping information about Creasion from Alba was treated as a joke and kinda just skipped over, but now that I think about it, unless Rchi had told Alba about it, Alba would’ve basically never found out about Creasion. (Since it was pure coincidence that he ended up in the Demon World and found out about it.)

I was wondering if Rchi really intended never to tell Alba about it even though they were working at saving Ros.

If there are any such reasons, I would like to hear about how Rchi was actually planning to tell him once some more time passed, or about how she had some other reason and was really planning never to tell, etc.

A. Ros being the Demon Lord’s son isn’t directly related to saving Ros (via finding a way to free the Demon Lord.) Even if Alba found out the reason why Ros couldn’t defeat the Demon Lord, there wouldn’t have been anything he could’ve done about it. So since knowing the truth would just give Alba more to worry about, I think that Rchi decided it would be better to just stay on their journey and keep looking for information. I don’t think she had any particularly strong desire that would make her really want to tell him.

Q. In F5 Ep. 11, I loved how Alba believed in Ros so easily, and how Ros declared with a smile, “The only person I punch for no reason is you, Hero-san!” How much deeper has their bond become since their early days?

A. How much deeper... how much deeper, I wonder? I feel like bonds aren’t the kind of thing you can measure in words. But I guess, compared to their early days, Ros trusts Alba enough to still be violent towards him even though he’s begun to realize that hey, “It isn’t really good to be violent.”

Q. How do you decide on the characters’ hair and eye colours? What do you use as reference when you draw their clothing and accessories?

A. Honestly, it’s always just whatever comes to me. Aside from the first few characters, I draw new characters vaguely at the storyboard stage, then draw them in properly at the manuscripting stage. For eye colours, in Senyuu I’ve decided that “people who can’t use magic don’t have red eyes.” That’s just something I’m trying to stick to, it doesn’t mean that “Everyone with red eyes in the Senyuu universe can use magic.” Cecily can’t use magic, after all.And there’s random citizens with red eyes out there too. I feel like people’s eyes turn red when they obtain magic because Rchimedes’ feelings towards Cecily were the trigger for magic’s discovery, even in Elf and Alf’s world. Cecily is an important character even though she hasn’t done anything.

Q. Elf and Ros haven’t really gotten the chance to really talk to each other thanks to their respective situations, but now that they work at the same place, I was wondering how close you think they are to each other. If you could expand on how their thoughts and impressions towards each other since their first meeting have changed, I would be really happy.

A. Elf used to think of Ros as someone to be pitied, but nowadays he’s realized that being pitiable isn’t something a bystander should decide, so he doesn’t think that any longer. The two of them aren’t particularly close, but they do chat normally. They’re like classmates who get along pretty well at school but never hang out on the weekends.

Q. If you have any thoughts on scrapped characters like Soldier Rosicks, the Season 2 Alba with the large sword on his back, cat-eared Rchi, etc., I’d love to hear them.

A. It’s less that I “scrapped” those characters and more that I just drew their appearances while I was drawing out all sorts of ideas, so they don’t have any particular backstories or settings associated with them. I’m the type to decide on things like settings as I move the characters around on a storyboard, so when I draw simple illustrations, they’re just empty shells.

Q. I’d like to know more about what happened with the first and third year Hero Academy students after Season 3. Also, how much do Sochi and her classmates know about “Lake’s little brother”?

A. I haven’t really thought about it, so if you’d like me to think about it I’d like to have at least two days for it, but I can’t take two days to think about this question, so the answer is “I haven’t really thought about it.” I’m sorry. Sometimes I can just think up answers on the spot, but I’d feel sorry to push entire lives onto characters based on ideas I thought up on the spot. So I’d like to think about what happens to characters “after” properly. Though I’ll decide things on the spot when it comes to random mob characters and aspects I don’t care about.

Q. The reason why Alba and Salt, who both obtained enough mana to affect the world around them, were able to leave prison was because they became capable of controlling their mana, not because their knowledge reached the level of say, Ros or Elf - would that be the correct interpretation? Additionally, what level of knowledge have Alba and Salt reached by F5, considering that they were getting 0% on even simple multiplication tests before?

A. Alba was released because he became capable of a certain level of control. His level of knowledge has not reached the levels of Elf and Ros. He hasn’t caught up to them, so unlike Elf and Ros, who’d use their knowledge and little tricks to turn 100 bits of mana into 200, Alba uses the bare minimum amount of knowledge to use 500 bits of mana as only 300.

I’ve forgotten most of what I intended for Salt back them, so I apologize if I’ve given a different answer before which contradicts the one I’m about to give. Salt obtained great power, but he had no talent in keeping it within his body, so the mana was gradually released from him. I think he became so incapable of using magic that he was no longer an exceptional case, so he was eventually released.

Q. I have a question about the differences between Main Quest and the original canon. There are scenes in Main Quest that weren’t in the original canon, such as Rchi and Alba’s discussion in Part 2 Volume 4 Chapter 41, “Alba Expresses His Gratitude”, and Chapter 50, “Alba Is Stupefied”, where Mortmorte the 2nd offers to be sacrificed. I was wondering what your thoughts were when you added these extra scenes in.

A. While it isn’t as though I thought carefully about every new addition, when I drew Main Quest, my thoughts were along the lines of “Let’s go a little deeper into things.” I think that’s what I was thinking when I put in new lines. Also, typically I had a set number of pages I needed to draw for, so I think I moved around lines and expanded scenes as needed to fit the pages.

Q. I have a question about Teufel. In Season 1, Teufel only shows up in the extra chapters, but did you already intend to use him as the “Soul Manipulator” during the fight with Rchimedes in Season 2? Or was this something you decided as you got through Season 2.

A. That was something I planned from the start! If you’d like to know why Teufel appeared early, please read Filled It With My Feelings! There’s even a PDF version!

(T/N: *shills Haruhara* Filled It With My Feelings (Digital): hiaruron.booth.pm/items/2329424 Filled It With My Feelings (Physical, only available to order until midnight JST Sept. 3rd): tckc-ch.net)

Q. “The world isn’t at peace or anything! He isn’t! Meta Ros isn’t smiling!” So anyways, Meta Ros hasn’t appeared since the last episode of Senyuu+, but is he happy? Is he having fun with Meta Alba?

A. Honestly, I haven’t really thought too deeply about it since he’s just a joke character. But since he’s just a joke character, I’m sure he’s off doing his own thing somewhere, free and unrestrained by anything.

Q. Since Lym is a demon and Lake is from a thousand years ago, they don’t have last names, but does Salt have one? He is from modern times. If he does, what is it?

A. He does. I’ve also thought up names for Rchimedes the Second and his wife, but the thing is with manga is that you shouldn’t include everything you think up. It’s more interesting to the readers if you just include the information they need to know. Like how if you introduce yourself to someone in real life, you don’t tell them your whole life backstory, like- “My name is Tanaka Tarou! My father is Tanaka Katsuo. My mother is Tanaka Hanako, my grandma is-” You just tell them what they need to know, right? That makes things go more smoothly. Yeah.

So anyways, about his last name, I did think of one. Yeah. But I don’t remember where I wrote it down, and I can’t remember the name at all right now. I mean hey, even in real life, sometimes you forget people’s names when you just call them by a nickname all the time. It’s like that, etc., blah blah.

Q. Why was Ros the only one to be released from the seal even though he was sealed together with Rchiemdes? Who broke the seal?

A. Wasn’t it Elf who released the seal in order to give Alba some stimulus? Though Alba and Ros’ first meeting itself was a coincidence. Elf wanted to release Ros, or rather, the Demon Lord into Alba’s time in order to give Alba some stimulus, and to achieve that goal he teamed up with Dezember... wait, was this something I scrapped? Did I never write about it? I remember everything until Season 4 pretty well, since I drew a lot until there, but when I reached Season 4 I started feeling that sense of relief like “It’s all over~” and remember absolutely nothing...! I’d need to completely re-read Senyuu to know for sure... every, please re-read it for me! If there was something like that in canon, then I’ll go with that. If there wasn’t, then I must’ve scrapped it, or else I just had to cut back some parts that I wanted to draw.

...Now I’m starting to feel like I scrapped it after all... because I thought that having Elf doing everything wasn’t a good plot device... I don’t know...

Anyways, for now the answer to the question is “Wow, it’s really quite strange... I wonder who did it~”

Q. Foyfoy said that Ros was “a soldier from a country who doesn’t know war.” What kind of environment did Foyfoy grow up in?

A. While Foyfoy’s hometown is peaceful, Foyfoy spent time as a mercenary in wartorn countries in order to make money. It’s never been shown in canon, so it’s basically just a little backstory that was thought up at some point in the past.

Q. There’s other countries in SQ, but if there’s other countries in canon would Alba be seen as a threat?

A. There are other countries. But the King of the country that collected all those heroes is so powerful, Alba being a wonder of nature isn’t as important. If we say that Alba’s country is Japan, the neighbouring countries are on the scale of the Fukue Neighbourhood in Kurashiki City of Fukushima Prefecture.

(T/N: You can see the exact scale on Google Maps by searching “岡山県倉敷市福江”, but essentially, incredibly tiny in comparison.)

Q. Is the King’s right-hand man Maine (Minister) still working at the castle?

A. He should be. He is.

Q. Crea awakened to his magic through contact with the Mana Maker, but can he no longer use it?

A. Crea doesn’t know how to use magic so he can’t. There’s no longer a Mana Maker in his body as well. There may be some mana left behind in his body, but he has no idea how to draw it out, so he can’t use it. At the start of Season 3, he tries to make a flower bloom with magic, but fails, after all.

Q. Hasegawara and Grandpa returned to their youths - did they continue living like that?

A. Since they did technically achieve their goal, they should’ve gone back to their original lives.

Q. In The Hero of the Port City, Guilty Justice says that she came because she sensed Creasion’s mana. What was she planning to do?

A. She probably came to fight him because she sensed some rare mana. Considering canon, it’s strange for Justice to appear in a place like that, isn’t it?

Q. How is Alf and Cecily’s relationship at the moment...?

A. They don’t have one.

Q. Back in his Originia era, Crea was an orphan, so how did did he survive?

A. Back then, orphans weren’t uncommon. The villagers helped raise him - he lived a happy life.

Q. The princess from ‘Tis Time for “Torture”, Princess and Hime-chan have the same birthday and a similar hairstyle - are they related in any way?

A. The reason why their birthdays are the same is that when I went to write about the princess’ birthday, I thought, “Hm, did I decide on her birthday? Oh right, March 3rd.” and accidentally remembered it as Hime-chan’s birthday. The princess’ hairstyle is entirely Hira Kei-san’s design, I had no hand in it, but I don’t think it’s that similar to Hime-chan’s?

Q. It seems like demons have long lifespans, so does the Demon World have problems with overpopulation?

A. In order to birth a new demon, you need to have a fair amount of mana and a good amount of skill in manipulating it. Alternately, you need to meet someone who you’re really in perfect sync with. Because of that, their population doesn’t increase that much.

Q. I really really love the “three burrs” hairstyle - will Ros never wear his hair that way again?

A. That hairstyle was something done by the first hairstylist he went to after he was unsealed, so unless he goes to that exact hairstylist again, he won’t have that hairstyle.

Q. What is Dezember and Justice’s newlywed life like? Is Dezember the househusband after all?

A. Though Justice was getting things going with the wedding, Dezember ran away so their newlywed life hasn’t begun. Their dynamic is kinda like the one in Urusei Yatsura.

Q. Rchi is now over 12. How does Rudolf feel about this?

A. I thought that Rudolf was good with anyone below 13? Was it only until 10? But even if she grows past Rudolf’s age ceiling, he won’t really stop being kind to her. He would stop spoiling her so much though, in how he used to do whatever she asked with no strings asked. He would instead start saying that it’s important to try things out yourself too. That’s the only thing that would change.

Q. F5 is a regular manga, so are there any plans to release a physical volume for it?

A. Not in the slightest.

Q. Cecily and Lake were living alone together before reuniting with Ros, so how did their neighbours react to a young teenager Lake having a younger brother in his 20s?

A. Their neighbours don’t think of Ros as the younger brother - they more just think of him as Cecily’s son who came back home from afar. I think updating the family registry wouldn’t have been hard with the connections they have in the government.

Q. I would like you to tell me how Januar got into ninja and tomato farming.

A. He got into ninja because they’re cool, and he got into tomato farming because tomatoes are yummy.

Q. Elf and Alf were time travelling in Season 4 - I would like it if you made a detailed timeline of what they and other characters did. (For example, Alf erased Elf’s memories during X time, at this time Rchimedes and Creasion were doing Y, etc.)

A. When I was writing Season 4, I did make a timeline, but I’m not sure where it went... what Elf and Alf did is all written in the article before this one, “My Memos”. I don’t think things have changed much from the timeline there for Elf and Alf, so please figure things out from there!

(T/N: I’ll consider translating that article at some point... it’s a lot of text... and it’s all disjointed...

Though I guess this Q/A is also a lot of text, I’m already at 3.5k words.)

Q. In the extra chapter in Season 2, “Right Before Episode 60″, Foyfoy asks if Marl wants to come to the castle with him, but do the two of them actually live in the castle itself? Or do they live near the castle?

A. Marl does live in the castle because she thinks it’s cool to live in a castle.

Q. Why are Elf and Alf not returning to their original time (ignoring the new future timeline after their changes) and are instead working at Alba’s research center?

A. Because they look up to Alba and want to help him out.

Q. Do you have any thoughts on how Alba watches over all kinds of worlds out there?

A. I do think, “That seems rather dangerous, doesn’t it?” But I also think, “Well, it’s Alba-san, he’ll be fine.”

Q. Personally, I feel like Senyuu. has a lot of whiplash between comedic scenes and serious scenes. Is there any particular scene you drew while specifically considering this whiplash?

A. Senyuu, is a work I drew as an amateur out of sheer willpower alone, so it isn’t that it has a lot of whiplash between comedic and serious scenes - it’s just that I didn’t understand a thing. “Woo hoo! This seems fun!” was the only thing on my mind. As a bystander, you may wonder, “How can he zoom right into that corner at that speed?” while watching me cruise along in my vehicle, but in reality, you just didn’t know that I was unaware of the fact that zooming into that corner at that speed could result in death. If I wrote Senyuu. the way I am now, I think it would end up being a much tidier manga, much easier to read as well, but I doubt it’d have that same speed and power to it.

Q. I had a question about Rchimedes the First’s character design. Did you give him black and white hair because you personally thought it was really cool? And then you thought it was too cool for him so you made his clothes super lame as a compromise?

A. It was all just from powering through drawing him. I did think “Wow, his clothes are lame!” but I immediately ignored it and continued drawing.

Q. Somewhere along the line, cellphones have spread among the masses - does Ros have one? And really, who’s making them?

A. From the very start, I planned for Senyuu. to be unconstrained by the chains of fantasy and include technology. Even in the start of Season 1, there’s a picture of Ros holding a DS at one point. Since it’s a manga, I completely intend to ignore real-life technological development timelines.

Q. Ros has pretty lax shifts - six day weekends and only needing to come in from the afternoon. Does he really only go to work once a week?

A. He doesn’t even go to work once a week. He does no work but wanders over to the research center to loiter around when he feels like it.

Q. In Senyuu+, Alba seems pretty tired sometimes. Is working at the research center actually pretty bad? As in, does it require a lot of overtime?

A. It isn’t bad, Alba is just going ahead and doing the work he wants to do, then going ahead and getting all tired because of it. From the perspective of the government running it, even just having the world’s hero Alba owning a research center they manage is good enough. It would be fine even if Alba never showed up at the research center at all and never did even one iota of work. Alba is just doing his best for everyone’s sake. Lately, he rests properly.

Q. Boss seems to have accessories and clothes other than his hoodie. Does he buy all of them himself?

A. Yes, he does. I talk about this in the doujinshi Filled It With My Feelings as well!

(T/N: If you enjoyed reading any of this tidbits, please consider supporting Haruhara by purchasing the original article on his channel: ch.nicovideo.jp/haruhara-ch/blomaga/ar1939122)

#senyuu #senyu #senyuu spoilers #haruhara robinson #haruhara robinson channel #senyuu content #my translations

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laurasauras · 5 years

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What do you think Homestuck believes in?

g, i love you, your interest in me infodumping is honestly such a delight. i can sometimes feel like i’m talking way too much, but you always make me feel special, it’s lovely!

this is long, so i’m going to use a cut. i’m so sorry, mobile users. blame tumblr. tl;dr? i think homestuck believes in love, hope, and fighting even when the stakes seem insurmountable.

so there’s a lot of like “core themes” in homestuck, but “what homestuck believes in” is such a lovely and specific way to phrase it, so i’m gonna go with what i think the most important ones are.

firstly: love. and more specifically, all love.

look, there are romantic parts of homestuck. and they’re often show-stopping.

(also homestuck does visual callbacks very well, there’s a reason that these two scenes are composed the same way.)

but the core of the story is these four kids, all of them starting from a state of isolation. they don't have "real friends", they feel disconnected from their guardians, they feel disconnected from everyone in the world they walk around in, but they go online and they have each other. and they're constantly joking and making fun of each other, but they're also checking in almost every time they achieve something, as if grounding their friends in their real life.

the story keeps progressing and getting more and more complicated, but it can never quite overshadow the beauty of the pesterlog conversations between friends.

i think that's a large part of what the audience of homestuck connects with—that feeling of connection online and the support that the characters give each other.

i also think that a lot of the time, the friendships and familial relationships in homestuck were given the same—if not more—importance as the romantic relationships, which is fucking uncommon to see in media! almost every character has to come to terms with how their upbringing shaped them, and you know what? that's the same of almost every person.

the conversation between dirk and dave before the final battle is one of the most important and touching moments of the whole story! two of the characters most concerned with their adherence to masculinity and appearing Too Cool For Emotions talk about their feelings and trauma before hugging it out. and it doesn't further the plot, it isn't part of the hero's romantic arc, but it's vital.

the second big thing i think homestuck believes in is the importance of doing what is right. in being a hero.

homestuck positions john and his friends as the main characters selected by the universe to play sburb and literally ascends them to god status.

they're empowered by destiny! they're going to beat the game, conquer the worst villain ever and bring humanity and trollkind back from extinction AND their new world isn't going to be under the tyranny of a genocidal fish alien!

but that empowerment is also a disempowerment.

look at how frequently dave falls into the reluctant hero trope. fate fucking kicks them around. when they are so destined to do all that stuff, can they really be said to have free will? and when they do seem to make a wrong choice in relation to their destiny, it's either something that furthers the plot OR it creates a doomed timeline and they're usually killed horribly.

and it's a story that is constantly reminding us that it's a story! you can definitely lose yourself in homestuck, you can zone into it and accept the rules and just read it as if it's a reasonable reality, but i don't think it was ever written that way, or when it is, i think that that's a result of hussie accidentally getting into the story as well!

like okay, we start off with this:

that's fucking bonkers. he's 13 and he doesn't have a name? but of course it's bullshit, it’s just a cool homestuck thing. because we never get a conversation that goes:

TG: so the big 13

TG: you get a name yet

EB: yup! let me formally introduce myself as john!

TG: i give that name 4/5 hats

no, dave just immediately calls john by his name. and likewise, until we're introduced to the other characters and learn their names, they're referred to by their handle abbreviations, but the second they're introduced it's first name basis time. because it's a story and our perception is what matters most.

then we have the ridiculous intermission, that starts out as what dave sees when he goes to mspa.com and which resembles problem sleuth enough that i almost thought it was just that, but then seemed to be an entirely new adventure, and then became a pretty vital subplot!

and then we have the author literally climbing into the story and we watch him type it. Don't Forget This Is All Written By Me!

the website changes format, there are the meta jokes, there's the way that caliborn raises the same complaints to hussie about the story being too long and confusing that some members of the fandom were. there's the way that pantskat happened! or they drastic changes in artstyle, often because someone else was drawing a panel!

so like, we've got these characters who seem to have goals that they've developed of their own volition and who seem to have their own ways of going about achieving them, who at times even act contrarily to how hussie says he wants them to act (remember how he attempted to propose to/revive vriska and how both she and caliborn at different times type into the narrative prompt "instead of" hussie) but of course ultimately! he wrote every word!

they don't have free will, they don't even exist! but on a different level, which any writer can understand, once you as an author have established a character, you trap yourself into writing them consistently, which can mean that while something might be best for the plot, the character metaphorically crosses their arms in your head and goes "i would literally never do that."

some characters of homestuck become aware that they are and we know they are, but most of them don't think that, they think that they're just living the life they have.

how the fuck are his characters supposed to go about their days when their author finds it funny to block their path with a giant bust of snoop dogg? and when they work for pages and pages and pages to get around whatever asinine thing andrew fucking hussie (or worse! his fans!) has come up with, there's another obstacle and maybe there's not even a point anyway!

how do you not just dismiss it as something like "hes just being weird/an asshole/etc”?

yeah, look, he might just be having a laugh. but so to might god.

sometimes you're walking along and something really stupid happens and it makes you for a second want to believe in god so that you can stare at the sky and say "really." :|

think about why detective stories are so popular. they give the illusion that if you're clever enough, if you collect the right data and link it together, you can trace back exactly what happened and solve impossible riddles and make sense of the world. you meet a man who has dust on his knees and you can deduce that he's been sneaking down to the basement of the shop he works at to tunnel into the bank next door. there's nothing magic about it, watson, it's just good detective work.

and we neeeeed that lie! but you know how it works in the real world? in the real world, police are baffled at a crime scene until a decade later someone discovers the fingerprints belonged to a fucking KOALA! that's more ridiculous than a snoop dogg bust in a hallway, or most of the other things hussie has written.

i think like that's a huge message behind the epilogues too, because john figures out he's in a story in candy and everything feels pointless.

but if that's the world he lives in, that's the world he fucking lives in. there's nothing pointless about living.

and i think that clicks for him towards the end when he talks to roxy and then rose. rose actually thanks him for choosing a path that allowed her to have the life she had, because she loves her wife and daughter. like it's insane, but she's happy, that's the life she lived and she doesn't want a more sensible one.

so what happens to us when we get that feeling like the world is pointless?

(which is A Major Fucking Side Effect Of Depression BTW and i still stand by my interpretation that ALL of john's shit can be put down to his depression, which is what makes it interesting)

for a generation with fucking terrifying levels of mental illness, when we start feeling like the world is too crazy and the odds are too high, and there's fucking war happening and our friends aren't even guaranteed to be on our side?

we just fucking fight anyway.

because we live in the world we live in and we just have to be grateful that we are who we are because of that.

every character in homestuck chooses this, again and again, so i have to read that as hopeful. alpha dave and rose knowing who hic is and that their kids are so far away? still gonna fucking fight and fight LOUDLY even though they know it won't change things. (on top of the fucking white house, in case the political allegory was too subtle lmao.)

there are so many messages in homestuck and honestly i feel like i’ve barely scraped the surface of them. but what does homestuck believe in? i feel that in my heart. homestuck believes in love and in doing what is right, even when it’s hard to figure out what right is, even when you might not make a difference.

homestuck is good, actually.

#long post #homestuck #my post

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thearistocratsblog · 4 years

Text

Academic Misgivings

I sometimes dwell on this stuff in my head so might as well inventory it here. During my college years in the Brown/RISD dual degree program, Brown work was generally on the backburner, but I did have a few ideas for essays which I thought might’ve been interesting if I had more time and space to execute them. I was never incentivized to try harder, because my teachers usually laughed at my ideas or directed me to focus more on sex/gender (never the most exciting topic to me, although it figures into my work in some capacity.) Off the top of my head, here are a few of my undergraduate academic ambitions/misgivings.

Sophomore Year:

1. American Modernism and Its Aftermaths: Essay on the relationship between “Squidward’s Suicide” haunted media creepypasta, Mike Kelley’s “Deoderized Central Mass With Satellites” /repressed memory syndrome/Derrida’s “Archive Fever.” Feedback: None.

2. Media, of Affect: Essay on the relationship between Bataille’s accursed share and loot box/blind box economics (with completely unnecessary detour on Greenbergian distinction between kitsch and fine art) Feedback: Was told to focus on gendered gross-out toys, so I added a whole section on how the the Trash Pack/ Grossery Gang toys never had menstrual blood on them. Would have been extremely helpful to research more about libidinal economies, video game monetization schemes, or Deleuze’s theories about the origin of money.

Junior Year:

3. Serial Fictions: Essay on Jim Woodring’s “Frank” comic/monomythic exploratory narratives/moral relativism of the cartooning medium/the relationship between cartoonist’s laboring-bodies and their corporeal, volumetric ‘illustrative’ sensibility/cartoonist vs painter personalities (& their respective working temporalities) /google maps as illustrative surface, as it relates to Kant’s mathematical sublime/fantastic sublimity as patchwork of realistic detail (It was titled “Moral Algebra & The Patchwork Sublime in Woodring’s “Frank”.)

Feedback: Told to make it more sex-related or something?

4. Digital Cinema and the Inhuman: Essay attempting a Deleuzian reading of Blue Sky Studio’s 2015 Peanuts movie. The neurotic/Freudian/ “talking cure”- style comic strip becomes properly Deleuzian when computer animation introduces a deterritorialized/anti-Oedipal set of concerns via textures, procedural simulation, moving cameras etc.

Feedback: Told to focus on only “Becoming Animal” chapter from Mil plat, fair enough. The teacher thought the essay was a bit of a meme. The “textural reading” in the middle section was a travesty. Read it here.

5. Refiguring Expression: The Feeling of Voice in Modern and Contemporary Poetry: Essay on Melanie Klein’s dolls as a site of projection/waiting-room aesthetics in Jasper Spicero’s installation, “Living Waterway.” All artists collect based on childhood motifs (therefore positing aesthetic taste in the model of traumatic recursion? or something?). Then I free-associate with the sculpture. Feedback: More on the sentence level, but helpful. Read it here.

Senior Year:

6. Deleuze and Cinema: Essay interpreting the contemporary horror movie, “It Follows” (with shapeshifting stalker-ghoul) through the lens of Bergson’s critique of duration (monster confusing qualitative and quantitative multiplicities). Also made the point of videogame-style POV being used to create psychological discomfort/lack of agency (a pt I have recently seen echoed in a Galloway book) and the question of how critique could be enacted at the ‘level of the character’ (the archive-as-monster?) and not the flimic scenario as a whole. Feedback: Can’t recall.

7. Getting Emotional: Passionate Threories: Essay attempting to develop a theory of “counter-diffential” irony that is purely spatial or experiential, using Marnie Mull’s affectively-imbued “Cigarette Hedgehog” sculpture as a key example. (Self-duping, self-sacrificing Romantic smoker ethics briefly discussed.) Going through DeMan’s “Rhetoric of Temporality” to figure out allegory of blindness... (and Duchamp’s anti-aeshetic sculptures-as-dick-jokes could be groped with your eyes closed, couldn’t they?) Also the “counter-differential” title is a reference to the normals used to calculate light info on surfaces of 3d models (normals= negative reciprocal of tangency, ) because I was also trying(& failing) to square theories of irony with calculus/rates of change. Also I compare Whitman’s poem about a blind man with his life story written on a sign around his neck to a Surgeon General’s warning LOL... Feedback: JK thought this was a mess, which is true.

8. The Contemporary Novel and Its Cultural Rivals: Essay on how Adult Swim’s Million Dollar Extreme used antihumor and excessive deus ex machinas to obscure conservative political intents- antihumor as inherently conservative aesthetic. Feedback:Gentle encouragement.

Supersenior Year:

9.Senior thesis proposal on “Theory of the quirk”: midway between characterology and aleatorics, by way of fan wikis. Also wanted to think about autistic memory-bank and subliminal memory vis a vis Derren Brown’s “Subliminal Messaging” video. Realized this was too unconventional a project for the structure Brown was providing, so I dropped out.

10. Sex. What is it, why does it matter? Essay on psychoanalytic/interpassive qualities in ASMR and “Satisfying” youtube videos. (What drive is being satisfied/denied relationship to sexuality etc.) Feedback: Helpful, according to JC didn’t do enough to acknowledge ‘the other in oneself’. Read it here.

10. Prose Sagas of the Medieval North: Essay applying Benjamin’s “Fate and Character” to Grettir’s Saga/Grettir as Homo Sacer (via Agamben). Low key the coolest move of my academic career was using the Draugr’s curse to critique Benjamin’s definition of law, rather than the other way around! (I.e. by creating a fork in fate to sap Grettir’s potential strength, the Draugr employs law as a preventative measure, a dimension of law which Benjamin never acknowledges. It makes sense, almost!) Feedback: None.

11. Is that a fact?: Wanted to write on discursive modes surrounding autism ( ironic oxymoron considering relationship between autism and nonverbal behavior). Feedback: My trolling was stopped in its tracks by the teacher; I wasn’t allowed to write this.

Academic work as a whole: I was most interested in sculpture/cartoons/toys/horrific allegories/archives/sexual difference/organization of the personality/ironic structures/art criticism rooted in the maker’s set of concerns. Too jokey at times but maybe I had potential. Le sigh.

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yamameta-inc · 7 years

Text

on yamamoto and gokudera’s relationship

i’m two years late with this post and i’ve realized i can’t make nice, readable, presentable list posts i’m just going to copy crossy and Just Say Things when i feel like talking about them

okay so what absolutely baffles me about fanon characterization of their relationship is that people seem to think gokudera dislikes yamamoto just because he thinks he’s Dumb, whereas yamamoto is just ‘haha oh you’ and puts up with it indulgently because he loves gokudera and gokudera is his Good Friend.

while the last part isn’t completely off the mark, i feel like this interpretation of their relationship completely ignores one essential fact: both yamamoto and gokudera initially do not think much of the other, at all. gokudera thinks yam is dumb, yes, but mostly, there is absolutely nothing about yam that isn’t either incredibly threatening or incredibly abhorrent to him. gokudera doesn’t harass yam because he’s tsun, he harasses him because yamamoto being in the same space as him is deeply upsetting to him and constantly threatens the implicit Rules that govern his worldview. gokudera hates yamamoto because yamamoto is a carefree civilian who’s allowed to just join up for no reason (whereas he had to pass a fake ‘test’ of sorts), which is a Big Deal for a mafia brat who grew up on the streets of the underworld; because gokudera doesn’t understand yamamoto at ALL and thinks that yam isn’t taking any of this seriously, which infuriates gokudera because of the honour he accords the position of guardian and because of what he perceives as the sheer audacity of being that flippant with tsuna’s safety; and, most crucially, because despite all of this yamamoto is genuinely better at everything than he is. we all know gokudera has self-esteem and insecurity issues in SPADES, and interacting with yamamoto automatically sets those off at maximum intensity.

and yamamoto? is fully aware of this. he knows gokudera doesn’t like him and treats him pretty unfairly. he just didn’t know the extent of gokudera’s dislike until the gamma fight, because part of him was hopeful that since they were Teammates, gokudera had to like him at least a little bit, right? but like, this is half the reason yamamoto is initially... kind of condescending towards gokudera. he doesn’t show in his behaviour, because he’s a Good Boy and tries to be polite, but the thing is, yamamoto knows he‘s stronger than gokudera. he doesn’t make a big deal out of it because he’s not an asshole and doesn’t particularly care about things like that when it comes to Friendship, but heeeee’s definitely aware that gokudera... isn’t all that strong? or reliable? and gokudera’s behaviour towards him just makes him even more “haha ok.” he laughs it off because gokudera is so theatrical about it and yamamoto has no idea how relationships actually work. it’s kind of the only way he can continue to go unbothered by it (though as we see in the gamma fight, when he isn’t putting forth the effort to not take it seriously, he is Very Bothered--yamamoto isn’t all that honest with himself, ever). the slapstick dynamic we see with yamamoto’s attitude towards gokudera being essentially “sure jan” and gokudera spitting fire at him is funny because it’s a Joke but also in terms of characterization it means yamamoto definitely has to be at least somewhat dismissive of gokudera in order for this whole thing to be sustainable?

for example, after the gamma fight, gokudera gives a genuine and earnest apology to yamamoto, saying he was scared and unfairly took it out on yam, saying things he didn’t mean. yam, in return, says.... “i also said things i shouldn’t have.” aka yamamoto meant all those things he said to gokudera--this entire time, yamamoto thought gokudera was doing an extremely poor job of being a guardian and that he had no idea what he was doing. he just never said anything because, well. he’s yamamoto. he doesn’t say things! he doesn’t want to cause any friction in the team, so he usually just lets everything slide (partly due to fear of losing the only place where he can belong, and partly because he is deathly allergic to confrontation and internalizes everything instead of dealing with his issues). that’s why he’s “easygoing”: he won’t disturb the status quo at all unless he has no choice (see: never bringing up reborn’s secret ever again because they forgot to ask him again), but uh, he’s extremely perceptive and in fact knows More Things Than People Think and has a lot of Opinions about things.

yamamoto is also a little shit, and a large part of how he deals with gokudera’s behaviour is by......... winding him up on purpose, because yamamoto thinks it’s absolutely hilarious (it is). yam deals with a lot of things by turning them into a jokes! it’s just a Thing. maybe it’s not healthy but hey, Now It’s Funny, and funny things are good. yam KNOWS that gokudera takes his whole “mafia game” thing literally, but never bothers to correct him, because he thinks it’s fucking funny that gokudera is so baitable. obviously, this does NOT help gokudera be less annoyed by him. these boys are really dumb.

yamamoto doesn’t DISLIKE gokudera, though. despite everything, he has high hopes of Being Friends with gokudera. he also can kind of guess where gokudera’s anger comes from? he can’t do anything about gokudera’s insecurities though (hell, he wouldn’t even know where to begin, or even how to formulate the thought--he’s a 14 year old jock he doesn’t know what the word insecurity means). he doesn’t really know where they stand, but he’s??? tentatively optimistic??? maybe??? he’s very attached to the fact that they are Teammates. a team ties people together, and yamamoto Knows teammates. he can do Teams. this is what he’s good at. the mafia is a Team Game and all his teammates are Extremely Important and he’s gonna win this you guys. he tries his very best to LIKE gokudera, which is why he’s always laughing and turning things into jokes, because gokudera is a lot more likeable if you turn him into a meme (this is applicable to all uptight or angry fictional characters): it’s a lot easier to get along with someone who’s always angry at you if you can go “oh you ahahahaha you’re always such a riot gokudera.” yamamoto actually really is strangely endeared by gokudera, probably because 1) gokudera is sometimes really Relatable 2) you will never understand a warrior’s bond 3) once yamamoto has successfully installed them into a Routine (which is partly why he never corrects gokudera on anything, so they always end up repeating the same arguments), gokudera and all his mannerisms become a familiar comfort instead of Attac 4) they hang out and stuff sometimes and it’s really chill?

just think of it this way: yamamoto is a dog that Loves gokudera, but doesn’t respect him in any shape or form. he is an EXTREMELY friendly dog, and so he will wag his tail and ask to play with him and lick his face, but only when he feels like it, and if gokudera tries to tell him to do anything.......

lol

this dynamic only really begins to change in the latter half of the future arc, after they’ve had their big fight! the frustrations they’ve had with each other ever since the beginning of the series finally bubble up to the surface and they blow up in an extravagant mess. they finally confront each other on their Feelings about each other, while also revealing other Emotions they’ve been experiencing that obviously neither acknowledged in the least up until then. (so. bad. at feelings and communication.) it’s at that moment that they finally start respecting each other, not only as people, but as fellow guardians! you’ll notice that in all subsequent arcs, gokudera is much less aggressive towards yamamoto, only griping for what seems to be the principle of it. it’s Routine now. (thanks yam) all this culminates in the peerless wonder that is the tandem bike scene. it’s a beautiful metaphor for how their relationship has evolved.

tl;dr-- yamamoto and gokudera’s relationship is actually extremely complex and fascinating, and it’s a crying shame that fandom simplifies it for the sake of tsundere gokudera and red-blue rivalship. gokudera is not tsun: he actually genuinely dislikes yamamoto in the beginning of the series. neither considers the other a worthy rival: gokudera thinks yamamoto isn’t qualified to even be a candidate in the mafia race by virtue of his character and background, whereas yamamoto doesn’t think gokudera is competent or strong enough to be on his level. they would both destroy each other in an instant for the position of tsuna’s right hand man. thankfully, they later become asshole friends and settle into a friendlier, heat-less version of their old dynamic.

#uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh this was supposed to be..... like 2-3 paragraphs.... lol #khr #yamamoto takeshi #gokudera hayato

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elizabethrobertajones · 7 years

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SAD TIMES! so when dean says that the boys home with sonny wasn't so bad because nobody bad touched him, burned him or beat him with a metal hanger? does that mean he's comparing his time there to all the other times he did get bad touched or burned etc? i bet that's it. like he could actually enjoy hid freedom from his father and freedom from responsibility in general and he was finally free of all the bad things that happened to him?

I’d read it as going under Dean’s pop culture knowledge of what’s “supposed” to happen in prisons or foster homes - the kind of abuse and violence that depictions of these often focus on, or of course sometimes are actually happening and you get horrible news reports about… (Honestly the fact they trawl the news for weird stories all the time means they must read some truly hideous news stories about regular people doing awful shit >.>)

I sort of file it under the same thing as what I was talking about in this recent post:

http://elizabethrobertajones.tumblr.com/post/155634477583/i-wonder-why-this-harmonica-thing-is-never-a-part

about Dean’s jokes about being in prison. Basically, he’s always projecting that defensive mechanism, and in these cases, trying to fit into the pop culture prisoner persona in a very genre-savvy way. In the end of season 2 you get those two episodes very close to each other (back to back?) where Dean is a PA on the movie set and in prison, and both times Sam calls him out for getting way too in character, but that’s sort of how Dean operates :P He’s very good at shedding personality skins and trying on a new one, possibly because 90% of Dean’s on screen time is Dean under one personality or another that’s not really who he is, whether because he’s acting as a persona obviously on the job, or because he’s deflecting and acting up a version of himself for emotional reasons…

That conversation was Sam challenging him about what it was like at Sonny’s and how Dean liked it, so he had a reflexive response to continue protecting Sam under the old rules of “the story became the story” from however John originally told Sam what happened (and Dean went along with it willingly or not) but obviously with the rules changed now that Dean’s in charge of the story and Sam’s found out it even happened… Dean doesn’t really want to share the truth of it, probably because it took a huge emotional toll on him to leave so the fact he was happy there and sacrificed that for family would get a really bad response from Sam (who Dean’s watching closely the whole time protective of John’s part in this and knowing Sam is liable to go off on one about how terrible John was - thanks Sam :P), and we get to see a lot more than he ever tells Sam through Dean’s POV and the flashbacks to understand WHY he is defending his time there so carefully and weaving this non-committal story about it to Sam, as if nothing there mattered.

So he gets flippant and makes references to stuff he knows can be connected to the situation to remind Sam how awful it could have been, and come at it from the negative perspective which is a good way to sort of establish that it was at a bare minimum not, like, literal Hell. Which changes the way some one thinking about it from that would imagine the experience, because Dean’s setting up “not beaten or molested” as the baseline, rather than selling something like that it was peaceful and quiet and boring but he didn’t enjoy it, because that would still be too fishy for Dean to risk it, never mind trying to pass off, it was great and I had a girlfriend and was learning to play guitar but don’t worry, it was actually totally crap here and I couldn’t wait to leave.

(He kind of fucks that up that their next scene is Sam finding out about Robin existing, but patching over the issue for that one conversation, at least :P)

But I guess because it’s Dean and if you like angst, there’s no reason that you can’t assume he’s drawing on other traumatic childhood memories, whether that’s an exaggeration or not of what he describes, because he does just comment this out of the blue, and it’s sort of… the fact he associates it with himself? Actually, this reminds me of the other moment in this episode that’s really close to the surface text, talking about Dean going through abuse, and it’s the same point I made in my rewatch notes about the ambiguity of that moment so I’m just going to copy and paste that >.>

okay whoever did this superwiki transcript is actually fascinating me half as much as the episode… I normally delete the stage directions but:

Sitting in front of YOUNG DEAN, SONNY takes his cuffed hands to open up the cuffs. YOUNG DEAN’s forearms are bruised and red, as if bruised or abraded by bindings or ligature marks.

SONNY (noting the marks with concern)Deputy do that? (YOUNG DEAN scoffs and shakes his head.) What, your old man? (YOUNG DEAN shakes his head no.) Well, then, how’d you get it?

YOUNG DEAN (turning back to SONNY, somewhat defiantly)Werewolf.

SONNY looks at YOUNG DEAN for a long moment, realizing he’s not going to get a different answer from the kid.

SONNYOkay.

There’s a whole ton of discussion on this moment already out there - the “did John hurt his kids physically” argument is long and old and no stone left unturned etc (well, I have found relatively un-turned stones on this rewatch but shh) but I’m amused by the way the transcript takes pains to describe how the marks look, suggesting specifically that Dean was tied up e.g. making it much more likely this was something that happened on the job.

[Note from present!me realising I never quite finished this thought: which isn’t to say that this interpretation automatically decides definitely what the marks looked like and how they were made, just that this is how that fan read them… Writing it that way in the transcript removes any ambiguity from what the surface text is telling us despite the fact it’s just presented as an ambiguous visual clue that the fandom’s been arguing about for ages about how those marks could have been made, and the fact of this lack of ambiguity is what amused me…]

The actual dialogue is an interesting example of the season 9 storytelling theme - and of course “the story became the story” coming from this episode we know it’s hard at work. In this case though I’m looking ahead to 9x18 and Metatron asking what makes the story work and citing subtext. This moment is intentionally given as an ambiguous moment. Sonny thinks Dean was hurt by John (or the deputy) and has no reason to believe “werewolf” because that’s blatant fiction because to him monsters aren’t real. Dean is being this much snarky and deflective enough that even for us, knowing damn well that werewolves exist in their universe and that Dean was already hunting them at this tender age, Sonny’s speculation on it changes the flippant rely and can offer a crack through which to wonder for ourselves how else Dean might have got the marks, and just to weigh the possibility.

And then of course from there you can make your opinion whichever way takes your fancy, like writing stage directions to imply it was the monster, or assuming at the very least having Sonny suggest it might be a call to think about how John treated them, in an episode that’s already repeatedly underlined his emotional neglect/harsh emotional punishment to Dean - if not to assume he did hurt him, then to take it as a prompt to consider it emotional abuse being depicted in the episode. And then some John fans will take Dean’s line as total exoneration of John from ever hurting Dean, and probably go with all his surface level comments telling Sam not to get all weird about John and Dean saying that he deserved it…

http://elizabethrobertajones.tumblr.com/post/148015532758/9x07-rewatch-or-i-love-this-kid-but-i-find-deans

Of course however Dean got the bruises, John at the very least comes out of this episode with another mark against his name for child endangerment and deliberate neglect, but the point I’m looking at here is that thought about Sonny thinking it was just run of the mill no supernatural stuff involved physical parental abuse. That creates an association in the story LINKING John to said abuse, whether the show is implying he did or not, his actions are equated to physical harm coming to Dean. I guess in the same way, this comment from Dean might not be directly implying that that ever happened to him, but it also makes an association between Dean and that kind of abuse happening to him as a kid, which again leaves you at least that avenue of thought to wonder how deep that implication goes…

(I think from Dean’s comments in that scene, he’s definitely more trying to guide how Sam thinks about what Sonny’s was like for Dean, and not getting alarmingly real about that sort of thing, as it was a fairly flippant comment even if for a rather grim emotional purpose… I’ve never thought about it inverting that he wasn’t talking about that sort of thing happening TO him there but instead being about it NOT happening to him specifically there, but it’s an interesting thought when it comes to interpreting it…

idk, I’d like to think that that didn’t happen to Dean, ever, and that he was mostly just run of the mill supernaturally neglected and endangered. :P)

#Asks #9x07 #abuse cw #*not a John Winchester fangirl*#... but not that much of not a John Winchester fangirl :P #it's a really grim avenue of exploring how the storytelling in season 9 was working #I mean I love how intricate the conversation about subtext and reading the story is this season but #brrrr #don't really wanna probe this one too deeply :P

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samanthasroberts · 7 years

Text

ReflexLOLogy: Inside the Groan-Inducing World of Pun Competitions

From the moment he spoke, I knew I was screwed. On the surface, the guy wasn’t particularly fearsome—pudgy, late thirties, polo shirt, plaid shorts, baseball cap, dad sneakers—but he looked completely at ease. One hand in his pocket, the other holding the microphone loosely, like a torch singer doing crowd work. And when he finally began talking, it was with an assurance that belied the fact that he was basically spewing nonsense.

“I hate all people named John,” he said with surprising bravado. “Yeah, that’s right, that was a John diss!” The crowd roared. John-diss. Jaundice. A glorious, groan-inducing precision strike of a pun.

Welp, I thought. It was fun while it lasted.

If you’re an NBA rookie, you really don’t want to go up against LeBron James. Anyone’s trivia night would be ruined by seeing Ken Jennings on another team. And if you find yourself at the world’s biggest pun competition, the last person you want to face is four-time defending champion Ben Ziek. Yet that’s exactly where I was, on an outdoor stage in downtown Austin, Texas, committing unspeakable atrocities upon the English language in front of a few hundred onlookers who were spending their sunny May Saturday reveling in the carnage.

The rules of the 39th annual O. Henry Pun-Off World Championship’s “Punslingers” competition are simple: Two people take turns punning on a theme in head-to-head rounds. Failure to make a pun in the five seconds allowed gets you eliminated; make a nonpun or reuse a word three times and you’ve reached the banishing point. Round by round and pair by pair, a field of 32 dwindles until the last of the halved-nots finally gets to claim the mantle of best punster in the world and what most people would agree are some pretty dubious bragging rights. It’s exactly like a rap battle, if 8 Mile had been about software engineers and podcasters and improv nerds vying for supremacy. (Also just like 8 Mile: My first-round opponent had frozen when his turn came to pun on waterborne vehicles. Seriously, yacht a word came out. Canoe believe it?)

Eventually, there we stood, two among the final eight: me, a first-timer, squaring off against the Floyd Mayweather of the pun world. Actually, only one of us was standing; I found myself doing the world’s slowest two-step just to keep my legs from trembling. I’d been a little jittery in my first couple of rounds, sure, but those were standard-issue butterflies, perched on a layer of misguided confidence. This was the anxiety of the sacrificial lamb. I was punning above my weight, and I knew it. Once the judges announced that we’d be punning on diseases—hence Ziek’s joke about star-crossed livers—we began.

“Mumps the word!” I said, hoping that my voice wasn’t shaking.

Ziek immediately fired back: “That was a measle-y pun.” Not only was he confident, with a malleable voice that was equal parts game show host and morning-radio DJ, but his jokes were seemingly fully formed. Worse, he was nimble enough to turn your own pun against you.

“Well, I had a croup-on for it,” I responded. Whoa. Where’d that come from?

He switched gears. “I have a Buddha at home, and sometimes”—making a rubbing motion with his hand—“I like to rubella.”

I was barely paying attention. Diseases, diseases—oh! I pointed at people in different parts of the audience. “If you’ve got a yam, and you’ve got a potato, whose tuber’s closest?”

“There was a guy out here earlier painted light red,” Ziek said. “Did you see the pink guy?”

“I didn’t,” I responded. “Cold you see him?”

Again and again we pun-upped each other, a philharmonic of harmful phonics. From AIDS to Zika we ranged, covering SARS, migraines, Ebola, chicken pox, ague, shingles, fasciitis, streptococcus, West Nile, coronavirus, poison oak, avian flu, gangrene, syphilis, and herpes. Almost five minutes later, we’d gone through 32 puns between the two of us, and I was running dry. As far as my brain was concerned, there wasn’t a medical textbook in existence that contained something we hadn’t used. Ziek, though, had a seemingly endless stockpile and tossed off a quick alopecia pun; I could have bald right then and there. The judge counted down, and I slunk offstage to watch the rest of the competition—which Ziek won, for the fifth time. Knowing I’d lost to the best cushioned the blow, but some mild semantic depression still lingered: Instead of slinging my way to a David-like upset, I was the one who had to go lieth down.

Author Peter Rubin doing the punning man.Ryan Young

When I was growing up, my father’s favorite (printable) joke was “Where do cantaloupes go in the summertime? Johnny Cougar’s Melon Camp.” This is proof that—well, it’s proof that I grew up in Indiana. But it’s also proof that I was raised to speak two languages, both of them English. See, there’s the actual words-working-together-and-making-sense part, and then there’s the fun part. The pliant, recombinant part. The part that lets you harness linguistic irregularities, judo-style, to make words into other words. It’s not conscious, exactly; it just feels at some level like someone made a puzzle and didn’t bother to tell me, so my brain wants to figure out what else those sounds can do.

A lifetime of listening to hip hop has reinforced that phonetic impulse. Polysyllabic rhymes aren’t strictly puns, but they’re made of the same marrow; when Chance the Rapper rhymes “link in my bio” with “Cinco de Mayo” in the song “Mixtape,” I get an actual endorphin hit. Besides, rap is full of puns already: instant-gratification ones—like Lil Wayne saying “Yes I am Weezy, but I ain’t asthmatic” or MF Doom saying “Got more soul than a sock with a hole”—as well as ones that reveal themselves more slowly. Kanye West might be more famous for his production than his lyricism, but he endeared himself to me forever on the song “Dark Fantasy” by spitting the best Family Matters pun of all time: “Too many Urkels on your team, that’s why your wins low.”

I was punning above my weight, and I knew it.

Whether this is nature or nurture, though, the end result is the same: I’m playing with language all the time, and Kanye and I aren’t the only ones. “I can’t listen passively to someone speaking without the possibility of puns echoing around in my head,” says Gary Hallock, who has been producing and hosting the O. Henry Pun-Off for 26 years. He’s seen the annual event grow from an Austin oddity to a national event and watched dad jokes, of which puns are the most obvious example, take hold in the millennial consciousness; a dad-joke-devoted Reddit board boasts more than 250,000 members. “I’ve often compared punsters to linguistic terrorists,” Hallock says. “We’re literally stalking conversations, looking for the weak place to plant our bomb.”

And we’ve been doing it for a long, long time—verbal puns date back to at least 1635 BC, when a Babylonian clay tablet included a pun on the word for “wheat”—and the world has been conflicted about them for nearly as long. (Linguists can’t even agree whether the word pun derives from French, Old English, Icelandic, or Welsh, though there’s no point heading down that scenic root.) On one hand, puns are the stuff of terrible children’s joke books. Oliver Wendell Holmes likened punsters to “wanton boys that put coppers on the railroad tracks. They amuse themselves and other children, but their little trick may upset a freight train of conversation for the sake of a battered witticism.” On the other, God, how can you not feel a little thrill when you make a good one or a begrudging joy when you hear a better one?

Humor theorists generally agree that comedy hinges on incongruity: when a sentence or situation subverts expectations or when multiple interpretations are suggested by the same stimulus. (Also, yes, humor theorists are a thing.) That stimulus can be visual (looking at you, eggplant emoji!) or auditory (what up, tuba fart!); most commonly, though, it’s linguistic. Language is slippery by nature, and of the many kinds of wordplay—hyperbole, metaphor, spoonerisms, even letter-level foolery like anagrams—nothing takes advantage of incongruity quite like puns, of which there are four specific varieties. In order of increasing complexity, you’ve got homonyms, identical words that sound alike (“Led Zeppelin’s guitarist was interrogated last week, but detectives weren’t able to turn the Page”); homophones, which are spelled differently but sound the same (“I hate raisins! Apologies if you’re not into curranty vents.”); homographs, which sound different but look the same (“If you’re asking me to believe that a Loire cabernet is that different from a Napa cabernet, then the terroirists have won.”); and paronyms, which are just kinda similar-sounding (“I have a ton of work to do, but I ate so much cucumber chutney that I have raita’s block”). When we hear a pun, the words we hear aren’t the words we think we hear, and the burden’s on us to crack the code.

Granted, there are people out there who hate puns, and maybe rightly so. But for many of us, that decryption process is a reward unto itself. “Humor happens when something important is being violated,” cognitive scientist Justine Kao says. “Social norms, expectations. So for people who are sensitive to the rules that language follows, puns are more entertaining.” In other words, if you work with words on a daily basis—writing, editing, translating—you’re simply primed to appreciate them more. Behind every great headline, any editor will tell you, is a great pun. (I have a colleague at WIRED who once looked at a page about chef’s knives and gave it the headline “JULIENNE MORE”; people lost their goddamn minds.)

Still, even among the nerdiest of word herders, there are some rules. Two years ago, Kao and two colleagues at Stanford and UC San Diego decided to prove empirically that incongruity was the root of humor. They tested people’s reactions to hundreds of sentences that varied from one another in minute ways. Some used homophones; some didn’t. Some added detail supporting the nonpun interpretation of the sentence; some stripped detail away. They were able to demonstrate that ambiguity of meaning is necessary for a pun to be perceived—but it’s only half of the equation. (And literally, there’s an equation.) After all, “I went to the bank” is ambiguous, but it’s not a pun. The true determining factor of a pun’s funniness is what the team calls distinctiveness.

Take the sentence “The chef brought his girlfriend flours on Valentine’s Day.” It’s a homophone, so it’s not the most complex pun. But if you turn the chef into a pastry chef, that added vocation property makes the pun more distinctive. “When you’re able to identify keywords from different topics,” Kao says, “it clues you in on the intentionality of it—you’re forcing together two things that don’t often co-occur.”

Of course, “The pastry chef brought his girlfriend flours on Valentine’s Day” still isn’t funny. It’s the kind of pun a bot would make, and maybe has made in the decades since programmers created the first pun generator. There’s no storytelling to it, no drama. A good pun isn’t just an artless slab of sound-alikeness: It’s a joke that happens to hinge on wordplay. A truly formidable punner knows that and frames a sentence to make the pun the punch line. The longer you delay the ambiguity, the more tension you introduce—and the more cathartic the resolution. A pun should be an exclamation point, not a semicolon.

But was I a truly formidable punner? I’d thought so—hell, my lifelong dream is seeing Flavor Flav and Ellen Burstyn cohosting a talk show, just so it can be called Burstyn With Flavor—but after Austin, I had my doubts. I’d cracked under pressure once; until I tried again, I’d never know fissure. As it turned out, a second chance was around the corner.

The Bay Area Pun-Off, a monthly philharmonic of harmful phonics.Ryan Young

Compact and jovial, Jonah Spear is a dead ringer for Saturday Night Live’s Taran Killam—or at least for Taran Killam in high school: Spear recently shaved off a grizzled-prospector beard and looks about half of his 34 years. He’s also a professional play facilitator and counselor at an adult summer camp (no to phones and drinking, yes to sing-alongs and bonfires). That loosey-goosey vibe has carried into the Bay Area Pun-Off, a monthly event Spear began hosting in January that’s just one of a handful of competitive punning events popping up across the country.

If the O. Henry Pun-Off is the Newport Folk Festival, then its Bay Area cousin—like Punderdome 3000 in Brooklyn, Pundamonium in Seattle, or the Great Durham Pun Championship in, well, Durham—is Coachella. The audience is younger, and the raucous atmosphere is fueled as much by beer as by unabashed pun love. It started in the living room of a communal house in Oakland in January 2016 but quickly outgrew its confines; in June the organizers even staged a New York City satellite event.

But on this Saturday night, a week after O. Henry, it’s a high-ceilinged performance space in San Francisco’s Mission District where I’m looking for redemption. The pool of contestants at the Bay Area Pun-Off is small by O. Henry standards, and we commence with an all-hands marathon on tree puns designed to winnow the field of 12 down to eight. “I’m just hoping to win the poplar vote,” one woman says. “Sounds like birch of contract to me,” says someone else. A lanky British guy whom I’ll call Chet rambles through a shaggy-dog story involving a French woman and three Jamaican guys to get to a tortured “le mon t’ree” punch line. The crowd eats it up.

“Keep the applause going. It takes balsa get up here and do this.”

When you’re waiting for 11 other people to pun, you’ve got plenty of time to think of your next one, so I try to Ziek out a good-sized reserve of puns—and when it’s my turn, I make sure that my puns build on the joke that came before me. “Keep the applause going,” I say after someone boughs out. “It takes balsa get up here and do this.” After someone delivers a good line, I admit that “I ended up being pretty frond of it.” They’re not distinctive, but at this stage they don’t need to be, as long as they’re ambiguous. Things go oak-ay, and I’m on to the next round. (What, yew don’t believe me? Olive got is my word.)

After I indulge in a muggleful of Harry Potter puns, I find myself in the semifinals against a Quora engineer named Asa. Spear scribbles the mystery topic on a small chalkboard hidden from sight, then turns it around. It says … diseases. The same category that knocked me out in Austin? The category I dwelled on for the entire flight home, thinking of all the one-liners that had eluded me?

This time, there’s no running dry. Not only do I remember all the puns I used against Ben Ziek, but I remember all the puns he made against me. So when Asa says, “I’m really taking my mumps,” I shoot back with “That’s kinda measly, if you ask me.” I reprise puns I’d made in Austin (“Did you see that Italian opera singer run through the door? In flew Enzo!”); I use puns that I’d thought of since (“My mom makes the best onion dip. It’s HIV little concoction you’d love”). Asa fights gamely, but I have immunerable disease puns at my fingertips, and it’s not much longer before the round is over.

And then, again, there are two: me and Chet. The difference now is I’m locked in: no nerves, no self-consciousness, just getting out of my brain’s way and letting the connections happen. When Spear announces the theme—living world leaders—I don’t even start trying to stockpile puns. I just wait, and they come.

Chet opens the round: “Ohhhh, BAMA. I don’t know anything about world leaders!”

This time, just hearing him mention Obama conjures up a mental image of Justin Trudeau. Before the laughter even dies down, I nod my head encouragingly: “True, tho—that was a decent pun!”

It’s Austin all over again, just in reverse: Now I’m the quick one and Chet’s the one who has to scramble. He fumbles through a long story about rock climbing that leads to a pun about his cam-bell. (And before you ask: Chances are he wasn’t actually talking about Kim Campbell, who was prime minister of Canada for all of six months in 1993, but in the heat of the moment no one realized he’d just screwed up David Cameron’s name.)

My turn? No problem. Just keep flipping it back to him. “Another patented long-ass Chet story,” I say. “I am Bushed.”

“Well,” Chet says, then pauses. “He thinks he can just … Blair shit out.”

It’s his one solid blow. I talk about the “bonky moon” that’s shining outside that night. I confide in the audience about my own alopecia problem, and how I needed to buy a Merkel. And each time, the audience is right there with me. They don’t necessarily know what’s coming, but they’re loving it. Chet’s used three US presidents and two prime ministers; meanwhile, I’ve been from South Korea to Germany, by way of Canada.

Even better, I’ve got another continent in my pocket. “Have you guys been to Chet’s farm?” I ask the audience. “He has this group of cows that won’t stop talking.” I wait a beat. “They are seriously moo-gabby.”

What happens next is a blur, to be perfectly honest. I can’t even tell you what comes out of Chet’s mouth next, but it’s either nothing or it’s the name of someone dead—and either way, the Bay Area Pun-Off is over.

I might not have been able to vanquish Ben Ziek; this may be my only taste of victory in the world of competitive paronomasiacs; hell, I may never know the secret to the perfect pun. But as long as I’ve got the words to try, one thing’s for sure: I’ll use vaguely different words to approximate those words, thereby creating incongruity and thus humor.

Or maybe I’ll just plead raita’s block.

Phrase the Roof!

Author Peter Rubin set up a Slack channel here at Wired to crowdsource the punny headlines for the opening illustration to this story. He compiled more than 150 of them. Here are the ones we couldnt fit.

1. PRESENTS OF MIND

2. SHEER PUNDEMONIUM

3. VIRULENT HOMOPHONIA

4. OFF-SYLLABLE USE

5. PUNBELIEVABLE

6. HEADLINE BLING

7. LIVE A CRITIC, DIACRITIC

8. FEAST OF THE PRONUNCIATION

9. VERBAL MEDICATION

10. THE BEST OF BOTH WORDS

11. SUFFERING FROM INCONSONANT

12. DAMNED WITH FAINT PHRASE

13. THE SEVEN DEADLY SYNTAXES

14. THE NOUN JEWELS

15. PUNS THE WORD

16. CONSONANT READER

17. FARTS OF SPEECH

18. PUN-CHEWATION

19. GRAMMAR RULES

20. POISSON PEN

21. PUNS AND NEEDLES

22. DEATH AND SYNTAXES

23. THE WRITE STUFF

24. MAKING THE COPY

25. SLAIN LETTERING

26. PUN AND GAMES

27. VALLEY OF THE LOLZ

28. NOUN HEAR THIS

29. WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR QUOTE

30. PUT A VERB ON IT!

31. CRIME AND PUN-NICHE-MEANT

32. TIC TALK

33. ECCE HOMONYM

34. DEEP IN THE HEART OF TEXTS ASS

35. WRITES OF MAN

36. VERB APPEAL

37. THE RHYME DIRECTIVE

38. SLOGAN’S RUN

39. REBEL WITHOUT A CLAUSE

40. BURNS OF PHRASE

41. ARTLESS QUOTATIONS

42. BON MOT MONEY, BON MOT PROBLEMS

43. JESTIN’ CASE

44. LET ‘ER QUIP

45. ADVERB REACTIONS

46. INFINITE JESTS

47. ARTS OF SPEECH

48. DIGITAL PUNDERGROUND

49. THE PUN-ISHER

50. IMPUNDING DOOM

51. BEYOND PUNDERDOME

52. BAUHAUS OF CARDS

53. TEXTUAL HARASSMENT

54. IT’S A PUNGLE OUT THERE

55. GRAND THEFT MOTTO

56. IT HAD PUNNED ONE NIGHT

57. PLEASE GRAMMAR DON’T HURT EM

58. RHETORICAL QUESTIN’

59. ACUTE PUNS? SURE

60. BAWDILY HUMORED

61. DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDO, DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDON’T

62. TROUBLE ENTENDRES

63. WITS UP, DOC

64. SELF-IMPROV MEANT

65. PUN-EYED JOKERS

66. LAUGHTERMATH

67. JAPES OF WRATH

68. MAKING HA-HAJJ

69. MUTTER, MAY I?

70. BATTLE OF HALF-WITS

71. DEMI-BRAVADO

72. MALCONTENT MARKETING

73. NON-SILENT OFFENSES

74. ORAL HIJINX

75. THE PUN-ISHER

76. NOUNS, YOUR CHANCE

77. TEXT OF KIN

78. OH, PUN AND SHUT

79. JOKE OF ALL TRADES

80. PATTER UP

81. SCHTICK IT TO EM

82. BOOS HOUNDS

83. IT’S NOT EASY BEING GROANED

84. FAR FROM THE MADDENED CROWD

85. COMPETITIVE DEBASING

86. THE PUNFORGIVEN

87. THE PUNCANNY VALLEY

88. INTENTIONAL FORTITUDE

89. CHURCH OF THE LETTER DISDAIN

90. POETRY IN MASHIN’

91. CREATIVE SENTENCING

92. DAAAMN, DACTYL!

93. NO CONTEXT

94. A TALE OF TWO SILLIES

95. THE WIZARD OF LOLZ

96. IT’S A PUNDERFUL LIFE

97. WHAT’S HA? PUNNIN’

98. THE ZING AND I

99. THE WILD PUNS

100. THE PUN ALSO RISES

101. HOW THE REST WERE PUNNED

102. RAGING SYLLABLE

103. DANGEROUS ELISIONS

104. GOODWILL PUNTING

105. FELLOWSHIP OF THE WRONG

106. INGLOURIOUS LAST WORDS

107. THE LIMITATION GAME

108. APPETITE FOR DISTRACTION

109. HOW I MEANT ANOTHER

110. LARKS AND RECREATION

111. COMEDY OF AIRERS

112. DECLARATION OF INNER PENANCE

113. BOO HA-HA

Senior editor and pun criminal Peter Rubin (@provenself) wrote about the roadblocks to VR in issue 24.04.

This article appears in the October 2016 issue.

Source: http://allofbeer.com/2017/09/12/reflexlology-inside-the-groan-inducing-world-of-pun-competitions/

from All of Beer https://allofbeer.wordpress.com/2017/09/12/reflexlology-inside-the-groan-inducing-world-of-pun-competitions/

0 notes

adambstingus · 7 years

Text

ReflexLOLogy: Inside the Groan-Inducing World of Pun Competitions

Welp, I thought. It was fun while it lasted.

“Mumps the word!” I said, hoping that my voice wasn’t shaking.

“Well, I had a croup-on for it,” I responded. Whoa. Where’d that come from?

He switched gears. “I have a Buddha at home, and sometimes”—making a rubbing motion with his hand—“I like to rubella.”

I was barely paying attention. Diseases, diseases—oh! I pointed at people in different parts of the audience. “If you’ve got a yam, and you’ve got a potato, whose tuber’s closest?”

“There was a guy out here earlier painted light red,” Ziek said. “Did you see the pink guy?”

“I didn’t,” I responded. “Cold you see him?”

Author Peter Rubin doing the punning man.Ryan Young

I was punning above my weight, and I knew it.

The Bay Area Pun-Off, a monthly philharmonic of harmful phonics.Ryan Young

“Keep the applause going. It takes balsa get up here and do this.”

And then, again, there are two: me and Chet. The difference now is I’m locked in: no nerves, no self-consciousness, just getting out of my brain’s way and letting the connections happen. When Spear announces the theme��living world leaders—I don’t even start trying to stockpile puns. I just wait, and they come.

Chet opens the round: “Ohhhh, BAMA. I don’t know anything about world leaders!”

This time, just hearing him mention Obama conjures up a mental image of Justin Trudeau. Before the laughter even dies down, I nod my head encouragingly: “True, tho—that was a decent pun!”

My turn? No problem. Just keep flipping it back to him. “Another patented long-ass Chet story,” I say. “I am Bushed.”

“Well,” Chet says, then pauses. “He thinks he can just … Blair shit out.”

Or maybe I’ll just plead raita’s block.

Phrase the Roof!

1. PRESENTS OF MIND

2. SHEER PUNDEMONIUM

3. VIRULENT HOMOPHONIA

4. OFF-SYLLABLE USE

5. PUNBELIEVABLE

6. HEADLINE BLING

7. LIVE A CRITIC, DIACRITIC

8. FEAST OF THE PRONUNCIATION

9. VERBAL MEDICATION

10. THE BEST OF BOTH WORDS

11. SUFFERING FROM INCONSONANT

12. DAMNED WITH FAINT PHRASE

13. THE SEVEN DEADLY SYNTAXES

14. THE NOUN JEWELS

15. PUNS THE WORD

16. CONSONANT READER

17. FARTS OF SPEECH

18. PUN-CHEWATION

19. GRAMMAR RULES

20. POISSON PEN

21. PUNS AND NEEDLES

22. DEATH AND SYNTAXES

23. THE WRITE STUFF

24. MAKING THE COPY

25. SLAIN LETTERING

26. PUN AND GAMES

27. VALLEY OF THE LOLZ

28. NOUN HEAR THIS

29. WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR QUOTE

30. PUT A VERB ON IT!

31. CRIME AND PUN-NICHE-MEANT

32. TIC TALK

33. ECCE HOMONYM

34. DEEP IN THE HEART OF TEXTS ASS

35. WRITES OF MAN

36. VERB APPEAL

37. THE RHYME DIRECTIVE

38. SLOGAN’S RUN

39. REBEL WITHOUT A CLAUSE

40. BURNS OF PHRASE

41. ARTLESS QUOTATIONS

42. BON MOT MONEY, BON MOT PROBLEMS

43. JESTIN’ CASE

44. LET ‘ER QUIP

45. ADVERB REACTIONS

46. INFINITE JESTS

47. ARTS OF SPEECH

48. DIGITAL PUNDERGROUND

49. THE PUN-ISHER

50. IMPUNDING DOOM

51. BEYOND PUNDERDOME

52. BAUHAUS OF CARDS

53. TEXTUAL HARASSMENT

54. IT’S A PUNGLE OUT THERE

55. GRAND THEFT MOTTO

56. IT HAD PUNNED ONE NIGHT

57. PLEASE GRAMMAR DON’T HURT EM

58. RHETORICAL QUESTIN’

59. ACUTE PUNS? SURE

60. BAWDILY HUMORED

61. DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDO, DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDON’T

62. TROUBLE ENTENDRES

63. WITS UP, DOC

64. SELF-IMPROV MEANT

65. PUN-EYED JOKERS

66. LAUGHTERMATH

67. JAPES OF WRATH

68. MAKING HA-HAJJ

69. MUTTER, MAY I?

70. BATTLE OF HALF-WITS

71. DEMI-BRAVADO

72. MALCONTENT MARKETING

73. NON-SILENT OFFENSES

74. ORAL HIJINX

75. THE PUN-ISHER

76. NOUNS, YOUR CHANCE

77. TEXT OF KIN

78. OH, PUN AND SHUT

79. JOKE OF ALL TRADES

80. PATTER UP

81. SCHTICK IT TO EM

82. BOOS HOUNDS

83. IT’S NOT EASY BEING GROANED

84. FAR FROM THE MADDENED CROWD

85. COMPETITIVE DEBASING

86. THE PUNFORGIVEN

87. THE PUNCANNY VALLEY

88. INTENTIONAL FORTITUDE

89. CHURCH OF THE LETTER DISDAIN

90. POETRY IN MASHIN’

91. CREATIVE SENTENCING

92. DAAAMN, DACTYL!

93. NO CONTEXT

94. A TALE OF TWO SILLIES

95. THE WIZARD OF LOLZ

96. IT’S A PUNDERFUL LIFE

97. WHAT’S HA? PUNNIN’

98. THE ZING AND I

99. THE WILD PUNS

100. THE PUN ALSO RISES

101. HOW THE REST WERE PUNNED

102. RAGING SYLLABLE

103. DANGEROUS ELISIONS

104. GOODWILL PUNTING

105. FELLOWSHIP OF THE WRONG

106. INGLOURIOUS LAST WORDS

107. THE LIMITATION GAME

108. APPETITE FOR DISTRACTION

109. HOW I MEANT ANOTHER

110. LARKS AND RECREATION

111. COMEDY OF AIRERS

112. DECLARATION OF INNER PENANCE

113. BOO HA-HA

Senior editor and pun criminal Peter Rubin (@provenself) wrote about the roadblocks to VR in issue 24.04.

This article appears in the October 2016 issue.

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/2017/09/12/reflexlology-inside-the-groan-inducing-world-of-pun-competitions/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/165253970052

0 notes

allofbeercom · 7 years

Text

ReflexLOLogy: Inside the Groan-Inducing World of Pun Competitions

Welp, I thought. It was fun while it lasted.

“Mumps the word!” I said, hoping that my voice wasn’t shaking.

“Well, I had a croup-on for it,” I responded. Whoa. Where’d that come from?

He switched gears. “I have a Buddha at home, and sometimes”—making a rubbing motion with his hand—“I like to rubella.”

I was barely paying attention. Diseases, diseases—oh! I pointed at people in different parts of the audience. “If you’ve got a yam, and you’ve got a potato, whose tuber’s closest?”

“There was a guy out here earlier painted light red,” Ziek said. “Did you see the pink guy?”

“I didn’t,” I responded. “Cold you see him?”

Author Peter Rubin doing the punning man.Ryan Young

I was punning above my weight, and I knew it.

The Bay Area Pun-Off, a monthly philharmonic of harmful phonics.Ryan Young

“Keep the applause going. It takes balsa get up here and do this.”

Chet opens the round: “Ohhhh, BAMA. I don’t know anything about world leaders!”

This time, just hearing him mention Obama conjures up a mental image of Justin Trudeau. Before the laughter even dies down, I nod my head encouragingly: “True, tho—that was a decent pun!”

My turn? No problem. Just keep flipping it back to him. “Another patented long-ass Chet story,” I say. “I am Bushed.”

“Well,” Chet says, then pauses. “He thinks he can just … Blair shit out.”

Or maybe I’ll just plead raita’s block.

Phrase the Roof!

1. PRESENTS OF MIND

2. SHEER PUNDEMONIUM

3. VIRULENT HOMOPHONIA

4. OFF-SYLLABLE USE

5. PUNBELIEVABLE

6. HEADLINE BLING

7. LIVE A CRITIC, DIACRITIC

8. FEAST OF THE PRONUNCIATION

9. VERBAL MEDICATION

10. THE BEST OF BOTH WORDS

11. SUFFERING FROM INCONSONANT

12. DAMNED WITH FAINT PHRASE

13. THE SEVEN DEADLY SYNTAXES

14. THE NOUN JEWELS

15. PUNS THE WORD

16. CONSONANT READER

17. FARTS OF SPEECH

18. PUN-CHEWATION

19. GRAMMAR RULES

20. POISSON PEN

21. PUNS AND NEEDLES

22. DEATH AND SYNTAXES

23. THE WRITE STUFF

24. MAKING THE COPY

25. SLAIN LETTERING

26. PUN AND GAMES

27. VALLEY OF THE LOLZ

28. NOUN HEAR THIS

29. WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR QUOTE

30. PUT A VERB ON IT!

31. CRIME AND PUN-NICHE-MEANT

32. TIC TALK

33. ECCE HOMONYM

34. DEEP IN THE HEART OF TEXTS ASS

35. WRITES OF MAN

36. VERB APPEAL

37. THE RHYME DIRECTIVE

38. SLOGAN’S RUN

39. REBEL WITHOUT A CLAUSE

40. BURNS OF PHRASE

41. ARTLESS QUOTATIONS

42. BON MOT MONEY, BON MOT PROBLEMS

43. JESTIN’ CASE

44. LET ‘ER QUIP

45. ADVERB REACTIONS

46. INFINITE JESTS

47. ARTS OF SPEECH

48. DIGITAL PUNDERGROUND

49. THE PUN-ISHER

50. IMPUNDING DOOM

51. BEYOND PUNDERDOME

52. BAUHAUS OF CARDS

53. TEXTUAL HARASSMENT

54. IT’S A PUNGLE OUT THERE

55. GRAND THEFT MOTTO

56. IT HAD PUNNED ONE NIGHT

57. PLEASE GRAMMAR DON’T HURT EM

58. RHETORICAL QUESTIN’

59. ACUTE PUNS? SURE

60. BAWDILY HUMORED

61. DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDO, DAMNED IF YOU INNUENDON’T

62. TROUBLE ENTENDRES

63. WITS UP, DOC

64. SELF-IMPROV MEANT

65. PUN-EYED JOKERS

66. LAUGHTERMATH

67. JAPES OF WRATH

68. MAKING HA-HAJJ

69. MUTTER, MAY I?

70. BATTLE OF HALF-WITS

71. DEMI-BRAVADO

72. MALCONTENT MARKETING

73. NON-SILENT OFFENSES

74. ORAL HIJINX

75. THE PUN-ISHER

76. NOUNS, YOUR CHANCE

77. TEXT OF KIN

78. OH, PUN AND SHUT

79. JOKE OF ALL TRADES

80. PATTER UP

81. SCHTICK IT TO EM

82. BOOS HOUNDS

83. IT’S NOT EASY BEING GROANED

84. FAR FROM THE MADDENED CROWD

85. COMPETITIVE DEBASING

86. THE PUNFORGIVEN

87. THE PUNCANNY VALLEY

88. INTENTIONAL FORTITUDE

89. CHURCH OF THE LETTER DISDAIN

90. POETRY IN MASHIN’

91. CREATIVE SENTENCING

92. DAAAMN, DACTYL!

93. NO CONTEXT

94. A TALE OF TWO SILLIES

95. THE WIZARD OF LOLZ

96. IT’S A PUNDERFUL LIFE

97. WHAT’S HA? PUNNIN’

98. THE ZING AND I

99. THE WILD PUNS

100. THE PUN ALSO RISES

101. HOW THE REST WERE PUNNED

102. RAGING SYLLABLE

103. DANGEROUS ELISIONS

104. GOODWILL PUNTING

105. FELLOWSHIP OF THE WRONG

106. INGLOURIOUS LAST WORDS

107. THE LIMITATION GAME

108. APPETITE FOR DISTRACTION

109. HOW I MEANT ANOTHER

110. LARKS AND RECREATION

111. COMEDY OF AIRERS

112. DECLARATION OF INNER PENANCE

113. BOO HA-HA

Senior editor and pun criminal Peter Rubin (@provenself) wrote about the roadblocks to VR in issue 24.04.

This article appears in the October 2016 issue.

from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/2017/09/12/reflexlology-inside-the-groan-inducing-world-of-pun-competitions/

0 notes