Fallen Angels deserve to fly

[sharpnelshell-deactivated201905]

It had almost escaped my notice that it is now May, the month that dooms to a heartbroken death 99% of characters from folk ballads. So, if you suspect you may be a character from a folk ballad, for your own safety: 

don’t fall in love, don’t go by the river, don’t go to the sea, don’t talk to sailors, don’t gamble, don’t ramble, don’t go North, don’t go North-West, don’t stand in the wind, don’t dance with anyone named Sally, Sue, Mary, Ann, or Barbara, don’t go to the pub (but if you do go to the pub at least don’t drink, and if you do drink at least pay for your own drink, and if you are absolutely broke and have to let someone else pay for your drink then at the very least do try not to forget to toast everyone you know whom you think might be there very loudly and possibly multiple times), don’t lend money, don’t borrow money, don’t wish you had more money, don’t make plans to make more money, don’t start working for a new employer, absolutely do believe anyone who says they will try to kill you, curse you, or maim you, absolutely do believe anyone who says you might die, turn down every invitation to go a-hunting, horse-riding, or a-courting, be wary of flute players you meet on your path, don’t dance with satanic men in black coats, don’t marry off your daughters to the first man who’ll have them, and don’t promise your true love any herbs you can’t readily plant and gather in your own garden. 

There. That should just about cover you for 31 days. Heed the warnings and you may have a chance to last the month. Good luck.

[javascript-official]

Fuck this job man, I sentenced this guy called Theseus to life in prison for murder and then I get a call from the prison that he has systematically replaced every organ in his body including his brain and is now claiming he is not the same person who committed the crime. They are letting him go free, fuck this. Worst of all is he also then took all of the parts that he discarded and made a second Theseus who is also claiming he did not commit the crime and they are also being let free. Now there's two of them out there and you just KNOW they are murdering people and then having gay sex. I fucking quit man...

[linguisticparadox]

(via @luimnigh )

[ezrafael]

I know that rationally speaking, Vulcans probably use robots to help them achieve that awful bowl cut they love BUT imagine for a second that instead they value manual work more and so go to the hairdresser/barber.

They are touch telepath. Going to a human hairdresser must be a no go, because it could mean an unwanted meld on both side, so there are Vulcan hairdresser. Of course, everyone could close their mind but what if hairdressers came to be specialized in both haircut and mindhealing? You go get your bowlcut and you get free therapy on the top.

Now,when the Enterprise is in the air, Spock use a barber robot, but when they go to a space station, it is mandatory to look for a Vulcan barber for good old therapy time. There is one right there so Spock enters. A new barber goes to him, but the manager send him a Look. It's the look thay says "honey you're good at your job but this case is too heavy for you", so the new one takes a step back and manager Storp goes to Spock.

It's a slow day in Haircut for Vulcans, so everyone is listening in fascination. The barber start the shampoo then ask the usual questions, like how have been things since the last time? Spock briefly answer that yes, everyone is fine, can they please get the haircut down fast, because the captain has tried to get himself killed no less than five times and doctor McCoy have been insufferable with Spock (it is unrelated to the fact that Spock had put himself into the medbay three times trying to protect his captain who was trying to protect him) and Storp face goes blank, because it will be a long session.

After that, therapy/haircuting continue in silence, but as soon as Spock leaves the room, everyone gather around Storp begging for him to spill the hair (because gay human hairdresser may still say spill the tea in a few centuries from now and it may have impacted Vulcan hairdresser's slang, but "spill the tea" is unhygienic and inacurate while there are always are on the shop's floor) and Storp put the "We are taking a break" sign on the door and turn to them with a face that means "girls, have a chocolate, because it's going to be goooood" (while the Vulcan hairdressing and therapy society have a no-divulgation oath, it doesn't stop them to talking between each others. It's only logical to help each other to better help their clients, right? Also, have Spock being kissed by his devilishly handsome captain already or not? Have Storp seeing him without his shirt again during the mind melt? They need to know!)

Sadly, the oath forbid them to bet on how long it will take for Spock and captain Kirk to marry or fuck or whatever there is between them like the rest of Vulcans. It is logical and ethical but so damn frustrating sometimes.

[kirbydots]

“Magneto’s backstory should be changed, it’s unrealistic that he’d still be alive after all this time!” Have you forgotten what franchise he’s from?

[kirbydots]

You can suspend your disbelief for the man transformed into sentient rocks by space radiation, the interdimensional bird, and the flaming biker skeletons, but one guy being a little old is where you draw the line?

[magnetothemagnificent]

It's the ~antisemitism~

[magnetothemagnificent]

#its also worth noting that marvel *DID* change magneto's backstory#he was originally presented as someone who had survived the shoah as an adult#and marvel retconned it to him surviving it as a child#iirc his original debut backstory involved him losing a wife and two kids??

Well, no, not really. When Magneto was made to be a Holocaust survivor, he was a survivor from childhood, though by the end of the Holocaust he was in his teens. His daughter Anya was killed by an antisemitic mob after the Holocaust, at some point in the 1950s.

[daughterofstories]

It's also an attempt to pretend that the Shoah is ancient history, when it's really not.

"It's unrealistic for a Holocaust survivor to still be alive."

Assholes, there are Holocaust survivors still alive in the real world.

[prismatic-bell]

They're really telling on themselves because Wolverine is like 170 years old.

[pusheenthenerdcat]

wolverine being a hundred and fucking seventy: normal

magneto being the same age as currently alive holocaust survivors: impossible

[onbearfeet]

While there are definitely living Holocaust survivors today, most of them aren't up to doing half the shit Magneto does, and it seems to be affecting the impact his stories have on audiences. I remember reading Magneto stories as a kid in the 90s, knowing he was a little younger than my grandparents, and getting hit with a truckload of sympathy for the dude. He just wanted to have a normal life like Grandma and Granddad, and then the war happened and oh FUCK. Younger readers now are much less likely to have that personal connection; that's just how human lifespans work. And it's only going to get worse. Magneto does need some future-proofing.

That's not to say I think Magneto's origin should be changed, or that he should be permanently killed off. Far from it. This is comics; all kinds of timeline bullshit happens all the time. As someone pointed out above, Wolverine is most of the way into his second century of life.

What I'd do--and what I'm shocked Marvel writers don't seem to have done yet--is wave the mutant bullshit wand and make Magneto functionally immortal. Secondary mutation, maybe. Something something magnetic fields. The mechanics don't matter any more than "Wolverine is functionally immortal because healing factor" does. What matters is this:

At some point, Magneto will be the last living Holocaust survivor. And he will not let the world forget.

There was a story I read as a kid where Magneto took a handful of soil from the camp where his family died and spread it on the surface of the moon, where he was building a mutant haven of some kind. The image of him on his knees with soil running through his fingers and an agonized look on his face has haunted me ever since. To some part of him, it's always 1945. Never again is quite literally now.

I want to see Magneto as the furious conscience of the Marvel universe. I want him to rip a hole in the UN General Assembly building and stride in with his full regalia on--except for one sleeve, stripped to the forearm to show his tattooed number--and read the UN the riot act in all his nigh-unkillable glory. I want him to storm into summits between warring planets, atomize the ferrous metal in everyone's weapons, and lay down the galactic law that is There Will Be No More Genocides On My Watch, And My Watch Is Eternal. And I want future writers to use his story, and his enduring popularity as a character, to make sure that audiences don't forget either.

Magneto being a Holocaust survivor is only a flaw in the storytelling if you're a goddamn coward.

[ezrafael]

I need a fourth Benoit Blanc movie. This one would be called something like Innocents Men needs no Help. It would tell the story of how Benoit Blanc is falsely accused of murder. All evidence are against him, policemen tired of seeing a pro bono detective do their work better than them hide proof to see him put down, the public turn against him (people love to see their idols put down) but Marta, Helen and Jud work together to prove his innocence, using everything they learned from him. Blanc is not helping, because he is so proud of his little babies and he wants to see how they will prove his innocence... Or, is it?

Let's just say his husband is happy to see Benoit as a proud father of three, but please, could he help the kids so he's back home next week before The Think (like his mother coming). Of course, Benoit is sabotaging is pupils' work to be sure he's not there in time for The Thing.

[ezrafael]

I don't know what's funnier: imagining Trent and Ludinus in the background of the campaign, plotting plan after plan to steal/keep Luxon for their evil plans, or the idea that the members of the Cerberus Assembly have a calendar with slots assigned to each of them, and if their plan to conquer the world/destroy the gods/invade unholy cities isn't ready in time, they fall to the bottom of the list.

[mimsymars]

Before you correct my pronunciation just know my Mother is from England, and she said all these names are pronounced however I think is funniest, so.

CW: bad british accents

[firbolging]

the pride and prejudice musical we deserve:

darcy doesn’t sing a single note even during conversations where everyone else is singing at him that is until the argument following his first attempt at proposing to lizzy where you can see his restraint fall away

his first big solo is the letter he writes her

gelsey bell is mary and the unofficial narrator and she sits down at her piano to describe whats going on but before she can ever reveal her feelings on the matter, starting with that gelsey bell scream, mr bennet comes over and does the whole ‘that’s nice dear but give someone else a turn’

mr wickham has this huge ballad about how darcy ruined his life and its super melodramatic and touching

mr collins proposal to lizzy is an absolute bop that he gets so into he forgets for a moment what he’s doing he’s just owning the stage

wickham has a song where he’s trying to seduce lydia but she’s not even listening she’s just monologuing about how excited she is to get laid

during darcy’s second proposal he keeps hesitating waiting for lizzy to interrupt him like she has done every time before but she doesn’t say anything until he’s finished

at the end mary sits down at the piano and right where she’d usually be interrupted, kitty joins her and harmonises

 jane and bingley have the adorable upbeat romantic duet which is just them being super polite like ‘oh so nice to have you here’ ‘so nice to be here’ interspersed with their inner monologue which is just them being like fucking jesus I’m so in love

the bingley sisters probably have a really cool mean solo

lady catherine has this terrifying disney villain song in the garden

there’s for sure a song about ribbon shopping

[ode-on-a-grecian-butt]

art by RobtheDoodler Doodle Of Boredom

[bad-writer]

I do think it’s strange that Maedhros of all people is a character that gets woobified so hard because the MOST compelling thing about him isn’t his heroism, it’s the fact that he was heroic and the BECAME A VILLAIN. I’m not even going to say became an anti hero because I don’t think that’s accurate, I mean he became a straight up villain. Destroying what was basically a refugee camp, attacking the army fighting against morgoth when half of his identity post thangorodrim was once based around fighting Morgoth. I’m not the first person to mention the irony of the fact that maedhros is the only person to ever escape Angband without being in thrall to Morgoth, and then years later his actions are absolutely aiding morgoths cause rather than the cause of the remaining Noldor.

And that is what sets this character apart. His downfall. Part of that downfall is his earlier heroism but what makes this character so well written in the first place is that the seeds of that downfall start early at Alqualonde. It’s tragic but it isn’t surprising.

I changing this character around so that somehow his later actions are excusable or against his will or that deep down he has actually been a hero this whole time is very strange because if that’s the case then how is he any different than fingon or turgon or thingol? In fact if that’s the case then he’s more boring than these characters because he’s not nearly as outwardly noble.

He becomes a villain and as the shadows of that villainy were apparent early on, the shadow of his heroism is still apparent later on as well and that’s the tragedy. He could have turned around at any point, he could have still saved himself. But he doesn’t and it’s horribly tragic and as a story, it’s absolutely brilliant character work.

[tanoraqui]

I believe Fingon’s rescue of Maedhros was 100% heroic, hard-fought and well-earned against the vicious will and plans of the Enemy. I believe that Morgoth bore a grudge against Fingon forevermore for both his success, his love from Manwë, and his sheer temerity in “stealing” one of Morgoth’s favorite toys…

But I also believe that when Maedhros was first dragged before the dark throne in the depths of Angband, Morgoth took one look at the Oath burning in his heart, saw what it was and how it would twist him, the things he would or at least might do in its name, and burst out in terrible laughter. And put him on that cliff knowing full well that it wasn’t the most secure location.

[firstofficerkittycat]

au where eberytjings the same but they have to go to five guyd

[astrangedoor]

Vulcan AITA but it's Am I Being Illogical

[deus-ex-aquila]

r/AmIBeingIllogical • Posted by u/tpringles Stardate 3372.7

AIBI for choosing my husband's human boss as my champion?

My (29F) husband (29M) is from a well-known and eccentric family, and has only made himself more notorious with an unconventional career and an unnecessarily emotional falling-out with his father. The aforementioned unconventional career keeps him away from Vulcan. In his absence, I have found a mate I prefer.

At koon-ut-kal-if-fee, I had planned to choose kal-if-fee and make my preferred mate my champion. However, my husband unexpectedly arrived with humans, one of whom is his superior, apparently a friend, and appears physically fit. Setting aside the impropriety of bringing outsiders to koon-ut-kal-if-fee, this human seemed more interested in my husband's family connections than any prurient interest in the pon farr itself. I realized that I could choose him as my champion instead, and not risk my preferred mate's life. If the human wins, he will be very unlikely to wish for a Vulcan bride, and would release me; if my husband wins, he may also release me for challenging, and even if he does not, he will still be as absent as before, and I will have my chosen mate at my si

Update: Please excuse the abrupt cutoff. My ex-husband just killed his human superior, and has indeed released me and returned to his post, I believe to seek formal disciplinary action.

i-chaya-2230 • Stardate 3372.7 NBI. Your logic is sound. You are, however, the asshole. ⬆️ 915 ⬇️ 💬 Reply Share Report Save Follow

[lemonsharks]

@taraljc​

[taraljc]

BEST!

[moonachilles]

Jane Austen really said ‘I respect the “I can fix him” movement but that’s just not me. He’ll fix himself if knows what’s good for him’ and that’s why her works are still calling the shots today.

[nitewrighter]

Meanwhile Emily Brönte just said “We can make each other worse.” 

[theonlycabbage]

Mary Shelley said, "I can make him

[mysterybones]

If it sounds like the composer is trying to blast you with the orchestra until you're as deaf as he is, it's Beethoven.

If it sounds like the composer might be a vampire, it's Bach.

If it sounds like the composer is trying to set the violins on fire, it's Vivaldi.

[frenshaped-deactivated20241222]

If it sounds like the composer is trying to shoot you, it's Tchaikovsky.

If it sounds like the composer is mansplaining to you, it's Wagner.

If it sounds like the composer is making fun of you, it's Mozart.

[realgoogleclassroom]

If it sounds like the composer is being a father figure to the music itself, it's Haydn

If it sounds like the composer is playing Star Wars 60 years early, it's Holst

If it sounds like the composer is trying to incite a riot, it's Stravinsky

[avelera]

The Causal Chain And Why Your Story Needs It

The most obnoxious thing my writing teacher taught me every story needed, that I absolutely loathed studying in the moment and that only later, after months of resisting and fighting realized she was right, was something called the causal chain.

Simply put, the causal chain is the linked cause-and-effect that must logically connect every event, reaction, and beat that takes place in your story to the ones before and after.

The Causal Chain is exhausting to go through. It is infuriating when someone points out that an event or a character beat comes out of nowhere, unmoored from events around it.

It is profoundly necessary to learn and include because a cause-and-effect chain is what allows readers to follow your story logically which means they can start anticipating what happens next, which is what is required for a writer to be able to build suspense and cognitively engage the audience, to surprise them, and to not infuriate them with random coincidences that hurt or help the characters in order to clumsily advance the author's goals.

By all means, write your story as you want to write it in the first draft, and don't worry about this principle too much. This is an editing tool, not a first draft tool. But one of the first things you should do when retroactively begin preparing your story to be read by others is going step by step through each event and confirming that a previous event leads to it and that subsequent events are impacted by it on the page.

[elidyce]

When your character is standing knee-deep in literal or metaphorical shit with a weapon in one hand and their last hope of surviving evaporating around them, and they’re wondering how their simple smuggling job/adulthood ritual/simple morning in an ordinary village led to ALL OF THIS, both they and the reader need to be able to backtrack through every single choice, mishap, attempt at fixing earlier problems and panicky flight or fib led them unerringly to this moment. That chain cannot have breaks in it, or you lose the whole impact. 

[classically-lit-memes4u]

I hate it when I talk wistfully about the ancient world and then people are like “you wouldn’t survive back then” yeah obviously I would die immediately but do you think achilles would be able to survive in the modern world if he had to send one polite email? no

[classically-lit-memes4u]

congrats to these people on being funnier than me on my own fucking post

[grogusdads]

it would have been really funny if palpatine enacted order 66 only to be immediately killed by one of his own clone guards who doesn’t really understand the difference between the sith and jedi and just sees palpatine with a lightsaber and goes “oh a jedi!” And point blank shoots him without hesitation

[cannedinternets]

while testing the coruscant guard's chips, your pal friendpatine tests out order 66 and fox just. fuckin shoots him. later, when they figure out how to disable the chips, it turns out that fox:

a) has never met an actual jedi b) doesn't actually know what a sith is,

and so he just went "oh the chancellor must be a jedi. he does weird magic bullshit. and he seems as shitty as every other natborn." and so when the chip activated he just went "ugh, finally, i can kill this assshole"