A selection of the 3D character models in Minsk-based artist Dmitriy Bezrodniy’s portfolio.
This actually came up in the movie Shadow of the Vampire, where two members on the production team for the original Nosferatu ask actual vampire Max Schreck (played by actual vampire Willem Dafoe) what he thought of the book, though the movie plays the question more for melancholy and absurdity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgqgSaDCgC4
the best gag in dracula by far is how the entire time jonathan harker is imprisoned in dracula’s castle, dracula is pretending to have a full household of servants when in reality it’s just him running around doing everything, and it would be CRIMINAL to write a drac-centric adaptation and not milk this gag for all it’s worth. dracula dropping off harker in the carriage, pulling into the stables, then sprinting through the castle to answer the front door. dracula lurking outside harker’s bedroom for him to leave so he can sneak in and make his bed and fold his pajamas. dracula in the kitchen struggling to make food when he hasn’t eaten anything except blood in centuries. dracula giving up, turning into a bat in frustration, flapping over to the nearest farmhouse, stealing a pie off the windowsill, and proudly presenting it to harker for dinner.
You can’t fool me, Madiha, you’re clearly a Belarusian bot, here to tempt us with pro-tractor propaganda.
we did it guys we caught all of them. mission accomplished. now nobody can call me a russian bot. we have a list theyre all there
TNG still had a fair number of godlike energy-based or “sufficiently advanced” beings outside of Q. Off the top of my head there’s the extradimensional god of the Edo, Nagilum, Kevin Uxbridge, and “Isabella”. Beyond TNG, I do think you’re right; there really weren’t any in DS9 outside of the Prophets, and VOY and ENT avoided the trope entirely. There are other ways the consolidation of the Trek universe under TNG changed the types of stories that were told. There was a recurring trope in TOS of fellow captains who suffered some sort of horrible tragedy and ended up going off the reservation in some way, and the only time that plot comes up in TNG is with Benjamin Maxwell and the Cardassians. @abigailnussbaum also made the point in her old TNG critique that as the show went on, the planets-of-the-week Picard and co. visited were increasingly worlds that had preexisting relations with the Federation rather than being new discoveries. While this didn’t really change the types of stories that were being told, it had the effect of making TNG more about maintaining the Federation than exploring strange new worlds.
One of Star Trek: The Next Generation's missions was to give coherence to a world originally developed as a frame for the one-off episodes – completely disconnected SF stories using the same stock cast and setting – of the original series.
There's an abortive first season plot about corruption in Starfleet that's dropped once it's established Starfleet isn't interesting enough to bear more weight than as a plot device telling the Enterprise where to go this week.
Something underappreciated as a success though is that the original series had scads of godlike but trickstery or inhuman beings because individual writers (the Trek franchises were famously full of episodes by published SF writers and continued to take freelance episode pitches well after this had been widely abandoned in TV) kept finding the notion of the Enterprise dealing with one a solid premise.
And in TNG we instead get Q, this type condensed into a single recurring character, introduced in the pilot, getting 6 episodes to himself and then blessing the finale, going on to appear in other Trek shows across multiple galactic quadrants (also, basically My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, as the John de Lancie-voiced season 2 big bad Discord)
There’s something deeply distressing to me about how there’s been this steady push over the past twenty years to transform all forms of media from things you can physically buy and use as you see fit into things you essentially rent in perpetuity from publishers and hosting services. It’s like there’s this assumption that we can rent these things forever and never have to worry about the Internet ever going down or one of these digital landlords deciding to take them away from us whenever they want. Movies and PC games are my beat, but I've certainly had to stockpile a number of hard copies over the years due to rights issues or lack of interest keeping them out of the digital marketplace.
“Digital is about access, it’s about sharing,” Schwartz said. “But once you digitize something, suddenly the object is not human-readable anymore—not readable like a stack of letters in your attic. With digital you have to preserve the letter, and you have to preserve the software, and the machine that can read it.”
That means that as technology evolves, the types of data it can read evolves as well. Think about the floppy discs you almost definitely have in a box somewhere—or DVDs, to pick a more recent example. My current laptop doesn’t have a CD/DVD drive at all. I couldn’t watch my Mona Lisa Smile DVD if I wanted to. So you can see how delicate that media is.
Thinking a lot about this since Apple announced the demise of iTunes. One great thing about iTunes was the convenience of digital while still owning a physical library. I spent a good chunk of the 90s building a music collection. It defined me, which was the things worked then. It’s no coincidence that the transition from aesthetic to moral signal occurred alongside the transition from owning a physical to a virtual library. If the things we own can’t define us, then what does? When I was twelve or thirteen, I would have killed for something like Spotify where all the music I could ever dream of was at my fingertips, but there’s no hunt, no sense of personal value.
I wish all writers who haven’t been able to write in a long time bc of depression a very I love u and I promise u will write again
You’ve made it through a difficult year, and Picard is proud of you for that!
Well, Madiha and Esther called me out in this episode, so here’s my thoughts on Hitoe’s fate: Thought #1: aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Thought #2: Even though I’m a guy who’s never touched a Wixoss deck, even I am not immune to having my wishes turned against me in a cruelly ironic manner. Thought #3: Why do we play customizable card games? Just to suffer? Thought #4: Given how there are probably a bunch of LRIGs out there who were once human (and how I suspect Tama was one), there’s a sliver of a chance Yuzuki got her memory wiped, and as such might be a less awful person as an LRIG.
Thought #5: Even so, someone please get Hitoe off of Mari Okada’s wild ride.
And finally, I want to thank you two for plunging into the depths of animé hell to entertain us biweekly. You two are the troops in my book.
Topics include: Video Game Hell doesn’t do anime so we win there; these episodes of Wixoss are dire; once again, relevant trigger warning for Incest because Yuzuki sucks; foreshadowing The Scene; a quest to stop the marketing; Yuzuki marauding the streets for card duels; Ruuko overturning the tables; hey Mari Okada weren’t you hired to sell cards; Takara-Tomy what happened; does Executive Man know what he is doing; DONT LOOK AT THE WIXOSS WIKI; our whitehouse.gov petition to get fan wikis regulated; Ullith the Horny LRIG; two girls doing it; thirst for battle; It’s A Wedding; Iona strategies; Wish Crisis; Yuzuki ruining lives; Kakegurui crossover; addicted to booster packs; dubbed Akira; Guy Fawkes Mask; the First Malformation of Akira; chuuni scar; Alt Girl turn; somebody sponsor us for $15 to keep this podcast solvent; quasimodo scare; Akira ninja; elite friendship moves; the most angelic girl; we’re gonna dox Ruuko’s brother; best Grandma; impressed by my fake deep sister; The Final Duel; The Wrath of Buns Girl; my friends who spread incest rumors; peeling some beans; girls are terrible, except for my sister; The Incest Scene; cool genes bro; bio-horror dialog; Mari Okada’s intentions; we nearly quit the podcast but we talked ourselves into continuing; Madiha’s Nebula-Brained Galactic Genius Analysis; returning to Hitoe; Hitoe, situation improved, or fate worse than death? You decide!
Outro theme is “Battle – Why Not Eliminate The World?” from Selector Infected Wixoss’ OST.
Send us questions and game jam submissions!! Rate us on iTunes!
Email us at transmediacrity@gmail.com! Check out our TUMBLR and TWITTER.
SUPPORT US ON PATREON! Or donate directly to Madiha for hosting costs.
Check out our YOUTUBE CHANNEL. Subscribe, and like our videos!
Special thanks to Velt for our cover art! Check her art here. (Not worksafe.)
You can find us at:
Madiha: Twitter, Tumblr, The Solstice War. Esther: Twitter, Tumblr.
Wait, what happened to episode 26...OH I GET IT!
Esther is back from the battle of the Trinary Star System. Now the course of history can resume.
Topics include: the state of liberal propaganda on television; the GameGriper; shitting on the sidewalk to own the libs; my first move since I became a full grown idiot; Esther kept playing Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse and she’s here to say; which society sounds best; Dagda; SMT Scathach vs dope baedysuit queen; Dagda’s mom; there’s still the Abrahamic god; WHY DON’T THEY PUT PERSONA ON THE ~SWITCH~; Madiha beat Doom 2016 and she has Feelings; FPS raid boss; strafing enemies across the entire room; worth $60; overwhelmed by SNAPMAP; game development teams are a mini Ship of Theseus; Millennial John Carmack’s “Woke Doom”; Madiha is still reading HAKAIOU ~ GAOGAIGAR VS. BETTERMAN; Somnium lore; eldritch horror; our listeners should really listen to Betterman Anime Club; Madiha deep Betterman lore cuts for 20 minutes; WE STAN MICATEAM; WE WILL SHILL YOUR GAME FOREVER; Girls Frontline is good; team 404 is good and strong and my friends; Esther played the Shin Megami Tensei mobile game; steampunk patrick klepeck; gun otaku girl; brand new assets; the comments on the demons; Madiha sends hatemail; if you have more sentience than Madiha, who is turing incomplete, send us that mail; Kizuna Ai poppin’ the biggest bottles.
Send us questions and game jam submissions!! Rate us on iTunes!
Email us at transmediacrity@gmail.com! Check out our TUMBLR and TWITTER.
SUPPORT US ON PATREON! Or donate directly to Madiha for hosting costs.
Check out our YOUTUBE CHANNEL. Subscribe, and like our videos!
Special thanks to Velt for our cover art! Check her art here. (Not worksafe.)
You can find us at:
Madiha: Twitter, Tumblr, The Solstice War.
Esther: Twitter, Tumblr.
Cecilia: Twitter, Tumblr, Video Game Hell.
Hello there! I'm nesterov81, and this tumblr is a dumping ground for my fandom stuff. Feel free to root through it and find something you like.
215 posts