REPOSTOBER, DAY 7: Van Hohenheim

oh ok. the dwarves in dungeon meshi live in a steampunk world. good to know. But i love the juxtaposition between elves using magic birds to communicate while the dwarves have straight up telephones

and the gnomes are hopelessly dependent on the orb

I could look at the flavor text and art of random magic cards for hours on end

Flavor Text Highlights - Magic 2020

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Cool - Show of Valor

“As the knight struggled to stand, his squire took up his blade. The foe advanced not a single step.” —Krinnea, Siege of the Bone Spire

Funny - Pattern Matcher

“Good! Now put it with the other widdle bunnies.” —Sargis Haz, artificer

Worldbuilding - The Lament for Bala Ged Cycle

“Yarok grieves within the waste Of Bala Ged’s corrupted land.”

“Yarok’s waters rush and rage Where armies bled into the sand.”

“Yarok’s nightmares lurk and wait Where dark despair is near at hand.”

“Grief and rage and nightmares fade Where hope and comfort make their stand.” —Lament for Bala Ged

Emotional - Tale's End

“When you are gone, will anyone remember your story?” —Unknown

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why is france called the hexagon when its abundantly clear that it’s a pentagon

Scott Pilgrim is, I think, the best example I can think of for establishing a setting's Nonsense Limit. The setting's Nonsense Limit isn't quite "How high-fantasy is this". It's mostly a question of presentation, to what degree does the audience feel that they know the rules the world operates by, such that they are primed to accept a random new element being introduced. A setting with a Nonsense Limit of 0 is, like, an everyday story. Something larger than life, but theoretically taking place in our world, like your standard spy thriller action movie has a limit of 1. Some sort of hidden world urban fantasy with wizards and stuff operating in secret has a nonsense limit around 3 or 4. A Superhero setting, presenting an alternate version of our world, is a 5 or 6. High fantasy comes in around a 7 or so, "Oh yeah, Wizards exist and they can do crazy stuff" is pretty commonly accepted. Scott Pilgrim comes in at a 10. If you read the Scott Pilgrim book, it starts off looking like a purely mundane slice of life. The first hint at the fantastical is Ramona appearing repeatedly in Scott's Dreams, and then later showing up in real life. When we finally get an explanation, it's this:

Apparently Subspace Highways are a thing? And they go through people's heads? And Ramona treats this like it's obscure, but not secret knowledge. Ramona doesn't think she's doing anything weird here. At this point, it's not clear if Scott is accepting Ramona's explanation or not, things kind of move on as mundane as ever until their Date, when Ramona takes Scott through subspace, and he doesn't act like his world was just blown open or anything, although I guess that could have been a metaphor. there's a couple other moments, but everything with Ramona could be a metaphor, or Scott not recognizing what's going on. Maybe Ramona is uniquely fantastical in this otherwise normal world. And then, this happens

Suddenly, a fantastical element (A shitty local indie band finishing their set with a song that knocks out most of the audience) is introduced unrelated to Ramona, and undeniably literal. We see the crowd knocked out by Crash and The Boys. but the story doesn't linger on the implications of that, the whole point of that sequence is to raise the Nonsense Level, such that you accept it when This happens

Matthew Patel comes flying down onto the stage, Scott, who until this point is presented as a terrible person and a loser, but otherwise is extremely ordinary, proceeds to flawlessly block and counter him before doing a 64-hit air juggle combo. Scott's friends treat this like Scott is showing off a mildly interesting party trick, like being really good at darts. The establish that Scott is the "Best Fighter in the Province", not only are street-fighter battles a thing, Scott is Very Good at it, but they're so unimportant that being the best fighter in the province doesn't make Scott NOT a loser. So when Matthew Patel shows off his magic powers and then explodes into a pile of coins, we've established "Oh, this is how silly the setting gets". It's not about establishing the RULES of the setting so much as it is about establishing a lack of rules. Scott's skill at street-fighter battles doesn't translate to any sort of social prestige. Ramona can access Subspace Highways and she uses it to do a basic delivery job. It doesn't make sense and it's clear that it's not supposed to. So later on, when Todd Ingram starts throwing around telekinesis, and the explanation we're given is "He's a Vegan" , you're already so primed by the mixture of weirdness and mundanity that rather than trying to incorporate this new knowledge into any sort of coherent setting ruleset, you just go "Ah, yeah, Vegans".

The time of year where I listen to Burning Down the House for an hour straight

It obviously stands for Theoretical and Applied Mathematics

Obligatory question "is it short for Tamophania?"

no keep guessing

ok but if bruce wayne somehow came upon zuko fresh out of banishment he would lose his mind.

black hair? check. bad parent(s)? check. trauma? double check.

bruce: how’d you get your scar?

zuko: my dad got mad at me for saying that killing people is wrong so he lit my face on fire and banished me.

bruce, vibrating with excitement, already pulling adoption papers from his utilility: that’s terrible. how do you feel about capes.

The Owl House fandom is very funny bcos at one end you have the Lumity shippers but then at the other end you have the people who are obsessed with the Bone Pit

across the multiverse!!