dhampyresa

I first got interested in Sophie Clark's "Cruel is the Light" because the cover is really pretty (art by Mona Finden, art direction by Ben Hughes). I wasn't going to read it because while the marketing said "enemies to lovers" the summary wasn't sound "enemy-ing" enough.

Then the Pope died.

And I thought I'd read a book sent mostly in Rome because I had no idea what to read next, fiction-wise.

Cruel is the Light is... Fine. It's fine. It indeed isn't enemies to lovers, it's more rivals to lovers forbidden love fake dating. The love story isn't unbelievable, anymore than any two week love story is. I guessed both that

from the summary

Jules was a demon

and

from early in the book

the Vatican's god was a demon

but not how those two tied together. There's one image I really liked and might draw at some point, idk. The demon/exorcist worldbuilding reminded me of the manga Claymore. Anyway. I don't regret reading it, but I wasn't going to read the sequel. I'd give it a 13/20. (Disclaimer: I read something like half of it while stuck on a stopped train.)

Then the Pope died.

Ok, in the book he's "Exorcist Primus". Point is they're going to be doing X-Treme Conclave next book and I am intrigued.

8 episodes is way too short for Doctor Who. The core of the show is the Doctor + Companion(s) relationship(s) and there isn't any time for that in these Disney seasons.

A friend and I were supposed to go watch Sinners this evening. Unfortunately, the screening was full so we went to see Thunderbolts instead. It was better than I expected.

Needed more Ghost. I always want to see more Hannah John-Kamen.

The only MCU movie I’d seen since Endgame was The Marvels but I was still able to follow the plot.

I could have done without Red Guardian.

I liked that the Sentry project was described as "the power of 1000 suns" and later that was called back (ish) by The Void’s nuclear shadows.

The Void looked cool as fuck

I do not think I should have watched this movie. There was a moment when The Void had taken over NYC where I thought "that looks so peaceful, so nice" and overall The Void’s speeches had this undertone of... i guess rightness is the word I'm looking for. It turns out watching movies about depression and/or that give depression a voice is like maybe not the greatest idea when you have major depressive disorder, lol

I liked the greyscale painting homages during the end credits.

Does anyone know what Anya's book was?

Webtoon's Dr. Kim of London is about a modern-day Korean surgeon being reincarnated in 19th century England and having to deal with lack of sanitation and public amputations and other such barbaries. This puts it in the same third-time's-the-genre as the manga Jin (modern day Japanese surgeon in 19th century Japan) and the K-drama Faith The Great Doctor (modern day Korean surgeon in 14th century Korea).

I love me a good "let's science the shit out of this" story and both it and its medical-historical subgenre need names. Any ideas?

The European Citizens initiative to an on conversion practices in the European Union needs more signatures before its deadline of saturday may 17. Please share and sign if you can.

The Locke & Key horror graphic novel series is now apparently being posted on webtoon. Having read it in its original, non-scroll format, I can guarantee it has a good and satisfying ending clearly planned from the beginning.

The short pitch I would give for the series is:

Following the murder of their father, the Locke family moves to the ancestral family home in Lovecraft, Massachusetts. The children discover keys with magic powers all over the property and the youngest also discovers a new friend, imprisoned at the bottom of a well.

I've read comics that when from a scroll to page format (Hooky, Colossale) but not the other way around, so I'm quite curious how that'll turn out. Curious to see if there'll be any changes to the art or story too.

A story I am currently experiencing posits that scanning a person's brain is enough -- modulo computer code -- to upload them into the cloud.

But is it really?

I'm not talking about a soul or the golem's divine breath of life or anything on a metaphysical level. I'm talking on a purely physical level: is the brain the only part of us that thinks?

If my spinal chord can wrench my hand away from a hot stove, is that not thinking? No, seriously. What counts as thinking?

I think (hardy har har) this is not the line of questionning the story wants me to go down, but it's where I am, and I'm really curious what everyone else thinks?


I trying out the construction "story experiencing" as an alternative to "media consumption", because I hate the passivity and destruction implied by consumption. Would also welcome opinions on this.

To be clear: The movie is simply titled "Fanon". It's just that that's also a word and I wanted this entry title to be not confusing.

I just saw this 2025 movie by Jean-Claude Barny. It's only come out in very few French theaters (for... some... reason...) but I hope it ends up getting a wider/international release.

It's really good! It covers Fanon's life from 1953 to his death in 1961. It's mostly about his work as part of the pro-Algerian independance resistance and anticolonialism/antiracism activism rather than his work as a psychiatrist. I didn't know he was so hands-on with the resistance.

Fanon's social status as a Black French citizen is really interesting, because the film makes the very deliberate to only show scenes in North Africa. Fanon is a Black man, which makes him a victim of anti-Black racism, but the main form of racism he lives within is racism directed towards people of Maghrebi/North African origin[1]. He's a Black man but he is also a French citizen, which gives him rights and protections many of his friends don't have -- he doesn't have to obey a curfew and can't get arrested by the army, for two relevant examples.

[1] Tbh this is the main form I see racism in France take -- this isn't to say there are no other forms of racism in France, simply that the biggest racialised minority in France is people of North African descent.

I was wary of Josie, his wife, taking a completely passive role in the story. She never becomes an active character but she is still a person in her own right. I liked the scene where she quotes back more of the poem he was quoting back at Ramdane while Fanon is like ._.

One thing that really stuck out to be was how the French army was filmed. They were filmed like... Well, like Germans. As in, like how the German army is filmed in WW2 films. I don't know how else to put it? Maybe it's the thudding of the boots or the crispness of the uniforms or something but it was noticeable.


Besides the obvious warning for racism, both anti-Black and anti-North African (including one use of a slur directed at each), I should also point out that there is a somewhat graphic surgery scene at one point, an onscreen strangulation and at least two occasions of people being shot, as well as implied/offscreen torture, murder and bombings.

I love having hot water, hot damn. This is a marked improvement from a week ago. My computer was also not working back then (unrelated) and now it is... Not not working. I'm writing this from my sickbed my phone.

I don't really know what else to say, so have so random thoughts.

In 2015, the grave of F. W. Murnau (of Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens fame) was desecrated, and his head stolen. Murnau died within a month of the premiere of Dracula (of Bela Lugosi fame). Bela Lugosi was buried in his Dracula costume.

JFK died on November 22 1963. Doctor Who premiered on November 23 1963. I can only conclude The Doctor is saving us from a zombie apocalypse. There is a suspiciously amount of Kennedys with holes in their brains.

I fucking love comics. I especially love knowing about how they work as medium and how that makes me appreciate them on an additional level. I wouldn't have enjoyed The Bone Orchard Mythos: Tenement as much if I wasn't also going "bruh the panelling!!!!!" to myself every so often, for example.

Tenement review, since I'm here: BRUH THE PANELLING!!!!! Also the landscapes????? Amazing, 10/10, no notes. The colouring was often very muddy, in a way I think sometimes did a disservice to the story. In other places (the landscapes, the masked people) the colouring was excellent. It maybe was mostly an issue with the faces? Idk. Very Lovecraftian horror. Not sure I understood everything that was going on, but I don't think I was supposed to. It's my favourite of the three Bone Orchard books out so far (then Ten Thousand Black Feathers, and last The Passageway -- this one felt very "we have Enys Men at home").

Enys Men is a 2022 horror movie I got interested in because, as far as I or anyone else seems to know, it is the first movie to have had promitional posters in Cornish (a language closely related to Breton). There is very little Cornish in the actual movie, but I don't regret seeing it. The best way to describe it is "haunting". I thought about it/its atmosphere for days afterwards.

Just finished reading the webtoon Like Mother Like Daughter up to the s2 finale and I need to SCREAM

The Cinderella Boy webtoon is also very very good and I have reread season 1 multiple times. I feel like I ought to be taking notes on how the enemies-to-lovers was develloped.

I don't know why I seem to only be reading comics right now. I want to be reading books too, but I don't seem to want to read any specific books?

As I understand it, it is impossible to steal the relics of a Catholic saint. If a relic is moved, it is always with the saint's approval (if not God's), and the Church can only comply.

Joan of Arc heard the voices of the following three saints: Archangel Michael, Margaret of Antioch and Catherine of Alexandria. The first two are sauroctones (dragonslaying saints), the latter two virgin saints. The patron saints of France include both Michael and Joan. I don't want to use the word "nepotism", but...

The word "monachoparthenoi" is the term used to talk about saints assigned female as birth who later took on a male identity, often as a monk. Hagiographers have referred to them as using both male and female pronouns.

You can put maple syrup in tea and it's delicious, especially if you make chai.

This youtube short about making miso soup has the GENIUS idea to use a strainer to avoid clumps from the miso paste. This also works for matcha powder if you make matcha latte, btw.

You can put orange blossom flavouring in a glass of milk and it's nice.

Wish I wasn't so tired all the time. Wish I could Do Things. Gonna go cuddle kitty and sleep.

I wish there was a shorter way to convey "I said I hated it, not that it was bad".

For example, I hated watching the movie Flow. I hated it so much it dealt me actual literal physical damage.

The main character is a cat who spends what feels like the entire movie being scared and/or unhappy. There are also multiple scenes of characters having their cherished possessions get lost and/or destroyed.

I never was not digging my nails into my arm from stress. The marks didn't fade for over 24 hours. Actual literal physical damage.

It is, however, a good movie. Part of why I hated it was how good it was, even. The little kitty is so little and so kitty ;_;

This obviously works in reverse, where me liking something doesn't mean it isn't bad. Though no example comes to mind at present, which either means I have never watched a single movie nor read a single book in my entire life or that I am less critical of things I enjoy. (To be honest I would rather have bad taste and enjoy things than the opposite.)

Anyway, I would like a concise way to convey the above, since it appears yo be a difficult concept for many people to grasp. Something as pithy as "depiction isn't endorsement". "Enjoyment is not quality", maybe?