Lords of Kobol, hear my prayer...

++ I'm doing okay. The nausea-inducing anxiety and dread of this week has subsided. I've since mourned and now I'm just in a state of numbness. I don't talk about current political events that much on my journal anyway. I have commented on other people's posts venting my shared frustrations and disbelief, and that's about enough. I don't have anything else to offer that hasn't already been said. As of now, I've blocked and blacklisted as much as I can revolving anything to do with politics, and I've been focusing on other things that make me happy to distract myself for my own peace of mind. I don't intend on going down that self-destructive rabbit hole of doomscrolling and getting myself upset, and I encourage anyone who has been feeling down to do the same. And that's all I'm going to say on this matter.

Now, onto other happier and better things....

++ Music: XG just released their newest music video "HOWLING" last night off their new mini-album "AWE", which was also just released, and yeah, I'm also in awe with it, just like with everything else they've done. I'll be talking more about this later on the end of the year fandom meme, but they're by far one of the best musical discoveries I've had this year. The (actual) raps, the vocals, the visuals, the pure artistry of their team, the dancing skills, the concepts, especially the alien/wolf pack concept they as their whole group have. Amazing, phenomenal, spectacular, showstopping, etc. I just cannot get enough. These girls are unstoppable and I'm obsessed.

++ So it seems that The Untamed hasn't left Netflix as originally planned, since the announcement was that it was going to leave by the end of October but it's still there. I figure it's probably about renegotiation of licensing contracts. Not that there weren't other places to watch it, of course, but regardless of the reasoning I'm happy that it's staying. :)

And on that note, it appears that Love Game in Eastern Fantasy will be available on Netflix starting November 10th. It's of course already available to watch on YouTube and other places, but it's still a pleasant surprise whenever ongoing dramas get onto Netflix rather quickly.

++ We got our first look at the third season of The Legend of Vox Machina, just the opening title sequence but it features a lot of interesting Easter eggs including a very small one from the current third campaign. It'll premiere in October, but just seeing this and knowing what is coming has me excited to see certain moments played out.

++ Life Is Strange: Double Exposure was announced, which is a direct sequel to the first game that came out in 2015. This honestly caught me by surprise since I didn't know this was in development at all. Personally, aside from some issues and opinions I have about certain things (mostly with the toxicity of the fandom but also with how the new developers screwed over Ashly Burch in Life Is Strange: Before The Storm), I am pretty neutral when it comes to this franchise. Although I am more familiar and invested with the first game I also know of the other games released and have heard good things about them. With this new one it also seems they are taking inspiration from the official (yet non-canon) comics that were released where they explore one of the possible endings from the first game, so I'm curious to see what happens in this story.

++ The Lord Of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim is an upcoming anime film adapted from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and is a prequel to Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy, which a few official stills were recently released.

Not gonna lie, I'm actually intrigued by this. Animation can work wonders for such genres like fantasy where live-action often falls short, and this being anime style animation has definitely sparked an interest. We'll have to see how it is in motion, but I do appreciate switching things up and doing something new and different.

++ Lastly, my copy of The Untamed: The Official Artbook arrived today! :D I love official art books from media, they may be big, bulky and heavy, but I just love them.

( Zewu-Jun and Sandu Shengshou. )

My Comments: This week's fanvid is a bit different because it's an original creation by fans, from the song to the animation used, this fan project was made with a labor of love and it shows in the final product. This is entirely a Lan Xichen/Jiang Cheng centric fanvid, one of my OTPs of The Untamed/MDZS, and this is an excerpt from the video description in regards to the composition of the song (which I highly recommend reading the entirety of with its message): "We did not focus on the positive side of happiness, but describe more about their sufferings and spiritual frustrations. We hope everyone could understand that they have overcome a lot of pain but still have pure hearts." I'd say they did a good job at presenting that. It's a beautiful video, a beautiful original song, and the first time I saw this fanvid I was blown away at the level of dedication this fan project was given.

Continuing on with that individual fandom meme that I've been steadily filling out for certain fandoms, this time for The Untamed.

( I've been 'dead' once. We, of course, came from hell. )

++ I recently discovered a post that features audio pronounciations for the names in The Untamed, which has been incredibly helpful because while watching the show everything is spoken quite fast that I cannot keep up with understanding how to properly pronounce things. And Chinese is a difficult language to learn, so having a guide, even a simple one to know how to properly say their names, is very useful and I'm grateful for the OP for doing that.

++ I started a new show recently, a kdrama called Crash Landing On You. It was a random pick based off of a recommendation and decided to check it out, and from the very first episode I was sold. I haven't watched much of it yet, I'm spacing out the episodes and pacing myself, mostly because I'm still stuck from the emotional hangover that is The Untamed, but so far it's absolutely delightful. It is adorable, lighthearted and so tropey in the best possible way.

++ It's been announced that Cas Anvar has been let go from The Expanse, which is good news considering what was revealed about him earlier this year, however it's also been announced that the show was been renewed for a sixth which will be its final season. I kind of suspect the latter may possibly be connected to the former, but that's just my own speculation due to how deeply involved he was with the fan campaign to save the show in the first place, including his account of talking with Jeff Bezos directly during a conference. I sincerely hope that's not the case, though, and it's more of a creative decision since the books do have a massive time-jump. Also it could possibly be COVID related since the pandemic has affected a lot of filming of shows and films at this time as well, so that could be another factor to consider.

I'm conflicted on this because on one hand I really wanted the show to on long enough to adapt the entire book series, since it would've been really cool to see an adaptation actually complete that task and have it be done right. And while I haven't started the books yet I know it goes to some interesting and fascinating places that would be amazing to see on television. On the other hand, the fact that the show was saved from cancellation to begin with is a damn miracle in itself. Having six seasons is actually quite an accomplishment, and if they're able to make adjustments to wrap things up proper to give us a damn good finale, then I'm happy. Because while I wanted there to be more seasons, that's all I want: a proper conclusion to a damn good story, and I trust the people running the show to deliver us something epic.