What's Worse Is That Cousin Phil Is So Three Seasons Ago. He's Since Lost His Power, Become Mortal, And

What's worse is that Cousin Phil is so three seasons ago. He's since lost his power, become mortal, and sacrificed himself to save the world. Last season they had to fight -- I am not shitting you -- God's sister. Oh, and God's name is Chuck.

You cannot make fun of this show. It makes fun of itself.

Every time someone tries to explain the metaplot of Supernatural to me, it basically ends up sounding like redneck Dragon Ball Z. I’m sure there’s some nuance I’m failing to grasp here.

Why? Because what America needs right now is more love!

Repost for the morning crowd!

The streets of 1892 London are cold and dark, mist curling at the edges. Couples move through the night, hoods drawn up and watching close. Murder has a way of turning even a raucous street city into a trembling wretch, holding its breath against the next attack.

Only a few weeks ago, the first body was found along the edge of Lucy Road, ripped to shreds by fangs or claws in unnatural ways. It wasn’t the last. Scotland Yard is looking for someone controlling a pack of wild animals, using them as a means of execution. As yet there is no suspect and no pattern among the dead, save the means and location of the blood-stained corner that is now avoided more cautiously than a plague wagon.

When will the next body be uncovered? Who will it be?

Citizens of the Borough of Islington grow more and more nervous. Watch patrols have been called for among the working class while the finer lords and ladies hire more and more well-armed guards and stay to their fast-moving carriages, running down any who might seek to slow them. Everywhere you look, people are striking out against the dark. But unfortunately for them, the dark…has teeth…

Greetings and good evening! If you follow me, you know who I am, but let me briefly explain myself. I’ve been a writer for almost as long as I’ve been able to write, have been a role-player for a good couple of decades, and have participated in online RPing in some form or another for almost five years. I’ve run a number of in-game events for players of both GW2 and SWTOR and I really enjoy group storytelling.

Now I’ve watched far too much Penny Dreadful recently (but not the last season, please don’t spoil me!) and I have a hankering to run a murder mystery in the same sort of world.

This is London, 1892, specifically the centrally located Borough of Islington. A murderer is afoot and no one has been able to track them down. People are getting scared. There’s a monster out there in the dark. Or maybe he’s in here…with us.

Added to this sense of macabre terror is a hint of magic and the occult. Not that most people believe in witches or ghosts…but just because you don’t believe in them doesn’t mean they don’t believe in you. Weird science, subtle mysticism, demonology, and fantastical creatures hover at the edges of the world, just waiting for an opportunity to reach through and tap an unwary shoulder.

Does a murder mystery in Victorian gothic London sound like fun? Then come on down! I’m looking for four or so players willing and able to meet weekly via skype (or the group’s choice of chat program) for 2-4 hours for group interactions that I will game master/storytell. Simple die rolls might be used for combat, but nothing deeply structured. If you’re interested in single or smaller-group interactions for advancing particular parts of the story, that’s available as well.

If this interests you, please send me a PM and let me know what kind of character you’d like to make. I would like all characters to have some connection to the murders, whether because they know one of the victims, they work for Scotland Yard, or have a driving reason to seek out the killer. If you’re struggling with this, ask me about it. I have a lot of ideas we can work with!

Thanks for reading this far, I’m glad to see you were at least mildly entertained. I’m really looking forward to leading people through the labyrinth of horrors to come! <cue evil laughter>

Video game things I’m good at:

Knowing every obscure scrap of lore ever introduced

Being pretty bad at the actual game

Reblog if you roleplay BOTH seriously and, well... not seriously at all.

All day I’ve been trying to think about what to say about Donald Trump’s acceptance speech last night.

Obviously, I have my disagreements with the GOP platform when it comes to the rights of women, to LGBTQ individuals, to immigration, to the environment, to taxation, to separation of church and state, and a good deal more.

But beyond those disagreements, I realized as I watched that Mr. Trump was speaking to a group of people who see the world–and this country–in a fundamentally different way than I do.

He insists, and they believe, that we are desperately unsafe, that crime and violence are all around us, that our government is doing a very poor job of protecting us, and that even the police are powerless to stop the criminals who target us and them. He insists, and they believe, that vast hordes of Mexican murderers and Muslim terrorists are streaming or preparing to stream across our open borders and kill our loved ones. He insists, and they believe, that we have major economic problems and that we spend too much money on our international allies. He insists, and they believe, that America is being or has been stolen from the white Christians who made it great and that he is the only person capable of restoring America to its former glory.

This isn’t my America. This isn’t what I see when I look around.

Certainly we have a lot of work to do as a country; certainly there are many, many things we need to fix, including our politics; and certainly there are dangerous people out there. But in general things are pretty good, and certainly they are rosy when we compare things with the way they were in our not-so-distant past. Thankfully, there is actually less violent crime today than in the past; there are fewer police officers being killed in the line of duty; we are mostly shielded from terrorism, at least in part due to the governmental processes already in place to protect us.

So, as I watched thousands of people on their feet, voicing their approval for Trump as he hollered “We don’t want them in our country,” I realized it might be impossible for me to understand this. I might be in a position where all I could ever feel was fear and revulsion for this sort of thinking.

My family came to this country not so very long ago, survivors of the Nazi Holocaust who moved here from Israel for opportunities for their young children. As I listened to the full-throated approval for a presidential candidate playing on their fear of immigrants and refugees, insisting that THOSE people don’t belong in OUR country, I was reminded of Pastor Niemöller’s most famous quote:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

I’m not a Mexican immigrant and I’m not a Muslim (whether a Syrian refugee or someone born in America). But I know my world history and my family’s history well enough to know that we must speak out and we must work against this notion that THOSE people make US less safe, take OUR jobs, make OUR country less safe, that THEY don’t belong HERE and that they’re taking OUR country away from US.

We must do this not only so that someone will be there to speak for us when we need them, but also because it is a moral imperative to speak out against the terrible lie that America belongs to a certain group of people and that the appropriate response to feelings of insecurity is to empower the government to lash out at anyone who isn’t part of that group.