alias_sqbr

Something I've been poking at lately is the fact I genuinely don't seem to enjoy writing original prose fiction, even though I enjoy creating fanfic, original visual novels, visual novel adaptations, and original art (and fanart). I definitely don't think it's lacking as an artform! It just doesn't fit my brain so well to make it. And I guess to some extent I also am less drawn to it as a consumer of fiction? That's harder to untangle and not so much the point of this post but I'm going to ponder it later.
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Comics:

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl 1: Good naturedly silly comic about a girl with the POWER OF SQUIRRELS balancing the start of college with saving the world from various random supervillains. Written by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics. She isn't sexualised at all which is nice, and there's understated but pervasive diversity.
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Graphic Novels:

The Wicked and the Divine: there's a queer comic book club this Sunday discussing volume 1, and since I've been meaning to read it anyway I bought the digital version. It was, as others have said, an interesting premise with middling execution, but it does have a lot of lgbt characters and an ethnically diverse cast. Basically: a group of young people have become/realised they are the incarnations of various gods. This means being immortal, having powers like fire, and the ability to "sing" in incomprehensible tongues that cause listeners to be inspired/overcome. So they act exactly like rock stars, with popular cheery goddesses, literally underground gothic death gods etc. The main character is a teenage god fangirl who gets caught up in a mystery around the gods when she befriends "Luci" (Lucifer), basically rule 63 Sandman Lucifer. The plot is moderately interesting though I've been massively spoiled for some major twists by tumblr. The characters are...ok. The dialogue is nowhere near as clever as it thinks it is and mistakes sexual references and clunky one liners for wit. The art is good asides from the bland expressions, like it's traced from 3D models. I'm in that annoying in between place where I'd like to see what happens next but don't like it enough to spend any more money or effort on it. I think I'll wait until it's done then see if I can be bothered.

Miss Marvel (vols 1,2 and 3): this is the other diverse comic the teenagers on tumblr keep posting gifs of and I liked it a lot more, though it's less my kind of thing. A lower middle class muslim teenage superhero fangirl gains super powers, and decides to defend Jersey from evil. It's a pretty straightfoward "optimistic teen gains superpowers" story, but charmingly done, with likable characters, light humour, thrilling fights etc. There's some heavy handed Young Adult Fiction elements, like Consent Is Important, Teenagers Have Value But So Do Parents etc, as well as some plain silly aspects, it felt very aimed at young people. But I still quite enjoyed it as someone who was once a teen fangirl and still gets a kick out of imagining befriending Wolverine (this scene was so cute). Also there's a little Agents of Shield crossover at the end of Vol 3 with Simmons (and Coulson) which I enjoyed.
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I was boggling that I hadn't done one of these since June then looked at my post titles for the last few months and remembered how sick I was for a while there. But I managed to draw some stuff anyway through the fog :) Also I got a copy of Manga Studio 5, which does some lovely lines and painting...that make my computer cry :(

All art has transcripts/descriptions at the link.

Prettiest:

Snow White and Red Riding Hood

Most interesting:
News From The Sea: A little fantasy comic adapted from this short story I wrote. Created for a Comic Books and Graphic Novels course. Transcripts in chapter 2.

As far as I can tell I got...120% for this comic? And that's getting less than half of the available extra credit. lol coursera. But it was fun!

( Person of Interest, Avatar: The Legend of Korra/The Last Airbender, Guild Wars 2, Dragon Age Origins, Mass Effect 2, Red Dwarf, Bastion, Dr Who, Original, Game of Thrones, The Hobbit, Fresh Pretty Cure )

So! I just came from Swancon. It was great! I may write some more coherent personal thoughts later, but plausibly not cos I don't have much interesting to say. What I do have are COPIOUS NOTES. So let's get started.

( Queerbaiting )( Favourite Comics )( Magic Systems )

I am currently comfortably set up on lilysea's very nice armchair in her very nice airconditioning avoiding the ridiculous 40C/104F+ weather Perth is in the middle of several days of. (I am also enjoying her company, but we are both in need of a lot of quiet resting time, which works out well. Reading her Facebook updates when she is JUST THERE is as surreal for me as I imagine this post will be for her when she checks her lj :D)

Yesterday I explored the local mall and sat in a library reading graphic novels. I read all of the first Hereville which was unobjectionable and light but didn't wow me, read enough of their Lovely Complex to realise I'd missed a few off the end reading online (now I want to buy it all but it's 17 volumes!), and enough 20th century Boys to decide it was good but way too slow and dark for me. Also saw that Girlfriends by Morinaga Milk comes as a 2 volume omnibus which I will definitely have to buy, woo adorable lesbians.

Today I finished The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo by Zen Cho and YOU ALL NEED TO GO READ IT NOW. It's the happy snarky light hearted romantic adventures of a twenty something year old Malaysian girl in London in the 1920s there is literally nothing not to like. I got it for free but it now costs all of $3. And the author turned out to be quian, who is an online friend of several of you guys, and has a story in Steampowered 2 though I haven't hit it yet in my reading.

Now to go back to "Finder" by Carlo Speed McNeil which is good but hasn't entirely grabbed me.

Oh! And I got all of Doctor Who season 5 for $50 yesterday. That would be good for any tv show but for Dr Who it's practically free. Also some nice cheap shorts, and earrings to attach to my-ear-friendly hooks, and a bunch of other stuff. Yay actually making it to Boxing Day-ish sales and having a wheelchair to move me around them.

I rather overdid it today, and this sort of post keeps me from falling asleep at 7pm.

Rango: a straightforward but well made humourous CGI spaghetti western with talking animals which are BEAUTIFULLY animated. The cinematography and character design in this film are truly gorgeous, they really add to the humour and drama etc. It is alas rather racist and ableist, this didn't ruin the film for me but YMMV.

Becoming Loveless A cute sweet little comic about being aromantic.

Kino's Journey (2 episodes): Slow, gentle, atmospheric anime where not much happens, about a young traveller and their talking motorbike travelling between various strange lands. The final proof I needed that I cannot stand this kind of anime (see also: Mushishi, Haibane Renmai). I kept waiting for there to be ACTUAL PLOT that MEANT SOMETHING rather than subtle mediations on the bittersweet irony of life. Also the gentle tragedy of the first episode has a REALLY OBVIOUS SOLUTION which really didn't lessen my desire to walk in, slap everyone upside the head and take over the damn story. Um. But if you like this sort of thing it's pretty good for what it is :D

Fringe (First 3 disks of season 1): This is basically an updated, slightly kookier version of the X files. I really like the main character Olivia, a gritty bitter female FBI agent, but in general am not sure why I am enjoying it. Yet, I am!

Hanna: Thriller about a teenage girl trained in survival skills by her father in the wilderness, on the run from the FBI. A failed attempt at a good film, had some good moments but was patchy and tonally inconsistent. On the plus side: a thriller with a female main character who is neither sexualised nor evil!

Get a free copy of "Dragon Age: The Silent Grove" Issue #1 It's actually a pretty good comic.

Farscape watch it/skip it guide I just finished Season 2 and agree with pretty much everything they have to say about those two seasons. Which bodes well for season 3! Overall enjoying it, though it's kind of dated and dodgy in parts. Also BLINDINGLY white, not even the one token black guy you get in crappy US shows. There's something refreshingly different about it though, at least when it's good.

Guide to Homestuck fandom Very useful hints for those who have trouble with the coloured text/flashing images etc. I've linked to a comment thread pointing out that it's a bit condescending.

Maximising war assets in Mass Effect 3 The decisions you have to make in all 3 games to optimise the result at the end. Very useful as I replay from the start (which is still lots of fun. I am doing all the sidequests, partly to avoid Virmire. I do like the sense of a huge varied universe that you get from driving around all these planets on the mako, even if it was frustrating when I just wanted to know what was going to happen next)

Why I Hope Dragon Age 3 Is A Lot Like Dragon Age 2 I thought this article was pretty good.

Under the cut: various tv and books and stuff. Because apparently I am too sleepy and dizzy to surf the internet or play glitch, but am awake enough to type a post?
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I was alas too sleepy today for the Girls reading comics in public mob (for International Read Comics In Public Day) but sat in the front garden for a bit and read, which I have decided still counts (some people went past!) Here is a vastly unflattering laptop photo of me reading Scott McCloud's "Making Comics" (since that is what I'm reading at the moment)