rionaleonhart: goes wrong: unparalleled actor robert grove looks handsomely at the camera. (unappreciated in my own time)
[personal profile] rionaleonhart
Robert Grove of The Goes Wrong Show sank his teeth into my throat at the turn of the year and has spent the four months since then shaking me violently, but I think he's starting to relax his grip a little!

I'm still deeply fond of the Cornley Drama Society, of course! But I'm no longer constantly thinking about the Goes Wrong universe, or feeling the non-stop drive to write fanfiction. I can think of other works of fiction again at last, without resenting them for having the temerity not to feature Robert Grove!

In short, I find myself stumbling back into the real world at last, squinting in the sunlight, with 60,000 words of fanfiction scattered around me. This has been one of the wildest, most intense fandom experiences I've ever had. I lost twenty AO3 subscribers. I don't regret a thing.

Does this mean I'm going to start posting entries about other things again? No promises, but it just might happen.

Actually, here's an entry that's at least partly about other things right now! Rather an overdue entry, to be honest.


Towards the end of last year, I wanted to make an entry reflecting on the three canons of 2025 (specifically, canons I'd first experienced in 2025) that had had the biggest impact on me. I was struggling a little to come up with three, though! I knew Clair Obscur would be one, and the Silent Hill 2 remake would be another, but I just couldn't think of a third.

And then The Goes Wrong Show slammed into me, absolutely obliterating me, and I'm now making this post four months late because I've only just regained the ability to talk about anything else.

Of all the canons I first experienced in 2025, here are the three that had the largest impact on me:

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 leapt with impressive speed from 'huh, I've never heard of this' to being one of my favourite games of all time! Loved the gameplay, loved the concept, loved the characters. The art direction is stunning, as is the music; I actually bought the OST, approximately twenty years after my last purchase of a videogame soundtrack. I replayed the game immediately after beating it; I just wasn't ready to put it down. It's not a perfect game - I have severe frustrations with the ending - but it comes so, so close, and even the aspects I dislike are still interesting to think and talk about. I also really enjoy the way it is unapologetically Frencher than France.

I was nervous about playing the Silent Hill 2 remake! The original Silent Hill 2 was so formative for me; it was hard to imagine that a remake would get it right. But it got it so right. I'm absolutely awed by how well this remake captures and expands on the game, and how clearly it's built on deep foundations of love for the original. It was a pleasure to spend time with James Sunderland again. Well, it was horrible, obviously, but I still had a great time.

And, finally, The Goes Wrong Show, which I absolutely lost my mind about for four solid months, going from 'wow, this is some really impressive stagecraft and comic timing and Robert is hot' to 'I kind of want to dig into these characters' to 'wait, where did these theatre tickets come from' to 'somehow this is now my fourth-most-written fandom of all time?'

On a canon level, I enjoy The Goes Wrong Show because it's very funny and well-crafted! On a fandom level... honestly, I think it woke up a side of me that's been dormant since I was a teenager in Top Gear fandom. I heard 'a group of people, everything they do is a disaster, one of them is a big blustery attention-grabbing man who blithely causes problems for everyone', and the part of me that wrote 90,000 words of fanfiction about Jeremy Clarkson at the age of eighteen immediately shouldered her way to my computer and opened up a Word document.
anneapocalypse: A blonde-haired Elezen character wearing a flower crown and glasses, grinning at a bluebird on her shoulder, with a tiny bluebird earring in the opposite ear. (Default)
[personal profile] anneapocalypse

We got some big Final Fantasy XIV news this weekend at Fanfest in Anaheim. If you want to watch it for yourself, you can do so here. The keynote presentation, beginning with the 8.0 teaser trailer, is at 59:30 and is around two hours long; the job system changes are explained in the developer panel at 6:11:48. Or, if you’d rather watch a shorter summary, here’s Meoni’s on the keynote and developer panel.

So here’s my initial thoughts! Yoshida really emphasized that all of this, especially the system changes, is still in development; a lot of this could change, and my opinions might as well.

On the trailer and the hints at the story… )

trails to azure - final thoughts

Apr. 26th, 2026 11:30 am
larissa: (FFXIII ☄ ⌈Lightning ; don't look back⌋)
[personal profile] larissa

i beat trails to azure last night, so here's some wrap-up thoughts on the crossbell duology.

first, my backloggery status update and spoiler-free azure review:

43 hours. All sidequests completed and hit max Detective Rank. Bonded with Elie and every NPC except KeA (dunno how that happened).

(it was only 43 hours thanks to the turbo button, which i held down for most trash mob fights. thanks turbo button.)

Azure takes some big swings that don't always land, but I appreciate the effort. Frankly, the twists in this game constantly had me on my toes. It's definitely the stronger of the duology, but parts of it are exhausting — the extremely long final chapter (and dungeon), the backtracking, etc. That said, on the whole it's better than the sum of its parts and I'm glad to have played it.

which pretty much sums it up, tbh. but let's get into the weeds.

full spoilers below )

so now it's on to clair obscur! hoping to (re)start it tonight, though new ffxiv patch this week will definitely distract me in the coming days. i don't think clair obscur is that long, though, so it should be easy to get it finished in may. here's hoping!

the miscellaneous april update

Apr. 25th, 2026 09:11 am
larissa: (FFVIIR ☄ ⌈Tifa ; smile⌋)
[personal profile] larissa

i was going to wait until i finished trails to azure to make a post (and i should finish tonight, i am nearly done this longass final dungeon oh my god trails what the fuck) but it's [community profile] 3weeks4dreamwidth so i might as well post today. also i have like 15 more minutes of crafting in ffxiv i gotta sit through, so.

anyway, there's been little progress on anything but gaming this month. i need to fix some stuff on my sites in the coming days (font loading issues) so maybe i'll take another stab at the contact page redesign. writing has been going well but i still haven't been writing anything but my oc stuff. at least i've been writing that every day, though.

new ffxiv expansion was announced yesterday! the setting is UNEXPECTED, but it looks promising. a lot of the keynote yesterday focused on the fact that they don't want to make the exact same game over again, which i approve of because the game has been incredibly stagnant and predictable for years. like don't get me wrong, i love xiv, but it has desperately needed a shake-up in terms of gameplay for a long time. there's comfort in familiarity, but it's also time for a change. and frankly none of the changes they showed looked THAT out there.

also i'm really excited for a new difficulty between normal and savage raids. due to my health i had to leave my savage static for this tier, and i don't know when i'll be well enough to try again. having a genuine midcore difficulty is exactly what the game needs. the numbers they gave were that 20% of players clear savage and 85% clear normal raids, so like, there's clearly room in the middle there. i like raiding a lot, but it does require a time and effort commitment that i can't always give, and i'd like to be able to tackle something in between.

on that note, i've been playing with a group for a year now to farm out the extreme mounts; we meet every saturday and sunday afternoon and it's been a really fun time. that group i was able to stay in, and i'm really excited to get the final set of wings and the capstone mount. (i'm only missing doomtrain; it only dropped once in all our static clears.) we finished doomtrain some weeks back, so we've been fucking about since then — we learned and clearned p8s and p12s unsync for the mounts + achievements, did some blue mage stuff, etc. it's been a good time.

my reading has totally stalled. i've been reading a perfectly good book, but i've had no drive or desire to read lately, which sucks. i don't think it's the book at all... i would DNF it but i want to read the rest, so. it seems my first half of the year will be a lot like last year's in terms of not much reading.

trails has been occupying the rest of my time. azure is a good game and i intend to write a wrap-up post about it, but man has it had some CURVEBALLS. also i wasn't kidding, this final dungeon is way too fucking long. (all spoilers are masked at that link.) i love a good dungeon crawl but MY GOD.

after i finish azure though it's on to clair obscur! i think i'm going to restart clair obscur from scratch; i was only 7 hours in and friends have told me it's better as a cohesive experience, so. i still only know one spoiler from the game, so i'm excited to finally experience the Game Of The Year 2025 that everyone has already played, lmao. the only caveat is that i haven't used my PS5 controller in months (i've been playing the PS4 version of XIV on my PS5) due to hand pain... i hope it goes okay.

okay my crafting is done and i'm out of things to talk about, so. now i have to figure out what to title this entry...

anneapocalypse: A headshot of Urianger in the Waking Sands. (ffxiv urianger waking sands)
[personal profile] anneapocalypse

Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV
Rating: Mature
Archive Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Urianger Augurelt/Moenbryda Wilfsunnwyn, Urianger Augurelt & Moenbryda Wilfsunnwyn, Ardbert & Urianger Augurelt, Unrealized Ardbert/Urianger Augurelt, Pre-Urianger Augurelt/Warrior of Light
Characters: Urianger Augurelt, Moenbryda Wilfsunnwyn, Ardbert Hylfyst, Elidibus, Unukalhai, Tataru Taru, Minfilia Warde, Warrior of Light, Dewlala Dewla, Y'shtola Rhul, Yugiri Mistwalker, Thancred Waters, J'Rhoomale, Blanhaerz, Lamimi, Naillebert, Haneko Burneko
Additional Tags: Grief/Mourning, Angst, Religion, Isolation, Loneliness, Patch 3.4: Soul Surrender Spoilers (Final Fantasy XIV), Elezen Warrior of Light, Female Warrior of Light, Canon-Typical Violence, Guilt, Emotional Repression, Child Neglect, Childhood Memories, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Series: With Lilies and With Laurel
Length: 75,514 / 92,000
Chapter: 12/15

Summary:

Heartbroken after the loss of his dearest companion, Urianger labors to save two worlds in which he has never felt more alone.

Notes:

If you're new here, please start with Chapter 1!

Final Fantasy XIV is owned by Square Enix. This is a non-commercial work of fanfiction.

( Read on AO3 )

...or below! )

rionaleonhart: goes wrong: unparalleled actor robert grove looks handsomely at the camera. (unappreciated in my own time)
[personal profile] rionaleonhart
I've received a few more Goes Wrong questions on Tumblr!


Anonymous: Cornley School au anon here. I worded it terribly, sorry. What I meant to ask was about the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society if they had met as teenagers and grown up in the 2010s but I absolutely garbled the word soup there.

Ah, thank you for clarifying, and I'm sorry for getting confused! It worked out in the end, because I enjoyed the idea of everyone getting trapped in the drama room.

I was an adult by the 2010s myself (I'm pretty much exactly the same age as Lewis/Sayer/Shields) (even the most virulent antis cannot complain about our four-month age gap when Robert Grove and I get married)*, so I don't know how intelligently I could talk about what it would be like for them to grow up in that decade; I imagine smartphones in particular made it a very different experience! (Unless Cornley has no reception, which I could definitely believe.)

* This is assuming that Robert is the same age as his actor, which is admittedly not a given! Chris is canonically two years older than Robert, whereas there are only three months between their actors. I considered using Lewis for this joke instead, but it's not Henry Lewis I'm weird about; it's Robert Grove. Which is unfortunate, because marrying Lewis would be a) more achievable and b) probably a less terrible idea.

If they met as teenagers, I could see them sort of gravitating around Robert. Things often feel uncertain and unstable when you're a teenager, and, at that age, I can imagine that Robert's projected air of absolute confidence might feel magnetic, particularly for the characters who have very little confidence themselves (e.g. Dennis and Vanessa). It's possible I just think that because I find Robert so compelling myself, though!

If Robert does end up the centre of their group, of course, it's only a matter of time before he ropes them into putting on theatre. They are doomed to end up in the drama society in every universe.


Anonymous, continued: Also, I am taking notes on If We Were Villains and I shall explore that... but yes, we do not want Robert killing Chris!

I hope you enjoy If We Were Villains, if you check it out! It's not a perfect book, but I really enjoyed how intense and weird the character dynamics were.

Maybe Robert could instead attempt to murder Chris and then get really huffy that Chris won't let it go. The man's still alive, isn't he? Why is he still complaining over one measly murder attempt? It's been weeks!


Anonymous: I don't know if this counts as a ficlet, but I'd love to see Man-Spider's mishaps with the Goes Wrong crew.

This is such a deep cut, and I’m so curious about who you are! In any case, Man-Spider is thrilled that someone remembers him.


The Theatrical Adventures of Man-Spider. )


Anonymous: Who would be the worst member of Cornley for Robert to be bodyswapped with? I am imagining shenanigans galore for every possibility!!!

I feel Sandra is simultaneously the worst and the best option!

Robert rather enjoys being in Sandra’s body. Does a lot of strutting and posing, comments that he can see why Sandra’s such a fan of it.

Sandra hates being Robert, right up until she realises that, if she’s in someone else’s body, she can have sex with herself. Robert takes up the suggestion with great enthusiasm. They make very little effort to hide what they’re up to from the rest of the society, who are deeply unhappy about this.
kalloway: Warrior of Light from Origins with Lensflare (Final Fantasy)
[personal profile] kalloway
Except I've mostly lost track of dates so I'm basically tossing out the old advent and will start over with counting down to... idk, Xmas? all over again?

Dragon Goes House Hunting 9 (Kawo Tanuki & Choco Aya) - still cute, still gonna be glad this is ending next volume.

Polite Society - this was honestly really fun even if it wasn't entirely what I was expecting and I think it'll likely end up as a frequent comfort watch just because it's so delightful and over the top.

Know Your Ships (2011 Edition) - my father picked up a bundle and this was a duplicate of what he had, so I now have a fancy, if outdated, Great Lakes Ship reference. \o/

Nobunaga Concerto - JFF film, this is a movie wrapping up a television series, and the movie does the quickest three minute recap and then just runs with the bonkers isekai premise. It was okay, but probably lost a lot without having seen the series.

Bleach S1 - I actually had expected to watch this and then put it in the sale bin but I really enjoyed it. Maybe I'll pick up the next set and see how far I get before I fall off like I always do. Bleach has a really good beginning.

Every Day A Good Day - JFF film, this one was about tea ceremony and was a nice enough culture drama. About a young woman learning tea ceremony and how she kept with it over the years.

Mobile Suit Gundam Wing Endless Waltz: Glory of the Losers 6-11 (Katsuyuki Sumizawa, Tomofumi Ogasawara) - the whole middle and getting to the end! Lots of little differences and explanations for things that felt vague in the anime. Gorgeous art and fun extras, too.

Confetti - JFF film, this one was absolutely wonderful. About the youngest member of a traveling theater troupe and how he enrolls in a new school for the duration of the troupe's stay in a town, but he doesn't tell his classmates about his life.

The Prince and the Dressmaker (Jen Wang) - reread to finally write something for [community profile] small_fandoms since I've meant to for actual ages. This is still delightful and full of yearning.

Tsukipro The Animation 2 - still idols and fun songs, but things get a lot weirder in this one and it's a lot of fun.

Let's Go Karaoke - JFF film, live-action adaptation, about a yakuza guy recruiting a teenage choir member to teach him how to sing. It's not BL but it's also not not BL, or something. I ended up watching the short anime version afterward and while it does some things different, they're both really good.

Heavy Metal L-Gaim (Box Set 1) - L-Gaim is getting a domestic release (or just has) so I wanted to watch this ancient bootleg set and see if I actually liked it enough to get the proper version. Unfortunately the translation on this is pretty poor and I'm not sure how I feel about the story. There are a lot of interesting things but also a lot that... eh. But absolute banger of an OP, if nothing else. I do have the second set but it's vanished from the pile by the TV so ???

Carole & Tuesday - since I picked up the fancy box set, I wanted to do a quick disc check and this is always so, so good. I don't think I've ever actually put this show away because I always want to watch it again. Fabulous music, fabulous everything.

Podfic Pinch Hit!

Apr. 23rd, 2026 06:04 am
flowersforgraves: A small metal robot charm. The robot is wearing a headset with an attached microphone. (podfic: robot)
[personal profile] flowersforgraves in [community profile] amplificathon
[community profile] the_mane_event, a multifandom gift exchange for all things hair-related, is seeking an emergency pinch hitter for a participant requesting both fic and podfic! Podfic must be of a work that is minimum 500 words, does not include the recipient's DNWs, and fits one of the requests, meaning that it includes one fandom, one ship, and at least one freeform or optional tag requested.

You can view the pinch hit here, which also has instructions on how to claim the pinch hit.

Search maintenance

Apr. 22nd, 2026 09:19 am
mark: A photo of Mark kneeling on top of the Taal Volcano in the Philippines. It was a long hike. (Default)
[staff profile] mark in [site community profile] dw_maintenance

Happy Wednesday!

I'm taking search offline sometime today to upgrade the server to a new instance type. It should be down for a day or so -- sorry for the inconvenience. If you're curious, the existing search machine is over 10 years old and was starting to accumulate a decade of cruft...!

Also, apparently these older machines cost more than twice what the newer ones cost, on top of being slower. Trying to save a bit of maintenance and cost, and hopefully a Wednesday is okay!

Edited: The other cool thing is that this also means that the search index will be effectively realtime afterwards... no more waiting a few minutes for the indexer to catch new content.

rionaleonhart: goes wrong: unparalleled actor robert grove looks handsomely at the camera. (unappreciated in my own time)
[personal profile] rionaleonhart
I have written a lot of stupid bullshit for this fandom, but this is the stupidest bullshit yet, and I apologise.


Title: Adaptability
Fandom: The Goes Wrong Show
Rating: 15
Pairing: Robert/Chris, Robert/Robert, Robert/Chris/Robert
Wordcount: 2,700
Summary: “In the end,” Robert says, “I concluded that I was also the most qualified person to play Juliet. Therefore, I have decided to summon myself from an alternate universe.”

Adaptability )

Spiral Bound

Apr. 20th, 2026 09:27 pm
kalloway: Mucha art of a woman in a pink dress (Mucha 8)
[personal profile] kalloway
I am currently not allowed to purchase any further emotional support notebooks until I use up a substantial amount of the emotional support notebooks that I have. This is actually fine, because for the first time in ages I can get to most of my notebooks. At the very furthest reaches of my bedroom shelves are a bunch of old and battered spiral notebooks, quite a few of which suggest they're leftover from my first stabs at college and university. Any remaining pages in these can be used for things like Accidental Advent, rough logging possessions before sorting properly, and general notes. Use once and destroy. (well, recycle)

I have, multiple times over the years, found absolute notebooks upon notebooks filled with my old fantasy novel. The last plan was to stuff it all into the back of my file cabinet, which I apparently then never did because I just found it all again. This time, it'll get filed for reals. (hopefully)

But I have also found some blank or blank-enough notebooks for projects, which is good. Also found the beginnings of a Serpent Tail timeline, probably from the big timeline that came with the serialized version of Frame Astrays, pre-smartphone... I remember working painstakingly with my kanji dictionary on my lap and now I can just point, poke, and probably have the whole thing translated and corrected in an hour. ;_; (this is mildly untrue because the amount of cross-referencing I'd start doing would turn it into a weekend project and then I'd start adding in information and whoops)

((I wonder if a newer whole-series timeline exists in any form.))

[FFXIV Meta] Urianger's Faith

Feb. 6th, 2025 09:00 am
anneapocalypse: A headshot of Urianger in the Waking Sands. (ffxiv urianger waking sands)
[personal profile] anneapocalypse

I think Urianger’s faith is a core part of his character. In fact, I think that most other things about him—his history of secrecy and deception, his lifelong fascination with prophecy, and his growth over a multi-expansion character arc—are better understood in the context of it. So that’s what I want to talk about today!

This essay contains major plot spoilers through Endwalker. It's also really long. Originally posted to tumblr; backdated to reflect original post date.

Urianger's Religon... )

(Probably Enough)

Apr. 19th, 2026 07:23 pm
kalloway: (Xmas Lights 20 Drape)
[personal profile] kalloway
Now that it's time to go back to work for the week, the brainweasels of "you didn't get enough done this weekend" have come to circle. Could I have done more? Probably. But did I do an absolute lot? Sure did! (Just ask my back!)

While digging through stacks of books that I didn't realize I had, I came to two conclusions. First, swapping out the short, long bookcase in degrading condition would be a good plan. There have been two tall, thin bookcases at the 'rents that were 'given' to me years ago that I just didn't think I had space for. If those will fit in the same spot, it'll be perfect. And second, I completely fell off with Accidental Advent, which is fine and not terribly surprising. I'll see about re-starting in the near future because I did enjoy the nudge. (The old bookcase can probably go to the garage if I can get it up on cinderblocks. It's still fine to hold non-book things but if the bottom shelf has started a chemical reaction, I don't assume it'll magically stop.)

I suppose plans for the rest of spring/summer are going to involve clearing every shelf, cleaning it, and checking conditions of things. I also need to get fresh air into the place more often. I'd wanted to get things opened up already but it's also rained every day for like two weeks now. Except right now, because it's snowing heavily. (WTF)

Also got a good percentage of my gunpla logged. I want to eventually have a good list of what I have both unbuilt and built. While just my backlog sounds like a slightly better time, I definitely know that I've built things and then forgotten about them as time passed. (In my defense, I mean built in like ~2010.)

I stirred up a lot of dust, which mostly means that I have a lot of dust and need to do some work tetris-ing things around so I can do a more thorough vacuum and whatnot.

I know I declare every year as the year I finally sort through everything but I'm feeling the motivation and am going to try to run with it.

Ah, A Day

Apr. 19th, 2026 03:58 am
kalloway: multicolored christmas lights (Xmas Lights 26 Unspun)
[personal profile] kalloway
Went on an entire road trip today- Michael's first, which is down near where I used to work but feels like the other end of the universe. I have, for months, kept thinking I should make a chunky list for when I finally got down there, because I need many things... Did I ever make this list? No. Did I get the one thing I really needed? Yes. (smallish ziploc bags, generally sold for beads and whatnot but I use them for gunpla accessories)

Then on to HobbyTown to pick up a belated prize from that contest a month ago. It is a ballcap, and I am not a ballcap-wearer, so it'll just chill on a wig head or something. Also picked up a couple of 30MM kits, RG Wing (all the Wings!), and a couple stands because I am direly low on stands and keep building critters that don't balance well.

After that, back across to a free "anime convention" also near where I used to work. I can't even say I managed to walk around once because it was the biggest shitfire I've ever seen of a convention and I have been to a lot of dire nerd shows. No parking (I parked at a drugstore nearby and hoofed it), no lighting, a rock band playing loudly over a wrestling show, and a bunch of randomly laid-out artist tables and some random woo and a poor guy selling fudge. The layout was so bad that it was impossible to walk down aisles normally, even without cosplayers in large costumes blocking things (possibly the only actual "anime convention" hallmark). Maybe stayed ten minutes.

Doing a lot of cleaning tonight, both in my bedroom and online. First is a quick journal cleanup, removing inactive accounts and a bunch of communities that I'm not doing anything with and probably won't any time soon. As always, it's not anything personal. I should do my fediverse accounts next, and discord servers that I haven't looked at in ages.

(Bedroom cleaning is cataloguing models and became a dedicated shelf clean of a bookcase where I think the old paperbacks and the old clearcoat are interacting badly. But I think I can replace that bookcase easily so *waves hands* I also gave the discolored/spotty book bottoms a quick sand and they look a lot better. Also also these are mass market pocket paperbacks from the ~80's so they are not in great shape to begin with and there's some book repair in my future.)
rionaleonhart: goes wrong: unparalleled actor robert grove looks handsomely at the camera. (unappreciated in my own time)
[personal profile] rionaleonhart
My usual policy is that, if I write fanfiction in the comments of someone else's journal or community, I'll repost it in an entry over here. If I write fanfiction in the comments of my own journal, though, I won't make an entry for it; it already exists on my journal in some capacity, after all.

However! [personal profile] wolfy_writing's prompt in the comments of this entry ('Robert's ideas for seducing every other member of the drama society') launched me into writing eight separate short fics in response, one pairing Robert of The Goes Wrong Show with each other member of the drama society. I think that's an ambitious enough project to warrant its own entry!

Do these fics technically fit the original prompt? Let's... let's not worry about that.


Much Ado, Robert/Annie, 900 words. )

With the Camera, Robert/Sandra, 700 words. )

In Position, Robert/Trevor, 1,100 words. )

Imparting Wisdom, Robert/Dennis, 1,200 words. )

Problem-Solving, Robert/Jonathan, 700 words. )

Hands-On, Robert/Vanessa, 2,200 words. )

Chemistry Testing, Robert/Max, 1,000 words. )

Rehearsals, Robert/Chris, 2,300 words. )

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