Pinned
Commission info
Reblogged incorrectnorse-quotes
Norse Mythology in pop culture: Machiavellian manipulator Odin buts heads with chaos entity Loki as they manipulate and murder those around them ina bid to destroy and dominate the nine realms with ASoIaF level political plots and a foreboding prophecy of doom hangs over their heads.
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Actual Norse Mythology:
Freya: *asleep in her bed when the phone rings. She picks up the reciever without saying a word.*
Odin: FREYA! YOU HAVE TO HELP US! LOKI AND I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE EXTREMELY FUNNY TO DISGUISE OURSELVES AS DWARVEN PROSTITUTES AND INFILTRATE THIS GIANT KING'S PALACE BUT NOW LOKI IS PREGNANT I'M ENGAGED TO SEVEN DIFFERENT GIANTS, THERE'S THIS HORSE! CALL THOR SO HE CAN HIT THE PROBLEM REALLY HARD AND-
Freya: *hangs up the receiver, unplugs the phone, and goes back to sleep.*
Reblogged pterosauridae
Are you fucking kidding me rn
Reblogged pterosauridae
Before Il รฉtait une fois... la Vie
The Once upon a timeโฆ franchise, or the ยซย Il รฉtait une foisโฆย ยป franchise, is probably one of the most well-known French animations. The whole franchise, created and directed by Albert Barillรฉ (1920-2009) was aired into around 120 countries, and is still well-known and fairly popular, with DVDs still being released. The idea behind these shows? Being educational shows for kids, about a wide choice of subjects. The shows also re-use the same cast of โheroesโ and โvillainsโ, by putting them in different context, places and time periods.
The seven series making the franchise are: Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโHomme (Once upon a timeโฆ Man/Human); Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโEspace (Once upon a timeโฆ Space); Il รฉtait une foisโฆ La vie (Once upon a timeโฆ Life); Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโAmรฉrique (Once upon a timeโฆ America)ย ; Il รฉtait une foisโฆ Les dรฉcouvreurs (Once upon a timeโฆ The Discoverers)ย ; Il รฉtait une foisโฆ les Explorateurs (Once upon a timeโฆ the Explorers)ย ; Il รฉtait une foisโฆ la Musique (Once upon a timeโฆ the Music) and Il รฉtait une foisโฆ notre Terre (Once upon a timeโฆ Our Earth). There was actually two more series planned, but that never could be made: Il รฉtait une foisโฆ la Mythologie Grecque (Once upon a timeโฆ Greek Mythology) and Il รฉtait une foisโฆ le Progrรจs (Once upon a timeโฆ Progress).
I mainly want to talk about Once upon a timeโฆ Life, but still, letโs see a bit of the other shows.
It all beings in 1978, with the show Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโHomme, created by Albert Barillรฉ through his studio, Procidis. (And, while it seems to be a purely French product, some sources claim that it is a France-Japan-Canada-Italy collaboration, so I donโt know what to make of it). The purpose of the show was to teach kids the history of humanity, with a focus on Europe. The Big Bang, Prehistory, Antiquity, medieval times, Renaissance, Age of Enlightenment, the World Wars, the Roaring Twentiesโฆ Thereโs a total of 26 episodes, which seems to be the constant number of episodes in every show. It ended in 1979.
The particularity of this show is that in each episode we follow the adventures of the same character, that seems to be reborn at different time periods and in different countries (a bit like how La Commedia Dellโarte reuses the archetypal characters again and again). We have Pierre (Peter), the good father if not a bit conservative, Pierrette (female form of Peter) the good mother, Pierrot (diminutive of Pierre) the brave, courageous and adventurous son and Petite Pierrette (Small Pierrette), the daughter whose character completely changes from one episode to another. Pierre has a best friend, Le Gros (literally The Big One or the Fat One, translated as Jumbo in English), who is a gentle giant, fat, ginger-haired and really strong. He has a son, Petit Gros (small Gros), who is Pierrotโs best friend. Then there are the villains: Le Teigneux (literally the Scabby) who embody the brutal and stupid bully, often in a position of authority or command, and Le Nabot (literally The Runt), who embody the deceitful, the shabby and coward that always allies himself with Le Teigneux to make peopleโs life a true Hell.
And, of course, we have the most iconic character of all. Maestro, a mix between Gandalf and Leonard Da Vinci. He is the Wise One, the Good Teacher, the Intelligent Scholar, the Gifted Inventor, and the mentor of Pierre. On another note, all of the characters were designed by the animator Jean Barbaud (who also worked on Inspecteur Gadget and Lieutenant MacFly).
The show was known to be at the same time funny and dark, with a lot of characters dying through the course of History and us seeing the effect on these deaths on other people (parents waiting for their child to come back from a trip to America, the first humans discovering the effects of death, best friends being stabbed in the back during warsโฆ). The last episode also permitted itself to go out of the โclassicalโ History to dig into what the future may hold for the Earth. Reflecting the ecological and ethical questions of the 60s and the 70s, the episode warns about future troubles like pollution, nuclear accidents, or extreme urbanization, and ends up by showing the Earth being destroyed in a world war, the only survivors being the people in space at the time. So yeah, pretty darkโฆ But the last episode also wants to make clear that there is hope and transmits this message that was probably the signature of the 70s: You can change things. It all depends on you. The future of Earth is your choice.
This show had an enormous success, in all of Europe, bought by nearly every European country at the time. It became one of the three most successful kids shows in France along Les Shadoks and Aglaรฉ et Sidonie ; it became the pioneer of the educational show genre and it also was probably one of the first world-renowned French animation. It was adapted on DVDs and Blurays, then in bande-dessinรฉe (comic books) and different sorts of games.
Some people compare this show with Miimu Iro Iro Yume No Tabi, aka Meme: The Dream Journeys, an 1983 educational show by Nippon Animation. Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโHomme was also a huge success in Spain and Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America. Must have a thing to do with the fact that the Spanish dub was made by very famous voice actors.
After this success, Albert Barillรฉ created another show. For this one, he used the idea of the last episode of Il รฉtait une foisโฆ LโHomme, that is to say that Earth was destroyed and all the survivors were left in space. His French studio, Procidis, this time collaborated with the Japanese studio Eiken, and brought to the screens in 1982 Il รฉtait une foisโฆ lโEspace (Once upon a timeโฆ Space). In Japan it was aired as โGinga Patrol PJ/Galaxy Patrol PJโ, where it was not as successful as in Europe.
Again, 26 episodes, with the same archetypal cast, expect for the addition of two other characters that would become recurrent afterward: a young woman named Mercedes, but nicknamed Psi, which is a young intelligent and clever woman, who plays the role of Pierrot love interest ; and Mรฉtro, the robotic equivalent of Maestro, but much more arrogant than him. ย
While Once upon a timeโฆ Man was an educational show explaining History to children, Once upon a timeโฆ Space goes on a completely different path. It is a fictional science-fiction show, telling the story of a war between powerful inter-galactical factions, with recurrent science-fiction themes like the revolt of the machines, the existence of extra-terrestrial beings, the dematerializationโฆ Interestingly, a lot of the events of the show are retelling of the Greek myths or well-known legends (Atlantis, Prometheus, David and Goliath, the Apple of Discord). There are also huge influences from Star Wars and Star Trek.
Despite the fictional aspect, the show isnโt just complete nonsense. It uses all the scientific knowledge of the time concerning space, planets and stars (which may be a bit adapted from time to time for plot purpose). Some planets are stuck in an โold timeโ setting, allowing the show to explore things that Once upon a timeโฆ Man couldnโt touch, like dinosaurs, Incas, and other things. The show also makes sure to not use a lot of violence, to differentiate itself from American shows: no big explosions, no killer rays, or things like that. To give you an idea, the weapon most people use in there are rays that paralyze people. The show is known to have a better animation than Once upon a timeโฆ Man, great music composed Michel Legrand (three Oscars for his cinematographic career), and a feminist message, with the women in there being clever captains, competent presidents, and the equal of men (in the show Pierrot and Psi are always working and treated as equally talented agents and warriors).
The space vehicles and ships were designed by Manchu (Ulysse 31), and, itโs also interesting to see that, despite mainly being a French-Japanese production, other countries helped into the making of the series (Belgium, Canada, Spain, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the Netherlands), resulting in a more diverse cast of characters (Mercedes/Psi alone is a Mediterranean girl). Also, when I mentioned the music was beautiful, it was considered so good that it had its own CD sold alongside the DVDs. It is also the only show that had a movie adapted from it: Once Upon a timeโฆ in Space: The Revenge of the Humanoids, direct by Albert Barillรฉ, of course.
Reblogged
Okalivember day 9: Abyssal!
- The new moon yani is an elusive crustacean, that usually spends its time on the seafloor. But on the rare occasions that all three moons are new, leaving the sky all black, they come up onto shore.
- The many-eyed reksirg is a totally blind, translucent jawless fish that scrapes microorganisms off of deep-sea surfaces. The "eyes" they are named after are actually bioluminescent spots.
- The siglalmi is a detritivore nudibranch that floats around in open water, eating whatever particles pass close enough.
- The deep nerifabi is an active hunter of the abyss, luring prey close to itself with the electric blue, glowing spots on its arms and shell.
Reblogged
Introducing to you - made over the course of a few months - a visual guide to cybertronian pedipalps and proboscis!
The general gist and inspiration for such being of course the episode Thirst and the fact that, up until that point, dark energon did not have any mutagenic properties only (in the show) being utilitised to revive the dead. What if, instead of being a side effect of dark synth energon, dark energon just... reactivated dormant pedipalps (remnants of a more buggy pre-metamorphosis sparkling/protoform lifestage)?
A more comprehensive look is down below- and don't mind how it's exclusively 'Cons lmao :P
