stray

Transmogrify! 14 Fantastical Tales of Trans Magic is a collection of short stories focused on including trans characters in magical worlds. Some stories have very inclusive settings, while others involve characters rebelling against rigid systems and/or abusers. While the cover reads very femme, there are plenty of male characters, and quite a few of the authors have made a point to focus their stories on nonbinary validity.

Some highlights:

Verity was interesting due to its inclusion of fluid pronouns, which I'd not seen before.

The POV character of Dragons Name Themselves is a magical school, the building itself.

In Genderella, Ella's wicked step-mother won't let her go to prom in a dress. I'd really love to see a film like this.

Espejismos is similar to some Latine horror films I've enjoyed, and that made it my favorite. It has a mysterious apocalyptic setting, dream-like events, and a bittersweet tone.

Self-Made Boys is a reimagining of the Great Gatsby by queer and mixed-raced author Anna-Marie McLemore. It has mystery, love geometry, good humor, and great pacing.

It touched on some pretty heavy topics, but always managed to make me feel really good about myself rather than depressed or triggered. The author made me feel connected to a wider community through the characters' connections with each other, and the supportive ways injustices and traumas were addressed.

Five stars.

This is going to contain spoilers through season 1 episode 10.

My tastes in media have become somewhat more demanding as I've gotten older. I used to enjoy pretty much anything with a fun adventure, but now I need my entertainment to also be educational or growth-provoking in some way.

I mostly enjoyed episodes 1-7 because even though it was a cute slice of life, it was coming at it from a more unique angle of how we form and value relationships and I felt that it was emotionally meaningful.

But then by episodes 9 and 10 suddenly all these villains have really specific quirks, and the combat is drawn-out as characters over-exposit every detail of what's going on. They even tell you what's going to happen with the fight well before it ever occurs, and then they still drag out the result for some reason. It was very disappointing and I'm concerned this is just going to be the state of things from now on.

I got kind of excited about the way Frieren was talking about demons because her beef with them sounds a lot like what a pig or chicken would think of humans, and I got almost a racist vibe, but my partner's reaction made it seem like we're not going to get introspective about our biases and hipocrisy, and he suggested we move on to something else. (He's read the comic and wanted to watch the show together.)

Thoughts? I'd like to think the story is going somewhere, but it won't be good for our relationship if it just ends up with me complaining the whole time.

One time on IRC the topic of what Boxing Day even is came up, and this guy said in seriousness that it's to memorialize the Boxer Rebellion, and we had a big fight about it. He backed up his claim by pointing out that the horse from Animal Farm was an allegory for said uprising, so he wasn't just making things up.