The Soapy Sedimentality Thread



  • Continuing the discussion from The Waterloo Dark Ale Status Thread:

    @ScholRLEA said:

    Status: Just finished reading the latest WA story, which is the first one with Hank DeClan (Lancer) - who has been part of the main cast since day one, but has been pretty much a blank the whole time - as the main POV character.

    Awwwww!

    Since the forums there are borked right now, I am sorely tempted to just make a thread for it here, even though no on else here is likely to have any idea what I'm talking about. I was thinking of calling it "The Soppy Sentimentality Thread" just because, awwww...

    Go. Read it. It won't make sense to you, but read it anyway. Awwww.


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    Alright, now at home.
    clicks link
    Huh. 22k words, I'll shelve this for some late-night reading later...


    Filed under: Gotta get warmed up on some 2k, 5k and 10k chapters first...


  • BINNED

    Can you at least tell us the genre? Also what do you mean by Awwwww!? Is it aweful or awesome or just cute?


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    @dse said:

    do you mean by Awwwww!?

    I think that's the sound you make when getting teeth pulled?


  • BINNED

    It could be shortened ouch too, yes.

    But guessing from the thread name it might be expression of cuteness, and I do not want to waste time reading something I will hate



  • 'Aww' as in 'that's so sweet!'. It's a nice look into the head of a character who is more of a prop than a real member of his team.

    As for genre, its primarily comic-book Superheroic, with a lot of anime influence and Lovecraftian horror as well. Whateley Academy is a high school (mostly) and this world's equivalent of Xavier's School for Gifted Children - but much bigger (around 600 students in the 2006-2007 school year, and growing every year), and without the superhero team (officially, at least). The school has a strict neutrality policy: any mutant, regardless of their powers, where they come from, who their parents are, and what their politics or relationship with the law is, is allowed to attend, and those who can't afford the steep prices usually qualify for significant amounts of financial aid. That part is a bit more like Sky High, in that both heroes and villains can send their kids to the same school, but rather darker in tone.

    The original main stories focused on Team Kimba, a group of students who were in the same cottage (dorm). They were put together because they were all changelings - their mutation caused their sexes to reverse, either completely or (in Ayla's case) stopping somewhere in between. Usually there are very few changelings in a given year, but in 2006 there were six at the beginning of the term (though Jade wasn't actually changing yet, and in fact is 'stuck' at the apparent age of eleven), and more kept showing up over the course of the year. Most of the other students outside of Poe Cottage are unaware that Poe is the LGBT dorm, so there's a lot of speculation and rumors about how such a powerful training team formed so quickly (right at the start of their freshman year).

    All of the members of Team Kimba (yes, the silly name has a story behind it) had their own POV stories except Hank, the only FTM changeling at the start of the series. The writing is extremely variable, with the original writers for Tennyo and Chaka being rather poor while the ones for Phase and Generator (and Shroud, but she's the same person as Generator, really) being quite good, and Fey's was sort of OK. The series is heavy on both melodrama and psychodrama, and many of the stories are told more than once from different character's perspectives, which makes the absence of a canon writer for Hank all the more problematic.

    EDIT: If it helps any, there's a TVtropes entry on Whateley which might give you a better idea, though you can naturally expect a lot of spoilers in it.



  • I want to know what a "WA story" is. A story about Washington State? Waterloo Ale?



  • Whateley Academy. I've mentioned the series a number of times before.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @ScholRLEA said:

    Sky High

    An underrated movie.



  • Anything with Bruce Campbell is good, but... it still isn't very good, sorry.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    It has Bruce Campbell and Kurt Russell. It's pretty good.



  • Kurt Russel's done nothing good since Escape from LA, and Escape from LA wasn't all that great, either.

    Also just now while composing that I got him mixed up with Patrick Swayze and was about to say he hasn't done anything good since Road House, and when you get mixed up with the star of Ghost, you got problems man.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @blakeyrat said:

    you got problems man.

    No you got problems.





  • @boomzilla said:

    No you got problems.

    Maybe, but I ain't never been confused with Patrick Swayze.



  • A few interesting quotes from the Whateley stories:

    Generator: And then, once I was charged into my clothes, I was a lot calmer than me, so-


    Billie said uncomfortably, "So the common denominator for all six of these [ecological disasters] isn’t Darrow, it’s… Fey?"
    Nikki threw her hands into the air and sobbed, "Oh Goddess! I’m the worst supervillain in the last two years!"
    Hank muttered, "Man. What do you say to that?"
    "We're number one?" tried Toni.


    [W]hy does every woman have to rip my penis off?
    — Jobe Wilkins (Yes, this happened more than once; the second time, referred to here, was a prosthetic organ Jobe had created to replace the one detached by Carmilla when she forcefully completed his accidental Gender Bending transformation against his wishes.)


    Yes, I know, I know, it’s MY fault, I hired them… bargain basement villains, hired at the last minute… SO, this is why some supervillains are always screaming about being surrounded by incompetents.
    — Jadis Diabolik (while She-Beast is mostly grey-hat herself, her father is a supervillain, and at the time she was stuck getting any help she could find so she hired a bunch of minor-league supervillains out of a Bad Guy Bar)


    Gunnery Sergeant Bardue: Okay Elite League, welcome to a little simulation that I like to call DARK TENNYO!
    Team: Oh fuck.
    (Tennyo, aka Billie Wilson, is bonded with the Star Stalker, a being that is sort of a cross between Galactus and the Phoenix Force - a living weapon of mass destruction created billions of years ago to fight the Great Old Ones. The school has a standing order that anyone who starts a fight with her outside of martial arts classes and survives is automatically expelled because of the risk that her powers might go out of control.)

    "These [electricity-proof full-body condom] suits are also available in the appropriate size for household pets and equine companions, though like many things in the porn industry it’s best not to think why."
    — quote from "Sara's Little Purple Book", an in-world sex manual for mutants

    "[Loophole], I’m not here to fill your ear with a load of crap about rules, or making wise choices or wasting your potential or any of that crap. You got on the pill; that tells me you’re trying to be responsible. Now, let me clue you in on something about bad boys. Most bad boys aren’t a project, honey; they’re not fixer-uppers. They won’t fall for the right girl and mystically be cured of their faults while keeping that cool edginess. And, sadly, most of them need a cop with a gun and the threat of a jail sentence hanging over their heads to wake up and figure out which way the world spins. I know because I was one and that’s what it took. More to the point, Trish [the House Mother at Loophole's cottage] and I would rather chew ground glass than see you hurt."
    — Mr Donner, regarding Lanie's relationship with Kodiak


    "Superman never takes karate, ya know, he just punches people. Or... hits 'em with trucks! Hey, can you hit guys with trucks in karate class? 'Cause that would be my special move. The guy goes hi-ya! And I go 'TRUCK!' And the match is over."
    — The Crimson Comet!!!, trying to talk her way out of taking martial arts for P.E.

    I didn’t mention that I was putting together a small emergency packet I was going to keep at the bottom of one utility belt pocket, just in case Ayla Goodkind couldn’t put in an appearance. A couple fake IDs and matching credit cards. A couple saleable diamonds, a couple valuable but not ultra-rare stamps, and a couple limited edition proof Krugerrands, just in case I needed the ready cash. It would be better to have the packet on hand and never need it, than to need something like that and not have it.
    — Phase

    [Belphoebe] was watching all of this, eyes glittering with Techno-Lust. If she could have had sex with a weapons system, she’d be on her back with her panties around one ankle, waving in the breeze.
    — Jadis Diabolik


    Jade: (to Billie) Okay, okay, sometimes you're no fun at all.
    Ayla: (walks in) And speaking of no fun at all, I'm here too.
    Billie: But I'm more fun than Ayla, right?
    Jade: Oh yeah, everyone's more fun than Ayla.
    Ayla: In fact, I'm changing my name to... No Fun Guy!
    Billie: Hey Jade, that could be like your arch-enemy.
    Ayla: That's right... Giggle Girl! Once I unleash my latest invention, the Federal Tax Code Emulsifier, no one will be having fun ever again!
    Jade: Giggle Girl doesn't know the meaning of the word defeat!
    Ayla: And she doesn't know the meaning of the word 'rationality' either!
    Billie: Or the meaning of the word 'crayon'!
    Jade: Giggle Girl does so know the meaning of the word crayon! It's the cute little pink thing I use to write 'No Fun Guy is a big poopyhead' all over your secret lair.
    Ayla: D'oh! I knew I shouldn't have shot all those henchmen even after they said they didn't do it...
    Jade: Hah! Giggle Girl always defeats the forces of boredom and no-fun-ness!
    Ayla: But can she defeat...your next final exam?
    Jade: Noooo! Not that!
    Billie: (announcer voice) Has No Fun Guy defeated our heroine? Can she find a way out of this hideous trap? Tune in next week for the further adventures of GIGGLE GIRL!


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    @ScholRLEA said:

    [W]hy does every woman

    Sounds like a personal problem to me.

    @ScholRLEA said:

    rip my penis off?
    Fool me once, shame on me...
    Actually, if this is a common thing, why not get two? That way all the women can do it once, think the job is done, but there's still a backup ready for use!


    Filed under: Hmm, not sure if a terrible idea or...



  • @Tsaukpaetra said:

    Actually, if this is a common thing, why not get two? That way all the women can do it once, think the job is done, but there's still a backup ready for use!

    Well, that works for Jobe's father, so yeah.

    Seriously. Shortly after Jobe was born, Gizmatic (Joe Wilkins, AKA Emperor Joseph I of Karedonia) lost his willy in a fight against a superhero, and built a bunch of wireless, smart prosthetic dildos to replace it. Jobe did not like hearing from his mother about how she was able to use up to three of them at a time, though apparently she was able to stop Emperor Joe from starting a nuclear war once by activating it remotely to distract him.


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    @ScholRLEA said:

    up to three of them at a time

    Clearly she's not very imaginative!

    @ScholRLEA said:

    activating it remotely to distract him
    But probably intelligent at least. 😄



  • @Tsaukpaetra said:

    But probably intelligent at least. 😄

    Hard to say, she always acts like a ditz in the stories, but there's evidence that this is due to the 'conditioning' Joe uses on her. Reportedly, she was pretty smart - and seriously pissed off - on those occasions when the brainwashing wore off temporarily.

    And people wonder where Jobe gets his fucked up ethical perspective...



  • So every memorable quote from this story is utterly gibberish. Good to know.



  • Meh, a lot of them are hard to make sense of out of context, I guess, especially if you don't know the peculiar terminology of the series.

    Some of the terms used in the series are:

    Brick: a general term for anyone whose superpower makes them tougher than a normal human, usually at least enough that they can shrug off a low-caliber bullet.

    Exemplar: a power set that changes the mutant's body to fit their Body Image Template, a sort of subconscious idealized version of themselves. Usually makes you stronger, smarter, and prettier, but sometimes things get a bit weird.

    Avatar: a power (or group of related powers) that involve bonding with spirits (totems, animal spirits, kami, dryads, minor demons, even ghosts) and gaining control of their powers. If the spirit is stronger than the avatar, it may cause the host's body and behavior to change to suit it better. A 'Paladin' is an avatar that serves a more powerful spirit (mostly gods such as Bast or Quetzalcoatl) as it Earthly representative.

    Bad Seeds: a clique at Whateley of students whose parents are supervillains.

    Gross Structural Dystrophy: While it has a more specific definition, GSD is usually a catch-all term for any mutation that makes your body something other than human-looking. Can be anything from pointed ears to looking like a furry to having a body comprised of liquid. The worst case to survive to date is Fubar, who turned into a giant water breathing squid-thing following an encounter with some Lovecraftian nastiness; he's now the leading Psychic Arts professor and one of the school's psychotherapists.

    Anyway, more than you probably wanted to know already.


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    @ScholRLEA said:

    leading Psychic Arts professor

    I bet! Do you know how hard it is to manipulate water particularly?



  • I don't... care.



  • Well, then you can either mute the thread, or just keep sniping about it for no reason.

    If anyone is interested (and I'm not exactly expecting many will be), I can recommend a few of the more stand-alone stories and vignettes.

    The Pushover
    The Bad Seeds
    Never Look a Gift Squirrel in the Mouth
    What's Up, Dork?
    Afternoon Tea with the Devil's Daughter
    Combat Boot
    A View to a Smell
    Gearhead
    Summoning Courage
    Panty Raid
    For Whom the Belle Tolls
    The Big Idea
    A Single Fold
    Three Litttle Witches
    The Case of the Unseen Switch
    Ayla and the Networks

    That should be enough to keep everyone busy for days, and it's only a tiny fraction of the whole series. Really, no joke - the Ayla storylines alone are longer than the entire Harry Potter series.



  • @ScholRLEA said:

    the Ayla storylines alone

    I read those.

    What a goddamned Mary Sue. "Oh I'm a homo sapiens, I'm so much better than you neanderthals!"



  • Huh, really? I think if any of the Team Kimba girls were to get smeared as a Mary Sue (as opposed to simply saying all of them are and leaving it at that), it would be Chaka. Even Tennyo is less obviously Sue-ish than Toni is, and she's the equivalent of having a nuclear-armed B-52 at the battle of Thermopylae.



  • What the fuck are you talking about?



  • :facepalm: I should have seen that coming... Can I have a whoosh for myself?

    Filed Under: srsly, how did I miss that?



  • @blakeyrat said:

    What a goddamned Mary Sue. "Oh I'm a homo sapiens, I'm so much better than you neanderthals!"

    To be fair, it is pretty impressive to be the one person who invented pretty much every single pre-historical technology. I haven't read the books since high school (there weren't as many of them back then, either), but even after the first three the list was getting pretty ridiculously long.



  • IIRC she could also telepathically talk to animals. But yes, fucking ridiculous.

    The things you read when you're a kid, the Internet doesn't exist, and the only books in the house are your mom's dumb books about some cavewoman.



  • I was thinking

    but yep, guess that works too...



  • Not those Aylas, this Ayla:

    The Intersexed Teen Billionaire Superhero Formerly Known as Trevor Goodchildkind.





  • Yet another one, because I am bored:

    Envy and the Gilded Cage, Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3



  • I don't understand what you're accomplishing in this thread. You're not writing these stories, you're just linking basically to their index page bit by bit? Why does it matter if you're bored or not?



  • At this point, I'm not even sure any more.



  • @ScholRLEA said:

    At this point, I'm not even sure any more.

    If it's any consolation, we're as confused as you are.


  • Notification Spam Recipient

    Quick! We need a Thread Derailment Kit, STAT!

    Um... How about....

    Soapy Sedimentary Salts Suck Solicitously.
    Ready? Disqus!


    Filed under: Thread-helling Initiated!



  • @Tsaukpaetra said:

    Soapy Sedimentary Salts Suck Solicitously.Ready? Disqus!

    I'm gonna need a threaded interpreter to make sense of this...



  • Ah, I'm bored again, so here's another quote for you. The setup: Mad Biology student and all-around prick Jobe Wilkins just caught Mad Engineering student and kleptomaniac Belphegor using the Drow serum he stole from Jobe to create a clone using the cloning chamber he also stole from Jobe. Belfinko's plan was to put Phobos' mind into the new body, in hopes that she would sleep with him out of gratitude. Unfortunately, the mind transfer was glitchy, and the clone, now named Belphoebe, ended up with a copy of Belphegor's mind instead. They have now been called upon to face the most intimidating person any of them know: the headmistress of Whateley Academy.

    Elizabeth Amelia Carson stands six feet tall in her stocking feet. With heels, she’s even taller. She appeared to be in her thirties, but even the dimmest idiot on campus knew enough of her background to know that she’d fought Nazis back in World War II. Sixty years of combat experience has a way of maturing a person, I suppose. She’d gone through at least three husbands, and a half-dozen superhero identities. She’d held the Champion Force for a while, and then given it away. Rumor said that she’d gone toe-to-toe with Deathlist, last Halloween. She’d faced him and beaten him, the rumors said.

    And now, she was facing us.

    I noticed that my mouth had gone oddly dry.

    Filed Under: Still not sure why I'm doing this fan advocacy thing...



  • That's gibberish.



  • Typical horrid fanfic writing style. Do these people even read what they write?


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Magus said:

    Do these people even read what they write?

    If they did, they would be getting paid for their scribblings instead of writing dreadful fanfic.



  • I rather doubt that.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    You know the difference between a professional and an amateur? The professional gets paid for what they do.



  • Contrast that with, say, the writer of Metro: 2033 who similarly posted his work on a blog. The difference is: Metro: 2033 was good, good enough to get published as a novel and get TWO AAA video games based on the novel.

    If this site about dumb gender-bending superheroes were any good, it'd have at least one AAA video game about it by now.


    I don't even get why that "headmistress" is so scary. Because she's tall and really really old? Great; a superhero grandma. Real threatening. "What if Aunt May were slightly taller? Wouldn't that be scary!" "Uh. No." "How about if she beat something called 'deathlist' which is presumably a threat in some way?" "Still no guys."



  • @blakeyrat said:

    I don't even get why that "headmistress" is so scary.

    The best I can figure is that the author is terrified of anything military-related.



  • Like that really shitty Season 8 of Doctor Who!

    Where they introduce a new love interest who is a ex-soldier purely so the show can call him a horrible monster about 36 times in each episode.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @blakeyrat said:

    Like that really shitty Season 8 of Doctor Who!

    Where they introduce a new love interest who is a ex-soldier purely so the show can call him a horrible monster about 36 times in each episode.

    But at the end of the season, the Doctor learns that not all propaganda by dirty hippies (that is, that all soldiers are mouthbreathing morons who can't wait to kill helpless civilians) isn't true! This season, not much military-bashing. Instead, we get "the corporate guy's a greedy scumbag instead".


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