Weekend Edition!

Okay so, I think I might have to move this blog to being bi-weekly instead of every day... Just a thought. Today's post is basically because wanted to let everyone know what I've been up to all week. The answer is: PONIES.

I've been drawning and coloring ponies. And being on Gaia. And drawing Gaia-based ponies. And drawing some original character ponies. Oh, and watching Stargate SG-1 while playing Pokemon Pearl... If you follow the links below, you'll get to the pony pics I've worked on this week. The links will take you off-site to my Deviantart page... but the individual pics, if that makes sense.

Corkboard

Himeko Pony Sketch

Himeko Pony Finished

Himeko Pony 2 Finished

Hogosha Pony Finished

Love ya, Jessie.

Because You Knew It Had To Happen...

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has invaded the blog... as if the bouncing Pinkie Pie at the beginning of the year wasn't a dead giveaway...

I started watching My Little Pony sometime in... November... I think... of 2011. I was watching it with my littlest sister, just, in order to have someone to talk to about it. We fell in love with it. The animation is wonderful, the characters actually have depth after the first couple of episodes, and, yeah, they're fucking cute. Of course, being a girl, Friendship Is Magic was hardly my first Pony experience. My little sisters and I used to watch it when the Disney Channel was airing it... back when the ponies looked closer to actual horses... only smaller, cuter, and fatter. I used to love watching My Little Pony Tales. My favorites at the time were Melody and Baby Buttons. However, going back and watching them now... the voices are kinda... wrong. Everyone sounds like they're trying too hard to be cute or they have a stuffed-up nose...

Explanation

     For the uninitiated, the My Little Pony cartoons started out as a vehicle for selling the My Little Pony toys. There have been several generations of My Little Ponies over the years. You can see a good example HERE (links to a DeviantArt meme pic). The current crop of My Little Pony shtuff started as a cartoon pitched by Lauren Faust. The concept is simple: each episode is dedicated to teaching a lesson to the young viewers... and sell the toys. The lessons aren't heavy-handed and are often only mentioned when the characters write to Princess Celestia at the end of the episode. If you're going to watch My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, I suggest watching at least four episodes, the characters flesh out more as you go in.

Characters

The main characters, seen above, are (From left to right, top to bottom): Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Twilight Sparkle, Princess Celestia, Rarity, Spike, Fluttershy, and Apple Jack. Each has their own distinct personality and talent. As each pony has their own special talent, each has their own cutie mark -- the little design on their flanks. Ponies start out without Cutie Marks and earn them when they figure out what their special talent is. Oh! And let's not forget the ever-important types of ponies...

Pony Types:

Pegasus  In charge of the weather

Unicorn  Can work magic

Earth  Have a special connection to the earth

Princess  Design only used for Princesses Celestia and Luna. Cross between Unicorn and Pegasus

My Pony Preferences

My favorite ponies are Rarity  and Princess Luna  My favorite pony type is Unicorn (I collect them... unicorns). My favorite episode so far is Stare Master. I am most like Twilight Sparkle And last, but certainly not least, this next picture is my "Pony-sona."

Love ya, Jessie.

The Doctor, The Widow, and The Wardrobe Review

First of all, just let me say that it is really, really hard to get back into the habit of writing in this blog everyday. By the time I remember I'm supposed to do it, it's 11-something and the post won't get posted until after 12AM so... I decide not to. Again, sorry.

But hey, I have a little review for you today. This years... last years... whatever... Doctor Who Christmas special: The Doctor, The Widow, and The Wardrobe! I'm not really excited about it. In fact, I was disappointed. This Christmas Special made next to no sense... and the end... I saw that coming miles away. The mother character, she must be insane or something. The father, he was dead for most of the episode... and then wasn't. And then he just shook off her insanity as par-for-the-course. What? The daughter/sister could have been interesting if she'd been given more to do and wasn't so snotty. The son/brother... there's just something wrong there. He bothered me.

The tree people. Well... they lived on Androzani-something-or-other. The mention was nice, but otherwise... they went from being trees to a star-field of some sort. Yeah... that made sense. NOT. But hey, they got saved in the end, so that was sort of okay.

And that's all I've got for that episode of Doctor Who. It didn't make sense. I was disappointed. A Christmas Carol was much, much better.

Love ya, Jessie.

500 Miles, Hellfire 2: Parts 1-5 Reviewed

Happy New Year! Welcome to the Year of the Apocalypse! (Not that I actually believe in that, mind)

Sorry... couldn't resist the Pinkie Pie...

But anyway, welcome to 2012, and hopefully a full year of blogs from me. To start us off this year, I have another 500 Miles review! It's the first 5 chapter of Hellfire 2. And yes, I am trying to cut down on the summary... which tends to get super-detailed. So... here we go!

500 Miles - Hellfire 2, Parts 1-5  by Princess Alexandria

     We pick up with Raven's story immediately after Demise has left Raven's body. It's slightly disconcerting that Raven doesn't trust Mystique at this point, because Demise clearly did. However, it does make all sorts of sense considering what Raven has been through. Raven starts her "witness protection" thing as a bartender in New Orleans, Louisiana. Doesn't last too long, only the first chapter. And it was probably a good thing Raven ran into Logan on her way out of town instead of one of the other X-Men who came with him. He understands her need to be away from the X-Men without much explanation on her part and lets her go on her way.

     I really love Mystique's more careful interaction with Raven this next time around as Raven's switching identities. This chunk of chapters reveals that this Marvel Universe is crossed-over with the CSI universe... which I didn't notice the first time through.

     We meet Lois, who runs the Kitten Ranch borthel Raven now works in; and Drahke and Jewel, two of the prostitutes that Raven interact with on a regular basis. Personally, I love Drahke. She kind of reminds me of Mystique... confortable and teasing Mystique... and we find out that Drahke is a Mutant who can breathe fire. There's also some interaction with a teenaged boy named Terrance, who lives near Raven. His father's an asshole and mistreats his son... mostly because Terrance is gay.

     It's revealed that Drahke works for Lady Heather (of CSI fame) at her BDSM club. Raven gets some lessons in what the Dom-Sub relationship should be like over the course of her painting both Drahke and Lady Heather.

     Timeline-wise, we're around the time Mystique is working for X-Factor, which we find out on a hint from Irene. Also, Men in Black apparently just opened in theaters. This puts us around 1997, if we're following our world's timeline. Did you notice I have an obsession with timelines?

     The chunk of chapters ends with Raven leaving town, taking a newly Mutated Terrance with her. there's some time that's gone by between their original move to California and the end of the chapter... Raven had a little bout with alcohol and drugs... and a suicide attempt around a Christmas somewhere in there. Irene has passed away by the end of this chapter, which made me cry. And Raven has followed Mystique, with help from Irene, onto a cruise ship in order to comfort the grieving shifter.

Character Spolight: Lady Heather!

     Didn't think I'd be doing another of these, did ya? Well, Lady Heather is possibly my favorite recurring character from CSI so... yeah...

     Lady Heather is a professional dominatrix who runs an S&M club. She originally appears in Season 2 of CSI (the Las Vegas one) when a murder occured at the club. She and Grissom are attracted to each other and she and Catherine have a talk about their daughters. Heather later appears in Seasons 3, 6, 7, 9, and 11. Her character evolves over these time periods, moving in response to her daughter, Zoe, and later, her granddaughter, Allison.

     Somewhere along the line, Heather gives up her club and ends up as a sex therapist. And... that's all they wrote. Delving too much into her character would spoil things, so I'm not going there. Suffice to say, in 500 Miles, Heather helps Raven in several ways, least of which coming to terms with what happened to her in the Hellfire Club and getting herself back.

Housekeeping

As usual, the links to various important sources are in the section headers. Links to previous chapter reviews are on the "Reviewed" page accessed through the header. For those reading this on the Blogger site, this header is on the main website... or you can attempt to use the link bubble-rotating-thingy in the sidebar. I highly roccomend that you read 500 Miles and everything else I've reviewed or am reviewing. Alexandria has some new chapters to Adrift in a Room of Mirrors up and new Twilight fanfiction called Tossing Stones up.

Over the break, I've been busy watching lots of Stargate, Dollhouse, and cross-stitching ornaments... which didn't get done... I've also done some art that will have shown up on my DeviantArt page. I hope to return to regular posts now that the holidays are over.

Love ya, Jessie.

500 Miles, Hellfire 1: Chapters 6-8 Review

Just got back from Target, with my sister. Got more stuff for my Mom... again. Everytime I go to Target, I find more stuff for my mom. And it's cheap. But there's a lot of it. There seems to be a bit of a problem here...

500 Miles, Hellfire 1: Chapters 6-8 by Princess Alexandria

     When we last left our perilous heroine, Demise was being rescued from the Hellfire Club by the X-Men. At this point, it's safe to say that Demise is completely disillusioned with Charles Xavier. Not only did he know full well Raven/Desmise was at the Hellfire Club, but he waited at least a week to send anyone to rescue her. I'd be disillusioned, too. In fact, I was. And this was before I'd read the Deadly Genesis trade, where the X-Men find out that Xavier's been messing with their heads for years.

     At some point during the last chapter chunk, Demise and Raven have figured out how to switch who's in control of Raven's body... which I'd forgotten. Demise discovers Raven's artistic talent and is a bit jealous.

     We get a little taste of Xavier erasing memories after Demise tells Kitty what happened to her and Raven. This is later revealed to have happened a lot. Apparently, Xavier's been erasing random bits from people's memories whenever he thinks Raven's told them too much. Demis confronts Xavier about what he did to Tessa and Raven, and also a bit about the memory wiping. This unsettled Xavier, but he doesn't stop being a manipulative bastard. He reminds me of religious nuts using God to back up their actions. Except, Xavier's only got his "grand plan" to back up his actions. This really, really pissed me off. It still pisses me off. I hate people who pervert their religion or ideals to get what they want.

     Demise strikes up a little conversation with Rogue, which is helped along a little by Destiny/Irene Adler's precognative powers. After shoving a box of pictures, sent by Sebastian Shaw, into Xavier's lap, Demise and Rogue slip off to Christmas dinner at Mystique and Irene's. Raven finally decides she's had enough of Xavier's nonsense and quits the X-Men... after giving Xavier a good yelling at. We get Raven's side of her and Tessa's past as she and Demise pick up various things from the hidey-hole Xavier had housed them in.

     Raven and Demise try a hit on Shaw, with help from Mystique and Irene. However, this fails miserably because Raven had forgotten that Tessa would be there. This then leads to some conspiring with Mystique and Irene over Raven leaving the X-Mension altogether. They succeed and go to live with Mystique and Irene for a while. This section started me off on my love-affair with Destiny. Alexandria paints her as such a strong, amusing, gentle woman. I really do love this portrayal and wish she hadn't died in the comics.

     There's an interesting discussion about Emma Frost and the paths Destiny sees for her. Demise wants Emma to have the best future possible, but that can't happen without the devastating death of the Hellions. It's really a no-win situation as far as both paths Destiny sees have to get worse before either can get better.

     Raven attempts to get Tessa to come with her into the special "witness protection" thingy Irene and Mystique are setting up for her. Tessa refuses, leaving Raven devastated. And then Demise leaves the very next day.

     These chapters are really an emotional roller coaster for both Raven and Demise. Demise gets more attached to Raven than to any of her other doubles. Raven leans more on Demise than is really advisable, especially as she knows Demise has to leave. Tessa's refusal to leave with Raven hits a nerve with Demise, especially since she seems to dedicated to bringing down Shaw Xavier's way. It's really heartbreaking to see that Xavier would purposefully leave someone with no one. And it is all Xavier's fault. Every bit. But I'm not going to rant about that...

Housekeeping

This was supposed to go up yesterday, but my working on my little sister's Christmas present distracted me. Until I get that done, I may be sporradic with my posts... and what I post about. As always, the link to the fanfiction and the author's page are in the mini-header.

Love ya, Jessie.

Things I've Discovered

I've decided to do this post earlier than usual today... mainly because I have a cold and my head feels like it's a bowling ball sitting on my shaky neck. Today I've got a picture of that cross-stiching project I've been working on. These two are finished, at least, the stitching part is done. They're not COMPLETELY finished.



I've also decided that I'm tired of hearing about the Presidential nominees for the Republican Party. They're all nut-jobs with annoying stances on things. I think they all secretly want to be Amish. However, they lack the actual balls to go be Amish and so fail completely.

Other uninteresting things I've discovered:

• Lifting heavy things with a head-cold is a bad plan
• Having someone try to a cajole you into eating when you're not hungry is annoying
• Reading fanfiction can, in fact, make you feel less crappy
• Paranoid and extremely worried about everything Remus Lupin is annoying
• Thin fleece hoodies are still super-warm
• Watching My Little Pony until 4 AM is a bad plan

Love ya, Jessie.

Quick Catch-Up

Okay so... I've been cross-stitching a lot. And yesterday I got it into my head to do some My Little Pony Avatar Art. I've got it all sketched out and I'm currently coloring it on my computer. This is taking up a lot more time than doing just one picture. Did I mention I was doing more than one? Yeah... most of my more regular Gaiaonline Avatars are getting Pony-fied.

While I've been cross-stitching, I've been watching Stargate SG-1. I've just started the sixth season and gotten to the episode with Jonas' Professor person. I've really been enjoying this season. I quite like Jonas, he's more fun than Daniel... and without the baggage. He's snarky enough to go up against Jack so... yeah... those bits are funny.

I'm off to go work on that Pony Art now.

Love ya, Jessie.