Don't get me wrong, I love the dreamy fairytale-ness of the Ghibli movie version of Howl's Moving Castle, but the book. The book. Sophie, first off, being so incredibly set on being the boring un-gifted un-adventuresome eldest daughter (as is right and fitting for an eldest daughter to be) that she doesn't notice she's working magic, like, constantly? And when a witch shows up like "hey girlie you are fully working SO much magic that I'm feeling threatened, so like I'm gonna put you in the old lady dimension ciao," she's like well. That was weird. Anyway I guess I better go find something to do as an old lady. And she reasons that this famously evil sorcerer who eats young girls' hearts is probably safe for her now cause like. She's old. What's he gonna do to me. And proceeds to bully her way into becoming his cleaning lady. And Howl, known flaky whimsical fuckboy extraordinaire, is like sure okay I guess that works for me. And just as well because it turns out he's also a fucking bottom who kinda digs this strong stubborn lady who's steamrolled her way into his life, kinda weird that she's disguised as an old woman but w/e he's not gonna question her life choices and like it's not actually a problem for him, and by the time Sophie's figured out that oh crap oh shit she's actually kinda into this flighty asshole, what am I gonna do, he'd never return my feelings in a hundred years, Howl's basically accepted that they're mostly married. And also how can you top "my extremely powerful and slightly fey wizard is just a Welsh grad student who wandered into a portal one day" for a character concept. You can't. It's the perfect book really
being a pepper plant has to be so weird.
Imagine evolving capsaicin specifically to stop mammals from eating your fruits, and then a mammal comes along that not only will eat your fruits, but likes them specifically because of the capsaicin, so much that it starts using its weird paws to distribute and care for your seeds, which turns into a strong selective force that literally starts evolving you into producing MORE capsaicin and makes you a WAY more successful and wider ranged species than you ever were before
simply because this mammal LOVES Pain Chemical. that evolved specifically to produce pain in mammals. It's not that the capsaicin isn't WORKING. It's just that these freaks like it.
This is the same mammal with social instincts so goddamn strong that they literally try to form social bonds with their predators, and end up evolving the predators into a new species that fits into their social communities as a form of mutualistic symbiosis, and exists in several different forms with unique morphology and behaviors based on the function they perform.
Instead of, I don't know, EVOLVING TO BE FASTER, this animal finds a faster animal and sits on it. Which shouldn't even work because the faster animal is a prey animal and this animal is a predator, but SOMEHOW they FORM A SOCIAL BOND WITH THE PREY. So they can sit on it while it runs fast. And somehow the prey animal?? is cool with this?? and benefits from this relationship???
Literally how can you hate humans. Humans are possibly the most hilarious thing evolution has ever done.
other things humans have done
- eat poison plants, decide they like getting poisoned, and evolve the plants to poison them more
- evolve to not have hair, but they find mammals with thick fluffy hair and put the hair on themselves, and evolve the mammals to produce extra hair so they can both have a warm coat of hair
- split up their parasitic lice species into two separate species because they start taking other animals' hair and putting it on themselves so much
- learn how to set things on fire on purpose. maintain body temperature by just standing beside some wood that's on fire instead of literally any normal option
- figure out that their prey tastes better and is easier to digest when they hold it over a fire after killing it. get smarter because they digest food so good after it's been held over a fire.
- find a poisonous plant and try washing it in boiling water until they don't die when they eat it anymore
- go across the ocean by making a floating nest despite not being able to breathe underwater, drink ocean water, or even swim naturally
- drink milk from other mammals even though they can't digest it and it makes them sick. Evolve those mammals to produce more milk than their babies can drink so they can drink the milk. Some members of the species evolve to be able to digest milk because they were so hellbent on drinking it.
- find flowers, bugs and minerals that are nice colors and crush them up to try to turn other things that color
- eat mushrooms that make their nervous systems malfunction because they like malfunctioning their nervous systems
humans worldwide looking up into the celestial vault of stars a million light years away, separated from Earth by the deadly cold and emptiness of space: I bet there are guys up there to form social bonds with
You telling me that Jack Black would not be 1000% down to be kidnapped by the muppets for a shenanigan, or possible a hijink?
Mr. The Frog still sends me more than “we all agreed a celebrity is not a people”
I kind of feel like Jack Black would somehow end up running his own kidnapping because the muppets can’t get it together.
isekai about a nyc apartment block getting teleported into a fantasy realm, and how this group of people who previously have only had incidental contact with one another come together to build a vibrant community in their new circumstances. there's a season-long arc about introducing bagels and pizza to the fantasy world that gets into the details of sourcing ingredients, developing new technologies, and learning how to work with supernatural substitutions.
Clarifying question: just the people or the buildings and animal life too?
And does it include random people on the street at the time of the transfer?
oh the whole thing for sure, im picturing the whole city block with a crust of sidewalk just dropped onto the outskirts of a small medieval village. im thinking theres probably a corner store and a couple other things included too, so youve got the people who work there or were shopping at the time of the transfer too.
i hadnt thought of animals but having a whole thing w pigeons would be awesome too; have new york feral pigeons meeting with tamed messenger pigeons of the era, a raccoon that was sleeping in a trash can eats a magical necklace and starts talking. love it.
ALTfucking love this. an army of monster rats descend upon the kingdom, led by a single subway rat under the banner of a half-eaten pizza crust
But they do not anticipate the rise of the Hero, their one, true, and most worthy foe—
THE BODEGA CAT
Bagels are fairly simple to make in a typical medieval fantasy world, but I do assume that finding tomatoes for the pizza would be A Quest.
becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys
