Tag: writing

Motocross Legend, Love of My Life, Pt. 19 (Poetry)

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial2 Comments

You can read this novella from the beginning through this link.

The eve of your death anniversary
Resurrected the old nightmare once more:
I was riding pillion, clinging to your waist,
While your Aprilia Red Rose growled
As it devoured the highway under its tires.
The rainfall hammering upon car roofs,
Drumming on our helmets,
Splashing against our drenched clothes,
Overwhelmed the steady roar of the engines.
The wind drove icy raindrops into my face.

The beam of your bike’s headlamp
Sliced through the rain sheets,
Lighting the rear wheels of the truck in front,
That spat up trails of rainwater.
In the oncoming lane, twin beams appeared
And quickly expanded toward us,
Cutting luminous swaths across the blackness.
On my right, traffic signs, trees, buildings,
They all blurred into smudges,
And the sparse streetlamps revealed themselves
Like floating, shimmering haloes.

Lights glinted off the gleaming, mirrorlike tarmac
In ripples of red and blue-tinged white.
Above, lightning leaped from cloud to cloud,
Followed by grumbling thunderclaps.

In my embrace, your body trembled;
You were crying, or at least on the verge,
And you channeled that anguish
Igniting your steel beast’s roar
With a wrench of the throttle.
My heart thrummed with dread.
The acceleration pressed against my bones,
Tightening my chest and freezing my breath.
Along with the golden tracers of streetlamps,
Oncoming vehicles whooshed past us.

Lighting the way ahead, we were falling headlong,
Whipping through the darkness like an arrow.
Teary-eyed from the sting of rain,
I raised my voice over the rushing wind,
Over the rumbling engines.
I shouted, I yelled, I gripped your sides tighter,
Imploring you to slow down.
As if you couldn’t hear me, as if I wasn’t there,
You revved the throttle further,
Making the speedometer needle climb sharply.
Your bike’s chassis shuddered under the strain.
The raindrops felt like dozens of fingers
Poking my numb face to wake me up,
But you kept racing through the storm,
Maybe wishing to outrun yourself,
Outrun all the voices telling you to stop.

As we approached a curve, your Aprilia wobbled,
Its front wheel skidded on the rain-slick tarmac,
And the bike lurched sideways,
Flinging us off.

The color spectrum gleaming through the downpour
From headlights, tail lights, streetlamps, and lightning
Spun into a blur of light and dark
While my body flailed, limbs striking out,
Scraping against the road as I slid
With rainwater gushing over me.
The friction ripped through my clothing,
Seared my skin, and tore the flesh off my bones.
Screams lodged in my throat.

Your Aprilia Red Rose was flipping end-over-end,
Scattering pieces of its decimated bodywork.
My frantic gaze glimpsed flashes,
Illuminated by the headlights of passing cars,
Of your body cartwheeling uncontrollably.

A murky shape, the guardrail,
Rushed out of the rain-haze toward us
Like a reef thrusting from a savage ocean.
You smashed against the metal barrier,
Which launched you into the darkness.
I clenched my eyes shut, bracing for impact,
And awaited the final, wet crunch.
When I slammed into that guardrail,
A loud snap reverberated through my spine
In a starburst of pain.

The impact had squeezed my lungs,
Knocking the air out.
As I gasped, mouth agape,
A thunderous crash against the guardrail
Sent a shockwave through the cold steel,
Making me, slumped against it, shudder violently.
Fragments of the bike ricocheted off the barrier
And stung my arms and face like shrapnel.
The metallic clang lingered as a discordant ringing.

Your Aprilia lay on its side close by,
Gleaming darkly in muddy rainwater,
Its windscreen shattered,
Frame bent, chassis mangled,
Front wheel still spinning.
A rearview mirror dangled from its stem,
And reflected the electric clouds.
Fuel leaked out of the dented tank.
The headlamp’s white beam,
Shining through the cracks in the lens,
Faltered, flickered, then faded away.

The ozone scent of the storm mingled
With the chemical smell of gasoline,
The burnt stench of grinding metal,
And the bitterness on my tongue.
A tingling white noise had spread
To the farthest reaches of my body,
And in the places that hadn’t gone numb,
My shredded flesh screamed
In a fiery, knifelike pain.

Instead of writhing in the gutter
Like a crushed insect,
I would return to your side,
But when I tried to stand,
My limp legs refused to move.
I grabbed the cold, wet guardrail,
Then heaved myself over it.
I hit the grassy, upward slope chest-first,
And mud splattered on my face.

I crawled onward, clawing at the grass and soil,
Coating my hands with squelchy mud.
The relentless pounding of heavy rain
Along with the deep rumble of distant thunder
Isolated me in a cocoon of noise.
Every creep up the slope ripped me open with hurt.
In jagged gasps, I breathed razors.
Where are you, Izar? Where are you?

The blades of grass glistened
With a fresh spray of blood.
Silvery light from turning headlights
Swam in waves over a body splayed face up
Like a doll tossed in a tantrum.
Your drenched, ripped red jacket gleamed.
Gashes oozed through the torn jeans.
The crushed helmet still clung to your head.

Beside you, I pushed myself up onto my knees,
And lifted the cracked visor of your helmet.
Raindrops splattered in concentric circles
On the blood pooling within the face aperture.

I attempted to take your helmet off,
But your neck strained, its muscles taut,
As if your head might snap off.
You couldn’t breathe.
“Stay with me, Izar. Don’t leave me, please.”
When I scooped blood out of the hole,
My fingers didn’t graze your face.
I sank my hand up to my wrist, to the elbow,
But I couldn’t reach you.

I woke up with a start, drenched in sweat,
Gasping for breath, clutching at my throat.

My fingers are calloused
From decades of clawing
At the dark soil of this world
To drag myself back to you.

Author’s note: the song for today is “I Lost You” by The Walkmen.

The next part will conclude this story.

Review: Mushoku Tensei, Vol. 12, by Rifujin na Magonote

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, ReseñasLeave a comment

Three-and-a-half stars.

I love me some isekai. If you pay any attention to my words, you know this already. It’s the quintessential boys’ fantasy: explore some fantastic places cut off from this repulsive Earth; exploit newly-gained, generally undeserved powers; meet cool people mostly of the attractive, female persuasion then have sex with them; possibly marry one or more of those gals before or after impregnating them; enjoy the fact that you will never, ever have to deal with Earth and its people again.

This time, our hero starts at the lowest point of his life: after two decades of parasitizing his parents as a hikikomori due to relentless bullying in high school, his parents died. Instead of attending the funeral, he spent that day jerking off to child porn (or loli hentai), a fact that bothered his siblings enough to beat him up and throw him into the streets. As he wandered in a daze, the mythical creature known as Truck-kun deigned to make a visit and transport the protagonist, along with a couple of people nearby, to death, and later on to a fantasy world.

Our protagonist gets reincarnated as a baby that retains the memories of his harrowing past life. In this new one he’s Rudeus Greyrat, son of a horny swordfighter and a lively mage, who had retired from adventuring to start a family together. Rudeus is overjoyed by the fact that he’s been given a second chance at life, but mainly that he’s able to suck on a hottie’s tits on a regular basis, and that the grown-ups around him forgive him for his relentless perversion. The anime adaptation did a good job rendering this, as seen below:

Anyway, lots of shit happens, as it tends to do. I read this volume of the light novel to catch up with the anime adaptation, that has just finished its second season. I’m discussing spoilers from now on, so read on only if you already know what happens, or you don’t care to find out this way.

<spoilers>That whole magic displacement incident that teleported Rudeus’ family, as well as the redheaded terror and his childhood elvish friend, to random corners of the world, has led him to organize a spelunking raid to a teleporter labyrinth where his mother is supposed to be trapped. We accompany Rudeus along with his scumbag father Paul, blue-haired loli and magician Roxy Migurdia, their monkey-man scout, a gay dwarf, and a promiscuous grandma as they bond with each other and fight monsters. First they rescue Roxy, who falls in love with adult Rudeus because he saved her from the brink of death. Finally they face a hydra, and although they defeat it, they suffer a devastating loss. Rudeus also ends up maimed.

The biggest difference from the anime adaptation happens when they’re nursing their wounds back at the inn. Rudeus is depressed in a similar way as he’s been in the past (for example during his episode of erectile dysfunction). This time, Rudeus’ grandma-in-law suggests Roxy that she should fuck Rudeus to get him out of his funk. In the anime, Roxy drags Rudeus to bed and mounts him. In the original, she’s about to stand up when Rudeus pulls her down and fucks her roughly. He barely considers the fact that he’s cheating on his pregnant wife. Later on, his grandma-in-law deceives our protagonist by stating that he’s impregnated the blue-haired magician, in order for him to take responsibility, as the Japanese love to say, and make Roxy his second wife. Other than those significant changes that made me lose some respect for both characters, the anime adaptation is faithful to the rest, even verbatim for plenty of the dialogue. The author is involved with the adaptation, so maybe those changes are a very late revision of the original work.</spoilers>

What else can I say? If you like Mushoku Tensei, you’ve likely watched the anime, so you knew what to expect from this volume. This is a story about the pains and struggles of growing up, rising from rock bottom to becoming a more or less respectable family man, processed through the Japanese charm you know and love (if you know and love it), and free from the politics that have corrupted every aspect of Western culture. This story also makes polygamy quite appetizing.

Motocross Legend, Love of My Life, Pt. 18 (Poetry)

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial2 Comments

You can read this novella from the beginning through this link.

I used to know every contour of your face,
The exact timbre of your voice,
The way your body pressed against mine,
Your taste, the salty scent of your sweat.
But your traces are flaking off my brain;
In the seams and margins of my memories,
Bugs and patches have appeared,
Corroding the integrity of a past
That I’m editing, shaping with bias,
As I revisit it time and time again.
Your gaze, your smile, your laughter,
They all fade away into oblivion
With each ticking second.

Izar, I beg you, stay with me.
Let’s leave this suffocating city
On a motocross odyssey spanning Europe:
Hundreds of kilometers of highways,
Speeding through the countryside
Past petrol stations, fields, and farmhouses.
We’ll make love on the shores of the sea,
Then sleep under a blanket of stars.
Let’s rent bikes and ride along the Seine.
Let’s explore the winding streets of Venice,
Swim in the turquoise waters of the Caribbean,
Surf the waves of Hawaii or Costa Rica,
Climb the ancient terraces of Machu Picchu.
For the rest of my days, I will care for you,
Your unstable mind, your fits of rage.

Forgive me these postcard destinations;
You dreamed in exact places: Ponts, Jerez,
A rundown cottage in Sierra Nevada.
I dream in the smudged colors
Of a map left out in the rain.

Growing up, I feared venturing far
From my neighborhood, from my parents.
I dreaded exposing myself to risky experiences.
In my mind, I saw my mother’s stern face,
Ready to scold and ground me
For daring to struggle against the vines
She had wrapped tight around me.
Roam the breadth of Spain? Travel the world?
Such adventures felt as distant as the stars.
I was convinced that even as an adult,
I wouldn’t organize something so troublesome.

But that year, I stood in the blazing Roman heat
With my teenage son beside me
And my daughter’s small hand grasped in mine,
Gazing up at the façade of the Pantheon,
Its towering Corinthian columns glowing faintly,
Burned by the merciless July sun;
Its triangular pediment pockmarked, scarred,
By twenty centuries of plunder and weather.
I longed to appreciate its grandeur in solitude,
But a throng of tourists choked the square.
A listless guy stood dressed like a centurion,
His helmet adorned with a plume of dyed horsehair.
The muscle cuirass concealed the flab
Of a modern man suited to a desk job.

The Pantheon didn’t belong in this post-apocalypse,
Among the disoriented survivors of the 21st century,
Who lacked the knowledge to recreate
The sunlit glory of their once eternal past,
And who had lost the will to rediscover it.

Well, what did you think about the sights, Izar?
We never had the chance to escape together,
But I carried your memory to Rome.
I hope you enjoyed the trip.

In my little corner of the world, whenever I could,
I escaped to the freedom of an isolated bench
Along the wooded lane containing your memorial stone.
There, beneath the sunlight filtering through branches,
Hunched over a notebook, I poured my memories of us,
Capturing in words every detail I could remember.
I discovered that writing tricked the brain
Into gilding moments and affixing them to its cells,
Regardless of their authenticity.

Drawing, writing, they couldn’t save me;
They just helped me endure this lonesome life
For yet another day.
But maybe the right words could save
What remained of you.

In my heart, a secret garden bloomed.
Pollen sparkled on iridescent flowers,
Their petals fanning out like peacock feathers.
In this floral realm where time stood still
And death could never enter,
You, enshrined within a poem or story
That wouldn’t fade, rot, nor be reduced to ashes,
Could live eternally.

Author’s note: the songs for today are “This Is the One” by The Stone Roses, and “Sit Down” by James.

Motocross Legend, Love of My Life, Pt. 17 (Poetry)

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura2 Comments

You can read this novella from the beginning through this link.

Do you remember, Izar,
That one time in the basketball court
Of our old primary school?
Your hair looked like honey.
Pale wisps floated about your face.
You glanced up at the sky and said,
“The sun’s right above. Look!”
While shielding your eyes with one hand,
With the other, you gestured toward the hoop,
And the round, golden sun,
Glowing with midday heat,
Swished through the net.
You grinned triumphantly at the perfect shot,
The work of a godly markswoman.

In my memories, in my dreams,
Our teenage selves, wild and free,
Dressed in the sun of summer,
Roamed iridescent streets together
Under a sky layered like an oil painting.

One day, after a shower,
I wiped the fog off the mirror
To reveal a man’s naked body
Glimmering through the vapor.
The once lean-muscled figure,
Sculpted laboriously in the gym,
Had softened under the looser skin
To a layer of resigned flesh
That gravity insisted on dragging downward.
With both hands, I grasped my gut,
Stretching it as if to rip it open
And let the aging machinery spill out.

I locked a tortured gaze with the mirror,
With that cold-eyed stranger
Whose wrinkles carved on his face
Deepened each passing year.
His hair and stubble were flecked with gray.
The flaws I scarcely noticed during the day
Beamed back as if lit by headlights.
Every trace of my youth had eroded away;
I had transformed into a middle-aged man
That you, forever eighteen,
Would hardly recognize.

A rapping on the front door shattered the static haze.
When I opened the door, I faced an apparition.
Your chocolate eyes glowed with affection,
Your smile showed off your crooked teeth.
Rainwater slid down your sleek red jacket,
That framed the Evangelion T-shirt underneath.

You had finally returned from the beyond
To replace my dust with your stardust.
I hugged you tight, lifting you off the floor,
And you wrapped your legs around me
While giggling like a girl in love.
“How long has it been?” you asked.
“Far too long.”
“Will you come with me?”

In the corner of the street gleamed
Your beloved Aprilia Red Rose,
Its fuel tank painted yellow-and-white.
High-rise chrome handlebars,
A padded leather seat with visible studs.
Exposed engine components turned the Aprilia
Into a rugged and warworn mechanical beast,
Ready to race through the landscape
With its raw wounds laid to the wind.

As I rode pillion on your bike,
Its throaty rumbling vibrated through the seat.
I rested a hand on the thigh of your jeans,
And felt the firmness of the flesh beneath.

You swerved onto Navarra Avenue toward the highway.
The road ahead lay empty, an invitation to speed.
We passed by an endless procession of ghosts,
Whose whispers blended with the engine’s rumbling.

The low, crimson sun raced toward the horizon,
Stretching wavering, unnatural shadows.
My heart pounded, my breath came in gasps.
Dread clawed at my mind: we might never arrive.
Even as you speeded,
The destination receded farther and farther.
“We’re never going to get there, are we?”
“Where is there?”
“Wherever it is we’re going.”
Your whipping hair framed the profile of your face,
And your lips curled into a sad smile.

Back when you told me you were quitting school
To pursue the goal of becoming a motocross racer,
Should I have convinced you to continue your studies
And to use your spare time to train,
Even at the cost of seeing you less?
That one time in your parents’ apartment,
When your father stomped out of your bedroom
While threatening to go beyond words,
If I, instead of just comforting you,
Had confronted your old man,
Even at the risk of ending up bruised and bloody,
Maybe I would have intimidated him enough
That he wouldn’t have marked you
With a red handprint on your cheek.
If I had instilled in you the fear
That you might ruin both our lives
By crashing during one of your reckless stunts,
Maybe you wouldn’t have died so young.

I see you back on April 27, 1999,
When you scratched flakes of paint
Off that basketball pole.
The wind tugged at your ponytail,
And shiny raindrops dripped
From the soaked tips of your hair.
You turned your youthful face to me
And revealed your plan to leave.
For a moment, I panicked;
Would you untether yourself from me?
But you asked me to run away with you,
To drift through Spain on your bike
Like pirates on the open sea.

I said I would follow you anywhere, didn’t I?
When I replay that night in my mind,
Sometimes I see myself answering you,
And other times, I assumed you knew the answer.
Had I answered enthusiastically,
Promising that nothing and no one could stop me
From accompanying you to the ends of the world,
Would you have chosen to speed through the rain?
Did I let you die thinking I had abandoned you?

Author’s note: the song for today is “The Wait” by Built to Spill.

Song “Fuck You, Life (garage rock version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

The last song of the third volume of Odes to My Triceratops (out of four) works for me great both as a cabaret/vaudeville song, and as a garage rock song. This evening I present to you the garage rock version. Very cool tune, nice to let it play and have a good time.

Same lyrics as the cabaret version:

Lorenzo was a triceratops
With a portal to hell inside his throat.
Claire was my next-door neighbor,
As well as the love of my life.
She didn’t want to love me anymore,
Even though I did the best I could.

At this point, the only thing worth doing
Is saying, “Fuck you, life,” and turning away.

Fuck music and poetry!
Fuck the people you loved and trusted!
Fuck this pointless earthly world
And the stars in the heavens!

When I close my eyes,
I see the end:
A red curtain drops
On a blackened stage,
And the universe applauds
At my grand finale!

Anyway, what’s next? First I was writing a novel for about three years, then it went on hiatus so I could work on a novella, then I barely progressed on that novella as I started producing a fuckton of songs. There’s still the last stretch of William Griffin’s story to discover, but I will park that for now until I get through what remains of Motocross Legend, Love of My Life. I intended to edit those parts at work, but I’ve been beyond busy this past couple of months, burdened with the task of replacing hundreds of printers at the hospital complex where I’m employed.

At some point of this marathon of songs, my “readership” apparently gave up. Oh, well. I’ll continue doing what I’ve always done: exactly what my subconscious demands, as obsessively as necessary.

Song “Fuck You, Life (cabaret version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

The last two songs I uploaded were versions of the same lyrics, which was the first time it had happened: I loved two possible genres so much for the same concept that I produced both instead of discarding one. I thought that situation would be rare, and maybe it is, but it has happened again right away: this last song of the third volume of Odes to My Triceratops (out of four) works for me great both as a cabaret/vaudeville song, and as a garage rock song. Tonight I present to you the cabaret version, which will conclude the album. I love how it came out.

Lyrics below:

Lorenzo was a triceratops
With a portal to hell inside his throat.
Claire was my next-door neighbor,
As well as the love of my life.
She didn’t want to love me anymore,
Even though I did the best I could.

At this point, the only thing worth doing
Is saying, “Fuck you, life,” and turning away.

Fuck music and poetry!
Fuck the people you loved and trusted!
Fuck this pointless earthly world
And the stars in the heavens!

When I close my eyes,
I see the end:
A red curtain drops
On a blackened stage,
And the universe applauds
At my grand finale!

Song “Farewell, My Friends (new wave version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

As I was planning this new song, titled “Farewell, My Friends,” and trying to determine what genre it would fall into, I loved how it sounded both as a rock ‘n’ roll and as a new wave song. Unwilling to discard either, I chose to do both, using the same structure and lyrics. I will likely do this in the future in the rare case when such a thing happens.

Earlier today I posted the rock ‘n’ roll version of the song. I think that both of them came out very well.

Same lyrics as the previous version:

In a frozen nowhere-town
Stands William Griffin, waving us goodbye,
One hand on his guitar’s neck,
The other holding out a shiny blade.

William Griffin, boy of melodies and songs!
He has a triceratops and a killer girlfriend.
Well, not anymore (oh no!):
The triceratops is six feet under,
And Claire’s probably sucking off strangers
For pocket money and coke.

William used to be a good friend of mine
Until he lost his damn mind.
He has so little life left in him,
It’s a miracle he hasn’t wasted away.

In his throat, a dark-red portal to a land
Where damned souls roam free.
Stretching forever, a bridge through time
To the endless pit that awaits us all!

Yeah, I’m crossing over into a realm
Where my old pal now dwells,
A place where we’ll feast and dance,
And be young once more.

I’ve done many wrongs,
But I can still do one more.
The hell that awaits down below
Will be funner than the one above.

I don’t have any friends left,
And I don’t want to live anymore,
So goodbye, I’m outta here.
I’m taking a step into the dark
With my guitar on my back,
And a hole in my neck!

My name is William Griffin,
And I will exist forever,
In every word I have written,
In every song I have sung!

Song “Farewell, My Friends (rock ‘n’ roll version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, Música1 Comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, who’s a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

As I was planning this new song, titled “Farewell, My Friends,” and trying to determine what genre it would fall into, I loved how it sounded both as a rock ‘n’ roll and as a new wave song. Unwilling to discard either, I chose to do both, using the same structure and lyrics. I will likely do this in the future in the rare case when such a thing happens.

Anyway, both this version of the song and the new wave version, that I will post later today, have been among the hardest songs to put together of the seventy-five or so I have already made. They’re both long musical journeys.

Lyrics below:

In a frozen nowhere-town
Stands William Griffin, waving us goodbye,
One hand on his guitar’s neck,
The other holding out a shiny blade.

William Griffin, boy of melodies and songs!
He has a triceratops and a killer girlfriend.
Well, not anymore (oh no!):
The triceratops is six feet under,
And Claire’s probably sucking off strangers
For pocket money and coke.

William used to be a good friend of mine
Until he lost his damn mind.
He has so little life left in him,
It’s a miracle he hasn’t wasted away.

In his throat, a dark-red portal to a land
Where damned souls roam free.
Stretching forever, a bridge through time
To the endless pit that awaits us all!

Yeah, I’m crossing over into a realm
Where my old pal now dwells,
A place where we’ll feast and dance,
And be young once more.

I’ve done many wrongs,
But I can still do one more.
The hell that awaits down below
Will be funner than the one above.

I don’t have any friends left,
And I don’t want to live anymore,
So goodbye, I’m outta here.
I’m taking a step into the dark
With my guitar on my back,
And a hole in my neck!

My name is William Griffin,
And I will exist forever,
In every word I have written,
In every song I have sung!

Review: Invincible, by Robert Kirkman

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, ReseñasLeave a comment

Five out of five stars. I’m reviewing the whole series.

Like many people, I first became aware of Kirkman’s Invincible through its animated adaptation. I was hooked on the show from the first episode, that set itself up as a charming, seemingly typical superhero narrative about a teenager, named Mark Grayson, whose dad is basically that world’s Superman, only to whack you with a brutal ending that promised a story far from normal. Here’s the clip of that pivotal scene, which serves as the story’s first major plot point. In case you want to spoil it for yourself. It gives you a good idea of the kind of superficially goofy but dead serious story Invincible is:

Getting through the animated series was a struggle at times: painful attempts at humor, cramming in woke points, race-swaps only in one direction (turning the very white, very blonde Amber into a black ballbuster whom comic-book Mark would have never dated was a particularly egregious one), and in general the kind of marxist garbage you can expect from any major cultural production these past couple of decades (if you agree with any of that, please go away). While the adaptation surpasses the original when it comes to the choreography of the fights, virtually everything else is worse, and now that I’ve read the original, that adaptation feels almost insulting.

Anyway, Invincible tells the self-contained tale of a powerful, brooding, and hot-headed young guy that strives to use his abilities to do good for others and protect the people he cares about, but he struggles with the fact that the world is far more morally complex than he’s prepared to accept: does someone who killed thousands, whether deliberately or through poor choices, deserve forgiveness if they repent? Is it right to exploit a villain’s abilities for good, despite their crimes? Can you forgive someone who endangered your loved ones for what they perceived as the greater good? At the core, many of the characters, starting with the protagonist, understand that their nature is dangerous, that a few unlucky events or misguided decisions could turn them into forces of evil ready to destroy everyone around them.

We first meet Mark Grayson as a high school student, but by the end of the story, it has brought you on an epic journey that makes the beginning near unrecognizable. Many of the characters feel real and have been given compelling character arcs. Notable among them are the gorgeous redhead Atom Eve, a headstrong, resilient woman who can alter the atomic composition of damn near anything; Rudy “Rex” Robot, a guy born extraordinarily intelligent yet hideously deformed, forced to interface with the world through mechanical constructs, who fears that his logical detachment will end up causing harm; Monster Girl, a no-nonsense thirty-year-old whose transformations make her younger each time (she’s also the most terrifying futanari in the universe); the protagonist’s father, who struggles with his upbringing in a Spartan-like space society that despises weakness, almost especially familial ones; an immortal dude who has lived for such a long time that he prefers to keep everyone at a distance, lest the mounting grief destroys him (he was also Abraham Lincoln); the government agent constantly forced to make unsavory decisions, potentially enraging his contacts, in order to save the world at any cost, etc.

Throughout the story, I often feared for the characters’ lives. Many meet permanent and often brutal ends. I wished for them to just get along and have a good time, only for the next crisis to bash against them. Plenty of times I echoed the protagonist’s words right after a tremendously costly battle, when he cried out, “Oh god, what now?!” because the next threat burst in immediately after. You experience these people building strong bonds with each other, only for disasters, threats, or their own conflicting decisions to pull them apart in painful ways. I was hooked, devouring the series day after day, nearly missing my train stop a couple of times.

The story isn’t exactly perfect to warrant a five out of five, although I don’t have much in particular to nitpick. At times it had me wavering between four and four-and-a-half stars. But looking back at the ride, from a teenager playing superhero with undeserved powers to a profound tale about family and the importance of building strong bonds, it feels so dense and carefully woven that it deserves nothing less than a five from me.

I wish there was more Invincible out there to consume beyond the bastardized adaptation, but the limited nature is part of its brilliance: this isn’t a corporate comic book with repetitive, resettable storylines. Mark Grayson’s fascinating story of hard-earned growth was one of real stakes and permanent losses, and it ended precisely when and how it needed to. For me, the ultimate superhero story.

Song “St-a-b Ya-self” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, who’s a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

If you were waiting all day to hear a psychobilly slash glam rock song, I got you: this one’s titled “St-a-b Ya-self.” It’s about stabbing yourself because you deserve it, and such.

Lyrics below:

Oh, st-ab-a-dab-a-dab-a-doo…
St-ab st-ab st-ab ya-self!
If ya wanna keel ya-self, yeah,
Stab-a-stab-a-d-d-a-d-AAGGH!

Yer just a robot,
Fakin’ feelins fer humans,
Repeatin’, “Keel ya-self,”
All through da day!

Ya know dat yer heart’s a machine,
Ya know dat yer head is too.
Dere’s no point in livin’ if yer dead,
So slide da steel against yer skin.

Don’t worry,
Dere’s a place for ya in my collection,
And dis here blade will send ya dere!

Don’t be a pussy!
Don’t be a wuss!
No one cares ’bout ya,
And ya deserve it anyway!

St-ab-a-dab-a-doo!
I feel like a bird,
And if I can’t fly,
A knife will haf-ta do.