#rustpunk

It's punk-o-clock and someone really should finally agree on how we are gonna call those kinda stories and how we are gonna define them. I have read so far:

Dustpunk

Rustpunk

Desertpunk

The Apunkalypse

And some people say those are different things, but reading over the different descriptions I gotta say: "They sound pretty much the same to me."

There might be an argument made that "The Apunkalypse" is a subgenre and then Desertpunk/Rustpunk/Dustpunk is one subgenre - and Oceanpunk can be another one... But the three formerly named once pretty much sound the same to me. Big drought. Desertification of large chunks of area. And often enough they do involve cars in a major roles as the best way to cross the desert.

And I talked about it before: But I freaking LOVE Mad Max, especially Mad Max Fury Road. God, I love this movie so much. Just... Yeah... Love. Pure love. Best movie.

And I would argue that no matter what we call that genre (I would argue that Desertpunk is the best name) that especially Mad Max Fury Road and Tank Girl are the prime examples of it. Why? Well, you know it. Because they are the most... punk.

Mad Max as a series definitely starts not out as very punk, given that Max is in the beginning literally a cop. Road Warrior and Thunderdome definitely have some punk themes and aesthetics in there, but they do not go there the full way. Meanwhile Fury Road is all like: "Smash that toxic patriarchy and metaphor for capitalism!" And I am all there for it.

Tank Girl of course is even less subtle. Both the comics and the movie are just openly punk. Tank Girl herself is a punk, wearing punk attire and literally fighting capitalism, while also being very openly bisexual. I love it.

And I think that is what should differentiate Desertpunk from just your average Post-Apocalyptic storystelling. If you have a post-apocalypse in which just everyone is out for themselves with maybe small survivor groups battling each other... I mean, you could still tell a punk story in there by focusing on the community and mutual aid aspect of punk, but in general most stories in those settings are not, in fact, punk.

But if you put in some sort of institution with people who try to exploit the post-apocalypse for their advantage? Yeah, fuck. That's so darn punk.

Ironically, Desertpunk is probably the Punkpunk genre, for which I can think of the clearest examples of PUNK in there. Kinda funny how it goes. But given that I love both Fury Road and Tank Girl so fucking much as movies... I definitely want to see more of this!

[NO SPOILERS]

A WONDERFUL DANGANRONPA takes place 400 years past the lives of characters like Makoto Naegi. a lot's happened in that time, including the rise and fall of an entire world—ours.

primarily the game draws upon three aesthetics.

the first: that of "salvagepunk" and "rustpunk"—old things made new again, waste becoming want, etcetera. we reforge license plates into shoulder padding and call it fashion. Mad Max is a good example of this. if Danganronpa 1 was PSYCHOPOP, then AWD is PSYCHOJUNK.

have a moodboard yo

[ART FOR OTHERS]

This week’s Art for Others (the series where I make some free art for others) featuring @axl-ul’s mythic-historical fantasy story called City of False Gods. The summary:

After the failed pilgrimage to the Western Paradise, Sun Wukong was imprisoned by Buddha once again. Now, he is awakened from his cursed slumber to experience the shocking world of 1920s Hong Kong, or rather one of its infamous islands - Dragonfly Island. Under the supervision of Erlang Shen, Sun Wukong must find his Master while being stripped of many of his powers and forced to take up the identity of a simple auto mechanic at the local police station. Despite his ban and various restrictions, the Great Sage finds himself rescuing a poor orphaned boy who witnessed a murder of a prostitute.

Hunted by the local crime lord and his superordinate with new tasks in the workshop or coerced by circumstances to protect little Zhihao and encounter familiar faces from the past, the Monkey King faces a new trial the fate has prepared for him. Shall he prove worthy of restoring the sutras after all and achieve nirvana? Or shall his name be remembered as that of a treacherous demon who never learnt his lesson?

Versions uncrunched by tumblr for you here

Check it out and show them some support! They don’t have a page for this story set up yet but follow them and keep an eye out for it! This one was a little tougher to arrange but I like how it turned out. If you’d like me to make free art for one of your stories all you have to do is be following me and have a titled writing project!