Trabia Garden

I made this image for my Goes Wrong website and, unfortunately, I think it might be the best thing I've ever done.

While I'm thinking about stupid Death Note crossovers, here's my response to an anonymous question I received on Tumblr a month or so ago: what if light woke up in hope peak academy? what if, he didn't have the death note?

It’s interesting to contemplate Light in a Danganronpa situation! He’s willing to kill, obviously, but he’s used to killing in the distant, detached way the Death Note enables.

Without the Death Note, I think Light would end up trying to set up traps, trying to find ways he can kill without being in the room himself at the time. He reasons that this is the logical thing to do because, if he’s not at the crime scene, it’s harder to pin him as the culprit. And he’s not wrong! But it’s also because he doesn’t want to kill someone with his own hands; he finds the thought of stabbing or strangling someone disturbing. He wants something detached; he wants to keep himself clean.

He doesn’t like to acknowledge this; it’s a weakness in his eyes. So he’ll just keep telling himself that he’s taking the most logical course of action.

(He might also be willing to use poison as a method, come to think of it.)

Light’s first choice of victim would be someone whose death he can easily justify to himself. He’d target someone like Mondo. A violent delinquent, a gang leader; who’s going to miss him?

If he struggles to kill Mondo, though, he’s willing to switch his victim to someone he considers easy to kill, like Chihiro or Naegi, or to whoever poses the biggest risk in trials, i.e. Kirigiri. He justifies this to himself by telling himself it’s essential for him to get out of here. After all, it’s his duty to rid the world of crime, isn’t it? Sometimes sacrifices must be made.

There are two ways I envision things going if Light ends up in the first Danganronpa game:

1) Light uses a trap to kill Kirigiri and assumes he’s home free; nobody else has the intelligence to pin him as the culprit. He’s outraged and incredulous when Naegi unravels his plan in the trial.

2) Light spends several chapters planning the perfect crime, assuming nobody’s capable of taking him down, and ends up getting murdered by someone else before he can carry it out.

The day after we saw Death Note: The Musical at the Barbican, Tem turned to me and asked, 'Do you want to go back and see it from the front row?'

And I did. I really, really did.

We went to yesterday's matinée and had a great time. Going from 'far enough to see all the choreography' to 'close enough to see all the expressions' was such an interesting contrast!

I'd heard that the stage was on the tall side, and I was a little worried that it would obscure what was going on, but it was absolutely fine! We couldn't always see everything that was happening in the shinigami realm, which was on a higher level above the main stage, but, to balance that, having the gods physically high up above us was pretty cool.

(There was a moment I was very worried about the height of the stage. Instead of a curtain, the Barbican has an unsettling shiny black monolith, with a prominent horizontal seam about eight feet up. I was looking up at it, thinking '??? surely the stage cannot be eight feet tall???? I've heard it's tall, but surely it's not so tall that nobody at the front can see anything.' Fortunately not!)

Death Note feels so well suited to the stage. At its heart, it's almost a Greek or Shakespearean tragedy, particularly with the musical's revised ending. I really hope it has a future in London beyond this short run.

In the queue for the loos at the interval, a woman in perhaps her sixties asked me whether it was originally an American production, so I had the opportunity to speak a bit about the odd history of this musical. Although the songs were originally written in English by an American composer, over ten years ago, they were translated into Japanese for the first performances, and this London run is the first time the musical has been performed in full in English.

'It's such an incredible production,' the woman commented. I'm glad to see this musical winning over newcomers to the story!


( Death Note: The Musical, 20 August 2026. )


Ryuk's first appearance in the human world is impressively done: the lights in Light's room start to flicker, then go out for just an instant, and when they come back on Ryuk is standing on Light's bed. The first time I watched the show, I couldn't imagine how this was done! Light's bed was too far from the wings for Ryuk's actor to have run in during that brief blackout; how had Ryuk appeared?

Coming back to watch from the front row, one of my main thoughts was that perhaps I'd be able to solve this mystery at last. How does Ryuk appear on Light's bed during that second or two of darkness?

The answer is perhaps the best thing I could have hoped for: turns out Ryuk was already in Light's bed, hiding under the covers. I just caught a glimpse of him starting to emerge as the lights went out.

It's an impressive bit of stage trickery, but I like to believe that 'Ryuk was hiding in Light's bed to screw with him' is also canon. If the blackout hadn't happened, Light would have been very startled to discover Ryuk when he pulled back the covers to go to bed.

The Murder at Haversham Manor, 2012 (dir. Chris Bean)
I'm sorry, everyone. I had the sudden realisation that Galuf of Final Fantasy V was basically a ready-made pixellated Robert Grove, and there was only one thing I could do. Someone should make The RPG That Goes Wrong.

While I'm posting stupid Goes Wrong things, here are a few ficlets! (Not all the ficlets I've written lately; I'm keeping a couple in reserve in the hope I can combine them into a single fic.)


( Three Goes Wrong ficlets. )


I don't often stick around in a fandom long enough to become recognisable, so I'm delighted to have found myself accruing a reputation in the Goes Wrong fandom. Multiple people have referred to me as 'the Robert guy' or 'a Robert connoisseur'. It's the name I've always wanted to make for myself.

Yes, I've only known Robert Grove existed since December. I stand by it. It's the name I've always wanted to make for myself; I just haven't always known it's the name I wanted to make for myself.

My last six entries have not been about The Goes Wrong Show, so perhaps you were beginning to think you were safe. Bad news, I'm afraid.


Title: The Medic
Fandom: The Goes Wrong Show
Rating: 14
Pairing: Robert/Chris, sort of Robert/Chris/Trevor
Wordcount: 2,200
Summary: “I am planning to make a sexual advance towards Chris,” Robert announces, and Trevor chokes.


( The Medic )

I received an anonymous question on Tumblr, asking whether I had any predictions for Deltarune.

What's going to happen in Deltarune?? I have no idea and I'm scared. (For future reference, these thoughts were written based on the first five chapters of Deltarune.)


( Predictions for Deltarune. )


PERHAPS MOST IMPORTANTLY: Kris/Noelle/Susie real??? There are suggestions that Kris might be romantically interested in both Kris and Susie, and there's been a surprising amount of what I can only describe as 'throuple foreshadowing'. The contrast between the way you're travelling around the festival as a trio and the way the festival's activities keep forcing you to split into duos feels weirdly pointed. Maybe I'm imagining things. But maybe not???

It was my birthday on Saturday! To celebrate, my housemates and I sang karaoke at home. These were the songs I performed!

- As ever, I picked something I wouldn't have to take too seriously as my first song, in this case 'David Duchovny' by Bree Sharp. I had the video playing, naturally, for the whirlwind tour through faces of the nineties. Possibly the most insane moment is Brad Pitt, in character as Tyler Durden, lipsyncing to 'DAVID DUCHOVNY, I KNOW YOU CAN LOVE ME.'

- I introduced 'Water the Roses' by Flavor Foley as 'a gay divorce song', in the knowledge that this would be of interest to my audience. I chose it as my second song because I thought it wouldn't be too tough, but it turned out to be much more challenging than I anticipated; I was trying to sing too high for my range while getting slightly emotional!

- Everyone joined in on 'Sing' by My Chemical Romance, which was fun! Terrible confession: I was in fact hearing the Glee version in my head as I sang.

- By this point I'd warmed up and was feeling ambitious, so I attempted 'Une vie à t'aimer' from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. I only sang up to the 2m20s mark, for multiple reasons: a) the song has long instrumental sections that makes it unsuited to karaoke, b) it's an eleven-minute song, which is far too long for karaoke anyway, and c) nobody needs to suffer through me singing dramatically for eleven minutes in a language I do not speak. I enjoyed belting out my best effort at dramatic French, though!

- 'Burn' from Hamilton was another intimidatingly ambitious pick, but I think it went well! There were a couple of points where I ran out of breath at the end of a line, but that actually worked for the emotion of the song, because it made it sound like I was on the verge of tears. Rei followed this up with 'First Burn', an earlier version of the same song, which was interesting to hear!

- My next pick, 'Vienna' by Billy Joel, was a targeted personal attack on Rei, for a couple of reasons. The obvious surface-level reason was the 'hey, slow down, you'll burn yourself out if you try to do everything' lyrics; Rei, and I say this with the deepest fondness, is a slightly frantic overachiever with a tendency to convince themselves that everything is their job and their responsibility.

The other reason 'Vienna' was a personal attack: it was covered in absolutely nonsense bullshit drama The Politician, which Rei and I watched together years ago. Rei, upon realising where they'd heard this song before, bellowed 'YOU MOTHERFUCKER! YOU DUMB PIECE OF SHIT!' at me so loudly that Tem heard it from the loo and burst out laughing.

- My last 'this is far too ambitious' pick before starting to wind down was 'Through the Fire and Flames' by Dragonforce. Again, I only did the first couple of minutes of this; it's seven minutes long and goes at an exhausting pace! I had fun with it, though.

- At one point Rei was out of the room, meaning I was just performing to Tem and Ginger. I chose 'See You in Hell' from Lost Records: Bloom and Rage, as they both enjoy that game, and I hugely enjoyed their delight when they realised what I was about to sing. Tem joined in on the chorus with enthusiasm.

- 'Future World' by Koethe is a song that's resonated more with me every year since it first came out. I don't want a future world! I don't want to be sold the next big thing! Leave me alone!

- Rei and I dueted on Rei's pick of 'The Ticketman' by Rachel Rose Mitchell, which was great fun! (This is a song that gives Rei feelings about Bill Cipher from Gravity Falls.) (A lot of songs give Rei feelings about Bill Cipher from Gravity Falls.)

- Tem and I sang 'Borrowed Time' from Death Note: The Musical together, because it's just not a household karaoke session without Death Note: The Musical. Poor Misa!

- As it was my birthday, I picked the final song: 'Affirmation' by Savage Garden (heads-up for immediate flashing lights in the video). Everyone joined in and danced along to this one! Rei and I used to sing this song with our mutual friend Yuffie when we were all teenagers, dancing around Yuffie's flat.


My favourite performance of the evening was Rei and Tem's enthusiastic rendition of 'RATATATA' (NB flashing lights) by BABYMETAL (played by Tem) and Electric Callboy (played by Rei). This falls into the karaoke curse where I first hear the song performed at karaoke, then go to listen to the actual song and go 'oh, it's not the same when my friends aren't singing it :('

Rei's performance of 'Shining Collection' from Gravitation was a lot of fun! (No link, alas; it's astonishingly hard to find good-quality versions of the original songs from Gravitation.) I was surprised to find myself singing along with a lot of it, despite the song being in high-speed Japanese; I listened to this song a lot when I was fourteen, and apparently the memory of it has never left me.

Tem's performance of 'Suki, Kirai' by Phantom Siita was also memorable. 'I'm going to base this on their live performance,' Tem warned us, 'so, if you find yourself going "wow, Tem's doing a lot," just know that Phantom Siita do even more than that.' Xe proceeded to perform an initially chirpy-sounding song that degenerated into a sobbing, shrieking breakdown.


After karaoke, I used my birthday privileges to make my housemates watch the BBC's 2005 ShakespeaRe-Told adaptation of Macbeth. It's a modern AU, set in a restaurant, in which a young James McAvoy's Macbeth murders the restaurant's owner in order to get the restaurant. It's not called MacChef, but it should be.

I was obsessed with this stupid thing when I was seventeen. To be honest, my love of Joe Macbeth probably laid the groundwork for my later love of Light Yagami. I really enjoy watching a character absolutely psychologically disintegrating while committing multiple murders.

To my delight, Tem loved MacChef! It's the outcome I was hoping for; Tem and I have a deep and inappropriate shared fondness for fictional murderers.

The Goes Wrong fandom had a drabble event recently, Cornley Christmas (in July) Chaos 2026! Participants were invited to choose prompts from a list and write drabbles based on them.

I was hoping to write a drabble for each of the twelve prompts, but, alas, it went wrong; I fell just short with eleven! I had fun, though.

Here are my Goes Wrong drabble efforts! Mainly Chris/Robert, to nobody's surprise. The bolded phrase before each drabble is the prompt that inspired it.


( Eleven Goes Wrong drabbles. )


While I'm sharing Goes Wrong ficlets, I wrote one a couple of days ago in response to an anonymous request on Tumblr: I know you have said in the past that you see Robert as disappointingly vanilla when it comes to the bedroom compared to Chris, but I wondered if you might write something where he accidentally discovers that side of Chris?


( The Goes Wrong Show, Robert/Chris, 430 words. )


It's been fun to write some tiny things! Particularly about Robert and Chris's dynamic; I always have such a good time with these two weirdos.

After sharing my thoughts about how Robert of The Goes Wrong Show would react upon learning Chris was trans, I received another anonymous message on Tumblr: hiii do you have any more thoughts on trans!chris/robert??? i really enjoyed what you wrote!!! •ᴗ•

So, for an alternative scenario, what if Chris joins the drama society while he's still presenting as a woman, meaning that he comes out as a trans man when he and Robert already know each other? Again, I'm envisioning Robert somehow managing to be completely unfamiliar with the concept of being trans.

At first, when Chris attempts to explain that he's a man, Robert assumes Chris is simply mistaken and attempts to 'help' by explaining Chris's gender to him. No, Chris, you must have lost your memory. I've known you for years, and you've been a woman the entire time. Look, I've got photographs.

("For God's sake, Robert, you don't unders— why do you have so many photographs of me? When did you take these?")

Eventually, Chris manages to communicate that he'd like to be referred to as 'he'. Robert clearly doesn't understand the point of this exercise, though, and he makes an effort so token it's almost worse than not trying at all; he gets Chris's pronouns right maybe twenty percent of the time. He also hasn't grasped that this is a permanent state of affairs; when Chris corrects him on his pronouns the next day, Robert's response is "What, still?"

And then Chris hits on the answer. "Look, Robert, just think of this as an acting exercise. Up to this point, I was playing a female role. From now on, I'm playing a male role, and you should play your part accordingly."

It clicks for Robert instantly. Suddenly he takes great pride in treating Chris as a man, and in correcting anyone who slips up. Chris has no idea of whether Robert thinks of him as a man, but he'll take it.

I was trying something a little weird and experimental with Through the Cracks, my Deltarune fic set in chapter five's weird route, so I thought I'd reflect a bit on how things went!


( Notes on an experimental fic! )


I wouldn't want to do this with every fic, but it's been fun as a one-off experiment!

I received an anonymous question on Tumblr about The Goes Wrong Show: do you think dennis tyde would like undertale/deltarune?!! if so that means robert would be aware of it given they live together!!

Interesting question! I've never really thought about the Cornley Drama Society's relationship with videogames before.

I can't really envision Dennis playing Undertale or Deltarune; they're pretty complicated and challenging games, and Dennis gets stressed out and overwhelmed easily, so I think he might prefer something more straightforward. The way he struggles with vocabulary and reading also makes me think that, if he does play games, they're probably not text-heavy ones.

I can see Dennis playing Mario games! At first, he's not really sure what he's supposed to be doing. He asks why there are so many giant pipes, and, when Annie tells him that Mario is a plumber, Dennis concludes that he's supposed to go through the pipes repeatedly in order to clean them out. He seems to enjoy himself once he's got a goal in mind, even if it's perhaps not the goal intended by the developers.

I think Annie and Max are the members of the drama society who are most likely to be into videogames. Max probably enjoys couch co-op Nintendo games, anything colourful and family-friendly that he can play with friends. I can see Annie playing things that are more story-driven; I think she's probably your best bet if you're looking for an Undertale player amongst the drama society.

Actually, Vanessa might be a possibility as well! I could be swayed to either 'Vanessa doesn't play games at all' or 'Vanessa will occasionally play something single-player and story-driven'. In either case, she will absolutely panic if she has to play a multiplayer game.

Jonathan has dabbled in videogames but can never beat the first boss. Sandra's not really into games, but she'll occasionally play co-op with Max to indulge him. Chris looks down on the pursuit and refuses to attempt them. Trevor plays Tetris for hours and has never touched anything else.

There is not a chance that Robert plays videogames. I suspect the man can barely operate a phone; he just doesn't strike me as a technology person. His mental image of videogames is stuck back in the 8-bit era, and, if you tell him that games often have complex storylines, he will simply not believe you. Annie and Max talk him into a round of Mario Kart on one occasion, though, and he gets wildly competitive and insists on everyone playing long into the night. He does not place in the top three once.


While I'm talking about videogames: Tem and I are finally watching a Let's Play of The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil in Me! I find the Dark Pictures games fascinating, if flawed, but unfortunately I'm incapable of playing them myself because I find them unbearably stressful.

Tem is a bit of a true crime nerd and, the instant it became clear that actual historical serial killer HH Holmes was involved in this story, xe perked up and started giving me fun ('fun') facts about his murders. As a consequence, I began referring to Holmes as 'your boy HH Holmes' or 'your blorbo HH Holmes'. Tem did not appreciate this.

Riona: You know, if a trapdoor opened under me in a hotel and I narrowly avoided falling through to the bloodied floor beneath, it simply wouldn't occur to me that the hotel owner was trying to kill me. I would just go 'oh, no, the hotel's trapdoor is malfunctioning; they should really get that fixed.'
Tem: In many ways, it's incredible that you've survived this long.
Riona: The thing is that you don't actually encounter murderous hotel owners very often.

That said, I would start suspecting I was in danger when I saw the wrecked lobby and the thick trail of blood along the hotel carpet, so I am at least doing better than Charlie.

It's a good thing I'm not part of the focus group for this television programme about the murders of HH Holmes, because, when present-day criminal psychologist Kate and nineteenth-century murderer Holmes were inexplicably in the same shot, all I could think was that they should make out.

I'd barely started watching this game when I had a dream about it, which does not seem to bode well. I'd forgotten how frequently Supermassive's horror games give me nightmares.

The dream was about an alternate path in the prologue: you could choose between EXCITED and CELEBRATE for the couple. If you chose CELEBRATE, they sat in a shallow pool in the hotel grounds together, chatting excitedly about their marriage, and were both suddenly electrocuted when Holmes threw some sort of electric device into the pool from behind. It struck me that I wasn't sure this would satisfy Holmes; the couple died immediately without even knowing they were in danger, when the impression I'd got from the game's actual prologue was that Holmes likes you to know when he's murdering you.

Unfortunately, having dreamt about Holmes does make it a lot harder for me to tease Tem about Holmes being xyr blorbo.