Trabia Garden

When 2020 was looming, I posted an entry about the media that had made a real impact on me in the 2010s. I had fun with this, but it's hard to narrow things down across an entire decade! Maybe I should start doing these media roundups more frequently? Every half-decade, perhaps?

Oh, hey, it's 2025.

In alphabetical order, here are ten canons from the last five years that I think I'm going to remember! Note that this is media I originally experienced between 2020 and 2024, rather than necessarily being media that was originally released in that period.


1. Celeste. One of my absolute favourite games. Great music, charming characters, satisfying gameplay. It's tough, but I rarely found it frustrating, and I was delighted to realise how much I'd improved when I went back to replay from the beginning. Playing Celeste is a lot like playing the piano, learning the right pattern and timing of button presses through repetition until you can run smoothly through a level. I'll often find myself replaying Celeste levels when I've got a little time and nothing else is grabbing me, in the same way I'll often take a moment to sit at the piano and play a few pieces I know by heart.

2. The Coffin of Andy and Leyley. The relationship between these siblings is just so awful and intimate and fascinating; I can't get enough of it. I want to swim around in all this hideous codependency. When I first drafted this list at the start of the year, I noted, There's a chance I'm being too hasty with this one; I discovered it right before 2024 ended, so I haven't had time to be sure it's going to be a lasting interest. But, having had my mind obliterated by the latest chapter, I can now say with confidence that I am never going to stop thinking about this horrible game.

3. Lost. What an experience! I love it when characters are stranded together and forced to bond under high pressure, and this is an absolutely stellar example. Went in some wild directions, too; I said 'what the fuck' so many times while watching this show. Jack Shephard is a wreck of a man in a way that I find fascinating.

4. Omori. This game fucked me up. A lot of it is fun and charming! And then there are the parts that severely messed with my head. Two separate aspects gave me trouble sleeping. Some really interesting uses of gameplay, including one of the best-executed plot reveals I've ever seen.

5. Person of Interest. In a lot of case-of-the-week shows, the case itself is the least interesting part for me. In Person of Interest, I found the individual weekly cases absolutely gripping. The fact that the murders they're investigating haven't happened yet gives each case a living main character, usually the would-be victim, which makes them so much more fun to watch. I really enjoy Reese as a character, too.

6. Persona 5. I picked up Persona 5 in lockdown, when it was heavily discounted. I'd heard good things about the Persona series, but I'd always been intimidated by how long and complicated the games sounded. Still, it was 2020, and I wasn't able to leave the house, so it seemed like the right time for a hundred-hour RPG. It was an incredible decision. What a stylish, fun game! What great kids! I played it non-stop for a month and a half and had an absolute blast.

7. Persona 4. I was a little concerned about going back to Persona 4 after playing 5. I'd loved Persona 5 so much; what if the previous game was a disappointment? But I ended up loving Persona 4 just as passionately, largely because of Yosuke; he's a good-hearted but slightly shitty disaster of a teenage boy who's helplessly in love with the protagonist, and I find him endlessly endearing.

8. Severance. I've always been compelled by stories about weird things happening to people's memories, and by stories about people developing intense relationships while isolated together, so Severance is essentially the perfect canon for me. By a long way, it's the most gripping show I've ever watched. I'm so nervous when I sit down for a new episode; I never know what to expect!

9. Taskmaster. What a show. It makes me laugh like nothing else. The way it keeps a single set of contestants for each series adds a lot to the experience; you really get to know the contestants and their approaches to these ridiculous tasks over the course of a series. The New Zealand and Australian versions are just as great to watch; Greg Davies remains an unparalleled Taskmaster, but, if I'm honest, Paul Williams is my favourite assistant.

Wait, that's only nine! Okay, I'm going to add a tenth, but this is definitely cheating:

10. Death Note. I absolutely did not first experience Death Note between 2020 and 2024; I've enjoyed it since 2008! But I feel it sort of fits in my 'canons of the last five years' post because I got back into it in 2023 in a way I'd never been into it before. I watched the stage musical, absolutely lost my mind and spent months thinking about nothing but Light Yagami. Let's say the tenth canon here is Death Note: The Musical.

Honourable mention to The Quarry for the burst of intense ficwriting it inspired in me! I wasn't that drawn in by the canon itself, but the potential in Travis and Laura's relationship really grabbed me by the throat.

EDIT: WAIT, I just thought of a legitimate number ten!

10-2: Die Hard. We were locked down for Christmas in 2020, and I was sorry that I couldn't visit my family, but the upside was that I joined in my housemates' Christmas tradition of watching Die Hard. This film was such a delightful surprise for me! I went in expecting a badass, stoic action hero; I got a desperate, terrified mess. I found John McClane's suffering so compelling. What a blast.

The annual threesentenceficathon is currently underway! It's always a lively event.

The second prompt post has just opened; you can find it over here if you want to leave some prompts, or you can poke through the first prompt post in search of inspiration. (The title of this post comes from the fact that there are always a surprising number of Narnia incest prompts, but it isn't intended as a dig at all; I'm glad the Narnia fandom is having a good time!) The three-sentence limit isn't a strict one; you're free to go over.

Below the cut, I've shared my fills from this year's Three-Sentence Ficathon so far. Fandoms: Aladdin, Death Note, Uncharted, Lost, Community.


( Three-Sentence Ficathon fills from 2024. )


While I'm at it, here are a few fills from earlier years that I never posted here. Fandoms: Danganronpa, Final Fantasy VII, The Politician.


( Three-Sentence Ficathon fills from previous years. )


I might as well also share a Taskmaster drabble I haven't posted to this journal before:


( Taskmaster UK/Taskmaster NZ, Greg Davies and Paul Williams, 100 words. )


And that's all for now! You should all go over to the current prompt post and leave lots of prompts for my fandoms your fandoms.

Taskmaster NZ is back!! I'm so pleased. I'd genuinely struggle to say whether I prefer the New Zealand version or the original UK one; Greg Davies is a much stronger Taskmaster, but Paul Williams might be my favourite assistant, and the NZ version frequently has such great tasks.

Paul Williams went through a lot in the first episode of series four, which bodes extremely well for the rest of the series. I'm sorry, Paul; I love you, but in the scary 'I really want to see this guy get fucked up' way I love my favourite fictional characters.

I wonder what it'd be like if Taskmaster UK and Taskmaster NZ swapped assistants for an episode. It'd be a relaxing holiday for Alex, although I think he'd miss the abuse. Paul, meanwhile, would have a terrifying experience; Greg would eat him alive.

I don't think I've mentioned the Australian version here before, but Taskmaster AU is also worth a watch! Only one season so far, but the tasks are great fun and it has a strong opening cast; Nina and Julia in particular are both fantastic contestants. Nina is an endearingly enthusiastic disaster, and Julia, clearly having a great time, is a wildcard who swings wildly between 'barely making an effort' and 'committing to an alarming extent'.

Tom Gleeson is the Taskmaster for the Australian version, and he's good at it. I prefer Greg, but Gleeson has enough presence, quick wit and delight in messing with the contestants to feel suited to the role.

Tom Cashman doesn't quite have the quality I'm looking for in a Taskmaster's assistant. I can envision him having a normal life when the cameras are turned off, which doesn't entirely seem right; Alex and Paul both feel weird all the way through. But Cashman is solid enough, and he occasionally can't hold back his laughter when a contestant is being particularly disastrous, which I find endearing.


On an entirely different note, Tem and I have started playing Master Detective Archives: Rain Code!

We're not far in - we've only just entered the first labyrinth - but so far it feels like a sort of blend of Danganronpa and AI: The Somnium Files, with all the tonal irreverance and horniness that that implies. We've cheerfully embraced this.

Game: More DP means a higher Detective Rank!
Tem: That's why Columbo always looks so scruffy.

Shinigami: We exchanged an intimate, secret pact, just between us.
Riona: Did we fuck the ghost?
Tem: It does feel like we fucked the ghost.
Shinigami: What? You've forgotten all about how we were so passionately bound together?
Tem: We fucked the ghost.

Oh, no, this game has quick-time events? I'm fine with these in Playstation games, but I don't know the Switch button layout off the top of my head! I never really thought about how important it is to be familiar with the controller for these things; 'X is down, triangle is up, square is left, circle is right' is second nature for me, but of course that won't be the case for everyone.

The first quick-time event glitched somehow, and the prompt was only on screen for maybe an eighth of a second. I thought the game was intentionally presenting an impossible QTE as a joke about how silly QTEs are.

We've got into the habit of announcing 'Master Detective!' at the screen whenever one of the Master Detectives states the obvious. This is not an infrequent occurrence.

Every character name in this game is absolutely ludicrous. 'Zilch Alexander' is a particular standout. Although it's not quite on the level of the Death Note: Another Note light novel, which featured characters named Beyond Birthday, Quarter Queen and Backyard Bottomslash. (And those are only the ones I remembered off the top of my head. Looking those names up to confirm I'd got them right, I found I'd somehow forgotten about Believe Bridesmaid and Blues-harp Babysplit.)

Last night I dreamt I was a Taskmaster contestant. I went to the Taskmaster house on a day I wasn't filming, for some reason, and found Alex sitting outside it. 'Oh, I'm so sorry, am I interrupting filming?' I asked. Alex said, 'Well, yes, but only in a very small way.' We chatted for a short while, and then one of the other contestants emerged from another part of the garden and announced to Alex, with an air of accomplishment, 'I've killed them all.'

In fact, while I'm thinking about dreams, I'm going to drop some of my other dream notes into this entry, so they don't get lost if something happens to my phone.

This is mainly for my own benefit, of course; I realise that other people's dreams aren't that interesting to most people! You're welcome to read if you're curious, though. One of the dreams is a bit dubcon, so I'll include a warning before that one.


( Archiving a handful of dreams. )


Happy new year! Sorry for kicking it off with a post that's solely of interest to me.

We've torn through all the Taskmaster in existence, alas! I'll miss this ridiculous show, but at least there's more to come.


( Rambling about series ten and eleven of Taskmaster. )


There are over a hundred episodes of Taskmaster, and somehow it still isn't enough. If I could trade episodes of other shows for more Taskmaster, there would be no other shows left.

(What if sacrificing episodes of other shows resulted in episodes of Taskmaster where the characters of that show competed? I'd love to see the Red Dwarf boys on Taskmaster. Rimmer accuses every task of discrimination for requiring a corporeal body. He might not be wrong, but he's still not going to get any points.)

'Riona, how's your resolution not to read Taskmaster fanfiction going?'

We don't need to talk about that. Let's just talk about Taskmaster instead.


( Talking about Taskmaster (mainly series eight), and only very slightly talking about Taskmaster fanfiction. )


We're two episodes into series nine, and it's making me laugh more than series eight did, but that's not an indictment of series eight, which still made me laugh a lot! There's so much debate over which series of Taskmaster are better than others, but it feels like a pointless distinction to make when they range from 'I'm laughing enough to give myself a headache' at the high end of the scale to 'I'm merely having a great time' at the low end.

th_esaurus sent me this Taskmaster fanvid and I could not process any of it, including the parts I'd seen before. Why is this light entertainment game show so kinky??? I'm not complaining, necessarily, but I'm very confused.

More notes on Taskmaster! We've just finished series seven.


( Notes on Taskmaster, mainly series five and seven. )


Finally, here is perhaps the best exchange I've ever heard in an interview (source):

Russell Howard: So, if the world came to an end, what would be your biggest regret?
Greg Davies: Every winter, when it first goes cold, I pull a muscle in my left shoulder, and I'm reminded of the fact that when I was thirteen I tried to suck my own cock.

I haven't written a post flat-out advertising a canon in years, but I'm having so much fun with Taskmaster and I want everyone else to have fun as well!

I've really missed comedy. I had no idea how much I'd missed comedy. I hadn't watched any panel shows in years, and it never occurred to me that this was a void in my life. Yes, I had a great time in my passionate panel show fandom days, but I didn't feel I was suffering from any sort of comedy deficiency.

And then th_esaurus introduced me to Taskmaster.

And it turns out that laughter is great.

Taskmaster is a British panel/game show in which five celebrities compete in a series of ridiculous tasks. Their efforts are judged by Greg Davies, the Taskmaster.

So long as the contestants stay within the rules specified, they can use any tools available to complete the task. The tools available generally include Alex Horne, the Taskmaster's assistant. Horne is extremely unhelpful if you ask him to clarify the task, but will do just about anything you request.

This is perhaps the root of how astonishingly horny the fandom is. I'm not planning to get into Taskmaster RPF (I think my RPF days are behind me, although they made me some great friends!), but th_esaurus sent me the list of the ten most-used additional tags for Taskmaster works on AO3, and I'd never seen anything like it. In my experience, the most-used additional tag for any fandom on AO3 is almost invariably 'fluff'. For Taskmaster, 'fluff' is nowhere in sight; the most-used tag is 'dom/sub'. (Also in the top ten: 'humiliation', 'obedience', 'restraints' and 'painplay'.)

Anyway! I'm glad the fans are having fun, but I'm not into Taskmaster because it's erotic; I'm into Taskmaster because it is hilarious. I'm watching it with my household now, and we've had to pause episodes because we were all laughing too hard to keep going. It's proved particularly good to watch when we're upset; it's fun and engaging enough to be distracting, without demanding the level of focus that fiction does.

We started out on series twelve, and we've now jumped back to watch from the beginning, which is sort of fascinating. I'd expected to find the show had changed substantially over the course of its twelve series, but the format is almost exactly the same; the only major difference is that the present-day episodes are socially distanced, for obvious reasons. And I'd thought the 'Alex will do any bullshit you ask him to' aspect might take a few series to manifest - I'd envisioned that maybe one contestant would test the limits of what you can request after a while, and then others would pick up on that - but as early as episode two he's being forced to eat a hot toothpaste pie.

One interesting thing about Taskmaster is that each series focuses on a single group of contestants across five to ten episodes, so you have time to get to know the contestants and their approach to tasks, and they have time to get to know each other. Different groups can have very different dynamics. The series twelve team are very friendly and supportive with each other! The series one team are incredibly cutthroat.

Taskmaster is a Channel 4 show, and it's available on All 4, if you have access to that. If you're looking for something engaging and ridiculous, I recommend it! Series twelve involves Victoria Coren Mitchell, which is how th_esaurus managed to hook me in, and she's great on it. (Well, she's terrible, but in a great way.)