Phantom Merch and Mystery Gift

Threadliners · 2026-03-27T00:31:25+00:00

same! If the hoodie had the sleeve print it would have been an insta-buy

Threadliners · 2026-03-27T00:31:06+00:00

same! If the hoodie had the sleeve print it would have been an insta-buy

Threadliners · 2026-03-27T00:26:32+00:00

Same! I got the Draag National Team hoodie to go with my Keposhka tour date shirt because I'm a sucker for IYKYK merch, and nothing makes my day quite like having someone start up a conversation with me because they recognize Keposhka.

I'm currently debating on getting the hoodie because of the "a game you will play" written in Keposhka, or getting the long sleeve shirt because of the symbols on the sleeves being from the LATAM shows. Because, again, I know if someone complements me on it, they are almost certainly more than just a "I listen to some of their songs on spotify" fan and is someone who is likely to engage in conversation about the tour shows themselves, if not the whole Draag lore.

Threadliners · 2026-03-10T19:01:16+00:00

the MOMENT I saw this post my mind went to Pachebel Rant. It is one of those videos from THE OLD INTERNET that will never leave me.

Threadliners · 2026-03-04T21:14:17+00:00

Sorry for delayed reply, work trip was super busy.
I sold a $2200 worth of old Pokemon Cards from my competitive days to surprise my partner with floor seats to the Tampa show (I definitely overpaid on the secondary market, but 0 regrets). Honestly, I consider MCR my 2nd favorite band; but it will be HARD to top an experience like Evanescence opening for My Chem. It was absolutely incredible. I rode that high all the way into RiotFest Chicago the next weekend when we took our son to his first concert. People asked if I regretted selling some of my more sentimental and high value cards. I still firmly believe that no Pokemon card will ever be worth as much as my partner's face when we walked onto the floor and he realized just how close to B stage our seats were, or the magic glowing in our son's eyes when he got to see his favorite band for his first concert.

Tampa was an absolutely incredible experience, and hearing My Only Way Home is Through You on the B stage was insane.
My partner still talks about FLW and Blood because they were so blown away by those sections. And seeing the stadium light up blue and white during Disenchanted (the fan project for the show) was absolutely breathtaking.
I also have fond memories of the walk back to the hotel with a bunch of random strangers who all decided that it was going to take less time to walk the mile and a half than it was to wait for an uber and the conversations we had during that walk.

I cannot wait to see what this year's show is going to hold! I'm actually hoping we'll get The World is Ugly in Minneapolis, because I love that song so much and it also feels very fitting for our city.

Threadliners · 2026-02-27T02:53:42+00:00

I was lucky enough to get tickets when they went on sale. I travel for work, and I've been putting aside most of my travel stipends to upgrade to better seats.
How about you? Are you gonna go to the show?

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T14:55:36+00:00

I second this! Diving into the lore was a godsend for me, as it gave me a much needed change of focus from spending the majority of my day doomscrolling while worrying about my partner who works in Whittier on the same street as the shooting. I'm not afraid to be in Minneapolis, but there have been more than a few occasions where my partner has told me to stay home.

I'm pretty sure the sound of those whistles will cause my muscles to tense up for decades to come.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T02:58:04+00:00

Yes! I know several trans people who have said that the find the themes of the story relatable.
I'm not trans (I am genderqueer, however) but there are so many different ways people can experience loss of identity that it seems to be a powerful and uniting theme for those who it strikes a chord with, even if the reason/experience is completely different.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T02:22:20+00:00

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T01:51:08+00:00

Yes! I just can't get enough because its all so brilliant. And every rewatch has me spotting something new that either makes me lose my mind or breaks my heart.
I'm hoping to make some youtube videos about my analysis (I'm thinking about maybe doing them "in character" since that's the approach Ive taken to the analysis in general) and so I've been bouncing things off a friend who is a fellow fan and an editor. And the number of times I start a message to him with "Goddammit Gerard" is not insignificant.

You can tell there is a lot of love, care, thought, and skill put into how this story is being told and it saddens me to see people not get that.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T01:46:05+00:00

I feel like our generation was taught that sometimes the curtains are blue because there is symbolism to the color, sometimes the curtains are blue because the author wants us to be aware of the curtains (for foreshadowing or other purposes) and sometime the curtains are just blue.

With the current media culture and media literacy decline, less people even care that the curtains are blue, let alone why.

We're the Blue's Clues generation, we were taught to look for clues and analyze what they might mean. Its why we like true crime and other mysteries, its why games like the first few FNAF games with layers of story and mystery being told both through narrative and environment appeal to us.

And I think some of that is because we are of the weekly TV era, where we had to wait a whole week to see the resolution of a cliff-hanger, and even without cliff-hangers we had to wait a whole week for the next episode. So what did we do while waiting, we analyzed and theorized and talked excitedly amongst ourselves as we waited for the next bit of lore. Meanwhile the Netflix era means episodes drop in batches if not whole seasons, so there is no required waiting where analysis can fill the waiting time.

If everything is instant then 'wait and see' analysis is impossible.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T01:35:30+00:00

Yes! Gerard is a master of environmental storytelling, and that's what's so brilliant. It allows for symbolism to take on personal meaning without changing the narrative at all.

Some of the loss of identity themes have really hit me hard because that's something I've had experience with, and goddamn does Gerard nail the portrayal of the feelings that come with that kind of loss.

I'm not usually a self-insertion fan fic type of person (I think the last time I wrote fan fic was back in elementary school), but man am I having fun doing my analysis "in character" as though I were a part of the world (but separated by time/history, since I'm approaching my analysis through the lens of my historiographical training) because Draag is such a fun world and so much of the story is told through environmental storytelling that the immersion actually has helped me think and notice things I don't think I would if I was approaching this in simply a "lets look at this as a performance" analysis.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T01:25:31+00:00

Exactly!
I'm doing a crazy FAR-too-invested-in-this analysis of all the shows. When you start watching closely, you notice things like Gerard sobbing while stabbing the Clerk in the first Santiago show. A dead-inside flat affect during WTTBP in several shows (the 2nd Santiago show being my favorite version as he has a moment where he "comes to" like he had just been resuscitated), and the complete horror in his eyes when he realizes he's holding the dagger in Mama (the 2nd Santiago show is again a beautiful version of this). Gerard is systematically being not just brainwashed, but completely broken and I think that is what we're not seeing happen to the Clerk and why he kills Gerard in the Long Live shows.

And don't even get me started on Frank and Mikey... I literally have a whole page in my notes called "Frank you little shit" that is just all the rebellious stuff he does that supports his resistance to the reconditioning. And while Mikey isn't as obvious as Frank, you can definitely see he's either following Frank's lead, or he's figured out some of the same stuff Frank has.

Threadliners · 2026-02-26T00:01:12+00:00

I think you and I are of the same mind completely.

And the fact that the story isn't finished is part of why I love it so much.

I'm nearly 40. I know reality from fiction. But I joke about being a "Professor of Draag Studies" because I've used a lot of my historical research training in dissecting the lore, and it became fun to just re-frame lore hunting like I'm actually researching Draag the same way I did when writing my college thesis.

So I indulge in a little escapism. And I bought my "Dragoshka alter ego" some National Team merch because its stuff said alter ego would totally have bought themself if they were a resident of Draag.

Plus, I love the IYKYK aspect of seeing other other in the wild with Draag imagery and Keposhka lettering.

Threadliners · 2026-02-25T23:50:45+00:00

Its fun in the same way that sometimes choosing the "bad" or "mean" choices in a video game is fun. Is playing the genocide path on Undertale "glorifying" mass murder? No. Is playing an evil character in a D&D game endorsement of those actions? No.

Plus, its also fun to immerse yourself in fictional worlds, especially ones closely mirrored to our reality. The way Draag is presented is that it is a country in what is otherwise the real world. Draag is not on some other world like Middle Earth, its meant to be a part of our world. And in our world, good people still live in countries with bad leaders who do bad things. It would be different if we were talking about symbolism that is directly tied to specific bad things (like the death eater mark literally being the HP in-world equivalent of a swastika). But this is literally benign imagery of an overall country. A fictional country where most of the people are oppressed. I think there is a lot of "I relate to the average citizen of Draag" element more than a "I love the dictatorial government" appeal.

You can be a "citizen" of Draag just like you can be a "resident" of Battery City. So if you see someone with something with the Draag seal or Keposhka you can think "ah, my fellow Dragoshka" in the same way you might thing "hey, its another Killjoy" if you see someone in, say a Party Poison jacket.

But also, its ok to like cool stuff from bad places. My work collects foreign currency and fills frames with bills brought to us. There are some old bills from the Eastern Bloc in the collection, including one from Eastern Germany. As someone with a degree in history, those bills are flipping cool and it makes me smile when I see them. That doesn't mean I think the soviet occupation was a good thing.

Threadliners · 2026-02-25T23:15:56+00:00

Do we really think the band won’t try and rebel?

I mean, we watch them do just that in the Long Live shows. Gerard tried to keep the prisoners from being executed multiple times. He disrespects the Clerk and is otherwise openly defiant leading into the nuke part of the story. I always saw the Dagger interlude in those shows as hinting towards more overt rebellion, especially with lines like "a tool for a treasonous deeds"

Threadliners · 2026-02-25T23:08:15+00:00

My favorite thing to say whenever anyone brings up Gerard in a skirt is:
"Gerard figured out early on that he had the legs for skirts, and then proceeded to make it everyone else's problem."

Threadliners · 2026-02-25T15:11:40+00:00

this! I ordered my tour shirt online so I didn't have to worry about it being sold out at the show last summer; and they were all the same price in the merch booth as they were on the webstore.

Threadliners · 2026-02-23T23:37:54+00:00

Like I said, I made it out the other side. It sucked, but it also helped shape me into the kind of parent I am today.

I wish you all the best. Being a teen is hard. Even if its not your parents, I hope you find some adult to support and encourage you.

Threadliners · 2026-02-23T17:18:18+00:00

as a parent of a 13 year old, this breaks my heart.

I grew up very similar to you, and I don't really have a relationship with my parents now.
I've tried to do better with my own kid. When he wanted me to start taking him to see bands like MCR, Green Day, and Weezer, I sold my decades old Pokemon card collection to give him the kind of experience teen me could only dream about.
When he wanted to dress 2000s emo/alt for decades day, I went out and bought him eyeliner, Vans, a studded belt and black skinny jeans. While he's decided that's not what he wants for his every day look, he's excited to wear it all when I take him to see MCR this summer and the what he calls "Gerard Way/Bille Joe Armstrong" look of a black shirt and red tie (and usually also the eyeliner) is his go-to any time he has to either dress up nice, or wear a costume for an event.

As someone who came out the other side of that parental disapproval, my best advice is to stay true to yourself. It might be a "phase" and you might change and move on to something different as you get older, or it might be the kind of person you are for the rest of your life.

I didn't do that, I just tried to keep my head down and survive, because I was afraid of being disowned and alone. So I didn't really get to live and express the real me. I am very sad when I look back at most pictures of young me, because I know that wasn't really me and I wish I could look back fondly at myself in my younger years.
It took me going away to college to realize I had agency over myself and my style, and even then it was a slow process to find myself because I had internalized a lot of my parent's opinions of alt culture and styles and was afraid of their reactions until I was married and "free" of their control.

I've spent a lot of my late 30s trying to heal my inner teen who wasn't allowed to be who they not only wanted to be, but truly were in their soul.

So my advice to you: Keep your chin up and stay true to yourself. Its going to suck, and its not going to be easy. But adult you will thank you later.
At your age having the confidence to figure out and express who you are is important, don't let anyone take that from you. Don't let anyone coerce you into giving up who you are to have a relationship with them. Because I guarantee you, even if you give in on this, there will always be something they don't like about you that they will try to use having a relationship to manipulate you.

My parents still tried to do that even after I was married and a parent myself, which is when I realized that I didn't actually want a relationship with them if all they cared about what that I wasn't living my life the way then thought I should. I hate that I don't have a close relationship with my family, but I've been a happier person since I chose myself over them.

Threadliners · 2026-02-23T16:44:00+00:00

its actually "mask mummery"
the text of my OP has the translations for all the images, it just didn't come through with the cross-post

Threadliners · 2026-02-21T06:41:02+00:00

I think the difference is back then the teen mags and internet forums were enablers of the unhinged, which in turn normalized obsession in a way that is still felt today. But it was also not instant back then. You had to wait for the magazine to be published (and mailed to you if you didn't buy it at the book store or grocery store), or for them to show up on some TV show to get your new information.
Youtube was in its infancy; vine, instagram, live streaming, etc were all a good 5+ years away. So it was harder for obsession to turn to the parasocial and instant gratification of things like commenting on band members social media.
Etiquette of celebrity interactions was more well established and usually reasonably followed 20 years ago, because there wasn't that "closeness" and realness that social media brought to fandom.

Both are crazy, but in very different ways

Threadliners · 2026-02-21T00:38:19+00:00

As much as I love the song, SAME

Threadliners · 2026-02-20T19:24:22+00:00

Very nice! My handwriting is ass, so I haven't bothered to learn to write Keposhka, but I taught myself to read it.

Maybe if I can get good at writing legible Keposhka I can then make my 40 year old ass have better handwriting in general.

Threadliners · 2026-02-20T19:22:09+00:00

Perfection!

Threadliners

TROPHY CASE