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sasaranurude · 8 days

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Okay. I've been playing Tokyo Debunker today, since the release happened to catch me on a day when all I'd planned to do was write fanfiction. I just finished reading the game story prologue (it was longer than expected!), so here's a review type post. If you're reading this post not having seen a single thing about this game: it's a story-based joseimuke gacha mobile game that just released globally today. It's about a girl who suddenly finds herself attending a magic school and mingling with elite, superhuman students known as ghouls. If you look in the tumblr tag for the game you'll see what appears to be a completely different game from 2019 or so: they retooled it completely midway through development, changing just about everything about it due to "escalating competition within the gaming industry."

I'll talk about how this looks like a blatant twst clone at the end.

Starting with the positive: The story is charming. I enjoyed it thoroughly the entire time and am excited to read more. The mix between visual novel segments and motion comics was really nice--it broke things up and added a lot of oomph to the action or atmospheric scenes that visual novels generally lack. I like the art in the comic parts a lot. the live2d in the visual novel parts is... passable. Tone-wise, I think the story was a little bit all over the place and would like to see more of the horror that it opened on, but I didn't mind the comedic direction it went in either. The translation is completely seamless. The characters so far all have unique voices and are just super fun and cute. Of the ones who've had larger roles in the story so far, there's not a single one I dislike. It's all fully voiced in Japanese and the acting is solid. (I don't recognize any voices, and can't seem to find any seiyuu credits, so it seems they're not big names, but they deliver nonetheless.) Kaito in particular I found I was laughing at his lines a ton, both the voicing and the writing.

He's looking for a girlfriend btw. Spreading the word.

The problem is like. The gameplay is the worst dark-pattern microtransaction-riddled bullshit I've ever seen. Hundred passive timers going at all times. Fifty different item-currencies. Trying to get you to spend absurd amounts of real world money at every turn. There's like five different indicators that take you to various real-money shop items that I don't know how to dismiss the indicator, I guess you just have to spend money, wtaf. Bajillion different interlocking systems mean you have zero sense of relative value of all the different item-currencies. I did over the course of the day get enough diamonds for one ten-pull, which I haven't used yet. Buying enough diamonds for a ten-pull costs a bit under $60 (presumably USD, but there's a chance the interface is automatically making that CAD for me--not gonna spend the money to check lmfao), with an SSR rate of 1%. BULLSHIIIIIT.

There's like a goddamn thousand-word essay explaining the dozen different types of character upgrades and equippables and equippables for the equippables!! Bad! Bad game design! That's just overcomplicating bullshit to trick people into thinking they're doing something other than clicking button to make number go up! That is not gameplay!

In terms of the actual gameplay, there is none. The battle system is full auto. There might be teambuilding, but from what I've seen so far, most of that consists of hoping you pull good cards from gacha and then clicking button to make number go up. There's occasional rhythm segments but there's no original music, it's just remixes of public domain classical music lmao. I'd describe the rhythm gameplay as "at least more engaging than twisted wonderland's," which is not a high bar

At least there's a cat in the rhythm bit.

And like, ok, I gotta remark on how derivative it is. Like I mentioned in my post earlier, this game is unabashedly aping twisted wonderland's setting and aesthetic. (That said, most of the stuff it steals from twst is magic school stuff that twst also basically stole from Harry Potter, so...?) However, it isn't exactly like twst: in this one, the characters say fuck a lot and bleed all over the place and do violence. Basically, the tone is a fair bit more adult than twst's kid-friendly vibe. (Not, like, adult adult, and I probably wouldn't even call it dark--it's still rated Teen lol. Just more adult than twst.)

Rather than just being students at magic school, the ghouls also go out into the mundane world to go on missions where they fight and investigate monsters and cryptids. Honestly, the magic school setting feels pretty tacked-on. The things that are enjoyable about this would've been just as enjoyable in about any other setting--you can tell this whole aspect was a late trend-chasing addition, lmao. So, yeah, it's blatantly copying twst to try to steal some players, but... Eh, I found myself not caring that much. Someone more (or less) into twst than me may find it grating.

Character-wise, eh, sure, yeah, they're a bit derivative in that aspect too, but it's a joseimuke game, the characters are always derivative. Thus far the writing & execution has been solid enough that I didn't care if they were tropey. If I were to compare it to something else, I'd say the relationship between the protagonist and the ghouls feels more like that of the sage and wizards in mahoyaku than anything from twst. There's some mystery in exactly what "ghouls" are and their place in this world that has me intrigued and wanting to know more about this setting and how each of the characters feels about it. I have a bad habit of getting my hopes up for stories that put big ideas on the table and then being disappointed when they don't follow through in a way that lives up to my expectations, though.

So, my final verdict: I kind of just hope someone uploads all the story segments right onto youtube so nobody has to deal with the dogshit predatory game to get the genuinely decent story lol. Give it a play just for the story if you have faith in your ability to resist dark patterns. Avoid at all costs if you know you're vulnerable to gacha, microtransactions, or timesinks.

#suchobabbles #Tokyo Debunker #it's a global simultaneous release so I'm curious to see how it ends up doing in Japan #it's gonna be competing directly with stellarium of the fragile star which releases in a few days lmao. and is about a magic alchemy school #looks like the two games twt accounts have a similar number of followers #and then theyre competing with bremai releasing in may...#also adding this at the very end since i cant confirm anything:#but i found out abt this game bc it was rt'd by the former localization director/translator of A3en #i dont know if she worked on it or maybe her friend or maybe shes just hype! who knows! but i think her word (or rt) is worth something

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popculturebuffet · 5 months

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Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes Retrospective Part 1: Breakout (Episodes 1-7) (Comissioned by WeirdKev27)

Assemble all you happy people and welcome to the first of many looks at one of the greatest cartoons in marvel history, an adaptation that honors the source material while streamlining and improving it to create something impressive. One of the best adaptations and one of the last before the MCU was in full force. It's a show unlike any other, it's Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

And the timing isn't concidential. While i'm a few months off, this year marks the 60th anniversary of the avengers, the first time the team assembled and hulk was a clown for a bit because the 60s. And since I both hadn't really talked about the Avengers on this blog despite being a massive marvel nerd and because i'd rewatched this very arc a few months back, I was happy to jump on it when Kev suggested this. He won't be sticking around for the rest of the retrospective, but I plan to cover this series on and off for the foreseable future as i've only seen about half of it and hadn't rewatched it in years and it was about damn time I did. And i'm glad I am as this is one of the sharpest shows in marvel history.

For those less familiar Earth's Mightiest heroes was a cartoon that ran for two seasons from 2010 to 2012, and was a fan faviorite for most comic nerds like myself, as what I caught of it I love. It's not hard to see why either: EMH is a giant love letter to the Avengers history and Marvel in general: Ciro Nireli, Christopher Yost and Joshua fine, who developed the show, all were clearly fans and thus try to cram as many iconic foes for each of the avengers as they could into this show, from cameos to arc villians to our big threats, just about every major avengers threat you could want makes it's way into season 1.

It's also a smart remix: The show takes after the earliest days of the team, starting with the original roster of Iron Man (Tony Stark), Ant-Man/Giant Man (Hank Pym), Wasp (Janet-Van Dyne), Hulk, and Thor (Odinson), while soon adding cap as happened in the comics, as well as adding longtime mainstays hawkeye and black panther soon into the season, with many of season 1's episodes adapting early avengers tales and the art style is a very stylistic jack kirby style art, while still being it's own thing with a bit more expression and some anime styling in the eyes and how the action unfolds.

That said it's clear the crew was also aware those early tales could use a coat of paint and thus the series takes from all across the heroes histories, combining Kang's first apperance with the later epic kang dynasty for instance, or setting up Carol Danvers becoming Ms Marvel as soon as Captain Marvel debuts. It's a streamlined approach that feels like what the ultimates should've been: honoring the past but looping in the present, with the classic avengers being assembled using the breakout arc from the new avengers. More ont hat later. The result is a fresh take on the cast that feels awesome.

It also feels unique as this was before a LOT of change swept through the marvel universe and productions: the x-men and the ff still show up beofre their LONG unecessary hiatus due to marvel being dicks about not owning either's film rights, the mcu was just budding so only iron man is modeled after that version as Cap and Thor's films would air the same year as EMH, and Black Widow is a recurring character rather than part of the team, though it was hinted they might have her join up eventually.

It also happened before a lot of comics biggest events of the 2010s, which like the MCU stuff isn't bad at all, it's just neat to see just how diffrent things were: Carol Danvers wasn't captain marvel yet, next gen heroes like Ms Marvel or Miles Morales weren't around, and ideas like Jane as Thor or Sam Wilson as Cap hadn't happened. It's an intresting time capusle of a comics brand before it changed forever.

So opening this capusle is a treat. As for this batch of episodes, EMH started in a unique way: With shorts. See at the time cartoons were just starting to captalize on the concepts of minisodes, tiny shorts in continuity usually distributed via youtube. Most shows just have some skits, like Lapis trying to destroy her phone thinking Steven's trapped or Tilly Green getting buried in cats

EMH decided to get ambitious with theres: TWENTY shorts, all from what I can tell intended to be repackaged as full episodes, all setting up important stuff for the series and serving as introductions to our main cast before they all assemble properly, including later additions Captain America, Hawkeye and Black Panther.

It's an approach I respect: much like the MCU was doing around the same time, it allows the writers to set up each character, get to know who they are as a person, what their deal is and put them into place for the series proper, essentially giving them their own solo series like they had in the comics. It's a great idea and makes these feel like characters who had their own lives and plenty of adventures BEFORE we step into them, and makes the idea of them coming together all the more awesome. It also fits the avengers well: the x-men and fantastic four are largely their own spheres of the marvel universe and most members of those teams were created for them. With the avengers it's marvels' best and brightest all assembled into one massive dream team, so showing said team's adventures. We even get setup for later additions to the team: Black Panther gets a short detailing his origin story and Hawkeye is a key part of hulks before getting his own.

I have only two gripes with this setup: the first is that it's long. It's well done and important but it's still a LOT of setup, and both times i've found myself happy to get to the end: Glad I took the journey but thankful we can get to the main event.

The other is the structure: as a result of them being shorts every non-thor episode here has one segment that serves as an epilogue to the others.. but really dosen't lead as effortlessly in. It feels like the episode ended and we're now just in an extended post credit's sequence. Not a bad one, all of these are necessary and important, it just shows why this type of structure wasn't repeated: it has it's limits, and they show at the end of almost every episode. You could for instance cut out the kang bit that starts the cap one and the kang segment that ends the cap ones and have a cohesive story. Their still GOOD shorts, it's just clear they don't quite work as a cohesive episode, which woudln't be an issue if these shorts also weren't clearly part of the season order.

Still I admit these are minor complaints. They drag the presentation down slightly.. but not enough for me to not have enjoyed this episode pile. So assemble under the cut as I break down the first 7 episodes of Avengers: EMH

Iron Man is Born! (Micro Episodes: Iron Man is Born!, HYDRA Lives, Behold, The Mandroids!, and Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.)

So our first episode. .is third on disney+. Getting this out of the way if you watch these on disney +, start with this one, as disney mildly messed up the airing order. It isn't as bad as say Ducktales was at first, which was so bad the creators had to ask directly, but it's still very noticable disney coudln't be arsed to.. move two episodes on the list they gave people down a few slots. Then again this is the same company who won't give us the weekenders dammit, so i'm not surprised, just mildly in convinced.

Anyways this short follows Iron Man and as we go through our mightiest heroes, I thought it'd be fun to give my own personal history with each character. As I said, I really haven't gotten to dive into the avengers on this blog. I've covered Avengers #200 and Avengers Annual #10 this year but the former is more a Brotherhood of Evil Mutants story guest starring Ms Marvel and the Avengers, and the former.. is a nightmare from which there is no waking where only The Scarlet Witch and the Vision are remotely in character. Neither were really a time to talk about the team, the members of said team, or anything besides deep hurting and an antidote for said deep hurting that involves Carol Danvers verbally bitchslapping the avengers. Which is awesome, but not really a time to go "Gee this is why iron man is so great".

So starting with the cool exec with a heart of steel, I'm a pretty big iron man fan. I love Tony as a character a guy whose arrogant and overly macho at times.. but deep down is a man who just wants to make a better world after helping burn it to the ground for a profit. Someone who can be an arrogant know it all ass.. but also someone who once you've got his loyalty, he'd die for you. A man struggling with addiction, but whose also a poster boy for getting better.

I became a fan of Tony's around the movie, as before that I only really knew him as "that guy who was on spider-man once", "that weird cartoon I watched once or twice" or "That fucking asshole who ruled the superhero community with an iron fist and kicked every dog he could find post civil war".

Thankfully the movie changed that, and along with finding out his fascinating history and the utterly awesome run by Matt Fraction that launched alongside the movie, something I badly want to cover in some form at some point, I was a fan of shell head for life. My favorite runs for him aren't anything suprising: Fraction's run with invincible iron man, Dennis O'Neil's awesome epic run that sees Obdiah Stane break tony with every intention of having his enemy relapse and see's tony rebuild himself while Rhodey puts on the suit, and of course the classic Layton and Michillne run that introduced Tony's Alcholism in the first place.

The movie is important to this series as it not only launched the MCU, but said MCU incoming is likely why it happened, and while it was still young enough at the time to not impact this series heavily for most characters, that wasn't going to happen with tony. Tony, his CFO Pepper and his best friend and military liaison Rhodey, are all heavily modeled after the movie versions. That said given said versions are entirley accurate to the comics and all the MCU did to Tony was give him even more swagger.. this isn't remotely a bad thing and making sure kids had the iron man they were familiar with dosen't hurt the series. The suit's still more designed after the then current bleeding edge suit from the comic, one of my favorites. I have no issue with using stuff from the MCU, the mcu is mostly great. My issue is when latter stuff kinda.. ignores the comics except to bring in more people to punch.

Iron Man is Born gets tony down pat, in large part thanks to his VA, Eric Loomis. To my shock Loomis hasn't done a ton outside of play tony in this show and various video games but damn if few do it better. He gets the swagger, the desire to do better, and the stubborn ass refusal to let people help him down PERFECT, as does the writing. This is tony stark. Leading with him was also smart given, again the movie would be fresh on everyone's mind.

What's also neat about this one is it dosen't put tony up against any familiar foes. We'll still see some in Breakout and like the other heroes here he's already well experienced by the time the series opens up. The only thing close to it is Ultimo, a giant robot he fights in cell phone footage at the start of the episode, and even then that's just to establish Iron Man Slaps.

No instead it sells Tony's obession with his tech not hurting people by putting him up against some HYDRA robots using his tech. For those less familiar with marvel stuff, HYDRA are a bunch of snake themed nazi offshoots who are everywhere and generally the go too mook to punch in the face in the marvel universe. Who dosen't want to punch a snake nazi? Except bob. He's just there for dental. Oh bob.

The fight with said HYDRA bots is awesome: not only are they well designed, but it's classic iron man stuff: his suit running out of power, and tony having to use his brains, and hold out against his suit rapidly draining. Been used before? Sure. Helps establish how Tony fights and how his suit is both super strong and has a logical weakness in battery life? Yup.

And the best part is.. while HYDRA are his main threat... the real conflict simmering underneath this one.. is Stark vs S.H.I.E.L.D. the world's top super cops and shady assholes. Wether their being actually helpful or being obtuse and trying to obstruct the hero largely depends on the day, with the MCU making them more helpful and less greasy.

See SHIELD is mad Tony stopped making weapons. Tony is mad they won't quit bugging him about that, as he simply.. dosen't want to be an arms dealer no more. Which is fair. He made their weapons, and as he makes clear to Rhodey who also wants him to work closer with SHIELD, he's still HELPING them. He just won't build weapons. As we find out in breakout he built the Vault, one of four supervillian prisons , this one specializing in tech criminals. So he hasn't STOPPED helping them, he just wont' give them tech to go kill people with, which is fair. While they don't give his origin, at least not yet, it's very clear whatever version of it taught him the same lesson: just because someone else fires the gun dosen't mean you won't have blood on your hands.

So naturally SHIELD"S reaction to Iron Man taking down HYDRA.. is to try to arrest him

Yeah Tony has.. done ABSOLUTELY nothing wrong here.. and Nick Fury, for all his flaws we'll see in VERY short order, is not so stupid as to fire and orders them to stand the fuck down. The fuck is implied.

Tony trying to help them.. instead gets them to fire on him as the SHIELD Agents are using mandroids powered armors using tony's tech.. and unlike the comics where he BUILT the mandroids for them as a compromise, no lethal weapons but still a way to be on even foot with superheroes, here they just flat out used his blueprints to make their own weapons and expect him not to be mad. He has no right to get mad at them for doing this, he sold them the goods and clearly gave them enough legal room to do whatever, but they have no right to be mad at him for SAVING THEIR LIVES.

And they are as while Tony takes down the last hydra bot that suddenly wakes up, when he shows up at the hellicarrier, RIGHTFULLY pissed at being fired on and having them make their own iron man.. maria hill, Nick's right hand and like the comics a total asshole, PUTS A GUN TO HIS HEAD

I mean yes she has him surrounded by shield agents and if fighting them tony would half to hold back.. but he's still a man in a mostly powered armored suit that can suplex a train, while your only strategy is "hope he's really scared of a hand gun".

Fury wisely asks her to stand the fuck down, again fuck's implied, and we get a really compelling argument with him and tony: Tony has every right to not want to sell weapons, while Fury makes the point that with supervillians ont he rise they NEED this tech to compete. Tony still wins in my eyes mostly because while yes he's witholding tech and what not.. SHIELD... isn't hurting. They made the mandroid armors, they have the tech to compete with the hydra bot likely bodying them because it has the element of suprise. THey have a giant hellicarier, tons of staff, and plenty of super powered allies help keeping the various super prisons safe. Granted all four prisons are about to become paper mache, but that's not down to SHEILD being stupid. While Tony dosen't SAY it to his face, which given this is tony is a fucking achivement... the issue isn't that Fury can't handle these or the various super powered heroes out there don't have this covered for now. It's that Fury dosen't have CONTROL over it. IT's a problem inherent in most versions of Nick: it's not enoguh to be the world's top cop he has to CONTROL the situation, the info everything. He's often resonable sure but he puts control over what makes sense and antagonizes valuable allies simply by not respecting they want autonomy.

Our backup story is really just "why nick fury is badass" and "Why hydra is super dangerous". Turns out Fury has their leader, Baron Strucker. Strucker is an egotistical nazi who frequently runs hydra and is Nick's arch enemy and opposite number. So this whole mech thing.. was a smokescreen to get one of their agents, The Grim Reaper in.

The Grim Reaper in the comics is the brother of Simon Williams, aka Wonder Man. We'll get into him more next time as he has a full episode coming up, but long story short, he died, Grim blamed the avengers, and then he tried to kill his brother when Simon came back because he'd put simon on a pedestal. Here the two are pretty much detached and Grim is instead hydra's top enforcer, single handidly breaking in and wrecking up the place, only stopped, and captured alongside strucker, because Nick Fury is that badass. He also life drains fury a bit, giving him his signature white streak from the comics.

Thor The Mighty (Microepisodes: Thor the Mighty, The Siege of Asgard, My Brother My Enemy and the Isle of Silence)

As I said Thor the Mighty is the only one of these episodes that feels like a mostly cohesive 22 minute episode. I mean you can still see the seams where the shorts were, but it's one 22 minute story instead of one long story and one short one connected to the first. It's also not suprisingly my faviorite, but not just for this reason but for having some gorgeous action, great character work and a hell of an ending.

Before all that we have to talk about the god of thunder. Thor's a character I love, I mean I have a mjonr I got a yard sale somehwere around here. But he's also one i'm pickier on story wise: you either have to REALLY sell the scope and granduer of asgard, as done by Walt Simonson, god among men, and currently Al Ewing or do something fresh with it like the start of Jason Aaron' srun, Donny Cate's recent run or my all time faviorite thor story, J MIcheal Strazenzki's run. Thor's not a bad character but there is a tendency to focus on ye olde english and not on him as a person.

EMH thankfully sidesteps that. It shows thor as fucking awesome and has him do cool stuff.. but it also emphasises who the odionson is and WHY he prefers our world over his own. We start with his daily routine: finding some supervillians to punch. He fights the wrecking crew. The Wrecking Crew are villians I like, marvel's designated Jobbers. If you need someone to get their face punched in these are the guys. They CAN be dangerous, see the avengers storyline under sige where the four of them together bodied a slightly frazzled hercules, but their primary there to show up and get knocked down: their strong enough to fight thor, having asgardian enchanted construction tools.

But still not SO strong that say spidey , the runaways or whoever needs a pick me up this week can't body these jackasses. So their the perfect starter foe for thor: powerful enough to give him a good scrap, but not nearly as strong as what he faces on his home turf.

It also serves as a handy intro to Thor's love interest, Jane Foster. The film takes her from a doctor to a paramedic, ironically years before the comics would do the same, and it's a great update: Since Thor isn't spending time as mortal doctor Donald Blake here, there's no real reason for her to be at his practice as a nurse then doctor. Instead she's in the field trying to save lives just like him, and is shown to be fearless DESPITE being a squishy human, getting out to help someone the wrecking crew hurts without any hesitation while her partner cowers in the car instead of helpign. I mean .. I get it , supervillians, but yoru a fucking emt man. Your job is to save lives even at your ownr isk.

Thankfully thor provides backup. And cleans house. The Wrecker TRIES to hold jane hostage, with Thor chastising his lack of honor.. before smacking him in the back of the head with mjonir because hammer's don't respect chilvarly. Thor and Jane hit it off, and I like how even if Jane's entirely in this series to be thor's love intrest.. they give her personality and a reason he falls for her: she's just as dedicated to her job of helping people, and Thor is awed by the fact that DEPSITE not having the powers of a god and being at high risk she does it anyway. Which for us is a normal thing but for thor.. sums up why he likes Midgard so much. On asgard heroisim happens all the time, death is an endless cycle. Here humans are fragile.. but the best of us try to help each other anyway.

Thor is played by Rick D Wasserman and as you can wager i'm mostly focusing on the main cast's voice actors for this review. I"ll point out some others, for instance Jane is voiced by VA legend Kari Whagreen whose also played Charmcaster in the ben 10 franchise and Saturn Girl in the awesome Legion of Superheroes cartoon i'm bound to cover at some point, it's just EMH has a MASSIVE cast and introduces a lot of characters in the span of these 7 episodes, so adressing every single one is a lot to ask. I will try to adress the most important ones and some in future reviews as the voice cast here is positively stacked.

Which makes it weird that once again one of the main cast is a pretty low key voice actor: like with Iron Man, Thor's va did his voice for Marvel Vs Capcom 3 and Marvel Ultimate ALliance 3, but otherwise hasn't really done much else in the main roll. And given just how well Rick slides into the roll of thor as if he was born for this it befuddles me.

But we, and the god of thunder, have bigger issues..s pecifically frost giants thor writing shorthand for "We wanted something big for him to hit" I can only think of one run in recent memory that hasn't invovled thor hitting a frost giant in the face.

Turns out their invasion is being led by Loki. Loki here is another intresting time capsule as a combination of Tom Hidelston's standout performance in Thor and Avengers and character defining runs I need to read and finish respectively from Kireon Gilleon and Al Ewing placed Loki squarely in the anti hero position. As such instead of the genderfluid trickster we know and love, this is the old school loki they were for much of their run and what loki at present is deeply afraid of becomiing again: manipulative, evil and hellbent on burning down everything his dad and brother built.. if with a dope horn helmet. He at least has that.

As such this loki gets into a badass fight with thor, with Thor BEGGING his brother to reconsider.. but it falling on deaf sweet horn helmets. Loki wants to burn it all. Thankfully Thor is able to beat him and being thor does it in the most badass way possible.. gatherting a GIANT STORM above him before focusing all it's energy into a massive lightning bolt. And those horns are really good conductors.

Odin, who sat this one out as his powers are weak at the moment, more on that in a sec, punishes Loki by banishing him to thei isle of silence. It's one of his faviorite pastimes. The other is questioning his son's life choices, wanting Thor to stay to guard Asgard while Odin takes a nap. It's why he was weak: Once a year Odin enters the odinsleep for a few months, to a week to a day. Whatever's narratively convent. It's how he recharges.

Thor.. dosen't want to as he's needed on earth and the two get into a snit and what I like is it's well ballanced: Odin isn't wrong to want his son to protect the kingdom that will one day be his.. but Thor isn't wrong that the warriors three and sif, his best friends and badass warriors, can do the job and Thor is only one call away if needed. Odin bringing up Jane dosne't help as Odin comes off as being a spying dickhead which.. he is. He entirley is. So Thor leaves in a huff.

And so we get our final segment.. which unlike the others ties in directley. We see Loki in the isle of silence, which is neatly depecited as a black and white void with no sound. Loki is visited by the Enchantress. The Enchantress is a powerful sorceress whose vane as she is obessed with thor, but dosen't understand he's just not that into her for being you know.. manipulative, cruel and trying to kill his friends. Turns out, in classic loki fashion, this was ALL his plan. ALLL of it.

He set up thor to run into the wrecking crew by spying on them taking a job for the Leader, more on him later, having the Enchantress disguise herself as a regular woman , i.e. just a green dress, and point thor their way. Fun fact: She and jane have the same VA. Funner fact: Loki is voiced by Scottish actor Grahm McTavish of the Hobbit and Outlander fame. Both do a terrific job.

Loki then pretended to be Baulder, Thor and Loki's third brother and painted what Thor was doing as egocentric hot doggin and grand standing and the Jane thing as more serious than "They just met". All of this was part of a larger scheme... all going to plan.. and neither the god of thunder nor his neglectful dad have any idea they were played. Granted Loki's scheme would fall apart of Odin brought up that conversation with baulder to the brave himself, but while a risk.. Loki still wasn't TOO reckless with this: in any other thor story this would be highly stupid. Here it's risky, but with Odin going into the Odinsleep soon and Loki's plan HINGING on his dad being in the odinsleep anyway, it gives his plan a VERY small window for fuckups.

And what is his plan?

I genuinely forgot what his grand plan was other than "conquer asgard" but we'll find out as the season unfolds. For now we move on to another hero..... some call him a man, some call him a monster.. but is he both?

Hulk Vs the World ( Microepisodes: The Coming of the Hulk! , Hulk Vs the World, This Monster, This Hero!, and Beware the Widow's Bite!)

Now we talk about the strongest one there is, the man whose wrecking the town with a power of the bull, ain't no monster clown, he's that loveable and ever lovin Hulk. And sometimes immortal, grey and what have you but point is Hulk slaps.

Yeah like Tony I love me some hulk: I haven't read nearly enough of his earlier stuff but I adore the late 80's early 90's run of peter david, one i'm just one digital omnibus away from having the complete run of at the time of this writing, and Al Ewing's recent and incomprable Immortal Hulk, which I REALLY need to cover and just. .haven't. Hulk's just a good character: A man with DID who turns into the literal represntations of the emotions he represses: his rage, his childlike innocence that his abusive dad made sure he never had, his need for a father, his hornier and more traditionally masculine traits... Hulk is an endlessly fascinating character.

And the show does him good, partly by exploring a key part of Hulk's marvel history: the fact that for the vast majority of it.. he's an outsider. Oh sure Hulk will show up for crossovers if needed and what not, but most of the time people treat him as a giant monster to be put down instead of simply an angry, powerful being tired of people trying to kill him. Hulk is oft pegged as a monster, and can often turn on his own allies thorugh bad luck or simply a poopy mood. Most people in Hulk's suppporting cast care about BANNER not hulk, while Bruce is often hunted simply because.. he has a mental illness. Granted most mental illnesses can't suplex a train, but many people genuinely don't seem to CARE that Bruce isn't responsible for what hulk does. Hulk is part of bruce banner.. but he's NOT bruce. And the poor guy is constantly hunted for something he tries to cure or control but often simply can't.

EMH emphasies this as when we meet Bruce he's deshevled, in a hat, looking like the unibomber and getting harassed by the police like one. And this is a Bruce who as we learn later ACCEPTS that hulk is part of him: he dosen't LIKE turning into a rage monster, no one does, but he acknowledges the big guy can do things he can't and that curing him simply hasn't worked. He's someone trying to manage his condition: until now staying away from population centers and only going into them.. because he's worried.

This is also our intro to our second of the four supervillian prisons, the Cube. The Cube is a heavily locked down place for radiation based supervillians, mostly gamma mutates like Bruce himself. And in a fitting shift instead of being a place to stash away or rehabilitate their foes.. the cube is basically one giant lab and Bruce fears it's purpose.. is to create a hulk SHIELD can control. It gives a reason to why he runs: Sure the Cube has facilities to help.. but one hulk is already incredibly dangerous and barely managable. Now imagine if say it goes wrong and hulk ends up with no brain or concense like the current hulk, just PURE. RAGE.

Or they succed in making a super solider with gamma power.. but he simply dosen't want to do what they ask and has all the power of a hulk but none of the restraint, and all the ingellgence to misuse it.

Or you get someone with repressed issues and DID like bruce.. but you get something darker than a cranky teenager who just wants to be left alone

Granted that last one didn't turn out so bad but Bruce's point is easy to see just looking at the comics or basic logic: Making more monsters is way too big a gamble and as we saw with SHIELD in the Iron Man episode, they aren't exactly moral paragons to begin with. Fury will go to any lengths to make a safer world... so whose to say even IF best case scenario we get a she hulk style transformation... that fury can be TRUSTED with that power.

So Banner goes to get some answers. Bruce is played by Gabriel Mann, who played Alan M in the JOsie and the Pussycats film I need to cover, and also played Bruce in Wolverine and the X-Men, which shares a universe with this show. More on that later. He does a great job selling Bruce's fear but also compassion.. he wants to CURE the target he's after, Absorbing Man.

Absorbing Man, aka Crusher Creel, is another frequent Jobber of the marvel unvierse, though unlike the Wrecking Crew he's slightly less of a joke, though like them he started with Thor. Unlike them he became more of a hulk villian and a general marvel villian. If they need someone dumb and powerful, Crusher is their go too. In the comics he also has a wife Titania, also a super villian. They have an adorably healthy and happy marriage.

So naturally Crusher.. wants nothing to do with this and wants to instead punch the hulk. He gets his wish.. but then gets plenty of punches back. The Hulk here is based more on then recent Planet Hulk Storyline: Hulk is still not super smart, but isn't thuggish like say Joe Fixit or sadistic like Devil Hulk. He's just savage hulk if given the chance to learn and evolve: all the power, all the rage.. but with SOME smarts and dry quips. He eventually flattens Abosorbing Man easily after a brief fight.

Hulk himself is played by Fred Tatiscore. Much like Thor and Iron Man's VA"S, Tatiscore is marvel's go to for the hulk for adaptations, and has played him a LOTTT: Ultimate Avengers 1 and 2, Avengers Next, Avengers Assemble, Hulk Vs(Also part of this continuity), Wolverine and the X-Men, Hulk and the Agents of SMASH, Ultimate Spider-Man, Marvel's Spider-Man (Cartoon), The Incredible Hulk Tie IN game, Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, All three Marvel Ultimate Alliances. If you want someone mean and green you go with Fred and that's JUST his rolls as hulk. Fred is a prolific voice actor with a WIDE list of credits. This isn't even his only roll in this SERIES, but we'll get to that. If you want a good gravely voice, Fred Tatsicore is your man.

So Hulk is no sooner done punching his daily asshole when General Ross shows up.

So for those who haven't had the distinct pleasure of meeting this twatballoon before, General Ross is one of Hulk's two main arch enemys, the other one we'll meet later. He's the old man who ruins everything, a hard nosed general who already didn't like banner and hunts him and hulk like a monster, and is LARGELY responsible for both the hulk being treated like a monster (though his earlier, far shadier versions didn't help), and for Banner being hutned like one. If someone's going to fuck a situation that could've helped the hulk up, it's this fucking guy. It's shown here brilliantly as one of his men questions WHY banne'rs here.. and ross dosen't care. He can interogate banner later, not getting that bruce wont' want to help him.

Ross charges in with a bunch of smashable robots, but is ordered to stand down by the Black Widow and Hawkeye, in their classic outfits. For Nat it's .. really the same as the movies, for Hawkeye.. he has an actual costume instead of purple spandex and maybe sunglasses... please bring this outfit back.

Thankfully Clint isn't a piece of cardboard like the MCU , though he is an agent of SHIELD since Thor was in production and the Ultimate Unvierse existed. The two plan to subdue the hulk.. yes the martial arts master who is great in hand to hand and the expert marksman... think they can take down the hulk. or at least hold him off. Hulk is less than impressed but has bigger worries as Ross FIRES A MISSLE AT TWO SHIELD AGENTS DESPITE BEING ORDERED TO STAND DOWN

Seroiusly ross you fired on two fedral agents. I'm shocked he wasn't disohnorably discharged but he's gotten away with worse in the comics.

Thankfully hulk beats missle.. and we get a heartbreaking moment as Ross's stupidity and the hulk reflecting the missle nearly downs a hellicarrier... Hulk saves it.. and is taken in anyway. Always hunted, always alone with Banner's cries of having actually made the hulk work and not wanting to be cured falling on the deaf ears of Doc Sampson, usually Hulk's therapist here just a scientest.. and an asshole. Hawkeye though buys it.. unfortuantely he thenf inds out Black Widow is seemingly a tratior and she betrays HIM, framing him for working with hydra. So yeah this one ends with our heros impreioned for doing nothing wrong, the bad guys ahead and things about to get so much worse.

And if you thought we were done with downer endings well.

Meet Captain America (Meet Captain America, The Red Skull Strikes!, If This Be Doomsday!, Come the Conquerer)

Almost forgot this till I was done with this section: So I fucking love Steve Rogers. Loyal to nothing but the dream, kind, thoughtful and a badass through and through. That said when it comes to solo stuff it's hit and miss. I've come around to Ed Brubaker's run as while the winter soldier itself has lost a little impact with the fog of ages, Bucky's turn as cap is great, what i read of Ta'Nesi Coates run is fantastic, and I love Mark Gruenwald's lengthy run. I like cap, he can just be very hit and miss for me on his own, but usually if he's in a team he slaps and there's a reason he's key to the avengers.. and getting his own episode despite not being there for the origin story.

Meet Cap is a fun WII adventure, reminding me of the First Avenger despite coming first. It's got a lot of silver age charm and pep to it as Cap breaks into a hydra castle with the Howling Commandos. The Howling Commandos are Nick Fury's WWII running buddies in the comic and his dad's friends here. The roster's mostly the same, characters I don't really know and who won't be relevant to this show so i'm not going into... except one. He's still not relevant to the show.. but it's a cameo I can't not mention. One of the commandos here is...

YUP. As one of the many subtle hints this is the same continuity as Wolverine Vs X-Men and it's prequel Hulk Vs Wolverine, Logan fucking HOwlett is on the team. He dosen't go snikit either because he dosen't have bone claws in this continuity or simply to keep that under his helmet but it's still neat to see him. THey even got Steven Blum for this tiny apperance. There's small hints like that here and there, with another in the next episode we'll get to but sadly a combination of diffrent networks and Nick screwing over WATXM meant we never got an actual crossover, and Disney screwing over this series meant we never got a fully absorbed finale either. And as should come as no shock as a giant x-men nerd, I plan to cover WATXM after this show.

Anyways, cameos aside it ventually comes down to Cap and Bucky. Bucky is cap's sidekick, and unlike the mcu he' skept to being around 17. This is also one of his first apperances in animation after the landmark winter soldier story recontexutalized Bucky from "Child sidekick who really REALLY shoudln't be fighting WWII" to "that being a propoganda and Bucky being Cap's stealth man who does the stuff too dirty for america's symbol".

As a result this version, at least as Bucky, is voiced by Robin voice actor Scott Melinville, an excellent bit of meta casting given Bucky comes off as a fairly blatant robin clone. The two's banter is genuinely heartwarming as you really get a sense of their friendship.

Cap himself is played by Brian Bloom, who like most of theset voice actors continued the roll for Marvel Vs Capcom 3, it's sequel Infinite, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 and unlike the rest recently in Midnight Suns. He's awesome and plays Steve Pitch Perfectly.

So the two's target is Red Skull, Naziism incarnate. He's pure evil, one of the most horrifying villians in the Marvel Universe and one of the few most other villians will nope out of working with being a literal nazi. And not just a snake Nazi, though as he does here he will work with Hydra. He was taught by Hitler himself. Fun fact that's pretty brutal: he has in fact met Magneto, Marvel's #1 holocaust survivior, who held his contempt of the guy long as he could when forced to work with him for acts of vengeance..a nd then first chanc ehe got Erik buired the guy in a bunker with this chilling as it is awesome sequence

This is just one long fun pulp adventure as Cap punches out hydra agents and i'ts revealed the Red Skull was experimenting with the 9 realms of norse mythology and marvel comics. Well 8, he's already on Midgard. His various captured norse creatures escape from fairies to a frost giant he almost kidnapped. it's fun chaotic brawl as many a nazi is eaten and we get some really cool lighting. We also get a mention of a Baron Zemo. This will be importnat later.

The Baron himself is absent though, and rather than being the one escaping on a rocket it's the red skull. And anyone familiar with the comics just tensed up a bit and really even if you aren't.. the fact that this is Cap's origin story, he's getting a full episode, and it's WWII kinda tells you this won't end well.. and it dosen't. Steve prepares to sacrifice himself.. only for Bucky to tell him "The world needs cap more than it needs bucky" and push him off. The Skull and the boy wonder apparently die .. and seemingly so does cap.

Well.. KINDA, as our last short happens: see the cap shorts kicked off with someone watching and we find out it's Kang, the Conquerer

For those who haven't heard of him or seen him thanks to the MCU, and the less said about his actor there the better, Kang is from the 30th century, a time of peace, love and no traffic accidents. And it was BORRRRRIIINNNGGGG to him, so longing for the past he only read about he stole a time machine, and ended up in a savage post apocalypse he eventually conquered and made the bedrock of his empire, using his time travel tech, vast army and genuine stategic knowhow to conquer civlizations throughout time and space.

Here though he seems to have just conquered this future, which is still a lot... but is about to be a little as it's in danger of being erased.. thanks to Cap. Kang is puzzled since if Steve DIED.. then how is he fucking up Kang's day? We get a really cool seuqence of Kang traveling through the previous parts of the episode, trying to figure out what he missed.. and finding steve frozen. Steve lived.. and thus his future will die. He plans to go back and stop this, but his future starts deteroating already, leaving him with just one warship. He TRIES to get his girlfriend Ravona on the ship in time.. but interfernce means she comes in and thus is stuck between fading out of existance. Kang's able to put her in stasis... but to save his empire steve rogers must die.. in about half a season.

Yeah Kang... dosen't come back up for a while and while it baffled me.. the more I thought about the actual two part premire.. the more i relaized why this was there.

The Man in the Anthill (The Man in the Anthill, Enter the Whirlwind, The Big House, Welcome to Wakanda) We end our slew of origin stories with the introduction of Ant Man and the Wasp, my faviorite avengers out of this intial lineup. I love all these characters but Hank and Janet are some of my faviorites in all of marvel. I became a huge fan of Hanks after reading Dan Slott's run on Mighty Avenger where Hank, follow his ex wife Jan's death, takes up the wasp mantle. He also gets into the greatest pissing contest in all of marvel history with reed richards... though in his defense, Red started it

It was a burn so fucking awesome that the rest of Reed's team were all asking him to please, for the love of god call back and apologize. He did not and suffered the consequences. Again story for another day.

With Jan it took some more time but this series and various awesome apperances, chiefly her time in Zeb Wells uncanny avengers and what i've read of Roger Sterns avengers, sold me on the winsome wasp. For good stories for each, for Hank there's the aformentiond Mighty Avengers, Avengers Academy where he serves as headmaster, and West Coast Avengers for his redemption after his mental breakdown and abuse of Jan. For Jan I recommend Stern's avengers, The Unstoppable Wasp which follows Hank's Daughter and Jan's adopted daughter Nadia but heavily features the OG wasp, and most recently the Wasp mini series from king of awesome Al Ewing and it's currently running Followup, Avengers Inc, both things I intend to cover some day.

So for those less familiar with them or more familiar with the MCU versions, Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne were founding avengers and the first Ant Man and Wasp, going in and out of the team to retire. They were in love.. but sadly hank's obession with work, undiagnosed bipolar disorder, and Janet marrying him while he thought he was someone else because Hank having a mental breakdown was the PERFECT time to marry him, the marriage fell apart, hank had a large scale mental breakdown and well.. you likely know the rest. Both would rebound with Janet finding a new indpendence and sense of self and Hank , after hitting rock bottom.. .finding the will to live on and atone for the various mistakes he made, first as just Hank Pym then as a superhero but not wearing a costume. I love these characters, their rich history, their powers just all of it. I also love these versions of them: With the baggage of his mental breakdown and the infamous and horrifying slap gone, Hank is back to his roots as a science hero, finding his work the neatest thing in the world, while Janet is back to being hank's younger girlfriend , a social butterfly, and the one helping him get to do all his science stuff by doing the promotion, the last one a clever addition. It takes her later swagger and better writing by writers who knew how women worked as opposed to silver age stan lee who while many impressive things.. could not write a woman who wasn't some form of a sexisim. Likewise Hank ignores jan but it's more "he's a workaholic" and less him ranting about her being a stupid woman and friviolus and I wish I was making this up. It takes the best of them in the silver age, mondernizes and makes it awesome

They also each get a short spotlighting them: The first has Hank researching some Vibranium near wakanda when he has to deal with Klaw. Klaw is a recurring avengers bad guy, black panther bad guy and general punching bag. He's not yet to full costumed villian here, instead just having a giant sound canon instead of having said canon as a new hand. He and some mercs break in to steal the vibranium.. and get utterly wrecked in the best way possible as Hank shrinks, easily dispatches them in a scene straight out of a hroror film as each mook goes unconcious, tehn in an awesome moment, when Klaw uses his really big gun fulla sound to try and blast hank, hank GETS BACK UP and presses a button.. shrinkign EVERYONE present. Also while again i'm not pointing out EVERY villian's va i'd be remiss if I didn't point out that Klaw's is mark fucking hamill.

As for Hanks, Hank is played by Wally Wingert, who for once for this show DIDN'T play this character again in Marvel Vs Capcom 3 because Capcom wasn't awesome enough to include an ant man. THey DID include MODOK who Wingert also plays and got to reprise so he still got a well deserved paycheck. He's also been in Bleach and is the voice of Cubot in Sonic. Who knew. I also love the ending: Jan comes in, we get her adorably just throwing her arms around hank.. and then hank casually asking his girlfriend to go save the mercinaries before his ants eat them

The next one focuses on Jan and also shows the contrast between the two. Hank has super powers.. but prefers his research and rehabilitating criminals, not wanting to fight them. In contrast Jan recognizes sometimes you gotta throw hands, action is her reward, and gladly speeds into battle. We also see that while this hank hasn't spiraled yet.. he still has control issues, showing up wot Jan's battle with Whirlwind and telling her to back down, despite her both making the vallid point they can help people and that she can handle herself. And given she stings teh fucker in the eye and beats a guy with tornado powers with just her stingers and some inginuity yeah, hank ease off there bud.

Jan is voiced by Colleen Ann O'Shaughnessey, a va I grew up with as the Voice of Sora on digimon, a role she STILL has to this day. And if that and Jan wasn't enough she's also Jazz Fenton, a characte ri'll be looking into next year. For now though she just rips as Jan, whose the best of the founding 5. I mean their all pretty great and Hank comes close, but Jan's sarcasm, energy but also her heart and talent make her hard NOT to love.

The third short and the final one focused on our duo is the big house which reveals the third of the prisons: The Big House. Focused more on rehabilitation, the Big House was made by hank, housing a LOT of characters i know. Whirlwind tries to escape. If your curious who this schmuck is, Whirlwind is the closest thing Jan has to an arch enemy: he started out fighting her and hank then started stalking Jan who didn't take it well. He's incapaciated as the big house shrink's it's prisoners. Whirlwind is put back inside.. but is insured by the Mad Thinker that they'll be out soon. It's just a matter of time. The Mad Thinker is a long time fantastic four villian, a mad genius and.. that's basically it. He does have an awesome android though

He's a very good dude.

As for Hank and Jan theyt alk to Nick Fury who wants to recruit them. Jan's all for it but Hank says no.. that being said, it's not just Hank not wanting to be a costumed superhero: he dosen't TRUST nick, dosen't think he genuinely wants to rehabilitate criminals, and dosen't trust shield. And given what we've seen.. he's right. Jan follows Hank's lead, if reluctantly while fury.. berates hank for actually carrying about reform and building villians "Comfier jailcells".

With that we get one last standalone to set up episodes later this season: we see the origin of The Black Panther as his dad dies in comnbat fighting Man Ape, whose not NEARLY as cool or nearly as fun in the comics or this cartoon. Man Ape kilsl his dad with help from Klaw while T'Challa's people.. all agree to this trial by combat bullshit.

T'Challa not taking this shit heads off, takes the Panther Mantel and plans to find Allies. To be continued next time, same as cap. I love the animation on The Black Panther as he skulks around. So damn cool. He's voiced by James C Mathis III a voice actor primarily known for playing the character in this and Marvel Vs Capcom.. infinite this time. He's fantastic. And with that it's time for the MAIN EVENT BABY

Breakout Parts 1 and 2

So here we are, the big one. The reason we're all here> the Main Event. Breakout is the proper premiere for the show, airing before the repackaged episodes above though taking place after. And like the MCU with those episodes in mind it feels like a well built up climax to almost everything in the shorts, while setting up the rest of the season, with what wasn't setup for this being setup for later in the season like Cap, Kang and Black Panther.

Part 1 has the characters still in their own corners of the marvel universe before fate assembles them: Tony breaks up an arms deal between AIM, a bunch of super scientests in neat beekeeper suits who function as world conquerers or arms dealers depending on the day, and Lucia Von Bardis, one of Doctor Doom's minons in Latveria. Iron Man easily stops the sale, especially since it's his tech their selling and warns Doom via his proxy: do not come for his stuff again. He then drops them off at the Vault, talking to Jimmy Woo who sadly isn't as in to close up magic here but has noticed it's security is off and asks Tony for help since he designed it and it's not a weapon. Tony agreees.. but also wants him to make an appointment because Tony is a lot of things.. but he's also a massive asshole no matter where in time and space you find him.

Banner is still in the cube, trying to warn Dr. Sampson of two things: the cube is not a jail but an incubator to make another hulk, and that filling a jail full of super strong gamma mutates and gamma research is a ticking time bomb... and given bruce blew himself up with one he should know.

Thor.. is having a far chiller day of stalking Jane as she does her job since as an EMT she finds trouble and he dosen't exactly have a thor signal. And because she fascinates him, not getting how creepy that sounds. Jane finds it charming, partly because he's built like a norse god and partly because she gets this is less "I need to call shield a god is stocking me" and more "He's REALLY that clueless he dosen't get this is a felony".

Finally we have Hank and Jan on the hellicarrier, with Hank doing mods to the big house and arguing with Nick and Jane sorry she can't take maria hill's offer... only to realize hank had a point when maria won't answer a simple whose that.

It's then chaos breaks out.. as does every super villian at the 4 prisons with the Hellicararrier, which houses the big house, also going offline. Oh and Nick's house just blew up, but that happens every tuesday. You can just ignore that one, don't know why I brought it up.

As you'd guess most of our heroes are soon caught in the middle of it: Iron man flies back to the Vault, getting a heads up from Pepper that SHIELD"S in chaos, but finds all his foes have already kitted up and gang up on him including Crimson Dynamo, his russian equilveant and Blizzard, a villian i've always had a soft spot for who gets a truly awesome look here

Is his look baiscally just captain cold and mr freeze smushed together now? Sure? Does it look fucking dope? yes.

Thanks to SHIELD being stupid though, Iron Man isn't the only hero there and despite nearly blasting him earlier, Hawkeye helps for a sec before fleeing to clear his name. I like this setup for hawkeye as in the comic's hawkeye also started as a costumed criminal thanks to a misunderstanding, a nice way of meshing his mcu/ultimate self with the og. Hawkeye is also one of my faviorite superheroes, and something I can gush about later when Clint properly returns to the story. For now he's just awesome as always.

So Tony decides to escape by BLOWING THE FUCKER UP with his enemies inside

Yeah the civilians have apparently evacuated and the villians scene DO come back but you'd think after a few months after this Tony's go to wouldn't be "Cave a building on them and let god sort it out". Then again this IS Tony Stark we're talking about....

Bruce is IN one of the prisons and thus has a harder time, though there is one silver lining: Dr. Sampson.. is now fully on his side, having realized from the buildling falling apart that Bruce was right about this being a powder keg and promising to help. Granted it's a bit too late but still. The radiation abound has also given the good Doc super strength

Zzzax shows up. Zzzax is an energy being the hulk fights on and off, a big zappy man made of electricty who has a name that's as fun to say as it is to type. Naturally this brings out the other guy and Hulk fights him, winning becasue of course.

In the core of the cube and it's control rooms is the Leader. The Leader is Hulk's arch enemy and polar opposite: Hulk is pure rage and strength, the Leader is a calculated super genius with the durability of any other guy. And unlike the other villians in the other prisons.. Leader has no intention of leaving, to the bafflement of Absorbing Man and Abomination. Abomination is Hulk's other arch enemy, a KGB agent who got caught in a gamma ray blast when Hulk tried to kill the hulk with.. .the same thing that makes the hulk, being almost as strong but retaining his mind.

Leader sends the two to fight hulk as a distraction but once Hulk has them down he flees with Sampson.. and the Leader has his minons back off, explaning WHY he wants to stay in prison: he's going to change the world. And impliclity, what better lair for a super genius gamma mutate than a giant gamma based lab and former prison? It's almost like putting the lab next to the dangerous criminals was a bad idea waiting to blow up in their faces.

Before we move on Leader is played by horror legend Jeffery Combs, most famous for playing Herbet West in Re-Animator and it's sequels. Combs is a large ham supreme, a true craftsman of playing hammy bastards with no morals, and is perfect casting for the Leader, and SHOULD have played him in the mcu. Then again given how little the MCU has acctually DONE with the leader thanks to universal, it's a blessing in disguise. They can use him another way. Lots of mad scientests with no morals in marvel. Leader's story will be continued later, but I coudln't just.. pass by Jeffery Combs. I'm not made of stone.

As for Hank he gets the shit beat out of him by the people he was genuinely trying to help. Which is just.. sad... the problem wasn't hank's idea, a deluxe prison with creepy robots where he genuinely tries to reform people.. it's just most of the criminals were either people he brought in, resenting him automatically, or simply didn't WANT to change. Had he tried it on like the beetle or screaming mimi or someone who genuinely had the potetial to reform who knows what he could've done. Thankfully he's backed up by Jan and the fact he can become a really big man, a GIANT man if you will.

While this goes on Thor.. has a date. Jane gladly listens to his daddy issues, Baldur the Brave had visited earlier.. and Odin hasn't let up on the "come home thing". Jane breaks down "ancient asgardian things beyond your understnading" into what it is "You had a fight with your dad" and tries to convince him to go home and patch things up.. but then thor hears the explosions in the distance and goes to help.

So the bad news is a bunch of our heroes villians are free, with the only ones who aren't.. now running the prison. The WORSE news is that there's one more prison that didn't have a superhero on duty as Thor was out to lunch: the raft, a secret fourth blacksite prison hinted at earlier, containing the highest security cases... and one of them just woke up from a ten year nap, radaiting with power and rocking the helicarrier.

This yelling bearded man is Graviton, also played by Fred Tastiscore, whose hamming it up from here to eternity. He wants Fury dead and tha'ts where part 1 ends.. with him holdling fury hostage and sinking the hellicarrier.

Part 2 opens up with the origin of Graviton: Franklin Hall was a physcist for SHIELD before Fury tried to shut him down... for good reason as while Fury was trying to do this Franklin not only refused but his experiments blew up in his face. Then rather than help Hall.. fury locked him unconcious in the raft. Even the breakout didn't let him out it turned out ot be Baron Zemo. Baron Zemo is one of my faviorite super villians, a genius tactician and son of a nazi what cap fought. Naturally he tells franklin he's been down here for a while, then skedaddles. Unsuprisingly we'll be seeing the martial artist whose so skilled and cunning he's in the same jail as the guy who can make gravity his bitch.

Graviton is distracted by Iron man, who shows up to fight.. but tony gets a refresher in Gravity and gets bounced all the way to the endless cornfields of Kansas. Trust me having been in the car as someone's driven through them, that joke is not an exageration. Ther'es plenty of towns, intresting places.. but also large stretches of corn and nothing. So much corn and nothing.

While Tony calls for a backup suit, Thor tags in, while Hank chews Fury out, especially relevant since Fury refuses to tell them anything at first calling it classified... despite the giant exploding gravity man fighting a god above them.

As for Hulk... Hulk needs a snack. Prison hasn't done wonders fo rhis appittite so he stops at a diner, asking them to get help for Sampson... when Hulk has another guest: his brain buddy bruce who urges Hulk to help as he's the only one that can. Hulk makes the valid if misnthropic poitn that if no one's helped him, why should he.. but Bruce poitns out all the good he can do.. he can be more than the monster they see him as and he knows it. SO Hulk agrees to serve as backup.. provided Bruce make one concession: Hulk becomes the dominant personality and bruce comes out , as we find out later, only once a month.

As we wait to see the results of that deal, Thor gets plumeted to the bottom of the sea and Jan decides she isn't going to stand by anymore.. while Hank is like "NO YOU'LL GET HURT. LISTEN TO ME. " because he hasn't gotten Jan dosen't CARE she can get hurt, knows the risk, and is doing the right thing comma jackass. Jan.. actually puts on a decent showing as her stingers, small lasers , aren't affected by gravity. She is.. but Hank catches her having gotten his giant head out of his ass, while Thor regains Mjonr and tony joins back up. The avengers have.. mostly assemebled.

They still can't make much of a dent though: not only are they still very new at this tea-m thing, but Graviton is still strong enough to body a god: a scientest, a fashioin icon, and billionare mass attempted murderer aren't really going to turn the tide. Unluckily for Franky he decides to get braggy.. and gives too good an intrance cue NOT for someone to stomp in and ruin his day

Graviton: I'm stronger than all of you! I'm the strongest one there is! (BOOM) Hulk: You sure about that?

Hulk is here and easily beats the stuffing out of Graviton. We get a truly EPIC moment too as Graviton tries increasing the gravity on him which only works for seconds at a time as Hulk KEEPS, GETTING, BACK UP. With the others helping, and sometims just.. rushing him, Hulk is able to land the final blow on Graviton. My faviorite moment during this is Wasp lasering a container in half, confused someone's helping him... before Janet helpfully pipes in he's the bad guy. THe two will be incredibly close after this and given they both like hitting things and impulsive desicions, easy to see why.

Well almost final, He still has time to weakly rant before Wasp shuts him up.

Naturally SHIELD"S response to Hulk saving the day, the future avengers lives, and stopping an evil they created.. is to point all their guns at him. This time though Hulk has something he didn't have back in Vegas: Friends. Iron Man refuses to let SHIELD take him and everyone else gladly joins in, Jan naturally being the second most vocal behind tony.

Fury reluctantly gives in, and admits he could use the five's help: the various prison breaks have unleashed 74 other super villians and someone needs to round them up.

Hank.. turns him down, getting one last callout and a very damming one: they CREATED this mess: while Franklin made himself into a living god instead of trying to cure him or turn him into a force for good they locked him away an dhoped he'd never wake up, and new york nearly got leveled. I forgot to mention it somehow but motherfucker LEVITATED manhattan.

Tony does concede Fury has a point:.. not about joining SHIELD, they suck dirty ass in thunderstorms. But about working as a team:

Iron Man: One on one, we can each take down a villain or two, but 74... none of us can do it alone. Together we have a chance. What we did here, it can change things. The world needs us, but not as S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. As a team of our own. Together, we can avenge the wrongs caused by all these villains. Wasp: We can be Avengers. Hulk: Huh. Good name.

And thus.. a team is born. Hulk agrees to stay for now and everyone else, even pacifist hank seems excited. And even Fury, while not exastic, dosen't really poop on their parade. He is worried about one thing though: Who was behind this?

So yeah.. the first 7 episodes of EMH, the breakout two parter in paticular, are amazing. It sets up the world, fleshes out the cast, and gives us some great hooks going in: how will this team mesh? can hulk be accepted by the rest of the world? Who caused the Breakouts? What's loki's plan? How is leader going to "Change the world"? What did steve do to destroy Kang's timeline? All valid questions we'll answer another time but for now we've got 7 pretty excellent episode an da great start to one of the greatest avengers tales ever

Sometime Next Year: The avengers loose a member, gain an icon and a king and deal with their growing pains, ionic men, dougboys, ape men, living sounds, and a bunch of hulks. See you then and thanks for reading.

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cleopatrachampagne · 6 months

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i know i’m far from an expert on history but it always bothers me to see bob marley’s portrait hanging in my local weed shop. like, i’ve loved reggae music since i was young, well before i ever smoked weed, i know listening to music is pretty rad when stoned, and i admit i understand that a lot of prominent figures and concepts idolized by the hippies and revolutionaries of the 60’s and 70’s in the usa eventually became synonymous with drug use, esp marijuana, due to smear campaigns against counterculture so maybe it is a kind of defiance to display it proudly? but while i understand the admiration a lot of disillusioned young people in the usa in the 60’s and 70’s would have felt for the people fighting the class war in jamaica and the reggae music emerging with lyrics about said war but still pushing for peace, for one love, as they worked to topple inequity and corrupt systems while redefining perspectives on race, oppression and intergenerational trauma but how did bob marley become “the weed man” in the cultural consciousness when he was a spokesperson for political change and class revolution? is it only that way in the us? do other countries and cultures see him as more than a stoner icon with his face on rasta memorabilia sold at jacked up prices to college kids who have never even heard of the rastafari revolution, the pan-african movement or the jamaican civil war, idk why but it really does bother me to see a strong voice for peace and change reduced to a face plastered on drug paraphernalia and stoner t-shirts. like… damn. that’s the death of a revolutionary in the capitalist tradition, i suppose. bob marley’s portrait hanging above the bud hut cash register, “grunge” clothing sold by fast fashion corporate hellholes, t-shirts with kurt cobain’s suicide note written on them being sold for 800 bucks a pop, eat the rich stickers for sale on amazon of all places, santa muerte being sold as a goth accessory or a “hardcore” generic tattoo in the us stripped of what she symbolizes to me and many other latina/o people who were raised with mexican neopaganism and folk catholic traditions, sanitized street art commissioned by some silicon valley suit that is purely aesthetics with no heart, no soul, nothing related to the authenticity of artistic vandalism, just imaginary street cred points for a rich dick. i get the same feeling in my stomach seeing the “aesthetic” whitewash of counterculture, the clownery of “alt” culture on apps like tiktok, the cashing in on the suffering of the oppressed for a quick buck and the tragic victory of cementing hippies and beatniks and freedom fighters in the minds of the following generations as degenerate druggies (thanks nixon and crew) that i get when i hear that pop remix of “the hanging tree” and it’s a lot to take in while i’m just trying to buy a box of strawberry cough prerolls.

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apphiarothowrites · 8 months

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(Not your average) Blushing Maiden

(Or, "An Introduction to Zoan Anatomy"-zoan anatomy 101 remix) I'd also like to dedicate this version of the idea to @xamaxenta

Marco eats his fruit three weeks before his 17th birthday. It takes him exactly 1 hour to notice that something has dramatically changed about his body-mostly because he spent most of that 60 minutes doubled over with incredible stomach cramps. But the second those subsided he realized he had to pee and moments after that-

Well. He hadn't reacted well, in the slightest. There was screaming, and his first ever full transformation, involved. It was traumatic, even. Pops, after consulting with Whitey and Jozu, immediately set course for the North Blue to an island famous for it's medical advancements. They assumed, correctly, that this "White City" would be able to find answers to Marco's insanely weird new problem.

The tests were many, invasive, and took multiple hours a day-every day, for an entire month. Nearly the entire hospital staff they consulted with, plus several animal sanctuaries, got involved. In the end, Marco was left with a hard-to-process reality.

Gone was the previous anatomical features he was used to-that he had tied his identity to-and in the place of his dick and balls was. Just another hole. At first it was mortifying, embarrassing, and shameful. Half the jokes he used to tell were suddenly cruel jabs at himself. Half the conversation of the crew suddenly felt like an indictment of his lacking.

It took him nearly to his 30th birthday to come to a place of real acceptance. The process required the assistance of his family's steadfast refusal to think less of him, and several meetings with a very strange group of people calling themselves "the okama kingdom." Slowly, but surely, he figured it out. He got there.

Where before he hid every stormy emotion of the day underneath a relaxed veneer, now at the age of 40 he openly expressed how he felt. Happiness was all smiles, anger a downturn set of eyebrows with a frown, sadness was shown with tears, stress was a pair of hunched shoulders and tight lips.

Where before he envied other men for the ease in which they proclaimed themselves such, now Marco knew-just as surely as he had before his fruit-he was just as much "male" as they were. He didn't need a dick and external testicles to prove it-just his fists and the occasional flash of talon. No one had joked about his lack of balls in decades, but he knew that if the punchline came up he could roll with it easily.

Where before he would get angry enough to lash out, or scared enough to flat out hide, on his bad days where the alteration of his body bothered and unnerved him, Marco now instead could lean on his brothers and sisters among the crew. Izou happily kept his quarters unlocked for Marco's bad days, as did Thatch and Rakuyo and Jozu and Pops. Even Vista, and the more reserved Namur, gladly let Marco hang around in awkward silence when he knew he couldn't be alone with his thoughts.

His lack of sexual experience never bothered him before now. He figured out his own needs-what worked, what didn't, and the things in between-and then held himself back. He knew there were people out there who wouldn't be bothered by his body-in fact, if Shanks were any indication, there were likely people out there who'd be really into his body-but the difficulty in explaining things made him hesitate. Eventually he decided that tending to his own lust by himself was preferable to fumbling through awkwardness with a partner. Even the few times he genuinely thought finally taking the plunge with someone, something would hold him back. (A niggling, scared voice that reminded him of himself at 18 whispered how can you prove they won't brag, that they won't turn you into a joke once you're gone?)

Then along came Ace, incredible and bullheaded. And Ace brought with him something Marco didn't think he'd ever find. Ace with his fire and fiery personality. Ace with his whip-smart brain, with his incredible body, with his brighter-than-the-sun smile, with his flirty grins and heated looks. Ace brought hope.

(The voice would tell him Ace brought trouble.)

#AR writes #not your average blushing maiden #a zoan anatomy remix #trigger warning for body dysphoria #marco still identifies as a man but his fruit changed parts of him that he assumed made him a man #and he's gotta deal with that somehow

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meat-wentz · 1 year

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you mentioned you were indie sleaze, can you talk more about that scene from the 2000's? i want to get into the scene but don't really know where to start and i don't trust tiktok lol.

omg of course. so to preface this i wanna say that there is a natural emo to indie pipeline that existed from around 2006-2008 and i was fully a part of that pipeline. there's a lot of crossover especially as emo evolved into scene and as scene evolved into party scene into indie sleaze. musicians like shiny toy guns, dev, cobra starship, amanda blank, hyper crush, etc were all like natural transitional bands that held little emo hands as they transitioned into indie sleaze. for instance, does he look familiar? well, he's the dear boy from sugar we're going down.

youtube

indie sleaze was a mixture of nihilism and hedonism, a general mindset of nothing fucking matters let's destroy ourselves and fucking party. it was like this huge embrace of self-destruction and effacement, but also like a huge embrace for being young and saying fuck it and partying your face off. it glorified the unpolished, ripped stockings and hazy drunk eyes, hair plastered across your face with sweat, smudged makeup, looking like you've made out with everyone in your path and you probably have. it was body paint and underground hipsters and red bull chasers and ketamine bumps and perfect cocktails of pills. it was a bunch of jaded young people rejecting 9-5's and blending the party culture of raves with the rock and roll underground of sleazy clubs in nyc. there's a good documentary on this that follows some of the most notable bands in the nyc scene called "meet me in the bathroom" and it's available on showtime right now. they were the "new" club kid. there was a notable genre exchange, it was super eclectic sonically, ranging from techno and electronica to twangy bass riffs and dirty guitars to more folksy or preppy sounds (you'll see more prep aesthetics leak in particularly towards the latter half as indie sleaze evolved into millennial indie in the late 2000's and early 2010's, like vampire weekend, metronomy, two door cinema club, and chester french). aesthetically, flash photography became huge, rejecting the gloss of the mainstream. decade clashing was huge, drawing inspo from 70's vintage athletic wear, sleek 60's mod, 80's punk, vintage shopping was huge, neon and bright colors and american apparel basics, ironic t-shirts were huge, actually irony laid into the aesthetics and sound HEAVY, because irony indicated you didn't care but you were still fun.

photographers like the cobra snake super well documented the scene and all its most notable scenesters, and misshapes would throw these massive celebrity scattered parties with all the who's-who of musicians. they're two really good places to look into what and who and why and how. you might also want to look into kitsune maison compilations, urban outfitters playlists via the web archive, and ed banger records. soundtracks for shows like gossip girl, skins, and misfits were literally soooooooo influential to me as well.

perhaps the prime examples of what the scene looked like and what parties looked like:

youtube

vimeo

and here are some of my personal favorite indie sleaze mvs that i feel really encapsulate sort of the aesthetics and the draw:

youtube

not an official video but literally so influential, my friends and i would pregame to this edit of babel so often its literally embedded in my bloodstream:

youtube

here's some gems you might not find in any research:

my favorite musicians at the time were mgmt, metronomy, css, crystal castles, uffie, lcd soundsystem, yeah yeah yeahs, young love, the rapture, hot chip, girls, electric six, bloc party, bright eyes, the virgins, the teenagers, peaches, friendly fires, gorillaz, the xx, franz ferdinand, neon indian and kenna. i do actually have a musical archive @sleazeandscum where i just post songs every once in awhile from the time period. i hope this helps and ty for this question lol it was literally SUCH a formative period in my life and also the beginning of my time as a blogger.

#ask #anon #sorry this took a few days to answer i was collecting media!!!!!

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sizzlingpatrolfox · 6 months

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Jk album is just not good. Ever hear clear bandits rather be song? Yeah. I am sure one of his songs is a copy of that melody. If ppl want that generic crap they probably think butter is the best bts song ever. It's also pathetic the connections ppl keep making to jimin because of the lyrics. Jikookers....jk disnt writw anything, he had no choice what he wore, he had no thoughts at all. He sang poorly written songs, bland mediocre melodies, and unoriginal and danced around like a trained monkey.

Then you have v who tried to being back the 60s love song slow rock vibes. At least he pitched in his ideas and tried. I swear ive heard something very similar to v slow dance...def 60s vibes. I wish taekook all the best.

Please jimin keep being you, amazing. Like the mother theresa of kpop

At least clean bandit used to go off at the gay clubs and you'd feel as hot as Adele Exarchopoulos dancing to it while your drunk pick me white girl with cornrows has her hands inside your shirt and she keeps stealing kisses from you.

Those were the days,,

Or so my friends told me.

Now I'm thinking of all the remixes from 1989's songs they used to play in gay clubs as well. Shake it off was hard carried by the lgbtqs.

I haven't listened to Jungkook's album but I highly doubt it's going to receive the Gay Club Music Approval so that's enough for me. Layover definitely didn't pass the Gay Club Music test.

Jikookers are just hanging in there as hard as they can lol. I was surprised when JK said there's nothing he wants to write about, or something like that. So according to jikookers he's been in love for 10 years and he can't squeeze out ONE song?!*?#( twelve year old girls write love songs, mind you.

(Part of me tho keeps in mind the option that he's lying about that and just wanted quick and meaningless fame and popularity so out of the goodness of his heart he just made this album as a gift to scooter and bangpd. But he's been proven to be quite.. an empty shell of a man lately, so I'm still more inclined to take his word for it).

Same goes for Taehyung. He's dating one of the hottest women in entertainment and he can't say anything about it?

They've been scamming people making them believe they can write music.

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ashleyfanfic · 2 years

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Jonerys Remix 2023

Hey guys! So, I know we skipped the last two years, but this year, I think we're gonna do it again.

But I want your input! I want to make it as fun and engaging as possible. I want people to sign up and look forward to the posts and possibilities! With that in mind, here are a few considerations that I've been bouncing around with @justwandering-neverlost I will post a list of couples that are based off the ultimate winner. This isn't based on a poll or anything like that. Feel free to give your opinion in the comments and I will evaluate from there.

ALL FAIRYTALES - Now, this falls under what's your definition of a fairytale. You have your Grimm brothers, your Hans Christian Anderson, and even folklore of different civilizations. Everyone's remix would be based off a couple that falls under this umbrella.

LET'S GO TO THE MOVIES - All couples come from movies. But Ashley, what about movies based on books or tv? Well, you'd have to use the movie as your main source material. Not your only source material, but your main. TOTALLY TUBULAR 80'S - Guys, my love for the 80s knows no bounds. The movies, the tv, the music. So, you'd pick a movie or show made in the 80s and use a couple from that. Now, just to give you an idea of what I mean, Raiders of the Lost Ark was made in the 80s and is fair game. It would give you a pretty broad range, especially considering the Princess Bride and the Neverending Story were all made during that time, you have a pretty wide berth to choose from. PERIOD DRAMAS - Guys, we don't have enough of these. The Rennaissance, Regency, Gilded Age, Turn of the Centry, The Roaring 20s, The Groovy 60s and 70s. Pick your couple and set them in or use their time period. Let your imagination flow and transport us to a different time, with different circumstances. LEAVE IT AS IT IS - Why mess with something that works? No limitations obviously work better, so why start putting them on now? You want the ability to change your mind or couple and not make the work so hard on yourself with having to stick to a theme. I get it. Letting things keep as they are isn't outside the realm of possibilities, but I will take suggestions for couples to add to the list as a lot has happened in a short span of time since the last. So, please, don't be shy! Let me know what you think! I look forward to hearing from you!

#jonerys remix 2023 #jonerysremix2023 #jonerys #jonerys remix

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abisbookshelf · 2 years

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100 songs - byler :)

1) i wanna be yours - artic monkeys

2) moment - lildeath & vierre cloud

3) lover - taylor swift

4) alien blues- vundabar

5) francis forever - mitski

6) as it was - harry styles

7) video games - lana del ray

8) two birds - regina spektor

9) i want to be your boyfriend - hot freaks

10) fool - cavetown

11) i love you so - the walters

12) heather - conan gray

13) boys don’t cry - the cure

14) wish you were gay - billie eilish

15) all i wanted - paramore

16) deja vu - olivia rodrigo

17) soap - melanie martinez

18) friends - chase atlantic

19) washing machine heart - mitski

20) another love - tom odell

21) sweater weather - the neighbourhood

22) juliet - cavetown

23) cupid - jack stauber

24) idontwannabeyouanymore - billie eilish

25) sunflower - michele leigh

26) can't remember to forget you - shakira & rihanna

27) first love / late spring - mitski

28) take my breath away - berlin

29) this side of paradise - coyote theory

30) every breath you take - the police

31) time after time - cyndi lauper

32) black out days - phantogram

33) falling for ya - grace phipps

34) save your tears - the weeknd and ariana grande

35) style - taylor swift

36) are we still friends? - tyler the creator

37) glimpse of us - joji

38) cruel summer - taylor swift

39) she likes another boy - oscar lang

40) all too well - taylor swift

41) the beach - the neighbourhood

42) movies - conan gray

43) me and my husband - mitski

44) lay all your love on me - ABBA

45) closer x love me like you do - the chainsmokers & ellie goulding (remix)

46) message in a bottle - taylor swift

47) a pearl - mitski

48) poison - rita ora

49) without you - odesza

50) look after you - the fray

51) 505 - artic monkeys

52) night bus - gabrielle aplin

53) unconditionally - katy perry

54) again - noah cyrus & XXXTENTACION

55) grace - lewis capaldi

56) chasing cars - HALE (snow patrol cover)

57) can’t remember to forget you - shakira

58) until i found you - em beihold & stephen sanchez

59) enchanted - taylor swift

60) still falling for you - ellie goulding

61) getaway car x out of the woods - taylor swift (remix)

62) marry you - bruno mars

63) take on the world - you and me at six

64) as the world caves in - matt maltese (sarah cothran cover)

65) you are enough - sleeping at last

66) cloud 9 - beach bunny

67) wildest dreams - taylor swift

68) hug me - pharrell williams & trey parker

69) dandelions - ruth b

70) can’t take my eyes off of you / i love you baby - paul anka

71) kiss me more - doja cat

72) silhouette - pastel ghost

73) bags - clairo

74) take your shirt off - millionaires

75) maps - maroon 5 / adam levine

76) birthday - katy perry

77) shadow lady - portwave

78) rock your body - justin timberlake

79) light switch - charlie puth

80) only love can hurt like this - paloma faith

81) SNAP - rosa linn

82) apocalypse - cigarettes after s*x

83) fine line - harry styles

84) ocean eyes - billie eilish

85) set fire to the rain - adele

86) back to you - selena gomez

87) i will always love you - whitney houston

88) tek it - cafuné

89) traitor - olivia rodrigo

90) happier than ever - billie eilish

91) why am i like this - orla gartland

92) water under the bridge - adele

93) mr loverman - ricky montgomery

94) freaks - surf curse

95) pretty boy - the neighbourhood

96) hey lover! - wabie

97) heroes - david bowie

98) me and michael - MGMT

99) i met sarah in the bathroom - awfultune

100) fight or flight - conan gray

#byler #stranger things 4 #finn wolfhard #noah schnapp #mike x will #dancing #taylor swift #conan gray #olivia rodrigo

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fearlesslyenchantedinwonderland · 6 days

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So High School Reaction

wait shes so cute

she's giving 90's/00's, a high school romcom, hilary duff and chad Michael Murray in the classic a cinderella story

i really want a remix of this song, I want to hear what this would be like more pop-a-fied.

taylor truly found her end game, so happy for her.

You know what funny my mom when she started dating again in her 60's she also said she felt like a teenager (so cute)

Again I know they are aiming for a more sonically cohesive album, but I wish she could go harder on the vocals to make it more fun

sooo cute!!

#so high school #taylor swift #ts #taylor and travis #taylor swift and travis kelce #so high shcool reaction #ttpd #ttpd reaction #the tortured poets department reaction #the tortured poets department #deluxe album #deluxe songs #2am edition

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shibotaibo · 13 days

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6 Songs on Repeat

Tagged by @edmunderson (bro.....🥹🫶)

YT links because I'm too cheap for Spotify<3

Remedy by Little Boots

Racing into the Night by YOASOBI

Thong Song by Sisqó

Dearly Beloved (Leg Day Remix)

Prayer X by King Gnu

Chocobo Theme (60's Surf Big Band Version) from The 8-Bit Big Band

Tagging my only moot who hasn't already been tagged/done this (I THINK????) @littleberrybat

#I am all over the place #feel free to do this even if I didn't tag you 💁‍♀️#sorry to put you on the spot brotato #txt

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rastronomicals · 1 month

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2:28 AM EDT March 25, 2024:

Can - "Flow Motion (Air Liquide Mix)" From the album Sacrilege (1997)

Last song scrobbled from iTunes at Last.fm

Not sure how this entered my music collection, but it's definitely the first Can record I ever had, which is weird, considering how it's not really a Can record. It's a drum and bass record or a progressive or ambient house record, if not quite a Fancy-Restaurant-Music record.

In the liner notes, Brian Eno (somewhat clumsily) says that "any attempt to do anything rhythmic against Jaki [Liebezeit, Can drummer] is an insult to his beautiful, spare playing, and just fills up the gaps he so gracefully left. Turning things into loops destroys the delicate balance [Can] always kept between the mechanical and the human."

Not sure that Mr. Eno nails it, but he's in the neighborhood. The thing is that remixers (endlessly, and as Eno recognizes, loopingly) rely on the drum breaks from '60's and '70's soul and funk music, while Jaki Liebezeit sounds nothing at all like that. He's toms, not snares, and he's beat-behind, not beat-forward. So this record recorded from pieces and bits sounds nothing like the band that inspired it. You might think that machines like samplers and TR-808s would be an excellent way to mimic the beats of a drummer who so publicly expressed his admiration for the music of the machine, but no: they don't get it done.

It's nice to upon occasion to listen (especially while mobile) to stuff that drops the bass in the same fashion as so much of the annoying and graceless music you hear on the streets. And the artifacts of the Can songs left in the remixes remind me as I listen that whoa, it's so much better. But I'd really just rather listen to Ege Bamyasi

File under: Krautrock with the Krautrock removed

#Can #Sacrilege #Flow Motion (Air Liquide Mix)

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krispyweiss · 4 months

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Sound Bites Presents: His Favorite Archival Releases of 2023

Music vaults are apparently overflowing with unreleased gold, some of which was finally freed in 2023. And for other artists looking back, the year brought repackaging and remixing.

The following are Sound Bites’ favorite new/old releases of the year almost ended, presented in alphabetical order:

The Beatles - 1962-1966 and 1967-1970 (2023 Editions) - Though the Blue Album contains the meat of the Beatles’ recorded output, the expanded and remixed Red Album is most improved. Review here.

Bob Dylan - Fragments - Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series Vol. 17 - Seventeen volumes in to the Bootleg Series, and it’s almost frightening to ponder how much different Dylan’s 60-year string of studio albums could have been. Review here.

Fleetwood Mac - Rumours Live - Rumours Live may be the quintessential in-concert capture from this lineup in that the players aren’t as cocaine sloppy as on 1980’s Live nor as polished on the Dance from 1997, on which a cadre of backing musicians sterilized the music. Review here.

Jerry Garcia - Might As Well: A Round Records Retrospective - Looking at the tracklist, one might think Might As Well is a Grateful Dead compilation. But this is a Garcia best-of album, albeit one where 12 of the 16 studio tracks went on to become bonafide live-Dead classics. Review here.

Little Feat - Sailin’ Shoes (Deluxe Edition) and Live in Boston 1975 - Everyone will start to cheer when you put on the new deluxe edition of Sailin’ Shoes. Same goes for Live in Boston 1975, a formidable rival to Waiting for Columbus. Reviews here and here.

Joni Mitchell - Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 3: The Asylum Years (1972-1975) - The glorious sound of Mitchell morphing from a folkie from the 1960s to a jazzer of the 1970s. Review here.

Pink Floyd - The Dark Side of the Moon - Live at Wembley Empire Pool, London, 1974 - At this point, Dark Side is an album that needs to be revisited only sporadically. But this high-fidelity recording offers a fresh take - one that fares better in both sound and performance quality that the many bootlegs of various Dark Side performances floating around out there. Review here.

Carly Simon - Live at Grand Central - As a soft-rock artist associated with the 1970s, Simon’s songs have been relegated mostly to oldies radio stations and memories. Live at Grand Central should be sufficient to put them back in the forefront for a while. Review here.

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band - The Darkness Tour ’78 - Still young, still hungry and already one of rock’s great on-stage conglomerates, Springsteen and the E Street Band in 1978 were doing something unique to them. Review here.

Various Artists - Playing for the Man at the Door: Field Recordings from the Collection of Mack McCormick, 1958–1971 - Next time someone says, “Thank a taper,” mention Mack McCormick by name. Review here.

12/28/23

#the beatles #bob dylan #fleetwood mac #jerry garcia #grateful dead #little feat #joni mitchell #pink floyd #carly simon #bruce springsteen #bruce springsteen and the e street band #2023 albums #mack mccormick

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randomvarious · 1 year

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Today’s compilation:

Apollo 1993 Downtempo / Breakbeat / Ambient Techno / Ambient

Here's an absolutely breathtaking self-titled sampler that was put out in the early 90s by Apollo, the "ambient" sublabel of the great Belgium-based R & S Records. Honestly, as far as early 90s ambient and ambient-adjacent comps go, this is hands-down the best one I've ever heard. It's like the electronic music equivalent of hearing Dark Side of the Moon for the first time—just total mind expansion by way of progressive psychedelia that leaves its listener in awe; a completely unparalleled sonic experience. And I'm sure the nifty outer space-themed album art isn't a coincidence either.

The way the word "ambient" got thrown around back then was as an umbrella term; it wasn't just largely percussionless, beatless electronic music as we tend to define it today; it was just stuff that was markedly slower and less intense than stuff that was made for a typical dancefloor. So, although this is usually classed as an ambient album—the release itself has a sticker on its jewel case that literally says "file under ambient"—by today's standards, it's really mostly not. It's more so downtempo, techno, and breakbeat. And even though techno and breakbeat are usually referred to as dance genres, the vibe here is way more of a chill one, hence people's use of the term "ambient techno," for example. So, to put it more simply, most of this album isn't actually just purely ambient music, despite its own claim to the contrary.

Anyway, without the constraints of needing to make something uptempo and dancy, it allowed artists to really explore and push the bounds of electronic music. Canvasses were basically blank and there was no "rule" to incessantly loop any rhythms or melodies. You could pretty much craft whatever the hell you wanted, however the hell you wanted. And this album collects some great, early 90s creative electronic efforts that were made with that spirit in mind, which still have the capacity to amaze as we approach this release's upcoming 30th anniversary.

On here you'll find both abstract electronic music's greatest innovator, Aphex Twin, and the godfather of techno himself, Juan Atkins, and both of them turn in stellar contributions, with Aphex's being the first track from his famed Selected Ambient Works 85-92 compilation (one of Apollo's first releases), "X-tal," and Atkins' song being the lesser-known "The Passage," released under his Model 500 moniker. Both very unique and stunning ambient techno-breakbeat journeys there.

And then there's the star of this show, the relatively obscure David Morley, who gets two tracks of his own as well as a remix of Golden Girls' "Kinetic" to kick off this whole shebang. Guy hadn't amassed much of a solo career when this album was initially released, but his tracks here are all fantastic. He seems to enjoy utilizing and intertwining multiple layers of psychedelic synth sounds, generating these warm and comfy blankets, and with his three different placements here, he manages to apply that complex synth approach to IDMish, ambient techno, and chillout room frameworks. Brilliant stuff with a lot of texture to it 😌.

So, for me, among early 90s electronic comps, this ranks on the same level as Warp Records' pioneering IDM album, Artificial Intelligence, from 1992. Both still manage to totally floor me despite how archaic the technology that went into making them was back then when compared to today. And, to a certain extent, I've never really cared about when something came out anyway—the Holland-Dozier-Holland-crafted Motown sound that busted up the pop charts in the 60s still sounds better than pretty much any other pop era or craze that followed it—and the same goes for electronic music. A DAW can only really get you so far. It's still the mind of a creator that matters more than anything else, and an album like Apollo makes that sentiment crystal clear, technological advancements be damned.

Highlights:

Golden Girls - "Kinetic (David Morley Remix)" Model 500 - "The Passage" David Morley - "Evolution" Aphex Twin - "X-tal" David Morley - "Calibration" Neuro - "Mama (Justin London Mix)"

#downtempo #breakbeat #ambient techno #techno #ambient #electronic #electronic music #dance #dance music #90s #90s music #90's #90's music

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thesinglesjukebox · 5 months

Text

DOJA CAT - "PAINT THE TOWN RED"

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Spooky season lasting a little longer than anticipated...

[4.75]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Doja Cat's music and Doja Cat's public image are in this weird inverse dynamic where the more outré and provocative she gets the more boring her work gets. This has no distinguishing features at all, an expensive sample wrapped around a platonic solids. For an artist that, at her best, could be either an exquisite pop-rap irritant or an effortlessly charming hook machine, here she seemingly intentionally choses to be neither. At this point, she's an empty retread of her empty retreads. [3]

Michelle Myers: Massive, obvious samples like this are actually quite bold if you consider how easy they are to do poorly. Helps that the selection isn't arbitrary. "Paint the Town Red" channels the same refined resentment that Dionne Warwick mastered in the '60s. The raps are flowy and villainous with some genuinely weird phrasing. Euch! [7]

Jackie Powell: I couldn't be more glad that Dionne Warwick, an underrated legacy artist, once again gets her mainstream due. First she was the queen of Twitter before Elon Musk turned it into a dumpster fire, second she was impersonated by Ego Nwodim on SNL, and now she's been included in a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hit. Unfortunately "Walk On By" didn't have a random revival cover, but rather Doja Cat took Warwick's hook followed by the two bar trumpet riff that follows it to serve as the heart and soul of her diss track "Paint the Town Red." Warwick's original song is about getting over heartbreak, but Doja Cat uses Warwick's vulnerable hook as a chiller means to say buzz off. That's why "Paint the Town Red" feels lyrically out of place. Doja is trying to emulate an I-don't-give-a-fuck type of attitude alongside one of the more vulnerable hooks of the 1960's. That contrast leads me to believe that Doja Cat actually does care about the droves of people on the internet that have a problem with her. Using the phrase "walk on by" to dispel haters might make sense initially, but writers Burt Bacharach and Hal David intended for it to be much more introspective and about some personal accountability. That doesn't happen in "Paint the Town Red." [5]

Harlan Talib Ockey: Every time I hear this song, I immediately cue up its slowed and reverb remix, and then I am at peace. I'm going to avoid engaging in Doja Discourse (you hate your old music and your fans, okay), but for something that's supposed to be a demonic clapback, this ends up feeling a little too bouncy and endearing. The snaps in the percussion leave the trumpet sample sounding oddly jaunty. Even the title is quaint, more "pleasant carousing" than scaring the haters into submission. (Unless the implication is she's painting the town red WITH BLOOD, but that's just funny.) The one element that is genuinely intimidating is the vocal harmonies, and I think what keeps dragging me back to the slowed and reverb remixes is the extra depth and menace they gain. [6]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: Tik Tok background music that dissipates into invisible wisps of smoke when it's asked to foster any IRL connection. [3]

Tim de Reuse: I do not like Doja Cat. There's a featheriness in her aesthetic that itches at me. At high enough energies her delivery is like being caught on the kiddie coaster at the fair malfunctioning at sixty miles an hour. I [1]'ed her breakout hits on this very site back in the day. I hate fun; My poptimist card has long lapsed; I'm never here to have a good time. But here, there's a heaviness to her delivery. No longer failing to seduce, now proudly misanthropic, her style -- finally, finally! -- clicks into place, immune to my curmudgeonly nitpicks. If I dug in, I might find insincerity, awkward rhymes, lazy lyrics, but that's not a fight I can win. She is not here for me to have a good time. Finally, we agree on something. [7]

Nortey Dowuona: Doja Cat deciding to embrace her super serious Little Brother side proves that some folks need to stop running from liking browbeating purist rap. We've been doing it for years now, and whenever this happens. it's dispiriting to the actual true schoolers who won't switch up and chose to continue making purist rap and the cynicism by certain pop rappers who wish to escape the scrutiny and hype caused by their own actions and sharpen their hooks, pick more important and complimentary beats, get makeovers, then chafe at the restrictions and try to become serious without undertaking the necessary effort to make oneself -- at this point, the writer realized he was in this picture and ragequit. [6]

Ian Mathers: An earworm of a chorus deployed over a lovely use of the Warwick "Walk on By" and maybe the only song I've heard to make me think of both Kendrick and "212," but ultimately with this kind of power move it comes down to: when she starts off with "bitch, I said what I said," does it signify? I discounted this one on first listen and then came back a few days later and rewrote this blurb after I couldn't get it out of my head, so you tell me. [8]

Oliver Maier: Boring, mostly because Doja is entertaining as a rapper when she's being a weird little sex gremlin, not brandishing a huge inexplicable chip on her shoulder about being one of the most successful musicians on the planet. Even the touches of whimsy -- like the breathy, higher register she brings out on the god-awful chorus -- feel perfunctory, like they're only there to remind you who you're listening to. More whole lotta nothing than whole lotta red. [3]

Brad Shoup: A jaw-dropping heel display here, a weapons-grade blister agent: like prime Eminem without the self-thinkpiecing. She makes one feeble attempt to sort the fans from the freaks--otherwise, it's omnidirectional menace. The jokes are great; the image she inhabits is too. To sound famous, Doja Cat risks looking ridiculous ("ain't no sign I can't smoke here"), getting so deep into her lore I'm honestly surprised she didn't threaten to show feet. The sophistipop sample is big and obvious, but she doesn't interact with it like on "Vegas". In fact, listen hard enough and Warwick becomes a beleaguered member of Doja Cat's team, pleading with her to drop it already. [9]

Katherine St Asaph: At the risk of engaging in the sort of parasocial shit Doja Cat openly despises, including on this song: What demon lord are we talking here? Lamashtu? Oublivae? What is the Doja Cat lore? (Besides an Internet history of far-right chat rooms and a present history of working with Dr. Luke. Just pretend the "Walk on By" sample is siphoning more of the proceeds to Burt Bacharach than it probably actually is.) [7]

Michael Hong: Explained Doja Cat lore to my friend under the dim lighting of a restaurant, from "she was showing feet! in the racial chatroom!" to her berating her fans for acting like they know her. Knowing that, it's incredible how little bite, or anything resembling weirdness, her music has. [3]

Taylor Alatorre: For most people under the age of 60, "paint the town red" is not a phrase that immediately calls forth any specific, tangible emotions or experiences, if indeed it ever did. That doesn't mean it can't be used as the basis for a contemporary song, but it should ideally be expanded upon, with some sturdier reference points brought in to help with the heavy lifting, rather than left to fend for itself in an ocean of tetchy self-justifications. Name-drop Carti or Trippie, claim a tenuous connection to the Bloods if you have to, just do something. Maybe the Dionne Warwick nod is meant to do that -- an old-timey phrase paired with an old-timey tune -- but I doubt it. If that were the case, they probably would've done something with the sample beyond giving it the most basic Pro Tools treatment imaginable. [1]

Aaron Bergstrom: It sure doesn't take long for that sample to go from pleasantly hypnotic to painfully tedious, which is a problem since it's the most interesting part of the song. [3]

Leah Isobel: This year, Kim Petras released an album called Problématique, a title that petulantly nods to her association with Dr. Luke and the aura of controversy that has consequently clung to her work. Earlier that week, "Paint The Town Red" hit number one. While Doja's association with Luke hasn't impacted her career in precisely the same way as it has Kim's, his presence has undoubtedly shaped the discourse around her. "Paint The Town Red," and the whole Scarlet album cycle, demonstrates how that discourse has, in turn, shaped Doja right back. The needling repetition of the line "Bitch, I said what I said" has big I'm-not-bothered-you're-bothered energy, turning the laid-back bounce of the sample into something testy and passive-aggressive; the post-chorus slide into the third person is like she's psyching herself up, trying to summon her persona in order to escape her own emotions. I'm very sympathetic to Doja -- her work is admirably honest about how dehumanizing it is to be a woman who makes pop. This feels more and more vital as the industry contracts around the demands of major labels, who have a habit of hiring dudes like Luke to flatten out creative and talented women. In this light, Doja's edgelord heel turn isn't surprising; it's just sad, and predictable. [4]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: Becomes tiresome with every passing minute. Everyone who complained about TikTok songs being 90 seconds was wrong. [1]

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#doja cat #music #music writing #music reviews #pop music #the singles jukebox #Youtube

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