#I think if I do more comics with them the more ‘father-son’ dynamic will shine through more | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

yamujiburo · 26 days

Text

Why I Love Hanamusa

I get this question very frequently but have never given a really in depth, definitive answer. All just kinda implied through my comics and spread out asks. So here's this I guess! Long post ahead:

First, as a Pokémon fan in her mid 20s, I love seeing a ship where the characters are both in their mid/late 20s. Already, they’re much more relatable to me and my current experiences. Most Pokémon ships are between preteens, which can be cute but ultimately don’t interest me as much as they used to when I was a kid myself. Not enough to get super invested in and draw a lot of fanart for anyways haha.

I’ll also start by saying that canon doesn’t always influence whether or not I’ll ship something. I’m much more drawn to potential. Could the characters work together? Do their personalities work together in a nice way? I feel like this so much of fanon is anyways. Especially with queer relationships because they’re rarely depicted in the first place. A lot of the context for these ships is usually up to the fans to piece together or make up in general. And that’s the fun part to me!

Jessie and Delia have only met in the anime a handful of times. Any interaction they’ve had has either been pleasant, or just a typical Team Rocket interaction, with Delia dismissing them/not seeing them as a threat. Already a great jumping off point for me since, truly, they don’t have any actual beef or true, ill feelings towards each other. It’s not TOO out of the realm of possibility for them to potentially fall for each other. “But Jessie chased Delia’s son around trying to steal his Pokémon!” That’s where that dismissive and aloof attitude that Delia has comes into play. I’ll go more into Delia’s whole deal a bit later but I do think this aspect of her personality is a large reason why this ship can work. It’s not that she doesn’t care that Jessie has a bad past, but she can tell that, on the inside, Jessie’s a good person. And, in a scenario where Jessie is trying to become a better person, is forgiving enough to give her a shot. I feel like this is such a solid foundation for a ship. A character who has done wrong but is trying to be better and another character who is willing to help them be better. A classic dynamic!

It’s not just one-sided though; where Jessie is the only one benefitting and learning from the relationship. I believe Delia could get a lot out of being with someone like Jessie. To understand why, I think it’s important to know these characters’ respective backstories.

Jessie is an orphan/foster child who grew up in poverty. Her mother Miyamoto (from The Birth of Mewtwo) was a Team Rocket operative herself, who went on a mission to find Mew. In order to do this, she had to leave Jessie when she was just a toddler. Unfortunately, Miyamoto went MIA on her mission leaving Jessie to more or less fend for herself. Jessie went through life with zero stability, evident by her MANY different careers and constant moving around. It’s implied in the show that she went from foster home to foster home, and later in life tried being an idol, weather girl, florist, wine connoisseur, actress, most notably a nurse and finally a Team Rocket field agent. And even while in Team Rocket, she, James and Meowth were always doing odd jobs to get by. We see that Jessie used to be a sweet kid, and even adult, but the world and her circumstances repeatedly did her dirty, leading her to become the character we know today. Hot tempered, mean, selfish, etc. But despite this, her soft side does still shine through for the people and Pokémon she cares about. She is incredibly loyal.

Delia, unbeknownst to a lot of fans, also had a rough past (see Pocket Monsters: The Animation). Like Jessie, she had a lot of dreams and aspirations like wanting to be a model and even a trainer. But when she was 10, her mother didn’t let her, telling her that she had to stay home and learn to run the family restaurant (she’s an only child). Delia’s father left her and her mother to be a trainer, and never returned. When she was 18, she married Ash’s father and became pregnant shortly after. But right after Ash was born, he also set off to be a Pokémon trainer. And soon after that, her mother passed away, leaving Delia with just the restaurant and baby Ash. This gives so much context to Delia’s attitude in the show. We see that Delia is pained whenever Ash leaves on a journey, but she never shows that pain to anyone. ESPECIALLY Ash. She’s very quick to shoo him off when he shows any sign of wanting to go on another journey and even when he returns home, she acts more excited to see Pikachu than him almost every time. Without all this backstory, it’s easy to just read this as a funny gag, BUT with context, I think it really shows how quickly Delia shuts down and detaches in order to not confront her own feelings. She’s afraid of losing people and getting hurt again.

All that said, I think Jessie and Delia provide each other with EXACTLY what the other needs.

Aside from becoming rich and famous, Jessie’s biggest aspiration is to get married. In my opinion, this is more so an underlying want for love and stability. There is no one more stable in the show than Delia. Delia’s lived in Pallet her whole life, she’s worked at the same restaurant since she was young and she is always there when Ash comes back home. She has all the love, patience and stability Jessie needs and craves. While forgiving, Delia’s not stupid and can keep Jessie in check. Delia’s also just an angel, which I feel, would make Jessie want to be better. And on top of all this, on more of a surface level, Delia’s a chef and excellent cook. She shows love through cooking and Jessie, who grew up poor, regularly starving and eating snow, happily receives that love. Jessie’s able to live a happy and healthy life with someone like Delia.

Delia, as stated, is very stable. Likely pretty monotonous and solitary, especially living in such a small town like Pallet. This isn’t a bad thing but it’s a little sad when you consider that Delia also had dreams of traveling, being a model and a trainer. She had to give up so many dreams in order to fulfill her duties as a restaurant owner and mother. And even now, when Ash is off on his journey, she feels the need to always be home and be that stable pillar, leaving behind any ambitions she had, thinking it’s too late for her (she’s only 29 btw). But then along comes Jessie, dangerous, passionate, an absolute firecracker. Someone who’s whole life has been about chasing dreams and either, never giving up on them or finding a new dream to chase. Upon learning about Delia’s past aspirations, I could see Jessie pushing her towards them, letting her know that life’s too short and she has nothing to lose from trying. On top of this, Jessie’s also loyal. She, James and Meowth are depicted as doing anything for anyone who gives them food or shows them kindness. Delia does both so there’s no way Jessie would leave her. This fulfills an essential need for Delia, who is afraid of the people in her life leaving her.

There’s so much potential for mutual growth and learning between these two and I adore that. They compliment each other, they help each other and they bring out the best qualities in one another.

I’m not really sure how to end this and I could truly talk about them even more but I don’t want this to be tooooo long haha. OH I could end it with maybe the most funny aspect of this ship that I've brushed over and also what drew me to it in the first place. Jessie. As Ash’s stepmom. THE END.

#hanamusa #hanamusashipping

2K notes · View notes

syn0vial · 11 months

Note

Apologies for the long take/response/reblog thing from your JF post. But I'd like to hear more about your thoughts about the Fett dynamic ♥

no problem at all! lord knows i'm a rambler, too, haha.

as for the dynamic between jango and boba, my personal interpretation is that jango felt pulled between two ways of relating to boba, his clone: one, as a son, and two, as a carefully-crafted extension of his own self and legacy. we get stories and scenes where he is simply a doting, loving father—when he first receives boba as an infant from the kaminoans in the republic commando novels, for example, or in the dark horse comics where we see him making time to play with boba before a mission. and we get stories and scenes where he treats boba much more callously, like when he forces boba to fight a monster alone in the blood ties comic or gives boba posthumous orders to seek out people he knows will be a danger to him in the junior novels.

now, if i'm being honest, i think that oftentimes, the actual, "doylist" reason for this is that different expanded universe writers had different ideas about jango''s moral alignment and personality and this shines through in how they write about jango treating boba. at others, however, i think this ambiguity is very much intentional. in these moments, i think we're supposed to see jango as someone who requested a clone of himself for his own, fairly selfish reasons but who, maybe unexpectedly, ended up loving that clone as a son as well. but rather than the latter overriding the former, jango tries to have it both ways and it makes for a pretty unhinged upbringing for poor boba.

some moments in particular that come to mind when contemplating this dynamic:

in open seasons, jango explicitly denies to dooku that he intends to raise his unaltered clone as a son and instead refers to him as an apprentice and a means to continue jaster's legacy. while one could assume he's lying, it's curious that when taun we tells an adult boba about his father's words, boba feels hurt by them. that implies to me that there is at least some truth to them, because if it was ridiculous or beyond belief, why would boba entertain the notion enough for it to hurt? for this reason, i think jango really did mean it when he told dooku his intentions—even if his feelings evolved once said clone was actually a reality.

(my personal headcanon is that he was forced to reconsider the second he actually held a baby boba in his arms. we see a moment in republic commando where he's holding boba and he's very clearly totally bowled over by love for the kid)

in the posthumous recording jango makes for boba in the junior novels, jango tells boba that he loves him. he also tells boba that he was "more than a parent to you" and goes on to give him orders for who to find next—people who jango knows to be dangerous individuals who will force boba to become more self-sufficient and mistrustful to survive or die trying. i think it's interesting that jango calls himself "more than a parent" in this context bc it calls into question how jango himself sees his relationship with boba. like, what else are you then, jango?

in the attack of the clones novelization, we do get some thoughts from jango's POV about this question and they're interesting, to say the least. here, jango reflects that raising boba is an opportunity to see "all that he [himself] might have become" if circumstances had been different—if there had been someone in his life "to force him to perfection." here, i think we get some insight into the "more than a parent" remark. boba is jango's son, yes, but in jango's eyes, he's also jango himself—a version of him that jango can mold to be without his flaws and setbacks, a version of him he can perfect. in this way, jango is indeed more than boba's father—he is that person who can "force [boba] to perfection," as he says, and the prototype whom boba must surpass.

(extremely ironic then that, as an adult, boba is quite astutely accused of constantly self-sabotaging because he's afraid of ever surpassing his father. in enlarging his own importance in boba's life, jango actually prevents boba from fulfilling the purpose he was created for: being a perfected version of jango)

as for how this affected how he treated boba, i think this excerpt from the same novelization sums it up pretty well: "With Boba, there was pride and there was love, and Jango had to work constantly to keep both of those potential weaknesses at a minimum. While he loved his son dearly-because he loved his son dearly-Jango had been teaching him those same attributes of dispassion, even callousness, from his earliest days." this ties into what i was saying in my earlier post: though jango's actions towards his son may at times seem unloving or even callous to the reader, in jango's mind, even those actions are acts of love.

as for how it affected boba's view of jango, i think boba's reflections on his father in legacy of the force offer a pretty believable picture of how this kind of treatment would affect the child's psyche as an adult: boba loves his father and cherishes his memory, but also very much fears it as well. he conceptualizes his dead father as constantly watching him, judging him—and finding him wanting.

tl;dr: jango loves boba but he also has a destiny in mind for him and while a more good-aligned, well-adjusted character might have ultimately decided that the love is more important, jango pretty much just grit his teeth, dug his heels in, and went, "i can do both."

#jango fett #boba fett #fett feels #told ya i was a rambler :`D

45 notes · View notes

theopolis · 1 year

Note

I'm told BND Harry started patching things up with Liz off-panel and didn't care about Normie for most of his appearances. Would you say that's a fair assessment?

I'll preface this by saying that I may be overlooking something as I am not super well read on the post OMD era (many thanks to my friend @kitausuret for her liveblog of it, which def filled in some gaps for me!)

But overall... yes and no. Patching up things with Liz off-panel definitely rings true to me, I can think of only one storyline where the conflict between them was beginning to be adressed head-on

Which ended with both of them by Normies side, establishing how they are a family regardless of how the relationship between Liz and Harry may evolve from here. Overall, a good start.

However following that this conflict was neglected. Until, at a later point, we were informed that while plot was happening Harry and Liz were basically locked in a room together and whatever happened in there caused them to get romantically involved in some way again which. Hmmm. Is a very lackluster way to revive their relationship, especially considering how little ground it had to begin with. I can buy them being young, impulsive, etc pre OMD and rushing into getting married and having a child. But after the trauma Harry put his family through during his Goblin days, I cannot imagine things resolving so easily. We deserved a deeper exploration of their feelings, especially Liz' side.

Harry's relationship to Normie post OMD wasn't as undercooked, although it still didn't receive its due if you ask me. The main thing that made me go "blegh" was that one quote from Harry about how he went for days at a time without thinking of Normie while he was in hiding. Bad. Very ooc. I do not see it

But ignoring that - Harry was consistently shown around Normie when the narrative didn't whisk him away to somewhere else (a problem of its own) and they definitely got more of a real pay-off to the conflict between them compared to HarryLiz. Normie was wary of his father upon Harrys return and there was this subplot about Harry struggling to raise two sons at a time, and Normie growing jealous of Stanley (as well as being confused by the status of his parents relationship)

In my opinion, Normie's feelings were justified considering how big of an impact Harry's Goblin days and death must have left on his young psyche, and his (one-sided) sibling rivalry with his half brother was a compelling concept. The resolution to that, while rushed, was still quite sweet

The main issue with post OMD Spider-Man comics, as you may have deduced from this summary, is that they more often than not do not want to commit to fleshing out grounded interpersonal conflict. Often, the writers don't give the characters enough time to be around each other, and when they do, we do not get to see enough of it to really paint a picture of the way their dynamics evolve. A problem will be set up, forgotten about for a while, and then we jump-cut to its supposed resolution.

This stands in stark contrast to the root of the complicated feelings between Harry and his family especially - DeMatteis' Goblin Jr arc left more room for the characters inner lives and how they externalize those than perhaps anything else. That's what made it so intense and captivating.

I really wish for another version of the post OMD era where Harry is not only written more in line with his original personality and themes, but he and his family receive more of an opportunity to shine as complex individuals with complex relationships to one another which change at a natural pace and through thoughtfully placed character beats. But regardless, I cannot agree with the assesssment that post OMD Harry didn't care about Normie. If anything, his scenes with Normie are the rare moments where his once character-integral softness and domesticity come through

#harry osborn #liz allan #normie osborn #theopolispost #osborns #canon

27 notes · View notes

laufire · 4 months

Note

Bruce as a father across the multiverse 🔥

I'm going to put aside Bruce's that don't get children (which are. most of the ones coming to mind rn ngl xD), even if I think I could make a compelling argument for a few of those being primed to be better parents than comics!Bruce -like gotham!Bruce or nolanverse!Bruce lol.

honestly, other than those from animated versions, like yj!Bruce or gotham knights(cw)!Bruce (we don't see him that much because the show is NOT a batman show, but both him and the kids around seem more well-adjusted xD), or dcau!Bruce which I haven't seen in a long time but was overall alright, from what I remember... my mind is focused on the different versions of Bruce we see in the main continuity. aka the one whose fatherhood we see been explored.

first, there's pre-crisis/earth-one!Bruce. I'm less familiar with Bruce, especially with that particular Bruce-Dick dynamic (though what I've seen is complex and less defined than father-and-son. they call each other partners, brothers, and yes, they have a discussion about the more parental aspects of their relationship while Bruce is in a custody battle with earth-one!Jason). but I have read everything there is to this version of Jason and Bruce and it's... well, the most properly fatherly we ever see Bruce, probably? it's sweet. it's hardly perfect or straightforward (this Jason already served as a counterpoint to Bruce, in a much calmer way), and it could be easy to point out questionable aspects, I'm sure -but maybe because I inevitably compare it to the other versions, he comes out shining xD. he's incredibly flaky with women though, I don't know why they put up with him lol.

then there's post-crisis/new earth!Bruce. now this is the bitch I'm most familiar with xDD. and honestly, yeah, I would call him a shitty father figure. increasingly worsening with time, with things taking a nosedive after Jason's death, but he also pulled Some Shit with Dick or Jason (although with the later he apologised and recognised his mistakes once!!! woah).

what I will say for new earth!Bruce is that the concept of BatfamilyTM, while present, was much less conventional than it is right now. while I wouldn't defend any of the shit he pulled, I can acknowledge it was written with more attention to characterization, to the dynamics involved, and in a less... simplified and stereotypical way, iykwim? the ways new earth!Bruce screws up as a father/authority figure feel like they are meant to inform the character, at least most of the time. I feel like I'm watching a deeply troubled man stuck in his childhood trauma who arguably should never have taken a caretaker role over fellow troubled kids, who acts in controlling and damaging ways because of his own issues and might need to hit rock bottom before he could even think to really do better. but there's a sense that all this is in sync with the story, with the path it and his character follows, iykwim.

then there's post-reboot/prime earth!Bruce. current Bruce. mister "I'll beat Dick into submission to accept an incredibly dangerous job after he's already going through the worst time of his life". mister "I'll beat up Jason so badly he won't be able to hold a gun without his hand trembling a month later". mister "I'll brainwash my son and leave him defenseless because he once made choices I disagreed with and he might do them again". mister "I'll never face any consequences for this for longer than 5 pages, if that, and nothing will change no matter what."

the thing about this one is that he suffers the flaws inherent to prime earth: objectively worse writing that veers towards conventionality (if you try to push a more conventional father-kids view of the Batfamily, Bruce's abusive actions read much, much worse), and chronic inhability to commit to anything which leaves writers scrambling to return to a more comfortable status quo, while recycling storylines in a way that makes this come accross as a consistent, undeniable pattern. that, plus the framing of these actions (gotham war pending, but I'm not getting my hopes up) as Bruce-the-stern-Patriarch who must control these unruly kids is. hmmmmmmmm.

I'm not saying that new earth!Bruce didn't suffer some of that but... it does feel different to me because the kid and not so kid bats got to grow and evolve, if that makes sense? and to do it past Bruce. while in prime earth, everything feels in a state of arrested development. stagnant. and thus, unchangeable, unmoving. not all the "movement" in new earth was good or forward but it's a whole other beast, basically. and things now feel like they're more tied to Bruce, like a lot if not all the other bonds go *through him*? maybe I'm being ungenerous: I haven't read a lot of prime earth (and I'm not gonna xD), but that's the impression I'm left with after what I have read.

and all of those factors contribute to making current!Bruce such a despicable figure to me. if we crossed paths one of us would walk away a few appendages down xDD

Send Me a 🔥+ a Topic, and I’ll Tell You My Honest Opinion About It

#replies #talking to the void #i'm not The Expert in any of these continuities. but I have read enough to feel that I can speak about the instances i HAVE read #so there's that #my thoughts #dc #dc thoughts #bruce wayne

5 notes · View notes

teal-bandit · 1 year

Note

I LOVE your "Itsu lives" au! I was wondering some things about it though, and if you don't have an answer, that's perfectly fine!!

1: What name do you think Akihiro would have in this au? Since he'd have his bio patents to name him this time sjsjjs

2: How would Laura and Gabby go with them this round?

3: Does Akihiro still pick up costumed fighting sjsjjsjs

I love thinking about how my man's life would have been if he'd had both his parents to raise him .. I'm not crying you're crying

1) I'd still like him to retain a part of his name, if only for the connection to him as a character. I feel like something like Hideaki (meaning "shining excellence") or Hiroshi ("generous")

We know from the bad bad no good What If? Issue that Logan would have named him John, which was his (nonbiological) father's name, so that sort of sentimentality could arise in his name, too. That said, you could technically get away with naming him Jon and have his name mean any number of things based on what katakana you use. That said, if he had to be names after/in honor of a family member, I'd prefer him honor his mom. Itsuki is a fun little play on Itsu's name, and means "tree" 💜

2) I feel like, with Logan having a family to support (we don't know 100% if he would have stuck around in a traditional "father" role, as he was disgraced and told to leave by Itsu's father), his role within Weapon X would have been mitigated to a degree. That said, with them being kicked out of Jasmine falls, and perhaps on the move to flee from Romulus as well, I could see Logan taking his family to Canada or the states to keep them safe. Charles was apparently aware of his existence well before his appearance in Uncanny X-Men, so it's possible that they could have gone to the school for protection.... By the time Laura and Gabby would be in the picture, Itsu would be somewhere in her 90s if not older, and Akihiro in his 70s, but with a vastly different skill set, personality and motivations. Their dynamic would be completely different in a lot of different ways, but I still see Akihiro as someone who would be completely devoted to his family, and the girls 100000000% deserve Itsu someone to spoil them.

3) With his father's guidance, he may have more peace with his powers (Romulus' training was abuse at best, and it's taken Akihiro a lot of time in the comics to come to terms with who and what he is; Logan training him, or having him learn with the other X-Men would have shortened that process, if it didn't eliminate it entirely); I don't know that he would take up costumed fighting immediately, given Logan's propensity toward self-sacrifice (I feel like he'd take on the fighting role so his son wouldn't have to), but once the girls are in the picture, that's what leads him into it. He doesn't want them to have to fight any more or take any more pain, and so he would take up the costume to save them.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk; tune in next week when I share my thoughts on Akihiro's romantic partners/relationships and the themes of loss of self and belonging.

#daken akihiro #bandit talks #shut up bandit #ask stuff #listen i have too many thoughts and too many feelings #most if the time theyre rolling around in my head like an angry hornet nest but sometimes the hornets let me write

8 notes · View notes

scorpionyx9621 · 3 years

Text

Maybe it's just me but I always feel that it's such an interesting thing to think about Bruce and Jason's relationship.

Before Jason's death in Death in the Family, Batman almost had a sense of camp to him. Yes he was that tough edgy detective noir type. But Dick and Jason softened Bruce's edge and made him a bit more human.

After Jason dies, Bruce became what we really kind of popularly know him as today. Strict, cold, fearsome, and not one to joke around or be messed with. Because Jason's death loomed so large over him. Part of the reason why he pushed Dick away much harder than he did before and initially; and didn't give Tim the time of day was because he was afraid he was going to lose them too.

And then Jason comes back as Red Hood. Now the comics and the movie differ in the ending but the outcome is still the same. Bruce is shocked by Jason being alive and now a villain and while Bruce does what he can to stop Jason from hurting people, Bruce's means of stepping up to advocate for criminals and try to help get them rehabilitated increases tenfold for Jason.

And although objectively he's the worst part of any Bat Family story, Bruce is forced into such a unique position and I can't help but not try to take his perspective. What would you do if your son, who had died under your watch, had come back and swore his life to hating not only you but everything you set out to create and wants to destroy it all, only so he can take your place and be a version of you that goes against your core and most central tenant of not killing. What would you do?

Bruce's dilemma is that he still loves Jason like his own son. And Jason, while he does have reservations, he does still love Bruce like a father, an estranged one, but the two clearly do still care for one another. Bruce could easily choose to throw Jason away in Arkham for killing tens if not hundreds of people without batting an eye, but he doesn't because he still cares about Jason. And Jason has every right to tell the bat family to stick it where the sun doesn't shine, and pre-New 52 he did. However (and for the best might I add) in our current continuity, Jason is being fully integrated back into the family. But I like the fact they are having this discussion. Family is one of the key and central themes of Batman. And Jason and Bruce's dynamic shed light on the fact that we have family members who do things we don't like. I would certainly hope none of us have to deal with our families being vigilante crime fighters/serial killers, but it does highlight the challenges of not only having a parent who doesn't accept you, but also having a child who does things you may not like or agree with.

Just 11pm work night thoughts.

#jason todd #bruce wayne #batman #red hood #bat family #tw family #tw family abuse #¯\ (ツ) /¯ ¯\ (ツ) /¯ ¯\ (ツ) /¯

38 notes · View notes

traincat · 4 years

Note

Hi traincat! Hope you're doing well. I figured since you have an extensive knowledge on all things Spider-Man, you would know your way around his rogues! I wanted to ask if you have a favorite or one that you find most compelling and why. Thanks a million!

I think my answers for which rogues are my favorites and which I find most compelling and which are widely viewed as the best and why are all pretty wildly different. I do think the popular assessment that Spider-Man has one of the best rogues galleries in Marvel canon is true. Like, I think the absolute best Spider-Main villain story -- the one that gives you the best sense of the villain as a character and also the one that works best at uniting villain and is Kraven’s Last Hunt, which is just incredible on every level. (Content warning for suicide.)

(Web of Spider-Man #32) Also, like, in terms of design, Kraven is great. Love a big Russian game hunter perpetually bare chested and wearing leopard print cropped leggings. That’s not something you get sick of. Only Kraven Sr. for me, though -- I’m less fond of his son, although I think the whole family affairs in Grim Hunt and Scarlet Spider v2 are pretty fun.

On the other hand, though, I think that some of the biggest villains in Spider-Man’s gallery, namely Norman Osborn and Doc Ock, are overused, although I know why they’re overused and it’s because they’re really good villains. (But also you can only make people pay for the same story so many times with only minor variations before it starts to get old.) I think Norman and Peter are pretty perfect opposites, whereas Otto and Peter are mirror images -- although I think generally Norman stories pull off that opposite nature better than Otto stories reveal him as a mirrored image of Peter.

I think it’s interesting that Otto is kind of the first “big” villain Peter encounters -- he makes his debut in ASM #3, so there are villains that come before him, but they’re like, the Vulture and the Chameleon. And there are great Vulture stories -- love that flying octogenarian -- but like, I would not put the Vulture in the absolute top tier Spider-Man villains. And the Chameleon is a freak.

Same, girl. (Web of Spider-Man #65)

More villain talk beneath the cut.

By comparison, Otto is the first villain to actually serve Peter a real defeat, the first one to humble him. So I think it’s interesting that they come from very similar backgrounds -- both geniuses, both lonely as children, both people who were in danger of becoming very solitary, isolated adults, which Otto did and which Peter did not. They had a mother figure who verged on at times or was actually smothering in her affections, and a salt of the earth type father figure. And Otto gains his powers after suffering an accident with radiation much the same way Peter does. It’s one of the things that disappoints me about Superior Spider-Man, because I don’t think it plays into the idea of Otto and Peter as mirrored images of each other nearly as much as it could have. Even Otto’s Parker Industries originally showed up in a “bad” version of Peter’s life, where he never got bit by the spider and instead becomes a CEO:

(Sensational Spider-Man #41) “You prove yourself to everyone -- except yourself.” Which is what Otto is continually trying to do, and which is what he always falls short of. So it’s interesting that there’s kind of all this set up here and that the actual comics sort of continually fall short of it.

Green Goblin stories live up to their rep a little better, in my opinion, and they’re better at playing into those parallels. Norman and Peter are both self-made men, but Norman is rich and Peter is not. Peter accepts responsibility and fault; Norman does not. Norman’s life is devoid of women, while Peter’s is full of it. If Norman and Peter are both studies in masculinity, then Norman’s is toxic and Peter’s is not. Peter is capable of growth; Norman is entrenched in this role he’s made for himself -- he is not capable of sustained growth beyond the role he’s made for himself. There’s a reason I think Norman gets used so much and it’s because it’s a heady dynamic to kind of play into -- especially when you go with the relatively more recent angle of things where Norman kind of views Peter as the perfect heir, worthy where Harry is not. Honestly, it’s a good time whenever you’re involving Harry in the mix at all, as someone caught between these two very powerful figures and how the tug-of-war there for ownership of him is just completely soul destroying.

(Spectacular Spider-Man #180)

But I do think Norman is overused, and it’s gotten a point where in Amazing Spider-Man #800 it was like -- oh, what, he’s going to kill Flash? He’s going to kill someone else Peter loves? He’s killed like half the main-main cast at this point. He’s behind the murder of Peter and Mary Jane’s baby, he’s responsible for Ben Reilly’s death, he killed Gwen Stacy, Harry’s death goes directly back to him, he’s kidnapped May and Mary Jane and Flash and blah blah blah it’s JUST TOO MUCH. It can’t always be this one guy! You can’t just bring him back every 50 issues like “this time Norman Osborn’s gone too far” when he went too far in the ‘70s. Everything since then has just been trying to recapture the moment he threw Gwen Stacy off the bridge. It’s exhausting. I’m begging Spider-Man, as it starts hyping up yet another Norman story for ASM #850, to do something new.

In comparison to Norman, I think Harry’s run as the Green Goblin is fairly flawlessly executed as far as villain stories go, especially in its final hour. Spectacular Spider-Man #200 is really one of my favorite single issues of all time. Harry has the pathos that Norman really never does -- you can feel for Harry in a way that you can’t feel for Norman. And it’s because Harry loves Peter -- really, truly loves him -- that his acts of villainy take on that special edge of cruelty. It doesn’t just hurt Peter that these things are being done; it hurts Peter that these are being done and that it’s Harry doing them and that, in a lot of ways, they both blame Peter for why Harry is doing them, even if at the end of the day it’s in no way Peter’s fault. And then there’s the utterly perfect moment as Harry dies in Spectacular Spider-Man #200, that his act of triumph is that he can’t bring himself to kill Peter, because he loves him too much. It’s perfect. I live in fear they’re going to make Harry a villain again and try to replicate it only to fall painfully short.

I think the Jackal is actually underutilized because he is in my honest opinion the scariest Spider-Man villain, or at the very least the creepiest. Where Norman can only dream of remaking Spider-Man in his own image, the Jackal actually does that with Ben Reilly -- and, to a lesser extent, with Kaine, his first damaged clone. He’s a good lurker, too, less show-y than either Otto or Norman. He lurked in the background for a while. And in a series where I think you can pick a lot of the villains apart as men who take advantage of their power, having the Jackal be a college professor whose villainous career stems from his obsession with one of his students fits right in. And he’s just creepy. He’s upsetting! The things he does to the clones -- both the Peter and Gwen clones, although I think the comics are not so great at letting the Gwen clones shine as individual characters, which is something I wish someone would actually do something about -- are very upsetting, especially since you can extrapolate from a lot of Kaine’s stories and the things we know bother him and how he’s consistently paralleled against Janine Godbe, that both Kaine and the Gwen clones were sexually abused by the Jackal. (Spider-Man’s not typically shy about examining darker subjects, and while we can only extrapolate from canon with Kaine, it’s extremely there on the surface with the Gwen clones. I mean, he married one.) And honestly, the villain who’s whole schtick is cloning makes more sense as someone who can repeatedly come back from anything than Norman’s deal of Corrupt Businessman Surprisingly Hard To Kill. I’ve said before that Peter appears to have a bit of a loophole in his personal moral code when it comes to violence that either has no consequences or lessened consequences, like when he cuts loose against Wolverine, someone who has a healing factor, or when he buried the Juggernaut, supposedly indestructible, in concrete. The Jackal as someone who could and has clone himself repeatedly opens up similar doorways -- what’s to stop Peter from cutting loose if the Jackal isn’t confined to this one body? There’s a lot to play with there and a lot more interesting spaces to go than, say, having to invent increasingly poor excuses for why Peter hasn’t taken more permanent action with Norman if Norman is always going to return to do harm to someone beloved to Peter.

Finally, I’m in a weird spot with personal favorite villains because honestly my instinct is to say the Lizard. And that’s an issue because of one fairly recent storyline and everything that’s spun out from it: Shed (Amazing Spider-Man #630-633), the storyline where Curt Connors loses all control over the Lizard, kills, and partially devours his son Billy. Like, I LIKE grim dark Spider-Man comics, and Shed is honestly too much for me -- not because of the Lizard’s actions, but because in the story Peter fails to save Billy. And I say not because of the Lizard’s actions because I think, as fun as a giant lizard man in purple pants and a lab coat can be, I think Curt Connors makes for one hell of a supervillain metaphor for domestic violence.

(ASM #365)

(Spectacular Spider-Man v2 #13) And it’s very compelling. There’s a lot of things to explore down that alley. But once you actually go as far as having the Lizard kill his son, you can’t take that back. And the problem is, that’s what Spider-Man comics have tried to do post-Shed. It feels weird and deeply out of character to have writers assume that Peter could forgive the murder of any child, let alone a child he knew, and have him continue his relationship with Curt Connors. It’s a weird message to go “yeah, he ate his kid, but he wasn’t in control, and he made up for it via cloning, so we’re all good now.” Like imagine trying to spin that in any horror movie. It doesn’t work -- that your villain kills his kid and then clones him and pretends everything is okay now would be the plot of the horror movie. Spider-Man is a series fundamentally built on the fact that actions have consequences, and sometimes those consequences are utterly unfixable. Peter can’t go back and intercept the burglar to prevent Uncle Ben’s death. He can’t clone Uncle Ben and wipe that incident out of history. So to have a story like Shed in continuity as something that doesn’t alter Peter’s perception of Curt Connors forever doesn’t work.

Anyway that’s why my favorite villain is the Shocker. Love that quilted bastard.

#traincat talks comics #*replies #long post/

38 notes · View notes

mythoughtsxxblog · 4 years

Text

A Toxic Mess of Entertainment - Secret Life of the American Teenager

Quarantine Update: I've started rewatching this mess of a show for the 100th time (its so infuriating, I can never not rewatch it 💀). And I've decided to rate the characters on this show because they're just all so......interesting.

Ricky Underwood: A precious angel. His character development was fucking amazing. He deserved the absolute world and was the best parent to his child. Despite his tragic childhood and his lifestyle choices/inner struggles, he really turned his life around for his son and honestly became my favorite character on this show. His relationship with John was the cutest and I absolutely adored him and Amy (when she wasn't being annoying/immature).

Amy Juergens: Oh Amy.....so damn annoying, but likable at times. Honestly after rewatching this show so many times I've come to the conclusion that she may have had postpartum depression. She had the signs and seemed to resent her own child at times. I will say though, she had her good moments. Like when she actually acted like an adult and not a little kid. Also her cute moments with Ricky. And honestly, Shailene playing her made me dislike the character less lol

Ben Boykewich: Where the hell do I start with this piece of shit. He was slightly decent the first season, but my God wtf happened...I mean he is honestly creepy as hell. So obsessive, compulsive, and manipulative. I don't understand how the hell Amy went back and forth with him when the better man, her baby daddy, was right there the whole time. Although he's a little bitch, the storyline with Adrian and their baby killed me. It hurt me the first time I watched it and every other time I've seen it. Other than that though, he can fall in a sewer.

Adrian Lee: When I watched the show as a young teenager, I couldn't stand her, but being older now, I grew to like her. I loved her growth throughout the series, but I'll admit she did have her shitty moments. She made dumb ass mistakes (sleeping with Ben, going back to Ricky all the damn time, etc.), but I'm happy she got her happy ending. After everything she went through, she deserved it. I also loved the way her friendship with Grace evolved.

Grace Bowman: God, this bitch was annoying as hell for a good 3 seasons. She had her good moments, but she was so insufferable. Especially when it came to Jack. The storyline where she thought her having sex killed her dad will forever be the dumbest yet funniest shit ever 💀

Jack Pappus: He was alright I guess. I'm very indifferent on him. He had good and bad moments. His obsession with Grace was extremely annoying.

Ashley Juergens: I had a love/hate relationship with Ashley. I loved when she'd drag Amy when she was acting dumb, but Ashley herself acted dumb at times. She was a know-it-all and that annoyed me because it lowkey reminded me of myself 💀 at times I forgot she was the younger sister cause she was more mature than Amy lol.

George Juergens: Though he has his obvious flaws, I freaking love him. He's hilarious and I honestly think we need a reboot of this show with him and Moose 💀 also I loved his father/daughter relationship with Ashley.

Anne Juergens: Molly Ringwald is an icon. I didn't care for the character, but I love her lol. "Everybody forgot my 16th birthday" ICONIC.

Betty Boykewich: A character that had me dying of laughter most of the time. She honestly gave the show the light hearted humor it needed. Jennifer Coolidge is a legend.

Leo Boykewich: One of the more likeable parents on this show. I loved when he'd tell off Ben for how dumb he was acting which was almost 24/7. I also loved his relationship with Ricky. He treated him like a second son and it was sweet to watch.

Henry and Alice: I absolutely love them. They were the perfect duo that offered comic relief.

Bunny: LOVE HER. I would have loved to work in a butcher shop with her lol.

Lauren and Madison: Annoying as hell and honestly were never true friends to Amy. They couldn't keep shit to themselves and honestly the show would have been just fine without them. They were irrelevant characters to me 🤷‍♀️

Tom Bowman: I really liked his character. He brought a different feel to the show. I love that he wasn't treated differently despite him having down syndrome. I also love when actors with down syndrome are given a chance to shine and the actor really shined.

Some Thoughts:

With how the show ended horribly, I'm happy knowing the producer came out and said that in the end Ricky and John follow Amy to NY and ultimately they get married. I still cannot believe I watched this show for 5 years and the finale happened the way it did. But knowing this little fact keeps me at peace lol

Despite my obvious hatred for Ben, I lowkey wish he and Adrian had worked out. Yes they were, at times, extremely toxic, but I thought they had great chemistry.

Nora was awesome. I wish her character had been around since the first season. Her dynamic with George was entertaining af

Even though I didn't really care for Jack, I loved his and Tom's friendship.

#secret life of the american teenager #tslotat #amy juergens #ricky underwood #shailene woodley

92 notes · View notes

sparrowsabre7 · 3 years

Text

Thoughts on the Snyder Cut Chapter 3 of 6

So the famous Barry Allen saving Iris West scene is added back in, but also features the kind of slightly awkward comedy you’d expect of a Whedon script. Also, the dude driving the truck due to crash into Iris seriously got a burger from “burger shop” like fucking try a little bit, guys.

God he looks so weird doing his little half-run out of the shop to save her and unnecessarily spends 5 hours brushing her hair aside. I did appreciate the very unique take on super-speed though compared to say, Quicksilver from X-men. There’s an incredible delicateness about how he manoeuvres himself and Iris which is interesting to see, however, the sequence adds little besides that “Barry is a doer of good” which we already knew from the CCTV footage in BVS*.

We then have ‘wolf gathering some Atlanteans for interrogation, after the stock “we will never betray Atlantis!” statement, he uses a weird spider robot to scan the guy’s brain or something and show him the location. The film would have been better without this scene, it - again - adds little and even beginning to think about how the fuck the mind projector spider would even work will distract the audience for at least the next five minutes.

Another scene of Lois Lane grieving. We had one added earlier in the film but I forgot to mention it because of just how inconsequential it was. God bless Amy Adams because she is clearly giving it her all but I’m not sure “Lois Lane grieving widow” is a much better look than “Lois Lane world’s thirstiest woman”, both undermine and neglect her as a character in her own right and I just hope the Snyder cut doesn’t have her just be a prop to satiate Superman’s rage like Josstice League.

Back to Bruce and Diana, the latter now seems more proactive in helping Bruce search for the other supers, which is good. It also gives nod to Diana knowing the history of Amazons and Atlanteans. There is some sarcastic banter exchanged and some awkward accidental hand touching (are we sure this isn’t Josstice League?) *The aforementioned footage now plays out in full again here in case anyone watching this hadn’t seen BvS... this feels like an odd move. I could sort of understand it for cinemagoers who hadn’t seen BvS, but the Snyder Cut is so slavishly made for fans of Snyder’s work in the DCEU that it seems odd to repeat it here with colour commentary from Bruce and Diana.

Cut to Victor Stone sadly watching kids play football and then flashback to his own football career which, credit where it’s due, is beautifully shot, looking straight out of 300 if it weren’t for the football gear. It also tips the hat to Victor having some hacking know-how prior to his Cyborg transformation, using it to help his friend’s grades - a move that is not merely standard high school hijinks, but done out of a sense of social justice and points to inequality within the school system. Much as this is another diversion that adds little, it is worthwhile and introduces some much needed nuance into the character of Victor and the world of Justice League as a whole. Snyder has a tendency to be heavy handed, but he does occasionally touch on issues which have weight and whether purposefully or not, his small-scale interaction with them makes them feel that much more real and ingrained in the world. Things like the Gotham PD largely ignoring their jobs to watch the game, the disabled Wayne Enterprises employee struggling to make ends meet, angry at the world, how different social classes view Batman’s actions.

I digress, the sequence also puts Victor’s mother back into the picture and helps embed the kind of relationship Vic has with his father. Said mother is then unceremoniously killed in a car crash, diverging slightly from the otherwise somewhat faithful recreation of “Justice League: Origins” from the new 52 relaunch. This recontextualises Silas’ decision to apply the motherbox to his son as a rather more selfish act than in the comic, where it was ostensibly to undo a mistake he had made (or rather, undo the fallout of something he was working on). Clearly Victor agrees with this reading, as in the following montage we see Silas explain the extent of his powers as he uses them to fly, test his cyber control and finally grant a single mother a boon of $100,000 to keep her from becoming homeless. After this, Silas states “all this has been as a scientist, I would now like to talk to you as your father” upon which Victor simply crushes the recorder the message was playing on. Curiously the tape recorder was a literal tape recorder rather than digital and while it’s entirely possible that’s just an accident, it could also be that Silas knew any digital recorder would immediately be within Victor’s purview and thereby he would have no choice but to hear the message. In giving him an analogue tape recorder that choice was put back in his hands. This has been perhaps the most worthwhile addition so far, fleshing out Victor and his dynamic with his father, as well as a better explanation of his powers, perhaps making him one of the strongest members of the League.

Bruce visits Barry, an exchange largely unchanged save for the thankful excision of the “brunch” dialogue which, while I never had a huge problem with it, was awkward to watch.

There’s a rather fun exchange between Alfred and Diana (generally a lot more Alfred in the Snyder cut in general actually) where he lectures her on how best to make tea and she sassily implies that Bruce is basically building her gauntlets only bat-themed. A throwaway scene but there’s fun chemistry here with Alfred ultimately bringing her tea when distracted, despite her assertion she’d make it herself. It segues into Victor and Diana’s first meeting, Diana’s dialogue seems unchanged but Cyborg’s dialogue is a little angrier; he also flies in in full Cyborg mode rather than stepping out in a hoodie. I’m not sure I like the alteration, it’s less subtle and doesn’t really change the tone of the scene. We then see Vic bury the motherbox in his own grave followed by a useless scene with Silas and Ryan Choi looking at a hunk of metal being super hot, with Choi then making another Whedonesque joke about that being what he said to his prom date. To be fair though, I keep saying Whedonesque at any bad jokes, but I have to remember Man of Steel had “I just think he’s kinda hot” scene which gave me immense secondhand embarrassment.

We are now back to your regularly scheduled programming with the film mostly returning to playing out how Josstice League did: Jim Gordon is introduced, the bat signal shines, the Atlantean motherbox is stolen (albeit with added violence and additional Amber Heard). The extension does make the scene flow better for sure, though I question if the blood and bissecting is necessary.

It is now the halfway point and basically the full length of Josstice League has passed. I have to say, while there are certainly some improvements, I would by no means call this a definitive version, it absolutely needs significant editing to be a watchable movie, I feel like we’ve barely gotten anywhere and the small scraps of nuance gleaned from this version are not worth doubling the runtime. So far it does seem to have excised the weird Russian family cutaway scenes which is only a good thing, but little added has provided enough value to warrant this undertaking so far. Hopefully there’s enough in the latter half to assuage this feeling but so far it just feels like an exercise in directorial onanism.

#justice league #snyder cut #films #reviews

2 notes · View notes

joealwyndaily · 4 years

Text

Man About Town interview with Joe Alwyn

Fresh off the back of a star turn in Kasi Lemmons’ Harriet, we catch up with British superstar Joe Alwyn about getting into an evil mindset, playing the long-game in his career, and his upcoming role in Steven Knight’s A Christmas Carol.

words by Francesco Loy Bell

It’s an unnerving experience, having to ask an actor to fill you in on the ending of the film you’re supposed to be interviewing them about, but it’s a testament to Joe Alwyn’s charm and down-to-earth manner that he duly obliges, happily relaying the final ten minutes of Kasi Lemmons’ Harriet with an infectious enthusiasm only someone with genuine passion for a project could muster. I had been most of the way through Lemmons’ bold new offering, centred around American historical icon and slave-turned-abolitionist Harriet Tubman, when the fire alarm sounded, resulting in a hoard of shell-shocked journalists being quickly ushered out of the building, only to be told that we would not be able to watch the last 25 minutes of the film. Fast-forward 24 hours, and I can’t help but pause to reflect on the surreality of sitting across from the films horrifying antagonist as he casually explains his fate to me over coffee. More on that later, however.

Despite being the only actor in his immediate family, it’s fair to say Alwyn inherited some of the requisite DNA to pursue a career in film, his father, a documentary-maker and his mother, a therapist. Alwyn sees both as formative, instilling him with the “curiosity for looking into people’s lives, observing, and listening to stories” that had possessed him from an early age. “I always liked going to the cinema,” he explains, “sitting in big dark rooms, watching stories. It was kind of a way to disappear.” Though he cannot pinpoint the exact ‘light bulb’ moment in which he decided to become a professional actor, he does attribute seeing Ben Whishaw as Hamlet at the Old Vic when he was 12 or 13 as foundational, and “one of those moments that stick with you, where I thought: ‘I would really like to do that’.” That feeling soon blossomed, Alwyn taking numerous shows to the Edinburgh Fringe while at school and university, shows he can now jokingly admit “should not have been seen by anyone!”

Drama school naturally beckoned, the then-graduate enrolling himself into The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, an experience he looks back on fondly, his eyes lighting up as he recalls some of the more eccentric aspects of his time there. “A lot of rolling around on the floor, a lot of tight black clothing. And lots of trees, I was a brilliant tree,” he laughs, before informing me, in sudden deadpan: “you’re also looking at a llama.”

Alwyn probably wouldn’t have expected such a swift re-entry into the dynamic absurdity of drama school so soon after leaving, but then he probably wouldn’t have expected to be working with director Yorgos Lanthimos only a couple of years later either. Having shot his first job — Ang Lee’s reverse-engineered war film Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk — just after he graduated in 2015, Alwyn was sent the script of a then still in development The Favourite soon afterwards. “It felt like a special script. I mean, at that point, I hadn’t read that many scripts. I still was” — he catches himself, as his eyes widen in momentary wonder — “well, I still am new to this. But yeah, it was just... such a good script. I knew of Yorgos; I knew of his films. And those two things kind of narrowed together: this twisted take on a genre that can be quite conventional and stuffy, and his very unique, singular mind. It was exciting.”

A skype session with Lanthimos soon followed (“we talked about everything probably apart from The Favourite” Alwyn laughs), and the rest is history, the actor landing the role of Samuel Masham, a young baron in the court of Olivia Colman’s Queen Ann. Though his turn in the film is punctuated by exaggerated physicality — the court dancing scene with Rachel Weisz a particularly memorable example — Alwyn tells me that it was only when he got on set that Lanthimos’ true, bonkers vision began to come to life.

“I didn’t know that it was going to become one of those moments,” he says of the dance scene and others like it. “Because in the script it just said ‘they dance’, or, ‘he chases her’.” He can’t help but smile when speaking about Lanthimos: “He is hilarious. And confusing. He doesn’t really say anything to you about conventional direction; there was no discussion of period, or etiquette, or character, or history — which I think we’d expected to a degree, just because of the nature of the film. We had two weeks of ridiculous exercises and rehearsals, where I’d be playing Olivia’s part, and Olivia would be playing Nick [Hoult]’s part, and you’d sing the lines, and you’re chasing each other, and... you don’t know what you’re doing, or why you’re doing it. And Yorgos doesn’t say anything. And then he’d get on set, and just kind of say ‘Mmm... louder, faster, quieter’.”

The profound respect Alwyn holds for Lanthimos is tangible — he responds “Yorgos again” in a flash when I ask him who he’d love to work with — and he largely credits the director’s vision for the success the film has since garnered. “He made it weird and wacky and bawdy and irreverent, and it’s just not what you’re used to seeing,” he gushes. One particular on-set tale gives some insight into the energetic nature of Lanthimos’ sets, Alwyn recollecting a close-shave experience during a flirtatious forest scene with Emma Stone which resulted in the actress being taken to hospital. “The woods scene; the rugby tackling scene. We — or I — got maybe a little too carried away in the rugby aspect of it, and Emma took a fall... which was completely my fault. She knocked herself on the root of a tree and hurt her head; the paramedics came, she had to go to hospital, and we had to stop filming for the day.” The sheer panic still momentary lingers on Alwyn’s face as he recounts the story: “She’d just won an Oscar [...] I was cowering in the corner thinking I’d just killed Emma Stone.”

Alwyn’s latest project, Harriet, is a stark departure from The Favourite, the actor trading in Masham’s comic fluidity for the chilling rigidity of Gideon Brodess, the vengeful and sickeningly violent son of Harriet’s owner. As aforementioned, it is difficult to reconcile the man sitting opposite me sipping his coffee with the evil he portrays on screen, and I’m curious as to Alwyn’s process for getting into such a poisonous mindset. “It’s tricky, because what he stands for is abhorrent, and obviously unrelatable,” he explains. “What him and his family did, and the idea of slavery, is repulsive. But I suppose with those kinds of characters you try to find some kind of humanity within them — which suits the time they were living in — to hold onto. And in Gideon’s case, it’s probably some kind of deep, repressed, buried feelings of love. Maybe love for Harriet? I don’t think he necessarily has a language for it, or even understands what it is. But he’s deeply tangled and confused inside. And you try and connect with those sides of him. But, in terms of who they are and what they stand for... it’s hard to find a way in. It’s near impossible.”

Alwyn gives a brutal performance in the film, deftly showcasing Gideon’s skin-crawling internal struggle between racist disgust, and Lima Syndrome-style lust of Harriet, and his antagonistic villainy is the perfect foil to fellow Brit Cynthia Erivo’s stunning performance as the eponymous emancipator, Alwyn extolling her “formidable” work ethic and on-screen generosity as hugely motivational in his preparation. The story of Harriet Tubman, though well known, is perhaps not as staple a piece of knowledge in the American psyche as her actions demand, and Alwyn hopes that the film will help to give her the wider historical credit she deserves, both in the States and beyond. “Growing up in the UK,” he explains, “I didn’t know who she was, really. I’d seen her name; I’d seen the older iconic images of her. But I didn’t know her story. You hope that films like this will make it more accessible, and bring people in to learn about her and the story of what she did, what she achieved.”

As the politics of division take hold around the world, there has been an intensified focus on the debate surrounding story-telling, and the potential impact or consequence a story can have in the current climate; Todd Phillips’ Joker, for example, has faced significant criticism for potentially giving encouragement to white terrorism and racism. In this vein, the telling of stories like Tubman’s seems more necessary than ever, and this is not lost on Alwyn. “If you go on Twitter and read down on the news, there’s endless stories of division and racism, bigotry, families being torn apart at the borders. Without putting too much on it, if there was someone who represents a fight in the face of that, Harriet Tubman seems to shine pretty strong. And you’d hope that someone like her would become a part of a global curriculum at school.” Alwyn is hopeful that giving figures like Tubman their due historical credit — at least in terms of film — will universalise her all-too-recent struggle, and help unite people in the face of societal partition.

Alwyn’s next project will see him return to London, albeit a dark, Dickensian version of the city, as he takes on the role of Bob Cratchit — Ebenezer Scrooge’s much-abused clerk — in Steven Knight’s upcoming rendition of A Christmas Carol. Though he cannot give too much away, he promises the miniseries will be much darker and truer to Dickens’ sordid portrayal of London than previous versions. “It’s very much more in that kind of gritty, darker, slightly twisted world,” he explains. “It’s not as sanitised, perhaps, as most other versions are [...] it really goes into Scrooge’s own pain and why he is the way he is in quite an unpleasant way. And definitely in a way that hasn’t been seen before.”

Alwyn speaks with a soft, magnetic enthusiasm that almost makes me forget that this is indeed an interview, and I am disappointed to look down at my dictaphone and discover that our allotted time slot is drawing to a close. Characteristically, however, he laughs off any time constraint, and I am afforded some final questions. At 28 years old, the actor is arguably slightly older than some of the other industry ‘up-and-comers’ one might bracket him alongside, and I ask whether he thinks the hyper-visibility of fame elicited by social media is in part to blame for an increasing tendency to link the validity of success with being in your early 20s. Alwyn, despite having an instagram page and being in a relationship with one of the biggest musicians in the world, is notably more private than many others in his position, and he quotes a piece of advice given to him by Ang Lee on set of Billy Lynn in his response.

“It’s not a sprint,” he decides, after some deliberation. “Everyone has different ways of going. I’m still at an early stage in my career. I left Central in 2015, the first film I was in came out at the end of 2016. It doesn’t feel too long ago. I don’t think there is any right way to do it, but [...] I do think it’s an interesting point about social media and the idea of instant visibility, an instant attainment... it’s a dangerous thing to play into. And something that would be dangerous to get hooked on because I don’t think it’s real. You know, social media is [a facade]. And if you buy into that being a reality — or that’s what you go after — it’s not healthy.”

I am struck by how refreshing Alwyn’s attitude to fame is, though by the end of our conversation, I am hardly surprised. This is someone for whom the work is clearly a far superior motivational factor than fame or recognition, and this passion for his craft is evident in every project he touches. Ang Lee was right, it is a marathon rather than a sprint, but Joe Alwyn certainly seems ahead of the curve as he enters what promises to be a vastly exciting new chapter in his career. I, for one, can’t wait to see what he does next.

#joe alwyn #interview #man about town #harriet #a christmas carol #the favourite

122 notes · View notes

samesongxox · 4 years

Text

Savior: Chapter 2 (Falling Fast)

Summary: (Hellboy 2019) AKA Turning a New Leaf AKA Good Samaritans Need Love Too. The B.P.R.D is tasked to infiltrate a black market creature trafficking ring led by a powerful warlock. Hellboy rescues Phyrra who is found being held hostage, a slave for her magic. He must protect her as she is hunted by her master and his gang of monsters. (AU where Broom isn't dead/Abe wasn't found)

It will be rated M, it will include violence, swearing, smuttiness, all the good things in life.

I've just used an LOTR elven translator for Phyrra's language, I wanted her to start off disoriented enough to revert back to her old language and it was the simplest way I could make that happen but I won't use too much of it.

Also, for those wondering, I wrote down Phyrra into a text to speech and the way her name sounded to me was Pier-Rah, I know with phonetics PH makes the F sound, so saying it like Fear-rah, I think could also be correct.

Disclaimer: Hellboy belongs to Dark Horse Comics/Mike Mignola, I don't own anything except the AU and my OC's.

Meanwhile, in a corridor not far away…

Running full tilt down this damp, dark and fucking horrible smelling hallway, Hellboy could think of at least 10 other things he wanted to be doing right now instead. He ran round the corner, stood at the end, and waited for the big bastard who was chasing him to come around it. He had no one to blame but himself, for the situation he was in; the creature stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of his target, giving Hellboy the proper momentum to swing his stone hand into the stomach of an ogre.

When dear ol’ dad had said in his usually chastising tone: 'This isn't some simple run and gun mission Hellboy! Our operatives have intelligence that says this ring holds over hundreds of different species and creatures!" He hated when his father looked at him like that, the disapproving glint in his eyes. 'We have no idea what you could find in there, this requires a lighter touch than you're used to.'

The argument had ended the usual way they did, Hellboy stomping away petulantly, ignoring the protects from Ben about his father being right, as always, blah blah blah. Sometimes he wished they never recruited the Major, sure he had chilled out considerably since the whole Nimue debacle, he even accompanied Hellboy and Alice to the local bars on occasion; he never joined in the karaoke, but he gave Hellboy a run for his money in a round of pool.

"You're gonna die today demon!" The ogre gloated, grabbing Hellboy by his jacket. Hellboy grimaced at the stench of its breath, being thrown against the wall was preferable. He crumpled to the floor, shaking off a daze. Charging towards him, Hellboy saw his advantage and swept the creature's legs, bringing it to the ground. Hellboy stood up and brought his arm down on the Ogre's head, rendering it unmobile with efficiency.

It wasn't that he didn't agree with his dad, Hellboy thought, shaking the goop left behind from the head of the Ogre. He knew he dealt better in the aggressive tactics used by B.P.R.D, there was a reason the times they needed to attend some charity function or government funded mixer, Alice accompanied the Professor. She had turned into quite the little agent his Alice Monaghan and Hellboy didn't care for any of that bureaucratic shit anyways. And since the incident, he had been trying his best to see his father's side of things more often.

Hellboy didn't want to admit to anyone he was scared.

He was still had nightmares about it, the sight of his father lying dead had been a shock to his system. For so long he had held so much anger towards the Professor, it coming to a head at the knowledge Lady Hatton had given him. It really sucked to find out your purpose in life was to bring about the apocalypse, and Hellboy was still dealing with the news being something he feared for so long, meanwhile that wasn't even the worse bit.

Still Baba Yaga's curse loomed on his shoulders, he didn't know the details of the curse, he sure as shit didn't want to go back there and ask the witch.

Professor Trevor Bruttenholm was pronounced dead, for 12 whole minutes.

Hellboy thought it was morbid when the agents that rushed in brought a defibrillator, ripping the shirt off of his father's body, placing the charges on his chest. Hellboy protested greatly, bring held back in a surprisingly strong embrace by Ben. So when his father's eyes popped open, to say Hellboy was surprised was a great understatement.

Now things were back to normal, well as normal as there dynamic had been before. Dad always there with a less than kind word with nothing but good intentions towards his 'son'.

The presence of Alice and Ben on the team had cooled them both down considerably, the workload now sectioned off between the four of them, and someone was always there to get in the middle of them and be the voice of reason.

It wasn't like they held interviews for the kind of team that they were, it just kind of happened. Alice was insistent on sticking around with her new found abilities, wishing to hone them, be able to research in the vast codex of ancient knowledge B.P.R.D possessed, but Hellboy knew that what Alice wanted more than anything was somewhere to belong again, and she did at the B.P.R.D.

Major Ben Daimo, after being caught with his curse of the Were-Jaguar, simply realized he was with much better company than M11.

Hellboy, having wiped his arm clean of the gore, took about three steps down the hallway when a "Stop!" Made him growl in exasperation. He turned and was just as surprised when they arrived at this giant fortress like building, this place just kept getting fucking weirder.

Hellboy had never seen a Centaur before, he could check this off the list. The half-man half...appeared to be …. A ram or a bison or something if the horns were any indication.

Hellboy was being charged at again, this time with a much quicker adversary. Hellboy was at a disadvantage of only having two legs as he turned tail, pun intended, and ran once again from a foe.

These were some The Shining level of creepiness hallways, Hellboy deduced, being chased by a Centaur, he called for backup but they had all conveniently split up in the warehouse; but it was hard to hear oneself think in that veritable zoo of mythical creatures. Father was not lying, this Warlock was bad news bears.

The Centaur was rapidly gaining on Hellboy, it was inevitable when he felt himself being lifted by his tail, rude pal, and tossed him into the wall. Hellboy hated being thrown around like some ragdoll, it didn't help that the Centaur obviously had more weight to his throw than the Orge, and Hellboy was left staring at the twinkling lights above him, knowing he was gonna hurt in the morning.

Rhys huffed, adrenaline breaking out into his coat in a thick sheen of sweat. He picked up the currently incapacitated creature and examined him. It seemed to be some sort of demon or other. Rhys was disgusted at the creature to see his shaved forehead where horns should be, Rhys prided himself on his own, and considered any creature that would try and hide his features like that weak and embarrassed at his own lineage.

He threw the impostor creature onto his back and took off in hurried clomps to Elias' office, needing to let his master know about this invasion. Where did this thing come from? Rhys called for Mordecai begrudgingly, but was left with a true silence that meant he was not hiding in some corner somewhere. He was most definitely already with Elias.

His suspicions were correct as he entered the masters domain, seeing the two figures speaking in a quick, long dead language Rhys didn't understand. He hated when the two of them did that, he knew he was out of the loop for a lot of things, but it wasn't like they had to rub his face in it, he was a powerful creature, stronger than both of them combined. He couldn't think like that though, even in his darkest thoughts; he was owned by Elias for the rest of his life, nothing could be done to change that.

What was worse was that Elias didn't even acknowledge Rhys had stepped in the room, or that he had dropped an intruder at the front of his desk. Almost as if he already knew.

"There are intruders in our home Rhys. Go with Mordecai to holdings and deal with them accordingly, leave this with me."

Those were the only words spoken to him, Rhys nodded gravely trotting out the door, knowing at once he had messed up allowing whoever these people were to break so easily into the property.

Elias' eyes trailed down to the pathetic looking creature at his feet, he was having the most awful deja vu. Taking in the tail, shaven horns and red skin, Elias knew who was breaking into his home. B.P.R.D. This had to be the Cambion known as Hellboy.

Elias growled, this meant serious trouble. How did he have such rotten luck, his dejected attitude continued as the beast stirred on his floor. He had to get ahold of this situation.

Hellboy regained consciousness quickly, one minute he was in a haze of pain, the next he flew up from the floor so quickly he thought he'd blackout. Hissing in a deep breath, Hellboy touched his stomach gingerly, diagnosing himself a cracked rib. Standing in front of another mythical nutcase no doubt, Hellboy took in the room.

This dude was seriously fucked in the head. He thought the Osiris Club was bad enough mounting giant heads on their walls, but this room had that one beat clean. Wall to wall the heads of creatures were hung, along with various ferocious animals were on proud display. Dead fairies and pixies beside butterflies and beetles pinned in glass coffins. He realized he was standing on the fur of a Cerberus, Hellboy gasped, stepping ungracefully away from the awful sight. Hellboy glanced at a bowl filled with what looked like mints, and gagged to see that they were teeth.

"Goblin Teeth. A little hobby of mine. As you can see, I am an extensive collector." Hellboy hated him already. The smooth, calm voice, the power he emanated even behind the desk, this was the warlock, no doubt. The owner of this little auction house.

"A demon, how quaint." Elias scoffed in the most condisenting fashion, looking the epitome of ease, fiddling with the golden staff adorned with amethyst from the dwarven royalty. A present for dealing with their little dragon problem so long ago, when species of all kinds were allowed to walk on earth. A time he sorely missed.

"Half-demon, buddy. Get your facts right." Raising his arm to bust the desk, Hellboy was unsuspecting of the staff being more than just for show, he was proven quite mistaken.

A blast of magic so focused hit him, Hellboy was thrown out the room. The magic was a tidal wave of white-hot wind that blasted multiple doors opened in the hallway, tearing wallpaper from the walls. Hellboy was stopped only by the brick at the end of the hallway. Living an indent of his body, Hellboy groaned and peeling himself off the wall. He was bleeding from his head, he realized swiping at the blood that dripped into his eye. Probably concussed.

At the door to his office stood Elias, arms crossed with the staff perched on his shoulder, he didn't have a care in the world. This demon was nothing compared to a being of magic such as himself, and it was laughable the demon got back up, as if he had a chance from this distance.

"Are you as dumb as you are strong, demon? My name is Elias, this is my home and you have most aggressively broken into it. I plan on taking the necessary steps to protect my property."

Hellboy collapsed in half real agony, gritting his teeth, listen to this asshole posture on like some sort of movie villan. Hellboy tried to shake the pain, biting his cheek to focus himself, distracting the warlock enough to grab for his weapon. He took a deep breath and with a reserve of strength he had, pulled and shot off all 6 rounds in the chamber, a special design by the eggheads in the labs, with barbed edges that exploded on contact, shredding the flesh of whatever unfortunate being was on the receiving end of his little gift.

One bullet would of incapacitated him, maybe all 6 of them was an overkill, if the gruesome sight of the warlock gasping wetly from a pile of guts. Better safe than sorry Hellboy always said. Elias attempted to speak, choking on the mess in his mouth, and his eyes slipped closed. An odd, peaceful aura enveloped the area around him, the half-demon went to investigate.

He heard the sound of agents arriving on the scene, there voices calling for him from afar. Obviously brought by the sound of his gun going off.

Hellboy just seemed to keep getting distracting in this place however, for no sooner had he begun to walk towards the body, when a lump on the floor of one of the rooms caught Hellboy's attention.

It was a girl. With a towel haphazardly wrapped around her. Hellboy turned away sharply as his eyes automatically glanced at the slight curve of her breasts peeking from the top with her slow breathing. He didn't mean to do that, it just happened, but Hellboy was left surprisingly winded. Embarrassed.

"Uh.. Alice? You out there?" He called desperately out to the woman in the hallway, distracting himself by looking at the room. It was simple, compared to the rest of the place; stone walls and wooden furniture, a large four poster bed with white sheets. Nothing caught his eye of any interest, and he felt his eyes pulling towards the girl on the floor. Aw Crap. He reasoned he just felt bad if she was injured to just keep her in this position. He gave one last attempt at an "Alice!" Before he turned completely back to the girl.

She was young, that was his first thought. She was petite but she wasn't a little girl, her body, small but obvious curves were any indication. Hellboy felt his stomach clench in horror as the towel slipped further as he came forward, as if it had a mind of its own and was torturing him for looking. Awkwardly one-handed, he knotted the front of the towel more securely as carefully as he could, if his knuckles brushed her skin, he didn't think about it.

Finally finished his difficult task, Hellboy glanced at her head, noticing the long upward slopes of the tips of her ears peeking out from her hair, an elf. She also had some of the strangest markings Hellboy had ever seen, gold swirl like tattoos covered her body, on her face all the way to the tips of her fingers and toes, in an intricate, almost tribal fashion.

Hellboy glanced up to see a large robe hanging from a hook and shot up like a rocket, grabbing for it grateful for his find; he felt very guilty for continuing to just crouch here and look at her, he felt like a real pervert.

It also occurred to him he never even tried to wake her up. Well he had to deal with the towel falling off, he reasoned with himself, he knew in her position he would be very unhappy to wake up like that. It was much easier to get the robe on her, the distraction of the towel dealt with, and Hellboy felt a kind of accomplishment tying the sash at her waist; He had never had to play caretaker to someone. The whole time she did not awaken, left in some sort of unconscious state, Hellboy gently gathered her up in his arms easily and checked the back of head, pulling the long tawny strands apart, vaguely thinking about their softness, but mostly looking for blood.

Jostling her caused the elf to groan, Hellboy was taken aback when he pushed her away to see her eyes opened. They were very pretty, Hellboy thought stupidly as she glanced around blind in his clutch, before locking her gaze on the one who held her up.

"Cin're hi na rad-nin?" Her voice was a light questioning tone, her breaths quick and pained. Hellboy didn't know how to reply to her, he was struck dumber by her being awake than when he could move about her without that icy gaze focused on him it seemed.

"Uhh...Whatever you say, sweetheart." Hellboy blatantly realized the endearment he mumbled out, but didn't give it much thought, after all it seemed they were speaking two different languages, literally. He really needed to get her out of here, if not to get her checked for a possible concussion but just because this room was creeping him out, it was too clean, to… Much like a prison cell if he was being honest with himself.

"Mui mellon Binx?" At least she wasn't freaking out in his hold, cause she's still weak from the blast, he chided himself. He stood up and was about to cross the threshold with the elf in his arms, she kept saying something: blinks? When he heard Alice down the hall, her voice getting rapidly closer.

"Were you callin' me HB? I thought I could hear-Oh!" Hellboy felt himself flustered as the medium appeared in the doorway, the girl quicker than Hellboy could react to, jumped out of his arms, only to cower behind him, further placing Hellboy in one of the most awkward situations he could recall.

The girl was obviously hurt however, as no sooner had she hid herself behind Hellboy that her clutch had weakened and Hellboy could see her going down again, barely managing to catch her by her waist, again thanking his thinking in getting her into the robe as he pulled her once again into his arms.

Alice watched the whole interaction with a little surprise and much glee, tickled positively pink by Hellboy playing prince charming it seemed, saving this damsel. Alice thanked her internal romantically inclined side, one that she rarely showed, it was hard being the only female on the team at times. She tried to have a friendship with some of the agents, but the women in the B.P.R.D were professionals through and through, not a whole lot of interest in the fun times she could get into with HB, sometimes even Ben, or Major Stick up his Arse, as Alice sometimes called him, always with affection.

"Who's this then?"

"I don't know. I was dealing with Stinky, Hairy and Moe out there and then I just found her. She's an elf." He finished lamely,

Swift as a hummingbird, a creature the same size flew into the room. The ball of light honed onto Hellboy's face, making contact with his cheek. Hellboy stumbled back and looked at the attacker. A Pixie.

Between the Ogre, the Centaur and the Warlock, he was grateful for the size of this one. The thing was speaking a quick lilting pixie speak that Hellboy never understood, they had a textbook of Fae languages back at headquarters, he just never got around to reading it.

The Pixie seemed to know the Elf, she slowly took stock of the girl before pillowing herself on the chest of the unconscious girl, glancing up at Hellboy in a wary gaze.

"I found the little thing down the hall, think she knows her?" Alice chuckled.

"Let's get her to the helicopter. None of the others were put into rooms like this, she must be important." Alice was already at the doorway when she turned around, a typical cheeky Alice expression on her face. "You handle carrying her hero?"

Hellboy snorted derisively at the comment, turning away from Alice with her intense gaze. He ignored the curious gaze of the Agents and met up with Ben in the hallway, the Major raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Don't ask." Hellboy said simply, not wishing to explain the whole crazy turn of events that transpired since they arrived here.

"You guys get that warehouse cleared out?"

"Yes they're loaded into the trucks, on there way to headquarters. It's gonna take weeks to catalogue all these species. Hope you're ready for some paperwork." Hellboy knew Ben was joking, even to the outside it seemed like no humour was coming from the man. You just had to know him enough.

"How dare you touch her!" Hellboy jumped at the screech that came from the puddle that was Elias in position on the floor of his office, he thought for sure he had died. "Unhand her demon, she is not yours!"

Hellboy didn't scare easily, but he would be lying if he said the way Elias was looking at him wasn't causing goosebumps to break out on his arm. It was half crazed, desperate. Very different from the cool, assured master he was not 10 minutes ago.

"Phyrra wake up!" That must of been her name, Phyrra. It suited her, sweet, gentle and exotic, her name sounded like the purr of a cat, Hellboy always liked cats. He didn't like the way Elias was saying it though, the ownership plain, like he was commanding her to wake up.

"So I guess I was right, eh? She important to you? Well you won't mind if we just take her for awhile do ya? Thanks mate," Alice took the warlocks sudden invalent state as an opportunity to tease.

Phyrra also took the moment as a great opportunity to wake back up, as if even in her injured state, she was conditioned to listen to Elias' demands. She glanced around in even more confusion than the first time Hellboy watched her wake up. The warlock brightened at the sight of Phyrra awake, his voice quickly turning into butter, Hellboy cringed at the way he spoke to her.

"Phyrra, pet. Come and help me."She seemed to understand her name, if nothing else. She fixed her gaze on Elias as if she didn't know him from any other stranger currently in the room. Everyone seemed to be waiting for her to make some kind of decision, why none of them could really gather, but they didn't have to wait long for a response.

Phyrra didn't listen, what she did instead was wrap her arms around Hellboy's neck and bury herself in the crook of where his neck met shoulder, refusing to look at anything else; Hellboy was left with an elven woman clinging to him. The Pixie flew displeased at losing the perch on her elf.

"Tul-nin awaui o hi near." Hellboy involuntarily shivered at the obvious plea was whispered delicately in his ear. He didn't know what she was saying, but he wanted nothing more than to get her away from Elias fiery gaze, which was getting darker by the second.

"Binx! Don't you let them take her! I'll rip your fucking wings off myself!" Everyone looked on as the Pixie flew over to the warlock, and Hellboy couldn't stop the bark of laughter as the tiny creature, now Hellboy realized what Phyrra had been saying back in her room. Binx threw herself into Elias' forehead, he grunted at the contact, then glared at the tiny thing spitting no doubt terrible insults in its language.

Elias gasped in hysteria as Hellboy began to walk away from him. Getting out a last: "You're going to regret this you devil!" Before Ben did him a service of tasing him, silencing the man before his head popped clean off in his fury.

At that moment, Rhys and about a group of 20 creatures: Goblins and Ogres mostly, crowded into the space, some climbing over the backs of others to fit into the room.

Chaos broke. Fires were shot from the various machines carried by the Agents, tearing through the creatures scrambling to reach them.

"HB, the window!" The gazes of the three main team members individually sought out the broken window to their left, Alice shooting off a quick round from her pistol, cleaning the rest of the glass from the opening, before jumping off confidently. Even in the moment, Hellboy recognized he would have to tell her how badass she'd been in that moment. Before jumping himself out the four story window.

He broke his fall with his body, hoping this was the last time he was going to hit a hard surface today, he didn't know if he could take another one. Hellboy quickly checked to make sure he also broke Phyrra fall, it would be a shame to go through all this to end up squishing her himself. The trio ran towards the helicopter, the blades whorrling signaling its readiness for take-off.

Ben was clipping off the goblins crawling out of the window they just vacated as Alice and Hellboy dealt with the new cargo. Ben jumped in the last minute, yelled to the pilot to get them the fuck out of there and into the air they ascended.

Safely in the chopper, Hellboy's arms felt rather empty after Phyrra was placed carefully into the seat beside him, Alice taking over and strapping the girl in as her head lolled in delirium, she seemed to be coming to again, but only got those glacier depths of her eyes opened before the slumped again. Alice sandwiched her in between the two of them, placing Phyrra's head against Hellboy's arm and he looked at his friend in question.

"What? You won't mind watching to make sure her head doesn't move too much, would you?"

Alice snickered in delight at the cautioning way HB looked at her in the moment, as if begging her to stop teasing him so, which only spurred her on even more he had to realize.

They didn't know anything about this girl, but Hellboy was obviously taken with her.

Alice had been with the B.P.R.D for almost a year now, she'd never seen Hellboy act this way before. Hellboy was a badass motherfucker, he drank hard and fought even harder. It wasn't irony one of his arms was made out of stone, he was tough, inside and out.

That didn't mean Alice wasn't aware of his sensitive side, he saved her as a baby, she owed HB her life. The fact he was a loyal friend was just a bonus. He loved the Professor, Alice could see that plain as day, they were father and son to her, actual parentage didn't matter. Even then, he wasn't exactly the kind of friend you had long soul searching conversations with, except those times one of them got too into their feelings, and too into a bottle of tequila.

So Alice knew HB had the capacity to love, that she was certain. But as far as she knew, Hellboy had never even attempted to go out on a date before, she saw how the female agents of B.P.R.D looked at him, he was a pure specimen of a man. Muscle and stoicism, half-demon be damned.

Alice had asked Lloyd one night, who had been working there for ten years, if Hellboy ever dated anyone or anything, she wasn't gonna discriminate. Agent Reese had asked her in reply if they were an item, on their own date of all times! Alice was annoyed and had answered the same way she always did to the inept question. Disgusting! Like if I wanted to fuck my own brother! Which was correct, but she didn't think she'd see Lloyd again. Lately she had her eye on Agent Colter, she liked men of all shapes and sizes, but it was the blondes viking types that made her weak, which Colter fit to a tee.

Alice tried to slow the matchmaker in her head, immediately writing their names together in the notebook of her mind. First the girl had to wake up.

Elias opened his eyes slowly, feeling the pain immediately. His body was twisted in a most uncomfortable position and as he looked down he realized in a daze his leg was broken. On instinct he called out for Phyrra, before the recent events came back to the front of his memory. She left him. He did nothing but care for her, dress her in the finest things, held her to the highest standard above his advisors and this was how she thanked him?

First Lazarus sends him some would be assassin, and now to have lost his most precious trophy? His Phyrra? Elias felt helpless, something he hadn't felt for many centuries, it was maddening. It simply would not do.

So in his awful, disoriented thoughts, he didn't take notice of the Vampire and the Centaur stepping towards him, one expression of dispassion, one of stunned concerns.

"Master, drink from me." Elias wild eyes swung to the undead man, not for the first time Elias was grateful towards Mordecai, his oldest companion. He sucked in the old blood in thick gulps, feeling it buzz through his system, he will heal much quicker than normal, although his old friends blood did speeden his recovery, it was Phyrra who had the most wonderful touch for mending wounds and broken bones. What to do about Phyrra? It was quite simple Elias didn't have to think for a second about it.

He would get her back.

She will learn, he would teach her, as he always did, the hard lesson he had himself long ago been made perfectly aware of, that she was born to be his pet. That her life before him, the loss, the pain, the agonizing loneliness he knew she felt was because his story began the same. He was meant to teach her everything there was to know about life, about love.

Distracted, he heard Mordecai explain the lost of his inventory, but Elias heard none of it.

Elias instead, felt himself seeth at the memory of her in the demons arm. He would take great pleasure in harming it, peeling the skin from its arms for even daring to touch his Phyrra, he wouldn't stop till he got to bone. Yes, the demon, the whole B.P.R.D, were going to pay greatly for playing with him.

fin

Translations:

1)"Cin're hi na rad-nin?" (you're here to find me?)

2)"Mui mellon Binx?" (My friend Binx?)

3) "Tul-nin awaui o hi near." (Bring me away from this place)

#second chapter #fanfiction #hellboy fanfiction #hellboy 2019 #be gentle

5 notes · View notes

two-baes · 5 years

Text

Just gonna, leave this here for myself.

Main Batfam (ie; the ‘core’ fam) :

Athanasia - Sparrowhark - 14

Barbara - Batgirl - 29

Bruce - Batman - 42

Cassandra - Black Bat - 19

Claire - Gotham Girl - 18

Colin - (work in progress) - 14

Cullen - No superhero identity - 17

Damian - Robin - 14

Dick - Nightwing - 27

Duke - Signal - 16

Harper - Bluebird - 20

Helena W.- Huntress - 21

Jason - Red Hood - 22

Matt - (Flame) Robin - 13

Maya - Nobody - 15

Maxine - Oracle - 20

Stephanie - Spoiler - 19

Nissa - Batgirl - 16

Terry - Batman - 21

Tim - Red Robin - 18

Extended Batfam (ie; cousins / like family) :

Basil - Clayface - 37

Beth - Brightbat - 40

Bette - Flamebird - 24

Carrie K - ‘Robin’ - 13

Charlie - Misfit - 17

Helena B. - Huntress - 26

Jean-Paul - Azrael - 27

Kate - Batwoman - 40

Kitrina - Catgirl - 16

Luke - Batwing - 30

Maps (aka Mia) - No superhero identity (as of yet) - 14

Mary - Strix - 19 (physically)

Selina - Catwoman - 35

Tiffany - Sugar Glider - 12

Outer (ie; not quite Batfam but Batfam adjacent / Batfam friends) :

Calvin - Falcon/Falco (I’m undecided) - 31

Lonnie - Anarky - 20

M - Midnighter - 36

Tatsu - Katana - 33

Violet - Mother Panic - 21

Zatanna - 39

Other (ie; people I haven’t decided what to do with yet but they exist) ;

Lincoln (aka Thomas Jr) - Owlman - 39

Thomas - (currently undecided) - 62

----------------------------------------------

Breaking things down a bit - The inner fam ;

Dick, Jason, Tim, Cassandra, Harper & Cullen, and Maya have all been officially adopted by Bruce in this universe

More or less in that exact order.

They’ve all kept their respective last names, but will occasionally hyphenate and tack on ‘Wayne’ to the ends of them.

Maya was brought home one day by Damian, who insisted Bruce take her on as a ward. Bruce was more than happy to oblige, tho noting how close of a bond the two children already had (and how they were already referring to one another as ‘brother’ & ‘sister’), he decided to just adopted her.

Barbara and Stephanie are not adopted

Steph is however a ward.

Bruce did ask to adopt her but she feels that it would be too weird for her to be legally adopted, since her and Tim are dating. ---She is however, considered by most of the family (in particular Harper, Cullen, & Cassandra), to be an ‘honorary sibling’.

Barbara’s father is still very much alive, altho Gordon and Bruce often joke about shared custody. (Also Babs agrees with Steph in that it would make dating Dick awkward)

Bruce still thinks of them like his own, and they’re considered as a core part of the family by everyone else.

Both also have their own respective rooms at the manor. Steph because she lives there, and Babs because she visits so often.

Claire is more or less an unofficial ward of Bruce’s.

In this verse he took her in after the death of her brother, and has been helping her to get the help she needs to recover; she’s been healing slowly but surely.

She’s formed a close bond with Duke.

She’s been getting training so that she feels less inclined to use her powers and won’t shave any more years off her lifespan.

Duke and Colin, while not officially adopted by Bruce, are his wards

Duke’s parents are still alive (though Jokerized), in light of this Bruce has offered to adopt him, but Duke politely declined. The offer remains open should he ever change his mind, however.

Colin similarly has been made an offer to be adopted, but turned it down for unspecified reasons. (ie; I haven’t decided yet if I want to go the ‘Tiny Boyfriends’ route w/ Dami&Colin in this AU, so I’m holding off on making them adopted siblings)

Helena, Damian, and Athanasia are all biologically Bruce’s children

Helena is from the future (or at least a possible future) in which Bruce and Selina have a child together. She refuses to tell them what year she’s actually from, or reveal much about her timeline.

Damian is Bruce’s son by Talia. He came to live with Bruce when he was 10.

Athanasia is Bruce’s daughter by Talia, although she was more ‘created’ than ‘conceived’ (ie, very much like those spare clone babies Talia had floating that she showed to Damian in the comics).

For clarification, she isn’t a female-clone of Damian. Talia used a sample of her own DNA and a sample of Bruce’s to create a new embryo.

When Damian was sent off to join his father, Talia had Athanasia born; aged up to ten years old to match her brother. She kept her a secret, hidden from Bruce and Damian, training her in the ways of the league for the next three years, before having a change of heart and sending her daughter to meet her brother and father.

Terry, Matt, Nissa, and Max are all from a future timeline that was wiped from existence somehow, they managed to time travel back to the past to survive.

Terry and Matt are (because of genetic tampering done by Waller) biologically Bruce’s sons. Terry is aware of this information. Matt is not.

Since they didn’t arrive with them, Terry and Matt believed Nissa & Max had died. However it turned out that their device had been damaged somehow, causing the timing of their arrival to be off by a year.

Breaking things down further - The extended fam ;

Kate and Beth are identical twin sisters, and are Bruce’s cousins.

In this verse Beth recovers from her ‘Alice’ persona and adopts the mantle of ‘Brightbat’, working alongside Kate as a vigilante.

Bette is the youngest cousin of Kate, Beth, and Bruce.

Jean-Paul isn’t related to anyone, nor is he adopted by, or a ward of Bruce.

He does however work closely with the family, and is considered an extended part of it. He’s like an honorary cousin more or less.

Luke also isn’t related to anyone, but works closely with the batfamily, earning him a spot as an honorary member, even if he's not a part of the core family.

Tiffany is Luke's youngest sister.

She's taken to training with and helping him out on the field. Don't call her his sidekick though, she hates that.

Helena B. has close ties to the batfamily, although she isn’t part of the core family, she is always welcomed by them, and in turn will always aid them when they need it.

She’s particularly close w/ both Barbara & Dick, as well as Cass. She also gets along well with Jason.

Mary isn’t officially integrated as a part of the core family, but she does live with them, having been brought to the manor to live by Babs, who she has grown close to.

She appears to be around 19 years old, in actuality she is much older. Because of the process she underwent when being made into a Talon, she doesn’t age physically.

She was taught sign language from Cassandra, although she still prefers writing as a means of communication.

While Babs fills the role as an older sister type figure for her, Mary seems to have latched on to Secret Six team-member Thomas Blake as something of a (reluctant) paternal figure.

Charlie isn’t exactly a full fledged part of the Batfam, so much as Babs has taken her under her wing and started to mentor her.

She lives with Barbara, and is generally introduced as her cousin.

Carrie is Barbara’s second cousin on her mother’s side, who randomly showed up on her door one way after finding out she had a relative in Gotham.

Eventually she discovered Babs was Batgirl and pleaded for her to mentor her.

Basil has gone from a former Gotham rogue, to a redeemed and trusted member of the batfamily.

He's particularly close to Cassandra, and has become somewhat of a second father figure to her.

Selina really is on the family friend/extended family cusp, with Helena’s arrival edging her a bit closer to the latter. --She’s not quite a part of the core family, but with a daughter from a potential future timeline showing up her dynamic definitely changes.

Her and Bruce have, as you can expect, had a thing. They have in fact, had several things. They’re very on-and-off.

When they’re 'on’ their relationship is sometimes left open (bc y’all kno I’m all about that poly)

Selina being the alleged long-lost daughter of Carmine Falcone is canon in this verse.

Kitrina isn’t quite a part of the batfamily on her own, however as Selina’s protege she’ll make appearances here and there during times of need at her mentors side.

Kitrina is Selina’s niece (unbeknownst to her, tho Selina knows.)

Maps is one of Damian’s very best friends, and has taken full advantage of that to worm her way into the (at least somewhat) inner bat circle.

She’s is --as Damian keeps reminding her -- a vigilante in training and is always asking him to mentor her so she can join in when he goes on patrols. She's even volunteered to be the Robin's sidekick.

Breaking things down even more - The outer fam;

M is for lack of better explanation, like that close family friend you have who is sort of like the cool/fun Uncle. He helps out here and there, gets along w/ most of the fam, and pops into the manor uninvited every now & then to get a rise out of Bruce.

Gets along well with Dick and Jason. (Tends to team up with the latter to tease the former)

Cullen seems to have taken a real shine to him, and has asked if M would mentor him since starting to consider becoming a vigilante. (M however is unsure he's the right fit as a mentor for the kid, since his crime fighting methods tend to be a bit brutal)

He’s not married to Apollo in this verse, though they do have an on-again-off-again type relationship (so I can occasionally hook him up with other people w/o leading to drama).

Zatanna also falls into the category of close family friend.

Her and Bruce have been friends since childhood, making her one of his oldest and closest friends.

Also her and Bruce have had a thing once upon a time. (There might still be some feelings on both sides, I’m keeping options open here...)

Violet isn’t part of the core batfamily, and she doesn’t work quite closely enough with them to be considered part of the extended fam either, but in this verse she’s close friends with (and maybe dating) Harper. which has lead to her working a bit more frequently with the bats than she usually would otherwise.

Calvin is an ally of the Batfam & comes to help them when called upon.

He gets along really well w/ Dick. Circus boys gotta stick together! ...No really, they've got like a whole act worked out together.

Tatsu is another close friend and trusted ally of the bats. Though she doesn't work often with them under normal circumstances as she usually has her own things going on, when they're in a real pinch they can call on her, knowing she'll answer.

Lonnie's position within the batfamily is...complicated, as he doesn't always see eye to eye with some of them.

Despite not always getting along (with Bruce in particular), he does help out the family from time to time when they have need for him, and has admitted that he prefers being friend over foe.

Gets along best with Stephanie and Harper.

Had somewhat of a rivalry with Tim when they were kids. They're both (mostly) over it now.

Sort of awkward around Jason since it's highly possible Lonnie's biological father is the Joker... in this verse it totally is canon

Whatever is left to break down ;

Lincoln - aka Thomas Wayne Jr - Bruce’s younger brother that he was unaware most of his life that he even had.

(I’ve not really decided what to do with him yet, he’s only been fleshed out in this verse far enough for me to have decided that he definitely exists here, his backstory will mostly follow comic canon but after that I don’t know yet)

Thomas is Bruce (and Lincoln)’s father from an alternate timeline where he didn’t die (so, again, also not a huge divergence from comic canon, except this one isn’t an asshole who tries to ruin his son’s life and break his spirit whilst claiming it’s to help him...)

(I haven’t decided yet what to do with him. Do I want him to also be Batman?? Do I want him to have retired??? We’ll see... He, much like Lincoln in this verse, hasn’t been fleshed out beyond ‘he exists’, yet.)

#my batfam AU #Earth 7777777 #7Sevens or 7s for short #I spent fucking hours writing this all up lmao god damn.#Helena being from an alternate timeline is the only way I could make the age I wanted her to be work w/ the ages I wanted Bruce and Selina

4 notes · View notes

zdbztumble · 5 years

Text

Botching Backwards and Forwards, Or: Today’s KH Ramble, Part I

As I play through KH III, I’ve also been catching up with the series by watching the Let’s Plays of the other games done by Team Four Star. Because they didn’t play through Coded and only watched the cutscenes from 358/2 Days, that means that there’s only one game on their playlist that I haven’t played myself, that game being Dream Drop Distance. From what I can tell, its gameplay operates on a similar mechanic to Birth by Sleep, which I enjoyed quite a bit. I frankly prefer the Command Decks to what we have in the console games. DDD making levels out of some left-field choices in Disney worlds was a pleasant surprise too. For the Fantasia world alone, I’ll have to consider picking DDD up when I’m not facing a month of utter financial ruin.

And yet, between the two of them, BbS and DDD are responsible for nearly everything wrong with the story of Kingdom Hearts up to this point IMO. Coded got the ball rolling by opening back up a story that had already been satisfyingly ended in KH II, but these two titles do the bulk of the damage to a series that, up to that point, had handled its story pretty well.

Starting with BbS, I freely admit that some of my issues with it boil down to a matter of preference. Turning the Keyblade into a (once) fairly common weapon with many wielders, with a history detailing a great Keyblade War and a test for a Mark of Mastery...all of that wasn’t to my taste, but I can’t say that there’s anything in principle wrong with it. It isn’t necessarily out of place for this series, and the one major wrinkle in continuity it causes (Keyblades choosing wielders) could be squared fairly easily. A prequel focusing on hitherto unmentioned characters rather than the series protagonists isn’t an inherently wrong choice either, though I’ll have more to say about that in Part II of this rant. That I don’t find Terra, Ven, or Aqua terribly interesting as characters is mostly a matter of preference as well, though I do think Terra’s descent into the darkness relies too much on sheer idiocy, and I will admit that Aqua is possibly the most fun player character in this series with her plethora of magic spells. But where I more seriously fault BbS (and Coded, for opening this door) is in its changes to Xehanort’s plots and backstory, and in undermining one of the best thematic ideas from the original Kingdom Hearts game.

"Ansem” turning out to be the true villain of KH I after two-thirds of the gameplay pass under the assumption that it’s the confederation of Disney villains was an effective twist that let an original character, more comfortably of the Square Enix half of the crossover, shine. “Ansem” turning out to be Xehanort the renegade apprentice, with his Nobody Xemnas the leader of Organization XIII, was hardly the most organic twist in the world; I don’t think anyone would go back to KH I and say “oh, it was so obvious, how did I not see it before?” But it made for another genuinely surprising twist in KH II. A villain can only have so many twists and secret plans, however, before effective surprises become cheap gimmicks, and any ability to take their current scheme seriously evaporates.

The revelation that Xehanort is in fact a transparently evil old man who, years before any of the events that led to KH I, plotted to synthesize a X-Blade and bring about a second Keyblade War (with less than ten combatants, so it’d be more of a Keyblade Skirmish) in what basically amounts to a mad scientist’s scheme in fantasy genre clothing, was the breaking point for me. This is a common trap of both prequels and conventional sequels; trying to tie too many things into a small group of characters, or in this case, a single character. Making Xehanort into a villain that spans multiple generations, the man who set into motion everything that preceded KH I and is indirectly responsible for Sora, Kairi, and Riku becoming Keyblade Wielders, can seem like an expansion of the universe on paper, but in execution, it’s a contraction. It reduces too many events down to factors in a single character’s actions. The fact that his scheme is no more coherent than those from KH I and II doesn’t help, nor does the fact that the storyline that most directly leads into Xehanort’s role in those games - Terra’s - is so transparently ripped from Revenge of the Sith.

But Xehanort’s abrupt reentry into the story isn’t truly maddening - not in BbS, at least. For me, the worst part of the BbS story is how it retroactively changes Sora’s. I’d go so far as to say that BbS is to Sora what Dragon Ball: Minus is to Bardock and Goku.

Don’t misunderstand me on that point: BbS is nowhere near as bad a game as Dragon Ball: Minus is a comic. What I mean by that is: prior to Dragon Ball: Minus, most people took Bardock: the Father of Goku to be canon. And, in that TV special, the history given to Goku, derived from what was said in the manga at the time, was that he was of no account by the standards of Saiyan society. He was a no-account spawn of a low-class warrior, sent off to a far-flung planet to clear out its worthless inhabitants. That low-class warrior who fathered him was as ruthless and mercenary as any typical Saiyan, and while he was stronger than the average low-class fighter and was given psychic insight into the fate of his people, Bardock was ultimately just another Saiyan doomed to die and be forgotten by time. Nothing in Goku’s origins is special or fated, which makes his accidental amnesia and eventual surpassing of Vegeta, the supposed Saiyan ideal, more remarkable. By transforming Bardock into a more tamed Saiyan with a close familial bond to his mate, who sends his son to Earth for safety in a blatant rip-off of Superman’s origins, Goku and Bardock both become too special, Goku’s turning into a kind-hearted child becomes too telegraphed, and their stories become too beholden to “chosen one” cliches.

And that is what BbS does to Sora, Riku, and to a lesser extent Kairi. That all three of them just happen, in their childhoods, to have had contact with Keyblade Wielders who left a personal mark upon them - and, in Sora’s case, literally took up residence inside him - is just too pat. It makes the three of them ending up with Keyblades too easy, too predestined. This hurts all three of them, but Sora most of all. Ven looking like Roxas and Vanitas looking like Sora, is a massive headache (and yes, I’m aware that there is at least some explanation of that), but the big loss is in the thematic content of the story, and there is where the comparisons to Dragon Ball: Minus really come into play.

Like a pre-Minus Goku, pre-BbS Sora is not special, in any way, at the start of KH I. He’s an ordinary young teen, plucky and affable and just a bit lazy, with a burgeoning quasi-romantic interest in his friend Kairi and an in-all-things rivalry with his best friend Riku. Compared to Riku, Sora comes up short in pretty much every area. Riku, at first glance, is faster, stronger, smarter, more dedicated, more fearless, and more capable. If you were going to choose one of those two to be the fated hero wielding a magic blade to save the worlds from darkness, Riku’s the better candidate by every metric, on paper. And, in fact, the Keyblade does choose Riku. The whole “chosen one” cliche is subverted in KH I in a brilliant way by essentially having destiny make the wrong choice. That Sora only gets the Keyblade by accident, loses it to its intended master, but quickly reclaims it on the strength of his accomplishments and his purity - that he earns it - is one of my favorite things in this entire series, and is a wonderful thematic idea and moral. Giving Sora and Riku both a fated “touched by a master” backstory kills so much of that idea, and it’s enough to make me wish that there was no BbS, as fun as the gameplay can be.

Ironically, DDD tries to have its cake and eat it too by playing up the fact that Sora wasn’t chosen by the Keyblade, but the damage was done by that point. And DDD further undermines that initial concept in the way it writes Sora, and his relationship with Riku. For one thing, Sora in DDD seems so much dumber than he was in previous games. Up to that point, he’d been written as an upbeat young teen, possessed of a certain level of immaturity and naivete, but always determined to help save the day, and more than capable of getting serious when needed. DDD abruptly starts to portray him as more of a doofy shonen hero, without any clear motivation and to no real purpose. It also introduces the idea that the central dynamic in Sora and Riku’s friendship is that Sora lifts Riku’s spirits while Riku takes up the slack from Sora’s sloppiness and carelessness. I have a real problem with that presentation, because it just isn’t true.

If you go back and look at KH I, those early Destiny Islands scenes set Sora up as the underdog to Riku’s Big Man on Campus. Riku jokes that he’s the only one working on the raft, and Kairi remarks that “he’s changed,” but he doesn’t come off as someone needing to perk up. And with one of the first challenges of the game being Sora gathering raft supplies, it doesn’t seem that Riku needs to take up that much slack either. In any event, over the course of KH I, Riku’s the one who drops the slack and falls into darkness, with Sora literally having to stop him from doing horrible things. And it’s Sora who continues on through CoM and KH II, saving the worlds. While Riku does appear here and there to aid Sora, his aid doesn’t come in the form of “taking up slack” or cleaning up after messes Sora leaves; Sora, Donald, and Goofy are still able to save the day by their own skill in each world. This whole notion, and Sora’s more dim-witted persona, seem invented, if not from whole cloth, then from very little that was previously established.

And again, there doesn’t seem to be a clear motive, unless it’s to highlight the differences between Sora and Riku and give more justification to Riku getting the Mark of Mastery when Sora wasn’t. But the writing doesn’t give a coherent through-line to that idea, nor does it sufficiently justify Sora not becoming a Master. Had the game actively told a story of turning the tables, and made a point to stress the idea that Riku’s fully reformed and that Sora was slipping up, then I’d be more forgiving (even if I still wouldn’t like the idea), but the work just isn’t there.

I’ll admit that there’s a certain amount of bias in my assessment; I’ve never liked Riku as a character. As a teen playing KH I for the first time, I found it easy to project my dislike of certain people IRL onto him, and in the years since, I’ve continued to find that the manner of his turn to darkness in KH I makes it very hard to accept him back into the fold with Sora and the others. He’s also a lousy player character in Reverse/Rebirth and in KH III IMO. But I accept that he’s the deuteragonist, and that his story since KH I has been one of redemption. In principle, a game that builds him up as a character and lets him save the day is fine. But the manner in which it was done in DDD was all wrong. And to an extent, the changes made to his and Sora’s friendship, and to Sora’s personality, have all carried over into KH III, which is even more frustrating.

And, speaking of things carried over...DDD is where Xehanort gets completely ridiculous IMO. Having pulled a third twist that he was actually an ancient Keyblade Master seeking to provoke a war, now there’s a fourth twist where his younger self has been traveling through time (by ridiculous means) to ensure that the fifth twist - that all that business about Nobodies having no hearts was a lie, and that the real Organization XIII exists to create thirteen Horcruxes vessels for Xehanort’s heart, so that there can be thirteen darknesses to face the seven lights in the Keyblade War (which still seems short of the numbers you’d need for an actual war, but whatever). The whole business about “recompletion” allowing an original person to revive if their Heartless and Nobody are destroyed is already enough of a contrivance to bring the original Xehanort back, but time travel and heart-splitting is even more absurd. And I still haven’t been able to figure out how “Ansem” and Xemnas can be back in action, even with the time travel aspect.

Recompletion also means that DDD brings back the rest of Organization XIII. I consider nearly all of them to be glorified henchmen, possessed of a gimmick for combat and a single personality trait at best, so their revival - and their cameos in BbS - do nothing for me. A big exception to that is Axel, but if I don’t care much for Riku, I can’t stand Axel. He comes off as what an “edgy” teenage writer would come up with for a “cool” character in a bad first stab at fiction. From his character design to his abused catchphrase, everything about him pisses me off. His one saving grace in KH II was that he sacrifices himself, and nothing undermines a sacrifice like a contrived way around death. That he’s become a Keyblade Wielder, and one of the Seven Guardians of Light, is ridiculous to me, and I’m not sure if I can think of a more blatant example of a writer’s pet character being so inorganically shoved to the forefront of a story that supposedly isn’t about them.

DDD also started to open the door to the possibility of Roxas and Namine being restored. That idea is less annoying to me than any of these others, but it’s still a mistake IMO. That Roxas and Namine both ultimately elect to give up their lives as individuals to return Sora and Kairi to their full selves, accepting their fate so that others can live more fully, is a bittersweet and touching concept, and one that lets “death” have some real consequences and the happy ending of KH II come with a price. I hate seeing that undermined, and I’m frankly frustrated by how much of KH III’s front half involved chatter about Roxas.

And speaking of KH III...that’s where Part II comes in.

ADDENDUM: Another thing about DDD that I feel undermines Sora is that, while writing him dumber, the game also hypes him up more than he ever was in the past. It’s the same problem as Harry Potter; for all that series’ virtues, constantly pointing out how special Harry is can end up taking away from his character by making his unique traits too ubiquitous. Other characters constantly pointing out how kind and loving and easy to bond with Sora is undermines that trait by over-playing it and turning it into an exercise in “tell, don’t show.”

#critique #commentary #kingdom hearts #birth by sleep #dream drop distance #disney #z's crits

11 notes · View notes

entamewitchlulu · 6 years

Text

Homura’s Flash Reviews [Spring 2018]

It’s the end of another animu season, so it’s time to give some flash reviews for the stuff I ended up finishing this season!

Under the cut for the length + all the gifs lol

Comic Girls

After having storyboard after storyboard rejected, young aspiring manga artist Kaoruko moves to a dorm specifically for young mangaka, where she makes new friends, has fun adventures, and learns a lot about herself and her craft.

I liked this show way more than I expected to; it’s a very moeblob show and especially in the first couple of episodes there’s a lot of anime bullshit. It IS a gag anime at the start and tends to default to a lot of the same tropes. Despite this, I found it ridiculously hilarious, and I could relate to a lot of the #ArtistProblems and other things the girls dealt with regularly. Not to mention, the characters were generally just really fun, cute personalities. Despite some frustrations with some general character arcs feeling a bit stagnant, there were actually multiple places where I physically cried because despite the gag manga start, it gets pretty emotional later on regarding things like anxiety, artist’s block, and the feeling of stagnation, which was super relatable. Also....Kaoruko is absolutely a tiny lesbian and I love my tiny lesbian daughter. Actually I’m pretty sure they’re all lesbians, except for Rukki who is probably bisexual.

overall: 7/10

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card

Following the events of the original Cardcaptors, Sakura wakes up one morning to find that all of her Sakura Cards have turned clear. Not only that, but there are more, strange new spirits appearing, and she’s been granted a brand new key from a dream.

Okay so....I have made mention of this one from a few other flash reviews since the first cour took place during last season. And...my opinion has honestly worsened. This was 22 episodes of obnoxiously boring fluff and little else. Don’t get me wrong: I love fluff. But I watch specific things for fluff. I don’t watch magical girl shows for 95% fluff, I watch them for sparkly, magical girl bullshit, cute costumes, fun magical experiences, and maybe just a little bit of worldbuilding. Clear Card gave me next to nothing on all fronts. When it wasn’t trying to be Cardcaptor Sakura: The Cooking Show, it was dragging its feet with 15 minutes of pointless chatter that did nothing to further characters or relationships, leaving them the exact same static characters they were in the original series. Syaoran’s greatest draw was nearly completely erased once he became just a sedentary background love interest who did little. At least as a rival he pushed Sakura, but here, he just enabled the boring writing that did nothing to push the envelope. The formula is nearly exactly the same as the last two series and the arc even mentions it. Characters are unnecessarily cryptic, hiding things from each other, which only drags the story down. The main plot is barely sprinkled in, magic stuff usually only happens for about 2 minutes towards the end of the mind-bogglingly slow fluff episodes, and the major plot?? Only appears for about five minutes in the final episode, addresses none of the questions we had and only reveals things we had already figured out fifteen episodes ago, gives no conclusion to any of it, and COMPLETELY ERASES THE ONLY CLIMATIC, STORY-FURTHERING SCENE BY USING TIME MAGIC.

And that’s...it, apparently. I see no indication of a second season. I assume the manga is still ongoing, but even if it is, this was an absolutely horrendous ending that did nothing to satisfyingly tie up ANY loose ends, further the world or the characters, or really do anything to add to the previous series. Even the costumes were few and far between and the cards were almost all the same as the last set. There was no creativity and nothing added here for the fans. That brings me to my ultimate complaint: who was this show even for?! It can’t still be for kids, because new young fans of the original demographic’s age group would not have any clue what was happening with these characters, and it’s just lore-based enough to confuse any new viewers. And it can’t be for the original fan group, who are all much older now and want something with just a little more substance. I’m not asking for a gritty cardcaptors show at all. Just something that respects us as adult viewers and gives us a little more to grab onto. And that was way longer than any flash review has any right to be, so I will cut myself off there.

overall: 4/10

Lostorage conflated WIXOSS

Though they believed it was finally over, former LRIG and Selector Kiyoi knows that the Selector battles will come again, and this time, they will destroy everything--and she is determined to bring the dark loop of suffering to a close once and for all by bringing together all of the greatest Selectors from every generation to take on the new threat.

Boasting the largest cast of any of the previous WIXOSS series and continuing both the story of Lostorage and the first two Selector series, this is absolutely the most ambitious take on the WIXOSS universe thus far: and it does fantastically with it. There was not a single moment where I was bored; even during slower flashback and exposition parts, I was hooked. This was one of the best ways to expand and complete the universe, as the ending here finally does feel like a decisive end to the anime franchise (though, so did the end of the Selector anime, so who knows lol).

As always, WIXOSS has some of the most fantastic character designs, relationships, dynamics, and animation among other anime, making it truly stand out. The card game is more window dressing than actual substance, but that doesn’t matter, because the power of the relationships and the messages that this story is telling are far more powerful and attention grabbing. The decision to make Kiyoi the protagonist of this series, while also bringing back previous protagonists Ruko and Suzuko, was an incredible decision and really made for a fantastic story.

overall: 9/10

Golden Kamuy

After being discharged from the army after the Japanese-Russo war, Sugimoto is left with the dying wish of his comrade: to make enough money to support his fallen comrade’s wife and son and pay for their medical expenses. He stumbles across an opportunity when an escaped convict tells him of a hidden trove of Ainu gold that can only be found by collecting the information tattooed onto the bodies of a group of escaped prisoners. With the help of an Ainu girl named Asirpa, whose tribe the gold was stolen from, Sugimoto takes on the mission to track down the prisoners and find the gold.

This show is absolutely fucking incredible. I don’t think I can even give it proper words. Like what a goddamn great season for anime this was?? Not only is the show clearly heavily researched, giving us insight into a part of Japanese history and Ainu culture that is rarely if ever discussed in Japanese culture, the story and characters are all so well done. The animation can be wonky in places, but the expressions, the character banter, and god the soundtrack are all mind-blowingly good. Unlike Clear Card, when this show decided it wanted to be a cooking show, I was completely on board, because I was learning something new about Ainu culture and also getting to see our heroes be adorkable and hilarious together. The characters are absolutely where this show shines, and even though it’s a bit bloated at first, characters quickly become recognizeable and easily separated. The relationship between Sugimoto and Asirpa, especially, is one of the most wholesome and fun friendships I’ve ever witnessed (I’m hoping, tho, that it stays platonic despite some jokes to the contrary lol). This was only season 1, and season 2 will air in October, and you can bet I will be waiting at the edge of my seat for more of this incredible show.

overall: 9/10

Hinamatsuri

After a strange girl in a metal cocoon drops out of the sky and onto his head, yakuza Nitta finds himself the reluctant father of a needy young girl with psychic powers. Shenanigans ensue around their strange new family and the dysfunctional adults and children that surround them.

This show was so much fucking better than it had any right to be; from the initial plot summary I was worried it was going to be awful, creepy-ish moe bullshit...but it was NOT. This was a gag anime of the highest caliber. The pacing was amazing, the characters were to a one endearing, the animation was BEAUTIFUL, and god...the punchlines...everything was so fucking funny the whole time.

You’ve got pretty much everything here: you’ve got the obnoxiously needy Hina, who is monotone in everything she does, you’ve got the Worst/Best Dad Nitta, you’ve got poor can’t-say-no-to-favors Hitomi, and the Most Pure and Wholesome Anzu. There’s something to love in every character and every scene, and it’s ridiculous just how amazing this show is. I can’t put it into words, please just watch it. Where my other top shows of the season took awhile to grow on me, this one was hitting home runs from episode 1. Do yourself a favor and watch it.

overall: 9/10

Megalo Box

In a world where boxing is performed with powerful mechanical rigs known as Gear, a nameless boxer known only as Junk Dog is tired of being forced to throw fights in an illegal underground boxing ring to pad the pockets of his gambling organization. When he crosses paths with the current champion of Megalo Box, he and his crew take a risky gamble to get him into the world’s first international Megalo Box competition so that he can fight the champion again, reinventing himself as Gearless Joe as he steps into the ring without any Gear.

This show took a while to really get onto my Awesome List, mostly because the aesthetic that it’s throwing back to was never really my thing in the first place. I’m generally not a huge fan of the muted color palettes, the punkish music, or just the idea of boxing in general (a lack of significant female characters also always tends to put me off). Despite this, however, the show ended up being stunning. By halfway through, I was incredibly hooked on the high this show wanted me to ride, by the character arcs that were playing off each other, and I was even coming around to the music. Boxing may not be my thing, but the character story that was told here was an incredible one, and definitely deserves its place among the Best Anime of 2018, which if it doesn’t win something come that time, I’ll be floored and disappointed with everyone.

overall: 9/10

Overall this was an incredibly strong season: I dropped a few things of course, but what I continued were almost all 9/10s. I’m super pleased with the spring season and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s coming out for summer.

#comic girls #cardcaptor sakura clear card #lostorage conflated wixoss #golden kamuy #hinamatsuri #megalo box #homura's flash reviews #homura reviews

27 notes · View notes

aion-rsa · 3 years

Text

Why Superman & Lois Went Full Friday Night Lights

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This article contains spoilers for Superman & Lois episode 6.

There’s a moment in “Broken Trust,” Superman & Lois episode 6, that will make you confused about what show you’re watching. Volunteer assistant football coach Clark Kent is in Metropolis with the boys for their first game against their old school, and the first time Jordan is seeing his ex-bullies since he gained his powers. Like any kid who found their confidence after time away from their tormentors, Jordan is revelling in showing them up a little – he lays a massive hit on one of the Metropolis High players and taunts him over it. He gets called off the field by Clark, and when Clark grabs Jordan’s face mask and threatens to bench him if he doesn’t knock it off, you’d be forgiven if your first reaction was to cock your head and mutter “Coach Taylor?”

That Friday Night Lights comparison is not an accident, according to Superman & Lois showrunner Todd Helbing.

“I think Tammy and Coach Taylor was such a great relationship, so that was sort of the inspiration” for Clark and Lois’ on-screen relationship, he says. “As a couple, [we wanted to] have them be respectful and great parents and a mature relationship. They talk about the stuff that they’re dealing with.”

Having that show’s family dynamic laid over the Superfamily is revelatory in what it exposes of two of the oldest, most examined superhero characters. “We just wanted [Lois] to be fearless and independent and a great mom,” says Helbing. “With Clark, we wanted him to be humble and good and a great dad, and as Superman, we really wanted Clark Kent to be the person, and Superman to be the alter ego.” After decades of people complaining about how Superman is too powerful to be centered in good stories, and Lois being unable to hang with him, Superman & Lois is succeeding simply by making them both competent, emotionally healthy adults. It’s breathtaking.

At the point where Clark and Lois’s stories diverge in “Broken Trust” is a scene with Tyler Hoechlin and Elizabeth Tulloch that shows how beautifully this show has balanced their relationship. Lois is trying to get into the mines and complaining to Clark about her lack of success, and he starts trying to escalate his assistance. He’s immediately and forcefully waved off by Lois, who orders him to stick with the kids while she figures out her own solution, and he does. The effortless, egoless transition of authority between the two makes it really easy to believe this relationship: you see Hoechlin and Tulloch completely inhabiting their roles as the most powerful man and the greatest journalist on the planet moving through life as equals. The trick, Helbing says, is “to strip away that they’re two larger than life characters and write them real. Bitsie and Tyler are so good and so honed in, if we just write them as a real couple, then who they are shines more.”

At this point, Superman’s origin story has been so absorbed into the popular consciousness that comic book alchemists have found the most economical telling of it possible. It’s almost not worth trying to retread that ground, because it’s been worn into a chasm at this point. And yet, one of the subtler beauties of Superman & Lois is they’re actually pulling it off. And they’re doing it through Jordan Kent.

“Broken Trust” is as much about Jordan and how he’s dealing with his developing powers as it is about his hyper competent parents. At one point, Clark takes him and Jon under the barn to show Jordan how Pa Kent taught him to control his own strength, and we get to see a battered old telephone pole with hand marks all over it. It doesn’t go great, at least at first: Jordan smashes his hand pretty hard trying to throw what appears to be his first punch ever. “The lessons [Clark] learned from Jonathan Kent, all the lessons we learn from our parents, when we’re adults, they sink in differently, they mean different things,” Helbing says. “And when you try to teach your kids those lessons, you’re coming at it from a different angle, but you understand now what your parents meant. That was the angle that was really interesting to us.”

That angle gives a way into Jordan’s character, too. Jordan’s powers are fritzing out as they develop – at the end of the football game, he gets jumped by the losing Metropolis side and the stress causes him to build up a heat vision blast that his father protects him (and the rest of the field) from. This is, understandably, difficult for the Kents to take, but it’s another way to look at Superman’s origin – by seeing what it wasn’t, through his son’s eyes.

“Clark got bullied, but not in the same way,” says Helbing. “How does he then relate to this kid like that? He’s got to figure it out for himself in an interesting way.”

The care put into character work doesn’t just stop with the Kents. Erik Valdez’s Kyle Cushing gets a little more dimensionality this week – Lana gets a new gig as Edge’s person on the ground in Smallville, and Kyle takes her out to celebrate, but not before Lois tries to get them to flip on Edge and give her something she can use to expose his malfeasance. Kyle doesn’t have the benefit of Lois’s broader view of Edge’s history, but he is very tied to this hurting town, and he views what Lois is doing as fundamentally destructive. And he’s not entirely wrong – the town was dying before Edge got there, and now everyone is employed and there aren’t many obvious cracks or problems.

“To [Lois], it’s a very important job to do because she feels like [Edge] is going to destroy this town,” says Helbing. “[Kyle] feels like she’s going to destroy this town if she gets rid of this guy. They both have a point, and we’ll see how they collide further on in the season.”

That wasn’t the only point where Helbing was coy about what was coming. For all of Superman & Lois’ (excellent, effective) focus on character, it’s still one of the sharpest looking shows in the Arrowverse, full of extremely deep cuts (X-Kryptonite?). “Broken Trust” is no different – a conflict between burgeoning super-speedster Tag and Superman takes the pair in front of an oncoming train and has Clark, at super speed, catch the train mid-air and use his heat vision to collapse the tracks back to the ground to keep the train moving. It’s an extremely effective capital-S Superman moment, as it was at the end when Sam Lane’s DoD squad, out to recapture Tag, fires a kryptonite bullet into Superman’s chest. While Helbing was sketchy on it, he promises more to come. “We do this super cool thing coming up with the Fortress of Solitude . I would tell you but it’ll spoil a lot.”

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

If the rest of the season is half as good as the start, it’ll be well worth the wait.

The post Why Superman & Lois Went Full Friday Night Lights appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3bCu6VZ

#aion-rsa #Den of Geek

0 notes