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hayleysstark · 5 years

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Hi! I love reading your merlin thoughts, so can I ask if you have any headcanons for Elyan and Percival? They seem to have gotten v little characterization in the actual show compared to the others imo? I’d love to hear what you think!

headcanons for Elyan and Percival, you say??? i’m not sure i have very many of those ((like you said, they get almost zero characterization, and no real development, especially in comparison to, say, Gwaine or Lancelot)) but i can certainly see what i have for them!!!

Elyan:

really fucking sarcastic pretty much all the time. it gets to the point where not even Gwen can tell if he’s serious or not.

he has really intense bouts of insomnia. sometimes you’ll run into him on the training field in the dead of night, whacking away at the practice dummies. it just be like that sometimes. everybody knows to just let him be.

very jaded. pretty sure the whole world’s a piece of shit but by god he’s still going to save it anyway

drinks his Respect Women juice every day

ARO 👏 ACE 👏 ICON 👏

CAN and WILL get wine drunk. ((if you think Gwaine ever lets him live this down, you are WRONG))

loves Gwen more than anything else in the whole-ass world, but his horse is a very close second

he’s terrible at taking advice ((too proud smh)) but he’s even worse at giving advice. please don’t ask him for solutions, he’ll probably tell you to hit your problem with a sword until it goes away. he really wants to help you, he just,,,,,,,,, doesn’t ???? know ???? how ?????

good at sewing !!!

p e r f e c t i o n i s t

buys Gwen pretty things literally all the time ((the knights’ salary is absurdly high, as far as he’s concerned, why not spoil his sister ??? she deserves nice things after all)). sometimes his idea of “pretty things” is far, FAR different from what is actually a pretty thing, though. has Gwen forgiven him yet for the Shrimp Head Necklace Incident ???? survey says no.

really just ridiculously proud of his status tbh. he never thought he would ever do anything worthwhile. he always believed he was a dead-ender, a disappointment, a loser, he always thought he’d do nothing but let his family down. when Prince Arthur fucking Pendragon of fucking Camelot makes him a fucking knight??????? life-changing tbh. his cloak and sword are among his most prized possessions

Percival:

easygoing is this man’s middle name. captured by bandits?? nbd. he’ll find a way out of it somehow or other. imprisoned by an evil sorceress??? ooh tricky but it’ll make a fun story ’round the fire when he gets back to his fellow knights. literally nothing rattles this dude.

hot baths are the greatest joy in his life tbh

always pays too much for things and INSISTS the shop owners and stall vendors keep the change. it was his mistake, after all.

with his reserved nature and tall stature, you’d think he’d frighten people but this guy doesn’t have an intimidating bone in his body tbh. servants know they’ll be listened to and treated fairly if he’s around. children climb all over him like a fuckin playground. he loves it.

really devoted to his religion tbh. he wants something to believe in, and he wants to think there’s something bigger than himself out there to guide him

neat freak honestly

drunk Percival is sad Percival please don’t ever take him to the tavern ((looking at you Gwaine))

thunderstorms are his SHIT. the noise, the lightning, the rain ,,,,,,,,,,,,,

VERY!!!!! GOOD!!!!!!!! HUGS!!!!

will cry if you let him think too long about puppies

honestly, he really wants to settle down and start a family one of these days. maybe not anytime soon - Arthur and Camelot still need him far too much for that - but he can’t wait to find somebody to love, and share the rest of his life with, and raise children with.

could live on chicken if only his friends let him

has caught precisely one (1) cold in his whole-ass life. freakishly strong immune system. everybody kinda quietly assumes he’s got magic, or maybe he’s a fae or some shit, but everybody is ALSO too scared to say this out loud and get him arrested

has Never Worn Sleeves and you can’t make him

really romantic tbh but thinks That’s Just What You Do In Relationships

that’s all i can remember off the top of my head!! i probably have more i forgot to add, but i hope that’s enough to give you the Good Elyan and Percival Content™️!!

#merlin #bbc merlin #ask #anonymous

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unpretty · 7 years

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i lack self-control and there’s other shit i should be doing so it’s time for the first installment of

Let’s Read: Kraven the Hunter

Kraven the Hunter's first appearance is The Amazing Spider-Man #15 from August 1964, written by Stan The Man himself, which is how you know it's gonna be batshit. Every comic writer has strengths and weaknesses, and in many cases you kind of have to overlook those weaknesses to really enjoy the strengths.

Stan's strength is also his weakness, which is that none of his plots ever make any goddamn sense and all his characters come off as weird assholes, and whenever you finish a comic you are left with a vague sense that literally everything that happened in that issue could have been avoided if they'd just stopped being weird assholes for five seconds.

Some writers attempt to remedy this later. Those writers are wrong.

Stan Lee still writes the newspaper comic strip version of Spider-Man, as far as I know, and for years I thought those strips were just nutso because Stan Lee was old and out of fucks to give. Then I read some old-ass comics and realized that Stan Lee is just Like That, and always has been.

He also writes credits like these.

If there is a space where a man can reasonably fit more words, Stan Lee will find more words to put there.

Early Spider-Man comics feature a lot of weird old-timey bank-robbing gangsters? Like, straight-up Dillinger Gang motherfuckers. So anyway the issue starts with some old-timey gangsters, bla bla bla, the Chameleon bla, curse you Spider-Man, etc. We don't care about that part. What we care about is that the Chameleon (who is also, to be clear, kind of an old-timey gangster) decides he's gonna call in Kraven the Hunter to solve his Spider-Man problem.

Here are the first things we learn about Kraven, in order:

He's been in Africa, where he defeats terrorbeasts single-handed and with his bare hands.

He's a fucking hunk.

"You know what the ladies love? Rectangles. I’m gonna build a man entirely out of rectangles. For the ladies." - Ditko, presumably.

I know that what the creators were thinking was, 'let's give him an outfit like a circus strongman or something, to emphasize that he's tough', but what this implies is that Kraven the Hunter thinks this outfit is a good idea. He deliberately chose to dress like he got his wardrobe at the circus. Maybe he did! We don't know. Anyway never trust anyone who tries to take away Kraven's ballet flats and leggings because they are just as Iconic™ as his lion vest and I will not hear otherwise.

Okay but anyway the second thing that happens, after we learn all about what a fine cut of beefcake Kraven is, is that all of the animals Kraven has brought with him to New York have escaped.

This is not the only time this happens, presumably because Kraven has no interest in catching animals that aren't wily enough to try to escape en masse.

Since Peter Parker is on location to snap some sweet pics of Kraven's pecs, he makes an attempt to save the day, only to get beaten to the punch by Kraven before he can get his fucking pants on.

Just casually flinging some fucking cobras into a bucket, nbd. Hey, you know that weird fucking belt Kraven always wears?

Belt tusks. He wears fucking tusks full of drugs on his belt, in a constant outward stabbing position. Anyone who tries to remove Kraven's belt without Kraven's consent is getting knocked the fuck out. I mean he also has some Vulcan nerve punch shit going on, but more importantly, belt tusks.

Peter... please. You are a child. You are in high school. Control yourself.

I'd like to note that this was in no way part of any kind of 'fucking with Spider-Man' plan. There is no indication that Kraven even thought Spider-Man would be watching. This is just How He Do. However, Spider-Man was watching, and then had to leave to change into different pants again, meaning he failed to do either his hero job or his day job.

Peter. You should have had your camera out to take pictures of Spider-Man anyway.

Peter.

Did it seriously not occur to you to snap a single fucking picture while you were watching Kraven do sweet ape tricks.

Anyway here is where things really start to go sideways.

Now, personally, if I saw a dude save a bunch of people from rampaging gorillas, then refer to me as 'more beast than human' and 'the most dangerous game', I might consider taking him aside and letting him know that I am actually an orphaned teenager whose only family is an old woman with heart problems and also I get picked on in school. I mean, not to give too much credit to a guy who says 'man is the most dangerous game' without irony, but I'm pretty sure his stated goal of Kicking Ass is not furthered by beating up nerdy children. You don't even have to tell him your secret identity! Just show him your chin and explain how long you've been trying to grow a beard! This whole fight could be avoided and Kraven would go back to the Chameleon to laugh at him about how he got his ass kicked by a baby.

But this is Peter Parker, so instead of that he just regrets getting out of bed and considers building a nest in his bedroom and never leaving.

Incidentally, the b-plot of this comic is that everyone thinks Flash’s girlfriend Liz wants to bang Peter. His crush Betty is mad, Flash is mad, Peter does a lot of moping about how life is uniquely difficult for him and only him. His boss is mad at him, just because he didn't do his one and only job! A hot girl he likes is jealous of the other hot girl who likes him! It's hard and no one understands. I don't know if Stan Lee intended for this to be aspirational, or relatable content, but I'm kind of into it.

Either way, 'teenage boy would rather mope and then fight a grown man to the death than admit he's not worth fighting' is a pretty realistic beginning to a blood feud.

IT'S THE FIRST APPEARANCE OF A BULL ELEPHANT and also Kraven mentioning his total willingness to just drink weird shit in the jungle if he thinks it will help him punch better. Based on existing Marvel canon, I think it's totally possible that he drank something made from some kind of weird super soldier plant that exists in their universe. But also, if he had not specified Africa, I would probably assume it was coca. He seems like a guy who'd do a lot of coke and punch an elephant.

Also I'm pretty sure the Chameleon just gave him a bunch of articles from the Daily Bugle as research. SPIDER-MAN TERRORIZES CITY, SOMEONE PLEASE SAVE US FROM THIS MENACE, read headlines. "Yeah okay," says Kraven. FAMOUS HUNTER GOES NUTS AND TRIES TO KILL SPIDER-MAN FOR SOME REASON read headlines later this week. "What the fuck," Kraven will say.

Oh my god the best fucking part of this fight is that Kraven does one of his nerve punches and disables Spider-Man's arm, causing him to have to flail his limp arm around like a dipshit.

GOD I know this isn't what's happening here but I just really want Kraven to be trying to have a serious fucking fight with what he assumes is a grown man with the unholy powers of a spider, only to have a teenager furiously windmill his limp arms at him. Where is the Spider-Man comic we deserve about this.

Now, plenty of comic book villains are hypocrites, but rarely do you meet one as good at self-justification as Kraven. Bare hands! Mano-a-mano! Except, Spider-Man has spider powers, and that's cheating. Not like Kraven, with his drug powers. He got those fairly. But Spider-Man is cheating by having super strength, and the only way to level the playing field... is more drugs.

I love how consistently they use the word 'potion'.

"Look, this is totally fair. I, too, am on drugs." - Kraven, probably.

Incidentally, Kraven has from day one had this problem of being really weirdly sexually menacing. Bisexually menacing, even. Like, later comics writers absolutely used Kraven as a vehicle for their weird fetishes, but this has been a problem with Kraven from the start.

Kraven please listen to yourself.

GUYS THIS IS ALSO THE FIRST APPEARANCE OF KRAVEN'S NOT-BONG

YEAH THAT'S DEFINITELY A CARAFE, FOR THE TEA HE'S DRINKING. ABSOLUTELY IN NO WAY GIVING OFF MAJOR HIGH-VIBES. SITTING ON A DESK. Why is he sitting on a desk? Why is his leg like that? Why is he holding his cup like that? Is that bong on another, different table? Who arranged the furniture in this evil lair and why didn’t they put in more chairs?

Meanwhile Aunt May is trying to hook Peter up with her neighbor Mrs. Watson's niece. THIS IS THE FIRST MENTION OF THE ELUSIVE MISS WATSON. Right after Kraven's not-bong. Mary Jane is not named in this comic, she’s just the niece. Peter's lady problems with pretty girls being thrown at him continue apace, and he is as annoyed about it as ever. You know what else is annoying?

KRAVEN IN JJ'S OFFICE PROMISING TO KICK SPIDEY'S ASS

From Kraven's perspective this has to be just, the weirdest shit. OUR CITY IS BEING MENACED BY A MONSTER MAN, read headlines, while JJ's like "okay but don't break the law while freeing us from this reign of terror".

Kraven's clever plan is to let Chameleon pretend to be him, so that he can suckerpunch Spider-Man while Spider-Man tries to suckerpunch him. It's flawless.

"God, I'm awesome." - Kraven, literally just now in that panel.

Thanks, Stan. Every single word in these panels is very necessary. Thank you.

EVERY TIME I SEE THIS FUCKING PANEL I LAUGH MYSELF TO TEARS. KRAVEN LITERALLY MADE CHAMELEON PLAY THE FUCKING BONGOS TO DISORIENT THE ENEMY. THE ENEMY IS SPIDER-MAN SO IT FUCKING WORKED. PETER HAS NEVER BEEN SO DISORIENTED AS HE IS NOW, HEARING THESE SICK BEATS. WHY IS HE RUNNING LIKE A CONFUSED DOG THAT GOT OUT OF THE YARD. EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS FUCKING PANEL IS GOLD AND I WANT IT FRAMED.

I have turned off my caps-lock for readability but please know that there is a caps-lock on in my heart. My heart, which also knows that this is fetish gear. Kraven just put Spider-Man in magnetic manacles with bells in them.

I'm like 99% sure that at some point Kraven figures out that Spider-Man is Peter Parker, and when he does, I wonder if he ever does the math and figures out he put a high schooler in weird bell manacles.

GOD.

Anyway Spider-Man eventually figures out that HE CAN WEB UP THE BELLS. IT TAKES HIM LIKE THREE PAGES. HE'S JUST JINGLE JANGLING ALL OVER THE FUCKING PARK FOR, IDK, TWENTY MINUTES PROBABLY BEFORE HE REMEMBERS HE'S GOT WEBS. FUCK. That's when Kraven retreats because discretion is the better part of valor and you gotta know when to fold 'em.

What the fuck are spider beams.

God. What the fuck, Peter. Kraven's springs forth from the shadows with an action-packed punch and Spidey's just like HEY. CUT THAT OUT. EXCUSE YOU.

Why are you reinforcing the idea that you are an inhuman monster you fool.

He could have said... literally anything else. Anything. I mean, he's Spider-Man, so insulting his villains is kind of his whole deal, but like?? YOU ALREADY WON. YOU WATCHED THIS MAN SAVE A WHOLE BUNCH OF PEOPLE, INCLUDING YOUR BOSS AND LOVE INTERESTS. HIS ONLY CRIME IS TRYING TO KICK YOUR ASS, A CRIME OF WHICH THE ENTIRE POLICE DEPARTMENT AND FOOTBALL TEAM ARE ALSO GUILTY.

... also conspiring with the Chameleon. But like? Chameleon is implied to be a terrifying crime boss. You didn't even ask why he was conspiring with the Chameleon. You just assumed.

There's kind of this thing, which starts basically in this panel but which continues onward forever, where Kraven and Spider-Man seem to bring out the worst in each other? And part of it is that Kraven thinks Spider-Man is the Most Dangerous Game for some reason (possibly arachnophobia), but I'm pretty sure it's also that instead of just besting him in honorable combat like men, Peter insists on completely humiliating and mocking Kraven every single goddamn time. Starting with this one. Kraven kind of has a huge ego?? Being tough is his whole deal??? Peter said the exact wrong thing if he didn't want Kraven to come back for vengeance??????

But also Peter Parker is a teenage boy and Kraven is a grown-ass man who wants to hunt him for sport, and that's pretty goddamn terrifying. Covering fear with mockery is pretty par for the course. It just happens to be the worst possible thing to do to a man with a massive ego built around kicking ass who assumes you are a grown man who isn't human. Is all. It's a comedy of fucking errors, is what it is.

Anyway JJ rewards Peter for his pictures of the eventual arrest with a chocolate bar (WHICH HE KEEPS IN A FUCKING SAFE), and Betty apologizes for being so mean about assuming that Peter would want to go out with another girl, and proceeds to ask him out. Which he turns down, because he has a secret date with Mary Jane. But Betty foolishly assumes he has a secret date with Liz! Which is totally different from his actual secret date, which he is only going on to please his Aunt May. Life is hard.

Meanwhile KRAVEN IS BEING DEPORTED

to... South America? Apparently they just asked where they wanted to go, and then sent them there. Instead of actually sending them back to Russia. Which is a neat thing I guess the cops do sometimes instead of arresting people.

Hey, here's a question: WHY IS PETER RELAXING BY GOING TO THE FUCKING DOCKS IN COSTUME

So anyway, that's Kraven's first appearance. He shows up in New York to deliver some animals, saves everyone at the docks from gorillas armed with cobras, tries to rid the city of the webbed menace, and ultimately gets deported. It's a weird week for Kraven.

(Next Time, or, The Mess So Far)

#original #kraven readalong #kraven the hunter

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thethirdrose · 6 years

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A Chronicle of Anne Shirley’s Girlfriends

So listen. I know the Anne of Green Gables books really very well. But the more I reread them the more frequently I have moments where my queer lady self really can’t do anything except howl “HOW COULD THIS EVER BE CONSIDERED HETEROSEXUAL??????”*

And so I have taken it upon myself to chronicle the progression of Anne’s intimate relationships with various women throughout the first five books, mostly just citing the actual text as actually published because it kind of speaks for itself. This is meant to serve as textual support for my contention that Anne is hella, hella gay and would probably have be happiest taking a couple months off every year to go live in a lesbian writer’s commune.

*Yes, I am aware that the answer to that is “by the power of ever-changing but no more or less restrictive standards of heterosexuality.” That doesn’t change the underlying point.

SO. LET’S BEGIN.

EXHIBIT A: DIANA BARRY (THE FIRST LOVE)

This is the one that everyone loves to cite. I mean, to be fair, it kind of cites itself. It starts off with an oath of friendship clearly cribbed from some sort of romance novel, but that’s easy enough to put down to Anne’s canonical desperation for companionship. But then –

Yes. This is definitely, 100% a normal friendship reaction. Totally! NBD! I also get intensely jealous of the hypothetical romantic partners of all my totally platonic friend relationships. It gets better though. Diana’s mother is introduced for the sole purpose of separating the two friends and forbids them from playing together. They’re given ten minutes (!) to say goodbye.

(As a side note, check out how “I didn’t think anybody could love me” is a real thing that Anne Shirley says that just gets slipped in there.) Anne then asks for a lock of her hair (!!!!), which Diana happily gives her. Of course, they’re soon reconciled, and Anne immediately goes back to spending every possible moment with her and talking about her nonstop whenever they have to attend to silly things like school and chores and families.

On the other hand, the thing about Diana is that while Diana is happy to follow Anne’s lead and is clearly Anne’s first love, Diana is also…actually pretty straight. Unpopular opinion, I know, but for her, her relationship with Anne is clearly a platonic-best-friends kind of deal. Anne is important to her, Anne is her best friend, but her relationship with Anne isn’t central to her life. It’s not all-consuming and life-changing in the way that the way Anne feels clearly is for her. Diana quickly and contentedly gets married to a dude, while Anne has a wistful moment (or three) (or ten) over the slow changes in their friendship.

BUT the stage is set for Anne’s long catalogue of intense and intimate relationships with women.

EXHIBIT B: PHILIPPA GORDON (THE MANIC PIXIE DREAM GIRL)

I have an outsize love for Philippa (aka Phil), who seems to waltz onto the page with careless abandon and proceed to charm the pants off everyone, including the reader, and definitely including Anne. At this point Anne is a grown-up damsel of twenty, past the loves of childhood and ready to expand her horizons in her college years. Two of her “chums” from books past, Stella and Priscilla, appear frequently as well, but Phil has a particularly intimate relationship with Anne, which makes Anne (for once) the one pursued rather than the one pursuing:

Phil also flirts shamelessly with everyone in sight, regardless of gender:

I love that Phil clearly started out as a morality play City Girl intended to showcase the Corruption of Wealth and High Society in contrast to Anne’s Wholesome Country Girl, and then managed to undermine the moral entirely by dint of her total appreciation of and lack of resentment for Anne. Just look at this moment where Phil tries to convince Anne to come home with her for the holidays:

It’s a bit of a one-sided relationship in some ways – Phil doesn’t have as much to teach Anne as Anne has to teach her – but it’s nice to see Anne be fully appreciated and loved by someone very different from her.

EXHIBIT C: KATHERINE BROOKE (THE ENEMY-TO-FRIEND)

Katherine Brooke is the other principal at the school Anne ends up working at while Gilbert is in medical school, who spends at least a year and a half making a point of being mean to Anne at every opportunity in the pettiest ways possible. It is later revealed that this is because she’s jealous of Anne’s happiness, although she puts it in slightly more poetic terms:

Anne, of course, is able to win her over, although not before delivering the iconic line “Katherine Brooke, whether you know it or not, what you want is a good spanking!” They share dark secrets with each other – Katherine is the first person that we see Anne share her horrible childhood with as an adult and Katherine tells Anne about her experience being brought up by her abusive uncle and aunt, her feeling of being trapped as a teacher, and her longing to travel. (Just as a side note, it is probably an under-acknowledged fact that these books do not pull punches when it comes to childhood neglect and abuse. Anne spends her entire childhood up to age eleven (after she’s orphaned as an infant) as an unpaid maid/nanny before being sent to an orphanage; Katherine’s fate is similar minus Anne’s deus ex machina adoption.) Anne also makes her over, in very classic (gay) ugly duckling fashion, convincing her to enter a reading competition and then helping her dress for it. She even, by the end of that semester, has convinced her to change careers and take a job that will actually let her do the traveling she wants, although she leaves a forlorn Anne behind, saying wistfully in a letter to Gilbert “There was so much to discover in Katherine, when you once got past her guard.”

EXHIBIT D: LESLIE MOORE (THE ANGSTY THREESOME)

Leslie Moore is sort of a special case, in that her relationship with Anne is the only one of these intense and intimate friendships that Gilbert Blythe (Anne’s ongoing love interest/husband) also participates in. She’s Anne’s neighbor in her and Gilbert’s first home, a beautiful woman with a tragic past. Anne sees her without knowing who she is as they approach their new home and christens her “the girl with the splendid, resentful eyes.” Then they meet again on a stormy night, when Leslie accidentally sees Anne dancing and laughing on the shore (the original meet-cute!!!) resulting in this wonderful introduction:

Anne doesn’t quite know what to make of her, but finds her deeply interesting, saying to her husband later:

Yeah, ok.

It emerges that Leslie was bullied into a marriage with an abusive man who had an accident soon after they were married and now is severely intellectually disabled, leaving Leslie as his caregiver. This just sets the scene for a friendship that rivals Anne’s friendship with Diana for intensity:

And she does!

And yet, something remains between the happy pair and Leslie, clearly a product of the tragedy of Leslie’s situation:

(My kingdom for a really good, angst-ridden fic where Leslie ends up having a threesome with them, honestly.)

But Anne soon faces her own tragedy, in the sudden death of her first-born daughter after she herself almost dies in childbirth. And soon after, Leslie makes her declaration of love, in a chapter very aptly titled “Barriers Swept Away,” which honestly deserves to be quoted more or less verbatim:

They spend some time processing, but finally it seems that nothing remains as a barrier between them:

I MEAN. THAT’S FINE. LET’S JUST LEAVE OUR TWO HEROINES LITERALLY CRYING ABOUT HOW MUCH THEY LOVE EACH OTHER.

They have a beautiful summer together before further shenanigans ensue, and Leslie eventually gets free of her terrible husband (through a truly glorious plot twist); the book starts to wrap up with this lovely little gem:

That seems – well, like a good place to end this, honestly. QED, Anne’s friendships with women are the most beautiful collection of interesting and varied loves anyone could ask for. It’s a good reminder of what fiction looks like that runs rings around the Bechdel test and then tosses it out a window, which honestly we could all use a little more of.

#anne of green gables #l. m. montgomery #contains spoilers for pretty much all the first five books #anne shirley #diana barry #philippa gordon #katherine brooke #leslie moore #this is the story you asked for / I leave it in your mouth #listen anne is my FAVE #there are very few other characters I would expend this much effort on #so here you all go #feelings about stories #and Ruth said: entreat me not to leave thee

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secretsofthemasquerade · 7 years

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But what is wrong with Light Yagami? What is wrong with the classic anime Death Note? Why does it have to be Americanized, whitewashed and tossed into theaters? Why?

*Netflix

It doesn’t “have to be”, but spreading culture and media sometimes means localizing the original work for it to suit the target Audience. And the target audience of Death Note (anime and manga) in Japan is certainly not the same as the target audience of the Netflix version.

Why was Ugly Betty localized? Why was The Ring? What about the Hunger games? They’re all localized works. Ugly Betty was a telenovela, The Ring is a Japanese horror film, and obviously, Hunger Games is a blatant rip off of Battle Royale (while the other two did respect the original works and paid licencing :p).

Death Note, the manga and anime, both place themselves in a very specific context that just cannot be transposed into the Western. First Japan does have the death penalty, but only apply it so scarcely. There’s no crime and violence culture in Japan (at least not in that kind). A serial killer in Japan just weighs so much more than in the US, because in the US, y’all have one every three days (even adjusting for population). The police investigation that follow and the lack of army also play a big role in the originals.

Changing the name, dropping the story in the middle of nowhere, Ohio just fails to explain why and how Light is insane. The meanings behind the originals are lost in a pure transposition into a western society (at least the American one. Had this happened in England I would have been less pissed off :p)

There’s two ways to bring something from a culture into another; subtitles with reading guides, and localisation. Plain transposition does not work.

This is why in 99% of subtitled work, you have pauses, translator notes, and stuff that needs to be spelled out loud for people who do not live in the context. That the school year is from April to April in Japan, so you don’t change grades in September after the “big holidays” (which isn’t even that big). That the police has an overwhelming positive reputation. That people spend 3-4 hours per day in public transport. That there is public transport. That classrooms have assigned spaces and being 40 in one class is nbd. Shintoism. Buddhism. School pressure, contests, grades. Non taboo sex. Teen dates. Tengus, other creatures…

Subtitles led to this stupid lol (obviously keikaku is a specific word for plan which implies a bunch of connotations that should have been explained in the translator’s note, but wasn’t…)

I love me some culture learning, but having to get a BA to understand and enjoy a series is a hassle and I understand why people don’t want to.

This is where localisation works for us lazy entertainment consumers.

Card Captor Sakura’s Kero has an accent from Okinawa in the original, and to avoid explaining that to 10-12 year-olds, France chose to have him have a southern accent. Sakura’s age was also changed (by mistake, she was in fifth grade of primary school, while “5th” in France corresponds to our second year of middle school, so she went from 9-10 to 12-13 yo, which actually allowed to explain why there were different teachers and allowed mature words and romances to work better). Everyone’s names were also changed as to allow watchers to get attached to the characters more easily (this was only in the anime, in the manga they kept the original names).

Overall the fact that the story happens in Japan isn’t really the turning point or the main approach of CCS. So they could get away with minimum work (change of currencies, change of grade names, and because it’s aimed at kids, the relationship between wood, fire, earth wind and water is explained to everyone).

But for Death Note, this is not enough. If you want to tell the story of death note, you have to change 95% of the setting and really “adapt” the whole thing. Light being part of the majority (straight A smart student) is fine, and this is why him being white in and out of itself is not the problem. To me the problem is the whole thing ; you can’t transpose a story about a serial killer who thinks he’s doing the world a favor into gun-loving America just like that. Shinigami? Yeah, gods of deaths, that’s easy. Misa fangirling over the guy who killed the assassin of her parents? That’s fine too.

I think the problem lies fundamentally in how the theme is taken and adapted to the American context. Death Note isn’t about murder, it’s about where do you draw the line and how far will you go to “do good”, all with a delusion of grandeur. It’s about what’s acceptable and what isn’t, about the respect of the institutions (trial and execution of a sentence) and immediate justice. And how, of course, the gods of death are playing an olympian game with punny mortals who are given powers they shouldn’t have.

The death penalty is far too common and misused in the US to be shocking as to the American public. Kira, in this context, just becomes y’alls judicial system, it’s y’all’s power structure already, but Kira in the original context is rogue, goes against the establishment. This is why it really fails (and this is why a plain transposition of Battle Royale would have failed too, the Hunger Games fits the American narrative so much more.. much to my cringy self).

Who know what does great localization work?

Blizzard. Play World of Warcraft (or Warcraft 3) in French, (Latin)Spanish or German, and you’ll see how all Feats and Achievements, quest names, character names, and other winks are directly related to that language’s culture and common frame of references. There’s a few “international references” that are kept (”Over 9000″ for instance), but many others are rebuilt from scratch for puns, cultural references, and of course, TV series, movies, politics and stuff. Some references are from shows that are American but who became huge in France too (Forest Gump reference for instance :p the chocolate box)

Those of y’all who speak French.. https://www.youtube.com/user/gybet37/videos (Warcraft III)

But these are just easter eggs :p Localisation for content is harder and needs very very skilled writers. That Netflix show, meh.

About GiTS, it seems they missed the point of the original, tbh, but the iconic scenes being redone with today’s technology was cool and they really seem to have used the 3D really well. Considering the high budget and how the American general public needs to have a "big name" on the billboard... it's a safe thing to do when you're pouring millions into it. I mean as a general random person can you name 10 great Japanese American actresses? I can't. I would have preferred a better Japanese actress (seems there were some fails) but I don't blame them for using white actors to sell in their own country. It's why it's an adaptation. So yeah. Of course we need more diversity but the public in general needs to care, and tbh they just don't. It's entertainment, it's not social justice for 90% of them and they just want a nice pop corn stuffing waste of time stuff and not author philosophical shit. Then again I did say they missed the point of the original didn't they ;)

#littlebigdisappointment #unrelated #ghost in the shell #death note #critical #sorry

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gethealthy18-blog · 5 years

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5 People Who Rose To Fame Overnight

New Post has been published on http://healingawerness.com/getting-healthy/getting-healthy-women/5-people-who-rose-to-fame-overnight/

5 People Who Rose To Fame Overnight

Saumya Gaur January 22, 2019

Back in the early 2000s, if one wanted to be famous, all they had to do was audition on one or the other song-and-dance reality shows that populated most of the channels. The participants of these shows, especially the ones who made it to the last couple of rounds, had some or the other type of emotional backstory that made them relatable to the viewers, catapulting them to heights of fame.

However, today, achieving fame is, as the kids say, NBD (no big deal). The definition of being famous today is synonymous with being Insta-famous or meme-worthy. One doesn’t even have to put in efforts to be famous anymore, you can just be going about your business and garnishing your food and voila! A video of you doing that can appear on the social media and before you know it, you would be bestowed with a title such as Pepper bae! To capture the fickle ways of fame we decided to make a list of few such famous personalities who shot to fame overnight. If you’re looking for some inspiration, here you go:

1. Priya Prakash Varrier

Priya Prakash Varrier is popularly known as the girl whose wink made men weak in their knees. The Malayali teen actress shot to fame when a promotional clip of a song from her unreleased movie OruAdaar Love, went viral in 2018. The scene featured a gregarious Varrier, in the garb of a school teen, winking impishly at her school crush. Needless to say, the scene captured the imagination of people of all ages across the nation. It became so popular that she was given the title of “National crush of India”. Want to know what the fuss is all about? See for yourself.

2. Kim Kardashian

You might know her today as a social media icon, Taylor Swift’s frenemy, or as a very successful business magnate. But Kim a.k.a. Kimberly Noel Kardashian West’s journey began when she was catapulted to fame due to a video leak in 2007, that captured her intimate moments with her then-boyfriend, Ray J. Capitalizing on the media momentum, later that year, she, along with her family signed on to the E! channel reality series, Keeping With The Kardashian’s, and the rest is history. In the 12 years since then, Kim has not only managed to stay in news for her short-lived marriage, her video game, but also managed to erect a beauty empire of her own.

3. NusretGökçe A.K.A Salt bae

NusretGökçe, is a Turkish restaurateur, chef, and butcher who is the owner of Nusr-Et, a chain of steakhouses. He first rose to fame when a video of him “suavely” cutting and seasoning meat became viral in Jan 2017. This video which inspired a bajillion memes propped Nusret as the next internet sensation. While his restaurants have been widely panned for having substandard and overpriced food, Salt bae’s histrionics continue to pull in huge crowds to this day (1).

4. Taher Shah

Bet you forgot all about him! This businessman from Karachi became a huge internet sensation following the release of his song, Eye To Eye, in the year2013. Then came his song Angel, in 2016. Dressed in the garb of an angel, with his wings intact, the amateur singer can be seen, making an earnest plea in the video, in the following words, “I am like an angel, mankind’s angel, lonely for you”. Needless to say, the trolls on the internet had a field day commenting on the video.

Say what you will about Taher, his confidence is surely inspiring. See for yourself!

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Source: YouTube

5. Pooja Jain A.K.A DhinchakPooja

You must’ve been living under a rock if you haven’t heard of this self-acclaimed rapper’s famous work, Selfie Maine Le Li Aaj. Pooja Jain, known as Dhinchak Pooja to her fans, scored big on the internet following the release of a spate of her songs in 2016. Following this newfound popularity, she even featured on the popular Indian reality series, Big Boss, in 2017. She recently released another song on her official YouTube channel, titled, Nache Jab KudiDilli Di.

Want to know what you’re missing out? Here you go:

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Source: YouTube

Honorable mentions: Jeremey Meeks a.k.a the “Hot felon”, Taimur Ali Khan Pataudi, Mikhail Varshavskia.k.a Dr. Mike, Omar Borkan Al Gala.

That’s right guys, if fame is something you aspire to achieve, then let these personalities inspire you. Turns out doing your own thing can ensure that you enjoy your 15 minutes of fame. In 2019, anything is possible.

Do you have any worthy additions to this list? Share them with us in the comments section.

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