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dasphinxone · 4 years

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I hope I'm not too late and asks are still open. But I wondered if you had any more thoughts/ideas/scenes/etc for the Mummy au? I totally love your contribution of Booker and Nicky as brothers and what that dynamic would look like. BAMF!Nile and Librarian!Booker give me life. Thanks for all your wonderful au ideas and fic!

Oh man, you are NEVER too late for Asks and they are currently open! In the meantime, allow me to ramble about my PURE AND UTTER LOVE FOR THE FRASER/WEISZ VERSIONS OF “THE MUMMY.”

You see, I had a mad HUGE crush on Brendan Fraser when the first one came out. Except it turned out that the entire damn cast was so beautiful (OMG, the Oded Fehr hotness. So glad they brought him back for the sequel). They all have wonderful chemistry too, and rather similar to the group dynamics of The Old Guard.

On top of that, I have always maintained that it’s Evie who is the real protagonist of the movie. Everyone else stays pretty much the same to their characters as when we’re introduced to them. Meanwhile, it’s Evie who goes from librarian to adventuress. She is thrown into all sorts of situations where she can prove to the world that librarians are just as damn smart and necessary as the brawns of Rick, the cunning of her brother Johnathan and the honorable warrior of Ardeth Bay.

It’s also Evie who comes out of the other end of the wild-ass adventure a changed person. It’s even more obvious in the sequel, where she takes a level in badassery. The best part about that? Rick adores her for it and they are clearly in a happy marriage versus the tired trope of married couples being all bitter.

(I pretend the third movie NEVER HAPPENED, you hear me?!)

ANYWAYS, As Evie and Jonathan grew up rich (the museum curator clearly says to Evie that the only reason he puts up with her is that her parents were the largest donors to the museum), I figure Booker can grow up pretty wealthy too.

Sébastien le Livre is an only child who spends his life around his Action and Adventure!French Parents who have moved to Egypt to be archeologists. While they are world famous archeologists? They’re not the best parents. For they drag Sébastien along on their archeological excursions because they don’t know any better. So Sébastien spends all of his childhood time around his parents and their eccentric adult friends. Yes, they should have sent Sébastien to boarding school, like other rich folks of their time. But what kind of boring-ass education is that as compared to going out into the real world for field study?

Sébastien’s field experience makes him brilliant child. Yet it also turns him into a socially awkward little boy. He’s rarely around other kids or attending school since he out on digs with his parents. On top of that, when his parents can’t bring him on digs, they leave him home in their great big house with his nanny, tutor and the servants for company. Since Sébastien doesn’t have kid friends, he’s always taking in stray animals, rescuing birds that fell out of their nests and doing precious sorts of things like that. He also LOVES reading. He’s fluent in French, English, Latin, Greek and conversational Arabic. Oh, and he can also read hieroglyphs with ease.

Again, Sébastien is a weird kid.

When Sébastien is around say, nine or so, he catches seven year-old orphan Nicky in the parlor of his and his parent’s grand house breaking in and trying to steal things. His parents are out of town on yet another dig, so Sébastien’s randomly wandering around the house by himself. Instead of panicking, Sébastien just invites spooked Nicky to kitchen for tea and sandwiches out of the sheer delight of having another child to talk to. Thoroughly used to Sébastien and his soft spot for strays, the kitchen staff sits the two boys in the corner and lets Nicky wolf down whatever he wants. Nicky eventually leaves after Sébastien swears he won’t tell his parents about the stealing. But only if Nicky promises to come back tomorrow to hang out with Booker.

Nicky actually shows up the next day. Mostly due to the promise of food. While he thinks Sébastien is clearly odd, he also realizes he’s just as lonely as he is (after all, street kid orphan Nicky hasn’t survived this long on his own without being able to see people for what they truly are). But whereas Nicky is aggressive with acting out due to his abandonment issues, Sébastien tends to implode on himself due to his own parental abandonment issues. Basically, they balance each other out.

Three weeks later, Sébastien’s parents come back from their latest dig down in Alexandria. They find Sébastien playing with this street kid out on the extensive grounds of their estate. Shocked at seeing their usually quiet and withdrawn son having a blast with this Italian ragamuffin of a child, due to being the impulsive types, Booker’s parents decide to adopt Nicky. So Sébastien gains a new brother. No matter that they’re not related by blood, Nicky is his brother.

Since Sébastien loves to read, he enjoys reading out loud to Nicky (who is nearly illiterate since he’s an orphan who never had formal education before being adopted). While Sébastien and Nicky have their own rooms at their parents’ estate, Nicky will often sneak into Sébastien’s room at night so that his older brother can read to him. Their nanny usually finds the two boys asleep together with a book sitting between them. Sébastien also helps Nicky learn to read far better than their tutor does. Mostly because Sébastien is so patient with his new little brother.

It’s because of this that Nicky comes up with the affectionate nickname of “Booker” for his new big brother.

Booker graduates from boarding school and attends The Sorbonne back in Paris. While he misses Nicky something fierce, everything will work itself out because he’ll be graduating from The Sorbonne at the same time Nicky will be finishing boarding school. That way, they both be archeologists together and follow in their parents’ footsteps. Booker plans to focus on the research side of things from either libraries or teaching. Nicky plans to actually go on digs and bring back things for Booker to study and catalogue.

Booker does eventually get sent off to British style boarding school in Cairo, as is expected of a wealthy child of his class. A couple of years later, Nicky is sent off to the same boarding school.

Nicky's always getting into fights. Mostly due to the other kids bullying him for his accent, heritage and defending Booker against bullies too. The only reason Nicky doesn’t’ get kicked out is because Booker is able to charm the teachers into looking the other way (remember, he was around mostly adults before he started attending school) when it comes to punishing Nicky. Also, their parents donate a ton of money to the school.

Except the Great War breaks out the same year Nicky graduates from boarding school. He signs up with his school chums for “a great adventure,” like all of the other young men of means did in the opening days of the war.

However, Booker refuses to come along. He’s studied history all of his life and intellectually knows how terrible war can be. As far as he’s concerned, the war is stupid. People are going to get themselves killed over all of these royal families of Europe who refuse to apologize to each other over the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand. He’s certainly not throwing his life away to get shot at, thank you very much. Besides, he didn’t grow up with much in the way of friends or camaraderie among the other boys while he was away at school. So he doesn’t feel like he’s going to miss out on anything.

Nicky thinks Booker is a coward who has no appreciation for a right proper great adventure. Booker thinks Nicky is a headstrong fool who doesn’t value the opportunities their parents have given them. They part ways on bad terms.

Booker eventually relents and writes to Nicky whenever he can. However, he never hears from his little brother. The only way he knows Nicky is alive is through their parents, who Nicky constantly writes to in Cairo. At the same time, Booker doesn’t return to Cairo because it would remind him too much of how much he misses his brother. So he throws himself into his work at the Egyptian Antiquities department of the Louvre. He also tries to ignore the raging war moving closer and closer to Paris.

Wars come and go, antiquities do not.

Except Nicky suddenly goes missing during the Battle of Verdun.

Still in Paris, Booker is dealing with his side of suffering through the war as a civilian. He suddenly gets frantic word from his parents (who still live in Cairo) that Nicky is MIA. The panic immediately starts to set in. He regrets that he didn’t do more to communicate with his little brother while he was away at war. To assuage his guilt, he goes down to the war office every single day to find out where the hell Nicky is.

After a few frantic weeks, Nicky turns up alive but injured. As a result, he’s evacuated to a Parisian hospital. Booker takes a sabbatical at the Louvre to attend to his beloved brother there. Nicky almost dies of an infection but pulls through. Too weak to go back to fighting, Nicky is honorably discharged and goes to live with Booker to convalesce.

Nicky’s not the same vivacious, passionate young man he was before the war. He’s the only one of a handful of his unit to survive both death and not losing a limb or having parts of his face blown off. So there’s the survivor’s guilt. He constantly has nightmares about his time on the front and in No Man’s Land where he wakes up screaming. Bouts of rage and grief hit him without warning.

In order to deal with the crushing swirl of ugliness that’s festering within him, Nicky starts spiraling. He starts heavily drinking. He skips meals. He starts hitting up gambling dens and whorehouses that can make your every wish come true in Paris.

Booker has no idea how to cope with it all. So he once again throws himself into his work. He feels disgusted with himself for silently judging his brother’s actions all while he absolutely has no clue how to deal with his own guilt of not being by Nicky’s side during the war. Perhaps it would have been better to have died together than exist in the sea of darkness they are trapped within now.

Within two years, the war is over. Everyone celebrates only to see the rise of the Spanish Flu Pandemic. It ends up killing Booker and Nicky’s parents, who die within days of each other back in Cairo.

Now, Booker and Nicky are alone in the world and with only each other to depend on. Wanting to escape all the pain they’ve seen in Paris, they head back to Cairo to put their parents’ estate in order. Since their parents split their inheritance evenly between them, they’ve inherited a hell of a lot of money. At the same time, money doesn’t fix their psychological problems.

Yet while they both have a difficult time dealing with their parents’ death and each other’s war trauma? It turns over a new milestone for them. For it allows Booker and Nicky to make their peace with each other since they're the only ones left of their family. They vow that they’ll try to go back to their dream of working together as an archeologist team.

Unfortunately, it never happens. Nicky is still dealing with the PTSD and acting out. Booker tries to manage his brother’s psychological issues and balance his work at the Cairo Museum. Problem is, it’s a job he knows he only managed to secure out of pity since their parents were the largest donors to the museum. The nepotism stings and makes Booker feel inadequate. All despite that he's a damn good researcher and brilliant at languages and hieroglyphics.

Booker once again throws himself into his work at the museum. He has no social life, rarely goes out for fun and no relationship lasts for more than a few months at a time. For he’s grieving his parents and the shell of a man Nicky has become. Meanwhile, Nicky drinks, gambles and whores his way through Egypt in between digs with folks no better than grave robbers. But he always comes back home to stay with Booker in the nice house they own together.

Booker is always there for Nicky and vice versa. No matter how hard it gets for both of them to deal with the losses in their lives, they are and will always be brothers to the end.

And then one day, Nicky finds Booker in the Cairo museum after he’s been rejected by the Benbridge Scholars yet again. All after Booker’s ruined the library and knocked over all the bookshelves after he nearly killed himself trying to get off that damn ladder while filing away books.

Nicky reveals to Booker an odd little box that he found on a dig down in Thebes. Turns out the box contains a map to the lost city of Hamunaptra…

#Book of nile #my asks #booker le livre #nicolo of genoa #the mummy au #booker x nile #the great war #sadness #because even in AUs we gotta have that angst #fanfic #fanfiction #the old guard #why are my answers to my asks so damn long tho?

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jadedjo · 4 years

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Star wars asks 13,14 & 18

Hi Anon! Thanks for the great asks! I’ll be basing these solely off the Movies/TV shows (spoilers for TROS) so if you don’t mind spoilers or don’t care, here we go…..

13. kiss

Fav

I love this more than the Falcon Kiss. The carbon freezing chamber kiss is a close second, then maybe the Falcon kiss. Hell… ALL the Han/Leia Kisses!

Least Fav

just….not a fan so the kiss was just not my jam.

14. fight

Lightsaber fight? Space Fight? Fistfight? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Who are we kidding, this is SW, of COURSE it’s about lightsabers!

Fav

Luke fighting Vader after Vader finds out Luke has a sister. The music, the emotion, the DRAMA. OMG this is the best fight in all of Star Wars! It’s not about flashy moves or one-ups-manship. It’s all about emotion. Honorable mention is Obi-Wan vs Maul in Rebels for sheer badassery!

Least Fav

Some of the Lightsaber duels in the prequels went a bit long but none had the horrible choreography of the Rey/Kylo vs the Red Lobster men. Not to mention that I’m still not emotionally invested enough in the outcome combined with the fact that I know both Rey and Kylo Whine will be ok.

18. villain

Fav

Is there any other? BAFM Darth VADER!

Least Fav

I feel like this is a theme…..

#asks #star wars fav asks #anon #don't stop asking #Anonymous #rise of skywalker #tros spoilers #star wars

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darthstitch · 6 years

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Castlevania Netflix Season 2 Review: All My Bloody Tears

Yeah. Uh. SPOILERS. MASSIVE GINORMOUS SPOILERS. Consider yourself warned.

I'm kind of a complete mess as I write this because PAIN! PAIN AND SUFFERING! TEARS! BLOODY TEARS!

While it's not without its flaws, the second season of Netflix's Castlevania is incredible and lives up to the promise of Season 1. This, gentlebeings, is how you set up a sequel and leave the audience wanting more, but still walking away satisfied with what we've currently got.

The Good Stuff

The thing about Castlevania - as the game series by Konami - is that it's pretty much a patchwork quilt of everything goes. Think your favorite fan fiction peeve on AO3, the ones with the ten million tags before you even get to the goddamn story. So on one hand, it's got its clear inspiration from the classic Hammer and Universal Horror renditions of Dracula. But the game series is Japanese, so you have your beautiful anime-esque artwork by Ayami Kojima and the obvious anime influences.

I've played a few of the games, but I'm not going to claim gamer-god status. I just play for the fun of it and I don't hesitate to use walk throughs as a map of sorts, basically figuring out where to go, because the general castle layout is set up like a labyrinth and it is INSANE and FUN at the same time. So far, I've played and finished Symphony of the Night and two of the GBA ones: Harmony of Dissonance and Aria of Sorrow. I'm still trying to master the ones on the NDS. But basically, the premise is the same: You're the hero/heroine, you need to enter the big spooky castle, gather weapons and/or spells to make you stronger and add to your abilities, take down monsters and Major Bads - including Death Himself - and hopefully prevent Dracula from resurrecting and covering the world in Eternal Night. The main timeline basically has Belmonts, assorted Not-Belmonts who also hunt vampires and of course, pretty, pretty Alucard.

Then, there was your AU timeline in which Gabriel Belmont goes to defeat a Big Bad and becomes DRACULA ... and Trevor Belmont is his son, a.k.a. Alucard. Yeah, wrap your head around THAT one.

In short, Castlevania canon is fucked. To quote our Trevor, "Snake-fuckingly insane."

So Warren Ellis does the smart thing and basically picks up what works from the "canon" and crafts a damn good story out of it.

The Disaster Trio that is Alucard, Trevor and Sypha, end up bonding even closer together and spend much of this series in the Belmont Basement...er.... I mean, "Hold," trying to do the game equivalent of gathering spells and weapons to storm the castle with. We learn a few more interesting things about the Disaster Trio. Trevor actually ended up losing his family at a way too young age. Sypha and her people have some pretty "interesting" views about God. Alucard has artistic talents and basically acts his real age, which is a traumatized snarky 20 something year old, who's barely holding on to his composure with his shiny fangs and claws. There are epic moments such as "Treffy" and I would absolutely LOVE to hear the Belmont family story that explains how the hell a book of "penis spells" ended up in the Belmont Family Library.

Seriously. Fan fiction writers, don't fail me now!

Also, Lisa gets a few more minutes to shine and break our hearts at the same time. This is the woman who managed to charm and get one Seriously Scary King of Vampires wrapped around her tiniest finger. She's snarky and sassy as before, but so real, so kind and just basically trying to be a decent person in a Crapsack World. She loves her husband but she knows he can be monstrous. She loves her son but as Alucard himself puts it, she wants him to be able to be himself, be happy and not be overshadowed by his father. Seriously, as long as each season gives us something more about Lisa, I'm gonna be content.

We also get introduced to a few more new characters, who basically make up Dracula's Court of Evil. Hector and Isaac are humans but sociopathic enough to despise their own kind and willing to take part in their death and destruction. They both have their requisite tragic and abused pasts. Hector, however, has an element of naivete that makes him an easy target for the machinations of Carmilla, the only general in Dracula's court who's figured out which way the blood's flowing and wants to make sure she comes out on top. Isaac, however, is somewhat the mirror of Alucard himself. This is the guy who gives his unconditional love and loyalty to Dracula and refuses to abandon him no matter the personal cost to himself or his remnants of a conscience or whatever he has that passes for a moral compass. I figure that it's there, it's just not one that I would recognize. Isaac is a scary, scary mofo and it looks like he and Hector are gonna be back for season 3.

In fact, if Isaac ends up becoming "Death" in this entire series, I'm gonna be evilly delighted.

And then, there's Godbrand, who is basically the vampire equivalent of YOLO. Basically, all he wants is to fight, fuck, drink blood and make boats out of things he shouldn't make boats out of. Generally, he just wants to have a good time, rule the world like a king and make sure the humans know their place.

So okay, let's give Carmilla her due. Evil? Check. Manipulative? Check. Sadistic, vicious and cruel? 10 across the board. In the absence of a Certain Fanged Someone taking a more active role in what should be "The War on Humankind," Carmilla wants to make sure she's keeping things moving, spinning her webs of intrigue and plans upon plans, thinking she's going to come out the winner and make herself the new Queen of the Damned.

Here's the problem. Dracula figures that out, easily enough.

Here's the OTHER problem. His Fanged Nibs is all out of fucks to give. He's done. Finito. Finished with everything.

Yeah, about that.

While the humor of this series is a gift that keeps on giving, the drama and the feels will DESTROY you.

You know that moment when you realize Dracula isn't just waging a war on humanity, he's waging a war to destroy all vampires too? Because in that moment when he lost his beloved Lisa, he hated not only humans, but he also hated HIMSELF. He hates the fact that his life of evil, wanton death and destruction, wrought this price on the person that he loved. And she damn well didn't deserve that treatment. He hates the humans who killed her but he also hates his own kind, who are just as monstrous as he is.

So when Godbrand basically asks him, "If we're killing all the humans, what are we going to EAT?" Dracula basically tries to fob him off with some excuse or the other. Yeah, His Fanged Nibs is a LYING LIAR WHO LIES. Also, this lying liar who lies is actually spending most of his time sitting, brooding and being HUNGRY. Because he's not drinking blood. At all. Any blood drinking we see from His Fanged Nibs is in flashbacks.

Let that sink in for a second.

Aluard accuses his father of basically doing history's longest suicide. Yeah. It is - Dracula wants to take EVERYBODY down with him.

The fight scenes are worth the wait. I was screaming when the classic "Bloody Tears" started playing in Episode 7, an episode that I'm gonna watch like ten thousand times more, because OH GOD THE EPICNESS OF IT. The sheer badassery. The fact that Alucard is actually the secret identity of Moon Moon.

And then, the final fight between Dracula and our Disaster Trio is just as epic as expected. Even when he hasn't drunk blood, the trio is outmatched and outclassed and this is where you remember that if Dracula had only roused himself long enough to give a flying fuck about something, Carmilla's head would have been rolling on the floor a long time ago.

But then: "My boy.... I'm killing my boy. This is your room. Your mother and I painted these walls, made these toys. Lisa.... it's our boy. Your greatest gift to me. And I'm killing him. I must already be dead."

GDI WARREN ELLIS HOW VERY FUCKING DARE YOU.

The only way they take down Dracula is because he basically wants to die. So he lets his son kill him and end his misery. And when his rotting, decaying, corpse seems to be reaching out to his son for some kind of last embrace, Trevor, thinking that Alucard's going to be hurt, takes Dracula's head off. Sypha burns off the remains.

And it's done.

Castlevania is a game with numerous endings, all depending on how you played the game and whether you got this artifact or what not. The series pays homage to it because Trevor bequeaths the Belmont Hold to Alucard and asks him to be the last defender of it and his father's Castle. It's not going to be Alucard's grave, but his home now. Trevor and Sypha wander off into the sunset, for more adventures and mischief and Alucard lovingly sends off his BFFs with a fond "Fuck you."

We check in with the villains who survive and of course, we know there's gonna be sequels, because, hey, that's kind of the point of each and every Castlevania game. There's always gonna be a new Big Bad coming around. And trust me, Dracula's gonna be back. He's not just going to lie quiet in his grave.

And just when you think you can end this series with a satisfied sigh, our very last moments are spent with Alucard. Who is haunted by the ghosts of the parents he loved so much. Who gets to relive one happy memory with his mom, who loves him with all her heart. And she's so proud.

And Alucard finally breaks down into heartbreaking sobs.

We grieve with him.

The Bad Stuff

Yeah, okay, so I need to get this explained. Why bother to have all these interesting character designs for Dracula's other generals AND NOT HAVE THEM TALK? I'm serious. Not one of these fascinating-looking vampire bastards HAVE ANY GODDAMN LINES. Netflix, FFS, DON'T WUSS OUT ON YOUR CHARACTER ACTORS. YOU CAN'T BE THAT POOR. GIVE THEM VOICES. PAY YOUR CHARACTER VOICE ACTORS. OMG.

They basically just get killed off in the end, but while we know they were pretty scary and formidable, we don't really know anything about them other than: Vampire, Scary, Dracula's General. They were just pretty much Red Shirts, because the heroes never did get to confront Carmilla, Hector and Isaac directly.

There was evidently so much story to be told here, like they seem to have come from all over the world, even as far off as China AND THEY'RE. NOT. TALKING. The only ones with any dialogue are Carmilla, Hector, Isaac and Godbrand and none of these guys even get to share screentime with the Disaster Trio. Godbrand doesn't even make it to the final battle.

I mean, if these guys were just going to be cannon fodder, then let's just use any of the voiceless Major Bads from the games. Put some requisite scary music and sound effects and let the Disaster Trio take care of them. Let them speak in mysterious archaic languages or whatever, since we're not going to care about them anyway.

The Conclusion

Apparently, this is gonna be a pattern for this series. It's going to be good, it's going to be GREAT but there's always going to be that ONE THING that would drive us batshit crazy. But not enough to wreck my enjoyment of it.

The best parts of this series is the faithfulness to character, the layers upon layers of motivations and feels you're going to uncover as you rewatch it, the fact that it's not afraid to put tongue in cheek and leave canon at the door, while still being true to the source material.

So. "What is a man? A miserable little pile of secrets. But enough talk! Have at you!"

#castlevania #castlevania season 2 #dracula #alucard #trevor belmont #lisa fahrenheights tepes #sypha belnades #lisa and her boys #sypha and her sidekicks #oh god my heart #all the bloody tears

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fire-fira · 5 years

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Aquaman (2018) is a fucking GEM and here’s why

Buckle up, get your popcorn, get a drink, because my squawking about this film--

--is gonna be long!

Okay, so as anyone who knows me reasonably well or has followed me for my DC stuff can tell you I am a MASSIVE nerd about DC’s Atlantis (thanks in large part to my wonderful and adorable fishy son La’gaan).

(Obligatory shot of this kid’s happy smiling face because I love him and he deserves at least a moment of attention.)

SO--

The Big Things

This film freaking delivered with showing us Atlantis in full lit-up glory, not to mention showing a clear delineation between the lower levels and the upper levels. We didn’t get to see much of the lower levels unfortunately, but the fact that what we did see of it was an old shipwreck says some things. (Which I’ll probably extrapolate on under Social Things.)

I was never left in doubt for even a moment that Arthur and Mera were capable of what they were doing. Both of them are badass beyond words, are goddamn tanks who should NOT be trifled with, and have genuine complexity and chemistry that makes me heavily invested in their relationship. I can understand why they would be drawn together and how their dynamic would work out, and even as that’s going on I am never once left in doubt that both of them are a force of nature who are just as capable of flattening their enemies individually as they would be if they joined forces and fought side by side. Get on their goddamn level, because they are a power couple who can and will destroy you (or make you wish they had) if they deem it necessary.

BLACK. FUCKING. MANTA. I was not prepared for the sheer level of genius badassery from this man. It was one thing finding out that he got his tech from atlanteans (fuck you Orm), but it was something else watching him break it down and rework it to suit his needs while making his own helmet for-- oh yes-- the goddamn eye-lasers. We are very clearly shown that with his first attempt if he’d been wearing the helmet he would have died, but this brilliant badass pretty much just, “Guess I need a bigger helmet,” and then just went ahead and made a second one with everything figured out and sorted so it wouldn’t blow his damn head off any time he used his main weapon! Just HOLY SHIT BLACK MANTA! On only the second try?! What the shit dude?! Granted, you started out as a pirate and then stepped it up to being a supervillain, but HOLY SHIT. I’m surprised he stuck with being just a pirate for as long as he did!

Also, Black Manta’s motivation makes perfect sense. It took one of the more dick-ish moves Arthur’s done (which was also in character for him at that point in the movie), but that act of not saving Black Manta’s dad (especially since with their interactions I’d argue it’s fair to assume that his dad was a good dad to him) feels exactly like it was all that was needed for him to decide he wanted Arthur dead.

(And RIP me, when I first saw Black Manta’s dad my first thought was ‘Is that Coffeepot Guy from Young Justice?’)

Orm. Hoooolllllllyyyyyy SHIT Orm. Full props to that actor, because he completely sold Purist McDouche-Face Orm for everything he was worth. Even down to the subtle nuances of how easily he let Atlantean slurs fall, the casual arrogance and unnoticed contempt for anyone who wasn’t ‘pure’ (though that specific word didn’t come up) or who he viewed as ‘traitors’, and the fact that this son of a ba’athu-kest had his brother dragged to him unconscious and in chains in his throne room. There was a fucking COLLAR around Arthur’s neck! And then he has the fucking gall later on to essentially say, ‘If you leave now I’ll let you live and we never have to be at odds again, just ignore the fact that I’m going to be committing genocide that’ll probably include your Dad since he’s close to the shore. No hard feelings. ‘Kay?’ and act like it was an act of goddamn mercy or benevolence. Just... OMG. Seriously, just... fuck you Orm. Fuck you so much for engineering a goddamn war. JFC.

And speaking of Arthur’s Dad-- Arthur’s Mom and Dad are PERFECTION. Yeah, we don’t get to see as much of their relationship development as we do with Arthur and Mera, but Tom Curry and Queen Atlanna are the kind of partners you would expect to see epics written about in the old and ancient days. If we’re talking The Odyssey, then they are Odysseus and Penelope with their roughly 20-year absence from each other-- except Atlanna’s Odysseus and Tom’s Penelope. And when they came back together? I was almost crying in the theater. Holy crap. It was just SO MANY FEELS. Not even a moment of doubt that the two of them loved each other, that they loved each other deeply, that they loved each other intensely, and that they loved each other so much that they were willing to wait until the end of time if that’s what it took for them to be reunited. And if I’m not careful I’m going to get misty-eyed over them again.

And can we just appreciate the fact that Tom and Arthur are indigenous? I mean actually? Because dear gods when Tom greeted Arthur and they pressed their foreheads together and breathed I started fucking crying in the theater. I needed that. I needed to see an indigenous superhero with his culture woven in in subtle ways and for it to play out through affection between him and his dad WHO HE ACTUALLY HAS A WONDERFUL RELATIONSHIP WITH-- and fuck I’m crying again. (I’m assuming because Jason Momoa is Maori that that means they’re Maori? I’m not sure though. I hope the specific culture gets mentioned on the bluray whenever it gets released, because I’m forever after this film going with indigenous Arthur and I want to know I’m referring to his people correctly. Indigenous Arthur is in, all other versions of Arthur can go home.) Gods I have so many feels. If Atlanna had showed that she’d adopted small parts of Tom’s culture by doing the forehead thing with Arthur that would have ended me. On the spot. Do not pass go, do not collect $200, 404: Fira not found due to breaking down over all the feels.

Shifting a little (because otherwise I’m grinding to a halt and I have SO much more to get into) let’s talk about the kisegra, the Trench, and the various beasties! Of the kisegra we only really get to see two types-- the Fishermen (merpeople essentially) and the Brine (lobster/crab-centaur-ish people). I’m not going to fault the people working on the movie for showing us only those two types because they busted their asses on this movie and it shows-- hell, even among those kisegra there’s a diversity of coloration and body-build!-- but I was a tiny smidge disappointed not to see more diversity. Maybe something for a later movie. And then there’s the Trench. THE GODDAMN TRENCH. THESE NIGHTMARE FUEL BA’ATHU-KEGEST.

The La’gaan muse in my mind may as well have been screaming bloody murder. The scene with them is THAT MUCH NIGHTMARE FUEL. It’d be one thing if only a couple of them had been on the boat and the ones on the boat were all there were.

AHAHAHAHAHA-- NO. I do not have words for the SWARM of them that we end up seeing on screen. JFC. (Though there is the vague indication that the Trench may???? be some type of kisegra???? in this reality??? Don’t like that implication one bit, especially with how it gets tied to bigoted purist comments. Might just be a thing purists were saying because fucking sea-nazi purists though.)

And can I also say that the Karathen is a damned Queen? Yes, Julie Andrews voiced her. Yes, she was voiced by Mary-goddamn-Poppins. Yes, she is “practically perfect in every way” and will flatten (or eat) a bitch as needed. Lava doesn’t affect her, she is fucking impervious. It’s no wonder why King Atlan wanted her to go with him when he fucked off into permanent self-imposed exile for his GIANT ASS mistake-- because who wouldn’t want to have their bestie to spend the rest of their life hanging out with when said bestie is the ORIGINAL ‘Deep Beast’ and will cheerfully destroy any of your upstart descendants if they try to be as stupid as you were by attempting to repeat your mistakes? (Real talk though, the fact that King Atlan made friends with her in the first place implies that he learned how to let go of almost all the excess pride that got him in trouble in the first place. Congrats for having some character growth and having stuck with what you felt was right my dude.)

SEA. HORSES. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA They were SO DAMN COOL.

And armored sharks. Fucking armored great whites. For when you absolutely, positively, have to kill every mother-fucking thing in the ocean around you.

The Differences From Other Realities

So one of the big things that stuck out to me was the “only the high-born can breathe air” thing. While I do agree that the ability to breathe air, or water, or both probably varies due to genetics and whatnot, in most realities and interpretations I’ve seen the ability to breathe air isn’t something only found in ‘high-born’ individuals. (Case in point, La’gaan. I love him to pieces, but as someone from the Outer Provinces there ain’t no way that boy is ‘high-born’, and yet he can breathe air.) I’m not pointing this out as a “screw up” of any sort on the part of the writers, but more to point out that this is a detail that makes the DCCU unique from other DC universes.

Atlantis-- Something that caught my attention was how Atlantis was spoken to in relation to other kingdoms. We have several kingdoms mentioned in the movie-- the Kingdom of the Fishermen, the Kingdom of the Brine, the Kingdom of the Trench (who tf decided they had a kingdom???), the Kingdom of Xebel-- but the way they’re each spoken about implies that they’re not seen as being part of Atlantis. Whiiiiiich is kind of weird, because Atlantis (in most iterations) is implied to have been a small continent/large island and not just a single city-state. On the other hand there have been (mostly older) renditions where it was a single city-state. Going off of what we see though, I’m inclined to think that what may have happened is that what was that world’s Poseidonis at some point during their history got renamed Atlantis (so kind of like a New York, New York situation; New York City in New York State, Atlantis City in Atlantis).

The number of kingdoms-- This is something I’ve seen vary SO DAMN MUCH. Some realities it’s only one, others have implied as many as 12 (before several were lost), and this reality says that there were 7 and that 3 have been lost. Fun details.

And Xebel being one of the kingdoms? Most renditions I’ve seen have it as a place for criminals or sealed off in its own pocket-dimension. So it being one of the kingdoms is pretty unique.

ARTHUR’S. PARENTS. ARE. ALIVE. HOLY. FUCKING. SHIT.

AND NEITHER OF THEM DIE!!!

And thank you SO MUCH to the writers for completely erasing some of the more questionable things that have been done with Mera and Xebel, and with Black Manta. As far as I know none of the recent comics dip into that uncomfortable written history, but I still couldn’t help but be thankful that none of that awful crap got used.

No use of the word ‘pure’ in regards to the purist rhetoric of some of the characters, but it was so heavily implied that I think it’s safe to assume. Still mentioning it because with everything else going on it was almost weird that it wasn’t mentioned even once.

BORDER PATROL AND WALLS AROUND ATLANTIS. What the actual fuck?! What the fucking fuck?! Who the hell in Arthur’s family thought that was a good idea?! ‘Oh, you’re trying to go up and over the wall and not through the only gate into or out of Atlantis-- ‘cause that’s not asking for trouble AT ALL-- how about... No. Instead we’ll just FUCKING ANNIHILATE YOU WITH GIANT ASS LASERS BECAUSE THAT’S REAL PROPORTIONATE TO THE SITUATION.̓ (Seriously. What the fuck.)

The split between upper and lower levels. I’ve seen splits between inner and outer provinces before with various iterations, but this reality is the first one where I’ve seen an upper-versus-lower-level split in Atlantis.

Arthur being the eldest. Some realities he’s older than Orm, and in other realities Orm is older than him. It’s kind of a toss-up.

Atlanna being ‘sacrificed’ to the Trench. WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ATLANTIS?! Granted, the Trench are a recent addition to the Aquaman mythos (a la New52), and it could be argued that for other realities they’re almost a myth, a legend of nightmare stories to warn reckless guppies away from going into open and empty areas away from others where it’d be easier for predators to snap them up and swim away; but for a reality where they’re known to factually exist and for people to be completely okay with SACRIFICING THEIR QUEEN TO THEM... What. THE. FUCK.

The Social Things

Technically I could put this point under Differences From Other Realities, but it has to do with a huge social detail for this movie, so it’s going here. ARRANGED MARRIAGE. I think it’s fair to assume that it may have been a thing in the past in most DC realities, but this reality is the first one I know of where it’s a current thing. Obviously this has HUGE repercussions for how things play out (like Queen Atlanna getting ‘sacrificed’ to the Trench for ‘committing treason’ thanks to having fallen in love with Tom and having Arthur-- WTAF Atlantis?), and it implies a lot more heavy restrictions in Atlantis than even I headcanon-- and I’ve headcanoned some really dark shit based on the crumbs and hints DC has given us over various renditions.

This movie did not sugarcoat or simplify the bigotry in Atlantis. They very clearly conveyed that being bigoted isn’t just “deliberately being mean to someone” and that bigotry is pervasive and can affect damn near everything. In fact they did an artful job at subtly and carefully weaving it into interactions that you might not even notice unless you know what to look for. This includes such “tasteful” (NOT) Atlantean slurs and comments rendered in English as:

- Half-breed (canonically an in-world slur)

- Mongrel (implications similar to ‘half-breed’)

- Savage (I hate this word so GODDAMN MUCH, you have NO fucking idea, my kneejerk reaction to hearing this word is the urge to either deck someone or set something on fire)

- “If that half-breed mongrel wields the trident, then that half-breed mongrel is your king.” (May not be word-for-word exact, but it was said by Mera’s father-- which fuck you Nereus, you purist piece of shit, and fuck you for daring to refer to the man you just told your people to follow by using a goddamn slur.)

- There’s more, but goddamn if I went through it all this thing would get even longer and I’d be screaming even more about Orm and Nereus.

- Though I will say with Arthur being indigenous, that insult of ‘half-breed’ carries WAY more weight than it might otherwise. Like WAY MORE.

Oh yeah! And before I forget! Because fuck that hagfish-sucking purist piece of ba’athu-kest shit ORM! THE ASSHOLE KILLS KING RICOU, KING OF THE FISHERMEN, IN FRONT OF HIS FAMILY BECAUSE HE WAS CALLING ORM ON HIS SHIT AND REFUSING TO GO ALONG WITH HIS WAR.

And then he fucking threatened to kill King Ricou’s partner and daughter if they don’t do what he wants!

Just... FUCK ORM. Fuck his purist bullshit, and fuck his purist bullshit that obviously made him think nothing of killing a kisegra where he actually hesitated over the idea of killing someone ‘pure’. (Think Vulco, to a certain extent, and Nereus when Nereus told him to back down over killing Mera.)

Mera says that people try to get into Atlantis over the wall “all the time.” Um, hi, because that’s not saying anything intense. At all. What it immediately calls to my mind is that it may be a direct hint of kisegra not being seen as citizens in Atlantis and (generally) not allowed in. In fact, in the main crowd scenes during the first fight between Arthur and Orm I only noticed ONE kisegra, and then only because of their tail. I may be wrong, there may have been more that I didn’t notice, but in the brief amount of time there was I tried to scour the shots of the crowd for kisegra and came up empty aside from the one. (Can we say ‘possible hints of that arc in the pre-boot comics where kisegra weren’t citizens until Arthur took the throne’?) It also implies-- if they’re willing to risk getting FUCKING ANNIHILATED BY GIANT ASS LASER-CANNONS to get in-- that things are B A D outside Atlantis.

(Arthur, you poor bastard, you’re walking/swimming into a shit-storm.)

And ‘battles to the death for the throne’???? In a goddamn ARENA?! What kind of fucking hellscape is Atlantis that they’ve had such advanced tech at their disposal for centuries and they’re doing that shit?! (Again, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ATLANTIS?!)

The division between the upper and lower levels. Um... What... the fuck??? Apparently the “low-born” aren’t able to breathe air-- which okay, whatever-- but they apparently have to live with/in wreckage???? Without electricity??? (Obviously the Atlanteans have some form of energy production going. Magic or electricity or both, idek, but that shattered wreck of a ship looked like there wasn’t anything on it or in the area around it that might have cast some light that wasn’t whatever happened to be shining through from higher up.) And apparently without the means to build actual houses???? Great system there for the poor Atlantis. Really.

Arthur, you poor, poor bastard, you’re swimming into a shit-storm.

A gigantic shit-storm.

Arthur, you poor, poor bastard, you’re swimming into SUCH a gigantic shit-storm.

Arthur, you have my deepest sympathies. (Pun not intended.)

I know I said it before, but I’ll say it again: the implications for this world’s Atlantis are way darker than my headcanons have been.

Though this does make me wonder just how much shit Arthur and Mera might get over their relationship and how it came to be (since it obviously wasn’t through “proper traditional procedures”).

Some Other Points I Realized After Getting Some Sleep

Even though we get the sense that everything is headed by kings in Atlantis (HA), we also actually have evidence that Atlantis might not actually go in for surface-world sexist shit.

- Atlanna is clearly Atlan’s descendant, not Orm’s father, otherwise Arthur wouldn’t have been eligible for the throne. Which means the throne was hers (before she was going to be ‘sacrificed’ as a traitor). So that brings up the possibility that things may have played out differently if she’d been found out before Orm was born. (Maybe they wouldn’t have been able to safely ‘get rid of’ her without having someone of her family line available and ready to step in.)

- When Orm kills King Ricou it’s very clearly implied that the throne immediately goes to Ricou’s daughter and not his partner. There is no question or doubt that the princess is immediately in charge of her people’s armies, not even a hint that her gender is a factor in the situation. (It also reinforces the prior thing in the point about Atlanna that family-line seems to be the important factor over everything else for the royal families.)

- Atlanna and Mera both are shown to be highly capable fighters who aren’t to be taken lightly, and though we only really see them being pursued by and fighting against men, there’s not even a moment where any of the atlanteans seem surprised that they’re as capable as they are.

- The Karathen is arguably the biggest badass tank in the entire movie, and yet it’s safe to assume that when King Atlan went into his exile that he cared more about what she was capable of than he cared about the fact that she was the biggest badass woman in the entire ocean. (Assuming the Karathen even has the concept of gender. Pretty sure that’s up for question.)

Chances are high that when Atlanna was ‘sacrificed’ to the Trench, Orm saw his father’s show of harsh and callous ruthlessness and told himself that it was strength, it was admirable, and he wanted to be as much like him as possible. And there’s also the possibility that he had some part of himself deep down somewhere that was absolutely terrified over what his father might do if he ever was or became anything that his father saw fit to ‘destroy’. (Not that it excuses his purist bullshit for even a moment-- purist fucking McDouche-Face Orm can still fucking die in a fire as far as I’m concerned-- but that kind of thing may have added fuel to the fire for his purist bullshit.)

Since it’s very clearly implied that Mera and Orm were raised together, there’s a high chance they were friends as kids. It also means she got to see his increasing asshole-ish-ness, and while she may have missed the friendship they used to have as kids (thank you @tamlins-stories-and-poems for bringing this point up) she also would have known how quickly the switch could be flipped from him caring about her to him deciding she needed to die if he saw her as a ‘traitor’. (Which also explains her deliberate anti-surface comment to him before trying to say that she felt he was going too far.)

I just have to say, in regards to my fishy son La’gaan, he’s the kind of person who doesn’t willingly bow before or submit to anyone unless he feels they’ve earned it. The versions of Mera and Arthur in this movie? They are exactly the sort of people he would be ecstatic to call his Queen and King. They’re the sort of people he would be loyal to and fight with everything he has to defend them-- because they’re both the sort of people to essentially say “fuck you” to social conventions to do the right thing.

With the 7 kingdoms, at least 6 are outright mentioned (unless I’m not remembering the seventh, and even so I’m dubious about the kingdom of the Trench even counting).

- The Remaining 4: The kingdom of Atlantis, The kingdom of Xebel, The kingdom of the Fishermen, and The kingdom of the Brine.

- The ‘lost’ 3: The kingdom of the Deserters (implied to all be dead), The kingdom of the Trench (again, I’m dubious about their claim to the title, but there’s that purist rhetoric about some people having ‘regressed’-- fuck that noise SO much-- but if we put any stock in it then it would imply the kingdom was ‘lost’ because they ‘fell’ so far), and then the third one which may have been mentioned but I don’t recall.

- I just have so many doubts in regard to the Trench having their own kingdom. They’re screwed up nightmare fuel, and claiming they’re one of the Lost Kingdoms feels almost like one of those things that purists thought up as a way to support any claims they have about kisegra being “savage” and all that shit.

And while I’m at it, I fucking love how Orm’s spouting bullshit about how ‘savage’ and ‘barbaric’ kisegra are, and meanwhile the King of the Brine and King Ricou both tell him in no uncertain terms that he’s the one who’s being a violent asshole who needs to back the fuck off.

Really fucking pissed about how Orm killed Ricou and was going to kill the King of the Brine (after he’d already ripped his arm off, fucking asshole Orm).

- Also not thrilled about how after Orm gets ripped away from the King of the Brine, we don’t get to see that king again. I would have liked a moment of him making his way to Arthur to talk. (Maybe something to hope for in a sequel. And hopefully they’ll give him an actual name.)

Also, I appreciate that the one group of kisegra were called fishermen and not fish-men. It’s only something I’ve seen come up in a couple iterations (the animated Young Justice being the main one), but ‘fish head’ is yet another Atlantean slur. Presumably going off of that, things like ‘fish face’, ‘fish lips’, etc.-- while possibly not outright slurs-- could be similar enough to the actual slur to (justifiably) make any kisegra bristle. By going with ‘fishermen’ for that group, it’s pushing away the negative connotations of a possible slur by invoking a term and imagery that implies they are hunters, and therefore shouldn’t be taken lightly. It’s a nice little touch that I’m not sure if the writers intended or not, but I appreciate it all the same.

That said, for all my screaming, I LOVE THIS MOVIE.

#Aquaman #Atlanteans #Arthur Curry #Queen Mera #Black Manta #La'gaan #Lagoon Boy #Orm can die in a fire #long post #meta #updated

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makeste · 6 years

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BnHA Chapter 019: Hey Google, Play “You Say Run”

Previously on BnHA: All Might plus ultraed a bunch of thugs but then the three Big Bads converged on him and nearly ripped him apart. Deku ran back to try to save him and nearly got his own self killed. Then Bakugou fucking Katsuki, Todoroki motherfucking Whatever His First Name Is, and Kirishima goddamn Same Deal as Todoroki showed up at the last fucking second to save the day.

Today on BnHA: Todoroki is a beast. Bakugou nearly gives me a heart attack. All Might is hurt and almost out of time and in no condition to be fighting the enemy. All Might fights the enemy anyway. All Might fucking demolishes the enemy, and sacrifices damn near everything to do it, and it’s the single most badass thing I’ve ever seen in my fucking life.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’ve read up through chapter 31 now, so any ETAs will reflect that.)

oh damn, Todoroki is so maddeningly excellent at life that he can control his quirk to the extent that he stopped just short of freezing All Might in addition to Noumu

mighty fine job there, Elsa

OH THANK GOD All Might took advantage of that to loosen Noumu’s grip and now he’s hopping out of there

but he’s still fucking hurt! the guy was fucking clawing at his old injury, and even before that happened he was already close to his limit. I really don’t like this at all

now everyone is just staring at Facepalm. like, fuck you, dude

“WE DON’T LIKE YOU”

Bakugou still has his hand on Kurogiri’s neck. just blow him the fuck up already. of course you pick now of all fucking times to go all lawful fucking heroic

Noumu’s just sitting there in Kuro’s void all

his expression literally has not changed once since his first appearance, but it’s amazing how all it takes is the right context, and just like that it becomes hilarious

“you’ve pinned down our way out” yes he has! but for whatever reason, he’s not going for a killing or even a disabling blow! and it’s making me fucking anxious!!

and now Bakugou is monologuing like fucking Peter Pan hlkhsakdh. “OH THE CLEVERNESS OF ME”

listen Baku, that’s great that you’ve figured all of that out and all, but I’m serious now, you had better blast this guy sometime today or this is all about to get extremely fucking dire again

now he’s recalling when he first tried to attack Kurogiri at the outset of the surprise attack, back when he nearly blasted him and Kuro was like “that was close.” except that as far as Bakugou’s concerned, he might as well have said “BOY THAT WAS CLOSE, IT SURE IS GOOD THAT HE DIDN’T HIT MY WEAK SPOT RIGHT OVER HERE.” apparently

it is pretty clever tbh but omg I just want him to stop dragging this out already. my heart can’t take

he’s telling Kuro that he’ll blow him up if he decides he’s doing anything fishy. I’m sure that’s going to pan out

seriously Bakugou, it’s football season now in the U.S. and I just watched the Packers come back from a 20-0 deficit, after their quarterback fucking died in the first half but was then somehow resurrected. I’m just not in a mood to underestimate anyone right at this moment, least of all a bunch of shounen villains whom the author has clearly invested a great deal of time and thought into, and who are thus quite unlikely to just die here a mere 8 chapters after their introduction

ughhh

Facepalm is acting entirely too calm for the heroes to not be on their fucking guard right now

aaaaaand now he’s telling Noumu to “take out the explosive brat”! :’D

haha! bitch if you fucking try anything I will go out and buy like 50 mouse traps and wait until you’re sleeping and then stick those things all over all fourteen of your creepy superfluous possessed fucking hands

so now Noumu is hauling his ass back out of the portal... and his arm and leg are literally crumbling, WOW

son of a bitch I’m glad Todoroki’s on our side

Deku and All Might are watching this and wondering what exactly Noumu even is, which is quite a reasonable thing to be asking yourself at this point

oh, great. apparently he has hyper regeneration too and can regrow his limbs and repair all of his injuries in an instant! so that’s just fucking great

does Todoroki have a limit to his ice powers? we don’t know of one yet, at least. hey bud, can you just. freeze him again real quick there

or if you really want to be a dear, maybe try freezing Facepalm since he’s clearly the ringleader in all of this??

now All Might is heroically leaping into the fray once more

and now it occurs to me that Bakugou and Todoroki (and Kiri) may in fact be acting so frustratingly complacent because they, unlike Deku, aren’t aware of just how close All Might is to his limit, and just how fucked they’ll be if that actually happens. as far as they know, All Might doesn’t have a limit. he’s fucking All Might. why would he?!

so in fact I can’t blame them, because they’re not aware of just how close to the knife’s edge they’re actually walking right now

nnnnnnnnngh something is happening with Bakugou, something or someone is approaching him and it’s probably Noumu!! 8|!!! I’ll have to scroll down in order to see but I’m worriiiied sob

[peeks through hands]

um. what the hell just happened

it looked like something was disintegrating for a second there in that FWSH panel but other than that? I got nothing

(ETA: I’ve read this chapter like 4 times and I still don’t know what was going on in that panel, honestly. everything else is pretty clear now though)

whatever it was, it was too fast for any of the kids to follow. even Kacchan has no idea how the hell he suddenly got where he is

I personally have a guess

MY GUESS IS CONFIRMED

ALL MIGHT IS SO FUCKING GLORIOUS. THANK YOU FOR SAVING MY SON’S LIFE!! PLEASE MARRY ME!!

now Facepalm is sarcastically praising him, as villains do

this is the second time he’s mentioned something like this now. I’m starting to get the feeling it has something to do with whatever his motivation/backstory is. you know, what with this being the first arc with bad guys, as of yet I have no idea what BnHA’s Villain Redemption Policy is. but I have to say, I can’t see myself ever liking this nutjob. so he’d better not try to pull any Vegeta/Byakuya/Itachi/Mukuro type of shit, that’s all I can say

and now he’s ranting about how it’s ~not fair~ because when bad guys do bad guy stuff violently, it’s bad, but when good guys do good stuff violently, it’s fine!

there are so many logical holes in this argument!! but!! it’s also one of the themes I was lowkey hoping the series would explore, and it looks like maybe it will, so this is pretty exciting!

but his argument here is just so fucking wrong, though. like dude, you really can’t see how All Might’s “violence” is just a little bit different from you and your friends’, Mr. “LET’S KILL SOME CHILDREN HAHAHA”?

lol now All Might’s calling him out on his bullshit and basically saying that he knows full well this psycho isn’t a Mukuro-type. I fucking love this

and now these four boy scouts are feeling empowered

I LIKE THEIR FIGHTING SPIRIT. THE ONLY PROBLEM IS THAT THE “WITH ALL MIGHT SUPPORTING US” PART IS SECRETLY FLAWED!!

and now All Might’s telling them to get out of there because he knows, sob

jesus christ Deku are you seriously pointing out all of All Might’s weaknesses right now in front of the fucking enemy

I get that he’s worried about him but dude!! some discretion, you know???

thankfully All Might cuts him off, but the damage is probably already done

Facepalm is now instructing Noumu and Kurogiri to go after All Might and says that he’ll handle the kids 8/

hey so Todoroki, maybe now you might want to try freezing this dude’s ass?? like what are you waiting for though??

fuck me, All Might has “barely a minute left” now. this had better be like one of those Dragonball Z minutes that’s actually 15 episodes long. or else we’re really in a bind

and now he seems to be powering up to do something...

oh my god

okay, can I just say, I’ve seen a LOT of anime eyes in my day. magical eyes, cursed eyes, eyes in all shapes and styles and every last color of the rainbow. but All Might just may have the coolest fucking eyes I’ve ever seen

and I’ve actually thought this ever since we first saw them in his Skinny Steve form. there’s just something so cool about the black eyes with blue irises combo. it doesn’t look like any other character I can think of, and it just works for him. I’m unfortunately at a complete loss for how to explain just why I like it so much, because I always read these chapters so late, and my brain’s not up to the task. but anyway! the point is that he’s awesome and this closeup is crazy intense and is giving me life right now

even everyone else watching is just blown the fuck away by the sheer badassery he’s suddenly radiating at this moment. THE SYMBOL OF PEACE IS ABOUT TO FUCK SOMEONE UPPPPPPPPPP

HE’S PUNCHING NOUMU AND HE DOESN’T SEEM TO BE CONCERNED AT ALL ABOUT THE SHOCK ABSORPTION, AS THOUGH HE HAS SOME SORT OF PLAN NOW

OH WOW

HE’S LITERALLY JUST PUMMELING THE EVERLOVING SHIT OUT OF HIM

WELL MORE LIKE THEY’RE PUMMELING EACH OTHER I GUESS

WOW. GOTTA SAY, THAT IS ONE OF THE MOST SHOUNEN THINGS I’VE EVER WITNESSED

ohh SHIT, All Might says that since it’s “absorption” and not “negation”, it implies that he must have a limit

and now he’s basically saying “oh, you built this thing to be badder than me? well then in that case I’ll just have to be EVEN BADDER”

ALL MIGHT IS FUCKING CRANKING IT UP TO ELEVEN AND IT IS GLORIOUS

BUT HE’S ALSO DYING STILL

DON’T DIE ALL MIGHT

A HERO’S ALWAYS READY TO SMASH THROUGH TROUBLE OH MY GOD

HE IS LIKE THE LIVING EMBODIMENT OF SHOUNEN

OH MY GOD NOW HE’S SAYING THE THING

THE NONSENSICAL THING THAT I’VE BEEN KIND OF ROLLING MY EYES AT THIS ENTIRE TIME BECAUSE IT MAKES NO FUCKING SENSE

AND TO BE HONEST IT STILL DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE

BUT...

...I THINK ALL MIGHT MAY BE STARTING TO WIN ME OVER ON THIS ONE

my GOD that was satisfying to see

(ETA: you guys. YOU GUYS. I watched this scene like a half a dozen times in the anime. it. was. so. cool. like honest to god one of the single coolest and most badass things I’ve ever fucking seen.

so what I didn’t realize is that BnHA is one of those newfangled anime that actually runs in seasons, instead of starting one day and then just never stopping ever again. I have seen so many good series brought to their knees by attempting the latter. it drains the budget, necessitates all kinds of obnoxious and pointless filler, and ends up forcing things to be unbearably dragged out. but by condensing BnHA’s first two arcs into one 13-episode season, the anime sidestepped all of these pitfalls entirely. the animation has been gorgeous, and they only animated what was in the actual canon! no fucking filler omg.

and the soundtrack. GUYS. I had no idea the OST was going to be this fucking good. and just, when it gets to this scene, and the production values just jump up ALL THE NOTCHES, and the music starts to swell, and All Might is being so cool and THROWING ALL THE PUNCHES, and the fucking SKY is getting dark for no reason at all except that EVEN THE SKY IS INTIMIDATED BY HOW BADASS HE IS, and there are all these wind effects and camera angles and I’m losing my mind, and then ALL MIGHT SAYS. THE. THING!!! and then KAPOOOOOW

just. it fucking floored me. like I wanted to cry almost. my adrenaline was so ramped up I was practically ready to do backflips. that shit made me want to go out and save the world.

I fucking understand plus ultra after that, man. I get it now. it’s like my third eye has been fucking opened. universe tell me your secrets. oh my god)

the kids are staring in shock

there is literally smoke clearing. from the flurry of punches. they were punching so furiously that somehow there was smoke

All Might punched him over 300 times in like, 10 seconds. damn, All Might. that sounds like the kind of hyperbolic thing I would say to describe something like what you just did. only you actually did it

goddamn

so now only Facepalm and his convenient friend with the convenient escape power are left. I wonder what will happen next chapter lmao

BONUS:

JIROU!! ANOTHER OF MY FAVORITES!

she has such a weird power and I fucking love it

unfortunately her power is incompatible with all iPhones manufactured since 2016

“she looks like she’d play bass” yessss

did I mention that I love her?? and I ship her with Momo lol

#bnha #boku no hero academia #makeste reads bnha #todoroki shouto #bakugou katsuki #shiragaki tomura #all might #and now that I've finished the anime's first season I was finally able to download the OST #and now I get to feel empowered and energized all over again #good shit

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tahlreth · 7 years

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OMFG Wonder Woman is Amazeballs

This is it - this is my new favorite movie. Everything I ever watch ever will be judged on this scale. Whenever I re-watch old favorites, they will forever fall short of this sheer masterpiece of awesome. Holy shit. I have no one to gush to right now, so I’m just going to do it here, because if I don’t I will explode. There will be spoiler-y stuff, so beware.

Okay, first - this movie made me cry FIVE TIMES. I have never cried so much during a movie in my whole life. Like, I don’t cry IRL, so I get a lot of that out during movies and books and songs and especially touching commercials, but it’s usually a one-off deal. FIVE. TIMES.

When the Amazons are first getting ready to fight the Germans with guns on the beach because I KNOW HOW THAT ENDS, OKAY, but they were still all badass and you can bet your life that they will now be fucking preparing for bullets and next time things’ll be different. Just as I had gotten myself calmed down and cheering their awesome fighting...

ANTIOPE WHHHHYYYYYYY

When Diana makes the charge across ‘No Man’s Land’ because OMFG, that was moving as fuck and I don’t care that I’ve seen men do it tons of times, this was fucking WONDER WOMAN and she did it because it was RIGHT and she and a rag tag group of men just did the impossible and I had so many emotions that I just can’t even express them properly. I sobbed and cheered and it was amazing.

When the gas was fired on the village and Diana goes and finds all the villagers she was just celebrating with like, a day before all dead. The confusion and anguish over why such a thing happened that Gal Gadot was able to portray broke my heart.

STEVE WHHHHHYYYYYY and then all the way until the end of the damned movie.

It’s been 20 minutes since I left the theater and I’m still close to balling. OMG. I’m used to superhero movies making me feel a little emotional, but mostly being full of fighting and badassery. Wonder Woman had all the fighting and explosions while also making me FEEL more than I think any movie ever has before.

Things I Loved, The Short List

Antiope’s scar on her shoulder. Like, this is one of the first times I’ve seen a heroic female character just showing her scar like it was no big deal. Even Natasha in MCU only really has the one, and she hides it and is all like ‘can’t wear bikinis anymore’ and it was only there for plot reasons anyway. Antiope is a fucking warrior, and she has no shame in the marks battle has left on her body, and I dunno. It’s just a little thing that is never commented on in the movie, which makes me love it even more. Antiope in general stole my heart, and I now belong to her, TBH.

The Amazons weren’t all tiny, stick-thin blonde women with big boobs. There was so much variety, and I found that both beautiful and believable. It was just great to see some muscular babes up there being all bad-ass without having to look like stereotypical movie-pretty woman. They were every single one of them absolutely stunning.

The scene where Diana walks in on Steve bathing and is just like ‘whatever’ about his nudity while he’s all flustered and worried about modesty. It was adorable, and that’s when I fell in love with him.

ETTA CANDY. Oh my god. I love her so much. I want a movie where her and Diana are all up in the women’s suffrage movement, and it’s just Etta helping Diana navigate being a woman in that time and place while Diana helps Etta get in touch with her inner Amazon, and both of them help each other through the loss of Steve. Charlie shows up often to serenade them for no reason at all.

Speaking of, the way Diana was like ‘Charlie, you should come because who else will sing for us’ just really got me. She’s seen how damaged he is, how he has so much trouble shooting, but she’s unwilling to just throw him away or say he won’t be any use on the mission. Him being there matters to her, and it was just a nice little moment.

Every moment between Diana and Steve. It was all so beautiful, and that he was the reason she almost went to the dark side and also the person that saved her was just... hng. Crying again.

Nobody had to take off their clothes to let me know that they were lovers. The ‘love scene’ was just handled so well, where you knew that they were emotionally close and finding comfort in each other, and there was no need to be all in the audience’s face with nudity. It was refreshing - there’s nothing wrong with a ‘fade to black’ after some intense gazing in to each other’s eyes, is what I’m saying. I don’t need to see the LI’s tearing off their clothes (or each other’s) to get the message.

Diana’s crisis of conscience where she was just DONE with humanity’s bullshit. Like, this is the first time she’s seen war and death like this, and to realize that it comes from something inside instead of being solely the work of an outside force had to have crushed her. Again, Gal Gadot here was remarkable. The amount of emotion that woman can put into a scene is awe-inspiring.

Everything. Just... everything.

Things I Didn’t Like, The List

Nothing. Fucking nothing. Usually I walk out of movies - even ones I love, even ones that are my favorites - with a small list of things I wasn’t happy with. Subsequent viewings make the list grow, and I’m sure that once I’ve seen Wonder Woman a few times, I’ll have some bones to pick. But right now? There is nothing that I am immediately unhappy with. I love this movie so much.

SO YEAH. Best movie ever. Like... sorry, but to me this just proves that women should be directing female-centric superhero movies. It’s not a slight against male directors or anything, it’s just... women and men frame things differently. I cannot imagine that a man directing this movie would have been able to capture the essence of Wonder Woman the same way. I cannot imagine that it would have made me feel so damn much if a man had been at the helm. Women know what women want to see - I’ll still go see the male superhero movies, but I want more where women are front and center, both as the stars and the people behind the scenes. Men have dominated the movies for a long time - it’s time and past to make some room for us ladies at the table.

If anyone wants to gush/scream about this movie with me, feel free. I needed to get this stuff out because I have no interested friends outside the computer. All my friends are dumb. XD But yeah, if anyone wants to talk about the movie I will happily oblige, now that I have finally seen it.

Now excuse me while I go scrape together another $10 so I can go see it again tomorrow.

#wonder woman #best movie ever #new favorite #i could gush all day #this movie has changed me #on a fundamental level #i will never be the same #everyone should watch it #patty jenkins is my hero #gal gadot is too #this movie should win all the awards #more female superheros please

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mrandyzavala · 7 years

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The Significance of The Uniform

You know, for someone who is really not "into" fashion, I feel like I've written a fair amount of blogs about clothes.

And here's another one!

The other day, I saw that one of my former employers got brand new rash guards, prompting a series of awesome group shots showing off their shiny new digs. And that got me thinking about the clothes we wear as zookeepers.

This this amazing ensemble, which prompted my grandmother to ask "Who is that man?" when I showed her this photo of me at work

So for most of us, this is really a matter of function. But it starts out as a badge of honor, if you think about it. It is pretty awesome to don your first work shirt with STAFF or TRAINER or GODDESS OF THE UNIVERSE on it. It also immediately identifies you based on the longevity of your tenure at that particular facility. In fact, there are a lot of things our uniforms do (both good and evil) that I think are worth taking a second to address.

1. As mentioned above, uniforms can identify how long you have been at a place

Look at those crisp new digs. I was a baby trainer...maybe a month into the job.

D'uh, some of this is pretty obvious. Let's talk about my first day at Miami Seaquarium. Or Clearwater (as an intern). In both cases, these were my FIRST uniforms. Clearwater was the first place I was ever involved in the marine mammal training community. It had a standard uniform shirt, but everything else was up to me to provide. So I had swishy black wind pants and Tevas. I also had no clue what the general "work attire" vibe was, so I showed up to my internship utterly drowning in make up.

Okay, can we just talk about that for a second? I am still like super embarrassed about this. I'm not saying it is wrong to wear make-up to work if you're a dolphin trainer. Plenty of you guys do it and well, good work.

Just make sure your makeup doesn't run

The thing is, I have NEVER pulled off make-up wearing well, not in any facet of my life. I just look like some kind of B-movie horror film villain and/or a Bratz doll. I also bought the cheapest stuff available, mostly because it took me until I was 30 to realize you can buy good stuff (read: waterproof) from actual cosmetic stores, versus my main source of the stuff *cough Walgreens cough*. Wait, I'm lying. Walgreens was for fancy occasions, such as weddings and/or first dates that went horribly awry. Everyday makeup was purchased at the grocery store.

Anyways, so I totally showed up in my brand new wind pants and a Killer Clowns From Outer Space face to my internship, my enormous quantity of hair draped over my person like a wet towel....let's just say my lack of bleach stains on my clothing were not what tipped people off to my n00bness.

This is a more pleasant image than what I looked like on my first day as an intern

At Miami, I was a little savvier about personal appearance. But I still felt like a new kid in school when I walked around with radioactively white shoes and perfectly ironed khaki shorts.

Am I right or amiright when I say we can all make pretty decent guesses at the length of employment of animal caregivers based on: sun-fadedness, bleach stains, holes, and/or the intangible badassery that surrounds a confident zookeeper like a magical aura?

2. At some point, new uniforms absolutely make your day

Glory days.

I've worked at places that REALLY care about your appearance, and places that really didn't, and places that were somewhere in between. And in all of those cases, there was one thing that made everybody happy:

New work clothes. Especially wetsuits. Oh god.

My brand new wetsuit (right)!! So shiny and new!

When I worked for Marineland when it was privately owned, we had a pretty baller logo and the clothes were cool and functional. We had rash guards, tank tops, normal shirts, wind breakers, wind pants, sweat pants, sweat shirts, swim suits, viser, khaki shorts and pants, and board shorts (THAT WHEN THEY GOT WET THESE HIBISCUS FLOWERS APPEARED OMG OMG IT WAS AMAZING), and the standard issue of full and shorty wetsuits. I LOVED those uniform pieces. The only problem was that the super comfy bathing suits um, became see-through around the butt area.

Yeah. It would start with the butt crack. And then, like some kind of disease, the fabric surrounding your butt crack would grow into a sheer window so that everyone could see what your momma gave you. When waiting for new suits, we would wear bikini bottoms in order to prevent the public from gazing upon our glorious cabooses (I mean, they didn't pay enough for that show). It goes without saying that it was a joyous occasion to get a new bathing suit.

Exactly.

But other things really made a difference. You work outdoors in FL or any other hot climate, you know that sweat stains turn a color currently not understood by science and will not go away no matter what you treat it with, including fire. There is a point at which your old work shirt turns a corner into a category that requires action including but not limited to: dragging it behind a shed and shooting it.

At Gulfarium, we had these rain jackets that basically absorbed water and deposited it efficiently to all points of the human body most prone to immediate heat loss. As such, we decided to pool our money together and use a coworker's absolutely unnatural talent at sniffing out a deal (and her employee discount at Eddie Bauer) to buy some freaking AMAZING foul weather jackets.

Check out that incredible foul weather gear I'm rocking. Also, this was a Peeps eating contest.

Guys, we made an entire evening out of this event. It was an event. We knew that we had to use our money to buy these things, but these things were incredible. We all went shopping for them, and celebrated our purchase by GOING OUT TO DINNER. For months, we talked about how amazing these rain jackets were. Waterproof pockets, waterPROOF material that only soaked through after hours of relentless downpour but dried super fast, a zip-in fleece for those colder days. Ah-mazing.

3. But there is nothing like a broken-in set o' clothes

Look how happy I am in my broken-in wetsuit

Like anything, it is impossible to categorize an experience in absolutes. Yes, new uniforms are great. But before it gets to that health-hazard and/or see-through phase, it has its glory days.

Wetsuits are a fab example of this. New wetsuits are nice when your old one can basically stand on its own (more on this later), but it really does require some serious breaking in. There is nothing like slipping into someone else's wetsuit to realize how differently the human body is shaped, even if you are the same size.

Or, ha, like I did for a while, when I would put on a guy's wetsuit before I got one of my own. I wore it so much that conformed pretty well to my body, except for that enormous, gaping space in the nether regions that made me seriously afraid of encountering the man who used to use that wetsuit. Or rather, made me wonder why anyone would need a space that large to accommodate any body part.

To creators of male wetsuits everywhere

4. Old uniforms can also make your day the Absolute Worst

Tina consoling me that my shirt doesn't perma-smell THAT bad

Okay, wetsuits are perfectly demonstrable evidence to support this contention.

Once the sun has set on your wetsuit's glory days, it enters into an abysmal hell that at the very least, entails other organisms sharing your neoprene. Dry rot was my personal favorite. I have had my fair share of wetsuits where the neoprene had shriveled up and died and was replaced by some kind of mystery material that feels like a combination between a paper bag and the tears of orphaned children.

This usually happened because we didn't take care of our wetsuits "properly", like you would if you were a pro surfer or diver and had access to the right chemicals, the right dry locker environment, and/or didn't wear your wetsuit for 40 hours a week for years at a time.

"Where did I leave my wetsuit yesterday?"

"Don't ever rinse your wetsuit in hot water," they said. "It'll stretch the neoprene cells," they said. Okay butthead, you try following that advice when it's 30 degrees out and you are 6 seconds away from end stage hypothermia. When I needed hot water, it was in times when you know, my hair was literally frozen and I couldn't feel my soul. There was never a time I needed hot water the temperature of lava sprayed all over me when I thought, "BUT THE NEOPRENE".

So yeah, my wetsuits got destroyed over time. Sometimes, they would get holes in the seems (side note: this was a great way to distinguish between uniform wetsuits when our initials faded....like HEY that's mine, it's got the hole in the left armpit).

5. Every place has orphaned uniforms that usually make us a little sad

Most of the people in this photo have long since abandoned their wetsuits and moved on. p.s. Miss you guys

There is that rack of wetsuits, or cabinet of old uniforms. You know it. It's the one you use for food prep. It's the one you have interns or volunteers scavenge from. It's the graveyard of old employees.

Even if I didn't know the people, I always felt a little sad going through the Quitter Closet/Rack and seeing initials of people who had long since come and gone. I wonder too, who wears my old stuff at the places I've been at.

BRING THEM ALL BACK

But all of this just makes me realize how much our uniforms mean to us, not just in the utilitarian sense. They are a historical marker, they are an indicator of seniority in some cases, they conform to you and see you through some of the best and some of the worst times. They are the butt of our jokes (especially if they actually SHOW your butt). And so you know what? They deserve a little recognition. Thanks, work uniforms!

from The Middle Flipper http://ift.tt/2s3Dw4t

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