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citrinesparkles · 2 years

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I hope you don't mind me asking, but do you have any tips for anyone starting their own x reader(s) blog/doing requests? If not, I hope you have a nice day either way. :)

hey lovely!! this is such an interesting question omg. i don't mind at all!!

i do have some thoughts based on my own personal experience (i, in true citrine fashion, went full babble mode on this so that'll be under the cut!) but i think the tl;dr of it is have fun and be willing to experiment. (also if any of you lovely folks reading along at home want to drop your two cents in the replies or otherwise add to the conversation please feel free! i can only offer my perspective and i love hearing others)

if you have any follow up questions or want more specific advice, feel free to shoot me a dm! i don't bite, i promise.

okay. hi.

first thing's first: starting an x readers blog!

right off the bat, my absolute most important advice is this: be gentle with yourself. you're trying something new. even if you've been writing your whole life and been on tumblr since it was founded, this is a new way to combine those things. new adventures have bumps and blocks and you'll have trial and error before you really find your way (and likely after you find your way, too!) and that is fine. take your time, try to enjoy the process, and be kind to yourself.

for me, a lot of finding my way- and i mean A Lot- was just looking at other imagines blogs and asking myself what i liked about them. for example, for me, i get inspired by angelz-dust's incredible dialogue and use of details in her writing, beautiful desktop theme, a super user friendly masterlist, and clear and concise rules page. i also love unmotivatedwrit3r's intro post with both masterlist and rules, grounded stories, and that their blog is super easy to navigate. (i could go on and on, but my point is, look at your favorite writers. why does their writing appeal to you? why does their blog appeal to you? how can you incorporate parts of how they run their blog into how you run yours (obviously without stealing other people's work, haha.))

shaping your blog takes time, but can be a really fun process if you let it!

some of the things i find most useful for my blog are a good desktop theme, a useful pinned post, a masterlist, a mobile masterlist, and a tagging system i'm very comfortable with.

(idk how tumblr savvy you are, anon, so if you would like advice on any of those things specifically please let me know!)

technical tidbits

something i've found super helpful as both a writer and a reader of imagines is when a fic has an intro. as an example, i'll use my fic cat. the section at the top tells the reader what they're getting into; in my case, i like to list any qualities i've written the reader with (in this case, the reader is not referred to by gender!) so the person reading knows if it's something they can relate to (or, if not, if it's something they're interested in anyway). i also include what character i'm writing about, how long the piece is, any fun facts or relevant information i think the audience should know (like thanking my darling angel for being my beta reader/enabler/cheerleader), and also any content warnings i think apply. in this case, i also linked the next chapter of the fic.

if the post is long, throw a read more/cut on there! (i do this for posts that are longer than 1000 words, but you can use any measurement.) it makes navigating your blog (and any tags you post in!) muchhhhh easier.

back up your work. no, seriously, save often, and save your fics in a secondary location. i use google docs, but you could use word, a private discord server, your notes app- just make sure to save it! and just a heads' up, tumblr drafts can be a bit of a gamble. i've had posts post themselves prematurely, posts disappear entirely, and formatting glitch. (also? be prepared to reformat your posts.)

(i also save drafts i hate or can't get to work. sometimes i find a way to recycle them later on!)

don't be afraid to use tags, but try to stick to relevant ones. tagging your fics with unrelated characters or fandoms is unlikely to get your work any extra attention- and if it does, it's not likely to be good. i use several different imagines tags (because people call imagines lots of different things- [character] imagine, [character] x reader, [character] x you, and [character] x y/n are my go to tags.).

i also find it really helpful to use consistent content warning tags (such as "fire cw" or "blood cw").

self reblogs are a great thing. i have a queue i maintain almost religiously, so i queue mine, but you don't have to! but don't be afraid to reblog your work. people follow you to read what you post, and they may not see it the first time around! (i usually post at night, reblog the following morning, and once again the following night.)

accepting requests.

disclaimer: requests aren't my main source of inspiration. i write from movies, music, things i see irl, my literal dreams- i say this because i've seen a lot of writers get discouraged by a lack of requests (especially early on) or frustrated because they can't complete requests as quickly as they'd like. i think it can be really refreshing to take a break from them occasionally and write from another source of inspiration, if you can.

that being said! to answer your actual question, the biggest suggestion i have is to set basic rules. if you are asking for requests, what are you willing to write? what's a hard no?

it's okay if those things take time to figure out- or if they change with time! but having some basics down can be a huge help for requesters.

also! you're more likely to get requests if you allow anonymous asks. (this was, last i checked, not allowed by default. i would recommend switching them on in your tumblr settings if you would like to take requests.)

i really hope some of this helps- and again, if you have any questions or would like any other input, please feel free to send another ask or dm me <3

#citrine responds #oh anon #you got a novel #i tried to make this as digestible as possible but i have soooo much that i've learned with this blog #and from watching far more competent experienced writers run theirs #i hope this isnt overwhelming 😭#also!! when you start your blog 👉👈 if you feel comfortable sharing please lemme know! i'd love to see :)#i am... gonna go to bed now. its midterms season and it is very late and i am very tired.#MWAH #mailbox #anon

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themyskira · 7 years

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THAT Wonder Woman script, part 2 of oh shit it got worse

Previously on Wonder Woman, we met our hero -- brave, selfless, moral, willing to go to bat for perfect strangers without a thought for personal safety, but uneasy with emotional vulnerability, preferring to rebuff intimacy with snark and condescension.

I’m talking, of course, about Steve Trevor. Wait, who did you think the hero of this movie was?

Anyway, Steve crashed in plane on an island of Nasty Women, proved his moral superiority and won a convert in the form of a luminous-elemental-natural-curvaceous-waterfall-girl, who beat up her mother to save his life, then decided to follow him home. Just because.

Now Steve and The Girl are flying into a war zone, where Steve is overdue to deliver much-needed supplies to sick, starving refugees.

Alright, so they reach their destination, and there’s trouble on the ground. The runway is crawling with soldiers, and Steve’s crew — Ben Mzamane, Dr Moira “Sully” Sullivan and Griffin Thiele — are looking distinctly worried.

Steve admonishes Diana to keep herself hidden and not cause any trouble, before exiting the plane to greet the soldiers’ leader, a “petty warlord” called Goshnak. He’s the one they had to bribe to get supplies in for the refugees, and he’s demanding extra compensation on account of Steve’s delayed arrival.

BEN We are grateful for everything you have done—

GOSHNAK And what is your gratitude? A few paltry bribes!?

STEVE They’re not paltry. These are quality bribes—

Things are getting dire. They’re surrounded by men with guns and Goshnak is threatening to take the whole damn plane. Then Diana emerges from the plane and suddenly everyone is staring.

SULLY My god. That is a quality bribe.

Hahaha!! What hilarity! I don’t know why more writers don’t exploit the rich comedic vein that is human sex trafficking!!

There’s some mystical nonsense where the camera closes tight on Diana’s foot as it touches the ground and sends a wind whistling through the trees, across the mountains, over the sea and into a darkened room where an ominous figure raises its head. Nobody on the airstrip notices, mostly because Goshnak is still threatening to shoot everybody and Diana is Not Helping.

GOSHNAK All the goods on that plane are mine.

DIANA No they’re not.

GOSHNAK Do you dare to question my authority?

DIANA Authority that cannot be questioned should look for a different name.

wow great very helpful Diana, lecturing the man with the gun on semantics.

GOSHNAK You bring this whore to insult me?

DIANA What did you say?

STEVE Diana, shut up.

Okay, on the one hand, in the context of this scene Diana is making a bad situation worse and, as she’s being written, this character kind of needs to be told to shut up. On the other hand, I don’t need to see Steve Trevor telling Wonder Woman to shut up, especially right after another man has called her a whore.

And speaking of stupid out-of-character behaviour—

DIANA (moving toward Goshnak) If you want to challenge me, then be man enough to—

I cannot think of a character less likely to use the expression “man enough” than fucking Wonder Woman.

Anyway, that’s the point where Goshnak shoots her in the chest.

She puts a hand to her chest, confused. Blood runs over her hand. […] Diana is on her hands and knees, an unlovely gurgle in her breath. She pushes hard on the (unseen) wound. A few moments, and she wrenches her hand from her chest, rearing back onto her knees.

In her bloody hand, she holds a bullet.

She stares at it, standing shakily up. Goshnak backs off a step, freaked. She holds the bullet up to him, furious confusion in her eyes. She looks at Steve…

DIANA Are you people insane?

And then she faints.

Such heroics.

We cut to Gateway City, where the Spearhead Technologies building dominates the skyline, resembling the head of a spear. Track down through the more run-down neighbourhoods, down into an empty subway station and deep into the old sewerage tunnels beneath the city.

An older homeless man leads a younger female reporter through the tunnels. Their destination:

…a half graffiti/half American-primitive MURAL, depicting a figure in armour on a horse stabbing a giant dragon. Behind them, towers crumble and burn. It’s eerie and awkward, and very beautiful.

It also apparently means something to reporter-lady, but we don’t get to find out what, because that’s when Strife appears.

GINNY (continuing) My God…

The white, deformed face with the bright red teeth and the carved metal skull-cap appears right next to hers, grinning horrifically.

STRIFE No. Not yours.

And then he kills them both. Yes, “he”. For some reason Whedon has decided to make Eris/Strife — a goddess in Greek mythology — into a dude.

Back Our Hero, waiting outside a tent at base camp. Sully is inside tending to Diana. His mate Griffin is particularly concerned for Diana.

GRIFFIN […] I can’t believe Goshnak. Who the hell shoots an unarmed, tasty looking girl?

Okay, so really he’s more concerned for Diana’s rack.

Sully steps out, clearly unhappy, and announces there’s nothing more she can do. This sounds ominous until Diana strides out afterwards, completely healed; turns out Sully didn’t need to do anything.

Diana heads urgently for the plane and Steve hurries after her. He’s stunned that she’s up and about with barely a scar after only six hours; Diana is aghast that it took so long.

STEVE […] You’re healed.

DIANA Yes, after hours. It’s degrading… to be felled by a tiny piece of metal. (quietly) I didn’t know something could hurt that much.

STEVE (not unkindly) Welcome to the world.

THIS WORLD IS SO FUCKED, MAN, I HAD TO WAIT SIX WHOLE HOURS FOR MY NEAR-FATAL GUNSHOT WOUND TO BE MIRACULOUSLY HEALED. SO DEGRADING, I HAVE NEVER BEEN SO OFFENDED IN MY LIFE.

Diana picks up the pace. Goshnak’s men took the supplies to their camp in the hills, and she intends to get them back. There’s a guard at the plane; she knocks him flat without breaking a sweat. As she changes into her armour, Steve lectures her again. He’s a dick about it, but he does have a point: none of Diana’s behaviour has been helpful so far, and now she’s planning on walking into a warlord’s camp and starting a firefight.

Not killing, though. She is prepared to kill a warrior on a battlefield, she says, but nobody who “hides behind” a gun can be called a warrior. Which— look, I’m as pro-gun-control as they come, but that is a bizarrely political statement to put in the mouth of a character who barely even understands what firearms are, let alone the currents of debate going on in America and around the world. Sure, she’s just experienced being shot, and the intense pain of it shocked her, but I’m pretty sure getting disembowelled with a sword is super painful as well.

Basically, Diana’s deep and immediate disgust at guns specifically reads like Whedon trying to shoehorn his own politics into the script, and it does not work.

To Diana’s credit, she proves slightly more competent at dealing with Goshnak’s men. She picks off the sentries in the dark, takes the sleeping soldiers by surprise, and this time when Goshnak shoots, she’s ready to deflect the bullets with her bracelets.

She could use some work on her patter, though.

…she grabs his throat.

DIANA Stop. Shooting. Me.

The gun hits the ground and Diana brings her heel down on it with enough force to break it.

DIANA (continuing) This land is not safe for you. The people here are under my protection and if you even approach them, your death will be appalling. Remember that, when you awake.

She headbutts him, her tiara ringing off his forehead like a blunted bell.

“your death will be appalling”? really?

She changed her mind quick on the whole non-killing thing.

Later, in the refugee camp, the food has been distributed and the doc is tending to the sick. Diana watches as a young boy eats hungrily from a can, only for a man — maybe his father — see him and snatched the food for himself.

STEVE (appearing) Yeah, starvation doesn’t seem to make people nicer. It’s weird.

URGH GO AWAY STEVEN YOU ABSOLUTE TOSSER.

DIANA How could the gods allow this?

STEVE Your gods are dead, Diana. World hasn’t been theirs for a long while.

HAHA, BOOM! Take that, Diana! Shame on you for trying to come to grips with a world you’ve known for all of twelve hours!

Steve walks off, and Ben approaches to reassure Diana that Our Hero is just super prickly because of his Tragic Backstory. See, he used to be in the Air Force, flying combat missions, and once got downed behind enemy lines. He left the military with “a health distrust of anyone with too much power” and “[d]ecided to drop something more productive than bombs” — that’s why he set up this operation with Sully.

Diana asks whether Steve and Sully are “mates” because let us remember that the Amazons are a DEEPLY AND EXCLUSIVELY HETEROSEXUAL CULTURE and naturally it would never enter her mind that Steve might be in a relationship with Ben or Griffin, or for that matter more than one person. Anyway. AWKWARDNESS ENSUES.

BEN Mates?

DIANA Do they… mate? Or…

BEN (smiles) Sully would never put up with him. I don’t believe Steve’s seeing anyone right now.

DIANA (awkward) Oh. That’s of no import. To me. I don’t care about that.

URGH STOP.

Ben asks Diana what she intends to do next, and she says “to help”. Because as we’ve seen she has zero plans outside of taking a gap year in Man’s World so she can ‘find herself’. “I need to know more,” she elaborates unhelpfully. “I need to see… everything.” Apparently unfazed, Ben invites her to “stick with us”. Next stop, Gateway City.

What is Gateway, Diana asks?

We’re answered by a voiceover as we cut back to the Spearhead building.

CALLAS (V.O.) The greatest city in the world. The symbol of American ingenuity, prosperity, and cultural diversity. […] Literally, our gateway to the world.

The speaker is Spearhead’s CEO, Arabella Callas, who appears to be a low-budget Veronica Cale. She is, Joss tells us, “[v]ery blonde, very patrician, unflappable and icy smooth. As lovely as she is untouchable.”

She’s talking to a seemingly mundane meeting of executives and city councilmen, about zoning issues. We learn that Spearhead deals in military technology and is one of the city’s biggest investors. The councillors are keen to accommodate them.

Of course, the moment everyone leaves, Callas flips from zero to cartoon fucking villain. She touches a painting behind her desk, which glows briefly. A tapestry lifts to reveal a giant steel door, which slides open. And with that, Callas strolls on into her evil lair.

INT. SPEARHEAD WAR ROOM - CONTINUING

A cross between a Wall Street trading bullpen and Houston Ground Control, this is where Spearhead monitors the world. There are screens with maps and satellite feeds, dozens of employees with headsets tracking troop movements, high-level government communications, even weather patterns. These employees don’t wear suits. They wear black.

From Callas’ interactions with the operatives, we basically learn that Spearhead are secretly puppetmasters of chaos; no exaggeration. Talks between two warring nations have broken down thanks to an interpreter on Spearhead’s payroll; Callas instructs an employee to “keep our reps on point; I don’t want a bullet fired that wasn’t bought from us”. There’s a hurricane off the Carolina coast, and Spearhead is preparing to seed mass panic in the media. Some dictator wants to get his hands on Spearhead’s new bombers before the Pentagon — Callas is willing to deal for “12 per cent”. A 12 per cent mark-up, the employee asks? No, says Callas: 12 per cent of his county.

Basically, Callas and Spearhead are a caricature of corporate villainy and Joss could not be less subtle if he tried. But wait! There’s more!

Callas announces that she’s going to pray and exits into a dark room lit by torches and dominated by a statue of Ares.

I know, guys. I’m shocked, too. Who would’ve ever thought that Spearhead Enterprises, a weapons manufacturing company that secretly stokes war from inside a building shaped like a spear, would actually be a front for a cult of the god of war?! This is entirely unexpected. I mean, gosh, next you’ll be telling me that Gateway City is sitting on top of a gateway to something ominous and supernatural! Crazy stuff!!

As Callas prays, Strife materialises and tells her he’s gotten rid of the reporter. Callas presses; was he discreet about it?

CALLAS […] The eyes of the world cannot be on Gateway. Not right now. The world is won—

STRIFE (along with her) —won in silence. I know. There was a time when the God of War made war.

CALLAS You want war, you need armies. You need an acceptable level of poverty and ignorance. (looking up at the statue) Despair, rage, religious fervour and above all fear.

Honestly, Marston wrote villains that were more nuanced than this. Whedon literally named her Callous, ffs.

They talk about some reports of a woman taking out a rebel brigade in Africa singlehandedly, then they discuss a planned test of “the Khimaera” as they step into a large silo. The technology inside has a distinctly magical edge. What’s the Khimaera, you ask?

CALLAS The Age of Monsters is over.

STRIFE Is it. Is it really.

As he says it the camera pulls back to reveal the head of the Khimaera — we see little more than a metal shape, the top of which resembles a cross between a lion’s head and a massive rock-drill. Clearly filling the entire silo, the thing writhes and spews fire. Maintenance machines arm out from the wall or crawl over it, insectlike.

groan.

Back to Our Hero and The Girl, who have arrived in the city. Diana is eager to see everything at once; Steve isn’t so sure it’s a good idea to let her go wandering on her own. “I’ll be fine,” she says. “No, I’m kind of afraid for the city,” he deadpans.

Diana enters the throng of the city — “looking at everything and everyone intently, more sociologist than sightseer”. We pan through various sights — extreme wealth and extreme poverty, toy stores and strip clubs. Someone shoves a “LIVE NUDE GIRLS” flyer into her hands; appalled, she looks around to give it back. Which makes sense, because obviously living all her life on an island of Extremely Heterosexual Women, Diana is going to be extremely prudish about the female body.

Then,

—a hooker in an outfit skimpier than Diana’s who stares at Diana, asking:

HOOKER Who are you supposed to be?

Hahaha!! It’s funny because the sex worker thought Diana, also, was a sex worker, which as we all know is a Gross and Shameful thing to be! Oh, the comedy!

Diana steps into the street, forcing a guy in a convertible to swerve around her. He calls her a bitch, she stops the car dead with her bare hands and asks him to repeat that, but then the confrontation is cut short by a cry from across the street. A fourteen-year-old boy is being shaken down by a drug dealer.

Diana whips the dealer with her lasso; he pulls out his gun and starts firing. She deflects the bullets easily, knocks away the gun and lectures him about how she doesn’t like firearms. Then she whips the lasso around his neck and demands to know what he’s doing.

THE DEALER I’m just standing here minding my own crack dealing! (he stops, shaken) No, no, I sell crack! And guns. I also run whores sometimes— or, no! I mean… (deflated) That’s what I mean.

Diana ascertains that the major drug kingpin in the city is a dude called Kleen. We will be spending a stupid amount of time following up on him later, despite his having no relevance to the broader plot.

However, as they speak, Diana realises that dozens of rats are scurrying up from the basement grating of the old building behind them. They’re afraid of something.

Cut to the Spearhead war room, where the Khimaera test — whatever that is — is underway. An employee tells Callas that they have structural engineers ready to feed the media some story about a seismic tremor and a building not built to code. But there’s a problem — the cameras are showing somebody unexpected on the test site.

Because gosh darn it, wouldn’t you just know, first day in the city and Wonder Woman has managed to blunder onto the very site on which Evil Incorporated is testing their doomsday device!

Back to Diana, who’s now urgently shoving people out of the building, racing up the stairs to usher people out of the upper floors as the walls begin to lurch and buckle. She’s barely managed to get everyone out when Strife jumps her. They fight, Diana just holding her own, and Strife warns her to stay out of the city as he teleports away, leaving the building to collapse on her.

Later, in Steve’s bedroom, Diana lies face-down and topless on the bed as Steve cleans her wounds. She explains that Strife the the cruellest god and the servant of his uncle, Ares, because Joss isn’t even trying. FYI, Eris — the Greek personification of strife — is Ares’ brother (and/or first-cousin-twice-removed, Greek divine family trees are complicated) and she works for her own dang self.

Steve immediately leaps to the conclusion that Strife’s appearance is Diana’s fault, because Steve is a dick.

DIANA Do you think it’s all coincidence? Truly? The signs are all around us. You don’t think I’m here for a reason?

STEVE I think you’re dangerous. I think you mean well but you’re looking for trouble and you’re wildly adept at finding it. I think you’ve got delusions of grandeur and some actual grandeur, which is confusing. I don’t like confusing. I hate the fact that I’m so attracted to you, just touching you is overwhelming and I keep hoping you’ll turn around so I can see more of you naked.

He stops, even more confused than she is. His jaw sets and he reaches down, pulls the lasso out from under his butt. She tries not to show her smile.

you are the worst joss.

Diana talks a bit about how despite the violence and inequality and selfishness she’s seen, she believes the people of this world have the capacity for good — they just need to be reminded to look up. Steve makes a guess — that’s her mission, right? Diana corrects him: “Our mission.” This… is actually sounding almost like Diana for once. She doesn’t just want to beat the big bads, she wants to inspire, empower and work together with those around her to build a better world.

Naturally, Steve has to spoil it by being a wanker again.

STEVE […] What if you lose?

DIANA As long as there’s life in me, I don’t quit.

STEVE Nyeah, but I didn’t say ‘quit’. I said ‘lose’. Any idiot can win. Doesn’t mean jack till you’ve done the other thing.

Aaaaaand we’re back to the old “you can’t be a hero because you haven’t suffered enough”.

A series of short scenes follows; Diana interrupting drug shipments, taking down thugs, rescuing women from human traffickers, saving people from collapsing buildings and so on. We see that Steve and his people are working with her to give medical treatment to victims and map out Kleen’s criminal empire.

Joss still has time for some casual dickishness, though.

GIRL Lady? (points up) My cat is stuck in that tree.

Diana looks up, sees the cat on a branch, looks back at the girl with dismissive incomprehension.

DIANA Climb it.

but waitwaitwait. You know what we haven’t had in a good couple of scenes? Some good ol’-fashioned slut-shaming!

NEWSCASTER [female] Reports have come in from all over the city. Descriptions vary, but all describe her as female, impossibly strong and scantily clad. […]

NEWSCASTER #2 [male] So, what do you think? Publicity stunt?

NEWSCASTER (sourly) Probably. The last time I checked, heroes didn’t run around in bustiers.

Strife and Callas complain about how the meddling kids are spoiling their evil plans. Callas has a solution in mind, though — the one thing that “for an Amazon, is worse than death”.

OH GOOD WE’RE ALMOST AT THE DEPOWERING, DEGRADATION AND LIVE BURIAL PART OF THE SCRIPT THIS CAN’T POSSIBLY GO POORLY

#wonder woman #whedon does wondy

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paulisweeabootrash · 6 years

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First-ish Impression: Angelic Layer

Welcome once again to Paul is Weeaboo Trash!

Today’s topic: Angelic Layer (2001), based on three episodes.

I went to Saboten Con, an annual anime convention in Phoenix, AZ, this year, and I attended a panel on the history of the influential manga group CLAMP. Even if you’re not an obsessive or long-time otaku, or only really pay attention to anime, not manga, you may be familiar with them from works like the TV adaptations of Cardcaptor Sakura and its brand-new sequel Clear Card, or tangentially from Code Geass (which they did not write, but did design characters for), or perhaps from the work of theirs I’m by far most familiar with, Chobits. In addition to telling me some stuff I didn’t know about CLAMP’s members and catalog of works, the panel gave me a few promising things to add to my “to do” list, both for reading and for watching. One of which, it turns out, my wife owns and I’ve seen the first episode of before, but which I somehow entirely forgot about: the earlier series to which Chobits is the sequel, Angelic Layer.

Angelic Layer follows the story of Misaki Suzuhara, a middle schooler moving on her own to Tokyo to live with her aunt. As soon as she sets foot outside the train station, she is captivated by an enormous screen on a nearby building, showing footage of a fight during the championship of Angelic Layer, a sport where two players duel via remote-controlled robots called "Angels". She immediately feels the need to learn to play, rushes off to the nearest department store and, with the help of an enthusiastic random stranger (who is understandably mistaken for a kidnapper by a store employee), spends all of her money (including money set aside for local train fare from the station where she arrived to her aunt's place) on the beginner essentials for playing Angelic Layer. Including, apparently, a special purpose laptop preloaded with the necessary software.

The random stranger, by the way, is named Icchan, and he immediately takes an interest in Misaki as a player and teaches her the basics of the game. He is revealed to the audience to be a comedic relief-level eccentric who works for the company that makes Angels and runs the Angelic Layer tournaments. Misaki does not know this, which is bizarre and uncomfortable. His insistence on teaching her could be portrayed as reasonable and kind of endearing, except that she has absolutely no idea who he is or why to trust him, and does not seem to question that he keeps showing up to offer her his help, which alarms me, at least.

Anwyay, Misaki gets to work setting up her Angel, which she names Hikaru, modeling her on Athena, the winner of that first fight she watched. She even makes her own clothing for Hikaru, using what turn out to be experimental fabric samples given to her by Icchan. Who was supposed to bring them to a meeting. Oops. As of episode 3, Misaki has won a couple of pickup fights against other, much more experienced Angelic Layer players -- getting into those fights accidentally both times -- met both extremes of the spectrum of realistic gamers (from supportive veteran encouraging new players to the antisocial jerk bent on pwning noobs), and made friends at school who share her interest in the game. Icchan has even decided to sign her up (without her knowledge) for the upcoming tournament, for which she is technically eligible purely because of those pickup fights. And this is where I am now, staring down the prospect of a tournament arc.

Usually, I would dread this sort of thing, especially with the way we’ve seen Misaki start out playing so easily. I would be fearing the worst: an unreasonably talented competitor breezing their way through fights where the writers are inconsistent on or don’t bother to establish how their own narrative universe works as long as it furthers the plot goal of the main character winning... but Angelic Layer seems promising on this front. It really seems like it should be a lot harder for any player to pick up even the most basic controls of this game, but I guess that could be chalked up to very good thought-reading technology -- and there’s a pretty obviously-foreshadowed but technically spoiler reason I happen to already know for why Misaki in particular would be talented. But despite her too-easy start to the game, she also is shown winning partially through her opponents simply not anticipating her unusual choices, and more importantly, she is shown needing to actually learn new skills, which together make this angle not bother me as much as it otherwise could. So maybe the tournament will turn out more reasonably than such arcs have a reputation for.

One thing that tangentially occurs to me about the setting: I wish I could put myself into the mindset of the original audience in 2001 (or 1998, when the manga came out), to know how immediate this felt, or didn't feel, then. In 2018, it feels just around the corner. Thought-controlled computer interfaces, e-sports, personal robots... these used to be the realm of sci-fi generally, and probably more prominent in otaku circles than in Western-focused nerddom. Now they're things that get mainstream media attention, and there are even easily-available toys for small children based on customizing and programming robots. If not for the more fantastical elements of the sport as depicted (the energy ball thing in the first episode, for example), I wouldn't be that surprised if people started playing it IRL in a few years.

I’ll definitely keep watching, and I’m glad I went to that event to remind me how many CLAMP stories I need to start or resume.

-----

W/A/S: 2/2/5

Weeb: Because of what I mentioned above about the trajectory of nerd culture and technology, I think this probably used to be far far weeb-er when it came out than it is now. These days, probably the most foreign concept depicted is a minor being considered competent and responsible enough to take the train between two cities on her own.

Ass: Very little suggestive content, but still not something for small kids unless you want to answer uncomfortable questions about a couple jokes, e.g. Icchan realizing he's coming off as possibly perverted after he looks under Hikaru's clothing to examine her.

Shit: This is shaping up to be an interesting premise and enjoyable characters, but something is just... off... with the art, and I'm not whining because it's in a simpler art style than earlier CLAMP projects. I mean things like uncomfortably long still frames, eyes that look like they're in the wrong place, and inconsistency in character drawings between different scenes in the same episode, suggesting this was rushed. Finally, at my wife's insistence, I watched the dubbed rather than subtitled version for the first couple of episodes because she remembered it being pretty good, but some lines are just delivered with such awkward inflections that we questioned the competence of the direction, so, uh, add a full point of shit if you're watching that version.

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Stray Observations:

- Real life gamers like Kyoko, the player who challenges Misaki because she’s new and therefore presumably an easy target, are the reason I so rarely play online games. That and I’m bad at just about all of them.

- Speaking of gamers like that, do kids these days even say “pwn” anymore? I’m getting “old” by internet culture standards.

- Oh wow. I knew this was an old DVD, but I was still surprised when it had an ad for Newtype USA play before loading the menu.

#anime review #first impression review #except actually I've seen one episode before #CLAMP #Angelic Layer #weeaboo trash

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