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faunusrights · 4 years

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Before The Dawn -- Preview Thoughts (ahoy rwde)

So if you didn’t know (or didn’t see [or didn’t hear {or are living the life of blissful ignorance that I, for one, wish I had}]), a preview for the next CFVY-centric novel, Before The Dawn, came out! It’s the sequel to After The Fall, which I liveblogged a while back and generally like… was ambivalent about. Some of it was okay. Other parts were weird. Some bits just plain bonkers. But whatever!

Well, a part of this preview also happened to contain a flashback of Velvet and her father, and I really wanna extrapolate on some reasons this has me bewildered and frightened for my wellbeing! Because what the fuck! Anyway, goes without saying this post contains spoilers for six pages or so of Before The Dawn, but I can’t imagine anyone really cares about spoilers? Probably? Anyway.

(A small aside: I’m not crazy interested in engaging in, like, any debate over anything I’ve put here. This is just a write-up of conversations I’ve already covered with other people for the sake of quick linkage, and not a bright flare arc of ‘somebody come debate this’. If you like what the book says: fine! I don’t. Let’s leave it there, kiddos.)

So, I’m opening this with a disclaimer: many people know I have some hefty headcanons for Velvet’s parents, and I wanna just make it, like, excruciatingly clear: never, at any one point, did I think my headcanons or my AUs or what-have-you would ever become anything even vaguely close to canon. I knew a day would come in which what I’d filled in would come to have canonical content (or, rather, I’d hoped they’d not touch Velvet with a ten-foot pole and I’d never get disproven), and that this was inevitable. Canon and I aren’t on speaking terms, and that’s okay! I didn’t want, nor expect, nor imagined, my stuff becoming canon. So everything I’m about to say isn’t a case of my headcanons were superior or I wish they’d done what I did. What I wanna talk about is how… bad the canon we got, is. Got it? Good.

The preview doesn’t grant me page numbers so I’m unsure exactly where we are in the book, but that prooooobably doesn’t matter so much as the content of the section I’m talking about, but anyway; somewhere in this book is a 6-page section of a flashback Velvet has of talking to her father, as well as some Velvet and Scarlatina family lore. Can I even call it lore? Probably not. But it’s there and it’s real, and I wanna just dissect it for a moment by covering the main points from this excerpt, in no real order, with no input on my half, just facts:

Velvet’s father is an Atlesian engineer.

He works for/under/with Ironwood.

Velvet’s own skills as an inventor and engineer stem directly from him.

His work in Atlas has divided the family, because Velvet’s mum hates that he prizes his work over his family.

Velvet has always wanted to go to Atlas as it’s the tech capital of Remnant.

Velvet’s father doesn’t see her often and that causes some strife.

Her father’s name is Will Scarlatina.

Her mother’s name is Meg Scarlatina.

These are probably our main points to cover, and I’m gonna go over ‘em probably in this order since this is more or less how the excerpt presents them. So let’s take it from the top.

1. Velvet’s father is an Atlesian engineer.

WOW what a start. What a START!!! So, someone pointed out to me that this definitely implies he’s a human, which has some in-text proof that I’ll show a little later in point three, but my god what a. bold beginning. Yes. That said, this point only gets egregious a little later down the line, so let’s hop to point two.

2. He works for/under/with Ironwood.

Okay, so, again. I don’t plan nor intend for my headcanons to become canon in any capacity… but GOD do I hate how we have someone else tied up to Ironwood in some way. This man pulls all the strings, and it seems like nobody can do anything science-y or invent-y without it getting all wrapped up with Ironwood, what gives? Also, probably further proof that Will here is a human, though I’m ready to be wrong. I SURE HOPE I AM. Either way, with Velvet being a Faunus and Will potentially being/having married a Faunus, this slaps in all the bad ways. Can we stop that? Right now? Thanks.

3. Velvet’s own skills as an inventor and engineer stem directly from him.

SO THIS WAS MY FIRST STICKING POINT. The way I explained this was that, in some ways, some people are just like their parents (I sure am in a lot of ways!) and others are totally UNLIKE their parents (such as a lot of my friends!), but it really bothers me that RT looked at Velvet, who they decided was a very competent inventor and creator, and said well, she must’ve gotten it from somewhere! No way she did that all by herself! Let’s have this masculine figure in her life be the reason she’s Like That!

You can say I’m maybe over-exaggerating and, hey, maybe I am. But I really hate stories when a person’s skill is attributed directly towards someone else as if they have no autonomy to learn things on their own. Wouldn’t it have been cooler to have had Velvet strike out and make use of a skill that she developed with the help of friends and family? Who weren’t responsible for this skill, but aided her improvement? It’s real annoying that they decided she’s basically a clone of her father, which is supported by that in-text quotation I mentioned:

“She might have her mother’s ears, but she was her father’s daughter.”

So, first off: what the fuck. Secondly: ?????? Thirdly: so I think this is proof towards Will not being a Faunus, since the reference to ears is so pointed, but GOD I HATE THAT WHOLE IMPLICATION? People aren’t always little mini-clones of their parents, and something really bothers me about a daughter being Just Like Her Dad. It smacks all wrong, and maybe it’s ‘cause I have my vision of the Scarlatinas being so matriarchal and all but it bothers me one hell of a lot. Jesus.

4. His work in Atlas has divided the family, because Velvet’s mum hates that he prizes his work over his family.

/deep breath

Okay. Again, not tryna inflict my own headcanons on this. But are we really gonna play ball with yet another heterosexual marriage on the rocks because the man of the house prizes his job over his family? Really? Really? That’s what we’re being given, hot and fresh, off the printer? Really?

I’m just. Deeply disappointed that this is the angle we’re getting here. Like… right now, the ONE family we’ve got with their braincells in a row is, like, the Belladonnas, and yet we can’t get ONE other out here??? Not one??? The hets, they’re at it again! And I just. It would be SO easy to toss in some good queer content with these flashbacks and we’re just Not getting it. I don’t know why, I shouldn’t have to wonder why, but this is that, I guess.

5. Velvet has always wanted to go to Atlas as it’s the tech capital of Remnant.

HAS SHE THOUGH… REALLY? We’re really gonna say the Faunus who canonically got bullied in Vale and like, is visibly concerned about asshole humans being assholes, wanted to go to Atlas? Asshole human capital city? Are we positive? ‘Cause I, for one, ain’t. Tech is everywhere! You can study and deconstruct and pick apart and invent shit anywhere on the planet! Why would Velvet put herself at such risk just to see the equivalent of Silicon Valley dipshits engage in a circlejerk?

6. Velvet’s father doesn’t see her often and that causes some strife.

Here’s a slice of in-text dialogue to chew on:

“Just another way I’ve disappointed you, huh?” he said.

“Dad. No!” Velvet paused. She didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but she didn’t have much to follow that up with, nothing that would convince him, anyway. It was hard to argue with the truth.

Now, small tangent: if you’ve read, or seen, any of my writing on Arslan-as-Sienna’s-offspring AU (which is [are] good AU[s] and general idea[s] you should read my content on the matter), then you’ll know I hate the trope in which a parent who does wrong by a kid, then expects that kid to apologise in order to make themself behave better. For instance: kid has an absent parent. Kid apologises profusely to the parent in hopes they’ll come home and be more present in their life. Parent feels bad, and does that, validating the kid’s belief that they needed to apologise to get their parent to come home. It’s a garbage trope and a dangerous one, because you don’t have to apologise for someone else hurting you. Full stop.

So imagine my surprise to see the same thing happen here! What’s this guilt-tripping? What’s this weird focus on Velvet when he’s the one not coming home? As soon as I read this line, it felt skeevy, it is skeevy. I hate it. I am brimming with hatred. Why do this? Why bother? Why does she need this drama? Jesus christ.

Next two points are a two-in-one:

7. Her father’s name is Will Scarlatina. 8. Her mother’s name is Meg Scarlatina.

WHAT? WHAT??????????? HUH????????????????????????

Okay, I know this seems like a bizarre thing to latch onto when there’s already so much fucked up here, but huh?????? These are the names? You chose? Will and Meg??????????????????? Never mind that they do NOT flow into their surnames at all (Meg Scarlatina????????????????????), but also the fact that Meg makes me think of Family Guy (which is something I NEVER want to think about, thanks,) just makes this a fuckin’ TRIAL of pain for me. Will and Meg???????

Did they pick up a phonebook — or, like, an online one — and grab the first two names they saw? Did they get a dartboard and put on a blindfold and launch darts across the room? Was this a socially-distanced[1] conference call gone wrong? I’m BEWILDERED. I learnt these names from someone posting about it in my discord chat, and I thought it was them telling a shit joke to try and piss me off. Are we really serious?

And to me, the name thing really epitomises this whole section. These names — that don’t fit well, that don’t really make sense with the whole colour-name lore, that don’t sound like they should be within a 20-mile radius of RWBY canon — are like the excerpt itself: bonkers. Bonkers bananas. Where every page brings in a new and unprecedented level of huh???????? that I JUST can’t get over.

Now, again. I don’t want my take on Velvet’s parents to be canon. No, really, I’m gonna use them for an original fic, RT don’t touch them they’re mine and they’re going to be in a novel. A series, even. It may even be erotica! But that’s neither here nor there; when I made Ash and Taffeta, I spent a lot of time reverse-engineering (my brand of) Velvet to put the pieces together. How did she grow up to be who she is now? What influences did she have? What examples did her parents set? What were her family like, and how did she take that upbringing forwards? And I spent a lot of time thinking about who they were, the environment they fostered, and I spent so many hours googling names it doesn’t even bear thinking about. Point being: I put a lot of time and energy and love into the Scarlatina family because I wanted, so badly, to have a family people could be, well, jealous of! A family so big-hearted and kind and full of love and furious compassion that you couldn’t help but wanna be there.

To me, this… take. This version of Velvet’s parents being peddled as canon is just so… unreal. Never mind that it’s been so many years since Velvet was unveiled, so many years people have developed headcanons of their own that, honestly, at this point, why bother? But it’s so frustrating to have taken time to make a queer family built on the solarpunk and socialist and eco-friendly and green-thinking and sustainable ways of being to then have canon turn around and say, okay, what if her dad’s a bootlicker, Velvet’s a mini clone of him, and the marriage Velvet’s parents have is on the rocks due to a trope older than time itself! Why? Why bother? What can this possibly add?

I’m not mad that what I wanted isn’t canon. I’m mad that what canon has given is so… lackluster. So boring. So unoriginal. I feel like I’ve read this story a thousand times, but it would have been so easy to make something so much richer with just a smidgen of effort on everyone’s parts. I expect so little from canon and I’m still let down. This is somehow worse than anything I expected canon to pull. It’s wild. What a bonkers series of choices to make.

[1] I know that most of this book would’ve been planned/written before lockdown, but please bear with the joke.

#rwde #before the dawn spoilers #preview discussion #dont @ me fuckers im too busy being disappointed BUT NOT SURPRISED

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journeysintowebcomics · 4 years

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Worm Liveblog #120

UPDATE 120: Hope

Last time the Travelers plus Cody managed to escape from the quarantine. Everyone has powers – well, Oliver kind of doesn’t – and it’s all fine and dandy while they drive to the next city. This peace lasts until the first signs something’s very wrong with Noelle show themselves. Let’s continue.

Looks like there was a time skip, because Trickster is now standing at a front desk. A receptionist for someone. Trickster feels the need to smoke, and although the receptionist says that’s a bad idea, he does so anyway. He’s at Boston right now, one year and three months have passed since their arrival to this world. That means by now they’re officially a team, hm...

You know, I wish I could have read any discussion they had to decide their names. That could have been interesting to read! But yeah, by now, they all have their names, I bet. Trickster does, after all.

How had Jess put it? This world was sublime. A world that was awesome in the truer sense of the word, greater in so many respects. In a metaphorical sense, the peaks were higher, the valleys lower, works of art more artful, extremes more… extreme. It wasn’t a good thing. Make the mountains twice as tall and the chasms twice as deep, and things start crumbling.

Iiii don’t know if it’s really that worthy of admiration. I don’t think the entire world has as big of a mess as Brockton Bay does, but given entire islands have been obliterated, there are superpowered villains everywhere, and you don’t know when your life is going to be turned upside-down and most likely ruined, I sure would prefer a world like the Earth without parahumans. Besides, it’s not like the general population gets to enjoy the high technology and all that. Most of those are limited to the heroes and villains’ use. It doesn’t seem to me like any random person lives much different of a life than they would if there were no powers around. No, thanks, you keep your awesome world, I’m satisfied with mine.

The person Trickster came to meet is called Accord, and looks more like the kind of supervillain that tries to make things civilized and orderly for his own again. Like Coil, but less sinister. And less successful, since he’s not even the most influential villain in Boston. Accord shakes Trickster’s hand and asks for the reason for his visit. Well it turns out Trickster is here to reach some agreements and introduce himself, as it’s customary for him when he arrives at a new city. Gotta make sure you’re not stepping on anyone’s toes, you see.

Hah! He asks for permission before committing crimes. I doubt many villains are like Skitter in that they want to keep their communities orderly and with the least amount of trouble possible, but it’s good he’s being prudent. You don’t want to mess with villains.

“If I granted that permission, Trickster,” Accord raised a warning finger. “I would not be doing so for free.”

Trickster nodded. “I understand, and I wouldn’t expect you to. We’ve recently passed through Richmond, Paine, Baltimore and Philadelphia. Each time, we paid a modest up front fee to anyone that hosted us in their territory. We also offered up a twelve, thirteen, twelve and ten percent share, respectively, of our take. For you, if you’ll allow me to make an opening offer, I’d suggest ten thousand dollars up front and a fourteen percent share of anything we gain. We’ll be saying for ten days.”

And it turns out ten days is longer than they usually stay. Golly, that means they have been a very, very, veeery long time in Brockton Bay by now, that’s the most stable place of residence they have had. It’s because Coil can help them, I’m sure. But yeah, they’re on the move more often than I thought. Destructive Noelle or not, I thought it was like...a monthly thing. At this rate they’ll run out of places to be at in this country!

Trickster seems to be trying to be particularly flattering, offering Accord more money and being generally polite. Since he gets information before making a move, I suppose he was told he had to be as flattering as possible. Regardless, it’s working. Accord sees right through Trickster, but he’s accepting the offer, although with a warning not to scam him.

I’m not sure what Accord’s power is. There’s a lot of emphasis on things being rather orderly, but I’m uncertain if that’s an indication of what his superpower is, or if he’s just a very neat person.

Accord looked down and corrected the position of the pen on his desk before turning back to Trickster. “Fifteen thousand dollars, and fifteen percent of any take. The heroes don’t have a strong presence here because they don’t need a strong presence here. I maintain the peace. It will cost me if I have people here, active and causing trouble.”

Okay! Maybe he does keep the community safe to some extent. In that case, he should keep under wraps that he’s getting a share of the bounty from any stealing the Travelers do. Just in case. I’m sure there’d be people who would be very upset about that, even if they can do nothing about it.

Since the Travelers are here, Accord offers to forgo the fifteen thousand dollars from his fee and reduce his share, as long as they complete a job for him. Hey, Luke, there’s a job offer! The job is to steal tools from a tinker. Seems like Accord isn’t a tinker at all.

“Blasto. A tinker. Not quite the destructive personality his name implies.”

“I read up on him. Blasto from the latin prefix, meaning bud, germination or seed. Tinker botanist, grows walking, sentient plants in giant glass tubes.”

Not what I’d have imagined from that name, I admit. My knowledge of latin prefixes is quite lacking, turns out – and given I speak Spanish as my native language, that’s kind of sad. But, you know, if the intent is to steal tools and destroy this Blasto tinker’s stuff, Trickster and Sundancer is perfect for this. They should be done in no time! Which is why I suppose it won’t be that simple.

That said...I doubt it’ll get written. It’d be quite the side story! But it’d extend this origin interlude for maybe a tad too long. I’m not sure how well this all was received back when it was written, but I know I’d be kind of annoyed at a meandering interlude. Still...hey, Mr. Wildbow, how much do I have to donate for you to write how this went?

Not only he’ll forgo the entrance fee and reduce his share, he also will make costumes for the Travelers! Oh boy! Does that mean the costumes they’re all wearing in the present were designed by Accord? Didn’t expect that, honestly.

And you bring the world a little more in order, Trickster thought. Accord was a thinker, and the running theory on his power was that he got naturally smarter as the problems he was addressing got more complex. It gave him an intuitive understanding of groupthink, politics, and convoluted designs. It also made him a local warlord capable of devastating counterattacks. The power failed to grant him the same advantages in a one-on-one fight, and he wasn’t quite the same battlefield strategist when it came to direct assaults.

Which was, Trickster understood, why Accord wanted him and the other Travelers to handle the attack on their own.

Huh. That’s...a power. I’m not entirely sure how useful it is, I admit. It’s...a bit underwhelming, to some extent? But he has achieved some success, so I suppose he knows how to get use out of it. Maybe he’s like Tattletale. More like a mastermind type of person. Just that instead of finding out secrets like Tattletale does, he finds...solutions to problems.

Say, I just realized that when they attack Blasto there really are veeeery high chances it won’t go according to plan, thanks to a certain leader whose name I won’t reveal. He hasn’t been a particularly impressive force when it’s about attacking someone else’s lair. Personally I can’t let go of the Slaughterhouse Nine rescue, really.

Only four people will need costumes. Trickster himself, Sundancer, Ballistic...hm. Genesis wouldn’t need a costume because she does everything with her creations, Oliver wouldn’t want to be anywhere near a battle, so...Noelle or Cody.

Cody. The text pretty much says Noelle won’t get a costume. So this Cody person is still going with the group, one year later. He hasn’t gotten in the way of their return home. Say, how far in the past is this, I wonder? Could it be Cody’s...not-being-in-the-team is a more recent change than I thought?

The relatively pleasant discussion is interrupted when Sundancer bursts into the office, alarming Trickster, who had told her to stay back and not meddle. That she was disobeying and ruining Trickster’s carefully calculated meeting plan meant something was very, very wrong, and he should be worried. Hah! He’s got more immediate things to be worried about, right there! Accord isn’t happy at all with Sundancer.

Accord stepped over to the window behind his desk and stared outside. Trickster waited patiently as the man composed himself. Long seconds passed, and Trickster couldn’t help but imagine the worst case scenarios that would have Sundancer forgetting common sense and crashing a private meeting between supervillains.

I can only imagine it’s related to Noelle. Maybe she’s out there, causing immense amounts of havoc, in a sample of what will happen to Brockton Bay in the present. It’d be quite the way to establish how big of a Noelle threat is.

And there’s the immediate threat! Accord isn’t happy at all, and is already laying a series of demands. One: he’ll get the full amount of money he demanded. Okay then. Two: they’ll complete the mercenary job and receive nothing in exchange. It’s going to suck, but I guess it was to be expected. Three: Sundancer has to die. Beg your pardon?

Trickster tensed. Really, really didn’t want to have to fight this guy. “Let’s… not be so hasty.”

Okay then! Accord just made the stakes go way higher. So, Sundancer is very obviously alive in the present, so as I see it, there’s only one possibility: Trickster killed Accord. I really doubt by now fleeing Boston is an option, and given how upset Accord is with the...imbalance Sundancer brought to his turf, I don’t think he’d accept something else in exchange of her life. Unless she proves to be absolutely stellar in the mercenary job. Who knows, maybe she burned Blasto’s lair to the ground and that saved her.

How to convince the lunatic to leave Sundancer alone? If he couldn’t, would it be better to fight and kill Accord now or wait until he could recruit the others? Accord wouldn’t have invited him to a meeting if he didn’t have some kind of safeguards. Traps? For all Trickster knew, there was a pitfall in the floor or dart traps in the walls. Accord’s power, his knack for complexity, would make it trivial to weave such things into the architecture of his home and office. If he knew, he could use his power, time it to put Accord in the way of his own trap… but it could be something else entirely.

I meeeean...if he has the ability to make traps and safeguards, I’m certain making it so Trickster can’t use his power effectively to attack him would be easy as pie. Also, given how it was remarked Accord isn’t very good in one-on-one confrontations and is a warlord, I think it’s plausible he has a few people ready to act if things go pear-shaped. He wouldn’t rely on himself to ensure his own safety if he knows he wouldn’t be enough.

Accord was still talking. “Others aren’t so accommodating. They are freefalling, careening elements, bouncing off any and every surface, damaging everything they touch. Pyrokinetics so often fall into this category, I’ve found. Rest assured, it’s better to eliminate this disordered element before it does too much damage.”

...suddenly I have a nagging feeling Sundancer burning Blasto’s plants and lair to the ground would make things worse in Accord’s eyes. Scrap that plan. New plan: lose your powers, and then get them back before you get to Brockton Bay. There, problem solved. I’m a problem solver now, Accord-lite, praise me.

Turns out Trickster does think of a possible alternative on how to handle this. He appeals to Accord’s sense of order, saying Sundancer is an agent of harmony despite her powers, and that she’ll prove it to him. Trickster has effectively placed the burden of proof right on Sundancer’s hands. Masterful leader move, pal, throwing the weight onto your subordinate and friend. But hey, she’s alive in Brockton Bay, meaning it worked, meaning I have no grounds to complain. Besides, he’s going to discuss it with Sundancer right now. I for one am looking forward to finding out what he intends to suggest she does.

Trickster gets ten minutes to male Sundancer go into Accord’s office – alone. As expected, Sundancer is taken aback by the fact her life is in danger just like that. I share Trickster’s opinion in that Sundancer wouldn’t ruin Trickster’s meeting if there wasn’t a very good reason, though...she even tried to bring it up immediately, and Trickster didn’t let her speak. At least he’ll get briefed by someone else.

When the timer hits zero, you’ll walk into his office, then you’ll perform a ballet routine.

Well! That’s not going to bring up any good memories, is it. Given how one of Sundancer’s memories was freezing and not being able to do a thing, in front of a public, I hope it won’t happen again. At least she won’t have the Simurgh showing her those awful memories over and over, but still...ouch, the things she has to do to survive.

If he gives any sign he’s not satisfied, or the second you fuck up, set the place on fire and scram.”

“Krouse-”

“Call me Trickster when I’m in costume,” he corrected, his voice hard. “Don’t worry about burning him alive. He’ll have escape routes.

Oh, yeah, he’ll have escape routes. You know what else he’ll have? A desire to have both your heads on a plate, just saying. If he gets his office incinerated, there won’t be anything that’ll stop him from getting everyone he has to pursue the Travelers, I’m sure of it.

Since she has to go get ready and hopefully save her own life, Sundancer hurries inside, leaving Trickster to find out what problem is going on that made Sundancer risk ruining everything like that.

“It’s Cody. He touched Noelle.”

Trickster froze. “How bad is it?”

“Three times, Krouse.”

“Three,” Trickster said. “Fuck me. I’m on my way.”

Okay then! It was Cody’s fault. Not surprised he’s being a pain, really. He touched Noelle a total of three times, and that is...bad. For reasons I imagine I’ll find out very soon.

There’s no way Cody’s stupid enough to make contact with Noelle.

There’s no way anyone would do it three times. How?

Hm. I don’t know what exactly are the consequences of touching Noelle, but given the fact it was three times, I doubt it was an accident. It happening once would give him the benefit of the doubt, it happening three times pretty much guarantees it was on purpose, unless it turns out there was a really contrived reason like...some parahuman slamming Cody onto Noelle three times or something. But seriously, what happens when you touch Noelle?

Apparently whatever’s happening is among a crowd, and Trickster searches while thinking how everything they have been doing recently is minimize damage. Well, given how they keep moving because of Noelle, I imagine she’s the source of the damage. Does this mean lately she’s been getting worse? More powerful, dangerous?

What Trickster encounters reminds me a lot of those very mutated monstrous humans that arrived with the Simurgh. It’s a very deformed person, attacking bystanders and being rather violent. This mutant’s nature is revealed right afterwards:

Three seconds later, the man snapped back into the same position, in front of the creature. Perdition… Cody. Except not quite. The man carried through the shoving motion, but Perdition wasn’t there any more.

That’s Cody? Goodness gracious, what did he do?! Holy crap. What I note is that nowhere in the description Trickster gave of that thing attacking, he mentioned it looked like Cody at all. The extent of those tumor things on him and the twisted crooked factions must be such there isn’t much left of Cody. Noelle must have some sort of mutagenic quality, then. Perhaps she mutates those that make contact with her skin? Since that was what was fizzing and all that. And the more you touch her, the worse it gets. Cody touched her three times. Here’s the result, I suppose.

Innocent children are about to get attacked, and Trickster shouts to get Perdition’s attention. May as well exploit Perdition’s hatred of him! And it works, Perdition swivels around, looking for Trickster to do him some harm. Trickster keeps moving around to stay out of his sight while Perdition shouts slurred threats, accusing Trickster of having taken everything from him. Technically he did – except the part about ‘my girl’, because Noelle was never his – but it’s not like Trickster one day woke up and thought ‘oh you know what’d be a riot? Let’s ruin that Cody guy’s life’. Perdition is lashing out as usual, really.

Some of the time, the powers would be different. Most of the time, going by precedent, they were stronger. Trickster was left to wonder how Perdition’s powers had changed. Duration? Range? The amount of time reversed?

Huh, that so? It could be the mutations are an attempt to enhance the powers of those who touch her, then? And it doesn’t work properly because she didn’t take the vial correctly. That doesn’t take into account the eye thing from last chapter’s ending, though...right now my thought about that is that maybe she’s not immune to her own mutations. It could even be that Perdition touching her made her even worse.

Perdition uses his powers to keep track of Trickster, getting him closer and closer to him to perform some murderin’. Trickster tries to stay away, although that soon leads to...well...casualties. There have been at least two so far. Damn. Trickster makes some calculations and tries to think of a plan on how to handle this.

What he does is hurry, swap himself with one of the casualties’ bodies, and shoot Perdition to death. Well! That was anticlimactic. I’m pretty sure if Perdition knew how simple that was, he’d be very upset. So this is why he’s not part of the team nowadays...not really how I expected him to die, although I did expect Trickster to be the one to kill him.

The next scene starts with Francis arriving to a place, where I suppose the rest of the Travelers are hiding. Oliver is already waiting for him, and the effects of his half of the power potion are shown: Oliver is handsome. Like, real handsome and smarter and also learns skills? He got lucky, then. If this is the extent of what his botched power has, then he’s incredibly lucky. But it’s still Oliver, so he’s as milquetoast and socially stunted as usual. Maybe forever, given how he’s...pretty much in a stranger’s body.

...

Maybe he wasn’t as lucky as I thought at first, when I think about it like that.

Fuck you, Simurgh, Krouse thought. They’d all been forced to deal with their individual tragedies. Noelle’s went without saying. Jess hadn’t gotten to walk, Luke hadn’t gotten to fly, Oliver got a physical and mental overhaul without any fixes for the real problems, and Marissa had been thrust into the situation she’d fought so hard to escape, where she was forced to pursue a life she didn’t want.

Krouse’s tragedy was waiting for him inside.

Wow. Things are pretty bad for everyone here, but the way it’s worded Luke’s plight is so out of place. He didn’t get the power to fly. That sucks, but it certainly isn’t on anyone else’s level. Surely there must be something else about this situation that’s more fitting to bring up as Luke’s tragedy. Maybe that he’s very dissatisfied with being part of this group and feels they’re getting nowhere? That’s the impression I have of him in the present, after all.

Between Francis and Oliver they manage to drag Cody’s corpse to the living room, where there are...another two. Two more of Cody. Okay then! Looks like something’s going on. Does someone care to explain? One Cody is bad enough, the universe doesn’t need two more, hah!

Noelle is upset right now and it’s Francis’ duty to go calm her down. Before he goes he glances at the bodies.

They all stared at the bodies. This would be the third incident. Or incidents three through five, if he wanted to count it that way.

This can mean either this is the third incident where mutated people go and cause destruction, or this is the third time Cody has touched Noelle. Both are equally plausible, honestly – but I lean towards the former, because...then it would mean Noelle is causing some awful terror and destruction. Just like a Simurgh thrall would. Everyone else in the Travelers, taking her around the country, are doing their part as well.

There’s a lot of injured people and a few casualties because of the many Perditions. The...real Perdition? He’s somewhere inside the house. Nobody has found out what exactly happened, why Cody would touch Noelle three times despite presumably knowing really well what would happen. Francis will have to deal with this problem, since he’s the leader. First he goes to smoke for a while.

Sundancer has arrived! And she’s unharmed, thank goodness. Looks like her dancing routine in front of Accord went well, then! Or not, as she says two lines later. It satisfied Accord anyway, so may as well take that as a victory.

“No,” she said. “He said I wasn’t perfect, but that he saw what you meant. He said I was trying, despite myself. I… I don’t know if that was a compliment or not.”

That’s definitely a compliment. If it wasn’t, then she wouldn’t be here alive, or at the very least there’d be mercenaries pursuing her. She must have done well – not being the agent of chaos and disorder Accord thought she’d be, despite her incendiary powers.

Since Mars has been declared not responsible for the incredible chaos from today, Accord wants Francis to bring the real cause. He decides he won’t be bringing Noelle – obviously not, because that’d be incredibly dangerous and, more importantly, there’s no way Francis would backstab Noelle. Instead, he decides he’ll take Cody. Hah! Well it’s pretty clear Cody isn’t harmonious at all, so...maybe that’ll work. It helps that those berserk things were literally him.

Mars isn’t into the ‘let’s blame Cody for everything’ plan because it’s very likely Cody will die, and Francis although isn’t happy about it either, sees no other option. Is he going to inform everyone else of his decision? Because I figure everybody would like to be aware one of their teammates is going to be murdered by a local villain, even if it’s Cody.

As Francis sees it, there’s only one scenario where Cody would be in contact with Noelle three times, and it is that Cody went to wherever she is, was a major dick like he usually is, and made her so upset she attacked him so badly Cody has broken limbs. An arm and a leg. Well those sure are two of the three contact spots!

“He had a goal in mind, only he didn’t anticipate how fast she moves, how strong she is. He was trying to do one of two things. Either he did something general, said something, with the aim of making her go berserk… or he tried to kill her. One way or another, Cody wanted to end this. End our mission. Free himself. He doesn’t give a fuck about the promise, so I don’t see why the promise should protect him.”

Cody was trying to kill her? I’m not sure about that. He has to know Noelle has some form of fast regeneration, meaning hurting her physically is a chore and almost unlikely to work. Also, he has to know touching her is a very bad idea. No, I’m leaning more towards thinking he was once again disparaging people around and trying to not be an outsider, and for some reason he was...talking with Noelle...and said something he shouldn’t have...and...okay this reasoning is kind of falling apart by the seams. Fucking Cody. What the hell was he planning?

Well at least Francis is going to talk to everyone else before taking a decision, he even is going to have a word with Cody to see if his suspicions have a reasonable base or not. That’s more than Cody usually gets, really – although I doubt he’ll appreciate it at all, what with Francis being the one to talk to him and what not. Oh well. Now that that’s...somewhat settled, Mars has the task of going to get a lot of food for Noelle. A lot of meat, in fact. Right, I kind of remember that was necessary. Geez.

Before she leaves, there’s something else to bring up!

“I almost forgot. Accord. He wanted me to pass this on.”

She handed him a piece of paper. There was a number printed on it. Different area code.

Holy crap, Mars, you can’t just forget something Accord asked you to do. You almost died today because you metaphorically stepped on the guy’s toes, and you were about to do it again. Goodness gracious...and the reason why she’s hesitant to even remember stuff Accord asks is because she doesn’t want to interact with guys like him. Hah! Boy will her time under Coil’s employment be a treat, then. Coil and Accord seem to be a rather similar kind of person, just that Coil is far more sinister in so many different ways – although I’m sure Accord has his own shady plans, of course.

Once Mars has left, Francis dials the number and gets in contact with whoever it is. Francis doesn’t seem to appreciate much having to call acquaintances of Accord. It’s only when this person says it’s a long-term job I have a hunch of who it is. That you, Coil? Will it turn out Accord and Coil do know each other? Hah! Well! I was saying they were kind of similar in terms of the way they work, but I never thought they knew each other.

“I know Accord through a mutual acquaintance. Through this acquaintance and my own resources, I’ve gathered a fairly robust set of data on you Travelers.“

Intereeeesting. I think there’s a pretty good chance this acquaintance is the entirety of Cauldron. In that case, could it be Accord got his powers from Cauldron? Also, if they got information about them through Cauldron, then it means that big shady organization that gives powers is aware of the Travelers and how they got the powers. Oh boy! No indication Cauldron has sent superpowered thugs to take due revenge for the Travelers pretty much stealing powers, hmmmmm...could it be Cauldron is letting them do whatever they want, knowing they can use them later? It’d explain that, at least.

The person, who I’m absolutely certain is Coil, says he’s offering a solution to three things in exchange for them working for him. That’s enough to get Francis’ attention, he’s willing to listen. Make your offer, Coil!

I thought he was Luke Brito, not Luke Casseus. Either way, there are records of one Luke Casseus and one Noelle Meinhardt who were once in the hospital at the quarantine, and seem to have appeared out of nowhere. Most people would simply think those teenagers used fake names for some reason, but Coil has more information that indicates there’s something going on.

Also, Meinhardt is a cool last name. I like it a lot.

“Rest assured, Trickster, there is no need for any alarm. The fact that I know these things is an asset to you. A contact of mine in the PRT has taken over your case file and requisitioned all details on your encounter with Myrddin. That case will not be pursued further.“

I suppose Myrddin gave all the information and control of that particular investigation and just…focused on the myriad of other things he has to deal with. I guess that makes sense, but I’d have thought the PRT would be far more attentive with investigations involving roaming Simurgh thralls. Coil and Cauldron’s influence is quite notable.

So, Coil has three solutions that will solve all of the Travelers’ problems. One is that Coil will offer all the money they need. Right, about that...since you’re offering, can you send them $15000 in cash, they need it kind of urgently.

The second solution is that he’ll send them home. Naturally, they wouldn’t work for him unless he made such an offer. The contacts he’s talking about are undoubtedly in Cauldron, more concretely the one who can make portals to reach Cauldron’s buildings. Given Coil’s...demeanor, I think he really would have fulfilled his end of the deal once he had taken over Brockton Bay, at least when it’s about sending them home. Unlike Dinah, there’s really no reason to keep the Travelers around, it’s not like they’re especially noteworthy as a team and other than Noelle their powers are nothing too remarkable. Who knows, though...maybe he’d have tried to keep Noelle, for one reason or another. Make clones of his soldiers or something to have a permanent source of non-powered mercenaries.

The last thing Coil offers is not said in the text, but I imagine it’s related to Noelle, since that was the other thing the Travelers were so worried about. They wouldn’t work for Coil unless he promised to fix her. Which is very...unlikely, really...but not impossible. If there’s someone who maybe could, it’s Cauldron. At a very, very, incredibly exorbitant price, I suppose, but they could. Don’t ask me how, though, because I don’t have the slightest idea. I’m not part of the group who sells bottled powers around.

Francis goes into the house, where Luke tries to get him to join them into a meeting about what they’ll do about Cody. The chance to explain they’re throwing him at Accord and hoping for the best! But nope, first he wants to talk to Noelle.

“After, Luke,” Krouse said. He spun around, faced his friend. “I think we’ve got what we’re looking for.”

“What?”

“A way home. Maybe even a fix for Noelle.”

Maybe a fix for Noelle, he says, meaning that even though that may be what Coil offered, he didn’t phrase it as a certainty at all. Merely a possibility. But...a possibility is the best they can get, really.

Promising to tell everyone else – sans Cody, I imagine – what the solution to all their problems is like, Noelle knocks to the door of Noelle’s room, where she immediately tells him to go away. Boy, even if she returns to normal, she won’t be anywhere close to Francis, I’m sure of that. It’s over between them, isn’t it?

Doesn’t take much to convince her to let him enter, so he does. The inside of the room is all broken, no word on if it was like that before Cody pissed her off.

“Come to talk?” she asked. “Keep me company?”

“I was planning on doing it a little later. Things are kind of a mess out there, you know. The Cody situation.”

“Nobody keeps me company any more. Only you.”

Ouch. Not even Mars? That must hurt. I had the impression Noelle was in good terms with pretty much everyone, that only Francis visits her...well, that really sucks. Is it perhaps because they’re afraid of touching her and making more of those deformed copies happen?

Noelle sure doesn’t try to deny Francis’ theory about Cody’s murder attempt, she instead says she can’t die. She has tried to end it. So yeah, she does have fast healing.

“I’m one of them. Or I’m becoming that way.”

“Maybe.”

“An Endbringer.”

So that was the Simurgh’s plan? To create a...pseudoendbringer? Since they were never human in the first place, from what I was told ages ago, it’s unlikely Noelle will turn into one, but she’ll...be pretty close to one if things get worse, she fears. And apparently, given what she can do, it’s not an outlandish possibility.

“I’ll be just as bad as the Simurgh. In a different way. I touch someone, and then I spit out copies. Uglier, stronger… meaner. I can’t control them. If I got my hands on one of the major heroes? Someone like that Myrddin guy?”

It’ll be even worse if she gets her hands on many of the major heroes. Many evil copies of the major heroes roaming around and destroying everything would make things go downhill fast, that’s for sure.

You know, in general I’m against clones as a plot point, but I think this is fine. This is interesting!

Francis brings up that he talked with someone who maybe will be able to help them, and that they should give it a try because this person knows a person who has a way, who goes between worlds.

Aha, so this is how Coil got Francis aboard. He promised hope, not by promising to heal Noelle and send them all back to their worlds – but by promising to get them out of the Simurgh’s plans.

“No, listen. The Simurgh? This guy said she has a weakness. Two ways where she can’t see the future. Two ways to break free of her cause and effect.”

Noelle didn’t say anything.

“The first way, you’ve got to be basically immune to powers. Scion is. He’s immune to precognition, throws everything out the window when he shows up. I saw it when he fought the Simurgh. She couldn’t automatically dodge his stuff, because she either couldn’t read his mind or she couldn’t see the attacks before they happened. So he hit her, a bunch of times. I saw it.”

That supposed weakness isn’t going to lead anywhere, really. What is Coil going to do? Get Cauldron to fill the Travelers up with powers until they’re like Scion? Hardly. I don’t think it’d even be feasible because...I mean...having more than one power into you has to make some of them interact with each other in nasty ways, no? Taking half a vial is bad, taking two or more has to be bad too if you don’t know what you’re doing. No, the whatever this second way is like has to be what they’re looking for.

Also, that’d be hella expensive and not even Coil would be able to buy it, I’m sure.

Krouse was getting more excited, had to press his hand flat against the floor to stop it from shaking. “And the other way? There’s thinker powers that mess with her ability to influence events. If another precog gets a hand in events, the Simurgh automatically shuts them down and vice-versa. The way this guy said it, the precogs get overloaded with the second-guessing the other precog, on top of having to figure out all the quantum possibilities and split paths. And this guy? He has a power that messes with precogs some, and the precog working for him has a power that will help circumvent the Simurgh’s power. Get it? So long as we work for him, we’re free of it. No more cause and effect. No more feeling like we’re doomed no matter what choice we make. We go from that kind of safety to home. To our world.“

I suppose this precog is supposed to be Dinah, because I can’t recall anyone else who has that kind of power and is under Coil’s employment – also, employment is definitely not the right word to use when it’s about Dinah, Coil, that’s imprisonment. Either way, if not Dinah, then...Tattletale is the closest one I can think, but she can’t foresee the future and I’m sure Coil knows that rather well. No, it has to be Dinah.

Which would give the Travelers a lot of encouragement to get in Skitter’s way, really. If Dinah is giving them the safety they need to not be destroying everything in their path, then of course they would disapprove of Skitter trying to free her. Still...do things really work like that? I don’t know, something’s off here.

I just find a bit hard to believe Dinah can singlehandedly stop the Simurgh’s cause and effect. Is there a ratio of effect or what? Does Dinah have to think of the Travelers? The details are a tad vague. I’m sure Mr. Wildbow thought the details well, so I’m not going to insult him by insinuating he didn’t think things through with that paragraph, but the amount of details given to me the reader right now is kind of lacking. I’m kind of leaning towards the possibility Coil is wrong about how this all works. Or he’s hiding something. This just...needs more building upon.

What follows to this is the reveal of what’s going on with Noelle. I had months to imagine what could be so bad it needed a vault and widespread panic, and this doesn’t disappoint. It’s worse than I expected. What can I say, I’m somewhat optimistic by nature, the worst case scenarios aren’t something I indulge into if I can avoid it, haha...ha...but yeah, this is nasty.

Around where her pelvis should have been, she’d changed. The mass of tissue left her tall enough that she had to hunch over to avoid hitting her head on the ceiling, and she was lying down. Half of it was angry, red, wrinkled or blistered. The other half was smooth tissue, dark greens, dark brown and pale grays. The head of an animal, half-bovine and half-canine, extended from the front, large as a horse from the back of its skull to the tip of its flaring nostrils. Another head was in progress, emerging just to the left. Two forelegs extended to either side of the heads, rippling with powerful muscle, ending in something that fell between claw and hoof, massive and easily capable of tearing through steel.

There were the fingers and thumb of a hand, extending from her right hindquarters, each digit thicker around than Krouse was, with another, smaller limb extending from the palm. Her rear left hindquarters featured only a mess of tentacles, some bearing partial exoskeleton, some long enough that they had to encircle the massive head and numerous limbs, or wind in a wreath around her as she lay down, lest their coiled mass fill the master bedroom of the house and leave Krouse nowhere to sit. Despite the apparent lack of bones, the tentacles were capable of supporting her weight.

It’s like she’s piling more and more tissue and forming...limbs. And a couple heads, for some reason? I’m morbidly curious if she can see through that head that’s already formed. Oh god. Here I am, trying to distract myself with banal thoughts like...how do the Travelers manage to move Noelle from city to city, do they steal a freight truck every time? Sorry, I’m thinking of all kinds of things to distract myself about how horrible it must be to be Noelle right now, augh

I can see why nobody else but Francis visits her, though. It must be hard to...to see Noelle and try to not focus on what’s going on with her. Not many would have the...bravery to face her and try to make small talk or anything. What would you even say if you went to see her? How uncomfortable, for both Noelle and someone else, would it be to sit around and try not to talk about the elephant in the room? This is a situation nobody is prepared to deal with. I can definitely understand why it’s easier to just...not go see her at all.

But damn that must feel very lonely for Noelle.

She’d tried to starve herself, to die of thirst. It had turned out badly. She’d gone berserk and killed forty people in one autumn night. Their tissues had played a large part in building the massive fingers and thumb that extended behind her.

Welp! The Simurgh really knew what she was doing. That’s all I have to say. Well played.

And so that’s how the Travelers started working under Coil. Because they were given hope. And nooooow that hope is gone. Here is the present time now, where Coil is dead. No wonder Noelle went berserk and escaped the vault. Where could she have gone...? Where could she be hiding? Because...if she was destroying anything, they would have heard about it even before they saw the broken vault.

But it still can happen. In the very near future. The rage of Noelle.

He had no doubt as to who had died here. Could remember the scene as it had been just before he’d been knocked unconscious, could remember where people had been standing.

Another wave crashed against the beach. He heard the seagulls cawing angrily, wanting the morsels that littered the ground in front of him.

Krouse spent a very long time staring at the stain.

This must be the end for this interlude arc. It’s quite the ending, pretty poignant. A quick check on the next chapter link shows that yeah, a new arc is starting next time.

So yeah, that’s it. The Travelers’ arc is over. Must say, this may be one of my favorite arcs so far. It sure makes a few things seem different than before. I appreciated the extensive peek into the circumstances of the Travelers and everything they went through. They’re quite a tragic group, really. In one single day they went from just a normal gaming team to a superpowered bunch without a home and having to lug around someone who is...slowly and horrifically mutating into a mess of flesh that creates mutant copies of people. Pretty amazing they all have held onto their sanity, really.

I’m sure the next arc – which I suppose will be about possibly finding and fighting Noelle – will be quite a thing! I’m looking forward to that.

Next time.

Next time: in three updates

#worm #worm liveblog #webserial #liveblog #webserial liveblog

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slo-liveblog · 4 years

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Witch’s Heart Final Thoughts

Hellooo! It’s been a bit! I figured I’d go ahead and post that big ol’ thoughts and rambles post before I went ahead and started the Bonus Stage. I’ll probably be doing some similarly styled things in the future... anyways, I hope you’ve all been doing well, and don’t mind the long post!

CHARACTERS

Claire: Oh my god. I would give my life for Claire in a heartbeat. I was honestly expecting to not care for her much, not that RPG maker games don’t have plenty of female protagonists I like but they’re almost exclusively children. On the adult side of things, not so much. I was expecting a mostly silent audience insert at best and an annoying, shallowly written protagonist at worst. Thankfully I was 100% wrong and ended up absolutely loving her and rooting for her all the way. I probably said at some point but she reminds me of Hiyoko Tohsaka, the protagonist from Hatoful Boyfriend... yes, the bird dating simulator, don’t even get me started. Maybe a little bit like Emma from The Promised Neverland, too. Pure of heart, dumb of ass female characters that could beat the shit out of anyone AND are incredibly compassionate and enjoyable to watch are just too damn rare. The ways in which she interacted with the other mains felt completely organic and I was never skeptical as to why she was spending time with them, which is something I tend to take issue with in games with a scenario/route structure. On the flip side, the reactions the mains had to her were completely understandable- as far as they were meant to be, anyway- and I found myself at least somewhat identifying with their thoughts on her. Like Leon, I too am in love with Claire.

Ashe: Oh Ashe. Fuck Ashe. In terms of livening up any situation he’s in, for better or for worse, he’s an absolutely perfect abomination of nature. Every time he enters a scene I either laugh or am filled with pure, unfiltered rage, which I guess is a good sign. He’s definitely an excellent wild card that makes the experience better no matter what way you look at it. However.... in hindsight I think he might actually be the character we understand the least at this point, despite being the first person you meet and the first to get a scenario (if you play it in the order I did, anyway). Even Wiwardo, who’s silent 90% of the damn time, does have a pretty clear motivation. It seems likely that Ashe’s wish is to bring back his family, but not only do we not know anything about them or how they died, we also don’t have any context as to how Ashe became the sort of person he did. So it’s hard to really have a full grasp on him... I appreciate his character for what it is, but I’m not quite as enthusiastic about him as I am some of the others... yet.

Reynaldo: Reynaldo makes me want to start throwing things, in a good thing. I didn’t liveblog the beginning of the game, but I distinctly remember telling my friends he was my favorite initially- the bizarre name, the gun sprite that inexplicably makes me laugh, seems like just a sexi guy. I adore the reveal of what the curse/his wish was, and I think despite not knowing much about the particulars yet it says enough about why he is the way he is that it works perfectly even without the missing information. He’s a fascinating character and has a TON of the best moments in the game, for me personally anyway. My one major complaint would just be like... c’mon, I know he’s the stoic type but I would’ve liked just a liiiiittle bit more reaction from him in some of the bigger scenes, such as when Claire confronted Invective. Also I hate him and I’m gonna beat him up

Sirius: Baby boy. Baby. I want to hold his hand. He’s the character that I think is the easiest to understand at this point in the game, as his cards are almost all on the table. We’ve seen snippets of his childhood, gotten him to reveal pretty much all his thoughts and relevant knowledge to Claire, we’ve literally seen him go to hell, all the good stuff. Male tsunderes, at least ones that are still generally nice people like Sirius, are sooort of my weakness. There’s not a lot to say about him that I haven’t already said but he deserves the world.

Leon: BABY BOY. BABY. Okay, granted, I don’t... really care about Leon that much. Don’t get me wrong, I love him and nothing bad should ever happen to him ever again. But since he didn’t really get to be present in the other’s scenarios, I don’t feel as connected to him as I do the others. BUT with that said, now that the ball has finally dropped and his whole deal isn’t a secret anymore, at least not entirely, I’m hopeful that him not being around enough’ll be rectified by the bonus stage and final endings. He’s never done anything wrong in his entire life.

Charlotte: Charlotte’s in a weird place for me where I’m intrigued but not quite into her yet. I feel like we’ve only really scratched the surface, so I’m interested to see where she goes from here. She got so many interesting scenes like the one with Noel, Fiona, and Lime in her backstory that REALLY hit the mark for me.

Zizel: Not a lot to say about Zizel, just that her interactions with Claire were absolutely adorable no matter how morbid the context. Love her.

Lime: Lime.... oh boy. I have some. Emotions. About Lime. She definitely seemed like the most one-note out of the demons when she first appeared, just sort of a cutesy masochist anime girl, but wow. I love her relationship with Charlotte and her fascination with Leon is really interesting. I kind of hope going forward that she develops more of a relationship with Claire? I dunno, feels like there’s just some untapped potential there, with Claire being as empathetic as she is and Lime being... as confused about emotions as she is.

Rouge: Again, not a ton to say about her, but her relationship with Leon ended up being way more interesting and heart-wrenching than I expected despite how little we saw of it. I appreciate that she really does care.

Overall & Final Score The characters were fucking fantastic. My only complaint is that I haven’t seen enough of them yet. 9/10

STORY

Ashe’s Route: My least favorite route, I think, though that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it. It does have the advantage of being completely new (if you played it first like I did) and Claire and Ashe’s relationship was so fucking cute and entertaining to watch. It does really feel like an introductory route though- it was mostly setup, which isn’t bad. Just not as gripping as the other routes. And the ending is... a little anticlimactic, considering you can see Ashe’s murderous tendencies coming a mile away. But there’s nothing in particular I think I would change, solid but not incredible.

Wiwardo’s Route: My second favorite route, which... I have a feeling will be an unpopular opinion. I dunno, I just really enjoyed it from start to finish. The partner swapping was hilarious and did a lot to flesh out the dynamics between the characters, Invective was really fun and fleshed out Claire’s personality as well as a lot of demon lore, and I think Reynaldo’s conclusion might be my favorite in the whole game. I was really questioning where any of it was going towards the end, it definitely had me on the edge of my seat. The main complaint I have about it though is that we... don’t actually see that much of Reynaldo. Like, at all. I mean, he’s THERE, but as I mentioned prior he doesn’t... react to much. Of course he doesn’t need to be overly emotional, that’s just not in his nature, but a few more moments where he actually had any sort of stake in what was going on might’ve been nice. The majority of the scenes he’s in prior to the boss battle hardly get any dialogue out of him at all. But like I said, the ending really made it worth it. Fighting Ashe was probably THE most cathartic boss battle in the game and the realization about what Reynaldo was going to do moments before it happened gave me chills.

Sirius’s Route: My favorite! Love my boy!! God Sirius’s route was incredible. Definitely the one that was the most consistently gripping. Exploring hell was such a cool way to make the route continue after Claire’s death and Sirius’s character development was top notch. It really felt like we were finally getting some answers, too, which was satisfying. I will say, despite being my favorite, it probably has the weakest actual conclusion. Like, the confrontation with the monster made me Feel Things, but since we don’t actually know who or what it is there’s not really as much weight as the other routes that end with Claire’s death. Still, the juicy plot revelations and character development more than made up for it.

Leon’s Route: It may not be one of my favorites but this shit fucked me up. Definitely elicited the most tears, the whole goddamn thing’s miserable. Leon’s route feels slightly lacking in the charm department for me, which probably sounds weird but... I guess it’s cause the whole thing is so laser focused on Claire. Like, obviously Leon is primarily concerned with her, so it feels like there’s less emotional or interesting moments with everyone else and the ones that ARE there aren’t as impactful as they could be since, y’know, he’s really only here for her. But that’s mostly just a personal preference and since that was the whole point I can’t really complain. Leon’s relationship with Claire was wonderfully executed and I really appreciate this poor boy.

Torch Backstories: Like. They didn’t HAVE to add all this stuff in but they sure did and wow does it pack a punch. I was always super excited to see the next one after finishing a scenario. I do wish we had a little more variety instead of half of them being Lime though, as much as I adore her character.

Overall & Final Score My only real issue with the story is, again, I haven’t seen enough of it yet, and that it sliiightly dragged in some places. Plus there were some small elements I took issue with, like the use of the ??? character, but nothing major. 9/10

GAMEPLAY

Fighting: No major complaints with the fighting mechanics, it was actually a really nice change of pace since most RPG maker games I’ve played don’t have battles. I do wish Leon had something a little different to set him apart from Claire, since he essentially has the exact same fighting style, albeit with a knife this time.

Demon Requests: This was a mixed bag. I liked the concept, especially how it wraps in a little bit of lore and everything. But some of the requests, like the ones that involved fishing, were just tedious. I probably would’ve preferred if demon requests were either just a liiiiittle less frequent or had more lore sprinkled in to keep me interested.

Scenario Mechanics & New Items: The whole idea of the scenarios is... good, but not flawless. I think giving the option of doing Reynaldo’s scenario first probably wouldn’t work very well and giving the illusion of choice only for it to just be which of the two you play first is a little redundant. But that aside, I really love the way they’re strung together with the hell room and all the things you can do there. Setting up a routine in this kind of game was a really good idea. I also looooved the new items you get each scenario, the lighter doesn’t do much but the wand and broom really feel like they broaden your horizons.

Gift Giving & Minigames: Not super into the affection system to be honest. Like, the plushies are super cute, but the gifts and minigames feel pointless and tedious. I would’ve liked if there was some sort of scene, or even multiple, per character that you get when you max their affection, you know? Obviously this is a small complaint considering the absurd amount of content in the game but I was a little disappointed by how underwhelming the gift giving was.

Other Puzzles I didn’t take issue with any particular puzzle, they were all reasonably easy and fun to do. I really enjoyed the majority of them and if I didn’t they were either over quickly or optional, such as Ashe’s damn slider puzzle.

Overall, Final Score The gameplay isn’t anything crazy, but it does what it’s meant to do. 6/10

ART & SOUND

Character Design: I don’t have a ton to say about the designs, I think they’re all really effective and well thought out, especially for the demons. No two characters look too similar despite the simplistic art style making it very easy for that to happen, and I thoroughly enjoy everyone’s outfits.

Sprites and BGs: There are a few wonky sprites here and there but for an RPG maker game I was pleasantly surprised by their overall quality. And ability to make me feel things. And quantity! Like damn, there’s so many sprites for each character, I never feel like I’m seeing too much of the same one.

OST and Sound Effects: I know none of the songs were composed for the game itself, which is common in these sorts of games, but the selection was excellent regardless. I still listen to the soundtrack a lot just for fun. The sound effects are really cute too, no complaints there either.

Overall, Final Score It’s crude at times, but the art and music is perfect for what it wants to be and elicits a hell of a lot of emotion. 7/10

I adore this game and I can’t WAIT to start Bonus Stage!

#slo lbs witchs heart #slo talks #slo reviews #no really ive been thinking abt wh for forever im dying to finally keep playing it

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duhragonball · 5 years

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Dragon Ball Z 249

So, funny story, I was going to watch Episode 250 this morning, and my DVD player quit working, so I had to go to the store and buy another one. For those of you keeping score, this is the third external disc player I’ve used on this project.

My best guess is that the mechanism that actually reads the DVD’s is getting worn out somehow. The first player I used could do Blu-Rays too, and it still can. It can play CD’s too, anything as long as it’s not a DVD. You put one in and it acts like you stuffed a cookie in there by mistake. The second one’s doing the same thing now, only it never had Blu-Ray capability, because I just wanted a cheap standby to get me through this liveblog. Hopefully this third one will last. I’ve only got 43 episodes and five movies to go.

Anyway, I’m wondering if my gif-making procedure is what’s wearing these things out so quickly. For 248, I spent a lot of time moving the playback slider on VLC Media Player, trying to recapture the footage so I could get what I needed. Most of my gifs are a little quicker. I have a rough idea how many frames of animation I can use, and I’ve gained a better sense of what I want and what my “aesthetic” is, for lack of a better term. So usually I can get what I need on the second or third pass. For Episode 248, I had some trouble, so I kept going back and replaying a few seconds of video from that disc, and I wonder if all that jumping around messed up the thing that reads DVD’s.

The discs are totally unaffected by this, I know that much. I watched 249 on the second player before it died, and I just watched 250 on the third player. What concerns me is that one of these years it’s going to get harder to find the hardware to play these things. I picked up these last two from Wal-Mart for under thirty bucks, but you used to be able to buy VHS players at Wal-Mart and now you can’t. I still have machines that’ll play the discs, and I think that’ll always be so, but I fear that it’ll get harder and harder to hook one up to a computer for gif making and screencaps.

Well, that’s a problem for another day. Today, Goku’s going back to Otherworld with Fortuneteller Baba, and this time he’s not coming back (ohhhhhhh, brother). For what it’s worth, she agrees with his decision to leave the fate of the Earth in the hands of the living. Personally, I don’t think Goku had much choice.

At King Yemma’s place, the line is backed up from all the millions of Earthlings being killed by Majin Buu. Yemma’s job is to judge each soul and determine their respective fate in the afterlife. I guess he’s pretty quick in general, but this is enough to tax even his system.

Goku cuts in line and asks about Gohan, since everyone but Videl thinks Buu already killed him. But Yemma can’t find him on the rolls, and he’s sure he would have remembered Goku’s son if he ever came through. So Goku has proof that Gohan survived, and he’s thrilled. Now Gohan can still help the others against Majin Buu.

But before Goku can celebrate this, Yemma informs him about Dabura’s death. The flashback shows him being dragged before Yemma by his employees, which reminds me a lot of when Cell was brought before Yemma. Why do these two get to keep their bodies? Anyway, Yemma would have sent him to hell, but he knows that hell is very similar to the Demon Realm, where Dabura used to rule.

So instead he consigned him to heaven, which.... okay, you’re the boss, Yemma. If you think that’s the right call.

So Goku heads out and flies among the golden clouds for a bit, and he notes that Videl was right all along, which I like. Then he wonders where Gohan’s been all this time. If he’s not dead, why couldn’t anyone sense his presence on Earth? So he reaches out with his senses and finally picks him up, but he can’t tell where he’s sensing him. It’s not on Earth or in Otherworld. So he just uses Instant Transmission and settles it that way.

And he nearly teleports right into Gohan swinging the Z-SWord.

Kibito’s not thrilled to have another mortal treading the sacred ground of the Supreme Kai Planet, but what can he do? Apparently Goku could have teleported here whenever he wanted, he just never knew this place existed, and I’m still a little fuzzy on whether the Z-Fighters can sense the Supreme Kai’s ki.

Goku takes a few swings with the Z-Sword just to see what it’s like. In the dub he gives Gohan some helpful advice, which was a nice touch, but in the original script he just asks if he can hang out with Gohan until he’s ready to return to Earth. Also, he wants food, which is just as well, since Gohan would need some eventually anyway.

On the way to... well, I don’t know where these guys are flying to. My first impulse was to imagine the Supreme Kai has a little place for eating, but not like a house or a palace, more like the clubhouse at a golf course. They’re gonna go there and eat those little sandwiches with the crusts cut off. Anyway, Gohan asks Goku about Super Saiyan 3, and Goku’s like “Yeah, I’ll show you when we’re done eatng, son!”

So, if Gohan, on this plane, could sense Goku using Super Saiyan 3, on Earth, doesn’t that mean someone on Earth could sense Goku using SSJ3 in Otherworld? Because he would have used it before, at least once, when he first developed the form. King Kai knew what he was doing as soon as he mentioned it to Majin Buu, so King Kai’s seen him do it off-screen. But all the characters on Earth, and the Supreme Kai and Kibito were completely surprised by it. I think about that a lot.

We then flash forward a day later. I think the dub failed to mention this, which is why I was always confused about this next scene where Goten and Trunks are asleep and Piccolo has to wake them up.

I always thought it was weird how Goku just left and they immediately went to bed, and Piccolo’s coming in like ten minutes later to wake them.

Anyway, as soon as his back is turned, they immediately go back to sleep, so...

BEST GREEN DAD

Meanwhile, the whole gang is watching this. Bulma’s like “Yeah, slug my kid. He deserves it!”

Anyway, this is the scene in the dub where the boys ask Piccolo what’s for breakfast, and he shouts “BREAKFAST?! YOU’RE HAVING THE FUSION TECHNIQUE FOR BREAKFAST!”

Before they resume training, the boys want to see the Fusion Dance one more time for reference. Piccolo asks Krillin to help him demonstrate, since he’s seen it before, when Goku did it. Krillin’s like “Why me? The others all saw it too!” And then he looks around and everyone else is gone.

So they do it and it looks badass, and I’m only sorry that this wouldn’t work for real and Pillin or whatever he’d be called can’t go kick Buu’s ass himself.

The boys are embrassed to even see this, and Piccolo’s like “Dammit, you were the ones who wanted to see this done again.”

Meanwhile, Gohan’s got the Z-Sword pretty well under control. He can do majorette twirls with it...

And he can reverse-weild, like Asohka Tano from Clone Wars. Wait, why didn’t Asohka hold her sabers backwards when she fought Darth Vader in Rebels?

Never mind that shit, here comes Mongo Majin Buu. These people were all gathered around a giant TV screen watching news coverage of how Buu has already wiped out two-thirds of the population, and then Buu barges nto the studio and makes faces at the camera to frighten everyone else. See? He’s smarter than he lets on. Anyway, he blows up the whole town after this.

On his way to the next town, he spots a little boy walking by himself and tries to scare him, but the boy can’t recognize him because he’s blind. He may not even know who Buu is.

This annoys Buu, who gets a kick out of frightening people before he kills them, so he heals the boy’s eyes just so he can finally see Buu and be afraid.

But it backfires, because the kid is so grateful to be able to see that he thanks Buu profusely.

Buu asks the kid if he thinks he looks cool, and the kid’s like “Well, you’re literally the first person I’ve ever seen, so I really don’t know.” But he thinks Buu is cool, simply because he cured his blindness. This is really kind of fascinating to watch, because you get the sense that Buu’s only been killing and terrorizing people because he genuinely has no idea how else to interact with anything. It never occurred to him that people could like him, or that he could get them to like him by doing good things.

The boy tries to reward Buu with the money he was planning to use to buy milk in the next town over, but Buu doesn’t like the taste of it, so he flies off to get the boy actual milk.

And buy “milk”, I mean “he found a man and turned him into a carton of milk. Buu’s got a long way to go.

So he flies off without even killing the boy, and he seems very pleased with that whole interaction, and then he notices another town and blows it up.

The message here is that there’s definitely an opportunity here to get Buu to cut this shit out, but how is anyone going to get close enough to him to pull that off?

#dragon ball #2019dbliveblog #majin buu saga #majin buu #goku #gohan #fortuneteller baba #king yemma #supreme kai #kibito #dabura #goten #trunks #piccolo #bulma #krillin #yamcha #ox king #puar

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jinjojess · 5 years

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One of the main things I get asked about or have mentioned to me is why I don’t as zealously translate things on my blog anymore.

There’s a lot of reasons, some of which I’ve addressed in the past, but they’re kind of persistent issues that don’t only affect me. They affect just about every other fan translator that I’ve had the pleasure of working with and they’re why you don’t tend to see the same people stick around for a long period of time.

This is going to come across as a vent-type thing, and it isn’t aimed at anyone in particular, but just at certain trends in fandom and social media spaces in general, so I’m not calling anyone out or anything.

Like I mentioned before, you tend to notice that a lot of people who translate things for a particular fandom will drift away after a certain amount of time. This isn’t an accident, nor does it necessarily need to be an eventuality. Some people will always move on because they lose interest in the source material, but I’m not talking about that today.

Reason #1: Work and Real Life

The biggest, most persistent issue for me is my job. I work long hours, I have a two-hour commute on a train each day, and my work is very stressful and demanding. Would I rather be translating? Hell yes! Can I support myself doing translations for free? Hell no!

When I was doing really hardcore translation stuff, it was basically me not sleeping. That was a thing I could do because my hours were shorter then and I got long breaks throughout the year. I was home and in my house by 18:30 every night which meant I had way, way more free time than I’ve had in the last couple years.

I’m not in school anymore, nor do I work part time, nor am I figuring things out at my parents’ or anything. I’m also getting older and more tired. That means I can’t afford to be translating a bunch of text for free and sacrificing all my free time and time to sleep. It’s a little unfair to expect me to compete with pro translators, people who work part time, or are in university, or NEETs who happen to be doing translation stuff.

Reason #2: Lack of Motivation/Lack of “Customer Loyalty”

I was going to call this “lack of reward” but there is an inherent reward to doing this kind of work and lots of people have been very vocal and kind about their gratitude, so it’s not necessarily that you never are rewarded.

However, I do need to address the elephant in the room.

Fandom is a fickle and impatient creature. It doesn’t care about quality, it cares about speed. The second biggest reason I don’t try to keep up the pace I was going at a few years ago is because there’s really not any strong motivation to do so aside from my own pride and a handful of people.

Let me try to explain what I mean: when you’re cranking out translations quickly, before anyone else has touched anything, then people will respond well. They’ll reblog your posts, donate small amounts of money, draw you fanart, send you nice messages. The second you stop cranking things out as quickly though, all of that dries up. Yes, a core group of people will stick with you, but the majority of the fandom just kind of moves on and latches onto whoever’s faster.

And it’s frustrating. It’s annoying that I can spend hours and hours and hours putting something together, only for it to get like 50 notes. My DRT summaries have been read by countless people, but the posts themselves have less than 10 notes in most cases.

People don’t really appreciate that translation is ultimately a creative act--it’s not just a mechanical process of Language In > Language Out, it require you to be creative in your word choices. Also they don’t appreciate the hidden work, like all the money spent procuring the original source material (which I always tried to do since I prefer to be self-reliant like a dumbass), or the formatting, or the TIME.

Meanwhile, people will reblog visual art that looks similar with no qualms, but if it’s a long translation, they won’t even bother to read other interpretations, much less spread them.

People remember the names of visual artists, and will promote them and yell about how they need to be paid and whatnot, but they don’t tend to remember the names of people who translated things. Fandom just doesn’t do that. Unless you stay relevant and in the public eye as it were, fandom at large doesn’t remember the people who did seminal translations of works.

They don’t have to, of course, but I gotta admit that it doesn’t really make me want to pour hours of my own limited free time into working on something that no one will care about or remember I did after the fact.

Reason #3: Cutthroat Tactics

As you can imagine, when speed is the only thing that matters, the situation turns toxic real quick. While you’ll meet a lot of other great translators, and everyone I’ve personally worked with has been fantastic, but I think the incident that best shows off what I mean is what happened with Yaz and someone taking his raws to release their own version before shslscans did. That happens all the damn time.

While a certain group of people will cooperate and try not to step on others’ toes or be respectful (the reason why I never finished kamase-megane’s DRK1 translation), there will always be other people who just jump in and do stuff and don’t even recognize you--they can’t, because if they do, they run the risk of people going to read your stuff instead of theirs, and as we established, the fandom will only read one translation and nothing else.

There’s also the issue of the audience themselves, who will do things like nitpick everything you post if they don’t like it (which happened to a friend of mine, who ended up having people attack them because their interpretation of the vaguely worded source text didn’t line up with what they wanted to hear).

There are also people who very clearly want to use you for their own advantage. You can always tell who these people are, because they will be up in your face and promoting you left and right until you need to take a breather, at which point they will drop you like a sack of potatoes and heavily promote someone who is doing the thing they want, but faster. They will also not circle back around and promote your version once you finish it.

The fandom will take your scans and your translations and use them without credit, gaining way more notoriety and attention than you ever could on your own (this happened to me last year on Twitter, where someone took a photo and translation I uploaded to my blog in 2014 and used it to garner LOADS of attention--while the Tumblr post that talked about the tweet credited me, the original thief never did, despite me politely asking).

Fandom will also turn their nose up at anything that isn’t a word-for-word translation. My summaries for the side novels are extremely detailed and I end up translating large passages anyway, and STILL people bitch that they won’t engage with summaries because they’re inferior. r/choosingbeggars much?

Part of the reason that no one remembers the translator or sticks with them if their pace drops is because there’s an unspoken expectation that the fandom is owed the translations. It doesn’t matter who they come from, but clearly someone has to do it, because it’s just a thing that fans are entitled to. That’s mind-boggling to me, who grew up with fan translations as the only way for me to experience a LOT of foreign language media. No one owes you translations of things as soon as they’re released!

Finally, it’s difficult to get your work even seen, because the market gets so saturated; all of the aggressive self-promotion often ignores what other people are doing, either because of sincere ignorance that your stuff exists, or because they’re intentionally ignoring you to make themselves seem like the only option.

Conclusion:

This is not a DanRon fandom problem; this is a fandom problem, full stop.

I can’t tell you what to do, or how to engage with fan translators and their work. This is more just a vent about things that irritate me about the whole scene and to explain why I don’t update as quickly or as often these days.

I do still want to get my version out there, and I will still do it--I was doing side novel liveblogs and summaries before anyone paid attention to my blog and I will continue on after--but I do ask that maybe you be patient, or you try reading different translations of the same thing to appreciate the various approaches. Remember who translates what and makes sure that you always credit and source. Reblog translation posts, don’t just like them.

Basically, treat us the way you treat visual artists.

Thanks for reading, and thanks to all the folks who have stuck with me through the years. Everyone who sends me nice asks and who has sent me art or liked or reblogged my posts, I appreciate all of that. You should be the norm, but you aren’t, and so I really love you guys. I’ll have some stuff for you very soon!

#long post #vent #translation #fan translation

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tfw-no-tennis · 4 years

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One Piece Readthru

heyo ive decided its time for me to catch up on the one piece manga finally!! i last read it uhhh sometime late 2018?? MAYBE early 2019....anyways ill be liveblogging it, basically for myself but if anyone is interested then enjoy lol

so w.out further ado hers 927-931 hya

uh ok i left off kinda in the middle of the wano arc, so im scanning thru some stuff to see what i remember.....i dont really remember what the deal is with that ginger (?) pompadour guy lmao. theres a lot of new characters and intricate politics in this arc from what i remember.

i havent really gotten spoiled for anything....i know that something bad happens to kid & killer, somethins up w/sabo (but we dont know what), luffy fights kaido (more than once i think?) uhhhhh we get roger flashbacks and hear the yonkous bounties....thats abt all i really know. so im hype to find out what else has gone on....

im gonna start around 927, i defs read this but i want a refresher

wow its amazing how sanji can oscillate so fast from being unbearable and annoying to like one of my favs

i loveeee the panels where those dudes start trashing sanjis soba stand and usopps like lol lets back up yall we KNOW sanjis boutta kick some righteous ass....YESSS

franky supplexing a guy....ily franky

toko!!! i forgot abt her!!! cute kid, whats her deal? iirc she works at the uhhh wherever komurasaki works and she almost gets murderized later

sanji and little kids is so cute ;_; more of that and less stuff of him being gross w/women

ok exposition....i do remember a lot of this

928, i feel like i remember this stuff so ill kinda blow thru it

oh yeah i remember luffy n the prison shennanigans....good times

and kidds here too, talkin abt how he lost his arm trying to fight shanks...lol dude

dude is really like oh i couldnt take down shanks, so ill aim for a different yonkou, im sure this will go much better a second time (and down an arm)

omfg i forgot abt this dude who apparently sold his FAMILY to get money for komurasaki....

i think we’re supposed to feel bad for this dude and think komurasaki is cruel or w/e but man honestly i just respect the hustle. girl knows whats up

HVBJSDKFBDS I FORGOT THE HILARIOUS LINE WHERE SHES LIKE ‘I HATE POOR PEOPLE <3′ IM....its literally like a weird twitter shitpost lmaooo

they cut immediately from komurasaki to tama asking momo if he has a sister....LMAO SUBTLE......

i dont even remember if that twist was spoiled for me, but either way it was my like immediate thought upon komurasakis intro lmao

ok 929!

omg kanjuro selling some-drawn fish lol

OUGHHH CARROT AND THE OTHER MINKS....i miss carrot sm i hope she shows up more :( i really wish she would join the crew....

lmao that guy calling zoro a pretty boy and saying girls are probably all over him....zoros like uh ew no im gay

OOOH PLOT SHITTTTT....caesar and doflamingo name drops...

VEGAPUNK HM [eyes emojiey]

orochis defs gonna get fucked up at some point. his design reminds me of wapol and other like corrupt king archetypes

oguhfdbsjkgjdfbh laws head basket i forgot abt that. also i love when people call him traffy thats weirdly cute

oh right the other supernovas who became kaidous bitches are here to fight...i recall that fight somewhat

920 time!

oh yeah the weird place where all the poor starving people laugh constantly...inch resting

OHH YEAH BIG MOM!!! man i definitely read a lot further than this lmao. w/e i was SO fucking hype when she showed up, imo the whole amnesia thing is pretty lame. we’ll see where it goes tho

the art here is just so good oh man. the panel of big moms ship charging up the waterfall while she laughs? fantastic

EPIC arrival. i hope big mom gets to do cool stuff even despite the impending amnesia

i ALSO hope her kids get to do cool shit too. im still holding out for a zoro vs amande battle (if shes even there? i dont see her, but thatd be such a waste)...and smoothie vs robin....

and she wants zeus back....NAMI FIGHT??? PLEASE???

oh its bdsm dinosaur guy....hmm never thought id type that

LMAOOOO law is like Dont You Dare Fucking Snitch On Us and usopp is like uh luffy pls come pick me up this guy is too hardcore

FINAL BATTLE thats so dramatic law please

sanji saying he’ll protect usopp omfg

oooh theyre destorying all the soba shops....here comes sanji to bring the PAIN

OMFG THE RAID SUIT i forgot he busts that out....hilariously quickly all things considered

931! ok but first my obligatory thots on how sad i am abt how the women of op look nowadays lmao revisiting old one piece just makes it all the more obvious how ridiculous its gotten....like nami and robin dont even look human, its insane, and the sameface has gotten so bad...idk i miss when op women used to look normal and could just exist without being Sexy Women bc that was a thing at the beginning and i really loved that...now its just like wow all titty no waist legs are 100x longer than normal....not to mention the writing for women in op has gone way downhill...ugh. ANYWAYS onward

ofc as soon as i say that theres a rlly cute and p normal looking cover w/nami...i love her sm shes my fav character thats part of the reason this bothers me so much lol

i miss her short hair tho...the long hair is pretty and i like her different hairstyles but i defs prefer the short spunky look. i wish she wouldve gotten a cool bellmere-esque haircut after the timeskip at least

ok im p sure i didnt read this...? i dont remember hgbvhjaksdfk

GERMA THEME SONG HBVJSDUIFJBSF are you telling me that the raid suit activation process involves a THEME SONG....please i need to hear this. thats so fuckign funny

‘GERMAAAAAAAAAAA’ [sanji doing an unironic magical girl transformation] IT CANT BE OVERSTATED HOW HILARIOUS AND AMAZING THIS IS LMAOOOOOO

i think we saw this w/his siblings during whole cake but i forget lmao

of course franky and usopp are like OOOH FUCK YEAH

HHBDSJKFJSB the implications of law knowing Exactly who that is....like i really need to see an omake of a campy power rangers/sentai/whatever-esque show/comic with all these germa personas omfgggggggg

and law having read the comics is SO funny

also. sanjis hair is SO unfortunate lmaooo

O SOBA MASK HBVHSJDKUFJBDSK

germa was the bad guy group in the comics....good lmao

law was defs a fan he knows ALL the lore LMAOOO

A BABY SANJI....and then sanji being weird. skip!

ironic hows theyre like oh shit gotta challenge this dude so he doesnt destroy the town and their fight is gonna level the place anyways lmao

oh i did read this i think cause i remember all those ninja busting robin for sneaking around

which ok theyre ninja but robin could grow eyes for surveillance so it doesnt make much sense that shed be caught so easily...alas

THAT GUYS HEAD HBVHJFKD LMAO

oh yeah then big mom washes up w/amnesia lmao. i hope that plotline doesnt suck, i dont have too much hope...normally i really like amnesia plotlines and honestly i think itd be cool to explore w/like one of the strawhats but in this case it just seems kinda like a lazy way to take big mom out of the game :/ my prediction is she’ll get her memory back at a certain time thats convenient to the plot, just in time for like an all out war w/kaidou and the straw hats and the yakuza maybe? we shall see (possibly)

ok its past 6 am so its bedtime. more later!

#LJ reads one piece #thats my tag now!#one piece #my posts #liveblog

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blapisblogs · 4 years

Photo

After that song ends and Corey Taylor gets a glimpse of something we’ll come back to later, we then cut to “young Corey Taylor” getting smacked and sassed by... Rob Scallon as the teacher? Yeah, Doug not only got Corey Taylor and his son Griff for this, he also brought in another musician. At least he got to contribute more to the music in this “review” than Corey Taylor did. Apparently he’s dating Tamara Chambers and that’s how he got involved with this (which makes the fact that Tamara’s here as one of his “students”... awkward at best), but judging by how desperately he’s tried to erase any mention of his involvement with this after the severe backlash it got, I’m guessing that he now regrets this. Anyway, hello, other Doug Walker regular Malcolm Ray. I have no clue who the other two “students” are, but I can only guess that they’re other regulars for Doug’s stuff. (Edit from the future: I think the other guy’s name is Walter? I know nothing about him except he works for Doug and I guess he likes Power Rangers.) All of them have high-pitched dubbed-in voices (I guess to make them sound younger in a “funny” way), and it’s really grating. Like... If you’ve read through my liveblogs about Sonic X, then you remember how I hated it whenever Bokkun said literally anything, right? Well it’s not quite as bad as him as far as the pitch goes, but it is just as annoying, if not even more so because there’s multiple people with high-pitched voices and the lyrics they get to sing in this part aren’t just annoying, they’re insulting.

Oh yeah, did I mention they sing for this next parody song?

If you know the album or the movie, you're probably already dreading this, and it's just as bad as you fear, maybe even worse. Yes, we’re at what’s probably the most popular song from The Wall: the BAFTA award-winning “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)”. If you don’t know, that song is preceded by “The Happiest Days of Our Lives”, which is so connected with it that most of the time it’s considered part of “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)” itself, as I’ve always heard it credited as part of that song on the radio. Doug does seem to know the difference though, as he notably does not parody the lyrics from “The Happiest Days of Our Lives”, which to me is a problem: that part is integral to knowing the story behind the song that follows it because it’s the part that talks about how the children in the school were abused by their teachers. Again, since Roger Waters based a lot of this off his own life and he grew up in a time where the teachers were legally allowed to physically and emotionally abuse their students, it’s pretty obvious that’s what the song’s about. Even without including “The Happiest Days of Our Lives”, Doug still parodied the scene where the teacher was humiliating young Pink in front of the entire class, reading his poems aloud and calling them “absolute rubbish” (though for this “review” it’s the teacher insulting Taylor’s musical taste in Pink Floyd, which is still shitty and psychologically damaging, and really upsets me as an autistic person who’s had their interests mocked multiple times). Despite all this, Doug claims Waters is just being a crybaby and exaggerating how bad his school life was when the abuse he suffered and the damage it caused him was real and very serious. You can say what you want about Waters’s ego, Doug, but making fun of someone for being abused, especially as a child, is a line that you should never cross.

It seems like Doug’s not satisfied enough with mocking what Roger Waters was talking about regarding his school life, though, because he goes as far as to mock all people who complain about school, dismissing detailed dissections of what’s wrong with today’s education system as “long-winded rants”. I’m convinced he didn’t actually read these “rants” he’s mocking, because there are serious problems with our education system. I could go into all the shitty things that I personally had to go through as an autistic kid, but you can find plenty of better, more detailed posts and articles talking about how fucked up America’s education system is today, to say nothing of what England’s school system was like in the 50′s (you know, the time period and experience Waters was clearly talking about with this), and this post is already long enough before I can even properly rip into this dreadful parody.

As the turd on top of this shit sundae, Doug Walker does a Dracula impression for part of the song because he’s saying that Roger Waters is calling all teachers “monsters” (yes, that’s literally the only reason). More specifically, it’s the Dracula played by Adam Sandler in the Hotel Transylvania franchise, where Sandler was already doing a weak impression of Bela Lugosi. Basically Doug’s doing an annoying, shitty impression of an already annoying, shitty impression.

Kill me.

[Lyrics (and snark) below the cut]

NC: We need more victimization (There are no good teachers! Not one! Not even by accident!) We need more stuff to rebel

[I know some people will complain about literally anything, but did you actually pay attention to what the album and film were saying? That teachers who abuse their students and try to quash their creativity and individuality is bad, something that Waters himself has clarified in interviews regarding the very song you’re parodying here? Do you not agree with that?]

(We don’t want to help you! We just want to eat your blood and suck your brains!) Though our education system’s broke (Wait, maybe it’s the other way around. I don’t know, I got a high school education! Muahahahaha!) This is pandering like hell

[You reviewed Norm of the North, Boss Baby, and the Emoji Movie despite none of those having ties to anything nostalgic (you even admitted as much in your review of the former), which was the entire point of the Nostalgia Critic. If that's not you pandering to your fanbase who just likes hearing you yell about bad movies, then I don’t know what is.]

(Remember that one teacher who seemed cool? He wasn’t! He was all part of the plan!) Hey! Who cares? All this bitching sells!

[Clearly it does considering your whole internet career is founded on that.]

(Remember that one teacher who seemed really kind and gave you candy?) Well oh well, we’ve got another hit in The Wall (That candy was really sugar-coated children's’ souls!) L-O-L, so school sucks. Grow a damn pair of balls.

[Okay, Boomer. You first. (Before anyone goes “well actually he’s not a Boomer”: I don’t care. This is such a Boomer message that a Boomer may as well be saying it.)]

(Children’s souls! We’re so evil! Muahahahaha!)

[I’m sorry for including all the evil laughing in this transcription, but it’s just as annoying to hear it, trust me.]

Bokkun “Child” chorus: Real cool visualizations (It’s all part of the plan so that you’re more likely to get a job when you’re older!) Milking your gloom and pity (Muahahahahaha! How terrible is that? Muahahahahaha! Muahahahaha!)

[Considering how schools in the way they operate now make students lose sleep, stresses them out over numbers that are assigned to tasks that have been forced upon them, and has been outdated for years since that’s not how most jobs work anymore... Yeah, it actually is terrible. You even said earlier that there are problems with our current education system, yet now you’re making fun of people who criticize it? Make up your mind.]

You hated school, who the hell didn’t? (It’s like those ‘90s commercials where the adults look like bad guys!) What’s next, hating DMVs? (Except they weren’t 90s commercials, they were really mini-documentaries! It’s all true! Muahahahaha!) Hey! Waters! Leave it on F-B!

[We get it already, Doug, you really hate Waters’s ego and the things he talks about in these songs. You’ve already talked about that in your previous parody, can you move onto something else about the movie that isn’t that? So far you’re making it sound like that’s the only thing worth talking about regarding this film.]

(We really don’t see what makes Cinnamon Toast Crunch so great!) All and all, complaining doesn’t mean much at all

[Well, at least you’re able to admit that your career means nothing.]

(Because we’re old! Muahahahaha!) But who cares, it’s still a damn cool song in The Wall (Bleh bleh bleh bleh, I’m a teacher, bleh bleh bleh bleh!)

[In case anyone was wondering why I said it was Adam Sandler’s shitty Bela Lugosi impression he was doing and not just a shitty Bela Lugosi impression, there you go. (For those who don’t get it: the “bleh bleh bleh” thing is a recurring “joke” in at least the first Hotel Transylvania. Yes, it’s as lame as it sounds.)]

We still need more persecutions (Muahahahahahaha! Ahehahahahahehe suck your blood, bleh!) (??) need to hear you (???) (Stabula!)

[I’m giving this my best shot, I really am, but... all I hear for that last set of question marks there is a really inappropriate c-word.]

What are you big boys to say school’s lame? Based on a long-winded rant?

[Hmm, posts and articles made by people who know what they’re talking about explaining how the American school system (since that’s what you’re basing this on rather than the one Waters wrote about) needs some serious retooling in order to cause less burnout, stress and trauma with literal children that can and will affect them in the short and long term when they grow up, or some internet jackass who gets paid for yelling at things and hasn’t been to a high school since at least the 90′s. Gee, I wonder whose opinion on that subject matters more in this situation. (That was sarcasm, by the way, for those who couldn’t tell.)]

Hey! Twitter! (???) bloody (???)!

[I’ve tried my best to figure out what they’re saying here, but this is one of the few times that I cannot actually tell no matter how hard I try, I’m sorry.

So anyway, the TL;DR version of what I think of what this parody song has to say about the original can be summed up in one Kermit gif:

...Why aren’t I watching The Great Muppet Caper instead?]

#Blapis tears down NC's The Wall #abuse mention //#child abuse mention //#long post #bold text warning #very long post #gif warning

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sage-nebula · 5 years

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Fire Emblem: Three Houses - Thoughts so Far

So I’ve just hit the timeskip in my Golden Deer playthrough (which is my second playthrough overall, my first being a Black Eagle Strike Force playthrough), and so I thought I’d post some thoughts, especially since I’m feeling kind of disgruntled at the moment and feeling disgruntled seems to be the best way to get me to lay thoughts to paper nowadays. This is going under a cut, both because of spoilers, and because it’s going to be long.

I can’t remember if I made a long post when I finished my initial playthrough or not, and I haven’t been using a very concrete tag for posts about it regardless (gone are the days when I’d liveblog every little thing, I guess, particularly since I got so absorbed into this game so quickly---I’ve put 85+ hours into it already, and it’s only been a little over two weeks!), so it wouldn’t be that easy for me to check. But needless to say, I’ve fallen head over heels for this game, and I absolutely loved my initial playthrough and the Black Eagles House (minus Caspar and kind of Hubert). Edelgard and her route have garnered the most Discourse™ in fandom, from what I can tell, for both legitimate reasons and not, but while I did have some personal issues with Edelgard toward the end of part one (and kind of leading into part two, though I learned to let it go), I have to say that overall I loved her and I feel that her overall objectives---dismantling the oppressive Church of Seiros, dismantling the nobility system and establishing a meritocracy, and ultimately abdicating the throne to a worthy successor once she was done because she never actually wanted power, she just wanted to change a world that was domineering and hurting people and knew she needed power to do it---were just. She could have gone about it in a better way, maybe---but then again, it’s very easy to say that violent revolution isn’t necessary from a comfortable seat where you’re not actually forced to make that decision, versus when you live in a throes of a world that has not only existed this way for thousands of years with any hint of rebellion quickly executed by the church without a trial (as we see in game with characters such as Lonato and the Western Church soldiers), but also saw your siblings tortured and murdered before your very eyes, with you yourself being the sole survivor of that torture. Rhea showed time and again that she was not willing to negotiate with anyone who breathed a word against the church. Edelgard merely announcing that she was going to take the Crest Stones from the Holy Tomb had Rhea calling for her head, not only in the Black Eagles route, but in the Golden Deer route as well. If there is to be no negotiation, then the only choices are to let the world continue as it has been---which, considering what Edelgard has personally seen and how we know so many others in the game have suffered, is not an option---or to meet force with force, which is what Edelgard chose to do. Her path was not perfect, no---but considering Rhea is one who is willing to send children into battle to execute a man without a trial (children which could include that man’s own adoptive son, if you’re playing Blue Lions or otherwise request mission assistance from Ashe) as a way to show them why they should never raise a weapon against a church, I can’t see any other way to unseat Rhea and stop further injustices from being carried out. It’s not perfect, but life isn’t always, and I for one think it’s kind of refreshing to see a JRPG acknowledge that for once, rather than have everything wrapped up in a neat bow like Awakening did (much as I love Awakening, it went way too far with the happy ending nonsense).

. . . And that was an absurdly long paragraph that really got away from me. Apologies.

Anyway, as I was saying, I love Edelgard and her route. Apart from Sylvain (who was free), Ashe (who was adorable), and Mercedes (who I got to supplement losing Flayn), I didn’t really recruit anyone, and as a result I got to know the Black Eagles very well (aside from Caspar, whom I ditched early on because a.) he kept dying, b.) his voice was annoying, and c.) I wanted to focus on my other students). I’ve only played two Houses so far, but as it stands I’m just really very attached to the Black Eagles . . . and only like about half of the Golden Deer.

To be fair to them, the Golden Deer have had kind of an uphill battle. Unlike last time, I got to work recruiting people early; I scooped up Sylvain immediately because, again, he was free, and I used Renown to boost the Support ranks of Bernadetta, Petra, and Linhardt so I could get them immediately as well. I also used Renown to boost up my sword skill to nab Felix, since the fact that he has four support ranks with Sylvain piqued my interest and I wanted to see what all that was about. So from the get-go, I didn’t have much reason to pay attention to characters like Ignatz (who was replaced by Bernadetta), Lorenz (who was replaced by Linhardt), Raphael (who was replaced by Sylvain and Felix), or Leonie (who was replaced by Petra). But even if I did have reason to pay attention to them, mmhhh . . .

Well, okay. Let me do a brief rundown of each student from the Black Eagles and Golden Deer (including House Leaders) and how I feel about them, real quick.

Edelgard: Obviously, I love her, as I’ve already said. She’s a complex, strong character---not just in what she’s able to do in battle or how she’s able to lead, but in how she’s written. When playing her route and getting to know her, you come to see her vulnerabilities---and I think in that sense I benefited from playing her route first, so I could get to know that side of her before seeing the side of her that’s a warlord trying to change a world that desperately needs to change, but doesn’t want to. Edelgard’s vision is one of sweeping, systemic change; it’s not something that can happen overnight, or easily, or without sacrifices, particularly when some (e.g. Rhea, Dimitri) insist on calling for heads and blood splatter and refuse to surrender no matter what. But it’s change that’s rooted in the concrete, change that says, “I don’t care whether you like it or not, this is what’s best for all those who have been suffering until now, and you’re going to do it whether you like it or not.” That sort of demanding attitude can be bad, but considering Edelgard immediately takes action against corrupt nobles, dismantles the church that dominated EVERYONE in reality even if they claimed not to on the surface, and established a meritocracy, we can see in this instance that she truly was looking out for those who were disenfranchised, hurt, and suffering under the way things were. Certainly, there were things she could have done better (not working with her uncle would be a great start), but considering the situation she was in, I can also see why she made the choices she did. (Also, Hubert is a terrible influence, so.)

Hubert: SPEAKING OF . . . I have a love / hate relationship with Hubert, in that I like him as a character and what he adds to the story (especially with regards to Edelgard’s personal story), but mmmmmboy do I dislike him as a person. His ridiculous habit of threatening everyone for so much as looking at Edelgard wrong aside (when Shamir called him out on being unstable and told him to be careful who he threatened, I cheered), the fact that he says time and again that he will go and do heinous things behind Edelgard’s back in her name really pissed me off. Hubert is what’s known as a Poisonous Friend; though he does genuinely want to help Edelgard, his refusal to actually consider what she wants and what her values are regardless of what he, selfishly, believes to be in her best interests means that he very easily becomes the exact sort of person Edelgard despises. And while you could say that’s fine so long as she doesn’t find out (because that way she wouldn’t need to imprison him), what if others do, hm? How would that make her look, for everyone to know that her very own advisor and retainer was the exact same sort of person as Prime Minister Aegir, or her own uncle? I wanted to punch Hubert in the face so very badly. It’s a shame I was never able.

Bernadetta: MY SWEET AND PRECIOUS DAUGHTER . . . I LOVE HER SO MUCH . . . While I will admit that some of her supports with various characters got a bit repetitive and annoying because Bernadetta refused to listen to anyone and thus would continue into hysterics without reason, at the same time I can’t help but love this anxious little recluse (and want to murder both of her parents, but her father especially, given that they’re the very reason Bernadetta is so reclusive and prone to panic as she is---she’s traumatized!). Not only do I love her personality and design, but she is an absolute MONSTER on the battlefield. Part of the reason I insisted on recruiting her immediately in my Golden Deer playthrough is because Bernadetta slaughters pretty much everyone she comes across, without fail. Her and Petra both. But seriously though, her parents are awful and I wish I could adopt her.

Petra: YET ANOTHER DESTROYER OF WORLDS, AND THE ULTIMATE ASSASSIN. In both of my runs thus far I’ve classed Petra as a thief and then assassin, and honestly I can’t ever imagine classing her as anything else. She crits on practically every single strike, and she’s quick enough to get to chests I actually try to get to (some I skip on purpose because they’re too much of a pain lol). Personality-wise I also love her, though I wish her grasp on the Fodlan language had improved over the five year timeskip, instead of staying exactly the same. It would have been a subtle way to show some growth for her.

Dorothea: I like Dorothea, but I’m actually not as in love with her as most of the fandom. When I started playing I actually assumed I’d marry either her or Edelgard on my first run, but not only did Dorothea’s first support come across as very off-putting to me (I’ve had bad experiences with people who are desperate to be in a romantic relationship at all costs in the past, no matter the reason for it), but I actually found her to be kind of . . . annoying after the time skip. Whenever I selected her in battle she said, “More fighting” with a heavy sigh, and most of her win quotes (e.g. “Only thorns left on this rose”) felt very melodramatic. Which, I mean, she’s an opera singer, and I’m not expecting her to enjoy war, but it just grated on my nerves after a while. No one wanted to fight, but no one else complained about it as constantly as Dorothea did. That said, I do like a lot of her supports and how, well, supportive she is of (most of) the others, and she was a good mage as well, so I don’t dislike her. I’m just not as crazy about her as others are.

Ferdinand: OTOH, my opinion of Ferdinand is the opposite of my opinion on Dorothea. While I started off not liking him at all because of his insistence that he was superior to Edelgard (especially when he was so fragile at first? bruh), his character development was truly great. He was a true noble gentleman by the end, truly caring about doing his best for his people and Edelgard both. Many of his supports---particularly those with Petra and Dorothea---were very sweet as well. I truly came to enjoy Ferdinand immensely.

Linhardt: THIS BOY, I LOVE THIS BOY. At first I was not too impressed with the “just want to sleep, leave me alone” shtick, but aside from that being as relatable as Bernadetta always wanting to be left alone, I came to love how direct he is, how blunt he is, how clever and witty he is, as well as how great of a healer he is (make him a Holy Knight and he can destroy everything as well as heal it---and he knows Warp, too!). He’s one of my top favorite students, for sure. Love this boy.

Caspar: On the other hand, as I think I mentioned above, Caspar . . . got ditched fairly quickly. His voice is annoying, and on top of that he had low defense without enough damage input (or movement squares) to justify it. I already had an axe user with Edelgard, and so it made more sense to just bench him early on and be done with it. As a result, I don’t have much to say about him. Didn’t have many supports, never really talked to him outside class. Sorry Caspar, but you were just a very low priority for me.

And with the Black Eagles rounded up, let’s move on to . . .

Claude: I love this boy a WHOLE LOT as well, but I’m also not feeling much of an . . . attachment? between Claude and Byleth. I think it’s because Claude takes so long to open up, and he (understandably) wants to know about Byleth’s past before he’ll share any of his own. But even when he starts to open up, his words about how he feels as if his meeting with Byleth was fate and how they’re more than a friend to him feel kind of hollow since we haven’t had emotional moments before that to build it up (unlike how we had in Edelgard’s C and C+ Supports). The fact that his reaction to Byleth returning was less emotional than Edelgard’s contributes to that too, I think. On the other hand, I love how much he knows about Byleth even before the timeskip---way more than Edelgard knows even by the end of her route---as well as how he did have genuine consolation for Byleth after Jeralt’s death, which was one of my issues with Edelgard (SHE OFFERED MORE CONSOLATION ON THE GOLDEN DEER ROUTE THOUGH, WHAT EVEN---). I also just love, love, love everything about his personality. He reminds me a lot of Marco from Animorphs, albeit more idealistic and optimistic, and so I just can’t help but adore him. (More on his idealistic approach in a bit.)

Hilda: Honestly, I thought I wouldn’t be able to stand Hilda, but boy was I wrong. Yes, she’s a bit self-centered and definitely lazy and takes advantage of others---but she also encourages her less confident Housemates to be stronger (in a way that’s actually encouraging, at that), doesn’t take kindly to others not getting what’s owed to them, is honest, and DOES pull her weight when she needs to. On top of which she is a total TANK, and I can’t help but love dainty-looking female characters who can just steamroll and sweep through enemies with giant axes, haha. Hilda’s a fave, and it kills me that she can’t be recruited to Black Eagles at any point ever.

Lysithea: Another fave, and someone I’m recruiting IMMEDIATELY when I play the other routes. She’s by far the best black mage I’ve encountered, and the fact that she has white magic to go along with it (making her a shoo-in for the Master class Gremory) makes her fantastic on the battlefield, even if her defense is a little fragile. And while her “OMG I’M NOT A KID >:(” thing can get kind of annoying at times, at the same time the reason for why she’s desperate to grown up does make sense, and I love her overall attitude.

Marianne: Like Dorothea’s attitude post-timeskip, Marianne started to wear on me after a while. I do like her okay, but her constant “I’m cursed” and “leave me here to die” and “I am going to apologize for breathing now” --- even if there’s an understandable reason --- got to be a bit Much after awhile. She seems a bit better post-timeskip, which is nice, but mmmm, my nerves still feel just a bit frayed.

Raphael: Honestly, I usually skip past his dialogue, because it’s either about Muscles or Food or Both. I’m wondering if this is something that was done to him in the localization, to make him the Comic Relief character, but either way I don’t find this archetype funny at all. He could have been a big dude who likes working out with more to him---and maybe he does have more to him, in his supports, but I have no need for him in battle and thus haven’t seen those, particularly since I don’t feel like talking to him out of battle since he’s just a walking Fat/Muscle Trope joke. Disappointing, but is what it is, I guess.

Leonie: THE MOST. ANNOYING. ISTG. I don’t think I would mind Leonie so much if she didn’t act so antagonistically toward Byleth / so possessive of Jeralt, but her constant prattling about how she’s “Captain Jeralt’s first and best apprentice” and how she’ll have HER revenge for his death and etc etc --- sis you knew him for, what, a couple weeks? TEN YEARS AGO??? Holy shit, it’s a wonder Jeralt even remembers her name, much less taking her on as his apprentice when he’s got the kid he raised from infancy right there. Considering that both her C and B supports have her yelling at Byleth for ~not appreciating Jeralt enough~ just makes it worse. It’s a shame, because she could have been a supportive pseudo-sibling for Byleth, but instead she just comes across as annoying as all get-out. Needless to say, she’s perma-benched.

Ignatz: I really don’t have too much to say about him, because he’s another that was benched pretty much immediately and didn’t give me reasons outside of battle to un-bench him. As in, he never offered anything particularly interesting in cutscenes, or out of cutscenes, his design wasn’t appealing, etc etc. I don’t dislike him, but I don’t like him, either. I actually forget he exists most of the time.

Lorenz: His design is unappealing, his attitude is insufferable (worse than Ferdinand EVER was---at least Ferdinand started supporting Edelgard by the time of the timeskip, whereas Lorenz can’t even do that for Claude!), and his C support reveals that he’s an incel. Like I don’t think there’s much more that needs to be said about how little care I have for this dude.

So as you can see, even setting aside my biases, the Golden Deer just . . . don’t click for me, for the most part. If I could poach anyone I liked to other Houses, I would definitely take Claude, Hilda, and Lysithea, and leave the rest. (Well, except Marianne; she’d be useful as a secondary healer, since I don’t like Mercedes’ voice and Flayn is too loyal to the church.) And as a result, I really, really miss my Black Eagle Strike Force route.

But do you know what makes me miss that route even more than the students?

The stance on the church.

Listen: I figured that playing the Golden Deer route wouldn’t mean tearing down the Church of Seiros the way that playing the Black Eagle Strike Force route does, but the fact that you’re still siding so heavily with the church and that Byleth is apparently super concerned about Rhea / actually likes her in this route just disgusts me. Listen again: I’ve never liked Rhea. Admittedly when I very first started playing I thought that she was probably another Emmeryn type, but the moment she said that she wanted to send the students to kill Lonato because she wanted to show them “what would happen to those who raised a blade to the church” she went on my Red Flag list, and everything that happened in the Holy Tomb after just cemented that for me. For all that people love to call Edelgard a tyrant, the real tyrant in this game is Rhea. Those who speak out against the church aren’t given a shot at a fair trial or a chance to surrender. In both the Black Eagles route and the Golden Deer route her immediate reaction to Edelgard turning on her is to call for Edelgard’s death in the most brutal way possible, ranting and raving about how Edelgard’s “sins” will never be forgiven “even if she bathes in flames and her blood soaks the earth for eternity” or whatever it was. And while she puts on a nice face toward Byleth provided Byleth doesn’t also turn on her (at which point she immediately flips on Byleth and starts calling her a “worthless failure” and “filthy thief” and whatever else), keep in mind that’s only because she thinks that Sothis will use Byleth’s body as a puppet vessel. She doesn’t view Byleth as a person, she views Byleth as a thing, a means to an end, something which even Seteth points out is “questionable” (though it’s much worse than that). True, you can work very hard and get an S Rank with Rhea (though why anyone would want to I have no idea), but that doesn’t change her general attitude throughout the game if you choose not to go that route. It doesn’t change how she treats other people, even if she does eventually see Byleth as their own person. Rhea is a tyrant, and rather than being their own sovereign nations, it’s more accurate to say that Faerghus, Adrestia, and the Alliance are states / colonies of the Church of Seiros. The fact that Garreg Mach is at the center of all three territories is not a coincidence. That those who speak out against the church are assassinated / executed without trial and without hesitation is just another instrument of their tyranny. And you can even see Rhea’s manipulations with other characters, as well. Cyril was taken in as a child, and raised to worship the ground Rhea walks on; Rhea took Shamir in when she had nowhere else to go, making Shamir feel indebted to her; Rhea saved Jeralt’s life (and granted him immortality) so that he would serve her as a Knight of Seiros, and so on and so forth. And should any of them turn against her, she immediately wants their heads on pikes. No doubt she would have killed Jeralt in an instant had she the opportunity to get Byleth away from him before he left the monastary all those years ago (/had he tried to leave the monastary with Byleth again). That’s just the type of person she is.

So the fact that Byleth in this route seems to genuinely like Rhea---enough to risk their life for her---disgusts me. It goes completely against how I feel. I not only hate the Church of Seiros, but I hate Rhea most of all. (Though I also hold quite a bit of contempt for Catherine, given how gleeful she is about killing others.) Claude knows that Rhea was up to some shady bullshit in the past concerning Byleth’s history, but he’s still placing faith in the church (mostly for his own gain, which I get, but still). It really, really bothers me. I already knew ahead of time that the Blue Lions route would be church heavy given that the Church of Seiros openly owns Faerghus, but I didn’t expect that from the Alliance as well, and it makes me feel queasy. I might have to cleanse my palate with another Black Lions Strike Force run again after this. (And if the Blue Lions is even more church-centric than this? Ugh. I don’t think I’ll be able to stand it.)

All of this said, it kind of makes me want to write a fic that combines the Black Eagle Strike Force route with the Golden Deer route---one where Claude joins with Edelgard and Byleth pre-timeskip, and continues working with them after. Bringing Claude and Edelgard together would be difficult, but not impossible, I think, considering that Claude feels no loyalty to the Church of Seiros and wants to know the truth behind everything more than anything (and has a pretty open mind, at that). Perhaps, with the three of them working together, they could even save Dimitri later on down the line as well . . . well, it’d be something to consider, anyway.

That said, this post is long enough as it is, and I still need to shower and then get to sleep. Better leave it off here. :P

#fire emblem: three houses

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theteaisaddictive · 5 years

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life and death: chapter two.

guess who’s back? back again? this shit’s back! tell a friend!

house rules: bolded with proper punctuation/capitalisation is direct quote from the books. anything else, even if it’s in quotes, will be me shitposting. all misspellings unless pointed out are my own (this includes autocorrects such as ‘favourite’ or ‘colour’)

i’m also going to set up a page with links to all previous liveblogs for ease of access, but for the moment just searching tagged/life-and-death gets all previous liveblogs up

*mario voice* here we go!

The next day was better . . . and worse. ah, i was wondering how long it would take for beau’s emo-ness to show up again. the very first sentence of the next chapter was the answer. but honestly how relatable; things are better because it’s no longer the First Day. things are worse because when playing volleyball, beau didn’t dodge out the way of the ball and hit two of my teammates in the head with one bad volley oh man i feel you, pe’s rough. and worst of all, THE PERFECT ONE isn’t there (i think she’s meant to be in alaska at this point fucking around with the denali sisters?? or i guess brothers in this verse)

McKayla, who was starting to seem weirdly, I don’t know, territorial about me beau you have spent the last four paragraphs imagining confronting a girl you met once about why she doesn’t seem to like you you really don’t have a leg to stand on buddy. beau is conFUSion bc mckayla (swap!mike) is into him and he’s not used to that and honestly?? that’s valid. i spent my adolescence knowing nobody found me attractive and when people finally did there were several ‘does not compute’ messages. beau also ponders the patriarchy, and whether or not he’s uncomfortable because mckayla’s coming on to him, as it were (it’s high school, nobody’s coming onto anyone but you catch ym drift)

oooh, more patches of red fading out of [his] face instead of blushing. beau really has problems with erythema, doesn’t he? he goes shopping and angsts about the beautiful liminal space that is the thriftway, but not before seeing the cullens and their shiny volvo of justice. It seemed like too much for them to have both looks and money. Though, as far as I could tell, life worked that way most of the time. WELCOME COMRADE STEPHENIE IT’S NICE TO MEET YOU. (brosalie’s name is royal. ROYAL. this shit writes itself!)

charlie comes home from work to beat making tea and we get That line about the gun. “What’s for dinner?” he asked warily. Mom was an imaginative cook, when she bothered, and her experiments weren’t always edible. I was surprised, and sad, that he seemed to remember that far back. oh man that is a whole-ass divorced kid mood

omg i forgot how in love with carlisle charlie was this is JUST as entertainig holy fuck. “Dr. Cullen is a brilliant surgeon who could probably work in any hospital in the world [...] We’re lucky to have her -- lucky that her husband wants to live in a small town. She’s an asset to the community [...] Just because they’re newcomers, people have to talk.” It was the longest speech I’d ever heard Charlie make. JUST SAY YOU WANT TO HAVE HER WEIRD VAMPIRE BABIES CHARLIE, IT WOULD BE QUICKER

there's an uneventful weekend which smeyer skips over and we rejoin beau on monday (aka The Day Edthye(ward) Comes Back so buckle up lads). they see each other in the lunch room, and edythe is still presumably confused about her inability to hear beau’s thoughts. he sneaks a look at her and stares long enough for the normies his friends to pick up on it. and now edythe is staring at him, although beau is talking to jeremy (swap!jessica, aka anna kendrick). also i just have to say that i do legitimately find it hilarious how much hatred beau has for the snow.

BIO CLASS BIO CLASS PREPARE YOURSELVES IT’S THE SCENE WITH THE ONION SLIDES

and finally, our leads talk to each other.

“Hello,” said a quiet, musical voice. [...] Her perfect face was friendly, open, a slight smile on her full, pink lips. But her long eyes were careful. is beau not being able to describe eyes in a way that make human sense going to be a recurring motif?? or is it just bad writing? you decide!

and these two are awkward fucking ducks, because of course they are.

“Ladies first, partner?” Edythe asked. I looked up to see her smiling a dimple smile so perfect that I could only stare at her like a fool. you know, for beau being a straight guy he sure reacts to pretty girls smiling the same way that queer women do (beau.exe has stopped functioning due to presence of dimples) “Uh, sure, go ahead,” I sputtered. I saw her eyes flash to the splotches blooming across my cheeks. Why couldn’t my blood just stay in my veins where it belonged? am i missing something or did beau just get a boner in class bc a pretty girl smiled at him and raised her eyebrows.

man, just seeing the words Miss Cullen and Mr. Swan used in a twilight book is bit of a trip, clearly i’m too used to bella being called ‘miss swan’. not a bad thing, just a ‘brains are weird sometimes, huh’ thing.

THEY TOUCHED. THEY TOUCHED. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. Her fingers were ice cold, like she’d been holding them in a snowdrift before class. [beau, to be fair there was a snowball fight going on that you bailed on] But that wasn’t why I jerked my hand away so quickly. When she touched me, it stung my hand like a low-voltage electric shock. was this in twilight?? bc i don’t remember her getting shocked by edward in bio class. anyway, they finish the exercise, beau is a klutz, and then he notices the colour-changing eyes thing.

they chat a little about why beau came to forks, and edythe is apparently puzzled by beau’s motivations.

“Did I . . . am I annoying you?” She shook her head and smiled with half her mouth so that one dimple popped out. [is this meant to be the equivalent to edward’s crooked smile?? GIVE US EDYTHE’S CROOKED SMILE, STEPH] “No, if anything, I’m annoyed with myself.” “Why?” She cocked her head to the side. “Reading people . . . it usually comes very easily to me. But I can’t -- I guess I don’t know quite what to make of you. Is that funny?”

oh man. oh man edythe is that an understatement of what you can do.

the rest of the day passes uneventfully, aside from mckayla being on beau’s team in gym?? in america do you guys mix genders during gym? because while that happened sometimes here, it was pretty rarely. beau ends the chapter by almost reversing into a car as he pulls out the car park, and [he] could see enough in [his] peripheral vision to know [Edythe] was laughing.

#life and death #twilight #rae reads life and death

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blookmallow · 5 years

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weLL I GOT TO THE END

this is gonna be kind of. mixed up and out of order bc i actually finished it like weeks ago and never got around to putting together the liveblogs so like. i cant exactly remember which comments i was gonna make with which pictures/what order things happened in/etc, bear with me

----

???? well SHIT

so like.....witchcraft and witches and all that are all stage tricks/illusions/hypnosis, which. ok a lot of “magic” can be done with technology and if this is a town where nobody is aware that kind of technology exists they’ll believe its witchcraft, BUT

this is still a town wherein a CHILD was ‘born a witch’ (how did she Know she was a witch?? how could she do magic if she was a kid and wasnt in on the whole thing with the shades??), believed she turned her childhood goat friend into gold (meaning the shades did that to her just to fuck her up), was distraught to the point of trying to fucking DROWN HERSELF and living in hiding as a boy and presumably never saw her parents again

what the fuck was the aim in doing that to a kid and her family

and like, this means the storyteller is directly responsible for Choosing which members of the town are going to be witches. he looks at peoples’ lives and just Decides ‘this person’s gonna get completely fucked over and live life thinking they’re a monster and having to hide from their friends and neighbors truly believing they’re going to be cast into a fire pit if anyone finds out what they are and will probably eventually have to go through a public witch trial in front of the entire town and experience the immense trauma of being sentenced to a horrible gruesome death and falling into the fire, even if they arent really hurt, and now have to live in the woods as an outcast of society carrying out whatever orders they’re given”

and he had to have been the one who said witches can only be women!! so he decided Only Women would go through this. he decided a child and a young girl would go through this and god knows how many others

also how the fuck did they do the thing with the witches chasing layton and luke in the beginning then bc they’re not hypnotized to believe whatever they’re told they see,

what the FUCK

EVERYONES JUST BEEN... UNDER AMNESIA AND HIGH ON HYPNOTIC INK THIS WHOLE TIME,

and everyone in town has a rare medical condition induced by the water that makes them fall unconscious when they hear a silver bell, bc thats...plausible,

like i guess. everyone was like. people who wanted to start over and forget their old lives for whatever reason (i was gonna call out the fact that theres children in this town but if its been 10 years its possible that young children could have been born and raised in the town since then) (but then, greyerl looks older than 10?) and consented to.... having their memories erased and being completely mind controlled, I Fucking Guess,

IM NOT BUYING IT EITHER PHOENIX,

but like one person in the crowd was going “wait yeah i just realized i cant remember my own mother’s face!!” how....did nobody in town realize that Everyone has no memory of their childhoods or their parents or anything. surely someone somewhere would’ve confided to someone the terrible amnesia they’re suffering from and had a “wait what the fuck me too” moment and it would’ve spread. surely the people with kids would have had to think about the fact that they dont remember being a kid/having parents/etc. surely those kids wouldve asked about their grandparents or ‘what was it like when you were a kid, mommy?’

“now now sweetie remember, dont touch that bell OR A WITCH WILL POSSESS YOU AND MAKE YOU DESTROY EVERYTHING YOU LOVE” yea thats definitely how you talk to a child and will absolutely not backfire in any way

jfc though ‘i rang a bell that ended up causing everyone in town to fall unconscious at the same time and resulted in a fire that destroyed everything and killed everyone i know including my mom and my best friend’s mom’ is a FUCKING LOT to cope with, especially considering she was like 6,

so i guess... there is no actual real ‘bezella,’ eve the cat is. just a cat, but the name was subconscious memory of darklaw who is actually named eve and is actually the ‘grand witch’ of the woods and was in on it the whole time but isnt actually bezella or a witch but then theres no actual witches anyway, and technically i guess she is bezella bc ‘bezella’ was the one who destroyed the town and shes actually the one who rang the bell but none of that Really matters bc no matter who did it someone was going to end up ringing it anyway

ok EVEN IF you buy ‘everyone’s been hypnotized by weird ink into believing whatever the storyteller says but dont worry about it its totally legal bc they consented to this somehow even though they dont remember, and they were told they cant see pure black so anything pure black is invisible’

A) how does no one ever hear any sound from these machines. and if you argue that the machines are only ever used when people are knocked out,

B) how does NO ONE IN TOWN ever manage to accidentally bump into one and wonder what the fuck they just ran into. how does no one ever see a bird land on it or something. the bell tower was there the whole time covered in an ‘invisible’ black tarp but the wind never blew the cloth around. no one ever walked through that spot in the middle of the town square even though the vigilantes wouldnt have been guarding it yet bc they didnt know anything was there

alright is anyone else absolutely shipping espella and eve by the end of this nonsense though. i know shes described as being “like a big sister to her” but they’re not actual sisters, theres only a couple years age difference, and i mean, like,

look at this!!!!!!!!! harold they’re lesbians

see!!!!! they’re married now!!!!!

barnham is ROCKING that look

OH FUCK!!!!!!! OH SHIT OH FUCK THERE HE IS THERE HE IS!!!!!!!!! HE!!!!!

I WAS NT EXPECTING TO GET TO SEE EDGEWORTH AT ALL IM YELLING

also edgeworth definitely shouts OBJECTION as much or possibly even more than phoenix does so who are u calling annoying,

god fucking DAMN he cute tho. he has absolutely no business being this cute. look at that lil nose. fuck

#lucy plays layton v wright #scooby dooby queue

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gayliensav · 5 years

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the opening card of fear the walking dead is literally the most annoying sound to my overly sensitive ears

but im starting a rewatch, just gonna keep updating this post below the cut

S1E01: “Pilot”

ahahhaha that millennial daughter of theirs not watching to eat gluten. Bet the local white moms who are casual watchers for Norman loved this joke

Alicia is the only character I have liked from the very beginning (besides like...Strand, but he wasn’t in the first ep)

Like I know everyone is up Madison’s ass (at least they were last time I checked and I’m a few seasons behind), but I don’t like her or Travis all that much

Nick changed for me, I used to hate him but he got a little better

Nick hating Travis???? A BIG FUCKING MOOD

Like I understand that as the viewers who watch TWD we’re supposed to be annoyed with their decisions, which is how I feel from the beginning, but I do realize that’s how they want us to feel.

“You need to take Christopher” “i DoNt WaNnA gO”

He’s literally asking his son, a teenager, to come and spend the weekend in the hospital with someone he barely knows, like what does he expect here??

the lead up draaaaags on for too long

*slams fist on desk* wheres isaac lahey

I think one of the main problems with the relationships in this show is that there’s no lead up and no development, they just immediately love each other. Like with Rick and Michonne, we had seasons of lead up, but not with these two. The writers of this are capable of writing good relationships, they just chose to drag these two heteros into the main stage without giving them any backstory in the beginning.

This liveblog is going to consist of me making quips and then actual analysis of stuff

i walked out of the room to go to the bathroom and didnt miss anything

this one kids got it covered, tobias is prolly still out there

thats what I expected Paul Rovia to be like at the beginning of the apocalypse. Everyone is like dicking around and hes like nah fam and yeets his body outta town

the whole show is on 123movies, btw, dont give amc the numbers by watching it on their site. They also don’t have the first few seasons available anyways, so

like why don’t they just go check the building instead of saying Nick was just drugged. Like I know he was high, but he saw dead bodies, they need to call the police and have them check that shit out. Instead Travis just goes there by himself. Ricky Grimes would not approve.

I forget how long until the actual apocalypse stuff happens, but I’m getting a teeny bit bored already.

“Something really bad happened there” “I don’t care” lmao WHAT, Madison????

“You cannot enable him” IM HOWLING THESE WORDS JUST CAME FROM MADISON’S MOUTH

I paused and 50 pop ups came up, thanks

you know alicia’s bf goes down

IS THAT ANDRE FROM VICTORIOUS

ITS LEON

they really teased us with an almost-zombie huh almost like they knew we were bored

fffff there aint a doubt in my mind that anyone from the pilot except tobias and alicia survived this show

nick’s yeetin outta here

Like the concept of being in a huge city during the beginning was great, but we didn’t really get very much of that. The first few episodes especially when Travis was trying to get Chris and was stuck in that barber shop was great. Like that’s one of the few episodes of this that really stick in my mind. Those crazy fucking scenes were great.

“there’s no bodies...they couldn’t just get up and walk away” lollllll what clever writers WE HAVE

Like I’ll give Travis credit, he did try to be a good dad and stepdad...just bad timing, not great decisions in the end of the world, etc. Like the one scene where he was swearing he’d drag Nick to rehab??? That scene got me feelin’ stuff.

YES FINALLY SOME TENSION ON THE HIGHWAY LETS GO LESBIANS THIS IS THE WALKING FUCKING DEAD

lol a helicopter

you know why all these kids aren’t in school??? their parents are anti-vaxxers

walkers walkers walker walkers LETS GO THERES A WALKER

“killshot, bitch”

that took way too long to be the first episode goddamn

S1E02: “So Close, Yet So Far”

Ooooo cellphones are starting to go, shits getting good now

I’m like 30 minutes in and haven’t liveblogged anything, I’m bored

Well, that was that.

S1E03: “The Dog”

I hate this already because of the title we stan (1) TWD Dog in this house and his name is Dog Dixon

this star wars now???

See, I’m a neutral gay who just likes to watch chaos. A chaotic neutral, if you will. So this episode is fucking WILD, like this is what I mentioned before.

the monopoly scene was wholesome

I guess I could see Paul joining in on this chaos for a bit until he realized oh shit this aint good chief THEN yeeting outta there

Fun fact, the truck they use for the first part of Fear is Daryl, Aaron, and Paul’s truck on the askjaaryl blog:

The music while they’re driving is on fucking point, like it kinda sounds like that one TWD theme (the hopeful one) but remixed.

The scene where all the lights in the city go off PHEW poetic cinema

Madison: DONT LET IT IN! Nick: ITS A DOG! -- Daryl felt that

I frozzee I thought for a hot minute that it was Dog

He a cutie tho

that poor doggo im so sick of this show’s treatment towards them like

if anything happens to Dog, I think Norman will quit and rightfully so

i feel like just a few people in the post-apocalyptic world where zombie movies dont exist were just blessed with the knowledge that you have to shoot the head

damn chris really didnt do shit and got a whole broken nose huh

so far, stan list: alicia, victor strand (he hasnt appeared but yyknow), and chris sort of

they need a doctor but she never went to school before the end of hte world is this how alex feels all the time

S1E04: “Not Fade Away”

The opening to this one always really stuck with me. Like it’s so normal but you know it’s not.

lol remember that time everyone freaked the fuck out thinking this was Carl

I feel like Ophelia and this soldier dude would have one of those conversations where it’s like “what do you like about me?” “you’re beautiful” “is that it?”

deadass don’t care if nick is over 18, she still hit her son who has an addiction he can’t control

I think this is where I started to hate Madison. Instead of blaming the people who did it, she blamed Liza. Because that makes sense.

S1E05: “Cobalt”

YOU ARE MY DAD YOURE MY DAD BOOGIE WOOGIE WOOGIE

Strand out here scamming the heteros since before the apocalypse started

Paul Rovia and Victor Strand had a thing, you can’t change my mind

Everything but Strand’s scenes is boring to me and there is an extreme lack of those.

S1E06: “The Good Man”

Honestly, the relationship between Nick and Strand was really great.

“We’re gonna get along fine, Nick’s mom” is one of my favorite lines because like...it’s like a little kid talking to someone else’s parent, but he’s a grown ass man and he knows damn well how funny he is.

So wait did Ophelia die???

oop nope she good

lol she deadass apologizing that he got taken and not for beating her own son but OKAAAAAY

S2E01: “The Monster”

Here we go, a full length season this time. Let’s see how this goes.

#sav watches;

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killian-whump · 6 years

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OUAT 2x12: Rewatch Blog

Wow! It’s been awhile since I’ve done one of these, since it took me forever and a day so long to GIF and post all that whump from the last episode! Really, considering Killian had a bookshelf thrown on him, got beaned in the head with an oar and knocked into the hold of his ship, was beaten viciously with a cane, and then got hit by a car... Well, I think it’s understandable.

But now that’s all done and it’s time for us to watch episode 12 of the second season, “In the Name of the Brother”... Wait, what’s this? Hook’s in the hospital this entire episode? *sigh* Okay, everybody! I’ll see you all next year! ;)

Well, pitifully and hopelessly behind or not, it’s time for another liveblog!

Starting RIGHT where we left off... with Hook in pain and Belle being very, very confused. And Hook in more pain. Haha.

I’ve seen some anti-Hook arguments about how gunshot wounds are so traumatic and take so long to recover from... but I just watched Rumple literally make it “all better” in about five seconds, so I have no idea what that argument was all about. Haha, I forgot he did that, so I just kinda nodded along, like, “Fair point...” but it’s actually not a fair point at all :P

“Hey beautiful!” Hey yourself, beautiful <3

“There’s someone in [the car]!” WELL, I SHOULD HOPE SO. Why is everyone so surprised there’s someone in the car? Do cars regularly drive themselves in Storybrooke? Nevermind. Don’t answer that.

Drinking on the job. Really, Whale?

Oh no... Whale flashbacks. I’ll be honest, I’m not really interested in Whale’s story :/

...I am interested in hot, bloody pirates on gurneys though.

I love how Rumple is in color in these flashbacks, but it just makes me wonder why Whale is in color whenever he visits the Enchanted Forest. Like, shouldn’t he be black and white in their realm if Rumple is in color in his?

And are they going to address the fact that he’s in color?!?!

Suddenly, I’m a little interested in the flashbacks now...

Whoooooa, bad idea, Rumple. I mean, I know what you’re going for right here, but in the world of failed TLKs, this one might be the failiest.

I mean, listen to her scream. WOW. Hard fail. HARD fail.

Well, I always like to segue into a Hook scene by focusing on the handcuffs he’s wearing. It’s, you know, an artistic thing. Very... artsy. Yes. Art.

I love how he’s all grunting and groaning and wincing... and then he spots Emma sitting there and he just freezes like “OH NO. DON’T SHOW WEAKNESS.”

“Again? You’re really into this, aren’t you?” Heehee <3 We all are, baby. Get used to it <3

He’s such a smarmy, adorable little bastard right here. “Chills.”

Okay, but because I’m me, I do have an issue with this scene, and it’s about his left wrist. I get that it’s movie magic and it’s not a real blunted limb. It’s just something to cover Colin’s hand. Fair enough, but why is it SQUARE?? Like, there’s kind of a cube-type quality to it?

When you inspect it closely, it just looks... square. Like the sides are flat and there’s four corners to it. It annoys me every time I see it.

That said, I do enjoy this scene as a Hook scene and (of course) as a whump scene, but I don’t really care for it in a CS context. I mean, her telling the nurse to hide him was nice, but kind of necessary... but the rest of her actions show a complete and utter lack of care for what’s happened to him. She tells the ambulance crew to let him wait, and then she resorts to torture tactics whilst interrogating him, which - I mean, don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed every blessed moment of it - is kind of not a glowing character trait in general, let alone a promising sign of impending true love. Although, that said, I would be ALL OVER True Love’s Waterboarding if it were a thing. Just saying.

“Guess another passcode” Dave, you bloomin’ idiot. “Well, you do understand that computer hacking and pickaxe hacking are different?” Hahaha, Leroy <3

One of my favorite Rumple lines right here:

“So glad I don’t give a damn.”

So am I, Rumple. So am I. That’s when you’re the most fun to watch :D

LOL Dave... “Dr. Whale, prep for surgery.” Like, who said there was a surgery? Dave, you’re not a doctor. Dave. Dave, listen. Dave...

And Whale’s just walking out like, “Yes. Prep for surgery. What a fantastic idea. What surgery? When is it happening? Who is assisting? Are there even any other doctors on this staff? WHO KNOWS?! Dave said to prep for surgery!”

“Anyone else notice he’s drunk off his ass?” Hahaha, Dave’s look right here. “Uhh... No, I didn’t notice that, honey, but that DOES explain why he totally took my order to prep for surgery when I’m not remotely qualified to give it.”

SAME, Leroy. Hard same on all accounts.

More flashbacks. “How did you get in here? Who are you?”

WHY ARE YOU IN FUCKING COLOR?!?!?

Wait. Wait. Back the fuck up. “Rumple von Stiltskin”????????

RUMPLE VON STILTSKIN?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

What the fuck did I just hear with my own two ears?!?! When? How? Who?!

“A foreigner.” “What tipped you off, my rosy complexion?” OH, SO WE ARE GOING TO ADDRESS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM. And then drop it like a hot fucking potato. Mm hmmm.

So typical of Rumple von fucking Stiltskin.

LMAO “Are you a philanthropist?” “Well, I’ve been called worse.”

Okay, but where are you going to spend that totally-not-suspicious pile of FULL COLOR gold coins?!?!

I’m just... gonna pretend none of that ever happened.

RUMPLE VON STILTSKIN. Whatever, man. What-ever.

Why is the chipped cup in a display case, though? Like, his entire shop is just full of things on display that aren’t actually for sale. HOW IS HE STILL IN BUSINESS?!??! And where did the von come from?!?!?!

Creepy shit happening... Cora must be arou- Oh, there she is.

Hahahaha “Had hoped you were dead, but hey - disappointment’s just part of life. I’m sure we can agree on that.” LOL, Rumple. VON STILTSKIN.

I am never going to forget this. Or forgive it. Bury me here.

Oh, Cora, you cheatin’ on your boo Hook with Rumple von Stiltskin? Oh, wait. My bad. Mama makes all the rules, and when the pet boy lands himself in the kennel, well, she’s gotta find some new playthings...

Hahahahahahahaha “I’m joking. as far as you know.”

Oh, no... Ger von Hardt has been shot!!! And Vic von Tor has done a runner out the front door! WHAT WILL WE VON DO NOW?!?!?!

“Maybe Doc can do it?” Leroy’s laughter, OMG, hahahahaha, one of the best Leroy moments right here. HAHAHAHAHAHA... NO.

Leroy’s really shining in this episode. Like, he’s only even here to make me like him even more or something. Dave: “[Whale] had his arm ripped off and put back on.” Leroy: “Cool.”

Okay, Cora, I love you, babe, but this is kinda creepy. I mean, you’re sniffing your daughter’s clothes.

Oh wow. This is, hands down, the snazziest hidden underground lair I have ever, ever, ever seen. Regina, your talent is wasted in evil doing and mayoring. Seriously, girl. Get yourself into interior decorating. This is fucking beautiful.

“I think it’s not alright.” Nah, actually on this show, it’s... kinda sorta alright. We really don’t have that high of standards for “alright”ness to begin with, let’s be honest, and even lower ones for parental “alright” behavior.

“Emma and Henry and the two idiots” :D Dave! I think she’s talking about you. Dave! Dave, are you listening? I don’t think he’s listening. Daaaaave.

“Don’t come near me!” LIGHTNING SPEED. “I told you not to- oh, whatever. No one ever listens to me.”

Hahahaha, oh shit. This is gonna go bad. It’s gonna go so bad.

Yep. It went bad.

I love it when Ruby tells people she ate her boyfriend, by the way. It just never stops being hilarious. “Oh, did I mention I ATE MY BOYFRIEND?!”

'Ohhhhhhhhhhh look what I found under my butt!' 'That wasn’t under your butt, it was in my house.' 'But I’ve never been to your house!' 'You were in my house, Mother.' 'No, no, you just keep your car too messy. What’s this?' 'It’s LITERALLY the KITCHEN SINK from MY HOUSE' 'It was under the seat, dear.'

“I was just... stretching my legs. Now I’m gonna go do this thing.”

YEAH. NO IDEA WHY ANYONE WAS WORRIED, WHALE.

NOOOOOOOOO IDEA.

Aw, poor Gerhardt. Ger von Hardt. Neeeever forget.

OH NO, SHE THREW THE CUP OH NOOOOOOO

Oh, wow. Gee whiz, they’re so lucky he didn’t see anything! Wow. That’s so convenient! And so great that Emma knows when people are lying...

Emma’s so done in this scene and I love it, haha.

'We have a long history together so... Yeah, long story short, I’m going to kill EVERYONE HERE if anything happens to Belle.'

“You’re not going to believe what I saw.” Actually, I’m pretty sure she’ll totally believe what you saw, considering you both know magic is real and you came looking for the town and magic wielders in it. Just saying.

ANYWAY... That’s a wrap!

PEW PEW PEW VON PEW!!!!

#ouat rewatch #watching fairytales #2x12 #ouat criticism #oc #kw reviews #rumple von stiltskin #never forget

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journeysintowebcomics · 5 years

Text

Worm Liveblog #111

UPDATE 111: Set Skitter on Fire

Last time Calvert had done the betrayal. Using the technology he has access to in his new position and thanks to the stuff his new parahuman villain pals made for him, he teleported Skitter into a trap where he’ll now shoot her. Oh this is going to be a tough one to get out of. Let’s see how she’ll do it!

So, the very last line last update was that Calvert shot. She doesn’t even get to move out of the way before the bullet hits her. Is the costume bulletproof? I once heard that the silk, if tensed properly, could resist bullets, but I imagine that’d require some rather specific tuning and positions. Also more than one layer of thread. There’s a chance her costume can be bulletproof, but...

Getting hit, the smallest part of me could only think costume can’t stop a bullet after all. Except it wasn’t even a complete thought. Just a momentary disappointment as I felt the impact of the bullet passing through my chest to my back.

Golly! If I wasn’t aware there are like fifteen arcs more and by now it’s unlikely Skitter will die in the middle of it all to pass the baton to someone else, I’d actually be freaking out. What is it she’s feeling, if not a bullet? The force of the impact? I also have heard bulletproof vests don’t protect you that well, it only protects against the bullet itself. The impact can break your ribs and leave you bruised like you don’t know.

The last thing Skitter needs right now is a few broken ribs, that’s for sure.

Skitter falls, and all of her bugs start flittering around, distracting everyone. Even Calvert is forced to aim away, protecting his face from the bugs, knowing some of them must be covered with capsaicin. Doesn’t seem like Skitter managed to sting anyone, but she’s not hit by any further bullets, so that’s good.

When he spoke, his voice was raised to be heard despite the muffling effect, “Out of the room. Fill it with bullets… no. Scratch that.”

He’s coming up with counter-counter-plans before I even have a strategy in mind.

“…Set her on fire. Her costume is bulletproof, and I want this done. I need to attend to other matters.”

Naturally he’s using counter-counter-counter-counter-counter plans. Maybe he’s even using his power right now, using one plan in this timeline and a different plan in another. It’s possible the ‘fill it with bullets’ plan is for the other timeline. You know, that makes things even worse! It means Skitter has to escape alive in two different timelines, or else she’s screwed because Coil will get rid of the timeline she survives in! As if things weren’t difficult enough, haha

You know, I know it should be kind of common sense, but it kind of blows my mind bugs have senses of smell and taste.

Calvert leaves the place, possibly going to deal with how he’ll explain to the Undersiders Skitter was teleported to who knows where, and two of his soldiers advance to fulfill his orders and burn everything. Skitter finds a crushed bullet on the armor on her chest, showing it was the armor what saved her, not the tensile strength of her costume. Now she has to deal with two men here about to blaze everything with Molotov cocktails. Her immediate idea is to use her pepper spray and try to light one of them on fire.

It wasn’t the brightest move, trying to stop someone from lighting a fuse by setting them on fire, but I wasn’t in a position to be picky.

Look, if it works, then it wasn’t a stupid move. No move that works is stupid, that’s my life philosophy. It has gotten me in so much trouble in the past, but when it works, it works!

Merely setting one on fire seems to have bought her some time, because she got time to tie the other soldier’s hand to the Molotov, making sure he wouldn’t be able to just throw it with no problem at all. Calvert, who apparently stood around in the other room instead of leaving like he said he would – just go already, man, dontcha trust your mercenaries? – takes the Molotov cocktail and doesn’t light it on fire. He tosses it into the room, breaking and spreading the incendiary contents around.

Ah, so that was his idea! He knew Skitter was doing something to stop the bottle to be thrown adequately, so instead he spread gasoline around and used the burning soldier as the lighter. In other words: Skitter pretty much delayed the cocktail from being lit, she didn’t save herself that well. On the other hand, she didn’t get two flaming cocktails shattering all over her, so it must have been for the better.

You know, while I was skimming the next few paragraphs, I realized Skitter must be hearing through her bugs, she has quite some detail about everything that’s happening in the other room, even though there’s a fire here right now and fires aren’t really a silent thing when you’re close to them. Also, I just remembered she’s supposed to be temporarily blind. Absolutely nothing of what’s going on in the story hints she has any sort of eyesight problems. It’s amazing how handicaps and health problems are forgotten in life or death situations when it’s fiction, eh? Not that I can complain, it increases the odds she’ll get out of this...relatively unharmed.

The situation is tough: there’s containment foam over here, cornering her onto one side of the room. Beyond the containment foam there’s fire with accelerant in it, meaning if she steps on it, she’ll get fire on herself and that’s a death sentence. The door is getting barricaded, so it’s pointless to even think about going over the containment foam and the gasoline, and I imagine there are no other ways out. I bet the soldiers will set whatever place this is on fire from the outside, just in case, so...her only hope would be to extinguish that fire, getting enough time to try to undo the barricade on the other side of the door? She’s in trouble, then. Last I checked, she’s not carrying anything for extinguishing fires.

Well, she does have something on her side now: she subconsciously called all bugs in the area to her. That has to be useful for something, she’s been able to use her bugs in creative manners before. I doubt the fire can be gone by using the bugs themselves, but perhaps they can do something about the fire? Somehow?

The situation outside is rough. This is an abandoned neighborhood; the area was prepared so there wouldn’t be eyewitnesses. There’s also a legion of soldiers outside, with spotlights towards the house and all kinds of weapons and containment foam. Escaping the perimeter seems impossible. Hmmmm...did Calvert make everyone drive everything here? Maybe, once Skitter escapes the room, she’ll find something related to teleporting and manages to use it to teleport away.

Oh, there are windows. They’re boarded up, and from what Skitter can feel with her fingers – what a time to remember she’s kind of blind right now, Mr. Wildbow – they even have uncommon screws keeping everything intact. This means they’re boarded on the inside, no? Instead of the outside? That may have been a mistake on Calvert’s part, because the boards are on Skitter’s side. That’s just giving a chance for...something. No idea what, but it’s something.

This would be a perfect time for a second trigger event. Hadn’t Lisa said that my mind-power link was enhanced whenever I felt trapped? I doubted I’d ever feel more trapped than I did right this moment. I couldn’t see just how far the fire reached, because I was blind, and the heat of the fire was killing the bugs I needed for sensing my surroundings. I had only a minute or two before the room became an oven and killed off the rest, leaving me blind and roasting to death.

Heck, maybe her bursts of listening and seeing through her bugs are her second trigger event on the verge of happening. It’d make sense, that her power would intensify so much she’d effectively be able to use her bugs as an extension of her senses. I’ll be surprised if Worm ends without she getting a second trigger event, by the way.

Skitter manages to find black widow spiders in the area and stings Calvert with them. Say, is North America filled with black widows or what? I swear Skitter finds them around all the time. The thought such poisonous spiders must be around you all the time must be terrifying.

Getting bit with these spiders only serve to annoy Calvert, who orders them to burn everything – order I’m sure he’d have given anyway. What Skitter did pretty much hinted Calvert she’s still feeling well enough to fight back. Many Molotov cocktails crash against the house Skitter is trapped in, the fire’s only going to get more intense from now on. Calvert, satisfied, gets into the car.

Calvert glanced over his shoulder, then confidently strode over to a car and took a seat in the back. He didn’t have the driver take him away. No, he’d be more interested in watching, in verifying that things went according to plan.

Didn’t you have other matters to attend somewhere else?! Geez!

I considered waiting for the fire to weaken the floorboards before leaping over the foam and plunging down to the lower level, then dismissed that idea. I wouldn’t last that long, for one thing, and there was too much chance of me being injured.

Thankfully she rejected that idea. The floorboards won’t weaken for no reason; they’ll weaken because there’s fire. This maybe could work if it wasn’t because there’s accelerant. It’s just too much of a risk, getting gasoline on you and being set on fire, no? Still, this means she’s not on a ground floor. Even if she escapes through the window, she’ll need some way to get safely outside – and unnoticed, too. I remember it was mentioned there were lights pointed at this place. Escaping this room is going to be merely the start of a troublesome ordeal.

It’s a tad puzzling Calvert took into account the possibility Skitter was carrying a screwdriver, but didn’t account for the possibility she might have a gun. Personally I’d have thought it was more likely someone would carry a weapon than a hardware tool. I don’t remember if it was ever mentioned she had a distaste for guns or something, but if she did and Calvert found that out, then it’d explain why he didn’t consider she’d have a gun, I guess.

Skitter uses the gun to weaken the boards’ hold onto the windows. Turns out Calvert boarded up both in the inside and the outside, so that solves the problem I had mentioned before! Nice! Skitter, not having expected the strong recoil, drops the gun and therefore wastes some time. Hmmm...say, the soldiers must be far away enough to not hear the gunshots, no?

The gunfire had attracted attention.

Nevermind, they weren’t. I must have overestimated the noise of fire and underestimated the intensity of a gunshot.

This caused the soldiers to use their ammo against the house, a flurry of bullets breaking through the walls and floor. Say, that means the intensity of the bullets must be diminished because of the obstacles, right? She may be safe. One of the bullets does hit her on the back, and that hurts, but she’s not dying from a gunshot. She is running out of time, though. The place is getting worse and worse.

Aha, finally something goes well for her! Skitter had managed to send cockroaches onto the vehicles that are aiming their headlights at the house, turning them off. Is it a preparation for an escape, perhaps?

It was! Skitter gathers as many of the bugs as she got, and uses them to form decoys. One goes through the window, getting shot immediately and slumping over. Then comes another, and another, until Skitter can’t handle anymore the heat inside the room, forcing her to go outside already before she faints. As expected, she’s shot when she’s on the windowsill and she falls down to the ground, in what I hope was an identical move to the rest of the swarm decoys. Hm...I wonder if she’ll have enough strength to make a few decoys more to make them fall from the window, as a distraction.

She does have enough strength to move her decoys like they’re truly getting gunned down and injured, just to stand up again. Given her costume is bulletproof – as far as Calvert and his soldiers know – they can’t afford not to shoot anything that moves, so it really is just matter of time before the real Skitter is shot again. Could she do something with bugs to disable the machine guns? At least to stop the endless barrage?

One of the decoys arrives at the fence surrounding the perimeter, and since Skitter had done a well enough job making it look like it could be her, they keep shooting at it, until someone got the idea of throwing a Molotov cocktail on it, obliterating the decoy. Hm, this settles it, they’ll do the same to any other decoy that gets to that area. If she’ll get to the fence, she’ll have to think of a way to make sure she won’t be set on fire.

If Thomas Calvert was using his power to guide his men, to give them an advantage and give them directions that would help narrow down the decoys, then I’d inevitably face the same fate as the decoy had after I got to the fence.

But he wasn’t giving directions. He was in the truck, watching. No radios were sounding with instructions, not yet. He had to protect his perimeter, keep me from getting to freedom… but he was in a reactive position, not an offensive one where he could command an attack and then make it so it never happened if the attack went awry. No, I’d weathered that initial attack.

He’s not giving instructions...perhaps he did use his power earlier? And he can’t use it again because it’d meant putting himself at disadvantage, in case this timeline is the one where Skitter escapes again? Calvert is not forced to use no more than his considerable cleverness and craftiness! Haaaah...that’s still a big threat.

Are the soldiers starting to deal with the approaching decoys by throwing Molotov cocktails at them? Then it’s only matter of time before one hits Skitter, this can’t be good. To try to stop that from happening, she decides she’ll need a distraction to sow some discord into the enemy lines. Her distraction is to use her swarm to talk to the soldiers’ ears, saying creepy stuff to unnerve them. She’s going to need to do that to everyone here if she wants to distract them enough to run away, I’d say! Good thing there are plenty of bugs here.

Calvert’s voice sounded over a dozen radios in the area, “She’s playing mind tricks. She’s still near the house, and she’s never killed or tortured before.

Oh, I see Calvert isn’t aware Skitter freaking took Lung’s eyes out. I’m pretty certain that has to count under the word ‘torture’! Yeah, I’m not getting over that little incident. Hah! Either way, even if he was aware, I’m sure he wouldn’t tell his troops Skitter may actually do some pretty messed up stuff. Why give validation to Skitter’s creepy threats?

Maintain the perimeter and do not use grenades.”

Again, with the refusal on the subject of grenades. A reminder, even, this time. Was this a point where he’d split the timelines, bombarded the house with grenades in one reality and stuck to the guns in another?

It’s not a bad theory. In which case, in the other timeline Skitter will have to survive grenades in close quarters. Being trapped in one end of the room, with nowhere to go, with a couple grenades thrown at you...how would she pull that off, really? Or had that gone catastrophically bad for him, even if he managed to kill Skitter? Hm, I wonder...

Then there was the possibility that this tied into his alibi, that he didn’t want the Undersiders or even the Travelers to know he’d gone after one of them, and the use of several grenades would be too easily traced back to ‘Coil’. He would stick to an over the top arson, maybe hide the police reports and suppress the media. If I was in a territory owned by the Travelers, maybe they’d accept a price for keeping this quiet from the Undersiders.

...I don’t know...I find it hard to believe that Calvert, with all his power and everything, wouldn’t be able to hide a few grenade blasts inside a house. He could burn the house away and get rid of the remains, and it’d be like there was an arson all along. No, I’m more inclined to think that something went wrong with using grenades against Skitter.

Thinking about all this leads to Skitter remembering how she escaped from the hospital bed after the Endbringer attack. Oh...I don’t remember at all how she escaped. Using her bugs, Skitter checks the soldiers’ equipment, searching for stuff she could use, until she finds the cords and bandoleers for the grenades. Ah, there’s an idea: force the soldiers to use the stuff Calvert told them not to use no matter what!

Using her spiders, she manages to trick a soldier to throw grenades, having loosened the pins. Hmmm...let’s hope none of the grenades falls near the house! Thankfully, thinking ahead, Skitter also put the ring of the grenade string onto the fence, making it swing back and explode there, destroying some of the fence and forcing other soldiers to back off. Nice! Skitter is managing to make some progress here! Calvert must be so annoyed right now.

Some other soldier realizes what Skitter is doing and panics, shouting about how the pins are being pulled. Hah! Great, that’ll be of help! Everybody starts retreating, giving Skitter more leeway to advance. Since the headlights aren’t working, someone starts firing flairs to illuminate the area. Skitter will have to hurry before one of the flares gets too close to where she is.

The psychological pressure she’s mounting is pretty good. She’s appealing to the sense of ‘ew gross’ that’s hardcoded in our psyches, and I’m sure it’s especially effective when it’s talking about gross stuff happening to you. That’s just terribly unnerving. In the meantime, Calvert keeps insisting them to not throw the grenades, but when the other option is to hold grenades and wait for them to explode on you, can you really obey that order?

Skitter had been almost out when she made a little too much noise, alerting one of the soldiers. Hurrying to act, she runs to pull anything she can get her hands on. It’s not a grenade – luckily for Skitter, really – and it’s not a flashbang. Still, what she did get will call so much attention to the area: it’s a smoke grenade. Everybody’s going to look at the sudden burst of smoke, won’t they? Especially if the soldier starts alerting everyone Skitter is there!

Scavenging used silk from previous attacks, my bugs arranged to pull more pins for smoke canisters.

Oh, nevermind. The entire area is going to be covered in smoke at this rate. Skitter is doing a fantastic job against a squadron of trained mercenaries, it’s impressive. Having fun watching the show, Calvert? The soldiers can’t even shoot around due to the risk of hitting an ally through the smoke!

I sensed Calvert’s truck pulling away.

Calvert could use his power to prune away possibilities that didn’t work for him, but only if he was aware of me, aware of my movements and how I was mounting my attack.

His retreat left me wondering if he’d deemed this situation unsalvageable. Had he deemed this a loss?

Sucks to be him! I wonder if, in the timeline grenades were being used, something like this happened. I find it unlikely, but...who knows!

Knowing Calvert is leaving, Skitter wonders what his plan will be now. Shall he look for leverage somewhere else?

My dad. The others.

I suddenly felt the urge to get away, and get away quickly.

If it’s for leverage I think it’s more likely he’ll go for Dad Hebert. Calvert is ruthless like that, I’m sure he’d play dirty and target Dad Hebert.

Escaping now is somewhat easier. The soldiers seem to be unaware she’s so close to the fence, because they’re still focusing on the house, throwing the smoke canisters in that direction so Skitter wouldn’t be able to use them against the troops. Skitter manages to overcome the fences and goes to the trucks, managing to obtain the keys through some subterfuge and getting onto the driver’s seat.

It sure is a tad nightmarish filling the enemy’s mouth with bugs and letting them choke for a while is starting to be one of Skitter’s moves. I wonder how much longer it’ll be before anyone facing Skitter will make sure to have some protection over their mouth and noses? Knowing Mr. Wildbow, it shouldn’t be much longer, haha

All in all, that was a pretty daring escape. I liked pretty much all of it! The only thing that kind of bothers me is that, well...Skitter sure can’t be blind right now. I mean, she’s driving a vehicle. Even in desperate situations as this one, this just wouldn’t end well. Luckily for Skitter, if she still is blind, she has the author’s favor, so she won’t crash three hundred meters away from the burned house due to the sorry state of the roads and what not.

Skitter has no communication right now, so she won’t be able to alert the rest of the Undersiders Calvert is a traitorous snake. She has to think her next move now: which weak point of hers will Calvert strike?

I was struck by an ugly connection between two thoughts. Calvert had mentioned he had other matters to attend to, and if Chariot’s teleportation device mimicked Trickster’s power, they’d had to swap something or somebody in. If he’d replaced me with a body double, he would want to stay in contact with her and help ensure things went her way with the other Undersiders.

That’s a good point, yeah. He’d need someone ready to pretend to be Skitter, right away. If there’s a trained body double with the rest of the Undersiders right now, then they’re in danger. Now that his plan to get rid of Skitter is starting to fall apart, he’s going to have to take action, and since the Undersiders are turning into a liability if they ever hear Calvert’s betrayal, it may be safer to get rid of them altogether, no? It’s not like he needs them anymore. Heck, he may even twist it as the PRT being especially effective, and delay the Travelers’ departure for as long as it’s needed to keep the public story going according to his plans.

On the other hand, if Calvert was looking for a way to get leverage over me, my dad was one very vulnerable target that he was aware of.

Frankly, it’s matter of time before a villain hurts Dad Hebert to make Taylor suffer. I’m not expecting him to survive this story. Maybe Coil will be the one to do it.

It would have to be the Undersiders and Dinah. I hated to admit it, but if my dad was attacked and I had the Undersiders there by my side, they could only help. If the opposite were true, my dad would hamper me.

So, all in all, what I’m getting here is that she’d have to get in contact with the Undersiders one way or another, no? If she can get in touch with Tattletale everything should go okay. I hope so, at least. Last I heard, Tattletale and Regent were going to do stuff for Calvert, so they’re...not in the safest of situations right now, really.

I’d seen how involved Calvert’s maneuver had been at the debate. He had a grand plan, and it wasn’t necessarily the one he’d shared with us earlier. I was now a glitch in his system, threatening to unravel everything he’d put together.

My opinion is that he’s proven to be too inflexible when it’s about Dinah. Does he not have a strong enough structure in his plans for them to continue ahead safely even without Dinah? Is Dinah the big cornerstone, somehow? He really should have prepared things to be able to continue without Dinah and acquiesce to Skitter, if only to have her at bay so she wouldn’t wreck his plans. In exchange, he’d have someone skillful working for him. I don’t doubt sooner or later he’d get tired of listening to Skitter, buuuuut by then he would have a way to squash her, no?

So yeah, I believe the unraveling of his plans is his fault.

No option but jump ahead, face Coil’s plans, and try to succeed without casualties or injuries. But that will be for next time!

Next time: in two updates

#worm #worm liveblog #webserial #liveblog #webserial liveblog

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sachi-pon · 6 years

Text

free! dive to the future episode 10 liveblog/review thing

i appreciate anyone who is actually reading these weird liveblogs, hahahahahaha. i know that i kind of ramble on and on and on. hopefully you guys like my rambles!!!

my previous liveblogs: (episode 1) (episode 2) (episode 3) (episode 4) (episode 5) (episode 6) (episode 7) (episode 8) (episode 9)

watch the episode here: http://www.crunchyroll.com/free-iwatobi-swim-club/episode-10-the-grab-start-of-hope-775641

***

"it wasn't anything special," says albert. haha this reminds me of something i get annoyed by... i hate when a highly skilled artist says this after making an amazingly good-looking artwork!! they're like "this is just a quick 10-minute doodle. sorry it's so ugly," and yet, it looks waaaaay better than my artwork *sob* *sob* *sob*

okay, that's a nice shot of albert's gorgeous body <3333

makoto knows about odin??? aaaaah he's so smart!!!! lol i had no idea who odin was.

so albert is not an alien, but a god?!?!?! and... haru's mind has been torn apart?? ;__;

STUPID GUY!!!!! he asked everyone else to leave, but i think he should give a married couples exception for makoto to go talk to haru <3

rin and sousuke meeting again ^_____^

that shirt rin gave him is so kawaii, lol. i wanna see him wear it tho.

rin being a little embarrassed was so precious!!!

*dramatic pause* A SUCCESS!!!!!!! (yay!!!)

I HATE HOW THIS SHOW GIVES ME SO MANY FEELS, UGH.

rin isn't crying. he has pollen allergies that make his eyes watery, or something.

i know it was just a fist bump but it was the most romantic fist bump ever <33333

haru, come on, text makoto back pls ;__;

mako is so sweet, he apologizes when he did nothing wrong XD

just fyi, i am trying to watch this episode while eating and i keep forgetting to eat because i am too nervous lol

"i heard something from a friend..." uh, who?

massage?? =) =) =) sounds like a good idea to help haru =) *prays to kyoani writers to create this scene* PLEASE? ...PLEASE? ...PLEASE? ...PLEASE?

what happened to nao's eye? if this has already been revealed, then i forgot ^__^U

mako leans down while talking to masaki, that's a little detail i noticed that is so cute <3333

wait, we didn't find out who nao's "friend" was...

even ladybugs are attracted to makoto's awesomeness. hey if i were a ladybug, i'd land on makoto too.

mako's phone is vibrating. IT'S HARU!!!!! ... no, it's not =(

omg what??? congrats, rei!!! and to think, he didn't even like swimming.

i love how a dark cloud just randomly appeared behind rei lol

nagisa mentions how everyone is going to see each other in tokyo... omg, there's going to be a big reunion!!! =D i am so excited!! =D

haru suddenly becomes this magical fairy tale prince. okay, i'd watch that anime. XD

omg makoto looks adorable in that outfit. <3

"BKC NANASE" LOL WTF GOU. what is wrong with you. XDDDDD

hahaha makoto's facial expression is like "uhhhh this is kinda strange"

makorin date yaaaaay XD all right, to be honest, i kinda ship it. >////< like, not seriously, but like... kinda sorta. a little bit. they are cute together!!!

um, that thing is not cute at all. ^__^U

rin, how are you calling someone else weird when you have shark teeth????

makoto being so happy about sousuke's surgery is melting my heart... (but my heart has already been melted many times this season so i don't understand how it is still melting more and more...)

makoto (casually): oh btw, haru swam an IM. rin: *spits his drink out all over makoto* WAIT WHAT?!?!!?!??!?!?!? hahahahahaha

rin is so dramatic, like he is about to lead an army into battle. but he's just going to go with makoto to see haru. XDDDDD

whoa, haru looks mad o__o

hey coach... don't be so hard on haru!! it's not haru's fault that he lost to an alien god.

no, haru wasn't always this competitive. he is acting out of character...

haru's like "this is stupid, i'm outta here." lol.

there is really dramatic music during this casual conversation so it's kinda weird

"he doesn't listen to a thing i say." but that's because what you're saying is confusing and vague.

"i haven't looked at my phone in two weeks" huh??? how are you a young person in today's world who doesn't use their phone??? something is extremely wrong here. XD

hahaha i figured this would happen. makoto would explain things in a way haru would understand. of course haru understands mackerel, hahahahaha, makes sense to him!!!

i love how haru took a moment to think about what mako said. that was funny. ^__^

rin is like "good, i approve of this mackerel teaching method."

i can imagine that haru is pretty surprised to suddenly see rin appear out of nowhere!!! o__o

"i was swimming, but it didn't feel like i was swimming." huh???

soft piano music in the bg, awwww it's so cute.

huh? makoto heard what rin said, through the windows? either rin was talking very loudly or makoto has hearing superpowers. XD

"what can i do?" asks makoto. well, makoto, i have an idea. why don't you give haru a massage, like nao instructed you to do earlier in this episode????? come on!!! (okay, so maybe that's not exactly what nao said, but that's what i heard!!)

yes, mako knows haru well, but it's also true that he is good at reading people in general, not just haru. of course, haru is the person he can read most of all, but makoto can also read others.

wooooow that little part with haru taking off his swimcap and shaking his head as sparkling drops of water fall around him was one of the most magical moments of my life and i will cherish it forever.

"don't tell him that." makoto should totally tell him that. =P

i literally laughed out loud at the timing of haru (and rin) walking into the room. haru, you should have come in just a little bit earlier and then you would have heard what was just said about you that you weren't supposed to hear!! lol!!!

haru is so confused like "why is he a good coach? he's just annoying."

ugggghhhhh, makoto, you are not listening to me. -___-UUUU you are blatantly ignoring what i said. i said give HARU a massage. you've got the wrong person!!!! ;___;

misaki doesn't really know all the specific examples you're talking about, makoto... ^___^U

"i'm sure swimming with natsume-kun again will open your eyes, too." well, idk about that. i thought haru was the only one who has the power to give people epiphanies while swimming with them...

well this is awkward. misaki and natsume aren't happy to see each other =(

his goggles flew off??? i feel sorry for his eyes, then! XD but i guess this is the "opening your eyes" makoto was talking about hahahaha

awwwww that is so sweet. natsume was happy for just a second and then he held back because he didn't want to make misaki feel bad awwwww ;__; ;__;

...but misaki was a good sport and congratulated him anyway. okay, it's official: these two kids are extremely adorable!! =)

why is makoto so shocked that he helped misaki? that's kinda the entire point of his job. XD

makoto has a new dream!!!! he's so fired up and determined. aaaah i love him so muuuuuch <3333

aaaaaaand here comes the iwatobi crew. this will be fun!!! =D

ummm okay, that's it. the episode's over... i am sad because that was a fun episode to watch. i really liked it, and that's because this episode had a lot of makoto in it, so of course i'm going to like that. XD and i just loved seeing makoto discover some of his own strengths. he even figured out his new dream at the end. he's just so special!!!! he is someone who has a positive impact on other people around him, and that is so clearly seen. it makes a lot of sense that he wants to be a trainer. he knows how to bring out the potential in others, because he can understand their feelings and figure out the best way to challenge them and encourage them.

oh, and... as of now, it is a real, true, canon fact that makoto is good at massages, which is yet another thing that makes him more perfect. <333333 this is really important to me. no seriously, this is something that matters to me a lot. this is like if the writers had thought, "hmm. what can we make makoto do that would be the #1 most amazing wonderful thing that sachi-pon would love???" it's like they read my mind and are trying to appeal specifically to me!!! ^___^ this is exactly what i would have thought of... uh... i mean... already thought of. okay, i thought about this a long time ago. >///////< but now this has gone beyond my fangirl fantasy and is a real thing that exists in the actual show. XDDDD hooray!!!!!! *waves pom-poms like a cheerleader* now all i need is a scene of makoto using his massage skills on you-know-who, and i'll be fine. ^__^

yes, i do have a problem with being too addicted to makoto. no, i do not intend to see a doctor. i intend to live with this problem forever. <3

wait... were there other people in this episode too? i forgot about everyone else besides makoto. uh, oh yeah. there was haru. he was so sad after the loss, but i think he's starting to feel better now, so that's good. i was getting worried when he wasn't texting makoto. =( don't do that anymore, haru!!! ;__;

also, there was rin, and later, makoto, finding out about sousuke's surgery. both of them had such excited reactions!!! and yes, rin, you cried, admit it!!! (haha) but yeah, it just shows how much those two care about sousuke. i loved those moments!!!

i am so happy for the big reunion in the next episode. i think it's going to be a little crazy, but definitely a lot of fun!! and of course, rin and haru's big showdown. who will win?!?!?!? also, what about the mysterious alien god????? how can anyone defeat him? the only way to defeat him is for haru to... TURN INTO A MERMAN!!!!!!!!!! (yes, i am still talking about merman throughout this whole season)

#free!#free! dive to the future #anime review #anime reviews #anime liveblog

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