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justkeepdancing-nemo · 1 year

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laur’s 2022 rp questionnaire!

the video was an intrusive thought i had.

Your Name: laur

Characters: Berlioz, Hades, Merida, Ashleigh, Nemo, Jun, Olaf, Pip, Amity, Snow, John, Michael

Pick one of your characters and talk about their growth (we recommend choosing an older character, but it’s up to you!) What about their story has surprised you? What are you proud of? How have they changed from their original inception to now?

Last year I wrote Amity for the following question which means now I can write about her for THIS question. Did I succeed in taking Amity where I wanted to take her??

Absolutely!

It was a long time coming, but Amity has broken free from the Blights! She had done what I always intended for her to do: fail, and fail hard, and in spectacular fashion, the kind of heart-breaking, soul-crushing failure that I’m sure every former gifted child is shuddering to think about. I should know; I am one of them.

That kind of failure was very important to me because of the next stage of her journey, where she gets to build herself back up from nothing. What’s surprising so far– it probably shouldn’t be tho, lol– is how haaaaaaaaaaaard that’s going to be. Like, I knew it was going to be hard, but I wanted to make her a ward for the RAS in part to show her that adults can be trusted. However, that part didn’t pan out the way I thought, and y’know, Amity is valid for that. Right now, she very much believes they can’t be. She trusts Riley most of all, and she trusts Mim. And that’s… the entire list. Even Marlin is on thin ice, but she believes she’s safe as long as Mim is looking out for her.

So yeah, she’s definitely still searching for her purpose. I have lots of ideas for her and the fact we have Grand Prix stuff– and Lilith– means there are lots of interesting ways Amity can go from here!

Pick another character (or the same character if you only have one) and talk a little about where you WANT them to go. What are your plans for them going into the new year?

I’ll talk about Snow, briefly (I hope). Year One of a character for me is always very foundational. Im trying to build relationships and that usually means not a lot of like, plotty plot stuff gets done. And hey, i did that! Snow’s got lots of great relationships and she’s established in town, which means that in the coming year, i can maybe kick off some more ‘intentional’ moves with her, both big and small.

Small Plots:

-i’d like to do more small-scale necromancy stuff, helping some vamps or doing some medium stuff! I should hook Snow up with Elliot maybe and get that cracking.

-i’d like to so more small-scale interior design and hotel stuff! Teased this for a task a while back but i want Snow to do some freelance interior design bc i think its neat. And I want to tie both this and the above mediumship thing in because i love the idea of like, redecorating a space as a way to help a restless soul move on. Its got that thematic resonance that i think is true for anyone who has ever felt like a new person after u go thru ur stuff and do a lil make over.

Big Plots:

-Big necromancy stuff, which in this case mostly means telling ppl who dont know that she’s a necromancer or that coming into like, actual relevance. I don’t know how yet but im def open to some cool ass spooky yucky death shit lets get it

-Family and Snow’s Past: she hasn’t talked to her parents for a year now. Would love to poke that and maybe have her parents call her. Also, it’s in my mind to have Estella, the woman accused of killing Snow, do a retrial and Snow being implicated in that.

Pick a thread or a plot that you’re proud of and talk about why you loved it.

Like always i really have so many. I love a lot of my plots!!

Amity Demon Prom Arc: obviously this gets a shoutout as it is the biggest plot thing i did this year in terms of affecting the entire rp lol. I was definitely nervous going into it…id done big plots before, but those felt shared among my partners in a way that this didn’t. Amity was def the star, I guess I’m saying– it was her actions and no one else’s, as opposed to helle doing something or the order fall out etc. SO YEAH i was worried about it and felt burdensome asking people to do paras about it, which i know is silly, but IN THE END it worked out! I loved the build up with the blights and also amity’s lil circle– mainly mim and riley. Writing Amimity taking on Ashmedai was super epic and Lins did such a great job writing that action with me. And ofc, all the aftermath which was wrought with emotion and i got to play a completely broken amity but also a strong amity like even though her life was in ruins she stood up to Odalia…ugh. It’s what I envisioned for her from the start. I’m so happy with how it turned out.

Piplo Surprise Thread: Throwing this one on here bc yeah i know. I know ive done a similar plot before. But i frankly never get tired of turning animals into humans. I think its funny. And this thread WAS funny and also tense and emotional and milo has arrived AT THE PERFECT TIME for pip’s general arc! He like, needs someone like Milo– a confidante who knows about Boba and is endlessly loyal lmfao. Or else can u imagine how much worse he’d be.

Random Phinnip Discord Moments: shouting this out bc what i like about it is that emma and i never say to each other what if phinnip are weird and fight in this discord event…they just do that on their own. But yeah got lots of iconic fight moments like pip and phineas doing that weird five dollar quid bet, or pip exposing his nyu drama and also phineas running off to taco bell together… its all very improvised and frankly that kind of fun improv rping has been a huge joy for me this year.

F.R.O.G. Heist: another silly thread. I just love silly threads can i get EVEN MORE SILLY THREADS. But yeah this was an amazing thread with Drakken and Mim, such an oddball trio and I miss them!! I love this thread because it honestly just has everything: action, comedy, weirdness. It was a challenge to write on my part because I don’t feel confident with action, so I’m proud of how it turned out. Need to somehow throw Nemo back at Drakken as he is an adult Nemo respects, against all odds lmfao.

The Ashleys Break-up: ive talked about this i think but i just think this plot is not something we do a lot– like a friendship break up. It was HORRIBLE to write because Ashleigh is a horrible person. I didn’t enjoy it but at the same time, like, i did?? Because it was so new and it hurt in a good way. And writing should def make you feel something so there u go

The Acheron Children Reveal: This thread had it all. Grand reveals, dramatic confrontations, Opal being a little terror, and me getting to RP Hades and Snow’s first meeting, which is a big deal to no one but me. I loved it!! Love this plot in general, it’s very fun, dramatic, and silly to an extent– like, maybe not the same kind of silly as the nihon plot at all, but just the kind of bizarre humor that I really love and thrive at.

In terms of your own writing, identify 1-3 strengths and talk about why you think it’s one of your strengths.

Ive done this questionnaire too much and i never improve on anything so its just gonna be the same shit yall im so sorry lmfao.

Image Systems: this is still my best thing i think. Its what really helps a character come into focus for me in the first place and definitely helps me wake up the muse if im struggling. I love using weather metaphors for nemo or a billion pop culture references for pip. I just love an image system.

Crea…tivi…ty? I could just write LORE but gosh atp im almost a cliche @ myself. So i’ll go even broader and just say hey i can come up with a lot of oddball ideas! Maybe its plot related (the nihon plot) or maybe its a spill meme. Maybe its new lore and maybe its a throwaway joke. When im at my best, i feel like an idea factory lolol.

Spontaneity: also a weakness which i’ll use to expose myself in a second but i like taht im a go with the flow rper and will follow my own silly tangents. It makes rp FUN and i hope that people have as much fun reading some of those replies as i do writing them!!

In terms of your own writing, identify 1-3 areas of improvement.

I have no flaws actually (joke). With this im going to get granular why not

Pay attention to excessive filtering

Pay attention to use of the beloved m dash

Work on more creative metaphors and imagery

Edit out like 50 percent of characters saying ‘oh’ before they finish their sentences lmfao

Establish setting better so ppl dont think ur character is inside when u are very much outside (if u know u know)

Plot more intentionally or check in with partners more about direction of a thread (even if i love for a thread to do whatever it wants lmfao)

And so on and so forth.

Pick one of your plots, or even just a character, and come up with a list of 3-5 “mentor texts” where you can look for inspiration or research, then write a short (2-4 sentences) why you picked those texts. (They don’t have to be books, either!)

I guess i’ll do SNOW sure.

Hometown Cha Cha Cha: This de-light-ful little kdrama really helped me hone the ‘gentle’ part of Snow’s gentle fantasy last fall before she came into this rp. It’s about a city dentist who comes to the small seaside town of Gongjin to set up a private clinic where she meets a town handyman. Does that sound like a Hallmark movie to you? It does. It’s better though. What I loved about this drama was how it made Gongjin the town a character too, and spoke a lot about connection and community. I wanted this for Snow, both with her staff and in Swynlake as a whole. Also, this is why I gave Snow her fabulous LA backstory bc c’mon aren’t we all suckers for the culture shock and hallmark moments we are!!

Gideon the Ninth: it is no secret that I picked this up while working on Snow’s necromancy, but in reality this gave me WAY more Amity inspo. Hilarious, i know. BUT I will say the Seventh House specifically–the rose unblown– really gave me lots of inspo for how Snow THINKS about death. This is a house that finds death inherently beautiful, and the lush descriptions of disease in Gideon the Ninth made me so excited to write about corpses and blood and all that fun yucky stuff. Romanticize the shit out of it. That’s what Snow is here to do.

Hotel Del Luna: It is ALSO no secret that I basically stole this kdrama’s main premise because it is about a hotel manager for the hotel of the dead, though it’s like, way more about dead people than the Hauntley because unfortunately we don’t have enough dead people in this rp and I have to NPC the ghosts more lol. What this kdrama really did though was give me ideas about how necromancy can be connected to past lives. This is a plot I’m doing right now with Robbie and Nemo and would love to do more because it’s dope, really. Also, Snow’s expensive wardrobe is a homage to Jang Man-wol, the og. I was so so so so close to using IU. I think about her every day.

IU’s album, Lilac: Ahem, so the concept of Lilac is "greeting/farewell.” I’m going to quote IU now because she can speak for herself "Since I debuted at the age of 18…I'm making this album because I want to say goodbye to those who have been watching over my twenties, and thank you to those who watched until the very end. I want to have a glamorous goodbye. Something glamorous, without sadness. [...] I want to reach my thirties with a clean slate. In the language of flowers, 'lilac' means 'memories of youth.' I wanted to include a farewell with the message 'I'm now going onward to my next chapter' while also greeting my upcoming 30s at the same time.”

This is very Snow and contains a lot of her themes. Snow’s story begins with goodbye. It begins with literal death. But the whole point of it is that she emerges more hopeful and even more powerful. IU’s album is full of gorgeous spring/winter imagery and songs about the inevitability of aging and like really tackling how contentious that is for women and especially for women in the spotlight. All of that is VERY Snow White, like not even just my snow, but like, The Snow White. It contains one of the most powerful ballads I’ve ever heard called “My Sea,” which is my fave genre of song, aka, talking to your childhood self and forgiving yourself for your own turbulence. It’s fuckin stunning.

Random shoutout also to all the architectural digest walk-throughs that I watch, and to Paige Wassal for teaching me about prop styling and Marie Kondo’s book about tidying up and the belief that even every day objects have their own spirits.

And now, a wishlist! Jot down a few themes or stories or genres etc that you want to maybe pursue in the upcoming year!

-Tournament Arc: I might have said this last year. I’ve been saying it for a while. But I just think we need to have a canon anime style tournament esp now that we have grand prix lore and shit like i want a proper tournament. Just wanna punch stuff idk.

- 2 Baddies 2 Baddies 1 Porsche: sorry bad reference but the tl;dr is i would like to do some villain-esque plotting in the new year maybe!! Dabble with the darker sides of stuff.

-More Silly Stuff: While writing this, i realized how so many of my fave things to write were inherently silly. I should lean into this! I want HIJINKS. I want off the wall things! Dumb stuff. Maybe i should be trying to work on my weaknesses, but nay, i’ll simply indulge them!

-Ghost plots??? Sort of talked about it with Snow but like… I got an inn full of ghosts. I also have Hades, who is King of the Underworld. Kinda wanna play with some ghosties some more. I did it in my first two years of the rp so maybe getting more into it, esp with Snow (no offense Hades, but snow has more interesting opinions about ghosts).

-Love Triangle: they get a bad rep i know! But they can be done well and personally I think i could do them well, lmao.

OPTIONAL: Why do you RP?

I’ve answered this question for like five years in a row, and i dont have anything new to say! RP is my number one hobby and what consumes most of my brain energy, for better or worse. I just love this world and i love my characters and i love finding out what happens and i love that i can do all that and not worry too much about if my writing is “good.” i get to practice in the most generous and supportive playground with all my friends. Thank god i logged onto neopets and starting rping on those forums!! Thank god!

#swyntask #im valid for this i think

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hunxi-guilai · 4 years

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I loved your proposed names for Qingheng-jun and Lan Qiren! I was wondering if you have any thoughts about potential names for Madam Lan? I realised the character 水 used to be a common surname, and then started spiralling about thematically appropriate binomes like 山洪 and 汛期 and 水灾... I would love to hear your take on what you'd name Madam Lan, and what title she might have had before she was married!

HELLO THERE! I have been sitting on your ask for SO LONG because I’ve been thinking really hard about it, I promise

so the tricky thing with coming up with a name for Madam Lan is that we have, like, no information to go off of. At least when I was playing around with titles / courtesy names for Qingheng-jun and Lan Qiren, I had a little bit to go on -- I could use Qingheng-jun’s title as a template for Lan Qiren’s, and Lan Qiren’s courtesy name as a template for Qingheng-jun’s.

Yeah, um, Mama Lan has none of that, so I’m basically plucking a name out of thin air for her.

THE TL;DR OF THIS POST:

Title(s): 湛露散人 / Zhanlu-sanren -and- 蓝夫人 Lan-furen / Madam Lan

Courtesy Name: 荆玉飞 Jing Yufei

Personal Name: 荆晞 Jing Xi

So! Thematic resonance! Anon has made excellent suggestions above with 山洪 shanhong / flash flood, 汛期 xunqi / flood season, and 水灾 shuizai / flood (or, if we want to get literal, ‘water disaster’) -- in that vein, I started playing around on Pleco looking for characters with drought-like valences. Since the Lans as so deeply associated with water, I figured having Mama Lan associated with dryness/drought could be, y’know, symbolically complementary or something like that.

I stumbled across the character 晞 xi, which is glossed as ‘dry.’ Grand. It is also glossed as ‘the dawn,’ as in 东方未晞 dongfangweixi / the dawn has not yet broken over the eastern sky and I--

How could I resist? That would make Lan Xichen’s courtesy name a subtle (tbh not so subtle?) reference to his mother’s name -- both 晞 xi and 曦 xi have meanings associated with the dawn, and are actually the exact same sound and tone.

Okay! With a single anchor point of 晞 xi, I went looking for poems with that character, and found 《鹧鸪天·晓日初开露未晞》by Song Dynasty poet 叶梦得 Ye Mengde：

晓日初开露未晞。夕烟轻散雨还微。暗摇绿雾游鯈戏，斜映红云属玉飞。情脉脉，恨依依。沙边空见棹船归。何人解舞新声曲，一试纤腰六尺围。

not gonna translate the whole poem at this moment, but the relevant lines are these two:

晓日初开露未晞 / dawn sun, just risen -- the dew has yet to dry

[...]

斜映红云属玉飞 / setting sun, red clouds, like flying jade

玉飞 yufei / flying jade just sounds lovely, and various references to jade are pretty popular in naming (in fact the 琼 qiong of 温琼林 Wen Qionglin means ‘fine jade’), so that’s how I got to Mama Lan’s courtesy name.

I realize I haven’t talked about Mama Lan’s surname yet -- for that, I looked up the 《百家姓》Baijiaxing, aka the “Hundred Surnames.” It’s a classical text that’s just a... list of all the most common surnames, so I scanned through them until 荆 jing caught my eye.

荆 jing, when it’s not being a surname, is often associated with botanical meanings (you can spot the grass radical on top of it); 荆棘 jingji refers to thorny plants, like thistles (this character also has a 利刀旁 a knife radical in it). I loved the plant symbolism of this surname because 1) again, a nod to the general foliage/marshiness of Lan Xichen’s title, Zewu-jun, and 2) the suggestion that this rose has thorns (can confirm it does. If there’s one thing we know about Mama Lan’s biography, it’s murder).

BUT ALSO the character 荆 jing is a classical allusion to only the most famous assassin in all of Chinese history, 荆轲 Jing Ke from the 《史记·刺客列传》 “Biographies of the Assassin-Retainers” in the Records of the Grand Historian, which I will not shut up about. I’m not going to go in on assassin literature at this moment, but I was tickled to think about again, certain narrative parallels present.

And lastly, a made-up title for Mama Lan... I kept clicking around on the baidu-baike page for 晞, which led me to a discovery of a 《诗经》 Shijing / Classic of Odes poem called 《湛露》Zhanlu / The Crystal Dew or The Heavy Dew depending on which reading of 湛 zhan you’re rolling with. And if I was powerless to resist the Lan Xichen reference earlier, I was even more incapable of resisting the fact that the character 湛 zhan, here, is the zhan of 蓝湛 Lan Zhan. I’m walking a dangerous line here, because naming someone after someone else is Not Done in Chinese culture, but I’m hedging my bets because this is Mama Lan’s title, not her actual name. It's not ideal, but listen -- I looked at James Legge’s translation of the first two lines, and tell me you don’t see the resonances:

湛湛露斯、/ Heavy lies the dew;

匪陽不晞。/ Nothing but the sun can dry it.

we’re all seeing this, right??? the narrative implications??? we’re all having feelings about bb!Lan Wangji now, right???

I went ahead and assumed that Mama Lan was a wandering cultivator, and gave her the -sanren title, which gets us to 湛露散人 Zhanlu-sanren.

ONCE MORE, WITH FEELING:

Title(s): 湛露散人 / Zhanlu-sanren -and- 蓝夫人 Lan-furen / Madam Lan

Courtesy Name: 荆玉飞 Jing Yufei

Personal Name: 荆晞 Jing Xi

#ask and ye shall receive #so this was a wild time #and a ton of fun #but it's also wildly unrealistic because it's waaaaayyy too intertextual with the names of her sons #but this is FICTION and I shall DO AS I LIKE #still thinking about the AU #where Qingheng-jun abdicates his position #and go wandering the jianghu with Mama Lan and rogue cultivator Twin Jades

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bisluthq · 3 years

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you have been giving bad vibes lately tbh, like ily and you’re the only blog i’ve got notifications in snd check everyday, and i live that you call out antisemitism and homophobia (i’ve messaged you private stuff too and you’ve been totally lovely too, like ily!!!) but some of the stuff you do it questionable, and idk if it’s just because it’s online, but you always talk about how hot women are when discussing them, even when it’s not relevant, and call them bitches and stuff, and i saw some people call you out for misogyny and you never really took it as valid criticism, but you kinda talk about women like a shitty 17 year old boy tbh, it’s just weird, and the going after a hardly 18year old too instead of just ignoring those messages, it’s all just a bit iffy to me, nothing major and you’re definitely not TTB (it’s disgusting to even suggest that, that woman is so fucking disgusting!) but just some things that you should maybe not brush off as people just being pressed, as you say you’re a human being who will fuck up, but it’s nice to acknowledge that and understand why people say it, rather than just thinking people are haters and what not

Hey, this feels like it’s in good faith but I would very much like a chance to respond to some of your points (again in good faith). Like I hear you but I am not sure I agree with you and here’s why:

1) the criticism that I thirst over women or behave like a “teenage boy” is entangled in respectability politics, slut shaming, homophobia and patriarchal standards. Nobody pearl clutches over anons going off about Dino Dick (except people who’re like “wow these anons are wild” and like fair enough). Harmless thirsting over public figures is absolutely normal and not something to feel ashamed for. It’s okay to discuss sex and how horny shit makes you. It isn’t a bad thing at all.

2) “bitches” is used by me as slang. I have called people “motherfuckers” etc as well, it is 100% used in a general slang way and not in a way intended to be derogatory.

3) I don’t think it’s fair to say I’m “going after” Olivia. I said she’s very talented, very ambitious, has some boppy songs, and is insanely good at marketing herself (and performing! Her SNL slammed and that’s SUCH A HARD STAGE TO PERFORM ON). Saying her songs are thematically similar as a marketing choice and she’s copy pasting Taylor’s ideas isn’t going after her. Also, there is a huge power imbalance here and it’s... in Olivia’s favor. Olivia has the backing of UMG and Disney. My saying “she’s contrived in her public persona and good for her hope she makes it since that’s clearly what she wants” isn’t an ad hominem attack on a random teenage girl.

4) I don’t think people are “just haters” but you need to understand that I’ve had a LOT of antisemitic remarks in my ask in the last bit and obviously that’s affected my mood and general vibe. It lowkey sucks. And I do think people willfully and sometimes like obstinately misread what I am saying and take my words out of context or obfuscate what I was saying which, yes, is frustrating.

So like yeah I’m not perfect and yeah I do hear people if they come with valid criticism of me and if people point out stuff I said that’s problematic I take it on board. “Bitches” is offensive to some but is also a linguistic choice. I will think about that one because it doesn’t bother me but I don’t need to be offending people y’know.

The respectability politics stuff is a bit bullshit though. Like I say you can’t just cry misogyny at people thinking people are hot and tbh on that same note at some of the times I’ve been called a misogynist. I have expressly called Harry Styles a himbo, I have roasted him for having Camille teach him to read, and butchering her favorite wanky book for his pussy song. I’ve also like.... not expected Harry to give good critical analysis of a wanky post apocalyptic nightmare novel. Which is a very similar criticism to what I’ve leveled at Madison. Yeah, they’re talented musicians. Yeah, they’re hot. No, don’t expect them to give you a good take on some literary topic that’s kinda unfair to them. Just let them be hot and talented.

I’ve also said that Harry’s hyperconfessionalism on Fine Line annoyed me and I’ve said I can’t stand Ed’s music because it’s like the exact same topic on all of them.

Nobody has been like, “WOW YOU HATE HARRY! WOW YOU ARE A MISANDRIST!”

Because those criticisms have nothing to do with the identity of the people.

One can criticize women for things they’ve said and done and also just.... things you find annoying.... and that doesn’t mean you hate women.

And it does feel unfair that that gets leveled at me a bunch because I really don’t think it’s true at all. I think this is a deeply and inherently feminist space. And yes we thirst in it, which is fine, and yes we don’t act like women are somehow immune to criticism. That doesn’t make us sexist. It’d be worse to be acting like somehow being a woman makes people immune from discourse or needing to be held to a different - presumably lower - standard. Like that’s be fucked up.

Hope this makes sense and let me know if you have any further thoughts or comments. I’ll think about the “bitches” thing.

#anons against bisluthq #kinda

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prettyboysdontlookatexplosions · 3 years

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fic year in review post, because i looooove reading other people’s and because new year’s is my favorite holiday (and literally always has been even before i knew or cared about what being a capricorn meant which is how you know astrology is real...)!

first of all, i posted a truly deranged 376,298 words of fanfiction this year, which is... bananas even given that i y’know quit my job in the middle of a global pandemic and have had a lot of time on my hands. i historically don’t do great with unstructured time & i am in fact extremely grateful to this weird hobby and the weirdos i do it with for giving me something to focus my energies during several months of empty schedules and a lot of um emotional processing happening in the background & as at times unhingedly absorbing as it has been, as new year’s & capricorn season work their magic i actually find myself starting to feel very recharged re: the prospect of making moves to reenter real life, in a way that it’s hard to imagine having found my way to without the mental washing machine of throwing myself into.... This.

wild geese (56k, quentin/eliot)

not included in the word count above because i finished writing it at the very end of december 2019, but i’m listing it here because it’s the only magicians story that would be left out otherwise, and it’s my dumb list. this was my shooting-from-the-hip post-4x13 fix-it, started within two weeks of having made it through the series as it existed then and driven entirely by the concept of quentin coldwater finding a way to let the soft animal of his body love what it loves; also in no small part a big love letter to quentin & julia; & to some degree a way for me to process the emotions watching the magicians brought up (mostly actually not bad) about my own history of depression. it surprised me with how long it was, and the fact that i expected it initially to be simply about feelings but it developed a thematically relevant plot-like magic concept, which was a fun novelty for me! it feels very tame compared to everything i’ve written sense, which would have shocked me to hear at the time i finished it, but i’m still very fond of it, particularly towards the end.

burning holes in butterflies’ wings (7k, julia/alice)

a little bizarre niche nightmare story! a tag joke about griefbanging turned into something miserable and weird. the first sex scene i wrote because i got halfway into the story and realized that writing a story from the premise “julia grief-fucks her dead best friend’s deranged ex” and not letting the actual sex show for itself what a psychological and emotional nightmare that would be was just a waste. a very jumping into the deep end way to learn about writing that part of the human experience, lmao.

wreck my days with a violent hunger (30k, quentin/eliot)

i loved this story a lot when i posted it and i love it a lot now; there are stretches where the prose sounds like the prose i had been wanting to write for years and never quite managed, and it also gets at some trauma-stuff i circle back to a lot as well as i’ve ever hit it. i think it’s still my most technically accomplished piece, and it taught me a lot about how to think about writing. also was my first foray into exploring the potential of quentin’s post-resurrection anger, which i spent many hours pondering and dissecting and clarifying for myself for this fic where it gets articulated in one (1) scene and then found myself at this story’s conclusion.......... obsessed with.

damage control for a walking corpse (78k, quentin/eliot, quentin/a lot of people, quentin/being a fucking terror)

my beloved and cherished demon baby.... my most precious unholy nightmare.... i simply have never had as much fun doing anything as i had writing this story! i had a blast leaning into what made me uncomfortable, & letting myself write in detail about sex without the pressure of writing Hot Sex Scenes, & letting myself be propelled by what made me laugh; SO much of this story, including some of the shit that wound up really dark in execution, started from the question of what would be most hilarious to me, personally. i’ve always loved stories about fucked up people in a lot of pain doing ugly fucked up things but i’d never been bold enough to venture there myself, and then this particular conception of post-resurrection q slammed down the gas pedal and would not stop, careening past moment after moment where i was like, is he really gonna do that, and the answer was: yes, and then some. and for all the meanness of this story, i love many quentins but i think i kind of love this one most of all.

how a resurrection really feels (260k and counting, quentin/eliot)

well! as i have said many times, the goal with this & damage control has been, quite simply, to give quentin coldwater what he deserves, which is to (1) completely lose his fucking shit and (2) figure out how to be okay after that; it is not my fault that quentin coldwater is the craziest motherfucker in the history of the universe, and has needed so very many things along the way! i had to learn new ways of thinking about stories just to begin getting this down; writing it has been sometimes thrilling, sometimes boring, sometimes a pleasant stroll, sometimes pulling fucking teeth, but i’m proud of pretty much all of it, from the Big Things it gets at that i’ve been working on in my own brain for years to the goofy worldbuilding details which are a totally new thing for me to be playing around with. this is gonna sound weird and deranged but i legitimately feel like writing this story has changed me as a person, in ways that i’m currently discovering and wondering about; one small way is that when i think about the two chapters that are left i’m like, “okay, another 40k, that’s eminently doable,” which truly is insane to me considering that before this fandom i had never written anything longer than 34k. this entire project really is, and i cannot emphasize this enough, something i had no idea i was remotely capable of pulling off ever in my life until it was happening, so if you are one of the people who has mentioned to me that you are impressed because it feels like something you couldn’t do - you really don’t know that! keep reading! keep writing! keep giving yourself space to grow <3

next year: finishing a resurrection; bigbang fic; beyond that, who knows! i have a WIP list that contains 5 stories i’ve made some level of drafting or notes towards & another six concepts i have hazy outlines of in my head, but i went back a while ago to the WIP/wishlist post i made once and most of those stories have totally lost their appeal for me so, i’m letting the muse take me where it will. hopefully it takes me to some things that are like, short. that would be neat. other than getting the bigbang story done on time, i don’t think i’m going to be setting longterm goals beyond keep writing; my weird hobby has sparked a lot of joy this year, and i want to hold on to that.

#writing tag #abt yr blogger

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murasaki-murasame · 4 years

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Thoughts on Fruits Basket 2019 2nd Season Ep25 [”I’m Different Now”]:

For the season finale [but not series finale, because they’ve already announced a third and final season for next year], we get a huge plot twist that completely changes our perspective on one of the characters, and their various relationships, in a way that has major implications about the future of the story and how things will progress.

Aside from all that, we also get the world’s worst gender reveal party.

Thoughts under the cut.

Just to start off, this episode adapted chapters 96 and 97 like I figured it would, to wrap up this season with a big cliffhanger to hype people up for the final season. And for better or worse, this was a pretty much 1:1 adaptation of these chapters, so there’s not really any differences to talk about that I noticed.

Anyway, I may as well just cut right to the chase and talk about the whole Shocking Gender Reveal Plot Twist[tm], now that that’s out in the open and everyone can stop tiptoeing around it.

It’s not like I’ve really tried to hide it or how I feel about it as a plot point before this, but I really do dislike it on basically every level. There’s a whole lot to unpack about it, but really at the end of the day it’s just one of those old-fashioned plot devices where we’re meant to think that someone being a different gender to what you thought they were is inherently something scandalous and shocking. They could have at least immediately started talking about the idea of her being raised as a man against her will, since that’d at least give it some actual meaning and value, but they don’t, which really says a lot about how that’s actually kinda just a foot-note that the story doesn’t dwell on much, and in practice we’re just meant to be surprised that she’s a girl.

It doesn’t really help that the season just ends right there, when in the manga this whole sequence keeps going in the next chapter, and I think they start touching upon that part of Akito’s backstory then, but the anime won’t get into that until next year at this point, so I think it’s fair to take it as it’s presented right now.

The idea of Akito being a girl is surprising in basically the exact same way that it’d be surprising if we found out that Haru was a Sanrio fan, or something. That is to say, it’d be vaguely surprising, but then we’d all just go on with our lives.

Even at this point you can definitely guess that there’s probably something going on with her being forced to present as a man, but it hasn’t really been explained or touched upon yet, so it’s all pretty nebulous, at least from the perspective of someone like Tohru who barely knows Akitto at all and doesn’t know all the stuff about her past that Kureno does.

In general I’ve never been a fan of this entire trope to begin with, but I think it’s made a lot worse by the fact that, as you get further into the rest of the story, it becomes clear that it’s not even that important, and the majority of what’s going on with Akito’s character has much more to do with the curse situation and how it impacts her relationship with the zodiac members. The whole deal with her character is how being the god of the zodiac from birth forced her to be pretty much raised in seclusion, with her only frame of reference for human relationships being abusive cult behavior. She’s miserable and twisted because she isn’t allowed to live a normal life due to her status, and her possessiveness gets enabled by the people that she clings onto, putting her into a loop of arrested development and mental instability.

And literally none of that has anything to do with her gender, lol. None of it would be different if she was a cis man, or if she had been raised as a woman. Because that whole deal isn’t actually all that relevant to why she is the way she is, why she has the attitude and world-view that she does, and why her relationships are so fucked up. Even if you decided to write out her romantic/sexual relationships with people like Kureno and Shigure by having her be a man, that’d barely change anything about the story as a whole, because even if it was entirely for platonic reasons Kureno would have still decided to stay with Akito and ultimately enable her actions, and Shigure would most likely still more or less do all the same things he’s already done. And obviously to begin with, if Akito was actually a dude that wouldn’t even necessarily mean you couldn’t still have some of these relationships play out this way, so you can’t even really act like the story required her to be a girl for that reason, lol.

And for better or worse, if Akito was written as a gay dude, it could still totally have lead to all the same stuff with her possessiveness over the male zodiac members, and her irrational hatred of the female zodiac members. It’d just be a different, more homophobic sort of trope than what actually happens, in a way that plays out in basically the exact same way. It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve gotten a villain who’s a gay dude that irrationally hates women for Reasons [tm], and who has ominous and sinful relationships with men.

Which is also the reason why I don’t exactly think the story would be ‘better’ if she had been written as a gay dude, or as a trans woman, or anything like that. With her whole role in the story to begin with, it’d play out in an obnoxious way no matter what. Mostly I just kinda wish they had completely avoided this sort of outdated, schlocky storytelling to begin with, and just focused entirely on the more interesting stuff about her character.

And in terms of outdated tropes, we haven’t even gotten properly introduced to Ren yet, lol.

I’m also assuming that they’re not exactly planning to change anything about this in the anime, so I’m just going with my existing thoughts about how the manga handled it, since that should still carry over to the anime.

I know that this is all just beating a dead horse with a stick because of how long the series has been out for, but I still just can’t help but be irritated by this whole mess.

I don’t want to spoil it too much, but I think a good comparison to make is the recent Banana Fish adaptation, and how from what I gathered, most people’s reactions to that series’ ending was ‘I know it’s just a product of it’s time, but this is just kinda unironically shitty’.

Ultimately, I think a big part of why this annoys me so much is because I actually really like Akito’s whole character and what the story does with her after this point. I just dislike how it’s shackled to this unnecessary plot twist that ends up dominating the conversation surrounding her even though it’s barely relevant to anything after this in the story.

The stuff with her being the god of the zodiac and how much it fucks up her entire life and all of her relationships is genuinely really compelling, and represents an integral part of the story’s overall message about the nature of abusive families and cults, and the various ways they end up hurting everyone inside them. Her whole arc is about learning how to embrace a life that’s not based around being a god surrounded by their followers, and I think that aspect of it works really well, especially with how it ties into all the stuff with Tohru later on.

I also think that all the stuff with Kureno that gets revealed in this episode is genuinely really interesting, and is ACTUALLY a plot twist that meaningfully shakes things up, and people actually have a reason to be surprised by it. Especially Tohru, since her whole goal at this point is to break the curse, and now she’s literally found someone who’s already had their curse get broken. It’s basically the first major lead she’s found in her whole search for answers, but in the end it kinda just, y’know, gets overshadowed by the gender reveal and her being shocked about that instead.

It’s also still really interesting to me how the Kureno situation is basically the only time where the story seriously talks about the implications of the animal transformation part of the curse, and how someone in the zodiac might internalize that part of themselves. Most of the time, the animal transformation part of the curse is kinda irrelevant, and the series could work in 99% the same way without it. I think Takaya’s literally said before that she didn’t even plan to include that whole aspect of the story until her editor suggested it fairly late into the process, and I think that shows with how it’s kinda just there for some wacky hijinks early on, and then it just gets benched in favor of the actual stuff Takaya wanted to write about.

But with Kureno we actually get a look into what it meant for him to be able to literally turn into a bird, and how losing that ability affected his sense of identity and how he engaged with the world. It’s still ultimately just metaphorical in it’s own way, but it still feels like more of an acknowledgement of the fact that they literally turn into animals than basically any other part of the story, lol. And in general I just think it’s at least compelling on paper that he ends up shackling himself of his own free will, because that sense of freedom and disconnect made him feel obligated to stay with Akito to ‘make up for it’.

I just wish that Kureno as a whole was interesting enough for me to actually care that much about all of this, lol. In the end he’s just kinda intentionally boring, and it’s more interesting to write about his role in the story than it is to actually, like, watch him do stuff as a character. Which I guess is all just part of how much it bugs me that all of the interesting stuff in this episode, and this whole part of the story, feels like it gets overshadowed and drowned out by a dumb shock value plot twist.

There’s also all the thematic stuff with how he’s basically Tohru if she was taken advantage of and had all of her own bad habits enabled until she ended up barely being a functioning adult. He even has his whole personal conflict about feeling like moving on with his life and developing new relationships is an act of betrayal towards someone that he really needs to let go of at this point. But then you just get into the whole Uo thing and how their whole relationship is about as compelling as the whole Cinderella plot that it’s clearly a reference to, and aaaaaaah why is this series so frustrating, lol.

Really, the fact that I can gripe so much about stuff like this just goes to show how much I like the series in general, since I can’t muster up any strong feelings about stuff like this if I just straight up dislike it as a whole. At least for me, stuff like this is much more frustrating when it’s one part of a larger story that I really love. Thankfully there’s more good than bad when it comes to this series, so I can still hold onto it as a personal fave that I just happen to have complaints about.

I’m genuinely really excited for the final season, in spite of all this, since there’s a whole lot I love about the final third of the manga, and in a funny way, the fact that Akito being a girl isn’t actually that big of a deal in the long run, and what actually happens with her as a character after this is more about her status as the god of the zodiac, actually means that I’ll [mostly] enjoy a lot of it. It’s mostly just this specific part where we get the Big Reveal [tm] itself, and the immediate lead-up to it, that bugs me.

Anyway, as a whole, I still think this is a good episode that serves as a fitting cliffhanger for the season. The actual plot twist that most of the episode focuses on is really good, and serves a really meaningful role in progressing the story, and it gives a pretty clear picture of how we’re entering the final act of the story.

Hopefully the final season will start in April next year like the first two seasons did, but it’s entirely possible it might get delayed because of the whole pandemic situation. But I could live with them holding off on starting the final season until it’s ready to come out.

Also, before I forget, they haven’t said anything about it, I’m pretty sure the final season will also be around 25 episodes long. With how many chapters they have left, if they stick to the same two chapters per episode pace that the anime’s had on average thus far, they could easily cover the rest of the story in 22 episodes, which would be a lot easier to expand by an extra two or three episodes, than it’d be to condense it all the way down to 13 or so episodes.

#murasaki rambles #Fruits Basket #can you tell that I have Feelings [tm] about this whole part of the story? lol

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some-creep · 4 years

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CREEP RANKS EVERY SONG IN NIER... AUTOMATA (mostly) BY TITLE

Because, like, no one played Gestalt. Also this game has more songs.

Significance Like. I guess. It’s a title you can use. What is significant? We don’t know. The characters don’t know. They are struggling to find out. We all are. What is meaning? What really matters? I don’t know but we’re all crying. 8/10

City Ruins – Rays of Light / Shade Plays in the ruins of the city. Exactly as advertised. Sounds sad like you might imagine. 9/10

Peaceful Sleep This is the Resistance camp right? Peaceful things don’t tend to happen there honestly. At least not as we keep going. Sounds like a sleepy JRPG town though. Ok title for the mood it gives. I like this song a lot so I’m cheating and giving it more points than I know it deserves as just, like, a title. 8/10

Memories of Dust Sand is dusty. What memories? We’re making them. Cool title. Sounds like a YA novel though. 9/10

Birth of a Wish Genuinely often get confused with the Silent Hill 2 bonus story Born from a Wish whenever I try to remember what this song is called. This Cannot Continue / 10

The Color of Depression This is like… a really cool title. Thanks. That Scanner boy is not gonna live the happy family life you all for some reason keep suggesting he is. Bad things are gonna happen to him. He dies anyway. 11/10

Amusement Park Yeah. I guess. We certainly are in the amusement park level. Creep why does this one rank so much lower than City Ruins which was also just “name of location”. Amusement park is not a cool title. City Ruins is a cool title. 7/10

A Beautiful Song Would you say Simone has girlpower? Would you say Simone successfully used her girlpower to kill and consume countless androids and also turn them into near lifeless weapons and body jewelry? 9/10

Voice of No Return Sad title. Sad song. Exactly as advertised once again. I feel sad listening to the Automata OST most of the time. Is this quest complete in the camp? I think so. Anyway it’s really sad. I love to cry. 11/10

Grandma – Destruction Um so this is like. Genuinely a horrible title. It reminds me of the title of a darkweb video which I will say no more on. This song is REALLY good its a shame this title is so… uh. Bad. It’s just bad. 1/10

Faltering Prayer – Dawn Breeze / Starry Sky This is another really cool title. This game is about like… life after god. I’m not here to get thematic. I say in a list entirely about if the song fits the theme. Anyway this is a cool title. The song again… sounds sad. One of them is a music box which I love. Cheating again. 10/10

Emil’s Shop EVERY DAY’S A SALE. EVERY SALE’S A WIN. 12/10!!

Treasured Times The fact this plays after Emil’s shop on the OST is the biggest tonal whiplash in the world. This song makes me feel an emotion I cannot describe. It’s something like sadness but not quite. This isn’t a review of the songs, just the title. But reading the title makes me feel that emotion too but stronger when I think about it. I don’t know. 9/10

Vague Hope – Cold Rain / Spring Rain Good title… Thematically very appropriate. Not COOL like some of the others but it feels right feels canon. I like it. It’s just the city ruins quest complete song but it also plays in one of the fucking… DLC fights. That makes me extra sad. 10/10

End of the Unknown Which unknown was ended. Genuinely think when this plays I had more unknowns than knowns. This song sounds like every song from the Gestalt DLC. 6/10.

Pascal At least Automata has far fewer “named after a character” songs. They just have named after a place songs. I love Pascal so if I give this a low score he might be upset. 8/10

Forest Kingdom It really… the forest huh. Random but one of the songs in Code Vein does a vocal thing that always reminds me of this song for some reason. That has nothing to do with this game or this songs title at all I just wanted to tell you. Long Live The Forest King / 10

Dark Colossus – Kaiju This song is also in Gestalt. It’s cooler here. More stakes. Song title suggests less stakes though? That’s kinda weird. Because of this it loses points. I’m sorry. 7/10

Copied City Dude I left this one off the list when I first typed it out lol. Someone not to @ anyone told me this was based on Nier’s village. Lie to me again. I don’t know what City is being Copied. One of them. It reminds me more of the Cathedral City from DoD3. Which is a bad horrible game that I completed 100%. 8/10

Wretched Weaponry Not to be confused with Wretched Automatons. Is this like, a remix? My ears don’t work so I don’t know. Don’t inform me because I love being stupid. Anyway, in the narrative it makes sense. It’s a good, cool title. Song is softer than the title would suggest. 9/10

Possessed by Disease COOL SONG TITLE. Thank you. This plays… somewhere. Uh. Hm. I’ve 100% completed this game like three times. 9/10

Broken Heart You think you’re gonna hear a sad song? SURPRISE. Sinister as hellllll. Subverted expectations baby. MCU take notes. I’ve never seen a movie in the MCU. Loving the dark tones in this. Broken heart but the emotion isn’t just sad. GOOD STUFF. 10/10

Mourning Again. You think it’s gonna be sad? But BOOM. It isn’t. I mean it still is, but in a dark way. These aren’t song reviews. These are title reviews. But if a title suggests one thing and delivers another that’s still a valid point right? I don’t know. Hey wait isn’t this just Shadowlord’s Castle? Yonah / 10

Dependent Weakling Well, it’s no Song of the Ancients – Fate, but it’ll do. In all seriousness, this is like, a great song title for Eve’s boss battle. Y’know, because he relied so heavily on Adam and all’a that. Maybe a little on the nose. Maybe a little rude. Eve sucks / 10

Rebirth & Hope Sounds hopeful. Plays during ending A where we see a Rebirth cos 9S super doesn’t die. This song is literally 30 seconds long why am I even bothering. Oh, right, because it’s on the OST at all. 30 second songs / 10

War & War Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here, this is the war room. It… sounds like a war room song. A preparing for a big battle song. Once again, exactly as advertised. Plays before a big battle. It really thematic naming! Peace was never an option. 8/10

Crumbling Lies Words cannot express how much I adore this song. First of all, title is on point. It’s the song that plays when you get to Route C. Literally the moment I fell in love with the game. The Bunker is destroyed, which, again… maybe it’s a bit on the nose. I don’t care. This is the perfect song title to the perfect song. I will die on this hill. 12/10

Widespread Illness Red Eye except it’s robots now. Very thematically appropriate. Everyone is dying. There’s nothing you can do to cure it except kill them. They’re incredibly infectious. Zombie Virus but with Robots. Can you tell I don’t remember what it’s called? I’m writing this at 1am and I’ve decided it’s funnier if I don’t look anything up. Sounds very somber… I like it. 9/10

Fortress of Lies Not to be dramatic but when I read this English title I was like MMMMMMMNNN because like. I get it. It plays in the Bunker. Which… is built on lies. Again. Incredibly on the nose but when I learned what the song was called I just fucking DIED the first time. I’m stupid. I don’t care. 11/10

Song of the Ancients – Atonement Another song I died when I learned the title of. Devola and Popola in that game have nothing to atone for. They are atoning for sing they did not commit. Punished for the crimes of another set of Androids, possibly thousands of miles away. It’s not fair. They have nothing to atone for. They’ve done nothing wrong. 12/10 crying creeps.

Blissful Death FUCK. This one plays in the Devola and Popola like. Text Adventure part. Which is just. I love it so much. No one dies in that though. Well… maybe someone does. It’s not impossible that Popola hurt someone. It’s suggested that, maaaaybe she did. No one stops. No one Stops.

Emil – Despair Emil’s life has quite literally only been despair. Please don’t bully him with your song titles like this… 9/10

Alien Manifestation Vintage meme of that guy from the history channel with the impact font that just says Aliens. This game has aliens, I will give you that. They’re all dead though. I guess the machines are aliens but. Eh. Wait doesn’t this play in the castle? There aren’t even aliens there what the fuck. 5/10

The Tower There’s a tower. This plays there. Thank you. Also the name of a tarot card I think? That could be cool if I knew a single goddamn thing about tarot cards. I don’t. 6/10

Bipolar Nightmare Cool flying section. Has anyone found Grun skip yet? Because the bounty for that was like. A lot of money. Vaguely a cool song title. I kinda like it. Although for some reason it reminds me of The Evil Within’s Japanese title, Psychobreak. So I think I like it less because of that. Not the worst title, but maybe the lowest of the COOL EDGY song titles. Fucking love the piano part in this one though. 7/10

The Sound of the End Really super cool and sexy song title. 2B is going to die but she can’t let anyone else get hurt because of it. She’s already done so much damage. This song is really dramatic sounding. The title is dramatic. Love this one a lot. The actual playable segment is kind of a struggle. But I think that’s the point… 10/10

Weight of the World / End of YoRHa I once got into an internet fight because I said this song is about every character except 9S because of the line “I’m only one girl”. I was corrected that the Japanese version is basically EXCLUSIVELY about 9S. None of this is relevant at all I just wanted to remember it. I still do not like 9S. Thematically a brilliant title. Everyone feels like they must do so much… but you cannot bear the weight of the world alone. Ending E legitimately makes me cry. Whenever I think about the messages from other players supporting me? It’s a lot. What the fuck. 12/10

#nier #nier automata #long post #creep ranks

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wombathos · 4 years

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just saw one of the worst posts I’ve seen in a while and while I’m usually hesitant to screenshot-dunk and it probably wasn’t made with malicious intentions but rather just comes from a place of profound ignorance, it is pretty horrific and..... okay y’know what here’s the link to it. and like it’s a mess the whole way through but there’s so much going on here that I’m just gonna run through a few of those things in whatever the tumblr-equivalent of a subtweet is:

It is generally a bad idea to use the Holocaust as a plot device. It is an even worse idea to want the Holocaust to be used as a plot device for the sake of your ship between two non-Jewish characters. If your show is about time-travelling and your main character regularly saves a lot of people, the best thing to do with that bit of history is stay away because obviously the main character can’t change it but trying to justify not changing it is.... eh, how do you say... bad. At most you can use it as a backdrop in another country with its own experiences of WWII (c.f. Empty Child/Doctor Dances) or you can essentially tell a story about something completely different (Let’s Kill Hitler - which understands the show cannot kill Hitler and it’s distasteful to have an episode handwringing about it but does have that moment where they imply River Song is worse than Hitler, which, bad idea). Another franchise that’s amply demonstrated why this kind of alternative-universe-but-not-really-in-the-context-of-world-war-ii is a bad idea is Fantastic Beasts, a limping reminder of why your answer to ‘why didn’t wizards stop the holocaust’ should be ‘ehhhh let’s not talk about it’, not ‘magic hitler was trying to stop the holocaust’

What genre fiction does allow you to do is to take a sideways look at any of the aspects of the Holocaust people feel compelled to interpret and examine through fiction: whether the rise of fascism or industrialised mass killing or resisting authoritarianism or genocide (though there is a tendency for American media in particular to visually code its baddies as Nazis while refusing to engage with any of these issues on a substantive level, but let’s not get into that). Someone in the reply to the same post said something along the lines of ‘don’t these people know what the Daleks are based on’ and..... yes, of course they are, but the ‘based on’ tells you why it’s different. Sff gives us the space to tell these stories with - ideally - safe distance. The real ‘let’s kill Hitler’ story wasn’t the eponymous episode, it was Magician’s Apprentice/Witch’s Familiar - but because Davros isn’t Hitler but merely shares some of the same features (i.e. will grow up to be responsible for genocide), you can tackle those thorny moral issues without dealing with living, painful history (the other thing OP mentioned was making this whole bit of history a fixed point in history *sigh*, which is similar to the plot of the episode Fires of Pompeii except that this is different for several reasons because it’s a lot, lot further in the past and is less painful/contentious, and is also a natural disaster rather than a man-engineered atrocity). In the context of the show’s long history, the Daleks have been used to illustrate or tackle various aspects of the Nazis - as have various other villains - but it would be different if you had actual Nazis in those episodes because Daleks are fictional pepperpots who haven’t actually killed any real people. Take any episode with the Daleks in it and replace the word ‘dalek’ with ‘nazi’ and quite rightly the end product would be accused of trivialising the Nazis, because fiction and reality are not the same and you need a degree of caution when dealing with real-world history that is simply not comparable to its equivalent in fiction.

That’s the short version on why it would generally be extremely hard to write something in genre fiction on the Holocaust where realistically a protagonist would have the power to change it. There’s also a reason why Doctor Who specifically might be best to stay away from it: it’s a ‘family’ TV show. While there’s been plenty of thematically dark material throughout the show’s history, there’s still going to be limits on what they let four-year olds see. Any episode that doesn’t shy away from its horror to the extent that they’d show a concentration camp (another gem from OP’s post) would either not make it to the beeb’s kid-friendly programming or would be watered down in a way that is frankly insulting. I know opinions differ on this and I’m sure some people find books like The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas a helpful teaching resource (though that book is additionally bad for a specific reason I’ll also come back to). My personal view is that at some point you should introduce children to material that at least attempts to capture the true horror of the Holocaust rather than a watered-down version that may end up being the only thing they ever see, but... like... while I am aware of Doctor Who’s original remit and think some historical episodes could be helpful in introducing kids to certain periods.... not this one.

Which brings us to the really really bad bit of this specific post, the idea that this should all be done in service of a ship, and specifically in response to a moment in the previous series where the white protagonist removed the disguise of the antagonist of colour and left him at the mercy of Nazi soldiers in WWII Paris - and it is never addressed again. Now. That was bad and frankly for me served as even more explanation why perhaps the show should stay away from the Nazis and certainly not do... that. Using the plight of Holocaust victims as a way to remedy that would be.... not exactly better. You are using their suffering in a way that is fundamentally not about their stories - and here TBITSP is relevant again because it focused on the child of a Nazi officer and that family’s suffering while using a Jewish child as essentially a walking plot device; which is remarkably similar to what OP is suggesting. This isn’t just some nice historical backdrop. You aren’t fixing anything. All it ends up doing is making light of the horrific suffering real people endured for fictional angst. However much you would try to ‘flesh out’ the Jewish character in question, it still wouldn’t be a story about them. The show has plenty of powerful analogies at its disposal to discuss history and morality - use those instead.

And lastly, and I cannot believe I am saying this, but coming from Switzerland of all places doesn’t give you a special insight into the Holocaust. Learning about it in school doesn’t make you an expert. Again, I don’t think OP was actively malicious but they are very wrong and it frustrates me that the post is gaining any traction at all. The way it’s framed and the tags on the first post make obvious that this was entirely about a ship. Speculating about whether the Master would’ve avoided being trapped in a concentration camp in the notes (I’m sure they didn’t mean to imply that this was something that could’ve been avoided with enough intelligence and yet) or whether the Master (currently played by an actor of colour) would support genocide because he was helping Nazis (and yes the episodes in question already went there but they sure shouldn’t have!) is just remarkably disrespectful. I’m usually of the ‘do whatever you want’ view when it comes to fandom but there are limits and apparently this one’s mine especially a week after there was the whole journalist writing anne frank fanfiction discourse. Think before you post.

#i don't have any clue how to tag this apart from *screams*#eh trying to figure out what people might have blacklisted #cw holocaust #doctor who negativity #txt #the space box show #also read what the person arguing with them said because i'm really only supplementing that

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zdbztumble · 5 years

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“Kingdom Hearts II” revisited, Part V

Having only ever played XIII out of the Final Fantasy series, I only know characters like Cloud, Leon, Yuffie, and Aerith through their roles in Kingdom Hearts. In that capacity, I like them quite a bit, and I was upset along with all the FF fans that they were left out of KH III, for spurious reasons. “We didn’t need them because we have original characters to fill those roles” basically amounted to handing off the job of exposition dumps to Ienzo, as if it were simply a matter of trading out corporate spokesmen. From KH I to II, Leon, Yuffie, Sid, Merlin, and Aerith establish themselves as a group, each with a distinct personality, notable interplay among themselves, and each with a unique relationship to Sora and friends. Cloud, on his own, did the same. To toss them aside in favor of a character with no personality, and no connection to Sora, makes the exposition dumps in KH III far more tedious to get through, not helped by the fact that the exposition itself is so much more ridiculous by then. The character dynamics lost are hardly worth the promotion of one unremarkable figure just on account of his being “original.”

But KH II has the opposite problem with its FF guest stars: at a pivotal moment in the story, an excessive number of cameos make unavoidable appearances, creating a painful drag on the pace of the game and distracting from the main story just when major events get underway.

This is unfortunately evident as soon as Sora arrives back in Hollow Bastion after his first pass at the Disney worlds and runs into Cloud. I have absolutely no objection to Cloud being included in this game, and I love that he’s in Hollow Bastion with the others. But Cloud’s history with Sephiroth - and with Aerith, and with Tifa - have nothing to do with the main KH II story, and when the game is building toward King Mickey’s reintroduction, the twist with Ansem, and a shift in power among the villains, being forced to take time out for cutscenes teasing conflicts and relationships from a different series is most unwelcome. The scenes of Tifa rifling through the castle are, if anything, even more of a distraction - one could at least argue that Cloud’s conversation with Aerith has some thematic connection to Sora and Kairi, and that his relationship to Sephiroth has some thematic relevance to Riku and “Ansem.”

A far better reintroduction for Cloud, and a first introduction for Tifa, would have been to have them with the others when Sora first comes to Hollow Bastion. Cloud could be aloof, if that was desired, and Sora could have been surprised to see him there. Tifa could have been introduced as another member of the Restoration Committee, with a line from Aerith or Yuffie or somebody about how “it’s not just us, y’know.” Their first appearances would thus have come at an appropriate moment in the game, and they would have already been established as part of the Hollow Bastion world before Sora returns after completing the first pass at the Disney worlds. If Sephiroth, Tifa’s desire for Cloud, and Aerith’s relationship with him were all things the staff dearly wanted in the game, that all could have come in the form of completely optional material unlocked after the big Heartless battle, just the way that Sephiroth was an optional fight in KH I. There was no reason to make this material mandatory.

Worst of all are the appearances by the Gullwings. My understanding is that Final Fantasy X-2 is a controversial title in the series, and all I know of it comes from this game and a comedic “review,” but I can still wholly understand if any fan of that game had a problem with their cameo here. Besides the pixie makeover, they are, more than any other FF characters, completely irrelevant to what’s going on. A gift of a Keyblade after the fact does not a justification make, and I really can’t believe that they were included, just for the sake of Nomura’s notion of doing “not human yet human” versions of the characters.

(I hate to say this, but Stitch’s introduction is pretty appalling too. He’s just there, no rhyme or reason, and there’s no relationship established between him and any other character before he jumps down. At the very least, Merlin could’ve introduced him a “a stray I picked up along my travels” or something.)

But, I’ve gotten ahead of myself - and while this issue is a substantial one, it’s my only major gripe with this middle portion of the game. There’s a medium-sized one as well...but we’ll get to that.

Since I tend to play “in character” as Sora, I can sometimes find myself reacting to certain things in unusual ways. In the case of the first return to Twilight Town, I started to get excited at the thought of seeing Kairi again even as I knew how the story plays out, which makes me very grateful that I was alone at home while playing the game. Kairi’s brief interaction with the Twilight Town trio is nice, though having been introduced to the KH II manga, it’s hard to watch her being taken by Axel and not wish she showed the sort of fight she puts up in that adaptation.

Twilight Town is also the first time in quite a while that signs of Roxas appear, as he asserts himself from within Sora with the blue stone. At first, I found this moment a little jarring - Sora has just been learned that Kairi was kidnapped, after all - but given that it’s a moment for Roxas to briefly take control, I made peace with it.

Out of all the Disney titles used for Kingdom Hearts worlds, Tron is the one I have the least amount of experience with; I’ve only seen it once, I didn’t care for it very much, and I never bothered with the sequel. Here in KH II, the level is fun and colorful, it isn’t too stiff a recap of the movie from what I remember, and it represents a clever way to tie Disney material in with the original elements of the KH universe. Though I do wonder if Tron was only selected as a world because it offered Nomura and company a platform to indulge in nonsensical techno-speak dialogue.

Tron is also the catalyst for that medium-sized complaint I mentioned before: I see no good reason why Sora’s talk with King Mickey about Ansem had to wait until after Sora goes back into Space Paranoids. There’s no clear ticking clock demanding that he go back right away, and all this does is undercut the reunion with King Mickey and the sense of revelation in the air over the true identity of “Ansem.” When we do finally arrive at that moment, however...it’s not bad. It has to be admitted that there is no real set-up for this twist. You can’t even go back to KH I and find lines equivalent to “there’s too much of his father in him” in Star Wars to retroactively make into foreshadowing. Nothing from KH I, or CoM, is negated by the revelation that “Ansem,” Seeker of Darkness was really Xehanort the apprentice, however. For a twist that exists just for the sake of having one, it’s innocuous, and well-placed within the narrative to give an appropriate jolt to the proceedings. Certainly it’s better-handled, and more benign conceptually, than later “twists” in the series.

This leads us into the long battle with the Heartless, and there’s a lot to recommend this whole sequence. As clumsy as Cloud’s reintroduction was in this game, the moment of him and Leon fighting back-to-back was fantastic; I imagine that scene is an even bigger thrill fro FF fans. What’s more, it’s appropriately placed to be both cool and relevant. The run down the hill that sees Sora fighting alongside one FF character after another is just as delightful. I’d completely forgotten about this part of the game, so it was a pleasant surprise...and a painful reminder at the lack of effort put into giving the other Keyblade wielders some time with Sora in KH III. I will note, however, that Aerith’s absence from the line-up in this run is a problem, and that by rights Merlin should be there too.

The villain material in this section isn’t bad, though it would have been more powerful if their respective plots hadn’t been in such a long lull in the back half of the Disney worlds. Maleficent battling the Nobodies, and ultimately confronting Saix to buy Sora time, is a wonderful idea, and helps to illustrate her story as one of a long and ultimately fruitless climb back towards the top of the villain totem pole, but a larger presence for her in some of those Disney worlds would’ve helped build to that more. Some appearances by the Organization would’ve done the same for the battle with Demyx. It’s not a bad fight, for the first serious boss battle with a member. The shorter time trials got pretty aggravating, though.

There are also some character beats in this section that are on the whole nice additions, if imperfect in execution. Sora being conflicted over whether to help Leon like he promised or to go search for Kairi and Riku is fine - it’s a conflict Sora’s faced, in various guises and degrees, since the beginning of the series, and he’s well-established at this point in the story as someone who goes where the greatest need is over his own desires. But the scene is just a little overdone. I’d say the same about Goofy’s fake-out death, which is cleared up just a little too soon. On the other hand, it’s in the midst of all that that the 1000 Heartless fight takes place, and that’s just as much fun as I remember.

(While I’m on this section of the game, I want to air a nitpick with the gameplay that pops up before, during, and after this section. What is the point of these “runs” where you take about two seconds’ worth of steps after one cutscene just to trigger another? Just go straight to the next scene!)

This section also reveals that Kairi managed to get away from Axel. As an idea, that’s fine. But why isn’t it a scene? Give me one reason why that wasn’t a serious enough story beat to warrant a cutscene. Of course I’m advocating for more material for Kairi, but - and I can’t believe I’m saying this - such a cutscene might have even given Axel some development. I’ll be talking more about the additions to Final Mix in a later post, but the fact that a long-ass walk down hallways was a priority over expanding on this plot point tells you something about the warped priorities the creative team developed in the years after KH II’s release.

We leave this section of the story with Sora, Donald, and Goofy on the retreat, guided out of darkness by Riku and guided by the Keyblade to some unknown destination. But when that lane opens, Sora declares “not yet! I have to look for Kairi!” thus setting up the second pass at the Disney worlds. How often in this series does Sora voice an urge to follow his own desires over the call of duty? I thought it was an impressive moment for his character.

EDIT: corrections made (thank you @khtrinityftw.)

#z's crits #kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 2 #critique #commentary

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bigskydreaming · 5 years

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gingerjab replied to your post “ANYWAY. The petition/prayer circle for Michael Trevino to be cast as...”

I’m forever an asshole obsessed with fire/ice ships so Thunderbird or Sunfire, fuck the inhumans one off and St. John. Also, Rahul Kohli as Neal Shaara/Thunderbird/Agni. Also I’m sposed to be asleep so ignore if this is a shit idea.

For the record, I actually kinda like the Inhuman guy, cuz I mean, its not his fault he’s part of a trash franchise. I think it probably helps that I’ve only ever read one issue with him, so as to render it absolutely impossible for his writing to piss me off. I like to just close my eyes and pretend he’s a mutant. Y’know. Like I do with Kamala!

Who is obviously a mutant.

(And like.....let’s be real. The dude is a pyrokinetic with a demon form, the codename INFERNO, and his REAL name is DANTE Pertuz. DANTE. INFERNO. Like, that’s the on-the-nose-fuck-your-subtlety-we-came-here-to-be-pretentious-as-fuck-with-our-literary-references-look-how-dignified-it-makes-our-character balls to the wall character concept I am HERE for. I’m like OH HAI I SEE WHAT U DID THAR. And they’re like “oh yeah? You got it? Hahaha, we were worried nobody would, phew, good job tho. Totally adds to the character right? Pretty clever of us.” And then I’d be like Hahahaha no, not even a little bit, but ‘scool, I like him anyway cuz I’m easy like that. I put out for puns.” And then they’d be like awwwww, dammit, we worked so hard on that. And I’d be like....well, that doesn’t speak highly of your abilities, I mean it was a super obvious joke. And then I stopped making up conversations with hypothetical people in my head.)

Also, in defense of comic book St. John Allerdyce and absolutely NO OTHER VERSIONS EVER because agreed, they all suck....

Comic book St. John is a snarky Australian asshole who in between acts of mutant mass destruction, has a side career as a successful romance novelist under a pen name.

(I’m not even joking. Comic book St. John, in canon, writes romance novels in his spare time as a hobby. LOLOLOL c’mon, how is that not a great character beat for a supervillain slash occasional kinda-if-you-squint-superhero).

Anyway.

I too am also trash for fire/ice ships because SCREW SUBTLETY, WE SHIP THEMATICALLY. But like, its gotta be the RIGHT fire/ice ship. I weirdly have standards with my fire/ice ships? Probably just because I’m obsessed with Bobby Drake but whatever, who cares, how is that relevant.

I mean, OBVIOUSLY, you have your proto-fire/ice ship, the one, the original, the Word I came out of the womb prepared to preach and ship and like, spread to the masses....Bobby Drake/Johnny Storm. Because like. They are elemental dorks whose competitiveness is only matched by their dumbness, how can you not love them, I DEFY YOU TO SAY.

I’m kinda meh on Iceman/Pyro, because like, original comic book Pyro and Bobby never even interacted I think? And in cartoons they’re always totally different generations/age groups, and in the movies they’re like....boring and stale and not even all that attractive and also did I mention boring, omg no offense to whomever wrote them, but I tried reading Bobby/Pyro movie fanfic years ago because like, that’s the only movie Bobby fic there is, unless you want to read about him being an asshole to Rogue and/or cheating with Kitty and just generally driving Rogue into the arms of the much (much much much much, like ewww) older Logan or Gambit. Because srsly, so appealing. So obviously, I caved and tried reading Bobby/Pyro fics because like, they had the word ‘Bobby’ in them, and the bar is too low in my X-Men fic reading habits. And omg I fell asleep. I just. It was all just the standard m/m cookie cutter generic ‘good boy plus bad boy uwu yaoi-zowey’ bleh starring two not at all deeply written or well-acted meh-looking white dudes, and just. Why.

But that’s what I mean when I say I’m wary of fire/ice ships, because sometimes with powered characters like, authors think oh hey, LOOK ONE IS FIRE AND ONE IS ICE, THIS TOTALLY COUNTS AS THEM HAVING OPPOSITES ATTRACT PERSONALITIES AND THUS I DONT NEED TO GIVE THEM A PERSONALITY, RIGHT? Like. They’re just very boring and unimaginative in execution, just because they expect the basic premise of fire and ice/’obvious opposites attract, obviously’ to do all the work for them.

(Katey if you’re reading this I’m super for sure not talking about YOUR superpowered romances, because you are wonderful and GOOD at writing and imaginative, and thus none of this applies to you. Requisite disclaimer.)

So, when they did this random Bobby/’New Pyro Dude like where did he even come from I still dont know’ hook-up, I was prepared to like, yawn endlessly, because I figured it would be more boring imaginationless ‘ooh look what an obvious pair they are and yet still praise me for how clever I am for pairing them’ crap.

And I was absolutely right!

(But I mean, it was written by Marc Guggenheim, the odds of it sucking were totally in my favor. Betting against them being well-written under his pen might feasibly be construed as cheating. Whatever).

And also, the art did them ZERO favors, like I know they’re both generic blond dudes in their twenties, but I LITERALLY COULD NOT TELL WHICH WAS SUPPOSED TO BE WHICH in any of the panels that they were like, in bed together or dressing or talking or literally anything until they started using their powers to fight bad guys. It was soooooooo bad. Like the art just manifested every ‘look at the white gay date his mirror reflection lol what is variety even’ cliche and beat you over the head with it.

(Also Bobby is supposed to have brown hair, which at least would’ve helped a LITTLE bit. Meh. Still was gonna suck because like, nobody had any intention of WRITING them together, like, developing their characters and laying the groundwork for a possible relationship. It was just ‘oh look, the fire and ice dude got drunk at a wedding and hooked up, cool deal, now on with the story.’)

Anyway, the ONLY redeeming potential for a Bobby/Simon relationship in my opinion is ENTIRELY due to a fic I read with them. Its probably the only fic written about Simon ever, lmfao, so its not like the writer’s characterization of him has any competition among either canon or other fans’ renditions of him. But it was pretty well written, I actually liked their portrayal of Bobby, which I’m SUPER picky about in fanfics, and they actually invested time in developing Simon and his POV and giving him an actual personality and shit, that wasn’t half bad. So if Simon was written like that in the comics and their relationship progressed in similar ways, I could feasibly be on board with them.

But it won’t, so I’m not. Meh. Anyway.

I actually really REALLY like both Shiro AND Neal, with the caveat that I hate Neal’s stupid offensive-ass codename, I know Claremont only named him Thunderbird because he introduced him in an anniversary issue that was supposed to be a call-back to the original Giant Size lineup, and he needed a stand-in for John Proudstar, but like....wtf Claremont, just use your brain and save Neal to introduce a whole issue later and stick Jamie in John’s place the way everyone else does. He literally went by Thunderbird in the comics already in his Hellion days, which YOU wrote, so why the fuck did you feel the need to be stupidly offensive and act like Native American people and traditions are interchangeable with those of a guy from India? Ugh he’s so....gah.

Anyway. So I actually like both Shiro and Neal, though pretty much only when people other than Claremont are writing them, lololol. Which is admittedly...rare. Because of all his pet characters, they’re both at the top of the list of ones nobody else has any interest in touching. Bizarrely, my favorite run involving Shiro was when he was randomly shoe-horned into that Alpha Flight relaunch in the late 90s, that only lasted a couple years? Dunno if you know what I’m talking about, the team with Radius, Flex, Murmur, Heather as Vindicator and Mac was a robot or some weird shit.

I have no real thoughts on either of them with Bobby though, for a fire and ice pairing. Tbh I can’t really see Bobby/Shiro like, at ALL lmfao. For one, Shiro’s always felt written as though he’s a good ten years older than Bobby at least. Like they’re not really compatible dialogue-wise lol. And he’s pretty much never had any patience for Bobby in the comics, which has a lot to do with most of their interactions being written by Claremont himself, and Claremont infamously haaaaaaates Bobby’s character and trashes him any chance he gets, aka the few times editorial makes him actually use Bobby in a script. But I also think even under other writers, like....Shiro honestly is not the type to have any patience for Bobby’s antics or brand of humor, like.....he’s like JP but without the superficial crush JP used in canon to view Bobby’s idiosyncrasies as endearing instead of migraine inducing. I don’t think any readers would buy someone of JP or Shiro’s personality-type crushing on Bobby twice, lololol.

I DO however kinda like the idea of Neal/Bobby? If someone ever actually brought Neal back and gave him a new codename and stuck him on a team with Bobby? They’ve also barely interacted in canon, and the only time I can think of, Neal was super rude and dismissive of Bobby, because like, Claremont was writing it of course, so it made total sense for him to have the dude who’s literally been an X-Man for two issues talk down to the X-Man of several decades like the latter had no clue what he was doing, lol. Oops, still slightly salty there.

But honestly, I doubt anyone who didn’t have hyperfixation fueled grudges on a fictional fave’s behalf would ever even remember that one canon interaction, and tbh Neal’s pretty much a blank slate character wise. His only defining traits from what little he’s been used are that he’s fairly young, in his early to mid-twenties, from a wealthy family, a little full of himself but in a ‘really wants to impress people and prove himself’ kinda way instead of an overly entitled ‘i genuinely believe I am superior to all you buffoons’ kinda way. And he was always endearingly enthusiastic and eager about new stuff he encountered from being with the X-Men.

(He was also randomly obsessed with Psylocke, but I truly think Claremont was like, well I’m just gonna write him like I would Warren Worthington because why not. So yeah, obvsly he’s super obsessed with Betsy. Duh.)

Anyway - I would like someone to do something interesting with Neal, and I think his and Bobby’s chemistry has a lot of potential and they could bounce off each other well.

Also, I like Rahul, but I was randomly fancasting some of the more obscure X-Men awhile back for Reasons (I forget what they were tbh, but I’m sure I had them. I usually do). I came across this Indian actor named Karan Tacker and was like ohhhhhhh he totally looks like he could be Neal Shaara.

I mean, I’ve literally never seen him act, so who knows what his acting is like, but since we’ve established Neal’s character is essentially whatever the person to actually use him next wants it to be, I don’t think that’s a big deal lol.

So this is totally superficially based casting, like I think this guy looks and ‘feels’ the way Neal’s typically been drawn and the kinda vibe he gives off.

Also, incidentally, having absolutely nothing to do with anything, let alone my selection process, by pure coincidence the dude just so happens to have abs for daaaaaaays.

But I mean. Like I said, that is neither here nor there. Obviously.

Of no relevance whatsoever. I didn’t even notice, tbh. Don’t even know who hijacked my body and ghost wrote these last few sentences, quick, call an exorcist.

....oh noes, is this one of the consequences of being an ‘anti’? IS THIS MY COMEUPPANCE? *flees*

#gingerjab

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rutilation · 6 years

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another day, another stressful chapter.

Okay, first of all, I fucking called it.

Which also means that Phos’s very first interaction with Cairngorm was them respecting Cairn’s wishes even when Ghost was willing to cajole them into their partnership. Oh boy, do I ever love being hurt!

But before I dive more into my favorite disaster gem, I’d like to talk about a few of my observations of the first half of the chapter. Y’know, I was looking forward to a chapter focused solely on the earth gems, so that I could finally figure out how I feel about Euclase, and not be stressed out by Cairn for one (1) month. But it seems Ichikawa does not want me to have a god-damned break.

Well at least I figured out how I feel about Euclase. Turns out they only said those kind words to Phos in order to manipulate them, and they completely misinterpreted what amounts to Phos’s acknowledgment of their own mortality as mere insecurity about their low-hardness status. I’m not sure if they’re going to have this same mindset by the end of the story, but for now it seems they are firmly in camp stasis-and-conformity-at-all-costs.

At this point I think it’s been enough of a reoccurring element that we can add sleeping vs restlessness to the list of thematic through-lines of this work, be it Phos’s restlessness, Kongo’s frequent naps, the gems’ hibernation, etc. Furthermore, the opening of the anime played a lot with this imagery. If you think about it, the opening is essentially a series of images of Phos breaking apart and being put back together, and Phos waking up three times in a row. The director of the anime has stated in an interview that he had a chat with Ichikawa about the overall themes of the work, so I think it’s safe to say that the use of awakening imagery in the opening is very deliberate. My first instinct is to see awakening as a metaphor for enlightenment, and sleeping as a metaphor for ignorance and stasis, but I’m not super sure of my reading.

I’d also like to talk a little about robodad. There are a couple of contradictions in his character that have been bugging me for a while, and I might as well talk about them here. Going back to the early chapters, he got pretty mad whenever the gems acted recklessly behind his back. Like in chapter one towards Morga and Goshe, and then again towards Phos in chapter eleven. But despite the fact that Phos has made a much, much bigger mess than either of those incidents, Kongo has made no effort to stop Phos. Sure, he stonewalls Phos when they try to ask him directly about what he’s hiding, but ever since volume four, wherein he realized that Phos was suspicious of him (they weren’t exactly subtle about it,) he pretty much gave Phos free reign to chase whatever subversive, rebellious whim they desired. I keep getting the impression that he wants Phos to defeat him, and that’s why he stopped getting on their case for insubordination the moment he realized that they had more ambitious aims than mere trouble-making. In fact, the way he simply shuts Phos down when they try to get answers out of him, instead of doing his best to explain what he can, like he is with the earth gems right now...it almost seems like he’s trying to goad Phos into antagonizing him.

Which is why I’m really curious about why he refuses to release the Lunarians--and his words in this chapter do seem to confirm that he’s intentionally not releasing their souls, and isn’t just broken. He holds the Lunarians and humanity in contempt, but I find it hard to believe that he hates them more than he loves the gems, so whatever’s stopping him from praying must be pretty significant. That would lead one to the conclusion that there’s some terrible consequence that would come from him releasing the Lunarians, and I’ve seen people float the idea of a seventh meteor coming and wiping out the remaining life on earth as soon as the last human souls leave. The little moment in chapter one in which Phos mistakenly thinks that seven meteors had already hit the earth would seem to foreshadow that. But the thing is, if the consequence of praying for the Lunarians is that dire, then why hasn’t he lifted a finger to stop Phos? Why hasn’t he tried to find some way to impart to Phos the peril of what they’re doing, even if he can’t directly tell them what’s going on?

It’s all quite mysterious.

Okay, back to my wayward child.

First of all, this reeaally hurt. I had been afraid that this might happen since chapter 67, but since it hadn’t been brought up, I thought that they weren’t going to reject the name Phos got for them. Turns out, I just needed to be more patient! They haven’t mentioned what they’re going by, so for now I’m gonna keep calling them Cairngorm.

Regarding their explanation for why they stabbed Phos...

I mean, I know that the tone Cairn is going for here is disdainful indifference, but isn’t this just a roundabout way of saying that they don’t have the guts to talk to Phos? This has been on my mind ever since chapter 68, but Cairn seems awfully skittish about actually confronting Phos, don’t they? The fact that they were willing to allude--albeit vaguely--to what happened in chapter 67 in front of Yellow and Padpa, but were completely unwilling to even tell Phos directly that they were breaking up with them, much less explain why, seems rather telling to me. The fact that they apparently couldn’t stand the thought of an awkward ride back to the moon and had to make sure Phos was unconscious for the duration just compounds this. (This is all assuming they weren’t secretly trying to destroy the pearl eye.)

Honestly, when Cairn decided they needed to involve themselves in a mission they told Phos they wouldn’t go on, and behind Aechmea’s back no less, they forfeited any chance of convincing me that they actually don’t care, and no amount of shit talking is going to outweigh their actions when said actions tell a very different story. While it’s still too soon to say what exactly those portentous lines about Cairn being a good actor really mean, they’re definitely relevant. The only question on my mind is whether or not they believe their own bullshit.

To sum it up, it seems that Cairn is once again in need of some Antarc advice:

But instead, the only advice they get nowadays is from their controlling boyfriend who pays lip service to valuing their autonomy but then throws a temper tantrum the second they stop acting like his personal dress-up doll.*

Something I found really unnerving was Cairn’s reaction to Aechmea’s little fit of pique. They looked uncomfortable with being screamed at, but they didn’t seem the least bit shocked, despite the fact that Aechmea looked Like That, which raises the possibility that this isn’t the first time Aechmea has lashed out at Cairn like this. Yikes.

Furthermore, once they start talking to Aechmea, the confidence with which they held themselves the past chapter-and-a-half completely dies, and they’re back to being drawn in that vaguely off-putting moe style, and they’re back to expressing themselves in a way that seems more juvenile than how they were acting moments before. So, the cutesiness is definitely an affectation, though I doubt that anyone is surprised to have that confirmed.

A few months ago, I assumed that Aechmea was manipulating Cairngorm to a specific end, but it’s looking more and more like he sees Cairn as, like, a shiny new toy that he doesn’t want getting dented.

And finally, that glove that Cairn is wearing. I didn’t notice it the first time I read chapter seventy so I didn’t bring it up in that essay, but they sure are covering up the symbol of their weakness and reluctance to change, aren’t they? Embracing one’s weaknesses and failings has been a major theme of the series, and there are several visual metaphors that allude to this. Phos’s kintsugi arms and Dia using their octahedral cleavage to their advantage to defeat Shiro are the examples that initially spring to my mind. While the plot of the series is twisty, and the characters are often duplicitous, I find that the imagery and visual metaphors are pretty consistently trustworthy--albeit up for interpretation. So, while there are many things in the series that I’m not sure about, I’m pretty sure that Cairngorm’s left arm is getting replaced sooner or later.

*hey guys, remember how there was an entire omake in which the joke was “Cairngorm sure does dislike all the frilly, impractical pajamas that Red Beryl is forcing them to wear.” That was a thing.

#the price of sincere engagement with art is that sometimes an author endeavors to give you ulcers #houseki no kuni #land of the lustrous #i'm gonna go rewatch some more pt to soothe my soul

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icarusandtheson · 5 years

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How do you choose the names of your fics? They're always interesting

i have a general rule of using song lyrics as a nod to, y’know, canon being a musical. usually it’s a song with some thematic relevance and usually it’s one i’ve been listening to while writing/around that time.

i’ll break that rule if i can’t find something that works, so there are also titles from books, poems, and scripts, but mostly it’s song lyrics. i like taking a piece of something and making it into a new thing. but i also care very much about titles so it’s often the most irritating part of the process. often i just have to try things and see what feels right.

it’s like making a little time capsule, interestingly – even reading through my fic titles now to answer this, i can remember where every title comes from, why i picked it, and what i was thinking at the time.

#/#//#///#////#/////#ask #Anonymous #is 'interesting' code for 'what the fuck are these titles icarus' because if so. mood.#i love them i love my long winded titles so much #what do they even mean we just don't know

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tyrantisterror · 6 years

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FUCK IT LET’S GET ASININE

TT’s SUBJECTIVE RANKING OF THE MARVEL MOVIE VILLAINS (AND A FEW SPECIAL MENTIONS FOR THE TV VILLAINS TOO)

I maintain that ranking characters is stupid but sometimes I dare to be stupid so let’s do this. SPOILERS FOR EVERY MARVEL MOVIE YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED SEE YOU AFTER THE CUT FUCK I’VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT SUPERHEROES A LOT IN THE PAST TWO DAYS HUH

Ok, I guess I should give some criteria for this, so we’re going to be judging these guys both as villains and characters in general. As characters, they need to be interesting and compelling - i.e. you want to follow their journey, you want to hear their story, because that’s a characters job. If a character isn’t making a story compelling, they aren’t a great character. As specifically antagonistic characters, they need to provide an interesting counterpoint and conflict for the heroes - there has to be a substantive reason for why they are opposing the main characters. And as villains - and while villains are often antagonists, those two words AREN’T synonymous - they need to bring a level of menace to the table. We don’t just want to see the heroes/protagonists win - we also don’t want the villains to succeed in their goal, because their goal is, y’know, bad.

If a villain is successful in all of these things, then there’s another criteria to consider: did they reach their potential? There are some villains - actually A LOT of them - in the Marvel movies that are good on paper, but didn’t reach their fully potential, either because they lacked time or the writing just didn’t give them enough to do. A number of the guys on this list would be higher if they hadn’t been, essentially, wasted by the screenwriters.

There are also some antagonists in the Marvel movies who I don’t really think qualify for the villain label - they were obstacles the heroes had to overcome, sure, but they weren’t meant to be full on SUPERVILLAINS. There’s nothing wrong with that - hell, I honestly prefer stories to have multiple kinds of antagonists, because it makes the world more complex and interesting. I’ll give these successful non-villains some honorable mentions.

Let’s dive in then!

As it currently stands, Loki is the best Marvel villain. I know, I know, a lot of you hate Loki because teenage girls think Tom Hiddelston is cute, but has ANY villain in the Marvel movies gotten even close to as much development as he has? Loki was one of the strongest aspects of the first Thor movie, with a sinister cunning backed by motives we could understand but not condone. This guy has reasons for being the bad guy he started as - hell, the main one, his dad, is also the father of the hero he arches for, Thor. From the start there was complexity and intrigue built into him, and his devious mind presented a great problem for not only Thor but also the three other big names in the first Avengers lineup - because while Captain America, the Hulk, and Iron Man can all hit really hard, those powers aren’t really great at beating a scheme.

Loki also opened the door (literally) for a greater scale of threats and scope of story possibilities in the universe. Then, once his big starring villain moment in The Avengers came and went, he proceeded to take a slow but well done turn from villain to hero - one fraught with missteps and backsliding. He didn’t turn into a good guy easily. Again, he was arguably the best part of Thor: the Dark Wold, a movie that’s kind of a low point in the series (and yet one that’s still far from bad, because that’s how Marvel do). Admittedly, Loki wasn’t the high point of Thor: Ragnorok, though that’s only because Thor: Ragnorok was great in so many other ways, taking a series that was up till that point a more middling part of the greater Marvel Franchise and making it one of the best. Notably, Ragnorok finally allowed Loki to complete his turn to hero, all while keeping his personality traits that we’ve grown to love. No villain has been better served by the franchise, and likewise none has served it better.

The first Guardians of the Galaxy had so much work to do - not only did it have to introduce us to and get us to love the five weirdest fucking superheroes of the franchise so far, but it also had to introduce the entire Space Opera side of Marvel’s universe to us - infinity stones, celestials, various planets with various sapient species with a great and varied history. We had to learn about Groots and children of Thanos and the Kree and the Nova Corps and the Ravagers - we can forgive that movie for having a weak villain, especially given the fact that it had FIVE protagonists to develop meaningfully instead of one like every movie before it.

Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2, by contrast, has a lot less to do. Its heroes are introduced, as are a lot of great supporting characters, so in that regard it just had to follow through on what it had already built. That gave the writers significantly more time to work on the antagonist, and the result was Ego, the second best Marvel movie villain. Though his relationship with Quill is first and foremost, Ego also has meaningful thematic ties to the other heroes as well - he’s an abusive father of unfathomable power, much like Gamora and Nebula’s adoptive father Thanos, he’s an inherently lonely being that longs for a familial connection that may well be lost to him, like Drax, Rocket, and Groot, he’s a deeply flawed parent figure to Peter much like Yondu, and, well, he’s personally isolated and abused Mantis. Ego’s motives are understandable but reprehensible. We feel his pathos - no one wants to be alone, and most people can understand the desire to reconnect with one’s offspring - but we also know he can’t be allowed to succeed. The threat he brings is palpable, and his conflict changes all the heroes in a meaningful way.

Like most Marvel movie villains, Ego dies in his debut, but to the film’s credit, Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 makes every second of his screentime count. We could have gotten more tales from Ego, but if this is his only one, then I feel we can say his potential was used well.

Like Guardians of the Galaxy, Black Panther had a lot of stuff on its narrative plate. While it had a slight headstart in introducing its titular hero thanks to Civil War, it still has to do a lot of work to make us understand who T’Challa is, while also introducing Okoye, M’Baku, Wakanda’s greatest export Shuri, Nakia, and oh yeah, the Afrofuturistic country of Wakanda. It also had to justify the existence of fakeout villain Ulysses Klaue and unnecessary white man Martin Freeman for, I imagine, the comfort of the white executives taking a “gamble” on a big budget movie with a predominately non-white cast, because somehow that was even more ludicrous in Hollywood’s eyes than a movie starring a talking racoon and an Ent.

where was I?

Oh, right, my point is that there was significantly less narrative space for Killmonger than the two villains above him, and that’s the SOLE reason he’s at number three here. Killmonger’s motives are just as complex as Loki’s, and he is as thematically relevant to the MANY heroes opposing him in this film as Ego is in Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2. And he gets a lot of good development!

but... Killmonger dies at the end of Black Panther. He dies when there is so, SO much more story we could have gotten out of him. And while his story in the film is well told for the most part, some of it is abbreviated. This dude needs, nay, DESERVES more time. If they retcon his death and bring him back for a sequel, Killmonger may very well climb to the top of this list.

Thanos is the only villain on this list who is arguably the protagonist of a Marvel film - really, Avengers Infinity War is his movie more than anyone else’s. He does a lot of the same stuff as the three villains before him - his motives are understandable, the threat he poses is immense, he challenges the heroes, and at the same time has thematic connections to... well, some of them (look there’s significantly more heroes in Infinity War than there are in Thor, The Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Black Panther, so cut him a little slack). But he’s a bit weaker at all those ways except for the “level” of threat he poses. The only heroes he’s really intimately tied to are Gamora and Nebula - for everyone else, his threat is more general than personal. Sure, he’s a lot more SUCCESSFUL at killing named characters than the previous three villains on this list, but if you think all of those deaths are gonna stick you’re a very gullible person. Ultimately, Thanos’ character had to sacrifice narrative complexity for the sake of establishing a higher scale of threat, and the result if a character that’s a bit weaker than Marvel’s best - but still pretty damn good. I mean, he was good enough to feel like a credible threat to a literal army of superheroes - that’s gotta count for something.

Funnily enough, the Vulture is kind of on the opposite side of things from Thanos. The threat he poses is significantly lower stakes than the villains that preceded and followed him - and, oddly enough, that’s in his favor. He felt new as a result. This wasn’t a guy who was starting wars or committing genocides - he’s just an asshole who sells illegal and highly dangerous weapons. His motives are understandable, too - dude wants to give his family a good life, and this just happened to be a solution to that problem (if not a moral one). He’s much closer to the kind of “villain” an average person would be affected by in real life.

At the same time, well, he’s not a world shaking villain. He does what he’s meant to do well, sure, but he wasn’t meant to be the next Loki - he’s a one shot filler villain for a movie that was really about introducing its hero to us. There are a LOT of villains who were meant for that niche, and of those villains, Vulture is the cream of the crop.

Though she was going to be higher, didn’t you?

My immense attraction to her aside, Hela is... kinda flat. Her motivations are kinda weak - she’s a warhawk who wants to start wars and was kicked out of Asgard for starting wars too much and now is back to start some more wars because... because war is cool, I guess. Cate Blanchett’s wonderfully campy performance elevates the material she’s been given a lot, don’t get me wrong, but objectively... Hela’s not very interesting. In terms of her relation to the hero, she’s basically Loki except with no development or intrigue - yeah, she’s technically Thor’s sister, but we don’t feel a familial bond between them, so their conflcit doesn’t really get any intrigue out of that. Hela isn’t really a character - she’s a conflict, as developed and emotionally complex as the tornadoes in Twister.

I hate to say it, because I love Thor: Ragnorok and just, like, the concept of a Goddess of Death played by Cate Blanchett, but Hela just isn’t very well developed. She’s a lot of wasted potential - wasted potential made very... entertaining by Cate Blanchett’s... entertaining performance, but if it weren’t for the skills of the actress playing her and, uh, some aesthetic preferences on my part, she’d be even lower on the list.

Hey, speaking of really good actors who played elf leaders Lord of the Rings, here’s Red Skull! And, like Hela, he’s kind of wasted. Movie Red Skull is basically the cartoonishly exaggerated caricature pop culture has made nazis into - “evil” in the Snidley Whiplash sense, but not evil in the have-you-actually-read-up-on-how-fucking-horrifying-the-holocaust-is sense. And, look, I understand that bringing in the actual horrors of the holocaust in a movie about a guy who’s basically wearing the American flag as a costume could very easily become uncomfortably misguided, but the defanging of the nazis - I’m sorry, HYDRA, the “more evil” nazis who somehow don’t do any of the actually ridiculously evil shit nazis did - that Red Skull represents isn’t a great solution to that problem.

Movie Red Skull is less complex than Cobra Commander. He is pure “I’m evil because... because!” villainy. He’s less deep than Hela, and unlike Hela’s actress, Hugo Weaving was kind of phoning it in. There’s some hammy fun in Red Skull, sure, but he could have had so much more impact than he did.

Ronan the Accuser’s motives are a bit better defined than Red Skull’s. His people have been in an on again, off again war with the rival civilization of Xandar, and yeah, that’s a tale as old as time - dude wants to destroy a country because they fought his country in the past and all that, happens all the time, fine and dandy. But... while we can understand that because it’s basically the bulk of human history, we never really feel it, y’know? Xandar and the Kree’s history is TOLD to us, not shown, and as a result we don’t really FEEL Ronan’s motivation.

So what does that leave us with? Well, a very shouty and hammy performance by his actor done from under some thick makeup. It’s fun and campy, but Ronan’s a filler starter villain - he’s weak so the heroes may have time to be strong. It’s fine - he does his job - but he’s not what he could have been.

Although I will say, the moment where his brain just short circuits when Peter Quill stops their fight to challenge him to a dance off? Hands down the most satisfying thing in the entire Marvel universe.

Aww yeah, here’s an interesting guy! Isn’t this not at all underwhelming after the colorful cast of characters above? Look, it’s... a dude! A white dude! Swell!

Zemo is, like, the less-good prototype for Killmonger. Dude got fucked over by American Imperialism and blames the superheroes for it, using a bunch of dastardly tricks and cunning schemes to create strife in their ranks! He does it well enough, and he’s got a good amount of pathos, and the actor playing him does the job very well, but... c’mon, do you really want to see more of this guy? Did you even remember his name? He’s just complex enough to get the job done, but just boring enough to let the movie focus on its REAL conflict, which is the titular super hero Civil War. Like the Vulture before him, he’s just as good as he needs to be - but since he didn’t need to be as good as the villains higher up, he didn’t reach those heights.

Also it should be noted that comic book Zemo looks OUTRAGEOUS and interesting and fun so it’s kind of a shame that, like, exactly 0% of that was translated into film. You could have called this character Greg Fucktruck or whatever instead and saved that character for a movie where, like, he could be interesting and cool, instead of a one off filler villain.

Robert Redford begins as a good guy in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and initially feels like a reasonable authority figure, only to be revealed as a secret bad guy in a surprising plot twist! It’s effective, but as villains go. he’s just, like, a guy. He’s a guy in a suit. Not a supervillain suit, just a... a normal suit. He wields a lot of power and has an evil plan and is played charismatically by a very good actor, but like Zemo, he’s not exactly memorable. I mean, fuck, I just listed him as Robert Redford because I couldn’t remember his character name and didn’t want to look it up.

Y’know how I said Zemo is the crappy prototype for Killmonger? Yeah, well, Whiplash is the shitty prototype for Zemo. Same motives but shittier, same personal connection to the hero but shittier, same critique of American Imperialism but much, much shittier. At least he loved his bird, though.

I couldn’t find a gif of his monster form, but the Abomination is... uh... he’s a guy... a mercenary? And he turns into a monster. That’s neat. Turning into a monster is the sole reason he’s this high on the list. And I couldn’t even find a gif of it.

Ullyses Klaue was a boring, one dimensional filler villain who was given some fun quirks by his actor, Andy Serkis, but ultimately failed to not be boring and was thankfully killed off halfway through the movie so the actually interesting villain of the movie could take center stage in a surprise twist that made said interesting villain all the more memorable. He died so a better plot may live, and a better character immediately filled his shoes. Rest in peace, you boring ass red herring of a villain.

“I’m selling the entire universe to a hell dimension because the hell dimension doesn’t have death because there is no time! That’s a complex motive, right? Right?” No, c...caecilian? Cesarian? Caeser Millan? No it’s not. I mean, an attempt was made, I guess? It’s technically a different motive than past villains? I guess? This guy is the “You Tried” sticker of Marvel’s movie villains.

Ultron tried to be so, SO much more than most of the characters on this list. In terms of authorial intent, he would rank higher - they were really, REALLY trying with him! They really were!

But, for me, Ultron fails in everything he tries to be. That’s why he’s this low on my list - not because he’s not complex, not because he’s a boring concept, but because there was so much potential and effort here and it was all WASTED, and that is so much more frustrating than the boring villains that preceded him on this list!

Like... comic book Ultron is a giggling, manic lunatic of a villain, full of energy and intensity that is so unlike most of Marvel’s rogues gallery, especially those that made it to the films. The default movie villain is “smug, disinterested bad guy who talks way too much and takes himself too seriously.” Comic book Ultron ISN’T that. Comic book Ultron is fun and passionate and coo-coo for coco puffs bonkers bananas! And yet he’s also got a lot of pathos - he’s a new life form whose creator didn’t know how to nurture properly, who grew too fast for his unwitting parent to deal with. There’s a tragedy to Ultron.

Also, he’s an awesome robot man with a scary as fuck unmoving robot mask that looks like some alien skull that is both screaming in fury and laughing in maniacal glee at the same time. Like, visually, comic book Ultron is really good.

And... and an effort was made to capture some of that, but it failed. They tried to capture Ultron’s loopy thought process, but in reality they just made his motivations and plan a fucking mess that’s impossible to parse. They tried to give him a good design, but ditched the iconic and creepy screaming skull mask in favor of... weird robo lips, and then stuck those on a Michael Bay transformer body. They took his manic personality and, well, chucked it out in favor of...

Well, a smug, disinterested bad guy who talks too much and takes himself too seriously.

Ultron should have been something we hadn’t seen before, or at least not recently - he should have been, well, Comic Book Ultron. Instead, they forced him into the mold of MOST Marvel villains, and forced his design into the mold of the most profitable robot designs at the then-current time: the Michael Bay transformers. The result was so disappointing. It’s heart breaking.

You know what they should have imitated, but didn’t? Darth Vader. Darth Vader is perhaps the most well known movie villain of all time, and certainly the most lucrative. You know what Darth Vader has? An immovable mask that is iconic and terrifying and brought to life by a passionate, inspired vocal performance from the actor playing him.

Ultron is most effective at the very end of the movie, when he’s speaking through his drone, which DOES have that immovable, scream/laughter face of his comic counterpart. It’s way more unsettling and interesting to watch, even if James Spader’s performance in that part still has that smug, bored disinterest to it. I know this sounds like a minor point but really, it’s one of the many big missed opportunities of this character, and it’s a damn shame.

Malekith is a shitty prototype for Ronan the Accuser, played by an actor of great talent who was given absolutely nothing to work with from the script and then had his performance hampered by thick makeup. Malekith sucks.

There are, like, fifty evil businessmen who want superhero technology to make money via evil in the Marvel movies. They all have different names and different actors and they’re all boring and they suck. They suck hard. They’re all the exact same character, and the fact that some of them are played by really good actors sucks doubly hard because those good actors could have played, like, someone INTERESTING instead. Fuckin’ Sam Rockwell? You waste Sam Rockwell’s talents on this bland stereotype of a character? You wasted the Fucking Dude on this? Christ.

Honorable Mentions pt. 1: the Not-Really-Villains

Jeff Goldblum’s performance as the Grandmaster is a gift that humanity must treasure till the end of its days and beyond. He is so delightfully weird and charming in every scene he’s in and I would watch a thousand movies with this character in him. So why isn’t he on the villains list? Well, because he’s... not really a villain. He’s an antagonist, sure, and on paper he sounds pretty villainous - tyrannical ruler of a planet who forces people into gladiator games and all that.

But in execution he’s more of... a goof. He’s basically Michael Scott from The Office - a weird fucking idiot who was given way too much power and weilds it irresponsibly. He causes problems that can ruin peoples’s lives, sure, but, like, he’s entirely unaware of what he’s doing. He’s not consciously evil - he’s just a silly bastard who doesn’t understand the consequences of his actions. He’d be harmless if you took him out of that power structure.

When we first meet him, he metls a guy with a stick. Most movies would play that for horror. In Thor: Ragnorok, it’s a comedy beat. Audiences lose their shit laughing at the dark comedy of that moment. The Grandmaster COULD have been played as a villain, but instead he was played as a buffoonish antagonist - and he’s BETTER for that. He’s more memorable for that.

Bucky is a great antagonist in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but he’s not a villain. He’s a victim - you can’t hold brainwashed, mind-controlled man accountable for his actions, as everything he’s done was carried out specifically because his own will was overridden. Bucky’s a damn good character, and if this was a ranking of ANTAGONISTS he’d be up in the top five, but you can’t call the dude a villain.

There are a lot of henchmen in the movies that were full on villains in the comics, like Skurge and Crossbones and so on. But, look - in the films, these guys are just henchmen. Some of them are very fun, very interesting henchmen - I chose Skurge to represent them for a reason - but they aren’t VILLAINS. They aren’t the focus. They’re a side dish, not the main course.

Holy shit I posted this only to remember Dormammu’s been in a movie ten minutes later while getting cereal. Movie Dormammu isn’t a villain or a henchman - he’s a cameo, much as Thanos was until very recently. He fills the same narrative role as a McGuffin - he’s the big bad weapon we have to stop the villain from using. He’ll probably get to be a character in later movies, but for now he’s little more than a prop. Fuck, I couldn’t even find a gif of his movie self - had to use his comic counterpart instead.

Honorable Mentions Pt. 2: Sirs And Madamns Not-Appearing-In-These-Films

So the Marvel movies technically share the same universe as various T.V. shows, though at this point the likelihood of that ever being played for more than a few winking nods and veiled references is PRETTY LOW. Most of these series are designed to be binge watched on Netflix - i.e. consumed all at once, from the comfort of a couch, so the audience can enjoy a longer form story than an individual movie without having to wait several months between installments. That’s a very different writing task than writing a MOVIE villain - structurally, it’s significantly different, with a whole lot of different problems and possibilities. Judging the villains of the shows by the same criteria as we judge the villains of the movies isn’t fair - the villains of the shows have a LOT more time on their hands to prove who they are, and without long gaps. Loki, the villain with the most screentime in the movies, still had less time for his arc than, say, Kilgrave, and Loki’s arc was staggered in two and a half hour chunks with years in between them, while Kilgrave’s story could be consumed all at one upon release. That’s not a fair fight.

That said, I want to talk about some of the TV villains:

Kilgrave is the single most complex, terrifying, and overall effective villain the Marvel Cinematic Universe has produce, at least from all the content I’ve seen. None of the other villains (that I’ve seen) are explored as thoroughly, none of them are as personally tied to every facet of the hero they oppose, and none of them - not even world ending Thanos - are as starkly fucking terrifying the depths of their depravity and the strength they have to achieve it. Kilgrave is brilliantly written, and David Tenant outdoes himself in bringing him to monstrous life. He is the best villain the MCU has produced.

You know how a lot of the movies have somewhat bland villains by necessity, because giving them too much narrative weight would keep them from properly introducing the hero? Cottonmouth would have that problem had Luke Cage been introduced in a movie instead of a show. As it is, Cottonmouth still feels like a “starter” villain - he’s a normal sort of criminal, not a Supervillain - but at the same time, he’s a damn complex and interesting starter villain. He’s miles ahead of most of the movie villains, but it’s purely because he’s got a lot more time to develop.

Diamondback, by contrast, has a really interesting concept, but is kind of bland in execution. The show builds him up very well, but slowly drops the ball once he finally shows up in the final half of the season. Maybe a second season can make good on his concept, but as it is he was kind of mishandled.

I watched about three episodes of Dardevil. It was very good, but there was a scene where Daredevil tortured a criminal to get information out of him to stop crimes, and that is a dealbreaker for me. I don’t care if they “explored the ramifications” of it - as far as I’m concerned, when a character tortures someone for information, they are no longer sympathetic and I cannot call them a hero. I will not watch the rest of that show.

I’ve heard Wilson Fisk is VERY well handled and interesting from enough people to feel that’s almost certainly true. Shame I can’t see it.

Outside of Jessica Jones and Luke Cage, I also watched two seasons of Agents of SHIELD as well as The Defenders. I can’t remember any of the villains from either. I mean, there definitely were some, but I can’t remember a single one. Unless we count Danny Rand - I certainly felt personally victimized every time he opened his shitty mouth to say some shitty dialogue and take some screentime from Jessica Jones and Luke Cage in The Defenders. Or the writers of Agents of SHIELD for killing Lucy Lawless off in the same episode they introduced her into the show, thus denying us an awesome character played by Lucy fucking Lawless. But other than that, I don’t know the TV villains that well.

#Marvel #Marvel Cinematic Universe

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lit--bitch · 4 years

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Current-Reads (20/04/2020 - 26/04/2020) 🍓🐢

(Disclosure: I don’t know anybody I’ve been currently reading this week. 😊)

Adding the preface again here: every Sunday without fail I throw up the freshest literature and photography I’ve read over the week, sometimes it’s a book, sometimes it’s a piece I saw in a magazine or an online zine, sometimes it’s something I saw on social media, etc. Sometimes I add ‘RECOMMEND’ next to a few of the titles, but that’s not to say I don’t recommend all of them, I just love some pieces more than others. Not everything will be everybody’s cup of tea, yanno, c’est la vie. And any titles that you see in bold are hyperlinked so if you click or tap them they’ll direct you straight to the source… or shopping basket.

This week I’m gonna throw in a red herring and tell you about something I’ve been watching as well as what I’ve been reading, because I think it’s really cool and definitely appropriate for the age we’re living in at the moment.

So I’ve been reading: Susan Sontag’s As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh (Diaries 1964—1980) which was edited by her son, David. I also read an interview on Granta from March between Rachel Long and Morgan Parker. I’ve also tucked into a couple pieces on Fence, Lexi Welch’s ‘Astroturf’ and Anthony Michael Morena’s ‘The Whale’. I also saw Cecelia Knapp’s poem in Bath Magg Issue Three (but the whole issue is an absolute smacker, it’s great). Last but not least, I’m up to episode 5 of a brand new thing called The Midnight Gospel. It is crazy good. And it’s on Netflix right now.

***

Cecilia Knapp, ‘I Used To Eat KFC Zingers Without Hating Myself’, Bath Magg Issue #3: I really loved the whole of Issue Three, I guess I was quite struck by this particular poem for its “staccato-ness”. This poem is buttered with present-day references. But they’re not necessarily about creating a familiar environment. Rather the object of familiarity is found within the assemblage of places, snacks and thoughts, all of which compound the grief ‘I’ is experiencing. The ‘I’ ruminates on life’s banality and their personal insecurities in living banality: ‘I need a thigh gap. I use emojis / to avoid conflict. Worry I’m a gentrifier. Watch docs about murdered women’. The vapidity is funny. The pain is not. The insecurities deepen. Your body, your life, continues the ache of day-to-day routine, and finds no resolution in the things which may or may not stand to comfort oneself when ravaged by loss. The poem feels quite loose, and disinterested. It’s a sore poem, but its array of references make it colourful. It sort of reminded me of Édouard Levé’s work a little bit? But if Édouard Levé had been a pop culture fanatic chewing HubbaBubba bubblegum on the London Overground. Bath Magg is a pretty exciting new magazine, (been around just under a year I think?) and they’ve published a lot of great writers, many of whom are emerging and I’ve spotted some quite established peple in there too. Kudos to their rubber ducky logo. It’s run by Mariah Whelan and Joe Carrick-Varty.

In Conversation with Morgan Parker and Rachel Long, Granta Magazine: I deeply love Morgan Parker’s work, she’s, in my opinion, the master of titles. I can’t think of anybody who titles their work as well as Morgan Parker does. And I love the depth of honesty and charisma in this interview. Like yeah, it appears to be a generic Q/A but, it genuinely feels like a conversation, and it’s welcoming and unpretentious. Rachel Long asks some penetrating questions, and Morgan’s answers are so detailed and self-aware. Most of the discussion revolves around the action of writing poetry in general and where does that impulse arise from, but they do discuss Morgan’s latest collection Magical Negro which came out February last year. It’s a narrative on black womanhood, on micro-aggressions and reoccuring violence, it’s about breaking down white perceptions of blackness, and dissolving those projections. What I love about Morgan Parker is she’s tackling this fucking idiot thing where (mostly) white people think she’s attempting to represent all black women in her writing, which is, by Morgan’s own admission, impossible. Her work is a duty to herself, to the background she’s lived and lives, and to unpack that discourse in her own way. And if it resonates, then great! I felt all this was inherent in the interview and only adds to my respect for her, and to Rachel for being such an attentive interviewer. BTW Rachel Long has a debut collection coming out this July, My Darling from the Lions.

Anthony Michael Morena, ‘The Whale’, Fence Portal (Streaming) (RECOMMEND): I can’t tell you how much I adored this beautiful mass of whale and word. It’s an essay which references the American Natural History Museum’s Blue Whale model. The writing is thick with feeling and fat with concern. It blends monologue, memoir. It’s non-fiction and documentary. It’s elusive, enigmatic, fragmented. It’s like broken biscuits and blubber. To me it felt like a note on the offences of climate change, the emotional response and grief as we bystand erosion and corrosion, the loss of life, and the urge to merge something back together as it dissolves and fragments before our eyes. It’s as personal as it is public. A gorgeous and complex piece.

Susan Sontag’s As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh (Diaries 1964—1980) (RECOMMEND): I felt so afflicted reading Susan Sontag’s diaries, because y’know, it’s the equivalent of invading an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh’s tomb. Like, leave people alone. At the same like, this woman. These diaries are still shaping me, and each section leaves you with the weirdest aftertaste. Her personality permeates through every detail, every line-break, every reference and articulation of feeling. You learn so much, you gain so much from her perceptions and observations. How do I contain Susan Sontag? How do I describe these diaries? Not at all. Just buy it.

Lexi Welch’s ‘Astroturf’, Fence Portal (Streaming) (RECOMMEND): My eyes locked onto this piece and just didn’t really stop reading. Lexi’s voice is enamouring and hypnotic. It’s so violent too. You’re lunged into friction burns and sports injuries, time and progression, the tensions between collectivity and individuality, family and sexuality, or as Fence put it, ‘lesbian eros’. This piece felt acidic. At times you can’t tell if the ‘I’ is indifferent or hurting to the point of numbness. It straddles so many different thematics, and breaks down a lot of conventions pertaining to the “ideal experience” of family relationships and team work. The resolution seems to be that in spite of people, our collectivity is defined by our collective solitude. This essay kicked me around a football field. It takes a good few repeated reads to appreciate its kaleidoscopic shifting, but it’s definitely one of my favourites.

The Midnight Gospel, from Pendleton Ward and Duncan Trussell, Netflix: (RECOMMEND) So the other day my friend Ben linked this to me and I had seen the trailer ages back and thought “Oh yeah I really wanna watch that”, but just forgot. After his reminder, I started watching it and ever since I’ve been saying to loads of other friends “Have you watched ‘The Midnight Gospel’ on Netflix?” because I’m d y i n g to talk about it with everybody.

I literally can’t categorise this “TV show” to you. It’s like if animation had a baby with a philosophy podcast and then put that baby onto an IV drip of psychedelics. It’s this swarm of different stimuli which you kind have to zone in on and absorb individually and yet somehow collectively.

So like, “Clancy” is a spacecaster who sets up “spacecasts” (podcasts) with creatures from other simulated worlds and he interviews them. But when Clancy transports himself into these worlds, it’s not like they’re sat down on some cream sofa with two glasses of water like it’s animated Oprah. No, his interviewees are like in the middle of fighting off a zombie apocalypse or meditating on a mountain or trying to find and save their lost lover. And Clancy just joins them on the journey and interviews them about their “specialism”. These are real people that are being interviewed like, the first episode is with Dr. Drew Pinker. And when you’re watching it, you think that the animation is totally separate to the conversation exchange the characters are having, but that’s not true. They have intersections, they have meaning. It only becomes obvious that it has meaning right at the end of each episode, but if you lock on you’ll see it’s all relevant throughout.

One of my friends was like “Oh I might stick that on tonight and have a joint” and I was like, don’t fucking get high when you’re watching this because it’s already intense enough as it is, like you know that Pendleton Ward and Duncan Trussell have felt some real shit to create this absolute rare jewel. In my opinion, you don’t need cannabis to appreciate these discussions. But if you wanna do it, then hey it’s a “free country”. And it’s not as though there’s a serious, central core plot like there is with Rick & Morty, I mean there is a kind of overarching plot but it’s not always integral. Like ultimately we’re invested in Clancy’s story but also all the stories of all the other people that come his way. There’s multiple plots, there’s multiple dimensions and ways of seeing. It’s a programme which delivers on multiplicity, which manifests itself in everything and everyone we see and know and touch and hear, etc, etc.

This production articulates some of the revelations that psychedelics can give you. Psychedelics don’t make you see the world literally like these animations do, but the sensations of the animation are reminiscent of an acid trip’s oscillating moods and sensitivities. It’s really cool, and it’s very poignant, and it’s my new favourite show to watch. And what’s so great about it is that, it requires multiple watches in order to really absorb everything in its entirety, so it’s a series you can just keep going back to even after you’ve seen them all. It’s re-watchable. Just fundamental goodness all round. Best way to indulge in it is with ice cream. 🍨

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So that’s it for this week, next Friday’s review is Annie Ernaux’s A Girl’s Story translated by Alison L. Strayer, published with Fitzcarraldo Editions.

Stay safe and well as always, my little caramels. 💁🏽

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