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absolutebl · 4 months

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This Week in BL - Alan & Jeff Forever!

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

Jan 2024 Wk 4

Ongoing Series - Thai

The Sign (Sat YT) ep 10 of 12 - I am a little concerned that this is getting too big for its britches, rather like Phaya’s recently recovered snake… shall we say? Adding in yet another character at this juncture isn’t the best idea. Still, I love how this show makes me cackle laugh with grandmas + Yai and then TENSION.

It’s a wobbly kind of balance but a balancing act is happening nonetheless. It makes the pacing of this show good. It may be all over the place but I'm never bored.

Pit Babe (Fri iQIYI) ep 11 of 14 - No trash talk this week, I was charmed & delighted. Who knew I would actually enjoy this show? Certainly not me. (not much of a...) Trash watch happening here.

Cooking Crush (Sun YT) ep 8 of 12 - I am pretty much skipping most of the 3 chef friends, and all of the side dish action (sorry Neo). And with OffGun apart for most of this ep, it didn’t hold together since they are the glue. Sigh.

Last Twilight (Fri YT) ep 12fin - Okay let’s talk about it.

Mhok should have gone off with someone else. Day treated him like shit and never once apologized. To assume an apology isn’t necessary is to pity Day in the exact way he didn’t want. (On a complete aside, one of my favorite Thai restaurants back in my mispent youth was in Hilo, HI… ah memories) meanwhile the "passing escalators trope" activated in the land of malls (it’s been a while my old friend).

Anygay, I hold that Mohk was not a fault and Day was the one who needed to apologize.

Although they did have one of BL's BEST ever face touch moments.

In conclusion:

The story of a blind man and his caregiver falling in love. Mark is great. JimmySea are spectacular. The support cast is GMMTV-good. And for the first 3/4 this BL was something rather special. But it was let down by its ending (for which I entirely blame the author). In order to like this show you must buy into the premise that Mhok was in the wrong and caused their breakup. If you don’t believe that, you won’t like this BL. Also "fixing a disability = true happiness" is gross messaging. For me, endings counts for a lot and this one was ultimately “happy” but felt like a failure. 7/10 and I was sorely tempted to go as low as a 6/10, so it should count itself lucky

I dithered my darling BLabies... I dithered A LOT over this one. But JimmySea alone held this one up.

GMMTV we gotta talk. You're fielding some of the world's best pairs right now. It's time to get them equally good scripts.

For Him (Thurs iQIYI) ep 9 of 12 - This installment had too much of the side couple in it. Although it was nice to see First/Dream (Twins) again. He's still a cutie, even playing a straight.

My Universe (Sun iQIYI) ep 23 of 24 - I have to say I’m very glad we are on the last installment of the series. Narcissistic hairdresser starts seeing a spirit in a mirror. Turns out to be a friend from his youth who he thought was dead. This one is kinda sweet, and I find the premise interesting. Is the kid actually dead and a spirit? Or is there something else going on? I am intrigued. And I like the actor playing the kid in the mirror. I suspect this will be sad tho.

Time the series (Thai Gaga) ep 3 of 10 - I don’t exactly know what is going on. And frankly I don’t particularly care, either. So far nothing seems to be happening, and I really intensely dislike one half of the main couple. DNF welcome 2024 here we go

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Love For Love's Sake (Korea Weds iQIYI) 1-2 of 8 - based on the Manhwa Love Supremacy Zone by Hwacha (they should have kept the original title). I adore the premise. IRL person has been sent into fictional universe to save a side character from doom. Fantastic. Every fanfic author's dream. Also, I love that our POV was the bad boy in high school so there’s also a redemption arc going on. I adore this kind of isekai (if you wanna call it that). Puppy/cat pairing too!

Although I Love You and You AKA Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro ka (Japan Thurs Gaga) ep 3 of 10 - Oh my goodness they too cute. Basically dating. Although only one of them realizes it, and he is such a drama queen. It’s GREAT. Also they are both so damn gay. I love the supportive bestie trying to cope with the girl who has a crush on his gay bff.

Happy Ending (Korea Tues YT) 1 of 3 - Strongberry is back and it’s very them and very atmospheric and cute. I’m enjoying it.

Sahara-sensei to Toki-kun (Japan Fri Gaga) ep 7 of 8 - Japan giveth and Japan taketh away again. Look, I just like the lost love teacher/teacher couple better. I'm assuming they'll have to do a time jump in the final episode to make this one work at all.

I am SO GLAD we have KBLs back on our screens.

It's done

What Did You Eat Yesterday Season 2 AKA Kinou Nani Tabeta? Season 2 (Japan Gaga) 10 eps - will binge when I have any spare time. 2024 is crazy busy for me so far.

The Servant and the Young Master - from Vietnam so I assume it's on YouTube. I never even noticed. Anyone?

Began Beginning (Myanmar YouTube) - Is TRUST Entertainment bringing us the first ever Burmese BL? I don't know if it's really the first, but @heretherebedork vouched for it, so I will give it a watch through.

Beside You (Thai ????) - a 3 ep short that's supposed to have aired but I can't find it.

It's Airing But...

[NO INTERNATIONAL] Cherry Magic (Sat YouTube) ep 3 of 12 - yeah Japan put the smack down on our boys. Sadness. You can use a VPN if you like. Read all about it here.

Ossans Love Season 2 (Japan Gaga) - 5 years later, will anything have changed? This is Japan so… probubly not. I won't be watching this. I disliked Season one and actively hated the follow ups. No thank you.

Playboyy (Thurs Gaga) 14 eps - Dear Playboyy, it's not you, it’s me… I hate you. You’re about as deep (and as palatable) as a shot glass of cum. While I'm sure you’re someone’s kink, you're my weakest link. Goodbye. I DNFed this at ep 5. Frankly I'm impressed with myself for getting that far.

The Whisperer (Sun ????) 10 eps - Ends next week. Thai horror BL that ALSO involves cheating (what joy is mine). I don't think even the perfect single dimple can motivate me to watch. Word is... it's terrible.

7 Days Before Valentine (Weds WeTV) 10 eps - Giving me Luminous Solution vibes. I'm waiting to binge if safe.

Dead Friend Forever (Thai Sat iQIYI) - horror, meh, tell me if it's worth my time?

In Case You Missed it

All my year-end round ups:

TOP 10 BL Trends of 2023

Top 10 BL Secondary Pairs of 2023

2023 BLs Best Trope Execution Awards! TOP 10

All the BLs Announced for 2023 that didn't happen

BL 2023's Best:

Back Hugs Thailand & Elsewhere

Cute Bits of Domesticity

Boys Feeding Boys

BOOP!

Best Cuddles

Heads in Laps

Touching Head Touches

Thailand Put His Head on Your Shoulder

Put Your Head on My Shoulder (not Thailand)

BEST KISSES (not Thailand)

BEST KISSES FROM THAILAND

Next Week Looks Like This:

2/2 City of Stars AKA Fueangnakorn (Fri YouTube?) 10 eps - An actor falls in love with a programmer and the narrative intends to “explore the ramifications of being public figure in the social network era who must endure critics, bullying, and defamation.” Looks like another Lovely Writer/Call It What You Want sort of thing. But helmed by Star Hunter? Chaos will ensue.

2/2 Anti Reset AKA Anti-Reset (Taiwan Fri Gaga?) 10 eps - from Vidol (who aren't doing us very proud right now) - Human and robot find love.

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Say what you like about this show (and I have) they do some very gay cuddling. (Him the series)

I LOVE THEM SO MUCH.

This show, damnit, so close to being genius. (Last Twilight)

I don't that's a hardshi,p grandma ... although it may be a hard ship... get it.

I'll stop now.

(The Sign)

(Last week)

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shaunashipman · 2 days

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I'm a new 9-1-1 viewer (binge watched the first 6 seasons like two weeks before the new one came out and been watching season 7 as it comes out) and I'm so glad I found your blog because it annoys me how most of the conversation around the show is always about b*ddie and I really needed to find people who weren't b*ddie shippers. Like, I get why people ship it even if I don't particularly see it or agree with it but they're always trying to prove how this plot point or the other points at them becoming canon next episode and it's so annoying? Especially now that Tommy is in the picture because I think he's such a great LI for Buck and has so much endgame potential but they're all talking about him being a "stepping stone" for their ship and completely ignoring how this is a chance for him to be in a loving, stable relationship in the long run, something he absolutely deserves.

Honestly sometimes I feel like b*ddie shippers don't even care or like Eddie and Buck, they just want them to kiss onscreen and ignore their well written arcs just because they don't end up in them being canon (which honestly after seven seasons of the same clownery they should have learnt by now that maybe it's just not happening and that's okay! they're well thought out, fully fleshed characters that don't need to be involved romantically to have a satisfying storyline!)

welcome to the fandom, and my blog 👋👋👋

it is unfortunate that the show has so many great characters and dynamics that get consistently drowned out by a single fanon ship. i get it if you're just here for b*ddie, but to make a big fuss over losing a single scene in another couple's big episode? when you still got something? sometimes you need a reality check that the show is actually about other people too

fandom is not about hunting for hints that your ship is going canon. like, i have never seen a fandom that seems to spend more time "proving" their ship is gonna go canon than actually, you know, doing fandom stuff. (i was not in spn/destiel, idk what nonsense went on there) we're supposed to ignore what the TPTB say while we play with our dolls because it doesn't matter, not ignore what they say because clearly they're lying and misdirecting and building up to do what they have have said, as explicitly as they can in tv world, won't be happening. this obsession with "going canon" is, frankly, weird in fandom.

my blood pressure goes up when i read the phrase "stepping stone". even if bucktommy doesn't last, they will never have been a stepping stone. one, because it is a relationship, and relationships can't be stepping stones, that is such a cynical way to look at things and really makes me wonder about some of these people's real life relationships (yeah i know it's fiction, but y'all take it too far in your vitriol for it not to be invading your personal lives) and two, because b*ddie is not happening, so it can't be a stepping stone to it.

they have done everything they can except saying "b*ddie isn't happening" because in tvland ambiguity is your best friend. but ryan calling eddie heterosexual twice is not ambiguous. and i've already said, but ignoring what ryan has said about the coming out scene because it doesn't fit your headcanon is extremely disrespectful. it is fiction, but it is fiction made by people drawing from real life experiences and y'all are shitting on that

and tommy does have such potential!! they like to shit on us for saying that, "oh he's only been there for 4 eps, we don't even know anything about him", and, ignoring that we actually do know some stuff about tommy, more than we've gotten for other LI's, that's why we say potential. we are looking at possible future storylines and seeing how tommy could fit. we are looking at what was lacking in prev LI's (not in a deficient way, just in a compatibility way) and seeing how tommy can fill the spaces they couldn't.

we're basing our theories of him at least sticking around for a bit, not on wardrobe hints and coded gazes and what actors post on their socials, but by what we've seen on-screen, what has been said in interviews in black&white no hidden meaning, and by simple knowledge of story pacing.

and we could be completely wrong. that's part of it being a theory; the acknowledgement that it is not guaranteed . once you start insisting something is 100% going to happen, it's no longer a theory

wow this got long 🫣 sorry for making you read all that, if you're still here lmao. but conciseness is not my strong suit, so enjoy my babbling if you stick around, and feel free to drop in my inbox anytime

#cleo gets mail #anonymous #911 #911 critical #bucktommy #anti buddie #i didn't realize i had written that much until i scrolled up lmao #but as you can see #i've got a lot of thoughts

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canmom · 2 months

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Ping-Pong The Animation: eps 1-3

So Masaaki Yuasa [AN12, AN28, AN150] can do no wrong, right? OK, well, I'll admit Ride Your Wave was kinda mid, and Devilman Crybaby goes hard as hell at the beginning and end but sorta treads water in the middle, but... generally speaking! No-one does it like Yuasa.

For reasons I don't really remember, I didn't get very far watching Ping-Pong The Animation some years ago. It should be entirely my shit: Yuasa pulling in a gang of wildly creative animators to put their unique spin on something. However, the first episode didn't entirely hook me, and I never got round to trying the second before something else punted 'watching Ping Pong' out of my brain. ADHD, y'know.

This is a shame because even the very next episode seriously goes, as does the one after that. But also this anime isn't entirely what I was expecting (crazy sakugafest full of Yuasa weirdness). Not to say it doesn't do a lot of really unique stuff with its cinematography and animation, but these first episodes at least are more about like... dissociation! ennui!

But more on that in a mo. First I wanna continue the thread of 'how do you animate sports'.

So, ping-pong, or table tennis. Not a sport I know much about, I'll be honest. (To be fair I don't know a lot about sports in general outside of some very specific niches. The sports I've pursued so far are rather eclectic: swimming, fencing, tai chi chuan, and roller derby; I never got particularly far in any and it's been years since I've done them.)

I'll inevitably be drawing a lot of comparisons to The First Slam Dunk, the other sports anime I've watched recently. I do think it's a productive comparison though! Both of them bring something of the visual language of manga into their presentation in unique ways. I have not yet read the Ping Pong manga, but it's by Taiyō Matsumoto, otherwise known for scifi manga like Tekkonkinkreet (god tier movie, still need to read the manga) and Number Five. So that's a pretty impressive track record!

If you go take a look at some scans of Ping Pong, what will immediately jump out is the shaky, rough line style and unusual camera angles and compositions.

The stylisation is also very different from a lot of manga. Noses are fully drawn, eyes are realistically small, and in contrast, lips and mouths tend to get the emphasis - as well as hands.

Knowing this makes a lot of the creative choices in the anime make sense! It also adopts a shaky lineart style, and makes use of heavy line weights and spotting blacks to add definition. It also has a lot of crazy closeups and layouts, and it loves a visual metaphor. But most of all, the most striking element of this anime is how often it loves to split the picture up into little panels...

...which [eli]'s subs do a really good job of typesetting, incidentally, moving the dialogue to fit naturally into the split composition. And while this shot with 7 smaller shots is perhaps on the extreme end, splits of three or more are pretty frequent. It's a really interesting way to evoke the effect of seeing a whole page of manga

So, as you proooobably know, ping-pong is a game of bouncing balls off a little table and directing them into places the opponent will find it hard to hit them back. From watching this anime I picked up that there are a number of styles of holding the racket (e.g. 'penhold grip' and 'shakehand') and approaches to hitting the ball (e.g. 'chopping'). A lot of this pretty much went over my head, but honestly it didn't matter, since the narrative significance was pretty much always evident.

Compared to basketball, though, ping-pong is a pretty tricky sport to make visually interesting! Sure, you have the players running to and fro, and that can lead to some interesting poses, but how do you get the drama and tension into this?

Ping-pong additionally is all 2D, it doesn't have the sort of resources that Toei could throw at making the best looking 3DCG basketball game ever. It is limited to a TV-feasible drawing count. So it has to make use of clever limited-animation tricks to get the most impact out of fewest drawings.

Let's take an example sequence from episode 3. A minor character is about to get his ass kicked by Tsukimoto. Tsukimoto is something of a pingpong prodigy, and yet he is very emotionally closed-off and even standoffish; he doesn't particularly seem to like the game very much, and doesn't particularly feel inclined to flex on other players and get into the status games. But other players, like Wenge, have heard about him and want to see what he's got.

First we have the setup. Other characters are observing and discussing the game. Since ping-pong tends to involve very rapid exchanges, it can follow the classic shōnen model where there's a lot of talking, flashy fight sequence, more talking...

The cut happens in two steps, maintaining the vertical dividing line. This approach to cutting is used a lot in Ping-Pong, and it's quite a creative way to keep visual interest when it's using a lot of largely static shots. The panel on the right is more animated than the panel on the left, a naturalistic depiction of bouncing the ball off the table.

Things start moving faster here. A rapid pan on the image on the left disguises the fact that this anticipation pose is actually not moving at all. This then goes into a rapid, explosive moment as this guy serves.

The final pose is held for a couple of seconds while the voiceover line discussing his intended move finishes. This sort of elasticity of time is a very Osamu Dezaki type of move - it's something that Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata actually really disliked.

A sound effect hits as Tsukimoto appears on the right in silhouette, anticipating his reaction, and setting up the next shot which leaves the split picture and hides the background for just a moment, as if to put us in Tsukimoto's shoes: he only sees the ball.

Tsukimoto follows through and holds this pose - the ball is the only thing moving here. The ball moves mainly on 2s while Tsukimoto moves on 3s and 2s, and he and the ball move on alternating frames. He holds the pose as the ball zips off to the right (bouncing off the corner of the table), with a speed lines-like effect. At the end of the shot, the ball freezes in the air for the moment while the sound echoes.

The actual table-tennis round lasts just seconds, and the drawing count involved is pretty minimal, but it does a lot with those drawings.

We go back to voiceovers and reactions in the next few shots, returning to the split video as Tsukimoto's opponent thinks about how he'd really rather be at the beach...

Often, these comic-like compositions will change one panel at a time, and while one panel is animated another panel will be still, naturally moving your eyes across the screen. It is an approach similar to some experiments I've seen in 'animated comics' viewed in a web browser, where the panels do not appear all at once, but enter with some animation.

So this is the sort of animation technique that Ping Pong uses. It's effective! Elsewhere the cuts are used in a less direct, continuity-editing way and more in a juxtaposition/montage way. For example, Wenge's desire to return to China is symbolised by match cutting/fading to shots of an aeroplane.

And there is a recurring image, which I'm sure will be expanded on, of Tsukimoto hiding in a cupboard and wishing for a tokusatsu hero to come save him from his isolation. As Tsukimoto's feelings about himself change, the toku hero is replaced by a robot. At this points it starts to feel like an outright Ikuhara anime.

There is occasionally a little bit of CG, mainly when Tsukimoto uses a different type of racket surface, and the way the ball and racket make contact is the crucial thing that the shot is trying to convey...

It gets the job done, but I'm glad they stuck with 2D for most of it.

So I went in the first time expecting like, crazy elaborate sakuga - and to be fair, the OP, animated by none other than Shinya Ohira, delivers on that front - but if anything what I've seen so far in Ping-Pong is actually a triumph of storyboarding and limited animation techniques. I think back then I didn't have the eyes to appreciate it in the same way.

OK, that's the film nerd stuff, but what about the story? Ping Pong follows two school friends, Makoto Tsukimoto aka "Smile" (right), and Yutaka Hoshino aka "Peco" (left). Smile is defined by a flat affect and a standoffish persona. He's just going through the motions. He's very good at ping-pong, but to him it's just a way to pass time, and he's scornful about the idea of caring all that much about it. Much like Shinji with his casette player, Tsukimoto is pretty much always staring at a handheld games console rather than make eye contact with anyone.

Peco on the other hand is the more childish one - playful, kinda arrogant, very much an 'emotions on his sleeve' kinda guy. He sulks when he loses and gloats when he wins, and is constantly seen with bubblegum or other kinds of candy. He provides a lot of our commentary when he chats with the other players.

日本語上手 readers probably noticed the tsuki (moon) vs hoshi (star) symbolism thing they've got going on here!

High-school table tennis in this story seems to be a rather 'tough love' kinda world. Most of these players tend to look down on those who can't meet their level. Going easy on someone is seen as weakness, or cultivating bad habits, by almost everyone. Tsukimoto doesn't play at his full potential because he isn't as invested in winning as all these weirdos, but it seems that might be starting to change...

The coach is interesting. He's an old man and fairly disdainful of the club at large, and prone to speaking English randomly with a heavy accent. But he gets excited at the prospect of getting Tsukimoto to unleash his full potential, in terms that are repeatedly metaphorically compared to romance/marriage.

And when Tsukimoto gets sick of it, he challenges him to a game, with the stakes as...

Cue Makima/Beatrice images here I guess.

Tsukimoto de facto wins when the coach collapses, but this episode marks a change of heart. He starts to think of himself as a robot - the affect of a robot replacing the affect of the toku hero in his fantasy. And in this way he does what people seem to want and plays ping pong with mechanical precision, expressed once again in visual metaphor (shot here from a cool transformation sequence)...

What if I just dissociate harder? This is gonna end well.

So it really is one of those kind of like 'ennui of being a teenager' kind of stories - c.f. say FLCL. 'Boy with complicated emotional landscape' is Yuasa bread and butter, but the particular variant here seems a little unusual for him - they tend to be a little more earnest. I'm curious to see how Tsukimoto develops.

I am definitely enjoying the arrogant Chinese player Kong Wenge. Dude's got a lot of screen presence, and while I'm sure he'll get shown up sooner or later, he makes for a very fun antagonist of sorts.

In comparison to Slam Dunk... one thing that's significantly different about table tennis is that it's an individual rather than a team sport, which means it's harder to have an ensemble cast all contributing to the protagonists' eventual victory - instead it's about a lot of individual arcs interweaving with each other, individual duels. Besides that, it does seem like it will be following a similar arc of a character in an emotional hole (grief for Ryota, depression for Tsukimoto) finding new meaning and purpose through sports - though I can't be sure how things are gonna go for Tsukimoto here!

The tone however is quite different. Even when it's silly, I feel like Slam Dunk is a very sincere story. There's little detachment or irony, or false consciousness - with perhaps the major exception of Ryota's mother, who lets her own grief and trauma get in the way of understanding her son. But ultimately 'why would you care this much about basketball' is not a question that anyone would ask in Slam Dunk. Even the judo guy in the manga who's trying to recruit Sakuragi is just as hot-blooded about his own sport of choice.

There's a difference in like, general affect about the players as well, which has something to do with the sport itself. Yeah, Sakuragi's superpower is his 'genius' ability to predict rebounds, and there is plenty of strategising in Slam Dunk - but basketball is still a sport that very much emphasises physical power, and as much as Slam Dunk will work hard to sell you on a clever trick pass, the visuals are also emphasising the speed that players are dashing, the height they're jumping, their physique. Table tennis by contrast seems to be a sport that's more about prediction and mind games.

That said it is equally just like Matsumoto's style being different from Inoue's. Now I know it's by the guy who wrote Tekkonkinkreet, a lot about this series falls into place! There's a sense of tension here, of being fundamentally at odds with the world. The autismfeels. This is reflected also in the drawings - the characters don't entirely seem comfortable in their embodiment.

So if that's what I'm getting from just three eps, I'm very excited to see what the remaining 8 have to offer. This series is probably too long to cram into Animation Night format, but we'll see...

#anime #manga #ping pong the animation #masaaki yuasa #animation

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thinkingisadangerouspastime · 4 months

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good things about ep. 7:

this episode was by far the best at working with film as a medium. there were still issues, to be mentioned soon, but this ep did a lot of things that impressed me on a level of cinematic structure and format:

some actual tension!! simply showing the trio running from cerberus created investment and stakes for me in a way no monster fight or other obstacle had before (a matter definitely enhanced by the music)

the use of flashbacks!! now, i have some issues with the content of those flashbacks, but since im basically getting two degrees in assessing media i know how to give credit where credit is due lmao. these flashbacks were doing interesting things cinematically, creating parallels with percy's experiences in the present, especially that last flashback where they continued poseidon's voiceover into the present moment. fuck yes!! use the medium of cinema to your ADVANTAGE!!

related to the use of flashbacks, the match cuts!! they were so good, as they helped make visual those narrative and characterological parallels being constructed through the flashbacks. film is an inherently visual and auditory medium, and it was so refreshing to see the show experimenting and making effective choices with those tools

some issues with ep. 7 and the series as a whole:

i'll admit it. im tired of the trio already knowing everything about every obstacle they face (having to improvise in the fight with cerberus was so refreshing and retained more of the spirit of the book as opposed to uh. every other obstacle). and i think this connects with show's overall struggle with writing, adaptation, and the medium of film. these writers have committed the cardinal sin of assuming their audience always needs explanation. in any writing class (fiction and screenwriting are my personal expertise), you are told to assume your audience is smarter than you think, bc a writer's instinct is to assume they need to be clear about action and themes out of a fear of confusing their audience and the end result of that situation is a boring, overly explanatory piece of work. (an re the young viewers, kids are freaking smart!! i literally teach kids of the age range these books are directed for and they are so quick-witted. kids don't need stuff handed to them on a platter, they know how to put puzzle pieces together.)

example of the aforementioned "too much knowledge" issue: the pearls. (people have already explained the issues with medusa, the casino, procrustes, etc., so im going for a new one that's been bugging me a bit.) after percy received four pearls, the general conclusion people came to was that one pearl would break, forcing them to have to choose three people to go/one to stay and thus making the choice more "meaningful" (i.e. bc the opportunity to save everyone had been stripped). it's a fair choice, a fair reason, a fair analysis, and this is a change that bothers me but much more minimally than other changes to the show. here's the deal: the reason they had to give four pearls in the show was bc the trio already knew exactly what the pearls would do. there was no reason to give only three pearls bc that would force a character (probably percy) to raise the question of like "hey, that's not enough to save four people!" so where am i going with this?

in the books and the musical, we get the alluring line of what belongs to the sea can always return to the sea. percy gets three pearls in the book and a seashell in the musical, where he doesn't know right away the specifics of what this gift does (the seashell is an excellent example of adapting a story to a new medium, as a low-budget theatrical production can't afford the effects of smashing three pearls and causing people to vanish from the stage, so blowing the seashell to open a portal was a great move that worked for the new medium and retained the spirit of the source material - percy having an epiphany well after receiving the gift about what, exactly, the gift did and how it would help him). in the show, they issue is that they already know, thus creating the dilemma of there being no reason not to give four pearls. again, not the worst choice the show has made, but it's another example of how the show's most pervasive issue is over-explaining and giving too much information to its characters.

in short: the pjo show doesn't understand "show don't tell." they love telling even though "showing" is Most Important in film as a medium, like it's even more important to show what's going on in film than it is in prose because cinema is an inherently collaborative medium that generates a visually-dominated product. the show clearly lacks a fundamental understanding of the medium it is working with!! and that is bad!!

another issue: the lighting. this show suffers from the current trend in film to make dark scenes impossible to see in.

more characterological problems: the gods are not imposing. just to speak of ep. 7 alone, why was hades so... banter-y? in the book he literally makes percy's hand "move... against [his] will" to show him the pearls. there was none of that power and domineering energy in the show!! the pjo show keeps hammering us over the head with what should be a series-long revelation about the gods' flaws and pettiness and spite and misuse of their incredible power, and yet all of the gods seem almost like... caricatures. where is their ability to be charismatic and threatening. to be lax and powerful. to remind us that they can, have, and will kill demigods.

core thematic issue: the show lacks the humor and fun and adolescent spirit of the books. i've seen a lot of people insist the show is directed for young readers of the book, which i don't disagree with, but the lack of humor and energy and vitality is undoubtedly turning off a lot of younger viewers. in a lot of instances, everything feels so gritty and angsty, lowkey like the winx adaptation (but on a less severe scale). we have moments of sass/sarcasm, moments of levity, but it doesn't feel like a core trait of the show (much less of percy) like it does in the book. and honestly, i think that's a loss! if rick wanted a grim pjo adaptation, fine, but i wish the show hadn't been advertised as something perfectly attuned to the spirit of the book bc it's just not. if it was, i'd be laughing a lot more.

now, let's talk about sally...

i don't love how they've characterized sally in this show. i respect that they wanted to "modernize" her character and more accurately demonstrate the struggles of a single parent raising a child with learning (and in percy's case, also magical) difficulties. i genuinely do respect that choice, and i can follow the thorough-lines created in the show that illustrate this revamping of her character. similarly, i can respect that they didn't want sally to seem like a stereotypical "passive" victim of abuse re gabe, hence her explicitly pushing back at him. that said...

i still don't think these are effective or necessary changes, because i don't think sally was portrayed as overly passive or as a perfectly equipped parent in the book. i understand the argument that gabe is still presented as abusive, i.e. that he checks her phone without permission and controls access to the car, but those moments feel so technical. when i rewatch those scenes and examine the acting (both line delivery and bodily cues), sally is outwardly derisive toward gabe ("who's yancy?" / sally sighs and shakes her head, exasperated, has the long blink to give an extra beat before responding: "the school."), yet at the same time there's a banter between them, where sally insists that she's going to go to montauk no matter what, and if gabe disagrees then she won't bring back both their sandwiches for the knicks game that they apparently watch together often (implied by "you know i hate watching the knicks alone!" "so do i!"). sally holds herself confidently in this scene (hands on her hips). gabe is forced to actually ask politely for his sandwich order (and notably holds his shoulders slightly inward, visually closing himself off in a physical representation of surrender). two of my friends, diehard pjo fans who are not literature or film scholars, were both confused as to why sally and gabe seemed to be bantering within a seemingly standard relationship dynamic - not necessarily the happiest of couples, but a standard married couple (as opposed to clear imbalance of power between them in the book).

to be clear, it's not that sally needs to be a "passive victim of abuse," and it's certainly not that the show needs to explicitly depict gabe hitting sally or percy for us to understand that he is abusive. my issue is that the show seems to have not understood what made sally a strong character initially: her willingness to endure anything for her son, including marrying an abusive man who smelled so rankly human in order to prevent monsters from finding them. like, sally resisted gabe's abuse in the book! the reason blue food is a major motif in the first place is because sally and gabe had a fight where gabe insisted blue food wasn't a thing, and thus percy observes that "ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue."

in other words, verbally standing up to one's abuser is not the only way to demonstrate that a character is not a stereotypically weak, helpless, passive victim. it's definitely an easy choice with regard to cinematic staging (and the show has a pattern of taking the easy way out of conflicts and nuance), but i think the real issue is that sally's vocal protests come in tandem with the defanging of gabe. why does his body language and tone falter in arguments with sally? does he not have the upper hand? where is the evidence of an imbalanced power dynamic? there is no one way to write abuse bc the tragic reality is that abuse happens in an infinite number of ways, but nonetheless i am frustrated with the route the show went down in the first ep bc it feels reductive to the core of sally's character and her strengths: her endurance, her implicit but present rebelliousness, and her love for her son.

im also not a fan of some of the flashbacks we're getting with sally. it's not that sally shouldn't be "allowed" to get frustrated ever, but a major element of her characterization in the books is that she didn't take that frustration out on percy. i just don't see sally jackson getting upset that percy doesn't want to swim (beside that, i can't imagine percy not wanting to swim lmao). i just don't see sally jackson almost aggressively telling percy that he is the one making their goodbye ugly (because he's being a kid?? who doesn't want to leave his mom?? you're telling me sally wouldn't recognize the root of his anxiety immediately??). i just don't see sally speaking vaguely to percy about there being things she has to do that he doesn't understand instead of doing her best to meet percy where he's at with her explanation. if someone is coming to this show without having read the books, i genuinely think they might be starting to question sally's parenting, i.e. if she was really as wonderful a mom as percy insists or if he simply sees her through rose-tinted glasses. bc here's the thing: percy does see sally and his mom's struggles through rose-tinted glasses, and it's because sally bottles up and hides her struggles and frustrations from him. she doesn't let percy witness those frustrations. as such, there's an incongruity between book!sally and show!sally that doesn't mesh for me.

in short, show!sally feels like a new character to me. that's fine if that's the route they wanted to take, but again: why advertise it as a faithful adaptation if you're not going to be faithful to the core elements of central characters?

im also disappointed by how much the show has stripped annabeth of her character besides her intelligence. i have some thoughts about the adultification of young Black girls and the fact that annabeth is Black in the pjo show, mostly that i can't tell yet whether the show has the self-awareness to offer commentary on this reality for many Black girls through annabeth's character being seemingly defined by her intelligence and maturity or if they're simply unwittingly replicating this circumstance. i need more material before i can make a concrete assessment here, but all the same, i wish they were allowing these kids and especially annabeth to be kids - to make mistakes, to fall into traps, to have little crushes and get flustered, and to not know everything about every monster/obstacle before they come to face it.

people have talked to death the issue of the pacing so i won't belabor it but in general this show has terrible pacing. the first two eps are rushed (we got so little luke that im concerned his betrayal won't have much heart/meaning/oomph in the final ep), the constant unnecessary exposition creates periods of narrative drudgery, most of the fights lack tension bc the choreography is effectively nonexistent, them missing the solstice deadline has so far sucked the wind of the energy of their quest (of which there wasn't much in the first place bc the show did a poor job establishing the looming threat of a globally destructive war being on the horizon), and in general there's no sense of stakes. sigh.

i probably have more thoughts, but i'll stop for now bc i've got a shit ton of assignments to work on. in sum: the show lacks an understanding of how film operates as a medium, and while the merit of the show as an adaptation can be debated, it's simply a poorly constructed and lackluster piece of tv.

(but on the bright side? the trio is killing it even with the weak material they've been given, and their acting talent is the only reason i and many of my friends have kept watching)

#pjo show crit #pjo tv crit #my brain is EXPLODING with thoughts lmao #now i've gotta go work on my own movie o7 godspeed everyone #amy analyzes

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individualentityinverydeepburrow · 4 months

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Just finished episode 7 and 8 of Hazbin hotel!

These are not in order of appearance and I tried to make them vegue enough that someone with only the knowledge we've accumulated before these episodes would've know for sure any spoilers.

- Every song in these two episodes where so adorable and hopeful. I feel like if it was edited a bit it could have passed as another mlp:fim anthem (very positive)

- they made fun of the fact that episode 6's reveal is kinda obvious to the keen eyed ( which makes [redacted] the best person to point it out

- the explanation on how to kill an angel made SO much sense!

- noo they're dead :'( I knew it was most likely to happen but It still hurt

- Yes! They made it! I knew they where pure enough to be reformable! :')

- Why am I so hyped over a throwaway line? Why Am I Do Hyped Over A Throwaway Line?OMG YASSS ACE REP ACE REP ACE REP

- She gets excited about romance but still respects and initiates the agnolagement of the existence of the aroace!?!?!? Am I dreaming?? (positive)

- "This is only the beginning" I feel that's a comfort for the viewer as well who just got acquainted with these characters.

- Since our characters didn't get filler eps to breath and interact so far stopping now would feel really bad. Seeing this as a intro and not a full fleged arc feels comfier than seeing it as an ending for the viewer and a beginning for the characters.

- Ooo what's going on with Alastor The Fragiled Egoed Insecure Lil Guy? Is he feeling a lil frightened. A lil scared ?

- Ooo what's going on with Lilith after she when to buy milk and then never returned?

- Groop hug with lil big man! 🤗

- lol Vox is SO obsessed with Alastor. That's really embarrassing for him haha

#hazbin hotel #alastor hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel alastor #hazbin hotel charlie #hazbin #hazbin angel dust #hazbin episode 7 #hazbin episode 5 #hazbin episode 8 #hazbin lilith #hazbin alastor #alastor hazbin #alastor #hazbin sir pentious #hazbin charlie #hazbin vaggie #hazbin vagatha #hazbin vox #hazbin hotel vox

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twig-tea · 8 months

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Only Friends Ep7 Random Things I Haven't Already Spewed in the Tags Somewhere

God every line of dialogue this episode makes me want to write an essay.

This is the episode that's going to kill all of the mastermind theories and I'm so grateful. Everyone is just messy and young, not a genius or a villain, thank goodness that's now clear. Though I'm a little sad Boston didn't torture Nick by having more sex with the bug still present before confronting him about it (even though I agree this would have been worse writing).

Kudos to Nick for not outing Sand as the thief even though he was pressured and knew he was losing Boston. I respect it.

I was waiting this whole episode for Mew to confront Boston about him using the footage he took of Mew and Ray kissing to manipulate Top, but he never let on to Boston that he knew about that detail from Top. I was especially thinking about this during the scene where Mew threatens Boston with the Boston/Gap sex tape. I feel like some of those complicated expressions on Neo's face are about Boston thinking about that detail and whether Mew knew. It also says something to me about how much Mew is thinking about Top in this revenge moment (read: not at all). I wonder if it will come up later.

I also wanted to add that this was a brilliant way for Mew to make Boston feel regret (because it was clear he felt no remorse on his own). Mew got to feel morally superior AND instill real fear of consequences in Boston, it really was the perfect revenge.

I'm so interested in what Nick's thinking was re: giving the info about Boston's weakness to Mew. Did he want Boston more isolated from his friends? Was he actually compelled by Mew's argument even though we know he already said he didn't actually want to hurt Boston? [Ok I did already ramble in tags about this one but frfr I wanna knowwww]

Speaking of, it's interesting that Boston felt safe enough to tell Nick those details and not his best friends. Admittedly Nick was a bit right-place-right-time but Boston gave him an explanation, and now we know Mew hadn't heard about this previously.

I'm with @shortpplfedup and @lurkingshan on the Top cares more about Top than he cares about Mew train. I do think Top has some feelings, and they're associated with Mew, and I think they're mostly tied to Top's sense of self and how he wants to change and has told himself Mew is a critical part of making that change work (and making it worthwhile). His own sense of self got in the way of that change initially (which is why he did something Mew would not like at the first sign of maybe being lied to), and this loss seems to have helped him overcome that part of his ego, but we'll see.

Was thinking about the ephemerality squad as we watched Mew burn the physical representation of his time with Top, but only part of it.

Mew is careful and calculating, but he's not perfect and now he's doubting himself. After having scripted his first romance and having had it crash and burn despite his best efforts, second-guessing himself about Ray and being willing to give it a try even though he is sure it's a bad idea is.... painfully real. I didn't think RayMew would happen because Mew seemed so sure, but of course Mew would be doubting himself and his previous convictions now.

Mew really turned to Ray and said "I know we're not a good fit but maybe this is what I'm supposed to do" and Ray went for it because of course he did. Feels like that part of the script is explicitly calling out romantic tropes vs real life and how applying the logic of a romance narrative to reality just leads to heartbreak. I hope this keeps up, because YES. [Also @slayerkitty; is this what Jojo is doing re: dropping the narrative frameworks? Eps 1-5 people were telling themselves stories about how this was going to go and eps 6-7 have so far been realistic consequences. I'm now wondering if there's something there about applying dramatic tropes to the real world and how it doesn't work, actually?)]

Also just have to say, Drake's horny confident impersonal energy was perfect.

I have a whole other post about Cheum I've been drafting since last week and keep getting distracted from, but just to put this out there now: Mew was drowning Boston in that pool and girl you just stood to the side and watched (so did Ray, but he had a fractured arm so I'm giving him a pass).

No Yo at all in this episode; possibly another point in my corner about her being the representation of permanence (at least for this group), since everything was either under threat or had already imploded this episode.

Lastly, I keep thinking about what Ray's dad offered Sand, whether Sand took it, and what it would mean either way. It's absolutely bullshit, actually, that Sand not get paid for spending time with Ray considering how much money he is literally losing by spending time with Ray (this episode mentioned it explicitly: by staying to chill in the tub, he was missing out on plum wine $$). At the same time, Sand losing his other jobs to rely on money from Ray or his father is a recipe for disaster, because Ray is unreliable as a consistent source of income (please see his love of Mew). I understand not wanting to be misunderstood or influenced by money and so leaving it out of the situation, but it's in the situation anyway because Sand has debts and a lot of jobs and not a lot of time. I hate how much money has morality tied to it as much as I hate how sex has morality tied to it. It's not romantic to ruin your life for someone who won't even notice that's what you're doing (because Ray could never understand how Sand not working as hard for a week could absolutely mean Sand can't eat or pay rent--especially if Nick moved out--or pay school fees or his debts). Leaving money out of the calculation of a relationship is a privilege of the middle+ class. [@neuroticbookworm we're really going to have to have that noodling session because now you've got me fired up about this lol].

[this really only barebones touches on ephemerality but since I was thinking about y'all: @ranchthoughts @slayerkitty @wen-kexing-apologist @neuroticbookworm @waitmyturtles @lurkingshan @distant-screaming @chickenstrangers @clara-maybe-ontheroad ]

#only friends the series #only friends meta #only friends #ofts meta #ofts #ephemerality squad #also how did this get long?#ugh #long post

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theflyindutchwoman · 3 months

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You know in my mind Lucy's mother would visit without warning and that's how she'd learn for Tim. Lucy not telling her because they're not close and want to protect the relationship because she know her parents. Tim would want everything to be perfect and try hard to please them during dinner but her mother isn't gonna like Tim because he is a cop and divorced. I see her to be traditional don't why. And that's what would cause Lucy to blow up. Defending her relationship and telling her mom what she has kept for herself all these time. For her biological dad and everything else. Calling her on her hypocrisy and lack of support and dare I say love. Then we'd have chenford scene for support that strengthens the couple. I could see a scene where Tim stop trying to please the parents and just tell them how amazing Lucy is and what a good cop she is and that it's sad they miss all of it without lucy present in the end of the ep. Like lucy deserve to stand up to her parents herself and Tim would just calmly tell them the facts. I would want to see this in s6. We saw Tim met with Rachel and ashley parents we can do it even with a short season it's just 1 ep. Maybe then, in the next season we could see Lucy parents finally try. You know I imagine season 7 to be the engagement for chenford so they could work on building the relationship during the preparation for the wedding. Because I don't see the end of episode ending with a good note for the daughter/parents in my scenario. It wouldn't be realistic and too easy. Not me making up a full scenario in my head. At least now we know it will prob not happen lol

It's the rookie so the storyline with the parents could be a hit or a miss tbh as we know sometimes they miss. 🤐 hoping for the best tho as always!

See, this is why I'm a bit conflicted about Vanessa showing up again because I don't know what I want to see.

On the one hand, I wish she would come back just so Lucy could stand up for herself and finally confront her mom on her hypocrisy because it's a very much needed conversation. I think it could be very cathartic for Lucy. And to be frank, I thought that was where we were headed with the reveal of her bio dad… Alas, it went nowhere (for now). But on the other hand, I kind of want Vanessa to make amends. To admit that she was wrong. It may be too unrealistic (and it certainly wouldn't happen within one episode) but at the same time, I want Lucy to have some closure. Not that she can't have that in that other scenario of course.

Now should Vanessa make a come back, I absolutely can imagine your scenario, with her showing up unannounced (like she did in 2.05) and thus finding out about Tim - especially if he was the one to open the door #awkward. I doubt very much Lucy would voluntarily mention her relationship to her parents, not in the current atmosphere. She's far too protective for that. I get the feeling that while she is still in contact with them, she also does the bare minimum - like sending flowers for the big dates and that's it. Which honestly is more than they deserve. So the only 'Tim and Vanessa meet' scenario I can picture at the moment is the accidental one. Be it an impromptu visit at Lucy's apartment, at the station, at the hospital… or by sheer coincidence.

I do think that Lucy would be overall wary of her mother. Considering how Vanessa's last visit went, she would be on edge the whole time. I don't know if Tim's divorce would be a point of contention : I feel like the age difference, his job and the fact that he was Lucy's TO would take precedence over that. Although I'm not ruling it out either. And I have no doubt either that Lucy would stand up for herself. She did it several times already after all. But that's also why I want Tim to support her here. Because it has to be tiresome for her to have to justify her choices and happiness over and over again, knowing full well that it's not going to change her parents' minds. As amazing as Jackson was for standing up to Vanessa, Lucy didn't see it. And neither did we. So it would be nice for her to see someone in her corner. Especially since up to this point, Tim has been playing the devil's advocate and has defended Vanessa's behavior several times.

I don't know if it can fit in S6, since there seems to be a lot of intense storylines already, but it could work for s7, yes.

#ask & ye shall receive #the rookie #chenford #lucy chen #tim bradford #vanessa chen

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heartdrift · 9 months

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Every Caryl Scene (S1-11) (1080p/Logoless)

PART 1

PART 2

PART 3

PART 4

PART 5

PART 6

PART 7

Whew. I'm not gonna lie to y'all, this took forever. My goal with this was to recreate my previous Caryl compilation with 1.) all scenes intact, not missing anything and 2.) much better quality. I ran into many issues that I won't bore you with, but in summary - almost everything here is completely lossless from the original files, aside from S10, which I unfortunately had to reencode to fix a few issues I could not solve no matter how much I fiddled with it. However, it is still much better quality than the previous file I had up! These also have 6CH audio, which means that if you make fan videos and use something like Vegas Pro, you will be able to isolate the spoken audio from the music/random background noises and have better, cleaner voiceovers!

All of the seasons add up to about 123 GB, so I'm sorry that these will take up quite a bit more space than before, but the improved quality hopefully makes up for that! These are not perfect, so please forgive any little framerate bugs or very slight (hopefully) issues with video/audio syncing. I'm aware that the audio for S10 is a bit behind, but hopefully not to an extent that ruins anything - that season gave me quite a hard time, and I'm not really sure how to get it just right. It bothers the hell out of me, so I'm sorry, but I did my best. Otherwise, any issues should be pretty minor, but let me know if you run into anything major.

As always -

Credit is not necessary.

You are free to - and encouraged to - use these for anything creative that your heart desires. Just don't claim that you put these together yourself and I'm happy.

If you want me to see something you made with the scenes, tag me! I love seeing new creations in the tag, so don't be shy.

This is my love letter to y'all. It's not much, but I hope it sparks joy!

(Pssttt, psstt. If you would like episode timestamps for each season, click the link below. It's pretty lengthy and they're not precise, I just did my best.)

Season 1

00:00 to 02:52 - Episode 5, Wildfire

02:52 to 04:17 - Episode 6, TS-19

Season 2

00:00 to 14:21 - Episode 1, What Lies Ahead

14:22 to 20:05 - Episode 2, Bloodletting

20:06 to 21:38 - Episode 3, Save the Last One

21:39 to 26:16 - Episode 4, Cherokee Rose

26:17 to 27:18 - Episode 5, Chupacabra

27:19 to 42:17 - Episode 7, Pretty Much Dead Already

42:18 to 45:16 - Episode 8, Nebraska

45:17 to 51:00 - Episode 9, Triggerfinger

51:01 to 55:03 - Episode 11, Judge, Jury, Executioner

55:04 to 57:49 - Episode 12, Better Angels

57:50 to 01:12:48 - Episode 13, Beside the Dying Fire

Season 3

00:00 to 11:34 - Episode 1, Seed

11:35 to 20:08 - Episode 4, Killer Within

20:09 to 26:13 - Episode 5, Say the Word

26:14 to 31:12 - Episode 6, Hounded

31:13 to 33:14 - Episode 7, When the Dead Come Knocking

33:15 to 39:58 - Episode 9, The Suicide King

39:59 to 43:41 - Episode 10, Home

43:42 to 44:45 - Episode 11, I Ain't a Judas

44:46 to 46:18 - Episode 15, This Sorrowful Life

46:19 to 46:37 - Episode 16 - Welcome to the Tombs

Season 4

00:00 to 02:11 - Episode 1, 30 Days Without an Accident

02:12 to 06:11 - Episode 2, Infected

06:12 to 10:03 - Episode 3, Isolation

10:04 to 13:49 - Episode 4, Indifference

13:50 to 14:53 - Episode 5, Internment

14:54 to 16:18 - Episode 8, Too Far Gone

Season 5

00:00 to 20:07 - Episode 1, No Sanctuary

20:08 to 33:23 - Episode 2, Strangers

(^tw for emetophobia at 22:27 to 22:42, I know it might seem silly since this show is full of blood and gore, but I don't want to catch y'all off guard with something unexpected that might really bother you to see.)

33:24 to 34:19 - Episode 3, Four Walls and a Roof

34:20 to 34:52 - Episode 4, Slabtown

34:53 to 01:16:24 - Episode 6, Consumed

(^yes, I included this entire ep, y'all ain't missing a second of it.)

01:16:25 to 01:23:28 - Episode 8, Coda

01:23:29 to 01:27:29 - Episode 10, Them

01:27:30 to 01:28:14 - Episode 11, The Distance

01:28:15 to 01:30:58 - Episode 12, Remember

01:30:59 to 01:33:56 - Episode 13, Forget

Season 6

00:00 to 01:31 - Episode 1, First Time Again

01:32 to 09:26 - Episode 3, Thank You

09:27 to 12:59 - Episode 6, Always Accountable

13:00 to 14:59 - Episode 9, No Way Out

15:00 to 17:18 - Episode 11, Knots Untie

17:19 to 19:40 - Episode 13, The Same Boat

19:41 to 25:28 - Episode 14, Twice as Far

25:29 to 28:38 - Episode 16, Last Day on Earth

Season 7

00:00 to 02:55 - Episode 1, The Day Will Come When You Won't Be

02:56 to 03:55 - Episode 9, Rock in the Road

03:56 to 20:43 - Episode 10, New Best Friends

20:44 to 28:13 - Episode 13, Bury Me Here

Season 8

00:00 to 08:46 - Episode 1, Mercy

08:47 to 13:22 - Episode 4, Some Guy

13:23 to 15:22 - Episode 5, The Big Scary U

15:23 to 17:45 - Episode 11, Dead or Alive Or

17:46 to 20:02 - Episode 13, Do Not Send Us Astray

20:03 to 27:51 - Episode 16, Wrath

Season 9

00:00 to 02:33 - Episode 1, A New Beginning

02:34 to 07:27 - Episode 2, The Bridge

07:28 to 08:28 - Episode 6, Who Are You Now?

08:29 to 23:25 - Episode 7, Stradivarius

23:26 to 28:00 - Episode 10, Omega

28:01 to 29:41 - Episode 13, Chokepoint

29:42 to 31:01 - Episode 14, Scars

31:02 to 58:58 - Episode 15, The Calm Before

58:59 to 01:22:21 - Episode 16, The Storm

Season 10 (Part 1)

00:00 to 09:24 - Episode 1, Lines We Cross

09:25 to 35:48 - Episode 3, Ghosts

35:49 to 38:34 - Episode 4, Silence the Whisperers

38:35 to 39:46 - Episode 5, What It Always Is

39:47 to 53:52 - Episode 6, Bonds

53:53 to 01:06:48 - Episode 7, Open Your Eyes

01:06:49 to 01:19:18 - Episode 8, The World Before

01:19:19 to 01:44:24 - Episode 9, Squeeze

Season 10 (Part 2)

00:00 to 08:41 - Episode 9, Squeeze (continued from the previous part)

08:42 to 16:35 - Episode 11, Morning Star

16:36 to 20:04 - Episode 12, Walk with Us

20:05 to 31:45 - Episode 14, Look at the Flowers

31:46 to 40:01 - Episode 15, The Tower

40:02 to 01:02:20 - Episode 16, A Certain Doom

01:02:21 to 01:07:40 - Episode 17, Home Sweet Home

01:07:41 to 01:33:05 - Episode 18, Find Me

01:33:06 to 02:05:42 - Episode 21, Diverged

02:05:43 to 02:08:40 - Episode 24, Here's Ne/gan

^I don't want this post to show up in that character's tag on mobile, it would just be annoying for those fans since this doesn't have anything to do with him.

Season 11

00:00 to 09:55 - Episode 1, Acheron: Part I

09:56 to 15:29 - Episode 9, No Other Way

15:30 to 18:51 - Episode 10, New Haunts

18:52 to 24:27 - Episode 14, The Rotten Core

24:28 to 27:26 - Episode 17, Lockdown

27:27 to 37:24 - Episode 18, A New Deal

37:25 to 57:18 - Episode 20, What's Been Lost

57:19 to 01:19:32 - Episode 21, Outpost 22

1:19:33 to 01:20:56 - Episode 22, Faith

01:20:57 to 01:32:27 - Episode 23, Family

01:32:28 to 02:00:35 - Episode 24, Rest in Peace

#caryl #long post #kimmy.txt #caryledit #< this is here so that y'all know you can use this as a resource for any graphics/gifs/videos/etc #i am still salty that i had to reencode s10 and that the video and audio aren't synced properly EVEN AFTER THAT >.<#but sometimes you just gotta throw in the towel before you lose your mind

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mindmeltonabun-blog · 5 months

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My Demon: Theories and Analysis for Eps 7-8

Hello Readers!

The episodes this week were top-tier! Some quick thoughts I had about this week's eps: Kwang Chul gave a whole new meaning to the phrase, “step on me”. I totally wasn’t expecting this drama to have any blood or gore, but here we are. Did they have to make Gu Won’s stabbing so violent and gruesome?!! Blood was spurting out everywhere! It seriously made me want to vomit.

Other thoughts I had were that all of Madam Ju’s family members should be in prison or at least a mental institution because they're all so freaking crazy. The only good thing about these episodes was that Do Hee and Gu Won finally admitted their true feelings to each other.

I'll try to keep this post as short as possible, but you know me, I still end up writing a shit ton. Anyway, let's take a deeper dive into some of the many mysteries in "My Demon". Time to put on our thinking caps to analyze and theorize!

Demons' Limitations

In Ep 7, we were finally given more information about demons. Specifically, the writer provided us with information about demons' limitations which are quite similar to the limitations of the genie from Aladdin.

For those who don’t remember the rules of Aladdin's Genie, here they are:

1. Can’t kill anyone 2. Can’t make people fall in love 3. Can’t bring anyone back from the dead

There are some minor differences between the two sets of rules. For instance, instead of the rule that prohibits you from making people fall in love, there are rules against interfering with God's work and preventing natural disasters.

I believe the writer is presenting these rules to suggest that Gu Won will eventually break one of these rules to save Do Hee's life (see the section "What's Best for You is What's Best for Me" for more). Something interesting to note is that Netflix didn't translate the whole page in this scene. There is a part of the text that says, "Killing the living, saving the dead, etc are part of God's domain". This means God is allowed to kill the living, bring back the dead, prevent natural disasters, etc. Basically, God can do all the things demons can't. Seeing this translation also made me realize what God meant when she said "turf" in Ep. 7. I'll further elaborate in the section titled, "God/Lady".

Demons vs Guardians

I'm curious about the differences between demons and guardians. When a demon becomes a guardian, do they acquire a new set of powers? Or does becoming a guardian simply mean they return to being human without additional abilities? Based on the information presented so far, it appears that for a demon to transition into a guardian, they must learn to love and be loved in return. Achieving these milestones would essentially enable them to regain their soul and humanity. It would be cool though if, upon becoming a guardian, demons retained their powers but without an immortal lifespan, similar to Lee Yeon from Tale of the Nine-Tailed!

What Landed Gu Won in Hell? Love

Being a demon is comparable to the life of a genie. In both cases, the individuals are bound to fulfill the desires of others. However, for demons, this servitude isn't a mere obligation--it's a necessity for their continued existence. Unlike genies, demons must grant wishes to sustain their own lives. When I think about it, the life of a demon is quite sad because they have to spend their entire existence granting others' wishes without ever having an opportunity for their own wishes to be fulfilled. This got me thinking about what exactly was Gu Won's greatest desire or wish. Side note, y'all should check out the show Lucifer if you like mystery, devil and human romance, family drama, etc.

Throughout the show, we have witnessed that our deepest wishes and desires, can ironically, lead to our demise, sending us straight to Hell, where we are tormented by these very wishes. Take for example, Park Bok Gyu's wish to never go hungry. After he died, he was tortured by creatures with fish heads. Conversely, the mob boss, who sought wealth and power, faces a fate in Hell that, according to Gu Won, would be even more severe. These examples show us the larger the wish, the steeper the cost--meaning that if your wish is significantly large, your soul could end up in far worse places than Hell. But what's worse than even the deepest levels of Hell? Becoming a demon. Unlike in Hell, where you could finish your punishment more quickly and be reincarnated, being turned into a demon means becoming a slave for all of eternity. All hope isn't lost though because as I mentioned earlier, if you learn to love and be loved returned, you can be free of your demon existence.

I'll now provide you with what I think Gu Won's wishes were and the circumstances surrounding his transformation into a demon! Let me just say that Gu Won's wishes were astronomical. They weren't common wishes like wealth or power which would be easily granted by demons. They were wishes only God could grant.

(DISCLAIMER: DO NOT PLAGIARIZE MY THEORIES, I BETTER NOT BE SEEING MY THEORIES ON ANY SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM WITHOUT CREDIT).

So, Do Hee and Gu Won were in love, but their societal positions created significant barriers. Being a kisaeng and a nobleman, they faced the harsh reality their love could not flourish in that lifetime. Now, Do Hee was forced to work as a kisaeng to provide for her family.

Due to Do Hee's status as a kisaeng, she was either sold off to someone else or, in an alternative scenario, their forbidden love led to her tragic death (who knows, maybe Jin Star's past self killed Do Hee in a fit of jealousy; maybe they were sisters?). In either situation, Gu Won would've felt a profound sense of insignificance and weakness, unable to protect Do Hee from these tragic fates. Like he must've really hated himself.

In his pit of despair, Gu Won wished he could've saved Do Hee from her enslaved position as a kisaeng or untimely death, protected her, and married her one day. Now, those are some big wishes, and remember what I said? The bigger the wish, the larger the cost. In a twist of fate, God/Lady heard Gu Won's fervent wishes and offered Gu Won a deal. God would fulfill all of Gu Won's wishes if he agreed to work as a demon.

Sometime after this, Do Hee found out Gu Won became a demon because of her and felt immense guilt. Do Hee who was a devout Christian, prayed to God wishing Gu Won would be spared from suffering such an existence as a demon. Now, God mostly fulfilled this request by erasing Gu Won's human memories (I'm going with the Grim Reaper/oblivion tea theme here haha). Since Gu Won's inability to protect Do Hee tortured him deeply, the act of forgetting lessened his emotional pain. I say mostly because God wasn't quite done with fulfilling this request.

Just imagine being God, you would have to shuffle so many things around to fulfill both Do Hee and Gu Won's wishes. Make Do Hee rich so she's not working in a slave position...check...create a situation where the two would meet (i.e matchmaker got the hotel name wrong)...check...create a situation where the two would have to depend on each other (i.e shut off Gu Won's power on the road)...check..... make them get married..check and check.....free Gu Won from his existence as a demon...ongoing. IT'S A LOT Y'ALL.

How do you save Gu Won from a sad existence as a demon and spontaneous combustion? You turn him back into a human by introducing him to the very girl who would be capable of bringing out his humanity through her love. She's the water that extinguishes the Hellfire that is about to consume him. Gu Won freed Do Hee from being an enslaved kisaeng in the past and now she's freeing him from the shackles of his enslaved existence as a demon.

Gu Won and Do Hee are each other's salvation. One cannot survive without the other. If one is killed, the other one will be too. For example, if Do Hee dies, Gu Won would either be stuck as a demon for all of eternity or combust. And if Gu Won dies, it would leave Do Hee unprotected and she would probably get killed. It's like Do Hee said, they share the same fate and are in the same boat.

What’s Best for You is What’s Best for Me...Danger on the Horizon!

On the surface, the quote "What's best for you is what's best for me", said by Madam Ju and echoed by Gu Won may seem sweet, but upon deeper reflection, it reveals a bitter truth: what's best for you is not always what's best for me.

A brief digression: I have a suspicion that Gu Won might be a long-lost ancestor of the Ju family. Why would the writer intentionally give Gu Won similar personality traits as Madam Ju or have him repeat things she said if not to suggest there was a possible familial connection? While shared traits don't always indicate a blood relation, the repetition of the same phrases is highly suspicious. I guess one reason the writer did this was to convey that even though Madam Ju was gone, Do Hee would still have someone similar by her side. However, they could've accomplished this without having Gu Won be the male version of Madam Ju.

Another explanation for why Gu Won and Madam Ju say the same phrases could be that they crossed paths in the past. Maybe Madam Ju heard Gu Won say it or vice versa. Who knows. It would be sweet though if Gu Won were a long-lost Ju family member because then Do Hee would be related to Madam Ju through her marriage to him.

Ok, sorry for the brief tangent, it's my ADHD brain haha. Now, let's get back to discussing how what's best for you is not always what's best for me. Taking the example of the mother and her sick daughter, from the mother's perspective, signing away her soul to ensure her daughter's health might seem like the best thing to do for her daughter. Yet, it wouldn't be truly best for the mother as she would be damned to Hell. Similarly, from the daughter's POV, what's technically best for her (i.e not being sick anymore), wouldn't actually be the best, as she would be fraught with guilt knowing her mother suffered because of her.

When it comes to Do Hee and Gu Won, what's best for Do Hee is to continue investigating the deaths of her parents and Madam Ju. However, this poses a significant risk to Gu Won, who is almost fully human now and no longer invincible.

This leads me to my next point. Gu Won would stop at nothing to ensure Do Hee's happiness. He's well aware that for Do Hee to continue her investigations, she would need to remain alive and safe. For that to happen, he would need to have his powers fully working so he could protect her. What this means is that Gu Won will become a full demon again. I believe this is about to happen soon because, in Ep 8, we see God/Lady looking at the moon which is now a "waxing gibbous". If you recall from Ep 2, Park Bok Gyu hypothesized that they would have to wait until the next full moon to attempt transferring the tattoo back to Gu Won so he could be a demon again. And well, the next phase after a waxing gibbous is a full moon.

I think Gu Won isn't going to tell Do Hee about his decision to become a demon though. He's going to take Do Hee to the beach and make her think it's a romantic outing and she's not going to suspect anything because they’re in a relationship now. Then bam into the water they go! The betrayal she'll feel after Gu Won does this will be astronomical. It goes back to Madam Ju's quote about having someone on your side who, if they stabbed you in the back, you would understand. Even if Do Hee understands why Gu Won did this, it still wouldn't change the fact it would still hurt like Hell.

Would Gu Won doing this be really what's best for Do Hee? Or the both of them? Yes and no. While it would keep Do Hee alive and safe, she would be riddled with guilt knowing Gu Won sacrificed his soul and humanity to ensure she was protected. At the same time, Gu Won would become immortal again and able to protect Do Hee better, but he would no longer be able to feel love for her since demons are devoided of human emotions. Gu Won would simply view her as someone he just needs to protect to keep his end of the bargain.

Following this, I think there will be a situation where either Kwang Chul or Abraxas gets ahold of Do Hee and I think this is where Gu Won’s latest dream will come into play. To save Do Hee, Gu Won will have to kill whoever, and this will force him to break the rule that states demons can't kill. Subsequently, he'll spontaneously combust. Well, that's going to suck. Had Gu Won remained human, he could've killed whoever and not spontaneously combust. However, since he's a demon again, those consequences would apply. Don't worry y'all, I feel like Do Hee is going to wish or pray to God/Lady that she'll take pity on them and bring Gu Won back to life lol.

Abraxas..It's Still Seok Hoon

So earlier this week, I posted on Twitter how I now thought Abraxas was Seok Min or Do Gyeong based on the pillows. However, after thinking through some more things, I'm going back to saying Abraxas is Seok Hoon. That's my final answer.

Seok Hoon is a trickster/magician! He makes things "disappear" including money and people. That's why Madam Ju said in Ep 4, "You killed someone on top of all your dirty tricks?". He even suggested Do Hee let his department buy shares of her company to offset their losses which is a form of trickery since it would appear Do Hee was engaging in stock manipulation or insider trading.

The biggest trick Seok Hoon is attempting to pull on Do Hee is to make her believe he's really on her side and that he's her real guardian. Going back to Madam Ju's quote about having someone on your side means you would gladly let them stab you in the back and understand. When you trust someone completely, it means you would let them stab you in the back because at the end of the day you know they have your best interest at heart so you would understand.

Throughout this show, the writer has made it a point to emphasize how Seok Hoon is the only one on Do Hee's side. Here's the thing though, Do Hee doesn't completely trust Seok Hoon as evidenced by how she doesn't tell him everything. The same goes for Gu Won, but he's not a suspect in the death of Madam Ju.

Between the two men in the show, who do you think is the real demon and guardian? Btw, Abraxas is sometimes seen as a demon in mythology. For me, the real demon is Seok Hoon. Even though Gu Won projects an image that he's a big bad demon, he's actually an angel on the inside. In contrast, Seok Hoon projects an angelic persona, but he's really a devil on the inside. Gu Won is the real guardian who's trying to protect Do-Hee while Seok Hoon is the real demon who's trying to kill her.

One major question I had from earlier episodes was how Abraxas/Seok Hoon knew the identity of Gu Won was the Director of Sunwol Foundation before the wedding news articles came out that said as much? Furthermore, how did Seok Hoon know the Wild Dogs were looking for him? If you remember, the Wild Dogs only found out Gu Won was the Director of Sunwol and Do Hee's bodyguard after Kwang Chul passed the note revealing as much. There was no explanation of just how exactly Seok Hoon and Kwang Chul found out Gu Won was the director of Sunwol and that the Wild Dogs were looking for him. I looked through earlier eps to see if there was ever an instance where Do Hee told Seok Hoon that Gu Won was the Director of Sunwol, but there wasn't. I think Seok Hoon probably found out this bit of info from Secretary Shin. She probably mentioned it in passing to Seok Hoon because she thought Seok Hoon was Do Hee's ally.

I'm sure many of you are probably wondering how Seok Hoon can be Abraxas when we see Abraxas chilling at Seok Min's home. Well, the thing is, we haven't seen Seok Hoon's place for a reason--he doesn't have one. Due to his "hippie" lifestyle, he engages in communal living, meaning he lives with relatives. More specifically, he resides at Seok Min's home, and that's why we see him as Abraxas there. There's a strong possibility that he and Seok Min are probably working together too. Additionally, I'm ruling out Do Gyeong as being Abraxas because I think he's trying to help warn Do Hee in his own creepy way. When it comes to the pill switching of Madam Ju's medications, I suspect Se-ra may have some involvement. According to the info on SBS, Se-ra is the daughter of a leading pharma company. As someone with a background in pharma, I was like wait a minute. While I'm not sure about the rules and regulations in South Korea, in the US, diclofenac is a prescription medication. I'm just going to guess it's the same in SK. This led me to think that maybe Se-ra provided the diclofenac to Seok Hoon.

In Ep 7, Abraxas/Seok Hoon informed Kwang Chul that Gu Won was only a demon when he was around Do Hee. This revelation led the duo to believe Gu Won's access to his powers was somehow linked to his proximity to Do Hee (they just didn't know how close). To test this hypothesis, they decided to separate the two lovers so that they could eliminate Gu Won. When this plan failed, they went back to the drawing board. At this point, the duo remained unaware of the tattoo and its connection to Do Hee and Gu Won's powers because there was nothing in the book about the tattoo transferring or how to get it back. I wouldn't be surprised if the book didn't even say how the tattoo was connected to demon powers.

It was only after Seok Hoon saw Do Hee place Gu Won's hand on her wrist with the tattoo that he realized the connection between the tattoo and Gu Won's demon powers. This is going to be important further down the line.

After realizing this, Seok Hoon messaged Kwang Chul, saying, "There's something wrong with his powers." Although not explicitly shown on screen, I believe Seok Hoon knew precisely what was wrong with Gu Won's powers. He deduced Gu Won was becoming human through Do Hee's love. This is why Seok Hoon chose to tell Gu Won he was the reason why Do Hee was giving up the Chairwoman position and investigation of Madam Ju's death. Seok Hoon strategically revealed this information to Gu Won with the intention it would encourage him to pursue a relationship with Do Hee, ultimately leading to Gu Won becoming fully human through her love. If Gu Won were fully human, he wouldn't have the powers to protect Do Hee, making them both sitting ducks for slaughter.

Seok Hoon's little plan is going to backfire, though, for two main reasons: He doesn't know one can get the tattoo back and he doesn't understand the power of love. Remember, the book doesn't tell us how one gets the tattoo back. Bok Gyu and Gu Won are the only ones who know this bit of information because they figured out the conditions (i.e full moon and ocean) had to be the same as the night the tattoo was initially transferred. Furthermore, Seok Hoon doesn't know the lengths Gu Won would go to protect Do Hee. He doesn't understand that Gu Won would essentially sell his soul and humanity to protect Do Hee (Gu Won's already done it once before in past), meaning he would become a demon again to protect Do Hee.

God/Lady

I don't know about y'all, but I'm quite frankly done with God in disguise figures in fantasy dramas. It's like in every single fantasy drama, there's always a God in disguise character that gives you hints of what will happen in the form of riddles, leaving many scratching their heads to figure out what they mean. We have seen these types of characters in Goblin, Tale of the Nine-Tailed, King Eternal Monarch, Doom at Your Service, Alchemy of Souls, etc. The list is endless.

The latest God in disguise is Lady... who goes around saving "recyclables", more like saving people. Anyway, I've seen many questioning if she’s really God. Y’all if she’s wearing a hat that spells out G-O-D in bold letters and she’s always asking money for Jesus Corporation, what does that tell you??? I don’t know how much clearer it can be that she is God. Instead of questioning whether she is God or not, maybe it would be a better use of our time if we spend it trying to decipher what she says instead.

Let's get to dissecting the many things God has said. Now, I've already gone over most of the things she said from Ep 1-6 either in the previous post or on my Twitter act so I won't really discuss more here. However, the are a couple things I forgot to mention in my last post though. Here they are:

The roulette wheel has 18 odd and 18 even numbers (36 numbers total). (18) 1+8=9 and (36) 3+6=9 all correspond to Gu (9) Won. The sum of all the numbers (0-36) on the roulette wheel is "666" which I already said in the previous post is the number of the beast/devil and corresponds to Gu Won (the combination to his safe is 666). When you flip “666” it’s “999” which is an angel number that symbolizes completion and new beginnings.

In "Divine Comedy", there are 9 realms of Hell + 1 with Lucifer = 10. The same pattern is present in Purgatory and Heaven. Gu Won's soul was in Hell and now it's in the purgatory on its way towards Heaven. Demon-> Guardian. Hell-> Heaven

On a broader level, if 1= new beginning and 0= end, our couple who's represented by the number 10 symbolizes they are each other's end and beginning. They complete each other.

The bill God is holding when she's saying, "I'm betting all my money on the odd numbers", is a 1000 bill. 1000 or "cheon" means "heaven". That scene could be intrepreted as God or the heavens are betting everything on our couple to win. Also, Madam Ju's first name is Cheon which probably means she went to heaven.

The overall conclusion I'm drawing from what God said about odd numbers from eps 1-6 is that our couple will have a happy ending after they go through some shit haha.

Moving onto what God said in Eps 7-8! When Gu Won called God/Lady, "Arabica woman", my mind lit up! Does anyone see the connection? Arabica...Abraxas. Abraxas is 7 letters and Arabica is 7 letters. In some belief systems, Abraxas was viewed as God. So, Gu Won calling her "Arabica woman" could be another hint she's God. The word "Arabica" also sounds very similar to "Abracadabra" which is related to Abraxas. Just so we’re clear, I’m not implying God/Lady is the Abraxas who’s trying to kill Gu Won and Do Hee. Seok Hoon is a wannabe Abraxas while God/Lady is the real Abraxas haha.

I also found it hilarious that God was constantly begging for donations for Jesus Corporation. It made me think about that time Madam Ju said she bribed God through donations after Do Hee said liars can't go to Heaven. Guess Madam Ju bribed God enough to earn a spot in Heaven.

When God says she knows this place like the back of her hand, she doesn't mean the train station, she means the whole world...because you know, God is omnipresent. God then tells them, they've intruded on her "turf" which means they've intruded on her domain.

What's her domain? Matters of life, death, natural disasters, fate, making people fall in love, etc. This was why Gu Won's powers would fail at the most random times or rather not-so-random times. God already has a grand plan for these two and she's keeping up her end of the bargain of the contract she made with them in the past (refer to "What Landed Gu Won in Hell? Love" section). However, these two would interrupt her work so she would shut off Gu Won's powers so that they follow the predetermined path she has planned for them.

Gu Won's power failed in Ep 1 because God was creating a situation where they would depend on each other, get to know each other, fall in love, etc. In the latest power failure, God turned off Gu Won's powers to prevent them from escaping so they could kiss each other. Consider this scenario: If God hadn't prevented them from escaping, what would've happened? They wouldn't have kissed. That kiss set the wheels in motion for the romance between Gu Won and Do Hee. God was just giving them a nudge in the right direction.

The next time Gu Won experienced another power failure was later in Ep 7 when he and Do Hee were attempting to leave Sunwol Foundation. Once again, we should question why God didn't want them to leave at that particular moment. Remember, because Gu Won and Do Hee were unable to leave precisely at that time, they encountered the Wild Dogs, who then proceeded to pledged their allegiance to Gu Won. Based on Ep 9 preview, it appears the Wild Dogs will play a crucial role in finding Kwang Chul.

As Gu Won and Do Hee were leaving, we saw God telling them, "What flickers would eventually go out sooner or later". Many interpreted this scene as God saying Gu Won's powers would eventually go out. Well, duh. I interpreted this scene a bit differently because I noticed God was looking at the clock that was flickering and pointing at 1.

What does 1 symbolize in numerology? New beginning. My interpretation was that she was saying Gu Won's life as a demon along with his powers was coming to an end and that he was about to begin a new life as a human.

Gu Won should really be nicer to God lol. Look at what happened to the Prince from Beauty and the Beast after he wasn't nice to the old beggar lady...she turned him into a beast. Ohhh now I get it....Gu Won needs to learn to love or he'll remain a beast forever aka he'll remain a devil/demon forever haha (666=beast=devil).

Later in the episode, one guy advises the other to let it go and blame it on fate. This refers to an earlier scene where Gu Won was blaming Do Hee (Fate) for losing his powers. God's message is clear--Gu Won shouldn't be blaming Do Hee for his current state; rather, he should be blaming himself. After all, it's not her fault that he's falling in love with her and becoming human. Moreover, there's the possibility that becoming human was one of Gu Won's original wishes in the contract he signed with God.

In Ep 8, we don't see much of God except in the beginning. Many interpreted what God said in the following scene as meaning Do Hee had special powers that allowed her to heal Gu Won. However, I don't believe she possesses any supernatural abilities. Instead, I think she saved him through the power of love, and, perhaps prayers. If you look at the end of Ep 7, you'll notice Do Hee's hands were in a prayer position right before they zoomed in on the cross tattoo. Do Hee likely wished and prayed for Gu Won's salvation, and God granted it.

Regarding the second thing God said, I believe she was referring to the moment when Do Hee was trying to save Gu Won. Seok Hoon witnessed Do Hee placing Gu Won's hand on her wrist, setting off a chain of events that would eventually threaten her life (refer to "Abraxas...It's Still Seok Hoon" section).

Tarot

Whew! We are almost near the end of this post! There wasn't really anything of significance in terms of tarot in this week's episodes. One thing I found interesting was that the social influencer had asked Gu Won if he was a magician. For those who don't know, the 1st tarot card is "The Magician". You can make multiple connections between that, the number 1, and Gu Won, but since I'm tired of writing, I won't be further elaborating on it. I think we'll see a situation in the future where everyone really thinks Gu Won is dead, but he'll show up very unexpectedly and say "Abracadabra, I'm back!".

One last thing I found interesting was the tarot card pulled by Jung Mi in Ep 8. She had pulled the 19th tarot card, which is the Sun. This card usually indicates success, good fortune, happiness, etc. Also, 1+9=10 and Yi Sun...Sun haha. I think this card conveys the same message that everything will be okay after we go through some Hell.

I bet you all that we'll be seeing the following tarot cards in future eps: #1 The Magician, #8 Strength, #11 Justice, #12 The Hanged Man, #13 Death, #16 The Tower, #18 The Moon, and #21 The World!

Other Random Thoughts

Gu Won and Do Hee's red and green didn't refer to Christmas or Battery Charge Status. They referred to the colors on the roulette wheel. There is only one green space on a typical roulette wheel and it corresponds to the number 0. Number 1 is usually red. So 1...0....10 and 1+0=1 completion. Also, odd numbers are usually red and even numbers are black. Oh, I get why Do Hee was wearing a red dress and Gu Won was wearing a black suit now haha.

What determines if one remembers their past lives or not? Why is Park Bok Gyu the only one who remembers his past lives? Will Do Hee ever remember her past lives?

I can't believe Park Bok Gyu compared Gu Won to being a meat eater who ended up becoming a vegetarian because he met a very special pig (Do Hee) that he didn't want to eat haha.

With Madam Ju, is she suppose to be a spirit in limbo or is Do Hee schizophrenic? In Ep 8, it almost feels like she’s a real ghost bc we see her tapping her cane in hesitation after Do Hee said she didn’t know who killed Madam Ju and her parents.

I hope the Wild Dogs or Park Bok Gyu will find the bug underneath Gu Won’s desk when they’re cleaning haha. Did Seok Hoon put bugs in Do Hee’s place?!!

Was Gu Won a prince when he was human?

Do Hee’s birthday is Oct 29 (look at her phone in ep 1) which means she is a scorpio. On the SBS site, it tells about the story of the frog and scorpion. In the story, the scorpion stings the frog who’s carrying it across the river. They both end up dying and the scorpion is basically like oops it’s just in my nature to. Also, on the lovers tarot card (Rider Waite deck), there is a snake which equates to the 8th zodiac sign…scorpio! The other zodiac sign on the lovers tarot card is a lion which means Leo (5th zodiac sign). I guess Gu Won’s zodiac sign is Leo. This would also explain why he likes those lion bookends haha. Oh and lions are considered “apex predators” haha. Leo’s element is fire and Scorpio is water….hahaha Fire and Water…Gu Won and Do Hee. In most tarot decks, the 8th tarot card is justice. In the Rider Waite deck, the 8th card is strength which shows a lion.

The kiss scene with the garden backdrop looks like the lovers tarot card where Adam and Eve are in the garden of Eden. I can totally see people start making theories about how Do Hee is Eve and Gu Won is Adam after reading this post 🤣. And talk about “original sin” and “forbidden fruit”. Good luck haha.

Number 15 is associated with the devil tarot card as well as the full moon (the full moon comes 15 days after the new moon).

One other theory I had for Gu Won and Do Hee was that in the past, they were in so love that it became detrimental to everyone around them. Gu Won was a rule breaker and instead of doing whatever job he was suppose to do (I.e work as a government official), he was always going around “flower watching” aka hanging out with Do Hee. Him and Do Hee forgot about their responsibilities so God punished them. Gu Won’s punishment was to be turned into a demon so he could learn to follow the rules (Gu Won did say the demon manual was a book filled with many threats haha). For Do Hee, maybe her punishment was to always be alone, meaning she would always lose those closest to her. I feel this theory is just meh haha. The other theory aligns more with the many themes in the show than this one. I would be surprised if the writer goes this route haha.

END

Overall, I don't think we'll have a sad ending. I'll definitely let y'all know if I see anything in future eps that would indicate otherwise! I hope in this week's eps, we'll get to see what actually happened in Gu Won and Do Hee's past! I'm dying to know the circumstances that led to Gu Won's transformation into a demon! Alright, that's all I have for now!

#my demon #gu won #do do hee #do dohee #jeong gu won #kim yoojung #song kang #tarot cards #there are probably grammatical mistakes #oops I sound repetitive

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nerdy-frog98 · 19 days

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almost done with my first watch-through of 9-1-1! gonna be completely honest with yall - seasons 5 and 6 were harder to get through. season 5 felt like it was just trauma after trauma, and season 6 has felt very…disjointed? like a lot of the stories come from nowhere only to go nowhere. also, there were a few moments in season 6 that eddie felt out of character to me- moments where he didn’t seem to care about buck? like/ you’re telling me that eddie wrote buck into his will, AND buck had a meltdown when eddie nearly died… but eddie basically disappears when buck almost dies? i don’t even care about the romantic-coded buddie- where did best friends buddie go this season? i mean, they were still there sometimes (and the moments they had in s6 were cute and very domestic, obviously), but…yeah.

don’t get me wrong, i still love the show! i genuinely don’t think you could rip it from my cold dead hands now- i am definitely too far gone. there have been a lottt of banger episodes (i really liked the ep where chimney has to practice his leadership and ends up bringing ravi back to the firehouse! ravi needs to be a main character asap), and i’m a huge fan of each of the characters and their individual stories, but lord. i can actually TELL how much control FOX had over those stories.

main bonus from season 6 though - they tried so hard to make eddie straight that they accidentally made him seem soooo much more gay (or at least that is how it feels to me. the whole episode where he goes hiking and golfing to ‘flirt’ with women was so unserious). also, madney engagement episode(s) were so incredibly sweet 😭

i have one more episode in season 6 before i get to season 7, so i’m almost caught up! i’m already looking forward to it :)

#watch 911 with whitney #911 abc #buddie #911 #madney #911 season 6 #911 s6

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absolutebl · 3 months

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This Week in BL - I'm Late, I know

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

Feb 2024 Wk 2

Ongoing Series - Thai

The Sign (Sat YT) ep 12fin - we waiting 2 weeks I guess? Bah.

Pit Babe (Fri iQIYI) ep 13fin - I wasn't impressed by the last ep at all. Trash watch happened here.

My final thoughts:

Based on alittlebixth's omegaverse novel #พิษเบ๊บ’ set in the world of car racing omegaverse. Thailand brought us the world's first omegaverse BL but then failed to lean into the courage of its a/b/o convictions by not emphasizing the difference between our world & theirs, adding & subtracting characters & allegiances + a weak ending. With earnest performances, enthusiastic sex scenes, a fantastic side couple, and some delightful scenery chewing - the actors tried… poor things. It's just the story failed both them and their parent genre. Frankly? I just wanted it to be more outrageous and trashy, since I never expected it to be good. Instead, it was just… meh. 7/10

(Imma remind all the newbies that this is not unprecedented from me with hugely popular BL.)

Cooking Crush (Sun YT) ep 10 of 12 - I like it but there’s a high % of this show that doesn’t interest me. Anything to do with the side couple, or the friend group, or the cooking competition drives me into a comatose state of UGH. That means that in this episode, I paid attention to about 5 minutes worth.

For Him (Thurs iQIYI) ep 11 of 12 - I'm ready for this to be done. I think they were trying to be this year's Big Dragon, but they just aren't good enough. I really didn’t need a third couple.

City of Stars (Fri iQIYI) ep 2 of 12 - I'm warming up to FueangKrom a bit. It’s cute. I am finding the pacing interesting. That pacing might be bad, but right now it’s simply different.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Love For Love's Sake (Korea Weds iQIYI) 5-6 of 8 - I still love this show a lot, but this 2 ep installment felt a little disjointed. I’m not sure if that’s the narrative structure or the subs. The captions are shockingly bad for a KBL and I don’t have enough Korean to make up for their clear failings.

Although I Love You and You AKA Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro ka (Japan Thurs Gaga) ep 5 of 10 - Oh the return of the manic pixie dream ex. This is all very high school drama for purportedly grown-up adults. But them both being jealous and then kissing was sweet.

AntiReset (Taiwan Fri Viki/Gaga) ep 3 of 10 - They remain adorable and the sunshine robot is very sweet. But it is a little slow.

Perfect Propose (Japan Fri Gaga) ep 3 of 6 - I prefer the episodes when we get more of them onscreen together. But this was fine.

Happy Ending (Korea Tues YT) 3fin - The ending disappointed me (are you surprised?). What can I say, not Strongberry's best as far as I’m concerned. High school besties that many could be sweethearts. I don’t like an ending that’s left up in the air. 6/10

It's Done but...

What Did You Eat Yesterday Season 2 AKA Kinou Nani Tabeta? Season 2 (Japan Gaga) 10 eps - will binge when I have any spare time. 2024 is crazy busy for me so far.

The Servant and the Young Master - from Vietnam, it's on YouTube. I will give it a try when I have a window of time.

Began Beginning (Myanmar YouTube) - A Burmese BL? @heretherebedork vouched for it, so I will give it a watch.

It's Airing But...

[NO INTERNATIONAL] Cherry Magic (Sat YouTube) ep 3 of 12 - yeah Japan put the smack down on our boys. Sadness. You can use a VPN if you like. Read all about it here.

Ossans Love Season 2 (Japan Gaga) - 5 years later, will anything have changed? This is Japan so�� probubly not. I won't be watching this. I disliked Season one and actively hated the follow ups. No thank you.

7 Days Before Valentine (Weds WeTV) 12 eps - Gave me Luminous Solution vibes. It finished, is it worth it?

Dead Friend Forever (Thai Sat iQIYI) 12 eps - finished, horror, supposed to be very philosophical, I think I'll give it a go.

Time the series (Tue Gaga/YT) 10 eps - dropped it at ep 4.

Next Week Looks Like This:

Starting Up

2/16 My Strawberry Film (Japan Gaga) - not quite sure how much BL this one is, because... Japan, but we shall see.

2/17 A Secretly Love (Thai WeTV) - Khonprot, a third-year head hazer of the engineering faculty, has a secret crush on Pluem, a tsundere fourth-year head hazer. Over the years, he's seen Pluem cycle through many girlfriends. Recently, after a public breakup, however, Khonprot thinks maybe a boy has a chance. Unless this is really good I probably won't I hate the WeTV interface...

Still Coming in Feb

2/24 Unknown (Taiwan Youku) 12 eps - Older brother tough guy criminal breadwinner looks after his sister and defacto adopted little brother. Little bother falls in love with him and is sent away after a stolen kiss. But when he comes back…

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

We gotta talk about LFLS this week. Look at Korea go!

Talking about a dead fish kiss, how meta! This will end up on one of my best of the year moments. I could not have been more gobsmacked.

Also something rarely directly addressed, particularly for same-sex firsts.

And then, a claiming trope, a personal favorite of mine.

Thank you Korea!

I just love them. (Pit Babe)

(Last week)

#pit babe the series #pit babe review #alanjeff #cooking crush #thai bl #love for love's sake #kbl #korean bl #Perfect Propose #Although I Love You and You #Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro ka #japanese bl #AntiReset #Taiwanese bl #cherry magic thailand

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fromalltononeandback · 6 months

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i think the saddest thing about Normal (i’m on ep 7 so like probably the saddest SO FAR FOR ME) is that like all things considered dude IS very normal. just a very regular teen with very regular and average teen problem, especially for— what are they 14?? so like freshmen???

like what is Sparrow going ON about???

like yeah it IS very hard to make GENUINE friends in highschool especially when you’re still trynna figure out all your OWN ish!! but normal was still trying!! so genuinely trying!!

and what the dudes smelly??? what fucking teen isn’t a smelly little weirdo??? fuck OFF MAN

and the mascot thing??? literally STFU!!! kids have their THING that makes them THEM that they LIKE!! PEOPLE in general have things they like it’s called having fucking INTERESTS

and like what kinda VALUES even IS that??? being “normal”??? normalcy is fucking subjective at BEST and downright fucking complacent at worst

besides that look at who and what Normal actually IS: KIND. he’s so kind, and that’s worth so much fucking more imo

#just HAD to rant this one out #cuz sparrows on some SHIT AND MY BOY IS SAD #stop making the squad sad #dungeons and daddies season 2 #dndads #dndads normal oak #normal oak

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gunterfan1992 · 8 months

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Episode Review: “The Star”/“Jerry”

(Fionna & Cake, Eps. 7–8)

Airdate: September 22, 2023

Story by: Anthony Burch, Adam Muto, Hanna K. Nyström, Jack Pendarvis, Kate Tsang

Storyboarded by: Iggy Craig, Graham Falk, Jacob Winkler, & Sonja von Marensdorff

Directed by: Ryann Shannon (supervising), Hans Tseng (art)

It is hard to believe that we are already privy to the penultimate episodes of the Fionna & Cake miniseries. So far, this series has been hit after hit. So do "The Star" and "Jerry" live up to what has come before them? Read on for more...

The plot to "The Star" is deceptively simple: Fionna, Cake, and Simon are transported into a universe where Simon was killed by vampires, which led to Marceline being abducted the ice crown-wielding Vampire King (once again played by the wonderfully sonorous Billy Brown) and turned into his protege, known as "The Star." While the world has been almost entirely overrun by vampires, a Mad Max-esque version of Princess Bubblegum is still putting up a hell of a fight (Mad Max Bubblegum is aided in this task by Peppermint Butler-as-a-Tank, a human[?] version of Huntress Wizard, and a non-psychopathic version of Martin). Cake's shapeshifting impresses Mad Max Bubblegum, and so she decides to enlist Fionna, Cake, and Simon's help in defeating the Vampire King and his evil 'daughter.' Alas, as goes the best-laid plans of mice and men... The episode ends on a purposeful anti-climax: Fionna, recognizing that all is effectively lost, forcibly teleports herself, Cake, and Simon away from Vampire World while Mad Max Bubblegum and The Star struggle in the sky, with neither wanting to land a killing blow. The fate of Vampire World is thus left unresolved.

As a major fan of Stakes, I was delighted to be transported back into the world of vampires in "The Star." And this time, the show does a very solid job showing just how powerful and scary these monsters actually are (despite their Kermit the Frog-meets-Nosferatu appearance). And let us not forget Evil Marceline (oh, where to start)! I quite like that Ooo's Marceline is a heroic anti-anti-Christ, but even I found the titular antagonist of "The Star" to be a terrifying delight. It has been a good long while since Marceline has rightly pranked someone, and while I don't know if killing people or sucking souls count as pranks, it was nonetheless wonderful to see her ornery side return—only this time, turned up to 11. You can tell that Olivia Olson had a lot of fun recording her lines for this episode; her performance is energetic, her tone mocking. When I heard The Star taunt Mad Max Bubblegum and Co., it took me back to when I first heard Olson's voice acting in "Evicted!"

It was a clever move having The Star and Mad Max Bubblegum be sworn enemies, as it allowed the series to explore their dynamic as a couple without focusing on their past or present relationship. In the Vampire World, we learn that the two have never been in a relationship together. But despite this, still found themselves pulled toward one another in an almost preternatural way. Who knows… Just as the souls of Finn and Jake seem to be destined to always find one another, perhaps Marceline and Bubblegum are "soul mates" in a similarly metaphysical sense? Regardless, the hesitancy to kill one another that both characters show at the end of the episode speaks volumes as to how they feel about one another, even in a universe where they are sworn enemies. (Man, I really hope we get a Bubbline spin-off one of these days…)

Ah, I feel like I could talk about the Star for days, but there is more to consider, so let me move on to…

Airdate: September 22, 2023

Story by: Anthony Burch, Adam Muto, Hanna K. Nyström, Jack Pendarvis, Kate Tsang

Storyboarded by: Hanna K. Nyström, Anna Syvertsson, Jim Campbell, & Jackie Files

Directed by: Steve Wolfhard (supervising), Hans Tseng (art)

"Jerry" begins with Fionna, Cake, and Simon finding themselves in a dead and desolate world—humorously dubbed "Crapworld" by Cake—that we later learn was created by the Lich's wish in the season five premiere "Finn the Human." (As a mythological aside, when the Lich made his initial wish, it seems that Prismo did not simply wipe out all life in the Oooniverse; instead, he effectively created a copy of the Oooniverse within the Oooniverse. After killing off all life in this bubble dimension, Prismo then transported the Lich to his new wish-altered reality. Really, it is turtles all the way down…) While searching for the Crapworld ice crown, Simon tries to cheer up an increasingly despondent Fionna by telling him the story of how he and Betty met.

Eventually, our heroes run into Crapworld BMO, who upon learning that Prismo's remote is out of juice, attempts to recharge it with his robot heart. This does not go as planned (it actually results in Crapworld BMO spectacularly exploding, which is somehow both horrifying and funny), and Simon, Fionna, and Cake decide to track down Crapworld BMO's oft-mentioned friend "Jerry" and tell him that BMO has passed. Upon finding Jerry, however, the trio discover that he is actually the Lich… albeit a depressed Lich; it seems that after fulfilling his mission of ending all life, the Lich lost a sense of purpose. (I've been there, dude...) Simon sees this as an opportunity, and using the Crapworld ice crown and the Lich himself as a conduits, he manages to summon GOLB just as Scarab materializes to deliver divine punishment.

To be continued!

"Jerry" is a decidedly bleak episode that more than anything radiates the creative sensibilities of its supervising director, Steve Wolfhard. For those out of loop, Wolfhard was a storyboard artist on the original Adventure Time series, and he helped write some of the show's strongest outings (e.g., "Puhoy," "Lemonhope," "Escape from the Citadel," "Graybles 1000+"). Wolfhard has a unique approach to writing, often using humor/cuteness to paste over more existential horrors, and while he did not storyboard "Jerry," the episode nevertheless feels like the apogee of his "voice," brimming as it does with a darkness that is only lightly covered with a veneer of humor. Indeed, many of the episode's funniest moments (e.g., the scene in which BMO cheerfully, stupidly kills itself, the reveal that the Lich has depression) cannot be described as anything other than gallows humor. Wolfhard often joked in interviews that many of the episodes he pitched involved main characters dying. With "Jerry," he finally got his chance.

Ultimately, what prevents "Jerry" from becoming a bummer-fest is the way the episode is interspersed with flashbacks that tell the story of how Simon and Betty fell in love. Despite their being the emotional heart of the episode, I do not have much to say about these scenes other than they are sweet. They largely expand upon details that we already knew, but in doing so, they enliven those details, infusing them with a sense of affect that exposition or background detailing could never convey. There's a couple easter eggs thrown in for die-hard fans (e.g., several relics from the main series are name-dropped, we see when a photograph of Simon from "I Remember You" was taken), and its all tied-up nicely with a new HALF SHY song, "Everything in You." All in all, these scenes are the sweet, sweet eye bleach we need, given the tone of the episode's other half.

My biggest gripe with these episodes is that they both lean too far into Fionna's failures while somehow not leaning in far enough. The former issue is most noticeable in "The Star," the beginning of which sees Fionna follow up her candy genocide by making a series of increasingly bone-headed decisions, one of which leads to the direct death of a character (although, Mad Max Bubblegum was also quite bone-headed for letting Random New Girl put everyone in danger immediately after introducing them to her few crew members). Put simply, I feel the episode excessively plays up Fionna as a gullible girlfail, which seems a bit much. Paradoxically, in "Jerry," the show did not have Fionna properly, fully, believably consider the ramifications of the mistakes she had made; instead, the episode focuses much of its emotional energy on the story of Simon and Betty's relationship. Yes, Fionna does have a realistic breakdown in the middle of the episode, but almost immediately, the show decides to have Simon distract her with more of his own love story. None of this sinks the episodes, but it does make them less than perfect.

For some, the episodes' bleakness might also be a defect: indeed in both "The Star" and "Jerry," lots of characters die, and the fridge horror is off the charts. But while I have criticized the show for such cruelty in the past (e.g., my review of "Wizard City"), the bleakness in these episodes is not meaningless. Instead, it arguably serves to underscore that without Simon Petrikov existing and doing all that he has in the Ooo Prime universe, the world (any world) quickly goes to hell. (This is perhaps most noticeable in "The Star," given that the big twist of that universe is that Simon was killed by vampires, presumably before he placed the ice crown on his head, thus resulting in Marceline's capture and indoctrination by the Vampire King.) Even in his crazed "Ice King" state, Simon is something like a cosmic lynchpin holding together reality! Considering how much Simon/the Ice King is a woobie in the original series, it is nice to see Fionna & Cake accentuate just how important he actually is.

Final “The Star” Grade: A-

Final “Jerry” Grade: A-

#adventure time #atimers #marceline #review #marceline the vampire queen #princess bubblegum #bubblegum #bubbline #fionna and cake #fionna campbell #cake the cat #simon petrikov #ice king #lich

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