Ellen Brock again with another amazing video! If there's one channel you should binge-watch every video, it's Ellen's! Her experience in the industry is invaluable. This is a great video for writing a page-turning story :)

Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girl found dead in a hidden room.

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even for period typical ableism it still drives me nuts for karen to go oh poor matt how can he deal and get around as if he hasn't been blind most of his life at this point and living on his own by himself as an adult for his entire adult life after college and has also lived in the city his whole life like girl use your damn brain he can get around by himself just fine. good god. like take five seconds to use your brain. literally adult man who lives by himself if nothing else that should tell you he is fine and when he needs assistance has the knowledge and ability to go get it you act as if he can't even walk on the sidewalk by himself. he literally shows up to work by himself. it drives me up the wall sometimes how she sees proof of him functioning fine independently literally witnesses it on the daily and still thinks these things. like again foggy isn't great either bc again the period typical ableism (and just general ableism in the world outside of this period as this is a common attitude of viewing disabled people as helpless and unable to function even if they are people who do live independently (and im not touching on people who do need extra support and caretaking in this context. as this post is about these characters in the context of a story. so im talking about what we see there instead of any truly meaningful nuanced way) but the writing here is like. Particularly this way due to the time) he has a modicum more of understanding that matt is literally a capable grown adult man. literally told karen matt is a big boy who can handle himself and then karen went b-b-but you forget he's blind as if foggy hasn't known him for years of his life and is his best friend like PLEASE SEE HIM AS AN ADULT. I AM GOING TO GO INSANE. PLEASE RESPECT HIM IF YOU LOVE HIM SO DEARLY. AND EVEN IF YOU DIDN'T. JUST RESPECT HIM AS A PERSON!!!!!!

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kazumaji fans where do we think they fall on this graph im conflicted

bc like. sometimes it's actually agonizing how blatant they are while still never being allowed to be together (i.e majima everywhere system. oh m.y fucking god dude) but sometimes it's more subtle though still Really Gay i.e. yakuza 3 and the fucking. movie. do we feel it's insulting or peak or smth else

my other controversial disco s1 opinion was that Georgiou (Captain) was below the belt level cruel to Michael before she died and it's very easy to see how her evil counterpart became Emperor.

many fics are also bad bc they don't recognize wwx is a beast

Once again thinking about Dora and Asha. Help me.

I mean, are they even in love with each other? Or are they just alone together? Did they only connect because they had no one else in their lives? Are they together just because it eases the pain of death? Did they simply find comfort in their mutual destruction?

Would they have even loved each other under different circumstances? Or would they find no connection at all?

Wait wait okay so Mineru's ability is she can seperate her soul from her body and put that soul in something else. I believe in game she calls it her spirit but soul is like the same thing. Also spirit sounds more 'mystical' and soul might have religious context to it? Whatever. The stones amplify the holders already present power, not giving them 'new' ones, meaning she already had some power relating to spirit magic.

Two questions.

One, what was the extent of her power BEFORE she got the stone? In the scene she describes it as the stone gave her the ability to take her soul out of her body, not like she always had the ability to do that.

Two, if she can do that, why couldn't she separate Ganon's spirit from his body as a way to stall for time or temporarily stop his rampage?

It still doesn't make sense to me that Rarau, the light guy, was able to put Ganon in a stasis when Sonia's thing was time. Thou with Ganon killing Sonia and stealing her stone that couldn't be done. But it felt like, a kinda crappy way to go about that. The whole scene felt, not planned well. It felt like a first draft they went with instead of really dissecting the possibilities and making a more compelling and imo, more 'logical makes sense' of a story. If Sonia wasn't used as a sacrificial lamb for the story, SHE could have used her time powers to stall+stasis Ganon. She could have used her time powers to stall the malice infecting Link's arm, slowing it but never fully able to stop it due to her weakened power from keeping a lock on Ganon all these years and giving us the same reason to get the orbs to purify Link's arm.

This could also serve as a mirror back to Zelda's plight from BotW, stalling the big bad (she wasn't using time powers but still) but her power waning, unable to fully end it, just slow it down. Fighting the same foe, failing, and stalling, relying on the hero to finish business.

However, I feel like part of the reason Rarau was chosen to stop Ganon and give Link his arm was that he's Zonai, he's new, and the developers wanted to push that rather than the ancient Hylians. After all they did give us *too much of the Zonai and also still not enough. Even thou Rarau ends up playing such a small part in Link's encounters and is like, never seen again after the tutorial area then once more at the very anti climatic ending for Zelda.

Incase you couldn't tell, I have NOT finished the game, I probably never will and I've only spent 45 hours on it then never picked it up. 5 of those hours was spent on the tutorial sky island (I messed up so badly my first time that I *had to start over). I have also not seen many ending scenes so maybe there was a legit reason Mineru couldn't trap Ganon's soul but with the crappy writing of this game, I wouldn't be surprised if it was some dumb reason.

I want to write an analysis on why the plot structure and character arcs of Hacks S2 failed to be interesting to me. But to do that, I will have to rewatch S2, in case I somehow like it more the second time.

I really don’t wanna.

ideal scenario is that i like thinking about this like, essential short story adventure where winston and tuk hook up w/a couple [that bachelorette party] members, and as a foursome/quartet because they have these parallel stories of two pairs of friends who are like "sure i'd have sex with you if things aligned for that" and now are living that short story about expanding a dynamic & becoming closer friends for the end of it (of course billions only wrote winston as standing next to tuk next episode, instead of rian as he's often written to be standing with incl in a previous finale, to shove him out of the path of getting material and let taylor have confusing nonresolution w/rian based on this proximity and coincidence instead. but who can't say that that, And winston next not even trying to sit with tmc in the last finale appearance which at this point is probably for the best and instead again hanging out with tuk and then ben, isn't about having been closer for whatever all happened there in obtaining casual sex together)

and they can have perpendicular stories of also just having some nice chats and enjoying other interactions together such that maybe it's just fun for this one night of crossing paths, maybe anyone stays in touch at all, who even knows, if winston or tuk are dating anyone it's probably only going to come up again in how they were last dumped for being too much effort for how unepic they are, so godspeed to offscreen unmentioned dating. but just friendly acquaintanceship, or again this one-time spontaneously crossed paths night's acquaintanceship, is also a lot of fun. and why not imagine that winston "he's not allowed to not feel self-loathing or, by doing basic things like talking or initiating Or oppositng anything, Not operating as though he's too low in a social hierarchy here to be allowed thusly" type of material where his spontaneity, vivacity to bon vivantocity, self-assurance that is apparently arrogance/aggression to every who thinks he ought to be self-effacing instead, etc, is actually just a social success in other less wretched non-work situations, and his personality is taken as a contribution to the proceedings even before anyone takes up his proffered contribution of himself as a potential sexual partner. and lending confidence to tuk as like one person who won't, at any given time, go into hostile mode with him or even like take up the position of issuing this criticism, which is an inherently elevated (over tuk) one when it's a unilateral thing. such that tuk's personality can be a potential contribution as well. and winston and tuk's Friendship Developing Moments can be happening then, too, b/c Maybe they've hung out outside work on their own aleady, but also maybe they've never really been interacting with a larger group outside work, such that that group is less likely to include some people, or entirely people, who will suddenly go sicko mode on either or both of them. and then meanwhile, who knows anything abt this bachelorette party, could be already a cohesive friend group who all see each other all the time, or people who see each other more infrequently meeting up on this trip, or a mix; could be fun and chill or something so scheduled/demanding it's kind of like a work trip, or fluctuate....and of course zero info abt the individuals such that imagining anything abt them is entire OC territory, and i'm bad at that, or at coming up with stories, so not exactly a lot of details here from me but godspeed if two of them unlock another tier of friendship here b/c like parallel to winston and tuk, they're like hmm okay so we're mutually down re: potentially having a foursome here, and spending some time away from the larger group

(or of course the scenario that tuk and winston can also have that moment but just as putting "and/or: a threesome?" as an option, and that tips the scales for someone who might've otherwise felt more indecisive like "hmmmm casual convenient hookup, or spending more time out & about like this / whatever other activity...." but then is like oho Well, if it's a threesome, i'll seize that opportunity, sure....such that then maybe afterwards [winston and tuk hanging out together] happens sooner, if the third member feels more third wheel about things lol, since now they'd be the only two who already know each other. like ooh who knows, round n+1 in the aftermath just one on one (and/or i mean, maybe another thing the third party's still around for, re: further casual sex opportunities that don't just fall into your lap every day), and/or talk, watch tron together, go back out on the town even. where the conclusion of this truly is the essence of "it Is easy to imagine that winston and tuk are real Genuine Friends for the implicit further offscreen time spent together outside work / interactions between them here. and fun" and with that flair of "and give that a juxtaposed parallel in it being the same for a couple bachelorette attendees, why not, good for them"

huge asshole fleetway sonic really did grow on me. like when i first started reading it was Distressing how constantly and casually cruel he is to amy and tails. hes just MEAN!!!! STOP!!! but by the end its like. all his friends Know hes a selfish rude asshole and they Do get tired of his shit and they Have formed their own support network for each other and they Did all grow into better, more self-actualized heroes without him.

so its no longer excessive to the point of hilarity, its more like. here’s this hero who is a huge jerk to the point that his friends will tell him to fuck off. and he has an extremely strong desire to be praised and everyone’s favorite, so this Does make him more reflective and frustrated. and even if he never really stops being a self-centered asshole, at least he is capable of regretting some things.

idk hes not a Nice sonic but he is a very interesting character. in that, he’s very entertaining bc his natural abrasiveness makes him a great conflict generator.

My biggest self-diagnosed shortcoming as a writer is not being better at dialogue 😔

Why do people think characters making emotion based decisions is "stupid" or "unrealistic" bruh why do you want the characters to be worse written? Why do you not want the plot to happen?

The pain and struggle of ~noticing important things~ about characters you don't really have any interest in, but are very relevant to the story as a whole :(