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untitled-tmnt-blog · 3 months

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Summary of Cartoon Base's Q&A with Ron Corcillo

(Feb 10, 2024)

This is VERY long, so putting it under the cut!

Apocalyptic Future

We don't know how Donnie and Raph died specifically, but it was in combat against the Krang.

The turtles were leaders of the resistance and obviously went through some serious trauma. We don't really know how that affected them emotionally. It might be interesting to do a series that explored that timeline at some point.

Leo was the best ninja fighter. Once Raph and Donnie were gone, he was also the leader of the resistance. He also had a special affinity for Casey. He may have felt particularly responsible for Casey once his mother was gone.

Mikey probably could have communicated with Raph/Donnie/Splinter in the same way they could communicate with Karai, even though we didn't get the chance to see it.

The turtles wouldn't have had time for having their own kids or starting families. They were too busy fighting the krang, and the world was too dangerous for raising children.

They couldn't work out everyone's timelines in the bad future, but presumably, Big Mama's assistant would have joined the resistance, because what else could you do? She would have to have adopted her brothers as allies.

Mikey is definitely less cheerful and more wise, but he still ultimately has faith in the goodness of people and the world. Some things, you just can't change.

The turtles are in their early 40's, but the war has taken a toll.

Characters

Splinter spent a lot of time in the Hidden City, so he knows about more mystic things than we realize. He's developed those skills (i.e. using Leo's odachi to make a portal on the first try), but they've been dormant for a while.

Donnie can temporarily create items with his powers like the ones we see in the movie, but to make a tangible item that would last, he's have to build it physically the way he would with any of his tech.

Leo probably had the hardest time accepting Draxum, since he is the most skeptical. Mikey is the one who accepts Draxum the most easily. But they did have episodes planned where Leo and Draxum work together, so Leo would have gotten over it as well.

They had never worked out a name for the second turtle sister (the first possibly being named after Frida Kahlo), but would have chosen another female artist to name her after. Maybe Camille, after Camille Claudel.

The planned sisters would be roughly the same age as the turtles, so also teenagers. The only existing designs are what we saw on screen. They had never settled on colors for them.

CJ and present Leo is kind of a weird dynamic, when you think about it. Casey still couldn't help but see Leo as a father figure, but it must be a little different when you're roughly the same age.

Leo keeps whatever he wants in the little bags he has attached to his belt. Snacks, candy, fidget toys, body spray - this is Leo, after all.

Splinter had never celebrated the turtles birthdays in the past, because he was so depressed about his own mutation. But going forward, now that he's come to grips with who he really is, he would start to celebrate that day.

A meeting between Cassandra and Casey Junior would be incredibly heartfelt. Break out the tissues.

They thought about bringing Piebald back in Man vs. Sewer, but it didn't work out. She's definitely still out there in the sewers, so there would be plenty of opportunity for the turtles to interact with her again.

Following the movie, the most serious repercussions would be to Raph mentally. He would still be carrying some of that krang mentality. He might even occasionally pick up on thoughts of the krang. It would almost be like he had some form of ptsd.

A lot of Draxum's softening only comes from after his horrible experience of having his life force sucked away by the dark armor. He may have never seen the error of his ways without an experience like that. So, if the boys had never been taken by Splinter, he probably would have gone through with his plan to make them into weapons.

Splinter would have understood that Casey Jr became a soldier because he had to, and wouldn't have a problem with that. He would view Casey Jr as a nephew or grandson. They're all used to thinking of people as family even if they're not exactly related.

As far as mystic abilities, Mikey is definitely the most powerful. Donnie and Raph both seem to have pretty strong powers too, maybe Donnie a little more so. Leo is the one who relies the least on mystic power and the most on his physical and mental skills.

Donnie definitely seems to embrace the mystic power at the end of season 2 and in the movie. Ultimately, he would find ways to combine it with his tech for supreme power-ups.

April is 18 and the turtles are 16-18. Casey Jr is around late teens or 20.

Rise Lore

Given that the first krang that came to earth crashed into the Crying Titan, there must have been some form of historic yokai/hidden city even before the empyrean was around to introduce mystic powers. After all, someone must have built the Crying Titan. Maybe it was built by some other race that actually predates the yokai, and the yokai evolved from that race, affected by the emperyan.

There are definitely still krang out there, and most of the ones that we encounter are evil. The possibility of a good Krang could exist, though.

Before the humans, the yokai roamed freely both on the surface of the Earth and underground. They were probably a lot happier then, and somewhat more numerous. Oppression by the humans must have taken a toll on them.

There were a lot of Hamato and only so many powers you could have, so there would have been a lot of overlap in ninpo abilities across all the ancestors.

The Prison Dimension and Dimension X are two different dimensions. Dimension X is where the krang are originally from, and the Prison Dimension was just used to get rid of villains. Both exist in the Rise universe.

If there was more Rise

There weren't any specific plans for Kendra, but she certainly could have been interesting as a frenemy.

They would definitely want to get into Casey's whole history with the TMNT, his mom, etc.

They would have wanted to develop April and Sunita's friendship a lot more, and see how both of them related to Cassandra Jones.

They'd make as many seasons as they'd be allowed to! But seriously, they could easily fill at least 3 more seasons. There's a lot to unlock with the Krang, and they'd also want to expore much more with Big Mama and the Hidden City.

Cassandra might not have been part of the main group, but she would have been a regular ally.

Cassandra and the turtles would have been allies, fighting the Krang. It's clear from the end of the movie that Cassandra is now roaming around and fighting krang, so she and the turtles could connect occasionally as a running storyline.

A new season would pick up from where the movie left off, so it would be a new plan instead of what was already made.

Bishop would have to be an ally, considering that the turtles had just saved the Earth. But he might be a grudging ally, one who didn't really trust the turtles or didn't like the fact that they don't play by the rules.

It would definitely be easier to do crossovers with the other 2D animated series, like the 87 series or the 2003 series. They could have some fun playing with both the writing and animation style of those shows. Combining 2D and CG animation is more difficult.

They probably would not have mutated April, as it would be a big step. In the scrapped episode where Dale turned into a wolf mutant, it was a result of a temporary mystic curse. They could certainly do something like that with April.

The turtles would still be able to comminicate with Karai through mystic means.

They would have gotten a lot more into the history of the Council of Heads in future seasons when they explored the relationship between the Hidden City and the Krang. They are clearly among the most ancient of yokai, possibly predating the Hidden City itself.

They could have done a temporary reverse mutation via some sort of mystic spell, to give the turtles human designs. It might have been fun since it seems to be something that fans enjoy so much.

They would have had the turtles go to the krang's dimension at some point in order to defeat the krang fully. They could have encountered any of the traditional dimension x/z stuff that way.

The storyline where the boys find their sisters would probably still happen. People would want to see it, even though it's been spoiled.

They had plans to eventually visit other Hidden Cities, such as one beneath Tokyo.

Cut Episodes/Scenes

In the original ending of the movie where Casey says goodbye and leaves, he was going to find his mom.

One of the scrapped episodes had to do with Mikey taking care of the other turtles when they were transformed into toddlers. He was a natural caretaker.

They never planned on a space arc, but they probably would have done one where they travel to the Krang dimension. They also were going to travel to the prison dimension to release Karai, and they could have had other adventures there as well.

Behind the Scenes

For the episode Pizza Puffs, Ben Schwartz did his part for feverish Leo without looking at the script so he would sound confused.

It would be great if Nickelodeon released some of the finished animatics for the lost season 2 episodes that were already boarded, but unfortunately, it's all copywrited material.

All animated movies go through multiple revisions, rewrites, and changes, which is why some of the original rise movie storyboards were scrapped.

They do remote recording all the time, especially since covid.

The amount that a writer incorporates into a fight scene varies from script to script. Sometimes, there are moments in a fight scene that are key to the story. If so, they are written out. Otherwise, they would sometimes write out a fight scene but know that it would change in the board. Sometimes, they'd just shorthand it.

The writers try not to indulge in too much fanfic because there could be copyright issues if it is similar to anything they would ever do in the show.

When writing the brothers, it was important to keep them in character. You have to know exactly who your characters are, all the time, in every way. The audience will forgive you if you do things that aren't exactly logical, but they won't forgive you if you sell out your characters.

There was never an overall map done of the lairs, just individual rooms. It was always kind of tricky for them to figure out exactly how to move the characters from one room to the other.

The krang invasion was specific to the movie, so we probably wouldn't have seen it in the series at all if it had not been cut short.

Other TMNT Characters

They weren't necessarily planning to add characters from other versions yet. They still had so many areas to explore that were specific to Rise, like the Hidden City, the yokai, and the history of the krang.

There were no particular plans for Honeycutt. One character that they wanted to use but never did was Monty Moose, and they were trying very hard to figure out a way to incorporate him into a story.

They didn't have any plans for Renet, but a character like her could easily fit into the Rise universe. Obviously time travel is a big part of the movie. They could use her to explore timelines that might have happened had the events of the movie turned out differently.

They didn't get a chance to explore triceratons, so there could certainly still be some out there.

Any similarities between Big Mama's assistant and the High Mage from TMNT 2003 are coincidental. They gave her the cape and hood to disguise her identity.

They didn't have any plans for Beebop and Rocksteady, since they don't really fit in with the Rise version of Shredder and the Foot Clan.

The turtles certainly could meet Yuichi Usagi.

Usagi Yojimbo crossovers are always fun. Ron could see one where his dimension has been overrun by the krang, and he comes to our dimension to seek the turtles' help because they're the only ones who have ever defeated the krang.

Ron-Specific Questions

Ron's personal favorite episodes are "Hot Soup: The Game" and "Sparring Partner."

They were super excited when they got John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten) as Meat Sweats, just because Ron and Russ are big pink rock fans.

When asked about favorite duos, Ron likes Raph & Mikey, Donnie & April, and Leo & Senor Hueso.

If he could only save one episode from Rise and the rest became lost media, Ron would save the four-part finale.

If he could save one cut episode or plotline, Ron would want to save the more complete version of the end of season 2, where we would have seen much more of the turtles training and bonding with Karai.

Ron was not part of the new Saturday Morning Adventures comic that has Rise Raph on the cover.

If he could make a spin-off, Ron would want to do a series where Cassandra roams the Earth fighting remnants of the krang, joined by her son Casey, and occasionally joined by individual turtles and others. Draxum might join forces with her as well.

Miscellaneous

The silhouette in a tank shown at the end of Bug Busters was meant to illustrate Lou Jitsu when he is first hit with the ooze and mutated along with the turtles. It's more of a memory than an exact replication.

The reason Raph was transformed via the pod instead of instantanously may have been because Raph was unwilling, and was more difficult to change than someone like the Foot Clan ninjas, who underwent their transformation willingly.

They never attempted to get a brand deal with a soup company so fans could get Rise hot soup, but it would be a good idea.

The photo from the movie was taken just before the krang arrived.

When asked which Rise character is most likely to be Spider-Man: none of them, because he's owned by Marvel and Sony.

When asked why Donnie likes cute bratty girls: Ron is not sure where that comes from.

In Dungeons and Dragons, Raph would be a fighter class, Mikey would be some sort of illusionist, Leo would be a clever assassin or theif. Donnie would insist on being a scientist because he's sure there would have been at least one sensible person back then. April would be the DM.

Ron doesn't know what the illegible skate ramp graffiti means, but can ask one of the designers about it.

In a coffee shop, Mikey would be the baker, Donnie would create the most efficient coffee brewing system ever, Raph and April would run the business side, and Leo would be the most demanding customer ever.

The Future of Rise

The demand for Rise merch is real. It would be nice if Nickelodeon would put out more official merch.

There are no current plans for a season 3, but we can keep trying!

All we can really do to try and get Rise back is continue to share the show and encourage other people to watch. As well as keep it trending whenever we can. Sooner or later, someone will realize that there's a very real demand for this show.

He has talked about the potential for continuing the show in a comic book or short format, or in some other formats as well.

When asked if there's any chance of Netflix picking up Rise, or for both Tales of the TMNT and Rise to coexist -- anything's possible!

Ron would love to see a Rise comic series, but it's not his call. As far as if it would be darker, Ron thinks it's important that for Rise, they keep things light-hearted and comedic. That was always the goal of the show.

Shows rarely get "cancelled" in kids animation. It can always be brought back, but the focus is on Tales of the TMNT for now. He's said before that Rise could be brought back down the road as a "retro" series, or in other formats like a comic book, movie, or shorts.

... plus one answer, that does not have the original question attached:

"She would be stunned, and probably disbelieving at first. But we would find a way (through mystic means) for her to see her future timeline, at which point she would be overcome with emotion."

#rottmnt #rise of the tmnt #ron corcillo #cartoon base #Q&A #my post #tmnt #Q&A summary

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ayabeanworks · 5 months

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Title: No Repeats

Synopsis: Suguru & Satoru are sent to an alternate timeline around 10 years into the future, where their older counterparts tell them the story of you, on the anniversary of your death.

Character: SaShiSu x reader

Series: Let's Meet in the Spring (SaShiSu x reader)

Notes: Mentions of death & suicide, some angst, some fluff, some pining, bittersweet. Alternate timelines AU. AU where Geto doesn't defect.

Somewhat of a sequel to this AU.

"Suguru, we're in Tokyo, right?" Satoru questioned, tilting his head slightly as he peered his surroundings. He thought he was tripping, but he really had to blurt it out since things were different. It sounded like a stupid question, but it really wasn't.

A brief pause from Suguru confirmed Satoru's own thoughts - it was strange, it was Tokyo, yet it wasn't the Tokyo they knew.

"Everything seems newer, there are more people, and it seems...more developed?" Satoru paused for a moment, feeling remnants of his own cursed energy loitering around. "It's my own cursed energy but I don't remember doing anything down here."

Suguru had his own thoughts about this, and it was quite similar to Satoru's. It was strange - what had happened? They were on a mission together and somehow they ended up in Shibuya?

Was this an illusion by a curse?

No, this is too real to be an illusion, Satoru locked eyes with Suguru, who held the same thoughts.

"I can't feel the curse we were fighting before," Suguru took another look around, just seeing the people pass them by.

With a frown, Satoru shrugged and started walking towards Jujutsu High, "Let's just go see the school. If anything's changed, that place would have too."

Suguru placed his hands in his pockets as he followed Satoru, wondering why everything still felt out of place even though he knew it to be the Shibuya he often frequented.

Something was odd, and he didn't like it.

When the teens arrived at the steps inside Tengen's barrier leading to the school, they were stopped by 2 taller individuals, both of whom they recognised with their cursed energy.

After all, they had the very same cursed energy in their own bodies.

"Suguru, is this what I looked like back in high school?" A taller man with a bed of white hair and a black blindfold pointed at Satoru, eyes switching between teen Suguru and older Suguru. Their younger counterparts had expressions of surprise, not even sure such a phenomena could happen. In what type of world would they be able to talk and converse with themselves but at different ages?

"Satoru," Geto sighed, "Pointing is rude."

"Hey, we can hear you, you know!" Satoru made a face, an irritated expression at the older version of himself.

He knew it immediately before he could even see the two who stood in front of them - they were him and Suguru, but older than they were now, possibly by 10 years?

But why were there 2 of each of them? Did he and Suguru skip timelines or something?

Because there can't be 2 six eyes users in the world at the same time, and Satoru was sure his eyes weren't working as they should have. The reason being, he could only feel the cursed energy of the older two, he couldn't see it like he normally could. It was even harder to see out of the pitch black glasses he normally wore, so he just placed them on his head since his eyes weren't working as they should.

Gojo laughed, grinning at the two youngsters in front of him. It really did remind him of his youth, and everything that happened 7-9 years ago.

They weren't exactly 100% pleasant memories, but they were precious to him in many ways.

"How's Shoko?" He placed a hand on his hip, probing him for information. If the teen him and Geto were here right now, most likely it was the doing of a curse. But he wanted to know around what time it was from their original timeline that they came here.

Geto gave Gojo a look, but knew exactly what he was doing nonetheless, chipping in himself, "And [name], how are they?"

Satoru and Suguru exchanged glances, raising a brow each. They knew they could trust their future selves so they were pliant with giving any information.

"Shoko is fine, she's in the morgue taking care of [name]. [Name] recently exhausted their cursed energy." said Satoru, lightly sighing, remembering the last time they were there to see them.

"[Name] exhausting their cursed energy?" Gojo turned to Geto, "Isn't this when they were on a mission with you?"

Geto only smiled, but it wasn't an incredibly happy smile, it was a strained one from remembering that time. "Yeah...[name] will be fine, don't worry." He turned to his younger self, "Make sure you tell them you're happy to see them healthy and happy."

Suguru's eyes widened at his older version's words, wondering what type of message he wanted to deliver. He sounded sad, like they were words he himself wanted to convey to [name]. But why?

"Why don't you just tell them that now?" Suguru, being as sharp as he was, questioned directly. He had an inkling of a feeling there was bad news to be said.

Geto exhaled, shaking his head. He met Gojo's eyes, silently wondering if he should tell them. Gojo nodded in silent agreement. Even if they were from another timeline, he didn't wish for them to experience what they did. It would be wrong to put them through such a time when they themselves knew the pain they'd gone through.

"Why aren't you answering?" Satoru pressed, leaning forward and taking another step up on the stairs.

"Today is the anniversary of their death."

"What the fuck happened for them to die?"

Gojo and Geto watched their younger selves as they stared at the grave in which [name] was in. It was a makeshift one on the outskirts of Jujutsu High, away from the prying eyes of others. There was a stick in the middle of a mound to indicate it was a grave.

"It's an empty grave." Geto took a step forward to lay down some flowers. "Their body went missing after their death, then some stuff happened and an imposter took over their body and became a curse user with their abilities."

"What the fuck?" Satoru couldn't believe their words. More like, he didn't want to believe their words. There was no way you would die, you were healthy, happy and doing what you did best back in their original timeline!

But here we have someone - their older versions, to be exact - saying the opposite. If it was true, what conspired to make that happen? Isn't that just speculation?

"How and why did [name] die?" Suguru grabbed Satoru on the shoulder to tell him to calm down, but he also wanted answers on whatever the hell was going on. If what they were saying was true, then something similar was going to happen if they didn't get to the root cause.

Geto studied Suguru's face. Seeing the young version of him was entertaining to say the least; the emotions, feelings and turbulent thoughts under those calm eyes and facade made him want to reminiscent the past.

"They killed an elder and became a curse user," He started. He could see Suguru's expression break for a moment, but he prompted his older self to continue, "They killed several elders, all pre-planned and on separate occasions, before they went on to massacre more of them during an important meeting here. They managed to do so or fatally injured them, before committing suicide."

Hearing the details from Geto, Gojo could only press his lips together and push his hands into his pockets, remembering the feel of your body dying in his arms. The warmth from your body disappearing at an alarming rate, the scent of your blood, your touch on his skin, your tears and even the last smile you gave them. All those sensations and feelings were seared into his brain whether or not he wanted them to, and on occasion it would give him nightmares. It left a deep ache in his heart, but he would cover it with laughter, frivolity and work.

However, Gojo didn't want to forget anything about you - so he experienced everything his mind and body conjured up, and went with it.

Geto gave their younger versions the super short version of what happened, but he wanted to gauge the reactions of their younger versions before continuining.

Satoru and Suguru's mouths were dry, as if they were parched. It was unbelievable what their older versions had said, and it was even more unbelievable since it was you. Yes, you had trouble with the elders, but they didn't think you were the type of person to do something drastic. There was a root cause to this!

"You're not telling the full story." This time, it was Satoru who spoke up. For this kind of information drop, he was normally more hot headed and reacted like so, but since all of it was hyperthetical and might possibly not happen, he wanted to get to the bottom of it and had questions.

Even if it was hyperthetical.

To Satoru, he knew you, and he knew you to be someone who didn't and wouldn't do such a thing. But if someone else was telling him, much less his older version, that it was something that could happen, that set off alarm bells in his head.

Gojo let his lips curl up into a small smile. He was well aware of how he himself thought, and hearing his younger self want to know more, was a step forward in the direction he would rather they be in.

It was still him, after all.

Geto smiled, but there was no happiness or positive emotion behind it. It was merely affirming Satoru's suspicions.

"I'm not." Geto turned to your grave, "[name] made the first move. The elder they're butting heads with now, [name] will eventually kill him. They got sick of him and his corrupted ways, and didn't want it to happen to other sorcerers. [name] was at their breaking point."

"After they killed the elder, [name] went into hiding. We saw them before that, and the next time we saw [name], they were dying in our arms." Gojo's voice was uncharacteristically soft.

Reminiscing about an old friend now scorned by the world wasn't a good feeling, precisely because he knew how good of a person [name] was inside, just that they made the wrong choices. Or more precisely, the most unlawful choice by society's standards.

To be honest, Gojo did not care whether it was unlawful or not, he was just devastated to have lost you.

Even if your opinions were different, it was still something that could have been talked about and communicated through with them. After all, all of your goals were the same: reformation of the Jujutsu society. But could a different opinion really be called wrong when it follows one's convictions for a revamped reality?

"Did you have to fight [name]?" The question was at the tip of Suguru's tongue since Geto mentioned it. How could [name] die in their arms unless they were close enough? They took their own life after all.

And the [name] they knew now, was only going to begin to understand how their cursed energy worked, after getting it unblocked through a dangerous mission.

"We did," Geto shook his head even though his words confirmed his question. "But [name] didn't want to fight us. So when we caught up with them after the massacre, they tried to not engage with us in battle."

"[name] was strong. But they couldn't - no, wouldn't - fight us. It might have been because we were the strongest and it would be difficult to win, but I'd like to think it was because we shared a strong bond."

Gojo wondered if his younger self would cry if he saw the letter [name] had left for him before they decided to become a curse user. Would he cry his eyes out? Or would he rip it up and decide it was bullshit?

After all, Gojo knew when he was a teenager, [name] was more precious to him than he realised, and he would be in denial about their little soft spot for them. It was probably the same as it was now for the teen in front of him. The only difference being that the younger Gojo had you alive in their timeline, whereas for his own, you were a distant memory.

"And that's why they killed themselves?" Suguru breathed out, his voice almost in a whisper. He was trying to solve the complex problem that was you - it was the last thing he would think of you doing, and he wondered if there were already telltale signs in your behaviour back home.

Geto hummed in confirmation. "[name]'s body went missing during the cremation process, and wasn't found until years later. But by that time, an imposter had taken over their body, and they were treated as more of a cursed user than before."

Gojo's hands clenched in his pockets, remembering the anger he felt when he realised it was an imposter in [name]'s body. He was absolutely furious someone or something had the audacity to do such a thing to you.

How dare they use your body, your voice, your expressions, your memories to try and trick them? That was not the [name] he knew, and God forbid him from destroying the entity using your identity.

"This time, they died by our hands, and their body was retrieved and cremated." Geto spoke those words sadly, his own body remembering your second death; but since it wasn't you, it was more of laying you to rest, to finally be at peace.

He could not mention that it was an uphill battle because they just couldn't find it in themselves to kill you since it was still your body. To have you die in their arms again and experience your second death was too much. They didn't want to have to experience killing you, because they understood how you didn't want them to kill you and that's the reason why you did it yourself. But the pain of having experienced you killing yourself and then also having to kill you whether an imposter was in your body or not, was enough to have them waking up in a cold sweat at night.

Satoru and Suguru could feel their older selves and how much they cherished you. It could be said they themselves also felt that, but it was different, since the two older versions of them had experienced much more and they knew the depth of their feelings towards their dead best friend.

Suguru let out an exhale, his mind going crazy at the information given to him. It might be a figment of their imagination from a curse, but there may be some truth to it.

"You don't believe me?" Geto could only laugh lightly at the expressions on their younger selves. He knew it sounded impossible, but for him, it was the truth. For them, it may seem like a distant future, or even a sad, made up story.

"Why don't we show them the letter they left for us and Shoko?" Gojo gave a nonchalant shrug.

"Letter?" The two younger males echoed.

"The ones [name] left before they became a cursed user." Geto and Gojo had a mutual agreement,and set off to find the letters, with their younger versions in tow.

Once they got the letters, Gojo and Geto left them in the teacher's staffroom and stood outside, giving them some privacy. They'd need it.

It was a couple of minutes later that they came back in, only to be met with the expected expressions from the teens.

"So? How was it?" Gojo cooed teasingly, plucking the letter out of Satoru's hands. The expression on his younger self was something he saw rarely, and only in events which affected him on a more personal level. Even now, he was like that.

Satoru lips were pressed into a thin line, his teeth clenching together to try and prevent any form of tears. Gojo could see, his eyes were glossy behind the blackout sunglasses he wore, which were coincidentally covering his eyes instead of sitting on top of his head.

I knew it, thought Gojo. If he was so emotional as an adult after reading the letter (even though he hid it), there was no way his younger self wouldn't be.

If he had to guess, his younger self would be rethinking everything that happened, and trying to figure out whatever the hell was going on to cause what happened in the current timeline following the older versions.

Gojo glanced at Suguru, who had placed his elbows on his thighs, leaning forward to cover his eyes with his hand. Geto didn't make any effort to take the letter away, knowing full well how his younger self would feel.

Since Suguru was in denial with his budding feelings, it was going to make him rethink many things, and it would be painful. Geto himself had already come to terms with it, but at the same time he held a hope, no matter how small it may be, on meeting you again no matter where, to convey the words he's always wanted to say.

"It's [name]'s handwriting, right? If you think it's a joke, it really isn't." Gojo spoke in a lighthearted tone, trying to make the atmosphere lighter, but to no avail. It was still heavy, and their younger versions sat on their chairs, silent as they digested the information.

His eyes took a look at the photo by his rarely used desk, one which had a photo of the four of them - Gojo, Geto, Shoko and you. It was the same one as the one in the safe, and he had copies made of it to make sure he wouldn't forget you, ever.

He ignored the sting in his heart every single time he looked at the photo until it numbed him. There were many things he wanted to say when he saw you, but he'll cross that bridge once he's on it. There just isn't any plan at all, and he'd much prefer it that way.

A bittersweet smile curled his lips slightly when he turned his attention back to his younger self. He had a slight frown on his lips as he looked at anything but their older versions.

"Suguru, a word of advice. If you have anything you want to say, just say it. Especially to [name]." Geto placed a larger hand on top of his younger self's head, ruffling it slightly in an affectionate manner.

Suguru let out a half cry half hum, not wanting to talk in case his voice betrayed him further. He was glad he wasn't bawling his eyes out now that he's realised his true feeligs.

Gojo, on the other hand, flicked his younger self's forehead, "They say sorcerers don't die without regrets. Spoil them as much as you want. This one next to you, too." He cheekily pointed to Suguru.

Satoru made a funny sound, something between a grunt and a hum of agreement. His eyes were yet again elsewhere, but landed on Suguru to see the state he was in.

Satisfied by his answer, Gojo clapped his hands together, "Now, shall we exterminate that curse that's caused you to come to the future, or an alternate timeline?"

Geto sighed at his best friend's antics, "You mean exorcise, Satoru."

"And that's done!" Gojo had one-handedly just killed off the curse guarding the door back to Satoru and Suguru's original timeline. "After you go through here, you'll be back to your own realities."

"Remember, everything you heard here is just a possibility that can happen. We told you this to make sure you two get a happier ending." Geto placed a hand on each of their younger selve's shoulders, giving them a couple of light taps before pushing them gently towards the door.

"What is this, Doraemon?" Satoru muttered, staring at the door.

Suguru, on the other hand, turned to his older self and Satoru's older self, giving them a slight bow, "Thank you for letting us know."

"You were such a nice boy back then, Suguru!" Gojo gasped in faux shock, giving Suguru a thumbs up.

Geto rolled his eyes at Gojo's poor attempt to ellicit a reaction out of him, ignoring him instead to give his younger self a grin.

Satoru and Suguru left through the door, waving at their older selves, prompted by an excited older Gojo and calmer Geto, as they said goodbye and left the timeline to return to their original one.

"No injuries, no head trauma or anything?" Shoko questioned, checking up on her classmates. She was currently still in the morgue, same place as always, making sure [name] was alright as they came in for a check up after a mission.

Suguru and Satoru had to pinch each other's cheeks to make sure they weren't dreaming, and they really were back in their own timeline.

Satoru was even more sure it was the correct one since his six eyes were working again.

"Don't think so." Satoru responded, leaning over your face as he examined your features. They were calmer now that you'd had some time to heal, and from Shoko's excellent RCT and healing techniques.

"Nothing for me either." Suguru followed. He placed a hand on your forehead gently, feeling your temperature and hoping you weren't running a fever. You didn't look like you were, but he had to make sure.

After hearing those words from his older version in another timeline, his words struck a chord in his heart. Reading the letter solidified that, and it really brought Suguru back to a reality that something horrible could happen in the not-so-distant future.

"Wake up soon, [name]," murmured Suguru, tapping your nose.

He probably wouldn't know what he'd do or what he'd think if he lost you. It was something he didn't have in his mind until the recent timeline-skip, one that made him well aware of what he could've done to help you, and by extension, himself and others he deemed close or best friends.

"They'll be fine." Shoko raised a brow at the new point of affection, "They've gotten through the toughest stages, so they'll wake up soon."

Suguru turned to Satoru, who already had a grin on his face from the news, celebrating it with a cute little dance to express his happiness.

He stopped after a moment, going back to his usual self as he sat down on another table, crossing his legs and leaning back. "Shoko, you probably won't believe us if we told you that we met our older selves when the curse pushed us into an alternate reality or timeline." He leaned on one arm, waiting for her to give a retort at how fake it sounds, but to his surprise, all Shoko did was let out a long hum.

"Really?" She took the lollipop out between her lips and pointed it to both him and Suguru, "So, what were you two doing however many years from now?"

Shoko didn't really care whether or not it was real. It was something done by a curse, so there's no telling whether it was fake or if it was indeed real. But from Satoru's tone and Suguru's expression that followed, it didn't seem like it was fake. And, she knew the boys wouldn't lie about something that serious. If they did, their demeanour would've already been broken.

Either that, or they believed it since it was so real even though it was fake. Shoko didn't quite know which one it was, so she entertained the idea.

"We were teachers here." Gojo and Geto spoke simultaneously, "And you were a doctor here, too. But we didn't see you, they just spoke about you."

"Oh?" It was no surprise, since that was what she aimed to go for after she finished high school. "By 'they', you mean your teacher versions?"

"Yeah."

"So, what about your older versions did you want to tell me?"

The two males exchanged glances at each other, then looked at [name], then Shoko.

The hesitant looks they gave each other made Shoko wonder what happened over in the alternate timeline they've jumped to (provided it was true) and why they were like this.

"Spit it out."

"[name] was dead in that timeline." Satoru's fist clenched until his knuckles were white. He could remember his own older version's face, Suguru and his older version's as well, and his own from the information given in the alternate timeline.

He didn't like it one bit.

"[name]? Dead?" Shoko's spoke with mild surprise, not really believing his words. She still entertained him, though.

"Yeah. We thought it was fake too, Shoko, but they gave us all the evidence needed, and what happened in that world." Suguru spoke this time, his voice gentle and soft.

This time it was up to Shoko to narrow her eyes, suspicious. "Ok, so tell me what happened and why [name] is dead in that timeline."

It was a while until Suguru and Satoru filled her in on the details. They gave her longer answers than usual since they needed to set the scene, as well as tell them more about the context surrounding a world in the future.

"What the fuck." Shoko couldn't hold her shock at the turn of events. She didn't think you had it in you to do all that, especially if it was a possibility going into the future.

"I know right." Satoru sighed, laying on his back. "And whatever they've said about this time, we already know."

"It could be a curse messing with our memories." Geto pointed out an obvious possible fault in everything they've said, but Gojo shook his head.

"If it was fake, then why did my six eyes not work? The other me had his working just fine." Satoru mumbled, a bit annoyed yet slightly intrigued that his own powerful technique got overwritten in another world, much less by the same person as himself albeit older.

"You make a good point..." Shoko hummed, crossing her legs. "So then, if this was all true, and you read [name]'s letters to you, did it have any pointers in there?"

Geto nodded, "Apparently I was the one who figured out something was going on. But I don't know what. It didn't say."

Gojo added, "There was nothing on mine. Just them professing their love for me." He tried to break the ice a little since the atmosphere had become too heavy, but the comment made Geto slap him on the shoulder.

"[name] professed their love to everyone here, so you're not special." Geto rolled his eyes, a childish side of his coming out.

Gojo whined, sitting up and staring at your face with his arms crossed. "Well if they like us so much they should express it."

"They already do that. Don't tell me, you've fallen for them?" Shoko couldn't hide her smugness about the matter, wanting to tease him further. He was irritating, but sometimes it was easy to get a read on him.

Gojo shook his head, vehemently denying it with his whole being, similar to how a wet dog or cat would shake all the water off them when wet.

I didn't mean it in a serious way...Shoko took a look at Geto, who stared straight back, his thoughts written all over his face.

"Ok, ok, how about you're just very fond of them?" Shoko wanted to laugh at how Gojo acted, but the laughter died slowly in her throat as she realised she was also in the same boat as Gojo.

Shit, I need a cigarette. Or alcohol. Shoko couldn't do this sober.

Geto, realising everything going on, let out a genuine laugh, the first one of the evening. He knew his best friends like the back of his hand, and he knew their thoughts at this very moment, or at least a majority of it.

"Since we don't want the future we saw, let's do what we can." Geto took a step forward, resisting the urge to bump his forehead against yours. Instead, he opted for another boop on your nose.

"Yeah, I don't want to have to visit their grave on their death anniversary ever again." Gojo muttered somewhat spitefully.

He recalled the sad smile his older self had when he watched Suguru's older self place the flowers onto the makeshift grave. Heck, since you were treated as a curse user in that timeline, you didn't get a proper grave and instead was treated like shit after you died.

Like hell that is going to happen here, Satoru hoped his words and actions later down the track could help, but he was unsure how much he could.

Should I just get rid of the elders? Or should I convince [name] education is the way to go? His mind went through many possibilities in less than a second, and he was brought back to reality by Shoko sighing and agreeing all the same.

"I wasn't there, but I don't want to see [name] die so tragically. Nor do I want to see you two fight them." She threw her finished lollipop into the bin and stood up, "Gonna go for a smoke."

And she left.

Geto and Gojo sat in silence for what seemed like a long time, but was in reality just 2 minutes, before Geto started up conversation.

"It seemed like there was a lot [name] didn't tell us." He sounded lost and regretful.

"Makes me wonder if they trusted us at all." Gojo mumbled. "Or did they already say it, but no one listened?" He didn't mean any of the words in a spiteful nor mean way, it was more of an observation from what had already happened in an alternate timeline.

Geto paused for a moment, turning to Gojo as if he was a genius, "You're right. It took them a long time to hit breaking point, didn't it?" He remembered their older versions and the extra information they gave them. "Don't you think it was that elder who started everything?"

Gojo thought for a moment, "You mean he already started it."

"You're right. It's already starting to happen. [name] complains to me about the elder after they have a fight." A pause, "Do you remember when they said [name] killed him?"

"...3rd year. 3 days after a short holiday." Gojo recalled his older version's words.

"Ok, that makes probably around a year and three quarters left." Geto breathed out, "We have time." There was hope in his voice, and he was ready to do whatever it took to make sure you stayed with them.

Satoru grinned, standing up. "Yeah. We have time."

He turned to face your unconscious state, "Listen here [name]. There's no way we're leaving you behind. We've got lots to talk about, so you better be ready. We're not letting you go that easily." It almost sounded like a threat, but the way Gojo smiled genuinely through the whole one-sided interaction spoke volumes. He was serious about it, and it was almost like a promise he made with Suguru as a witness.

There were many things Gojo wanted to say, but he had no idea how to say it in the most Gojo way possible, otherwise that's just not him. But that'll be a problem for another day.

Suguru laughed at his best friend's antics, but agreed nonetheless. "Let's not hide anything, alright?" His words were softer, but it was also a promise to himself that he, too, needed to be more upfront with his thoughts and feelings.

"Make sure to tell us everything, ok?" Shoko gave your forehead a couple of taps, having come back from her smoke break quickly. She had stood by the door to listen just as Geto and Gojo had started talking about when [name] killed the elder in the alternate timeline, to see where they can go from there and how much time they had left until disaster struck.

"Shoko, that was fast." Geto and Gojo spoke in unison, watching her plop down back onto her seat.

"Had to make sure I came back down before [name] wakes up from how loud you guys are being." She teased.

"Oi!"

The three stayed like that and chattered away, filling the room with their joyous voices as they moved onto happier topics. Sometimes, it would veer into topics on how to make sure you stayed with them, but others, would be hopes for the future and what it will bring, should they change the trajectory in comparison to the alternate one.

There were many things for them to change, but the main thing was that they were never going to let you become their regret. Not in this timeline, never.

A/N: This one is somewhat of a sequel of this fic, and initially there wasn't going to be any, but I wanted to expand on some extra information about what reader/[name] has done, and what better way to do it but in an AU where another timeline comes into the original?

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reviewsthatburn · 7 months

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THE WITCH KING by Martha Wells is excellent and I had a great time reading it. The worldbuilding is nuanced and well-developed, with factions and history in a way that implies much more going on, but not getting bogged down in little details that don’t matter to this particular story. It deals with colonization and empire from the perspective of a quasi-immortal character (Kai) who has not been around forever, but has been around long enough that things which are part of his culture and history are now details that would fascinate only historians. The narrative shifts between two time periods in his life. This means that some events are mentioned before they were actually shown, but it was generally in a way that made the whole thing easier to follow. The two timelines are connected, as the main characters are trying to figure out whether the plan they were working on when they were betrayed is still salvageable.

Full Review at Link

#BookReviews #Audiobook #Fantasy #Highly Recommended #witch king #martha wells

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farklelucas · 1 year

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okay so. now that ive taken some time to breathe, compose myself, and gather my thoughts, lemme lay out why the teen wolf movie was a hot holy mess (besides, you know, the obvious) as a teen wolf enthusiast and expert.

a lot of the characters were really little more than set dressing. to be specific, i think liam could have been replaced by a mailbox with a hat and the movie would have been the same (and this is coming from a major liam fan). the same can be said for mason, malia, melissa, peter, and honestly even the sheriff (which i hate bc god he was such a core of the show). i think parrish was only useful in one specific instance and even that isn't enough to warrant him being in the film. the characters i loved felt like cardboard cutouts and that wasnt fair to me, to the characters, or to the actors. i would have rather they not been there at all tbh. like just leave liam out of this if youre gonna do him like that fr

a lot of the plot points felt... disjointed and weird. saraid said it felt like three different movies in one and i have to agree. derek and eli felt like its own thing, then scott and allison, and then everything else (whatever the hell parrish and malia had going on, the lydia and jackson buddy cop comedy, liam in... japan with a ramen shop i think? and some random girlfriend that happened to be a kitsune) kind of fell to the wayside in between.

this movie was truly so flat without kira. it was hard to make a nogitsune movie without stiles, but it was almost impossible to make without her. hikari unfortunately ended up just feeling like a woman they randomly shoved into all the plot points kira was supposed to be in. because she didnt have a character besides liams girlfriend (and because liam was barely a character himself), she just couldn't compare and so kiras lack of presence was really felt. she left a huge hole in the narrative. they didnt even mention her and you knew what was missing. if you had cut khylin and dylan sprayberrys checks entirely, im sure they would have had enough to pay her as much as the rest of her white coworkers :) but that's just my opinion xxx

this was supposed to be for fans of the original series, but really just felt like jeff davis's weird rare pair fanfiction. instead of focusing on the dynamics that already existed - melissa and the sheriff, malia and peter, scott and liam, derek and. anyone really - he ended up delving into all these new dynamics with only two hours to develop them. malia and parrish (which. i really had to mentally run through the show to see if those two had interacted before and i dont think they have), liam and hikari, and derek and eli. all of which had a shot at being interesting but because there were so many different plots going on, it all just felt. awkward and confusing.

that being said, im gonna move onto derek and eli generally. i like eli! i do. i thought he was funny, i thought the actor was super charming (although the timeline made no sense because if he was born fifteen years ago And allison died fifteen years ago he would be braedens and. hate to say it folks. thats not braedens baby. make him mixed jeff davis you fucking coward). really, i liked him. ... but not at the expense of dereks character. the derek i knew was an asshole. he was mean, he was sarcastic, he was a bastard (honorifically). its not to say that people cant change, but... the derek i saw in the movie was a complete 180 from the derek we last saw in the series. honestly, the derek i saw in the series probably wouldn't have made a good parent - we saw how he was with erica, isaac, and boyd. even with scott. derek was kind of a dick. i dont even think he would have wanted kids - i think he would raise them out of duty, and i think he would if a partner wanted him to. but i dont think kids were ever in his life plan. and i think that could have been super interesting to see with him and eli. i think making him a parent could have been really interesting and it just. crumbled.

i know i mentioned the timeline in that last bit but. the timeline. it hurts my head. when was eli born. what year is it. how long has it been since scott has been in beacon hills. im so confused.

lets talk about adrian harris. shall we. i have made a list of people who i think would have been a better villain reveal are you ready: allison, peter, theo, chris argent, kate argent (resurrected), matt daehler (resurrected), victoria argent (resurrected), kira herself, danny mahealani, rafe mccall, isaac's shit dad, coach, greenberg, me with a baseball bat filled with rusty nails, jeff davis in a wig. the list goes on. you could not have picked a more random and less memorable character to reveal as your villain. i almost felt like i was being mocked. "haha! you didnt expect it to be this guy? the chemistry teacher who also died fifteen years ago? who had almost nothing to do with the plot until season 3? stupid! idiot!" i have never been so mad in my life

speaking of villain. did they forget what a nogitsune is. it needs a host. its not some guy they can stab to death. its a concept, a feeling, a parasite. its a manifestation of mental illness. but no sorry excuse me i must be wrong bc now its also a werewolf??????? im sorry. am i the crazy one. give me void allison! give me allison as the host and shes being taken over and she has those bags under her eyes and that creepy void stare and grin! give me crystal reed emmy noms! while we're on the subject, heres some more questions about the nogitsune include: why was it in a jar? why was it with LIAM of all people (who didnt even know what that was)? why did its powers completely change? HOW was it a werewolf????????? i cant stop thinking about it.

i said it once and ill say it again: jackson fucking carried this movie. he was giving all season one jackson, he was bringing comic relief, he was even bringing up ethan when no one else would! king! he carried. but he shouldn't have had to. dont get me wrong, i think crystal reed ate and left no crumbs. this was allisons movie and it should have been. but when the other two standout characters imo were jackson (who arguably did nothing) and coach (who did even less)... you simply didnt use your characters well. i think i would put deaton up there and even chris, but... scott and lydia? this should have been their movie. but scott spent nearly the whole movie ignoring his friends, and lydia was reduced to 'woman whose plot was about a man,' again. it was horrible. lydia outgrew that song and dance by season two. and scott? hasnt been to beacon hills in twelve years? hasnt seen his mom or his friends? not the scott mccall i know.

this is not about shipping discourse this post will never be about shipping discourse so i say this as a completely objective party. that being said. st/dia was so strangely shoved in there at the end. how did harris even know about lydia leaving stiles. how did he know about her dream. how did it add to the plot. like yes the nogitsune feeds of chaos and strife but i think lydia was getting enough of that watching her friends get murdered. it felt like a weird way to explain why dob wasnt there and it simply didnt work. i would have rather they not said anything about stiles at all.

anyway, this is skipping over a lot of other little things that i thought were really bad (sexualizing malia who literally had the mentality of an eight year old for most of her life AGAIN, why was mason a fucking cop, peters lack of interaction with the hale family which is what made him interesting in the first place, the absolute insanity of allison coming back to life and just being absolutely okay even though shes been dead for fifteen years, died at the hands of her friend, and almost everyone she knew including stiles, isaac, and kira are all just gone now), but boy oh boy. for a while it was funny bad. like "oh this is bad but i can still enjoy this for what it is" bad. but those last ten minutes. what is actually absolutely wrong with jeff davis. there are very few times ive felt this betrayed by tv shows i held this close to my heart, but im there. im heartbroken. i wont go on about it here, bc honestly, it would need its own post considering how much i have to say. but if the rest of the movie was bad? that was shit was traumatizing.

anyway. so sorry this post is this long, and so sorry i couldnt come back with a positive review. this show died long ago; i think we should have just let it rest - nobody asked for a reunion, and now i can see that was with good reason. so the next time jeff davis opens up an email with a header titled 'sequel idea' and he ccs tyler posey, i think we should all just agree to ler arden cho beat him to death in a dennys parking lot instead.

#long post #teen wolf #teen wolf movie #twm #personal #shut your pie hole katie

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ladyluscinia · 6 months

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I think they were so worried about not getting a season 3 they ruined both the viewers expecting one and the viewers who would've liked it to end there. they've created an easily destroyable status quo because of course something needs to happen to get everyone back together for season 3. so it's not even a happy ending; it's so fragile, it's designed to fall apart the second that anyone learns that the show is back on. i get not wanting to bank on having a third season and wrapping it up but like. Galavant did that and did it better. WITH THE HEROES RETIRING AND THE TWO MINUTE MARRIAGE CEREMONY TO BOOT. But it gave an outline of where the plot might go from there and how the adventure will continue if it gets to. And it never got to, and season 2's ending is good because it's not /fragile/--it's not a cliffhanger, but you get the idea that they could keep going from there still. whereas this one didn't want to be a cliffhanger so much that they created the most breakable new status quo in history and if there is a season 3 it'll immediately be undone and I'll probably still watch it but like I'll /know/, y'know? They could fix everything in the first episode of season 3 and I'd still have to know that at one point, this was considered an acceptable outcome.

The thing that is driving me absolutely insane is they DID NOT HAVE TO DO THIS!

There's so many people looking at it like "well it's a shame that 2x08 clearly had to cram several episodes into one for budget reasons and it made the development weaker but that's the situation MAX put them in" and I cannot emphasize enough how much that is not true.

MAX did not break it to them after episodes 2x01 - 2x07 were written and half filmed that they would have to wrap up the whole plot in 30 minutes. Like absolute worst case scenario they had 10 eps mostly written and budget came back 20% over and they had to reduce to 8 total. More likely they knew they were getting 8 from the start.

It is absolutely nobody's fuck up except David Jenkins and his writers' room if they were unrealistic about what character beats were needed and would fit in the timeframe to reach a satisfying wrap up.

Worries about no S3 were on the table the moment it took until JUNE to get confirmation of S2. This wasn't sprung on them. If they wanted their story to have a "just in case" happy ending and then a "fully realized arc" happy ending, they should have fucking acted like it???

I was shocked when the first three episodes that dropped were so hardcore on destroying Edward's relationships and laying bare exactly how deep his issues went. It only made sense to me if they were going all in on getting a S3 and prepared to spend all of S2 focused on the implications of all that, and then the not-even two week in-universe timeline of the season reinforced my understanding that was happening.

"Shame we don't have time for our main couple to even start addressing their relationship or having moments of self-realization and sharing their issues," says guy who decided to make the first half of S2 about adding more problems on top of well established ones from S1 and the second half of S2 about throwing in a second breakup cycle instead of dealing with the fallout from the first.

Want Edward to end on a beat of feeling part of the found family? Well maybe adding a timeskip after 2x05 and then a crew chat in 2x06 where you make it clear he did an apology tour offscreen could help, but you also could have just not focused hard on him poisoning his relationship with every single one of them in the first place???

There's multiple different ways you can do Act 2 of a three act structure, and they did not have to choose one that ends on another dark cliffhanger beat or right at the open ended turning point toward growth? Like they didn't even do the one they picked in a way they could fit in their season. I feel like by the end of a struggles Act 2 both your protagonists need to have self-realized their issues and maybe had one conversation about it? Edward still wasn't talking about his guilt, and Stede wasn't talking about anything.

They aren't even at the turning point of growth and out of the backsliding / lessons learned era yet, that's why potential S3 will start on another backslide when status quo breaks and Stede starts "that's nice, dear"-ing Edward during the day and slipping out at night to vicariously listen to pirate stories or whatever (and they frame it like he's cheating).

We have two out of three seasons in a show that might only get two, and I feel like the characters have barely moved from their starting position.

Like idk maybe they are really good at coming up with character flaws - ex: Stede is repressed and bottles up his traumas until he mentally checks out / runs away - and just drawing blanks on how to believably "fix" them, but just going "well what if we just used this flaw to throw another miscommunication roadblock in their relationship?" is not getting them where they want to be.

The season was fundamentally designed against their stated goal and did not make what seem to be necessary writing concessions to the reduced screentime if they wanted their finale to land as an even plausibly happy ending. It's hollow.

And possibly not even salvageable in S3 since they aren't demonstrating the skills to salvage it.

#our flag means death #ofmd s2 #ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd 2x08 #david jenkins #ask #ladyluscinia #ofmd meta #ofmd critical

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tr3xinfinite · 2 months

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Ok so finally here's my opinion about the Jim/Troll!Jim situation

I'm gonna try to be fast so maybe i will left a few details

First of all what i think about him becoming a Troll?

I think it was a great twist, not many shows are brave enough to make a whole almost permanent change in the MCs like TH did, Amphibia, The Owl House, Gravity Falls, Avatar, etc. I can't think of many shows where at the end the mc is forced to sacrifice his humanity and his normal life in order to gain a bigger power enough to save the people he loves (not to mention the bathtub scene is actually a MASTERPIECE of scene) hell even 3Below and Wizards didn't do this

Could have been executed better? Mmm maybe if Jimhunters was actually a Part 1/2 episode and Angor Reborn was adapted so we could have more screentime to Tol boi and his development

Do i think what Merlin did was right? I'm gonna be kinda gray but he was and at the same time not right, he destroyed Jim's life since the moment the amulet was held into his hands or should i say the peak of the iceberg (cause everything went downhill since Angor's debut) but at the same time he got a point, Jim's humanity was his biggest help it was his heart what tied into all the people he helped and who helped him, but that wasn't enough, his humanity started being his weakness by the end of Season 2 if Jim battled a whole Gumm-Gumm army + Gunmar + Angor + Morgana yeah he definetly couldn't have make it, Angor only died cause he sacrificed himself, Morgana was throw into another dimension and not exactly killed and Gumm-Gumms were gone along with Gunmar, but almost all of that was possible thanks to Jim's sacrifice, damn even one of the comics shows and alternate timeline where Jim dies in the eternal night

And i think that was an unavoidable situation, Merlin practically manipulated Jim to make 1 choice not 2, the Deep showed a Non-human Jim (not exactly TrollJim but maybe a glimpse of him) and there's also the amount of foreshadowing around it, and i don't think the line "Don't worry mom, you don't need to protect me, i think this is what i was meant to do" in the transformation scene was a random choice of words hell even Hunter Jim warned him.

Do i think Guillermo didn't have enough balls to let him be a troll for the whole franchise? Mmmm no, if Guillermo really didn't have balls to do it he wouldn't even turned Jim into a troll to begin with besides where talking about the same madman who make Wizards a whole kill count of 10 episodes

Now for the point i wanna talk here is

what do i think about Jim turning back to human?

Let's do one thing first, separate Human Jim from Troll Jim as if they were different characters

Human Jim was the original Jim a happy boy who was happy to help his mama, hang with his friends and tried his beat into saving humankind and trollkind while trying not to skip school days

TrollJim was the most depressed and conflicted state Jim was in his life, he couldn't go in the sunlight, couldn't eat human food, was separated from his friends only having Claire and Blink, was almost killed by the Green Knight, locked in a crystal by Merlin, the shard was aiming for his heart, he got to fight another war while being phisically at his most painful state and then he knew that no matter what he tries the Onyx will eventually kill him which leads me to believe that maybe Jim turning into a full Troll to fight Arthur was an attemp to do a "Suicide by Cop"

Human Jim was the warrior he became a new "light" for all the earth, Troll Jim was the warrior Merlin wanted him to be he "eclipsed" himself

TrollJim's main reason to exist was to kill Gunmar, Angor and Morgana and save everyone from the Eternal Night, notice how after killing Gunmar and after Angor's death TrollJim was slowly "dying" when he meet Arthur.

Then he turns himself into Beast Jim turning into a pseudo Gumm-Gumm, Jim was at his most feral, confused and most uncontrolable state, even his soul ended up corrupted, the happy Jim and tragically heroic TrollJim that we knew died in that moment all what's left was "that beast"

And what happens after Morgana (the last reminisence of the eternal night, the reason why TrollJim was born) dies not so after Jim also dies, notice what i'm trying to say? Born to defeat Gunmar, Angor and Morgana? And just after Morgana's death he finally dies too? I'm not trying to say that Jim needed Morgana to die to be human again what i'm trying to say is that with M finally dead he's free from the Eternal Night, Human Jim came back and is now with his friends a second chance his "resurrection".

After all that suffering, being born to fight a war and being turned into a monster TrollJim can finally rest in peace and leave the rest to Human Jim

I see this whole thing as a rebirth of Jim and as a way to let TrollJim rest cause he could finally ended his purpose (even if he wasn't exactly the one who killed Morgana)

For an example to this i have Ken Kaneki and Haise Sasaki, the same being but not the same person, Haise was just a happy dream of Ken and once he finally accepted that, he "died" and let Kaneki regain his body, the difference is that the Ken and Haise thing was literal while the Jim and TrollJim thing is more of my POV (now you get why i used Haise and Kaneki as a reference for the fan art)

But anyways that's just my opinion, but everyone can have their own interpretations

So in short: Jim regaining his humanity was like a second chance of living while TrollJim dying was a way to set him free

#toa trollhunters #jim lake junior #tales of arcadia #jim lake jr #analysis #thread #troll jim #Beast Jim

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genericpuff · 5 months

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Tbh Sicily and Italy in general are actually mentioned quite a lot in Greek texts, including mythological ones, and that's because South Italy was FULL of Greek colonies. To the point the Romans even called it Magna Graecia, that is "Big Greece". There are literally modern productions of Greek plays still held in the ruins of Greek theatres there to this day in memory of that heritage.

And while Ancient World colonialism doesn't always correspond exactly to later examples, if RS had actually developed her idea of having P and H bond over being originally from Sicily and P being ashamed of it, she could have easily found a way to use that to her advantage. P was supposed to be the naive country bumpkin coming to the big city and coming into her own there, anyway. Why not combine the two things?

She could have used the existence of different dialects of Ancient Greek to add a panel of Minthe and Tethys laughing abt P's accent and calling her no better than a barbarian (a "barbarian" was originally someone who clearly showed they were foreign bc they didn't speak Greek fluently) behind her back, high school mean girls style. Or toxic suitor Apollo mansplaining Greek traditions to her which she keeps trying to tell him she's already familiar with. Or heck, H showing an interest in P's life in Sicily and P thinking he's gonna make some rude assumption or lame joke but instead he just geeks out like "you ever met Archimedes of Syracuse? I heard abt that thing with the lever and I love it"... timeline's fucked enough for it anyway, and it would have been better than the pity part we got. Also RS seems to want a lil nerdy charm for H sometimes when she draws him with glasses, and what's nerdier than geeking out over famous mathematicians.

But obv, RS being RS, we only got said pity party and people making "mamma mia" jokes in response. Oh, and this post I remember reading somewhere were people were whining that Sicily shouldn't be mentioned in media abt Ancient Greece bc the poor, poor Americans only know it bc of Mafia so it makes the tone too confusing. Bc that's totally an ok thing to say. Also Americans should never be forced to check Wikipedia ig

Oh absolutely, I don't doubt that Rachel made Persephone Sicilian in an attempt to reference this, it's just really, REALLY funny out of context. Her being Sicilian really has no bearing on her character writing, it seems more like it's just an oddly specific thing thrown in about her and Hades so that they can have something to bond over (because they barely have anything else). Like that one time she anxiously twisted a napkin and Hades remembered back to the one time in the comic we saw HIM twist a napkin and he was like "omg she's just like meeee!"

Her being Sicilian wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing if there was actual effort put into writing her as a Sicilian woman. But there isn't so it comes across as really random (and ripe for meme'ing on, even from people who are Sicilian themselves).

#lore olympus critical #lo critical #anti lore olympus #ask me anything #ama #anon ama #anon ask me anything

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dirty-bear-rick-sanchez · 1 year

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I have some kind of mixed feelings about part 2 but some things I appreciate under the cut (messy and non-linear):

I love that we’re getting more content from the other team leads this season and also that we’re seeing interactions between them that we haven’t seen before? Like Glenn and Myc bonding over looking different in the first episode? Brett and Andre defending Gigi in that episode? Brett and Andre friendship in Rontagion?

This kind of falls into the top one but Reagan and Gigi becoming gal pals and Reagan having her first ever female friend? I love it

Also the Reagan and Brett dynamic is top tier this season. Brett is so supportive of Reagan and I also love that they’re allowed to be so affectionate but still platonic friends (no offence to Breagan shippers, it’s just not my cup of tea and I just love Reagan and Brett and platonic besties).

Myc being a nerd who ran away from the other mushrooms because they were mean to him is a great backstory. Tropey? Sure, but I love it.

I also love that Ron actually says he would’ve liked Reagan to confess to him in the broom closet (like she originally planned) - they really are good for each other

Andre fucking his own clone is great. Honestly he was just an icon this season

I thought it was actually nice to get some actual development of Reagan and Tamiko’s relationship this season. It’s nice that their relationship is considered salvageable (not so keen on how they handled the thing with Rand but I did like that Reagan still put her foot down and sent him to Shadow Prison X)

The dynamic between Rand and JR this whole season is great and I love their college flashback as well.

JR definitely lost the games on purpose every year so he could be humiliated by kissing the ring in front of everyone (you’re telling me this man doesn’t have a humiliation kink?)

Also the dynamic between Rand and the head of the Illuminati was great and the second we had the reveal of Ron also controlling the head of the Illuminati I just knew what was coming but I still loved when it happened anyway (the kiss)

I don’t know if I should admit to this one but I definitely found it hot how Rand was being humiliated in front of everyone at the games

Brett having a secret passion for puppets is adorable and I love it

Also the Hand family ranking their children every year is hilarious and extremely in character. Made me feel so bad for Brett, I love it, 10/10

I like that we’re getting recurring appearances from minor characters like Mothman, Grassy Noel, Kate (and RepliKate, what a great name)

The fact that Myc’s dream timeline was one where he was pregnant is fucking adorable

You’d better believe I cried when Reagan forced Brett to his own dream timeline and when he returned because he made notes on his poster

Also at the reveal that Reagan saw the only way for Ron to be happy was for them to break up and chose his happiness over their relationship. Also I know some people weren’t fans of Ron because they felt like he was unnecessary/rushed but honestly having a gender-swap of the typical ‘female love interest is just used as character progression for the male protagonist’ felt pretty progressive. I also liked how he was shown to be similar to Reagan and actually had his flaws presented similarly to hers (e.g. not getting on well with people) even though female characters are often hated for the same flaws that are excused or even enjoyed in male characters

I have to admit that the end scene with the robes ‘how could she? After all, she’s only human’ was fucking cool

I loved everything about Alpha-Beta this season

And finally, thank fucking Christ that Ron wasn’t revealed to secretly be Reagan’s brother or something because as an RnM fan I can’t take much more incest at this point

Side note to that last one: fun little theory that Ron is actually a clone of Reagan (one of them can be trans, as a treat) and it was revealed and that’s what actually lead to the clone fucking discussion at the start of that one episode but they erased their own minds and everyone else’s and let Andre take the fall (either it was intentional and they set that up as a distraction or it was unintentional and Andre just happened to be fucking his own clone anyway, take your pick)

#inside job #inside job spoilers #inside job part 2 #inside job part 2 spoilers #reagan ridley #ron staedtler #brett hand #andre lee #dr andre lee #gigi inside job #magic myc #glenn dolphman #rand ridley #jr scheimpough #alpha beta #alphabeta #alpha-beta #tamiko ridley #i’m definitely forgetting some characters

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shepscapades · 7 months

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im rotating the dbhc au and s9. do you think theres anything about the decked out (or s9 in general) experience that would be notably different in that au, or would things mostly follow canon bc theyre all pretty adjusted to eachother by then?

OOOH this is such a good question tbh. I think currently, not that I can think of? There are a few little things that kind of change the… context? I suppose? Of what’s currently happening, but I don’t think the moments themselves change all that much, besides maybe little emotional inflections that I would imagine are different based on the slightly different relationships of the characters. (for example, I see doc and X being a lot closer in this au since they preside over android maintenance together!)

I would say most “canon divergence” happens kinda at the beginning of s9 and a LOT of s8, because I’m still not sure which androids were introduced in s9 (i had a few in mind that I wanted to introduce for s9 for dynamics reasons, but I’m still trying to logic out how all that changes s8 and stuff like that) and I also don’t know the exact timeline of deviancies for s8. So honestly, as the au develops and I figure out everyone’s backstories/fill in gaps, it’s very possible that current dynamics/plot points may change!

Such is the nature of a fluid and ever-changing/ever-updating au though I suppose!! but i think it’s kinda fun that not everything is figured out— it always gives me something new and exciting to explore that could always make the story more interesting, in my opinion :]

#it’s very good for my adhd brain I think… always something new to explore!#dbhc #dbhc ask #ask #anon #tango specifically I think changes a little bit in terms of context #Bc I imagine most of the 13 month period he’s working on the game is pretty… rough on him mentally #so the game being finished and seeing the fruits of his labor is kind of the narrative turning point for him #so drawing him laughing and smiling with the other hermits is really… idk!! it’s a lot more meaningful i think :))

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galacticbuddysimblr · 20 days

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Part 1: The Timeline of The Sims

Welcome to the first entry of The Sims Mysteries! I’ve been wanting to give my take of the story of The Sims for a while, and to start a conversation with other Simmers about what their theories are for the countless lore debates that are out there. First though, here’s some context:

There’s a Sims movie in production! Margot Robbie’s production company, LuckyChap, has started work on one, which we heard about last week. I’m super excited! However it turns out, I’ve always wanted to see a live action Sims movie, and I personally have high hopes for it. So far we know the movie is not going to be largely based on the game lore, but now’s as good a time as any to give my two cents on the various inconsistencies in The Sims canon.

As with Barbie, I can imagine the movie will deviate somewhat from what the fans consider canon and will not actually focus on lore at all, but on the simulation aspect of The Sims just as how Barbie focused on the dissonance between the real world and Barbieland. Today, I’m going to start with the topic I feel most strongly about: the timeline order of The Sims. If you take away one thing from this post, let it be that the story of The Sims does not take place in alternate universes or timelines. Take a look under the cut to read my explanation!

When The Sims 4 came out, the alternate universe theory was used as the main explanation for inconsistencies in the lore, specifically regarding sims’ ages. For some reason, this explanation was set in stone as canon without question. A lot of the confusion surrounding the timeline arose due to the assumption that The Sims 4 would take place after The Sims 2; at that point the latest established point on the timeline. Also, there seems to be a figure that’s cited often whenever simmers refer to the timeline; that there are two 25 year time jumps between The Sims 3, The Sims, and The Sims 2. I haven’t been able to find a source for this fact, though. If you know where it’s from, please send a link my way! I presume that it’s not as canonical as it’s considered to be, and in any case it’s a very rigid timescale which is incompatible with the stories of most if not all sims.

I want to recognize the fact that I think The Sims 4 has started taking its lore more seriously. The story of Robert Crumplebottom turned Roberto Crinkletop shown in a promotional video for Horse Ranch is exactly the kind of small scale but significant lore that I personally love! It truly gave me an impression that the developers care about the stories of our favourite sims. Just because The Sims 4 base game is not a neat addition to the canon we all know and love, that does not mean we should resort to the alternate universe explanation. Personally, I see alternate universe explanations of lore as lazy and messy world building, at least if a story doesn’t start out with a theme of alternate universes in the first place. It just seems like a sign that the developers or writers between different entries in a franchise were not in sync with each other or didn’t care enough about the story as long as the same characters were used. In any case, it’s more challenging, and in my opinion more interesting, to put together a unified story from a franchise that is on the brink of being explained away as a multiverse.

In a sentence, since the developers didn’t give us a clean slice of lore, it’s up to us simmers to put the story together. As you may know, this is the current most popular theory of the chronological order between the mainline Sims games based on lore:

The Sims 3

The Sims

The Sims 2

(The Sims 4 outside of the timeline, in an alternate universe)

Here is what I think the timeline should be:

The Sims 3

The Sims

The Sims 4

The Sims 2

The Sims 5?

So yes, all Sims games (including all spin-offs) are in the same canon and timeline in my eyes. The confusion comes from multiple inconsistencies introduced in The Sims 4, but as I said the main factor is the age of sims.

Originally, the main reason I was going to give for the inconsistencies in age was the Elixir of Life. We know that the Elixir of Life is an item in The Sims 2 which has the ability to prolong a Sim’s life in their current life stage, thought to be invented by Mortimer Goth. When it comes to aging inconsistencies, I think this makes for a much more elegant resolution than branching off a whole alternate universe. Anti-aging potions might not seem like a good solution for realism-oriented simmers, but at the end of the day something like an Elixir of Life is exactly in tune with the unique magical realism of The Sims.

All that considered, though, when looking at some of the staple households which appear in multiple games, there actually isn’t any aging conflict. That is, in the chronological order of games that I propose, the age of said sims progresses linearly. The issue might arise when trying to define the exact number of years passing between The Sims games, however considering that there could be different lengths of time between different entries in the franchise, it should be relatively straightforward to figure out when comparing sims’ ages against each other.

To convince you that the multiverse explanation of The Sims canon is unnecessary, I’m going to address the main reasons given in the ‘Alternate universe’ article on The Sims Wiki. Thank you to the person or people who wrote it by the way! Insofar as explaining the alternate universe it makes sense but I’m just using it as a jumping off point to explain my perspective. In the below table, the first two columns contain the conflicts in quotation marks as they appear on The Sims Wiki, while the third leftmost column is the reasons I have for the differences in the lore:

My main wish for the lore of Project Rene, or the current development of The Sims 5, is for it to be set after The Sims 2. This way, we start a new entry in the franchise with a clean slate and no confusion about the timeline. A big mistake The Sims 4 made is being afraid to show how life has gone by for our favorite sims, which just made confusion in the storyline. In fact, SimGuru Sarah said herself that it was the most flexible way to keep the most recognizable sims in the newest game. However, this made the story of The Sims 4, at least in the base game, seem stagnant. Let some of our favorite senior sims die from old age! Let our younger sims grow up and start families! Let Bella Goth grow old!

At the end of the day, we don’t need to rehash Bella’s, or anyone else’s, young adult life with new places and people, and it would be much more interesting to see how she is as an older woman, while her family matures and grows. That is, if Bella is in The Sims 5 at all! Thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts! If you have any comments please message me or reply to this post—I’d love to start a discussion! For upcoming posts, here are some ideas I want to tackle (see the table for the mention of the topics below):

(1) The Timespan of The Sims

Have the games given us enough clues about the lengths of time that pass between the games? Can we use this to figure out the exact ages of sims or vice versa?

(2) Too Many Malcolms

With enough Malcolm Landgraabs to go around, how can we tell who’s who? Which Malcolms are the same person, and which are relatives?

(3) The Disappearance of Bella Goth

The age old debate: what happened to our Bella after that fateful night in Pleasantview? How much do we really know?

(4) The Nighat Caliente vs Katrina Caliente Conflict

Both moms to our favorite sisters, Dina and Nina, but who is the real deal? Are they both?

(5) Agnes and Mrs. Crumplebottom

You’d be forgiven for mistaking the two, so how do we know they’re different? Is there a larger lineage of prude Crumplebottoms?

(6) MySims or OurSims?

With some of our favorite adorable MySims bridging the gap to the mainline franchise, how can we abridge their stories? What problems came up in their move to The Sims?

The Setting of The Sims

Do The Sims games take place in SimNation, or across the world on an alternate Earth? How does this Earth differ from ours?

The Teleportation of Don Lothario

When the time came for Don to reap the consequences for his streak of heartbreak, what did the women he scorned decide to do with him? How did Don end up in Riverview?

The Time Travel of Alexander Goth

One Alexander Goth is credited for writing A Murder in Pleasantview, but how did he write the book when his parents were still children? Did young Alex try to save his mom by trying to undo what was already done?

The Identity of Lolita Goth

Who was the mysterious bachelorette buried in the graveyard of Goth Manor? Was there an unspoken affair between her and Gunther?

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providing-leverage · 2 months

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I've had a fic idea kicking around in the back of my mind for a while where Ted and Beard give the team a safe sex talk.

Because these two came not just from coaching a whole different sport, but a whole different demographic college-age young men who grew up in the US, probably in red/conservative states. And in the US, especially red states, we don't get sex ed in high school. Abstinence-only is the norm.

The first time I got any kind of sex ed that wasn't preaching abstinence was in a college course where my professor had realized that this gap in our education, while sucking for us, also impeded our ability to understand some of the later material. She developed a sex ed course taught over two weeks or so.

In this vein, Ted and Beard realized while working with college students that their teams were lacking some vital info about things like STDs and consent. So they threw together a power point which they normally present at the beginning of a season, which is part of their getting settled ritual.

The original premise of this fic was something fun, comedic and fluff filled. Pure crack. I have done zero research on sex education in the K and other countries where the AFC Richmond players are from but I'm sure it's better than the United States because the bar is on the floor. Plus these guys are older and more experienced so the talk would be a refresher kinda thing. I was going to throw in a few paragraphs about how Ted and Beard made an effort to include talk about non straight sex too, for that to resonate with Colin. Maybe make this happen when Trent was shadowing Ted, or have Trent hear rumors and grill Ted about it like he did about Sam's birthday party.

But then, just now, it occurred to me that depending on the timeline, Jamie might still be there. So it's early season 1. Maybe just after the gala. And when Ted starts talking about how consent matters so so much, not just for the girl but the guy too, that brings up some...stuff.

Because they're talking about informed, enthusiastic consent. What counts as consent. Relationship dynamics. How you do it because you want to, not because you've been told by a partner or society that you should. Honestly might segway into asexual spectrum Jamie because my own asexuality colors my writing and interpretation of characters (Jamie being ace in sex-positive, likes to make his partners feel good vein, similar to how @zehwulf talked about evidence towards Ted being asexual) and also because I enjoy ace-ifying characters.

Anyway, the TLDR of it: I had a fun idea and now I'm thinking about Jamie Tartt's trauma. A normal occasion, in this fandom, I think.

#I don't know if I'm even capable of doing a Jamie voice I have not really tried #writing him from an outsider pov is tough enough #but it could be from ted or beard's pov too/instead #if anyone has thoughts I'd love to hear them #ted lasso #jamie tartt #elliot writes #ted lasso fanfiction

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inbarfink · 8 months

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Random question but I just realized/remembered that Calvin and Sam were YOUNGER than Barbara.

Yet I don't remember them being babysat by her the night she died so where do you think they were?

Also I was wondering if I'm the only one who thinks Rick might not have killed Barbara?

Cause it COULD be possible that the serial killer/deranged fan part of the comic could have been real. Meaning that that could be why Rick disappeared.

Anywho sorry for the out of the blue question/rant. I just didn't know who else to ask.

(Sorry for the late reply @hannahhook7744, it's been kind of a Weird Hectic Weekend for me)

The thing about Barbara's Death Sequence is that it's really the most 'distant' one we've had. Most other Finches have records written by themselves just before their deaths or written by someone close to them just after their deaths. Barbara got a fictionlized comic book written by strangers for strangers that came out a full year after her death.

Sure, it seems like the Finch family collaborated on the story (since they've got the music box in there), but it's still pretty different from Molly's diary or Lewis' therapy notes. Espacially as a lot of little details in Barbara's room seem to contradict the story. So it's probable that Sam and Calvin were also being babysat by Barbara that night, but as they didn't figure into the narrative the comic-writers were telling they just casually dropped them from the narrative or merged all three younger brothers into Walter's role.

Or maybe they were out having a sleepover with friends or a boyscout camping trip or something but the comic didn't mention it, cause, again, it didn't factor into it's story. This comic was obviously not a serious documentation of Barbara's death, it's a fictional horror story targeted at people with just a casual understanding of the Finch Family outside of Barbara - if at that. So if that comic dedicated a whole narration box to "and also Barbara had two other little brothers but they were off at camp and had nothhing to do with this story" that would just seem Weird to the in-universe readers of 'Dreadful Stories'. Even if it might be useful to us, the REAL audience trying to piece together the timeline of the Finch family.

(Also I do suspect that at some point of WRoEF development Calvin was supposed to die before Barbara and then their timelines ended up being Switched so the Weirdness here might be a remnant of that)

As for the matter of Rick. I think the reason why he's considered the Prime Suspect of Barbara's death within the fandom is due to the Law of Conservation of Detail. You know, like, Details in stories come up because they're important to the story in same way. And yeah, 'What Remains of Edith Finch' is not exactly a traditional narrative and not every detail here has to "further the plot" - but even the most unimportant little details in WroEF still serve to add flavor to the characters, atmosphere and the themes. Which are things that are important to the story.

So why bring up the fact that Barbara had a boyfriend and even give him a name and a face? (which is very rare for anyone outside of the Finch Family in this game) Why doesn't Barbara just die alone in the house with just Walter? Rick has to be Important in some way if the game went to all this effort to create and establish his existence to us, right?

Plus, there's the thematic role of 'Dreadful Stories' within the narrative. Personally, I can't see the idea of there really being a serial killer or a real-life crazed fan that inspired the 'monsters' at the end of the comic. Because my read of 'Dreadful Stories' is that it's made to be so ridiculous and sensational- with both a serial killer AND monsters out to get Barbara - to showcase a little taste of the wild and weird stories being told about Barbara's death. And to put the first subtle little wrinkle in the poetic idea that the Finches deaths always match their lives - Edie had to choose this silly little comic to deliberatly turn Barbara's death into something horror themed. And if she chose something a little closer to reality, it would've turned out to be much different.

So what is the mundane Not-Thematic-Enough-For-Edie's-Tastes way for Barbara to get murdered? I can see why for a lot of people, the 'obvious answer' was 'got killed in an argument with her boyfriend'. Since, again, we need to have a reason why he exists in the first place.

...Although that's actually not my favorite theory lol

I think Barbara's death was even more mundane than that. One of the few details about Barbara's death we can confirm are based on reality is the moment where she pushes the killer off the railing.

In the current-day Finch House this little piece of railing IS noticeably broken.

So someone did absolutely fall off the second floor of the Finch House at some point.

So what I think happened is that Rick and Barbara did have some sort of a lover's tiff that night, then Barbara slipped on these rollerskates the Hookman slipped on in the comic.

In a panic she tried to grab on to something and only managed to catch one of Rick's crutches. (The important thing here is that Barbara is ALWAYS memorialized holding that crutch. Even in pieces that were made prior to the comic's printing, like her portrait)

So that part of her story has to be true in some way.

Barbara's death was just yet another Patented Tragic Finch Accident, but suspicions kept falling on Rick from the General Public and the media, and so he had to go into hiding. Meanwhile the Finch Family, or at least Edie, kept promoting the most Bonkers version of her story they could find.

#hannahhook7744 #what remains of edith finch #edith finch #barbara finch #wroef

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lokiondisneyplus · 8 months

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How Marvel officially added McDonalds to the MCU

On the very last day of filming on the first season of the Marvel Disney+ TV series Loki, executive producer Kevin Wright sat on the steps of The Citadel at the End of Time with costar Sophia Di Martino (Sylvie), and they started to chat about what might be next for her character. Not in any official script capacity, just as fans of the story they’d just finished filming.

“This character had been on a decades-long, maybe centuries-long revenge mission, and the classic trope of those stories is that it’s all-consuming and she’s not thinking about what comes next,” says Wright. “Now she has this moment of opportunity, where is she going to go?”

Di Martino thought about it for a moment, and said, “She’d probably be pretty hungry.

There are more than 13,000 McDonald’s across the United States right here in 2023, and untold more across the multiverse. In a new campaign launched this week, the fast-feeder gave Marvel and Loki fans a peek at its own cameo in the series’ upcoming second season, set to launch on October 6.

“As Featured In” is the Golden Arches latest Famous Orders meal campaign and, instead of being tied to a particular artist or character, it celebrates all the instances in TV and movies that McDonald’s has appeared or been mentioned by characters: Friends, The Office, Seinfeld, Space Jam, Coming to America, and many, many more. But at the center of the campaign is Loki, one that hasn’t even happened yet, which is probably appropriate for a show that revolves around the multiverse and many different timelines.

The meal itself—a choice of a 10-piece Chicken McNuggets, Quarter Pounder with Cheese, or Big Mac, with medium fries, a Loki-branded Sweet ‘N’ Sour Sauce, and a medium soda—is, like the Famous Meals before it, nothing all that special, but that has always been the point. The genius of Famous Orders is that it drives customers to McDonald’s core menu items rather than a limited-time stunt. There is, of course, also a merch collaboration, this time with streetwear darling Palace Skateboards. The packaging features QR codes that customers can scan to get fun Loki content and buy pieces from the Palace collaboration.

Long after his conversation with Di Martino on the Citadel set steps, Wright and his team were developing season two, and they were finding it difficult to pick up a new Sylvie storyline. She had just killed He Who Remains in season one, where does she go?

“When we stayed in the view of character, this woman who went on the run as a child, had been running through time, a fugitive of time, living in apocalypses, never being able to relax or slow down, the novelty of walking into a 1980s McDonald’s looked appealing,” say Wright. “You play a Little League game and go to McDonald’s. You go to a kid’s birthday party at McDonald’s. Someone like Sylvie would never have experienced that, and would be really taken by that.”

Marvel Studios has been a brand partnerships factory since Iron Man first ate a Whopper in 2008. Typically these things happen when there is a finished script, and producers go through it with the studio’s brand partnerships team to see where opportunities may be. A car chase, you say? What brand of car should we use? Maybe an Audi?

But this latest collaboration happened in reverse. A 1982 McDonald’s was specifically written into the script, so Wright approached Marvel’s partnerships people to talk to the brand about helping them out with the details. “I was worried that McDonald’s would think we wanted to do something ironic or make fun of them,” says Wright. “But we were selling an earnest story, a love letter to nostalgia through a character’s eyes who will see all of the novelty and joy of it.”

He needn’t have worried. “When I pitched it, our internal team said, ‘Uh, you realize we have a partnership with McDonald’s already, right? The fact we’re going to them wanting to do something makes it even better.”

Around that same time mid-last year, McDonald’s marketing execs were on a tour of sorts, meeting with content creators and creative teams at studios like Disney about the brand’s interest in participating in cultural moments beyond the typical product tie-in. That’s when the call from Marvel about Loki came in.

“We tend to embrace things like this,” says McDonald’s global chief marketing officer Morgan Flatley, “which we feel can be an opportunity for us to learn, especially because we felt that between Marvel and Loki, there was a real willingness to take their rabid fandom and mix it with a fan truth around McDonald’s and bring them together.”

The fan truth Flatley refers to is of McDonald’s as a congenial gathering place, a common experience for so many people. “Sylvie’s storyline perfectly aligned with how we think about our brand in terms of providing comfort and familiarity,” says Flatley. Familiarity is the key to the emotion of nostalgia and shelter that Wright was aiming for in the story.

That same familiarity is indicative of a brand so ubiquitous, it’s become a cultural touchpoint. Hence all the McDonald’s references in TV and movies. There’s a reason McDowell’s works as such a big bit in the classic comedy Coming to America. We all get it.

That all sounds great, but many brands get nervous or overprotective when they aren’t in full control of the creative. Not that long ago, McDonald’s was among them. The success of Famous Orders, allowing artists and partners like Cactus Plant Flea Market to play with its brand logos and characters, and the passionate response from fans—along with the sold-out merch and boosted sales—has given Flatley and the brand more confidence than ever in what she calls “sharing the pen.”

“I’ve become a big believer that if we lean into the right kind of creators in the right cultural phenomenon, and loosen some of our control on the brand, magic will happen,” says Flatley. “A few years ago, I don’t know that we would have felt as comfortable handing over key aspects of our brand to be part of a storyline like this, but today we’re really aware of the authenticity of our brand and the role that it can play.”

Wright is very familiar with the pitfalls of ill-conceived brand partnerships, and the impact they can have. “Wayne’s World was making fun of this stuff 30 years ago,” says Wright. “When it’s done poorly, it looks like business not driven by story. I don’t think that was ever a concern for us, mainly because we knew it was being driven by our story, and the more McDonald’s partnered with us, the better we were able to service the story.”

Multiversal marketing? Let’s see McDowell’s try that.

#loki #season 2 promo #mcdonald's

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justatalkingface · 9 months

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No idea if I send this one before (I think not) but here we go. I think Izu op could have worked! Controversial take, I know.

I mean...if Hori hadn't this mentality "Izu needs to suffer bc I hate him" this could be a 0 to hero story as Izu ends up having a powerful quirk. But for that to work we would need a few things

(Note how Hori seems to love the underdog trope but failing miserable)

1) time skip. Izu cant master ofa in a few weeks. On that note, the second user cant be bk 3.0

2) a writer who is interested in explored the ofa and what it can do. Like, what if Izu can have a quirk awaken? That would be cooler.

3) senseis who know what they are doing and who helped Izu not only physically but mentally. Wouldn't be swell if Izu stoped thinkig he is worthless? If bk got consequences and Izu CAN be mad at him for what bk did? Yes it would.

4) and a sense of limit. Yes, I did mentioned how op Izu can work but if he gets too op and can face all the big bad villains, if he can use ofa 100%...it would be a bit stalled in terms of writing "dont fret, super Izu is here". It would be Izu repeat AM's mistake. What I would do is make Izu, who after proper training and well used time skip earned how to use his quirk safely, has a support group. Ochako, Iida, Shoto and whatnot. Meaning is not just Super Izu alone.

Friendship wins.

But of course....Hori didn't went to this route. And the timeline is really ....a joke.

Anyway, to end. I do think the concept of op Izu could have worked if Hori had stopped his hate for Izu and focused on the mc and developed more ofa.

I... have mixed feelings about OP characters in stories, mostly because they don't do them right. The thing is, an OP character, on the scale we're talking about here, because in chapter one, All Might sets that ceiling of OP way up there? That is someone so... stupidly strong that they actually direct national policy just by their very existence; quite possibly the world changes because they exist. And I feel that, most of the time, stories either: A, ignore the implications that this person can beat up God and isn't hiding that fact, or B, makes some shallow attempts at acknowledging it, but quickly moves on from those attempts so they can fight their equally OP enemies without giving it it's due.

The point being is that introducing an OP person is something a writer should use carefully, the same way they should treat time travel, if they're not just some villain driven off by the power of love, friendship, this gun I found, and the McGuffin used to beat them.

...However, MHA is interesting to me in that it started off by doing it better than normal, with All Might. The story starts by insisting that All Might is so damn broken that Japan itself actually worked differently after he heroed for awhile, even though, as far as we can tell, he did nothing to actually try and manipulate national policy or anything like that.

He just existed, and everything changed in response.

And, while I admit I wasn't thinking that hard about it when I first read the story, the initial set up actually was in a great place to work with an OP Izuku... if almost everything after the initial setup went differently, anyways.

Let me explain.

So, early MHA, those initial chapters, just hinted at a lot of depth to it. Philosophical, legal, societal; part of the reason I, and probably others, fell in love so fast is that it was approaching the usual super hero thing from a new direction, and seeming to acknowledge the flaws in such a system the ways other stories generally don't.

Back then, it was the difference between being a Hero, the job description, and being a hero, someone who saved people, and how wildly disconnected those two terms were. The disparity between the weak and the strong, Quirklessness as something five seconds from being called a disability, a heroic system that had been slowly festering in on itself, for years and years and years, until we get people like Mt Lady, who caused god knows how much property damage just to kill steal a villain away from Kaminio Woods, who had the situation under control.

Into this toxic mess of a situation walks Izuku Midoriya: kind, smart, beaten down on for all his life for being weak, yet determined to stand up for what is right anyways, blinded by childish naivety and propaganda to how fucked up the world of heroes truly is.

And the man who changed Japan with his mere existence gave him his power, the power to stand above everyone else, to do anything he wants, because once he masters One For All, the only one able to stop Izuku? Would be himself.

And here's where it would have to change: Izuku's conflict, for most of the story, is simply about fighting; not about right or wrong, not should he do this, but can he do this? There is something he wants to earn, or a person he needs to beat, and so he tries to do it. Sometimes he does it by being smarter, more often he does it by being stronger, and sometimes, and too often for my tastes, or at least at the wrong times, he just can't.

Hori gives up on all the things that made MHA so interesting, only giving them empty lip service from that point on, so he can just do the usual shonen plot.

But imagine if he didn't. Imagine Izuku's conflicts being about idealism. He's strong, unbelievably strong, the second coming of All Might, acknowledged as such by the man himself, who may even admit that he is retiring. In a fight, Izuku wins, plain and simple; hell, he may have to worry about keeping his opponents alive rather than if he can beat them or not.

But that's not where the problems come from, beating X person in a straight up fight. The problems come from the system itself: a machine made to chew up idealistic kids and spit out cynical, money hungry heroes. An entire department in UA devoted to selling an image to the public, ruthlessly trying to take advantage of the new students while they're too new to realize what's happening. A bigoted, self-important teacher who hates him just for what he is, and is determined to ruin his career because he can. A government agency determined to control heroes and direct them to their own aims, who take an interest in this budding super star, and their pawn, merciless yet conflicted, who will kill to see their will done. A media system determined to get headlines, no matter the cost or who it may harm. A Number Two Hero ascendant, cruel and calculating, who uses his own offspring as pawns and views Izuku as a threat to his rise. Villains who, knowing they can't take him in a fair fight, try to beat Izuku in other ways, more complicated and sinister than a simple fight. Festering in his mind like a dark secret, Izuku's entire life as a Quirkless child, despised by the world for being Deku, for being useless, an old pain and shame that still defines him and shapes him, even if he's not longer Quirkless.

And with all this arrayed against him and his dreams, all Izuku has to guide him onto the proper path is his mentor, wise yet cynical and broken in his own ways, and his own innate spirit of heroism. And the choices he makes? Effects millions.

Leaning into what they said they were about, the League of Villains would not be a bunch of crazed murderers, but what Hori wants us to think of them: people beaten down by society until they felt they had no other choice but to fight back. Toga who isn't a deluded serial killer, Spinner and Compress with more development, and yes, the Dabi Benchmark of Insanity(TM) to keep them all sympathetic, because their purpose here isn't just as villains who have to be beaten... their purpose here is also about how heroes react to them.

To a LoV who is milder in what they do, so they still get heroic ire, still get labeled as, 'villains'... only for them not really to deserve that label, the hatred they get from the public, and the force used against them.

And Izuku, who is no longer a spectator but on the front line, sees that. He sees how they're getting tarred by the brush of 'villain', the way they're getting discriminated against because of their Quirks, and the eerie similarities it has to his own treatment as a QUirkless child.

And yet, the ones doing it are heroes, the ones he looks up to, and all but worshipped for his entire life, the ones supported by everything he's seen in his entire life, by the entirety of Japan.

And that is where the conflict is, that is what the story focuses on: what is right? What is a hero? What is a villain?

...

Well, that's how I would do an OP Izuku story, anyways.

#ask #bnha critical #mha critical #OP has consquences #Hero vs hero #the chronic lack of quirklessness development #the failure of the development of heroic society and corruption #the dabi benchmark of insanity

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