just finished watching nimona, i may or may not have sobbed

Ballister, kissing Ambrosius: Be gay.

Nimona, breathing fire, destroying property, stealing cars, and just being a menace to society: DO CRIMES.

Been thinking about the Goldenheart/Nimona family dynamic, so here are some headcanons pertaining to the sillies as parents

While Nimona is functionally their adopted child in many ways, she also isn't. She's their sidekick, roommate, best friend, mentor, mentee, child, sibling, all rolled into one chaotic shape-shifting gremlin who lives in their house

I do think however that at some point, the family would adopt a child (besides Nimona) that they could actually raise

Based on what's seen in the show I imagine Ballister to be an orphan himself with a childhood very similar to that of Comic Ambrosius, this weird rambunctious little sad orphan kid who wants to prove himself more than anything. I think he would totally want to raise the family he never had and give it to a little orphan kid like him.

Ambrosius I think would want to raise a family as well, he radiates dad energy, but really wouldn't want anyone else to have to deal with the Legacy of Gloreth on their shoulders, so he'd want to adopt rather than try and father any biological children. Plus he sees his beloved husband in all those sweet little babies at the orphanage and by default that makes him love them so much.

We already know Nimona is good with kids. I feel like people don't bring that up because she's pretty alternative and in our society, liking kids is seen as somewhat trad (especially for a person with an even remotely feminine presentation) but it's obvious that she has a soft spot for them. She puts herself in danger just to comfort a little girl who was frightened, she is devastated by children's learned fear and hatred of her. Anyway what I'm saying is she would totally be like "ew, a child, keep it away" then proceed to be the absolute best uncle/aunt/sibling/godparent/mentor/friend imaginable. She would shapeshift into a little kid to play with them, or into animals like when she used to play with Gloreth. If they were adopted as an older child (not a baby) I think they'd glom to her first because she can make herself very physically non-threatening whereas two battle-scarred brick shithouses can't really do much to change how imposing they look besides trying to be as nice as possible.

I can imagine Ambrosius being a stay-at-home dad because while Ballister was actively extremely ambitious about his career, Ambrosius was just kind of shoved into it with no choice, and expected to be perfect. I can imagine him burning out and going like "Nope. Don't want that. Never wanted that, actually. I'm going to stay home and play Legos with my baby and the creature that lives in my house." Not to mention, while both the boys have dad energy, I think Ambrosius is more of an extrovert and would be less likely to get mentally burned out taking care of a little kid all day

One particular situation I like to imagine is them coming home from a date night after leaving Baby with Nimona and opening the door to see she's shapeshifted into one of them to calm the baby down. They are both screaming crying throwing up over how sweet it is before Nimona can try to explain themself away.

i'm procrastinating studying rn so here's a list of my kins and reasons why i kin them

*drum roll*

nimona (nimona)

chaoic gremlin, genderfluid, "fuck the government" personified, just wants to be accepted and loved for who she is, pretends to be "a villain" and plays into that "evil" role society made for her to protect herself emotionally, destructive

blitz (helluva boss)

chaotic, traumatized, parents would've wanted someone else as their child instead of him, hides insecurities and inferiority complex behind fake big ego

catra (she ra and the princesses of power)

mommy issues, her mother would've wanted someone else as her child instead of her, "this person hurt me so i'm gonna be successful, beat them in every aspect of life and shove my success and their failure in their face every time i see them" mindset

marcy (amphibia)

unimportant friend in a trio, friends don't share her niche interests, very much a daydreamer, "i excel at school so i can play video games and read comics/manga and watch cartoons/anime/movies" vibes, escapes reality by running away into a fantasy world where everything is magical and amazing and new and interesting

luz (the owl house)

"the truth can't hurt me if i pretend it doesn't exist" mindset, daydreamer, escapes reality by running away to a fantasy land where everything is not better, but new and interesting, lies to loved ones about her own wellbeing in order to avoid worrying them, has absolutely no idea what she wants from life or where she's going or what her future is

amity (the owl house)

mommy issues, "i've been following my parents orders blindly and not even thinking about my life up until a certain point when i realized that the life they chose for me doesn't fit me/isn't something i want for myself and now i have to rebel/convince them to let me make my own choices" mindset

willow (the owl house)

insecure af, nice and kind towards her friends and ready to murder anyone who even considers harming them, "everyone has bigger issues than me right now so i'll focus all of my attention on being there for them and i'll be emotionally vulnerable and deal with my issues later, wgen everything gets resolved" mindset (which leads to bottling up emotions despite having friends for support)

gus (the owl house)

gifted kid TM, his skills are so integrated into who he is that he has an existential crisis every time he mildly fucks up anything he's usually good/great at

diane (bojack horseman)

"good damage." that's it.

well that's all folks! thank you for coming to my ted talk / therapy session! i'll see you when/if i survive exam week!! :D

Good Stuff: Nimona

or How to Not Worry & Channel Your Inner Limp Bizkit

In the year before 2020, it was announced that Blue Sky Studios was adapting ND Stevenson's hit graphic novel. Everything changed though when Disney was on that bullshit post-Fox buyout, where to our surprise Blue Sky and Nimona would be shut down. The latter's cancellation hit especially hard understanding it was almost finished anyways, but that's Disney for you. Long as you don't say gay and give 'em your money, they'll stay out of the way. Leave it to Netflix to let the film rebound from Super Hell and finally make it to both the big and small screen; makes you forget they're garbage at anything else. All in all, Blue Sky had the last laugh one more time but was Nimona able to bring the flavorful fireworks or did we get a weak flare that fumbled before the 4th of July?

Well, I will declare now that the film... is fun. If it wasn't fun, that means Disney made it and would remake it live-action around 2040. This film is a ride-or-die by its titular protagonist and lads, I can't lie...

PROTECT. THIS. GODDAMN. SMILE.

Nimona is both a bundle of chaotic joy and an entity that deserved far better. She's like the manifestation of Limp Bizkit, 2000s punk, and B-tier shitposting rolled into an unapologetic but deeply frustrated rebel. I've seen naysayers before release going, "She's another attitude girl archetype" and like no. She has that raw gremlin bastard energy, but she's never an annoying bitch and that's big difference. The best thing is that you're with Ballister in getting to know her; it surprisingly hard for folk to be accepting of somebody harmless who's more comfortable with themselves than anyone lets on. She's not a character I felt forced to sympathize with nor was intrusive on Ballister's story. She's not exactly the focus, but she earned being the star of this movie.

I got major Haruhi and Kyon vibes from their dynamic and it's great

Plotwise, there's a good flow to it all that makes this rewatchable thrill. If there's one major gripe I have is that while Nimona and Ballister have a great dynamic, there's a part in the 2nd act involving them and the villain that was a bit rushed. I will admit to not have read the book, but while I do know the tone is different given they were probably going for an all age rating, I say things didn't feel too compromised. My mind is blown enough that we got an animated kids movie with two, COUNT 'EM TWO, openly queer protagonists. No winks and nudges towards Ballister being gay, no scatterbrained subtlety on Nimona's genderfluid existence, and thank balls their story exists as more than being a preachy memoir. These two get to just BE and live to go on a crime spree justice adventure. That is what I've wanted for longer than any of you think and this delivered. Any criticisms I could have I felt was diluted by the actual fun this was.

And if you've seen Iron Giant, you probably will love this movie

To conclude, I am wondering of a timeline where this wasn't originally cancelled and Blue Sky didn't get axed. This was as much their movie as it is Annapurna and DNEG who helped finish it. People said it looked "unfinished" but then again, given the situation I can cut it some slack because it still plays out gorgeously. Like you know Blue Sky got most of it done, but you think about the changes in direction and ponder if this was the best outcome for the film. It is poetic though, a phoenix forced to burn out but gets to revive as a stronger, if not more so, being that people finally get to see. For Nate, this is undoubtedly a dream come true. As for me, not since Puss in Boots The Last Wish have I been delighted to call this a...

9/10 ABSOLUTE BANGER

Watching Stuff Day 2 - 7/8/2023 - Current Streak: 2

For today's movie, I watched Nimona, and it was so good that it felt criminal that I was able to watch it by just having a Netflix account. I wish this movie had a theatrical release for the sole reason that it would allow me to purchase tickets and support it more directly.

As mentioned in my previous post, I read the Nimona graphic novel when I was middle school and I decided to read again before watching the movie to refresh myself on it. The movie ended up changing most of the plot while still keeping quite a few similar story beats, so the re-read wasn't really needed. Even though it wasn't a faithful adaptation with the exact plot, it did still feel faithful to the spirit of the original comic and the purpose of its story which is why I feel that it's still a good adaptation alongside being an amazing movie on its own.

One of the major changes that I ended up really liking was how they handled Ambrosius and Ballister's relationship dynamic, they made them have more explicitly show that they have romantic feelings for eachother and even had them in a relationship. I also specifically with how it changes the scene where Ambrosius removes Ballister's arm. In the comic, Ambrosius and Ballister were more spiteful despite still having some care for each other because they had a longer period of time in the comic to develop as enemies and because Ambrosius removing Ballister's arm was due to more selfish reasons. In the comic, Ambrosius was told that if he could beat Ballister in joust, he would become the Institution's Champion. The Institution wanted to secure his victory, so they gave him a weaponized lance in order to make that happen. He didn't want to use this unfair advantage, so he was planning to use it as just a regular lance. Since he wasn't familiar with it, he lost fair and square to Ballister, and in desperation he used the weaponized lance and blew Ballister's arm off. It's still an interesting backstory for how that happened in the comic, but I prefer how the movie handled it by making it a much more complex situation. Instead of it just being black and white with Ambrosius being fully wrong, it's a lot more nuanced now. Slicing his arm off was still a bad thing to do from the audience's perspective because we know Ballister is innocent but from the perspective of everyone else, he had a dangerous weapon that just killed the queen and needed to be stopped. However, since Ambrosius had such a deep connection and relationship to Ballister, it still works at being a betrayl to Ballister since Ambrosius would've been the one most likely to trust and defend Ballister, and Ambrosius being aware of that adds to his guilt over it. It does a lot to set up conflict between the characters while still giving you reason to empathize with both of them to some degree. Also, generally since they were still in a relationship at this inciting incident for the film and still have strong feelings for eachother throughout, it adds a lot more depth and intrigue for the scenes they share together and how they end up. As individuals though, I feel like both characters were changed a lot from their comic counterparts. Ballister's change feels a bit more natural to me as we're seeing a version of him that didn't have any reason to be critical of the institution or commit more actually evil acts until he met Nimona, while he was already doing that himself for a while in the comic. Ambrosius feels very different though, he seems to be a better person in the movie, showing more guilt and struggle with his actions. This is somewhat better because it strengthens his relationship with Ballister but doesn't feel as much like the original character.

As for Nimona's character she was handled perfectly here! They kept her as a violent, chaotic, fun-loving gremlin and executed that incredibly well, no notes on that. I also really liked all of the focus given on how she doesn't want to be defined by others or feel like she has to change to be accepted. What I found to be one of the most emotional scenes in the movie was when she was flashing-back to when she was using her powers and changing herself to try and fit in with various groups of animals only to experience rejection each time, only to find someone she thought did accept her as she is, only for her to be betrayed and have that ripped away. I almost cried at that. I also like how the movie had a more uplifting and happy ending for her with her being accepted and mourned by everyone while having an ending scene that implies that she is still fully alive and going to be more directly connected to Ballister. This is more of a personal preference though, the comic ending is also really good, and in quite a few ways better critically imo, I'm just a sucker for happier endings most of the time.

A few minor nitpicks I have:

I feel like Ballister's distrust of Nimona at the end wasn't as well built up as it could've been. It was still fine, but having the comic as a comparison, where it was much more believable with how it happened makes it stand out a bit more to me.

The artstyle was quite a bit different from the original comic. I found the comic's artstyle really charming and was a little disappointed it was changed so much. However, I understand that it was the kind of style that would be difficult to adapt in 3D and the new style they went with also looks really nice on it's own. While I'm talking about how it looks visually, it was also really well and smoothly animated for the most part along with having interesting shot composition. It also had really good modeling and set design. They really knocked it out of the park with all of that.

They changed Ballister's last name to Boldheart instead of Blackheart. I don't have an issue with that , but do think it's a missed opportunity that they didn't have a line where someone who believes him to be a villain goes "Boldheart?!? More like Blackheart!" It would've been cheesy but I would've appreciated the reference.

Overall, an amazing movie on its own along with having good callbacks to the comic (stuff like the board games, "I'm a shark", and the zombie movie). A near 10/10, I'll probably rewatch it at some point in the near future and if they do a blu-ray release of it I'll probably buy that too.