#not from a 'great for my characters in particular' standpoint | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

dilfsonic · 1 year

Note

PLEASE tell me more about Sonmetadow! Anything at all- headcanons, meta, just rambling about them, anything!!

Sorry this is so late!! But I wanted to answer this for a while.

> Metal gradually develops complicated feelings the longer he’s allowed close proximity with his organic copy. As an AI he learns constantly, but given he’s only ever around Eggman his emotionally intelligence can only go so far. The more he watches, learns from, and mimics Sonic, the more his emotional intelligence grows. And the more he ‘feels’ what Sonic feels (this headcanon is derived from a mix of the OVA movie from the 90s and modern iterations).

> In my au, Metal naturally forms feelings for Shadow because SONIC has feelings for Shadow first. Metal inadvertently mimics these emotions and they develop the longer Sonic’s emotions influence him. In turn he becomes influenced by Shadow’s feelings…it’s a never ending feedback loop, feeding into one another.

> Metal may mimic their emotions to begin with, but as he becomes more advanced, he comes to grasp his own uniquely complicated feelings. He hated Sonic, but it was a hate he was programmed with. When hardwiring meets fallible emotion— which comes out on top? That’s the question. He now can no longer tell if he wants to be his organic copy or if he wants to be WITH him. Sonic has a unique ability to the touch the core of those he empathizes with, and I think if he got past Metal’s hardwiring/if that was ever compromised, Metal has the potential to be the most touched by him.

> He’s still learning, he never ‘finishes’ developing and therefore his feelings are ever evolving, the more self aware he becomes and can begin to pinpoint and predict his own feelings. Sonic is his primary guide in this, while Shadow (who is peak example of holding onto very complicated emotions) kind of learns alongside with him.

> Metal and Shadow bond a lot over things that have been brought up in canon. Shadow has a unique and interesting facet of his character in which he’s shown to consistently show a great empathy and understanding of robots and androids. Metal Sonic, Omega, Emerl, etc… Particularly with Metal, who has a similar dilemma as Omega, in which he’s a tool for the Doctor, like Shadow was. Whereas canonically Omega defected on his own, Shadow is trying to convince Metal to do it. He won’t hesitate to fight Metal, but he would prefer not to, and he’s set aside their necessary opposition to work with Metal in the past, who was even willing to take the chaos emerald from his own body to give Shadow a chance to warp back home. That’s pretty awesome.

> An interesting observation to me is that Shadow and Sonic are both often in opposition from a moral standpoint, they actually both share a goal with Metal. Both of them extend their hands in offering to him, and encourage him to make his own decisions independent of Eggman. And it’s not that Sonic and Shadow even want Metal to be a hero necessarily— even if Metal were to remain an adversary, they just want Metal to come to that decision on his own. Shadow and Sonic both have a strong sense of freedom in their own ways, and encourage others to exercise their own freedom even if it means that person continuing on their own opposing path.

> In a what-if scenario, seeing Sonic and Shadow combine their efforts to free Metal is really fascinating to me. Metal is like Shadow in the sense where it begs the question, can he really learn to love? Is he capable of that particular emotion? Can he grasp what romantic interest really means? He understands as best he can, and is still learning all the while… Yes, while Sonic and Shadow certainly hold a candle for one another by this point in the story, their ‘love’ is considerably complicated. They’re still rivals, after all. Rivals with benefits, I suppose! Except the longer they’re ‘stuck’ together (affectionate) the more they fall into a comfortable push and pull.

They become sort of inadvertently committed (though Sonic continues to see other lovers he’s kept up over the years, Knuckles and Jet), and it probably stems from the fact that Sonic is canonically one of the only (if not the only) people to touch his heart. They are both still guarded in their own ways, and would probably require many lifetimes over and over to fully learn and know the other, and it’s something they enjoy exploring.

The difference is, Shadow has endless time to learn about Metal, but only one lifetime to learn about Sonic. It’s sort of bittersweet, the way Sonic continues to live on through Metal after he’s gone in lots of little ways, but Metal is still his own unique personhood, and Shadow knows better than to think he could use him as a replacement.

Anyway, sorry for this wall of text!! I have a Lot of opinions and feelings on these guys. They’re my OT3 LOL. Please feel free to ask more questions whether it’s regarding my au or just sonmetadow as a concept in general because I have a never ending fountain of thoughts and scenarios on them.

#asks #sonic the hedgehog #Sonadow #metonic #metadow #sonmetadow #heroes and cons au

150 notes · View notes

vasito-de-leche · 1 month

Note

I saw your post regarding the Self-Aware R1999!AU and it was good and mind-blowing! Now I'm wondering how will it go with 6 or 37 regaining consciousness, considering that they're always seeking for the "truth", and maybe the Reader's existence would heighten the quest for the truth more!

;R1999 37 - Self Aware AU

Headcanons about how 37 would act upon becoming self-aware. Related to this Self-Aware AU post.

I RECENTLY FINISHED 6'S ANECDOTE, SO NOW I HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS THIS ASK IS A GREAT EXERCISE TO GET THE BRAIN GOING o7

this post only contains 37, since it got a little long and I didn't know how to format it the usual way because I LOVE rambling and rambling. I think there's another ask somewhere about 6 in the self-aware AU, so I'll get to that one soon!

also I think this post is impossible to read if you haven't read chapter 5 at least, bc I use a lot of the terms used in Apeiron!

37 is such an interesting character. Okay okay, bear with me for a bit while I get all of my 37 thoughts out of my brain!

I feel like people downplay how cruel or detached she can be. Because of her innate ability to see numbers in everyone and everything, essentially seeing "the truth" and being able to provide Proof to support her claims, 37 lives disconnected from her entire community while also being upheld as a genius and beacon of progress. She's the "Star of Hermes," after all.

A lot of her character focuses on this alienation and "othering," how her mindset and beliefs set her apart from others as she cannot understand the importance of soul numbers from an emotional standpoint--like she says in the main story, she's always known she's 37. Everyone's known this. And she does not understand the importance of knowing WHY she's 37. She doesn't care about the traits assigned to each number, that is meaningless rhetoric to her, what matters is the final result. She's 37, and that's it. She upholds the purity of numbers, practically worships this pure aspect of the world of Forms. She's at her happiest when she talks about how numbers will always be numbers, no matter who tries to figure them out, or when or how.

And we also see the cruel aspect of her that I believe people overlook--37 admits that she enjoys revealing people's numbers because she wants to be the first to prove this truth. It's only near the end of Chapter 05 that she wonders, if only briefly, whether being the first to prove someone's number means that she knew the truth better. Other than that, she has absolutely NO trouble revealing Vertin's number, nor attempting to tell Sophia her own number as kids--and 37, while she does not care for the rhetoric of numbers and their assigned virtues, knows how much the journey of self-discovery means to her entire community. And she still chose to do this, because she does not see the value in the process.

This isn't to say that she's exclusively a cruel character nor a misguided little baby, I would say that she's cruel the same way a child can be--37 is a very lovely and complex character! I just think people take her cute appearance at face value and forget the extent of her abilities and her perception of the world.

In the context of a Self-Aware AU, I believe that this self-awareness would be recontextualized as yet another eternal truth for her. Her curiosity wouldn't be applied to this, because there is nothing to figure out--the world has always been a game, that's it. Instead of focusing on the emotional or existential aspects, 37 would focus instead on the "guidelines" that rule this fake world.

It would revolve around the mechanical aspects: she understands that every fight follows a set pattern, as this is a turn based combat game. She wants to know why some people stand out, why they're assigned as 6 or 5 or 4 or 3 or 2 stars. Why not a 1 star? Why not 10? Why this system in particular? Why doesn't Sophia have any stars? Is it because she hasn't figured out her number yet? No, that can't be, because 210 also lacks stars. And so on and so forth.

The focus will still be numbers, so she would be the perfect assistant for Players who care a lot about meta!

I'm also willing to say that 37 would be one of the very few characters who has no trouble at all coping with the fact that she's a character in a videogame. To know that she's a bunch of "code" wouldn't change a thing for her, because she was already 37 in the first place!

There is also the aspect of finding out that her mother's death (as well as Sophia's father) was scripted. I'm going on a long tangent here, so bear with me for a second.

I feel like... 37 would see that as a positive thing? First of all, we know that the death of everyone in that boat was caused because of a miscalculation from Sophia and 37's part, which is the catalyst for 37's Emanation research. I do believe that, even though 37 shows little to no (conventional) emotion in that specific moment, she still grieves and mourns in her own way--and the way she does that is by clinging onto the one thing that is left of her mother: her pneuma analysis and research, the computer that stopped working, the pattern of the "Storm". We are told that 37 became a recluse, isolating herself even more from her community, when her and her mother's research was proven to be wrong, that she only came out of her lab when Vertin and her team arrived. We see her muttering while unconscious in the cave with Vertin, calling out for her own mother and telling her that their research wasn't wrong, that they were right all along (because they were missing one vital piece of information that only an outsider like Vertin could deliver).

Second of all, we know that 37 does not understand nor care about fate, she does not care for wordplay that muddies the true essence of numbers. So she would not think that the death of all those people can be attributed to something as vague and nonsensical as "fate."

Third and final point of this tangent, 37 does not like to be proven wrong. Or rather, 6's character event shows us that, no matter what she's told or how she behaves, 37 will always believe that she's in the right.

With all of this in mind, I think that finding out that this accident was something scripted--that is to say, part of the "truth" (or canon, from our perspective) of this world--would reinforce 37's beliefs. This miscalculation was a mistake born from her former self, the 37 that did not truly understand the world, before she achieved self-awareness. And now that she's wide awake, there's no way that she could ever make a mistake like that ever again. If else, I can see her being mildly irritated that it took her this long to open her eyes, struggling with the fact that she's not the first person to become self-aware. And just like she casually reveals other people's numbers, she would dangle the knowledge of self-awareness in front of others instead of keeping it secret.

On the subject of finding out about the Player, I'm not quite sure how 37 would react. Sure, 37's life is ruled by the same dogma that rules everyone else within Apeiron, but her approach is devoid of that same spiritual and religious devotion that others like 210 carry. Like we see in 6's character event, 37 does not care about the importance of the number 6 nor whoever holds the title, because the "truth" is that everyone within that bloodline is going to inherit the title at some point or another. Compare this to 210, who treats the previous 6 (Atticus' aunt, Alma) with such reverence.

So perhaps that's how 37 would act, then? This "divine" figure is yet another 6 for her, someone who has all relevant knowledge, nothing more and nothing less.

I like to think that 37 is able to see the Player very clearly right away, the same way she can see people's numbers, whereas 6 is the one who can hear them clearly, the same way he inherits the Revelation from his ancestors.

And unless you're another super math genius like her, I can absolutely see 37 pouting about it. How come someone like you gets to be "outside" in the world of Forms? Maybe she becomes curious about finding "proof" of your world, to confirm whether you live in the world of Forms or something else entirely, perhaps yet another world of Matters, full of Fragments. Realizing that the world the Player lives in is practically identical to her own--minus the existence of integers and fractions, just a world full of imaginary numbers--would be a curious experience for 37.

I can also see 37 telling Vertin the Player's own soul number the moment she figures it out, perhaps as a way to repay the favour for the events of Chapter 05. Assuming she survives that bomb, I actually don't know what happens in Chapter 06 LMFAO....

Long story short, not many would realize that 37 has become self-aware, since her behaviour remains largely the same. And it wouldn't affect her as deeply as it affects other characters.

#reverse 1999 #reverse: 1999 #reverse 1999 x reader #reverse 1999 37 #37 #self aware au

35 notes · View notes

masezace · 9 months

Text

little off topic for my blog, but i started watching a new show since a friend mentioned it was good and i'd heard positive things about it, so i just wanted to talk about it a little bit (probably never again after this since this isn't a fandom blog, but it's the only one i have rn so idc it's going here)

the show is Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous, and just going on looks alone, despite my love for dinosaurs and the Jurassic Park franchise i never would have considered it. it appears to be very much for kids, and as i'm in my late twenties now i'm not particularly interested in especially kiddy media. however a friend my age enjoyed it and mentioned it has a canon lgbtq+ couple in it among the main characters, so of course i just had to watch it. i had already been hearing that despite its initial appearance and premise, it was surprisingly good for a kids' show, so i had already been curious, but i was even more keen after knowing there were queer characters, and not even the adults, the kids themselves (in a kid's show?!! what a time to be alive), so i finally sat down and watched it.

[spoiler warning, both minor and major, for the rest of this post btw, so continue reading at your own risk if you haven't seen it yet/are still watching]

the show overall

okay so firstly, i am coming at all of this from the perspective of a writer, so my observations are from a technical standpoint more so than just as a fan of the show. and honestly, it really is a well-written show as a whole. is it geared towards kids? definitely. there are plenty of jokes/gags in it that just don't appeal to me as an adult, but beyond that, there was plenty to appreciate as an adult.

the writing is actually phenomenal? there were several points in the series where i just sat back and mulled over the way a scene went, what the thought process behind writing it was like, how well it was executed, and how important it was to the characters and overall plot.

the suspense is spot on, nothing gets dragged out too long, and i will admit there have been a few scenes throughout that actually got me; i jumped! it's actually scarier than i expected a kid show to be, but i'm so glad they went where they did because it really elevated the experience.

the pacing overall is very good, adequately engaging for kids' short attention spans (and us adhd adults 🥲) but not too short either to a point where things felt abrupt or unfinished. plot arcs are well developed and tied up nicely. also, as a bit of a dinosaur nerd, the array of dinosaurs in the show is super broad and satisfying! very fun stuff.

character element

imo the real gem of this show is the character development. honestly it's just *chefs kiss*

the characters grow and change so much and so realistically over the course of the show, it's honestly so much better and more satisfying than the character growth in most adult fiction/media recently.

the growth in ben (who btw was def my favorite character by the end of s1) and kenji in particular were my favorites and, in my personal opinion, the most interesting. the way ben started out anxious, cowardly, and rule abiding to a fault, then grew into a brave, confident, adventurous little pyromaniac gremlin, then had that stint later in the series where he regressed a bit-questioning himself-until eventually ultimately striking a great balance and really coming into himself was just... peak character writing.

kenji started out overconfident, lazy, and overly concerned with money/status. but that arrogant overconfidence and laziness slowly turned into responsibility, and a desire to protect his found family, and the realization that it's the people in your life that really matter most.

honestly what i mentioned only scratches the surface in terms of those two characters, there's certainly more that can be said about them (as well as all the others) but i'm not really in the mood for a deep dive character analysis atm. just trust me tho when i say these characters are so well done and each one of them have arcs that are super satisfying to watch play out.

queer representation

and as for the queer couple? yasmina and sammy are PERFECT. it was so beautiful watching their relationship grow from one-sided to mutual friendship, to loyal devotion, then to love. they were set up incredibly well and incredibly naturally. i have like, no complaints when it comes to them. i don't even know if there's anything i can say that would add to things, they were just a really awesome couple to watch become canon, they're the beautiful and painfully needed representation we all beg for in tv and movies.

shipping, chemistry, and intent

but oh goodness... probably my only real complaint about the entire show would be how benji (ben x kenji) and kenji x brooklyn (kenlyn? brookji? idk and idrc) were handled. because for all that this show did SO much beautifully right, they really screwed the pooch here, sadly.

i'm gonna start by saying that the writing in this show, as with most, is deliberate. what i mean by this is that despite having no clue who it would be because my friend thankfully did not even spoil me as far as the genders of the queer couple, i clocked yas and sammy as the would-be queer couple as early as season one (actually it was between them and benji, but more on that later). i could already see the chemistry, because it was deliberately written in.

shipping is subjective. anyone can ship any character, and in most cases it's pretty easy to see how there could be (romantic) chemistry between fan pairings based on their personalities, their arcs, etc. and that's okay! ships don't even have to have any canon support to be valid, because shipping is for the fandom, and it's for fun (i have a few rarepairs and crack ships across different media that i just love).

but onscreen/written romantic chemistry is a lot less subjective (to clarify, it is subjective whether or not the chemistry is good, but it's not subjective about whether or not it exists). there are literally scenes written with the sole purpose of building the romantic tension and/or chemistry between planned couples (some of which even have absolutely zero plot relevance, which usually is not advised tbh, and most of which are the cliches/tropes you see in literally any romance ever written, some are just disguised a little better than others. but make no mistake, it's all the same set of cliches. there is nothing new under the sun), as well as intentional, key moments within scenes that have other purposes. they are essential to establish romantic pairings.

and typically, the foundations for these couples are laid VERY early on. always within the first or second season (well, at least they are when the writer actually knows what they're doing and has at least a rough plan/outline for the entire series & characters. this is usually a large part of what separates the good chemistry from the poor chemistry. an author who knows who the couples are going to be and has a plan from the beginning to build them up is going to be more successful in creating a believable relationship with good chemistry. one who does not plan, or makes last minute plans will almost certainly fail, and the couple is just going to suck). when the set of characters you're working with are going to stay the same for most or all of the story, you start immediately.

i don't mean to toot my own horn, because i think it's because i'm a writer so i just pick up on narrative patterns very easily, and pretty much always clock the planned couples within the first few episodes of any series, and by the end i am right like 9 times out of 10.

that being said, do you know whose deliberately written chemistry i also clocked in jwcc? ben and kenji's.

kenji and... brooklyn?

no offense to people who like/enjoy kenji and brooklyn, you are free to love them, but the way their romance was written is... quite possibly the weakest point of the show. it felt like they were just trying to appease the upsetto heteros in charge, because there was definitely another het pairing that had a lot more potential than kenji and brooklyn (hello darius x brooklyn aka darilyn, you would have actually made sense because your relationship had amazing buildup and multiple standout scenes from s1 on. dgmw, i love that we got a m/f strong, supportive, purely platonic friendship out of them, i live for those and we really need more of them. but we could have had that with kenji and brooklyn, or darius and sammy, or ben and yas, literally any other pair instead).

kenji and brooklyn as a couple came out of absolutely nowhere. i honestly think they decided to shove them together last minute, and had no actual plan for them until they were working on s4. because their development barely started at the VERY end of s3 (the abruptness of him caring about her being held hostage so much more than literally anyone else in their group despite them having like zero buildup to that point gave me whiplash), but honestly didn't really even become "meaningful" development until s4, over halfway through the series. the two spend the first 3 seasons basically not particularly gaf about each other individually, only as part of the whole group and on an equal level with everyone else. they otherwise have no deliberate narrative foundation. it just starts in s4 with no prior hinting. which makes their development rocky and difficult to believe. the funny thing is their characters literally have dialogue (in s4) trying to draw comparisons/parallels between them to say that they especially have a lot in common and like??? no? they really don't? not any more so than any other two kids in the group. their relationship just, really falls flat.

it was disappointing to see it take such a massive spotlight in the series for almost all of seasons 4 and 5, overshadowing the friendships that have been the focus of the show and should have remained so, to the point where at times it just felt like i was watching some stereotypical het highschool romance. genuinely, it made s4 & 5 more of a drag to get through. yasammy and ben and yas' growing bond (which by the way was so sweet, it had the strongest queer solidarity vibes good lord, i sure wonder why yas chose ben out of everyone to come out to first, hmmm) were some of the few things that kept me invested, otherwise i would have dropped it if it had leaned much farther into becoming the kenlyn show than it already was. especially when it was that pair so much of the focus was given to, even though we had so readily and perfectly available, the pair that could have, should have been: benji. which finally brings me to:

ben and kenji

benji's foundation was laid in s1. their interactions, the situations they found themselves in, were deliberate (on the writers' part). i'm even gonna go out on a limb here and say the pairings were fully established in s1e3, even with parallels between yasammy and benji (sammy clinging to yas and ben clinging to kenji throughout the episode), and darilyn gets the beginning of their development too.

even though they bicker a lot in the beginning, they clearly care about each other? kenji protects/helps ben multiple times, and there are definitely some looks ben gives kenji at times. at the end of s1, the one who seems the most deeply effected over ben's "death," other than darius (understandably since he's the one who failed to save him), was kenji! immediately after it happens, we get two close up shots, darius and brooklyn then yasmina and sammy. after which, we go back to the whole group with kenji in center frame, the focus is intentionally on him. it is only kenji who drops to his knees at the loss, and then we get a close up of just kenji. he was saved for last, and he was alone in frame (tbf bumpy was in frame too, but i'm talking humans here), which implies his feelings are especially important in this moment. that is the reason for solo close ups.

after ben's "death," kenji takes to always wearing ben's fanny pack, and up until bumpy--who ben cares VERY much about--got separated from them, kenji was the one who (however briefly) took over her care, ensuring she got off the monorail with them, and he's extremely distraught, more than pretty much all of them, when they can't find her, and he's last to leave when they decide to accept that ben's gone. even when they do leave, he's distant and distracted and his mind is clearly still on ben.

other than darius, kenji is the only one (if i'm remembering correctly) to mention ben/say his name after they lost him, upset because he was actually trying not to think about him. he has clearly thought about ben, probably a lot, because it's hard not to be reminded constantly when you wear something that belonged to a deceased loved one. and frankly, he appears to be the only one who dwells on him that much.

when ben reappears alive (which btw he found the group again because of kenji's butter knife, hello), the frames literally purposely focus on kenji's reaction. he's the one in the foreground every time they show him and brooklyn in that scene. he is the first one to say ben's name, the first one to go to him and hug him, and the scene takes special care to highlight kenji's strong emotions at ben's reappearance, lingering on his teary face as the focus for a bit even after brooklyn enters the frame to hug ben (because she is not at all an important element in the scene at that moment). just like when ben "died," the way this scene is written and shot HEAVILY suggests that ben holds significant importance to kenji, specifically. because again, the focus here is on kenji and ben almost exclusively, with brooklyn as only an afterthought lol. and quite frankly literally everyone else's reaction to him being alive was pretty lackluster compared to the special attention they gave to kenji on this.

and then in s3 we have the infamous hat scene, where darius and ben are in the limo and ben sees and mentions kenji's sailor hat, looking sad and sounding like... longing?? then directly after we switch to kenji realizing he forgot his hat?? the scene has no real significance tbh other than to draw a connection between ben and kenji. like, it acts as a transition to switch to the pov of the group on the boat, but it was entirely unnecessary? why not just have darius say something about the others and then show them on the boat? if there were no special relationship between ben and kenji, it would have made far more sense if they really wanted it to be ben to say something, that he sees the hat, and sadly says something along the lines of "i hope the others are okay/doing better than we are right now/etc" which implies that the hat made him think of everyone, their whole group. rather than what we got... which very much implies that he was mostly just thinking about kenji 💀 and then kenji thinking about the hat at the same time ben's looking at it and thinking of kenji. like, this is.... a very blatant connection being made by the writing/directing here.

all of that. so many deliberate connections made between ben and kenji, they had a very solid foundation laid for a romance to develop, and by all intents and purposes one already WAS developing according to the show's own subtext. which was why up until s4 obliterated the idea, i was positive the queer couple in the show was either going to be yasammy or benji. it was extremely obvious imo. but as soon we started getting the typical, loud, cliche "we are going to pair off these characters" scenes for kenji and brooklyn, i knew we were getting yasammy and not benji (to be clear, i'm not at all upset about yasammy, they're beautiful and i love how their relationship was done, i wouldn't have had it end any other way for them. but i do personally prefer benji, i just like their personalities and dynamic more. and i feel they had so much potential that got wasted to make way for a far less interesting pairing between kenji and brooklyn. why can't we have 2 queer couples, huh? and if we really needed a minimum of one hetero pairing to appease whoever needed appeasing, darilyn was right there).

but then??? their like entire bond just gets dropped (honestly ben himself gets pretty heavily sidelined for almost all of the last two seasons, which is criminal imo). mostly so that a rushed kenji x brooklyn can be established. like there are still a few small moments here and there in early s4, and one episode in s5 (ep 10), but from early s4 till pretty much the end of the series we hardly see them have any meaningful conversations or interactions, meanwhile literally every other combo in the group does.

it's so weird? why build up benji so deliberately over the course of multiple seasons just to like, fully discard it for a pairing with far less chemistry, even after the chemistry-building scenes they shared, some of which literally had no other purpose than to affirm their connection? even though they were very sparse, the moments benji had were just so blatant (kenji leaps into the rock crevice right onto the back of a saber tooth to save ben?!!?? like he literally was just willing to exchange his life for him like that?? he basically says that he wasn't really thinking, he just did it. so he moved out of what, emotional instinct, that's what we're meant to intuit from that series of events? implying that he specifically has strong emotion and doesn't think things through when it comes to ben? because he doesn't do that kinda stuff for any of the others in the group! even better, this parallels when sammy jumped on the nothosaurus to save yasmina. and then the way benji look at each other after it's over??? hello??? and then how kenji pulls both brooklyn and ben in for that hug a couple minutes later... side eyeing the writers for that choice. they knew what they were doing there and they were evil for it). i just can't see any reason to have dropped them like they were, after all the development they shared for 3 seasons. confounding. biggest disappointment of the series.

i know this probably reads to some as just "wahh, my ship didn't become canon" nonsense. but that's not why i'm bugged. this wasn't just a ship i liked and wanted canon despite no actual narrative support, as most ships tend to be. this ship did have narrative support. there was intent behind many of their scenes together, lingering looks and little things that matter narratively and are always used to signify a stronger/special connection. and it led nowhere, for no good reason. that bothers me. writing that implies and promises something, but never delivers on it. like a person who never finishes their sentences (think Dr McPhee from Night at the Museum). ultimately it's not a HUGE deal or anything, at the end of the day it's just a ship and just a kids' show. but as a writer, it's just irritating to see something like that be done. what can i say 🤷

conclusion

even despite the wasted potential between certain pairings, and even though i do think the first three seasons were superior to the last two, overall i really enjoyed the show, and for what it was, it was really well-made. the overarching focus was of course on found family and friendship before anything else, which i absolutely love, and it was masterfully done. out of 6 kids, all of them had at least one or two meaningful bonding moments one-on-one with another in the group, so every possible combination had their moment to build strong, believable friendships with each other. i'm just so surprised by how good it was as a whole honestly, good enough to binge over the course of a week. i will happily recommend jwcc to anyone willing to give it a watch regardless of age, because i definitely think there's no age limit for a good story, no matter the medium it's told in. :)

#jwcc #jurassic world camp cretaceous #benji jwcc #benji #yasammy #yasammy jwcc #i would say that there's prob an age minimum tho... it's a bit scary so depending on the kid i wouldn't rec it to under 10 years #this is a long post #omg so long i'm sorry #i just have a lot to say #gotta shout into the void #it just be like that sometimes #fair warning this post is literally just me praising the show in the first half n then going absolutely off about benji in the second half #review #tv show review #as always with stuff like this that has any mention of ships it is bound to ruffle some feathers #so let me postface this with the reminder that this is all just MY OPINION #you are free to disagree but i'd rather you don't share your disagreements on my post via reblog/notes #feel free to write up your own show/ship review if you feel so strongly #otherwise if you dislike anything i've said you can just scroll past or block me <3

92 notes · View notes

calvincell · 5 months

Text

Finally got around to reading the first volume of ONE’s new manga “VERSUS” which is drawn via a new art collaborator: Azuma Kyoutarou! So far it honestly continues to confirm that One Punch Man & Mob Psycho 100 weren’t just flukes & ONE truly is just that good at original writing.

Basic 1st Chapter Spoilers:

VERSUS is a worldbuilding masterclass where multiple distinct human civilizations of different worlds facing varied extinction-level events/threats collide in an isekai-like fashion & must strategize & collectively work to resolve their doomsdays by pitting those threats against one another. As several readers have pointed out, the truly special thing about it is how each & every one of the so far revealed 13 worlds has a distinct setting that could easily work as a stand alone series which exponentially makes the whole series more compelling & fresh. Of course it has great fight scenes & character/creature designs & ONE’s particular brand of comedy that entertains but rarely takes away from tone & tension. One of the funniest wrinkles of the series is how the different humans, despite being desperate refugees of mid-apocalypse worlds often bicker like fanboys over the strength & danger their particular world’s threat is in the style of fandom arguments like: “Are you joking! Goku could totally beat the Hulk!”

So far the only issues I have with the series are:

A) The manga deserves a much more distinctive title than “VERSUS”. Hell, just from a search optimization standpoint the name completely kneecaps the series’ penetration into the mainstream/zeitgeist.

B) 11 chapters in & it sort of feels like the pacing is a bit off in a way I can’t quite explain. It feels slightly too fast but it might just be my own personal brain chemistry making it feel that way.

C) Somehow ONE has managed to create a much more annoying floating mascot character than MP100’s Dimple in the fairy character PanePane. It ruins each and every panel it’s in 😭

Besides all that though, I absolutely HIGHLY recommend giving the series a read for any manga fan but especially to anyone who already loves Mob Psycho or OPM

41 notes · View notes

svtellify · 1 year

Text

the vacker legacy and their golden boy: fitz vacker

welcome to my new psychoanalyzing kotlc characters series! i thought i’d start with fitz because this particular reread of the series has brought up some interesting facets in his character i had previously overlooked. i’ll try to keep this objective (focusing on canon and what shannon has written) but i’ll also include some of my personal opinions about him in a separate section at the end, to keep my bias out of it.

(apologies for how long these are going to get, i’m having a little too much fun with them!)

now.

fitzroy avery vacker.

it’s no secret that sophie is infatuated with him from the moment she meets him. but that’s sophie. this is about fitz (and while i do mention the love triangle situation and how it develops, it’s not really about the ships - that deserves it’s own moment to shine.) it’s also important to remember that the series is from sophie’s perspective. this is an unreliable narrator, and it shows us fitz through sophie’s eyes, but also through the other character’s eyes.

from the start, we’re told that fitz is the golden boy, the youngest telepath to manifest in the elven world and an incredibly powerful one at that. he grows up as a part of the vacker family, which is quite possibly the most powerful family in the lost cities, regardless of who the councillors are. all the elves grow up with money, but fitz grows up with status. what sets him apart from biana is how this status evolves between the two of them as the vacker legacy itself unravels.

in the first book, fitz is, from a writer’s standpoint, boring. he’s too perfect, never making mistakes, and busy being handsome and smart. obviously, given that the series is from sophie’s point of view, it makes sense that her gateway to the world remain untainted, regardless of her feelings for him. where we really start to get to know fitz is in exile. we get to see that perfection shatter entirely, and as a writer, it’s beautiful. fitz is ugly when he’s mad, shouting and screaming and blaming everyone but himself - outwardly. it’s no secret that he thinks highly of himself as the golden boy of the vacker family, and it’s hard to imagine that he doesn’t place some of the blame on himself for not being his dad’s first choice - or being able to fix alden.

still, his anger is a remarkable facet of his personality - and just what makes him a great foil to keefe. we’ve all seen his temper flare up in exile, blaming sophie for the memory break going wrong.

fitz isn’t used to things going wrong - as i’ve mentioned in other posts, he’s a creature of perfection of habit. he’s used to being the best, and while he admires sophie’s powers and her strength, that doesn’t mean he necessarily knows how to accept it with grace. in other words, he’s never been second best.

despite all the kids being young, fitz is the oldest of sophie’s group at the time. and his reaction shows his age, but not his maturity. he’s quick to blame and reacts without thinking - his anger brings out parts of him that he normally doesn’t reach for. fitz is always the one who prefers plans and thinking things out, and rarely do we see him like this. as a reader, it’s easy to hate him for this reaction - because we know that it’s not sophie’s fault. and the rational fitz is supposed to know that too - and he does.

kind of.

fitz’s greatest weakness as a character is that he doesn’t grow from this outburst. it’s not the first, and it’s not the last either. he’s a prideful guy - and with reason, he has a lot to be proud of. he’s not the best at apologizing either - it’s a cycle, where he gets mad, has an outburst, and apologizes with gifts to fix things.

this wouldn’t be such a big deal, i mean all of us have different love languages, right? but there’s a constant in the people he gets mad at (neverseen and related villains regardless. that’s justified anger, even at alvar, although that’s a little more complicated) and it’s:

1. sophie 2. keefe 3. dex

starting from the last, but not the least, dex. even after it’s revealed in (i believe) lodestar, that dex used to eat alone in his alchemy sessions and the vackers weren’t necessarily the nicest to him, snobby over their status in the elven world etc., we see him get mad at dex for hesitating over the situation with alvar. it’s particularly interesting, considering we never really see fitz bond with dex, just dex tell sophie that he’s going to be nicer to the vackers now that he understands them better. this is apparent to be a little more one sided in their interactions, and it gets worse with the reveal that alvar has “forgotten” his memories. fitz is ready to condemn him, but when dex isn’t, it upsets him.

remember, alvar was a part of the group that kidnapped and tortured sophie and dex. his supposed crush and his friend. and yet, both of the victims are feeling a little more kind hearted than fitz, who is alvar’s brother, yes, but it’s also been made clear that he isn’t as close to alvar as biana is. and yet.

as for keefe, his reasons for hating keefe make sense. and they don’t. if anything, he should be able to understand where keefe is coming from, especially since he *does* seem to be aware of keefe’s feelings for sophie. and despite the fact that they’re supposed to be best friends, he’s the least sympathetic to keefe’s situation. he’s betrayed, of course, they all are, and he’s angry about it, because of course he is. that’s normal - and it all adds up. where things get weird is when we realize that fitz doesn’t know that much about keefe. sophie’s the first one up to his house and keefe even says he doesn’t bring friends home, but it’s clear that he’s never talked about it with fitz.

fitz also has a tendency to not take keefe seriously, which the other characters all do an extent, but they know when to take him seriously and when to not. but fitz misses a lot of keefe’s growth and he still sees keefe as this weird kid that skipped a grade and likes to play pranks. keefe’s a shell of the person fitz knows at this point, and this is something they both need to come to terms with.

fitz’s pride comes into the picture here, manifesting as willful ignorance. he doesn’t know about keefe’s situation because, quite frankly? he didn’t want to sympathize with dex either. he’s a proud guy and this is GOOD characterization but. he kind of looks like a jerk.

in regards to sophie, these scenes sum up both how he feels about her and why i think they’re not good together:

i’ve talked a little about fitz and perfection and why he sees sophie as perfect even though it feels like he shouldn’t - and i don’t want to rehash all that so i’ll leave a little link to some thoughts i had regarding a scene in stellarlune, so you can check it out here. warning: stellarlune spoilers. the non spoiler version here: fitz craves perfection. his world was always perfect, and so was he. he’s the golden boy, after all, isn’t he?

what makes it so hard to have sympathy for him, after all i am an eldest daughter in an indian family with gifted kid burnout and a queer identity crisis - i know pressure lol it’s all i’ve ever known - is that he simply can not let go. he expects that painful level of perfection from himself, and it’s sad that they can’t have a little fun with the chandelier incident. he thinks that sophie would expect that kind of perfection from him, and for that reason, he thinks the problem is his levitating.

obviously lol, it’s not, but the boy but he also expects that kind of perfection from others, and thinks that others ALSO want that perfection, as seen in how he handles the news that sophie has found out who her genetic mother is.

more on THAT later. i doubt i’ll be able to stay objective on that scene so i’m saving it for the end of this little piece. (which is not as little as i was hoping, but if the people are interested, i could do a part two where i answer questions instead of just winging it!)

the second scene’s literally from the next page, but his pride and focus on perfection converge in on telepathy. sophie’s better than him, and there’s this undertone that this bothers him. he’s losing - and perfection always wins. here it is again - sophie’s ridiculously strong mental barriers. the point of trust.

part of the reason the sophitz relationship was doomed to fail from the start is the emphasis fitz places on their abilities. but we’re cognates is a cry for the little boy who wants his place back as the best, and sophie is his return to greatness. it’s not a bad thing when done right, but fitz can’t see past that. his sense of trust is misconstrued and believes it means sharing everything, never mind the fact that sophie’s a part of a rebel organization with thoughts planted in her head that could change the world. literally. the black swan planted them there.

(is the humor helping? i feel like we’ve been bashing fitz a bit for his lack of growth and i would apologize because i do think he’s a valuable character and a well written one at that, but a bit unlikeable when it comes down to it.)

he’s had his trust broken and people have hidden things from him, but in the grand scheme of things, alvar’s betrayal is the one that cuts him the most deeply. keefe’s hurts, sure, but i could argue it’s for love triangle related reasons, more than their supposed friendship instead. (i will, actually. that’s a part of the love triangle analysis - and if you think this is long...) but nothing is really earth shattering in the sense that it deeply warps his sense of identity. he’s been hurt a lot, and he’s a traumatized kid, but he reacts with less maturity than his younger sister - and a lot of the other (younger) characters at times, which can be frustrating to see when the solution is right there.

and here we are. the most painful scene for me to read - and i haven’t even gotten around to rereading legacy yet. so. legacy spoilers ahead.

this is my warning - i’m not cutting fitz as much slack for these scenes even if i understand where he’s coming from. he’s wrong. it’s as simple as that, and i *will* explain why, but if you still believe sophie and fitz should have ended up together and plan on reminding me of that, i respect you, but please just stop reading here.

for context, this is right after sophie finds out that oralie is her genetic mom and fitz is waiting at havenfield and tries to guess why she’s so upset. or that she’s figured out who her parents are. it becomes apparent shortly that even he doesn’t know which he’s doing.

“I get why you’re not ready to talk about it YET.”

this is supposed to be a small sentence to show how understanding he is, and it would be, if it wasn’t for the glaring YET at the end. he still expects sophie to talk about the subject sometime, and with him. but it’s weird that he’d be so relieved about it - considering how UPSET sophie is at the moment.

i tried, you guys, i really did. did i mention i was a hardcore sophitz shipper when i first started the series? only the first three books were out and i was in middle school minding my own business and even got through exile mad at fitz but hopeful.

it was my second readthrough before neverseen dropped that had me, you know, rethinking things. and now, at 19 (yeah okay that makes me sound old but you know the books have been out for a while now so), it’s easy to see why. sophitz is every little kid’s dream come true. your crush likes you back and it’s all as magical as you thought it would be. except it isn’t, because we tend to only see the good in people we like. sokeefe is the slow burn because it takes time to build up to a relationship and it’s not going to how you think it will.

I DIGRESS. this next excerpt is where i get really upset because fitz just does not listen. he pushes and he pushes and he pushes and god, you would think he’d get it.

things he gets points for: not lashing out at her immediately and holding back on his anger

things he does not get points for: well, you’ve read the scene too, right?

sophie says it best: he. just. wasn’t. listening.

and he also takes it upon himself to decide for her, who it is, even though sophie is clearly so very painfully obviously distressed. i mean, for anyone in his position, this is a major jerk move, but you know, it’s fitz, so he’s going to keep it perfect.

and just when we think he’s finally understood, just as i was thinking he’s getting better at reading situations, he brings up the matchmaking thing.

y’all, he acts like her not being matchmakable is a problem for both of them, even though it technically doesn’t affect her the way it affects him. she’s said it herself, that she has reservations about the whole thing, and it’s not even something she considers her future to be.

“you don’t want it either - you know you don’t.”

they might both be telepaths, but fitz projects himself onto sophie a lot because of that. it gets worse after they become cognates because it’s an even greater honor and they’re doing it together.

but they’re not the same. nowhere near it. it’s this scene that made me realize that fitz hasn’t been seeing sophie - he’s been seeing her potential and everything she could be, and that’s why he’s so fixated on the matchmaking lists. of course, matching with the most powerful elf the lost cities has ever known would restore his family name. it would be perfect, really, the most powerful elf and the second most powerful telepath the lost cities have ever known, matched together.

i could say more about him claiming that sophie’s privacy is less important than her future, as if the two aren’t one in the same, but i’d like to overlook that and pretend it’s just his entitlement and his view of matchmaking as the be all end all creeping in and nothing more.

so.

that was a lie.

“I… don’t think you’ve thought this through. But of course you haven’t. It’s late. You’ve had a long day with lots of huge stuff. So… can we just agree to not make any decisions right now?”

the way he’s so sure she hasn’t thought this through is a double edged sword. not only does it show a kind of possessive edge over her, where he’s constantly speaking for her and OVER her, it also shows us how he’s convinced it’s still about him.

fitz. my buddy. my man. listen to the girl.

he doesn’t bother giving her reasoning a chance and steamrolls ahead with his own, which we know sophie hates anyone doing. i mean, look at her argument with keefe in nightfall - she’s not going to stand for people speaking over her or for her. she doesn’t want their protection.

what’s wrong with this scene is that fitz writes off everything sophie is feeling and saying, and the key word here is ruin.

ruin.

instead of being understanding to sophie’s upbringing and her unique situation, he can’t look past his own return of the king (a lotr reference, shannon would you be proud even if i’m slandering your character?) to elven society. in fact, it says a lot that he sees her as the vacker redemption arc even when sophie herself has mentioned - to us and to HIM - that she doesn’t feel like she fits in with elven society but only if she plays by his rules.

(feels a little like objectification, ngl, and that doesn’t sit right with me.)

he’s blinded by his status, his pride, and perfection, and that, right there, is his biggest downfall.

not the conclusion gif i was looking for but y’all this is long enough let me keep this brief.

(HAHA YOU THOUGHT i am incapable of being brief)

fitz is an incredibly consistent character when we get down to it, and he’s not as complex-ified as the other characters are. well, not the way the other characters are. biana’s arc is about improving as a person and getting stronger, dex’s is about overcoming internalized prejudice, keefe’s is about chosen family and trauma, etc. fitz’s character arc is almost backwards - from a writing standpoint, this would be a really cool villain origin story. not that fitz is a villain, but over time, rather than his character becoming a better person, he starts out perfect until that perfection crumbles and we get to see the perfectionist that so desperately craves a return to his old normal, with everyone in this new normal. he’s trying so hard to fit into old clothes, outgrown shoes, and slip back into his old memories.

as a love interest, no. i could go further about his “interest” in linh being driven by her same power, but i have no doubt that matchmaking would still be of great interest to him, so i’ll leave it at that.

I DONT HATE FITZ. not as a person, nor as a character. i don’t see him as the most likable, but you guys, he’s not a villain. he’s a teenage boy who needs to work through his issues before he gets anywhere near sophie, but he’s been through a lot so i’m trying to cut him some slack. he’s an incredible asset to the kotlc team and his need for a plan tends to keep them from getting themselves in more trouble. he’s helped sophie improve her abilities vastly, and indirectly, pushed her to become better. quite literally, the story would not exist without him. we need fitz as a character because he makes the story what it is, but as an individual i just think we wouldn’t get along.

-k

(any questions are appreciated and i would love to have some canon discourse! i know in the quest for more diversity in the kotlc characters, discourse tends towards that, understandably, but i do believe there’s a lot to be uncovered in canon and i would love to talk about it more! yes, more than 3,219+ words about it LOL)

173 notes · View notes

scintillatingshortgirl19 · 6 months

Text

I'm going to go ahead and say that I genuinely think - on a personal level but also just from a narrative standpoint - that that might have been the worst possible ending they could have come up with for this character.

It was established throughout the series (and in particularly clear terms in the previous episode) that Loki's worst fear - the worst fate that could befall him - is being alone. It's also abundantly clear to anyone who has analyzed this character for so much as five minutes that Loki does not and never has actually wanted a throne - and that this isn't a change that came about during the series, either. Even when he did "want" it, it was just as a substitute for the love he couldn't access. And, bonus, the "glorious purpose" thing has never held any actual significance - it was a throwaway line fed to him by Thanos that has never been true to Loki himself. His underlying goal has always been this: love, acceptance, and a sense of belonging within a community.

The ending gave Loki these three things which he did not want - one of which was his literal worst fucking fear - and withheld the one thing he has always wanted. Based on the narrative and character traits they established, this is the most tragic ending they could possibly have given this character. But this isn't supposed to be a tragedy. It's framed as if it's bittersweet. A necessary sacrifice. Sad, but inspiring.

I can't see it as any of those things, though. It's just . . . bleak.

Being completely isolated in a solitary confinement situation forever - never able to experience actual connection, only able to watch from afar - is arguably a fate worse than death. And based on the facts established about Loki in particular, this is definitely the case for this character. It's great that he got his hero moment - I'm not denying that it was a beautiful scene - but this all leaves such a bitter taste in my mouth I can't really focus on the positives.

This is a character who has experienced tragic ending after tragic ending. I've spent over ten years of my life watching him be knocked down over and over and over again, and I am just not capable of seeing a tragic ending for him as satisfying in any way. This isn't the first time Loki has sacrificed himself for his loved ones. I already watched it happen in Infinity War, and I had no desire to watch it happen again.

All I can really say in conclusion is thank fucking god I'm not hyperfixating on this show like I was during season one. Hell, I've been watching this season almost casually and I'm still this fucking pissed off. I can't imagine how I would feel if I was still as engaged as I used to be.

#loki spoilers #loki tv series #loki #loki series negativity #i just. loki deserved better #he really did #op

21 notes · View notes

agentnico · 12 days

Text

Challengers (2024) review

That’s one way of engaging me in sport I guess.

Plot: Tashi, a tennis player turned coach, has transformed her husband from a mediocre player into a world-famous grand slam champion. To jolt him out of his recent losing streak, she makes him play a challenger event -- close to the lowest level of tournament on the pro tour. Tensions soon run high when he finds himself standing across the net from the once-promising, now burnt-out Patrick, his former best friend and Tashi's former boyfriend.

It’s safe to say this movie has blew up the internet. Zendaya with her major fan-base starring in a threesome tennis flick that’s brought to you by the director who revealed Timothee Chalamet to the world in that queer flick that featured the infamous peach scene? Now that’s quite the selling pitch. Naturally the result is a box office success and a movie that is already taking the top spot for the most memeable motion picture of the year. And I get it, this movie is definitely provocative enough and has enough sexual tension in it to excite any viewer. I’ll refer to my friend’s Letterboxd review for this movie with him saying the following: “I’ve found recently that hormones in films plays a factor in how much I like the film and this film is very horny”. Right, let’s not delve too deep into my friend’s evident sexual frustration, but he is not wrong that this movie reaches peak horny levels. Every scene is imbued with the steamy appetites of its central trio of characters. Like damn to these people want to f*ck hard big time! This should not come as a surprise though, as this follows a very similar formula to Luca Guadagnino’s other films, stoking the appetite of the youth to provide an open forum for unbridled desire to let loose. Call Me by Your Name, Suspiria, Bones and All, A Bigger Splash - every single one of these features tackles themes of sensuality and elegance. You know exactly what you’re getting into with a Guadagnino movie and Challengers is no exception.

That being said, with Challengers the actual narrative serves itself perfectly for a trashy B-movie experience, however it is thanks to Guadagnino’s directorial prowess that the film rises above that and becomes a truly cinematic experience. This thing looks great, and I don’t mean due to the lovely actors present, but the camerawork and the scene framework. The way the sweat drops off people’s faces in slow motion and the camera lingers on their stoic yet thoughtful facial expressions to the impressive tennis match scenes with a particular impressive sequence involving the scene being shown for, the perspective of the tennis ball which….I don’t know how the hell they managed it but that was awesome! Also need to mention the great techno score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross that creates an unlikely pairing in electronic dance music and classical, with the result really amping up the energy of every moment. Honestly from a technical standpoint this movie is a marvel.

In regards to the narrative that is where we start running into some trouble. For starters this movie did not need to be over 2 hours. The story was simple enough to shrink down to a 100 min max run-time, but instead the film opts to really dial in on extended pointless shots that linger way too long, so much so that I noted multiple audience members looking at their mobile phones to check the time. Secondly those excessive time jumps. Telling a story in a non-linear fashion can be a useful story-telling device, but here it was used way too much that it became distracting. Like there was a time jump back and forth every 5 minutes, with some jumps sprawling 13 years, which made it really difficult to get engaged in certain moments. Speaking of the 13 years, bless Zendaya’s heart but as much as they tried to age and de-age her through hair and make-up, she never looked older than 19 years regardless of the time era. For all of the film’s technical achievements you’d think they’d put more effort in the make-up department.

As for the actors, whilst I admire Zendaya for tackling such a meaty and, dare I say, challenging role, I feel like she’s too young in her acting career to be able to fully perform a weathered, jaded, cynical, ruthless and calculating character like Tashi. It seemed for the most part she relied on having a resting scowl face, but otherwise I found it actually hard to believe any of her chemistry with her male co-stars. As for the male co-stars, out of this love triangle it was in fact the queer relationship that really popped. Props to Mike Faist (who was a highlight for me in the recent West Side Story remake) and Josh O’Connor whose chemistry was through the roof! The way they looked at one another, to the churros to the way O’Connor smoothly moved Faist’s stool closer to his with his foot…… they can say they are best friends all they want but we just know they are both aching for those benefits! Again it’s how strong of performances these two give that hinders Zendaya who is nowhere close to their level.

Challengers overall is an entertaining enough youthful erotic crowd -pleaser that from a filmmaking standpoint looks fantastic, however due to the narrative structure and Zendaya’s arguable miscast this movie falters. That being said to Tom Holland, dude, I’ve seen your social media posts about being excited to support your girlfriend and going to see this movie, but dude, I bet your cried your eyes out after. Spider-Man - she ain’t coming home!

Overall score: 6/10

8 notes · View notes

skullsfigurepage · 7 months

Text

Trafalgar Law - Banpresto Maximatic Figure

Note: I won this figure in a claw machine and it fueled my ego so much before I kept losing at every other claw machine I played. Stay humble.

Review and more photos under the cut :-p

If you follow my main account (@skullc0r3) you might know that Law is one of my favorite one piece characters so walking into an arcade and seeing Several boxes of this figure stacked in a claw machine felt like crazy luck even before I won. I'm so used to all the merchandise for things I'm into being rare or super expensive (persona 5 scalpers I hate you more than I can say) so getting into OP has been interesting because of the sheer volume of merchandise for it that's below $50.

Onto the figure!

For starters this is the first time I have ever seen a figure with such an obvious front and back to the sculpture. In this case it's because the back has significantly less painted details. In the last photo above you can see on his leg closest to the camera the back of his pants and the front have different shadow qualities. This isn't because my lamp was strong enough to cast such harsh shadows, its because the front of his pants (and the front of the rest of the figure) has painted on shading while the back does not. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, most people wouldn't notice or care since they were only ever going to display it from the front, but the box did hype up all the detailed painting that would be on the figure. In their defense though, I understand why this would be necessary from a production standpoint. My biggest gripe with this (still fairly small) is that on his back hand, Law doesn't have his signature (stupid) knuckle tattoos.

Here's his forward hand. The tattoos are all printed on and thank god for that because I can't imagine how miserable it would have been to force someone to hand paint them.

And then here's his back hand. I wonder if the issue was a matter of the tattoos being harder to place in this position, or at least to do it efficiently enough that it would be worth it. Again, not something that impacts the actual quality of the figure but I find it a fascinating insight into the production.

That being said the paint job on the front is super neat, it really does add so much depth to the figure (especially on the yellow and blue parts of the figure; it makes it look less like cheap plastic, lol) and I really enjoy it.

Next, the scale of this figure. I didn't realize when I won it, but this thing is huge. I can hold him like a small carp (and I have). He's huge. I'm guessing here, because I don't feel like finding a ruler right now but I'd say he's probably 10" tall? including the stand, which makes him one of the biggest figures I own. It also means the scale of the sword is perfect for just kind of, pointing at tiny stuff with. Which I have done. I have fun.

I think the figure's pose is super fun. It's dynamic and getting photos of him with a wide-lens is really fun. The actual sculpting details on the clothes and arms in particular are so fascinating to me, they're incredibly well done in my opinion. The composition is good too, the lines create a few triangles which really helps balance the figure.

(had to fudge it a bit here to show the triangle with his hands and head since one hand is hidden in this shot, oops)

The only issue I've had with the figure is it's kind of wobbly. I've fixed this by either putting his lower foot against a "wall" or putting something under it. It's not really a big deal if you don't disturb the figure too much.

From looking around online this figure is around 30$ including shipping (and that is a higher estimate), so as far as figures go this is pretty affordable and imo it's worth it (so long as you have enough display space).

Final Thoughts: I love this freak figure. It's fun, its got great details, it fueled my ego for a week, it has a pole going up the ass of the figure, what's not to love.

Thanks for reading!

#one piece #anime figure #trafalgar law #one piece figure #figure review #figures

20 notes · View notes

blackautmedia · 6 months

Note

Have you seen the owl house? If so, do you think it has good representation?

I have seen it, yeah! I enjoyed it too. As for its rep, I think it depends on what kind of rep you're looking for.

From a disability standpoint I think it's fine. I know a some people relate to Eda and later Lilith for how their curse reads more like a chronic disability and there's also the unintentional neuroexpansive portrayal of Luz.

It also manages to avoid a lot of the issues that generally come with treating curses like a form of disability that a lot of other media does. I'm a big fan of the episode where Eda's mother visits has to unlearn her ableism to be a better parent.

I think where it could be improved is in how it utilizes race with its characters. It's not a secret that the main villain is a cream cheese colonizing crusader and the Boiling Isles has several forms of white supremacist violence like:

It being a police state

branding the citizens with law, deception, and force to be killed with the coven sigils, a practice done to several real groups of oppressed people. Obviously not with magic tattoos, but I feel any work that centers heavily around its villain branding oppressed people to denote their status in society should be extremely cautious with how it handles a very real thing.

the control over the education system and information

the breakup of community and enforcing of individualism

declaring the cultural practices of the people native to the land impure and wicked

the colonization, etc.

So while the series focuses a great deal on taking out said cream cheese colonizing crusader, it frames his white supremacy in a way that assumes nearly every single white person complicit in that was "tricked" and immediately understands upon learning properly because Belos was this crafty manipulator who fooled everyone.

ToH imo is at its best when it gets Luz or others to challenge and dismantle the institutions around them and most of its greatest episodes I feel come from its strong cast when it doesn't have to orbit them around white characters. Luz, Camila, Gus, Willow, Eda, Raine, and Darius for example all solo everyone and are great. King is fun.

Luz in particular is really such a great protagonist that I feel strengthens a lot of the show and makes up for the aspects I didn't care for as much.

I don't really like the discourse around or even the term "redemption arc" because I don't feel it drives at the right questions, so it's not an issue of if I feel these characters deserve to be forgiven or not, but moreso how the Owl House provides a white fantasy in how white people can picture themselves as being alleviated of their white guilt and welcomed with largely open arms from non-white people because of it. My question is more "who is the intended audience?"

To give an example using a different show, one of my favorite Moon Girl episodes is the one where Lunella is belittled at school by a white girl because of her textured hair. They don't go on to give the white girl a backstory, they don't show her parental background or even give her a name. The focus is on Lunella dealing with desirability politics, texturism, and getting support from her friends and family to embrace her hair as it is.

It's not to say I hate the white cast or think they have nothing of value to offer. It's not lost on me that Hunter for instance is an abuse victim and a lot of people can identify with that struggle and him having to unlearn that behavior.

But at the same time the show goes back and forth on trying to do that and also having him wield state power. I'm not all that cool with him institutionalizing a bunch of girls and non-white kids, not listening when they say he's hurting them, then only coming around because he felt more sympathy for their animal companions, which ends up happening far more often in real situations than it should.

A lot of the Owl House when looked at that lens may have a lot of non-white characters in it, but they can sometimes feel like trophies for its white cast after they've been taught better. They do a great job of depicting numerous facets of colonial violence portrayed in an easily accessible way to younger viewers.

But it also feels ultimately in service of centering the rehabilitation of its white cast.

So I think "what audience is this intended for" is an important question to ask when evaluating representation in a work.

#owl house #toh spoilers #luz noceda #darius deamonne #toh darius #luz and camila solo everyone #moon girl and devil dinosaur #moongirl lunella #lunella lafayette #tw: racism #normalize calling Belos a cream cheese colonizing crusader

16 notes · View notes

bitty-bits · 5 months

Text

The First and the Last of the Year

And possibly last ever... on Tumblr at least.

Where did I go?

Nowhere in particular... if you've seen my socials all year, that is. This blog/newsletter however, took an extended vacation, not just from a lack of interest (and personal real life stuff getting in the way) but also from a technical standpoint - I really wanted the email newsletter aspect of this to work, but I still couldn't. I was considering using TinyLetter ...until they announced that was shutting down. If I had a nickel for every time a newsletter service shut down out of nowhere I'd have two... you know the rest. And with Tumblr getting worse as the year went by, maintaining this wasn't exactly motivating enough.

That said, it was a less than ideal year for my productivity, inconsistent pace, money issues, the lowest amount of notable dreams to write down on my dream journal to date... you get the idea.

So I can only hope for things to be better. For me to be less lazy... and work not only on stuff I make, but on myself. And I do have a bit of optimism, since a lot has, so let's see a couple of stuff, although everything else you should expect to see in a "rebooted" version of this blog...

Also, Free Palestine!

What I've Been Playing / Watching

So while I haven't fully completed a LOT of things this year, this will be going back to the beginning of the year, essentially, so strap yourselves. (Some of it I'll be grabbing from my media thread that I've made on Twitter as well)

Lucky Star (Finished)

I have posted about Lucky Star in another issue, but I was still in the middle of watching it. Now that I've actually finished watching it (in February) I can say more about it: When it comes to this anime, it was either pretty ahead of its time, or we just have Regressed as a species since then. Maybe the latter.

And sorry folkz, Lucky Star is pro-ship/pro-fic culture and there’s nothing you can do about it. I watched the entire series including the OVA, and while I’m definitely still not sure I’m exactly the "target demographic" what I saw was still very enjoyable. it really just is whatever the fuck and I'm all for it.

At first my kin™ was Konata pretty quickly because of course. That was until Minami showed up and like, she’s basically the weeb version of Ongo Jelly Jamm™!!! I actually can say I got attached to and care about most of the characters, even if just a little.

Like I said in a previous issue, in 2015 I had watched part of an episode of it english dubbed and it didn’t click with me at all. Turns out the dub just sucks as I should’ve expected lol (And I really wasn’t used to segmented "several short stories in one" type anime and stuff to be fair - that and I was dumber too of course so I couldnt properly appreciate the ART........)

My rating is Timotei/10 - and Nichijou is next!

Pizza Tower

Easily the biggest loss for gaming this year was this game not winning "Best Debut Indie" at the Game Awards. Oh well.

I was already highly anticipating this game - having first heard of it when it had a demo at SAGE 2019 I’m glad the game turned out great and is getting the recognition it deserves. I pretty much finished the game in early March. P/10

The Owl House (Finished)

Well... it’s over... for better or worse. I do think they managed to deliver a satisfactory ending all things considered. This was definitely a great cartoon to kick off the new decade.

And of course, fuck Disney as always.

This show got me to break out of, I guess an habit, you could say, or a superstition, or whatever the hell it is, when it came to media with too much ""occultism"" in them. You know the drill. I guess it opened up the little my mind had left that was still a bit closed. Even if it’s mostly involuntary.

But this isn’t even new. As a child I’d actually have an "imaginary friend" that i made (that kinda just Existed, didn’t really "interact" much with them whatsoever cuz i was Dumb™) that their backstory was literally that they were a demon in hell "gone rogue" so they were "not an evil one". Again, I was a kid. I never thought too much about the implications of me thinking about stuff like that already at that age. But it is interesting to think about now.

Anyways, been gay, did witchcraft. ⛥/5

Invader ZIM (Series + Enter The Florpus)

Well I did it. I finally watched the funny hot topic show™ (Finished in late May)

What can I even say about it that hasn’t been already said by everyone else? ...well maybe I have one thing: for some reason I didn’t find That One Episode that people always bring up the MOST disturbing one. I thought the one with a literal character flatlining and Zim being ":)" about it got to me a bit more.

Anyways yeah it’s Cool I liked the characters especially Gaz, and GIR obviously Why Wouldn’t He Be Here. The show can be stupid and end episodes in Whatever The Fuck ways that leave you like "That's it? That's the episode???" but I think that’s one of the unique aspects of it that I Enjoy - also the movie is cool. ☮️>🐔+🍚/10

The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)

So I watched it first when we only had shitty cinema bootleg recordings (that aren’t even that shitty anymore at this point in terms of quality, the Shit comes in the form of godawful intrusive illegal casino ads™ placed.) even though a bit later the raw movie would sometimes be uploaded in full to YouTube with no consequence for days. And at this point I’ve rewatched it plenty of times in proper HD (though only once in English cuz I’ll be honest, the Brazilian dub really is phenomenal really and blows the original "star talent cast" out of the water in my opinion, where it falls short is the voice for Luigi, as I know the dude’s voice too well and he’s just doing his normal voice with an accent, not to mention he’s the brazilian Sonic voice already!!!)

I think Charlie Day is the superior Loogy here but I’d still say the dub is better, not only for the fact there are "real voice actors" cuz you know, that’s Their Job, but also like, Charles Martinet is still in there cuz in case you didn't know, he voiced that jumpman dude’s only line in pretty much every language possible which is absurd/admirable.

It’s a fun movie if not mostly for looking at Mario Things happening that you know and recognize, because otherwise the story is pretty ridiculously basic, though even for "Mario game story" standards it’s definitely refreshing to see Luigi as the one to be rescued... though that Also sucks because Luigi deserved more screentime. The main Toad too. Oh well. Also disappointed that the "wise Toad" in the movie isn’t Toadsworth… or maybe he is but hasn’t aged yet and maybe in a sequel we’ll see him get older and then main Toad becomes Captain Toad. Who knows 🍄/10

Honorable Mentions - Stuff I've Watched That I've Yet To Write My Thoughts About, I Don't Have The Time Now

Spy × Family (Season 1) - Not the type of anime I'd see myself watching, but I was forced roped into it by one of my partners and found it to be VERY enjoyable.

Sparkle On, Raven: The Life of Drillgirl - Charming, shitpost-y, but genuine and fun

The Amazing Digital Circus - A very promising series with unexpected popularity, and equally unexpected high quality Brazilian dub with recognizable talent.

Murder Drones (Season 1 - 6/8) - A series I've been cautiously optimistic about since its pilot - it has endearing, enjoyable characters and settings, but flawed writing and pacing - more on that at a future date.

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off - An amazing take on a series that I'm not so familiar with (haven't seen the movie or read the comics, only really knew that the franchise "exists") and judging from what I've heard from others, it probably is the best take on the main storyline. Especially when it comes to the representation of who turned out to be my fave - Roxie. Watching the live action now is... probably gonna be very weird. Not sure if I want to.

Kunshikter (Күншіктер) - A new, yet very obscure cartoon from Kazakhstan. It's cute. It's for children but at this point I don't think y'all care. It's still ongoing and there are not many episodes so far. I recommend giving it a watch. Now!

Future YouTube Updates

As some of you saw in a xeet tweet from early October I was planning to do something significant on my main YouTube channel which has been stagnant for a while now, only for that to, surprise, not happen. I do have a set goal now: In very early January, a video to explain exactly what happened and what was the video I wanted to make, and... why it's hard for me to get a video like that out in the first place. The short answer (that doesn't actually account for Everything) is autism. The long answer is... stay tuned for it, lol

Song of the Issue

youtube

Although this section was supposed to be for sharing music that isn't mine, I thought I'd share snippets of music stuff I've been making since the beginning of 2023 until now, that you can look forward to!

Conclusion

I dunno. All I can say is... happy new year! It's been a tradition to make a stupid amateurish collage at the end of the year with the highlights, but this year there's been... less of them, that I took note of at least. But that won't stop me I think. Once I have that done, I may edit this to include it.

No comment on anything related to Twitter (which I'll never call "X") and the billionaire that happened this year as you all probably already know by now, and by the way you can now follow me on the social butterfly of bluesky. See you next year!

#newsletter #personal #Youtube

8 notes · View notes

altschmerzes · 1 year

Note

Ooooh i would LOVE to hear your hot takes about the back half of season 2 and how they could have dealt with Jamie's history of abuse differently. I'm really hoping they show in season 3 that it's either been festering under the surface or that at least Jamie and Roy addressed things off screen. And of course I really need a Ted/Jamie conversation in season 3 about their father issues (and also why Jamie has featured in Ted's panic attacks) (call him your son to his face Ted so I can sob)

heyyyy i would be THRILLED to elaborate on that cause MAN is it something i think about a lot. i'm hoping they return to it in season 3 as well, especially in the ways you mentioned. like. my hat for that, i'd die.

anyways as to specific things that i think could've gone differently in the tail end of s2, i have some general thoughts and one very specific minor thread that i feel Very Strongly should've been approached differently. i'll put this under a cut bc it might get a bit long and i should be pre-emptively planning for that by now XD

(edit: i was right. it's enormous. i am both sorry and not at all sorry. i have one million thoughts and it turns out "narrative arcs related to abuse" and "jamie tartt in that context, specifically" are like, my activation concepts. who'd have guessed.)

alright. so. generally like....... i really wish that literally anyone had addressed what happened at all. like, as soon as the scene cut away from the scene in the locker room in 2x08, it was like that never happened. like we did get the scene of ted talking to sharon, and then beard leaving after that, and those were great scenes! but i found it really strange that jamie didn't come up there Once. like, once the shot cut from him and roy in the locker room, it may as well not have happened.

and i know i'm biased and would've liked to see that yknow, Dug Into, but even from the most 'we just don't have room in the season' standpoint, it would've taken what, six seconds? to have some throwaway exchange as beard is leaving at the end along the lines of "oh, also, jamie doing okay?" "ehhh. unclear. he's on the bus, the guys have him." or something. someone takes a moment to stop and check on him. tell him they're there if he needs anything. it could be anyone, it could have happened at any point after 2x08, but it quite literally is never discussed, mentioned, or referenced again, which seems....... like. idk. that was an enormously significant and enormously traumatic thing to have happen. you have a huge, horrible loss and then your teammate/player/friend's father shows up and you learn 1. his father is abusive, and 2. his father is now actively abusing him a couple of feet away from you, leading him to 3. need to punch his father in self-defense. and it simply never comes up again. i? hm.

and then in specific. the character that really strikes me here, the one that scene was maybe more significant and like......... perspective? shifting for? than anyone else aside from jamie and arguably ted is roy. and i think there's a specific Thing with roy that there was a massive missed opportunity on, vis a vis how things had to have been different for him regarding jamie after he saw that happened, after he stepped in to handle the fallout. i think roy not having to contend with what he saw, what he did there, at all is a missed opportunity overall, especially after he was such an instrumental part of that episode's build-up and boil-over, but there's a particular piece that gets stuck in my craw, to the extent that i may at some point be forced to write a 'what if' about it:

roy's reaction to the news that jamie told keeley he loved her should not have played out like that.

like. okay. hear me out on this one.

(putting that whole... thing. aside for the moment, about which i will only say: that was the most aromantic "love confession" i have ever seen in my life gd bless.)

all things considered the way they resolved the whole like. almost-but-thank-fuck-not a love triangle thing (season 3 do not fuck me on this one) with jamie being like yeah that was my b i'm sorry and roy being pissed but dropping it and forgiving him was like...... that went better than i ever would've hoped it would. but still there's a whole thing where- okay. it was mostly a joke, because this is still a comedy, and comedies do be like that. HOWEVER.

the whole.... exaggerated violence thing around the way that interaction went, "yeah you better talk first cause i'm gonna knock your teeth in and you're gonna need them for the talking bit," and then he tells keeley and she's like oh my gd did you punch him. did you kill him. and then he tells the diamond dogsTM and they're like And He's Still Alive?

i just.... i don't think that roy could've stomached saying something like that to jamie after what he saw happen in that locker room. i don't think he could've watched jamie's abusive father push him around and mock him to the point that he had to defend himself like that, and then held jamie while he had a full-on sobbing breakdown about it, and then like. turned around and threatened him like that not that long after especially with the way jamie is behaving in that interaction in the boots room. (like. he's scared. i don't think i'm reading too much into his behaviour in the scene where he apologizes to roy when i say that He Is Afraid, In That Scene.) i think once he saw that, no matter how mad he was that would've stopped him dead.

i think what would have played way better is if he'd maybe been Going to launch into that and then got into that room and saw the way jamie was standing and Not Looking At Him (seriously he is allergic to eye contact at all times but it's like. the extent to which he won't look at roy in that scene is Extreme) and completely lost the will to say any of it. so jamie gets through his apology and roy yells fuck and it's sort of the same but also for different reasons this time. and then he gets home and talks to keeley, and that goes pretty much the same. he's maybe more reserved, more serious during that bit.

and then we get to the bit with the other coaches and higgins, right. and there's that response again- and he's still alive??? and roy snaps. because why do people keep fucking SAYING that? what kind of a person do they think he is? why the fuck are you people implying i'd have- have fucking done something to him over this?

(which, obviously they did not mean this seriously. they were kidding. keeley and them were all obviously Kidding in these interactions.)

which is a pretty alarming reaction, like whoa, whoa, whoa, okay, rewind, what gives, that was a joke.

and he calms down and is like yeah i know i'm just. i don't want to be the kind of person people make that sort of joke about. (not when i stood in that room with jamie and knew he thought i was probably about to do something to him and he was not joking.) just like. some kind of buildup, buildup, payoff to the way that i don't think roy could've walked out of the locker room at wembley and had things just.... go back to being the same between him and jamie. go back to interacting with him the same way all the time, just. that scene was huge, especially for the two of them, and we have no idea how that affected them. none.

like. this is not in the past, is what i keep coming back to. and roy knows that. this is not Jamie Had An Abusive Father, which would have its own impact for damn sure. this is jamie's father is abusive and is actively still abusing him in the present tense, in fact did so right in front of my face the other day. and just. man. yeah.

anyways. this has been one million words long. i still think it went way better than i could've hoped. it went better than pretty much almost any other show would've done it. the 'i forgave him' thing was huge for roy. but still.

this would've acknowledged what happened, and done, i think, a great service to roy's continuing character arc. like, jamie was a shithead and he sucked in season 1 but roy was equally culpable for those two's specific uh..... rocky dynamic. that conflict DID escalate to violence a few times! not particularly seriously, just some shoving, but it did. and roy has this whole Thing where he's wrestling with leadership and responsibility and influence, wrestling with people looking to him and counting on him and "it has to be me. it can't be anyone else." (we want nothing from you that you do without grace. or without understanding.) the What Could've Been here haunts me. HAUNTS me, i'm telling you. one day i might have to write it just to exorcise that ghost.

#gav gab #gav answers #IM SO SORRY. THIS IS SO LONG. I JUST HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS.#and ive been like THINKING ABT THIS SPECIFICALLY since i saw the episode #abuse cw

48 notes · View notes

lumagen · 6 months

Text

so i watched the movie

i think i get it now!

maybe.

hell even if i didn't, i got this so I'm not mad

thoughts under the cut. you get the idea by now

initial thoughts:

is the third act like a metaphor on how Utena exists as a vehicle to move the plot forward cuz if so that's genuinely hilarious and i love it

this movie has too many teenagers with exposed breasts. coulda done without that

AKIO DIES IN THIS VERSION WHICH IMMEDIATELY MAKES IT BETTER

also the shadow girls literally carry the series on their backs i love them so much

also utena's short cut is perfect. her uniform is also better. her design in this movie is perfect. give anthy back her glasses tho

also they kiss in this movie??? like twice??? that's fucking awesome where was that in the initial series like what

such a worthy payoff . so cool

ok now for my actually structured thoughts

this movie sucks for several reasons but I also liked it? it's weird, and I have no idea what the purpose for it existing was, and it kind of alienates both old fans and newcomers alike, but I still...liked it.

let me explain

the first third of this movie I actually have very few complaints with. utena's new design is fresh and fits very well, almost more than her original fit, and the story does a good job (re)introducing all the characters we've all grown to love/despise (there is no in-between). the movie is also just straight up gorgeous to look at - they didn't waste a single dollar in the budget with the visuals and animation. I don't have much more to say, it's pretty inoffensive, Saionji in particular looked great in the fight and Anthy only got abused once! hooray!

the end of the first act also shows how they decided to make Anthy's sexual antics more overt, which imo was a great change and felt realistic considering how everyone pretty much viewed her as an object and how her brother sexually preyed on her in the original series as well. utena's forceful pushback against her advances just felt...right in a way, and I think it served as an interesting glimpse into another version of the story we didn't get.

second act was dumb

the council members all suck ass and i hate them. juri in particular felt like pure character assassination. miki doesn't do anything important. kozue making a cameo was fun but they went all in on shiori just being pure scum and I don't have any idea why. why is she even in this movie if Juri's character has almost nothing to do with the plot? what even is the plot at this point? it all felt like tongue in cheek nods to relevant moments from the main story without actually...developing any of them? the only real exception is when touka got his backstory fleshed out a bit more, but it's really ultimately minor. it didn't feel necessary and it doesn't make Touka sympathetic either if you've watched the main series

i like that Akio dies in this film, but from a narrative standpoint it feels...strange? like it straight up comes out of nowhere after Utena and Juri's pointless fight and then it kinda just...railroads into the third act? I don't understand why they chose to phrase it this way, especially since he fucking comes back later

also Dios gets referenced like twice in this movie and it feels so forgettable like what the hell. why is he even here

also there's a timeskip without warning or explanation in the movie and that's also very very bizarre. if I had no experience with the main series I'd be so lost

third act is funny

utena going through a car wash and coming out as an overdesigned sports car may actually be top 5 moments in the series, period. it was playing the duel music too it was a moment to remember for sure

shiori dying in car form was cathartic fuck you bitch

but uhhhhhh on the whole it just felt very overdramatic and random? like I get it's a movie and you want to have a big ol' climax but why this? not that I didn't like it, everyone loves a good car chase, but what the fuck?

however this was like the one time i actually (kind of) understood the metaphors. i like how the castle was ultimately just harmful to everyone, with its intricate wheel structure and the hell it takes to even leave in the first place. i like how utena is a car to begin with because she is the vehicle that drives the plot forward. she's not a static character by any means, but it's her initial determination, resolve, and fighting skill that causes meaningful change in the world in the first place. we love her for that

this doesn't make the car chase not weird but, y'know. credit where it's due

also although i'm not the biggest fan of Akio's implementation in this movie, I do like how he's still the final obstacle that has to be overcome. not only does he still possess his same manipulative "charming" behavior, he also acts outwardly harmful to Anthy, almost killing her in the process. loved that. abusers will keep you chained down to the bitter end. i also like how anthy didn't necessarily overcome it by herself, but she also didn't need to be saved, either. it was the joint effort of them both that let them both escape to the real world, and me myself personally that resonated way more than the ending of the og anime. they were both victims of akio, and together they overcame him while building a new future together.

them escaping to a world with no roads showing that they were free of the predetermined narrative that chained them is just so beautiful, and the final kiss really tied everything together. loved that. perfect ending. i wish them the best

also the nanami chuchu cameo scene was just as strange as it needed to be and i loved all the references. all that was missing was her egg

i dont really have any concluding thoughts. it's still a batshit insane film with poor pacing and detrimental character writing (i couldnt bring myself to mention the utena/touga kiss) but as a companion piece to the original series it's...fine?

honest to goodness, i'd love a remake of the series with ideas from both the anime and the movie that gives anthy a little more to do than be strange and in the background while things just happen around them. I'd love more slow and tender moments between Utena and Anthy as their relationship deepens and Utena spends time ONSCREEN really trying to understand Anthy as not the Rose Bride but as her own person. I think that'd be really cool

but uh as for the movie it's. fine. i guess. part of me wants to give it a ten for the last 2 minutes alone but that would be disingenuous so it remains unscored.

definitely a must watch for anyone who finished the main series tho!

#utena log #revolutionary girl utena #this movie is drugs #adolescence of utena

8 notes · View notes

kelbunny · 6 months

Note

3, 4, 13, 22, and 23 for the Triangle Strategy Ask Game!

3. Favorite NPC?

Papa Svarog! I always seem to be drawn to sad dad's with dead kids, and I like how he was handled in particular. His grief and handling of grief feels real, and fighting him in the utility ending is painful knowing that he could be and is our ally in golden. And despite still being a serious man, I love how he's warm and loving compared to Gustadolf's cold and cunning, and how it's reflected in the elements they use.

4. Least Favorite NPC?

From a love to hate standpoint, Thalas and Erika, especially Thalas. Heck you you nasty little twink.

From a "you could have been so much more" standpoint, Tenebris. He doesn't feel like a full character and more like he was just made to die in 3/4 of the endings, which is made even worse by the fact he's the only one of the Saintly Seven you never fight. All of the rest of the are all so interesting, and then you have him.

13. Were there any npcs you wish were recruitable?

Exharme and to a lesser extent, Lyla. They're tied for my favorite of the saints, and some of Exharme's skills in particular could be fun to use. Lyla though could be redundant in the skills department however, considering we already have Quahaug.

Another one is Jerrom. We've only got Frederica as a Rosellan unit, and although Maxwell and Roland are great, I do wish we had more spear units.

22. Favorite moment?

all of TriStrat

But to be more specific:

I really like the ending of 14 liberty with the duel between Roland and Avlora and how it reflects the end of chapter 7 battle between Maxwell and Avlora. And of the 3 chapter 13/14 options, it feels the most canon to me, at least in terms of the Golden Ending, both with how it's handled in game, as well as due to fics like The Same Bridge.

And speaking of the Golden ending, the scene where Serenoa realized his own path that doesn't leave any of his friends behind. That cutscenes with the scales *chef's kiss*

23. Any unpopular opinions?

Definitely gonna make some enemies with this one, but I don't really like Cordelia x Avlora. I never really saw it when I first played through the game, and even though we don't get exact ages, the fact that Cordelia is ~17 and Avlora is 30 at her absolute youngest (but definitely seems to be in at least her mid 30's to me based on other in game dialogue) is enough to make me uncomfortable with shipping them.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love their dynamic in game and it's one of the best the game has to offer, but I just can't see it as romantic at all.

#triangle strategy #triangle strategy spoilers #Kelbunn answers

8 notes · View notes

bryants-things · 1 year

Text

So I’ve been thinking about the ancient elves and the Dalish. And how apparently there is nothing left of the elves. Of course a lot was destroyed by the Humans but still such a big influential society just don’t disappear into thin air. The ruins scattered across Thedas are proof of just that.

Language and culture evolve such is the way things. So even with the elves being oppressed it’s very unlikely that their language and culture is completely gone.

It’s more likely that the information we have access to throughout the lore and codexes are seen through mostly human eyes. With exception of characters who have reason to know more aka Solas, Morrigan, Ablas and Fellasan to mention a few. And such the information regarding the elves is at best incomplete.

It makes sense that the Dalsih know a great deal more about their culture than humans an even Solas believe. After all he has (in game) not actually spent a lot of time with the Dalish only seen whatever remains spirits have picked up in the Fade.

And if we apply this theory to the games, one could imagine that Lavellan in particular would posses a good deal more knowledge than he (my Lavellan is male) lets on.

Something as simple as the glyphs in the exhalted plains. Lavellan get short burst of information from lighting them up. (This of course is probably true regarding every inquisitor no matter the race) but if we go on the in game information veilfire is elven magic. And so one would think one would need an elven mage to access them which I presume would be Solas with other races.

Although from a pure lore standpoint Solas claims he’s never seen veilfire only heard of it. Of course he could be lying but bear with me on a in game lore rant. Solas lived in a world where the Fade and Thedas was one. So the need for veil fire would be non existent. My guess is that the Dalish might use veil fire to write secret messages such as the way to Dirthramen’s temple or the location on an arthlahaven. And that the veil fire we find in the crossroads during Trespasser is purposely placed there by Solas to get Lavellan to follow the trail. Just a thought.

Another hint at this that I find interesting is the boy in the Exhalted plains that run away from his clan to impress the keeper. He found the location to Elandrias talisman but could not break the seal on his own and tries to summon a demon. How would he find the way without any information? Rumors might be a start but he would need something, say that there is a written account of Elandrias legend which would make sense. And that this is written in common tounge is unlikely. Why would the elves write down something so precious so a human could find it. No it would have been written in elven.

And there is more in the temple of Mythal Lavellan (going head cannon here) recognizes the language as ancient elven. He can’t translate but he does understand it’s elven. Which makes no sense unless he would know both how to read and write modern eleven and probably some ancient elven.

I’m Norwegian and interested in languages but I can tell you I would not be able to read Viking runes but because I’lve learned a little at school and through my own curiosity I can recognize that a text is indead written in Viking runes and not let’s say Latin or Celtic just for comparison. This would not be possible without pré knowledge. And I dare say that if you play a mage you are the keepers apprentice which mean he is very likely to have been thought a good deal of eleven even the ancient one. But he will say the same as a rouge. Which mean that at least the Lavellan clan know how to read and write elven and have been thought enough that they can recognize a language that is millennia old. I assure you the Norwegian I read and write now is nothing like what the Vikings used.

And from a pure evolutionary point of view. Language and culture evolve continuously and societies will have accounts a big one like Elvenan would have lots and no not all of it would be hidden in the crossroads or lost with Arlathan.

One does not stop speaking. So the elves that built Hamshiral, the emerald knights and last noble houses of Arlathan would have kept using their language.

If one think about it, speaking a language that no human in Thedas understand would have been an advantage they would have used.

When the dales fell the only elves who would benefit from not speaking elven would be the city elves.

And those who speak also write, messages, letters, lists and so on. Interesting fact there is a mosque in Istanbul that has a Viking rune carved in it. We’re talking 800 years ago some Viking dickhead with a knife carved Erik is awesome into a temple wall. So yeah. People leave traces. Not that I think the elves went around and carved dicks into chantry walls, but the plausibility is there.

The arrow stuck in the roof at Skyhold(just above the garden go check) has elven carved into it. Now someone at Skyhold would have translated that, highly likely someone went to Lavellan and asked.

Again people like marking there territory so to speak, the elves that fled the dales probably had quivers full of arrows saying things like “fendis shems”, or bags of herbs or food marked so one didn’t accidentally eat Raveshine which from what I understand is poisonous.

And they would have had beautifully carved weapons, cutlery, jewellery, books and other nick nacks. One does bring the most precious things.

Clothes as well, tack for their Halla. All of these things have as much impact on a culture as oral stories and legends.

The Dalish work to preserve what was, Bioware have chosen to focus on religion and how it evolves over time. But from a historical perspective religion is only a small part of what make our a culture. And a culture as powerful as the elven one are no small matter to erase.

So it makes no sense at all that all the Dalish are left with is a warped religion, useless tools and simple phrases.

But in a world like Thedas where the elves are hated and feared it makes more sense to hide.

The Dalish keep their cards close to their chest. What would make sense is that they speak elven amongst themselves and common tongue when needed. Coming from a minority language myself there are benefits to doing it that way.

And what we hear in the games might be as simple as that some words are difficult to use in any other language than elven.

In Norwegian “hæ” is a very oral way of saying “what” it’s so stuck in my speech pattern that even when I speak English I end up saying hæ. But I have lived on the British îles for such a long time I say Sorry instead of “unnskyld” And “au” which roughly translates to “ouch”.

Such is the way when one deal with several lanauges on a daily basis. I have a Belgian friend that grew up in Dublin and she can figure out using “pradon” and “great craig” in the same sentence.

I’m a handweaver I work on a loom that has not changed it’s design for 500 years or so. The loom itself is 10-15 years old, things that work move on. And things one always need like clothes, bowls and tools. A hammer might be made of steel instead to iron but it’s still a hammer.

My point is the Dalish elves have learned to adapt to stay alive, but when no one is looking they speak the same words sing the same songs and cook with the same things the elves of Arlathan did.

Right game rant done

#dalish #inqusitor lavellan #dragon age #elven #arlathan #language #culture

20 notes · View notes