that was so embarrassing from dunk lol

deeply refreshing to see someone critical of Swift who also like, genuinely likes her. Like i'm neutral to positive on her, but the online discourse has been absolutely rancid. flipping between "Taylor Swift has never done anything wrong ever and she's a fucking genius" and "Taylor Swift is the worst lyricist of all time and also a bad person" is exhausting, so thank you for like. nuance or something lmao

not to make it serious for a sec but i genuinely think that being able to like things that are bad is really important. like I think that it's an important skill to be able to look at something and see what you personally enjoy about it and then take a step back and acknowledge that objectively it's flawed. and to also be able to acknowledge that liking something isn't necessarily an identity or a moral stance. and i think that fandom space in general could really benefit from more people taking the time to learn how to do that. it's okay to like things that are bad

Why is the anime so weird, it's not even the same series dude?? It's like,

Anime:

GOKU: I have a great idea to bring peace to the universe, and my leadership and compassion alone will unite us all. I have No Flaws and am A True Relatable Everyman :)

VEGETA: NO! I AM THE BEST AND I WILL CAUSE PROBLEMS UNTIL I AM RECOGNIZED AS SUCH!!!!

Manga:

GOKU: Vegeta what's cornmeal made of? I know it's what the corn eats, but what's it made of? VEGETA: Hey Kakarot let's play the quiet game until one of us dies.

Can we talk about The Dying Swan moment in Coda? As someone who was once a very serious ballerina, I need to talk about the Dying Swan. Here's your context --

CHAKOTAY: Harry's clarinet solo was okay. I could have done without Tuvok's reading of Vulcan poetry. But the highlight of the evening was definitely Kathryn Janeway portraying the Dying Swan. JANEWAY: I learned that dance when I was six years old. I assure you, it was the hit of the Beginning Ballet class.

Have you seen The Dying Swan? It is dramatic.

Here, take a minute:

First of all, this dance is much too advanced for a six-year-old, even if they’re doing it in demi pointe. (Six-year-olds emphatically should not be in pointe shoes btw.) The dance is almost entirely bourees and arm movements done to very subtle musical cues, not the foundational ballet moves typically taught in Beginning Ballet.

This is a very vulnerable, dramatic dance that is effective because of its subtleties. The performer would need to embody that vulnerability in some way for a convincing performance. It's short, but it's a solo piece -- all eyes on you. I mean, it was choreographed for a prima ballerina, BUT THAT'S NOT MY POINT

Can you imagine our unflappable Captain Janeway willingly getting in front of her crew to do this ballet? I get that it’s thematically relevant to the plot of Coda, but since Janeway is only vulnerable in front of her crew when it means putting herself in harm’s way, it seems like a wild decision. She tends to hold herself apart from her crew, maintaining the professional distance of the captain. Further, when she does any creative pursuit, it is almost always in private, since her sister was the artist in the family and she was the scientist. As a captain, she commands Voyager in a much different way than she would as a dancer with this piece. I'm not saying she never shows vulnerability because she definitely does, but not necessarily in this way. Then when she talks about it with Chakotay, she just casually brushes it off with a laugh like no big deal.

There’s also the question of costume – would she have gone full tutu? Done it in her Starfleet uniform? An impeccable yet flow-y white suit? She does get into costume and command a performance in Bride of Chaotica!, but Coda is still kind of early days for our captain. Arachnia aligns more with what we know about Janeway's character.

Granted, it is Chakotay laying down these complements about her dancing ability and he is clearly biased. To be fair, Neelix does too before they leave in the shuttle. If she did this dance and performed it poorly or amazingly, I feel like the crew would look at her a bit differently afterwards.

Canonically she did The Dying Swan, but I certainly have trouble picturing it happening.

The way Percy is so hated even though he was one of the very few characters with self-respect and ambitious yet realistic goals and was willing to go to great lengths to reach it despite his family not being the slightest bit supportive of it.

Just started rewatching Transformers Prime and

HOOO BOOY!

I did not remember Optimus and Ratchet being THAT IN LOVE at the beginning.

Like, It's very obvious, but most of their moments you think about come later in the show. But naw, they really just start off like that.

*Optimus runs to his aid and squishes the spider machine for him* "And STAY DOWN!" (Yep, I'm helping my husband)

*after they just barely survived and explosion and OP strikes a hero pose* "Cutting it a bit close a r n ' t w e?" baBE SHUT UP!!

Optimus taking Ratchet out on a date reconnaissance mission, and only because he didn't think he'd be in danger.

"For the first time in my life, Optimus, i'd hoped you were mistaken." BRO!!??

Like they really just looked at the two of them right off the bat and said, yep, old married couple.

i don't expect adaptations to be carbon copies of the original, because then what would be the point of the adaptation when we already have the original. i don't expect adaptations to be better than the original, sure, there are a few cases of that happening, but it's rare.

what i do expect adaptations is to be faithful to the source material, keeping to the same themes that were integral to the original, and i do expect adaptations to maintain the integrity of the characters, especially in a show like avatar the last airbender, where much of its appeal and depth come from the growth, development and the relationships of the characters and that's where natla fails.

Konoha: Wow, it’s so great our double agent within the Uchiha Clan has the selfless Will of Fire, completely cancelling out the possibility for trauma, repressed emotion and deep love to trigger the Curse of Hatred and cause them to sacrifice the many for the few they care about. We can relax and leave it all to him :)

Itachi, trapped on a burning clifftop, wrapping Sasuke in duct tape in preparation to throw him over the edge: ~ I will kill our friends and family to remind ☽  you ☺ of ♬ my ☮ love ☠ ~

series i’m gatekeeping from my family vs series i’m ✨ok✨ with my family knowing i’m into:

had a lengthy conversation with a coworker yesterday, and she's sort of the... not-insane kind of conservative. the sort that's lived like this her whole life and seen only the bad sides, heard and taken to heart only the bad-faith interpretations of everything. and in that environment, yes, i can see the appeal of libertarianism, of withdrawing, of "burn it all down" and she is intelligent and thoughtful enough that i feel it's worth having these conversations with her, that i might actually be able to have an impact.

and i think i made headway! i told her about people tens of thousands of years ago making toys for their kids that look like the ones we make today, about how cave paintings come alive in firelight, about a healed femur from thousands and thousands of years ago proving that humans have always cared and helped one another, and yes, of course some people are awful, but they do not define us. and i think i made her think about it when she said that she believes we should allocate money to communities to better help one another and i was like "how is that not a government?" and she paused and then said "it's just that it's gotten too big, it's the bureaucracy that's killing us" and like. i can see that. i think there are ways to solve that problem, but it's not a fundamentally flawed belief. (again, sane. intelligent, educated, willing to consider alternate points of view.)

and i think that a lot of this... madness of the modern world is rooted in fear and despair and isolation and the sense that we've become completely disconnected from ourselves and our history, and we need to remember that this is not true. or -- it's only true if we choose to make it true, if we let it be true.

this does not have to be our legacy. this rage, this despair, this does not have to destroy us.

i wish steven universe went more into the watermelon stevens (said no one ever, but hear me out!) i wish they went more into how steven made a whole society and abandoned them, just like the diamonds do, just like rose did. and how it demonstrates that having such immense powers very easily leads to a disregard for life.

Fanny: Nickey Barclay, Alice de Buhr, Jean Millington, June Millington, c. 1970s (per the source, photo "courtesy of Alice de Buhr")

-Remembers how T’Pring looked as she watched Spock & Chapel vanish into the bathroom together after seeing them kiss on the bridge (which she knew was for a mission and didn’t hold against them but perhaps she could sense something there since they do have feelings for one another), maybe attempting to calm herself and her suspicions as she’s left alone again (and later finds she’s been left out entirely this whole time) and how she doesn’t know that Spock almost told Chapel he loved her then and there, with T’Pring in the other room waiting, and how Amanda and Sevet both think she could have more confidence in herself and how T’Pring thought that she and Spock were in this together (her holding his hand, subtly letting him know to pour slower so the tea flowers would bloom correctly, a whispered ‘well done’, the ritual is over mother) and how mere hours after she expresses to Spock how she feels: Like he doesn’t trust her, like he doesn’t care to include her in his life, how she’s trying her best to show him that she will accept him wholly, how she wants to be his partner instead of an adversary or an obstacle, after all this he’s found Chapel within the hour and is kissing her.-

its white day so remember to spoil ur gf today!!

I do wanna lowkey apologise if I've been unnecessarily critical of Hazbin Hotel in any way, there is a very high possibility I'm taking out a lot of shit on things I was disappointment with due to what's been going on in my life.

I'm sure the show's not terrible, and there are some things I am very interested in that have happened, I'm just very raw emotionally in general, and the negatives are not something I wanna pile on top of everything else, regardless of how inconsequential a cartoon is in the grand scheme of things.

In my mind, there's a platonic ideal of the traditional fairy tale retelling that takes the story seriously, follows the general outline of the fairy tale in a traditional fairy tale setting, and--most importantly--has well-rounded characters and a well-developed world that grounds us in the details of the setting. It often has romance in it, but the romance is part of the character's wider story instead of the focus.

The authors with books that fit this ideal include:

Gail Carson Levine (Ella Enchanted)

Shannon Hale (The Goose Girl)

Sarah McGuire (Valiant)

Amity Thompson (the first half of A Trial of Words and Worth)