Idk why, but my Instincts are telling me that Yeong-hu and Seok-chan will live and stay together until the end.

hey idk how to tell u this but the big cliffhanger in s1 isn’t the crew being separated it’s stede going out to find ed when ed has fallen so deep into heartbreak and self-loathing that he’s destroyed stede’s ship and split up their crew. the cliffhanger is about “how will ed and stede fix their relationship after stede broke ed’s heart and ed went off the deep end?”

bc what’s going on with the crew is not the main storyline. the main storyline is the romance between ed and stede, djenks has said this many times. the main plotline is the development of ed and stede’s relationship. the show didn’t “shove most of the characters into 1 minute scenes between much longer gentlebeard arcs” in 2.04, the crew was just part of the B plot that episode, which is to be expected because they are all side characters who are always in B or C plots if they’re not part of the plot with the main characters (ed and stede). the main A plot of 2.04 is ed and stede making up now that they’ve finally been reunited, and the show develops this storyline in a rewrite/adaptation/homage to the play who’s afraid of virginia woolfe.

it’s fine if u don’t like gentlebeard or if your main enjoyment from the show is izzy/the crew, but if that’s the case for you then unfortunately you’re always have a harder time enjoying ofmd bc the writing in the show is always going to prioritize gentlebeard over the other characters. the crew reuniting was always going to be much less important than ed and stede reuniting and making up. that’s what david jenkins meant when he said “the show is the relationship.”

Heyo! I see my meme has breached the side of ofmd tumblr I usually interact with, which is really cool! Thanks for stopping by haha

I think your response is so emblematic of the shift the show went thru from season 1 to season 2- namely, that season 1 was an ensemble show and season 2 was not. Stede was the main character, yes, and he got more backstory and focus than a lot of the crew, but the story of the show in s1 was that it was a bunch of people with conflicting personalities shoved onto a boat together. Stede’s the center, but every other character gets focus as well. This show, by djenks own admission, was not originally intended to be a rom-com romance between stede and ed. He said that he didn’t commit to actually have them be together until filming season 1 episode 6- more than halfway thru the story of the first season, and that it was mainly due to rhys and taika’s acting that made him change it from an unrequited love to a relationship. So while the story is a lot about gentlebeard, saying that every other character is secondary to them and their romance isnt true.

I think a great example to bring up would be season 1 episode 7, the episode that solidifies (via lucius) that yes, this is happening. This is a very relationship heavy episode, but crucially gb isn’t the only focus.

Here's a breakdown: we start w a 1:00 gb scene, then roach comes in asking about the oranges, which leads to a 2:00 scene w the whole crew that sets up the episodes plot (swede has scurvy, we need to get more oranges). Jim protests going to st augustine, which is followed by a 1:00 scene between jim and olu, including a jim flashback. Stede and lucius return with the treasure map, there’s 1:30 more of the whole crew, then we go into the captains cabin for 1:00 of stede, ed, and lucius. 6 minutes into the ep flashes to the crew on land, a 0:50 conversation between jim and olu, then 2:00 of the whole crew, ending then nana invites them all to eat some cake at 8:15. We then go to stede, lucius, and ed in the marketplace until the 9 minute mark (abt 0:45), then back to the church where olu and jim talk to nana for 1:15, including more jim flashbacks. Back to the adventure w stede ed and lucius, which is 2 scenes back to back, totally about 3:00 (the “oh my god this is happening” scene). Then back to the church for jim olu and nana, a 1:00 jim flashback inside a 3:00 scene. Then back to the captains and lucius for 1:30, then to jim and olu, more jim flashback, then the a and b plots converge at the 2:30 mark when jim sees stede digging up their tree. Stede, ed, and lucius exit the scene after 1:30, jim and olu have a conversation for another 1:00. We see the crew leaving, then olu and nana talk, which all takes 2:00. Back on the boat, ed and stede become co-captains in a 0:45 scene, then the final 1:30 of the ep is izzy at jackie’s with 1:30 credits

Gentlebeard: 9:00, whole crew: 5:30, Jim and Olu: 11:35, Izzy: 1:30, credits: 1:30

I would say that s1e7 is the most overtly gb episode before the kiss in s1e9. But as you can see, it’s not just gb. There’s a lot of focus on jim, who gets multiple filmed flashbacks, there’s scenes w jim, olu, and nana, there’s scenes of the whole crew together, stede and ed are really only oncscreen together for abt 9 minutes- not even 1 third of the episode. And this is the ep that says directly to the audience “yes, they have a romance building”. I’m not trying to say w this that every member of the crew needs to b given equal screentime, bc that didn’t happen here obv, but everyone is doing something, and the plot is moving forward propelled by more than just the gb relationship.

Now this is very much changed in season 2.

S2e4 starts with 0:20 of stede waking ed up, then 0:45 of stede and the crew, 0:30 of ed and buttons, izzy’s w the unicorn for 1:00. The crew kick ed off the boat in a 1:15 scene. Now at the 2:25 mark we get to the plots splitting. Ed has a 1:15 scene on land, 0:45 is spent talking to a bunny. Stede and buttons find anne and mary’s antique store after 0:45 of walking. The scene in the antique porch is 2:15. Back to the revenge where there’s a 1:00 scene where wee john, roach, and pete talk about how the kraken crew, lucius, and izzy are different, and the kraken crew thinks they’re plotting to kill them. Already we go back to anne and mary’s where theres various conversations for 3:00. We go back to the revenge for a 0:45 scene where the revenge crew scare the kraken crew and lucius by trying to surprise them. Back to land, where anne and stede and mary and ed talk for 2:00. Back to the revenge for a 1:45 scene w the crews, izzy enters at the 1:00 mark and then crawls away. Well that’s that, we go back to the dinner on land for 1:00, then ed storms out and he and stede have a conversation on the couch for 2:15. Anne and mary reenter, followed by a 3:00 argument that ends with anne burning down the house and they don’t kiss for some reason. We have a 0:20 scene of the crew preparing the unicorn leg, izzy is in his room and received the leg in a 0:40 scene, and well it’s been a whole minute on the revenge, time to go back to ed and stede for 1:00, ed and buttons talk end when buttons turns into a seagull after 1:30. Ed and stede talk for 0:30, and then we end w izzy the new unicorn for 0:45. Credits are again 1:30.

Gentlebeard: 19:50, whole crew: 5:05, Izzy: 3:10, credits: 1:30

To illustrate my point, i made some graphs

You don’t even have to think very hard to see the change in distribution of screentime season 1 vs season 2. And i’d argue that this is absolutely to the show’s detriment, because that ensemble cast is given way less time to shine, grow, or even speak. Notice how for the second chart there isn’t a jim and olu section? Yea that’s cause Jim has 10 lines this whole episode, and Olu has 5. Two characters, whose relationship, backstory, and plot takes up more screentime than gentlebeard’s in season 1, have a combined 15 lines between them, only 4 of which are longer than 1 sentence- 2 for jim, 2 for olu, and those lines are two sentences long. god bless us every one.

I get that there’s a large subset of the ofmd fandom that only cares abt ed and stede. I get that that’s how u find enjoyment in the show, and u know what? All the power to u. I’m not saying stop liking the show, stop liking gentlebeard, stop caring abt these characters. I don’t like gentlebeard, but i used to, and i remember really really loving ed and stede and their relationship in season 1. That changed in season 2 because of ed’s abusive actions and stede pivoting from being an independent character to just basically following whatever ed says (but that’s a story for another day).

But let’s be honest with each other, and with ourselves: season 1 was an ensemble show. Season 2 narrowed its focus to gentlebeard, while also making it (for some people) harder to like. That’s why a lot of people (myself included) didn’t like season 2 as much as season 1.

Also, just to focus back in on the original issue, the meme was not about gentlebeard. It was about Anne and Mary. And there is literally no way you can convince me that they were used as well as they could have been, or that they were implemented into the story in a smart, necessary, or even respectful way.

Because i'm a nice person, i made a brand new updated meme just for u, anon!

:-)

please do share how you'd adapt the book/s you're thinking of 🙏

Anon you’re an angel for indulging my nonsense 😘

Ok so I’m going to talk about the adaptation I’ve planned for the excellent but not very widely read book The Girls at the Kingfisher Club by Genevieve Valentine! There will be some spoilers for the book but I’ll try to avoid giving so many that the book would be ruined, because it is a very satisfying read for anyone who loves sisters and jazz age new york 💜

The Girls at the Kingfisher Club is a retelling of the fairytale the 12 dancing princesses, set in 1920s nyc. It’s about sisters who sneak out at night under the nose of their tyrannical father to tear up the dance floor as some of the most notorious flappers in prohibition new york. But their father is growning suspicious, and the older sisters are only too aware that their precarious double life has a time limit on it.

Part of why I think this would make an excellent tv show is the setting—what an opportunity! You could do so much with the dance scenes, which are so crucial to the book, and which deserve to be brought to life in all their dazzle and chaos. And the music! Jazz music!! I’d hope for something as rich and gorgeous and overall stylistically similar to Babylon Berlin. Something that conveys both the danger of this criminal underworld and the freedom the girls find in it.

I also think a tv show (with the benefit of actors interpretations) could flesh out some of the more minor sisters more than the book gets a chance to. Very interesting bones exist for all of the girls, and it would be a wonderful opportunity to see a lot of interesting, complicated, and very different women on screen. And all their relationships with each other are so rich! Would love to see actors develop these more :)

If I was writing the show, I’d probably choose to have each episode follow a specific sister. Unreliable competing narration is the way to go with an ensemble cast of siblings, even if it’s just about who stole whose perfume <3 I would also do it lovesick style, with a past and a present storyline in each episode, with storylines gradually converging on the dinner party (people who’ve read the book know which dinner I mean!). I would open the show with Jo, the oldest, introducing her rules, and then work my way through some of the other sisters before returning to her in a more honest way.

The joy of having so many characters in big group scenes at the clubs, all of whom are keeping secrets from each other, is that you can easily seed the other girls stories (and romances) into the background of their sisters episodes! For example, when Tom finally shows up, the audience should realize they recognize him as someone who’s been dancing with Jo in past flashbacks. Season 1 ends with them running, season 2 finishes up the book, potential for season 3 to follow some bootlegging adventures?

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Selene’s Statements About Della Duck

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When it comes to Della’s decision with The Spear, we’re meant to believe she was more excited about taking a quick joyride in orbit than prioritizing motherhood. We’re also supposed to believe that Della’s crash-landing was the thing that humbled her into being more family-oriented. 

But even with the show being over, there are still some things about this that leave me unconvinced...I mean, yeah, it was very convincing after Scrooge gave his perspective of the ordeal, but as Season 2 progressed, I began to question this retelling...

Although taking the Spear was presented to us as this big, selfish mistake that Della has been trying to make up for and get past, other cases that resembled this story or touched on a contributing factor, didn’t quite treat it as such. Space-related imagery and the like continued to be brought up in the background; even after major events like Della’s return, Lunaris’ defeat and Penny settling her homesickness...it felt like there was something much more important that needed to be said beyond Bradford’s small mention in the finale.

If these other situations in the series truly were inspired by Della’s situation and if she was completely in the wrong, then there would have been more things to further cement this to line up with Scrooge’s perspective. If what he said was exactly what Della was doing, it should be reflected in these other stories as irrefutable no matter how you look at the situation. There shouldn’t be anything that makes us want to second guess...and yet, there’s enough room to think about this.

Dewey and Webby meeting Selene in her garden was one of the first moments I started to question when I looked back at it. As soon as a negative view of Della was said, Selene immediately, without a doubt, went against it by claiming otherwise. At this point in the series, it could have been argued that she was just looking at her friendship with Della in a rose-colored way, but as the time went on, a lot of the information she gave about Della became evident.

In a similar manner, it was once believed both inside and outside of the show that Della had died after getting lost in Space. But the Sphere of Selene itself was hinting towards the opposite; that she was actually alive on the Moon.

Let’s take a deeper look at what Selene was saying about Della here:

“So, we’re back to “she stole Scrooge’s spear and betrayed the family” then. Great.”

“Whaat? No way! She loved her family more than anything in the world!”

This was suggesting that Della was always family oriented, not suddenly after her arrival to the Moon. This is proven through the episodes we’ve seen with her as a child.

In “The First Adventure!”, Della stayed persistent in convincing Scrooge that it would be better to take Donald and her with him, than to search for The Papyrus of Binding by himself. Later after he agreed, both Donald and Della had to get after him for caring more about his business than enjoying the adventure he was having with them. In “Last Christmas!”, Dewey had to explain to Donald why Della was so upset with him. She had planned for the night to be spent going on a mission together but Donald misinterpreted her actions and skipped out to do his own thing. 

Even in the Pre-Spear comics IDW provided, it was Della who was chosen to remind Donald about what it means to be family in Issue # 3. And while the comics don’t determine the canon, the writers who developed these stories were given insight about how the show’s universe works and how the characters are supposed to act. The writers in both the show and the comics could have easily slipped something into these stories to demonstrate how wrong Della was to go into outer-space at the time that she did. In the child episodes, they could have highlighted her selfishness directly by making her want to catch Santa to steal all of his presents or having her extremely eager to make her own request with the papyrus. Why would the showrunners miss out on that opportunity...twice? Why are other characters focused on being in the wrong, but she isn’t?

As an adult, it didn’t feel right to have Della fussing at Donald and Louie for taking significant leaves and not being mindful about the impact of their actions, if she basically did the same thing. It never came off as not wanting them to make the mistake she made, it always sounded like she would know better. She was so quick to point out this problem she had with others that it felt like she forgot about herself. On one hand, this makes her look like a hypocrite, but on the other, this gives off the notion that being selfish and leaving her family out of big events, is not initially a part of her nature.

The closest case we have to better reflecting the Spear situation is in “Trickening” where Della’s desire is at a level of uncertainty that could easily be misinterpreted. In this episode, she wanted to join in on what someone else was doing to give the trick-o-treaters a memorable Halloween. She was aiming to share her love of the holiday with them, but she was so caught up in making it special, that she didn’t realize this plan was way too intense. 

Donald was completely opposed to it like he was with her space travel proposal. He wanted to make his sister understand that she was doing too much, but she ignored his concern and tried to push past him. If Della was supposed to learn that she should listen to Donald more, you would think she would have taken that into consideration much sooner instead of having a huge relapse. Della showing improvement after a major mistake would be too important of a thing for her to revert on, so, having a similar situation in “Trickening” was more than likely done to help us understand something about the Spear one better. As the twins fought, he begged Della to think of the kids and she stated this was exactly what she was doing. This suggested that Della had the same mindset when it came to her own kids.

So, as both a kid and an adult, she has been portrayed caring more about family than other things like adventure itself or some kind of item she could get out of it. If she loved her family so much, then what on Earth would make her leave during such a crucial time and jeopardize the chances of ever being with them again?

“Last Christmas!” showed us that Della doesn’t adventure out on her own unless she feels like she has to. If she didn’t go out in the snow after Donald refused to come with her, then she would have missed out on her chance to catch Santa as a present for Scrooge. Like her Santa hunt, Della originally intended for her space trip to be a family thing. If a parallel is meant to be made here, then that opens up the possibility that Della took the rocket so that she wouldn’t miss her chance to do something special for her family; more than likely, something for HDL’s birthday that could not wait. That could explain her urgency and lack of detail in the letter she left for Scrooge.

If she was just taking the rocket for a spin, she wouldn’t need to word her letter like that. She would have used it as a way to express her gratitude towards her uncle for having her project built. Why would the showrunners have her letter be like this purely for the sake of suspense if we’re supposed to be looking for clues? This is another thing that is too important for them to have pulled something meaningless here. If she had to leave a letter for Donald about naming the boys for her too, then it sounds like she was doing something that may not have been able to be done in time before their hatching. Or, I suppose, in case she didn’t make it back at all. Either way, both messages showed that she thought about the consequences beforehand.

In addition to the garden meeting on Ithaquack, something else that made me slowly change my mind about Della’s decision was how she had brought her copy of the family photo with her. Having it placed on the dashboard in front of her as she traveled through Space, seemed to imply that family was a driving force in her choice to continue in the direction of a storm she could have easily avoided. In Scrooge’s flashback, it seemed like Della was enjoying the challenge she was faced with before the rocket was struck. But when it came to showing her perspective, she wasn’t having a fun experience at all.

“Aw, Della wasn’t just a good person...she was the greatest! And she made everyone around her better.”

When Launchpad defined what it meant to be a Senior Woodchuck in “Challenge”, I immediately made a connection to what Selene had said. It’s a bit uncertain whether Della became a Senior Woodchuck or not, but she was still a dedicated member of the Junior Woodchucks and that sort of implies that she was someone who often looked out for others. This coincides with how Della encouraged HDLW in “New Gods” and helped to bring the children’s feelings of inferiority to Scrooge’s attention. Della eventually helped to make Penumbra a better person once the lieutenant realized that her jealousy and suspicion advanced Lunaris’ invasion. The betrayal against the pilot made her a hero in the eyes of her fellow Moonlanders again, but it was through a lie and that didn’t settle with her. Acknowledging the fact that she messed up motivated her to regain her heroic title in the right way.

None of the points that I’m bringing up in this is to say that I don’t think Della was flawed or that she isn’t really an impulsive character, but that maybe there was a different kind of mistake she made with her rocket plans than what we were being told.

“Maybe the spear isn’t an artifact...maybe, it’s something else!”

“Your mom did love a good mystery!”

This part makes me think of the riddle from Della that the boys would later find in “Castle”. It led them on a quest to find a lost crown, but similarly to The Spear, they found out that this treasure was never an actual crown--it was a sailor’s hat in a duffle bag. It was within the castle’s catacombs where HDL realized that the riddle was originally intended for Donald; another character who is supposed to be looked at as their parent. An imprint of the Spear’s blueprints were later discovered on the back of the paper Della’s riddle was written on.

The way Selene mentioned mysteries right after Webby wondered about the spear being something else, seems to suggest that Della’s disappearance could have been due to her wanting to solve a mystery of her own. In “Last Crash”, Scrooge did compare Dewey’s hunt for the missing photo piece with how he previously failed to keep his niece safe from the cosmic storm.

“Here. It’s not a spear, but it’s a treasure even Della never found.”

This feels reminiscent of Della’s old journal statement about how she never found Coot’s armory. In this episode, it was explained that her younger self was looking for something in relation to the non-McDuck side of HDL’s family. Webby wanted to follow in Della’s footsteps and bring the boys with her on an epic journey to finally resolve this mystery, but once they reached their destination, it landed them in a room full of corn instead. Because the treasure was expected to be materialistic rather than sentimental, the trip looked like a big waste of time. It wasn’t until a spark was set in motion, that the characters were able to acknowledge the importance of what they discovered.

I noticed many elements in “Coot” that could be paralleling things in relation to Della’s journey. On her side of the story, she was determined to complete the task of celebrating her family at the fort, but a setback prevented her from doing it sooner. There was also an cloudy formation that accompanied a crash as well as there being a moment where her vehicle needed to be reassembled.

If Della was looking for a treasure of some sort in Space, perhaps she didn’t reveal this afterwards because, like Scrooge was with her, she was embarrassed about her failure. Selene implied that Della was usually great at accomplishing cases like these but this one resulted in a major loss that caused a decade of separation.

“Don’t give up, young duck. Your mother never did.”

There is definitely no exaggeration about this. In spite of all her struggles, Della continued to press on until she made it back home.

As I was observing the occurrences in Season 2, I noticed that there were key moments about her departure from the Moon that line up with her departure from Earth. If she was working hard to get back to her family on Earth, then there could have been something about Space that she was working just as hard to get to. If there was a particular goal with Earth that Della wanted to include the Moonlanders with, then there could have been something particular with Space that she wanted to include her family with.

Della had to leave the Moon earlier than expected because an emergency came up. That creates a possibility that there was some kind of emergency that caused Della to launch The Spear from Earth sooner than she intended to. Both departures resulted in leaving groups behind and breaking a promise she made to them. Della was very concerned about what the Moonlanders would think about her being gone and while Donald was the one who made a promise about never spending another Christmas apart, she had to have agreed to it; she’s the one who made a big fuss in the first place. If Lunaris' claim of Della being a traitor was false, then there's a possibility that Scrooge's explanation wasn't true either. What could strengthen this is how he was wrong about Della in “Raiders” during its own parallels to the Spear incident.

Adding on to what I said about “Trickening”, If both of these situations were meant to be reflective of Della taking the Spear, then she wasn’t using the kids to mask a selfish desire, she was seriously doing it for them. Lunaris told the rest of the Moonlanders that Della made up her stories about Earth to trick them into letting their guard down, but that was never part of Della’s plan.

So from evaluating Selene’s statements we can gather:

That Della was always family oriented and that betraying her family for the thrill of adventure or the sake of something materialistic, is considered out of her character

Della doesn’t adventure out on her own unless she feels like she absolutely has to

Della may have taken the rocket so that she wouldn’t miss her chance to do something special for HDL’s birthday

Della’s letters to Scrooge and Donald showed that she thought about the consequences before taking the Spear

Della may have not avoided the storm because there was something in the direction of it that she was trying to get to

That even in the past, Della was someone with the tendency to look out for others and make them better people

There may have been a different kind of mistake she made with her plans than what we were being told

That Della’s disappearance could have been due to her wanting to solve a mystery of her own

That if Della was looking for some type of treasure in Space, there’s a higher chance that it was of sentimental value rather than what we would have normally expected it to be

She was more than likely looking for something in relation to another group of people who would also qualify as being part of HDL’s family

Della might not have revealed this afterwards due to her being embarrassed about her failure

Maybe she didn’t tell Scrooge and Donald the truth about her outer-space proposal because she wanted it to be a surprise

If the kids succeed in finding the armory’s gold with realizing it...perhaps in some strange way, Della may have unknowingly completed her goal too

That Della was always known as someone who persevered whenever she had her heart set on something

Della’s plans to enter Space may have played out in a similar manner to her plans to come back home

An emergency in relation to her goal could have caused Della to leave sooner

There’s a good chance that Scrooge may have been wrong about Della’s intentions

If there was nothing significant shown ahead in the storm, then what was Della working towards? Before this episode aired, there were comments here and there speculating that the cosmic storm was a wormhole that sent her into the future. I think that especially at this point, it could have been some kind of portal. The clouds were in the formation of a tunnel and an underground tunnel was what led to the golden armory, so, whether she realized it or not, the storm could have certainly led to the treasure she was seeking. It could have been a portal to a place that wasn’t easy to realize until you’ve passed through it. The Shadow Realm was a hidden dimension that made Lena seem invisible while she was trapped there. Or, maybe like the wormholes in “Neverrest”, the storm could have been a shortcut to another area of Space.

If Della had a bigger reason for taking the Spear then why didn’t the showrunners go into that before the series ended?  Maybe in a similar way to Negaduck’s return, they wanted to get to that but something caused a change. Perhaps there wasn’t enough room to conclude it while also doing the same for Huey and Webby’s F.O.W.L. arc. Interviews with Vulture and SyFy Wire   revealed that twenty minutes had been shaved from the original finale script during finalization as well as there being fifty-five-ish episode ideas leftover that we didn’t get to see.

Another potential option for the additional Spear information is that was always set aside in case Disney greenlit a fourth season. All of the other seasons provided something new about The Spear of Selene and the subject matter is deeply tied to the series, so it would be pretty strange to suddenly stop mentioning it in the next continuation. Maybe Huey and Webby’s arc needed to be focused on first because there’s something about Della’s decision that further connects the two. I’m just...really doubtful that we were given so much build up against the narrative with no intention of it paying off at some point. 

I would love to go in fuller depth about what I think could be going on with Della’s story, but it’s SOOO much work to put everything together for evaluation...I’m not sure how long it’ll take to get it done. I started a multi-part essay about this two years ago and wanted to have it finished before Season 3 but there was too much left to finalize in the last section….

Right now, I can only manage to make singular posts like these and shorter...but there are older, slightly outdated traces of my theory if you look around my blog long enough.

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What’s still so crazy to me is that Landon went on an entire journey in season 3 that we didn’t see. A whole season’s worth of content and growth and development that would’ve made for some really emotional and intense and amazing storytelling and they didn’t show it. Even if they show flashbacks in the next four episodes, I know they’re not gonna spend enough time on them. And even if they did, it still probably wouldn’t be enough. Because what Landon went through spanned across the entire season. There’s not an adequate amount of time at this point to give his season 3 storyline the screen time it deserves unless they somehow extend it into the rest of season 4, which I can’t imagine them doing. And I don’t think I’ll ever understand why they did this. Why add something so huge and so crucial to the story and then have it happen offscreen?? I get that they clearly wanted a plot twist. And while it was a very good plot twist, it wasn’t worth it because they sacrificed literally almost all of the real Landon’s screen time in order to achieve that plot twist. And because of that, we missed out on seeing what will most likely be the most significant story arc for Landon on the show. And that plot twist is only good for one time. Only one time do they get to surprise the audience. Then it’s over and, in this case, that’s all it was good for, along with moving the plot forward, while taking away our chance to actually see a major storyline play out. And season 3 will never have the same effect for fans who go back and rewatch it. Everyone will already know what happens. And that mystery of who/what/where is Landon that is no longer a mystery is all there will be (since it lasted all season), along with the giant hole where we should’ve gotten to see Landon’s arc. And we’ll still be left wondering what exactly Landon experienced and wishing we could’ve seen it throughout the season. Whereas, if they had actually shown it, we’d get to go back and rewatch it every time, and there would be SO much more to see and so much more to it. (Imagine Aria’s acting alone!) It would’ve had real depth and meaning that lasted. It would actually hold up, rather than being completely dependent on a temporary mystery. Because, even just objectively, regardless of whether or not people like Landon, his storyline in season 3 would’ve been the most engaging. His storyline had the most stuff going on, it was about survival, him learning how to fight and facing constant danger. The stakes were incredibly high, which so rarely happens on this show, if at all. Plus how it all must have affected him mentally and emotionally, and him persevering through how hopeless he must have felt. And then finally escaping only to be taken over by the villain. That’s some of the craziest, most intense stuff that’s happened on the show, and they skipped over all of it. The amount of stuff that happened to Landon, all of his experiences, far outweighed what the other characters did all season. But instead, they chose to focus on some of the most dull and insignificant storylines on the show so far. Besides with Hope, there really wasn’t much happening at all back at the school last season. And you really can’t even compare the importance of those other storylines with Landon’s either, his was so huge. And I just don’t understand what kind of decision-making went into them choosing to basically have the whole season be only about what everyone else was doing back at the school while leaving out the most exciting and important stuff that was happening elsewhere? I can understand wanting to try new things, but having your leading man absent for most of the season and revealing what’s happened to him at the end without ever showing it visually is not the way to do it. Especially when it was so meaningful for Landon’s character, and may end up influencing his character for the rest of the show. Why send your male lead on a journey and not show it or explore it? Like, this is the equivalent of if they didn’t show any of what happened to Stefan in season 3, or Bonnie in the prison world in season 6, or Damon and Enzo in season 8, etc., I mean??? I just... I’m never gonna get over it. It’s not enough to tell and not show, and to only show the aftermath with Malilandon in the first episodes of season 4. And I also don’t think there’s a more obvious way for them to say that they don’t care about Landon’s trauma and hardships than the fact that they did this. They completely ignored all of Landon’s suffering all season long, couldn’t even be bothered to show it, they quite literally shoved his trauma into the background. They have put all of the focus on Malivore and have disregarded what Landon has gone through, and what Malivore has put him through. And I’m willing to bet they’re gonna continue to do this, and if they show what’s going on with Landon while he’s under Malivore’s control at all, it will be minimal. And there will probably be more focus on the other characters, as usual, and them facing Malivore, the action, more monsters, etc. because that seems to be what the writers truly care about. While they put Landon through hell and do nothing to even acknowledge any of his pain. And I would be thrilled to be proven wrong, but my hopes are so low at this point. And unless they spend next season revisiting everything, unless a big part of Landon’s storyline next season is about his recovery and finding out what he went through (which is very doubtful), I don’t think there’s a way for them to ever make up for this. We really missed out on some of the most interesting and important content this show had to offer.

Hi there, I just discovered your amazing metas! I’m curious now, since you mentioned previously that you think Klaus will eventually have to let Dave go, do you still think that after what we saw in season 2? And do you have any thoughts about Klaus and Dave’s possible story in season 3? (Since your season 2 prediction was scary accurate!!!)

Hi! It’s so nice of you to drop by 🥰 Thank you for the kind words! For reference, I think you’re mainly referring to this post  [x], is that right? Rereading it now, it does seem uncannily accurate, even to me 😂 The benefits of being vague.  I have to admit, I wasn’t as into season 2 of TUA as I was season 1. So that, combined perhaps with pandemic fatigue (for which this blog has been suffering greatly, I admit), means I haven’t got nearly as many headcanons or metas as I did for our favourite disaster fam the first time around.  Reflecting on my own words in the linked post, though, I can say this:

Whilst I would love to see Dave fleshed out more as a character, I don’t know what merit that would have for Klaus’s own development as things stand at the end of season 1.  

I was really pleased with the turn of events in Klaus and Dave’s storyline. I had not considered the age difference between Klaus and Dave, should the fam land - as they did - in the 1960s. That age difference, however, forced a new dynamic to emerge between Klaus and young Dave. It was not one of romance and shared experience, but almost one of mentor and mentee. This is actually something your comment made me realise! 

Klaus is very much the older, queer mentor in this dynamic. We could speculate that he awakened in Dave this hope that his own queer identity could be seen and validated. In turn, Klaus himself unwittingly takes on this mentor role that 1) parallels and highlights the satire of his messiah image throughout the season, and 2) places him in a position of authority akin to the one Reginald held over him as a child - he can make or break Dave in this moment, as I try to explain in the post you reblogged. 

However, to return to your question, I still think that Klaus will have to let Dave go. Crucially, though, that’s not to say that we won’t see Dave again in season 3. We might see an older Dave - perhaps the Dave of the season 2 timeline, who never meets Klaus and who perhaps lives through the Vietnam war; perhaps a Dave that remembers Klaus as just ‘that crazy hippie who gave me a gay awakening in 1963′; perhaps a Dave who meets Klaus in Vietnam anyway, and they fall in love a million new little ways - or we might see Klaus’s Dave again. But this young Dave was here, I think, precisely to teach Klaus how to let him go.  Klaus avoided trying to find Dave until he absolutely had to return to Texas. (A bit like avoiding an addiction maybe...? Yes, turns out I’m still on this parallel.) The, when he did return, Klaus tried real hard to convince young Dave not to enlist. Even if it meant they would never meet. But Dave went anyway. And Klaus has to live with that. He has to live with the fact that Dave walked away, and he has to live with the fact that he will always play a part in Dave’s death. He lost Dave, again. (Klaus and death walk hand in hand, after all.) Perhaps some things in life are just set in stone. (What was it Five said in season 1? He just had to find the constant version of himself to return to? A fixed point in time?) I think for Klaus, this season was very much about coming to terms with moving forward - the anxiety just before the first step; the pain of leaving the safety net you wrapped yourself in. Now, we might see him start to move on from the people who have propped him up for so long: Dave, and Ben.  So I think in season 3, we will see Klaus grapple more with this dissonance - that his version of Dave and Ben aren’t who Dave and Ben were/are as independent people. Sparrow Academy!Ben may in fact turn out to be all the dark parts of Umbrella!Ben that Klaus and the others refused to see, and for Klaus this may mean grappling with the two opposing images of Ben whilst also finally grieving for the loss of his brother. Alternatively, he may deal with this dissonance better than the other siblings, because this is similar to what he went through with young Dave in this second season.   As for Klaus and Dave’s story in season 3, I’m honestly not sure where we go from here. I don’t think we’ll get anything from Dave’s point of view. We still have yet to really get into his head, and he remains a character whose main purpose is to fuel Klaus’s character development. Therefore, as Klaus moves on from Dave and comes to accept his death, we may not see much more of Dave at all - flashback or otherwise. He will still be very much in Klaus’s mind, though. We may also need to learn to move on from Dave. That said, I would still love to see him again, and for their story to develop further. Until we know more plot details for season 3, however, the possibilities are simply too vast to start speculating with any accuracy. 

Realistically, Berlin is the only possible candidate for the spinoff, because he's the one connected to most people from the original lcdp characters. they could make one with nairobi and helsinki, but those are just 2, with berlin, there are more familiar faces, 7 at least (that is, if pina doesn't go crazy and do a spin off about the wives.)

Yes. And outside his connection to the characters and both heists and his crucial role in them, Andrés is one of the biggest fan-favourite characters. Like in most normal case scenario, assuming that it works both for the actors and the productions and that the writers aren't screwed in the head, Berlin's spin-off would include Marseille, Bogota, Palermo, and Rafael. In the least, with maybe guesting from Sergio's Alvaro or the other younger actor for flashback. So exactly like you said, in this case, it's not just Berlin (who admittedly had a lot of development and focus in the main show itself, being a main character and all) but about 3-4 other characters with him who had tons of potential in canon but not that much space for development. In best case scenarios, we're exploring Marseille and Bogota's past a longside him, so it would be like another ensemble cast, just smaller. The other characters never had that much focus in the first place. Nairobi was loved by the fans but I honestly don't think a spin-off of her would have any chance of success, mainly because her backstory isn't connected to anything but herself and I doubt her and Helsinki did any interesting things those three years. Helsinki could have an interesting story but 1)the show barely gave him any storyline of his own in the 5 seasons of the show, even though he's from the main banda 2) his story is once again disconnected from everyone and everything. Even in the banda years itself, his only relationships were Nairobi and Berlin. Tokyo and Sergio were the main protagonists in La Casa de Papel itself, that show is theirs lmfao, so another one again about either of them mainly is very redundant. A spin-off idea, generally speaking, isn't the best thing, but if we're being honest, Berlin holds the only suitable spot, both textually and meta-textually.

Fiveya Meta: they need to talk

Endure me, I am on a fiveya-train and my thoughts don’t shut up.

After watching the most recent behind the scene videos of TUA season 2 we can conclude that they did make senseless choices in the plot because in some cases they had to. For example in the case of the snow storm created by Harlan in the final episode, that was added to the script because suddenly there have been a snow storm on the outside set the days before the scheduled filming and they couldn’t clean the place enough, in time for the recording. The snow was added.

I also think they could have written some of the characters better and given them real development (*cough* Luther, Ben *cough*). I wasn’t even a fan of the whole “Vanya lost her memory” thing, but I’ve read that Steve Blackman (the showrunner) doesn’t want to diverge from the original content too much (which is a bit silly to say since they did make major changes since season 1, but okay). I guess that’s why Vanya’s amnesia was still there, although they treated it differently. In the comics it was Mom-Grace who helped Vanya to find herself again and her own value, in the show it was Sissy who did it. I thought it was kind of a hint to the comics the fact Sissy resembled Show-Grace a bit (blond, kind and a mom). Did I think it was unnecessary to have a love interest for Vanya right after season 1? I did, but I justified the choice by thinking that the show wanted to give Vanya a taste of what real love (not like Leonard’s manipulative and abusive love) is supposed to be. I also thought it was a way to show how Vanya needs to stop clinging to the first person who gives her affection, attention and treats her with kindness. I hope she’d realize that and work on herself and family in season 3, first and foremost.

Even with the evident flaws I enjoyed season 2, especially because I decided to treat it as a passing by (detour/digression) chapter in a longer story. All Hargreeves siblings in the ‘60s tried hard to make a new life and ignored their actual life (Allison, Luther, Klaus) or had a convenient amnesia (Vanya) or focused on something too much to lose track of what matters (Diego). Everyone except Ben (who was not treated once again as a full character despite the apparent level up the PR promoted) and Five (who once again was running around in panic mode to stop an apocalypse). Remember Vanya saying, “New timeline, new me.” And Five replying “That’s NOT how it works.”? I may give the writers more credits than it is due, but I hope those two lines were some kind of meta messages for the more attentive viewers. Those two lines can explain perfectly season 2 to be honest.

Nobody can know how long a tv show would run, a fact that expose us to uncertainty. It’s always a gamble trusting writers and showrunners to deliver a good story, but all it’s fair game and one has only to accept it. I do not trust any of them, but I cannot help myself and still hope that they will not ruin everything. With all this said, let’s talk about something I think the show has to tackle in next seasons: Five and Vanya are two points of a theme that needs to be addressed and solved. They need to interact, talk and close their open theme together.

This is not a cohesive meta and I probably will lose myself in too many details, but I hope the message I am trying to convey will arrive. This is only my reading of the show and theories, so you can disagree. I just hope you’d find something interesting and maybe help someone to have a different perspective on what’s going on and where (I pray) the show will go. Here the points I will talk about, if you are in for a very verbose essay, please click on the “keep reading” button. Meanwhile I’ll wear my tinfoil crown and sip some margarita.

Five and Vanya are a theme

It was mean to be Ben

Why the Fiveya’s tension in S2 EP 7’s iconic scene is a symptom of something

I dare to hope in fiveya (at least until proven wrong)  

1. We have a theme: Five wants to stop the apocalypse and Vanya is the apocalypse

It’s a twisted joke of the universe that the very thing Five is obsessed about in season 1 (the apocalypse) was caused by the person he trusted the most (“I’ve decided you’re the only one I can trust” - Five in S1EP1). The red thread that linked Five and Vanya can’t be more evident, that’s one of the reasons why I started shipping them. The family’s dynamic, the siblings’ relationships and bonds are equally important, they add layers and motivations to the story, but if we strip everything else and look at the core, we all know Five and Vanya are at the centre of it.

It’s not a simple coincidence that Five said “I’m the four horsemen”. At first, it’s just a funny line, because Five is drunk and he described himself as those fearsome figures (because he is the best assassin of the whole world and time. Death incarnated in his humble opinion). You don’t take him seriously when he said that line, you don’t pay attention to it.  

However, later it gains a certain degree of truth. Subtly the show tells you that indeed Five is linked deeply to the “apocalypse” (Vanya), as much as the four horsemen (they are the prelude and the bringers of the end) are linked to the apocalypse (in the biblical sense). He lived it. He was trapped there for 45 years. He is obsessed with it. The Apocalypse is his business.

Timid little Vanya is the first person he looked for in the middle of the doomsday’s ruins and arguably his closest friend. On the first day of his return Five only have meaningful talks with Vanya. Five sought her to confide the horror of his memories and share the burden of the truth. He trusted her above everyone else. Then the universe made a laughingstock of him when it was revealed that Vanya caused the Apocalypse. Five didn’t know he was running towards her, despite wanting to go back to his family (her) all his life. 

In the first two episodes of season 1 they made clear that Vanya and Five had an intimate bond in their childhood and still cared for each other after so many years, then the show proceeded to separate them until the finale. They tried so hard to keep them far away from each other during season 1 and we all know everything would have been different if they had time to properly talk, process their situation and find a solution together. Of course, the show didn’t give them that chance, otherwise the show would have ended in episode 3 and goodbye drama!

They did not confront each other in the end of season 1, they let Allison take that role because the show built up their connection as sisters and I didn’t dislike the choice. Did it work thematically? No, Allison has no connection with the apocalypse. That’s Five’s business. He didn’t confront Vanya, he let others take the lead in the most crucial moment and with no surprise the apocalypse still happened.

The other apocalypse in season 2 was still connected to Vanya and again Five ignored the cosmic signals and focused on dead ends. Despite knowing perfectly that the butterfly effect can come from any source, he didn’t even think about Vanya’s being the cause of the apocalypse again. Five should have listened Klaus when he suggested that Vanya might have been the cause. Funny how Klaus told him in S1 that he has an addiction and Five aggressively denied it. Funny how saving his family and stopping the apocalypse are always his top priorities, but Five still deny himself (for a reason or another) the time to confront Vanya (the apocalypse).

We have a theme waiting to be resolved: Five wants to stop the apocalypse and Vanya is the cause of the apocalypse. If Five does not confront Vanya the theme will never have a closure. It’s still open right now. It is still there, waiting to be picked up again. There is no resolution.

2. Vanya and Ben’s goodbye

The scene between Vanya and Ben was one of my favourites from season 2 and after pondering for a while I concluded that it couldn’t have been anyone else but Ben the one who helped Vanya in that moment. My theory is that the show will walk backwards the breaking points of Vanya’s life: Ben’s death, Five’s leaving and Reginald’s abuse.

Vanya is not fixed. How could she when she was barely Vanya in this season? “New timeline, new me” she said, but that was just a convenient escapism mechanism. Years and years of mentally and emotionally abuse don’t disappear in one week. The Hargreeves have still a lot to process and resolve, individually and as family. That’s why I hope the show will progress the story in the right direction and actually work on them in season 3. Especially Vanya, who needs to confront her trauma. That’s why the scene with Ben in episode 9 was necessary.

From Vanya’s book:

[…] Our everyday existence was full of evidence that Dad had [...]-pped into treating us like experiments. Not as children, but like animals. And what happened to Ben was the last straw that finally shattered the illusion for the others …

Ben died long time ago and his death was the last straw that shattered the illusion (for the others) that their father cared about them (even in his own messed up way). Everything changed from that moment and each sibling drifted away from one another after that. Ben’s death was the moment Vanya and the rest of her siblings stopped being a family. The definitive step of Vanya’s alienation from her siblings.

There was no place in the group for her. With Five’s absence and Ben gone (he is a caring brother, with Klaus is like that and I can imagine him being kind to Vanya in their childhood too. Although, Ben is not Five and we have seen him being harsh to her in the flashbacks in S1EP10), Vanya was truly lost.

The tearful and important moment between Ben and Vanya was a reverse moment in my opinion. Vanya needed that from Ben, his death heavily influenced the course of her life (everyone’s life) and it was only fitting that Ben should have been the one helping her to start again. It’s symbolic in a sense, but also very factual.

“Sorry that I left without saying goodbye” – Five, S1 EP2

“At least this time I can say goodbye.” – Ben, S2 EP9

I’m using my fiveya-goggles, but we all thought that what Five said in S1EP2 (when Vanya tried to find him at Hargreeves’ mansion) wasn’t just about him leaving her apartment. It’s a very specific line that works on double levels: text and subtext. The subtext of course refers to the day he run out the house and time jumped. I highlighted these two lines from Five and Ben because I think they share the same theme: leaving her without saying goodbye.

Vanya wasn’t on mission with the team when Ben died, and I doubt she even saw his body (or whatever remains were left) when the Umbrella Academy returned. She didn’t even see his manifestation during the Icarus’ fight, too focused in her own power. The scene between them in Vanya’s mind gave both the opportunity to make amend of untold words and missed moments.

Ben is dead, he is the one he cannot return. His departure is permanent, there is nothing they can do about that. However, they can have a closure. Ben needed to be the one first patching to mend Vanya’s relationship with her family, to remind her that she does belong. This sort of second death (finally move on into the Light) has more meaning than the first one, this time Ben completed the mission. He saved someone he loved (he couldn’t stop Klaus from destroying his life with drugs and alcohol) and could trust his siblings to take care of the rest.

I still think Ben didn’t need to die-die, but in a sense it was time for him to move on into the light. He was afraid to go on, but if he could move on so his siblings. It is time for Vanya to move on her own trauma.

(Yeah, I know. I still have problem with the scene because they erased canon in a way and Ben could do a lot more as character. They erased the fact drugs stop their powers like in Klaus’ addiction and Vanya’s pills, so how Vanya was able to use them under LSD? I tried to explain that to myself by the fact “they needed to bs that canon fact in season 1 and ignored it”.

We can also argue that Ben could have prevented the apocalypse in 2019 by doing the same thing, but in their defence S1-Ben didn’t know he could possess a body. Yeah, how did he do that without Klaus’ power help? No idea, that doesn’t make sense to me either. Ahah. I just swam with the flow at that point and accepted it as it is. Call it the power of superpowered siblings’ love. I’ve seen worse plot holes in my life. I can live with this).

3. Pass me the knife, there is some tension here!

From Vanya’s book:

Though prone to arrogance and outbursts, even more than the average preteen, Five was my sole confidante in the years before he disappeared. It almost seemed fitting […] the siblings to leave us, it would be him who [I fully?] […] who fully trusted me.

I said that Vanya’s walking backwards her life’s breaking points. So, after Ben’s death, she needs to address Five’s leaving. Five was her only confidante in the years before he disappeared, as she wrote in her book. Five was very important to young Vanya (and old Vanya needs to remember that) and I bet when he left, that was a scar never healed.

Vanya missed him and hoped for his return, for a while she kept the lights on in the house every night and prepared for him his favourite sandwich. When Five did come back Vanya couldn’t process that fact properly in season 1, all she could think of was that she didn’t want to lose him again. Five on the other hand decided that he would save everyone on his own and for that choice he made a bunch of tragic rookie mistakes.

Miscommunication is their kryptonite and right now Vanya and Five aren’t able to fully communicate at the same level. Reggie did such a good work at parenting that they’re so unfit to deal with their emotions and relationships, that will always be the root of their mistakes.

Same story in season 2, meanwhile Vanya is on the verge to provoke another apocalypse (although indirectly), as usual Five was too obsessed with his own plans and was not even aware of the situation. He knows nobody is insignificant when it’s about altering the timeline, but he always ends to focus on the wrong lead. The show again did incredible summersaults to avoid the two to interact properly and when they interacted things still didn’t work for a reason or another. She didn’t remember her past, he was not entirely sincere with her. She wanted to start anew (having a family with Sissy, easy-peasy), he is trapped again in a run against time to save his family. They are still not at the same page and for the show that is convenient. They still can play with their open theme (my point number 1 in this meta).

I don’t blame Five in S1 for thinking that if the worse happens, they would need to kill her. I think he was in a very delicate state of mind in that moment, he didn’t have time to process the fact Vanya (his favourite sibling and we all know she is his favourite) caused the end of the world. It was disappointing and cynical, but time was ticking fast, and he had been in his “maniacal-panic” mode for almost eight days. I also think he wouldn’t really kill her; he was the one who convinced the others that they needed to take her with them in the time jump. They need to “fix her” (aka help her to never feel alone in the universe and prove her we do love her) or they’re going to make the same mistakes again and again.

Just to be clear I think if Five wasn’t one day from the end of the world and in a rush to stop Vanya, he would had had the same reaction as Old Man Five in S2. His 14-days younger version take it very well “Fair enough” he said and then proceeded to tell Luther how to save Vanya, no mention about killing her whatsoever. Old Man Five had time (10 days more than our current Five) and a direct clue on how to stop the apocalypse (thanks Luther). Nobody was going to kill Vanya.

“Vanya will always be the cause of the apocalypse, unless we fix her.” - Five S1EP10 

“Vanya is the bomb. She will always be the bomb.” - Diego S2EP8

Vanya is the bomb and she will always be the bomb unless she heals. A fact that can be added to my number 1 point in this meta, there is an open theme and they need to tackle it. Five and Vanya need to confront each other and resolve it.

This takes me to S2 EP7: the iconic stare-power stand between Five and Vanya. THE TENSION was real, and you could cut it with a butter knife. The first time I screamed at my screen, I felt like Gordon Ramsay in one of those episodes of “Kitchen Nightmare US” when someone finally serves him good food.

Of course, the immediate reading of the scene is that Five needed Vanya to come along and Vanya didn’t want to go because at that point these Hargreeves are still strangers to her (amnesia is so convenient), Sissy and Harlan are the ones she knows and loves in that right moment.

They were still able to cut each other with sharp words and hostile glares though. Five let her have what she wanted, not because he feared her, but because as usual he cares more about her feelings than what he would ever admit. It’s the second time in S2 he let her go, his soft spot and favouritism for Vanya was showing once again! *fakes surprise*

I think the tension shown in this scene is a symptom that Vanya and Five are on the verge of something they will (they have to) confront soon or later. This is the subtext reading I came out with.

Even if you don’t look at it with shipper goggle, you feel there is something going on. They let the viewers feel there is a sensitive something whenever these two have an alone scene together. All their alone scenes have a specific grade of intimacy, they made it clear since the scene in front of Five’s portrait. They care for each other, they love each other (sibling love, platonic love, we-could-have-been-something love etc…) and it’s there. However, Five left and Vanya never truly recovered from that. They didn’t process that fact and I truly believe they can’t move on until they heal that scar.

Basically, S2 EP7 Fiveya’s scene = We have to talk, but this is not the moment because the show is only on its second season! THIS TENSION IS HERE FOR A REASON.

4. Hope is the last thing to die

I shouldn’t trust a show, I’ve been disappointed so many times in the past years and showrunners of popular shows tend to be unoriginal and cowards. However, I am an optimist at heart and until season 3 I dare to hope anyway. If proven wrong, there are always fanfictions who can do better job than canon.

If all was lost they could have eliminated Alluther too from the universe because of certain fans screaming “harcest is incest you weirdos”, but Allison and Luther’s situation still exist and still work on the parameter “will they or not”? I imagine for their shippers it was annoying to have such a regression in season 2, but they didn’t destroy it and they still gave them scenes.

Fiveya had even a more subtle situation than Alluther but they’ve been granted the same level of intimate interaction whenever they have an alone scene together. Until Five (the character) will gain an older body (which he can) the whole thing is suspended. However, I think they wouldn’t have been open about the possibility of Five changing back to an older body and spoke about in season 1 if they didn’t have an idea for that.

I brushed off the line Five said to Old Man Five about being forever trapped in his 13-years-old body. It’s canon that there is a way to gain an adult body for Five, the Commission has the technology and even if it’s not the Commission they can mambo-jambo the thing in a way or another. That would never work. The actor is a growing up teenager and from season 1 to season 2 he has already changed. I imagined he will change even more before season 3 will ever start recording (maybe very late due the COVID-19 situation).

Aidan is a fan favourite and I am one of those who can’t see anyone else playing Five, with this said there are still ways for the show to give us fiveya. Young fiveya flashbacks will be always an option to explore the idea of “they had a crush on each other when they were young” and make other viewers understand that it wasn’t all “sibling” love between them. Endgame in a distant season can always have an epilogue with an adult Five (another actor I mean) having a very non-platonic (let adult Fivey kiss please) moment with Vanya, meanwhile building up the longest slow-burn (kinda, deep down I believe those feelings for each other are there) of the century.

Maybe I am wrong, maybe my tinfoil crow is too tight, and my brain doesn’t breathe. Maybe the show will succumb to easy paths and angry bullies. I don’t know, but until proven wrong I dare to hope.

PS: This is a monster of a meta and it probably doesn’t make sense? I hope someone will get what I’ve tried to say. I hope you survive, brave readers. Here a glass of margarita for you. I’d love to hear what you think

RWBYlog vol 5, eps 4-6

i still like the dude that works for raven who doesn’t realise yang is almost completely identical to raven in every way except colour scheme

he even saw yang’s red eyes what more does he need

Episode 4:

“We’re gonna take your bike, and you’re gonna take your lumps” is hands down the best filler mook threat ever. 

Also the idea that these thugs thought it was a good idea to jump Yang in the first place? Qrow and Raven became Hunters to give their bandits a fighting chance, since Hunters are leagues above literally everyone else. This dude notes Yang looks like a Huntress, but... picks a fight anyway? How’d he expect this to go?

Yang’s combat is very low energy compared to what it used to be. “Character development” or whatever, I guess? 

They’re just now explaining how semblances work??

Raven and Yang’s reunion is... weird. Yang decided at some point she didn’t care about getting resolution with Raven and is blowing off her attempts at being friendly, and Raven is just... desperate for Yang to like her? This is a weird payoff to a plotpoint established in the Yellow Trailer. It’s Yang’s whole personal story and she’s just. Lost interest, I guess? 

why does it feel liike yang is bullying her deadbeat mom

also how did weiss not hear all this commotion

that freezerburn hug had more passion that almost all of bumblebee

Episode 5:

Episode 5 and nothing has happened?!

Ghira’s speech was pointless, then? Since Blake and Sun have to do a recruitment drive?

Also, again - hey civilians! Come fight terrorists for us! What is this. What. Why.

Blake having the Adam talk with Sun really... paints future events in an odd light. Sun doesn’t even meet Adam? Also, her “someone is the personification of this word” speech is so... bad. People don’t talk like this??

Also, her flirting with Sun gets painted in an odd light in general. This entire conversation jives very oddly with canon bumblebee.

Also, Blake talking about what Adam thinks the world did to him is odd, since he’s the Faunus that’s hardest done by on-screen? His fucking face, Blake. 

this entire episode is just talking. i say this a lot but the rule “show, don’t tell” is crucial. 

Oscar has more emotional investment in the plot than Ruby, go figure. Her speeches always read as... preachy and hollow. It’s like the show is trying to be really profound but it’s just... longwinded and pointless blathering. I’m not even sure when Ruby was supposed to have gotten wise and wordly to start lecturing people. also that speech was like 3 minutes long

 also not sure when ozpin saw this spark of ruby’s outside of like, the exam in the forest?

god this episode is just. 4 fucking conversations chained together and all of them were boring

also making the fang. like. a cult. sure was a choice.

Episode 6:

I kinda wish we knew how much money was worth in RWBY. I want to know how horrified I should be at Qrow throwing down 16,000lien.

RWBY would really, truly, benefit from flashbacks. There’s a reason we use them - they’re more goddamn engaging than endless monologuing!

oh god... the horror... ozpin turned me into a BIRD!!! kind of! sort of! it’s optional!

Yang’s “you weren’t kind this time either!!” comeback to Raven is dumb because Raven was nothing but accomodating almost the entire time. 

Ruby freaking out when she sees Yang again is the most genuine emotion Ruby’s shown this entire volume.

Also Yang “abandonment issues” Xiao Long really let being abandoned go pretty easily? Raven and Blake suck but Ruby’s fine???

god this season fuckin sucks

anarchiana replied to your post “I rewatched S14 this week. In 14x19 there's that harsh line from Dean...”

@mittensmorgul Hi Mittens! Thank you so much for answering, I should have checked your previous posts first before asking my question, I’m sorry! I read the posts you linked now, thank you for linking and for your insights.  <3  I really should know by now to read your posts before I watch an episode. This show is such a minefield of mindfucks, my brain blue screens me when I think about all the spirals and mirrors and layers and whatnots... ����

@mittensmorgul One thing after reading your posts. Do you think that we are supposed to think that Dean and Cas don’t talk about the harsh words between them; that they don’t need words to get over their shit; or that they somehow talk about it and we simply don’t get to witness those scenes? Or it doesn’t matter because that’s not the focus of the show?  Thank you ��

Hi there, and no worries! It’s probably an excellent time for me to have gone back through all of that anyway. :D

I think we absolutely are being told that they DO talk offscreen. And that they do it frequently. That was a major theme of the last few seasons, going back to at least 12.19 with the Mixtape Revelation.We learned at at some point, Cas and Dean had at least one (1) offscreen conversation that we never knew about before, and not only that, but the implications of the nature of that conversation based on the fact that it culminated with Dean gifting Cas a freaking mixtape, well... that’s a personal conversation, you know?

Then 14.18 doubled down on that with all the flashbacks of Mary’s life since her resurrection, which began with Cas’s recollections of her from a time shortly after the events of 12.03. So this “things have happened that you didn’t know about” has been applied to everything, not just Dean and Cas’s interpersonal stuff. But Dean and Cas’s interpersonal stuff has still been at the core of this particular theme, and most of these “we talked about this while the cameras were off” situations ARE about Dean and Cas’s personal interactions. Mixtape, they casually watch movies together, they casually spent several weeks holding down the fort at the bunker together while Sam took off to avoid dealing with the grief of 14.14, etc. These are such TINY moments sometimes, we don’t really stop to think about what they’re actually telling us, repeatedly.

The hard truth is that while we LOVE these sorts of acknowledgements, they constitute the C plot of Supernatural, you know? The A Plot is the mytharc, the B Plot is the MotW and larger individual character arcs, and the C plot is... their relationships. So on the playing field of the story, this is just never gonna take center stage you know? Not that it’s not important, or doesn’t have a significant impact on the larger story. Like I said above, the themes these plotlines are being defined with are also defining the larger story as a whole. By nature, that MAKES them important.

It’s just that they will never (or at least not until right near the very end of the road) supersede the A Plot, and the B Plot. At that point, after the series-long A Plot has been resolved, we will be able to measure the true import of the C plot, you know?

But in some ways, the fact the show is repeatedly reminding us that these offscreen conversations are happening makes them more and more important. We’re being repeatedly badgered to just KNOW they’re happening, because the show has spent several years instructing us to make those logical jumps from what we saw last and what we’re seeing now, you know?

I remember the OUTRAGE from early s11 that Dean and Cas never talked onscreen. We felt we’d been PROMISED this conversation from the PR. Things such as “Dean and Cas resolve their differences,” and “they’re on the same page again” were dropped during the filming of 11.06, and many of us believed we were owed an onscreen conversation where they apologized to one another (Dean for 10.22, Cas for 11.03). And then the feeling of letdown was so powerful, for WEEKS some folks thought there was a conspiracy involving a cut scene that we never got. BUT WE DID GET THE DEAN AND CAS VERSION OF AN APOLOGY.

First off, Cas was trying to save Dean in 10.22, and got hurt because he refused to hurt Dean when he was so obviously going off the rails and not in control of himself. Dean was trying to save Cas in 11.03, and got hurt because he refused to hurt Cas when he was so obviously going off the rails and not in control of himself. PARALLELS! HOW THE TURNTABLES! wait I have that gif...

This is how the show deals with this sort of interpersonal drama... turnabout is fair play and all that. It was an eye for an eye, and they both knew they didn’t need to apologize, because they’d each experienced this painful walk in each other’s shoes, as it were. Neither of these incidents were “he was mean to me wah wah wah” that NEEDED an apology. Call it instant karma. Whatever. In the language of Dean and Cas, THEY understood and forgave each other, because neither had ever blamed the other in the first place.

But the show has expanded that language in very deliberate ways since then. Of course there are things they haven’t yet clarified for each other, but at this point, so close to the end, they’re standing right on the precipice. They’re at a point where ~actually having that conversation on screen~ will knock the whole wall down, you know?

Whatever is standing between them in early s15, I’m betting it’s something that will be clarified in 15.01. It’s probably built on the foundation of that conversation in 14.18, because that wasn’t just Dean telling Cas he was dead to him if Mary was dead... because Cas clearly isn’t dead to him. Dean didn’t even cold shoulder him for the rest of the season, you know? But the REAL foundation of any potential rift between them will be from Cas’s side, and the fear he described in that conversation:

Castiel: I was scared. I believed in Jack for so long, I... I believed that he was -- he was good. I -- I knew that he would be good for the world. And he was good for us. My faith in him, it -- it never wavered, and then I-I saw what he did. It wasn't malice. It wasn't evil. It was like Jack saw a problem, and in his mind, he just solved it with that snake. Dean: The snake?! Castiel: What he did wasn't bad. It was the absence of good. And I saw that in him. But we were a family, and I didn't want to lose that, so I thought I could... fix it on my own. Felt like it was my responsibility. So I left. And I didn't tell you. If I could go back and just -- just talk to him right then and there, I would. But I can't, Dean. I failed you.

THIS IS WHAT CAS FEARS MOST. That as much as he talks the talk that he’s part of the Winchester family, he is terrified that he really isn’t. He’s not “useful,” he’s not really family. He doesn’t understand that yet, and seriously, at this point, all it would take is a five minute conversation with Dean to resolve that... so obviously the show is gonna avoid resolving that for a while to drag out the drama, because that is literally the core character issue Cas has been dealing with since 4.01. That’s his entire character arc, and they won’t let him find peace until they’re done, you know?

So... instead, they have given us these important reminders that even though these character interactions between Dean and Cas aren’t crucial to their overall character development, at least not like That Big Conversation would be, or in a “we should take up precious screen time showing them kicking back and watching movies and having casual human interaction” sorts of ways, that they are important enough to tell us about, repeatedly. It’s important for us to know that their relationship is so much deeper and broader than what we see onscreen, you know? Like, they’re actually friends offscreen, who hang out and talk and do fun stuff for fun. THAT is all we really need to understand about them. Because that’s what adds that huge weight of depth to their relationship, you know? And all they have to do to maintain that is to keep surprising us with these little casual mentions of Things We Don’t See. What I like to call “The Other 364 1/2 Days.” Because our window into their lives is only open 42 minutes a week, 20 weeks a year (now, we used to get 23 weeks a year). That’s 840 minutes a year. There’s over 525,000 minutes a year we DON’T see. And the fact they repeatedly tell us how Dean and Cas spend their free time together seems significant within that tiny sliver of their lives, you know?

So it’s not really a matter of “important vs not important,” but priorities within an incredibly limited constraint on storytelling time.

The 100 rewatch: 3x01/3x02 – Wanheda Part One and Two

My rewatch will have to be sped up so I could finish it before the season 6 premiere. I’ve seen up to 3x08, but from now on I have to watch more than one episode a day. I hope to be able to finish season 3 by the end of this week. Which means I’ll have to try to make my next posts shorter than this one, which I’m pretty sure is my longest rewatch review so far. Maybe I could try covering several episodes in one post to try not to repeat myself in the following reviews?

Season 3 is definitely my least favorite season of The 100, and so far, having rewatched half a season, I haven’t changed my mind on its quality. But, except for one instance of really lazy writing (which will, sadly, turn out to be something the writers like to do, since they did the same but in an even worse way in season 5), this two-parter was a solid opening to the season, which, unfortunately, started going downhill right after it.

Also, I only realized this on rewatch…. Clarke is Rapunzel?! Or anti-Rapunzel.

*These rewatch posts have spoilers for everything up to the end of season 5, and I may also mention stuff from the season 6 trailer. No spoilers for 6x01, and please don’t mention any if you reply or reblog with comments, I’m trying to avoid them (good luck to me on that).

3x01 Wanheda, Part One

Timeline: This is one of few episode reviews where it makes sense to start with this, because it’s the show’s first time-jump – it starts almost 3 months after the season 2 finale, or specifically 86 days,. In most other shows, this wouldn’t be considered a time jump, but most of The 100 episodes take place just a day or a few hours later (which was the case with the time that passed between the season 1 finale and the season 2 premiere), sometimes just a few minutes later (season 3 finale/season 4 premiere). It’s even notable and relatively rare when there is a week, or just two days between episodes. Although this is obviously nothing compared to the time jump in the season 4 finale (and, to an extent, season 5 finale – which was technically much bigger,, but only really counted for three characters), this time jump is still twice as long as the entirety of seasons 1 and 2, which lasted less than a month and a half.

The starting sequence is great, with Murphy with long shaggy hair and a beard, in a state of desperation after being locked up in the bunker for 86 days, to the point that he almost decides to shoot himself in the head. Similar to how Clarke almost shot herself in the head in the flashbacks in 5x01. Even the greatest of survivors come to the point when it’s just too much for a human being to bear. Clarke reached that point after a month of being not just all alone on a desert, radiation soaked planet, but likely to be all alone for at least 5 years, and even more likely to die of hunger, thirst or exposure. Murphy took 3 months, but was in situation where he didn’t lack food or drink or comfort – but isolation, without any human contact or entertainment, other than videos of a guy committing suicide because he felt responsible of the end of the world, has to be unbearable.

Introduction of Becca In one of the videos is good as we get more crucial info practically at the beginning of the season (and at the same time, not so good, because I can’t stand Becca and I’m really not fond of the entire storyline about the chip/Flame/Commanders).

Scenes in the mansion with Jaha and ALIE are really creepy, as we see just how much Jaha has become removed from reality and immersed in the City of Light. When Jaha explains the concept of COL, the prospect of getting rid of pain, hate and envy,  Murphy has maybe his best ever line, and pretty much his defining quote: “Pain, hate, envy… those are the ABCs of me. Take that and there’s nothing left.”

Getting thrown right into Camp Jaha, now called Arkadia, after 3 months, to see how much everyone’s lives have changed, works well for the most part (with one exception – see below). Jasper’s new look and attitude are shocking, but make sense. I don’t know if this is an unpopular opinion, but I think Jasper’s storyline was one of the best things in season 3 and even season 4, and I think it’s great that the show, for once, didn’t shy away from showing the consequences of emotional trauma (these people are teenagers who have been through terrible things in an extremely short time, it’s hard to believe everyone would soldier on and no one would break), and that they didn’t try to make a depressed person be more “likable” by being nice, even if it resulted in so many fans calling Jasper “annoying” and now showing any understanding for his mental health issues just because he wasn’t depressed in a nicer, more palatable way.

Raven’s story in seasons 3-4, which is also pretty good, also gets set up with a conversation with Abby about her pain, where Raven refuses an operation and they end up saying bad things to each other, as those two sometimes do. Raven calls out Abby on trying to hide from her own pain, too (over losing Clarke), which is a major theme this season. She also tells her she’s bad as both doctor and Chancellor, and much as I used to love Abby in S1 (and still like her) I’m afraid that this is least half-true since she’s sucked at politics most of season  2and 3. As a doctor, she’s good at healing people, but her bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired.

The show gets rid of the Raven/Wick romance plot (which had to be jettisoned due to Steve Talley being a terrible person IRL and tweeting racist “jokes”) in the best way it could, by referring to it in one line (according to Abby, Raven pushed Wick away) and never having him appear again.

They used “Add It Up” by Violent Femmes! And even Shawn Mendes’ cover worked well – his was a sad and plaintive ballad, as a contrast to the original, which is an energetic rock song. (I had no idea who Mendes was when I first watched this, but his cameo didn’t feel weird or out of place).

A huge plus because Emori makes a return. Also, Otan is introduced, who actually is her brother (it’s not just a classic thief/swindler thing where partners in crime are like “I’m an innocent damsel in distress and this dude is totally my brother…” thing).

There are several character introductions of characters that are varying degrees of interesting or not so interesting. Roan’s is especially intriguing right from the start, and there’s also Niylah, Becca and Gideon, and Gina. Speaking of…

My biggest problem with this episode is how weird and jarring it always felt that we just get introduced to Bellamy’s new girlfriend, a random character we’ve never met before and who doesn’t get developed at all. We know she’s nice and really into him, and he likes her fine enough, but there’s very little about their relationship that goes beyond very basic relationship-establishing stuff. This was all the more jarring because Bellamy had never previously been shown to have an actual girlfriend (rather than friends with benefits/fu*k buddies, which he had quite a few in season 1), and by what we know of his backstory and what we was like in season 1, I had always assumed he had never had a serious relationship or even a serious friendship, because he could never allow himself to trust people on the Ark, and he was too focused on protecting Octavia and keeping that huge secret. So for him to be a real relationship was a new development that I would have loved to actually see. And in general, how weird is it that the show seems to treat the love life of a major character – second protagonist as an afterthought, to the point that his relationships get developed completely off-screen and just get a few perfunctory scenes to establish “there was a time jump, it happened, this is a thing now, that’s all you need to know” (which was all the more jarring when Gina then got fridged just 3 episodes into the season). Hey, and just how weird would it be if the show did this TWICE? I have an idea why this happens – because neither of his relationships with Gina nor with Echo was ever treated by the show, as genuinely important or something we need to be invested in, but If I ever believed that Clarke and Bellamy were really totally platonic BFFs (because one major platonic relationship is not enough for Bellamy, who is one of the very few characters on the show who actually has a sibling, and his relationship with Octavia is also a major one the show focuses a lot..) and that the show wasn’t doing something else, I’d be really puzzled by such weird narrative choices.

·Raven teases Bellamy that Gina is “too good” for him. That may be because she is aware that he was “never as devoted to Gina” (compared to Clarke), as she taunts him as ALIE!Raven in 3x11.

Gina gives Bellamy Iliad as a gift, because his mother used to read it to him… an epic whose main theme is a warrior hero’s rage and all the mess it causes?

The Ice Nation aka Azgeda, after being referenced before, finally gets introduced (though Echo will get retconed revealed to be one of them), and I have very mixed feelings about this, because the oversimplified way the show tried to suddenly establish “Trikru=good Grounders, Azgeda=bad Grounders” in season 3 was kind of grating.

·Everyone is still bad at dealing with people with PTSD and mental health issues in general – as seen in the fact that they made the mistake to bring Jasper with them on a mission. This time, Bellamy had an inkling it was not a good idea, but Monty thought it would do Jasper good… and again, it didn’t end well.

Indra has changed her views a lot and is now the liaison between Trikru and the Arkers and o very friendly terms with Kane.

The relationship between Trikru and Arkadia is at this point kind of a mixed bag – they have a truce and cooperate, but there’s a problem of limited trade routes and ability for Arkers to get food, the Grounders are not happy with the prospect of them using Mount Weather, and Lexa has issued a kill order on Lincoln (which is why he has had to stay in Arkadia even if he didn’t want to – though it seems he does want to) just because he went back to help Arkers against Mount Weather (any disobedience of Commander’s orders, no matter how justified, is apparently punishable by death).

Something that’s annoying, but expected and in character: Octavia complaining about Lincoln wearing an Arkadia uniform and trying to integrate into the Arkadia society. It’s like she was so happy to be rebellious and have a cool Grouder boyfriend, and now she’s disappointed.  She tells him he will never be one of them (oh, the irony of this coming from Octavia, who says “I’m a Grounder” every second episode – which I don’t get, does she think being a Grounder is a lifestyle you can choose?) and even lectures him about the culture he grew up in: “At least you still speak our language” (meaning Grounder speech). LMAO

Octavia suggests they go off on their own and find Luna and her people – one of the many, many references to Luna going all the way back to season 1. No character has been set up so much long before they appeared.

It takes quite a long time for Clarke to actually appear in the episode, right after the revelation that she’s the titular Wanheda everyone is looking for.

About the nickname itself: Clarke herself hates it, of course (though she will kind of ‘reclaim’ it in 5x12) – because she feels deeply guilty and hates herself, but I’m sure that, for Grounders, “Commander of Death” an expression of awe and fear, not any kind of judgment, which wouldn’t make sense – we’ve seen multiple times that Grounders take the “kill them all If we can’t kill their leader” approach to their enemies, so I can’t see them being bothered by her killing all the Mountain Men. It’s the fact that she was able to destroy their old, powerful enemy that gives her a mythical aura. If you can kill the Mountain Men, you must be able to command death itself. They would also assign it all to Clarke, because, for starters, they weren’t there to know about Bellamy’s or Monty’s role, and secondly, Grounders tend to give all credit or blame to the leader, and they perceived Clarke as the sole leader of Skaikru during season 2.

This mythical status, however, merely makes Clarke a symbol and prize, due to the belief that killing someone means taking their power. (Which should also mean that she took the enormous power of Mount Weather in the eyes of the Grounders?) Does Queen Nia actually believe that she would literally take Clarke’s power if she killed her? I don’t know, but she probably just knows that people would perceive her as more powerful if she managed to do it.

Indra also explains that another reason the Ice Nation feels bold enough to make another move against Lexa/Trikru is that Clarke made Lexa look weak – which makes perfect sense, of course that’s what people would think after Lexa walked away from the battle and Clarke went in and killed the Mountain Men.

Seeing Clarke’s new look and persona was weird as hell the first time, but I don’t know how to feel about it as a plot point. I like it when characters’ traumas are not ignored, and it makes sense that, in her state, she wants to be anonymous and leave all she was behind. But Clarke as a great hunter after 3 months, making a living out of killing large animals? That’s a bit hard to believe. It’s not the first time the show is giving her unrealistic or, rapidly learned skills (overpowering an experienced warrior like Anya in a fight, apparently learning to ride a horse off-screen in a day, being such a good shooter to kill the MW sniper through Lincoln’s shoulder – after the short training she got from Bellamy in S1..) I complain about that with Octavia, so I should about Clarke, too (though it bothers me a lot more with Octavia since her being a great warrior  – with her few months of training -  is such a big part of her arc, while these skills are never supposed to be Clarke’s main strengths and don’t get much focus. But I like that she tells the panther “Your fight is over” while killing it.

Niylah, looking at Clarke’s back: “No kill marks”. Clarke: “My back is not big enough.”

Clarke sees Niylah has a wristband from one of the Delinquents, which is going to be a plot point in 3x11.

It’s nice to see someone expressing gratitude to Clarke for defeating the Mountain Men – Niylah says she appreciates it because her mother was a victim taken by Mount Weather. It would make sense if many more Grounders actually felt like that, but we don’t ever see many ordinary Grounders say anything about it. Usually it’s just Grounder leaders trying to make Clarke feel guilty over Mount Weather to manipulate her or excuse their own actions.

Clarke’s one night stand with Niylah is the first f/f sex scene in the show. It’s also, as far as we know, only the second time Clarke has had sex with anyone (the first one was way back in 1x04). At this point, Clarke can only bear to have physical intimacy, or any kind of human contact, if it’s not with anyone she has any stronger feelings for (and asks Niylah to stop talking before initiating sex, because she doesn’t want to risk any real intimacy). But at least Niylah is really nice and helpful, doesn’t cause drama and treats her better than any of her romantic partners have.

The first time I watched this, I found it funny that Clarke’s f*ck buddy got more screentime and development than Bellamy’s supposedly serious girlfriend.  But I didn’t know that the latter would die in two episodes, while the former will remain on the show into season 6 and get to have a role beyond that of Clarke’s occasional friend with benefit.

This turned out to be much longer than I wanted it to, but that’s because this episode juggles so many storylines and characters (and a bit of nice blatant fanservice, too – like the scene of Bellamy and Lincoln sparring shirtless, or a celebrity cameo).

But how about the one plot point that was completely ignored in this episode and the rest of season 3 (and 4, and 5, and we can assume will be ignored forever)? WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO THE REAPERS?? Did they get cured, as the plan was originally? Abby was supposed to cure them when the alliance was still on. Did they get killed – and how, and by whom? Were they still roaming around in season 3 and 4? Why is there not a single word about any of that after season 2? Indra even recognized one of the Reapers in 2x15, it was obviously someone close to her, maybe a family member, maybe her husband/Gaia’s father? The show dropped that plot like a hot potato as soon as season 2 finished.

Body count: 

3 Ice Nation scouts killed during the confrontation (2 shot by Raven and Miller, one shot by Bellamy in the arm and then killed by Octavia)

Rating: 7/10

3x02 Wanheda, Part Two

This episode benefits from focusing on just a few storylines and characters and not featuring any of the poorer storylines.

Most of it is an exciting and intense action-adventure episode that revolves around Roan kidnapping Clarke ad trying to bring her to Lexa, as it turns out in the twist ending (after both Clarke and first time audience thought he was taking her to the Ice Nation Queen Nia), while a group from Arkadia including Bellamy, Kane and Monty are trying to rescue her.  

More new characters are introduced, including one with a huge role this season: our group (including Bellamy, Monty, Kane and Indra) has a surprise encounter with a group of survivors from the Farm Station, including Charles Pike and Monty’s mother Hannah. It was a weird meeting as it started as an ambush, before they recognized each other. Who did Pike’s group think they were ambushing and capturing? Some Grounders who stole clothes and weapons from dead Arkers? It doesn’t seem they were aware that there were any other survivors from the Ark, or else, they’d have tried to reunite with them. But it also can be seen as a sign that their terrible experiences on the ground and almost 4 months spent in the woods as guerrilla fighters have made them inclined to see enemies everywhere and mistake friends or allies for enemies.

We get the immediate “trouble ahead” warning moments when Pike calls his people “Grounder killers, all!” and they cheer, and our group looks uncomfortable because Indra is there, and then when Pike looks at Indra with animosity as soon as he hears she’s a Grounder and expresses distrust when hearing that they’re allies. But really, there’s nothing surprising about his attitude, at all, and I’ll never understand fans who are like “but why is Pike such a dick”? The show told you why, right from the start. Most of our protagonists had a similar attitude to Grounders in season 1 and early season 2, when their experiences with people on the ground consisted mostly of those people attacking them and trying to kill them. And Indra (just like many other Grounders) had the exact same attitude towards Sky people in early-to-mid season 2, as Pike has to Grounders now – when we first met her, she was constantly asking for all Sky people to be killed and trying to dissuade Lexa from an alliance, especially after Finn killed 18 unarmed people, mostly civilians, in a Grounder village. But these characters all got to have different kinds of interactions with each other and have character development since. Well, Pike and the rest of the Farm Station people have had only terrible experiences – being attacked by the people on the ground right after they landed, seeing over a hundred of their people killed in front of them, including 15 children, and they’ve spent all the time since fighting in the woods, with zero positive interactions with any Grounders. It’s really not surprising that they’re the ones with most extreme views.

Kane, however, tries to convince them that it’s all Ice Nation, they’re the bad ones, Trikru are their allies. When Pike asks for details about how that alliance happened, Bellamy gave him the shortest and nicest-sounding possible version: “We had a common enemy” – “What happened?” “We won”. Bellamy obviously doesn’t want to talk about any of it, since he’s tormented over Mount Weather even though he may not be showing it the way Clarke does. But we see that Monty later told Pike about everything that has happened, though we only see the end of that story, how they got out of Mount Weather. We can assume, however, that he did tell him all including Lexa’s betrayal, because Pike later references both that and Finn’s death in 3x08. Somehow I don’t think that hearing “well, Trikru tried to kill the kids in our camp, so we burned 300 of their warriors, then we made an alliance with them to fight the people from Mount Weather who were trying to kill us all, but they betrayed us and left us to die and we had to save ourselves on our own” helped change Pike’s opinion on the Grounders in general.

Having Zach McGowan on the show is always a good thing, and his screen presence helps make Roan an intriguing character. At this point he’s a mysterious kidnapper with a backstory about his banishment from Ice Nation which I really wanted to learn BUT THAT WE NEVER LEARNED (what the hell was up with that?) and (twist!) we learn in the last scene that he’s the Prince of Azgeda. Clarke and Roan had quite an interesting dynamic throughout the show – thank god for once that the show didn’t try to do an “Enemies to lovers” storyline (though I bet that’s just because the show already had two popular Clarke ships to juggle) but rather “Enemies to allies who are not exactly friends, definitely not romantic at all, who kind of bond and respect each other but are constantly trying to politically manipulate each other”.

Bellamy wanting to immediately run to save Clarke, the moment he saw that she had been kidnapped, and then dressing himself as an Azgeda warrior and going into enemy territory to rescue her, is a far cry from his behavior in 1x12 when he was able to be calm and rational about Clarke (and Finn and Monty) being kidnapped and presumed dead. It shows how much his feelings for her had become stronger since. In season 1, only the concern for his sister’s safety could make him have such a reaction. But he typically doesn’t make his best decision when he lets his emotions completely rule him and acts that impulsively, and in this case, his unsuccessful rescue attempt only made things worse, as it alerted Roan he was being followed, and made Clarke stop fighting and let Roan take her to his destination.

But it’s not just Bellamy who would “do anything for her, to protect her”, Clarke is equally determined to protect him at any cost, and we’ve seen evidence of that many times, including this time – when she begs Roan to spare Bellamy’s life and promises to do anything and stop fighting if he does. At the time, she believed Roan was taking her to Queen Nia to be executed, so she was basically ready to offer her life for his.

When I first saw that scene, I thought “Oh wow, show, you are really doing this? This must be the most romantically-coded scene in anything ever.” Before even starting to binge the show, I was always spoiled on the fact that Clarke and Bellamy are not a romantic couple to date and that people debate whether they’re just friends or not, and I always knew people shipped them, but that didn’t mean much since fans will ship anything (Broadchurch fans even ship the leads from that show, and they are genuinely nothing but platonic partners). So one of the bigger surprises of my initial binge was that the show is so blatant about this romantic subtext (which is more like text, a lot of the time), and has been since season 1, but they were relatively subtle with it at first and then more and more obvious as seasons went by. Maybe it jumps at you more when you’re binging it. In any case, this scene – the soft music, Bellamy touching Clarke’s hair, the way they look at each other after meeting for the first time after 3 months, Clarke begging for his life – it all looked like it was straight from some epic medieval-themed romance. I later heard people compare it to Tangled, but I’ve never seen that movie (it’s been a very long time since I’ve seen any Disney cartoons). But I’ve recently happened upon gifsets that compare that scene to a scene from Tangled: 

` Woah, they really did this. They modelled that scene after the scene where Rapunzel’s love interest tries to rescue her. And it’s not the last time they keep doing that and have used every goddamn romantic trope for the Bellamy/Clarke relationship. Is Jason Rothenberg for real? How do you do stuff like this, over and over, and then go in interviews: “Weeell, it’s Rorschah test, you can see this or you can see that, I mean maybe, but maybe they are just best buddies, ya know?” LMAO

Knowing about the Tangled reference suddenly makes me realize, they’re kind of doing this whole story as Rapunzel in reverse. We have our golden haired heroine who’s a target for her supposed special powers, and. Clarke finds herself as a literal Princess in the Tower at the end of this episode, and remains that for half of season 3. But while Rapunzel was trapped in the tower to begin with and wanted to escape and be free to see the world, Clarke was running away from the world, then got kidnapped and brought to the tower, and then decided to stay there.

 And what a freaking huge tower it is – I didn’t know the full significance of it (that it’s the former Polaris space station) when that reveal was the last moment of the episode. This thing must have been a great strategic asset, you’d have seen any army approaching from miles away.

I love the last scene, which is the first meeting Clarke and Lexa after season 2, because Clarke’s rage – spitting into Lexa’s face and yelling that she’s going to kill her, while she’s dragged away – is such a fitting and relatable reaction to the betrayal at Mount Weather, and, maybe even more, to the way Lexa starts talking to her without apologizing or even mentioning their history, being all business instead and talking about the current political situation and how Clarke can help her in that department. I didn’t even notice this before, but while Clarke just glares at Lexa at first and stays silent, it was when Lexa said “I need you” that Clarke spat in her face and went ballistic. It’s interesting to compare that to 3x05, when Bellamy had a bad reaction to Clarke telling him “I need you” in a similar context. It’s not the same thing, of course, because Clarke had not betrayed Bellamy (even if he may have kind of felt otherwise), but it’s a similar “I’ll just ignore our history – there’s nothing personal and painful to talk about here, la la la  – let’s instead just talk about how you can help me stop the war” approach.

I now love that scene even more because it’s the last time Clarke shows anger for the next two seasons. Or rather, she shows the same anger early on in the next episode in her conversation with Lexa and then when she was planning to kill her before changing her mind, but from that point on, there’s a shift in Clarke’s characterization that I’ve never liked. She was always smart, pragmatic, caring, vulnerable and good at using her words to convince people, but she also used to be vibrant, edgy, held grudges before finding a way to forgive people, and could be very impulsive. But in season 3, after the first couple of episodes, she kind of became a lot mellower and blander, and remained that way throughout season 3 and in season 4 (even though there’s otherwise a lot I like about her arc in season 4), where she would do ruthless things and feel sad about it and say “Sorry” a lot while other people told her she sucks, she would cry and look sad, but never ever show any anger herself. I really found myself wishing for her to finally show some anger at some point, at anyone, for any reasons, or go off and stop repressing her feelings and scream about her pain, break things, do something. I finally did get some of that – in 5x01 when she screamed at fate for taking everything away from her, and then, boy, did I get what I was wishing for in 5x09 – her slapping Bellamy and her silent but deadly rage/heartbreak at what she perceived as his betrayal, was the first time she had that kind of reaction to a person since her rage at Lexa in 3x02/3x03. (Unpopular opinion: I prefer season 5 Clarke to season 3 Clarke. Sure, season 5 Clarke was a total mess and reached rock bottom in many ways, but she was a more interesting and edgier mess. )

The B storylines were good, too. This is the first time we actually get to see what “the City of Light” looks like and learn about how it works. After Gideon, the big dude with a facial disfigurement, is killed by Emori in self-defense, we see him again in the “City of Light”, where he’s removed his disfigurement and can be a “normal” person rather than a “freak”. In later episodes, we see that Otan has done the same, but only Emori will not change herself physically, because she doesn’t have a problem with her body, just with the way others react to it, making her an outcast over it.

Nice to see Nyko again, one of my favorite minor characters. Unlike so many other people in this show, he’s always both nice and rational. When Abby, Jackson, Lincoln and Octavia took him to Mount Weather to find resources to cure him, and Lincoln was concerned because Grounders could have a problem with Arkers moving into Mount Weather because of their history with the place, Nyko pointed out “Places are not evil, people are.” The whole idea of the Arkers not being allowed to move into Mount Weather is stupid, knowing that the place had all those resources.

The show tried to give us bad vibes about Arkers moving into Mount Weather (which they absolutely had right to – they conquered it, so by the very rules of a warrior culture like the Grounder one, they could lay claim to it) with the talk from Octavia and Lincoln about how Grounders would have a problem with it because of bad memories. But that was just a red herring. Moving into Mount Weather turned out to be bad for a very different reason. We now know that at least the leaders of Ice Nation didn’t give a damn about their bad history with the Mountain Men, since they were working with Emerson.

What the heck was Abby thinking when she took Jasper to Mount Weather? She’s not a psychiatrist (did they even have psychiatrists on the Ark?) but I don’t think taking him back to the place of his greatest trauma is a good way to help his mental health. At least we get a nice scene for the Octavia/Jasper friendship, where she is comforting him while he remembers Maya, looking at her favorite painting, Second Circle of Hell by Dante. (The second circle of hell is for those guilty of lust... Is that why Jasper said it was ironic? Because he and Maya just kissed once and never got the chance to have sex?

Timeline: It seems that Parts One and Two lasted a little less than two days – Part One started during the day, Clarke spent a night with Niylah and immediately left in the morning, and Part Two took place during the following day.

Body count: 

Three Ice Nation warriors killed by Roan

A bounty hunter killed by Bellamy to save Niylah

Gideon, killed by Emori– but still “alive” in the City of Light

I don’t know if this counts for this episode, since it actually happened after the Farm Station landed on the ground, so somewhere around the season 1 finale and early season 2, but we only learn it now: about 120-130 people from the Farm station were killed since they landed (there are 63 Farm Station survivors, but Kane said the station initially had three times that number). A lot of them, including 15 children, were killed by the Ice Nation right after they landed, and Monty’s father, who saved four children, was killed when trying to save another one. I assume that some of the Farm Station people died fighting the Ice Nation in the woods, and that they also killed an unknown number of Azgeda people during that time. (Technically, this all happened during the timeline of season 2 and between the seasons.)

Rating: 8.5/10

To be fair, Miyu and Windy’s kid can’t exactly duel right now but that doesn’t mean that they might still duel in the future. For all we know, maybe they’ll play a big role in the next or final arc - I mean this whole overarching story has been about the Lost Incident and the kids affected by it. I’m not expecting them to duel right away but I’m not ruling it out either.

I don’t care if they duel right now at this very second. You don’t have to duel in Yu-Gi-Oh to be important to the story (at least in Vrains anyway) just look at Akira who has only had one duel since the beginning of the show. I just want them to be apart of the story, to actually contribute to the plot and not, as seen in Miyu’s case, be pushed to the side for someone else’s development when they should instead be crucial to the story. Once again, that’s why we have background and one-shot characters. It is one of the reasons why people wanted Aoi to be the Water Child, cause we really don’t have much time, especially if we are going to be fully introduced to them in season 3, to flesh their characters out and give them growth that doesn’t feel rushed. That’s what happened to Rin and Ruri in ARC-V and I think everyone can agree with me that looking back on it, even if they were showed to us in occasional flashbacks, they really should have been added in sooner, especially considering that when we did get them they were brainwashed. For calling out loud, we never even got to see Rin and Ruri duel not brainwashed! That’s what I’m worried about when it comes to Miyu, who at the current moment is in a coma and everything that made her important to the story to begin with is being handed right over to Aoi because plot convenience. That dream Aoi had before meeting up with Aqua and the reveal that Miyu is her origin is the pure definition of plot convenience.

As for Windy’s kid, my big hope for him is that he is working for SOL and that big reveal will happen soon once BS leaves. I also seen some people suggest that he could actually be Ryoken’s spy in there for the Knights which would also be an interesting twist. They just need to reveal who this guy is first off before we throw in what role he is going to play because again, don’t think he’s dead. I truly don’t understand why they would kill him off screen when he’s so important to the story and without so much as a name from him either.

Episode 45, Outside the Walls of the Orvud District, Review

(Manga spoilers)

So before episode 46 airs later today, I thought I’d quickly review last week’s episode. When I first watched it I felt really quite bitter about the removal of one of my favourite moments and I was ready to write a really salty review. However after watching it a second time I realised there was so much I loved about the episode so I toned the saltiness down.

However there will still be a fair bit of ranting in the middle of this review so bear with me 😂 I’ve been very patient with this season, letting the story play out before jumping to any harsh conclusions but we’re getting near the end of the Uprising arc now so I think it’s fair to raise a few criticisms.

This review should be pretty simple to structure as I can easily split this episode into three sections.

1. The beginning part that was excellent!

2. The middle part that disappointed me.

3. And the ending which I have mixed feelings about.

So I guess I’ll do this in chronological order and start with the beginning part that was excellent.

Eren finally gets hard!

I refuse to apologise for that subtitle.😂

So this is the part of the episode that I did love. Like last week I was amazed by the superb animation and Yuki Kaji’s emotional performance as Eren. What also made me emotional is the joy of Historia’s growth. She has gone from being the ‘good girl’ who wished she’d never been born, to a girl who is in charge of her own destiny and stands up for others.

Also what a great moment it was when Mikasa swooped in and caught Historia before she got hurt and thank God she went straight for Historia and didnt run in yelling Erenereneren! (based on how Wit portrayed her at the end of the kidnap scene that really wouldn’t have been surprising!)

So yaay! Finally some God damn self control! Mikasa stayed with Historia, trusting that Levi, Jean and Connie would get Eren out and they did. Oh my God I laughed hard at Jean calling Eren a ‘topless wimp.’ 🤣 Although I still think I prefer the manga’s version ‘shirtless wonder.’

What followed was very powerful. The cave is crumbling and death looks certain unless Eren does something but he and breaks down again under the pressure, believing himself worthless.

I think my favourite part of this whole episode was the throwback to another difficult decision he had to make.

Back in season 1 I remember what a crucial moment this was when Eren learned to trust. Even Levi looked shocked by his decision not to transform, showing how much of a turning point this was for Eren’s character.

Back then, Levi was the only one who empathised with Eren’s moral dilemma and this time around it was no different. While the others were getting a impatient with his hysterics in the cave, Levi acknowledged the impossible situation he was faced with and urged him to make a choice.

And he made the right one! I loved the animation of Eren crystalising. What a mesmerising scene, I’m glad they animated the full process.

I also thought this part looked cool.

After Eren’s friends broke him free I’m sure the praise from Levi, someone he looks up to, meant a lot to him.

Hmm but what exactly does Levi find ‘pretty impressive’ here? 😏the crystalised titan or Eren’s abs?

Also Sasha laying on the ground and thanking Eren was hilarious and this little Eremin moment was beyond adorable! ❤️

All in all the first half of the episode was excellent, definitely of the same high quality of last week’s episode.

The rest of the episode however I have a few small issues with ...

The Journey to the Orvud District

Brace yourselves! This is the salty part! For weeks I’ve been balanced and fair in my reviews so I think I’m entitled to a bit of a rant!

So in case you hadn’t noticed this season (haha) a lot of the manga material has been cut. Many times I have been disappointed when I realised a certain scene hadn’t made it into the anime but I tried not to dwell on it and let it spoil my enjoyment of this season. However (and maybe I’m being biased because this was a personal favourite moment of mine) this time there was just one deleted scene too many and I need to vent!

If you haven’t figured out by now which scene I’m talking about it’s this one.

Yes it’s the part where Eren yells at Rod Reiss, calling him a midget only to remember that Levi, (a man who stands at just five foot three) is right behind him and damn you can feel the burn from that side eye! 😂

Now I know what some of you might be thinking. Oh my God, get over it, who cares? It’s not like it’s important to the plot or anything!

And ok, yes you are right. No, it is not essential to the plot but you know something it was funny, it was cute and it humanises the characters i.e. Eren doesn’t always think before he opens his big mouth and Levi, while he’s never said anything about it, might actually be self conscious about his height.

What made the loss of this moment even sorer was the fact that another cute moment was cut immediately after. I’m talking about the moment where Hanji, despite being injured, leaps up like a complete goof and yells “Heya Erwin.”

Once again, not essential to the plot but it showed us how well the veterans know one another. Erwin immediately recognised that Hanji wasn’t badly hurt as she was acting like her usual crazy self! So many subtle character details can be picked up from such fleeting interactions ... but I guess Wit just don’t care. All they care about is concluding the Uprising arc in as few episodes as possible!!! 😤😤😤

Honestly it feels like all the heart and soul was sucked out of this scene. I have to ask, was this one of the changes Isayma insisted on? Did he want this scene to be so dry and devoid of character? I get that Snk is not a comedy but it doesn’t always have to be doom and gloom. Sometimes I like to see the characters slip up and do stupid idiotic things that make me laugh. It makes them more human and relatable.

This made me realise something about season 3 as a whole. Sometimes I feel like this season is doing the bare minimum. All boxes are being ticked, all the essential plot points are being covered ... but nothing more. The result = emotional detachment!

So I’m sorry Wit but I’m very disappointed in you for taking these small but meaningful moments away from us.

Rant over!

Thank you for coming to my TED talk!

As for the Rod Reiss CGI chicken/worm titan, I personally don’t see anything wrong with it. It looked weird and gross in the manga and it also looks weird and gross in the anime 😂.

“Become the Queen”

Now here is the part I have mixed feelings about.

On one hand I am glad we got this scene at last because at least now we know we’ll get to see Historia punch Levi at the end.

But on the other hand the scene was quite awkwardly shoehorned back into the plot with half the impact it originally had.

Now see here’s the thing. I’m glad that in this version they didn’t have Levi attack Historia as it wouldn’t make sense this late in the plot and it would just undo all the character development she’s just had, but on the other hand the ending of the Uprising arc won’t be half as satisfying because Levi hasn’t done anything to deserve a punch.

In this version it feels like just a childish dare played on for laughs, without the enjoyment of seeing Levi getting a taste of his own medicine.

Although I have to say (other people might disagree) but I actually like that it was Mikasa who suggested the idea. It never ever crossed my mind that it would be her yet somehow it makes perfect sense! Payback for kicking the shit out of Eren in court maybe? 😏 Nah, I’m joking, I know Mikasa has moved on from that and she just suggested punching him to relieve the tension. Since joining his squad it’s clear Mikasa has come to respect Levi but at the same time she knows he’s far from perfect so I reckon she’d secretly quite like to see him on the receiving end of a punch. That’s just my take on it. I’m perfectly happy with the punch being Mikasa’s idea.

Despite the “become the queen” scene being pretty underwhelming compared to the manga, hopefully we’ll still get to see Levi’s beautiful smile.

Additional Thoughts

So I was wrong about potential flashbacks to the rest of Eren’s titan experiments at the cabin. I guess they are well and truly gone and I will say that without them, Eren finally gaining the hardening ability wasn’t as satisfying.

I realise that every week my opinion of the season seems to change. I’ve gone from praising it last week to complaining about it this week but I’m just being honest about how I feel in the moment. I just judge each episode as it airs and sometimes all it takes is one episode to make me completely revaluate my opinion of the whole season. It really is that unpredictable.

Ok so I was a little salty this week but hopefully today’s episode is one of those episodes that is so amazing that I forget how bitter I was feeling the previous week 🙂.

What are your thoughts on season 5 of Voltron?

WOO BOY! Do I have thoughts! I didn’t answer this right away before I have so many points I want to hit on, and I had to gather my thoughts.

I’m not sure yet how I’d rank the season yet, or how much I liked it. Like with all the seasons, I’ll need a few weeks and a rewatch or two to really help me decide on how I feel overall. 

The one thing that is definite is: I’m sick of this half-season crap. I want my full 11-13 episode season. Cutting them in half like this disrupts story flow and leaves too many loose threads for too long. 

Now, that being said, I’ll put the rest of my thoughts below the break, because this will be a long post, and it’s got spoilers for those who haven’t watched yet.

You know what I’m also tired of? Time skips. I would have liked to have seen Team Voltron and Lotor meet for the first time, but apparently that’s not important I guess. 

Zarkon is just… dead? It feels really weird to kill him off at the beginning of the season. In other shows Zarkon would’ve been killed off in a season finale and then the fallout over the throne would have happened the following season, but that’s not what they chose to do. It makes it feel like he’s not dead (only mostly dead, not all dead) and that he’ll come back, but as far as we know no one went and got his body? Also, Haggar didn’t seem so broken up about Zarkon this time around, as a opposed to seasons 2 & 3. 

Haggar remembers she’s a mom! I don’t know what she’s going to do with this information. She didn’t want Lotor to take over the empire at the Kral Zera, so what did she think was going to happen to him? 

SO BAYARDS?! I was under the impression that since the bayards are connected to the lions, that only a lion’s paladin could wield it’s specific bayard, but apparently not?! Can anyone use any bayard, even if they aren’t connected to a lion? Could Matt use Pidge’s bayard if he tried? Or is it like Lotor could use the Black Bayard because it was Shiro’s will, kind of like how Black picked Keith as their new paladin because Shiro trusted him to be a good leader? Also, Zarkon said “…even with a Black Bayard…” Not the Black Bayard. Does that mean you can manufacture more bayards just like the armor? Were bayards common weapons at one time? And Lotor could change the type of weapon the bayard made like Zarkon could. So does that mean that really is the power of the Black Bayard, or is Lotor more like his father than he realizes?

I think it’s a little rude that we’ve seen Lotor use the Black Bayard in combat, but still not Shiro. Just saying.

ON THAT NOTE, SHIRO! Yeah…. Yeah he is not the Shiro from S1&2. This is a different Shiro, either a clone or an android. BUT he is still a good Shiro. All Shiros are good Shiros (except BOM holo Shiro :P). Yes, he’s been going behind the teams’ backs on crucial decisions, and yes, he yelled a Lance. But he at least apologized, and later he even went to Lance with his concerns about not feeling like himself. He realizes something is wrong, and it scares him. He’s clearly being manipulated, and he’s another tragic victim of Haggar. He still deserves all the love, and I hope that he makes it out of this mess okay. I’d like him to be like a brother to OG Shiro when we get him back, and he can create his own identity. What I really fear is what will happen if Lotor finds out Haggar is using Kuron to spy on him and try to take him out like he did Narti. 

I’m glad Lance is coming into his own and following in the steps of Alfor. While Keith is the best match for the Red Lion, Lance is definitely Alfor’s successor as a right hand. I loved his and Allura’s scene in the training room, dancing on that line of friendship and flirting, and I hope we see more of that. (Is it possible to be a right hand while flying the Blue Lion? Are there any connotations for being the right foot? Yeah, I still want the original team line up for the lions.) 

OG Shiro, stuck in the astral plane? Perhaps stuck inside the Black Lion’s consciousness? Stuck in the rift? Lance will definitely be able to help, somehow. Keith will of course help, because he’s made it his life’s mission to save Shiro “as many times as it takes,” so seeing if Lance and Keith can work together to save Shiro, and subsequently Kuron, would be cool.

So… is Pidge’s arc done now? She accomplished everything she set out to do. She rescued her brother and father, and now Matt is fighting with the rebels and Sam is returning to Earth. And now she’s also connected with the paladins and Alteans as her new space family. I don’t know where else they’re going to go with her character here. 

SO LET’S TALK ABOUT HUNK FOR A MINUTE, SHALL WE? At least, I think that was Hunk. There was a Yellow Paladin shaped figure in a lot of scenes that didn’t really do much. Was that supposed to be Hunk? I couldn’t tell (I am extremely salty). Yeah, Hunk didn’t have much of a role this season. He made a comment every once in a while, and he made that drive of the paladins’ messages to their families. That was really cute. He had fun goofing with the sentry with Pidge and Lance, and apparently he doesn’t double-modulate things. Yes, I know that the staff had been saying in interviews that this season would mostly focus on Lotor and Lance, so I wasn’t expecting Hunk to get an arc, but you could have written him out of the show this season and a good chunk of the fandom wouldn’t have even realized it. It’s been so long since the Balmera arc, I’m starving for Hunk development and story. Dreamworks ordered at least 78 episodes, so we have 35 to go. They’ve got to throw another Hunk arc somewhere in there, right? Right? 

Um… does Sam ship Team Punk? Is that foreshadowing? The part of my heart that loves every Hunk ship is excited, but the part that exclusively loves Hunay is nervous. 

Sendak’s still alive, I’m not surprised. What does surprise me is that the generals found him so easily, and apparently he’s been alive for millennia?! How much of that is his natural galra lifespan and how much is quintessence exposure? So I guess he’ll be back again later. 

Whaaaaaat was the creepy quintessence monster Krolia let loose? It looked like a cross between a xenomorph and Pyramid Head. 

Speaking of which KROLIA!! I am so excited Keith finally met his mom! We don’t know his full reaction yet, but it’ll definitely be interesting. Krolia seems like a really cool character (I’d like her even if she’s wasn’t related to Keith) and I want to see how she’ll fit into Keith’s life now that she’s back. Now, I’ve enjoyed the theory that Keith and Acxa are long lost siblings for a while now. Now seeing how Acxa and Krolia resemble each other, I say it’s a good change Acxa and Keith are related. Acxa seems too young to be his aunt, so I would say she’s his sister, but Acxa is more blue and Krolia is more pink. If Acxa is her daughter, where did the blue come from? Does the blue come from somewhere else in Krolia’s family tree, or maybe Axca is only Keith’s half-sibling and the non-galra part of her heritage isn’t human either? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

We didn’t get to see Romelle/Flashback Queen/D&D Allura like in the Netlfix trailer, so I’m disappointed on that.

So what did Allura actually learn after she gave herself up to the lion? I’m glad she’s learning more about her powers, and I hope to see her grow even more. But that voice actually tell her alchemic secrets, or did it just enhance her powers? Little confused there.

Lotor. I didn’t comment on him after season 3 or 4, so I’ll do it now. I like Lotor a lot. He’s a very fascinating character. He’s intelligent, cunning, and charming (AJ does a great job here. I really like his voice). He truly doesn’t want to be anything like his father, and he wants to return the empire to how it was before the destruction of Daibazaal. He wants to lead through communication and teamwork with locals rather than fear and violence. He’s got a layer of softness to him. He’s interested in learning about his Altean heritage, and he deeply respects Honerva and her work, even if he doesn’t know, or is in denial, that Honerva became Haggar. Like I said, I like him a lot…. but I still don’t trust him. At least, not completely. Nothing he’s told Team Voltron so far has been a lie, but I don’t think he’s telling us his true motive. Or at least, his motive and those truths will in the end only benefit him, and not Team Voltron. He likes them well enough; they’re good allies for him now, and a lot of their desires line up. However, if in the end he has to chose between reaching his goal and Voltron, he’s going to pick his goal. His really good at manipulating; he’s an actor. He acts very different with Team Voltron than he did with his generals, which was different from how he acted with Zarkon, which was still different from how he acted in the arena in front of Throk and the crowd. There is truth in all of these performances, but which is his real personality? I don’t know what he’s going to do with all this quintessence he’s hoping to obtain from the rift, but it’s going to be dangerous, and Team Voltron need to be on their toes. And no, I don’t think he’s in love with Allura. I do think he likes her, but I think he’s ultimately more interested in how a relationship (romantic, platonically, politically, whatever) could benefit him. He’s attracted to Allura’s power as a sacred Altean, and now as a Chosen who unlocked those alchemic secrets. This is the friendship is making me uneasy. Allura clearly feels a connection with Lotor because they’re both Altean and he has knowledge of their culture that she doesn’t, so I’m worried she’s going to be really hurt if/when Lotor’s goals diverge from Voltron’s. 

Okay, so those are all my current thoughts. I’m really looking forward to season 6 to see where the story is taking us. :)

I read your previous answer about Stefan being a martyr or a hero (I agree with everything you wrote, thank you for always answering so throughout and thoughtful, it's a joy reading your metas) and I noticed you wrote "lost my soulmate to a coma" in a part of it and I just wonder, do you really believe stelena were soulmates? I do and I've seen other people discuss it, but it'd be fun to read your opinion on it too... if you'd like to share it of course (:

You’re welcome! I’m so glad you love reading my metas, because I always love writing them.

In answer to your question, of course I believe Stelena were soul mates. Of everything pertaining to their relationship them being soul mates is one of things that can never be denied or taken from them. Kevin Williamson has explicitly called Stelena soul mates, Nina has said Stefan feeds Elena’s soul and even Caroline Dries described their relationship after their break-up as being a soulful friendship.

Since you’re already familiar with my metas, it should be no surprise to you that I’m putting the read of my response under the cut, since it’s so long haha.

I think the concept of soul mates is one that’s different for everyone and there are no clear cut definitions or answers, but the most basic definition I can find is from the Oxford dictionary which is:

A person ideally suited to another as a close friend or romantic partner.

I don’t even feel it’s necessary to give examples of how Stefan and Elena fit this definition. It’s pretty obvious for everyone to see that they were ideally suited both as a couple and friends. The problem with that definition is that it’s too simplistic and unfeeling, so I’m gonna go to Urban dictionary instead. I would usually never do this, but since soul mates is more about personal interpretation I wanted to get an idea of some of the common things others perceive it to mean. A few definitions say:

A person with whom you have an immediate connection the moment you meet..The first time you glimpse at each other you are immediately drawn to each other…

A soul mate is someone you meet and the instant your eyes meet you feel these incredible feelings that you never knew existed…

This is a crucial element, that I feel ultimately solidifies Stefan and Elena as soul mates above any other couple on the show. They are the only couple who had an immediate connection from the moment they first met, which is a crucial attribute of soul mates. The reason for this is that the idea of soul mates, comes from Folklore and is the idea that when a soul descends to earth it splits in two, each half of the soul inhabiting a separate body. These two halves are destined to wander the earth until they find each other and only then will they be complete. And since these two people are essentially  two halves of a whole, there is an instant recognition and connection, which is also where the idea of “love at first sight” is born from.

Another definition of soulmates is the following:

It’s the love that survives anything and everything, that struggles and pulls through, that even when it seemed hopeless and out of control it still beat strongly. It’s the love that is not superficial, a love that transcends not only the physical world but time itself.

This fits Stefan and Elena perfectly. There seems to be an impression that just because Stefan and Elena broke up their love ended or they stopped being soul mates, which is completely incorrect. Stefan and Elena’s love transcended their break-up, transcended Elena falling in love with Damon and being in a relationship with him, transcended Elena being in a coma for 3+ years and transcended Stefan’s death. In 6x22, 6 years after they met and after everything they’d been through (individually and together), Elena stood before Stefan and said, “I love you so much” and in 8x16 she sat outside Stefan’s resting place 10(?) years after his death remembering him and devoting her life to his memory. Their love was eternal and survived through everything, even death.  

A common theme I also see popping up in these definitions as I’m scrolling through is the unwillingness to live without your soul mate in your life, which again describes Stefan and Elena. Even after she broke his heart in season 4, Stefan never stopped wanting Elena to be a part of his life and in season 5 he pushed through his personal feelings in order to establish a friendship with her, because he knew she was so important to him that he’d rather have her in his life as a friend than not in his life at all. In addition, in season 6 when Stefan had moved to Savannah, Elena refused to leave Stefan alone to get on with her life and he told her that he was avoiding Mystic Falls not her. This shows that even when they weren’t living in the same town and their common connection (Damon) was gone there was still a connection between them and a desire to remain in each other’s lives. Similarly, Stefan’s reaction to Elena’s “death” in 7x12 and Elena’s reaction to Stefan’s death in 8x16 showed all the signs of people that couldn’t bear to live a life without their soul mate.

I’ve also found an article that outlines 10 elements of soul mates (x) which I’ll go through systematically.

1. It’s something inside. This is an ambiguous definition and one of the reasons discussing soul mates is so difficult. But I feel like Stefan’s quote from season 5 of, “When we were together, every single atom in my body told me that it was the right thing, that we were the perfect fit,” pertains to this. It’s something that’s deep and profound, a love that makes you feel something you can’t quite explain.

2. Flashbacks. Now, this one is very interesting regarding Stelena, because of the issues revolving around them being doppelgangers. There’s no denying the doppelganger story line developed in season 5 is incredibly flawed with plot holes left right and center, but ultimately, I feel that what it was doing was implying the idea of soul mates. The doppelgangers were born as a direct result of Silas and Amara’s love, they were literal copies of them and therefore destined to meet and fall in love. As Tessa said, she watched versions of Stefan and Elena find each other and fall in love century after century. And when you take away the idea that each doppelganger is an individual person/character these doppelgangers throughout the centuries can surely represent various past reincarnations of Stefan and Elena?

3. You just get each other.“I know you, Stefan, better than anyone.” “You know me probably better than anyone else.” “You knew me better than anyone, you always have.”

4. You fall in love with his (or her) flaws.This is referring to the acceptance of one another’s flaws. I can say with complete confidence Elena accepted Stefan for his flaws and she took this a step further by having faith in his ability to overcome them. The poor writing in the later seasons means that Elena’s flaws were hardly acknowledged by the writers let alone by Stefan or any other character, but the fact he remained a faithful and loyal friend to Elena until the day he died suggests that he did indeed accept every part of Elena.

5. It’s intense. Again I feel like I don’t really need to explain this. From the very beginning their relationship was intense and although the romance ended, whenever Stefan and Elena had an emotional or romantic scene together it was incredibly intense (e.g. almost kiss in 5x04, goodbye in 8x16)

6. You two against the world.I think this definitely applied to Stefan and Elena when they were a couple. Whenever they faced an obstacle they faced it together, they were a team. When Elena was dealing with finding out she was adopted/meeting Isobel, Stefan was right there by her side, when Katherine came back and tried to tear them apart they fought to face her together, when Klaus was hunting Elena they worked as a team, even though Elena becoming a vampire broke them up, they still very much faced that together in the early episodes, and even in the hunt for the cure they were united. Let’s just put it this way: Stefan and Elena have always been on each other’s side, always fighting the same battles and for the same cause.

7. You’re mentally inseparable.This is without a doubt a trait of Stefan and Elena’s relationship. It’s why Stefan’s humanity was so rooted in his love for Elena, why Elena instinctively knew Stefan was looking at her in 3x02, it’s why no matter what happened they remained in each other’s lives, it’s why in his final moments the person Stefan saw was Elena.

8. You feel secure and protected. Again, no explanations necessary. In 3x22 Elena clearly stated that part of the reason she fell in love with Stefan is because he made her feel safe. Whenever Elena was in danger, it was always Stefan that she sought and when he held her in his embrace, you could clearly see how safe she felt just for knowing he was there. With Stefan, I think the safety he experienced with Elena was not so much rooted in his physical safety, but his emotional/mental safety. Elena was the first person since Lexi to keep him grounded, to connect him to his humanity and keep him sane. When he was with her he felt safe knowing that she gave him the strength to conquer his demons and overcome the darkness.

9. You can’t imagine your life without him (or her). This goes back to what I’ve already mentioned about how Stefan and Elena could never completely leave each other’s lives. Even after his death, Elena was finding a way to weave the memory of Stefan into her daily life. Stefan and Elena from the day they met were always going to be in each other’s lives and that is just a fact.

10. You look each other in the eye. Stefan and Elena did this all the time, even after their break-up. Their eye contact, the way in which they looked each other (8x16 is particularly coming to mind here, but also 6x21 and 6x22) was always intense, soft, adoring and easy. You could see the familiarity and comfort that was between them just by seeing the way they looked at each other.

So, by the definitions I’ve found and outlined above, Stefan and Elena seem to be confirmed soul mates.

From a personal perspective, I have never doubted that Stefan and Elena were soul mates. The reason for that is that my perception of soul mates is simply two people that upon meeting form an instant and profound connection and that connection grows and blossoms into a very meaningful relationship that is inexplicable and unbreakable. Whilst the characteristics above do describe soul mates to an extent, for me it really comes down to the fact that Stefan and Elena had such a life-altering impact on each other. They’re two people who brought each other back to life and who quite literally transformed each other’s lives forever. Stefan and Elena’s lives took the paths that they did because they met, because they fell in love, because they knew each other. Even though they broke up Elena reconnected Stefan to his humanity in such a deep way that he was able to continue to grow and move forward with that and loving Elena is an experience that enriched his life and made him happy (even if only for a short amount of time). For Elena the impact was so much bigger because not only did he save her (literally and metaphorically in season 1), but she actually ended up living her entire life through Stefan. She devoted her life to his dream career, chose to live her life a certain way and to be happy in honour of Stefan and what he’d given her. That alone makes me wonder how anyone could say that Stefan and Elena weren’t soul mates, because really, is there anything more profound than that? Another significant reason as to why I perceive Stefan and Elena as being soul mates is because of something which has already been mentioned - their emotional/mental connection. Particularly emotionally, Stefan and Elena had such a instinctual and natural understanding of one another that continued throughout the seasons. As always I feel like the concept of an emotional connection can be very misunderstood by people, so I took the liberty of doing a quick Google search and found a site that I feel explains it very well (x). The first basic definition it gives is:

An Emotional Connection happens when two (or more) people knowingly feel and perceive the same thing at the same time.

I feel like this definition alone really hits the nail on the head and clears up the how/why Stefan and Elena developed such an intense and deep emotional connection. In fact, it also actually explains why/how they connected so quickly, since they were both feeling lost and as Kevin said “dead inside” and they knew they were feeling that way. When Stefan found Elena’s journal, it suggested that she was feeling certain emotions that she couldn’t express in any other way except by writing them (just like Stefan), when they sat in the Grill and Stefan explained that he lived with his uncle, there was an immediate connection on the basis that they’d both lost their parents (obviously the circumstances were completely different, but that’s irrelevant) and particularly at the end in 1x01 when Stefan showed up on Elena’s door with blood shot eyes and they had that conversation where Stefan asks Elena if she’s okay and she says that’s all anyone seems to ask her and he says, do you ever really mean it? That conversation just confirms that emotional connection that was already being built in the earlier scenes by portraying two people that were clearly at a low point in their lives and looking for that emotional connection they found in each other to appease their loneliness and give their life meaning and purpose. The examples that the site gives are also great for going deeper with what it means to have an emotional connection:

Two lovers holding hands while gazing out together at a beautiful sunset - hello, this is already a canon Stelena moment.

A mother and a baby feeling scared together after the baby falls over into a coffee table - comparable to pretty much every scary event Stefan and Elena experienced throughout the season (and let’s face it there were a lot haha) where both of them shared the same fears

A husband and a wife discussing and forming a shared commitment to financial goals - comparable to Stefan and Elena’s shared vision for the future (a human life, children, marriage, careers as doctors etc.)

Two friends laughing together over an old teacher’s funny walk - the entirety of 5x21 comes to mind (they had so much fun and laughed so much together in this episode).

As you can see from these examples and the definition, an emotional connection is really rooted in sharing emotional experiences, negative and positive. Throughout all 6 seasons Stefan and Elena consistently shared similar emotional experiences at the same time (a few of which are outlined above).The next essential part of an emotional connection is empathy:

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person.

This is something I feel like Stefan and Elena did brilliantly. For all of their common feelings/thoughts on certain subjects, there were also a multitude of things that made Stefan and Elena different from each other. They went through experiences emotionally that the other hadn’t, yet they always displayed understanding and empathy. When Stefan was struggling with his blood lust towards the end of season 1, Elena was completely supportive and empathetic, despite being human and not being able to necessarily fully understand what Stefan was going through as a vampire and the same happened in season 3 when Stefan had no humanity. Stefan was empathetic towards Elena in season 2 when she was suffering through the pain of being coveted by the most powerful hybrid of all time. There’s the whole line from Stefan in season 4 of, “You’re in hell, which means I’m in hell” line from Stefan which really sums this up (x). Whatever Elena felt, Stefan felt and vice versa. That is a very powerful thing which is reserved only for the deepest of loves and relationships. However, as the article says, empathy is not enough in itself, it needs to be communicated.

Feeling empathy is a necessary ingredient for emotional connection. But it is not, by itself, sufficient; in order for an emotional connection to be created, the empathy needs to be communicated.And that is where validating feelings comes into play.

Again, Stefan and Elena had no problems in this area. There have been endless conversations between Stefan and Elena where they demonstrate understanding and empathy for one another, even if it’s just simply saying, “I know” and hugging each other. Look at what Stefan said to Elena in 2x20, “Hey, it matters. It matters.” A prime example of Stefan validating Elena’s feelings and showing her his empathy towards her. An example of Elena showing this to Stefan would be in 2x05. “Just a few drops every day, right?” Elena is so empathetic towards Stefan’s struggle with blood and his dilemma between not wanting to lose control, but also wanting to be stronger that she changes her perspective to see Stefan’s POV and then willingly agrees to allow him to feed off her. If that is not a clear example of both empathy and validation, I don’t know what is.

The article ends by explaining that the reason why so many people struggle to establish true emotional connections with others is a discomfort at the prospect of being vulnerable, which is essentially a completely natural human fear. Once more, Stefan and Elena demonstrated the extent to which they were able to be vulnerable with each other. An emotional connection cannot exist if the two people involved are unwilling to drop their walls and be completely honest about their feelings. Here are examples where Stefan and Elena did this with each other (these are just off the top of my head, there are probably more):

1x19: Stefan tells Elena the truth about his struggles with blood lust and openly cries and shows his frustration in front of her

1x20: Stefan cries and admits his guilt, pain and turmoil over the terrible things he’s done in his past

2x09: Elena cries in Stefan’s arms and expresses how she blames herself for her friends being hunted by Klaus to break the curse

2x20: Elena opens up to Stefan about not wanting to be a vampire and cries in his arms

3x14: Elena tells Stefan how she’s feeling about the uncertainty of their relationship and encourages him to open up to her in return

3x20: Elena cries in Stefan’s arms and admits she feels she has no one

4x01: Elena cries in Stefan’s arms openly as she suffers through the transition, later on in the episode Elena and Stefan talk about their love for one another, the situation with Elena nearly dying and cry.

4x02: Stefan admits to Elena he feels insecure that she chose to turn to Damon for help instead of him and Elena opens up about the heightened grief she’s experiencing

5x18: The two discuss how they’re feeling about their visions openly and honestly and get very emotional with each other.

6x22: Elena cries as she tells Stefan how she feels about him.

8x16: Both of them openly cry and discuss how they’re feeling about Stefan’s death and hold each other.

There are so many more examples, particularly in the later seasons that I’ve skipped because I’m just too lazy to write them out haha, but the point has been made anyway. Stefan and Elena were able to be very vulnerable with each other and they had complete trust that neither of them would use that vulnerability against the other as a weapon.

Proof of this emotional connection manifests itself in so many ways throughout the series. The fact that Elena was consistently Stefan’s connection to his humanity, that Stefan was the connection to Elena’s (I will not have anyone tell me any differently on this matter, 4x19 and 4x21 just proved this), that even when she was in a dilemma about Damon Elena sought out Stefan for advice/comfort (even after Damon’s death in the beginning of season 6) and that they knew each other better than anyone else. All of these aspects of their relationship stemmed from this emotional connection that was between them.

Although there are many other smaller factors that contribute to it (such as their general compatibility as people, which I’m sure I’ve discussed in another post somewhere), the depth of this emotional connection Stefan and Elena shared combined with the long-lasting impact they had on one another’s lives are really the main reasons I believe Stefan and Elena were soul mates.

Types and purposes of editing

Continuity Ending

Continuity editing is the process, in film and video creation, of combining more-or-less related shots, or different components cut from a single shot, into a sequence so as to direct the viewer's attention to a pre-existing consistency of story across both time and physical location.

An example of this is the scene from Avengers Infinity War in which members of the avengers and the Guardians of the galaxy meet for the first time. The scene cuts back and fourth between the two teams fighting each other with eye line match also being thrown into mix, it establishes that it’s the same scene but just in a slightly different location. This is what allows for a scene to flow smoothly and carry on the overall narrative throughout without any unnecessary stops. 

Non-continuity Editing

The viewer will not notice the transition between shots. Non-continuity editing is when shots are mismatched to disrupt the impression of time and space. This draws the audiences' attention to the process of cutting and disturbs the illusion of 'reality such as a flashback.

A brilliant example of this is a scene from the finale of Arrow season 2 in which Oliver Queen and Slade Wilson have their present day fight and a fight from the past interwoven with one another as the scene seamlessly flashes back to a past encounter and then back to the present multiple times. This method is often used to give exposition to the audience of either something that has happened or something that will happen, it also helps to show the symbolism between their past encounter and what is happening in the present.

Purposes of editing

The editing of a film or TV show is the most important process of all. Editing is done so that an entire other layer of depth can be added to the production, it can allow for controlling the overall rhythm and flow of the project. Time manipulation for instance can control the perception of space to create a believable space between characters/objects that are in separate shots. Speeding up and slowing down a sequence is usually done to ensure that they abide by a specified running time, for a movie to be classified as feature length it must surpass 90 minutes in run time, a sequence could also be sped up or slowed down to help it flow better with the narrative that is being presented. 

In this scene from Smallville, Jonathon Kent has fallen from a significant height, as he falls in slow motion, when Clark runs towards him at super speed he is perceived as running at a normal pace as Jonathon falls in slow motion. This is effective as not only a method of creating tension, but also is a visual way of representing Clark's ability's. This a prime example of how time manipulation of either the scene as a whole or just one character can be used to improve a scene in terms of how it is carried out.

Functions of editing

Editing’s main purpose is to create a narrative out of a series of different shots, this can be accomplished through what is known as motivated editing, this is where the editing is used to create motivation for a characters actions throughout the narrative either. Drama within a film can also be developed through the editing, certain pieces of music can be added to ensure that scene conveys the correct feelings from the audience, if the scene is meant to be sad then a slow piece of music can help to ensure that the audience will feel sad. How information is provided/withheld from the audience is also mostly down to how it is edited. 

This scene from season 2 episode 3 of Titans is used as a way to establish that the character of Death-stroke has a history with the character of Dick, dialogue regarding him is quickly interrupted with a few frames of Death-stroke pointing a sniper at someone. These couple of seconds are a perfect way in which through editing we are given information, but information such as who was shot is left unanswered. The episode after this shows the audience the shooting in full including who was killed and what the aftermath of the shooting entailed. 

Creating continuity between shots

As stated before, editing is supposed to link shots together to form a narrative throughout, this is handled in two ways known as continuity editing and non-continuity editing. Continuity editing follows the action in the order in which it is taking place, shots are assembled in a certain order so that they appear to be happening one way when in actuality they may have been filmed out of sequence then assembled in the correct sequence during post production. A change in location is also an example of continuity editing, when a scene changes from one location to another, whether it contains the same characters or not is a primary way of continuing the story. For example in 2018s Avengers Infinity War, there are at one point four different narratives happening at once as the film swaps back and fourth between them, towards the end of the film these four narratives become two which is used to the films advantage as it is able to swap back and fourth between two different scenes both of which are important to the overall story. Non-continuity editing means that shots occur out of continuity, a main example of this is the technique known as flashbacks, this is where we are presented with events that pre-exist the films primary continuity/story, they usually act as a visual method of delivering exposition to the audience, but sometimes they are used as an effective way of revealing information to the audience. Flash backs can establish a characters motivation for there actions throughout the story as they can often come out of nowhere or coincide with the present day narrative.

Gaining engagement/a reaction from the audience

It goes without saying that the directors, writers and most importantly editors want to not only keep the audience engaged but also invoke a reaction out of them. Whilst the writing and performing is often the main reason for engagement and what gets the biggest reaction from the audience, how the story is edited together is also just as effective in doing so. Suspense and pace are the best ways in accompanying this, ensuring a scene is suspenseful is a great way in keeping the audience engaged with what is happening.

In the 1990 adaption of Stephen Kings novel Misery, a scene that beautifully creates suspense is one in which it jumps back and fourth between Paul trying to return to the room in which he was being held hostage, and Annie returning to the house. Everything from the music present to how long each character is on screen for during each cut is what especially helps this scene to create a very suspenseful tone. In terms of pacing, the scene seamlessly transitions between the endangered protagonist and the imposing antagonist who gets closer with every second that passes. This is one of the best presentations of generating suspense in film through the use of various editing techniques from jump cuts to  the use of music within the scene itself.

Pacing is also a crucial method of ensuring engagement from the audience, shots can occur in a fast paced sequence or can occur in a seemingly slow pace. A fast sequence of shots creates excrement and can give a scene a real sense of energy, this style of shot assembly is most present in action movies during a fight scene as the camera cuts back and forth to different characters trading blows with one another helps to keep the scene interesting. Scenes in which each shot drawn out are not necessarily a bad thing, this style of editing is beneficial for scenes that involve either important dialogue or establishing shots are the world in which the continuity takes place. If scenes are not paced well then it can impact the audiences overall enjoyment, it can lead to scenes feeling either drawn out or rushed, so it is important that the right balance is found when it comes to pacing.