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knightofbalance-13 · 6 years

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https://rwdestuffs.tumblr.com/post/177987755536/the-jaune-problem

Yeah- There’s a reason critics don’t discuss certain topics: because of bias.

Okay, I think I’ve calmed down enough that I can talk about this without getting too mad,

Dudeblade, you don’t have anger issues with Jaune, you have BIAS issues.

On it’s own, Jaune being a self-insert is not a bad thing. Keywords: “On it’s own.”

A. Jaune is not a self insert.

And B. We all know ‘on it’s own’ means ‘born the wrong race/gender.’

There is no reason to not base a character off of someone you know in real life, or even yourself. Some of media’s famous characters are based off of actual people, or even the people who write them. Or sometimes, their experiences.

Take Superman for example. He’s a being from another world who has to try to figure out how to live in another world where he feels alien, and constantly struggles with the idea of accepting the place he was raised as his home, or the place he came from. If this sounds familiar, it should. Superman’s creators, Jerry Sigel and Joe Shuester were the kids of immigrants. Who better to write about an alien in a new world than people who felt alien in a new world?

And yet you’re gonna go on to ignore similar subtext with Jaune AKA none of the writers have actually written anything aside from Miles with Red. vs Blue but with Jaune he doesn’t count.

So, people basing characters they write about off of their own experiences isn’t inherently a problem.

What is a problem, is when you make that character hard to identify with, or make them not have actual humanistic characteristics.

Dudeblade, Jaune being the race and gender you at ebigoted against does not make him less human nor unable to identify with.

Jaune is very guilty of this.

Correction: your delusion of Jaune is very guilty of this.

He wanted to become a hero, and doesn’t want to be the damsel in distress anymore.- That is relatable.

What isn’t relatable, is how he intended to do that. He cheated his way into the school. He also didn’t study in class, nor did he study outside of class. He also refused to accept Pyrrha’s offer of being trained because of his ego, and that hurts his ability to be relatable to the audience. Yes, swallowing your pride and accepting help is hard to do, but the only reason Jaune accepts Pyrrha’s help at the end of his four-part arc in the first volume of sixteen episodes is because his ego got boosted. Jaune didn’t learn a lesson at the ed of all that, nor did he actually earn that ego boost by himself. Pyrrha did it for him.

A. Jaune shows guilt over cheating and feels inadaqute over it like a normal person.

And B. Jaune admitted it was because of his ego and humbled himself so your lying.

He didn’t really learn a lesson on respecting women in volume 2, he just got to bother Weiss, tell off Neptune for not considering her feelings, and get validation from Weiss and getting to dance with Pyrrha.

Considering Weiss never showed respect to him and he only acted that way towards Weiss AND he’s apparentgly the only suitor who actually respected Weiss by seeing her as a persona dn not a Meal ticket, your point is invalid.

In volume 4, he acted very ungratefully towards Qrow, but then the following volume shows that he has no beef with Ozpin. Like, they both gave Pyrrha that ultimatum, they should both be mistrusted by the guy.

You screeched in the writer’s faces when they did that. You have no one to blame but yourself there.

Jaune has not learned from his mistakes. There’s no evidence that anybody will call him out on starting that fight in volume 5, and it’s even more likely that people will be congratulating him on unlocking his semblance instead.

because he doesn't need to eb called out, you just want him to be because you hate him.

Also: never learns from his mistakes. Sounds like you Dudeblade. So either Jaune IS human or you are not.

Jaune’s role also doesn’t make sense, as he grew up in the world of Remnant. There is no reason for him to not even know the basics of aura, or know who Pyrrha is despite him knowing who Weiss is through her career. If he could recognize Weiss because of her singing, then you’d think he’d be able to recognize Pyrrha because of her own fame.

A. He has a crush on Weiss and not Pyrrha.

And B. Show me where Aura is common knowledge. Fucking show me.

Characterization marches on, but there’s no notable evidence that Jaune’s has taken more than a few minor steps. He’s just as reckless as he was before, and his disrespect towards Pyrrha is shown when he doesn’t think about her parents wanting to hold onto a few of her memorabilia that she had at Beacon by virtue of him just melting her stuff to upgrade himself.

No, more like you refuse to see it so you just deluded everything else away and delude away any explanations.

I’m gonna take a break from ragging on Jaune. But I’ll be back to rag on him some more later when something else inevitably pops up.

Probably after a shit ton of self inflicted brain injuries.

#dudeblade

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mondofunnybooks · 6 years

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MONDO FunnyBooks: Bunker Down.

Were you a recent visitor to the wonderful world of comics fandom and discussions between professionals in the business, you might have the idea that comic customers were essentially a superstitious and cowardly lot.

Current sources of outrage, retweets and outbreaks of delusional authority run riot have been ranged from the fairly embarrassing to the downright worrying. Arguments in this writers memory have been about: 'Is The Joker doing something not very nice to a human being?', 'How dare a movie studio choose to cast who they like in the film they're paying to make without consulting US first?', 'This man who draws and has been drawing people in a particular fashion has drawn this person in his particular fashion. How dare he?' We reached peak David Icke/Alex Jones levels of hilarious Othering this week when an X-Men artist referred to SJWs as 'Nazis'.

Irony and Satire have apparently given up on humanity and gone for a pint.

The usual conservative, tribal viewpoints of people who've confused an artistic medium with a constant stream of politically free distraction designed only to anatheize rather than engage and stimulate thought, then. It's more important to harass Ruby Rose for being cast as 'Batwoman' until she feels compelled to leave Twitter or be upset at the news of Michael B. Jordan playing Johnny Storm for reasons that were absoultly nothing to do with racism but rather the...uh...misportrayal of the modern American family which defintly traditionally couldn't contain a black man. Also something something tradition or something.

When we've brought this up before, we're usually countered with something like 'Oh, you should see Harry Potter/Overwatch/Hunger Games/Fortnite fandoms, they're JUST as bad.' Which we are willing to assume is true, having seen YouTube comments, but it does seem that the entertainment industry has a bad habit of emulating the worst excesses of the comics industry.

Whether it's Empire or TV Guide running variant covers, Toy producers doing convention exclusive figures and then selling them at a premium afterwards or even, HighFather Keep Us From Laughing, the application of the words 'Limited' or 'Collectiable' to a product to imply both a scarity that requires instant purchase and a possibilty of high resale value when in fact those are words that could be applied to any physical product ever.

We can almost guarantee that there are only a limited amount of copies of 'Night Rocker' by David Hasslehoff in the world and should you decide to purchase one or more copies, you have collected them, but neither fact is hard evidence that anyone will offer you more than you paid for them ten years in the future.

This is a rather..odd state of affairs to have come about. With the exception of poetry or graffiti, Before the medium was hijacked into becoming one more vehicle to sell corporate superhero products, work like George Herriman's 'Krazy Kat' explored the nature of language via abusive animals against the unrelenting tedium of the desert. Little Nemo In Slumberland by Windsor McCay was a continous attempt to map the subconscious in a strip adaptable to any format thrown at him by publishers. Sigel and Shuster commericalised the Jewish notion of a charismatic Golem who would maintain balance against an American society that had been taught to hate them. Fly By Night publishing types would use the form to glamourise the world of true crime and vaguely condemning tales of drug abuse to create an entire sub-culture by showing a willingness to adapt to the times.

These were the early days of comics and sequential story-telling and by now there ought to be work making these masterpieces look like the plinkings of Woody Gutherie against the all out assault on the cortex that is an Atari Teenage Riot. Instead the front end of the medium seems more concerned with dotting the I's and lining the t's of it's previous output (our favourite example being Marvel's 'Secret Wars Too: A comic that explained to readers why the comic it was parodying would be late. They charged money for this, as well.)

Comics were long considered the Outlaw Artform, so capable of shaping the public psyche that the content and distribution were brought up in Congress to see if it was necessarily to regulate the avalibilty of them to children. It's a longer story than will run here but the essence of the events is that while the 1954 hearings saw Congress conclude that comics were NOT a harmful product that would negatively influence children's minds, the comics industry decided that it would be best to settle public hysteria by establishing 'The Comics Code Authority', which would impose a series of standards and regulations upon comics seeking to be distributed on the newsstands.

Ironically, one of the people on the earlier incarnations of the board that would make up The CCA would be John Goldwater, one of many who takes credit for the creation of Archie Andrews'.. This writer likes to think Mr Goldwater was probably a little resentful of EC Comics's Archie parody 'STARCHIE!' (MAD Magazine Issue 12. Remains funny but now also looks like any episode of 'Riverdale'.) and was more than happy to choose the phrasing of a code that also happened to regulate the key words in EC Comic's top selling comics out of publication. All the resentful little men in comics complaining about being mocked are 'Happy Days''s Howard Cunningham wearing his Grand Poobah hat in our head.

We say 'ironically', because the current Ickeian theory is that comic sales in the direct market are so low due to Marvel and DC 'giving in' to the demands of the 'SJWs'. What with their unreasonable demands for more realistic representation in mainstream comics, we can see how 'Could you produce more comics we'd be willing to buy?' would definetly be an agenda designed to bring down the entire comics industry.

Because we are given to facts, we can't dispute a lot of the problems the new comics industry faces. Sales on New Comics to The Direct Market ARE down.

It would take the same sort of mind that blames Barack Obama for his Presidential inaction during Hurricane Katrina to think that the problems of new comics are the work of those damned SJWs, though. Not unless Heidi MacDonald has a time machine.

Unless Laurie Penny staged a hostile takeover of The Marvel Editorial Summit and said 'Right. Here's what we want: Please keep raising the prices of your comics by roughly about a dollar every few years, do more $150 crossovers that will have no significance in about 4 years or so. Please spin off as many comics as possible from one of your prime brands. Make sure your top staff behave like Obnoxious King Nerds on social media whenever possible.Instead of focusing your sales team on promoting the comic as a good read, keep pitching your comics as must buy investment issues aimed at speculators who won't be back for the next issue. As soon as your readership have begun to settle into a book, it's direction and it's creative team, that's probably the best time to relaunch your titles.

Be sure to confuse readers and retailers by pretending each relaunch is a 'Season' without ever referring to which season is currently published in advertising or trade dress. Come up with any justification whatsover to publish an anniversary issue that's triple the price of a regular comic as frequently as possible. Try to devalue the contribution and sales cache of your creative team over the amount of variant covers offered to retailers. Have your top writers actively and vocally hostile to the notion of second printings and finally publish no comics that even vaguely resemble the TV and Movie versions of your characters so new readers can come into a shop after seeing "Avengers Assemble" and be offered 7 books called "Avengers" but they'll mainly be about some men chatting at a table.'....then the reasons why new comics are failing aren't at the hands of SJWs.

They're at the hands of the publishers. The above list is the main reason for the decline in sales of new comics in specialist shops that we saw in our days behind the till. All things we were saying over a decade ago at retailer meetings with Marvel and DC. We were brushed off in order to try and wave shiny new 3D variants back then.

A few years later, when it was apparent that the law of diminishing returns was in full effect, was when finally The Big Two turned to the 'gimmick' of appealling to a wider audience. When oddly, that half-hearted effort to win over a new readership by publishing the books in the same venues as usual didn't work,with little support from their publicity and advertising departments both Marvel and DC quickly threw these efforts under the bus as proof that trying to expand your salesbase beyond a Wednesday crowd was a waste of time.

Except that''s nonsense of course. Any analysis of pre-order charts will tell you that the sales have been in heavy decline since 2007's 'Civil War' from Marvel. The constant attempts to repeat that success in that format are the problem. Marvel and DC trying the 'Social Justice' route and it's subsequent failure is a shameless attempt to rewrite history for the benefit of an agenda of tired Poobahs scared of time and their limited views of the comic medium making them irrelevant.

In fact, Marvel's recent attempt to appeal to Muslims,AND teenagers (imagine.) at once was quite late in the game with 2013's 'Ms Marvel' while the 'Feminazi Bible' Mockingbird wouldn't begin threatening Poobah Egos until around late 2016. Meanwhile, Archie Comics had smelled which way the wind was blowing several years earlier....

Archie Comics were always smarter than the ongoing superhero titles because they never set themselves up to tell an ongoing story, but rather worked like an extended cartoon strip. If you read three random issues of any Archie comics, you were probably as clued up on the cast of Riverdale as you were going to need to be to understand the dynamics of what was going on. Archie was perptually out of sync with the world around him, Betty was goal driven and meant well, Moose wasn't quite sure what day it was but loved Midge more than anything, etc. etc. All you had to do was set up a situation, add two or more of the characters and let the rest play out.

Even better, since the characters weren't obliged to be a certain age given the backstory (Peter Parker can't be worrying about teenage problems since he's been around long enough to get married, be a lecturer, etc.) the backgrounds and fashions could simply be updated to reflect the times of publication.

So no awkward retcons such as Reed Richards and Ben Grimm starting off as veterans of World War 2 and suddenly having gone through The Gulf War instead, prompting questions like 'Which comics have and haven't happened, then, because The Avengers definitely went to Saigon in the 70's but the existence of The FF precedes The Original Avengers finding Captain America in the block of ice and Cap turned out to be fighting Richard Nixon during The Secret Empire Saga so...argh!'

Archie managed to stay on the newsstands long after the self absorbed and inside baseball nature of superhero comics rendered them unsaleable in your average W.H.Smith's or Wal-Mart, since any issue of Betty & Veronica could be read by anyone with no need to check out previous issues. It was very rare that any one tale would run more than one comic and the few times it did, it was with fantastic results. We'll get to that.

In 2010, Marvel was wasting everyone's time and money on 'Siege; or 'What If Asgard wasn't in space but in Oklahoma instead?' while DC insisted on spreading the myth that people who grew up in Liverpool talk like they're from Shoreditch by adding John Constantine to the line up of 'Brightest Day'.

During the same year, Archie dragged mainstream comics kicking and screaming into the future with 'Kevin Keller', a comic featuring an openly gay male lead out in the real world and everything. This annoyed some American Mary Whitehouse wannabes called 'One Million Moms!'. They campaigned against the title being sold in children friendly areas such as Toys R Us but only really proved their basic inability to count to 1 million.

In the same year they published covers featuring Archie kissing Valerie, the black bassist from Josie & The Pussycats. If this doesn't strike you as a big deal for a comic being published in the mid-west of America, well, you might be one of those guys suggesting that there's always been adequate representation in comics.

They didn't sell as many comics in specialist shops, but while The Big Two continued to tread water, Archie kept moving forward, kept looking to crossover with big name brands, parodied the biggest comic crossovers, featured the likes of Barack Obama and Sarah Palin, paid homage to EC Comics and got Adam Hughes to draw covers. They even explored exactly what WOULD happen if Archie finally chose Betty. And Veronica. And heartbreakingly, how deep Archie's love for his fellow man ran in the conclusion to the marriage stories in 'The Death Of Archie.' Oh, and he also met the Predator.

Then they stepped everything into higher gear with our second favourite horror comic of the 21st Century with Afterlife With Archie. It was a book we'd recommend to new readers as a good alternative to the horrendously overpriced, badly drawn horror or just too boring to be scary books glutting the market with 'Torture Porn Variants'. AWA would feature at least one chilling moment per issue likely to stay with you long after you finished reading. One issue of tie-in book 'Sabrina The Teenage Witch; is worth 3 or 4 'Walking Dead' trade paperbacks in terms of actual horror instead of people talking around a trailer park.

If you had been a fan of the Archie world before and hadn't read it for a while, though, our glee would be magnified. While the horror/jump scare bits of AWA are genuinely well done and actually quite intense, the bits between undead assault are where the real horror lies as relationships between all the characters are twisted forever, new angles and revealations would stop you ever being able to see Midge, Cheryl, Reggie and more in quite the same light.

This moving with the times meant that the Archie readership were quite capable of seeing the characters they loved for so many decades in different modes of storytelling and art styles laid the groundwork for two things: The relaunch of the line in 2015 with high profile creators such as Mark Waid, Fiona Staples, Chip Zdarsky and Adam Hughes doing new and interesting takes on a universe we all knew so well (A bit like The Ultimate Universe but with a point and a plan.) and also the hit show 'Riverdale'.

It will not surprise many of you to learn that the Grand Poobahs Of Comics (TM MONDO FunnyBooks 2018) hated 'Riverdale' and frequently grumbled 'Not MY Archie.' but then, by folding their arms and threatening to hold their breath until the artform of comics goes back to being what THEY want, they've proven time and again that they're constantly wanting to find a straw man to blame for the world moving on without them. These were the same people who moaned about 'Archie Vs Punisher' for not taking Frank Castle seriously enough and thought the parody crossover 'Love Showdown' (Which promised that Archie would finally choose a permanent girlfriend) would break the Archieverse once and for all.

There are lots of ways to improve the state of comics. Indulging the whinging of grumpy old men and refusing to believe the rest of the world might be interested in comics are not on that list of ways.

And as a wise man once said 'The people want BeBop. And who I am to tell them that BeBop is wrong?'

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nny11writes · 7 years

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Fictober 27- Moment

The one where Ahsoka goes undercover, finds herself crushing on someone, and can’t act. But honestly, what else is new? ~~~~~~~~~~~ Ahsoka was doubled over with laughter, unable to explain exactly what she found so hilarious about the dramatic Jedi flick based on the totally fake time that never happened where Skyguy beat Grievous aboard the Malevolence.

During her undercover mission with Master Obi-Wan it had seemed prudent to actually spend time with regular kids her age. In practice Ahsoka had found it awkward, nerve wracking, and unpleasant with one exception. She had gotten to meet Moshi, who was a fifteen year old togrutan colored all in purples and pinks. He was silly and kind and had a set of fantastic dimples that complemented his round face. Ahsoka had known from the moment she’d met him that she was in, what some might call, Trouble. She knew better, she’d done better when it came to Lux but Mosh was...was him. Despite knowing it was a bad choice, Ahsoka had agreed to watch The Great Malevolence with him.

She only somewhat regretted the choice.

Moshi had responded to her laughter with a kicked puppy glare as if he was personally hurt. Each new round of her laughter, and derisive comment only causing him to melt sullenly into the couch. Ahsoka eventually managed to get a few words out to explain herself. “Look, it’s, it’s just, it doesn’t work like that! Explosive decompression is, well, it’s explosive. Lightsabers don’t work like that. Master Skywalker probably didn’t get shirtless for the fight, and what the heck?”

Dashing on screen was a rail thin togruta girl who performed a rather average gymnastic stunt before landing next to Anakin “The Hero with No Fear” Skywalker.

“Don’t worry Master, we can take him!” The girl cried dramatically.

“Of course we can, stick with me Padawan.” Fake Anakin said with a wink, and the two posed with some frankly amazing backlighting. “Let’s scrap this droid.”

Moshi’s sullen glare softened into something dreamy. “That’s his apprentice jedi, Ahsoka Tano. She’s amazing! And hot!”

Ahsoka coughed violently as she fought another round of blushing. The fake Ahsoka on screen effortlessly destroyed droid after droid with a great vibroblade technique that would cause an actually lightsaber to bounce back in her face. Ahsoka tried not to notice the way the actress’s headdress had some weird triangular stones on it to stand in as akul teeth. That was just rude.

“She’s a huntress, you can see her akul teeth, and I’m just saying if jedi could marry I’d propose.” Moshi continued, apparently blind to her deep suffering. “I’d totally get my ass kicked to propose to jedi Tano. She’s so cool! Did you know she liberated Ryloth? Like, please, just punch me in the face master jedi.”

Ahsoka tried to keep her peels of laughter inside and mostly managed to just vibrate from the frankly unhealthy suppression. So this was what Sith Hells was. Trapped between inappropriate laughter, indignation, and the nervousness that only seemed to show up the second she wanted to be cool.

Fake Anakin turned screaming and force pushed fake Ahsoka through a dramatically closing blast door. It cut to fake Ahsoka pounding on the metal, her fake off green lightsaber apparently not good enough to cut through metal.

“Don’t worry young one,” Fake Anakin said as he turned to face the rail thin cyborg. “I am not afraid.”

Ahsoka’s brain made a choice without her input, and she lost an inevitable war to her soul shaking laughter. “This is sooooo bad! Stars, cut through the door dumbass!”

“Don’t talk about my wife like that!” Moshi cackled as he chucked a kernel at her head. “But seriously, cut through the door! It’s one of the biggest plot holes of the whole damned thing.”

Ahsoka was too busy dying to respond that it was a plot hole because it never happened, because Anakin hadn’t dueled Grievous at all! She had!

“And her technique is so, stars, it’s the wrong way to do it completely! Lightsabers are all weight in the hilt, there’s no weight to the blade.” Ahsoka wheezed at the ceiling. “And what kind of catch phrase was that? ‘I am not afraid!’”

“Oh so now you’re a jedi expert?” Moshi half kicked at her feet.

Ahsoka grinned awkwardly. Oh boy, some day she’d think before she spoke. Might as well take the life line though. “I might not know a lot about fake jedi, but yeah, I keep up about real jedi.”

“Oh really?” Moshi shuffled to sit closer and leaned in with a critical look. “So tell me then, what form is she supposed to use?”

Were lightsaber techniques public domain? Did the general population know about fighting forms? She dug a hole and decided in a slight panic to do what she was best at, keep digging. “Shien.”

Moshi blinked, suddenly sitting up straighter. “What unit does The Hero With no Fear fight with?”

“General Skywalker leads the 501st Legion, typically fighting with Torrent Squad. So does Commander Tano.”

“Dude!” Moshi stared at her with excited round eyes and bubbled with excitement. It was like she was the best thing he’d ever seen. Ahsoka did not preen as he whispered, “Dude!”

“What? Those aren’t hard questions Mosh, especially when you spend time learning real things!” Ahsoka lightly kicked at his leg. Returning the affection the way it was given. Probably a decent way to do this. She hoped.

“I concede that we could totally learn a lot, especially if it was about the jedi and my future wife. But c’mon, the vids are just fun even if they aren’t battle accurate. I mean, the mission with the Malevolence is still classified anyways. All we know is that Master Skywalker stopped it and that it was a super weapon.”

“Fire the super weapon!” Fake Grievous manically laughed. Fake Grievous was some kind of droid with a voiceover, a poorly maintained droid that Ahsoka felt pretty bad for. “There’s nothing that will save your precious Kenobi now!”

“Speaking of lucky assholes, dude, your dad!” Moshi fanned himself as he leaned back to watch the flick again. “He looks just like Kenobi!”

Ahsoka’s laughter turned into an epic coughing fit. They did not just go from her being the cool crush to Master Obi-Wan-who should Not Be Recognized At All Costs. She forced each word out around a set of chest rattling coughs. “What? No! He? No! Kenobi?”

Smooth. Real smooth.

“I’m serious, if he’d cut his hair and trimmed that giant bantha beard he could totally pass as The Negotiator’s twin. How have you not noticed?” Moshi, her dear new friend and crush, watched her coughing fit without so much as offering to help beyond nudging a soda towards her. A disgustingly sweet overly carbonated drink. Romance was truly dead. Ahsoka glared through her watering eyes and he continued, “Honestly he does! Hey, maybe you two could dress up as Tano and Kenobi for spirits eve. Dude, holy crap, that would be awesome!”

Ahsoka leaned back into the couch and tried to feel less awkward. “I don’t think that would fly. Besides, hopefully we’ll be gone long before then.”

It was like cold water had been thrown on them and Ahsoka did her level best not to turn and stare. Normal people couldn’t read emotions like that, so she should pretend to care about Fake Obi-Wan and his ridiculously chiseled features instead. Right?

“Do not worry my young friend,” Fake Obi-Wan turned, his ripped shirt dramatically revealing his super defined pec and nipple. He smirked as the camera zoomed in on the largest vent she’d ever seen. “I can make my own way from here.”

Fake Anakin, still shirtless, grinned at his communicator and posed with his lightsaber just so. The open circle sigel appearing from the random assortment of junk in the background very dramatically as Anakin turned to look down a giant hallway. “Meet you in the middle master.”

“Hey Mosh, what’s wrong?” Ahsoka hoped enough time had passed for her to ask.Moshi shrugged then rolled his whole head in time with his eyeroll.

“I just, are you really gonna leave that soon? Don’t you like it here Ashla?”

“I do! I really do, but we need to leave as soon as we can.” Ahsoka rubbed her knuckles together. “We can’t just stay.”

Moshi practically slammed the popcorn bowl down before turning to look her dead on in the eyes. “You could. If you want to.”

He placed his hands on top of hers. Light enough that she could pull away. Ahsoka tried to not melt the couch.

When had her own life gotten so much more dramatic and soppy than the flick? Even so...even so she just wanted to have this one moment last forever. She just wanted to have this one moment.

“I-”Ahsoka’s secret comm went off, loudly. She fumbled pulling away to fish it out from her belt. She at least had the sense of mind to answer with, “Ashla.”

“No time for that, I’ve found them and they are running. I need you to cut them off at the juncture to the spaceport.” Obi-Wan’s slightly winded voice blared at her along with several blaster shots and the whirling of his lightsaber.

Ahsoka, despite the seriousness of the call, found her eyes meeting Moshi’s huge watery gaze. “Yes Master. I can be there in ten.”

“May the force be with you Ahsoka. Kenobi out.”

Ahsoka let the call cut and summoned her school bag, all but ripping her lightsaber out from the smaller front pocket. As soon as the hilt hit her hand Ahsoka dropped the bag as dead weight. She turned to look at Moshi again, trying to memorize the way he looked right then. So hurt but happy, proud and sad and like he was desperately in love with her. As if she had any right to those emotions at all. “I’m sorry Mosh, but I really can’t stay. Thank you. For everything, it was fun.”Ahsoka tried to not kick her own ass too hard over how terrible of a goodbye that was, before she turned and ran for the junction. No chaos, be tranquility. No emotion, bring peace.

It would be hours later and light years away that Ahsoka would realize she still had her fake comm unit. A single message showed Moshi looking serious as he held up her school bag. The text said, “ nowyou have to come back i got your stuff”.

#starwarsfictober #fanfiction #star wars #Ahsoka Tano #OC: Moshi #Star Wars the Clone Wars #This is totally part of declarations #Ahsoka please stop crushing on people who are oblivious-everyone with an obvious crush on you would appreciate it thanks

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avaliveradio · 5 years

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Listen to London Hip Hop Artist Sir London's Newest Release Mirror2020

Artist: Sir London

New Release: Mirror2020

Genre: Hip Hop

Located in: : London

I would describe my music as the ‘golden era’ hip hop meets new school hip hop; I pride myself on lyrics and bars but then again, great music to me isn’t about being the most technically gifted, it’s about a feeling.

I came up mostly listening to the likes of Biggie, Lox, Hov, Nas, Dipset, 50 Cent, State Property, Papoose, Ali Vegas, Kool G Rap, Mobb Deep, Cormega, Foxy, Flip Mode, Saigon, CNN, Nature, Fabolous so you will always hear those influences in my music.

It’s different times though, so I like to make sure I’m in tune with what’s going on out there now. I'll come with different flows depending on where the beat takes me but I’m always gonna give you London at the end of the day. Every track I do, I mean it so I’m different from a lot of artists that record to put out lots of music for the sake of it.

I don’t really like to put myself in a box, but if I was to sum up my rap style, it’s mostly gully underground s*** (I liked to switch it up though too) and I would probably categorize myself as a ‘Slick Talker’ type rapper.

As far as this new track – ‘Mirror2020’, it’s more of a commercial joint. The instrumental by one of my favorite producers at the minute – Jaywan Inc and it’s kinda dark and melodic, almost trance-like/hypnotizing but then it’s also got a nice bounce to it cos of the bass. As a matter of fact, on my first mixtape – Hacking 4 Beats, I did a freestyle track called Reflective King.

I’m a very reflective person, and that particular track best shows that side of me and probably gives you a really good insight into what I’m about and where I’m coming from. Mirror2020 is like a continuation of that but on a bit more of a superficial level.

On one hand, it’s kind of a statement of intent to let people know that I’m here, that I’ve arrived, and what my vision is for the future – as well as what I’m about to bring to the game for that time that I’m here. And, on the other hand, it’s a celebratory song and about knowing who you are, focusing and elevating beyond all the BS and life's distractions. I would say this is a real-life soundtrack for all the 'go-getters' and like-minded individuals out there who are transitioning in life (from their old) and are about their business.

The music...

As I said, this track is a statement of intent. It's been a lot of blood, sweat and years - like the OG Soul B says, so it's no turning back for me after this release....I'm all now. There was a time when I wasn't even gonna put out music but I wasn't hearing enough of the type of music I like so I only decided to get back into the business in 2016 after 11 years away. And, my first mixtape was more of an experiment to see if people were rocking with me which is why it's taken so long for me to drop any new music as I had to sit back and decide what direction I wanted to go in as an artist. When you look at groups like the Migos, they're artists (and superstars) first and rappers second which is great and something you can be these days. This track is more on my superstar s*** but I've got a lot of more gritty stuff in the works too.

Right now we are...

It's all Mirror2020 right now, and I'm putting 100% of my energy into this at the minute - so we'll see what's next. I've got another few joints in the clip, but Mirror2020 is the motive right now.

How does music touch you?

Without sounding cliche, music is almost something spiritual to me as an artist. When I hear an instrumental that speaks to me, it’s like I go into a stream of consciousness and the words just come to me (Sometimes I even laugh to myself and think...where did those lyrics/words come from?).

What do you think music does for us all?

I think it means something different to the individual. But for me, it’s the soundtrack to my life. Music balances me out, gives me energy and motivation to keep going. It empowers me and even gives me a sense of nostalgia at times. I guess it would probably mean something similar to other people who are music lovers or musically inclined.

How important is it to be authentic with lyrics?

I don’t think it’s important to everyone, but it’s important to me as an artist (even when I was a kid rapping). There was about a year or two where hip hop was all about how gangster you could be, and most of the older members in my crew at the time starting rapping with more street-oriented lyrics. I was still young and I found myself doing it to because it sounded nicer on freestyles (as that was still the peak of the era of the mixtape), but it didn’t feel right after a while, which is part of the reason I stopped rapping at the time. But I can say hand on heart that all my lyrics now are all factual/reality-based. Of course, as an artist, you add a bit of dramatic effect, but I pride myself on rapping about things that I know about or have experienced myself.

Why do you make music?

Music is a form of expression and an outlet for me. It’s was the first thing that I was interested in as a child – other than boxing. Once a musician, always a musician in my opinion (at least deep down).

Even when I stopped rapping for 11 years (btw I started rapping at 8 years old); I was still writing almost every day or every other day. Being an emcee always meant showing off your best rhymes and letting people know how nice you are with the bars – so if I’m honest – a bit of why I make music is probably also to do with ego and my inner competitiveness. But then it’s also the fact that I like words, and painting a picture using my lyrics and the instrumental; there was a period in time when I could only communicate in slang words, but I taught myself how to write and better formulate my words.

I like the whole creative process, from hearing that ‘perfect’ instrumental that speaks to me, to writing the lyrics, to being in the booth and recording a new track. It’s also to do with affecting people's emotions and exciting them with bars, my flow, creativity or just the vibes I’m able to bring. As well as the sense of validation you sometimes get when people feel your music – not that I need validation but it’s always nice.

In fact, the main reason I got back into the rap game was because I wasn’t hearing enough of the type of raps that I like to hear....the type of rap bars that make you scrunch your face up because their so good (not to say it wasn’t out there somewhere but I was hearing much of it). I almost felt like most of the rappers had pretty much the same story and the same bars. I’ve always thought the genius of a ‘real’ emcee comes from saying things that no one else could have ever thought of saying and coming with a totally fresh perspective/sound (that was 50 Cent when he first arrived on the scene commercially, that was Eminem when the world was first introduced to him, Nas the same, Jay-Z over time, once the world eventually woke up to him, Papoose with all his mixtapes, Ali Vegas with “The Specialist”, the same with ‘Beanie Sigel when he first signed to Rocafella, Juelz Santana when he was first coming out, Young Chris the same, and Lil Wayne when he started to become more of a solo artist. These are all greats I’m talking about obviously, but my point is whenever I make any track – it’s about coming with a unique perspective and bars that are actually personal to me – that no other rapper in the world could come up with because we’re different people with different life experiences and perspectives, and then for me it’s about bottling that all up and giving it to the world.

LINKS: https://twitter.com/Sir_London1 https://www.facebook.com/SirLondonOfficial https://instagram.com/sir_london1

https://soundcloud.com/sir_london1/sets/sir-london-hacking-4-beats

#Sir London #UK #london #Hip Hop

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damnthatnoise · 6 years

Text

The Future Is Now | An Interview With Zilla Rocca

Philadelphia is rich with hip-hop history going back to Spoonie-G, DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince, The Square Roots (The Roots) on through Freeway, Beanie Sigel, Dice Raw, Lushlife and of course the Wrecking Crew’s own double threat Zilla Rocca. With more than 15+ years deep in the game Rocca is approaching the release of his latest and in this writer's humble opinion most impressive album yet via legendary music journalist Jeff Weiss’s POW Recordings with, Future Former Rapper set to drop in the coming months.

I reached out to the Wrecking Crew, Career Crook, Grift Company Producer/Lyricist to talk about his career, parenthood, how his approach has changed and all sorts of shit in between. Over the course of the conversation I digested the new album and the more I listened to it the more one thing became clear to me...Zilla Rocca is one of the NICEST FUCKING MC’s THIS CULTURE CURRENTLY HAS AROUND! The man has not only studied the greats but he holds tight in his essence the core of what made many of them great to begin with and when you get your hands on this album you will see what I mean.

For now, grab a drink, roll a blunt, and read my interview with Zilla Rocca!

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Damn That Noise: "Future Former Rapper" you said has taken around 4yrs to create, and in that time you dropped 3 Career Crooks projects, your joint EP with Curly Castro as Grift Company and your "Hard Boiled EP" not to mention becoming a father and husband, and writing for Passion of The Weiss. What was it about this specific album that you really wanted to take your time on, and where do you think you've matured and refined yourself as an artist and man since "No Vacation for Murderers" dropped?

Zilla Rocca: That’s a great question. All of heady stuff takes me 1-4 years to make for some reason. This album went through a lot of incarnations even though the songs are pretty direct and the conceptual stuff is digestible. When I started making it I decided to record maybe 4-5 songs, play them live, see how people reacted, and then go back and re-record them after doing field research. I’ve never done that before and it was great! Plus as an emcee it helps you catch pockets with the rhymes in a live setting that you might now catch in the booth.

I think after No Vacation specially I wanted to make more straight forward stuff. I feel like my Shadowboxers projects are ahead of their time and take a minute to digest. Once real life stuff intersected then I really had no time just to experiment and meander with songs. I wanted to get my point across on different types of production on some Danny Brown and Vince Staples steez since they challenge people while being bare bones rappers. The bulk of the album was done before my son was born and his first year I had to pause with all music stuff and just be a Dad and husband. So that year off helped me recharge to do new stuff like Career Crooks and Grift Company.

DTN: I had written about your really growing into an MC who belongs alongside the caliber of folks who came from the DITC era, and you had replied in a tweet saying that you had really been studying those guys for a while recently. What is it about Finesse, Diamnond D, Big L, OC and the rest of the Digging in The Crates crew that inspires your asthetic? You sound like you and not a knock-off, but the essence is there which is hard to do some times....how do you incorporate those inspirations into the process?

Zilla Rocca: Just being mentioned anywhere near DITC is a blessing so thank you. I feel like DITC is still an all time great secret in rap. I love Wu and Mobb Deep and all the other big groups and cliques but everyone knows them. How many people who love Fat Joe know DITC? I think those guys are incredibly consistent first off which I admire. AG is still great! Showbiz still gets busy. As does OC and everyone else. And their sound has always fluctuated between dark and cinematic but also shiny and bouncy. They could do clubby joints for the car and do headphone cypher riding on the train beats. I’ve been making beats for 15 years and definitely studied their approaches. I told Small Pro that “Good Luck with That” is his Buckwild album. And as a rapper I love Finesse and Diamond D for being so in pocket and dead on with their lines. There’s a beauty to their simplicity on the mic. It’s hard to be simple and dope. Plus Big L was the opposite using 5 syllable rhyme schemes while talking fly street shit. His rhyme structures are like cheat codes. I’m not a die-hard Big L dude but I’ve listened to him for 23 years and his shit is incredibly memorable and catchy. That’s why I did “Lamont Coleman” off Hard Boiled - I had those Big L lines in my head for a week and thought they’d be a great hook. And the beat had that eerie Word...Life/Jewelz feel. So it was the ultimate genuflect to the whole unit.

DTN: We seem sometimes to be in a Renaissance of hip-hop with artists like Armand Hammer's Elucid and billy woods both releasing such prolific group material not to mention solo material, as well as the likes of Milo, Mike Eagle, JPEGMAFIA, PremRock, Karma Kids, Ka, Marci, Westside Gunn and the Griselda fam continuously coming with heat and of course yourself and the countless others dropping really noteworthy albums....do you think we're hitting a creative stride right now that we were worried we might not see again 8-10yrs ago?

Zilla Rocca: I think we’re just in a media consumption phase as a culture right now. Binge watching shows. Staying glued to the news all day on twitter and cable. In the past only a handful of rappers were wild prolific like Doom, Kool Keith, Lil B, Lil Wayne etc and it made them stand out. Nowadays people hear your project and say “that’s hot but when’s the next one dropping?” Because people are just consuming endless shit now more regularly in that fashion. I’ve always worked on music and did it damn near every single day from 2005-2012 so once I saw people respond more to lots of music these days, I was game to feed them. I’ve always been diligent with lots of songs on deck so it’s nothing for me to try it this way for now. It’s been highly successful I’ll tell you that!

DTN: As someone who is an artist, and as someone who also writes about music where do you think music journalism specifically online has gone wrong over the last 5-10 years? Blogs at one time seemed like the spot where new artist could be broken and discovered but now most places seem no different than the old pay to play models of old. What do you think killed this?

Zilla Rocca: With music journalism, it’s just things are always changing. Blogs were a reaction to music magazines becoming corporatized and shitty. Then blogs became corporatized and shitty and streaming took off so they got wiped out. Plus youtube has now been around for over 10 years and people just digest and learn shit from video so sitting and reading something is now a different option for music writing or criticism, whereas in the ‘80s through ‘00s it was almost the exclusive means to know about music

DTN: What about this album was different for you in the approach to bringing it all together? How did you decide on the group of producers you gathered and why them for THIS album?

Zilla Rocca: I really thought this album would be my last. I was about to be a dad and I didn’t think I’d ever have time to work on music again. So I thought about making an album to capture every era from my career. I started in the early 2000’s doing more experimental stuff. Then did boom nap East coast underground music. Then some artsy indie rock sampling stuff. So this album was about showing off all of that.

So choosing the producers to handle that was the key. Steel Tipped Dove is the bridge between the more loop driven east coast beats on here, from Small Pro, Ray West, Disco Vietnam, and Messiah Musik, to the EDM/trap type beats by Starkey and my man William J Sullivan. I probably started the album with his beats and Messiah Musik’s first then chose beats around theirs. I feel like Danny Brown has been really good at that mixture so I patterned it after Old specifically without doing 2 sides to an album that breaks up the style of production. DTN: Jay is 48, Em is 46, El & Killer Mike are 43, do you see yourself actually becoming a Future Former Rapper at some point in time or do you think that it's just going to transition into a different path of creative writing for you, but keep the same essence?

Zilla Rocca: There will be a day when I hang it up. Maybe it’ll be when I’m 40? I’ll be 36 tomorrow but I feel energized now with people still discovering me. But once my son gets old enough to play sports I know my time will be even more limited. And I’ll be ok with that. Like I said I really didn’t think I’d be doing music right now a few years ago. But great writers get better with age so you shouldn’t stop if you can help it.

DTN: What inspires 36yr old you now to keep moving forward and creating? If you could sit 18yr old you down and give him advice about what to expect and how to move what would it be?

Zilla Rocca: I just really do what I like now and I don’t care about what happens after that. If no press gets behind it or If it sells 7 copies I’m ok with that. I’m not as thirsty as I was when I was 18. It’s really just about the work. Since I’ve approached music that way things have gotten easier and I’ve found new fans. I would tell my 18-year-old sell the line I said on “Career Crooks Theme”: nothing comes your way when you chase, best be patient.

DTN: What do you hope Future Former Rapper expresses to the people who take time to sit down and listen to it? What do you want the listeners to walk away with from the experience?

Zilla Rocca: Phonte described his new album in a way that applies to mine: it’s for people who have other shit to do. I was really conscious about the overall running time and number of songs. Selfishly I just want people to hear it and think I’m a great rapper. If they can relate to some of the topics on a personal level, that’s a win too. It’s really autobiographical and very specific to my life growing up loving rap in South Philly in the 80’s and 90’s. But there’s a song about my wife and son and how they became the first thing I loved more than music. So there’s a lot to digest but I wanted to get in and get out like a bank robbery.

DTN: You have Serengeti, Armand Hammer, Curly Castro and another I know I'm missing on the album as guests... What was it about those voices on this album this time around? I know Curly is a regular voice but why Geti and AH...?

Zilla Rocca: Castro is the most important voice. I deliberately put him on multiple songs because I wanted the album to reflect my life. He’s my best friend and we talk every single day so his voice should be heavily involved. With Armand Hammer, I’ve been working with Elucid since like 2009. It’s great watching people catch up to him now. Billy woods is one of my favorite rap friends ever so even if he didn’t rhyme on the album I would’ve just called him and recorded him talking cause he’s brilliant and hilarious. With Serengeti, I’ve just been a big fan of dude for years and we’ve been twitter homies forever with lots of mutual friends but we’d never worked together. So I wanted him in the mix because he’s very adventurous and bold while being original. Plus he doesn’t do a lot of features so I feel like it’s special getting him on my album.

DTN: Why is storytelling such an important element in your writing? Even with your writing being more straightforward you've always focused on telling stories, and your favorite MCs have all been great storyteller... What is it about bring able to tell a story and not just say fly shit that has no real depth that calls to you?

Zilla Rocca: I think storytelling is hugely important. To me, you’re not a great rapper if you can’t tell a convincing story. I like writing in that form because I’m an avid lifelong reader too. I also like structure and coloring within the lines sometimes and stories make you do that. There’s a beginning, middle, and end. Maybe a cool plot twist. I’ve written a fantasy type of story songs, sports stories, crime stories, relationship stories, and personal stories and I appreciate it when they connect with people. “Time Ran Out” off my new EP “Hard Boiled” is a breakup story and it’s one of the most mentioned favorites which shocked me. I wasn’t sure anyone would like it but I felt like it would break up all the random rhyming and fly talk like you said!

DTN: Favorite rap magazines growing up and why?

Zilla Rocca: Obviously The Source. I also loved Blaze Magazine and then later Scratch Magazine. It was a real elation seeing the newest issues on newsstands cause we had to go hunt and search for hip hop back then. It was a secret.

DTN: You've dropped shit on your own label, you partnered with Urbnet for the Career Crooks albums with Smallpro, and now you've decided to sign with Jeff Weiss' newly formed POW Recordings for your latest solo. Why at this stage of your career when you're capable of navigating it all on your own would you sign with a new label, and what is it about Jeff that had you decide to work with him for this release (other than the obvious fact he's a clear champion of great hip-hop of all kinds)?

Zilla Rocca: I only deal with labels that love the music. I like partnering with people who are excited about the project first and foremost. I just left Toronto where URBnet is located and it’s such a clean and diverse city. Made me realize they really had to love Career Crooks to sign us cause our stuff is gritty and edgy being from Philly, which was not my experience of Toronto at all! With Jeff, we’ve known each other 13 years. I knew of POW Recordings when it was just a thought. His plan was to only sign up and coming cats to help them get shine, not Old grizzled vets like me from the Blog Rap Era on the verge of turning 40 years old. So when he heard the album, he fell in love with it and wanted to be the person who put it out. And I just went with it. It was effortless.

DTN: Thank you for your time my dude, do you want to leave the people with any final thoughts/words?

Zilla Rocca: Check my upcoming album. Check the singles we’ve dropped. Check my latest solo EP “Hard Boiled”, the latest Career Crooks remix album “Thieving as Long as I’m Breathing”, and the Grift Company EP from me and Curly Castro! Psshhew...ok that was a lot. Now, to sign off, peace to everyone who checks my stuff whether you’ve been down since 2008 or 2018. Just you reading this is built off my work ethic and stubborn refusal to quit rapping because I never had a major co-sign or a big manager or was down with a crew that blew up. I just keep doing it year after year so thank you for listening and reading!

Future Former Rapper by Zilla Rocca

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