#I was so hyped for the red dragon arc and you have no idea what this series has done to my autism

[mirror-mariposa]

Never gonna get over how the anime made this scene just so,, haunting and elevated. Like I love the manga but I love how the anime has taken these scenes and elevated the themes of death and rebirth with simple shots like this and it’s why even after reading all of the manga I still get excited for the anime because I *know* the anime will not only be a faithful adaptation, but also an artistic masterpiece as it uses the medium to its advantage

#mari talks #dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #new episode got me clawing at the walls #I was so hyped for the red dragon arc and you have no idea what this series has done to my autism #so glad the anime exceeded my expectations with the Falin skull scene

[theshy1sout]

What do you think will happen in season 4?

Hahaha, it depends on what are you asking for!

We have so many arcs going on here and my predictions are way different than my expectations, they are almost the opposite sides of the possible plot of s4.

So SPOILERS ALERT!

Wukong is going to lose the fight with LBD of course xD I'm more than sure about it. But also he won't die, I think season 4 it's too soon for that (if the writers plan to let Wukong die at all... it would be actually interesting to see some angst when Mk literally replaces Wukong as the new Monkey King). I guess he will hide somewhere to recover and I wish he would meet Macaque halfway. They really have things to talk about. I'd like to watch the whole ep with only them talking/fighting. the fact they both have different views on what happened between them, and we don't know either what happened or what they think about it, it's just thrilling and intriguing.

Also, I'm a big fan of a theory that Wukong has kinda complex bc he hurt Mei and disappointed his successor. He's kinda still in the "punishments&praises plus self-interest" level of morality (it's a child level if you dunno what I mean), I think that's why he always runs away from consequences. He just doesn't believe in forgiveness and redemption (maybe that's why he did what he did to Macaque). So Wukong getting a bit obsessed to earn Mei and Mk forgiveness without even trying to directly apologize to them? I'm in that angst, baby

Also Macaque is finally free and nothing forces him to do anything. I'm super curious about his arc. He was my very first love in lmk, I can't hate him for anything, I just understand and feel this character too badly

Mk and the crew... I didn't watch the English translation of the scene when they talk about what they're gonna do now xd So no idea, are they looking for Mei? I don't know xd although I'm still waiting for Sandy's true potential reveal and Mk going apeshit

RED SON. YEAH.

Look, I was so hyped and I overanalyzed EVERYTHING about Red Son in season 3, my BFF read essays about him day and night for two weeks, and I'm not gonna write everything down right here right now, but LISTEN, there is no other way to explain what he's doing in this season, he got pretty attached to Mei, or at least to protagonist, but listen, hear me out omg

~ Red Son was wandering around the world with her dragon plushie, looking for Mei to help her with Samadhi ~

TRY TO READ IT AS A FRIEND'S INTENTIONS WHEN THEY ARE LITERALLY STILL STRANGERS

And however obsessed I sound, the truth is, Mei's arc is really expanded right now, she went through a lot of trauma, she holds a lot of pain, she was betrayed and used, she's not a sunny smiley sweet girl sidekick with sick dragon powers anymore. She's not someone who's gonna tease or joke with the only person who can help her with the mess she's forced to live with.

And Red Son on the other hand had his quite long now story of redemption, he's completely into supporting protagonists, even against his parents, even despite the fact protagonists literally used him, punched him, stole and wrecked his car right after he saved them and let them eat, drink and sleep in his house. We still don't know why is he doing all of this, completely selflessly and quite desperately tbh.

So whatever relation between these two will be, it visibly can't be slick and simple like their teasing-competing relationship from Spider Queen ep. They both have complex arcs now, it's hard to write their training plot as a 'buddies bonding time' thing or sth like that. They both know how serious is the situation, so their bond after 4 will be really deep and strong

Or the writers will make fun of them or put a lot of drama, I'll be mad if they make fun of my poor traumatized Mei and my selfless gold-hearted Red hero

i WISH we'll see some dragonfruit, but there is no love plot in lmk so far, and I know other cartoons directed by Sarah Harper (for example Glitch Tech), and she's not really into "let them kiss'' stuff XD however, I love her for the absolutely brilliantly created man-woman best friends tropes. Mk & Mei relationship is so purely natural friendship arc! So whatever she's up to with Red Son and Mei, I trust her it's gonna be good

Thank you so much for giving me an excuse to scream about my favorite animation. I'm always ready to write an essay about anything about this brilliant cartoon

#lmk season 4 predictions #lmk #red son lmk #lmk mk #lmk mei #lego monkie kid #lmk wukong #lmk s3 spoilers #lmk season 3 #lmk sun wukong #lmk macaque #i was maybe a bit too happy about this question xd #it felt like i waited for opportunity like that to talk more about monkie kid xd #well thank you so much for asking #im sorry i wrote an essay #it will happen again #monkie kid #monkie kid red son #monkie kid mei #dragonfruitshipping #well i wish i hve more to tell about macaque about there is more waiting than knowing about him #im crazy after s3 im just going crazy cause they left me speechless #tbh before season 3 i would never say that dragonfruit has a chance to be a canon thing i was so sure i ship sth almost impossible #but well i also thought the same about inkypagesshipping and here we are #i absolutely love everything about s3 and yeah im kind of loving angst person and this seson was genius i want mooorrrrreeeeee #ask #answered

[hamphobicbasil]

different anon, as someone who technically is still a dsmp fan (although at this point i consider myself more a fan of some specific streamers who happen to be on the smp, and haven't watched a dsmp storyline stream since january), everything you said makes complete and total sense. i don't fully agree with every point made, but i agree with most of them, and honestly that -- combined with. y'know. actual person dream being revealed to be... Like That -- are probably main reasons behind my growing disinterest in the server itself. i still really like some of the creators, but. the story's degradation combined with some of the creators i don't like getting steadily worse... i really don't care about the server anymore.

but as someone who has kept up with the more current stuff, i can just say that. basically everyone is cheating off of wilbur's storyline homework in some way or another. quackity's current thing with las nevadas is being regarded as him "drawing parallels" between him and wilbur's character arc, and with wilbur being revived it's being seen as him being a character foil -- i do not think these people know what a narrative foil is, because it's not just a carbon copy -- but in all honesty he's just doing pogtopia wilbur v2. the egg arc has been "resolved" technically, but it less got resolved and more just petered out and died pathetically after a genuinely really good stream (red banquet) where they set up interesting things. it's just. done now.

techno seems to be incapable of allowing his character to develop whatsoever. he never lets his character suffer, never lets him hurt, and even outside of the monotone acting his character never loses anything. he's invincible and that doesn't seem set to change. even now, when he got tricked into being trapped in the prison, he made it clear that his character isn't even remotely bothered by this. does he have a plan to escape? maybe, although if he does it's gonna read as a shoddy deus ex machina because he didn't set anything up aside from "press this button and i teleport out." did he know he was being trapped? it's not clear, he might've known or he might've been just incredibly stupid. it's boring. he's less a character and more a brick wall with a rocket launcher.

and i feel bad for tommy The Person, because he's clearly gotten stuck in a bit of a content mentality. he got a big reaction from his character suffering in pogtopia, so he did the exile arc. the exile arc got a big reaction, so he did more similar things. it feels like he's gotten stuck in the mindset of "the fans like angst, so i need to continue to just endlessly torment my character with no purpose or goal." his "death" had even LESS permanence than wilbur's, because he got full on revived two days later just so his character could be traumatized some more.

the server is somehow simultaneously too ironclad in its story (not leaving room for others to jump in with ideas like a rp should, such as eret wanting to return in the pogtopia arc, or the egg plot being just ignored) and way too open ended (no clear rules or laws, lack of communication between people -- the "villain" team on the january doomsday showed up a whole 30 minutes earlier than the scheduled time without telling anyone, seemingly because "war isn't fair." those streams are an absolute disaster.) it's a little disappointing because some of the people involved are clearly talented; wilbur is a decent writer, although clearly more suited to a dungeons and dragons DM type of medium, many of the streamers are pretty good actors and not horrible writers / could be better with practice, and some of the newcomers, like ranboo, clearly have experience with roleplay character-driven storytelling and are very good when they're actually given the chance to do things. the whole thing is really disappointing, all in all.

sorry for rambling so much. tl;dr, you're absolutely right, it's disappointing as hell.

sORRY for not replying to this sooner- i read it earlier and completely forgot to respond

added a read more just in case this was a bit too long!

BUT UR ABSOLUTELY RIGHT ON ALL OF THIS- and speaking of "drawing parallels" with characters, i feel like its become a MAJOR crutch for the writers lately. its not only in universe with c!tubbo being compared to c!schlatt or c!quackity being compared to c!wilbur, it extends to myths too. i find the whole c!tommy = Theseus thing and whenever techno starts writing to be sorta a "get out of jail free card" yknow? they don't actually have to write their own plots or characters, just mimic that from myths and legends and i dont think it gels well with wilbur's somewhat original plot [i understand it was just minecraft hamilton, but it had some charming stuff in there yknow?]

and god yes you put my problems with c!techno into words beyond his voice acting, i don't want to imply that he's written his character to be invincible [or the olden term, a "gary sue"] but god it certainly comes off that way. i get so confused when i see people say "oh c!techno has been hurt over and over again!! why are things so terrible for him?" when he got "betrayed" once and that's it, its just so stupid and i cant understand the love for his character

and speaking of tommy, i totally agree. i dont mean to speculate on the kid's mental health since that's mega weirdchamp but combined with the constant angst his character is in plus his recent bad run ins with twitter, i hope he's doing okay. and on a side note, i hope his character gets to have the happy ending he deserves because man. Man.

BUT I HAD NO IDEA ABT THE EGG ARC KINDA BEING WRAPPED UP?? thats so disappointing oh my god. i'll read into it more since im curious about how it ended but god the fact that it sounds like it didnt have a bigger ending is just. wow. the annoying green man villain with no real motives and less of a stage presence gets all this hype and a bigger "ending" [yknow, him being sent to jail] than the eldritch creature that was growing throughout the smp?? wack.

i think one of the bigger problems of the dsmp story is just that. wilbur introduced some basic ideas and basic world stuff and instead of expanding on it gradually in a satisfying way, the new writers just went ham and didn't know what made the original so enjoyable, even tho it was, again, minecraft hamilton. i've seen some people claim that the new writers are better at precise intense moments but i heavily disagree with that, but thats probably because a lot of them involve dream yelling for his acting and i cant take that man seriously even in character.

but yeah, youre absolutely right on everything you've said here. they basically went "hey can i copy your homework?" with wilbur and somehow made things worse

#txt #dsmp crit #dsmp critical

[lesserfandomappreciation]

📝 i love hearing about other writer wips!

Yay! Thanks! I have too many WIPS that I am struggling to begin but I’m having a hoot outlining them. 1. Egyxos 3 years later!

Summary: Leo is now a teenager in high school, trying to balance out student life, being an older brother, a social life and being part of the Golden Army in another world. However, things go sideways when one of his teachers is attacked by Anubi wielding a mysterious ancient artifact from a civilization long forgotten. Leo and his allies must race to find the source of Exaton’s new power, as well as unlock the secrets from a civilization long lost to time. And why was Anubi targeting his teacher in the first place?

Egyxos is one of my favorite shows in terms of world-building but I HATED how few arcs there were in terms of character growth! There’s so much potential there and it’s under utilized, so I decided to do a fast-forward in time to after the events in the show. It’s a chance to put the characters through new circumstances as well as expand on the world-building because there are so many questions the show never answered. 

One thing I wished the show had done was give Leo a human ally from Earth. Leo is a kid who is suddenly having to not only deal with the stresses of human life but also being a hero in an entirely different dimension with world-ending consequences. That’s a lot for any kid. Not having anyone on Earth to open up to who can relate to the Earth-side perspective he has would have been hard on him. So I made an OC for him to open up and to step up for him because what do you mean ‘he has to always be available for every problem in Egyxos?’ What do you mean ‘12 years old is a great age to start having to fight in a literal war?”

(TBH I’m super hyped for her to interact with the rest of the cast simply because having a responsible adult confront them on some of their non-sense would be delightful.)

Aaaaaand because I like to make things hard on myself, I decided to re-write some of the characters to better fit into the world, flesh out their backstory or some combination of the two. Leo for example having grown up a bit has a slightly different personality shaped from his experiences, including the fact he struggles to really open up to others. At the same time I reimagined him because why is any descendant of any pharoah white, so that was fun to do. 

Outlining wise I’m actually at 25,000 words of backstory development, arc planning and character personality writing, plus research for the other ancient civilization I want to add in. It’s going to be a bit before I’m really done with the outline, simply because every time I finish one part, it gives me 6 ideas for other arcs. 

2. Red Shoes and the 7 Dwarves OC

I have like 2-3 ocs for Red Shoes, one of them having been re-worked for another WIP I’m having fun with, but basically they’re possible love interests for the rest of the cast of Red Shows besides Merlin and Snow.

Thumbelina as the name implies is the tiny little lady from the story Thumbelina. I found out through a bit of research that originally in the credits after the movie it was going to be Thumbelina, not little Red Riding Hood, who was going to be Arthur’s love interest but in the end I wound up making her Kio’s love interest. She’s not as developed as the other oc I mentioned, but she’s been fun to flesh out. 

What’s been really fun is figuring out what type of personality she’d have after the events in the story because holy smokes does Thumbelina go through the ringer. She literally got kidnapped, nearly forcibly married to a frog, forced to be a bug’s friend before she was ditched, dressed up and then ditched again, almost forced to marry a mole against her will because she was guilt-tripped by a mouse who had saved her, saved by a bird she saved only to be betrayed at the last second by said bird who could have flown her home and instead flies her to the fairy prince who forcibly marries her. Yes the story implies she marries the Prince by choice, but considering what fairies typically do to people who don’t agree with them, I can’t imagine Thumbelina would be thrilled at the idea. Especially since her repeatedly stated goal is to go home to her mother. 

Personality-wise she’s a bright little lady who understandably has severe trust issues around strangers given her incredible streak of bad luck in the past. Her experiences have made her be more observant of her surroundings and quick-minded so as to escape any situation. Plus, because she’s survived so long in the wilds at her diminutive height she’s very knowledgeable about the woods and how to really thrive in a tough situation.  

The other oc is Yvonne the Hunter. There’s a lot of hunters in fairytales to work with so I thought it would be fun for there to be one hell of a good hunter who is not actively trying to be part of fairytales but it keeps falling that way. Also I’m a sucker for a badass female hunter who can kick ass without any hesitation. 

Yvonne is the eldest of 4 kids in a very poor family in the woods. To help support her much younger siblings Yvonne became a hunter, taking on deadly kills and bounties for deep wood beasts that haunted the surrounding mountains. With the added in cash flow she was able to better support her siblings once her parents died, wanting to provide them a good life. 

Currently she has taken on the hunt of a life-time; a dragon attacking the northern lands repeatedly, but completely untrackable. The reward? A king’s favor. Any favor from a king, completely impossible for him to refuse. It’s a chance Yvonne could not pass up (for more than one reason). 

I fluctuated between Arthur and Jack for her and I’m still undecided, because 

a) I’m a sucker for a stern badass and a himbo starting off as rivals and becoming attached.

b) I’m a sucker for a pretty boy falling for a feral hunter. 

so it’s going to be a while before Yvonne or Thumbelina’s stories will be written, though I do have some outlines for them. 

3. The many requests from this inbox!

I’m always working on an ask for this blog, so there’s a lot of WIPs at the moment. 

4. Grace and Alexander

Summary: Lorcia. The country with an army unlike any other. At it’s northern mountain border the empire of Marvansk looms - ever-eager to take the southern fertile lands to feed its expanding population. For centuries they have been at a deadlock, unable to start war without plummeting the entirety of the continent into decades of combat. Grace Tenorio, the head of the legendary Black Brigade, has grown under these circumstances. Never has there been a day where the Lorcian military woman was able to discount the lethal presence of the northern bully. When air pirates raids increase at the the Northern border and invitations from the north to discuss collaboration arrive, she must escort the Foreign Minister deep into enemy territory to find the root of the recent attacks.  Alexander Volkov - the merchant turned leader of the finest pirate hunters the empire has to offer - is a man who seeks redemption for a crime not his own. When a brilliant battle axe of a woman arrives from the south seeking out to hunt the worst of all threats, the two will have to make alliances with an enemy of the opposing land to take down a threat larger than either could have ever assumed. 

I’ve been working on this one for years now. A steampunk adventure/romance with plenty of intrigue, ass-kicking, enemies to lovers, pining, and badassery all around. I try to write a bit of it every now and again with mixed results. It’s more of a personal project than a fandom WIP but who knows? Maybe someday I’ll get it out there. 

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero

I guess I should provide my hottt takes on the new DBS movie.  A few days ago, they did this video for Comic Con announcing the title of the movie and teasing some details about the story.  

I gotta say, this is exactly why I’ve never had any interest in Comic Con.    They put this on YouTube, I guess because of the pandemic, but any other year they would have gathered an enormous crowd and made them stand in line for hours to watch all of this in person.   I live in the Midwest, and when I went to comic book conventions it was for the sole purpose of rummaging through back issue bins.   SDCC was always promoted like the biggest and most important convention in the U.S., but all I ever heard about it were trailers for movies and TV shows.   Or, like, you had to go to Comic Con because that was the only way to get an exclusive Orange Lantern Hal Jordan action figure or something.   They would always hype up all of this useless stuff and I just never heard of anything so important that I was willing to fly out to San Diego and stand in line for three hours for it.   So now SDCC peels back the curtain with this video, about something I’m fairly interested in, but it’s really not that big a deal.  I found out most of the information on Twitter before I even knew to watch this video.

But I’m just not that hyped about trailers or sneak peaks or sneak peaks at trailers.   Which is probably why I waited this long to talk about it.  

I’ll just go through the video.   The first four minutes are Hironobu Kageyama performing “Cha La HEAD Cha La” live on the stage.   That’s a pretty epic way to open this, but I feel like it oversells the importance of this event.  You finish watching him and you think you’re about to see the movie itself, instead of hearing from the people who made it.  

Next we have Sascha, the host of this panel.   He speaks better English than I do, but I’m not sure what the point was in having any of this in English since he has to talk to the guests in Japanese.   Pretty much all of the important information in this video is in Japanese, and I think everyone understood that going in.   I guess it does give an international feel.  If I spoke another language as fluently as Sascha, I’d want to show it off too.

4:56 is where Masako Nozawa comes out, and she’s just a joy to watch.   She looks like this sweet grandmotherly figure, all warm smiles and then she busts out “Ossu! Ora Goku!” and immediately sounds like a badass. 

Guest #2 is Akio Iyoku, Toriyama’s editor.   Not to be confused with the awesome editor who poo-pooed all the androids and Cell’s semiperfect form.    That was Yu Kondo.  Iyoku comes out dressed like Goku, but he can’t talk like him so he’s immediately second-tier. 

Guest #3 is Norohiro Hayashida, Producer from Toei Anaimation.   He is also rocking the Goku cosplay, which would be a faux pas in most fandoms, but he can just say that he’s cosplaying as Krillin or Yamcha, which gives him greater nerd credibility because those are more obscure references.

Around 8:30 we really start getting into this, and they show us a model sheet of Piccolo.  Is Piccolo being in the new movie a big surprise?   He had a dry spell in the mid-90s, but he’s been in every Dragon Ball movie made in this century so far.   And it’s not like they changed his look, like when they put Goku and Vegeta in those adorable coats last time.   I’m not complaining about any of this.  It’s nice to see that a) Piccolo is confirmed for new movie and b) they didn’t tinker with his appearance.  

All I’m saying is that they only brought up this model sheet to show off how they’re using his color scheme from the manga as opposed to the anime.   Hence the red belt and the yellower arm sections.   In the anime, the belt was always blue, and his biceps were hot pink instead of off-yellow.   But it’s such a subtle thing that even Sascha didn’t pick up on it.   It’s like they were hyping up the fact that it’s such a minor change.    I like it, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a weird flex.   Also, he looks like he still has his five-fingered anime hands, so I’m not that impressed.   Give us four fingers, Toei!

Sascha asks Masako Nozawa what she thinks about Piccolo and she just starts off with “He was Gohan’s teacher,” and talks about how strong and cool he looks.    She speaks of him like he’s a family member, because she’s awesome.

Next up, we have Pan, and now we’re talking.  The scuttlebutt is that this was the character Toriyama was referring to when he spoke of an “unexpected character”.  And I guess Pan fits the bill, since I don’t think anyone expected her to be this old in the movie.   I understand this is her kindergarten uniform, so she’d have to be about five or six years old.  I love Masako Nozawa’s reaction here.   Throughout this video, you can see that Goku and Gohan aren’t just roles to her.   

I’ll put on my fanboy hat here and point out that Pan’s age may imply that this movie takes place after the final episode of Dragon Ball Z.    She looks older here than she did when she fought Wild Tiger, at any rate.   So far, the entire Dragon Ball Super franchise has been set during the ten-year gap between the Buu crisis and the finale of Z.    So everyone has been wondering if DBS would move beyond End of Z, or whether Akira Toriyama even still recognizes the continuity of those final chapters.   They were supposed to be ten years of peace, but all the battles in DBS say otherwise.   Also, I’m pretty sure Pan and Bulla’s ages in the DBZ finale don’t line up well with their appearances in Super, but I’ve never studied it very closely.  

So this might be set post End of Z, or this might be Toriyama retconning End of Z altogether.  I’m interested to see which way this goes. 

Here’s Krillin, still working for the police, although his uniform looks more like Bronze Age Lex Luthor than anything else. Like Piccolo, the “big” story here is that he’s been tweaked to resemble the coloring in the manga, so his sclera are now white instead of fleshtoned.  

Never mind that, here’s Piccolo’s house.  This is probably the breakout star of this video, because I think everybody is excited to see Piccolo’s house.   Because it’s new lore!  No one even knew if he had one or not.   It was a running gag in DBZ Abridged that he was homeless.   I mean, congratulations to Krillin for getting his eyes colored in right, but that doesn’t tell me anything new about the character.  But Piccolo’s house is a big friggin’ deal.   What’s inside of there?  What’s on the second floor?   Check out his mailbox.   What kind of mail does he get?  It’s exciting.  

Nozawa even points out that she and her co-workers would talk about this sort of thing in the recording studio.    That’s a big deal to me, that the voice actors think about the same kind of stuff that I do as a fan.   

Around 15:30, they start talking about Toriyama’s commitment to the making of this movie, which seems like a weird thing to focus on, because he wrote the screenplay to the last two movies.   Did anyone think he was stepping back? I get the impression that there’s still some hard feelings about the failure of Dragon Ball Evolution, in the sense that they want to reassure everyone that we’re still in good hands.   I suppose one of these days, Toriyama won’t be as heavily involved in a project like this, so maybe it makes sense for Toei and Shueisha to make it clear that today is not that day.

On the other hand, Toriyama was just as involved with Broly as he was with Resurrection F, and Broly was a much better film.  The Dragon Ball Super manga seems to have revived the old argument over who’s to blame when the story is a letdown, and I think that misses the point.  Look, the Zamasu arc sucked, and I don’t care who wrote what parts, or whether Toriyama had a bad idea or whether he handed a good idea off that was badly executed.   They can hash that out behind the scenes if they want to.  

About 19 minutes in, they show us this model sheet, and refuse to explain who these guys are or what they’re doing in the movie.   Are they villains?  Who knows?  I’d like to think they’re important characters to the story, but I have my doubts that Krillin will have a big part to play.  

At 20 minutes, they announce the title of the movie, and I’m not very thrilled with “Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero.” They can talk it up as much as they want, and maybe the title is relevant to the plot, but it’s just too many uses of the word “super”.   Especially when they’ve got another series called “Super Dragon Ball Heroes” on YouTube. 

Then we get this teaser trailer, or whatever you want to call it, with a CG Goku hopping around and doing his classic fighting pose.  Now, for some reason, lots of people concluded that this means the entire movie will be done in this CG style, which has led to a debate over whether or not that’s a good thing.  If they can make the whole movie look this slick, then I’m fine with it.  Hell, I’m not picky.   They could animate the whole thing in Yukio Ebisawa style, and I’d be thrilled. 

But I’m not understanding where people got the idea that it’s definitely going to be a 100% CGI movie.   They never spell that out in this video, and they even go out of their way to admit that this shot of Goku isn’t actually from the movie.   So is there some other source people are referring to, or did everyone just jump to conclusions?  

And that’s pretty much it.   I don’t mean to sound negative on this panel, but I don’t feel like they revealed very much, unless this is actually going to turn out to be Piccolo and Pan having an adventure by themselves.    I think Toei could make a movie like that and it would be a success, but I have my doubts that they’d go in that direction.  If this is going to turn out to be another big slugfest with Vegeta, then I’m down for that too, but don’t show me Piccolo’s house if the movie’s going to be about Vegeta punching a guy. 

Bottom line: I’m still looking forward to this, but I don’t feel like I know much more about the movie than I did before.   Well, except for the part about Piccolo’s house.  I’m looking forward to seeing the inside of it.

#dragon ball #dragon ball super super heroes #piccolo #pan #krillin #goku

[shy-magpie]

RQG 154

Wherein red stringing occurs. Liveblog under the cut:

 Not much hype this week, just a lot of being quietly thrilled RSB got the beginning of the episode dedicated to us. I hope the rest of the fandom doesn't feel like Bryn plays favorites. Its sweet he back reads and answers questions but its nothing he wouldn't do in official. Last week was such a gift that I think it cut down on hype for this week because even if (Alex forbid) they immediately time skipped to the end of the week, quarantine still got us amazing backstory and character moments. Unless Alex gets truly desperate and has someone attack the inn or infects both the new kids, the characters are safe from physical danger so no fear hype either.

Yes I want follow up on that Hamid & Zolf conversation: I am so proud of him for calling Zolf out on being patronizing (I can't believe I didn't see earlier with his family, of course that's the aspect that got to him) and they need to figure out how to deal with the chain of command. Zolf already seems more willing to get input on his decisions so its mostly losing the attitude when things happen like Hamid casting lights. Yes I also want Cel to talk about themself more, but I am fine with waiting until they aren't locked up with no privacy. Azu's backstory is coming out at a decent pace and Helen spoils us so not even worried about not hearing more about her becoming a paladin. I am curious if Alex thinks its worth bonding with the new kids and this better not be a set up for splitting the party. So enough pre episode babbling, final bets on if they play with the brorb now or wait until they can take it to Cel's? Gotta love that music. Oh they do want to get back to things! Listen to how fast they're talking. That's nice I wouldn't have thought they'd be as excited about the pure RP backstory and character bits as they get about a boss fight. No Alex neither players nor fans want to skip anything. I will concede that further conversation was unlikely to be productive that night so the morning makes sense. There was only one corridor! Barnes is still using the stairs to get some space. Some might see it as a sign he is infected or afraid of infection but honestly not wanting to puppy pile with a group as tight knit as the party especially while they are shaking out their issues is valid. Azu checks on Carter who passed out drunk face down. Zolf is sleeping in. With Hamid's family issues, Bryn being so careful to specify he has a healthy relationship with alcohol every time makes it a lot easier to not tense up listening. Oh My God thanks Bryn! I know he said the beginning of the episode was dedicated to us but I was expecting a throw away line not a proper red stringing scene! I am grinning so big right now. Azu is watching Hamid Cel is sleeping curled up with the sealed bottle of elvish mead. Because Lydia is as much a criminal as Bryn just plays a longer game. Speaking of criminal, Ben really plays up this rivalry from Azu & Zolf covering similar roles and its a really close second to the rank thing between him & Hamid in character arcs I'm interested in. I think both are aiming towards a happy ending but no idea how the middle is going to play out. I don't think it's aiming for a "this party isn't big enough for two of us". Alex is encouraging this. This is great just going to get a clip of this rather than attempt to transcribe on first listen. Bryn/Hamid is laying this out so clearly: The knowns, assumed, and questions are being labeled nicely. (I wonder if our little discord helped him refresh his memory so he'd be able to match how much Hamid would remember in character.) Bryn also goes 3rd person? Hope it isn't a stress tell like Alex. Yes Bryn is obsessed and as a listener its is utterly charming when he shows up in RSB or Official and is unabashedly as big a fan of the show as us. Zolf wakes up to Hamid red stringing. Thank goodness he isn't letting security concerns lead him to putting the brakes on. I know there was some concern that if one of them was infected sharing they could pass on anything they talk about. As long as they don't get too specific about classified info, using the time and frankly just having a project to distract them is a good idea. Plus in my mind Hamid always looks so hurt when Zolf pulls on the reigns. Lilliana is not allowed to be the connecting thread. Oh seed is finally being addressed. Aw Hamid handed Cel a glass of water. It really is the little things I love about this show: 1)told you he has a knack for leadership: anticipating the needs of team members even as they diverge from his own 2)He does see Cel as a team member not just someone he worked with, you don't hear him cooing over Carter 3)does it quickly then moves on, because as a gentleman he thinks it's what anyone would do. 4)speaking of, I wonder that Azu & Zolf haven't done rounds. its not like they have anything to save the spells for and the field is only in the cell.

Svalbard! Do not taunt us, does Ben have any idea how much we want to see the science dwarves of the north? Um hmm, vindi-fing-cation. I know it wasn't exactly a huge insight but the mixture of science and various schools of magic is key to my theory on what “Erasing The Line” refers to. Oh Frankenstein in this world is such a concept. Plus it makes Mary Shelley canon. Aw Alex thought we'd never get to this bit of lore. Thank you Blue Veins info being given as whole instead of bits & pieces.  Ooh and Barnes is taking it. Time to get a sense of who he is when he's not swinging a sword. Navel engagement with Blue Veins? Hive mind! Minimize harm? Not dead. Paladins are complicated, maybe a rumor, maybe transfer of allegiance. Cyborg kraken Cyborg Zolf Oh splitting the kraken to make more Barnes just checks out as the conversation goes over his head Called it I told you it was a sensible test. (ETA Zolf’s fart test) (ETA: Re: people with Blue Veins) No lies, no embarrassment, very literal. Other instances? Riots London->Paris->Europe Not safe to go to London If you're in their presence you are highly likely to be infected, mass infections,  not passed by corpses? Memetic effect? Tick tock. Ben and Alex have one of their friendly tussles as Carter decides its a me may Yes he did! And Helen name dropped us! I know I'm just a little part of the brigade but I'm going to to be smug for at least a week that we are so good at what we do one of the actual players looked to us. Hey Lydia is welcome too. Paperwork time! Yeah yeah I knew security was going to be used to undermine Hamid. At least it isn't Zolf and they aren't trying to make him look rash for the whole idea. Getting new info from the paperwork is a bit different than talking about what they already know. Make the place bigger? Nice spell Zolf. If this leads to Animorphs again... Oh I was thinking more like a big horde somewhere you could check stone in & out of a stone plane of existence ties in with elemental lore right? Seriously "Cure Hangover" isn't a spell? Or do Zolf & Azu just not approve of using their magic that way? Intoxicants have to fall under mild poisoning, right? Do the studying later in the week? That's a fair compromise; even if Zolf is still presenting it as an order he is explaining instead of giving his advice or IDK putting it to a vote. I'm not positive but I think Lydia is suggesting they go over their character sheets in character. Alex is not amused. Lydia sounds pleased with herself. Perception check? Azu hears someone knocking something over upstairs. Azu tries to not wake Carter as she listens at the door. It had to be her foot in his mouth. Multiple people in the inn. Carter tries to pick the lock. Azu & Carter start bickering. Carter is perception penalty. The inn is being searched Zolf suggests they wake Wilde up by making a racket. Cel hears the door being unlocked. Voices speaking muffled Japanese. Cel just shouts "Hey what's going on?". Zolf joins in. Azu uses her armor to make noise. Thump of someone hitting the floor! Wilde's voice! Lots of feet? Yes Helen, what if it is the kobolds? Oh god what if Skraak checked on them and found out they were in cages underground? Poor guy would think Wilde is their Shoin. Bryn clarifies Hamid shouts out to Wilde Zolf forbids them leaving the basement Cel shields themself. Azu goes for her armor Barnes is keeping Carter from going for the lock again. Hamid casts Fear (!oh that’s a new one isn't it) I assume #jail is already full of angst criminals connecting Hamid's bully days and him going from S1!Hamid scared of every fight to now casting fear as a way to control his enemies). Also these better be his enemies because I still don't put it past Alex to set us up for a tragic misunderstanding. Dragon roar and dragon face is how he casts fear Ok Rusty Quill LOTR night sounds awesome Zolf helps Azu put on her armor The other feet flee Zolf cries out for Wilde as loud as he physically can but still won't let them risk infecting Japan by leaving quarantine early. Oh if that ain't a fic and a half. A set of small claws! It is a kobold End the episode with the kobolds?  

#Rusty Quill Gaming #RQG Spoilers #live blog thingy #RQG 154 #RQG season 4 #long post

[murfeelee]

Alright, I’ve been talking about The Witcher TV show for months and months, and now I’ve FINALLY seen it.

I've skimmed through the books here and there, but really I’m a diehard fan of the video games, particularly The Witcher 3 (I’ve played TW1 and TW2 as well). Because of all the hype, attention and love the TW3 got over the years, with even Henry Cavill being a major fan of the video games, Netflix went and made this tv show, with Cavill as Geralt of Rivia, The Witcher.

MY THOUGHTS

It was GOOD! \(^0^)/ I really liked it!

Alright, don’t get excited, I think this show had some serious problems. But we’ll start with the good before getting to the bad and the ugly.

THE GOOD

THE ACTING

Everyone was top notch, and did a fantastic job. I freaking LOVE Grandma Calanthe, omg. I wanted more of her, and Mama Tissaia, and the different sorceresses (when Sodden started I was like hooo boy, I know how this goes; the finale is WORTH the price of admission, folks).

I even liked Eclipse-Princess (her name escapes me, my bad; I was calling her Arya 2.0 in my head). Don’t think I effing missed how they threw in a nod to the Eclipse Princess from Blood & Wine; that was awesome, featuring the Black Sun “curse” again.

I already knew I was gonna HAVE to tune in to see Yennefer’s story, and it was every bit as superb as I suspected it would be. Dare I say it was THE most interesting story arc of the three? Caught me tearing up a few times. I still don’t see book/game/Polish Yennefer with her, but she did a GREAT job, nonetheless--her emotions and delivery and everything was excellent.

She sounds so dang young though, which throws me off with the timeline, cuz when exactly does Yenn’s story take place in all of this? It’s hard to match her with the more...well....matronly/mature persona we’re more familiar with in the games. But I guess she develops that over time, after getting to raise Ciri. Though this does put in better perspective why she was so mean to Ciri at first, calling her ugly and everything. She wanted a child so badly, and Geralt just...gets one by surprise, and she was feeling bitter, I see it now.

THE ACTION

And I gotta give it to Cavill. Boy can MOVE. My favorite moments with Cavill were when he was sword fighting; whoever choreographed all that needs a frikkin award. I imagined the Butcher of Blaviken just tearing up mofos, and that’s exactly what we got. And he was WERKING them pants! XD

Except we never really saw my favorite sign, Igni. Oh well. And I hate that he doesn’t have cat eyes. And the Toxicity ISTG makes him look like a vampire and makes no effing sense, but whatevs.

And sometimes he was sounding WAY too Batman or demonic with this really deep and gravelly voice -- I appreciate that he was trying to give us that gruff and sandpaper dry video game Geralt, but when they’d make him yell or be mad I was like JFC NOT TODAY SATAN. But an attempt was made, and I appreciate it. ^_^ He was fine for the most part. More than fine, even. As I said, the acting & action was great, and they played to Cavill’s strengths.

THE SPECIAL EFFECTS

I also thought the CGI was fine--not the best, no, but I’ve seen way worse in shows with bigger budgets. The dragons...eh.... And that kikimore.... Well, I’m just remembering the Polish tv show, the Hexer--BIG improvement. Trust me. O_O The practical effects were excellent. Even though they messed around A LOT with the Striga plot from TW1, and what it looked like, I did like that they stayed pretty faithful to the fight. 

THE STORIES & CHARACTERS

IMO, the best episode was E04, with Pavetta & Duny. It was just REALLY well done, and the one I was LEAST expecting. My favorite episode was E06, with the dragon, because of course. Reminded me of Hercules the Legendary Journeys, IDKY. The finale was really good, too; I love the sorceresses and all the magic. And E07 when all the plots and flashbacks come together was great.

And now for MY COMPLAINTS

THE BAD

#1) OMG WTF WAS UP WITH THE TIMELINE?

I feel BAD for anyone who’s watching this show fresh, who’s never played the games, read the books, seen the Polish Hexer tv show, played Gwent, or anything related to the Witcher world.

I was thrown off several times, as they shot from Ciri running for her life or Geralt fighting a Striga in the present time; to Yennefer learning magic in the past. Geralt & Dandelion go on adventures Shrek & Donkey style--I ASSUMED in the present, with the Sylvan, Djinn & Dragon, until an episode or two later they’re in Cintra together in the PAST, and Ciri’s not even born yet, and we’re seeing a drunk Ermion/Mousesack and young Crach an Craite (I squeed, my dad~!! His accent was on point!), and Ciri’s mom and grandma. (And WOW, the lady they got to play the mom looks just like the actress playing Ciri--are they related?)

And they do this over and over again over the episodes--present day with Ciri, eff knows when with Geralt or Yennefer. Especially since you know from the books/games that they’re both almost 100 years old. Yenn keeps throwing out “it’s been decades“ this and “years” that. But W H E N though!?!

I mean, I could follow along, sure, but they REALLY needed to make it clearer SOONER for people who have NO idea who TF these people or which kingdoms are which, that some things are happening YEARS apart from each other. Pay attention to how many times GoT shoved those maps of Westeros and Essos in our faces. Or how different shows use color filters for flashbacks or something. Properly situate the audience in time AND space--we’re not Cirilla, who can travel willy nilly between both. They bounced back and forward between past and present with the toss of a frikkin coin.

And speaking of coins...

#2) THE MUSIC WAS...Well.

Oh, Dandelion. XD

Anyone who knows me knows I fangirl HARD over the Witcher video game OSTs. And unfortunately, the music on the tv show was just...alright. :\ And for a franchise so closely connected to iconic music like the band Percival, it’s a crime against nature that the tv show never had a single track that made me go YES. Give it up for POLAND. The end credits song is okay, but I only started getting into it at like Episode 6, soooo... :\

And no, I didn’t like Toss A Coin to Your Witcher in this show. It didn’t sound like part of this medievalesque universe AT ALL, but something kinda pop/country, aimed at I don’t even know who. Sure, the dude playing Dandelion can sing. But so can Ed Sheeran, and when GoT got him to sing on the show, he sure AF didn’t bust out with the next Billboard Top 40 on us in the middle of nowhere.

#3) THE CHARACTER BONDING?

The acting was top notch...it was the plot/writing I didn’t like. Or rather, the relationships between the characters. I felt more for Yennefer & Istredd, and Geralt & Roach, and Ciri & the Elf boy (and her grandma), and even Pavetta & effing Duny/Emhyr (that royal piece of sh!te) than I did for any other characters on this whole show. And that’s a bit of a problem.

First off, I HATED how they made it seem that TEENAGED Ciri had no idea who TF Geralt was. TV Ciri’s gotta be what? 15? Geralt said something about it having been 12 years since Pavetta & Duny, but even that’s too old. Book!Ciri met Geralt IN the Brokilon or whatever forest with all the water drinking and the dryad queen and mess.

They were already obsessed with each other before the fall of Cintra even happened! Ciri was like 10 already when Geralt took Ciri to Kaer Morhen to start her Witcher training, but this girl on the show’s way older, and effing clueless. They don’t even meet til the final few SECONDS, wtf!! It’s just Destiny~! Destiny~! Child of Surprise, but we never even have a scene together~! Destiny~!

Speaking of children, we have Yennefer and Geralt, which was better, but again, WOAH with the pacing. I felt effing BAD for Istredd! :( I don’t really GET why Geralt & Yenn fell so hard for each other; I don’t really feel that connection. Geralt had just as much bonding time with that eclipse-princess! They only had the Djinn episode, really, and by the end of the Dragon episode it was already over!

I mean, yeah, in the books/game they have A LOT of ups and downs, but come on; we’ve already wasted so much time on Geralt & Triss (that homewrecking wench, I’m glad her airtime was minimal), and I just want more BAMF battle couple parents Geralt & Yenn raising Ciri already! >_<

Same with Geralt & Dandelion. Geralt’s kinda mean to him, which is fair; Geralt hates everyone. But I don’t feel where they’re friends at all, and they part at the end of the season on NOT great terms. I kinda feel Geralt doesn’t really like Dandelion at all. :( Even with the whole comedic relief Shrek schtick,

THE UGLY

#4) THE LENGTH

I dunno what’s up with all the 8 episode miniseries lately (GoT, Mandalorian, Witcher, etc), but it REALLY isn’t enough to really flesh out a story. Especially not one as convoluted as The Witcher, AKA the GoT of Poland.

Again, I REALLY feel for the casuals watching, who probably don’t know what the Conjunction of Spheres Istredd keeps referring to is, or what exactly a Witcher is, or why Ciri’s so dang special -- was Lara Dorren or the Elder Blood ever even MENTIONED???

We know Yenn’s got elf blood, but it’s waaaay more than that with Ciri -- though I don’t think they mentioned her elf blood, either, just that Calanthe’s grandmother or someone had their Banshee powers before Pavetta & Ciri.

BTW, wtf with Ermion/Mousesack? That’s gotta be a red herring or something. Cuz we know this dude’s old AF and thriving in Skellige, sooo....? TF. Why the Doppler? Why?

TBH this felt like Season 1A, if anything. I don’t feel the plot really progressed much at all, other than us getting Yennefer’s story. Ciri & Geralt finally meet (cliffhanger supreme right there), but jfc this felt like a prequel -- so much of the season was dedicated to backtracking us in a roundabout way up to the fall of Cintra, then skipping ahead to the Battle at Sodden Hill.

And why the heck did they wait so long to get to get to Vigelfortz!? That’s what I was sitting here WAITING for! You mean I gotta wait for Season TWO to see my Hanse in full force!? :( URGH. Reeeeeeeegiiiiiiiis~! :(

Maybe cut out some of the unnecessary nudity every frikkin where and tell the full frikkin story, hmm? (Yenn’s boobs look great, we got it the first 5 times. Meanwhile these cowards won’t even have a dude’s left testicle be shown on screen, but whatever.)

So yeah, those are my 4 biggest complaints.

Well, and that wig’s hard AF hair line, jfc.(I was DYING during the Pavetta & Duny scene, when Cavill was holding on to that wig for dear life. XD XD)

Otherwise, I really liked the show! B+!

#nonsims #non-sims #the witcher #the witcher 3

[sparda3g]

Kimetsu no Yaiba Chapter 184 Review

The heated battle between Yushiro and Muzan has come to an end. The victory goes to the Slayers for they have brought Muzan to the surface. All they have to do now is to keep him around and kill time for the sun to rise. All of which are far easier said than done. No matter where they are, the danger remains red alert.

The last chapter was really intense in many ways. Although the main battle is not over, it was a huge sigh of relief with Yushiro practically won the struggle. It’s definitely good news, but the bad news is the location. Tanjiro realizes they are in the middle of the city. Their intention was to relocate closer to their base. I don’t know how much this would affect the Pillars aside of reinforcements being left behind, but hopefully no citizen will come out to complicate things.

To add more troubling news, Kiriya is informed that the dawn will arrive in one and a half hours. I hope they have an amazing movie to distract Muzan. Imagine implying Dragon Ball time logic; that would be a nightmare. Not to mention, it will be 10 volumes long. But seriously, that’s pretty damn long. At least the Pillars are fine, so that’s a relief. Funny that Kanroji was the only one feeling the pain from the crash. The element of surprise with other characters are still intact. All they have to do is to continue holding Muzan down. God speed.

With plenty of troubling news, Muzan in rage mode tops them all; the worst case scenario. Destroying the construction with ease is enough to believe the Pillars are entering “prepare to die” mode. This feels like a video game scenario. You have the final boss breaking free like nothing, about to unleash multiple strikes for the Pillars, and the only way to win is time limit. Basically, this is straight-up hell.

Once again, the action is unnerving with the intensity rising with each page. It’s pretty cool for the action to increase from two Breathing Form attacks to three with Giyu, Iguro, and Kanroji going at it. Sadly, Muzan is fast as hell for them to pull it off, so they resort to evasive maneuver. That’s still impressive enough. Amazing that Giyu is willing to fight with a broken sword. That’s hardcore; whatever it takes. If fast reaction isn’t terrifying enough, try regeneration for shock value.

Iguro makes contact with his sword to Muzan’s neck. Even though he knows Muzan won’t lose from it, it’s better than nothing. Plus, breaking him apart will slow him down significantly. That would have been a great idea if his regeneration wasn’t fast as hell. His neck recovers immediately after it was cut. That’s insane. You basically have to cut him at light-speed. That or at least find a way to slow down his regeneration speed.

It makes me wonder how the hell they can kill time when they may be the one to be killed instead. In fact, the next moment has all Pillars except Tanjiro get really close to Muzan in which gives him the best chance to kill them with his spears. I don’t know if Croc-sensei is testing the fans or not, but placing Kanroji on panel before revealing the outcome, implying her end is here is not cool. It aches me to believe the worst outcome. What happens next however was unexpected; at least to me.

It resulted with reinforcements of Slayers saving the Pillars from their immediate death, but in return, sacrifice their lives. It’s quite mind-blowing for many reasons. One is the double-page spread. I thought it’s well-implemented to create a gasping moment; it sure had me doing so. Second is the use of these characters. I mentioned in my last chapter’s review on how Croc-sensei utilized fodders in a surprisingly good meaningful way. This one is far more apparent than the small detail from before. Lastly, I was left amazed by their action.

The fodder is treated as a hype buff for the next challenger. In this case, however, it’s different. We know the capability of Muzan. We don’t need a hype buff. What we didn’t think we need is the showmanship that grasped our attention to honor their bravery. On top of that, their motivation makes it better. They’re not taking action to steal the Pillars’ spotlight with arrogance or believe they can win for themselves. They’re willing to die to protect Pillars because it’s their way to pay tribute to them. That’s strikingly admirable. Rarely, fodders are treated more than simple sacrifices; I actually felt their action. I believe it’s safe to say, these fodders are the best fodders in Weekly Shounen Jump today.

Tanjiro and others react to their sacrifices, which help out the effect. It would have hurt otherwise. I thought Tanjiro being protected was a great small moment that perfectly described the emotional weight from all grounds. This is not what everyone wanted, but it’s the only way to advance. That’s true terror. Tanjiro gets back to action, but suddenly stops and spits out blood. At first, I thought he tripped due to exhaustion or low on stamina. It wouldn’t explain the blood part, but that’s how it looked like. But the truth is far worse than I expected.

Tanjiro begins to suffocate horribly and his face, notably the damaged eye area, swells up. It actually left me feeling uncomfortable. It turns out Muzan has injected his attacks with his own blood, but not to change them into demons, rather infected them. Tanjiro was caught last time, which makes sense on why only him and not Pillars. It destroys the cells and eventually, lead the victim to death. In short, Tanjiro is a goner. Well, that’s one way to ensure this series won’t have another arc.

In all seriousness, I don’t think he’s going to die here. However, it doesn’t take away the shock value. It’s quite unsettling; it had fans horrified. If you can make them believe a possible death, you know you won their attention. As of now, I’m pondering where this leads to. Will Tanjiro miraculously escape death with lineage connection? Will Nezuko appear to save him? Will Tanjiro become a demon instead? There’s so many possibilities. The cliffhanger has me aching for the answer.

This was a really engaging chapter. Although the Pillars are on surface, nothing has decreased the danger level; maintaining the sheer intensity level. Arguably, it has gotten worse. The action was unnerving. The use of fodders was incredible in its own right. The artwork is clean. The cliffhanger left me completely interested yet scared for what comes next for Tanjiro. It’s possible for an asspull to occur; don’t know if this is the time for one. I doubt he will die. But if he does, life will never be the same again.

#kimetsu no yaiba #demon slayer #chapter 184 #review #spoilers

[neverwatchedonepiece]

623-624: "Time for Tearful Goodbyes! Departure from Punk Hazard!" and "G5 Destroyed! Doflamingo's Raid!"

DOFLAMINGO, YOUR BLOOD PRESSURE, PLEASE. D:

Those veins will blow any second! 

You need to relax. Subscribe to Headspace. Take a yoga class. Kill some innocent Marines--- oh...

Oda has knocked it out of the park yet again. Now Doflamingo has entered the game, the implications of the wider criminal network of New World pirates has come to the fore. This, of course, means Law’s plan to take down Kaidou is not only super ambitious but also fraught with peril.

Considering I go on and on about peril like a broken record, this is a good thing.

And sorry about that last mini hiatus, by the way. Blame it on full rewrites and Resident Evil 2.

“Watcha thinkin’ bout, Luffy?”  “Chikkin.”

“And thus the Strawhat crew spent some time intoxicated during their celebrations.”

Eloquently summed up by the Narrator, I feel. xD  Totally love how the Strawhats can switch from party mode to sober and ready to sail within minutes. Guess that’s part of the pirate job description. Things change on a whim out there in the New World. Sobering up fast is a vital survival skill.

There was a mini recap of the terms of Law’s alliance with Luffy. Smoker wanted to know what was going on. “There’s no way you believed I’d keep a promise to a pirate like you. If you really wanted to silence me, you had plenty of chances to kill me. What are you planning to use Strawhat for?”

At first I was like, what the hell, Smoker? Stop being arsey with all the Marines vs Pirates crap. You only escaped Punk Hazard alive because you teamed up with Law. Everyone’s on the same page right now. What happens on Punk Hazard stays on Punk Hazard. None of your men will rat on you for chatting to Law. Later, of course, I changed my opinion on this.

The recap of the Law/Luffy alliance chat revealed a bit more information about Kaidou. According to Law, Kaidou the Beast is known as the most powerful creature in the world. Creature, I think, being the operative word here because he might not actually be human?

One of those hype-building silhouette stills showed up, with Big Mom, Blackbeard, Kaidou, Shanks and Whitebeard. Couldn’t make out much of Kaidou, so I’m still none the wiser on the appearance front. Maybe he’ll be hairy, with that whole beast thing he’s got going on.

Back in the present, Law was characteristically cagey about the chat with Smoker. He told Smoker there was no real reason he let him live, but turned round and spilled that he was “planning on heading to Green Bit.”

I’m still confused about the Green Bit scene. Mainly because I have no clue where/what it is. Is is a code name for Dressrosa? Is it another island completely? Is it a town somewhere in the New World? Or is Law trying to throw Smoker off the scent because he doesn’t want his favourite smokey Marine to be endangered again?

Whatever the case, Law had some final business to attend to before waving goodbye to Punk Hazard. Caesar, Baby 5 and Buffalo were chained up in a corner and drew the filthiest looks when he walked over. (Well, Baby 5 and Buffalo did. Caesar was still unconscious.) They really are acting as if Law has betrayed them somehow.

Doflamingo also keeps calling Law a brat. Vergo was also riding the brat train hard. Can’t help but think Law was affiliated with Doflamingo when he was a kid. Maybe he resented it all these years and this is overdue payback.

We hate love hate love you JUST GO BEFORE WE CRY!

At the harbour, the Strawhats continued to be absolute diamonds. Apparently, Nami and Chopper refused to sail until they knew the kids would be okay. The good news is that Vegapunk himself offered to help cure the kids of Caesar’s meth candy! Wonder what Vegapunk is thinking right now. He used to work with Caesar. Probably, “Always knew that guy was an asshole.”

As Luffy couldn’t be bothered waiting for another Marine ship to arrive, he told Smoker to just take the SAD tanker and send the kids home on it. Good decision, given a feathery menace was approaching at speed.

The scene with the G5 pretending to hate the Strawhats - erecting a protective banner so the kids wouldn’t be able to thank the dirty, cheating pirates - made me mad at first. I thought, damn, was that ungrateful or what? The Strawhats were the reason they escaped Caesar’s lab with their lives. If the Strawhats hadn’t been there, they would be locked up in cells and the last thing they’d ever hear would be a hiss of gas and a soft, “Shurorororororororo....”

But when the foghorn blasted and the ship set sail, Oda revealed some of the G5 guys’ inner thoughts. Sanji lead them out. Zoro and Tashigi teamed up. Law and Smoker fought together. Usopp guided the Minions to safety. Chopper and Nami helped the kids. Then I saw the sweat drops and the oddly tight jawlines.

Yup. They were fronting.

When Tashigi called them out on their rudeness, they even admitted it. “But Tashigi-chan, if we don’t stop insulting them, we’ll end up actually liking these outlaws.”

Ha. It is way too late for that, G5. You love the Strawhats. No one can escape the roaring event horizon of their charm.

Luffy was totally oblivious to it all. He just laughed and, “What weird Marines.” I mean, come on, G5. Don’t you realise by now that Luffy does not do subtlety?

As they walked to the ship, Zoro suddenly realised Law was tagging along. Usopp whispered in his ear, “Oh yeah, you don’t know. Luffy’s making trouble again.” Poor Zoro. Always the last one to know. xD

A brief flashback of all the major moments in the arc finished it up nicely. Luffy taking that DDM distress call, the fiery dragon, finding Kinemon, discovering Caesar had been drugging innocent kids, Smiley, Luffy declaring he would “kick Caesar’s ass and kidnap him” (best), saving Mocha, Caesar gloating about how well connected and protected he was before the final grizzly magnum smacked him out of the action.

A standard, uplifting ending with dramatic fanfare and Luffy shouting, “SET SAIL!”

But not quite.

For Doflamingo drew nigh...

Law Didn’t Spend Seven Years In Med School To Be Called Traff

The scene when Law chatted to Doflamingo over DDM was probably my favourite across 623-624. It ramped up the stakes and reset the peril level to red alert. Only one might be tied with it.

Doflamingo bounded across the “sky path” (what is that?”) He bemoaned the fact it cut short. “You brats seem to have the devil’s luck.” He spied something floating on a raft below. He found Buffalo and Baby 5′s disembodied heads chained to it. He jumped down for a chat.

It was weird seeing Baby 5 and Buffalo so contrite. They kept declaring how ashamed they were. “I wanna apologise with my death. I was needed and couldn’t help,” etc. Doflamingo didn’t want to kill them. He needed answers.

What Doflamingo didn’t spy was a video DDM. Law’s voice spoke through it.

“What a surprise. I didn’t think the boss would come out himself.”

“Is that you, Law? Long time no see. Couldn’t you have stayed so I could talk to you in person?” At the point, Doflamingo was still supremely confident.

“If you’re looking for Caesar, he’s with me.”

To hammer home the point, Caesar’s wheedling voice cried, “JOKERRRRRR, PLEASE SAVE ME!” (Lol, oh Caesar.)

“Where are Baby 5 and Buffalo’s bodies?”

“That’s not what we’re talking about,” Law said, taking back control of the conversation. “Let’s make a deal.”

“Don’t try to be so tough,” Doflamingo laughed. “A brat shouldn’t try to act like an adult.” (There’s that calling Law a brat again. Plus, Doflamingo tried to take back control of the situation by ignoring Law and pressing his own agenda.) “Where are you right now? You shouldn’t anger me?”

“Anger? Your most important trading partner is Kaidou the Beast. You’re the one who shouldn’t anger him. What do you think would happen if he found out you couldn’t make SMILEs anymore? He’s not a man you can negotiate with. There would be a brutal battle. You would be killed.”

For the first time, the slasher smile was wiped off Doflamingo’s face. Forehead veins began to throb. That had obviously hit a nerve.

“You’re taking this joke too far, Law. What do I have to do for you to give back Caesar? What are your demands?”

And there it was. It definitely hit a nerve because Doflamingo has deigned to negotiate with the brat. Kaidou really must be something if he can intimidate Doflamingo. 

Law’s demand was kind of weird. It must mean something, but I have no idea what yet.

“Give up your Shichibukai post. Throw away everything you have gained these past ten years and return to being a normal pirate. Of course, if you do that, the Admirals will hunt you down. You have until tomorrow morning’s news. If I see you’ve retired from the Shichibukai, I’ll contact you again. If I see nothing, negotiations are over.”

I have no idea why Doflamingo *needs* the Shichibukai position so badly (other than being able to live on Dressrosa, I guess) but Law threatening to take it from him in exchange for Caesar made him M. A. D.

Multiple veins popped.

It was not pretty.

I guess Doflamingo is now on a deadline. Here’s hoping he does not catch up with the Strawhats before they reach Dressrosa. For that is their canon confirmed next destination! They are sailing to meet Doflamingo on his home turf. Foolhardy? Of course! It wouldn’t be the Strawhats otherwise, right?

Meanwhile... Back On Sunny

This was so funny. Chopper fixing up Caesar so he can beat him all over again. Even Sanji said, “What kind of doctor are you?” But Caesar, though. Imagine bitching and moaning, “Oweeee, it hurts!” when you gleefully killed tons of people without a flicker of remorse. You deserve it, Caesar. Suck it up and take the L.

Franky also told the story of how he retrieved Mini Merry Mark II eight times (Franky’s long, luscious hair in bunches was excellent, btw).

While Sunny descended a Sea Slope (dat Oda creativity again), the team gathered round to discuss The Plan.  Zoro, now aware the plan was to take down a Yonkou, was suddenly and enthusiastically on board. Luffy asked if anyone objected and Brook replied, “Does objecting do anything?” (Lol, Brook.)

Sanji reminded Law again with a whisper in his ear that Luffy’s idea of an alliance is different from his. I think this might mean something later, so I am recording every instance of this warning as it’s come up twice now.

Then Sanji called Caesar a weird sheep and smacked him when Caesar said, “You’re all fools. You think you’ll get away with this? You’ve landed yourselves on some major big shots’ wanted lists. I hope you realise your foolishness before you die.”

And Chopper was like, “Oi. No kicking until after I’m done treating him.” xD

Law updated the Strawhats on the situation. Most of the Big Name Pirates of the New World have turf on this sea. This has created a massive criminal syndicate. Everyone is linked with everyone else. The scale of operations is on a completely different scale than the Strawhats have been used to. Deals and trades are done in secret so the don’t attract Marine attention. Law also updated them on Doflamingo’s trading relationship with Kaidou.

I’m not sure but I get the feeling Law is enjoying the prospect of taking down Doflamingo even more than Kaidou. There is history between these two and I cannot wait to find out what it is.

Ahem...

And the scene that is tied with Law threatening Doflamingo over DDM?

Why it’s the scene when Aokiji Showed Up Out Of Nowhere To Kick Doflamingo’s Ass, of course!

While Smoker and his G5 guys stayed behind to rescue any petrified survivors (still a bit salty about that, but I’ll get over it), Doflamingo landed on Punk Hazard like a bomb going off. A single, loose pink feather falling to earth was all the warning they had. Then he hit them with Conqueror’s Haki.

The veins. Oh, the veins. Veins galore criss-crossed that forehead. I counted approximately twenty.

I thought, this guy is out for blood. But he had questions that needed answered first. Doflamingo is not a reckless guy.

“Are they all gone? The tanker’s not here, either. I believe a group of pirates were just here until a minute ago. Where did they go?”

Maybe if he hadn’t opened with Conqueror’s Haki, he would have got some answers. G5 resented the fact he’d attacked them. There was an attempt to fight Doflamingo. An attempt.

With a few twitches of his fingers, Doflamingo took control of their bodies.

“Law could be a problem but Strawhat is just a pirate. Where did you let them run off to?” He turned the G5 against each other, forced friendly-fire massacre style. His pointy shoe stomped a random G5′s chest. “ANSWER ME. What direction did those brats go?”

When the G5 couldn’t answer, they had outlived their usefulness. “Then die.”

Luckily, Smoker smoked into the fray and saved their asses. There was a brief stare off. Doflamingo had a Scary Shiny Glasses moment.

“Smoker, tell me where those brats are.”

This is when Smoker really came through for me. He knew Doflamingo was a corrupt betrayer of the Marines. He played dumb, but could not resist getting a jab in at Doflamingo.

“Who knows? I sure don’t, Joker. They must’ve slipped through our fingers. How can I explain this to our Base Commander, Vergo?”

Smoker made two mistakes. He revealed to Doflamingo that he knows his underworld nickname and hinted he was aware of Vergo’s true allegiance.

Doflamingo’s voice went eerily quiet (I like his VA). “He’s dead, right? It sounds like you know too much.” His hands twitched and he leapt at Smoker.

Does Doflamingo have telekinesis, or something like that? A power that lets him control the movement of others? I’m still not sure what it is. It looked great in the fight, though. Smoker kept getting cut by slashes out of nowhere.

Then, just as Doflamingo sat on Smoker, about to end his existence, a Presence drew up behind him.

“Oh, my. Sorry, little boy. Could you move, please? He’s my friend.”

Holy hype machine, Batman.

You could have knocked me down with a feather. Aokiji, fresh from quitting the Marines, is back in business!

Doflamingo is not having a good day. 

Usopp has become oddly genre-savvy.

#one piece #neverwatchedonepiece #nwop #never watched one piece #monkey d. luffy #trafalgar law #donquixote doflamingo #admiral aokiji #kaidou #caesar clown #roronoa zoro #sanji #usopp #nami #tony tony chopper #nico robin #franky #brook #vice admiral smoker #captain tashigi #vergo #baby 5 #buffalo #punk hazard #dressrosa

[kageyamarltsu]

ROTTMNT OCs

Okay first off, a bit of a preface: They’re a bit based off these guys from the 2003 tmnt

fyi tho, rottmnt is my first tmnt media, I actually never got into tmnt before then because it never really interested me (I only watched media with lots of girls when I was younger,) And while I do plan to watch the 2003 n 2012 ones eventually, I don’t know much about the other turtle universes ^^; sorry!

Next thing, I imagine them being sometime after the whole Shredder arc, and being like the turtles next main foe. They’re created by Baron Draxum of course, and they’re around the same age as the rest of the turtles. Major difference is that they’re essentially “””raised””” by Draxum-- not actually, as he doesn’t regard them as his children, and doesn’t give them names, they’re called by their numbers; he’s a bad parent. He treats them like soldiers, and since they only know that sort of lifestyle, they just go with it.

They all each mirror their respective turtle, in both personality and body type/character design shape.

Second preface: they are all girls.

‘Why?’ you may ask. Simple, I love girls, and you can’t go wrong with more girls in your show! Also, goes with them being raised soldiers and having higher and stricter standards held by Baron Draxum as a sort of metaphor for how girls are raised to higher standards at a young age and don’t get to act like teens as much. (Though one of the major plot points with them is them learning to act like teenagers and have fun, through both the turtle crew and April)

Now to finally introduce them.

#1 Mirrors: Leo

I’m imaging her more-so mirroring (from my little knowledge of) past iterations of Leo. Where she’s the oldest of her sisters, has a lot of responsibilities to uphold, and is the leader of her sisters. She’s the only one of her sisters who actually looks like a turtles (I’m still deciding if the others look somewhat similar to a turtle-- like with having shells-- or are completely different animals). I’m still deciding though if I want her to be a red-eared slider like Leon, or a different turtle breed from all the main boys entirely.

She’s considered Draxum’s favorite due to her being the envisioned soldier he wanted. She follows orders clearly and concisely, is one of the strongest of her sisters. Although Draxum expects her to be cutthroat, when she actually doesn’t like the idea of being murderous. She attacks hard and strong, but she doesn’t wanna kill anyone! She’s incredibly protective of her younger sisters, and would do anything to make sure they’re safe (even if they may not do the same for her)!

Also since she’s Draxum’s favorite, he let’s her use his like seed things he uses to to make those purple vines. She uses those similar to him, but mostly to make twin swords (another relation to Leo!), and she can combine them hilt-to-hilt to make one bigger sword that she can spin around n stuff. She can also use them to make other weapons or used for other purposes if she wants to, but she prefers the swords.

Doesn’t immediately bond with Leo at first, because she’s emo and angsty. But when she grows a bit, she joins in on memeing with him. She also likes puns, and makes them a lot too! (Even in the beginning)

#2 Mirrors: Donnie

Like science nerd baby Donatello, she’s the brains of her group. Major difference is while Donnie has his *Leo voice* Emotionless Passion™, #2 is passionately emotionless! She’s like feral and just always hyped about things, but has zero morals in an evil way. I know a lot of people like to poke at the idea of Donnie going to ~the dark side~ but I never think he would, he’s still a good boy at heart. #2 however has been raised to be evil, so...

She’s part chameleon, so she has cloaking abilities, and makes tech to work with it. She probably has similar tech to Donnie, but instead her main weapon would be like a naginata (that can change and stuff like the tech-bo).

She’s Draxum’s next favorite, because she makes him new weapons.

She likes to hang out with Donnie a lot, and actually does even when their both enemies, and the exchange ideas and designs for new tech. For the ~~~science~~~ Thing is she’ll sometimes suggest something that’s even a bit too much for him.

#3 Mirrors: Mikey

She’s similar to Mikey where she’s really cute and (appears to be) the smallest of the four. However, since she’s actually a middle child, and not the youngest, so she’s a bit more feral compared to Mikey, as well as more deadly! She’s quite free-spirited, and is able to be since Draxum cares more about the older two.

She’s part poisonous frog! Thinking something like either the harlequin poison frog or the golden poison dart frog black legged dart frog! She crouches a lot, so she looks like shes the shortest, but when she actually stands up tall, she’s the tallest and is really lanky. She’s still got a mostly circle character shape to her though.

Her main weapon is her skin being deadly to touch, so she fights mostly with her fists. She may get an actual weapon, but I’m still thinking it through (I’m thinking something with a long chain to mirror Mikey's weapon, pfft). She can jump really high and far like a frog, as well as, crawl on walls and maybe ceilings idk how frogs work very well. She’s quite deadly and fast when she wants to be.

Both her and Mikey like art! They have funsies, and Donnie n #2 both eventually make some sort of tech where her skin isn't as super poisonous anymore, and her n Mikey can play more.

#4 Mirrors: Raph

She’s baby! She’s super big and hulking like Raph, but she’s the youngest of them, so instead of being the type to lunge in headfirst and think later like Raph, she’s a bit more level-headed because she has lower expectations with Draxum focusing on mostly #1 and #2. She’s similar to Raph in being a big softie, and incredibly lovable of course!

I’m not still finalized on her species yet, but She’s part komodo dragon! Quite big and deadly if she wants to be (but she never really does, she mostly would only be so when following orders). She has a large tail that she can use to sweep at enemies.

And similar again to Raph, her main weapon are her brawns. Thinking something similar to brass knuckles or blades coming from her hands (I don’t know a lot about ninja/shinobi weapons, but I do know they have stuff like that).

Her big sisters are very much protective of her. Mostly emotionally, not physically, because they know she can defend herself.

Her and Raph both like plushies, talking about their siblings, and training with each other to hone their own abilities/strengths!

Major character development with them, is spending time with April and learning teenager things (probably eventually getting phones through her help), she also gives them names (I personally headcanon April gave the turtle boys their names, considering Splinter tends to call them by their colors), and while #1 is the first to initially protest it--  with the others being on board with it-- she eventually gives into it, and it helps all four of them become more of their own selves. I haven’t decided what names yet, because I don’t know a lot of Renaissance artists, sorry ^^; this is also why I refer to them by their numbers in the entire post too...

Another scenario is they kidnap Leon and Donnie, #1 and #2 go disguised as them (because #1 looks most similar to Leon, and #2 has a similar body type to Donnie, and just has to add a few things and use her cloaking to look like him), and they use this to infiltrate the turtle lair. There, #2 tries to survey everything, and studies a lot of Donnie's things. #1 has a heart to heart with Mikey over her self-esteem/high expectations issues. (She also becomes protective, like over her sisters, over Mikey because of this).

Another scenario that can really be a part of anything, is a situation where they have the turtles down, and Draxum wants #1 to finish them off. While the others are whatever about it--possibly #2 n #3 excited about it (mostly because they don’t have as much of a good sense of morality yet, except for maybe #4)-- #1 is very hesitant about it, and eventually tries to sneakily let them go. Leo's the first of the turtles to catch on that she let them go and that the Draxum soldiers are likely not pure evil or unredeemable; which eventually leads to wanting to help them escape Draxum.

They also eventually do become friends/siblings with the turtles, and either Draxum becomes a good dad or they ditch him. Though this is more-so an end-of-arc situation where then they’d might eventually leave NY and go somewhere else to fight evil yokai, and like sometimes visit the turtles and April for funsies.

#rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #tmnt #tmnt2018 #i will NOT put any of this under a readmore #you WILL read all my thoughts #cen's ramblings #also sorry to anyone whos a hardcore tmnt fan on anything i may have gotten wrong regarding canon in both rottmnt n other tmnt universes #also big love to anyone who likes my ocs!! #also (like a lot of things regarding them) colors for them arent final either #just general idea of it all so far #also colors could be kinda messed up bc my computer displays colors dif from my phone so uhh #feel free to message me about my ocs #i would love to hear anyone n everyones thoughts *grabby hands*

[sophie-turner-fan]

The Female Stars Of Game Of Thrones Tell Vogue What To Expect From Season 8

In leafy Dulwich, south London, four stars from Game of Thrones convene in a Georgian house for Vogue. With the sky outside a washed-out grey, the jewel-like colours of their Balenciaga and Givenchy gowns are almost obscenely bright. In the fictional world of Westeros, a mighty gathering such as this would be a prelude to war. After all, these women play four of the strongest characters on the blockbuster HBO series that helped revitalise the TV landscape, launched a thousand water-cooler conversations, won 47 Emmys and turned a generation of British talent, including this foursome, into bankable global stars.

If Game of Thrones proves anything, it’s that it requires full commitment – to gore, intricate plotting and gargantuan world-building – to craft a cultural phenomenon. Same-day viewers quadrupled since the first season, in 2011; cross-platform numbers for the seventh season averaged 30.6 million viewers per episode – more than the populations of Greece and Belgium combined; and for seven consecutive years it was the world’s most pirated TV show. Fans breathlessly pore over every last detail that emerges from the notoriously tight-lipped set, right down to the size of the green screens being used or the choice of crown deployed for each character. The series has dispelled the idea that fantasy is solely for male dweebs. It’s no understatement to say that the forthcoming eighth season – the show’s final six instalments – is the most exciting TV comeback of the year.

Lena Headey, 45, who plays merciless Queen Cersei, arrives first on set in a shaggy faux fur-trimmed Acne coat – a post-Christmas gift to herself, she tells me. Gwendoline Christie, whose 6ft 3in frame led to her casting as noble warrior Brienne, appears in a necklace and dressing gown. “There she is! The lady of the day!” Headey cries. Christie, 40, puts on her best fashion-assistant voice: “When you’re ready,” she demurs, as if about to usher Headey on set. They burst into laughter.

The atmosphere is less Red Wedding massacre, more congenial college reunion. The actors have been working together for almost a decade. Thrones is a “big chunk of my existence”, Christie says. Or, as Headey has it even more directly, it’s been long enough for “two children and a divorce”.

Williams and Turner were only 12 and 13 when they were cast respectively as sisters Arya and Sansa Stark, the former a tomboy turned assassin, the latter the brat who matured into the queenly Lady Stark of Winterfell. Their lives have changed in real life, too, of course. Filming aside, Turner is engaged to the musician Joe Jonas, while Williams has launched Daisie, a social networking platform for creatives. “The older ones of us always go, ‘Look, it’s f**king killed us!’” Headey laughs. “Then you watch Maisie, who arrived as a baby, and Soph, who are now these incredible women. It’s just bonkers.”

It’s easy to forget this TV goliath was once a risky proposition. Game of Thrones arrived in 2011, a decidedly unmagical time in entertainment. The Lord of the Rings trilogy had been and gone; the Harry Potter films had just wrapped. Critics turned up their noses at the idea of a fantasy series that combined CGI dragons with Tarantino-style violence and West Wing-level political machinations. “None of us knew,” Headey says. “You do your audition, you get a job and then you think, ‘Will anyone watch this?’”

But they did. After a slow-burning first season, executive producers David Benioff and Dan Weiss set the ratings on fire when they killed off their seeming central lead, Sean Bean’s ill-fated patriarch Ned Stark. Audiences were thrilled to know that nobody on the show was safe – a fact confirmed by subsequent deaths in their multitudes. Beloved characters have been poisoned, stabbed, blown up, eaten by dogs, shot with arrows, starved, beheaded and burnt at the stake. It makes for uniquely stressful viewing, with each instalment of the final season costing a staggering $15 million (episodes of Netflix’s big budget Stranger Things cost $8 million).

As the new season begins, Williams, Turner and Christie’s characters are hunkered down in Winterfell, the ancestral castle of the Stark clan. The army of the dead – led by terrifying supernatural warriors known as the White Walkers – are marching towards them. Further south, Cersei – newly pregnant by way of her long-term sexual relationship with her twin brother, Jaime – is plotting to wipe out the Starks and any other threat to her reign.

Understandably, there is a whiff of battle-hardened weariness to the group. The final season took 10 months to film, including a much-hyped fight scene that was shot outdoors for 55 nights before moving to a studio for further weeks. “All the training in the world couldn’t have prepared me for the amount of stamina you needed for these night shoots,” Williams says. “It gets to the point where it’s four o’clock in the morning and you’re looking around like, ‘This is ridiculous. What are we doing?’”

Such is the secrecy around the show that even the normally garrulous Christie clams up when asked about the battle: “There’s an increasing darkness in Westeros,” she says. Headey is more circumspect about the whole experience. “It’s long hours and hard work,” she says. Amid the exhaustion is pride and a palpable sense of mourning as the action comes to an end. Tears on last days on set were not uncommon. When the time came to shoot Turner’s final scene, she says, “I couldn’t control myself. I cried for hours and hours once it wrapped. It was like leaving behind a character that I’ve grown up with. It’s almost like a death.”

When Game of Thrones premiered, much was made of its no-holds-barred approach to female nudity, rape and violence. Turner’s character, Sansa, in particular, was put through the wringer – she was first betrothed to abusive boy king Joffrey Baratheon, then married off to psychopathic sadist Ramsay Bolton. Her rape at the hands of the latter, in particular, had viewers up in arms. “There are some people who make comments like, ‘It’s a misogynistic show because all these women are getting raped,’” she says passionately. “[But] most of the people coming out on top are women.” Williams agrees: “I’d say the key players this season are all female, which is why it’s so amazing we’re doing this shoot today.”

Thanks to seasons-long narrative arcs, female characters – sometimes given short shrift in cinema – are maturing and developing over time. Brienne, for one, has been a joy to watch. Playing the warrior with a heart of gold has left a deep impression on Christie. “I do see Brienne of Tarth as a modern day Joan of Arc,” she says. Will she consummate her romantic tension with Jaime or the strapping fighter Tormund? “What I will say is, I’m happy to see more of Brienne of Tarth the woman explored this season,” she teases.

Headey maintains that, along with Martin, it was always the producers’ plan to upend the patriarchy of Westeros. “That’s why they could shoulder all of the criticism – they knew what was coming and what they had in store for these women,” she says. Did she ever doubt them? There’s a flash of Cersei-like steel in her look. “No.” Headey would know: she’s had plenty of encounters with overbearing men, having spoken out about the bullying she endured on the set of The Brothers Grimm and a near-miss encounter with Harvey Weinstein (she escaped when the key card to his hotel room didn’t work). What would Cersei do to people like him? “Hotdogs for sale,” she says, smiling.

As a parting gift, each actor was given a storyboard of Weiss and Benioff’s favourite scenes – Headey got the “moment where Cersei sits on the throne and Jaime comes back and sees her”, she says; Turner took the liberty of taking her corset home. “Everyone else has something that runs with them throughout the show, like a sword,” she explains, laughing. “I didn’t have anything that stayed the same except for my corset.”

As for the wrap party? In keeping with the House of Stark’s famous motto, “Winter Is Coming”, HBO booked Snow Patrol to play for the cast and crew in Belfast; footage later uploaded to Twitter shows a tipsy crowd singing along to the show’s distinctive cello theme. “Goodbye, Belfast,” Williams posted on Instagram on the last day of shooting. “Goodbye, Arya. Goodbye, Game of Thrones. What a joy I’ve had.”

Well, not quite goodbye. HBO is already casting an as yet untitled Game of Thrones prequel, set thousands of years before the original, with Naomi Watts signing on to star as a mysterious charismatic socialite. And this isn’t the end for the women of Westeros. Already they’re appearing in each others’ projects – Headey has directed a music video starring Williams for the English singer-songwriter Freya Ridings – and sitting front row together at fashion weeks. Best of all, they even have their own group chat going. “It’s like this big WhatsApp group with David and Dan and all the cast in it,” Turner says. “It’s called ‘Game of Thrones Alumni’.”

“Actually,” she corrects herself, “we changed the name. It’s called ‘Mates’ now.”

See the full shoot in the April issue of Vogue, on newsstands now; the eighth and final season of Game of Thrones begins on April 15 on Sky Atlantic and Now TV. [Source]

The Female Stars Of Game Of Thrones Tell Vogue What To Expect From Season 8 was originally published on ♔ Sophie Turner Fan ♔

#Sophie Turner #sophie turner #game of thrones #got cast

[realfxntasy]

The decline of Game of thrones SPOILERS INNIT

So the show has finally came to an end, it took the world by storm with its twists and turns, the violence, intrigue, characters, worlds and winning the award of most genitalia shown on a TV screen. But the last season was unfortunately blasted with lots of heat, negative opinions rained fire on the show’s creators just as Dany did to all those innocent Kings Landings citizens. So where did the beginning of the end start for game of thrones? Let us take a look at thrones in its entirety and talk about what happened to the show we all once loved.

I absolutely loved the first six seasons, they were incredible, season one introduced us to a world of deep political intrigue, not your usual fantasy, this one was incredibly dark and realistic, realistic even when it had zombies and dragons, like a world that really could exist, because the show managed to capture so elegantly the motives of each character and why they acted as they did. Seasons two, three and four brought the same brilliant realism, intrigue and storytelling but upped the ante with some incredible spectacle, I remember watching the battle of kings landing for the first time, seeing the shot of wildfire explode and thinking this show was just something else, season three brought serious shock in terms of the red wedding and season four showed off the shows continuous ability for intense battle sequences mixed with great character development during the battle for the wall. The first four seasons for me are basically near perfect, I’m sure there are flaws here and there but none I can remember too well, they facilitate game of thrones as one of the greatest shows on television.

Season five is where things began to change a little for me, not greatly though, season five was still fantastic, the plot with the sons of harpy, the tensions on the wall, in Mereen and so forth but I felt the pacing did struggle at some points especially in Mereen and Kings Landing, luckily by the end of the season I felt things really begin to kick off as Dany had to fall to the whims of the slavers and re open the fighting pits, Cersei got in hot bother with the sons of the harpy and was arrested for her sins and who could forget Hardhome, it was amazing. However even though season five was still a high quality part of the thrones story it does to some degree begin to mark the beginning of the end as this was when things really began to deviate from the books, I hadn’t read the books the first time I saw season five so I wasn’t sure what I was missing out on, but my god, I’m up to date on the Song of Ice and Fire novels now and there is some difference, mainly where a certain place named Dorne is concerned, this is where most people’s complains about season five stem from, the whole Dorne arc seemed to be a little rushed and quite flimsy at points, but this was game of thrones, it had delivered so much, so why would we have been worried? Well I certainly wasn’t but looking back now this was where you can really put the show creators into question, they properly deviated from the books this time and it was up to them and their own creativity and it was the first time the show seemed to fall short a little, not that I hated the Dorne arc or anything but at the same time the frustration people feel comes from how good it was in the books I believe.

Season six, I really enjoyed season six, it was the point where the show seemed to really be moving on to its grand conclusion, Bran was having visions about Ned Stark and Lyanna and if you had seen any internet theory video on the fabled R + L = J then you knew what was coming, the hype was real, Jamie was facing off the Blackfish in a part now taken from the books, rather than his Dorne arc which the show writers created the season before and the change in quality here with a sequence from the book was more evident, the battle of the bastards gave us one of the most gut wrenching and intense battles not just on TV but really in any medium, straight out of a movie really, who could also forget Cersei’s glorious revenge against everyone who ever screwed her over when she blew up the Sept of Baelor and finally the season ended with Dany making her way to the seven kingdoms, season six for me was absolute quality and I think we were all pretty hyped for what was to come in season seven.

But then, all of a sudden, something was different. Season seven was when things began to truly go downhill; the show had veered off from the books fully now and it was up to the show’s creators to keep the quality up, season seven for me was poor for a number of reasons, the biggest flaw for me was how they had completely thrown away game of thrones’ realism, not in terms of fantasy, the white walkers and dragons are fine, but how it became a show where things happened for plot convenience and really badly at that, people were using teleportation all over the map by this point like the show was an MMO or something, beyond the wall was the perfect example of this, we see Jon, Tormund, the hound and the rest of the gang travelling north to capture a Wight, its cool to finally see so many beloved characters in one place but at the same time the whole thing feels messy, it looks like a hard and long trek and they send Gendry back to the wall when they’re in trouble because he’s ‘the fastest’, Gendry makes it back to the wall in record time and sends a raven off to Dany, the raven reaches her and she’s off to the north to fight the white walkers, meanwhile Jon and the gang are surrounded by hundreds of the dead, things felt so sped up by this point, there was no pacing, everything was going on at once. Another issue with season seven was to do with the death of intrigue and compelling writing, Kings Landing, where pretty much every scene from the show was riddled with genius dialogue and political stakes was now completely forgettable, not once in season seven or eight did you actually see a crowd of nobles watching the queen decide the fate of the realm, it was simply Cersei and her closest allies treating with Euron and not much else, I was really disappointed with how little interest seemed to be going on in Kings Landing, as for Winterfell, my god, I was furious with the treatment of one certain character, Arya, she was easily one of my favourite characters in the show until this point. The entire debacle for me was over how her relationship was handled with Sansa, they seemed to force some kind of split between the sisters for the sake of it and it just felt completely uncalled for, I get that sisters are like to argue but Arya was pointing out such strange things about Sansa, she was genuinely trying to do what was best for the people of Winterfell but Arya began accusing her of all sorts, of being power hungry, narcissistic and self-serving, I really just didn’t buy it, if they gave it more time and some more development of such an idea like Sansa really trying to uproot what Jon was doing as King in the north then I would have understood, but it really just seemed like the show creators were forcing a divide between the sisters so they could have an excuse to build tension, then have them reunite to kill Littlefinger, which to me was also a bit of disappointment, I think a lot of us didn’t expect Littlefinger to go out so easily, he seemed like he could have a plan for almost anything, if it did come to the point where he was put on trial for being more or less a giant snake wouldn’t he have something up his sleeve? like how maybe the Lords of the vale are under his rule, bound by law to serve their lord, when Robb Stark executed Lord Karstark the north lost all Karstark men, when Sansa executes Littlefinger the Vale just shrugs it off, meh, is basically their reaction, this is the vale which loyally served a lunatic of a women, everyone could see how much Lysa Arryn had lost her mind, but the laws are laws, people must follow their Lords and ladies, such is the nature of Westeros and its culture, or so we’d think, the men of the Vale allow their Lord Littlefinger to perish, Littlefinger being a supposed genius, wouldn’t he think something like, I don’t know, ‘I should probably make sure all the vale is loyal to me so they love me and protect me’ the man is always tactical and conniving, finally he is the Lord of an entire people and he doesn’t really use this to his advantage at all. The dynamic between Dany and Jon Snow was fairly interesting; Jon refuses to have the North bend the knee to the iron throne once more regardless of who is sitting on it, but he also needs Dany for the obsidian down in the Dragonstone mines, it’s a pretty interesting plot, yet still I found the dialogue wasn’t as conveying as the previous seasons where the words which came out of characters mouths were like music to my ears. It was in season seven I began to worry that the lack of episode count in the season really pushed the writers to hurry up and get this thing moving, therefore sacrificing a lot of the shows quality.

Let’s move on to the final season, game of thrones had a much needed years break it seemed to me, I was glad about this, I mean look how long it’s taking Georgie to write the next book Winds of Winter so by all means go ahead HBO and give the show some time to work on what it needs to, so the first episode aired and well, I was excited you know, they had a year off so things seemed to look up, but erm, well I wasn’t exactly super impressed by the opening scenes, one in particular, we’ve got Tyrion and Varys in a carriage, famed for their trading of incredible wit and knowledge, clearly the years have not been kind to Tyrion as all he can muster up in this scene is, “I have balls and you don’t” I know it’s not much but for me it really just set the tone of how dialogue would be handled this season. The next episode picked things up a little for me, there was more character development, Samwell is traumatized by the news of his father and tells Jon of his true heritage and Sansa is also none too happy about Dany and the power she now has over the North, it seemed like things were moving in the direction of some in-fighting, Sansa would maybe raise the north up against Dany, Jon would be highly conflicted on the matter and friends would have to turn on friends, classic game of thrones, I was thinking maybe they would end up destroying each other, and as the white walkers come they are decimated, too busy fighting politics the white walkers end up causing serious damage the living, thus the lesson is humanity could not hope to survive divided. Anyhow the white walkers invade in episode three, now this episode for the most part I found really enjoyable, the action was crazy, it was intense and the visuals were something else, scenes like the Dothraki swords being lit on fire got me all chuffed about how far the show had come and Arya being trapped in the library with a bunch of Wights was gut wrenching, however then comes the end of the episode, in a twist pretty much nobody was expecting, Arya kills the Night King, well damn, there it was, the apocalypse was over, it was very strange to say the least, no one expected it to happen, I was one of the people who was a little optimistic about the season still, I got it, so the Night King is beat and the final battle is for the iron throne, ok I guess it is all about the Iron throne at heart but still it did leave a strange taste in my mouth as the shows greatest enemy was defeated before the final episodes, it felt like whatever could happen now was just a little underwhelming compared to the fight against the dead, all this we heard about no wars mattering but the great war as Jon would say, but now it was over. In the next episode Dany declares optimistically that ‘the we have won the great war, now we will win the last war’ ok cool I get it, I’m thinking let’s see what the show has to offer from here, the party scene shows that everyone loves Jon Snow and that Dany is becoming very insecure about her ability to rule as everyone loves Jon and that he is also the rightful heir to the throne, this all seemed well and good to me, things were getting interesting, sure the dialogue still was off par compared to earlier seasons but I was still behind the program here, despite my fears, by this point a lot of people seemed to have lost faith in game of thrones, I understand this, the decline here was evident but I was kind of hopeful that despite the bad writing and entire rushed feel of the final season the ending would be satisfactory, therefore not taking away from the shows overall glory. As episode four continued some more questionable things began to happen, Rhaegon is straight up shot out of the sky with four straight bolts placed perfectly, it all happened in an instant, so fast I couldn’t really process it, Dany then goes into a rage and heads straight to Euron’s ships to toast them all, as at least a dozen more bolts are shot this time and Drogon is arguably in better range they all seem to miss? The plot armor is pretty strong here, never the less Dany retreats and Euron’s fleet destroys Dany’s. Oh and I almost forgot to mention, let’s take a pause from the episode and have a look at one certain character, Euron Greyjoy, if you haven’t read the books then I’ll explain things for you, Euron from the books is a straight up psychopath, his presence is felt in every page he’s in, the way he is portrayed in the books is brilliant, he’s extremely selfish, power hungry, savage yet also comes across intelligent in a horrifically manipulative way, he’s also very mysterious, the man came back from travelling all over the world, he’s seen things no one else in Westeros has but in the show, he’s pretty dull to be honest, he’s mad but in just a silly lunatic fashion more than anything else, I just don’t think anyone is that bothered about Euron in the show, he’s not a great character, I’m ok with things being different from the books, its fine, but Euron isn’t different to the book in an interesting way, he’s just a really bad version of the real Euron, this is illustrating my point further that the writers don’t seem to be handling things well if it’s not taken from the book, which is sad because in earlier seasons there’s scenes that aren’t in the books that are exclusively part of the show that are brilliant pieces of dialogue, every exchange between Littlefinger and Varys in the show is purely the show writers creation, ‘the chaos is a ladder’ scene isn’t in the books, and it is one of the shows definite high lights. Back to the main story, Dany makes it to Kings Landing and Cersei declares she will not be making peace any time soon, thus beheading a captured Missandei, ok so we all know what is coming, one final battle for Kings Landing. Episode five, some scenes in this episode are actually great, Tyrion setting Jaimie free and them having a brotherly bond hit me hard, visually everything was excellent and you truly felt right in the middle of the onslaught. Drogon absolutely rips through Euron’s fleet like butter, which was weird to me because the season set up how dangerous the scorpions (the giant dragon killing crossbow machines) were to dragons but apparently not, there’s plenty on the city walls and on Euron’s ships but Drogon evades all and destroys every one of them, finally he flies back to the front of the city and destroys the golden company who are meant to be pretty formidable but they completely disappoint, they just act as more cannon fodder really, also I was well salty that no elephants appeared, why even set that up just to tear down our expectations? Then the moment that shocked us all, the men of Kings Landing surrender despite Cersei’s commands, yet Dany decidedly burns the whole city anyway and murders plenty of innocents as part of her rage. So this is where pretty much 90% of the shows audience turns on the show, that’s not an exact statistic but it seems like a whole lot of people got furious here, I want to go in deep on Dany’s turn to full madness, some of it can be explained, she was insecure that the thing she has worked for so hard is now out of reach because she is not in fact the true heir despite believing that for most of her life, she’s lost two of her dragons and one of her closest advisers betrayed her via her lover revealing he is in fact the true heir, it’s tough we can definitely say that, but does it merit what the creators did with Dany, overall no I don’t think so, certain signs were indeed there, she nailed nobles of Mereen to crosses independent of their part in the slave trade and burned one of them to root out the sons of the harpies, from her slow decline you could see how Dany becomes less of savior to more of a lawful bad in serve of the greater good, she wants the best but she’ll be absolute in judgement to achieve it, however the slaughter we see in Kings Landing is chaotic evil, not lawful, it’s just utter madness, killing soldiers in an army is lawful and cannot be avoided, their all farmers and villagers when you think about it, enlisted into the ranks but in war killing them is virtually unavoidable, however I don’t think Dany could see murdering innocent children as unavoidable, the greater good always seemed in her best interest, serving the oppressed in society, here she murders everyone she claimed to once motivate her, her turn to madness is just, well, mad. Her character is completely butchered and not just her, Cersei’s ending I found to be pretty underwhelming, I felt the shows undoubtedly greatest villain should have gone out in a blaze of glory and madness, Cersei was truly mad, yet she gives up completely while Dany takes the spotlight of lunatic, it just doesn’t seem right, it feels completely rushed. Moving onto the final episode, I was hoping despite all that had happened this episode could make the ending still satisfying to a degree, everyone would have to fight Dany and restore order to the kingdom, again the visuals are stunning, the scene where Drogons wings fly over Dany and it looks like she’s half human half dragon was crazy good, I also loved how the throne room looked exactly the same as it did in season two when she had her vision of the red keep, but the action is over before it starts, with Jon killing Dany while she kisses him, it was certainly an anti-climax, what happens from here is by far the worst.

This is where I just wanted the show to end already, there are so many strange things going on in the finale, Grey worm decides to not kill Jon Snow despite already being shown as blood crazed and exclusively loyal to Dany, Grey worm has been in Westeros for maybe a year or less I’m not sure and at no point does he show any care for the other lords of the kingdom, only his queens law, as you’d expect, he’s from the other side of the world and it was Dany who saved him from slavery, he only came to Westeros to serve Dany, but for some reason he keeps both Tyrion and Jon alive and awaits the judgement of some nobles he barely knows or cares about, and what great judgement they all have. This was the biggest crime of all for me, Tyrion spouts some absolute garbage about stories uniting people, to one point I get it, everyone loves a good story about their ruler but really it just wasn’t a very convincing reason overall for me, and to choose Bran as the King of Westeros, what… the … f### ok so the reasoning for Bran to be king is that he, well, knows everything, but this isn’t even a good reason, a king must have heart, he must sympathise with his people and make a choice for the realm he believes is right, having an overpowered omniscient wizard as king is a terrible choice, Bran is so un-relatable, he can’t even connect to his siblings, telling Sansa how she looked beautiful during one of the most traumatising moments of her life and completely freaking her out for example in season seven, Bran also has zero experience ruling anything, he is literally the least suitable choice for king out of everyone sat there, just elect the Dornish geezer because he has a cool beard, that makes for a good story, Brans sister who has survived the Lannisters, Littlefinger and Ramsey Bolton and has also got experience ruling the north is just passed up for the magical tree wizard, I was happy Sansa ended up ruling the north but really did Tyrion not consider her for the throne? She even shows her commanding presence when she completely shuts down her uncle who tries to state why he should be king. Now what about the other characters, Jon gets sent back to the wall, what an unsatisfying character arc for the man rising above his constant mistreatment through childhood as the bastard, as the soldier on the wall, to lord commander, to king in the north, the ultimate underdog, oh then back to the wall, it’s just ridiculous and he doesn’t even seem bothered, neither do his siblings, then he goes off with the wildlings to I assume become king of the free folk which isn’t really explained but we just take it as it is, poor effort I think. The complete decline of smart decisions is shown off with the new small council, why is Bronn on the small council! This is completely baffling, I liked Bronn’s whole point of all Lords and houses beginning out as cut throats, Littlefinger started out from nothing but he’s a devious genius who worked his way up to the small council, Bronn is just there, chilling as the new master of coin literally nothing but a bloodthirsty mercenary, I mean who needs someone with actual knowledge of Westeros’ economy anyway? It was simply so we could see a familiar character we once liked be there for maybe an attempt of fan service or something, it’s strange the final season on one hand feels like a bad attempt of fan service but then also a bad attempt of completely subverting fan expectations.  

So, game of thrones, this is how I feel overall, it was my favourite tv show hands down, it was genius, the first four seasons are near perfect to me, I’d say the decline of this show is down to two main things, the deviation from the books, unfortunately the writers of the show don’t live up to George R.R Martins masterful way with words, the rushed nature, they only had two seasons to finish everything up, with less episodes too, we cannot fully blame the writers, I think in earlier seasons they demonstrated an ability to make great original content for the show, but with the added pressure of finishing the show in just two seasons and thirteen episodes this just put things in disarray, the mistreating of characters, bad dialogue, flimsy plot choices  and an unsatisfactory ending. However despite this I’d say we can still enjoy the good parts of this show, like any form of art, its subject to interpretation, nothing can be perfect and this is ok, I hope the writers of game of thrones take all criticism constructively and don’t get disheartened by the some of the monumental hate they’re getting, this is how art improves, through feedback, I don’t think game of thrones should be rewritten or anything like some are proposing, take it for what it is and enjoy the show for what it once was, a masterpiece and it’s not like there were not some enjoyable parts in the last season, the battle for Winterfell in episode three of season eight was genuinely incredible to me, and who’s to say if you loved the last two seasons you’re wrong, this is simply my opinion so by all means if you loved game of thrones all the way through, more power to you, don’t let others ruin your opinion, I think it’s important for us all to have our own opinion on shows and other forms of entertainment, this is mine, let me know yours! Thanks for reading, peace dudes : )

#gameofthrones #gameofthronesreview #got season 8 #tv review #fantasy #a song of ice and fire #d & d #george rr martin

[wowheadquarters]

Attack on Not-Theramore timelines

For @shatterstar1998. Alright, time to summon my inner bronze dragon Authormi, we are going to explore different timelines. That is, timelines in which Garrosh Fuck-up Hellscream decided to bomb someone else’s capital instead of Theramore by the end of the Cataclysm. Reactions, story arcs, what all changes in these different timelines?

Stormwind The fight here was actually pretty much similar to the one on Theramore Isle, with a few exceptions: Reinforcements (and also Alliance generals) were able to come to Stormwind much faster than to Theramore, there was no Jaina Proudmoore, nor Rhonin, but there was Sylvanas with her Plague Wagons. As result: Varian Wrynn and a handful of generals have died (a lot of them becoming Forsaken), plus countless soldiers and civilians. The Mage Quarter is now The Magic Crater, Anduin rules what is left of the city. The Alliance is officially in war with the Horde and the Mists of Pandaria are less about Pandas and more about the war.

Ironforge, Aerie Peak and Shadowforge Garrosh isn’t an exclusionist and when Nazgrim asked him “What Dwarf capital do we Attack?” he said “All of them.” Which proved itself to be a fatal mistake, because the forces weren’t focused in one place but three... And mostly underground where they weren’t used to fight. While Aerie Peak eventually got hit by the mana bomb and Ironforge is as of now full of lava, Shadowforge is actually clean of the Blackrock Orc, and now even the Bronzebeard and Wildhammer live in the Blackrock Mountain... which has become the main fortress and amory against the Horde. There is Mekkatorque inventing weapons like crazy. Pandaria has been discovered around the time of the Legion, while most of Azeroth was too focused on the Mecha Wars. Oh, and there are mana-gryphons now.

Darnassus You know that trick “Stuff Teldrassil with wisps full, so it blows up”? Garrosh didn’t know the trick. Also, there is no longer any Garrosh Hellscream, the Horde forces were reduced to 20 % of what it used to be. Baine and Vol’jin are dead too. There are exactly 10 wisps left in the world. Malfurion is also dead. The Veiled Sea is full of splinters. The Night Elves sprouted a new vengeance-seeking life-sucking death-bringing subrace called Lanadorei, the Mourning Elves which are not playable, but bear the worgen curse and oppose everyone and everybody, defeating them being yet another plot in Mists of Pandaria.

Gnomeregan Actually, nobody from the Alliance has really noticed or cared about this one. Gnomeregan is still in a bad shape, no matter how hard Mekkatorque works on it. All he did was leading the Horde forces into the irradiated zones, and that was it. Now we have a slightly radioactive Horde. Garrosh has been pun on a trial and consequently in a prison by Thrall, Pandaria went far more peacefully, Sylvanas’ Apotheracy now work with the Gnomes to find some large-scale de-radiationizer. Baine Bloodhoof is the new Warchief, everything is far more peaceful.

Exodar Y’know... Garrosh didn’t think this one entirely thorough. He got whacked by the Naaru, personally kicked in head by Velen, and also the Draenei have still a lot of feelings about the slaughter on Draenor, and while they are very peaceful race, that doesn’t mean they are necessarily forgiving and they want their vengeance. It was Garrosh who started the war, true, but it was Vindicator Maraad who continued in it. There wasn’t even any time to drop the mana bomb on Exodar, because Maraad ordered to drop a great deal of the blood red crystals on Orgrimmar and all over Durotar, turning the zone into Bloodmyst Wastes. It served also as a test-flight for Exodar after the repairs.

Gilneas At first Sylvanas was really hype for this one, but then it turned out that Garrosh wants the city destroyed. So Sylvanas and Genn did that spear-lending scene from the MoP cinematic and joined forces against the attack. Gilneas eventually got mana-bombed while Sylvanas was still inside. She was later rescued, but the rebellion against obviously treacherous Hellscream, was already started, and the Alliance helped. Siege of Orgrimmar happened. far earlier.

Orgrimmar This is instant treason, but the Horde can’t do much about it, can it? Almost everybody in any leading position is dead, such as Thrall, Vol’jin, Baine. Sylvanas and Lor’themar are on the other continent, they are fine and taking in refugees. Saurfang leads a war against Garrosh with whatever he has left of the Horde (it isn’t much). MoP goes pretty much as it went, except Garrosh is viewed from the very beginning as the evil guy we are fighting against.

Echo Isles Alright, I have said that if you bomb Gilneas, siege of Orgrimmar starts much earlier. If you bomb the Echo Isles, it starts instantly and it is... far more voodoo induced. And also Vol’jin comes to the conclusion that actually the Zandalari had a point, so it is actually trolls from all over the Azeroth taking over Orgrimmar. Pandaria has to wait, because we get a Troll expansion beforehead, named something like The Warlords of Azeroth. Also, Alliance Dark Trolls, I suppose.

Thunder Bluff See Orgrimmar, but there are minor changes. First one - Mulgore becomes an end-game zone and Thunder Bluff is a gigantic crater now. Taurens now start in the Thousand Needles. The Grimtotem are on Garrosh’s side, while all Centaurs have put aside their differences and joined the Tauren.

Undercity Well, another fight in the Undercity, can’t say we haven’t seen that one. The results are nearly the same as in Gilneas, with one quite an important difference - Koltira is rescued, and upon finding out what Sylvanas has done to him, the Ebon Blade temporarily (very, very temporarily) joins Garrosh Hellscream.

Silvermoon First of all, the capital of the Blood Elves becomes... Theramore! Second, there is a huge plot-deal with an arcane infuse spreading from the north thorough the Eastern Kingdom, as the bombed Sunwell decided to seep into the soil and contaminate everything. Plaguelands and Ghostalnds are full of undead arcane monsters and it’s seriously creepy. There is no Purge of Dalaran, instead Kirin Tor joins in against Hellscream in the very beginning, because Aethas Sunreaver gives those inert bastards some very good yelling. Kalecgos marries Jaina. MoP is mostly the same, because nobody gives a fuck about Blood Elves otherwise.

Bilgewater Port It doesn’t result in any kind of war and Garrosh achieves literally nothing. A new race of Gillblins is added. In this case Gillblins are a product of a rapid mutation of (mostly) Bilgewater Golbins hiding underwater at the time the mana bomb went off. Normal Golbins are still with the horde lead by Gallywix, Alliance Gillblins are lead by Her Finesse Milda (Finesse as in “fin-esse”), Horde Gillblins are lead by Gazlowe. MoP stays the same, but Azshara wents thorough yet another terraforming and is now again lvl 40-45 zone.

Torchkeep ...Let’s say the Golden Torch has arrived on Azeroth somewhat sooner, say around the Cataclysm at latest, and settled in Northrend. Upon Torchkeep being attacked by Garrosh’s army, Velen was all like “Hey, we are killing the demons now? Cool idea, let us help.” so Horde and Alliance cooperated here instead of fighting one another (although Garrosh meant to betray the Alliance and throw the bomb all the same). However, the Golden Torch booby trapped the place like crazy and set it on self-destruct mode, while they all boarded their Netherships and fucked off from Azeroth. MoP went pretty much the sam, though, except initially Horde and Alliance weren’t at war. Rhonin died in the Purge of Dalaran. Taedal’s awesome expansion has never happened and never will (not like it is any different from the current situation).

#World of Warcraft #WoW #Warcraft #This has been fun #alternative universe #alternative timelines #Attack on Theramore

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball Z 279

Never mind that shit!   Here comes Mongo Majin Buu!

This episode ruuuuuuuuuules.    No more Earth, no more kids, no more Dragon Balls, no more power-ups, no more asses to pull power-ups out of.    We’re down to just Goku, Vegeta, and Kid Buu, and they’ve got a big ol’ planet all to themselves to fight on.     Vegeta’s ready.   Look at this cocky sonovabitch.     He’s dressed in his finest blue ballet tights, got his opera gloves on, and he’s ready to smack a pink fool upside the head.  

Goku makes his serious face because it’s TUFF TIME and he doesn’t want any crappy side characters getting hurt in this epic battle.    Time for the Kais to leave.

Before they go, the Elder Kai insists that their planet will be able to withstand the awesome forces of this metal-as-fuck struggle.   That’s the spirit, old man.   

Big thumbs up from Goku before they leave.    Yeah, nice. 

Kibitoshin teleports Dende and the Elder Kai to this planet, which has a bunch of hollow logs lying around like park benches.    I like this planet a lot.  I don’t know why.   It just looks so... orderly, even though it seems to be deserted.    Almost like the hollow logs are part of the trees’ life cycle.    6000 years of being a tree, and then they pick themselves up, shed off part of their trunk, carefully arrange it to line up with the other trees, and then they wander off to die somewhere.    Or maybe the hollow logs are how they reproduce. 

Look, we don’t not know that the Elder Kai is fucking this log right now.   He’s not too sure about Goku and Vegeta’s chances, but if they won’t use the Potara earrings, maybe they’ll use the Fusion Dance instead.   

Then he sees them playing Rock-Paper-Scissors to see which one fights first, and he quickly loses all hope.

Kibitoshin’s probably like, there, you see?  This is what I’ve been putting up with this whole time, old man. 

Goku wins and he gets the first crack at Buu.  As he limbers up, he monologues about how he thinks he could have beaten the Fat Buu as a Super Saiyan 3, but he wanted the boys to do it instead, to prepare them for future conflicts.

But no one’s listening to him, so he looks like a jerk talking about this.   

Also, Buu fell asleep while they did all that pre-fight stuff.   So Goku looks pretty dissed right here.

And that’s the last damn straw.    Goku’s been dead for most of this arc, and all of his bold plans and grand strategies have failed, while this creep has destroyed everything he ever cared about.    Well you blew up the earth, you little shit, but you missed a spot, and it’s called Goku Town.

It’s about here that Kibitoshin realizes he forgot to take Mr. Satan and his dog along with them when they evacuated the planet.   Well, he’ll be okay.

When Buu finally wakes up, he starts beating his chest for no good reason, and Goku drives his knee right in his dumb face.    But Buu keeps beating his chest anyway.

But it doesn’t take long to get Buu in the mood.    I really can’t capture this fight with still shots.    These two just keep moving and doing cool stuff.   I don’t know if this is the best fight in the series, but it’s pretty damn great.

It’s the same story, though.    Goku can land some gorgeous offense on Majin Buu, but none of the damage really sticks, and sooner or later Goku will tire out.    That’s really what Buu is about.    It’s kind of pointless to ask whether this Kid version is stronger or weaker than the other forms.   I think he’s weaker than Super Buu because Goku never did this well against any of the Super Buu forms, but what’s the difference?   He can’t beat Kid Buu either.   All he’s doing here is lasting longer.

I have a feeling this is what’s going through Vegeta’s mind while he watches this play out.    They’ve both had to fight Buu a few times already, and the fundamental problem hasn’t changed much.   

So this is one of my favorite spots in the battle.   Buu drives his foot down into the ground, tunnels it through the dirt, and makes it sprout up and into Goku’s face.  He plays at this for a bit...

And then Goku thwarts this trick by stepping on Buu’s foot as it comes out of the ground, using Buu’s kick to propel himself...

... right into Buu’s ugly mush.   Yeah!

So Buu snags him with his head tentacle and airplane spins him into a mountain.

Mr. Satan still thinks this is all a dream, but he’s still pulling for Goku to win. 

Buu stands on top of the mountain and beats his chest some more.    He thinks he’s hot shit until...

GOKU PUSHES A MOUNTAIN IN HALF!  COOL!

Buu tries throwing this enormous energy ball, but Goku deflects it, only for it to end up going around the planet and landing on the surface anyway.

The sky turns red...

And this happens, whatever that is.

And big swaths of land just sort of collapse and distort.  I don’t know what this means, but okay.

Even Buu seems to have no idea what he did to the planet, but he finds this very amusing.  

The battle doesn’t look like it’s going well, but the Elder Kai belies that Goku’s just been getting Buu’s measure so far, and now he’s finally ready to go all out.  

Buu seems to know that too, but he rolls his eyes while he waits for Goku...

... to finish turning into...

SUPER SAIYAN 3!  Yeaaaaahhhhhhhhh!     In the manga, Goku went SSJ3 right off the bat, so a lot of this fight sort of happened in the manga up to this point, but they retooled some of it so Goku would be in SSJ2 instead.     Needless to say, this transformation scene is filler. 

Vegeta’s pretty hyped for this, because he wants to see SSJ3 in action, and now he’s finally getting his wish.  

Hell yeah!

Buu seems pleased.  I guess there is some personality to Kid Buu.   He’s waited patiently for Goku and Vegeta to prepare for the battle, and he waited for Goku to finish transforming, even if he seemed annoyed by the delay.   So maybe he does have a sense of... well, maybe not sportsmanship, but he’s at least savvy enough to understand that he has to back off to get a better fight.

And that’s just what Goku’s gonna give him.

#dragon ball #2019dbliveblog #kid buu saga #goku #majin buu #vegeta #mr satan #dende #bee #elder kai #kibitoshin

[wackygoofball]

you once talked about the parallels between sigurd and jaime I have to point out hat sigurd is a dragonslayer who killed fafnir ( who was a dwarf who became a dragon after killing his own father fafnirAsked his father for gold. tyrion Asked his father for his inheritance (Casterly Rock). fafnir Murdered his father upon refusal. Tyrion Murdered his father in light of multiple grievances. tyrion will end up helping dany with her dragons and/or riding one so what if jaime kills tyrion

Hi megashadowdragon and thanks for the question.

I realized I didn’t meta in quite a while, but ohwell, real life calling and all.

First of all, I am impressed that you still rememberor found a way to dig up that comment I made… years ago. Anyway, I had to revisit my own post to check, butreally, the main intention of that post was to point out the many similarities thatcan be drawn between Jaime and Brienne and Sigurd and Brynhild, less so aboutmaking predictions about how those similarities may foretell the outcome of thestory. I hope that this came across and that I didn’t make it seem like I wasfirmly believing in Jaime and Brienne fulfilling the Sigurd/Brynhild saga frombeginning to end.

After all, GRRM uses tropes and themes rather thancopying word-for-word the narrative upshots of the story he takes from. Like,JB builds on the Beauty and the Beast trope in order to subvert it, but thatdoesn’t mean it’s going exactly congruent to the original tale in terms oftrajectory (I can’t seem to recall zombie!Cat to have been amongst the ensembleof Beauty and the Beast, LOL). So Itry to be cautious when it comes to making predictions based on mythologyparallels I can spot in a narrative. After all, GRRM mixed in a lot of mythology, Norse mythology *atlarge* being the first idea that comes to my mind, wherein Jaime fits multiplecharacters. Like, you can easily parallel Jaime with Norse gods like Tyr, amongothers. Or Christian mythology with the Jacob parallels. So… I am very carefulon that territory, which is why I dare not predict future outcomes based onother story’s equivalents. It’s far too tempting to just go down the rabbithole because every story parallel you choose will give you a potentiallydifferent outcome based on the trajectory of the story itself. I am much moresold on the BatB trope and trajectory because a) GRRM has affirmed that hebased JB on that trope, and b) tropes are not the same as following a storyfrom beginning to end along the exact same lines.

However, as you rightly point out, there are greatparallels to be drawn between Tyrion and Fafnir, both taking part in patricideand developing a certain greed (hence the dwarf turning into a serpent as they aresymbols for greed) for gold, which again plays well into the Lannister gold andred theme. And I am thankful that you brought it to my attention because – alsodue to my clear JB focus – did not even think about how Tyrion very well fitsinto the Volsunga Saga in that regard, and it may well be that GRRM drewinspiration from Fafnir when creating Tyrion’s character.

Yet, strictly following that analogy (for the sakeof the argument here), Regin is the brother of Fafnir who orders for hiskilling and enlists someone else to do it (Sigurd). Now of course, we caneither substitute Regin for someone to fill into that role and order Jaime todo it or we cut out the middleman for the sake of maintaining that parallel.  

But anyway, perhaps we ought to see it not so strictin terms of how the characters are related and more in terms of what they doinstead. Again, the trajectory for Tyrion maps neatly on Fafnir, as you assert,even more so in the books wherein he has embarked on a much darker route thanin the show (I won’t dig too deeply into the matter as my knowledge remainslimited on book!Tyrion, not having read those chapters in their entirety justyet).

Though that in itself should be telling, I think, withregards to Tyrion’s outcome in the overall series. I think the general themewill be that most characters will move into a gray area in terms of morality(safe for the clear villains that we have… like, Euron won’t become a graycharacter, Cersei won’t either, I daresay). Characters like Jaime are movingtowards the lighter spots whereas supposed heroes have become/are becomingmorally corrupted or at the very least tested in their morality and balancingit with the need to maybe do acts of dishonor for the sake of the people atlarge. The show did away with the dark tidbits of book!Tyrion’s journey why? We will only know once the finalseason airs, of course, but as others have put forward before me (and far moreeloquently than I do here), it may well be that show!Tyrion will move into moremoral grayness towards the end, whereas book!Tyrion may well get a redemptivemoment of some kind to move him back towards gray.

I tend to think that the show wants to link Tyrion’shaving to make tough choices between his family (Jaime) and the woman of nametitles to the grayness of his character. This has already been party exploredin season 7 wherein Tyrion was kind of hoping for Jaime not to be offed byHighgarden and looking completely devastated when he had to see what the womanwith many titles could do with a flying nuke and a bunch of Dothraki in an openfield. It was surely not without purpose that a) she questioned his loyalties beforeand after that and that b) Tyrion looked so clearly devastated and was made tobear witness of the apparent horror that the woman he chose as the one he meansto support can cause to see the overall goal of her ascending to the IronThrone being achieved. They also could have chosen to have Tyrion stay atDragonstone to await the news, but the fact that he bore witness to both thehavoc a dragon can cause on a battlefield plus the barbecuing of the Tarlys wassurely not without purpose. Which was now a long way of saying that I wouldn’tfind it farfetched if his loyalties were to become ultimately tested in season8, and further, that he will ultimately have to choose between his brother andthe mother of nukes.

While characters are supposedly uniting for thegreater purpose of fighting against the White Walkers now, I am by no meansconvinced that this is smooth transition from war to the Star.garyenRestoration Period towards the end of the series, which is to say that it maywell be that we are headed for conflict among the factions and that maincharacters who offered their support last season may still find their loyaltiesquestioned in their wish to seek power and may or may not ditch the groupeffort at least for a certain amount of time. Now, I don’t want to dig intothat whole matter because that is something people have sent plenty about and Ihonestly can’t be bothered too much about either the fandom-favorite theoriesregarding the restoration period or the hype of the characters mostlyassociated with said theories. I don’t discount their overall importance to thenarrative, I am just saying that I personally have zero shits to give besidethe plot purpose they fulfill for the overall narrative, but I have no personalinvestment in the lady with many names beyond her arc contributing to theoverall series.

But I derailed now again, sorry, I suppose I justwanted to position myself so that I don’t then get questions about a character Iam not invested in and don’t want to be bothered to bash on because, really, Ijust don’t care. The point I was heading for but kind of got away from is thatI am not entirely sure whether Tyrion *will* remain Team Lady of Many Names bythe end of the series. The fact that Tyrion’s and Jaime’s conflict has not beenwholly resolved just yet (while they wereon friendlier terms again, Tyrion did only so much as dodge the big questionsstill standing between the two – namely the consequences of his killing Tywinthat had direct impact on people Tyrion did not intend to harm with that, e.g.Jaime, Tommen, etc., for his own purposes of getting revenge on his father andI think the narrative set it up in such a way that when they met again for thefirst time in the vaults of the Red Keep that it was meant to show that Tyrionwas giving Jaime the same old argument as always instead of owning up to it)has me sold on the idea that something else is still coming with regards to thequestion of where his loyalties will eventually lie.

Now, to come back to the Volsunga Saga and theparallels to GoT/ASoIaF: I would also suggest another thought experiment justto explore the many ways of looking at it: Trade in Fafnir for the woman ofmany names (undeniable, the dragon connection is strong with her… and while sheis certainly no dwarf… she is not exceptionally tall, LOL, but now I digressfor sure). She had Khal Drogo kill Viserys with gold (hence, arguably, substituting Hreidmar, the father of Reginand Fafnir, for it), hence also having the gold aspect on her side and the ideaof greed being potentially subsumed in her ongoing quest for power even aftershe achieved to establish herself as Boss in Essos. Now fast-forward to (forthe show here) season 7 and Spoils of Warand have Sigurd (Jaime) go up against Fafnir (the woman of many names) afterreceiving orders from Regin who wants to see Fafnir gone (Cersei). Yet again,gold also plays a large role, and while Jaime is not successful in killing her,he was definitely going for it right there.

So, you see, I think that you can spin this manydifferent ways (which is the wonderful thing about literary analysis that Ilove so very much) and arrive at similar results. It neatly fits with GRRM’smode of paralleling and mirror characters. So the woman of many names does wellfit Fafnir the same way you can find reasons to see Tyrion being paralleledwith the serpent/dragon.

Now, to go back to the suggestion that Jaime may killTyrion… within the narrative, I just fail to see how he would pose such a*threat* that would make it necessary for Jaime to kill him. Tyrion… is only asdangerous as is the power he is granted. If Tyrion were to go completely rogue,hotwire a dragon and ride it into battle against his brother et al., then thatwould require some… serious turnaround and it would still make the dragon the more immediate threat to get outof the way.

Now, he could use wildfire to trigger Jaime into goingagainst Tyrion and make an attempt on his life, but I have my doubts regardingthe matter. I think wildfire will be vital to the plot in defeating the WhiteWalkers, and that it won’t be only limited to being at Cersei’s disposal,because let’s be real, it kind of loses effect and is in itself a gun she issitting on, waiting to be fired. And while Jaime will certainly be triggered byit, I think it makes much more sense for him to either then help evacuate thecity or help set up the trap for the White Walkers to walk into, seeing thenecessity. Now, if we spin this into the woman of many names going rogue andwanting to torch the capitol to thus blow shit up in red and green, then Jaimewould still have more incentive to be mad at her than at Tyrion.

If we spin it in such a way that Tyrion commits utterbetrayal towards Jaime a second time and Jaime found himself in a position ofauthority in the post-war times, then this would come close to Jaime having tosentence Tyrion to death, which I don’t really see happening, to be honest. Atleast I can’t come up with scenarios that would map with what we have been setup for in terms of character development over the past few seasons. While Jaimesaid that he would kill him, he evidently did not whenever he had a chance forit (if he was serious, he could have offed Tyrion in that vault with even justone hand and a tourney sword). Because just as evidently, Jaime loves hisbrother still, which made Tyrion’s betrayal burn ever the harder for Jaime, butthe more organic conclusion to such a conflict is that they talk it out or that Tyrion makes good onhis promise of when Jaime freed him from the prison where he said that he owedJaime his life, which makes him indebted to Jaime.

So I can actually see self-sacrifice to a certainextent far more prominently being one possible upshot of Tyrion’s arc than himgoing rogue on a dragon to require Jaime to slay his own brother instead ofhaving Jaime go through the motions of committing an additional act ofkinslaying. Generally speaking, I just don’t see Jaime offing any more of hisfamily members (and yes, that includes Cersei, the whole valonqar thing beingJaime and then going into suicide for *reasons* is nothing I am getting behind,but yet again, I digress and, yet again, I think people have written enoughabout that by now, so I would much rather focus on literally anything else). Because it would be sovery repetitive for Jaime and the Lannister clan at large. Cersei killed Lanceland Kevan and the in-laws Margaery, Loras, Mace… and kind of gave rise toTommen’s fall by making him watch that shit show *ahem*… Tyrion killed Tywin. Jaime(at least for the show… for *reasons*) killed a cousin and in-law Olenna uponCersei’s order. Like, honest to the Seven above, I don’t see the Lannistersdoing any more internal family murder. I think another family can well take aturn now.

So… to somehow tie those loose threads of thought togetherthat I have been spewing out now, anon… I think the parallel of Fafnir andTyrion most definitely fits, and I think there is a lot to be said about thesymbolism and even potential trajectory of the overall story, especially if youlook at book!Tyrion and his dark journey which neatly maps on Fafnir’s fallingfor the gold/greed. However, such analysis only ever takes us so and so farbecause, as I hope to have highlighted, we can recreate similar parallels byexchanging the players and it still matches. Because that just correlates withGRRM’s way of writing, which heavily builds on involving themes andpre-existing tropes, mythology, and narratives. That doesn’t mean we can takeone narrative and go to the end to determine future outcomes for GRRM’scharacters, though. It may well be that it will turn out eventually to be truefor one case, but at this point of time, it is simply too hard to guess whichone he may pick or subvert or abandon.

Though more on a sidenote, I will say that I would notfind it entirely unlikely if Tyrion ended up riding a dragon, as you pointed toin your ask. In fact, I would find that muchbetter than Jesus I mean King in the North riding one because Tyrion has builtup a significant relationship with those scaly nukes and I would much rathersee the dragons being okay with being ridden by a guy they learned to trustthan one that has the right Targ smell to him. But then again, I think dragonsare dicks, so maybe that is why they are more sold on the King in the North orthey just really want their mom to bang her nephew… so, who knows?

Now, speaking more in terms of *just* the show/books,I don’t think Jaime will kill Tyrion because I just don’t see where they would getthe conflict if the show has already hinted at it that there is more things toconnect them than keep them apart. If the woman of many names is supposed to bethe reason why, then Jaime should direct his anger towards *her* rather thanTyrion, and I do think that Jaime canmake that kind of rational decision, even with all those feelings involved. Thenarrative would have to make some true 180° to go back to where we basicallywere in season 5 to have Jaime be again all “I will murder him first chance Isee him.” And all atrocities I can come up that may trigger Jaime would almostalways relate to the woman of many names instead of his brother.

So, in sum: Tyrion and Fafnir parallels are awesome and I am grateful that you brought it to my attention because I missed the connection before. Ithink Jaime and Tyrion will pull themselves back together. I hope that Tyriongets to ride a dragon to prove that you don’t have to smell of Targ in order toearn yourself a ride on a nuke. And I most certainly hope that Jaime’s andBrienne’s narrative will end on an entirely different note than that of Sigurdand Brynhild because I remain sold on the idea that they are, against whatseems to be commonly believed by many people, headed towards a happier endingthan most will have in mind. Naturally, I may be totally proven wrong on thematter, but for now I reserve for myself the luxury of being in the hiatus ofsweet, sweet oblivion, wherein I can imagine all kinds of scenarios where Jaimeand Brienne live happily ever after, to finally get started on the Braime Bunch™,and that if Tyrion is meant to live till the end of the series, will spend his daysin good companionship with his brother.

*flies away*

#anon #ask #game of thrones #jaime lannister #tyrion lannister #jaime x brienne #meta #got meta #essay #kind of #it's long enough to be one lol #thanks for the question

[blueeyeswhitegarden]

Yuya and Reiji for the meme!

This is going to be pretty long, so I’ll put my answers under the cut.

Yuya:

Why I like them/why I don’t like them: Of course, I love Yuya. There are so many reasons why I like him. He’s just so likable, relatable and sympathetic. He genuinely wants to make everyone around him happy even when he’s dealing with so much sadness and pain himself. I love that he wears his heart on his sleeve, which makes it easier to emphasize with him. Even though he deals with emotional issues like self-doubt and self-confidence throughout the series, I love that being emotional himself was never treated as a flaw exactly. Even near the end of the series, Yuya would still break out into tears, but he wasn’t looked down for it. That is so refreshing, especially for a lead male character.

He struggles through his emotional problems throughout the series, but he doesn’t give up on his goals in spite of those issues. That makes him inspiring in a way. Wanting to end the Dimensional War works so well with his goal of becoming a great Entertainment Duelist like his father, as well as the tone of the series in general. I love that he is able to reach out to people more with his dueling once he develops his own kind of dueling. Instead of trying to be someone he isn’t, being himself made Yuya closer to his goal, which was a nice touch considering his self-confidence issues. His development is fantastic and he is still my favorite character in the franchise.

What I like about their appearance: I think that the red, green and orange color scheme works really well for his design. Plus, I still love how fans see his hair as a tomato and a Christmas tree. It’s a cute fun little joke.

Do I prefer their dub names or their original name?: Yuya has the same name in both versions, but I do prefer how the Japanese version pronounces his last name. Maybe I was just too used it after watching the Japanese version for nearly two years before the dub even came out, but Sa-ka-KEY sounds like a much more natural way to say Sakaki to me than Sa-KA-key does.

OTP: I love his relationship with Yuzu. They’re such good and caring friends, which makes it easier to believe that they’d develop romantic feelings for each other. I especially appreciate that you can read their relationship as platonic or romantic, but either way, they clearly love each other.

NOTP: I’m not really a fan of any of the pairings between the Yuya counterparts, mainly because the idea of being romantically interested in someone who has the same face always sounded weird to me. I probably dislike his pairing with Yuri the most given how he treated Yuya in the series.

OT3: While I don’t like the pairings romantically, I think that the relationships between Yuya, Yuzu, Sora, as well as with Gongenzaka, are really good. They all have good friendships with each other.

Favorite card they use: I love so many of Yuya’s Performapals, but Discover Hippo and Silver Claw would be some of my favorites. They’re cute and perfect sized monsters for Yuya to ride on. Odd Eyes Pendulum Dragon is also great and is a pretty cool ace monster. Smile World is really good too. It represents Yuya’s ideals on dueling, as well as perfectly captures his goals. He wants to make everyone, including his enemies, smile with his dueling.

Favorite moment they were in: There are a lot of great moments for Yuya, but one of my favorite ones were his last turn against Jack. Seeing Yuya being able to reach out to the whole City with his dueling was so heartwarming and wonderful. Whenever I think back to that moment, to that duel and to Jack holding Yuya’s arm up to celebrate his victory, I still get immensely happy. It’s one of those moments that remind me just how much I love both Yuya and Arc V itself.

Least favorite moment: I’m not sure if this counts, but it was probably when it was revealed that Zarc had taken over Yuya completely after Yuri was defeated. It was a good shocking twist for the match and it made sense, but I was also really sad that Yuya wasn’t able to fight off Zarc’s influence even after struggling so much.

Would I fuck, marry or kill them?: I love Yuya, but I’m also over twice his age, so I wouldn’t be into those first two options and I obviously wouldn’t want to kill him. I would want to give him a big hug and have a duel with him instead.

Reiji:

Why I like them/why I don’t like him?: I like Reiji. I still remember thinking he was going to be another Kaiba clone based on his character information, but he turned out to be a much different and refreshing take on a main rival. He was still Yuya’s main rival, but they were more polar opposites. Yuya is more emotional and prone to act out of anger, while Reiji is more calm, collected and calculated. He rarely acts without having a plan in motion and only takes action himself when he deems necessary. That made their rivalry pretty different and refreshing, especially when Yuya wasn’t focused on defeating Reiji. Plus, I like how Yuya and Reiji slowly develop a nice friendship over the course of the series.

Being more morally gray also helped to make him more interesting. In retrospect, I do think I was a bit hard on him, mainly during season two. I never hated him or thought he was evil like a lot of fans did, but a combination of misreading his behavior/actions and being surrounded by a lot of negativity towards him made me upset at him for awhile. After getting away from that negative environment and looking back at what he did, I think too many people, myself included, read his calm demeanor as being too cold or a sign that he didn’t care about people around him. Even now when rewatching the series, I’ll often think to myself that Reiji didn’t deserve the hate he got and feel kind of bad about how his character was received.

What I like about their appearance: Reiji’s scarf is still so ridiculous that it turns around to become awesome again. I love it and the jokes about it make it even better. His plain blue shirt really works for his design too.

Do I prefer their dub names or original names?: I prefer Reiji over Delcan. I’m just more used to Reiji and I think it fits him more than Delcan does. It isn’t one of the worst dub names, but it is pretty strange. It is a shame that they didn’t choose Reggie instead. Maybe they didn’t want to do that because of Shark’s dub name, but Reggie would have been a much more fitting choice than Delcan.

OTP: I don’t have too many pairings for Reiji, but I kind of liked the pairing between him and Serena. I thought that meeting three years prior to the start of the series gave them some potential for an interesting relationship. I kind of like his relationship with Yuya. I don’t see it as romantic, mainly due to how I can’t see Yuya developing romantic feelings for anyone besides Yuzu, but I like it as a platonic pairing if that makes any sense.

NOTP: I’m not sure if there is a Reiji pairing that bothers me that much. Maybe the closest would be his pairing with Shun, but even then, I’m more indifferent towards it than anything else.

OT3: I think I have a three character pairing involving Reiji that I like either.

Favorite card they use: Unlike most rivals, Reiji usually use different monsters as opposed to having a more traditional ace monster. I thought that the three new D/D/D monsters he used during his third duel with Yuya were pretty cool and intimidating. I also liked his use of Contract cards in general. He always had a plan in mind when using them, which fits with his personality quite nicely.

Favorite moment they were in: One of my favorite moments for Reiji was when he was struggling against Leo during his tag duel with Yuya. Reiji had spent years preparing to stop his father and the show had shown just how powerful he is multiple times. But he still couldn’t defeat his father, even with Yuya’s help. Leo even called him out on his poor strategy and Reiji was clearly shaken up over being put into a tight spot. Since Reiji is so calm and collected most of the time, seeing him actually struggling against another opponent and being more clearly emotional made the moment stand out.

It’s also why I was glad that they didn’t have Reiji lose to hype up another secondary villain before this point. If he had lost to Roger or Yuri before, it would have weakened the emotional impact of this moment since we would have already seen Reiji lose before. It helped to make Leo more threatening and the fact that Reiji couldn’t defeat him even after planning for this confrontation for years gave the moment some good emotional weight behind it. Plus, the tag duel had some nice moments for Yuya and Reiji’s friendship so that was nice.

Least favorite moment: I’d probably go with Reiji making sure that the LDS trio’s memories were altered. It did show Reiji’s morally gray mindset, which does help to make him more interesting, but I also think that was the starting point of people thinking that Reiji was secretly evil. Plus, it wasn’t the best way to effectively write the LDS trio out of the plot. People might have thought Reiji was really evil regardless of how they handled the LDS trio, but handling that in a different manner that still showed that Reiji is morally gray might have helped.

Would I fuck, marry or kill them?: Reiji is cool, but I’m still over ten years older than him, so I wouldn’t be interested in the first two options. I certainly wouldn’t want to kill Reiji. I like the idea of telling him to relax and have some fun after the events of the series since he would definitely need that.

Thank you for asking. ^_^

#Asks #Arc V #Arc V Spoilers #Yuya #Reiji