#Plot explained by dialog? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ja-khajay · 9 months

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hiii! In regards to the "Guillermo del Toro Says “We Have to Rescue” Studio Animation From “Emoji-Style Behavior”" article/statement, do u have examples of animation that specifically is & is not this type of expression/animation? Bc it's rly hard for me to actually picture this and like I need examples ahaha

Disclaimer - I was not at this specific talk, so I don't have the full context and I know from reliable sources - friends of mine that DID attend it - that it's not all he said there, so that article is pretty much only relying spicy chosen bits. That being said, I will focus on this paragraph.

Getting more specific, he went on to detail what he despises about certain lazy proclivities in commercial animation, notably how characters and emotions are “codified into a sort of teenage rom-com, almost emoji-style behavior.” He added, “[If] I see a character raising his fucking eyebrow, or crossing his arms, having a sassy pose — oh, I hate that shit. [Why] does everything act as if they’re in a sitcom? I think it is emotional pornography. All the families are happy and sassy and quick, everyone has a one-liner. Well, my dad was boring. I was boring. Everybody in my family was boring. We had no one-liners. We’re all fucked up. That’s what I want to see animated. I would love to see real life in animation. I actually think it’s urgent. think it’s urgent to see real life in animation.”

What he talks about here is something I find omnipresent in modern American animation, or from studios that are funded by and/or trying to sell to americans (ex: Illumination McGuff). Here del Toro specifically mentions characters and emotions and how they are codified, which would include how characters are written, how animated their emotions and body language are, how they interact... He also mentions studio animation, an important distinction - this does not include indie animators!

A few things, adding * to those he's specifically calling out here, and more of my own that are not stated but I feel match the style

*one liners

*the "dreamworks face"

*sassy attitude

*quick banter

*taking poses

looking into the camera

overtly smooth, cartoony body language

characters explaining their emotions, plot resolutions around this

I will now get to examples, starting by a comparison between two animated films. Both of these films are contemporary, family-audience, french animated films. They share similarities in setting, being medieval fantasy fairytales about female heroes. One of these films was made with an american audience in mind (Pil), and the other caters to a french audience (Dragon Princess). You can compare how the characters act in both trailers:

youtube

Try and only focus on dialog, body language and expressions, barring art style and story!

Feature films that, in my opinion, also fit that "emoji style behaviour" (* for those I have not fully watched) any why:

Turning Red: the sass, the one liners, body language, camera looking, quick banter, plot resolution with characters explaining their emotions. The whole film fits

Puss in Boots: The last wish: sass, one liners, body language, banter, characters explaining their emotions. Scenes like Puss meeting his past lives and the dog's dialog are strong offenders

The emperor's new groove: sass, one liners, posing, banter

Encanto: sass, posing, banter; the explaining their emotions to drive the plot is ridiculously present to the point where I'd say del Toro was vagueing that one with the family example

Klaus: posing, banter, body language, explaining their emotions

*Nimona: sass, posing, banter, expressions...I only watched the trailer so can't say much but it leans HARD into the rapid fire quip territory with emotional resolution

*Trolls: sass, posing, banter, body language, camera looking...

Regarding films that do not do this, the quick answer would be...watch foreign (=not american) and/or older films. Nowadays with internet a massive catalogue is available, although the USA has such a monopoly on animation via its advertising budget other countries don't have that those films can be harder to find especially if you only use english-speaking internet.

As most studio animation is for a young or family audience and my entire example list above is, I will give some recommendations of films that are also for such an audience, but with older and worldwide picks. Some of these films are fully available on YouTube (although not in english always), so I'll be linking that when possible!

Mom is pouring rain (France, 2020s) (trailer): A shorter film about a little girl sent to live with her grandmother while her mom heals from depression. Has emotions front and center but expressed and animated in a way typical of modern french animation, with cartoony designs but subtler, more "boring" acting

The little prince and the eight headed dragon (Japan, 1960s): Beautifully animated in a style distinct from anime, this is a simple folktale adaptation. Fully on YouTube, albeit in its original english dub who's quality is frankly not great.

Next! (UK, 1990s): Stop motion short by an animator who specifically explores subtler, harder to animate expressions, as well as the art of theater, represented here by a Shakespear puppet playing out his works as a one-man show.

Ramayana (India, 1990s): Animated version of the legend of the same name, coupling a Ghibli art style with your ancient legend's large scale battles and polite heroes.

Ne Zha (China, 2010s)(trailer): that trailer is dead serious, it's actually a pretty damn silly movie! Including this one because as a big CGI animated film it's interesting to compare to what Pixar/Dreamworks/etc is doing.

...I'm realizing that I included a whole lot of animated folk tales so for modern chinese animation I'll also name Legend of Hei (2020s)(trailer), an original fantasy film with indie origins and a whole lot of over the top action.

As for films from the US that do NOT match that style? As a country the US has a rich history of animation asides of Disney! I personally grew up on Tex Avery and Looney Tunes cartoons who (pre-90s) are great examples of this.

For more adult films, I'll link my list of mature animation recommendations!

My ask remains opens for any clarifications :) have a nice day!

#answered #animation

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xxblairexxss · 9 months

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Saving your bacon

Pairing : Charles Leclerc x medicstudent!reader

Theme : Light on angst, more heavy of fluff

Word count : 3.4k

I feel like something’s missing but I’m not sure what it is and I don’t wanna keep this in my draft so I’m just gonna drop and dip. Oh, and I wanted to switch up and play around with reader’s personality instead of sticking to one so this time around, reader is more (idk how to explain) but more bright????? And I also don’t want to write her as someone struggling with her studies just because I think I have seen the same plot a few times around so let’s just say she enjoyed doing what she did. I know you asked for more angry Charles but for some reason I found him more of a people pleaser so it’s hard to write him getting angry at the crowd. 😭

Warnings, inaccurate medical term and procedure, as usual.

Requested!

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Charles was catching up to his favourite series, all sluggish and slothful on his day off when he heard your footsteps and humming got closer and closer to which he immediately took a cushion near him and laid down, pretending to sleep.

“Oh?” Your little skip stopped when you reached the living room. You were so, completely sure he was awake because you sworn you heard him laughed at one of the jokes on the television a few minutes ago. Stepping closer, you saw the way his lashes slightly fluttered as he bit the inside of his lip, holding his smile from exposing his little trick. “You are not sleeping!” You called out and chortled, quickly placing your medical files on the tea table before diving into his embrace, making him groaned from the sudden impact. “I caught you!”

“You got the wind knocked out of me, baby.” He moved a little so you could settle down by his side. “What do you need me to do today?”

“How do you know I was gonna ask for your help?” You cackled in his arm at the way he looked completely unfazed with your requests by now.

“Because this isn’t the first time. I just knew how your steps would sound like if you needed my help.”

“Yeah? How does it sound like?” You sat up and his hand snaked its way under your shirt instantly.

“Can’t explain it in words. Lay down or sit up?”

“Lay down! Wait,” You took back your medical files and scanned through your notes. “Oh, wait! No, no! Sit up and turn that way.”

“That way?”

“Yeah! And close your eyes! I’ll be right back.”

Charles had his eyes shut, sitting up straight facing the balcony of his apartment while trying to catch up with the dialogs coming from the tv series he was watching. “No way! I missed the important scene, did– ouch!” He jolted to the front when something cold was pressed on his neck, sending shiver up to her head. “Babe, what was that?!”

“Ice pack! Sit back down!” You pulled him back and placed the ice pack back on what you imagine the pain would be.

“It’s cold! Can’t we just pretend to use an ice pack instead of– cold! Babe, it’s cold! Instead of using actual ice pack?” You held him by his shirt to stop him from moving away while you repetitively went back to scan through your notes.

“Stay still! I’m trying to get these right! Oh, I need to move it in circular motion and never let it sit for more than 20 minutes on the same spot.” You leaned against his back and giggled. “I nearly gave you frostbite!”

“Are we done yet, babe?” He tilted his head to the side to catch your eyes, while still obeying every instructions.

“Wait, let me do one last check on the C1 and C2 first.”

Charles had always been your some sort of medical dummy ever since you started your medical school residency. You would always come to him whenever you needed to revise some of the notes that you had written as you went through different types of medical or surgical problems. Thought it looked more like you were trying to disturb your boyfriend’s peace, it actually helped you a lot. And though it looked like your boyfriend was trying to hide and ran away whenever you needed his help, he was actually excited to be apart of your dummy, claiming to be his some sort of contribution to your career.

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“Oh, this is sour! Babe, give it a try.” His face was all wrinkled up as he tried to feed you the fruit to which you refused. “Try it.”

“I don’t like sour berries!”

“It’s good though.” He popped another one into his mouth and shivered when the sourness hit, causing you to laugh.

“Your face doesn’t seem like it. I think I picked the wrong batch, baby. We need to let it ripe a little longer.” You sprinkled some salt into the the pot before letting it stir. Charles was too busy chumbling on the berries to realise that you had been staring at him with your arms folded.

“So,” You spoke and he stopped chewing.

“Why? Do I have something on my face?”

“No, but let’s say you come in with your nose bleeding.” You moved closer, half leaning your body against his side with your head tilted up so you could admire his pretty face.

“Ah, so we are doing this?” He pushed the berries away and propped both hand on the kitchen counter. “Okay, let’s pretend my nose is bleeding. What’s next?”

“And I asked you how did your nose bleed. What would you say?”

“Babe, I’m completely lost with whatever topic or disease you are proposing right now.” He hummed, eyes wandered away to think of an answer. “I would say “How I would know, doctor. That’s your job to find out.””

“Charles!” You bursted out laughing and he chuckled along, casually left a soft pinch on your cheek.

“I don’t know, pretty. What should I say?”

“Let’s say you got into a mild accident a few hours ago but you refused to go to the hospital because you thought you were fine but then!” You dramatically gasped and Charles’s eyes widen in amusement. “Then you started feeling blockage in breathing. This is one of the symptoms for?”

His lips curved downwards as he shrugged. “I don’t know. Flu?”

“Wrong!”

“Dang it, that was my best shot. What is it then?”

You giggled and stood on your toes to kiss on his cheek. Charles would always try to answer your questions though he never got any of it right but you just found it adorable how he never gave up because he said he would get it right one day. “Septal hematoma! I need to drain it before it collapses your nasal bridge.”

“Really?! Wow, never knew that. How do you drain it?”

“You are gonna fall asleep before I even start explaining the first procedure. Oh, are we still going to the event tonight?”

“What event?” He raised his brow and his mouth went wide when he realised about it. He was talking about an event a few weeks ago and you decided to tag along. You were rarely seen attended any of his weekend events. Even more after you started your practical and though he never said anything about it, you still felt guilty about it, especially when you saw his pictures at any events that you didn’t attend, all alone while most of his friends would have their partners by their side.

He was a little dubious when you told him you wanted to attend his next event. He didn’t want to make it seems as if he was forcing you to do something that you didn’t want to because he knew both of you have different schedules and accountability as a student and an athlete, or public figure. You had to reassure him that it was something you wanted to do, not because you felt like he was forcing you in some sort of way. A fresh breath of air was the reason that you came up with, professing that you needed to get away from your cases this weekend.

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“Are you sure you want to go?”

“I’m all dressed up!” You clipped on your left earrings and gave a little twirl. You had chosen a satin dress with crisscross backless as it would be the perfect dress considering the event was more leaning towards an informal night out vibe. “Why?You don’t… want me to go?”

“No, that’s not what I meant, babe.” He held your hand, wrapping both of his and your arms on your waist as he turned you around, making you faced the mirror. “You are literally the most beautiful doctor I have ever seen.” He stared at your reflection admiringly, giving a soft smile when he locked his eyes with yours in the mirror and pecked on your neck.

“Nice try, handsome but I’m not a qualified one yet.”

“But you will be.”

“Not if I fail my residency.” You spun your body to face him, hands on his shoulders as you found yourself getting butterflies from seeing his face up close, even after all these years.

“Did you forget how many times you made me suffer with all those on hand practices? It’s impossible for you to fail.” He stole a kiss on your newly applied gloss and left the room before you could scream at him.

“Stop kissing me when I got my lip gloss on!”

“Can’t help myself. Come on, we gotta go.”

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“Is this normal?” You blinked as Charles made the final turn towards the entrance of the club. There were tons of people with cameras hung around their neck gathered in front of the building. They would congregate towards every cars regardless of who it was.

“No, not at all. It might have something to do with the other event that is happening at the casino, I think.” Charles saw you clasped your hands together on your lap and knew what you were feeling even when he didn’t see your face. “You okay, babe?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Just a little surprised.”

“It’s okay. I’m not gonna leave you behind. Don’t let go of my hand okay?” He unbuckled his seatbelt and was going to unlock the door, when he stopped himself. “No, babe, hold on. Wait for me.” You retreated your hand from the shotgun door as he hopped off the car. Charles handed his car key to the valet staff who greeted him as he walked around to get to your side. You saw the flash went off, following your boyfriend all the way to your side. Though the front windscreen window was half tinted, you could still see how bright it was.

“Ready?” Charles leaned in, one hand gripped on the door seal and other arm at the end of his car roof to make sure you felt safe and had the people blocked before your could step out.

“Ready!”

He offered a hand, while keeping his other on still gripping of the weatherstrip so the door wouldn’t be opened too wide. “Don’t let go of my hand, okay?” He brushed his lips on your cheek before moving away so you could step out.

The first few interactions with the fans were fine. He was handed notebooks, caps, and shirts to be signed. Even a few selfies here and there. You were gripping on his jacket, a little uneasy when you heard a few men with cameras started shouting and scream. At first it sounded far, as if it came from the casino so it shouldn’t be a problem to you. Soon enough, the shouting went louder as if it was brought closer to you by a wave and the fans who were asking for Charles’s autographs and pictures began yelling out to stop the shove and push. Charles heard the commotion and intertwined his hand with yours before making his way to the building before it got any worse.

The flashes suddenly went off to your direction and you could barely see where you should placed your heels, your free hand immediately tried to shield your face. Even some of the fans from earlier started to get shoved around, some even used it as an opportunity to take closer pictures of both you and Charles.

“Charles..” You breathed out, feeling yourself getting pushed. You could feel the crowd getting closer as you tried go get out of the way. He didn’t reply but you could feel his grip on your hand getting more firm as he tried to step away from the crowd.

“Don’t push!”

“Give them space!”

You kept on hearing the words being shouted over and over amongst the crowd but you still felt all closed up with them getting closer and closer regardless of the orders. You let out a gasp when you lost your balance as the crowd started pushing one another, causing a few of them to accidentally inclined towards you.

He stopped and turned back, looking all worried. “You okay? Baby, here. Hold my arm.” You regained your composure and held, more like clinging on his arm while your other hand still fully secured in his. It felt like forever for you to pass your way through the throng, even with the help of the person in charged because none of them even bother to listen and kept on pushing one another towards you.

“Stop it!”

You heard another howl from one of the crowd when you stumbled back as few people were pushed in front of you, the impact caused your hand to slip away from Charles when you tried to move away from the pack of people, your arms were pressed on your chest while you swayed back and forth from constantly being pushed from every sides.

“Y/N– excuse me!” Charles tried to get back to you but he got pushed back by the crowd even more.

“I can’t– !” He heard you called out to him before your voice was swamped with voices amongst the number of people.

You tried to wrap your arms around your body, feeling as if you taking up the space was the reason why you felt suffocating and squeezed up but a sudden shove caused you to jerk forward. You tried stop your fall with your hand but the impact sent a jolt of pain on your wrist. The pain made you wince as you tried to retract your hand but it was stepped on over and over by the number of feet around you.

“Charles, here.”

He was pulled out from the crowd and was being assisted, more like dragged towards the entrance of the building before he stepped back. “I need to get back to my girlfriend.”

“Leave it to us.”

“No.” He sprinted back out and tried to scan amongst the crowd. It got a little under control now that they had enforced more people in charge though the pushing and shoving was still going on.

“Please let me pass..” It took you a while to get back on your feet and tried to squeeze your way out when a camera was thumped on your face, causing your head to tilt. You couldn’t see anything else other than constant flash and light. You started choking back tears and dabbed on your philtrum when it felt like something warm trickled down your nose.

You tried to move away, hand kept on wiping your philtrum as the blood was still leaking down your nose when you felt a firm grip on your arm, yanking you away and out from the crowd. Charles had saw you in the midst and just grabbed on whatever he could get. The grip was harder that he had wished for but he needed to get you somewhere safe, regardless whatever force he had to use.

Your face was forcefully crashed against something hard but you were too beat to repudiate that you continued to cry against the embrace. It was when the familiar scent hit you when you finally realised it was your boyfriend.

“It’s okay, baby. I got you. I’m so, so, sorry.”

You refused to pull away, your whole body was aching but the stroke on your hair and the strong grip on your back made you feel safe, away from the furore. “I was– “ You sobbed. “I was so scared.”

He could feel you trembling in his hold, your head tried to look back to make sure you were really away from the people. “Y/N– Y/N, look at me. Baby, look at me. You’re okay. I got you. You’re okay.”

He leaned away but you could still feel his body latching against yours. “Fuck, you’re bleeding.” Holding your face in his hands, he started scanning through your pretty face. That was when he actually saw the bruise on your temple, your bloody nose and your flushed cheeks. When he caught you by your arm earlier, he was a little at eased as it felt like you weren’t harm but you were far from it. You kept on sobbing, your hand wiped on your tears that was threaten to fall from your chin. “Let’s go home, alright? I’m taking you home.”

Charles wrapped his arm on your waist as you leaned against him while he tried to get you to his just newly parked car.

“Y/N, a picture!” One of the paparazzi snatched on your sprained arm, causing you to shriek in pain.

“Hands off my girl.” He pushed the guy away, feeling so close to land a punch on that face but he had to hold himself from causing any scene that he knew would feed these people even more. Instead of placing his hand back to your waist, he lifted you up in his arms as you placed one arm across his neck, the sprained arm to your chest. He didn’t know you had any other injury because your hand was out of his sight the whole time.

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“Is your nose still bleeding?”

“I think so…” You dabbed the tissue that Charles had given to you when he got in the car and still found a fresh, wet blood stained.

“Keep on pinching your nose, alright?”

“Where did you learn how to treat nosebleed?” You tilted your head to the side and stared at your boyfriend in surprise.

“From my doctor girlfriend.” He gave your hair a stroke and pressed on the pedal as the light turned green.

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“Baby, stay there. I’m gonna get the first aid kit.” He left you and rummaged through the kitchen drawers. “Let’s treat your wrist first.”

You winced and pulled your arm away when he wanted to place it on his lap. “It hurts..” You didn’t think it was that bad but it still hurt. The tears started to fill your eyes again but you looked away so it wouldn’t roll down onto your already wet cheeks.

“Oh, was it too harsh? Sorry, baby.” He scooted closer and tried to place your hand on his lap more gentle this time. “Here. I’m gonna use– yeah, I’m gonna use the one with velcro.”

“Do you know how to do it?”

“Yeah, I have seen you did it to me before.”

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flash

Charles groaned a little when he heard you placed all sort of stuffs in front of him. “Babe, can I borrow your hand?” He heard you whispered as you sat cross legged on the floor.

“Right now, baby? Let me sleep 5 more minutes.”

“You can just keep on laying down.” You replied as you pull his hand from under his head. He was laying on his stomach on the couch before you disturbed his peace with the first add kid and your notes with you. “I just need your hand.” He is still in the same position, just his arm dangling from the end of the couch.

“Like this,” He heard you kept on murmuring, as if you were chanting something whilst he was trying to get back to sleep. “and this,” He peered at you first with a frown and soon after a smile formed on his lips. “around the thumb,” You were completely focused on wrapping his hand with the compression bandage, completely unaware and thinking he was still sound asleep. He would always find the little wrinkles in between your brows whenever you were too focused on some things made you look so adorable so instead of dozing back, he was gazing at you with fondness.

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“I thought you were asleep when I wrapped your hand!”

“I wasn’t. Your little mumble kept me awake.” He rolled the elastic compression bandage around your wrist one last time before securing it with the velcro. “There you go. Did I do I right?”

“Yeah!” You held your now fully wrapped wrist. “I think you did it better than me.”

Charles had left you again to get an ice pack and you leaned against the back pillows. You were expecting neon lights and loud music before you left the house, not coming back with bleeding nose, bruise, and a sprained wrist.

“You okay, baby?”

“Yeah, just a little overwhelm. Can we cuddle?” He then took a spot next to you, ice pack still in hand as as you leaned your head on his shoulder. His hand is on your back while you propped your legs on his laps.

“How did you get those bruise on your head?”

“One of the man accidentally hit me on the face but I don’t think it was on purpose.” You were playing with his necklace when dabbed the ice pack on your temple, causing you to move away. “It’s cold!”

“Oh, so now it’s cold? Was it warm when you dabbed it on my neck for no reason a few days ago?” He pulled you closer to dab the ice pack back on your bruise. “Baby, stay still!”

“I’m getting brain freeze! Stop it!” You giggled and pushed him away.

“You are overreacting! It’s not even 20 minutes yet.”

✧.* general tag list! @i83andrew @cltrlne @karmabyfernando @ohthemisssery @ru-kru @tastebaldwin @f1obessed @love4lando @shinrjj

if your usernames were crossed meaning I can’t tag you 😭 let me know if you would like to be removed or added to the taglist! or if I missed anyone!

#charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc imagine #f1 imagines #charles leclerc #charles leclerc imagines #f1 imagine #f1 x reader

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familyagrestefanblog · 11 months

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There is this ongoing thing with Adrien drawing back from kissing Marinette all the time, which at this point in "Collution" doesnt make sense anymore as him just 'backing out'. "Emotion" too brought this up already as legitimate issue Adrinette is going through that after the ending of "Adoration" every single time Adrinette tried to kiss, Adrien stopped it and even ran away.

This is a great opportunity for me to FINALLY talk about this massive subtext plot that started for real with the end of "Adoration" but up til now I didn't know from which angle I should approach an analysis post about it. This kissing detail being back and visually more elaborated on is EXACTLY what I needed!

In "Collusion" we see that Adrien's facial expression looks like as if an older order put in him is lighting up for a second preventing him from kissing her:

I mean, the shot composition is even purposfully leading your eyes towards Adrien's head with the background wall for example. It's clear who you're supposed to focus on the most.

"Emotion" already implied it through dialog but "Collusion" now pretty much proves that the one time on-screen we saw Adrien draw back from Marinette in "Emotion" wasn't merely caused by the damn phone (although this isnt the first time something weird happens with Adrien's phone this season) or an order somehow given in real time as one would assume, every single time after "Adoration" where Adrinette tried to kiss, Adrien seems to be stopped by an order Gabriel gave him after Gabriel turned Adrien into a puppet in the end scene and Marinette was so worried about if Adrien might be in danger in his home, but tried to remain hopeful:

This is something I figured for a while now. That we were supposed to feel exactly what Marinette is feeling here. She has no idea if Gabriel is doing something to Adrien and if its bad. She is the the outside person, she doesnt know whats happening in that house and she can't help Adrien once he's in it alone with his father. All she can do is hoping that there is another explaination.

Though that turns out to be wishful-thinking, because "Emotion" in fact has already told us that Gabriel did something to Adrien on this evening in "Adoration" after Adrien was forced back inside and Gabriel kept on and on twisting and using the ring while creeping backwards where WE know exactly that Adrien has just returned inside. They would have met in the foyer.

There is nothing far-fetched about a conversation having taken place once Marinette was gone and in my opinion it feels more like wishful denial to say that Gabriel 100% totally did not go to talk to his son. I mean, Adrinette was straight up about to have their first kiss right in Gabriel's view and that right after the events of "Protection", the episode right before "Adoration":

Re-enforcing to Adrien through harsher means to not be in a relationship with Marinette seems like a fitting punishment order Gabriel would pull after "Adoration's" horror show ending.

Give me a logical reason for why that wouldnt have been a realistic thing to happen? A reason that please isnt rooted in the logic of "we didnt see it when we followed Marinette's pov and therefore nothing happened". Cause I sure followed Marinette's pov and she ended this episode very alarmed and concerned.

Alarmed and concerned for a very good reason. The entirety of "Emotion" then goes on and on and ON about asking WHY Adrien is acting so weird and WHY he hasn't told Marinette about the Diamond Ball:

This question is a central theme all through the entire episode, and in the end the truth about Adrien's silence gets revealed.

Marinette herself has no idea and everyone else in this episode is also just giving their best guess of what makes the most sense for them. But that doesn't mean anybody actually got this right. And we know that because in the end Adrien outright SAYS that he didnt mention it because his father ORDERED him not to:

And then Adrien's and Gabriel's father son talk elaborates on that further from Gabriel's perspective:

I don't know what to tell you, it's right THERE. Adrien did not tell Marinette because Gabriel forbit it. It was an order Adrien couldnt go up against because it explicitly stated that Adrien is not allowed to tell Marinette specifically about the Diamond Ball. And as we saw in "Emotion" this order manifested in Adrien panicking around Marinette and lying in a way that at least somewhat still contained the truth:

I really find it upsetting when people victim-blame Adrien for not rebelling and "being brave" the way Félix and Kagami do (or even worse, compare him to Marinette who isnt a Sentihuman at all) because unlike them Adrien is not wearing his own amok AND is unfortunate enough to have both his parental figures wear them, so of course there are alot of direct interactions.

But if that one moment in "Collusin", where Adrien talks back at his father, indeed showcased Nathalie giving Adrien the means to really fight back for a moment by having laid her ring hand on Adrien's so one of his amoks would for the first time touch his skin and making it possible to nullify Gabriel's order depending on how passionately Adrien is against it, then this was a first taste of what Adrien would be like if he were given full control over himself:

Nathalie did that on purpose to protect Adrien from Gabriel and enable him to choose his own happiness as Emilie wished, which is what we saw moments before:

Adrien in "Emotion" and "Pretention" was not a 'coward', that is such disgusting victim-blaming against a person who is literally mind-controlled by their parent without even knowing it for their entire life. It's like giving Kagami shit for giving her amok back to her mother when Tomoe demands it, as if Kagami KNOWS that her ring holds her entire mental and physical autonomy. These poor children have it horrible enough being literally almost enslaved to their parents demands from the day they were born for some sort of sick purpose. Cool that Marinette doesn't have that problem at all and Félix doesn't have it anymore so THEY are able to do whatever they want, but they have no business being held as the golden standard.

This is about Kagami and Adrien who are still being taken advantage of and lied to ever since birth from the people who are supposed to love and protect them. Yes, they act weird and nerve-wreckingly sometimes and in ways that apparently dissappoints you because - of course - if you were a Sentihuman half enslaved and kept in the dark by your parent you would just choose to not have those problems, no biggie, but unfortunately Adrien and Kagami arent you.

They're weird and frustrated. Weird, frustrated, exhausted and abused little half-slaves, left in the dark and still minors so they cant escape anyway.

These things matter.

DETAILS matter.

Details like between the ending of "Adoration" and "Emotion" the episode has Marinette tell us that there was a time skip we didnt see in which Adrien has been acting very weird:

New and suspicious extremes MATTER.

Gabriel crossed a massive line by turning Adrien into a literal puppet at the end of "Adoration" seemingly for the first time from a further distance, since this seems to be the first time THIS happened in Adrien's head:

The fact alone that this was the instance where Gabriel crossed such a fundamental line is already a give-away that whatever is about to follow from Gabriel as Adrien's father from this moment onwards will be on an even more extreme layer of abusive. Which we know to be true from all the episodes afterwards.

But even if you wanna ignore all that, Marinette is then increasingly more worried about Adrien's safety in his home and everything regarding his father and has to truly face for the first time her underlying fear of "what if Gabriel isnt just a bad father?" and "What if Adrien is even being hurt in some way?" although she tried to approach it from deflecting angles until Gabriel talked to her in "Pretention".

But more and more Marinette is learning in what hellhole Adrien has been living in for all his life.

Because, you know, that is the case with highly abusive parents and its something one very likely has to face when one enteres a relationship. This is perfectly realistic, just the abuse method is fantasy. Something the show is not yet letting any of the children besides Félix know yet.

But we KNOW that Adrien is a Sentihuman at his abusive father's mercy and "Emotion" tells us that Marinette's concern at the end of "Adoration" was correct. Gabriel DID do something to Adrien but we, just like Marinette, couldnt fully see it because the biggest portion of the abuse happened behind closed doors as most abuse does. And Marinette, just like us, was left wondering what just happened to Adrien when she saw something disturbing happen to him which may stand in connection to his father.

And she, just like us, asks herself if he's even safe living with this man (no he isnt) when THIS is what happend to Adrien just being near his home and father:

And just like Marinette WE were supposed to find Adrien's silence after this concerning. Marinette read this correctly but she doesnt know yet how to properly interpret all of Adrien's types of silence and the family contexts surrounding it.

Adrien didnt tell Marinette about the Diamond Ball because Gabriel silenced his son, something that Adrien himself wouldnt properly recognize as such and only blames himself for as a failure on his part.

Who cares what the other characters' guesses are for why he didnt say anything? The only two people who truly know why Adrien didnt tell her are Adrien and Gabriel themselves because that's the abusive parent and his abused child. And that's the truth Marinette should be after. Not the one she prefers to be true and she is finally making good progress on that front.

And we can take the silencing in "Emotion" even further, because that wasn't the only time skip + silencing situation we had.

Just like in between "Adoration" and "Emotion", there is yet another significant time skip very cleverly handled - and almost hidden - between "Emotion" and "Pretention". We know that there is a time skip because once again Adrinette tells us:

Honestly, no doubt they will go back to these important time skips in season 6 or 7, there is so much important Marinette development for her love-related anxiety alone deliberately skipped before and after "Emotion" because of what it was entangled with. Not to mention everything else!

Optional rant ahead, I need to get this out of my system for a second: "Emotion" still barely makes sense and dont get me started on Félix! When do you think he fell in love with and stalked Kagami besides in the time skip? He wasnt in love with her before he found out at the diamond ball that she's like him, he probably barely made anything of her when he thought her to be a "normal human". Kagami and Marinette were not part of Felix' plan, Kagami he only just found out is a sentihuman too and therefore deserving of concideration for him, and Marinette wasnt even supposed to be there!

I swear, "Emotion" and the time skips before and afterwards are driving me crazy. I have to make a seperate post for the Felix and Amilie stuff alone and Adrien too was just plain weird in that episode with no proper explaination besides for the little amout that was required to make this work for Marinette's outsider perspective who doesnt know what's going on inside those families anyway. Félix apparently was gone for WEEKS and apparently both Adrien and Kagami knew that because they werent surprised hearing that and neither Gabriel nor Tomoe seemed to care that Amilie went off on Gabriel about it in infront of their children.

Félix was gone for weeks. Adrien knew it. And then we see Adrien immediately recognizing Félix as peacock miraculous holder even despite the magic; not being too surprised seeing Felix there transformed and AT ALL when he should be missing and is willing to go to him in a friendly enough and trusting manner despite that being weird too with no context! Félix is a completely new person who suddenly is aware that Adrien has always been a victim caught in a hellhole with Gabriel and what the fuck was that fake miraculous ring from Adrien Felix had?

Screw you, something happened there in this time skip before "Emotion" and we only got to see the tip of the ice berg! And screw this show for barely giving context for anything in "Emotion" yet because we are stuck with Marinette as main character and Adrien didnt wanted to involve her in his family shit because why would he?

*GROAN* I'm turning grey because of this damn show...

ANYWAY

What "Pretention" does very cleverly is picking up the same character goals established at the end of "Emotion" prior and starting this episode with it. But that doesnt mean at all that this is the next day. NOTHING about what Adrinette tells us about how Gabriel now breathes down their necks makes sense if this is merely the next day:

It's at the very least a couple of days and that's being VERY generous. I'm personally putting it at one week. That would mean Gabriel is being increasingly more of an ass for one school week where Adrinette has to get more and more creative (and Adrien ending up knowing when his father is busy) and at the beginning of the second Marinette has had it. One week is also a perfectly reasonable timeframe for the kids to put off talking to Gabriel and Tomoe while its also a realistic point in time where you would draw the line and motivate yourself again to finally do it.

Kagami's dialogue is the factor that very cleverly tricks the audience into thinking it can just be the next day since Kagami is "oh so much braver than Adrien who doesnt dare to talk to his father", which the episode then subverts by showing that Kagami rightfully fears her mother too and shouldnt be concidered less for it because Tomoe is an abusive hardass too who Kagami needs to be protected from as (her) child and Sentihuman who doesnt know she is one & the end of "Emotion" literally showed us Adrien talking to his father right after he told Marinette that he would try to convince him to have a heart-to-heart with her to clear up whatever he has against her:

Adrien did NOT fail to talk to his father after he said he would because we saw him do it right away. What he did "fail" to do though was mentioning towards the girls that he already talked with his father and tell them what Gabriel said - though that's understandable, Gabriel is being an irrational fuck; blaming the fiasco on Marinette when it's realistically on Félix - and to convince his father to talk to Marinette. But even for this Adrien's on-screen talk with Gabriel has the explaination for:

Did you pick up on the pattern too? That as well was an explicit order from Gabriel with the ring.

Adrien in "Pretention" didnt 'manage' to talk to his father again about him and Marinette so they can have a heart-to-heart because prior to that Gabriel forbit Adrien through an order to ever mention Marinette towards him again (and that means, since Adrinette didnt talk to Gabriel yet, Kagami in turn put off talking to her mother too)

So of course Adrien couldnt do it, which is why he went along with the only option he subconciously felt like he had left. Bringing Marinette to his father so SHE can talk to him by his side, forcing his father into a corner. Adrien unknowingly loopholed himself and out of Gabriel's order that's literally silencing him.

Details, time skips and circumstances matter.

So to bring this back to the failed Adrinette kissing in "Collution":

I'm pretty sure that from the ending of "Adoration" onwards we are now going to see a further and further escalation of ways for Gabriel to enforce his power over Adrien. Regularly just as his father (which is already bad enough) and also the ways in which Gabriel can hurt Adrien through the amok ring

- but in ways he can for now at least somewhat still hide from Nathalie, though no doubt this is going to end BADLY where even Nathalie cant help Adrien anymore as it was already established that Gabriel can absolutely do that and still cross so many more lines-

and in "Emotion" that already included silencing Adrien from letting Marinette know about the Diamond Ball and then not letting him talk about Marinette to him at all (for which I'm quite sure Nathalie touching Adrien with the amok ring in "Collution" helped Adrien break through that barrier because that WAS the first time he really talked ABOUT Marinette towards Gabriel since "Emotion" that isnt just him mentioning her name in logical situations or vaguely talking around the relationship topic like in "Pretention").

But I'm also betting that Gabriel odered Adrien to not kiss Marinette after he puppeteered Adrien back into the mansion in "Adoration" or some other variation of an official grand gesture that Adrien is in a relationship with her. Something that... yeah, DID indeed stop after "Protection", didn't it? (Ooh. That explains why the date was made such a big deal for Adrien's story through the parallels to Gabriel's and Emilie's date in the past in "Evolution"; that was the last time Adrien was able to do something like that...)

But poor Adrien of course does not know the true reason for why he's still hesitating to kiss Marinette even now in "Collusion". He must be so relieved that Marinette is reading it as him needing more time with her too to get comfortable enough to kiss. It's so rough watching all these episodes and seeing Adrien beat himself up and think so low of himself when he's literally being abused through mind-control. All I want is for Adrien to finally have his rings on his hand like Félix and Kagami get to. I just want my boy to be free :'(

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jayrockin · 1 year

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How did you narrow down what story you wanted to tell out of all your characters/worldbuilding/etc? I want to write a graphic novel of my own, but I have so much world and not enough space in comic format to spill it all (which I feel a compulsive need to do.) How do you tell necessary worldbuilding information about biology and the world of RTTS to your readers without just spitting a bunch of exposition all over a page?

Here’s my thoughts on the matter, hope they’re helpful:

Worldbuilding IS narrative. Plot out when you reveal information like you do with story events. You create intrigue and mystery just by showing an interesting aspect of the world and not immediately explaining it. If you connect emotional reveals with worldbuilding reveals, you can heighten both.

Assume readers are smart. Mention or show the most weird and interesting parts of a whole, let them connect the dots.

Decide which parts of the world you want to show off, and route the plot and character roles so they intersect with those details. If something doesn’t fit into the story you’re working on, save it for a short story or an aside.

Include asides. Manga artists have it figured out, inter-chapter worldbuilding notes and 4-koma comics are great. Readers who don’t care can skip them, readers who are curious get more info. I prefer putting these in between chapters because it spreads it out, when it’s all in a blob at the end it feels like homework.

Show vs tell: I can only provide a comics perspective on this. Telling is fine, but avoid having a single “clueless” character who doesn’t know anything for the other characters to explain things at. If it feels unnatural for a character to mention something, find a different way to include the information. Don’t just have the characters talk about The Thing, show them participating In The Thing.

You can show what’s normal for the setting by having characters who deviate from the normal. They require explanation within the setting, thus the world is described in how they interact with it. I use this to the point of abuse.

Another comics-specific thing, but I like to make panels into diagrams and labelled cutaways, and insert mini-panels and non-diagetic bg elements during dialog to show what the characters are talking about. It can add visual interest and humor, and isn’t too obtrusive if you use it judiciously.

#jaytext #writing #worldbuilding

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nanowrimo · 10 months

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Writing Tips for Every Age and Mental State

Not every piece of writing advice will apply to you — and that’s okay! Sometimes, your writing strategies will change as you go through life or learn more about yourself. NaNo Participant Clara Ward shares writing advice that they've learned over time.

There’s no right way to write. Writing—like life—is about finding your best fit. What follows are tricks that worked for me. Please borrow what works best for you right now. (Then save a few ideas for future you!)

I wrote my first novel four decades ago, when I was thirteen. I’ve written while juggling three jobs or zero. I’ve written as a kid, a parent, and an empty-nester. I’ve learned from my own neurodiversity and mental health challenges along the way.

Each struggle taught me how to customize my writing practice. Here’s a list of what worked for me at different stages. Adapt as you see fit.

Stage 1: Meet Yourself Where You’re At

Outline - For my first novel, I sketched furtive notes on the back pages of a school notebook. I created headings for each page that became section or chapter titles later. Numbers helped me order the scenes and letters delineated details.

Note: Leave extra space for fun facts or snippets of overheard dialog. Years later, I heard a NaNoWriMo buddy joke, “Careful, or you’ll end up in my novel.” My apologies to my high school geometry teacher, who received no such warning.

Avoid Distractions - I needed a closed door to write at first. I couldn’t read other fiction during the week or two when I frantically converted my outline into a rough draft. Luckily, I wasn’t in charge of meals back then!

Stage 2: Find Your People

Give Yourself Permission - I first heard about NaNoWriMo in 2004, when I was parenting, working, and volunteering as if there were two extra days in each week. I hadn’t written a story, an outline, or notes in over a year, but I knew exactly what I wanted to write. I signed up for NaNoWriMo and opened a family meeting by showing the webpage to my spouse and kids. I explained how I’d budget four hours a week for writing in November.

Note: I didn’t complete 50,000 words that first November. But the next year, my kids enthusiastically joined the Young Writers Program!

Enlist Support - Eventually, my kids and I designated one hour each day for writing. There were many distractions, but it felt great! We attended NaNoWriMo write-ins at a donut shop to build community, and my kids each persuaded a friend to join. (Yes, donuts are a sometimes food, but at least they weren’t asking for coffee!). With support and determination—and for me, a bit of sleep debt—we all met our writing goals most years!

Stage 3: Embrace Your True Strengths

Emotion Mapping - In the last couple decades, as attitudes and terminology evolved, I’ve learned a lot about my own neurodivergence and mental health. Oddly enough, the self-knowledge I gained by masking and compensating before I knew those words, informed both my writing and the tips given above. As I became more honest with myself, I brought more emotion to my writing.

Note: Sometimes it helps to skip scenes I’m not in a good headspace to write. I jot down key plot and character points inside curly brackets and skip to a scene that suits my current feelings. Since I don’t used curly brackets anywhere else in my writing, they’re easy to search for when I’m ready to go back.

Fascinations - After years of being warned about “info dumps,” I realized that my own fascinations (neurodivergent or otherwise) were assets that could serve my writing. At the beginning of 2020 I did a deep dive into researching sea creatures and ways to protect our oceans. At the back of my research notebook, I gradually outlined my 2020 NaNoWriMo Novel, Be the Sea. Parts of that outline cross-referenced pages of ocean research or articles I’d saved online.

Note: The system above worked well enough for me that I now have a book deal for Be the Sea, which will be published by Atthis Arts in early 2024!

Seriously though, this isn’t a post about how to get published on a 40-year plan. By matching your writing practices to your ever-changing self, you give all your stories the chance to be told. I wish you and your stories that success!

Clara Ward lives in Silicon Valley on the border between reality and speculative fiction. When not using words to teach or tell stories, Clara uses wood, fiber, and glass to make practical or completely impractical objects. Their short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Decoded Pride, The Arcanist, and as a postcard from Thinking Ink Press. Clara’s 2020 NaNoWriMo novel, Be the Sea, will be available from Atthis Arts in early 2024. For updates on this and other projects, follow Clara on their website. Photo by Anastasia Shuraeva from Pexels

#nanowrimo #writing #writing advice #writer's life #neurodivergent writers #for parents #inspiration #by nano guest #clara ward

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wyvernwriterparttwo · 1 month

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How to Design a Large Cast of Characters

Note: While this advice can be applied to all forms of fiction writing, I will be primarily focused on helping you design casts of *playable* characters for games similar to Fire Emblem or other SRPGs. Also, this is mostly going to be the weird ramblings explaining how I personally design large casts, so if these tips don't work for you, don't worry about it.

Something you should know about me is... I love a large cast of characters. Specifically in games like FE. I love looking into the lives of the units who I use in battle and watching them grow stronger, and watching their character arcs. If their villains or otherwise important characters, I love seeing how they influence the narrative outside of my influence and how they can aid or help the main party.

For anyone who's designing games with large playable casts of fun characters or making a large cast for any other project, I feel like this guide will help you a lot.

Step 1: Make Some Characters

This is the easiest step, at least for me. Take a world that you made, and think about characters you want to use for this world. Main characters, side characters, villains, etc.

They do not have to be the most fleshed out, at least at the beginning. They can be a concept you think would be neat for this world to explore. They could be simple concepts you'd want to write or neat ideas you think would be fun to design. Hell, it could even be a character from a story that either died or got cut.

Step 2: Cut and Assign Roles

For this step, you must have a set number of characters you want to have in your playable main cast. For Fire Emblem games, this number usually ranges around 30-40.l playable units.

About now, you should also begin to flesh them out, making them more than just concepts.

You must also consider the themes and world of your story. Who in your list of characters could best explore those themes in some way. Note that not every character has to be important to the plot or masterfully explore the themes of the game.

Once you've gotten a range of main/playable characters, pick the best ones, or thr ones you like the most, and bench the others, and congrats, you have yourself a cast of good guya. Do the same for some of the NPCs or villains, but on a smaller scale, and you have a pretty good list of characters.

Step 3: Make Them Interact

There is one major problem with making large casts...and that is that they are large. There are a lot of characters you must keep an eye on, and they should all do something in the story.

If you focus ONLY on the main character(s), you risk making the characters bland, boring plot devices, or meatshields that add nothing to the story. On the other hand, if you write all characters as if they are important, you risk bloating your story with names and dialog and making the story take too long.

Important characters should be in the spotlight most of the time, but it I'd a good idea to spread it around. Show how some of the more minor characters feel about this situation, maybe have them talk with each other outside of danger, give them relationships with each other. Give em enough for people to want to latch on to

#writblr #writeblr #creative writing #writing #writers on tumblr #writing tips #game development #gamedev

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david-talks-sw · 1 year

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BONUS stuff from the AOTC screenplay...

1. Yoda probing the Dark Side.

In an earlier draft of the Attack of the Clones screenplay, Scene 51 (which I've already talked about here) ends with this comment by Mace, where he explains what Yoda is doing up in his quarters, followed up by Scene 52, showing Yoda meditating:

And it turns out, this is actually a mini plot point in this draft!

Since Qui-Gon's death, the Jedi are actually on the lookout for the remaining Sith Lord, waiting to sense even a trace of him... but then this happens.

And, like, nobody saw it coming! What the hell!

So that leads to this other cut scene (originally set right after Obi-Wan tells Anakin that Padmé "was happy to see us"), Scene 12, which features an evening conversation between Mace Windu and Yoda.

When Yoda says "the dark side of the Force clouds everything", that's not just an expression to say 'he doesn't know'.

The Dark Side has tainted everything around the Jedi, and THAT'S why the Sith have an advantage. Because they're used to it. They were 'born in the dark, molded by it'.

As a result... in this situation, they're the only ones who can foresee the possibilities of the future, while the Jedi are pretty much walking blind, in a fog.

It's not just that the Sith Lord is a master politician and the Jedi are politically inept. It's that, right now, he's the only one who can truly see the future and roll with it, while the only thing the Jedi can do is go forward, have their guard up and hope for the best.

Which a concept explored in the non-canon comic Sithisis from Star Wars: Visionaries (which, if I recall, was created by Derek Thompson after his regular interactions with George Lucas and a 45-minute interview with Ian McDiarmid)!

2. "Sifo-Dyas", aka Sidious

Okay, so some of y'all probably already knew this tidbit. I did, but didn't know it was in this draft of the script so it was a fun surprise:

Sifo-Dyas was originally a pseudonym used by Darth Sidious.

Throughout the script, his name is spelled "Sido-Dyas" (which sounds a lot more like "Sidious").

And when it comes to the mysterious Sido-Dyas, the Jedi talk about him like they've never heard of him before and full-on say he's an imposter.

At some point, there ended up being a typo in the scene where Obi-Wan talks to Lama Su, and the word was mispelled "Sifo-Dyas" and eventually Lucas decided to make him a different character.

Also the Tyranus who hired Jango Fett is referred to as "Darth Tyranus", in this draft, which I guess was changed because it was gonna be to obvious.

But it does indicate that after TPM, they concluded that Darth Maul was the Master, not the Apprentice.

3. Are Yoda and Padmé friends...?

Okay so there's this moment here:

Yoda taps Padmé with his cane!

Thus CONFIRMING that poking/tapping/hitting people with his cane is Yoda's love language!

Seconds later, there's also this line where Yoda tells Padmé to reign the selflessness and politics back and accept their help:

First off, I'm just picturing Padmé just casually kneeling so she can be at Yoda-height and I'm dying!

But also, like... he calls her "Padmé". They're on a first-name basis!

To me, that's gotta be an implication that in the 10 years between TPM and AOTC... I dunno, Padmé visited the Temple while Anakin was off-planet or just met Yoda at a meeting, and now they've formed a bond and they're pals.

If that's the case, then their Ilum mission in Clone Wars (2003) takes a whole new aspect.

And if we're rolling with this idea... how much of Padmé did Yoda see in Luke?? None? Some?

I think it's a case of when Luke is screwing up royally "he's just like Anakin ffs" and then the few times he's actually listening "nice to see you inherited some of your mother's sense!"

Bear in mind, these bits of dialog never made it on the screen but they did make it to the "final" version of the screenplay published in The Art of Attack of the Clones. So if I had to guess the reason for deletion, it was probably for pacing purposes.

Bonus:

Yoda introducing the younglings in his care is such an adorable thing.

Just in general, this scene is great. George Lucas had this to say in the AOTC commentary track:

"This is a chance for me to play with that more mischievous side of his character and get away from the 'official, serious Yoda' that ends up [...] on the Jedi Council, where he really isn't allowed to be as fun and tease people. In this environment with the kids, he's able to lighten up a little bit, which I really wanted to do for his character. It's much more what his character is in the other movies, especially in Empire Strikes Back."

But also... like Yoda is hyping up the younglings! Is that a thing?

Did Dooku & Yoda have competitions and introduce their respective clans like hype men? I'm picturing a scene where Yoda's like:

Yoda: "To a competition, the mighty Bear Clan challenges the Thranta Clan!" Bear Clan younglings: "GROOAAAAH!"

And Dooku is like:

Dooku: "The gallant Thranta Clan is ready to clean the floors with the Bear Clan whenever you want!" Thranta Clan younglings: *POSE MAJESTICALLY*

Glorious...

#I may have had a bit too much fun with this post #star wars #attack of the clones #aotc #yoda #dooku #sifo-dyas #sidious #padmé amidala #padmé #mace windu #george lucas #jonathan hales #script analysis #bts tidbits #long post

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synnthamonsugar · 4 months

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My issue with D2 isn't that it's bad.

Bad media can be, and frequently is, fun, strange, shocking, thought-provoking, entertaining. Bad media often has things to say (even if not said clearly), it's often heartfelt in ways that bigger and more-polished productions cannot be since it's more likely to be the brainchild of an individual or small team instead of a committee of writers working under tight managerial control.

Even through its better-crafted plot beats, I think Destiny (counting both games together here) has often felt bad to me. I say this with utmost love and respect. There are limits to its model of storytelling, and there have always been plot holes, strange bits of characterization, setups without payoffs, weird dialog, gameplay-narrative dissonance, etc. and I think it's easy to focus so much on the high points in its history that we forget that being bad isn't atypical for Destiny, and that this is fine!

The issue is, it used to be that even when it was bad it was genuine, meticulously detailed, oozing with character and heart in every line and lore tab, had bits of world-building and background that made me desperate to know more. It was a rambling story from a friend, who might not have a point but they're so into telling it that it becomes the most interesting thing in the world to listen to. I think, for much of Destiny's history, you could feel Bungie was putting their whole back into it, that the creators made it with love and care. It was impossible not to get invested in return, even when it was a little corny.

The issue is, it doesn't feel like that anymore. It feels like something that's being made because it's contractually obligated. It feels like something neither Bungie nor the creative team wants to put effort into, and I frankly cannot blame the creative team given what we know is going on behind the scenes. That doesn't make it less disappointing or frustrating - in fact it might make it worse because I can't help but see it as something being made under a level of duress. (More than the typical level, for anything made in capitalism.) But it certainly explains why.

And of course, given we know they're trying to make the bottom line there's always the question of how much executive meddling is affecting the story. I definitely have qualms with some of the narrative team, but I do wonder what Destiny would look like today without the stress of meeting sales goals and deadlines.

I think you can sort bad media into roughly two buckets. There's the good-bad media, the kind I talked about, the passion projects bristling with heart and character and vision if nothing else. Then there's the bad-bad ones, the ones that were produced to make a paycheck, be consumed and forgotten ...

My (rhetorical) question is: why should I care about something whose creators don't care about it? If something is a cynical cash grab, how can I feel anything but cynicism toward it?

#destiny #destiny critical #destiny meta

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goodboyaudios · 5 months

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Idk if anyone has asked this but...which listener is your favorite listener? In writing, plotting, powers(if they have any) or story wise?

In other words, which listener was your favorite to write?

Oof, that's a great question. Tbh, I hate listener characters. I understand why they exist, I just hate writing around a character that has, in theory, infinite ways of responding to any given situation. It's headache inducing and the reason why I typically fall into the trap of never letting the listener interact with the scene because it's so hard to write dialog explaining what the listener is doing or saying without it sounding fake. And without a visual aspect, I am forced to do that.

That being said, the one I hate the least is Karmor from BvZ. He has a Canon reason why he doesn't speak during the videos he's in, and I think that's really neat.

#goodboyaudios #good boy audios #youtube #asmr roleplay #asmr boyfriend

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lightandfellowship · 2 months

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KHDR Re:Write - Giving Urd A More Prominent Character Arc

The tl;dr:

Urd’s initial motivation: To explore the outside worlds and learn more about them.

Urd’s struggle: She realizes that when their mission ends, she will go back to her boring, normal life in Scala, once again forbidden to leave. This in conjunction with feelings of loneliness make her consider running away after their mission is complete.

Urd’s conclusion: The freedom to explore the worlds is still a motivating factor, but she realizes that protecting the worlds and sharing her experiences with her friends is her true desire, compelling her to stay in Scala and continue her training. Her loneliness can not be cured so easily, but her friends will help her work through it.

Below the read more is a rough outline of how I would implement this character arc into the story. Be forewarned that it's a fairly long and text-heavy post.

Four notes before we begin:

Rather than this being a full-fledged rewrite where I get to go ham and do whatever I want, instead my goal is to try and demonstrate how the game in its PRE-EXISTING state could have given Urd a more clear and satisfying character arc via fairly minor changes to the dialog, characters, and story. I want to see if this could have been possible without having to expend too much extra time and resources, since it seems like a lack of time/resources/budget is why her story got cut in the first place. So I won’t be doing anything drastic like creating entirely new episodes or anything like that. Same worlds. Same number of episodes. Same sequence of events. Same overarching plot.

Ideally, I would have liked to convey certain details about these characters and their story via secret reports/diary entries. Specifically, the sorts of details that would slow the pace down or feel a little too direct/clunky if addressed within the story itself. However, because of the self-imposed restriction I talked about in point 1 (i.e. no drastic alterations to the game or additions that would require extensive effort to implement), I won't be utilizing such a format, and so I will sometimes have the characters speak a bit more openly/directly about their feelings/thoughts than I otherwise would've liked.

Because I have a lot to say, I won't be providing summaries of the episodes I'm discussing as I explain my story changes. A fairly solid recollection of the game's events is...perhaps not required, but certainly helpful for understanding what I'm talking about and how I arrived at my choices.

I don't claim to know better than the writers or even be an experienced writer myself, this is just how I personally would approach giving Urd a more prominent character arc, because I think we can all at least agree that Urd didn't get enough focus in this game. If Urd's story hadn't been cut (presumably), I have no doubt that Tomoco Kanemaki would have come up with something better than what I'm proposing here.

But anyway, without further ado:

Urd's Motivation and Personality

During the flashback where the underclassmen explain their reasons for wanting to become Keyblade Masters, Urd says that it’s because she wants to explore the outside worlds and learn more about them. However, I feel that KHDR could do a better job of depicting this motivation throughout the game. Were it not for Urd directly stating her motivation in this scene, I don't think you could have ever reasonably guessed that this was her motivation based solely on her dialog and actions throughout the rest of the game.

She says her dream is to see the outside worlds for herself, and yet she rarely ever shows any particular interest in the Disney worlds that she does visit, or at least she’s no more interested than the rest of her friends are, which is to say: barely. It's a common gag/occurence throughout the game that the underclassmen are either disinterested or unsettled by the worlds and their inhabitants, and for whatever reason Urd is included in that. Sure, she’s on an important mission, but where’s the curiosity? Where’s the desire to learn more about the worlds? Shouldn’t that motivation bleed into her actions and dialog even a little bit? Even if she’s trying to reign herself back for the sake of the mission?

I think having Urd be just as indifferent/detached from the worlds as her friends is a misstep, personally. So in this rewrite, I am adjusting her personality a bit, in contrast to Hermod who doesn't really require any personality changes in order to have his arc make sense (to be discussed in his rewrite post). In short: I want her to be more excited and inquisitive in each world. I want her to be enamored by all the strange sights and sounds. I want her to get lost in thought as she analyzes some new find, her friends having to snap her back to reality and remind her of their mission. When the rest of the characters are awkwardly trying to ignore some oddity that's demanding their attention, I want Urd to be one of the few who actually shows genuine interest.

Like I mentioned, I know the characters are on an important mission and aren’t supposed to get sidetracked from their primary goal, but like, Vor and Eraqus were allowed to be curious and easily distracted by stuff, so I don't see why Urd couldn't as well, at least a little bit. I also think this personality change will provide more variety among the underclassmen, specifically in how they interact with the outside worlds.

Anyway, for the sake of not making this post any longer than it needs to be, I’m not going to list every dialog tweak that needs to occur in order to accomodate this personality change, just the most notable ones I can think of.

One last thing: it’s under-explored, but the game seems to suggest that Urd might be lonely. When remarking on how close Eraqus and Xehanort are, she says that she wishes she had a relationship like that herself. The implication seemingly being that she doesn’t feel like she has any best friends to share a special bond with. I think this desire for a friendship like Xehanort and Eraqus' may be further evidenced by the fact that she tends to tease Eraqus the most and is pretty friendly with him in a way that she isn't with the others, which makes me think that she's indeed jealous (in a nice way) of the relationship Xehanort has with Eraqus, and thus attempts to mimic their dynamic with Eraqus.

To me, Urd being lonely is too interesting of an emotional angle not to expand upon, even if the writers didn’t intend for her one-off comment to mean anything deeper. And I think her struggling with feelings of loneliness will synergize well with what I have in mind for her story.

Episodes 1-4: Establishing Urd's Character

The first dialog tweak: when Odin informs the class that they’re being sent on a mission to the outside worlds, in addition to Eraqus and Bragi expressing excitement at the news, I want Urd to be excited, too. She can still have her “Don’t sound so excited about it.” line, but maybe after she says that she makes her :3c face because she can’t hide her true feelings. Eraqus can reply with something like “Speak for yourself, Urd! Getting to see the outside worlds is a dream come true for you!”. Hermod and Eraqus can then have their usual lines of H: “Hey, this is serious! People are missing, you know!” and E: “Right. Sorry.”

As cool as the party member specific dialogs in Episode 3 can be, I’m dropping the mechanic where Episodes 1-3 let you choose your party member for the cutscenes. IMO, it's just bad for the story, because you can never focus on just one particular character and properly illustrate their unique personality; everyone's dialog has to be juuust generic enough to be easily swappable. Instead, in my rewrite, Urd is your assigned party member for Episode 1; perhaps she's even the one who requested to team up with Xehanort and Eraqus.

Not much happens in Episode 1 admittedly (it's mostly an exposition dump and premise setup), but in the very least it needs to establish and emphasize her love for exploration and learning. I think this can be easily achieved with the pre-existing Agrabah scenes. For example: when the party arrives to the outskirts of Agrabah and is attacked by Heartless, have Urd be disappointed that their first trip to the outside world was soured by their presence. When the party enters the abandoned city proper, have Urd express further disappointment that there’s no residents to interact with. Things like that. But obviously still have her be serious about their mission and the missing upperclassmen; she shouldn't seem selfish in her interests.

So Episode 1 is just kinda whatever, but It’s in Episode 2 that I definitely want her desire to learn and explore be in full force (she’s your primary party member for this episode as well. Which also synergizes with my Hermod rewrite—stay tuned for that, eventually). Everything in Wonderland is so strange and different and fascinating to her. The other characters find the world confusing and off-putting, but Urd finds it charming and unique. This does admittedly require Episode 2 to have some extra cutscenes/events since in the base game the only thing that really happens in this episode is the trial, and I think it’s still essential for Vor to be the party member in Episode 3 (where most of the Wonderland hijinks happen) since Vor doesn’t get much screentime in the second half of the game.

Two changes I would suggest: rather than the party waiting around indefinitely for the other underclassmen to show up to their meeting spot, and having the Cheshire Cat and Card Soldiers come to them, instead they get worried and decide to leave to go look for their friends, while running into these characters along the way. Then, take the tea party scene from Episode 3 and put it in Episode 2 instead, before the trial happens. You could even use this scene to foreshadow the trial by making it so that the White Rabbit fretting over his broken watch is because he doesn’t know what time it is and he fears that he’s going to be late for the trial. This will require some dialog tweaks in Episode 3 because the characters have an important discussion there that involves the Mad Hatter and March Hare, but it's nothing too hard to work around; maybe they just visit the tea party a second time, maybe they just bring up their interaction with them from Episode 2, or maybe they only talk about the Tweedles instead. There are multiple routes you could take to accomodate this change.

And rather than the Cheshire Cat directly telling the party that their friends are locked up, and the Card Soldiers mentioning the trial, instead I want the whereabouts of the other underclassmen to be more of a mystery that the party has to solve, with Urd being the one picking up on most of the clues just by being her inquisitive and observant self. Eraqus says it himself in some optional dialog that Urd has "always been good at figuring things out".

So ultimately, it’s Urd who realizes that the “trial” mentioned by the White Rabbit (because in this rewrite its the rabbit who mentions it instead of the soldiers), and the other “trespassers” mentioned by the Card Soldiers, are both in reference to their missing friends. (And maybe the Cheshire Cat gives the party a legit riddle too that they solve together, rather than being fairly straightforward in his hint like he is in the base game). Thus Urd paying attention and finding inherent worth in the strange and nonsensical world of Wonderland is what saves the day, her natural curiosity and collected knowledge about the world and its residents coming in clutch. This way, her motivations and personality can also be directly integrated into the plot rather than just being a character side story, and she gets the opportunity to shine, too.

And to tie in to the loneliness angle, I think some of the other underclassmen should be a little confused by Urd’s enthusiasm for the worlds they visit. Not in a mean or insulting or putting her down kind of way (they are friends!), but just a little at a loss for how to react when she expects them to understand her feelings and her point of view. The plot doesn’t need to highlight this too directly, just have Urd’s classmates being confused/unsure of something Urd says or shows them and then have Urd looking a little let down at their lukewarm reactions. Much like the underclassmen unintentionally leaving Vor out of stuff and underestimating her, I want this to be kinda subtle and under-the-radar. This would be mostly meant as set up for her arc later.

All that being said, I imagine Urd's loneliness isn't just because her friends don't always Get Her on a deeper level, it's also because she's not really open about her true feelings a lot of the time. Her official bio states that she's relied upon by the others, so perhaps she's too scared of burdening her friends with her own issues. However, relationships are a two-way street, and she's partially preventing herself from forming that close bond she desires because she isn't really letting herself lean on her friends when she needs them.

Episode 5: The Problem/Conclusion

So, to summarize, Episodes 1-2 need to establish her love for exploration and learning (and also give some brief glimpses at her loneliness) since she’s not present much in Episodes 3-4. Episode 5 is when her side story needs to officially complete. A rather quick arc, admittedly, but I think that’s what would work best in the framework of what the game gives us; the base game seems to suggest that her arc was supposed to end in this episode, anyway.

Events start to unfold when Urd realizes that once their mission is over, things will go back to normal and she will no longer be able to explore the outside worlds until she becomes a Keyblade Master. Something that might not occur for YEARS; heck, something that might not occur AT ALL if she fails her exam or if Scala's rules change. Thus, she starts to question whether she even wants to return home to Scala. What if, after their mission was over, she ran away? What if she got to explore to her heart’s content? She can’t imagine returning to her boring, normal life now that she’s gotten a taste of freedom. And maybe she can discover a way to cure her loneliness by finding fulfillment elsewhere? Perhaps it was Vor leaving in the previous episode that makes Urd realize that leaving is even an option.

Thus, in this rewrite, in Episode 5 when Lumiere offers Urd an invitation to stay in the castle, she actually seriously considers it. Of course Hermod and Xehanort are not happy to hear this, especially after what happened with Vor, and thus try to convince her to reconsider, but Urd is conflicted and doesn’t know what to do. She explains her concerns about being stuck in Scala forever, but is understandably reluctant to talk about how Eraqus and Xehanort’s strong bond has only reminded her of the closeness she desires and yet lacks. She loves her friends, but she doesn’t feel like she has a best friend who understands her on a deeper level, and she’s too scared of potentially hurting her friends’ feelings to admit this, so she keeps it to herself.

Xehanort doesn’t say it out loud, but he understands exactly the feeling of being stuck somewhere against your will and desiring connection and fulfillment in the outside worlds. He tells Urd that she should follow her heart on this. Hermod is taken aback and anguished at the situation, but doesn’t know what he can say to make Urd change her mind. They decide to just shelf the conversation for later so that they can focus on their mission of finding the culprits who stole the rose.

Vala witnesses this argument and decides to use what she's learned about Urd to her advantage (much like how Vidar witnessed Vor's conversation with the Mirror and then used that to his advantage). So when Vala finally approaches Urd, rather than trying to order Urd around (which didn’t make much sense as a tactic to begin with; that approach would have worked far better on Hermod, if you ask me) instead Vala tries to convince Urd that she can have the freedom she wants if she joins Vidar’s crew. She can explore to her heart’s content, with the benefit of having comrades at her side to keep her safe on her journey rather than having to run away and travel alone.

Vala, perhaps through her ambigious "vision" abilities, also correctly guesses about Urd's loneliness and tries to appeal to Urd’s desire to be understood by claiming that she and Urd are very much the same. They are both level-headed, analytical individuals who crave knowledge, and sometimes people are just too blind in their pre-existing beliefs to understand their (Urd + Vala's) "vision" of the world. However, Urd is unsure. She still doesn’t understand what Vidar is trying to accomplish, and as much as she wants to run away and find meaning elsewhere, if securing her freedom means having to harm the worlds alongside the upperclassmen, then she doesn’t want to do it. Plus, the thought of traveling the worlds with the upperclassmen rather than with her friends doesn’t sit right with her, despite everything.

Much like in the base game, Xehanort eavesdrops on this conversation, but this time Hermod has tagged along as well. In the base game, Xehanort alone eavesdropping on Urd and Vala doesn't really lead to much in the story as far as I can tell, because Urd reveals her conversation with Vala in the very next episode. I think this might be a dropped plot thread where Xehanort was supposed to sit on this secret information for a while longer before acting on it somehow, but in any case, it's no longer necessary for my rewrite, thus Hermod is now here as well. Perhaps Hermod initially tries to approach Urd right away, but Xehanort pulls him back and convinces him to stay in the shadows in the hopes that Vala will reveal something important about Vidar's plans.

As they eavesdrop on the conversation, they finally learn of Urd’s secret loneliness, and see that Vala might successfully persuade Urd to leave them just like Vidar did with Vor. Hermod simply can't let this happen, and so against Xehanort's wishes he bursts into the room, interrupting Urd and Vala’s conversation to grab Urd’s hands and tell her how much she means to him and their friends. He doesn’t invalidate her feelings, but apologies for making her feel so lonely. He never meant to make her feel like she was different or weird for her interests; he may not always understand her, but he thinks she’s amazing and brilliant. And he’s willing to help her in any way he can and support her in whatever she decides to do. Perhaps he and Xehanort even bring up how her interest in the worlds was essential to saving their friends in Episode 2, to show her that she's valuable and appreciated.

Hermod's impassioned and sincere speech along with her own misgivings about Vala's offer help Urd realize two important things. One, that she enjoys exploring the worlds so much precisely because she gets to share that experience with her friends; it wouldn’t be the same without them. Yes, maybe there’s still this feeling of loneliness inside of her, and maybe she still wishes that her friends and her were more on the same page about certain things, but sharing a laugh, fighting by their side, and just getting to spend time with them are still precious experiences for her, and not to mention, her loneliness would be so much worse if she didn’t have her friends by her side at all. It’s not perfect, but she still loves them dearly, and she knows they love her back. And who knows, maybe they’ll be able to help her work through her feelings now that the cat's out the bag.

The second thing she realizes, is that exploring and learning about the worlds and its people, though a big part of her motivation, is ultimately secondary to wanting to protect the worlds and its people. Which is what being a Keyblade Master is all about, really; a goal that can only be achieved by staying in Scala and continuing her training. And a goal that would certainly be jeopardized by assisting the upperclassmen.

I imagine Urd directly talking about at least some of her thought process here when she refuses Vala's offer and explains to her why, but the rest should probably just be implied. In any case, these two realizations make her change her mind about running away. As she says to Lumiere later:

Her home is with her friends in Scala, and she has the important responsibility of protecting the worlds she holds so dear.

And when Urd says “[The Beast’s] wish will come true, I know it.” she’s implicitly including herself in this statement. She knows she’ll gain her freedom one day and form the bonds she's looking for, she just has to be patient and believe in herself. Additionally, I want this line to now invite comparisons between the Beast and Urd: the Beast, lonely, trapped inside his castle, wishing for a genuine connection, ignorant of how he is surrounded by servants who love him unconditionally; and Urd, stuck in her little world of Scala, wanting to find fulfillment in the worlds outside, feeling distant from her friends despite them loving her deeply. Oh, and, perhaps Urd telling the servants to help keep the Beast's spirits up could parallel how Urd is now going to allow herself to rely on her friends for emotional support.

Finally, to make her untimely demise a bit more of a gut punch, I think it’d be fitting if Urd got to have some dying words. Maybe something like “But I never...got to...” Got to what? Become a Keyblade Master? See all her friends one last time? Explore all the worlds? Who knows, she doesn’t get to finish. That’s for your imagination to decide.

And yeah, that's my pitch. Thanks for reading this far. If you have any feedback, ideas, or criticisms, feel free to add on.

#khdr #kingdom hearts dark road #kh urd #kingdom hearts #rambling about dim path #ch tag: ur #khdr spoilers

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coffeebeanwriting · 2 years

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Writing Dialogue Tips

1) Slang. Consider how your character’s past and upbringing might change the way they refer to things. Does your character refer to a dog as 'pup’ or ‘beast’? If the latter, was it because they were attacked by a dog as a child? Another example would be referring to a girl as “lassie” or “chick” or “lady”. These all display a different cultural upbringing.

2) Action. Mix in action with your dialogue to make it more natural. As humans, we rarely just stand straight like a post while talking. We move our hands, fiddle with things, have nervous ticks, etc. A great tip is to add in a prop for your characters to mess with while they talk. For example, a soldier talks to a newbie about the harsh realities of war while he cleans his gun.

3) Make sure the dialogue advances the story. This could be revealing a secret through dialogue, further developing your characters, creating or breaking relationships, physically pushing the plot forward, creating conflict for your crew, etc. Some authors go as far as saying to cut any dialogue that does not aid in the progress of the story.

4) Naturally reveal worldbuilding through dialogue. This one is pretty important as it helps to prevent info dumping. If your character arrives somewhere new and knows nothing, or you need to explain something to your readers that is unique to your world, dialogue is a great place to do this. Give your character a mentor who can explain the way things work, or have them meet a character to who they ask questions.

5) Don’t overuse catchphrases. Giving your characters a unique phrase that they say often can bring them to life. Extra points if this phrase enhances your worldbuilding by being unique to your fictional realm. However, if the catchphrase is said too much, it can become unrealistic and a bit annoying to the audience. Here are some examples of catchphrases:

“Cauldron Boil Me!” - A Court of Thorns and Roses “Thank the Maker!” - Star Wars “Old sport.” - A Great Gatsby

6) Not every character knows the truth. To write enticing dialog, it can be smart to keep in mind that not everyone knows everything. A young man raised in a small village would not understand the slang or politics of a bustling city. Therefore, the way he talks and what he says will be vastly different than the city folk.

7) So... create conflict and false truths. Expanding on the previous point, if your character doesn’t understand something... it can be human nature to pretend that we do. Does your character spread false information to the reader and characters? If so, this can be a great opportunity for twists and epic reveals.

8) Using said is okay. You've heard it before, so I won’t say much, but you don’t always need flowery dialogue tags. Sometimes using ‘said’ and be much more impactful.

Instagram: coffeebeanwriting

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harbo-urr · 9 months

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Alhaitham's and Kaveh's relationship in the Sumeru arhon quest: new perspective (for me, maybe for you too!).

Oh it will be long...

It started with my short thoughts about their first on-screen dialog and how it feels different now compared to a year ago, but then spiralled into me re-watching the entire Sumeru archon quest to properly analyse Alhaitham's hidden struggles during it and Kaveh's (not big but) actual plot relevance.

Disclaimer: I'm aware that English VAs were way more emotional then Chinese, especially in 3.2, but, for the sake of having the information to analyse, lets believe that at least the official eng text of their interactions is more or less correct... (I'm sorry I only know English and other languages most likely have translation errors as well anyway).

I'm also assuming that you've read their character stories and know their more deep personalities, not just "cold smart guy and artsy broke guy".

Anyway, I hope someone will find the analyses below as entertaining as I do.

1. Kaveh and Alhaitham: what we see during their first on-screen interaction.

Now, let's all time travel into the day when the last part of Sumeru's quest dropped. These sweet days... Version 3.2, two versions before we got Alhaitham as a playable character and four versions before Kaveh. By this point we've already known a little information about Alhaitham, mostly from the archon quest itself, and next to nothing about Kaveh.

Well, we knew some info, but it was mostly leaks and speculations, nothing more than "a genius architect who lives with Alhaitham because he is broke".

Now, if you didn't read the leaks and just carefully played the quest, you could actually catch some phrases here and there that implied that Alhaitham lives with someone before it was openly confirmed, but again, it's not specific at all. That is why our first meeting with a brand new sexy blond boy was so extreme in all ways. It was beautiful, emotional, entertaining and... extremely toxic. Both Alhaitham and Kaveh behaved surprisingly aggressive (calmer in Chinese but still more negative then what we usually see now). It was fun to watch, and made a lot of people including me really interested in those two from the get go.

But re-watching this dialog now after almost a year felt... Weird. Yes sure, they bicker, it's their thing, but if you compare any other scene with them later it's not nearly as intense... especially on Alhaitham's side (yes, even if you don't listen to va and just read the lines).

So it got me thinking. Why did Alhaitham behave like that? Was it a random writing decision for the drama effect? Or was there something more going on that I didn't understand?

After going through everything from start to finish I believe that yes, there was. But I'll need go through a lot of content recap to fully explain what I mean.

2. First aka "the first on-screen" aka "Where were you when Sumeru needed you most!?" dialog

It is essentially our first glimpse of Kaveh, which we catch in the library on the search for Alhaitham.

Kaveh has just returned to the city so he has no idea what is going on. The shown interaction starts with Kaveh demanding Alhaitham to put his book away and explain what is happening at the Academia. The fact that Kaveh is already pretty irritated when we first see him tricks us into thinking that he's a short-tempered overly dramatic guy, which is...

Well, partly true, but having already experienced how sweet Kaveh actually is we can see through that and realize that Alhaitham most likely was ignoring Kaveh's questions for some time now, and that's why our Kaveh was already on edge when we started. Already weird and we're just at the first line.

After that they bicker a little, Kaveh again asks about the Academia, on which Alhaitham answers: "Oh? I thought you would already knew the inside story."

Then they bicker again (2) and Alhaitham goes hard on Kaveh here. He even agrees with Kaveh that he doesn't say anything nice about him, because "anyone who knows you as well as I do would do the same". DAMN, Alhaitham, that's brutal even for you, why are you so mad, is something bothering you? Oh well..

Then they bicker again (3) and Alhaitham proposes Kaveh to move out of his house, but Kaveh ignores it and tries asking about the Academia again. Alhaitham ignores it as well and says "Forget what's going on with the Academia, haven't you been busy with your construction project?".

Kaveh doesn't want to answer this question and says that he's "getting angry just thinking about it" (worth noting). Kaveh then wants to change the subject again, but Alhaitham doesn't give up and asks about Kaveh's project again ("Where were you when Sumeru needed you most?").

Then they bicker again (4) and Kaveh leaves to ask around.

Huh, that was heated...

Lets do a little bit of unpacking.

So, Kaveh wanted to know more about the Academia and Alhaitham was constantly changing the subject. It can be read as Alhaitham mocking Kaveh just for the sake of it, but if we pay a little more attention to what Alhaitham is saying every time he interrupts Kaveh, it becomes more interesting.

1) "Oh? I thought you would already knew the inside story."

2) "Forget what's going on with the Academia, haven't you been busy with your construction project?"

3) "Where were you when Sumeru needed you most?"

Each time Alhaitham changes the subject, he talks about Kaveh being away for the time of the quest. Let's remember the golden rule of miscommunication conflicts: to understand what actually bothers your opponent you need to spot a repetitive theme in their words. And Alhaitham has a pretty clear pattern. Interesting.

But let's move on to the next dialog.

3. Second aka "second on-screen" aka "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?" dialog

Kaveh returns after asking around and confronts Alhaitham about it ("WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?") (just a funny line). After some bickering (5) Alhaitham agrees to finally tell him what happened. He mentions that Kshahrewar sage was a part of conspiracy as well on which Kaveh reacts surprised and says "...could this be why they sent me out on a project?". However Alhaitham replies that it's just a coincidence and proceeds to suddenly go hard on Kaveh again, saying "whatever you were doing won't have any significant impact now or in times to come" (auch, Alhaitham, auch). Then they bicker again (6) and the dialog ends.

This interaction is more relevant to the "Kaveh plot relevance" section, but the important things for now are:

Kaveh: "...could this be why they sent me out on a project?"

Alhaitham: "I think its just a coincidence ... whatever you were doing won't have any significant impact now or in times to come."

And why is it important?

I find the flow of this whole conversation to be very weird, since it goes "confrontation - agreement - information share - speculation - confrontation". In other words, first Alhaitham doesn't want to talk, but Kaveh persuades him, learns about the sage, brings up his mission in the desert, and Alhaitham returns to the confrontation mode again.

It can be interpreted as Alhaitham just using every opportunity to disagree with Kaveh just cause, but at the same time his words sours exactly after Kaveh talks about him being missing from the quest. Coincidence? I don't think so.

All these little things got me thinking. Why is Kaveh's absence so triggering for Alhaitham? Sure they're close or whatever, but they both value their freedom very highly and it's probably not too rare for them to disappear for a day or two for work. Why is it such a big deal now?

But then I also remembered that Kaveh, basically the only family Alhaitham has (yes I call people you willingly live with a family, its my life experience), went missing from home exactly when the fishy stuff at the Academia started resurfacing. And he was gone for a long time, at least for the duration of the quest, which is about two in game weeks.

Even if Alhaitham is not a very emotional person, he still values family, home, routine and comfort very highly. So, in theory, the sudden empty house should have affected him in some way, right? That's how I decided to check Alhaitham's behaviour during the archon quest and it was.. interesting.

4. Alhaitham's side of the Sumeru quest, with me fillng in the gaps.

Let's think about all these quest days from his perspective.

You're simple logical guy who already for quite some time lives with an annoying but kind of endearing roommate, who you drink coffee with in the morning and often discuss intellectual or not really stuff. Sometimes you argue but he's perspective on life fascinates you as a scholar, so you don't mind it too much. Ultimately you're just used to him in your life.

Then one day you go to your work, which brings you just enough money to feel completely comfortable, but you start feeling that something fishy is going on behind the scenes. Some sages disappear, your archon is treated like a power source and there are weird rumours about the divine knowledge capsules. Then you get a sudden assignment - investigate a blond traveller with a talking fairy. And sages propose to pay you with the divine knowledge capsule.

Suspicious. If it's such a big deal, why would they promise you it as a present for a simple spy work?

You decide to get to the bottom of this and for this you need to buy the capsule yourself. You're sure that the infamous merchant Dori has some, but you're definitely in the black list as the Academia's scribe... Ah, how lucky is it. Your roommate just so happen to have a strong connection to Dori. If you give him money and an excuse why he needs the capsule so much she would definitely sell it to him. It settled then.

You come home. But you're roommate isn't there. You wait. He doesn't come back. You're confused and decide to check using you're connections at the Academia, and... he suddenly was requested to the desert? And just left? Why would he leave exactly when everything was going to get weird? Did he know something? Did Academia want to temporarily move him out of the picture? Maybe they did something worse than that? Was it all a coincidence?

You don't know and you have no time. You need to spy on Traveller. You need to buy a capsule. It seems that you're alone in it.

Dori didn't sell you a capsule. That wasn't unexpected but still worth the try. You decide to make the mysterious traveller to buy it for you. It went great. You find out more about capsules, you steal one yourself. You realise that the divine knowledge offered by the sages was a trap to dispose of you. Your roommate still didn't come back. It's been what, almost a week? Whatever. It's nice and quiet at your home.

You meet Traveller again on your way to the desert to investigate the source of the capsules. You run into Cyno and a bunch of other people and you seem to finally get the lead to answers that you wanted. You find out that the capsules were extracted from the brains of scholars who were send to the desert by the Academia and then abducted. You're roommate was also sent to the desert by the Academia. Uh. He's fine. You have your problems to deal with.

You and your unexpected but quite pleasant team find out that sages want to create a God. It seems it's time to rescue your archon. You came up with a pretty good plan. Noe you need to return to the city after these couple of days in the desert. When you come home, your roommate still isn't there.

The next day your team is preparing for the plan and Cyno says that you all need to go home and have a good rest.

"...Thankfully I had my place to myself recently. It's been nice and quiet."

"...Huh?"

Dehya stares at you confused.

You didn't realise that you said it out loud and you're not sure how other people deal with situations when they say something without thinking.

"Oh, nothing"

You went home and slept alright.

The plan worked, Nahida was saved, sages punished, akasha destroyed, your comfortable routine is safe again. It's still nice and quite at home, so you go to the library to read some books.

"Alhaitham, what happened in the Academia?!"

You hear a familiar voice. After all this time he returns like nothing happened.

5. And this was a recap of Alhaitham's side of the archon quest!

Interpretations can vary of course, but the way I see it, Alhaitham was very bothered by Kaveh's sudden disappearance. He clearly expresses that he wishes Kaveh was in the team during the quest ("Where were you when Sumeru needed you most?"). From this we can guess that Kaveh really left without any warning and had Alhaitham known about it, he would most likely stopped him.

I think Alhaitham quickly found out where Kaveh was (connections) but he had no means of contacting him quickly and maybe didn't even know the exact location. At first it was a minor inconvenience because of the Dori situation, but he probably wasn't bothered to much by it. But after he found out that sages actively tried to dispose of him by making him insane, he probably realised that the situation was way worse that he initially thought. And Kaveh still was somewhere in the desert with no means to contact him.

So what Alhaitham does next? He goes to the desert. Yes, it was for the plot reasons, but let's agree, he at least considered a possibility that he could run into Kaveh there. But he never did. And what's more, he found out that the Academia was abducting scholars and sucking their brains out. Let's be real, the theory that Kaveh was send to the desert for the reasons connected to knowledge capsules, most likely was on Alhaitham's mind, and in a bad universe it could've been correct.

Well, Kaveh did return home after all. But by that point Alhaitham's supressed stress about this whole situation was so great, that it resulted in him being genuinely salty at Kaveh during their first on-screen dialog and even saying "Well, maybe then you should move out of my house" - which, at least from my point of view, is way worse then his usual teasing about Kaveh being broke and homeless or whatever.

6. About Kaveh's role in the archon quest besides making Alhaitham sad

Ag, that's a very fun topic. I don't know how I totally missed it the first time, maybe it was the lack of respect for Kaveh, idk, but he was 100% purposefully sent away for the time of the quest.

Sages wanted to move him out of the picture just like they wanted to do with Alhaitham using knowledge capsule. Except they knew that Kaveh would not be too interested in the capsules. So they needed something else to remove him... Like a sudden very urgent request to build a children's hospital somewhere very deep in the desert for people who are literally dying without it! Huh, well, I just made it up, but I believe that sages came up with something very similar.

Kaveh is the type of person to jump straight into any charity he sees and ask next to none questions about it, so it would be the easiest way to send him away for good. Plus I believe that it could've been the reason why he didn't talk with Alhaitham about it and disappeared so sudden. Children are dying! No time for talking! But then he arrived to the said place in the desert and it was just a mess. Maybe a fake project, maybe literally nothing, maybe a trap. In other words - not the project he was told he is needed for.

It's something that we don't get spelled out for us (Alhaitham even denies it cause he's angry at that moment), but timings are just too perfect to be a coincidence. And that's not the only proof - Kaveh himself heavily implies that there was something very fishy about this mission.

He straight up avoids answering Alhaitham's questions about it, and says "Thinking about it makes me angry". Why would he say this about the Academia project? It's not like he had a specific annoying client. Kaveh was sent as a representative from the Academia to be the head of some "construction project" after all, he presumably was the boss there. So it can only mean that there was something wrong with the project itself.

Plus immediately after he finds out that his sage was a part of the conspiracy, he says "So that's why they sent me there", which further implies that whatever was happening on that mission in desert – it was either absurd (if the sages just wanted to keep Kaveh away for some time) or very dangerous (if they wanted him dead). Unfortunately Kaveh's the last person who would tell us about the danger to his life, so we can forget about learning what the hell was that mysterious mission.

Ah, and about why would sages want Kaveh away. Sure it can be because of his connections to Alhaitham, but…

I think anyone who knows Kaveh more then 10 minutes would know that if he found out what sages are planning to do with a literal child and what they do to other scholars, he would die but not let them continue all of it. And he is quite popular among students and citizens alike, so he could've been a potential threat for the sages.

Makes me wonder how many other potential dangers did sages eliminate in some way for their plan. Probably not too many, but still interesting behind the scenes of their actions.

AND NOW, AFTER ALL THIS THINKING, I FINNALY, FINALLY, WAS ABLE TO UNDERSTAND ALHAITHAM'S FINAL LINES IN THE ARCHON QUEST.

Let's return to the end of the act 5. After we had a feast at the Grand Bazar, we were able to one last time talk to each member of our Sumeru-rescue team.

Alhaitham said this:

Which was always bothering me, because:

One: He suddenly becomes quite sentimental and talks about happiness, which is cool to see, but at the same time... He very rarely talks about subjective emotions. And what's more, he seems genuinely enjoying the thought of it. He isn't really the kind of person who gets his sense of satisfaction out of someone else's happiness (it's one of the things he parallels Kaveh in), so what's this all about?

Two: He extremely abruptly switches the topic to point out that he "seems to have taken both keys when he left the house" (tbh I thought that I accidentally clicked on him the second time and it's the new dialog, but no, it is all specifically a one long dialog).

Well well well. What do we have here.

When I first read these lines I decided that's it's just a weird writing without normal conversation flow. First Alhaitham is satisfied that he's plan worked and his daily life is safe, but says it through pointing out that other people are happy rather then explicitly stating that he's happy. Then he yaoi baiting us with "haha, harassing Kaveh is so much fun" and that's all there is to it.

But.

Now that we know more about Alhaitham's daily life during the archon quest, let's think about the keys some more.

He was able to take both keys because Kaveh was at home and his keys were there either. On his way out to meet us, Alhaitham saw Kaveh's keys on their usual place and took them as well, ultimately making Kaveh unable to leave the house. Which also means...

Kaveh will definitely be at home when Alhaitham returns after the feast.

So if we flip everything based on this logic, Alhaitham tells us: "This is a great evening. This gathering is special. People are finally happy. They feel happiness from the bottom of their hearts. And when I return home there will be someone waiting for".

Which is. So. PRECIOUS!.. Something clicked in my brain when I first realized this meaning and these lines are finally making a lot of sense!

It's the perfect final words for his little character journey in this quest. He protected the life he had and loved, everything and everyone were back to normal again and for him it is a true happiness felt from the bottom of his heart. Just precious.

Final words

Anyway, yes, that's why I believe that during the archon quest Alhaitham was actually constantly worrying about Kaveh at the back of his mind and maybe even feeling lonely, which resulted in his great boom of toxicity during their first on-screen dialog, but after some time he cooled down and slipped into his usual happy comfortable and not "nice and quiet" life again.

And fuck the sages for sending away our boy Kaveh (who actually knows a lot about desert since he works there often) and making our rescue-Nahida-group one competent person shorter.

Thanks for your time and tears, you, the person who read this!

#you can read it both as platonic or romantic #haikaveh #alhaitham #kaveh #kavehaitham #sumeru archon quest #character study #sort of?#my text

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sweetgaleria · 9 months

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Just watched the ladybug movie with a friend and i want to share my thoughts

Things that i liked: -chat noir calling ladybug a watermelon -their miraculous glowing when they need each other (or when there's an akuma? idk, the movie didn't make it super clear) -ladynoir practicing fighting together!! It was so cute! I wish the show had more moments of them just being silly and hanging out outside of battles -Sabine, Gabriel and Nathalie's models looked great -the times careless whisper started playing made me laugh so hard -Marinette's dress was super pretty -I like it that their magical outfits weren't indestructible -them being literally stronger together was cool -The final scene when she takes his mask and puts it on her face to say she's ladybug

What I didn't like -the movie felt like a bunch of scenes glued together by spit and a half assed prayer -why was everything happening all the time with no explanation -the characters barely had time to connect to make their relationships feel genuine -that made all the important scenes have no emotional impact for me, I only cared about the characters because I already knew them from the show -this is just my personal taste but their designs/models were so... round? idk, I didn't like it that much, they looked kinda weird to me -"the power of love" being important out of nowhere?? -a lot of things just started happening without rhyme or reason, the movie didn't explain their powers at all and also -WHERE'S THE LUCKY CHARM -also the dialogs felt so out of place? Marinette asking her mom at the start how should she go after her dreams just felt like it was put there to make marinette sing -oh and this movie had the audacity of being a musical and having zero good songs -also I understood that she's insecure from the first song, didn't really need the other 3 -how Marinette went from "I'm too scared and I can't be a super hero" to "this guy sucks and I can beat his ass" in 0.5 seconds -why was plagg like that -also why was adrien chosen to be chat noir here? did plagg just fly inside the first house he deemed worthy of his presence? first place he could find cheese? where's his moment of selflessness? -Ladybug had no importance for the plot. at all basically. If all it took for Gabriel to quit being hawkmoth was realizing he was hurting his son.... what is left for her to do? -after god knows how many songs about believing in herself, her final battle she still felt too weak to fight and she still wasn't important for it - did i already say that the scenes had no emotional impact? -her speech to paris at the end just fell flat -again, ladybug had basically no importance in this movie

In the end the movie looked nice and it was fun to watch with a friend but I, personally, didn't think it was good. Had some nice things in there but that was it for me

#miraculous movie #miraculous awakening spoilers #miraculous movie spoilers #spoilers #honestly the best part of the movie was seeing ladynoir again #but i feel like i only care about them because i know them from the show

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talltoontales · 28 days

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// Kung Fu Panda 4 Rewrite \\

PROMPT: Kung Fu Panda 4 felt a little lacking, wanted to try my hand at maybe making it better.

PROMPT BY: Me (ToonMan)

STARTED WRITING: 03/29/2024

Alright, Ground Rules:

Jack Black’s cover of “One More Time” by Britany Spears is amazing, and I will not argue otherwise.

This rewrite is coming from my enjoyment of the series, not just bashing a “bad movie” for the sake of bashing. So, if you’re just here to hate, you’re in the wrong place.

I’m not a professional writer. I only started writing semi-consistently this year. So, take this rewrite with a massive grain of salt.

To make this whole process easier on me, no world-shattering changes.

Zhen’s still gonna be chosen to be Po’s successor

No Furious Five for most of the movie

No killing or reviving characters that don’t originally die or return.

We good? Good. Now, let’s get this party started!

/////

So, the opening fight doesn’t need to change much, save for one thing. Tigress fights alongside Po. Seeing that she’s the only member of the Furious Five to get any development in these movies and has the most chemistry with Po, it makes sense. The two beat…whoever Po fought in the intro (I think it was a stingray that could fly) and have a short dialog after explaining that Tigress, along with the rest of The Five, have moved on from being warriors and transitioned into being teachers/masters of their respective styles.

SIDE NOTE #1: I know that Po and The Five are already masters, but in my head, master sounds like a better term for “teacher” than sensei.

I like this better than having The Five be “on a mission” or whatever excuse was used to keep them from helping Po in this movie. Also, seeing that the main lesson Po needs to learn by the end is to move on from being a warrior, having The Five, his long-time heroes, retire around him helps get that ball rolling.

Po is honestly excited for Tigress and offers to support her however she needs it, just like he does with the rest of The Five. However, Tigress uses this moment to, not so subtly, ask if Po has any plans on doing the same. Po gives a vague, jokey answer before the two walk off into the title screen.

\\\\\

Back in the Valley of Peace, everybody’s celebrating Po at his dads’ noodle shop, but the celebration is interrupted by Shifu summoning Po to the Jade Place.

SIDE NOTE #2: Let me just take this moment to say that while their scenes in the movie do basically nothing for the plot, Ping and Li deserve a short or web series or something. They were seriously a joy to watch every time they were on screen together. #CoParentingGoals

First major change is why Po needs to become a master:

“As the world moves on, so must we. As to stand still is to be left and lost to time.”

Right now, Po is at the top of his game. He’s mastered Kung Fu, led and kinda trained The Five, found inner peace, beaten General Kai, and mastered Ki. However, there will come a day when Po faces a foe he cannot beat, a foe that can challenge Po in a way that he can’t adapt to, as Tai Lung did to Shifu or Kai to Master Ooguay.

Those who become Masters don’t do so because they’re past their prime; they do so because they know the world in which they thrived is coming to an end, and in the new world that follows, their wisdom becomes more needed than their fists. To lose such wisdom could be detrimental to the next generation of heroes. Of course, Po denies that he has any real wisdom to give (aside from food), only seeing his value as the Dragon Warrior. However, Shifu has never been a patient man.

The next day, Po is just messing around the palace when four warriors (No Mr. Beast Pig) attack him. During the fight, Po mocks his would-be assassins by pointing out all their errors. Shifu then stops the fight, explaining that this was a test to prove that Po is more than ready to be a master and to introduce Shifu’s candidates for the new Dragon Warrior.

Still firmly in denial, Po and Shifu go through the Peach Tree Scene the exact same way. The only difference being that when Po notices Zhen breaking in, he thinks she’s another candidate who was late or something.

A broad change I’d make that I can’t really put in writing is just to put a pinch more focus on the fight scene. KFP4 had the most out of the series at seven, but they all felt like an afterthought.

To make Zhen a bit more unique, she’s more of a “fight your surroundings” kind of fighter. She’s never standing still, never uses the same weapon more than twice, and never really fights head-on. Po can claim that she’s not fighting fair, which she’ll laugh at before he locks in and captures her. This fight being short is expected because Po is a Kung Fu legend and should have no problem taking down a random thief.

SIDE NOTE #3: Totally a personal opinion, but did bother anyone else that they named the fox Zhen? Not that the name was bad or anything, but we already have Lord Shen and those names are waaaay too similar…You know what, here’s another change. Zhen is now Vox.

Fast-forward a bit, and the two are now traveling together. Po explains how the Staff of Wisdom can’t be stolen; it must be given, and Po shows Vox genuine kindness and generosity. Vox thinks it’s some kind of long con but accepts it anyway.

The Friendly Bunny goes about the same as it did with Vox being the loot goblin she is, but I don’t want this to be an actual fight. It’s more like Po trying to keep the situation under control. Keep Vox from stealing, protect Vox, protect the helmsman, protect the bunnies, and keep the entire restaurant from falling over.

Instead of getting knocked out of the restaurant like a fool, Po uses his weight to force the patrons away from the exit, and with a mighty leap, Po exits the Friendly Bunny with Vox, the Helmsman, and the bunnies and lands on the boat like a boss. While sailing to Juniper City, Po talks about his dads, but Vox doesn’t share her backstory. Instead, mentioning how the Bunnies were safer at the restaurant.

Introducing the Chameleon and Entering Juniper City goes about the same except that Po and Vox get caught because Vox keeps casually stealing, which she does undetected, but the police only notice when Po is trying to return the stolen goods.

In the Thieves’ Den, Vox isn’t hated, but the vibe is still the same. Everyone casually messing with/ stealing from/ hurting everyone else. They find Han, who says something to the effect of “never thought I’d be seeing you again,” gives them a map of the chameleon’s temple and the scene goes on as usual from there.

/////

Alright, time for a BIG change: The Chameleon’s Motivation/ Plan/ New Name

Every other villain in the Kung Fu Panda movies has an actual name, and if I had the power, Chameleon would be named Tai Zhi for reasons that are probably obvious now but will be explained later.

Tai Zhi’s new backstory is that she was bullied, and all she could do was hide, just camouflage, no shapeshifting yet. Until one day, she learned about Kung Fu. Tai Zhi would find a master, they’d train her for a little bit, then they’d sense how evil she was and kick her out before she could learn anything actually dangerous. She then found a dark master in hopes their similar moral alignment would convince him to train her. Instead, he was the first master who refused her outright, verbally destroying her before threatening her to leave.

Tai Zhi then turned to sorcery for her claim to power but could never let go of Kung Fu. So, she found a way to open a door to the spirit realm, but there was a catch. Equivalent exchange, she’d kidnap citizens of Juniper City and sacrifice them to the spirit realm and get a D+ spirit at best in return. To get around this, she’d need the Staff of Wisdom, and she could get anyone she wanted, no matter how strong.

SIDE NOTE #4: Tai Zhi isn’t collecting the money from the mob bosses for any particular reason. It’s just a power flex. I assume she needed the gold and stuff for her cages, but they never made that clear in the original move. Plus, why would she buy the metal when she can just steal it.

\\\\\

Vox finds Po practicing Kung Fu, and Po offers to teach her. Vox doesn’t believe him, but Po reassures her he’s being 100% honest. He teaches her some basic stuff, and she picks it up pretty fast, and when she doesn’t, Po incorporates what he’s seen Vox do into his lesson. This all leads to a short spar where Vox almost beats Po but gets cocky and loses to a good ole’ fashion belly gong.

Vox questions why Po does what he does: He offers a thief a cookie, saves those who want to kill him, and teaches a thief his own moves. Po opens up about how Oogway chosing him to be the Dragon Warrior changed his life for the better. He’s made friends across all of China, found his biological dad and his people, and saved China at least three times—all just because of one moment.

Because of that, Po believes everyone deserves the same chance, no matter who they are. Those words visibly touch Vox as she almost reveals her big secret before the two are kicked out of the Thieves Den. Po and Vox sneak into Tai Zhi’s lair, and things go about the same. Now for how Tai Zhi met Vox…

Vox had been a thief well into her adult years, and a really good one, but she was tired of stealing, tired of watching over her back every second, tired of not being able to walk the city streets without seeing her face on a wanted poster. Vox wanted a new start where no one would know who she was. The problem was that most people in Juniper City were pretty poor, even the mob bosses, and Vox didn’t feel comfortable forcing someone else into poverty. So, the choice was simple: steal from Tai Zhi. Even one gemstone from her temple would set her up for life.

At the same time, Tai Zhi needed to steal the Staff of Wisdom from the Dragon Warrior, but due to all the stories she’d heard during her research, she didn’t want to risk taking him head-on. She needed a thief, and it just so happens that she knows about the best thief in the city. Tai Zhi sets up a fancy trap to bait Vox, who sees it, knows it’s a trap, but falls for it anyway. However, Vox manages to escape without a scratch until the artifact she stole is revealed to be Tai Zhi in disguise.

Tai Zhi marks Vox with a tracking spell, and while Tai Zhi could care less about Vox, there’s a pretty big bounty on her head. Not to mention, she’s stolen from some pretty powerful people who don’t really care about the reward. All Vox had to do was bring the Dragon Warrior to Tai Zhi, and she’d not only lift the curse but also let Vox take whatever she needed to disappear.

SIDE NOTE #5: I’d have Vox always scratching her neck because that’s where Tai Zhi marked her. She’d just play it off as if she had a flea problem.

Now, I don’t hate the “Villain raises a child to betray the hero” thing. It just doesn’t hit the same in the movie. We’re not given enough time to feel Vox and Po bond in the original movie. Also, if you’re like me and are unable to not analyze movies while watching them, you noticed almost immediately the aztech-esq earring Vox wore and figured out the twist.

Plus, I feel like having Vox be a reluctant thief just trying to get out of the game makes it a little easier to explain how she can betray the Tai Zhi in the end.

Now, I obviously cut the amazing Ping and Li scenes so how does Po not fall to his Death? The answer is simple: watch the Po vs Tai Lung fight again.

Seriously, go watch it. I’ll wait.

…

Done? Pretty awesome, right?!

Anyway, we can have Po swing from tree branches while fighting the lizard soldiers until he hits solid ground, or we can re-do KFP2 and have him fall into a river or large body of water. Back at the temple, Tai Zhi and Vox go through with the ceremony, and we’re keeping the bit about the blood moon—it’s honestly the funniest joke in the entire movie! Now, for the big reveal I set up a while back.

/////

Tai Zhi summons Tai Lung from the spirit realm and calls him “Master.” Before he was freed in KFP1, Zhi broke into Chorn-Gom Prison to free Tai Lung in exchange for training. Instead, Tai Lung verbally destroys her, insulted that Zhi would ever believe he needed her help. Maybe even have him almost brute force his way through his restraints just to scare her.

After Tai Lung’s death, Zhi took the “Tai” part of his name to never forget how weak and powerless Tai Lung made her feel. She steals Tai Lung’s skills and proceeds to wail on the guy, maybe even paying homage to the end of the Tai Lung vs Shifu fight, before throwing him into a cage.

Tai Zhi then releases Vox from the tracking spell and gives her a choice:

“Stay by my side and witness my rule or help yourself to however much treasure you can hold, find the farthest, darkest corner of the planet, and pray I overlook you.”

Then we cut back to Po at the bottom of the temple for the Po vs Vox scene. The only change I’d make here is just making the fight longer, showing off how much Vox has learned on this journey as well as how outclassed she is compared to Po.

Vox reveals that she is gonna to run away, and wants Po to come with her to help save as many people as they can. Po refuses but is proud of Vox and her mission, saying that if he can’t beat Tai Zhi, he’ll buy as much time as he can for Vox to escape with her people.

While Po goes Assassin’s Creed on the temple guards, Vox returns to the thieves' den and tries to convince the criminals to do the right thing because “it’s the right thing to do.” When that fails, she reminds them that if Tai Zhi is taken down, they can loot all the treasure stored in her temple.

\\\\\

As the army of thieves goes to war with the temple guards, Vox sneaks in after Po. Inside, Po sneaks around as Tai Zhi fights General Kai, noticing other warriors and Lord Shen. He’s then stopped by Tai Lung, who’s disappointed in Po and remarks how Oogway may have been wrong in the end.

Kai loses and is thrown in a cage as Po makes his dramatic entrance. Tai Zhi gives the staff back and does her “you and I aren’t so different” monolog, which Po acknowledges. There’s a possibility he could have ended up like Tai Zhi if he never became the dragon warrior (Throw in one of his villains laughing in disbelief), so he offers Tai Zhi a chance to be better than the villain she is now, to learn from him.

Tai Zhi then proceeds to mock Lord Shen, General Kai, and Tai Lung about how Po stopped all of them from achieving their goals. The mocks Po, claiming that for all the good he did, for all his adventures, no one in Juniper City and beyond has ever heard about him and that once she’s done with him, Po will become what he was always meant to be, nothing.

-OR-

Have Tai Zhi call Po weak because he needed a master to make him the Dragon Warrior. Just to have the line, “Alone I mastered magic, took over the entire criminal empire of Juniper City, defeated all of your greatest enemy and treasured masters, I am my own master!”

Now, something about the original Po vs Tai Zhi fight bothered me. Across three movies, over and over again, there’s always a moment where Po gets to nerd out over Kung Fu legends and flex his knowledge. He even figured out the Wuxi Finger Hold on his own. Yet, he’s going one on one with the ultimate echo fighter of those same warriors and his knowledge does nothing to help him. Let’s fix that.

Here’s how this fight could have gone: Tai Zhi changes into a warrior, Po does his nerd bit while caught off guard, but he then picks up on the fighting style and proceeds to body Tai Zhi in record time. Rinse and repeat that a few times and then Tai Zhi tries to use Po’s old villains which backfires horribly. Eventually, she runs out of warriors and must repeat, and with transformations getting predictable, Po starts winning the fight. Until…

Tai Zhi's frustrated that she has the forms and skills of at least one hundred kung fu legends, but she can’t beat one dorky panda. In that frustration, she loses control of her shapeshifting and mixes two forms together, catching Po off guard. Tai Zhi then starts using chimera forms to gain the advantage, but before she can deal the finishing blow, Vox swoops in and saves Po.

The two hatch a plan to make Tai Zhi so mad that she loses control long enough for Po to use the Staff of Wisdom to return the stolen skills. The plan starts to work as Tai Zhi turns into that chimera dragon form, but before Po can use his staff, Tai Zhi grabs Vox, forcing Po to save her by making Tai Zhi crash.

In the aftermath, Vox finds Tai Zhi transformed into Po, and we could have a short chase before the real Po saves Vox. Po has Vox find and bring him the staff while he fights himself, which does not go well at all. Tai Zhi traps Po in a cage before Vox can get the staff back to him.

Vox is now the only one who can stop Tai Zhi. Vox tries to fight Tai Zhi head-on like Po but fails miserably. However, Vox notices that the entire temple is fit to collapse. So, Vox sticks to the shadows, taking potshots at Tai Zhi, and every time she transforms, whoever she transforms into tells her their weakness/ tell from their cage. This continues until the temple starts to collapse, and as Tai Zhi tries to escape, Vox fights her head-on again to keep her inside (this is where she’d scream, “You fool! You’ll kill us both!”).

As the dust settles, Po stands up from under the rubble and helps Vox up, noting that he could have escaped earlier but she was doing such a good job and didn’t want to interrupt. The other spirit warriors get from under the rubble and thank Po for freeing them. As Po prepares to open a portal to the spirit realm, let’s say Master Wolf tries to sneak attack Po from behind but gets decked by Tai Lung, transforming back into Tai Zhi.

Tai Lung mocks his wannabe successor by saying; “first lesson, know when to quit.” Tai Lung then steps out of the way, and Po returns all of the skills to the spirit warriors. As they return to the spirit realm, Tai Lung acknowledges Po and what he’s become and also recognizes his “pupil,” referring to Vox. Not wanting to be outshined, though, he takes Tai Zhi with him into the spirit world, finally taking her on as his student, whether she likes it or not.

And the story ends basically the same: Vox and Po return to the Valley of Peace, Po offers to train Vox at the Jade Palace to Shifu’s frustration, and credits.

/////

Wait! One more change…

Shifu meditates under the peach tree with Po joining him shortly after that. Po can’t meditate to save his life, so Shifu questions why he’s here. Po admits that Shifu was right, that it’s time for Po to pass the torch, but also thanks Shifu. Po knows it wasn’t easy for Shifu to train someone like him, but he did, and because of Shifu, Po has never been happier with his life.

I don’t know if this will be the last Kung Fu Panda movie, but if it is, I’d like a nice moment between Shifu and Po and maybe ghost Oogway. Just wrap a nice bow on it.

///// The End \\\\\

And that’s it—that’s the rewrite. Wow! That’s a lot of words (3,573, to be exact). Like I said, I’m not a scriptwriter. I’m just a guy with a little too much time on his hands. Kung Fu Panda 4 was, and still is, a solid movie that I’ll definitely watch again, along with the other three, and so should you.

I had a total blast writing this, and I hope you enjoyed reading it.

#kung fu panda #kung fu panda 4 #rewrite #writeblr #writing #writers on tumblr #writerscommunity #writing blog #jack black #still an amazing movie #aaaaaand that's MARCH

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