#also a bit related to this but to me the emotional climax in the finale was actually Yuuri's free skate and him breaking the record | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mdhwrites · 1 year

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I'm sorry to vent about something Owl House related again, I imagine you're getting sick of it by now, but

Maybe it's just cause I love Lilith, but the duel in Agony of a Witch kinda bothers me because it feels like it invalidates Lilith as an equal to Eda.

With Convention, it felt like Lilith, while often mocked, was Eda's equal. Their duel feels evenly matched, maybe with a slight edge to Eda because she plays dirty and Lilith doesn't, but in terms of sheer power they feel equal.

Then Agony of a Witch throws that out the window by showing that Eda is so much more powerful that she can be dying from her magic-draining curse and still kick Lilith's ass with no problem.

And I know it's satisfying to see a hero wreck a villain, but it has the side-effect of making Lilith no longer appear as a powerful character, which is made worse because her only "fights" from that point on are punching a racist (which is cool but not really "apex of arcane power") and getting one-shot by the Collector. Retroactively it takes Eda's relationship to Lilith from "plausible threat" to "Just humoring her"

and not to compare two bad bitches because I do love these shows, I think Amphibia did this better with King Andrias. Despite being knocked around on occasion, and having plenty of humiliating moments, Andrias retains his menace in part because he's never actually beaten by the heroes. At worst he gets blindsided before composing himself and returning to being terrifying.

I dunno, maybe I'm biased by I would've liked it if Lilith got to remain a badass instead of being reduced to just comic relief. Make her duel with Eda more even, and have Eda ultimately gain the upper hand through cheating, dirty tricks, and being more desperate

(I don't mind the TOH asks at all. No one has even asked about Willow yet somehow so to say there is so much more to talk about this show is an UNDERSTATEMENT. Honestly, I just wish people would also throw story concept pitches at me from time to time too so I can actually remind people that I do writing as well. XD Not that I expect to write those stories but just how would I handle them and what not.)

I think the problem is more that last paragraph you bring up than anything else. Mind you, I actually do agree that it would have been cool to see Eda's strengths being more in cheating and dirty tricks versus years of training and secret knowledge only able to be accessed by an EC coven head but… Man TOH just kind of pushes the idea that you're born gifted or not. There is no real inbetween in power for most people and that really sucks.

I don't think the fight in Agony of a Witch is bad though, mostly in that I see it more as the emotions Eda is channeling effectively is overclocking her. If Lilith could last even another minute, it wouldn't be the curse that beat Eda: It would be running out of magic. A candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long sort of thing which works well for the emotional climax that's supposed to be happening there. Narratively, it works well.

Also, while Lilith is the definitive loser there, she doesn't come off as weak. It just finally feels like we're getting to see what Eda could have been without the curse. Back in Covention, we see what she is because of it. Does that suck for how strong Lilith actually is? Yes but Eda is literally years younger than her and back in school this was the same case where Lilith could just see "Oh… I'm fucked because my sister is strong… For reasons." It works for S1's tone, leaning into issues with the fantasy genre honestly (but remember, Episode 2 said no chosen ones so shouldn't merit, you know… matter? How much effort you put in?) but…

Then we get to S2 and Lilith is FRUSTRATING for me in S2. She gets such a good first episode in S2 with handling no longer having magic, dealing with the loss of her place in the world, her ambitions shattered and making a new friend. She stumbles a bit during King's episode but hey, it's okay for a character to be comedic for one episode. And she get's to actually represent the curse in Affearances!… Before being a joke for the rest of the episode about mommy issues until she turns into the Owl Beast.

And then when we see her next she has fully transitioned into "Look at me! I'm as bad as Hooty! Take me seriously? DON'T YOU DARE!" And it is… awful. There's no two ways around it. People go "Oh, but it's returning to better days for he-" No. No it's not. Every single portrayal of young Lilith wasn't funny or about history or anything like that. She was a driven young girl who wanted to be the best witch she could. She wanted to be the top of the class. She took pride in her effort and success. She had ambition and was more serious than her sister.

And now she's a complete joke. A complete joke that claims to have been bad at her job, even though she seemed so happy anytime she was inspiring people, mentoring them, seemed more than competent if not just amazing. She was the head of the Emperor's Coven and she seemed to deserve that position.

And then they did literally nothing with her in regards to that. There is a slight nod to the concept of her wanting to strike back at Belos for the lies and damage he'd done to her but it's instead framed as just a prank and kindness to Eda. Because that Scrying Spell should have been the start of her real arc. Her wanting to get back at the man who wasted so much of her life and learning that devoting one's self to only a single goal is unhealthy no matter what.

Personally, I still wish Lilith had harnessed Luz's anger about the petrification, the coven system, Belos, etc. and helped her be a rebel LOOOONG before Hollow Mind. Trying to be her new mentor in how to take down Belos and possibly corrupting Luz with her own anger and fixations until something goes wrong and both are taught to be more reasonable. To actually lean on others. To not only fixations.

Or, I dunno, we could entirely ignore the fact that Belos tried to murder three of them and wants into the human realm and instead just focus on a bad but sad boy who's now a main character instead of the SISTER OF EDA AND NOW REDEEMED VILLAIN LILITH.

When people tell me more time would have made the show better, shit like this makes me go, "No," because the writers had no focus, no idea of how to actually follow up their plot or character hooks and it's just a complete, fucking mess.

A mess that makes me very sad because focus could have made it so much more amazing than it was. Could have made it rival Avatar. But I guess you wouldn't get "Cool Aunt Lilith" so who am I to complain?

#Lilith #TOH #Rambles

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unforeseen-idiot · 6 months

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Emperor Pickletein Rides the Bus

Oh boy, the grand finale of a grand series. To be honest Princess Labelmaker is more of a climax to the series than this book is, but that’s ok. I like to think of this book as a great epilogue, just helping our favorite characters get to their happy endings and giving us some fun stories along the way. This book is interesting since it’s a story being told in semi-real time. At least the case file follows one singular day and some of its entries happen in real time. This is just a cool idea and helps keep things fresh. Anyway though this book also focuses on our main 7th graders even though Remi and Murky get little chapters of their own (some more fulfilling than others *sob). Dwight and Kellen are fun in this book since they basically just vibe the whole time, absolutely no drama whatsoever (I mean Kellen did the paper airplane thing and got mad at Lance, but Dwight was perfect). Some fun stories include Sara’s first chapter with her field trip haikus (I’m not really surprised that Sara writes haikus), the tragedy of Mrs. Porterfield and the TURTLE, Sara again, getting Rhondella to stop texting her Bib Fortuna boyfriend, and made you look because it’s just so accurate to middle school. I liked the use of Fruit-i-gami Yoda since it kinda helped show that our main cast doesn’t really need Origami Yoda anymore and neither does Dwight, he was there for a few final bits of advice to finish the character arcs but he wasn’t as common. This serves to my theory that as the story of the books go on the kids need Origami Yoda less and less (when the series starts every chapter is dedicated to a kid asking for advice but now Origami Yoda is hardly even present) and Dwight, who I think used him as a way to relate to his classmates that couldn’t understand him, is now ready to let go of him since he has a support system now and people who have grown to appreciate and understand him. It’s honestly a great character arc that I definitely couldn’t pick up on as a kid. And with that we have Harvey who carries around Pickletein, an annoying jag who just serves piss everyone off. I remember starting this book thinking why is Harvey doing this, he’s on our side now. But then I actually thought to answer my question, why is Harvey doing this, and I realized (like Tommy does later) that Harvey has similar mental processes to Dwight but handles them differently. He has a lot of passion and emotion, but it goes unnoticed since like Dwight, people don’t really understand Harvey. I think that Harvey sees Dwight adjusting to life, but Harvey still hasn’t and can’t understand why, if Dwight can do it why can’t he. So he makes Pickletein so he can have some way of relating to the world on this field trip. But when he keeps pissing people off on this field trip they all get rightfully mad at him and it’s all building in him, finally when Tommy gets kissed by Sara he just can’t take it anymore and punches him, and he immediately regrets it because he’s not a bad person, just emotional and confused, and when Tommy forgives him that’s the understanding he needs to finally find peace in himself and gain the same support system that Dwight has. Ok I realize I may be reading to much into that and I don’t have any basis for this knowledge, but it’s how I see it and I think it’s a great character arc for the both of them. Back to the fluffier stuff, the astronaut ice cream thing was hilarious throughout its time, and the fact that it paid off so well kills me every time. Amy and Lanlan have the funniest and realest time ever in this book, honestly Amy is so real in this book. The great respect given to the Bell X-1. Freaking Mr. Good Clean Fun. The ending showing how everyone has grown into better people thanks to Dwight and Origami Yoda (and that Dwight really hasn’t changed, rather the people around him changed for the better), and that Origami Yoda is in fact real I believe it. In conclusion, thank you Tom Angleberger for creating an amazing series and ending it properly.

#origami yoda #nostalgia #stooky #Bossk and Boba Fett are hilarious #Emperor Pickletein Rides the Bus #Thank you #Respect the Bell X-1

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beachback · 9 months

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Hi there buddy, my name is Athena. I'm coming to say hi, see how you're doing and this is a chance to ramble about your wips. What's the biggest wordcount you've ever achieved on a wip?

Sorry I haven't gotten around to this yet I've been a bit busy D:

I've made quite a bit of stories, but the ones that I qualify as wips were the ones I got more serious about. So I have a bunch of untitled documents with one to ten pages of beginning a story, only to never work on it again xD

So then as for that, I've only had about five serious wips --- four after quarantine hit and I decided to try being a writer, and one before when I was simply dilly dallying in the art. xD

My first wip in quarantine (titled "Paodd Scrunch", a keyboard smash name plus the version where I stopped adding spaces after every paragraph) was me trying to seriously write, but looking back I know how many mistakes I made, not just within the project but how I set the project up. It was a story 100 years after an apocalyptic virus, containing zombies, shape shifters, and made-up human-like creatures that were bodies of whizzing mass/energy.

I wrote almost every night with really mostly just emotions to guide me. This meant that the plot? Nowhere to be found. It was all character relations and conflicts charged with emotions and toxic, but also confusing behaviors, since I would forget what the character's theme, internal conflicts, and desires were supposed to be like 😭.

But I did have a lot of fun watching book tube, book reviews, writing tips, and writing commentary videos. I really had a blast in quarantine having so much time to learn. In the end I wrote two books of it, although in the second one I only summarized the last 150 pages of. But all together it hit about 121k words in nine months (I titled the final document "The Big Boy: Large Paodd Scrunch") So that's my biggest word count! :0

My next wip was titled "NEVER FALL IN LOVE IN THE OCEAN" and was also focused primarily on character relations and conflicts amongst each other. The main character was trapped on a floating, planked island in the middle of the ocean, with other characters who had a deal to say about her and their own internal conflicts and behaviors. I wrote the climax during the plane and decided I hated it. I didn't like what it led up to. So I tried rewriting everything, the whole thing multiple times. I never found the solution. So I decided to put the draft aside, and see if I could find a better solution a few months or years down the line. In the end I reached 57k in about five months.

My next draft was about Grace, a Fragmented beast that had a great amount of power and was put in an education/facility for it, and Luna, a new scout who needed a Guardsman for her journey. This started out as a comic, but I soon decided to develop it novel-wise. I enjoyed working on this one a lot, but as I continued writing it, once again I felt that the plot was not thought out, and it felt like it didn't lead to much. Once again I was disappointed, having not planned much of the plot but more of the premise, and wanting to work on character relations more than plot, that I tried rewriting it again to add more story. This only lasted a few pages, and I was losing motivation from not understanding how I wanted the story to go. Once again I have put this draft aside, but I actually have looked at the first wip recently and I did like what I saw. Perhaps I will work on it again in the near future. In the end I have reached 28k words in two months.

My current wip is titled "The story of Cat Vegas" (actually it's "cat begas" on Google docs xDDD). It started out with me writing a short story about Jerry Cat and Serious Baby, the two toys I bought at an antique store and brought to school to show my friends. I really fell in love with their characters. Eventually I developed the world that they were in, and I decided to work on the lore, the landmarks, etc. for some mega world-building, but started again with simpler world-building based on an old Minecraft world of ours. Decided there wasn't enough plot, started again. This time I really worked on the plot, and how I wanted the story to end, working on it multiple times so I could feel satisfied with it. Feeling satisfied, I had started rewriting it in a thick journal, taking it with me wherever I go. I started it in June, and am still working on it. I have not transferred it to Google docs yet, so I have no clue how much the word count is. But I'm excited to see where the story is going!

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ramshackledtrickster · 2 years

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Oof ok I’ll get to posting a drawing later today I swear but WOW a I loved turning red so much

If I had a nickel for every movie to come out of Disney (it’s an umbrella Corp so I’m wording it like this) to tackle generational trauma in POC families,,, I’d have two nickels! Which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice.

But yeah turning red is AMAZING and back to back with Encanto it’s,, so good. Honestly some things hit harder for me in turning red though since it’s a Chinese family in America (Which hey!! Me too!!) and the mother and daughter’s relationship is like. So immediate and so nuanced and ugh theres so much to gush about.

It got me thinking abt the symbolism and metaphor of the red panda in the movie and of course it’s about embracing yourself and puberty and growing up but I couldn’t help but read some cultural ideas into it.

Some spoilers under the cut while I explain myself!!

So the red panda is abt embracing your emotions and your true self yea?? But I also really think it’s abt your cultural ties and heritage too. When Chinese immigrants came to America and Canada, there was still a lot of stigma (same could be said for other immigrants from other ethnicities and cultures too bc xenophobia was and still is very strong— lots of relatability across the board here I think) so those first generation immigrants almost always hid away signifiers for their cultures. For Chinese, it was language, food, writing, articles of clothing, etc— and people still judge us to this day for language appearance food clothes the way we express love— all things culturally embedded and hard to understand for westerners (especially the love part). So sealing away the panda is essentially a form of assimilation into western culture and western expectations— it’s no longer an inconvenience.

That’s a huge conflict of the movie within Meilin— she wants to be herself but she feels like embracing her culture and tradition and embracing her friends+Canadian middle school culture is mutually exclusive when that really isn’t the case. She is just as valid and true to herself when she embraces both and all aspects of her (that’s another thing that makes the climax with the Cantonese chanting and the boyband music so good like,,, the meshing. And that harmony is what is truly coming from the heart. Mwah). And showing her embrace something her family has hidden away out of fear of judgement is just,, it hits. And it made her ancestor Sun Yee proud. Look at her smile in the final scene, she’s so happy to see her descendant be unapologetic for her Panda and unapologetically be herself. I’m proud of her too.

Of course the panda can take on multiple metaphorical meanings, and you don’t have to read this deep into it, but it’s something that struck a chord with me especially. I grew up in China, and I’m half Chinese (mom’s Chinese, dad’s white), but I can’t tear myself from my culture while I live in America. And I get defensive. My culture is beautiful, and I’m glad I could make my own way in america and like the things I like while keeping this close to my heart. There’s something to be said about how the previous generations had to hide it the most and keep it private since people weren’t as accepting back then, and Chinese people were often made scapegoats if they weren’t of service in one way or another (see yellow peril). But in the newer generations, there’s definitely a boldness and pushback to say hey I’m here. I’m here because of my family’s sacrifices and I’m here despite how they may worry for me and what others may think of me.

My mother tells me because I have some white features, I should say I’m European of some kind so people won’t hate me for being half Chinese. I can’t help it and I can’t hide it, and if people don’t like it and only want to exploit it, then tough. I think my ancestors would be proud of me too for trying to keep my culture close in this fast paced, changing (rapidly degrading) world.

I know I went on a bit of a tangent, but yeah! Those are some of my readings of the Red Panda metaphor based off my own experiences n my family history. The metaphor can mean many, MANY things, but hey why not offer a lil bit of my own insight.

LOVED this movie!!

#turning red #pixar #personal??#racism mention

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chireikiden · 2 years

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Almost a year ago, when Gensokyo of Humans ended, I talked about doing a little retrospective post on it. Never did, but Ashiyama’s new manga finally reminded me of it. So here you go: a bunch of emotional, kinda stream-of-consciousness rambling, mostly about the emotional things I like and not the practical critiques I also have. Memory being what it is, the former have far overshadowed the latter, anyway.

HEAVY SPOILERS FOR GENSOKYO OF HUMANS. GO READ IT, YOU. Also CW for neurological disease, and the depression and suicidal thoughts of fictional characters.

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I’ve said it a couple times, and it sounds a bit corny, but it’s the way it feels to me: translating especially emotional content feels like you have to almost physically take in the emotion of reading it, and try to pass it into the translation as undiminished as possible. Reasonable enough so far. And of course, this means that you have to take it in as honestly as possible, dwell on it through the whole process of actually translating it without letting it shrink from the first reaction you as a reader had, and kinda push it to its strongest at the moment you’re writing the line, as the weird translation equivalent of method acting or something. Then potentially keep revisiting it as you proofread, typeset and all that. For this reason, translating emotional stuff (that I’m invested in, anyway) is a way more intense experience to me - in a good way - and leaves a stronger mark than simply reading it. I can’t say I do much original creative writing, but I bet there’s some similarities.

Anyway. Plenty of doujins have done this, but out of SCoOW so far, mainly just Azuma Aya’s Shinigami and Gensokyo of Humans - the latter far more so, and at length. And it follows that though I also liked the art, the writing (though it had its oddities), the Gensokyo lore and whatnot, when prodded about GoH, my first impulse is to start rambling about the emotion. Which is what I’ve done in this post, for like an hour or two.

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Akyuu’s problems – both the new crisis in Gensokyo of Humans and her situation in general - are caused by the supernatural, but still extremely human, in a way that is evocative both on a general level and for all too many people’s personal experiences. I have lost a close relative to Alzheimer’s (which other people have also brought up in relation to GoH), though never went through it myself of course, and certain parallels are obvious: dementia and memory loss are brought up from the start, but the absolute worst of Akyuu’s despair coincides with when she stops recognizing the faces of the people closest to her. It’s subtle enough that you could even miss it on a quick read, but the page in chapter 13 when we see (and Akyuu sees) that this even includes Kosuzu begins the emotional climax, and is one of the most loaded in the series. It’s a weird subject, because we see it from the person’s own perspective, but for reasons of selection bias, most readers with experience have only seen it from the outside; but it still stings.

However, from Akyuu’s perspective, the mental deterioration itself is not what causes her the most struggle: it’s the feeling that her only value as a person, and the only value people see in her, is what she produces and the status that she brings to whoever can claim possession of her. When she can no longer write, they immediately move on to thinking about the practicalities of her death. Something something capitalist experience, but anyhow: “I’m not afraid of death. I was afraid of ending up like this. Of realizing none of it matters.” On a factual level, she’s known her fate since she was young, but the bad thing wasn’t living that way: it was having to feel like not only had she lived that way all along, now she had nothing left to do but to die worthless. She’s also spent most of the story wanting nothing more than to see her friends, but now when she finally does, what she sees when she looks at Kosuzu is only the final proof that all hope is truly lost.

I’m very consciously not using words like “realize” above: Akyuu can’t “realize” she has no worth, because obviously, she does. I’m 100% one of those people who couldn’t care less about “power of love” stories as a kid, but as an adult, is absolutely moved to tears by them. And I think it’s 100% clear in GoH that this would’ve been resolved far more like a regular incident if Akyuu'd had Kosuzu (and Reimu and Marisa) by her side from the start. Much of the first half is about both parties just trying to meet, hoping or knowing that this would solve everything, but of course one of the biggest plunges in Akyuu’s morale comes around the halfway point when Kosuzu does reach her, only to be physically torn away. Eventually her isolation starts becoming self-imposed. And it’s not merely about solving “the problem”, anyway, because the actual problem in the story is ultimately way, way secondary to the emotional snowballing it causes in Akyuu. The content of Akyuu’s life is in the people she cares about and who care about her, not just her work, and being deprived of them is what really brings her to the edge.

The emotional core of GoH is, in the end, about being plunged into the depths of despair, your biggest regret that you couldn’t have died sooner, and being pulled up by those who love you - very literally, yeah, in a maybe-cliche-but-I-literally-don’t-care underwater scene. And it’s the power of love not in the form of some magic beam, but literally caring about Akyuu more than she, at that darkest point in her life, cares about herself. For that reason, even though you could take the vast majority of GoH and say it’s a “dark, depressing story”, and I don’t blame anyone who’s been put off by that and decided not to read it, read as a whole, it completely turns around into an uplifting one. And here it’s definitely true that the light wouldn’t be near as bright if it weren’t for all the darkness before it. At the time it came out, I was more invested in seeing GoH have a happy ending than in any other Touhou story.

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Yeah, I’m still going. And this post is still only about Akyuu’s side of the story, not, say, Tea Store Girl who has her own problems to deal with, and who also ties into other stuff about Akyuu I won’t have space for here.

The last three chapters are narratively in a difficult spot, coming after the emotional climax of the story and basically being an extended bit of cleanup for the practical side - and I’m not gonna claim the execution is flawless. The whole twin-memory thing is hazy enough, both in-universe and to the reader at this point, that the way it “will be resolved this way, probably” also ends up feeling kinda half-hearted. And at the time of reading, I was emotionally disappointed with Tea Store Girl's final handling in general. But more on that later, if I end up rambling about her too.

But besides indulging the whole lore and literature aspect that Ashiyama loves so much - a slight case of split attention on the doujin’s part, someone might say, but at least I like that stuff too - and being a fun little story in its own right, the three chapters of what you’d usually consider epilogue or falling action serve a vital purpose related to the emotional aspect above: obviously there’s still the baggage of the rest of the story to deal with, and the overall somber tone is still there, but we are shown that the instant Akyuu, Kosuzu, Reimu, Marisa and Tea Store Girl are together, they have the answer to the incident, and the focus shifts to them working together on a kind of zany scheme. All those horrible things from just a chapter ago seem like a distant memory that could almost have been a different manga, and I’m going to claim that means it’s working.

Furthermore, though the actual scheme is about practical clean-up - fixing the memory problem, convincing people that Akyuu is fine now - the chapters’ greater purpose is to solve the true problem mentioned: Akyuu’s feelings. While being around her friends has immediately made her feel better, the deeper, honestly rather “rational” cause behind her worries hasn’t really been fixed. But the few chapters of extra time give her, and the reader, time to absorb both the fact that people do care about her, and that as Akyuu herself points out, she’s been really blind to her relationship with her “servants”. The Humans of “Gensokyo of Humans” aren’t really any of our main characters, but the many unnamed ones around them, and while it would be silly to blame Akyuu too much for feeling offended when people seem a little too mercenary about her death, these are people who have not only taken care of her for her entire life, but whose own lives are very much tied to hers, and who have no choice but to feel concern about the practicalities of Akyuu’s death while also grieving it. It’s maybe a little glossed over, could’ve been shown better, and emotionally I can’t really blame people who felt disappointed that the servants didn’t get some kind of narrative “comeuppance” in the end, but I do think they’re missing the point. Akyuu’s earlier perspective of the cruel, self-serving servants isn’t meant to be any more objective than her view of her own worthlessness.

The bigger problem behind Akyuu’s feelings, her being the Child of Miare with a limited lifespan, isn’t anything the characters can fix, and that might end up making the whole story feel like a bit of a delaying the inevitable, Pyrrhic victory kind of thing. Other than ZUN making a kind of half-meta joke in Who’s Who that Akyuu might end up living way longer due to medical advances, which the end of GoH also jokingly alludes to, this is true. However, besides some platitudes about how that is true for all of us yadda yadda, I think it’s incredibly important that Kosuzu has managed to convince Akyuu that even if every life, or book, will inevitably end... it’s still worth it to the last.

...And immediately after Kosuzu says that she’ll be reading this book to the end, after everything Akyuu has thought and felt during the story, she goes out to give this speech no one can convince me wasn’t improvised. And it’s maybe slightly corny. But at this point, it's earned.

I have thoughts about Gensokyo of Humans.

#not kidding about the spoilers by the way #human gensokyo disc.

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spockandawe · 3 years

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Hello! While I know this point must have already been talked about a lot in the fandom but since I have only recently read tgcf, I don't know much. I came across threads on where people talked about Hua Cheng being obsessive and toxic, with his existence being centered around Xie Lian and hence not having a grounding personality and life of his own + the scene of Ten Thousand Gods Cave.

Since I have been reading your metas, I was curious about your thoughts on this? Thank you!

Sure thing! Apologies for the slow response, this whole thing with my back has been really disrupting everything I want to accomplish. Now, I think that Hua Cheng is obsessive in a way that could easily become toxic, but calling him obsessive+toxic relies on only a shallow reading of the character and limiting yourself to the point where he is at the very start of the story, ignoring all the character/relationship development that happens over the course of a very long book.

Now, when it comes to the flashback books? Hua Cheng can have a little obsession, as a treat. I’m not going to say that the way he feels back then is any kind of basis for a healthy adult relationship, but Hua Cheng is approximately ages 10-17 over the course of book 2, and isn’t much “older” after his death as the ghost fire and as Wuming in book 4. He’s not relating to Xie Lian in a way that’s going to lead to a relationship of equals at that point, but he’s also a kid who’s worshiping a god who saved his life at a young age, twice, and who comforted and reassured him when their kingdom’s guoshi told him that he was doomed to bring misfortune to everyone in his life. All of their interactions in book 2 are extremely good reasons for why Hua Cheng would idolize him and obsess over him in that way, and I’m not going to fault him for any of it.

Now, I would say that the end of book 4 illustrates how badly that kind of idolization can go better than anything set in the present day, but it’s telling that this is also the point where Xie Lian abruptly realizes how much he doesn’t want to be Like This, and hauls his life around. Even eight hundred years later, he’s more ashamed to speak of this part of his life than anything else. He’s way more willing to laugh at his own pain and suffering than he is to even mention a time where he was cold and controlling with someone who offered themself to him.

SO. In the present, Xie Lian has a very good reason to know that he does not want to take advantage of someone else’s offered devotion. It’s an old memory, but when we see how much he doesn’t want to talk about it, it’s clear that it made an impression. If the direction of this book was only up to Hua Cheng? He’s already made it abundantly clear that he’s willing to sacrifice his everything, including his sense of self, if Xie Lian asks, but Xie Lian has confirmed very strongly to himself that this is not what Xie Lian wants.

And Xie Lian is walking a very fine emotional line in a lot of ways that he himself isn’t even fully aware of, but the early development in the book has this really interesting balance in the dynamic between him and Hua Cheng. He’s happy to rely on Hua Cheng for advice and help, but he’s also completely willing to worry for him (when he jumps into the sinner’s pit) and to gently scold him (when he jumps into the sinner’s pit). Hua Cheng worries about what will happen if Xie Lian finds out who he really is, but Xie Lian pretty much confirms it to himself, and when Hua Cheng is finally anxious enough to ask about it, Xie Lian’s main reaction is ‘isn’t the important thing that I like you as a person?’

If Hua Cheng was left to his own devices, he’d obsess over Xie Lian in a way that let himself suborn his entire identity to whatever Xie Lian wants from him, but Xie Lian has been so horribly lonely for so long, and even before a relationship enters the picture, what Xie Lian wants is a friend. And Xie Lian, on his own, is determined not to let himself take advantage of a person the way he took advantage of Wuming. And no matter how much Hua Cheng wants to submit himself to Xie Lian, what’s more important to him is what Xie Lian wants. The meta that’s been doing good circulation that I bet you saw was about how Hua Cheng developed his own independent sense of self over the last eight hundred years, no matter what he’d originally wanted, but as he gets to know Xie Lian in the present, Xie Lian makes it clear that Xie Lian likes who he became.

Hua Cheng does still definitely take the position that ‘whatever Xie Lian wants is more important than what I want’, and that could go badly in so many ways, but from the very beginning, Xie Lian is firmly, firmly expressing, ‘I like who you are and I want to be friends.’ Xie Lian doesn’t scold Hua Cheng for being a dick to Fu Yao and Nan Feng, or for breaking heavenly artifacts, even one that used to be one of his own treasured possessions. He scolds Hua Cheng because ‘you jumped down into that pit and I was afraid you would be hurt.’ He doesn’t try to sand off Hua Cheng’s sharp edges or change him, and isn’t willing to sit back and relax as Hua Cheng puts himself in harm’s way. He doesn’t give Hua Cheng room to make himself a less-than, and (probably unintentionally) positively reinforces Hua Cheng when he lets bits of his own true personality show through. One of the reasons I love this book so much is because that relationship could have so easily turned toxic and controlling, but the main pair like each other so much that they manage to pull through into a healthy, balanced relationship.

It’s not a perfect relationship, because perfect relationships are boring and unrealistic, and there’s no tension in a story if two characters are perfectly in step. But by the end of the story, this is a more perfect relationship than I’d ever expected to be invested in, because they’re so in sync, haha.

I think the moments that show the ways it’s not obsessive in a toxic way best come through in the times when Hua Cheng has some sort of grudge against a person that Xie Lian genuinely cares for. It starts with the shitty teens in the Banyue arc, but even near the story end, Mei Nianqing is Xie Lian’s old beloved teacher, and is also the person who told Hua Cheng ‘wow! you’re destined to fuck over everyone who ever gets close to you’ when Hua Cheng was just a little kid. It’s clear that Xie Lian likes and respects him a lot, and Hua Cheng feels not at all compelled to play nice. He’s happy to continue being nasty as hell to Feng Xin and Mu Qing, who are Xie Lian’s next two closest friends. He’s not even willing to be nice to E’Ming even as 1) Xie Lian pampers it, and 2) E’Ming is literally a part of himself.

And he doesn’t hide this at all. He’s willing to act in ways not at all aligned with Xie Lian’s own opinions, especially as time goes on and Xie Lian doesn’t correct him. He’s willing to act against Xie Lian’s wishes in order to protect him (taking back his spiritual energy in the black water arc, overexerting himself to the point of dissipation at the climax), and it becomes more clear as the story progresses that he’s a person who wants only the best for Xie Lian, but who exists independently from Xie Lian, and isn’t willing to completely defer to Xie Lian’s desires or to override Xie Lian’s desires for what he thinks is best. To me, this relationship is primarily defined by how much the two of them like each other, and especially early on, I could see it easily tipping in an unhealthy direction, but it feels like most of the later relationship development specifically exists to undermine that particular flavor of toxic dynamic, and what we end up with is a very sweet, very balanced relationship. Hua Cheng’s willingness to submit himself to what Xie Lian wants is overridden by Xie Lian’s desire that Hua Cheng be himself, because that’s the person who Xie Lian loves.

#spock replies #tgcf #long post/#hualian #hua cheng #xie lian #i hope this is coherent my back is really undermining my words more than it's messing with anything else ;u;#Anonymous

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matan4il · 3 years

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Buddie 402 meta

Let’s start with some Buck and how this ep is reminding us all along of his progress. Remember him at the start of season 1, rash and reckless and told off by Hen for solving everything by smashing things? Well, he still gets to smash things, but now we also see him cool, collected and resolving problems by figuring out awesome and smart solutions (the baby monitor feedback, the chimney). All this parallels his emotional progress, where he went from being the “dumbass kid” as Bobby refers to him in ep 101 to giving Chim advice on his relationship with Maddie from a mature place.

* * *

I loved the bit with the roommates and the feelings realization during lockdown together. A comical wink at what Buck and Eddie might have gone through if Eddie did quarantine at Buck’s before he went home to Chris? ;) IDK, but it’s a fun thought. *gasp* And they were roommates!

* * *

I mentioned this in the 401 meta and I’m keeping up my promise to follow this, how Buddie are a team with preferred roles, infinite coordination and mutual reliance. Just one ep later, we have it again, down to Buck rappelling down a rope while Eddie holds him, even attaching the equipment on him instead of Buck doing it for himself, passing him the ax and being so in sync with him. Battle boyfriends!

* * *

Ok, I title these posts ‘Buddie meta’, focusing on anything related to Buck, Eddie, them as a ship and the characters/couples that parallel/connect to them, because that alone is way too many words already. But I have to mention the scene where Chim and Athena’s story arcs climax in intertwined cuts. Everything about that is amazing, not just the acting, but the editing, the music, the build up to how we get to this moment to make it so effective, even the way they managed to create two totally different scenarios that both culminate in the need to ‘push!’ It’s masterful. It’s the show telling us, ‘look at me, look at how well I know my craft, at how I build a story and its meanings and parallels, at how good I am when I do it.’ This is the show earning our trust and our love, proving that we’re not just wasting our time when we give it credit and invest time and thought into analyzing it.

* * *

Chim isn’t paired up with Eddie in this ep, but I had to think about their parallels. Chim comes to see he’s been scared and that’s why he ran away, but he figured it out and came back to his child, just like Eddie did. But Chim came back to his kid and to Maddie, realizing it’s gonna be better if they’ll be scared together. Eddie returned to Chris, but how sad is it that at the end of the day, he didn’t have a partner to be scared with? When he was discharged, Shannon felt she had to go. And even later on, she didn’t feel she could stay and be with him, asking for a divorce. How wonderful would it be if in Buck, Eddie finally found a partner he could be scared together with? Because in practicality, that’s what’s been happening since 204, when Eddie was overwhelmed by and terrified of the bureaucratic system and Buck found a solution for him (Carla… don’t get me started about her speaking of invisible strings of love to Chris with Eddie right there, that scene was too sweet, and just think about the fact that it exists thanks to Buck), or another example of how Eddie went to Buck when he was scared about having let Chris down in ep 312 and Buck is there to listen, as well as to help with a solution. Just another reminder that in all ways but one, they truly and fully are partners.

* * *

The mystery woman turned out to be a therapist, no surprise there. However, Buck’s exact words to her were a pleasant one, as was the way Oliver delivered the line. So I’ll step into speculation territory again (please don’t allow me to keep doing this). TBH, I actually don’t think this will immediately lead us to Buddie or a bi!Buck. I think this will first play out in the context of telling Maddie and his parents how he really feels when they will come into town. We already knew from 316 Buck sometimes holds back on some of the things he feels, like how it’s taken him years to tell Maddie about his feelings of loneliness and abandonment, so this falls in line and I do believe he will have to go through this family drama first to figure himself out. He will have a crisis, it’s not going to be easy to get through, but it will be so very important. But then, later on, I think the show might return to these words and build upon them as a parallel. Because if we are getting Buddie, then this is a slow burn. Gotta throw in a couple more obstacles first, like going through an identity crisis… those obstacles will only make the journey that much more worthwhile when we get to the final destination. And I do see over time more and more of a possibility this destination is that Buddie will be together canonically.

Thank you so much again to the incredible @bicepsie for doing the gifsets for this meta, I know that these are a lot of work and you get bombarded with my messages in what is in our time zone the small hours of the morning, when the ep had just finished airing, and you do it with love and so beautifully. I really feel like I can’t thank you enough, love! xoxox

#402 #911 season 4 #buddie #evan buckley #evan buck buckley #eddie diaz #edmundo diaz #buddie meta #911 meta #911meta #9-1-1 #christopher diaz #chris diaz #honest to god #they are partners #wm #911 on abc #911abc #911 abc

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bereft-of-frogs · 3 years

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so this last gifset has got me thinking about the Loki series and its relation to other Marvel films, and this sort of feeds into the debate around costuming and whether or not he should have gotten a bit dramatic costume change. I know people have been getting heated that Loki stays in the same TVA costume throughout the series, but I don’t think the dramatic costume change actually would have fit in the series and I don’t think it would have satisfied audiences.

Because the climax of Loki isn’t like Wandavision, or Falcon & Winter Soldier or Ragnarok: it is Captain America: The First Avenger.

Stick with me here for a minute.

First off, I don’t think a big costume change into a cool new outfit would have actually fit into the series. The costume changes in the other MCU films come at a moment of transformation, largely about accepting something about themselves. It’s a visual representation of the internal character journey. Sam reckons with the complicated history of the United States and the supersoldier program, and becomes Captain America despite the struggles he’s sure to face. Thor gets his literal glow up (slightly less a costume change) when he learns that he didn’t need his hammer to unlock the power within him. Valkyrie gets her old costume when she stops running from her past and her trauma. Wanda gets her new outfit in the finale when she accepts that she has the power and responsibility to control her magic and not be controlled by it.

The climax that Loki builds towards is also one of self-acceptance, but in a much more subtle way. He doesn’t have to accept the weight of his power or responsibility; as the first episode shows, he’s already aware that the things he says about other people are really weapons he’s wielding against himself. Through the series, he works to accept that those attitudes have been a limiting factor, keeping him trapped in the role that (Kang) has cast him in and that he desires to move on from that role, and change the way he thinks about others, and then by extension himself. The final stage of that takes place during his and Sylvie’s confrontation in Kang’s creepy (cool) castle beyond the end of the timeline.

And a costume change at that moment...yeah would have been really distracting.

Which I think is the point of that quote from the costume designer, that seems to have sparked some of the discourse - about not letting a costume ‘distract’. But it’s true. Honestly, any appropriate thematic moment would be undermined if it were accompanied by a big flashy costume change. The stages of the character journey happen gradually, and every moment I can think of where Loki undergoes a part of that internal transformation (watching the reel of the end of his life, connecting with Sylvie on Lamentis, admitting why he cut Sif’s hair, etc...), would have been made significantly weakly by interrupting the performance to change costumes. It would be a big tonal shift as well. Both Wandavision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier were much more classical superhero/MCU movies (outside of WV’s internal sitcom). This was much more...weird (in a fun way). It would have been a big tonal shift, imo, to shift from the quieter, stranger mood that Loki was aiming for to have suddenly a more traditional superhero/magical girl transformation moment.

I think the only place a costume change would made any sense would have been when they were about to fight Alioth and at that point...I don’t know, it would have felt a little superfluous. Like it would have been a purely aesthetic change, which, y’all know me, I’m all about aesthetics for aesthetics’ sake lol, but I can also understand why they decided to keep everyone in the same costumes. (No one changes costumes in the series. The only thing is Sylvie loses her cape....wait, and Loki loses his jacket, and....ohhhh.) Like I guess it could have been a bit more like Captain Marvel, when it’s in the quiet of pre-battle but Captain Marvel also had a thematic reason for changing the colors of her suit (to break away from Kree influence now that she’s remembered and accepted her past and her true identity). Like, it’s possible it could have been fit in there, but it certainly wasn’t essential for the theme or the character development.

And I think they may have wanted to keep him in the TVA costume to set up the ending, as we see in this parallels between the ending of Loki and the ending of The First Avenger.

And ok, I might be going out on a limb here, getting on the tinfoil hat, but so much else of this show has been so intentional that I can’t help think this parallel might have been on purpose. The series and the movie end with their characters in a moment where they’ve lost something profound, in a perilous new world. Steve gets a couple costume changes in his first film, but they’re a little more gradual as the Captain America costume becomes more functional and less about the spectacle. (That’s also more about how others perceive Steve and his symbolic vs functional value as Captain America.) And they’re not part of the emotional climax, which is centered around his final sacrifice and then his waking up in that new world, which sets up his character journey through the rest of the series of films, as a man out of time, trying to find his place. (Cap does get the thematic costume change, but in Winter Soldier, when he returns to his symbolic roots after breaking free from SHIELD/HYDRA.) In the final scene, which is the most important for his character arc going forward, he’s in his SHIELD-assigned pajamas. Drab, sort of boring, in a similar muted color scheme to the TVA costumes. Which is also where we find him in Avengers. And...where Loki is left at the end of the series, in a similar color scheme, similar ordinary costume, out of place, in a frightening new world with strangers, and a cosmic threat beyond imagining.

Anyway. I hope this makes sense. I feel a little like I’m wearing a tinfoil hat, and I definitely had to under-develop or quickly summarize some of the supporting points to avoid turning this into a really long post, but...

it’s almost like Loki is being set up to be the ‘man out of time’ in Phase 4.

[tldr: I actually do think that a costume change would have been distracting at any of the appropriate thematic points, and I think they might have been purposefully keeping Loki in the TVA costume to set up a parallel between the ending of the series and the ending of Captain America: The First Avenger, making Loki the new ‘man out of time’ in Phase 4 of the MCU.]

#ok i'll go get my tinfoil hat #even if this doesn't end up being the intention at all i think it's a cool parallel and i also understand their decisions about costuming #loki series #loki spoilers #feel free to disagree or poke holes but be kind about it please!#long post #loki series discourse

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papers4me · 3 years

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Fruits Basket Manga Review , ch 110

The writer doesn’t need to rush to akito (antagonist) & give us quick background exposition & escalate her mentality to the exploding moment, simply cuz tohru (the protagonist) isn’t emotionally in her most vulnerable moment yet. Tohru’s issues will be presented deeper with each pov chapter she’ll have. So what should the writer do now?

This is a connected plot, meaning the emotions belonging to the previous chapter are still lingering & needs to be dealt with. There is no stupid laughing & cooking or even dumber momentarily amnesia. Nope! There is this:

-The Art of Writing Slow-Burns: (Lingering Emotions:)

Last time kyo hugged tohru thro the sheets. sth he wouldn’t do if it weren’t for the heartbreaking moment of tohru’s tears & the reason behind them. Why wouldn he do it? cuz he believes he’s the reason of her pain & is setting his mind on leaving her & being imprisoned as a punishment. He wouldn’t do it cuz he loves her but he did it cuz he loves her. why? cuz love is illogical. Kyo’s heart moved him effortlessly to embrace her & “ his tenderness covered her pain” as the writer put it at the end of ch109.

Last time tohru hugged kyo thro the sheets, sth she wouldn’t do if it weren’t for the comfort of his warmth enveloping her loneliness & providing safety & a home. A home can a person. Why wouldn she do it? cuz Tohru is someone who hides pain behind a smile, someone who thinks she’s ugly & unlovable cuz she’s grieving still after all this time. She’s thinks she’s a burden. But here she confessed to kyo unprompted or advised by anybody. He only asked a fleeting question. but tohru cant hide who she is friom him anymore. Still, he accepted her & tenderly held her thro the sheets & she threw her body at him, she initiated the hug.

The sheet hig is the biggest emotional moment between kyo/tohru yet. It altered how they feel for each other cuz in that moment tohru’s mask fell & kyo was the most honest with himself emotionally. That’s not sth you move from with the stupid ED song. They both try to carry out normally afterwards cuz they live together after all. The slightest touch brings..... sexual tension!!! it was so bad poor yuki left the house running!!!!!!!!

The writer cleverly escalates the sexual tension as they awkwardly try to find a talking topic, then dissolves it a bit when kto asks if tohru wants to go out together & where, then escalates it when tohru suggests buying eggs cuz she’s awkward, then dissolves it when kyo grumpily agrees but this is just grocery shopping” not a fun going out”, the escalates it when tohru said she’s happy for just bring together with him regardless of the location & kyo looses it! sexual tension explodes!

The target of the slow-burn isn’t the characters... the target is the audience! the writer plays with their emotions & cleverly puts the audience in a place where they desperately want these two idiots together but still remember why they aren’t! that’s very important. Having the readers cheer for a romantic relationship includes the readers understanding the obstacles ahead & how big they are & still cheer. If the obstacles are meh~ the readers will find the couple unrealistic, if the obstacles are so big & the couples emotions aren't buildup properly, then the couple themselves will feel meh~. Glad kyoru survived such writing mistakes both manga & anime ( anime hurt their characters more than their relationship).

-Yuki wants to move on from the unofficial son third wheeling his mom & her man:

The writer jokes abt yuki admitting he felt as a son watching his mon & her bf. I love tha this joke becuz it cleverly addresses the following points:

it is cleverly weaved in with the kyoru incident from last chapter. Sth happen & yuki doesn't know what is & doesn't want to! Yuki represents the audience I talked abt in the slow-burn point above. He is us. He’ll cheer for them to be together & will be so frustrated when they can’t. It adds to yuki confronting kyo at the climax!!! You see in the anime kyo/yuki stopped interacting much in se03. Then tada~~ big fight when it’s a must! & can’t be escaped... Here we still have kyo/yuki moments despite each boy moving away from his issues being the fault of the other. Basically better writing.....

The writer cleverly used this to address that yuki still feels like tohru’s son sometimes despite being more independent now, which is natural as you cant switch ur feelings with a button. But also the writer doesnt stay in this moment long & use it to build the next moment.. yuki/Aya , yuki/machi & aya/mine.... sadly all there dynamics are shortened in the anime like kyoru’s.

-I don’t think yuki/Aya moment suffered much from the cuts, the entire school parents meeting ep us enough to reconcile the brothers. Aya defended yuki that day & so did yuki. He completely accepted him & stood up to him in front of the mom.

- More aya/mine would’ve been good to see & I would’ve preferred it to yuki/motoko moments in the anime that served nothing. but aya/mine too are stand alone story. They’re the most alike couple in a healthy way. Aya is the guy who protected his woman the most. simply cuz he’s the snake. snakes are secretive. he kept her to himself, even from yuki!!! impressive.

- What I lament from the cut of this mini yuki adventure?

1- This: ( yuki’s facial expressions) This is sth the anime fears, either cuz (a) pretty yuki is 100% pretty all the time, so no expressiveness cuz it leads to showing eyebrows & hiding them under layers of hair is the A.B.C of pretty characters... (b) Yuki in the anime is a prince 98% of the time, except with kyo (they got rid of this in se03 & give them one honest/ugly moment together) & with kakeru (one tiny moment in se03 in match’’s focus ep & then quickly back to prince yuki!)..., ugh!!!!!! I hate how yuki is prince thro & thro in the anime!!that’s why they couldn’t get rid of any motoko content!!! he’s a prince there... heck! school girls float after him the graduation ceremony... what’s up with that!! lol.

2-. This: ( machi with the toy that tohru/kisa/kagura/momiji & kiro like! so cute!!! also, foreshadowing yuki’s future chosen extended family! (his bro & his wife), (yuki & his wife) & best friend/his brother in law! Also, yuki is so himself! no glitters, no bubbles & no pretending anger! <3

Side Notes:

The lovely @mizzraynelly made notice kto’s speech in ch109 abt not vising his mom’s grave! Even tho it’s such a minor line, it’s one of the biggest cuts that foreshadow the accumulation of kyo’s guilt towards his mom. Kyo’s thing is guilt towards ppl he loves & fear of hurting them, by keeping this feeling alive in readers’ minds, the writer is making sure that the climax will hurt like sharp knives cuz the readers are on the same wave liength as kyo!!! epic buildup consists of tiny subtle pieces!

Luckily, kyoru as a ship felt so strong in both manga & anime despite the later cutting half of their moments. Why? cuz the chosen cuts didnt affects the romantic relationship...no... the cuts affects the characters’ own personal struggle... most precisely tohru. Kyo’s own character struggles had better luck in the anime despite the cuts, simply cuz (a) was drawn with very expressive emotions & the anime team lingered on them in his scenes. (b) His character design as a whole was very expressive, the anime team didnt give him constant wide eyes like tohru & didn’t fear expr4essivness will affect for his “beauty “ like yuki. (c) kyo was given one ep per season for his issues which altho not much but way better than tohru (d) most important: kyo’s issues are very universal & very relatable” feeling guilt, mistakes & choosing wrong. That’s sth we all do!!! Tohru’s thing is grieve: this is very personal & most ppl experience it differently.

I love kyo’s oufit!!! we have a hint of this moment in se03, ep 10 when yuki was fighting kyo... but they made yuki see them shopping as opposed of him seeing them being sexually charged!

I’m so mad this kyoru moment is cut!!!!!! tohru as a woman with pending sexual emotions is so refreshing & underrated in the trope of “ girl saves guys”. Also, it contradicts the pure mom image that’s been suffocating her since se01 ep 1!!!!! oh now i know why it’s cut... That’s why! momma tohru is so pure for such things & only when it’s the last two eps, then will allow her to be a woman choosing to live away with her man by her own desire! Why the anime only allow things ti happen when there’s no escape!!! I’ve always felt tohru/kyo is the type of couple to be expressive emotionally & sexually with each other based on seeing that ALL of their romantic interaction involves body language & I’m so happy there’s a canon proof so early before the future glimpse in finale!!!!!!

I liked the aya-story, but it felt like the typical “ lesson of the day” formula, so I didnt analyze it much, but I enjoyed the brotherly interaction so much!! It had a gold mine of yuki being himself & so nit a prince! Im so happy I saw it! <3.

Every time yuki looked expressive is a happy moment for me!

#Fruits Basket #anime only #fruits basket manga #manga review #manga spoilers #sleepy paper #ch 110

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aeolian-mode · 3 years

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my grievances with BNHA

(Spoilers below) I’m long-winded today cos I had some Thoughts to get off my chest in regards of how I feel about the storytelling of BNHA.

TL;DR: I don’t think Horikoshi understands the value of ma. Maybe he believes that his target audience would grow impatient, and I have to remind myself that BNHA is a shonen and is made for young people and my storytelling tastes probably aren’t what he’s marketing towards- but I still think there is a lot that could be improved about BNHA if Horikoshi spent a little bit more time in the slow moments, and valuing the emotions and relationships of the characters instead of rushing to the next plot point. He also made way too many characters, which is typical of shonen, but the more characters he has to cover, the harder it is for him to provide content for all the people who have picked a favorite character out of the sprawling cast. Everyone is forced to find satisfaction in table scraps, but if he stuck to a strong core cast, there would be plenty to go around. Long version:

"Ma” is an extremely important storytelling concept. Ma is the Japanese word for 'negative space.' In visual art, negative space is the empty places on the canvas where there's nothing important to look at. After all, if every single square inch of your canvas was filled with something exciting to look at, like character faces or action scenes, your illustration would be very hard to take in at a glance, there'd be no distinction of character silhouettes and nothing would be readable. The same concept applies to storytelling. You need ma to achieve a greater emotional impact when the heavy, loud moments occur. Let's take a look at how Hayao Miyazaki of Studio Ghibli writes ma. In My Neighbor Totoro, 80% of the film is slow-paced slice of life moments where two sisters explore their new house, and discover supernatural creatures living peacefully beside them. Then, at the end of the movie, something distressing and horrible happens to the two sisters' mother, who has been hospitalized since the beginning of the film. The film's final 20 minutes or so are about them discovering this distressing event, and the emotional climax of the film feels extremely powerful because we were given time to live with these sisters, observe their peaceful daily life, and grow attached to them. Suddenly, something important to them became jeopardized, and we care.

Miyazaki often uses ma with food. Characters cook for each other, or eat together. The detail of the food in the animation is often exquisite. Miyazaki and the Ghibli animators want us to notice the way light refracts through the glossy surface of an egg on toast, or the lines of fat on bacon sizzling in a pan. He wants us to exist in these quiet moments of daily life.

I can't tell you the last time My Hero Academia actually had an extended scene of ma. Maybe it was the bench scene, where Eraserhead and All Might share a moment. It was a powerful scene in the manga, and it was powerful because it wasn’t about the plot at all. It was about the intimacy between two characters who have grown close over shared adversity, and All Might struggling to find purpose in his hard life. After this scene, however, the story has been one distressing event after another without any breaks to breathe. And, since it has so many characters, it has failed to prioritize the emotions of significant characters. How did Eri feel when Aizawa was maimed? Who is watching her? How did Inko feel when she saw her son mangled, even after All Might promised to protect and raise him? How much raising has All Might actually done in Midoriya’s life? It seems every time the two of them have a conversation, it’s about One for All, not about Midoriya’s growth into manhood or his emotional development as a suffering teen who’s picked the world’s worst profession. Will we get assurance on the safety and wellbeing of favorite heroes like Fatgum and the Big 3? Will Mic and Aizawa properly grieve Midnight? What about the rest of the UA staff? How does Nezu feel when UA was turned into a safe haven for civilians? How have the parents of all these students processed all this grief? How has Class 1-A handled their painful struggle? The story has been, instead: >heavy, distressing, lengthy action sequences where everyone is hurt >immediately following that, a prison breakout >immediately following that, scattered moments of characters in a hospital with dramatic flashbacks of their lives and burdens, yet none of them fleshed out to their fullest potential because there’s too many injured characters >immediately following that, heavy and intense emotions all focused on the plot of One for All, yet All Might is a mute ghost and has no actual bonding with Midoriya since they don’t even speak to each other >immediately following that, more heavy and intense emotions as Horikoshi rushes to show that Izuku is gone and has slapped together letters about his departure >immediately following that, more villains attacking heroes and civilians because of the prison break. There has been no ma. We haven't had a single quiet moment that isn’t focused on bulldozing into the next plot point or action sequence. What about a scene like Eraserhead sharing a meal with Eri, or talking to her calmly about life? How about the neglected characters like Fatgum and the Big 3 recovering in their own way? How about the moms of all these hurt children actually coming in and getting involved in their lives? How about the students of class 1-A trying to do something fun to diffuse the tension and show how they have grown close as friends or a found family? Sometimes Horikoshi tries to show ma in tiny snapshots rather than entire scenes; for example, there's a snapshot in one of the earlier chapters of Aizawa putting Eri's hair in a hair tie. This is a single panel. It's not enough to have a single panel. What we needed was an entire scene or chapter dedicated to Aizawa and Eri and Friends. Show her with her found family, show her going out in town or playing with a cat or talking to Mirio or Aizawa for an extended period of time. Show us scenes about nothing particularly important.

When your story is plot, plot, plot, you're deciding that human moments and human interactions aren't important. And at the end of the day, no one watches a show for the plot. They come to be validated as a person, and relate to the characters. I came to MHA because I relate to All Might, his disability, and his desire to be strong and fight through his suffering so he can selflessly help other people. That character resonated with me. I saw myself on the screen. Unfortunately MHA stopped being what I came to see a long time ago. I’m here because I like drawing my favorite characters, and the fandom has introduced me to a lot of wonderful friends, I’m not ready to give it up. But I wish it had more of what I was hoping to get out of it. I understand that making a manga is extremely difficult. And I understand tons of people enjoy it and have no issues with it whatsoever- all power to you! I just haven’t gotten what I was personally hoping to get, and this is why. :( ANNNND SEASON 5 JUST STARTED AND IT’S AN ENTIRE SEASON OF CHARACTERS I DOOOOON’T CARE ABOUT AT ALLLLL! HEY WE REALLY NEEDED AN ENTIRE SEASON DEDICATED TO CLASS 1-B CHARACTERS THAT ARE COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY IRRELEVANT AFTERWARDS, THEREFORE WASTING SCREEN TIME ON FORGETTABLE UNIMPORTANT SIDE CHARACTERS INSTEAD OF THE CORE CAST THAT WE DESPERATELY NEED CONTENT ABOUT ALSO THANKS FOR FORGETTING ABOUT DADMIGHT HORIKOSHI

#aeo rants #blog #text post

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its-miichan · 3 years

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TGCF criticisms

Spoilers and unpopular/critical opinions ahead! Beware! I tried to like this, I really did, but this novel really makes me frustrated. It clearly has so much potential, but so much of that potential was wasted on pandering romance and shallow caricatures of main characters. Overall 1.5-2 stars because it gets worse the more you think about it. CHARACTERS: 1. The main character, Xie Lian was wildly bland and boring. He is presented as the kindest, purest, most selfless person in the world, but really he was just a bland white lotus. With Xie Lian, his personality can be described in just a sentence or so, while the author's other two MC's (Wei Wuxian and Shen Qingqiu) are both charming, funny, and deep with their own motivations. Xie Lian just walks around in the story with no purpose and he says that he wants to help the common people, but he really hasn't done that! He's barely helped anyone at all, and those times he did help people are quickly followed by flirting with the ML and forgetting all about the people he was supposed to help. Honestly, in the past, Xie Lian was also the biggest jerk ever. He gave up his own friends and family's well being for his own sense of justice and was stubborn to a fault and refused to listen. What's worse is that none of these flaws are actually addressed, and the story just lets him roll with it and never actually calls him out on it. If you want to see all the reasons why he's a poorly written character, check out this reddit post: https://www. reddit. com/r/MXTX/comments/j2l9ye/why_xl_is_a_poorly_written_character_in_my_opinion/

2. The ML, Hua Cheng, is equally as bad. He is extremely shallow and such a static character, with his development in the present times being nonexistent and his development from the past to the present being wholly nonsensical. His personality is very cliche and his motivations and thoughts are left entirely up to the reader's imagination, which significantly reduces character depth. He could've been such a great character, a ghost king who rules over hell and is morally grey, but instead he is dumbed down to a Xie Lian fanboy. Everything about him not related to Xie Lian is thrown at us in a few paragraphs if at all, and what little motivation and thoughts about him we do get always fall flat. [Like apparently this guy saved him once, and he fell in love with him and became devoted to him for 800 years? Like people get saved all the time and we don't see them going 800 years and 3 deaths for a guy they've barely talked to] Also, he is wildly unlikable. Of course, this is purely subjective, but he is irritatingly smug and lords over literally everyone he meets. It doesn't help that he's an insufferable Mary Sue with an endless array of powers, intelligent as hell and knows literally everything, really good at painting, sculpting, woodworking, and on top of that the richest, most powerful, most handsome, and most charismatic man in the book. His biggest flaw is supposed to be his insecurity and inferiority complex, but that barely ever comes up and 90% of the time he is arrogant and smug. More information on why he's badly written here: https://www. reddit. com/r/MXTX/comments/iskkp5/why_hc_is_a_bad_character_in_my_opinion/

3. The side characters in my opinion are written far better, but obviously quite underdeveloped. They are all three dimensional and have their own thoughts, emotions, and feelings as well as a believable backstory, but so many of them are quickly offed to make way for the main couple, some of them not only not becoming better, but actually getting quite a whole lot worse. Qi Rong, who was supposed to be super strong demon that is one of the 4 great evils becomes a comedic relief gremlin who just shows up for some comedy and then leaves. Feng Xin and Mu Qing, the MC's childhood caretakers disappear for like 100 chapters after we're given their backstories and then once they reappear, they don't do anything either. Shi Qingxuan, who in my opinion is by far the best character in the book, has his arc left open with no ending at all, only to be forgotten about for 80+ chapters only to reappear completely the same with no character growth at all. All of this is because the main couple take up so much of the book, and the rest of the side characters and their character growth is sabotaged for the author's ego so that the main couple can look better and get more screen time.

4. I lost interest in the story pretty quickly due to the bland characters and their out of place romance and how unlikable they were. A lot of this novel was very surface level, and it's pretty on paper, but when you think about the characters a bit longer, the more bland and shallow they become.

PLOT: 1. The plot was... There was no plot. It was just a collection of monster of the day arcs that aimlessly meander about and then everything returns to the status quo once they return to Xie Lian's temple/home. Obviously books 4 and 5 were a lot more to my taste because the writing was a lot more concise and the pacing was less slow and pointless, as well as actually incorporating fantasy elements and shaking up the status quo. However, the other 3 books, especially books 1 and 2 had way too much fan service, pointless romance, and plot lines that don't go anywhere and don't contribute to the story.

2. The past plot line, or the flashbacks were pretty interesting, except for how b*tchy the MC was. Book 2 has a lot of important information and some action, but a lot of it was boring fluff that didn't really contribute to the story other than introducing the villain and showing how XL and HC met. The rest, we're literally told already and there's no new information. Book 4 was supposed to be suffering heavy, and I agree that the character development was alright, but it was too brooding and oppressive. In the end, I just stopped feeling bad for Xie Lian because of how bad the story was trying to make you feel for him. I was not invested in him, and although he was significantly more deep in this book than in the other 4, the bad logic is still there. [you wanna kill people but then someone gives you a bamboo hat and you're all sunshine and rainbows again?] The suffering is excessive in my opinion, and although it's supposed to provide contrast to the romance, it just feels done in poor taste. seriously, 20 chapters straight of suffering is not necessary, and the pacing and tone suffers because of this. The flashbacks really don't contribute too much to XL or HC's character development, but is just there to be angsty and cryp*rn.

3. The final battle was the most unbelievable thing I've ever read. All the gods got together and the first part seemed pretty epic as we got to see all the side characters finally showcase their powers.... Until the MC and ML show up. The MC and ML show up, and instantly the background extras—excuse me I mean side characters, go back into hibernation as the main couple show off how cool and powerful they are. And then we get to the final confrontation, which has our MC, ML, and MC's two friends face off against literally the most powerful being in the freaking universe. I thought it would be a tense fight scene with lots of close calls, but I was so disappointed. Instead the ML is so OP that he breaks the spells binding MC's powers, and MC becomes so overpowered and slams the big boss into the wall with the power of love while his two friends just stand there doing nothing.

4. A lot of what happens in the flashback is directly Xie Lian's fault, but the book never seems to register it? I won't go into detail on this point since it's already covered in the first Reddit thread, but basically because of XL's s*upidity and refusal to listen to anyone else, the people around him suffer.

WRITING: 1. The writing wasn't great. It was very choppy and as I said previously, very monotonous and monster-of-the-day. Yes there were great scenes which got to me, but most of it was really boring and descriptions and dialogue dragged on and on with no end, and with the bland MC, it wasn't even interesting such as the dialogue in MDZS was. Side arcs were introduced with no warning and ended with no warning, leaving the reader wondering "Why was that even there in the first place if it was just going to be forgotten about?"

2. The water demon/wind god arc. The opening and most of the middle of this arc was extremely good, the logic and mystery was written well, and Shi Qingxuan's (the wind god) antics were funny. But after the big reveal and the tense climax, the story just... stops. Like it's literally forgotten about. [The MC gets dragged out by his all powerful lover, they romance some more, and forget all about Shi Qingxuan who is literally left in the hands of the second or third most powerful demon ever who is also his mortal enemy]

3. The incessant flirting really got on my nerves. The tension and tone of the entire story got completely ruined because of the MC and ML flirting and the MC blushing and giggling while the ML teases him and everyone else is literally fighting for their lives. This felt very fan-service like, and it felt like the author stopped trying and just fed us dog food after an emotionally taxing arc so that she wouldn't have to close out the arc properly, completely destroying the tone. Speaking of the tone, the tone whiplash was just... wow. You're fed fluff and romance during or after a high tensity and highly emotional scene with no connection at all, and you're just supposed to accept it instead of wondering what's happening to the characters you actually care about.

4. Romance and side arcs quite disconnected from the story. Quite frankly, most of this book is just romance with the plot and characters put in second place because "lOOk hOw CuTe the COuPLe iS!" You could literally take out all the side arcs and the story would literally be no different. The romance overtakes the entire plot and becomes the main point of the story. With her other two books, the romance is like the icing on the cake. With this book, the icing overtakes the cake and becomes the cake.

5. Perhaps one of the biggest reasons I was uninterested through most of the book was due to the lack of tension and suspense. The flashbacks were better in the sense that Xie Lian was helpless and couldn't figure anything out, which was why he was just as likely to get hurt as anyone, making the stakes significantly higher. But in the present, with the existence of Hua Cheng, that tension is completely gone. This is because HC knows basically all there is to know, and what he doesn't know he can figure out in seconds. Additionally, he is super powerful to the point that anything that can harm XL can be one shot K.O'ed by him. At this point the conflict becomes trivial to the point where I'm just asking "why are we solving this mystery anyways when HC can just blast it into oblivion?"

6. The fact that HC does the bare minimum in arcs frustrates me. If you're going to include a character with powers that will basically deem any threat against them null, then actually use them at least! HC's apathy does not feel like a coherent part of his character, but an excuse for MXTX to drag out plot lines and make things unnecessarily long and winded. Additionally, his apathy is contradictory. On one hand, he is super overprotective of XL and wants to make sure he won't get hurt a single bit, but on the other hand, he has this advanced ideology of the 21st century that he believes XL is capable so won't constrain him as much. If anything, they should start out with HC as this overprotective follower and have a dysfunctional relationship, and end up with XL teaching HC that he is able to do things and doesn't mind doing them, and that HC can live a life outside of him as well. That would've introduced some narrative stakes and romantic tension, but no, MXTX just had to make these characters perfect in every way.

ROMANCE: 1. The logic is so flawed here. The reason that HC started loving XL is literally because Xie Lian saved him once as a child and therefore he will devote his entire life to XL, not caring about literally anything else. The reason that XL started loving HC is even more so. The thing is someone like say Shi Qingxuan has done every bit as much for XL as HC has, but we don't see XL fall in love with SQX, do we? HC literally listens to him talk and XL falls in love with him, and although it does make sense due to XL being lonely for 800 years, how low the bar is set really bothers me.

2. The constant blue-balling was annoying. At some point, the ignorant MC became annoying and self indulgent instead of cute, and having it be drawn out over nearly 200 chapters makes it even worse. The MC is supposed to be super intelligent, but he literally misses all of the super obvious hints the ML drops at him, which is so weird.

3. It felt like MXTX (the author) went overboard on the romance here. Like she tried way too hard to the point where it was obvious she wanted to make this "the most romantic CP ever". The aesthetics went so overboard with butterflies and flowers as romantic themes, thousands of lanterns, the red string of fate (which didn't even do anything in the actual story), poetry, etc.

4. The romance could almost be described as kind of creepy. Like the ML obsesses over the MC for 800 years, isolating himself from the world and not taking any side of the story besides MC's is supposed to be romantic, but it really isn't. The ML carves thousands of statues of the MC, which is sweet in a way, but also really, really creepy. To quote someone from NovelUpdates who put it 100x better than I could: " They don't feel like equal lovers, HC obviously worships XL to an unbelievably amazing degree while XL only knew he existed from only a while ago (Is this obsession? Stalker-ish? I know his stalker-ish tendencies are usually played for laughs, but realistically?) HC very very very rarely calls XL by his given name but with GeGe or CrownPrince, dude has a name you know. I know you feel lower than XL, but seriously man, the guy's your life partner. HC would destroy the world if XL said to. He'd probably try to talk to XL first, confirm things, but if at the end XL really does want it, HC would do it. He lives for XL, he has no other reason to do something aside for XL. No reason to say NO for himself. They're not equals in which one wanna do something bad, the other would stop him because they have their own convictions. You can't tell me one only lives for one person's sake, will do anything for that guy, and has no attachments in the world aside from that guy, is a healthy person. It may seem romantic, but when you actually think about it, it becomes uncomfortable."

5. The romance was really cheesy. There were some powerful moments, but it was mostly flirting and "he fell on top of me" or "he needs mouth to mouth". Most of it was just the ML flirting with the MC, which you may like if you like this kind of stuff, but I really didn't enjoy it. Overall, I was desperate to love this novel, but I couldn't because of the shallow characters, unlikable main pair, and the constant abandonment of great plot lines in favor of the shallow romance. It felt like MXTX was constantly trying to one-up MDZS in angst, drama, and romance, but at the same time it felt like she didn't know what to do with the characters and world, and therefore fed us fan service and took the easy way out. This review is purely subjective, and if you want to read this go ahead, but I'll be seeing myself out.

#tgcf criticism #tianguancifu #tgcf #mxtx critical #xie lan #hua cheng #ok but this kinda sucks

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neitherlightnordark · 2 years

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4. Did you have any ideas that didn’t make the final cut of [sock and buskin]? / 33. Have you ever stopped yourself from writing something? Why?

4. i have... a few lots :-) the final cut is of course still under construction!

my brother wanted me to make the mangoes sentient. he also wanted them as the pov of the climax. i told him that if i decided to do that i'd credit him (as "my brother"). he decided he no longer wanted this. the mangoes will NOT be the pov of the climax, and they are not sentient. i'm sorry

the cake poll was SUPPOSED to be relevant! i swear!!!!

tasque manager was going to rewire seam's speakers to play new wave synth pop. then susie was going to throw a cake at her and the lancer fun squad would take refuge in the café from her screaming

the second or third chapter was actually supposed to be from susie's or seam's pov???? this was before i learned about the exquisite amazing wonderful beauty of swatch being a little shit, and also tasque manager and queen's. everything

sweet cap'n cakes was going to be helping seam set up the speakers and they were gonna complain about queen and seam was gonna tell them a bit about queen too but it felt... contrived? 'cause the whole point of them being friends was always that sweet cap'n cakes just thought seam was cool and seam was like well i guess this was happening. it's a comfy sort of "they visit seam for random reasons and seam lets them talk but it's certainly not the other way around" or something??? i care about them

when i changed it to tasque manager second chapter pov she was originally supposed to visit seam when everyone's going to sleep to ask seam about queen. stupid crepescular cats

generally swatch was going to be more kind of... obviously conflicted about queen doing all her queen things? but now it's like. i am queen's silly rabbit while she walks into explosions and causes collateral damage because i get to tease her about it

you know this tali! jevil was meant to be more annoying and hehehehehehe i am in susie's brain! also so were queen and swatch. and there would've been more emphasis on susie's shadow crystal powers as related to equipped darkners but i was like Nahhh Writing Seven Characters Sucks and scrapped it for what is the new post concussion chapter 4

there was gonna be analepsis juice in seam's shop (also courtesy of my brother) (thanks dude :D)

the chalkboard used to be green

complicated things about portals that are now spoilers

queen was going to stream [something] so i could include berdly and noelle in the fic (this might still happen but it is not likely?????)

susie and kris were supposed to leave right after passing out cake but susie made the decision for me

in general this fic was really supposed to be shenanigans centered and then dip into being serious but i suppose it's now more... there's lots of relationships happening that i didn't expect. like jevil and susie just talking to each other. or all the lancer fun squad and queen and rouxls and lancer just casually joking about being a family. cause they are.

spamton wasn't fucking supposed to be mentioned at all THIS WHOLE MESS IS TASQUE MANAGER'S FAULT YOU KNOW. SHE CAUSED CHAPTER TWO TO HAPPEN

33. OH YEAH there was this noelle fic that i decided to scrap cause it was mostly her angstily yelling at the church. actually out of context that sounds hilarious i should write it again. usually if things get too dark or too mired in too many emotions for my taste i backpedal

#this was reALLY FUN. THANK YOU TALI #personal

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herinsectreflection · 3 years

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I really love how much of Faith there is in S6, and I mean that completely seriously. She's a constant unmentioned figure, haunting the narrative. The central ideas of her character become the central ideas of the season, and for Buffy's character specifically.

Faith is such an interesting figure because despite appearing in less than thirty episodes across both shows, she’s one of the most important characters for reflecting both leads, but especially Buffy for obvious reasons. She's Angel's mentee figure, the representation of how good desire to right his own wrongs and give others a chance to do the same can reciprocally save him. And she's Buffy's dark mirro, representing who Buffy could be if she surrendered to the mercy of her circumstances. Faith’s status as Buffy’s distorted mirror image is constant throughout the show. Cordelia was Buffy’s first shadow self, but Faith owns that role, long after she stops appearing regularly.

The season opens for Buffy with her hand stretching up out of her grave, with a visual almost identical to Faith’s dream in This Year’s Girl. You could almost see Buffy’s ressurection as akin to Faith waking from her coma to find a world that has left her behind. They both wake up alone and stagger around town, finding themselves at the burned-out site of the previous season’s finale, and both their initial instincts are to destroy their bodies - Faith by disappearing into Buffy's, and Buffy by leaping off the tower again.

Throughout the season, Buffy exhibits a lot of Faith-like behaviour. A big one is using sex as a coping mechanism. Buffy instigates an unhealthy sexual relationship with Spike to stave off her depression and hide it from others. Faith uses agressive sexuality to intimidate others and keep her pain hidden (see her initially attempting to seduce the Mayor to avoid accepting his paternal affection, or instigating sex with Xander in response to his attempts at emotional connection). Both are prone to violence against their sexual partners too - Faith with Xander in the same scene and Buffy with Spike multiple times. Like vampires, the Slayers seem inclined to conflate sex and violence (I'll let the fact that they are both prone to violence against each other speak for itself). In her dream in Dead Things, Buffy mixes up seeing Katrina's corpse and having sex with Spike in a blurry whirlwind of sex and death, bringing this conflation to the forefront.

It's also worth noting that Faith is implied in many ways to be a victim of sexual abuse, and it's in this season that Buffy experiences an attempted rape. Both are caught up in that cycle of abuse, and thankfully they manage to both escape.

And then there's the suicidal ideation. Oh god, the suicidal ideation. There's a few examples of characters being self-destructive or sacrificial in a way that evokes suicide (Angel springs to mind in multiple instances), but it's only Faith and Buffy in S6 (and parts of S5 to be fair) that explicitly grapple with this. Buffy's arc in S6 is basically her grappling with suicidal ideation, and struggling to actually want to be alive. Faith attempts suicide multiple times - metaphorically in This Year's Girl and literally in Five By Five, when she attempts suicide-by-copvampire-detective. I would even argue that Graduation Day is another example of attempted suicide-by-slayer, given that she actively goads Buffy to kill her (and therefore become her), and seems almost relieved and proud when she seemingly does so.

The kicker is really Dead Things. This is such a vital episode for understanding Buffy in S6, and it is absolutely dripping with Faith parallels. It's almost a Frankenstein episode, made up of bits of other Faith-centric episodes. The central conflict is the exact same as Bad Girls, with a routine patrol (seemingly) killing an innocent bystander at the hands of a slayer. Spike has the same solution as Faith - dump the body and forget about it. He even uses the same utilitarian argument to justify it - that one lost life is meaningless, collateral damage, against the many that Buffy has saved. But it's Buffy who is in Faith's shoes, struggling with the idea that she killed someone. Ironically, her solution - to hand herself over to the police - is in fact the same solution Faith eventually comes to in Sanctuary. At this point in time, that was the last thing we saw Faith do in the Buffyverse, and now Buffy herself reaches for that same idea to try and achieve peace.

Her attempt to turn herself in can and should be read as a metaphorical suicide attempt. Her words to Dawn saying goodbye are pretty much a repeat of her words to Dawn before she jumps in The Gift (see @impalementation 's great post on this). She's been trying to recreate that feeling of exquisite peace all year, just as Faith repeatedly turns to metaphorical and literal suicide to find her own. That idea of "peace" being equated to both voluntary incarceration and suicide makes the ending to Sanctuary much darker, which makes me glad that Faith ends up taking an active role in the world by the end.

Buffy beating up Spike in the alley - himself a mirror to Buffy in many ways, and behaving identically to Faith in this episode - is lifted from Who Are You.

"Shut up! Do you think I'm afraid of you? You're nothing. Disgusting. Murderous bitch. You're nothing. You're disgusting."

- Faith Lehane, Who Are You, shouted while crying and punching someone on the floor, but obviously talking about herself.

"You don't have a soul! There is nothing good or clean in you. You are dead inside! You can't feel anything real! I could never be your girl!"

- Buffy Summers, Dead Things, shouted while crying and punching someone on the floor, but obviously talking about herself.

Both scenes come at the climax of an episode-long metaphorical suicide. Both strip away the characters' defenses and lay bare an unfiltered and messy psyche, dominated by anger and self-hatred.

So we can see that when Buffy is at her lowest, she becomes her own shadow self. Faith is in many ways a permanent part of Buffy's psyche, which comes up to the surface occasionally and has to be actively quashed (I'm thinking about her taking on parts of Faith's wardrobe along with her personality in Bad Girls, until the accident at which point she actively goes in the opposite sartorial direction). In her post-ressurection depressive haze, Buffy is simultaneously less connected to her own personhood and more emotionally volatile, so her shadow self is exposed, and that shadow self is Faith.

It gets extra interesting when you remember that Faith is The Slayer at this point. No new slayer is called when Buffy dies - nobody even suggests that one might be out there - which suggests that the sole Slayer line runs through Faith now, and Buffy is an abberation. (S7 kind of confuses the issue when it suggests that the First will have to kill Buffy last, but it makes more sense to ignore that than to ignore this). The Slayer is a core part of Buffy's identity, one that she ambivalently pulls away from and grabs on to - but technically it belongs to Faith now. In S6 Buffy loses connection to her identity, and so becomes an echo of Faith, who owns that part of her now.

Going even further - Faith only exists as The Slayer at all because of Buffy's first death. Slayers are kind of an undead like vampires in a way - they can only ever exist because someone else dies. They live because of death. Faith is the walking, talking corpse of Buffy, a reborn figure given purpose by death, for death. Buffy in S6 is experiencing her own kind of un-life, as depression so often feels like. She too feels like the walking, talking corpse of Buffy. The Slayer, Faith, and Buffy are all caught in their own purgatory, born out of death and unable to see anything but death in their near future.

It's just so much fun to pick apart this season and see how it relates to this seemingly unrelated character. Faith feels like a major presence in a season that she doesn't appear in - and I'm not sure even explicitly mentions her - solely thanks to how effective a lens she is to view the main character. Now that's effective connection of character and theme.

#faith lehane #Buffy summers #s6 #dead Things #parallels #btvs #cw rape #cw suicide #theme: death #meta

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pair-annoyed · 3 years

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Anime I Watched This Fall

My first semester of college is officially over and the December holidays are upon us! I hoped to make one of these posts sooner, but I have been incredibly busy with schoolwork. Now that things have slowed down, let’s take sometime to reflect on things I’ve watched.

These anime are listed in chronological order and encompass everything I’ve watched from 9/1/2020 - 12/15/2020

Like always, they will be rated on a 1-10 scale; 1 meaning complete garbage, 10 meaning masterpiece. I will offer my thoughts on what I did/didn’t like about each show!

1. The God of High School - 6/10

Despite the stellar animation from MAPPA and my high expectations, I was really disappointed by how this series was treated. Most of the story’s crucial elements were handled poorly. I finished this series feeling more confused about the plot than when I first began. The power system is really cool, but poorly explained. More time should have been spent on exposition and world building for this series, instead the fights were given the most screen time.

2. Doukyuusei - 7/10

I really liked the style of Doukyuusei. Granted, this was another movie I chose to watch primarily because of the hype surrounding it. The dynamic between Kusakabe and Sajou is an interesting one, and I also enjoy how the movies different acts were separated by the seasons. However, there's nothing that really sets Doukyuusei apart from other romance movies, its a little generic. Still, I enjoyed it nonetheless.

3. Re:Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu 2nd Season - 8/10

My opinions on Re:Zero’s second season are biased. This was, by far, the sequel I was most hyped for during the summer/fall anime season. I was so happy to see the story’s continuation and I’m looking forward to the season’s second part coming sometime in January. Re:Zero is one of my all time favorite series because of the way it handles it characters and power dynamics. I also really enjoy the show’s psychological aspects. If you haven’t already, give Re:Zero a try!

4. Saint☆Oniisan (Movie + OVA) - 8/10

This was a wonderful comedy. I wasn’t sure how the subject of Jesus and Buddha living together would be tackled, but it was handled wonderfully. I was laughing for pretty much the entire movie. I love the art style and little references to both Buddhism and Christianity, plus the incorporation of Japanese culture. Saint Oniisan is a bright comedy, with two eccentric main characters. If you like a show that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and need a good laugh, I can’t recommend this more.

5. Clannad: After Story - 10/10

Never, while watching anime, did I cry as much as I did while watching Clannad: After Story. I didn’t realize how much I related to Okazaki until I saw him grow up in After Story. I was left sobbing, especially after episode 18. I still, to this day, cannot listen to the Dango song without tearing up. The original Clannad is nothing special, but the continuation of its story its something heartfelt, emotional, and down-to-earth. I love Kyoto Animation with all my heart, and Clannad made me appreciate everything the studio has done just a little bit more. Thank you Clannad, for reminding me about the kind of person I strive to be.

6. Nakitai Watashi wa Neko wo Kaburu - 5.5/10

The art in A Whisker Away was beautiful. The story itself, however, is nothing too enjoyable. I found it difficult to like our protagonist or her love interest. Nothing about this movie is inherently memorable. The emotional climax came far too early which made the second half of the film seem long and drawn out. All in all, the movie has a wonderful concept, I just believe it could have been so much more emotional than it was. When I watch a move, I like to empathize with the characters. It’s difficult to do when the characters aren’t given the proper exposition to be empathized with.

7. Shikioriori - 6/10

This is less of a movie and more of a collection of short stories. Flavors of Youth is something you shouldn’t watch on an empty stomach, all of the food looks incredible. The same cannot beside for the rest of this feature. The stories themselves seems heavily clichéd. Much like A Whisker Away, the initial premise is intriguing, but the execution results in something that comes across as trying too hard and carries no emotional weight with the viewer. If you plan on watching, pay more attention to the artwork and animation than the actual plot. You won’t be missing anything.

8. Vinland Saga - 7/10

Vinland Saga helped me get out of the rut that Clannad: After Story. Not only does this show have a great story, its action packed with lots of interesting fights. I especially enjoyed all the Nordic history embedded within the show. Its really unlike any of the other historical anime I’ve watched. I will say, it’s gory. But, compared to all the other things I watched this time around, I finished this series the quickest. Its good, its graphic, its fast paced!

9. Mononoke Hime - 7/10

It’s ironic considering how much anime I’ve watched that I have yet to watch all of the most classic Studio Ghibli films. Princess Mononoke is grittier than most other Ghibli films I’ve seen, but it’s message is positive and its characters are wonderful. I can’t really speak ill towards classics like these. I guess maybe my one complaint is that this movie could’ve been a faster pace. Other than that... I really enjoyed everything Princess Mononoke offered! I understand why it’s so popular.

10. Howl no Ugoku Shiro - 8.5/10

Can you believe it took me this long to finally watch Howl’s Moving Castle? Me neither!! This movie is so endearingly beautiful. I loved every second of it, from the characters to the soundtrack. So many iconic things come from just this one movie. I would like to take this time to thank my best friend for reminding me that Studio Ghibli films are wonderful! Thank you for watching this with me, I loved it! All in all, I regret not watching this sooner!

11. Toradora! - 6.5/10

Toradora took me a while to finish, just because I lost interest about halfway through. But, I powered through it, and ended up really enjoying the show! I’m not the biggest fan of the ending, but that’s just a personal preference. Somehow, this show also made me cry? I’m not entirely sure why because Toradora! is probably the thing farthest from sad. Apart from the show’s dull slice of life moments, it was super cute! A much needed light-hearted romance.

12. New Initial D Movie: Legend 1 - 5/10

Full disclosure, this is the only thing related to Initial D that I’ve ever watched. My band and I watched this expecting to hear some of that iconic Initial D music, itself all we got was a mildly confusing story about different types of cars. It was cliché and frankly a little boring. Although, I am still considering watching the original Initial D just so I can hear the music in the way it was original intended. I’ve got no other opinions on this movie. It’s best not to watch these movies without the context from the rest of the franchise.

13. Uchuu Patrol Luluco - 7.5/10

I didn’t really understand why people enjoy studio Trigger so much until I watched Space Patrol Luluco. I loved all the fun references to other studio Trigger works. I loved the humor, and I loved all the bright colors. The animation was extremely high energy, and the art style fits the show’s premise. Each episode was only 12 minutes long so it was a super quick binge. If you’re looking for something quick, light-hearted and comical, this is the perfect show to watch.

14. Orange - 7/10

I owe a big thanks to a tumblr mutual for recommending this show to me! This holds the honor of making me cry by episode 3! I honestly did not expect the subject matter of this show to be as dark as it was. Usually when I see the genre ‘shoujo’ I do not associate it with a love story like that of Orange. The heavy subject matter made it a little too close to home for me, but I still really enjoyed this series. It reminds me off all the good times I had with my friends in high school, and of all the regrets I carry with myself to this day.

15. 3-gatsu no Lion - 7.5/10

March Comes in Like a Lion is another show that was a bit of a slow burn for me. Each episode left me feeling emotionally drained, so I had to take a lot of breaks while I was working on watching this series. Shaft, the studio behind this anime, holds a special place in my heart because I loved their work on the Monogatari Series. March Comes in Like a Lion is a little different. It’s driving force it is characters, and it was cathartic to watch our main character transform through the entire duration of the first season. I know the show’s second season is much better, so I’ll be starting that soon!

16. Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei - 8/10

I loved how artsy and smart The Tatami Galaxy is, but honestly I couldn’t watch too much at once cause it would hurt my head. I also couldn’t watch this show while I was tired because the speaking rate is much faster than typical anime. The Tatami Galaxy is so unique for its medium. I loved the different time loops and the crazy animation. The characters were fascinating. The dialogue, although very fast, it also fantastic. There’s an element of humor to this unique story telling, and I enjoyed ever minute of it!

Currently Watching:

Hunter x Hunter - 6.5/10 (As of Episode 30)

I pride myself in having watched a lot of shounen anime, but I was reluctant to start Hunter x Hunter for years because I thought I would find it boring. I was oh so very wrong. Considering great shows like Naruto and Fairy Tail that fall under the same category, I expected Hunter x Hunter to be subpar in comparison. It gets a low score for two reasons. One, the power system was introduced a little too late and now I’m wondering if all the fights post episode 30 will involved nen in some way, shape, or form. Two, its still on hiatus.

Two Cursed Additions For This List

Please to do not let these be representative of my anime taste.

1. Yarichin☆B*tch-bu - 4/10

I am a CLOWN for not knowing this was 18+. The only reason I watched this was to see why everyone was talking about the pink-haired boy with the glasses and tongue piecing. I know why now, and I regret it. This was a massive mistake on my part. But hey, at the least the art and ending song kinda slap?

2. Euphoria (Dropped After 1 Episode) - 2/10

If you know what I’m talking about when I say Euphoria, I am so sorry. And no, I am not talking about the HBO series. Seriously, don’t google this. Don’t watch this. Don’t interact with anything related to this. You’re probably wondering, “Then why did you watch it?” I did not watch this willingly. You see, I have a very bad habit of starting anime and then taking months to finish them. I made an ultimatum with a friend, lost, and then was forced to watch this a punishment. Not a fun experience. I’m very glad there are no GIFs of this on tumblr...

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ghostofmichelangelo · 3 years

Text

silent patient ~ alex michaelides review/reaction

** DISCLAIMER! - contains a lot of spoilers about the book **

** Read at your own risk of spoiling the storyline **

so i just finished the silent patient and my god what a fucking ride. after finishing it, i literally could not articulate it whatsoever cause i was trying to put 2+2 together for ages. the sheer cleverness of the writer had astounded me. i was also extremely shocked at how the writer was able to wrap up the entire plot of the book in not more than 20 pages max, managed to keep it completely unexpected and while doing so, evoke such a powerful reaction from the readers. i would bow. the storyline was absolutely fresh. it was very original and it was written in a language which was easy to read through and easy to visualize. that’s what i really liked about the book. it was written incredibly well written especially the main characters i.e alicia berenson (the patient) and theo faber (the psychotherapist). the character development happened very smoothly and slyly. the length was also perfect. what i mean to say is, it is not unnecessarily long wherein it is getting too descriptive and at the same time, it was also not too short and abrupt. i felt like all the words in the book were written judiciously and all the details had a role to play in the overall story. every single word had a purpose. none of the bits seemed overexplained (*coughs in king*) or irrelevant. for me personally, it surprisingly had a lot of elements which i really like in general and did not expect to be in it judging by the first look or the first few pages. i am talking about the use of greek mythology, particularly the tragic story of alcestis, art, interpretation of art and psychology. usually i don’t come across these themes when i’m reading about a murder (i'm fairly a new reader, more like a resurrected reader). at least in contemporary fiction. another thing that kept me on edge every step of the way was the fact that the climax wasn’t revealed till the last few pages of the book. I would like to emphasize on the word ‘few’ cause the story is wrapped up in pretty much the last 10-15 pages of the book which is something extremely risky and difficult. The fact that the writer was able to summarize the entire plot and tie all the loose ends in the final 10 pages is something that is definitely worth all the appreciation in the world. to do such a task and so effortlessly needs a lot of skill, planning and courage. the last 10-15 pages were the ‘make it or break it’ point in the book which was handled very intelligently and naturally it evoked the intended reaction out of the readers. the readers made it through triumphantly without any chance of disappointment. now, diving into the main plot points which got me fkn charged with emotions was obviously, without a doubt, the ending. I felt like such an idiot for not seeing it coming. for some reason i saw kathy cheating on theo and, alicia and gabriel’s story as two separate things altogether. i did not, for once, get the slightest inclination that maybe the two can be related. i just don’t know why. maybe i trusted theo as a character way too much. i know that agatha christie had a big influence on the writer and boy, did he manage to pull a complete ‘roger ackroyd’ on us. it makes complete sense. why alicia ‘opened up’ to him out of all the people who tried to cure her, why theo insisted on having her as his patient, why he believed her ‘strange man’ theory unlike all the others, why alicia randomly attacked him etc. i did not understand the whole ‘strange man’ trope till i unconsciously found theo outside gabriel/alicia’s house while following the man who kathy cheated on him with. everything was in front of my eyes and still i wasn’t able to grasp it. even then the mere fact that theo was following some random man and the fact that alicia also complained of being watched/stalked did not ring a bell. it was only when he notices alicia berenson from the summerhouse, did i have my hallelujah moment. however, my dumbass brain still wanted to get confirmation, which it did by the end of the next chapter. when this happened, my mind went along the lines of, ‘wasn’t alicia in coma?’. That’s when

i realised the timelines of the story. my god, there was a point towards the end of the book where even i was convinced that alicia was lying and that maybe she has been making the whole of it up to fulfil the rest of her revenge plot. throughout the book, there wasn’t a single person i didn’t doubt. i doubted max, diomedes, yuri. these are apart from the obvious ones like elif, christian, gabriel himself, jean etc. it was only towards the end i realised that there were two time periods as well. i thought everything was happening side by side. that there was no past or present. this aspect took me a while to comprehend cause it became a little confusing. also I really appreciate how paintings were used to interpret the story/psyche of the person. i found it very refreshing and new. this is psychological aspect of the book which i really enjoyed. i wanted to see those pictures myself. overall, i feel like i can give this book a solid 5/5 stars and is hands down one of the top reads of this year by far and knowing me, i know im a picky reader, esp in thrillers.

P.S would love to do more book reviews if it helps out and if you enjoy reading them!

#books #bookreviews #darkacademia #lightacademia #silent patient #psychologicalthrillers #thrillers #murder #crime #truecrime #mysterybooks #mystery #booksbooksbooks #book clubs #read #literature

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