#and then leaving what had actually developed alone for the audience to explore on their own based on what happened in the game

[kanansdume]

I'm honestly so glad we're getting more of Mon Mothma because she is becoming everything a lot of us wished Padme had been.

Padme, sadly, is a character who is defined predominantly by being a wife and a mother. She was introduced first and foremost as Luke and Leia's mother: someone who was beautiful and kind, but sad. Presumably someone who had once loved Darth Vader, but who was also presumably long dead. We never know her name, what her relationship to Darth Vader had been, why Leia remembers her but Luke does not, or anything but those 3 descriptors. Beautiful. Kind. Sad. That's it.

When she's introduced in The Phantom Menace, they do her the very kind service of doing so in a way that doesn't immediately let you know that that's what she is. She's a young Queen of a planet we've never heard of before who is fighting an occupation. It's not until she lands on Tatooine and walks into Watto's shop and has that fateful first interaction with baby Anakin Skywalker that her eventual future becomes obvious. The moment Anakin asks if she's an angel because she's so beautiful, there's no doubt of what role she ACTUALLY plays in this story.

And from that point forward, that's what she is. By Attack of the Clones, her most important role is as Anakin Skywalker's love interest. By Revenge of the Sith, she becomes predominantly Luke and Leia's mother. Her narratives are consumed by these two identities, erasing any ability for the audience to truly understand her motives as an individual beyond being a wife and a mother to more important characters. She becomes problematic in her choices, less because of the choices she makes and more because her choices are incapable of really being understood. Why does she even want Anakin? Why would she marry him at all, let alone so quickly? Why doesn't the murders of the Tuskens, especially their children, bother her? Why would she have CHILDREN with someone she knows has murdered children already once? Why is she so quick to believe Anakin couldn't have murdered the Jedi when she already knows him capable of murder?

She could have been a complex, interesting, flawed character. Instead, she's mostly just ended up confusing and a little flat. She's fascinating to play around with as a character, to mold into different versions of herself depending on which motivation fans decide to assign to her. But she doesn't stand on her own. She's not important on her own.

But now we have Mon Mothma. And she is becoming everything Padme could have been. Flawed, yes. She's privileged, short-sighted, uncommitted but righteous. But she's good, too. She WANTS to help people, but she has a family she wants to protect. A family who is becoming more and more distant from her due to her conflicting responsibilities and values. Her motives are her own and have nothing to do with how important she is to a more important character in the larger narrative of the Skywalker Saga.

But Mon Mothma has the advantage of having been introduced VERY differently to Padme. Mon Mothma is first ever seen as a rebel leader. We don't know anything else about her but that she is a rebel leader of some kind, who appears to have quite a lot of respect from the rebels she is speaking to. Her character is small, but it has so much more room to develop as an individual outside of the constraints Padme was limited to.

Mon Mothma has returned every so often over the years in increasingly larger roles, but her main defining factor was that we knew she would become a rebel leader. So we know where her morals lie. We see her associated with Padme and their group of loyalists in both Revenge of the Sith and The Clone Wars, we see her leading the rebels during Rogue One, we see her leave the Imperial Senate and join the rebellion more fully in Star Wars Rebels. And now, finally, we're getting to explore her more deeply. Find out why she commits herself to the Rebellion, what her motives might be, what may have stopped her from joining as a leader earlier, what her struggles are and how she manages them. She can exist outside of a relationship to a larger character because she's never really BEEN connected to a larger character in the narrative. She is her own person, in the background of other people's stories and only now getting to tell her own.

And that story is free of those connections, free of the constraints, so she is allowed to be complicated and kind, beautiful and flawed, difficult and stubborn and sympathetic. She happens to be a wife and a mother, but it's not the most important aspect of her character.

And I love that for her.

#andor #padme amidala #mon mothma #andor show #andor series #sw andor #star wars andor #andor spoilers

[feverdreamjohnny]

My Melting World

Hey there. This is going to be a bit of a personal post. I'm going to talk about a game I made in 2020 that I kept returning to well after I should've left it alone.

Demon's Island was... Well, it wasn't a game, I guess. Probably something closer to a virtual post card, maybe even a hangout zone by proxy. Regardless, Demon's Island was an effort to collapse a lot of my feelings and memories down into a single bite-sized sandwich. That's probably why the game feels distinctly childish and silly; it's as earnest as I was capable of at that time, purely translating how I felt in the form of messy, unfiltered in-jokes and spaces built for people that no longer exist.

I think that last part is probably one of the more haunting prospects whenever I revisit the game. 2020 was a different time. There are rooms and textures left over from people who've since faded away, and revisiting it in recent times feels like walking into the bedroom of a deceased relative. It's just a room, but the little imprints of them are still left there. It's a chilling sensation, sometimes unpleasant, but I still feel like it's something we all need once in a while.

Tallying all of the time up, I probably spent nearly a year building this time capsule. I went through a lot of growth as a game developer over these past few years, and I really think Demon's Island was core to it. It wasn't just the technical skill required to make a multiplayer exploration game, but because it was also the last place I got to store a lot of the unbridled joy I felt with my friends before I had to suit up and try to become a "real" game developer. Excitedly promising my friends a trip to a mall that we could all walk around in before I moved away to some proverbial college town.

Demon's Island wasn't the first game to serve as a time capsule for me. Years ago I had this friend who I was close with and it was actually his body of work I used as a touch-stone to come back to a time I was quickly forgetting. His work always fascinated me because while I was struggling to try and make my games evolve (to disastrous results), he went with the flow and just did whatever he felt like. I think that's probably why his games managed to capture a lot of raw emotion that I was completely incapable of in my own work. It's tragic that I failed to understand the value of what he was doing because I was too distracted with trying to "become something."

I pushed him a lot, trying to encourage him to leave his comfort zone and make something more "tangible." He always responded that his work was just for his friends. He ALWAYS responded that his work was just for his friends.

We ended up separating around late 2019 after a serious personal rift outside of game development. I disappeared and moved on to another friend group, trying to pretend that nothing ever happened. He just moved at his own pace and continued onward like always. It was a hard time.

One day I was curious about what happened to him, and I eventually came to discover that he moved to 3D art. From what I could tell it seemed like he had found an audience for himself. I was happy for him. Despite the rift, I still wanted to see him succeed in the end. Even though I pushed him in the wrong direction, that was always what I wanted to see. Maybe it was for the best that he stopped being around me.

About a month or so ago I was reflecting over the games he and I used to make to a different friend of mine (who also knew him), and this friend condescendingly described my nostalgia as "immature." I never really confronted the way he phrased it, but I fumed internally. It's funny how a single, stupid word affected me so much. It frustrated me that one of the few things I had left that connected me with a happier time was now re-framed as something to be shoved under the rug. I think it's important that you occasionally take time to reminisce so you don't forget the events that are shaping the moment you're in. Sometimes you need to look back to figure out how everything got to this point.

I think the reason I've fixated on this concept of "games as time-capsules" is because I have an incredibly hard time remembering things. Not so much that my memories are being completely erased, but recollecting things becomes more and more difficult if I leave them alone for long enough. Now, it's not uncommon to have a hard time remembering things, but I definitely lose my grip on memories faster than the average person. I'm not sure if this is something I inherited from my mother (who's also had memory recollection issues her whole life) or if it's something else, but it's definitely made it difficult for me to retain most of the things that have made me who I am today.

The reminiscing isn't just to relive happier moments, it's also one of the only things I have that's keeping me tethered to my roots. The less and less I reflect, the deeper those memories sink into murky waters, to the point that it becomes nearly impossible to bring them back up. I've already lost so much of my past self this way that I can't help but be frustrated that I never took an effort to archive stuff from when I was younger.

The reason Demon's Island still matters to me is because it was the first time I had managed to make a game (without my old friend) capable of tethering me to a time that's been slipping away so fast. It's possibly the single most ridiculous, mind numbing game I've ever made, but it might have one of the most important roles in keeping my fading memories alive.

Somehow a bunch of silly dancing rat gifs have convergently evolved into this. I don't know if it's the funniest shit in the world or just tragically pathetic. Maybe it's both?

I think the most important part of this entire blog post is what follows. This is the only reason I found the motivation to re-examine my feelings about Demon's Island and make a retrospective.

About half a year ago, a woman contacted me on Patreon to tell me a story about her husband.

I was floored by this, not only because I was offered to be a part of something so meaningful, but for the first time this... Stupid little thing I built to scaffold my failing memory actually connected with someone. I immediately offered to do more than just a personal message or a secret image: I wanted to make them a special room to celebrate their anniversary. She decided to send me some images and videos from their relationship, and I stitched them together to make a little flowers n' fruits themed space. This was eventually packaged in a private version of the game, and after giving her the files I went to sleep.

I didn't hear anything for about a month or so, but the silence was broken when she sent me a video of her husband reacting to his gift. Despite all of the memories fading and twisting out of my mind like shopping bags in the wind, I don't think I'll ever forget seeing the genuine joy on his face.

For first time in my life, I felt like I had finally done something that mattered.

Before I received that message, Demon's Island wasn't special to anyone but me. For my friends, it was just a fun scrapbook from a time that we were all rapidly moving on from. For strangers the game was even more useless: it was just an unrelatable stream of conscious chattering from inside my head. Who was Tim? What's with the weird HPS1 rooms? Why is there a guy with cream all over his mouth on this Thanksgiving poster? Just a bundle of connectomes signaling to nothing in particular.

For me, it was one of the last things I had connecting me to one of the most important years in my life. After receiving that message, I understood that someone else connected with the game the way I did. It was the first time I felt like I was actually being seen. Of all the little funny moments that have happened in my time as a developer, this is the one I'm fondest of.

If you're a game developer and you happen to be reading this, I have a single recommendation for you. I think you should consider making a little world of your own. It doesn't have to be a "game." It doesn't need any core mechanics or structure. Just make a little world filled with memorabilia, and make a little character to let you walk through it.

Stupid in-jokes with your friends, images and gifs you like, weird drawings, photos you took, whatever you want. Just build a world for yourself (and maybe even your friends too if it interests them). Even if you don't release it, I think you'll be grateful in the end.

There might come a day where your world starts to melt into a blurred puddle, where every day feels the same and the endless grinding makes you want to scream. There might be a day where you forget that you were alive once, and maybe having that little bucket of memories will be the thing that keeps you moving on to tomorrow.

Anyhow, we're nearly done here. I wanted to end on this room. It's actually my favorite area in the game.

See, during the latter part of 2020 my grandmother died, and my world sort of got thrown into insane disarray. It resulted in us moving out of our old home to take care of hers, and during that move I decided to build a room out of textures from my backyard.

This little room is one of the few personal remnants I have from that old house. The house I spent my entire childhood in. The house where I started making games. Guess I'm glad I kept something to remember it by.

[littlestsnicket]

@kuwdora and @sassaffrassa

i did a thing! what sort of thing? a my creative process is a nightmare and i like to write bits of things to throw at a wall and see what sticks and if it doesn't work hopefully i'll be able to canibalize it for parts Witchyr app fic sort of thing.

for the moment, yen has a post transformation body--because the experience of being physically changed to be more palatable to others is an important part of her canon character for me, but who knows if that's what's going to work best for medical device hacker!yen in this fic--but deals with chronic pain. she has a migraine here because that's the only thing i have experience with to write without doing research, and i'm not at the doing research phase yet.

this is all pre-geraskefer vibes, because my current idea is that i can use their developing relationship to try and anchor this story to keep it from getting totally out of control, but i don't actually know if that will allow me to explore the political/economic cyberpunk nonsense i want to explore. we'll see. (another potentially useful piece of context is that--while this is a cyberpunk story in my head--it has none of the vibes that the genre usually has, as it's kind of supposed to be about how close we are right now to the dystopian elements of cyberpunk so i wanted it to feel more grounded in our present, but this fic snippet is not at all any of that yet.)

fic snippet under cut (1.1k, oops that's probably my median completed fic length)

Geralt felt completely useless. He was a witcher; that made him the target audience, not a useful participant in trying to get this startup off the ground. He had been silently, with increasing anxiety, watching Jaskier practically vibrate with tension for about half an hour before Jaskier finally snapped.

“As the closest thing we have to an HR department, I have to know, are you one of those asshat engineers who thinks anyone not directly contributing code is a waste of space or do you have a problem with me specifically?”

Yennefer looked sincerely offended for a moment, but she schooled her features into a bored scowl. “You specifically.”

“Oh, alright then, we can work with that,” Jaskier replied with deceptive calm as he tipped his chair back on its hind legs until it creaked in protest. Yennefer started forward, not even leaving her seat, but it was enough to make Jaskier flail. He was only saved from sprawling across the floor by Geralt’s witcher fast reflexes. 

Jaskier fixed his attention back on Yennefer as if the incident hadn’t even happened, standing up but not crowding into Yennefer’s space before Geralt had even fully stabilized the chair. “Do you think I’m a spoiled rich kid? Because by the gods, have I got news for you. I am! And you can get the fuck over it or find someone else to bankroll this operation and deal with lawyers and tear their hair out trying to put together a fucking business plan— ”

“Jaskier,” Geralt interrupted softly. 

Yennefer, surprisingly, levered herself out of her chair and left the room.

Jaskier sighed, deflated. 

“You’re not…” Geralt trailed off, thinking of the kid that had stubbornly subsisted off ramen noodles so he could pay his half of the rent even though it had been the heyday of the Witchyr app and Geralt could have—had offered to—cover it. Geralt had seen Jaskier act like an entitled prick, used to getting his way because of who his parents were, but he was also so stubborn, dedicated, and kind.

“I try so hard, Geralt,” Jaskier swallowed audibly, “but that’s the point. I have to try and it won’t do anyone any good for me to forget that.”

Jaskier shoved his chair over so it clattered against Geralt’s and plopped back into it to slouch to rest his head on Geralt’s shoulder.

“Should I try to talk to her?”

“Hmm,” Geralt responded, indecisively.

“I want her to like me. I want her to let me help. I want her to know she’s not alone. But she makes it so difficult… Fuck, I am so tired.”

“When’s the last time you are a vegetable?”

“What?” Jaskier straightened up to look at Geralt incredulously. Geralt raised his eyebrows.

“I’ve been drinking the stuff. You know, the green stuff? That you mix with water?”

“That’s code for you don’t remember.”

“No, it’s code for I’m almost 30, and despite my miraculously youthful looks my body is not as springy as it used to be,” Jaskier smiled slightly. “It may also be code for I don’t remember.”

“I’ll make you dinner, would be good for you to eat real food.”

“May I invite Yennefer?”

“You’re paying for groceries, you can do what you want.”

Jaskier hummed, taking a page out of Geralt’s book.

“We’re all tired,” Geralt said, letting some of his own instinctively concealed exhaustion show.

“Exactly, she’s tired too.” Jaskier stood and followed Yennefer through the door.

“Yen?” Yennefer’s back was turned as she stared out the window in the tiny reception space with the perpetually unmanned desk. She had been hugging herself, trying to force herself to breath, but had to steady her hand against the windowsill when she startled and the sharp movement made her vision spot. Her migraine was so bad at this point it didn’t even hurt.

Jaskier reached a hand out towards her. It hung uselessly between them for a long moment before he shoved it into the pocket of his jeans.

“What?” she snapped.

“Geralt decided I needed a break, and I’ve decided you need one as well. He’s going to cook dinner at my place.”

“And?”

“You should join us.” Jaskier’s smile looked hopeful and Yennefer had no idea what she had done to deserve this, neither the kindness nor the irritation.

He studied her intently and then nodded. “Good, you can meet us there in…,” Jaskier raised his voice and Yennefer wanted to drive a fork through her temple. “Geralt, how long will it take us to get groceries?”

Geralt pushed the door open and looked at Jaskier with poorly concealed fondness; Yennefer didn’t understand why he bothered. “If you’re involved, at least 45 minutes.”

“Ok, well, you have my address. Geralt will text,” Jaskier gave Yennefer a stern look like he was daring her to object. He flexed his fingers and wandered back into the other room, presumably to gather his things.

“You don’t have to,” Geralt said in a tone that Yennefer thought might mean he didn’t want her to eat dinner with them, but he was so bloody hard to read sometimes.

“No, it’ll be nice.” It would not be nice, but somehow, even though it shouldn’t, going back to her apartment or staying in their tiny office space on her own seemed even less nice.

Geralt frowned at her with careful thoughtfulness. “Any dietary restrictions?”

“No,” Yennefer smiled ruefully, “that is the only way my body has been remotely cooperative.”

Geralt nodded, a frown still maring his expression. She wondered if he could smell how much pain she was in or something. She didn’t know much about how the mutagen enhanced witchers worked, but it was one of the cybernetic sensory enhancements available to higher level witchers now.

“You cook?” Yennefer asked, surprising herself with a sincere desire to know more about Geralt.

“Hmm. I can follow a recipe or execute on Jaskier’s vision. He’s a good cook but only—you’ve met him.”

Yennefer laughed at that; she could picture Jaskier walking out of a war zone with an oblivious smile and a perfectly golden crusted beef wellington. Laughing turned out to be a bad idea though and Yennefer had to fight through a wave of nausea.

Geralt had taken a few cautious steps toward her by the time she could focus on her surroundings again. 

“May I?” he asked. Yennefer made a vague affirmative noise even though she had no idea what he was talking about. His hand pressed against the base of her neck through her shirt. She had no idea what he thought he was doing, but his hand felt impossibly warm, and that warmth was energy she could channel into nudging all the muscles she was involuntarily tending to relax. Probably, Geralt had been around long enough to have a basic idea of how magic worked and knew exactly what he was doing.

Hollowed out weariness rushed in to replace the pain, but she knew it would be futile to try and sleep. Dinner would probably help.

#the witcher #geraskefer #witchyr app fic #mayo writes fic

[the-sublime-unreal]

The Psycho & The Barbarian:

Intuition, Intertextuality, & Irony in Cregger's Barbarian

Barbarian (2022) is a slasher-thriller that touts a deceivingly simple premise: a woman, alone in a strange city, finds herself in close quarters with a stranger who shouldn't be there. While her first instinct is rightfully to leave, through bad luck and alarming coercion her options are steadily whittled down until she is forced to stay the night.

This information is all that is offered in the first half of the trailer, with the actual details of Tess's, our protagonist, time in the house left to the viewer's imagination. Instead the viewer is greeted with jump shots of claustrophobic subterranean hallways, glimpses of pale, hobbling flesh, and the same green-tinted shots of shocked audiences that have plagued horror fans since Paranormal Activity's 2009 release.

This tepid trailer does little to inspire hope for a decent movie in the viewer, which is why the bulk of Barbarian- to say the least of its brains- comes as a shock jarring enough to rival any jumpscare.

The opening half hour of Barbarian sees Tess and her unexpected companion, Keith, stumble through what might be interpreted as a meetcute in another genre but is instead a parade of red flags. Keith comes off as untrustworthy, overeager and manipulative, so when Tess finds a hidden tunnel in the basement with what appears to be a snuff film set, the audience is primed for Keith to be the antagonist, particularly when he downplays her concerns as "just a room with a bed and a bucket".

What is unexpected, however, is that when Keith enters the tunnel beneath the house and goes silent for way too long, what Tess finds waiting for her is not a trap set by a manipulative slasher. Instead, Keith is in a hushed panic, and after a seconds-long reunion where he says that there is someone else here, a misshapen elderly woman, fully nude, appears from the shadows and beats his head against the stone hallway. Then, in a jump cut recognizable to any movie buff, the dark and bloody interior is replaced by a classic convertible driving along the coast, pop music replacing the shrieking score.

Like Hitchcock's Psycho, Barbarian explores the loss of the suburban dream. Its setting, Brightmoor, Detroit, is an embodiment of housing crises previous, and the fact that the home is specifically an AirBnB that the owner had never before visited emphasizes the current housing crisis. Psycho explores the death of the family unit, with Norman Bates clinging to a relationship with a mother who no longer exists, whereas Barbarian's bogeyman is a mother who has never had a child. While this is merely the beginning of the comparisons between the two films, in order to preserve the excitement of any potential first viewings, I will refrain from examining specific details.

The true antagonist of the film is little more than a living corpse whose horrific crimes occurred long ago- The Mother merely a product of abuse, mind broken and development arrested, her speech limited to babbling the word "baby" over and over. Is it this babbling that gives the film its name? is it that the street where the antagonist resides is called "Barbary", making him the sole original occupant: the final Barbarian? Or is it meant to be an explicit callback to Hitchcock's work?

This leads into the true question of Barbarian's intertextuality: is it merely aping Psycho or is it actually in conversation with the piece- if so, what is it saying?

Barbarian invokes a question about desperation, the nature of our dreams, and the dangers of idealizing the past— doing so by referencing a classic film that is, in itself, idealized. With this, Barbarian posits that the American dream is not just dead, but has been dead for so long that not even its corpse is recognizable. Long gone is the slasher, the serial killer lurking in the depths of our quiet suburbs: the well-meaning but nevertheless horrific byproducts of those legends are what haunt us today.

#Barbarian #barbarian (2022) #zach cregger #barbarian spoilers

[greatqueenanna]

As Promised, here is my very late review of Polar Nights.

As a note, if you are curious about my thoughts on other Frozen Novels, I have an analysis here where I did short reviews on all of them. Once again, my audience scores are based on Goodreads.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Frozen Polar Nights: Cast into Darkness

By: Jen Calonita and Mari Mancusi

Released: July 19th, 2022

Type: Stand-Alone

Age Range: 8 - 12 years

Audience Score: 4.2/5

My Score: 3.8/5

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Overall, Polar Nights was a nice story that included some elements that helped build Frozen 2's story more and gave explanations to things that were previously left vague. Anna and Elsa's interactions were the best element, especially when they talked about the past, and there was also a little bit of great Kristoff and Anna content that helped built their relationship. However, the story was a bit boring for me and I wasn't really invested in the two sisters Sissel and Inger. It seemed like I was just reading it to see how much more deleted Frozen 2 content and world-building lore was put in there to help further develop the films, rather than actually caring about what happened in the story.

More details of my thoughts are under the read more.

The Good

Polar Nights shines the most with its main characters Anna and Elsa. It explores their relationship and even has them acknowledge more aspects of their troubled past, something fans have been asking for since Frozen that some fans felt was glossed over in Frozen 2.

Polar Nights tries to further canonize the infamous deleted scene where Elsa brings up a memory of their parents praising Anna - that was also previously brought up in Dangerous Secrets as well.

The novel also tries to better explain what Elsa is doing in the forest now, with her trying to better perfect her memory powers, learning more about the Northuldra and Spirits, and studying Ahtohallan.

The novel tried to harmonize the previous version of the North Wind Siren with the current film version. What do I mean? From Aurora's interview and the Into the Unknown: The Making of Frozen 2 documentary, the siren was meant to be an ancient force that calls to Elsa. This was then changed to Iduna calling her - leaving it vague on whether it was actually Iduna or the memories of her. Here, it explains that Ahtohallan called to Elsa using Iduna's image to appeal to Elsa as a mother. It was nice to finally get some clarity on this.

Polar Nights also has a great emotional side story for Anna and Kristoff. Kristoff begins to lose his memories of Anna and we are treated with some very emotional scenes of Anna trying to cope with this. I remember the satisfying reunion they had when Kristoff finally remembered Anna. It was a beautiful scene.

The Bad

This is less a criticism of the novel and more of Disney in general. The novel pretty much writes the Northuldra out of the story - which is understandable in terms of Disney not wanting to write them without a Sami guide, but given that the Northuldra were such a big part of Iduna's story and the overall story of Frozen 2, we really need more content with them in it. I believe it is long overdue to have a Sami actually write or guide a story featuring them to further push their importance to Frozen's lore.

Another one for Disney in general because I'm not sure how much power the writers actually had when it came to his character - Runeard continues to be a one-dimensional villain and scapegoat for everyone's problems. The issue with this is that we can't really teach children that evil things only happen because of unrelatable evil people - it happens because of abuse, misinformation, prejudice, pride, and fears that are not exclusive to just one big bad. Anyone can do something bad if they think it is right.

The story itself wasn't bad - it was fairly serviceable in terms of a simple, monster-of-the-week type story. My only issue with it was that it was a bit boring. I didn't really feel anything for Inger and Sissel since they seemed to just be diet Anna and Elsa and felt they needed a bit more pizzazz to really make me want to know what happened to them and invest myself in their story. I know the focus needs to be on Anna and Elsa - but you can't build a story around the interactions of two people without building an interesting world around them.

I don't know what it is about Frozen Novels, but they seem to love to write out Kristoff and Olaf as much as possible - and now Mattias has been added to that list. Maybe we can use a little less of the original, forgettable characters and start using the ones we already have. Like, instead of a random shepherd seeing the death of the sister, why not use Mattias to involve him more in the story? Again, this could be more of an issue with Disney restricting characterizations, but given that Mancusi was getting ready to write in Kristoff's mother in Dangerous Secrets with the only thing stopping her being timeline issues, then maybe we can get a little more content here.

#Frozen Polar Nights: Cast into Darkness #Polar Nights: Cast into Darkness #Polar Nights #Frozen #Frozen 2 #greatqueenanna/analysis

[gamora-borealis]

I think with vol 1 Gamora we see her have a slow transition from beginning to end of the film and she softens over time. She had a plan in place to leave Thanos and was ready to risk distancing herself from him. She goes from quick to anger and having almost no trust and fear of vulnerability to letting her guard down a little. We can see her nodding her head to Peter's music and offering him a gentle smile by the end. In vol 2 she's grown some more and is closer to the others and more open, but she still has rough spots and doesn't trust new people easily or read every emotional situation. Then of course by the end there's more growth and deeper relationships to the others. We get to see a solid arc of emotional and mental healing. We're allowed to understand the good and bad parts of her and to connect with her story. In Endgame 2014Gamora is just like vol 1 Gamora. We see how hard she can be but also that she cares and has a good heart. In vol 3 Gamora is very much like vol 1 Gamora only a bit rougher because she's a ravager now. But also she's basically vol 1 Gamora who didn't get to ease into changes. She was thrown into the future, found out she had been killed, was dealing with both 2018 and 2014 Nebula and had to then jump head first into a potentially universe ending battle against her abuser. If that had been me I would have had a nervous breakdown. There's so much that was going on and vol 3 never allows that to be explored. Her entire significant experiences in the future all happened between Endgame and vol 3 where people couldn't emotionally connect to it. The guardians aren't given space to sympathize with her and the audience is left with undefined backstory and no real plot for Gamora in the film.

Lots of people have been deliberating on 2014Gamora and I think the most simplistic answer is they never should have killed 2018Gamora. Especially with only one film left. The contrast between her death in Infinity War and how James Gunn has handled characters deaths with far more agency and dignity stands out a lot. But in vol 3 it's so much more in your face how Gamora was treated compared to the other characters. In Infinity War she dealt with Thanos mostly on her own, was emotionally abused and then just as she's telling her abuser what he's done to her isn't love the movie allows her experience to be silenced when Thanos throws her off the cliff and actually receives the soul stone. Afterwards we are never given a chance in any other movie or show with the guardians to see them all angry or sad about what happened. In vol 3 we see every member of the team openly distraught over Rocket's situation. When he faces his abusive past he's not alone. When he stands up to his abuser his feelings aren't shutdown and he gets to win.

I think vol 3 had a number of nice character moments for Gamora and I was particularly happy she got to stab the villain. There are many aspects to the writing and characterization that are great. But it's hard not to notice Gamora's treatment compared to all the other characters has been pretty awful since IW. I saw lots of people excusing what Thanos did to Gamora after Infinity War or saying she wasn't really abused because Thanos got the soul stone. I now see some of those same people talking about how Rocket's abuser was actually a bad person and what he did was unforgivable. That alone tells me Infinity War should never have happened. Nobody should have been left feeling Gamora deserved what happened or that it was justified. James Gunn has said he signed off on and was okay with how Infinity War went down and I try to respect that but I don't understand him signing off on the message Infinity War sent about Gamora's abuse compared to the message he put out about Rocket's abuser. I don't get allowing a prominent character who was on her way to easily having one of the strongest arcs in the mcu, ending the trilogy the least developed character with the least amount of relationships to a story that she helped shape.

Yes Yes Yes! Great write up anon.

I think there could have been more Gamora stuff in Vol. 3, but it clearly was meant to be a Rocket-centric movie and there was so much going on considering they had to fit in Adam as well, so more stuff with her would have taken away from all that from a writing perspective. Not that that's fair to her character at all, but story/time-wise and knowing that Rocket is Gunn's favorite and this was meant to be his movie (whereas the last one was a little more Gamora and Nebula heavy), it makes a lot of sense.

We also have to remember: the timing of the James Gunn drama may have affected this too. The first time we see the Guardians again being in Thor 4 where it's just supposed to be kinda goofy and short was not ideal. This movie is 3 years late, and there were some changes made to the script (not huge, but probably some side-plot Gamora and Adam related stuff because the movie was further up the timeline now).

One thing I liked in Vol. 3 is they kind of have a moment where they take a jab at the "magic cliff" and how it doesn't make sense. I also struggle with Gunn's decision to sign off on her death. He seems to care about these characters a lot, even if Gamora isn't maybe his favorite like Rocket. It makes me wonder how much say he actually had in all of it, and how much it was just reassuring the fans (I'm skeptical of statements like this having become a Supernatural fan since 2020 lmao). From a writing standpoint, I can see how "Gamora having a big emotional death and Peter fucking everything up" sounds appealing, especially since they were desperately trying to figure out how to incorporate the soul stone and give the movie emotional depth. The soul stone was originally supposed to be tied to Black Panther/Wakanda, but their director wanted the movie and T'Challa's powers to be rooted in Wakanda/Africa (the flowers) and not some weird space thing (which makes sense!). So they probably came up with the Vormir idea and approached Gunn with not a lot of options. If Gunn had been the sole writer of IW/Endgame, I'm sure that even if he still chose to kill Gamora, that the stuff after Gamora's death would have been handled a lot better (as we see with Rocket and his abuser in this film). It's clear that Gamora couldn't have been brought back though because that would have meant Natasha also would have needed to come back, and the Avengers people clearly wanted her to stay dead (and that's a whole other problem ugh). Gunn probably was given story points he had to work with in IW/Endgame and write dialogue for, which I feel like he did a decent job of (Gamora spoke her mind as much as the story allowed and tried to sacrifice herself).

A lot of people have pointed out that sexism probably has some to do with how Gamora has been treated too (like if she was a male lead would it have played out like this). And you know, I don't think James Gunn is purposely trying to be sexist, but the dude is flawed (and admits it) and his writing used to be more problematic than it is now. It's maybe still a blindspot for him.

I'm also potentially processing this all differently because I purposely spoiled myself on some Gamora details last weekend before going into the movie (yesterday) to prepare myself (because if not I can get wayyy too invested and it hurts a lot). So I've had some time to think about all of this at a meta-level before I saw the film. I think I'm generally happy with how it turned out considering what happened happened in IW and can't be changed now. I kind of liked that Gamora had all this growth in Vol. 2, idk what path she would have taken in Vol 3. Everyone had to go discover themselves at the end. Would Starmora have broken up then? Adding the new challenge of making it a different Gamora was kind of more compelling in some ways, although I absolutely hate that that meant she had to die to get there (maybe if it was the same Gamora with no memories that would have been interesting).

I'm also very used to filling in all the gaps of what isn't on screen because that's just how my fanfic brain works, and I feel like Gunn writes such strong characters that it's easy to imagine stuff offscreen (and maybe that's what he wants us to do). So like, just because some of the Gamora / Guardians mourning her stuff happened offscreen doesn't mean it didn't happen. Gunn would probably agree with that. It still sucks that we didn't get to see it though.

#guardians of the galaxy #gamora #gotg #gotg vol 3 #gotg spoilers

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

How ‘Our Flag Means Death’ Designers Mixed History With Broad Theatricality

Working on “Our Flag Means Death,” a half-hour comedy now streaming on HBO Max, production designer Ra Vincent was excited for the challenge of crafting “a theatrical play … on the high sea.”

Concept art by Ra Vincent, reunited with collaborator Taika Waititi

A fictionalized account of reallife 18th-century “gentleman pirate” Stede Bonnet (played by Rhys Darby) and his relationship with the infamous Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard (Taika Waititi), the series needed to use its sets in ways that typical movie and television productions do not.

“It’s less of a major motion picture and more of a theater sports performance,” Vincent explains.  At the outset, Vincent says the team decided, “Let’s build an environment where the cast can explore exactly who the character would be without the limitations of having a seriously preplanned set.” To fashion that kind of open space, the art department needed to make room for 100 crew members and their equipment, while also allowing for the actors and their needs in the moment. “That meant building 360-degree environments for them to work in, and then making them shootable,” Vincent says. “So we made these theatrical versions of stage backdrops for these characters to work in. They were really there to support the development of these characters.”

Production designer Ra Vincent conceived theatrical versions of stage backdrops for actors to work against.

In 1717, Bonnet commissioned a Spanish galleon outfitted as a warship and christened the Revenge. Vincent describes his vision for the vessel: “Part of his flamboyance sort of rubbed off in the finishing of this ship. You can commission a warship easy enough, but then when it comes time to do your decorations and add your flair, that’s where we built a layer of Stede Bonnet over everything.”

Vincent went merrily over the top in designing the captain’s quarters: “We modeled his cabin loosely off your typical sailing vessels at the time, but given a little extra proportion we built into his cabin an amazing bathroom and walk-in wardrobes and a library with an open fire. It’s sort of a crazy notion: Who would have an open fire in the library on a wooden boat? Stede Bonnet would, just because it looks right.”

Completing the look of the captain’s quarters, set decorator Christopher Carlson added soft furnishings, fine linens and many of the sorts of details one might expect to see from a pirate who is actually an aristocrat.  When fully assembled, the Revenge is 180 feet long and fills a large soundstage at Warner Bros. “We did quite a lot of serious research and realized that it would be extravagantly difficult to build [an exact replica of a] sailing ship,” Vincent says. “We went about simplifying some things.”

For instance, the actual ship had a great deal of rope hanging from it for specific purposes. “But maybe we don’t quite need to make everything make sense,” says Vincent. “Sometimes a rope looks better at one end of the ship than it does at the end of the ship where it’s supposed to be. For the purposes of telling a really great story, you kind of want to coerce the audience into believing what they’re seeing is a version of reality.”

Similarly, the designers loosely interpreted other historical details. For a fictitious pirate town in the Caribbean, “we also used a massive LED backdrop, with a two-dimensional plate projected on it, of a few locations in Puerto Rico,” the designer says. “And you can kind of tell when you’re watching the series that it seems like you’re there but you’re not really there: Is this a play? Or are we at sea?”

Ultimately, Vincent sees his job as supporting both story and character. “The audience already bought the fact that we’re on a boat,” he says. “After that, you can allow yourself to leave the epic scenery alone and just enjoy watching people do amazing performances.”

Source: Variety

#our flag means death #ofmd #black sails #holy i spilled my drink when I recognise hal gates there #wonder if taika has seen black sails

[wanderingwomanwondering]

Strange New Worlds Commentary/Meta

**this post is NOT spoiler-free** AND **long post!**

We’ve gotten 4 solid eps of Strange New Worlds so far. Ep5 dropped today but I haven’t seen it yet. Overall, I like the show and I also have some constructive criticism. Here are my thoughts:

Episode 1 - Strange New Worlds

This ep was fun and it was GREAT to meet the main characters, especially Uhura. She was more fully presented and developed in this one episode than she was in TOS. Overall, I enjoyed this episode. I’m a sucker for cosmetic genetic modification for away missions lol. 

What I did not love (at all) was the paternalism shown toward the citizens of the war-torn, warp incapable planet. The leader that Pike and Spock spoke with made it clear that she and her people had no intention of listening to their plea they not use warp technology as a weapon in their war efforts. Pike pushes the issue by waving the entire damn Enterprise around AND inviting himself to a meeting of the warring factions to force an Earth history lesson on them to discourage them from obliterating themselves.

On the surface, that seemed like a fine tactic on Pike’s part but scratch the surface and the persistent paternalism displayed is staggering. Pike has zero right and zero jurisdiction on an alien world. Period. Of course, if he had left it alone after the original demand that he and Spock leave, it would have been a very short episode lol. So, for entertainment purposes, it’s less concerning to me that Pike took it upon himself to (paternalistically) instruct an alien world on how to lessen their growing pains and is more concerning that no meaningful discussion of that action was supplied within the narrative. They chat for like 2 seconds about the precursor to the Prime Directive but then explain away their social and political interference with the aliens by saying that the only reason the aliens had warp technology in the first place was because of the war with Control in Discovery. 

Mind you, the Federation has no way of knowing how many other pre-warp worlds may have been negatively affected by what they saw in their night sky during that epic battle with Control (or any other space battle for that matter). Does the Federation plan to scan for ill-gotten warp-signatures in every star system where a space battle ignited the sky in inhabited systems? 

The Federation is not a “divine power” that can or should play with the destinies of worlds, which is why the Prime Directive among other regulations was established in the first place. But without some full-on, in-depth discussion within the narrative about these situations and the parameters for intervention (if any!) the show is buying into and perpetuating harmful logics that erode the agency and autonomy of worlds in the name of paternalistically-driven harm reduction. It’s...a problem LOL one that I hope they actually talk about a lot INSIDE THE NARRATIVE. We as long-time viewers of Star Trek know the basic ethical issues being alluded to in the episode but without a real exploration of those issues in the narrative (which is harder to do, but not impossible, in an episodic format) we are left only with the problematic implications of the “solutions” worked out by one Starfleet captain.

Another issue: Pike’s thinking about what his future disability will mean for him has been framed in an ableist way so far. I sincerely HOPE that framing of his thought process is on purpose so that the audience can go with him on the journey of deconstructing his ableist attitudes and changing them!! Seriously, if that doesn’t start happening in earnest soon, I’m going to have more to say about how deeply problematic his current conceptualization of his future is. *side-eye emoji*

Episode 2 - Children of the Comet

Super fun ep! Uhura, my beloved. Anyway, what I did not enjoy was the name calling (e.g. zealots), Like. How dare an alien species blend religion and science I guess??? It was an interesting choice of words for a man that regularly discussed the spiritual implications of the Red Angel while they were all figuring out exactly what was going on in s2 of Discovery. I had a lot of side-eye during the episode.

I did appreciate that at the end, Uhura (my boo!) presented scientific evidence that Ma’hanit was in fact runnin’ shit in the galaxy LOL. Just as Spock flying his shuttle mission factored into Ma’hanit’s role in seeding greater life on the planet (and Ma’hanit had foreknowledge of this), the Shepherds’ reverence and defense of Ma’hanit was important too and factored into the overall positive outcome. Arbiter of Life and Shepherds for the win!

Again, what I wanted was some engaging discussion of these issues/ prejudices/ assumptions and a visible/overt shift in crew viewpoint in light of the information Uhura shared. Preconceived notions + one scene where those preconceptions are proven wrong is nice but in 2022 it doesn’t feel sufficient imo. Within the Star Trek universe, there are a lot of lessons to be learned at this point in time in terms of the Federation’s and Starfleet’s development. I don’t know about other fans, but I want to see how the mind-changing sausage is made LOL.

Episode 3 - Ghosts of Illyria

I liked this ep too! It hit another Star Trek plot trope that I love: alien virus that makes the crew go a little cuckoobananas. Yes! Bring it! Also, we got the superhuman alien trope, my beloved. I was winning with this ep lol.

Overall the issue of genetic engineering was fun to explore. It’s been a theme throughout Trek and is hotly debated every time it comes up and I always find it fascinating. Those issues were at the center of a few eps involving Dr. Julian Bashir in DS9 and it was fun to watch. So I loved the reveal about Number One being Ilyrian. The Illyrians genetically modify themselves (instead of terraforming) in order to fit with a natural environment. They are contrasted with the Augments and I hope like hell we get more discussion of the (perceived) similarities and differences between the groups. 

Anyway, at the VERY end of the episode, Una offered FANTASTIC commentary on the consequences and problems inherent in being designated as an exception to a series of stereotypes (”one of the good ones”, a “hero”, etc.) by a person in power (Pike in this case), then the personal log entry was deleted, the ep ended, and I don’t know if they will carry it forward in BOTH small AND large ways. I mean - we will probably get a big moment in the future where Pike defends Number One to Starfleet a la TNG’s The Measure of A Man but who knows. Still, I wonder about the small ways that we’ll deal with Una’s identity among the crew and the day-to-day intraship politics of that now that it’s known. That pathway wasn’t really made clear and highlighted in the ep. We got Una’s discussion with La’an but I doubt that same level of interpersonal challenge will come through for Una ship-wide especially given Una’s rank. So where/how/to what degree will that character arc get to take us viewers on a meaningful journey?

Episode 4 - Memento Mori

Dire stakes. Mental health issues. Grief. Mind meld. Ingenuity. More backstory for La’an. Great character beats for Uhura (my love) and Hemmer. We glimpsed a possible love connection forming with M’Benga and Una. Nurse Chapel was in excellent form. Ortegas being snarky. Pike visibly feeling the weight of the captain’s seat. I was winning with this one yall. YMMV.

Ah, the Gorn. A faceless, predatory species easily glossed as “monsters”. The ep doesn’t do much to deal with that highly problematic characterization of an entire species but I think they laid the groundwork to approach that issue later in the show?

La’an noted that because of her past traumatic experience losing her entire family to the Gorn, she does not feel that empathy is possible and that they are true monsters, though not supernatural. That’s a big friggin statement and they HAVE TO come back around to that in a meaningful way. New life, new civilizations and all that. Conflict is of course a part of the mission but the demonization of one’s enemies, while very human and understandable is STILL A PROBLEM. 

Be enemies if that’s how it has to shake out because one side won’t see you as a human/person worthy of not being violently consumed but demonization feels beyond the pale (for Star Trek). Yeah yeah I know this is an way early in the ST timeline but still. They have to unpack that in the show (right???) otherwise what the hell are we even doing here???

Pro & Con of the Episodic Approach

I understand the fandom’s collective longing for the “simpler”, “easier”, episodic, exploration-driven times that defined the STU prior to Discovery. DS9 sort of started to break that mold in its final few seasons when the war with the Dominion began, but Strange New Worlds seems to be bringing back the episodic approach for the franchise. My basic point is that has a big con and a pro imo.

The big con I think is that the episodic format limits what they can really say/do AND FULLY ATTEND TO over the course of the season. We get snippets of deep/meaningful stuff but then those MAY get lost over the course of the show???

The pro is that the episodic approach is less “heavy”. We get mostly bottle episodes that exist in their own right and don’t require us to think and feel about the same/consistent cultural/social issues very deeply from week to week. Like. All four eps so far were good but they aren’t connected by anything but the characters themselves and their mission to seek out new life and new civilizations etc. 

I have theories about deeper connective elements at play across episodes but the show hasn’t been very loud about any of those yet. That’s understandable since the show is still very young, but it does make me wonder where we’re going in a deeper sense than just “the mission”. Like. What does that mission mean? How do we accomplish that mission? How, why, and to what degree must we grow and change to truly accomplish it? These are my questions and I think they are the show’s questions too? I just haven’t fully seen it on screen in SNW quite yet.

Season(s)-long narrative arcs imo allow for stronger clearer statements about key social/cultural issues presented in the narrative. Check out my post here to get more of a feel for what I mean. SNW returning to the episodic format is nice in many ways but my fear at this very early point in the show is that key character issues and larger/in-depth social commentary may not be as fully developed and explored as they would be in a season(s)-long arc format. I know some in the fandom may prefer this and I understand the various reason why but it still kinda concerns me.

#star trek strange new worlds #star trek snw #star trek snw meta #star trek meta #christopher pike #snw spock #nyota uhura #number one #la'an noonien singh #strange new worlds #ghosts of illyria #children of the comet #memento mori

[gbridges2003]

Immerse fest

To start off this year’s immerse festival, we had a few session with Jodie to help us understand ecology. From these session I learnt that the impact will become different when we’re thinking ecologically, by playing around with elements such as space, movement, sound/ words and audience. If we change any of these how will this change our system/ final piece. In this blog I will be referring to the theorist Karen Christopher and exploring what her thoughts on working ecologically. Also, I will be looking at the practitioner Jess Allen, looking at her performances and reflecting on how it links to my piece in an ecological way. I will be writing this blog to reflect on my process and start bring my awareness ecologically, by looking at the elements within the play. 

WEEK 1

In the first session my group sat down with all the scripts and started the eliminating process, keeping in mind “eventually the work begins to make itself” Christopher, K. ‘page 119’, in Small acts of repairs. This quote inspired me and help me with my future experience’s within the developing process. We read through most of the scripts, noting down what ones we resonated with. We wanted to have lots of different options and didn’t want to fixate on anything quite yet as we understand we need to be looking at, what is the impact of the play? And what message do we want the audience to leave with? In my opinion, I feel that it is best to keep asking yourself questions to come up with lots different material that can branch out and to help finalise later ideas, always thinking about the impact of every detail. 

After sitting and reading through the scripts we came across ‘You Are Not Alone’ by Nicole Pschetz. The reason we felt deeply about this play was because it was a short piece about climate change and having to come together as a community in order to create change, no matter how scary it may seem at first. We thought it was important for us to perform this play as it is about a global issue that is relevant to today and felt we had a story to tell. After we found our play, we started to brain storm ideas and we came to a group decision that we wanted to do a physical theatre piece and have a audio over the top. This was because we wanted to show on stage through movement how a community can come together in order to create change whilst the audio is talking about how people are scared of change as you feel lonely but once your apart of a community, you realise life becomes easier as you have people around you trying to better themselves/ the planet. Our next challenge was choosing who was playing what part. There were three characters in the play, River, Old River and Wind. Our first cast was formed by myself playing Old River, Olivia as River and Heather as Wind, as a group we was not set on this cast indefinitely as wanted to keep an open mind so we can work to the best possible outcomes. When writing this blog and reflecting on the work of Karen Christopher, this links to her ‘cherry blossom tree theory’, this is a method were you go into your work with no sense of direction, you just gather up lots of material by trying out different elements and selecting what works after detailed analysation. I realised we was doing this all along and I  saw the connection between my work and the theorist’s work. 

WEEK 2

At the beginning of the second week we worked specifically on the audio as we knew  that was our starting point in generating movement for the piece. I took on the responsibility on directing the audio and actually creating the finishing product. I have never done anything like this before so it was a challenge, but I enjoyed it. My thought process going into this was to get everyone to re-record their lines, portraying different emotions or tone, in order to see the impact each one brought. Working like this, thinking deeply about each detail brings you more aware of the story you want to tell, by zooming in on specific outcomes “we are looking to discover as many solutions as we can” Christopher, K. ‘page 120’, in Small acts of repairs.  This critical thinking,  I will be taking this with me for future projects as it’s important to analyse your work in order to impact the audience the way you envision.  It starts making you mindful about all the small things that can lead to the bigger picture. 

After gather all the speaking material, I then went home to piece the audio snippets together with the help of Olivia. We also added background noises such as bird chirping, wind blowing and water flowing. We thought this would help the impact of our piece. 

At the end of the week we had a show back session in class. We didn’t have any movement made as we were to focused creating and producing the audio. Looking back and reflecting on my work with ecology in mind,  this might not have been the most affiant way of working as we could have been working on movement at the start of the week, but in the moment we felt like we did not have enough time so we focused on the audio. Our feedback was to make the piece more original and meaningful for us.  After having a convocation we decided we wanted to add the Welsh language into the story as both Heather and Olivia speak Welsh, it is important for them to bring back their native language. As we know, the population of Wales do not have many Welsh speakers, only 29.5% can speak it! (Welsh language data from the annual population survey: 2022). With that in mind, we started to link it to our piece and it fitted perfectly as the play text’s message was about bringing a  community together and all it takes is that one person to step up, to not be scared. Just like it takes one person to speak welsh in convocation and then other people start to speak welsh. A good example for me was Sian, Oliva and Heather. They are all welsh speakers but decide to speak to each other in English but when one starts to speak welsh they all speak welsh. It proves it takes that one person to stand up, just like our piece. Whilst looking at ecology and looking at K.Cristopher’s work I feel you should have lots of contracting elements within your play that each impact the audience in their own different way. You go through a process of trial and error, for the purpose of selecting the fitted outcome. Therefore, having audio that is incorporated with Welsh language and movement that appears on the stage, hopefully,  will both have their own story to tell on their own as well as together.

(First day in audio booth)

WEEK 3

Tuesday morning came around and we got straight to work. The first thing we did was to change the roles of people, we did not mind as we was not set on the characters we were originally playing as we knew we wanted to keep an open mind, referring to the K.Christopher’s ‘cherry blossom tree theory’, which I mentioned earlier. After we moved the characters around we decided on heather being Old River who is welsh speaking,  Olivia being River who is a non welsh speaker and me as Wind also a non welsh speaker. After showing back the new half english half welsh audio, our feedback was a question: Why aren’t you going all the way with the welsh language? Our response to this was we didn’t want to excluded any one from the performance as non-speaker won’t be able to understand. Matt came back to us and inspired me as he told us that it isn’t our fault that people do not speak welsh when you are in Wales. It also connects to our piece as well as you can’t be half and half you have to go all the way in order to create the impact we intend of creating. 

With that being our feedback we again switched the characters for the final time and have Olivia also speaking welsh.  It was set that Heather will be River, a welsh speaker, Olivia as Old River, who is also a welsh speaker and myself playing Wind, I am a non welsh speaker. We swapped the characters because we though this would fit better as heather is a stronger welsh speaker than Olivia so she took the bigger part and everyone was happy. 

WEEK 4

As the performance dates were coming up we knew we had to get on with the movement, so at the start of this week we split off into two groups. Heather went away to translate the script into welsh with the help of her welsh teacher, whilst Olivia and myself started to generate movement material. We did this because we thought it was the fastest way of getting things up on its feet. The way me and Olivia created movement was by listening to the words in the script and picking the deeper meaning/ message within. We both started to come up with different material, from what our understanding of the plays message was. We then brought everything together, working out what fit and what didn’t but not completely getting rid of any material as we kept it for future purpose’s. This associates back to K. Cristopher as all material that has been produced, can still bloom in other areas. I learnt that you should keep everything you create for other projects as then you always have something to work off of. 

As Olivia and I were in the process of making movement we came up with the idea of using a blue ribbon as a symbol of change and delicacy of the earth, we had the phrase “the whole world is in our hands” in our minds. We wanted to use the ribbon the show the audience a sense of community. You have to work together in order to make things easier for all. So with that in mind, we started to play around with ways we can incorporate the ribbon.  After heather was finished translating the script we started to show her what we had come up with, she gave us her feedback and we all spent some time so we could fix and piece the material together. 

Here are a few pictures of us as a group trying some material out with using the ribbon (in the pictures it is a scarf but the final piece it was a blue ribbon). 

Here you can see us creating a little scene, our purpose for this scene was that when a community come together life gets easier, if you help out others and they can help you. This session was very productive as we had our first 4 minutes of our play (it was a 6 min and 50 sec piece). At the end of the week we performed what we had to Sian and Matt. We got our feedback and they said it looked to dancy and we should try work towards something, Sian gave us the example of the whole company coming together to change a lightbulb. Also, as we’re doing a physical theatre piece, Sian advised us to keep in mind that the movement that is happening on stage has to tell a different story to what the audio is telling the audience. For me, feedback is very important and should never be taken in a negative way but to use it to better yourself and the work your producing. After reflecting on the process I feel that feedback is another element on working ecologically. To keep working to benefit stronger meaning within your work. We had to put the movement on pause as we had to go record the audio for the final time. I worked on putting it creating the audio over the weekend so it would be ready for when we start next week. 

WEEK 5

With last week’s feedback in mind, we wanted to start the week thinking about ways on how we can make it more theatrical. We came to the conclusion that Heather‘s character (River) wanted to change for the better, but she was too scared to do anything because she felt as if she was on her own. Whilst Olivia’s character (Old River, who is Rivers older and wiser self) comes to help her present self, showing River what the world can be if  us as a society come together to work with one another. Contracting that, my character, Wind, represents the rest of society that do not want change/ don’t believe in global warming as they lack care and gratitude of the world around them. Wind doesn’t want to socialise with River and Old Rivers views about the world as my character fills as if it is useless. However overtime in the piece, River and Old River helps my character understand the world so we can better it and show that community isn’t scary, it can create change. This is when I started linking my work to the practitioner Jess Allen.

 J. Allen likes to push boundaries and making people feel uncomfortable by using “unlikely audiences in unusual locations” (Allen, All in a day's walk). Her work is made for the outdoors and it aims to bring communities together by understanding the world around them, bettering themselves for a healthier world. What I learnt from Allen was you should learn how to challenge people behaviours and to have meaning into your work.  Her performance ‘Drop In The Ocean’ is a non-stop movement play about water sustainability . I think this is to show the struggle some people may face when they don’t have free, clean, running water as they are always working to make sure they have the bare needs. For the rest of us, we need to learn how to be grateful for what we have In our own lives. This reflects in our piece as it was a physical piece with non-stop movement to show that the community works behind the scenes in order to make the environment around you better but, there are people like ‘Wind’ who needs someone to open their eyes and realise they are damaging the earth. I’m going on to do my PGCE after university and I would keep J. Allen work in my mind as I feel she is a positive role model with strong views. I feel it would be important for my students to understand the world around them by seeing the effect it does have on us as a society. 

WEEK 6

This was the final week of rehearsals and at the end of the week we will be showing our immerse festival performance’s. the beginning of the week we had to work with the class to work out the transitions of each group on how we’re entering and exiting the stage. 

After, my group went to finalise the ending of our piece as we wanted to keep developing until The last moment, making sure we were portraying the impact/ emotion we wanted to get across. In the middle of the week we got a chance to rehearse in the room we would be performing in. This help us as a group a lot, I think this was because we had more room to move and  express how our characters felt freely.  After our slot, I wanted to talk to the girls about our hair as I had the idea of each of us having the blue ribbon imbedded into our hair in some way. This was to show that us as humans are all connected In some way and we should be open to making new relationships that can challenge and change your views and to broaden your experience’s. Again, reflecting back on the work we always were trying out different material/ props and costume. This benefited me as I never struggled with creating material as we would brainstorm and have loads of different ideas to go from. Below is some pictures on how I did our hair for the piece. We did one run without it and one with it to see the impact it each one had. I was talking to one of my class mates and they said the ribbon in the hair helped tell the story clearer. Therefore, we kept the ribbon in our hair as I added another layer to our piece. 

In conclusion, when thinking back on my process ecologically, I have realised that every detail has an impact on the finale piece. Working as a team where everyone has job to do to help create a finishing outcome can be like an eco-system where every life in that system has a role to play,  otherwise it will start to fall apart. Allowing to share responsibilities can help come up with stronger and meaningful projects as you have more than one outside opinion. Thinking in this way, I will be taking this tac-tic with me for future projects now that I have a better understanding and can be used as a skill. 

Grace Bridges.

[tapwrites]

Sequels and Fanfiction

The story doesn't end with the last word you read. Just as the story in your head doesn't start with the first word you read... it doesn't end with the last word you read either.

As the heroes ride off in the sunset... your mind is free to wonder what they get up to next.

If you enjoyed a story, your brain will automatically write its own fan-fiction. What new adventures do the cowboys go on? Who else does Superman save? What's it like when the Prince and Princess live "happily ever after"?

That part of the story is completely in our hands. It can be so pleasurable to be left with the characters we've come to love and imagine our own stories. Or ponder over the meaning of the last cryptic shot of a film. To unpick the twist that left you breathless and its possible repercussions that aren't captured in the novel.

...Until they make a sequel.

A sequel continues the narrative of the previous installment. Which means that whatever the viewer dreamed up for their own head-cannon and added to their own personal version of the story suddenly is categorically did not happen.

Now, this can be fine. Most people don't go into a lot of detail with their own ideas of what happen next unless they're writing fan-fiction. More often, they might conjure images of particular events as implied by the movie they've just seen.

And some narratives purposefully leave things open-ended. People say it's "left open for a sequel," but what does that really mean? It' means 's more like "left open for people to imagine their own sequel, and in turn to be excited for a sequel if it were announced because it could be as cool as what they dreamed up."

"I didn't come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell you how it's going to begin."

My favourite personal example of this is from The Matrix. A speech at the end is aimed at the Agents, but simultaneously speaks to the audience. And all but encourages them to imagine what happens next.

"I'm going to show them a world... A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there, I leave to you."

...And so, I went places with it.

My head-cannon fan-fiction story had Neo in the Matrix showing what's possible to people, revealing the truth in an open-secret that spidered its way across internet forums and back-channels. Of, "is that a bird? A plane? No, it's Neo!" demonstrations, and society fundamentally changing as people exit out. Of Neo zooming into Agent after Agent, an unstoppable force that can bend The Matrix to his will.

And then the sequels came. None of that really happened. Instead of the hints being developed and the most reasonable expectations explored... we get new powers, nerfing of old powers, and new lore thrown in. New stuff is cool, unless it asks the audience to forget all the stuff they liked about the original.

So now, my version of the story is simply incorrect. And all the joy I had dreaming it up was a bit silly. Being a big enough fan of the first film to be excited by those hints was just foolish. Because none of that happened.

Prequels have a similar problem. The narrative has been presented, the audience has a form of it in their heads--their "story" of what happened. But with the prequels, now the people they thought were one way are actually a different way. The mechanics of the world are changed. Any change or clarification a prequel makes, ripples out across all subsequent parts of that story. Such ripples tug and tear at the stories people have in their heads; not the part of the story they imagined might come next... but the part that was set in stone because it was part of the darned film!

This is why sequels and prequels are so hard to pull off. And why standalone stories are often best left alone. And why when a sequel or a prequel, or a season-2, or a spin-off show, or a reboot, or a reimagining, or a remake, or an adaptation, or a movie-of-the-game is announced... fans of the original may well sigh despondently.

A sequel is not just another film. It's a continuation of a story that now belongs to someone else.

So yes, a sequel or prequel can ruin the series as a whole. Because it is one long story, in the viewer's mind. Because that's where the story really lives.

You're messing with the story that's been germinating in other people's heads. Which is a very delicate thing to do, in which you risk just steamrolling your audience's own imagination, their own story of events.

If you're going to do a sequel to your film or your book, or a second story for your TV show... you're doing it for the fans of the original. And the most die-hard fans pick up on your hints, and spin out their own ideas of what could happen and how cool it would be. That's why you put those hints in there in the first place! To get their cogs turning!

If you don't take that seriously, and pay as much attention to those hints as your fans, your sequel will disappoint them. In which case, what's even the point in making a sequel? Apart from trying to rake in some more dough, of course.

And as the series goes on and on, the more the fans will stop getting excited about what might come next. Because the production company is going to tell you anyway, and it's not going to be anywhere near to what you thought up.

#story #sequels #prequels #series #writing #film #fans #fan-fiction

[sillyguyhotline]

like . idk. every time i think about tlou2 i’m just like “what did i take away from this where did the characters progress” and i just don’t have an answer. it’s still so egregious with ellie’s character in particular because her dilemma at the end of part 1 never left me with the idea that she was vengeful or vicious or inherently flawed in the ways she attempts to seek justice. the most devastating thing about her is that she is self sacrificial and self destructive and you want to see her character develop from this point because of how much you’ve seen her struggle throughout the entire game. yes, if the story is isolated to part 2 and ellie’s downward spiral, the lesson about seeking closure and avoiding self destruction is somewhat cohesive, but in the context of part 1 it’s so difficult to feel compelled by the story.

ellie has experienced nothing but loss over and over to the point where at 14 years old she believes that her death is something she’s had coming and that she doesn’t deserve to be alive because it’s a chance the people she loved didn’t get. although the ending is morally questionable it represents a small modicum of hope in that ellie is given the chance to live a better life. and then in part 2 all of her fears are realized. the person she’d loved most, the only person in the first game not to die on her or leave her, is killed. she finally snaps and turns her self destructive grief outward in some attempt to seek closure because she’s watched so many loved ones die and been completely unable to do anything about it. and this costs her everything and leaves her living her worst fear, alone and isolated and listless. the story preaches about how violence won’t bring you closure while simultaneously showing that the violence and revenge abby enacted did indeed bring her closure and that shes had the satisfaction and stability to grow as a person and seek out a new life even after doing the same thing the narrative condemns ellie for doing. the story posits itself as being ellie’s story as well as abby’s, but ellie’s narrative goes absolutely nowhere in terms of her character and leaves her in the same place- possibly even a worse place, considering the growth she’d shown at the beginning of the game- that she was at to start with. even abby’s narrative is damaged by the need to mesh it with ellie’s, because she doesn’t get the same explorations of moral complexity or condemnations of her actions in the story. it starts off with the knowledge that audiences are going to hate her so the majority of her story is spent trying to humanize her and make her more sympathetic to the point that by the time most people are willing to appreciate and engage with her as a character her section is nearly over. the morals it attempts to teach are incredibly simple and poorly executed but because the game is so reliant on shock value and excessive angst it allows itself to appear deeper than it actually is. also the pacing is fucking awful partially because of the issues i stated with abby’s character development and partially because the second “half” of the game is blown through at an absurdly fast pace. by the end it just feels so repetitive and drawn-out. i’m gonna go eat glass

[luckthebard]

The campaign wrap-up was so interesting in that it basically wasn't moderated - meaning we got an often wildly tangential conversation covering things that cast had on their minds and thought to bring up in that particular conversation.

And it showed off some of the disconnect between what the cast were actively wondering about and what the collective fandom has been interested in in some interesting ways.

I also thought it was interesting to notice which players were more likely to not want to explain certain things than others. Matt was the most obvious in his reasoning for giving "vague" answers, but I noticed that there were things that Travis, Taliesin, and Liam also sort of shied away from fully explaining or defining, and seemed to want to leave up to audience interpretation.

#I'm *sure* this format is not universally beloved by viewers haha #but it definitely was an interesting choice #critical role #cr spoilers #an example of that last thing was that Liam pretty clearly signaled that romance wasn't the main thing on his mind during the campaign #and yeah then went to list all the people Caleb connected to in that way anyway #but briefly and in a way that suggested he was sort of going 'yeah yea yeah these were his thoughts on those feelings' #and then leaving what had actually developed alone for the audience to explore on their own based on what happened in the game #side-note I'm honestly surprised I haven't seen more toxic takes on how they approached basically not taking fan questions #but maybe I just have the right people blocked

[stillreadingpjofanfiction]

I’ve seen a few posts recently on people not liking Percabeth attending college in New Rome. I thought I was alone and had been sitting on this draft post since I made my account. Here’s why I believe this is a bad storyline and maybe even a bit of a harmful message to the target audience.

1. Percy is portrayed as being very family-oriented throughout the series. I don't buy that Sally and Paul have Estelle and Percy just jets off to the west coast for college. I know he has lots of magical means of transportation at his disposal, but I would think he would want to be around a lot more for Estelle.

2. Annabeth’s fatal flaw works against college in New Rome. I think Annabeth would want to go to the best architecture program in the world out of pride for getting in and the achievement of graduating from such a prestigious program. Could that be in New Rome? I guess. But, the rest of the mortal world doesn’t even know that New Rome exists, so they would not see it as such. To me, Annabeth attending college in the mortal world makes a lot more sense for this reason.

3. I think a large part of what makes Percy and Annabeth interesting is their connection to both the mortal and immortal worlds. Both could have been year-round campers, yet they chose to spend most of the year in the human world. They seem to have a deep tie to the mortal world that spending forever in New Rome largely abandons. In canon, New Rome is written as the only place they could truly be safe, but I could write a whole post in itself about why that doesn’t seem to be true.

I also think that Annabeth attending college in New Rome and then intending to stay there makes it hard to imagine she practices architecture in the mortal world. I don't think that being the most famous architect in the godly world is enough for her. I think she would want her work to be widely known in the human world as well. I prefer to imagine a world where Annabeth, after having already redesigned Olympus, is like, well that was fun. Next up, let’s get into the best architecture program globally and work my way up from the bottom with actual competition. Then she eventually opens up her own equitably run firm with paid family leave and profit-sharing like the boss she is.

4. Now, why I think it is a harmful message. I think Percabeth going to college together in New Rome is reflective of an unhealthy co-dependence. Percabeth ends HOO with immense trauma and a deep fear of being separated. And I think this makes sense after everything they have experienced. However, I think in their cameos in follow-up books they could have been portrayed as working through their trauma, growing as separate individuals, all while maintaining their relationship. College in New Rome feels to me like a band-aid solution to their issues.

Percy is most affected by this, given his lack of development as an individual in HOO. At the end of the series, he doesn’t have interests and dreams beyond being with Annabeth. I think it would have been interesting if Rick gave Percy a bit of an existential crisis. What are Percy’s hobbies now that he is in retirement? What does he want to study in college? Is college even for him? Instead, Percy follows Annabeth to college in New Rome and doesn’t have any plan beyond that. Maybe Percy could have been held back a year because of his six-month absence from school. Then, Annabeth would graduate a year before him, and they would be faced with how to move forward. Maybe Percy takes a gap year on his own to explore what he wants in life.

Basically, I believe that there were a lot of opportunities to write a healthier Percabeth in the backdrop of the other series. Rick could have portrayed a relationship where Percabeth works through their trauma and carve out a level of independence and individuality because those are elements that every healthy romantic relationship has. And Rick should be portraying this to his young audience rather than unhealthy co-dependence.

#pjo #hoo #percabeth #percy jackson #percy jackson headcanon #rick riordan #riordanverse #heros of olympus #annabeth chase

[oswinsdolma]

Yes, it's nearly 2.00am (because that's apparently the only time I have inspiration to write essays) but I've been thinking a lot about this lately and wanted to get it off my chest, so here you go:

The main goal of Merlin becomes disturbingly fractured along the way, which opens up the gaps for the prophecy to seep through instead of following the expected channels, but it can essentially be boiled down to three key elements 1) build albion; 2) decriminalise magic and 3) save Arthur, but when all is said and done, we never really see any of those objectives achieved.

Now, there are a few reasons for this, both from a writing perspective and a plot perspective. The first, and one of the most obvious, is that this show loves irony. I won't go into a lot of detail here because I've already written a whole ass essay in this very subject, but in a nutshell, you can look at this from two perspectives: firstly, it's important to establish that this technique is purely about the angst: it's the writers' way of provoking a reaction from an anguished audience, but it's foreshadowed just enough to make it more painful than it is shocking. Alternatively, there is the more plot motivated irony in that it genuinely makes a good story. Irony is a technique that has been used for thousands of years, not just because it provokes a reaction from the audience, but because it allows you to explore your characters in greater detail than before, riddling them with hidden juxtapositions and internal conflicts that are never resolved quite in the way you expect. The irony in Merlin is the epitome of this, with the whole motif of Arthur needing to die for his reign to begin. It is a classic example of the simultaneous despair and hope that mocks you from the shadows.

Following this, there is another force at play that deals with half truths and seemingly imperfect contradictions, and that's prophecy. It's not really a secret that I have very strong feelings about prophecy and its effects on all the characters, Merlin in particular, and the fact that fate and destiny are such key themes in Merlin both makes perfect sense and wants me to smash my head into a brick wall. Prophecies are another common trope that often go hand in hand with irony (think Oedipus Rex, Macbeth, The Iliad, all that doomed hero shit that I inexplicably adore), the key to their influence over the plot often lying in how they usually come true in the most unexpected of ways. This links back to that initial theme of irony, but this isn't what makes me angry: what is infuriating is that prophecies tend to come true, no matter what, and most of the characters seem not only to know this, but to let it take their autonomy over their respective fates, driving them to disaster.

Let me elaborate: especially in season five (I'm assuming just for the added fall at the end), Merlin talks a lot about how "one day, things will be different". He tells sorcerers that one day they won't have to hide. That one day, they won't have to live in fear of who they are and what others think of them. And Merlin is right: while it is not explicitly stated, it's generally established that this is one of the things Merlin should actively be working towards. But here's the kick: except for a few specific circumstances, when has Merlin ever actively tried to change Arthur's mind about magic? Yes, he has taken a few opportunities, like with Dragoon saving Uther's life, or with the Dolma's final request, where he has encouraged Arthur to rethink his choices, but otherwise, his support has been lukewarm at best. Instead, his primary concern was always saving Arthur, so he can become the king the magical world hoped he'd be, but he left out a crucial part, trusting in the prophecy to fill in the gaps. He knew it would come true, but it was, almost predictably, in the one way he never dared to expect.

And in a twisted way, there's that thread of irony again: Merlin thought he was saving Arthur so he could one day become the king who would see magic as a force for good, but instead, he created someone who was merely a survivor. It was Kilgharrah who said it first, and he who would mention it last: they are two sides of the same coin. But as willing as Merlin was to give his life for Arthur, and vice versa, he was never really ready to give him his mind.

Another interesting thing to note is Merlin's fixation on the "Saving Arthur" lens of the prophecy over the "Restoring Magic" part. Now, there are a ton of ways you can look at this, depending on how far along the scale of Queer Analysis you are, so I'm going to try and address a couple. At one end of the scale, you have the fairly simple and very believable "merthur" take. This basically boils down to the fact that Merlin and Arthur may or may not be deeply in love with one another, and that drowns out any voice of reason that may unfold. This is actually fairly canon compliant, particularly looking at incidents such as the Disir, when Merlin chooses Arthur over his and his people's freedom, though that choice was clearly, in hindsight, misadvised.

At the other end of the spectrum, there is the idea that it is the work of Kilgharrah, Gaius and other responsible figures in Merlin's life when he was new to his role in destiny, who reiterated at every occasion that Arthur must be protected at all costs. This may have ingrained into Merlin's thoughts and influenced his decisions from here on out.

Between those two points, there is a grey area, and I am of the personal opinion that neither extreme entirely satisfies the situation. For me, I think the characters in question are far too complex to have such simple motivations, and that the true reason lies somewhere between the two: Merlin undoubtedly cares for Arthur, and while at the start, his actions in protacting Arthur may have been driven by other (largely superficial) motives, over time, their mutual affection blossomed to the point where certainly the more personal quests were motivated not by need, but by love. However, there is a divide here, and while the line in the sand smudges from time to time, it never really disappears: a lot of instances in which Merlin is trying to help Arthur are entirely overshadowed by destiny, and in time, Merlin comes to accept that Arthur and Destiny are, in fact, one and the same, and this is where that ever-present tragedy lies. For all he truth in here, Merlin doesn't get everything quite right: he sees Arthur as a balance that needs to be protected, without fully realising that he doesn't just have to keep the sides of his equation in equilibrium, but he actually has to start solving them if he wants them to endure.

Having just said all that, sometimes I decide to fuck over complexity for a few hours purely because I am a shameless merthur hoe.

Also, can you take a moment to please note that this last section is highly subjective and it is completely up to you as to what you decide!! This is just my opinion and you're welcome to agree or disagree at any point.

So, aside from the Angst Factor™ and twisted character development, why was the main goal never fulfilled? Unfortunately, that is a question far cleverer people than me can only speculate, as the writers alone know the answers, but I'm going to give my opinion a shot. Honestly, there is something beautifullly poetic about something that never ends, or ends when there could be something more. Humanity has struggled with endings-and beginnings- since it learned truly how to think, because that kind of finality, that inkling that there might have been nothing before and after something else is incomprehensible. In leaving Merlin in a place where the next point was uncertain, the writers left the story open for us. In depriving us of that catharsis, they effectively made sure that the story would never be over, not until we want it to be. And yes, it was painful. I can't think of an ending that was more heartbreaking than that curious mixture of closures and openings all at the same time (hell, I could write a whole essay based on this concept alone!), but it was also a gift, ironically like that of the prophecy itself in that we can choose what we want to do with it, safe in the knowledge that there will be a happy ending again, one day.

In summary, we might not be left with catharsis in the way we wanted. We might not have got the happy ending that could also have stretched on and on indefinitely. But we were left with something else, something equally beautiful as closure, but in the complete opposite way. Amongst the remains of allwe had hoped to build, Merlin left us hope.

#sorry for the inevitable ineloquence here i am absolutely knackered #bbc merlin #merlin #merthur #i'm going to regret this in the morning

[obsessioncalledhsmtmts]

What I would've done for S2 & S3 of hsmtmts if I was the writer/director:

Nini

I would've probably changed Nini to not getting into YAC in the first season. She would've stayed the second semester at East High. She would spend the season working on her acting to get ready for an audition for YAC for senior year (so the audience could feel like she actually deserved it- instead of just bc she's the MC). -

She would have to reckon with the fact that her going off-script was probably why she wasn't accepted. -

I would've also given Nini more personality, maybe explore her interests outside of school, or her relationship with her moms. Make her have more flaws and have her learn to work through them. -

Nini lands the understudy for a main/secondary role and gets casted as the rose. She ends up helping backstage and works with Ashlyn as a songwriter/composer for the show. -

I'm thinking throughout the season she'll deal with a lot of school pressure, along with relationship problems, and her own stress of trying to make it into YAC and she'll eventually break down from the stress (Gina, Kourtney, and her parents would be there for her) -

her audition could've been in the last episode (making the "second chance" song more meaningful) -

I think Nini being low-key iced out by her friend group for going to YAC was messed up. That was her ambition. -

ALTERNATE IDEA: She could've also transferred to North High instead, making their menkies competition more relavent. Then tranferred back after a while and have to deal with going against her friends. [Idk just most of her personality in the two seasons, even after Ricky and Nini broke up, revolved around Ricky and she didn't get to have a life or personality beyond 1) the musical and 2) the boys in her life]

Ricky

Ricky's arc would be similar to the original. Him having Nini as his lifeline was pretty toxic for the both of them anyway. This time with him having some character development. Maybe having a scene where Nini says something like "I care about you Ricky, I really do. But I can't handle my own problems along with yours. I'm always here if you need to talk, but...maybe you should get some help first. You should talk to your parents." then after a bunch of stuff, Ricky learns to ask for help, and his parents send him to therapy. He apologizes to Nini. [Btw this arc wouldn't be to bash Ricky, but more of have him learn healthy ways of venting and finding help]

He finally talks and works things through with his mom and she and his dad finally realize the emotional toll their problems have caused Ricky

I was thinking about a flashback to Ricky seeing his parents fight all the time but that might be too dark for a Disney show

Ricky wasn't interested in musicals before, so therefore he should, realistically, have to learn to play the piano or guitar (Nini could've taught him)

if the writers wanted him to have acting/singing as his actual passion and not just as something he joined to get Nini back- then we should've had him practicing singing or acting (not for Nini this time) while also doing his old hobbies.

Nini and Ricky

I feel like they missed a really good opportunity to teach the audience how to open up and work through problems when they just decided to make Rini break up over miscommunication.

For a relationship that mentions them as childhood best friends, i wasn't feeling the best friends thing when they were together

If the writers were intending for us to root for Rini, then they should've made Ricky have more redeeming qualities, him doing stuff on Nini's phone was EJ-like which they established in S1 was bad

Consider this as some dialogue Nini and Ricky could've had about their relationship in the treehouse scene: Nini: "I don't even know how I got from loving you so much to not even wanting to fight for this" instead of just stating the obvious of "we've been miss-communicating all year" Ricky could've said something like: Ricky: "I wasn't honest with you. I tried to hide things from you. It feels like we're not even friends anymore." Nini: "We were friends...what happened?" Ricky: "I don't know, what's been going on with my parents has-" Nini: "No, this isn't their fault. It's ours." *a long pause* Nini: "Since we're admitting things we've done wrong. I've got one. I wasn't intending on sharing the rose song with you. I don't know i think i was just- scared it would cause more problems and i...hid a lot of the things i was feeling...about us." Ricky: "Can I ask...what are you feeling... about us? Like... was the song really all about us?"

you get the point- Rini would actually work through their problems instead of constantly having miscommunication problems that were unrealistic given that they were friends since kindergarten

Kourtney

Kourtney should've been given an arc and I would probably cut Howie (i like him but not every girl needs a love interest- if not then Howie shouldn’t have been the only depth she has).

Kourtney could have a fashion internship and we could explore her personality.

Make her more than the bff of Nini- have Nini be the one to reassure and be there for her

healthy feminism that's not just there for tokenism (and not whatever S1 Kourtney was)

Make people be there for her and don't just leave her alone because she's "strong" and "independent" People need help sometimes. Being independent is different to having no one there for you.

Gina

Jack appeared and disappeared- would've probably made him show up once more. And Gina and him wouldn't meet like that- maybe they knew each other from another school (bc normal ppl don't randomly talk to strangers at airports lol) -

I liked Gina's arc overall and would've kept it.

Introduced or at least hinted at Gina's brother more (him calling her but her refusing to answer because it's been so long)

Even if her main plot will revolve around love, Gina would have...well... a life.

Explore her relationship with her mom

explore how traveling all the time has affected her

things like not wanting to get attached bc even tho she has a place to stay, things can change at any moment and she knows that

showing her adapting to new situations really quickly

Her relationship with her brother could've been explored more

EJ

More on-screen character development

Building off the arrogant, confident character he was in the first season and still having some of those qualities as the second season progressed

Follow up for him and his dads conversation

Cousin duo with Ashlyn

EJ should've had a storyline outside of Gina being a symbol of his "development,"

He could have talked to Nini about how he was feeling about his future since they both were worried about the same

Gina and EJ

EJ's is a lot more tactful than Ricky and if the writers had wanted for us to root for them more- Ej could've represented what Ricky didn't do. Instead they had him misscomunicate about the big brother thing for shock and drama value and have Gina be the one to clear it up.

Have EJ try to be a good person, not for Gina, but for himself.

Consistent friendship with Gina before it was implied he had a crush

ALTERNATE PLOT IDEA: Instead of having them end up together, have them be more brother/sister and support system. Have EJ learn to be a good person without doing it for someone and rather do it for himself

All in all I would've kept the basic framework of their relationship and just change up a few things

Carlos and Seb

I loved Carlos' arc too (and Seb's).

Have Seb sing more

more screentime alltogether

Ashlyn

I liked them touching on body image issues with Ashlyn but i probably wouldn't have mentioned it once and then never mention it again. I think it should've lasted at least 2/3 episodes.

Ashlyn could've seen a plus size actress in a musical she goes to with Kourtney and Gina (bc that trio is amazing) and feeling a lot more confident but still a little insecure (cuz insecurities don't just disappear with a short monologue)

I'm very anti one-dimensional mean girl so, as part of Lily's redemption, lily would build up Ashlyn a little.

Maybe cut out Big Red/Ashlyn because i see them more as friends (they could still have similar scenes together tho)

have ashlyn and big red break up by spring break- ashlyn won't tell anyone and keep her personal life out of her acting and end up spiraling

completely cut out any french guy jealousy from Big Red (completely unneeded)

Lily

I would've had Lily be more of the 3 dimensional character- i think we should be over the mean girl trope. I'm thinking parental issues/pressures (building off episode 11) and some insecurity or anxiety would be pretty realistic. Maybe she’s sick of constantly being the center of attention and wants some downtime.

If they intend to make Ricky and Lily end up together (or at least have a friendship), I would do it a little differently. In the Ricky section of this post i mentioned Ricky, if acting/singing had become his passion, should've taken up some lessons. What if Lily had ended up being his tutor or something? Maybe he signed up before all the drama and got to know her before.

just think of all the possibilities tho- it would also make the “let you go” song that Ricky does on the piano have some double meaning

Lily stealing the harness makes absolutely no sense plot-wise, so I would also cut that out

Side characters

French dude should've gotten more screentime

Mazzara/Jenn should've been equal pining like in S1- not just mainly one sided

Plot

more episodes, most of the problems and conflicts presented weren't resolved or addressed by the end of the series. Characters, especially the ones in relationships, don't even talk about their problems. And yes, realistically, sometimes people don't talk it out, but most get closure within themselves and problems don't appear and disappear magically. -

maybe change the menkies competition for another competition, something where you can have more creative liberty with the plot and songs -

cut out the dance/sing off, it was completely unneeded

cut out the "come back video" to North High's diss video

cut out the sleepover episode

All these episodes did was provide unneeded drama that could've been used to instead to take a break from the conflict and be more character driven -

Maybe a different musical- BATB was a weird choice for an official competition. If not then different casting

Ej for beast, Ricky for Gaston, seb for candleholder, carlos for clock,

The scenes from the musical should've been included, I felt like there was an episode missing between ep.11 and 12

Every relationship was the exact same- the guy pining to the loosely interested girl and then when they get together the girl having to constantly reassure him about the relationship

Ok, guess they wasted that entire semester just to never open the envelope (they should've opened it because they realized that the Menkies tore them apart and they lost sight of their passion)

a lot of the events, character development, and reactions were off-screen, which made it so annoying to watch bc a lot of those scenes were important to the plot

Disclaimer: Not hating on the writers, directors, or actors of this show. I'm just inputting my own ideas of what I think would've made the show better for me. I kept and cut out some ships i did/didn't like so my personal opinion on the relationships do have an influence

#hsm the series finale #season finale #hsm the series #nini salazar roberts #ricky bowen #ashlyn caswell #gina porter #ej caswell #portwell #kourtney greene #big red #miss jenn #seblos #ricky and nini #big red x ashlyn #Ricky x Lily

[riathedreamer]

Zero is Null

A discussion of Zero’s love-hate-relationship with RvB and struggling independence; including a hotdog too big for the bun, tragic backstories, a single bow-chicka-bow-wow, and a cookie at the very end.

Welcome to what will be a lot of text. Basically, it will explore why Zero fails as an RvB (with emphasis on RvB) season. I will not be the first one to bring forth some of the points, and I promise to be fair and civil and fun. This isn’t supposed to be a piece of hate – in fact, I’m writing this because I love Red vs. Blue.

Okay, first of all, to increase your fun – take a guess on just how much of Zero is spent on fight scenes. You see, I’ve calculated the exact amount, and I will reveal it later, but for now, take a guess and remember the number. Maybe you are the winner!

Alright, time to share my thoughts. Wait! Since I suffer from anxiety and have this one annoying voice pretending to be all those critical statements my opinion could be met with, let’s give it an actual voice and address the points throughout this review.

“Why would I care about your opinion, Ria?” – I don’t know, you’re the one who clicked Read More.

“Your opinion doesn’t matter!” – Of course, it doesn’t! Geez. Do you think your opinion matters, though? Listen, we’re on Tumblr, the actual equivalent of screaming into the void. And it’s fun, too!

“If you don’t like it, don’t watch!” - *activates Uno Reverse Card* “You can’t talk about something you haven’t watched!”

“You’re just a Hater” – Actually, this is a point I’ll come back to. Like a cliffhanger. Also, at the end of this, there’ll be a cookie. But this will also include me talking about the stuff I like, because, surprise, Zero is not without talent!

“You just don’t like it because the Reds and Blues aren’t in it!” – Actually, that’s a good point, so instead, this review will start with a sole focus on Zero and discuss the problem that lies within that story. Then we can address why the lack of OG cast is understandable and problematic and weird.

But first! Backstory.

When the first 5 second teaser dropped back in spring (you know, when we were young and innocent and the world didn’t feel like an apocalyptic movie yet), I held onto that one image of what I thought (hoped) to be Grif and Simmons in the sunset, hopefully addressing Grif’s hateglue arc, but boy was I wrong because a) that’s not Simmons, that’s Sarge, and b) the image was from a PSA since the Reds are not in Zero.

Actual face-reveal of me below:

Admittedly, when I heard that the Reds and Blues were not going to be the main characters (or even show up), it felt like a gut punch. However, I actually found myself getting excited due to the creators’ hype. I want to praise them for this. It’s been a while since an RvB season was talked so much ABOUT before its release; it had advertisements, it had creators and voice-actors talking about it. Please. More of that in the future. Their passion rubbed off on me, and that deserves recognition. So it pains me that this was clearly a passion-project, and then when I gave it a try, I didn’t want to touch it again for weeks.

Here’s the thing. I cannot whole-heartedly say that Zero is bad. It’s not gonna melt your eyes. It’s not even so-bad-it’s-good. For me, it’s meh. It’s a Saturday-morning-cartoon aimed for a younger audience with a rushed plot and clich��d characters. The problem is that it calls itself RvB, and with that title comes something to live up to – but more importantly, something to continue.

My main issue is that Zero forces its story into existence by ignoring established content rather than adjusting to it. Let’s call this for the hotdog-too-big-for-the-bun syndrome solely for the sake of the bow-chicka-bow-wow that’s coming now. Bow-chicka-bow-wow. Many of the separate issues I will dive into all add to this hotdog-issue, so I will scream “Hotdog!” whenever this is the case so we can all keep track of my argument.

You can continue the story of Red vs. Blue without the Reds and Blues. While that would personally crush my heart, it can be done. There’s a story of Red vs. Blue that can be continued. The world can be expanded, the previous actions of the Reds and Blues can be explored from another angle.

So.

How does Zero do this? It doesn’t.

I just want to make it clear that new elements can definitely be added when it comes to worldbuilding. That’s literally the point of sequels. But Zero’s settings are presented with so little grace and with no connection to previously established worldbuilding. We get Alliance of Defense and GLASS thrown in our face as very big important organizations – yet we’ve never heard of them before. A big central plot point of RvB is the UNSC and Project Freelancers, and those were introduced naturally with the plot. We already have big established intergalactic organizations. What is AOD’s connection with those? We aren’t told. We are just told they exist and expected to accept it, no questions asked. If this was a whole new world and story – fine. But when you need to build on an already established worldbuilding, you need more grace than this. Chorus was a whole new setting, but it was explained, and it was connected to the previous plot. Same with Iris. Same with Desert Gulch. In Zero, it feels lazy. It feels forced. These organizations are just there because the story is built around them (HOTDOG).

This vagueness when it comes to wordbuilding is also reflected in the settings - we have a desert, a training base, a lab, temples, Tucker’s workplace, and we do not know if all those are set place on the same planet. If that is the case, what is this planet’s relationship with Chorus? Is it Earth? And most importantly, what is the deal with the temples? Why are they connected to Tucker’s sword if it isn’t the same planet. Are they made by the same aliens? Are people okay with this? Why haven’t these temples been explored before? Chorus makes sure to establish this, while Zero doesn’t, adding to a growing amount of confusion.

Okay, so no connection with previous worldbuilding. What about characters? I mean, we got Wash and Carolina and Tucker! So we have RvB characters, it gotta be RvB! Technically – yeah. But it feels dirty. These three characters are not here to be characters. They are here to be props to the new cast. They are not given any development. Their presence isn’t even that important, and if this was a whole new show, they could easily have been replaced with an unknown face. Worst of all, they feel miswritten.

Carolina and Wash are working at a new military organization? Leaving the Reds and Blues behind? To help people? First of all, fucking bad idea, Carolina, the last time you left the Reds and Blues alone, they changed the timeline. But most importantly – Carolina and Wash just joined this new super elite military organization? After being mistreated and manipulated by such an organization in the past?

Carolina is there to introduce the characters. That’s it. We are force-fed their personality by having her literally read out loud their personality. There is no gentle introduction to the new cast. We are not allowed to get to know them naturally. Why show when you can tell, huh? That’s Carolina’s role. That’s why she is there. To introduce the cast and explain their story. That’s it. (HOTDOG).

How about Wash? He is there to get beat up and be a damsel in distress so that the new cast has a reason to explore the plot. Oh, and that brain damage that was the consequence of previous seasons – gone now. The guy who literally has trauma from having an AI explode inside his head is fine with having a computer inserted into it instead. Because that’s needed. To explore his brain damage wouldn’t work now when his role is to be a prop to lure the new cast for one episode and then be put onto the bench for the rest of the runtime (HOTDOG).

And Tucker – he is there to die for a second and have his sword taken from him. That’s literally it. And for the few moments he is there, he feels like old super flirty Tucker, which erases the character development he went through in previous seasons. Okay, so Tucker dies, and then not dies, and then he is put on the bench with Wash where they can sit and talk or whatever (‘cause holy shit, the new cast is not allowed to that), because he isn’t important. The sword is. Tucker is just a prop, even more than his sword is (HOTDOG).

Damn. Wash gets beat up. Tucker gets beat up. Dies. Gets his sword taken away. Almost seems like a Red’s wet dream. Sorry not sorry, Blues, you were done dirty.

So there are miswritten old characters. Even worse is the retconning. The plot needs a “normal” Wash, so, bam, magic computer solution. Never mind Wash’s trauma and character traits. Never mind the logic of the new worldbuilding which also includes a character suffering for years to heal an illness. But the brain damage that was such a big consequence that it became the main part of the plot of the last two seasons – gone. I mean, a gunshot to the head can be healed by CPR. That’s canon. But no one gave Wash CPR so it’s a big thing, okay. It was canonically a big thing, and Zero erased that. This is not me saying that a Cerebral Enhancer couldn’t work in the RvB universe. Imagine it being done right. Wash struggling with the choice of getting used to his disability or accepting the possibility of help - at the cost of reliving his trauma. The struggle between what to choose - what should he choose when he wants to help as many as possible, the sacrifices he thinks he has to make, the way it could have been used as a part of his character growth. But in Zero, the enhancer isn’t a part of Wash’s character. It’s there so the story can work without having to deal with the previous plot’s consequence (HOTDOG).

Same with the sword thing. They sorta explain it by having Tucker flatline, but it’s weak. Honestly, I find it sorta offensive. What about Locus’ sword as well? It’s twisting previous lore to make the new plot work (HOTDOG). (Also, are we not gonna talk about the ultimate power being Spencer Porkensenson’s helmet? Have the writers forgotten Spencer Porkensenson? Have we as a community forgotten Spencer Porkensenson?)

If you have Red vs. Blue in your title, you cannot ignore what you inherit from it. You need to respect the worldbuilding, the established characters, and the previous plot. Zero does not do this.

Let’s talk about the Triplets. No, really, let’s do it. I don’t think I’ve ever talked about them before, because season 14 was a mixed bag for me (that I have now learned to appreciate. Thank you, Zero.) because I have heart at the size of the Grinch and can only love a few characters at a time, and that did not include the Triplets. Can’t even remember their names. Well, I can, but I can’t for the love of me remember which state is which, and my tongue is twisted every time I try to say Ohio, Iowa, and Idaho, and I know it’s on purpose. I know it is. And it got me good. That being said, the fandom actually embraced them really, really well! Seriously, I’ve seen more content for the Triplets than for Zero as a whole.

Why talk about the Triplets? (Was Iowa the lesbian? Or was it Ohio? Fuck.) Because like Zero, they introduced new characters with a story of their own. The Reds and Blues didn’t play a role. But here’s what I feel like the Triplets got right. They didn’t change the settings to force their narrative. They used stuff already established (Project Freelancer), added their own story as a continuation of that. They even included old characters in the beginning (Wash and some other Freelancers) but it felt natural and it didn’t feel like it happened at the expense of the old characters. Wash’s writing felt natural, and his presence wasn’t needed to tell these new character’s stories. He wasn’t a prop to them. He was there to establish the setting and to establish the relationship with these new characters, and then he and the other familiar faces (helmets??) left, and we as the viewers were left with these new characters. And the new characters told their own story by themselves. It felt like, hey, here’s something you know – remember Mother of Invention, and remember Wash’ lower rank, but now, try to imagine being even lower rank than him, aren’t you curious about those fates? Now let’s hear their story! It was new, it was something else, but it didn’t wreck what came before it, and it stayed true to the classic vibes of RvB.

As I said before, the hotdog-issue is my biggest problem with Zero. It infuriates me. I will return to this. But there are more issues, even if we try to look past the title-related problems.

If we try to imagine Zero as its own story and universe (as it should be, in my opinion), it still earns the meh review from me.

These isolated issues include awkwardness, the writing, lack of self-awareness, and pacing. First of all, holy shit, this is a tell, don’t show. Nothing is subtle, nothing is allowed to develop. It’s like the show thinks you are six years old with an attention span of a goldfish. You are not just led by the hand – they have literally pulled off your arm by the end of the show. We are force-fed every bit of information, every bit of personality from these new characters.

The voice-acting is a mixed bag for me. Sometimes it’s pretty good, sometimes it’s not. Some of the problems can definitely be blamed on the dialogue that you can only do so much with. It’s not good. I can’t remember any good jokes (the one joke I really appreciate was the cast on armor, and that was freaking visual humor. That was so RvB. Kudos to that. It was fun. More of that, please.), and RvB is known for having memorably good lines. This is a show built on good, clever, funny dialogue. Zero does not deliver. You have to sit through clichéd lines – “You’re not my dad”, “I trusted you”, “Come with me”, “It can’t be!”, “She’s way too powerful”, and “We have to do this together” – performed unironically. I cringed more than I laughed. Worst thing is that Zero could be a good parody. Sometimes, it feels like it is. One-dimensional characters, a villain wanting ‘the ultimate power’, very overpowered characters, bad one-liners, etc. But Zero takes itself seriously, and I was one of the people rooting for Jax to show up at the end and yell “Cut”. That would have been a funny-as-fuck twist. A spin-off parody. If I can’t have “Sarge the Movie”, I would have taken that and loved it. I would have forgiven everything. “We put so much info into finding that power, but we had no idea what it was” is really a line in the finale, and I cannot believe this is real in a show that somehow still tries to present itself as serious. What a plot.

We have to talk about pacing. God, first of all it should be stated that RvB is a mess when it comes to pacing. I honestly get what they were going for. Sometimes, RvB has come across as a bit boring when you get three episodes stretched over three weeks without much going on. I know season 11 did not have the warmest welcome because it was seen as boring until the finale. But when you see season 11 as a whole, as a movie, as a part of a trilogy, it works so well. Zero is more focused on being episodic. They want something to happen all the time so we will stay tuned. The thing that will happen – a fight. Oh god. The fight scenes.

I have done the math. I have run the numbers. I deserve a freaking cookie for this. Are you ready?

If you put all the episodes together, you have a runtime of 106 minutes. HOWEVER, with the introduction of credits in every episode, you gotta account for this. Removing the credits, this gives us 94 minutes of actual runtime. Out of that, 45 minutes are dedicated to fight scenes. That means 48% of the show is fight scenes.

If I wanted that many fight scenes, I’d watch Death Battle. Except the actual RvB Death Battle episode has a runtime of 20 minutes, and out of that, 5 minutes is dedicated to the actual battle. For the people who hate math – that’s 25% of the actual runtime.

RvB Zero has more fight scenes than a show called Death Battle. Take that in.

The pace suffers from this. Where’s the time to explore the characters? Where’s the time for good dialogue? All I can think of is this:

I get that RvB is a show that’s literally making fun of itself by acknowledging all their characters do is stand around and talk. I get that you want characters to do more than that. But for the love of Church, would it kill the new characters to stand around and talk? For just a minute? Stop fighting, I am begging you, stop fighting! Am I a pacifist now? Am I purple? Have I joined Doc’s team? What has Zero done to me?!

The good thing though is that fight scenes are very good. They’re entertaining. However, they seem to deconstruct themselves when we need to get a fight scene in every episode. Usually, the few fight scenes in an RvB season were in some of the most climatic episodes. In Zero, I can hardly keep up with the pace because they won’t stop moving. Fight scenes aren’t plot. They aren’t character development. You need more than just fight scenes. They entertain, but there’s a limit to that.

Noël Wiggins, the co-writer, stated the inspiration was a Saturday-morning cartoon. They nailed that vibe. If that was their goal, hurray, they have accomplished something! Because of the poor plot and constant fight scenes, it feels like you could just switch on the TV and drop in at any moment and let yourself be entertained by the cool and colorful soldiers punching and kicking each other. I will admit that the fight scenes entertained me. But they don’t make it a good season.

If I were the six-year-old with the attention span of a goldfish that the show believes I am, I honestly would enjoy it. The stiff dialogue and the constant tell-don’t-show makes you feel like an audience that’s not supposed to do anything else but admire the flashy fight scenes. I miss the cleverness of RvB. I miss the characters I get to connect with as I see them grow.

I miss the tone of RvB. Because this isn’t RvB to me.

It’s not that RvB hasn’t changed its tone before. Holy shit, I sorta do want to experience the absolute shock the RvB fandom went through when s6 aired and they were given new characters and serious plot. I would have loved to experience that, but I was too busy being ten years old. The Freelancers seasons also introduced a new tone and more fight scenes with very talented fighters compared to the Blood Gulch gang, but a balance was kept by having half of the season still revolving around the Reds and Blues. But Zero – Zero is so much change. And it’s on purpose. At least this has been made very clear from the beginning.

They constantly seem to appeal to new fans, rather than be directed towards older fans of the show. If you want an entirely new audience with a season with a new cast, new worldbuilding, and new tone, I’m confused as to why they don’t just make a new show. The hotdog-problem begs for this solution. This story and environment and characters feel so out of touch with the original RvB, that with a few rewrites and lack of Halo-armor, it could just be a new show. Problem solved.

If not this, then present it as a spin-off. In all ways, it feels like a spin-off (again, see everything marked HOTDOG). But the creators refuse to do this, and I don’t understand why. I could forgive many of these issues, had they officially separated themselves from canon.

Ah, what’s the idiom? You can’t both swallow and blow? (You can hear the Bow-chicka-bow-wow in the distance). Something about eating cake and having it. Forgive me, English isn’t my native language. POINT IS why are you calling yourself RvB while actively fighting against the core essence of RvB? In my humble opinion, you can’t be both. Marketing it as a spin-off would have granted it some defense when changing, well, literally everything, and I just, would someone please properly describe why it isn’t a spin-off? Isn’t this season marked by its association with the plot of RvB rather than a continuation of it? Zero presenting itself as not a spinoff feels like a toddler clinging to the hem of its mother’s dress while forcefully running away from her, ripping the dress in the process.

When they do connect with the original RvB, it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. When they let Carolina, Wash, and Tucker appear for a moment, it feels like luring viewers in with the RvB title. Look at me. Look at me! I’m not saying this is the case. I say that it gives me the annoying vibes of being lured, rather than letting the characters be a part of the show for their own development, rather than having RvB in the title to continue its story. I should not be getting these vibes at all. But I am.

If you want to use RvB in the title, something from the core of RvB needs to be embraced. Things can be changed. They should. Something new should be brought in. But there’s a limit to how much you can change and replace and twist until it would have been better with an original show. As a season of RvB, it should tell the story of Red vs. Blue.

From my perspective, Zero fails to do so.

It pains me that the old cast has been replaced, but as stated earlier, a season could have worked without them. However, I do not like the take that one should be excited about all the new characters. That it isn’t a big thing that the OG cast got replaced. That we should just deal with it. Just, try to imagine another show suddenly replacing the main characters with characters we’ve never met before. Imagine RWBY suddenly only focusing on a new team of huntresses with the previous main characters reduced to an Easter Egg presence, or Camp Camp suddenly being about a new team of campers, no warning given. Can you imagine the outcry? So maybe let’s agree that a replacement of the main cast is a big thing and should be addressed and it’s valid to be upset about this change.

Could Zero have worked? It’s hard to answer this. How can I accept something as RvB if the season actively pushes away the core of RvB aside for an isolated story that could have been told in any other media? As a spinoff, I could have ignored it. To enjoy Zero, I have to fully separate it from RvB in my mind, and then it’s alright. S’not good. But it’s not bad. It’s entertaining enough. I really ended up liking Raymond and Tiny, and there were a few good jokes, and the fight scenes were admirable (but too much) and I love the creators’ passion. But it’s not RvB. I also wish that the new characters had been attached to previous worldbuilding, for example soldiers on Chorus or agents from Project Freelancer. That way we could build on familiar lore which would have decreased the confusion and added a much needed connection with the previous seasons of RvB.

God, the anxious voice is back (by the way, it sounds like Tutter from “Bear in the Blue House”).

“You’re racist” – I hope not. Literally, I do not want to be. Tell me if I’ve ever crossed some lines, because I swear, that is not my intention, I will apologize and most of all, change and do better. I included this because I’ve seen this take thrown around in the big ugly mess that is the fandom clashes regarding Zero. And racism is problem within RT community (this includes AH and RvB, sorry, I just use RT as an umbrella term for the latter), and I’m not saying it hasn’t been a problem with this season. Writers should never be harassed, and never-fucking-ever because of their skin color, and voice actors shouldn’t be treated like they are responsible for the choices of the show. But I was legit nervous to post this review, and I hope it’s been factual without feeling like personal attacks on the creators because that has never been my intention. I was delighted to hear about the diversity behind this project, and Torrian’s passion legit blew me away because it’s been a while since I’ve seen that for an RvB project. I’d hoped for it to be good, and when I feel disappointed, it’s for the reasons stated in this analysis. That said, Zero is made by a diverse cast and it’s made with love, and both of those things are so, so great, but it does not mean that Zero cannot be criticized. It can, and it should. It’s a product, just like all the other seasons, and fans are allowed to discuss it – both what they loved, and both what they found troublesome. And to repeat previous points, and be respectful, always, fuck racists, and never-fucking-ever harass the staff behind a season, what the fuck is wrong with you if you do this.

“Don’t you get it, it’s different because it’s trying something new!” – Hey, remember the philosophical question: if you replace all the parts of a ship one-by-one, is it still the same ship when you’re done? If it doesn’t include the Reds and Blues, if it ignores previous plot, if the old characters feel miswritten, if it values animation over dialogue, if it values fight scenes over comedy, if it wants to be Fast and Furious instead of Red vs. Blue – is it still Red vs. Blue? Because it doesn’t feel like it to me.

“It's been 17 seasons, it’s time to let the Reds and Blues go so someone else can shine!” – I simply do not understand us having been with the Reds and Blues for 17 seasons should be an argument to let them go, rather than be an argument as to why their absence hurt like hell.

“The Reds and Blues ran out of things to do!” – Did- did they, though? I mean, if we were discussing pretty much any other show, I’d probably agree that they were running out of content. But for the Reds and Blues… I think the PSAs nailed it this year! I’m not kidding, I had more fun watching the Reds and Blues discuss how to do laundry than watching Zero. You could literally give me an hour of the Reds and Blues trying to bake a cake or clear a gutter or simply settling down with an ordinary life, and I would trust them to make it worth the watch.

“The flaws were due to the fact it’s only 8 episodes long!” – Look, I can only judge a product the way it’s presented to me. I cannot come up with excuses for it. If they had 8 episodes to work with, they need to come up with a plot that works with this runtime. Seriously, this excuse cannot work when 48% of the season is spent on fight scenes. They could have used more runtime, sure, but the show needs to be able to pace itself and be planned accordingly.

“The OG cast couldn’t be a part of this year, hence Zero!” – That might be true. But. Would one year without RvB kill it? Is Zero necessary? Again, I just can’t judge excuses for the show. But trouble with the cast has been an issue before. Season 15 solves Geoff’s sabbatical by actually making Grif’s absence a part of the plot. Zero’s lack of Reds and Blues just feels like this excuse to tell a story that needn’t be a part of RvB.

Am I a hater? I guess? I greatly dislike Zero for the critique stated above. I do, however, not harass the creators and no one should ever do that. However, I have to admit that I feel there’s been this weird rejection of any critique of Zero where everything’s been brushed off as haters gonna hate, including the critique stated above. And I think that’s a problem because critique, as hard as it can be to hear (and I know this. I’m an author of original works. Weird flex, I know), is valid and necessary and shouldn’t just be shrugged away. As always, both sides of the fandom should always be respectful, but my own opinion is that addressing the flaws of Zero should not be controversial.

Does this super long rant/critique/whatever mean you cannot enjoy Zero? Gods no! I almost envy you if you enjoy this season, but holy shit, feel free to love it and tell the creators that you love it! Me pointing out the issues I have with the season shouldn’t be stopping you. I loved (and still love) s15 when it came out, and it was majorly rejected by the fandom. There were many, many critical posts, people were going on about how RvB should have ended with s13, and it evolved into the writer receiving death threats (me, once again: never ever harass the creators, assholes). But I didn’t tell people to stop being negative. I actually agreed with many of the flaws that were pointed out, and I enjoyed the season despite this, because that is possible. We, as RvB fans, should agree that RvB, is... I mean, it’s not the greatest, most flawless of shows, but we love it nonetheless. So go ahead and love Zero. This is not a stop sign. This is my opinion that you chose to read.

Wait, I promised you a cookie, didn’t I? Well, you’re not getting one. Why? Because I’m a Red and this is my chance to piss off a Blue. As Caboose wisely said: “Well, at least I don't go around... knocking on people's non-doors... and promising them cookies... and then NOT. GIVING. THEM. COOKIES!”

Blue Team sucks.

End speech.

#rvb zero #rvb #rvb zero critical #rvb critical #rvb0 #my rvb stuff #pls dont hate me for this #this is my honest opinion that people apparantly wanted to hear #as a standalone story zero isnt totally bad #as an rvb season it is