#but that doesnt mean shes absolutely beyond redemption | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thespleenman · 11 months

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the absolute insane misinterpretation of azula by the entirety of tumblr will actually kill me. anyway, i’ve gotten BACK into atla and. oooooh boy, i’ve had SO many thoughts about it but never had a way to communicate these to other people. but. now I do! and this post is entirely dedicated to Azula. and it will be opinion, but also sort of true? i dont think my opinion is necessarily MORE correct than anyone elses, but i think if i see one more post about it without having shared my view i will immediately combust. So, if you have a very precious view of azula for whatever reason, i wouldn’t read these. I don’t hate on azula or downplay her mental illness & relationship with ozai, but i also do discuss a lot of negative things azula has done. So, without further ado;

JAGA’S AZULA MEGA POST

1. Yes, Azula WAS an antagonist. She did awful things BEFORE the psychosis actually began (which. i will be talking about) and she should not be excused for that. Yes, she was 14, but she also was also incredibly intellegent and recognized that what she was doing things that WERE harmful to others (the whole “she was right of course” shows her recognition of these things.)

2. HOWEVER; she was practically groomed to behave the way she did, and i’m not just talking about Ozai. Ursa labeled her a monster before she could even truly understand the consequences of her actions. She grew up with this title, believing she fundamentally WAS a bad/awful/evil person, not that she had DONE things that were wrong. She also got praised and rewarded for the things her mother said were wrong, so she had just as much (if not more) internal strife. (hence her hallucinating her MOTHER and not Zuko or Ozai, despite seeing them more)

3. People often overestimated her intelligence, especially in the situation with Zuko coming home. No one in that situation would have said that she “failed” in any way, meaning there was no need for a back up plan like that. I think azula, in her own way, did care about Zuko. However, this one is just personal opinion but i believe she felt betrayed in the end, and thats what made her behavior towards him change so drastically in the last book.

4. I see a lot of argument about this, and this is one that i feel very strongly about, and that is that azula WAS one of zuko’s abusers. BUT azula had never seen anyone treat zuko CORRECTLY until way after her behavior to him was solidified. (i mean, iroh is not exactly a picture of great parenting, and he isn’t in the picture until AFTER ozai planned to kill zuko!) Hell, i’m willing to bet ozai rewarded her for abusing zuko, and beyond that, Azula probably believed that was ozai caring about zuko, the same way zuko did. Azula was not INTENTIONALLY abusing zuko, but that does NOT mean she didn’t.

5. Azula does not need a “redemption arc”, and i would argue that zuko did not have a typical “redemption arc”. Redemption Arc’s are for when someone is MALICIOUSLY hurting others, with full knowledge of it. Zuko just needed to see that the war was in itself wrong, and that ozai was lying about… pretty much anything. Azula needed that too! But, she instead was stuck (which. great job iroh! i love you but that girl was still a CHILD she could have CHANGED) with the man who had proven he would lie to anyone about anything to seem like a benevolent ruler. Azula also was mentally ill, NOT evil. yes, mental illness does not excuse any of her behavior, but someone doesn’t START with extreme and vivid hallucinations! i’m willing to bet she was struggling with some sort of personality disorder, which immediately brings all her behavior into a new light. (if anyone sees this post and wonders how i came to that conclusion, i will explain it, but it doesnt feel necessary to add currently)

thats all i have for now! i don’t know if i articulated most of my points well or anything, and i have no doubt that i will think of more things to add, but i really want to share some of these things, because i only see reaaally extreme views on azula, and i think she is more in the middle of both sides. if you actually read that word vomit, thank you, and adios

#azula #zuko #avatar #atla #atla azula

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goatpaste · 4 years

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WC design/headcannon/ect masterlist- Part B

another chunk of all the headcanos/AU’s/design notes/warrior names for kits and leaders never given a canon one/ect for all the wario cats!

this one is for all the B named cats!

info under the cut

Badgerfang

badgerfang i think a lot of us have a big ol soft spot for, but ought i really care him and his family i think it needs more than jusT the badgerfang death like for real

one of the biggest reasons i wanna learn to animate is because i wanna make a badgerfang and flintfang amv! it would be sdkg more about flintfang because i think he’s a neat character who has a lot of potential for development

like mAN you ever stop and think about not only was flintfang sad over badgerfangs death because it was sad, bUT also because badgerfang was his sisters kit AND to the thought of blackstar is flintfangs brother. flintfang had to deal with playing a hand in badgerfangs death then watch his brother loyally follow brokenstar, then tigerstar 🥺

Baypaw

baypaw was the first of his lil chunk of family i design, i didnt have a sorrelstripe design made yet so i ultimately decided to base his design on his grandpa Lionblaze. smaller fluffy lionblaze.

I know we should be coming up to baypaw getting their warrior name soon

i think a name like Baysong or Baygale

Beech Tail

the only thing i have to say is dgjksh when i designed the ‘beech’ prefix designs it was late and i totally went ‘beech... the beach’ and noT beech the tree sdjkgh. so i designed beech tail like that of a penguin sdjkgh

Beechfur

beechfur , riverclan warrior under mistystar’s leadership

i imagine beechfur is be EXTREMely accident prone, from the first instant of getting sick and healed by leafpool all the way up till the end. He is in and out of the medicine cats den constantly. and through this formed a big ol crush on the pretty medicine cat apprentice Willowshine who has had to full on decline his feelings. he is not the only one who has had this treatment, many a riverclan cats have found themself charmed by willowshine

Beechpaw

Beechpaw, a apprentice of ancient skyclan who were forced to leave the forest territory. i imagine beechpaw was of the few cats who did everything he could to keep the others in good spirit while they tried to find their home, which often came to the annoyance of all his distraught clanmates. he never stopped doing all he could to put a smile on their face until he died.

he was the last apprentice cloudstar named a warrior and only lived a few moons after becoming one.

warrior names i like for him are like Beechshed or Beechshine

Beenose

slight update to my beenose design because i want her to fit my newer darktail group clown aesthetic

another design note is her and her siblings all are themed after a diff color of the rainbow, beenose is yellow. their mom snowbird has a pale rainbow pattern and each other her kits is a diff color of the rainbow

Beetlewhisker

Beetlewhisker is another one of my quiet favorites i have, and it is because of the error of him being alive for SO many books after he died.

like !!! bitch had a HUGE major death and went on to live for a long time aND be listed as a cats mentor (which i think that has been changed now)

i love the idea of in a way beetlewhisker WAS with the clans that long after his death. that due to his death was in a way locked in the dark forest, his soul stuck there. but because of the ways of the dark forest cat’s he was chased out, and unable to enter starclan having died in the dark forest, now cursed to live in limbo.

He walks to the grounds of riverclan watching over his clanmates while they rest hoping that no one else is to be preyed upon by the dark forest like he was ever again.

theres ghost stories of riverclan cats seeing the shape of a cat shining brightly when hit by moonlight. a peaceful spirit of the past who protects them.

and in design 100% his design was made to look like that of a smeleton bones lol

Bellaleaf

the erin team will have to pry bellaleaf and firestar being siblings from my cold dead hands!!

you can’t say they look basically exactly alike and their not related i wont take it sdjkg. i DIE for the idea oh whore jake managing to have so many kids that get into the clans. like the over saturation of jake dna through the clans ruining them absolutely kills me sdjkg

i also imagine ravenpaw having like deja vu of firestar when he looks at bella, cats who knew firestar look at her and can’t help feel she reminds them of someone.

Berryheart

another one of the designfor snowbirds kits, berryheart is the red themed sibling.

she also got a slight design change to be more clowny to fit her time in darktail’s group

Berrynose

i just love berrynose, i think hes very terrible and i love him a lot

i think the books are cowards and i think berrystar woulda been the fUNniest outcome oR like

imagine the powermove if berrynose lived and squirrelflight fucking made berrynose her deputy likE

also berrynose is a lil gay brat, he has a thick country accent and everyone find him weirdly charming. many hate him but cant help but find him alluring.

he actually is a very good warrior, he stays on top of his task and brings in the prey. his biggest problem is his ego and his need to get in others faces all the time

i love when he’s paired with lionblaze because their stupid rivarly is so good i really wish it was more plot important and lasted longer i LIVE for best friend rivals lion and berry

buT i also love him with jayfeather for the simple dynamic of the one cat who would probably hate him more than anyone else but oops he’s in love to

or him and breezepelt because they could be lil shitheads togeather

Birchface

the biggest thing i can say about birchface is 100% birchface watched over mapleshade’s kits, doesnt let appledusk or his own family hurt them. He treats them like his own.

in AU’s where birchface lives i defiantly can see him having a HUGE crush on mapleshade and being much like thrushpelt was to bluefur. being as a surrogate dad for her kits and keeping the secret.

in my main AU with mapleshade dieing and getting a redemption its mostly the same except they become a sweet happy family together in starclan.

he’s a big goofy dad type and his father had hoped he would become leader one day, but worried that he was too lax with the code and not as driven to fight as others and began to think he would have to rely on frecklewish instead. then they both died and he ended up turning to his youngest son pinefur

Blade

this is just a one time ghost cat buT i like the design i made for her.

im all here for dark forest cats having this black oozing mark from where they died, starclan gets being covered in stardust and maybe having from pretty plats or glow or other representative stuff on their death. but ghost cats are loUD with their mark of death. its a nagging weight they carry around based on their inability to move on to their respective afterlives. For blade its giant bright red tire marks that slowly circle around her body.

Blazefire

just a lil boy

i imagine he kinda constantly has crushes on cats from other clans which while some might tell him to hush when he shares his thoughts on the pretty cat from riverclan he gets some loving teasing from dovewing and antfur

Blazefire is also miss nearly all of his tail

Blizzardstar and Blizzardwing

not much here but to say 100% i designed blizzardwing in mind of being that of a grandson or great grandson to blizzardstar

Blossomfall

shrug idk a lot to say about her beyond, i know she’s a asshole character but i remember liking her, i think she’s mean but its kinda fun in a way

i think i also just have this soft spot for millies kits because their millie’s

also i just like my blossomfall design i think she’s v fun

Blossomkit

another shadowclan kit who died under brokenstar’s ruling.

i think as sad as it is, i can imagine blossomkit to be badgerfang’s sister, just another sad thing to think about for fernshade’s litter. the potential idea of all her kit’s dying because of brokenstar

a warrior name for her that would been cute woulda been like Blossomglaze or blossomsprout

Bluebellkit

bluebellkit sure disappeared from the books. she’s one of those kits that like, she already had a mouth full of a name and i wish i coulda seen what they woulda named her as a warrior

but she’s another one of snowbird’s rainbow themed kids, her ofc being the blue one.

i think a cute warrior name for her could been Bluebellwhistle or bluebellfoot

Blouder

i lobe boulder i think he is very under appreciated!!

i think it be very fun to get a novella or something in this POV,,

he’s just hangin out back there yknow,,,

Bouncefire

(bit of an art change from here as i took a break between these two and switched programs)

idk a lot about actual bouncefire, i think the only books with any real characterization in it was ones i havent read

buT id really like to imagine growing up he saw his mentor patchfoot as a father figure and was ultimately the reason patchfoot and his mom got together. and bouncefire being absolutely ecstatic about it. thinking patchfoot is the coolest guy

bouncefire gets along good with his half siblings

gay cat and wanna be emo but just is kinda angy

Brackenfur

my biggest brackenfur AU is my medicat brackenfur which i have info of here

https://goatpaste.tumblr.com/post/631020627780911104/au-where-insteed-of-fireheart-picking-up

and

https://goatpaste.tumblr.com/post/632972589046890496/mmm-writing-out-like-big-plot-point-changes-in-my

the other thing vaguely mention in these but would probably be more prominent in his og story

but brackenfur is quietly the biggest mess in the family. Being on pare with confidence and energy as cinderpelt when they were young, after her accident somethin changed for him. he loved his sister but is a big distant. but its hardly noticeable between the two as they worked very separate jobs in the clan

then his other sister, brightpaw has her accident and brackenfur begins to question something

but when he his the last to leave in the thunderclan group to their new home he stops and looks back at his mother frostfur who is old and frail look, though she wasnt young the damage of the forest hit her hard.

this when brackenfur decides starclan has it out for his family, especially the mollies. they were cursed he was sure.

moons later he is expecting his kits with sorreltail, letting his mind rest on the idea, the crazy notion that some greater force wanted the she-cats in his family dead.

then the day his kits arrive cinderpelt dies to the badgers. he pushes down these feelings down again it was the time. But he couldn’t help but think that, if leafpool was there, if starclan had given them a sign of the badgers, anything. maybe cinderpelt might have lived. but he pushes it back down and tells himself it was a warriors death

and then his daughter, cinderpaw is struck by the tree and the stirring in his mind grows stronger. why has starclan done this to his family

then honeyfern gets bit by the snake. how could starclan be so cruel, their always so young.

then his sweet sorreltail fought strongly for her two young daughters future

and on his own, forced to watch seedpaw drown and lilypaw be haunted by what happened.

the women in brackenfurs family is cursed and he bears the burden of relizing it, of living and watching each of them suffer until the end

to the ones that lived and are happy still, with no burdens in their lives he watches happily making sure NOTHING bad comes their way. he would fight starclan themselves to make sure his family is safe and happy

Breezepelt

in design Breezepelt has a p average length tail. which for him is a huge disappointment. His father crowfeather has a long slender windclan tail, a trait that is held to high standards in his family. a trait passed all the way down from windstar herself who had the longest and most beautifully windy tail.

Breezepelt has a angry spot about this because he feels lacking and especially disconnected to his father. BUT double this with jayfeather having only half windclan blood has a tail even longer than crowfeathers

i also would NOT put breezepelt with heathertail, i dont see any reason for it. like first off this bitch gay, id love for him to have a boyfriend and it think it should be berrynose because one, their both terrible i think it be funny and i also think its funny to ship berrynose with lionblaze or jayfeather so im like, whats another brother (to be clear not shipped all together, this is separately) and two, the idea heathertail and poppyfrost lesbian could exist

then the big BIg thing is, i would take breezepelts character and gut what happened in crowfeathers trial out of both him and crowfeather

i talk about it a bit here, but i think ill re talk about it in full when i get to crowfeather https://goatpaste.tumblr.com/post/190544981670/breezepelt

Briarlight

miss briarlight i love you!!

very sweetgirl

i based her design off sakuras and bleed heart doves. idk what possessed me but when i went to design her i knEW she was gonna be pink she needed to be she deserved it

briarlight buff as shit in her forlegs she loves trying to rope leafpool and jayfeather into lil strength contest she always wins (sometimes she will let leafpool win on days she needs it)

her and jayfeather are wlw/mlm best friends. jayfeather calls her pidge which started as a mean nickname that she simply loved and embraced fully

also in my AU with medicat lionblaze i can very much see briarlight and lionblaze being very sweet friends. like big strong lionblaze who is actually docile and compassionate about his work and briarlight loud and rooting him on

Brick

swear to god until i got back into warrior cats this year i had always thought brick was a lady and her and bone were suppous to be scourges like adoptive bad parents jkdg

anyways im still with that, she/her agender brick who adopts their terrible son scourge and is in a monogamous partnership with bone’s. strictly business defiantly not married, they just have a son together.

Brindlewing

idk a ton about her, but from her wiki it dsjkgh doesnt look like theirs alot

but i’d like to imagine she’s a very anxious girl and struggles in crowds especially around cat she doesn't know. she feels more comfortable when one of her sisters is with her or her grandmother nightcloud. Nightcloud has always been a source of self confidence for her and they love each very much.

Brindlewing also inherited crowfeather’s family long tail that skipped breezepelt. Brindlewing holds the tail in her mouth as a means of helping her anxiety.

Bristlefrost

a biG design overhaul for my bristlefrost design, i really didnt like the old design i made her. wanted her to be a lil darker colored and in general have a cuter design

i gave her diff color eyes to mark her double agent status one eye green like her fathers and the other sharing the same blue i use for ashfur’s eye color

i kept her with the one white paw which i give to any descendent of jake, just because canonically she is ivy and ferns kid.

but in my rewrite their not togeather. Fernsong was a kittypet or a loner who had lost their mate and home and was found by ivypool caring for his three kittens alone. this is more fernsong headcanon, but bristlefrost is there

bristle and all the kits love ivypool they look up to her big time and all wished she was their mentor when they became apprentices.

bristlefrost often confides in her father when feeling guilty or unsure of herself and he is always there for her

Bristlekit

half brother to tallstar

i imagine woolytail’s family seems to have a high mortality rate with their kids with only one maybe two usually making it to adulthood. bristlekit would die before becoming an apprentice and spent time in starclan with finchkit and later rabbitkit waiting for wrenflight and tallstar.

if bristlekit made it to being a warrior id like to think he was named Bristlefeather or Bristlefoot

Brook where small fish swim

teeny update to my brook design to give her small white fish dots matching her brothers spots

her general design is mean to be loosely based on a mountain lion.

she got strong powerful mountain climbing body

i also wish her romance was better developed and wasnt like based in a lot of white savior romance plots given to native and native coded characters

in general the tribe really shoulda just been written better

Brownpaw

brownpaw, brother to littlecloud killed mosspaw as a kit on accident and was apprenticed for it by brokenstar

i imagine him and his brother wetfoot killing mosspaw effect them both deeply. for wetfoot it shook him to the core and made his doubt his own claws

for brownpaw it set him down the path of destruction. brokenstar rewarding him for what happened with mosspaw was the biggest enabler

brownpaw would go on to be a blood thirsty apprentice who would throw his young life away under brokenstars order of attack.

had he been made a warrior i think brokenstar woulda named him Brownmoss claiming he had earned the name when he took it from mosspaw.

Bug

design for bug because i think the book she was in didnt exist when i originally started drawing every warrior cat

love her!

bumblestripe

bumblestripe’s character makes me sad

im SUCH a millie stan and for one of her kids to be disabled then treated like garbage to the end of her life and written super ablest and then her other two kids are total shit heads? makes me sad

i wish at lEAST millie and graystripe had a second little, maybe just one total sweetheart

and its been forever since i read the books. but i remember bumblestripe being a real nobody characters just very generic personality until romance plot for dovewing came into play. and now he super sucks!

i wish he coulda just been a good character who loved dovewing, is sad and kinda jealous of her feelings for tigerheart but in the end respects her decisions and even admires her courage to follow her heart even if it led her over the borders.

Buster/Rippletail

slight buster redesign to fit more in the circus clown look from when he was in the kin

also design note, he’s got an orange themed design to go along with his rainbow themed siblings

Buzzardkit

windclan kit who showed up once in the sight crying and being comforted by a queen

mm i think some good warrior names for them woulda been like

buzzardface, Buzzardshriek or buzzardwhistle

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tumblunni · 5 years

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Ehh i think i finally summed up why all of this steven universe diamonds stuff has been so underwhelming.

YES you can redeem a villain

but you have to

actually

TRY

Yes you can write a story about the world’s most fuckin horrible person being really actually sad at heart

Yes you can write a story about an abusive parent actually being able to change

Yes you can write a story about some wild genocidal alien civilization of asshole space rocks actually only doing it because something something societal pressure DESPITE BEING THE ONES IN CHARGE WHO SET THE DAMN RULES I GUESS

But fucking hell its not gonna be EASY and you shouldn’t treat it that way.

All of this shit was SO fucking quick?? And everything else WASNT!

You spent SO long hyping up these guys you spent SO long convincing us that they WERE evil and that they had entirey different motives for what they were doing and EVEN WITHIN THIS FUCKING EPISODE you spent more time showing us White Diamond being absolutely ridiculously existentially horrifyingly awful and refusing every offer everyone gave her to help and refusing every chance and fucking fucking goddamn violating people’s entire minds and just.. fuck.

After all that you cant just fuckin have steven walk up to blue and yellow and say “hey everything you did was bad” and them go “GEE WE NEVER KNEW!” for some reason this time they’re convinced in a single sentence despite it being the same sentence steven said before in every damn episode and pink said to them years before and every person they abused and enslaved and mutilated and KILLED said while they were DYING

And you can’t fucking have white diamond never redeem herself and never change and never admit she’s wrong and steven SOLVE IT WITH FUCKING FIGHTING WHILE SAYING HE DOESNT WANT TO, WHILE THE ENTIRE SHOW TRIES TO CLAIM THE REASON THEY ARE DOING IT THIS WAY IS BECAUSE OF PACIFISM

because seriously he?? just defeated her?? and this made her?? change???

redeeming a villain shouldn’t be easy. redeeming a villain has to have the villain TRY. white diamond has done nothing to prove she really has a heart, prove that she really did all this for sympathetic reasons, prove that she’s able to change, AND ESPECIALLY NOTHING TO MAKE IT UP TO ANY OF THE PEOPLE SHE’S HURT

she just got defeated and basically admitted she’s wrong cos she has no other choice. and i guess her blushing because steven issued a SICK BURN to her is meant to be enough proof that her entire motivation so far has been because of self confidence issues forcing her to put up a false front aka her entire personality we saw so far. If you wanna tell me she’s entirely different to what we saw so far then please could you please give it more screentime than twelve goddamn seconds.

This is like how yellow and blue just suddenly were accepted as part of the family and steven agreed to go with them to homeworld literally just because they realized he “is really pink diamond”. Like they never fucking repented or actually learned to empathise with humans or ever explained why they dont empathise with humans no nope the only answer we got is that they were sad about their sister/daughter/friend dying even though they were already doing all the same evil stuff before that and its what caused her to leave in the first place. no we’re gonna just completely trust them instantly and not even continue making an effort to convince them? we’re gonna trust them so much we’re gonna trust that white diamond will also change just cos we beat her up? COS SERIOUSLY STEVEN FUCKIN DEFEATED BLUE AND YELLOW IN A FIGHT AND THATS THE END OF THEIR ARC, HOW IS THIS PROVING THE POWER OF PACIFISM!! beating everyone up and then saying the same singular sentence again and somehow now it works!! or saying “my mum was pink diamond” and it doesnt convince them but hey if we say it again with magical proof its true then i guess it works now. wow that sure does argue the power of words i guess

everything EVERYTHING they did was just a fuckin misunderstanding cos they dont UNDERSTAND they were doing bad and thus they dont have to face any form of consequences beyond being mildly embarassed i suppose.

if you wanna make that the ending then you need to work to disprove all the hours you spent implying that.. yknow.. they were doing things because they were evil

and even if theyre sympathetic they still did evil things and they still need to work to prove that theyve changed

and ESPECIALLY if you’re making a show very heavy on subjects like LGBT discrimination it shouldnt be FUCKIN WOW UNEXPECTED that the audience would see this plot as a metaphor for stuff like homophobia and abusive parents and.. yknow.. societal oppression in a law system that forces you to live in the closet in constant fear of being discovered and killed. and all the other apparantly accidental undertones of racism and extermination of indigenous people in stolen land which YOU REALLY SHOULD HAVE EXPECTED PEOPLE TO SEE WHEN THE PLOT IS LITERALLY EXTERMINATING PEOPLE TO STEAL THEIR LAND

all of that means you need to do MORE work to prove that that isnt actually what the plot is supposed to be, and more work to redeem villains who are very heavily goddamn triggering to a large part of the vunerable audience YOU SPECIFICALLY MARKETED YOURSELF TOWARDS

this was just so fucking overwhelming and somehow rushed despite being an hour long episode, and i hate it because the show spent so much effort on so much other stuff yet decided to half ass it at the really important part that NEEDED to have thought and time put into it if it was gonna nail the landing

especially after ALL THAT FUCKIN TIME AND EFFORT INTO THINGS THAT ONLY AMPED UP THE VILLAINY AND TENSION OF THESE GUYS AND MADE IT SO MUCH WORSE

like fucking hell how can you be so tone deaf??? this has been in the planning for so damn long and theyve been working on it forever and THIS is what they chose to rush over? this is the priorities they thought were important? even just within this episode if youre struggling to fit it all in then like seriously cut out some of the stuff like the montage of unseen fusion forms that did basiclaly nothing but a few jokes, and the equally as rushed bad lars and sadie romance resolution. Which is another thing that needed a lot of work to fix when the introduction we got to these two was a really unhealthy relationship and a dude who refuses to change despite being given twelve chances but suddenly changes COMPLETELY on the thirteenth one and i guess cos he died that proves he’s all good now. Except he acts all weird and creepy in the very next episode and endangers his new friends by acting all possessive over sadie again and getting angry that she has other friends????

i hate it because ive had to deal with the fandom telling all the people who were rightfully uncomfortable with how these subjects were handled that oh we’re just overreacting and oh wait and see cos they totally have a big plan for the ending or something that’ll make it all make sense. And comparing people being triggered by child abuse and racism to “huhu those dumb su criticals who hate the art style” or whatever...

god, man, its just a deflection of what the issue really is

“oh youre saying NO VILLAINS can EVER be redeemed and NOBODY can EVER talk about dark stuff in shows without being SECRETLY BAD AND SUPPORTING IT IN REAL LIFE?”

no im not saying that im just saying the subjects are fucking depressing to people who’ve suffered from the real life stuff and the villain redemption should be GOOD and should THINK ABOUT THOSE PEOPLE IN THE AUDIENCE if it wants to make up for it

like fucking hell look at how much zuko from avatar went through before his redemption. look at how long he struggled with his morality and how long it took him to realise he was wrong. look at how much detail they showed us on all the people who negatively influenced him into making the bad choices he did. look at how much he went through to make up for what he did and apologise to everyone he hurt. look at how everyone he hurt didnt believe him at first and it took a while for everything to work out. look at how sometimes he messed up and took steps backward before getting to where he needed to be. and look at how he actually changed as a person and continued learning and growing and trying to be a good person even far into the future after the story ended.

hell, fuckin look at PERIDOT! peridot had a full goddamn zuko arc! peridot had more screentime than all of the diamonds combined, and it was way better utilized! she had a full process from being introduced as a scary villain BECAUSE OF MISUNDERSTANDING WHO SHE REALLY WAS, then being revealed as having a fully rounded personality, flaws and redeemable traits while still being a villain. and moments of her proving that she did indeed only become a villain because she didnt understand what she was doing was wrong, and a personality that matched with that reveal rather than having NO INDICATION she was like that until it suddenly happened only after she was defeated. and her redemption came slowly through friendship with steven and it had moments of the other characters not instantly trusting her and also of her making mistakes and struggling with believing steven’s philosophy when it went against everything she knew about life. and speaking of which it was established that she had a very different life which had negative influences pushing these ideas upon her, and tough stuff that made her scared and pressured. Not just being in a high position of ruling over a planet in the lap of luxury and ONLY AFTER BEING DEFEATED do we learn that they feel pressured by the societal expectation to be perfect and they actually would have agreed all along with dismantling the system but they were just too afraid to be honest. Or whatever the fuck that rushed ending was trying to go for! And man even after peridot joins the team she’s NOT redeemed yet, she’s initially only halfway doubting herself and only teaming up with steven because they’re both afraid of the cluster. And she messes up and says horrible shit to her new friends and feels the consequences of her actions and chooses to change. And her ultimate choice to switch sides is REALLY hard, she gets so close to going back to the diamonds and its a great personal sacrifice on her part when she chooses to give it all up and make an enemy of the person she was so scared of!

and GAHHH that good redemption is one in a million episodes that really set up the diamonds Being Bad and should have been a goddamn tally in the “effort required in the fuckin ending” chart!

could we not have even just had one ten minute episode of blue and yellow going around earth and experiencing human life and realizing there’s things worth protecting? or a few damn scenes foreshadowing white being actually insecure and lying to protect herself, rather than GENUINELY ABUSIVE BECAUSE SHE’S BAD?

and seriously even if you hurt people because you hate yourself YOU STILL HURT THEM

a sympathetic backstory should be a reason why they COULD be redeemed, not proof that they already are redeemed just because the backstory was stated in words and nothing else has fuckin changed.

imagine if zuko just lost one fight to aang and said “yes but my dad abused me” and aang was like “oh no now lets team up with zuko to beat up his dad” and none of the bad things zuko did were ever mentioned again and also he keeps his season 1 personality throughout the entire series

imagine if peridot fuckin.. just changed sides cos she’s funny and we like her. people wantedher to change sides as soon as she acted funny and likeable but they still made the effort to actually prove she had changed! the diamonds didnt act remotely harmless or remotely good until they just suddenly are in the very last episode.

hoo

fucking

ray

also why are we constantly just ignoring all these dark things about homeworld? like the episode with holly blue agate and the famethyst slave caste and all the creepy ways the entire place operated. i totally thought thatd.. yknow.. EVER BE REFERENCED AGAIN?? its never even mentioned that anyone even WANTS to go back and save them?? and the human zoo were outright stated to be like.. unsaveable. “oh theyve never known real human life and theyre happy in their slavery so itd be cruel to take them away from it” One off episode, forgotten about. And the creepy as fuck scenes of gems being BUILT INTO THE WALLS AND DOORS AS SECURITY SYSTEMS and the confirmation that more lapis situations are constantly going on yet somehow that singing hairbrush person doesnt get all the sympathy that she did. And steven going daww at the pebbles instead of being horrified that theyre born to work as servants and forced to live in the walls because the noblewomen dont want to look at them? and he asks them to make him a new outfit?? and theres no plot anything involving them except them puttering around in the background outfitting?? like was none of this meant to be seen as PROOF THAT THE DIAMONDS WERE EVIL and PEOPLE WHO NEEDED TO BE SAVED????

goddddd

please say they were rushed or something please say this is all the faultof being given less time than they expected please say there were other plans for other episodes we didnt see that would have given at least slightly more substance to any of this

also why wasnt this even advertised as the last episode if its the last fuckin episode

hhhh well at least obsidian was a great character design and so were the other fusions and new outfits even if they only appeared for twelve seconds. and white’s whole scary evil mind invasion stuff was really good even if it actually hurt the episode by being good, kinda

man im not even mad or anything i just feel mehh and bored and like im actually glad its over. i never wanted to feel that way about a show that used to be so good. i kinda wish the earliest episodes werent so good if the answers to all those well set up mysteries were gonna have so much less effort than the setup itself

...man i should make a whole post about all the mistaken ways i THOUGHT the show was gonna go that actually would have been way more interesting than the real answer.

i’m just super glad that my last theory was wrong cos wow that would have been the only thing worse than this ending! when white pearl first appeared before we’d actually seen white diamond, and it had all this thing that white diamond hadnt been seen in ages.. well i was worried it was setting up some sort of reverse twist where actually white pearl is bodysnatching white diamond instead of vice versa. So the whole evil empire would actually be run by a member of the slave class that its oppressing, and the diamonds/representative of the upper class would actually be poor victims all along. dear god i am so glad i got that wrong! tho im weirded out by how evil white/pink pearl looked in that first hint that she was originally pink pearl??

anyway basicallly im just so fuckin tired

#su spoilers #su critical #more like su dissappointed from someone who started off so damn su positive #su bored su rushed su i just wanted you to care as much about making this redemption good as you cared about other things #it really felt like in general the crewniverse just lost interest in the story around the third hiatus or so #whyyyy did they take so long to reveal anything if all the reveals were gonna be so fast and so bad #you gotta learn that if you hype up a thing you actually have to deliver #like fuckin hell it took a whole season to even introduce a single other gem at all #and so long to introduce homeworld and so long to introduce the diamonds and then whoops blink and its over i guess #also why was jasper hyped up so much and then shitcanned for practically a decade #and her only narrative purpose in the end was just a brief hint at the pink diamond arc

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theworthofhollin · 7 years

Text

SHITTY MOVIE REC OF THE WEEK:

Nick Powell's OUTCAST (2014) starring Hayden Christensen, Yifei Liu, and Nicholas Cage.

(i know. i know. bear with me here.)

Dudes. First things first: this is Hayden Christensen's perfect come-back film. like sure this is not a Great Film but I honestly forgot how good Christensen was as a physical actor??? and DAMN. with the physicality of this role...he is so good. (and what’s so great about this is watching it immediately following the clone wars tv show is PERFECT because its the same form of Anakin we see there: a killer, but war-torn, hungry, dynamic.)

No, really. This is, I shit you not, the ultimate Anakin Skywalker AU Redemption Arc. But with more mohawks and stunning fight choreography and crazy good scenery and also did i mention mohawks. hayden christensen has a mohawk. anyways. if that alone doesnt make any sw fan want to watch this movie [on US Netflix too!!!] then 1. have fun living ur boring ass life??? 2. look at this photo, is that not rots skywalker to a t and 3. keep reading.

SO. Set in what we can assume is the late 1200s, early 1300s?? Hayden Christensen plays a Jedi Knight, sorry, TEMPLAR KNIGHT, named Anakin-- I MEAN JAKOB, who is fighting alongside his Master, Obi Wan Kenobi-- no, sorry, his MENTOR, NIC CAGE, in the Clone Wars, sorry, i mean THE CRUSADES. classic mix up.

SIDENOTE: If the guy who wrote this movie doesnt also have a secret ao3 account dedicated to his star wars prequel au fanfic collection that he’s been cultivating since high school then ill eat my fucking shoe.

(also idk what Cage’s character’s actual name is considering I, like everyone else in the world, can only refer to him as Nic Cage in any role ever. But back to the point.)

[spoilers ahead]

Alright. so.

Somewhere In The Middle East, Nic-Wan Kenobi witnesses his protégé's bloodlust in a battle that results in the deaths of a temple full of innocent women and children, (THE YOUNGLINGS... ANAKIN....) and naturally he goes awol, while Jakob/Anakin spirals down a guilt-driven descent into opium, believing himself to be Damned, Capital D, for his actions.

SIDE NOTE: Hayden looks especially good in this movie, but particularly when he’s PISSED OFF and EXTRA SAD. i dont want to use to the term smad but damn. smad is...a good look here.

i digress.

(serious spoilers below:)

Here's where we enter fix-it fic mode: 3 years after the Crusades have ended, (and in true Kenobi style, Nic Cage has disappeared into the vast eastern wilderness with only his patchy grief-beard and an extra robe he’ll probably lose) a Chinese King is dying, and wishes to make his heir his gentle-hearted 13-year-old son. His elder son, a brutal war-monger, says FUCK U DAD, kills him and takes the throne, but not before their sister LIAN, played by the lovely YIFEI LIU, escapes with both her younger brother and the seal to the kingdom under the cover of night.

(this is basically TPM with shittier gender roles, but otherwise a pretty obvious parallel to the sw Naboo Invasion) And its EXTRA interesting to me because in the sw universe, Naboo court regalia is canonically based off of ancient chinese imperial robes, with aspects of certain japanese and mongolian formalwear as well. AND most of the jedi philosophies are bastardized variations of asian iconography and medieval knights errant, so its fun to see that played out on screen and it lets me draw parallels wherever i want which is always a major plus.

(SIDENOTE: during the escape, her little bro is all decked out in black clothes with dark accersories for night camouflage etc etc while Lian shows up looking hella fine in hand embroidered white silk like. bitch??? u thought i’d downplay my aesthetic for my own HEALTH and SAFETY?anyways what a gift and if im being honest that moment alone made me go, shit, fuck, padme. love of my life.)

(she’s been running hard road for 2 days and just LOOK at her, jesus.)

but back to the plot.

While on the run from the SITH, I mean, the evil brother’s Black Guard, they happen to stumble into a cantina in the lower mountains, where they meet a drugged up, super smad Jakob pulling an Solo in the back of the bar.

( HELP ME... JAKOB.... WHOEVER THE FUCK U ARE--)

The Black Guard then tries to take his LIGHTSABER, I mean, his special, holy, papal blessed broadsword, which ends up being a really bad move. (It's interesting how they play the scene as well: from under the brim of his hat, they make sure his eyes glow bright angry yellow in the reflection of the candles around the table. like. they switch angles and everything just so you’ll notice. It's all very Vader-esque.

[MUFFLED ‘VADER’S THEME’ PLAYING IN THE DISTANCE]

Also immediately after this he pulls a Complete Anakin and flips a fucking table so people will pay attention to him, i love this boy, oh my god, he then proceeds to murder everybody in the bar, which is just. wildly satisfying.)

SIDENOTE: its important to acknowledge the fact that first time director Nick Powell is also a well known fight choreographer and has been a hardcore stuntman for most of his career, so the real highlights in this movie are the GLORIOUS action scenes. Honestly, the sword fights in this movie are some of the best ive ever seen onscreen. and Hayden is absolutely magnetic. 10/10 would recommend just for that alone.

ANOTHER SIDENOTE: Lian also knifes a dude in the neck here w/ her jeweled hairpin. So thats #neat

coincidentally, this also happens to be the moment where both Jakob and I fell in love. also #neat

(AND. this star wars concept art from ROTS and these shots of lian and jakob. discuss:)

(im the guy silently sweating in the back)

ANYWAY.

After witnessing Vader, I mean, Jakob, utterly destroy a full contingent of bad guys, Padme, I mean, LIAN, asks him to help get them to Xing Yuan, a city several days ride away that holds their father's army generals, who will support them and help them take back the throne. Jakob agrees, and then there's lots of exciting action sequences and Anakin and Padme falling in love (SIDENOTE: TRUE TO FORM, ANAKIN IS TERRIBLE @ FLIRTING IN LITERALLY ANY UNIVERSE. GOD BLESS.)

BUT beyond that human disaster, this movie is so underrated. paralleling the sw plotline, the boy king gets his own little padawan training lessons, we get some crazy acrobatic swordfights here and there, they run into obi wan where he’s been hiding in the woods for a decade (#consistency) and its all very dramatic and on ridiculously shaky historical ground but who cares guys thats not why ur watching it in the first place.

We all know why ur watching it in the first place.

the plot. you’re watching it for the plot.

#hayden christensen #outcast #outcast 2014 #nicolas cage #star wars #film reviews #anyways watch this movie #i forgot how much i love reviewing shit films #(disclaimer: nic cage is so weird in this movie and as per usual his accent is the most uncomfortable thing ive ever heard but Whats New?)#also:#im lian in that last pic. we are all lian in that last pic.#long post #mine

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