#human designs get flack and for good reasons but

[brawcolie]

Human softboots + a waltz:)

#human designs get flack and for good reasons but #i couldnt help it:( #i think kitty would be so pretty #and my human designs #theyre like 45 #im old ppl lover #puss in boots #puss in boots the last wish #my art #kitty softpaws #softboots

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Could you talk about the Statute of Secrecy? Or the Ministry’s corruption in General :)

Well, those are two different things. Given that I believe I have an ask floating somewhere in my inbox on the Statute, I suppose we’ll talk about the Ministry of Magic today.

I feel like this is such a broad topic though that I’m not quite sure where to start. I guess I’ll just throw spaghetti at the internet wall and see what sticks.

The Ministry is a Reflection of Society Who Never Admitted They Were the Death Eaters

In the ministry of Harry Potter’s era the Ministry is hopelessly corrupt and filled to the brim with spies (more on this in a later section). Lucius Malfoy, very high up in an unofficial capacity in the Ministry and owner of the Ministry’s mouth piece: The Daily Prophet, was a known Death Eater with a very flimsy excuse.

How is he even able to wield so much influence, you ask? Well, I think it’s not just because of Fudge picking the wrong friends.

I think most the population probably does believe Lucius Malfoy is innocent the way Fudge does. I think it’s a very small subsection, i.e. Dumbledore’s lackies, who go “Nah, ain’t buying it.” I think that, in 1981, when it came time to reveal just how many were Death Eaters and how far this went many people just couldn’t handle it.

Because it was to the point where the nation wasn’t battling Death Eaters, Death Eaters were the nation. Look at the members, these are and were the most influential and prominent families in the country, who combined hold a non-small minority of seats in the Wizengamot. More, these were only the participants, combine those who given anti-muggle and muggleborn sentiment (which I believe are pervasive even among those who claim they fight for the rights of muggles and muggleborns) and you get a nation that is suddenly facing a huge cultural issue that was never previously acknowledged.

We’re talking an entire purge of the Wizengamot, of the Ministry, of the major families and cornerstones of this society. The Black family is completely and utterly destroyed.

People were and remain throughout the 1990′s, desperate to believe it was not as bad as it was or isn’t as bad as it is. If Lucius Malfoy says he was never really a Death Eater then he was never really a Death Eater.

The Ministry is Lousy With Corruption and Spies

What’s hilarious to me is not only is the Ministry incompetent. It is positively flooded with spies. Given the ministry’s overbloated, it’s not even a sizeable minority of employees, but nonetheless every major department has at least one person (if not more) who works for somebody else.

Most work for Tom Riddle. He seems to have intelligence in every department. Through Lucius, who is working pretty much as an unofficial aide to Fudge, he has access to Fudge, complete control of the Daily Prophet, and a voice on the Hogwarts’ board of governors.

Through Rockwood, Tom has direct access to the Department of Mysteries which Lucius is then able to take full advantage of.

Lucius is able to set up an ambush in the Department of Mysteries, getting escaped convicts into the building with the none the wiser, and, had his sole purpose not been a prophecy that only Harry Potter and the Dark Lord can touch, he would have been able to take what he liked. (Though it was always odd to me that the plan was to get Harry Potter to do it, when the better solution would have been to polyjuice Tom Riddle into someone else, set up a tour with the department, and then Tom wanders off conveniently to pick up the prophecy. My theory, I suppose, is that chasing after the prophecy was mostly an exercise in punishing Lucius. And then Lucius fucked up.)

And of course, in book seven, Tom Riddle makes a puppet minister. Point being, to me, it always said a lot that in Book Seven Tom just sort of walks into the building and says, “I’m in charge now” and everyone says “okay”. There was no second Wizarding War, it was a bloodless coup that met zero resistance from anyone but angry school children. 

But that’s Tom’s spies, we also have other spies. Who am I talking about, Dumbledore’s folks of course.

Shacklebolt, Moody, Tonks, and Arthur Weasley are all spies, they just don’t have the introspection to even realize it (which really tells you something about the state of corruption in the ministry). They all work for the ministry, yes, but they in fact pass on information to and serve another master, whose goals do not always align with the government and was a hop skip and a jump away from overthrowing the government at any given moment.

And they don’t even really realize they’re doing this! There doesn’t even seem to be a thought of “I’m doing this for the greater good”, they don’t seem to acknowledge that what they’re doing is very very very bad. Arthur, in fact, is appalled when Percy refuses to do this (well, he’s upset for a lot of reasons, such as that he thinks Percy is spying on Arthur for the minister, but in there is also that Percy refuses to help out with the Order or follow Dumbledore without question). 

Harry paints the Dumbledore’s Army threat that Umbridge saw as something utterly ridiculous, but honestly if I was the ministry I would be worried about this. Dumbledore’s people have infiltrated the ministry just as deeply and badly as the Death Eaters, Dumbledore’s known for recruiting children into his vigilante organization, I don’t know what he’s doing with an army of schoolchildren but I can smell a coup coming.

Anyway, I’m getting off track, point being though that corruption is not only expected and accepted by the ministry, they cannot recognize what it even is. They’re at the point where paying bribes is allocated in their budget.

I Don’t Blame the Ministry For Not Thinking Tom Riddle Was Anti-Jesus

Fudge is designed to get a lot of flack for his outright denial that Voldemort had returned from the dead. He, and other denier characters, are meant to be fools with their heads in the sand who can’t see the obvious.

I ask what about it was obvious?

The only witness to Tom Riddle’s resurrection, Harry Potter, has a known history of erratic behavior.

The previous year, he’d performed illegal magic on his muggle aunt and run away from home. During the previous school year, Harry was revealed to be a parselmouth in a time when the Chamber of Secrets was presumably opened and the mystery was never fully solved (remember, that it was a possessed Ginny never comes to light for more than a few people.) Beyond that, since his first day of school, Harry is routinely in and out of detention, constantly out after curfew, and only seems to not be in serious trouble because he’s openly favored by Dumbledore (who gives him hundreds of points for breaking one of his school rules, during the Philosopher’s Stone fiasco in first year). In 1994, Harry is entered into the Tri-Wizard Tournament under very suspicious circumstances.

We know why all this happens to Harry but from the outside he looks like a delinquent. In fact, he kind of is a delinquent. 

Point being, the only witness is not only Harry Potter (who is already sketch) but it’s Harry Potter holding a dead body of a rival in the tournament.

And he’s claiming that a man who has been nearly fifteen years dead, a man who held the nation in terror and Harry Potter is beloved for destroying, has returned from the grave and conveniently murdered Cedric.

Why is Cedric dead? Well, you see, he and Harry both touched the goblet at the same time because they were going to share the reward. The goblet, a national treasure, was turned into a portkey so that Voldemort could kidnap him.

Why didn’t Voldemort just kidnap him at any other point during the year where he’s guaranteed not to get tag a longs or the wrong kid? Uh... VOLDEMORT IS BACK (for the record, I think it’s because Barty got hung up on the goblet scheme and was determined to ruin his father’s day.)

Where is Voldemort at this very moment? Being evil, somewhere, that is not right here. No, Harry has zero evidence this happened.

Frankly, I wouldn’t believe Harry either.

And when Dumbledore goes about promoting this as sound evidence that Tom Riddle has in fact returned, it starts to get even sketchier. Rather than sounding the alarm, Dumbledore is using this boy’s madness to stir the public into a panic that he, perhaps, plans to take advantage of.

After Dumbledore does that, I would suspect that, even if Harry does give me a memory of the graveyard scene that his head had been tampered with by Dumbledore.

And it’s so convenient that, of all the names Harry picked, it’s Voldemort who killed Cedric. It seems like a ploy to not only deflect the fact that he murdered Cedric but 

Harry’s very upset when some don’t take him at his word but Harry’s also a dumbass and a psychopath. He hates everyone who doesn’t agree with him.

More importantly, necromancy isn’t a thing in the Harry Potter universe. People don’t rise from the dead. Horcruxes exist, but they’re extremely rare, and it seems like no one ever really makes use of them.

So, yeah, not unreasonable that Fudge didn’t immediately go, “My god, Voldemort has risen from the dead! LIGHT THE BEACONS AND SUMMON ROHAN!”

So yeah, it’d take me seeing Voldemort waltzing through the Department Mysteries to go “... Goddammit, this man is more unkillable than Sheev Palpatine.”

After the Epilogue, I am Certain It’s Still the Same Damn Ministry

People hate the epilogue, but in a way, I love it, because it confirms many of my headcanons: these people don’t learn a goddamn thing.

Nothing in their society seems to have changed. Instead of one set of families holding all the power it’s now a new set of families and friends holding all the power. The difference being that they are now all in some way connected to Harry Potter.

Nepotism’s still the name of the game, we still see only human children boarding the Hogwarts Express so you know shit hasn’t changed for the goblins, Draco Malfoy’s alive and well and holds a position in the Ministry that Kingsly graciously allows him to have, it’s just now you have Hermione writing all your laws for you.

The Wizarding World is still the Wizarding World in every single capacity. The only difference is that Voldemort is dead again. Hooray.

Harry and friends simply don’t have the introspection to even realize it.

#harry potter #harry potter meta #harry potter headcanon #the ministry of magic #cornelius fudge #albus dumbledore #anti albus dumbledore #anti harry potter #voldemort #tom riddle #lucius malfoy #harry potter epilogue #meta #headcanon #opinion #the wizarding world

[earthstellar]

TFP Megatronus x Orion Pax Experimental Concept Playlist: The Timescale of Cybertronian Lives + Music from 1890 - 2021

I know there are tons of playlists for these characters out there, but I’m trying to do something a little less conventional with this one; Please hear me out! 

Two Playlists in One: Love Throughout The Ages 

The first half of this playlist is almost all new music mixed in with some hits from the 60s, 70s, 80s, etc. to give variety, plus tracks from different genres so that hopefully everyone has a song they can enjoy in there somewhere.

For the second half of the playlist, I wanted to emphasise the idea of how long the war on Cybertron has been going on for, and just how old this conflict and the people involved actually are. 

Cybertronian Timescale: Long Lives and The Perception of Time 

We think of the Orion Pax / Megatronus stage of their relationship as being relatively brief, which it was in comparison to how long the war has been going on for as of TFP, but these are people who live for centuries. The scope of that is staggering. 

Optimus Prime and Megatron have known each other personally (either positively or negatively) for longer than modern human civilisation has existed. 

So to me, the best way to touch on that idea of time, musically, is to have the first half of the playlist be modern music, remixes, etc. and then the second half is well known and lesser known hits throughout early radio/TV (with many tracks on this playlist pre-dating those forms of media as well). 

What’s on the Playlist, Then?

My grandmother was born in 1914, and her music collection spans nearly 100 years. It’s all good stuff.

I have included some of her favourites, which she always called her “sweetheart jingles”, on this soundtrack. I think many of them work surprisingly well for the Megatronus/Orion Pax relationship.

Many of these songs will probably be unknown by the vast majority of people who might want to listen to this playlist, which is also appealing to me. (I hope if this is your first time hearing some of these, that you enjoy a few of them!)

My parents were born in 1944, and I remember all of the classics they would play; Some of those tracks will be more recognisable as this was the era when radio and TV became far more common and accessible, but I picked the tracks that I think best apply to the pairing and the relationship between the two characters at that point in their lives. 

The link to the playlist is below after some notes on Cybertronian language evolution! 

Quick Thought: Cybertronian Language Over Time and Era Specific Speech Patterns 

While thinking about my grandmother’s music collection as I assembled this playlist, I thought about some of the words and phrases she used commonly that are now totally non-existent in modern conversational English. 

She had what would probably sound to most people like “1930s radio voice” or a more Trans-Atlantic Accent way of speaking; She grew up in the Northeast USA and so she had a very distinctive way of stressing the vowels in words. It’s not just the words themselves, or how they were pronounced, but the tone and pace of speech was also very different. 

This got me thinking about Cybertronians, age, and speech:

Bots as old as Ratchet may have grown up with a totally different spoken language version of Cybertronian, and we already know that there are regional dialects, multiple written forms (glyphs), and era-specific types of Cybertronian language. 

But the way they speak, as I mentioned above with the stressing of vowels and the tone and pace of speech, might still be different due to the different eras, even after language packs/programs are downloaded and updated periodically as needed. We already know Cybertronians have regional accents, so it stands that generational accents would also possibly exist as well. 

Such a difference in speech patterns could possibly be used as a primary indicator of relative age on Cybertron, as physically they don’t age in the sense human beings do. 

Back to the Playlist: Link + Track List + Notes on Audio Prior to 1930

The playlist is here on YouTube. 

Scroll down to get to the second half (oldies section) if that’s what you’re here for! 

Please note that the songs are not arranged in any particular order aside from the first half being newer music and the second half being far older music.

Also note, where original recordings are available on YouTube for some of the older songs, I have used those original recording versions. 

However, keep in mind that there may be a couple seconds of “fuzz” at the top (start) of those older tracks, because they have been recorded from records or wax cylinders, which are formats of music that typically had a “pause” on the track to allow for needle and speed calibration when playing them manually. Modern records don’t do this in quite the same way and nobody uses wax cylinders anymore, but older records typically did. If this bothers you, skip ahead about two seconds or so, and it will resolve. 

Tempo may seem slightly “fast” on two of the tracks due to difficulties with the medium and modern recording tech/methods, and one track has some persistent “fuzz” throughout due to the original recording being rare and therefore it is a “best copy available” type archival recording, but otherwise I’ve managed to find the clearest audio possible for the vast majority of the older songs! 

(Fun music note, the “click track” in modern digital music was partially inspired by the clicking of the needle hitting the “countdown grooves” on old cylinders and records, which creates an audible mild clicking sound as the needle finds the groove and provides time for usually a half rotation or full rotation of the record before the track actually begins to allow for adjustment before the music starts! If the clicking is too fast, dial down the rotation speed, for example. 

This itself was inspired by classical metronomes as well as the actual physical method of playing the music in this way, but it’s cool to see how this persists throughout musical history even now when we don’t need the click for digital production for quite the same reasons/applications. It’s all about timing, no matter the medium or era!)

Due to the method of how some player piano rolls were credited, often by roll company and not by individuals, the actual artist name is often not available for those tracks. Where possible and where known, I have included credits to the artists/musicians. I have done my best to research and find the artists in these recordings. 

I have also included orchestrions and other “automated” music in addition to a player piano track as I think it’s interesting; These are often very old compositions being played on these machines, and as such are designed to reflect the earliest days of their relationship. 

Songs range from the years 1890 to 2021, and I will add more as I manage to find YouTube videos with some of the older songs I’m still looking for. 

By the way, if you need a love song for like an actual partner or crush that you have, I’m just going to say it now and point out that a lot of these classics are great to use in real life for cute purposes. My partner of ten years agrees, and my grandparents were married for over 60 years and sang many of these daily, so obviously something here works well. You’re welcome. ;) 

Below the cut is a track list of the second half of the playlist, as it’s 7 AM and I’d like to emphasise the “classics” section here as it’s the central theme of the concept.

I will add to this list as more tracks are added:

You’re the Top - Cole Porter

What is this Thing Called Love - Leslie Hutchinson 

I Get a Kick Outta You - Cole Porter 

Puttin on the Ritz - Phil Spitalny Orchestra

What a Day - Carl Fenton

Come Fly With Me - Frank Sinatra

Earth Angel - The Penguins

Ring a Ding Ding - Frank Sinatra 

In my Merry Oldsmobile - Billy Murray

Singin in the Rain - Gene Kelly

Dream a Little Dream of Me - Doris Day

Unforgettable - Nat King Cole 

Can’t Help Falling in Love - Elvis Presley 

Good Golly Miss Molly - Little Richard

Bei Mir Bist du Schoen - The Andews Sisters

Shine on Harvest Moon - Ruth Etting 

1920s Dance Sequence from Don’t Knock the Rock

In the Mood -Glen Miller Orchestra

Dream Lover - Bobby Darin 

When the Ragtime Army Goes Away to War (Artist Unknown) 

After You’ve Gone - J. Lawrence Cook 

My Sin (Artist Unknown) 

Flick Flack by Albert Vossen (Unsure; Song + Artist Unknown; Orchestrion) 

Lotosblumen Walzer by E. Ohlsen (Hupfeld Violina) 

Waltz no.2 - Dmitri Shostakovich 

Jupiter - Gustav Holst 

Love Potion no. 9 - The Clovers (Please note, this song mentions the word “g*psy” once in the beginning of the track. Skip this song if you would prefer not to hear it; I have done my best to only include songs that are friendly to the modern listener, but where needed I will make annotations such as this one to ensure nobody has to hear anything potentially offensive, as is unfortunately often the case with older music/lyrics.)

Come a Little Bit Closer - Jay and the Americans 

Sh-Boom - The Crew Cuts

Oh Boy - Buddy Holly

#long post #playlist #megop #megops #cybertronian culture #transformers #transformers prime #tfp #maccadam #maccadams #megatron #optimus prime #orion pax #music #concept playlist #megatronus

[hyena-frog]

I personally don't understand people who think that Virginia 'can't win on her own'. As if she has to prove herself or she is 'too nice' and has to learn 'how to violence'. Just because Sevro's solution for everything is cutting some fingers or worse, doesn't mean he is always right or that Mustang's work to keep that balance and play within the designated lines is not badass or interesting. She is the only demokratic ruler and her own people gave her absolute power of decision making to end the war at any cost. What's not great about that!?

If Virginia was indeed 'too nice', she would have perished long ago - last absolute cinnamon roll we saw was Julian and we all know what Society thinks about people like him. Just because she plays by the rules, doesn't mean she has no claws - she wiped a terrorist's memories away for fuck's sake. Now that the rules have been extended, you can bet your ass that she'll take more than one page out of Nero's playbook. After all, she said it herself, she tamed herself, but it's fun to let the lion out.

Agreed 110%! I don't understand people who give Virginia shit in general tbh. I mean, how do you not fall in love with her immediately? How are you not ride or die for her from the get-go? It boggles the mind.

Those arguments, being "too nice" or being unable to win on her own, are reaching and easily debunkable. The lack of reading comprehension. 😒 If you don't like her, then whatever. I may not understand how that’s possible, but it really isn’t necessary to make shit up, you know?

Virginia can't win on her own, huh. The nerve! Where would Darrow be without her? Dead. Many times over. He would have bled out after Cassius stabbed him if Virginia hadn't helped him. And it was Virginia who brought the Howlers back from the Rim weeks in advance of Darrow actually needing them, just in case. So many things would have gone wrong in Morning Star if she wasn't at Darrow's side (and if Ragnar hadn't gone out of his way to make sure she'd be there, the absolute legend).

Perhaps it's Darrow who can't win on his own? But that sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? All of his successes were achieved through teamwork. Darrow acknowledges this many times. It's the same for Virginia. While it's simply not true that she can't win on her own, it’s also untrue that the inability to win on your own is a bad thing. The whole argument doesn’t make any sense.

The idea Virginia still needs to “prove” herself despite doing so plenty of times already throughout the series is frustrating. The fact of the matter is, the success of the Rising relies just as heavily on Virginia's intelligence as it does Darrow's battle skills. The Solar Republic simply wouldn't exist without her. Fitchner never had a clear vision of what "after the Society" would look like and neither did Darrow for a long time. The war effort needs a conscience and a vision for the future, otherwise it's just endless bloodshed. Virginia helps Darrow see beyond the bloodshed. Plus, Darrow has no interest in politics. He'd be the first to admit he’s not good at the slow game of political maneuvering. But Virginia thrives in that environment. In Dark Age, Darrow even admits his current predicament is a consequence of not trusting his wife's way of running the Republic, and he vows never to do that again.

Sure, Virginia doesn't get into physical fights often, especially now that she is Sovereign. But politics is no less perilous a battlefield. I feel like because the political battlefield isn't as flashy and fast paced as a literal one, people forget the constant danger she is in, even before the Senate's betrayal. Silenius' Stiletto is a delicate tightrope act she has to perform every day to drag progress forward while keeping her opponents in check. This requires a level of self-restraint, clear-headedness, and badassery, that no other character can achieve.

Virginia is not "too nice." She is practical. And often, is it practical to play nice. Not every confrontation is best solved through violence Sevro. We all know the line: Virginia is the mustang that nuzzles the hand; people know they can work with her. That’s why the people chose her consistently for ten years, over literally everyone else in the solar system, to run this new government. And her steadfast resolve to gain Imperium legally, to not force her will on the people, proved to them again that she won’t abuse this ultimate power to end the war.

No, Virginia may be reasonable but that doesn't mean she is too nice. If she was too nice, she wouldn't have used her relationship with Cassius to protect her family. She wouldn't have shot Cassius in the throat with an arrow. She wouldn't have promised Ephraim he would "die shitting in a foreign bed" if he skipped about on their bargain to return the kids. She wouldn't have zapped the Duke of Hands' entire personality from his head. Like you said, she never would have made it this far if she was truly toothless. She's practical, and sometimes the practical solution doesn't require violence, but creative thinking.

Speaking of creative thinking, one thing Virginia doesn’t get nearly enough credit for is abolishing the death penalty immediately after Adrius was hanged. That wasn't her being "too nice" or too lenient on her caste. Yes, she feels life in prison is the moral option over the death penalty. But she knows her people. The punishment for the worst criminals in Deepgrave is a Gold's worst nightmare. Life in prison denies a Gold their desire for a glorious death, to be remembered through the ages for their deeds in battle. The Republic's justice system sends a clear message: "Mess with us, and you won't get your notoriety or fame, you'll only get obscurity and shame and sucking algae through a tube until you die naturally of old age." That to me is crueler than hanging.

Virginia’s mind is her greatest weapon, but more than that, her greatest strength is how she applies her intelligence. Her ability to read people, and to communicate, is greatly underappreciated imo. These skills require nonviolent interaction yet they yield great results. There are many examples of this. She used her natural charisma to gain Octavia's trust. She brokered an alliance with the Rim when she thought Darrow was dead. She held the Republic together for ten years despite constant, increasing animosity from the Vox. She refused to torture Lyria and was able to see she was not lying about being an unwitting pawn in the kidnapping scheme and was rewarded with information and a new ally. She figured out exactly what Sefi was planning for Cimmeria, even manipulating the situation to her advantage without Sefi realizing it. She knew Victra was going to bargain with Sefi for the kids, without being told. In her own words, this is simply what she does.

There is a quote in Iron Gold that caught my eye: "Communication is the soul of civilization." (532) Now, this line has nothing directly to do with Virginia. This is Ephraim trying to get a rise out of Gorgo. But it fits Virginia perfectly, doesn’t it? The Republic is able to exist as a civilization because it has such an amazing communicator at its center.

Virginia is such an excellent communicator that she is even able to get parties who refuse to communicate with her initially to reciprocate communication eventually. She convinces Sevro, Dancer, and even Victra to stop freezing her out and work together. She does this by speaking their "language." She knows exactly what to say or what to do to get them to finally listen to her. Revealing she already knows exactly what is going on works for Sevro, providing hard evidence of conspiracy works for Dancer, and proving her actions (showing her scars) works for Victra. This isn't to say she never makes mistakes. She shouldn't have called the Wardens on Darrow, for example, just as Darrow shouldn't have kept the meeting with the Society "diplomats" a secret from her and the Senate. But more often than not, her nonviolent communication skills yield valuable results.

As for Virginia apparently needing to learn how to use violence… While Victra and Sevro’s feelings were justified, their actions at the end of Iron Gold and the beginning of Dark Age were just wrong, wrong, wrong imo. Freezing out Virginia did nothing but delay the return of the kids. It's frustrating to think how much heartbreak could have been avoided if they'd just put their heads together from the moment the kids disappeared. And what exactly did Sevro's rampage through Luna's underground accomplish? Some dead Syndicate thorns, sure. But that tantrum put a huge target on Sevro's back. As Virginia said, one lucky sniper and boom, no more Sevro. What would Victra have done then?

While it may feel like Virginia would have achieved more if she just beheaded some people, she has a responsibility as Sovereign to consider the bigger picture. She has to consider the Stiletto. If the Vox saw her offing some fools it would have added credibility to their smear campaign. The people would have lost faith in her and think she turned into another Octavia. Whoever replaced her could use her actions to justify their own dictatorship. Violence was simply not practical for her until she legally gained Imperium. Now though… 😈

Virginia's over here playing 3D chess while everyone else is playing Connect Four, but this still isn’t enough for some people. After the clone gets the better of her, she gets flack for not being an omniscient god and just knowing her twin brother laid out a plan to clone himself ten years ago. Tut, tut, should have seen that one coming, despite the lack of evidence. If only she’d punched some people. (Can you see I hate this argument with every fiber of my being?)

In Dark Age, Ozgard says this about Electra and Pax: "She is better fighter. He is more dangerous human." (184) Well, Pax gets it from his momma. Pax and Virginia may not be able to throw devastating punches but in many ways, their intellect is what makes them the greater threat to their enemies.

Thank you for the ask!

#virginia au augustus #red rising #iron gold #dark age #iron gold trilogy #dark age spoilers #astreamikaelson13 #sorry I disappeared for like a week #I'm back writing unnecessarily long posts #my post

[kendrixtermina]

The "waifu bait" criticism of Edelgard is so dumb given that most of the cast is technically waifu/husbando bait in one way or another, they're all meant to appeal to players as romance options, and she's the only one getting flack for it. (Well, not the only one, there were some people giving Dimitri shit too for being "wish fullfillment for stupid teenage girls who think they can fix a man," but I see the complaint most often with Edelgard.)

Yeah. I mean, you can boink Rhea and Jeritza!

It’s not like satelite love interests aren’t a plague onto anime and fiction in general, but I only ever hear this “you only like them because they’re waifu/bishie” thing directed at characters who very much DO have personality, unique compelling features and plot relevance. 

I’ve also seen this thrown at, say, Evangelion’s Miss Ayanami, as if all the fascinating sci-fi concept stuff and compelling narrative about finding your own worth and making a connection in a cruel lonely world wasn’t there - and at least we do see her through a “main character’s love interest” sorta lens. (I was thinking about how Byleth is actually quite similar, except more proactive with more of a dorky side, and less philosophical/reflective, but because Byleth is the MC we come off with a fairly different impression. )

Meanwhile with Edelgard they really didn’t pull any punches, the whole story is set in motion and dominated by her active choices, most the unique designs/outfits she gets are geared to look elegant/powerful.  (Apart from the usual ‘individually wrapped boob armor would break your sternum’ thing but you’d really have to know physics for that/ could be fixed easily by making the fit more sweater-like), she has a specific discernable philosophy and makes impactful choices, that can genuinely be agreed or disagreed with.

You can’t swag her into your way of thinking - you can only ally with her under the presupposition that you already actively agree. (See all the people complaining that you cant “criticise her more”, expecting her to be like Dimitri basically even though they are exact opposites. You can only get on her route by making two deliberate choices. I mean they wrote this with your first playthrough in mind, in-universe you’re not there because you wanna complete all aroutes but because you actively chose to join her after she spent a year unsubtly trying to recruit you to her cause)

You don’t talk Claude out of his tactics either. (and forcing it all into this comparision often leads ppl to overlook that he has ambiguities or character development at all, maybe he isn’t vilified but he gets simplified and therefore wronged just as much in the end. They’re not all Dimitri. The whole point of having three or four different potential deuteragonists to choose from is that they’re different)… heck, even if you look at Dimitri, you only get him back to what he really wanted to do back in part I before his black-and-white thinking and exaggerated sense of duty got the better of him. 

With all three, joining them eventually just enables them to get closer to their actual vision. Back when you meet her in Remire, Edelgard outright tells you that “with your power on my side, we could courttail the slitherer’s atrocities much more efficiently”. You don’t change her mind at all; You enable her to use “Plan A”. Same with Claude, who otherwise plains much more defensively both because he has less support and because he’s more jaded. And Dimitri essentially pulls a Sayaka, ie being unable to live up to his own unrealistic standards drive him to lose all hope and become the very opposite of the hero he wanted to be, but you do help him get back to that, or to a more balanced mature understanding of that. 

The best proof of that is that the popularity poll numbers actually went down after the release, ie a lot of ppl who liked her just bc they liked her design were turned off that there’s a specific personality there that isn’t necessarily their type/ a MO they don’t necessarily agree with. Or all those peeps complaining that the S-support was too understated for them. Claude got that too - They’re just not the most open/expressive people in the world, one would think that after playing through their routes you would know and understand that. Whereas Dimitri has been super emotional from day one (which is both his greatest strength and greatest weakness), so it figures that he’d be more conventionally romantic. 

- Hardly things that would happen if she were written to be “blandly pleasant”.  I mean generally speaking she’s not the best as showing her feelings and when she does she’s often pretty blunt at it even with her closest friends (El: ”Hubert! I order you to tell me what it is you’re not telling me!” Hubert: [elegantly weasels out of answering] El: [after he’s left the room] I’m worried about him tho. )

Seems senseless to claim that she’s blandly pleasant when she’s absolutely gotten a love-it-or-hate-it-marmite-reaction all across the board. It also seems to go along with the implicit idea that everyone who likes her is heterosexual boys. I’m neither, and it’s not like heterosexual boys aren’t ever interested in “plot” or “writing” I mean geez. Though I would resist the temptation to fully ascribe it to things like that. 

To an extent it’s simply confusion. “How can they like this thing that obviously sucks? Must be an ulterior motive”, whereas in reality ppl who like her have probably parsed what happened here differently to begin with (It depends greatly on how powerful you concluded Rhea was, ie, wether what Edelgard is doing is a conquest or a revolt. She certainly sees it as a revolt. Even today in the modern day most of us see revolts as legitimate, or at least, if they get overly destructive, as a fault of the bad government. Heck, there are many on this very site who would label all revolts legit by default (”eat the rich”, the more ‘original sin-like’ variants of privilege theory) which is further than I would go )

There certainly are a bunch of ‘cute’ scenes post holy-tomb scene and under the assumption that Edelgard is this my-way-or-the-highway type of person that many have her pegged as I can see how they might think that it “makes no sense” but that’s really down to wanting her not tp step outside of that idea they have of her. I mean even supervillains have silly everyday situations. Bin Laden loved Disney Movies, Hitler loved his dogs. By itself that has nothing to do with morality or likeability. It’s just being human. Supervillains blush, not because they’re not villains, but because they have blood vessels in their faces. It’s only logical that once you get close to someone and get them to trust you, you get to see more of their silly or vulnerable sides. It’s the same with Rhea. (except that the same people argue that having personable vulnerable sides at all makes Rhea good s of course it causes some cognitive dissonance when Edelgard also has them. I’ve yet to see ppl calling “waifuism” on Rhea (whom I would consider a full-fledged villain), and they shouldn’t - it’s characterization.) Same with ppl calling Edelgard a “manchild” for liking stuffed animals and sweets. She’s actually very mature and adult for her age, having some interests that aren’t super high-minded is just realistic and if you looked at her as a full 3D person who can have more than one trait you’d see that. 

This also goes with that tendency of holding up AM as the gold standard complaining about the lack of AM-like plot that they completely miss the different but equally compelling character arcs in VW and CF. That’s not a lack of arc, that IS the arc, it’s just a different arc: We get to see this tough, in-control high-minded character who’d completely given up on the normal life she wanted so much and resigned herself to never being understood finding out that she is very much still capable of normalcy and humanity and finding friendship and love and I think that’s beautiful. It’s my jam. 

And it’s meaningful precisely because it’s a change from only seeing the tough leader guise otherwise. Complaining about that is like complaining about getting to see Claude’s more wistful, dreamy, benevolent, not-entirely self-interest side in VW or claiming that the writing would be better if he were just a straight-up selfish trickster. Actually, if you removed their heroic traits you’d end up with a lot more generic characters. You’d simply get every wild card trickster ever, and every “Nietzschean” villain ever.  It’s the fact that they’re unconventional heroes that makes Claude and Edelgard so unique, compelling and interesting. If you like conventional heroes, Dimitri is right here. Your basic heroic fantasy ‘rightful king returns/ soft peace loving hero’, plus your basic jrpg guilt-ridden angsty protagonist. I mean there’s good reason that these character archetypes are popular. Plus he’s especially well-executed and recontextualized by the contrast to the others, but there he is, enjoy him! We’re not stopping you. 

It’s really Seteth who came up short arc wise. You could have given him an arc, the potential was there, he essentially transistions from protecting himself and his family to taking on his family’s heroic quest and rising up to that, but he doesn’t get like, a scene reflecting on that. Or you could’ve sent them on some mission to actually curb some corrupt cardinals etc, shown them actually reforming the church and realizing that it wasn’t all perfect, after all he very much knows that Rhea herself wasn’t all perfect. 

For all that much of media is obsessed with making characters “hot”, the truth is that if people like them for any reason, they will find them hot anyways, regardless of whether that was the intention. (unless the people in question are aroace, or the character is a literal, realistic prepubescent child)

You don’t have to “make”  a character hot for ppl to find them so.

#fire emblem: three houses #fire emblem three houses #fe3h #edelgard von hresvelg

[bluetortoist]

-

Questionnaire 1

Cosmo

What is their name, gender, and age?

And he is a 5yr(26 year old), male tortoiseshell Manx cat

What are three adjectives to describe them?

Well Mannered, Wide-eyed, Free spirited

Do they have a human home or are they a stray? If they have a human home, what is their home life like? If they are a stray, what is life like on the streets?

Technically a stray, but the family of the house he used to live by would give him and his family some scraps and water sometimes.

What is their ‘role’ within the tribe, or what are they known for? (Ex: Tugger is the curious cat/rockstar, Gus is the theatre cat, Mistoffelees is the magician, Munkustrap is the Jellicle Protector, Jelly is seen as a caretaker, etc)

He’ll probably be known as “Cosmo the Swingin’ Cat”. He doesn’t have a role yet, but everyone likes his presence and to hear some of his stories from the country. He is good with the kittens, being sort of a big kitten himself.

Who are their best friends? You can include characters from the show or tag other people’s OC’s. How popular are they?

He's sort of popular. His main friends that he made have been Bastion, Damus, Hayato and Coquette and Marikit. But it's safe to say that he's made friends with nearly everyone, some are interested in him because of his accent and that he lacks a tail.

What is their favorite food? Do they prefer human food or something they’ve hunted?

He likes chicken and eggs, but isnt picky either. He used to live in the backwoods of the country, so he knows how to hunt. But hell get away with a bit of begging when he wants a taste of human food.

Do they have any accessories? Scars? Why or why not?

He wears suspenders and baggy pants along with a newsboy cap hat. 

What style of dance do they work best in?

Tap dance and swing

Do they have any sort of magic? Do they fear magic?

He was a little scared at first because he had never seen magic or grew up with it before. But now he is really enchanted by it.

Any fears?

He is of birds. The big ones in particular like hawks and owls. He saw one snatch up an older cat across the street where he used to live one day as a kitten and it has haunted him ever since.

Do they believe in love? If so, what is their “type” and how do they act when they are in love? If not, then why?

He is a romantic at heart, so he believes in love. When he is in love, he tries to hide his face with his hat from how big and goofy he's smiling.

Do they personally know anyone who has gone up to the Heaviside layer? Do they believe in the Heaviside?

No he doesn't. He never even heard about the Heaviside Layer. When he does, he sometimes thinks that his Ma and Pa might be there.

Any passions or hobbies? (Ex: Dance, hunting, etc)

Besides dancing, he likes to do woodwork making all kinds of figures. 

If a song was sung about them at the Jellicle Ball, what would it be about?

It would be about Cosmo and his voyage from the states to England and would definitely have swing kind of music. He would sing about his life on the countryside and his adventures going from boats to planes to trains traveling across the sea to where he is now.

What are their thoughts on some of the main characters in the show? (Ex: Tugger, Munk, Jenny, you get to choose!)

It's safe to say he likes nearly everyone. He likes to talk to Skimbleshanks and Jenny; they remind him of his parents. He's friends with Alonzo and Plato and Tumblebrutus. He finds Tugger a little strange, but he doesn't think badly of him.

Do they have any secrets they are hiding?

None

Questionnaire 2

What are they like on the outside?

He’s a polite, happy-go-lucky gentleman who kind of has a flirtatious streak, but is also very curious and adventurous when it comes to new surroundings.

How do others perceive them?

Some might of him as a childish hick or a shameless flirt who knows nothing about the world around him and doesn’t know when he is being taken advantage of.

What are they actually like on the inside? Are they similar to how they are on the outside, or totally different?

he is a little bit of both because in some ways, they way some see him is completely true. But he is actually smarter than he looks and is more sensitive to other's feelings than some think. He knows that some things that he says come out a different kind of way, but he means no harm and thinks anyone should be treated the way he'd want to be treated.

How many cats truly know who they are on the inside? Does your character often show who they truly are?

He is an open book. He doesnt hide anything about him.

What makes your character appealing to other cats? What reason do others have to like them?

A lot of cats like to hear him talk because of his accent and him having no tail is a conversation starter. He will joke about having no tail and make up a story about how he lost it.

What flaws does your character have? Do they give anyone any reason to dislike them?

He is a bit gullible and can be tricked easily when not paying attention to his surroundings. Sometimes things that he says sounds more like flirting than what he thinks is a compliment and that gets him in trouble sometimes.

Can they fight?

He can. But even with how toned he is in some areas, he has a lean build, so he’s not too strong

Do they often get into fights? What do they get into fights over?

No. He tries not to get into fights, but he will if necessary

Who are their parents? Are they alive? Do we know what they are like personality wise? Does your character have any sort of contact with them?

His Ma and Pa have passed away a long time ago of old age, but he knows they’re in a better place. 

Do they have any siblings or other relatives?

He has no other siblings, but considers the neighbourhood cats back home part of his family. 

(If they have a home) How did they end up in their current home? (If they’re a stray) How did they end up on the streets?

He has no current home as of yet. He has just been sleeping wherever it was dry and safe. Hes been sleeping in a wood box outside of a restaurant for the time being.

What was their childhood like?

He was born a stray living with his Ma' and Pa' in a barn next to wildlife in the American countryside. He was taught how to hunt and dance, but was also taught manners and being a good tom. It was a laidback life on the farm and going into the human town, but out in the woods was pretty tough and you had to always be on your guard.

What was the worst experience they ever had to go through, in their opinion?

2 experiences. one being when he saw the hawk catch his neighbor up as a kid. And the other where he wasn’t paying attention and was nearly stomped on by a farm bull. 

Do they potentially have a crush or a mate? Have they ever been in love?

He comes to like Marikit (another friends oc from discord) when he first arrives. He has had a few crushes, but they were from as a kitten. He a little embarrassed by it now, but one time when he was younger he tried to put the moves on a fox whom he thought was another cat. but he soon realized what she was and was kinda interrupting her waiting for someone else.

Who do they look up to?

Besides his parents, he looked up to his neighbor who was an old cat before he was snatched away.

Greatest achievement? 

 He thinks with how much he has traveled without getting thrown off is a pretty good accomplishment. He also feels kinda proud that he rode on a running horse once (even though him and his claws were the reason it was running in a frenzy)

Do they have any pet peeves?

Not really.

How do they react to a compliment? An insult?

To a compliment, he's pretty humble, but depending on the cat, he’d try not to get too flustered and grin like an idiot. To an insult, he's not one to get too upset about things, but if it does too far and if it's someone else getting the flack, that would be enough to get him pissed off.

What are they best at?

Dancing, Singing, Woodcrafting,  Sneaking and Begging

What do they often fail at?

He might take a joke too far or too long, so he ends up apologizing.

What assumptions do others make about them and how does your oc react to them?

Some might label him as a dumb, naive hick while others see him as a very sweet and energetic guy to be around. 

How many languages do they speak? Do they have an accent?

He can only speak english. And he has a southern accent.

Do they label their sexuality? (Pan, Gay, straight, etc)

Male, Bisexual

What is their ‘outlet’? How do they express themselves?

Woodwork and working with metal. Besides wood dolls, he has little side projects of sculptures or figures made out of metal. They take a while to make though so he only has a few completed.

Are they secretly worried about anything? (Worried about a friend, the future, family, etc.

He's thinks about the neighbor's and other animal friends back at home and worries about their well being sometimes. He might want to visit back once in a while.

(Extra, for the creator)

Are you currently in a rp with your oc?

yes!

Why did you decide to make an oc? 

I thought it would be cute to have a little country bumpkin-like cat from overseas visiting London

How did you pick their name?

No particular reason. Mostly because I thought it sounded funny and fitting for him and his personality

Are they modeled off any specific breed?

Yes! After a tortoiseshell manx cat

Why did you pick that design for them?

Because I wanted to make a cat who would joke around about having no tail.

--- Yup. people are probably sick of it by now, but heres some more Cats oc’s in your face!  both questionnares belong to @magical-marvelous-mistoffelees​

#cats musical #cats the musical #cats ocs #my ocs #long post

[straightupstrangetimes]

13 Not-So-Scary Movies to Get You in the Halloween Spirit!

Contributed by Kris Rustic, host of Obscure Anomalies podcast

Halloween is around the corner. Everywhere you look a horror movie is playing. For me, I love it. There is just something about being scared while knowing full well you are safe. But not everyone is into that sort of thing. My wife is one, so I tried to find lists of not-so-scary movies but was having trouble coming up with one, so I decided to write my own.

Please keep in mind, I did try to keep the list more kid and family friendly.

13. HOCUS POCUS

300 years have passed since the Sanderson sisters were executed for practicing dark witchcraft. Returning to life, thanks to a combination of a spell spoken before their demise and the accidental actions of Max, the new-kid-in-town, the sisters have but one night to secure their continuing existence. With the help of his younger sister Dani, his high school crush Allison, and a magical cat, it is up to Max to save the children of Salem.

A must see on any Halloween movie list. Full of light-hearted humour, this film is loved by people of all ages.

Watch it: Amazon Rent or Buy

12. CASPER (1995)

Furious that her late father only willed her his gloomy-looking mansion rather than his millions, Carrigan Crittenden makes a plan to burn the place to the ground. That is, until she finds a map leading to a treasure hidden under the house. But when she enters the rickety mansion to seek her claim, she is frightened away by the mansions ghostly inhabitants. Determined to get her hands on this hidden fortune, Crittenden hires afterlife therapist Dr. James Harvey to exorcise the ghosts from the mansion. Harvey and his daughter Kat move in and soon Kat befriends Casper, the ghost of a young boy, who is “the friendly ghost.” But not so friendly are Casper’s uncles--Stretch, Fatso and Stinkie--who are determined to drive all “fleshies” away. It is up to Harvey and Kat to help the ghosts cross over to the other side.

I may get some flack putting Casper this high up on the list, but hey, to each their own. Casper is a fun little film filled with the right amount of supernatural scares placed inside a package that every age can enjoy.

Watch it: Starz; Amazon Rent or Buy

11. THE WITCHES

While staying at a hotel in England with his grandmother, Helga, young Luke inadvertently spies on a convention of witches. The Grand High Witch reveals a plan to turn all children into mice through a magical formula. When they find that Luke has overheard, the witches test the formula on him. Now, with the help of his grandmother and new friend Bruno Jenkins, Luke the mouse must fight back against the evil witches.

Based on the book of the same name, The Witches is a classic. This may be one of the more frightening films on the list but is still children-friendly. Besides, who doesn’t want to save the world as a mouse.

Watch it: Amazon Rent or Buy

10. THE MONSTER SQUAD

The Monster Squad is a club of friends who idolize the classic monster-movies, especially their non-human stars. One day, Dracula, the Mummy, Frankenstein’s Monster, and other classic horror icons, all of which the club idolize, arrive in town in search of a magic amulet to destroy all the good in the world. It is up to the five friends to save the amulet from destruction and use it to cast the monsters into limbo.

One part The Goonies, one part Ghostbusters, and one part Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, the Monster Squad is a true cult classic that was way ahead of its time.

Watch for yourself and find out if the “Wolfman has nards.”

Watch it: Amazon Rent or Buy

9. BEETLEJUICE

Adam and Barbara are like every other happily married couple -- who just happen to also be dead! Before they died, Adam and Barbara had spent their vacation to decorate and make the house their own, that is, until the fatal car crash. Unfortunately, a new family is moving in, and not quietly as they make plans to redecorate the house with the help of an interior designer. Adam and Barbara try to scare them out, but end up becoming the main attraction to the money making family. They call upon Beetlejuice to help, but Beetlejuice has more in mind than just helping.

While having a special place in my heart for taking place in Connecticut, Beetlejuice is an all around classic starting Michael Keaton and a young Winona Ryder.

Watch it:: Amazon Rent or Buy

8. PARANORMAN

Norman Babcock has the ability to speak with the dead -- and he often prefers their company to that of the living. Norman learns from his estranged uncle that a centuries-old witch’s curse on their town is real and about to come true -- and only Norman can stop it. When zombies rise from their graves, Norman and his ragtag team must summon all their courage and compassion to the limit to save his fellow townspeople. Taking place in the fictional town of Blithe Hollow, this stop-motion film is a beautiful take on the Salem Witch Trials.

I have to admit, I slept on this movie when it first came out. I had no interest in it at all, but then I watched it and became an instant favourite. The humour is a little more blue for a “children’s” movie, but the lesson learned in the end is valuable for all involved. Did I mention it is also well known for being the first mainstream animated film with an openly gay character?

Watch it: Sadly it is not available for streaming on Amazon, Netflix, or Hulu at this time, due to licensing agreements

7. FRANKENWEENIE

Young Victor Frankenstein is a science nerd and an outsider at school, but he does have one friend, his dog Sparky. Sadly, tragedy strikes, taking Sparky away from Victor. Heartbroken, Victor is given an idea of how to bring Sparky back to life. The experiment is a success and everything goes fine, that is, until his fellow students learn of his secret and use it to resurrect their beloved lost pets. Frankenweenie is a heartwarming tale of a boy and his dog, and the lengths we would go to keep our beloved friend.

I consider Frankenweenie to be the sister movie to ParaNorman. Both are stop motion and came out in the same year. The difference is Frankenweenie takes you back to the classic universal horror icons in a brand-new way. Did I mention it is in black and white and has that classic monster movie feel?

watch it: Rent on Youtube

6. NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS

What happens to the Pumpkin King when he tires of being just that, the King of Halloween. Jack Skellington is bored of the same annual routine of scaring the people of the real world. One day, he stumbles upon Christmastown, full of bright colours and warm spirits, bringing a new lease to Jack’s life. He plots to bring Christmas under his control, only to find that the best-laid plans of mice and skeleton can go awry.

Originally I intended only one movie per director, but I don’t think you can begin to discuss family friendly Halloween without Tim Burton, especially because you cannot have a Halloween list without Nightmare Before Christmas. In all fairness, this is the perfect movie to finish out the year with.

Watch it: Amazon Rent or Buy

5. COCO

Miguel dream of becoming a musician, just like his idol, Ernesto de la Cruz. The problem, his family has a generations-old ban on music. Desperate to prove his talent, Miguel steals Ernesto’s guitar and finds himself in the colourful Land of the Dead. With the help of a charming trickster named Héctor and Miguel’s dog Dante, Miguel must find his way back home, meanwhile learning the truth about his family’s past.

All bite. Coco is a Dia de los Muertos movie. I know some of you will complain that it is not a Halloween movie. Truth is, the spirit of Dia de los Muertos and Halloween are close enough for me to warrant inclusion into the list. The scenery and background is gorgeous, the story will tug at the heartstrings, and you will get to learn a little about the culture behind Dia de los Muertos, even if a bit Disneytized.

Watch it: Netflix

4. HALLOWEENTOWN

On Halloween, while Marnie is arguing with her mother Gwen, the kids’ grandmother Aggie comes to visit. Aggie wants to start Marnie’s witch training before her 13th birthday or Marnie will lose her powers forever. But there is another reason for Aggie’s visit. Something dark and evil is growing in Halloweentown, and Aggie wants help to defeat it. While Aggie and Gwen are arguing, Aggie uses magic, which Marnie observes. After Aggie leaves to return to Halloweentown, Marnie, Dylan and, unknown to Marnie and Dylan, Sophie follow her onto the return bus. Soon afterwards, Gwen follows the children to Halloweentown. While there, Aggie and Gwen are attacked by the dark force. Marnie, Dylan and Sophie have to race to get the ingredients to activate Merlin’s Wand to stop the evil and save Halloweentown.

A classic made for TV Disney movie, this film (and all sequels) are a perfect Halloween movie for all ages, and albeit a little cheesy at times. But who doesn’t love the occasional cheesy movie?

3. SCOOBY DOO AND THE WITCH’S GHOST

When the Master Gang Scooby meet a famous horror writer Ben Ravencroft (who may or may not be based off of Stephen King) during their last mystery, he invites them to his small hometown of Oakhaven, Massachusetts to join in the annual Autumn Fest. Ravencroft tells the Mystery Gang about the history of his ancestor, Sarah Ravencroft, who happened to be an evil witch and is supposedly haunting the town of Oakhaven. The gang decides to help the town and solve the mystery of the Witch’s Ghost.

This was tough to pick. We have Scooby Doo and the Ghoul School, Scooby Doo and Zombie Island, I mean honestly any Scooby Doo movie could fit. But I picked Witch’s Ghost for three simple reasons: takes place during the fall, witches, and the Hex Girls, a fictional all-female Goth Rock Band.

Watch it: Amazon Prime, Boomerang Channel on Amazon

2. MONSTER HOUSE

13-year-old DJ is obsessed with his creepy neighbour, Nebbercracker, and his eerie house. After all, rumours of his past have run rampant in the town. But one day, DJ and his friends witness the house come to life. Unable to find an adult that will believe him, and with Halloween vastly approaching, it is up to DJ and his friends to find a way to destroy the house before innocent trick-or-treaters meet their end.

At times, this film is a little on the frightening side, at least for the younger ones. The characters are well thought out and put together. While the animation is not ground breaking, it looks great and fits the movie perfectly. A perfect film for those looking for a fun, clean movie this Halloween.

Watch it: Amazon Rent or Buy

1. GOOSEBUMPS 2: HAUNTED HALLOWEEN

While collecting junk from an abandoned house, best friends Sonny and Sam come across an unpublished “Goosebumps” book. Opening it, they release Slappy, a mischievous talking dummy. Hoping to start a family, Slappy kidnaps Sonny’s mother and brings fourth all of his ghoulish friends (creatures and monsters from the Goosebumps novels) to life, just in time for Halloween. The sleepy town becomes overrun with monsters, witches, and other mysterious creatures. It is up to Sonny, his sister Sarah, and Sam to save their town, his mother, and foil Slappy’s plans.

Goosebumps (2015) is a pure nostalgia ride with a brand new feel and Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween is no different. Trading in some of the humor for a little more horror feel, the movie has a little bit to offer for everyone.

Watch it: Netflix

The truth of the matter is, this list is not perfect and may never be complete, but it is a great starting point to the ever growing list of the Not-So-Scary Halloween movies. I feel in writing this, I have left so many great films off, so I have a list of some runner up films that just barely missed being on my top 13.

RUNNER UPS

HOTEL TRANSYLVANIA

Dracula and the classic horror monsters are afraid of humans. In an attempt to take a vacation away from humanity, Dracula operates a hotel way off in the woods. One day, a brave human makes his way to the castle, where the human and Dracula’s daughter “Zing”.

ADDAMS FAMILY (1991)

A man claiming to be Uncle Fester, the missing brother of Gomez Addams shows up at the Addam’s household. The family is thrilled, however Morticia begins to suspect the man is a fraud as he cannot recall details of Fester’s life. With the help of a lawyer, Fester manages to get the Addams evicted from the home. Can the Addam’s family save Uncle Fester? Can they get their home back?

DOUBLE DOUBLE TOIL AND TROUBLE

The Farmer family is in debt and might lose their house. The Farmer Twins discover the somebody mean and shrewd is responsible for all the family problems. The determined twins try to trick at their evil aunt out of her magic moonstone to save their family home.

THE ADVENTURES OF ICHABOD AND MR. TOAD

Two animated adaptations of classic literature adapted by Disney make up this film, which is the only reason it made the runner up list as Mr. Toad, while good, has nothing to do with Halloween. However, in the “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” the gangly schoolmaster, Ichabod Crane, falls for the beautiful Katrina Van Tassel. Caught in a love triangle with Katrina and Brom Bones, Ichabod fears the local legend of the Headless Horseman. Is the legend more truth than lore?

ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS MEET THE WOLFMAN

Alvin loves monsters and monster movies, though he is terrified of them. Stuck with Werewolves on the mind, he believes his next door neighbour is one. Reluctantly, Simon helps Alvin investigate the neighbour. Meanwhile Theodore is bitten by a strange dog, and finds his inner “inner monster” and starts behaving like a werewolf himself.

Did I miss your favourite Not-So-Scary Halloween movie? Let me know what it is in the comments below.

_________________________________

Enjoyed this piece of high strangeness? Share it with your world!

#halloween movies #family movies #not scary movies #halloween #halloween spirit #movie list #top 13 halloween movies #top halloween picks #halloween for everyone

[bloody-fists-beating-hearts]

It’s a Fallout76/Bethesda rant

Bethesda just released Fallout 1st, a horseshit pay-to-win subscription system for their absolute cum-bubble of a game, and while it’s getting the flack it deserves there are people already putting on their kneepads so they can gobble down Todd Howards entire turgid cock, and as someone who likes rpg’s way too much this irked me, so have a massive and barely coherent rant i took off the discord because why not.

I want to start off with this:  Every good thing about current fallout comes from the fanbase. The stories people tell, the headcanons, the fanfics, the art, everything fans do for it is made with more love, and more thought, than anything Bethesda’s writing and games design team has done in the last 10 years

Now first of all, I haven’t bought or played 76. People are gonna stop me right there and go ”well you haven’t bought it how would you know its bad!!” yeah, I’ve never eaten dog shit either but I can pretty well guess that I ain’t gonna fucking like it.

I knew the second he said "there are no npcs" with actual enthusiasm that this game was gonna be shit. And if you give me 2 seconds to gloat, I never bought the game and I knew this was gonna happen and I was RIGHT so suck my fat hairy nuts all those fanboys who pre-order things mindlessly just because there's a brand name attached to it. If there is anything you take from this its DO NOT PREORDER. BRAND LOYALTY IS FOR BOOMERS AND BOOTLICKERS. FOR FUCKS SAKE BE SMART WITH YOUR MONEY.

Games like this are fucking 80-90 dollars or more in Australia so I actually have to think about whether this momentary distraction is worth almost an entire days paycheck, and I’m still looking for employment which means I actually haven’t bought shit in a while (side note, anyone wants to commission me for 10 dollars I’ll draw damn near anything. God I need to make rent)

Every executive at Bethesda seems to be playing catch-up to EA's monetisation scheme. Beth has abandoned their model of single-player rpg's in favour of a "games as a service" model. Fallout 76 seems to me like its a weird experiment for just how far they can stretch this and still make money. It actually makes me wonder if they are 

 a) just completely unaware of fanbase response [no idea HOW]

b) are running into financial problems and are doing this out of desperation

 c) todd howard is still mad that obsidian made a better fallout than he ever could and he's doing this out of spite 

  Games as a whole has become much like the movie industry where publishers will throw big buckets of cash around to development teams, and those teams have CEO's and higher ups that throw lavish meet n greets and have nice fancy suits and cars and then treat their development teams like shit, overworking them to the point of exhaustion, because the product has to be on time for release dates that are scheduled to be the most profitable (christmas is a notable one). 

And those products are consistently bland, shitty, shallow experiences. Narrative cum-dumpsters that are purposefully made to toe the line as safely as possible, to be open to as wide as an audience as possible so they can make the most money, and Bethesda is a huge offender. Skyrim was fun, sure, but it was watered down to fuck, it had shitty dialogue, it had bland one-note characters, it had a simplified skill system. It was impossible to lose. Seriously, try and fail a fucking quest in skyrim, other than one or two, it's a hand-holder of an rpg, but it has a huge community of fans that put in monumental effort, for free, because they like the Elder Scrolls, and they like the world bethesda made. 

  Then Bethesda goes "hey, that watered down thing we made got huge! lets release it about 12 more fucking times, with some of the SAME bugs, with the SAME content, with the SAME limitations and Yes, we absolutely expect you to pay for it, again. Then they release the remastered edition which, to their credit, is free to anyone who already bought the legendary edition (on PC), and does actually have updated 64bit capability and some graphical enhancements (that aren't anywhere near what some goober in his basement cooked up in his spare time, but whatever). Then, seeing that Skyrim was so popular, with kids especially, and made money, they turn their sights to fallout 4, a game that was so anticipated that someone made a fake countdown and caused a small meltdown on tumblr/social media when it was revealed to be fake (i was part of that fiasco, i remember the hype, i was there goddamnit)

So Fallout, a franchise that literally has its theme as its FUCKING TAGLINE, an ADULT game that is equal parts crude, gory and humorous. A game that satirises the cold war era of american my-country-tis-of-thee blind loyalty and openly mocks the way war was idealised, and shows that not even the literal end of the world could either stop humanity's lust for blood or its desire for conquest. Games that showed you the growth of the world - from shady sands to the NCR, from the vault dweller to arroyo, shit actually happened in the games, the world didn't just stop turning when the bombs dropped. A game where you you become a porn star for fucks sake, and it's funny. 

So Bethesda sees that, makes something like it (fallout 3) which is good, but a little rough around the edges when you look at it too hard. But the way they suck you into the vault, the way they build a relationship with your dad and your way of life is immersive as fuck, so when you leave the place you actually feel like you're leaving something important, not just finishing the tutorial

then they outsource a Fallout game to obsidian, because hey, we saved your franchise by buying it off you, but if you can make an entire game in one year and get a metacritic score of 85 we'll even throw in a bonus. And fuck me sideways and in the ear, if the obsidian devs didn't work themselves harder than a 4-armed hooker. And they made a game that on release was a clusterfuck of bugs, because they were given an unrealistic time limit and missed the metacritic score by ONE POINT so bethesda goes "nhey heh sucks to suck" and fucks them off the franchise forever. EXCEPT (and I admit I'm biased here) the game is good. The game is actually really good when you remove those bugs, and people start forming attachments to it, and mentioning how bad fallout 3's writing is by extension. 

  So Todd and Co. in his infinite wisdom, decide that the only thing a fallout rpg needs is 50s aesthetic and fuck all else, and he releases a game so watered down it can't even be called an rpg. And its not. There are no skills. There are barely any dialogue checks. Instead of dialogue, Nate/Nora is a flat, samrish individual that is either "yes sir right away sir may i have another", "yes but i'm gonna make an unfunny quip about it" "this option pretends to say no but its gonna give you the quest marker anyway". 

The game drops any pretence of difficulty by giving you a deathclaw, a minigun and some power armour in the first 10 minutes, allowing you to effectively reach late-game power levels with some minor scavenging for ammo or cores. Then the game ropes you into some inter-faction war that realistically you wouldn't give a shit about, because some spud in a cowboy hat fucking deputizes you into a military general because you shot like 4 raiders from a rooftop (with a minigun. in power armour. making you nigh-invulnerable to bullets). You're sad about your son about 3 times the whole game and then you're on your merry way to mowing down humans left right and center without a care in the world. God fallout 4's writing is so stupid it gives me an aneurysm.

 Remember the part about resources wars and america only having the veneer of a strong country while riots, inflation, and resource shortages tore it apart from within? Bethesda doesn't, have an eerily stepford pastel coloured glimpse at a world that was totally fine, nothing wrong here, shame it got nuked oh well moving on

Your spouse? yeah you love them, they're said 2 whole sentences to you then they died, be sad because you totally loved them and it is totally sad that they are dead. Your weird play-dough son shaun, you love him so much, you even tickled him on the chin once, okay he's gone off you go to chase him - woah now, don't chase him too hard we have all these side quests for you to do! What would be the narrative reasoning for a supposedly distraught parent to fuck around boston instead of finding their goddamn child? fuck knows! just go pick up some goddamn wood and get to base building sonny-jim! 

Companions? yeah, they're fun, we gave them a romance questline and it's thus: if you pick enough locks and pass a minor charisma check maccready will be ready and willing to tell you about his sick child, and then he'll ride you like a stallion. Talk to him like, 4 times, and he will be your bosom buddy for life in about 3-5 days if you just pick locks like a fucking madman, because character growth is hard and counting beans is easy.

 Also your son is a part of the faction we were talking about! something about synths, remember that one questline from rivet city that barely anyone actually remembers and was an interesting time waster at best? Well get ready to do that same quest but about! 15! more! times! because we could not think of anything else to write about synthetically produced humans that assume peoples identities other than having them as a hamfisted metaphor for slavery. Why do they take over people's identies? Well because the institute needs them to aasdkfjdh kshshshsh t9oe of course. 

Speaking of hamfisted metaphors, here's the underground railroad, named after the underground railroad that actually mattered, except this time its the same thing but synths. They are so top secret that the only way to find them is to follow the only bright red line in a street that is exclusively green-brown otherwise, and then enter their super secret password, which is "password"

They are then, like every other faction, absolutely willing to trust you, at face value, no questions asked, because have to actually do something or require a skill check might make this hard for people under the age of 12 to play. Then you go do whatever fuckin shit you do, I stopped playing at this point, and then you find out your son is actually 60, you guys have a tearful, 10 sentence reunion, then he diesthe whole reason you were out here in the first place dies, and you react appropriately, which is to say you say his name really sadly, and then go back to mowing down raiders with reckless abandon

And then 76 gets released, bethesda drops all pretense of fallout still being an rpg. You want a story? Fuck you, pay up. Its retro future and thats all that makes falloutSatirizing war mongering? You can nuke things in this game and its totally fine, its actually the goal, because fallout has nukes in it right? Pay us 10 dollars and you get army olive drab spraypaint because hurrgh war is fun and great, wasnt that the tagline from the first game?The more i rant the more angry i am because people put their heart and soul into writing this. The lore and dialogue is actual work that someone researched and loved and felt proud of and now  it's becoming a hilariously meta parody of itself. 

Honestly FUCK bethesda and and fuck todd howard for his pisspoor cash grab. Not even worth calling it a video game anymore

#good lord what is happening in there #meta #listen i fucking love fallout #but this aint fuckin it chief #fallout #fallout 4 #fallout 76 #fallout 3 #fallout new vegas

[not-a-space-alien]

hey its me again wall of text sorry not sorry

k i saw your little treatise justifying zadr and yknow its a cartoon its not the worst thing ever of course nobody is gonna sue you for reblogging fanart or burn you at the stake or w/e and im glad you decided to open yourself up to a differing opinion but zim IS portrayed as an adult. there was even an unfinished episode where zim’s childhood and growing up training from start to finish would be shown so by the time of the pilot he is definitely a full grown developed adult by irken standards especially if hes a former member of an elite military force like the invaders. jhonen has said that the irony and sad comedy of zims character is that hes a grown ass man and a war veteran to boot who VOLUNTARILY goes to an elementary school every day and throws hands with an 11 year old boy who should be well below his notice because he’s that pathetic and desperate for validation that he’ll stoop to seeking it from a child. it also sets up a dynamic between them where dib is CHALLENGED by having to go up against an adult with way more experience than him while dib is just a child, so when he wins its more meaningful, which is a common trope in childrens fiction that an underdog young hero has to take down a powerful adult villain.

jhonen might joke a lot but he’s serious about this part of the characterization of zim and dib and he even went to great lengths to make dib look and act more like a kid in ETF (more emotional and naive, designed to look smaller/softer, going in depth with his relationship to his dad and sister and needing his dad to protect him at the end when he’s too overrun to fight alone) just to drive home the point of how young he is. it was a very deliberate move and jhonen knows what hes doing ESPECIALLY since he also left zim pretty much unchanged and also includes gags about zim’s relative maturity like animating him briefly grimacing because his joints are sore and the part where he pretty much gestures to his crotch and goes “theyre afraid to look at ALL-A THIS”. like you would not see jhonen do that sort of joke with an underage character ok. dont confuse his social awkwardness and self deprecating/trolling humor for not knowing the difference between right and wrong and not acknowledge when he means something sincerely because he doesn’t just clown on people and troll ALL THE TIME 24/7 hes a human, and times have changed with more awareness on issues such as the grooming of minors so he can go back on things he may have said in the past that he doesn’t agree with now or said by mistake. he has said enough times that zim is older than any human alive that its safe to take his word for it by now. judging by the one strip he did in JTHM about johnny murdering a pedophile who was about to prey on squee i think his stance on protecting kids is pretty clear. also i wouldnt put it past jhonen to have redesigned membrane to be more chaddy looking to divert the adult fandom’s attention away from dib and throw the fangirls a bone but thats a whole nother can of worms lol.

and the justification that zim is immature so hes essentially on dib’s level is a reversal of something lots of kids hear from either creepy or ignorant adults who tell them theyre “so mature for their age”. no matter how emotionally mature you are it wont ever compensate for the number of years youve been alive so that’s not very sound logic, and even in fic where theyre both adults it’s still pretty weird because it doesn’t erase their history where zim knew dib as a kid. that’s sort of like a grownup waiting with bated breath until a kid is “legal” so they can start dating. kinda like when jacob imprints on bella’s newborn daughter in twilight then having it handwaved away by saying he’ll wait till she’s grown up, which understandably drew a huge amount of criticism. it’s a loophole that might be mildly acceptable in some cases but the context leaves it colored with a residual ickiness that sets off some red flags for me and a lot of other people.

also you said zim is an alien and therefore the situation itself is unrealistic, but the reason invader zim’s writing resonates with people is because zim is written with very HUMAN emotions and motivations and part of the humor again is how irkens despite being aliens from another planet mirror some of humanity’s worst flaws such as being petty, gluttonous, willfully ignorant, arrogantly believing they are special and better than everyone else, easily manipulated by propaganda, all too eager to greedily colonize other societies etc making them not so different from us at all. so the premise out of context might not seem realistic but the idea of a sad burnout adult who doesn’t realize how humiliating it is to be consistently outsmarted by a kid less than half their age IS realistic and applicable to human interaction since we’ve likely all met someone like this before at one point in our lives for example a schoolteacher who has a personal vendetta against one or more of their students and has nothing better to do than antagonize them, or a really dumb parent that you fight with a lot.

another thing, i know you and other fans probably have a lot of sentimental value and nostalgia attached to zadr because you probably shipped it back when you were a kid yourself and you cant be blamed for something you liked as a kid, but youre an adult now, and you have to listen to the portion of kids in the fandom who dont like zadr and say without question that the age gap makes them uncomfortable. those kids ARE the priority. we’re grown up now and we have to put our feelings aside for them because that’s part of being responsible and mature. i feel like zim himself is a pretty good example of how not to act at our age [shrug emoji]

and anyway a lot of the same elements of zadr can be explored with zadf just as well with just as much potential for cute moments and as a bonus is it’s not creepy

You do bring up some good points, and I’m not saying you’re wrong...  But honestly I’m still not convinced.  I mean, stuff that Jhonen said, the thing is even if it’s the author saying it it’s still outside of canon, that’s the reason why Neil Gaiman got flack for Good Omens because they didn’t write an actual kiss or hug or hand-hold between Aziraphale and Crowley yet Neil Gaiman went on Twitter saying they were queer representation.  I still don’t really put much stock into what he says because the unfinished episodes and Jhonen’s commentary don’t really change the dynamic that’s actually in the show.  And again...Jhonen said if there were going to be romance in the show it would be Zim/Gaz, so he’s either a huge hypocrite or doesn’t view Zim as being incompatible with Gaz.

I do think it’s much better when Dib is an adult and it just makes more sense, and I actually do prefer zadf to zadr and if i were going to ever write fanfiction or make fanart it would probably just be zadf, just because i know this does have some stuff to think about and I totally respect that you have a different view of it, but i honestly just don’t see it that way.  The analogy with Jacob imprinting on Bella’s child in Twilight isn’t really the same thing honestly.  The author in that situation tried to make it not......that....by saying that imprinting isn’t always a romantic relationship thing, and that Jacob would be more of an older brother, but honestly that doesn’t really negate the impact of grooming that kid would have with Jacob around.  The idea that Zim would somehow be grooming Dib seems really silly to me although you’re right, I think his characterization in Into the Florpus has evolved somewhat especially with regard to Dib wanting to get his father’s approval, but again Zim has parallels with that in trying to please the Tallest.  the world-building and characterizations are inconsistent and scattershot at best.  Like no, zim isn’t waiting for him to turn legal, that’s absurd, they’re nemeses coming at each other then learning to be friends.  You’re right that that doesn’t have to be zadr but I still tag it as zadr so people can block it if they want to.

Like, I’ve seen people ship Zim with Professor Membrane instead of Dib.  That seems very weird to me.  that professor membrane would have a relationship with someone who literally goes to his son’s elementary school and who doesn’t know anything at all about human behavior and emotions.

I feel like with this discussion people don’t really understand the problem with age gaps. With age gaps, it’s not a matter of mature/immature, it’s about development.  A ten year age gap sounds like a lot right?  a 25-year-old and a 15-year old would absolutely have a predatory “relationship.”  But a 35- and a 45-year old, that’s perfectly fine.  Having a difference in age doesn’t automatically make the relationship unhealthy.  so if Dib is 25 and Zim is [whatever the hell aliens years i still don’t really take Jhonen’s word for it bc he’s not consistent], that’s doesn’t mean it has to be bad.  The thing about telling minors they’re “so mature for their age” to try and convince them that a person interested in them isn’t a pedophile is that we know a human being who is 15 isn’t developmentally at the same level as a 25-year-old regardless of their behavior.  What is Zim?  All we have to go on is how he acts, and he acts like Dib is an equal match, it’s not “he’s immature for his age,” it’s very unclear.  Raw number of years isn’t the ultimate decider, for example in DnD lore elves reach maturity at, like, 100 years old so a 25-yo human trying to get with a 50-year-old elf would be predatory to the young elf even though the “younger” one is technically twice as old as the human.  Do you see what I’m saying?

I also don’t really buy the idea that Invader Zim’s writing resonates with people because Zim is ~~so human~~.  The guy steals a bunch of kid’s organs in one episode and flies into a tantrum over the slightest inconvenience.  You have to be reading really deeply into it and dig into some old internet archives of things Jhonen Vasquez has said to paint it as realistic.  You can do some interesting things with it wrt like, Zim being defective and starting to experience human emotions but that’s mostly fanon.

Well, you’ve given me some things to think about, thanks for explaining your side to me.  I’m still going to tag things as #zadr so people can block if it can’t plausibly be categorized as zadf.  I’m not actually making any fan content for Invader Zim so the point is kind of moot, but if I ever do I’ll definitely take this into consideration.

#invader zim #zadr #submission

[ellawritesficssometimes]

What this post aims to do is cover Japan’s relationship with other Asian nations. While a tricky subject for good historical reasons, I think that while he initially had a rough start, Himaruya does a fair job of balancing a narrative that promotes worldwide peace and reconciliation without trivializing or obscuring the tragedies of the past.

By that, I mean that while there are many unresolved historical issues between Japan and other Asian nations, Himaruya is still able to have the respective personifications get along amicably. They’re not portrayed as close personally, but they are nonetheless civil and friendly. To portray them in the former fashion would be insulting, especially given how there are still tensions regarding how these unresolved historical issues are to be properly compensated for and addressed. 

Nonetheless, Himaruya is able to work around this and the narrative of world peace by portraying them as being civil with each other. He even offers several instances where Japan expresses regret for his past actions—albeit implicitly.

There’s this panel, which alludes to his desire to make peace in East Asia and achieve reconciliation. I’ve done a longer post on this here [x], and there’s also a scholarly article that covers the meaning behind this specific panel in much more detail. Point is, Hetalia doesn’t trivialize or obscure these dark historical realities but rather it offers hope for the potential of reconciliation and co-operation as well as the capacity to overcome grudges.

Article: Sands, A. T. (2013). Belittling japanese nationalism in hetalia: axis powers. Humanities and Social Sciences Review, 2(3), 125-144. Source: Volume 3. 

That said, let’s go over some examples:

China:

There’s the infamous scene where China is betrayed by Japan during WW2. What I want to place particular stress on is how Japan disconnects from the situation emotionally—notice how blank his expression is—and asks China to forgive him.

Source: Hetarchive, The Story about the Early Days of China and Japan.

Chafed and devastated, as he raised Japan and considered him to be a younger brother, China fears that war has changed Japan and that the two will never reconnect. Russia reassures him that time will heal their wounds…and they do.

Source: Hetarchive, The Story about the Early Days of China and Japan.

It takes a long time, but the two do in fact reconnect. China’s character song, “Aiyaa 4000 years” expresses China’s longing to look under the same moon as Japan again (i.e., to reconnect.) China’s signature verbal tick—aru—is scattered throughout the whole song; it’s not until World Stars that we learn that his aru is symbolic of his hopes, dreams, and romance.

Source: Hetascanlations, World Stars Chapter 43. 

In the same World Stars Chapter, we see the two of them working on improving their diplomatic relations.

Another example of their co-operation would be them designing postcards together.

Source: Hetarchive (Bamboo Thicket, eng trans., Oct 26th, 2011). 

Again, they may not be as close as they used to be, but they’re nonetheless on relatively good terms with each other.

South Korea:

As mentioned, Himaruya had a rocky start and many lessons to learn after his characterization of South Korea received a lot of [warranted] flack.

South Korea claims to hate Japan and will disagree with anything he says at world meetings, yet he also seems to aspire for Japan’s approval by mimicking him and showing the latter his creations.

Source: Hetarchive, It’s My First Appearance and All I Get Are Some Scribbles!  + Hetarchive,  Opening of the Meeting at the Center of the World

Unfortunately, that’s the brink of their relationship, since South Korea’s poorly chosen perverted tendencies have caused Himaruya to ultimately abandon using the character. Because of this, I can’t comment on any progression in their relationship. The point I want to emphasize is that they don’t outright hate each other. Although, South Korea’s grudge is certainly present in what little interactions that we have.

Taiwan:

Taiwan is the Asian nation whom Japan probably shares the closest relationship with.

From the inception and early sketches of the series, she is seen defending Japan, telling China to back off from him.

Source: Hetarchive, Taiwan’s Web Profile.

In the present, the two also get along just as well.

Taiwan is very friendly with him.

Ex: She tells his fortune for fun.

Source: Volume 4, Ilha Formosa ~Beautiful Island~

Ex: She gives him chocolates for Valentine’s day. It’s hinted that she may even have romantic feelings for him, judging by France and Italy’s suggestive expressions.

Source: Hetascanlations, World Stars Chapter 42. 

Hong Kong:

This relationship is more indirect, but it still tells a lot. Hong Kong considers China to be his teacher, as they currently reside together. The fact that Hong Kong finds it suitable and acceptable to ask Japan for favors is indicative of China having no problem with them interacting. Although, it is humorous that Hong Kong turns to Japan rather than relying on China to help purify the air in his country.

Source: Volume 6. 

All in all, it’s not so much that Hetalia leaves tragedies of the past unacknowledged. It’s satirical genre in tandem to its promotion of world peace limits what it can cover and what stories it can tell. On the other hand, it doesn’t trivialize or erase these tragedies either. Instead, while seemingly simple, it’s able to promote narratives of co-operation and civility in spite of past and current political tensions.

#hetalia #characterization in hetalia #aph #aph Japan #aph South Korea #aph China #aph Taiwan #aph Hong Kong

[konekoryuugamine]

Chaos Critic’s Top 10 Disliked Anime

Oh man I am going to get SO much flack for this one . . . I know, I know" so many anime are out there, and so many are like this, and yadda yadda - Look, I wanna do this, I wanna help people steer clear of these shows, and if someone likes these shows, more power to ya, but I don't like them, this is only opinion, and I prefer that no one calls me a liar or a jerk for saying something about an anime that is all speculation and varied per person. Anyways, I don't own these animes, and please read and enjoy, no flames, thanks a bunch.    Let me say this now: not all anime rock.    I have been an avid anime watcher since I was in the 5th grade, and when I realized anime were released every year, in the hundreds, I was flipping over in cartwheels. Vampires, dragons, wizards, ninjas, rock and roll - all of those in my favorite animation style that is pretty much SO flipping awesome in so many ways - made me so happy.    I ended up binging anime on Toonami, (still do), and joined several anime sites to get the latest anime dishes and series that I could muster up enough free time to watch. My parents grew concerned about me watching so much of it to the point where I would have been addicted, but then I ended up telling them it was where my heart laid, and they accepted, it with somewhat unwilling protectiveness.        After all these years of watching anime and reading manga, I ended up developing tastes that ranged from very horroreqsue anime with suspense and mystery to ridiculous comedy with great puns on words.    'Bakemonogatari', everyone.

   However, with these tastes and genres came some of the weird and strangest animes I have ever seen, and am currently watching. Does this mean I think all 'weird' anime are bad? Heck no - 'Bobobo-Bobobobo', "Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" and "FLCL" are some of my favorites, although I consider Bobobo a guilty pleasure.    I did run into some strange and bad anime, however, and it made me wonder whether or not getting into anime at all was a good or bad idea. It even made me think that these were the animes that gave other great ones bad wraps - hence the stereotype of Japanese anime always being about ten-year-old girls and tentacles.    No idea why, honestly.    The more I do think about it, however, I do feel there are some pretty bad anime out there on the internet, and if you ask any anime fan, they will list some anime that are bad, their favorites, and even one they watch when they choose to. Many a conversation I had often resulted in me talking about the ones I liked more than the ones I hated, to my relief.    But otherwise, I feel these anime I'm about to list carry their ideas a bit too far, go too far with anime as a format, or are just overhyped and bad as heck . . . just because an anime is weird, strange, badly dubbed or whatever else does not mean I have to hate it.    I have my reasons.    So, without fault, here's my top ten anime I dislike more than others. Keep in mind that these are the anime I dislike for certain reasons, and if someone out there does like these, and calls me out for hating them, then I accept it. Just because I hate something doesn't mean you can make me like it.

   And here they are. NUMBER 10: " Lil' Pri"        I thought this series would be cute to watch for a while, and I decided to watch a few episodes. I ended up binging the whole series and started thinking too much about it.    Then I realized it wasn't really that good.    Ringo Yukimori, a young girl who enjoys Snow White's stories, literally bumps into two other girls at a concert for a super famous singer named Wish. The other girls, Leila Takashiro and Natsuki Sasahara, also enjoy the stories of Princess Kaguya and Cinderella. The suddenly then run into three adorable talking animals, Sei, Dai and Ryoku, (a bird, a squirrel and a dragon), who are looking for their princesses in the human world.    The main idea behind this series is that the three girls turn into older versions of themselves with the embedded spirits of Snow White, Cinderella, and Princess Kaguya to help bring human happiness, "happiness tones", to Fairyland and save it. Humans' happiness and believe in the fairytales has dwindled, decreasing the happiness tones. So, the girls agree to help retrieve those, and along the way, they figure out Wish is the Queen's 'long-lost' son, who can turn into a rabbit . . .    Yeah see where I'm going here?    The anime is, for all intents and purposes, as straightforward as a magical girl series can get. There are no hidden meanings to Ringo, Leila or Natsuki, and their names pretty much are dead giveaways to what stories they enjoy most. Prince Chris, a.k.a. Wish, is immediately given focus at the beginning of the series, and there are no real surprises until the last few episodes of the series when the girls give up their magic, hint-hint, and leave Fairyland after retrieving all the happiness tones.    Let me tell you, that can get kind of boring . . .    The main problem I have with this series overall is how bland it is and how it seems to take ideas from several other little girls' magical shows, such as Ojamajo Do-re-mi or Pretty Cure. The concepts of having normal girls become heroes to save other lands, rescue royalty and adapt to their situation are something I've heard before and seen more excellently done, in other shows. The fact the girls also become idols onstage is an interesting quirk, but it reminds me too much of the Witchlings' maid outfit changes from the fourth season of Ojamajo. 

   It doesn’t help the CGI in the anime comes off as awkward, leaving the concert scenes clunky and hard to watch. Their movements are stiff, and their voices are not exactly the best. They do get better in vocals as the series progresses, but everything else stays the same.    When I also state how bland the series is, I'm also referring to Ringo, Leila, and Natsuki, reluctantly. The audience is told and can understand the heroines well enough to the point where we wish they had more depth. They all love Wish, they love fairytales, Ringo loves apples and has seven brothers, Leila is half Italian, Natsuki loves sports - we get it.    The problem is that they have no other depth than being cardboard cutouts of anime heroines.    We are never given any character conflicts, they never have issues that expand over the series, they never really get the kind of development other series like Sailor Moon receive for magical girl heroines. I know I may get flack for mentioning that, but I have seen development of Usagi Tsukino in both the manga and the new anime adaption of the series. The girls don't really receive any development here, aside from the minor mentioning of growing up and accepting happiness as it comes rather than forcing it on others.    The reason this one ranks so low on my list is because I do still enjoy the cuter designs of the characters, and give it points for trying to come up with a good driving plot that does bring to mind the idea of growing up and being happy. It’s a cookie cutter style idol show but it has heart to it. It tries to overstep its bounds, but never gets the chance to.     At the same time, I also think Show By Rock!! and Zombieland Saga did the “idol concept with a twist” take much better, what with one being a Sanrio based product that combines an isekai with an idol show, and an idol show about zombie girls that satirizes the entire idol industry.  NUMBER 9: " Full Metal Alchemist"    I am going to get SO much flack for this one . . .   Before someone eats my liver, let me say I love the series as a whole, but compared to Brotherhood, this series has become something that both baffles me and makes me confused.    The series revolves around Edward and Alphonse Elric, who try to bring their mother back from the dead using the practice of alchemy. Strictly taboo, and stricken with grief, they decide to bring her back and return to their happiness. However, something goes horribly wrong and Alphonse's body is taken as compensation for their mother, who doesn't truly return. Ed sacrifices his arm and leg to save his brother and bring him back in a suit of armor. After the incident, in the anime, Ed decides to join the military of Risembool and hunt down the Philosopher's Stone, which is implied heavily to be something that can work real miracles.    I enjoyed watching the series, and I empathized with both Edward and Alphonse. They lost everything, tried to get it back, and lost more in return. Their tackling of the philosophy of equivalent exchange and getting something for nothing is truly moving, and the deep symbolization of The Philosopher's Stone being hope and realization is something that I know I will never see duplication of.    Then . . . I saw the ending episodes of the first series.    And I got mad.    I expected an epic climax, much like what happened in "Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood". I wanted Ed to get his limbs back, Al to get his body back, Ed to marry Winrey, Hoenheim to die and accept his flaws, for the Philosopher stone to dissolve, and for Scar to repent himself . . .    Instead, we got something that felt rushed, confusing and strange to me. Something that throws the entire series out of whack because of it.    The leader of the Homunculi, who had been chasing Ed and Al all over the place until they reached Liore again, were being led by Dante. The old lady who taught Izumi, their teacher. The old lady who was killed by Greed in episode 33. Who had an assistant who had that strange alchemic tablet.    Dante, as it turns out, was a lover of Hoenheim, much to everyone's shock, and when Hoenheim and she gave up their souls for the stone, they created something that they could use to swap their bodies and minds, intelligence included, into other beings, sort of like the plot of "Quantum Leap" without the randomness and depth. She was jilted because Hoenheim left her, (reasonably succumbing to his guilt over killing so many people to make the stone), and she decided to make and use the Homunculi to chase down HIS sons and make a new stone.    In other words, she ended up wanting to make another stone, and her real motives for why are never explained, although her anger over Hoenheim leaving her for another woman, then using HIS KIDS to make a new stone, is petty in terms of evil levels. She toyed with the Elrics, taunted them throughout the series, and ended up controlling things to make a new Philosopher's stone.    That part, however, is hard for me to buy.    Dante being the villain behind everything, including the making of the second Philosopher's stone, and bringing back Rose for no other reason than to use her as a 'figurehead' then possess her, is hard for me to take in. This would mean she'd have to have tabs on the Elrics at all times, be involved in the Risembool military, use more than one person at one point or another, display that she knew about the war and probably was the one who started it in the first place.    There were no indications to me that Dante was the villain all along through the series, as the Homunculi were given more screen time than her, her assistant and later body double Lyra was shown twice and was bland as other minor characters, and things don't connect well for me to buy it logically.    If she was the one behind everything, and she was supposed to have been fake-killed by Greed, then when did she successfully possess Lyra? How long has she kept tabs on the Elrics? Was she involved somehow in Trisha's illness, that kickstarted the entire flipping hunt for the Philosopher's Stone? If she was also involved, why drag Rose into the battle to just tick off Edward?    And furthermore, if Hoenheim knew if she was behind everything, and knew he'd be killed otherwise, then why didn't he just come right out and explain everything to the brothers when they first got involved with the Homunculi? Was he just afraid of dying? Of killing others?

   The more confusing thing is how this ending was created. Anime depends on the manga in most cases to flesh out the story. If the manga is over several volumes, like One Piece or Bleach, episodes will be released and designated in arcs and storylines. If the manga is ahead of the anime, then the writing process for the episodes can be ad-libbed thanks to the story that’s already present.

   When the manga halts or goes on hiatus, the anime must do something to fill in the extra space while the mangaka continues their work. Hence “filler arcs”. Like the extra few filler arcs in Bleach that involve the new captain or the Bounts, or the filler arcs in Naruto that everyone wishes didn’t exist. They exist to not only extend the anime’s lifespan but to try and flesh out the worlds of these series to make them feel more alive. 

   In this case, this was a filler ending for the Full Metal Alchemist anime series. The manga had gone on hiatus and they had nothing to conclude the show with, so they had to deal with what they had. I wanted to like it, but after looking at everything, I just find that nothing fits.    Either way, the ending of the original anime just befuddled me with an antagonist who was barely connected to the story to me, and the threads that bound her fingers to her puppets were about as thin as fishing line to me.      . . . Not to mention I'm still wondering how the anime connected itself to the 'parallel-world' of 'Germany' and how Edward was stuck there through the movie "Conqueror of Shamballa", but that movie did try to tie up the original anime series with a bow.

   Of course, this leads me to say why I dislike it so much: because Full Metal  Alchemist: Brotherhood exists. It’s an amendment to the series that aims to follow every detail of the manga. We see more progressive action and character development from start to finish, and we see an expansive world that was never given to us in the original anime. Fans of the show were rewarded with Ed and Al getting what they wished for, intense and awesome animation, and a marriage proposal that is adorable no matter which way you put it.

   However, I will say the first 10 to 13 episodes of the original anime are far better introductory episodes than the first few episodes of Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood. We see the Elrics grow and reach their respective early goals quick, and we actually get to know Alexander and Nina before Shou Tucker fucks things up. We also get deeper motivation for Ed’s reasons to become a State Alchemist. 

   If I did have to recommend this series to people who’d never seen it, I’d say go watch the first 10 episodes of the first FMA series, then watch Brotherhood in its entirety. Get the context and emotional development first, then come back in for what else is in store.    And now I'm gonna put on this football helmet while I wait for the hate mail. NUMBER 8: " Ghost Hound"    This one is a special case of bad to me.    There was a point where I got hooked on the anime "Serial Experiments Lain" and I got into the idea that many anime were deeper than they seemed. Lain was a dimensional protagonist who I felt much in common with, and developed a sense of what I wanted to know about ESP. I decided to get into shows involving the subject, and later developed a taste in supernatural shows and law dramas. Or anything that often touted lighter themes of horror.    I found this anime on accident one day when I was looking up scary anime. And after finding out it was done by Production I.G. and Shirow Masamune, I was ecstatic.     I was disappointed when I watched it.    The entire story revolves around a boy named Taro, who was kidnapped with his younger sister Mizuka on September 22nd, 1996. His sister died, but he survived the horrific situation. Since then, he's been seeing a therapist and has horrible PTSD-induced nightmares involving the situation. He also develops the ability to astral project himself into The Unseen World, which is the space between the living and the dead, and he uses his ability to better himself and his friends Makoto and Masayuki, who have also suffered similar traumatic childhood situations. They are led on this journey by their psychologist, who has his own agenda on the matter, but wants to help solve the supernatural insanity in the boys’ lives due to his own interactions with The Unseen World.     On its own, this idea is rather interesting, and you feel it can be done well over the course of 13 episodes, with an added OVA of how the entire conflict is resolved with death being a part of life, how having a power means it comes with greater responsibility and how everyone has issues they must come to terms with. And in the case of Masamune’s anime, delve deeper into the human understanding and structure of the conscious and unconscious mind.    However, the anime takes a rather . . . interesting, turn in its story. And when I say interesting, I mean something that may or may not work, depending on who you ask.    When the boys get together and go after the one who kidnapped Taro and his sister, they come across Miyako Komagusu, who has spiritual powers thanks to her miko line. She chooses to help them and Taro soon becomes fixated on Miyako due to her appearance, which is eerily similar to his sister. 

   Soon, the whole kidnapping element is thrown out the window, same with the title of the anime being only Makoto's astral-projection form, and comes in with a religious sect underneath Makoto's family and the fact his grandmother tries to make Miyako the new head after her father is hospitalized.    And it's later revealed that the Ogami Religious Cult has ties to an underground group of illegal drugs, medical enhancements, MUTANTS, and child kidnappings . . .    At this point, I was saying "why?"    On the one hand, it's a dark turn for an anime that started out with ESP, traumatic incidents, and they do save Miyako from the group of psychos. Whether or not the group remained standing was unclear to me, and the more I thought about how deep this went, the further I ended up in mental spirals of how logic had to be invoked.    On the other hand, it's a mish-mash of every cliche involving some evil mastermind group I can think of: the bad guy actually did this to such and such, who became the main guy's best friend, and now they want the girl who the main character has a connection with, and they all have supernatural powers, and they get others who betrayed the bad guys to help them.    This overlay of genres, and the fact the ESP is forgotten at about halfway through the anime for my liking, (along with there not even being MUCH of the supposed 'ghost hound'), there is also a stunning issue I had with the design of the characters not fitting the backgrounds. Whereas the designs were simple, the backgrounds were overly lush, too detailed, too mesmerizing.    Not like in "Over the Garden Wall", but still.    All in all, 'Ghost Hound' is a mixed bag to me. It does provide some good food for thought and an interesting storyline, but the second half ruins the story and eliminates the ESP the story was embedded into. NUMBER 7: " School Days"    I am aware this will be on others' hate lists, but hear me out . . . yeah, it's that bad in the anime form.    "School Days" is based on a visual novel game of the same name by Overflow, and has quickly garnered a reputation. The series involves this character, Makoto, as he makes his way into high school and develops a crush on adorable and shy Kotonoha. At the same time, depending on which way the player goes, he'll also fall for his best friend, his best friend's cousin, the other girls IN his class - well, you get where I'm going with this.    But before I get to the anime, let me explain a bit more about the game itself.    It incorporated motion and sound into the visual touch, making it look like you were playing an interactive anime, which wasn't that bad of an idea. There were also numerous cut scenes, (including graphic content might I add), that depicted the characters, and something that made the series very popular online: the death scenes.    What made this game unique from others is that it included graphic and detailed executions of main characters in several gorey fashions, along with some of the worst bad ends that can ever be imagined when it comes to one main character screwing over someone else. One death scene in particular involved Kotonoha committing suicide from a tall building in front of Makoto and Sekai, and you can HEAR THE CRUNK AND BUBBLE OF HER BODY AS SHE HITS THE PAVEMENT.    THAT ALONE TELLS YOU WHAT IS AT STAKE IN THIS GAME IF YOU SCREW UP.    But, because of how varied the main character's answers can get, and how many cut scenes are available at the time of the first go-around, someone will have to play the game multiple times before a Good ending is unlocked, like the super-rare harem-esque relationship between Makoto, Satonaka and Kotonoha. (Apparently, it's impossible to get because of how many things you can say, but I digress).    Now, to explain how the game became an anime . . . and I really don't want to . . .    The anime adapts the storyline of the game, following Makoto in high school, and he tries to get Kotonoha to fall for him, and Sekai tries to help him, then she falls for him. In short, it's a typical anime that depicts a three-way love triangle.    Until about the fourth or fifth episode.    After he gets Kotonoha as a girlfriend, he dates Sekai, with the knowledge of everyone, and LIES about breaking up with Kotonoha, AND HAS SEX WITH SEKAI, for the purpose of making things better with Kotonoha. He then goes around and sleeps with OTHER GIRLS IN HIS CLASS and AVOIDS KOTONOHA to keep up this whole thing.    That is called "sleeping around" and "being a jerk".    The reasons why people list this anime on their worst list is mostly because of the annoying voices, or because of the stilted and bland colors in the background, but to me and numerous others, it's because of Makoto Ito being a two-timing jerk who also has sex with numerous girls while still having one intimate girlfriend.    No, what also cements it for me, are the last three episodes: Sekai announces she's pregnant to the class, Makoto is reasonably cut off from his friends, Kotonoha, who had been RAPED, is devastated, and Makoto blames Sekai for ruining his life when he was JUST as much at fault in the first place. He goes out with Kotonoha, and right as he gets home, Sekai, reasonably ticked off, stabs him brutally with a butcher knife, and Kotonoha kills her and affirms she was lying about her pregnancy, then takes Makoto's head and sails off.    This was about the only way I could have expected this entire mess to conclude. Someone had to die, Makoto had to be given his karmic payback for sleeping with so many women, and for cheating and leaving Kotonoha to be raped and blaming Sekai for everything when he had his own faults, and Kotonoha had to take revenge or grow a backbone because of how everything bad happened to her for some reason.    In other words, the conclusion is more satisfying to me than the show itself, and that actually saved it a few places on my list. Watching it from start to finish is terrible, and the way you know about Makoto's sleeping around makes you want to slap some sense into him.    Or stab him with a knife, but I digress. NUMBER 6: " Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan"    AND now we get to something that's both bad and comedic.    And for once I'm not talking about Spongebob.    "Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan" is an anime that combines hentai and comedy, and as for the brand of humor, it relies on what is known as the continuous running gag. To understand what I mean, let me give you a few examples of continuous anime running gags: Team Rocket blasting off in every episode of "Pokemon" and doing some kind of farfetched scheme to capture Pikachu, how Joey Wheeler is also denoted as being immature or a punk, and as of more recent anime I've seen, how Tsukune is subjected to being fought over by Moka and the other girls.    The reason I'm bringing this up is that these are the gags I've seen being used in shows that quickly got stale . . . and were still being used as the show went along. 'Pokemon' is still the biggest offender of this since Pokemon Co. got a hold of the dubbing and anime creations in both Japan and America. The gag of Team Rocket blasting off is okay for a season or so, but seeing them just get pounded again and again makes me feel sorry for them, and makes me want to slap them and say "Stop blowing yourselves up all the time!", thinking they'd learn.    But hey, I can dream can't I?        The issue with that is the issue with this anime completely.    "Bokotatsu-Tenshi Dokuro-Chan", or "Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan" is an anime that focuses on a boy named Sakura Kusanabe, who is a normal boy going to school and having a crush on his classmate. Apparently, 20 years into the future, he invents a machine that prevents the aging process on women after the age of 13, making them . . . physically younger.    They literally call this in the anime a "pedophile's dream world".    So, God, in the future, sends an angel, Dokuro, to go and assassinate him so he can't make this crazy machine . . . if you are laughing right now, I was too.    The plot is ridiculous, as par for how it's supposed to be a comedy, but the manner of ridiculous ends there and it becomes more mindbogglingly annoying with each passing episode. Dokuro, when she gets to Sakura, decides to live with him and convince him to not build the machine, and in the process, does so with her rambunctious energy, super-human strength, her annoying voice, and often times, KILLS HIM WITH HER KANABO CLUB CALLED EXCALIBOLT.    That is the gist of the entire show. He tries to impress a girl, he 'insults' the over-sensitive Dokuro, she kills him, she brings him back to life. He tries to make some friends, she gets offended, she kills him, she brings him back to life. And so on and so forth.    For about thirteen episodes.    I ended up watching the series with my younger sister when I was about 15, and I couldn't help but laugh ad how dumb it was. And because I knew I couldn't change the videos because of my younger sister saying "Show me more, show me more! I wanna see him die again!"    . . . I felt a part of my soul die. (I also learned never to show my sister that kind of anime again . . . until she watched "Attack on Titan"). so, Anyways!    The entire anime, dub or sub, is annoying, high pitched, and the characters are all flat as boards. Dokuro's entire character is her crush on Sakura and the fact she wants to help him while never learning she accidentally causes his deaths. Sakura is a perverted young boy who is trying to get by, and ends up falling for Dokuro in a stereotypical fashion. There's also other angel characters, such as one who uses a  . . . cattle prod, and she has ram horns . . . and one who is a  . . . transvestite punk goblin?    To be honest, I never bothered to remember their names because I forgot about them after another two episodes. Same with Dokuro's sister. The only reason I remember her was because the show made her look hot for a 7-year-old, and she used a wet towel as a weapon.    And everyone in the school thought she was hot.    . . . I'm gonna stop on this one now before I get angry again and say that this anime isn't very good, but it does do a good job in setting up something that is both hilarious in context and causing some of the better memes in AMV Hell 3. NUMBER 5: " Sonic X"    From contrived and humorous to awkward and strange.    I first watched this show, much like others, on the Fox Box, (among other anime that were terribly dubbed by 4Kids). It was . . . strange, to see a talking hedgehog with blue quills run about with a two-tailed yellow kitsune, and on Earth no less. I had to change the channel every few seconds or so because I felt so strange watching them. I ended up feeling the same thing when I was watching 'Sonic Underground'.    I know now that the feeling was 'awkwardness'.    The story follows Sonic and his friends from the planet Mobius as they get transported to Earth because of some unintended calculations from Sonic screwing with Dr. Eggman's machine. Because they don't how it happened, and they don't know how to go back, they have to adjust on Earth, and they do just that. In the process, Sonic befriends a human, Chris, whose father is a scientist.    And the wacky adventures are supposed to continue from there . . .    I'll go ahead and say this now: combining humans in a world of anthropomorphic animals has to either be done well or not at all. I'm cool with anthropomorphism being talking animals, like Bubbie from 'Flapjack', or like Fred the horse or Beatrice from 'Over the Garden Wall'. I also don't mind if they have only the humanistic approach, and cannot talk, like the animals from 'Wicked'.    But if it's full anthropomorphism, like Looney Tunes or Tom and Jerry, then it has to make sense as to why they are there and how they can fit in with the environment. It comes down to three basic things: environment, history and art style. If the environment is okay, and the history of there being anthropomorphism is established, and the art style is in turn okay, then it is okay in the long run.    This is why I enjoy "The Looney Tunes Show". The environment is more modern and bent to match reality, the history of the characters is established early on and build on episode by episode, (and there's the references that add to it with Looney Tunes jokes from previous shorts from the 60's), and there are confirmed humans in the show who don't notice the anthropomorphism, and the art style blends it all together in a clean swipe of hilarity and animation brilliance.    This is also why I enjoy the movie "Cats Don't Dance": it takes anthropomorphism of animals and turns it into a metaphor for racism in 1940's Hollywood. It combined a relative environment of a historical timepiece, added the necessary elements of anthropomorphism with its own rich metamorphic history and the art style made all of it look like it was a classic cartoon.    If the environment works, and the history is laid down, and the art style manages to work it together, then anthropomorphism in shows is alright and well done in my book. But, (and I do have to be honest when I say this), if even one of these is never touched on, or brought too much into focus, then questions will be raised and things can be turned awkward.    This is what I feel happened when I watched 'Sonic X'.    The environment was Earth and all humans, with no mentions of Sonic being real before, and then out of the blue Sonic and his friends fall to Earth, "like Magic". The art style made it harder for me to watch because of how cartoonish Sonic and his friends looked compared to the humans and Eggman. It also could have been because every line looked SO SMOOTH, and there were no detailed areas or specifics, but I could have been wrong.    To me, this series started off awkward, and continued to get more awkward with the introduction of Shadow, Eggman's schemes and the later part of season one. The conclusion of season one was, and I'll say it lightly, okay. Chris saying goodbye to Sonic and his friends at the expense of never seeing them again was heartfelt, and he did act reasonably when it came to seeing them leave.    (Although the CGI could have been better for their transition back).    THEN . . . season two happened . . . then season two happened . . .    Just like how I feel with "Sword Art Online", I feel season two of 'Sonic X' is weaker than the first. Chris coming back because he longed for Sonic all these years and building a machine to send him to Mobius, and he happens to turn into a kid again because of the time differences on planets?    Sure, I'll buy that, albeit it sounds like Sonic 06 to me.    And Cosmo being the key of life for an evil overlord, and later performs a sacrifice of herself to save everyone and Tails is left in the Friend Zone?    Cliche, painful to watch, predictable and overall weaker than the previous season.    I don't want to spend too much on this season either because the plot and Chris made it weaker than when we witnessed Sonic and his friends adapting to Earth and humanity. Introducing an annoying character again and adding a character who becomes the key for hope is something I feel has been done better before. I hate feeling this way because I watch "Sonic Boom" now, but I feel that one is better than this . . .    I hate to feel that way, but I do. NUMBER 4: " Eiken"    Stop me if you've heard this before: a new male student to a school, desperate to make friends, ends up tripping and falling, literally, for a busty babe who is perfect. Then he has to do something insane, meet her friends, and tries to hook up with her only to be shut down as lucky, a pervert or a complete loser.    If you answered me with "That's the opening plotline for Rosario+Vampire", then you're close. I also would have accepted "Stop talking, that sounds like every hentai anime out there", but fair enough.    This is also, word for word, the opening scenes of the OVA series "Eiken".    THIS one is BAD.    Originally an 18 volume manga series, "Eiken" involves a boy named Densuke Mifune, who transfers to Zashono Academy at the start of a new year. He accidentally gropes one of the school's most attractive girls, Chiharu Shinonome, and gets drafted into the Eiken Club, which is run by her friend, the lively and flirtatious Kirika Misono. He is then subjugated to being tortured by the club members while he tries to get Chiharu to like him.    . . . there is a catch to this one aside from being stereotypically harem/hentai anime.    "Eiken" has become infamous in the anime community for having female characters possess pronounced, er . . . "tracts of land".    Yeah, I said it.    The entire manga and two-episode OVA series follow hentai taken to ridiculous extremes, involving large boobs.    I don't know how the joke came about, or how people come to know about this, (probably in the same manner that people know about Boku no Pico), but dang it, I hate that I know about this one. The only reason this isn't my number one pick is that I found other clips on AMV Hell about it, and decided to check it out.    Now, I bet you're wondering: why would a straight-laced, highly intelligent young woman like myself watch a two-episode OVA involving girls with 'humorously' large breasts and a perverted boy who day-dreams of bondaging his crush in measuring tape?    I'll let Alucard get channeled here for that reason. Ally? (Alucard: Fuck you, that's how.)    Thanks, ya fuck-mothering vampire.    Aside from hitting all the earmarks of cliche and hentai moments in the book, the OVA adds to it by adding as much fanservice as physically and mentally possible, such as the bananas, the table dresses, the bondage day-dreams, etc. If someone wanted to make a hentai porn, those already exist. This is trying too hard to be something like porn without being it.    And kind of doing it poorly.    The games of the academy also are involved in some kind of rigging, which is contrived and makes no sense whatsoever, and Chiharu is involved with the bad guy, who is also cliche and makes no sense, and the entire resolution is easily predictable. It's dull, and only served to make me angry when I watched the OVA to see what the frick it was about.    I really do regret it.    I cannot stress how much hatred and pity I have for those who read this and actually enjoy it. If you do, more power to you; but just remember something.    THEY GAVE A 10-YEAR OLD BOOBS THE SIZE OF BASKETBALLS. NUMBER 3: " Black Butler II"    Before ANYONE says anything, YES I consider the second season of "Black Butler" to be another anime entirely.   Makes separating the two much easier.   For the record, nothing is wrong with "Black Butler". The series is wonderful, the pacing is perfect, the storylines between the manga and the show differ greatly, but either way the conclusions are perfect, the artstyle and metaphoric coloring is syched, the voicing acting is awesome - shall I go on?    So, when I finish the first season and see the second one, I decide to watch it.    I really, really, REALLY wish I hadn't.    The first season was, in all definitions of the words, "a work of art". The second season too it, and decimated every last loose end that was tied up in the first season finale.    Why am I being so hard on this series?    For a couple of reasons.    First of all, the plot.    The second series picks up with a new young blond gentleman, Alois Trancy, who has recently been found by his family after a kidnapping incident. Because of his trauma, he's become a bit of a jerk and often harms others. At his side is a handsome and elegant butler, Claude, who looks eerily closer to Sebastian than I can stand. They take the mansion over, and Alois goes about his merry way to be happy, albeit in the worst of ways, by torturing his female maid Hannah and the triplet servants.    If this is starting to sound like a warped Ciel Phantomhive to you, then you are feeling the exact same thing I felt when I first watched it. Of course, the first episode delves right into these two firsthand, how Alois is a bit of a prick, (the fact he wears booty shorts), and how he is not above hurting others to get what he wants. 

   Something I don't remember Ciel ever wanting to do or exhibit.    So, in episode one, a strange man with a large suitcase comes to the door and Alois lets him in. The man is later revealed to be Sebastian Michaelis, who was searching for something. In the suitcase is Ciel Phantomhive's soulless body, and Sebastian leaves the mansion with a tea box, holding a familiar blue ring. Alois is ticked, Claude is pissed and Ciel comes back from the dead.    The reason for this is pretty much left obvious for the viewers through flashbacks: in the first series finale, Sebastian was about to take Ciel's soul, when a contrived demon spider, Claude, swiped his delectable soul away from the raven demon. Sebastian, reasonably ticked off, went after him and gave him his soul back, but now Ciel's memories of the previous season are gone, he has lost his revenge sought, and doesn't remember how he helped to save London.    There's a reason I hate this anime.    Claude stealing Ciel's soul and him having amnesia are just more contrivances that serve nothing more than to force the plot of there being another demon-master team for Sebastian and Ciel to go up against. Rather than build up to something in the previous season, everything in this one is left readily explained, and it just hurts to see how everything goes swiftly to dog poop.     The second reason, the behavior of Claude and Alois Trancy. I've seen several worst anime character lists over the web, and Alois Trancy often dominates because of his smarmy attitude, his devastating contrasts to Ciel and how he harms others and begs to be saved by Claude at every instant notion of danger. 

   And, I can see why. Alois was, without a doubt, raised in a hellish environment, and all he had to look forward to was his 'brother', who is actually a saving grace for the anime and the blond. However, the severe deaths and mass village murders that took place because of his brother's pact with Hannah the Demon just wrecked everything for him.    If the writers wanted to make Alois more relatable, like Ciel, then more emotional touching could have been done. Instead, Alois is often shown not regretting his actions, causing trouble and damage at every beck and call, and like in one episode, begs for help from Claude. I can tell he's supposed to be a contrast to Ciel, but it's too far.    Especially when you count in how he also has three servants and Claude.    As for Claude, he's not off the hook either. His mannerisms are more unique than Sebastian, but aside from that, he's the same dandy as Sebastian. All he does differently is be more cold-hearted and go back on his bargain made with Sebastian in the second episode. And to explain that in further detail, he and Sebastian ended up making a blood pact using roses and their own blood to see who would get Ciel Phantomhive's soul: a who would win kind of scenario with a yaoi prize going to the winner. Claude was the one who suggested it, and he was the jerk who broke it. Sebastian even pointed this OUT, and still, Claude wanted Ciel's soul.    Not . . . to mention when Ciel and Alois' souls combined, he acted a bit . . . creepy around Ciel. (Dude kisses his leg . . . pedophilia there.)    Three, the introduction of Hannah and her role in the story. Hannah is literally the Deus-ex-machina in this story, and I will not lie when I say I genuinely believe it. The maid, Hannah, later in the episodes, is revealed to be a demoness, (whom Sebastian never noticed before, even when Clyde used her as a sword sheath), and was never brought into full use as a demoness and user of magic until the final three episodes. She is given a very cliche and bland personality at first, which gives way to how she was putting on a facade to get close to Alois, because she felt what his brother felt when he made the pact with her.    As much as I feel Hannah is a saving grace of the anime, I have to ding some points off because of how she exposites her role in Alois' past to him, in Ciel's body no less, and ends up performing a final act, that should not be possible, until she dies with Clyde and Alois. She could have been a better part of the story if she was given more of a stronger personality when Alois was being cruel, without going too sappy.    Not much else about her makes me want to hate her as much as hug her. She does has a reason to be near Alois, she does care about him unlike Clyde, and does win him over in the end. But in all cases, she was a little bit of a good thing in a large bad thing.    And as for the fourth reason, the flipping ending of the second series.    Oh . . . MY GOD . . .    Here's what happens as a recap, and stay with me here. 

   Ciel and Alois' souls are combined so he can be used by Claude as a last-ditch effort to win over Sebastian, and Sebastian gets reasonably ticked. Claude acts creepy, Ciel and Alois fight over Ciel's body and a maze is conjured that is fixed by Alois to let Claude win and take Ciel's soul away. Sebastian and Claude fight in the maze, Grell is there for no reason, Hannah is trying to talk to Alois who is in control, and Ciel's will takes over and changes the maze again. Alois finds out Claude lied and did want Ciel's soul, and Alois is ticked. The butlers complete the maze, and see Hannah over a passed out Ciel/Alois, and now with a new mark on him. The butlers are then escorted by Hannah to a demonic isle where they fight, and Alois' final contract with Hannah is revealed: he decided if Ciel's soul was so valuable, then he didn't want anyone to have or love it. So he wished that Ciel was a demon.    Ciel Phantomhive becomes a demon, and his last command to Sebastian before this happened was to follow his order and help him.    . . . The slap mark on my forehead is red.    Alois, being jealous of Ciel, wished him into a demonic being, and now Sebastian, who ended up with a happy ending in the first series, is now stuck with Ciel for all eternity. And as a bonus punishment, Ciel is immortal and has to retreat with Sebastian to the demon world and never return.    I was so angry when I watched this episode that I threw my phone across the room in a rage. Thank god for the Otterbox, or else it surely would have broken.    There are several problems I have here with this ending, one of the most obvious being how Hannah could get Alois to get another contract in when he was already in one with Clyde, and how Ciel's body could handle THREE contract pressures at once and not feel any kind of soul degeneration, or something by then. But no, the largest problem is how and why the writers turned Ciel into a demon.    The point of 'Black Butler" was to become associated with the concept of revenge and learn that it is not often what others are searching for. It's to be accepted that people will do bad things, and often get away with it. It doesn't mean taking revenge is the best option. While it is fulfilling, oftentimes it's not.    Here, the concept of revenge is taken to the extreme with Alois turning Ciel into a demon because he was jealous. There's nothing in the lines of retribution here, aside from the fact he sacrificed his life to save Ciel's and Sebastian's. All that he did he did for petty jealousy. Ciel never did anything wrong in this series, so it was as if Alois was the torturer and Ciel was the poor dude strung along on the wall. The revenge within this series was also manipulated and forced between Ciel and Alois, compared to how Ciel had to sleuth out who to kill in the first series.    Forced elements are never good. They always end badly.    And this series is just proof of it.    Having Hannah use her power to turn Ciel into a demon is also a stretch, as it is never implied she could do something like that before. I blame it more on the writers going "This is a good idea' and inserting it into the anime for kicks.    . . . or to create a 'hint-hint-yaoi-hint-hint' product to establish a new fanbase.    BUT, that just about sums up this one: contrived, bad characters, and ruining the first season of what made it good.    And now I will put on a helmet . . . because the second one is going to make SO many people angry at me . . . NUMBER 2: " Sword Art Online"        I can feel the fury from much hate-mail coming my direction, but let me explain my piece before someone goes all out and eats my liver.    I like sci-fi tech stories in anime. .Hack//Sign is one of my favorite anime, and it still stays as one of the better examples of video games in anime, next to "No Game No Life" and "Log Horizon". It takes gaming into another level and gives you a video game world you want to participate in, and characters you want to root for.    Yet this anime is where I draw the line when it comes to intense immersion. Aside from the stunning artwork and the stellar designs of the characters and worlds, I don't know much else I can commend about this anime, aside from the fact that it was also a fanfiction that became a thing.    (Remind you of anything?)    Now, back to what I was saying.        SAO follows a boy, Kazuto Kirigata, or as he goes in the game(s) "Kirito". In the first arc of the anime and stories, he gets stuck in a game called "Sword Art Online", along with about a thousand other players. The mastermind behind it, one of the creators of the game, got them stuck there, and to leave, the players have to reach level 100 of the entire game and defeat him. And they can’t be forcefully removed from the game system due to it being hooked to their nervous system.     Sure, it's a good idea, and sure I thought it was okay, but a part of me instantly disliked this idea because the same instance occurred in '.Hack//Sign', except the main character was the only one stuck in the game, it was psychological aspects with less action and the main character was a male avatar with a female body in the real world.    I just thought it was a rip-off of the series, and when I decided to watch the rest . . . I had to nope out.     About two to three episodes into the series, the players of SAO start to think the beta-testers for the game are beating everyone else easily because they know the mechanics and grinding points. So they try to force beta-testers to help them get information about the game and everything that entails it. And of course, no good comes from it because someone has to be the sacrificial lamb. This also spawns the term “beaters”, beta-testers who are ‘cheating’ in the game because of their foreknowledge.

   Kirito then gets the idea that since he was a beta-tester for the game, and knows the details of the game and knows everyone hates his ass now, he can beat the game himself. So, he gives a shortwinded diatribe about being “The Guy” and goes it alone. This is given the fact he also seems to have no motivational aspects for this, nor does he TRY to reach out to other members of the SAO player communities that are stuck in the game, but the other players treat him and other beta-testers of the game as jackwagons.    Beta-testers of games are beta-testers for a reason; they OK a game and game-play for little to no money, or much, and most of the time are good gamers.    And the nicest people. I should know; I know a dude who beta-tested Destiny.    Here, they're treated like jack-wagons, and Kirito just enforces the whole idea by acting like a jackwagon and walking away from other players to continue the game because why not.    Aside from that, Kirito's personality is one of disinterest and expressionless pity. He wants to get out, but he continues alone until he meets Asuna, who for all intents and purposes, is the BEST character in Part I. Their relationship is easily one of the better things in this anime, albeit ham-fisted and later turned to sludge in the second and third parts, but still.    Seeing them happy was a GOOD thing midway through this anime of darkness. It did give Kirito and Asuna something to fight for, but it never really fleshed either of them out for me. Skewer me later, I have a LOT more to point out.    AS the show progresses, the plot becomes more and more linear, it never forks, Asuna is later RAPED IN THE SECOND PART, IN GRAPHIC DETAIL, and Kirito's flat sister comes into play as well. My disinterest in the characters and hatred of the second villain of the anime was enough to make me switch to something else.    I'll be finishing this anime up for a full in-depth analysis later, but for now, I'll go ahead and say my piece here and leave it at that.    I know people like this anime, and it makes me happy to see they like something collectively. I may not like it, like how I may not like One Piece as much as I used to, but for people to come together about an anime is okay.    It's just I don't like this anime, and I don't mind others liking it.      The pacing of the story measures out for almost an eternity, Kirito's ambitions and goals and behaviors are never really justified, the second part's villain made NO flipping sense, Asuna was degraded as a character and as an archetype, Kirito is in desperate need of development, reasons are needed for how they can be so OP in many parts, and I want some more answers on how his sister came into the picture.    And . . . for the love of god . . . I want a redo on this anime's second half.    . . . and I think most people do as well.    . . . I don't think I can continue this part until I can get the FINAL and WORST anime I have ever seen out of my system.    And believe me when I say . . . it's BAD. NUMBER 1: " Pupa"    This anime.    This . . . anime . . .    I found this anime after scrolling around on Crunchyroll for something to watch in the Summer of 2014. I was interested in the genre and cover of the anime and decided to give it a try.    . . . I want to erase it from my brain.    Utsutsu Hasegawa and his little sister, Yume, are exposed to a rare and monstrous virus called 'Pupa'. Yume becomes a vicious man-eating monster, while Utsutsu gains regenerative powers. They are then approached, almost as if by magic, by a researcher who wants to contain Yume and Utsutsu and use them as guinea pigs for research. Utsutsu allows it, saying he'll do anything for his sister, and decides to become his sister's food source so she can assume a normal life.    While the concept is golden and has the potential for deeper symbolic meaning, like how it used the teddy bears as the shattering of Yume's humanity and innocence, and how Utsutsu's relationship with his sister was put to the ultimate test, it becomes . . . hard to watch. In more ways than one.

   The anime episodes are 4 minutes long each, leaving the entire series at a binge-able time of 1 hour. There’s not much to do with that much time, and it can’t be a fast-paced comedy like Hetalia. It’s a horror series. Horror series need to work quickly but have context and depth, or else the deeper meaning is lost. Since this is also animation, it means the drawings and backgrounds need to be visually appealing or eyecatching so the viewer can keep watching without problem. 

   Artistically speaking, the characters are well designed, but in animation terms, their movements are as bad as an early Studio Deen production. 

   And that’s where the praise ends. 

   There is an episode of the anime, each being five minutes long, of Yume just eating her brother, and saying "Utsutsu" over, and over, AND OVER again . . .    If you get the idea of where I am going with this, then you know exactly WHY I do not like this anime.    The concept itself is the driving force for the anime, and after that, NOTHING HAPPENS. Yume is kidnapped and experimented on, like Utsutsu, but he saves her and still decides to be her food source. She feeds on him, they love each other, they live normal lives, yadda yadda.    Nothing. Conventional. Or concrete. Happens.    Characters are introduced, but they come and go and are never touched on again unless the plot calls for them to make an appearance. Utsutsu and Yume's mother is cold and sees Yume as a monster, which may or may not be her delusions given how she was also abused by the kids' father, who is ALSO never developed outside of being a wife-beater, and both are who I consider to be the worst parents of all time.    Yume and Utsutsu, for all purposes of the anime, are the most developed and touched on characters. But, they never do much outside of adapting to their own hellish nightmare. Never do they ask Maria the scientist for a cure, never do they try to escape or move along with their lives.    They just get stuck in their nightmare, forever to be mad.    I hate it when animes like this come around. It introduces an interesting scenario, only to forget plot and context in favor of showing more and more grotesque imagery and disturbing content. I know it's rated M, but in all honesty, the incest insinuations and the fact that no one helps these kids out of this problem is enough to make me mad.    I will say it has beautiful designs. 

   I will say it had an interesting idea.    I will not say it's a good anime.    And, now you know why.    Well, there you have it. Those are the top ten anime I personally dislike, and in a few cases, hate to the core. But, just because I hate these anime doesn't mean that others can't enjoy them.    That's the power of the internet and personal opinion.    Now . . . I'm gonna go back to writing MLP reviews . . . I've been getting rusty, and I feel like I'm gonna get so much flack for these . . .

#lilpri #anime #analysis #anime analysis #animeanalysis #marsha blackburn #black butler #bakemonotagari #pantystocking #panty and stocking #studio deen #studiodeen #animation #japan #japanese animation #spoiler warning #trigger warning #trigger #spoiler #ghosthound #ghost hound #ghostintheshell #ghost in the shell #danganronpa #FLCL #Gainax #StudioGainax #Studio Gainax #fullmetal alchemist #fullmetalalchemist

[spoadicdeviance]

Simple and Clean: The Kingdom Hearts Conundrum

Well it looks like the hype of the release of Kingdom Hearts 3 has calmed down significantly, mostly due to the fact that the game is considered by many to be lackluster. As for myself, I have finished my first playthrough of the game, on proud mode, and done most of the side quests, and while I did like my experience overall, I can’t really refute the criticisms the game has gotten and have to agree that Kingdom Hearts 3 is a disappointment.

I suppose I can’t be too surprised with how the third game in the franchise turned out considering the direction the series has been on since the second game which is actually the third game released but due the number placed at the title the game is still the second game, and I’ll just stop right now before I go on a tangent over the names of each game.

Kingdom Hearts, to me, is a series that captivated me right at the very beginning. I love Kingdom Hearts 1. It’s probably in my Top 20 favorite games of all time. The game managed to encapsulate the whimsy and charm of Disney, while delivering an epic, yet simplistic tale of adventure, light vs darkness, and friendship. The game was fun to play, and the story kept me engaged to the post credits scene. To this day, the game is still one that I would gladly replay and enjoy in its entirety.

Can’t say the same for the other games.

I know, I’m in the minority here on this, but in my opinion, the Kingdom Hearts series peaked with the original game from 2002 while all subsequent games have struggled under lackluster levels, a combat system that favors style over substance, and a convoluted plot with dull, heavy-handed dialog. Heck, a lot of what made Kingdom Hearts 3 such a disappointment to many players can be found in Kingdom Hearts 2 and (to a lesser extent) Birth by Sleep, the two games fans say are the pinnacle of the series.

Now I’m not simply here to say that I like this game over that game end it there. I’m going to explain why I think the Kingdom Hearts 1 (or KH1) is my favorite game in the series while putting into words my disappointment with the later games in the franchise, particularly KH2 and Birth by Sleep. This is going to be a long one so just get yourself comfortable and wait until you finish reading my post before you comment. Let’s go over why Kingdom Hearts 1 is the best in the franchise.

First things first, let’s discuss the levels in these games. The worlds of KH1 are a lot of fun to explore. While not exactly Thief II: The Metal Age complex, they were expansive and navigating them was more than just going from point A to point B. Some of the worlds were almost maze like in their design. There were light puzzle elements to most of the worlds. There was even platforming that, while clunky, added some variety to each level. These different elements made the moment to moment gameplay more than just brawling and therefore playing KH1 never got stale.

It’s quite a different story for the other games. The worlds in the latter games are straight forward in their design. The worlds were usually a singular pathway with the occasional branching off into a mini path, (Enchanted Domain, KH2’s Halloween Town), or central hub area that branches into three-four linear pathways (Beast’s Castle). Just look at the maps of Agrabah from KH1 and KH2 to see the downgrade firsthand.

Not only did the levels lack complex designs, they also had little to no puzzles in them and instead of tweaking the platforming to make it less clunky, the worlds minimize or flat out remove platforming all together. This resulted in worlds where you mostly just walk and fight.

Now these games are not simply all combat. There is something added that is intended to break the monotony, and it’s one of the most out of place aspects of the game; the forced minigames.

To be fair, having minigames isn’t a bad thing in and of itself, even if its put into the main campaign/quest. Games like Jak and Daxter and Donkey Kong 64 have plenty of minigames, however most of them are optional to beat the game. Finishing DK64 requires 50% of golden bananas and minigames give roughly 25% of golden bananas. Final Fantasy IX and Skyward Sword have the player do a minigame, but it lasts for 2-5 minutes out of a 35+ hour campaign and serve more to entice players to do a side quest. Even KH1, the only moments that feel like the game forces you to do a minigame like activity were the race against Rikku at Destiny Islands, the 1 minute of vine surfing at the start of Deep Jungle, and the 2-minute magic carpet escape at the end of Agrabah.

The other Kingdom Hearts games are not as stingy with minigames. As each world progresses, minigame after minigame is dumped on the player. KH2 is one of the worst offenders of this. It doesn’t help that these minigames, unlike the ones from DK64 and Final Fantasy IX, don’t provide a real break from the endless stream of battles. The majority of minigames are just regular fights with an arbitrary stipulation added to it; fight the enemies before the timer runs out, fight the enemies until the timer runs out, fight the enemies while collecting some orbs, fight the enemies while filling the bar onscreen, fight the enemies while depleting the bar onscreen, fight the enemies while escorting a slow ass character. It’s all just more fighting, and it even spills over to some of the bosses as well.

Even the minigames that aren’t centered around fighting, like the rhythm games in Atlantica, are too shallow to provide any sense of fulfillment while playing them. Subsequent Kingdom Hearts games aren’t exempt from this. From Birth by Sleep’s Disney Town world being dedicated to minigames, to the shallow imitation of Nintendogs in Dream Drop Distance, these games also have the same minigame issue that KH2 has.

I have talked about how the games became more combat oriented, however I haven’t really discussed combat itself. This is probably the part where I’ll get the most flack.

Combat in KH1 is a lot of fun and the highlight of the game alongside its story. While basic at first, the fighting gets more complex with the addition of special moves, extra combos, spells, and summons adding variety to the system. Plus, different enemies and bosses a certain attacks and weaknesses. Mashing the x button repeatedly will not get you far, you will have to think and be strategic during battle.

The later games, however, do not have strategy in their combat. Sure, you have different options with drive forms, shot locks, trinity limits, and other sorts of abilities, but at the end of the day, combat from KH2 onward is mostly whaling on the attack button over and over again. The amount of enemies that require certain strategies to defeat them diminish, dodging becomes practically unnecessary, and combat becomes simplified as a whole

Drive forms and trinity limits require little to no strategy when using them. Just activate them and mash buttons while your character zips their way through the battlefield while all sorts of flashy effects fill the screen and enemies go down without a fight. How fortunate that certain abilities could only be unlocked when the player fights with each drive form for a certain amount of time. Forced grinding, what a treat.

The worst offender of this is the context sensitive “reaction commends” that can clear waves of enemies and knock out a huge portion of the bosses’ health. Sometimes it’s the only way to defeat certain bosses. All the player must do during these reaction commands is simple press the triangle button over and over. It’s like a quicktime event only virtually impossible to fail at. There’s a reason why the phrase “press triangle to win” exists.

Magic also got a downgrade as the series progressed. In KH1, magic was not always at your disposal. When your MP got depleted, the player (or companions) would have to use an elixir/ether or land enough melee strikes on enemies to replenish your magic. Despite that, spells and summons were incredibly useful in battle, as well as for environmental puzzles, and the proper use of magic could mean the difference between success and failure.

In the later Kingdom Hearts games, the inverse seemed to be true for magic. Not only were puzzles that require spells became almost nonexistent, removing more variety in level design, but spells and summons became less effective in battle. In KH1, the player could focus on spellcasting, while doing the occasional melee attacks, and get through the game with relative ease. In later games, due to how magic became nerfed, using magic primarily was more of a self-imposed hinderance rather than an alternative style of play. This results in the player using magic almost exclusively for healing. Lucky for those players, MP automatically regenerates after depletion at a relatively quick rate, making ethers useless, which gives the player an unlimited amount of heals.

After KH2’s release, with the emphasis on style over substance, combat in Kingdom Hearts games became more about how to make the player look cool while fighting rather than making the player feel good after the fight.

The reason why it felt good to complete a battle in KH1; the game was actually difficult. Enemies and bosses didn’t just let you pummel them with combos and stylized forms. You had to react to the enemies and the arena you fought in. Even to this day, fights against Clayton, Ursula, Maleficent (human and dragon), possessed Rikku, many more bosses still put me on edge as I fight them.

There was no challenge to the fights in games like KH2 and Birth by Sleep. Since the player has multiples ways to dispose of an enemy, virtually endless amount of heals, and less adversaries that require any strategy outside of “hit me a bunch of times until I no longer exist”, they face little to no challenge while playing latter day Kingdom Hearts games. Bosses that make creative use of the environment you fight are less frequent too. The only way a boss can begin to test the player is when a minigame-like stipulation is added to the fight. Stipulations such as kill all the water clones in this time limit, put the coins in the chest before you can do damage, whatever the heck the Luxord fight was supposed to be, and so on and so forth.

Even then, I still didn’t get that much of a challenge. After three playthroughs of KH2, two of which were on Proud/Critical mode, the combined total of times I died does not even come close to a quarter of the amount of times I died in my first playthrough of KH1. I never even died during KH2’s Sephiroth fight, and I still struggle to defeat him in KH1’s proud mode. The other games provide even less challenge outside of a few endgame/postgame bosses.

And before you reply, the re-releases did not remedy this issue. In fact, the re-release of KH2 gave the player new abilities that allowed the player to cheese his/her way through some boss fights.

Now I have talked about the level design, the moment to moment gameplay, and the difficulty. I supposed that leaves us with the plot of these games.

Do I even have to explain why KH1 has the superior story?

KH1 had a simple yet effective hero’s journey story about a child who wanted to explore the various worlds with his friends but got more than he bargained for when his home is engulfed in darkness and he’s separated from his friends. He goes to various worlds, forms friendships with numerous people, and learns about his newfound abilities as well as the forces that try to stop him on his quest to find his friends. It’s not the most complex of narratives and that’s all for the better. The amount of exposition is kept to a relative minimum, characters can breathe and are not just there to explain the situation, dialogue was never forced or awkward, each world had their own mini-story that’s both entertaining and connects to the overarching plot, and the story is self-contained, no outside material required to understand what’s going on.

You know the pattern by now, but I still need to elaborate. For some reason, Square-Enix thought that they could pull off this grand epic saga spread over multiple games, well they couldn’t. KH2’s plot is a total mess. It’s a constant bombardment of new ideas, exposition dumps, vague allusions to events from games that weren’t even released yet. It was bad enough that the player had to have played a GBA spinoff in order to understand a lot of the plot, but the narrative was so muddled with inconsistencies and unexplained concepts that two more spinoffs had to be made in order for KH2’s plot to make some sort of sense, even then the plot is still convoluted and heavy-handed.

I’ve seen spiderwebs that have less interwoven parts than the plot of Kingdom Hearts, and far fewer holes as well.

And no, this does not make the story “complex and deep”. While I expect a game called Kingdom Hearts 2 would require me to play the first game in order to get a clear understanding of the plot, that doesn’t excuse having to play multiple spinoffs just to get a iota of a clue of what the heck is going on. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, one of the most celebrated series of books ever, contained an epic tale of war across multiple kingdoms and fleshed out worlds with history and culture. Even then, the reader didn’t have to refer to The Hobbit or The Silmarillion in order to follow the plot of the novels. That’s mainly due to the fact that J.R.R. Tolkien, unlike Tetsuya Nomura, can actually write an overarching story.

There’s also the fact that a lot of the plot in these games feels like filler. In KH2, the first visits to most of the worlds don’t connect to the main plot about the nobodies and Organization XIII. It’s not until the second visit to Radient Gardens where the plot starts to get rolling. In Birth by Sleep, almost all of Aqua’s campaign feel inconsequential until the very end. You could cut her story and have her just be a side character in Ventus and Terra’s campaigns and not much would be lost, plot wise.

The reason why I find a lot of the plot to be filler is due to the stories of most of these worlds are retellings of the Disney movies they’re based on while having little connection to the game’s main plot. In KH1, the stories of the worlds were mostly original tales that were intertwined with the game’s main plot. Whether it was dealing with Maleficent’s group of villains, the search for King Mickey, Rikku, and Kairi along with the rivalry between Sora and Rikku, learning more about the keyblade and its various abilities, visiting each world moved the main plot forward while having fun mini-narratives of their own. Even worlds like Wonderland, Deep Jungle, and Neverland focused more on one scene/act from the movie and expanding on it rather than rushing through the cliff notes of the source material.

It seems like for the other games, Nomura just copied and pasted the scripts of the movies the worlds a based on, added interjections from Sora, and called it an original story. It sticks out like a sore thumb and makes visits to these worlds feel more like distractions than anything else.

This longwinded plot also extends to the dialogue. The dialogue in KH1 was natural, aside from a few moments of emphasizing the difference between light and darkness. Characters acted normally, they had actual personalities and chemistry with each other. That was because KH1’s plot was not domineering to the point where the characters were relegated to just be vessels meant to explain the narrative. In games like KH2, conversations don’t feel like a group of people talking amongst themselves but rather like a lecture that the player needs to pay attention to. It makes a large chunk of scenes drag on for what feels like an eternity.

The fact that characters feel more like lore dispensers than actual people leads me to my next point, I don’t care about these new characters. Almost every character introduced from Chain of Memories onward has left little to no impact on me.

Organization XIII are a bunch of cliché Shonen Jump villains, either cackling at how evil they are or brooding over something quasi-poetic until the main character comes in and inevitably defeats them.

Roxas got a 2-hour prologue in KH2 in order for the player to get to know him and I was more relieved than upset whenever he “sacrificed” himself in order for Sora to wake up. Even 358/2 Days couldn‘t get me to care for this guy.

Xion exists solely to die at the end of 358/2 days and then be resurrected in Dream Drop Distance, that’s it.

Hayner, Pence, and Olette are like the annoying group of kids you’re forced to hang out with during college orientation, then they think you want to spend more time with them afterwards.

Ventus, Terra, and Aqua might’ve been interesting characters if we had more than 10 minutes dedicated to their friendship and personalities. Birth by Sleep is so focused on explaining the origins of Xehanort, the ways of the keyblade master, and linking its plot to the overarching plot of the series, that I never find myself connecting to any of the characters. The three separate campaigns don’t do the plot any favors. In fact, it makes the story seem disjointed. To be honest, when the characters were either killed, possessed, or banished to the Realm of Darkness, I did not care in the slightest.

It doesn’t help that Tetsuya Nomura can only seem to write 4 or 5 kinds of original characters, resulting in everyone being a Xehanort/Ansem clone or a copycat of the Sora, Kairi, Rikku dynamic. Seriously, the amount of Sora clones in this franchise is absurd. 

The worse thing about these new characters is that Square seems convinced that the general audience needs more of them and forces them into the plot at the expense of characters we already have investment in.

The most egregious example of this happens at the end KH2 when during the final fight against Xemnas, rather than allowing the player to use Donald and Goofy, the game forces you to use only Rikku in the fight.

I don’t care that it’s meant to serve as Rikku’s redemption. He seemed to have redeemed himself with his self-sacrifice at the end of the first game. I don’t care about that stupid reaction command in the middle of the battle looks cool. It’s just another example of the game preferring style over substance. I don’t care that I get to fight with Rikku. I want Donald and Goofy.

I know we play as Sora and therefore focus on building his stats/abilities, but we put almost as much time into Donald and Goofy while we played the game. The player had to find the best equipment, do the side quests in order to obtain their ultimate weapon, mastered their trinity limits, managed their A.I. to suit the player’s needs in battle. Then the game rewards your dedication to these characters by saying “Screw you! Here’s a premade character with a default weapon you can’t change, and you only have the final level to learn how he is like in combat. You’re gonna love it.”

I’m sorry, but for an RPG to do that is inexcusable. Imagine in an Elder Scrolls game, before the final part of the main quest, your character is killed, and you must play as a premade Dark Elf Mage for the rest of the game. How about in Persona 5 before the last boss, instead of the Phantom Thieves, Joker gets a party consisting of some random side characters you barely interacted with in the game. Would anyone defend that design choice then?

The fact that I’m forced to only use Rikku in the fight, alongside how easy it is, makes the final battle against Xemnas in KH2 one of the worst final bosses in gaming, in my opinion.

I’ve been ranting about KH2, Birth by Sleep, 358/2 Days, Chain of Memories, but I haven’t talked specifically about Kingdom Hearts 3. KH3 is a weird case because it fixed some issues that I had with the later Kingdom Hearts games while doubling down on the issues it didn’t fix and adding new issues altogether.

KH3’s level design is improved somewhat. There’s still generally not much to do in the worlds aside from walk, fight, and do a minigame, however the actual levels are more open and intricate compared to KH2 and Birth by Sleep. The presentation is the best in the series, not just the graphical upgrade but also cinematography of the cutscenes and animations are more expressive than in past games. Plus, I got to give the game credit for making me like Axel/Lea, who before was just another forgettable side character.

However, combat is even more style over substance with additions like the Attractions Summons. The minigames are still as intrusive as they are lacking in quality. The retelling of the Disney plots is so bad here that there are literally shot for shot recreations of scenes from the movies with Sora, Donald, and Goofy added in the background. The Frozen and Tangled worlds suffer the most from this. Plus, the Pirates of the Caribbean world is based on the third movie despite the fact that no Kingdom Hearts game covered the second Pirates movie. Good luck understanding that plot without seeing the films. Dialogue is just as mind-numbingly dull. Also, you know how the plots of the latter Kingdom Hearts game can be described as having 30-50% filler, well KH3’s plot is almost 80% filler.

All this is combined with new problems such as combat feeling floatier compared to KH2 and Birth by Sleep, the emphasis on Disney over everything else, and the fact that this supposed “conclusion” to the trilogy didn’t fulfill on all the promises of past games, forgot to fill some of the plot holes, and felt like advertisement for games yet to come, makes it hard for me to say KH3 is a total improvement over the other Kingdom Hearts sequels and spinoffs. In many ways, it’s a downgrade.

You know, it feels like Kingdom Hearts is the Guns and Roses of the video game industry. Their first effort is groundbreaking and makes a huge impact on the scene. Subsequent follow-ups do their best to expand upon the initial outing only to end up with well regarded yet still confused end products. Then a new project is in the works and gets constantly delayed during which a revolving door of crew members tries to salvage the development, all the while a talented yet egomaniacal leader is micromanaging every aspect. Then when the long-awaited product is released, reviewers give mild praise while the general public is disappointed and finds the end result to be a mish mash of disparaging ideas while feeling almost unfinished.

Yes, Kingdom Hearts 3 is Square’s Chinese Democracy.

If I were asked to do a tier list ranking of each game in the series, at this moment, it would look like this.

This maybe a bit of a surprise to you since I spent the entire time ranting about KH2’s flaws, so let me explain. After playing KH3, I’ve come to notice more of the positive aspects of the second Kingdom Hearts. While I do think that they serve more to make the game easy and hate the excessive grinding that comes with them, the drive forms do give the player a sense of experimentation with some of these fights. In fact, compared to KH3, 2 has more builds for the player, as well as more balanced. KH2 is still easy as heck, and in my opinion inferior to KH1 in almost every way. However, I now appreciate more of the second game’s strong points.

Also, the music is excellent. I think that goes without saying. Yoko Shimomura is a goddess of music.

So as if this entire post hasn’t made it clear already, I love Kingdom Hearts 1. Unlike the other games in the franchise, it knew where to be straightforward and where to have complexity. It had a robust, dynamic combat system, the plot was self-contained and had more personality than exposition, and the gameplay was varied without being diluted. To this day, I find it hard to understand why most Kingdom Hearts fans prefer games like KH2 and Birth by Sleep over the original Kingdom Hearts.

Who knows? Maybe they like the combat to have some flash and felt the fighting in KH1 is too rigid. Maybe they found the puzzles, exploration, and platforming of KH1 to be more akin to fat that had to be trimmed in service to the aspect of the games that they actually like. Maybe they enjoy the plot because it has such a detailed lore and expands the narrative beyond three guys saving the universe from darkness. Maybe they find the new characters charming and enjoy the parallels between them and other characters like Sora and Rikku.

If that’s how they feel, then that’s more than fine. We’re all allowed to have out take on things and no one should tell someone else that they shouldn’t have their opinion.

That being said, in my opinion, while I do enjoy most of the games in the Kingdom Hearts franchise, the only game that I find exceptional is Kingdom Hearts 1.

#kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 2 #kingdom hearts 3 #birth by sleep #358/2 days #chain of memories #dream drop distance #sora #rikku #kairi #disney #donald duck #goofy #roxas #axel

[thecartoonarchivist]

My Thought on The Dragon Prince

So, the first season of The Dragon Prince released on Netflix yesterday and like the cartoon nerd I am, I binged watched all the episodes at like... 12:00 at night. (Sue me.) 

And I’m gonna be honest: I have some opinions.

For those of you who don’t know who I am, or haven’t seen my posts popping up from time-to-time over the past month or so, I’m the Cartoon Archivist. I’ve watched a lot of cartoons over the years and I help people find the cartoons that they’ve looking for; in my spare time, I write exposés on different cartoons that used to premiere on various networks and rate them. I won’t go into detail about my “cartoon resume” but if you’re interested in what I do, go ahead and check out my blog, or read this post here to get started.

Regardless, I feel that it’s my duty to my followers and my blog as a whole to write an article about what I’ve seen thus far and my opinions about The Dragon Prince.

And honestly?

It’s not that great. Shocking, I know. Unpopular opinion? More than likely. Will I get flack for it? Probably, but I’m more than willing to accept that.

Here’s the thing. While watching this series, I was keenly aware of all the things that it lacked; I knew exactly what it could be and that’s just not a spot that you want to place you want to put your audience into. It then appears to be half-baked, rushed, and disappointing because you know how much work went into the show--- you know how much was sacrificed to get it out on time.

And that’s just sad.

Now, before I go into detail, I feel that I need to clarify a few things. 

As much as it seems extremely unfair to compare this series to that of Avatar: The Last Airbender, that’s exactly what I will be doing but for a good reason. You see, Avatar: The Last Airbender was a trailblazer in a lot of ways. Although it wasn’t the first western animation that featured a large, complicated, overarching plot, it was the first to do so with, not only a plan of how each season was to go and lead towards the finale, but to have such important character growth as well. Shows like Teen Titans, Ben 10, and Samurai Jack to varying degrees all had similar types of storytelling that was present in Avatar: The Last Airbender and these groundbreaking shows helped pave the way for Avatar to even exist. But it wasn’t until Avatar was released that it helped show western audiences the types of stories that could be told in animation. Anime was already telling these stories over in Japan, even premiering some of their stories in the west with television programming such as Anime Network, or Toonami--- but these never really seen such sweeping popularity, and for the most part, was catered towards kids and early teenagers. However, Avatar was so popular that I haven’t met a single person who was a child when this show was airing that hasn’t at least seen the show. (I’ve met one or two individuals who didn’t like the show, but they’ve at least seen it. [Needless to say, they turned out to be very nasty people but that’s neither here nor there...]) It’s probably one of, if not the, cartoon that went from being considered a “children’s show” to being a family show. My parents watched it! My parents loved it! It wasn’t a weird thing to watch this show because it managed to cater to many demographics. And for that, it becomes one of the most influential cartoons within the past 20 years. Avatar has turned 13 years old this past February and it feels like it could of been released this past year. It is simply, a classic.

However, aside from Avatar, there’s not many cartoons to compare The Dragon Prince to. I could compare it to shows that I’ve stated before: Teen Titans, Samurai Jack, Ben 10, Codename: Kids Next Door, and many others. But the problem is that many of these shows focus on one type of storytelling. With Ben 10 and Codename: Kids Next Door, there wasn’t so much of an “overarching plot” that drove the series forward as much as there was character development over a series. You could make a case for Ben 10, saying that Ben 10 gaining the omnitrix and trying to remove it was the overarching plot of the show, but to that I say, there wasn’t a particular finale planned for that “goal.” It was more of a vague possibility that they worked and not every season funneled towards it. There wasn’t an escalation. Not everything was working towards this goal. It was simply there. For Teen Titans and Samurai Jack, there was an overarching plot but at the expense of other things. For Teen Titans, there was an overarching plot for a season; it focused on the problems and the struggles for one of the Titans for a season, maybe even a couple of episodes within a season, but there wasn’t a particular end goal. There wasn’t a final boss to defeat. There wasn’t an overarching plot that connected the overarching plots. It was primarily focused on character growth. For Samurai Jack, it had an overarching plot at the expense of character growth. For the most part, Jack stays the same throughout the series. He may learn some new tactics, become more accustomed to his new surroundings, fight new and increasingly difficult challenges, but he doesn’t grow towards something. He continuously tries to go back home and defeat Aku, but there’s not the constant escalation towards a final battle like there is in Avatar. Because of this, The Dragon Prince is in the difficult position of not only having such a ridiculously small venue to compare itself to, but also the fact that it’s going to be compared to its spiritual predecessor. It’s unfair. It’s cruel. But it’s the only other show that uses the same complete range of techniques that The Dragon Prince uses. I may compare it somewhat to Anime, but seeing as that’s eastern animation versus western animation, I’ll try to refrain from that as much as possible. So while it appears that comparing The Dragon Prince to Avatar: The Last Airbender pre-establishes a bias and unfair advantage towards Avatar, I’m only doing that out of lack of options and opportunity. Otherwise, I will try to remain as objective as possible. After all, The Dragon Prince needs to be able to stand on its own merit, regardless of its predecessor.

Now that that’s out of the way...

One of the first things to comment on is the art-style, and for a lot of people, it’s a bit of a turn-off. For one thing, it’s animated using cheaply produced CGI, which leaves the animation rather choppy.

However, that doesn’t really bother me too much. The character designs are fantastic. The establishing shots and aerial angles of the backgrounds are absolutely stunning. And even while using such a generic type of animation, they were still able to create a unique look to their animation that anyone would be able to identify this cartoon from a mile away. For what the technology they were working with, they did a great job. Could they have used better technology? Certainly. But for what they had, I was generally pretty happy with the result.

On top of this, I was an individual who was able to sit through the awful animation of Ajin: Demi-human and still enjoy myself so... really... it’s not as bad as it could’ve been. (And for those of you who never saw Ajin, here’s a clip of the animation. It’s just... hot garbage...)

Watching all 9 episodes that released yesterday on Netflix, I feel that I can identify 3 major problems that I had with the overall quality of the series.

1.) The Plot Felt Rushed.

The best way I can describe the overall feeling I had from watching this series is if someone tried to explain to me their DnD campaign in the span of 9 twenty-five minute episodes. And to any DnD or Table-top RPG player, this seems like a dream come true. However, in practice? This is a very poor way to tell a story. Having watched way too many hours of DnD livestreams and YouTube shows, I can tell you that when you try and summarize a DnD campaign, it just doesn’t amount to actually sitting down and watching each individual session. Many of the things that the average individual wouldn’t include in their overall summary of the campaign help us feel closer to the characters involved! The weird, crazy antics and conversations that players get themselves into help reveal to the audience (and to each other!) the type of people each character is. If we don’t spend enough time with these characters, getting to know their personality, they’re speech patterns, their quirks, it becomes a whole lot harder to care for what they want or are striving towards. It becomes difficult to relate to them as people and you begin to view them more as symbols, or objects than actual living beings. Watching this series, I felt like I was constantly being fire-hosed with information and plot and world-building and backstory and character growth and new characters and my god how much can you fit into one fucking episode I’m so---- I never had breathing room. I never had enough time to get to know these characters. I never got to see them when things were dull, or they had a long stretch of road to travel, or just having a moment to process all that’s happened. To be honest, I wanted some filler episodes. I wanted an episode or two where we weren’t focused on all the terrible things that were going wrong. I just... I wanted a moment to breathe. And seeing as they only included 9 episodes instead of the standard 24, I can’t help but feel that they should’ve put it off. Now, maybe there was some pressure from Netflix to get this baby out to the public, but really, it was to the show’s detriment. It wasn’t ready. It needed more time. The scripts needed a better once over, another look to say, “You know what? Maybe we should put another couple one-off episodes to make this breathe a little better.” It just... it needed more time.

2.) The Characters Felt Like Chess Pieces, Not Characters.

What do I mean by that? Well, let me explain.

In writing, one of the major things that they tell you is that your characters should fuel your plot. Their actions and reactions should help push your plot forwards; in every scene, they should be working towards their goals and what they want, and if they aren’t well... you should cut it.

If you’re using your characters as chess pieces, that simply means that your characters aren’t fueling your plot, your plot is fueling your characters. Each character does a certain thing, not because your character wants to do X thing, or does something because of X reasons, but simply because the plot calls for it. When this happens, characters become wishy-washy. The small little problems that arise come, not from conscious character decisions and personality clashes, but from lack of communications and convenient drama problems. On top of this, small character quirks, lines of dialogue, actions that actually affect the plot of the story, could be fulfilled by any one of the cast of characters. They aren’t individual people with their own wants and desires, their own personalities and flaws. They simply become pieces to fill a role that’s empty and as an audience member, how am I supposed to empathize with that? How am I supposed to care about these people and their struggles when whatever “3- dimensional personality traits and backstory” could’ve been fulfilled by... anyone... 

On top of this, it causes character motivations to become muddled. They may have a “reason” as to why they act the way that they do, but it doesn’t really affect their personality. 

Let’s take Zukko for example. It’s goal, his motivation, is to capture the Avatar at all costs. Why? To restore is honor. To be accepted back into the Fire Nation with open arms. To make his father proud of him for once in entire life. Because of this motivation, Zukko is desperate. He wants so badly to be accepted by his father that he’s willing to do anything in order to capture the Avatar. This affects his actions. He’s very rash. He doesn’t think things through to their fullest extent. He’s a very angry character because of the fact that he’s so desperate for the love and acceptance that he’s never received from his father that every single failure, every single step back, every single moment that he has to wait and plan and think things through seems like a delay of his desires. If you were to place Sokka, or Katara, or Aang, or any other character in the same exact situation that Zukko was placed under, they wouldn’t react the same exact way and that’s what makes a character individual. If we were to compare Zukko to Rayla, we see that Rayla’s actions... could’ve been Soren’s actions, or King Harrow’s actions, or even Callum’s actions if placed in the same exact circumstances. The fact that she spared a random human soldier, or the fact that she’s teaming up to save the Dragon Prince doesn’t seem like a decision that she’s actively made. It only seems like she’s made those decisions because the writers wanted her to, or because the plot called for it. The writers say that it’s because Rayla wants redemption for her parents cowardice but I don’t really believe it. If Rayla really wanted to redeem herself, she wouldn’t have hesitated to kill the human soldier. If she found the Dragon Prince with the human princes, she would have taken the egg for herself and became the hero of her people. Why would she care about some war? Why would she care about the “fear in the soldier’s eyes” or “the right thing to do?” The only thing that is established that we know about is that she’s trying to redeem herself for her parents mistakes, which is why she’s the fastest, the strongest, and the most skilled in her group. All these... additional actions? They make no sense. They’re out of character. They just don’t... fit. And because of that, they don’t feel real. They simply feel like chess pieces that the author uses to further the plot. Granted, we’ve only seen 9 episodes of Rayla, but even in the early seasons of Avatar, every character’s actions had a purpose even if we, the audience, couldn’t see it, we could feel the consistency within the character. But with The Dragon Prince? There was no character consistency and because of that, the audience could feel that.

3.) Who’s The Villain?

Consciously, I know who the villain is. Viren is supposed to be this big man-ba-jama that’s supposed to be out to kill the prince. Why? Because he wants the throne... supposedly. But... why? What does he gain by becoming the King of an empire at war? Power, sure but... nobody wants power for the sake of power. If he really did, he would have killed King Harrow a long time ago. But instead, he’s simply trying to pull Scar (from The Lion King) with... no real reason? I mean, Scar wanted power because he wanted people to respect him. But I’m still baffled as to why Viren wants the throne...

And as far as The Dark Magic is concerned, I mean... I get why Dark Magic is supposed to be bad. Using someone’s life-force against their will is... it’s kinda horrific. Not to mention, the process appears to be pretty fucking painful, so yeah. Bad Idea™. But like.... what’s the benefit of using Dark Magic? What do you gain by using it? Like, we have 6 different sources of magic. We have multiple different magical ways to solve a problem, why do we need a new “evil terrible” one? On top of that, Viren isn’t... a threat? Like... yeah, he orders to kill the princes. Yeah, he places Runaan’s soul in a coin which is pretty fucking bad but like... with Firelord Ozai, he killed millions of people. He burned his own fucking son just because dared to speak out of turn, like that’s straight up sociopathic. He uses his children as tools and doesn’t care for anyone but himself. But Viren? He... actually cares? And he has legitimate feelings? And maybe he uses his children as tools but at the end of the day, he still actually cares about them and like... Viren legitimately seems like he’s just trying to do what he thinks as right, but doing it in the worst fucking way possible. 

And maybe that’s the point of the series. Maybe it’s the idea that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” but there just... isn’t enough indication of that fact. The series tries to paint these children as “right” and Viren as “wrong” and Runaan as “overzealous” and General Amaya as “misguided” and... when you want to use gray morality, you have to show the good actions people take along with the bad actions. You have to show that the villains are capable of good, that the heroes are capable of bad, and that there’s a reason for everything someone does.

 That’s how you write gray morality. But seeing as the characters aren’t solid personalities and there isn’t really a reason for a character to make any particular action, it becomes nigh impossible to do so.

So, where does that leave us?

Well, it’s not a bad show. The world-building is so vibrant and so alive that I would love to see a DnD campaign or some other form Table-top RPG to come out of this series. The animation was actually surprisingly good for what they were working with. Yeah, backgrounds were a little recycled and a bit bland from time-to-time. They could’ve used some more in-between frames to make the animation more smooth and connected. Even some shots leave me going, “Ewwww.... You really skipped that one for time, didn’t cha?” But at the end of the day, I could dig it. I could ignore it for what was happening.

The problem is that the writing was so rushed. The characters felt lost. The plot was running at a break neck pace. I didn’t understand why anything was happening the way it was. I was just... disappointed. While looking through some gifs for this post, I feel like this one really describes my overall impression of the show.

It needed more.

It needed more time, more character development, more episodes. Just... more.

Problem is that it’s a quality show. It’s so much better than many of the animations that I’ve seen in recent years that it really does become a cut above the rest. However, like I said before, I know what it could be. And that just makes me extremely sad for its lost potential.

Overall, if I had to rate it, I’d give it a solid 7 out 10.

I’m going to keep tabs on it. The first season is always the roughest one, so in the future, it very well could live up to expectations. But for now, it’s just... disappointing. It isn’t bad by any means. I’ve seen some bad animations in my time and this doesn’t even come close to that. But I just feel like it could be so much more and that really bothers me.

If there are any corrections you’d like to make in regards to this post, please feel free to send me a message with your corrections and I’ll get back to it as soon as I can!

Do you remember a cartoon your friends have never heard of? Got a scene from an animated film that you’re dying to know the name to? Send your questions to The Cartoon Archivist and I’ll see what I’ve got in the vault!

#the dragon prince #tdp #tdp spoilers #the dragon prince spoilers #netflix #2015-present #I see one of two things happening #1: I'm gonna get a big boost in followers #2: I'm gonna get a lot of hate mail for this #Or both #I don't really care all that much #I just felt the need to share my opinions on this because let me tell you: I HAVE SOME OPINIONS #I JUST WANTED MORE GODDAMN IT

[jacereviews]

Review: Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam

Television (Anime) Consumed in: English Sub Note: This review covers only the 50 episodes of TV Zeta, not A New Translation. For the sake of discussion I will have to cover the plot of Gundam 0079.

March 2nd, 1985 the second series of Gundam made its debut, Zeta Gundam. While the 0079 movies may have put Gundam on the map, it’s Zeta you still hear people discussing to this day. Revered by many as a classic, and one of the best mecha anime of the 80s, Zeta’s a big name, but does it hold up to it? Let’s rock.

PLOT: Universal Century 0087, the One-Year War between the Earth Federation and Zeon is long over, however peace is not to be had. In response to the remnants of Zeon, the federation has created a police-like military organization called the Titans to control Zeon and other spacenoid groups to prevent them from uprising and resisting the Federation’s control. To do this the Titans have been given borderline free reign to do whatever they see fit to do their job, no matter how atrocious it may be. In response to the unchecked reign of the titans, a resistance group called the Anti-Earth Union Group (or simply AEUG) has risen up to fight back. During an AEUG mission led the mysterious blonde pilot who always covers his eyes and his past named Quattro Bajeena to the colony Green Noa, a young man called Kamille Bidan steals a prototype Gundam Mk. II belonging to the Titans. The two cross paths and Kamille ultimately ends up joining Quattro on the Argama as it sails out to fight the Titans. From the get-go we have a story both similar and dissimilar to the prior series. Once again we have a young man piloting a Gundam on a white ship as it battles enemies, but instead of being a traditional soldier, we’re now following a rebellion. It takes awhile for the plot to get truly moving, but when it goes it goes. The Titans are a hateable cast of villains, unlike the Zeon of the first series the Titans are mostly irredeemable. The Titan cast is likeable at best and cartoonishly evil at worst. There was never a Ramba Ral style villain where it felt like that without the war they’d be our friend. As it goes on the plot gets more and more interesting with webs of betrayals, cyber-newtypes, and even the remnants of Zeon. Especially of note is the ending of Zeta, which without going into detail, is both narratively satisfying, thematically resonant, and quite shocking for a series aimed at young audiences. Very few series have an ending that really make me sit back and consider it like Zeta’s and that’s a good thing for Zeta. However the story is not without its flaws. The first 10 episodes can be kind of a drag, and the once again episodic format can lead to some weak and borderline filler episodes. I feel the series could’ve shaved off 10 episodes and be better for it. The biggest problem I had with Zeta however, is the amount of things that happen off-screen and details the series feels like it doesn’t need to give to the audience. Many a times I found myself confused or questioning stuff and just had to concluding that some change happened off-screen. Characters swap ships on both sides with little notice, and operations fly by with people hardly mentioning it. It made the whole experience way less cohesive. The series also had a few cases of trying to emulate the original series for no good reason, such as bringing kids on board the Argama half-way through. It made sense for the White Base to have kids but the Argama really didn’t need them and it just felt like poor decision making. However by the end I felt that the pluses far outshine the negatives and ultimately lead to this series being one hell of a ride. 

8/10, it’s good, messy, but good. Ending earns a whole point on its own.

CHARACTERS: Let’s start with Kamille Bidan himself. Kamille starts off as an obnoxious brat, a lot of my early enjoyment was seeing people beat the shit out of him, but he honestly grew on me, and by the end he’d gone through quite the character arc. He’s a good mc, but takes a damn long time to become that. Luckily he’s not alone. Let’s discuss the overly familiar looking Quattro Bajeena, doesn’t that scar look familiar? Might he be the Red Comet of Zeon? No he can’t be... But he is definitely a highlight of the series. The audience is invested in him from the get-go, and throughout the series we see him mentoring Kamille and doing some amazing stuff in his own right. He’s only human and has his flaws too, but whatever flaws they may be are something you forget when you see his speech during the Day of Dakar. Zeta’s also notable (by the audience and Kamille) for its sizeable female cast. Emma, Reccoa, and Fa Yuriy are all notable female characters put in powerful roles. Even if Reccoa’s later arc may inspire some ire from viewers they’re all great characters with their own interesting arcs. Another thing I’ve got to give Zeta a lot of credit is for how it used the returning characters from the first series. My boy Bright Noa shows up in episode 1, and many of the White Base members make some kind of reappearance (not really a spoiler because it’s in the opening). We get to see how they’ve lived their lives since the events of 0079, and they have many interesting scenes without it ever feeling like the series is too dependent on them (save for Bright). The problem I had with Zeta characters, is a lot of them act out and act irrationally. Now this isn’t necessarily bad character writing, but when someone acts out and takes a mech, does something stupid with it, and the next day is piloting a mech again it raises a few eyebrows. It can also get obnoxious with how many characters are being overly emotional twats, but I never found any of the Argama crew to be entirely irredeemable idiots. They were just flawed people in a stressful situation. The Titans on the other hand had what I felt to be a relatively lacking cast. While the character of Jerid and his varied love interests were all likeable, with Jerid himself being a standout likeable douche, aside from Jerid they didn’t get character arcs. Otherwise like Titans consisted of pitiable cyber-newtypes, hand-rubbing schemers, and straight up assholes. Aside from the cyber-newtypes none were very redeemable. The cyber-newtype Murasame Four was notable but limited by her limited screen time. They tried to make Paptimus Scirroco into a new Char, but he just felt way less interesting than Zeon’s red comet. The ultimate leader of the Titans, Jamitov, was just a bog standard evil politician. All in all only Jerid and Four were interesting characters, and only Jerid lived up to much potential. While you didn’t have any Garmas or Ramba Rals to make the war seem like a curse causing good people to die on either side, the Titans did fill the role of hateable villain well. Without going into too much detail, I do want to give a shoutout to Haman Karn. She was a rather engaging character but pretty much everything about her involves spoilers.

8/10, a lot of good characters, a lot of hateable villains, but most of the best characters are repeats from 0079.

VISUALS: Now probably the biggest improvement from 0079 is the animation. The noticeable errors of 0079 are gone, replaced with some truly gorgeous and fluid animation. Zeta has a lot of sakuga packing, and when it wants to move well it damn does. However when it doesn’t care it’ll freely use a lot of cheap tricks that the skilled eye will notice, but what doesn’t? The actual art of the series I’m less in love with. There were less moments of truly interesting visuals than 0079, but being okay is okay. The character designs were mostly fine, with a few (Jamaican in particular) being very dull. The mecha design is a mixed bag with me. The designs feel way less varied than 0079, with a lot of mechs feeling like the same skeleton with different overly ornate decorations. As cool as they looked I found myself just shaking my head and saying “Really?” at some of the more over-ornate designs. However the thing that bugged me the most was the Titans using Zeon-esque mechs. Being part of the Earth Federation you’d assume they’d use Federation mechs, but instead they use mechs designed like their original enemies. This didn’t make much sense outside of the meta-reasoning “Villain mechs in Gundam need the domed one-eye design.” However everything I’m saying is simply nitpicks. 

7/10, at worst we have functional art that suspends disbelief, at best we have gorgeous animation.

AUDIO: In all honesty, I don’t remember much of Zeta’s soundtrack which is an okay sign. What I do remember is pretty decent but nothing ever stuck out to me except the first opening. The first opening was a rather enjoyable song, the second was very mediocre. The ending theme for the whole time was entirely forgettable as you’re skipping to the next episode anyway. Sound design wise everything sounded fine and natural, despite sound effects in space. Voice acting was passable. Most of the voices fit well with no real stand out performances in my opinion. The voice of Bask Oum was notable for sounding overtly evil, so that was nice. However there were some voices that were not so great on minor characters. Every time the minor character Sydle talked I just wanted her to stop talking. Luckily she was incredibly minor.

6/10, functional with a demerit or two.

FINAL SCORE: 7/10

While not the perfect masterpiece many claim it to be, Zeta Gundam is something I’d personally recommend. With a powerful delivery of themes and a strong follow up to a good series, Zeta’s a fantastic watch. There’s a lot of great to be had here, though sadly the execution of the ideas is far from perfect. Held back by some bumps, Zeta nonetheless stands out as an excellent story animated quite well. The ending alone makes me want to raise the score even higher, but a show is more than it’s last five episodes. I now set out to continue my Gundam Quest with ZZ. I’ll probably get a lot of flack for rating the quintessential 80′s mecha so low, but don’t let a number understate how much I love this series.

#gundam #mobile suit gundam #mecha #classics #classic anime #anime #anime review #zeta gundam #kamille bidan

[goddamnitlady]

Me @ Me: ....How EXPENSIVE is Orochimaru’s coat in this AU?

Self-indulgent writing. This is a narrative description of my thought process while writing a scene and getting stuck on one detail that is on great influence on the world-building. When I am in the zone, I think fast. So to make sense of in a fun narrative format, I broke the process up into different voices with a different name-titles. This cost me an hour to write down in full length, so future-me to can easily read it back and smile.

WAR

Writer me: How EXPENSIVE is Orochimaru’s coat in this university professor AU roleplay? I’ll say €400. Student me: That’s too much. No one walks around in a €400 coat. What if a bird poos on you, or it gets scratched! Diva me: ...then you’ll be glad you’re wearing a coat. Please, darling. Make it haute couture. Roleplayer me: Excuse me, can I say something? 

Writer me: Girls! Attention! I need an answer. How much? €1400 then? I don’t know these prices. Cosplayer me: Neither do I.    ....I just can guess better than most people how it’s made. I could probably made a C-class rip-off lookalike. 

Writer me: YOU’RE A COSPLAYER. Come help me! How’s €2400 for a coat? Is that reasonable? Diva me: Haute Coutre means, high sewing. Literally the best designers, seamstesses and materials in the play, as well as enough time. Daywear like jackets can start at $10 thousand dollar. But gowns with embroidery and a lot of material can go up to 800-thousand hours. Why do I know this shit. Student me: Wtf how do those people make money. Roleplayer me:  ....Hey..... Diva me: They don’t. It’s one big promotional event to sell perfume and lipstick. Actresses are asked to wear a dress to a red carpet event, for the promotion of a brand, that’s all.  Writer me:  Cool stuff, not interested. How much does Orochimaru’s coat cost? Student me: How much can a professor pay? lmao. Writer me: He also dabbles in human experimentation, shush. I’ve decided he’s got money but I don’t know yet if it’s from legal corporate or black market transactions. Student me: Fair. Writer me: Only governments and state-backed individuals can acquire so much capital and expertise to create reliable environments for experimentation. Diva me: I wonder how much a coat would cost that has all te specks. 1) Comfort 2) stylish 3) laboratory-proof and 4)bulletproof 5)with ingrained pockets for wires and mechanics. Cosplayer me: I am glad you asked! WELL. If we go for a long-term sturdy material because let’s be honest, Orochimaru hardly changes his wardrobe. We would use long strips of supple high-quality leather. 4 meters, waterproof. It would then have an inside of labcoat-fabric. The choice for this lining is to protect the skin, even if spilled acid burns through the outer layer. There ought to be little seams as possible so no acid can come through. Tightly sewn. Writer me: Bulletproof? Student me: That’s nonsense. Then when he visits people the coat rack will topple over and create an awkward social situation. Writer me: Would be nice for surviving drive-by shootings though. Student me: Sometimes I can’t tell if you’re a writer, or a hypothetical murderer who puts it in narrative form. Writer me: Stop teasing. Cosplayer, continue! Cosplayer me: What will block bullets? A flack jacket, thin plates of metal, or chainmail? I don’t know this but I’ll go with thin metal plates so it’s still nice to move in. At most, the plates will change the trajectory of the bullet. I know nothing about guns don’t trust me. Cosplay me: For sewing, I am tempted to adhere the metal to the leather outside of the coat, because leather is sturdy. But that won’t be pretty because the outside of the coat will show bulky outlines. So I’m going for a third layer inside the coat, that will hold the metal plates in place, on the big parts of the body. Chest, area and especially the high collar. 

Roleplayer me: Hey... I want to say something?

Cosplayer me: Each plate would need its own pocket or hook. There ought to be come overlapping. Strips of 10 cm? I should consider the bending of the coat, and seating. Comfort is key. OH HEY actual bulletproof suits exist for people in the diamond industry who go to countries with unrest. That thing has eight layers of white white material between the outer layer and the inner lining. (No price on the website.) OK let’s go with that. Plus the 100 hours minimum that I would put into measuring and cutting and sewing. Thus my verdict is... Cosplayer me: ...-I have no idea how much it costs. 

Diva me: Come on. Boooo.  Writer me: SHUSH EVERYONE. I’m trying to say something!

Diva me: Did you just raise your voice at me?   Roleplayer me: Shush. I am talking! How about for ONCE he ISN’T a creep, but a normal professor who looks pretty and has an odd interest in topic X because he is worried about the world? 

Writer me:  ................................equally valid.

Roleplayer me: Can we go for ‘undecided’? Let’s see what the RP brings? Writer me: Okay, yes, sounds good. I will just write ‘expensive coat.’ All other versions of me:  Uuuugh. Writer me: I want him to be researching it because he has a bionic hand covered by synthetic human tissue, though. Roleplayer me: ....a NORMAL professor. 

Writer me: But I- Roleplayer me: Look at him! Look! Sasuke has this great odd effect on him that he can’t explain yet. That should be his greatest issue. And modelling. And books. Get your own AU. Gee.

Writer me: A new AU. One where Orochimaru made/makes himself immortal by using AI robotic technology alongside with still having human tissue. Yes, yes. So in a later stadium he can upload his mind to computers. (I should watch FF7:DoC) He should be capable of taking over any human as vessel. 

Student me: I hate it when she does the villain laugh. Diva me: It gives me the chills. Cosplayer me: I don’t know... I kinda like it.

#lady vs literature #ooc #lady look

[wishingforatypewriter]

May I request something? I wondered about that matter since Chapter 9 of "On Casual Commitments", since it was brought up there. I was too shy to ask earlier, but I'd really like to know what happened between Yuki and Marui when they met at Polar Star to help Fumio-san moving out. So yes, may I ask for that? I am still enchanted by the two other One Shots you wrote about them and thought I could ask. Have a good day or night :)

Sure! I hope you enjoy it!

Yoshino Yuki woke up in her luxury suite at the Totsuki Imperial hotel. Ah, let’s just take a moment to let that sink in. After her first class, nonstop flight from New York City to Tokyo, Yoshino Yuki—the lifetime lover of all things decadent—had checked in to a room on the top floor of of a five star hotel and did not have to worry about the price!

Sometimes when she missed home or got tired of filming or woke Ryoko at 4 o’clock in the morning because she forgot about the time difference, Yuki wondered whether the cosmopolitan lifestyle she had chased so tirelessly was really worth it. But now with the silk sheets beneath her and the city streets below her and a remote control that could turn day to night in her room, she was sure that she had chosen correctly.

With a click of a button the sunlight was absorbed by dark curtains. That was nice. She stretched and rolled over in bed, hoping to fight the jetlag with a couple more hours of sleep. Her plans were promptly foiled all of fifteen minutes later when her cell phone started ringing.

Yuki groaned, rubbing at her eyes. If it was her producer again she swore she was going throttle him. What part of ‘vacation day’ was so difficult to grasp? “You’ve reached Yoshino Yuki,” she said, trying her best to put on her TV voice despite the ungodly hour.

“Good morning, Yoshino-san. I’m a few minutes away from your hotel, so you can come downstairs.”

Fuuuuuuck. She had completely forgotten that Marui offered to drive her up to campus. She’d gotten so accustomed to taking taxis everywhere. “Ah…um…about that…” She hopped out of bed and started rifling through her luggage for something to wear while simultaneously unpinning her hair rollers. “I’m not quite ready yet, but I should be down in ten minutes.”

“Yoshino-san,” he said, his voice laced with disbelief.

“Okay, twenty minutes,” she conceded, sighing. “A half hour tops. I just overslept so—”

“Figured as much,” he said, and she could almost see him smugly adjusting his spectacles. “Truthfully, I haven’t left my house yet. Do you think you’ll be ready in an hour?”

“Damn it, you almost gave me a heart attack!” Yuki huffed, hands resting on her hips. “That’s so mean of you, Marui.”

“Sorry, I couldn’t resist. You’re always running late, ever since we were in school.”

“Whatever.” Yuki rolled her eyes, annoyed that she had fallen for it. “An hour should be fine, though.”

“I’ll see you then.”

When she finally made it downstairs, wearing oversized sunglasses and a navy jumpsuit from Neiman Marcus, Marui Zenji was waiting for her. She smiled a bit when she saw him in his tweed suit jacket and slacks; he looked more and more like a professor every time they met.

“What are you doing dressing like that to pack boxes?” she asked.

“You’re one to talk,” he said, gesturing at her designer diggs.

“I have an interview later with this really cool magazine,” she explained, blushing a bit. She remembered the first time he’d looked at her like that, when she had gone to a school dance in that silly cherry dress.

“And I have a review session to run,” he said.

Yuki nodded. They were both still busy—the same kind of busy that had broken them up close to a decade ago. “That’s exciting!” She beamed at him. “You’re almost like someone reliable now.”

“What do you mean ‘almost?’”

The drive went by relatively quickly; they chatted amicably about the ambitions that had come between them and the precious godchild they shared.

By the time they made it to the Polar Star, they had fallen into a synthetic version of their old rhythm―her giving him flack and him flipping it back on her. But a sense of hesitation coated their interactions; after all, it would be too easy to fall back into old habits. And that would hardly be appropriate given that he was engaged to be married.

“There you kids are,” Fumio-san said as she ambled out into the hallway.  “You’re late. I’m already halfway done.” And, of course, by halfway done she meant that all the boxes were open, but had nothing in them.

“Fumio-san!” Yuki dashed to hug the old dorm mother, who she hadn’t seen in two years.

“There’s the Hollywood star,” she said. “You know the only reason I kept paying that damn cable bill was to watch your shows.”

“C’mon, that’s not true,” Yuki replied. “You’ve been watching those soap operas since we were in middle school. Right Marui?”

“I can’t remember. Don’t bring me into this.”

Yuki crossed her arms. “That’s so half-assed of you. A man with glasses should be more assertive.”

“Why do you insist on attributing so many characteristics to the fact that I wear glasses?”

“Because it’s true,” she quipped.

He sighed. “On what basis does…” And then they were back to their banter.

Fumio watched them go at it for a few minutes, smiling as she leaned heavily against her cane. “Hey now,” she said finally. “Did you come here to stand around and bicker all day? Start packing up the bookshelf while I make lunch.”

The bookshelf was a wealth of knowledge. Over the years, generations of Polar Star residents had left behind textbooks, recipe books, travel guides, and a host of manga volumes for new cohorts of students. All of these, Fumio-san would be leaving at the dorm. The only thing she would take with her was the yearbooks—one for every class she had nurtured until graduation.

Because they were only human, they stopped to peer into the lives of the famous generations—the Polar Star’s golden age, Shinomiya Koujirou’s class, and naturally their own jewel generation.

“Look at the Elite Ten page,” Marui said after Yuki flipped to it. They were all lined up in front of Totsuki’s Parliament for a group photo, smiling in front of the fresh blossoms.

“They’re all paired up now,” Yuki noted. “Megumi and Takumi, Alice and Kurokiba, Hayama and Hishoko-chi, Yukihira and Erina-chi. It’s so cute.”

“And a little frightening,” Marui replied. “I can only imagine the next generation.”

“Well, that’s your problem now, prof.” Yuki laughed a little bit of the thought of him having to contend with their crazy classmates’ offspring. Then she turned the page to reveal the students’ individual photos. Yuki groaned when she saw her picture. “I was so plain back then.”

“That’s not true,” Marui told her.

“How?” Yuki pointed to yearbook again. “Look at me and then look at Erina-chi, Alice-chi, Nikumi. Compared to them I practically faded into the background.”

“You were always vibrant,” he said. “Even when the people you mentioned were present, it was you that lit up the room every time.”

Yuki smiled a little bit. “Well, you were biased back then.”

Later, she gestured to another page as he was about to turn it, their fingers brushing in the process. “It’s the pregame before senior formal. How did that make it into the yearbook?”

“The better question is how did the pregame make it into my room?” he asked, scowling at the memory.

“I think we convinced you somehow,” Yuki said, grinning as the memories came back to her. “Besides, I helped you clean that time.”

“Literally only because your room was overrun with baby animals and you wanted to crash in there.”

“Details, details.” She waved the comment off. “Anyway, I don’t remember you being upset about my presence there back then.” Now that she thought about it, that night had been special in more ways than one. She turned the page again, trying to change the subject in her own mind. “Remember senior ditch day?”

“I remember carrying you back from the beach because you fell asleep,” he noted.

“Well I remember running up and down the beach to look for your stupid glasses.” In the end, Yuki had narrowly saved them from being pounded with a baseball bat—that watermelon game had always done more harm than good.

They remembered, and they remembered. And the more they remembered the more they forgot how they had ever been able to manage without one another.

They finally reached the photos from the alumni banquet—the event that had changed everything for the 92nd generation. “It’s almost a little bittersweet when you think about it,” she said as she read through the initial career choices of all their classmates. “Hayama and Hishoko-chi were over by the end of the night.”

“Ibusaki and Sakaki found an apartment together by the next day,” he added.

“And Megumi turned down her best offers to follow Yukihira to New York,” Yuki recalled. “Not that she ever told him that.”

“In the end, that’s probably what doomed their relationship,” Marui said somberly. “A sacrifice like that…” He shrugged. It was unimaginable for most people.

“I don’t know,” Yuki said. “From where I’m standing, I still wouldn’t call it a mistake to value a relationship that much. I mean, if I could do everything over…” She trailed off. No. She couldn’t take it there.

Marui suddenly spoke up. “I’d follow you,” he said, pushing his glasses further up his nose. “If I could do it again, I would follow you to Munich, to Prague, wherever.”

“I would stay.”

They let the truth hang between them for a moment, and then neither mentioned it again for the remainder of the visit.

After they finished helping Fumio-san move, Marui dropped her back at her hotel, and they hugged goodbye for a second too long.

“Get home safe, Yoshino-san,” he said. “Text me when your plane lands.”

“Yeah. I will.”

That night the silk beneath her felt distant, cold, and she longed for the cotton quilts of days past.

#shokugeki no soma #maryu #yuki x marui #yuki x zenji #polar star #yoshino yuki #marui zenji