#something about protagonist having to die is like man nothing is ever really happy

[screeching-bunny]

Dark/yandere king x the queen's lady in waiting mc, perhaps with Anne boleyn vibes👑🌹♟️♥️

Saw the witch x priest post and I have to say that the morally grey protagonist is a really refreshing and unique take

Yandere! King pt.2

Warnings: Obsessive Behavior, Yandere Thoughts, Bad Writing, Stalking, Possessive Behavior, Reader is Referred as ‘You’

Pt.1

Even though you were never assigned to him Yandere! King couldn’t help but want to be by his side no matter what. You are the in-waiting for the queen, you’ve been with her for all her life and you adored her. She was strong willed and she was extremely intelligent. You’ve been by her side ever since you were young and have a tight bond with her. She was cold but you were happy to serve someone like her. Yandere! King was someone that people couldn’t be offended easily. When in his presence, everyone needed to watch their tongues if they wanted to keep it. He was a ruthless man who only cared about his own needs and goals. Even though he was married it was clear to see that the marriage was clearly political. There was no love between the two of them and they would almost daily cheat on each other. He sometimes even forgot that she existed. It was due to this loveless marriage that he became so interested in you.

Any normal person would be intimidated by this but you honestly didn’t care. If his attention would help you get a pay raise then let him stare at you all you want. In this economy, there was no way you were letting this money bag go. Something that you noticed about this man was that he was overly possessive and seemingly jealous of the things that he considered “his”. If he remotely took interest in something then it was his until he got bored and discards it. No one is dumb enough to stand in his way; he's cunning, backstabbing, and absolutely brutal. Morality means nothing when faced in his way.

Right now, your current situation was… strange. In a dining hall filled with luxurious food. There was a centerpiece in the middle of the table that no one could take their eyes off of.

“You’re majesty, please let me go! I repent, please forgive me for my sins! Please just don’t kill me!” The man screams with streams of tears pouring down his face. It was quite a pathetic sight to behold.

Yandere! King stared coldly at the man nailed down to the dining table. The look on his face could send shivers down anyone’s spine. He was absolutely pissed off right now. Aside from the man in the middle screaming, the room was filled with absolute silence as everyone held their breath. The tension in the air was thick enough to cut it with a knife.

“Your highness please have mercy on my husband! He didn’t mean to! He wasn’t in the right mind! Please forgive him!” The man’s wife begged.

“Listen to him scream like a pig. He touched someone who belonged to me. A sin like that is unforgivable.” Looking your way the king says in a menacing voice. “Tell me where he touched you.” Oh boy, you knew for sure that this was about to get very bloody. Man you really wanted to leave right now. All you could do was hope that he’d increase your salary pay after this for compensation for having to witness this. Like yeah it sucked that someone was going to die right now but there’s no way that you’re quitting. This job paid way too much and you were way too money hungry to quit.

“Tell me where did he touch you? I’ll make sure to gouge out the exact body parts to match.”

“My cheek, my neck, my waist, and my thigh”

Giving you a dismissive look, the king finally allows you to finally leave. On your way out all you could hear were the screams of the man and the sound of ripping flesh. Thank god that was over, it was starting to get annoying. Now you might be wondering where was the queen in all of this? Well, she was with her lover of course! Like I said, the king and queens marriage was only a political one. As long as they didn’t bother each other or get into the other's business, then they did not care about what the other did. It was just truly a loveless marriage.

Making your way towards the queen’s chambers you begin to perform your daily duties. Mindless tasks that bore you to death. The only reason your pay was so good was because of how fond Yandere! King is of you. Any other person in your position would only get a fraction of your wage. You were a bit thankful for this because if he ever deemed you as boring and fired you. You’d still have enough money to live a fairly decent lifestyle. Something that you’ve learned while working for the royal family was that it was always best to stay away from their personal affairs. It gets real ugly once an outsider ever decides to interfere. You honestly wished you knew this before your parents forced you to sign up for this job. Maybe it would have saved you from an annoying king?

Sometimes he’d hand you little trinkets to indulge yourself in. It seemed that he was quite fond of observing you and witnessing your reaction to new devices. With someone like him running the country most people would think that it’d be in ruins. However, he’s definitely smart and knows how to run a country. It’s thanks to him that his kingdom has one of the best economies in the world.

Even though you were primarily assigned to the queen you saw Yandere! King more than her. To you, he was an obnoxious and dangerous figure. One that can easily win wars and conquer any land he so desires. He is a very selfish man that has a habit of being physically and emotionally manipulative. To be honest you can’t say you were any better. Oftentimes you’d use people to your own benefit but he’d definitely take it to the extreme. The amount of people that he used and discarded was insane. Weakness is a word that seems to be out of his dictionary.You could never tell what exactly he was thinking, he was like an enigma. One thing you were certain about was that with the rate of his obsession he’d never leave you alone.

#yandere #yandere headcanons #yandere imagines #yandere x y/n #yandere x you #yandere scenarios #yandere x darling #yandere x reader #male yandere #yandere king #yandere oc #gn reader

[aceybullets]

what's monster about? and who's the blonde guy from your profile picture?

Thank you very much for that, Pepper. You are too kind. I owe you one.

To put it in a way that is not too extensive, Monster is, essentially, about chasing a threatening serial killer who, to the eyes of the general public, is a “non-existent human being”, because he is constantly changing his identity and killing off most of the individuals who would be aware of his background. This killer is the blond man from my profile picture, and he is mostly known by the main characters as Johan. He is the main antagonist of the series, and the titular “monster”.

Johan was shot in the head when he was 10 years old and, as such, was brought to Eisler Memorial Hospital along with his twin sister, Anna (who, later in the series, is called Nina). Kenzo (who I have the habit of calling him by his surname, Tenma) is the protagonist and also the neurosurgeon in that hospital who chose to operate on him first, disobeying the director's orders in performing a surgery on a political figure, consequently ruining the luxurious life that he was set up for.

9 years passed, and Tenma learns that the boy that he saved turned out to be a serial murderer. Feeling responsible for the lives Johan took throughout all this time, both the doctor and the antagonist's sister make it a priority to pursue Johan and exterminate him, the former doing it as a way to “fix” his mistake.

At the very beginning of the series, you are immediately faced with a moral dilemma: “Are all lives equal?”

It was not until Tenma disobeyed his chief's demands that he realized that life is a precious thing; a thing that no one has the right to take. To him, regardless of origins and status, all lives should be treated as equal.

To Johan, there is nothing special about being alive. We are all going to die anyway, so, why should we bother keep breathing the air of this world? To him, lives are only equal in death. And that is why that, despite being constantly surrounded by neo-nazists, he does not agree with their agenda, and kills people indiscriminately.

He knows that, if the doctor who resurrected him manages to execute him, then, it would imply that he concurs with the statements that lives do not hold the same value. And that is the struggle that Tenma has to deal with.

There are other prominent themes in the series, such as the exploration of the concept of depriving a child of their identity ever since they were born, philosophies like nihilism (something that Johan is the embodiment of), corruption, etc. It is a really dark show with rather mature contents. So, that is why despite enjoying it so much, I am a little hesitant in recommending it to my younger mutuals. However, some of you have shown interest on even if you know that, which makes me really happy, because Monster is relatively obscure.

#[♦️] Inbox #Empathsasuke #🤼

[dukeofriven]

Shang-Chi starts off with a fluid bang, an uptempo fight scene like nothing ever seen in a Marvel film before—and then immediately dies, every scene having less and less energy than the one before it until it collapses into that dullest of Marvel touchstones, the 45-minute climatic battle of muddy CGI to defeat a boring villain (the actual, interesting villain of the film being neutered after the first hour in favour of a vaguer, more nebulous threat of ‘some gross dragon thing I dunno’). The lead is a cipher who walks through the film in a sort of uninterested daze: he starts the movie a badass-combat fighter and finishes the film the same way, having required no personal growth to achieve it, only some extra training of unclear goals since at no time is it clear exactly what his or anyone’s power cars are: he wins and loses the fights at the whim of the narrative rather than exceeding or meeting his skill level. Any entertainment in the film is predicated entirely on how much you do or do not enjoy the comedic stylings of Awkwafina: I had never seen her before this movie, and ended the film loathing her (the film’s dumbest moment may be her learning archery in the course of a few days, despite it never previously being established that she had any physical training at all. As anyone who has ever tried to pull a real bowstring knows, that is not something you can just pick up and pull: a properly strung bow is physically draining to draw, much less draw and aim. The film sets-up that Awkwafina is skilled as a driver: this is then dropped in he second half for, again, the seamless transition from driver to archer.) At the heart of the movie’s weakness is that the film is about a man with a much more interesting female character pushed behind him. Iron Fist was about bland Danny instead of the fantastic Colleen, Ant-man was two hours of hyper-competent Hope being passed over for bumbling dolt Scott (for reasons), Captain Marvel spends at least half its run-time going ;But what’s Nick Fury doing right now—what’s he feeling and thinking and doing let’s really dig in to that,’ both Guardians films saddled poor Gamora with babysitting a bunch of man-children who will not grow up, and Black Widow had to DIE before anyone would give her a movie. And now in Shang-Chi we have a man who ran off to San Francisco and is happy being a car valet meanwhile his sister had to train herself to be a combat master because her father forbade her from learning and then she escaped his evil clutches and had to survive by running and underground fighting ring in Macau: in every way the story is clearly telegraphing that she should be our protagonist because she has so much going on, she has motivation and drive and skill, but instead we keep our focus on a guy who has so little on-screen presence that he’s out-acted by Ben Kingsley funny animal companion who is a small faceless butt. Shang-chi is mediocre and forgettable. Folks who wanted the first Asian-led Marvel flick deserved better than whatever this tedious mess was supposed to be. If you’ve not seen it, don’t bother: it’s not the worst film in the MCU (that’s still a brawl between narratively-terrible Dark World and the technically-incompetent Captain Marvel), but it’s not a movie anyone would ever have a reason to watch twice, except for the soporific powers of watching Simu Liu spend the better part of two hours trying to keep himself awake.

#Shang-Chi #Marvel #Iron Fist #Captain MArvel #Ant-man #MCU #Simu Liu #Awkwafina #archery #Meng'er Zhang

[neveind]

The First Day

This is the first day I try to do this on this app. But it’s not the first time that I try to do this daily journal thing. I have tried to write a novel, but that didn’t work out so well. I guess I just get distracted and forgot about it. I have several little break downs this afternoon and I’m still feeling sad right now, I want to write something down hoping it will make me feel better. I don’t know if I’ll ever read this again, but I tend to write this sort of thing as pretty self loathing and embarrassing and hard to read (like those kind of instagram post you would delete after. Ps I have a diary in middle school and it’s fucking embarrassing to read and I tried to burn it but it wouldn’t burn), so probably not. Or probably I won’t write on here ever again.

The cause of everything is the failure of the final presentation I guess? After I got several unfriendly comments on the bus from my teammate this semester, I got back home and listened to welcome to my island in bed. It seems like I realized something, and I can’t hold it together anymore. I begin to cry in silence, after that I got up and started to watch Licorice Pizza and eating from a box of cookie. And when the scene of the protagonists first time having dinner together, oh no, it’s the scene where he treated his brother so nice, I realized I have literally nobody in my life, and I began to have a breakdown. I threw the cookie back to the box and I began quivering, the bitterness spread from the throat. I didn’t notice chronic pharyngitis makes my throat hurt when crying. Or it’s just always feels that way. After that I had another two little breakdowns. For dinner I cooked noodle with Pesto and Lachs. It’s kind of addicting because I have been eating this for 4 evenings.



I did a lot of self loathing and self reflection in my head. I am insensitive and unfocused. I am weak. I might be evil. I think I’m a good man, but the evil side never left me. I want genuine connections but I kept pushing everyone in my life away. I don’t know what to talk when I’m in front of strangers. I always think I’m interesting, but I’m actually boring and have nothing to say. I’m only speaking other people’s words. I’m no better than the people that I hate, and i can’t even really admit that deep down.



Am I smart?  Maybe in some things. But I’m literally fucking stupid in everything else. Am I talented? Maybe not enough to make a living out of it.



I hate the way I look. I can’t even look into a mirror or reflective surface in public. I hate where I come from. I don’t like my parents. I hate the things they did to me and I did to them. But in the end I am really my mother’s child. I am just another her in the world with slightly stronger nerves. Maybe it’s a curse, it’s in my bones.



I’m never a happy person. The feeling of isolation and otherness haunted me since I was a child. I remember being carefree as I was maybe 10? But the feeling of sadness and frustration took over me when I’m like 11 and not ever disappeared ever since. When I was a child I used to always think I won’t be able to live past adolescence because I secretly believed that I have a very big disease and it would eventually take my life. But I’m still living today so I guess that’s a win?  Well, but today I have other reasons to believe I might die a much more violent death: I will eventually lose my mind. Or die of self harm or depression. I have that thought less now. But when I do, I just can’t help feeling so so sad for myself.



I have nobody in my life. Or did I really have a life? Everything feels like a blur. I feel like a ghost. I don’t know what to do.



In less than 4 months I will be 24. I remember my mother had me when she was 24. It was 1999, a year before the new century. Was she full of hope? Was the world busy celebrating the new millennium? Do they realize the intrinsic frustration of life itself even back then?



Today is February 7th, 2023. It’s 23:33 now. I think I’m going to bed.

[etrobeauty]

Inspired by the endings of KH3 and Tales of Xillia 2.

AU where Lightning ends up sacrificing herself. So Bhunivelze and the chaos is sealed in the realm, but not for long. Her vessel must act as the seal to lock the forces and to guard the new world from corruption. There is a price to pay as the saying is. The price being her own soul. Sleeping eternally to seal anymore chaos from expanding. So her looking at her companions and muttering her last words “it’s time” just brings such a bittersweet thought. Everyone else will be reborn in this new world. Except for her.

#i edited that gif and looked at that scene so many times #and then i started watching Xillia 2 and KH3 ending like #why do I do this to myself #hey maybe in her afterlife she meets Sora or someone. WhO kNoWs #she dies protecting the new world. so that's the theory of this AU. #maybe that she's somehow containing Caius soul while being seal pact? #;____; #I just love that look and smile she does like. #how much I love her so emphasized here #Xillia 2 cause remember in the true ending. Ludger goes away #something about protagonist having to die is like man nothing is ever really happy

[hakasims]

The Most Important Review of Every Single Marwan Kenzari Film

If you’ve seen this one about Luca, you know the drill.

Now, Marwan’s brand is a little less defined than Luca’s but I managed to find similar tropes in a lot of his films. Also, rather than copy myself and give you a redundant Marwanmeter, I decided instead to recommend which Luca character best pairs with each Marwan character for your crossover pleasure. Let’s see if we ship the same things! Some of them are crack. You’re welcome.

(all gifs again by the awesomely amazing @weardes​ who did not ask to be my gif factory but life’s a bitch)

Het zusje van Katia (2008)

Will you miss him if you blink? Kinda. They talk about him a lot but his actual screen time is like 43.7 seconds. Also can I just say... he’s supposed to be from Italy?? The boy says literally one (1) Italian word, and you’ll never guess what it is. (Obviously, it’s “bella” like there’s a chance he could’ve said anything else.)

Is he hot? Painfully hot.

Is he naked? There’s this one scene where he’s wearing the sluttiest pair of speedos I’ve ever seen in my entire life.

Does his hair look great? Actually, yes. Perfect hair, perfect beard, he looks amazing.

Does he fuck? Yes, a lot - off screen, including an M/M/F threesome he presumably, probably, most definitely initiated.

Best paired with? From what I’ve gathered, this hoe ain’t loyal, so the best course of action is to find him a Luca that would benefit from a one night stand with no strings attached and wouldn’t fall in love with him. The obvious choice here is Valerio from Slam - Tutto per una ragazza. They meet, they fuck, then Giac makes his 4-hour drive back to Pisa, and they don’t see each other again until the next time he’s in Rome. Everybody’s happy, especially the two sluts in question.

De laatste dagen van Emma Blank (2009)

Will you miss him if you blink? Yes, absolutely.

Is he hot? Very.

Is he naked? Almost constantly.

Does his hair look great? He’s got those cute short curls, he looks so good.

Does he fuck? That’s literally why he’s there: to fuck and to die.

Best paired with? Man, I wish I had something to work with here. The only thing we know about him besides his sexual prowess is his affinity for white suits and toy helicopters. And as far as I know, those might be the exact things Fabrizio from Nina finds hot in guys. So like, why not?

Loft (2010)

Will you miss him if you blink? He’s the fifth most important character.

Is he hot? Yeah, sure.

Is he naked? There’s a scene where he’s wearing underwear and a tank top but it somehow makes him look like a kindergartener.

Does his hair look great? It looks quite nice.

Does he fuck? Yes, though I wish he didn’t.

Best paired with? Tom is a very violent person and a drug addict. He does messed up stuff to his sexual partners I’d rather he didn’t do to any of Luca’s characters. Feel free to use him for your sadistic fantasies or as a villain or whatever.

Rabat (2011)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s one of the three leads.

Is he hot? Oh yes! And cute!

Is he naked? He’s at the beach wearing nothing but boxer shorts.

Does his hair look great? He’s got this extreme undercut thing that would look ridiculous on anyone less pretty, so like no, he doesn’t have great hair, but also like it’s Marwan, you know what I mean?

Does he fuck? Before he embarks on a road trip with his friends, he has an offscreen threesome with two girls he picked up at a wedding. Slut.

Best paired with? Gabriele from Waves. They’re both sweet guys who could meet in some Tunisian port and decide to sail the Mediterranean Sea together.

Black Out (2012)

Will you miss him if you blink? Not unless your blinking is very deliberate.

Is he hot? Not really. He’s a dirty cop with a shitty moustache and oral fixation.

Is he naked? No, but I wish he was: his clothes are awful. Marwan is 29 in this movie and he looks 50!

Does his hair look great? Nope. They took Marwan’s usual short hair and made it not work somehow.

Does he fuck? No.

Best paired with? The one thing Luca’s characters all have in common is that none of them come off as bootlickers. All of them are either too soft for such a relationship or wouldn’t waste their spit on a cop.

Wolf (2013)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s the protagonist.

Is he hot? *gestures wildly at the gif*

Is he naked? He’s got quite a few shirtless scenes.

Does his hair look great? It’s nothing special but suits his character well.

Does he fuck? Oh yes.

Best paired with? Hear me out. I know that some people ship him with Fabio, but in my opinion that pair, while hot, doesn’t work. Here’s my pitch: Cesare from Non essere cattivo. The drug connection is still there, but in this case Majid’s problem-solving skills won’t fall on deaf ears. Cesare needs a daddy, ok? Majid can be a daddy when he needs to, especially when he has a soft boyfriend to care for. And Majid needs soft, not psycho.

Hartenstraat (2014)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s the protagonist once again.

Is he hot? Painfully.

Is he naked? There’s that iconic scene where he’s wearing nothing but black boxer briefs and boots while carrying a tray...

Does his hair look great? He’s got Joe-like curls and looks like what every male romantic lead should aspire to look like and then cry because they all fail.

Does he fuck? There’s one very unfortunate sex scene played for laughs. I’m pretty sure he’ll need therapy afterwards. I certainly do.

Best paired with? Paolo from Il padre d’Italia. Paolo deserves the best boyfriend, and who’s better than Daan, an extremely hot man who cooks? They both have daughters, so they can talk about that, I guess, and Paolo can finally have a family. Honestly, this is so wholesome I just made myself cry.

Lucia de B. (2014)

Will you miss him if you blink? For sure.

Is he hot? He’s a cop. Again. But he looks good.

Is he naked? Fully dressed, but man are his clothes ugly. Is that a cop thing?

Does his hair look great? He has slightly longer curls, which is fine and the best thing about this character.

Does he fuck? ACAB. (I know this doesn’t answer the question, I just wanted to make it clear.)

Best paired with? See my bootlicker comment from earlier. While Detective *checks notes* Ron Leeflang isn’t explicitly corrupt, he’s obviously a dick, so the best I can do here is recommend any Luca character that has ever been in trouble with the law for any fics about power imbalance you want to write but aren’t comfortable with a nice Marwan playing the villain.

Bloedlink (2014)

Will you miss him if you blink? Oh no, he’s there the entire time.

Is he hot? In a weird way, yes.

Is he naked? So, so, so naked. Like, leave nothing to the imagination naked.

Does his hair look great? I’d say that little rat tail is the exact opposite of great.

Does he fuck? Probably more than is good for him. I should also add that he’s canonically queer in this.

Best paired with? Rico is a pathetic loser in need of someone who’s got his life together and has a lot of experience dealing with fuckups. Enter Loris from Il mondo fino in fondo. He has a stable job and a savior complex, and with his little bro gaying it up in Chile and not needing him anymore, all he wants right now is someone to fix. I should be a fucking matchmaker in real life, for real.

Pak van mijn hart (2014)

Will you miss him if you blink? Undoubtedly.

Is he hot? No. The whole point of his character is to be the lesser choice compared to a guy who looks like a completely ordinary bland white dude...

Is he naked? ...so of course he isn’t naked! What, are they gonna take this poor woman, show her Marwan Kenzari’s post-Wolf body and expect her to choose her deeply mediocre ex? Please! They’re gonna dress him in the dorkiest clothes possible...

Does his hair look great? ...and make him wear the most awful wig that was clearly run over by a truck.

Does he fuck? No. As you can observe, they tried really hard to make him unfuckable, but honestly, he seems like a perfectly nice guy.

Best paired with? You know what? Mattia from La solitudine dei numeri primi is in desperate need of some sweetness and normalcy. I’m sure Richard will treat him with kindness and respect.

Collide (2016)

Will you miss him if you blink? He’s the fifth most important character. Out of five.

Is he hot? Very hot.

Is he naked? Not for a second! What’s up with American movies where people aren’t just casually walking around naked without any plot necessity???

Does his hair look great? His curls are so cute you guys! Look at them!

Does he fuck? Not explicitly.

Best paired with? Fabio from Lo chiamavano Jeeg Robot. Again, the drug connection is there, but Matthias is soft enough not to butt heads with Fabio and, by the end of the movie, rich enough to satisfy his cravings for good living and fame. Also look at how good their color coordination is with those dark wine red clothes! Sometimes planets just align, okay?

Ben-Hur (2016)

Will you miss him if you blink? Yes, especially if you aren’t watching the background.

Is he hot? Your usual Marwan hot.

Is he naked? No.

Does his hair look great? His typical short curls with a twist. I think the forehead area is supposed to invoke the Caesar cut? I don’t know. It looks fine when not hidden under that dumb helmet.

Does he fuck? No.

Best paired with? A better script and a much better director. (Seriously, what is this blocking?)

The Promise (2016)

Will you miss him if you blink? He’s there a decent amount in the first half of the movie and then almost completely disappears in the second half.

Is he hot? Very much, yes.

Is he naked? Unfortunately, no.

Does his hair look great? He’s got short curls again, but this time they’re fashionably styled, it’s magnificent.

Does he fuck? Oh yeah! And there’s no way he isn’t bi or pan in this. No way.

Best paired with? Roberta from L’ultimo terrestre. Listen, Emre Ogan may be a slut but he’s a gentleman, okay? He’d treat Roberta right and he’s got daddy’s cash to spare on hundreds of gorgeous white dresses for her.

The Mummy (2017)

Will you miss him if you blink? He’s there, but barely.

Is he hot? Dangerously hot.

Is he naked? Not once! Instead we get a naked Tom Cruise literally no one asked for.

Does his hair look great? It’s your basic professional short hairdo.

Does he fuck? No.

Best paired with? Malik is a member of an organization tracking and destroying various monsters and historical artefacts related to them. Guido from Tutti i santi giorni speaks four languages, including Latin, and is a literature and ancient history nerd which makes him a valuable asset. Malik can fight and protect; Guido is bumbling and in need of saving. Guys, this writes itself.

What Happened to Monday (2017)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, especially not in the third act.

Is he hot? He’s okay.

Is he naked? Very naked.

Does his hair look great? They shouldn’t have greased his curls back. He looks like another victim of Fabio Cannizzaro’s stylist. Also I wish he’d either shaved or finished growing out that beard.

Does he fuck? He fucks and he fucks good. He’ll go down on you, he’ll deflower you slowly and gently, he’ll choke you if you want him to, he’ll spoon you all night, he’ll give you emotional support, he’ll murder people for you - he’s down for whatever.

Best paired with? There’s one Luca character who needs a lot of sex and even more emotional support. Alright, most of them do, but I’m thinking of Ettore from Lasciate andare. He needs it, okay? Good dicking, good spooning, a good ear, a fine piece of ass to cry into - you get the gist. Most importantly: someone who’d love him for who he is and with whom he could relax and be himself. (Also, I see you, people comparing him to Fabio. Shame on you for sleeping on this soft boy and judging him based on his appearance.)

Murder on the Orient Express (2017)

Will you miss him if you blink? He’s kinda always present, being very French.

Is he hot? Very hot.

Is he naked? No, but I’m willing to forgive that because he looks so good in his conductor uniform.

Does his hair look great? He never takes off his hat.

Does he fuck? No.

Best paired with? Mickey Miranda. They’re both murderers morally dubious characters who would look hot together. What else do you need? (Again, I see you, people who want Pierre for Roberta because he’s a “nice guy”, and I know for a fact you didn’t watch the movie. Spoilers, I guess.)

The Angel (2018)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s the protagonist.

Is he hot? Oh yes.

Is he naked? Not once, but you won’t regret it because he’s wearing excellently stylish 1970s clothes.

Does his hair look great? It looks fantastic. The sideburns (not yet seen here) are a good touch.

Does he fuck? He can definitely get it, but he’s loyal to his wife.

Best paired with? As the most aesthetically coherent and fashionably hot pair in this post, Ashraf and Primo are a no-brainer. Can you imagine Primo calling him “Angel” in different contexts? When he’s being intimidating, not realizing how palpable the sexual tension between them is, and later not even hiding his arousal? Sometimes things just work because they’re hot. That’s all, folks.

Aladdin (2019)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s the main villain.

Is he hot? It’s not like he went viral for being the “hot Jafar” or anything.

Is he naked? No! Fucking thanks a lot, Disney.

Does his hair look great? He has a buzz cut under that turban but he looks good in the turban, so that’s something.

Does he fuck? It’s a Disney movie, so he doesn’t fuck - explicitly or otherwise - but he still comes off as a thirsty bitch.

Best paired with? Jafar ends the movie as a genie who’s obligated to grant his master three wishes but is enough of a petty bitch to exploit the hell out of the “gray area” and screw them over Wishmaster style. My unconventional pair for him is Lui from Ricordi? So many scenarios with distorted memories and magic-induced mindfuck. So many possibilities for awesome and messed up crossover gifsets! Don’t say I never give you guys anything.

Instinct (2019)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, he’s very prominent.

Is he hot? I hate myself for finding him hot but I do.

Is he naked? He’s playing basketball shirtless in one scene, shaking his sweaty boobs everywhere.

Does his hair look great? His weird mohawk-like thing is honestly terrible, but if anything can make it work, it’s Marwan’s bone structure.

Does he fuck? Um, I’m pleading the Fifth on this one for the sake of good taste.

Best paired with? Prison. A very lonely, Luca-less prison.

The Old Guard (2020)

Will you miss him if you blink? No, unless blinking in your case means sleeping through the gloriousness that is the first ever canonically gay couple in an American action film.

Is he hot? Painfully.

Is he naked? Shirtless in one scene.

Does his hair look great? Soft curls courtesy of Luca Marinelli’s tireless lobbying.

Does he fuck? Not on screen, but you can just tell by the way he looks at his husband and reads impromptu poetry right to his face. And everybody knows nothing kindles the fires of passion quite like murdering homophobes together.

Best paired with? If you have to ask, you’re clearly reading this by mistake. In which case, kudos for finishing such a long and confusing post, now go watch The Old Guard and cry at the beauty that is The Immortal Marriage.

#marwan kenzari #luca marinelli #the old guard #and other movies #i'm lazy #immortal husbands #and their parallel versions i guess #crossover ships galore

[simplyotometrash]

The favorite places the bros like to kiss?

Their Favorite Places to Kiss

we gonna exclude the lips because we don’t take the easy way out

Lucifer:

Luci loves to give temple kisses. 

They’re soft and sweet, oftentimes done when you least expect it.

He might be the Dad of the group but he can have a fun side, too.

He likes catching you off guard by kissing the side of your head out of the blue.

If he notices you are getting anxious, he will press his lips to your temple and let them linger for a few moments.

These are such comforting moments between the two of you, there’s just something special about them.

Nothing can change them.

These moments mostly happen in the confines of the house or when you’re needing comfort at RAD. 

He will also press these delicate kisses to your temple when out for dinner so long as you’re sitting next to him.

He might be the eldest brother and the Avatar of Pride but even he has a soft side to him.

It’s a side of him reserved for you. No one else gets to know that side like you do.

And that’s the way he likes it.

Mammon:

Two places with Mammon.

Firstly, he likes to leave kisses on your neck and ears. 

Definitely nibbles at your ears while he does it.

But the neck is easy access and perfect for leaving bites and hickeys. He has to let everyone know that you belong to The Great Mammon!

But his neck kisses can also be quite gentle.

When you’re laying in bed together, he leaves light kisses against your neck and your ear. Then he’s able to whisper his true feelings, the things he doesn’t want to admit around his brothers.

His other favorite that ties neck/ear kisses? Belly kisses!

He loves kissing your stomach unexpectedly, mostly when you’re in the house, because he pulls your shirt up, leaves a kiss, and then blows a raspberry before taking off in a full sprint!

He can’t help but enjoy being a total doofus. It makes you laugh and smile.

That’s really all he wants. You’re his treasure. Your smile is more precious than Grimm.

Levi:

Once he’s sure you’re okay with him kissing you without asking for permission, he really likes kissing your hands.

He saw it in an anime, okay! The protagonist was a knight and kissed his love interest’s hand and it made them swoon so he wanted to try it with you!

Seeing you laugh and smile made him decide that it was his favorite.

He knew you weren’t laughing at him because you told him over and over how cute you thought it was.

He will never, ever do it out in public. Unless he’s out as the Grand Admiral of Hell’s Navy or in cosplay. 

He takes his role in Hell’s Navy very seriously and thinks it’s like an anime moment when he gets to depart, leaving you with a kiss to your hand and a promise he will be back soon.

Even though he’s literally just going to be gone for the weekend. 

When you do well at a video game or beat him, he kisses your hands in congratulations before you kiss him on the mouth.

Sometimes, when he feels bold enough, he will kiss your hand while you two are walking about the house hand-in-hand. He only wishes he were that bold out in public.

Baby steps, though. He will get there. If not because he wants to then because he wants to see the look on your face.

Satan:

We are not going back to hand-kissing territory bitches. He would be a hand kisser though.

Satan is a man of class and keeps it simple. He loves to kiss you on the cheek.

It’s a small act and it’s effective.

Plus you tend to turn at the last second to lock lips with him instead, which is an added bonus.

But he can give you a quick kiss on the cheek when reading or just about anywhere, really.

He knows it isn’t the most romantic of places he could kiss you but he finds something wonderful about its simplicity.

Especially when you return the favor or take to surprising him with cheek kisses.

To which you’ve started a war. He can and will kiss you on the cheek at a time that is guaranteed to make your face heat up. It turns into a game of who can embarrass the other one.

He feels free and genuinely happy. It’s such an innocent act, he feels almost like a kid with how innocent it is.

Nothing can sully the purity of that act between you two.

He will melt into a puddle though if you kiss his cheek randomly while he’s talking to his brothers.

Especially Lucifer. 

Asmo:

Nose kisses all the way! 

Like with Satan, there’s something inherently innocent about just lightly kissing the tip of your nose.

It’s so genuine and cute that he could die!

Trading nose kisses becomes a little ritual between the two of you.

You don’t kiss on the lips when first waking up, for example, instead you kiss one another on the tips of your noses. And then it turns into lip kisses.

He loves to tap you on the nose and follow it up by kissing where he tapped. It’s his way of booping your nose.

He isn’t shy about it in public either. He can and will kiss you on the nose in public, no matter who is there to see!

The purity of this act isn’t lost on him either. He thinks it’s the most wonderful thing because there’s nothing he wants more than to love and be loved. He craves physical affection and this way is more addicting than anything else.

Just the little touches. The nose kisses, rubbing noses together, resting foreheads together. He loves it all.

Your forehead is his other favorite place to kiss because of this reason.

It fulfills his true lust. The desire to love someone and be loved in return. 

There’s nothing more he wants than that.

Beel:

He likes kissing your wrists. Pure and simple. Your wrists are his favorite place to kiss.

He can feel your pulse pretty well through the pulse points on each wrist. 

He finds that so reassuring. 

Considering he holds your hand when he sleeps if he wakes up from a nightmare the first thing he does is kiss your wrist and let his lips linger until he’s sure he isn’t imagining your pulse.

He needs to be sure you’re still alive and well.

Then he proceeds to hug you into his chest and go back to sleep.

Beel doesn’t hesitate to pull your hand up to him when you’re out and about together, either. He will kiss those points on your wrists literally anytime and anywhere.

He might be shy but he doesn’t see any point in hiding something he likes.

He’s not ashamed or embarrassed about it. He’s quite public just like Asmo is.

But it’s a big comfort thing for him. He gets nervous when he doesn’t see you for long periods of time at RAD, so he kisses your wrist as soon as he sees you again. It just brings him that sense of security.

He will absolutely melt if you do the same back to him.

It’s so precious he could die!

Belphie:

Lazy boy here is a collarbone kisser.

He finds something quite appealing about kissing your collarbone.

Also, it’s just very easy to get to if you two are just lazing about in bed. He tends to sleep on top of you so you can’t go anywhere.

Like Mammon, he doesn’t shy away from leaving bites and hickeys wherever his mouth can reach on and around your collarbone just to ensure everyone knows not to mess with you if he doesn’t want to get out of bed.

Belphie isn’t a big PDA person so the fact that it’s not an easy place to kiss out in public is no bother to him.

Why would he give two shits about where he can kiss you in public? 

If he’s going to kiss you in public then it is going to be on the mouth to be extra certain that the other demons that see you know they better think twice before even approaching you.

So of course, collarbone kisses are quite private.

His own collarbone is quite sensitive and he will have to hold in laughter if you try to do the same to him.

He wishes it were sensitive in a sexy way but all you get is laughter out of him if you try. 

He tries to stifle it for you because he thinks it’s adorable that you want to do the same thing to him. 

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me headcanons #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon #obey me levi #obey me satan #obey me asmo #obey me beel #obey me belphie

[galaxina-the-pyro]

So I'm kinda curious, what is your "Like Father, Like Son" Au?

Oh my...I was honestly afraid someone was gonna ask me this, but I kinda wanna answer it so...yeah. X'D

The AU started off as a "Doof is Phineas' dad" fan fic that evolved into something else entirely...sort of. Doof's not Phineas' BIO dad in this AU to put it simply - that just wouldn't make sense for the story I've written for it.

Basically, the AU takes place in "another 2nd Dimension" - the 2nd Dimension with the 2D cast still exists, this just takes place on another route (because I doubt that the number of dimensions is that finite if the movie is to be believed). Kinda like @lyllaotterofhalfworld's Platydad AU, everyone there is kinda the opposite of their canon counterparts, only I take a different approach.

Phineas is the main protagonist of this AU - he is an orphaned/abandoned little ragamuffin that Doofenshmirtz and Schnitzel ended up taking in after finding him in a dumpster. He is creative and fun-loving much like the Phineas we know, but has a much more destructive way of going about it, often choosing to blow stuff up than build something in particular (though he CAN build things and has - his favorite part is just the demolition). He's a little troublemaker who likes to break rules, worldly possessions, and starts some fires here and there. He's also inhumanely strong and indestructible, with boundless amounts of near-unhealthy optimism. He can be pretty selfish and a brat, often at odds with the people who took him in, but ultimately is very caring towards others in spite of his more unstable tendencies. He's an adventurous daredevil that is incredibly extroverted.

Doofenshmirtz is the deuteragonist, and much like in the 2nd Dimension, he is a dictator (though his reign goes far beyond just the 2nd Dimension). He is almost nothing like his counterpart - rarely cracks jokes or smiles, is very no-nonsense, and is incredibly intimidating - it's also very clear that while he never wanted to be a dictator, he is the only reason why the inhabitants of Danville have not been killed by their own hubris. He's often the straight man to everyone else's insanity, though he too is quite the character, often displaying the same kind of reckless behavior and Phineas (and even somewhat encouraging it). He tends to keep people at arms length, but cares a lot for Phineas and Schnitzel's well-being and happiness. He lost both Charlene and Vanessa in a blimp accident and was never the same ever since. He also has a softer side when it comes to animals, stating that they're easier to understand than most people. Though he often is fine with Phineas' antics, he's equally overprotective of him.

Schnitzel (my OC) is the tritagonist, and is Doof's righthand (wo)man. She's a medical professional who's in charge of multiple factions of DEI, and is always stressed and suffers from high levels of anxiety. Always having to keep an eye on Phineas and to make sure Doofenshmirtz doesn't feel like being an idiot, she's often the voice-of-reason, or at least tries to be, her fear often driving most of her decisions. She is incredibly motherly, but can be very blunt and violent when provoked to rage. The universe seems to absolutely hate her, seeing as she's often the target of a lot of the slapstick in the AU. She's Doofenshmirtz's love interest and closest friend, being incredibly loyal to him and Phineas, as well as to Charlene even after she died. In spite of being the universe's punching bag, she often comes through when the call to action arises.

The AU centers on these three dealing with multiple antagonistic forces such as the OWCA, a "heroic" organization that experiments on animal agents to take on DEI (led by Monogram, the man that supposedly was responsible for Charlene and Vanessa's deaths), The Resistance, a group of teens bent on overthrowing Doofenshmirtz by any means necessary (that's also lead by Phineas' older sister, Candace, who very much hates him and is sadly blinded by anger to see that she's not being reasonable), and even LOVEMUFFIN, the very organization that rules over most of the planet that Doofenshmirtz and Schnitzel both work for. They also deal with a bunch of misadventures as well, some typical familial drama, that kinda stuff.

A lot of the times Isabella, Phineas' best friend/crush (the boy just...loves her so very much, he can't even, if only she frigging knew, come on, it's so obvious), will tagalong on these adventures along with the likes of Ferb (who is NOT Phineas' stepbrother in this, but is considered his OTHER best friend - really, Ferb is trying to assassinate Doofenshmirtz for Candace, but grows attached to the very annoying triangular redhead), Buford, Baljeet, Irving, Django, and the Homicide Girls (the Fireside Girls of this AU). There's more to them as well, but that's about the gist of it.

Phineas also has a hamster named Freddie (ala @sortofcaffeinateddoodles) instead of Perry - I'm not actually entirely sure what Perry's role IS in this AU, anymore. He's definitely THERE, I'm just not sure what his relationship is with everyone else, or even if he's a good guy or a bad guy. Freddie's fun - he's got a knife. No one knows where he got it from, but he has one, and Doofenshmirtz and Schnitzel are concerned.

This is mostly a very self-indulgent AU, that I guarantee is not for everyone - especially since I portray certain characters like Candace and Linda in particular in a very bad light, some characters like Vanessa are dead/are probably gonna die, and the fact that there are OCs in this story, blahblahblah. Oh. And they cuss a LOT - this isn't a kid friendly AU. I do plan on writing a fic where the canon-verse meets this AU, cuz I feel like it would be interesting for the characters to interact. Though I already do that with @lyllaotterofhalfworld, and our three-way AU where her AU, my AU, and the canon-verse Phineases all interact and stuff, and it's great and I wanna do more of that.

#phineas and ferb #pnf #pnf au #like father like son #like father like son au #lfls #lfls au #phineas flynn #dr heinz doofenshmirtz #alice schnitzel #oc #fan character #self indulgent au #this is my baby and i will cherish it #not the 'doof is phineas' father' au but it's inspired by the concept #fair warning #and yes they all need therapy #like a lot of it #yes even Phineas he's got a lot to deal with #this AU might as well be called 'holy shit everyone has issues with coping with stuff where is that psychologist when you need him' #also there's a lot of phinabella and aliceshmirtz in this ngl

[dontcallmecarrie]

No Hero [And Not Made Of Stone]

...I’ve got nothing. Not even sure where the idea came from, but as per usual, the moment my brain had an idea it immediately took it by both hands and ran with it so here you go. Name for this AU might change, but for now here have another song lyric [from Five Finger Death Punch’s “Wrong Side of Heaven”]

Fandom: Marvel Cinematic Universe

Warnings: mild profanity, dysfunctional families, a metric buttload of gender and identity issues, because the protagonist is a possibly agender character [their stance on gender can be summed up as “huh, those parts are new. Weird. Moving on”]. Not exactly Tony-friendly at times, but not for the reasons you’d think. 

To sum up: haven’t done a SI-OC fic before, let’s see how it goes. Under the cut, because RIP mobile users otherwise.

.

Justin Hammer’s name wasn’t always Justin Hammer.

He doesn’t really remember what it was anymore, but he knows that much.

.

Honestly? This ‘memories of another world’ thing was more a pain in the ass than anything else, at least at first.

It might’ve been cool if they remembered something useful— concrete dates, specific innovations, hell, even any tips of what stocks to invest in— but no, they had to get short end of the stick with weird dreams, identity crises, and a longing for a family they’d never had.

Oh, and another round of puberty, because of why the hell not. Like last time hadn’t been enough of a pain in the ass.

Ugh. They wanted a refund.

.

...okay, so it probably could’ve been worse. 

Justin has vague recollections of going to sleep hungry, of huddling with their younger sibling under blankets because their parents couldn’t pay the electrical bill— so really, in the great scheme of things, being born as part of the 1% this round was. Something.

Trippy as hell, is what it was, honestly.

This family was loaded, and under other circumstances, they might’ve even been able to enjoy it— if, y’know, they hadn’t had the incredibly shitty luck of being born two years before Tony Stark.

.

“Look at what he’s doing, that could be you” this, “study hard, he’s going to be your rival” that— geez, if any other kid had been in Justin’s shoes, he would not have envied them. 

If he didn’t already have a firmly established sense of self, it would have been a mindfuck of a childhood because for some reason, his father kept comparing them? And yeah, Justin could kinda see some of the parallels— they were about the same age, both firstborn sons and heirs to their parents’ respective companies— but that’s about where the similarities ended.

Look, Justin wasn’t a genius, okay? He was fairly bright for his age, but...he wasn’t a one-in-a-million prodigy. And, up until he was 6, that had been acceptable.

But then the press went wild because oh, look, Howard’s son built a circuit board at age four, and it all went downhill from there because suddenly, being normal wasn’t good enough. Not for his parents, anyway.

.

Sometimes, he wondered what would’ve happened if it had been another kid in his shoes— how they would’ve handled the small army of private tutors and the extra classes they kept being signed up for in the hopes of finding something they excelled in.

The pressure of constantly being compared to a once-in-a-generation prodigy, and always being found wanting.

Justin wasn’t afraid of hard work— but it was grating, even for him. 

Really, just about the only silver lining to this ‘second life’ thing was his adorable little sister, Stephanie.

She, at least, looked up to him: her gap-toothed smile didn’t hold any expectations for anything other than the piggyback rides he regularly offered, and this time he didn’t even have to worry about medical bills, or—

Anyway.

.

His family and the Starks run in the same social circles, because of course they do. 

Now that he’s getting older, Justin’s being dragged along to all of the fancy shindigs with his parents, and it’s only due to two lifetimes’ worth of self-control that keeps his polite smile from wavering when he’s introduced to the bane of his existence.

“Hi, my name’s Tony Stark.” The little brat said, and Justin bit back a sigh as he shook his hand.

.

...so, the Stark heir his father wanted to be his rival was a kid. Actually a kid, which just made this mess that much more pathetic because part of Justin had almost been starting to want to buy into this rivalry thing, but.

In this life, and the last one, they’d been an older sibling.

This time, despite everything, he could tell he was softer— he had never gone to bed hungry, never had to worry about the roof over his head, or being solely responsible for his younger sibling’s health and safety— but.

Old habits die hard. 

.

Of course Justin’s father hears “the Starks are sending their seven-year-old heir to boarding school” and thinks “good idea, why didn’t I think of that?” 

Of course.

Of fucking course.

Steph had cried when they’d packed their things, and for that alone, Justin would never forgive their parents.

.

The other brats at boarding school are more invested in the Hammer-Stark rivalry than they are.

...this was going to be a long 9 years, wasn’t it.

.

One of the perks to going to one of the most elite boarding schools in the world was the options. Certainly, Justin doubted other places offered skiing and fencing and over eleven languages in their electives. 

Not that he was complaining: it was definitely a way to keep busy, certainly much better than the constant attempts at one-upmanship that came part and parcel with cramming the richest heirs, heiresses, and honest-to-goodness royalty in one place. 

At the end of the day, though, they were all kids. Bratty, entitled little shits who were still at the stage where they constantly went “my father will hear about this!” and Justin had way better things to do with his time than engage in those petty little playground attempts at power plays. 

So he dove into everything the school had to offer, bouncing from elective to elective like a ping pong ball, and trying not to think too hard as to why Spanish had come so easily to him, though he’d never studied it before— or why he’d felt a pang when the instructor had congratulated him on his accent. 

.

Somewhere down the line, Justin...kinda made a name for himself? Apparently?

Ugh, they’d never understand these people. 

.

Okay, so apparently he’d kinda become an older brother figure of sorts to the brats around here? Somehow? Even though he hadn’t exactly been planning on doing anything of the sort when he saw an underclassman struggling during practice, or stopped fights before they could start in the common room because he’d just sat down and didn’t have the patience to move all his stuff somewhere else to study.

Didn’t make sense to him, but apparently it was enough for some of the professors to write ‘good leadership skills’ on his transcripts, so whatever.

As a bonus, it made his old man happy. Not that Justin gave a damn about what he thought about him personally, but the increase in his ‘allowance’ [it was in the triple digits, like hell he was calling it that] was nice.

.

Among the hobbies Justin bounced between, there were a few that raised more eyebrows than others.

Knitting, for instance, was something some of the more annoying brats liked to laugh about. They eased up when they found out he sent the scarves and hats he made to his little sister, but... eh, whatever. 

Sewing, too— apparently it was okay if it was framed as a Boy Scout-esque ‘know the basics so you can always be prepared!’ way, but the moment he did any sort of embroidery there went his respectability. 

Well, at least nobody gave him a hard time about cooking. But then, his chilaquiles had some of these guys’ eyes watering just from the smell of it, so. 

It still didn’t sit well with him sometimes— kinda like how puberty had Not Been Fun on a number on levels, but hey, if all else failed, he could just ignore it harder. 

It hadn’t failed him yet.

.

Stephanie insisted on going to boarding school with him when she got to the age he’d been shipped off at.

It was...nice, having his little sister around again. 

.

It was a good thing Justin had been okay with being designated the heir of Hammer Industries, because Steph was... exactly like he remembered her.

Cheerful, upbeat, startlingly devious and manipulative when she wanted to be, and just a tad bit spoiled.

...okay, so Justin had probably contributed a bit to that last one. In his defense, he’d been doing his best to shield his sister from the staggeringly high expectations he himself had to deal with, but look, he wanted at least one of them to have some semblance of a happy childhood, okay? 

Goodness knew he hadn’t [not this time, nor the last].

.

Stephanie wasn’t interested in the family business, was more interested in pursuing a career in the arts.

Justin, of course, encouraged her wholeheartedly.

Their parents weren’t entirely happy about it, but...wasn’t like they had much to complain about. Not when Justin was always in the top ten of his year, not when the professors practically gushed over his responsibility and work ethic. 

He was no Tony Stark, but he’d made a name for himself nonetheless.

.

“So, we’re supposed to be rivals?” The bane of his existence said once, at yet another gala. “Howard says so, anyway.”

“Seems that way,” Justin shrugged as they pilfered a flute from a nearby table, carefully not commenting on how he’d referred to his father by his first name. Talk about a strained relationship, right there.

“You’re not really acting like one.”

“Well,” Justin sipped at his flute before making a face when he discovered it was champagne and not apple cider like he’d hoped, “it’s nothing personal, just business. Healthy competition, y’know? Someone’s got to.”

Stark eyed him for a moment, before giving him a brilliant smile. “You know, I think I’d like that.” 

.

Justin would never, ever understand these people.

.

In the time Justin Hammer got his degree in business, Tony Stark got several Ph.Ds. 

Not that he envied him: the idea of being shoved into the limelight after losing his entire family? Hard pass.

.

For some reason, Tony Stark seemed to think they were friends.

Why.

Sure, Justin tried to be as cordial with him as he did with anyone else, but... how on Earth did that translate into being friends?

.

“You look at him like he’s a kid,” Steph says once, laughing, “you look at all of us that way, haven’t you noticed?”

“Well, to be fair—”

“You’re only a few years older than us, but you keep acting like you’re dad. More like a dad than our actual dad, sometimes,” her smile dropped for a moment, “don’t think I forgot that time he didn’t even call for your birthday.”

Justin made a face. “But what’s that got to do with anything?”

She sighed, then gave him a smile and a look he couldn’t decipher. “You’ll figure it out eventually.”

.

By the time Justin Hammer became the CEO of Hammer Industries, Tony Stark had held the same post in his company for over half a decade. 

Yet...well, something weird was going on.

Maybe it was because Justin’d had more time to prepare for the cutthroat world that was the defense industry, but— 

For some reason, he couldn’t help but think Tony was softer than he’d thought.

No-brainer contracts that would have been a cinch to broker, passed over simply because their distributors didn’t pass their incredibly high standards; buyers who wanted in, but whose past associations— very, very far in the past— meant SI didn’t even consider them. 

Justin couldn’t understand it. 

For someone in the industry, Stark’s morals were...unusual. Respectable, from one perspective, but remarkably naive from any self-respecting businessman who wanted to turn a profit. 

He was fairly certain the only reason Stark Industries was considered number one in the sector was because of the constant influx of new designs; they just were turning down too many contracts for him to consider otherwise. 

Sure, sometimes Hammer weapons found themselves in the wrong hands— much more often than Stark weapons, regrettably— but it was one of the hazards that came with the business. They’d both known it from the get-go; Stark weapons were considered the best for a reason, even though somewhere down the line, his company’d gotten a reputation for no-frills dependability and ruggedness to the point where unscrupulous individuals would do anything to get their hands on either. Wasn’t like there was anything they could do about it, not when money talked in ways laws didn’t.

Why Stark was so hung up over it, he just. Couldn’t wrap his head around.

.

Stark was proclaimed dead, and there was strong evidence to indicate the attackers had been using his guns.

...well, fuck.

.

“This is fine,” Justin muttered as his personal headache proceeded to come back from the dead only to say his company was going to stop doing the thing it was known for and making an ungodly mess in the stock market while at it, “it’s not like it affects me, anyway.”

.

Overnight, Hammer Industries became number one in the defense sector. 

Justin was not a happy camper about the spotlight.

Even more so, when he had to take additional measures so his sister could continue enjoy the privacy she’d had after pursuing her dreams as an artist because the press didn’t want to leave well enough alone.

.

“You know, you could’ve given me a warning.” Justin scowled when he saw Tony at the next gala.

“You handled it well enough, didn’t you?”

Ugh. 

His headache was back, and worst part was, the smile he got more than made up for it.

.

...and then I kinda ran out of steam.

tl;dr: MCU canon had Justin Hammer as a foil to Tony Stark, here their dynamic is more along the lines of Beethoven and Mozart [one really respecting the other’s genius, and working their butt off to get to that level of respectability and general acclaim].

in this AU, Stark Industries is kind of like Apple— very futuristic high-tech stuff, all the bells and whistles going on, etc, whereas Hammer Industries is the Nokia in this analogy: not fancy in the slightest but as close to indestructible as it gets. 

#No Hero [And Not Made Of Stone] #No Hero [Downward Descending] #My writing #character study of sorts #fic idea #fic ideas #3 am musings #kinda #also #does it count if said 'fic idea' is over 2k long?

[supercalime]

The House in the Cerulean Sea Commentary

Chapter 1 to 10:

- I love that we get straight into the story

- I like that Linus starts off as a likable protagonist. I was afraid he was going to be the trope of jerk turns softie because of children

- I love casual queer rep! Pop off!

- I love that they didn’t need to say that calliope was a cat. Saying is a creature of evil was enough for us to guess it was a cat lol

- Petition for Dan fogler to play Linus in a movie adaptation of this book. Tell me if that wouldn’t be perfect

- This book reads like a Tim burton and a Guillermo del toro movie, I can’t explain

- The loneliness stuff are hitting me like a train

- He took calliope with him! That’s cute

- Calling it now. Calliope will be the sweetest to Arthur and that’s how we get ✨soulmates✨

- The kid. Is literally. The child. Of the. Devil. I-

- I already love the caretaker. She’s sassy and calls out toxic masculinity. My gal

- I love how weird all the kids are. They have really unique designs

- Lucy is hilarious, I would die for him

- Oh poor Sal...

- Poor all these children

- I’m happy Linus is putting his foot down in his reports. The department fucked him over and he let them know. Good on him

- Of course there are some assholes threatening children and being hateful bigots ugh

- Queer main character and Religious trauma walk hand in hand. I can relate

- Chauncey is a precious little blob! I love him

- Beelzebub is not a scary name at all. For the son of the devil? Lame

- “How can we fight prejudice if we do nothing to change it?”

- I am getting that the romance is going to probably be a slow burn. I don’t even care. I love everything about Linus and Arthur. They can take their time. Their dialogues are so good

- Why the hell is chapter 10 38 pages?

- Oh the islanders are not only racist, but they are also homophobic? Why am not surprised?

Chapter 11 to Epilogue:

- seriously, the reports are the best parts of this book

- Oh sweet! Calliope likes Sal!

- Lucy gave him a record player! That is ADORABLE

- I was wondering for the longest time why this book is categorized as adult when it could have very well be middle grade...until now. They just made a masturbation joke. And I cringed

- What I love about Linus and Arthur’s relationship is the communication! They even disagree well

- Arthur is one flirty motherfucker

- If Chauncey is not a bellhop by the end of this book, then I don’t want it

- THEY. ARE. HOLDING. HANDS!!

- I really like how the children are written. It doesn’t feel forced. They’re human, talking normally

- I’m scared for these kids man. I think something bad will happen in this outing

- Record store guy is cool

- And he’s a stoner. Why am I not surprised 😂

- Of course ice cream parlor server is a dick

- Linus having full conversations with his cat is a MOOD

- I KNEW IT! I KNEW ARTHUR WAS A MAGICAL BEING!!!

- A Phoenix?????

- Ugh. The assholes with pitchforks and torches arrived

- Helen saving the day!

- They made him a goodbye sign! I’m gonna cry

- And now Arthur and Linus are dancing. Tj really wants to kill me

- We need to have a rom com type “running through the airport”scene. Linus can’t just LEAVE

- Or he can. Disregard what I just said

- Yeah Linus! Make the extremely upper management SUCK IT!

- Oh thank god they approved the orphanage

- “I don’t know why you don’t just kiss him and get it over with. Adults are so dumb.” Lucy is all of us lol

-“I don’t know why you don’t just kiss him and get it over with. Adults are so dumb.” Lucy is all of us lol

- This book would make a sweet movie. Of Hollywood ever gets progressive, they should definitely adapt this into a movie. But for the love of god don’t let Tim burton even look at it! He’s gonna butcher it

- They are getting another kid!

- PROPOSAL???

- Aw! That was nice

#lety rambles #book commentary #the house in the cerulean sea #tj klune

[my-bated-breath]

Closing Thoughts on Vincenzo

No one asked, but here you go.

I watched the last two episodes of Vincenzo yesterday, but even in the midst of my viewing experience I was able to synthesis and analyze what I was enjoying and not-enjoying, what worked and what didn’t work (for me), so that itself says something about how immersive it was. Of course, Vincenzo is a great show — the action is sharp and satisfying, the schemes are elaborate and spectacular, the humor is cracky yet genuine, and the characters are so, so lovable. And I loved the romance side plot, because yes, I am weak. Still, the last 2-4 episodes strained some of that, and this is my take on why I felt not exactly disappointed, but underwhelmed in the final stretch. I’m also including what I did like at the very end, as that makes sense with how I’m structuring this kind-of-analysis.

spoilers below

Tension, Stakes, and Pay-off

The tension in Vincenzo has been ramped up ever since the death of Vincenzo’s mother, loudly and painfully declaring in that moment that “this is not a game” (contrary to Vincenzo telling Hanseok in jail that he’s toying with him). This leads to a chilling confrontation between Vincenzo and the antagonists while also uniting the residents of Geumga in all-out, unapologetic war. And there is no more game of chess — just one of cat and mouse, with Vincenzo descending upon his prey.

Hence, Vincenzo is noticeably less soft, and he strikes Babel with the steel of his resolve. His schemes feel much more sinister than mischievous as they had been before; he is ending this, once and for all. So, how does the show amp up the tension and stakes from there?

Well, it’s all in what I said before. The tension is teased out in Vincenzo stealing everything Hanseok has ever treasured and then taunting/threatening him in prison, and then with the Babel villains descending into chaos and desperation. The stakes, however, are less noticeable, because Vincenzo is kind of obviously winning. The stakes have already been established with Vincenzo’s mother, then paid off with her death, and then paid off even more with Vincenzo mercilessly seizing the upper hand.

That’s why I feel like Myunghee and Hanseo’s death just... happened. Because it’s been 3 whole episodes since Vincenzo has founded this new resolve, that sort of dragged out follow-up loses its thrill and gratification. They’ve been defeated now, completely and totally. But so what? They’ve been on the losing end for more than 3 hours of screen time now, and even their last resort of a counterattack didn’t hold much narrative weight (which is something I’ll get to later). Their deaths are not boring to say the least — I saw a post that said something similar to “Myunghee, a woman who danced to the music of others’ pain, died dancing to her own” and “Hanseo, a man with no heart, has a hole drilled into that empty cavity.”

But their deaths also happen very isolated from everyone else, not just physically, but emotionally as well. It’s almost as if Vincenzo’s clapping his hands and saying, “Let’s wrap this up now, I’m getting a little tired.” And while I wouldn’t say their deaths are unnecessarily cruel, given everything they’ve done, I don’t think Vincenzo does this in response to anything particularly substantial. Is this for his mother’s death? For Chayoung’s injury? For everyone else? Well, maybe, but it sure didn’t feel like he was contemplating that during or after torturing them. If I put the Vincenzo from the beginning of the show there in those two scenes vs Vincenzo from the end of the show, post character development and all, I think the only difference would be that beginning-of-the-show Vincenzo would still be unfamiliar with Babel’s crimes and see this as a waste of time.

A sort of side note: Now, one of the strong points of this show is its use of comedy in its otherwise very serious schemes (I still thinking about episodes 8 and 15 all the time). But with the impending climax and increasingly serious tone, there was no comedy to make said-serious schemes as engaging to watch. So now unable to rely on one of its greatest strengths, the show must rely on emotional impact. Or similarly: narrative weight.

Narrative Weight

In episodes 19-20, Chayoung is shot, Hanseo dies, and Chulwook is stabbed (and you think he’s going to die but he doesn’t). Who said there was no emotional impact in these episodes again?!

Oh right. Me.

Beyond Hong Yuchan and Oh Gyeongja’s death, injuries and fatalities suffered from our protagonists’ side don’t really have that many consequences. You can argue the consequences of Hanseo dying is that we’re all very sad, but both we and the characters are barely given a moment to grieve before we have to move on. What does Hanseo die for? He dies as an abuse victim just beginning to break out of the cycle he was trapped in, and that itself isn’t necessary a bad narrative choice, and he dies as a warrior in this Mafia vs Conglomerate war, but what does he die for? If it’s for Vincenzo and Chayoung to live, they pretty much get lucky with Hanseo running out of bullets. If it is to show that he had changed, and that this tied into some greater theme of redemption, then his death really isn’t really given enough thought for it to resonate well. I would’ve loved to see Vincenzo reflecting on Hanseo learning to trust and love again, despite all the mistakes he made in the past, and how that influences his own decision to embrace his version of villainous justice. But no. This is something I only thought of after reading a few Vincenzo posts and trying to justify my own moral for the show.

Don’t forget that Chulwook almost dies too. Like I genuinely believed he was dead, shed a tear for the daughter he would never meet, and then the show went like, “Guess what? Psyche!”

I’m not very fond of that injury/pseud-death-but-not-really.

And now we have Chayoung, the person who Vincenzo is the closest to. Don’t get me wrong, I amso weak for her never giving into Hanseo and asking for death over Vinceno getting hurt, for guarding Vincenzo from the bullet, for Vincenzo’s shocked and empty eyes, for Chayoung’s glazed gaze, for him desperately and powerlessly hugging her tightly because that’s all he can do for her now. Afterwards, she’s in the hospital, her shoulder is recuperating, and there’s a nice Chayenzo parallel to episode 4 when Chayoung was waiting by Vinny’s hospital bed. But afterwards afterwards? She’s just in the hospital. Sidelined from the climax.

Vincenzo told her, “I will finish this, for you.” That could’ve worked, because we could’ve seen Chayoung emotionally or spiritually with us during the climax and Myunghee and Hanseo’s deaths. But like I mentioned earlier, it really didn’t feel that way. Ultimately, the narrative tells us that Chayoung’s injury just means she can’t strain herself for a couple of days, despite initially delivering it so dramatically and emotionally.

As one of my friends said while we were discussing this episode: Vincenzo is the titular character, but Chayoung has so much to care for too. Her father died because of Babel, and she said, “We should share the danger.” Instead, we got a decentish-but-slightly-underwhelming scene where she is driven to see Vincenzo off. Okay then.

Characters

Speaking of, Chayoung receives much of the short-end of the character development stick in the last 4 episodes. I found this to be acceptable in episodes 17-18, and she does have that moment where she looked uncertain and nauseated at the death of the “hunting dogs” before shoving down her misgivings, clinging onto a facade of strength as she says “this is what I wanted.” Also, even though it wasn’t episode 14, I wasn’t complaining about the Chayenzo moments either.

But still, this is the second most important protagonist in the narrative and nothing about her really changes in these last few episodes. Nor does she experience catharsis alongside Vincenzo, emotionally or otherwise. There had been some buildup about whether or not Chayoung can swallow the cruel path that she has chosen, but if she’s not even the given the chance to make her own decision on said cruel path, that’s just wasted set up.

(I know that during the Babel Tower party-fiasco Vincenzo told Chayoung that he originally wanted her to push the button that’ll kill one of the hunting dogs, but then decided against it upon seeing Chayoung’s wavering face, but like. Narratively, if she was the one to press it, and then we had some follow-up character arc about her coming to terms with her decision... Oh, we could’ve had it all.)

Another thing I want to point out is that Chayoung has been a foil to Vincenzo in that she represents the happiness, love, and innocence now unattainable to him. (This is just his view, by the way, since Chayoung isn’t exactly innocent herself, which he could’ve seen if the show had only taken this direction.) That is to say, Vinceno’s most interesting character moments are drawn out of him by Chayoung: In his apartment, when they are under the ceiling-stars, and she asks him whether he has ever killed anyone. On the rooftop, when they decide that Hanseok must lose everything before he dies, and he promises to her that he’ll stay in Korea to see things through to the end, in direct contrast to himself at the beginning of the show. In the highway pass, when she embraces him after a gunfight, the closest he’s ever grazed past death. When they drink makgeolli together and he tells her about what her father wanted to say to her. When they sit together by the riverside and she tells him that his mother would have been proud of him.

One of my favorite parts of episodes 11-12 during the gun fight is just how emotionally present Chayoung is, despite not wielding a gun herself, or even being anywhere near the action. I’m not sure if I’m getting this right, but I think this is the first time Vincenzo had killed people on screen, so to see Chayoung embrace him so tearfully afterwards almost felt like he was being reminded of his humanity. And this also shows that Chayoung, despite saying that she would feel distant towards Vincenzo if he did have blood on his hands, loves him closely, so closely it hurts.

We think about Vincenzo, what it means to be a consigliere, and his distorted flashbacks of flesh and blood and killing and losing himself, and that teddy bear, slowly panning out to a child, staring at him in fear. We think about how is it possible for him to love again? Can he even know what love is?

Then Chayoung appears, a woman whose very presence unraveled the mystery that is Vincenzo. But the moment that Chayoung’s development was stunted, that was the moment Vincenzo lost his foil, and we, the audience, lost the ability to see how his past, present, and future reconcile.

Themes: Loving in Sin

In episode 20, Vincenzo and the monks have a conversation about whether he was worthy of love or not before being told that he was Vaisravana — and though he could never be accepted by Buddha, he would be appreciated at times, and he would have his own role to play too. I like this conversation a lot in concept. In execution, it would’ve left much weightier an impact if only we had seen Vincenzo’s journey to reconcile his villainy and humanity play out more, if we had a glimpse into the moral conflict warring in his mind. The last time the drama showed that to us — not told it to us — was with the death of Vincenzo’s mother.

I would add more, really, but I feel like my review up until here says everything I want it to. In my opinion, there was no real epiphany that Vincenzo reached upon hearing those words from the monk because he hadn’t reflected on it enough for there to properly be one. And the ending to Vincenzo and Chayoung’s romance would’ve felt a lot better if it was Vincenzo choosing to love her despite his fear of himself, despite his belief that he could only hurt people. (Also that ending monologue wouldn’t have felt so tacked-on, like, oh wait this is supposed to have a theme right? Here, this is vaguely related, right?)

Because a lot of this emotional potential was not quite met, I think the finale also had to resort to some cheaper ways to make us feel for the romance, such as Chayoung rushing to see Vincenzo off and Vincenzo leaving the diplomacy-relations party early (he very poetically disappears while walking behind this sculpture, but I thought it was hilarious that if the shot didn’t get cut off there in another 2 seconds we could’ve seen him walking out of where that sculpture thing blocked him lol).

Overall though, I’m pretty happy with the romance’s ending, at least conceptually. The way they incorporated the story of cow herder and weaver girl and the bridge of pigeons (not magpies!) that will allow them to see each other again every year was so bittersweet, and as someone familiar with this myth, it made me very nostalgic. Also, I do think it works better with Vincenzo’s themes that he would be apart from Chayoung in some way. They each have their own lives to lead, but although they met by coincidence, they’ll remain by each other’s sides by intention. He is a villain, and so is she, but villains love tenaciously.

#vincenzo #chayoung #chayenzo #chaenzo #which one is it huh #jang hanseo #kdrama #i'm so tired i tried posting this so many times #i made a whole side blog so i could post this review without exposing myself as a kdrama fan #but it's not worth it #anyways these are my thoughts #please let me know yours #but only if you phrase it in a kind way #apparently this is 2279 words of me breaking down #my bated breath analyzes #my bated breath's posts

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “Creation”

Happy Saturday, everyone! Oh man, oh man, oh man. I think I'll need to steer clear of the general RWBY tags this week, simply because I know the sort of responses I'll see to this episode. From smug celebration at Ironwood's downfall, to bad takes about what makes us human, this episode is a petri dish of sensitive material handled insensitively.

Let’s unpack it, shall we? 

We open on an action that feels like a summery of the last three volumes: a grimm attacks an airship from the front, no doubt killing its pilot, while the other grimm conveniently ignore our heroes, no masking in sight. The group looks a little sad at the destruction around them, but ultimately ignore it because they have bigger, heroic things to do. I could write a whole, additional essay on how the huntsmen code — to protect the people — has been warped and abandoned by our protagonists in their effort to do what they think is right. It's a tale that might have been compelling if only RT knew they were writing it.

We get a shot of Atlas drones unloading the bomb before one is taken out, presumably by Qrow and Robyn. Segueing to Ironwood and the Ace Ops, they're waiting for Penny to arrive, the former carrying a massive gun presumably capable of capturing her. Despite the horror we saw on their faces last episode at the realization that Ironwood would kill Marrow for speaking up, it seems that now the Ace Ops are entirely in agreement with these measures. A week ago the implication was that they fell back in line out of fear, but now Harriet talks passionately about "putting down" the group if they were stupid enough to accompany Penny. "The General gave his terms." Vine sighs at this, but doesn't actively disagree. He's just "retracing the steps that led us here."

So, congratulations on introducing four new characters, not bothering to develop any of them, killing one off while ignoring Qrow's hand in that, and having the other three become all, "Yeah! Mass murder is a perfect solution!" off screen. Marrow is the only one with something resembling development and, as covered in these recaps, that's been pretty badly executed too.

Ironwood sends them to deal with Robyn and Qrow after Winter reappears to "assist" him. That gets quotation marks because most viewers at this point have realized that she's who our two birbs spotted in the elevator. Winter isn't on Ironwood's side anymore, she's just skillfully clearing the field for the final attack. Indeed, we get a moment where she hesitantly brings up the bomb and Ironwood responds that he hopes she's not going to try and talk him out of it. No. Winter doesn't think that's possible. This was her final attempt at peace.

One of the reasons why I think I'll stick to my own blog for a while is because the fandom has a tendency to paint broad personality traits as evil when applied to some characters, yet simultaneously heroic when applied to others, when really it's about how that those traits are used. What I mean is, I've seen a lot of Ironwood critical posts that emphasize how stubborn he is. He thinks he's right and he won't back down. He wont listen to others. He's going through with this plan and if anyone tries to stop him? That's their mistake. Totally evil, right? Except, this is the exact same behavior Ruby displays, particularly in Volumes 6 and 7. She was stubborn about stealing from Argus and continuing the fight to the point where it endangered her and her teammates, to say nothing of the rest of the city. She refused to listen to Qrow, or Ironwood, or the Ace Ops, loudly announcing that she was right about, well, everything. If they didn't agree with her, the options were to leave the group entirely, or fight her. The actual difference here is that the writers have taken Ironwood to an extreme, one that's incredibly easy to understand as bad because it is bad: bombing Mantle has no defense. Ruby pulls the exact same nonsense, it's just not to that same extreme and her actions are followed by scenes that are meant to make us forgive her: a sad look because she didn't mean to get a city attacked by a leviathan grimm, a cry on the staircase because she didn't mean to risk the lives of an entire kingdom... even though she did. Ironwood is the bad guy because he's been written to take specific, OOC actions like shooting unarmed kids. He's not the bad guy because when other characters go, "Don't do this" his response is, "I have to." Because that's been Ruby's motto ever since she "had" to use the Lamp to rip Ozpin’s life story away. RWBY introduced those extreme actions of shooting the youngest in the group (for no reason) and threatening to bomb a city (for no reason) or shooting a councilman (for no reason) because when you remove those you've got a man who looks exactly like our hero. Ironwood's arc has been peppered with these confusing, unpersuasive actions because if you just keep the story as him stubbornly keeping to a plan he thinks will save the world, you're left with the reminder that all Ruby has done lately is stubbornly keep to plans she thinks will save the world. This moment with Winter just highlights how ill thought out Ironwood's descent has been because he does everything Ruby does... with a few, tacked on, “and randomly shoots people!” moments to ensure we understand that he’s definitely evil. No comparison to our heroes here, folks! 

Ironwood is a bad guy now. That’s certain, but he was made that way so the story never had to grapple with the question of what that means for Ruby if we really start condemning things like lying, secrets, stubbornness, or endangering others for the greater good. Well then damn, if we strip away the hypocrisy then she might not be a good person after all. Or the people she’s simplistically labeled as bad might not be the devils Ruby claims they are. 

But that’s a level of nuance RWBY would rather pretend doesn’t exist. 

All of which is highlighted by Ironwood’s reaction to "Penny." He sighs and sags over the gun, immediately putting it aside. With his hand on her shoulder, Ironwood tells her she's "done the right thing." Precisely the same way Ruby would lower Crescent Rose and give someone a smile when they decided to fall in line with her.

Which, of course, is the moment when Emerald reveals herself, dispelling the Penny illusion and revealing Team JNPR The Second behind her. She gives a quip about it feeling "weird" to do the right thing before disappearing.

From there the action picks up fast. I really enjoyed this battle simply from a choreography and energy standpoint. It gets the blood pumping, Ironwood's hand-to-hand is spectacular — especially that moment against Ren — and the group actually displays teamwork for the first time in what feels like forever, all of them needed to land a hit on Ironwood. As always, out of the context of the rest of the show it feels and looks great. My primary issue is that we get this fantastic fight against Ironwood. Not Salem, not Cinder, not Watts (like last volume when Ironwood was still a hero), not even Emerald as a means of transitioning from murderous villain to the group's best bud. No, what's arguably the best action sequence in the volume thus far goes to beating up the guy they betrayed from the start. There's no catharsis for me here, only frustration as we watch Ironwood stand in shock as Winter powers up Nora — who's fine now, I guess — and she slams her hammer into his face. 

It never should have come to this and when a good character is done so dirty, their downfall doesn't evoke the emotions the writers are looking for. Watching Ironwood fall doesn't generate feelings of victory, or even tragedy at a course of events others were powerless to stop. It's just frustration at watching years worth of bad writing, sprinkled with fantastic ideas that never go anywhere.

Oscar gets a few hits in, Ironwood snatches his cane, and just as he's about to throw a punch, Winter arrives with the most dramatic sword slash I've ever seen.

Ironwood's aura breaks and he falls, unconscious. We cut to an image of a droid's head separated from its body, one of Robyn's arrows through its skull. That doesn't have meaning or anything.

I suppose I should be grateful they didn't rip Ironwood's arm away during the fight, or outright kill him, though I'm still expecting him to die before the end of the volume.

Hmm. Wouldn't that be something? If after Salem's arrival, freezing cold, a Hound attack, grimm soup, a giant whale, a massive army, and a hack ending in self-destruction, the one character who actually dies is Ironwood. 

It's looking more and more likely.

Honestly, beyond all the obvious, what's so frustrating about this fight is that characters are only now using their impressive abilities to their fullest. Emerald creates an entire fantasy of what's happening and then straight up disappears, but she only does a half-assed version of that when fighting against Penny. (And really, she put more effort into helping the heroes she just joined over Cinder, the woman she's been obsessed with since the start?) Marrow refuses to use "Stay" against a group they wanted to peacefully arrest because that's just too horrible an act, I guess, but he'll do it on his own teammates the second Qrow and Robyn don’t want to fight.  

This is what I mean when I say the rules of the world bend to assist the protagonists in absurd ways. It's not nearly as egregious as Amity suddenly being up and running, but the fact that characters become substantially more powerful while fighting for the protagonists than they do against them is still a significant problem.

So Ironwood is down and out. As much as I hated watching that and didn't necessarily want more, am I the only one who felt like it was... a bit lackluster? I mean, the action was great, yes, but relatively short. There was no dialogue, such as another delve into the moral questions that led to this fight in the first place. There certainly wasn’t any hesitance against fighting a former ally. (Again, we’re meant to believe that the Ace Ops won because they just couldn’t bear to fight the group seriously, but every former ally here is capable of wailing on Ironwood without a single pause or pained look?) Ironwood just skillfully blocks for a while, is blindsided by Winter's betrayal, and then falls unconscious. Given that we learn he and Jacques will be evacuated after the rest of the kingdom, it's possible he'll escape somehow and we'll get a fight 2.0, but if not that feels like a rather tame end to the guy forced into the antagonist seat. Plus, what was the point of having Qrow frothing at the mouth to kill him this whole volume? I never wanted that to happen, I'm glad it hasn't, but I'm nevertheless left to ask why we bothered with that eleven episode side plot if we were going to erase it with one sentence from Robyn about Qrow being better than this. If that's all it took, let them work through Qrow's irrational anger while sitting around in a cell.

Winter tells the group to move onto "phase two" which is when we're treated to a flashback. We return to the ending of the last episode, with Ruby realizing that opening the vault is an option. Jaune, all smiles, goes, "We never considered using what's inside!"

This is what I mean about no consequences! This is what I mean about it all being a meaningless circle that ends with undeserved praise for the group! We started this horror show with Ironwood going, "We don't have a plan to protect the people, so I'm going to take what people we do have to safety" and the group going, "We don't have a plan either, but we're going to stop you implementing your plan because it's not perfect, risking a kingdom's worth of lives in the process." Now, the group has used two plans, one of which two characters knew about at the start and another they could have devised with the information they had. Oscar and Ozpin's, "We have an all powerful magical blast in our cane" and the group's "What if we used the Staff for something other than raising Atlas?" are both things that could have come up in the office debate. These were both always on the table! Instead, Ruby grew furious over the mere thought of cutting their losses, betrayed Ironwood again, attacked his people, denounced him to the world, and then two days later goes, "Oh wait! We could do something now that we could have easily done before if we hadn't made a needless enemy!" 

Everyone realizes how much worse they made things, right? Turning against Ironwood, bringing everyone left in Mantle directly under Atlas, sitting around while an army was devoured, drawing it out until Penny was hacked... all of it would have been avoided if the group had thought and discussed things for a few minutes, not jumping straight to violently resisting what Ironwood came up with first. "We never considered..." Ruby says. Yeah, you didn't, except that's not something to smile about. The group made the situation a thousand times worse with their reaction when they could have just magically evacuated the kingdom from the start. “Maybe we could use it to save Penny and get everyone in Atlas and Mantle back to safety." Nothing has changed! They had this ability the whole time! Nothing about the last twelve episodes led them here, they just randomly thought of it after RT had padded the volume with needless drama. Considering that they're heading to Vacuo now, we could have just made this the finale of Volume 7 instead: big fight with Ironwood, revelation, get everyone  evacuated while Salem attacks, leave her behind, then Volume 8 begins in Vacuo with the group knowing Salem is out there looking for them. This entire volume has been pointless. What did they accomplish?

Oscar got kidnapped and beat up, Nora was scarred, Ruby and Yang realized horrible things about Summer, and the whole world is panicking about a witch. Good things are... Ren and Ruby unlocked some semblance stuff? Weiss loves her brother again after he proved himself useful to her? Great work, team.

So this one moment makes everything they've done up to this point useless and, of course, once thought up the plan goes off without a hitch. Note that the summary of this episode says, "It's risky, dangerous, and nearly impossible — but it's the only plan they've got." Nearly impossible? That's a whole lot of talk for a plan that was implemented perfectly.

There is, admittedly, one snag, but one that is likewise made meaningless just seconds later. We'll get to that.

We see Winter call Weiss who also smiles at hearing from her sister. Obviously interactions like the group's with Emerald are the bigger concern, but it's still an issue that no one reacts as they should to people reappearing in their lives. Rather, RWBY continually confuses audience knowledge with character knowledge. We know Winter is on their side now, but Weiss hasn't a clue. Last she saw, she and Winter were agreeing to head down different paths. She has no reason to think her sister isn't loyal to Ironwood, so why isn't the group treating this call with suspicion? What if it's Ironwood trying to mess with them through a presumably safe party? I swear to god, with any consistency in the story this group would be dead ten times over because their decisions are so stupid. Oscar decides to believe in the guy currently beating him to a pulp, the group decides to trust a villain over a flawed ally, and now they see Ironwood’s second calling and are like, “Great, big sister Winter is checking in!” There’s a difference between a hopeful story filled with second chances and characters whose reliance on the narrative bending to assist them makes them come across as insanely naive. 

None of which even touches on characters forgetting that other characters are presumably dead. Ironwood shot Oscar off the edge of Atlas, but doesn't react to learning he was kidnapped, or when he shows up to the fight. Thanks to Marrow's comment, Winter thinks YJOR have perished in the whale, but also has no reaction to them appearing to help with this plan. Absolutely nothing is followed up on.

We then get a flashback within the flashback (fun) of Winter — shock — not arresting Marrow. It's precisely as I assumed, with Marrow angrily asking why she hit him and Winter responding with, “Because you were about to get killed if I didn’t do something!” As I said last recap, I feel like I should let the marginalized groups lead this discussion, but I do want to add that no matter how well intentioned — or strategic, as I mentioned last time — the imagery itself is still harmful. No matter the context, we were still left with white woman Winter putting her knee on black man Marrow's back to arrest him, and it’s an image that everyone in the U.S. should be familiar with the horror of. Far more of a problem than the (presumed) ignorance of this scene is, I think, the choice to make Winter entirely unrepentant. I think some of this discomfort could have been alleviated if RT had written Winter as apologetic, contrite that it came to that and asking Marrow to understand that she only did it as a means of assisting him. Asking his forgiveness. Instead, we get this

So what, the only emotion we have room for is gratitude that Winter beat him up? Yikes.

As a lighter side note, I find the animation here unintentionally hilarious. Winter's assistive device makes her shoulders look too high, making this gesture more, "Woman exaggeratedly pouts about not getting ice cream for dinner" and less, "Woman sternly closes off during a disagreement about saving lives and betraying their general." Gotta find our humor where we can, right?

What's intentional, but far less funny, is the needless animation to show us that, yes, Marrow is peering at Winter calling Weiss. Oh, the shenanigans. 

The elevator opens where Qrow and Robyn spot them. "Speaking of help," Winter says, as if she has any reason to believe Qrow didn't kill Clover. He and Robyn lower their weapons a bit, as if they have any reason to believe Winter and Marrow aren't still loyal to Ironwood. Would it really be so hard to have Winter immediately throw up her hands in the face of their almost-attack, blurting that she's not their enemy and needs their help, please listen? Again, RWBY can't remember which characters know what, let alone what their motivations and reactions should be.

We then enter the third part of the flashback where everyone piles into the Schnee dining room and discusses doing the things they could have done from the start. I'm metaphorically banging my head against that table. In RWBY's favor though, we also get a long shot of Jaune continuing to boost Penny’s aura.

Though it's only one of many issues, just the other day I asked, "Hey, why has Jaune always needed to hold onto the person he's assisting, but now suddenly he can touch Penny once and the boost remains?" It still doesn't explain why he was letting go before/why him needing to boost her continuously didn't put a hard time limit on their plan — not that Mantle's hour limit meant a thing — but at least they're showing more of that here.

Oscar notes that Atlas has enough gravity dust that it won't fall immediately when they use the Relic, but they will have to move fast to ensure no one is underneath. Yeah, like all the civilians you put there. He also cautions that the Staff isn't a "magic wand" that they can just wave to make all their problems go away... even though that's precisely what they're going to do. Ozpin gets some lines that aren't apologies or followed by attacks — hallelujah! — about how the Staff's spirit is a "character" and requires that you be able to precisely explain anything you want him to make. Blueprints, examples, a firm knowledge of how this will be accomplished — all of it is required to actually get what you're after. That's a cool limitation. It's just too bad we didn't know about it episodes ago, forcing our heroes to find ways to meet those requirements. Instead, they already have everything ready to go the moment they learn about it: Penny has her own schematics and Whitley apparently has knowledge of the entire kingdom after sending some ships out. Normally I'd go, "Really?" but I'm still just struck by how much good he's done compared to everyone else in this room. Your show is seriously broken when the side character the writers didn't even want the audience to like until a few episodes ago is more active, mature, and sensible than the heroes.

From there we see the group implementing the plan. They fly up through the hole Oscar left, straight to the vault. Penny opens it without any trouble and Ruby uses her speed to grab the Relic and stop time, halting her self-termination. I do like that combination of skill and their knowledge of how this magic works. That felt like a smart move. What's interesting though is that the Relic appears to stop time in the entire kingdom. We see people in Mantle and Atlas slowing to a halt too. I assume no one remembers that happening after time restarts, otherwise people would be freaked out by suddenly being frozen in place.

Wouldn't that have been cool though? The group often takes a while to use the Relics, either deciding what they need, or watching Jinn's information, so what if you had a population that blinks and suddenly, from their perspective, half an hour has passed? How long might Ozpin have sat on his knees after Jinn told him he wasn't able to defeat Salem? How long was that space frozen? We could have had a world built around rumors and fairy tales. Not the random stories Ozpin brings up to make a point and that we never hear about again, but tiny details that foreshadow these revelations. A Beacon where the kids tell each other spooky stories of people suddenly losing time, once a whole day. The wives, sisters, daughters, and nieces who disappear, or wake up one day with horrifying, unnatural powers. We see magic influence the world around it, but we've seen very little of the world reacting to that influence. The one time I can think of is Blake reading a book about "a man with two souls," the fiction clearly inspired by knowledge of Ozpin. And indeed, it felt great to recognize that as a significant detail and then be proven right years later as the lore was revealed. We could have gotten so much more of that if RWBY was better planned out.

I'm getting off track though. As time stops we see a series of images: Ironwood being led to a cell with Jacques, Penny succumbing to her hack, Team JNPR The Second preparing to contact the kingdom about what's going on. Then everyone is distracted by the giant, blue, buff Ambrosius who comes out of the Staff.

...there's a lot of innuendo in that last statement lol. At least RWBY is committed to the crazy design they chose? I was never particularly comfortable with the image of characters gaping up at a giant, naked woman in chains, so it's nice to balance that a bit with an equally giant, naked dude in chains.

From here things get confusing. In all honesty, I'm not sure if this is another moment where RWBY is trying to pass off a retcon as the group being brilliant, or if I, as an individual, simply didn't follow the logic. I won't bother to rehash the slow, meandering way that Ruby reveals their plan — that certainly didn't help with the clarity. Not in an episode where we didn’t even know these rules ahead of time — but it boils down to this:

The moment they have Ambrosius create something new Atlas will start to fall. Two of his creations can't exist at the same time.

He needs clear instructions about what he's making in order to create it.

The group has brought him Penny's schematics so that he understands how she's built.

They want, specifically, "a new version of her... using her exact robot parts."  

They can't just create an exact duplicate of Penny because that would carry the virus with it.

They can't create an exact duplicate without the virus because that Penny would cease to exist as soon as they used Ambrosius to make an evacuation plan instead.

So they essentially want Ambrosius to create a new Penny by removing all the robot parts from the Penny that currently exists, carrying the virus with them, and leaving only the human parts of Penny behind: her aura/soul. Then, the purely robot version is destroyed when Ambrosius creates something new.

Except... this new Penny, this human Penny, still needed a human body. That's what Ambrosius created and that's the snag I don't understand. They want a version of Penny that's just her aura, just her soul, but that soul still needs something to be housed in. Ambrosius himself notes that. At first I thought the group would just have some wisp-like version of Penny they'd have to find a new body for — perhaps leading to a new one for Ozpin too — but she's just... given a human body when he takes the technology away, something she absolutely didn't have before. That is Ambrosius' creation. That is what should have disappeared along with the removed parts of Penny, leaving only her soul — what Ambrosius didn't touch — behind. Instead, the plot oh so conveniently has Penny get a new body for free and it's untouched as they move onto the next task.

Ruby drops a casual line about Ambrosius not being able to kill, or destroy, or something, which I think is meant to be the justification here. The rule (which, again, we JUST learned) about not killing anyone supersedes the rule of two creations not allowed to exist, allowing Penny to stick around. But even if that’s true, it’s a load of bull. What, does the magic think no one in an entire city might die if the floating mechanism is removed and it plummets to the ground? Ambrosius didn’t say, “Sorry, can’t stop floating Atlas because thousands of people are still here and they’ll die if I create something new,” but we’re supposed to believe the group skated by on, “Sorry, can’t destroy the last creation like everything else because there’s a single person still using that body and she’ll die if I create something new”? 

Seriously, did I miss something? Or is this another, "Amity is ready because the group needs it" situation? The rule of creations ceasing to exist is bent because the group needs to have their friend around. Ambrosius is certainly enthusiastically complimentary, saying how "smart" the group is and that they've "done their homework," but I'm not so sure. It feels like a moment where the show is (once again) insistent that the group is far more talented and brilliant than their actions actually imply. It's only the rules of the world twisting and turning that allows for their success. To say nothing of how the episode dropped all these rules on the viewer in a ten minute info dump, ensuring we didn’t have any time to think about them before the deed was done. 

It doesn't add up for me and honestly, even putting that aside? I hate this. I absolutely despise it. Look, if it turns out this really does make sense then props to the group for coming up with that plan. Our snag aside, the rest is a legitimately well thought out wish. I don't have a problem with the execution so much as the message. I've been saying since Volume 7 that RWBY has done Penny a disservice in terms of her "real girl" narrative. Whereas before we had a firm message that you don't need "squishy guts" to be human, to be real, Volume 8 continued to carry us further and further into the idea that it is necessary. That Penny's body is entirely inhuman, something to hate, but at least her soul is human and good. That's what the virus arc taught us: your terrible, technological body might be betraying you, but hold onto the parts of you that are really human. I hated that too, but I never thought RWBY would go this far. They made Penny fully human and went, “THIS is the version that always should have existed.”

And this isn't just me reading into the implications. It's right there in the text. Blake says that they're looking for “Penny, the girl who’s always been there underneath." Meaning, underneath the metal. The girl exists trapped in the robot body. Yang holds up her arm and says that the metal is only "extra," it's not really who you are. 

That gets into two perspectives on disability that RWBY just doesn't have the nuance for: what's an integral and celebratory part of one person's existence can be seen as something separate and discomforting to another. Though there are many people with disabilities who would happily cure themselves with a magic Staff if given the chance, there are just as many who say no, this is a part of my identity. I don't want to change, I just want the world to accommodate my existence. However, RWBY takes a hard stance here, saying that any metal in your body is intrinsically bad. We didn’t use to have this take, but now the show has embraced it. Blake says the real Penny is trapped in there. Yang's words implies that she'd get rid of this "extra" bit of her if possible. Mercury with his metal legs is the enemy. Ironwood with half his metal body is the enemy. Whereas once difference was truly accepted, now it's shunned and fixed whenever possible. Those who can't be fixed, like Yang, must simply deal with the lot they've been dealt, reassuring themselves that the metal isn't really them. But Penny? Penny they can fix.

So they do and the very first thing Penny does is hug Ruby, exclaiming, “Do hugs always make you feel this warm inside? Wow. More!” and proceeds to hug all the others. 

What's the underlying message there? Penny didn't understand hugs before this moment. She never experienced the "warmth" of them while an android, despite the fact that here warmth is entirely metaphorical and has nothing to do with a literally cold body. RWBY really went and said that the "real girl” android was never actually real at all — not as real as she could be — because it's only when she's given "squishy guts" that she understands the true happiness of a hug.

Wow.

I mean seriously, wow. 

Never-mind that, you know, we've seen that happiness and warmth since she was first introduced.

RWBY is really rewriting all the core themes introduced in Volumes 1-3 and it sucks. The show is absolutely the worse for it.

To say nothing of all the other disservices to Penny's character here. There's all this buildup about whether she'll still be the same Penny once the wish is complete, but of course she is. We wouldn't want to have Penny struggle when she becomes something other than what she's always been, would we? After all, it took Yang an entire volume to work through the shock of a metal arm, but taking away a metal body for a human one is in no way traumatic. Having a normal, human body is intrinsically a good thing! Of course Penny accepts it with nothing but smiles. Becoming human is celebratory, but becoming more machine is a horror.

She gets to watch her body self-destruct, glitching out and collapsing in front of her. But again, nothing to unpack there that can't be covered with a hand over her mouth.

There's no discussion of whether Penny still has the Maiden powers, or whether a wish like that would mess with the transfer in any way. How did the group know this action wouldn't register as a clear-cut death, forcing the power out of her and into someone new? Obviously they couldn’t know, but no one even thought to bring it up? 

And the entire time they're formulating their evacuation plan, there's no talk of whether these portals will appear before everyone currently alive in the kingdom. I mean, if they do then Ironwood and Jacques can just waltz through and escape into Vacuo. If they don’t, then Maria and Pietro don't necessarily have a way out. We still don't know if they're stuck floating in Amity, or if Amity crashed, or if they made their way back to Mantle or Atlas. More importantly, the characters don't know. I have no problem with RWBY keeping that a surprise until the finale, but I absolutely take issue with Pietro's daughter walking through a portal, seemingly not to care whether her father is going to make it out too.

It's been the same with Qrow and his nieces' relationships. The show is good at insisting that these families love each other because they hug and smile while on screen together, but when shit is actually going down, none of them care about pesky things like disappearances, arrests, or “The last time I saw you, you were with an old woman on a damaged station after a villain attack, potentially stranded in deadly cold if life support failed.” 

So yeah, this entire arc with Penny has been a disaster. From throwing away her framing subplot, to giving her a virus that did absolutely nothing, to giving her the Maiden powers which she's also done nothing with, to erasing her android status for a “She's really human now” message, Penny has been done dirty by the show these last two volumes. Not nearly to the extent Ironwood has, but still. At this point I wish they'd just kept her dead dead. Why do I want her back when that resurrection produces no reaction, her conflicts lead nowhere, and one of the core things that made Penny Penny has now been magically erased?

I've been saying for weeks that killing Penny off and keeping Penny around each had serious downsides attached, yet I never expected RWBY to do BOTH.

Also, I'm warding off any, "But Pinocchio was made into a real boy too" defenses. RWBY is not Pinocchio. Penny is not Pinocchio. I thought the allusion was going to be the Pinocchio inspired girl heading into the whale, not the show forcing the exact plotline  —  down to a blue, magical creature — onto a character whose entire journey has been about accepting herself as an android. Congratulations, RT. You just obliterated years of work.

Again, if you'd like an example of how to do this far better:

As Penny's character falls apart, Atlas shakes, alerting Jaune and the other that a new wish has been granted. Jaune pecks at the screen and realizes "That did, uh, something…?” but doesn’t realize that there's a giant, red "LIVE" up in the corner.

Jaune tries to warn the entire kingdom about their plan, but what he actually says is

“Atlas is falling, but — !”

And then the communications cut out. 

Watts, perhaps?

Our heroes are really good at saying things that make large populaces panic, huh? This is the one (1) snag in their "impossible" plan, but as said above, it doesn't amount to anything. We get a shot of Nora, horrified at the thought of kingdom-wide communications being down, but literally seconds later Team RWBY has made portals appear that everyone can walk through. So... why do we care about communications? More importantly, why does the show try to make us care? So much time is spent getting the viewer invested in problems that never come to mean anything. 

Including the problem of Salem herself.

Because the group successfully creates that evacuation plan. This is it. Everyone is leaving while Salem still reforms. 

Yang asks if they can use the vaults themselves as a single point for everyone to go to and Ambrosius agrees. So everyone is going to pile into the Vacuo vault that can only be opened by an unknown Maiden? They're going to put an entire kingdom's worth of people, including their enemies, into the vault where the Relic of Destruction is? Yeah, that's great. Prior to this — like if this had been the plan at the end of Volume 7 — I would have 100% agreed that these risks are better than death by Salem/grimm/cold. Now though, Oscar as axed Salem for an unknown length of time, the cold is having no impact on the civilians outside, and the grimm only attack background military personnel that supposedly no one cares about. They couldn't have spent another few minutes (especially with time stopped!) to figure out a means of getting to Vacuo that doesn't involve revealing and providing access to the location of a super secret vault? To say nothing of what they're going to do if Salem wakes up and snags one of those portals for herself. Two kingdoms for the price of one!

But that's what they're going with. Weiss gives Ambrosius a schematic of the kingdom, I guess, and he makes branching pathways appear with numerous portals for everyone to step through. They'll enter through one and, when they exit another, will be in Vacuo. Easy peasy, right? Especially since Ambrosius doesn't seem to have any limitations about how often his power is used. Is it three creations every 100 years like Jinn? We're not told, at least not to my recollection. However, I was expecting there to be a waiting period, that they'd fix Penny, go to evacuate the kingdom, and learn that sorry, I can't make another creation just yet. It feels like the sort of shit move these beings would pull — "Don't cry to me when it's not what you wanted" —  it would have been another commentary on the group's insistence on putting friends over the people's safety (like demanding the Ace Ops not bomb the whale because of Oscar), and crucially, would have kept the action in Atlas. Isn't that what this volume is? The battle for and potential destruction of the Kingdom of Atlas? We have two episodes left and, unless something unexpected happens, we're moving that action to Vacuo. Why? 

Meanwhile, Penny's corpse is just chilling in the background 😬

While all this is going on, Winter reassures Jacques that he and Ironwood will be evacuated too, though she makes it clear saving him was Weiss' idea. It checks out, considering Weiss is the one who turned her father's arrest into a joke last volume. Winter still takes his abuse seriously.

The group prepares to leave with a celebratory, "We did it!" from Weiss. I'm still banging my head against that dining room table. Before they can pass through the portal though, Ambrosius leaves them with one, dire warning: "Do not fall." 

In any other story a line like that is a neon sign announcing to the audience that someone will absolutely fall, and maybe they will, but RWBY has dodged consequences so often I wouldn't be surprised if this was merely another way to string us along. Remember all the hype surrounding Salem? The cold combined with her army and magic? How she was going to decimate Atlas and leave our group broken in a Fall 2.0?

I mean, we still have two episodes left. Forty minutes of content. Salem might still decimate them, especially since something has to happen in the finale. But god, it's a problem that we've come this far without a payoff. Salem randomly decided not to attack anyone, was stopped by a weapon added in solely for this purpose, and now the whole kingdom is being evacuated with a plan the group could have used at the start. This volume really is meaningless. 

“We go to vacuo and hope we’ve thought of everything” they say as the camera zooms in on Cinder's smiling face. For the second week in a row.

Bingo time!

Winter betrayed Ironwood, the group used the Staff of Creation, and I'm axing Maria on behalf of Pietro. You can't have the guy's daughter become human — after he was killing himself to give her his aura?? — and magically walk to Vacuo, not knowing if he's even survived since she last saw him, and expect me to think he hasn't been forgotten. Same with Maria. Has the group mentioned her since Amity cut out, notably for reasons they couldn’t explain? Of course not. Did they care to find out what happened? Of course not. I have no doubt they'll both re-appear in the next two episodes, Pietro crying over how perfect his girl is now and Maria congratulating the group on their actions, but we're still marking it.

This is the ugliest thing I’ve ever created, I hope you all are enjoying it :D

Another week, another couple feet added to the hole we’re digging. I know I keep saying I have no idea what's going to happen next... but I have no idea what's going to happen next. A Vacuo ending was not in the cards, not outside of them miraculously showing up in ships. Maybe they have been on their way to Atlas (somehow...) and will arrive precisely when everyone has left! Anything is possible at this point.

See you next Saturday, everyone. Hold on until then lol. 💜

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #mymetas #rwby recaps #rwby creation

[dangermousie]

2020 End of Year Post - kdrama edition

You can find my 2020 cdrama post here: dangermousie.tumblr.com/post/638449659546845184/2020-end-of-year-post-cdrama-edition

This is only going to cover kdramas that aired in 2020; if it originally aired another year, it’s not on this list.

It’s been a pretty lackluster kdrama year. There are probably only 5 kdramas I truly loved and only three of them I was really obsessed over. Better luck in 2021!

DRAMAS WATCHED

(In order of liking from least to most as opposed to pure quality; I am including if I’ve seen enough to make up my mind; yes I realize that’s inaccurate, but that’s my list)

42 Born Again - so bad, so incoherent, so insane, I have no idea why the leads signed up for it (and unlike some of the other watchers, I think it was awful from the very start.) There is literally nothing about this drama that makes sense.

41 Love with Flaws - a bunch of people who should be tried under the Geneva Convention.

40 Sweet Munchies - Jung Il Woo proves his inability to pick a functional script.

39 Meow the Secret Boy - if you ever wanted to bang a cat, this drama is for you. Not being a furry, however...

38 Do Do Sol Sol La Sol - I lost braincells just typing out this title.

37 When I Was the Most Beautiful - the only way it’s not the dumbest, most pointless melo of 2020 is because Born Again considerately came out the same year.

36 Woman of 9.9 Billion - if you want to watch an artsy French movie about miserable people, but only badly made, boy do I have a drama for you.

35 Lies after Lies - screams after screams.

34 Backstreet Rookie - people were up in arms about various problematic plots. I am a survivor of many plots much more problematic but even I couldn’t survive how utterly boring and annoying this drama was and how utterly irritating the leads were. This has taken Ji Chang Wook off my top favorites into “should I even check his latest Lovestruck in the City? Probably not” territory almost single-handedly (Melt Me helped, to be fair.)

33 Men Are Men - boring is boring.

32 Dinner Mate - two beautiful boring people eat out a lot.

31 Was It Love - no it wasn’t.

30 Alice - Joo Won in the shower can make up for a multitude of sins but not plot nonsense of such magnitude. When you find yourself thinking it would be better if he hooked up with the alternate universe version of his mother because at least then something entertaining would happen, you know it’s bad.

29 More than Friends - started out OK, then made me hate basically everyone and kept going.

28 Start-Up - honestly, it’s probably more decent than its place here, but the toxic and batshit fandom for it (the worst this year) made me feel like breaking out in hives any time it’s even mentioned.

27 The Spies who Loved Me - how to take a good cast and waste it.

26 Private Lives - it was good but it never took off with its concept and spent more time on the incoherent plot than the OTP which was its one strength. It’s a decent drama but coming after Heartless City and My Beautiful Bride from the same writer, it’s a disappointment.

25 Record of Youth - as high as it is due to Park Bo Gum hard carrying this entire awful drama on his shoulders and doing it so well I finished it. Alas, while he is in one drama (and that drama is great), the rest of the characters and the entirety of the script are a pointless useless mess.

24 Do You Like Brahms - excellent first third, mediocre middle, and terrible last third. I don’t know what musical term applies to this? Diminuendo, I think.

23 I’ll Go to You When the Weather is Nice - nice and mellow but nothing much happens.

22 Forest - mainly for Park Hae Jin’s excellent and frequently naked bod.

21 The Ballot - I didn’t love it as much as everyone did but it was well-made.

20 Hyena - more romance and less weird law stuff would make it better.

19 365 Repeat the Year - surprisingly solid.

18 The Game Towards Zero - see 365.

17 When My Love Blooms - very old fashioned, very lovely.

16 Chocolate - also very old fashioned and very lovely but also with Yoon Kye Sang performing medical procedures bleeding and shirtless. MMM.

15 (tie) Secret Royal Inspector - a fun if run of the mill sageuk.

15 Find Me In Your Memory - best melo this year.

14 Mystic Pop Up Bar - surprisingly good even though I wasn’t planning to check it out.

13 Where Your Eyes Linger - came out of nowhere but was tender and hopeful and lovely.

12 Itaewon Class - Park Seo Joon hard carries a drama that is already excellent. Love it.

11 Psychopath Diary - Yoon Shi Yoon is such a treat in a hilarious, cynical, dark comedy.

10 Kairos - more like ouroboros.

9 Queen Love and War - in a year where sageuks are very rare, this was solid and surprisingly moving and shippy.

8 The King Eternal Monarch - people didn’t like it but I did. It’s no masterpiece and both the leads and the writers have better dramas, but it was a lovely romantic fairy tale for me.

7 Mr. Queen - sharp, hilarious, and some of my favorite actors.

6 Psycho But It’s OK - healing, sharp cinematography and even sharper chemistry.

5 Crash Landing on You - the last ep pissed me off so much this drama is dead to me but I loved it so much until then I can’t place it lower in good conscience.

4 Train - who knew I would go this hard for an OCN drama or that OCN would do romance so well? But this time-travel mystery romance is just incredible and I shipped the OTP and rooted for the characters and loved every last bit of it.

3 Run On - this is the drama Record of Youth wanted to be but failed. Smart and lived in, you feel like you are peeking at real people, but also even four episodes in, I am so invested in the main characters separately and together, and care for them so much, it’s a little frightening.

1 (tie) Tale of the Nine Tailed - my perfect fantasy romance. I liked it better than Goblin, yeah I said it.

1 Flower of Evil - all the tropes I love in one incredible package. I would rewatch episodes waiting for new ones trying to puzzle the story and to stay withdrawal but it works just as well on rewatch. Lee Jun Ki brings his trademark tortured intensity and for once, both his leading lady and his script back him up and are worthy of that. It’s perfect.

FAVORITE DRAMA

It’s a tie between Tale of the Nine Tailed and Flower of Evil but if I had to pick just one, FoE, because it had me seriously obsessed and guessing about the protagonist and gave me the narrative tropes I love so much and an OTP that statisfied all my hurt/comfort kinks and then some.

WORST DRAMA

Born Again - honestly, this is so bonkers it almost becomes good but alas...

FAVORITE MALE CHARACTER

Do Hyun Soo/Baek Hee Sung, Flower of Evil - he is so messed up, so on edge, so traumatized. Yet capable of so much warmth and caring even as he himself doesn’t realize his humanity. FoE is basically a story of a man pushed and punished by the world for his entire life who, because of one woman, finds a safe place and peace and slowly comes to life without realizing it, and watching his desperation to keep this small bit of normalcy is so heartbreaking and exciting all at once. Plus, you start the drama thinking he’s a psychopathic serial killer and end it (if you are me) thinking he must be protected at all costs and if anyone even looks at him wrong they must suffer, and that’s quite a change!

FAVORITE FEMALE CHARACTER

Nam Ji Ah, Tale of the Nine Tailed - she is so funny and tough and smart and loving and amazing that I will totally buy that a literal demi-god will do anything and everything for her and love her for literal eternity.

NEEDS TO BE MURDERED

Dad in Record of Youth - yes in a year with serial killers and supernatural demons, I picked a normal character from a mediocre drama. It’s his everyday awfulness to his family that hits so hard and I am sad he never got his comeuppance.

FAVORITE SHIP

Ji Ah x Yeon - a fearless reporter and an immortal demi-god who’s been hoping for his human beloved to reincarnate. A really rare set-up where the OTP is equally ride or die, so compatible and completely BAMF. I got why he waited for her for that long and then fell in love with her all over again. Perfection.

Runner up: Flower of Evil - he is so messed up he literally does not believe he is capable of love or empathy, but he falls in love with her anyway and so utterly she permeates his entire life. She is tough as nails and only believes what she sees and is the sole person who believes in him against the world. She loves him but he needs her. She needs him but he loves her. They are amazing.

FAVORITE SECONDARY OTP

Seo Dan x Gu Seung Jun, Crash Landing on You, North Korean x Conman were so good I shipped them harder than the main OTP and the end of that storyline pissed me off so much I dumped the drama and didn’t finish it for months (and it’s still dead to me.)

NOTP

Record of Youth - it started out and they didn’t have much chemistry but the dialogues were interesting and I thought the chemistry would grow. It didn’t and deteriorated, their dialogues became boring and relationship had zero development (about as much as the supposed female lead.) I think we were supposed to feel bad they broke up and they were going for a bittersweet open ending, instead I found myself happy about the break up of two incompatible, chemistry-less people and hoping for the love of God they never get back together.

FAVORITE SCENE

Yeon and the bridge of knives, Tale of the Nine Tailed - Yeon choosing to undergo the creeptastic bridge of knives for a chance to save Ji Ah, who at that point he is not aware is the reincarnation of his Joseon love because, as he says, he doesn’t care if she is or isn’t, it just would be more horrible to have her die than to undergo the horrific torture he is undergoing, and then the sequence with his catching her, her weeping over him and the fact that she is the original Joseon girl revealed and all the bandaging and his watching her sleep and all that loveliness, is everything for yours truly.

Runner up: Hyun Soo having that break-down at the cliff at the end of ep 15 of Flower of Evil as Ji Won desperately tries to convince him she is alive and he finally stumbles to her.

Runner runner up (it’s my list, I will do what I want): Do Won preparing to blow his brains out to give a chance to Seo Kyung to live in Train.

BIGGEST CRUSH

Seon-Gyeom, Run On. Yeah, I know. Im Siwan is tiny, delicate featured and has a runner’s build, none of which are things that normally appeal to me. But his character is so odd, so honest, so unflinching in pursuing what he thinks is right, so incapable of self-pity despite plenty of reasons for it, and so ridiculously attractive when he smiles, I don’t even care.

BEST SCENE STEALER CHARACTER

Kim Bum, TotNT - I started out being annoyed by him and ended up looking forward to his scenes and being distraught by his ending.

NEEDS A SEQUEL

Honestly, none. I was fine with all the endings. I wouldn’t mind seeing post-end life of Tale of the Nine Tailed characters or the OTP settling into their literal new world in Train, but I am good.

TROPE THAT NEEDS TO DIE

Time jump that solves all the problems off screen or alternatively years pass and everyone is frozen - something that kdramas need to learn and need to learn badly. See Record of Youth, Brahms and Start Up.

FAVORITE TROPE WE’VE SEEN A LOT OF

Men who are ride or die for their OTP - this was a great year for this - the male leads of four of my five dramas were beyond anything on that scale (only exception is Run On because it’s still too early to tell there.) Yes PLEASE.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT

This was a banner year for that what with Start Up, Do You Like Brahms, Record of Youth, and Private Lives all starting out well and nosediving off the cliff but winner is Crash Landing on You. I loved it so much for bulk of its run but the last episode pissed me off so much I deleted all my files and called it a day.

BIGGEST GOOD SURPRISE

Flower of Evil - I had no expectations of this drama and wasn’t even planning on watching it despite liking both the lead actors because yet another “look at evil serial killer be evil” drama with no romance was not my thing. Luckily someone convinced me there might be some romance and I peeked curiously. Honestly, their promo campaign was the most misleading and dumbest thing ever.

Runner up Psycho but it’s OK - I have never liked Kim Soo Hyun in anything before and the drama premise seemed WTF but it was shockingly good and KSH totally blew me away.

Hardest Working Lead

Yoon Shi Yoon - he starred in two (!!!) dramas in 2020 playing three characters and not only were both these dramas awesome in a lackluster year, but if it wasn’t for the fact that I knew it was the same actor and the fact that the characters shared a face, I would have never believed that they were played by the same actor. So good!

2020 DRAMAS I HAVEN’T SEEN THAT I MOST WANT TO WATCH

None. Covid Year gave me PLENTY of time

BEST NON-2020 DRAMA I’VE WATCHED IN 2020

My Beautiful Bride and Deserving of the Name - I was obsessed with both of them and honestly, they were much better than the bulk of 2020 kdramas I watched.

MOST ANTICIPATED IN 2021

The Moon That Rises in the Day, Hong Chun Gi, Joseon Exorcist, Island,  Frightening Cohabitation, Snowdrop.

#kdrama #flower of evil #tale of the nine tailed #ocn train #jtbc run on #jtbc chocolate #record of youth #crash landing on you #born again #love with flaws #sweet munchies #do do sol sol la la sol #meow the secret boy #when i was the most beautiful #woman of 9.9 billion #lies after lies #men are men #backstreet rookie #dinner mate #was it love #alice #more than friends #tvn start up #the spies who loved me #jtbc private lives #private lives #do you like brahms #i will go to you when the weather is nice #i'll go to you when the weather is nice #forest kdrama

[scrawnytreedemon]

Shit I’ve Been Winding Up For A Long Time Now But Am Very Aware Will Probably Hold No Relevance Should I Actually Go Into This More--

This is about Bhunivelze.

I.

You know, when I was chilling out, on my bed, that evening on that half term in early June, deciding to check up on ClementJ64′s FF retrospective because-- Hey! It’s been awhile, I wonder if he’s got around to doing the final bit of the FFXIII saga --You know, I was there, chilling, just for a laff. Just a laff.

The rest of that week was spent spiralling into a hyperfixation I absolutely did not anticipate in any way, shape, or form, because the way they introduced that character was “wwhdhfjjhHJDFJKHKJHW H A T??”

That retrospective and a good amount of wiki-scrounging is all I have as a basis for this. This is not a coherent character analysis-- Though I might tag it as that for ease of access. This is not, by any means, the thoughts of someone deeply familiar with FFXIII on the whole beyond plot synopses and overarching themes.

I don’t think I’m brave enough for that.

Reading the vast yet surface-deep lore on those wiki pages on my birthday while in a delirious state of mind was enough to make me somewhat nauseous.

Do you think I’m going to go through all of that in real time?

(Someday, someday.)

Ugh, I don’t know how to begin, but let us, I guess. I’d recommend you read this church-mime-demiurge’s FF Wiki page if you want the same level of base-knowledge I had, and maybe the aformentioned retrospective if you want the experience, because I don’t think I have the wherewithal to get into all of that from the bottom-up.

I am also, so, so fucking sorry for any remaining FFXIII fans in advance. There is like, a good chance I may be butchering the characterisation completely, so bear with me here.

With that... we begin?

Where do we even start with this guy?

How on earth to you begin to explain the absolute monolith you’ve constructed from crumbs of a Guy, some material no doubt spliced in from the Pale King, Sephiroth, y o u r  o w n  G o d  O C and other characters, and the mountains of religious trauma you carry around at all times that is probably the only reason you’ve been able to latch on as hard as you did?

I’m going to try.

What gets me, in summary, about Bhunivelze is how he’s a prime example of how love and concern can become deadly forces if in the wrong hands. His first acquainting with human emotion was by deceiving and possessing Hope, reverting his body to a teenage state, and planning to live among humanity through him. He sees human sorrow and suffering, and decides that, to End This(because it must be ended, you see) he’s going to destroy all the souls of the deceased that make up the Chaos that’s been eating this world for the past five-hundred years so they all forget and Are Happy. :).

Capital G God here hasn’t been present for the vast part of human history because he’s hidden himself away from Everything due to paranoia from killing his own mother and throwing her body into the Cosmic Basement, THEN creating the beings that would come to create humanity and OTHER beings because he didn’t have the keys to the cosmic basement. And also he believes death is a thing because she’d’ve somehow cursed all things to pass(including him) out of Spite.

Which explains why he’s so fucking averse to it and anything to do with it.

Bhunivelze, to put it lightly, is Shit at stepping into others’ shoes and Getting their experiences-- All the FalCie in FFXIII are, but him especially. It’s clear(again, in the f u c k i n g JP--) that he makes attempts to sympathise with them and does what he can to help, but it’s with such a loftiness and a complete inability to Understand why anyone would want grief, The Worst Fucking Experience In Existence, and even less why they’d be willing to Go Up Against Him And HisThe New Perfect World just for it-- And what would it matter, anyway, forgetting their loved ones. It’s not like you can grieve lost memories, right?

Right.

It reminds me of when at the end of the story of Job in the Bible, where, after putting this man through hell on earth, God rewards Job by giving him ten new children to make up for the ones that he lost. I. And that’s fucked! Nothing can replace the sheer uniqueness of each individual person you loved so dearly! But if you were a nigh-omnipotent deity high and mighty, with a cursory, almost mechanical knowledge on the functionings of the human psyche, that would seem adequete; enough.

Bhunivelze is doing that on a cosmic level.

I now want to get onto the romance: that being, his affections for Lightning. I don’t know how much I’m going to say, but it’ll probably be alot. It’s something that hits very close to home.

There is this... thing, within certain branches of Christianity, perhaps even in those of various Abrahamic faiths, where God’s love is posited to be the love-- The ultimate, most-fulfilling, all-encompassing love you could ever imagine --Because, well, he is love, so the story goes, and so often the best way to convey that is through the imagery of...

Marriage.

Giving up yourself so completely, to serve, to be the Bride; to be bound by him for all eternity; and for there to be no higher bliss than this.

This angle is pushed on young girls and women the most; from the mere parallels to the woman’s role in marriage, all the way down to downright-horrifying ultra-Evangelical purity pacts. With men, God is your dad, your best bud and confidant, your boss, your king, your this, your that, and the ‘marriage‘ as it were is relegated to a sort of half-thought; a metaphor.

For me, God was an attempt at all that, and my arranged groom.

(It was almost incestuous; was incestuous, that my own Divine Father would reach for my hand in marriage.)

Bhunivelze experiences Emotions™ for the first time through Hope, experiences Hope’s sheer overwhelming admiration for Lighting(whether there were any baby-crush feelings mixed in, I can’t say), and promptly falls into a nigh-romantic obsession with Lightning, deciding that she will be Etro(his all-but daughter)’s replacement, will be his Goddess of Death to-be-- He even calls her as such, before the final boss-battle--

...In the JP.

What happened in localisation, probably due to a number of factors, all the way back in early 2014, was that everything emotionally challenging about Bhunivelze was scraped off, like it was extra fat, and tossed aside, leaving us with the bland, clichéd shell of a foe-god we’ve seen time and time again. And I mean everything. I mean his very love for humanity; the fact his ploy was, in his eyes, to save them. Because if they’d left that all on, then it would raise the question of even if there was such a seemingly pure, all-knowing, loving being hell-bent on setting things “straight,“ would they truly be unquestionable? Would we have the right to fight for our humanity in the face of the Creator of the Universe?

To reject a love so personal?

That’s what gets me about FFXIII’s tackling of God, no matter how hackneyed and poorly-executed. It’s personal.

It’s from a feminine experience.

I know that terming is... vague, and problematic, but the way Christianity and much of the video game industry handle femininity itself is weird and problematic, so as it stands, I’ll have to simplify it. Apologies.

What sets FFXIII’s Let’s Kill God™ plot aside from most JRPG Let’s Kill God™ plots is that with our protagonist being a woman, and one who is very in touch with her femininity alongside her sheer strength; often, in these stories, God is reduced to Yet Another Foe, expected or unexpected, and you are tasked with taking him down unquestioningly for the Good of Mankind-- You will fight God, because you are right to, and you will go man-to-man-to-however-many-men you decide to bring along for the bloodbath.

And that just, doesn’t speak to me.

Even as an Extian.

Especially as an Extian. And an AFAB one with a deeply complicated experience with my gender, at that.

Leaving Christianity was painful. Questioning God was painful. Coming to terms with the fact that I had been mentally, emotionally, and spiritually traumatised under the guise of All-Encompassing Love was so, so fucking painful. I had been taught since I was five years old to devote myself to him, spent my life desperate to feel something, anything, to stay connected because I just, I never could Feel It on a deeper level, never could Give Up Myself, all I was, couldn’t Die A Spiritual Death And Be Reborn As His Eager Vessel, thus deeming myself to be worthless and a broken vessel for years and years on end... And for all that to have been... Nothing.

Lightning is hollowed out, the shards of her dead sister ripped from her in-stasis, leaving her emotionally numb for the majority of the game, Bhunivelze sweeps it under the rug, pretends he’ll perform a miracle and return Serah to life in exchange for her compliance, then sends her on her way to do his work, all the while knowing he’s going to pull said-rug from under her and elevate her such dizzying heights in the aftermath--

That he’ll deny her humanity.

Sand down all the rough edges that make her her, and polish her up afterwards, gild her as he is gilded, make her a Goddess.

And he’ll do it all because he loves her.

You can’t fight God like you can everything else. To fight It is the fight Existence Itself; FFXIII even conveys that by making Bhunivelze’s model part of the arena; it’s baked into the fabric of the game, no matter how minute.

While Lightning Returns is far from perfect in its execution of this concept, and that in itself makes me wince, not even taking into account the horribly botched excuse for a localisation Bhunivelze endured, it speaks to me more than anything else I’ve seen so far.

And it’s helped uncover some things within me. Helped me untangle them, just a little more.

So, yeah. I have alot of Thoughts on Bhunivelze, I want to share them, and I’m kinda really sad I have no one but my currently-absent friend Vee to share them with. I could get into alot more, like his very Fucked relationship with familial bonds, and how Lightning’s role as saviour so deeply parallels the overwhelming panic and never-ending guilt of Evangelical proselytisation, but I think I’ll leave those for another time.

In short, Bhunivelze is the epitome of Divine Love gone deeply wrong; on all fronts.

And if all of that isn’t enough to intrigue you, then, in Vee’s words, Lightning and Velze are literally canon endgame Sefikura lmaOOOOOOOOOOOOOO--

#ffxiii #lightning returns #bhunivelze #analysis #scrawny speaks #scrawny rambles #this was written on and off over the course of a couple months #i know this will only get two notes #if even that #but fuck it i love this guy and i'm going to puke words for his sake #religion mention

[ziracona]

T2 was okay and it could have been really good—had some real moments. But it needed more script iterations, and it was too goofy. Goofy is fine in general, but Terminator works best as a sci-fi action-drama-horror mesh. That’s the peak atmosphere. Also just, they gave their new Terminator scary powers to keep him relevant, but there’s just...no way to really make anyone on screen look like a threat to Arnold Schwarzenegger you know? And they never overcame that and it throws off the whole underdog atmosphere. He just. Wasn’t scary. Not when he was trying to kill heckin Arnold the brick house.

I’m not gonna talk about T3 bc I feel like I don’t need to and I think I have a lot of support for that in the fandom, and I’m not gonna talk any Genysis bc no one ever should, and I know I have support there.

Dark Fate was fine, but I felt like they really didn’t have to kill off their Kyle expy like at this point the surprising thing and interesting one would be /not/ to kill him. That role has died in /every/ other film. Like we get it. But plot rehashes are only good if you have some kind of spin. Mostly though I just...would have liked T800 man’s personality in another context but you couldn’t ever sell me on him after watching him gun down a 10 year old in the open. Like what, he found a soul by being...bored? If you want to convince me of fundamental change in a person, you /gotta/ motivate it better. Show me. Don’t tell me and expect me to take your word. And there just wasn’t enough meet in some spots. I wanted more firm lore and a little less action. Like I’m not even a science-heavy leaning sci-fi fan but it still wasn’t enough. I liked it more than most of the others but it just wasn’t quite...meaty enough. Sarah still a queen. But T800 man didn’t sell and that was a real weak spot, and so was expecting us and Sarah to just...like and forgive him bc he had accrued a family. But also like. I enjoyed having a new protag, but feeling like so much, no, /all/ of the work and suffering of everyone in other Terminator films was for nothing bc it’s not even Skynet anymore it’s some other robots?? It kind just...didn’t really work. It makes everything more hollow like it’s not even Terminator anymore there’s no more Terminators. They should have just had it be Skynet but a different rebel leader, or more. Sarah goes on to mentor Dani instead since John is dead, /something/ to make it more the same franchise and not so hollow. Or if it’s gonna be gutted, go all the way and let us feel that, don’t blip it as a plot point once and keep rolling. There’s decades of character attachment for fans; either make that matter, or make it mourned because it’s dead. Don’t skim it and make it cheap. Also on a meta level it was kind of weird how they handled time travel compared to the norm for the franchise but I’m not going into that.

BUT. The Terminator? A cinematic classic. It’s just...such a good film. The characters work is solid the whole movie, and Reese and Sarah are both truly excellent protagonists also given ample time to explore and exhibit that. There’s so much you get in moments that show tiny things about them. The way Sarah handles getting canceled on and goofing with Ginger, her having a pet iguana she loves to cuddle, talking to the statue at work? And she’s smart and normal (I mean normal in a very complimentary way). Kyle is introduced almost immediately running from the cops, but even in the middle of a chase scene, he’s stealing clothes in a mall while evading flashlights, and little things like hopping while he runs to check shoe sizes give you so much right away. He’s clearly out of his depth but he’s smart and methodical and he holes up in a car he hotwires and has a ptsd moment waking up from a dream because of some heavy construction machinery. You don’t have him say much about himself at all but you get him taking a second to be nice to the kids and guard dog on his way back before a T800 attacks. Even though if you’re watching it classic, you have no spoken goal for Reese and all you know is he’s armed and /also/ looking for Sarah, like the man who has killed three people already is, you kind of aren’t very scared of him by the time he’s creepily following her into a night club. That scene is iconic too damn. Anyway. Her reactions to everything are so great. Only film I ever saw where I 100% felt the person on screen was reacting like anyone would to almost being killed and then getting kidnap-saved by some other guy claiming to be from the future like I’d bite him too, but you know, I’d also be pretty happy he saved me and also decide he was crazy and not like, dangerous, and try to keep the cops from killing him. It’s so cute he thinks anyone is going to believe him like hang in there Kyle baby, king. Love as soon as the Terminator hits the police station, he breaks out and goes to find Sarah, and she’s immediately like ‘so fuck this actually’ and looking for him too. The deleted scene in the motel woods. The slow character build. Him falling in love with her because of the picture where she always looked a little sad and he wondered what she was thinking about and you don’t find out till the last scene it’s him she was thinking about in that picture. A family can be two complete trauma disasters making pipe bombs in a motel. The top 5 cinema shots moment where you think they won and they think they won and they’re both injured and stagger to each other and collapse laughing and crying and hugging and it holds for like ten seconds before that fucking thing gets up and you see the rubble in the fire shift and Kyle sees it first. And the hopelessness and despair. Sarah just screaming no in rage because it’s so unfair. The little scaffolding fight?? Kyle doing what he does? Sarah winning with a broken leg? The picture? The heartbreak? A work of art.

Also just. They’re both attractive but like, they are not remotely airbrushed Hollywood pretty. Kyle’s got that big scar on his lip and they’re both sweaty and bloody and dirty and gross the whole film??? God yeah.

Terminator Salvation? Also a classic. You have a film not about the core cast exactly, but it’s very ensemble. You get early days war. And it’s from the very open a solid narrative about second chances and what it means to be human and they really do explore that the whole runtime. Markus dies and comes back more confused than you are in the apocalypse. Baby Reese is absolutely perfect. You get formerly executed for murder Markus somehow adopting like 20 year old Reese and 13 year old kid Star and they’re amazing. Rebellion drama, lore reveals. Reese’s devout faith in the cause and how fast he looks up to Markus and starts learning and Markus is like :[ but then he’s like ... :] because he god assigned two family members now. The tag team fights—how incredibly talented Star is. Guilt trip on a look to dropping cars, she’s super effective. Tbh Markus is just O_O to >:-[ the whole movie as soon as Reese and Star are taken and I feel it. You’ve got a guy who was killed for straying too far from human, come back as a machine, but he doesn’t know it, wondering if he deserves another chance and if he can change, and it’s really neat the way it unfolds. Even after losing so many friends to Terminators that look human, Blair refuses to believe he isn’t a human even if he’s also a machine and risks her life to save him, when they barely know each other. Markus getting like, tortured by the rebels, and still choosing to help them and be who he has decided he wants to be this time, even towards John. Even with better alternatives. And you have Star never having a moment of doubt, or Reese, and him getting to save them both, and them trying to help the other humans in line for extermination before he arrives. The hand hold with Star when his hands just metal. And he decides to die for someone he doesn’t even /like/ and who has personally hurt him a lot of times, because he knows the rebels need him to win. Anyway death row to death row but completely different people in the same body facing that same death differently are amazing if done well (see TWDG I mean ow) and it was a very simple core theme to latch to and very enjoyable executed and it got snubbed by fans when it’s the best sequel Terminator ever had.

#thus concludes my spoiler heavy rant for why Terminator Salvation and The Terminator are the best two Terminator films #the terminator #terminator salvation #ramblings #spoilers #twdg spoilers #long post #sorry I had no idea how long this was

[charmspoint]

how was it ^-^

Let's seee. It was good, perfectly enjoyable, it reads fast and i was never really bored with it. I'd give most chapters like a 7/10 and then chapters 71-82 like 8 or 9/10 and then back to like 7/10 and the ending was weird but also kinda sweet in its own way.

Now to preface anything else: This isn't my type of manga. I can easily see it being a 10/10 for someone who really likes fight scenes and death and gore and what not. I'm not really into that, I'm a character and story driven person which is why the manga as a whole scored as just goodish to me while chapters 71-82 which kinda make a lot of emotional and psychological aspects of the chapters before them come to culmination scored a lot better. You know I don't GET fights. Chainsaw man was very gory but I didn't even really register it. Like because of all the gore I feel I heard people say it has horror aspects but I never really felt scared or off put or anything. It was just kinda like 'oh a lot of people are in pieces rn, okay, that's a thing that's happening'. So yeah that's why the score is the way it is, it simply isn't a manga that focuses on things I like and that's perfectly alright. I couldn't buy into the hype like I did with jjk and I certently didn't feel 'oh this is the best thing ever' like I felt with witch hat atelier.

With all that out of the way let me talk long and hard about Denji and sexual aspects of the series in a surprisingly positive light:

I like Denji as a character. I think he's still a bit rough around the edges but he's not a character made for introspection so that's fine, you really kinda have to take what he says and how he acts and think about it because the author won't do it for you. That being said, I think Denji is probably the most compelling shonen protagonist I've read so far. Like when I read bnha or jjk I see Izuku and Yuji and I'm like 'this is a shonen protagonist'. They are a likable character but they won't be your favorite character. They are largely made for japanese high school boys to project themselves on and I'm not a japanese high school boy. That being said, Denji feels like a character of his own and not something meant to be projected on to. Honestly if anyone projected on to Denji I'd be worried about them. But that makes him probably the most compelling shonen protagonist I've ever read. You just wanna dig a shovel into his skull and go 'man kid ur fucked up'.

I know when you first read csm you were off put by Denji because it felt like a manga put a pervert character as a protag which is naturally off putting and I can 100% see that. Now be it because I was warned about it first or something else, I didn't actually find fanservice jarring at all. It kinda was integrated into the world in a way that made me think 'yeah of course it's like this'. This is a very grim and rough and drty world and things in it would be just like that. It is a story about base desires and sex is one of those. These are people who expect they will die any day now and Denji is a person who's just now getting to experience a somewhat decent standard of living. Here's a thing I noticed though: even as Denji thinks many sexual things (which, he's a teenager, that's normal) he's actually very respectful. I don't think I've ever seen him touch anyone without their permission, in fact i think things like that mostly happen to him. Like example how Power comes in just as Denji is in the middle of his 'i wanna touch some boobs' phase. You would almost expect that what happens next is we see him try to grope Power as she's sleeping or something. But no, he doesn't do a thing until she asks him to help her save her cat and he gets to touch her boobs for it. And it's like this with p much every other sexual encounter through the series. Both partners are consenting and getting something out of the whole thing. Sexual aspects are used as normal bartering chips in a world where your whole body is a bartering chip. It's normal and no one is forced into it. I've told you before that my biggest misgiving with fanservice is that it's often based on embarrassment and unwilling participation of the girls. Like fanservice isn't fanservice because you saw a boob it's fanservice because you saw a boob when you weren't supposed to, when the girl didn't want you, when she's angry or scared or embarrassed because you did. A lot of fanservice feels very much like taking something from the girl, debasing and humiliating her for the sake of watchers/readers satisfaction.

Despite all it's sexual jokes and themes and everything else Chainsaw man never once made me feel like that. It never once made me feel like the author expected me to gain sexual satisfaction out of debasement of female cast. Which is why even though boobs and naked women are literally all over the manga I didn't mind it at all. It stopped being fanservice and became just a natural part of characters lives as sexuality and sex is a natural part of real world.

Back to Denji.

So I mussed a bit about Denji and Maslow before but here it is in total

Denji is 16 years old and at the beginning of the series he's just starting to have his physiological and safety needs met. Like he doesn't live like a human being at the start of the series and Makima recruiting him is A BIG CHANGE for him. Like for a good while Denji is like 'Now I have three meals a day and a place to sleep at so I'm good with whatever'. He's given reliable sources to fulfil his needs and he's given a way to keep those sources stable. He has a job, it's not a good job but he has it. He has a place to live and a theoretical safety net. He's immortal so there's nothing to fear in the death and injury department which means the otherwise unsafe job is perfectly fine for him. Now what Denji gets stuck on through most of the series is Love and Belonging. Because you can't just give someone love like you can give them food (not that Makima doesn't try). People are more complicated. Compromises need to be made and human connections are hard to establish, especially if you are someone like Denji who has no idea how to interact with others aside from obeying orders. This is why his need for love and belonging first manifests as a sexual need (that and he's an allo teenager). Human connections are hard but sexual contact doesn't have to come tied with connections so it's easier (if unsatisfactory as Denji finds out with Power) to achieve. A lot of Denji's personal growth is tied to him finding out that this need can be fulfilled by other things alongside sex. This is why I love chapters 71-82 so much because they are really a culmination of Denji's emotional journey in that category. Along the way along with sexual love he finds romantic one. He wants to spend time with girls he likes, he wants them to like him beyond the sexual. Of course sexuality is always an aspect of it but after that scene with Power it's never the only thing. Human connection, understanding the other person, knowing them, loving them, making them happy. And it all culminates in the familial love he finds with Aki and Power, taking care of someone and being taken care of for no other reason than they are your family and you love them, you care for them, you want them to be well and happy. There's this scene with Power later on when they are taking a bath together and Denji is like 'huh we are both naked but it doesn't feel naughty at all'. He's stopped seeing Power sexually because he started to see her as his sister and it's just really nice, those few chapters we get to see them as a family are really nice.

By the end of the series Denji starts checking off the esteem box too, by people accepting him and loving him and him feeling like he wants to respond to that, but I feel like that aspect and possible self actualization will be more explored in part 2.

There you have it, my essay about why Denji is the most compelling Shonen protagonist I've ever read :)

Also I really liked the girls in this series, it really isn't afraid of letting it's female characters be weird and gross and in Makima's case just plain evil and I appreciate it for that. I just wish Quanxi got more time and things to do but she's a side character and it's not her fault she's cooler than the whole main cast (Power best girl tho).

I feel like I talked a lot already about what was my most important take away from the whole thing but yeah, in general: pretty entertaining read, would probably be a complete blast for someone who's invested in fights, a little thin on psychology and emotion for my tastes but when it delivers them it delivers them good.

Also I like how it basically ended on 'you should give people more hugs' it was cute

Additionally I think the authors idea to basically release manga in seasons like you would an anime is straight up genius I hope that more mangakas start picking this up because it allows them more rest in between big arcs.

Ok now that's it for real this time.

#megacarapa #lucy rants #csm #chainsaw man #character analysis fanservice discussion sex and sexuality dicussion this baby has it all