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steve0discusses · 4 years

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Yugioh Ep 36 S4: Seto Joins Dragon Wife in Hell

So I dunno about you guys, but 2020 aged me like a lot in just these 8 months, so I figured it was time to embrace the feeling of being on death’s door and I decided to learn Mahjong. So I could truly embrace the ancients and vibe in their natural habitat.

Anyway, once I learned some Mahjong lore, some parts of Yugioh just open up. Namely--Seto’s dragons. Like a whole lot of stuff about early Seto Kaiba that confused me at the time just makes so much more sense now.

But unfortunately, he dies this episode, and he never pulled out his Blue Eyes White Dragons, and it’s just like...

...but my Mahjong deep cuts...

Like every episode I’m just rubbing my palms together in anticipation that someone will die, but like...I never get to talk about how in Mahjong, there’s only 4 white dragon tiles, but if you have 3, you can steal the fourth white dragon from another player’s discards, and that when you that, other stuff happens...I don’t get to talk about that because Seto’s hella dead.

So lets just get to the death. Dartz decides to make all of our soldier frenemies attack Pharaoh--because that’s all he needs to raise the Leviathan. Like Dartz doesn’t even really need to finish this game. He just needs Yami.

Seto picks up that these friend (and Pegasus) soldiers that Yami refuses to kill are probably going to end the world very quickly so he decides to do something about it. If this were a blog where I talked about cards instead of Mahjong, then I’d dive into the intricacies of what that even was.

But, we’re not, so lets just talk about Pegasus.

(read more under the cut)

This guy harnesses some psychic energy he’s got leftover from S1 and communicates directly to Pharaoh’s mind.

So, hey, what was that about Pegasus not having powers anymore? Like? He’s still doing this? He’s still psychic and he very clearly can still make blank cards so like...I guess you can take out the eyeball and make him nicer, but you can’t take out some of the effed up magic side-effects. (like there was a comment I didn’t respond to (which, sorry about that, been a little nuts over here in California), but apparently there was a movie in between seasons where Pegasus saved their lives--so he’s legit good now...there was a DLC where character arcs happened.)

Which kind makes you wonder about Marik, but we’ll probably never see him again so o well, save it for the fanfiction.

PS Yami is totally fixating on that eye we can’t see, right? Like...it never outright tells us, but does this spiritual Orichalcos manifestation of Pegasus still have the golden eye? A human eye? Or no eye at all? Just skin?

Not like it matters because Seto does some sort of card shenanigans that undo the whole friends that are soldiers thing like it never happened.

MMMMM I don’t like these weird legs on Yugi. Don’t like the thighs it gave to Joey. No! I’m seeing like this skin-tight silhouette of half an ass right now and I really don’t like it.

Along with other card things I won’t go into that consumed most of this episode, Seto finally got hit by a...well, I mean you can clearly see it in the next cap.

So, in Mahjong, there are 3 types of dragons: a white dragon, a red dragon, and a green dragon. I used to think it was really lazy that we’re just calling monsters straight up “white dragon” or “red dragon” in this show, but now it makes more sense because this whole time it was probably baby’s first Mahjong reference but I’m too Western to know that.

Anyway, the white dragon is funny looking because it’s a white tile--just a completely blank white tile. I thought it was a wild card at first but nah--it’s a white dragon in a snowfield--which is a very funny Dad joke from 200 years ago we’re still doing today. But, often, instead of a Dad joke, they’ll just make the white dragon tile a drawing of a blank card, like this:

Kind of funny that the guy who’s shtick is white dragons, ended up with his soul in a blank card. Was that a mahjong reference? Probably not, but I noticed it.

And mahjong aside, the show paid it’s respects to Seto dying and so he took his sweet time passing on. It’s still not that much respect. We aren’t gonna get that amazing Joey death sequence from S3 that took like half an episode of scene-shredding for our mains to recover from, but like...Seto was very determined to keep going, despite not having a soul.

He even finished his turn of cards, as if to just spite Joey Wheeler for that one time Joey hella died before killing Marik.

Shippers rejoice, it’s a Yami and Seto Kaiba death sequence. If you squint really hard, it might even be an embrace. I mean they both have very sharp duel disks on, and if Yugi’s closes for whatever reason, it’ll snap Seto’s head clear off, but what other “hugs” do we really get on this show?

And as for Mokuba, he was quite tragic this episode. I mean it’s Yugioh, so it’s not like you’re gonna cry or anything, but Mokuba just doesn’t really have anything else going for him without his brother so it is legit like...man Mokuba gets a lot of crap thrown his way and even when he’s happy, he still has to live with Seto so just...Mokuba...

Again we get this bubble effect of other people trying to enter the Orichalcos which happens just a Hell of a lot this season. Like Dartz probably has never had a single person WANT to go in the green zone in 10,000 years and then these bizarre children happened and they just want to bounce off that thing like a jello pudding.

I think it took over 5 minutes for Seto to die, and he was very, very, VERY angry the entire time. Just fueled by literally nothing but rage. Could probably go a couple more episodes if he had taken a nap in the KaibaCopter, but alas, even Seto Kaiba eventually runs out of fumes.

Anyway, another Mahjong fun fact. The dragon tiles are considered an “honor tile” and how many times have we heard Seto--who is such a scumball--go off about his honor? It can be hard to use honors tiles because their rate of success is lower, so when Seto’s like “I have to live up to my dragon’s honor or I can’t keep these in my deck” could he be like...making a Mahjong pun as well as a literal reference to whatever he defines as honor?

...Again, just a Mahjong reference I noticed, but probably not what they intended at all. Which is Good Enough for this blog.

After he tragically passed on, and Yami delicately put his body on the ground, -- Dartz decided to make this moment very funny for me, instead.

Bless.

Not as good as Yami the both times his body was chucked casually across the screen this season--but a very good toss, nonetheless.

I have made so MANY clips of this season!

Tristan and Tea kinda just stood there this entire episode while this was all going down and like...I know they can’t really do anything else at this point but like...can someone give Mokuba a hug???

I can’t believe Valon was the only guy in this entire show about friendship who knew how to hug people. He was in prison since he was 9, and then was raised by freakin Dartz, why is he the only hugger?

PS, apparently Seto’s yummy soul was enough to make the Leviathan open a single eye-ball in curiosity.

Mokuba out there flinging so many insults that he got everyone else banned from watching devil cards. It’s like sports competitions in Middle school with that one kid who won’t stop cussing. That one kid who is the reason everyone else has to sit through a boring ass assembly about sportsmanship? That’s Mokuba.

Now that everyone is ‘passed out’, we can get to the juicy stuff only the olds talk about--which sounds a lot like I’m about to do another segway into talking about Mahjong again, but I’m actually all out of the Mahjong juice. Again, I’m ass at Mahjong.

(and like...the peanut gallery died in the original version, right? I know to never trust a “they’re just sleeping” line in Yugioh.)

Dartz telling me he dragged that ass length blue hair across Egypt?

Man.

I would say that it must’ve really thrown people, but then again, their Pharaoh looked like...that.

So Dartz ended up wandering the earth for 5000 years, cursed to live immortally, unable to revive the great Leviathan, wallowing in his failure. Sentenced to suffer the entire existence of humanity that he never wanted to see survive anyway, unable to die himself.

That’s an interesting plotline that I wish I saw more of. I really like the idea of a supervillian who is already past his prime, who’s already burnt out, who’s so far removed from what happened that he’s fully accepted his demise and is just wandering around out of habit. But, most importantly--that changes my math. That’s like...5000 years he wasn’t slurping no souls because he was too damn depressed. So I’ll append the Deathcount. One second.

OK so we can just subtract 7.3 million from what we had, leaving us with: 7,805,844,047. Barely even made a dent but...eh...when you got the current population of the Earth in there it’s really hard to make a dent in that thing.

PS I still have that google doc where I keep track of the deaths, we have 55 lines of entries, haha.

Yugioh is interesting because you do have some racial stuff going on here where Yami is SO OLD that he doesn’t remember not only his own name--he doesn’t remember what he looks like. He’s even seen it a few times in hallucinations but like...Yami legit doesn’t know what it is to be an ancient Egyptian anymore. It’s been a hot minute, and he still sees himself as a pale skinned Yugi clone when he spiritually manifests in the show. Because the modern day, set in Japan, through Yugi’s eyes--that’s all he knows about life.

Dartz was so impressed by Pharaoh’s magic powers that he knew--he just KNEW that this Pharaoh with the worst hair would be the yummy soul for the Leviathan tummy. But unfortunately...

This is a show that has had so MANY overlapping apocalypses that I did have to sit back and kind of count off on my fingers which crazy person this would be about.

Honestly? Either Seto or Bakura...guessing Bakura because we haven’t finished his storyline yet and I know that he’s the big bad of S5. But man...Dartz was just like “oh...no thanks to that guy. I’ll just take a nap for 5000 years, BIG no thanks.” and it does make you wonder...

...oh...so that’s why you didn’t bother Bakura in this timeline.

It also helps make Bakura even more of a threat. Again, Bakura is great because he’s just constantly leaving nuggets of what a threat he is and then just...disappears for seasons on end. The Bakura we’ve made in our head is probably way more awful than what he may end up being.

But for now, it’s fun to just fill in the gaps instead.

anyway that was it for this episode, I’m off to pretend it’s Thanksgiving week and will look forward to drowning my anxiety in a 16 lb turkey shared between four people.

Anyway, I brought up the cat that falls asleep on metal rods so I have to do this:

And for those that are new, this is a link to read these in chrono order: https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

#yugioh #ygo #yu-gi-oh #yami #dartz #seto kaiba #dies #mokuba #tea gardner #tristan taylor #Yugi Muto #Joey Wheeler #'s weird ass pants with the flap thing going on #mahjong #S4 Ep36

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phoenix-downer · 4 years

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How would you personally rank the Kingdom Hearts games? Storywise, that is.

In terms of story alone, discounting gameplay (and insert disclaimer here that this is all my personal opinion):

1. KH1 and KH2 are tied for first place for me. KH1 is just so magical. It has this sense of awe and wonder and mystery and hope and bittersweetness and nostalgia. Sora’s sacrifice for Kairi will forever stick with me, and everything that occurred from Hollow Bastion onward elevates the game from “really good” to masterpiece. And KH2 has the best ending of the series. I tear up every time I see it. So, so satisfying to experience after everything the characters go through up till that point. Sora and Kairi reuniting is just... it makes the ending of KH1 (which is beautiful in its own right) that much better, and it was so lovely to see Roxas and Naminé living on through them, despite what they’d been told about Nobodies having to cease to exist.

2. KH3 including ReMind. ReMind really completed KH3 for me and elevated the whole game because it showed just how far Sora was willing to go to save Kairi, and his compassion for his friends’ suffering was really moving. That plot point has been teased since Re:coded, and this time he was able to bear their hurt without it breaking them. Being there with him for his journey over the years just makes me feel really proud of who he is now. And Kairi getting to fight is technically gameplay I suppose, but man was it satisfying, especially because we got to fight the guy who was responsible for her “death.” Her fighting by Sora’s side was what I’d been wanting ever since I played KH1 and KH2, so yes playing through ReMind was immensely satisfying, haha.

3. BBS has such a good ending in Blank Points that it elevates not only BBS but the entire series. Plus I like the whole “tragic heroes” angle with the Wayfinder Trio, and Eraqus and Xehanort’s relationship fascinates me.

(I keep waffling back and forth on how to rank KH3 and BBS. Without ReMind, I’d definitely rank BBS higher, and probably Chain of Memories and Reverse/Rebirth higher than KH3 as well, but again ReMind really elevates KH3 for me).

4. Chain of Memories and Reverse/Rebirth. Really excellent, strong story for Sora, Riku, and Naminé. I loved the themes it dealt with, and watching Naminé stand up to her captors and Sora kick Marluxia’s butt was immensely satisfying. So was Riku’s journey to rediscover himself and forge his own path, and his moments with Mickey were really touching.

5. Kingdom Hearts Coded/Recoded. Maybe it’s a surprise I have it here, but the ending was fantastic and actually made me cry. It set things up so beautifully for future KH games too with revealing to the audience what Sora needs to do to save his friends. Mickey being so supportive of Data Sora was the kind of Mickey and Sora interaction I didn’t know I needed. Data Sora and Data Riku’s interactions were great too, gave me Steve and Bucky vibes, and it was so nice to see even data versions of them get to work together like that.

6. Kingdom Hearts 0.2. Really got me excited for KH3, and I enjoyed the deeper dive into Aqua’s psyche. The moment where Terra protected her and Ven are top-notch, and her battle to protect Riku stuck with me too.

7. Back Cover. In some ways I wonder why it’s all the way down here on this list because the Master of Masters stuff was great and had me wanting more. I guess the lack of closure kind of hurts it, but it was still an enjoyable watch and got me interested in the Foretellers.

8. KHUx. I struggled with where to rank this one, because the story itself is really intriguing, but the presentation of it is frustrating with updates being rare. I wish the game updated more frequently, and I hope the story is released as a cutscene movie at some point a la Back Cover because I’d love to experience it all at once. The recent revelations have been tugging at my heartstrings, so I can only imagine what it would be like to experience the story with full voiced cutscenes!

9. Dream Drop Distance. This one is so near the bottom because its highs are really high but its lows are reaaaaally low. The time travel stuff is a mess, Kairi barely being in the plot really doesn’t have a good excuse, and Sora’s characterization doesn’t feel consistent with how you’d expect him to act after KH2 (thankfully KH3 fixed this but I digress). However, the “you treat people like bottles on a shelf” speech from Sora to Xigbar is fantastic, the whole “Sora almost gets norted” plotline was also really good, Sora and Riku being so supportive of each other shows how far they’ve come since KH1 days, and Riku’s arc in this game is just so amazing that really, it almost makes up for everything else. I just wish Riku being such a badass didn’t have to come at the cost of Sora’s characterization, but like I said, KH3 fixed my issues with that (but then handed Riku the incompetence ball unfortunately, but that’s a discussion to be had another day).

10. 358/2 Days. A controversial choice, I know, and please don’t take this to mean I think Days is terrible! Much like DDD, it’s a flawed game that does some things very well; I just enjoyed DDD more personally. Again, this is all pretty subjective, and I have been informed I did things wrong by watching the cutscene movie before playing the game. I think that probably impacted my experience of the story (plus Xion’s death was spoiled for me). The plot was also really overhyped for me I think? There just wasn’t any way it could realistically live up to the expectations people had set for me. I also don’t think I played the game at the right time of my life. The people who seem to love it the most are the ones who first played it as kids or teens, and I was an adult by the time I got around to it. So I think the theme of struggling with identity/what it means to exist just didn’t impact me as hard. It’s like if you try to watch My Neighbor Totoro for the first time as an adult. It just doesn’t land the same.

Thanks for the ask! Again, this is all just my personal opinion, and I’m curious to hear how you’d rank the games!

#answer #mademoiseli #long post #ranking the games

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captain-of-the-historicfuture · 3 years

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~hello~ !! For the meta asks!: 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, and 25 :))

Hello!! Thank you for sending these; I was really excited to see that ask game and I was hoping somebody would send some in. It still took me a while to actually answer them though, and for that I apologise. But without further ado! Some meta answers (under the cut because they ended up being fairly long, whoops):

3. What is that one scene that you’ve always wanted to write but can’t be arsed to write all of the set-up and context it would need? (Consider this permission to write it and/or share it anyway.)

I thought of a few examples, but they could basically be grouped together under a common theme: whumpy/angsty scenes that were self-indulgent as all heck. The whole self-indulgent aspect often required the characters to be just the teeniest, tiniest bit OOC and/or necessitated rather unrealistic plot circumstances. So it was simply easier to keep such scenes as maladaptive daydreams, rather than trying to think of explanations for the character/plot issues…or exposing myself to judgement for them LOL.

Receiving permission to write/share one such scene anyway is an opportunity I can’t let slip by though. It might be because I’m writing this while running on zero (0) hours of sleep—let’s hear it for insomnia, y’all!—but I suddenly couldn’t remember any of my newer ideas under this category. However, I did recall a one-shot I had started writing a couple of months ago that sort of counts? “Sort of” because I could actually be arsed to write it since I was, ya know, writing it. Only got about six hundred words down though.

…should I share those six hundred words…?

………nahhh. I don’t think I’m quite ready for that yet.

But here’s the gist of it: Coulson and May (because of course it’s Philinda) were married for quite some time before the Attack on New York. But then Coulson DiedTM and then got ResurrectedTM. But gasp of horror, he had to lose his memories of his romantic relationship with May because reasons. (I actually did have some ideas for those reasons but sshhhh this is about me yeeting context and setup.)

The first half of S1 still happens as normal (except MayWard doesn’t happen because??? Vows) and it’s now post-E20 “Nothing Personal”. The morning after (or a morning soon after, whatever) the T.A.H.I.T.I. reveal! May’s mom—who doesn’t know about GH.325 and whom May fed a cover story about Coulson divorcing her or something equally as oof, IDK—shows up at the hotel and starts ripping into Coulson for breaking her daughter’s heart, then dragging her back into the field with her ex-husband (him), then accusing her of terrible things and forcing her away again.

Poor guy’s confused as heck, and so is the team, and soon enough so is Lian. The only one who understands what’s going on is May, and she’s freaking dying off to the side like why is this happening to me and eventually everybody’s like! Explain??? (Was thinking about including something from Coulson like, “Are you still keeping things from me?” Just for that extra smidge of angst, yay!)

So yeah then May gives a, like, two-sentence debriefing that elicits more questions than answers. Coulson decides to take May aside and they have a heart-to-heart. Lots of feelings and angst and hurt/comfort and at some point plenty of kissing too. Just! May hiding her feelings for Coulson’s sake but really magnified, plus some actual apologies and consideration of the grief May’s been through on Coulson’s part.

And uhh yeah that’s basically it I dunno hdsjncjshd. I warned y’all it’s OOC, plot-bendy, and very self-indulgent!

6. What character do you have the most fun writing?

I don’t think I could name a single character for this. I get different things out of taking on different voices, you know? I guess recently I’ve found myself gravitating towards more taciturn and introspective points of view, like JQ from my original novel Rosewood or M. Yisbon from my…other original novel Temple.

Generally, however, I like tackling stories from an outsider’s perspective. That’s why I so rarely write my more “substantial” (serious? demanding? for lack of better words?) projects from the PoV of my “preferred” character. This usually means writing from their love interest’s perspective, but not always. With shorter fanfic, using a more removed/unconventional/niche PoV can be really fun. Like, I once wrote a canon compliant ficlet purely(-ish) about Philinda from Tony Stark’s perspective. That isn’t always sustainable with stories that demand more character development or closer character studies, however, which is why it’s a good thing I like writing drabbles!

9. Are you more of a drabble or a longfic kind of writer? Pantser or plotter? Do you wish you were the other?

My word counts tend to run long, but I usually only write one-shots for fanfic. If I’m even inspired with a novella- or novel-length story idea for a fandom, you already know I’m in deep with them. And if I actually find the motivation to plan and execute that idea? Dangg. That’s only ever happened…twice, maybe thrice, and I’m in a lot of fandoms.

At times, I wish I could go for more of a middle ground ’cause, like, you know what I love to see? An AO3 dashboard with several completed novellas for my ship/character of choice. I mean yes, I hecking love >90k fics, but sometimes I’m in the mood for quick reads…and what am I supposed to do when I burn through all the drabbles and 2k one-shots? (Besides despair and/or reread my faves desperately.) Novellas are basically always safe for me LOL, and I’d hope to be able to give as much as I take.

Ultimately though, I think I’m okay with where I am with regards to that. I wish I could write more in general, but I’d be okay with “writing more” just meaning “writing more one-shots”, ya know? More than okay, really. I have mad respect for fic writers who have, like, a hundred or more one-shots under their belt for this one ship. The fandom ecosystem would be incomplete without them (as well as every other type of writer, but sshhh that’s the type of writer I’m closest to being right now).

I’m definitely a plotter, and I definitely prefer it that way. It’s cool having such a detailed record of my process. I like feeling like a frazzled genius on the brink of a major discovery with all of my different outlines and colour coding and many drafts and various websites.

12. Do you want your writing to be famous?

Not exactly. It might be cool if my original works were recognisable in the world, but I don’t think I’d want to be recognisable. As for fanfic, I’d low-key enjoy gaining a place in that fandom’s community as a fic writer. Like someone who gave and got fic gifts from fic writer friends, who participated in challenges and GCs, who received writing prompts on Tumblr, whose name was known for doing a certain trope/genre a bunch of times… Ya know what I mean?

Unlikely to happen when I’m so hecking hesitant to publicly (i.e., outside of AO3) claim credit for my writing, but fjnskfsjhfjs. A writer can dream, right?

15. Which is harder: titles or summaries (or tags)?

Of those three, tags are the easiest for me, for I have a reliable system for figuring out those.

Next easiest would probably be titles. For fanfiction, I like to use titles that are a quote from the source material. You should have seen all of my old Hamilton fanfic… I was really proud of some of those titles. And I don’t mean, like, whole lines—usually only two to five words. It’s a unique type of wordplay that I just love dabbling in.

And lastly, summaries. Sometimes inspiration strikes me and a snappy and intriguing synopsis just jumps out—one that I’m quietly pleased with—but most of the time I’ll spend way too long trying to think of such a synopsis and eventually just go with whatever I’d come up with so far. And live with my quiet dissatisfaction for the rest of time.

18. Do any of your stories have alternative versions? (Plotlines that you abandoned, AUs of your own work, different characterisations...?) Tell us about them!

Typically, no. If I have deleted scenes, I save and publish them separately, but that’s about it. I sometimes think of AUs for my own work and might talk about them in my author’s notes—might even talk about writing them—but I never really do anything with them.

Although…

It’s not uncommon for me to decide a plotline isn’t working for a certain story or to think of an interesting but undoable arc for a certain character, but what I’ll do is make a whole new story for those ideas. Once I’m done developing the original idea and the branched-off one, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell they grew from the same roots. Does that count?

21. What other medium do you think your story would work well as (film, webcomic, animated series, etc.)?

That depends on the story. I’ve actually written stories in other mediums—movie screenplay, musical stageplay, poetry, TV show scripts, play scripts, roleplay—but the novel does tend to be my comfort zone. Sometimes, if I have an idea that I think could work, or would even work better, as another medium, I’ll label it as such in my folder of ideas and decide not to write it as a novel.

Most of the time, my non-book projects are collaborations. I’m working with five different people on six different story ideas: two webcomics, one stage musical, one anime, and two animated TV shows. Little concrete progress has been made in any of those, mind you, but they’re still fun to discuss!

24. Would you say your writing has changed over time?

Absolutely. But I’ve been writing stories since I was five years old, so we would hope so, huh?

I wouldn’t say my writing’s changed completely, though maybe that’s just my insider’s perspective.

25. What part of writing is the most fun?

Oh gosh, I can’t believe you’d make me choose. Writing is just such a wonderful experience for me; I love just about everything to do with it. Admittedly, not all the time, but. Since that barely qualifies as an answer, however, I’ll give you this—

The endings. Not only that intense feeling of rightness when you wrap up that last sentence, but also the moments before. The adrenaline of knowing you’re almost there but you gotta push just a bit more to actually get there. And also the part right after—the real wrap-up, honestly: the revision and the editing. Heavens, I love revising and editing my work.

Which is not to say I don’t like writing it out for the first time, too—there’s nothing quite like seeing your cursor scroll to the next page, like going from a blank expanse to a Oh man, how many more lines are even going to fit on this page?, like watching that page counter tick up another number. However, there’s something cathartic about finally ironing out those problems I had to force myself to stop worrying about earlier because “just finish the first draft dangit”.

I guess that’s not really the end of the writing process, but whatever. Close enough (as fic writers are wont to say).

Another thank-you for these asks, and feel free to come back with more at any time! ;P

Send in fun meta asks for your friendly neighbourhood writer!

#thou canst not then be false to any man #ask game #invictusmaneo #to write and read comes by nature

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recentanimenews · 3 years

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ESSAY: How Does My Hero Academia Fit Into Global Superhero Culture?

In 1989, Batman became the first film to make over $40 million in its opening weekend. In 2002, Spider-Man became the first film to make over $100 million in its opening weekend. In 2007, Spider-Man 3 hit over $150 million. In 2012, The Avengers nabbed over $200 million. And in 2019, Avengers: Endgame got over $350 million. Despite the fact that there have been concerns over “superhero movie fatigue” for literal decades now, it’s a genre that shows no signs of slowing down. As its universes expand on streaming services like Disney+, it’s apparent the age of the cinematic hero might be an indefinitely lengthy one.

As Marvel Comics luminary Stan Lee once said: “The pleasure of reading a story and wondering what will come next for the hero is a pleasure that has lasted for centuries and, I think, will always be with us.” In that quote, it seems our destiny is almost sealed — we crave heroes and we crave their stories and we crave their sequels.

This is the environment in which My Hero Academia was born.

My Hero Academia is, first and foremost, a superhero story. One could argue that most narratives of its ilk are superhero tales — anime like Dragon Ball, Naruto, One Piece, and others are full of good guys shutting down malicious attempts at local or world domination — but My Hero Academia embraces the iconography, both thematic and physical, of the superhero in a way that many other stories don’t. In fact, it might be one of the purest explorations of that kind of universe ever in fiction. It’s a world where heroism is practically currency, where roughly 80 percent of the earth’s population is imbued with some kind of inherent genetic power.

Populating your superhero story with powerful people instead of going the typical cinematic route of having one or two supernatural characters with a supporting cast of everyday folk might have been subversive 20 years ago. But in the age of the Avengers, where multiple heroes cross in and out of each other's storylines and the narrative objective was to eventually wrangle them all in one mega-movie, My Hero Academia fits comfortably. That doesn’t render it as uninteresting, though. Instead, rather than build to the issues that will inevitably crop up in a world full of Supermen, these themes are inherent in the story.

As such, most of the plotlines have to do with the idea of rampant heroism and the backlash that it would create. Plenty of superhero films address this (multiple Batman movies make the case that if there were no Batman there would be no Joker), but in My Hero Academia it is a constant struggle. Overhaul, wearing a variation of a 17th-century plague doctor mask, looks at these “Quirks” as if they’re a disease. Stain is against superheroes using their status for fame. Tomura Shigaraki wishes to destroy society as we know it, hating its values and its borderline divine treatment of figures like All-Might. These patterns are not just repeated in My Hero Academia, but inevitable. They are anime embodiments of that “superhero fatigue” article I shared above, except in this case they hurt and destroy in their attempts to find an alternative to the super status quo, rather than write essays in The New York Times.

It’s certainly an enthralling formula, though: My Hero Academia continues to be a best seller and has won numerous awards. Its anime has been similarly well-received. Despite the fact that superhero films very rarely have the same box office prominence in Japan as they do in America, My Hero Academia has been able to make an impact. That might be because, at its core, My Hero Academia adapts the ethos found in a hero that many Japanese creators really do enjoy: Spider-Man.

Kohei Horikoshi, My Hero Academia’s creator, loves Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man films. Creator of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Hirohiko Araki gushed over his love of Spider-Man 2 to director Sam Raimi during an interview. Yusuke Murata, illustrator of One-Punch Man, has done some absolutely amazing work when it comes to posters for Peter Parker’s cinematic adventures. Hideo Kojima, a video game designer whose creations are absolutely inspired by anime, called Into The Spider-Verse a “great masterpiece” and was “moved” by Spider-Man 2. After it became the best-selling game to be developed in the West but funded by Sony since 1998, Japanese game developers voted Marvel’s Spider-Man as their 2018 game of the year. So why the embrace of this particular character?

Journalist Kuremasa Uno told the Japanese site Business+IT that it’s because Japanese youth are more accustomed to embracing younger heroes. Since so much of Spider-Man’s Hollywood journey deals with him experiencing problems as a teenager and young adult, he fits in among the protagonists of series like Gundam or Naruto. Hideo Kojima even told Famitsu that Spider-Man is “similar to Japanese heroes,” as he has “worries.”

The aspect of youth is particularly interesting, as it’s what often renders heroes like Spider-Man to be the most relatable of all of their peers and rivals. In the comic book world, age tends to warp characters, turning them into beacons of impossible standards rather than troubled everymen. We have little in common with the hulking, aging Batman snapping bones in Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. We are enthralled with the story on a narrative level. Even the legendary curmudgeon of the comic book industry, the supremely talented Alan Moore, found The Dark Knight Returns fascinating because it gave a hero a chance to end, rather than cycle through an eternal series of escapades. If you know Moore’s stance on heroes, that’s high praise, but it’s hard to connect with him no matter how cool he looks taking down the Mutant Leader.

In youth we find common ground. We all grow up, and for the most part, we all experience that mix of angst, desperation, and uncertainty that comes with finding yourself on a bullet train to adulthood. In my interview with Matt Alt, author of Pure Invention: How Japan’s Pop Culture Conquered The World, the writer/historian affirmed these feelings as especially true in anime: “It doesn’t look at adolescence as a lesser form of adulthood and it doesn’t condescend to the young people experiencing problems.” That is true of My Hero Academia, which treats Midoriya’s teenage problems as valid and worth concern, and is also true to Stan Lee’s affinity for Spider-Man: “He’s the one who’s most like me — nothing ever turns out 100 percent OK; he’s got a lot of problems and he does things wrong, and I can relate to that.”

So perhaps it is in collecting a cast of characters that, like Spider-Man, are all dealing with youthful problems that Horikoshi found the fantastic formula for My Hero Academia. It’s a world with teachers and Pro Heroes, but there is no real equivalent of a Justice League, no impenetrable class of demi-gods to impart moral lessons on not just younger heroes but the world at large.

Instead, much like in real-life youth, the characters of My Hero Academia and the class of 1A must discover those lessons for themselves. With that, the reasons for the aforementioned creators’ adoration of films like the Spider-Man trilogy and Into the Spider-Verse seemingly become more clear. Though these films feature a ... ummm ... supportive supporting cast, the integrity must come from the hero alone in the end, no matter how tough their obstacles become. You are born with Quirks, but how you choose to implement them for the good of mankind is up to you. Great power, great responsibility, etc.

My Hero Academia and Spider-Man are not a 1:1 comparison as, again, the basics of its world and the attributes of its cast fit it more firmly with late-term Avengers films where dozens of heroes interact in a spectacle created by the sheer existence of their number. My Hero Academia rarely feels as lonely as Spider-Man tends to be. But in capturing the relatable qualities of adolescence and focusing on the “quirks” of what is essentially high school life, it does manage to hit some of the same high notes, notes that I imagine contributed greatly to its popularity.

Does that mean All-Might is an Uncle Ben character, with his “Now it’s your turn” point to Midoriya serving a similar purpose to the “Great responsibility” speech? Eh, a little bit. But in relating it to the superhero genre that currently forms an entertainment monolith around the world, especially when it has to do with the character of Spider-Man, we start to unlock some of the reasons why My Hero Academia has been such a powerhouse series over the past few years. You can see just as much of Midoriya in Peter Parker as you can in guys like Naruto or Asta — characters that aren’t relatable simply because they’re young, but because we connect to their experiences of youth, experiences that are somehow both deeply specific and also beautifully universal.

Daniel Dockery is a Senior Staff Writer for Crunchyroll. Follow him on Twitter!

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features.

By: Daniel Dockery

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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clansayeed · 4 years

Text

Bound by Circumstance ― Chapter 18: Let Me Do You This Kindness

PAIRING: Nik Ryder x trans*M!MC (Taylor Hunter) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Circumstance ⥽

Taylor Hunter (MC) has made it good for himself in New Orleans; turns out moving to a new city fresh out of college to reinvent yourself isn’t as hard as people make it out to be. Things only start to get confusing when he finds himself the target of a malevolent wraith. Good thing someone’s looking out for him though — because without Nighthunter Nik Ryder as his bodyguard he definitely won’t survive long in the twisting darkness of the supernatural underworld he’s tripped into.

Bound by Circumstance and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the book Nightbound and the rest of the Bloodbound series. Find out more [HERE].

Note: Circumstance only loosely follows the events and plotline of Nightbound, and features a separate antagonist, different character motivations, and further worldbuilding.

*Let me know if you would like to be added to the Circumstance/series tag list!

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

The Fate intervenes.

[READ IT ON AO3]

“You were there — you were watching us at Prytania Street.”

“In a way, yes and no.”

“It can’t be both. I saw you there.”

“Yes, I was witness to the events of which you speak. But no, I was not there as you were there; on the physical plane. I bear witness to all things. That is my purpose and my burden.”

“You could have done something.”

“You are mistaken, halfling child.”

“Bullshit. That’s—That’s bullshit. Its an excuse to justify doing nothing!”

“If that is what you choose to believe I cannot stop you, only try to sway your mind.”

“Well you won’t.”

“The world’s belief that I am capable of more than giving testimony is a false one. I cannot change the course of what is to be, no more than you can. I see every outcome, every possibility — every path from the moment it is built reaching out into oblivion.

“Who walks those paths — who has the ability to forge them new or break the chain — that is up to the individual. Certain roads will always be taken, yes. But the forces making those decisions were here long before me and will exist long after I am gone.”

He’s angry. And because he’s angry he’s indignant — he doesn’t want to believe them. Not when they speak in the voice of a forgotten child or a lost lover or someone whose time has come yet they find themselves filled with only bitter regret.

Always with the same golden eyes.

The weight of his breath sends Taylor’s body into tremors of emotion. Things he knows all too well — despair, guilt, self-blame — and things he has no name for; might never have a name for in any human language.

They overwhelm him until they don’t. Until he can look at each and every face of The Fate and speak.

“I don’t remember. Why don’t I remember?”

It’s his voice, his tongue curling around the words formed on his lips. But they aren’t his. They’re just sort of pulled out of him like they were trapped deep in his belly on a string.

Words that come not from the mind but from some place deeper. Those dying embers he thinks may have once been called his soul.

The Fate turns their wrinkled face away.

He knows this emotion. Shame.

“Why don’t I remember?” he asks again.

Doesn’t know where he is, or how he got here, or what it all means. But like hell he’s going to move or be moved without an answer.

“I thought it would be kinder.”

Their new voice wavers. A new face looks back at Taylor — creases in a frown that will settle into lines of age eventually, but not quite yet; thinner lips, yet hands still youthful. They look so much like his mother it hurts.

Thought what would be kinder? What happened? Where is everyone? Where is Nik?

All very important questions. All answers he first wants, then craves, then needs in order to remember how to breathe.

Instead he just whispers a weary “please,” because they both know what it is he’s pleading for.

But The Fate is reluctant — that much is obvious. “I would rather you understand before I did.”

“Understand…?”

“That I am merely the storyteller. Not the book, not the author, just a voice reading from the pages.”

This again. Can they blame him for being skeptical? For thinking someone with a name like The Fate might have a say in the order of the universe, in who lives and who dies?

“If I tell you I believe you, will you give me back my memories?” Will you explain? Will it all make sense?

“Would you be lying to me, Taylor Hunter?”

“You’re The Fate — wouldn’t you know?” Then, met with only silence, he does the only thing that feels right. He just shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t — I don’t, okay? I’ve been asked to believe in a lot of impossible things lately, but this… this is more than that, and that makes it harder.”

Because if The Fate really has no say in the way things have been then that means they have no say in the way things end.

The Coven Elders do.

His friends do.

He does.

But not someone who could make it all better.

And that’s terrifying.

“So I don’t know,” he repeats, “and that’s my final answer.” Not the right or wrong answer, but the final one.

He’s met with a chilling reality when The Fate reaches out their hand and he takes it and feels home. The Fate doesn’t just look like his mother; they are wearing her face.

It’s a useless epiphany though.

Because he remembers.

What’s an extra hour or two?

The difference between life and death.

By the time he notices the familiar figure of The Fate standing just off stage left it’s too late.

The screams, the crackle and POP of a spotlight sending sparks showering down onto the stage, the heat and flames and smoke choking the breath out of him — those all came later.

First came the explosive bang of double doors opening at the back of the theatre. If there was ever an apt time for an actor to fumble their lines it was then.

He still hated Antoni, the prick, but gave credit where credit was due — a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it beat in between stanzas and Oberon was right back in the depths of his monologue.

Second was the gust of wind that turned heads — Taylor’s included — to the draft coming through the gaping doorway. It reeked of revelry and jaegerbombs with just a hint of despair.

Taylor was convinced that last bit was his imagination having a last-ditch effort to try and ruin his happiness. Stupid, stupid boy he was; turning back to the stage like that.

Third came thunk. thunk. thunk.

He could recall, if only vaguely, the rehearsal where Daphne suggested imitating the Globe Theatre in London. She wanted to engage with the audience as Puck and the director loved it.

Her last big entrance was from the back of the theatre, right — he’d forgotten.

Thunk. thunk. thunk.

Daphne came barreling down the sloping path — collided with the stage with wet noise.

Or… her head did.

And it rolled in classic horror-movie gothic to stare lifelessly at the audience. Eyes milky white, veins blackened and bulging under tissue paper skin.

What came next doesn’t matter. If the curtain caught fire before or after Theseus fainted from terror didn’t matter.

The only thing that mattered was the wretchedly familiar grotesque hovering in the entryway — the shadow it cast stretching long, mangled limbs out towards them.

The bloodwraith let out a screeching howl that shattered glass, incited fire, sent the entire space into a pitch darkness only to glow and flicker with hungry flames.

I’m sorry. His first and only thought.

Nothing else The Fate gave back to him mattered.

“Holy shit — am I dead?!”

Taylor uses the thought to grapple back onto the present and pull himself together. Doesn’t even think about whether or not he should be using that kind of language in front of a very very old supernatural being but okay maybe he’d been a little premature in the ‘nothing else’ department.

If he was dead that definitely mattered. Because if he was dead Nik was going to kill him.

When The Fate readjusts themselves — a refined and more calm way of saying ‘recovers from whiplash’ — they reassure him with a small shake of the head, silvery wisps on a balding head shaking out to perfect and natural curls. “No, you are not dead.”

“Oh thank god,” he whistles low, but its the relief that catches him by surprise. And not just because he doesn’t have to worry about being chewed out by a surly Nighthunter.

He’s actually relieved to be alive. Or at least not dead. One of those things he wouldn’t normally perturb the semantics over but given everything that’s happened it only seems right.

“Am I alive?”

“In a way.”

“That’s a yes or no question. Please let that be a yes or no question.”

It takes Taylor a moment (his brain is catching up as quick as it can, yeesh) but when it becomes clear The Fate, powerful ethereal being witness to everything until the end of time, is amusing themselves with his reactions he tries his best not to give any.

He fails, of course, but he tried his best.

“Yes, halfling child, you are alive.”

“And —” Nik? Elric? Vera? Cal-Kathy-Cadence? Garrus-Krom-Ivy? “— everyone else?”

“Is there one for whom your concern is greatest?” It sounds almost clinical; doesn’t help that they now sound eerily similar to his hormone therapy physician.

Maybe they hoped Taylor would have to think about it. Maybe they wanted to see what makes him tick.

Too bad. “I’m not picking which of my friends I care about the most, if that’s what weird all-knowing trope you’re going for.”

“Not even your father is placed above them?”

“I barely know the guy. That answer it for you?”

The Fate gives a “hmm” and a nod. “Forgive me, I have never had such luxuries.”

“Family, friends?”

“Those as well. I see the bonds of the material made; thousands, millions in the spaces between heartbeats. But I do not feel them. I wish that I could.”

It rings wrong in his bones. Makes his blood curdle in his veins. “If you’re trying to justify preying on my fears to learn emotions, I’d say stop.”

“Is there a threat to be made?”

“No.” He’s not stupid — but he’s not just going to stand there and take it, either. “You didn’t answer my question. Are my friends — all of them — alive too?”

He can tell The Fate hesitates as one last test of wills. Still it doesn’t stop him from clapping a hand over his mouth when they finally nod.

“Thank god…”

They’d thought it would be safe. That they had time—however brief—to try and make the most of things; time together, the city in all her glory.

Taylor doesn’t realize they’ve been walking together, a simple man and Fate, until he stops and looks out of one of the large windows lining the hallway.

Outside is beautiful. It’s a lacking word but the only one that comes to mind. It’s the kind of sunset that people write entire poems and songs about because they can’t think of a simple one-word description either. So it’ll do.

He drinks it in — the vibrant sunset that reaches long tendril fingers of pinks and oranges across the sky and continues on and on and on into an endless horizon. Bright enough to illuminate dust motes hovering practically immobile in the still air around him. Even his heavy and awestruck breathing doesn’t disturb them.

Like he isn’t even there.

And it occurs to him like an afterthought that if he left this place to commune with that sherbet sky he’d never find the end. There’s a peace in that.

He could ask the obvious; where are we, how did we get here, what does it all mean, but instead he focuses on the things he does know rather than what he doesn’t. “You brought us here.”

“Yes.”

And he hadn’t planned it at all; the trap The Fate has so willingly fallen into. But there it is.

“That means you intervened.” He turns away from the world beyond only because he has to. Catches their ever-changing face in the sunset’s light. “I thought you couldn’t intervene.”

When they finally answer the words are chosen with care; careful not to reveal too much, careful not to make promises unable to be kept. “I did not change the course of what is to come; that is beyond me. But it is not beyond you, and so the lines blur. If you could be guided, or given more time, or protected from a death thought previously inevitable, then perhaps you could enact that change with your newfound advantages.”

His mouth twists ruefully. “You’re telling me you found a loophole in destiny?”

“Of a sort.”

“And you choose now to do it? That’s…” For once in his life Taylor thinks before he speaks; to his benefit. “Unless this isn’t the first time you’ve done it.”

The Fate looks at him with the eyes of a child again; a disturbingly profound wisdom looking him over as if in a new light. “There are very few places in the puzzle of time where I may fit.”

“So all that stuff you said about being an observer — what you’re saying is that’s a load of crap.”

“Would I have told you then what little I could do, would you have believed my interference so small?”

They’ve got a point. “No.”

“Then you see why these revelations take time.”

Maybe he does. That doesn’t change the truth, though. Doesn’t change the thoughts racing through his mind; thoughts of the dozens, hundreds of things that have happened that could have been changed in some little way. Changed had they had more time, or if they’d known more.

Or if he hadn’t been protected.

If Nik hadn’t been in the graveyard, Taylor would be dead. He was there, and at the bar, because…

“You hired Nik to protect me. You were the one on the other end of the phone line.”

“Yes.”

“Did it make a difference? No—No it couldn’t have. You said you couldn’t change it. You —”

“All that is meant to unfold still will. If not as swiftly as the witches had hoped.”

“So all you did was prolong the inevitable.”

“All I did?” his question played back to him in a voice rusted with time, incredulity on The Fate’s new leathery features, “You think so narrowly. What have you changed, what have you incited?”

“The Elders are still —”

“What. have. you. done.”

“I —” Is it any wonder he falters under the intensity of that stare; the weight of their words bearing down on him heavier than anything he’s tried to carry before?

Fine. What has he done?

He’s hurt Garrus by bringing Elric to the show.

He’s brought Garrus and Krom closer.

He’s put Vera in danger.

But given her a chance to reconcile with her mother.

He’s the reason Cal was cast out from his pack.

And the reason Donny is still alive.

Stop it, Taylor wants to say, because there’s no way that annoying voice in his head contradicting everything he’s thinking is him. It’s them — they’re in his mind.

But he’s heard dozens of voices from dozens of their lips; none of them have sounded like him.

And only his voice is ringing between his ears.

“If I’d died in the cemetery that night — would any of those things have happened? Be honest.”

“I see all outcomes; the realms in which they did happen and those where they did not.”

“Okay, so —”

“But because of you, Taylor Hunter, they did. And that cannot be undone.”

Taylor reels at the very thought of it. Talk about daring to disturb the universe. But all those things — they’re speaking of the past, of the present.

What about the future?

“Was it enough, though?” Was it enough to make a difference? Enough to save them? Enough to win?

Instead of answering with words The Fate reaches up, out. Doesn’t let up even though Taylor recoils (for good reason) at the weight of permanence that hangs around them in an unseen aura. According to The Fate themselves there are versions of this story where he dies; is already dead.

And knowing that doesn’t scare him nearly as much as being touched by someone who has seen it happen.

“Those who seek to change destiny always fail,” — something so morbid and hopeless shouldn’t sound so reassuring — “because it will always lie out of their reach. They never understand how to bring it closer. Now you do.”

The warmth of the sunset beyond prickles the back of Taylor’s neck. But even basking in the glow as they have been The Fate’s fingers are cold as ice.

Cold with the weight of the sorrows they’ve seen.

Wherever they are stretches out infinitely on either side of them. He hasn’t seen another soul this entire time. Knows somewhere deep inside himself that no matter how many halls he sees, no matter how many doors he opens, they reside here together. Alone.

So why then does he whisper? Who the hell knows.

“If you’ve seen all the terrible ways this could end… why do it? Why try?”

“Because,” they smile and suddenly Taylor sees why every other part of them is cold; to compensate, “I have hope.”

How, how can they have hope when they know what’s coming? “Hope for what?”

“Hope that you will prove me wrong.” You can change what is to come.

“Talk about your unrealistic expectations.” How?

“It has been done before — however rare.” You already know how.

But he doesn’t.

He doesn’t.

He —

He watches Cal with his arm over Vera’s shoulder — holding her close, pressing his mouth into her hair more a gesture of comfort than a kiss. To remind her the warmth of another body is close. That she isn’t alone.

A bright light flashes in front of his eyes, blinds him. Taylor tries to pull back but the EMT squeezes his shoulder and keeps him in place. “Not yet, bud, just try and follow the light okay?”

It doesn’t really make sense to keep staring at the thing that makes it harder to see but he does what he’s told. Follows the pen light left to right and up to down because that’s what they need of him right now.

“Your friends said you took a pretty hard hit.” He can feel the gloved hand on the back of his head feeling around for a lump, a cut, blood — anything.

Definitely more than the nothing he gets that’s for sure.

“Do you remember anything like that?”

No, he doesn’t. He only remembers silvery curls and an insistent understanding that he’s capable of more than he thinks. But those thoughts aren’t his.

It’s with reluctance that the EMT lets him jump from the back of the ambulance with the closest thing to a clear bill of health.

“Rook!”

Thank god he hears Nik only when there isn’t a stethoscope on his chest because surely his heart stops beating.

Taylor turns, doesn’t have the time to brace himself before he’s inhaling leather. Isn’t smothered by it at all — in fact it helps calm him more than expected.

Then Nik’s looking him over — touching the back of his head and holding up his arms; looking for cuts and bruises and any sign that he’s less than one hundred-percent okay. “Did you get checked out? Why the hell would they let you go? If they’d seen the way your head bounced off that concrete wall they’d be thinkin’ differently. Fuckin’ hell, they…” Just like the EMT he feels nothing, though. But this time Taylor isn’t let off the hook so easily.

“What the hell? There ain’t even a bump.”

“I hit my head?” he asks; realizes it’s the wrong thing to say when Nik’s eyes widen.

“You don’t remember? Shit — we’re gettin’ you to the hospital.”

“I don’t need a hospital.”

“I beg to differ!”

“If you’d —” Taylor actually has to smack the flurry of Nik’s concerned hands away, “— just stop for a sec’? Please!”

Even in the chaos of grief and seemingly fruitless attempts to restore order Taylor is loud. Manages to get more than a few heads turned his way — some that look between him and Nik in rising suspicion. He takes the man’s hand and pulls him off to the side before any of it becomes a thing.

They find the one police car without the overhead lights flashing. Away from the crowd swarming, from people who secretly wished they could be paid to learn what happened and grieve for it. Despite being entirely removed from the situation they are moths; the cruisers that bathe them in reds and blues are their flame.

Nik wastes no time. “You’re starting to scare me Taylor,” and he believes it with or without Nik using his name, “if somethin’ happened to you, somethin’ medical, we gotta —”

“Nik,” he insists again, “stop talking.” Cups his hands along a chiseled jaw and brings the man down to kiss him like that’ll explain everything. In a perfect world, maybe.

But even annoying as he’s being right now Taylor can’t hold it against him. He cares — in his own weird way sure — but he does.

They part for air but he allows strong hands to keep him close.

“I only just got back,” he mumbles almost breathlessly, “I don’t need you jumping down my throat.”

“Wait—what?”

“I —”

There’s a tickle on his forehead as Nik’s brow furrows. “No I heard ya. But you didn’ — we were here the whole —” Lucky for them both when, somewhere in the middle of those half-formed explanations and racing thoughts, he remembers that he’s Nik Ryder; Nighthunter.

“Got back from where?”

“Not here.”

“Yes, here.”

“Nik.”

Taylor would like to believe he relents because of trust, but knows the far more likely explanation is exhaustion. But he does and that’s what matters. “Okay Rook, okay. Your turn to call the shots.”

“First we need to get everyone together. I saw Vera and Cal, but…”

“Kathy an’ Cade were still givin’ statements last I checked. Iv’, Krom, and Garrus hightailed it before the cops showed up. Wait—you’re really sayin’ you don’t remember any of this?”

“Stay focused. Where’s Elric?”

“With them. He was out cold, hurt bad from the looks of it.”

Taylor’s heart straight-up stops beating. “Did the wraith —?”

“No Rook, no he, uh, he took a fallin’ rigging for you. Pushed you right outta the way and that’s how you hit your head. I really don’t like —”

“Later. We can’t go back to the Shift.”

“Well there we agree.”

“There’s my place, but —”

“No, nowhere connected to any of us. The Elders could’a hexed the place.”

“Suggestions, maybe?”

“Well damn Rook — not like I’ve got a map of secret warded places I can just pull outta my ass—actually…” Nik changes his tune so fast Taylor gets whiplash. But he knows the thoughtful look in those dark eyes well enough by now that he dares to have just a little bit of hope.

Why try?

Because I have hope.

By the time he’s pulled out of his brief recollection of The Fate, Nik is pulling him by the hand back into the crowd. They spot the beacon of Cadence’s towering head over everyone else and find the others still recuperating on the curb where he stands guard.

Cal spots Taylor and immediately tries to stand — but he’s leaning far too much to the right to be moving so fast. Katherine catches him, eases him back down with admonishing words.

“What did the EMT just say?”

“Yeah yeah, I ain’t a cub Kathy.”

“Then pay attention next time — to what they’re saying, not to their asses.”

Vera reaches for Taylor like a source of comfort. He takes her hand and squeezes; feels the warmth of her through blue medical latex in a way her usual silk doesn’t allow. Wordlessly she holds up a long scrap of familiar fabric as explanation.

Whatever Cadence had planned on saying, it catches on his tongue to be swallowed back down. Something makes his face turn away with a crinkle in his nose.

“No offense Taylor, but you smell like mold on vellum.”

“Huh?” Cal sniffs the air and comes to a similar conclusion. “Reminds me of the shed Kristof keeps his pelts in — like… dust and mothballs.”

“Uh…” what the hell does somebody say to that, “I’m sorry?”

“Just thought you ought to know.”

“Actually — speakin’ of all that research you do, Smith,” everyone looks at Nik like he’s grown a second head, but no one can match Cadence’s bewilderment; since that has less than nothing to do with the attack that’s left them reeling.

“What about it?”

“Any chance you know if the Saint Louis has still got that, uh, preservation sigil still in the stones?”

“Sure. That whole block of Chartres does.”

Katherine’s eyes narrow suspiciously. “Ryder, what are you thinking?” But he ignores her carelessly.

“Includin’ your office?”

“Yes but — Oh.” Epiphany crosses his face and makes his glasses slide down to the tip of his nose.

And though it may be just as annoying to be on the outs of something Nik, Cadence, and even Katherine with her slow nod of understanding seem to know that the rest don’t — there’s a comfort to it. Like they’re all back in the Shift shotgunning ideas on a chalkboard and not scrambling for a place to hide.

“I hadn’t thought of that,” the way Katherine says it though — it’s like a self-directed insult, “why didn’t I think of that?”

“Think we’ll all fit?” asks Nik.

Cadence gives everyone a calculating look, seemingly taking measurements. “I don’t see why not, so long as you don’t mind a bit of clutter.”

Kathy doesn’t even bother covering her snort, the derisive “Ha!” that earns her something like the vampire version of a pout. She remains unfazed. “That’s putting it a little more than lightly…”

“It’s not that bad. You’re making me out to be a hoarder.”

“Let’s just hope no one’s claustrophobic.”

“Kathy!”

Admittedly Taylor doesn’t know a lot about vampires besides the basics; immortal, super fast, super strong, blood-is-life. But there’s more, isn’t there? There has to be.

For example — werewolves are pack animals. He can guess that vampires are less so. So what fills the void?

Because from what he’s seeing before him… they’re nesting creatures.

This is a nest, right? Please someone say this is a nest, that this is normal behavior. That somewhere else in the city Isadora de la Rosa is just chilling in a giant pile of stuff like some sultry dragoness and Cadence is just following some sort of undead instinct.

Otherwise this guy needs help. Like — Hoarders-level help.

Ryder’s reaction does nothing to ease his discomfort; giving an impressed nod as his eyes sweep the room; the piles… and piles… and piles…

“You’ve cleaned up,” he moves an old filing box with little ceremony to rustle himself up a place to sit; apparently its every butt for itself here, “and is that two walls I can see?”

There are two seats not actively serving as storage and Katherine beelines for it. Cal gets there first with some semblance of victory — though it’s short-lived.

“You’re in my spot.”

“Grow up. First come first serve.”

She repeats herself in an actual growl. “You’re in my spot, Lowell.”

Arms crossed over his chest, he snorts a derisive “I don’t see your name on it,” only to fumble for purchase when she grabs the chair-back with both hands and spins it around.

Her name actually is written on the back. And in very large, blocky permanent marker.

She doesn’t need to tell him a third time. Settles in like it didn’t even happen. Out of everyone gathered, Cadence included, she’s the only one who looks like she really belongs.

“Three guesses why that is.” She says to Nik. It doesn’t take the man long to connect the dots.

“I’d’ve given some money to catch a glimpse of spit-shined Raines in this disaster.”

“Enough!” The vampire groans; finishes clearing up the last of what appears to be an outdoor patio table for the rest of them to prop against. “Unless by some miracle my—admittedly disorganized—attempt at scouring centuries’ worth of documentation in my so-far fruitless pursuit of an identity is the key to vanquishing the threat at hand.

“If so then by all means, continue on!”

It doesn’t help that the awkward silence is broken only when a towering stack of loose papers slides passed the tipping point and collapses somewhere unseen.

“Fuck.”

He accepts his defeat and takes up the chair beside Kathy with a surprising amount of dignity.

But his tirade served more than just a single purpose. It reminds Taylor of why they had to find somewhere to regroup, why it had been necessary in the first place.

You already know how, The Fate had said. And with a surety that had blurred the boundaries of whatever reality they had been in while talking outside of time and space.

Cadence’s mess isn’t the answer.

But someone not-Taylor in the room just might be.

“Vera…”

You already know. And the first thing he sees when he comes back to himself is Vera crying on the curb. That’s not a coincidence. In fact he feels a sharp, almost icy clarity when his train of thought switches tracks.

When he remembers the last time she cried and knows — just knows — that everything going forward isn’t random chance. It’s all meant to be.

Wordlessly they clasp hands. If before they were only doing this together and for Kristin, the same can’t be said now.

Taylor begins with a soft “I’m sorry,” because what he’s going to ask her is hard but there’s no way around it; he tries to be kind because she deserves that much at the very least, “but I’m gonna need you to tell me… tell us, I guess… what exactly you meant when you said you, uh, recognized the bloodwraith.”

Where’s a falling stack of papers when you need one?

Directly following another attack isn’t the best time to ask something that heavy. Everyone’s thinking it, but either lacks the guts or has enough brains not to speak it aloud.

The longer they wait the less time they have. If their minutes in the hourglass aren’t borrowed already.

Taylor can’t imagine the amount of courage it takes for her to share. She’d already been one sneeze away from “no no never mind, I don’t wanna bother you with it, let it go please; for me” back in the apartment. He recalls a brief flash of relief when they were interrupted. Though that didn’t last long given the news.

He’s there, you know, if she wants a hand to hold. Hesitates that hand over her shoulder as he watches the woman close in on herself… and lets it fall.

By the time she’s ready Cadence has ducked out and returns with a tray of water glasses and steaming mugs of fragrant teas. Three sleeves of soda crackers once abandoned are now their equivalent of a replenishing snack after a long journey.

All of it a little too mundane for the conversation at hand.

Vera gives herself a few shaky breaths — and begins.

“You ever been to one’a those big family reunions; the kind where you don’t know more than half’a the people showin’ up but it’s a birthday or a funeral or the like and you don’t really have a say in the matter?”

Literal crickets.

Even when she looks at Cal for backup he shakes his head and offers a shrug as an apology. “The Pack may be big but we’re tight. It’s impossible not to know someone, even if it ain’t a face but a scent.”

“But we can imagine.” Katherine makes a ‘continue’ gesture without bothering to mask the haste. “Keep going.”

Vera does.

“You’re wrong there, Kathy. No’ne who ain’t born a Reimonenq can really get what happens when you get more than a dozen’a us in the same room. All with the same blood in our veins but any opportunity to marry out the family, to change the name with somethin’ more bindin’ than just a court order — they take it.

“Last one I went to was ma Mémé’s funeral. Nawlins funerals, you know how they are —” only this time Taylor’s the sole sore thumb but no one stops to explain, “— and since she ran the Reimonenq Clan everyone who once carried the name or could have done was bound by duty to attend.”

Wistful memory clouds her eyes for a long moment. Whatever memory it is can’t be a happy one, not by the tick in her brow. “Met my uncle for the first time there. I didn’ even know Momma had any siblings — and here come up walkin’ two. They could’a been any random strangers on the street but they were huggin’ me and tellin’ me about seein’ me as a baby and…”

Katherine makes a not-so-subtle noise and shifts in her chair until it squeaks loud enough for Cal to flinch. It’s her chair, bears her name. She knows exactly what she’s doing.

Before she can say anything Cadence tactfully intervenes.

“So sorry about that; the chair drowned Kathy out. I could be wrong — but I think she was about to ask the relevance of this story and the wraith.”

Vera nods with a startling lack of apology. “If I could skirt around it I would. But every way I’ve thought about… about how I felt when I looked it in the eyes? This is the only way I can make it make sense.”

“It’s okay Vee,” says Taylor, “say what you have to.” And if he doesn’t mind her taking her time because it gets him a better chance of reading her inside, of understanding not just the words on her lips but the ones on her soul, he definitely isn’t going to mention it.

“I could see that they were my blood. Hell they were the spittin’ image of Ton—of Momma before she took over ma Mémé’s operations. The shady… smoky kind. But I didn’t know ‘em. I was five weeks away from my move to New York—I didn’t want to know ‘em.”

“Did they have the…?” She looks at Ryder sharply, watches him mime his hands without rhyme or reason. Her nostrils flare in anger.

“No. Turns out the Reimonenq Curse is a picky lit’le thing; picks the first born — or the only born, in my case. I got why she didn’t keep in contact when I found that out.

“I didn’ know why it bugged me s’a much until later. ‘Cause I just couldn’t give rhyme or reason to how I could see so much’a myself in stranger’s eyes.”

A hush falls over the group. Within it — an understanding. No longer with the need to ask Vera to tie her story together because she’s actually a lot more intuitive than even Taylor previously gave her credit for.

And now those tears of hers — always justified, always — they’re more than that. They’re understood.

Vera had looked into the eyes of the bloodwraith. What she had seen was far worse than simple familiarity.

She’d seen a part of herself in the rotting void of its skull. Recognized something hereditary in scraps of rotting flesh stuck in the gaps between its mouthful of fanged teeth.

And she’s still fucking standing, she’s still sane?

Not that there was any competition but Vera Reimonenq was definitely just crowned the strongest of them all in a landslide victory.

She gives them each individual looks. As if daring any of them to try and play Devil’s advocate. But why would they? You don’t fake something that soul-crushingly awful.

“There’s more.”

Cal kicks back on the floor with a groan. “Any chance there isn’t?” He’s the only one who could get away with it though.

“I wish that were the case. I’d been tryin’ to find the right time to bring it up — turns out it just needed to be brought up for me.”

I’m sorry, says way Taylor pulls her in for a one-armed hug.

It ain’t your fault, replies the last weary quirk of her lips.

“I ain’t the only one.”

“Tonya,” supplies Cadence, and Vera’s wobbling bottom lip breaks all their hearts in unison.

“Yeah—Yeah Momma she… she felt it too. I could see it in her eyes. She won’t spare it a thought but I don’ believe in coincidences anymore. She an’ I both feelin’ the way we did, then that thing’s touch takin’ away her Curse —”

“Mary Mother of Christ!”

The vampire stands so fast his chair goes flying into a stack of boxes — lucky for them all whatever contents are heavy enough to stay standing.

At first Katherine looks worried beside him, though it dulls quickly into exasperation. “Folks and faes I give you the Drama King…”

“Not the bloody time.” The look in those ruby eyes is almost manic — just like they had been when Cade had tried infodumping on them at the Shift. Only this might be slightly more relevant — hopefully.

“Care to share?” Cal drawls.

Cadence pays him no mind; focuses only on Vera and gets her attention in turn. There’s almost anticipation in the way he whispers, “You figured it out, didn’t you?”

“Well I wasn’t sure — not until now. You knew him?”

“I had the misfortune.”

“And you were… around when the Coven retaliated.”

“Like I said,” he wipes the lenses of his glasses with such convenient timing he could only be avoiding meeting her eyes, “I had the misfortune.”

It isn’t long after that they realize no one else is even close to catching up to them. A silent back and forth emerges Cadence as the lucky soul burdened with explanation.

“We’ve been so focused on the what of the bloodwraith,” there’s no possible way he knows what stack to dig through, it has to be a diversion to remove himself from the heart of the matter; doesn’t stop him from nudging Nik aside and rifling through an open filing cabinet, “what it is, what it seeks, what it can do.”

Nik grumbles at Taylor’s side. “And that ain’t important?”

“No no — it is. But it… it gave us tunnel vision. Made us docile; we stopped asking questions. Aha —”

Cadence pries free a packet; the contents of which Taylor can’t see even if he squints.

But the text must not matter because he focuses instead on a carefully cut newspaper article attached to the front. The same old paper as his news spread on the war — ink the same faded black.

He can barely look at it, though. Offers it to Kathy’s awaiting hand. “The fire was too great not to make the paper. Carlo personally ensured the cause of the blaze was covered up but no one could keep the deaths quiet. The city only knew three young women perished — not that they were the Garden Coven’s newest blooded witches. And because that fact needed to be concealed at all costs… there were no consequences for him to face.”

“For who to face?” Taylor’s afraid to ask but someone’s gotta do it.

Vera’s voice cracks when she answers.

“My ancestor — Derek Reimonenq. The Bloody Hand.”

“And the tortured soul the Coven used to bind the bloodwraith to this world.”

#nightbound #vera reimonenq #choices nb #playchoices fic #nik ryder x mc #cal lowell #katherine nightbound #oc: cadence smith #nik ryder #nightbound mc #mc: taylor hunter #oblv: bound by circumstance #oblv: new chapter #; my fics

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aproblematicpanda · 4 years

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Harry Potter? For the in-depth fandom ask

Hi thank you! ♥ I will use the books for my answers, since I didn’t really like most of the movies. I apologize if I mix up some of the characters, I’ve only read the books in my native language so I will have to google for some of the names in English. :’D

Top 5 favorite characters: Minerva McGonagall, Luna Lovegood, Fred & George Weasley, Neville Longbottom, Ginny Weasley. Other characters you like: The golden trio obviously, Molly, Dobby, Draco Malfoy, ... There are not a lot of characters I dislike. Least favourite characters: Umbridge, for obvious reasons. Otps: Hermione and Ron. Notps: I don’t think I have any? I’m not very invested in shipping when it comes to the HP fandom, I pretty much keep an open mind to everything? Except incest but I’ve never seen anyone ship anything like that, so. Favourite friendships: Harry, Ron and Hermione, obviously, and I also really liked Fren, George and Lee, and Lavender and Parvati. Favourite family: The Weasleys Favourite episodes: / Favourite book: Prisoner of Azkaban is probably my favorite book. Favourite quotes: "If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals." "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." "But you know, happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light." "Harry witnessed Professor McGonagall walking right past Peeves who was determinedly loosening a crystal chandelier and could have sworn he heard her tell the poltergeist out of the corner of her mouth, 'It unscrews the other way.’" "There is no need to call me ‘sir,’ Professor." And probably more. The books have so many amazing scenes, funny, inspirational, sad, hopeful, ... It was really hard to pick just a few. Best musical moment: / Moment that made you fangirl the hardest: Ehh... I mean, obviously I was rooting for Harry and the ending was a satisfying one, just like every other time Harry beat Voldemort, but the moment that made me fangirl the hardest would probably be Hermione punching Draco in the face. xD When it really disappointed you: The only truly disappointing thing about the book is how House-Elves are treated. Other than that, the only time I’m disappoint is literally every time JK Rowling decides it’s a good idea to open her mouth. Saddest moment: The moment Harry breaks down in Dumbledore’s chambers after Sirius dies gives me chills every. damn. time I reread the book. Most well done character death: Oh god, this is so hard because most of the deaths really hit me hard Favourite guest star: / Favourite cast member: / Character you wish was still alive: Honestly? Probably Hedwig. Maybe Fred. One thing you hope really happens: That JK Rowling’s Twitter account is banned so she doesn’t have a damn platform anymore. Most shocking twist: When did you start reading: I think the first three books were already out when I started to read them. My classmates kept telling me to do it and I was in that annoying phase where I refused to dive into anything that was this massively popular - but I’m glad I eventually caved because if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have grown up in this fandom and that means I would’ve had an entirely different experience. Now I can still say I grew up with the books and I’m glad I did. Best animal/creature: I’m a gigantic sucker for unicorns and I’m not sorry about it. xD Favourite location: I mean, Hogwarts is amazing, the descriptions of the castle never get old. Trope you wish they would stop using: Ehh... I honestly don’t know? One thing this book does better than others: I love how this show has such an inspired, dedicated, creative fanbase. The amount of HP related art, fanfiction, headcanons, ... out there is mindblowing. I’ve never quite seen that happen in any other fandom and it’s part of why I love this one as much as I do. Like how people can take a character that’s mentioned maybe a couple of times in the books and they create so much content for them to the point where I’ve actively had to stop myself from writing an answer to this questions because the answer isn’t canon, that’s admirable. Funniest moments: Fred and George wrecking havoc on Umbridge and finally leaving the castle after they get caught is without a doubt the funniest scene I can think of. Couple you would like to see: Like I said, I was never really into shipping anyone with anyone. I enjoy quite a lot of fanon ships I see on Tumblr, though. Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: / Favourite outfit: Every outfit I can think of is influenced by the movies so I don’t really have an answer to this. I would’ve loved to see Hermione’s dress to the Yule Ball, though, and the Patil sisters’. Oh, and Fleur’s wedding dress. Favourite item: The Marauder’s map. Do you own anything related to this show: No. What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in: I’m a Slytherin. Most boring plotline: I can’t think of anything. The passage that bores me the most is the one where the Minister of Magic meets the Muggle Prime Minister but that’s not a plotline. I guess everything is just so well thought of, everything that’s in the books in there for a reason and I wouldn’t cut anything out of it. Most laughably bad moment: As much as I dislike JK Rowling, she wrote seven brilliant books. I can’t think of a bad moment. There are plot holes, sure, and things that really fucking bug me, but no laughably bad moments. At least, not any that I can think of right now. The fact that she gave Cho Chang two last names as a name is a bad moment, though - but it’s not laughably. It’s just more proof that JK Rowling is a terrible person. Best flashback/flashfoward if any: The memories Snape shows to Harry, and the ones they both get to see of each other during their Occlumency lessons. Most layered character: I love the character development Ron goes through. Most one dimensional character: Ehh. There were a lot of important characters so it makes sense that not all of them got the layers they deserved. Right now nobody who’s relevant to the plot comes to mind as an answer? Scariest moment: Well, when Harry and Dumbledore came back from finding the fake Horcrux, that had me scared. Not for their lives (because it was obvious that Harry would live and Dumbledore would die) but because it felt like all of Dumbledore’s plans would be ruined so that’d probably be the scariest moment for me? Grossest moment: Ehh... I would probably throw up if I had witnessed Nagini sliding out of Bathilda’s dead body so I’m gonna go with that one, that must’ve been horrifying for Harry, especially because he spares Hermione the details. Best looking male: Well the books name Cedric Diggory as the most attractive one, so... Let’s go with that one then? Best looking female: Fleur and Ginny Who you’re crushing on (if any): I would probably be all over Ginny if I had gone to Hogwarts. Favourite cast moment: / Favourite transportation: A Thestral! Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): I really love the descriptions of Hogwarts. Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: Oh god, so. many. Off the top of my head, here we go. 1. The carriages that bring the students back to the train station are mentioned specifically at the end of the fourth book and yet Harry can’t see the Thestrals until the beginning of the fifth book. 2. In what world are the Weasleys poor? Hermione specifically mentions in the seventh book that you can increase the quantity of food and Harry gets more wine for Slughorn and Hagrid with a spell in the sixth book, so no wizard or witch would have to spend any money on food, ever. And like with clothes and books and everything, why buy multiple ones? Just buy one and then duplicate it like when Hermione did it with the medallion? 3. Harry randomly remembering the phone number to get into the Ministry of Magic after almost an entire year, having heard them once: please. I started rereading the fifth book like two months ago for the gazillionth time and I already don’t remember them anymore. 4. Supposedly there’s a curse on the position as the DADA professor ever since Voldemort asked for the job, so there’s a new teacher every year, but Professor Quirrel is introduced in a way that makes it seem as if he has been teaching there for quite a while and other students (like Fred and George) treat him as such - seems to me like the curse was only activated with Harry coming to Hogwarts but that’s not what’s canon. 5. Voldemort conveniently waiting for the end of the school year each year to make his move. 6. The school year somehow always starts on a Monday and the Hogwarts express always leaves on September 1 which would mean that September 1 was a Sunday for seven years in a row. 7. Why, WHY, would they use feathers and parchment? What the hell is wrong with pen and paper? Or things like torches, when electricity has been a thing since forever? And the same goes for using owls to send letters, or the memos that are used in the Ministry of Magic: just text or e-mail, dudes. One sloppy ‘this doesn’t work here because there’s too much magic in the air’ just doesn’t cut it for me, especially because Harry does wear a watch, for instance. I probably have more but this is all I can come up with right now. xD Best promo: My childhood best friend bugging me about the books until I finally caved and started to read them. xD At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Literally the first chapter.

Send me a show/fandom and I’ll answer

#hp #ask

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acearchivist359 · 4 years

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My Rise of Skywalker Opinions/Commentary

this is mostly for me but and for my other blog (not on tumblr) but I thought I’d post it here too cause why not ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ happy Star Ways Day fellow humans, may the force be with you

Okay so here's something I have a lot of opinions about. I'm gonna have to say right off the bat, I didn't like Rise of Skywalker. Being said though, I didn't hate it as much as I thought I would. I've seen it twice by now, I wrote my notes having seen it once, I've had lengthy debates about it with multiple people ranging from one of my parent's friends to one of my best friends to my little brother. I saw it like the day after it came out, I wrote my notes on January 1st, so I've sat with this for awhile and I'd sat with the movie before I wrote them. I kinda forgot about it all for a bit cause I blocked it out of my head and then I thought it might be too late to post it but I put a lot of, frankly chaotic, effort into my notes and I figured when it came on Disney+ people might start talking about it again so here we are. Now I'm still using my original notes, which I added to after seeing it the second time, cause I have no desire to watch this movie again. I really don't. I honestly wouldn't have even seen it twice but I had told my grandma I'd go with her cause she loves Star Wars and she had no one to go with. My grandma loved it, but my grandma loves them all "because it's Star Wars." My mom also saw it and liked it, she's only seen the originals though and had no idea what was going on. I, on the other hand, spent a lot of time hitting myself in the head (the first time round) and there was a few occasions where I honestly said "what the fuck??" out loud in the theatre. So one more thing I have to note, I feel the same way about the whole trilogy I don't really like any of them and I never did. But I'm not entirely just looking at this as one movie, a lot of what I've got to say looks at this as the end of the "Skywalker Saga" cause that’s what it is. I also have some things that go back through the entire trilogy but this is mainly based around TROS since it's the most recent and I refuse to watch the others to make notes on them. Also, I'm aware of the problem they had with the whole George Lucas vs. Rian Johnson thing and how they wrote them separately, however I'm still gonna call them out on things they should have done to tie things together from the beginning cause that was a really dumb way to do things anyway. Plus like I said I'm looking more big picture on a lot of things (mostly cause there's major plotlines that I hated). One of these days, I'll make a positive review but it won't be about the sequel trilogy, I'll tell you that much. With all that said, I vote that I get on with this. Just for reference though, none of this is in chronological order. There are some things I did like about this movie, I will give it that, so I feel like we should start there. Small Positive Things:

The first thing I put in my notes is just "Finn and Poe" and honestly that's still a mood. I really liked them in this one and I really saw why people ship them.

The next point in my notes just says "death star" which boils down to two different things: the aesthetic and the Imperial March

I know I said positive things but I didn't think of it in my notes and I need to address this. You're telling me that the Death Star exploded but there's still that big of a piece in tact??? But whatever not the point.

The aesthetic: vague continuity thing aside, I fucking love the Death Star in this I really do. It looks awesome. It's really cool to see this broken down, abandoned version of the Death Star. I loved the Stormtrooper helmets scattered on the ground, for some reason that part really stuck in my head. Being said though I generally love the old Stormtrooper helmets, the First Order ones just don't do it for me, but seeing them scattered around.. Idk it was a nice touch I think

Imperial March: so like the Imperial March is the shit, obviously, but that soft, subtle hint of it in that scene as Rey steps into the throne room is one of the only parts of that movie that made me hit my brother's arm in excitement (we do that at the movies, it's our thing). It reminds me of that thing they do in Clone Wars when Anakin does something just a little Darth Vader.

Right so the next thing I had was that part where Kylo Ren finds Palpatine and he switches from his voice to Snoke's to Darth Vader's.

It was a little thing but I liked it a lot. As far as having to tie it all together, the idea that it was actually Palpatine manipulating Ren wasn't so bad. (That being said the whole how Palpatine is around thing is pretty far fetched, but they tried.)

My next thing, and this I actually laughed at as opposed to like confused laughter, is the part where they get back from their little mission to find the map to whatever the place was called and Threepio introduces himself to Artoo and Artoo literally does a double take and backs up like "what the fuck??? " That was such a human expression for a robot, it was hilarious. Also Threepio being like "You're not messing with my head!" *cuts to Artoo messing with Threepio's head* Basically anything Artoo cause I love him.

Again tiny random thing, but the Jet Troopers and the Sith Troopers were really cool. Me and my brother quote the "they fly now??" "they fly now!" part all the time. Also just like red Stormtroopers..

So here's a thing that gave me feelings. (I'd like to just point out that this is one of the only things that gave me feelings and it's about to be clear why.) Chewie finding out Leia died. That hurt my heart. I knew that they couldn't possibly go through that movie without having Leia die, and I said this before the movie ever came out. What I said before was that they really had two options: they could have Leia die off screen which would have been disrespectful to both Carrie Fisher and Leia or she could just sorta disappear which would have also been bad. However they gave her the death scene she deserved. I mean sort of, jury's out on it really. But Chewie making sad noises and falling to his knees hurt me. Similarly Artoo beeping at her sadly made me weepy. (The Anakin in me really jumps out whenever Artoo comes up but like I love him)

I honestly have nothing else to say for this point besides: I can't believe Harrison Ford agreed to do that

I just wanna touch on Poe again cause he was always my favourite of the new characters, I wasn't really connected with any of them (which is so uncommon for me) but Poe was my favourite cause he was funny. He was really good in this one, I thought he was funny, again him and Finn had a brilliant thing going. For whatever reason this one made me appreciate Poe more.

I have some (general) grievances to air out now

I have to say one thing that really irks me about this trilogy is that none of the original characters reunite. The exception of which being everyone and Chewie. Also are we counting Luke and Leia's? I guess in the end they end up reunited in the force in the end either way but still. I mean really Han and Leia have their scene together, and I love that scene, but other than that nothing. No Han and Lando, no Han and Luke reunion. Han and Luke is the one that bothers me though cause them and Leia are the trio and Han and Luke are the only ones that don't reunite. We never see Leia and Lando together on screen either. It's a crime.

I don't know how I feel about Hux being the spy. I feel like it was just kinda lame, you know? Pretty predictable when you think about it, would have been cooler if he wasn't the spy. Seemed like it was just comic relief when it should have been a plot point.

I think it would have been cool if there were more Jedi in the final scene. Like all those Jedi voices spoke to Rey, but only Luke and Leia are there at the end? I get the symbolism with the lightsabers and Luke's place and all that, but still. Like at least, you know, Obi Wan or Anakin. This is one of those full circle things but still, I think it would have been a cool scene.

Okay so this is just me being petty but like I don't care it bothers me. The fact that they keep acting like the lightsaber Rey has is Luke's when it's actually Anakin's bothers me. I know it's a little thing and Not Important but it's dumb. Cause it's not Luke's lightsaber, Luke made his own later on.

Also the fact that they started calling it Rey's lightsaber annoys me so much for the same reason. She has her own lightsaber now, leave Anakin's alone.

Okay so, we have reached the point where I start talking about things a bit more, bear with me (if people even bother to read this at all idc this is mostly just for me to rant and stuff):

So like look, I'll be the first to say not a Kylo Ren fan. He had potential, I will give him that, and that's where I'm going with this. The other movies had him as this whiny, try hard, Darth Vader wannabe and I just really didn't vibe with that. I mean this is the first real villian since Darth Vader (not counting palpsy during the prequels cause he was just behind the scenes and every movie had a different Bad Guy) and he throws a temper tantrum. Those stormtroopers were hilarious but still. But anyway, did not expect to come out of this movie having wished Kylo Ren was in it more. If they had had him be the way he was in this one the whole time, I might have actually liked him. He did some cool stuff for once in this one so let's discuss that:

I talk about things being full circle a lot (but with movies as nostalgic as Star Wars there should be full circle, fight me) but him fighting with Anakin's lightsaber was very full circle

I do like that it was Leia's death that triggered his return to the light side (I mean I'll get into some things about that later) as opposed to some romance bullshit with Rey. I really don't ship them, like at all, and I think it makes it more compelling that it was his mother's death instead.

He did some cool shit at the beginning, that fight scene was cool. I like the part where he slams the guy down on the ground, don't ask me why I have no idea. I saw it in the trailer and I liked it.

The Han Solo in him really jumped out in the end there and it was really entertaining

The fight with the Knights of Ren was really cool (besides that one jump thing he did cause I see where they were going with it but it just didn't look as good)

What was definitely cool is the part where he pulls the lightsaber out from behind his back, that was a cool move

Alright so here's my thing and this is gonna make me sound bad probably but like as already established, I don't really like the new characters as much. I just didn't connect with them on the same level as the past trilogies characters, which is fine it's whatever. But I am just gonna say it, I don't really like Rey. But here's my thing, I've always been indifferent towards her but like not really caring either was but there are some things she did in this one that just.. bothered me so this being my platform I'm gonna talk about it.

So the thing with Star Wars movies for me and most people is the family feel right. But like Rey just goes off on her own and ditches Finn, Poe, Chewie and Threepio all the time and like I get that she's sensing something or she wants to get to the death star but she could say something instead of just.. disappearing

Okay so here's another thing, and I know they wanted to find a way to tie it back to the originals but….. a Palpatine?? There are so many other characters they could have gone with but it's like they just wanted to do the 'watch the light side defeat the dark side' thing in as many ways as possible in one movie (Which I'll talk more about later)

Alright so here's my last solely Rey related point and like I don't know where people stand on this cause they seem to either love it or hate it. But Rey Skywalker?? Here's my thing, I've a really hard time getting past the Palpatine thing on that one. But also is that supposed to be the Rise of Skywalker? Because I don't know that I consider that to be rising for her.

Alright, on the topic of the light side vs. dark side thing. Yes I am aware that this is a fundamental part of Star Wars and always has been. However they did it in two different ways in the same movie. Here's the thing I don't like Rey or Kylo Ren over each other, I have the same level of indifference with both of them. So this isn't me being a Ben Solo stan, promise cause I could not possibly care less if they bring him back, I'm not gonna fight them on it. But the storyline of him overcoming the dark side, would have been more interesting to me. Because I knew Rey wasn't gonna go to the dark side, this is Star Wars. But I wish we could have seen Kylo/Ben struggle with the dark side vs the light side more. I mean they gave us such a good look at it with Anakin, we watched him struggle and fall. That to me would have been rising.

Not to mention Palpsy literally just tries to use the same trick on Rey that he already tried to use on Luke. That's not full circle, that's Palps being dumb.

Okay, now for the full circle nonsense I keep talking about. The thing with this is that it probably would have been the things you do over two movies and not just the one but just cause they didn't write them that way doesn't mean I can't imagine it.

For one thing, I'd have had Ben kill Palpatine.

Hear me out: Palps himself refers to Ben as the "Last of the Skywalkers" and given that Palpatine is the reason behind all the Skywalker drama from the beginning. With that being said, having the last of the Skywalkers kill Palpatine and thus end his insane, saga long reign over the universe would have been amazing

Not to mention this would be finishing what his grandfather started which was his thing the whole time. Anakin tried to kill Palpatine at the end, and having the last Skywalker, the last of Anakin's blood genuinely finish what he started would have brought the whole thing to an end

Along the same lines as that, the power the all of the Jedi scene would have in that case (and I'm saying this like he was good for more than the last 10 minutes of the movie) been so much more powerful. To have him hear Anakin's voice, like he always wanted but guiding him towards the light instead. Not to mention his mother.

And also, small thing but on the topic of finishing what Anakin started and all that but his grandson, the last of his blood (I'm gonna keep using that) using his lightsaber, the very one he had when he first fell to the dark side, to kill Palpatine once and for all would have been one of those full circle moments that I expected the movie to have more of.

SO yeah that's everything, all my thoughts and feelings. This literally took me forever to finish. It's been like 5 months but it's Star Wars Day (May the Fourth be with You!) so I had to cram to get it done or I'd die. Plus once it started to get away from when the movie actually came out, I figured I'd wait for it to come out on Disney+ and it has so here we are. I'm glad to be done with this and get it all out cause I honestly just don't care for that movie. I'd rather watch Clone Wars (the finale was soooo good). Anyways, peace out and may the force be with you, always! -Moony

#star wars #the rise of skywalker #may the fourth be with you #literally just me rambling really #hntrswrlk-reviews #i should really bring that back i was serious about it before

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thekeybladehero · 5 years

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i have a lot of thoughts about KH3 so i’m going to put them below. it’s pretty long and obviously, spoiler-ish, so it’s under a cut in case anyone hasn’t played / finished it yet

okay, i have ... a lot of disappointment with KH3. when i first finished the game i was heart broken and hurt but i thought the journey had been incredible, but the more and more i thought about it, and the more hours and days started to pass and i started to really think on it, the more disappointed i became. i was just trying my best not to admit or recognize that i was disappointed because this is a game i, that all of us, have been waiting over a decade for, and to admit that it was anything less than what we’d hoped and imagined it to be is heartbreaking. but it wasn’t what i imagined it would be like, it didn’t feel like a proper end to a 16 year saga.

that isn’t to say i hate the game or that i even dislike it, i loved playing it, and the journey was incredible. there were so many things that KH3 did right and did amazing, a lot of amazing moments and the way they pulled everything together, convoluted plotline and dozens of characters and all, was interesting to see. it had a very different feel to the other games, especially the title games KH1 and KH2. it was far more poignant, more mature and serious. throughout the game you got the sense that this was the end to things, because everything was coming together and sora was reflecting on his journey so far.

so i feel like between that, and between nomura’s comments on how the end of the game would be hard to accept / how some friendships would change, i should have seen things coming, and i thought i did, but i didn’t. and i wish i could say that i was only disappointed in the ending of the game, but there’s far more to it than that. the ending however definitely felt a bit like a slap to the face, especially when you put it together with everything else that kind of fell flat.

to start off on the technical side: i feel very bad for any new players, because right off the bat square enix throws a whole lot at them, game mechanic wise, and it was a little tough even for me to keep up with all the controls at first. all the shortcuts and command switching in the middle of combat can be difficult sometimes. that being said, the way they incorporated all of the game mechanics from previous games and morphed into something more streamline, sleek, and uniform was fucking great. they really did well on that, and on making combat fun, exciting, and dynamic. all the links, the spells, the attacks, the combos, the team attacks and summons were great! the keyblade upgrading was a fun aspect too and i had fun maxing out starseeker and wheel of fate.

speaking of wheel of fate, aside from ultima which will always be the fuckin best keyblade to ever grace the goddamn planet, i LOVED wheel of fate so much!! it was so fucking badass and very powerful and along with starseeker, once i got it i don’t think i ever unequipped it lol.

also, one BIG THING that i absolute loved and could not stop talking about to anyone who would listen: THE NPCS!!! THE WORLD POPULATION!!! the fact that there were PEOPLE in the worlds! actual PEOPLE who walked, talked, laughed! people you could interact with and who reacted to you! It was so much fun just walking around the world and hearing all the conversations, seeing all the different NPC models. It really, really REALLY helped make the game feel more real. Like the worlds were actual worlds, and not just empty sets like in the other games. It really added another layer to the game, making it much more immersive, and I think the devs did a fucking AMAZING job and a fantastic decision on including them. :-)

and speaking of NPCS, the developers who scripted them and were in charge of them, i would like to thank them a whole lot. especially when it comes to the companions / teammates. because holy FUCK. CAN I TALK ABOUT THAT? BECAUSE I CAN’T GET OVER IT. in KH1 and KH2, it was always fun having your world companions with you, but there was never really much of anything to them apart from the fact that they fought beside you in combat and that they interacted with sora during cutscenes. but that was all there was to them. in between, while traveling, walking running breaking things or jumping on / off things, going different places, there was no reaction from them. teammates were silent companions and that was always kind of sad, always felt a little lacking.

and kh3 changed that. the scripts for your NPC teammates, having them interact with you during the actual game, point things out to you or comment on stuff you did. like flynn whenever you showboated tricks in the town, or the little games you could play with them while journeying through the world with them like in corona, when you slid down the meadow with rapunzel and flynn or danced in the town square with them. even whenever you took a selfie with them or a photo of them and they would look at the camera, comment on it, react, pose maybe. it’s those little things, the little reactions and the interactions between sora and his teammates / companions that made the journey seem much more ... real? it made the friendships more believable, that you actually did have someone traveling with you because they had personalities that shone and were shown outside of cutscenes or battle. but the cutscenes helped, too. there was much more interaction between everyone in the cutscenes this time around, and the dialogue -- while still cheesy at times (its kh and disney, of course, why wouldn’t it be?) was much more believable and natural as compared to the past few games. it felt more polished, more like conversations between actual friends, there was more emotion being displayed. in how they reacted verbally and also in the minute micro-expressions. the micro-expressions!!! god!! watching a brow twitch or an eye twitch or someone’s eyes crinkle or their hair move with the wind and the little subtle facial changes and scrunches !!! i loved it!!!

also, obviously ... the fucking graphics. the level of detail in the game. was fucking. GORGEOUS. the entire time i played i could understand why the game took so long, with everything that went into it, and how the gameplay graphics blended in so seamlessly with the in-game cutscenes. it was amazing. absolutely beautiful. all the models, all the textures, the lighting, the style --- so fucking gorgeous. and THE VIBRANCY OF THE WORLDS! the EXPANSIVENESS of them! they were HUGE! the fact that you could go so many places and weren’t bound to a small box room for the most part, no fading to black as you entered a new area. you just keep going for the most part and it doesn’t break you out of the illusion of actually being there. the maps were so expansive and the work that went into each of them was so clear...it was absolutely gorgeous and so much fun exploring them all and testing the limits and boundaries of them all.

HOWEVER, one of my main gripes with KH3, was the level of difficulty in the game. which is to say ... it had absolutely zero challenge in it. and it was extremely disappointing. in the other games you at least had to strategize on what items to equip and more importantly, what ABILITIES, but here they just hand you everything on a silver platter and let you go wild and yes, that can be fun, but not if it makes the game so unchallenging. even the boss fights were disappointing because they weren’t tough at all. the final fight against master xehanort wasn’t difficult, just time consuming. the boss battle of all boss battles in kingdom hearts 3, and he wasn’t even as difficult as riku or ansem from KH1. like. what? how does that make sense? they gave you kupo tokens in case you die but i literally never had to use it once. maybe it’s different on pride mode, but i’ve talked to people who have played it in pride mode, including my brother, and they say it’s not challenging at all either.

which, i don’t want to be eternally frustrated and never be able to beat a game because it’s so hard, but damn. at least some level of difficulty would have been nice. the enemies had a lot more HP this game but as far as their attack style went and how much damage you took, with all the accessories you were given and could equip, it didn’t matter how much HP they had, you’d cut through them easily and never be in any real danger of losing.

the worlds were also so short. like, incredibly short. unbelievably so. to the point where i really thought, for over half the game, that there would be a second go at them and you’d come back to them until i found out that that wasn’t the case, and you only go there once. the stories in so many of the worlds, toy story, mount olympus, twilight town and tangled especially, felt so ... incomplete. not only that, but so many of the worlds were just cut and dry repeats of what had happened in the original movies. it wasn’t like the other games where there were new plots and stories introduced that you could go through. the cutscenes were all basically just the movie repeated but with sora somewhere in the background. which, they looked absolutely beautiful! no joke. i won’t lie about that. it’s amazing how faithful to the disney movie art styles they stayed and how they recreated them. that’s amazing. but as far as actual content and story? they felt lacking. especially since so much of the worlds were made up of cutscenes. not even gameplay or battles but cutscenes.

there was eleven hours worth of cutscenes in the game. eleven! on average it takes around 20-29 hours to beat KH3. that’s practically half the game. that’s insane. and i hesitate to complain about this because i love cutscenes, i love seeing the characters and seeing them interact, but unlike the other games KH3 felt less like a game you played and more like a movie you watched where you could on occasion participate.

okay. now to the worlds:

Mount Olympus: so gorgeous....what a big ass fuckin world too. mount olympus had the most GORGEOUS lighting and colors and i probably spent a good hour just. turning every which way and staring for a couple of minutes at how beautiful and scenic everything was. the friendly back and forth between herc and sora was so cute too, really felt like they were good friends, it felt very natural and i adored it. sora’s instagram post on herc’s dad was hilarious too, oh my god.

Twilight Town: SO BEAUTIFUL! i love how they expanding on Twilight Town’s world, made it so much more open, made it so populated! the sunset was gorgeous and i took way too many selfies in front of it on the rooftops than necessary. hayner pence and olette were adorable and i adore them and how much they wanted to learn about roxas and get him back, and how they juped xemnas LMAO. ratatouille’s bistro was a lot of fun as well but cracking the damn eggs are devil’s work and i never fuckin got to five stars BECAUSE I COULDN’T GET EXCELLENT ON ANY EGG RECIPE BFBFRJFESJSAB

Toy Story: VERY VERY CUTE VERY NOSTALGIC GOD HOW CAN ANYONE NOT LOVE TOY STORY’S WORLD??? they did an amazing job in every world recreating the movie art styles but MAN ... TOY STORY FELT JUST LIKE THE MOVIE. fighting in the mechs was a lot of fun, the doll heartless was creepy, i had way too much trouble finding the stores i needed to go to and spent far too much time getting everyone’s voice high on helium LOL. woody was MVP of the world and he kicked ass, loved the sass he gave ymx. and speaking of ymx, how he kept subtly fucking with sora’s head, really fucked with me and left me so fuckin worried and anxious. also did we ever get an explanation on how they got home?? like we left them in a world split in two and we were just like okay bye now g2g laterrrr and its like, WELL ... OKAY THEN ... im glad it seemed their world was repaired at the end in the credits but, also, that means they forgot about sora and that makes me );

Tangled: My second fav world!! i admit ... i wasn’t looking forward to rapunzel’s world. i thought it would be my least favorite cuz tangled is my least favorite disney movie. i thought it was too boring and bland. but her world was anything but! and rapunzel and flynn themselves were very dynamic and active and interactive too. :-) it sucked that her world, like many of the other worlds, was just cut and paste of her movie with no difference, but her world was so beautiful --- full of vibrant colors, so expansive, and the movie cutscenes were gorgeously recreated. the festival where you dance with the townspeople was the CUTEST FUCKING THING EVER AND I MUST HAVE DONE IT LIKE TEN TIMES.

Frozen: i was very tired at the end of it after being thrown off the mountain like 5 times LOL BJSKDBA. the fact that they had sora poke fun at their plot after the last time he gets thrown off is funny too haha. other than that, frozen was cute. too cold and the colors too muted / the same in every direction for my tastes, and i had the most trouble finding one of the mickey lucky marks here too. all that fucking snow man. GAH. hearing idina menzel sing though was surprising but a blessing and while frozen has never been one of my favorite movies, i adore how much emotion idina delivers in let it go. the fact that sora was so clearly in awe of her voice and powers and his instragram post on it just makes it even better fbksba.

Monstropolis: this was fun! boo was adorable. sully and mike caring for boo and their back and forth banter, the way they just yeeted vanitas through one of the doors was fucking hilarious. sora’s reaction to being monster-ified was funny as well, and it was nice that there was a somewhat different plot to this world from the original movie.

POTC: MY FAVORITE WORLD HANDS DOWN ... nothing compares imo bjsakdbsa. the fucking hours i spent grinding to get my leviathan ship to max level and finding all the treasures and all the ingredients AND THE GIANT TREASURE COVE FULL OF ORICHALCUM AND PRECIOUS MATERIALS AND ACCESSORIES. WHOOOOOO! sora’s enthusiasm for being a pirate was cute as always, and the fact that he finally became captain of his own ship!!! the sailing of the seas and ship combat was so much fun too and unexpected, and the undersea combat was very fun as well. diving down and seeing all the fish and coves and caves!! man. it was so much fun. easily my favorite world by far.

San Fransokyo: i think my favorite part about this world was the fact that it was modern day, and so phones and cars and television were a thing, and the fact that we SAW! HEARTLESS! ON NATIONAL TV! ON THE NEWS! PEOPLE WERE TALKING ABOUT HEARTLESS ATTACKING AND IT FELT SO MUCH LIKE TWO WORLDS COLLIDING AND I LOVED IT SO MUCH. and i know the BH6 world was the movie version of the world but i like to think it’s still connected to earth-616 like in the comics anyway and therefore marvel and therefore sora in the same world as the avengers and the x-men. as for the actual world itself...i was really excited at first, but it felt a little ... anti-climactic? it felt very short compared to the other worlds, and san fransokyo itself was probably the smallest out of every other one. so that was a little disappointing, but BH6 team was adorable, and i loved all their interactions with one another and with sora donald and goofy. :-)

Pooh’s World: pooh’s world probably gave me the world’s biggest heart attack, with sora reassuring pooh and having us think everything was fine and innocent and carefree like the other times and then BAM you hear sora’s thoughts and he’s like ‘he’s right something’s pulling us apart, what’s happening to me?’ and you’re just left like HUH WHAT ? THE FUCK, EXPLAIN. other than that, it was very cute. very short, but cute.

now onto the actualy story of the game. i was kind of shocked about how serious, how dark and much more intense the story was in this game. the tone and the emotion in KH3 was so vastly different compared to the other games. it’s partly due to the dialogue but also, i think there was much more of an emphasis on realistic emotions and reactions as well. in the other games, whenever something bad happened, it sucked, but it was never really a big deal. the characters would never really react like it was something world ending or horrible, they’d just move past it like it wasn’t grave or like it weighed on them. there were times where things were more serious, sure, but even then, it was usually resolved with a smile or a laugh or a joke or some motivational speech or saying.

KH3 on the other hand? totally different. everything felt like it had so much more gravitas, because the situations that the characters were put into, the battles they faced, the people they met or fought against --- they weren’t resolved with a laugh or a speech, they weren’t moved on from after a few seconds of deciding everything was alright. there were some moments like that, but there were far more weighty situations where the characters really took everything in, really reacted to it. showed negative emotions -- fear, sadness, confusion, doubt, anger. there wasn’t just symbolic talk of death in some abstract form, where you could interpret the loss of a heart for someone dying but still vague enough it could be said it wasn’t really death. there were far more realistic and understandable forms of death: flynn getting stabbed with a knife, will getting stabbed with a sword, xigbar purposely letting himself fall off the ledge down a cliffside. sora going to ‘heaven’, and chirithy telling him -- and us, the audience -- that when the heart and body perish together someone is dead, and that that’s what happened to sora and the others. and the reactions to those deaths were far more real as well. in the other games death, when it happened, was never given much weight, apart from a few -- the main characters in each of the game mainly. but for the most part, the organization members, the NPCS who lost their hearts?

they were given moments but sora and the others all just kind of. moved on very quickly, and that was that. but for this game the reactions to seeing someone die were so much more intense. they were more real. when someone was dying, like flynn or will, people cried, sora got angry and violent and lashed out. for the organization members, they all had their own moments, there were conversations that were had, emotions displayed and truths told, and when all of the trios reunited there were tears and joy and breakdowns of relief. you could feel all of those emotions and you could see it in them and just how much this journey had cost each and every single one of them. there was no moving on right away, there was surprise but blink and they’re over it moments. each reunion and each goodbye held so much real, raw emotion, where the pain and the exhaustion and the sadness and joy were able to be felt.

in general, there was much more of a range of emotion and personality for all of the characters during moments of duress or conflict, but especially when it came to sora. and i absolutely adored it, even though it gave me so many heart attacks lol and a lot of pain and worry. he was showing such a mature side of him that we haven’t been able to get in other games. the closest one is DDD, where we saw sides to him that were serious, had more weight, but even then his faith was never broken, never shaken, and he had unwavering faith and radiated positivity. this game pushed sora to his limits. we saw him at his weakest, and his strongest, and every moment in between. we were able to hear his thoughts --- hear all the directions his mind takes that he doesn’t speak out loud. we were able to see that yes, sora is smart, and no, when things happen to him, he doesn’t just brush them off. he feels them - the pain, the hurt, the anger, the sadness, the doubt - just as much as anyone else. and the doubt. i’ve been saying this for YEARS that sora, while his strength lies in his friends, he relies on his friends too much, in the sense that he attributes all his success and all his strength and his worth from them. that he believes he’s ordinary and unextraordinary without them. this game fucking confirmed that. the moments where he doubted himself, where he lost hope in himself, where he admitted that he didn’t think anything of his abilities without his friends. it was heartbreaking to see but it showed us that sora isn’t just happy - go - lucky all the time like some people like to believe.

and riku ... RIKU! i’m SO PROUD OF RIKU. so proud of who he’s become. his empathy, his kindness, his thoughtfulness was so beautiful and so sweet. especially when it came to aqua. that first time we saw him and mickey in the realm of darkness, and riku was hesitant to leave, and he voiced how lonely and sad aqua must feel trapped there, it really showed how empathetic he is towards people, how caring he is. his conversations with repliku, his reassurance towards sora, how he picked up on what mickey had been planning to use stopga, the way he protects everyone. he’s warm and kind and he has a strong heart and while his moments were sadly quite few in the game, he really shined bright in a couple of scenes.

for kairi, i couldn’t shake the feeling all game that they were shafting her, pushing her to the side again. more so really in the first half of the game because, wow, while riku didn’t get much screen time (and i’ll talk about that in the next paragraph), kairi had even less. i’m pretty sure hayner, pence, and olette had double her screentime in the first half of the game which ... i love them, but really? c’mon. i was hoping we’d see more of her and lea training, or their conversations, or something. the moments they had were lovely and cute and so scenic and very deep, but i was hoping for more, especially for kairi. ): they also really fucked her over fighting wise. despite stressing that she and lea have been training together to become keyblade wielders and despite both of them being told in the game that they were ready to fight xehanort and organization xiii, they only showed kairi needing to be rescued. we saw lea fighting, but kairi? maybe one or two seconds. and that ... sucks. they still didn’t do her justice in that sense. she’s prepared - she’s capable. why not show that? that being said, i’m happy she had more focus on the second half of the game, and i absolutely ADORE her being determined to be the one to save sora this time and not the other way around, and making good on that promise, and being sora’s light to guide him back to the world of the living.

that being said i am very disappointed we weren’t able to play as her, or even as RIKU apart from those two short battles in the realm of darkness. i thought we’d be able to play more as him or kairi or even aqua, seeing how this is the third and final game in the saga, and we were able to play as riku for half of DDD and aqua had her own prequel to KH3 but it seems not. :/

not only that, but the characterization for riku, while i definitely think it started off strong, felt like it fell flat after that first fight in the realm of darkness. the fact that sora and riku were in the same room together, twice, at yen sid’s tower, and yet hardly even acknowledged one another, felt so odd. especially considering the fact that in every other game, their friendship and bond was stressed heavily, implying how close they were and how much they cared for one another. the fact that this was the end to the saga, the third game in the series, and they had only two significant moments with each other, both which lasted only about a minute or two, was so weird. it was so so weird.

i know nomura said that he wanted to keep the friendships realistic, that friends can grow distant over time as goals change, and fine, that’s fine, but it doesn’t make sense when you look at literally every other game and see how close sora and riku are, and then they hardly even look each other’s direction out of nowhere. it was just so ... disjointed. not just sora and riku either, but riku and kairi. we never ONCE saw them interact or even TALK. not once! sora and kairi were the only ones who got any real screen time and development together in the game, which i’m happy for, because that was long overdue, and kairi was a STAR in the second half of the game and that moment between them where they FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY share the paopu fruit with each other and make a promise to protect each other was so ... fucking long overdue ... and so gratifying and sweet and romantic.

but it’s just incredibly disappointing how all the other trios were able to get their reunion EXCEPT for sora, kairi, and riku. every other trio. literally every other trio was close, were friends, had a reunion scene. were able to relax, to find peace and rest after this long journey they’ve all been on. everyone except sora kairi and riku. we were all expecting for them to finish their journeys the way they started it: together on the island. after years of searching for one another, chasing each other, fighting, being apart. they were constantly looking out for each other and looking for each other and in the end? we never got that. we never got them together on destiny islands at last, after everything. never even got them together, period. it felt like such a slap in the face, alongside the fact that sora is dead.

and i know sora will remain the protagonist of the kingdom hearts series, and that the secret ending set up KH4 and sora’s next adventure, where possibly riku stars in it like DDD as well, but ... FUCK. it doesn’t take away the disappointment and the bitter feeling of knowing that everyone else is able to be at peace and find happiness and be among their friends, together with everyone at last, while he’s dead and gone and alone. and i try to justify it, because sora was fine with sacrificing himself for kairi. his journey started when he looked for her. he loves her. he loves his friends. he doesn’t want them to be dead. and if they’re happy, if they found peace, he’s happy.

but it also just hurts to think that after all that, after all of the sacrifices he made, after all the people he brought together and saved, he doesn’t get that happy ending for himself. doesn’t get to relax after everything. that he doesn’t get to be with his friends, that he’s alone.

it’s a very bitter ending and i know nomura intended for it to be that way, but understanding and knowing that the ending was meant to be like this doesn’t mean that the ending is any good, or satisfying in any way. it’s just disappointing and a little insulting.

in the end, i’m very mixed on kh3. i’m trying very hard to focus on what i enjoyed and take it for what it is and accept it, because there were a lot of good moments, but i can’t help but feel like the game could have been better in many ways.

#〈 out of worlds! 〉 ♕ ooc.#long post tw #spoilers tw #kh3 spoilers #very very long ....#i am very mixed and trying to stay positive and enjoy the good but

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timeisacephalopod · 6 years

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4, 6, 9, 10, 12: Rhodey and Bucky, 15, 16, 21, 23, 27, 29, 30, 32, 35, 37, 43, 46, 50, 54: Tony

You know that meme where the white woman is looking at the math overlaying the picture in confusion? That was me when I got this ask because instead of reading the fucking questions on the ask meme I put up I decided ‘Rhodey and Bucky’ were some other thing? Long story short I’m a moron lmao.

4- Favorite actress

Tbh I don’t pay much attention to the actresses and thus I almost missed out of saying Tessa Thompson like some kind of savage. I appreciate how hard she worked to try and make Valkyrie bisexual and also her character was basically the only thing I liked about Thor: Ragnarok (controversial opinion, I know).

6- Favorite quote

“Trust my rage” from Thor The Dark World. This line is so visceral and poetic. Like shit son, the rest of the movie was eh, but that line? Fucking amazing, and Hiddleston’s delivery of it is top tier bois.

9- BROTP

Pepper and Tony. I’ve never seen the romance between them, and in my opinion it was there because it seems movies are fucking incapable of not having a romance subplot (no hate to pepperony shippers either, everyone likes what they like and the entire point of fic is to circumvent canon anyways). But as a friendship pairing these two are excellent- they’re a great team, they understand each other on a fundamental level, and their friendship dynamic is interesting. Also, to me, I think their relationship is more compelling without the romance.

10- How did I discovered Marvel?

I’ve mentioned this in other asks but I had a friend make me watch Avengers and I didn’t like it lmao. I only gave it another show two years later and started from the beginning with CA:TFA and then I got into it. I’m not sure what changed or why I took to it later, especially when I found the later half of TFA to be kind of boring (I love Skinny!Steve ok) but it happened and when WS came out I saw it in theaters. From then I was hooked.

12- Make me choose between two characters: Rhodey and Bucky

Damn, I’d rather not have to choose, you suck! But, for the sake of the ask, Rhodey. As a character he’s better constructed, has his own story and motivation outside Tony, he’s funny, and while he has his moments (that I mostly blame on shit writing) he’s a great friend. I honestly wish that we could get a whole movie about him doing things but I did hear some rumors not long ago about Marvel looking into making Iron Man 4 an Ironheart movie and the only thing that would make that better is if Rhodey were her mentor (I literally wrote a story about this once).

Anyways, although I write Bucky a lot more than I do Rhodey I do prefer his character in a more fundamental way simply because he’s more fleshed out. Plus I love male friendships that are actually good and James Rhodey Rhodes is the God Tier of friends. The man spent 3 fucking months combing the desert for his disaster friend and that’s some damn dedication. Especially when you know people must have gotten real damn annoyed with him using resources and shit. But that action alone tells you everything you need to know about him and none of it is bad. I love Rhodey, seriously.

15- Top 5 ships

Tony/T’Challa

Tony/ Bucky

Tony/ Stephen

Tony/Rhodey

And, because I feel compelled to put a ship that doesn’t have Tony in it Steve/Howard

Honorable Mentions: Tony/ Peter Q

16- Top 5 villains

THANOS

Erik Killmonger

Loki

Justin Hammer (he’s just so absurd)

Ghost (from Ant Man and The Wasp)

Seriously, this was hard because Marvel’s villains are shit. They’re all the same one dimensional ‘they’re evil’ type characters.

21- Dream crossover

Basically any urban fantasy world I loved in my teens and the MCU. I’ve written a Vampire Academy/ MCU crossover but I’d love to write a House of Night crossover (I hate the characters in HoN, but love the world ok don’t judge), and a Shadowhunters crossover. I’ve seen some cool stuff with Teen Wolf being crossed over too though.

23- Most layered character

Tony fucking easily. His arcs are always the most compelling (or close to it), he’s had the most character development, and his trauma plays out so beautifully on screen. I’d argue Steve is a close second post WS, but the MCU will never let his character play out the development he’s gotten because they’ll never let Steve be less than perfect, which pisses me off. Otherwise his transition from a solider who wants to do right by his country to a cynical man who doesn’t know how to process the new world he’s been tossed into or how to handle a situation in which the morally correct solution isn’t abundantly obvious would be a compelling watch. But its been consistently proven that Steve will never get a real realization of his new characterization because ~~perfection~~.

27- Favorite moment

Shiiiit. That’s a lot of material and because I have a bad memory I’m going to go with ‘don’t call us plucky, we don’t know what it means’ because that was hilarious lmao.

29- Saddest moment

Shit boi, probs a toss up between Peter P’s death and Bucky’s. Peter’s is obvious but Bucky fucking dusting in front of the dude who spent so long trying to find him again in an effort to feel, even if its just for a moment, like he’s home again? Sad af. I felt awful for Steve there.

30- Most beautiful scene

Pretty much all of Black Panther is a visual treat, but I’m especially fond of T’Challa in the dream world with his father. That scene was so beautiful, and all the colors? Amazing. Only Guardians of the Galaxy even compares visually and even then Wakanda’s beauty has something else to offer that space doesn’t.

32- Actor/Actress I’d like to be cast by Marvel

As mentioned above I pay literally zero attention to actors- its a personal choice not to spend time being a voyeur into other people’s lives and treat them like commodities to consume because I loath celebrity culture (and this isn’t a slam to anyone who enjoys it, its more a slam to people who over engage in it- ie people who care enough to send death threats or paps basically). Anyways that’s an opinion you didn’t ask for, but because of that personal opinion I have no real cast choice lmao.

35- Most boring plotline?

I love Thor but all his movies. The first movie had good personal growth but eh. The second was an ok movie but forgettable (aside from my fav line from Loki in it), and unpopular opinion I hated Thor Ragarok. I mean it was funny. That’s all the good I have to say about it really. Though I have no idea why every comedy writers room is not leaping at a chance to get Taikia on their staff because the man is a comedic genius and that’s honestly being impolite to his comedy skill. Still, as much as I like Thor I didn’t really love any of his movies and all his villains were so fucking boring, even Loki wasn’t that interesting till Avengers. Poor Thor, MCU did him dirty :(

37- Most well done character death

Peter P. I give this to him over Bucky because apparently most of that scene was improv? I cried over my spider son ok. There’s someone who was in that theater with me who heard me sob out ‘my spider son’ and went home to tell people about it. That shit was heartbreaking. Second runner up goes to T’Challa but I didn’t think it was well done, I just thought it was sad as shit for Okoye and I love her so it was upsetting to see her lose her king :(

43- Characters I wish they’ve met

I don’t understand the question :( I think it’s supposed to be ‘characters you wish would met’ but all my wishes were granted in IW. Tony and Stephen met and so did Tony and Quill. I shipped Tony with both characters before they’d interacted on screen so it was nice to see :) Rhodey and Quill would be a fucking hoot together though, throw in Okoye and Valkyrie and you’ve got a bunch of drunk overpowered people telling war stories or, in Quill’s case, stories about that time he stole some shit.

46- What characters outside of the Mcu I’d like to see in a Marvel movie?

Ironheart, but I heard rumors they might do a movie with her. I think it’d be fun to have Riri in screen, especially since Peter is around her age. I’d also love to see a Young Avengers movie or a Kamala Khan/ Ms. Marvel movie though apparently there’s rumors of that too.

50- Characters that deserved better

Tony, Bucky, and Steve but all for different reasons. Steve deserves his fall from grace and not because I think he should suffer, but because keeping him on his pedestal means he’ll never be able to fully process his trauma and move on. Allow him to fall, allow him to know he isn’t perfect, then allow him to know that that’s ok, he doesn’t need to be, he just needs to do the best he can and then allow him a proper chance to move on.

Bucky because he deserves to be a character outside of Steve and, to a much smaller extent, Tony. Let the man have a movie about self actualization after trauma, let him figure out he isn’t Steve Roger’s best friend anymore (and that Steve isn’t really Steve anymore) and that that’s ok, they can both accept themselves as they exist now and still be friends. Let him develop hobbies outside of Steve, have him bond with Rhodey, he needs a good friend. Shit, let him bond with Sam too. Give me a buddy movie where Sam lowkey therapies Bucky into being a fuckin person again and Bucky finds some way to repay him. He can go beat up Scott for that time he kicked Sam’s ass lol.

And Tony because the MCU makes fuckin everything his fault, even stuff that only somewhat involves him. They drive him to an absolute breaking point and then have the characters get pissed that he broke? The only one that I found acceptable was Pepper and that’s mostly because I understand why she’d be freaked out both by Tony’s obsessive behavior and by nearly being eaten by one of his suits. She had her own shit she was dealing with post Mandarin so her I understand. Everyone else though? Mostly makes no sense. Why are you surprised that a person snaps when they’re pushed to the limit? That’s how people work lmao but that’s also because the writers make an active, and completely senseless, choice to have the characters react like Tony’s mental health problems are a choice he made and now he has to suffer because he has PTSD or some shit. Idk, but AoU was the worst for it, and, to a lesser extend IM3 but I refuse to believe Rhodey would really tell Tony to get over himself after a panic attack- the man is emotionally intelligent ok, IM3 did Rhodey dirty.

54- 5 things I love most about: Tony

Tony’s sheer level of wonder at the world around him- the look on his face in IM2 when he rediscovers that element perfectly encapsulates how he feels about learning and moving forward. (Flipside is that sometimes he has trouble staying in the present and that causes problems).

The way he tries no matter how badly he fails. Bih, if my random tests on a rock nearly ended the world I’d out and out throw myself off a cliff. Instead he accepts his part in it (and more) and chooses to try and make the best of it. He’s done that from the moment he got snatched by terrorists in Afghanistan. That in itself is basically a superpower.

His humor. I, too, hide my emotional distress under jokes so I can relate to being a lil bit of an asshole to hide how I feel. (Flipside: people don’t think he takes stuff seriously- hence Steve in the Avengers).

His mental health problems. Ok this one is weird, but I can appreciate that someone drew up a hero that isn’t based in perfection, but who tries to get there anyways. But the dude has problems, a lot of problems, and they aren’t always pretty. But they are complicated and it is compelling to watch.

The way he builds relationships. Its unconventional- Rhodey is probably the only person he’s super close to that he met in a normal way. Happy and Pepper were both people that worked for him and instead of just being their boss he took the time to learn about them and get to know them on a personal level. Obviously he ended up engaged to Pepper, but a guy who knows what his driver’s favorite show is and why he likes it is a good dude. He’d be nice to wait staff in restaurants.

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avani008 · 6 years

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TLJ Reaction Post

Short version: meh.

Longer version: behind the cut for length, disorganized rambling, general grumpiness, and spoilers. I haven’t really looked at anyone else’s reaction posts yet, so I’m sure my opinions could very well be diametrically opposed to everyone else’s, in which case....oops?

*I have mixed feelings about Poe’s actions in the first scene: one would think he’d have learned to be more pragmatic over the years, but that said, a plot arc (with Leia!) about learning to make hard choices as a leader is exactly the sort of character arc that I usually love....except when it comes at the cost of an idiot plot (see below.) But! At least Poe didn’t get stuck with a ridiculous romantic subplot and has an excellent chance of making it through the last film alive. He probably got the best deal of all three new leads, TBH.

* I also like Rose, quite a lot! I like her being idealistic and clever and determined, and she plays off Finn well. Which made me SO disappointed that her overall role is third leg of a LOVE TRIANGLE, of all things. (Star Wars doesn’t even do love triangles! At least not when two of the people involved aren’t awkwardly related to each other. And I hate how fandom will inevitably feel the need to pit her against Rey :( )

*That said, clearly Rose’s sister had to die horribly, because heaven forbid we have more than one POC female character featured. I liked her in her brief appearance, though.

* Holdo! I have mixed feelings overall. Morally dubious, smart, and ultimately tragic female leaders are some of my favorite character tropes (Everyone in Baahubali fandom is SHOCKED to hear this, I’m sure.) and also I loved Leia having a friend/alternative shipping option during the time she and Han were estranged. But: there was absolutely no reason for her to be so antagonistic to Poe, and his sudden dislike to her before he’s even met her doesn’t do him any favors either. We’re supposed to guess that the reason she doesn’t reveal her plan is because of a possible spy, which....um, how did the first order get the tracking coordinates in the first place? Did I miss that? Anyway, even if that is her reasoning, if she’s so close to Leia, surely she knows Poe is her protege and can be trusted. I’m not saying she has to announce her plans over the loudspeaker, but taking him aside to allay his concerns seems perfectly sensible and I can’t understand why she didn’t do that.

* Also Google informs me that Holdo first appears in a tie-in and has been compared to Luna Lovegood. Guys, I can’t imagine a character less like Luna than movie! Holdo; what am I missing?

*Which is as good a time as any to scream about Rey and how much her plot arc suffered the second Ben got involved. I’d happily watch a cut that was all her developing her Jedi powers, cut to the rescue on Crait and her “just moving rocks” scene. But no, instead she gets this long involved subplot with Ben that’s just....For me to believe that Rey has so much invested in his redemption, Ben needed to play the roles Finn and Han played in the first movie: the first people to value her, to help her, to come back for her. Instead Ben killed one of them and hurt the other before her eyes (yes, I screamed internally when he gave her the “join me” spiel.) Hell, I’d even have taken Han begging her to save Ben as his dying wish; or perhaps the AU where she’s Han and Leia’s adopted daughter taken in after Ben’s fall with all the complicated relationships that entails; but as is, it’s every toxic shipping dynamic that I hate.

*Okay, it’s time for the Ben rant (note: I do call him “Ben,” but that’s because I find I’m most attached and invested to the original trio, and as they all consistently call him “Ben”) Waking up to find your uncle and teacher trying to kill you is clearly traumatic!....But the appropriate response to that is not to turn around and do the same thing to your fellow students, who had nothing to do with this as far as we know. Nor is it to commit genocide knowingly. Nor is it to kill your unarmed father, who is specifically mentioned as not wanting you to be trained as a Jedi to start with, in cold blood. Also, even if we want to blame it on Snoke....Ben keeps on going even after Snoke’s death. At this point, he is beyond redemption for me; and Leia, at least, seems to agree.

That said, Luke: “If you cut me down, I’ll stay with you forever!”

Ben: *immediately slashes at him with his lightsaber*

...Methinks Bhalla and Ben probably need the same therapist.

*Leia flying in the vacuum of space was ridiculous. The CGI looked off to me, the science makes no sense, and we’ve never before seen that the Force can do such a thing, any more than we have astral projection (? But then how was Luke able to touch Leia’s hand or transfer the dice from the Falcon?) That said, I’m so glad she survived :)

* I was less happy with Luke’s plotline. First off, my! Luke would never be so pointlessly hostile and rude—I get the sense that his montage of going around the island was supposed to be funny, but no one in my theater laughed at least. But more egregiously, with regards to trying to kill his own nephew: LUKE WOULD NEVER. I just don’t buy it, at all, ever; this is LUKE SKYWALKER, the man who inherited his mother’s heart, the man who refused to kill Darth Vader. To think that he would, even for a second, CONSIDER murdering his sleeping nephew is completely incompatible with my understanding of his character. The scene with Yoda was better, as was the climax, but it’s not enough to overcome everything that had come before.

* Chewbacca and the original droids were sadly underused, most blatantly R2. I liked the one R2 and Luke scene but....how was that Luke had only the one interaction with his beloved droid?

* If he was going to be killed off so abruptly, I’d really have liked an explanation as to who Snoke is, how he found Ben and came into contact with him, what his actual goals are? But I guess that won’t be an option now.

* The porgs and the crystal fox-things were cute!

* Probably an unpopular opinion, but I actually was okay with Rey just being an orphan without connections to the Solo-Skywalkers. I know the story is largely a family saga, but I’m ok with the message being that bloodlines don’t matter (once again, the adopted Rey AU could emphasize this so much more). That said I’m still confused as to why Rey apparently has dreamed of Luke’s island before: this clearly isn’t something all Force sensitive kids do, so why her?

* Also, the pacing seemed a little off to me? I expected that the big Rey/Ben/Snoke duel was the climax and then the film went on for another thirty or so minutes, which seemed rather too much to me.

* Finally, I’ve mentioned this before to some of you, but overall what I find most disappointing about the new trilogy is how cylical everything seems to be. Leia is an overworked politician again, Han an unscrupulous smuggler; and just like Ben Kenobi, Luke is a hermit mourning the failure of his attempt at mentor ship for years. Actually Ben at least had the purpose of watching over Luke; Luke apparently abandoned his sister and the galaxy just to go wallow (LUKE WOULD NEVER!). The galaxy is at war, again, there’s the Sith back again, and whereas RotJ closed on a wealth of possibility for the characters, promising closure from the sadness of the past, the sequels just leave me wondering: “what was the point, then?” I was honestly expecting that watching this movie would make me want to write much more in this fandom, but honestly, the disconnect between how I see the characters and how the creators do is so great that I don’t feel I can do it justice.

That said, that is mostly me venting, mostly because of my own subjective tastes. If you guys enjoyed watching the movie, I’m super happy to hear that! We all need something to cheer us up these days :) I hope that you can all forgive my grumping and overall pettiness, haha.

#Star Wars spoilers #tlj spoilers #grumpiness #sometimes avani blogs about other stuff #also I just got back from the theater so apologies if this is largely incoherent

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carthonasi · 6 years

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My Thoughts on The Last Jedi

It’s been about 3 days now since I’ve seen The Last Jedi and I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on the movie and man oh man, do I have some thoughts on this sucker. This would have been out sooner but I unfortunately had to work all weekend due to the movie’s release and have only gotten around to making this post now. Spoilers under the cut.

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Okay, spoiler time. I’m going to do split my thoughts into a pros and cons list, and for once, I’m actually going to start with the negatives considering all of the controversy surrounding the movie.

CONS

Luke’s characterization for a good bit of the film is so off. Like, come on, you expect me to believe the same Luke Skywalker who refused to kill his father would attempt to murder his nephew in his sleep? Nah, that’s fucking bullshit. I could buy it maybe passing his mind, but to physically turn on that lightsaber? No. It was shit. And it was clearly only there to give Kylo some sort of sympathetic backstory. There were other things that irked me about how Rian Johnson portrayed Luke, but that was my main grievance.

I’m sure someone has written up a better explanation as to why this sucks so I’ll just leave this here simply: I hated that Luke died

Rey and Luke’s plot on Ahch-to just felt like a let down to me. Nothing really deep here, just felt it didn’t live up to the hype. This might change after a second viewing.

I wasn’t a big fan of how much the movie focused on Kylo, including the majority of Rey’s plot being focused on saving him when just a movie ago she literally was ready to kill him for killing Han. (More on things I liked about Kylo in the Pros section)

WHY DID NO ONE BESIDES REY MENTION HAN??? WHY DIDN’T LEIA ESPECIALLY MENTION HAN??? WHY DIDN’T WE GET TO SEE LUKE REACT TO HIS FRIEND’S DEATH IF WE FOUND OUT THAT HE DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT IT??? WHY WASN’T HAN MENTIONED MORE???

While I loved Finn and Rose and even liked their plotline (More later in the Pros), I felt the kiss from Rose came out of nowhere. I mean, it was obvious she had a crush, but idk. If they’re pushing FinnRose in the next movie, I’m gonna be slightly disappointed with the build up since their dynamic screamed platonic to me.

When we walked out, my brother mentioned to me that the humor felt “too much”. I didn’t agree or disagree with him at first since I had noted that something about the humor felt different, but now I agree with him as I saw someone mention exactly what type of humor this felt like. This was Marvel^TM humor. And not the good Thor Ragnarok kind. Some of this felt like the faux-Whedon quips that have become standard for Marvel movies. However, I will say that this doesn’t cover all of the humor, just that some of it felt like my brother said: “too much”

One thing that bugged me about the Holdo/Poe plot was that everything could have been avoided if she had told Poe the plan. Like, I understand this is a movie and they needed conflict, but this was handled very poorly in my opinion.

On the subject of Poe, his character felt slightly off compared to how he was portrayed in TFA and some other material. For a standalone movie, his arc was good and handled decently, but considering this is a follow up and the middle movie of a trilogy, it just seemed off to me. Maybe a second viewing will clear it up for me, but idk that was just my first impression.

Speaking of, I felt that while this movie worked really well and was very good as a standalone movie, I do not think it works well as a sequel to TFA. There were so many elements from TFA that seemed wasted or just completely forgotten. It was very obvious that this movie was written before TFA was finalized, as Rian Johnson has stated. Which leads me to…

Rey’s parentage reveal. It was shit.

Ok, so maybe I’m biased since this was a a subject I’ve been reading into for a while, but this “reveal” did not sit well with me. For one, the reveal came from the fucking villain in a moment where he was obviously trying to manipulate her, so you know, I’m not inclined to believe him. And secondly, the reveal doesn’t line up with what was in the TFA movie proper, or in the TFA novel for that matter, which was based off an earlier version of the script. If Rey’s parents were drunks who sold her off for drinking money and were in a desert grave, why was she shown in her force vision in TFA, crying out for someone in a spaceship to come back? Rey clearly wasn’t a slave in TFA. If she was, she wouldn’t have been able to leave Jakku. I think there are more discrepancies that others have pointed out, but the fact of the matter is, things just don’t line up. I sincerely get what Rian was trying to get across by having her be a random, but God, the execution was so fucking terrible if you look closely. I’m gonna elaborate more in another post on this subject once I see the movie again tomorrow, but fuck dudes, this was so disappointing.

Ok, on a less critical note, I just felt the movie dragged towards the end. By the time they reached Crait, I was like, we’re not done yet??? I might have just been tired so if this changes on a second viewing I’ll add an edit.

Snoke was kind of a disappointment, but I never really cared about him so it didn’t really bug me. Not really an extreme con like the majority of this list, but it’s still a negative so here it is.

Also, I’m adding this in after writing my pros, but I just realized R2 had so little to do and now I’m sad.

Ok, so a lot of negatives. But there are a lot of positives too so let’s get to those.

PROS

LEIA FUCKING ORGANA. LEIA USING THE FORCE. LEIA BEING AN AWESOME GENERAL. CARRIE FISHER’S PERFORMANCE. JUST. LEIA.

VICE. ADMIRAL. HOLDO. DID. THAT. I’m not gonna fucking lie, that was hands down my favorite scene in the fucking movie. Besides another scene in the movie, it’s the only one that had me genuinely awestruck in the theater.

MY BOY LUKE SHOWING UP IN AN AWESOME BLACK OUTFIT AND TRIMMED HAIR TO SHOW UP HIS SHITTY NEPHEW. THAT SHOULDER BRUSH WAS SUCH A MIDDLE FINGER TO KYLO I LOVE THAT MAN. MARK HAMILL GETS TOP MARKS FOR PORTRAYING LUKE NO MATTER HOW CRAPPY HIS CHARACTERIZATION WAS IN SOME PARTS.

Ok, I think I’m past the screaming section of this lol. Moving on, I absolutely adored Rose. While her initial scene was a bit iffy, I quickly fell in love with her. Kelly Marie Tran nailed it and I can’t wait to see more of her in Episode IX. I only wish that we had gotten to know Paige a little better and seen her relationship with Rose before she died, but considering how the film started, I’m not too surprised that didn’t happen.

You know who else I love with all my heart? My beautiful boy Finn. John Boyega continues to make me love him as he sold all of his scenes in this movie. From his scenes with Rose, to the fight with Phasma, he never stopped being such a damn delight to watch.

Speaking of Finn, FINNREY FUCKING LIVES. I loved all the moments where they referenced each other and I had the biggest smile on my face when they reunited. God I love those kids.

Speaking of ships, REY//O IS FUCKING DEAD IN THE GROUND. But seriously, how are shippers thinking that this movie confirmed their ship? If anything, this just confirmed that Kylo is forever lost to the dark side and that Rey will probably end up killing him. She literally shut the door on him how do misread that scene?

Kylo was a fantastic villain. Adam Driver did a great job of portraying him and I love the lengths they went to show just how shitty he is and just how manipulative and evil he is. They even gave him an out with a sympathetic backstory, but nope, he’s still a piece of shit. I’m so glad and relieved he’s not getting a redemption arc because he such a good bad guy.

That moment where Rey made it look like she was gonna take Kylo’s hand but then swerved and went for the lightsaber and then left his ass unconscious, I was like, “that’s my girl”

Also the lightsaber battle beforehand between Kylo, Rey, and Snoke’s guards was genuinely awesome to watch. A great fight scene. I didn’t get the same emotional feeling that I did watching Kylo and Rey’s duel in TFA but it was still fucking awesome to watch nonetheless.

R2 projecting Leia’s message nearly made me cry.

Another thing that actually made me tear up? Luke and Leia’s reunion, even if Luke was only an astral projection in hindsight. It felt like a goodbye to Carrie, even if it wasn’t shot that way, and his line to Leia (I can’t remember the exact quote) really fucking hurt.

John William’s Score. I feel like this is a given. I will however note that I think I enjoyed the score for The Force Awakens more. Nonetheless, it’s still John fucking Williams and as such it’s still fucking good

As you can see, I’ve got some very mixed feelings on the movie. No doubt I forgot to mention something, but I’m still pretty wiped from working all weekend. But I’ll just leave with this. I think as a standalone movie, this was very good. There were some great cinematic moments and awesome action sequences. Based on that, I’d probably give it an 8/10. However, as a follow up to TFA, it left me disappointed in many fields, which considering it was written before TFA was actually finished, isn’t all that surprising. So under that criteria, I give it 6/10.

However, I do think you guys should see the movie for yourselves and make your own opinions. It’s such a decisive movie that I think that the only way you’re gonna know how you feel about it for sure, is if you see it with your own eyes. And if you happen to love the movie, I’m happy you got an enjoyable experience.

#star wars #the last jedi #tlj spoilers #tlj #sw spoilers #star wars spoilers #my thoughts #sorry this is technically late since it's 12:13 my time #but this took longer than i thought to type up yikes

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humanityinahandbag · 7 years

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GRU, YOU ABSOLUTE FUCKING MORON (or, a review on Despicable Me 2)

Since a lot of people have been asking me my opinion (and let me start this off by saying that yes, I did like the movie so please keep that in mind) I finally took the time to write down my thoughts on the second movie in Illumination’s blockbuster hit of its Despicable Me series.

So, what are my thoughts?

Beyond a shred of doubt, I am absolutely certain that this movie was not as good as the first one. And why might that be? I wanted to do a huge rant about this and that and such and such and go on and on about writing and symbolism and everything big and boring, but really, it can all be summed up in one simple answer:

The storylines are separate.

The reason why the first movie worked so well was because two different stories, each containing a character or group of characters, (in this case, Gru and the girls) battled against one another in order to become one cohesive storyline.

And in the end, they did that! They became one story. The girls got a dad, the dad got daughters, and it was all wrapped up. The plots worked, the writing was, while not without flaws, neatly organized, and everything was handled well.

In Despicable Me 2, this was not the case.

First of all, there are way too many stories going on. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Well, let me show you.

Despicable Me (The First)

The Girls

Gru

Plan to take the moon

Parenthood

The main villain in the story didn’t even have a plot. He blended seamlessly into Gru’s plotline.

Now look at this.

Despicable Me 2

The Girls

Gru

Lucy

The Mall

The Serum

The hot topic generic boyfriend

The villain

The spy gig

Gru+Lucy

Nefario

The motherfucking Minions (tell me why they got their own plot again!?)

That’s 11, ELEVEN, plots minimum going on in this movie. And most of them do not actually end up meeting in the middle.

Simplicity is what makes for a good story. Characters are driven by goals and, succeed or not, they cannot be driven from them. This movie had no goals because each and every character had a goal.

Wanna know why Up worked? Because Carl had a goal, Russel helped him achieve it, and the rest of the characters were a part of the process that distracted and challenged him while he kept trying to continue.

Toy Story?

Two toys with different goals end up ultimately on the same path to reach the same conclusion.

Twilight even had a fucking goal! That’s why it worked! Even if I didn’t like it, it still had its shit together.

Bella has a goal. Edward does too. They work against each other but ultimately end up falling in love and therefore end up on the same track. The family is included to an extent, Jacob is the obstacle, and by the end, they're part of the same storyline.

Despicable Me 2 made me use Twilight as an example.

TWILIGHT.

Gru and Lucy? They BARELY meet the girls’ plot line. In fact, Lucy only sees the girls TWICE in the movie. Once in the mall and once at the fucking WEDDING. TWICE! IN THE WHOLE. ENTIRE. MOVIE! And while the plot of the last film was about Gru and his daughters (that’s right, remember that? He’s a FATHER!? Don’t worry if you didn’t remember. I forgot once in a while too...) this one focuses so much on Gru and Lucy that it actually sort of forgets itself!

THEY ARE A CRUCIAL PART OF HIS CHARACTER.

AND THAT WAS FUCKING LEFT OUT!

What if you’d done that in, let’s say, Coraline. The movie, not the book (though you should read it it’s so fucking great). If you’d just, I don’t know, left the Other Mother out. What if she only appeared twice and it was all just a way for Coraline to discover her true affections for that weird kid that wasn’t in the book.

You would have hated that movie.

Because the Other Mother is crucial to her development as a character. So much so that she’s often times identified by that relationship. It’s not a bad thing. In fact, it’s a good thing. Her goal is to sever that relationship in order to form her own identity. And she does.

They apparently forgot that relationships and character identity through interaction is a thing in this film...

Did you at all notice that the only scenes with Gru and the girls ACTIVELY together was at bedtime (no stories this time... wow... that whole plot point went out the window) and to talk about either dating or mothers.

So these girls have no substance other than to act like his personal fodder for dating. Wonderful. Just what a group of girls would do. You know. Besides school... playing... hanging out with friends... doing fun things... living life in general...

The writing focused so much on the relationship that it had no time to even present the other relationships that were crucial to Gru’s character.

Do you know HOW COOL it would have been to see Lucy hang out with ALL OF THEM!? To see a supervillain interacting with a group of KIDS!?

WHEN I FIRST HEARD THE BITS OF THE PLOT, I WAS SURE THAT THAT’S WHAT IT WOULD BE! That this agency was after Gru, and that they were sending their top agent to investigate, only to find out that he was actually not that bad, and that they could use him to help them thwart another villain! And everything is constantly interrupted by the fact that he has to get back to his kids!

HOW PERFECT WOULD THAT HAVE BEEN!?

SO. FUCKING. PERFECT.

But no. They gave us too many plots, too many characters, and too many relationships. And they tried too hard to give each and every one of these equal attention. Which isn’t possible. Only two are important. Lucy and Gu, and Gur and the Girls. And these two, like the movie before it, needed to find a way to merge.

And they didn’t.

And you know where this is most evident?

In the scene where Gru is saving Lucy on a fucking shark.

Look. I know that you’ve got the hots for this chick, Gru. I get it. Okay? Well... I don’t get it. But... whatever. You’ve got feelings. We’ve all got feelings for something. Personally, I’d do anything for my dog, my books, and my george foreman grill.

But are you forgetting one little thing?

Just one...

little...

thing...?

Oh that’s right.

You’re a single dad.

And up until about a year ago, your children were... what’s the word? It’s at the tip of my tongue! Oh drat my forgetful mind! What. could. it. be...

[Snap] I got it!

ORPHANS

THEY WERE ORPHANS, GRU

WHICH MEANS THEY HAD NO PARENTS

WHICH MEANS THEY WERE IN THE SYSTEM AFTER ALL THEIR PARENTS LEFT OR DIED.

WHICH IS NOW

who...

oh. right.

YOU, YA MORON.

When I saw this in theaters I almost threw my fucking popcorn at the screen. What was he thinking! Of course she’s important! But send the minions! Send Nefario! Send ANYONE ELSE.

BUT DO NOT. SAY. “WE’RE MIGHT NOT COME OUT OF THIS ALIVE” before asking this lady out and act like that’s the MOST IMPORTANT THING HERE

THE MOST IMPORTANT THING HERE IS THE CHILDREN WHO ARE WAITING ON THE GROUND FOR YOU TO QUITE POSSIBLY NOT COME BACK, INEVITABLY PUTTING THEM BACK INTO A HORRIBLE SYSTEM OF FOSTER CARE.

gru you absolute fucking moron.

Look. I loved this movie. I did. I thought it was funny. And well animated. And gorgeous to look at. The body diversity and colors were incredible and the movement and range of emotions and expressions were so much more fluid and well executed than the first. They really stepped up.

But bad writing is bad writing. And too many plots make for knots in the story. And this story had its knots.

I wish that it was different. But it wasn’t. So all I can hope for now is that the newest movie takes a breath, steps back, erases about ten million of the plots they might be ready to dump into their script, and figures out the best and most meaningful way to put a story together. Because oh boy... I do not want Gru or anyone else being part of a scene that has them leaving behind some kids and shrugging it off like it’s nothing ever again just because they want a ticket to Bone Town USA.

No. Fucking. Way.

Despicable Me, you’re still on my list of favorite franchises. But come up. You can do so much better than this.

#despicable me 2 #oh my god this movie #I liked it #I did #but OH MAN #THAT ENDING THOUGH #I WANTED TO PUNCH A WALL #what are you THINKING #YOU LEFT YOUR CHILDREN BEHIND!?#THEY'RE FORMER ORPHANS GRU #FORMER #FUCKING #ORPHANS

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briangroth27 · 7 years

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The Exorcist Season 1 Review

FOX’s Exorcist was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On one hand, I really liked the Rance family possession plot and felt the drama mined from watching them struggle to hang together was often excellent. On the other, outside of a truly effective and creepy scene of a mass organ harvest early on, I found myself tuning out whenever the papal conspiracy plot kicked in. That part of the show fell totally flat for me and never felt like something I should be worried about. I wish The Exorcist had been a miniseries focused on the Rances instead of reaching for a bigger canvas it didn’t need; the stakes were high enough with the peril surrounding the Rances over the course of the season’s ten episodes. I’m not really a fan of demonic possession stories, but this show pulled me in and kept me interested!

Full Spoilers...

The pilot’s reveal that it was seemingly happy Casey (Hannah Kasulka), not depressed Katherine (Brianne Howey) who was in the process of being possessed was a good twist I didn’t see coming, and the later reveal that this was a sequel to the original Exorcist film—Geena Davis’ Angela Rance was actually Regan MacNeil!—provided a great deal of drama and context to the proceedings. From that reveal on, this was no longer just a reimagining of the film’s events, but a continuation of Regan’s struggle to be free of a serial abuser. I loved that possessing Casey was really about repossessing Regan, and the battles between Angela and the demon Pazuzu (both for the soul of her daughter and later, for her own) were excellent. It was great to get Chris MacNeil (Sharon Gless) in the story as well for the full Exorcist film connection, even if her character was altered—seemingly drastically—from the caring, self-sacrificing mother she was portrayed as in the film. I’m by no means an Exorcist purist, so I don’t mind this change to Chris’ characterization and view her trying to publicize Regan’s possession in the 70s as a tragic, last-ditch effort to keep their heads above water financially...and maybe as a severely misguided attempt to prove her daughter had never had any sort of mental illness. I’m not sure how else she could’ve explained the deaths surrounding Regan in the film, so offering up the possession excuse and publicizing it makes some sense to me. Plus, Chris exposing Regan’s issues worked for me to bolster Pazuzu’s argument to accept him. After all, why stay with the family that exploited her? I enjoyed Chris’ reconciliation with Regan and the sense of understanding the two women seemed to reach before her untimely death. I liked that this new possession helped to bring them back together after the events of the film apparently drove them apart. I loved that this mother/daughter connection was echoed both after Casey’s exorcism, wherein Regan traded herself for her daughter, and in the finale, with Regan preventing Pazuzu from killing her family outright and their love helping her to overcome him.

Father Tomas Ortega’s (Alfonso Herrera) struggle with staying true to his papal vows and succumbing to romance seemed to fit in better with Pazuzu’s temptation goals than the cult trying to seize power. Father Marcus (Ben Daniels) provided a strong, experienced, and brutal alternative method of dealing with demons to Tomas’ more compassionate one and I enjoyed the interplay between the two of them as they struggled to save the Rance family. It was smart to use Casey’s exorcism to reveal more information about the priests and to test their resolve. As for Pazuzu himself, I loved that his intentions were largely kept small, trying to reacquire the “one who got away,” making this whole series a story about how Regan finally fought off her childhood abuser after hiding for so long and watching him come after her family as well.

All the actors were very strong, particularly Geena Davis, who oscillated between what first appeared to be overprotectiveness (and apparent religious zealotry) for her family, pure, creepy evil once she was possessed to save her daughter, and finally incredible strength to defeat Pazuzu once and for all. Kasulka did great with material that asked her to be vulnerable, terrifying, afraid, resilient, and just a little enticed by what Pazuzu was offering. Robert Emmet Lunney’s physical manifestation of Pazuzu (at least in Casey and Regan’s minds) was effectively creepy. I loved how he tormented Casey and Regan with the enticement of offering them release if they’d just let him overtake their souls. The way he’d entice Casey to treat herself by stealing a dress, for example, felt like a smart connection to real-life abusers who dote on their victims before turning violent. His constant decomposition throughout the season worked well to display his growing desperation to own Regan and her daughter. Alan Ruck, playing Rance patriarch Henry, was very good in a role that could’ve easily been forgettable and his character’s mental problems provided a nice contrast to the supernatural ailments the rest of his family was experiencing. Even though I’m not into seeing more of the papal conspiracy, Daniels and Herrera’s performances and chemistry were strong enough that I’d be down to see their continuing battles against other demons.

I wish Howey and Gless had more time to explore their characters, but they both did well with what they were given. Howey easily slid Katherine into more of the sane center of calm in the family as things went crazy, despite her own issues. I do think the show could’ve delved into Katherine’s car accident and resulting depression at the loss of her friend more: Pazuzu’s involvement seemed a little haphazard and her drama was quickly (if understandably) overshadowed by the possessions of her sister and mother. It also seemed like they were building to more fallout regarding Pazuzu revealing that she was attracted to girls to her family and friends, but the matter was dropped almost immediately. I guess the Rances were more understanding and accepting than the demon expected. Meanwhile, Gless brought credibility and a strong sense of regret to what Chris had done to her daughter before the show started. Perhaps it would’ve been a stronger choice for Chris to now be something of a rogue exorcist (as her entrance attire suggested), both as a tribute to the daughter she’d driven away and to provide a different sort of demon-fighting tactic than employed by Marcus, Tomas, and Sister Bernadette (Deanna Dunagan) & her convent.

The outbursts of violence, like an exceptionally brutal attack on a train by Casey, were well-utilized and didn’t feel gratuitous. The show also did well with creepy imagery, particularly as Pazuzu tormented Casey while trying to get her to accept him. The tunnel sequence in episode 6 as Marcus tracked down Casey is a great, scary one. The Rance “family meeting” in episode 9 was another stand-out moment. Getting to see Casey and Regan’s perspectives on the battle for their souls during exorcisms was something the movie didn’t offer and made total sense, serving to enhance the story (a great example of a concept being extended for the extended TV format).

I don’t know if the series will be back next season, but with the Rance family’s issues resolved, I don’t feel like I need to see more of it. If it does come back and the papal conspiracy plot becomes more interesting, I’d certainly check it out. Regardless, I’m very satisfied with what they gave us and would definitely recommend the show on the strength of the Rance plotline!

#exorcist #fox #geena davis #regan macneil #angela rance #alan ruck #pazuzu #captain howdy #sharon gless #chris macneil #hannah kasulka #casey rance #robert emmet lunney #brianne howey

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bellabooks · 7 years

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3 Things TV Can Teach Gaming about Queer Storylines

Even though television had a head start on the first generation of video games, these two art forms have found themselves on an even playing field within the last decade. Graphically, games may have evolved a bit slower over the decades but, that didn’t stop them from leaving as much of a cultural mark on the world as popular TV shows. Motion capture technology has allowed games the ability to deliver cinematic experiences in a far more immersive setting. One thing that is truly holding back major video games from exploring a range of gender and sexual identity, is the production process. In many cases, big name game developers can take two to four years to produce one title, and that’s if they’re lucky. Television shows take far less time to produce and thus, have done more to advance stories of the queer community by simply providing more of them over time. This is not to say that games have not attempted to include queer characters at all. In fact, indie game developers have been leading the charge in intersectional diversity for years. The only time queer characters come close to being the sole lead of a multi-platform gaming franchise is if it’s a massive RPG and you get to create your own avatar. While these kinds of games are enjoyable, they do not provide the same definite representation that a game with a set protagonist does. If we look back at the Tomb Raider reboot we can see a clear example of an opportunity for representation that was missed. In a 2013 interview with Kill Screen, Rihanna Prachet stated that she wished she could make Lara Croft gay, and went on to make very clear points about representation beyond including more female characters in games: “Whenever anybody talks about a need for more female protagonists I say: “There’s a need for more female protagonists, but there’s a need for characters of different ethnicities, ages, sexual orientation, ability, et cetera.” We are very narrow when it comes to our characters.” This interview gave many fans, including myself, hope that the reboot would establish Lara Croft as queer, especially with Lara spending the first game rescuing her best friend Sam, whom she clearly had a deep connection with. Since this interview, we’ve had one more installment of the reboot that side stepped Lara’s sexuality entirely. This didn’t make the game any less enjoyable but the complete disconnect from the events of the first game was not unnoticed by fans. Not only was Sam nowhere to be found in game, her Wiki page stated that she was in a mental ward. Now with Pratchet leaving the post of lead writer for the third installment there is not much hope left that we may see a queer Lara Croft anytime soon. It’s my belief that if major game developers studied three key factors of how queer storylines have been handled well (and poorly) on TV, they may be more willing to consider writing queer protagonists. Maybe even some that fall under that “et cetera” category Pratchet was talking about nearly four years ago. I find that most forms of mainstream entertainment relegate any serious exploration of gender identity to the fringes. Independent filmmakers, indie games devs, premium or non-cable TV networks. Billions, a Showtime original series, is introducing the first major genderqueer supporting character in a drama series. The character’s name is Taylor, and will be played by Asia Kate Dillon, an androgynous actor that identifies with they/them pronouns. In 2016, the now canceled MTV show, Faking It, featured many queer characters within one plot. It also had the first intersex character in a supporting role on a TV show. There are far more examples to pull from in television these days, with many shows including at least one queer character and sometimes even multiple queer storylines and once. It seems like an odd thing to dwell on because nobody ever says “look at all these hetero people in my plotline” but if we really think about the number of mainstream shows or movies in recent years with more than one or two queer protagonists who aren’t in a relationship with each other, it’s not as common. A current instance of this is Orange is the New Black. While not without its faults, there are a range of queer identities throughout the show. This does not make it exempt from failing its audience by killing off queer characters in misguided ways or failing to uphold a character’s sexual identity, however. Piper, the main character of the show, is clearly established as a bisexual woman through her various romances and yet, is never referred to directly as a bisexual. She is often referred to as a “former lesbian” “dyke” and so on, but she never corrects anyone. Oddly enough, the best onscreen conversation about bisexuality didn’t happen in a show like this, it happened on a now canceled show that aired on ABC family, Chasing Life. In episode seven of the second season of Chasing Life, Brenna Carver attends an LGBTQ club meeting and her bisexuality is brought up. The conversation that ensues showcases many of the most common misconceptions that bisexuals face. The conversation Brenna has reminded me of the conversation Krem in Dragon Age Inquisition has with the Inquisitor if they choose to have drinks with Iron Bull and his crew. The primary difference being that once the conversation is over in Dragon Age Inquisition, Krem turns back into NPC set dressing and in Chasing Life, Brenna is still a full-fledged member of the plot. Krem’s presence in Inquisition was incredibly important, but the impact he would have had if he had been a romanceable party member would have been astounding. Many people probably wouldn’t scoff at a trans male character like Krem at the helm of a major video game plot. Adding queer characters to a story is as important as actually utilizing them within it. It would also be ideal to include more than one queer character, to increase the likelihood that a queer character might end up alive at the resolution of a story. They often end up in shows or movies where “anyone can die” and due to the low number of queer people present, usually take the entirety of the stories queer representation with them if they get killed or written off. When this happens, it creates a bitter fan base and usually leads them to stop watching a show or seeing a filmmaker’s next 90-minute dramedy. It’s simple: don’t write queer storylines like an episode of Highlander. There can be more than one. Anyone who has spent any amount of time in the closet knows the depths to which one will claw at any scrap of positive representation they can identify with, even if that means reading into things only they can see. Often we are forced to create our own worlds within the restrictions put forth by the storytellers. Games like Final Fantasy XIII, while widely regarded as the most unfavorable game in the franchise, is also considered being the queerest one due to subtext. This is the result of the seemingly over-affectionate nature of characters Vanille and Fang. For those who didn’t pay too much attention to the development of the game, like me, you probably were unaware that Fang was first developed as a male character. This could explain why the relationship between Vanille and Fang reads as romantic. Intentional or not, if Fang had remained a male character, it’s highly likely that we wouldn’t be having debates over whether or not her and Vanille were a couple. We can only imagine the impact that game could have had if the relationship between them had been at the forefront. This “close female friendship” phenomenon is a very common form of subtext. A TV show notorious for subtext of this kind is Rizzoli and Isles. Ending in 2016 after seven seasons, plenty of beards and a hefty amount of queerbaiting, our heroines found themselves relaxing in a bed planning a trip to Paris together. Completely normal non-romantic behavior right? Let’s put things into perspective here. Bones, a show that has been on air since 2005, featured almost the same dynamic, a cop and a medical examiner working together with a rag tag group of scientists and detectives. The difference being that the heterosexual relationship between the two lead characters is acknowledged and fully actualized with them going on to marry each other in season 9 and even have children. Bones got to marry her quippy lovable detective friend, while Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles were constantly being bounced around to romantic storylines severely lacking in chemistry in order to deflect from the fact that they were perfect for each other. Had the relationship been made explicit it would have been the first major network detective show of its kind to put a queer female romance at the forefront. The resolution of the hero’s journey often relies on martyrdom or some other form of doom and gloom to wrap up a story. This is never more true than for the queer individual. If it wasn’t, then the Bury Your Gays Trope wouldn’t exist. It is very real, and self-explanatory but if you truly don’t know what it is, you’re one Google search away from being fully briefed on the topic. I’m one of those people who love a great ambiguous ending or twilight zone twist at the end of a story, but when it comes to queer characters, I would take riding off into the sunset over death any day. Games like The Last of Us provide us with Ellie, a queer supporting character who ultimately rises to equal footing with her male counterpart Joel but, her story is still rooted in tragedy. Many responses from showrunners have been that death is just part of the show and if we want to be treated like everyone else we should except it. Sure, that might make sense for Game of Thrones but not for shows like Last Tango in Halifax, which grew in popularity between 2013 and 2015, due to its inclusion of a genuine late-in-life coming out story and romance between two women. In the finale of the third season, Caroline marries her pregnant live-in girlfriend Kate, only to be widowed within 24 hours. Kate gets into a car accident off screen and dies, and a little piece of every fan rooting for them dies too. These types of “sudden death” storylines occur across television and film far too often. At a certain point, it stops being about just one character. Each new death rubs the salt deeper into an already open wound, a wound that constantly throbs with anger. An anger rooted in the fact that queer people have been around as long as there have been stories to tell and yet, we still live in a world that consistently fails at replicating our experiences. It’s 2017, and the only shows where there are well established queer female romances that will most likely not end with one of them dead are featured in shows like Wynonna Earp and Supergirl. Everyone involved in the creation of these two shows including the actors, has openly stated that they are invested in the characters that make up their queer representation, treating them as they would a heterosexual couple. SyFy even created an entire section of the Wynonna Earp website dedicated to the relationship between Waverly Earp and Nicole Haught. Games have the unique ability to sidestep the restraints of having to seek out crowd drawing actors or shooting in expensive locations because they can literally mold characters out of polygons and build their worlds out of code. This uniquely positions them to create something we have never seen before, someone we’ve never seen before. As Rhianna Pratchet put it: “Exploring something about what it means to be a gay character, bisexual character, transgender character, in games, that would create some interesting stories.” I couldn’t agree more http://dlvr.it/NKvGm1

#ACTION #ADVENTURE #Television

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