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phoenixyfriend · 3 years

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Anakin Introduces his Jedi Babies (and Himself)

Context: Anakin and the Jedi Babies, chrono

Warnings for: canon-typical dismemberment, unfortunately-aimed puppy crushes

Word count: 5,839

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

The first time a Jedi meets a Skywalker, it’s on Bandomeer.

The planet is close to Mandalorian space. Finding someone associated with Mandalore is, technically, not that surprising. There are even Mandalorian operations on the planet.

What is surprising is the fact that the person from Mandalorian space is an unfamiliar Jedi Knight who is utterly unstoppable.

(Obi-Wan Kenobi has no way of knowing how similar his experiences are to what might have been, on this planet. Mandalore has been interfering in operations here ever since Ylliben Skywalker started reporting visions about the coming catastrophe. Where that interference has helped or hurt... well. There’s no way to know.)

(Is there?)

When Xanatos shows up and starts taunting Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, there’s a giggle from the doorway.

All three have to turn to look at the individual in question.

Mid-twenties, leaning against the doorframe, slim but strong, covered in dark fabric and half a set of armor. A scar by one eye, well-kept hair, and a smirk that could burn the longest fuse. A lightsaber, unlit, in one gloved hand.

This man is... very attractive, Obi-Wan thinks. This is not an appropriate thought for the situation. Obi-Wan thinks he can maybe blame it on the exhaustion.

“No, no, keep going,” the stranger says, sounding like there’s a laugh stuck in his throat. He waves dismissively. “Let’s, ah, let’s hear the master plan. Good ranting voice, maybe a six out of ten on the ‘I’m better than you’ and a four on the actual intimidation. You can do better.”

“Excuse me?” Xanatos hisses, sounding incredibly malicious to Obi-Wan’s ears. “Just who do you think you are?”

“And now you’re overselling it,” the stranger sighs. “Are you new at this? You seem new at this.”

“I would... also like to know who you are,” Master Jinn admits, shifting uncertainly as he tries to keep both du Crion and the stranger in his sights.

“I’m just your friendly neighborhood Jedi Knight, here to fight darksiders because... that’s my life, apparently,” the man says, looking down at his arm for some reason. He shakes his head and looks up at them with a bright grin. “Do you need some help, Master Jinn?”

“You still haven’t told us your name.”

“This is true,” the knight says. “That said, I’ve been told by my boss to explicitly avoid naming myself while on this mission for a variety of reasons.”

“Your... boss,” du Crion drawls. “Not the Council, then.”

“Current supervisor,” the stranger offers as correction, completely unconcerned. “It’s a complicated situation, don’t worry about it.”

“I don’t worry about nonentities.”

The man purses his lips like he’s trying very, very hard not to laugh again. It’s very mocking. “Sure, kid.”

Xanatos has had his lightsaber out ever since Obi-Wan and Master Jinn entered the room, but he does one of those fancy, meant-to-be-intimidating one-handed saber twirls as he turns to face the Knight.

The man’s smirk widens. “You do realize you’re going to lose, right? C’mon, kid--”

“I’m older than you!”

“I did like zero research on you as a person, just your many and varied crimes; how old are you?”

Du Crion’s face goes pinched. “I’m twenty-five.”

“Ah, yeah, no, I’m older,” the knight says. “Only a few years, but I’m also a delightfully obnoxious little bastard who ages real slow for, uh, reasons--”

Obi-Wan is fascinated. This man is very strange. And very pretty.

Obi-Wan may be light-headed. Is he bleeding? Blood loss would explain this.

Obi-Wan isn’t bleeding. Damn.

“--anyway, I’m sure I’ve got a more interesting life with more mature experiences than you,” the knight says. “So even if I wasn’t older in body, I’d be older in spirit.”

The knight’s entire sense of being carries such an air of banthashit that Obi-Wan can barely believe it. It’s almost impressive. Obi-Wan wonders how often this man just opens his mouth and immediately gets punched in the face.

“You talk a lot for a man in someone else’s domain.”

“Hey, look on the bright side,” the knight says. “At least I’m not flirting with you. That’s what my master did with almost every darksider we met except his grandmaster.”

Du Crion pauses.

Obi-Wan has the distinct feeling that he and Master Jinn have lost any control they might have, at any point, had over this situation. They hadn’t had much control in the first place, but anything they did have is squarely in the stranger’s court right now. The silver lining to that is that du Crion is thoroughly distracted and has also lost some control of the situation.

“Besides,” the man continues, completely ignoring the very red lightsaber that is being very obviously readied for his death. “This is not that big of an advantage for you. I mean, hey, the fancy central console that can only be reached by skinny walkways with no railings are a nice touch, all chromed metal and minimal lighting, very dramatic, but there’s no lava. I’m not, like, chained to a rock in the middle of an arena for a public execution at the hands of starving animals the size of a fighter ship. You’re threatening to kill me personally instead of standing in the most expensive box of the theater, sipping your wine and congratulating yourself on step one of a plan that has another fifty-thousand steps and no end in sight. You--”

“Is there a point to this?”

“I’m just saying, I’ve been in worse situations by better darksiders than you. This is sad. You’re sad. Try harder.”

Obi-Wan makes a little noise in the back of his throat. Nobody seems to notice, but Master Jinn does put a hand on his shoulder. That’s nice.

“I don’t have any interest in setting up a public execution.”

“What kind of a Sith wannabe are you?” the knight asks, tilting his head. Obi-Wan distantly notes that his hair is longer than initially assumed; it’s just held back and curled. “Public executions are a whole thing. It’s like you’re not even trying. Tell me you’ve at least got vague plans to hand me off to a pirates instead of killing me so you can make some comment about me not even being worth the effort.”

“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” du Crion asks, his voice the kind of forced casual level nonsense that shows he’s actually very, very frustrated. Obi-Wan could almost believe that du Crion is as uninterested as he’s pretending to be.

“If I was trying to get myself killed, I’d... pick a fight with the Trade Federation, maybe? I mean, I survived that when I was nine but they’d probably take me more seriously this time.” The knight taps at his chin. “I don’t even know where the actual Sith is, but--”

“There are no more Sith,” du Crion scoffs.

Oh, the knight looks pitying now. Obi-Wan likes that much more than he should. It just really suits the man’s face.

Quin’s going to make so much fun of him later.

“I have fought multiple Sith,” the man says, slowly and clearly, as though explaining something to a child. “My master fought more than that. I lost my arm to a Sith when I was nineteen. You can say they’re gone, but I don’t trust like that.”

“It’s not a matter of trust,” du Crion says, rolling his eyes. “It has been a thousand years since the Sith were wiped out. Much as I’d like them to still be around, I’m not going to--”

“Oh!” the knight exclaims. “You’re lying! You do think they’re back, this whole mess is you auditioning.”

Du Crion stares at the man as though he’s lost what few marbles he had. “Excuse me?”

“You want to be the next Sith Apprentice,” the man says, cheerfully unconcerned by the mounting tension in the air. “That’s adorable. Well, no, actually, it’s very bad, both for you and for everyone else, and now it means I can’t just kill you in battle like I was planning because the Jedi are going to need you for information. Blast.”

Du Crion’s eyes widen. It is not in fear, but in incredulity. Obi-Wan thinks that it’s all in the eyebrows and the tight, befuddled smile. “You were planning to kill me, Jedi?”

“I mean... yeah, kinda,” the knight says, shrugging. “Quick and clean option, that.”

This time, Master Jinn is the one that makes a disbelieving noise that both of the bitchy twenty-somethings ignore.

“You’re a Jedi,” du Crion points out, entirely pleasant.

“...yes,” the man says, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “Technically.”

Du Crion is very much distracted by this. “Technically?”

The man wiggles a hand. “Arguments can be made. I certainly was trained as a Jedi and consider myself to be one. My knighting was according to protocol, and at the Temple. Technically.”

“...but?” Master Jinn prompts.

The knight smiles like he’s got something very spicy in his mouth and is unwilling to admit it’s too much for him. “But nothing! Don’t worry about it. There’s a fight to be had with a Sith wannabe who doesn’t realize he’s not going to measure up.”

“Arrogant,” du Crion accuses.

“No,” the knight immediately says. “You just don’t fight a galactic war without learning which opponents are actually going to kill you.”

Obi-Wan leans into Master Jinn’s side, his legs feeling a little too much like jelly. He whispers, “I have so many questions.”

“As do I, Padawan,” Master Jinn mutters back, and something in Obi-Wan’s heart twists. He’s a padawan! Master Jinn’s actually going to go through with it!

The fight does actually happen, at that point. The knight lights his saber and leaps forward, flashing through Djem So movements without a moment’s hesitation. For all the trash talk and boasting, the fight isn’t actually over very quickly. Du Crion is good, even without having had a chance to spar against a real person since he left the Order. Power flows around him, dark and heavy and sharp in ways that the Force usually isn’t, and the red saber snaps through the air with a speed Obi-Wan can barely track. Xanatos du Crion is, without question, danger incarnate in this moment.

The unknown knight is better.

There are attempts at banter, mostly by the stranger. Du Crion is too focused on the fight to bother responding. Obi-Wan just clings to Master Jinn, trying to stay awake and aware. It’s difficult, given the past few days, and even with help from the Force, he’s flagging.

The way the knight moves is... captivating, though.

(Quinlan’s going to laugh at the top of his lungs, later. Obi-Wan’s going to blush and stutter and bury his face in a pillow, and Bant’s going to pat his back like the amazing friend she is, and Quin’s just going to laugh, like an asshole.)

The fight doesn’t end cleanly. The knight cuts du Crion’s saber in half and, in the same movement, cuts the man’s hand off.

Obi-Wan’s seen too much blood in the last few days for it to shock him, but the smell is... unpleasant.

“I don’t suppose either of you carries Force-nullifying cuffs?” the knight asks, holding his saber to du Crion’s neck with an expression that is amused and satisfied in equal measure.

“No,” Master Jinn says. He seems... very bothered. Well, du Crion was his student once. Obi-Wan can’t imagine he’d be very calm if he had a student that went dark and started killing children. “Was cutting off his hand really necessary?”

“I feel like half my fights end with either someone dying or someone losing a limb,” the knight muses. “Sometimes that limb is my own, even!”

Obi-Wan isn’t sure if the man is manic or just trying to throw them off their rhythm. It probably doesn’t matter.

“Okay, I have Force-nullifying cuffs of my own,” the man says. “But these things are expensive as hell, and they weren’t paid for by the Order, so just giving them to you isn’t really on the table. That said... my ship kind of got shot down on the way here. If you could give me a ride off-planet--”

“Our ship was also shot down.”

The knight blinks at him, and then kicks du Crion in the hamstring. It’s not a very hard kick, but du Crion shoots him a look of offense that’s probably justified. Getting kicked when one is already down is never a great feeling.

“Stop shooting people,” the knight scolds.

Obi-Wan feels vaguely like he’s having a fever dream.

“Okay, new plan,” the man says. “What kind of ship did you come in?”

“KYL-3400 small transport,” Master Jinn says, with not a little hesitation. “Why?”

The knight grins. “I’m going to cannibalize it for parts.”

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

Jango has known Anakin Skywalker for six years. Many of those years have been spent being yanked into babysitting for the man. For reasons Jango doesn’t feel like examining, this will likely continue.

“You’re late,” he says, as the man in question stumbles out of a battered ship that looks only barely like the one that left three months ago. “I thought you said Bandomeer was a quick fix.”

“Ship got shot down, had to help some Jedi, ran into fucking Onaka on the way back,” Skywalker grouses. “I feel like shit. Where are my kids?”

“Buir says you have to go to medical.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever. My kids, Jango.”

“They can visit you in medical.”

“And, what, Mereel’s gonna go there for a debrief?”

“Your debrief is going through me,” Jango says, and doesn’t let himself flinch when Skywalker makes a face. “He’ll check in later.”

“Yeah, no,” Skywalker says, taking a step forward and then swaying with a curse. “Listen, this actually does need to go to Mand’alor direct, not just the Alor-in-training--”

“Please don’t do that with my language,” Jango immediately says. “That’s not--no. ‘Alor-in-training’ isn’t a thing. Don’t do that.”

Skywalker turns on his heel with a frustrated snarl, and Jango’s eyes widen as the stupid tunics the man wears flare out.

“Is that a blaster wound?”

“No.”

“Yes it--for fuck’s sake, Skywalker!” Jango growls and just goes over to grab the taller man by the shoulders and march him to medical. “I’m calling your sister.”

“Don’t tell Shmi, she’s got enough to--”

“I’m calling your sister,” Jango snaps. “And you’re going to deal with it. Ka’ra, do you even think? Is there a brain in that head of yours?”

“I’ve been told my braincell is lonely.”

“I’m going to shove you in a trash compactor, dikut’la jetii,” Jango mutters. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”

“If I say yes, will you let me go deal with it on my own?”

Jango strangles his own scream and shoves Skywalker into the nearest examination room. “Fix him!”

The medic looks up, raises a brow, and turns to Skywalker. “What did you do?”

“What didn’t I do?” Skywalker shoots back, grinning like they’re sharing battle stories over a drink in a cantina.

The medic--Mirka’lu, he thinks--crosses her arms. “General.”

Oh man, the medics must be angry with him already if they’re already jumping titles like that.

“I’m just a knight--”

“General Skywalker.”

The man in question grimaces. “I maybe got shot during an altercation with some pirates.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And... I maybe--maybe--picked a fight with some Hutt enforcers.”

Jango’s going to wring his neck.

Right after he calls Shmi.

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

Komari does her level best to not shift nervously under the judgmental eyes of the man they’re pretty sure is the Mand’alor. Her master’s got the situation under control. She’s just there to observe. They’ve got an entire team--

“Is that your way of telling me that your Order did minimal research on the situation before coming to intervene, and the only reason you bothered to reach out is because one of my men, weeks ago, let you know that Death Watch is setting traps for both my people and yours?”

Komari feels the flare of annoyance from Master Dooku. She doesn’t react, but she can hear the tension when her Master speaks.

“I assure we would not have attacked on Galidraan unless attacked first, or if we’d found solid evidence of the actions we were informed of,” Master Dooku says, quiet and even. “All your messenger did was save us all a little time.”

Mereel smiles thinly. “Saved us all some lives, more like it.”

“Perhaps.”

“Ah, jetiise aren’t the only ones with Force-Sensitives,” the Mand’alor says. “I’ve more than a few under my command. Visions aren’t foolproof, I’m aware, but I’ll be damned if such a warning goes completely ignored.”

Master Dooku makes a low humming noise. “Be that as it may, I’m unsure of what it is that you’re expecting out of our... presence. We are not here to help you claim your presumed throne. We are only here to stop the killings we were told about.”

“I don’t need your help to reunite my people.” Mereel waves a hand, batting the mere suggestion away. “But I’d appreciate the help with taking out the terrorist group that’s actually going out and murdering the helpless, this planet’s farmers and doctors and children. Kyr’tsad isn’t just a thorn in my side, Master Jedi.”

“And what proof do I have that you aren’t just the same kind of monster as you claim they are?” Master Dooku challenges.

It’s a little brazen, considering how dicey these negotiations are. For all that Komari herself doesn’t wince, someone behind her outright hisses in dismay. She agrees with the sentiment.

Mereel just laughs at them. He catches the eye of one of the armored individuals along the wall, human or close to it, and nods to himself.

“Right,” the man says. “Well, we have our own Jedi. Would you like to meet him?”

Master Dooku is immobile, as if carved from stone. The rest of the group is... not.

“I suppose that would be acceptable,” Master Dooku says, and Komari feels the tension in him wind further through the training bond. There are a million questions to be had here. None of them can be answered without the supposed Jedi.

“Great,” the Mand’alor says. He leans back in his seat and turns to the door. With the press of a button, the door slides open. “Ben!”

A child darts into the room, stops, and bounces on their feet. Probably male, Komari thinks, and very anxious. The child’s eyes dart about the room, taking in every single Jedi in sight. When that gaze lands on Master Dooku, there’s a flash of recognition and... not hate, but distaste. Confused and distant dismay, maybe. The child turns back to Mereel.

“Mand’alor,” the child greets, still bouncing. “Am I needed?”

“Thought I told you this meeting was for grown-ups,” the Mand’alor says.

Ben shrugs. “I wanted to listen in.”

“That door is soundproofed and you know it.”

“So?”

The Mand’alor grins. “Do me a favor and go fetch your dad.”

“Buir’s still sleeping,” Ben says, grave as dirt. It’s a strange expression for such a small child. He can’t be older than eight, and Komari’s pretty sure even that’s a stretch. “Shmi’s gonna be mad if he has to wake up before the bacta’s done.”

“I just need him for negotiations,” Mereel assures the child.

“Aggressive negotiations with a lightsaber?” Ben asks, and Komari nearly chokes.

“No, just regular ones.”

Ben nods sharply, and then turns and runs out.

“That boy...” Mereel mutters, but it’s fond. “Anywa--”

“BUIR!” Ben’s voice echoes from the hall, faint but audible, along with some very loud banging on what is presumably a door. “DAD! WAKE UP, THE COUNT IS HERE!”

The Count? Komari wonders. Even Master Dooku seems surprised.

The question is clearly on more minds than just her own. Mereel raises a brow at Master Dooku and gestures vaguely. “Didn’t know any of you were nobility. You a Count, Master Jedi?”

“No,” Master Dooku says, and before the Mand’alor can press further, he adds, “but if I were to retire from the Order, the title would be mine to inherit. As I have no intentions of retiring, I am not and will not be a Count, but I assume that is what the child is referring to.”

“Ben,” the Mand’alor corrects. He seems pleased with the reasonable answer. “Ylliben Skywalker. I suggest you refer to him by name.”

“You have a fondness for him,” Master Dooku notes.

Mereel shrugs. “No more than any other child, objectively, but his father is one of my more effective allies, and he gets antsy about things. Saying ‘your child’ won’t be a problem, but ‘the child’ is... well.”

The smirk is a challenge that Komari doesn’t feel ready to meet. She’s glad it’s not hers to handle.

“Why do you ‘have’ a Jedi?” Master Dooku asks, pushing the conversation back to the point Komari’s sure he was initially aiming for.

“Found him in a snowstorm, brought him inside,” Mereel says, grinning. “And then he refused to leave, the shabuir. Troublesome man, like you wouldn’t believe, but useful.”

“Like a feral tooka,” someone behind Komari mutters. She feels a part of her soul die.

You can’t just say that in front of the Mand’alor! she screeches in the depths of her mind, despairing.

“Exactly,” Mereel agrees with a laugh. “Skywalker’s a feral tooka.”

Komari dies a little more.

“Talkin’ shit about me, Mereel?”

...oh no.

This one’s pretty.

The man is tall, dressed almost entirely in black, and looks like shit.

“You look like you got run over by a herd of bantha,” the Mand’alor notes.

“I got back less than a day ago,” Skywalker growls out. He leans against the wall behind the Mand’alor’s desk. He folds his arms. He glowers around the room. “The kriff is Count Dooku doing here?”

“Master Dooku,” the man in question says, a little pained. “As I informed Mand’alor Mereel, I may technically have claim to that title, but I am a Jedi. So long as I remain a Jedi, the title isn’t actually mine.”

Skywalker makes a face, and then shakes his head. “Fine. Whatever. Jaster, what the hell do you need from me?”

“Well, some manners would be nice.”

“I got shot and am putting myself in a position to get yelled at by baar’ur Mirka’lu for coming here when I’m supposed to be on bed rest,” Skywalker growls out. He kicks Mereel’s chair, glaring at the back of the man’s head. “You’re lucky I put on pants.”

Mereel seems unbothered by this statement or treatment.

Komari thinks her eyes may currently be the size of dinner plates.

“You’re the one from Bandomeer.”

Skywalker’s head snaps up to focus his gaze on Master Dooku. “Say what?”

“You’re the one my former Padawan encountered on Bandomeer,” Master Dooku says, something satisfied in his tone. “He said you refused to give a name, but the physical description does match.”

“Oh, lovely, Jinn’s been gossiping,” Skywalker mutters. “That’s just--”

“General Skywalker,” Mereel says, voice finally slipping to something more stern than amused. “If you could please focus.”

Skywalker rolls his eyes and mutters something about painkillers.

“Buir?”

Skywalker’s head tilts to the side, and he holds one arm out to the side. The kid from before--Ben--darts in to cling to the man’s side. A slightly taller Togruta follows in and ducks in under his other arm. Both children keep a wary gaze fixed on the same person, and their adult...

Every look from this man is a new challenge to Master Dooku.

“They’re yours?”

That is the exact question Komari was hoping her master wouldn’t ask.

“We’re in Mandalorian territory,” Skywalker says. “They’re Force-Sensitive orphans with an incredible amount of potential. If I didn’t claim them, someone else would have.”

It’s not an airtight justification--the man could have just sent them to the Temple--but the air around him is roiling with aggression. This man does not like Master Dooku, and is more than a shade protective of these--his--children. Komari shifts her weight and worries as the pregnant silence grows heavier.

“As you say,” Master Dooku allows, and some of the bowstring-tight tension in the room loosens, drains away like foul bathwater. “If I may... I was unaware you were a General, nor that Mandalore had a standing army large enough for such a position.”

“He’s not,” Mereel says. “Used to be, won’t tell me where. It’s not my business, or yours. Title’s a holdover from whatever war he was fighting before we got him.”

Komari is not the only person whose heart drops as Master Dooku says, “Qui-Gon claimed that the rogue knight he’d met on Bandomeer mentioned a galactic war against the Sith.”

Mereel blinks, and then turns his seat around to look at Skywalker. The other Mandalorians look at Skywalker. Every single Jedi also looks at Skywalker.

The Togruta child sticks her tongue out at Master Dooku.

“I did say that,” Skywalker says. “What of it?”

“You know, when I said I didn’t care what fight you were running that turned you into a soldier, I kind of assumed it was something on the level of, say, a system-wide civil war,” Mereel drawls. “Not galactic Force nonsense.”

Skywalker shrugs. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want answers to.”

“Because you’ll lie?”

“No, I’m just going to be really annoying about it,” Skywalker tells him. The Togruta giggles and shoves her face into his side. “Or, hell, I’ll let Ben do it. We both know he can talk circles around basically everyone in this room.”

“Skywalker.”

“Mereel.”

The two hold gazes for a moment that lasts just a little too long, and then Mereel breaks it off. “We’re talking about this later.”

“Of course, Mand’alor,” Skywalker says, with a grim sort of smile. “Wouldn’t dream of doing otherwise.”

Mereel doesn’t seem particularly impressed by that.

Komari wonders if anyone else remembers that Skywalker was supposed to be here to make negotiations easier.

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

Yan Dooku is having a Day.

He’s not entirely sure whom to blame for this mess. Perhaps Yoda, for suggesting he handle this mission. Perhaps the governor of Galidraan, who decided collaborating with terrorists for his own gain was a good idea. Perhaps Jaster Mereel, whose influence and power is enough that Yan needs to tread carefully. Perhaps Qui-Gon, for giving him just enough information about Skywalker to cause some drama.

Perhaps Skywalker for being a recalcitrant, ornery bastard who delights in Yan’s suffering.

(One of the Mandalorians calls him that to his face, and Skywalker informs the man that “my mother always told me I didn’t have a father,” and stares until the Mando stammers out an apology and turns on his heel.)

(The smirk on Skywalker’s face is certainly informative.)

“Hi.”

Yan looks up from the datapad he’s been using to try and punch out a report, for all that he can’t find the words he needs, and sees the Togruta youngling from Skywalker’s side hanging upside-down from a ventilation grate.

He blinks evenly at her. “Good afternoon. Is that your normal manner of traversing the building?”

“Yeah, when Jan-Jan isn’t yelling at me about it,” she says, and drops from the ceiling. Seemingly without paying attention, she directs the grate itself back into place with the Force, screws reattaching themselves with only the slightest whisper. She’s done this many, many times.

“I’m afraid I don’t know who that is.”

“Jango Fett,” she clarifies. “Ad be Mand’alor.”

Child of the king.

He does remember that much from the briefing.

“I see,” Yan says, rather than try to tackle whatever the usage of such a nickname implies. “I’m afraid nobody’s seen fit to introduce you, youngling.”

“I’m Sokanth Skywalker, but most people call me Soka,” she says, with a bouncing, shallow bow. Full of energy, this one. “I’m eight.”

“The General is your father, then?”

“Mm-hm! He adopted me when I was almost two,” she says, and climbs up onto the bench. She wraps her arms around her knees and beams up. “Ben was still a baby, and we didn’t go get Shmi until a few months later when Skyguy could afford it.”

“Skyguy?” Yan prompts.

“My dad,” she explains, head tilting a little as she studies his reaction. “I... I’ve always called him Skyguy. He took care of me before he adopted me, for at least a year. He says I called him Skyguy when I first started talking, back then, and then he didn’t make me stop when he adopted me.”

“I see,” Yan says. “Does your father know you’re speaking with me?”

“Probably.”

“And would he approve?” Yan hints as heavily as he can. “He doesn’t seem to like me very much.”

“That’s because we’ve all seen what you could be,” she says. “But you’re not the Count yet, so it’s okay.”

Information. “Ah. Visions, then. That would explain some things.”

“Ben gets them the most,” she keeps talking. “But it’s not just that. It’s like... patterns. The Sith are going to target you, because they’re going to think you’re worth corrupting.”

“And you’ve seen enough Sith to know that?”

“Yeah.”

“Visions are not foolproof,” he says, trying to keep his tone gentle. He’s not used to interacting with children of this age, and this one comes with a father in the Mand’alor’s confidence, someone he can’t afford to irritate by making a daughter cry. “I have a friend who is very prone to visions, and some come true, some don’t, and others--”

“Are self-fulfilling,” Sokanth finishes for him. “I know that. But my dad’s actually fought Sith, y’know. The guy who cut off my dad’s arm used to be a Jedi Master, like you, and he was all fancy-schmancy and a history nerd for Sith stuff, and didn’t like the Council or their decisions very much. Like you.”

That’s... very personal.

“A surface-level similarity is not enough to make the claim that I am to become a Sith,” he says.

She blinks at him, eyes too large for a face that’s so near to human in bone-structure. It’s unnerving. “Whether or not you Fall is your choice, Count. All I can tell you is that you are the kind of person they look to groom... if only as a pawn.”

The words are too old for a girl her size.

“You speak as if you’ve faced the Sith yourself,” Yan says, well aware now that he needs to tread carefully, but... “You’re too young to go out into the field. I can’t imagine your father would allow a child like yourself to go up against someone that dangerous.”

She blinks those too large eyes, and tilts her head in the other direction, and then smiles. “You care. That’s good. Keep that compassion, Count.”

He raises an eyebrow. “I feel like you’re evading the question.”

Sokanth giggles. “Maybe. Buir doesn’t like us talking about it much. It makes him sad, ‘cuz he can’t help us not hurt, and a lot of it is really scary. It’s like... my memories are too big for my head. I don’t get a lot of visions, but I get a lot of dreams of things that happened that I’m not alive for. And buir does remember those things happening, so it’s true, and it happened, but I only... sort of remember it, and when I think about it too hard, it hurts my head. Or I get nightmares about it, and I don’t like those. Ben’s got it worse, though. He has more to fight.”

It’s a lot of information.

It’s confusing information.

It’s... possibly information that the General has asked her to feed him for reasons he can’t even begin to guess at.

“In this war your father fought,” Yan asks, “were you a soldier as well?”

“Commander,” she corrects, voice soft. “That’s what the dreams call me, before they start screaming.”

“How old are you really?” He asks, before he can quite stop himself.

She laughs, suddenly bright again. “I’m as old as I look. I’m eight. Just because the Force gives me memories I shouldn’t have doesn’t mean that my brain isn’t a kid. Sometimes Ben tries to act older than he is ‘cuz of the memories, y’know. Buir gets sad whenever he does that, ‘cuz he thinks we deserve to be kids before the galaxy goes to hell again.”

“He’s sure of such a thing?”

“It always does,” she says, with the air of someone who isn’t sure how their conversation partner could be quite that dense. Her voice takes on a sing-song cadence, like she’s telling a fable instead of a philosophy. “War always comes eventually. Not every sentient is selfish, but enough are, and they tend to be the ones that claw their way to the top. The rich and powerful will take and take and take, and then, when there’s nothing left, they will use their living stepping stones to tear each other apart. All we can do is be ready to end it as quickly as possible once it comes.”

Yan lets the claim sit for a long, quiet minute. “Did your father tell you that?”

“No,” she says. “Ben did.”

The six-year-old.

“He has a way with words,” Yan manages.

“Sometimes he uses his stuffed animals to host courtroom dramas,” she says. “He makes me look up the right laws so it can be procedurally accurate, ‘cuz he’s a nerd but so am I, and it makes Skyguy happy when he sees us playing like that instead of just doing saber forms and stuff.”

Yan has... no idea what to do with that. “I wouldn’t normally call courtroom dramas a normal children’s activity.”

“Yeah, but Ben’s a nerd,” she says, as if that’s all that needs to be said. Maybe, for her, it is. “And there’s only so much time I’m allowed to spend hunting.”

Right. Togruta.

“And what was your father doing at that age?”

“I’m not allowed to talk about that,” she says immediately. “Because it’s very private and he and Shmi get upset if we bring it up, ‘cuz of trauma and stuff.”

Shmi. The... sister, he thinks. People seem to be unclear on that. He’s heard a few refer to the teenager as just “one of Skywalker’s,” so that’s something to consider. She’s near-perfectly halfway between the children and the General, in terms of age, so it’s a little ambiguous where she fits.

That said, he’s been in a lot of places in his time as a Jedi Master. It’s taken him a little longer than it should have to realize, but he thinks he’s got at least part of the puzzle.

Skywalker’s a slave name. Tatooine, specifically.

It’s not confirmation, really, but...

Well. He thinks it’s better he doesn’t dig, on that subject.

“Hey,” Sokanth says, tugging at his sleeve. “Can I ask ya something?”

“I cannot promise an answer, but you may ask.”

“Can you spar with Skyguy? I wanna see who wins.”

#Disaster Lineage #Anakin Skywalker #Ahsoka Tano #Obi Wan Kenobi #Qui Gon Jinn #Count Dooku #Yan Dooku #Ben Kenobi #Jaster Mereel #Xanatos du Crion #Jango Fett #Komari Vosa #time travel #de aging #age shifting #family #phoenix files #Anakin and the Jedi Babies #500 notes

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growup-thatbeautiful · 3 years

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Clone Wars Character on TikTok

Anakin- Poor Anakin, man does not have a that many creative ideas, but his life and ideas are strange enough that he gets a lot of followers easily. He’s also almost constantly videoing things too, so he’s able to get real time. There are so so many videos showing the reactions that Obi-Wan has because of his dumbass plans.

Everyone, literally everyone, thought he was an f-boy until he made a post, super confused, saying that he has a wife?? That he loves so much? So, coincidentally, the next videos he posts are him and his wife, who doesn’t show her face but there’s a poll going on about who it is. Most people have figured it, though, because some of his videos are him just listening to Mrs. Skywalker rant about people in the Senate when she comes home to him.

He also tries to convince everyone that he’s the best husband in the world by videoing himself cooking her dinner, which he always burns. In those videos, Obi-Wan and Ahsoka, staples on Anakin’s account, are heard in the background giving him absolutely terrible advice on how to fix it. They usually end up with burnt pans and a whole bunch of frantic clips of Obi-Wan trying to turn off the oven, “My dear, your time is up.” And Anakin in the background “Force, that’s not going to kriffing work, Master. I’m coming in with the water gun.” (No one questions why there’s a water gun.) Ahsoka is just….chilling in the background. She’s just as clueless as the rest of them, but it’s funnier to watch them almost burn down Padame’s kitchen before she tries to step in and make things worse.

Ahsoka-Her feed is a more controlled chaos than Anakin’s, but chaos nonetheless. She does a lot of dance challenges with Fives, and is sometimes able to rope in Anakin, who tries really hard but is terrible at it, and Rex, who doesn’t actually dance and just stands there staring at the camera. There was one time she got Obi-Wan to do it with her, and he absolutely crushed it. All that grace has to help him somewhere else, right? Because she does dance videos, though, sometimes she get inappropriate comments or duets, which Rex, Obi-Wan, Plo, Fives, and Anakin all duet or make a video about explaining that she’s a minor and how unacceptable this is. Well, that’s what every but Rex does. Rex won’t let anyone, anyone, talk to his little sister like that, so he makes a super menacing video of him cleaning his guns.

Needless to say, she does a lot of videos with Rex. They do a lot of random videos of their conversations and pointless arguments. They also do so a lot of competitions with each other, rather it’s staring contests or sparring matches. Their sparring match videos are actually super popular, and they get more and more intense and complicated as they go on. There are never any weapons involved, but they get to show off combat skills and have huge fights across the ship or compound. Their usually filmed by a hysterical Anakin or Fives. Obi-Wan has made his disapproval clear, but there’s a video on Ahsoka’s account of him betting on the outcome.

Obi-Wan- Mostly on Cottagecore TikTok and posts aesthetic videos of him meditating, making fancy, pretty tea drinks, or any other mundane thing he does. He also posts self-defense videos to teach people how to protect themselves, and gives tips of how to use the force and how to help meditate. I think he posts once a week, but posts a bunch at one time because he’ll have one day of silence where he can get stuff for himself done. Basically, his account is to comfort people, to help people, in perfect Obi-Wan fashion.

He also posts encouraging videos to cheer people up when they need it. Cute messages like “Today’s going to be a good day” with that award winning Negotiator smile that get galaxy wide comments and duets. Sometimes the messages border on him illegally sharing decisions that the Senate’s made, like when he announced on his feed that a certain Planet should get ready to party because a certain vote had gone a certain way.

Sometimes, though, he posts videos of Ahsoka, Anakin, or Cody doing incredibly stupid things. It’s become a series, he shows the person do or say the stupidest things, and then he zooms in on someone else’s face. The most common duo is Anakin and Rex, but sometimes there’s Waxer and Cody, once or twice, Obi-Wan and Cody.

Rex- He doesn’t post a lot, and when he does he’s usually not really in them. People only know him specifically because he’s in so many of Ahsoka’s videos. His are mostly “the stuff I have to deal with videos” showing petty fights between some of the 501st or some animal that a soldier decided they wanted to sneak into the ship. That, of course, lead to a blowup on his account, so he started posting lots of content with his brothers. Ahsoka has the notion that he’s doing it to help the way people see Clones, but he does seem to enjoy it a lot.

He, like Obi-Wan, posts hand to hand combat training video to help people in the galaxy, put his training to more use. He makes sure to show how to hold your first in a punch, how to safely clean a blaster, how to take a punch. Some of his posts are to teach people about clones and mando’a traditions. But he’s not all serious. He likes making videos of him and his brothers when they go out to do things for fun or they go out to 79’s.

This one might be a bit far fetched, but I think he would also post videos of him and Ahsoka doing mundane things together, repainting their armour, making bracelets or some stuff on the floors of the bunks during hyperspace. It’s calmer than what Ahsoka posts, and purposely so.

Fives-Oh man. Fives’ account is a wreck. Half of the videos are him running away from something he’s done and the other half are him running into things that he shouldn’t about to be doing. Shakily filmed, someone (usually himself) screaming in the background, you can hear him panting and out of breath. A lot of the times Anakin is with him or chasing after him, and as you can almost always hear Rex cursing and yelling at them to stop, especially if they haven’t done the thing yet because that means they have a plan. When Fives has a plan it ends up being worse than when he makes it up on the spot.

He also posts videos of him giving people in the streets compliments, because he’s sweet like that. He usually gets pretty funny reactions most of the time, and the few times they’re bad reactions he simply flips the camera and grimaces, then, of course, starts laughing because he’s not going to let one person put him down.

He also has a series of him painting the Bi flag all over the ship and waiting to see people’s reactions. The cutest was that one time Ahsoka walked past and ran her fingers along it softly and smiling. Also notable was the time Obi-Wan caught him midway through and just pretended he didn’t see him. All of those are posted with the persons permission, of course.

Aayla and Bly- They share an account where they do ALL of the couple-y stuff. Any couples challenge that they’re asked to do, they do. It’s hard to do the challenges like “You could’ve been nicer to me today” because they’re both on it all the time and have definitely heard of it, but they make do with all kinds of others. Aayla and Bly are definitely one of those couples that adopts all the kids that follow their account, and they’re ready to fight anyone who says anything bad the Clones or the Jedi.

There’s also a large amount of videos that some of the 327th takes of them cuddling together, training together, polishing weapons together. Basically, their account is them being cute and the rest of the 327th either being incredibly supportive of them or gagging at all the PDA. They start a trend where they go up in front of random people around the ship and start making out to get the reaction. Some examples of the best reactions are franticly running outside of the room, slapping Bly across the back of the head, and wild cheering.

Cody: You’re kidding, right? He does not have time to do the TikTok, nor does he understand TikTok at all. He is in most of Obi-Wan’s videos, and he’s sometimes in Rex’s too. Most of the time he’s telling all of them not to do whatever they’re about to do, or he’s sitting on the floor and crying with Rex.

Anakin actually started making videos called “When you see your dad and your other dad be romantic.” Where it’s just him finding Obi-Wan and Cody doing cute things in random places, followed by Anakin or Ahsoka making faces at the camera.

Plo- Parent side of TikTok for sure. His account features so many, so many, videos of him doing fun things with the 104th. He may seem like an extremely serious man, but put him with all of his kids and has almost no impulse control. They ask to stop at that restaurant they saw on the way to their mission, and he makes it happen. Everyone pretends not to notice because they wouldn’t dare go against him.

This account is also mostly run by everyone in the 104th because A. Plo doesn’t have a password and B. That’s how they get a bunch of footage. The phone is passed around throughout the day, but all of the content focuses on the Plo’s Bros relationships. Anything that he does, from giving a shiny a thumbs up when he comes up with a new plan, to teaching some of the older clones who are a little overworked how to take deep breaths. All the followers also a learn the Plo is absolutely terrible at any kind of card games, which is shown when they post video after video of the bets he looses.

Next for Star Wars I’ll be doing Bad Batch, then, because this got so long, I’ll do one with some more characters! Sorry it’s so long, this ran away from me a bit.

Some clone wars beautiful mutuals @radbatch (Who is the absolute best person to talk to about Ahsoka ever period end of story) of course and @maiseey (Who is now my my mutual? How?)

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clonewarsarchives · 3 years

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BRINGING BACK THE BOUNTY! (#114, JANUARY 2010)

Supervising Director Dave Filoni how Season 2 of Star Wars: The Clone Wars is bigger, bolder and better! Words: Jonathan Wilkins

Star Wars Insider: The first season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars was a massive hit that defied everybody's expectations. Did that help you with Season Two, or did that add pressure?

Dave Filoni: I think that the main thing for me was I knew that we would have an audience, and I just wanted to find a way with my team to meet that audience’s expectations. I think that’s the hard part.

I know Star Wars is going to grow a new audience in addition to the fans that it already has, and that makes it difficult because we’re serving these two different groups. I think the entire audience likes all the action, adventure, drama, and characters that Star Wars has presented fans with for over 30 years. It wasn’t going to be a problem; it was just meeting the expectations and maintaining the quality. I think that as a crew we had our own expectations having grown up with Star Wars, and we wanted to push things. And really, because we work so far ahead, by the time we saw the first audience reactions we were well on the way with Season Two. It was validating because people were talking about things that they might like us to do better or that they were confused by and we were already improving that stuff, so we knew we were on the right track going into Season Two.

Was there a lot in Season Two that you couldn’t have done in Season One?

Technically and story-wise, absolutely. Mainly because we have more action figures—so to speak—at this point [laughs]!

You know, when they released the original set of action figures, you had Luke, Han, Leia, a stormtrooper, Darth Vader, C-3P0, R2-D2 and maybe Chewbacca. Actually, it was kind of exotic as a kid if you even had Chewbacca! You could only do certain types of stories. When the TIE fighter pilot came out I almost fell over! It’s been the same working on this show. For a while all we had were clones and battle droids for the most part. While getting a whole cast of individual characters like Cad Bane or Robonino into one episode was a really big challenge, it opened up tons of possibilities for us story-wise, tons of possibilities for us in the environments, and it’s really improved a lot of things we can do.

Why did you choose the theme of bounty hunters for Season Two?

It was the main element that we really didn’t have in Season One. Season One was very focused on good guy/bad guy, Republic/Separatists, battle droids vs. clones, with the Jedi in the mix. I think that the bounty hunters are such a stand-out, that when you say “bounty hunter” everybody goes “Boba Fett,” “IG-88,” “Bossk,” “4-LOM,” “Zuckuss,” “Dengar.” We all knew them by name and they didn’t do anything in the movies, so it was really exciting to include the bounty hunters and say, “We’re going to do a whole episode with these guys and they’re going to do a whole lot more than you ever saw them do before!” This is one way of illustrating the big difference in Season Two. And they’re nasty customers, too! There are some pretty intense storylines in Season Two.

Was it fun to make the IG-88 robots more agile than the audience anticipated when they showed up in Season One’s “Downfall of a Droid”?

Oh yeah, that was brilliant! The animators just went to town. They’re droids, so they should be able to do things people couldn’t do. Their ambidextrous nature as they were fighting and their front-to-back orientation worked really well. It’s always fun to expand that, but then you always have to be careful with the expectations, too. Bossk has been in a lot of the press coming out. I know there’s a whole fever built around Bossk, which is incredible for a character that basically just wiggles his toes! You start to get a little worried about those expectations. It’s the same thing as when we developed Plo Koon and Kit Fisto. The first thing is always the voice and what that’s going to sound like. That’s a huge expectation right there, but you just have to hope you make as many people happy as possible. It’s a challenge, but it sure is a fun challenge.

How many variations on the voice of Plo Koon, for example, did you go through before you arrived at what you wanted?

With Plo Koon, we basically wrote him three different ways before we settled on a final version of how he would speak. For a while our natural inclination was that he was going to speak an alien language. The problem there was that we weren’t going to subtitle a major character for a whole series, and he had to have a lot of intelligent stuff to say, just like Obi-Wan Kenobi in A New Hope. So, it became clear that he was going to have to speak Basic, or English. For a while, he was very abrupt and a bit more samurai in his delivery. And then eventually I just realized that I wanted him to be more like Gandalf the Grey, and that’s where the Ian McKellen inspiration came in. I think I had two different people try out as Plo Koon before we got James Arnold Taylor, and it was just all experimenting. I had some of my different stable of actors try stuff because I was searching for a voice. I was probably pretty extreme with Plo Koon, especially because he’s obviously an important character to me, but that being said I still wanted to get something that I thought would universally be liked by fans, not just my own preconceived notion.

With Kit Fisto I went to George a lot more for his advice. He has an input on all the Jedi voices and I always ask him about it to make sure I’m on the right track. We had some ideas for the character and he said to go in a different direction with Kit Fisto. With Plo Koon he kind of left me alone on that one [laughs]. He gave me some suggestions and then I think he was pretty happy with whatever I came up with. I don’t think he wanted to listen to me complain if I didn’t like it!

So I guess that George knows that Plo Koon is your favorite?

Well, insofar as I like to bring up things about the character. I guess it’s at the point that if I really didn’t like something George would maybe listen to me. It depends on his sense of humor that day. He might just keep going on something I didn’t like just to mess with me! He’s got a good sense of humor, so ifs hard to predict.

Obi-Wan's character is developed quite a bit more this season. Why did you think this is necessary?

It was one thing that a lot of people asked questions about in the first season. We have these characters and we know what happens to them. When it comes to Obi-Wan in the prequels, he does what’s required of him to meet up with where we are in A New Hope, but it wasn’t his story, so we didn’t really get a “behind-the-scenes” look at Obi-Wan Kenobi. Now we have a whole series to explore his character!

In Season One we didn’t really deal that much with Obi-Wan. He had a larger role in the Ryloth story-arc, but he was never a major focal point other than playing off of Anakin’s banter. In Season Two he’s a great character, and we had an opportunity to really talk with George about some opportunities for him. George had some ideas that he wanted to explore, and I’m really pleased with how it’s turned out. I think it’s exciting to fans that they’re going to get some more insight into the background of Obi-Wan Kenobi and his thought processes. We’re always used to seeing him in relation to Luke or Anakin. But Obi-Wan Kenobi is an interesting character to explore.

Are there any other characters that you'd like to explore in the show?

Padmé’s always an interesting one. We’ve done more with her in Season Two. It’s really tricky. When you get into the Padmé/Anakin dynamic there’s a lot defined in the films, and she has a role in Revenge of the Sith that I have to make sure that we meet up with. When I deal with Anakin in relation to Ahsoka, I have a lot more room to play, because obviously nobody knows what happens to Ahsoka. So how he reacts to her and how that relationship builds, gives us a lot more room to grow. I would still like to see more stuff involving Padmé to get a better sense of who this person is on a more intimate level.

You have all these episodes you do for every season and you can fill them up before you blink and go, “Oh my gosh, we didn’t do anything with that character or that group. Well, next season....” Then you create a whole bunch of new things that season and you go, “Well, I want to keep going with that.” Cat Taber [the voice of Padmé] is always on me to expand the role, so it’ll never get left out because she constantly reminds me that we need more Padmé!

So we can expect an episode centering on Padme for Season Three, perhaps?

Oh yeah, absolutely! Nothing wrong with that.

What's the biggest misperception people have about making animation?

I just don’t think people realize how long it takes and the amount of detail that goes into everything we do. And why should they? It’s hard for people who don’t draw to understand how much work goes into every single second that you’re watching. In our show, for example, everything that you see on screen had to be designed, built, textured, and rigged. There’s a tremendous amount of work, be it a plate on the table or some new type of walker that’s running around or a whole planet. On the planet you need the landscape; are there trees, or is it barren? Grass? Bushes? And it all needs designing. It’s always been that way. That’s not a problem that’s exclusive to The Clone Wars.

It’s just amazing to me, when you watch something like Coraline, to think that they built all of those beautiful sets, and put all those details into the sets. It gives you a real appreciation for the artistry going into everything. The end result is that you shouldn’t realize it, which is why the audience doesn’t need to be aware of it. All they need to be aware of is the story and the characters, ultimately. But I think it’s a misperception that somehow it just happens, or that it’s easy to redo stuff because it’s animated.

Do you have to ever redo things or go back and change things?

Oh yeah! I work with George Lucas. Of course! He is constantly improving stuff. For me, it’s actually a lucky situation that I work with someone that produces the show that wants it to be constantly better. No matter how small the detail, when he and I watch the final color version, he’ll say, “I love this episode, it’s great, but let’s go take a look at it and see if we can improve anything. For most people it would just be, “This episode is great, we can put it on the air, let’s go.” But for George, it’s always a matter of, even incrementally, getting something better up there. As an artist you learn a lot by watching him maneuver and tweak tiny things, and all these little things make a big difference in the end.

Can you talk a little bit about what comes up later this season?

We’re going to have some massive battles in Season Two, on a scale much larger than anything we had in Season One. For example, at the end of the Ryloth trilogy it would have been fantastic to have had a battle at the capital city with gunships firing, bombardments from above, and Separatist ships countering. But it really wasn’t a possibility for us to get that rendered at that time. I like that episode very much; I just wish the city had been more fortified when they attacked it, but we didn’t have the ability to do that.

I guess in some ways it’s like seeing the attack on the first Death Star compared to the second Death Star. You’re never lacking for the presence of a Rebel fleet or an Imperial fleet in A New Hope, but if you think about the giant logistics of a war, you do kind of wonder, “Well, if there’s an Imperial fleet and their main engagement is the Rebels, then why aren’t they jumping in from all over the place?” So you have to suspend that disbelief when you make stories, which I think we did pretty well with the Ryloth episodes. But when you’re aware of it you want to then later attack it head-on and say, “Okay, let’s do a battle, let’s do a landing, let’s do this in a massive way.” That’s a heavy task for a film, let alone a television series. We’ve got several arcs of episodes that I think are more emotional in tone and that delve into deeper layers of characters, and that’s going to be fun for people to watch. I’m very excited by Season Two as a whole. We have a nice gamut of episodes. Each week there’s going to be something different. Not to say that Season One was bad, but we looked at it and wanted to improve on what we did—and we have.

Who is the unsung hero of your team on the show?

That’s so hard to say, but I think for animation in general, a lot is always going to be made about the directors and the artists. It’s easy to see the tangible work that we do creatively on the artistic side of making a series like The Clone Wars, but the production staff behind the series, the people who have to sit down and figure how we’re going to get all this done, do a tremendous amount of work; it’s not glamorous work that gets written about much, if at all.

For example, if we have five new characters to build in a couple weeks, how are we going to budget an artist’s time? How are we going to get that done? How do these people manage all their time, my time, finding time, making time when there is none? The production staff does a tremendous amount of work behind the scenes to make sure this series gets done. It’s always very impressive to me. I just say, “This needs to happen,” but they actually have to figure out how. There are a lot of unsung heroes there. They’re here late making schedules, dealing with hundreds of assets, planets, and bizarrely-named things. And you know, they’re just as big fans as the rest of us. They’re huge Star Wars fans!

My associate producer Athena Portillo worked for Lucasfilm Licensing long before she ever worked on The Clone Wars. She actually wrote for Star Wars Insider, I think. [Ed: Athena wrote for issues 32, 34, and 35 in 1997.]

I get a lot of talk-back about being a fan, but the fandom of the crew of T The Clone Wars runs deep, so I think it’s in the production staff, it’s everywhere, in the rock, in the tree, in the grass....

You've kind of become a Star Wars celebrity. Could you say a few words about the fan response to the show, and what it's like signing autographs?

Well, I’ll tell you that it’s bizarre signing autographs, that’s for sure. The fan response, the fans themselves, have been nothing but fantastic. I’ve never had anything but great interactions with them. I always hate to say “with them.” I don’t feel any different today than I did when I was standing in line for The Phantom Menace—I honestly don’t. I feel incredibly lucky to have the job I do. I’m incredibly flattered that people want to talk to me about Star Wars and ask me questions about it, and I understand why. I wouldn’t have this job without people watching the show and wanting us to make it, so I do whatever I can when I’m at events and talk with them and say as much as I can without spoiling anything. That’s always hard! But it’s a real privilege to be this involved and to be a part of Lucasfilm.

I feel that so much has been made of me being a fan for so long, I’m just trying to represent that well. I mean, you can be a fan of this stuff and actually go on to make it. Peter Jackson was a big fan of the Lord of the Rings books, so who better to make those movies than Jackson because he is a fan? I think it shows when you have someone behind a project who really cares about it and can discuss it with fellow fans in a way they are passionate about. It’s always fun. I’ve been going down to Star Wars Weekends at Walt Disney World for two years and I always enjoy that. I recognize and know a lot of these people. It’s fun to represent them and to be involved. It’s always funny when people ask me though, “Can you sign something?” and I go, “Sure.” I see no value in that whatsoever. So I try to give them something more, which is a little drawing or something, because I feel that has more intrinsic value. I give them something other than my poor scribble! My grandmother would not like that signature at all!

#Dave Filoni #Season 2 #insider #i114 #crew #the clone wars #inspiration for character focus in S2 and behind-the-scene process

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radioactivepeasant · 3 years

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Fic Prompts: Star Wars Wednesday

Just like last week, spoilers for The Mandalorian season two

"I can't believe you talked me into this."

Cara leaned back in the pilot's seat, wearing that same smirk she always had. The one that said "I knew you'd do it". The one that said "Learn to have a little fun!" The one that said "Admit it, you're a pushover, Din Djarin."

"I can't believe you didn't think of this before!" Cara teased.

[[MORE]]

"The kid is training, and training is school, right? Kid needs school supplies. Styluses. Lunch box. Things like that."

Din looked over his shoulder at the small bundle on the floor behind him. "Maybe..." he murmured.

Cara frowned. "Hey, quit." There was no bite in her words. There never was when they talked about Grogu: she knew better than most that some subjects weren't to be taken lightly. "He's gonna want to see you. That kid adores you."

"He...he belongs with the Jedi," Din said, if only to convince himself not to snatch up his boy and never stop running. "Not the..."

He couldn't bring himself to say "Not the Mandalorians".

Cara adjusted the coordinates minutely, then swiveled sideways in her seat. She leaned forward, elbows on her thighs, and raised her eyebrows at the morose Mandalorian.

"So...there have never been any Mandalorian Jedi? Ever?"

The "no" was already on Din's lips before the weight of the Darksaber on his hip called it into question. Could such a thing exist? One who followed both the Creed of the Mandalorians and whatever Creed the Jedi lived by?

Could Grogu be one?

And was it selfish of him to hope the child might be?

They landed on Yavin IV with little difficulty. Din hadn't expected them to be that close by! It certainly made a difference to know that Grogu wouldn't be far from Mandalore after all.

They were directed by several New Republic officers to an upper level of what Cara said was an ancient temple, surrounded by jungle. It was warm and humid, but not unpleasantly so. The croaking of amphibian creatures in the trees made Din smile under his helmet.

"Hope none of those are poisonous," he remarked, gesturing toward the trees.

The man escorting them -- Din had seen his face on a bounty puck once, he was sure of it -- grimaced. "To most animals here, they are. To certain tridactyl toddlers though..."

Cara snorted. "How many did he eat?"

The man groaned. "Four. Five if you count the one he tried to give to my kid."

Han smirked despite himself when the Mandalorian behind him immediately said, "Urgh. I'm sorry, he does that. Is yours training here too?"

"Not training, no." Han led them towards an open courtyard like place. "We decided not to start that until he's five. Little bandit can't even sit up on his own yet. Luke just babysits when Leia and I both have to work."

"Hey Han! Over here!" The familiar voice of the Jedi echoed from a shady corner beside a tree.

Han. Han Solo! That's where Din had seen his face before! Well. Probably for the best that Boba was busy on Tatooine, then. Solo and friends had taken his fellow Mandalorian's honoring of his contract...rather personally. And Fett had the scars to prove it. For all that he thought the man would probably say something to the effect of "it was just business", Din still didn't think putting him in the same room as Han Kriffing Solo was a good idea.

Any further contemplation of men with prices on their heads crumbled into silence when Din heard a familiar squeal. He dropped to his knees on instinct, just in time to catch Grogu as he tripped on the hem of his little blue robe and fell headfirst into Din's hands.

"Grogu!" Din gasped around the lump in his throat.

"Buir!" Grogu laughed from upside down, though it really sounded more like "Bweeoo!"

Quickly, Din turned the toddler right side up and examined him for injuries. He didn't look hurt, but he did have a large smudge of dirt across his cheek, and dirty handprints all over his clothes. The mythosaur pendant had gotten a little tangled around the zipper on the front, and Din realized that Grogu's robe was just a human infant's sleep sack that someone had cut a hole for feet in.

Luke Skywalker sat on the grass with a three or four month old human baby in his lap. Din guessed that must have been Solo's child. Grogu was pointing at him and babbling incoherently. Din nodded seriously.

"Yes, yes he is a baby."

"Bee bee bee. Batu."

"No, not like the tadpole babies at all, you're right."

He had no idea if Grogu was actually talking about the tadpole child he'd bonded with, but he'd made similar sounds then, hadn't he?

"Grogu."

Grogu's head snapped back to face Din. His ears perked up, and his eyes shone. That threatened to undo Din there and then, but somehow he kept his composure.

"I brought you something to help you while you learn."

Immediately the toddler started looking around. "Buir? Buir?"

Cara held up the bundle Din had purchased from a Lurmen outfitters shop. A tiny red satchel, perfect for smaller species, hung from her fingertips. As soon as Grogu saw the yellow and brown frog pattern on the front pocket, he hooted with delight and reached for it.

"Hang on, short stuff," Cara laughed, "There's more!" She opened the bag and pulled out a pack of short, chunky, styluses in many colors. "Your dad thought you'd like coloring."

Luke laughed softly. "Oh he certainly seems to like his colors. Guess why we had to improvise new clothes?"

Gently bouncing his son in his arms, oblivious to Solo's bewildered look, Din asked the Jedi the question he almost didn't want the answer to.

"What...what happened to his romper?"

Luke winced. "Um."

Behind them, Han started laughing.

"Okay, so-" Luke ran a hand through his hair. "Part of being a Jedi is accepting when you make mistakes and learning from them. Case in point, Force strong toddlers and open jars of finger paint actually...aren't the great idea I'd thought they were..."

Almost completely inaudibly he added, "andalittlebitgotinhiseye,pleasedon'tbemad!"

Grogu flailed his arms up and then down with enthusiasm, trying to show his Buir exactly what he'd done with the paint.

"Yeah," the Manda'lor sighed, perfectly content, "That sounds like my kid."

#the mandalorion spoilers #the mandalorian #mandalorian season 2 #Mandalorian season 2 spoilers #mando spoilers #star wars wednesday #luke skywalker #din djarin #grogu djarin #baby yoda #writing prompts #fic prompts #the mandadlorian #cara dune #she's the fun auntie #han solo #the Yavin system is actually really close to Mandalore relatively speaking #that makes Bring Your Dad To School days much easier for Grogu if Luke trains students there like in the EU #i just need Din dropping Grogu off at Jedi Preschool with a little frog backpack

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bronyinabottle · 3 years

Text

MY LITTLE PONY: A NEW GENERATION (G5 Movie) THOUGHTS

It’s finally here. The beginning of Generation 5. Though before I get into the movie in some detail I’m going to reiterate one more time what G5 means for my content and a non-spoilery summary of the movie.

Again, I will say that the movie nor will the G5 series coming later have much of an effect at all on any of my blogs. The revelation in Secrets of the Dragon’s Tear that life itself is also magic means that a world that implied to have no magic for years would mean the extinction of all life (Perhaps resulting in the wasteland we saw in the Season 5 finale). There may be something I’ll probably do at some point on a certain different blog. But even then, that may likely be a one-time thing and probably come around the time the series is starting to air.

That said, just because I’m continuing with mainly G4 content doesn’t mean I disapprove of G5. In fact, my non-spoilers thoughts on the movie is I think it is a good start for this new generation. There are questions I have that I’m not sure will be answered (Though many of those questions are the same ones I had in my Trailer/Preliminary thoughts) quickly enough. But the movie is structured well enough, in fact it’s probably a better movie as a whole compared to any of the movies G4 had (The 2017 movie, Rainbow Roadtrip, and all 4 Equestria Girls movies). As the 2017 movie was fun, but it jumped around a lot, sometimes scenes transitioning too fast. And while Rainbow Roadtrip may have been this on purpose, the entirely slice-of-life story taking up a long length… made it something of a less interesting plot to follow. It feels like some of that special could of been cut to at least a two-parter length and keep the same beats they hit. And while i have a soft spot for the 3rd and 4th Equestria Girls movies, I’ll always say a full-length pony adventure feels better suited for what I want to see out of MLP then spin-off movies with high school movie cliches and weird pony/human world shenanigans.

So movie-wise I’m not a G4 purist. It’ll take some time to see how Gen 5 compares to Friendship is Magic when we get to the series. As I feel it’d take a lot for it to surpass G4 in my mind. But I’m going to try to be as fair as possible and judge on it’s own merits. The implied connection to G4 by referring to G4 being ancient Equestria is going to naturally get the staff and hasbro pressured by fans to tell us what happened in-between the generations. Because that’s the trap they put the writers in when they made it so they want to try to say it’s in the same universe. That’s the double-edged sword Hasbro chose to have, trying to appease the G4 fanbase and keep at least some of them around. But at the cost of questions both nitpicky (Such as character design being inconsistent) or actual honest questions that need to be known (Why did magic disappear, and what happened to the Alicorns) for some of us to truly see this as the same Equestria.

After the break, I’ll have more spoilery thoughts

Even for a brief moment, it was nice seeing the Mane 6 and 2D animation. The former because of course those are the ponies many of us that saw all of G4 loved. And the latter, because while the animation wasn’t bad in this movie. I’m one of those who’d prefer to have 2D animation in an animated film. As in most cases aside from Pixar, it’s just a strong preference of mine. If this had the animation of the 2017 MLP movie but otherwise everything else was generally the same here, I feel that would of have been great.

I wish they didn’t have to have Sunny’s dad die off-screen, as he seems like he could of been a compelling character. And not to mention if perhaps he has any connection the “ancient” days in any fashion. But *sigh* I get it, it’s an old trope where part of the character’s offscreen growth is not having their parent(/s) around.

On a side note there’s quite a few times during the beginning of the movie that somewhat foreshadow what happens to Sunny later. 3 times where she had a fake horn and wings on her. Once in the flashback, then 2 separate times when she’s doing her protest where she has her own costumed wings and horn. As well as the helmet and mechanical wings.

Also, there’s no way around it. Some of the discussions this movie are going to get quite political. (Namely one part of Sunny’s song that could be seen as having a double meaning of a jab at Trumpsts regarding “Building your wall”) From the very premise in the early times, we know that the inspiration for the story was last year’s Black Lives Matter protests. Which honestly, I do support the message they’re going for. Having an anti-racism message to tell kids from the very beginning and making a focus on it is important when in G4 it only got briefly touched upon in Bridle Gossip and the Heath’s Warming Eve play. Although it certainly rose up to some form of prominence with Season 8 and onward. Still, while you can argue if G4 executed the anti-racism message well. it does come with something of a problem that the series finale left Equestria in the least divided it’s ever been.

And personally, I feel it’s a terrible interpretation of time to say “Well, it’s a realistic take. Racism has existed for years in our world. Same should go for the ponies” and while yes, racism is still rampant in today’s world. That said, that ignores that if we went from The Last Problem to the start of G5. There’s a huge difference between our world and Equestria. There is no ancient civilization that we look at like “Yeah, those were the golden days of world peace” when normally the “Golden age” was reserved for the high classes of Ancient Greece or Rome. It was most decidedly not perfect, with slavery rampant and wars for the sake of expanding an empire. While if you look at The Last Problem’s Equestria, you not only have peace between the three main types of ponies. But you literally have non-pony citizens in Equestria. You can see a dragon handing off a flower to a pony which can imply cross-species romantic relations. With the Friendship school still going strong, and was the reason that the world was saved in The Ending of the End. While perhaps it may be too glowing to say that future is perfect for everyone even in-universe. It’s certainly a hell of a lot better outlook then comparing to how we view even the so called Golden age of ancient civilizations. The Last Problem’s Equestria implies it looks to ally with every country outside of Equestria, not conquer them.

So it should still be a valid question on just how this world collapses to the point it gets to where G5 is at the start. I at least assume that it’s not the fault at all of any of the Mane 6 nor Twilight. Or at least I hope it isn’t, as I’d rather the MLP fanbase not have to deal with a The Last Jedi Luke Skywalker situation. (Where after the joyful end of the original trilogy, things go wrong as Luke almost murders the son of one of his best friends and his sister despite trying to hard and succeeding at redeeming his father who at that point in the canon was a galaxy-wide known ruthless mass-murderer.) I assume we’re at a point where everyone of the Mane 6 sans maybe Twilight are presumed dead. And even in Twilight’s case, there’s a chance that G5 decides to say that G4 overestimated the whole Alicorn immortality thing. Though I wouldn’t put it past Hasbro to have some event where the Mane 5 of G5 meet the Mane 6 in some special event whether that’s a a Season finale or a sequel movie/special. Where either the Mane 6 return in a limbo situation similar to the Pillars at the end of Season 7 or Time travel gets involved. They may even string us along on answering just what in the heck happened until they involve a meet-up with the Mane 6 in that way. Though I hope they don’t, I’d really like the beginning of the series (Or I guess this supposed special coming up in Spring supposedly?) starts to answer some questions. G5 should get a chance to stand on it’s own, but I hope the writers are actually well aware there will be so many questions people have and address them in the show. A cynical part of me feels like they’re likely to string us along until at least the Season 1 finale.

Onto the characters for a bit. I think Izzy Moonbow was absolutely the most stand-out character in the whole movie. She was energetic, funny, and aside from “The pegasi are bad news” she along with Zipp and Sunny were the most averse to the way the world was. She was already the most popular due to the tennis ball memes. But now it feels like she legit stands on her own and most certainly deserves to be the most popular character of G5 thus far. Behind her in a bit of a surprise to me was Zipp, who I thought would be mainly a Rainbow Dash-expy. Though she really helps out Izzy and Sunny in Zephyr Heights. Despite having Twilight be my favorite pony from the very beginning of G4 all the way to the end, I didn’t feel as strongly about Sunny for some reason. So she’s in the middle of the pack, she could grow on me later. I just don’t know if I click with her as much as I did with Twilight. As for the last two, while I don’t hate either of them. Either one could be the lowest of the 5 for one reason or another. Pipp (Although I will say she's probably my favorite character design out of the 5) feels like she doesn’t do a whole lot in the movie and it takes until she’s forced to be an outlaw because the other choice was to get imprisoned like her mother was. So she may come off as quite pretentious, though it’s arguable Rarity was the same way early in G4. But she definitely grew later. Could be the same case for Pipp. And as for Hitch, he has shining moments in the film. But what might hurt him is the fact he was such a bad friend to Sunny up until the campfire scene. “I’m the last real friend you have. You really want to lose me too?” is not a healthy friendship. Hitch may have been Sunny’s friend the longest, but it definitely feels like Izzy connected immediately. I don’t know if this show will get into shipping any of the main characters between each other mid-show, but if they do. I hope it’s between Izzy and Sunny currently, cause Hitch and Sunny just gives bad vibes even with Hitch getting better later.

None of the songs I felt were particularly too special. Though I think the closest was Sprout’s “Danger, Danger” song that has similarities to Smells Like Teen Spirit in some parts of the song since I tend towards more rock/metal-esque music.

I touched upon it earlier, but there’s perhaps a stand-out reason for why the G5 movie outdid the 2017 MLP Movie. They have the typical “Our heroic group splits after a sad moment before coming together again for the climatic good end” in Sunny seeing that that the two crystals don’t instantly bring magic back, and when Twilight left the group after an argument that happened with Twilight trying to take a pearl. They perform the same purpose in the movie. But the crystals not working, crushing Sunny’s hope for a little while works better into the story. Where as Twilight’s part frustratingly brought the sea pony scene to an end too quickly and/or doesn’t feel right of Twilight to have done that. It felt forced in the 2017 movie, but works out in the G5 movie. Especially since a part of it is that it’s not the crystals themselves capable of bringing magic back. But it’s the journey going after the crystals that brings the ponies themselves their magic back.

Just a small note on dictator Sprout, he tries to cause a war. Though admittedly the film seems to treat him as a joke the entire time despite his seriously evil ambitions. With the only repercussions is he gets a wishy-washy answer on if he was a good sheriff from his mom. I don’t quite know how I feel about that yet, but I wonder what they’ll have in mind for Sprout given his actions. He and his mom are the only ones that feel like a true antagonist. Though they seem to be ok with things fast when the magic comes back.

But anyway on to the ending, we see that Sunny becomes an Alicorn. Which I guess with no other real Alicorns around, I guess it makes sense to alicornify her since she’s the real leader behind what united the leaders of each type of pony again. Though there is of course this weird thing where her horn and wings don’t seem like as much a part of her body compared to very obvious connected wings on Twilight when she got hers. Sunny keeps her horn and wings to the end of the movie, and has colored streaks in her hair. Though I do wonder if that;s truly permanent. If it is permanent, I suppose at least they got to have a headstart and have it established at the end of the introductory movie rather then have it shock people at the end of a shortened 3rd season. I still feel like Twilight had well earned her alicornhood considering that besides what she did in the series. She has a whole childhood and time as a teenager learning under Celestia. Which had to mean something, and I’m not sure Celestia just leaving her to live the rest of her days with her friends in ponyville was that. Sunny has no doubt been trying countless time to try to spread friendship throughout her life even after the tragedy of her father’s passing. So there’s no doubt she’s been through a lot, and may indeed be worthy of being an Alicorn at this point. Though in terms of screentime before Alicornhood it's definitely a lot less then Twilight had. And it is at least nice to see that it is possible for non-unicorns to become one. (The only case of that we sort of got was a children's book that may or may not be canon that implied Cadence was a pegasus before she ascended)

Though you have to wonder if the visual differences such as Sunny’s alicorn horn and wings, the cutie mark only on one side (Yes I know that’s how it was normally in the MLP generations before G4. But a distinct visual difference between shows is still noticeable even if the context of G4’s cutie marks on both sides of the flank was about it being easier on the puppets for Flash), and how animals can have wings or weird round shapes such as those bunnies when G4 has normal looking animals. There’s enough striking visual differences for any nitpicky G4 to say “This isn’t the same Equestria”. And if someone tries to say maybe some sort of evolution happened. That’s still trying to put a little too much real world logic on this fantasy world. And evolution tends to take millions of years to have such dramatic changes. Not 1000 years or so, there should still be normal looking animals at this point and time. And these small details are probably going to be the things most ignored but nonetheless can build a case that this isn’t the same Equestria. Even if they touch on the important questions like how magic disappeared and what happened to the Mane 6, there will be details they make different that will add to the case that this is it’s own universe if it doesn’t quite matchup with what was remembered about G4. There will be fans who will be that nitpicky to call G5 out of continuity for small details like that. That is again the trap they put themselves in when they decided to try to say it’s the same Equestria.

All-in-all though, I think that’s at least a good enough chunk about my thoughts on the movie to end off here. If there’s something I missed or something from the movie you’d like me to give a particular opinion about or elaborate on something feel free to ask me here. G5 is indeed off to a good start, just I will be along the many hoping some questions get answered sooner then later. And I’m not sure I’m confident in getting anywhere until a Season finale or a 2nd movie. And it’ll be a year before the series starts proper (Though again I guess there’s a 44 minute special coming in Spring to try to hold us over). But I could definitely see G5 finding it's own following, now there's just the inevitable clashes between some of the more vocal fans of each generation bickering at eachother. But hoping there will be enough that take the movie's lessons on divisiveness to heart and be able to enjoy both even if there may be preferences.

#mlp #my little pony #g5 #mlp g5 #netflix #my little pony the next generation #my little pony movie #generation 5

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norcumii · 3 years

Note

Yesss you're also playing! I gotta go with accidentally married and body swap. Godspeed.

I’ll admit, you stumped me for a bit with this one. Then the ship happened, this is like, two steps to the side of what you asked for, and it got wacky from there, but hey, it was fun! Hopefully you enjoy too!

For this trope mashup meme. Pairing is Cody/Quinlan, because I aim to please. ^_^

Commander Cody was almost THE worst possible choice for partner on this clusterfuck of a mission. Worst would have to be Yoda – there was no possible way he could go undercover, except maybe as a Jawa and that was just asking for at least seven different kinds of trouble. Then Aayla, not because she’d be bad at it, but because Quinlan was a protective bastard and historically their undercover missions hadn’t gone well. Obi-Wan would be third worst, because he was needed to fight the damn war, and that overcompensating jerk was responsible for at least one entire front.

Also, he’d be an insufferable asshole the entire time.

The problem with Commander Cody was that he was probably at least as responsible for another front, if not all the logistics for Obi-Wan’s bullshit while Kenobi was off fucking around the galaxy after his padawan and a half.

There were theories – rumors, really – that clones imprinted on their Jedi. Rumors that Quinlan totally believed, because there was no possible way, Force or no Force, that you could cram that much bastard into two men like Obi-Wan Kenobi and Commander Cody by chance. That much snark and assholery could only be malice aforethought.

Very good reasons that neither man had been included in the plan. And it had gone so well at first! Disguises, check. Pretend to murder Master Tholme (sneaky bastard had been giggling for days over the opportunity to go deep undercover on his own missions) and shoot Master Drallig (poor bastard needed a vacation that badly) – check! Get captured alive by the Coruscant Guard and tossed in prison – done with minimal bungling.

Making friends with Cad Bane and Moralo Eval didn’t go quite as smoothly, but Quinlan was good at his job, so when they busted out of jail Quinlan was ostensibly part of the crew.

That was when things went to shit. Between the jail and the get-away vehicle, they’d run across a patrol of clones in off-duty grays. There’d been a heartbreaking moment for them all to stare at each other in astonishment, just long enough for Quinlan to recognize the scar. Bad enough there was going to be yet another squad of dead soldiers, which he was very much not a fan of, but now the body count was going to include...someone he was very much a fan of being not-dead.

Then Commander fucking Cody had drawn a blaster and stunned the rest of his squad, planting hands on hips and scolding Quinlan about how he was at least fifteen minutes early and what kind of a breakout was this?

Vos still wasn’t sure how that ended up with Cody traipsing along, with Bane and Eval being thoroughly convinced that he was some random rogue clone who’d been having some kind of torrid affair with Quinlan. Cody almost had Vos convinced that he’d been ready to bust Quinlan out, and that had nothing to do with how Cody’s method of swaying Eval involved sticking a blaster up the bastard’s nose.

It absolutely wasn’t hot. Not at all.

He’d been dumb enough to relax a little when they took a pit stop to gear up. Some two-bit wannabe sniper had dared to get up into the Commander’s face – the clone was the one walking away with some new gear, a mock swagger, and a joke that he might as well take the idiot’s identity, if he was gonna be that lax about shit.

Still absolutely not hot.

On the upside, the new gear meant Cody got away when they landed on Serenno – at least, Quinlan thought he got away. He’d been busy at the time with the obvious downside: Dooku recognized Quinlan.

Con: Vos got captured and dragged off to a carbonite unit to sit and stew until Dooku’s...thing, whatever it was, was over.

Pro: he saw the freezer before getting tossed into it.

Who the fuck knows: there were at least two stray tookas in the area, and one of the little fuckers tried to trip Vos and all four of his guards on the way in.

Con: he still ended up on ice.

It wasn’t like he had a plan, but desperation could pass as genius if you squinted at it hard enough. And using the Force to toss a part of himself into the tooka that’d tripped him was definitely worth squinting at.

Better than studying his normal self, frozen in a block of tibanna. That was beyond creepy.

Not that he’d ever admit it to anyone, but Quinlan was genuinely worried, and the whole mission had gone so damn pear shaped he had no idea if anything was recoverable – including them.

Well, no better time to shit stir. Quinlan scuttled off to go looking for trouble.

The great thing about paranoid, power-mad bookish types was that they took notes. The smart ones prepared blackmail. Vos had a lot of things to say about Dooku, but dumb wasn’t one of them.

On the truly awesome side: he could sense Sithy wards in a lot of places, but tookas didn’t set them off because cats would get into whatever they damned well pleased – meaning Dooku had totally on accident handed Quinlan the metaphorical keys to the castle. If he’d still had opposable thumbs, this would have been perfect!

Well. Aside from the whole Chancellor-being-a-Sith-Lord-and-behind-the-entire-fucking-war thing.

Force, it was hard to stay positive for long nowadays.

Vos gave a quick, full body shake – wow, fluff was not a thing he expected to have happen – and got back to work. When he was done, he sauntered into the hallways with a whole collection of datacards tucked into a half-assed collar that had used to be a fancy curtain restraint. He was more concerned with keeping everything secure than it looking reasonable – after all, what cat would try putting on some kind of collar? Anyone looking at him funny would blame some kid or something.

If anyone asked, Quinlan had already prepared explanations of how he tracked down Commander Cody’s Force presence. He absolutely did not track his scent. That would be weird.

(To be fair, Quinlan did start by tracking him in the Force. It just hadn’t lasted the entire time.)

He found the commander lurking back near the area with the cryo setup, tucked behind some crates with several bodies nearby. Most were dead, though one or two were stunned, gagged, and trussed up with more binders than might be necessary.

Not hot. Really.

Quinlan considered his options, then planted his fuzzy rump almost next to Cody, craning as if to look over the crate as well. “Mrp?” It wasn’t quite the ‘whatcha doing?’ that he would’ve liked to go for, but close enough.

It earned him a classic side-eye. When it was clear Cody was going to try the ‘ignore the annoyance’ routine, Quinlan reared up to plant his paws against the crate and look over it.

Ah. They were watching the carbonite slabs that were stacked off to the side. Presumably, Vos’ own body was there. He hissed without meaning to, not happy about the reminder.

“Not now, cat,” Cody whispered right back, waving a hand to try to shoo him away. Quinlan shot him a look. Local animal flees from packing crates, investigation at eleven. Any idiot who saw that would at least consider that something had startled the animal in the first place.

Ok, fine: cat. Anything could set off a cat. His point still stood!

From the angle of his helmet, Cody was glaring back at him, then there was a small huff before the Commander went back to studying the area. Oh, Quinlan was not about to play this game.

He considered for half a second doing some typically catty gesture of disdain, but he was not about to be licking anything, even to make a point. Instead, he minced in a near circle, sitting directly in front of the Commander. He meowed, because throat clearing didn’t seem to be a thing cats could do.

That got him a quick glance, then there was a full-body pause as in the Force, Cody almost jangled with sudden suspicion. Quinlan hoped he was showing the cat-equivalent of a huge-ass smirk as Cody sloooowly looked over at him.

“General?” he asked, sounding annoyed and the kind of exhausted usually reserved for annoying toddlers.

Vos didn’t even try to stop a satisfied swish of his tail before flicking an ear and nodding.

Cody put his head in his hands. “...I’m not even gonna ask.”

Quinlan gave him another moment, then popped back to his feet and headed around the crate. After a beat, there was a long-suffering sigh behind him. “Yeah, okay. Let’s get your body back, and if you ever tell Kenobi I said that, no one will ever find your body.”

Quinlan let a little roll into his step, giving an insolent flip of the tail. Sounded like after they figured out this mess, he owed the Commander a nice dinner somewhere.

He didn’t need the incentive, but it sure helped.

~end

#star wars #My writing #meme #trope mashup #Cody/Vos #animal transformation #from a certain point of view #body swapping #Rako Hardeen #except not really #dharmaavocado

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black-rose-writings · 3 years

Text

I read Ruin and Rising because I’m bored

And I also hate myself

Like with the last book, I have a vague idea of the plot and stuff from tumblr and fanfics. I will also be refering to Darkling as Sasha for most of this.

I am still Darklina trash and don’t particularly like Mal.

On a different note, I’ve finally moved for college, but the internet here is trash, so I’ll probably have a lot more reading time now, since most games I play are online and will crash without internet.

Before

Cool story. Let’s hope Alina stays a badass.

Who am I joking, I know how this ends.

Chapter 1

So far so good. I hate the Apparat, per usual. Alina’s there basically dying and that bitch can’t wait to see her do so.

Cult leader to the core this one. He probably hates that his figurehead is alive and also not brainwashed.

Cult leader doesn’t like swearing. How surprising.

My boy David is completely right. What kind of irresponsible dingus keeps centuries old books in a fucking wet-ass cave? (Or a tree for that matter *cough cough* The Last Jedi *cough, cough*).

Genya is fun to be around.

Oh, shit, let’s go.

Chapter 2

Jesus Christ, Alina, Zoya isn’t that bad.

This is one hell of a shitshow.

I live for this version of Alina. Badass. Scary. I want more of this Alina.

Chapter 3

Out of all the random little details from crappy smut fics, I did not expect Oncat to be from the books, lol.

Mal actually has a supernatural tracking ability. Like, literally, they put a bug into the pouch with gunpowder so he could make the shot. I guess this was kinda said before, but never this directly, right?

Alina’s merzost-skyping Sasha now, yay.

Alina is horny for Sasha boy. Yay.

Alina canonically has a praise kink. Nice.

I hate LB with all of my heart at this very moment. How dare she bait us Darklina people like this? How DARE she? (Shipbaiting is the worst, seriously.)

Yes, yes, yes. These two lines. That’s what their relationship is all about. They’re each others foils, the yin to the other’s yang and... ugh. I am Darklina trash to the core and this hurts.

Darklina: You have a terrible taste in men.

Alina: I liked you once.

My boy Sasha walked into that one.

Chapter 4

Alina is a Queen. And we love her.

David, my beloved, my spirit animal.

It’s surprising they can read it at all, given it’s been centuries. Have you ever tried reading medieval manuscripts?

Honestly, with a father that crazy, it’s no wonder Baghra’s a bitch. And I’ve seen it said somewhere that the books imply Ilya’s experiments are what caused Baghra to be a shadow summoner and you know what? I can see how you’d make that connection.

Why is there so few Tidemakers in the books? Waterbenders are useful. I want more waterbenders.

Alina picking up some habits from Baghra I see.

Ah, yes, we love an educated giant.

I’m starting to think Harshaw is a bit nuts.

Shut up, Hershey. Or at least share the weed with the class. I’m not here for this “He’s mean to you because he likes you”. I might believe that in like, elementary school, but yall are (more or less) adults. Jesus.

Well, that was a bombshell of a twist.

Chapter 5

Oh boy, we’ve got some trauma bonding for out merry band of misfits. Yay.

Adrik has a crush on Zoya. And she hates it, lol. Cut the kid some slack, he’s like 15 or something.

That reminds me, I have a four-leaf clover pressed in books from close to year and a half ago. Time flies.

They’re really diving into the Mal has supernatural powers, huh?

Ghosts, let’s go.

Alina “I’m so happy to be outside I start to shine like a fucking fairy” Starkov and Mal is entranced. He’s definitelly nicer now. I’m not forgiving him for all the shit he’s pulled before and for using the silent treatment way too much, but hey, at least he’s improving.

I am not a Zoyalina person, but like... gay? Please? Rivals to grudging allies to friends to lovers, 300k slowburn? Sounds more fun than whatever Mala dn Alina have going on, lol.

(I’m starting to realize I’m not as much a Darklina person as I am anti-Malina person, lol. Like, literally everyone has a more interesting dynamic with Alina than tracker boy over there. Malina is at best boring AF and at worst toxic, codependent and emotionally abusive, while also being boring AF at the same time. It has literally nothing going for it except God herself liking it).

I can see why Nadia is gay in the show. The book version of her definitelly has a crush on Tamar. Homegirl likes a woman, who can murder her with the flick of her wrist and honestly? Same.

Alina has some big “coming out of lockdown after a year” energy atm.

The cat is one of the most realistic characters in this thing, lol.

And since Tamar is also heavily queercoded, our lovely ladies make off into the night, flirting. Or maybe not. Let me dream, though.

At least Blade Boy is aware that his tattoo is stupid. To quote someone ranting about him on tumblr: He’s embracing his identity as a tool.

Oh, boy, this will be fun.

Evil soldier is horny for Mal. Saints, is there a woman in this book who isn’t horny for Blade Boy?

And here comes Niki to save the day.

Chapter 6

Niki saved the day.

Fiberglass? And David being David. Genya being in love with her nerd of a boyfriend.

Jesus Christ, this one crazy kid has moved the technology in this universe a whole century on his own. So, when is David going to propose to him?

Baghra hasn’t changed much I see.

Baghra’s about to drop some truthbombs, but no, we have to be rudely interupted because Genya’s rapist is throwing a fit.

Chapter 7

How does Mal sound? Is she gonna say the Blade boy sounds like her dad? I mean, I know voices are partially genetic, but it has been tens of generations between them, probably.

So, we’re finally taking Genya’s trauma seriously after all this time? Good. Better late than never, I guess.

I wish that regicide was already finished and I’m pretty sure that Genya does, too. Stop defending the fucking king, narrative.

David’s a nerd in all things I see.

Someone please just kill the king already. And the queen, too, for good measure.

Now that’s a romance.

Infodumping and listening to said infodumps is a legitimate love language, Alina. Let them nerd out over poisons.

Wait, has Alina never directly killed anyone before? I thought she did... hmmm.

And just like that, it should have been over. Ugh.

Somehow, Baghra is a better teacher now than she was before. She half feels like a completely different character.

Nevermind, she’s back at it.

Chapter 8

Holy shit, Nadia and Tamar are canon. They have canon gays here.

So, which one of them is gonna die?

Chapter 9

We arrive at that scene. The one, where they should have fucked.

Jeez, girl, get a hold of yourself. Life is short, fuck a villain.

In other news, Genya and David definitelly fucked.

Chapter 10

Poor David. He just wanted to know.

Damn... I never realized just how young Baghra was, when she killed her sister.

I’ve already made a post about this, but it really does strike me like Baghra has already decided to end her life at this point in the book.

Why is that whole “but what if we’re related” thing even in there?

Chapter 11

We love a suprise attack.

When did Sasha boy learn that trick?

Baghra really just did that. Oh boy.

Chapter 12

No, don’t kill the kid... ugh.

Emotiona support cat. She should be friends with Milo.

Porrige for brains. Oof.

So Nadia was the one, who got bees set on her in the book. Cool.

That’s a good question. Why was it never brought up to Alina, that other Grisha get blocks, too?

David already thinking of steampunk prosthetic for Adrik is honestly kinda sweet.

Chapter 13

Back home... kinda.

Is that really... you really care about Mal bonking the Grisha school mean girl over a year ago? Okay.

Chapter 14

Angst! Yay!

And more angst.

Chapter 15

Sasha really went “My mom killed herself to save you? Well, I’ll kill the closest thing to parents you have.”

Chapter 16

Nikolai’s alive. Kinda.

And these two have such a sibling energy, I can’t.

And then they fuck. Ew.

Chapter 17

Wait, wait wait... so Alina isn’t even the one to destroy the Fold?

Okay. That’s... weird.

Holy shit. That was...

So, Aleksander is dead. Mal isn’t. Someone else destroyed the Fold for Alina and now she has no powers.

Okay.

That’s a weird-ass ending.

Chapter 18

The gays survived, so that’s nice.

Genya made good on her promise of making Alina a ginger, lol.

After

What emotion is this supposed to give me? Cause all I feel is kinda sad.

#shadow and bone #grishaverse #ruin and rising #book review #alina starkov #darkling #darklina

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shewhospeakswiththunder · 4 years

Text

Perhaps you’re feeling bored at home or, if considered an “essential” worker like me, you need a little fun and stress relief. Here is my masterpost of fic recs from my two years of reading so far. Maybe you’ll find something new, or reconnect with an old favorite. Either way--

Enjoy! 😷💕

Reylo Fics that Deserve All the Love

Near Kinsman by englishable

Englishable is just one of the best writers I’ve encountered in fandom. This historical western mail order bride AU is top notch quality.

The Masochism of Self-Defence by greyorchids

The Reylo dynamic in this Boston PD AU is steamy, but also heartfelt.

So Much Thin Glass by walkingsaladshooter

Never knew I loved modern day Gothic AUs until I ran across this one.

Heaven Forbid by DarkKnightDarkSide

I was stunned by the author’s creativity in this Priestlo fic. So smutty. So... inventive 😉🔥

Sonder by deathbyhumidity

Two strangers passing each other by on the train. Soft, dreamlike, somber, poignant. Modern AU.

And Still I Would Remember by Inmyownidiom

A Victorian era AU of two souls that parted and come crashing back together.

So, You've Decided to Glamour a Human Girl. by selunchen

Faeries AU! Ben, a fae, and Rey, a human. Shenanigans ensue.

Live Long, and Prosper by SaintHeretical

For the Reylo Trekkies. Hell, even if you don't do Star Trek, read this. PHENOMENAL.

Mr. Solo & Miss Wellfound by LinearA

“Regency/Victorian AU, Ben sees Rey's stockinged ankle by accident.”

Diyari by Nervoustouch

Modern archeologists AU. Snarky banter with dashes of Indiana Jones, The Mummy, and Sahara vibes.

Drawn to the light of your burning sorrows by Kyriadamorte

The Mothlo AU you didn’t know you needed. Both gritty and soft.

Crown Glass by RebelRebel

Fantasy AU, with lots of beautiful imagery and engaging character dynamics.

Kohelet 3:16 (Call Me A Cab) by LinearA

NYC Jewish Leia and Ben. Skillfully layered plot, nuanced characterization. Smut is HOT.

By the Shores of Varykino Lake by hipgrab (merrymegtargaryen)

Unhealthy dynamics, definitely read the tags. “There’s a lot of fucked-up-ness”, in the author’s own words. But it’s good writing. Fair warning.

Let Me Put My Darkness In You by ArdeaJestin

Canonverse. Hux is an insufferable, pompous ass and Kylo Ren writes terrible, melodramatic poetry.

Wintertide by Zabeta

Whimsical and primitive in turn, this lives up to the style of a true fairytale AU.

The Forty Thieves by PoetHrotsvitha

Peaky Blinders/Gangsters AU. Rey starts as Ben’s bartender and ends up as so much more.

I Said to My Soul, Be Still by LinearA

Dark!Rey takes her man. 🥵🔥💕

Hux's Rousing Pep Talks by Riels_shorts

This fic is hysterical. It’s not Reylo, and I don’t care. My list, my rules.

It's All I Can Do To Leave You Alone by TazWren

Office AU. Silly, spunky, with a bashful Ben.

Sip the Honey Sweet by dietplainlite

Anne of Green Gables-esque/Edwardian era AU, the title really says it all.

The Pull to the Light by HarpiaHarpyja

Entrancingly macabre. This modern/fantasy/monsters AU catches your attention from the get-go, and never lets you off the hook.

lay then the axe to the root by sciosophia

All the Bronte goodness, plus smut.

The Golden Age by TourmalineGreen

Golden Age of Hollywood AU in which Ben is a jaded actor in serious need of an image fix, in the form of fresh-faced actress Rey.

Never Be Your Curse by Kate_Reid

Kylo Ren is a go-go dancer in this AU. That was enough to get my attention 😘

Gallows God by Killtheselights

Bursting with deliciously grim imagery, an intelligent take on Norse mythology.

Thunderstorms, Clouds, Snow, and a Slight Drizzle by aNerdObsessed

Who doesn’t love an ugly sweater Christmas party? Ben Solo, that’s who. All the nostalgic wintertime feels in this modern AU.

Though My Soul Has Set in Darkness by englishable

It’s not long, but it’s good. A lyrical dive into the mindspace of child Ben Solo. A true gem. Also not technically Reylo. Still don’t care.

I Dare You by tinylittlebrain

Daredevil Kylo has pissed off ER doc Rey Kenobi for the last time. Spicy!

stuck in colder weather by redbelles

Professor Ren stops grad student Rey from biking home in a snow storm. And takes her to his home. You can guess where this goes 😉

Between Sky and Sea by nessalk

Serious Indiana Jones vibes with a Caribbean flair. Painstakingly researched, and moments of true beauty and joy.

But Before Tomorrow by Kate_Reid

Such good writing. Canonverse.

The Sword of Prince Hector by englishable

Exploration of what redemption might feel like for Ben, canonverse.

if compassion be the breath of life, breathe on me by Victoryindeath2

All the angst and unknowns that we were left with in the wake of TLJ are soothed in this canonverse piece.

build a ladder to the stars by redbelles

An exploration of events post-Crait. Fantastic, beautifully written.

nor are we forgiven (which brings us back) by TolkienGirl

Both Kylo and Rey get to see what life would have been like if they both got exactly what they thought they wanted after TLJ. Fascinating read.

Forsworn by Erulisse17

This Mando/ST crossover has everything you could want--action, witty banter, space romance! So much fun!

Reylo Favorites & Classics

One Shots

59 Minutes by delia-pavorum (literaryminded)

For Science by KyloTrashForever, ohwise1ne

He Made It Through the Wilderness (somehow he made it through) by LovesBitca8

light carries on endlessly by lachesisgrimm (olga_theodora)

Grey by ocjones

The Idiot's Guide to Flirting by Violetwilson

High School/College AU

I Caught Fire by KyloTrashForever

Mountain Springs High School by animal

Epithumia by pontmercy44

Soul Searching by OptimisticBeth

Office/Workplace AU

Sensual Storytime by andabatae

The Food of Love by LovesBitca8

Historical/Dystopia AU

Hiraeth by Ferasha

a manner of virtue by neonheartbeat

The lamb's thirst by animal

Wanted by Inmyownidiom

She Who Would be Queen by sasstasticmad

go i know not whither and fetch i know not what by voicedimplosives

ABO

Knot My First Time by KyloTrashForever

Canonverse/Canon-divergent

variations on a theme of you by diasterisms (Reydar)

i will be the wolf by diasterisms

Sky Marked Souls by AnonymousMink

The Death of Kylo Ren by nymja

World In My Eyes by sasstasticmad

i'm always in this twilight (in the shadow of your heart) by diasterisms

Catch Me I’m Falling by violethoure666

Sword of the Jedi by diasterisms

You'll Be the One to Turn by postedbygaslight

Dark Crown by Violetwilson

Harry Potter AU

Nocturnal Studies And Other Peculiar Magic by WaterlilyRose

Otherwise Modern AU

Pretense by Celia_and

Insta-heart by slipgoingunder

Serotonin and Dopamine by pontmercy44

The Elusive Mating Dance of the Porgus Adorabilis by andabatae

Hanging by a Moment by crossingwinter

WAR DOGS by fulcrumstardust

miles from where you are by Mooncactus

Charcoal by luvkurai

Stay by jeeno2

coarse and rough and irritating by frak-all (or_ryn)

Blades Crossed by the-reylo-void (Anysia)

Embers by sciosophia

Mitan, Midi by animal

Janus by englishable

Say My Name by Graendoll

Thank You for The Music by hipgrab (merrymegtargaryen)

darling, so it goes by akosmia

This is the Sign You've Been Looking For by RebelRebel

Broken Things by midnightbluefox

One-Night Stand by delia-pavorum (literaryminded)

The Rebel Side of Heaven by jeeno2

On The Bumpy Road (To Love) by violethoure666

we could plant a house, we could build a tree by Like_A_Dove

I’d Like My Obituary to Hint at a Sequel by Violetwilson

Only If You Want To by Violetwilson

Not Reylo, Still Awesome

Gingerflower/Gingerrose, Armitage Hux/Rose Tico

Between Sand and Sea by Brit Hux-Tico (birchwoods01)

If Ever I Would Leave You by Weddersins

Her Yellow Rainboots by Weddersins

Merrical, Cal Kestis/Merrin (Jedi: Fallen Order)

The Stars Alight by FlyingMachine

Heavy Ice by FlyingMachine

Caltrilla, Cal Kestis/Trilla Suduri (Jedi: Fallen Order)

No One Else by xanderwilde

call it what you want by xanderwilde

tear you to pieces by xanderwilde

Dramione, Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy (Harry Potter Universe)

Now Is A Gift by SenLinYu

Sex and Occlumency by Graendoll

Zutara, Katara/Zuko (Avatar: the Last Airbender)

oracle bones by an orphaned account

Fics by Me

Virtue Ethics

Reylo College AU (completed)

Dr. Ben Solo, adjunct philosophy professor and part-time martial arts instructor, discovers a young woman in his Intro to Philosophy course whom he thinks may not actually be enrolled at the University.

Chiasmus

Reylo Role-reversal canonverse AU (WIP)

Scourge of the galaxy, Kira Ren, is tasked by the First Order to eliminate the last of the Jedi. When she captures hotshot podracer Ben Solo to extract Luke Skywalker’s location from him, things do not go according to plan.

This Dance of Light, This Sacred Blessing

Snapshots of a modern Reylo AU. Smutty, prosey one-shot.

Listen Up, Kid

Canonverse Reylo Post TLJ one-shot

The ghosts of Supreme Leader Kylo Ren's past are back to haunt him with a vengeance. A well-meaning, familial kind of vengeance. Or, A Star Wars Carol.

Ben’s Body

Reylo Modern AU (completed)

Rey is an up and coming sculptor specialising in human shape and form. Her new next door neighbour has a body to die for and she's determined to preserve it in marble forever. Now she just has to convince dashing and reclusive Ben to model for her. Preferably naked.

Growin’ Up

Reylo High School AU (completed)

Ben Solo was supposed to only be ruining his own life with his bad decisions. Rey Niima was just trying to pay attention in class. Both get stuck in detention.

Seven Texts, 2 AM

Reylo Modern AU, smutty one-shot

Ben has good reasons not to have sex with his neighbor, Rey. She has other ideas.

Song of the Forest

Reylo Fantasy/BatB/Fairytale AU (completed)

Once upon a time, a girl with an unknown past appeared on the doorsteps of a lord’s manor, and now the forest at the edge of the lord’s property is calling to her.

A Season of Frost & Warmth

Modern Reylo P&P AU (completed)

When Ben shows up to a Halloween party with no costume, it only confirms Rey’s certainty that he is the world’s biggest jerk. Until it comes to light that maybe... he isn’t.

Follow Me Home

Modern Werewolf Reylo AU (completed)

Rey gets stone drunk and brings home a big cute husky she found in an alley. The next morning, she finds a naked man built like a fridge sleeping on her living room floor, and no dog in sight.

The Gentleness That Comes

Reylo Modern AU one-shot

Underground boxer!Ben is resigned to his life of violence, until he meets a pretty new bartender one night.

Unlikely, Unbidden, Unbound

Gingerflower canonverse AU (WIP)

General Hux is imprisoned by the Resistance when the First Order falls. He had known his death was coming, it was simply a matter of course. He’s disappointed to learn the Resistance has other plans, and an unwavering policy of giving people second chances.

@thereylowritingden @reylofic @nancylovesreylo @grlie-girl @lilia-ula @greyforceuser @tazwren @mhcalamas

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askmerriauthor · 3 years

Text

Star Wars: Visions thoughts and discussion

Been on a bit of a Star Wars binge lately. Getting ready for the Book of Fett and the return of The Mandalorian soon, just finished playing the Jedi: Fallen Order game, and recently "Star Wars: Visions" dropped on Disney+ (not to be confused with the, like, half-dozen other Star Wars properties that use "Visions" as their title). If you've got the streaming service and haven't watched the series yet, I can honestly suggest you should do so. The whole thing is a series of very short episodes and is entirely non-canon to the setting, so you don't even need a hard understanding of Star Wars to enjoy it.

In fact, it's actually better if you don't know anything about Star Wars going in. Spoilers and brief episode discussion after the jump.

Episode 1: The Duel As soon as I saw a lightsaber umbrella and a R2 droid in a hat, I knew this one was going to be a must-watch.

I REPEAT. LIGHTSABER. UMBRELLA.

Solid kick-off for the short series. Dig the aesthetic, dig the classic samurai vibe (even if it's more of an homage than a direct application of the style), dig the simple story. The particular animation style they chose here was a little wonky but I quickly got used to the visuals and loved a bunch of the design choices too much to care. This one was very action/style-focused and clearly chosen as the leading episode for that reason, which I don't fault them at all for.

Episode 2: Tatooine Rhapsody I'm sorry, I don't recall giving Star Wars permission to be this fucking adorable, how dare you.

The tale of a Padawan survivor of Order 66 who makes a new life for himself not with the power of the Force, but with the power of Rock and Roll and Friendship. Bitchin'. Super adorable, semi-chibi art style that's honestly ringing, like, a dozen different bells in my head for trying to figure out all the different styles it's drawing from. Good fun, if a bit bland in the end. The biggest problem is the music. The story relies on "using music to save the day", which is fine. But when you use that trope you need an absolutely face-melting banger of a performance, which this just doesn't have. An enjoyable entry all the same though. Not bad, not great, cute designs; the quirky story of how Jabba the Hutt got a new slave band to play at his den.

Episode 3: The Twins This entire episode is animated by the team who brought us Kill la Kill and that should really tell you everything you need to know.

You know how if you get a bunch of little kids together, they'll start playing make-believe games where they just invent stories and plot twists and super powers like "I have whatever you can do, but infinity plus 1 better!" shit like that? That's what this short is. It has only the vaguest allusions to the setting proper and immediately hurls every semblance of consistency, logic, and sense out the window with both hands. It is 1,000,000% style over substance.

Okay, y'know what, no, that's not enough to describe the utter insanity this episode is. All I can find online is pictures of the main villain character pulling a General Grievous impression or the protag snaring lightsaber whips on his lightsaber, but that is fucking tiddlywinks compared to where this episode goes.

There is a scene in this short where the protag, who is ghost-riding the hood of his X-Wing upside down in space without a space suit, super-charges his lightsaber into a giant rainbow of FUCK YOU GEORGE LUCAS with the power of familial love and fabulousness, using said rainbow super saber to CUT AN ENTIRE STAR DESTROYER IN HALF WHILE ACCELERATING TO HYPERSPEED, all to save his twin sister's life by making her explode in a somehow non-harmful manner.

This short is utterly nonsensical drivel and yes I would like more right the fuck now, please and thank you.

Episode 4: The Village Bride Wait, we're actually trying to tell a reasonable story in this series? Sorry, I was still on a sugar high from the previous episode. Lemme sit down.

The Village Bride is great. Excellent short that's just dripping with atmosphere and a slow, purposeful pace to its writing. It's short and sweet with little focus on the Force-using characters themselves, which actually serves to its credit. Even in the Star Wars universe, the Ainu people can't catch a fucking break. Easily one of my favorites in the whole run.

Episode 5: The Ninth Jedi The fact that two characters in this short have Sasuke's haircut was extremely distracting. But I actually really enjoyed this entry overall.

Despite playing extremely loose with the established lore around how lightsabers work, this episode over all others really embraces the original setting and tells a slow-burn story about the potential revival of the Jedi Order. A little meandering at times, but it's a solid piece and well worth exploring. Of all the shorts in the series, this one has the greatest potential to actually continue on as a standalone series or be folded into the canon franchise. Main protag is an adorable bean and I love her.

Episode 6: T0-B1 This episode is simultaneously a love letter to Astro Boy and a giant middle finger to Star Wars lore purists.

The tale of an imaginative Droid named T0-B1 who dreams of becoming a hero like the Jedi he's heard so many stories of. This short gets extra credit for being so unyieldingly stylish and charming. On the surface of its presentation and story choices it seems like it doesn't know anything about Star Wars lore, but it's actually packed full of some pretty deep cuts that show the folk behind it do know what they're talking about and just don't fucking care what purists have to say. The entire thing is just "Yeah, I'm ignoring your lore, but I'm doing it in a fun way that makes the setting more interesting, and I'm so genuine about it that you can't be mad at me". I can respect that. Plus the old dude in that screenshot is an armless Jedi who's retired to be a botanist and that's just fucking cool.

Episode 7: The Elder I'm Episode 1, but better.

This one. This shit right here. This is the good shit.

I'm sure y'all have heard before that Star Wars is directly inspired by Kurosawa and samurai films in general, but The Elder really digs into that hard. Where Episode 1 styles itself after a samurai tale, Episode 7 is a samurai tale. Subdued, methodical storytelling, slow-burn pace, charming dialogue amid believable characters, and a truly intimidating villain who provokes a brief but striking duel. This is my vibe. I crave more of this. Far and away the best short of the entire series.

Episode 8: Lop and Ocho Oh for fuck's sake, there's going to be so much porn of this bunny girl character, isn't there?

This entry is another that kind of meanders with the story it's trying to tell and plays very loose with the lore. It reimagines a lot of what we know of the Jedi/The Rebels and Sith/The Empire into a feudal faction-based conflict akin to what you'd see in a period samurai drama. Modernization and callous industry crushing the spirit of the people and breaking apart families. A decent work overall, but nothing really all that impressive in the end. It takes too long to get going and then peters out halfway through its pay-off for some reason.

Episode 9: Akakiri The fact that I had to look up this episode's name and scenes online and still could not remember anything about it should tell you a lot.

The series ends on a downer with the dramatic tale of a fallen Jedi who sacrifices himself and succumbs to the Dark Side. Turning evil for... the greater good? Wha? Had some pretty neat visuals, but I genuinely cannot remember a damn thing about this episode or its characters. Big swing and a miss in terms of impact.

#star wars #star wars visions #sw visions #animation #anime #spoilers

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clonewarslover55 · 3 years

Note

Even though I’m pretty sure I know almost all the answers already 😂 Rose and Vau for the ship questions?

Hell yeah!!!! (I fucking love you lol)

Find Memoires here or here

Find the game here

(It’s pretty long so see the answers below!!)

who hogs the duvet

Mird does, of course!! They blame one another anyways though, because they do both try to hog it.

who texts/rings to check how their day is going

They don’t do this till later in their relationship, like when they’re established. But it’s mostly Vau who does this, believe it or not. Mainly because he’s the one that’s away to war more often, while Rose is bounty hunting.(for the most part) So Vau likes to stay in touch.

Rose is the type of person that accidently ghosts people too. She just forgets she can contact people and ignores her shit unless it’s Vau. Well....Sometimes when it’s Vau.

who’s the most creative when it comes to gifts

Defiantly Vau! Rose is the type of person to give him a cool rock or something she found(Of course he keeps the rock) But Vau is the type to steal pretty jewelry from dead bodies, search markets, etc. Rose will do that sometimes as well, but it’s something Vau does a lot more.

He also knows what she likes. Walon is hard to “shop” for. Rose is not lol

who gets up first in the morning

Walon does, mainly because he has a hard time sleeping. His nightmares and such usually keep him awake. Rose usually sleeps fine, and likes to sleep in. Sometimes in the morning Vau just watches Rose sleep. Not in a creepy way, it just calms him down. Sometimes he just doesn’t believe she’s real, because he doesn’t deserve her affections.

who suggests new things in bed

Oh this is a hard one! Both are kinky as fuck and horny. Am I allowed to say both? Because it’s defiantly both of them.

who cries at movies

Neither of them, they’re just not that emotional. Especially Vau.

When Rose is pregnant though? She cries during any movie.

who gives unprompted massages

Rose does! She’s random like that.

who fusses over the other when they’re sick

Mird does

They both do it to one another, more so Vau than Rose though. He fusses over her all the time anyways, making sure she eats enough and all that. So when she’s sick he doesn’t leave her alone really. Rose pretends to hate being fussed over.

When Vau is sick Rose gives him some more tough love. “aww poor fool. Someone who should’ve listened to his wife-” Things like that, but she makes sure to take care of him. She annoys him while doing it too.

who gets jealous easiest

Oh this is another tricky one!! It’s nearly a tie they’re both so possessive.

But I’d have to say Rose! Especially when she's pregnant. She doesn’t keep him on a short leash though, because she trusts him. But she still watches those around him closely.

who has the most embarrassing taste in music

Walon Vau and his classical ass.

He’ll listen to really anything. He seems like a metal and rock dude to me.....But his favorite is classical music. Instrumental things. Star Wars Beethoven and Bach.

who collects something unusual

Rose and her too many blades and sharp objects

who takes the longest to get ready

Vau does. He has a reputation of looking nice. Rose, on the other hand, doesn’t care if she looks nice or not. Her hair is always a mess and her eyeliner was put on the day before. Vau puts effort into his look.

who is the most tidy and organized

Vau is. Both are pretty tidy, but Vau is far more organized and clean than Rose. and she’s pretty damn clean. The only thing of Rose’s that is organized is her blades and husband.

who gets most excited about the holidays

Rose because she can dress up Mird in the sweaters Vau knits.

(Hehehhee here's a fic called Sweaters that’s about Mird in sweaters)

who is the big spoon/little spoon

Vau is taller so he’s usually the big spoon. But it really depends on the moods they’re in. When he has nightmares or just a shitty day Rose is the big spoon. Whoever is the little spoon has Mird curled up against their chest.

who gets most competitive when playing games and/or sports

Rose does! She’s fucking terrible when it comes to being competitive.

who starts the most arguments

It’s a mix of both......but still mainly Rose. She never shuts her mouth and it leads to arguments.

who suggests that they buy a pet

Neither of them. Mird is enough.

what couple traditions they have

Arguing

They’re far from normal so they bounty hunt together! But something normal they do? They cook for one another as often as possible, even if it’s improvised and on their ship after a difficult bounty

what tv shows they watch together

Ooohhh this made me think!!

Soap operas

Probably documentaries so Mird can watch too. It likes to watch the animals, making noises at the holoscreen. Mird is their entertainment, not the show.

what other couple they hang out with

No one. They scare other couples off by their constant arguing and teasing

how they spend time together as a couple

Bounty Hunting, going to war, arguing, etc. You know.....regular Mandalorian things!

who made the first move

In Memories I dedicated a whole flashback to this!!

Both are horny idiots, so it’s a little hard to tell who makes the first move. But it’s Rose! Vau quickly catches on though!

who brings flowers home

Mr. Romance Walon Vau. He loves giving Rose odd but beautiful flowers he’ll find or buy. Especially roses that are odd colors or have patterns.

who is the best cook

Rose’s slightly impatient ass is a better cook, but mostly with quick things like pasta.

Vau was a rich kid so he didn’t learn to cook till he joined the Mandalorians. So he learned as he got older. He can cook pretty well, even better than Rose on some things. Mainly things that take longer.

He’s better at baking, because that requires exact measurements and Rose is too stubborn to do that. Plus it takes longer.

So both are good, but Vau is better with things that involve patience.

I had so much fun with this!!! Thank you for requesting this!!

Tags: @leias-left-hair-bun @iamassbuttkingofhell @catsnkooks @colorfulloverbatturkey @ahsokatano-thetogruta @peacefulwizardfox @jedi-mando @julyzaa @feathersforclones @chr0nicbackpain @jedi-nila-rhyn @strangebroadwaykinks @fyrepen33 @mistflyer1102 @kamino-mermaid @cherry-cokes-world @darmanfi @silverinkandstardust @chewychewyque @majorshiraharu @ravenpuff01 @808tsuika @valkyrieofthehighfae @roseofalderaan @ct7567329 @jadetheaverage @anstarwar @klay97 @seafoamandlilliesinthesea

#walon vau #verda tal rose #walon vau x original characters #walon vau x verda tal rose

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seekingthemacguffin · 3 years

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I watched Star Wars Visions and I loved it! I’m a huge Star Wars fan and I love anime, but going into this I was a little worried about how it would turn out. Between the fact that each episode was being done by a different studio and the fact that they were told “it isn’t gonna be canon so you can do what you want” I was worried it was not going to feel like Star Wars or like one series. I am happy to say I was completely wrong, this absolutely felt like Star Wars. And yes, tonally we were all over the map but it still felt like Star Wars.

Everybody understood the importance of cool lightsaber fights, found family, droid companions, and Jedi. The essence of Star Wars, really. Every episode had something Jedi related, which was great. And I loved that almost everybody threw in at least one “I have a bad feeling about this.” (Let’s be real, if you had one shot to make something for Star Wars you would do the exact same thing.)

The Star Wars saga has always been strongly influenced by Japanese culture, so it was really cool to see a bunch of actual Japanese creators do their version of Star Wars. And the animation is stellar in all of them.

Thoughts on all the episodes below the cut ranked by my impressions.

1. The Elder - Definitely my favorite, although I wouldn’t be surprised to learn I’m in the minority here. I love getting a glimpse of Jedi during the Republic before everything went south, and the master and padawan here have such a great relationship. The Elder gave off seriously evil vibes, and having him disintegrate like that was such a cool contrast to the way Yoda and Obi-Wan disappear when they die. And that lightsaber fight in the rain? Fantastic.

2 & 3 (it’s a tie) The Ninth Jedi - This was super interesting, even if it was a take on lightsabers that doesn’t quite line up with canon. It had a great twist moment, and I loved when her lightsaber changed colors. I would absolutely watch a continuation of this.

2 & 3 (it’s a tie) The Village Bride - I felt like I didn’t quite connect with the bride and groom and villagers considering the amount of time spent on them. Where this story really shined was F. She’s obviously an Order 66 survivor, and even though it was short it did a great job showing her deciding who she is. When she has her “I am a Jedi” moment? That is everything Star Wars is about right there.

4. The Duel - Great choice to use as the opener. I thought having it in black and white except for the lasers and lights was a cool idea. I have so many questions about Ronin. Was he a jedi who survived Order 66 that is hunting down darksiders and only uses a red saber out of necessity? Was he once a Sith who left (like Maul) but is still a darksider? Is he an unafilliated darksider? Why is he taking out darksiders? Is he in the process of turning to the light and is stopping them because of what they are doing, or is he evil and taking them out because they are a threat to his power? I have so many questions but I may never get the answers.

5. Tatooine Rhapsody - When I first heard a description of the episodes, this is the one that made me roll my eyes. But you know what? It was a delight. Yes, a Jedi padawan turns into a rock star after Order 66 and they play a gig at an execution for Jabba and convince him to sponser them and Boba Fett was bobbing his head to the music and I was vibing with it the entire time. Also, shoutout for including a good Hutt character. It has always really annoyed me that every single member of the Hutt species is portrayed as being completely awful and it was refreshing to see someone choose not to go that route with their Hutt character.

6. Lop and Ocho - This made me feel things. I hope they reunite someday. They really dug into the family aspect of things here. Also kudos for creating a side character that just screams “I’m an evil side character” from their aesthetics alone. You could show a picture of that imperial officer to anyone on the street and they could describe the character’s personality to a T.

7. TO B1 - This was super cute. I feel like I would have gotten more out of it if I was more familiar with Astroboy. I recognize enough that I saw the art style and went “Astroboy influences!” but I don’t know the content so I can’t pick up on if any themes or narrative elements carried over. This was probably the episode that went against canon the most since it has a droid use the Force. Loved the old Jedi, and really loved that he didn’t have arms but they didn’t make a big deal out of it. I’m glad they included a couple of episodes that would really appeal to kids. Tiny Me would have loved this so much.

8. Akakiru - The only reason this one is ranked so low is that it made me sad and it was the only episode with an art style I didn’t like. It is a really great look at self-fulling prophecies and the danger of attachment. Great parallels to Revenge of the Sith. It also gets credit for feeling like a samurai movie. I bet there were references to specific movies in this that I didn’t pick up on.

9. The Twins - I’m in the minority here for saying this was the only episode I didn’t like. The animation was fantastic, don’t get me wrong, but it just tried to do too much at once for me. You can do the brand new Star Destroyer design that can destroy planets or you can do the crazy new lightsaber designs or you can have your characters breathing in space or you can have somebody bisect a Star Destroyer with a rainbow lightsaber but doing them all at once felt a little unhinged. But hey, they were having fun with it and I can appreciate that.

Overall I really loved the show and I thought all the studios did a great job. You could really feel their love for the material and I hope we get another season of oneshots. I would also be up for giving some of these studios an entire series. This kind of felt like an audition and I would say some of them really nailed it.

#Star Wars #Star Wars Visions

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redundantz · 3 years

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Found an old write up of my Star War OCs Backstory and info 🤔

I’m not really a writer and usually don’t enjoy it at all so this is pretty big for me ahha

Yanna Sen'ka

Born on a distant planet, not uncivilized but not refined. A place full of plant life living in a small village on the edge of a forest near a large river.

She is an only child raised by her mother and father.

Her strong force sensitivity was noticed early on by Supreme Leader Snoke. Moulding and manipulating her thoughts and actions. Small whispers in her ear, little seeds of doubt, fear and anger. Building on her childlike fears and worries.

She clashed often with her strong willed mother. Who became distrusting of her daughters troubling and sinister behaviour. Only growing worse when she would go to her father for everything and get dotted on by him. Jealousy bloomed. Her mother was jealous of the great attention she got from him. And how she never came to her for help or comfort. All the while Snoke fanning the flames of your bitterness and resentment towards her. Becoming a dark ball of hate whenever near her. Often causing Yanna to lash out or run off sometimes for days.

Growing up in the forest she knew her way around well. What plants to eat and how to trap animals for food. She could spend days by herself. And she did. Not entirely out of her own desire. The other kids were also wary of her.

Her unstable behaviour and rumours surrounding her that strange and awful things happen.

On one of her outings by the waterfall, she was practicing her use of the force. Stacking rocks, building a little dam to catch the fish in the pond.

One of the village boys came through the brush spotting her using her powers. Startled, and still very angry the rock she had been floating flung into him with a startling velocity and power. So much so that his gasp of surprise was cut short and his limp body fell to the ground. In shock, she could only gape as blood started running down the stones into the pool. Dying it red.

Snapping out of it she started to panic and breathing hard, tears welled up in her eyes.

In shock, she just stared as the blood washed away. And a small consciousness came into the back of her mind saying. "You did nothing wrong my child. He saw you, you know what they would do if he told everyone. Imagine how disappointed your father would be if he found out? You don't want that....

Now, imagine how glad the other children will be now that he's gone. He was a useless boy, did nothing of value and lorded his false power over others.

And you my child have true power. Look what you did without even trying. Imagine what you could do with my full tutelage.

All of them would listen, never question you.

Your scum mother would never dare raise her voice at you...

And your papa would be so proud to look upon such a strong and accomplished daughter.

Now.... get rid off the body!”

Still horrified by what she's done yet with new found resolve she moves over to the corpse. Grabbing him by the back of his shirt she hauls him into the pool to be carried down river.

Washing away any of the blood on the stones and the evidence of her presence there. She glances at the body as it bobs down the river out of her sight before darting into the woods.

Frantic, she just couldn't get away from there fast enough still terrified by what she's done. She ran and wandered until her legs ached. The sun was setting causing the shadows in the forest to deepen before she climbed s tree to find a safe perch for the night.

Finally settling down and alone with her thoughts. The edge of panic had creeped off and she was surprisingly calm and serene. a voice in the night whispered "you've done well child...."

Looking up to the small group of stars she could see through the thick canopy. The fear and panic from earlier settled into the back of her mind she could only think of how glad she was rid of the boy.

None in the village could figure out what happened to the boy but everyone was on edge. And Yanna was put under more scrutiny. She couldn’t understand why everyone was so upset over the useless kid. Getting more and more withdrawn and angry.

Her mother was getting even worse to her as she got older and she got confronted by her if it was she who was the cause of the boys disappearance. Yelling and screaming, calling her a cursed child and that she stole everything from her. She was holding a knife in defence afraid of her own child or ready to attack..? Yanna looked for her father but he just looked at her with fear and uncertainty in his eyes. She felt despair. But really he was looking at his wife, maybe with clear eyes for the first time. As she went in to the attack, Yanna was able to avoid and fight back for the most part but her father tried to intervene and save her getting stabbed in the process. He wasn’t critically injured but she saw red and high pitched screaming filled her ears. Next thing she woke up to was her fathers body shielding her and the house, the village, and forest was on fire. Her mother was dead and her father was dead. Her mind was blank.

“It’s time”

When Snoke came to get her she was alone in the forest she couldn't stand to be around what she had done. Refusing to think about it as her rage died down. She couldn't. She just repeated what leader Snoke said to her before.

The code of the dark side.

Her only salvation.

She met Kylo Ren when she was 14. Only a few years older than her he was gangly yet exuded a great sense of power that radiated from him crackling and angry. He was reckless and had a childlike temperament.

She got on his nerves a lot and not always in purpose. Unlike him she has learned to focus her anger and fear. Her calculated control bothered him as she would look down on him every time he would throw a fit.

Often it would cause them to fight.

She wouldn't admit that she just liked to get on his nerves and show him how little control he had by flaunting hers. Also that she wanted to help teach him to master himself. Even though it should have been the other way around.

She knew it was not in her best interest but she grew quite attached to him. She was a decent comrade to the others. Especially Kuruk ren. He made her laugh with jokes and a sick sense of humour. Always having the most ridiculous of stories to tell. He even wanted to get in her pants a few times. She was tempted to be sure. Mostly to just get it over with and see what it's like. She really didn't enjoy his company "that" much. In either case she has never felt more included. she's finally a part of a group and working towards something bigger than herself. She was determined to be useful and prove herself. She wanted to make leader Snoke proud. He was the only one there for her her whole life guiding her, who truly understood her.

Master Snoke would train them all when he could but for the most part it was up to them to keep up their practices. Their fitness, saber wielding, meditation and use of the force. Most of the Knights would work independently as comradery was not something adherent to their teachings. Mostly sparing together to blow off extra energy and test their might.

Kylo was the over all strongest beating most of the Knights easily. A few where much more adept at swordplay and gymnastics each having their own strong suit . Some even preferring blasters and other physical weapons.

Yanna was not the best at swordplay, but was quite nimble and able to move around with a purpose from many years in the forests.

She would focus and use of the force to read movements and work around them. Reading their minds or just straight up using her powers to physically beat them or trip them. Usually that wasn't allowed in sparing but she didnt always listen.

Snoke chose Kylo to be the Master of the Knights of Ren and it must have been for a good reason. She just couldn't help but let a small part of herself felt slighted and jealous.

She was there when they helped kill all the Jedi training under Luke Skywalker. Snoke told her about Luke and how Kylo trained under him until he was shown the way to the dark side. How he was the cause of Vaders death. The Shinning example of pure darkness.

As a part of the Knights they all admired him greatly. None more so as Kylo. Not quite sure how deep his attachment goes.

They wore clothes and helmets in honour of him. Hoping to take up where he left off. Show the universe what true power is.

She has a special way she typically used her force powers. By exploding people's hearts. Not very messy but effective. Didn't require her to use her sword which was more for defence and secondary offence than anything.

Where would your character fall on a politeness/rudeness scale?

In the middle, she respects her elders and superiors but holds nothing back for her peers and children. Most rudeness is nonverbal just ignoring or blatant disregard.

How many friends does your character have?

Virtually none. The Knights of Ren are her closest allies. Kylo in particular and Kuruk. Leader Snoke himself has been her closest friend and Mentor.

Also Captain Phasma share a fun friendship the rare chance the meet.

How many friends does your character want?

She would say none. That ties to others always just end up in pain and are a weakness. In reality a few close good friends is what she wants and needs. People to share experience with and shared ambition.

How does your character feel about sex?

Not something she's particularly interested in. Neither is romance. Her life has been to driven and hectic to think of such things. Even being older it’s not really on her mind. If the fancy ever struck her she wouldn't say no. A few men/women and even the other Knights have tried. All their efforts just irritate her.

She does masterbate now and again, for release only when she's sure no one would know.

What was the best thing in your character’s life?

Her Father was her best friend and mentor. He would teach her all about living in the forest and wouldn’t treat her like a child. letting her figure stuff out on her own and make mistakes but always there to help out. But was also there to comfort her but was also a bit of a coward when it came to standing up to his wife.

#star wars #star wars oc #oc #yanna sen'ka #my writing #backstory #long post

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nitrateglow · 3 years

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My bottom five new-to-me movies of 2020

2020 sucked. So did these movies. Before I do my customary top 20 favorite movie discoveries list, I wanted to share five very special new-to-me movies that were painful to watch. Forgive me if it all sounds like ranting. It probably is.

(And remember-- if you like any of these movies, that’s fine. I am not attacking YOU. I just didn’t like a movie. I know this is a stupid disclaimer to put on a list of opinions, but combing the venomous old IMDB message boards has me on edge a bit lol.)

Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker

Whether you love the sequel trilogy or hate it, everyone pretty much agrees this movie was a mess. I thought no movie could have a more structurally unsound screenplay than The Crimes of Grindelwald, but Rise of Skywalker gives it staunch competition. It creates a new artform from making things up as the plot requires: new powers for Rey, new Macguffins to pursue, new motivations and backstories for characters.

I admit I dislike The Last Jedi. I dislike it a lot, actually, and it appears JJ Abrams did too from the amount of retconning he does here (Rey isn’t nobody! Honest, guys!). But you can’t backtrack THAT much. Either plot out your entire trilogy before shooting the first film or play fairly with the cards you were dealt by the filmmakers of movie two.

If anything, these movies have become a cautionary tale about not having a plan when making a movie trilogy. Now, George Lucas didn’t really have one either when he was making the original trilogy, but in that case, he wasn’t even sure the first movie was going to be a modest hit, let alone the biggest movie of the 1970s. He had an excuse and did well enough finishing the trilogy. Here, Disney knew there would be sequels, they knew they had a hungry audience, but they chose to just wing it and the results are just-- so disappointing, especially given the talented young actors and lovely special effects they had at their disposal.

The more I think about it, the more poetic the image of Palpatine hooked up to a life support system/crane is. The best ROTS can do is riff on earlier, better movies and hope our affection will make us overlook the awfulness.

Artemis Fowl

Outside of Animal Crossing, Artemis Fowl might have been the only entity to benefit (if only slightly) from the pandemic. I cannot imagine it would have been anything but a box office bomb had the theaters been open.

Artemis Fowl feels like it should have come out in 2003-- not just because the books were more prominent then, but the whole style of this film in general. In 2020, it’s positively anachronistic. The whole thing is a joyless attempt at dipping from the old Harry Potter well, with a bit of Spy Kids thrown in for good measure. Beyond that, it’s so poorly done as a whole. I have never read the Artemis Fowl books, but I watched this with a friend who has and his head near caught on fire. Apparently, it cuts out everything that made the books cool, like the protagonist basically being a kid version of a Bond villain. Here, he’s anything but that: he’s the usual bland child protagonist surrounded by a cast of slightly more interesting characters. Josh Gad seems to be the only one really trying. Judi Dench shows up and somehow gives a worse performance than whatever the hell she was doing in Cats.

I was actually shocked Kenneth Branagh of all people directed this. I generally like his films, even the less successful ones like his musical adaptation of Love’s Labors Lost. Even the uninspiring live-action Cinderella remake he helmed is at least pretty to look at-- Artemis Fowl has neither brains nor beauty to recommend it.

Bloodline

This film was intended to jumpstart a career comeback for Audrey Hepburn. This decidedly did not happen. One has to wonder what she saw in this sordid material in the first place. Maybe she really just wanted to work with director Terence Young again? Or she thought this would be a good, more modern take on her screen persona? I have no clue. All I know is that Bloodline is one of the worst big-budget Hollywood movies I have ever seen.

No contest: this is Audrey Hepburn’s worst movie. Hate on Green Mansions and Paris When It Sizzles until the stars turn to ash-- at least there was some fun camp value in them. The plot in Bloodline makes no sense, going into unrelated digressions that lead nowhere (did we really need that extended flashback about the dead father? or the subplot with Omar Shariff’s two families?). Oh and then there’s the awful sleazy snuff film subplot that’s also poorly developed and goes nowhere. Hepburn is game, but she can’t save the sinking ship. The best she can do is be charming in a terrible 70s perm.

Luckily, she made the underrated They All Laughed two years after this cinematic fecal matter bombed, so at the very least, Hepburn’s big screen swan song was a film worthy of her presence. (Hint: there will be more about that movie on my top 20 of the year list!)

Halloween III: The Season of the Witch

You all have no idea how excited I was to see this. All the mentions of it on Red Letter Media made it sound like deliriously entertaining schlock. I mean, it’s a movie in which the villain sells cursed Halloween masks that turn children’s heads into bugs and snakes! That sounds awesome! Instead, the movie is badly paced and boring: the main characters are uninteresting and the plot takes an interesting premise then does.... nothing with it. Nothing whatsoever. The second act is the cinematic equivalent of treading water. In fact, so little happens, that the filmmakers squeeze in a pointless sex scene between two character who have all the chemistry of a lit match and a bag of M&M’s.

The thing that annoys me most about this film is that it killed off a great concept: that all of the future Halloween films would be standalone stories centered around the spookiest time of the year. Unfortunately, this movie botched itself so badly that people often think the absence of Michael Meyers was the problem. It wasn’t: it was the absence of a good story.

Blindsided

This is probably the most watchable movie on this list, but that’s not saying much. A bloodless ripoff of Wait Until Dark, Blindsided is an unimaginative thriller with no thrills, humor, or interesting characters whatsoever.

The whole film is just repetitive. The situation doesn’t slowly boil to something horrific, the threat presented by the villains doesn’t escalate, there are no interesting interactions between the characters: no, here the underdeveloped protagonist is interrogated, tortured and/or sexually harassed, tries to escape, is recaptured, rinse and repeat for ninety minutes. I admit there’s some clever resourcefulness on the part of the heroine in the last scene-- but it’s basically just Wait Until Dark’s climax (down to the twist with the villain finding an alternative source of illumination for crying out loud!) without the emotional payoff that comes from slow-burn pacing or the fantastic performances, so even that’s a letdown.

I thought the movie might at least be saved by Michael Keaton as the main criminal mastermind since he’s shown he can be a great villain in other movies (if they had remade Wait in the 80s, he would have been a perfect Harry Roat Jr.), but even he seems to be phoning it in here. Beyond a scene of attempted cat murder (I’m serious-- the bad guys are so incompetent they can’t even kill a cat), there’s not even anything so bad it’s good to enjoy. Blindsided is just dull and by-the-numbers.

#thoughts

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elbiotipo · 3 years

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Ok that was the sequels with the Disney Canon, But MY idea of the sequels would be actually an animated series about Luke’s Jedi Order, it would be basically a Jedi School series with fun adventures and both old and new characters. I know I previously ranted about how I hate both school settings and teenage protagonists but this is different because it’s Jedi School and it’s Star Wars.

So, for this I take what I like from the old canon, other things from the new canon, and drop other things, don’t expect much coherence.

Anyways it’s set about 15 or so years after the Battle of Endor. Things have gotten much better, you know how it goes, the New Republic has grown and the Imperial Remnant are just a fringe junta of all the weirdo warlords of the EU, Han and Leia get married, Lando is chancellor, and Luke marries Mara Jade, because she’s awesome, and rebuilds the Jedi Order.

Since the old method of “kidnapping children” is out for obvious reasons, the Jedi Order functions more like a boarding school or summer camp in Yavin IV. It is much smaller than the prequels order, composed of:

Old masters and survivors to Order 66, like Luke, Mara, Ahsoka, Ezra and a couple others, they try their best but they are ultimately quirky teachers

First generation jedi that were only recently trained like Finn and Rey and still have much to learn

And a whole bunch of Padawans from all ages, species, worlds and backgrounds

The series mostly follows Luke’s son Ben, who is a Very Good Kid with a little of a complex fromhaving such a successful father (and mother) who are praised all over the Galaxy. He’s quiet, shy and isn’t very good with a lightsaber but has a deep connection to the force. He’s friends/rivals with his older cousin Aldera Organa (Han took Leia’s name) who is LOUD, sarcastic, hotheaded, and while overall a good girl WILL cut you up with a lightsaber if given the chance. They’re friends with a pilot jedi padawan from an Andes/Inca inspired world (we haven’t seen that before in Star Wars), a huge Wookiee who plays football (as in the one with foot, not the yanqui version), and a Trandoshan mechanic girl (because they are always shown as villain characters, make them heroes for once). Together, They Fight Crime and we see how they slowly grow from just kids to heroes.

Luke Skywalker meanwhile, tries to be a good teacher. He wakes up every day, drinks his blue milk, and reads pedagogy textbooks to try to become a better teacher, but is very concerned that he’s just winging it all, after all he only got two weeks top of training with Obi-Wan and Yoda included. Everybody assures him it’s okay but he doesn’t believe them. Leia represents the Jedi back at Coruscant, Han trains the New Republic special forces (including New Republic Super Agents Poe Dameron and Rose Tico), Lando is the New Republic Chancellor, R2D2 and C3PO are the official Jedi academy groundskeeper and translator, respectively, and Chewie is just vibing and enjoying his retirement.

Ok, so everything is nice so far. Another year in the Academy starts, all the character meet, Luke and Mara have a parent-teachers reunion, etc. etc. he assures everyone the school is Perfectly Safe, just look at that Togruta lady she has TWO lightsabers isn’t she awesome?

Meanwhile, somewhere in the Galaxy, Han and his Superagents are in a shooting with some aliens who come from outside the Galaxy. They escape in their ship and are headed to the Jedi Academy, Han tries to warn them but the transmission is cut.

So first lessons in the Jedi Academy, Ben is dissapointed that he isn’t as good as a Jedi as the other kids despite being the son of Luke and you know normal school dramas but with lightsabers.

THEN the aliens land. They are like... Vong But Not Really, intergalactic invaders who are able to manipulate and even disconect someone from the Force temporarily, and they are physically very strong. They are a scout team sent ahead of the main fleet to test the strongest force users of the Galaxy and they aren’t very impressed.

They kidnap the children to study them but they escape using Home Alone traps unorthodox tactics. A battle ensues, awesome things happen, Mara blows up their ship so they hide in the jungle at night. The kids are lost in the jungle though, and the Vong close up on them one by one. Just as the leader grabs Ben and does his villain speech, a green lightsaber lights up in the darkness. It's Luke. He gives the Vong leader one chance to free them. The Vong nervously refuse.

Luke Skywalker goes fucking feral on them, Darth-Vader-In-Rogue-One Style, until they finally surrender and free the kids, and then he goes back into Quirky Master mode and asks them all if they are okay. They are, just now are fucking terrified for several reasons.

Nobody is seriously hurt and all the kidnappers are captured so they see little reason to suspend the academic year. They send the Vong prisoners to Coruscant, where Leia resolves to learn more about these invaders before the come, and so the main arc of the series starts, while they fight pirates, bounty hunter, imperial warlords, dark side spirits and all that weird EU stuff, they slowly investigate who the Vong are, what they want and try to prepare for the upcoming invasion.

Other *fun* things that happen include:

Thrawn, who was conspicously absent all this time (though Ezra escaped from him at some point), comes back from the Unknown Regions with his fleet and sees the bunch of jokers leading what remains of the “Empire”. He goes all art student mode and says “hhmmrmm... an empeire need sthe figuer of an empoerer”...

And eventually manuevers over the warlords and crowns himself emperor, and the New Republic has another headache to deal with.

The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda from hit live-action series “The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda Show” appear, he finally found the Jedi after aimlessly wandering the Galaxy, and tearfully entrusts Baby Yoda to them. It’s a babysitting episode where Baby Yoda makes pure CHAOS in the Jedi Academy and eventually the Jedi give him back to Din, telling him to raise him until he’s more mature, much to his delight

Luke organizes a friendly lightsaber tournament to test everybody’s abilities. Ahsoka, Ezra and the rest, who had more lightsaber training than “Obi-Wan teaching me to avoid a floating ball and Yoda making me pile up rocks” wipe the floor with him.

In the villain romance nobody asked for, Thrawn marries admiral Daala in a marriage for convenience and the Jedi are invited to the wedding omg!!! Of course, IT’S A TRAP and the new Imperial couple tell them to serve the rightful galactic goverment, that is, them. And so they crash the wedding instead, it would be hilarious

The kids are majorly concerned about Luke talking to force ghosts and Mara ocassionally repeating orders from a dead Palpatine, and they try to make them get a fucking vacation and therapy for once.

LIFE. DAY. SPECIAL.

Some dark side cultists cloned Palpatine but because he was raised differently in another world he’s just like, an accountant, who gets kidnapped for their dark rituals, and the Jedi have to spend a whole fleet to rescue Some Guy who doesn’t even understand what’s going on.

Of course eventually the Vong invade in full force and the Galaxy is under attack again, the Thrawn Empire has to decide if to follow an old dream of a Sith madman or help the New Republic, and everybody has Choices to make and Tragedy incoming but that’s way in the future to write.

It would be so much fun to have an Jedi Academy series because I’m sure Mark Hamill would LOVE to be casted, the old EU has so much cool things (and stupid crap) to write about, and you have so many characters to make plots and subplots for and make toys and spinoffsHEY DISNEY ARE YOU LISTENING YOU CAN MAKE MONEY WITH THIS YOU BASTARDS

#sw #star wars #cosas mias #long post

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