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one-leaf-grimoire · 3 years

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“triad”

Chapter 15: the end of summer

Finally getting into the meat of the manga spade arc! Enjoy!

AO3 link

Days grew shorter. Shadows grew longer. So long that they seeped over the border and into the once-peaceful Clover Kingdom.

Many didn’t know it as they went about their lives, farming and working and sweating like usual. Only a few actually understood the threat that was growing, the threat they desperately wanted to overcome. But to overcome, you must be prepared to fight for your life.

Months and months of work were finally coming to a close. But would the Clover Kingdom be ready to face the spade Kingdom?

But also… would the Spade Kingdom be prepared as well?

“You’ve been sitting in that seat for months. Don’t tell me you haven’t figured anything out, yet?”

The man with shaggy white hair and large, reflective glasses nearly jumped out of his seat at the sound of the deep, rough voice behind him. He turned around, now backlit by the magical screen his eyes had been locked on. It played a clip over and over again, ripped directly from a Clover Kingdom broadcast that they managed to intercept.

“That’s not true, Lord Dante. I’ve moved.”

Dante let out a chuckle, his serious expression dissolving. The man was in a good mood, and why wouldn’t he be? The end of these agonizing six months was near, and it was almost time to make their move. Finally, he would be able to enact his plan, and get to fight some interesting people along the way.

“Not that I can tell. Every time I come in here, you’re staring at that screen, Morris. In the exact same position, too, I might add.”

Morris felt a little irked by the comment, but he couldn’t do much about it. Dante and his siblings, the Dark Triad, were the reason why he was allowed to flee the Diamond Kingdom after Mars took over. Well, that wasn’t going to end well for Mars, as Zenon himself dispatched most of the enemy country’s troops. It was a small comfort, but overall the situation wasn’t too bad. Morris got to do what he did best, and be part of something catastrophic.

“Whatever. And no, I haven’t.” Morris sighed before turning back to look at the screen. The clip looped again, and again, and again. Just two or three seconds of footage, a critical moment that defied all explanation. “All I know is that this new power is something she calls true time magic.”

“Ah, groundbreaking.” Dante narrowed his eyes at the display. “Is this something she inherited?”

“No… I don’t think so.” Morris weaved his fingers together as he watched, barely aware that Dante was there still. “It’s true- because of her Dyad magic, she was able to steal part of Julius Novachrono’s magic. But Simulcian Dyads don’t just borrow their partner’s magic. Over time, they make it their own. So, effectively, she’s come up with new time spells that even Novachrono did not.”

Dante nodded slowly, faint recognition registering in the back of his mind. Well, not his mind.

The power to steal part of someone’s soul… their essence, their magic… and make it their own. How terrifyingly powerful.

“You sure seem to know a lot about it, Morris.”

“I told you before- The Diamond Kingdom harbored a group of Simulcian refugees for over a century,” Morris reminded him. “They offered to share their Dyad with our army in exchange for a safe, private place to stay.” Morris let out a wistful sigh. “I was the only one who visited… I even talked to their leader, Mikal. He was interesting… He showed me the research he was doing on his own family. Quite diabolical.” Morris’s smile dropped. “But then all of them disappeared… I thought I’d never find out what happened, but then, 6 years later, the Clover Kingdom attacked us with a Dyad of their own. One containing the Wizard King of all people.”

And now, the other half of that Dyad was Wizard King as well, the Wizard King they would have to face in only a matter of days.

Or maybe not.

The woman’s movements were instantaneous. There was no delay, no movement, between where she began and where she ended. But in that moment, all 8 of her opponents were down.

“She hasn’t made any public appearances lately. She’s been keeping to herself… it’s too bad, I don’t know if I’ll be able to fight her.” Dante finally spoke, his own little brain trying to figure out her trick. “According to the intel our spies provided, she should be over 6 months pregnant.”

“Or dead.” Morris shook his head. “Mikal explained it to me- When you form a Dyad, you cease to exist as an individual. You share the essence of your soul, your EGO, with the other. When Julius Novachrono died, he broke her Ego. So…”

Dante’s eyes widened a little when he realized what Morris was about to say. Morris just let his voice trail off, because there was no reason to voice the inevitable.

She is wilting away. LIke a flower who has forgotten what the sun looked like.

“It’s a shame. She was getting so powerful.” Dante shook his head sadly, but couldn’t help but smile. “I really hoped I would get to fight her one day.”

Morris let out a chuckle. Dante, your mind dwells on the wrong things, sometimes. I don’t think you would want to fight her. “I suppose. I would have liked to research her powers… there might be something in there I can use. For now, I guess I can dream…”

Both men watched her form on the screen, again and again.

“And besides…”

“She’s very cute-” “She’s very cute-”

Dante and Morris both cut each other off. For the first time, Morris actually turned in his chair to face his superior, fear starting to register on his face. It wasn’t much, just a tinge, but it was more than Morris had felt in his entire life.

“Morris…” Dante’s smile was gone. “What did you just say?”

Morris gulped, feeling the hair on his arms standing on end. “...nothing. Nothing at all.”

After a few moments saturated with tension, Dante finally relaxed his frown into a grin. “That’s what I thought you said.” He reached down and slapped Morris on the shoulder, a little harder than could be considered friendly. Morris stiffened, watching as Dante turned to leave, his cloak flaring out dramatically.

“If I do get to fight the Wizard King… I will conquer her. Just like I conquer everything else.”

Dante’s eyes glimmered at the thought, the hope he held close to his heart.

“Meeting you… is going to be so much fun.~”

(a couple months later)

“All rise for her majesty, the 29th Wizard King!”

This is the same room where I was married, and where I was later crowned. But now, I feel none of the nervousness of that previous visit. I’ve walked this aisle many times, my head held high, a crown glimmering upon my hair, and my robe flowing behind me.

I am the Wizard King, and this is my court. This is where I sit on my throne.

These past few months have been dense with work, more work than I’ve ever had in my time as advisor. After accepting my fate, I threw myself into this position more deeply than ever before. There’s a whole kingdom of people who need help, and another whole kingdom about to attack us. But little by little, I chipped through the work with the help of Marx and Adeline, slowly but surely repairing the damage and making sure those who were hurt were well cared for. But even now, there are problems, which is why I keep my doors open to whoever needs help.

“Y-Your majesty…”

A pair of men stand before me, their hands clasped together to keep them from shaking. They look like peasants, and there’s fear glistening in their eyes.

“We’re very sorry to bother you… our town was lucky enough to receive aid, after all. But-” He gulped, his eyes flickering up to my neutral face, leaned up against my propped up hand. “The magic knights in our town are wreaking havoc… they steal our food, slack off… and they even harass the women. If it isn’t too much-”

“Remove them?” I ask, sitting up a little straighter on my throne. “Tell me, what squad did I send to your town?”

“T-The Purple Orcas, ma’am-”

“Oh, I see.” Of course it’s them… I’m sure Kaiser would have a fit if he knew, I think, letting out a tired sigh. “Well, in that case, your wish is granted. I’ll send for the immediate removal of troops. Should I replace them?”

The two men looked at each other excitedly before turning back to me. “No! We’ve mostly recovered, thanks to you, those knights were just taking advantage of our recovery.” They both bowed in unison, grins still shining on their faces. “Thank you, your majesty!”

I smile down at them, motioning for them to rise again. “No problem! It’s my job to ensure that every citizen in this city is safe.”

As they leave, the crowd murmurs angrily. For whatever reason, many people usually come to watch as I listen to those who have requests, probably just to gossip and jeer at me. I do my best to be a good King, but there’s always going to be people who hold my status against me. They still see me as nothing more than a consort, someone who used Julius for power. It couldn’t be further from the truth; there’s nothing I want more than for Julius to be sitting on this throne today.

“I can’t believe it! Who gave you the power to redistribute my funds in the treasury?”

Now a wealthy, noble merchant stands before me, with much less benevolence than the peasants. His face is red with anger, like a tomato about to split open with juice. “I put those riches in there to gain interest! I was supposed to get richer, not poorer!”

“Oh, you did get interest, though,” I tell him casually, smiling a bit to myself at how angry he is. “That’s all I took out of your funds, too. You know that the Kingdom has been suffering lately-”

“THE KINGDOM? My ass!” he cuts me off. “Sure, some towns out in the boonies got destroyed, but do I have to pay for their problems?!” He points at me accusingly. “That’s not right! You don’t have the right to do that!”

“Look-” I shake my head, letting out an exasperated sigh. The night sky outside signifies how long I’ve been here, hours at this point. I’m starting to get tired. “The interest I took was enough to feed a town of starving people. You’ll make it back soon. Can’t you be happy that you’re helping the greater good-”

“HELP?! Why do I have to suffer for them!” he yells again. “My life was perfect! Why should I care if-”

“SILENCE.” In an instant, I’m on my feet. The air around me suddenly crackles with mana, and I hold up my hand to let an orb of dangerously bright blue light gather there. The entire room vibrates, and the crowd cowers behind the man who dared to speak to me like that.

“Cut me off again… and I will cut you in half.”

I clench my fist, and the orb intensifies. The noble’s eyes are wide, and the strength in his knees finally gives out. He collapses, his head ducking down as his body wracks with tremors. “I-I’m sorry- please- have mercy-”

“Mercy?” I smile again, but my eyes are as empty as ever. “You would show no mercy to those below you either, right? So why should I care if you live or die?”

He doesn’t answer, just squeezes his eyes shut and accepts his fate.

Satisfied, I release my power, and the light disappears. With a sigh, I sit back down on the throne, crossing my legs once seated. I feel heavier than normal, and for good reason; My belly is swollen, life kicking around inside. It’s only been about 7 months, but with a clever magical strategy, I managed to accelerate the pregnancy by two months. So, any day now, I will be meeting Julius’s child.

“Don’t bother me with this nonsense again. Just be grateful that I’ve given your life more meaning than you’re capable of yourself. Goodbye.”

Finally, everyone leaves, still muttering about the display of power I decided to throw out.

“You really shouldn’t be so rash, they’re just going to hate you more.”

Adeline lectures me, as usual, as she holds my hand to help me up the stairs to our room. We moved into one of the empty rooms together. I don’t know why, but I didn’t feel like it was right to keep sleeping in the old bed. I still brought the robe with me, and it sits on a chair in the corner by the window. “One of these days, it’s going to come back to bite you.”

“Eh.” I shrug, not denying it. As things stand now, they’ll have to target another Wizard King soon. “I want to get through this Spade nonsense first before worrying about that.”

“Understandable.” Adeline leans over and gives me a kiss on the cheek. “Come on, you need to sleep.”

The two of us cuddle up under the blankets. I close my eyes and inhale her scent, a smile traced onto my lips. When we’re here, all alone, I almost forget about the world outside, and the fate within me.

However, the peace is short lived.

A scream rips through the early morning, jolting me from my trance. I sit up in a panic to see Adeline already awake, her eyes nearly bulging out of their sockets. A cold sweat coats her skin, and she’s shaking violently. “Adeline?! What’s wrong- hey-” I get cut off as she throws herself into my arms, bawling into my chest. I freeze up, not able to do much but stroke her hair awkwardly. I’m not the best at comforting people, since Julius was the one in charge of that back in the day. But slowly, Adeline starts to calm down, her sobs quieting. “So… a nightmare?”

“No… worse…” Adeline finally sits up, her eyes dilated with fear. “I… I got a flash.”

A flash….

Adeline’s Celestial Clairvoyance magic allows her to see flashes of the future, and sometimes those flashes come at random times, like when she’s asleep. I gulp nervously, my fingertips going cold. Usually these flashes help me in some way, but from the look in her eyes, I know this one is serious.

“What did you see?”

Adeline squeezes her eyes shut.

“Bones… bloodstained bones. Fire. Rotting flesh. And a tree… a huge tree being uprooted as an even larger one grows beneath it. And-” Her eyes pop open.

“A butterfly…”

My blood runs cold.

“Or maybe it was a moth…”

I take Adeline’s hand to distract her (and myself). “I see… I think I know what it means. Something we already knew.” I give her a strained smile. “War is coming… and soon.”

Slowly, Adeline nods. Somehow, I’ve managed to calm her down. “Right… right.” She glances over at the clock. “It’s early, but I’m going to get up. I don’t think I can sleep any longer.”

“Alright. I’ll do the same.”

Only fifteen minutes later, Marx comes bursting into the office, out of breath. “I have news from the Heart Kingdom- WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TWO DOING?!”

Adeline and I almost jump out of our skins at the sound of the voice. We freeze in our position. Of course he had to come running in as we decided to have a little make-out session, with me sitting up on the desk to reach her lips. My face heats up, and Adeline opens and closes her mouth trying to find an excuse. “Um… I was… feeling the baby?”

Marx lets out a rattling sigh before closing the door behind him. “Some things never change… anyway, the news from the Heart Kingdom-” He straightens up, looking worried. “They were attacked by a mobile fortress from the Spade Kingdom early this morning.”

“WHAT?!” My eyes widen and I hop off the desk immediately. “This morning!? What happened? Are we at war?”

“Not quite…” Marx sucks in a breath. “Our knights over there were able to stop them and even take over a border town. The situation deescalated so now we’re just waiting for the Spade Kingdom to retaliate.”

“Oh… oH!” I let myself relax. “That’s great news… hopefully this promises good things to come.”

“I hope so…” Marx looks at Adeline. “Come on, I have some work for you to do downstairs.”

“Awww, ok.” Adeline pouts before leaning in to give me a kiss. “See you later!”

“Yeah, of course!” I wave goodbye before sitting back down in my chair and pulling more paperwork towards me. The door shuts, and I am alone.

So… it’s going to end soon, right?

I reach down and rest my hand upon my belly.

I need to give birth to you before the war begins… so I can fight, and…

I close my eyes. Mana starts to course into my belly, time spinning around the baby gently. This is how I’ve sped up my pregnancy, bit by bit, not noticeable by anyone but myself. Any day now, I would be able to give birth.

And then, I smell blood. My eyes pop back open. I take my hand away from my stomach and reach up to wipe under my nose. Sure enough, a red streak comes with it.

Oh, fuck-

It hits me with as little warning as usual, the tidal wave of pain ripping through my head and through my soul. WIth a strangled cry, I spasm in my seat, my head thrown back against the head of the chair. The agony intensifies, this episode growing worse and worse with every moment. It happens infrequently, but over these last months it visits as a reminder of the fate ahead of me.

NO…. not yet…

I can feel what’s left of my soul desperately tugging itself away, desperately trying to die.

Just a little longer…

I clench my fist as lights pop at the corners of my vision.

I need… I need to die on the battlefield.

The lights get brighter, blinding me. A moth flutters towards me.

Not… YET…

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

“Oh god… oh god please wake up…”

Adeline’s voice eventually coaxes me back to life. I blink my eyes open to see her, Marx, and Owen standing above me with scared looks on their faces. “W-What happened?”

“You had another spasm episode,” Adeline tells me softly. “How do you feel?”

A spike of panic shoots through me. “T-The baby-”

“It’s fine, perfectly healthy,” Owen assures me. “I’m more worried about you.”

I gulp nervously at the way they’re looking at me. I can tell that they know I’m hiding something.

“Sorry… I can’t control the seizures. I’ll try and warn you next time I feel it coming on.”

Owen sighs. “Right… well, I need to run and check up on the others. I’m sure they’re also traumatized…”

“Traumatized?” I repeat. Owen stiffens up, and so do Marx and Adeline. The tension has grown, but for what reason? “Wait, what’s going on? How long was I out?”

“Hours…” Adeline whispers. Owen exchanges a glance with Marx before leaving. “It’s evening now… and… well…”

“There’s been a development.” Marx finishes her sentence as she trails off. “Listen… while you were out… there were more attacks. One in the Heart Kingdom and two here.”

My eyes widen, but he doesn’t give me a chance to talk.

“There are three devil hosts in the Spade Kingdom… they call themselves the Dark Triad. And…”

Adeline hangs her head, unable to look me in the eye.

“They kidnapped Lolopechika… and…”

There’s static in my ears. His next words are fuzzy.

“They took Yami and William, too.”

A huge tree is uprooted as an even larger one grows beneath it.

A moth flits through its branches.

Fate has arrived.

Uh oh.... next time, chapter 16: the shadows. Yami and William are gone, and the apocalypse has arrived. What is one supposed to do when the inevitable stands ahead of you? We'll see what our poor Wizard King decides to do...

#black clover #fic #triad #oc: lisa #bc oc

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spooner-the-trinity · 4 years

Text

How Infinity Train pulled from Infinity War’s Playbook for Doctor Who’s final curtain

Funding for Shaffrilas is provided by: Skillshare, the sponsor of today’s video. Stay tuned for a train ride to discountkosh at the end of the video.

O hai, Tetsuya Nomura. That’s a nice hole you’re digging with your Kingdom Hearts, what do you wanna do with it? Keep digging? Why thou? O for a production company? That’s great, whacha gonna do with it? Name and develop the town the Toy Story flicks take place in? Yeah, alright. Add the goofy jock from Glee as a best friend for Andy that the Triceratops assumes is just a Dinosaur Toy down the street? What a funny joke idea! Nix the final playtime they’ve hoped to cap off the film with and save it for a later project? A tad disappointing, but alright. Make Sora a vessel for Xehanort? Whoa, that sounds hella har- A sexy Genie of the Rose who grants a wish for every petal on that collar-mounted rose of hers? Unique concept, but I smell some Hans Christian Anderson shi- The genie’s life force is bound to the Rose so she croaks when the last petal falls ala Beauty and the Beast? And there it is, Color me unsurpri- The Genie finds Andy and drags him into a sex scene to the tune of Aladdin’s Friend Like Me? I don’t think the parents would be okay with their kids watchi- Toonami’s airing this show? Wait, isn’t it on a competing networ- Lewis from Meet the Robinsons is Deleted by DOR-15 Ala the Nanobots from Jimmy Neutron? Mister Enter would be insulted on how you did his favorite Disney flick dirty like thi- Andy is shot into a wormhole and is mutated into a photosensitive Beast? Guys, It’s starting to look like a bad ide- The Genie is an aged-up Bonnie and she’s pregnant with Shantae!? Get me off this crazy tr-

Infinity Train Productions is one of the boldest associates Disney has in its corner right now, from wrestling away ownership of three Gainax originals to collaborating with competing animation company Dreamworks, the IT guys are pretty renowned for their kooky crossovers and kookier cinematic universe. And they’ve made sure to make their acquired goods count towards that universe instead of burn it to the ground LUCASFILM. Starting off by stating this is a universe where Second Impact prevented the assassination of JFK by means of tanging up 13% of the world’s population and weaved a few stitches of train tracks across the globe, naturally the space race escalates exponentially and they begin to develop new technologies and elect Walt Disney himself to be the President of the United States with Nixon as his running mate. That alone resulted in a Sequel Show to Brigadoon where a 24-year-old Marin Asagi boards the Challenger and ends up cast into the future with Melan, a retelling of the first arc of Gurren Lagann that featured Yui Ikari as a supporting character that saves Kamina from death, a twenty-six episode miniseries featuring Andy from the Toy Story gaining a magical genie bound to an enchanted rose, and that’s just the first half of its initial decade. I could go on about its repertoire of shows both original and acquired: Twelve Forever, Evangelion, both Arcadia trilogies with the elder of the two being started by the aformentioned show with that genie of the rose titled, erm… Genie of the Rose, but the one I’m aiming my sights on is the latest acquisition, one that they made in secret. Doctor Who and how they pulled from the playbook of Infinity War to bring the story to its last stop.

Now, quick recap on how Infinity War makes a powerfully heartfelt mass market appeal joyride out of a thoroughly depressing story about failure. Where most Marvel Villains are merely obstacles for the characters to overcome, Thanos acts and reacts as a real person. Where most conflict have certain factors that tip the scales in the favor of who’s tipping them, the conflict is one where either side could come out victorious, where the Comedy of the Last Farcebender ended with the good guys laughing off their failure, Infinity War ended with a content smile from Thanos and our heroes dead silent save for a minor peep of: “Oh, god.” Where the bad decisions in Farcebender are made from genuine stupidity, Infinity War’s stem from worrying whether or not certain sacrifices are worth it. With that crash course out of the way, let’s dig in.

First thing’s first, is the villain a compelling character? Well, although Sacha Dhawan has the same unhinged energy expected out of any incarnation of longtime enemy, the Master, complete with moments of geniuine affection to his former best beff, he’s ultimately not the main baddie of this piece, that honor goes to Alrick. Believed to be dead after a dirtbike accident, it turns out that he had been picked up by the train and has spent a good three decades or so fucking with the systems to construct an empire starting with the crazy world of Elmore all the way to the Lanes Between and yes, he has shown himself to be a caring father figure to Grace and Simon throughout the second half of Cracked Reflections which leads into the episode, he’s concerned for his future as he’s clearly not as lively as he was when he first climbed aboard and even expresses hope for Jesse returning to the train after taking the exit and getting seperated from MT. And oh, look! He returns after the big moment, that’s nice.

So yeah, compelling villain, that’s one tick. Is there equal opportunity for either side to win? Well, MT and early on Jesse before his aformentioned exit have the additional assistance of the Watterson family, Banana Joe, and seemingly Penny for a scene only to reveal her in a new shell complete with mind-control and reflective surface to sick the Po-Po on MT. But despite being the protagonist of his show of origin, she’s not the opposing side to Alrick this time around, it’s the wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey biatch herself and man, does it set up a curious comparison. Alrick is focusing his will into projecting his consciousness into the Doctor’s heart, an alien with countless eons worth of memories under her belt compared to Alrick’s measly sixtysomeodd laps around the sun. Not only that, but the Doctor is able to expel regeneration energy to fry the shit out of him if he feels the need to get a little messy. But with her locked up in the Time Lord Matrix which the Master has already skimmed through, there’s nowhere for the Doctor to run or even hide from Alrick. Throw in the Master’s ability to have his mind occupy two hearts at the same time whilst he’s chatting it up with the Lone Cyberman and the Doctor’s pretty pinned but still has a chance to outfox Alrick at the end of it all.

Bad decisions, the Doctor doesn’t trade lives so she keeps asking about the Timeless Child, what it’s supposed to be and why it drove the Master into absolutely butchering Galifrey after all the hard work each incarnation of the Doctor had. It turns out that this Timeless Child was a Pheonix Denizen created by Alrick to create a perfect world but One-One cast it out in hard-light beam form, striking Takeru and Ryou from This Ugly Yet Beautiful World from 2018. From the clipped wings came Hikari and Akari respectively whilst the main body crashed out of a wormhole into the sights of Tecteun who adopted the kid in time for a spaceship of highly-evolved snake people to crash land due to Kate and Leopold rules of time travel causing their machinery to get mucked up by Time Police in an episode of Rick and Morty of all shows, causing the child to fall to its doom and promptly regenerate, making her the first to do so in Galifreyan history. One of the survivors offers the gift of Time Travel in exchange for the power of Regeneration and Tecteun, scientist and explorer, jumps at the chance by means of tearing out the child’s soul for every three days that elapse. Obviously, she’s a fucking monster and she eventually does crack the code and test it on herself and the results allow the gift of time travel to bestowed upon the newly minted Timelords by Omega. Wow, all of this from a formally great show, (Doofenshmertz: what are the odds.) The Doctor is obviously unsurprised that Omega dangled the keys to time travel over the heads of the Shobagan race, but what horrifies her is that the very thing she and every other Time Lord we’ve seen had taken for granted was pilfered from a denizen that she learns after the life of abuse was created by some dude who hijacked some Train Car manufacturing equipment to build a perfect world. And it’s here where we see the main lynchpin of Alrick’s character: Perfection.

Those of you who’ve seen the whole series of Cracked Reflections will know that Alrick is an obsessive perfectionist first and foremost hence the plan to transform every Denizen of Elmore into full-blooded humans with leftover energy from this same Timeless Child. But not many of us recognize that this is only part of Alrick’s shtick. A simple man with complicated motives, a futurist in the trade of nostalgia, a conservative obsessed with progress, a gentle mentor with an impatient temper. These are just a handful of the ways to describe Walt Disney that were used by Ben Bouqulet, Mic Graves, and Owen Dennis to depict Alrick over the course of the last two seasons of Gumball leading into Cracked Reflections and Garrick Hagon truly gives his all portraying all the various shades of this man especially here when he is sharing his story of how he created a literal god only for One-One to cast it aside upon regaining control of the train from the very woman he spent the past 33 years building a perfect world for, a woman he cherishes like his older sister cherished his girlhood friend, a woman that even now still believes him to be ‘One-One: Gone forever?’ That is some next level tragic shit right there.

Of course, the Doctor is still concerned for this child and it’s here where a familiar face crashes the party to let the cat out of the bag, Morbius from the Fourth Doctor Adventure Brain of Morbius outing himself as the infamous Timeless Child as well as harboring his disembodied heart in the Doctor after his ill-fated Mindbending Battle. This swerve may have served to provide added tension towards his motives, is he really wanting to go back to his home and views traveling with the Doctor as his only way there, or is he biding his time, waiting for his chance to overwhelm the Doctor when she’s not looking. As we see more of Morby’s checkered past in excruciating detail, slavery to the Division with everything down to his personality programmed and dictated into a mind-melded Morby by an enigmatic cult dubbed ‘The Master Writers’ An organization build solely and specifically for Infinity Train Productions to use in their portfolio of works. And when they were done with their enslaved progenetor, the Division in which they served lined him up for an execution from the Fugitive Doctor, during the 2nd Doctor’s orientation. Then they promptly merc poor Ruthie to regenerate her into the 3rd Doctor, closing the gap between Troughton and Pertwee. So yeah, The Division, they’re run by total assholes and Numero Dos only agrees to work there if his first assistant is longtime companion Jamie McCrimmon. But look at his face, does this look like the face of concent and tolerance to you? ‘Joe (Help, I’m a Fish!): Of course not!’ Props to Sam the Man with a Plan Troughton for filling his father’s shoes in this emotionally tense scene. And this ain’t the chilling twist that shocked the fandom.

Alrick: “Whoever harbors the heart of the child is the child in of itself.“

Doctor: “Wot?”

Alrick: “It means that I will have my prize whether you like it or not!” (Punches through the Doctor’s Chest, crushes the Smash Ball within, causing the Doctor to turn into a pheonix before dissipating into Alrick’s body with the Smash Ball. Alrick’s Number skyrockets as his body regresses to his prime, the man laughing maniacally as the Timeless Child’s ultimate power rushes into him)

So yeah, Morby’s been reconstituting his powers over the centuries the Doctor had lived hence the golden energy during the later regenerations. How we find this out is by the titular character of the BBC’s last remaining reason towards that sweet TV Licence Money getting outright merced by Alrick in front of a guy that deep down still admires his childhood friend. This closes out An Untimely Caviat, the final episode in Doctor Who’s revived series, and leads us right into the finale of Cracked Reflection where he goes full on Disney Villain. Mercing the Master to make him a conduit to gijinkafy the entirety of Elmore, Co-Opting his Cybermaster drones as a mechanical army, ludiccrous speed incubating a pocket-dimension frog to house the Train Cars his empire had conquered via that same energy he channeled through the aformentioned Master, yeah, this does not sound like the man Amelia planned to marry if not had already married outright. Well, that’s the point. He’s drunk with power, it’s more likely that this is his ambition talking. No doubt he’s relishing in his own arrogance much to Marnie’s horror. Oh, yeah, Old Marnie’s doing her astral projection thing to react to her younger brother’s madness and watches on as MT gets roughed up by Super Alrick in front of an audience of his adopted children.

Of course, MT does find some santuary in the Number Car and re-unites with Jesse, resulting in the now sempailess Agent Sieve phasing through the glass screen whilst the train is figuring out how to solve Jesse’s seemingly unsolvable problem of getting a denizen off the train. But that just gives the Fleck some time to witness the madness of this rumored Apex fella as he ankleholds MT and gijinkafies Gumball and Darwin to demonstrate his final offer, her response is to break out a Denizen Ex Machina by prompting Alan Dracula to slice the monkeyfigher in half, causing him to regenerate into a pair of innocent, mindless little babies that will never bother anyone ever again… The Crown grieve for their master, Sieve calls off the manhunt for the rouge slither, the companions go their seperate ways with Graham staying on Earth to deliver the bad news the two youngest raising the two babies up to the Doctor’s standard… or at least one of them due to Yaz getting arrested by a Judoon Platoon before she could legally adopt Zarc. The expression of the companions are grim, and rightfully so, the one guy-or-gal that has kept the 21st century from falling into tyranny is no longer around to do the job they enjoyed doing whenever there was a sitch to see through. But after the wide shot of Yaz getting locked up in Shada we cut to MT, off the train and safe with Jesse in Arizona. Jesse’s brother Nate comes up to find his older brother with the very Chrome Girl he met on a magical train, Nate asks for the girl’s name and her answer?

Jesse: Dracula 2?

MT: (looks to the Lake, concerned that the Flecks would come after her but eases up when its clear that there are no Flecks coming.) I’m Lake.

We get a nice little callback to close out the series as the song Kibō plays in the credits, indicating that Hope is still out there in the cosmos, Doctor or No Doctor. And that is a powerful message to send to the audience and I have a pretty good feeling that whether or not the Doctor ends up getting revived in Kingdom Hearts III alongside all the absent heroes that Infinity Train productions had raked in over the years doesn’t quite matter, the studio does not need Doctor Who and its universe does not need the Doctor. And I have a pretty good feeling that the Doc may end up giving up their ticket back into the land of the living, leaving the universe to all the other champions of the cosmos that Toonami has flaunted over the decades. The Doctor has overcome many frightening, haunting, tyrannical, violent and downright Orwellian things in life and man, oh, man have we got a whole plate of them to overcome even now. Would I go back to this expansive world for further analysis, sure, if the views get gud. But the impact of the Doctor’s Death is a pretty big deal that actually caught a bunch of us by surprise despite the minor hints scattered throughout. (One-One: All aboard for emotional maturation on the finest freighter in all of Trenzalore) The Destiny of the Doctor News heard around the world, and the outpour of memories and grief rivalling even Mr. Peanut but unlike the legendary legume, our favorite timelord will probably be gone for a lot longer than just a couple of weeks and the time it takes will show how deep the rabbit hole goes. It will also show who’s willing to step up and find ways to make a difference in the lives of others, and they’re going to need to learn a thing or two to do so. (Cletus from the Simpsons Movie with the Skillshare Logo slapped onto his face in post: My time to shine.)

#schaffrillas productions #Doctor Who #Infinity Train #The Amazing World of Gumball #Timeless Child #Alrick #submission

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artemis-entreri · 5 years

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[[ This post contains Part 5 of my review/analysis of the Forgotten Realms/Drizzt novel, Boundless, by R. A. Salvatore. As such, the entirety of this post’s content is OOC. ]]

Genre: Fantasy

Series: Generations: Book 2 | Legend of Drizzt #35 (#32 if not counting The Sellswords)

Publisher: Harper Collins (September 10, 2019)

My Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Additional Information: Artwork for the cover of Boundless and used above is originally done by Aleks Melnik. This post CONTAINS SPOILERS. Furthermore, this discussion concerns topics that I am very passionate about, and as such, at times I do use strong language. Read and expand the cut at your own discretion.

Contents:

Introduction

I. Positives I.1 Pure Positives I.2 Muddled Positives

II. Mediocre Writing Style II.1 Bad Descriptions II.2 Salvatorisms II.3 Laborious “Action”

III. Poor Characterization III.1 “Maestro” III.2 Lieutenant III.3 Barbarian III.4 “Hero” III.5 Mother

IV. World Breaks IV.1 Blinders Against the Greater World IV.2 Befuddlement of Earth and Toril IV.3 Self-Inconsistency IV.4 Dungeon Amateur IV.5 Utter Nonsense

V. Ego Stroking (you are here) V.1 The Ineffable Companions of the Hall V.2 Me, Myself, and I

VI. Problematic Themes VI.1 No Homo VI.2 Disrespect of Women VI.3 Social-normalization VI.4 Eugenics

VII. What’s Next VII.1 Drizzt Ascends to Godhood VII.2 Profane Redemption VII.3 Passing the Torch VII.4 Don’t Notice Me Senpai

Ego Stroking

Before Timeless, each new Drizzt novel release reached a new level of self-congratulation and selling out. After a one book break with Timeless, Boundless hops right back on the proverbial horse and charges to new distances.

The Ineffable Companions of the Hall

As mentioned in the previous section, Drizzt's awesomeness has increased yet again. It isn't quite clear what specifically is going on with him and what specific abilities he's using from his new multi-classing, but one thing is evident: Drizzt is way more than what he should be. I suppose this follows tradition, but it's past the point of ridiculous. While something like Drizzt's monk training helping him run more efficiently is plausible even at level one as long as it also isn't making him run faster, which is an ability monks do not gain until level two, the feat that Drizzt performs at the end of the novel isn't even a monk ability, at least not in the current D&D edition. Drizzt eludes a creature that wouldn't stop chasing him so long as they both exist on the same plane, and having stripped himself down to his underclothes, Drizzt has only his own body with which to perform his feat. The feat he performs is more on the level of Grandmaster Kane, who transcended death long ago and doesn't seem to even need his corporeal form anymore. Drizzt literally vanishes into nothing, and the creature chasing him returns to its home plane after its supernatural senses verify that Drizzt indeed no longer existed on the Prime anymore. So, several possibilities exist here, lets examine a few. First, Drizzt's awesomeness somehow negated a fundamental aspect of a very powerful creature that he couldn't defeat in combat. Second, Drizzt performed the astral projection portion of the level eighteen monk ability Empty Body. Third, Drizzt performed the twentieth level ability Psionic Body of the imbalanced and not yet official Mystic class from Unearthed Arcana. Fourth, Drizzt's sheer amazingness allowed him to transcend the mortal world and spontaneously become a Jedi master. The first of these possibilities is the least trite, but is still inherently based on a cheap tactic. I am legitimately afraid of what Salvatore is going to tell us about what happened. The creature pursuing Drizzt is a Retriever, with a challenge rating of fourteen. Yet, in Boundless, they are presented to be much more than that, on par with the demon lords and feared by lesser demons. In D&D canon, even a normal marilith poses a greater danger than a Retriever, and Drizzt had managed to singlehandedly defeat the greatest of that class of demon, the Maritlith who gave its name to its type. A Retriever, in comparison, should be no problem at all for him, but Salvatore inflates the power level of an established creature in order to create drama and suspense rather than coming up with something more original, or doing more research and finding something of an appropriate power level to use. The second possibility shouldn't be viable at all, the only reason aside from making his character and hence himself awesome through it is a story arc for the characters to recover or recreate Drizzt body and relocating his soul to put back into it. The third possibility I named is just really nothing short of Salvatore signing his name in an ugly sharpie across the tapestry of the Realms. Even though Grandmaster Kane was his creation too, apparently, Drizzt has to be the best, even among his own. The fourth option? Well, that one seems like it might be the most likely after all. I mean Salvatore does have an in with the Star Wars community... and wouldn't we all want Drizzt to dual-wield light sabers? The self-congratulation doesn't stop with Drizzt. The Companions of the Hall, in addition to being great heroes, apparently also have to be extremely physically attractive. This has already been done to death with Drizzt and Catt-brie, and in Boundless we're reminded a number of times of how hot Wulfgar is, but absent of this treatment thus far is Regis and Bruenor. I think Salvatore realizes that perhaps even his most fervent fans might raise an eyebrow if he pimped out Bruenor, or perhaps he doesn't have the stomach to do so for a character who's basically a very muscular, short and hirsute man. That said, it's not like he hasn't tried, for Bruenor has two wives instead of one after all. In Boundless, the circle is complete with Regis, who previously was a chubby (and hence unattractive) halfling. Now, he is described as a "quite striking figure" and "quite the dashing figure", wearing fancy clothes and equipment whilst rakishly having his "vest undone just enough to hint at another weapon he carried beneath it". Regis is so arresting that the disciplined and task-focused Dahlia "fancied she might comb her hair in her reflection" in the shiny silver buckles of his boots. Regis might've been a plump and greedy glutton with a heart of gold in his previous life, but no more. Now, he fits in with and stands beside the rest of his group in equal beauty, because apparently, it isn't enough for heroes to heroically kick people when they are down. They have to be look good while doing so too, or at least, Salvatore's heroes need to be best in all aspects.

As is routine with Drizzt's journal entries, there is much sanctimonious preaching. In Boundless, Drizzt lectures about tradition and the perils of following problematic traditions. Yet, Drizzt doesn't break from tradition himself, as though he, through being who he is, is absent from even that which he himself cautions about. In the opening to part three, Drizzt extols the dwarves for constantly searching for new tunnels to mine, Wulfgar for overcoming the sexist conditioning of his tribe, and the halflings of Bleeding Vines for the malleability of their society. Yet, he continues to hold fast to his intolerance of Zaknafein and his conviction of there being only one right path, namely, the one tread by him. This really makes him more akin to the unchanging Lolthite society of Menzoberranzan, the atrocious practices of the Prisoner's Carnival, and the insular elves who turn away refugees from their shelter, all things which he condemns. Drizzt, of course, is a fictional character, and these entries are Salvatore's words. The thing that is nearly unique about Drizzt in these novels is that he tends to present a more or less consistent stance and voice and this is still the case. Other characters are markedly less consistent, and I suspect this is driven by the fact that they are more purely whole cloth creations of Salvatores. This leads me to believe that Drizzt acts as Salvatore's perhaps unconscious spokesman, and that these ideas spouted by Drizzt are Salvatore's own ideas. If so, he is attempting to give them more validity by having them spouted by a "hero", and specifically one that he continues to build up to ridiculous levels.

Me, Myself, and I

Zaknafein, whom we're told on numerous occasions is so expert that he is pure grace with no wasted moves, is remarkably showy. During the recreational cavern-jumping sequence of the past timeline as well as the fleeing of the demons of the present timeline, Zaknafein's free-running style is more typical of a YouTube parkour performer. There are a lot of unnecessary flips, as though Salvatore in fact used a YouTube video for his writing guideline. Traceurs perform all the acrobatic feats that they do in their videos because it's more entertaining than if they simply followed the most efficient strategies for navigating a route. There's much of pointless flipping in those videos, such as running up a wall and back-flipping off of it only to climb that same wall again. Salvatore's describes Zaknafein doing a lot of similar things, with back-flipping off of stalagmites when he could just jump across, or running up surfaces that he doesn't need to run up in the first place to perform the subsequent moves. The specifics of Zaknafein's blade work is harder to comment on, as it's weighed down by Salvatore's tedious need to walk through the moves as though he were making a grocery list, but the amount of leaping and turning serving nothing but to offer his opponents openings makes the fight scenes reminiscent of old Chinese martial arts movies, where the combatants spent most of their time somersaulting at each other than exchanging blows. I believe Salvatore fancies himself a master of writing combat, for much of Boundless showcases his combat and action scenes, this is an inconvenient truth for those that would like to agree with Mr. Salvatore about his mastery. R. A. Salvatore might not be able to remember details of the greater world nor bother to spend the time to look them up, but he certainly will toot his own horn and reference his own work as though it's the only thing written in the Realms. The Stone of Tymora trilogy, penned by him and his son, Geno Salvatore, is a loose spin-off from the Drizzt series, featuring protagonists with less relation to the dark elf books than the cast of The Cleric Quintet. Yet, we're to believe that the, objectively speaking in the greater scope of the shared world, insignificant events have sent ripples that are still felt a hundred years later. The not-so-inconspicuously named ship, Joen's Heirloom, just so happens to be the trusty vessel boarded by one of the exalted heroes of the Companions of the Hall as well as the co-leader of Bregan D'aerthe. Joen is the co-star of that trilogy and eventually rises to become a minor pirate queen. Maimun, the main protagonist, and Joen were last seen during the Transitions trilogy, mourning the passing of Deudermont. The demon controlling Brevindon Margaster, a key figure in the noble Waterdhavian house that is consorting with demons, is a cambion named Asbeel. Asbeel is the name of yet another character from the Stone of Tymora trilogy, specifically, the main antagonist of the series. The last we saw of that Asbeel was being stabbed through the heart after the magic that was keeping him immortal was broken. In addition, that Asbeel, although cursed to appear with the visage of a demon whenever he wasn't in a shrine of Beshaba or Tymora, was fundamentally a moon elf. The Asbeel in Boundless is described as a cambion. Yet, this cambion possesses a "melodic and high-pitched" voice, specifically, "the voice of an elf, but twisted and grating". It seems to be no coincidence, especially considering that the description of Asbeel's sword in Stowaway, the first book of the Stone of Tymora series, is as follows: "Black iron, the blade was longer than Perrault was tall, and the whole length of it curved. The convex edge, the sharp side, was wickedly serrated, with bright red barbs lining its length. Even the hilt looked capable of killing. Its crosspiece of twisted metal spikes, a dozen perhaps, jutted at odd angles, and several more spikes stuck out beneath the demon's red hand where a pommel should have been. More frightening still, the length of the blade blazed with red flame." Meanwhile, the blade wielded by Brevindon Margaster, specifically stated by the text to be "Asbeel's sword", is described as, "a black blade" as well as, "a curving, viciously serrated bastard sword with a handle of jagged spikes that cut into his hands when he wielded it". It seems pretty clear that these two weapons are the same, even if the one that appears in Boundless is "completed in the town of Port Llast after the sacking" that had occurred earlier in the novel. Perhaps Asbeel was "reforged" in some way too for the purpose of this Generations trilogy, but another thing becomes, I believe, very clear: that Salvatore took time to reference other material, which is something he most certainly hasn't done recently to the works of others, and oftentimes not even to his own earlier books. Yet, what makes the Stone of Tymora series an exception? I suspect that his special treatment of it, as well as the name of the current trilogy, hints at the reason, which I'll go into further in the speculations section. Either way, it's yet another example of Salvatore exalting, or, at the very least, recognizing himself.

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creative-type · 6 years

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How Fullmetal Alchemist Integrates Theme and Character

In a world where everything is subjective and polarizing opinions are the norm, where anti-fans and trolls take ‘love to hate’ a little too far, and where any story popular enough to become a pop-culture phenomenon is almost guaranteed to have a small-but-vocal minority that can’t see what all the fuss is about, I have never once seen, read, or heard of anyone say that Fullmetal Alchemist is a bad story.

None.

I’m sure they exist, but during the course of its run Fullmetal Alchemist reached the rarefied air of being almost universally beloved within the manga/anime community and being critically acclaimed as a damn good story. This success is wholly deserved. Arakawa was able to do something that a lot of shonen mangaka can’t, and as a result Fullmetal Alchemist is one of the best plotted, tightly written manga I have ever read.

Others have and will write about the philosophy Arakawa presents, point out the incredible amount of research she was able to cram into her series, extrapolate on the world building better than I could, but today I want to talk about something I’ve not seen anyone else touch on, and that’s how she integrates her themes into her characterization in order to really drive the point she’s trying to make home.

So what’s the main theme of Fullmetal Alchemist? Luckily Arakawa tells us directly on the next to last page of the series.

So let’s pick this apart a little bit

There is nothing to be learned in a lesson without pain, because you can’t gain anything without losing something in exchange. But when you overcome that pain and make the lesson your own you will obtain an infallible, irreplaceable fullmetal heart.

Now since this is a comic we also have to take the image itself into account. None of the photos are of just one person. Even the dog managed to have puppies. So we can assume that the idea of community is also integral to what Arakawa’s trying to say here (I hesitate to say friendship, because, well, not all of these guys are friends, lol). Also, during Edward’s final showdown with Truth he states he’ll make due without his alchemy so long as he’s still got other people he can rely on

And Truth’s response is basically “Ding ding! You finally get it! Go claim your prize at the door, I never want to see your ugly mug again.”

(I don’t know Japanese, but I’m pretty sure that’s an accurate translation)

At its barest bones Fullmetal Alchemist is about overcoming past mistakes with the help of others. This is all fine and dandy, but without proper execution they just become empty words pasted onto the final pages in a halfhearted attempt at depth. I think most people know of stories about sacrificial love where there is neither meaningful sacrifice nor a healthy portrayal of love, or stories about overcoming overwhelming odds through the power of hard work and effort where every victory is handed over on a silver platter of asspulls and accelerated training arcs. It doesn’t matter how good something sounds if the execution sucks.

With that in mind, let’s look at some of the characters of Fullmetal Achemist and the mistakes they’ve made.

Fullmetal Alchemist: A Series of Terrible People Trying to Become Less Terrible

So this one is super easy. We’re presented with our lovable protagonists’s first major screw up on chapter 1, page 1

Oh look, it’s that quote again. Golly gee willikers, it’s almost as if Awakara knew what story she wanted to tell and integrated the main theme from the very beginning.

It’s not terribly uncommon for a manga to make some sort of thesis statement during their first chapter, but from the (few) long-running serializations I’ve read, the longer a series runs the more muddled these things get as far as theme and narrative go. It’s one of the difficult things about trying to keep an audience engaged over a long period of time.

Fullmetal Alchemist is more tightly plotted than most shonen affairs, but there’s another thing that helps it keep from undercutting its own themes, and that’s that it lets its protagonists actually make terrible mistakes, and more importantly makes them suffer because of it.

The Elric’s attempt to resurrect their mother is never treated as anything but a horrible thing that never should have happened. Yes, the boys’s plight is sympathetic and the loss of their mother after their father abandoned the family was a tragedy, but they were told time and time again that human transformation was not only impossible, but forbidden

Of course the Elric brothers don’t listen, because otherwise there wouldn’t be a series. It cannot be overstated that they purposefully kept their plans secret. They didn’t tell Winry or Izumi or any one else that they were going to try to revive their mother. Perhaps they don’t feel like they can talk to anyone about their grief, but there’s also a definite hubris involved. Edward and Alphonse -- but especially Edward -- think they can accomplish something “adults” have found impossible.

Perhaps if they had talked to Izumi more she would have been able to guide them through their time of grief, but it goes back to one of the main themes of the series: Camaraderie, doing things together, trusting your friends, community as apposed to isolation. The Elric brothers lock themselves away to their father’s dark library and perform illegal experiments in their basement -- hidden from anyone who might try to stop them.

And they suffer for it.

(Keep in mind the word ignorant. We’ll be coming back to it later.)

This in and of itself is good, but this message is hammered home by the supporting cast, especially the characters from the military. Remember Roy Mustang, suave up-and-comer who wants to completely reform the government from the inside out for the betterment of the people?

Complicit in genocide

His number 2, all around team mom, and rescuer of cute puppies?

Complicit in genocide

Husband of the year and eternal winner of Best Dad Joke?

Complicit in genocide

Human teddy bear, series aesthete, and walking meme generator?

Complicit in genocide

The beloved small-town doctor?

Complicit in genocide and human experimentation

The grumpy curmudgeon with a hidden heart of gold?

Say it with me now, complicit in freaking genocide.

That’s just looking at Armestrian military during the civil war. When the series jumps to the present day we see Scar has become a serial killer, while midway through the series Ling willingly becomes the vessel for an inhuman monster, nearly loosing his identity in the process. Hohenheim abandoned his family and was (unwittingly) complicit in a genocide of his own. In her grief Izumi tried to bring back her dead child via human transmutation, violating one of the fundamental laws of alchemy. The list goes on.

It is impossible to fully implement a theme of overcoming past mistakes without having characters be fully responsible for said mistakes. I feel like it’s a common trap to sacrifice likability for pathos. How easy would it have been to say that Ed and Al couldn’t be held responsible for their actions because they weren’t aware of the consequences, or had never been told that human transformation was forbidden? How easy would it have been to say that the military made Roy and Riza and the rest participate in the Ishvalan massacre?

Luckily the writing never goes this route. While the various characters might not fully understand the ultimate outcome of their choices they never have their agency stripped away by something outside of their control. Each and every character in the series thinks they’re doing the right thing by acting the way they do, which not only makes them feel human as characters but brings me neatly into my second point.

Overcoming Ignorance and Finding Truth

During the Ishvalan flashback we see both Roy and Riza give their initial reason for joining the military, citing their desire to protect others as one of their main motivations.

Edward and Alphonse were young children when their mother died, and their desire to bring her back stems from a child’s love. Izumi and Sig had struggled for years for a child, and the grief of losing a baby after longing for a family for so long led her to try to resurrect her child.

None of these desires are in and of themselves bad, but they stem from a place of ignorance. Attempting human transmutation was forbidden for a reason. The military ended up not being as altruistic as the young soldiers were led to believe. The world, which our main characters looked at as a simple, understandable thing, turned out to be complex, and hard, and unforgiving.

With their worldviews essentially shattered it would have been easy to give up or give in to the darkness that they had seen, but instead each main character decides to take full ownership of their mistakes and takes steps to correct them.

There are very few irredeemable bad guys in Fullmetal Alchemist, and it’s a series that ultimately has a very hopeful view on humanity. Because of this underlying philosophy people are not ruined or broken by their pasts, but rather learn from them.

This is the Truth that is presented. It’s not facts or book knowledge, which any alchemist capable of performing human transmutation would have in spades, but growth through life experience. Ed and Al see firsthand the evils alchemy can commit and strive to correct them. Roy and Riza stare down the barrel of the military machine and seek to dismantle it, even if it results in their own undoing. Ling learns to recognize the futility of his country’s current clan system and seeks to protect even the weakest of his people. It takes awhile, but Scar realizes that vengeance can only breed violence and strives to rebuild his people instead of the destruction of those who killed them in the first place.

None of these goals can be accomplished alone, building on the theme of camaraderie, but there’s also the side effect of preventing others from going down their path.

That is Fullmetal Alchemist in a nutshell. It’s a series about flawed people making horrible mistakes, overcoming them with the help of their friends and in turn preventing others going down that dark path of destruction. It’s not a smooth transition, and the lessons learned are full of pain, but in the end you’ll find your own Truth and come out the other side a better person. The rest is just gravy.

Although I will concede that having a main character who can turn his arm into a knife probably helps.

#Fullmetal Alchemist #Edward Elric #Alphonse Elric #creative-type analyzes #character analysis #Roy Mustang #Riza Hawkeye #Ling #character writing #Scar

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linkspooky · 6 years

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Do you think Kaneki is, finally, ready to win against Furuta? Or against any other enemy?

I seem to be in the minority opinion about this, but when has that stopped me before.

I don’t think it’s actually about winning or losing a fight. Let’s start with Kaneki’s attitude towards this fight. A lot of people are reading this as a change in attitude because Kaneki is finally shutting Furuta out and not falling for his barbs.

However, since when has Kaneki literally ever engaged with Furuta at all. Let’s go back seventy chapters ago to their first confrontation.

Kaneki’s basically checked out the entire conversation. Furuta describes in great detail that the Washuu family were raising child soldiers, and breeding them since birth for this purpose and Kaneki’s first response is “Wait, why would you want to go so far just for Rize?”

Like yep, I’m sure the only reason Furuta is doing all of this is because of Rize. It has nothing to do with the CCG using child soldiers for profit, and the fact that many humans have profitted and gained off of the war that he’s been suffering through his entire life, and the war that he only exists to become fodder for.

Kaneki hears the fact that the Washuu were slaughtered, he knows Arima somebody he cares about lived a horrible life full of regret that led him to suicide specifically because of the Washuu, and he gets explained by Furuta that the Washuu were specifically raising a breeding garden of people just like Arima for their own gain… and he’s still like…

Why would Furuta possibly want to slaughter the Washuu and seize control? He wanted to talk with the Washuu more than he did with someone like Furuta, one of their victims.

This isn’t to bash Kaneki though it’s just to prove a point that Kaneki does not empathize with Furuta in the least. Which is why he doesn’t understand him.

Kaneki’s never empathized even the least bit with Furuta either. He was partners with the much more likeable Furuta who only ran paperwork and followed Kijima as his aide, and seemed annoyed by his existence and barely communicated with him besides exchanging quips.

Ishida made them partners for a reason though. This is set up, he’s established again and again that Furuta and Kaneki are connected, but at the same time Kaneki will never empathize with him.

The reason why though isn’t because they’re too different, but rather too similiar. Furuta is all of Kaneki’s ugliness, but expressed rather than repressed. He’s the part of Kaneki that treats people like emotional outlets for his own issues and objectifies them. The everyone must love me and die part, that ruled so much of reaperneki’s tragic existence.

So, there are some people who think that Kaneki is going to defeat Furuta finally and have a moment of triumph where he overcomes a great foe with the power of friendship or whatever. That’s fine, but I also think those people tend to just see Furuta as a plot tumor who is just a really good villain and a despicable person who exists as a plot reason for the characters to be driven to tragedy.

My own reading is that Furuta and Kaneki are meant to be compared and connected, and that Furuta is not Kaneki’s greatest enemy, but rather his greatest shadow. The shadow isn’t something you can destroy though. It’s something that you accept when you look at it honestly.

Arima and Eto are people who Kaneki once feared and could not empathize with. Arima was an entity he did not understand at all. Kaneki’s defeat of Eto wasn’t a triumph, it was the beginning of his start of darkness in the reaper arc.

However, his second encounters with both Arima and Eto did not end with Kaneki winning a fight but rather with him learning to empathize with them both. Then they, as much as they had hurt him with their machinations, also became a part of his motivation.

So, why would defeating Furuta in a fist fight suddenly become the crowning moment of triumph in his arc? Is it because Furuta’s absolutely evil and the embodiment of the evil system the Washuu made whose forgone all self improvement and instead steals away the agency of others?

But… how is this different than Arima and Eto? Arima, Eto and Furuta are all the same kind of broken revolutionary, too broken to do anything but destroy the world that created them.

Even the thing. The big thing. The thing that everybody says marks Furuta as pure evil, dropping the crossbeams on Rize and harvesting her. Eto was literally going to do the exact same thing and tube Rize, she had Aogiri hunting her for that exact purpose. When she couldn’t get Rize, she then did the same thing to her father, who she also had an emotional attachment too and a feeling of abandonment for the same way Furuta had for Rize. Arima is the reason Rize was brought back to V. He did so under Kaiko’s orders, because that’s how Arima operated as a revolutionary. He still followed the orders of the Washuu and still killed and killed because that’s all he saw himself capable of doing. He didn’t orchestrate a master rebellion behind the scenes that secretly destroyed the Washuu while they were turning a blind eye and thinking him obedient. Furuta did that. Arima just set himself up to be a sacrifice for the new world, because he couldn’t see himself as being anything better than what he was.

So what will be gained by just silently smacking down Furuta as a one dimensional final villain? Nothing much in a manga where all of the fights are won by empathy.

My point is not to excuse Furuta’s actions but rather point out that he is a character in this narrative the same as anybody else, and he shares similiar flaws with Arima and Eto for a reason.

If there are sympathetic parts to what Arima and Eto did despite all of the bad they did, then logically there should be for Furuta to. Kaneki’s quest isn’t one to defeat villains, it’s to learn and understand them and see them as humans.

The real villain is the force of othering that would reduce a complex person like Furuta down to the narrative role of just a villain out to destroy everything.

#metasks #I know I'm not in the majority opinion but whatever I calls them as I sees them #longoodbye

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noveltyreads · 3 years

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Defending the Galaxy (Sentinels of the Galaxy #3) by Maria V Snyder Book Review

Potential spoilers for Navigating the Stars and Chasing the Shadows below ARC kindly provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review After about 3 years, it's crazy to think this series is over. I read the first book way back in 2019 and re read it again last year and in a way, it kinda feels like I've seen each book grow over time. Having recently binge-read the series, I have seen the character development, particularly with Lyra, change over the course of the three books. In Navigating The Stars, I found Lyra to be annoying and arrogant however, I found that she became a more mature and refined character in Chasing the Shadows. I thought that this streak of maturity with the characters would continue on in Defending The Galaxy but it felt like everything the second book set up quickly fell apart in this one.

After the massive bombshell of a cliffhanger in Chasing the Shadows, Ara works closely with the Q-net to overcome the shadow blobs and looters in order to protect the rest of the Galaxy from the looming threat of extinction. I won't go into spoiler territory, but it felt like from just the beginning I could sense where Ara's characterisation would go and I was right. Although she became more confident in her abilities (as seen in Chasing the Shadows), she felt so much more self-centred and even more arrogant in this book. I couldn't keep count of the number of times I heard "I am one of the good guys" or "The Q-net chose me. I am the chosen one who is meant to save the Galaxy from doom." I got so triggered by her dialogue that I was very close to DNF-ing the book altogether since this seemed to continue on for around 300 pages and not even the action could've changed my mind about that.

That being said, I powered through my issues with Ara and the often slow pacing at the start to finish the book where I can happily say it did improve towards the end. All the action picked up around the 400 mark which I felt like was such a long time for me to be properly invested in the story. If some of the events towards the end were panned out more instead of what we got in the first 300 pages or so, I think I would've definitely rated this book higher than my final rating. I did like how the series finished, however, I found it to be a little too fast paced since a lot of the things I wanted to know more about were briefly mentioned without the kind of detail that I wanted as a reader.

That being said, all in all, I didn't mind the finale of The Sentinels of the Galaxy series however, I thought it could've been strengthened by cutting down some of the scenes in the first 300 pages and focusing solely on developing towards the massive action scenes of the last 200 pages. Also, the connection between Ara and the Q-net was a great idea however, if she used it thoughtfully and instead of using it for her own personal gain (in some cases) then I think I would've liked her more. The connection that she had with the members of security (which was an element that I loved in the previous book) felt like a ghost in this story. As in, we knew that the security team had her back but I wanted to see more of them and get a glimpse of the amazing book that resulted from it in Chasing the Shadows. ACTUAL RATING: 2.9 STARS

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hisazuki · 6 years

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Yona ch.150 spoilers

Akatsuki no Yona chapter 150 “Conclusion” summary

Please don’t repost/reuse my scans and translations without permission. Tumblr reblog is fine.

The meeting/conference will happen in the Wind Tribe’s side of the military camp, in a huge heavily guarded tent. Tae-Woo and Han-Dae discuss the treaty and how Shin is such at a disadvantage they’ll probably have to accept whatever Soo-Won throws at them. They were surprised that a few moments before, Tao requested for Hak and Yona to attend the meeting as well. SW’s side was pretty shocked and Kye-Sook was even seething with rage., trying to dissuade Tao and saying this is a very important conference for both parties. Kouren sarcastically asks if this means Yona is no longer a royal since she was chased from her castle.

Yona tells Tao it’s fine, she didn’t wanted to attend the meeting anyway. Tao then proclaims loud and clear that if they were able to overcome their hatred and come to this conference, it’s thanks to the trust/faith they placed in Yona. Princess Yona is Shin’s savior and they fully intend to treasure their mutual friendship. Han-Dae realizes it’s basically her way to tell SW’s group to back off and let Hak and Yona alone. Tae-Woo says Tao must’ve read the atmosphere and seen how angry Kye-Sook was.

Han-Dae asks if they can go over to see Hak (who is standing close to Yona outside the tent) for a bit, but Tae-Woo tells him he should read the atmosphere too: there are soldiers and even Hak is pretending he’s someone else. Meanwhile, Lili goes to Yona and tells her she’s worried about their safety. The princess says it’s fine, Tao’s got their backs. Lili explains she’s talked with the Water Tribe soldiers too so the Sky army shouldn’t be able to lay a hand on her. She says she’ll help Yona too so she should depend on her more. Yona thanks her but adds Lili should still be careful. Lili says she’ll be fine since she’s not afraid of anything anymore.

Author notes: I’m so grateful I was able to draw 150 chapters of this story already! I still have things I want to write, so I hope you’ll accompany me for a bit longer.

Then the two Shin princesses come out of the tent. The meeting is over. Voldo explains Shin's foreign and military affairs are now under Kouka’s supervision. In exchange, Soo-Won promised the citizens wouldn’t come to harm. Kouren tells Yona she’s guilty for not being able to keep Gobi and his minions under control, so it’s not like they had another choice.

As Soo-Won steps out too, Hak glares at him. Kye-Sook asks SW about the four dragons Gobi spoke of, and the king says he has no idea and he’s not interested. They will return to Hiryuu Castle and deal with the matter of the Fire Tribe’s beacon. Kye-Sook secretly signals a guard and tells him to investigate Princess Yona and the 4 dragons.

Kouren remarks Yona’s friends are still in Shin. She wants Voldo to tell General Namsek to have his troops escort them back to the Wind Tribe camp and give them back their weapons. She then asks Argila where Gobi went. Turns out he fled/disappeared somewhere :S Argila is disappointed: he wasn’t on friendly terms with Neguro and Mizari, but he wishes he could’ve talked to them more. Kouren is very serious when she tells him they’ll make sure Gobi and his followers pay for their sins.

Lili comes close and casually tells Kouren she’s badly injured. Kouren says it’s not her blood, but Lili won’t have it and says she must be treated at once. Stubborn Kouren refuses to be indebted to Kouka, so she will head back to Kyuu castle. Lili calls Ayura and Tetora, who promptly appear and carry her away for Ayame to treat her. Lili says they won’t make her pay for the medicines or anything, but Tae-Woo sulkily remarks they belong to the Water Tribe in the first place.

Kouren arrives to the same place Yotaka was being healed at. He’s all bandaged up and becomes quite shaken up when he sees Kouren with a very lose yukata-like outfit (Tetora’s). Since Yotaka can’t handle seeing bandaged boobs, Kouren asks for her overcoat back. After they’ve told Yotaka what happened with Mizari and Neguro, he’s sad about being the only 5 Stars left.

Argila: Voldoctopus and I are still here, you know.

Yotaka: You’ve no right to call yourselves members of the 5 Stars!

Tae-Woo appears and says he’s glad to see Yotaka alive. He brought them medicinal food, and leaves once Yotaka explained who he was and Kouren properly thanked him.

Yotaka: Lady Kouren... Kouka wasn’t solely inhabited by demons, after all... I wanted... to tell Neguro that too.

Kouren tells him she intends to bring Neguro and Mizari’s bodies back to Kyuu Castle and bury them. She whishes he could stay here and heal properly, but she understands he’ll want to accompany her. Yotaka cries and says he will go with her.

Afterwards, the two princesses say their farewells to Yona. They have things they wish to tell their father while he’s still alive. Tao hugs Yona and tells her she’s grateful for all she’s done. Yona says she’s glad she met her and Kouren. Kouren says she spoke with Soo-Won about the possibility of citizens still rebelling against them so for now, she has no time to dwell on the past and she can only move forward just like Yona did.

Voldo says he’ll come visit them in Kouka again sometime, then yells at Argila for not coming to say goodbye. Actually, Argila is by the dragons’ side, sighing about them not waking up in time for him to properly thank them. Zeno, who is also lying by their side, tells him it’s okay and he’ll let them know once they wake up. Argila cries and hugs Zeno, thanking him repeatedly. As he turns back to leave, Shin-Ah calls out to him and says “see you again” (they’re all awake and smiling).

A few days later, King Bushin died and Kouren ascended the throne. We see Kye-Sook atop his horse, thinking it’s quite a feat they were able to sign the treaty without shedding a single drop of the Kouka soldiers’ blood. However, Princess Yona is too dangerous.

Outside the Wind Tribe camp (who seem to have lingered behind), Yona and Yoon are relieved to see the dragons have woken up, even if they still can’t move. Yoon wants to know what kind of power it was that they used on Yona, but Jae-Ha says he has no clue and he only desperately wished to protect Yona at the time. Zeno says the 4 dragons conceal greater powers than they imagine. If Seiryuu lets his powers run wild, he’ll become entirely paralyzed. Zeno explains this time was something akin to that. They let their emotions take over and didn’t control their powers so that’s why their bodies couldn’t keep up. Kija asks if they can become stronger once they learn to control those powers. Zeno doesn’t recommend it: they’re short-lived after all (apart from him of course). Yona thanks them for saving her, but doesn’t want them to use those powers again.

Yoon wonders where Hak went. Yona goes to look for him. He was injured too, but stood a long time to watch Soo-Won’s troops leave, as if telling them to back off. She thinks he might be somewhere moping alone, then she sees light coming from the Wind Tribe camp and walks in on Ayame bandaging Hak’s arm.

Hisa’s thoughts on the chapter:

I was really hoping to see how the meeting unfolded and get some more insight about Soo-Won... For an arc that spanned so many chapters, it ended a bit abruptly and nothing really changed for our main players except that Yona gained more allies who would be in a pinch if they were to oppose SW. I don’t think we’ll see the Shin characters again anytime soon. It’s unlikely Soo-Won will call for them if he goes to war against Kai in the near future, as Kouren still has a broken army and angry citizens to deal with.

Zeno made his case about the dragons’ powers, so that barrier-like burst of power wasn’t meant to become part of the warriors’ attack and defense kit. It doesn’t seem to be related to the shield from the prophecy either.

I wonder what Kye-Sook’s informants will dig up about the dragons. According to the Kouka citizens and soldiers who saw them, they must be like saviors with divine powers. According to Shin witnesses, they might turn out to be weak humans who can easily be injured and restrained with ropes ^^; As long as he doesn’t learn the trick about being too far from Hiryuu Castle, they should be fine.

#Akatsuki no Yona #Mizuho Kusanagi #Hana to Yume 24/2017 #chapter 150 #spoiler pics #my AnY scans

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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Attack on Titan Recap: Essential Moments to Remember Before Season 4

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Many anime series are able to grab a hold of mainstream audiences, but the kind of attention that’s surrounded Attack on Titan is on a whole other level. The anime series only has three seasons, but it’s taken over seven years for it to reach its finish and the enthusiasm towards the property has never waned. Attack on Titan looks at Eren Jaeger and his fellow resistance fighters who wage war against man-eating beasts known as Titans.

What initially started as a war story with monsters has evolved into a truly epic character study and masterclass in serialized storytelling. Each season of Attack on Titan changes the game in significant ways and its upcoming fourth and final season is set to do so once again. Attack on Titan’s highly anticipated concluding episodes premiere this week, so here’s a breakdown of the series’ biggest and best moments leading up to its finish.

Eren Reunites With The Colossal Titan

Attack on Titan is well aware of the disturbing nature of its titular creatures and right from the first episode they feel like a serious threat that are nearly impossible to overcome. Eren Jaeger swears that he’ll get revenge after his initial encounter with these beasts and the loss of his mother, but the fourth episode of the series is when an older and more prepared Eren finally mounts his attack. It’s thrilling to watch the Survey Corps in action for the first time, but it’s all punctuated by the surprise return appearance of the Colossal Titan. Eren has never felt more ready and his attack on the beast has become one of the most iconic images from the series.

Eren And Mikasa Murder Some Slave Traders

All of the relationships in Attack on Titan resonate, especially when they’re put in a pressure cooker of emotion where death becomes an everyday occurrence. The bond between Eren and Mikasa is one of the most powerful in the whole series and the origins of how these two met is the perfect backstory for their tortured souls. Mikasa becomes orphaned by two slave traders and Eren can’t help but try to settle the score, despite being just a child. The messy endeavor leads to both Eren and Mikasa taking the lives of these corrupt men and becomes the catalyst that forever bonds them.

The Introduction Of The Talking Beast Titan

Season two of Attack on Titan doesn’t waste any time and features the introduction of a powerful and mysterious new creature, the Beast Titan. At this point there have been several Titan varieties, but the Beast Titan is the first one that can talk and demonstrate that Titans can actually be an intelligent, complex species. The Beast Titan has crucial ties to Eren and becomes a big obstacle throughout the show’s future. The immediate spectacle that the Beast Titan poses and the insight that he provides on Titans’ and their past begins the second season’s focus on this unusual world’s history.

The Female Titan’s Assault On Levi’s Squad

The Female Titan is a foreboding figure from its first appearance and Annie guarantees that it remains one of the more brutal villains in the series. Attack on Titan‘s first season depicts Levi as one of the most accomplished and brilliant fighters on the Survey Corps, which makes his team’s destruction at the hands of the Female Titan all the more devastating. If anyone is able to take out this Titan it’s Levi and his team, yet the Female Titan destroys nearly all of Levi’s support in minutes. In an instant Levi’s squad goes from one of the Scouts’ greatest assets to no longer existing.

Eren Gets Eaten By A Titan

“The Struggle for Trost” arc during Attack on Titan’s first season features some revelatory moments as the Scout Regiment defends against the Titans. Out of nowhere, Eren gets swallowed by a Titan, which makes for a great cliffhanger, but the anime keeps the audience in doubt for several episodes before it’s revealed that Eren’s still alive. His absence is just long enough that it begins to feel like the character is actually gone and that someone like Mikasa or Levi will shift to become the new lead.

Kenny Ackermann Attacks Levi And His Squad

Season three of Attack on Titan expands on the past of many characters and early on Levi experiences an unwelcome reunion with the one who trained him as a youth, Kenny. Kenny is pure anarchic energy and the ambush that he launches on Levi and his men is easily one of the most impressive animated sequences in the series. This new villain instantly stands out and even though this sprawling fight takes many lives, it’s the personal history between Levi and Kenny that gives it such an impact. This is a visceral introduction to Kenny’s character, which beautifully comes full circle by the time he reaches his end by Levi’s side.

The Bond And Promise Shared Between Historia And Ymir

Attack on Titan deserves immense credit for how it takes two background characters like Ymir and Historia (formerly Christa) and turns them into the heart and soul of the anime’s second season. Historia and Ymir have both lied about their paths, which are tragic for different reasons. There’s an unlikely, yet genuine, love found between these two characters that teaches a lesson applicable to the entire cast. The characters’ passionate exchange about the future is a deeply touching moment in a show that’s filled with pain and it retroactively makes Historia’s actions during season one gain a lot more weight.

Erwin’s Inspiring Speech And Kamikaze Attack On The Beast Titan

Attack on Titan has traded in rampant death since the very first episode, but that doesn’t make it any easier when tragedy does strike beloved characters. Erwin is a fundamental member of the Scout Regiment and he makes a difficult decision when pushed into a corner by the Beast and Colossal Titan. The Beast Titan hurls boulders at Scouts, taking out many lives at once, but Erwin inspires his men to fight for their cause and to go down as heroes rather than cowards. It’s Erwin’s best moment and it becomes all the more bittersweet by how he’s almost immediately struck by a boulder. Erwin’s sacrifice is not in vain and it heavily motivates Levi’s retaliatory attack against Zeke’s Beast Titan.

The Mysterious Attack Titan Ally Is Actually Eren

The role that Titans play in Attack on Titan continues to evolve in fascinating ways and it’s easy to forget a time when they were just a horde of ravenous giants. The battle for Trost features a perplexing moment when a unique Titan begins to obliterate his fellow kind and looks to be a crucial ally in this fight. This strange behavior culminates with the reveal that this helpful Titan is in fact Eren Jaeger. It’s an important turning point for both Eren and the anime as a whole as it enters into a new relationship with Titans.

Thunder Spears Decimate The Armored Titan

Titans are very deadly creatures, but the Survey Corps develop a rhythm where they’re able to eliminate standard Titans with minimal difficulty. The Armored Titan is a major obstacle because the Titan’s tough exterior makes it impossible to damage its nape weak spot. Hange develops drastic weapons, dubbed Thunder Spears, which get the job done against Reiner’s Titan when they’re put to the test. It’s not only beautifully animated, but it finally marks a solution to a problem that’s confounded the Scouts for well over a season. It’s also a rare moment where Hange’s importance is emphasized.

Eren First Wields The Coordinate Ability

Attack on Titan’s second season concludes on some huge moments, chief among them Eren facing the disturbing Smiling Titan that ate his mother back in the first episode. Eren gets taken over by an avalanche of emotions after Hannes sacrifices himself to keep Eren and Mikasa safe. It initially looks like Eren’s lost his mind, but this fear transforms into confidence once Eren unleashes his Coordinate scream ability, which allows him to control smaller Titans. It’s an amazing new skill for Eren to add to his repertoire, but it also sheds light on why he’s been the priority of Reiner, Bertholdt, and Annie: they want to eat him and get the ability for themselves.

Ymir’s Past And The History Of Titans

Attack on Titan’s first season throws many characters at the audience, but it’s the show’s second season where most of its supporting figures get a chance to gain depth. A large focus in season two is the relationship of Historia Reiss and Ymir, both of whom are much more important than the series has previously indicated. Ymir receives a remarkable flashback story that explains how she was worshipped by a deranged cult as a child and turned into a Titan as some bizarre ritual. Ymir is forced to live life as a mindless Titan for years until she happens to consume a shifter and turns back to human. Ymir’s awe over gaining back her humanity and a second chance at life is beautiful and it speaks to her connection with Historia.

Reiner And Bertholdt Aren’t Just Traitors, But Titans

Attack on Titan works best as an action series, but it’s also full of mysteries and the second season engages in a suspenseful “whodunit” of sorts with the identities of the destructive Colossal and Armored Titans. The knowledge that some Titans are actually humans who can masquerade as normal brilliantly makes every character suspicious. It’s still a serious shock when Reiner casually tells Eren that not only is Bertholdt the Colossal Titan, but that he’s also the Armored Titans. These two trusted members of the Survey Corps suddenly are turned into the biggest enemy and they try to persuade Eren to work alongside them.

The Contents Of Grisha Jaeger’s Basement

One of the biggest mysteries in Attack on Titan revolves around what’s inside Grisha Jaeger’s basement. The anime impressively waits three seasons to answer this question and it manages to be more satisfying than anything that the fans predicted. Eren and company don’t just come in contact with Grisha’s diary, which has invaluable information on Titans, but the group sees their first photograph. It’s a stunning moment that’s accentuated by how these characters at first believe that it’s a painting because they’ve never encountered such technology. Up until this point it’s been presumed that Attack on Titan exists in a more archaic alternate version of the past, but the contents of the basement indicate that this is more of a The Village scenario where there’s a gigantic technologically advanced world out there that these characters have been completely ignorant towards.

Armin Nearly Dies And Becomes The Colossal Titan

Attack on Titan’s core trio of Eren, Mikasa, and Armin have been tested in many ways throughout the series, but one of the most emotional moments from the series involves Armin’s sacrifice to aid Eren. Armin has always struggled with confidence, so his seemingly final gesture to stand up to the Colossal Titan and get burned to death from intense steam makes for an honorable finish. It’s also the necessary distraction that Eren requires to finally remove Bertholdt from his Titan form. This scene is heavy, but what follows involves Eren, Mikasa, and Levi arguing over which of their nearly dead friends deserves to live on as a Titan. It’s an incredibly unexpected turn for Armin, especially once he’s the new Colossal Titan.

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godshipsit · 7 years

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he /thought/ he was in love, but instead actually obsessed... so did ishim think cas was obsessed with dean but hes actually in love 🤔

ask n. 2 “ishim is a monster incapable of healthy love” That’s why I don’t really like that comparison. They got compared to something that wasn’t really love, but more like a stalker obsessed with a poor woman.

(This turned way too long, so here’s a recap: I discuss the comparison between Ishim and Cas /and respective relationships with humans/, which tells us who Cas is by contrast; I also draw a parallel between Ishim and Godstiel, aka Cas’ darkest side – that Cas still managed to overcome on his own, because despite everything he’s always had a good heart and good intentions; also, are we supposed to reconsider the nature - platonic or potentially romantic - of Dean and Cas’ relationship in s6?)

Hello there, my friends! Unfortunately, you have just opened a can of worms, since I was writing some meta on the parallel between Ishim and Cas. To answer the first question, well, yes. Ishim (like many angels) doesn’t understand human feelings and emotions. Not only he’s a manipulative and abusive douchebag, he also lacks the experience to understand what love is (Cas, on the other hand, has been human..). So, when he sees the bond between Dean and Cas, he compares it to what he knows. And what does he know? The love he knows is obsession, rotten to the core; the human he wanted never loved him back; he thinks she made him weaker (and this is just textbook abusive behavior). So when he sees how far Cas has fallen (subtext: for a human), of course he thinks Cas is in his same situation.

You know why we’re meant to stay away from them humans? Hmm? It’s not because we’re a danger to them. They’re a danger to us.

Yeah, he’s talking about both Dean and Sam, but casually Sam is never called Cas’ human weakness (context: we’re talking romantic love, throwback to Metatron saying Cas was in love with… humanity, just to point out one episode later that Cas’ goal was all about saving one human), nor he is in the climatic scene where Ishim goes after humani– erm, Dean (hint: Sam wasn’t supposed to be there because Cas loves Sam, but he’s not in love with Sam).

Now, on to question #2. Too much exposition is deadly to a story. A great way to show who a character is or whatthey’ve become is… to contrast them with who they’re not (same goes for relationships).

Ishim is linked to Castiel, they used to fighttogether. Right before the final showdown, we also learn that Ishim had fallen inlove with a human. But his love was unrequited, until it became twisted andobsessive. In a horrible display of power and to cut his own “humanweakness”, Ishim murders Lily’sdaughter and lets Lily live. Big mistake. Lily wants revenge, and startskilling the angels who (unknowingly) helped Ishim. He didn’t consider she wouldbecome that powerful and dedicated, so he let her live, and now she’s out forrevenge. So, when it comes to Castiel’s human weakness (*coff* Dean *coff*) hedecides to immediately kill Dean. Even worse, Dean feels the same wayabout Cas, and Ishim knows.

(Read as: Suspicions confirmed)

Dean must be punished, because he (unlike Lily)loves Cas back, and that’s unacceptable. If anything, this episode shows us that Dean and Cas’ relationship couldn’t be more distant than Lily and Ishim’s.

Now, nobody asked me this, but while I was going through Cas’ emotional arc in s6, I realized that there were some similarities between Ishim and Cas’ worst chapter of his time with the Winchesters. I’m talking about Godstiel. Quick digression to have some context, in s6 if Castiel’s goal was to stop Raphael, his need was Dean’s support and affection. (I’m sorry, I’m about to quote myself now)

Castiel’sneed is expressed by Castiel himself after the whole 6x20 debacle. When Sam,Dean and Bobby find out what’s going on, that’s a turning point that leaves Caswondering if he’s doing the right thing. His goal is deeply related to hisneed, so it’s hard to let it go. Because if Castiel doesn’t stop Raphael, Deanand Sam are going to die.

In 6x20,we have this exchange:

DEAN: No,actually, it’s not, and you know that. Why else would you keep this whole thinga secret, huh, unless you knew that it was wrong? When crap like this comesaround, we deal with it… Like we always have. What we don’t do is we don’t goout and make another deal with the Devil!

CASTIEL:It sounds so simple when you say it like that. Where were you when I needed to hear it?

DEAN: Iwas there. Where were you?

6x21 is all about Cas needing Dean’s support and expressing his need.

CASTIEL: I came to tell you that I will find Lisa and Ben, and I will bring them back. Stand behind me, the one time I ask.

Ok, so, Cas needs Dean (and Dean needs Cas, but Cas is gonna wait 2 seasons before getting to hear it under tragic circumstances).

Then Cas swallows all those souls and monsters, and turns into the super powerful and arrogant version of himself (hubris used to be one of his biggest flaws). His goal changes, but his inner need is always there.

(6x22) CASTIEL: Theangel blade won’t work, because I’m not an angel anymore. I’m your new god. Youwill bow down and profess your love untome, your Lord, or I shall destroy you.

(7x01) CASTIEL: Stop.What’s the point if you don’t mean it? You fear me. Not love, not respect, just fear.

Going back to Ishim, what he does kind of echoes Godstiel’s words.

CASTIEL: Youwill bow down and profess your love untome, your Lord, or I shall destroy you.

Love me or I’ll destroy you. (I know this can be hard to metabolize, but consider that Cas had also swallowed Leviathans, who were probably starting to control him). Way before that, Castiel had broken Sam’s wall tostop Dean from trying to stop him. He had promised to save Sam, but after he becomesGodstiel, his dark side and whatever he’s swallowed take the upper hand. He lets Dean live out of mercy (or nostalgia, as he says in 7x01…),threatening to throw him into the pit again. He doesn’t fix Sam’s wall, and weall know that Lucifer hallucinations will almost kill Sam in s7. (I’ve read meta that explain how Dean’s relationship with his brother is often compared to a relationship with a son; Dean is a parent figure. Who does Ishim hurts to destroy Lily?) After that,Dean tries to get Death to kill Castiel. (Also, to reinforce this Ishim/Castielparallel, consider that Ishim was the first angel Lily had ever seen, just likeCastiel is the first angel Dean ever sees).

One of the biggest differences between Cas and Ishim, tho, is that (motivation) Castiel ultimately did what he did to protect Dean (and Sam) and to avoid the Apocalypse (and due tothe lack of communication, it was a tragedy… from the human perspective. akaour perspective) plus Godstiel’s most awful actions were probably influenced by the Leviathans, while Ishim’s actions were meant to subjugate Lily to hiswill (and he had no supernatural excuse for his actions).

Whilestory and needs are similar (and there’s a hint of possessiveness in s6Castiel’s behavior), Castiel always had good intentions, and went on to redeemhimself and gain Dean’s trust and affection back. Ishim’s intentions, instead,were completely egoistical, and he never changed. (Ishim’s character has a need to be in charge and subjugate other people.The creepy way he fixes his clothes after beating Castiel is a display ofpower, the camera work highlights that. He’s also extremely possessive.)

Ishimmirrors Castiel, but he’s also what Castiel isn’t at the moment (and has never truly been). Which better way to show how far he’s come without having to say itexplicitly? Also, which better way to show the extent of Dean and Cas’relationship? Those two would die for each other, while Ishim would rather destroy Lily than accept her refusal. Dean and Cas are family.Plus, since the episode’s context is angels falling in love with humans (and notin a platonic way), it all gets romantic overtones. For once, context gives usa not-so-platonic interpretation. We’re also asked to reconsider Dean andCastiel’s relationship in s6. Now, Ishim’s “love” was rotten, but Castiel’s? Andwas is platonic love or romantic love? Who the hell knows about then, it is even more ambiguous now for sure.

(Well, Dabb kind of gave us an interpretation in 9x20, when he decided to write this).

(I’ve read some people see the Cas-centric episodes we’re getting as past, present, future… what if it’s also about his relationship with “humanity”?)

tagging @tinkdw @elizabethrobertajones @mittensmorgul @bluestar86 bc maybe you can answer these questions ;)

#replies #long post for ts #destiel meta #mythoughts #ishim vs cas #s12 #dabb vs 6x20 #this is better structured than my BA final thesis #i copy n paste'd some parts from a document i was writing #so if some parts dont make sense..#eh sorry #Anonymous #meta: writing #dabb vs everyone

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isitandwonder · 7 years

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What was it all about, anyway?

Greg Lestrade is allowed to bookend Sherlock’s story arch. In ASiP, he tells John and therefore us:

LESTRADE: And because Sherlock Holmes is a great man. And I think one day, if we’re very, very lucky, he might even be a good one.

This comes full circle in TFP. when it’s hammered home (got, writing is my passion!):

POLICE OFFICER: Well, he’s a great man, sir. LESTRADE: No, he’s better than that. He’s a good one.

So, we have Sherlock’s, and therefore the series, narrative as his journey from great man to good man.

Only, as @wssh-watson has pointed out, this story is already copmplete at the end of S2. Furthermore, one could argue it was never a journey anyway, that Sherlock is just hiding behind the mask of the high-functoning sociopath, as he saved John Watson at the first night they met (turning the suicidal army doctor into a beautifully giggling, amazed friend, giving him his purpose in life back = saving Sherlock Holmes).

So, it’s not the outward change that is important then (other people recognising Sherlock as the good man he is) but his own acceptance of himself as a good person, allowing for emotions, allowing himself to get involved? Alone protects me / I don’t have friends / Caring is not an advantage is to be overcome by Sherlock steadily getting more and more human, until he can finally openly be who he really is?

Hmmm... let’s take a closer look:

In TGG, we get the following exchange between Sherlock and John:

JOHN: I hope you’ll be very happy together. SHERLOCK: Sorry, what? JOHN: There are lives at stake, Sherlock – actual human lives... Just – just so I know, do you care about that at all? SHERLOCK: Will caring about them help save them? JOHN: Nope. SHERLOCK: Then I’ll continue not to make that mistake. JOHN: And you find that easy, do you? SHERLOCK: Yes, very. Is that news to you? JOHN: No. No. SHERLOCK: I’ve disappointed you. JOHN: That’s good – that’s a good deduction, yeah. SHERLOCK: Don’t make people into heroes, John. Heroes don’t exist, and if they did, I wouldn’t be one of them.

This is the scene at 221b after the old Lady and her neighbours were killed by Moriarty’s bomb. We saw in the scene with Lestrade amd John, as the phone went dead, that Sherlock did care in that moment. But now, he’s pushed his shock and grief aside to function better, to solve the case. Because, as he says, caring about them won’t save other future victims.

It’s a bit like this exchange from earlier in the episode when Sherlock tries to solve the Carl Powers case to save the woman in the car:

JOHN: Try and remember there’s a woman here who might die. SHERLOCK: What for? This hospital’s full of people dying, Doctor. Why don’t you go and cry by their bedside and see what good it does them?

Of course, this is to show us Sherlock as the cold high-functioning sociopath he likes to see himself, as he prefers to pass himself of for. And, of course, it fails, because we do see that Sherlock does care, but that he is also able to detach himself from his feelings to do his work and save other people.

Therefore, what Sherlock does in these scenes, depite John’s disapproval, is in fact the right way. He helps others. He feels compassion. He only doesn’t show it like other people would do.

We see this emotional involvement reigned in by rational reasoning carried to extremes at the end of S2, when Sherlock sacrifices himself for his friends as he jumps off Bart’s. It’s his life weighed against that of Mrs Hudson’s, Greg’s and John’s. Sherlock doesn’t make this decision easily - therefore, of course, he’s not a sociopath - but he makes it anyway and sees it through to the bitter end. Between grief and nothing, I’ll take grief. John grieving for him is better than John being killed by Moriarty’s snipers. Sherlock can only choose between a rock and a hard place, so he selflessly decides for what’s best for others.

And it get’s the desired result: His friends survive, the snipers pack up and leave. This whole decision making process is based on Sherlock’ deep love for his friends. Because he cares! So, caring about them makes a difference, even back in S2. Sherlock has come full circle and did a slefless deed to save the people he loves. He fulfilled his arc.

John even says so at the graveyard at the end of TRF:

You ... you told me once that you weren’t a hero. Umm ... there were times I didn’t even think you were human, but let me tell you this: you were the best man, and the most human ... human being that I’ve ever known and no-one will ever convince me that you told me a lie, and so ... There. I was so alone, and I owe you so much.

Wouldn’t this have been enough? What was all the torment and suffering of S3 and S4 for? Sherlock had already shown to be a good man by the end of S2 by sacrificing himself and his happiness for others!

Because, what do we get in S3 and S4? Just proof that sentiment really clouds Sherlock’s judgement, that caring is not an advantage, that selfless love doesn’t pay off:

Sherlock’s plan to take Moriarty’s network down, to ultimately save his friends, gets him tortured.

Sherlock sees that Mary is a liar in his very first deduction of her but doesn’t connect the dots or makes anything of this insight.

Sherlock sees that she has rather special skills for a nurse, but doesn’t draw the right conclusions, therefore allowing his best friend and the love of his life to marry a dangerous assassin. Headlong into harm I call that.

Said assassin kills Sherlock as he offers her help - without ever facing any punishment for her deed. John even forgives his wife, thereby kind of ultimately betraying Sherlock.

No wonder Sherlock turns to drugs after John’s wedding.

Sherlock continues to try to protect Mary, to help her, until she, without any need, takes a bullet for him. Afterwards, Sherlock even feels responsible for Mary’s death.

In the aftermath, Sherlock takes all the abuse from John because he thinks he deserves it.

On top of that, Sherlock relapses again after John refuses to talk to him and kind of cuts him of.

In TLD, it is Sherlock who has to comfort John, while no-one has ever comforted him for all he’s suffered and sacrificed.

Emotionally compromised, Sherlock takes way too long to brake Eurus cycle of sick experiments.

Sherlock’s judgement is clouded and he doesn’t attempt to flee or resist Eurus because he thinks there’s a little girl on a plane that needs his help.

All this profes to me that loe on this show, when it comes to Sherlock, is truly a dangerous disadvantage found on the loosing side. Becaues, you know, S1-S2 Sherlock would quickly have seen through Mary and warned John (as he did with Molly in regard to Jim from IT). S1-S2 Sherlock would have called Eurus’s trick with the plane (at the latest when the girl couldn’t tell him her destination). He would have dismantled Eurus lie/fantasy far sooner, thereby saving Molly, Mycroft, John and himself. But now, in S4, sentimental, emotional Sherlock makes mistakes as his judgement is clouded by feelings and he truly acts like the idiot Mycroft calls him.

MYCROFT: Is that sentiment talking? SHERLOCK: No. It’s me. MYCROFT: Difficult to tell the difference these days.

But not even this is a new development, validating S4. We already had this with Magnussen, where Sherlock thought shooting himw as the only option left (the psychological outfall of this murder was never followed up, like so many things in S3-S4). At Appledore, Sherlock was blindsided by his love for John and prepared to do anything for him (which we also knew since TRF).

So, what we are shown in S3 and S4 is that caring is truly not an advantage. It just leads to violence, heartbreak and pain. And Sherlock gains nothing by his suffering, he doesn’t grow or learn from his experiences. He just repeats the same mistakes over and over again. It’s a vicious circle in which he, contrary to the rules of fairy tales, where the hero is redeemed in the end, is just repeatedly hurt, abused, toyed with and humiliated. He nearly looses everything (his mind, John, 221b), only to gain a crazy sister he never even missed before.

Sherlock’s destiny seems to be to play violin with a person that is even more disturbed and detached from reality than he was at the beginning of the series, surrounded by a family he didn’t give a toss about in earlier episodes (on the contrary, in comparison to his biological family, Sherlock had built a surrogate family of his choosing: Mrs Hudson, Greg, Molly, John [That’s why he stays!]. But all this seems forgotten when the Holmes’s meet up in Sherrinford to watch Eurus and Sherlock play violin). What is the message here? That it truly doesn’t matter who you’ve struggled to be, that biological family claims you in the end, if you like it or not? That you can’t escape the family you were born in? That you owe your familym even if they hid a sister from you that killed your best friend just out of envy? That ‘I made me’ was just wishfull thinking?

This is not emotional progress, this is locking Sherlock up in a glass cage like Eurus’s cell, keeping him away from an ordinary life with friends and the promise of love, burdening him with yet another lost soul to save (who might be beyond redemption anyway).

It’s a bit like the end of TLD: He’s Sherlock Holmes, so he wears the damned hat, even if he loathes it. But what can you do?

*I want to break free!* - Oh, no, sorry, that was the line of the baddie...

Is that truly the message the show wants to give?

Thanks to @callie-ariane for the transcripts.

#sherlock #s3 #s4 #great man to good

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oosteven-universe · 6 years

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Domino #2

Domino #2 Marvel Comics 2018 Written by Gail Simone Illustrated by David Baldeon Coloured by Jesus Aburtov Lettered by VC’s Clayton Cowles While on a security job in the Pacific Northwest, Domino received a warning from the mysterious Topaz in the form a broken domino tile. Soon, with her guard down after a surprise Birthday party, Domino was attacked by Topaz and a bitter elderly man in her care. Domino felt all her luck powers dwindling just as Topaz threw her out a window…. Which coincidentally is exactly where we pick things up. I like that about Gail and her writing an arc it’s usually done in real time mode and that negates the need for those pesky flashbacks. Also I just appreciate it more when we got from cliffhanger to seeing how it unfolds right away and we don’t have to rely upon I got out of it this way or that way. Also the fact that Topaz can do what she can is what really got under Domino’s skin and regardless of her gaining her luck back it’s that feeling of being helpless even for a moment that she has to cope with. While I am not surprised at the level of characterisation that Gail is bringing to this book I am surprised at the direction she’s taking right off the bat. It’s bold, daring and gutsy and is really something that will break here down and have to be rebuilt by finding that inner strength she possesses instead of relying on her luck to get her out of most situations. Whether she admits it or not most all her training is centred around her using that luck in concert with her moves so yeah she is going to have dig down, believe in herself and overcome this. It is for me an unexpected way to see the character and it’s also why I cannot look away either. I have to say that of all Mutants and heroes that were at her Birthday party it’s not ironic that she was saved in the nick of time by that particular person. I liked it, it was a damn cute exchange and reminds me beautifully that everyone may know of everyone else but that doesn’t make em friends but this was like something familiar yet stranger-esque at that same time. It uses this great way to make the spandex set smaller but still feel rather large. The interior artwork here is nice as it has the cartoon side of comic book art. Not at bad thing either and some of the detail work is extremely nice to see. There is some very use of varying weight in the linework that we see and Jesus’ colours has some stunning moments. The best moment came with the Golden Gate Park jog and that’s how i’d love to see every page! I will say I am very impressed with the utilisation of page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels, which themselves have excellent placing, shows off a fresh an innovative eye for storytelling. Also I like the way this team captures movement as well. I feel like it’s finally time that we got a mutant centric book that doesn’t revolve around all the mutant craziness. We all know what that is, so to see how she and her newfound girl group operate as Merc’s. I like that Domino is being introduced as an almost new character and bringing us this amazing supporting cast of little known/forgotten women and new villains. It feels fresh, new and interesting and in so many it really is and what Gail brings to a book especially when she’s having fun is immeasurable. So long as Marvel let’s Gail and company have fun and try not to limit what they do this could very well be a smash hit!

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recentanimenews · 6 years

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Stronger Apart: A Final Separation May Be the Best Ending for The Ancient Magus' Bride

While it’s had its dramatic moments, The Ancient Magus’ Bride is most easily considered as one of the slower and more contemplative series of the last two seasons, spending its time on the mundane rituals of everyday just as often on those of the magical variety. So the recent events have been quite a curveball, tearing asunder the central relationship that had been building over the course of the previous 20 episodes. In retrospect, it’s difficult not to see the groundwork that had been laid to drive us to that dramatic moment. Where things might go from here between Chise and Elias is anyone’s guess, but I’d like to argue that the themes of the series have been singularly pushing toward a crucial decision for Chise. To leave Elias so that they both can continue to grow.

Although Chise and Elias’s relationship is one of the central components of the story, and definitely one of the aspects of the anime that has attracted a number of fans, the primary narrative hasn't been one of romance as much as healing for Chise, overcoming her immense personal tragedies to find ultimately find a place and a purpose that will allow her to be happy. While her relationship Elias acted as a starting point for these positive changes that have ultimately lead to her deciding she wants to live and discovering her own agency, both can only be achieved as the result of a conscious decision rather than a preconstructed path. No matter how carefully Elias designs a course of development for Chise, it’s entirely up to her to decide what gives her a sense of meaning.

That decision has been made time and again when Chise discovers a new opportunity to help others. After so many years of being pushed out of other people's lives as a burden and source of fear, being able to touch the life of another and create a positive change is revelatory for Chise. Her warped perception is evident in her interpretation of taking action that ultimately hurts her to aid another as selfish for the way that it inconveniences Elias. Although she has certainly overcorrected and is too willing to take the cost of whatever aid she may offer from her own flesh, the concerns of not only Elias, but all of the friends she has collected as a result of her altruism, for her to consider how her self-harm might hurt them as individuals who care about her.

Chise’s compulsion to aid itself was an unexpected and unwelcome turn for Elias. A creature more familiar with bargaining for favors, Chise’s selfless giving is something that he has trouble comprehending and the manner in which it endangers her is unacceptable. Time and again she has had to persuade him to offer aid. It’s expected that he doesn’t want to see harm to come to her, but it also becomes evident he prefer they remain apart from such business entirely. While he logically understands the process that brings about the behavior, he seems to have no awareness or consideration of the positive effect that what she has managed to accomplish already has had upon her.

This conflict between the two has shown Chise’s growth appear not only in her emotional well-being but also in the dynamics of their relationship. Landmark changes for Chise are always accompanied by a shift in the paradigm between her and Elias and she grows confident enough to make demands of her own from him rather than accepting every wish he has for her. She’s requested that he speak of himself so she can learn more about him, drawn Elias away from his secluded lifestyle to interact with the magical community, and ultimately reframes their relationship not of master and slave or owner and puppy, but as two teachers exchanging wisdom and enjoying one another's company. Whenever Chise takes a step forward, it results in her gaining a greater sense of control over their relationship.

Or so Chise believes, while it appears she and Elias are growing closer to mutual understanding, we’re given clues that he may not be acting faithfully toward her. If Chise and Elias are indeed supposed to be a romantic couple, it’s difficult to ignore the intentional coding of Elias as an abusive and controlling partner. He recognizes that he values her but continues to think of her as an object he owns, which he jealously guards from others, destroying offers of admission from The College, spying on her with magic, and discouraging Renfred from involving himself in their relationship by plainly stating that Chise belongs to him. Elias broke Chise’s chains and assured her she had a choice in their future together while taking every available action to hold her to him and erase other avenues.

Whether due to misunderstanding because of his alien psychology or a disregard for Chise’s wishes in favor of his own. Elias knowingly takes action against what he knows Chise wants, isolating her from her newfound friends that he knows she values. This comes to a head with Stella, Chise’s first plainly stated friendship. He knows Chise values her and experiences jealousy at the prospect of having to share her or, perhaps, that they may share something together that he and Chise to not. When faced with the prospect of Chise’s death, he knows she wants them to work together to find a solution, he knows she would balk at the prospect of sacrificing another for her own survival, and he knows that, above all, harming Stella would wound Chise as well.

The Ancient Magus’ Bride is a story about Chise’s growth and, toward that end, Elias has grown into one of her greatest barriers. Starting blocks serve as a great launching point in a race but can only trip you up when you’re approaching your second lap. In addition to his direct actions against her wishes, Chise also needs to break free of framing her own development in the context of their relationship and to rid herself of her own dependency upon him. To know she can survive on her own two feet she has to try walking without the crutch that has been propping her up and experience her ability to live, laugh, and continue to help others under her own power and without asking anyone's permission. The conclusion of her arc with her mother perfectly matches this sentiment. Though she cannot forgive her, she won't forget her, and she'll move on without her.

Ironically, this may also be the greatest lesson Chise may have to offer Elias. Whether he planned to smooth things over after the ritual out of a fundamental misunderstanding of human emotion or a more nefarious plan to remove her memory of Stella entirely, Elias was prepared to commit the same unforgivable act that had turned a human being into a monster. In either case he displayed a lack of reverence for human emotion that represents an impenetrable barrier to achieving his goal of humanity. Experiencing the consequence of his betrayal and knowing first-hand that feelings can drive a permanent wedge between two people that no amount of transaction or bartering can overcome may allow him to finally recognize the gravity of what he has done and decide he needs to change.

Taking that lesson to heart, next time Elias encounters someone who is suffering, he may be less willing to demand compensation in exchange for his aid. Next time he has the opportunity to grow close to someone and become part of their life, he may be less willing to betray their trust, even if he perceives his own actions as the proper course. Next time he may be able to appreciate the gift he is given when someone can approach him without fear. Because of her tragic circumstances, Chise has given Elias an unrealistic amount of leeway in their relationship, allowing him to take what he wishes of her without giving back. Realizing that only pursuing your own interests is a poison between two people is the most important thing Chise can teach him and forgiving him may only be a lesson all it’s own. That no act of evil or dishonesty is too great that cannot be assuaged.

It’s an ending that’s far from storybook, but poetic in its own way. Many of the small betrayals and controlling behaviors that Elias exhibits are far too realistic to be anything but intentional. Building up an insidiously unhealthy relationship by also showing its positive aspects may be palatable but the evidence of Elias’s small betrayals was there all along. To drive us to this breaking point is immensely ambitious for a series that could have maintained its peaceful pace for years and carefully setting up a distinction between supportive and codependent relationships is an admirable direction. No matter where things go from here, this latest narrative turn will cement The Ancient Magus’ Bride in my memory forever, but I think the best path to take now is the one that diverges.

---

Peter Fobian is an Associate Features Editor for Crunchyroll, author of Monthly Mangaka Spotlight, writer for Anime Academy, and contributor at Anime Feminist. You can follow him on Twitter @PeterFobian.

By: [email protected]

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

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esonetwork · 6 years

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Timestamp #147: The Ultimate Foe

New Post has been published on https://esopodcast.com/timestamp-147-the-ultimate-foe/

Timestamp #147: The Ultimate Foe

Doctor Who: The Ultimate Foe The Trial of a Time Lord, Parts XIII-XIV (2 episodes, s23e13-e14, 1986)

It’s time for closing statements.

Picking up at the Doctor’s inadvertent admission of genocide, the Doctor charges that the Matrix has been tampered with so the Inquisitor calls upon the Keeper of the Matrix to testify. The Keeper denies the possibility on grounds that the Key of Rassilon is required to enter the database, and only senior Time Lords have access to the keys. Neither the Valeyard nor the Inquisitor is swayed.

Something sounded fishy here, so I waded back into the archives. The Invasion of Time calls out the Great Key of Rassilon, the literal key to ultimate Time Lord knowledge. So are all of these senior Time Lords holding Lesser Keys of Rassilon, and if so, what is the difference if they all lead to the same Matrix, arguably the source of all Time Lord knowledge?

Outside the station, two pods arrive and travel down the fancy corridor of light. They open to reveal Sabalom Glitz and Mel – though neither knows how they arrived at the station – and they barge into the courtroom to offer a defense for the Doctor. On cue, their mysterious benefactor is revealed as the Master, communicating to them from the depths of the Matrix.

First, this whole arc just got a lot more deus ex machina.

Second, it turns out that a Key of Rassilon can be duplicated. Looking back on The Invasion of Time and the (admittedly assumed) purpose of the Great Key the “lesser” keys, this really makes me wonder about the Artifacts of Rassilon. Possession of the Sash, the Key, and the Rod could lead to absolute power and a Time Lord dictatorship, and if the keys are so easily duplicated then why hasn’t someone attempted a coup with a Gallifreyan 3-D printer?

The Time Lords in attendance do not recognize the Master (which is surprising given how often the High Council has interacted with the Master and/or sent the Doctor to stop him), but the Master seems to have a deep interest in the Valeyard and a strong desire to see him lose. The Inquisitor allows Glitz to testify and the rogue reveals that the mysterious box he was searching for contained secrets of the Time Lords. The sleepers – the inhabitants of Ravalox, then known as Earth – somehow gained access to the Matrix and were siphoning secrets into the box for later use, and the Gallifreyan High Council drew Earth out of orbit, initiated the fireball, and renamed the planet to protect the information.

Yikes. The Doctor’s enemy in this story is own people?

The Master reveals that the Valeyard was charged to tamper with the trial evidence in exchange for the rest of the Doctor’s regenerations. You see, the Valeyard is the Doctor… or rather the amalgamation of the Doctor’s darker impulses from somewhere between his twelfth and final incarnations.

The Doctor’s real enemy is himself.

The Inquisitor agrees that the trial must consider this new evidence, and the Valeyard flees into the Matrix. The Doctor and Glitz pursue him, landing in a warped recreation of Victorian-era London. The Doctor is attacked by a rain barrel, but he is saved by Glitz. The rouge hands the Time Lord a note from the Master pointing them toward a place called The Fantasy Factory. As they approach, Glitz takes a harpoon to the chest.

The Matrix is a place where logic has no hold, and we’re back to The Deadly Assassin.

In the courtroom, the Master testifies to the court that everything they saw was true with minor adjustments to cast doubt on the Doctor. He also reveals that Peri’s fate in Mindwarp was a lie. She is serving as a queen at the side of King Yrcanos, thus providing a great sigh of relief from your humble reviewer. The Master hopes that the Valeyard and the Doctor will destroy each other and leave him free to pillage the universe, and he suggests that the High Council be made to answer for their crimes.

Reasonable.

In the Matrix, we find that the Valeyard’s attack didn’t roll high enough to defeat Glitz’s armor class, and the rogue is convinced to help the Doctor and escape the computer. They enter The Fantasy Factory and meet Mr. Popplewick, a rather stuffy bureaucrat who loves his red tape. The Doctor rushes past the front desk to the proprietor’s office only to find a more officious version of Popplewick. The procedure is sacrosanct!

Before the Doctor is allowed to proceed, he is forced to sign over his remaining regenerations to Mr. J. J. Chambers – the Valeyard – in the event of his “untimely” death. Within moments, he is whisked away to a bleak beach where hands attack from beneath the sand and draw him down, reminiscent of the quicksand traps that permeated much of ’80s television and film adventures. Glitz adopts the role of reliable sidekick and tries to rescue him, but the Doctor overcomes the trap by sheer willpower, pretty much invalidating any amount of physical peril going forward. After a round of taunting from the Valeyard, the evil Time Lord forces the Doctor and Glitz into a nearby hut with a cloud of nerve gas.

The twist: The hut is the Master’s TARDIS. The Master explains that the Valeyard has to be stopped because he has none of the Doctor’s morality, leaving him eviler, more powerful, and a huge threat. The Master tricks the Doctor by putting him in a catatonic state and leaving him as bait for the Valeyard. The Master’s Tissue Compression Eliminator proves useless against the Valeyard and the pair is forced to retreat. Meanwhile, Mel somehow arrives in the Matrix and escorts him out of the Matrix and back to the courtroom.

Mel testifies in the Doctor’s defense, offering footage from Terror of the Vervoids as evidence. The Inquisitor is not swayed, sentencing the Doctor to death. The Doctor accepts the verdict with surprising calm, and we find out that this is yet another Matrix illusion. Outside the Matrix, the real Mel is incensed, prompting her to steal the Key of Rassilon and enter the Matrix. She intercepts the Doctor, but he chides her because he knew it was a ruse based on her digital doppelgänger’s testimony. Together they enter the Fantasy Factory in pursuit of the Valeyard.

The Master charges Glitz, first via failed hypnosis then with a treasure chest, with finding the Ravalox Matrix box. Glitz finds the memory tapes and Mr. Popplewick while the Doctor discovers a list (in his own handwriting) of judges from his trial. Together, they force Popplewick to take them to the Valeyard, but Glitz trades the Doctor for the memory tapes, which he then passes to the Master.

The Doctor reveals Popplewick to be the Valeyard in disguise. He further discovers a maser device aimed at the courtroom, ready to kill the assembled Time Lords as a last resort. The list of names was a hit list. He dispatches Mel to evacuate the courtroom.

In the real world, Gallifrey is collapsing into chaos. The High Council has been deposed by a civilian revolt, and the Master takes the opportunity to seize control. The attempt is stymied when he loads the Ravalox drive into his TARDIS console and it freezes both the Master and Glitz in the Matrix.

Mel tries to evacuate the courtroom while the Doctor destroys the maser using a feedback loop. The surge strikes the Valeyard, knocking him down as the Fantasy Factory explodes. The Doctor returns to reality and learns of Peri’s true fate. The Inquisitor offers the presidency to the Doctor, but he declines, instead offering it to her. He also suggests that the Master should be punished but that Glitz can be reformed.

Leaving his fate up to the Time Lords means that the Master will be back. No doubt.

Mel and the Doctor depart with a quip, and the Doctor nearly abandons Mel at the hint of carrot juice in their future. Instead, they board the TARDIS and take off for points unknown. Meanwhile, the Inquisitor dissolves the court and orders the Keeper to repair and reinforce the Matrix.

Unbeknownst to anyone in attendance, the Keeper is the Valeyard in disguise.

As part of the Trial of a Time Lord arc, The Ultimate Foe provides a decent enough resolution, bolstered by the revelation that Peri survived and is living a good life. She did look a little sad, but I assume that it’s the weight of her role as leader. I can’t imagine that she actually missed the Sixth Doctor after all the abuse he has subjected her to, but she might miss the thrill of the adventure.

On its own, the story of The Ultimate Foe is fairly weak. The introduction of the Master weakens the power of the Valeyard and turns this “dark Doctor” into “Master Lite”. The disguises, the logical trickery, the drive steal regenerations and kill the Doctor… all of it is just a rehash of the Master’s various machinations. The resolution also points out a massive plot hole: If the Sixth Doctor dies with regenerating, there can’t be a Twelfth Doctor or beyond. The Valeyard cannot exist unless he remains outside of time, and if he does stay outside of time then what is the point of all that power?

On a series continuity note, I did enjoy the call back to the Doctor’s dislike of the nickname “Doc”. We’ve seen it at least three times before: The Time Meddler, The Five Doctors, and The Twin Dilemma.

On a project note, this is the first time that an incarnation’s finale doesn’t get the regeneration handicap. This wasn’t intended as the final story for Colin Baker, and he doesn’t even begin the regeneration process in this story.

Rating: 2/5 – “Mm? What’s that, my boy?”

UP NEXT – Twenty-Third Series Summary

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

#Doctor Who #Sixth Doctor #Timestamps Project

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be21zh · 7 years

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May 12, 2017

firstly dreamt likely in airport lounge, I with my son in queue for aboard. then it broke for awhile to let cargo unload. its likely railway cargo, emergent quilts and pillows for distressed people in problematic situation. once the queue restored, the conductor persuaded us buying sapling on the way, instead of brought it from hometown to destiny, for former mostly more resilient. after peed and returned to bed, I dreamt with my old family, relatives. we criticized each other, we enjoyed chatters, we are family. esp my mean nephew, ie. only son of my passed eldest sister who committed suicide in her mid age decades ago, who is so mean that defied my small loan request several times. we disappointed by counterpart but still we expecting. this week was a bit leisure. I picked up my zohosites and sorted them into precious assets. quite some web services allow early birds privilege more gracious than its current mature clients which generate stable product income. google apps and zoho sites are such cases. previously zohosites free charge of custom domain mapping for its sites users, but now it charges. in recent years I saw zohosites potential and powerful on web building, and more and more willing making better usage of it. so this week I enable all free functions zohosites offers for free old users, like blogs, spam control, custom form, collaborators, etc. I was so contented by the gains! in final step, I collect and sort them into my local bookmarks and web linkbook. this week also specially hard for my financially coping with coming events, weekend gathering my son, woz into dining out and monthly cinema, his coming birthday celebration, his lottery experience I promised to support on the event, and my longing for a new ring mouse to replace my old Microsoft arc touch. in God's bliss, QRRS dispatched one child policy reward, ¥60, yesterday. then I gathered courage from it to contact my niece in Wuhan, central China, for aid. she generously offered ¥400, doubles my entrust. with it I immediately ordered the innovative mouse on taobao.com. but sinking PRC surveillance again exploited and delayed near 2 days in logistics: so far since last morning my order status still remains paid rather than dispatched, or relay of expresses, which quite abnormal nowadays bragging next day delivery but usual in my case in recent years shopping online. they surveillanced my vpn in accurate in seconds: most cases under surveillances my critical submission online result in immediate time out or offline. my conversation with my son, each time broke amid, esp when I urging him adopting securer connection. however, my sweet companion of google music, these days last hours daily and that eases a lot pressure. coming weekend brings many hope of joys when I gather woz, dearest son. God, dad, I'm so contented with my life here so far, that almost leaves me more silence of harmony. bring me sooner my Royal China to be more productive. bring me Asoh Yukiko for brighter future family, and our offspring that drives the eastern Asia coming centuries. thx for sunshine outside, dad God, I know summer is soon under your shine.

May 6, 2017

first dreamt in a party where cult or mythical power shown by a mojo, likely in San Francisco or western coast of US. dark magic of superpower, manipulation of mind and fate. then in my routine space when I shitting I was surveillanced. I got up for pee. then dreamt among my senior school alumni, we saw magic robot through which one's life and properties can be exported and imported. there are several robots all can export and when you delete some information it can be restored by other robot peer. most dream details lost after sleepily got up. it's a drizzling morning after 2 or 3 days windy weather, or sandstorms, which tinted sky into brown. rains seemingly due ample but this summer scarce so far. however most plants turning green. last night I refined zhone sites on zohosites, but PRC surveillance heavily blocked me. I finished near 12am and satisfied. I also blessed in success gaining loan from dorm canteen, ¥300, for new public bathroom groupon and other small bills. yesterday bankcommm buzzed in, blamed me not return credit debt as ¥2000 as planned rather ¥1500 I paid in 2 series months. I explained my life should put first, esp my with kid while my salary under expectation. she threatened to sue me. I just can't see how ¥500 means so much for a bank, and how severe I broke my promise with ¥500 less. this noon I will visit my son, which I almost can't wait, for the relief loan, for new restaurant we found last labor day holiday, railway hotel which likely a SOE with proper standard at least we saw rich ready meals in addition luxury leisure space. and for my works review in a week. but financial situation still stern: next weekend movies, 4 gathering meals in weekends before next salary day 2 weeks out, woz's birthday celebration, etc. my sites hosting plan needs renew, ¥60/month. dad God, my life so fit that I envy nobody. let me walk through difficulties like on meadow. prepare us for greater descending, and forever uprising. dad God, bring me sooner my Royal China to overcome surreal. bring me my family clean and tidy with Asoh Yukiko, for our children coming heavenly. thx for the moisture last night and now, God, for the baptism in rough of rotten atmosphere ever seen.

May 4, 2017

first dreamt my passed mother brought me, a kid, to a training center. its a bit unreal, for my childhood never had out class tutorials in rural central China. but my son, woz, he was arranged quite some by his teacher mom. in the center an elder woman teacher whose student includes Dilraba, the hot Uygur actress in PRC now, exchanged words with my mom while I was impressed by the famous girl student. then on a train, Dilraba just aboard and seated feet apart me. she is alone and a bit unease in my gaze. I watched her and her natural beauty likes neighbor door girl, clean and untouched. when a foreigner or small English talk out heard in the carriage, she complained in murmur her English not good enough to catch up it, with which I echoed in common sense. in the dream I likely feeling collegian youth. its a brown morning. the overnight sandstorm left the air dirty and tinted. but in air dusts didn't felt. my breakfast in dorm canteen still satisfying, even in 2 series days the menu less choices on it. this early summer quite chill in Qiqihar, northeastern China. I usually have to put on winter coat against coldness in dorm. last morning I napped after breakfast in boring chill and idle. amazon video, esp old time real people movies inspired me a lot with righteous moral, standard of life and loyalty. recently quite some movies on elders' life caught me in my mindless picks. I was so enchanted that I pray God to keep me the secret of the hidden treasure of meanings and gospel. my life enriched by review of my campus loves movies aroused. I saw timeless love and purity of sanity stems out independently we were young. I saw flourishing lives in my life then and now fautless brilliant. God, dad, my son, woz, Hope of China, his birthday near in May, I promised him each birthday offer him ¥150 for lottery experience. and cake for celebration. we also have cinema agenda next weekend. and our spa groupon should renewed. dad, God, free me off trap of financial problem. with my dear sister's son's aid, I got webcam as longing after a month, I greatly refreshed by its inauguration in my workspace last 2 weeks. now I want to replace my frequently ill working microsoft Arc touch bluetooth mouse with a new innovative gear, ring mouse. aid me ¥100 for it. dad God, liberate me in this month's salary. bring me sooner my Royal China, esp my Crowned Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, to cater to our family and living. bring my children in time in our hatch before lapse of my prime time. thx for the life we enjoy so far and so frontmost.

May 1, 2017

dreamt in a dorm, Nankai campus or my QRRS dorm, I busy with my desktop. likely previously I played with water and sands through my under pants and gathered on my bottom. So I took off underpants and half naked. but Zhang Chongfu, my Nankai deputy monitor, brought a girl visitor and she waiting outside of the door. I at the moment can't find my underpants and later someone thrown me it or I found it somewhere. with almost put right I woke up. this PRC international labor day holiday almost again a disaster for me: I hardly support any treat entitles it. I ate a meal a day and still worring next 3 weekends' gathering dinning out with my son, woz, Hope of China. however passed weeks proves fruitful in heavy workload. I second time install Google Apps on woz new zte android without a single error after many failures missing in wrong files and their directories, as a false response to previous google play store pending download but forever zero traffic as penalty to region like PRC where google denied. I also deleted problemed payment account lest locked out again for PRC's shame. I also found google doesn't delete its gsuite account after our purchase for zho.io 2 email accounts phrased out due to unpaid on time. encouraged by the cheat, I applied 3 new gsuites for our new 3 domains, each claimed several GA accounts under trial period and hoping these accounts' chrome sync, contacts, custom search engines and other user data/settings maintained out of free trial period. we fatally love google's web sync service. last Friday I also found time to rip spam bots, minor errors on my dynamic sites, esp forum at bbs.zhuson.com and cms at agarten.in. after near a year running the web apps roughly familiared, I more or less more experienced with their structure, system, just like I perceived and executed, like other insights in my life so far holy grants. long time pains in ass, disorder among articles on dabbog.com, also totally relinked structurally. my son now seemingly likes to bring new smartphone with him, after many times I cursed him for unreachable online. when I can't access him I wondered why it is so painful. I saw most important thing I needed to share with him is my achievement in life stream. I need treat, celebration for holy witness and double joys devil eyes stolen most. but I prepared to live alone my stuff in my darker and longer journey ahead, in my aging world of coldness, hatred thick dusty land I stood decades. I don't afraid death nor rotten time, I only care holy bliss, and my mission here in northeastern China for future millennium, for Japan, US and my vested land of China Empire from my glorious ancestor. God, dad, its lunch time now, grant us an adequate lunch for the leisure time. bring me sooner my Royal China to outpace the curious eyes upon my legend. bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for my children's cosy family space.

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