#will feature one of the character design opinions I feel so strongly about that it inspired this whole series of posts

[artheresy]

Part Two (Stellaron Hunters)

Like the last one with the Astral Express, I am listing my opinions on aspects of the HSR designs, including things I kinda dislike or at least would change about certain playable designs in HSR to help myself with planning some of my own designs/redesigns for future art!

And I am so excited to get onto three of my favorite designs in this game!! The Stellaron Hunters are my babies and I originally was going to include them in the AE part 1 post, but sadly exceeded some kind of limit on the post while rambling about both of the groups designs, so they get their own post! And y'know what if that gives me more room to talk about them, I am not upset!

Ofc, Disclaimer: I am not a professional character designer, I'm not saying any of my ideas for them are objectively better or improvements even, nor am I bashing any of these designs. This is just my opinion and I like most if not all of the playable designs at the moment! I just have a few thoughts regarding them.

The List part 2:

Silver Wolf: I really like her design, I think honestly the Stellaron Hunters (at least for the trio, still forming my thoughts on Sam's) are easily some of the best designed characters in HSR so far. I do think out of those three designs though, Silver Wolf might be the weakest? Not that it's bad ofc, as I just said I think they're some of the best designs, but alongside Kafka and Blade, it feels like there's more that could be done with her design. They went ham on having so many like "Haha look she's a gamer!" details on her outfit that it ends up a bit eye rolling when you keep seeing all the details. The buttons hanging from her belt, the controller garter, the pattern on the fabric hanging from her hip for no reason, the power button logos on her her belt in multiple places and the strap that hold her knife, and that's not even all of them. It's just a bit much. Yes, she's a gamer, we get that. It doesn't need to be sprinkled throughout her design this much, at least not in this way. Because the way they did it, admittedly looks a bit gimmicky since it's only visual details rather than anything more is the best way I can describe it. I would maybe give her a few more items in place of all of these little things. Give her a visible earpiece, or some other kind of hands off communication device. Give her more devices if you're gonna have her adorned with all these straps, make them useful. Though I have two (maybe three?) other bigger ideas that could either work for changing her up physically, either separately or somehow together in a design. I'm stuck between the idea of giving her comfier clothes, both to reflect her more laid back personality and also to fit more so with what she does, or giving her more of a tech wear influence in her design, especially considering PunkLorde is meant to be a cyberpunk themed place. I feel like there's a better way to reflect that influence in her design. Also I dunno about you, but when I think cyberpunk I think of Neons a bit. I’m not saying turn her whole color palette that, but I think in a few of the patterns or in little details adding tiny touches of neon would look cool and help make her pop out a bit. (Sorry this ended up rambling, when I actually draw my thoughts for her, it will come through cleaner and clearer. Overall, I really like her design still even if there's a lot of details I would preferably change.)

Kafka: Kafka is one of my favorite designs, I adore her, I adore the spider, the web, and even the butterfly motifs present in her design. Her color scheme has a sense of allure to it if that makes sense, well balanced throughout her from head to toe. If I were to change something, it would be to make her design more show-y, a little more over the top. As it stands, Himeko has a more ostentatious design than her. Which feels off to me. "Oh but she's going on missions, taking people out, and collecting Stellarons. Her practical design makes sense." Very true, but also these missions aren't merely just missions. They are performances, displays of acting according to Elio's scripts in order to obtain the results he needs for the future. Kafka, of the rest of the Stellaron Hunters we've seen so far, seems to be the one that best fits into the role of Elio's dramatic villain/anti-hero. I mean just compare her presence in the Luofu quest to like Blade also in the Luofu quests, or Sam in the Penacony ones. There is a difference in dramatics and performance. She beckons the audience's (and law enforcement's) eyes towards her, as she strings them along with her schemes and plans. She is made to be the one in the lime light, delivering monologues and putting on the best show for everybody. When we look at the few missions of the Stellaron Hunters we’ve seen so far, Kafka does fit the bill as the star of his show, his leading actor in the role of the antagonist. As such, I think Kafka could benefit from making her outfit a bit more dramatic, leaning into the role she plays even further. Especially when thinking about how playing up that dramatized version of herself would work with the facade she's hinted at putting up. I do adore it the way it is, I just think more could be done with it. Lean a bit harder in, and by nature of making her more over the top, that could lead to the potential for a more interesting silhouette depending on how it's handled. Maybe even some more elements to influence like making it more over the top could be inspired from the Kafka Stigmata in HI3rd

Blade: I can’t lie to y’all. I think his design is close to perfection. I think it’s so well done (even though the silhouette could use some work? Depending?), it’s absolutely packed with symbolism. However, aside from just some silhouette adjustments, something I would change is the emphasis of how injured he is. The injuries he feels every single day of his life, that can’t heal because of Jingliu essentially overriding the default state his body is trying to restore. It’s a big thing in his lore, so much so that it’s been mentioned multiple times including in a main companion quest and literally up front show to us face to face. That cg of him with the sword in his chest feels like somebody stuck a sword in mine every time I see it, I swear. But design wise, I feel like this point about him and his history doesn’t shine through as well, and it feels like the gravity of that time isn’t properly portrayed in his design. Like let me emphasize, Bailu’s words might suggest that the default state for some of his injuries is literally open and bleeding so... And you might think “Oh that’s funny, when he’s literally covered in bandages like his arm and chest.” Well, I’ll one up you by clarifying if you look up his jacket as he runs, you’ll see his model has bandages ALL the way down his torso!! But the thing is, this is covered by his jacket. We only see his hand bandaged and a little peek at his chest, but his face? Completely fine. The rest of his body? Perfectly covered not showing anything. If I could change his design just a bit, first off, I’m making his coat more tattered and broken. Yes he gets his coat replaced at times, but that doesn’t mean we need to always see it in pristine condition. He’s a fighter, making his coat have tears in it, leave the edges worn down, more fabric than just his red ribbons to be frayed at the ends. In those tears of his clothes, either show bandages (left up to you whether to be seen as fresh injuries covered waiting to heal or more wrapped remnants of Jingliu’s slashes) or scars on every single bit of skin that manages to peek out from that coat. And for some flavor, add some scars to his face however big or small. There’s no way I can believe Jingliu killed him hundreds of times and didn’t at least once go for a head shot. I bet that woman knows the extent of his healing like the back of her hand, I bet she could answer my question about how exactly Blade’s body would heal if his limbs were severed. If he has some part of himself not covered, it should have evidence that he was harmed there! Never let us forget that part of his lore! NEVER!!

(I promise I’m totally not insane about him, what ever could lead you to that conclusion?)

I want to say, I will eventually update this once we have more Sam lore, perhaps I’ll include Sam with the Penacony characters post to make it easier or I’ll just redo the Stellaron Hunters post and revise and revisit my ideas for these three! As it stands, I want to wait until we have more Sam lore and more things cleared up about them before I jump into talking about the armor design or things I know from leaks until it’s been confirmed or disproven so I can give better my thoughts about the design in relation to the character!! Please stay tuned, I can’t decide if I should go for Overworld Belobog first because I have more clear ideas (including a rant about one specific character) or if it’s best to go to Herta Space Station first in order to just go in order essentially. Who knows ! Well! I hole you enjoyed this, I adore the Stellaron Hunters and any time I am able to talk about them I am very happy :D

#basically to sum it up #kafka and blade’s designs need to lean in more to certain aspects #(the drama and the trauma) #and sw’s needs to ease up on the gimmick #but overall? #some of my favorite designs in the game #MWAH love them #okay im finishing this at 3:30 am and i need to sleep so ill schedule this for later #have a good day y’all <3 #the stelle redesign btw is cooking in my wips im just making notes about what i would change or explore #so i can start making concept arts for the different ideas i hav #after her will probably be either himeko or march bc im still thinking of ideas for dh #and once i have this post done i might be doing belobog next #which as a heads up #will feature one of the character design opinions I feel so strongly about that it inspired this whole series of posts #(spoiler alert: the belobog design is servals and youll understand what i mean when i say i feel strongly soon enough) #hsr #honkai star rail #hsr blade #hsr kafka #silver wolf #stellaron hunters

[maythearo]

Yeah! The g3!! I know it has certainly been a uhhhh controversial topic lol

Imo draculaura looks sooo cute

Certainly lolll

You know how it goes I'm gonna ramble again so I'll put the read more thing for the sake of scrolling past it 😭

Well I'll start off by saying that, in this era of reboots and mass adaptations of every mildly old franchsie ever, is kinda impossible to avoid negative reactions from the people who were fans of the first generation of such franchises, because it happens, when someone takes something you grew up with and changes it to a modern audience most people's reaction will be "what in the world that's not how it was back in my days" + the phenomenon of older generations not liking the stuff that comes all for younger generations and etc. And I mention all of this bcs this definetely affects how people's opinions on things such as design (of MH in this case) go, there's lots of strong biases in this conversation of reboots and all

And tbh I wasn't immune to that 💀 at first I didn't like a lot of small decisions they made because I was used to the old one and "the og's always better" type of opinion, monster high was a big part of my childhood and probably a big boost to my interest in art! Which is what I live for baisically nowadays so ofc I felt strongly about it 😭 but when I came back after some time I realized, hey it's not that serious. I don't even remember specifically what those things I criticized were about, so that's an indicator of how much I actually cared, deep down lol. Like, pink Lagoona did not kill me, can you believe that? /s.

My opinion as of now, is that I think the g3 designs are really cute on their own!! I'm gonna stop myself from comparing it to the first gen because for the most part that's a waste of time and also a huge tangent from where I want to get 😭 recent reboots are a product of this era and they adapt accordingly. Sometimes they hit sometimes they miss, I think g3 mh is going well mostly!

(Talking about the concept designs and doll designs in this part) g3 takes from general modern fashion, clothing-wise the characters are not draaastically different from each other, they all just dress like how teenagers nowadays do but each got their own little motifs to their wardrobes. I don't think this "lack of difference" between each other's outfits is an enormous one nor is it inherently a bad thing because hey, if it looks good it looks good, and you can distinguish their clothings between one another just fine imo. In some cases I got some nickpicking in terms of "the pattern of this shirt is not working with these pants" or "whoa there's a lot going on with these colors" or "they really love to put bright pink lipstick on everyone huh" but it's rarely something I heavily dislike (only cases I can remember are that I wasn't a fan of was Heath 💀 feels like halfway through the process of his design mattel said "no you can stop now he's good like that" nothing is happening with that look, it's crazy, what happened to my boy. And Twyla, that wasn't as bad a s Heath's, but it just didn't work for me)

I can't say anything about the quality of the material of the dolls themselves bcs I don't have any of the new ones but oh my god, I also think Draculaura is adorable 😫 I think Venus dropped too recently and I'd buy her for sure!! The braided hair is everything and her fashion sense is probably one of my favorites so far? I also love Abbey's doll, and Frankie too especially that one line that they got a guitar? Instrument? Rockstar theme I think? (I'd cosplay that, no joke) from what I can see the designs are putting a lot more variety on drawing and sculpting different body types, features and details on the dolls and I think that's super fucking awesome! G1 also experimented with facial features and details on the body every once in a while but not as nicely done as now!

For the animated series I understand they had to tone it down to some extent because inserting all details the dolls and concept art had could lead to technical trouble (I think), so it isn't fair to compare them to one another. I'm just gonna ignore the animated series in terms of design for now, cause it's in the dolls and in illustration that a franchise like monster high work best anyway. I don't think much abt the cartoon tbh and I'm also not up to most episodes, idk who else dropped recently. But honorable mention, in the standards of the animated series my favorite designs are Deuce and Medusa for sure

That's long enough of a post so I'm gonna stop right hereeee, this was more of an overview of the g3 as a whole rather than ratings of each character, but yeah! I'm no longer a hater, I'm ok 👍 (if you're one of the people who heard me extensively complain over g3 before in another social, honestly I don't even know what it could have been about but you know what, disconsider it, it's easier that way 😭) I may have more opinions about it but that's all I could remember for now. Also my brain is fried.

And I can always change my mind on this, so there's that! Someone get me a Venus and Frankie doll rn please and thank you

#shut up may

[pigdemonart]

Answering your questions and comments! Pt2

This is for most of the anon questions I got! 

I actually haven’t considered that! Part of me wanted to say accents aren’t a thing in Unova, but then I remembered the infamous nugget bros...and their catchphrase “nuggetabout it!” It just makes me wish every single character in Unova was heavily accented in all variations. But to answer the question, I haven’t given it any thought at all so I can’t say! 

I’ve answered this before I think? But my point remains the same. My art of them features them exclusively in a platonic way!  However, I don’t mind the ships, and I don’t mind people seeing it in such a way. I get comments all the time where people joke about “Elesa and her two malethings + her gf Skyla” Hell even I joke about it sometimes. But it’s all in good fun. 

I love all this Ramses love. He IS the best and you’re both 100% correct!! 

wags finger. this is inappropriate behavior. 

I don’t have a discord server (don’t plan to make one) but I share a space with my partner in their vtuber server! It’s a place where we share our work, promote ourselves and others, and chat a lot about fandom stuff. If you’re interested in joining, send me a DM!

OUghguUGHhh thank youuu.

OKAY. I’ll be cynical for a second: From what I’ve noticed (this is a small observation, not a factoid) I think a lot of submas fans are new to Pokemon…so are maybe not used to gamefreak being huge disappointments yet. 😩 in my experience, they tend to drop lore or plot points and then ignore them for years.

I have no expectations for the sake of not getting my hopes up for nothing. ;-; though, it would be wonderful considering the themes. Even a subtle nod would make the submas tag trend on twitter without a doubt LOL

Wuahh…thank youuu…i love drawing… LOVE !!

EEEEE! I haven’t had the chance to draw up more big gay unovan family stuff yet, but Im glad its enjoyable to other gen 5 lovers. I do love imagining all region characters knowing each other in some way. 🥰 everyone has differing opinions on ingo and emmet but they can agree unanimously they are little weirdos.

;-;)9 its what im here for,,,

I have a whole comic script written for it…very emotional…verrrrryyyyy…gestures familyyyyy themed. But ah, we’ll see if I ever get to it!!! Sitting atop my pile of unfinished projects.

AAAAAAaah I super appreciate this!!! You’re so sweet!! Thank you!!

I hope I can keep making you smile.. its a very big motivator… ;w;

YEAAAA GOOD GOOD GOOD. THAT WAS THE INTENTION. THATS CRAZY THAT YOU CAN HEAR IT TOO LOL like obviously its near impossible to make sounds with comics, but I’m glad THAT part got to your brain HAHA!!

Fellow burgh lover i see you, I understand you, and i respect you.

Hahah, I haven’t really given it much thought, but I genuinely believe that three of them are some of the toughest trainers in Unova. I would say they got far enough to reach victory road. The twins’ talent speaks for themselves being battle facility bosses, but Elesa is nothing to sneeze at either. Since i like to HC them as childhood friends, it only feels fitting that Elesa was not only able to keep up with the twins, but probably bested them several times.

Maybe some daaaayyy….i love Adaman’s design (even if wayyy to many of the charcters are wayyy to pale eeergh)

Im always thinkin to myself i need to have comic ideas in order to draw certain characters. But I forget I can just … draw them……without giving them a reason to be. SO maybe someday haha! Im glad you like the way I drew him though lol!

It’s not so much that its canon (don’t believe much has been confirmed about them except they are clown inspired and have receding hairlines) but it’s apparent and obvious. I would dare say it’s not even debatable, but with these sort of headcanons, you have to consider that the people that feel strongly about it are more likely autistic themselves and therefore know more about the subject.

I recommend reading posts by @/1863-project! They go into detail about every detail and honestly it’s allowed me to learn a lot about how to write the characters!

https://1863-project.tumblr.com/post/676301481415262208/ingo-and-emmet-are-both-autistic-and-i-will-die-on

He’d eat his hat, I think.

Any kinda ugly, kinda clashing patterns... Turtle necks, or long coats. Outfits that are different, but still kinda match.

OH eelektross jacket…..

Anything that says transman swag…lmaooo

Im not very fashion forward myself, but I try to have fun with it. And when I draw them, i have unspoken hc for when they dressed themselves or when Elesa had an opinion.

I did draw them doin the based ball once…

But honestly, I don’t particularly think any of them is huge on sports apart from maybe getting excited by extension.

Unless of courss battling considered a sport?

Personally. I don’t think either of them gets mad often. Frustrated, annoyed, and cranky maybe…but all the way angry?

Kind of interesting to think about. I’m unsure if I’d describe it as scary. More so intimidating because it’s so rare to witness!

I’m reminded of how passively Ingo handled Melli’s fuckery…his customer service voice fell back in time with him. It can be attributed to his politeness, but it certainly takes a great level of patience. So yeah, honestly, I think Ingo would never allow anyone to see him completely angry. Similarly for Emmet, even though he does tend to be more expressive.

As of today, my commissions are currently closed!! But i welcome all inquiries!

It feels nice and warm… ;-;

Ah…………that description is so sweet…….thank you!!

Sadly i did picture that twilight scene with edward and bella JNFNDN BUT THE SENTIMENT STILL STANDS.

Tis a very very cute thought!! She’ll adopt some of their train themed phrases..since some of them are technically puns. Heehee..

Indeed. 🐷

THANK YOUUU!!!! AAAAAAA!! Thank you so so much!! Sometimes i worry more about the writing than the art itself, so it means a lot!!

#ask the pig #anon #LOTS OF ANONS

[scope-dogg]

Thoughts on the first episode of G-witch under the cut for spoiler reasons - I know it's just the first episode but it just came out and people will probably want to watch it first.

OK, interesting beginning. I'm not sure if gundam-meets-school-drama is what I expected from this - it definitely feels like it's borrowing the setup from other recent non-Gundam series - it was bringing Darling in the Franxx to mind for some reason, but there's enough interesting about the setting to make me want to give it a shot. I'd be willing to bet that it moves more towards the typical Gundam plot as it progresses, they wouldn't set up all these different megacorps with differing mobile suit designs if they weren't all going to fall out and get into a big slamfuck war at some point, but as things stand right now it's probably the most relatively constrained in scale setting I can think of when it comes to Gundam, save maybe War in the Pocket, and it's pretty obvious that things are going to be more character-driven for now.

And obviously characters are going to be a big deal in this one. Let's address the elephant in the room - it's the first Gundam series to feature a primarily female main cast, so a lot of attention is going to be on protagonist Suletta Mercury and the other primary characters, especially after the plot of this first episode - it seems like this series might be about to make a play for Fight! Iczer-1's crown as the mecha series with the most overt lesbian overtones out there - I feel like the plot of this episode and perhaps the series as a whole is going to bring a lot of strongly-worded opinions from a lot of annoying people.

That particular aspect of the characterisation so far doesn't bother me at all, but there was another problem for me - I dropped Sunrise's other recent mecha series Kyokai Senki after just a few episodes primarily because I was annoyed at how much a wet blanket the protagonist was, with him stammering his way through most of his dialogue and kowtowing to and getting pushed around by other people constantly. The impression I got of Suletta from this first episode was unfortunately similar. Now, she did show the right amount of fortitude when it mattered, and I'm sure that her growing out of that kind of behaviour is going to be a big part of her character arc, but I do hope that A) that doesn't take her too long and B) that they take her growth as a character in an interesting direction, and that for now they at least dial down the woobieness of her character from the levels on show in this episode. Of course, it couldn't be more clear that a huge part of this show is going to concern her relationship with the secondary protagonist Miorine Rembran, who I got a better first impression of - she's a much more serious and cool personality who's obviously going to be to Suletta's counterpart over the course of the series, but even though I liked her more from the get-go I also really hope that she gets some good characterisation going forward - there is the potential there for her to become a boring character if the writing team make too many wrong choices.

As for the show's presentation, I liked it. The show's got a nice artstyle and the quality level of this first episode was pretty high, though we need to wait and see if it stays that way. The mobile suit designs on show were pretty strong - the Dilanza, the big pink machine with the feathery crest and big beam spear, serves its purpose nicely firstly as an imposing adversary and then as a convenient victory for the Gundam Aerial, who makes about as impressive a combat debut as any other lead Gundam I can think of off the top of my head. The visuals of it taking the poor Dilanza to pieces with its remote bit weaponry was honestly really impressive, and I hope we got plenty more battle scenes animated to the same standard. I already liked the Aerial when it was revealed, but I think I might just have to spend some cash on that 1/100 full mechanics kit of it that they just announced when it comes out. As for the other mobile suit scenes, some were very obviously hand-drawn, and some are quite apparently done with 3DCG, and there were actually a few shots where I had a hard time figuring out whether they were one or the other. Just shows that we're getting to the point where 3D animation's no longer the kiss of death for a mecha anime's visuals. While bad 3D can still look rancid (last year's Getter Robo Arc is a prime example despite being a modern series) when it's done with care it can look quite good now. I just hope they adhere to the same standards as this episode.

At any rate, things could still go either way, but it was a decent enough start. The fact that this is only 13 episodes for now with another 13 in 2023 is on the face of it a little disappointing, but at the same time I'm hoping that that fact might keep the pacing tighter than IBO, the last new non-Build-series Gundam to hit TV screens. There's still many other ways this could all go badly wrong but for now I'm glad that the Gundam experience of big cool robots with a veneer of thinly-disguised homoeroticism isn't just for boys anymore.

#gundam the witch from mercury #mecha #respect the robot

[batfansa]

About the Blog

Important Note: I am currently combing through and moving artwork from my old blog onto this one. So, my reblogging spree is very inconsistent and some fanworks are from fandoms I'm no longer currently active in. This process will take however long.

Hello, I see you've stumbled upon my fandom blog. A place where I gush about the series I love and rant about the ones I don't. You'll find a lot of stuff here, from reblogged fanworks to discussions & rants, to even the occasional self-made posts. My frazzled brain tends to bounce between various things like a ping-pong ball, so reblogging and stuff is crazy and disjointed at times.

You can call me Beth(any) or Bats or whatever, if you'd like. I honestly don't mind so long as you're being respectful about it. I'm an adult female, but again, don't care what you refer to me as.

My main blog is Batscree which does have stuff like animals, food, photography, non-fandom artwork, interior design, etc. My shipping side blog is ships-n-bats which features all my ships (along with rambles about the ones I don't ship).

Just some things to know before interacting with my blog and me:

Please keep any heavy NSFW comments or material aimed at me, others, or any fictional character to yourself. While I have no problem with such subject matter (and may even discuss it in regard to certain series or characters), I don't feel comfortable discussing it directly with those online who I don't know the age of. The last thing I want to do is talk about inappropriate material with minors.

While this blog is an overall Discourse Free Zone(TM), I will still be reblogging posts and discussing things I liked and disliked within the series I indulge in. This may also include discussing and calling out toxic people or mentalities in fandoms or just complaining about some nick picks I had. I'll be sure to tag everything appropriately, however, in case others do not wish to see it.

I will admit it right now that I am a very passionate person, especially towards things I like and dislike. I'm also very sensitive and empathetic, so get very strongly attached to the series I enjoy. But I'm also bitter, stubborn, and made easily defensive when others try to control what I can and can't do, feel, or think. I respect that everybody has their own opinions towards fictional media and can disagree with me and opinions. All I ask is for everybody to be polite and respective when sharing their own opinions. Thank you.

tl;dr Don't try and start an argument with me with the intensions of either insulting me, riling me up, or trying to convince me to stop liking/disliking something. It's not going to work, and I simply will not engage.

If you don't like me gushing about certain series, while ranting about others, then just don't engage or block.

Divider Credit: straywords & animatedglittergraphics-n-more & morbidweb

#Mine #About Blog

[katemcgarry]

Seminar 1 & 2 Films

Submarine: 

Submarine is an award-winning short film by Mounia Akl. The film centres around a woman named Hala who, amidst the 2015 Lebanon Garbage crisis, is refusing to leave. 

The opening sequence in this film is an excellent demonstration of several filmmaking disciplines working together. As the camera pans around Hala’s home, it is clear from the production design this is the home of a person who is artistic and sentimental. The living room is covered in keepsakes, family photos, film and music posters; the place is warm and inviting. Due to the immersiveness of the production design, the slow pan at the beginning feels warranted as it gives the audience time to take a look at Hala’s home. The warmth built in these opening few shots is disrupted as her window buckles under the pressure of the mounting rubbish, and the harsh light of reality streams through her broken window. Cinematography and production design work together to create a striking image and establish the journey the character must go on. 

After this moment is where the film gets on to some uneasy ground. In terms of whether the 20-minute run of the film is warranted, I think it is. The filmmaker might indulge a little bit in the Cinemagic vistas of the landscapes, but I think cutting the runtime down would affect the passing and effect of what the filmmaker is ultimately trying to achieve. What I think doesn’t work are some of the story elements. Hala is somewhat passive, and I didn’t really believe in the romantic narrative or why she felt so strongly that she had to stay. I could pick up from context clues that perhaps she wants to stay to be close to her late father as her home town is her last connection to him. However, this is not clearly stated, and I think, overall, the narrative is a bit too unambiguous. I read a review by Vladan Petković, who argued that the film felt like a preview of something much bigger. They had quite a strong opinion about filmmakers using short films in this way as the format should be self-contained; they shouldn’t be used as a trailer for a feature. I have to agree with why I think the film is the way it is. Mounia Akl is giving her audience a taste of the theme and character she wants to explore in more detail and leaves you with more questions than answers to gain momentum toward a more significant project. 

Hail Mary Country: 

This 2018 short film, directed by Tannaz Hazemi, is about an American football-loving family held at gunpoint by an unsuspecting house guest. 

This is an interesting film and one which divided opinion among the class. For me, the film didn't work. From the get-go, the film felt as though it wanted to play with conventions and, at every opportunity, play with audience expectations. Whether it's the women who are obsessed with a football whilst the men are in the kitchen or having the male figures objectified whilst washing the car or the tv being the point of tension rather than the loss of a daughter. It felt too much, and after a strong first act, characters and plot points fell to the way side. For example, we are introduced to Darla as the protagonist; however, once she has stolen the car, the narrative shifts to the conflict between Nora and Irene. Therefore, the story doesn't sustain through its 18-minute run time and feels like a film of two halves.

However, the film does work in terms of production design and sound. In the opening shots of the family, we understand their passion for American football. Their living room is adorned with memorabilia; one of the daughters is taking bets, the dad is baking a celebration cake, and the family are watching old games before the big match at five. We also immediately understand the class dynamics of the family; it is clear that this family is a stereotypical working-class southern American family through the way they dress, mannerisms and family dynamics. Additionally, the sound design is used expertly, especially to explain the character's backstory. For example, whilst Darla is washing the car, we hear race car sounds; this, combined with the finishing flag necklace she wears, leads the audience to deduce that previously Darla has raced cars. Therefore, these filmic elements motivate Darla to steal the car without the need for unnecessary exposition. 

This film works on serval fronts, including production design and sound, but I think the main issue with this film is the writing. There is no clear protagonist, and for me, the quirky tension about the tv doesn't work and loses focus. 

Strange Men:

Strange Men is a 2013 short by Andrew Fitzgerald about a penniless young drifter who decides to travel back home. But on her journey, she encounters several strange men, including one who claims to be her father. 

The film's first half works well to comment on the pevertated male gaze as Abby travels through America. The editing and camera work together to capture the solo female travel experience. Whilst traving, women tend to be more warry of those who occupy the world around them to be prepared to protect themselves against strange men. This sentiment is particularly well communicated in the train sation scene. As Abby is waiting, her eyes constantly scan her surroundings, and the camera lingers on those passing, surveying for potential threats. The editing reienforces this setiment as people are continually crisscrossing across the frame to represent this heightened state of awareness. 

However, the film begins to lose itself with the introduction of Abby's father, Tim. Their conversation is overly long, rambling and inconsequential. Through this conversation, I think the filmmakers were trying to show Tim trying to find common ground with Abby to bond. The way Tim goes about it is unsettling; whether this was the filmmaker's intention to maintain this perveted male guess I am unsure of, but the writing of this scene is not strong enough to carry through any sentiment effectively enough. 

Overall: 

I  liked all the films across seminars 1 and 2. However, in terms of my filmmaking, this term, the production design in Submarine was particularly significant. In Moth Lilith's film, a lot of the action will occur in the protagonist's bedroom. And similarly to Hala's apartment at the beginning of the Submarine, we want our protagonist Sophia's bedroom to be equally representative of her personality, to have a richness to the production design to give the space depth.

[shearsgum29]

About Listen to Olive Green

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#Mark of Beast in telugu #Mark of Beast 666 #666 telugu messages #666 explained

[greysfall]

My 4444-word review of NEO TWEWY (with personal illustration + heavy spoilers)

My overall critical score for the game is 7.5/10, while my personal enjoyment score is 8.5/10. This review is posted as I have 80% completed the game, got the secret ending and achieved the Angel psychic rank. I’ll first start with the main pros and cons as follows.

PROS:

-        Enjoyable as a whole, still upholding the first game’s spirit in world building and sharing the same backbone - which was mostly revealed in the Secret Reports, it’s impossible to grasp the story without reading them.

-        The new cast and new game is charming in their own way

-        The old cast’s return is one of the biggest highlights for sure, it was fun and impactful. Everyone stays true to themselves and also had their own stories wrapped up nicely.

-        Boss designs are cool, new pins are fun to use and collect

-        The connection between the old and new cast is well written and executed, including but are not limited to the tension between the old and new protagonist, the weird but fun interaction between the 2 Composers, the new friendships revealed and formed

-        Sho being in the main cast is something so uniquely TWEWY and uniquely Sho

-        Still good music

-        Still many fun side quests, some of them really uphold the same quirky spirit of the old game and some are surprisingly touching

-        Many new nice stores and yummy looking foods to explore

-        The map is really easy to memorize for me, it’s fun to travel around the “current” Shibuya to see all the differences compared to the past

-        The social network is crazy and interesting to read through

-        Has an anti-frustration system to help 100% complete the game more easily and earn money faster, so post-game is relatively managable.

-        Overall, I really feel the efforts the team poured into making this as their passion project, not just during the development process but for all the last 14 years. They showed the vision of what they wanted to make, at the same time giving something to both the old as well as new fans.

CONS:

-        The biggest problem with the game is scenario writing. The story is so heavily back-loaded. The director himself thought it would be better to balance out the tension flow by adding more at the beginning but gave in to the scenario writer in the end, probably due to time pressure. This results in an underwhelming execution of characterization and lots of wasted potentials for the first half of the game.  

-        I struggle to view it as a stand-alone game, since the backstory and the old cast both play such an important role in the core of the game. If someone plays this game without having played the OG, they can only enjoy it on surface value at best.

-        The new cast is nice but most of them aren’t quite as intriguing as the old cast, maybe it’s cuz they’re all too nice deep down that they lack a little bit of an edge, of that batshit craziness that everyone in the OG used to have? I think some characters (Fret, Nagi) ended up weaker in terms of characterization because the writer is too afraid of making them unlikeable – which kind of backlashed cuz they only became likable in the most expectable way to cater for a specific group of fans. I would have wished for the other team leaders to be more crazy too, had they not suffered 30+ loops of the Game…

-        The CAMERAWORK IS HELL.

-        Gameplay does get tedious at certain points with all the time travels.

-        Shiba is so badly written as a villain, some Shinjuku characters should be given more screentime cutting into Shiba’s– like Hishima or Kaie or even, Hazuki (though his limited presence also solidified his importance).

-        Some of the main character designs, for example Beat’s hairstyle and his food reactions are hilariously bad. What’s the point of covering up most of his unique facial features?

-        Some of the minor/side characters’ design are too cool for them to have such a small role (eg: Ayano, Eiru). Ryoji did get much screentime but is nowhere as fun as Makoto was.

-        Overall the scope of this game is made a little too big for the team to handle as perfectly as the last game that was very compact, it felt somewhat rushed in development too so the missing pieces are clearly there in the final picture

The entry fee versus paying for it all in the end

An important difference between the Neo game and the original Shibuya game was that the Shibuya rule asked for an entry fee that is the Player’s most important asset, stated as a chance the Composer gives them to reexamine themselves. Meanwhile, the Shinjuku rule neither encourages nor allows personal growth and ultimately aims to erase as many Players as possible. It’s a pity we were never introduced to the full Shinjuku rulebook, as it seems like the system there focuses more on building up power and a grand government to compare with the individuality-driven system of Shibuya.

When you have to compare the new game and the original game (OG), this is an important factor to consider. Also, the OG has a serious storyline running through and through, locked with a different partner/GM creating unique atmosphere for each week and you don’t get to see your old partners again until the end. NEO’s team system does not allow such deep insight and communication between the Players. All of your teammates are always there throughout, the dynamic does change with each new addition but it is not as prominent as a partner change.

Another important factor is how the OG was built from scratch for a new platform as “something no one has ever seen before”, while Neo recycled a lot of old unused ideas from the previous development (check out this interview for more details). The development team for NEO lacks 2 key members and had a change of writer so the final product is not as strongly bound together as the last game.

The new cast is definitely inspired by today’s teenagers (from the view of creators), compared to the old cast they’re more sociable and always seem to take whatever works for them despite feeling unstable inside. They are all innocent and genuinely nice kids, avoiding to hurt each other to a degree that they end up keeping some sort of distance. They’re also unable to communicate at deeper levels, always stagnant at this half-baked stage of equilibrium without any motivation to get to the core of things. That is the cost of entering the game without an entry fee, without even dying or having a reason to be there/to fight seriously. These kids were stolen from the RG into a Game that was decidedly the worst environment for them to change or develop, just wandering around cluelessly to find a way “out” until tragedies started to unfold one by one and they ended up being charged the total sum of the price for their actions – ultimately losing everything in the end.

That is, I believe, a story arc which can resonate more to the youth of today rather than of my generation. If the message of the old game was to “listen”, enjoy life to the fullest and accept to trust others, the message of the new game is to “speak up” from the inside, trying to understand yourself and take actions instead of just going with the flow and finally, to take responsibility for such actions.

If Neku was handpicked by the Composer for being the special one with an all-dense soul to ensure victory of the game then Rindo was just a normal kid chosen out of random by Kubo to be his back-up plan, who just happened to have a high enough imagination to awaken the incredible power from his pin. Rindo was then officially chosen by the Composer as Josh picked up and handed the pin to him again, this time not as Josh’s personal Proxy – but as the Proxy to represent the normal people of Shibuya and via whom he could gamble if humans can fight for their own fate.

The underworld heroine and the hero with little of his own

Shoka is for me a refreshing and layered heroine. She’s the kind of character that took at least 3 trials of creators to form as a complete individual – that included Nomura who gave her the base design and Reaper background, Gen who gave a more cunning touch and the writers who made her English dialogues more punchy. Dishonesty equals “tsundere” is such a cliché, so the English writers tried really hard to avoid that trope in my opinion, while still letting her good intention come through.

She serves as the character who is informed of everything the players should have known, and there was almost nothing she could do about it. Almost. Until she met Rindo.

They were drawn to each other by sharing a state of “not having anything of their own”. They both started out with not being able to truly know themselves, Shoka even hated her RG life but also managed to mature from that stage before Rindo. She must have vibed with Shiki’s love and passion in the Gatto Nero threads, initiating her connection with Shibuya and understanding herself more. With Shoka as Swallow, they were able to open up to each other and offer mental support… but was still not getting to the centre of their problems because for all this time, Shoka could not tell Rindo the most important things about herself.

How did Shoka feel when she met Rindo at the UG? She probably didn’t want to hope that he would live the day until she witnessed the Twisters’ potentials. From the very beginning, they were both incredibly conscious of each other and also constantly frustrated that the person they happened to “notice” was such a condescending bitch/a clueless loser. The Shinjuku Reapers are overall quite drunk in power and uncompassionate to Players, Shoka included. She is also a master of dissociation, which results in her constant boredom, tone swings, haughtiness and subconsciously distancing herself from the friend – the boy she cares about – from false hope, as she judged from facts that it was a hopeless situation where nothing could ever be. Maybe she is naturally a bit of a chameleon just like her name suggests (Shoka 紫陽花 = hydrangea, the color-changing flower), so putting on an act and always dissociating herself from what’s important was easy, while hiding her contradiction was impossible. It was the ex-Reaper Beat who broke it out to her, that she should decide whether she really cared and wanted to do something for a change. He knew how it felt like to cross that line, and knew she wanted to too.  

Shoka is endeared by many of the Shinjuku Reapers and has shown independent acts of kindness (the Shinjuku ghost), proving that her kind and truthful side is as real as her harsh and dishonest side – which makes her a nice mirror to the previous heroine Shiki, who also embraced a dichotomy of self-complex and self-love within her character. In the end, she was the first of the new cast to ultimately accept all that is important to her and independently made the decision to help save Shibuya despite all costs.

She was jealous at Rindo’s interaction with Tsugumi and Kanon but remained silent cuz she wasn’t at a place to have any say about it. She also didn’t reveal about Swallow because that would only add an awkward irrelevance to their current situation, as she was too ready to face erasure at the end of the Game. She only wished to “play a game” with him, be it FanGo or the Reapers’ Game. The tension that the team could only feel at the end, she’s felt it the entire time. The song “DIVIDE” is applicable to not just one bond in the game, but it always makes me think of theirs. There is always a “divide” between her and Rindo throughout the course of their journey, as the living and the dead, as a Player and Reaper, as someone who has a place to return to and someone who doesn’t, someone who knows little but wields too much power and someone who knows a lot despite not being able to do much.

“If only I had the chance to connect with you on the other side

But time goes on, and without us realizing it

The battle is getting heated

Time goes on, and without us realiazing it

Divided again”

To be honest, maybe I didn’t grow any affection for the new main cast from Rindo’s perspective but from Shoka’s. Since I started to sympathize with Shoka, I started to see the boy in a more “real” way. The real Rindo, behind his peaceful façade with others, would lash out on Shoka for her unfairly harsh attitude while none of the others cared. He could also subtly feel that mantle of unspoken secrets from her, her own contradictions, the unresolved chemistry between themselves – and not knowing what to do with it rather than to feel angry with all the unfairness he could not process. (As a Libra too, he’s triggered the most by unfairness!)

It is actually a positive development as he’s at least “reacting” to something strongly now rather than to keep evading his problems. During my replay, I clearly saw the difficult situation Shoka was in, her remaining harshness after the Motoi incident was due to her internal struggle with a mission to save her own life, versus a chance to really be with the team. Her decision was to do both at the risk of losing favour from both sides. Rindo started to accept her layer by layer, as the person who resonated the most to her contradicting nature from the start and knew that via learning her resolve, he has learnt his too.

Later into the game, she even got too much of his attention. Maybe even without knowing she’s Swallow, he’s familiar with her thinking direction and Swallow had always been closer to him than any other friend. It was only after she had to betray her important ones twice that she could start being truly honest. The scene when she died a 2nd time left a strong impression in me, the little reveal let Rindo know that he is also losing Swallow as he’s losing Shoka – and that only death could drive the last secret out of her. Her final “Later, loser” echoed through Rindo as it was the final truth, with only him remaining to hear it: they had actually, already lost everything.

Rindo was the boy who never dared to face all that matters to him until he lost it all, fighting an unfair battle in the faith that they would somehow still win. Shoka was the girl who always knew what was dear to her, but never dared to think she could be together with them ever after and still threw her all into a battle she knew was losing. I think they stir each other on naturally to fill out their gaps, similar to what the Shibuya game partner systerm would have aimed for. The end reward was a little divine intervention to help close up the divide between them once and for all.  

During the game there was not enough space to process anything personal so at the ending when they officially became “friends”, it was an important affirmation of their bond. Some people complained it was friendzoning but it’s not, they just have arrived at the perfect place to start something more. “From now on, we will truly be together” – I read it as that kind of message.  

The heroine from a lost battle, with her story taken away

After reading the secret reports and playing the game to be surprised of how small a role Tsugumi had in the main game despite being the “Hype-chan” thought to be a major character of the next TWEWY installment, many fans would feel sad at a missed opportunity to see the Shinjuku arc in full depiction.

It was shown clearly that, a Shinjuku arc was very carefully planned out and is a vital part of the whole story, yet it could not be made due to various circumstances behind the development scene. I would assume, that the team were not able to make a TWEWY game that ended on a despairing note, but it already happened in their mind, thus becoming a mental burden that forced them to break away from it and started the game anew with NEO. A significant part of NEO became the healing arc for the Shinjuku characters, especially for Tsugumi though I really wished more emphasis should have been placed on her rather than Shiba. We didn’t even get to see her brother – Shinjuku’s Conductor who had a vital role and instead was given the clueless Shiba, who had absolutely no idea what’s going on all the way until the last day in NEO. It’s as if Tsugumi has had her story stolen away from her, because her own battle ended with a saddening loss.

I think every time the game creators look at Tsugumi, they would feel that sadness too. Maybe to them, she is a bigger character than what is seen by the fans, as despite their failed effort to depict her story, she’s lived in their mind for all these years through periods of destruction, healing and rebuild.  Though it is a pity we could not get to experience the full scope of the Shinjuku story, the creators was clear about the place they wished for it to arrive at.    

Individuality, connection and the social network

The team system adapted from Shinjuku rulebook does not allow much room for personal development, as the team dynamic is closer to a work relationship forced to bear results, than a spiritual bond to max out all corners of understanding as found in the partnership system. The old Shibuya system allowed only 1 winner and 1 week limit per game, while the new rule declares for a 1 winning team and only the team at last place will be erased – the other teams will enter another loop. Furthermore, whichever team to challenge the unwinnable Ruinbringers will face the risk of ending up dead last followed by erasure. As a result, the longest-standing teams are most likely not the strongest ever recorded, but the ones who have figured out a strategy to simply survive until something changes, enjoying their newly found social constructs while they are at it. Basically, it is a system to hypnotise players into the illusion that they are still “living”.

Therefore, we as players would not get to the core of each Player individually as fast and directly as we did in the last game. The Twisters were able to stand out not because they’re powerful, they only started to have a real chance after growing enough to each form a meaningful and personal connection to another teammate. It did not come as a team, nor did it intiate from the existing friendship between Rindo and Fret. In fact, I did not find much solidity or anything truly note-worthy about the main team and new characters within themselves until they started clashing with other team members, Reapers and new recruits from week 2 onwards. Rindo found his personal development with Shoka (via a clash with Motoi and pretty much a mini dating sim between them), then via the confrontation of his role with Neku; Fret found his with Kanon then Nagi, the team learned about the real Neku via Beat, Neku entered the UG via Coco’s wish to save Tsugumi… it was not the team but their personal links that empowered them to fight and solve each of their problems.

The other team leaders may have failed because they did not form such personal links, after 30+ hopeless loops Fuya’s team all fell apart to pursue their own interest even at the cost of erasure, Motoi quit his KOL façade to work like a dog for the Reapers (probably to save just his own ass not his team), while Kanon dropped her tricks to find changes via honest cooperation in acceptance of a fair loss. The despairing note in that is huge without making much of a scene because their failure didn’t happen at their best effort to “win”, but in their last attempt to find a way “out”. Even Shiba got his way “out” in the end thanked to his personal friendship with Hishima and Tsugumi.

Something has shifted in the mindset of the game creators in the last 14 years, as both games are about “connection vs individuality” but the last game focuses more on connection between just individuals and this one on the overall network that is formed out of those individual connections.

The introduction of Beat into the main cast was truly the bridge between old and new, they helped each other out in several turns before officially recruiting him. Beat is a character whom a lot of fans including myself have felt somewhat concerned about after Neku disappeared from the RG, so when the new kids welcomed Beat with warm and organic interaction and Beat seemed happy, I started to feel like I wanted to help them out too! I think the overall team chemistry is enjoyable enough for new players, but I could warm up to the new kids more from the pov of a returning character – whom I’m glad to be Beat, as the older brother figure who is genuinely kind, fun, serious and upbeat at the same time; who is needed and needs the kids in return.

The social network is a fun and refreshing feature. You can read all of the crazy tidbits about Shibuya and the links each character have formed with the town people, it’s also fun to visualize how the characters act off screen. Characters’ profiles provide extra insight into their background too, like how it reveals Tsugumi has been friend with Coco during her time in the RG. During the game when not all characters have showed up, you can sometimes guess which empty spot will belong to whom. For example there is a 1 character linking to Neky that is not linked to anyone else, so I could guess that was Joshua, and that another character linking only to Joshua was probably Hazuki, hinting that the 2 Composers are related before either of them even showed up.

Hazuki only showed up for 5 minutes, but his presence is so vital and true to the game that I think he is the most memorable out of the new cast. The two Composers have such an intriguing bond, with their yin/yang or phoenix/dragon themes, opposite color design, the sempai/kouhai tone and the way they keep some sort of distance/work relationship as if it’s mandatory between Higher beings, yet at the same time they can talk so casually because they are truly equal – and different from one another. I have written a separate meta on them here.

Some people pointed out, that all Shinjuku characters’ names and themes are based off Hanafuda cards and the Phoenix in Hanafuda belongs to the Paulownia suit – which is Joshua’s name flower. This is so interesting because it feels like the creators somehow saw it as a sign to interweave the Shibuya and Shinjuku storylines together. Though it doesn’t come out much on the surface, it’s fascinating nonetheless considering both Josh and Haz had at some point interfered with the other town’s affairs.

“Shibuya tour with Haz” was such a special scene, as it happened between 2 characters who do not/no longer have a reason to care about Shibuya, on the subject of what is worth saving about Shibuya. Hazuki carried out the purification of Shinjuku and stepped in to restore Shibuya just as part of his job and unlike Hanekoma or Joshua who both possess profound understanding of humanity, he really didn’t know humans at all. Rindo’s irrational wish invoked in him a sense of curiosity, to try gambling on something irrationally and learning a bit of what his senior have experienced. With all the pieces put together, it provides an overview on Higher beings as a whole, and that Joshua and Hanekoma are really the odd ones out with Hazuki being somewhere in between them and the rest.        

The old friends

It’s easy to have returning characters overshadow the new cast as they have already matured out of their personal story arc and stayed in our hearts for all this time. In the end, I have managed to enjoy both the old and new cast separately and altogether, and they will both find their own place in our memory of this game for the long term.

Sho is truly as crazy as ever, the game wouldn’t be the same if Sho is any less of what he is. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like Neky or Beat is younger than Nagi at all, with moments when it seems like Neky has aged 14 years instead of 3 years. His friendship with Coco surprised me pleasantly, and their interaction together with Beat was fun to watch. Rhyme’s found a new dream and her friendship with Kaie is precious too, especially considering that she can still talk to him online after the game ended. Josh and Neku’s interaction suggested that they have resolved the past and are on equal terms now, they even parted ways in good spirit and I don’t feel any worry about them like I did before.

Neku and Shiki’s reunion scene was beautiful, theirs is such a special bond that it has grown and supported them even without being able to see each other. I am so happy to see them all again and that they stay true to who they are, albeit looking more grown up, cooler and happier than ever before.  

Overall, NEO can’t become a classic on par with the OG, but is definitely a good sequel and a good game in its own rights. I’m happy with whether or not there will be a 3rd game to complete the 3 monkeys theme, but if there will be – I hope the creators can really find the time to learn from the last 2 games and start over with a fresh mindset and strong core.  

#neotwewy #neotwewyspoilers #ntwewy #ntwewy spoilers #neo the world ends with you #twewy #review #meta #neo twewy #shoka sakurane #rindo kanade #tsugumi matsunae

[madlori]

A quick primer on Schitt’s Creek

So apparently going by the comments on some of my fics I’ve done the thing where some of you who have been reading my fanfic a lot over the years want to read my newest stories without ever having seen the canon source material! You are all valid and I support you. 

So I thought it might be nice to write a bit of a primer on the show so you at least know what these people look like and who they are.

First of all I recommend just...uh, watching the show! It really is fantastic, and not just because of the amazing queer normalization. It’s funny and surprising and strange and heartwarming.

Caveat. A lot of people struggle with the first season. It is true that some viewers find it a rough start. The Roses all have significant character arcs and to do that you have to start from somewhere, let’s say. Also the tone of the show and its pace changed markedly between seasons two and three, which is when Dan Levy took over as head writer and they got a bunch of new writers. But even if you’re not quite feeling it from the first episode (I did not have this problem but some people do) I promise, you will be rewarded. And it’s fast, the episodes are only 20 minutes, so.

So! WTF even is this show. 

The Premise: The wealthy Rose family lose all their money when their finance guy absconds with it having never paid taxes. They’re left with nothing but the clothes (and wigs) on their backs and the ownership of a small town called Schitt’s Creek that father Johnny once bought for his teenage son as a joke. They relocate there and move into a dilapidated motel, thanks to the good graces of the town’s rednecky mayor, Roland Schitt (Chris Elliott). There they occupy two adjoining rooms, the parents in one and siblings in the other.

The Roses

Johnny (Eugene Levy) - Patriarch Johnny Rose made his money with a chain of video stores. Johnny is the straight man of the family, finding himself constantly shepherding his dramatic spouse and offpsring. 

Moira (Catherine O’Hara) - a former soap opera star, Moira is a creature not of this reality, it sometimes seems. She is an eccentrically outlandish persona who cares deeply for her family but is often befuddled as to how to handle those emotions or express them. 

David (Dan Levy) - firstborn son David is probably the character most viewers connect with first and more strongly, for a variety of reasons. His personal arc(s) are really the show’s emotional backbone. A former gallerist and pansexual aesthete, David is constantly frustrated by the Incorrectness of everything happening to the family.

Alexis (Annie Murphy) - younger sister and socialite, kind of a Coachella girl, who has spent most of her life globetrotting and getting herself mixed up in outlandish scenarios (it’s a running joke on the show for her to drop in “That one time when I was...” stories as offhand remarks). David is very protective of her even though they fight constantly, and often bailed her out of her Situations when their parents were too caught up in their own stuff.

The Honorary Roses

While the central “character” of the show is the Rose family, in my opinion there are six core characters, which includes these two.

Stevie Budd (Emily Hampshire) - Employee of (and later owner of) the motel where the Roses fetch up. She is David’s best friend and the first person in town he connects with. She is snarky and deadpan and sarcastic. She and David have a short-lived romantic/sexual relationship which ends amicably in season two, but their close friendship remains an important part of the show (yet another thing SC does that’s quietly revolutionary - feature exes who decided to be just friends and then actually do that). She later develops a strong surrogate-father relationship with Johnny as he becomes the co-owner of the motel.

Patrick Brewer (Noah Reid) - David’s business partner, and by the end of the show, husband. Although the show has a great deal to offer apart from this, a lot of people watch mostly for the David & Patrick relationship (which is fine, it’s a big part of the show). Note: if you are watching for this, Patrick does not appear in the show until the mid-third season. At first Patrick seems like an oasis of down-to-earth normalcy amidst all these larger-than-life personalities but it doesn’t take long to realize he’s actually an enormous troll who expresses his love for David by gently roasting him constantly.

And the Others - The show is an ensemble, and apart from these six folks, includes a lot of great secondary characters. Veternarian Ted Mullens (Alexis’s on/off boyfriend), Mayor Roland Schitt and his wife Jocelyn (who is one of my favorite characters), town council curmudgeons Ronnie and Bob, cafe waitress Twyla (played by Dan Levy’s sister Sarah), the local all-gender Casanova woodworker Jake, and the Schitts’ adult son Mutt, Alexis’s first hookup in town.

The Arc: This show is about how the Rose family - who have historically been distant and disconnected - had to lose all their money to find themselves as a family, and later, for each of them to find new fulfillment for themselves. They start out chafing and struggling to get out of this new reality, trying to find a way to sell the town, get “back to normal,” but gradually, they fit themselves into the community. Their family reconnection is pretty strong by the end of S2 (the final scene of that season was my first teary moment) and starting in S3, each of them finds a way to rediscover themselves. Johnny invests in the motel and in Stevie. Moira joins the town council and the local women’s a cappella singing group. Alexis goes back to school and starts pursuing a career in public relations. David takes over a vacant general store and turns it into the Rose Apothecary (which you have probably seen on merch everywhere), a venue for local artisans to sell what they make. It is through this venture that he meets Patrick, who first consults and then decides to invest and become David’s partner in the store.

The show is at the same time outlandish, hilarious, touching, abrasive and over the top. The Roses are over-the-top characters - especially Moira, who speaks in an unidentifiable accent and uses words that may or may not exist - and the story seems to exist in a kind of alternate reality (it’s a fandom joke that the timeline of the show makes no sense - it doesn’t - and it is always summer in SC except for one time when it was Christmas). There is also, by design, no homophobia in Schitt’s Creek. The various iterations of queer characters and relationships aren’t just represented, they’re normalized in a way that I didn’t know I was missing until I saw it.

Plus, it’s fun. Like many of Eugene Levy’s previous works (although the show is really Dan’s creation), the show makes use of musical set pieces. Probably the most famous is the iconic mid-season 4 episode “Open Mic” in which Patrick and David host an open mic night at the store and Patrick serenades David with an acoustic cover of Tina Turner’s “The Best” (arranged by actor Noah Reid, who is IRL a talented singer-songwriter, check out his albums, they’re great). It’s one of the most romantic things I’ve ever seen, made more poignant by the really remarkable face journey David goes through as he listens.

Well, have a look.

Another big moment was season 5′s production of “Cabaret,” directed by Moira and Jocelyn and starring Patrick as the Emcee and Stevie as Sally Bowles. The rehearsals and performance were mined for a lot of great moments.

Anyway, that’s the gist. Probably more than you wanted or needed.

#schitt's creek

[emmarzhere]

3am AU time: Sanders Sides Swap!!

Once again I can’t sleep due to my brain insisting it’s much more important to write down these ideas for a Light and Dark side swap AU than sleep, so 3AM TUMBLR RAMBLE IT IS BABYYYY!!!

So I wanted to try using traits already existing in each character to make their inverses, rather than just swapping traits or completely changing the character’s core values, and these are my initial late night ideas:

(Note: I saved this as a draft and revisited it in the morning / afternoon to make sure it all actually made sense and to add to it with a fresh mind)

(Extra note: I accidentally lost all my additions and the entirety of Patton’s and Virgil’s descriptions by refreshing the page, so it’ll now be written out again in a less formatted way. DAMN YOU TUMBLRRRR!!!!!!)

Roman:

My initial reaction was to make Roman “Pride”, and extend on his egocentric nature (like what is done with many Dark!Roman interpretations), however five minutes of laying in bed thinking about it later I found a trait I felt fit him better: Delusion.

This Roman could still be very much “Netflix kids and family”, living and trying to make Thomas live in a fantasy land where everything is always fine and dandy. This insistence of only seeing things through his figurative or not so figurative rose tinted glasses makes this Roman very naive and hard to get through to, and while on the surface appears very appealing to Thomas (when they first meet Thomas doesn’t understand why Roman counts as a dark side) can be very dangerous if Thomas leans too much into his ways of escaping reality, aka making Thomas a delusional person. The best part of this choice of trait for Roman is that I can still tie in his ego; delusions can be fuel people’s egos, and also to protect them from harsh realities, hence why Delusional works as a role for Roman.

While normally I see Dark Side Roman designed to be an evil prince or king, I decided to go for a more glamorous look which I think fitted my version more: Roman would wear a pristine black and red suit consisting of a red waistcoat, tie and trousers, a black button up shirt and black or red heeled boots. I also wanted his design to link to the white peacock (a rare type caused by a genetic mutation), so I topped off the outfit with either a vintage white shawl or a Cruella style coat (leaning towards Cruella because we know Roman and Disney!) with white peacock feathers attached (still trying to decide if I want Roman to have decorated the feathers with red and black accents or not), and a pair of literal rose tinted glasses to hide his white peacock eyes - pale blue with a glassy look to them which always gives the impression that he is far away, even when he’s not.

Finally his sword is replaced with a grandiose black walking stick with silver details, along with the handle being a silver peacock head (note: possibly detachable from the cane to reveal a silver knife?). I chose this as weapons like these in fiction are often used to appear innocent, only to reveal a hidden depth of skill and character; a description which I think applies well to Delusional Roman.

Extra note: Delusional Roman gets snappy, angry, or even threatening when people try to break him out of or correct him on his delusional ways, though he will often try to slip deeper into his fantasies than actually deal with emotional confrontations.

Extra extra note: Roman is incredibly jealous of his brother as he can’t understand why he’s been accepted despite Roman being the one who creates such wonderfully perfect worlds for Thomas to escape off into! He’s also jealous of how his brother doesn’t care what others think of his work and doesn’t seek validation from the others, not that Roman would ever admit that he does either of those things.

Patton:

So the 3 main aspects of Patton I felt would work best for a Dark Side are his destructive selflessness, his overly strong morale compass and how he encompasses many of Thomas’ more negative feelings.

I couldn’t decide whether to officially label him as “Denial” or “Repression”, but either way he holds a similar role: he represses his / Thomas’ negative feelings, as well as tries to push Thomas to do the morally right thing (as he still represents Morality, just not as his main trait) which almost always is the selfless option. It’s almost impossible to convince this Patton that his viewpoint is not necessarily the correct choice (he’s in denial that he as Morality can ever be in the wrong), and he becomes hostile when his views are continuously challenged.

The light sides see Patton as the main holder and cause of Thomas’ negative feelings (eg. makes Thomas act selfless and do things for others until he’s burnt out and depressed), and when Thomas is feeling these negative feelings Patton experiences them but more strongly to the point where the others have to force him out of bed (usually Logan) and take care of him until he and Thomas get out of the depressive slump. However once he’s out he will deny that he was the problem and begin pushing Thomas down the self-destructive path again.

While this Patton will deny his depression and many negative feelings, he is still not as upbeat as Happy-Pappy-Pal-Canon-Patton, matching more with how the side acts in more serious moments such as at the end of SvS redux. He will smile and comfort others, but laughter and puns are rarely seen.

Another thing about this dark side Patton is that he is very manipulative (a trait shifted from Janus to Patton), even if he doesn’t believe himself to be. He uses his role as “morale compass” to invalidate other’s opinions if they clash with his, and often emotionally hurts the sides he gets close to by caring for them and performing selfless acts for them to show his love (eg. makes breakfast for the other Darks sides every morning, goes out of his way to learn more about their interests so that they can have someone to talk to them about) followed by him simplifying complex morale dilemmas in a way that makes it appear that his option is the only correct one, making the others feel bad about their differing viewpoints (a bit like how Roman felt invalidated and morally wrong throughout SvSR as his views didn’t line up with Patton’s).

This Patton wears a worn out pale blue shirt with a fraying black jumper over the top, leaving only the collar of the shirt visible. He has frog features too; with blots of green skin scattered all over his body, slightly webbed hands and he croaks! The splodges grow larger the more emotion Patton represses. He also really doesnt like his frog features as they don’t align with the perfect image of himself that Patton has in his head, so he tries to cover them up as much as possible with his black jumper, pale blue gloves (leather ones as he tried woollen ones and his frog skin made them go sticky) and baggy trousers, although there isn’t much he can do to hide the blots on his face or his brown frog eyes....

(He’s also constantly worn out as frog-pops has no clue what self-care even means)

Extra note: Patton goes through a sort of alternate character development to canon Patton, where as he begins to be accepted by some of the Light Sides and Thomas they discuss how he doesn’t just represent Thomas’ negative feelings, but all of his feelings; a lot of them are just also accidentally repressed alongside the “bad” feelings. As time goes on Patton becomes more cheerful and goofy, even dropping the occasional dad joke, although never quite to the levels of canon Patton.

Extra extra note: The happier this Patton is, the less faded the blues on his clothes become (much like Virgil’s eyeshadow), until at moments of peak happiness his gloves and shirt are canon Patton blue (eg. when Thomas is with Nico, or when Janus and Thomas first accepted him). Cute blue embroidered designs also form on his black jumper at peak happiness, such as butterflies, simple cats, pawprints and frogs.

Logan:

So Logan is the only side I have decided to leave with the same official trait title: Logic, although he also has the orange trait Anger within him. He will also be taking the place of Virgil as the Dark Side who is prematurely accepted.

However Logan here is still different from canon Logan: he represses and denies his emotions even more than canon due to the other dark sides attitudes towards him (Delusional Roman in particular does not appreciate the truth bombs and logical reasoning the calculator watch drops), leading to more angry outbursts / orange showing through. This makes Logan a horribly unstable side, with him appearing completely apathetic to any sort of feeling for an undetermined period of time until he next reaches his limit and has an explosion of rage - he holds both Logic and Anger/Orange in him here, but the anger shows through a lot more due to his circumstances.

His clothes are always shredded and falling apart due to him tearing them when he’s angry + the rage can come out like an explosion that wrecks everything in his surrounding area, including the clothes on him. He sticks to plain black t shirts and trousers to start with as he claims he doesn’t see the point in putting effort into an outfit as he has no desire to please others.

However when Thomas starts making videos Logan can’t help but show up from time to time. He is unsure why as he could not care less what Thomas or the idiotic “Light Sides” think of him, though he figures while he’s there he might as well educate the buffoons so they can reach more informed, educated conclusions to their constant dilemmas.

At first the Lights don’t take his presence well, and more times than one he’d leave towards the end of an episode to explode in the privacy of his room. But surprisingly they eventually start listening to him, considering his inputs, and Logan leaves filming shoots satisfied, even popping into the Light Side’s area occasionally outside of filming days to talk to them.

However Logan notices a pattern as time goes on: the more he’s around the Light Sides, the less he goes Orange. He tests it by spending a week only hanging with the Lights and finds that his anger barely built up at all. Logan quickly reaches the conclusion that his orange trait isn’t actually uncontrollable, it’s how the others treated him that made it so hard to act civil. That is what leads to Logan hating the Dark Sides (much like canon Virgil does) and finally joining the lights.

Soon after being accepted Logan has an outfit change, where he goes from his burnt, tattered rags to his canon outfit, as he finally feels stable and appreciated enough to trust himself in not ruining a nice new Logic outfit. From then on his journey is about accepting that he has feelings and learning that they’re valid.

Extra note: Logan’s worst fear is the idea of going Orange in front of Thomas or the Light Sides - he finally has people who listen to him and if they see his orange side it might scare them off or they’ll lose any respect for him they had. Worst of all they could get hurt…

Extra extra note: Neither Thomas or any of the Light Sides apart from Janus are aware that Logan holds the Orange trait, believing that he only ever was Logic, just more apathetic to start with (and they actually all buy his reasoning of his old outfit being trashed due to him not caring enough about appearances to fix it, to Janus’s dismay but not disbelief - a bunch of himbos, the lot of them!).

Virgil:

Virgil still represents the “Fight or Flight” response in this AU, just without the excess Anxiety. His official title would be “Instinct”, and he would be more confident than canon Virgil. The decrease in anxiety would also make him better at making rational decisions, though he would still freak out and make not-so-great choices in stressful situations.

Rather than a spider, I decided to link this Virgil more strongly with a cat, with heightened senses, lightning reflexes and eyes that reflect light much like a cats. These additions also match with his change of aesthetic from patchwork emo to fantasy vigilante mixed with bright purple punk, plus the addition of purple eyeshadow applied actually correctly. I made this choice as both canon and this Virgil see themselves as a protector of Thomas, yet Virgil is still slightly more morally grey than the other 2 Light Sides (sort of like canon Logan) hence a darker design. Plus is it really Virgil at all if he doesn’t spend his free time listening to MCR?

Virgil also takes the role of canon Roman when it comes to Patton being accepted: he initially falls strongly for Patton’s caring qualities, with the Dark side helping sooth his anxious moments and suggesting that Thomas make other non-selfish options that don’t make Virgil feel as anxious as some of Janus’ options. So for Patton’s first few conflicts Virgil sticks up for him, claiming he’s not all bad. Then he witnesses how Patton’s selfless choices affect Thomas and realises he’s been manipulated; there was no reason to go all the way with Patton’s choice and hurt Thomas, yet Patton had convinced him that it was either his way or the wrong way, no compromises available.

So by the time Patton reveals his name Virgil really dislikes him and makes a snarky remark in which Patton replies with a jab at how he didn’t realise being Thomas’ protector meant that you could be as evil as you wanted with none of the consequences. Virgil’s equivalent line to Roman’s hero one could be something like “Don’t you trust me?” or “I thought I was your best friend?” - then again Roman’s hero line does work with this version of Virgil.

Janus:

This was one of the easiest traits to decide: with a lot of his more manipulative and deceitful traits being distributed between Patton and Roman, Janus is officially titled “Self-Preservation”, and while he doesn’t claim the father role like Patton does, he is still very much seen as a parental figure and guiding light for Thomas and the lights. He tries to be warm and welcoming to the Light sides (part of his role is to take care of Thomas, hence taking care of the parts that make Thomas), and they naturally gather around him as he gives off a safe aura.

However he is not quite as kind to the Darks - he still has the role of managing what truths Thomas can handle, so he controls which sides stay hidden from him. The darks being revealed tends to be down to him slipping up or the side finding a way around his defences more than by him deciding Thomas is ready to meet them, and each time it happens he beats himself up over it and tries to work harder to not let it happen again. The problem he doesn’t realise is that the slip ups tend to happen in the first place due to him overworking himself to make the others / Thomas happy - he doesn’t quite perform the self-care he preaches about.

I’m still not quite sure where I want to go with Janus’ outfit: the initial thought was to put him in a more Patton inspired attire, however this is still Janus, and he is still a theatrical boi. I ended up settling for a mainly cottage-core aesthetic with a flowy long sleeve yellow shirt made out of a light fabric, brown trousers and an overly large sunhat. He also drapes himself in bright patterned shawls and wraps (still predominantly yellow in colour) as while he doesn’t look as snake-like as he canonically does he still has certain snake traits, such as a weakness to the cold and a yellow tint to his left eye.

However snake features do begin to form later on into the AU as Thomas’ views on Lights and Darks alter over time: he begins to realise that despite how it appears Janus is not always in the right, such as how if it hadn’t been for mistakes Thomas would never have met the Darks and learnt to grow as a person - in fact if Self-Preservation got the say in everything he would likely do little growing whatsoever. He and in turn the other Lights begin to find Janus too stifling until SvSR happens where under the stress Janus becomes a true snake boi. The scales and proper snake eye don’t fade afterwards due to Thomas’ subconscious change in perspective, and while it is a big new insecurity at first over time Janus learns to accept these new changes to himself and the Mindscape, and begins adding a touch of darker mystical aesthetic to his look (slightly fantasy fortune teller based) to match his new look better - although cottage-core remains his go to!!

Extra note: In this AU Janus is definitely the side that would most likely be seen going around the Mindscape in a dress (Roman would also wear dresses on occasion but mainly only within his daydreams in the Imagination); he is all about taking care of yourself, and that includes wearing what makes you happy! Though I’m still kind of tempted to put him in a dress full time...

Extra extra note: while Janus is very much the “adult figure” in the Light Mindscape, he still has his goofy moments like in canon - in general he is more relaxed and jokey with the others...though he’s still a sarcastic shet.

(I struggled finding images that matched at all with the ideas in my head, so take these as very vague links to the actual design)

Remus:

Oh boy, Remus is a fun one...

So now that Roman is the twin known by a different title (like how canon Remus is referred to as “Intrusive Thoughts”), Remus now has claim to the Creativity role!! However Remus isn’t going to do a 180 personality wise - he’s still going to be a chaotic gremlin, just with a light side twist.

His design is purposely all over the place: his aesthetic is mainly pirate based with a long sleeve pirate shirt, loose black trousers and heeled black and silver pirate boots, alongside a dark green pirate jacket and slightly brighter bandana. However he has other seemingly random elements thrown in there, such as a white and green hero cape (fuck what Edna says) coming off the back of the coat, and random colourful potions in the green belt under his coat alongside a knight’s sword. This mismatched look is due to the type of imagination Remus provides: while he still represents and creates intrusive thoughts, he also creates adventure stories and life goals/dreams for Thomas, hence takes a form that has mixed elements from Thomas’ self-inserts and protagonists for said stories. While he personally loves his messy design (do you know how much fun can be had with magic potions, swords, tentacles, and a day in the Imagination? Remus sure does), it does cause some arguments between him and Logan over how illogical him and his ideas are (like canon Roman and Logan).

Roman makes this Remus....uncomfortable. Not necessarily because of his ideas (those are just dull and vomit-worthy in his opinion), but because of how he can’t separate dreams and reality - while Remus loves coming up with Imaginative stories for Thomas and setting slightly outlandish goals for the future, he has a level of awareness that Roman lacks in how he knows Thomas won’t ACTUALLY end up being a morally grey pirate travelling the seas to claim back the magical pendant of octopus powers (unless...). He’s also uneasy with how easily Thomas can fall for Roman’s delusions of grandeur and romance, in fact it opens up quite a major insecurity on how despite being the “good” twin his brother seems to succeed more as the creative role, eg. how Thomas will come up with a dream future career path, husband and even car in a matter of seconds yet Remus has to slave and hone in on decent ideas for weeks to reach his own standard.

This leads to another thing about Remus: while he doesn’t care what others think of his ideas (the trait I mentioned earlier that Roman was jealous of) he hold a high standard to himself and gets extremely happy when he perfects an idea. Besides he still wants his ideas to actually be used by Thomas as them being dismissed for not being good enough does hurt (a bit like how Remus got frustrated in the recent episode with how his “good” intrusive creations were being torn apart by Logan’s methods).

Extra note: The fact that Thomas doesn’t like or appreciate some of his darker ideas / intrusive thoughts doesn’t bother Remus too much as he tends to put less effort into them as he knows they won’t be liked - he just can’t help that they pop into his head and he has to get them out - repression is bad after all! However maybe there can be some episode drama about Remus wanting to be less stifled and have Thomas at least consider some of his more mature themes that he thinks would be good to expand upon.

Extra extra note: Just assuring the fact that Remus not caring what the others think about his work does not correlate with him not caring about the others. He loves his fellow Light Sides and Thomas - he’s just confident in his own craft and while appreciates advice and improvements from the others (he and Logan have a field day on creating biologically accurate gore together) he also is aware that HE is Creativity, and he understands his craft better than the others.

Extra extra EXTRA note: Wasn’t really sure how to put it in there but Remus still represents Thomas’ lust. Do with that what you want.

Thomas:

So all these changes to the sides....of course it has it’s effects on character!Thomas! However I’m getting REALLY tired now so this will be done in bullet points:

Not as Disney-centric as canon/real Thomas.

Has less issues with Anxiety, and more issues dealing with Depression

His morals start off a bit more flexible than canon due to always having we-live-in-a-society Janus as his guide

Still has intrusive thoughts, but not as debilitating with the lower levels of anxiety and the much better relationship with Remus.

Still overworks himself trying to help others (nice one Patton!)

Might have a different career due to Roman being more out the frame - maybe goes into writing instead with Remus’ more diverse form of creativity.

Does explore more diverse creative ideas and darker themes, but still out of habit sometimes puts down possibly good ideas as on surface level they appear too morally wrong.

However could possibly be in a non-creative career, and his major longing for a new career path could be what allows Roman through for the first time.

Less dad jokes but still incredibly goofy with both Remus and Janus being more present.

I think I’m going to wrap up there for now! I may make some art for this at some point, but I also want other’s opinions and ideas for this AU.

If you made it this far, thanks for reading!!

#thomas sanders #sanders sides #sanders sides au #au ideas #roman sanders #patton sanders #logan sanders #virgil sanders #Janus sanders #remus sanders #ts roman #ss patton #ss logan #virgil sanders sides #sanders sides janus #remus creativity #sanders sides swap #light and dark swaps #swap au #tsss #ss swap au #au #i put way too much time into this #i'm going to bed now and nothing can stop me

[sillybub]

If cats ever comes back to tour United States again they should give some Asian actors the right to perform on the play. I would really want them to seize their of triumph. How would that work?

Hello Anon! Thank you for such a great question!

First of all, I HARD agree on wanting a diverse cast! CATS is such a great show for having actors of all different kinds of backgrounds--the diversity of the cast should reflect the diversity of characters within the show. I would LOVE to see Asian actors being cast, along with other actors of color!

Second of all, I sense that you might be talking about the racism towards Asians within the show, and how that can be handled. I am more than happy to address this VERY in-depth.  I’m not sure if this is what you meant for me to do, you have provided me with a good chance for me to talk about my thoughts in-depth.  

So, the first instance of racism we have is in Pekes & Pollicles with the infamous "heathen Chinese" lines.

I've about this before: one fix could be to replace the word "heathen" with any other two-syllable adjective. My favorite fix here is probably "foreign Chinese", but I think the actor would have to be VERY careful with what tone they sing this line in.

My personal fix for this would be to replace that line entirely with something more like "toy Pekingese". Same number of syllables, but we're talking about the dog breed now, and not an entire nationality. Pekingese dogs are classified as "toy" breeds (breeds that weigh 15 pounds or less when they are fully grown), and calling them "toys" would also hint that they're very pampered lapdogs who aren't actually that ferocious at all.

The Pollicle dogs are specified within the song to be Yorkshires, so I don't see why we can't call the Pekes Pekingese on top of that.

Now, more pressing is the Growltiger Issue, which is a little more complicated.

So, first and foremost, I'm strongly in the camp that Growltiger's Last Stand should be eliminated from the show forever.

My reasons for this are as follows:

1. Racism is baked deeply into the character of Growltiger. His song is all bout how he likes to terrorize Asians, original poem calls them slurs, and the entire thing just reeks of Orientalism on top of that. This should be reason enough to take it right out of the show forever.

2. This is much more of my personal opinion, and probably unpopular, but structure-wise, I think that the entire sequence is too long and interruptive. Growltiger's Last Stand in its entirely has a runtime of approx. 10-14 min. The only other song in the show of comparable length is the Jellicle Ball, which is a showcase of all the characters rather than just a very small handful. 10-14 minutes feels too long to focus on a single cat, who isn't even a real character within the show to begin with. The musical is interrupted to put on a different, smaller musical that feels vastly out of place from the rest of it.

Typically, an entirely new set is pulled on stage for the Growltiger sequence, with new pirate outfits for the characters. This is in contrast to the other show within the show, Pekes & Pollicles, where all of the props and costumes are repurposed junk. One of these feels much more authentic than the other. I have always LOVED the decision to give Pekes & Pollicles to Gus; the feeling of improvisation and unprofessionalism, and the absolute chaos of the cats feels much more natural and justified when it was literally an unplanned decision to help Gus relive his glory days as an actor. And since all the cats are involved in Pekes & Pollicles, it feels more intimate as well.

I'm going to expand more on my first point, now.

The Siamese cats are racist caricatures, and non-Asian actors wearing them should be considered yellowface.

Sure, they're supposed to be cats and not humans, but they are so obviously racialized. The masks feature exaggerated slanted eyes, and are very often yellow--hallmarks of a racist Asian caricature.  In early productions, they even sang in a vaguely Asian accent.  For predominantly non-Asian actors to don this costume, it’s yellowface.  

Now, I recognize that the 2020 Asia tour has updated the costumes to be less blatantly racist.  For reference, here is a typical Siamese costume:

(Hamburg 1997)

And here is the revised version:

(Asia Tour 2020).

As you can see, the color pallet has changed from yellow to blue, and there is much less Thai influence in the designs.  In changing the design, the Asia 2020 production has attempted a well-intentioned effort to de-racialize the Siamese cats.  However, these are still racist Asian characters being played by a non-Asian cast.  They context of the song is still the same, even though the costume itself is different.  

So, is it yellowface if an Asian cast plays the Siamese?

No, but it would be incredibly poor taste to cast Asian actors so they can play the Siamese.  

The act of an oppressed group adopting language and symbols that are normally used against them is called “reclaiming.”  For an all-Asian cast (especially with predominantly Thai actors) to put on their own production of Growltiger’s last stand could be an act of reclamation.  I’m not Thai, and only have East Asian heritage on my mom’s side, so it’s not for me to discuss how Growltiger and the Siamese could be reclaimed.

Now, I’m not afraid to call out people’s racism (whether it was intentional or not), so I’m going to talk about a small controversy with the cosplayer Pixiedustjellicle.  She had expressed interest in creating a Siamese mask to sell.  She viewed the Siamese as the heroes of the story, and wanted to create the mask as a homage.  That was a nice sentiment, but as I have discussed already, the costumes and entire concept of the Siamese are undeniably racist.  What Pixie was trying to do is an act of reclamation, but since she is a non-Asian (and specifically white) creator, it isn’t her place to do that.  (After receiving feedback about this from multiple people including myself, she has since apologized.)

Non-Asians should never try to put on Growltiger, and especially not white people.  The Siamese were created and brought to the stage by white men, and there is no way to divorce the racism from their characters. Staging it is something for Asian (ideally with a strong Thai presence leading) cast and crew to do if they so choose.

Additionally, several different Asian cultures are referenced in Growltiger. although there doesn't seem to be much intentional distinction between them, which is why I label it as Orientalism earlier. The Siamese are referred to as Mongolian, for one thing. Additionally, a Siamese cat mauled Growltiger's ear, but now he indiscriminately hates all Asians.

That being said, the Siamese cats are the specific villains of the song; ie, cats hailing from Siam (modern day Thailand) in Southest Asia, which is a very different region that East Asia.  It is for this reason that I place heavy emphasis on leaving it up to Thai people to reclaim the Siamese.

A few people have suggested a major re-write where the Siamese are replaced with the British Navy.  I think that if you truly want to keep the racist song, that’s one option to fix it.  Additionally, you could cut Growltiger and keep In Una Tepida Notte and The Ballad of Billy McCaw, who are fairly divorced from the context of the rest of Growltiger and have no traces of its racism within them.

I’m in the camp that it should just be cut forever, to be perfectly honest.  Even if it wasn’t racist, I don’t care for it.

#I've heard fans defend Growltiger and/or the Siamese because Asian productions portray it #And by Asian they mean China Japan and South Korea #which are just three east asian nations out of 48 in the continent #but im not familiar with the background of those productions in regards to growltiger #so im not educated enough to talk about that aspect #its also worth mentioning that i have never had the opportunity to speak to a thai person about this #anways this post is about why as a general rule we should just not do Growltiger #Growltiger

[maivalkov]

I have seen not long ago a post about "spain's dark side" so...your opinion about that? (I kinda have a feeling of knowing why himaruya came up with that and, if I am right, I am not sure if I like it. It's not that I don't like the dark side thing, but if the reason is what I think, then I don't fancy it)

Great question! Please excuse the length of this response in advance, and if I go off on any tangents. To directly answer your question: I have a horrible feeling that Dark Spain is inspired by the Spanish Black Legend/La leyenda negra, and I don't like that at all. You've really hit on an important topic here, so I'm going to extend this discussion. I call this upcoming piece: Why I don't like Dark Spain and why we, as fans and creators, need to be mindful of how we enjoy our beloved series.

Side note before we begin: I'm going to be talking from a writer's perspective, since this is what I mostly do. My opinion is just that, nothing more. Some will agree with me, others won't, and that's okay. If you're happy with the terms, let's crack on.

Part 1: "Dark" characters I'm not against 2P or "dark" versions of a character if it's required for a particular setting. Let me show you what I mean, using some fic plots I just pulled from my head: Example one: You've got this gritty, fantasy gangster city plot. You use a real city as your location, but the characters are human. Antonio's the leader of a huge criminal organisation and therefore he will do incredibly bad things. It's trigger warnings ahoy. Is this portrayal okay? Sure. (read on before you hit that reply button) Example two: You're writing a horror fic. Antonio's a sexy merman who's more likely to decorate his cave with your entrails, than serenade you on a beach. Is this plot fine? Absolutely. It's dark af, but you're writing sexy merman horror. It kinda’ comes with the territory. Did you see how I wrote "fantasy" and "human" in bold? And did you see that I used Antonio, not Spain? There's a reason. I personally believe in this: When your story uses Hetalia characters in their human form (i.e: Antonio is just Antonio, he does not represent Spain), there's much more freedom and flexibility. I've read many excellent works with darker themes who use real locations alongside human versions of the characters, and do so brilliantly. They're wonderful stories, and they don't cause harm. They're fiction. Fantasy. Fiction. Did I mention fiction? On the flip side: When we are writing the characters as country personifications, who represent the people and the history, we must take proper precaution. The same applies to writing about historical events. (To be continued down below.)

Part 2: Dark Spain

As someone who's been in fandom 10+ years now, my problem with Dark Spain is this: a number of creators back in the old days seemed to agree with my Black Legend theory/concerns, and yet they willingly made content for it. Not everybody did this, but I certainly saw some who thought "wow dark crazy Spain because Inquisition", applied it to certain ships because "ohh angst leads to romance, what a plot" and that is wrong on so many levels. If you know the Spanish Black Legend, then you know how bad this is. It's an incredibly difficult topic because it is, in the simplest sense, massive propaganda designed to seriously damage a country's image. I welcome Spanish input on this, but personally I think using this as some edgy portrayal of Antonio in your fics is insulting. Don't bloody well do it.

(Please note that the fandom is MUCH better now, but it doesn't change the fact it has, and could still happen. I used past tense for a reason, as I do think things are improving.)

Russia is another character which suffers this treatment, and I do think we have a responsibility to be considerate. Many countries have done awful things, mine (the UK) included, and yet our characters have escaped receiving this Dark persona. It's not fair, it really isn't. It's a poor judgment call on Himaruya's behalf if my theory is true. If I'm wrong, then this argument is void. Either way I feel like Himaruya should've specified how and why Dark Spain came about. Part 3: Historical writing

Here's where it gets interesting. I'm not saying "don't write historical hetalia fanfiction", and I never will say it because historical fiction exists. You can go in your local bookshop and boom, people are making real money off it.

I'm not one of those lucky sorts, but I am contributing to that genre myself. Despite lots of magic, fantasy and general artistic license, my story Gatito can be considered historicaI.

It's set in England, 1569. Spain and the Netherlands are two of the main characters, and yes, their conflict is referenced. It coincides with the timeline, and all the while I write them as personifications, I can't pretend that tension between them doesn't exist. If I did, that'd probably be even more insulting to their history, and no doubt confusing for the reader.

The main plot is a daft mash of Arthur misusing his magic, a vile fictional man from Antonio's court who wants his head, and poor Netherlands and Portugal get wrapped up in the drama along the way.

The Dutch conflict is featured, but not the plot. The event is occurring right in the middle of a fictional disaster which Antonio is trying to overcome. It's acknowledged, but it's on the side, to put it simply.

I use human names (Antonio and Abel) and explore that situation from an emotional, human perspective. I do not claim that Abel is a victim, and no one thinks he is either. Personal HC time here: I don't think any of the characters look back at their history and think "wow, poor me". Everyone's made mistakes, and they've all played a role in hurting someone else. My history teacher once told me this: The more you look, the more you see. There's many sides to a story, and even to this day, I doubt historians have truly, faithfully documented events so that it's fair on every nation involved. That's why we need to try and learn history from multiple perspectives, and why when writing hetalia characters during a historical event, we should show the reader as many viewpoints as possible. If you don't, then... well. I frown at you. More on this in part 4.

Part 4: Conclusion/advice

I won't pretend to be a saintly figure in the fandom, and this rant is a bit of a mess, but I hope you get what I'm on about. Thank you if you're still reading.

I'm going to finish with a bit of advice that has helped me have a positive time, and allowed me to create works for a series I really love:

1- If your story is historical, and you purposely want to paint a country in a bad light, think before you do. Don't slander another country for the sake of your comfort character or ship. If your story is set during a battle then yes, they can moan about the opposition, but don’t go hardcore. You know what I mean.

2- Research, research, research.

3- You want to write a particular character. Their human name is unconfirmed, or you don't know a part of their history, but you want to write about it. What should you do? Talk. I had this very dilemma regarding Portugal's surnames, and I just asked Portuguese mutuals on Tumblr for help. I received numerous valid responses in under an hour, and I felt better for it. 10/10 highly recommend.

4- If you've gotta' write Dark Spain: Keep. It. Fictional. If you don't believe my theory behind it, cool, crack on. But if you agree with me, then yeah, I've said it enough. Respect the country.

5- DO explore history. It's fascinating.

6- If you write historical hetalia and you feel that something might be misunderstood: PLEASE USE DISCLAIMERS, END NOTES ETC. I write number 6 from experience. There is a scene in Gatito where a significantly stressed Antonio attempts to summarise the Dutch conflict. He's being blamed for countless fictional issues, and rather than think things through, he blames himself for Abel's pain as well. He does it on a purely emotional basis. Have you ever had that really bad day, and things keep getting worse? Someone comes along and says "you did x y z and I'm mad", and rather than argue your side, you accept it?

That's Antonio in that scene. I know it is, because that's how I intended it to be read. His answer is flawed, to say the least, but in his human heart, he can't help it. I used the end notes as a warning/apology/explanation for this scene. I don't want it to be misinterpreted, and I don't want to disrespect Spanish history.

7- If someone does comment/ask about a sensitive, historical part of your work: don't rant. And don't get offended. I believe we all need to talk more. Have conversations about HCs, how we would write/imagine different scenes, and use it to improve your work.

8- Have fun, and be sensible. Thank you again for reading, I hope this helps to some extent. I know I've thrown my opinion out here, but if you strongly disagree with me, don't @. Move on, embrace what you believe, and everyone's a winner. (This really should've been number 9 on the list haha.)

#ask #hws spain

[animatedminds]

Star Wars: Visions - Episode 8: Lop and Ochō

Early reveal for the rest of the review: this is by far my favorite of the films so far (who knows, maybe Episode 9 will extremely wow me, but until then...), for what is actually a variety of reasons that I will probably go into at length. And because there’s nothing I like better than to nerd out at length, there is better time than now to delve into... Episode 8: Lop and Ochō Developed By: Geno Studio Directed By: Yuki Igarashi Another one that uses a brief narration to approximate the opening crawl of the films, again to great thematic effect.

This is also another one with an explicit timeframe. During the rise of the Galactic Empire, we focus on a formerly isolated planet that has reached out to the Galactic Empire in hopes that the Empire’s influence can modernize their society (some very clear Japanese historical subtext here), leading to many aliens immigrating to the planet. This includes Lop, a homeless bunny-girl alien (mildly jarring, since Gamorreans aside animal-people aliens is something you’re more likely to find in Wing Commander) who escaped from captivity and one day bumped into the patriarch of the ruling clan of the planet and his young daughter. The daughter - Ochō - insists on adopting Lop, leading to her father bringing her into the family: and so Lop and Ochō become like sisters.

Years later, strife strikes as the patriarch - Lop and Ocho’s father - realizes that the Empire only intends to exploit their planet and mobilizes a guerilla force to strike back. But Ochō takes the opposite opinion: without the Empire’s influence, their backwards planet is doomed to fall behind no matter how noble their culture is, so they must submit to ensure their own future. This rift explodes as Ochō formally joins the Empire and their father steps up his efforts to fight back, while Lop stops at nothing to stop the fighting and bring her adopted family back together again.

The very first thing I’m going to focus on here is the choice in how the story opts to approach the setting. Here, instead of getting a Jedi who visits this planet, seeing these people as an outsider does in the way most of the other shorts set up narratives of this type, the focus is on this particualr culture and how its individuals see the Empire’s presence. You are immersed into these people and their ideologies, their history and how Lop and Ocho fit into it all as heirs in the next generation. This is a fantastic way of doing this - you may recall that back during my review of The Village Bride, I commended that short for giving the people of that short a distinct means of looking at the Force, but even in that one the people were secondary: objects of the Jedi’s perspective. Here, Lop is technically an outsider, but that only outlines the prominence of the setting and storytelling as she is then raised alongside this new family and world.

The presentation here is very similar to something like Lost Stars, a book in the current canon that I’ve always seen as one of the best Star Wars novels made in the last few decades. Like Lost Stars, this short uses the characters culture to set up their upbringings and situations, and then applies that to the issue of the Empire: Lop chooses to oppose the Empire - or, more accurately, to try and bring Ochō back home - because of how much her adopted people’s attachment to family has shaped her. Ochō chooses to join the Empire because she sees nothing but the big picture, her good intentions leading her down a draconian path, and as the story goes on her conceit as an entitled heir eventually starts to show itself. The conflict does strike similar beats as the one between Thane Kyrell and Ciena Ree for similar reasons: the story makes sure we know why these characters are going to split before the split happens.

The characterization is good, is what I’m saying. A great example of doing great, distinctive character work in a short amount of time.

I should also get the visuals. This short combines bright, modern character designs with a very classical, painted aesthetic for the world around the characters. This gives it a very classic animation feel, like watching a Miyazaki movie or Sleeping Beauty: the location art of this episode is among the series’ best, and the action animation manages to combine a fluidity of motion with a simplicity of choreography, in a way not unlike The Ninth Jedi - another of the shorts whose action animation stood out.

Back to the plot with another interesting track: the story makes it unclear how strongly force sensitivity plays a role, which also gives it a good contrast to the others which generally don’t just star Jedi, but are almost exclusively about Jedi intrigue and entanglements: Lop is clearly strong with the force, but she has no context for that and her objectives have nothing to do with being a Jedi - she is centered around her people and her family. The lightsaber we see in the short - fantastically - has a backstory similar to the Darksaber we see throughout The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Mandalorian: centuries ago, a Jedi was trained from this warrior culture, and instead of passing their saber down to a padawan or giving it back into the Order, this Jedi instead passed the saber down through their family, again cycling back to the way this short uses the characters’ unique perspective and history to approach the setting rather than the other way around. The people in the short only have legends of the Jedi, and the only thing that’s significant here is that the sword featured is the prized possession of their clan.

This gives the story a lot of room for questioning, especially as the ending is open rather than definitive: is Lop going to learn more about the force, and if so will she do through the lens of her people? Who was this old Jedi, and does the sword have a history like the Darksaber does? And most importantly: the war against the Empire does not end with the end of the short: where will it go from here? Will Lop and Ochō ever be reunited? There is a degree to which this short comes off almost like a pilot for a longer story, which would serve me just fine - for the reason I’m about to get into now: As always, a purpose of these reviews is to look at how much potential these shorts - which are currently non-canon - have to some day become canon, or even at least be followed up on by the studios involved. The potential there comes down a few key factors: the major one being the amount of support these shorts get from the fanbase. But another is in how easily or organically these shorts can be incorporated into the framework of the Star Wars universe.

And are the chances for this short’s incorporation good? ABSOLUTELY. I generally judged the other shorts’ potential on how little they contradicted the world and setting around them. With this one, however, its simpler to think of it from the opposite direction: this is exactly the kind of stories that gets told in the Star Wars universe today. There are several stories I can think of just like this in concept that were made within the last few years alone, or even being made right now: the current canon loves its stories about X culture in one corner of the galaxy and how its reacting to the rise of the Empire, which heroes come from there and why. Where those heroes go in the end. The comics, especially, always seem to be on the lookout for more focus characters to play with, but I also mentioned Lost Stars earlier, and that’s a very good point of comparison: for the same reason Lost Stars makes for one of the best prose installments of the current canon, Lop and Ochō has a lot of open real estate it can waltz into to define its own part of the universe.

Besides a couple superficial stylistic things (the symbols on the lightsaber blade, as I mentioned before, Star Wars doesn’t typically do strictly “animal people” as species - that’s more a Wing Commander thing - but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t if they really wanted to), there’s nothing really stopping this thing from getting canonized. I really hope people make some noise for it, because I’m being serious when I say this of all the films has The Best Chances of being followed up - minus The Duel which, of course, was already getting a followup before the series even released.

All in all, I mean it when I say this was my favorite of all of the shorts. It, pound for pound, has everything that I found enjoyable about this set of films all in one package, ever interesting means of approaching the Star Wars universe that I was looking for, all of the interesting ways of looking at situations we already know that I was hoping for, with a set of endearing characters on top of it.

If we can get more stuff like Lop and Ochō in the future, I would be more than happy. If we can get more Lop and Ochō specifically, all the better for it. I also mean it when I say I hope people make some noise for this one. It’s worth it.

#star wars: visions #disney+ #lop and ochō #Geno Studio #Ochō #Lop #Yasaburo #noncanon #but it very easily could be #the best chances of getting canonized #make some noise for it #the empire #the galactic civil war #great episode #my personal favorite #anime #star wars anime #sci fi anime #possibly a pilot #make this an animated series even if its not one #Animated Minds for Animated Times #the mandalorian #the darksaber #lost stars

[icy-hxt]

can you tell me what you think about the kids at 1a?

hi anon, I'm sorry that I took so long to answer this, when I saw your ask I felt really lazy, because there's too many people in the class lol

this is going to be a long post, since we have 20 characters to cover, so I'm putting it under the cut

okay, first of all I want to say that I don't hate any of the kids at 1a besides mineta, BUT, I do have a feeling of indifference towards at least half of them and do dislike some, I always thought that the story would been benefited if there were less people in the classes, since hori would've been able to develop them better, so don't expect me to talk a lot about everyone. also, don't take everything that I say too seriously, this is not a character analysis, I'm just doing it for fun.

anyway, the order that I'm using to list them is their seating arrangement in the class, so let's start

yuga aoyama: I already said this here before but I really like aoyama, he's ridiculous in the best way possible, he feels like a character that horikoshi took away from ouran high school club or something. since the chapter where he and deku became friends were released I felt like he deserved more screentime, because his backstory about him thinking of himself as different than the other kids in the class because of his quirk being "defective" is really interesting, I always wanted to see more of his friendship with deku and he overcoming his fears (since he was shown to be easily frightened)

mina ashido: I LOVE mina, I think that her design is so cool and her personality is really likable, when we had the kirishima flashback and we saw her protecting her friends from machia even though she was scared too was the moment that I decided that we deserved to see more of her in the story, I really liked to see she having a bigger role for a female character in a shonen, I wasn't too bad in the war but I still want more

tsuyu asui: okay, this is going to be controversial because I feel like everyone likes her, but I feel really indifferent towards her, maybe I was influenced by one of my friends that really doesn't like her but since that scene where she says that going to rescue bakugo is the same as acting like villains I started to not care about her all that much, and yes, I know that she admitted that she was wrong and everything but yeah, I don't really click with her personality (but I don't hate her, please don't be mad at me kdbdgsusj)

tenya iida: ah, what a respectable little man iida is, I really like him, I think that the way that he take everything so seriously is hilarious, like him acting super dramatically in their exams to be as similar as possible to his vision of what a villain is. I really like how he grew since the stain arc and how he decided to be a hero that prioritizes the safety of others in detriment to fighting the villains. I'm really happy that he became the focus of the story lately and that he was the one who could hold deku's hand, I want him to have a bigger role in the story for now, maybe even encountering with stain again and showing to him that he's now a great hero

ochaco uraraka: I love her personality, she's really cute, and her fight with bakugo at the beginning of the story was a highlight to me back then, but, I feel like her character became too much attached to deku after aoyama made her realize that she likes him, almost felt like her personality was gone and her only defining feature was having a crush on him, anyway, thank god that apparently she's going to have importance right now in the story because she's too much of a cool character to become just the romance interest for the male lead

mashirao ojiro: denki playing with his tail is cute, I think that is funny how horikoshi always describes him as the plain one, it was cool when he refused to participate in the sports festival because he didn't felt like he deserved

denki kaminari: oh this sweet dumbass, I love him, he's so funny and cute, I think that is that funniest thing how he just decided to call bakugo "kacchan" and is super overly friendly with him and bakugo just lets him, I actually don't think that he's "stupid" as part of the fandom seems to think, I strongly believe that people can be smart in their own ways, maybe he's not the brightest in math for example but he already showed to be able to come up with strategies, I feel like denki has a lot of anxiety inside of him because of his quirk, but i also feel like he's really genuine in trying to be a hero, overall I really like him, he's really sweet

eijiro kirishima: this swee- I mean, super manly man is amazing, I feel like kirishima is for bnha what rock lee was for naruto, I really really really like him, I love his personality and I love even more his backstory, he's really a great person and he deserves all the love that he get from the fandom, I hope that we're going to see even more of him in the future

koji koda: he's adorable, his voice is really adorable the japanese dub, his quirk is like a disney princess

rikido sato: he bakes, I like cakes and pies, we would've been best friends

mezo shoji: since I saw that hori said that he uses his mask because people are afraid of him I'm impatiently waiting for his face to be shown, and if he doesn't look like a junji ito monster or something I'm going to be pretty disappointed, anyway, I like his personality, he was really cool at the forest arc (I clearly don't remember the arcs names, I'm sorry lol), and I feel like he could have a bigger role in the story if hori finally decides to address the prejudice against people with mutant quirks

kyoka jiro: she kind of reminds me of a girl that used to bully me in middle school because of the way that she treats denki but I still like her lol I liked how she learned that is okay liking to sing and music in general and being a hero at the same time, because after all a lot of people were saved by music and/or their favorite artists, but since I find her quirk so cool I wanted to she her fighting more

hanta sero: he's funny, even funnier than denki, he has a really relatable sense of humor and I love him for that, his quirk is really cool, but I feel kind of bad for him because deku now has practically the same one and he's not the only spiderman in the story anymore (his quirk being similar to spiderman was actually what made me like him in the first place because peter is my favorite hero ever)

fumikage tokoyami: my 12yo emo self shakes inside of me every time that I see him, anyway, I really like him, how would I not? he has a bird head, he's nice without being overly friendly and dark shadow is really cute, I don't really remember everything that happened in the war but I remember him saying to hawks that he believes in him, so I really wanted to see him frustrated at his mentor because of what he did to twice please horikoshi address the consequences of twice's death, I'm tired of waiting

shoto todoroki: ah my angel, shoto was the reason why I started reading the manga back in 2015, I knew that he was going to be my favorite just by seeing his character design. I love shoto, I want him to become the happiest person in the world because he really deserves it, I know that everyone thinks that deku is what an ideal hero looks like but o me it is shoto, he's kind, sweet, forgiving, has a heart made of gold and is just genuinely a good person, I could talk about him for a whole week without pause and still find more things to compliment about him so let's move on before I write over 10000 words about how much I love him

tooru hagakure: she... exists...

katsuki bakugo: while shoto is my favorite, I have to admit that bakugo has the best character development in the hero side of the story, I used to hate him at the beginning of the series but now I love him, a lot, he shows that horikoshi knows how to write a compelling redemption arc if he planned it since the beginning, I love that he started only having "fight" points at the entrance exam for ua to now having his first priority at saving people, bakugo is other that I could talk about for hours so let's move on

izuku midoriya: I like deku when he's not putting his nose at the todofam business, he's a good kid who needs some self esteem urgently, the way that he never seemed to care about his own well being always made me nervous, even though I never felt like he was in real danger, he's the mc for a reason, to summarize: I like him personality wise but some of the narrative choices that hori made for him are not my favorites

minoru mineta: I don't care, I hope for him to vanish from existence

momo yaoyorozu: she's the stereotypical anime girl with glasses (but without glasses in this case), I like her personality, she's really cute, her quirk is neat and she's super smart but, everytime that she puts her hero costume on... I feel super uncomfortable... this is not her fault of course but I think that I would like her even more if she was less sexualized

I could write more if I take more time to think, but I'm not going to do that today, if you want to know my opinion about other characters or something more specific about the kids feel free to send me other ask

also, I'm sorry if there's any atrocious grammar mistakes on this, I didn't reviewed the text and wrote just what I had in my head in the moment at four am

#ann replies #anonymous #there's too many characters to tag... #so im going to just #class 1a #yeah that's good enough #bnha spoilers

[plotbnuy]

KarpReviews - Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995) and End of Evangelion

It took me a good while to really get into anime. Well, maybe that’s technically not true, as I grew up with the Pokemon and Yu-gi-oh anime series. That’s really where my exposure to the medium stopped for a long time, though. There was scattered influence, such as an ephemeral viewing of Spirited Away on Cartoon Network, and access to one of the Naruto fighting games. Ultimately, though, I hardly knew what anime was until high school. It was around this time that I would occasionally stay up late to watch Toonami on Saturdays. Toonami provided me with several of my first and favorite anime series, including Cowboy Bebop, Deadman Wonderland, and Soul Eater. One night, however, I found myself treated to something completely bizarre. 

I can’t say for sure exactly what I had watched, though my current knowledge suggests it was one of the Evangelion recap movies. These are abridged versions of the series that tell the story in a more condensed format, though it’s possible I just caught a few episodes of the regular series. The show itself was overwhelmingly confusing and bizarre, with concepts my teenage mind struggled to grasp, and characters that seemed strange and depressing. It certainly didn’t help that I was watching this show in the dead of night while sleep repeatedly attempted to pull me down. I was mesmerized regardless, and the images I saw never left my mind. 

It wasn’t until now that I decided to finally watch the series in its entirety. I was excited to figure out exactly what I’d seen, why the robots in the show looked the way they did, why the “monsters” had such abstract and strange designs. Most importantly, I wanted to experience one of the major pieces of Japanese animation that had influenced so much of popular media. Thankfully, Neon Genesis Evangelion did not disappoint. 

To briefly summarize for those who still haven’t seen the show, the main premise is that, for one reason or another, Earth has become assaulted by powerful beings known as Angels - strange monsters that threaten humanity with their otherworldly power. An organization called NERV, led by Commander Gendo Ikari, plans to protect humanity and destroy the Angels with mysterious and strange humanoid mecha named “EVAs.” They can only be piloted by particular children, one of whom is the main character and Gendo’s son, Shinji. The Angels themselves, as well as their lore, hearken to Christianity, though in the same way that American media loosely uses Greek mythology. While the premise of the show seems to match that of other mecha, such as Gundam or Macross Saga, Evangelion is more about it’s heavy, layered theming as opposed to mecha and kaiju battles. Evangelion’s storytelling is rich and layered, yet I never found it to be overwhelming or poorly paced. Even though it’s dark tone is prevalent throughout, the battles between EVAs and Angels are still exciting and enjoyable on their own, each encounter building the stakes higher and higher, until it almost feels that everything will suddenly explode. Almost. 

Visually, I think Evangelion holds up phenomenally. The animation style is instantly recognizable while still carrying the same charm that many 90′s anime have. Characters are expressive and animated when they need to be, and backdrops are detailed and colorful. I was blown away especially during the show’s numerous fight scenes. Unlike the bulky mechs featured in most media at the time, the EVAs are nimble and powerful, often performing acrobatic feats or creating stunning displays of destruction. I was absolutely captivated by the designs of the EVA’s and Angels, just like I was in high school. The EVA’s are both incredible and sinister, immediately intriguing just from their design alone. Just looking at one makes you want to know more about them. The character designs are simple but still memorable, which matches their personalities well. What I love most about the visuals of this show, however, isn’t the fluid action or expressive characters, but the implementation of long shots and surreal visuals. Several times throughout the series, the show will linger on a single frame for an extended period of time. There’s no dialogue in these segments, just ambient noise or background music. These moments are some of the most engrossing, trapping the viewer in a single uncomfortable moment, such as the gruesome aftermath of an Angel attack, or a long elevator ride following an argument between Asuka and Rei.

Speaking of, the characters in this show are truly fascinating. Nearly every character is layered and interesting, and each one has their own ways in which they deal with the pressure and terrors of the world around them. I was surprised with how much I ended up liking Shinji (during the main series that is, but we’ll get to that) whose awkward and conflicted personality can be easily polarizing to viewers. I thought Asuka was a nice foil for Shinji, and an entertaining character on her own. She is a bit rough around the edges, and her loud and often self-centered personality can be grating at times, but ultimately her presence is a positive one, and I feel she inadvertently pulls other characters out of their shells. Rei, the third part of our pilot trio, is quiet and mysterious, and she adds to a lot of the show’s intrigue. My favorite character is easily Misato. On top of keeping the younger character’s intense personalities in check, her own story is one that the show graciously gives a lot of attention to. Watching her start to work through her demons was thoroughly compelling to me, and I felt that even through her faults she always tries to be mindful of the people around her. Ryoji was another character that I was a bit worried about after his introduction, but thankfully he had much more going for him than his flirty, aloof attitude. The one person that I never got totally sold on, though, is Gendo Ikari. While he’s certainly integral to the plot, his character was too nuanced for my liking, and it dampened his impact on the story. He’s also one of the characters who I can confidently say isn’t a good person, making his presence even more distasteful. Important for sure, but generally unpleasant. 

Perhaps the most memorable piece of this show is it’s music. Truly, every single track within this anime screams “iconic.” The catchy drumming of “Decisive Battle” constantly plays within my head, a track that helped every Angel encounter feel like an elaborate chess game. “Angel Attack” has a memorable, intense melody that felt appropriate for the show’s surreal and powerful monsters. Of course, nothing needs to be said about one of the most iconic anime openings ever, “Cruel Angel’s Thesis.” By far my favorite, though, has to go to “Komm, süsser Tod.” Playing during the finale of End of Evangelion, this hauntingly beautiful song fits the show perfectly, from it’s use of choir-like vocals to the chaotic mess of strings towards the end. Every song in the show’s OST is wonderful, and I often listen to various tracks while I’m working. Even if you don’t want to watch the show, I strongly urge you to check out the soundtrack anyway. 

Deep within these varied, elaborate pieces, behind the catchy music and incredible action set pieces, Neon Genesis Evangelion is a show about depression. Each character struggles with this in a different way: Shinji keeps his distance from those around him, despite needing more than anything to connect to another human being. Asuka searches for validation from the people around her, becoming angry when anyone takes attention away from her, afraid that she’ll be ignored or forgotten. Rei struggles in general to feel like a real person, to become more than her birthright and her purpose. Misato tries to drown herself in her work and in alcohol, keeping herself in denial while she tries to distance herself from her past. In some ways, the EVAs represent the responsibilities of everyday life, highlighted by Shinji’s struggle to fully commit to his obligation of protecting mankind. The characters in this show are broken, messy husks, and for almost the entire show these struggles seem impossible to overcome. These themes and motifs become especially true starting with episode 16, where the show begins to slow down and focus on its characters as the final Angel threat is thwarted. Ultimately, however, the message of the original series is a hopeful one, sending the viewer off with the message that only when you’re able to help yourself can you finally start to truly connect with and help others. It’s a poignant message and one that I think the show earns by weaving it’s theme of depression throughout the entire show, not just focusing on it near the end. 

The end, however, is where Evangelion becomes a truly fascinating piece of media. Part of what makes this true is that, actually, Neon Genesis Evangelion has two endings: the final two episodes of the show, and the movie appropriately titled End of Evangelion. The series has separate endings for a couple of reasons, actually. While I won’t explain it in depth here, the summarized version is that the latter episodes of Evangelion, starting with episode 16, are subjected to a bit of a paradigm shift following production issues and budget cuts. These later episodes are where the various characters’ faults take the forefront of the narrative, and the action scenes become scarce. The final two episodes take on an especially bizarre nature, analyzing the characters within the context of the show, using abstract visualization and disjointed dialogue to do so. Personally, I’ve grown to appreciate this ending. As I mentioned before, while the focus does change towards the end, I still believe the show was always more about the heavy themes than it was about the robot fights. Many, however, do not share my opinion. When the finale originally aired, many viewers were incredibly unhappy. Unreasonably so, as thousands sent angry letters and death threats to the studio, griefing the creator for his vision. They called for a different ending, one with a more satisfying conclusion, with more action and a clearer sendoff for Shinji and the other characters. 

Needless to say, creator Hideaki Anno obliged them. 

Releasing in 1997, End of Evangelion is perhaps the most spiteful piece of artistry ever conceived. While the original series ended with a message of hope, this film turns the series on its head and creates a narrative that simply reeks of despair. Junko Enoshima  could only dream of creating something so explicitly hopeless. While Shinji takes his first steps towards healing in the original ending, this film features a Shinji who has completely and utterly given up. He’s succumbed to his base desires, numb to the world around him in a way that’s turned him into a monster. His thoughts and actions are violent and abusive, he becomes completely deaf to the needs of those around him, and in a few short minutes of this film, he becomes almost completely irredeemable. He knows he’s become a despicable shell of a human being, but he almost seems to revel in that fact. This version of Shinji is utterly useless, and his actions - or rather inaction - causes the complete destruction of everyone he loves. This film is depressing, it’s uncomfortable, and it’s absolutely unconscionable...

And I loved it. 

In context, it’s hard not to imagine that End of Evangelion is a deliberate slap in the face to the fans who so ruthlessly tore apart the original ending of the show. It completely reverses the progress that was made in the original series, opting to create an ending that is more intense and action-packed, but at the price of turning Shinji, the audience surrogate, into a complete bastard. Watching the film for the first time is almost infuriating, especially as Shinji repeatedly destroys everything in his wake through his own self-loathing. Yet, after letting the film sit in my mind for a while, I found it to be a truly unique piece of art. It’s hard to stomach, and I don’t think I can recommend it, especially on its own, but End of Evangelion is a truly fascinating film. 

As a whole, I’m extremely happy I decided to go back in time to watch this old classic. I believe it holds up incredibly well overall, and it has so much to say in just 26 episodes. Watching it reminded me a lot of Samurai Jack and Cowboy Bebop, especially with its use of masterful long takes and thick atmosphere. If you haven’t given this anime a shot, I strongly recommend checking it out on Netflix or wherever you can get your hands on it. It may not be for everyone, but for this kaiju-loving gal, it exceeded every expectation. 

#anime #anime review #movie review #neon genesis evangelion #shinji ikari #end of evangelion #review

[slasherholic]

(psst... did someone say Mikey whump? guys I think someone said Mikey whump…) 

Frisky February Prompt: Electricity~ (yes it’s 15 days too early shush)  @slashthedice

synopsis: Michael gets served up some nasty, nasty revenge by someone who really, really has it out for him.

warnings: torture in a medical setting, sexual assault, mikey has a bad time ok

foreword: the opinions expressed here by the POV character about certain sensitive topics in no way reflect my own beliefs <3

No Faith in Medicine | Michael Myers x Reader | NSFW

The hospital corridor is long and grey and stretches onward toward a single bolted door, labeled by the rectangular sign hanging above it as Therapy Theater No. 5.

This deep within the bowels of the sanitarium, below the patient wards and the enrichment centers and the checkered courtyard, there is hardly any of the familiar clamour; so as you stride closer to the door the clack of your bootheels over the beige linoleum carries like thunder.

Smith’s Grove was never the sort of place you had pictured yourself ending up during all those sleepless nights studying for your Ph.D, and truthfully, you can’t stand it here. The deliberate blandness of the hospital, with its color palettes limited to inoffensive whites and blues and greys—meticulously designed so as not to provoke its residents—wears on you more than anything else.

You feel like you’re suffocating here; but it doesn’t matter.

This job was never about you to begin with. It was never about some commendable interest in the healing of troubled minds, either; oh-no. There are two-hundred-and-forty-nine permanent patients living inside these sound-proof walls, and while it may not be a very doctorly thing to admit, you don’t give a rat’s ass about two-hundred-and-forty-eight of them.

...and as for that last “troubled mind,” well…

The breezy summer afternoon that Michael Myers was sentenced to life imprisonment exists in your head as vividly as a snapshot picture.

Almost as vivid is your memory of the Halloween that a policeman had come knocking at your front door to inform you in a strictly-business-voice that your sister was found dead in her kitchen, her throat slit open from ear to ear.

You remember watching from your couch as the gavel came down and the judge ruled the man who had taken your sister’s life away as criminally insane—and not responsible for his actions on that fateful October night—and therefor not legally a candidate for the death penalty.

You remember the burning, frustrated tears streaming down your face, the shatter of glass as you hurled the remote at the television screen, and then sinking down in a heap on the floor and screaming until your lungs were raw and your voice was in tatters, because it wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair.

So when the news came out that Myers was to be transferred back to Smith’s Grove—hardly a forty minute commute from your own house—you had been out the door that very same day, speeding in your car down the highway, ready to accept any available position the Sanitarium would offer you for your credentials.

It had been your one shot at revenge on the sick, evil fucker who had ruined your happiness; and you were prepared to move heaven and earth just to bring Myers hell.

It had taken eight months before you even laid eyes on the man for the first time.

You’d landed yourself a patient therapy position, but only had the clearance to treat patients who fell under the “medium” and “high-risk” categories. In the entire hospital there were only two patients who fell under the third and final category: a spitting lunatic of a man, who couldn’t be safely approached without first being drugged half-asleep with antipsychotics...

...and Myers.

You had possessed the patience of a saint, climbing through promotion after promotion.

And the very minute that you were handed back a fresh copy of your I.D, now with a little red stamp at the bottom, the stamp that meant you were cleared to work with Myers, you had raced down to the front desk to file your recommendation for treatment.

Three days later, after hours of debriefing by Dr. Ashton, Myers’ new court-assigned psychiatrist, you came face to face with the worst criminal the sanitarium had ever known.

You had seen Myers’ face pictured in black and white on newspaper articles and in fuzzy low-definition on T.V. 

And absolutely none of that could have prepared you for witnessing him in the flesh.

The thing that had startled you most when you were led by Dr. Ashton into Michael’s barren, cramped room—the thing that practically had you reeling when your eyes fell on the motionless figure sitting on the cot in the corner, chained at the wrists and ankles by a metal link fastened to the floor—the thing you still despise yourself for thinking—

—is that Myers was jaw-droppingly, stunningly handsome.

His were the kind of ethereal good looks that you might expect to find in some renaissance painting, or a Grecian statue, or a fantasy book.

You had stood staring across the room at the motionless young man, drinking in all the features of his vacant, pretty face; overcome by complete and total disbelief that this was actually the person responsible for all your grief.

And the very next second, that disbelief was shattered like a dropped vase; when you looked into Myers’ stare.

It brought down the temperature in the room like a cold-snap. It was not directed at you, only at the floor, yet it had you shuddering anyway, had all the hairs on your arms standing straight up. It was not a lights-on-but-nobody-home sort of gaze, the kind you were expecting from how Myers had been described by his former psychiatrist. His face was blank, yes; that was accurate enough.

But his eyes, they were the furthest thing from it. 

Michael Myers had the eyes of a ruthless, calculating, viciously deliberate predator.

The longer you had stood there, gawking at Myers as if he were a tiger in a cage, hardly listening to Dr. Ashton’s rambling about his admiration of your interest in his patient’s treatment, the more you became aware of the charge crackling in the air; like the moment in a thunderstorm just before lightning rips through the sky. It was as if every fiber in your body could sense the danger radiating from this man; you could all but see and smell the invisible blood staining his hands.

It had turned your vision into a seething cloud of red. 

Here was a murderer—the worst kind of murderer, who was perfectly, undoubtedly aware of his crimes, a fact you could tell from just his eyes—who carried in his heart not a single shred of remorse for the lives he’d ripped away. Who, when he was unable to kill, had resigned himself to sitting and anticipating the day when he might once again have his hands around a warm throat, the day when he would pick right back up where he left off and take another life as carelessly and thoughtlessly as one snuffing out a candle.

And this man had been allowed to keep breathing.

You think of all these things as you reach the end of the corridor and swipe your I.D card on the door to Therapy Theater No.5. Hidden locking mechanisms whirr and click open.

You place your hand around the cool metal handle. For a moment, you just stand there. Feeling your pounding heart in your chest.

It pounds not because you are fearful; you don’t care if you get caught because of what you are about to do. You don’t care if you get fired, or if you get your license taken away, or even if you go to jail. Those are the most trivial, unimportant things in the world. No. Your heart does not pound for those reasons.

It pounds because, finally, there will be justice.

Finally, the evil son-of-a-bitch who slaughtered your sister is getting what he deserved all along.

And you get to be the one to flip the switch.

You turn the door handle and step into the room.

Therapy Theater No.5 is bathed in bright fluorescent light and smells strongly of antiseptic and sterilization. Three people are already in the room: two armed guards, who nod in acknowledgment at you when you enter.

And laid out at the center across a white padded table, dressed in a pale blue hospital gown, strapped tightly down at the wrists and ankles by hospital-grade cuffs, looking up at the ceiling as if utterly uncaring, motionless save for the rise and fall of his ribs—Myers.

A nurse had come in before you to prepare the room for treatment. The therapy you’re meant to be administering is simple and painless: electrodes are fixed to the patient’s body and a weak electrical current is passed through, stimulating choice muscle groups—and in more recent cases, even parts of the brain.

You had emphasized that part specifically in your pitch of the therapy to Dr. Ashton, referencing a study which showed how violent tendencies could be soothed in patients who underwent the treatment.

And no, you’d reassured him, it was nothing like electroconvulsive therapy.

The electrical current used in E.S.T is never strong enough to induce seizures. The only thing the subject feels is a mild, if not pleasant, buzz...

·…or at least that’s how it’s meant to be administered.

Tampering with the wattage of the machine had turned out to be laughably easy. A few snipped wires here, a few crunched numbers there, and now the bulky device sitting atop the roll-around table beside your “patient” can deliver a shock nastier than a taser with every throw of the switch.

It’s not strong enough to stop a human heart (god, you wish.) But it is enough to make Myers hurt.

Enough to make him writhe on that table.

Maybe even enough to make the heartless bastard feel something for a change.

You thank the guards before dismissing them. They leave the room but you know they won’t go far; no further than right outside in the hall, waiting through the entire session with their hands on their batons in case Myers gets out of hand.

Their security would be a welcome thing, if you were actually about to /treat/ Myers instead of torturing the living daylights out of him. But now, the guards are just another problem in need of a solution.

Though you are almost confident that Myers will retain his silence throughout the ordeal—that he’ll uphold his veil of distance and aloofness and total lack of care with the stubbornness of an ass—you’re not about to bet your shot at justice on it.

That’s what the ball gag in your coat pocket is for.

Reaching down to check that it is still there, excitement swells in your belly as your fingers graze the black silicone.

On the table, Myers is still motionless. He doesn’t tilt his head to regard you. He pays you no attention at all, in fact, as if you aren’t even there to begin with. Never do his steely eyes move from their fixed place on the ceiling light hanging above him.

As you walk up to the roll-around table, plucking a pair of latex gloves from a box stashed on the shelf beneath before snapping them curtly on, for a reason that you can’t put into words, you find yourself hesitating to look Myers in the face.

It doesn’t matter that he’s restrained; it doesn’t matter that there are two armed and capable guards standing watch right outside. Despite both these things, that vitriolic, charged aura you had felt in his cell still surrounds him now, polluting the room, hanging like a storm cloud over your head. 

It’s as if some submissive animal instinct has gripped your brain and now screams warnings at you: Predator. Danger. Don’t look it in the eye. Don’t provoke it.

You do your damndest to dismiss the feeling as nerves.

In a little white tray next to the E.S.T machine sits a filled syringe; a sedative. Dr. Ashton has insisted on it to better ensure your safety, as well as Myers’ cooperation. In the psychiatrist’s exact words:

“These days Michael is, ah, fussier about this kind of treatment—you know, the kind they gotta bring in the guards for, the needles, the cuffs, the whole nine-yards. 

It’s a theory of mine that, after living with the sort of power Michael did, the loss of his own control doesn’t sit as nicely anymore. He doesn’t like it. And he’s not afraid to let us know just how much he doesn’t like it.”

Fussy. That was the word Ashton had used to describe Myers. 

It had taken every shred of self-control you possessed not to scoff in the Doctor’s face at that; as if the man laid out before you now were some sort of stubborn, overgrown toddler, and not a remorseless, murderous psychopath.

You don’t spare the sedative a second glance as you unravel the bundle of wires and nodes connected to the E.S.T machine; Myers is going to be awake to feel every goddamned second of what you do to him.

Only after you’re finished with him will you finally send him under.

You can picture the conversation with Ashton now: Yes sir, the sedative worked like a charm, he was out like a light the entire time; no sir, no complications at all.

You take your time setting up the machine because you’re still hesitant to even look at Myers, let alone touch him. But when the wires are all connected, the red power button flashing idly in standby, there is nothing left to do except attach the electrodes.

You force yourself to look him in the face as you approach. You should not be afraid of this man; you should resent him, should despise him, but should not fear him. He doesn’t deserve to hold that sort of power over you, or anyone else, ever again.

So you look.

Michael is still watching the ceiling. According to his eyes, he does not acknowledge you.

But just from how the hair on your nape stands on end you know you’re being watched.

Myers is regarding you coolly in his periphery with the curiosity of a feline, feigning detachment and disinterest; but the weight and pressure of that penetrating gaze could not be more obvious if it were a ton of bricks coming right down on your head.

With a deep breath to rein in your resolve, you reach down, your fingers working to undo the first knot on Myers’ hospital gown.

Quickly, you discover that it is one thing to look at Myers; to feel for yourself his ruthless awareness, the raw intensity of his presence.

But to touch him is another thing altogether.

He draws a breath of his own as you fidget with his gown, his strong rib cage expanding beneath your fingers. You shudder at the sudden pressure of his body; whether out of disgust, or anger, or some fucked up fascination, you aren’t sure.

After undoing the ties on both sides, you lift the front of his gown up and off—

—and find that Myers is totally naked underneath.

Standard hospital procedure for a therapy like this one. Nothing new.

But it’s different when the patient looks like this.

You hate yourself for ogling him. You detest the way your eyes rove across Myers’ body, lingering on all the features that your lizard-brain decides it likes; from the stark tendons in his neck to his sharp and angular collarbones, from his broad, rounded shoulders to the beautiful definition in his abdomen, and down even further than that before you can stop yourself.

To the V of his obliques—to the trail of curly brown pubic hair on his pelvis—and all the way down to his flaccid penis.

You snatch a towel from the roll-around and drape it hurriedly over his hips. Not for the sake of his modesty; just so you don’t have to worry about your eyes straying down to the cock of the man who murdered your sister.

As far as the placement of the electrodes on his body, you honestly haven’t given it much thought. It seemed like the sort of thing that would come to you like an epiphany, as if suddenly, in the moment, you would know exactly where to hit Myers to really make him suffer.

But no such epiphany comes. Oh well; you have an hour to experiment.

Grabbing the two nodes off their holders, you run the wires across his chest and press the little round circles down flat against his pectorals.

When your gloved fingers graze Myers’ skin you nearly jerk back your hand, startled. The man is hot like a stove.

Your medical fascination is instantly piqued—Myers must have the hottest resting body temperature you’ve ever encountered. You have to force away intrusive thoughts of sticking a thermometer in his mouth to see that number for yourself.

Focus.

Tugging up on the wires, you test the integrity of the node’s suction. They don’t budge from his chest, lifting his skin with them as you pull. Perfect; It’s nearly time. 

Now for the gag.

You just have to cross your fingers and pray that you can actually get it in his mouth.

Looking Myers in the face a third time proves to be no less jarring than it had been the second or the first. You’re just relieved that even after all your poking and prodding he is still pretending not to be interested in you, or in the things you’re doing to his body.

You clear your throat before speaking to him because you don’t trust it enough not to crack.

“Open up,” you command him, mustering every authoritative bone in your body and sounding very official even to your own ears.

Removing the gag from your pocket, you hold it up as if to show him, taking care to conceal the black silicone ball with your hand.

“Mouthguard.”

You doubt that Myers has seen this sort of gag before. Or that he even knows what a gag is. Still, you’re not taking that risk. If this doesn’t work then you’re going to have to drug him just to get the damn thing in place, then wait for him to sober up again—a colossal waste of time.

For a tense second, Myers does not respond to your command. He just lays there on the table, inhaling and exhaling, looking incredibly bored with you, with his nakedness, with the electrodes strapped to his chest.

Your jaw goes tense. You nearly repeat yourself.

But then, he opens up his mouth.

Beneath the harsh overhead lighting his teeth gleam wetly. You suspect immediately that he’s going to try and bite your fingers off the second you get too close.

Game on, fucker. 

From the shelf below the roll-around you snatch up a small blotting rag. Walking around to stand at the head of the table, you gaze down at Myers again.

“The strap goes underneath.” You inform him. “I need you to lift your head up.”

He does.

And you strike. Faster than you had thought yourself capable.

You drape the rag over his eyes so that he can’t see what’s coming. Thrusting the gag hard into his open mouth, you wedge it firmly between his teeth. In the corner of the room, Myers’ heart monitor spikes suddenly, the electronic beeping speeding up momentarily—a sound that has you beaming with pride.

You’ve actually managed to startle him.

As you clip the strap into place around the back of his head, a strange sense of accomplishment floods your body—you’ve done it. You’ve actually done it. Everything is ready. 

Every sacrifice you’ve made in these past eight months, every hour spent in this godforsaken hellhole, it was all worth it just to bring about this single moment.

The moment is made only sweeter when you rip the rag away from Myers’ face.

Oh. Now you have his attention.

Those pale eyes are looking straight up at you. Considering you with the cutting gaze of a hawk. Working out the situation. 

You glare right back down at him. You stare deep into his eyes, the triumphant fire now raging in your chest burning hotter than the ice in his stare, more furiously than all the danger—and you find that you are not afraid of him anymore. Like this, Myers is nothing. He’s not a boogeyman. Not a phantom. He’s just a man—stripped of all his mysticism. Strapped to a table. Naked. Gagged.

Powerless.

Just as powerless to stop what you’re about to do to him as each and every one of the people whose lives he took away.

“Hello, Michael.” You hold his fierce eye-contact as you speak. “Ten months ago you broke into my sister’s house and murdered her.”

Myers doesn’t blink. But neither do you.

“When they tried you, you were supposed to leave that courtroom a dead man walking; you were supposed to die. That's how our justice system works—when you do the things you did, you don’t get to keep on living.”

Nothing changes on Myers’ face as you speak. Nothing changes in his eyes. Not one molecule in his body has an atom of care to give about the words you’re saying. He breathes around the gag, his heart monitor beeping slow and steady.

“I don’t give a single fuck about what that judge said,” You continue. “And I don’t care how sick in the head you really are. You knew exactly what you were doing that night. I can see it in your eyes, Myers—you loved every fucking second of it. And that’s the only thing that matters.”

You draw a long breath. One that you hold in your lungs before letting slowly out again.

“You’re the evilest son-of-a-bitch on this entire fucking planet; and you deserve to die.”

Walking over to the E.S.T machine, fighting back with tooth and claw against furious tears now threatening your eyes, you place your finger over the power switch.

Myers watches you; and you notice something flicker to life in his glacial eyes. Not an emotion. Just a realization.

Good. He understands now. He understands what you’re about to do to him.

“Someone has to make you pay. Someone has to.”

Michael just stares. Watching you. Watching your finger on the switch. His pulse on the monitor ticks as leisurely as if he were about to fall asleep.

“And guess what, you sick fuck?”

Still staring—not blinking—breaths coming slowly.

“I’m so fucking happy that it’s me.”

You throw the switch—

—the wires crackle with live electricity—

—and all of Myers’ deliberate, calculated control is shattered like a dropped glass.

His body seizes. His eyes snap shut. His fingers curl into fists that turn his knuckles whiter than the table beneath him. The tendons in his neck and forearms jump out, straining beneath his skin. His heart monitor beats erratically, the little green line on the screen spiking sharply, racing out of control.

Your eyes are glued to the grisly scene. You devour each and every involuntary reaction, relishing in the complete and utter breakdown of his control.

Fifteen gorgeous seconds pass before you remember that you were supposed to be counting to ten. Whoops. You might be frying his brain into an unfeeling stupor at this point. You flip the switch off in an instant because you need him awake, aware.

Myers’ back falls flat against the table, the current cutting off as abruptly as it began. The muscles in his chest continue to contract and seize beneath his skin long after the electricity is gone; you count the spasms as they tear through his pectorals like sets of waves.

When the spasming stops, his chest heaves up and down, winded. His breaths around the gag come heavily. His eyes are still shut; but no longer are they /squeezed/ shut.

For a moment, you really think that he’s passed out.

Then his eyes twitch beneath their lids and flutter open again. Blinking. Focusing—

—flitting right back on your face. Right back to the spot where he had left them before the current forced them shut.

Myers’ eyes are devoid of care. He is entirely unperturbed by what has just happened to him; entirely unthreatened. But now, that murderous intent—the charge which until now you’d only felt in the air around him—is written in his stare as plain as day.

I am going to kill you, says Michael’s gaze, as nonchalant as if he were stating some trivial fact about the universe, like water is wet, or the sky is blue.

It makes your blood boil.

Adding insult to injury, the speed at which Myers regains control of his body is nothing short of infuriating. You fume as you watch the way his breaths level out again, the beeping from his heart monitor falling back into the former slow, rhythmic pace.

You feel as though you should say something to him; like you should retaliate to this defiance in some way that isn’t staring, because you’ve already lost that battle; you cannot possibly hope to match the severity of Myers’ gaze.

But you don’t.

In your heart of hearts you know that your words will go right through his skull, unheard. There is only one language that Myers understands; only one language that he can comprehend down to his marrow. So you’ll speak it to him.

Without wasting another breath, your fingers find the power switch again. And those defiant eyes of his snap shut a second time.

When you shut the current off the results are the same as before; Myers is heaving on the table. But he takes back his control just as quickly, his stoicism prevailing.

By the third time however, his breaths have begun to linger in their heaviness—

—by the fourth he draws them as shallow as a winded sprinter running a race—

—by the fifth, the intervals between the violent seizing-up of his body are too brief for him to catch his breath—

—and the way he now gasps around the obstructing gag, fighting and failing to suck in air past its silicone, his nostrils flaring rapidly to compensate, is the most beautiful display of desperation that you have ever witnessed.

The sixth time you throw the switch, Myers actually does pass out.

When the current stops his body loses its tension with the abruptness of a cut wire. You wait impatiently for him to open his eyes again with your finger lingering over the switch, preparing to meet that steely gaze with another brutal jolt of electricity.

You wait; and Myers’ heart monitor chugs away like a freight train going up a hill.

Still waiting… waiting...

...and nothing happens. Myers is out cold.

The contentment now pulsing through your veins is what you imagine a shot of heroin feels like. Snapping on a fresh pair of gloves, you walk up to the side of the table to admire your work.

The first thing you notice is the sweat. Myers’ body is drenched in it. It beads up on his chest and clavicle, on his biceps and shoulders, on his brow and cheeks, the skin there flushing a shade of stark, exhausted pink. Gorgeous.

Your eyes travel down his body to continue the examination; you stop at his hands.

Myers’ hands are bloody.

Crescent-shaped cuts litter the skin of his palms, marking the place where his own blunt fingernails had dug in uncontrollably, over and over and over again. The fresh blood streaks in little rivulets down his hands and pools on the white padding of the table beneath. 

You chew the inside of your lip as you stare at the mess; these cuts might be tricky to explain away. You’ll have to gauze them and tell Dr. Ashton that his patient did it to himself; maybe recommend that he be switched to a higher Thorazine dosage to really sell the lie.

Luckily, that’s a problem for the future. As for right now, you’re rather enjoying the irony of Myers’ own blood staining his hands for a change.

The inspection continues. Further down his body, you finally notice it; the bulge beneath the towel strewn across his pelvis. 

Oh my god, he isn’t. You think, lifting the side of the towel for a peek.

And oh my god, he is.

Rather frustratingly, just like the rest of him, Myers is pretty down here, too. Pretty and big. Which is not a compliment, you reassure yourself. Just a medical observation. You let yourself stare this time, because you’re not ashamed anymore. You’re not threatened by the notion of admiring Myers’ physiology anymore.

Not when he’s so completely at your mercy.

Somehow, Myers doesn’t seem to be the masochistic type, so you highly doubt that actual arousal is responsible for this. Sheer adrenaline coupled with his frantically pumping heart are probably to blame, his brain mixing and misinterpreting the signals, resulting in this little accident.

The longer you stare down at the “accident,” the more you find yourself wondering what Myers would look like fully-erect.

You cannot rip the electrodes off his chest fast enough. Plucking the towel from waist and discarding it on the floor, you stick the two nodes down flat against his obliques, then hurry to rig up a third. That one you plant just above his penis; as close to its base as the curly dark hair will allow.

You stand with your finger ready on the go-button again, opting to let Myers’ still-racing pulse dip out of the red before you pull the trigger and plunge him back into hell. Bloodied hands you can explain away, but cardiac arrest? Not so much.

The beeping slows. The green lines on the monitor settle. You throw the switch.

Myers’ pelvis bucks uncontrollably up from the table—

—and he grunts.

The sound makes your heart sing. It is muffled by the gag, low and reverberating, not very loud to begin with. Most definitely not on purpose; just a reaction that’s managed to slip through while his barriers are down.

Myers’ groin is still quivering when you cut the current off. His cock stands upright, stiff and swollen, totally erect. A line of saliva now dribbles down the side of his mouth, trickling between the gag, collecting in a shimmering mess on his shoulder. He blinks sluggishly up at the ceiling light as if transfixed; still dazed, you would guess.

Something twisted occurs to you as you drink in the scene. Something that you can’t deny.

Seeing Myers like this—fighting for his very consciousness, struggling to retain some sliver of control—is the single most arousing thing you have ever witnessed. You want nothing more in the entire world than to climb onto this dangerous, wounded man’s hips and claim him. 

You want nothing more than to give him a taste of what true powerlessness feels like.

It’s a lovely fantasy, a beautiful temptation, and a real shame that it can’t happen. You don’t feel like getting knocked up with the child of your sister’s murderer today; or ever, for that matter. Instead, you think you’ll make a game out of guessing how many more shocks will have Myers coming on his own thighs.

Striding up to the head of the table again, you plant your arms on either side of his shoulders, leaning over him, hardly ten inches from his face.

“Looks painful Myers.” You jest. “How about I make you a deal?”

Michael looks up at you. Unfocused. Blinking slowly.

“I flip the switch,” you continue,

“—and I keep it flipped until you’re covered in your own semen, and after that I jam a needle in your arm, pump you full of drugs, and you get to live out your next eight hours as an unfeeling fucking vegetable. Fair?”

You wait for Myers to do something. For your words to register in his brain. For some flicker of a response to let you know that he’s even still in there.

To your immense disappointment, Myers does nothing. Absolutely nothing. He just...

...well, you can’t even call it staring anymore.

He doesn’t seem able to manage that sort of focus, you realize, inspecting his face closer. His eyes are alarmingly barren; there really isn’t much of anything there, now. None of the ruthlessness, none of that predatory awareness, none of the murder.

You’ve actually shocked the bastard totally, one-hundred-percent out of it.

Whoops.

Back at the roll-around, you snatch up a hand light. Returning to the table, you shine it in his eyes, assessing the damage. His functioning pupil is slow to dilate. Worryingly slow. You click the light off with a contemplative frown.

Half of your mind begs whatever force might be listening that this isn’t a passing affliction, that whatever damage that’s done is done. If the courts insist on keeping Myers alive, then maybe reducing his brains to soup is what it takes to keep him docile. To keep him from hurting another living thing ever again. You can only hope.

As much as you’d love to do so, electrocuting the living daylights out of him some more isn’t likely to bring Myers back to awareness; and the session is supposed to be over soon.

You glance at the clock on the wall—

—Shit. Very soon.

You need to find out right the fuck now if you’ve just rendered Dr. Ashton’s patient catatonic.

Walking around the side of the table, you take Myers’ swollen cock in your gloved hand—trying not to think about the fact that you’re jacking off a condemned murderer—and pump hard, stroking him all the way from the shaft to the swollen tip, squeezing the head, massaging your thumb over it, rubbing all the way back down again.

“Come on, asshole,” you spit. “That can’t be all the fight you’ve got.”

Myers’ hips jerk slightly up from the table as you touch him. Probably just an involuntary reaction. You’ll need him to do better than that. Stroking him faster, squeezing even harder, you pray that the friction of your latex glove against his cock feels just about as pleasant as a rug burn.

As you watch his vacant face like a hawk you see him begin to blink harder, his eyes squeezing shut, twitching beneath their lids, staying closed for a beat before opening up again, like he’s struggling to wake from a deep sleep. A much more deliberate motion; he’s coming back to it.

“Can you feel that? Hurts like a bitch, doesn’t it?”

He breathes hard around the gag. His knees lurch up from the table, the cuffs around his ankles straining, holding him in place.

You give his cock another hard squeeze.

“Forget where you are Myers?”

His jaw goes absolutely rigid with tension.

Ah. He heard you that time. He’s back.

How unfortunate that his brain isn’t fried after all.

You can see it all coming back now as his eyes flit down, locking on your face, rebooting within him like a program on a script; the chilling intensity, the sharpness, all the things that had made your skin crawl in the days past. Despite the torture, nothing at all about Myers’ demeanor has changed.

“Welcome back.” You state dryly. “We aren’t done yet.”

As if to make your blood boil on purpose—as if the battered state of his body means less to him than dirt, as if he hasn’t spent the better part of the hour being brutally, mercilessly tortured by you—

—Myers just watches you. Damning you with his eyes alone to the same grisly demise as before.

An odd sense of something, not quite admiration, sparks in your gut. Looking into Myers’ eyes, there is one single thing that you are willing to give this monster credit for:

What sits before you is a creature that cannot be broken. One that will never be dissuaded from its primal, violent nature. To try it is an impossible task. You suspect that you could stand in this room for days, flipping the same switch, delivering the same current, knocking him to and from consciousness, and into all the states in-between.

And the result would never change. Not ever.

He’d still be looking at you with that same deadly stare. A stare as cold and sharp as the blade of a carving knife.

And it would only get more piercing.

And what a relief it is that your goal in the first place was never to break Myers,

just to bring the gates of hell down on his pretty, curly head.

And you have. You can hear it in every breath he takes; he’s struggling. Although he draws his inhales slowly, with mechanical control, the ragged wheezing in his chest is no longer possible for him to hide. Myers is hurting—he’s hurting bad.

As much as you would love to stay and twist the knife in even deeper, it's time to wrap things up. You’re all out of time.

Pulling the electrodes from his groin and thighs with one hand, you let two of the nodes dangle freely off the side of the table.

The third you stick against his cock.

“Count your lucky fucking stars that not everyone in the world is as heartless as you are.” You tell him, walking back around to the E.S.T machine.

Myers follows you with eyes the entire way, stone-faced, impassive. Like the fact that you’ve just fastened a live wire to his dick is about as boring to him as watching paint dry.

Flick goes the switch.

His back arches off the table like a bent bow. He scrunches his eyes shut, breathing hard around the gag, tugging furiously at the cuffs, the muscles in his calves and biceps straining dangerously, pulling upwards with a brutish force that has table whining beneath him.

You’re transfixed as Michael comes. His mess shoots out in thick ropes, reaching further than you thought possible, coating the table, getting on his legs. The sheer power of his body is a stunning thing to witness. You keep the current running to milk him down to the very last drop.

When he stops coming, you power off the machine.

The node comes away from Michael’s skin in a “pop” that is all-too satisfying. Bundling all the wires and electrodes back into place on the machine you listen to the only measurable signs of the man’s distress; the tortured intake of his breaths, the elevated beeping of his heart monitor.

Then, picking up the needle from the little white tray, you cross back to Myers’ side.

The vein in his forearm is thick and pronounced and the needle slips in beautifully. You press slowly down on the plunger, grateful when he doesn’t try to yank his arm away, relieved when he accepts the drug without a struggle. He must be exhausted.

The sedative works its magic quickly. You pull up a stool and sit down beside him to watch.

The vitriol in his eyes begins to melt and soften. One by one his strained muscles are allowed to relax again, the tension ebbing away; from his jaw, his shoulders, his abdomen, his legs. The electronic beeping on the monitor slows and slows until its powerful rhythm beats steadily again.

Evidently, Michael has decided he isn’t ready to go under just yet. Though sleep pools in his eyelids he blinks it away, clinging in a death grip to his consciousness.

Just to leer at you. Just to picture in his mind the day he will have his hands around your throat; as if it is already set in stone. As if it is just a matter of when.

Then, Michael’s eyelids flutter—

—fighting to stay open, still staring—

—closing, for just a beat too long—

—lingering shut—

—staying shut.

You move to clean him up quickly. The gag comes out first. Lifting his head to unbuckle the strap, you tug out the black ball, letting his strained jaw fall shut again for the first time in an hour; then carelessly drop his head. It thunks satisfyingly as it comes down hard against the table. Glancing at the gag’s silicone, you notice the deep markings worn into it, perfect impressions of Myers’ top and bottom teeth. You almost shudder; a bite from him would have been nasty.

You blot away the drool dribbling down his chin and shoulder with a rag, and then move on.

The last thing you expect as you begin to clean Michael’s bloodied hands is the tears that spring to your eyes. Even with your fear of the man gone and buried, you wish that you didn’t have to touch these awful hands; let alone treat them, bandage them, heal them.

You wipe away the tears on your sleeve as you gather your supplies together on the roll-around.

Grabbing each of his wrists just above the restraint cuffs and turning them so that his palm is facing upward on the table, you hastily swab him down with alcohol pads, wiping up the clotting blood from his skin, squeezing out a blob of antiseptic from a tube to smear across his cuts. As you wrap Michael’s palms tightly in gauze you try your hardest to snuff out that invasive thought when it comes searing like a bullet through your skull—

—these are the hands that killed my sister.

You simply can’t afford to linger on those thoughts right now. Maybe when you’re at home tonight, alone in your bed, you will let yourself cry; but not now. Not while you still need to clean up after Myers’ unfortunate mishap.

Toweling him down from his forehead to his calves, you soak away the sweat. And the semen. Then, you fasten back up the front of his hospital gown, knotting each and every tie.

And just like that, the job is done.

You knock on the door. The guards come in and wheel Myers’ unconscious body out of the room.

The next day, you have a debriefing session with Dr. Ashton. You feed him your meticulously rehearsed lie: that the therapy went without a hiccup, that you firmly believe this treatment could be the key to alleviating Michael’s tendencies for violence.

The moron laps up your every word.

Ashton ends the session with a delightful little surprise; he’s pulled some strings to allow for Michael’s therapy to be carried out bi-weekly. He is so impressed by your drive to treat his patient that he’s offering you a position as Michael’s secondary caretaker. He only hopes that you’ll accept.

The smile you give him is bright and sincere, one that beams from ear to ear.

“Doctor, believe me when I say that nothing in the world would make me happier.”

#Michael Myers #Halloween #Slashers #michael myers x reader #writing