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paperclipninja · 4 years ago

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Some finale thoughts

I’ve been sitting with the Younger finale the past couple of days and trying to wrap my head around it all and why I feel the way I feel. And how do I feel? Great question - sad maybe? Disappointed? Underwhelmed? A little bit of all of the above? But most of all I think I feel duped. And that is the feeling I’m having the hardest time reconciling with my overall love for this show. Also, heads up, this post is focusing solely on Liza and where her story ended up.

I want to be clear that this isn’t to do with who I wanted Liza to end up with romantically. Yes, I have always been an unabashed Charles and Liza fan, but I am first and foremost a fan of good storytelling. I am genuinely a showrunner’s dream audience because you tell me a compelling, well written story and I will follow you wherever you want to take me and appreciate the heck out of the journey and find satisfaction in the resolution. Because good storytelling isn’t about appeasing factions of an audience or taking pleasure in exploiting the trust viewers have in the way certain narrative conventions play out, only to hoodwink them at the 11th hour. It is about striking the balance between the predictable and unpredictable, staying true to the story that has come before and the endpoint that has been set, but doing so in a way that acknowledges that there are ways that certain conventions need to play out in order for an audience to feel satisfied. And for me, this is why Younger has fallen so incredibly short in the finale.

I am here every day of the week for a a clever twist but I have said it before, when it comes to executing any kind of bait and switch well, there is a really fine line between an audience feeling elated because they ‘got it’- they read the cues correctly and get the sense they were ‘in on it’ - and feeling like a fool. The Younger finale left me feeling as though my entire understanding of this season (and maybe series) was completely wrong. I was led to believe that I was supposed to be Team Liza, to be rooting for her to find success in life and love after starting over again.

So imagine my elation when during this entire season Liza seemed to have identified who she wanted in her life romantically and so, as the drama of season 7 unfolded, anyone could be forgiven for thinking that the heavy focus on Liza’s relationship with Charles was going to culminate in her FINALLY getting who she wanted romantically, while achieving the career success she desired (and set her on this journey in the first place) would be the final obstacle for the character to overcome. Is that route predictable? Maybe. Could it have maintained the follow through that we come to expect in this kind narrative but still have delighted with unexpected ways of getting there? Absolutely.

To feel like this entire season has been working to convince me that romance was a big part of what Liza wanted in her life, fabricate an inordinate amount of drama around the character she wanted to spend her life with, reunite them and then suddenly try to convince me in the final episode that the lie, which has not been mentioned once in two and a bit seasons, is an issue between Charles and Liza, only to have the protagonist serve as some kind of example that if you lie you can’t have it all...I’m sorry, what? And wanting to bookend the series with the bar scene, I totally get it, full circle, it ends where it all began - it’s a basic storytelling technique that I have marked in many a high school essay - but it once again comes back to me wanting to feel a sense that this was a looming possibility, that it was earned and I was ‘in on it’.

An effective twist doesn’t come out of nowhere and any argument that this didn’t, it came from the start of the series, is rubbish. In the context of this season, which is what any viewer holds in their mind as a season winds up, Josh and Liza reconnecting in this way was completely tacked on and contrived. Again, it could have been a really sweet moment if the break up that had just occurred between Liza and the man she had been desperately in love with for the entire season, didn’t render the entire season redundant, or if Josh and Liza had had more than one 2 minute interaction in episode 1. Like, what was the point of any of the drama from this season if the focus of the series was never meant to be the romantic relationships? And if the series was never meant to be about the romantic relationships, why end with the possibility of reconnecting with Josh at all and instead end with the four women toasting one another's’ success?

And THAT is why I feel duped. It’s not about who Liza may or may not have ended up with or the mental gymnastics required for the finale to make any sense in relation to the rest of the season. I feel duped because all the way up until this final episode I was under the impression that I was watching a different kind of show. One that was feel-good and light and fluffy and had its fair share of drama but the fun kind, and resolved in ways that were sometimes predictable, sometimes not, but always satisfying.

I was under the impression that by rooting for Liza, I was rooting for her to succeed and that telling a lie to combat ageism was worth it because the ridiculous premise paid off and she did get it all. Is it cheesy and too happily ever after? Maybe. But you know what? That is what I felt like I was sold all these years. A happy escapism that would often take the ridiculous and make it delightfully entertaining and never take itself too seriously. And with that comes certain expectations of the way storylines will build and resolve: reducing such a significant aspect of Liza's story to a cautionary tale on the perils of lying seemed completely out of place for the tone and type of show Younger has always been.

So perhaps I did misunderstand the type of show I was watching all these years, perhaps my expectation of my favourite series (and yes it remains my fave) to end all wrapped up in a neat way that saw these characters I’m so invested in ride off into the sunset with everything they desired was unrealistic (or perhaps for many they all did and if that’s how you felt then I’m honestly thrilled for you).

The loop back to the moment when the lie was conceived, right down to the verbatim dialogue from Josh and Liza’s first interaction, essentially creates a Groundhog Day scenario - Liza is back where she started, sure with some career success and some pretty great experiences, but the character growth has been stagnated by this lie from the very beginning apparently. And again, if this season had been working towards this moment of another reset, starting over once again but without the lie in place, I’d be so on board because I actually really like this idea. But to expect an audience to make the leap from one story that’s been told the entire season to this one is too much of a leap at the last minute IMO.

I will always love Younger, I was excited that season 7 seemed to be really deliberately building towards a clear ending, but I will be forever perplexed by the choices made in that finale.

#youngertv #younger tv #finale #spoilers #liza miller #thoughts

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wangxiandecoded · 5 years ago

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Episode 4 (& Wangxian Meta)

Previous Episode | Next Episode

(Spoilers for the whole show ahead!)

Cultivation Partner

Episode 4 opens with shots of the Lan clan’s rule books that drowned Wei Ying the night before. As explained in this amazing observation by a fan, the only rule that is visible in the shot is the one which states a Lan clan member should not take off their forehead ribbon unless in front of their parents or cultivation partner, despite the show using the word “wife”. This is a strikingly gender neutral change for a show that is going above and beyond to establish that the heroes are in love without being allowed to do so explicitly.

Wei Ying is Whipped, Lan Zhan is An Ice Prince

Wei Ying is like a puppy in constant need of love and affection from Lan Zhan, isn't he? It is so important to him that Lan Zhan forgive him, befriend him, laugh with him, spend time with him. Oh Lan Zhan, if only you would look past who you are supposed To Be and admit how cute he is.

There are only two people who can make Wei Ying wear this "guilty 5-year-old who stole the candy he wasn't supposed to touch" expression, and that's Lan Zhan and his Shijie.

Wei Ying earned my respect with the number of times he tried to get the attention of his crush in the initial episodes. A true inspiration!

Look how excited he is to see Lan Zhan! And look how gorgeously framed they are to once again remind us they are soulmates in life and the battlefield.

Lan Qiren and Wei Ying’s Disagreement Is The First Seed of his Downfall

Wei Ying angers Lan Qiren in this scene by suggesting they harness resentful energy the same way they use spiritual energy to his hypothetical question, when such a thing is unheard of, unnatural and contemptible in the cultivation world. He gets kicked out of the lecture for his answer, foreshadowing his fall from grace.

The interactions between Wei Ying and Lan Qiren are always strained, and understandably so. He is no stranger to the grim consequences of demonic cultivation after having raised two kids who were caught in its crossfire. Lan Qiren follows the traditions he values above all else down to a T. Wei Ying's method, be it now or when he actually starts practising demonic cultivation, is something that strikes him as being almost perverse. But are him and the other cultivators right in classifying Wei Ying as corrupt for going down that road? Wei Ying simply considered a logical but forbidden path people have not dared to think about. His ideas are out of the box and definitely not the orthodox thing to do but should he be labelled a villain for it? The cultivation world and Wei Ying just have two vastly different approaches to the same problem. The line of thought separating a genius and megalomaniac is pretty thin after all, and Wei Ying's heart has never been guided by anything but pure intentions and an unwillingness to sit back in the face of injustice.

But Lan Qiren's generation and all of the cultivation world would not understand that. And what they do not understand, they fear. The order of their world is sustained only by the stratification of black and white. This is indisputable and there is no other variable to it. Heck, it even takes Lan Zhan a long time to accept it is Wei Ying who is right and the rest of the world that is wrong.

Lan Qiren represents the ancient "natural" order of the world and Wei Ying's disrespect for what reveals itself to be a suffocating system leads to the new, better, inclusive order with revised perceptions of right and wrong that Wangxian end up creating. Even if this new world comes with a great cost. The story leaves us with the questions, who is right and who is wrong, after all? Who are we to dictate that and set them in stone?

(On a less serious note, I don't know if it's because I've seen this trope in many Asian dramas, but I found it funny how Lan Qiren is questioning Wei Ying simply for the purpose of belittling him by finding a blind spot in his intelligence. Even though Wei Ying is easily the smartest guy in the room, whose heart of gold and morally grey choices paint him as a villain. It gave me "mother-in-law who despises the woman who's going to marry into their family" vibes. Lol!)

Is The Untamed A Tale of Righteousness Or A Queer Romance? Both, Always Both

Somewhere in this war that will happen between Wei Ying and the rest of the cultivation world, between what can be considered right and wrong, honor and disgrace, the natural and unnatural ways of life (which are all codified into an absolute, immovable binary), there is a metaphor for being different in a world that is hell bent on excluding you for being thus. And you know what Wei Ying’s whole journey reminds me of? Of our heroes being queer. If you haven’t thought about it, the parallels do exist in the story, becoming obvious when Lan Qiren punishes Lan Zhan for questioning the fallacy in the same rules that made him lose his lover, and culminating with Lan Zhan irrevocably taking Wei Ying’s side in episode 42. He chooses to be on the “wrong” side with Wei Ying, orthodoxy be damned. (I’d hate to be Lan Zhan's uncle who is implied to be homophobic and ends up having a son-in-law.)

It might be early in the story to bring this up but The Untamed is at its crux, a story about two different guys who come together for the same cause and fall in love on the path of justice, while struggling to safeguard the definition of morality they know in their hearts to be true. Their soulmateship is woven inextricably with living with a clean conscience and doing the right thing even when the world tells them they are grossly incorrect. (Eat that, Romeo’s and Juliet’s! What life-or-death challenges did straight romance ever face?) That’s how Wangxian’s upright lifestyle (which only they know to be just and others frown down upon) doubles as a metaphor for their relationship. Some people support it, some don’t, some even deplore and oppose them for it because they think they are committing a crime. Doesn’t change the fact that we, the audience, can see that they are right (and that they’re in love). In fact, it is precisely because they chose the single log bridge together (because they fell in love) that led to balance being restored in their morally corrupt world.

It’s the many little things like this about our two heroes that make the world of The Untamed undergo a transformation for the better. We don’t talk enough about the fact that Wangxian together overthrow ancient, draconian laws that decreed what is black and white, by swearing an oath to protect the powerless together but also by swearing an unspoken vow to be together forever. And one can hope, especially if you’re a queer person who fell in love with this story, that the world and most of Asia will see the light about the LGBTQ+ people one day, like the other characters realized Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji were not criminals but the best of human beings who simply lived life the only way they knew as being honest with themselves and true to their hearts. They need not spend their lives on the lonely bridge of darkness, and deserve a wider path of acceptance built by and shared with the rest of the world, one that shines under the broad daylight, because they have always, always been in the right. Like Lan Zhan and Wei Ying have been. It’s that everyone else is slow to catch up with them.

It Is Doubly Hard For Lan Zhan To Do The Right Thing

Lan Zhan in this scene recites the rules he has learnt verbatim and his uncle beams. It is clear he takes pride in Wangji being his prized student and the perfect example of who a duty-bound clan member should be. The person Lan Zhan used to be makes it that much harder for him to rebel against his own uncle later. I cannot imagine the courage it took him to unlearn the principles he had centered his life around after they turned regressive, and acknowledge that they did more harm than good by viewing an expanding universe through an achingly narrow vision.

Wei Ying was born free-spirited and defiant so his choices are not totally unexpected. But Lan Zhan's choices make him lose his reputation as the unwavering bearer of light, along with the respect of his uncle who had placed him on a pedestal and vice versa. Once again drawing the comparison that turning his back on the world and ensuring his conscience was clean is the same as siding with Wei Ying, the man who he loves and was wrongfully denounced by everyone.

In summary, Episode 4 shows us the polarity between our heroes and the lives they lead. And after all, it is the most basic rule in the book that opposites make the perfect formula for a romance.

What Gay Messages Is The Show Sending?

In the new world order Wangxian write by themselves when no one else can, for Lan Zhan to choose Wei Ying means to choose an honorable life, and to choose Wei Ying also means to choose love. Their love for each other is the last standing untarnished virtue in the contaminated world that is already unravelling when Lan Zhan declares his love for Wei Ying in public and the first virtue in this new world that came into existence all the way back when Lan Zhan and Wei Ying launched the lantern together, deciding to stick together and be the voice that speaks out for the voiceless. It is Lan Zhan and Wei Ying’s love for each other that redeems the sorrows of the past, and paves the way for a greener future in their world. Their love story is undoubtedly the most extraordinary part of The Untamed and we are privileged to have seen it in our lifetime.

It is groundbreaking, if this metaphor for their gay love story was at all intended in any way. Even if it wasn’t, Wangxian are the queer heroes that have been sorely missing from our history. Their story propagates that people like Wangxian are liberated only when we realize we have to foster and feed the very thing that makes us different. The odds are we are the only ones capable of knowing that we are right, even if everyone else condemns and invalidates something as vital as our existence. For the sake of our clean conscience, we go on living life the way we see fit because that’s what living an honest and honorable life entails. That’s what Lan Zhan and Wei Ying would want us to do. We are all ridiculously ahead of a time that is running to keep up with us. So..

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amwritingmeta · 5 years ago

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hey! i was just wondering if you think spn will actually make destiel canon by the finale? it seems like in interviews they're trying to let us down gently w/a cas death (which possibly makes it seem like cas's ending might be related to his empty deal?) + all the parallels between saileen and deancas, and it looks like dabb and co (while not rly bringing arcs into conclusion and generally making a mess of spn) are fighting to make it canon, i was wondering what ur take on it was, esp after ep09

Oh, my dear, my heart is swelling with love for those two right now. I just watched the show through from 12x19-15x13 and I swear, that moment they share in 15x12, clinking those glasses and sharing all those smiles was like balm. It’s not even five minutes of screen time, and still it was like, okay, yes, good, thank you for the room to breathe. :D

It seems to be that Cas hearing Dean’s prayer has ushered in some much earned peace between them. They’re shown to be on the same page and taking each other’s side unquestionably. Dean trusting Cas’ judgment regarding Jack without pause. And that’s a good word for it: there’s trust between them, mutual respect, understanding. It’s so lovely, isn’t it?

So, there’s this line that’s sort of stuck with me. Actually, there are two things that have stuck with me (apart from all the gorgeous symbology baked into every episode) and it’s that the word “complete” has been mentioned twice.

Once in reference to Mary in Heaven, and once by Amara in reference to God.

Then we have a line that’s recurred twice: I had to die to get what I want.

The fact that its spoken verbatim twice made my antennas perk up a bit. It may mean nothing, as some things in this narrative sometimes do mean nothing, but it’s still interesting to take these things into account: that we’re searching for completion and that sometimes, in order to get what you want, you have to die.

So. Will Cas die?

I don’t think so. I don’t think so for many reasons that I’ve laid out here (I just posted this) (it was like you read my mind that this was coming today), but foremost because I cannot see how him dying does anything for his character arc, or for his joint journey with Dean.

You know, dark!Kaia (Kaia’s Shadow) going back to the Bad Place (Kaia’s unconscious) and accepting the ending waiting there, releasing our!Kaia back to the world where she belongs, makes me think, more than ever, that the integration of the main character’s Shadows are a necessity.

The Empty, way I see it, is representative of Cas’ Shadow, his unconscious, all the repressed and suppressed emotions of guilt, shame and doubt that has kept his self-worth down until Jack came on the scene.

And this is just my reading of this situation, but I’m not sure I can see Cas defeating the Empty in the Empty, if you know what I mean? The last time Cas intruded, the Empty made him suffer greatly. I don’t think Cas holds any sway there, nor should he.

To me, the weapon our conscious has against our unconscious ruling our decisions, is our ability to grow aware of our own impulses, our own thought patterns, and making choices to break away from them.

I think Cas can only beat the Empty through making a choice and, well, for a long time I’ve felt that choice should be to become human, because by making a final choice of who he is and who he wants to be, he brings himself into awareness, integrating his Shadow in the process, and narratively nullifying the Empty’s hold on him, since humans don’t go to the Empty when they die: they go to Heaven.

But that’s wishing and hoping and speculation, of course.

Here’s where the Destiel question comes in though.

Do I believe they’ll make it canon?

Personally, I can’t think of anything more a part of our story than the love story between those two, but I know what you mean. You mean a representative, tangible, clear, statement type of making it canon. Textualising it, so that there’s no room for doubt whatsoever. No more arguments, no more queer baiting complaints, just Destiel in plain sight. Undeniable.

I do and I don’t.

Watching these last few seasons through again made me realise what a different feel to them this last season has, because the emotional stakes for Dean and Cas have everything to do with what they mean to each other. Yeah?

Dean taking his anger out on Cas and it pushing Cas into a turning point where he chose to leave, to move on, which was a moment of clear independence a statement of his sense of self-worth, and it in turn pushing Dean into a turning point where he faced a side to himself that he’s needed to name since forever, admitting to not having any control of himself, which is something he has to acknowledge if he’s to move into trusting himself fully, all of this has been gosh darn breathtaking to get to witness.

And having them land back in this ease, where they work together seamlessly as a team, being kept together more than not, the framing of them, all of this makes me feel like they could give us canon Destiel. I’m not going to say they absolutely won’t.

I believe the writers want it. I believe the actors want it. But, again, that’s just what I take from the narrative itself, because the subtext is stronger than ever this final season.

Especially with Sam and Eileen being reunited.

Because it’s been that clear parallel you mentioned, but it’s been that clear parallel to those of us who see it. The echoes of the Saileen romance that trace through the Destiel progression won’t be as resounding to those that don’t.

And because of that, at this point, I also feel quite reserved with my belief that Destiel could become canon. Because there’s so much, but there’s also nothing. There’s so much for us to enjoy, there’s so much evidence they keep throwing at us that the writers support this reading of their story, but still, there’s nothing, really, to let on that they’re building towards these two men, at some point, declaring their love for each other.

There has been zero textual foreshadowing of that.

There have been throw away moments, like the cop flirting with Dean, for example, but he frowned at that, and then got sincerely flirted with by a woman, so that deescalated that very quickly.

There was Dean at first rejecting Garth’s compliment of “You smell SO good”, becoming uncomfortable, to then, by the end of the ep, tell Garth he didn’t smell half-bad either.

And there was that amazing moment with Cas calling out Sam being “sexually intimate” with Ruby and Dean repeating the words as if he can’t believe Cas even knows how to pronounce them.

So, there’s... you know, stuff?

But it’s not foreshadowing if it can be overlooked by the wider audience.

That said.

This show isn’t about this love story of ours. The fact that it’s so downplayed could mean that what we’ll get is something textual, but extremely subtle. I mean, for me, lingering eye-contact and a shared smile in a context that makes us understand they’re choosing each other would be enough.

If, by canon, you mean do I think we’ll get them kissing, then the answer is I want to believe that we might get that, because they could build towards that on the foundation of ease and trust that they’ve put down over the last few episodes and they could build it effectively, but I just don’t know if the studio (who own the characters) is onboard.

My hope is that they are, because the topic of healthy representation is so hot right now, and the question of the longevity of Supernatural to the younger generations (you know, you young ones who are proving exceedingly more open-minded and looking for something beyond the superficial brothers-hunting-monsters aspect of the show) would bank on the show opening itself up to the possibilities of solid representation already seeded throughout its run.

But Dean has flirted with more women than men this season. You know? I mean, he hasn’t flirted with any men. So.

Look, I’m not going to say I don’t think we’ll get it, because I don’t know.

I watched S15 yesterday and finished it today and suddenly I feel this wave of hope that it actually might happen, because they’ve already changed how Dean and Cas interact, they’ve given them so many scenes with just the two of them, and we have Sam clearly meant to end up with Eileen, and doesn’t Dean and Cas deserve that same happiness? That same sense of completion? That internal peace of loving unconditionally and being loved in return?

Sam and Eileen could be foreshadowing. These writers are subtle and they could be gleefully rubbing their hands together at the thought of springing textual Destiel on the GA, you know? The green light from the studio might make them diabolical. *sadism* And I love that thought.

Because that’s been the point of the love story for me, this slow, slow build to the moment when Dean and Cas have reached a point in their progression when what they’ll have together is a healthy, balanced, loving relationship because they’ve both let go of the past and are looking to the future.

But I won’t expect textual Destiel. If we do get it, I’m going to treasure it as a big cherry on top of an already perfectly inviting and exquisite pie.

What I do believe, more than ever, that we’re getting, though, is closure. Even if it’s only at the subtextual level, I believe that those of us who read the subtext will have Destiel verified beyond a shadow of a doubt. And yes, I will be quite surprised and disappointed if we don’t get that. Because of how these first 13 episodes have been shaped and how strong the subtext is in them.

I believe we’ll end on a hopeful note.

And wouldn’t that just be gratifyingly phenomenal?

(it really would) (honestly I just need to know that they are happy and alive and together and well and finding peace and carrying on) (you know?) (thank you and amen) :)

#answered asks #spn s15 spec #cas #dean #destiel #deancas #canon #oh I have the hopes #just not the expectations #:)

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thunderheadfred · 5 years ago

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We finished all of Hannibal and of course I have Thoughts but they’re obviously pretty spoilery and I’m too lazy to get my computer out and write a real post with a read more, so suffice it to say

The s2 finale / s3 opener was so committed to pulling the rug out that it forgot that Hannibal does in fact have priorities other than spraying as much blood on his carpet as possible, and the show (and Will???) immediately forgives him for throwing a heartless murder tantrum because awwwww, look, he made bad art out of a dead guy. he’s sowwwyyyy

this show fridged the same character THREE. TIMES. and not even in the funny literal way

I have So Many Thoughts about how they bungled that... but again, spoilers. Let us just say that if I ever wrote a fix it fic, certain someones would be A) not murdered for cheap shock value and B) doing the stabby stabby themselves, because “gutted” as a literal metaphor is exactly the level of beat-you to-death non-subtlety this show truly deserves

Season 3 was definitely more competent and less Halloween Spooky Bin but they just couldn’t resist having that ONE super extra (ARTICULATED?!?) craft project corpse. Did Will post it to his Insta stories or,,,,,,

Everyone is now a Batman villain. E ve r y o ne. Apparently interacting with Hannibal for any length of time will turn you into a ruthless, well-dressed psychopath. It’s transmissible.

Thanks for attempting to give us Hannibal’s boo hoo sad back story I guess? They seem to have given up halfway, explaining fuck all just so they could randomly add Chiyo the inexplicable super-sniper as a flimsy deus-ex-machina and then completely forget about her again? I read the Harris novels approximately ten thousand years ago and I can’t remember if she even exists in the books? God are we in the expanded universe now is that what’s happening

I guess breaking your spine turns you gay and nets you a trippy sex scene with your hot rich future spouse. Conclusion: Will Graham needs his back broke

I have no idea what was going on but I cheered when Chiyo pushed Will off the train. See above.

Hannibal was scarier in this season, like actually kind of legit scary again, even tho they just lifted a bunch of lines verbatim from the Ridley Scott film and used them less effectively while somehow bending the timeline into an AU pretzel but hey, that ice pick scene still got me good. n-ice

Tara from True Blood!!! She was great. Protect her

I really wanted to love Armitage as Dollarhyde but... I didn’t. I can’t tell if it was the direction or just his performance but it just.... didn’t work for me. Still INFINITELY preferred him over the freak of the weeks from s1-2, holy shit. Can’t imagine why.

I cannot BELIEVE someone’s non-con Verger Manor pwp torture porn got put on network television. I cannot BELIEVE real life actual actor Mads Mikkelsen—who has no right to look that put-together while naked, branded, and hog tied—has actually paraded himself around in the viscera of AO3’s ugliest tags for our entertainment like it was a sexy negligee

Gillian Anderson is a GIFT and I love every second she spends in anything. The crush is real, but that still can’t fix that her character made zero sense in s3, at all.

That said, Bedelia and Will sniping over Who Gets To Be Hannibal’s Tortured Love Interest was A+ trash

The whole last episode(s) is worth all the mess. Why couldn’t that have happened earlier. Yes I WILL watch a season 4, I don’t care how sloppy it is. This show is built of ridiculousness, I do NOT care. Netflix, please make it worse somehow. I dare you.

My husband spent most of this experience yelling at Will and Hannibal to kiss whenever they were onscreen.

#hannibal #as always i am years late #anyways #my steaming hot takes #fred watches hannibal

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tfw-no-tennis · 5 years ago

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hhhhhhxh

more abt hxh bc my last post was too long n i had to split it off holla

so i left off talking abt when gon woke up....i love how polite gon is to pretty much everyone - hes such a good lad all the time. s/o to his aunt for raising him right (tho i think hes also just a rlly good boy inherently too)

also is he named gon bc ging was like ha ha im boutta be GONe lol seeya kid!!!! like ????

i find it interesting that kurapika and hisoka fought....we really havent seen them interact at all yet. also hisoka is so smirk-y i hate that bitch...what did he say to kurapika??????

this poor red shirt old guy lmao hisoka is SO clearly uninterested in fighting him and then he fucking dies. rip mdude

what did hisoka whisper to HIM??? guess we’ll never know #RIPLegend

oh mannnn if killua had just won against pokkle then he wouldnt have had to deal with illumi doing That to him :( my smug son......

leorio is such a good dude....also its so funny to me how tall and lanky leorio is, espec compared to the other 3 main characters lmaoooo

or maybe those 3 are just rlly short??? i mean gon and killua are literally 12, but whats kurapikas excuse

GODDDD I HATE THIS BIIIIITCH. FUCK OFFFFFFF tho the evil piano music slaps. but jeeeeesus illumi is so creepy and awful, and seeing him take off his disguise is not any better a second time...he and hisoka truly deserve each other wrow

does illumi have hair powers??? cause it kinda looks like it. or maybe hes just gay and dramatic

ok but the sick electric guitar riff (?) that played when illumis face was revealed was lowkey kinda hilarious

man i was so wrong abt killua knowing that that was illumi :( poor kid

killua is immediately freaking out and meanwhile illumi looks bored as hell. dude ur the worst

killua: [freaking out] illumi, completely blank-faced: hey

I HATE HIMMMM even tho his catman design is regrettably kinda cute

why do illumi and hisoka both have such snatched waists i hate this

wtf so killua has another different brother??? i assumed he attacked illumi....how many fuckgin zoldyk sibling are there?????

leorio ur too normie for this conversation lmao. also wow fucked up family huh

killua looks so like...small and helpless, which is so at odds from what we’ve seen of him so far :( this poor kid

illumi totally has some weird brain powers man callin it now

gon: wow killuas family sounds wack... satotz: oh lmao you havent even heard the rest

KILLUA ;_;

this poor baby assassin :( :( :(

IMMM INCONSOLABLE. HE WANTS TO BE FRIENDS W/GON.......ARE YOU KIDDING....AUGHHHHHHHH

meanwhile gon decided he and killua are BEST FRIENDS like 10 mins after they met. GOD

like in the recap ep he called killua his best friend ;_; and meanwhile killua doesnt even think they ARE friends god destroy me

this calming classical music is throwing me off vbhjfjhbsdkgndks

i sense that leorio and kurapika are rapidly acquiring a new son

DAMN THIS IS SO FUUUUCKEDDDDD illumi is such a crusty bitch wow. leave killua alone asshole

all that stuff abt killua like, only thinking he wants to befriend gon but really wanting to kill him....that sure sounds like some ‘worst fears’ type of shit for someone like killua....illumi is such a classic abuser wow

i have 2 know is satotz like, repeating this entire conversation verbatim in a calming monotone to gon rn. like....

LEORIOOOOO I LOVE UUUUUUUU AUGHHHH him telling killua it doesnt matter if illumi is his brother, fuck that guy, beat him up as usual and leave.....ooooughhhh leorio is such a good dude ;_;

and the OF COURSE him saying the obvious - that gon and killua are ALREADY friends....i love this, i feel like leorio said all the exact things the audience is thinking...yet it still didnt get thru to killua bc hes so rattled by illumi appearing, and the abuse in general

i think if gon were there things wouldve gone much differently

of COURSE crusty bitch illumi is like oh ok now i have to kill gon.....biiiiitch i hate uuuuu

also that just shows that hes lying to killua (which we already knew obvs), bc if it were inevitable that killua would kill gon to like, test himself or w/e, then why not just wait for that to happen? that would have a much bigger impact on killua than illumi killing gon....its obvious that illumi is just manipulating him, but killua is too BSOD to be able to tell (also, hes 12)

ok bitch illumi is preaching abt not needing friends but he and hisoka are definitely fucking and theyve been teamed up for the entire hunter exam it seems.....what a hypocrite. hate this guy

god im so glad we didnt rlly get to see whatever the fuck illumi did to that random hunter examiner guy’s face. jeeeeesus. also i cant tell but i wonder if him forcing that info out of the guy was the result of his freaky mind powers or if the guy was just like oof ouch pins in me face

LEORIO AND KURAPIKAAAA THE PROTECT GON SQUAD!! and joined by new member hanzo!!! who ironically beat gon up for 3 hours str8 like, a very short amount of time ago lmao. but still i love that sm

illumi u dumb bitch.....tho i dont buy for a minute that he didnt already realize that killing gon would disqualify him...he defs just wanted to get under killuas skin even more :^(

KILLUAAAA ;_; when he goes to step back from illumi but illumi tells him not to....ughhh HATE this guy, leave this poor kid alone. no wonder he wanted to leave

illumi saying theres only 1 way that killua can stop him - does he mean by killing him, or something more specific, like some forbidden zoldyk murder technique?

‘your beloved gon’ wow gay. theyre 12 and theyre dating ok. killua is literally that kid whos like wow i wonder if gon likes me...and meanwhile gon is like wow cant believe me and killua have been dating for 3 months now

leorio saying ‘we wont let him kill you or gon’ ;_; leorio ily sm...thats like the exact right thing to say - hes offering protection and reassurance as an adult figure...unfortunately killua is clearly too freaked out to even process anything outside of illumis gaslighting and abuse

also illumi is defs doing something to killua w/his eyes via his freaky mind powers. js

illumi i hate you stop being weirdly cute. augh

classic abuse tactics, being like ha ha nvm i wasnt gonna kill gon! jk!

killua just shutting down completely after that :( :( noooo

and then he kills that old guy and leaves, ‘proving’ that illumi is right....noooooOOOO

and now we boutta see gon go FULL shounen protag for the first time, oh FUCKKKKKK yesssss

this is the first time we’ve seen gon angry oooh man and of COURSE its on killuas behalf,....im so fuckign emo already looooord

god ok the episode preview where its gon saying ‘do leorio and i look alike?’ YES U DO LOL youre father and son so jot that down

oof, gon and illumi have such fundamentally different POVs on like, family and life and morals, and you can tell by their 4-line exchange before gon does the ICONIC one-handed grab’n’fling

AUGHHHH gon saying hes gonna rescue killua....SO good...he recognizes that killuas family is wack as hell and killua shouldnt be w/them - the classic ingrained ‘found family is more important than blood family’ stuff

tho thats an interesting contrast to gon himself, whos looking for his deadbeat dad

‘but it wasnt his choice’ that so good ily gon BEST boy, hes so perceptive and good......he knows that killuas hand was forced and that he needs to be RESCUED (love that word choice) from his shitty abusive family

of course kurapika and leorio voiced complaints ;_; best parents

kurapika should be a lawyer tbh

leorioooo ;_; such a good dude, saying he should be disqualified instead

HOW is leorio a stronger combatant than that old dude hvbajufjbsja that guy had some moves it seemed, and leorio has,....a knife? a briefcase? the classic premed attitude of ‘fuck it, i could die anytime, lets do this’? like.....cmon vhabjdfjbhsf i refuse to believe this man is of any use in a fight. ill believe it when i see it

pokkle pls ur not plot-important enough to be jumping into this convo rn

tho i am curious abt what hisoka said to kurapika. tho i agree that thats irrelevant to the discussion

gon repeating satotz’s wisdom :’) and saying that killua will definitely pass if he takes the exam again...ough

gon is SO GOOD i cant get over it !!!!!!!!! AUGHHHH....recusing killua from his abusive family and making it so killua never has to see them again is like...so good. what a good good perfect boy.

also thats like, the perfect response to this. killing illumi would just start a ton of drama, and killua would be conflicted abt that....but removing killua from his situation is perfect

ok ive ranted a lot ill talk abt the rest later woohoo

PREDICTIONS:

i predict that hisoka will show up in this upcoming zoldyk arc somewhere bc illumis gonna be in it (i assume) and theyre dating. also hisoka is a central character so itd make sense for him to show up in the second major arc. tho tbh this could end up being completely false and i wouldnt be that shocked lmao

i think leorio is gonna get Big Sad someday bc hes like, so normal compared to the other MCs, and also hes suuuuch a bleeding heart (i love him....) so i feel like thats gonna lead to some sadness for him once his friends start doing crazy shit or w/e

also i predict that if he gets nen itll be like healing nen or st. does that even exist??? idk jack shit abt nen lmao

i think that illumi has hypnosis powers or something, even just based on design alone. it could defs be for aesthetic (character design in hxh is wild), but his eyes look noticeably different from any other characters. also he was doing some freaky shit to killua. also i held this prediction before seeing the part where this is brought up so we’ll see if its right lmao

as for this upcoming arc - ruth and i are wondering if itll be similar to the vinsmoke drama in one piece - character goes back to abusive family, squad goes to rescue them...and then character refuses to be recused. w/sanji it was partially bc the vinsmokes threatened to kill zeff, his TRUE dad, but i predict in this case it could be more like the zoldyks saying ‘look killua these 3 weirdos showed up looking for you, convince them to leave or we’ll kill them’ and killua will be like, oh shit bc like.....think abt it. the vinsmokes targeted zeff (and not the strawhats) bc they knew they could easily kill him. same goes here, i assume - a family of trained assassins vs Good Good Fishing Rod Smell-Power Boy (who hasnt thrown a single punch yet), Lanky Dr Man With A Switchblade We Havent Seen Him Use Onscreen, and Mx 2 Wooden Sticks, Bloodlust, and Arachnophobia - 3 For 1 Deal! its a no-contest. so thats one thing i could see happening, potentially

im way too tired to remember my other predictions rip lmao

#excited 2 see moreeee #lj watches hxh #hxh

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jbuffyangel · 6 years ago

Text

It Ain't Nothing but a Family Thing: Arrow 7x17 Review (Inheritance)

“Inheritance” is equal parts necessary exposition and filler episode. Not quite sure how the writers accomplished that, but they did.

Let’s dig in…

Emiko and Oliver

Soooo… here’s the problem guys. I don’t really care about Emiko. The whole time I’m watching this plot line unfold I am thinking, “Couldn’t Thea have gone all evil?”

Take a pause and give that a good think. How awesome would it have been for Thea to take a deep dive down the evil hole? It would have been amazing, which is why I loudly demanded it for the six years Willa Holland was on the show.

Watching Oliver try to pull Thea away from the Ninth Circle would have been a good time.

Not so much with Replacement Thea. The problem is I just met Emiko this season. I understand that’s typically the case when it comes to Arrow villains, but I’m supposed to bond with her character as Oliver’s sister and then be horrified when she turns out to be a villain.

Arrow even tried to fast track my bonding by making Emiko into Oliver 2.0. I’m not really seeing the individualism except for evil. Every week the writers were hanging a sign out that said, “SEE? SHE’S JUST LIKE OLIVER!” by mimicking previous OG Oliver Queen scenes. Just in case you missed any of the visual cues or copied verbatim scenes, the other characters are here to verbally proclaim Emiko is just like her brother.

Eh… keep it. Unfortunately, none of this has accomplished Arrow’s intended goal which is for me to give a crap about Emiko.

It should be noted that when Arrow does the “SEE? SHE’S JUST LIKE OLIVER” with Mia or “SEE? HE’S JUST LIKE FELICITY!” with William (and vice versus) I love it. Yes, I am aware this is a double standard. Maybe it’s because the kids have more personality than cardboard. Sorry Emiko. Facts are facts. Maybe it’s because they are Olicity’s kids and therefore my investment is virtually guaranteed. I don’t know. I don’t care. It’s Season 7 and I’m gonna do me.

The only thing keeping me mildly entertained with Emiko is that she is evil. I’m not really interested in watching her be redeemed either. I know I know. The season theme is redemption, but come on! Someone has to burn in the fires of Hades for all eternity. It doesn’t mean anything if every character is redeemed.

Typically, I am down for Robert Queen flashbacks whenever possible, but in order to make this storyline work they had to turn Oliver’s father into a tremendous pile of stinking douchebag. Robert was always kind of a douchebag what with the whole killing a man by accident, lying about it and then getting embroiled in Merlyn’s plot to destroy half the city because of his guilt.

But he had gravitas. The class of an elder statesman. Maybe it’s the silver hair and grumbly grandpa voice I pray Oliver Queen will have some day. Maybe it’s because he put a bullet in his head to save his son. Annnnd… also murdered someone else in the process. Alright. Robert was a douchebag, but he was a mildly noble douchebag and I love him okay? I DON’T KNOW WHY!

But the Robert Queen in “Inheritance” is a misogynistic, slimy, cheating, coward who kicks his mistress and love child out of the swanky apartment he was putting them up at and tells his daughter, “Life isn’t fair. We don’t always get what we want.” Wow.

That’s a great way to create a villain, Robert. Watch Batman or Star Wars or ANY HERO STORY EVER and learn fool.

Emiko worked hard to get her father’s approval or acknowledgement of her existence to the world. She wanted to run Queen Consolidated, but nope that’s a man’s job sweetie. Oliver Queen and his penis, which was whoring its way through Starling City at the time, are destined for CEO. Emiko takes Robert’s misogyny in stride and simply asks him to back a company of her own, but he balks at that too. This is the last straw in a very long line of straws.

Unfortunately, Emiko doesn’t tell her father where to stick it and cut off all contact. No, that would be reasonable. Instead, she decides to go super villain on him. She impresses Dante after stealing from him and he agrees to train her. Emiko vacillates between being a Queen and joining the Ninth Circle for years, but the final brush off from Robert is the tipping point. She decides Dante is right and the Ninth Circle is her real family.

Oliver follows Emiko after Bl*ck S*ren warns she may not be playing for the home team and he sees her with Dante. Oliver confronts Emiko and she sings some song and dance about not knowing who the real Dante was when she signed up with him. Now she’s trapped. It works. Oliver buys it hook line and sinker, because blindly ignoring blatant warning signs is what he does when it comes to the Queen family.

He smartens up once he figures out Emiko sabotaged Felicity’s Archer program to protect Dante’s location. DO NOT MESS WITH THE WIFEY’S TOYS.

Oliver and Emiko face off in a fight that’s a lot about her ponytail. It had a life of its own.

Sadly, this is one of the worst fights I’ve seen in Arrow’s history. I really hope Sea Shimooka isn’t taking acting tips from KC, because it sure looks like it.

WHO IS SHE LOOKING AT? I’m not putting all the blame at her feet. Stephen upped his cheese factor about ten notches too. The whole scene felt awkward, choppy and forced.

Source: smoakmonster

Diggle sits Oliver down for a much needed Yoda talk. John warns him not to be so invested in Emiko’s redemption that he ignores the threat she poses. Ah yes, the evil sibling plot line also happened in Season 4 with Diggle and Andy.

Yeesh, alright it’s time for this show to end. John’s need to save his brother ultimately cost L*urel her life and he doesn’t want Oliver to make the same mistake.

It’s time you left yourself off the hook on that one, Diggle.

It was all win from where I sat, so stop being so hard on yourself.

UGH. I tell the man to be Jesus and then he starts acting like Jesus!!! The nerve. Oliver, being a fully realized superhero doesn’t mean you save EVERYONE. Jesus didn’t save every – never mind. The point is, after seven seasons, now the pine tree listens to me? He could’ve popped the question in Season 3 and I’d be on my way to a second set of triplets, but nooooo.

Oliver wants to redeem Emiko because then it means he’s redeemed the family in some way.

Source: olivergifs

Why isn’t enough that you’ve redeemed yourself Oliver? You’re a Queen. You count. Yes, you were a massive douchebag once upon a time, but you stopped sleeping with Lance sisters (thank God), fell in love with sunshine, and embraced monogamy & commitment like the squishy teddy bear with abs we always knew you were. You also fight for the city, save lives, and cook your pregnant wife yummy veggies to munch on. You’re evolved dude. Cut yourself a break. And Thea isn’t exactly the Mistress of Satan. She’s off saving the world too. Two out of three ain’t bad.

This whole “Right my wrongs” needs clarification. First it was the list, but it morphed into saving the Glades. Then Tommy died and things kind of snowballed. So, how many wrongs are we talking Bobby? Let’s get specific. We’ve only got 15 episodes left. Did you sell Iran nuclear weapons? Use Moira’s toothbrush and not tell her? Steal candy from babies? Are there a dozen more Robert Queen kiddos intent on world destruction?

Time is a wasting. I have a spin off coming and it needs to not be about your bullshit man.

Team Arrow ultimately foils Emiko’s plan. Well… kind of. They miss one drone, but no worries! It was just a demonstration. They’re worried about the next time, when it’s not a demonstration, but I was more focused on the few extra tidbits delivered in the final moments of the episode

Not only does Emiko choose the Ninth Circle, she is their leader.

She is also targeting the Archer program, which means nothing good for Oliver, Felicity and their children. Despite, my frustrations with Emiko’s character I am glad they are tying this all back to Robert and the Queens. Family is where this story began and it’s where it should end.

Dante gave Emiko a gift when she was struggling between being a Queen or joining the Ninth Circle. It was the most hilariously unrealistic looking invoice from Merlyn Global, but it showed the location of the bombs on the Queen’s Gambit. Emiko knew about Merlyn’s plan and she could have saved her father’s life if she simply passed on the information at their meeting. But he rejected her once more, so Emiko sent Robert to his death and unknowingly condemned her brother to five years of hell. Damn.

What Emiko doesn’t realize is that by keeping quiet about the bombs on the Queen’s Gambit she helped set her brother on a path to become someone who can stop her. In the immortal words of Leo McGarry, “ "It ain't nothing but a family thing.”

Felicity Smoak

Source: felicitysmoakgifs

Felicity wins Walter White.

This is something many fans have been saying for years, including yours truly, so I am quite happy the writers agree.

Felicity continues to slay at all three, but a key part to “having it all” is knowing when you need help. Felicity asks her friend Alena to join the company as CTO. Look how excited this human rainbow is. She melts my heart.

Source: felicittysqueen

Unfortunately, I don’t really trust Alena. Yes, I know she’s helped Felicity in the past, but I still feel uneasy about her. Perhaps that distrust is unnecessary and her interactions with Felicity will continue to be adorable and on the up and up. But Archer is corrupted somehow in the future and I’m keeping an eye on Alena in present day.

Concerns aside, I did have myself a petty little cackle. Technically speaking, Felicity had a built in CTO for Smoak Tech on Team Arrow – Curtis Holt. Instead, the writers ship him off to D.C. and bring in Alena who, shady or not, is far preferable to Curtis. I just didn’t think Beth would agree with me. She’s like friggin Santa Claus.

The biggest issue I had with the spinal technology was it didn’t really connect to the Team Arrow storyline. A character feels isolated on their own show whenever that happens. My concern was Felicity’s great individual storyline was going to cut her off from the action.

The genius of this season, and the retooling of Felicity’s company, is the writers have found a way to weave it in with the vigilante storyline. Smoak Tech no longer feels like an island they are placing Felicity on, but rather it permeates almost every facet of the show – both past and present. This means Felicity permeates every facet of the show.

Last, but certainly not least, Felicity continues to be a bad ass wife as she manages more Queen family drama. The man is an Adonis who cooks, but oy does he come with family baggage. At least, Oliver’s reaction to this type of drama is predictable and Felicity doesn’t miss a beat.

When he comes back from the field empty handed Felicity knows immediately how to make him smile.

Source: olicitygifs

She tells Oliver he’s hot. That’s it. That’s how Felicity cheers him up.

He compartmentalizes and hyper focuses on stopping Emiko, but Felicity tells Oliver to take a beat and process.

Source: olicitygifs

Of course, Oliver ignores her and becomes frustrated with the team when they aren’t moving fast enough. So, Felicity tells him to cool it.

He ignores her AGAIN, but at least we are blessed with this glorious response.

Source: oliverxfelicity

Where has this gif been for the last seven years? If Oliver is going to be a stubborn ass then at the very least his wife is going to drag him for it with some patented Felicity Smoak snark.

I think Felicity and Diggle have a system for deciding who talks to Oliver. Maybe it depends on circumstance. Diggle seems like the obvious choice because he had an evil sibling too. Maybe they rock paper scissors. Whatever the system, it was Diggle talking down their boy this week.

We did, however, get some quality husband and wife crime fighting team work. YOUR OTP WOULD NEVER.

Source: olivergifs

After a long day of supporting her husband, incubating their child and stopping criminals, Felicity returns to the loft to work on Archer with Alena. And this was a light Felicity Smoak episode. Damn. Queen of DCTV is right.

Sweet holy Moses, how are we going to do ten episodes without her?

I love Oliver Queen. He is my favorite character, but I think we can all agree Felicity Smoak makes him infinitely more tolerable. Oliver can be stubborn, grumpy pine tree left to his own devices. Hopefully, he’s evolved enough that all of Felicity’s hard work doesn’t go down the tubes the moment they are separated. He is supposed to be Jesus now. I think Slabside is evidence it won’t, but ten episodes without Felicity Smoak feels like a daunting task. It feels like climbing a mountain...

only to get stabbed in the chest and chucked off the edge once we reach the top.

Bl*ck S*ren

BS decides to follow Emiko and gets spliced with an arrow because she sucks at covert ops.

Source: nyssaalghl

She goes to Olicity’s apartment to speak to Felicity about her Emiko suspicions, but unfortunately the wifey isn’t home. Bl*ck S*ren turns to leave when she realizes the only person available to discuss her suspicions with is Oliver. I believe there's 0% chance of L*urel falling in love with Oliver and 99.99% chance she's already in love with Felicity.

Not to be outdone, Oliver offers to bandage up her bleeding wound. He takes out antibiotic and gauze and SETS. IT. ON. THE. KITCHEN. COUNTER.

It’s a very large kitchen counter too, so it creates the wide berth these two require to stand being in a room together.

Source: nyssaalghl

We’ve gone from main love interest to stay on your side of the room. I died.

I don’t know how we got here family, but we’re here and it’s fabulous.

The writers are more anti L*uriver than I am, which is an impressive level of hate - if I’m being honest.

I need to put on a sweater whenever Stephen and KC film a scene because brr it’s cold!

The L*uriver fans expecting sexy bandage time must have been deeply disappointed. Or at least the two fans left were deeply disappointed.

Of course, Oliver doesn’t believe BS because duh. My dog could’ve called that one. He tells her to mind her own business and pretty much kicks her out the apartment. Obviously, L*urel is right about Emiko, but Oliver telling her to shove it never gets old under any circumstances.

Then Dinah accuses her of murdering a witness

Source: nyssaalghl

and L&urel is righteously indignant.

Of course, L*urel is right. It’s not like she has ever murdered before. Why on earth would anyone ever think that?

Dinah even has the nerve to bring up her dead boyfriend again. She really needs to let this Vince thing go because L*urel played lawyer for the last seven months and helped get Oliver out of a jail. See? All better.

BS is redeemed now, so Dinah really needs to stop bitching. Arrow is my life tutor, so following that same logic I’m going to murder a baby and then buy a puppy because it will even the cosmic balance.

The best moment is when Emiko releases images of Savior of the World L*urel L*nce meeting with Ricardo Diaz.

Source: nyssaalghl

It’s going to be pretty tough for BS to keep up the pretense she is law abiding, justice yielding District Attorney L&urel L*nce when she’s hanging out with one of Star City’s most notorious criminals. I take it back. Emiko is awesome.

Of course, I’m not delusional enough to believe Arrow is going to give BS an arc that actually qualifies as redemptive. Helping Felicity was a good start, but it doesn’t wipe the slate clean for me. Not by a long shot. Neither does being a fake lawyer. I would like to see L*urel pay for her crimes the same way Oliver paid for his by going to PRISON, but I doubt the writers will give me that much Christmas. I am very curious to see how “Lost Canary” shakes out. That said, I have very little doubt BS will betray her one true love.

Stray Thoughts

“Which doesn’t mean she’s bad.” I told you Olicity wouldn’t care Emiko killed Diaz. They brought the marshmallows to his bonfire party.

“On your own.” Stephen read that line super diva and it cracked me up.

“Being a father is more than just blood.” I hate to agree with a villain but damn he’s right.

Every time Felicity touches her stomach I happy clap. Source: olicitygifs

L*urel’s shoulder pads have to be stopped. Just say no wardrobe department.

Forcing me to go without this adorableness for an additional ten episodes is not oka. I’ll go through Felicity Smoak withdrawal which is hazardous. Source: ebett

Does Emiko visiting her father’s grave make a damn bit of sense now that we know she played a role in his death? Nope. Didn’t think so.

Disclaimer: Any gifs on the blog are not mine. If you would like a gif removed from my reviews, please message me. 7x17 gifs credited.

If you’d like to support the blog, please buy me a cup of tea!

#arrow #arrow 7x17 #arrow spoilers #arrow review #anti emiko queen #oliver queen #felicity smoak #olicity #arrow reviews #anti laurel lance #anti katie cassidy #anti lauriver #anti black siren #arrow season 7 #arrow season 7 reviews #arrow season 7 review #season 7 episode review #season 7 episode reviews

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logh-icebergs · 7 years ago

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Episode 29: One Narrow Thread

Early 798/489. Adrian Rubinsky meets with Bishop Degsby of the Earth Cult to discuss his plans to aid Reinhard’s forces in capturing Iserlohn and then assassinate Reinhard to seize power for Phezzan. Degsby points out that under this scheme the Earth Cult’s investment in setting up a puppet government on Heinessen would be a wasted resource, but Rubinsky plans to use his financial control over the Alliance government to manipulate them into backing Yang into a corner. Degsby reminds Rubinsky that he owes the Grand Archbishop for his current position and had better tread carefully. Rubinsky sends his minion Kesserling to Remschild to propose a scheme that will ensure that the Empire and Alliance continue to fight each other, while Admiral Kempf attempts to perfectly sync twelve warp engines to avoid trapping all of Geiersberg fortress in null space. ….....Meanwhile back in the actual show we’ve been watching, Yang loses at 3D chess, Julian attempts to drink wine, and Hilda visits Kircheis’s grave.

A Quick Language Rant

“Words are like icebergs floating on the ocean called ‘heart.’” This quote provides the guiding philosophy for this project: LoGH is a text that uses the nuances of language, in concert with facial expressions, body language, symbolism, etc., to point the viewer to deeper layers of meaning in the story being told. As a close reading of the queer narratives in LoGH, this blog attempts to tease out and expose these slightly hidden layers. But…..we are writing in English. You’re reading this in English. The gifs we reference have English subtitles and no sound. And uhh, how do I put this diplomatically…

Every English translation of LoGH sucks.

...Okay that’s a bit harsh. Translation is fucking hard, especially of such a complicated work, and everyone who’s put hours and hours and hours into bringing LoGH to the English-speaking world deserves a hell of a lot of gratitude and credit. We never would have been able to watch the show without them. But. When we get into the nitty-gritty details of analyzing a scene, the fact that often none of the existing translations matches the nuance of the Japanese gets in the way. I’d much rather be plunging into yelling at Cazellnu right now than writing this note, but the conversation between Cazellnu and Yang in this episode is a mess in both sets of subtitles that I have access to, so here we are.

Let’s start with the fansubs, on the left—notice a couple whole clauses that aren’t in the official Hidive subs at all? Care to guess where they come from? That’s right, they come directly from the novels, as does the word “perfect” in Yang’s “perfect parent” line. Hey, I totally get it, fansubbers, the novels are a fantastic resource for figuring out the kanji or double-checking words that are hard to hear. But the dialogue in the anime is not in fact lifted verbatim from the novels; and while not every difference is super meaningful, we are interested in the intentional choices made by the anime staff, and that makes deviation from the books especially ripe for analysis.

The official subs, which are generally quite reliable, are also unsatisfying in this scene. As I’ll discuss below, the word that Yang uses replacing the novel’s “perfect” is 人並みに, hitonami ni, an adverb meaning “like others/as much as anyone else.” The official sub translation makes it sound more like “under normal circumstances” than “like normal people,” and while that’s not a life-altering difference, the nuance is relevant to my analysis. And they got the grammar of the sentence in the last gif here backwards; indeed, neither subtitle translation understood what I believe Yang is saying in those lines, but the English translation of the novel agrees with my interpretation. (Not that the novels don’t have their own translation problems, which is outside the scope of this blog but also frustrating…)

Phew. What all of this means is that before we can even start writing a post, we have to go through a whole process of triangulating all of the slightly different translations of any scene we want to analyze in detail, making sure that we understand the nuances of the language and can convey them accurately. (Not to mention checking the original LD version to make sure no significant changes were made to the animation in the DVD remaster!) In the case of the conversation between Yang and Cazellnu, the subtitles used in this post are my own synthesis based on the fansubs (modified to reflect the actual anime dialogue) and the translation in the novel (where I believe it to be more accurate).

With that out of the way, we are now ready to plunge into the main battle of this episode, so buckle up for....

Yang vs. Cazellnu!

That’s right, we’ve seen Yang battle Imperial fleets to improbable stalemates at Astate and Amlitzer, outsmart the commanders of Iserlohn to capture it from the inside, and annihilate one of his own nation’s fleets on his way to defeating the military coup; but how does Yang the Magician handle the most intimidating of all battles: having dinner with a married friend?? I’ve said before that Icebergs is not a relationship advice column, and nor is it, usually, a tips and tricks guide for dealing with pressure from peers to conform to heteronormative expectations, but hey—when we have the chance to learn from a Master Tactician, we should take it, right?

...Hmm.

...Well in any case, what’s fascinating and important about this conversation is that it does have the back-and-forth tension of a battle, with multiple strikes and counterstrikes: Yang employs a wide range of different strategies tactics to parry the various arguments that Cazellnu makes in his quest to convince Yang of his duty to marry. This conversation is key to understanding both Yang’s attitude toward marriage and family, and the way that Cazellnu often speaks explicitly in the voice of the normative pressures society puts on people to fit into the “married with kids” box. The dynamics of the entire interaction set Yang and Cazellnu up as opponents, and the sum total of Yang’s resistance to all of Cazellnu’s different angles of attack paints a clear picture of his current reluctance to see himself in the role of husband or father.

Yang does indeed provide the first opening to be scolded about marriage, when he takes offense at Charlotte using the suffix -ojichama (an affectionate “uncle”) in contrast to -oniichama, “big brother,” for Julian. Keep this moment in mind; I’ll be coming back to it in…*checks calendar* about eight months.

Immediately Cazellnu frames marriage as a societal obligation, and failure to marry as a “luxury.” Aww Cazellnu you romantic you.

In the previous episode we saw Mittermeyer pushed toward a normative marriage by subtle, insidious pressures—his upbringing within the context of a traditional family and the (possibly unspoken) expectations from his parents that he’d follow that model; the preponderance of visible heterosexual romance in his society. We’ve seen Yang swept along passively into romantic situations in which he was obviously uncomfortable. But Cazellnu’s line right here is the first time that a character has actually given voice to the institutional heteronormativity of society, actually advocated for it in so many words, actually leveraged it to criticize someone’s deviation from that norm.

Bantering with a friend in the abstract is way less uncomfortable for Yang than being thrust directly into a potentially romantic/sexual situation—unlike when Lapp pushed him to dance with Jessica or when Jessica threw herself at him, here there is no immediate danger, no specific person to reject or offend. This is an intellectual battlefield. And so Yang does fight back actively, starting with Tactic #1: appeal to historical precedent.

Note that while in his initial grumbling Yang said he wanted to be called oniichama while *still* a bachelor, now that he’s talking in the abstract rather than about himself he’s taking the even stronger stance that people can be productive members of society while *never* getting married. This line of argument makes sense; history is where Yang feels like an authority, and even the syntax of his “shall I make you a list?” reinforces his expertise here.

If Cazellnu’s thesis were that marrying is the only way to be an asset to society, Yang pointing out the existence of plenty of queer people—er sorry, “lifelong bachelors”—making contributions throughout history would be an effective rebuttal. (No, I don’t think that Yang is consciously talking about queerness, but yes I do think the creators are, through him.) But Cazellnu’s thesis is that participating in marriage and reproduction is an obligation on top of whatever other accomplishments someone might have, and Yang bringing up historical precedent opens the door to Cazellnu pointing out that not only is marriage the norm right now, but it has been for much of history.

In case you think I’m just being overly cute with all the battle analogies, it comes directly from the source material: The narration in the novel here contains lines like “And the point goes to Cazellnu, Julian thought” and “Yang didn’t attempt another counterstrike.”

In the anime, however, Yang does attempt one more counterstrike here, which is important because it’s the closest he gets to just saying “but I don’t want to.”

For Tactic #2, Yang complains that he didn’t pass thirty on purpose; in other words, Cazellnu may think he’s at an age where he ought to be married, but on the inside he doesn’t feel ready for that role. In case there was any suspense about Julian’s feelings on the matter, he is in no rush for Yang to decide he has to get married—keep this line in mind too, as I’ll be coming back to it in a mere six months.

Cazellnu switches the issue from Yang’s feelings to his outward appearance—a subtle but symbolic shift. If only Yang would suck it up and play the proper role, he would become (outwardly at least) a true adult. The issue of Yang’s desires is casually brushed aside.

This entire exchange is good-natured banter—Cazellnu’s intention here, at least on the surface, is to tease Yang, not to seriously condemn him for his choices. But the framework in which people joke is telling; and Cazellnu’s teasing is framed around the assertion that Yang is selfish for neglecting his duty to play the part of husband. Stage one of the battle is interrupted at this point for dinner, and for stage two, during a 3D chess match after dinner, Cazellnu’s joking tone is gone. The topic at issue this time is not just marriage but also parenting; when Cazellnu casually (but correctly) criticizes Yang’s parenting skills, Yang defends himself with Tactic #3: appeal to special circumstances.

Notice that Julian is paralleled to Hortence here in the role of caretaker to the girls. He’s simultaneously being included by implication in the younger generation—as Cazellnu and Yang discuss Yang’s pseudo-parental role in his life—and acting as an adult vis-à-vis the younger kids. At the risk of becoming a broken record...keep this moment in mind, as I’ll be coming back to it in the future.

The key to what Yang’s trying to say here is that adverb I mentioned earlier, hitonami ni, which is a deviation from the dialogue in the novel and therefore something the anime staff thought about explicitly. Hitonami is an adjective meaning average or ordinary (literally “in line with people”), so the adverb form means “like other/most people.” Yang is situating himself as fundamentally outside of the norms that Cazellnu is so fond of imposing: He couldn’t be expected to be a parent like normal people, because he didn’t grow up with a model of a traditional family and because he’s single.

His upbringing is in the past and outside his control; but being single is (on the surface) a choice that he has made—between the tables full of love letters, and Jessica being none too subtle about her continued interest, and everyone on all of Iserlohn knowing that Frederica has a thing for him, it’s always been clear that he’d have options if he were interested. It’s not that his point here doesn’t stand—I agree, the fact that he’s a bachelor who lives alone and has zero interest in or experience with kids did make him a strange choice for Julian’s guardian. But tactically, within this conversation, this was a huge blunder: It opens the door right back up for Cazellnu to continue the marriage guilt trip that was interrupted earlier. And sure enough...

This is such an obvious error that it seems revealing; in Yang’s subconscious, when he’s thinking about why he can’t be expected to be a parent “like most people,” his status as single might feel like something more innate about himself than a temporary circumstance or choice. His shock here is overdone considering the earlier banter. Tactic #4, blaming the ongoing war, is presumably one he’s used before, as Cazellnu is expecting it and doesn’t bother engaging with it directly at all, instead…

...finally delivering his thesis statement on marriage and reproduction clearly. And well, it’s a doozy.

A human being’s greatest duty is to bring forth new life. Damn Cazellnu. The use of the word “duty” (Japanese: 義務, gimu) echoes what Poplan started to say to Konev and Julian about a man’s “duty” to have sex with women; within the first three episodes of the season we’ve had two different characters explicitly describe heterosexual sex and/or reproduction as an obligation. (And throw in the slightly more coded discussion of Mittermeyer’s parents’ “expectations” about his role in society that preface the depiction of his marriage, as well as Reuental’s discussion of his own parents’ unhealthy and unromantic marriage that we haven’t even had time to talk about yet…..hmmmm is it possible that a theme is being established here?)

I can’t emphasize the importance of these lines enough: This is not passive, silent, subtle heteronormativity. This is Cazellnu voicing a view of the main purpose of human life that positions essentially all queerness as not just unusual or different, but specifically a deviation from the greatest duty of human beings. He is not joking. He’s not bantering. This is his worldview.

...And it pisses Yang off. Leaning forward in his seat, setting his brandy glass down with a noticeable thud, furrowing his eyebrows—this is more visibly angry body language than we usually see from Yang. As for the actual content of Tactic #5, well, as much as I love Yang I have to accuse him of a bit of an obnoxious-Reddit-poster argument style here, completely avoiding what Cazellnu actually said and deflecting the topic to something he’d rather be arguing about instead.

Yang: “Yo can we please go back to talking about how much war sucks? I thought I signed up to be on an anti-war show, not to be lectured at about heteronormative social structures…”

The best I can do to relate this reply to what Cazellnu said is that Yang’s either implying that his own record of causing death as a commander morally disqualifies him from being worthy of participating in the whole creation of new life thing, or possibly questioning the wisdom of bringing new life into the middle of a war. Cazellnu seems to take it to be about Yang’s sins, as he counters with—somehow—an even more obnoxious view of the point of reproduction.

“Okay little Timmy, I’ve caused the deaths of approximately three million soldiers in war, so just be a good boy and go do enough good to compensate for that so Daddy doesn’t go to hell, okay?”

Yang is done with this crap by now, and the next gif is a tactical three-for-one: First he points out that for this specific point of Cazellnu’s, about passing along one’s unfinished ambitions to the next generation, there’s no need for one’s protégés to be biological children (#6); then without giving Cazellnu time to respond (perhaps by pointing out that this doesn’t address his original argument about biological imperative to create life), he adds that this whole discussion is moot in the case that there isn’t unfinished ambition to pass along in the first place—again positioning himself as outside the scope of Cazellnu’s arguments (#7); and finally…

...the ultimate maneuver to win any difficult argument: Tactic #8: get up to go pee.

If you’re keeping score, I’d say that the great undefeated Admiral Yang loses this battle badly. Cazellnu is constantly a step ahead, turning Yang’s arguments back around on him and taking advantage of every opening. Yang is a scholar and a brilliant logical thinker, but you can’t fight convictions like “humans have a duty to reproduce” or “being a bachelor is anti-social behavior” with the kind of logic that Yang is practiced in. Heteronormativity is, for Yang, a more difficult opponent than the Imperial army.

Julian

hey-did-we-mention-Julian-has-dual-identities-of-soldier-and-caretaker.gif

The first episode of season two was all about Julian beginning to grow up as a soldier; this episode forms the natural complement by focusing on Julian’s more domestic roles. Back when Julian was first introduced I mentioned that he’s one of the only male characters who embraces more traditionally feminine roles, and in this episode that side of his personality is emphasized—from happily puttering around the kitchen doing laundry and cooking dinner, to helping look after Charlotte and her little sister (henceforth known as Demon Child Cazellnu, D.C. for short, until someone gives me a better explanation for her namelessness…).

Did I say Yang vs. Cazellnu is the main battle of this episode? I should have said it’s second after the epic clash of Gensui vs. the Roomba.

Fun fact: 1600 years in the future everyone has finally gotten over being pedantic about calling it “Frankenstein’s monster”!

It’s not played up in the anime except in background shots like this, but from Julian’s diary it’s clear that, along with Yang, Schenkopp, Poplan, etc., Hortence also serves as a role model and mentor for Julian—he speaks admirably of her ability to quickly turn her new Iserlohn quarters into a true home, and eagerly seeks out new cooking ideas and tips from her.

Julian is by nature a caretaker and nurturer; it’s as much a part of his identity as his urge to fight to protect the things he cares about. I can’t express how fucking cool it is that one of the main protagonists of this show is a teenaged boy who’s completely comfortable putting on an apron and making stew while the washing machine whirs in the background, who looks up to both soldiers and housewives, who spends the evening playing with two little girls until they fall asleep on his lap. The landscape of fiction is generally not filled with men who are defined by empathy and nurturing. It’s so badass and so important that Julian embraces these sides of himself, without feeling the need to somehow reject or outgrow them in order to become a Real Man.™

.....Okay Julian yes you are a badass but please dear god learn how to hold a wine glass.

...and Yang

Icebergs Canon: The reason Julian’s suit and Yang’s pajamas are the exact same color is not the animators being lazy, it’s that both items were gifts from Hortence, who clearly bought them at the same store.

Oooh what is this? Actual backstory about what the fuck Julian is even doing in Yang’s life? One keyword of the storytelling style of LoGH is “patience,” and the show has taken its sweet time offering any real explanation of their whole deal. From episode 3 we know that Yang is Julian’s “guardian,” that Julian’s father was also a soldier, and that the military has paid for Julian’s schooling, but in typical LoGH fashion we’re forced to try to piece the details together ourselves. Here, finally, we’re given a few more snippets: Julian was sent to live with Yang four years ago, when he was twelve, and the person who had the brilliant idea to entrust Yang with a child was none other than…

This is the one skirmish of their battle in which Yang is clearly victorious. Even Cazellnu can’t come up with a defense of this decision. Seriously, Cazellnu…..why.

Poor baffled Yang has absolutely no clue what to do with this small human who showed up at his house and immediately started cleaning up. I love that Yang appears to have repeatedly gotten frustrated while writing something and strewn crumpled drafts all over the room...wtf Yang.

This flashback, which takes place earlier in the episode, complements and reinforces Yang and Cazellnu’s discussion of Yang’s total lack of parental instincts: Although he’s come to care about Julian a lot, he had no enthusiasm for this arrangement when Cazellnu first foisted it upon him. He’s Julian’s guardian not because he wanted a child, but because Cazellnu, tasked with managing supplies of all kinds, had a surplus of war orphans needing housing and pressured his friend into taking one in.

Back in the present, Julian continues to stress about Yang’s disapproval of his military career, leading to my third-favorite failure of the Yang-Bechdel Test:

Julian’s main reaction to his promotion is to wonder how Yang will react; his pout shows that, doing a bit of Icebergs-style analysis himself, he reads between the lines of Frederica’s words to understand that Yang did not act pleased.

This tension is underscored again when Yang, rather than toasting to Julian’s promotion, toasts his safe return. Geez Yang, kinda passive aggressive.

This episode is all set-up, laying out clearly the main themes of Julian’s arc that will continue to develop through the season: 1) He’s awkwardly between child and adult—offered wine but unable to drink it smoothly; playing together with the girls but in a caretaker role; promoted for his heroics in battle but insecure about Yang’s reaction. And 2) his dynamic with Yang is evolving, with question marks about how exactly they’ll relate as he grows up and about how Yang will deal with the reality of his becoming a soldier.

And of course, we’ll be keeping an eye on Gensui’s evolving dynamic with the Roomba as well.

Stray Tidbits

This breathtaking scene in which Hilda visits Kircheis’s grave is one of the first key signs of how seriously the show takes Reinhard’s grief and the hole that Kircheis left in his life going forward. Naturally we’ll be coming back to this moment in the future, so for now I’ll just say, god damn, I have chills.

Worldbuilding alert! Yang’s fleet may be currently stationed on Iserlohn, but lest we forget that it was originally constructed by the Empire, the incredibly fancy paneling of the living quarters is here to remind us. The animators really live and breathe this world and it shows in these details.

I’d be off-brand if I didn’t comment on Hortence Cazellnu finally getting more than a few frames of screen time; but other than being a cheerful hostess and more or less actually knowing how to hold a wine glass (unlike anyone else at the table—I made fun of Julian but in fact he’s just imitating Yang and Cazellnu!), she remains an enigma. Patience, the Hortence Discourse will come.

And then there’s Phezzan, back on its anime bullshit... Seriously wtf is this guy and what’s wrong with his eyes?? I’m scared.

#Legend of Galactic Heroes #Legend of the Galactic Heroes #author:Rebecca #Alliance #Yang #Cazellnu #Hortence #Charlotte #Demon Child #seriously what is her name #Gensui #Julian #gender #heteronormativity #marriage #translation #dammit Sue #dammit Cazellnu

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charly-ra · 4 years ago

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B2B Video Marketing on LinkedIn: How to Embrace Video in Your Content Strategy

Does your B2B marketing program include LinkedIn video marketing?

If it doesn’t, it should.

LinkedIn video content generates five times the engagement as image or text-based content and Live video on LinkedIn generates a whopping 24x more engagement.

87% of LinkedIn video marketers say it’s been an effective channel for them.

41% of marketers think video is THE best content format for building relationships that generate leads. Marketers prefer video for their lead generation goals over any other content format.

But maybe you knew all that already. It’s no secret that video works, or that social media is one of the best places to use it. But maybe you’re still not totally committed to video as a medium for your B2B content strategy.

Is it maybe… perhaps… because you’d just rather not appear on screen?

If it is, you’re not alone. “Fear or hesitancy to be on camera is still the #1 barrier to video use,” according to recent research from Vidyard. 36% of their study’s participants said they were avoiding video because of hesitancy about being on camera.

This is a real issue, whether it’s a logical one or not. But if 2020 has been good for anything, it’s been good for getting us all used to being on camera – on live video. So now that you’ve got a couple hundred Zoom meetings under your belt, hopefully you’re no longer among those hesitant 36%.

If you are still on the fence, consider this: What would it mean to get 5x (much less 24x) more engagement from your content – to get that much more of a response from your target audience?

With engagement levels like that, you might even be able to consider creating less content. You might be able to generate enough MQLs and SQLs to get the raise you want, and you might still have enough time in Q4 to land a nice year-end bonus… if you get started now.

So given all that, the question isn’t if you should be doing Linkedin video marketing. It is how you should be doing Linkedin video marketing.

There are four ways to use video on LinkedIn:

LinkedIn Video Ads

Linkedin Native video

Embedded video posts

Live video

Let’s dive into each of them.

LinkedIn Video Ads

These, of course, are paid ads that run on LinkedIn or the LinkedIn Audience Network. They can be used for brand awareness on LinkedIn, used in combination with LinkedIn’s pre-filled forms for lead generation, or used to drive traffic to a site or landing page, either to do lead generation on a page you control or to send prospects to a product page or anywhere else you’d like.

The current specifications for LinkedIn video ads are here. One of the most important specs on that page is that LinkedIn ads can be up to 30 minutes long, though LinkedIn will tell you that the “most successful video ads are less than 15 seconds long”.

It’s highly recommended for video ads to:

Be short.

Use captions. About 80% of videos on LinkedIn are watched with the sound off, so having text to guide the viewer through content is paramount.

Be accessible on a small screen. According to LinkedIn, 57% of their B2B content is consumed on mobile. So keep the visual simple and consider increasing the text size of the captions.

Maximize the first three seconds of the video.

Include a call to action.

Here are some ideas for great LinkedIn video ads to get you started:

Brief customer stories or testimonials. These can be used to engage your existing audiences, or to warm up cold audiences for lead generation ads later on.

“Day in the life” style videos of employees for recruiting.

Project or process videos showing your team and company at work doing what they do best.

Mission statement style videos, either from your CEO or from a mix of the C-Suite and front-line employees.

Product videos.

For some examples of great LinkedIn ads, see our blog post, B2B Advertising: 20 Examples of Terrific B2B Social Media Ads.

Demand generation marketers can make use of LinkedIn video ads to drive registrations for online or offline events, or to build excitement for a product launch, or simply urge business buyers to explore a better way to optimize their work.

If you want to add some sophistication to your campaign, also consider pairing LinkedIn video ads with LinkedIn Conversation ads. Videos are especially good for eliciting responses, so the two ads formats are complementary.

LinkedIn Native Videos

This is the format many B2B marketers will spend most of their resources on. Native videos on LinkedIn do extremely well and are familiar enough to adapt for day to day content production.

But here are some things to consider for that production:

Short videos work best on LinkedIn. In fact, you can’t post a native video that’s longer than 10 minutes. Even three minutes is now considered a “long” video; one minute or less often performs better.

As with ads, always use captions. Or, as LinkedIn suggests, “design for sound off but delight with sound on.”

Limit those brand introduction animations. The first three seconds of any video are critical. Don’t bore viewers with a brand intro that’s more than a second or so.

Professionalism rules on LinkedIn, but good video also needs to humanize. Some LinkedIn video authorities, like Allen Gannett, encourage video producers to prioritize being accessible and relatable over being overly professional. Remember the old rule in B2B: People do business with people.

Both personal profiles and company pages can publish native videos. For a deep dive on everything you can do with native videos, see LinkedIn’s on-demand webinar, [Lights, camera, action] How to wow your audience with video on LinkedIn. It’s one of the best, most data-driven, detailed explanations of LinkedIn video we’ve come across. It’s worth watching twice.

One of the webinar’s particular strengths is talking about how to repurpose video assets. This is key for those of you who are cool on video because of the cost and the time and resource investment required to produce good video.

There’s good reason to be cautious about that investment, but if you can create even one or two large video assets, then break them down into smaller chunks of video content, you can produce an enormous amount of video cost-effectively. One brand was able to take a one-hour recorded event and break it into over 40 different video excerpts, which is nearly half a year’s worth of video content.

LinkedIn Embedded Video Posts – and why you might not want to use them

You can republish videos from other platforms, like Facebook and YouTube into your LinkedIn feed. This is a way to distribute your company’s video content, but it’s not ideal.

For starters, LinkedIn’s algorithm strongly prefers native video. But even more importantly, using video from other platforms may result in low engagement rates, simply because the content is not platform-specific.

LinkedIn, as you probably know, is a unique social media platform. It’s not Facebook. It’s not Twitter. It’s not YouTube. It has unique social norms and content preferences. And so while it might be more efficient to create video assets and then just share them across every platform, the best social media pros discourage this. The social media platforms have evolved so much (and so much in just the last year) that any content that isn’t expressly designed for each platform may well fall flat. This may be part of why engagement rates on social are dropping… the old tactic of “publish everywhere” is working less and less well all the time.

Convince and Convert did a podcast recently about this shift to platform-centric content and about LinkedIn video in particular with Allen Gannett, author of The Creative Curve and founder of TrackMaven. Gannett has earned global recognition for his own LinkedIn videos, which are one-minute interviews with famous people.

Gannett’s episode on Convince and Convert goes into detail about how he approaches LinkedIn video, but also about how he schedules and plans it (hint: consistency is key). It’s a very good case study in how one marketer has chosen to commit to a platform and just do it really well, rather than trying to be everywhere at once. LinkedIn video can deliver enough returns to be worth that kind of investment.

LinkedIn Live

LinkedIn Live is still in beta, but the early results from marketers who are using it are too compelling to ignore. Case in point: LinkedIn Lives get 24 times more engagement than other content formats on the platform.

If your company has a strong LinkedIn presence and is already published quality video on the platform regularly, you might be able to get in early by applying for the beta program. Here’s the application page.

Some key things to notice on the application page:

LinkedIn “reviews applications and prioritizes approvals based on a specific set of selection criteria, such as:

– Video and overall content creation history – Audience size and engagement history – Member or Page account has been in good standing – Two Factor Authentication (2FA) enabled in account settings

You’ll need a third-party tool to Livestream to LinkedIn.

Current tools to do this are:

Socialive

Restream.io

Wirecast

Switcher Studio(iOS mobile only)

Wowza Cloud

StreamYard

Brandlive

Easy Live

Vimeo – Enterprise and Premium

Live U

That tool list is going to change over time, so see LinkedIn’s company page about which tools work for live streaming.

Review LinkedIn’s guidelines and best practices specifically for streaming content.

Some of these guidelines may surprise some marketers. Here’s what the guidelines were, verbatim, as of publication:

No selling or promotional streams.

No pre-recorded content. All streams should be live and happening in real time, or you may confuse members and potentially betray their trust.

No live streams shorter than 10 to 15 minutes because there won’t be enough time for the audience to increase and interact. You can share shorter videos from your homepage.

No meta streams. Avoid talking about how to use LinkedIn on LinkedIn.

Avoid sponsor logos that dominate the video. If you must use sponsor graphics, keep them small.

No long “starting soon” screens. Don’t keep your audience waiting for more than one or two minutes.

No unprofessional streams. All live content is publicly visible and should be appropriate for a LinkedIn audience.

The three biggest surprises there are

No pre-recorded streams.

No selling or promotional streams.

No talking about how to use LinkedIn on Linkedin.

If you want to get approved for the beta, also make sure your profile is publicly viewable, especially the following sections: Articles & Activity, Current Experience, and Education.

For further reading, the LinkedIn Live best practices guide is here. They also have a broadcast producer’s guide that covers the technical nuts and bolts of making the tech for LinkedIn Lives work.

LinkedIn Video marketing in 2020 and beyond

So that’s the landscape of LinkedIn B2B video marketing right now. B2B marketers have several different formats to work with between native videos and Lives, plus a great way to promote videos with video ads.

Those formats also allow for two big themes in video marketing right now: Long form and short form video. As you craft your editorial strategy for this medium, those two “containers” (long form and short form) should be treated carefully. What messaging fits into 15 seconds? What other topics require the 20 minute minimum of a LinkedIn live?

Fortunately, there’s plenty of time and creative opportunity to figure it all out.

from https://bit.ly/31vlICX

#Digital Marketing

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timothyakoonce · 8 years ago

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Transcript of Tips for Attracting Local Clients

Transcript of Tips for Attracting Local Clients written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

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Transcript

John: If you own a local business and are trying to attract local clients you must listen to this interview David Mihm, check it out.

This episode of the Duct Tape marketing podcast is brought to you by Active Campaign. This is really my new go-to CRM, ESP, marketing automation, really low cost. Any size business can get into it, starting at like $19 a month, you can keep track of your clients, you can see who is visiting your websites, you can follow-up based on behavior. Check out Active Campaign, there will be a link in the show notes but it’s ducttape.me/dtmactive.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing podcast. This is John Jantsch and my guest today is David Mihm, he’s a digital marketing expert for small businesses, founder of getlisted.org, a company he sold to Moz about five-six years ago, and he’s also co-founder of the local university conference series and currently he’s got a new thing going, start-up called Tidings, which I’m going to butcher the description but he can come back and tell you more.So David thanks for joining me. How’s that?

David: That’s pretty good. Thanks John. Great to be with you again and great to be with your audience again.

John: So I guess I’ll start off with because you write so much about local digital marketing, local search stuff. What’s going on right now in local that we need to know about that you don’t think enough people are aware of or are talking about?

David: Yup. So I’d say there are two or three things that come to mind. In fact I was actually tweeting with a few people, both yesterday and this morning about this exact topic. I would say that the first thing is that at a broad level, Google is essentially trying to keep as many people on the Google SERP as they can, that’s the Google results page. And so they are devouring click-throughs that used to go to either a small business website or even a big brand website that might have a local presence. A lot of that activity is just staying on the Google SERP right now and I think that’s a big change in the last two or three years that not enough — certainly not enough businesses and even not enough marketers are really aware of.

John: Yeah there’s almost not a question that you can ask Google right now that they don’t have the answer right there in the knowledge box right?

David: That’s exactly right and you know the — not only are they getting better at answering questions with knowledge boxes instead of websites but the amount of information and the kind of information they’re presenting there is really robust and especially for local businesses. I mean if you look at some of the later, more recently features that they’ve released are things like the hours that a business is busy versus empty, so that if you’re on a busy schedule you know hey maybe I should go to this pizza joint in the lunch hour I should wait until 3 o’clock when things have died down a little bit. They’re pulling in things like critical reviews so if a business is on [00:03:32] or Eater or some of these other — depending on your industry you know maybe it’s something like Superlawyers if you’re a lawyer. They’re pulling in the list of human curated list of successful local businesses and showing those right in the knowledge panel. So kind of as much information as you want to know about a business they’re trying to present on the Google SERP, which you know as a small business you may still be getting those customers but I think from a website standpoint, your website is really — it’s becoming a way inform Google about your business but not necessarily something that as many customers are seeing these days.

John: Yeah so that leads me to my next question where’s the best place to hide a dead body?

David: [Laughter]

John: It’s the second listing on page one.

David: Okay. Very good. Yes. For sure and especially if you think about you know, so many local searches are actually mobile and in an industry like food and beverage or even healthcare, two out of three or three out of four of those searches are happening on mobile devices. And sure enough, I mean the second listing on Google on a mobile phone is often four or five scrolls down your phone and so if you’re not — as I’ve been saying for the last six months or so it used to be if you’re not on page one of Google you’re invisible, well now it’s like almost exactly what you just said if you’re not number one in Google you might be invisible because of how much space these knowledge boxes and knowledge panels are eating.

John: And where does voice search go with that? What results are you getting from voice search?

David: That’s exactly right and I think voice is — it’s certainly informing a lot of the product decisions that Google is making. I mean voice search in our car and we don’t have access to a screen, even if we do have access to a screen that’s not something Google wants to distract people from driving right? And so the number of results they can “show” or read back to you is inherently limited by that form factor. And so I think you’re starting to see — it’s not like Google is using a different algorithm for desktop, for mobile, for voice, they’re using the same algorithm so you’re starting to see the same kinds of interfaces that you might see happening in voice search also happening on mobile and desktop.

John: What do you think about the trend to blend organic and paid. You know you’re seeing it in the — what do we call that thing now, the three pack?

David: Sure. Yeah. John: And we’re also seeing an ad that has reviews in it and all kinds of snippets in it now an extension. Is there going to be a point where we can’t tell the different?

David: Yeah I mean I think it’s pretty — the line is getting pretty blurry that’s for sure and I think you’re right. I assume you’re talking about what Google calls home services ads? Where you have a — in most cases a manual application process in order to get included in the set of business that are eligible for these home services ads but if you look at the interface that’s presented I mean it looks almost exactly the same as the three pack and so from a consumer’s perspective they don’t necessarily know that these businesses have paid to get in there and certainly given where it’s positioned on the page, number one, you know I have to think those things are devouring a lot of clicks in the markets where there are currently piloting it in San Francisco and San Diego.

So I think that that’s one area where we’re seeing Google — again as you said blending the natural or organic results with paid results and they’ve been doing this in a lot of different industries as well. I think over the years the Google hotel finder has eaten a ton of organic traffic that’s now part of a — sort of a paid inclusion product. They’ve done insurance comparisons, they’ve done local inventory ads for car dealers. So they’ve definitely been experimenting in a lot of different industries and I think it’s only a matter of time before these kinds of hybrid ad units are rolled out across almost every industry and almost every metro area so I think it’s definitely something to pay attention to.

John: Well I’ve even seen — I can’t remember what the search was or where but I’ve even seen some three packs with one paid, two organic.

David: Yep. That’s something they’ve just rolled out. In fact Hawkings who — brilliant local search marketer just started her new business Sterling Sky, she actually tweeted a great example the other day, a screenshot of a search where a competitor is advertising on another small businesses name and actually showing in the three pack which is kind of for that business, a specific what we would call a recovery search for a specific business and so it’s kind of amazing that Google is allowing these kinds of things to happen but absolutely, they’re just blending in — they’re definitely blurring the line between paid and organic as much as they can get away with.

John: Do we both optimizing for the three pack anymore? Or has proximity pretty much taken that away?

David: Yeah I disagree with the whole proximity premise. It’s certainly important right I mean it’s certainly — you have to be close enough to a given searcher for Google to consider your business relevant but I think there’s plenty of other ways that Google’s evaluating businesses these days and the three pack certainly still has tons and tons of value. I mean I’m not really consulting that much anymore but I still have access to a lot of analytics from former clients and I see the visibility they’re getting from three packs and from maps results as provided by the Google my business analytics. They’re still getting a phenomenal number of impressions and click-throughs and interactions from customers. It’s certainly not something that I’m encouraging anyone to kind of give up on organic search or give up on local search, I just think that increasingly the number of winners have been decreasing and as you said Google is kind of blending more paid ads means fewer organic clicks so I think it’s just — until when — well you’ve been in this business longer than I have but when I go stated in the late 2000’s you know local SEO was a phenomenally — just a phenomenally positive ROI. It was very little effort and huge upside and I think it’s gotten much harder, it’s gotten more competitive and the number of businesses for whom that’s true is declining so I think if you’re not one of these top three in some cases top one, organic search is just — it’s going to be a very hard nut to crack for you as a small business.

John: So let’s talk about snippets. That’s one of those things that I think you know there’s a little knowledge of location snippets and some of that stuff has just kind of gotten built in. But it seems to me like there’s almost a sort of strategic snippet you know, channel that I think we have to be playing today. What’s your take on that?

David: Absolutely. I think the guy that I look to for a lot of the snippet research is my former colleague at [00:11:07] Dr. Pete Myers. So he’s done a lot of research and has published a lot of examples around what he calls ranking in position zero right? So position zero is these answer boxes were Google is showing a snippet, whether it’s a bulleted list that answers a question or in some cases just a sentence that’s marked up with the keywords in bold lettering or a table of options, all these kinds of things. Google is essentially extracting the key pieces of information from a given organic webpage and populating right on the search result. And so it kind of goes hand-in-hand with the knowledge panel it’s just the knowledge panel for semantic knowledge as opposed to physical entities when it comes to local. So there’s certainly — I think in terms of SEO, it’s absolutely a discipline within SEO that is gaining — gaining prominence. Practically speaking it goes hand-in-hand with what you would do as far as best practice for marketing, which is answer the questions that your customers are asking you and do so in a manner that Google can crawl, and have a relevant enough website that Google sees you as authorative to answer this question. So it’s really — from a ranking perspective — or from a ranking tactics perspective, it’s a lot of the same stuff but I think being smart and being intentional about the kinds of questions your answering and how you’re answering those questions is really going to put you at the forefront of this “new” area of SEO.

John: This episode of the Duct Tape Marketing podcast is brought to your by Thriveleads. This is a tool that we use on the Duct Tape Marketing website thoroughly for content updates, for slide in boxes. Actually we even use the visual editor for all the pages and landing pages that we design so go check it out at ducttapemarketing.com we’ll have a special line in the show notes for today and check it out.

I’m going to quote you, “Unless you are a traditional publisher you should prepare for a time where no one ever visits your website.” That sounds terrible.

David: Well, does it? Do you really care as a small business if somebody sees your website? Or do you care that they click your phone number from a mobile SERP or click for driving directions to your business or have their self-driving care take you to the front door. So I think you know — you’re still going to get those customers, I mean I’m sure there are pure traditional marketers out there who want to control the conversion experience but increasingly Google is doing that right? They’re doing all the stuff — you can now book a table through open table right from the Google SERP so why would you click through to a restaurant website. In medicine they have a pilot going with [00:14:03] where you can book a medical appointment through [00:14:06] in fitness they’re working with MyTime and Booker and a few of these other booking engines where you can schedule a class right from the Google SERP so that’s really what I mean by that is to prepare for a time when all of these interactions are happening right there at Google and they’re not necessarily happening on your website.

John: And that’s really your analogy of thinking your website like an API, I mean the website still has to have this great information, it has to deliver that information if you will to go Google, so it’s not that you’re abandoning the website it’s just how it is maybe seen or where it is in the journey. David: Exactly and I think your website is still at the center of your overall digital marketing presence right. I think [00:14:48] graphic from six years ago still largely holds true the website is one of the core pieces of digital equity that you can build and just because people aren’t seeing it as much doesn’t make it any less valuable. How is Google going to learn about your business if not from the data that you’re presenting on your website. And so I think it’s still a really critical piece and the other thing to keep in mind is you know, I see what’s happening in technology more broadly, I would see Google as having a smaller market share in three to four years than they have today, I think you’re seeing Amazon make a huge play, especially if you’re a brick and mortar retailer, for example I think there’s going to be Amazon SEO in the future with everything they’re doing with Alexa and the Echo device, I think Facebook is a sleeping giant in local search. I think they have a lot of great data and it’s just a matter of time before people start using Facebook for search. Apple we haven’t even talked about but everyone knows they have Siri apple maps as a third of Google maps. And so I think just because Google is devouring more of these click-throughs it doesn’t mean you’re not going to get visitors from these other channels and especially from your own direct marketing whether that’s direct mail or email or those kinds of things. So I think your website is still important and I wouldn’t encourage anyone to think of it as anything but that. John: I want to visit a couple of just random topics, you may say I don’t really know much about that. But I’d love to hear it, what’s your take on chat bots?

David: Chat bots… okay so I don’t know a ton about them. However, I think at this point not only is the technology a little bit too nascent to really kind of sink your teeth into. But I’m not sure that the consumer awareness and consumer demand is really there from a chat bot perspective. I think one of the great advantages you as a small business have over somebody like a national brand or a national retailer is that personalized service. And so there may come a time when chat bots really help a small business save time and talking to customers and all these kinds of things but I think for right now it’s a little bit early to jump in and start experimenting with that stuff, especially since it kind of to some extent eats away at your core differentiator.

John: Yeah and I wonder if it’s going to be a day where email too, nobody wants that stuff in Facebook messenger or whatever because now there are thousands — David: There’s too many. Exactly.

John: So a recent act of congress kind of scared some folks on this whole net security and NSA spying and stuff. What’s your take on — I mean do we all need VPN’s? David: Yes. Absolutely. And I’m not a technical guy but I certainly — I am very much a strong advocate of consumer privacy and I think the recent congressional decision was just appalling. I think that — particularly when you see like the Verizon and Yahoo merger/acquisition — I mean the amount of data that companies that Verizon and Comcast and AT&T all have access to I think it’s a tremendous privacy invasion and if you’re the least bit concerned about corporations knowing what you’re doing and selling your data to anyone, I think everyone should get a VPN. Dark times I have to say, dark times.

John: You didn’t hesitate on that one. David: No.

John: Okay so this late in the show I’m going to open up a really big topic that we could do a whole show on but maybe you could just tease this a little bit and send people and we’ll have it in the show notes. You have a graphic that I think you call the graphic the local stack that you’ve written a lot really about — just about how to analyse your whole local marketing — digital marketing play, operations, customer service, presence, organic marketing, paid marketing, attribution, do you want to kind of unpack that a little bit and tell people what you think is in that for them to go and visit and figure it out?

David: Yeah for sure thanks for bringing that up. So the graphic is at [00:19:10] and as you said it’s you know — kind of my vision — my attempt anyway to visualise sort of a marketing stack priority checklist and so the idea is you start with things that every small business needs, things like accounting software and a domain name and a website and those kinds of things. And you kind of check off everything — it’s sort of loosely drawn on the analogy of a mass transit map where you have kind of zone one, that’s the stuff everybody needs, zone two you can graduate to that one you’ve checked all the boxes in zone one and so on and so forth. By the end you get to things in zone six like chatbots you know, like beacons, some of this technology that’s really bleeding edge it might be a little too early to start thinking about. That’s kind of the idea behind that graphic and essentially kind of plot your journey and look for marketing technology, marketing software, even marketing — just offline marketing tactics to plug in at each stage of your journey.

John: One of the most compelling elements of it for me is the entire layer of attribution. I think that is one that is terribly misunderstood but I think also just terribly underutilized by most businesses and I think that you’ve sort of built it squarely into the strategic consideration.

David: Absolutely. It’s the top one in the graph and there’s — even if you as a small business don’t have the time or the expertise to understand what your attribution software is telling you, just collecting that data can make a huge difference if you ever bring in a consultant or someone to help you understand that data, that’s kind of the first point so things like not having Google Analytics installed on your website or sending your email newsletter on a one too many basis instead of using an ESP like Constant Contact or Mailchimp or [00:21:14] or anybody and getting the analytics around who’s opening and what’s driving them, to which product pages, those kinds of things. I think the amount of data you can collect about who’s coming to your site and how [00:21:27] your business and it doesn’t have to be a website, any digital profile that you have and who they are and what they’re doing can give you tremendous insight into what marketing techniques are working and where you can improve. John: Yeah and I’d add webmaster or the search console on top of that one too as an absolute given as well.

David: Absolutely. Yep.

John: So tell us a little bit about tidings. What’s your — well first I guess maybe give the overview of what the product actually is but I’d love to hear a little bit of your thinking on what you’re trying to accomplish.

David: Yeah for sure. I guess — so currently I would say the best way to describe — you did a great job. Essentially it’s a web app that allows you to create an email newsletter instantly based on all of the existing social media content that you’re creating so basically we ask you to connect your Facebook page and then week to week or month to month if you prefer a monthly newsletter, we automatically pull in anything that you’ve shared from Facebook, so it’s just a way to leverage your existing social media activity into a channel that is by all accounts much more productive in terms of ROI than social media. I think people who’ve been around on your podcast for a while probably know that Facebook is really pinching the organic reach of business page posts and so right now at this point, if you look at the stats from Mailchimp and get response and these big email providers, you’re looking at probably 8/1 in terms of the number of people who open an email versus see a post on Facebook and so the really — I think a lot of small businesses still think of Facebook first and this is — Tidings is really geared to not disrupt that but leverage what you’re doing on Facebook into a more productive channel.

John: Yeah and it automatically formats it in a very pleasing way. But I think the other thing that’s kind of neat about it is a lot of people or at least a lot of the people that I advise, we’re sharing some of their content as well as other peoples content and so it almost acts as a curation device because even if you have great organic reach there’s a good chance that a lot of people aren’t seeing 90% of it just because they didn’t see that days post. So being able to collect it and I know that from my years of doing this that my blog readers are different people than my newsletter or my email readers and so it kind of allows you to really — probably the key is of course it’s very simple so it’s not a real time suck but it also allows you to do some things that are really valuable.

David: Yeah cool, that’s definitely the idea I think you explained it better than I could have so I’ll just leave it at that.

John: And we’ll have some links and what not in the show notes and there’s a way to try it out as a way to subscribe when you go to [00:24:20]

David: It’s a three week trail so no credit card until you try to send the fourth time.

John: Well David, always great to catch up with you, we could — I could probably do this weekly there’s so much to talk about.

David: I know it feels like it.

John: On this front, but hopefully — I was just — you’re in Portland right? David: I am yeah.

John: I was there just a couple of weeks ago actually for a conference and had some really tasty Bluestar donuts.

David: Oh yeah. The donuts, the coffee and the beer out here are all pretty top notch, it’s pretty good.

John: Awesome. Well thanks again David, hopefully we’ll run into you out there on the road.

David: Cool. Sounds good. Thanks again John.

from Duct Tape Marketing https://www.ducttapemarketing.com/transcript-of-tips-for-attracting-local-clients/

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Transcript of How to Negotiate As If Your Life Depended On It

Transcript of How to Negotiate As If Your Life Depended On It written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

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John: A lot of business is about negotiation, heck, life is about negotiation. We’re going to talk with Christopher Voss, former FBI negotiator and you’re going to learn some incredible negotiation skills.

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Hello and welcome to another episode of the Ducttape Marketing podcast. This is John Jantsch and my guest today is Christopher Voss. He is a founder and principle of Black Swan Group, a former FBI top hostage negotiator and the author of a book we’re going to talk about today called Never Split the Different; negotiating as if your life depended on it. So thanks for joining me.

Chris: John it’s my pleasure, thanks for having me in and just a little small correction if I may. It’s the Black Swan Group as opposed to black swan. Black swan almost sounds like we’re black water or something like that, we’re The Black Swan Group.

John: It’s on my piece of paper here but I didn’t get it out then. While we’re on it —

Chris: That’s alright.

John: While we’re correcting this is it Voss or Voss?

Chris: Voss. It’s Voss. Like the water.

John: Great so let’s talk about negotiating. Obviously, the book is filled with stories from your FBI past and I think a big thing you do in the book is to apply those to everyday skills. So really is anyone in business ever taught how to negotiate.

Chris: You know I think there’s this thing that everyone expects people to be great negotiators and I don’t know if people are afraid to get better or whether it’s low on their priority list or what it is, but I mean there’s just such minor tweaks people could make to take such huge leaps forward.

John: Well in your view is it something that — I mean you’re suggesting of course it can be learned. But is there also — do some people just have it as a street skill?

Chris: Umm no, I think some people might pick it up faster than others. But it’s a little like emotional intelligence which is E.Q vs. I.Q. Like your IQ is fixed you know you got a fixed IQ, it’s like your height. You’re only going to get so tall. I drank as much milk as I possibly could my whole life growing up and I’m just barely taller than my dad. I ended up six inches shorter than where I hoped to be, I wanted to be 6,7. So there’s nothing you can do about that, but your E.Q, as soon as you start making an effort to build it, that’s almost limitless. And the data shows us we can continue to build our emotional intelligent, which is what great negotiation is, applied emotional intelligent through our mid-80’s.

John: So obviously this book uses some very dramatic situations. I mean I don’t know that many of us find ourselves in truly life or death situations in business, I mean it may feel like that at times, but you know is negotiation really just human negotiation? Does it really matter where you’re doing it?

Chris: Great question. How could this possibly — how can high stakes, life and death negotiations, how could it possibly apply to what we do everyday. And the short answer is yeah it applies because it is human negotiations, it’s human interactions. And just because we’re upset doesn’t mean the other side is. Or maybe the other side are upset and we’re not. So the level of intensity varies wildly and certainly, some people treat some negotiations as if it’s a life and death deal.

John: One of the most interesting elements for me at least in the book is you like to think, I think a lot of people do think that negotiation is sort of rational, if I let them know what the facts are and I let them know why this is good for them they’ll take it, they’ll understand. And what you talk about is it’s not rational but extremely predictable.

Chris: Yeah and that’s a great distinction I’m really impressed that you picked that up because if negotiation was rational then we’d always make the deal, right? If it was simply rational there would never be anything to disagree about because we’d all be reasoned. But yeah, people are predictable, people repeat their behavior and make the decisions in patterned ways. So the other side may seem completely irrational but you know they’re going to have the tendency to do things to same, they’re going to be driving by what they care about and that’s going to affect what kind of deals they make. Or they’ll get mad at you and tank a deal that they should have taken because they were mad at you. I mean the F bomb in a negotiation and if you’ve read the book you’ll know what the F bomb is right?

John: Yep.

Chris: And “fair” comes up in every negotiation and boy that is a highly charged emotional word, if I say to you, look man, I just want what’s fair, which is really common.

John: Yeah.

Chris: I just levelled a huge accusation against you and the negotiation is going to knock you off balance.

John: Because you’re essentially saying you’re not being fair.

Chris: Exactly. Right I’m implying it, it’s what the NFL owners did to the NFL players in the last lockout. And clearly they came out on top.

John: So in some ways that predictability I mean especially if we’re thinking — and again you may differ on this but you know, if sometimes negotiation is looked at as I win what I want and maybe that means you lose I don’t know. But if people are predictable, and especially if we can learn what their predictable behavior is, doesn’t that become their weakness?

Chris: Certainly it’s a weakness you can exploit if you’re about that. That’s a really great point, Adam Grant, who’s a brilliant guy, I read his stuff, he wrote a book called Originals, he also wrote a piece not that long ago, it was the dark side of emotional intelligent. Because these are powers for good and not evil. The really bad guys, the sociopaths are using this stuff because it works, it’s tremendously powerful stuff once you start to wrap your mind around this and get your ego out of the way. It’s amazing the amount of influence you can have on somebody because yeah, you get to understand what drives them and helps you understand their weaknesses, you make deals, it’s enormously powerful stuff.

John: And it’s really not that — I mean that’s what’s so funny about this. When I read some of the techniques you know, we’re calling it negotiation but a lot of people have realised hey I can sell more if I appeal to people’s egos, things that come out as techniques they’re kind of really how people influence people all the time, or they’ve learned how to.

Chris: Yeah, exactly right. It has a very broad application. It’s not just negotiation. It’s for better interpersonal relationships, it’s for leaders, it’s across the board yeah.

John: And I think a lot of people now — I actually had this as a question, what is negotiation? Because I do think that a negotiate might be talking your wife into having something different for dinner then maybe what she wanted to plan. I mean we probably underestimate how often we’re negotiating.

Chris: Yeah I agree 1000%. The most dangerous negotiation is the one you don’t know you’re in. And anytime somebody’s trying to get somebody to say yes you’re in a negotiate. And the vast majority of them don’t involve money just exactly like the one you pointed out. They want something different for dinner, that’s a negotiation.

John: So in business, there seems to be quite often the negotiate is over price and there are people that seem wired to “I don’t care if that’s the best deal in the world, I don’t care if that’s good for me, I don’t care anything, I want a deal.” Is there a way to negotiate so to speak with that person so you get to a mutual benefit.

Chris: Yeah that’s the easiest guy in the world. Somebody who’s just complete focused on one term and typically it’s the price term. I can make any deal, either a great deal or a lousy deal based on the other terms you know and the really cut-throat negotiators on the planet, Carl Icahn is a famous guy for doing this. He’d be happy to give you his price because he’s going to kill you with the terms and he knows it’s your price focus that you’re really vulnerable, you think you got a deal from Carl Icahn and then you wonder what happened afterwards because he’s just destroyed you. So yeah I mean people think I’ve got to have a deal, that guy’s vulnerable to me. I’ll give you your money and you’re not going to pay any attention to the stuff I’ve put in there that I’m going to walk away with truckloads of value on that I’ll then monetize some other way.

John: Do you find or is your experience and maybe you don’t study lots of negotiators but you’ve certainly encountered other people on the other side of the table when you were negotiating. Do you find that there are men better than women at it? Are there personality types of people that just seem to be better at it, is there any kind of pattern there?

Chris: Well really the quieter people are better at it. I mean you’ve got to shut up to listen, as a hostage negotiator we used to say what’s it going to take to get the other side to come out, he’ll tell you what’s it going to take to make a great deal, he’ll tell you, the other side will tell you. A friend of mine here in Los Angeles when he was negotiating with sports agent he used to always say in the two-hour conversation it’s going to be 90 seconds of solid gold. Well, you’ve got to shut up and listen to get that 90 seconds of solid gold. So the quieter people are the ones who’re predisposed to actually listening for the solid gold. Now in terms of gender base, we actually see women pick this tactical application of empathy much faster than men do.

John: They sort of come to the table sometimes don’t they?

Chris: Yeah. I think the socialization you know, but then they need to assertiveness that men — men are socialized to be assertive and woman are less socialized in that direction. But women are more socialized to listen more. I’m not sure what the gender differences are, I know what the environmental differences are that make it — you know men are less socialized to listen so maybe, I don’t know that men are worse than listening, they’re less socialized to do so. But what it really boils down to the innate talent for being good or bad is not wired into gender.

John: Yeah so there maybe just socially have different things to learn if they’re going to pick up on this? So would you say there is a one killer skill, maybe you’ve already mentioned it. Maybe it’s listening, maybe it’s empathy, is there kind of one bass-line skill that you have to be able to master?

Chris: Yeah you’ve got to be able to shut up.

John: You know it’s funny that’s hard for people right?

Chris: Some people find that utterly impossible. I mean in order to get that point across one time I was working with a woman attorney. And she was the type of person that felt like in order to be in control which of course makes her very vulnerable because the secret to gaining the upper hand in a negotiation is giving the other side the illusion of control, that means she’s vulnerable to feeling she’s in control. She’s got to be in control she’s got to be talking. And I once literally said to her, “Did it ever occur to you to not talk?” And she went dead silent and then she said, “No.” But I needed her to see the distinction because she felt utterly out of control, she wasn’t speaking. And you walk right by great solutions doing that, you’ve got to shut up and open your eyes and ears to find a better deal.

John: I’ve actually seen salespeople talk themselves out of business doing what you just described, the client was agreed, said great and the person kept talking and eventually the deal fell apart.

Chris: Yeah because then they showed the client that even if they agreed they’re not going to listen to them and no one wants to work with someone who won’t listen to them.

John: So there are probably the most — at least the one I’m the most familiar with I don’t know if it’s the most famous or not or the most popular, a book on negotiation that so many sales people have read is called getting the yes and I know you’re familiar with it, I’ve seen you talking about it. What are the intrinsic differences between never split the difference and getting the yes?

Chris: Well getting to yes is intellectually sound, you know you can’t question the intellectual and academic rigor of the book. And it really doesn’t factor emotional intelligence into it. You know I haven’t seen or heard anybody say wow, five pages into getting to yes I immediately turn around and made a great deal based on what I read. What people will say is I read it and a lot of it made sense, that’s what they’ll say. They won’t say I made a deal because of what I read, my book never split the difference people typically people are out making deals 10 pages into the book.

John: This episode of the Ducttape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Active Campaign. This is really my new go to CRM, ESP, marketing automation, really low cost, any size business can get into it, starting at like $19 a month. You can keep track of your clients, you can see who is visiting your website, you can follow up based on behavior. Check out Active Campaign, there will be a link in the show notes but it’s ducttape.me/dtmactive.

So let’s talk about another book. As I was — and this is a two part question I’m asking if you think this particular person is a great negotiator from what you’ve seen. As I was researching your book I found really there was only one book right now that’s ahead of you in sales on Amazon and it is a book called the art of the deal by Donald Trump. Is Donald Trump a good negotiator?

Chris: You know I think I’ve heard of him, I’m trying to place exactly who that guy is…

John: I have kept my show non-political so this is a question about negotiation only.

Chris: Okay if you will, Donald Trump is the best of his type and there are three basic types and if you never adapt, there’s fight, flight and make friends, those are the caveman responses. When we’re walking down a jungle path in the caveman days and we saw something that startled us we thought you know, do I got to run from it because it’s going to kill me, do I kill it make a rug out of it, or do I make friends with it and it becomes either a pet or an ally, fight, flight or make friends. Now the most evolved negotiators learn the strengths of all three types. Donald Trump is in my view the best of his class as a fight negotiator, the aggressive negotiator. He’s always attacking and of that type which can be very — can be enormously effective for short periods of time and if you look at Mr. Trump’s impressive history he put up a bunch of — a number of the greatest construction feats in New York city in the 80’s and hasn’t built anything in New York that comes anywhere near it since. So a very aggressive negotiator will go in a rack up spectacular wins, a number of them in a row and then people will get tired of constantly being in a fight with that person and they’ll just stop cooperating and freeze them out. And Mr. Trump hasn’t put up a building to rival Trump tower in New York in 30 years. He has a building in Chicago, he goes a building here, he has a goal course, he has buildings scattered all over the planet, but he doesn’t have consistent successes in the same environment over a long period of time. I happen to be a natural born assertive and I had to learn to get out of that pattern and then that’s also the prototype of the international kidnapper too. They’re aggressive, assertive, they make threats, they threaten you and that was what I had to learn how to beat as a hostage negotiator. So my tools started out being tailor made to gain the upper hand on that guy and still keep a relationship going with them also you know so they’re happy to deal with you again. The other unfortunate thing about Mr. Trump’s success are after a while people get tired of being punched in the nose and don’t want to deal with him anymore.

John: So let’s dip into a couple of the techniques, tactics. One that I find really interesting and as soon as I read it I was like yeah I can see why that has power and that is the email subject line of have you given up on this project and again you use it in a lot of instances but just that sort of reigning engagement again and talk about the power of that.

Chris: Well you know that’s a killer line and one line communication. Nothing more in of itself for two reasons. First of all, people feel safe when they say no, it protects them you know so we’ve designed an entire strategy around that emotional really that if someone says no, it’s not a word to be overcome it’s just a word to be leveraged in a different fashion. We don’t believe I need 99 no’s to get to my one yes, that looks at no as a word to be avoided or to be overcome, that’s a word to be leveraged and it starts out by leveraging that word, you get somebody to feel safe and they let themselves in for nothing when they say no, they made no commitment whatsoever which calms them down and makes them in a position willing to talk to you because they’ve just protected themselves. Second thing that that does is it triggers the fear of loss and the fear of missing out which is a driving dynamic in today’s society. So much so that there’s actually an entire Nobel prize winning behavioral economic theory called prospect theory, because it’s the way people are driven, the avoidance of loss or the avoidance, fear of missing out is a common term in social media today, FOMO. So that ticks that in, you know that one line email actually punches two really important portions of the emotions in the brain that contribute to decision making and it spurs people and it moves them forward. It’s a really powerful thing it’s one of those things that you know it’s a great stealth weapon to get people to move forward.

John: So my second one and we’ll end on this one because again as you said 10 pages into this book you will find some things that are going to have you really scratching your head and thinking — not necessarily negotiate even, just present yourself I think from the beginner so it’s not — a lot of people look at negotiation and they think okay now I’m in this adversarial position but you put yourself in a better position I think by using some of these techniques before you ever get to that point. Getting people like that first bridge or that first trigger is getting somebody to say that’s right, or maybe it’s stronger and more emotional than that, but talk about that, those two words.

Chris: Yeah well when somebody believes what they just heard is the complete and utter truth they say that’s right, you know whatever side of the isle you’re on, the last presidential debate of the recent election, whichever candidate you like, when the say something you completely believed in you didn’t look at the TV and say you’re right! You said that’s right. So that’s right what we say when we believe something we’ve heard is complete truth and it’s the marker that we’re looking for when we’re everybody in the planet was advised by Steven Cubby to seek first to understand and then be understood. It’s a sequence. It’s knowing when the other side feels heard which then when somebody says that’s right to you, it’s also a signal that now their brain is open to listen and before they said that’s right they’re you know they were closed for business in terms of listening and every time you try and get them to listen to you at that point you were wasting your time because the listening part of their brain was closed for business. You just got him to turn the lights on and unlock the door when you got them to say that’s right. And at that point, that’s when you can begin to sway, that’s your marker that says the other side is ready to listen. And it’s not your right, you have to be able to listen and distinguish because you’re right is what we say to people when we want them to stop talking to us, that’s how we get them to shut up.

John: So I have seen — and that’s what’s interesting about this. Again when I read through the book I was thinking negotiation, negotiation but when I listen to you talk about that when I read about that in the book I’m thinking I’m a public speaker. When I get up there into he first 10 minutes I’ve got to get people saying that’s right about whatever it is I’m presenting or they’re not going to hear me.

Chris: Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

John: So many powerful applications. Great so talking with Christopher Voss the author of never split the difference negotiating as if your life depended on it. You want to tell — obviously the books available everywhere it’s been highly reviewed, tremendous best seller, you want to talk about where people can find out more information about you and your work and the black swan group? Because I know you have some products and services that you offer as well.

Chris: Yeah man I mean I’d love to thank you. The easiest way is for people to send a text message and send the words that right with no punctuation and no spaces, no apostrophe, no spaces, just write it out as if it were all one word, that’s right that right to the number 22828 and again that number’s 22828 and that will sign you up for a complementary AKA also known as free once a month negotiation advisory newsletter plus tell you about where to find other free things that we have and where we’re doing training where they might want to sign up for and also I help you understand where you can get the best price for the book.

John: Awesome. Thanks, Christopher so much and we’ll have that information in the show notes as well. So really great read, really great spending time with you and appreciate you appearing on the Ducttape Marketing podcast.

Chris: Thanks John it was absolutely my pleasure.

Transcription Provided by: Verbatim Transcription Services

from Duct Tape Marketing https://www.ducttapemarketing.com/transcript-of-how-to-negotiate-as-if-your-life-depended-on-it/

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