#'refer to me as your senior ok?' '...who are you' 'haha you should figure that out yourself if you want to be my replacement'

[eorzeashan]

*thinks about Emperor Jadus* I feel like Eight would be secretly pissed if that happened. or maybe not pissed, since it used to be Jadus' dream and all... but he'd be so disappointed lolol

Jadus: the Empire calls for my return.

Eight, sighing: y e a h... slouches

[the-chosen-half-of-one]

Really Long The Empty Grave Ramblings Lockwood and Co.:

Lockwood and Co. The empty grave spoilers, long incoherent commentary and rambling/babbling ahead, you have been warned... - - - "I'll treasure the memory on my deathbed" Oh Kipps, I laugh before I realize... What if his deathbed's in this book? "Holly got out some chocolate, began offering it around" She's like the Remus Lupin of the crew right there, 'Eat! you'll feel better.' I expected wax, but The wax figure actually coming to life actually freaked me out I imagine the skull saying "how's it going?" Like Isabella says "whatcha doing?" In Phineas and Ferb except more sarcastic. And when he says "eep, he's a big one!" ... There's Steve Irwin Lockwood's art skills have a Supernatural gif "I know your feminine wiles!" Oh my god, skull Oh my god just imagine George wearing a sequinned tasseled dress in a theatre show... Try getting that image out of your mind... When Lockwood turns to George and says how they can take anything La Belle Dame throws at them, it sounds like they're secretly gay for each other I knew Lockwood was showing Lucy his family's graves, but when he got there, there was just something in my eye, not tears, nope, nope, nope, just some dirt making my eyes misty Oh my god no, a space for Lockwood's grave, nope, nope, nope The empty grave isn't just referring to Fittes'... Let's hope it stays empty... The Lockwood's weren't even killed by ghosts, that's almost sadder I wonder if it was staged... This whole scene in the graveyard has an eerie but nice calm The skull is so just Lucy's sassy friend who likes discussing boys with her and embarrassing her: "ooh, I smell something burning... Oh wait, it's your pants! Your pants are on fire, you massive liar! You so weren't on a case!" Oh my God, the slow atrocious wink😘😜 Well, it was very overgrown. I bet it was. The figure rising from the mounds of garbage in the alleyway. "Hello, Flo" *Me chanting* George and Flo! George and Flo! No, Mr. Gale, really, I should have kicked YOU. Holly with her comeback. She's not the mom friend, she's the teacher friend. "Could you show [the papers] to me?" "I could. It would certainly be possible" The way they seem to think Barnes is trustworthy makes me worry he's not... Kipps! Kipps! Humble Kipps. My Kipps! Drinking game: take a sip every time someone says Charley Budd "[The scream] was higher and shriller than Holly's, so we knew that it was Kipps." Let's split up gang! No let's not, that's how problems start! Oh god no fortunes! Nuh uh! No you don't! Don't do this! "He will go into the dark" "He will sacrifice his life for you" I don't think so witchy! Nope! Lies! Shh! *worry* *sobbing* That moment with George telling her to really look at the ghost is grea- wait what if he's the one who dies... George is the strongest of them all! Lockwood no!!! Trapeze artist Lucy Carlyle at your service!!! "Hey, Luce..." Slap! Bearded lady has got a thing for Kipps😝 Anthony Death Wish Lockwood *sobbing* I hope Barnes is a good guy... Aw, he cares! Like a concerned grumpy ol grandpa. Lucy/Skull are totally a thing, they're an item I wonder if the silver Fittes uniform is like the feather cape or something Rupert can see the ghost... So ectoplasm can maybe do more than just keep you young and Penelope's not the only one with the secret... George???!!! Oh my god don't be dead don't be dead don't be dead Ok I know it's a bad time and my gosh poor George but internally chanting George and Flo! George and Flo! "Who's up for a spot of burglary?" Whoa an actual age for Kipps! His "advanced" age of 22 They have cloaks like the capes! I knew it! Fittes totally stole the Lockwood's research! This just makes me more sure their death wasn't an accident! Deranged seniors on stilts, I thought it was an automaton for a moment, but nope just old man Wolverine I can't take them seriously I just see elderly cosplaying as tinfoil robots with bulbous goggles and handmade weaponry I knew it! I knew it! It wasn't no accident! Oh my God, poor Lockwood! I want to punch the Orpheus Society in the face and get them in an "accident" gaah I'm so mad! Skully doesn't want to leave! Portal in Jessica's room... Means free the skull! Free the skull! *about the ectoplasm* "does she bathe in it? Does she eat it, what?" Just imagine Fittes having a nice peanut butter and ectoplasm sandwich... Hot potato pass it on pass it on pass it on hot potato pass it on, you've been ghost-touched There's so many hidden dirty jokes in this book No! Bad plot forwarding! Stop ruining my locklyle moment!!! He was giving her a necklace symbolizing undying devotion!! Come on goons, you couldn't wait 3 more seconds???!!! This is some Home Alone type stuff going on People keep liking my "who was going to die theory" I posted months ago and Kipps was just stabbed and I'm worried... Kipps says he's fine which is exactly what people say when they're not fine... Oh God, now they're trapped in the spirit world, how did I not see that coming??? And now they've got the ghost of Winkman to worry about... And they're totally dead and I almost always forget the skull's not very old. And no Gale don't take our skully!! ... She's actually physically stopping them from moving on... That's so awful... My god I think Kipps is dead or near death which is why he has so much energy in the spirit world. Flo's better than Lockwood with a rapier, she was an agent, now she's a survivor... So much character development in this book! More of the skull's spirit! Yay!... More affirmation of Kipps' not aliveness... Not yay... I wonder if ectoplasm has healing properties too... Am I getting desperate??? Tell me your name skull tell me!!! *me desperately yelling at him* I'm not crying. Who's crying? Just some dust in my eye. *begins sobbing over Kipps* They called him the body. I'm dying now. "It was only at the very end that I realized he was dying" "What do you mean dying? I bloody well hope not!" Oh my god if you heard my gasp of relief you'd think I won the lottery, that was beautiful. That was a roller coaster, that was my heart being ripped out and shoved back in. "You've got to take her by surprise, right? Well nothing would be more surprising than you stripping naked now, daubing charcoal on your cheeks-I'm not specifying which ones- and rushing out of the elevator, whooping and leaping like a mad thing..." Does this quote even need a comment? It's 'you and I' Marissa, geez, this is all I have now, correcting the grammar of fictional villains... Is Ezekiel controlling her... No that makes no sense. Does it? Oh God is his source in the cabinet?... Wait what... What's actually going on??? The body in the cabinet is Marissa?? I'm freaked... Is she a ghost? What is this? ... I'm with skull on this one "I didn't expect that." Is this possession?? Oh my god it was actually her granddaughter, that's sick... She killed her own granddaughter... Well I bet this is worse than we all thought.., and her daughter... *me chanting* free the skull! Free the skull! Dang it Lucy! Put some elbow grease into it!!! Hmm... I guess not. Lockwood no... Nope nope nope... Like Lockwood yes, perfect timing, but Lockwood no! Skull!!!!!!!!! Aw, he does care No, I knew safety was too good to be true! Really, a cluster bomb?? Really??? We were so close... The skull... The skull is the one who died... The one who sacrificed himself for her... The dead guy is the one who sacrificed his life... I don't know if I'm sad, impressed, surprised or all 3... I'm seeing the destruction in slow motion "Some of us have standards you know" oh Flo... That made me smile. Biker jacket Barnes! Phew Skully's okay for now. Unless... He finally decided to move on. Give the people the truth!!!! Lockwood in a macho leather jacket like Barnes, haha no. Lucy don't you see the Locklyle happening before your eyes??? Hope for skully! Lil green glint... Wait I just realized we never did learn his name did we? Locklyle! Locklyle! Locklyle! This book was too good! ... Now what do I do?????

[rainbowravioli]

What do you think about Febri interview and Yamada Reiji roundtable? It rises interesting issues in terms how bold can be authors depending on their gender and shows audience. I think now I understand more why Kubo answered in such weird way in pash

I heard so many good things about this interview and I really got my hopes up but…again, I’m thrown into despair. I’m sorry this is probably not going to be the answer you were looking for.

Summary of what I think about the Febri interview: Kubo is once again doing olympic level gymnastics to portray Victuuri as anything except a couple. She also can’t keep her story straight. I can’t roll my eyes any harder because they are full of tears.

Summary of what I think about the Yamada Reiji roundtable: Bless, but ultimately what he says means nothing because he has absolutely nothing to do with the project.

As for more detailed thoughts on both…I actually have a lot to say about the Febri interview, specifically on the narrative side of things. And I know that wasn’t the intent of this ask but I can’t not talk about the whole thing.

Febri Interview

From here (x)

First of all, I’ll say that I’m glad that there’s finally some Sayo recognition in one of these things. Let us never forget that Yuri on Ice is Sayo Yamamoto’s passion project and that the original concept came from her! Also confirmation that Kubo did not write the series by herself. Bless.

On the other hand I am frustrated and fascinated at the insistence that Yuuri was never meant to win gold, especially with how Kubo talks about writing and developing the story to go towards that specific end-goal because everything pre-episode 11 was pointing towards the opposite direction, so that’s a terrible job you did there! Ah…do I still believe this “Yuuri was going to lose from the start” thing is a lie? I sure do. The very existence of Welcome to the Madness is proof enough for me.

—Is there something you had a hard time with when you created the storyboard?In every episode, especially in the early part, I had trouble fitting the characters into the story. I drew about 10 pages but it felt really incoherent, so I had to draw it again from the start. That happened over and over. The story was already decided, therefore I couldn’t change it a lot. I mostly changed the situation or dialogues, and tried again until it felt right.

Not that I’m surprised really. Kubo already showed she has no idea what she’s doing with the characters what with all her “the way they acted here just can’t be explained by logic” and her “I have no idea what Yuuri’s motivations are better check with Sayo” and the “I didn’t want to show Victor’s face because I dunno what he was thinking *shrug*”.

You know I’m…I’m just going to credit the good things about the characters to Sayo, for the sake of my sanity.

On top of that, the director was towing the series with overwhelming power, surprising everyone by saying things like “all songs must be newly-written” and “let’s use an orchestra to create the music”.

Yeah, Sayo is responsible for all the good things in the series including the flawless soundtrack, I accept this.

We were planning to create a story centered around the bond of an athlete and their coach, in other words Yuuri and Victor, but before going location hunting we didn’t really have a clear image of that in our minds.

Victor and Yuuri were not meant to have a romantic relationship when the series was in its early stages. Fine.

At that time, a certain athlete said “I can skate for love”. In their case, “love” was probably referring to their lover (…) Yuuri Katsuki doesn’t skate for his own love, but to prove all kinds of love, including Victor, and when as a result his strong desire for a gold medal was added to it, I had the feeling that this series had finally found its powerful core.

Ok here’s the thing. The way this entire paragraph is structured it’s separating the romantic love of that real life athlete from the actual theme of the series. This is still fine. I’ve said it many times before that Yuri on Ice is about various different types of love. So this is ok. I’m just pointing this out, because I’m sure this will be used to point out “See, she means love between lovers about Victor and Yuuri” and that’s not what she’s saying here at all.

Victuuri aside, back to narrative critique. So Kubo says the powerful core of the series is based on two things: Yuuri skating for all kinds of love and his strong desire for a gold medal. Interesting. In my own breakdown of the narrative of the series, post-finale, I’ve said the same things, that these two elements provide the core for the story. Which is why the finale doesn’t work, because it took both these elements and threw them away.

—I see. Who was the hardest character to write?I had a hard time drawing the relationship between Yuuri and Yurio. Especially Yurio, I think he’s easy to grasp as a character and I was sure he would become popular, but for the same reason it was difficult to make him unpredictable. I wanted to depict him and Yuuri as rivals, however figure skating is mostly a battle against yourself, a sport where you fight to pursue your personal best, and after their direct confrontation in episode 3 they also become physically separated, so I was careful about the balance when making them think of each other.

You failed.

—Yuuri and Yurio had a kind of relationship that made it difficult to tell exactly whether they were getting along or not.We had already decided from the start that Yurio would hinder Yuuri’s victory in the Grand Prix Final, therefore I had to think about how to develop their relationship in a convincing way, so that the viewers would also feel a catharsis in that moment. When portraying rivals it’s important not to fall into stereotypes, that’s why I created the stir over Victor, Otabek and Yurio becoming friends in episode 10, and so on. It was for the purpose of reinforcing the fated connection between Yuuri and Yurio, and to consequently cause the viewers to want to cheer on Yuuri in the Grand Prix Final. However, at the same time the bond between Yuuri and Victor became deeper and deeper, and as I couldn’t really find enough place to put the spotlight on the rivarly with Yurio eventually Yurio stopped moving inside my storyboard, to my surprise. In that sense, I had to struggle to depict Yuuri and Yurio’s relationship until the end.

Wow! This is a real mess! First of all, what catharsis? There was no catharsis to be felt.

About not wanting to fall into stereotypes when portraying rivals - the entire Yurio > Yuuri relationship was textbook shonen/sports rival. The only thing that set the relationship apart was how Yuuri viewed and treated Yurio in return, at least before the finale. “Fated connection between Yuuri and Yurio” omg what is this? What kind of charged language, Jesus Christ. What fated connection, where??? She even goes to say, the bond between Yuuri and Victor took over this “rivalry” thing, so much so that Yurio got less screen time and she struggled to depict his relationship with Yuuri. “Fated connection”, I can’t. I’m using that in the future, I’m adding that to the #transcendental pile.

She should thank the heavens that Yuuri and Victor apparently decided to deepen their relationship on their own and take over the screen time because thee is no way, absolutely no way, that this series could have survived or achieved the popularity and critical praise it has on the grounds of the Yuuri/Yurio rivalry. You can’t make a 23 year old top athlete of his home country and a 15 year old in his Senior debut convincing rivals. You especially can’t do that when writing from the perspective of the 23 year old. If Yurio had been the protagonist and we were seeing things from his point of view then sure, I could buy him seeing Yuuri as a rival, but this is Yuuri’s story. And it being Yuuri’s story is exactly what sets Yuri on Ice apart.

Also, Yurio “hinders�� Yuuri’s “victory”….mmmmmm….

—Still, Yurio’s lines were all powerful, and I think he really stood out as a character. How did you create those memorable lines such as “I’ll make you into a borscht in Moscow” and “there are no gold medals for pigs!!”?Just naturally (LOL). Sometimes lines are born because the story requires them, and some other times a line a character would totally say eventually connects to the story, so it doesn’t really feel like I came up with all the lines myself.

Haha. Remember how the finale validated every horrible thing Yurio ever said? Good times.

—The bond between Yuuri and Victor became more and more extreme by the end of the series.Yuuri is just calling it “love” because of what he wants to express, without being afraid of the values arbitrarily decided by others, but I decided to go ahead and use any kind of representation if it was required by the story, without reserve. I believed that the buildup of such a relationship would lead to a special ending, I actually hadn’t envisioned their relationship from the start. In the end the bond between them became extremely deep, and I myself was surprised.

This is not her calling them a couple. This is not even her saying they are in love. Just want to underline this. Yuuri is “calling” it love, that doesn’t mean it’s love. In fact this indicates more that it isn’t. 

However, episode 10 was the last “break” before the Grand Prix Final, and as we were thinking about what to put in it to make it an absolutely enjoyable episode, we also wondered whether it was possible to further deepen their bond too. Since we had already done hugs and scenes like in dramatic TV serials* we thought we couldn’t go it any farther, but then I suddenly thought that they might want an item for support when facing the Grand Prix Final. When I tried browsing the websites of ring brands I found out that engagement rings aren’t necessarily something for people who get married, but that they can be given as presents to soulmates too. And I thought, “this is it!”. Besides, looking through the material we gathered during location hunting in Barcelona I found pictures of a church with a choir, so I was like “this is the place!”.

First of all what the ever living fuck kind of reality is this woman living in where people buy engagement rings without planning to use them as such?! 

Does she even know what she wrote? Does she lack total awareness of t what??? YOU CAN’T MAKE WEDDING RINGS PLATONIC!

But hey that’s exactly what she’s doing here! The rings were never meant to be anything other than support/good luck matching accessories. Soulmates =/= romantic. 

—As a result, the viewers were ecstatic.If it were a manga I think that scene would have actually looked much lighter and less important, but I was positively impressed to see how much impact it could have when in an anime.

Again Kubo persevering in her personal quest to undermine every single Victuuri moment and throw them straight into platonic buddies territory. The rings and their exchange are not important to her.

HOWEVER! She does admit she didn’t expect the scene to carry as much impact as it did in the anime. Because the scene is indeed directed like an important, meaningful and impactful scene. It’s directed like a romantic scene. It’s full of wedding symbolism. 90% of the fandom reading that scene as an engagement scene was not wrong because that’s exactly how the scene was directed. I’m officially crediting every Victuuri moment to Sayo.

Also, after episode 7 I realized it so clearly that I even began to think “this is reaching too many people”. On Twitter I saw lots of comments like “I cried so much I feel sick” and I thought “people’s autonomic nerves are going crazy” (LOL).

Again Kubo demonstrating that she has no idea why episode 7 was so important and resonated so deeply with people as it did. Can the fandom stop thanking her for Victuuri? Can the fandom stop saying she’s a great ally and doing good representation? Please.

(…) help director Yamamoto build the world she wanted to create.

I’m clinging on to Sayo for dear life and never letting go.

—I see. Lastly, many people are hoping for a sequel to “Yuri on Ice”. Could you tell us your current plans and whether you have a desire to continue?Even between me and director Yamamoto, we still haven’t discussed about it concretely. Besides, we cannot create an anime alone, and we do not know whether the important anime staff will have their schedules free. But we cannot move forward until we create something that will allow us to say “we have come up with this sequel, please follow us”, therefore, as one of the main creators, the first thing I want to do is conceive an interesting sequel. Actually, I’ll be going on a trip abroad with director Yamamoto soon. It has nothing to do with location hunting for a sequel, but like when we first discussed about “Yuri on Ice”, I hope that we can start to gather the external pieces while talking about figure skating every day. I think that the characters are out there somewhere, waiting for a chance to move again, and we are going on a trip to look for them. I hope we can find them.

There is not full translation (that I’m aware of) of the Yamada Reiji roundtable so I have to go on what people say it was about. So (x) (x) (x)

Someone saying, unquestionably, that Victor and Yuuri are a couple. Finally! Too bad he’s not involved in the show in any way. Him being Sayo’s friend doesn’t give him credentials, really. He’s just telling us how he interpreted it. I mean we can conclude that maybe Sayo told him it was her intention to portray them as a couple. I could believe that, considering the difference between the way scenes in the show are directed and what Kubo has to say about them. It still doesn’t count as an official statement though, because it’s not Sayo saying anything, just her friend expressing his interpretation.

That said, not everything said there is exactly great. But again, taking everything with a grain of salt because, nobody at that table is involved with YOI.

They also comment on the fact that in YOI they could have shown their romance in a much more evident way but they didn’t, they focused on the entertainment, and that’s what made the show so popular.

Uh, ok, that’s highly doubtful to be honest but sure, ok.

They also say how in episode 10, in the part where Victor and Yuuri go “on a date” (their words) and shopping, Yuuri’s reactions are “so much like a girl’s”.

Mmmmmm that’s a questionable thing to say.

Now anon I think you wanted me to address this part.

(..) men are usually much more blunt about BL than women, especially creators and people involved in the production of an anime. I think that women are scared that if they say something that hints at BL people will not take their opinions objectively and just think “you see things from that point of view because you’re a woman so you like BL”, while if it’s men saying the same exact thing people are not going to think it’s because they like BL, so they don’t feel that they have to justify themselves or avoid certain topics.

I understand what this is saying and there is a point to be made here. But. Quoting @soobaki, it doesn’t justify things like Kubo “no homoing” engagement rings.