#Also for part of her arc to basically be:

[runabout-river]

Thoughts on JJK chapter 271 - the last chapter (spoilers)

I did a live reading of this chapter you can find here if you're interested how my panel per panel thoughts progressed while reading it 😄

This very last chapter we start where we left off in ch 270: with the mission where the woman can't see the face of her boyfriend correctly anymore.

The first year trio are hard at work thinking through their options on what to do and how to pull that curse user out of hiding. We get a new sort of funny faces from the idiot duo, for them at least, I think these faces appeared in the Kenjaku/Takaba fight as well

The trio enacts their plan now and they catch the perpetrator really fast. Nobara does some funny yet unnecessary property damage in the process and we first get a cool panel of her and Yuji together than another silly panel of them not able to see their faces properly.

The perpetrator btw is a no name never before seen character created just for this mission so the guys can have one last low stakes adventure together.

We get a Gojo flashback giving Yuji a talk, saying his students should become better than him and forget him too, at least one of them. It isn't out of character for Gojo to say that but the placement and the build up for it is somewhat unsatisfying.

Yuji shows how he internalized Gojo's last words by encouraging the criminal to be better.

We get a cool Megumi pose with Kon after he showed us why he was the brains in the group but unfortunately that's basically it for him. Even though he was possessed and tortured by Sukuna for a month there is nothing left of that on him except superficial scars.

When Sukuna took him over Megumi was turned into an object meant to suffer. Now it feels like he's still that: an object but this time meant to be happy in a forcefully conflict free way.

When the readers believed in the dream theory, elements like that was where our thoughts came from. This forceful happy ending for everyone, a genre shift from what JJK had been at this point 🤔

Now we get a surprise Mahito and Sukuna interaction in the space before souls move on. Their conversation is interesting as is the reference to Sukuna's past and what he chose for himself.

In a way it was always apparent that Sukuna was bullshitting the people around him when he talked about himself and what others should do and not. For me it was the speech he gave to Yuji after possessing Megumi about how Yuji should stifle his misery because he was born low.

That immediately stood in stark contrast to what he later said to Kashimo about being born unwanted and cursed because now he admitted that he was in Yuji's position once too and still he developed that insanely arrogant self image.

My problem here is that this interaction references things that were not implied before like what his two paths above were supposed to be. Every time I look at that I get new ideas on what it could've been he's talking about.

It's good to have room for interpretation on someone's backstory. But to this degree it's just confusing. I thought the woman on the left is his mother, others said it could be Kenjaku or Yorozu. Whoever that is, the meaning of what Sukuna says changes drastically here.

His relationship and history with Uraume is also insufficiently explored. This scene unfortunately does not have the emotional impact it could've had if Gege had planted the correct seeds previously.

Sukuna walking away from the curse that represents human hatred however is meaningful. That part was halfway build up during the Yorozu fight when Sukuna said he would be willing to accept defeat.

We get the end of the manga the way it started: with Sukuna's last finger back in a box in a small shrine. It's poetic but the path towards it, these last chapters and the last arcs...

...it felt underwhelming, not gonna lie. Towards this ending were those unneeded scenes with the NSS and even the majority of this chapter was unnecessary and wasted time. What could've been a better last chapter than this while still hitting all the same beats would've been one solely from Sukuna's point of view.

Sukuna from before his birth, his infancy, his childhood. Showing us the path he talks about here. Giving us a glimpse on what the Calamity was, his relationship with Uraume, showing us why he accepted Kenjaku's offer. Then the canon timeline but all of it from his view. His thoughts on Megumi while he possessed him. Even the talk Yuji had with Gojo could've been shown because of the established resonance between Yuji and Sukuna.

Then should come his talk with Mahito. Then we would've understood and sympathized with it without problems .

We did not need the trio's last mission. The end scene of ch 270 was enough to make us imagine that mission on our own. This chapter could've been about sth with more meaning and the exact ending of it could've still been achieved without problems, all e.g. with Sukuna's last thoughts narrated over the happy faces of Gojo's students 😣

Overall I liked the chapter but I felt like sth was missing from this entire ending. It was safe for Gege to write I guess but it was also boring in a lost potential kind of way...

...and then I see that fucking time on that one panel and I think again about Gege wanting to troll us!

That's the same time we saw in ch 269 and I have no idea what it's supposed to mean. So now I'll make one last fucked up prediction, partly meant to be serious, mostly meant to entertain me these last few hours before the official gets released:

The digital release of chapter 271 is going to be a different chapter than the magazine release.

Why???? Because wtf not?? Shueisha and Gege probably too hate the leaks and don't you think this is only a problem in the anglosphere. Of course the Japanese side distributes these leaks around as well. From one small glimpse I saw, Japanese fans are wondering if JJK was cancelled because of this ending.

It would also fit with the dream theory or just my own thoughts from above about a differently structured last chapter.

So like, why not troll the fanbase? Many of whom have shown with Gojo's death chapter how they can't keep their eyes away from the leaks. Previously my own thoughts had been that WSJ could release final chapters like this exclusively on digital first to nip the leak problem in the bud.

But like, don't take this theory too seriously 😄

[nadiajustbe]

When it comes to HMC trilogy, I take almost no criticism, as it just a wonderful written-story with alive and relatable characters. However, If I had to name a part I'd found reasonable to criticise and may critises myself, I'd say it's Lettie Hatter's arc.

Not because it was entirely bad, but because it could be so much better If it wasn't written in the 80s and had a different mindset attached to it. And because the way it starts and the way it progress has little to no connection to how it ends.

Because the whole thing of the Hatter sisters, all of them, was breaking social norms and expectations.

Sophie firmly believed that she would stay in the Hatter Shop for the rest of her life with the most boring existence possible — and yet she married the most chaotic, whiny and slither-outing wizard in all of Ingary, with whom everyday is a full-blown fantasy adventure.

Martha, as the youngest, was expected to have the above mentioned fantasy adventures, be a mighty witch, even a hero, maybe — but she decided to chose a happy, steady basic life with a husband and ten kids, and she didn't want to listen to anyone who said otherwise.

Lettie's arc, just as the whole stories of her sisters, were tied on what people wanted from her. She was the most beautiful out of all girls, If we believe Sophie's words, and people almost wished she would marry and find a life spouse, as she had one million proposals a day even before switching with Martha. But that wasn't what she wanted — I'm sure she would reject all of them as often as her sister did, because she wasn't a big fan of it, just as working in the bakery. Lettie wanted to be a witch, and she practically became one, switching with Martha, working with ms. Fairfax.

But while Sophie's arc of expecting to be plane and ordinary ended on being gifted and adventurous, Martha's arc of avoiding busy life ended on finding a person she loves and planning to build a big family, Lettie's arc of searching for greatest achievement and avoiding marriages ended on...a marriage.

A marriage that, as stated by herself — "Ben doesn't like people to know I'm a witch" — kinda disregards her initial want to show that she has intelligence outside of her beauty, the one that he can show and that she can use.

(This line has absolutely no context whatsoever and we can only guess why Ben wants so, because it's actually so out of his character, even all the bits that were described before. But nope, no context, no explanations. It may be because she was pregnant at the time, but, again nothing like this was ever said and it's a pretty lame excuse anyway. Magical mirrors in their house also do not obey Lettie, at all)

And, as much as I absolutely love Ben and as much as I absolutely love Lettie, I don't think pairing them was a good choice. Mostly because Lettie was seventeen (one year younger than Sophie) in the end of HMC when their "pairing" started, and Ben is described to be noticeably older that Howl in CITA, which brings us to the conclusion he's at least in his thirties. And that's...a bit uncomfortable of an age gap, especially If we take into the account they canonically had a kid about a year later. And also Ben was supposed to be her mentor.

...And If he stayed her mentor and nothing more, it would be actually great. Because I believe Lettie deserves the same development her sister had, to get was she initially wanted and what she was fighting for. To be an apprentice of the Royal Wizard, to be a powerful a well-known witch, to show the world who told her that she has to marry to succeed in life that she in fact, doesn't, to show all this guys that tried to propose to her that she didn't need them, at all. But definitely not a wife, or a mother.

Not because being a mother or/and a wife is a bad character development. It worked perfectly with Sophie, because it represents her chaotic happily ever after better than anything else, it worked with Martha because she wanted to had ten kids and marry. It's just not for Lettie's character in particular precisely because everything in her concept of "beatiful middle sister" showed that was she's supposed to be.

Because Mrs. Pentstemmon said Lettie awaits a great, good fate, that she'll be as powerful as the Witch of the Waste — and I want to see it. Because I didn't.

[allwormdiet]

Buzz 7.11

I was so caught up in the euphoria of not having to read about the Empire that for a minute I lived in this world where Coil didn't exist

And so we arrive at The Coil Bunker. Heard this sucker come up once or twice in my time on the periphery.

Somehow I got the impression that it was more established than this. Sounds like a recent development rather than a long-standing stronghold, with the construction going on inside as well as out.

They are already so done with Coil's shit, there's nothing to be impressed by with this guy

It really is a rapid acceleration of their workload, yeah. Even setting aside that the Wards did basically nothing during the gallery job, they've gone against every hitter in the city except most of New Wave and the ones under Coil's employ, and frankly I'm willing to guess that changes down the line.

Coil's value to them as a boss has nothing to do with himself and everything to do with his resources. If he keeps putting them in more trouble than he's worth, then a coup would almost certainly be in order.

"Do you need reassurances that I'm not going to fuck up like some kind of moron and condemn you all to a pointless death in order to work for me?"

"Uh, yeah? It'd be nice?"

I'd talked about this elsewhere, but Coil's fuckup here breaks in two possible ways:

Either he genuinely could not think beyond pulling back the curtain on the Empire's identities and forgot his subordinate villain team who both have a member famous for knowing things she shouldn't and also publicly beefed with the Empire maybe a week ago, or

he actually did realize that the Undersiders would be caught in the blast radius of this plot, figured he'd roll the dice on their survival, and is now lying in a way that makes him sound shortsighted and careless

Like yeah no shit they don't have much faith in him, either he's a moron or a liar willing to look like a moron. Worst-case scenario he's both.

I hate this part. Fuck Coil, truly.

Hate.

Let me tell you how much I've come to hate Coil since I began to read Worm.

There are one million, six hundred and eighty million words in the web serial Worm. If the word "hate" replaced every character within those words it would not equal one one-billionth of the hate I feel for Coil in this micro-instant.

Hate.

Hate.

So this is actually a genius bit of writing, but it's also ironclad proof that Coil has loose gravel in place of a brain. The chances of success are lowering because "the Undersiders" are increasingly unlikely to include Skitter as a member, because she's sickened, horrified, and outraged by what her boss is doing and absolutely will not do what he asks of her at this rate. I'm willing to bet Tattletale knows what's going on, provided that she managed to tear her eyes away from the horror show in order to check on her teammates, but Coil, resident criminal mastermind, apparently doesn't realize that the odds for his pet villain team are getting worse because he's making one of the strongest members of the team hate him more with every second of this exchange.

We know what's going on in Taylor's head before she can even say anything because of this exchange. That's really well done.

I hope Coil dies screaming.

I was going to post a line from Arc 5 or 6 that I'd noticed, about the offhand news of a girl missing presumed dead, but I couldn't find it when I was going back through. I knew about it well before starting my liveread, though. Dinah Alcott. The twelve-year-old girl Coil keeps in his basement, gives drugs, and calls "pet."

Maybe I could've liked Coil more if he was just a kind of ineffectual mastermind and lousy boss, or maybe I wouldn't have felt such an active revulsion towards him, I dunno. But this puts him on a different layer of evil than just some kinda shadowy puppet master or gang boss or whatever. This isn't cops and robbers, this is the same kind of foul play that Heartbreaker operates on, and everyone hates Heartbreaker.

Also not sure exactly what emotions Tattletale is dealing with here but I don't know if people can make the blood drain from their face on demand so she's probably not fronting? She's had me nervous ever since she started more openly cooperating with Coil, but here's reassurance she's got a standard that he doesn't.

Current Thoughts

I will clap and cheer when Coil gets what's coming to him.

[peijizerojournal]

issues and inconsistencies in "khaos reigns" [part 1, probably] :

i already have a post speed-reviewing/critiquing ‘khaos reigns’ and i touched on the sektor parable via a reblogged post, but grrahh, i still have tons of thoughts, questions and comments about the narrative and i need to excise them from my soul so here are some of them. apologies for any spelling mishaps or inconsistencies i may have missed. spoilers below, of course :

- the new era being — essentially — a multiverse, totally cancels out the idea of kronika being THE titan of TIME itself. her timeline was the ONLY one. i know that they tried to explain this away by saying that the fight between liu kang and shang tsung for the hourglass in mk11 was apparently so powerful that it broke the space-time continuum, but still! the way mk1 ended and how ‘khaos reigns’ continues the story basically takes away from the gravity of her position, and the weight of what it means to be the keeper of time. kronika painstakingly tinkered with the realms to achieve a golden balance, but now, since basically everyone and anyone can be a titan, liu kang's sacrifice seems moot. everyone just opens a portal to anywhere and everywhere and does whatever they want to his timeline. he may be reluctant to touch the hourglass out of fear of going insane or mucking things up, but the writers sure don’t mind i guess lol!

- according to titan havik, ‘time crystals’ come from geras (because he’s the only one to exist in all timelines), and they function in a similar way as jinsei (only jinsei is the 'essence' of the realms). so does that mean jinsei isn’t a thing anymore? or are the time crystals the ‘jinsei’ for the alternate timelines? what do they even look like? the needles in geras' back look like they are holding the same fluid that was injected into bi-han, so i'm confused by how they were extracting anything from geras at all...

i wouldn’t really care about this normally, but since they went to the trouble to bring back the kamidogu and insert a weak explanation from havik about the usage of these phenomena, then why not give us the proper exposition? i guess they didn’t bother because the kamidogu are essentially just infinity stones (‘the avengers’) or chaos emeralds (‘sonic the hedgehog’). hm, veryyy creative plot device…

- the scene with sub-zero and havik talking about the time crystals and kamidogu should have been longer. noob saibot's transformation was too rushed and havik’s motivations for corrupting him aren’t there. why didn’t we get sub-zero’s final stand fight scene either? it would have made sense to show that: giving havik a reason to actually keep sub-zero and turn him into a henchman (because of his formidable kombat skills and cunning to follow him into the portal, perhaps) and it also would have helped flesh out bi-han’s dimensionality, too (i.e. jumping into the portal to go after geras).

- geras and sektor should not have stopped noob from attacking liu kang at the end. bi-han needed to fight the fire god. it's such a long time coming. the pressure between the two of them has been building, bi-han’s frustrations have been surmounting and in that moment, he was ready to implode.

would he have lost the fight? yes of course, but that’s the point. bi-han needed to be humbled. maybe after liu kang defeated him in kombat, he might've cooled off a bit and been more accepting of help and willing to go to the temple of the elements instead of having to be sedated and taken there against his knowledge/will. and sektor being the one to break him out and tell him that liu kang 'abandoned' him and left him to rot -- while his last memory of being awake is his failed confrontation with liu kang -- does his redemption arc no favours. no wonder he went back to being 'bad.'

- i believe that sektor is not only bi-han’s enabler, but his full-blown sycophant. i don’t necessarily think she is 100% a manipulative mastermind, but if we ignore the bad storytelling going on, it’s plausible that she is a ticking time bomb of her own, and in her obsessive infatuation with bi-han, she is -- perhaps unknowingly -- sabotaging his opportunities to grow and confront his flaws and frustrations. and to be honest, they don't really seem 'romantically' involved to me, but rather have developed a strange codependency toward one another.

bi-han in mk1’s normal story mode clearly sought to be respected, maybe even revered, and acknowledged for his efforts, as well as exhibiting a keenness to take on more proactive role in leading earthrealm. to go from that to: “better to be feared than respected!” hmm… that doesn’t seem like the same man to me.

sektor’s constant smirking/lurking in the background of the cutscenes, however, makes me think that she’s been planting certain seeds in his head: encouraging him to embrace his negative traits (likely not even on purpose, just out of adulation), be the villain that everyone has already been painting him to be, and continue to isolate himself from everyone who might have ever stood up to his shenanigans or help him find a better path.

whether or not she actually has ulterior motives, it's clear to me that sektor prefers bi-han to be "bad," or unchanged, based on his presented mk1 persona. for her to be the first voice bi-han hears and the first person he sees when he wakes up after his mind is fixed... that's something poignant.

the man has been -- more or less -- 'lashing out' because of the departure of his brothers, and because for sometime now, he's been frustrated by his strained, untrusting relationship with liu kang. so, sektor is quite literally the only one he trusts and feels that he can trust.

but, this sort of 'all-in' attitude is, of course, toxic. when she says to liu kang that she stopped bi-han from attacking him because he 'would have gained nothing' from the challenge'.. uh, who is she to decide that? of course she wants bi-han to be restored: as in, made human again. but not redeemed. a 'redeemed' bi-han would be a different one than the one she has known, and a version of him that has been humbled (like if he fought liu kang at the end and neither her nor geras stopped him), or cannot be controlled (noob saibot) is probably the one she wants.

she gives off: ‘i’m the only one that understands you’ vibes, but if he remains as noob, or if he were to be redeemed and healed as a better sub-zero, she cannot continue her power fantasy with him. to be honest, i think that would've been an interesting direction to take her character in: where in her mind, she has built up this idea of the lin kuei and the grandmaster, but in bi-han's fall from grace or in realizing her ambitions have diverged from his, she sees her disillusionment and in her delirium, proceeds full-force with the cyber initiative. THAT would have been one hell of a tower ending!

(side note: i also -- like many other people -- was almost certain that she would have looked down on bi-han in her tower ending, the same way she did with cyrax and kuai liang, and thus turned to embracing machinery and going full-on insane with her aspirations for the lin kuei. unfortunately, though... the writers introduced it only to then promptly throw it away.)

there is definitely more than meets the eye with all of this that is worth further exploration and analysis, as there are plenty of examples of her warped fanaticism (think annie, from ‘misery’ by stephen king), but it’s best saved for another post.

- there are too many contradictions between mk1’s base campaign and this dlc, INCLUDING tower endings and intro dialogue. i don’t know what is ‘canon’ and what isn’t anymore because technically, all of it is, if it’s in the game, right? but, it makes no sense for liu kang’s new era. what’s the point of introducing all of these plot twists when they don’t apply to the current timeline? from an ‘easter egg’ standpoint, it is what it is. but from a a lore/storytelling standpoint, it’s confusing and utterly inept. it seems silly to rewrite the lore while constantly referring to the 'old story' at the same time.

- NRS really do hate sub-zero and bi-han… but why? it’s clear that even in mk1, bi-han is shown to be a rather complex, emotional character that is grossly misunderstood and certainly not irredeemably wicked. i have a hard time believing that the guy who wanted to help lead earthrealm, who wanted to use his father’s teachings to guide him, who wanted to lead the clan alongside kuai liang first and foremost…. is suddenly a supervillain? who enjoys lying to his supposed ‘second-in-command’ (cyrax)? this contradicts mk1’s story mode so much (among other things) and it’s WILD. yes, he is extremely flawed, but it's clear that there is more under the surface than is being said. since it was a noob saibot-focused dlc, we needed more info about his upbringing, maybe; more insight into the bond with his brothers and even his subordinates, into his role as grandmaster... but it's clear that NRS can't wholly decide what they want to do with him. they villainize him in 'khaos reigns' except for his story chapter, and even that is nullified by his tower ending. another storytelling fail.

- another conspiracy theory i have is that this dlc seems like it was supposed to be longer and larger, likely including noob’s full character arc, too, because so many things are missing. some of the leaked dialogue from last year was not in the dlc at all, and lots of the lines in the cinematics seem to not really fit… almost as if there were cutscenes that used to be there but were hastily edited out at the last minute or something. also some of the audio mixing and animations are a bit off, if you pay close attention.

- in his first moments as noob saibot, bi-han is literally more human than he’s ever been throughout mk1. strange, considering in the beginning of ‘khaos reigns,’ he is SO out of character and almost comically villainous, but yet… after having his mind broken and then freed from havik’s mental corruption, he is forthright with liu kang, shows distress towards his situation with his hubris on full display, and then he fights alongside the allies to protect the timeline without claiming ulterior motives.

despite the khaos magic still coursing through him, he does his due diligence. but then… all of this gets tossed away when sektor frees him in his tower ending. what was the point in the vulnerable moment where he showed visible concern for how his actions compromised the timeline? or when liu kang lets him know that his desires for a different future aren’t an issue, it’s the ‘methods for achieving them?’ (that scene needed to be longer too, tbh) in short: why introduce the concept of bi-han potentially being salvageable if at the end he’s just going to continue being bad, if not worse off than how he began? the whole dlc was like a flat circle in terms of progression; that's how little happened in it.

- the hand on noob’s hip was supposed to be explained. in the last kombat kast (and i think in that xbox article, too) they said its purpose would be revealed in the actual dlc but… that never happened. aside from the missing fight scene with sub-zero and havik, we didn’t even get a glimpse at his transformation, either. he was just suddenly there… with the hand on his hip and all of these new powers. it would have been nice to get a teeny bit of info as to how exactly khaos magic works for noob, like imagine a scene where havik explains to noob what he can do now, how the hand and the shadow work in tandem and how much more powerful he is compared to how he used to be? it would also have been a chance to explain the random telekinesis, too.

- smoke really, really, really needed to have a chapter in 'khaos reigns'. i have a feeling — as i mentioned earlier on — that the dlc was originally going to be a bigger expansion, but some characters/scenes/dialogue were cut along the way; likely to drip-feed the whole story back to us in a trilogy of dlcs instead (taking notes from BUNGIE i see… ahem ‘destiny 2: lightfall’).

but i digress: smoke having a chapter maybe just before noob’s would have been amazing. it would have been nice to see his visceral response to bi-han’s transformation, as he has claimed to have idolized bi-han in the past and was/is hoping for reconciliation between the brothers. i personally think the brotherly bond between the three of them is the most interesting part of the lin kuei story in mk1, and it sucks to see this angle being completely abandoned when the dlc focuses around bi-han.

we needed MORE BACKSTORY! more info about their parents, their upbringing, bi-han’s obvious long-standing conflicts with his life's purpose, the true nature of their father’s death (what actually happened?), etc. and the dynamic between the three of them with bi-han as noob would have also been really interesting. smoke was absolutely necessary as a the vessel for the more compassionate approach to bi-han’s downfall and ensuing redemption (instead of sektor, who is obviously evil) and bridging the gap between scorpion’s mercilessness and bi-han’s malevolence.

- it's not havik, but liu kang who was the real hypocrite here, and it breaks my heart. first of all, stopping bi-han from killing titan havik in order to ‘save innocent lives’ is such a weak, oxymoronic explanation from liu kang. let’s not forget that he wiped out two timelines in the base game: titan shang tsung's and quan chi's. a bunch of other titans died at the pyramid battle too. liu kang even says himself that without shang tsung to ‘hold the timeline together’ it would collapse! the actions of the final chapter of mk1 were already enough to kill BILLIONS of innocents, yet havik is somehow an exception. actually, leaving havik alive would have been worse, considering he didn’t want to destroy or merge the other realms, but have them tumble into anarchy and khaos instead. bi-han was 100% correct when he said that they were 'not safe until he dies.’

- another problem i have with liu kang is that says he cannot leave his timeline to go help get geras (which by the way… geras is his closest companion and confidant, another powerful being like him who has been at his side for EONS). that left me with a huge, glaring question: where is liu kang’s urgency?

it is so unlike him to be this 'laissez-faire' (but that’s a discussion for another post). he says that he cannot go with them because the timeline would be compromised without him, but that is a silly excuse because:

1) his timeline is tainted anyway, because 'damashi' already messed with it, and the fact that concurrent timelines exist negates this idea that his new era can ever be truly 'safe' again.

2) titan havik leaves his timeline all the time with his cronies… he’s been collecting every geras and kamidogu, so why can’t liu kang? havik said he'd be back to inflict khaos after taking geras, so it wasn't like he needed to wait in earthrealm and twiddle his thumbs. it was GERAS, for god's sake. he should have been right behind bi-han going through that portal, the way they built up the bond them in the main story.

3) liu kang literally DID leave his timeline in the base story mode… the first time, he went to look for titan allies to fight shang tsung, and the second time was when he went to the pyramid to defeat him. he is essentially repeating the former raiden’s mistakes with this sort of approach to protecting earthrealm.

on one hand, raiden was slightly too impulsive and tried to intervene a bit too frequently, causing a negative ripple effect to those surrounding him. i get that liu kang does not want to repeat his — or kronika’s — mistakes, but doing absolutely nothing until your hand is forced and trying to evade all conflict by letting [terrible] events play out is not the way to be doing things. defend your timeline, liu kang!!! get up and get moving!!! just as raiden 'jumping the gun' had its own consequences, so does remaining overly-passive and slow-to-react.

- i like the character of liu kang and i was initially excited at the idea of a timeline reboot with mk1. liu kang is known to be humble, kind, genuine, understanding, compassionate: all of those hero-like qualities that we know and love him for. but that being said, why claim to reset the timeline if everything is going to turn out mostly the same, if not worse?

from a development standpoint, i understand needing to have certain things remain static, no matter what game or era we’re in. for example: raiden must always have lightning, mileena/baraka must always be tarkatan, sub-zero and scorpion must always exist, etc. fair enough.

but having bi-han not even make it a whole game without becoming noob? having shang tsung, shao and quan chi continue their plotting? how come some characters got a pleasant rework (reptile, sindel) but others are thrown so far under the bus and are poorly-utilized/represented (sub-zero, smoke, havik).

constants are needed, of course, but variables are also important too. and there are not enough variables in mk1 for it to feel like a 'new era,' and cheap, low-risk 'changes' are not an effective way to reflect it. at this point, the game should have just been called ‘mk12’, full stop.

- cyrax deserved better. she starts off as what we expected of her, based on her new character bio, anyway. she is loyal, but inquisitive. ‘free-thinking.’ she has no problem pushing back on bi-han a little bit about his explanation for kuai liang and tomas’ departure, and she obviously doesn’t get along with sektor and doesn’t mind talking back to her, either. she is defiant, but noble, as presented. but then…

she spends the rest of story mode groveling to scorpion: following him around like a lost puppy and begging for his forgiveness and receiving the brunt of his anger and spite (which was completely unwarranted and undeserved.)

kuai trying to hold her accountable for something that had nothing to do with her is crazy and really out of character for him, and because of this, her story arc was thwarted by her constant seeking of his approval and validation. the same way sektor’s reliance on bi-han takes away her arrogance, genius and austerity, cyrax’s sudden flip from being honourable but discerning into being manipulated by scorpion is just so, SO unfortunate. both ladies deserved better than to simply be portrayed as the unsung loyalists to a pair of capricious, irascible men.

some insignificant [mostly nitpicky] honourable mentions :

- this was an observation made by gaming youtuber mike hollow who pointed out some telltale inconsistencies regarding believable power balancing: sektor’s camouflage, scorpion’s fire teleportation and rain’s ability to turn into water were all missing in this dlc. it’s like they forgot to include the characters’ defining abilities in the story at all. why weren’t they taking advantage of the cybersuits in the maze? using camouflage to hide from havik’s minions? where was scorpion’s kunai climbing rope? why did rain not turn into water to escape his crushing death? again, it's not that deep in the grand scheme of things, nor is it new to the franchise, but it's definitely something i noticed, as well.

- in that same vein: geras’ time freezing abilities could have stopped him from being kidnapped by havik’s minions. why didn’t he stop them? he casually stopped bi-han at the end from lunging at liu kang, and he had plenty of time to do it since sektor stalled the attack.

in sindel’s throne room, havik was going on a big, illustrious speech about how he was only here for him. isn’t geras on par with being a kind of divine being, considering he himself is a construct of time (i.e. made of the sands)?

perhaps his lack of reaction in that scene can be chalked up to just 'shock', but this is just another example of poor power balancing in mk1's story mode (and i say mk1 and not the other games because the current timeline has all kinds of titans and divine beings that are all fair game). another example of this would be: empress tanya being able to defeat noob, but noob easily defeats titan, kamidogu-powered havik. and -- if the khaos magic had something to do with it -- they should have shown that somewhere in the campaign.

- how come titan havik’s limbs suddenly stopped regrowing when noob fought him? is it because noob has khaos magic in him and thus, he can be defeated by his own powers, therefore stunting his ability to regenerate? they don’t actually explain this whatsoever, unless again: it is another misrepresentation of power scaling in the story, but it is what it is. (seriously though, we should have gotten a scene where havik explains to bi-han his new powers!)

- if bi-han and sektor knew that cyrax wouldn't go for the wedding attack (hence the pointless lie they told her about liu kang 'capitulating to outworld'), then why take her along in the first place? why even include her in their plans at all? this doesn't seem like the same cyrax that kuai liang was referring to in mk1's regular story mode when he said she would 'sooner abet' bi-han's corruption than follow him.

um... as soon as we meet cyrax, she is already weary of bi-han and it seems like she has been for a while, enough so for he and sektor to already suspect her lack of fealty. at that point, she shouldn't have even been given that suit.

(side note: AS SOON as they arrive at the wu shi academy, cyrax is already fighting against the lin kuei and going against bi-han's orders. when she comes down from the roof, she immediately eliminates two of her fellow lin kuei warriors before harumi is even captured. she was already over it even before learning about what really happened.

it doesn't make any sense and does not corroborate kuai liang's observations from the main campaign. i feel like once more, this is another example of something being changed in this dlc somewhere between the initial leaks last year and the trailer drop this past july. it seems like there might've been more planned for 'khaos reigns,' but they got rid of it, or they're saving it for the next dlc (which i'm almost positive is the case, at this time.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

there are a million more things that are running through my mind, and if it comes to it, i'll make a part 2 to this post. there is still a lot to be said about the dlc on a corporate/business level that may be worth touching on.

that being said: the game design, stages, animations, cutscenes, characters, etc. are all absolutely gorgeous! you can tell the ground-level developers really care about their work and that's amazing. c-suite and the 'narrative department' however...

in addition, i've still got some conspiracies regarding liu kang, kuai liang and also... the khaos magic! has anyone out there played batman: arkham asylum? does anyone remember the TITAN VENOM? yeah, i have a feeling that the writers are doing some borrowing from other IPs beyond the obvious comparisons to the avengers (because, of course). the rabbit hole gets deeper and deeper.

i will leave the bi-han analyses to the experts in the community. there is already a lot of discourse out there about what happened to him but all i'll say is this... he deserved his comeback, redemption and victory lap. but... he was bastardized. again. bi-han 1000% deserved his moment. JUSTICE FOR SUB-ZERO!

anyhow, if you made it this far, thank you for reading! xo

[trekkingthroughthestargate]

We're less than a month away from the Doctor Who 60th anniversary specials, and I can't help but think back on Sarah Jane Smith, inarguably the most important Companion in the history of Doctor Who and one of two Companions who was brought back for every single anniversary special until her untimely death. Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, the other Companion who was in every special until his death just 2 months prior to Elisabeth Sladen's, has had his legacy brilliantly upheld through his daughter Kate Lethbridge-Stewart. While the Brigadier himself has been absent from the past 2 anniversary specials, his daughter carries on his legacy and has appeared in every one that he missed.

But Sarah Jane, so beloved, so deeply missed, was not so honored in the 50th anniversary special. And that's partly because Lis' death was so sudden and unexpected nobody knew whether Sarah Jane should canonically be gone or not. But now, semi-canonically, the world of Doctor Who has also said farewell to Sarah Jane, and my most desperate hope is that, since she's canonically gone, the 60th anniversary specials will take a moment to recognize her or honor her in some way. We deserve to see the Doctor mourn her, the way we saw him mourn the Brigadier. We, as fans of Sarah Jane, deserve to see her honored in the show proper, and not just in the lockdown short that was made in her honor.

I desperately need Sarah Jane to get just one moment to be honored in the 60th anniversary specials, since she cannot grace them with her presence, whether that be through the appearance of her children, Luke and Sky, or through the appearance of her own companions, Maria, Rani, and Clyde. Because for so many young people, Sarah Jane Smith was their Doctor, even more so than the Doctor himself, and she deserves to be honored and remembered in Doctor Who's specials.

Until the main show actually honors her the way she deserves, I'm glad we got this:

There is no one single piece of media that makes me cry more than this right here, and I really hope that the 60th anniversary specials can manage to surpass this by honoring her in some way.

We deserved at least another 20 years with her, but at least in the world of Doctor Who we got Sarah Jane for almost ten years longer than we got Elisabeth.

[guinevereslancelot]

what was with cameron house md she spends 90% of the episode saying she wants their patient to die bc he's a genocidal dictator and her colleague husband says "babe it bothers me for ethical reasons that you want our patient to die :(" and she said "hm maybe you're right :/" but when it comes down to it the genocidal dictator lays a finger on her in an aggressive manner and chase instantly commits medical malpractice to murder the guy and then when he tells her she LEAVES HIM bc boo hoo he's a murderer now like GIRL he killed a man for you!!! he's wracked with catholic guilt!!! he's being crushed beneath the weight of his sins because he chose his devotion to you over his devotion to god!!! he literally could not get any sexier at this moment in time!!!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Culture Shock

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[psychomusic]

oc time again! + her town & culture (heavily inspired by pre-roman italic populations)

she is suri sauthon (later suri laran, after her marriage). her story is linked to my swtor imperial agent, but most of her life for like. the one year away where she meets him, is spent in a town in the mountains of mirial.

despite mirial being cold and desert, and many cities developing underground, her town flourishes thanks to a force nexus, venerated in the form of an ancient, sacred, alive crystal. the ecosystem of that mountain depended on what "the horned crystal" was capable of giving them, but mirialans couldn't live off of that alone, so they developed trade and some rudimental technology, even if oftentimes it was bought thanks to the highly profitable trade of a plant used to make medicines that slowed down aging and had overall healing properties.

note: everything that's generated by this nexus has these healing properties BUT they have to be processed, except for those who bathed in the waters of the cavity under the crystal - the "real" nexus, but not the worshipped one. the waters were sacred but they were not thought to be miraculous, unlike the crystal, who instead was thought of as the keystone of the ecosystem: without it, everything would fall apart (and that is partially true: the cavity was the "real" nexus but thanks to the crystal, also strong in the force, the properties were spread all over the mountains). those who bathed in the cavity's waters - so, all of the town, who had a sort of baptism there - could eat the plant, make whatever food with it, and not only that plant, but everything generated by the nexus, that, again, had similar properties. this allowed people to live up to normal life-spans without advanced medicines or, much, really. to those who didn't live there, though, after the processing, had incredible effects, slowing down aging - for those who took it regularly - and making people able to live up to half a century more than the average]

originally, there were four tribes of nomads that lived thanks to horned farm animals that decided to settle down into one bigger town and other smaller settlements, to live off of transhumance. this division of the tribes stayed into the political and social organization: every person belonged to one tribe specifically, and had slightly different rituals and culture. for examples, each tribe had their own priests and healers, with different techniques and traditions. the town, tho, was guided by a group of people in the high priesthood, a position you could reach only by having earned the trust of all tribes. those high priests had many roles: they guided the people into sacred processions common to all the tribes, they managed the trading with outsiders, they did the maintenance of the temple of the summit (the one that functioned as casket to the crystal) and created a special liquid to offer the crystal that helps it grow.

this particular temple was important because 1. it was very visible, from every angle of the town, and it became an important identity symbol; 2. it stored the venerated horned crystal; 3. it had the altar where sacrifices were made for the crystals. that altar had a hole connected to the cavity, that allowed the liquids to reach the underground; 4. it had various symbols: statues representing each tribe + the high priesthood, and typical mirialan tattoos carved into the wood of the trees that served as columns for the temple, symbolizing 8 values that who dared to enter HAD to have; 5. it was on the way to an important lake (called "mother lake" because the lake the town was built around to depended on the waters of that other lake) where they traveled to in important processions; 6. it was said that a the wizard who unified the tribes made it with its magic, making the plant grow to hold the temple's roof. this wizard was, actually, a force user, obv.

BACK TO HER THOUGH: she's daughter of one of the high priests, who was in charge of managing the trades with outsiders, and lives in a house on the mountains with her mother and him. her parents are from different tribes (that's one of the things that earned him trust from the 4 tribes): when a child is born from two different tribes, they don't pick one to allign to, but they're usually linked automatically to the one with more relatives in it (in her case, the father's tribe: she had many uncles and aunts on his side while her mom only had one sister).

later, though, she got quite tied to her mother's tribe due to a mysterious illness that only her mother's tribe healer was able to cure. she spent 4 years (from 10 to 14 years old) living with the healer and learned her secrets. to better study, she wrote them down. when she returned home, she studied to become a priestess with her father. at 22 (the average age: you can't become priest before your 20s), she was supposed to take a test and become a priestess, but the healer of her mother's tribe died and the tribe asked her to take her place. she couldn't technically do that, but both tribes estimated both her and her parents and she was allowed to become both. she then decided to try to become a high priestess, and became one at 25 (a quite young age). being part of the council, she tried to convince the various tribe healers to unite their knowledges and write them down, and eventually made it. healers still remained tribe based but they now had an "upper, inter-tribe level" similar to high priesthood.

years later, the sacred horned crystal is stolen from the temple by some Hutt mercenaries looking for a profit. given the trust she has earned from all the tribes and the fact that her father is the high priest that deals with outsiders (and she's been hearing stories and advice about it since she was little), she is the one tasked with getting it back. without the growing crystal, the keystone to their ecosystem, the village would have lasted only a few years. in hrr quest, she meets imperial intelligence agent tar'x laran and, as they "solve the mystery" and fight to have it back, they get closer. they'll get married and have a daughter, Vegoia (who's the only one who actually will get to the plot of my story. this was all background)

[nachosncheezies]

People like Bill Jr. got all kinds of things wrong about Scully but probably none moreso than thinking it was tragic that Mulder was dragging her along on some descent into madness, when actually the real tragedy was how few of the people she loved ever realized it wasn't a descent.

(It couldn't be bc 1. it's not madness and 2. she was already there.)

[fiapple]

i'm getting towards the end of the skypeia arc, & i'd like to say just how much i adore the way the female strawhats have been treated.

just... every aspect of how the way their characters have been previously contextualized influences the story-line is treated with a masterful amount of consideration. we're given so many layers to both of them that enrich not only their characters specifically, but the arc, and the one piece world as a whole. without nami & robin having their specific skills, and their specific values, without those being built upon, the story would have come to a halt.

you could not have skypeia without nami & robin being who they are as individuals. not just because they never would've gotten there without nami, but also because the way these women think is itself foundational to the machinations of the arc as a whole.

to be totally upfront, if you think any other strawhats were more central to the skypeia arc than nami & robin were you are full-on fucking lying to yourself.

[jaggedcliffs]

I'm hoping Shui Long Yin gives me some prime Luo Yunxi content, since after watching Till the End of the Moon, none of the other cdramas have scratched that itch

I've already expressed my feelings about Love is Sweet. I'm still surprised I made to halfway through, but that was the power of Jiang Jun

I only got about 9 episodes into Follow Your Heart before giving up because the drug smuggling story wasn't interesting enough, and renewing my IQIYI subscription wasn't worth watching wuxia cop Jiang Xinbai do wuxia cop things.

Now Ashes of Love finally gives me a Luo Yunxi character I enjoy with some excellent whumpy content, but this rec list wasn't kidding about the old-fashion love story between the leads. Fuckboy Xu Feng rejects the powerful women around him for a naïve woman who's easy to control, and somehow his bullying, negging, threats, and manipulations succeed in making her fall in love with him 🤮 Tragically, Jin Mi also abandons her goals and delightful personality midway through

I'm also not entirely sure why I'm supposed to care about Xu Feng when Run Yu is experiencing several types of trauma, remembering childhood trauma, and then realizing his own powerlessness to obtain justice as he is trapped in a corrupt, cruel, and unjust system (and must therefore gain for power).

[thatonecrookedsmile]

I made these sketches the week SOTM launched, and I didn't think about posting them at the time. I recently looked at them again and thought "hmm, why not". In my own way, I decided to add a *little* color to make it a little more nice,and I edited the image *just* a little,and boom, here it is. My Riley Wells design. There's not much to say about the process of creating her design. I only used the portrait you find in the game as a reference, and I made a design of her at the time she joined JDS and then Gent. There's not much to say,really.

These were sketches made after I made an initial sketch of her to put the idea of her design on paper, and were made to help solidify and test out her design better. I haven't drawn her since.

So, yeah. They aren't much, and I don't have much to say about them. But I wanted to eventually show my design that I made of her. Plus, those sketches turned out quite nice,so there's that.

Other than a small idea that I don't know when I'll do, I don't have anything in mind that could result in drawing Riley again in the future. But hey, in case one day I end up wanting to draw her again, at least I have a design prepared for the occasion.

As a bonus, here is the first sketch I made of her. No editing or colors.

[libraryleopard]

Young adult contemporary coming-of-age story (releases 4/16, I read an early copy from Netgalley)

Follows two first-year students at Wellesley College who run dueling anonymous advice columns and befriend each other in real life as they bonded over both being aroace, unaware of the other's internet identity

Platonic love story

Explores themes like aroace identity, finding community, being the queer child of immigrants, and trying to find your place in the world as a young adult looking towards the future

Love letter to platonic/familial love and finding community

Aromantic asexual Chinese American protagonist; aromantic asexual gender-questioning/nonbinary (she/they) protagonist; lots of QPOC side characters

[microwaving-tesilid-argente]

never getting over how adorable young tesilid is.

his many many expressions in the toy mansion dungeon when he's surprised, miffed, or shy.

squishest little guy ever. i want to pinch his cheeks and ruffle his hair and give him more food.

when he sees his new Defend Partner skill lets him absorb ailette's wounds and he was so happy and excited about it 😭 terrible skill as a standalone, but he's so happy he could potentially be helpful to his new friend.

like this is literally the most openly happy expression we had seen on him at this point of time. he's already imprinting on her. to think that he was radiating "one wrong answer and i'm going to deck you" vibes at the start of this arc. i know they did go through a life-and-death experience together and that does create an unbreakable bond or whatnot, but he warmed up to her so quickly it's so cute.

then webnovel chapter 53 when the sacred sheep start going on missions and hestio & ephael are like "? oh you still care about that pink-haired girl? we're probably never meeting her again though" but tesilid was like no we Will meet again, with such certainty that the other two don't even have anything to say in reply. and he internally was like "we literally have a shared skill so we Will meet again!"

like. idk what their in-universe understanding of fate is, and whether having a shared skill does actually mean your fates are intertwined. but did it never cross his mind that maybe they'll have shared skills but never meet again. like two ships passing in the night, the world is so big. but he isn't anxious or impatient or worried that he won't be able to find her, he'e so certain that they'll meet again. he's like No We're Soulmates like woah! okay tesilid. like idk if he considered her a romantic interest at this point (esp since the sacred sheep can't marry, and i don't think he would have been willing to break the law) but he's already imprinted on her so hard

and then whenever he feels sad she comes to mind like oh my god, tesilid,

[gonguji]

it took me 200 years but I finally understand why there are no new Electro Visions given out...

[muninnhuginn]

having a growing appreciation of character dynamics that involve pedestals breaking. where a character thinks another character their god, only to realise that they're human after all.

sometimes that leads to heartbreak, betrayal. but other times, they grow from it and build a stronger relationship as a result. a more mutual one.