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dreaming-of-assclass · 4 years ago

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AssClass OC

Mai’s Relationships: Part 1

I’m procrastinating on homework and decided to work on this random ass post about my OC 😂

Her profile is linked here UwU

Warning: this is extremely long and detailed

Tomohito Sugino

Address each other as: “Tomohito” or “Domo” and “Mai”

(The Domo nickname is inspired by one of Fumiko’s ideas UwU)

Besties. Nothing can ever change that. He was the first friend she made when she transferred to Kunugigaoka in 2nd year, and they’ve stuck together since then.

Although their very first meeting was a little unconventional...Sugino almost accidentally hit her with a baseball and she almost threw hands hehe. But they got along instantly after that.

They bonded with similar outgoing, positive personalities and a shared fondness for sports. They hang out all the time and have become so comfortable with each other, they can just randomly show up to each other’s house. Sugino’s family basically adopted Mai, and her family loves him. It’s common to see these two hanging out at a corner store, tossing baseballs at each other to catch, sending memes in class, etc.

Mai is very defensive of him, and will absolutely speak up about his baseball skill, kind nature, leadership, etc. She even stays by his side during the baseball arc to support him. Nakamura calls them platonic soulmates, and both of them honestly agree.

They bicker sometimes since they both can be fiery, but it’s out of fun 95% of the time. The rare occasions they seriously fight are because of Sugino’s overprotective nature/patronizing, and Mai’s clinginess and tendency to get jealous. But regardless of any differences, they will always have each other’s backs. Chaotic besties forever.

Yukiko Kanzaki

Address each other as: “Yukiko” and “Mai”

They did not get off to a good start...it was rather rocky. They just didn’t have good impressions of each other, and neither cared to truly get to know the other. Kanzaki thought Mai was hyper, brash, and difficult. Mai thought Kanzaki was stuck-up and vain because of her idol status. The girls avoided each other, and Mai was less than ecstatic to hear about Sugino’s crush.

Finally they’re forced to spend time together during the Kyoto trip, when Group 4 forms. They begin to get along more and find a couple shared interests, the ice slowly breaking. Then the kidnapping happens, and Mai stays with the boys and Okuda to find them. Mai is given a job to discreetly locate the girls inside the warehouse and basically figure out it’s layout. She sneaks in and sees the girls, and unintentionally hears Kanzaki’s secret about her 2nd year gaming phase, and is shocked. But now she feels more understanding for her. Mai and the guys and Okuda save the girls, and she especially approaches Kanzaki, making sure she’s okay. Kanzaki opens up to the whole group about liking video games and such.

Later that night at the hotel, Mai admits to Kanzaki that she overheard her family story and rebellious phase without meaning to. Kanzaki says it’s okay, and thanks her for saving them, and for understanding. They both admit they had misconceptions about each other, but see that they’re not true.

The girls have an extremely close friendship after that, sharing interests in video games, e-girl fashion, etc. Mai’s competitive nature dies every time she plays against Kanzaki and gets completely owned and teased. They hang out a lot, and Kanzaki comes to basically live at Mai’s home, with how often she’s there. They’re the type of friends to sneak out of an important meeting to play games and talk together. They both become very protective of each other, and grow to think of each other as family.

They definitely balance each other out in terms of personalities and attitudes. Kanzaki is more calm and rational compared to Mai’s bold and outspoken self. Mai’s open-book nature contrasting against Kanzaki’s aloof image. Even if these differences can lead to some clashes, they both appreciate it a lot, and value each other’s views.

Also they definitely try to help each other with their best/worst subjects. Kanzaki trying to help Mai with Japanese work is the funniest thing to see because eventually they just mutually give up and move onto video games.

Hinata Okano

Address each other as: “Hinata” and “Mai”

These two are like two halves. Plain and simple. They hit it off super well on the first day of meeting each other, which was in 3-E. Well, it’s more like Mai wouldn’t stop bothering her or starting up conversation lmao. But they had instant chemistry, especially when around mutual close friends like Kayano and Maehara.

As soon as she realized they had the same birthday, Mai happily declared them to be sisters, and nothing would ever change that. Okano rolled her eyes, but secretly loved it. Okano uses that against her, saying that “Since she’s the older sister, do as she says.” But Mai always retorts with “But I’m taller.”

They’re extremely close, and bond over so many things. Being sporty, liking skate-boarding, teasing Maehara, etc. They’re definitely each other’s go-to person for venting and confiding in, since they somehow are almost always on the same wavelength.

They can get into bad arguments though, given their similar temperaments. But it’s over in 2.5 seconds, and after screaming at each other, they’re laughing at memes together.

They love challenging each other in PE and assassination-related things since they have pretty similar styles. They love when they get partnered together, although it’s not as common as they’d like. Overall just an adorably vicious combo of short-tempered cuties.

Justice Kimura

Address each other as: “Kimura” and “Mai”

Oh boy. Whenever these two are around each other, they just become a wild gremlin duo. They equally enable each other when it comes to being chaotic. They’re just really good friends who can be playful with each other.

They became friends and got to know each other mainly thanks to PE and mutual friends like the class athletes. Before they knew it, they started to just hang out without others, they vibed so well.

Kimura lives to make Mai burst out laughing with his random edgy jokes and humor. There’s just always a lot of laughter whenever these two are together.

That said, Mai is not immune to Kimura’s worst antics, like the parkour incident. For the first time, she gets so upset at him but after yelling her head off like he expects, she just crumples to the floor and cries. She really needed that good grade to show her mom, and because Gakushuu had spent so much time tutoring her...

Kimura feels like shit and apologizes, and they don’t talk for a couple days. Mai definitely forgives him and moves past it though. Sometime during watching the kids at the school, she hugs him and apologizes for going off on him. Kimura says it’s okay since he was being a selfish idiot in the first place. Their friendship goes back to normal UwU.

Mai loves to tease Kimura for A LOT of reasons, but his name is never one of them. She calls him “Shorty,” “Dumpling,” and always pinches his chubby cheeks, to his annoyance. She definitely roasts him whenever he pulls some harmless stupid stunt that results in disaster. But on a serious note, she’s his biggest hype-man and always cheers him on in PE and in schoolwork. If anyone makes fun of his name, she absolutely will deck them.

Karma Akabane

Address each other as: “Karma” and “May-chan”

Almost everyone was nervous on his first day, and how these would inevitably meet. The class was certain that Karma would test Mai’s already-thin patience, and they wouldn’t get along.

But to their surprise...these two did get along. Really well, actually.

Mai, a natural moodmaker and very open-minded girl, appreciated Karma’s quirks and the odd mystery surrounding everything he did. She thought he made an already weird-situation even wackier and more interesting. She also couldn’t help but have respect for how successful he was at his first try, although it was buried under her envy.

Karma in turn also appreciated her, and how she was so easy to read. Mai is literally an open book, which Karma gravitates towards. In the first ten minutes of meeting her, he realized she was totally fun to tease because of how irritated and snappy she’d get. Hence, their friendship formed and Karma teases her every single day. He also calls her “May-chan” in a very exaggerated American accent since her name is commonly mispronounced like that, and it’s the quickest way to annoy her.

Overall, these two are really good friends, but definitely in a very sibling-like manner. They make fun of each other a lot, but would murder anyone else (outside of 3-E) who dares to. Even though they’re around the same age, it sometimes feels as though Mai is his younger sister. She loves to drag him around by the arm sleeve or wrist, for no other reason to drive him crazy. Also, they both are strawberry snack enthusiasts, which they bond over. Occasionally, Mai will assist him in his pranks, just to try and make sure she doesn’t become the target of one. Nope, she still is. She’s either entertained by or tired of his shit.

Also...these two clash a bit in Civil War, because Karma’s vagueness really frustrates her. In general, Mai tries to keep an open perspective of the issues surrounding Group 4 leading up to Civil War, so she’s not completely pissed at him. But she does call him out and speak to him upfront about what problems he’s causing.

Don’t worry, their relationship definitely improves afterwards, once everyone receives some closure. Their teasing sibling-like dynamic continues to stay throughout high school and in the future.

#assclass #assassination classsroom #ansatsu kyoushitsu #post #assassination classroom oc #assclass oc #mai kamiya #tomohito sugino #yukiko kanzaki #hinata okano #justice kimura #karma akabane

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fgffbfghtr · 3 years ago

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disneydreamlights · 4 years ago

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Across the Stars: Chapter 5

AO3 | FFN

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9]

Summary: Tensions between the Separatists and the Republic are climbing as the Senate debates whether there is need for an army. Anakin Skywalker, Senator of Tatooine, has recently returned to Coruscant to speak against its formation, resulting in an assassination attempt that forces him to reunite with long time friends Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi and the newly knighted Padme Naberrie for his own protection. [Anidala]

(Or, an Attack of the Clones Roleswap AU)

Having left Mos Espa and Beru behind, Anakin had taken Padmé to the small moisture farm that the Lars family stayed at. It was a small underground building in the middle of the desert, surrounded by multiple machines. Anakin was certainly right about one thing. Nobody would be looking for them here. "I know it's not much, but I figured it'd be as good a place to hide out as any."

"Don't worry, Ani, it doesn't have to be much. It's your home." She knew that much. She'd only briefly looked around, but there were all sorts of holos of Anakin, Shmi, and their step family on the walls.

"I don't know if I'd say that." He rubbed the back of his head. "I don't have a problem with my step family, but it doesn't really feel like home." Padmé waited for him to elaborate. He didn't.

"What's stopping it?" Padmé asked after a moment more of silence. "Everywhere you look, there are tiny hints of you everywhere."

"We've only lived with them a couple of years, even if we've known Cliegg and Owen for a lot longer," Anakin answered, though it was clear it was at least a bit of a deflection from what he really wanted to say. "It makes it hard to adjust at times."

"Where did you stay then?" Padmé asked.

"On Coruscant. Sometimes with my mom, sometimes with whatever Senator was supposed to be watching over and teaching me." Anakin gave a weak laugh. "I'm amazed Bail still tolerates me. We didn't have the best of starts."

"You didn't? What happened?"

"I'm not telling you anything about that unless you tell me about Yoda's robes." It was clear Anakin was teasing, but Padmé pouted.

"Senator Skywalker–"

"I only deal in even exchanges, Knight Naberrie." Anakin smiled. But she still wasn't ready to embarrass herself in front of Anakin quite like that yet. "Thought so. What do I have to do to get that story out of you?"

"You can't." Padmé crossed her arms smugly. "No story is worth trading that knowledge for."

"Can't blame a guy for trying?"

Padmé laughed. "I absolutely can, Senator." She watched as Anakin stood up, walking over to a small fridge in the corner. "Looking for something?"

"I figure we should have something to drink while we're catching up, officially this time." Anakin brought over two cups of some kind of blue liquid. "Blue milk, it's popular on Tatooine since water can be hard to come by."

Padmé smiled, taking the glass. "Thank you." She took a sip, enjoying the refreshing, light, sweet flavor of the milk. Different than she was used to, but far from bad. "I'd imagine that's what the water farms are for?"

Anakin nodded. "They produce water for the people who can't afford it. We're looking to set up moisture farms much more widespread, as part of an effort to clean up Tatooine. It won't be easy, but certainly worthwhile."

She nodded. "It sounds like you've got a lot of plans."

"Somebody has to make life better around this dust bowl. Freeing the slaves and removing Hutt control was just the first step of many, and hopefully if a war does start, it won't stop us from continuing our efforts to improve the planet." He pulled up a chair next to her, facing her rather than the table. "But that's not the only thing I have plans for?"

"Oh?" Padmé asked, more than a little curious at where the Senator was going with this.

Anakin smiled. "I've been making plans for years for exactly what I want for my life after I'm done as Senator. Ever since I was a kid if I'm honest." His hand found hers, and Padmé closed hers around it in a squeeze, hoping he'd take it as an invitation to continue. "I want to do what I can to help clean the planet, but then once Tatooine is fixed, I want to retire with the people I love most, so I can always be with them."

Padmé found herself smiling. "A noble goal, Ani." His nickname fell from her tongue easily. "Who are these people you want to retire with?"

"My mom, Cliegg, Owen, Beru, Obi-Wan if he can be persuaded to ever leave the Jedi." He named her master so casually, it shocked her. She hadn't realized they were that close. "There's one more person who's more important than all of them though, who I'd give anything for if she chose to join me." His hand danced along her arm, taunting her with the answer that a part of her wanted more than anything and a part of her did not want to hear.

Padmé watched waiting for him to elaborate, to tell her it was somebody from Tatooine, Coruscant, anybody really besides his true answer. When he didn't continue, she asked. "Who?"

Rather than answer, Anakin leaned in, hesitant and unsure, and for a moment, Padmé found that same, uncomfortable tension building in her heart, urging her forward. She leaned in on instinct, following his lead as her eyes closed and their lips met. Her heart beat rapidly, and she felt nothing short of elated at the kiss. It was chaste, sweet, and so very Anakin that she couldn't help but be lost in the sensation for a moment.

But the world kept turning, and it wasn't long before her sense returned and she turned away, unable to look at Anakin. "I shouldn't have done that." She was a Jedi. Returning his kiss, his affections, it was doing nothing more than leading him on. Anakin deserved better than that.

"Sorry." She looked up to see the torn, yet sad look on Anakin's face. There were no signs of regret, but at the fact that he'd been kissed and then rejected, he did look pretty embarrassed. "I'll uh...take you to your room, so you can settle in. Assuming you don't have to look after me the entire time."

"I-I don't, no." She couldn't believe herself. Except she absolutely could. This was Anakin she was talking about. He was so easy to let herself go with, to love.

He led the way out of the room and down to another one, opening the door. "Maybe we can find something to do tomorrow?"

"Yeah. We'll figure it out." Whereas conversation both on the trip and earlier had gone so easily between them, now it was hesitant and uncomfortable. Padmé definitely wasn't happy with herself for causing that. "Good night, Anakin."

"I'll see you tomorrow." He closed the door, leaving Padmé to settle in as she buried her face in the pillow.

That night, she dreamed of Anakin, and the kiss they shared.

-x-

"You want to hear about the inner workings of the Senate?" Anakin asked, looking at her surprised as he was working on the mechanisms inside the vaporator. Aside from the slight awkwardness, both of them were attempting to forget about the kiss they'd shared upon arrival at the moisture farm, or at least Padmé was, and so she was scrambling to find any topic of conversation she could for them to discuss. "Why?"

"I suppose I'm just curious. I've always wanted to know, and while the Chancellor teaches me some things, having different perspectives is always good." She knew the Chancellor had some ideals that she didn't fully agree with, and she wanted to see if Anakin's were perhaps ones she agreed with more, or if a similar partial agreement would come between them as well.

Anakin smiled, glad to talk about his job for a change. "Well, as Senator of Tatooine, I have to make sure that the Senate attempts to listen to what would be best for us here." His smile changed into a smirk quickly. "Sometimes it's easy, sometimes I have to use...aggressive negotiations to get what I want."

"Anakin!"

"None of the Senators have been seriously injured...I have been arrested twice though over it." Padmé stared at him for a moment, trying to take in that last bit.

"You what?"

"I'm joking, I promise." Anakin smiled. "Well...about the arrested part."

"Has anybody told you you make a terrible senator." Padmé couldn't help but laugh. Even the idea of him as a senator seemed a little strange. "I know you care about Tatooine, but…"

"But it's hard to imagine a senator from somebody as rash as me, right?" There was a twinkle of amusement in the senator's eyes, almost as though he was pleased that she was poking fun at him. "Truth be told, if I was from anywhere other than Tatooine, somebody probably would have voted me out, or at least insisted that my mom take back over. But the people here love that about me, no matter what, I'll get results."

"That's not how it's supposed to work." Or at least she was pretty sure that was not how any government was supposed to work.

"It doesn't matter if it's not how it's supposed to work, what matters is that Tatooine's a better place because of it. I'm sure the Republic is too." He smiled. "I'm sure you've heard all about it from the Chancellor. He wanted to take me under his wing and teach me all about politics. I'm pretty sure now he's glad he didn't so he doesn't have to be responsible for me."

Padmé frowned slightly, actually, the Chancellor hadn't mentioned that. Then again, why would he? Palpatine knew that Padmé and Anakin were friends. Talking bad about one of her closest friends outside of the Jedi because he was causing a bit of chaos in the senate wasn't likely. "He hasn't, but probably out of respect, he knows I care about you. He's the one who told me about your request for Jedi help."

"Guess I owe the old man some thanks." Anakin smiled. "Even if he and I don't always get along."

"Of course."

They fell into an easy silence, enjoying the other's company as Anakin continued his work. She found her eyes occasionally straying towards him, finding it difficult to look away despite knowing she should.

"Can you tell me about your missions?" It was both a command, and a request, one that took Padmé a moment to process.

"Huh?"

"Not all your missions are spent protecting cranky senators who want to do their job, right?" Anakin smiled, indicating he was mostly joking. "I'm not saying you have to tell me the specifics, just give me an idea of what they're like."

Padmé couldn't help but smile at that. "You're right about that, Ani. A lot of times we'll be sent to various planets just to do what we can to keep the peace. Obi-Wan and I are sent out most of the time when they want to keep things peaceful. We have a reputation for finding trouble at the temple, but both of us are good at helping others find peace without having to pull out a weapon."

"You mean you don't just whip out your lightsabers whenever you want something?"

"Of course not, we're peacekeepers, lightsabers aren't f–" She watched him smirk only to come to the realization that he was teasing. "You're making fun of me, aren't you?"

"Me? Never my lady. If you were to ever find out I was teasing you, I'd end up much better acquainted with the sword end of a lightsaber than I'd ever asked." It was hard to take him seriously as it became clear he was trying to keep himself from laughing at her reaction.

"You are, aren't you?" But she found herself grinning too, easily brought up by his joking tone and attitude.

Anakin smirked and didn't respond, and she threw her lightsaber hilt at him, watching as he caught it easily. "I was right, you tried to kill me."

"It wasn't even on, Anakin. A lightsaber isn't dangerous if you don't have the blade out. It's just a piece of metal." And a Kyber Crystal, but the existence of the crystal inside the lightsaber was a secret that if Anakin didn't know, she didn't want him to. The idea of him in the Senate with a lightsaber was definitely not one she wanted to see become a reality.

"So you say, maybe I could've gotten killed." Despite his joke, the saber did seem to have captured his attention as he looked it over and pressed the button, watching as the beam part of the saber appeared from the hilt. "I can't compliment the execution with knowledge, but I can say it's perfect, just like everything you do."

Padmé wasn't quite sure how to respond when he handed the sword back to her.

-x-

"Obi-Wan's a gifted negotiator, he could talk down anybody into doing what he says if he was asked." Despite the awkward pause in the conversation they had found earlier with Anakin's flirts, they'd quickly resumed the easy banter from earlier in the day for Padmé to tell Anakin about her missions like he'd asked. Which was proving a good idea as things started to calm down for the night.

"And he passed those methods onto you?" Anakin asked. Padmé nodded. "I'm guessing that's helped out with more than a few missions?"

"It's probably a huge part of why the galaxy isn't involved in all out war." Maybe she was being a little praise heavy for her master, but Obi-Wan was her brother, the one who taught her everything she knew, her idol. "He and I have been offworld so often trying to negotiate with the Separatists ever since I got knighted."

Anakin frowned as soon as she said that. "You don't think something like having you guys out of the way could contribute to starting the war sooner?"

Padmé paused. It...was a possibility, even if it wasn't one she'd want to acknowledge, but no. That couldn't be right. The Chancellor chose her and Obi-Wan because they already had a relationship with Anakin. "I don't think so. The Senate should still be in negotiations on their own right now, and we don't have an army. The other Jedi should be enough to keep everything under control. Obi-Wan and I might be the best, but we're not the only ones."

"Right, of course." Anakin sighed, but she wasn't sure if he was reassured.

"Ani…"

"I know, everything will be fine. I should have more faith in Mon and Bail and my mom. It's just...hard not being there." He shook his head, resolving himself. "I'll try not to think about it." Padmé looked at him, doubtful. "Care to be my distraction for now?" She must have looked confused, because he elaborated moments later. "Teach me how to use a Lightsaber."

"Anakin, they're sacred weapons to the Jedi, not toys." She shook her head. Sure, when they were all Younglings and Padawans doing exercises there would be competitions for fun, but those were a part of training. It didn't make her weapon a tool for a game.

Anakin frowned. "I'm not treating it like one. I'm not asking you to give me your lightsaber, I'm asking to know how to use the basic forms. They can be applied to other weapons with a similar structure. It wouldn't hurt for me to know."

He had a point, and it was likely to keep his mind off of the goings of the Senate if he was exhausted from learning the different forms. "We'll start with Form I." Anakin's eyes widened, as though he hadn't expected his request to work, but didn't say anything. Padmé looked around for a moment before tossing Anakin a walking stick, which he caught easily. It'd be long enough. "The first form is simple, and almost all others are based on it. If you can't learn this, you won't be able to learn the others."

"And you use it?" Anakin asked.

"On occasion. I favor Forms III and IV." She smiled. "If I do keep teaching you, you won't learn those for a while. And definitely not IV while we're in here." Ataru required too much movement, and the idea of Anakin learning something like that in such a small area sounded like a terrible idea.

Anakin laughed. "I get the idea, too advanced. So, Master Naberrie, show me the basics." And she did, running through the poses and positions, watching Anakin try to emulate them himself and move fluidly beneath each position.

If she was honest, he wasn't bad. Considering it was his first time learning any of the forms, he was picking up on it with surprising ease. She made note of any mistakes before stepping up to him. "Your third pose has your 'lightsaber' pointed too low." She had him re-enter the pose and stood behind him, before she got to work at adjusting the pose. When she touched him the first time, Anakin stiffened at the contact, and though she went to pull his shoulders back, she couldn't find it in her to move. The world was still, and for a moment it felt like nothing mattered besides the brief point where they touched. The staff she'd found dropped from his hands, and the clatter it made as it hit the floor pulled her out of the moment, and away from whatever Anakin had been planning to do. She backed away, unable to face him after their moment.

"Padmé, I can't..." He seemed frustrated with his wording. "I can't keep dancing around what I feel like this." At that, she looked up, almost startled. "We have a connection, and I know you feel it too. Whenever I see you it's...it's difficult to even breathe. I can't stop thinking about you, or the kiss we've shared... You're the only person I have ever loved in this way."

"Ani...Anakin." She amended herself from the nickname to his full name. "I can't...you're a Senator, and I'm a Jedi…"

"That doesn't matter." Anakin looked at her. "I don't care that you're a Jedi or anything else. I don't care what we have to do, if I have to spend the rest of my life loving you in shadows, I would do it. I know you feel the same way…"

"Anakin, what I feel in this case doesn't matter. I have duties. So do you." She watched him for a moment, and the burst of courage he'd seemingly had earlier died down, and her heart hurt. She wanted him as badly as he wanted her, and both of them knew it. "If we admitted our feelings, fell in love...We'd be living a lie, and it would destroy us both."

"...I know." He finally relented, looking away and giving up in a way he hadn't earlier. "I know that more than anybody, but Padmé-."

"I'm sorry Anakin." Her hand grabbed his, and he winced, though didn't make a move to pull his away. "Maybe in another life, we'd have a chance to be together, but as it stands, we can't. Not in this one."

He remained silent, and so did she. "I'm going to clear my head." Anakin stood up, leaving Padmé there to watch after him, her heart aching just as much as his was.

She buried her face in her hands. Why did Anakin have to make all of this so difficult.

-x-

She hadn't seen Anakin for the rest of the night, and had found him gone for most of the morning. Fearing the worst, she had been about to sound some alarms and call in the other Jedi when she watched the senator appear at the entrance to the small house. "Anakin?"

Had this been before yesterday, she would've run to hug him. Right now, she knew that would just make things worse for him. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." His voice was tired, it was clear he hadn't slept. "I'm…" He rubbed his hand through his hair, unsure of himself. "I'm sorry for running off last night, I just needed some time. Not everyday your crush for ten years turns you down."

She understood all too well, maybe not the ten year long crush part, but the idea that after what had happened, he needed some space. "It's alright, you don't have to apologize. Just please don't do it again, I thought that all those assassination attempts might have finally succeeded."

Anakin nodded. "They won't, I'm not that easy to get rid of." A fact that she was thankful for. He sat down on the couch for a moment, looking at her as though trying to figure out what he was trying to say. "I think we need to get off of Tatooine."

Padmé looked at Anakin in confusion. "What?"

"We can't stay trapped on this world alone, doing nothing." Anakin explained. "You're…" He sighed. "Look, we both agreed we're not falling in love, right? Well staying here on a small farm where we're the only company the other has besides a couple of droids and all we're doing is finding ways to kill time together isn't going to help. I know it's for my protection, but we can't keep staying."

"We're not going back to Coruscant Anakin. You'll be in danger."

"It doesn't have to be Coruscant. Just...not here."

As much as she hated to admit it, Anakin was right. It couldn't be easy for him, staying trapped on the planet with just her while he was dealing with her rejection. She could understand his desire to get away as well. "I can call for another Jedi to take my place."

"No!" Anakin protested almost immediately too fast. "No, sorry, I just…"

It was frustrating to say the least for both of them. She knew there was nobody Anakin would trust more with the job aside from Obi-Wan (truthfully she wasn't sure she trusted anybody else with Anakin's safety besides herself and him either) yet so long as they stayed like this, it wouldn't be easy for either of them to continue to dodge and ignore any feelings they'd managed to catch.

"I'll…" Padmé frowned. There had to be something she could come up with. Some way to manage this and keep Anakin on the world without… "Get some rest. I'll come up with something."

Anakin nodded, and went towards his room. "At least consider the idea."

Truthfully, there wasn't a lot else she could do.

-x-

The sound of a door opening pulled Padmé out of her meditation, and she turned to see Anakin. "Thinking on ideas looks like sleeping?"

"Meditating Anakin." Padmé smiled. Anakin tilted his head, as though asking for elaboration. "It's something all Jedi do to help them feel more balanced in the Force, more connected. Obi-Wan and I tried to teach it to you, remember?"

"Nope." Anakin sat down next to her. "I remember how to use the Force, how to make shields to keep any Sith from detecting me, but meditation? Don't seem to recall that one at all."

Padmé rolled her eyes. Of course he wouldn't. Trying to get Anakin to sit down for ten seconds to meditate was a harder ordeal than anything else they'd had to try. She couldn't be surprised that he didn't remember when he'd probably purposefully tried to forget. "It's meant to help me figure out what's the best way to go about things."

"What did it help you figure out, Master Jedi?" Anakin smiled, and Padmé couldn't help but be relieved that they'd found a return to the easy conversation from before.

Padmé shook her head. "It didn't, but I could show you how to do it, if you'd like."

Anakin seemed to be taking that under consideration. "You sure it'll stick this time?"

"Well, my Padawan," she teased, chastising herself moments later in case he took it as flirting after they had just resolved not to do so. "You'll be the judge of that."

Following her lead, Anakin sat down on his knees and closed his eyes, looking over to Padmé as he closed his eyes. She watched him, interested in how he took it, though unsurprised when he started to wiggle, unable to sit skill. "You need to focus on your breathing, just keep your mind clear and reach out. Stretch out your senses until you can feel the Force around you."

"That's...vague."

Padmé laughed. "It is, but I trust you to figure it out."

"You'd make a terrible master if that's how you plan on training any padawans you get."

"I thought you were done making fun of me."

"You won't kill me, I'll be fine." Anakin opened one eye, giving her a smirk.

"I could take you out and blame it on whoever's after you."

"Would you though?"

She wouldn't, but Anakin didn't need to know that. "Are you questioning me, Padawan?"

At that, he sighed. "No Master Jedi, I'm not." And he closed his eyes, taking deep breaths in and out, although still clearly struggling with staying focused entirely on the meditation. Deciding it would keep Anakin out of her hair at least for a few more minutes, Padmé closed her eyes, hoping the Force would send her a clear answer. What could she do to keep Anakin entertained until they were able to leave this desert planet behind.

Before she could continue meditating, a loud beep grabbed both hers and Anakin's attention. "Artoo?"

"What is it buddy?" Anakin asked, patting the droid on his blue domed head. The droid beeped at them a few more times, causing Anakin's face to darken as he looked towards Padmé. "Meditation practice is going to have to wait."

"I'm guessing he didn't come with good news?" Padmé asked. Anakin shook his head.

"It's Obi-Wan. He left a message for you." Padmé felt her heart drop almost immediately, as though it plummeted right to her stomach the moment Anakin spoke again. "He's in trouble."

"Artoo, relay the message." The droid let out a few more beeps before running out of the room to lead them to the comms.

Looked like their vacation away from the world was over.

[Next Part]

#Star Wars #Anakin Skywalker #Anakin #Padme Amidala #Padme #Anidala #Heather Writes

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buzzdixonwriter · 4 years ago

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GOLDFINGER: Novel vs. Movie

The quintessential James Bond story. Not the first, not the best, but the one that got the mixture right and set the stage for all that followed.

The seventh novel in the series, it marks a significant milestone in Ian Fleming’s growth as a writer, being the first time he ever gave real attention to Bond’s inner life and how he reacts to his career and missions.

Fleming was a good writer but not a great one. He typically wrote a first draft of his novels in two months time, revising over another month before submitting them.

This is not a schedule conducive to tight plotting or attention detail and it shows in Goldfinger.

Give the book credit for being a fun, fast paced adventure, it still could have been better.

While Goldfinger was Fleming’s longest book to date, his publisher still felt it ran too short and asked for another 5,000 words.

Fleming added a lengthy detailed dinner with a minor character and a lengthy golf game (based on one he actually played once).

He should have spent more time on the logistics of Goldfinger’s scheme to rob Ft. Knox. When the big plan is presented, there’s almost no description of the enormous effort it would take to get the men and vehicles to the gold depository to pull off the heist. Fleming dismisses this with a bit of handwaveum by saying Bond, posing as a freelance crook, was coordinating the efforts via phone for Goldfinger!

On the other hand, the opening chapter, with Bond musing over the death of a Mexican drug cartel assassin sent to kill him, is expertly written and, as mentioned, gives us the first real glimpse into Bond’s psyche in the series.

One gets the feeling Fleming started Goldfinger with good intent but grew impatient towards the end and just wrapped it up as quickly as he could with slam-bang action to be done with it.

He did something similar with The Spy Who Loved Me, starting out writing what he intended to be a literary novel about a young woman’s coming of age told from a first person POV, either getting bored or writing himself into a corner 2/3 of the way through, saying to hell with it and dragging in some gangsters and James Bond to liven things up. (Robert E. Howard did the same thing with his story, “A Witch Shall Be Born”; when he got bogged down he remembered he fortunately gave the hopelessly trapped queen an unnamed general who had been captured and crucified by the villain, so with a few strokes of the keyboard Conan tears himself off of the cross and comes back to town looking for revenge.)

Unfortunately, there’s also some really ugly bits throughout ///Goldfinger/// as well and it’s a toss up as to who Fleming smears worse: Koreans or lesbians. The Korean stuff is really horribly racist and as for the lesbian material, well, lesbians don’t work that way, Ian.

Bond also thinks too often in terms more suited for a Boy’s own Adventure story, undercutting his previous melancholy.

Fleming could be a far better writer than he appeared on average, and his short stories show that probably was a better format for him than novels (but who can make a living writing short stories, right?).

Goldfinger isn’t his finest work, but it’s the must read entry of the series.

By contrast, Richard Maibaum and Paul Dehn’s movie adaptation does an excellent job adapting Fleming’s book to the screen, although oddly adding plot holes of his own.

Book and movie overlap by 90%, a pretty good average for this kind of story.

Briefly, here are the holes Maibaum and Dehn filled:

They eliminated a chance encounter with a minor character from Casino Royale, thus eliminating a huge coincidence that drags Bond into the plot of the novel. Instead, Felix Leiter tips 007 to Goldfinger and sets him to work.

The somewhat sad and melancholy opening of the novel is reworked as a James Bond mini-adventure with exploding oil refineries and naked flamingo dancers. It’s a great precredits sequence, arguably the best of the series.

Jill Masterson is killed by Oddjob and Bond is framed for it in the movie; in the book we only learn of her fate much later (Goldfinger supposedly killed her by painting her with gold body paint that sealed off her pores, causing her to suffocate, but to paraphrase Rocket J. Squirrel: “Hokey smokes, Goldfinger! That trick never works!”).

When Bond shows up at the golf course, Goldfinger is far more wary of him -- and why not? This is a guy he tried to frame for capital murder and he doesn’t even bring it up. Clearly Bond is much more than a freelance crook.

Tilly Masterson’s death occurs sooner and more logically. As I’ll note, it’s pretty farfetched for Goldfinger to let Bond live after catching him snooping around a third time, but it’s even more farfetched for him to keep both alive as he does in the novel.

Unlike the book where he continues passing himself off as a freelance crook, Bond quickly acknowledges he’s working for the British secret service (and why deny it? They just pulled him out of the wreckage of that fabulously tricked out Aston-Martin DB5). That fact doesn’t keep him alive but when he reveals he knows “Operation Grand Slam” is the codename for Goldfinger’s big scheme, that convinces Goldfinger to keep him alive so M won’t send another 00 agent after him.

Pussy Galore’s arrival is separate from the American gangsters, indicating she’s far closer to the heart of the plan than they are. Using her as Bond’s guard enables the two to build a relationship, which makes her joining the good guys more plausible. She also now leads a team of stunt pilots, an improvement over the book where they’re just a team of criminal acrobats (from Harlem, no less!).

Goldfinger simply kills the gangsters once he gets from them what he needs, a brutally cold but wholly logical departure from the book.

The biggest departure from the novel is that movie Goldfinger wants to blow up Ft. Knox with an atom bomb, destroying America’s gold reserves to the advantage of Communist China and bolstering his own gold holdings. That’s one helluva better plan than recruiting rival American mobsters from around the country to help loot the place. In the novel Goldfinger plans to use a black market nuke to gain entry to the vault, ignoring the intense heat / shockwave / radiation that would result (recovering stolen nuclear weapons would be the plot of Thunderball).

Pussy Galore helps Bond convey a message to Felix Leiter instead of Bond taping a note to the underside of an airliner toilet in the hopes a cleaning crew will find it.

Pussy Galore helps double cross Goldfinger in the movie, in the book she sticks by him.

Bond kills Oddjob inside the gold vault instead of shooting out an airplane window; it’s Goldfinger who dies the ignominious death of getting sucked out of the jet.

Maibaum and Dehn’s improvements tighten up the film, but they still leave a number of idiot plot points, such as letting Bond drive his own car after being captured despite knowing it’s tricked out with all sorts of spy gadgets and weapons or crushing a defecting gangster in his car but neglecting to first remove the bold bars he was carrying.

It’s also a fair question to ask why Oddjob just doesn’t kill Bond at the same time he kills Jill Masterson, but one could argue that while Goldfinger knew who Jill Masterson was and could kill her with impunity, he might have decided to err on the side of caution by leaving Bond alive – albeit with a gold painted corpse to account for.

Still, a marked improvement over the book, with the movie being only mildly implausible as opposed to the novel being wildly implausible. It’s the best of the early Bond films (though From Russia With Love runs a tight second).

#movies #spy movies #007 #James Bond #Richard Maibaum #Paul Dehn #Ian Fleming #Goldfinger #writing #review #book #novel

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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 5 years ago

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Psycho Analysis: Hol Horse

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)

So last year I thought it was a good idea to try and review all of the enemy Stand users in Stardust Crusaders in a totally random order. The results were… mixed. Some of them I think came out okay, but others? Not so much. One of them was just an entire backhanded attack against some guy who decided to say “No one likes your analyses” because I think ProJared was a creep. It was, quite frankly, a mess, and I never bothered to revisit it and never thought I would, even though I still hadn’t covered the glorious, wonderful human being who is Hol Horse.

Well, now, after playing Heritage for the Future and All-Star Battle as well as just becoming a bit more knowledgeable on JJBA, I’ve decided to not only give Hol Horse his dues, but also at least briefly go back over or cover the other Stand users and give them a rating or an updated rating, as the case may be. So buckle in, this is gonna be a long one, and it’s all gonna start with everyone’s favorite incompetent henchman.

Hol Horse is probably one of the most amazing characters Araki has ever created. Hol Horse is in possession of a powerful Stand, The Emperor, which is literally a magical gun that fires bullets he can control the trajectory of. By all accounts, Hol Horse should be the single most dangerous foe that the Crusaders face, more than even Vanilla Ice. This guy should be able to shoot them all dead without a second thought! There’s just one tiny little caveat:

Hol Horse is a fucking moron.

This man is cowardly, incompetent, and just the punching bag of cruel misfortune as all his plans constantly go awry and he is constantly knocked on his ass. And yet, Hol Horse is still the most beloved enemy Stand User of Stardust Crusaders, and it’s not hard to see why. Because despite all of his bumbling, Hol Horse just oozes a sort of cool you just don’t see every day.

(For best results, listen to this the whole time while reading the following).

Motivation/Goals: Hol Horse is one of the few henchmen of DIO who is motivated purely by his own greed… at least, at first. Eventually he has his ass handed to him one too many times, and he decides to try and assassinate DIO. This goes about as well as you’d expect, and Hol Horse – not just part of it, the ENTIRE Horse – is so scared out of his mind that he decides, yep, loyalty to DIO is the way to go! It doesn’t work out, but hey, he tried, right?

Performance: Imami Williams gives Hol Horse that raspy, American charm he needs in the anime adaptation. With his voice and the animation combined, we get to see our favorite smarmy sharpshooter who can’t shoot for shit shoot his shot and miss every time, and it is simply glorious.

Final Fate: Hol Horse kidnaps Boingo and forces him to work with him to finally get his revenge! With the prophetic skills of Thoth and the raw damage that can be done with Emperor, there’s no way they could lose! And yet, as is always the case with Thoth, things go horrendously awry and Hol Horse, despite having the ability to control the trajectory of his bullets, ends up shooting himself and knocking him out of part 3 for good.

Best Scene: Really, just the entirety of the episodes where he teams up with Boingo, especially when he tries holding up Polnareff. Considering what comes after and what came before it, it’s just the dose of lighthearted fun needed before you watch all of your favorite characters get brutally murdered by DIO and Vanilla Ice,.

Best Quote: There is only one line it could be, and it’s Hol Horse’s response to Thoth’s suggestion he kick a woman in the neck: “Listen, Boingo... I am the nicest man in the world. I have girlfriends everywhere. I might lie to a woman, but I'll never hit them! It doesn't matter how ugly they are! Because I respect women!”

That’s right, everyone. Hol Horse drinks Respect Women Juice.

Final Thoughts & Score: Hol Horse is simply astounding. The character is such a colossal screwup that he shouldn’t be as good as he is… yet he is. The dude is gifted with the most incredible power imaginable, and yet somehow he is never able to do a goddamn thing with that power! You control where the bullets go, dude! How can you not hit anything?! It’s interesting how his cowardice and lack of motivation makes him a perfect representation of the inverted Emperor tarot card, but hey, tarot motifs are par for the course with the Stand users.

But there’s something charming to how pathetic Hol Horse is. He’s always plying second banana, he’s a dirty coward who turns tail and runs when things aren’t looking good for him, he never wins a single battle, he didn’t even kill the one guy it seemed like he killed… but throughout it all he still has this sort of smarmy charisma to him that makes him impossible to hate. It’s no wonder this guy has girls all over the world, because he is a world-class charmer. There’s also how Hol Horse is just a character who really, really lives by his own personal philosophy – that is to say, he always likes to be #2, never going into a fight without backup. It’s kind of refreshing to see him always stick by this, even to his own detriment; it’s hard to hate a man who’s principled to that degree. And, of course, this man respects women. Good on him.

It helps that Hol Horse’s inexplicable popularity has led to him getting his time to shine in outside media. Heritage for the Future has two versions of him, his regular form and one that partners him with Boingo, and in skilled hands his Emperor finally gets to live up to its deadly potential. And he’s no slouch in his return appearance in All-Star Battle, and what’s more impressive is in that game he is part of the base roster while Joseph and Iggy, two of the main heroes, are relegated to DLC! You heard me right: the bumbling cowboy who did not win a single fight or even come close to it and spent a lot of time shooting himself managed to beat out out two iconic heroes from the same part onto the roster! Horsey Man must be doing something right.

As this video shows, Hol Horse is one of the most influential characters in the JJBA franchise, having helped to shape the franchise going forward and helped to inspire the traits that made beloved characters like Guido Mista, Gyro Zeppeli, and Yoshikage Kira as legendary as they are. Hell, Hol Horse is just so awesome he almost got to be a protagonist, but Araki decided that Horsey was too similar to my favorite big-titty Frenchman, Polnareff. This means Hol Horse never got his time to shine as a hero, and so stayed a villain til the end… but hey, can he really be that sad if he gets a 10/10 on Psycho Analysis?

Actually, maybe he wouldn’t like that. He likes to play second fiddle to others, after all. But I guess that’s just the curse with these JoJo villains who want to not stand out; they always end up being the best and most memorable characters.

Anyway, now that we’ve got the best of the best out of the way, it’s time for...

Psycho Analysis: DIO’s Other Henchmen

I’m just gonna give my brief thoughts on these guys. Most of them are pretty one-note oneshots, but there are a few who rise above that and manage to be something else entirely. These guys were a learning experience for Araki, and his enemy Stand users of the week definitely improved with later parts, with Vento Aureo really cranking it up to 11.

But for now, we’re stuck with these guys.

Gray Fly: I actually stand by my opinion from my original review of him; he’s nothing incredibly memorable, but he’s a solid start to the adventure and he is directly responsible for diverting the journey onto the course it ended up going on. Without him, things would have likely played out far differently. A 5/10 is still a good score for him.

Fake Captain Tenille: He actually gets bumped down to a 2/10, due to my changes in how things are scored. He’s not amusing enough to be in the “So bad it’s good” category of the other 3s, he’s just really lame and forgettable, and he still somehow manages to lose when he has the advantage. What a dweeb.

Forever: If you think the monkey boat fight is dropping in score, you’re mistaken. Forever remains at an 8/10 for being such a delightfully weird curveball that helps set the tone for the franchise to follow.

Devo: One of the weirder playable character choices from Heritage for the Future, and certainly not one I like too much; he’s also a random event that is pretty useful in All-Star Battle’s online campaign, so that’s a good mark for him. If nothing else, he gave a good showing of Polnareff’s skills when under pressure, so… yeah. I think a 5/10 is good enough.

Rubber Soul: This review I regret because I was backhandedly responding to that guy who weirdly decided to bring up my distaste for ProJared in a review of Arabia Fats and Kenny G. I do mostly stand by what I said; Rubber Soul is one of the more amusing minor foes, if only because of his ridiculous performance as Kakyoin. Still, it really sucks he was just a clone character in Heritage for the Future… put he gets points for having the iconic cherry-licking as a taunt. 6/10 is where he remains.

J. Geil: Again, my opinion hasn’t changed: J. Geil is a mountain of wasted potential, but at the very least he makes for a good antagonist for his brief appearance and hey, he’s the one who helped bring us the beautiful hunk of man that is Hol Horse, so I’d feel bad giving him less than a 7/10.

Nena: I honestly think Nena is one of the most boring Stand users of the part, which is sad because her episode gives Joseph the spotlight. She’s just really gross and uninteresting, and you’ll likely forget her after her episode is over. 2/10.

ZZ: ZZ is not particularly great, and his design is just there to be a joke, but it’s hard to totally hate a guy who manages to roll references to Christine, Duel, and the album cover for Eliminator by his namesake into one. I think he’s more of a 4/10, but probably on the higher end there. He’s not great, but he has enough going for him to keep me from hating him.

Enya: So if I thought that J. Geil was a waste of potential, I feel this even more so for his mother Enya. Despite being hyped up as this big, intimidating right-hand woman to DIO early on, she gets one appearance where her Stand is defeated by Star Platinum pulling a power out his ass and then is unceremoniously killed by Steely Dan of all people. I will give her this: her interactions with Polnareff are absolutely hilarious. But when all you have going for is some jokes, don’t be surprised when you end up with a 6/10, which you’re pretty much only getting because even despite the mountains of wasted potential you’re really not that bad.

She do be looking hot in the OVA tho.

Steely Dan: My opinion is unchanged; he’s a solid 7/10 oneshot douchebag. Nothing more, nothing less. His level in the PS1 game seriously blows, though.

Arabia Fats: I was too hard on this guy. While I meant everything I said, and his episode is boring filler, does it really make him a bottom of the barrel all-time worst villain? No. It just makes him a crappy joke character. 2/10.

Mannish Boy: I regret not getting to this guy last time, because aside from Forever he’s probably one of the most insane Stand user of the part, seeing as he is an infant. Like, he’s just an evil baby who can kill people in their dreams. And he gets defeated by being force fed his own crap. Much like Forever, it’s fun to speculate where exactly DIO found this guy; did he just go to a nursery and start jabbing babies with the Stand arrow? Did he meet this guy at a Cairo night club? What exactly is Mannish Boy’s origin? He’s just so utterly and hilariously inexplicable. He’s definitely a 7/10; he doesn’t quite have the shock factor that Forever did before him, but let’s not pretend an evil talking baby Stand user isn’t one hell of a weird twist.

Cameo: This guy really lives up to his name; his Stand is the one that gets the most screentime, with the actual Stand user being relegated to a – you guessed it – cameo appearance at the end of the fight. Thankfully, his Stand is an enjoyable take on jerkass genies and gives a pretty sad and disturbing episode that not only features my man Polnareff, but also marks the point where Avdol returns and brings “Hell 2 U!” I think he deserves at least a 7/10, even if this is mainly for Judgment. Still, a Stand is a representation of the user’s soul, so I think it works out.

Here’s the Stand:

And here’s the man behind it:

Midler: Midler is one of the single most interesting characters from the pre-Egypt half of Stardust Crusaders, and is the point where Stand users really started to get interesting. Her Stand, High Priestess, has a really funky and unique design, and her battle serves as the final roadblock before the Crusaders arrive in Egypt. Despite never appearing onscreen, with only her unconscious body being shown at the end of the fight in a way that obscures her, she got to appear in Heritage for the Future with an awesome sexy belly dancer design and a badass moveset that makes her a really fun character to play as. Taking everything into account, I think she just barely scrapes into the bottom of the 8/10 pool, though really this is mainly for her playable appearance.

N’Doul: My opinions really haven’t changed on him. He’s still an 8/10.

Oingo & Boingo: These guys are, in a word, hilarious. In between the grueling, brutal fight with N’Doul and the later fights in the part, these guys bring some much needed levity to the proceedings. Oingo gets an entire episode where he just completely bumbles about as he attempts to impersonate Jotaro to assassinate the Crusaders, failing at every turn and only managing to blow himself up in the end. Boingo fares a little better, eventually getting roped in to Hol Horse’s scheme to get some revenge, which leads to one of the funniest episodes of the entire series as Hol Horse and Oingo hold up Polnareff. I think they collectively get an 8/10 for being two of the funniest Stand users in the part. They even get their own unique end credits in the anime (with Hol Horse joining in on the fun when he teams up with Boingo)!

Anubis: Again, my opinion is unchanged, though I must say him having technically three playable appearances in Heritage for the Future does make me have at least a little more fondness for him. Black Polnareff, Chaka, and Khan are all amusing characters to play as and all have some awesome theme music. Introducing the concept of Stands being able to exist independently of their Original user is pretty neat, as well as the idea of a Stand that can switch users like it does. 7/10 is still what I’d give it, but I think that it’s pretty telling that this is probably the “weakest” character in the Egypt arcs in terms of being a villain, and yet he’s still pretty cool.

Mariah: Completely unchanged. She still deserves an 8/10, because her episode is hilarious, her playable appearance in Heritage for the Future is a blast, and she’s just really frikkin’ hot. I’m not gonna lie, she’s probably my second favorite enemy Stand user out of the Egyptian ones. I may or may not want her to step on me.

Alessi: I’m going to be honest here: Alessi is my favorite of the Egyptian Stand users. He’s an ax crazy coward with pedophile undertones who is just an utterly demented and sick individual with a seriously intriguing Stand that de-ages its victims. It’s a damn shame he never crossed paths with Joseph and de-aged him, but when he’s just such a hilarious and hateable lunatic with an incredibly fun playable appearance in Heritage for the Future (complete with awesomely creepy theme music!) it’s hard for me to give Alessi anything less than a 9/10. Attaboy!

Daniel J. D’Arby: My opinion is honestly unchanged, but I think I’d bump him down to an 8/10.

Pet Shop: Again, unchanged really. It’s hard to give a character as busted as he is in Heritage for the Future anything less than a 9/10 any way you slice it.

Telence T. D’Arby: Opinion unchanged, 8/10. I don’t have much else to say here, besides Xander Mobus rocks.

Kenny G: See Arabia Fats above. I got irrationally mad over a dumb joke character. He’s not going above a 2/10, but he’s not worth really getting mad about.

Vanilla Ice: I still think he’s the only enemy Stand user besides Hol Horse who deserves his 10/10. My opinion of him remains unchanged, but I would like to say he’s easily one of my favorite characters to play as in All-Star Battle.

Nukesaku: Ok, he’s not an enemy Stand user, he’s just some weird vampire… zombie… thing. Still, I feel he’s at least worth briefly mentioning, if only because he’s probably the only easily-defeated joke villain Araki did from the first three parts who is particularly memorable. Wired Beck and Doobie are really not all that memorable, but Nukesaku at least elicits a few chuckles – he even gets cameos in Heritage for the Future as well as getting to be a stage hazard in All-Star Battle. For what he is, I think he deserves a 5/10.

And with all these enemies taken care of, that just leaves one more Stand user to talk about.. one whose Psycho Analysis has been sitting in my drafts for a year now...

#Psycho Analysis #Hol Horse #JoJo's Bizarre Adventure #Stardust Crusaders #Imami Williams

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ikevampfg · 5 years ago

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How would the suitors react to mc being a top notch assassin or secret agent?

(Warning! Violence and graphic depiction ahead!)

MC is in present time along with the suitors and she had to resume her mafia jobs to keep up. At one point, enemies come on their way randomly and MC will show her deadly skills to them.

Napoleon and Jean

The three of them were walking together to get some crepes and sweets at the nearby cafe and as requested by Jean, to continue touring since he’d like to see other improvements in the future. Three men dressed in black suits suddenly halted their way and without a word, fired a gun at them. Jean and Napoleon didn’t bring any weapon along with them an is unguarded, advising MC to run but nope, she ain’t running. She doesn’t have a gun too, but what does she have? A goddamn sharpened pencil on her bag. She advised the two to stay put on their place as the three men attacked her, the first was kicked into his stomach band a few punches were thrown, aiming for the man’s eye before directly stabbing into the eye socket. The next ended up with the pencil stabbed on to the nape and the third on the throat all ended up dead, with the bloody pencil on her hands.

Only with a goddamn pencil.

They both witnessed it by their own eyes and didn’t even get to interfere or react, but one thing for sure is both the soldiers were head over heels for their deadly goddess.

Le Comte and Leonardo

They visited the newly modern library in the city for Leonardo to see new books and also for Comte to revisit and rest for a while. It was a rather large library, with many aisles without people considering its weekends when they visited. Leonardo and Le Comte were busy skimming books when a man, dressed in casual who has MC on a contract to kill, physically attacked her. The two were unaware until they heard a loud ‘thud’ and the shaking of shelves were MC was and both rushed to rescue her. But MC yelled at them to stay put, as she was doing her job. She had a thick hard bounded cover book on her hand, slamming it repeatedly on to the guy’s face having a heated combat exchange until MC shove the book on the guys mouth and forcefully push it in his mouth breaking the jaw with force resulting for the man to die.

They were astounded that she has hid that talent to them for long, and that she was actually a deadly woman who hides in a face of a angel. The heart of the two were easily snatched, and definitely turned on with the blood splattered a bit on her face.

Isaac and Mozart

They visited a modern music hall together. Even Isaac get to join, wanting to see new stuffs as well because MC and Mozart agreed to go to a planetarium after their tour at the hall. They were touring inside when men dressed in suits approached them, in need to ‘talk’ with MC. The two wont be able to defend her well, surely as the scientist and the musician weren’t experienced in fighting so she told them to let her ‘talk for a while and wait. The two were hesitant and still persuading to go but she just told them to trust her plans. They took distance just to avoid for the two to get involved on the fight and when they were far enough, MC immediately took down one physically and reached for the gun fast, flawlessly aiming for the head without a word. There were ten equal and she had brought down the six, no time for reload and just took the gun of other dead men he recently shot and gun them down.

The two were speechless. Both aren’t a fan of violence but when MC just executed it, they started to question their morals and why they were attracted on what she did.

Theo and Arthur

It was supposed to be a simple walk at the park when things just got out of hand when men suddenly stopped them on their tracks. Theo was easily annoyed and would be ready to go head to head in a fight, same with Arthur whose a bit cocky and refers it as ‘warm up’. When they both noticed that the men were armed, they backed with Arthur suggesting to run instead to avoid danger. And when one was supposed to attack Arthur by a punch, MC immediately caught the hand and twisted it ugly, snatching the gun and swiftly shot them clean in the head for reassurance of instant death and did it all without a word in such a cool manner. Even MC didn’t get a blood on her clothes nor face when she did it, showing her true nature as she looked at the dead men coldly.

And with that, Arthur and Theo were already conditioning their mind, and even planning to buy a ring later or plan a wedding at the afternoon. Let’s just hope the two won’t compete much.

Vincent and Shakespeare

They were in a simple resting place where both Vincent and William can write and paint together. It was all pretty peaceful, the three of them enjoying their activities while MC is sculpting a simple small sculpture with her steel spatula. It was all fine when one tall man immediately grabbed MC’s collar, probably an assassin from an opposing group. Vincent and Shakespeare was too late to respond, one thing they knew is MC already was done with the man, blood dripping on the steel spatula she was holding.

Vincent immediately rushed to her side asking if she was fine, even kicking the fresh corpse because she only cared for her while Shakespeare was grinning ear to ear, definitely turned on by her deadly action calling her off as the Lady of Death.

Dazai and Sebastian

They had visited a Japanese temple together so the three of them could revisit their Japanese roots. They were touring inside, looking at some old items related to Japanese tradition and culture, even religion too. They were walking in their kimonos when a man at their back had pointed a katana at MC, cutting her hair down from the blade. Dazai and Sebastian were cautious and pulled her to run but MC was mad because of her hair being cut down and wont allow the enemy to fled back along with her ‘honor’. There was a display katana at the thin wall when she suddenly grabbed it, coming fast for offense even with the dull pointed katana on her hands and managed to cut the man down because of ‘talent’ in killing, even leaving it stabbed at the man’s chest.

Dazai and Sebastian were left with their jaws dropped open, both are willing to kneel and even die on her own hands.

#ikemen series #cybird #ikevam #ikevamp #ikevam napoleon #ikevam leonardo #ikevam mozart #ikevam arthur #ikevam theo #ikevam vincent #ikevam isaac #ikevam jean #ikevam dazai #ikevam shakespeare #ikevam comte #ikevam sebastian #ikemen vampire

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quixoticnexus · 4 years ago

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Morality Guide

All of my characters have “Classical Alignments” listed in their About Pages, but I decided I wanted to expand on that, since it only really gives you an idea of what you’re dealing with. So if you’re interested in hearing the in-depth analysis of why I put them where they are, keep reading! Going in order of when they were added. (This might continue to be updated as I add more characters.)

Xavier: Chaotic Good

Xavier is a young man who’s deeply disillusioned with the establishment and how the world works as a whole. He’s convinced that nothing will ever change and no good will ever come unless the entire system is burned to ashes. While he’s emphatic about protecting those weaker and underprivileged, he’s also quick to resort to violence to get the result he wants.

This ideology is pretty firmly baked into his persona due to years of trauma and abuse. It’s hard to get him to change his ways, but not impossible. Someone caring and patient enough might be able to ease his savage temper and make him see that maybe he DOESN’T have to default to violence all the time and that maybe some people in the establishment genuinely care for the well being of others and can stay. So he’d drift towards Neutral Good in that instance.

That said, someone could also convince him to become utterly jaded in the idea that there’s even a concept such as Good or Evil in the first place, and just convince him that the only thing that matters is burning the establishment. In that instance, he’d become much closer to Chaotic Neutral, but due to his naturally caring nature, this would be much harder to do. His inclinations towards good are much stronger than his inclinations towards lawlessness, despite what it might seem on the surface!

Adrian: Neutral Good / Chaotic Good / True Neutral / Chaotic Neutral

This guy is possibly the second most flexible when it comes to interpretations of his morality. (More on that in a second.) He almost always starts out as either Chaotic Good (most Thief-only verses) or Chaotic Neutral (most Spy/Assassin verses). Obviously his “hobby” automatically puts him on the wrong side of the law, and in general, he can be quite selfish. Life has taught him that nothing actually matters except for fond memories and varied experiences you can relive later. Even his “Code of Conduct” is less about easing the suffering of others and is mostly about keeping things interesting for himself.

That said, he’s not nearly as baked into those positions as Xavier is. While he’ll never cross over into being completely evil, it’s pretty easy to mellow the Chaos aspect out since his rather jaded outlook on the world comes from a place of heartbreak rather than malice. If someone feels like going the extra mile and helping him realize he shouldn’t be such a selfish dick (to everyone but those he’s attached to), you can even possibly get him into the Neutral Good category! Otherwise, he’s likely going True Neutral.

Tobias: True Neutral (HIGHLY variable)

This guy is the one who has the highest potential to change from verse to verse. He’s smack dab in the middle of the chart, not because he’s perfectly balanced in every way, but because he’s super impressionable and will change based on the last thing that sounded good to him. How he ends up depends entirely on the people he looks to for guidance, for better or for worse.

I really can’t stress this enough. So far in most of his interactions, he’s been pretty good, if not a bit annoying and dude-bro-y. With good role models like Rose and Leon, he acts pretty respectably! With girls he wants to impress like Annalise, he can (eventually) be convinced to actually improve himself to be more appealing to them. He can become neutral good, or even lawful good with enough effort. It’s possible!

BUT. The flip-side is also possible. To put it bluntly, he’s one step removed from a full-blown incel, and I mean that in a completely literal fashion. This guy is one or two seedy internet forums away from losing his mind and trying to drive a truck into a crowd of women. It is THAT BAD. His sense of entitlement and desperation for anyone that will validate him makes him a prime target for radicalization, or even being directly used by evil people who will make him feel wanted.

In short, he’s the best Grunt anyone could hope to have. If you pay him with a sense of belonging, he will do ANYTHING you ask and subscribe to ANY ideology, no matter how fucked up.

Kouki: Lawful Good

Kouki’s as stereotypically Lawful Good as you can get. He is purely a pacifist, doesn’t eat meat (or consume animal products in modern verses like dairy), and probably would answer you literally stabbing him in the gut by threatening to raise his voice.

Like basically all of the guys listed above, his point of view came from a long life of abuse and neglect, but instead of getting jaded or angry with the world, he decided to make the conscience choice to live his life in a way that will never hurt anyone the way he was hurt in the past. He’s tied that philosophy with the “religion” he now lives his life by, and it won’t be changing any time soon.

There’s no way anyone could ever get him out of the “Good” category. The most you can hope for is convincing him that some laws are designed to hurt people and are thus unjust, resulting in a more neutral take. But even that’s going to be a struggle for you. This is a guy that lives and dies by his extremely strong moral compass.

“Doc”: Neutral Evil

This guy has no morals and is utterly self serving to the point of it being cancerous. I have him classified as Neutral Evil, because he does see the use in using the law to his advantage as a shield, when it suits him. But obviously the things he does isn’t ever going to be state sanctioned.

If given a choice, though, he’d be mostly aligned with the Lawful side than Chaotic. This guy absolutely LOVES twisting contracts and agreements to serve his needs. He finds the comfort that comes with having whatever you say backed up in ink very reassuring. That way if he ever does come down, at least he can drag his associates down with him.

Kyoko: True Neutral

While Kyoko’s morality is also variant based on the universe she’s in, it’s much less so than our friend Tobias. For the most part, she only sticks to the variations of Neutral and never strays too far to the extreme corners of LG/LE/CG/CE.

She is ultimately a self serving individual like Doc and Adrian, but unlike those two that are determined to twist the world to wring every drop out of enjoyment out of it before they drop dead, Kyoko’s mostly just trying to survive. She just exists in this space and is trying to get by as best as she can without raising a fuss or raising suspicions.

If that means a few people who saw too much maybe have to disappear, that’s too bad, but it’s the circle of life in a way. One being dies so another will live. And live, and live, and live, and live.

Kaneda: Chaotic Neutral

Kaneda’s kind of a surprising one for a lot of reasons, but I think how unstable his mood is in general makes a great case for Chaotic Neutral as opposed to True Neutral. Chaos is a large part of his life, as is the opposition to norms that he feels hold people back from their true potential. He always encourages people to be most true to themselves above all else, damn society.

He’s also commonly at odds with the law in many of his verses, but that has less to do with it -- unlike someone like Xavier, who’s made total anarchy his life’s mission. Kaneda’s opposition is mostly to societal norms and stuff like the gender binary and how one is allowed to express themselves.

That being said, Kaneda is pretty impressionable and is willing to do basically anything to prove himself worthy of being loved. Depending on who is influencing him, he can quite easily drift from Chaotic Good to even Chaotic Evil. (But Chaotic Evil is a bit of a heavier lift thanks to his general love of humanity.)

Touma: True Neutral

Touma is to True Neutral what Kouki is to Lawful Good. In fact, he might be even more rigid in his placement overall. He is the total opposite to Tobias, who will flip into another category at the drop of a hat.

Touma is almost militant in his desire and inclination to only look out for his own. He would do anything for his daughter and extended family as a whole -- no matter how cruel or sadistic. If it helps him in his goal to provide for his family, he’ll do it with no questions asked and no quibbles. And trust me when I say he’s done some fucked up shit in the past to achieve this end.

That being said, he doesn’t seek out such stuff, and would prefer to not have to do it at all. He has a working moral compass and knows what’s right and what’s wrong. It just ultimately doesn’t matter to him when the chips are on the table.

#headcanons: xavier #headcanons: tobias #headcanons: adrian #headcanons: kouki #headcanons: doc #headcanons: kaneda #headcanons: touma #ooc: deep dives #headcanons: kyoko

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allthingsfangirl101 · 5 years ago

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RA&L Chapter 3: Big Actor, Big Eggo

Masterlist

After Evan's Hollywood comment, I gave in to looking up who this guy was. It wasn't hard to figure it out. All I typed in was "Hollywood" and "Dylan" and it came up.

Dylan O'Brien. The actor most known for The First Time, Teen Wolf, the Maze Runner series, and Deepwater Horizon. It was recently rumored that he would be working opposite Micheal Keaton in American Assassin. At least that was before Dylan O'Brien ended up here, at the same rehab center I'm at. Speaking of which, he is the one person in this whole center who won't leave me alone.

And he is relentless. I can't walk around the center without him, by some annoying-ass coincidence, always finding me.

Every.

Single.

Time.

I couldn't leave my sessions with Dr. Hailey without being spotted by him. I couldn't walk to my daily sessions with Evan without Dylan jogging to catch up to me.

Each time he started walking with me, he'd always try to get me to talk. And each time he tried to get me to talk, I would just send him sideways glances. Luckily, Evan caught on and started waiting for me outside the PT room, ready to tell Dylan to leave me alone.

"That boy seems to be taking a liking to you," Evan teased as he felt my throat. I rolled my eyes, making him laugh.

"Okay, okay. No need to go all teenagery on me," he smirked. I kicked his leg making him laugh. "Careful. A little more left and I would be in a lot of pain."

I sent him a knowing smirk before it turned into a smile. "Well, I don't get why he's so obsessed with you."

I looked away, my cheeks burning. "Oh Dells," he sighed. "I didn't mean it like that. I just meant why he keeps going after you when you clearly blow him off."

I nodded my head as I bit my lip, avoiding his gaze. "Hey," he said as he gently grabbed my chin and turned me so I was looking at him.

"He should be chasing you. I know I'm not supposed to say this, but you're my favorite. And I think the other patients know it."

He let go of my cheek, playfully poking my nose. "Either way, stay away from him. You're too good for that self-observed, better-than-everyone attitude, selfish son of a. . ."

I put my hand on his arm, stopping his angry rant. He let out a small laugh as he put his hand over mine. "Sorry, Dells. Something about him irritates me. He thinks that just because he's an actor, he can walk around like he owns the place. Well, he's got another thing coming, huh?"

I smiled as he wiggled his eyebrows. "Besides, we all know you run this place."

I playfully pushed him, making him step back. He walked over to my charts, scanning them. I bit my lip when I saw the look on his face. He hesitated before looking back up at me.

"Stop that," he laughed, pointing towards my lips. "You're gonna make yourself bleed. And for nothing. We are still waiting on those results. The tea is helping soothe your throat, it's just not doing it as fast or as much as the doctor had originally thought."

I sighed, shrugging. Evan and the rest of the medical team were doing as much as they could. I knew that. I also knew that because of them, I'm actually able to speak. It may only be 2 to 4 times a week, but it's a big improvement from my status before the center.

He grabbed my hands, looking at them instead of me. "When you came here, I promised you that we would help you. You've been here six months and you've barely improved. I'm sorry, Adeline."

I sighed as I let go of his hand and lifted his chin. He looked at me, sadness in his eyes. I reached forward, wrapped my arms around him, and pulled him in for a hug. Evan instantly wrapped his arms around me.

Evan and I have a closer relationship than the doctors and patients around here normally do. When I first got here, I shut everyone out. It didn't matter that they were trying to help me, I always pushed them away.

Evan was the only one who kept pushing back. One day, during our PT, he sat down and told me about his little sister and how she was a lot like me. He said she was independent, confident, and stubborn.

He told me that he and his family got into a car accident when he was in high school. They were driving home and slipped on black ice. He was the only lucky one. He was barely injured, but both of his parents were hospitalized and his younger sister was killed on impact.

After the accident, he had to go through months of therapy to get better. That's what made him want to become a physical therapist.

When he heard about my accident and what had been taken from me, he was determined to help me in the same way he was helped. He asked to be my PT and promised that he would work long and hard to help me get better.

Evan pulled out of the hug and tucked a piece of hair behind my ear. "Hang in there, kiddo," he whispered. "We're not done yet."

* * * * *

After my PT session with Evan, I walked to the diner and got some dinner to-go. As I walked back to my dorm, I sighed when I saw him across the courtyard.

Please don't notice me. Please don't notice me.

Of course, he noticed me. I sped up my pace as he stood up and started jogging over.

"Wait up there, Ariel."

I froze in my place, turned on my heel and glared at him. I raised my eyebrows as I folded my arms across my chest.

"What?" He laughed. "You won't tell me your name so I had to make one up. I decided on Ariel because you won't speak to me."

"Won't speak," I thought. "Well, just like Ariel, I had my voice taken from me. Asshole."

I rolled my eyes as I started walking away.

"What is your deal?" He scoffed. He started walking beside me, anger radiating off of him. "Why won't you talk to me? I literally haven't done anything to you, and yet, you're being a bitch."

I turned towards him and slapped him across the face. He looked back at me, his eyes wide. I opened my mouth but quickly closed it. I grunted angrily as I walked away.

"Geez," he mumbled. "Didn't mean to offend you," he said sarcastically. I turned around, very aware of the whiteboard tucked under my arm and the marker sticking out of my front pocket.

I reached up and played with the scarf wrapped around my neck. I chewed nervously on my bottom lip as he watched me.

"Why are you. . . What? Can you not talk or something?" I sent him an annoyed look to which he took as funny. He laughed as he shoved his hands into his pockets, a smirk on his face.

"So should I stop asking you questions?" He teased.

"Yes."

I held the whiteboard out for him, tears building up. He looked down at the board before looking back up at me, confusion in his eyes.

"Why are you using that?" He asked slowly. I scoffed as I reached up and pulled my scarf off my neck, revealing the scars on my throat.

"Holy shit," he gasped. A single tear slid down my cheek as he stared at my throat. He looked back up at me, his eyes softening slightly when he saw the look on my face.

"I didn't mean. . ."

I quickly turned on my heel, not wanting to hear the fake-ass apology he made up.

#dylan o'brien #dylan o'brien imagine #dylan o'brien fanfic #tfios #rehab love story #RAL

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chiseler · 5 years ago

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Rip Torn: A Retrospective

Rip Torn died on July 9th at age 88. That he lived that long is nothing short of miraculous.

In the summer of 1969, Rip Torn was drunkenly screaming through New York’s West Village on his motorcycle when he slammed it into a police cruiser. Torn broke his leg in the accident, but didn’t notice. The next morning he got up, got on a plane, and flew to Paris where he was set to star in Joseph Strick’s film version of Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer. He shot the entire film all hopped up on painkillers on an untreated busted leg,. And you know what? He still gives a remarkable performance. It wasn’t the only time he worked with broken bones, either.

For over 60 years, Torn carried on in the proud tradition of John Barrymore, Errol Flynn, Robert Mitchum, Frank Sinatra, and Lawrence Tierney as the last of the great Hollywood hellions. In between insane drunken escapades, he was nominated for Emmys and Tonys and Oscars, he established himself as one of America’s most respected character actors, a man with a knack for making even a small role a pivotal one, and he was in Every Movie and TV Show Ever Made. Next time you watch something take a close look at the credits and you’ll see.

Torn’s given name was Elmore Rual Torn, Jr., but was nicknamed Rip as a boy, as was tradition among all the Torn men. He was born and raised and educated in Texas, studying animal husbandry in college before turning to acting.

The motivation behind the decision was different than most. He hitchhiked to California to break into the movies not because he wanted to be a big star, but because he thought it would be an easy way to raise enough money to buy himself a ranch. Things didn’t work out quite so zip bang as he’d planned, though he did earn small roles on TV and made his feature debut in an uncredited role as a dentist in Elia Kazan’s great and scandalous 1956 film Baby Doll. Kazan hired him again the following year to play another uncredited but extremely important role in the equally great Face in the Crowd.

Although he wasn’t making the kind of money he needed to buy that ranch, he was getting enough acting jobs along the way to start taking the whole enterprise a bit more seriously. He moved to New York to study at the Actor’s studio, worked in theater both on and off Broadway, and from the mid-’50s to the mid-60s established himself on TV in everything from Playhouse 90 to Thriller to Route 66 to The Untouchables. After that things took off. There was just something sinister about Torn, those wicked eyes of his, that crooked-toothed leer, the whole rat-like demeanor, that suited him for villainous roles of all kinds. Plus he was a chameleon who could shift his whole look and stature with the simplest change of accent. He would go on to play Judas in King of Kings, countless presidents, doctors, senators, military officers and judges. He played rednecks and gangsters, cowboys and spies and executives. He played Walt Whitman twice, was in a whole bunch of Tennessee William’s plays (on Broadway, TV and film). Yeah, like I said, between the mid-’50s and the present, he was in every damn thing ever made. Trying to summarize his career is pretty much impossible, but there was a stretch there from the mid-60s to the late 70s when he was top billed when he was turning small supporting roles into leads, when he was moving easily between TV, experimental films, and big budget Hollywood jobs, and when he was starting to earn himself a reputation as a wild man.

Looking back on it now, it’s hard to imagine the kind of talent, both in front of and behind the camera, that came together on the 1965 period gambling picture The Cincinnati Kid. It was originally a Sam Peckinpah film with a script by Ring Lardner. Then Peckinpah was fired (surprise!) and Norman Jewison was brought in to direct. He thought the script was too self important and talky, so he brought in Terry Southern. He also gave Hal Ashby his first big break, bringing him in as editor and assistant director. Steve McQueen stars as a hotshot young poker player in ‘30s-era New Orleans. Karl Malden is a former hotshot on the skids. Jack weston is the loud whiny guy. Ann-Margaret is the bad girl, Tuesday Weld is the good girl, and Edward G. Robinson is the old man, the undisputed champ, the stud poker king feared by everyone.

Ah, then there’s Rip Torn. His name’s deep in the credits but the whole film turns around him. He plays the slick and sleazy Southern Gentleman who will stop at nothing to see the Robinson character toppled. See, Robinson beat him at poker once, and for a Southern Gentleman of his stature there’s nothing in the world worse than losing. There’s one scene in particular, Torn’s showpiece here, in which he tries to blackmail the dealer (Malden) into cheating, and though it doesn’t sound like much nobody can muster up the cool menace like Torn. Oooohhh, he’s such a rotten son of a bitch.

Four years later he starred in Moses Ginsberg’s first film, Coming Apart, an experimental number that’s been called “More a Happening than an actual movie,.” Filmed with a single static camera to recreate the feel of a documentary, Torn stars as an unbalanced psychiatrist who torments and confuses his female patients, eventually going completely batty himself. It all takes place in one small room shot by that one unmoving camera. It’s at turns compelling and unbelievably tedious, and if it weren’t for Torn (thank god for that Actor’s Studio improv training) it would be unwatchable.

Around this same time Dennis Hopper cast Torn to be in Easy Rider. Then at what was either a production meeting or a cocktail party in New York (depending on who’s telling the story), Hopper and Torn got into a bit of a ruckus over whether or not all Texans were rednecks out to kill hippies. A knife was pulled (though Peter Fonda would later claim it was a butter knife, or maybe a fork, or maybe both). Next thing you know, Torn was thrown off the picture, and Hopper cast Jack Nicholson in his place.

About a year later Torn joined the cast of Norman Mailer’s improvisational experiment, Maidstone. Essentially it was a raucous, drunken three-day party out at Grove Press founder Barney Rossett’s Long Island estate around which Mailer tried to film himself as a director trying to shoot a movie. As the story goes, before shooting started each actor was given a card briefly describing his or her character, and that was as close as anyone got to a script. One character, however, was given a card at random informing the holder that his character was in fact a CIA assassin whose job it was to kill Mailer. The card’s recipient was supposed to be kept a secret from everyone in the cast, including Mailer.

Well, according to Rossett there was a little confusion there. Maybe it was the booze, or maybe the card simply wasn’t worded clearly. In any case Torn (naturally) got the card, but instead of thinking his character was supposed to kill Mailer, he somehow got the idea that HE was supposed to kill Mailer. Lucky for Mailer, too, as the confusion resulted in the only scene in the film anyone remembers.

After the shoot was over and most everyone had gone home, Mailer and his family are walking back toward the house when they’re stopped by a grinning and quite mad Torn, who is also clutching a small hatchet. The cameras are rolling and you can tell this was something Mailer was not prepared for. Nor was he prepared when Torn goes after his skull with the hatchet. The two wrestle each other to the ground, Mailer bites Torn’s ear, Torn leaves a deep gash in Mailer’s scalp, and Mailer’s wife and children scream in horror until a couple crew members pull Torn off him.

And that, my friends, is entertainment!

(The next morning Rossett found a drunken midget floating in his swimming pool, but that’s another story.)

Then came the motorcycle accident and shooting Tropic of Cancer on a broken leg. As it happens there were two films based on Henry Miller novels filming simultaneously two blocks apart in Paris. Jens Jorgen Thorsen’s Quiet Days in Clichy starred Paul Valjean, an American dancer who looked an awful lot like Miller, but neither sounded nor acted like him. Torn, meanwhile, looked absolutely nothing like Miller, but somehow by adopting just the slightest hint of a Brooklyn accent (and on all those painkillers) was somehow able to embody him completely. It’s a gritty, funny, poetic film and Torn is great, though to be fair it should be noted that Clichy was dirtier.

Also in 1970, Torn spoke out against the war in Vietnam on a TV show, and a few nights later someone fired a bullet through his window. It was a hell of a year for him.

In ‘73s Darryl Duke film, Payday, Torn gives what he himself would later refer to as his best performance. Or maybe his favorite. In any case he’s really something as Maury Dann, a womanizing, hard-drinking, bastard son of a bitch of a second-rate country singer. Dann and his band are on tour through the South as Dann screws and screws over everyone around him, from band members to family, to pretty much every woman he meets. He never quite hit the top, but insists on acting and being treated like he has. Toward the end he even talks his chauffer into taking a murder rap for him, since he has to get to a show. It’s an extremely dark, cynical, and painfully accurate portrait of the country music business of the early ‘70s, and Torn does all his own singing. It makes for a nice counterpoint to Robert Duvall’s quiet, soft-spoken, and sensitive country singer in Tender Mercies from a decade later.

Although again his name is buried deep in the credits of Larry Cohen’s 1977 biopic The Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover the entire film revolves around him. He narrates, after all, and gives another memorable performance as a young man who decides to join the Bureau after his father (another agent) is gunned down by a two-bit hood on the street. After seeing what’s going on in the FBI, though, and after being punished himself for a minor indiscretion, he tries to bring Hoover down a notch or two. In what could have been a hamfisted cartoon, both Cohen and Torn (and star Broderick Crawford near the end of his career) manage a shockingly human portrait.

As a flipside to Torn’s tendency to turn minor supporting roles into leads, there was 1978’s Coma, the medical conspiracy thriller directed by Michael Chrichton based on the Robin Cook novel. Torn was fourth-billed behind Genevieve Bujold, MIchael Douglas, and Richard Widmark. And sure, Torn’s character, Dr. George, is the film’s central villain, the man behind a Boston hospital’s fiendish conspiracy to harvest human organs and sell them on the black market, but he only appears in one scene, and speaks roughly four lines. It’s unclear whether this was the plan from the start, an attempt to turn his character into another Harry Lime or Mabuse, or if maybe all his other scenes were cut after Torn went after Crichton with a hatchet (we can only hope). In any case he was missed. He might have livened up what was otherwise a pretty godawful picture.

As Torn grew older and a little larger and his hair started getting thinner, two things happened. He began playing more authority figures, which only makes sense I guess. He had that look and sound about him. He also started doing more comedies and genre films. Sometimes he even combined the two, playing Ronald Reagan in ‘82s Airplane II: The Sequel.

In ‘91 he was Bob Diamond, the charming, sleazy, and utterly ineffective lawyer trying to give Albert Brooks a boost out of Purgatory in Defending Your Life. He was the sinister CEO in the otherwise dreadful Robocop 3. He even began lending his voice to animated features and video games (usually playing a god of some kind).

Then in 1999 Dennis Hopper was a guest on Leno and told a few old Easy Rider stories, including the one about how Torn had pulled a knife on him at a party. Well, Torn, remembering things a bit differently, sued him for defamation.

It’s pretty hilarious if you think about it; these two guys who were both completely out of their heads in the late ‘60s going to court to determine which one of them was behaving badly. I mean, they both had reputations to maintain.

Well, most of the witnesses agreed with Torn that it was Hopper who pulled the knife (except for Peter Fonda, who remembered all kinds of different utensils), and the court ordered Hopper to pay Torn nearly half a million in damages. It was all kind of silly. I mean, it’s not like the story cost him any work. Hell, trying to literally kill Norman Mailer on camera didn’t even cost him any work. But I guess pride’s a funny thing.

After that he continued to work regularly, as Agent Zed in the Men in Black films, in sit-coms, in made-for-TV films, christ, anything that came along. Every director I’ve ever heard talk about Torn can’t praise him highly enough for his talent and professionalism (except maybe Mailer), though given his admitted temper, it’s also possible they’re just scared of him. He was nominated for six Emmys for his role on the Larry Sanders Show, and came to be recognized by a whole new generation as the executive Alec Baldwin worships but wants to replace on 30 Rock.

Along the way he set himself the task of repairing any damage his reputation as a hellraiser might have suffered as a result of that Hopper lawsuit. The DUIs started adding up. Or at least getting noticed, in part thanks to the actor’s tendency to swing on the arresting officers. Along with being the president of the Extreme Dodgeball League (who knew it even existed?) it seems he was also an extreme regular at a bar near his Connecticut home. Every once in awhile the bartender himself would tip off the cops after Torn headed for his car. I’m not sure if that bartender’s still there, but even after being fingered like that Torn remained a regular, though he didn’t always drive. And that in itself might have caused some problems.

After returning home from the bar one night in 2010, Torn found his keys didn’t work in the lock. Seeing no alternative, the 79-year-old was forced to break into his own house. He was probably surprised a few minutes later, just as he got his shoes off and was making himself comfortable, when the cops arrived and informed him that he wasn’t in his house at all, but had broken into a nearby bank. And the cops were probably surprised to find Torn was carrying a loaded handgun. Yeah, he’s not the only one who’s been there, as I think many of us can attest.

Once it was clarified that it was not Torn’s intention to rob the bank, he was given a two and a half year suspended sentence and three years probation.

The arrest prompted the tightassed, no fun creators of Thirty Rock to kill off his character, but he remained as busy as ever, including an uncredited role as an alien in Men in Black Three.

He once proudly noted that he’s never missed a performance. He’s worked with broken legs, broken arms and ankles, and once while doing a play he passed a kidney stone on opening night. He was a rare, tough old bird, a vanishing breed, and one of my heroes. We won’t see his like again.

by Jim Knipfel

#Jim Kinipfel #The Chiseler #Rip Torn

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fortunatelylori · 6 years ago

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GOT: That awkward moment when Daenerys Targareyen turned into Mount Vesuvius

Oh, rejoice all you Dany critics, all you Jonsas and all you Sansa stans! Our deliverance is here! From this day on we can finally shed the shackles of the anti-Dany tag, stop censoring the conqueror’s name and go wild in the Daenerys Targareyen tag! Dark Dany has arrived!

Praise be! Praise be!

General impressions

This was, by far, my favorite episode of the season. Miguel Sapochnik really delivered on this one. It looked stunning, the fighting was interesting and realistic in that it showed the type of carnage that is handed down when an army attacks a highly populated city and the visual effects were incredibly impressive.

This shot right here might just be one of my all time favorite GOT shots:

It was also, frankly, a relief to finally have Dark Dany out in the open. The show has skirted around the issue of Dany’s turn to the dark side since season 2. If you were shocked by what happened in this episode and think it came out of nowhere, you have no one to blame but yourself. In this corner of the fandom we have been speculating Dany would end up burning King’s Landing for years.

Also ...

That’s season freaking 2, you nincompoops!

And they really weren’t stingy on the Mad King imagery now that the Her Darkness is here. Dany starts the episode looking like this:

What is the most pressing thing on khaleesi’s mind?

Girl! If you’re so worried about Jon’s lustrous, romantically jealous, always put together cousin, do yourself a favor, put a comb through that hair, slap some foundation and blush on and get a freaking grip! You need to be bringing your A game to this fight!

Luckily, Tyrion decides to give Dany the incentive she needs in order to tend to her person hygiene ... Getting ready for an execution, of course!

Dany is wearing a piece from the Targareyen nuclear winter collection. Very avangarde.

Things don’t improve from here and, as we all know, she ends up Dacarys-ing her entire fandom:

The city surrenders, the bells ring just as Tyrion had stressed through out the episode and Dany ponders ... She’s come to Westeros expecting to be embraced and loved. Being loved and accepted is very important to Dany. Without those two things, granted unconditionally and uncritically, she feels undervalued. King’s Landing ends up paying for that lapse in adoration:

This episode, GOT decided to take a break from ripping off How to Train your Dragon and decided to rip off Pompeii (2014) instead:

Pompeii:

GOT:

Pompeii:

GOT:

Pompeii:

GOT:

So yeah, guys! Daenerys Targareyen is a cataclysmic event! Can I get a hallelujah? Cause this delulu, sexually frustrated, teenage soccer mom is having fun!

Apart from the sweet taste of vindication giving me LIFE, the reason why I enjoyed this episode so much is that it focused on the 3 characters who actually had an arc this season. Apart from Dany, those are:

Arya Stark

I think the most important line Arya has uttered this entire season was this:

Arya: I know death. It has many faces. I look forward to seeing this one.

In true GOT fashion, be careful what you wish for. Arya is confronted with the most extreme versions of death imaginable, first in the specter of the Night King and his armies. And now, in the shape of Daenerys Targareyen and her dragon raining fire on a defenseless city.

And while the White Walkers rattle Arya’s cage, they don’t manage to break through it. Her reaction to the destruction of King’s Landing is far more emotional than what she experienced during the Battle for the Dawn.

I think that’s because the White Walkers were existential threats, catalysts of violence. They were not willfully cruel, they weren’t there to punish. They had a purpose and they served that purpose until the end.

The destruction of King’s Landing, on the other hand, is a human act. Someone makes the decision to destroy this city, burn people alive, murder and rape them. Daenereys chooses to do this:

The Stallion that Mounts the World serves Arya the most extreme lesson in revenge she could have ever gotten and the results finally break through Arya’s shell.

Another top ten GOT shot:

This is so visually striking! The blood framing her eyes just jumps at you. She looks like a rag doll on the verge of being tossed against a wall. This girl who has gone through such harrowing experiences, the brilliant assassin who ended the Night King is now in danger of being squashed as if she were an ant.

It really drives home not just the immense power Dany is wielding but also that in being rendered powerless, Arya always manages to find strength in herself and her basic empathy:

I’m really curious how her arc is concluded next episode.

Jaime Lannister

I was never a Braime shipper so, while I get your dissapointment, guys, I definitely don’t share it. I absolutely love how Jaime’s arc was concluded. I do think there will be differences in the books (I still believe Jaime is the valonqar). However this:

was foreshadowed back in season 1:

Cersei: Jaime and I are more than brother and sister. We shared a womb. We came into this world together. We belong together.

Jaime’s story started with Cersei, he dedicated more than 20 years of his life to this relationship, to the detriment of everything else in his life. It feels natural to me that his arc would end with hers, as well.

I think, in a really sad way, Brienne was Jaime’s last stitch attempt at getting Cersei out of his system. That would explain his awkwardness during their sex scene. And it almost worked, because Brienne is someone Jaime cares about. However when faced with the possibility of Cersei dying, Jaime goes back to her because he can’t bare to let her go through that alone.

I mean ... if you look up the definition of tragic couple, I half expect a picture of Cersei and Jaime to pop up. And I find it supremely ironic that the couple who shocked and disgusted everyone back in season 1, now gets a tearful reunion, the male character fighting a death duel to get back to the woman he loves and the woman who hardened herself against everything finally becomes human in the arms of the only person she truly wants.

This, to me, is love ...

Yes, I’m fucked up. Let’s not dwell on that!

However, as much as I enjoyed watching these three characters make their way through this episode, there are still two things that managed to tarnish this episode for me.

Let’s start with the obvious, shall we?

Jon Snow

This used to be Jon Snow, back when he had a POV and a spine.

In this episode Jon Snow stands idly by while a man gets burned alive:

Jon’s POV continues to be blocked and, at this point, I’m tired of trying to figure out what is going on behind the curtain. I’m just not willing to do it anymore, simply because Jon’s actions this episode speak louder than any supposed intention he might have in acting the way he does.

I want you to follow this conversation very carefully:

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Varys: We both know what she’s about to do.

Jon: That’s her decision to make. She is our queen.

Varys: Men decide where power resides, whether or not they know it.

Jon: What do you want?

Varys: All I’ve ever wanted. The right ruler on the Iron Throne. I still don’t know how her coin has landed but I’m quite certain about yours.

Jon: I don’t want it. I never have.

Varys: [...] You will rule wisely and well, while she ...

Jon: She is my queen.

This discussion is crucial to the ultimate question of whether or not Jon Snow bares responsibility for what happens in King’s Landing. And I would say that based on this, the answer is a resounding yes.

Varys starts plotting in episode 4, the moment he realizes that Dany is about to treat King’s Landing and all its inhabitants to some good ol’ fashion fire and blood. He tells Jon in this scene that they both know what she’s about to do. Jon doesn’t contradict him. He hankers down on the “whatever my queen wants” party line.

Whether or not Jon is political or simply a idiotic coward, the fact remains he knows enough of Dany at this point to figure out there is a strong possibility that she will sack the city and many, many innocent people will die. Varys is trying to get him to act. He’s had chances to formulate some sort of resistance against Dany since episode 1. He has chosen not to. He’s chosen not to plot against her, he’s chosen to tell her the truth about his parentage instead of using it to his advantage, he’s chosen to abandon the dragon he could have used against her and to keep those closest to him in the dark about his motivations.

He’s made his choices. If he’s done it out of love for Dany, than he’s an irresponsible and selfish fool. If he’s done it to protect the North and his family, he has done so at the expense of everyone else in Westeros. Either way, these are the consequences:

This man, and I’m very sorry to say it, is not fit to be anyone’s king. In this episode he barely manages to keep his men from killing indiscriminately and raping women. He doesn’t even take charge of protecting civilians and trying to take them to safety, the way Arya does.

Instead, Jon drags his men after him and runs from the city with his tail between his legs....

I just .....

My other point of contention with this episode doesn’t really have much to do with the episode itself but rather that the set-up for the pay-offs delivered here wasn’t done properly in past episodes. For example:

Cersei’s downfall: We all knew it was coming and it was bittersweet and moving. However they’ve given Lena Heady barely anything to do all season. She’s had a total of 4 scenes so when the end eventually comes, it feels shortsighted and incomplete.

Claganebowl: Another one that was telegraphed in advanced. The scene itself is brilliant however the set-up for it is so hamfisted. The Ds couldn’t think of another way these two could meet but for Sandor to just up and decide with no prior warning that he’s going to KL. Why now so damn particularly? In that vein, The Mountain is supposed to be a mindless zombie. How come he is now perfectly capable of disobeying orders from both Cersei and Qyburn?

Arya’s story: As I mentioned, I absolutely loved Arya in this episode. However, I can’t help but wish they had put more work in her POV and in her revenge vs. humanity dilemma to truly make Sandor’s advice and her journey through the burning city as emotionally rewarding as it could have been.

Tyrion: I get that I’m not allowed to understand what the hell is going on with Jon, but why has that extended to Tyrion all of a sudden? Tyrion starts off the episode betraying his only friend and condemning him to a fiery death and for the life of me I don’t understand why. He’s clearly terrified of Dany. Considering her state of mind when he informs her of Vary’s betrayal, she’s one step away from executing him as well. When he sets Jaime free, he seems resigned to being executed by her later on. So why not try to work with Varys to overthrow her? It certainly isn’t that he thinks she’ll make a good queen. He can’t possibly think that in this episode. Is it greed and desire for power? They haven’t done a good enough job for me to buy into that wholesale. So what is it?

Favorite scenes:

The “Are you unforgiven too?” scene:

youtube

So close, no matter how far Couldn't be much more from the heart Forever trusting who we are And nothing else matters

All the while, the Lannister theme plays in the background .... PERFECTION!

The “Love Thy Brother” scene:

youtube

I know I criticized the set-up but the scene itself is spectacular. The visuals alone are breathtaking. The fighting is brutal and absolutely horrendous. And the two of them falling into a bottomless pit of flames, feels particularly chilling and sad considering the Hound’s fear of fire.

My favorite part of the scene, though, is the cutting back and forth between Sandor and Arya. Coupled with their conversation that convinces Arya to give up her list, this creates a wonderful parallel between the two characters and a nice bookend to their twisted but, surprisingly, poignant relationship.

The “In the queen’s ashes” scene:

youtube

Maisie Williams has been a real champ this season. And this episode, in particular, was her coup d’grace. I absolutely loved her acting in this scene. On top of that, the imagery of the destruction around her, the eerie quiet after the chaos that had come before and ultimately the discovery of the charred bodies of the woman and child she had tried to rescue, with echos of the Stark theme in the background, make this a truly outstanding scene.

It becomes even more poignant when you think that this is the city that started Arya’s tragedy when her father was executed and her book wish that King’s Landing would burn to the ground. When faced with the reality of it, Arya finds empathy, not satisfaction.

In the BTS, the Ds compare Arya to Virgil taking her journey through hell and it truly feels that way. Up until she jumps on that horse and fades into the fiery landscape.

Beautiful!

Episode MVPs:

Lord “It’s been an honor, sir!” Varys

I’m going to nominate only one MVP for this episode because this man truly is in a league of his own.

He is the true hero of this episode and the fantasy show equivalent of a martyr. He is the only one ... THE ONLY ONE ... that actually tried to stop Dany from committing genocide. And as thanks for his bravery and commitment to saving innocent lives, he was betrayed by his best friend and burned alive.

#got8 spoilers #got 8x05 #got review #my got meta #got meta #jon snow #daenerys targaryen #arya stark #jaime lannister #cersei lannister #house lannister #anti-daenerys #jaime x cersei #house stark #lord varys

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toonstarterz · 5 years ago

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BECAUSE I’M NOT POPULAR, I’LL READ WATAMOTE: CHAPTER #160

After a long week of repeating quizzes, forging apology letters, and unexpected-but-not-really bonding, Tomoko and Yoshida are finally free to go. As the barrier separating Tomoko’s suspension and the outside world with her friends is finally lifted, we get to see just how both parties have grown from this experience. Even if Tomoko’s apology was more or less half-assed, something may have been gained after all...

Chapter 160: Because I’m Not Popular, It’s The Last Day Of Suspension

Whaddup, Tomoki? Your eye bags aren’t so heavy today. Is that artistic oversight, or has Tomoko’s suspension taken a load off your stress level?

Oh yeah, I had forgotten that Tomoki heads to school earlier than Tomoko does. He used to get really anal about avoiding his sister in the mornings, but it looks like he’s not so objectionable about it anymore...

Is that how it works? I've never worked at a huge company with a sports club other than a fantasy football league, so I don’t have much of a reference. But if Tomoko is correct, then my assumption is that the sports clubs are used to indirectly promote “company loyalty” and get more work mileage out of their employees.

It’s casual conversations like this that really show just much Tomoko and Tomoki’s sibling relationship has improved since way back then. Sure, they still take potshots at each other, but it’s more in the realm of affectionate brother-sister banter now. The days where they openly held the other with actual disdain have finally come to an end.

Not that they want to look particularly close when out in public, of course.

It’s only the second page, and we’re already getting hit with the heartwarming feels? Damn, this is gonna be a tearjerker chapter, ain’t it?

As this chapter soon verifies, the last day of suspension is nothing short of formalities and kissing ass.

Wow, it took the whole week to get full marks on those worksheets? Maybe I’m missing something here, but I’m not sure they’re really learning anything from those suspension packets if they’re just regurgitating answers.

Also, Dead-Eyes Teacher can actually smile? How about that.

Tomoko’s apathy towards her progress here leaves me wondering: Just how much do the teachers really think suspension is inspiring students to do better? My guess has always been that suspension is like a prison in principle in that it’s more about reforming them than punishment. It may work for some, though I’m inclined to believe that most of them just want to pay their dues and leave with very little actual reflection on their actions, like Yoshida’s perpetually blank face seems to suggest.

Well, I suppose the lack of classroom distractions had to account for something, right? Though having her friends around could be seen as both a hindrance and a benefit towards her study habits.

There’snospecialmeaningforwhyMakosaidYoshida’snamefirst.

...darn it.

So on the Indifference Scale, she just slightly dips in favor of wanting to see them.

Oh Yuri, I know that being noncommittal is kind of your thing, but no one’s going to give you a hard time for wanting to see your friends, especially Mako.

Do I sense a flash mob in the workings here? That’d be pretty lit.

So Katou actually does have some awareness that the idiosyncrasies of her behavior are, in fact, idiosyncrasies. I guess you don’t get to be as beloved as Katou unless you had some common sense.

Even though we all already knew the answer, there’s something oddly relieving to hear it from Katou herself. I think it’s largely out of a sense of empathy for Fuuka, since she’s been strung along for so long, but also because it comes across as “humbling” to hear the on-top-of-the-pedestal Katou accept the truth.

That’s what happens when your expectations don’t match up with reality. You build up this impression for so long that you can’t help but feel jaded when it turns out to not be true, even if you didn’t actually want it to happen.

I call it the Ucchi Effect.

Nooooo, Katou, you had it in the bag! You should have quit while you’re ahead!

But yeah. Katou didn’t really need to bring this up, so a part of me wants to think that she’s using the whole hair-touching moment as a consolation when the whole groping thing didn’t work out.

Still, it’s kind of unnerving that she finds the idea of Tomoko, or anyone really wanting to touch her...there to be so humorous...

What goes around comes around. Stay strong, Fuuka.

We get to see Yoshida’s mom?!?!

Officially the best chapter ever.

I love how this whole time, the teachers have been pestering Yoshida to look more presentable. I’m not sure if Yoshida is being actively defiant or if she’s just clueless about these sorts of things, but I do appreciate that she complies without much fuss.

Getting those parent-teacher conference vibes right about now. The only difference is that those are some swanky couches.

I wonder if Nico Tanigawa just drew up a bunch of random old guys for this “Presidents Throughout The Years” or if they were based on real people.

So...Yoshida’s mom. She definitely has the air of a high-powered career woman, what with the suit and all. It’s pretty ironic considering she has a delinquent like Yoshida for a daughter, but at the same time, maybe it isn’t. It’s been hinted before that Yoshida may come from a well-off family, so having a mom making a generous salary seems pretty plausible. Makes you wonder if Yoshida’s delinquent-ness is some form of rebellion...

I totally expected that Tomoko and Yoshida would have to do something like this, but still. FUUUUUUUUU–

In the immortal words of Tomoko Kuroki...

“How do I bullshit my way out of this one?”

Well, for what it’s worth, the principal looks like a nice, reasonable guy. But as Tomoko has proven time and again, you can never be too careful. Though I have to say, I’m surprised Tomoko would even consider screwing around instead of going right for the safe option. Having an active social life has really given her enough courage to take some risks, even if they end up with bad results more often than not.

So she thinks the principal is one of those perpetually smiling assassins you see in isekai series? That’s really chuuni and I love it.

So in the end, she takes the safe route. Fair enough, but her response is so stock and wooden that you just know it's gonna come to bite her in the ass.

In the midst of all the bullshitting, some of Tomoko’s honestly ends up rising to the surface. It’s the kind of unintended sincerity that really warms my heart. This whole arc has been a great opportunity for the adults in Tomoko’s life to recognize her unexpected popularity, so I’m sure Principal-san will offer some words of wisdom that Tomoko will take to heart for the rest for her li–

Nah, just kidding. Principal’s a troll.

I find it hilarious that Reina’s been put through the suspension wringer so many times, that it stopped being anything worth remembering. For all we know, suspension was just another Tuesday for her.

Of all the recurring characters, who would’ve thought the dog would be one of them?

...

But seriously, whose dog is this?

Delinquent girls laughing at dirty jokes is ironically wholesome to me.

“Do you’re best!” you say? All the evidence points to Ucchi finally going forward with her apology to Tomoko. Of course, Lady Luck will have it be that something will get in her way. And the way this is playing out, we’re going to have the single greater encounter this series’ has ever given us.

The fact that Ucchi can accuse this dog of being gross just because it kind of resembles Tomoko is so stupidly unrealistic and stupidly hilarious at the same time. Girl needs to start majoring in gross-ology.

Poor Emoji Girl just had a Freudian Slip that sums up her Tomoko-philia.

Probably the most reasonable “Gross!” Ucchi has said in a long time.

I wasn’t sure if Tomopup’s appearance was just artistic license, but it turns out the dog looks just as freaky to us as it does in-universe.

Huh. So unlike Yuri, Mako gets both the first name and -chan suffix? Maybe the girl’s just that naturally personable.

I feel like calling out Katou for asserting dominance would be a drastically unsupported claim that would be built upon unreasonable shipping desires.

But that piercing gaze of hers makes that notion hard to assert.

How the tables have turned, eh? I wouldn’t say Mako was being that hypocritical; more like she gained a bit of rebellion during the week while Yuri learned to restrain herself a little bit. A push and pull you could say.

Is this foreshadowing for integrating Yoshida’s delinquent buddies into the Class 3-5 group? Please, please please make it so!

Anna really does like to look on the bright side of things, huh? It’s a great perspective to have around, especially when you have a Reina in your group, who tends to see the world around her as a half-empty glass.

I’ve been made aware that Mrs. Yoshida was actually apologizing for her daughter’s actions and not her own, which suggests that blaming others whenever you can is in the family blood. Even so, Yoshida’s mom is unexpectedly adorable (though given who her daughter is, it’s not that surprising). Perhaps she and Mrs. Kuroki ought to start a support group for Mothers With Troublesome Daughters.

Speaking of which, can we get Yuri’s mom in the picture, too, Nico? You know, for reasons...

Ditching her own mom when the lady had to take time out of her schedule to represent her daughter’s suspended ass? The Yoshida household sounds like a fun ride (I say “ride” because prolonged exposure to Yoshida’s family sounds dangerous).

Not to toot my own horn, but I always knew that if a time ever came where Tomoko had to leave her mother behind to see her explicitly named friends, her mom would encourage her without question.

When it comes to apologies, acknowledgments, and the like, Tomoko is always late to the party. But even if it's at the very last second, she’ll get around to it. Tomoko’s relationship with her mom is probably the least we’ve seen since their familial love has always been more implicit. So seeing Tomoko outright admit that she really does appreciate her mother is incredibly heartwarming.

Hey, hey, hey! That looks like a callback to the afterparty Tomoko told her mom she was going to at the end of her second year. Looks like it really left a positive impression on TomoMom.

Not gonna mince words–seeing Tomoko’s mom look so proud of her daughter brings a tear to my eyes.

She’s never really admitted it before (as far as we know), but Tomoko’s mom really was concerned about her daughter’s lack of friends at the start of high school. Some have accused her of being a bad mother for not taking a more active role in Tomoko’s social growth, but I was never in that camp. Sure, TomoMom’s not perfect, and she could’ve shown more of an interest, but I think it did Tomoko some good that her mother never judged her. Expressing her concern without badgering her daughter is peak mothering right there.

To reiterate what every fan thought at this shot: This looks like a series finale.

It rare for a chapter to end so unabashedly happy like this, but that rarity makes it all the more sweeter when it does happen. It dials it up to eleven when you realize what this means for the series going forward. One of the uncertainties Watamote has addressed is the possibility that everyone will drift apart once high school ends. Well, this single moment gives us a little test on that theory. Even if Tomoko were to disappear for a week, her friends will still be there for her. And even if it doesn’t work out as well once they go out into the “real world”, it looks like, as her mom says, Tomoko will be fine now.

And thus the curtain falls on the Suspension Arc. We’ve still got a few hurdles to overcome, but for now, things look sunny in the world of Watamote.

#watamote #watamote review #chapter 160 #no matter how i look at it it's you guys' fault i'm not popular!#tomoko kuroki #tomoki kuroki #masaki yoshida #yuri tamura #mako tanaka #hina nemoto #akane okada #asuka katou #sakaki fuuka #ogino #tomoko's mom #anna haruna #reina #emiri uchi #review

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gerrydelano · 5 years ago

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Thanks so much! in my story 4 of the mc are gonna try to fix their countries. One has a huge rich ppl problem, the other has a dictatorship problem. The third one which 2 of them are from is a cool country, expect friends of the dictator from the other country are trying to corrupt shit up. On one hand id rll like them both to murder the bbeg. On the other id rll like the government to do it, cuz they can count on it, while the other two dont have that. (Theyre going to murder a lot of bg still)

under a cut just for rambling!

i had to look up wtf “bbeg” meant and NOW i get it. hmmm. i don’t actually know how to make this decision sadly, i feel like i’d probably have to know more about the story as a whole?

write out a list of pros and cons for each option, and weigh them against each other. what would be the most satisfying endgame? do you want this to be a satisfying kill, or one that’s perhaps stolen from the people who deserved to enact it, which may then kick off another plot bit?

would it actually be of any good for those two characters to commit a murder like that? would it empower or haunt them? if the former, is that something you’re prepared to explore the intricacies of? how could they change in good or bad ways as a result of this? how do they view each other after it happens, does it strengthen or damage their relationship?

that would set you up to explore them on an individual scale, how things change for them after it happens, how people respond to them, what they’re going to have to do to stay safe, etc. it’d be VERY complicated and maybe give you a little more to do, considering that’s an assassination and they’d surely be wanted for it.

definitely avoid the trope where someone kills the big bad and then everybody snaps out of a magic trance and everything’s all better. there’d be MAJOR consequences, even if the guy is Big Bad.

on the other hand, having the gov’t do it opens up all sorts of wild political nonsense you’d have to get into because no gov’t is actually. like. Good, really. there are most certainly going to be drawbacks to how even the Good Guys operate and gov’t sanctioned assassinations are a really wild thing to content with in writing and in concept so like.

you def have a lot to play with there! small scale vs large scale. the small scale option (having these individuals do it) would surely Expand into a larger problem and potentially go hand in hand with the government aspect of all of this, so mmmmaybe you can find a way to do both, in a sense? they do it, and their gov’t protects them/they get recruited by their gov’t, and then from there perhaps investigate things from within and potentially uncover/dismantle things, etc.

i just don’t trust any gov’t ovejhBKFJDNksjnkjn and when you’re dealing with things on a country wide scale, always remember that patriotism isn’t blind support for your country no matter what they do; it’s being constantly critical of it and actively advocating/fighting for ways that it can improve and knock off whatever bad shit it does. i don’t believe there’s such a thing as a Good Cool Country yknow like it’s WAY too complicated and Big for that, therefore you have a lot to play with!

and i don’t know your story or your characters! i think you should start with the list and see what you think would be the most fun to write. my personal feeling just from this is that the gov’t doing it seems almost too quick/clean? so i’d wanna know how you would make that interesting.

i hope this helps some! aaaa!

#anon #asks

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secretsfromwholecloth · 5 years ago

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Dragon Age II, day 5.

The post-coital arm stroking in Merrill’s romance cutscene, reblog if you agree.

The sweetness. The realism. That is a thing I have done to people.

The more characters I meet with amazing voices provided by VAs who are actually from the relevant country, the more inexplicable the casting of Zevran becomes.

When I do an RPG series playthrough like this, I research and plan out my class and romance choices to experience a nice cross-section of stuff that appeals to me. (My first four Watchers in Pillars were the result of just this sort of planning to make sure I bagged the set of romances and faction alliances without making myself look cis or homophobic. I get twitchy about these things, OK?) For this run, I read up on my romance options and picked out Alistair, Merrill, and Blackwall, constructing the rest from there. Alistair was the obvious choice because he’s cute and appealing, of course. With Blackwall it became obvious very quickly that I was seeing myself in him; I’ve got a long speech on that prepared that I’ll give you when I actually meet him. I thought I’d picked Merrill because she was adorable, but...”lonely person researches the ancient past of their culture as a way of connecting with them even though the present-day community wants no part of them”? I, uh, may know something about that. Oh, Merrill. I hereby decree that Taran is giving you a shit-ton more hugs somewhere just offscreen.

So, Merrill, Varric, and Sten are writer-siblings, huh? Clearly madame loves me and wants me to be happy, because she’s taken very, very good care of me.

I love it when writers don’t hate me, whether for being fat, AFAB, non-binary, aro and/or ace-spec, a rape survivor, mentally ill, or just generally kind of weird and terrible. The Deadfire team won my undying loyalty that way, and Ms. Kirby has now done the same.

Hey, Isabela, get back here, I hadn’t had your Questioning Beliefs conversation yet!

Oop, time to fight some Qunari.

Stroud? The Grey Wardens are here? Thanks, guys!

BETHANYYYY *sniff*

Honestly, Taran would be having a much easier time of the whole “losing pretty much his entire family” thing if the last non-Gamlen relative standing didn’t resent him so much for the whole “packing her off to the Wardens” thing.

That’s...a lot of hostile Qunari. Welp. Let’s do this.

And now, on to Act 3. Meredith, you’re terrible.

Oh hello, Delilah Howe. Why, yes, I’d love to go looking for your brother. :D :D :D

Oh, Nathaniel, I’ve missed you. I think Anders has missed you, too. Hm, you sound a little off, but I suppose you’re in rough shape right now.

*sniff* Bethany!

Nate, Bethany, you two take care of each other. You can bond over your messed-up families and how fucked up everything got because of the Blight. Oh, hey, get Nate to tell you some stories about her majesty the Warden-Commander, he’s got some good ones. (Oghren’s got better ones from the Blight, assuming he’s still alive, but he’s best kept away from pretty young women for the sake of everyone’s sanity. Maybe get those second-hand from someone less...sexual-harass-y.)

Honestly, Taran doesn’t even have the energy to misread the situation and give Nate a threatening speech about his intentions. Just...take care of his sister, buddy. Because he apparently can’t, and you’ll never, ever convince him that she doesn’t need a big brother to protect her.

(As far as shipping Nate/Bethany, I find I rather like it. But we’re waiting until after this happens to have them fall for each other, right? An 11-year age gap is period-typical and doesn’t have to stop a pair of adults from doing anything—I’d be a hypocrite if I said it did!—but I’m a little more comfortable when it’s 26/37 than 23/34. Besides, that way they’ve had time to get to know each other, which is how I like it.)

A new Act means a new round of scouring the hinterlands for crafting resources and loot. Wheeeeeee kill me now.

...Zevran? Are you sending me after Zevran, Nuncio?

Oh, Zevran. I’ll admit, I did kind of miss you. I still wish you’d had a genuine Hispanophone VA, though. And wow, you look different.

You’ll never convince me that Zevran isn’t on retainer as their majesties’ convenient assassin friend. Or at least that he won’t be once he finds himself back in Ferelden.

Here Taran thought he’d track down some relatively nice apostates, he’d turn them loose, they’d be grateful, it’d be nice. Nope, here he is putting down abominations. He took Templar powers in the first place because he could be more useful and less dangerous to the mages around him if he could dispel or no-sell magic that went wrong instead of having to attack them. It’s wearing on him.

See, this business with Emile is how he wanted all of them to go.

Oh, Anders. It’s understandable why you would lie, considering what you’re actually planning, but...augh.

Anders, stop. We get it, you think blood magic is awful, but a) considering what you’re up to, are you sure you’re an improvement, and b) ragging on Taran and Merrill’s relationship feels kind of icky coming from someone who was so damned loud about wanting Taran for himself. You won’t get them to break up any more than they’ll get you to call off the bombing.

Sister Nightingale? *bouncyclaps* It’s after midnight, though, so I’ll have to go see her tomorrow.

#dragon age #dragon age ii #taran hawke

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