#BIG FAN of that sequence from ep 7 to ep 8 | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

phoenixtakaramono · 6 months ago

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Well, alright. You’d asked for it.

*Note, to keep this fair, I will be excluding unconfirmed fan theories and merely judge the overall season objectively through the lens of a writer (albeit colored a bit with a bit of bias as a fan who loves the television series). And if I’m going to be shooting alternate ideas of what they could’ve done instead, they’d be on what I think could make more long-term sequel/ spin-off profit/ be better payoffs to set-up season 5.

**Also, no matter who you stan in the show, we all collectively agree The Boys TV is mainly about the story of Butcher and Homelander. They are the main characters; everyone else is their supporting cast to tell their narrative. Before you interject and say “but what about Hughie/ Annie?”—lemme stop you there. Let me ask you honestly, if either Butcher or Homelander died in S5x01, would you honestly keep watching The Boys S5 eps 2-8?

The tl;dr is aside from episodes 4, 7-8, everything else was lackluster and forgettable. There were only kernels of things I’d liked and would keep from the other episodes, but on a whole they’d left very little-to-nonexistent impact on my viewing enjoyment. VoughtHQ had leaked all the episodes so I wasn’t surprised watching anything this season the two big twists (Joe Kessler being a hallucination, and the reveal of Soldier Boy at the end) were already spoiled for me; if anything the expression of my face the entire time was: 😐 (default) or 🫤 (meh) or 😑 (oh, they went there; it could’ve been so much better).

Episode 1: Department of Dirty Tricks

I don’t mind the opening sequence of how they (re)introduced the relevant main characters of the show. But if I had to nitpick, from the writers’ table, you have to recognize S4x01 will be a portion of your audience’s first exposure to the show. Like an opening paragraph of any book, you have to tantalize your viewers. Lure them in—and captivate them into your universe. As a showrunner, you want more people tuning in—and spreading the hype so your show is raking up numbers. Showing newcomers of The Boys epically failing to assassinate Victoria Neuman—while, yes, it does establish Neuman as a legitimate threat and a boss b*tch—is…probably not how I’d open this scene. Because, as a reminder, in S3x08, the finale is of The Boys gathered around the TV looking in horror as Neuman declares her running as VP—with Butcher coming in and diabolically looking into the camera to declare the cvnt’s gotta go. I would’ve loved to have seen this entire season drag out Victoria Neuman’s death. Show us the process of The Boys getting the CIA’s cooperation, convincing and showing Bob Singer proof that his running mate is a Supe, and making a detailed plan to take her out in S4x08. I’d prefer that they build up to it, and we witness a cinematic masterpiece of an exciting heist-like crime thriller like Ocean’s Eleven—but make it bloody and gory and with your usual on brand raunchy humor.

I like the introduction of Homelander, Ryan, and Sage. I would keep all of that. It was very cool to hear Sage deliver her Machiavellian speech about turning the masses and making her allegory comparing Homelander essentially to Caesar and the fall of empires. It’s delightfully twisted—and sets up how crazy things will get.

I have very strong opinions about Joe Kessler.

This is Joe Kessler in the show

This is Howard Joe Kessler (aka Monkey, according to Billy) in the comics

Really? This is Billy’s personification of a tough, grizzled manly man? This nerdy coward who got SAed by monkeys, got kicked in the family jewels by Butcher and whom Butcher later got him SAed by Terror? …Are you starting to see my issue with the writers deciding to cast JDM for this role—when they literally could’ve chosen any other character from the comic?

Let’s put JDM aside for now (great actor, great guy, I just think they could’ve picked a so much better role for him; what a missed opportunity). This is going to be controversial, but honestly they could’ve replaced his character with any other character in Butcher’s life—and it would’ve been so much better and more hard-hitting and more of an emotional roller coaster ride. Especially if it’s, say, a character we’ve seen before so we, the audience, already have an emotional connection to and we, with our preconceived bias, assume, just like with Billy, that they exist in real time because we’ve literally seen them in prior seasons so we know they exist in the universe.

The plot twist about them being Billy’s hallucination would hit that much harder if it’s someone like, and I’m going to suggest a couple examples but hear me out: his abusive “miraculously cancer free” father, Sam Butcher it could’ve worked as a f*cked up father-son bonding experience Billy thought he was getting, but it’s already foreshadowed to us the audience that something’s wrong because Sam Butcher is said to be Stage 4 in a previous season and yet he looks somehow strong and healthy and it’s also strange because why is he in New York when he should be in London (you can even set this up to a future funeral scene where Billy shows up to his father’s grave in London, after his realization that the father he’s still seeing talk trash to him is a manifestation of his imagination and this could’ve served as a son’s projection about how f*cked up his troubled upbringing had been and how it’d impacted him and this could serve as the show’s cycle of abuse commentary, and Billy p*sses on his father’s grave as a homage to the panel from the comics). Or, heck, if it must be Kripke’s OC, maybe make it Becca’s brother—so Billy thinks he’s interacting with his grieving brother-in-law. Or make it Hughie, so when the plot twist is revealed, we, the audience, are like “What, that Hughie/ Billy’s obvious Lenny little brother substitute was a figment of Butcher’s imagination?” Or, make it Billy Butcher’s former case officer (for those who don’t know, think of case officers…like a CIA agent’s supervisor).

Literally any other character could’ve worked as the avatar of Billy’s V-ed up tumor the literal representation of Billy’s true thoughts (the devil on his shoulder, to contrast hallucination!Becca aka the good angel on his shoulder) so the writers can set him up as the show’s hidden boss/ ruthless genocidal Big Bad to defeat going into S5. And I’d just thought of these alternatives rapid-fire and off the top of my head in three minutes.

But, let’s say, Kripke is adamant about keeping JDM casted as Joe Kessler, for whatever reason. JDM is a fan favorite actor so of course you gotta capitalize on his popularity and cast him in the show. What then? Okay. You are introducing a new character in the show, so you need to get your audience emotionally invested in him. You will have failed as a showrunner and writer if I do not give two shites about him. So what I’d do instead is trim out the side-plots and make this episode (or a later episode) dedicated to showing the audience a flashback of Billy Butcher in the past. Imagine. Not only would it be an interesting insight into what Butcher was like younger, now in his days in the SAS or Royal Marines or maybe as a field operative for a paramilitary operation, we can also have the show’s idiosyncratic superhero and political satire commentary. Billy Butcher and Joe Kessler met in Panjshir, Afghanistan. Is this during the War on Terror era? Or a time even before that? Okay, imagine how much we’d care about Joe Kessler if we see a Steve Rogers and Bucky kind of friendship deep in the trenches of Afghanistan? The writers could show us a scene of Kessler shoving Butcher out of the line of fire but gets hurt—and, in return, Butcher heroically deciding to break orders to leave his comrade behind and recklessly go berserk rushing back to the frontlines to save Kessler (this is a character moment they could’ve capitalized on to endear us to Butcher and make us think, hey, despite how terrible he is, this crazy British mad dog also has a loyal, humane side to him even bad guys have their own code of morals; the showrunners could even make this flashback sequence badass and blood-pumping; it could also appeal to the patriotic historical war stans in the audience). The writers can even drop in a tongue-in-cheek Easter egg like a seemingly insignificant conversation about how Butcher and Kessler, as soldiers bonding together, heard about there being this so-called miraculous super serum that was supposed to make soldiers into super soldiers (spoiler alert: it’s Compound V)—and questioning what the heck happened to that? Wouldn’t that have been interesting? Now flash forward back to the present, and have Kessler and Butcher talk about how they’d both gotten jobs in the CIA, and the writer throw in a comic reference by joking how Butcher used to call him Monkey. Don’t reveal to your audience yet that Kessler is a hallucination (the payoff could be where it’s very subtly foreshadowed over a course of a couple episodes that Kessler, actually, had been KIA-ed or expired). The key is that the clues have to be subtle; literally the majority of the audience should not be able to have noticed the strangeness of those lingering pan shots during the first watch-though of season 4. This way the show has rewatch value of fans going back to inspect the show frame-by-frame after the twist is revealed, because now the audience can go back to try to catch what little Easter egg details they’d missed that’d foreshadowed this plot twist all along across the episodes—and now your TV ratings/ numbers are boosted because this shows that people are tuning in to watch.

This ties to my later opinion regarding the twist of Joe Kessler being revealed as Billy’s hallucination—and the tentacles.

Regarding Annie’s subplot with the Starlight House, they rushed too fast into the time skip with it and unfortunately, that sacrifices me from caring about any of these new side characters. I would’ve personally drawn this out by making one of these new characters somehow related to Annie’s past or unknowingly share with Annie about how much they’d admired Starlight as a result of her bravery bringing them out of their own dark trauma. Make me care about these characters—so when the violent protest breaks out, I’m much more gut-wrenched.

Also, I would axe the Colin and Frenchie sideplot completely. I’ll explain why in ep4.

Episode 2: Life Among the Septics

Homelander’s mid-life crisis and his narcissistic tendencies battling against his want to be a good supportive dad for his son is good. I liked the Sage, Ryan, and Homelander moments—especially when Sage said to Homelander’s face: “Ryan is special; he’s more special than you because he’s the first naturally Supe born child.”

What I don’t like is the aftermath of Todd’s death. It’s too quick—and there’s no satisfying feeling of payoff of M.M. feeling conflicted and whatever other emotion you, as the showrunner, want him to portray. Todd is a hilariously iconic Homelander incel fanatic who finally got his dream to meet his hero after all these seasons—and got murked by him; you can’t let Todd go out with just a whimper, writers. Todd was Homelander’s biggest fan. He had his own irl Twitter account. And you gave him a very ironic death in the show—which I would now then capitalize on. I would personally dedicate at least three to five minutes of maybe giving this side character a funeral M.M. is forced to attend and give a eulogy speech on, and this is an opportunity to slip in some kinda relevant subtle satirical commentary or wry punchline to it about not meeting your heroes—or something like M.M. telling his daughter this is what happens when you idolize celebs when they’re actually terrible people behind the scenes.

I like Firecracker’s introduction—and that she’s an obvious red neck conspiracist and Marjorie Taylor Greene inspired parody. And that she’s a C-or-D-list loser who’d be geeked out for an opportunity to be invited into The Seven thanks to Sage—and for a chance to meet and work alongside Homelander.

The whole episode of this conspiracy theory TruthCon convention is very on the nose and amusing to watch, even the centipede-man rimming each other sequence. It’s also an exposé on the American culture (with the title being life among the septics, aka British speak for life among the Americans).

I also like Firecracker revealing that she held a grudge against Annie for having spread rumors about her during their pageant days. I like the whole mean girl aspect of Annie being revealed. Personally I would’ve dragged this out to reveal her true motivation in a later episode; this way we see this new character gunning after Starlight so much and we think to ourselves—damn, woman, why do you hate Starlight so much? So if you keep it a secret for now, there’s now a mystery, so viewers will feel curious about her motivations and be more enticed to tune in.

You already know how I feel about the Frenchie/Colin subplot. It’s meaningless. I would respect it if they’d committed to it, but they didn’t and ended up chickening out of it. So I say axe it completely. I ended up pressing the 10 seconds fast forward button through his scenes—and I didn’t miss out on anything. I’m all for more bi and queer representation in my media—but my tinfoil hat conspiracy theory is that the writers threw this subplot in for Frenchie to detract from the irl controversy regarding Frenchie’s actor. I won’t get into that here but if you know, you know. Did the writers come up with this sideplot because Tomer Capone had to film elsewhere during this time so they made up this B-plot so they could have “Frenchie jailed” and let the actor finish filming his parts or finish whatever his obligation was, before coming back?

Kimiko’s sideplot about confronting her past to heal…I wished they did more for her character sideplot. Her tackling the child traffickers ring could’ve been interesting if they executed it better. Maybe axe Frenchie’s S4 subplot and make it so that it’s revealed Frenchie had accidentally helped out The Shining Light when he’d been a gun runner for Little Nina/ the Russian mafia. Imagine the potential. It turns out Frenchie and Kimiko had met long time ago; and they hadn’t realized. Maybe he’d been hurt and Kimiko, who’d managed to run away, kept quiet about his location when rival mafia members or Asian island cops were out hunting for him. Imagine how cute that’d be (“F: That little girl/ K: young man was you?”); destiny had brought them together again.

For The Boys being split and at odds with each other and excluding Butcher, I hate it. Remove that from this season. It’s a retread of previous seasons—and it bogs down the story when it doesn’t have to. You only have eight episodes. There’s no tension—because you already know they’re going to all somehow get together again, so this feels like unnecessary drama for drama’s sake.

Episode 3: We'll Keep the Red Flag Flying Here

This is the episode that delivered Karl Urban putting on an apron and going through the process of lovingly baking drug-laced cookies for Ryan—and, in the end, doing the morally right thing by binning the cookies and, instead, having an actual emotional heart-to-heart with Becca’s child. This feels like progress. It feels necessary. And I like that. It’s fanservice—but it’s fanservice with a bit of a reference to Sam Butcher having been a baker who ran his own bakery back in London in the comic. So of course William J. Butcher must’ve picked up on some baking cooking? skills from his dad and maybe from his mum?.

I’ll be honest, this is the only thing^ plus Homelander’s meltdown at the end of the episode that interested me. They needed a way to transition into Homelander's homecoming episode, and I actually enjoyed seeing him express his frustration at Ryan ("why am I not enough for you?"). Perfect and much needed character moment. Everything else though in the episode I’ve forgotten—which means it was unmemorable and lackluster and could’ve been skipped. This might've been the ice skating episode and if it is, I'd either remove the scene of Hughie escaping through the ducts (how is the common layperson supposed to know ducts are made of zinc? how wouldn't Homelander's hyper-sensitive sense of smell and hearing not be able to pinpoint where Hughie is?) or go about Hughie's plot armor a different way.

I don’t have much of other suggestions because this ties into my thoughts for the other episodes. Now you’d freed up more screentime to focus on other important things.

(⬇️For my thoughts about eps 4-8 ⬇️)

Episode 4: Wisdom of the Ages

It’s our insight in Homelander’s upbringing, and is important for both character introspection and plot development. I am relieved Antony Starr took a look at the script Kripke initially showed him—and went, “wait, that’s cruel and flat if I just go in and slaughter them; if I’m returning to my origins, I think it’d be more complex if I return to my origins and it’s like I’m still this lost child.” (Not his exact words from the interview but you get the gist.) I have nothing I’d change about this episode. I love everything this episode—whenever the camera reverted back to Antony Starr’s scenes.

My gripes with this episode is minor in the grand scheme of things. It has to do with the Frenchie/Colin subplot (okay, we saw the disaster a mile away; and this later inspires Frenchie to turn himself in…the writers could’ve literally skipped this whole subplot and it wouldn’t even detract from the story. In fact, this frees up screentime to focus on far more important things to advance the plot or give character development time).

The abortion subplot is also unnecessary drama. You could’ve removed it—and it doesn’t detract from S4’s story. Abortion already is such a controversial sensitive topic, and if the writers insist on the abortion subplot, okay, since this is a dark comedy satirical show, I would go balls to the wall and make this an episode 1 reveal where Annie has been puking all over and gaining weight. It’s when she misses her period that she thinks ‘oh no’ and whips out a pregnancy test. Now the writers have an opportunity to lampoon both sides. Maybe both Hughie and Annie are on the fence about it—and this is a character moment where Hughie reveals Butcher’s and Becca’s backstory to Annie. Everyone is encouraging them to have the baby but 1) they’re involved in a dangerous fight against Homelander/ Vought so do they really want Annie to be incapacitated and potentially lose their child, 2) what if it’s a Supe baby; what then are the complications and body horror potential HL literally lasered his bio mom’s belly and, in the comics, Ryan had literally killed comic Becca from childbirth and comic Butcher had to kill the baby himself, 3) and now there’s this fear that maybe Vought could get their hands on their child, take him/her away from them, and raise them like a lab rat. Do they really want all this to happen? The writers can show Hughie and Annie having a conflict about this instead of the Shifter Annie conflict, and it would hit harder. Do you understand the point I’m making? Do you see the emotional upheaval and impact this could’ve had—instead of the offscreen mention of Annie having an abortion?

The reveal of Butcher having taken V off-screen was a bad decision. This is a character defining moment for Butcher. Why did you make it off-screen? As a writer, I would’ve shown Butcher being torn up about it or—if they must save screentime—show it via flashbacks of his internal struggle. Show, don’t tell. The conversation he had with Hughie would’ve hit that much harder when Hughie contemplated injecting his dying father with V.

Episode 5: Beware the Jabberwock, My Son

The way Homelander changed his methodology of manipulating reconnecting with his son after is, in my opinion, not bad. Adam Bourke is a slimy man who deserved to be slapped. This also shows Ryan becoming more like his father, in a way. We get to see Ryan enjoying the power he has—but it’s “justified” because Ryan is essentially saving a damsel in distress.

Everything else though at the farm, oh boy. The return of Stan Edgar was fun, but too short. I honestly felt Giancarlo Eposito’s cameo was underutilized. He should’ve been the star of the episode—with the obvious virus plotline being introduced. Personally I would’ve moved this higher up as an earlier episode or foreshadow to this farm. Literally this could’ve been in S4x01 because in the last episode of Gen V S1, we see Butcher smirk at the implications of there now being this deus ex machina virus to take down Homelander. This could’ve been a strong opening episode, especially for those who haven’t read the comics or haven’t seen Gen V.

With what we got, I mean…yeah, the V-ed up rabid chickens, water buffalo, and sheep with bamboon fangs are kinda funny—as well as Butcher’s hilarious quips about V-ed up Kentucky fried chickens and his cold suggestion for the team to split up (“you don’t got to be the fastest *smirks* just not the slowest”) but the entire sequence could’ve been resolved much, much quicker and not be as drawn out.

I did like the metaphor of Butcher releasing the Temp-V lab rabbit (a metaphor of himself, and it’s a rare glimpse of his soft side), and the foreshadowing of the tentacles out of the rabbit’s lifeless body and Billy stomping it to death. I also liked the inclusion of Dr. Sameer Shah.

The B-plot of Hughie euthanizing his V-ed father, gee thanks mom, see what your power of attorney did…I will begrudgingly accept because this shows us the consequence had Hughie actually gone through with his plan. But obviously it can’t be Hughie—so it has to be his mom. I understand the possible writing intention. Plus, in the entire episode, this Hughie scene between Hugh Sr was the most emotionally invested I had been in this episode. Simon Pegg gave his best performance, and it’s the proper send-off to give to the man whom Garth Ennis based his comic Hughie’s appearance from and who had voiced Hughie in the animated Diabolical episode. I say, this is very deserved. Now, the mother sideplot, I can argue, was frankly underutilized; either the writers could’ve gotten rid of her character entirely (I prefer this because she’s honestly unnecessary to the plot) or dedicated more screentime to her. If you argue she was needed because she’d encouraged Hughie to propose to Annie and tie her down with the family heirloom ring, Hugh Campbell Senior could’ve done that. It fits the narrative of him being a single father for Hughie—so it’s even more devastating that he passes away. A lot of the audience can resonate with the loss of a paternal figure.

*EDIT: Hughie’s mother was underutilized this season. Imagine if we, instead, got to see Hughie encounter his mom at her MLM-like business with Voughtality selling herbal supplements and oils. Imagine the delicious conflicted feelings, and we see how brainwashed his mom is. Imagine that torment. His character arc could be trying to reconnect with his mom after his dad passed away—and trying to get her to see the truth. It can be The Boys’ social commentary on MLMs and cults and fanaticism and capitalism/ big corporations.

Episode 6: Dirty Business

Ah, this episode…every episode 6, according to Kripke, has to be the wildest episode in the show. I fear…that, while, yes, it was kiiiiinda wild, this isn’t the wild epic reviled? shocker they were hoping we’d feel and instead made a lot of people unhappy. This is the start of the “Hughie being SAed across three episodes straight” trend. S3x06: Herogasm was liked not only for the shock value of debauchery but also because it’d advanced the plot.

Firecracker’s actress, Valerie Curry, mentioned that she personally headcanons Firecracker having feelings for Starlight. I would’ve loved to see that extrapolated in this episode (and hinted in other episodes, like maybe showing us a couple seconds where we see Firecracker had kept an old crumpled magazine cover of Starlight in a f*cked up kinda creepy Starlight shrine with her face’s likeness showing signs of having been sparked or scratched out) because that adds a whole new layer of complexity to her character. We got a bit of it when she’d cornered Annie at the Vernon estate after she’d emerged from the bathroom with bloodshot eyes having felt a little hurt being excluded by the Mean Girls cool club (Homelander, Sage, and Victoria) and Annie apologizes to her face about it not being cool to have said that about her in the past—but then Annie showed her true intentions stabbing her in the neck.

Now, imagine, instead if we’d drawn this out even more. Firecracker’s writhing on the floor and screaming at her that she knew Annie was a lying backstabbing snake—and she blames herself for being stupid to have given Annie one more chance, and look where her forgiveness had done to her? She yells to Annie, who looks back guiltily, that Annie is still the b*tch from her memory and she’s not the good person that she thinks she is. Do you see how much more powerful this’d be instead of what we got?

Tek Knight, oh Tek Knight, look how they’ve massacred you, my poor hole obsessed man. Personally I’m all for creative liberty (for example, I would argue the genderbent female Stormfront in the show is an improvement on the comic’s male Stormfront who’d been Homelander’s real biological father technically/ sperm donor/ clone variant of his DNA). I’d even liked what they’ve done with him in Gen V S1—and was looking forward to what shenanigans he’d wreak in The Boys. And, oh boy, this is the best the Writers Room could come up with? Tek Knight is VERY different in the comics; I mean, yes, Butcher and Hughie did beat him up but in the end they decided to spare him. Comic Tek Knight is aware he has a problem (his obsession with f*cking holes) and sought therapy to no avail and even sent his Laddio away so he doesn't do the unthinkable to his minor sidekick.

Personally, since now the Vernon correctional facilities plot is going nowhere (is it? Or maybe, upon his death, by proxy he’d transferred the deed over to Homelander for his supposed modern-day imprisonment camps?), I would maybe have the entire thing take place at a Vernon Correctional Facility instead of at his manor/ Tek Cave obvious Batman reference with the whole BDSM plot. Or, heck, if you’d really wanted the BDSM plot, maybe make your corrupt judges being bribed to stuff-the-Vernon-jails-with-innocent-men-so-he-can-be-rich irl commentary (because it is a thing irl; even Leverage TV did an episode on this with this concept), have The Boys infiltrate a Vernon jail (it can only be Hughie, Frenchie, or if you want to go ham-fisted with the social commentary, go with M.M.), and have that character react to discovering a secret cabal of depraved folks forcing ordinary powerless prisoners to be pimped out as BDSM s3x toys for Supes and senators/ other powerful people in high positions of authority—and their deaths being disguised as runaways, killed by jail mates, su*cide, violent prison riots, what have you. Think about it. To these Supes and politicians and authority figures, they don’t think they’re doing a bad thing—because they’re giving punitive punishment to criminals i.e. “the bad guys” by depriving them of their rights and free will and consent to say no and subjecting them to their perversions. Think about the f*cked up social commentary implications and potential.

Think about it. Tek Knight is a parody of Bruce Wayne/ Batman and Iron Man. Think about what we could’ve gotten had the writers satirized Arkham Asylum/ Gotham Prison in The Boys universe. This could’ve been an episode about the American prison system.

The reveal of Kessler being able to see hallucination!Becca didn’t land a huge impact on me. 1) VoughtHQ spoiled it with their Fight Club “fanart.” Even if I hadn’t seen VoughtHQ’s leaks, this “plot twist” could’ve been seen a miiiiiiiiile away. The writers made it so obvious (Butcher talking to the air) that the twist just didn’t land as hard as it could’ve….

…About the breastfeeding scene. Personally, when Antony Starr said this was the craziest thing he’d done, my mind leapt at far wilder possibilities. So when VoughtHQ leaked that it was this scene, I was a tad let-down, lol. But I suppose I’ll take it. Homelander’s 100 micro-expressions, going from shock to confusion/ intrigue, during that scene was funny. That shot of milk getting squirted into his mouth was obviously done for the fanservice and the memes. You can expect fan artists and fan writers to go crazy with it because, hint, think about what else that white liquid could be substituted with and squirted into his face/ mouth.

Episode 7: The Insider

It’s the Christmas episode. Why, on god’s green earth, would you choose to ignore the perfect opportunity presented on a platter to you to not tie this back to the Vought Christmas party 12–13?—years ago (look, it happened in S1x07, and this is the 7th episode of S4 le gasp) and peel back the curtain to reveal more details about what might’ve happened between Becca Saunders and Homelander a decade ago? It’s the catalyst for Butcher’s antagonism against Homelander. This is a huge missed opportunity for both plot development and character development for Butcher.

What could’ve hit even more is Ryan, after receiving the framed photograph from Butcher, asking Homelander about how he’d met his mother in the first place and got him conceived when his bio mom had been in a loving relationship with this other man smart, Ryan, you’re now showing your smarts. And Homelander fumbles to tell him a fairytale version of How I Met Your Mother—but we get a true flashback simultaneously that contradicts exactly what he’s telling Ryan.

Now you have an opportunity to make it clear cut and double down on the SA angle of Homelander having r*ped her (now you spell it out for the folks in the audience who still don’t believe it; you leave no room for ambiguity anymore), or if you want to make it complicated you have an opportunity to showcase that Becca had known Butcher had cheated on her with a waitress and so in a fit of revenge she’d gone to cheat on him with Homelander—except it’d backfired on her. And now you have the opportunity to make Butcher feel even more of a survivor’s guilt because this meant she’d done it because of him. So this is his fault, this is what he tells himself.

Otherwise, I loved this episode essentially being about Ryan's turn in the spotlight and his character introspection moment. ...That's all I liked, plus this tying back to Butcher being smug and proud of him. And Homelander's scenes.

The last minute reveal of Shapeshifter Annie is introduced too late for me to give a damn. This could’ve been a really cool concept. They should’ve introduced her much earlier in episode 1 or 2; personally I prefer episode 2 because maybe you could tie her to someone Sage had found at the TruthCon expo. Because to me this is an obvious satire of the whole concept of reptilian lizardmen walking amongst us, camouflaging themselves as ordinary people in society. I would’ve preferred seeing hints of Shifter Annie early on to establish for as this threat lurking in the background—so when this happens where she shifts into Annie, bam, it hits that much harder. As of now, this subplot of Shifter Annie feels randomly injected too late into the season.

Episode 8: Season Four Finale/ Assassination Run

Victoria Neuman, like her comic book male counterpart Victor Neuman (Vic the Sheep), was always going to die one way or another. I don’t get the outrage seeing her go the Gen V enjoyers who watched Gen V first and came to watch The Boys after that are even more obvious. In the comic, Neuman was sworn in as president of the United States after Bob Singer dies and this is how sworn-in president Victor Neuman goes out:

Personally I do not mind her death being this early and in S4, but with her being set up as this cunning political savvy boss b*tch in the TV series, it would’ve been even more compelling, dramatic, and fun Easter egg reference to the comic if the writers kept her alive until S5, when the inevitable betrayal happens and Homelander rips her head off in Homelander’s descent into madness—or The Boys or Butcher kill her instead.

The way Shifter Annie subplot was resolved was anticlimactic. I might’ve cared a little more if it wasn’t mostly this one episode where we get to see her be a threat. Wouldn’t it have been so much more interesting and f*cked up if the writers showed Shifter Annie, as VoughtHQ initially alleged, becoming very, very enamoured by this happy married double life she could be having with this tall twink of a man? Give her some more depth. Annie blowing up at Hughie for not noticing…I’m on two fences about it. I get it; she was imprisoned for that long so she took it out on Hughie; it’s very human. On the other hand, Annie would not f*cking blow up at Hughie because he, too, had nonconsentually been conned into f*cking a stranger and proposing marriage to her. What could’ve been a sweet moment between them had been ruined by this chameleon homewrecker.

The scene with Butcher on the hospital bed, with Grace Mallory and Ryan visiting…I don’t necessarily hate it. Could it have been executed differently—and much better? Oh, most definitely. The writers essentially scrubbed away all of Butcher’s character development this season by “allowing Joe Kessler control of his body”—and cue evil genocidal maniac Butcher in S5 that I am pretty sure Hughie will still be the one to end him like in the comics. Like, c’mon. Unless Butcher self-sacrifices himself at the end nobly in S5, the narrative has been setting up the budding emotional tension and conflict between Hughie’s and Butcher’s final confrontation. But going back on topic, I could see the argument of Grace not thinking clearly in the moment like a concerned aunt/ grandma—and it backfired on her. Ryan coldly looking at her warm corpse is an obvious callout to Butcher, and us the audience, how eerily similar Ryan still is to his dad, Homelander. He’s Becca’s son, but he’s still his father’s son. It’s a very painful reminder for Butcher—which is why he cedes control to evil Butcher (tumor Kessler).

...In this season, they'd really nerfed Homelander a lot, huh? Not only the zinc ducts, but also him being a teary crybaby.... Ah. I don't mind it per se, but...man, I need to be reminded of the Homelander we saw in S1-2 (and S3). Him telling Ryan about the Bad Room off-screen was also a terrible decision; if this was instead acted out, it would make Ryan’s conflicted feelings even more heartbreaking because this is a 12-year old kid whose father scares him/ makes him uncomfortable, but this is still his flesh-and-blood biological father; he recognizes his father is a broken man but he’s literally the only parent this child has left. This is a situation irl that certain members of your audience will be able to relate to.

I did like what they did with Ashley though, with her taking V. I'm super curious what her superpower will be in S5. I also liked Sage coming back and telling Homelander she had fun coming up with this plan—just to see if she could. Stone cold. I love her.

I have a gripe with the V-ed tentacles (what the hentai tentacle p0rn?). Not only is it lame as h3ll (I understand this is probably a parody to capitalize on the Venom symbiote hype, as well as this possibly being a reference to the Diabolical episode), but they had a perfect set-up before with Butcher's powers in S3 ironically matching Homelander's with the super strength, durability, and laser eyes. It was sweet, perfect poetic irony, drawing uncomfortable parallels between Butcher and Homelander—and showing that they're foils of one another, two sides of the same coin. They could've shown us Butcher experimenting on his own body to see if he can find Homelander's weaknesses that he can use. It was the perfect set-up. But nooooo, now we have tentacles. This creative decision was probably made for the memes. Say what you will of The Boys writing staff, but they know their fanbase. TV Canon Tentacles Butcher was definitely fanservice.

The Soldier Boy reveal at the end…they have Jensen Ackles. With that star power and his surprising popularity with The Boys fans and Supernatural fans, I can understand why they hamfisted an end credit scene where he cameos again—and that’s the cliffhanger we end the season on, where Homelander tearfully overlooks his cryofrozen biological father and idol. Personally idgaf about Soldier Boy—my controversial opinion: Soldier Boy is honestly an overhyped character—but, again, I get it. Gotta make the fans excited. It’s fanservice.

Overall though, I really enjoyed Sage’s moments and A-Train’s redemption arc throughout the episodes.

I'm still tentatively excited for S5. I hope the writers learn from their S4 mistakes and deliver us an epic finale that goes out with a bang and not a whimper.

These are my own personal opinions however. If you were in the Writers Room, what would you change/ keep?

Would anyone want hear my honest unfiltered opinion(s) or breakdown about what I liked/ didn’t liked/ wished the writers had done differently for The Boys season 4, now that the season is complete and all 8 episodes are out?

Because, spoiler alert:

#the boys #the boys tv #the boys season 4 #the boys season four #billy butcher #homelander #hughie campbell #annie january #ryan butcher #kimiko miyashiro #frenchie the boys #mother’s milk #marvin milk #the boys season 4 spoilers #are there more things I would've wanted to see? yeah but everyone else has mentioned them in the subreddit or here #I'll reblog this in the morning for the morning folks #phoenix talks

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anosci · 2 years ago

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(166-180 albums etc that I’ve listened to this year, copied from twitter) (now with art. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13])

names and thoughts below cut

166/ MigloJE - Elements 2 (2023) hmm..it's not doing much for me? I think i wouldve been bonkers for this in 2006. does that make it retro? it does have a VERY early 00s bedroom synth vibe. highlights: "Eyes full of sky part 2". "Star Dust" hits right.

---

167/ (all of the mono/tonik/211 releases from 1996) mostly a pile of singles. a mish mash of styles, that hit me to varying degrees. some standouts: 23/Wired. BIG BEAT. 40/phunky habitation. the 2step matches that synthwork beautifully. 59/painting plastics. crackly :D

---

168/ (all of the modules from Tokyo Dawn Records, 1997) lots of dnb fodder. not even bad, im just picky. the standouts are the chillouts: rubrngr, almond ep… well, those are the standouts that i didnt already have from party releases :P

---

169/ Nimu - Picture In Picture (2023) flowing waters, gently carrying you away. surprising amount of tobacco smoke difuses the streetlamps. for some reason this didnt do much for me overall. highlights…… hmm. mostly just "Ultramarine".

---

170/ Brioskj - Afterlife (2023) a brighter side of chill. "I'm Jealous" has a really cool spacey progression that resonates with me fsr. the shifting harmonies actually permeate the whole EP, which i rather enjoy, but t3 in particular hit me 2nite. "Sultriness 2022" rly good too.

---

171/ Aleksi Perälä - The Colundi Sequence Level 1 (2014) i remember skimming a few tracks each of these 100000 albums and then adding them to my list if anything caught my ear. im not sure why this made my list. prolly GBBVT1337052. feels like great meditation music overall.

(runnerup GBBVT1337102!)

---

172/ (all of the stuff from monotonik 1997) it's just distance kicking all of the ass. well the other stuff is ok but i really like the chill-ish idm-ish stuff distance was dropping here. "pt30 tribute" ahead of its time tbh. s/o to Whiskas for his weird tune too.

---

173/ Mr. Bill - IRL (2014) fun electric sound with a touch of groove. it's a fun dichotomy between "submersed in the modern sound of 2014" and "not cleanly fitting in any single trend box". the combo is a really fun listen 9 years later.

---

174/ (all of the stuff from mono (not tonik) 1997) dnb? eh. 'sok. triphop and breaks? therein lies the good stuff. lets see, highlights: "blur (your) reality" cool orbital vibe! "twisted shadows" masiv "Call Me Persephone" d e e p SIZEABL8.XM <- surprisingly hard!

--- June ---

175/ Mr. Scruff - Friendly Bacteria (2014) nice clean beats. not a fan of the vocals when they appear, which is sometimes. title track is nice. gotta love some bendy octave defying bass. fav track "We Are Coming" tho. stac.

---

176/ TVBOO - HONKERS (2023) the high pitch weirdness in the opening track is enough to win my heart over, holy shit it's a lil silly but in an earnest way that only lends to the heart within the music. (check track 3 you'll know what i mean.) fun!

---

(extra long thoughts)

177/ (every Tokyo Dawn Records mod release, 1998) hmm. dnb. lots of good stuff tbh, but im being picky. some actual hilites: "selbstmord?" is such a cool spacey mood. feels like it could fit in metroid prime. love it. "peachy" is just oldschool s3xmit for me to enjoy the dnb "On me" still dnb but man i cant deny this is FRESH for 98. absolutely bonkers you could get a 1MB module of this at the time. "wolkenflug" hmm. a lil too trance for my taste but its getting there "in vestigator" cool! b-side is a bit much (loopy) but i dig the texture "during 8" finally! some big slow breaks! sadly its just ok. "Collapsoid" huh kinda cool lil textures in this groove "AbstractTechnoVibes" anything "aphexy" gets my attention huh. cool textures and cool synthwork. warbles! "into the unknown" holding an intense fight against my distaste for dnb (and esp darkstep) by being good "lesbians on wax 2.0" i love how this is called "ae-esque." it sure is… for 1998, on the 10th of july, three days before LP5. (ok actually LP5 isn't quite as much of a leap as confield was but still.) yes good i like it "AlbertoBalsalm (rmx)" is fascinating. its hard to best the original and this doesn't quite manage but it's neat to hear someone take it on in a tracker. it's at its best when it deviates from (instead of trying to augment) the original. 5!? wild. "little 8bit box ep" beats :)

---

178/ (all monotonik releases, 1998) mixed bag etc ofc "0% Sianisms (Dark Blue Mix)" wacky wonky good stuff "Chinwokh EP" cool and crunchy "Darn Martians EP" weird beats that sit well with me "Moss EP" really cool soundscapes! perfect turn of the century sound

---

179/ (all mono211 releases, 1998) mixed bag etc ofc. massiv hiphop standouts. &: "0% Sianisms" delightful, industrial, and a third thing "Two Girls EP" absolutely blown away at the outside perspective shown here. actually insane. fascinating. "More Tea EP" rly good! love those breaks!! "Parannoying" takes dnb timbres and combines them into a weird lazy afternoon tracker thing. the whole ep actually. standout. "Reversions" chilled out hiphop vibes, no twists. hits good.

---

180/ (all Tokyo Dawn Records, 1999) looking for non-dnb on the dnb label once again. i find myself mostly enjoying falcon's slow beats: "la petit prince" and "luv u" esp. "light" is peppy enough to overcome my anti-dnb bias. "repertoire#2" is a lovely variety pack.

---

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#media thread

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absolutebl · 2 years ago

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This Week In BL - I give out a bunch of 7/10s

Nov 2022 Wk 3

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs. Organized by which ones (in each category) I’m enjoying the most.

Ongoing Series - Thai

Between Us (Sun iQIYI) 3 of 12 - I’m beginning to get concerned about where the plot, pace, and conflict is going to come from. So far it’s all angst and internal conflict, and I’m not entirely opposed to that, but there needs to be some external stressors in Thai BL or it’s not enough to carry 12 episodes (especially if it’s helmed by New). WATCH ALONG HERE.

Ai Long Nhai (Mon iQIYI) 9 of 10 - something actually happened in this ep, we got some of Ai’s family history & backstory. Evil mother is evil. Sister may be evil too. But it’s still shirtless so I’m pleased. Also, yay, no singing!

Remember Me (Sun Gaga) 7 of 12 - Name has finally made a new friend. JaFirst remain the most interesting. I actually don’t mind the show when it’s focused on them, but most of the rest of the time I find it, if not boring, at least not something that engages me personally. Although, the younger boy flirting with Em after cheer practice was kind of cute.

I Will Knock You (Fri Gaga) 2 of 12 - Thi is such a pushover. Look, I’m just not wild about this lead pair dynamic and I absolutely can’t stand the score.

609 Bedtime Story (Sat WeTV) 1 of 11 - Didn’t drop to WETV in my territory, no idea what’s going on. I’ll have a bit of a hunt when I get home.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

My Tooth Your Love (Taiwan Fri Viki) 8 of 12 - Every week I look forward to this show the most. We knew it had to happen, but it’s really sad to see our traumatized bar-boy break our beloved dentist’s heart. We all know they’re in love with each other, they also know it. But Bai Lang is very very scared of commitment and the dentist is a good boy who keeps getting hurt by other’s inability to trust and open up. The past romance was really sad and sadly true to life. Is it better to have a friend’s love or pity, if all you really wanted was friendship? I like how complicated all of these characters are. I love the conversation the leads had with each other after Bai Lang finally admits to his true feelings. Such a good show.

Eternal Yesterday AKA Eien no Kino (Japan Thurs Gaga) 6 of 8 - This show is so sad. I sometimes wonder if Kochi remains alive entirely because Michan wills him to be so. Does anybody else wonder if the gay biology teacher who lost his first love is a nod to Boys Love? Just me?

Choco Milk Shake (Korea Strongberry Tues YT) 7-8 of 10 - The pacing is so good in this show. Also, I am completely and utterly in love with the ex-bf (hi, Wild Dog, long time no see, wanna run away with me instead?)

Happy Ending Romance (Korea Thurs Gaga) 1-2 of 8 - Very dramatic opening. I like it. Leo is stupid pretty. This is a complicated, if improbable, plot about writers and ego and reputation, but engaging. (For a change I like the OST, Leo is also one of my favorite main singers among the honey-voices of Kpop.)

Finished This Week

Ghost Host, Ghost House (Weds YouTube) 8fin - An excellent confession sequence. I was a little surprised. Usually confession scenes make me wince, but this one was lovely. I’m not a fan of the Kdrama “separation in the final episode” (see Big D) but in this particular instance, I understand why they did it. The characters did need to mature and build new lives. It’s just annoying that they couldn’t do it together. All in all? This is a light horror plus family drama built around a well executed BL trough-line that felt honestly queer with great chemistry from the lead pair. (I hope that we see more of them.) For me personally the surrounding cast, premise, and story didn’t resonate but if you like a touch of gothic in your BL this might appeal. RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS 7/10

Big Dragon (Sat Gaga) 8fin - I really don’t like Thailand copying Korea’s arbitrary “separation in the final episode” thing. So for me this final episode wasn’t very satisfying. Ultimately? This is a decent execution of enemies to lovers, exploring some darker themes and nodding at kink in a more respectful way than Mame could ever dream, plus excellent chemistry, but something was askew around plot, directing, and ending. RECOMMENDED FOR THE LEAD PAIR, BUT NOT MUCH ELSE 7/10

Kabe Koji (Japan Mon Viki) 8fin - Japan sure does love the “running of the gays” trope. Only this time around they ran together. Which was kind of cute. Honestly? This probably should’ve been my favorite BL of all time, but for some reason it just never resonated with me. Also, I’m over the no kiss thing. I’m tired. If they kiss in het, they can kiss in gay. IT’S FINE. 7/10

Apparently, when Japanese BL is good, it’s very very good, and when it’s bad I’m annoyed.

It’s Airing But I’m Not Watching It

War of Y (Thai Gaga) 20 eps - it’s just all too much for me.

To Sir With Love AKA Khun Chai 16 eps - could be sad v worried

2 Moons 3 (Thai Mon ??) 10 eps - Possibly a future binge watch. Rumor is it’s banal.

Love Bill (Vietnam Sat YT) - Bah Vinh is back but I’m too distracted. Also there’s a lot of fund raising and stuff going on. I’ll wait and binge.

How is he so hot? Asking for science.

In Case You Missed It

My Roommate (Thai YT) 32 eps of 2 minutes each now done, it’s terrible production values so I’m not bothering but it’s been repackaged into 8 min chunks on the youtubes.

Fahlanruk (Thai GaGa) 12 eps - I cut my losses at ep 5 but it’s finished now, someone who knows my taste tell me if I should I bother?

SELF (Thai Thurs YT) is complete at 6 eps, anyone watch this one? Is it sad? Worth watching?

LITA special - it’s exactly as trashy and kinky as you want it to be. Go indulge, you lushes. Rain & Payu, man, wow. Also, the sound is terrible. But no one cares much about the script, least of all the writers.

GAP the series (Sat YT) is a classic office set romance. WATCH IT! It’s GL and this studio needs our support! (Also, the stairs are back!)

Coming to Viki: Love in the Air, ITSAY & IPYTM, Remember Me, and new KBL, The New Employee.

Gossip:

GMMTV posted their pilot trailers for 2023. I reported on them all here. Fewer this year than last which is a good thing, they should slow down and focus more.

How did my predictions go? Not good. Scored a 6/10 maybe 6.5 if you’re feeling generous.

Next Week Looks Like This:

2022 still to come?

Dec 9: Semantic Error movie (Viki) - the repackage rumored to have some added footage.

Dec 19: Chains of Heart (movie? theaters?) trailer Suspense thriller about a forest ranger, smugglers, memory loss, and lost love. Stars Haii (Cirrus in TT2) and Poppy (Porpla in YYY). Adapted from a Y-novel of the same name by TJ Tommy. I don’t know if this is still releasing or if C19 has effected it.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Win, my love! Just call me his of the morning, hia. Just touch my cheek before you leave me, hia.

In Stongberry we trust! *consent in the house*

This week’s earworm: Just B - Me (srs where did these boys come from? so good)

(last week)

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dreamerwriternstargazer · 5 years ago

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In Defence of Team Purple Lion

Voltron: Legendary Defender and its final season remains as one of the most poorly received children’s shows in the past decade. The show was a reboot from DreamWorks of the popular Voltron franchise owned by WEP LLC (World Event Productions) who were responsible for the first version of the show Voltron: Defender Of The Universe (1984), an adaptation of the anime show GoLion by Toei Animation. It initially started strong when released in 2016, with a premise that of a typical mech-centric kids’ show; 5 pilots of 5 robot lions coming together to form one big robot (Voltron) to fight against a big bad alien villain in space, however despite the formulaic appearance it proved to be a captivating watch with detailed and beautiful animation as well as surprisingly deep subject matter. The themes and messages of the show touched on darker topics such as racism and genocide with the backdrop of a complex portayal of war while still balancing it with the light-hearted and goofy dynamics of the diverse main characters, played by a diverse cast. Produced by Lauren Montgomery and Joaquim Dos Santos, both of whom had worked on the acclaimed Avatar: The Last Airbender and Legend Of Korra, the story set up promised an equally deep and intricate story for VLD as had been the case for ATLA and LoK, as a result the show attracted a large and varied fan base beyond just children, many fans adults eager to see how the story and darker themes would be resolved as well as how the minority representations would be treated.

The final season released on Dec 14th 2018 came as a great shock to fans, not only were they intensely dissatisfied with the ending, virtually no one from any area or sub fandom was happy with the season as a whole and at the time of this article’s writing it has lower than a 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The show and its producers faced massive criticism over insensitive representations of minorities, an unsympathetic and condemning end for an abuse victim despite redemption for their abusers and a disempowering arc for the main woman of colour character in which she was sidelined and dismissed by her male counterparts up until her sacrifice. The core themes and messages of love, forgiveness and acceptance regardless of race were completely subverted, instead conveying to an impressionable Y-7 and above audience the opposite; heritage and race define a person rather than their own actions. As well as fans, many parents of kids who watched the show expressed unhappiness with the final season due to the toxic and regressive messages it sent. Soon after the season dropped a petition emerged to “free the original season 8 of Voltron” due to the belief that the final season was in fact an edited product of what the creators originally planned. This belief was sparked by visual inconsistencies in the season itself, the audio description not lining up with the action on screen (now fixed), one character not being played by her voice actor but her voice actually another character’s with the pitch turned up as well as comments from the cast and animators, now deleted. The strongest claims of edits were made by Tumblr user Leaking Hate in her initial meta Chasing The Ghosts Of Season 8 and the follow up, a more detailed breakdown, Seek Truth In Darkness in which she presented an alternative story that had been edited and cut down for reasons then unknown, with narrative and visual evidence from the season itself to support her argument. She and a few other fans officially came together in February 2019 to form Team Purple Lion, a team of analysts dedicated to finding the truth behind the disaster of the final season. However, since the fandom had had a poor history of harassing the show’s creators over ships (romantic relationships between characters) most attributed the poor story and resolve to an attempt to keep things neutral romantically between characters in a poor bid to please everyone. As a result the petition and campaign were merely linked to lack of shipping satisfaction for the fandom and dismissed as more toxic fandom behaviour that had been displayed previously by many fans.

Petitions and campaigns like these are not uncommon after a show or film’s ending, similar situations might be the HIMYM backlash in which fans were so unhappy with the ending of the show that there was a petition for an alternative ending, as well as the petition to Warner Bros regarding the Snyder Cut of Justice League. Both of these have actually succeeded with the Snyder cut of Justice League set to release in 2021 and the HIMYM DVD box sets containing the alternative ending, however what makes the Free VLD s8 campaign now led by Team Purple Lion unique is its claim that there’s an original finished product that the creators intended for release but was edited after completion to produce the poor final season that was released on Netflix. Often corporate meddling in creative works is common but it has not been documented before as a post production occurrence changing the finished work, it’s always taken place pre-production as was the case with Disney and Colin Trevorrow’s original script for ep. IX or during production, in the case of Justice League and Zak Snyder.

Since the start of the campaign in Dec 2018 there’s been continuous investigation and action taken by TPL to provide proof for their claims and the movement has evolved into a fight for creators’ rights, still active now a year and a half on. Their investigation early on resulted in discovering the IP holder (those who own the trademark) WEP as the ones with control over the show and therefore responsible for the released edited season 8. They’ve since defended DreamWorks and the showrunners from criticism in favour of requesting WEP and specifically President Robert Koplar, self proclaimed “steward of the property” for the original season 8 by the showrunners that was not released. There’s also been strong advocation from TPL to keep the protest against WEP’s interference with the creative team’s work peaceful to avoid dismissal and belittlement due to prior instances of the VLD fandom’s toxic behaviour that often included harassment of showrunners and toxic fan behaviour ranging from abusive remarks online to death threats, after the final season rumours were flying and the EPs faced abuse from upset fans so there was an active effort to stay civil on TPL’s part.

TPL and the #FreeVLDS8 movement has continuously faced criticism and backlash since its start regardless, the response from fellow fans ranging from supportive to downright disbelief and even the showrunners stating publicly [March 28th 2019 Let’s Voltron podcast] that there’s no “alternate cut of Voltron” branding the idea as a “conspiracy theory”. Claims of harassment have been attributed to TPL and the legitimacy of their allegations questioned, one fan questioning the possibility of the edits’ execution as well as others categorizing them as fans creating a theory based on shipping fulfillment. The controversy and consistent campaign a year and a half on interested me greatly, therefore after being led back to the movement by the very comments discrediting them I approached Team Purple Lion for comment on the aforementioned claims as well as conducting my own research and investigation into them. 3 members of the team, Crystal Rebellion, Dragon Of Yang and Leaking Hate spoke to me openly about their campaign and my own research produced some interesting results as well.

The basis of their argument is set on the show’s final season being an edited product, when I asked about what pushed her to this conclusion and writing her initial meta Leaking Hate explained that a mutual friend of Crystal and her’s drew their attention to it through the story saying:

“It’s interesting, nearly ALL of the episodes had a moment or two in them where Lotor [male villain] COULD have reappeared, and didn’t. Do you think he was written in to be the savior all along, and it was the higher ups that said no, good boy Lance [one of the main characters]? It seems like, given the narrative, and even given this season, it should have been Lotura [Lotor and Allura ship name], and all that wasn’t just feels… off. And not as a Lotura stan, I mean in general.”

“And YES I had. There was a narrative gap where Lotor should have fit, but for some reason wasn’t.” Hate said, “The initial conclusion we jumped to was that Lotor had been removed in the writing stage.”

It wasn’t until another friend mentioned a key scene out of place in the story and she went back to view it that she started to suspect the season had been changed from its original state. The scene in question was one in which Lotor says “Follow me!” at the end of Allura’s dream sequence in s8 ep8 Clear Day, despite his death being established before and after this point in the story. “There was no reason for that Follow Me shot to be there,” Hate explained, “unless the action of the viewer following Lotor had been removed.” Having studied a Fine Art degree and therefore well versed in animation and visual art she was able to recognise scenes that had been edited unusually throughout the season once she actively searched for other visual evidence. The Follow Me scene as well as others she found are displayed in her Ghosts meta, all indicating a different story from the one told in the show, along with the evidence Leaking Hate presented some initial ideas on what the story was (a redemption arc for Lotor and several sub arcs for the main characters that resolved their stories and previously set up story beats).

[Image Description: A close up of Prince Lotor’s face from season 8 on Netflix, staring directly out of the picture at the viewer. There are subtitles showing his speech at the bottom of the image, saying “Follow me!” End ID]

After Team Purple Lion’s formation Leaking Hate went on to publish a part two to her initial Ghosts meta, a 21k word meta entitled Seek Truth In Darkness which contained all visual evidence of edits found in the season as well as an extrapolation of the initial story indicated by said edits. The original story appeared to resolve unfinished narratives and arcs that the released s8 dismissed and the treatment of the representations in the show better, from respect towards minorities to an empowering arc for Allura, the main female character. Despite the original season having a more positive story, negative feedback from fans has been more common than positive. When I questioned the team members on it Leaking Hate mentioned “most people who believe we’re wrong tend to think we’re wrong in our premise” Dragon of Yang confirming that “it’s usually the premise of “VLD was edited after completion” that people disagree with”. However the screenshots they present as visual evidence hint at some truth in their argument, the first screen cap shown below indicative of some poor edits made to the animation since 3 characters are essentially cropped out of the picture.

Likewise this screen cap shows a split screen visually unbalanced with 2 characters at the bottom partially cropped out as well as the character on the left side with a much larger screen space than the other characters.

[Image description: A split screen from season 8 on Netflix, featuring from left to right: top left Shiro, below him is Keith in a larger section and Allura in a small triangular section below and to the right of Keith’s section. In the middle is a section showing Honerva’s mech stabbing the Voltron-Atlas mech with purple lightning shooting out. On the top right is Hunk, below him is Pidge, and below her the top half of Lance’s face. End ID]

Seasons prior to the final had always had visually balanced split screens with each character centred in their frames appropriately, indicating these and other s8 shots like them as an anomaly.

Hate reconstructed both screencaps based on what she believed they were originally:

[Image description: A split-screen from season 8 on Netflix, featuring from left to right: an Altean pilot, Merla, Keith, Hunk’s shoulder, Pidge, the top half of Allura’s face, and the top half of Lance’s face. On the top, right, and bottom of this screencap is dark pink background with the black lines of the split-screen extending to the edges of the colors, marking out where the rest of Hunk, Allura, and Lance should be visible if the view had not been cropped. With the lines extending out, Keith’s portion of the screen is also extended, leaving a completely removed section of the split-screen remaining, which is highlighted purple in this image. End ID]

[Image description: A split-screen from season 8 on Netflix, featuring from left to right: top left Shiro, below him is Keith, below and to the right of Keith is Allura in a small triangle section, the bottom of her face slightly cut off. In the middle is a section showing Honerva’s mech stabbing the Voltron-Atlas mech with purple lightning shooting out. On the top right is Hunk, below him is Pidge, and below her the top half of Lance’s face. On the left, right and bottom of the screencap is a dark pink background with the black lines of the split-screen extending to the edge of the colours, marking out where the rest of Lance and Allura should be visible if the view had not been cropped. Keith’s portion of the screen is smaller and a small dark pink section to the right separates his portion from the middle. Below him where his portion originally extended to is a section coloured dark purple that extends a little further to the left of Allura’s portion. End ID]

Other noticeable examples include scenes with the female lead Allura where her proportions do not match with any prior drawings of herself indicating that she was another character redrawn, Leaking Hate suggested Lotor as his proportions fit each instance.

[Image description: 2 pictures of Allura in the Blue Lion from a front and centre angle side by side. On the left Allura has her eyes closed and her arms stretched out holding onto the controls, the entire cockpit is glowing blue. On the right Allura’s eyes are open with a determined look on her face, she’s slightly hunched with her arms gripping the controls, the cockpit is coloured normally. End ID]

The image on the left is of Allura from s8 ep13 and the one on the right from the same episode a few minutes later, scaled so the interiors (which are unchanging 3D models) are the same size. She is notably taller in the one on the right with her head reaching above the seat and her frame bigger, with wider shoulders and thighs.

These are just a few out of the many examples of edits made that Leaking Hate presents in her metas along with her reconstruction of the original season based on what each edit indicates. While the reconstruction is to some point subjective, the visual inconsistencies are clear and can be easily checked by watching the show at each point said to be edited.

The timeframe and possibility for the edits’ execution, called into question by a fan on a twitter thread (now deleted) stating “it’s not physically possible to make that many edits in 2 months and with leftover budget”, was also addressed by the team and their work. Leaking Hate clarified that “it wasn’t 2 months” that they took place in, “it was 6. The edits began in mid July”, a fact determined by voice actor Jeremy Shada mentioning in an interview released on July 23rd that he had gone in to record new lines at the time. Hate also said, “It’s less of a question of would they have time than it is, well. They did do it. It was nearly impossible. But the fact that it is done shows that they did.” She went on, “I think people misunderstand when we claim it was ‘edited’. They hear “it was reanimated”, but it wasn’t reanimated. There is NO new animation in the edited s8 at all. As far as I can tell, 99% of the edits are composed of tracing, clever cuts and sleight of hand.” This is backed up by all the visual evidence they present as well as their work, claiming absence of animation (making the story disjointed and incoherent in places) rather than new, additional animation changing it.

Crystal Rebellion added, “One thing that strikes us (I feel pretty confident speaking for everyone in this case) is that Studio Mir [responsible for animating the show] is impeccably flawless with their work. Their previous work before Voltron: Legendary Defender, and even Seasons 1-6 and most of 7 are beautifully animated. Stunning. Season 8... is not. Studio Mir also had a viewing party for VLD: S8 - and they reported that they loved the final product; so the animators saw Season 8 after it was completed. The season, however, that aired, was really shoddy animation, rough transitions, music mistakes, and what appear to be alterations to still images - it isn't their usual quality of work, and moreover, the animators have stated that they don't recognize what aired. Often we've been asked something like 'Maybe they just didn't know what scenes they were animating' or 'Didn't know the intended finished product' but in this case, it is documented that they saw the final season and that it's different from what was aired. The poor workmanship in what we see from S8 - all the edits Hate goes through to find and explain, coupled with Mir's disbelief, is indicative that the animation studio had no idea this happened. That means it 1) Happened post-production and 2) It wasn't the Studio that changed anything. Dos Santos mentions in an interview [March 4th ABTV] that they were cut and pasting mouths and moving frames around - no time, no budget, and no staff left. It was all them, after it had been completed - after Mir had seen the original rendition and loved it, that all this happened. The parallel point to that to further support it is, had this been written in the script from the beginning, we would've seen a flawlessly animated season with a painful storyline. We don't see that.”

Although Mir’s reaction to the season they viewed in October (before its official drop) has since been deleted, one animator’s response to the season 8 that was released on Netflix is still online, comparing the show to a house and stating that “every single brick of the last season is very upsetting” but “everything else is good” (translation can be found here), making it clear he was not pleased with the final product. Joaquim Dos Santos does also mention in the interview Crystal references that changes were made to season 8 after season 7 dropped, stating, “You can probably see it in the animation. If you really pay attention it’s like, it’s literally our editor cutting out mouths and puppeting different dialogue.” It’s documented that the epilogue was added to s8 late after s7 dropped however it does not have any dialogue, this statement paired with Shada’s about “still recording on Voltron” begs the question, what change was made besides the epilogue? Hate shows in her Darkness meta that Shada’s character Lance was used to replace Lotor as well as Allura in key scenes, if Shada was still recording lines (unusual since audio recording is done very early in animation production) then it would have been for these moments.

Not all criticism has been based on the editing premise however; the story they present as the original has garnered negative comments as well since it featured Lotor, a divisive character due to his moral ambiguity and previous condemnation as a killer, and predominantly focused on his redemption as well as relationship with Allura. The narrative makes it clear that Lance, the blue paladin and one of the main characters popular with fans, would not have been the focus as he was in the released season and would have been replaced by Lotor as Allura’s partner. When I brought up the claims of bias in their reconstruction Leaking Hate pondered on it.

“Do I love the story because it is Lotura, or do I love Lotura because the story makes me love it?” she mused, “I think it's all the same. I was able to pick out the original story because of my bias in favour of Lotor, Allura, and Lotura. Had I not been invested in those characters, and that ship, I would have had no reason to look. I am not reconstructing based on wish fulfillment, or what I want to see,” she asserted, “but the story I am finding happens to be a story that I love.” In regards to Lance and her analysis on him she stated bluntly, “I HATE Lance. Were I reconstructing based on wish fulfillment I would have him alone and miserable. But that is not a good story. The real story of OGS8 has Lance coming to love himself and to learn to accept Allura's friendship as equally worthy as her romantic affection. It has him grow into a good man, and it has him become Allura's right hand when he helps her save the man she loves. It is an uplifting and wholesome message for little boys and grown men alike. And I think it is equally important that we save S8 for Lance as it is that we save it for Lotor and Allura.” When I mentioned that some would find her dislike of Lance an argument against her she also added that “they are right to.”

“I would not trust someone claiming to have found the 'real' story if I knew they hated Lotor or Allura.” However she admitted, “I don't hate him all the time. I think, if the Lance we get in OGS8 is the Lance I believe is there, then I will find him tolerable, if irritating.”

While it’s true that Hate is critical of Lance and his character, the reconstructed story she presents in Seek Truth does reflect her words, giving him an empowering and sympathetic arc growing from his previous immature and womanising character into a selfless, respectful friend. The team have also put their efforts into creating and realising the story in their reconstruction of the original s8, Rise and Atone, and so far it has stayed true to what they’ve promised, addressing characters and their arcs, the only deviation made being a romance free conclusion in a bid to stay ship-neutral. Dragon of Yang explained the narrative decisions they made with R&A stating clearly, “If this was wish fulfillment, we would have stopped at one detail or another. Every character’s arc was halted and destroyed beyond reconciliation or catharsis. Every character deserves their story to be done justice, and open-endings give that catharsis VLD originally had while remaining respectful to everyone’s shipping preferences. VLD is a story of hope and growth, to deny that a character has grown since day 1 is to deny that there is a story there to be told, and that in turn denies a person out there - who likely identifies with that character - the feeling of being seen. The best thing we can do as scholars and as activists,” she concluded, “is try to recreate the vision the staff had originally made and do so with care and attention to the work they put into every line.”

As for the harassment claims attributed to Team Purple Lion by both fans and The Voltron Store on twitter, there’s not much to support them, and in fact a great deal to disprove them. The team has maintained a level of professionalism in both their work and in their conduct online, consistently citing sources and providing proof for claims as well as campaigning respectfully. Hate commented, “they seem to be conflating our protest with the general hatred being thrown around in the fandom. We've made a point to emphasize polite but firm protest and advocate reaching out through official channels.” While there is a lot of anger and hate from fans towards the show and the producers, none of it has been from Team Purple Lion. Their protest has continuously avoided and often defended the producers and voice actors, who have been regularly attacked by other fans during the show’s airing and since due to the poor conclusion, all of whom TPL have made clear are under NDAs and cannot comment freely (although it’s worth noting, they stopped actively promoting the show on their social media after the season 8 release). Instead their questioning has focused on WEP, the company who own the Voltron trademark, after discovering through a meta analysis of a VLD episode signs that they were meddling with the creators’ vision of the show and ordered them to change it against the producers’ wishes. While it was only a speculative piece, WEP’s quick reaction to the release of said meta by claiming through their Voltron Store twitter that they “do not have any influence over the creative direction of the show” despite ignoring fans for months after the season release suggests some truth to it. Twitter user Eros compiled all evidence of their involvement since then in a Twitter thread and the majority of it is damning, their denial directly contradicting statements from the voice actors and producers prior to and after s8 that confirmed they were the controlling party and had creative input, as well as the creators’ desire to tell a progressive and empowering story however not being able to because of “other controlling parties” outside of DreamWorks. WEP have also made contradictory statements to fans about the season, saying that “nothing was edited” yet agreeing with a fan that a lot was left out and a director’s cut would sell well, as well as mocking another who left a Facebook review (March 16th 2019) complaining of being hung up on, replying to them that an “imposter” answered their phones:

[Image description: A facebook review of The Voltron Store. Text from the top reads as:

Reviewer (name coloured out) doesn’t recommend The Voltron Store.

Review reads: Terrible customer service. They literally hung up on me mid sentence and it was clearly not a case of a call accidentally being dropped. Extremely disappointed by the lack of professionalism!

The Voltron Store’s reply to the reviewer: if you actually talked to us you would find we are very nice people! And we never hang up on anybody EVER - unless they make outrageous claims like Power Rangers is better than Voltron!

The reviewer’s reply: The Voltron Store I did speak to a woman who identified herself Stephanie briefly, but I will never speak to your company again. Thank you for the response but I don't appreciate being called a liar. Please see the attached screenshot for proof of my abruptly ended call back in January. I desire to have no further communication with your company now, I simply decided finally other people deserved to know my personal experience.

Below is a screenshot showing the reviewer called The Voltron Store’s number.

The Voltron Store replied: We do not have a Stephanie here. That must be the issue: you dealt with an imposter! We would review the security cam footage but it does not go back 2 months. End ID.]

In stark contrast to WEP, Team Purple Lion has responded to criticism and addressed it, as well as reaching out to media outlets to clarify and correct poorly sourced claims, however have been faced with no response. Their questioning of WEP and their requests for the original season 8 on social media have been civil; their replies to the Voltron Store posts on Twitter containing no insults or cruel remarks, the harshest only critiques on the company’s lack of tact promoting a show and its merchandise that many considered offensive and toxic due to the last season. “At no point did we set out as some kind of campaign to “attack WEP” or “demand a new season”,” Crystal Rebellion said. “We were a handful of people looking at what amounted to, to use a metaphor, a puzzle that had technically been assembled but most of the pieces didn’t match up properly. We eventually decided to take the pieces that didn’t line up and look at what the picture was supposed to be. There was no ulterior motive - we just wanted the truth. When we realised the truth and it became obvious early on that Mir had seen the original season, we became convinced there was an unedited s8, perhaps in Mir’s backup drives. People saw it, which means it was a completed product, so it became a campaign to ask for it, it’s what the fandom wants, it’s what is profitable.”

In the face of all the negative response and disbelief, Team Purple Lion have gathered an overwhelming amount of evidence to support their case, not only from the show itself but also corroborating statements from the production team and cast as well as WEP’s conduct in response to the campaign. As a result TPL have gained a great amount of support and followers from the Voltron fandom, and are still gaining more a year and a half later. “I gotta give a shout out to Cosmic Royalty,” Leaking Hate said, “a group of Russian fans who reached out to us asking if they could do translations of our work. We host their translations on our website now and there’s apparently a group 500 strong on the Russian social media site VK that supports the work we do together!” Violet Howler on Tumblr has also been a big supporter as well as new fans, recently revealing themselves in the wake of good news, the fight to get the original season seemingly won as Leaking Hate displayed in her most recent meta. In it Hate outlines evidence for the franchise’s ownership changing hands from WEP to DreamWorks and therefore the release of the original season, based on the recent repromotion of the show through articles, new merchandise from the store and the new store designs that all suggest the release, since there would be no other reason to promote a show that was a PR disaster, so universally hated. Regardless of all the opposition and discredit they have faced, confirmation of the truth of Voltron’s original season 8’s fate is expected this summer before the official art book is made available, in the form of the season’s release itself. Whether the fans will be happy with it is another story, however Leaking Hate emphasised firmly that fan satisfaction was not the point, or at least not entirely. “Nothing is perfect, and nothing will please everyone. Especially a show like VLD, with almost 35 years of legacy and fans behind it. There are people who will not like the original season, there are even some who will prefer the edited one - I’m sure the WEP executives are some of them. But it will be the season it was supposed to be, the one that was a labour of love. There is so much love and care poured into every frame of VLD, this was a story that the people working on it wanted to tell; it was more than just a job to them. It was created with love, and it was with love that we fought for it, and when it comes down to it that’s what VLD’s meta narrative was about: love.”

#articles #fandom #fandom culture #team purple lion #voltron #voltron legendary defender #vld fandom #freevlds8 #dreamworks

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eclete · 6 years ago

Text

skam france ‘behind the scenes’ masterpost

While we all are waiting for bloopers to drop and hopefully news on new seasons let’s remember bts info that we got till now about filming seasons 3 and 4 (but mostly 3). Feel free to add more!

On the very first day, 3 of October, they shot clip ‘Samedi 14h34 - Pas si hétéro que ça’ from ep 2 [sources x & x]

At projection on 19th of April David said they shot clip ‘Samedi 14h32 – Intervention’ from ep 7 on the second day [source x]

3d day of shooting turned out a busy week for everyone, because we got the legendary Samedi 9h17 from ep 5, then ‘VODKAAAAA’ sequence following 3 clips from ep 9: 'Dimanche 16h34 - Je gère pas là', 'Dimanche 19h25 - La vérité' and 'Dimanche 20h41 - Un peu de vodka' AND also minute by minute scene, which is ‘Lundi 17h21 - On verra bien non?’ from ep 10. p.s. ‘minute by minute’ scene was shot right before ‘samedi 9h17′ [sources x & x & x & x]

6th day was pretty intense, because they shot Elu's 1st kiss (clip 'Vendredi 20h27 - Le premier’ of ep 4, then Elu's 2d reunion in ep 9 which is clip 'Vendredi 20h27 - T'es plus tout seul', and also Lucas' desperate run towards Eliott, when he almost got hit by a car [sources x & x]

The boat sequence aka clip that hurts like hell was shot on the 8th day (‘Vendredi 19h25 - Tu me fais confiance non ?’ and ‘Vendredi 23h37 - Une putain de lubie’ from ep 8). [source x]

The magnificent painting scene, which are clips ‘Vendredi 18h14 - Faudrait savoir mec’ and ‘Vendredi 18h35 - Ça compte pas’ from ep 7, was shot on the 16th day [sources x & x]

18th day of shooting. Clip ‘Jeudi 12h48 - Il te plait’ from season 4 ep 2 [source x]

20th day of shooting. Clip ‘Mercredi 11h54 - Une meuf bien’ from season 4 ep 8 [source x]

23 day (night) of shooting was Kiffance (but I’m not entirely sure), which are clips ‘Vendredi 21h - Kiffance’ and ‘Vendredi 21h36 - Pas forcément une meuf’ [source x]

24 day (night) of shooting and it was party at Chloé’s from clip ‘Vendredi 19h21 - Y'a pas de problème’ of ep 5 (the one where we all cry and Axel injures his hand) [source x]

32 day of shooting, and it was clip 'Lundi 18h49 – Gênant' from season 4 ep 4 [source x]

Clips without particular date of filming. It’s known that they shot everything by location, and so David confirmed that clips from s3 ‘Vendredi 18h53 - On aime bien chelou’, ‘Vendredi 16h07 - Avec des petites meufs au calme’, ‘Jeudi 17h32 - C'est pas des adieux’ and clip ‘Vendredi 22h47 - La meilleure personne que je connaisse’ from s4 were shot on 1 day [source x]

Also here are some interesting facts (well known and random):

David was the one who came up with the idea for the s3 trailer – the one with Eliott seeing Lucas on his 1st day in school [source x]

Axel was the one who suggested for Lucas to play piano before it was even written in the script, tho Niels also eventually came up with this idea. Quoting Niels ‘this cheeky bastard’ xD [source x] Axel made a playlist of songs, sent it to David and he chose the most complicated one. It took 2 months for Axel to learn it [source x]

Niels is the one who came up with a raccoon as Eliott’s spirit animal [source x]

The whole cast did a month preparation before filming seasons 3 & 4

Shooting of seasons 3 & 4 started on 3 of October 2018 and finished on 23 of November 2018 [sources x & x]

Maxence and Axel found out about the location of Elu’s first kiss 10 minutes before actual shooting [source x]

According to Niels Axel changed a bit Lucas’ line from ‘it’s good to hear you laugh’ to ‘you’re handsome when you laugh’ in the clip ‘Lundi 17h21 - On verra bien non?’ from ep 10

At projection on 22 of February David said they have bloopers at least 3 hours long [source x]

Before approaching to Eliott’s character Maxence wrote a letter to him, moreover draw a picture of him, adding notes about his personality [source x]

Lucas running to Eliott took 2 takes just because Axel ran too fast, so the minivan with camera had to catch him up all the time. Also a guy from the staff was supposed to inform him about the car, but he forgot, so Axel’s reaction is real [sources x & x]

Cast didn’t get to see clips before actual release. They discovered everything just as we did [source x]

SKAM FRANCE is Maxence’s first acting job

The painting scene was shot in 1 take, and it is 14 minutes long [source x] more interesting info about filming -> [x]

David was the one who took Maxence’s and Axel’s pants off because it was too slippery to do it for themselves [source x]

Maxence broke his foot just 2 days before first meeting and auditioning with Axel [sources x & x & x]

The artist behind Eliott’s drawings is Jeanne Lelièvre. Her Instagram [x]

Cast mostly wore their own clothing. Eliott’s famous brown jacket actually belongs to Maxence, and the ‘romance’ hoodie belongs to Axel [sources x & x]

Maxence hadn’t seen og SKAM and didn’t want to, because he wanted to create his own ‘Even’ [source x]

Polaris takes place in La Petite Ceinture, the church from ep 9 is Notre Dame du Rosaire in Saint Ouen, the Japanese restaurant in the corner of Eliott’s place is at 270 rue du Faubourg Saint Antoine. More about s3 famous places can be found here [x]

David said that the hardest scene to direct was Lucas opening up to Mika and Manon in ep 7 clip ‘Samedi 14h32 – Intervention’ [source x]

Tho we didn’t get to know what was the hardest scene to shoot in season 4, but David said it was Laïs first day on set and ‘conditions around Imane and Sofiane were an actual nightmare’ [source x]

The priest from ep 9 is actually Lula’s dad. His name is François Frapier. Moreover, Lula and Niels were extras for this scene [sources x & x & x]

Speaking of cameos, Alban Etienne, who is David’s producer, can be seen in trailer for season 3. Check it for yourself: Alban / trailer

The show got feedback from international fans much earlier than from French audience [source x]

The last shot scene from s3 is the one where le crew along with Lucas are taking the couch from that creepy store in clip ‘Mercredi 13h37 - Tu le kiffes en fait’ from ep 6

Also in that clip Axel had to wear fake eyelashes since he cut his own [source x]

The last sequence to film from s4, which also wrapped up the whole shoot, was ‘Aïd Moubarak’ and it was ruined by Laïs, because he couldn’t stop laughing for 15 minutes, and of course got scolded by David. According to Laïs and Assa it was Moussa’s fault [sources x & x]

Famous bus stop is actually fake [source x]

Paul Scarfoglio, actor who played Basile, improvised his famous line ‘check de gang’ (‘gang high five’) [source x]

Moussa and David had known each other even before SKAM France. Moussa attended casting for one of David’s projects, but didn’t make it [source x]

Filming Elu’s 1st kiss took 40 technicians [source x]

People in charge of social media content are Timothé ? and Victoria ? [source x]

David chose 90% of soundtrack [sources x & x]

Honorable mentions:

- Kevin McHale watches all versions of SKAM in real time, particularly he was a big fan of original and French remake. His favorite characters are Sana and Isak [sources x & his tweets]

- Endless birthday wishes to David. There were SO MANY of them, that at some point he got pissed and just sent these little devils far away xD [x]

#skam france #if someone knows any other info please feel free to add via reblogging the post #it was so much fun making it #now back to praying for more seasons #skam france masterpost

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daikenkki · 5 years ago

Conversation

MrDonald09: Since Series 22, what new change has annoyed you the MOST??

tttedrawings: Fantasy sequences and the intro/life lessons outro, they just make the episodes shorter, and most of the time aren't really needed at all.

MrDonald09: Ah yes unfortunately you can only have 4 options on Twitter polls, I’m sure the list would be huge if you could have more.

MasonDey1: To me the whole concept of the Steam Team is just pointless.

MrDonald09: Yeah it limits the characters that are used most of the time.

PSideplates: I voted for bouncing since it's closest to the general "kids show" tone that BWBA takes on. It really is like watching a show you put on for your 3 year old so you can leave the room in peace. It hurts to watch. If we were getting the Brenner era where the engines bounced, had ugly details, went worldwide, and got Nia and Rebecca, I'd be miffed but accept it. But BWBA just claims to be TTTE and acts like a generic preschool show. And I don't wanna be in a position where I'm an adult watching a preschool show.

MrDonald09: Agreed. I feel proud to be a fan when I watch classic era and Brenner era, but if it was like BWBA throughout the whole show I can tell you I would not be supporting it now.

TCKRangeltoon: I blame Chuggington.

PSideplates: I don't. Chuggington ended before they came up with BWBA. If anything, Chuggington made the market for train toys/shows competitive which forced HiT to make good Thomas products, well toys anyway.

ronniethe14xx: Honestly, disagree with the point it's the most general kids show tone. Travelling seems to be the new hip and cool thing to do in kids shows, I'd argue that makes it slightly worse then the bouncing because it's clear Thomas only jumped on that trend to be "hip".

JovanniChavez11: Faster pace and Thomas losing his identity. I don’t mind Thomas going on a trip but that wasn’t the way to handle it.

MrDonald09: Yes. IMO it should have stopped after the BWBA special, I think it should have only been a special.

Bostonthomasfan: Don’t really mind the bouncing but it can be over done at times. For around the world? I wish there were more episodes on Sodor and less around the world. Like 18-8 would be good.

MikeArc31375512: The bouncing. Loathe it with a passion.

ThomasTVNostal1: The thing I hate is constant arguing over opinions.Some people have been told to fuck themselves for disliking an episode of BWBA that the majority of the fandom likes and vice versa. This is unacceptable. As a fandom, we're a team and we help each other out.

ChillerB3: The forced feminism with Nia, Rebecca and the newer Steam Team really rubbed me the wrong way, more than hyper bouncing and worldwide shit did.

MrDonald09: Same, especially how the majority of the audience really doesn’t care about that, having more females, great! but don’t mess with many people’s childhood to make SJWs and toxic feminists happy cuz I guarantee you the people who wanted this change probably don’t even like the show.

ryanburges4472: I didn't read properly and the real thing since Series 22 that has annoyed me the most is the bouncing. I've been more bothered about the steam team without Henry (Just Henry). I'm happy with Edward sleeping at Wellsworth.

MrDonald09: Yeah, I completely agree honestly i’m not mad that Edward isn’t in the Steam Team anymore. It's Henry that annoys me the most.

ryanburges4472: I know! Gordon and James sleeping at Tidmouth without Henry. Edward is best at Wellsworth because he has a branch line which stars from Wellsworth.

CoolCar161: Henry and Edward stopped appearing as much anyway. They haven’t been good characters since series 4, even in the Brenner era they had little to no appearances due to writer's block. Rivets is a nice little detail that makes them seem more real, Thomas always wanted to see the world and the bouncing is hardly that bad.

TheBlueE21: Thomas' world tour. It's so inconsistent. Doesn't tie into the movie that hyped it up, never explains why or for how long Thomas is in each country, 1 ep he's in China, then Brazil etc then Sodor eps act as though he never left due to always being there. Plus most sets aren't great.

halfbakedhex8: For the record, I voted the 'rivets' option because the inclusion of the new detailing runs so counter to what the show is now, that trying to inflict reality onto the now-very-unreal engines feels very confused as to what the show is trying to achieve.

BluebellThEngin: The "bouncing" doesn't bother me much at first, but as time went on, it starts to get a little out of control and it kinda bugs me. I don't have a problem with the added details like the rivets, but they do look a little too big. Shrink them in size and they'll be okay. I'm mixed on Thomas travelling around the world if I'm being honest. The new Steam Team is what bugs me the most out of all of these options. I never liked it to begin with (minus my child self). It makes the other characters look useless. What I love about the Classic Series is we got lots of stories about almost each and every single one of them it makes the series interesting. But with the Steam Team, not only does it focus on the main characters so much, but it also brings them out of character. Especially if it's for the sake of the plots.

fan_ttte: The New Steam Team with Nia and Rebecca is what I don’t like most. I don’t mind the bouncing or rivets, Thomas going worldwide is okay. I don't know, I just feel like it would’ve been better if Nia and Rebecca did join, but also keep the others, for some interesting interactions and episodes.

islandofodor: If Thomas hadn’t gone worldwide, we’d probably still be in the Brenner era. Granted, it’d still be a slight step down but the international episodes barely take advantage of the different setting and opt to use generic plotlines that we’ve already seen on Sodor.

thesaddletank18: Bouncing, rivets and worldwide idea are bad but the new Steam Team is just....why was this done to the show?

Jacob34335638: I liked the new details, I’m mixed on the New Steam Team, and Thomas travelling the world. But the bouncing is what pisses me off the most, it literally makes the show look like Chuggington. The bouncing was at it’s worst in Journey Beyond Sodor and Thomas’ Magical Birthday Wishes.

TWR_Douglas_10: ALL OF THE ABOVE!!!!!!!

DFox1203: Is everything an option?

TheWinnerGuyCJP: Voted worldwide cuz it makes Thomas completely out of character.

SoupyGunzilla: I think a lot of the stories suffer from the shorter time. A lot of them could be better if they had more time.

kofi_milky: The bouncing, more sing alongs, replacing Edward and Henry with Nia and Rebecca. Even Thomas going worldwide. When the Rev. W. Awdry said "Here is your friend Thomas the Tank Engine. He wanted to come out of his station yard and see the world", the world that's he meant is Sodor.

sodordaily: Choosing New Steam Team because I miss the old SO MUCH!

peter_sam_no4: I think for me the bouncing as it’s so unrealistic . A 1 ton lump of metal can not swing all over the place like it has no weight.

Growlithemaste1: I hate the bouncing the most, but the rest are all useless too.

sixteen_dnw: Worst is the New Steam Team, then worldwide, then rivets, and then bouncing. TBH it doesn’t bother me too much.

BearsFlush: It annoys me that Thomas travels the world, as they remove chapters that might be focus on Sodor, and the locations and some engines are not represented correctly on the railroad.

VacentTest: I’m fine with the New Steam Team changing Edward and Henry out for Nia and Rebecca, I’ve always supported it in the beginning because increased feminism is good. Thomas going worldwide, that didn’t annoy me cause I was interested in that, the rivets is minor and nothing to worry about. But the bouncing, annoyed me the most at first but I’m used to it.

SnatchyBoi: The bouncing and the New Steam Team.

GWREngine: The New Steam Team is the most annoying change. It feels like Mattel doesn't care how special Edward, Henry, and Toby are. Plus we don't need to have more than 1 female main character. Emily being the only girl used to make her special. With Nia and Rebecca around, she isn't special anymore.

TurnTable2002: Chris Renshaw's music really annoys me.

MichaelfromNZ1: Bouncing, worldwide and New Steam Team. They represent how far Thomas has fallen since Mattel fully took over.

ArmchairRailway: New Steam Team.

TI4MGP: This is probably the hardest time I’ve had deciding on one of your polls lol. I went with the Steam Team though, but bouncing comes in a REALLY REALLY close second. The other two are less but equal with each other.

jack_bench: TBH, I'm fine with all of them? But I chose bouncing because the rivets are neat, world-tour - while it makes no sense - has a valuable goal (and is kinda fun), and the Steam Team really needed more female representation which we got with two positive role models in Nia and Rebecca. Bouncing is unnecessary, but not horrendous.

Holycro1Michael: Everything!

JosefSnowBall: Rivets was something I actually liked seeing on some engines. Bouncing is something I’m OK with, it’s kind of grown on me. New Steam Team sucks because it gets rid of the 2 best engines, Edward and Henry, and Thomas worldwide sounded like a bad idea to begin with.

TheThomasFan: Probably Thomas going worldwide . The animation is shit and it’s all just recoloured.

TheUnluckyTug: The new Steam Team. I think I'd be a little more accepting of BWBA if Edward and Henry weren't so transparently and obviously thrown to the side and treated as if they don't exist. It was like the biggest "fuck you" to fans ever.

MrDonald09: Yeah, not to mention Nia and Rebecca have such generic personalities they can barely hold a unique episode nowadays. I can understand Edward staying at Wellsworth but they did Henry DIRTY by slapping him at Vicarstown so he can focus on his Mainland duties yet not do any episode focused on this new job.

SteamEn83954980: Ok so ignoring Emily, it was a perfect 1-7 number of characters and now it's just 1, 18, 22, 4, 5, 6 and 12. Like I know it's minor but that fact gets under my skin.

DBlue02: I voted for the bouncing, but yeah, I kinda have to agree with Simon Martin’s opinion on the Steam Team concept, it’s long since overstayed its welcome. I’d prefer a nice balance of the main and side characters getting their share of the spotlight, like in the classic seasons.

TFan512: What if Edward, Henry, Nia and Rebecca were all part of the main cast.

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dominicvail · 6 years ago

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thjslove replied to your post

“do you think this could be end in one of them getting killed and...”

omg what CM receipts? ��

@thjslove cm is one of the most convoluted behind the scenes messes i have ever witnessed and i am just Astounded till this day like, i’ll bullet point for you because i Genuinely will be here writing this for 3 hours if i do details;

think of all the female cast members that have ever been on cm?? yeah?? a lot! well, the only ones who left in non suspicious circumstances? Lola Glaudini (elle) and Jennifer Love Hewitt (kate). Literally. The only ones.

one time (between seasons 8 and 9) they almost cancelled the show because aj cook and kirsten vangsness decided they didn’t like that their male costars were making $70,000 more PER EPISODE than they were (this was back when they did 24 eps a season so like... i’m not gonna do the math but that is A Lot Of Money). (they renewed it last day of renewals, it was the same year cote de pablo walked from ncis because of the same reason, legit the only reason they got anywhere was b/c they said ‘we both get raises or we both walk’.

btw while this was happening, minus Moore, the rest of the male cast was holding up negotiations so they got perks on top of being paid over 50% more than the women.

this sequence is the kicker

u know season six, the jj and prentiss absences???

it was because they both got fired, listed as ‘creative decisions’ (that’s important later), which basically seemed to amount to ‘we want both less women and for her to be younger than both of you’.

they fired aj cook flat out as her contract had expired that year, in the middle of a 2 parter, and didn’t even want to let her do an exit???? they legit had to fight for the right to have her to film an exit episode (they negotiatied 3 episodes, one for finishing the 2 parter, one exit, and one for when prentiss exited).

brewster’s contract had Not expired (also important later), they just only decided she should be in 8 episodes.

it’s important to the sequence of events that i mention outside influences, b/c the cm fans were PISSED. There was a straight up public outcry, i have Never seen a response like it in my many years of obsessive TV watching. People were Very fond of Prentiss and JJ and were Not impressed they were being booted as unnecessary to the narrative, those pesky creative decisions!!! the petitions and public support towards them were pretty incredible actually.

by that point there wasn’t much that could be done about Cook, but seeing the response CBS kept making Brewster film Way more than those 8 episodes she got slotted for actively dragging her along, Still fired but p much unable to find other work realistically??? b/c they kept calling her back in???

public support was still Overwhelmingly on the actresses side.

To the point that CBS started ardently claiming the actresses were fired for Monetary reasons. Yeah, they straight up lied, and still lie about it today. I have seen cbs affiliate websites print said lie bluntly in their articles (i no longer read cbs affiliate anything).

I listed the pay scandal first for perspective on the money lie. At that point i think the men on the cast were wearing about $110,000 an episode, and it got out Cook was earning about £50,000 an ep, and we never heard about Brewster’s salary But when i say she made a Big Deal over finally getting paid as much as the men in the past couple of years i mean it, so we can assume she was also being paid a lot less. My point being, if they needed to save money, it would have been more profitable for them to fire One man on the show than two women. They pay gap was that much.

so they lied, still lie, about why they fired them and it wasn’t even a good lie.

ANYWAY

i know the show’s writing isn’t really applicable but Prentiss and Seaver were never meant to be main characters on the show together, where they dragged out prentiss’ exit, they overlapped and Rachel Nichols had very little to do.

Anyway, by the time the late eps of the season were airing (and i assume they looked at how many viewers cut loose when brewster left) cbs straight up rang up aj cook and asked her to sign back on (why she was in the last ep despite only being hired for 3 eps that season). She said she hated them but she had a young kid at the time and regular work that was local was helpful (plus, u know, i bet it was a great ego boost).

the season finishes airing, it goes on hiatus with the cast listed 4 season 7 as the men, garcia, jj and seaver.

u know how i mentioned paget had a contract for s6 still but they cut her episodes down??? Well, CBS used the fact that they wouldn’t let her work on the show anymore despite being signed on as evidence that she was breaching contract if she didn’t go back as a regular for season 7. They threatened to sue her for breach of contract. The only reason prentiss was in s7 was because they used what they did against her that she had no power over to threaten her. So, u know, super nice.

meanwhile, they fire rachel nichols, don’t bother to actually tell her they’d done it!!! and she found out on fucking twitter (and rachel is such a nice person, and she was absolutely vilified and abused by every idiot on the internet too thick to realise none of the above was her fault jeez).

so s7 happens w/ the same cast as before, but brewster will Only work to contract and refuses to sign on again for s8. Understandable, tbh.

they hire jeanne tripplehorn, fandom is disgusting as usual, like, absolutely vile, not surprised just disappointed.

at the end of season 9 (they have 2 year contracts so like.. it was the end of her contract), despite everything in the storyline process indicating otherwise and how much of a farce for her character what went down was... Blake left???? No more Jeanne???

Not one peep from bts over what happened.

if that sounds suspicious to you, it is, one of the crew members let slip they’d all been gagged and were not allowed to talk about it. So cbs learnt it’s lessons in as such that they learnt to hide their shitty actions rather than not do anything shitty.

p sure there was another pay scandal in here somewhere too???

in terms of The Gay(tm), Reid was like, conceptualised as bi from the get go but that thing in season one with Lila happened so the execs said he could not possibly be bisexual. Yeah. Yeah u read that right. Most ppl laugh at that one and say uhm do you not know what bi is??? but honestly it was just an excuse they knew full well what they were doing imo

why? they did it again! the writers, producers and Brewster all agreed on a scene where an episode opens w/ prentiss waking up in bed with another woman, guess who nixed it!!!! cbs. They also put a gag order on That little fact too! Kirsten Vangsness, bless her, did a podcast a few years ago on afterellen (before it got fuckawful and was with it’s original owners) and, i’d say ‘let slip’ but she knowingly dropped that truth bomb knowing full well she shouldn’t have. I love her.

lately they’ve made brewster do “interviews” with some of those cbs affiliates where they try and get points??? for saying prentiss was gonna be gay??? like they’re not the ones removing the rep from the show??? and expecting a pat on the back for... refusing to have any kind of gay rep in a show that is by this point conspicuously straight (not that LA isn’t, but it’s not nearly as bad as cm).

the whole mess with Gibson is... Wild b/c as much as i Loathe the dude he supposedly attacked cbs would not just fire their white guy show lead for no reason and i didn’t see any above the level sites claim any funny business there, but he got fired and cbs rang up Brewster and asked her to be the show lead which, honestly, after being fired for being old and irrelevant must have been AMAZING.

she also takes the time to point out to anybody who asks about her and aj being fired for money reasons that no, it was not about money at all. She basically calls her bosses out for being liars in public interviews frequently and it’s Amazing.

i’m sure there’s more crap but i’m not recalling it rn

honestly cm bts drama is Wild and this doesn’t even get into the Patinkin drama (which while drama, is not actually anything to do with cbs).

Interestingly enough, it’s super hard to find out all this stuff unless u were in the fandom the whole time because they’ve bloody lied So Much it’s all everyone even believes anymore. It’s disgusting.

Still can’t believe ncis:la’s female cast has done this well for so long???? These are just CM’s reciepts, they have a history of doing this stuff over and over on multiple shows, i know of it as far back as when trek tng was airing in the 80′s and can name more in between.

#thjslove #not ncis la #sorry i just wrote this much about cm on this blog l o l

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glamatcha · 6 years ago

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Top of the Bops: the 18 Best Anime Opening Songs of 2018

At the end of every year, I like to do some sort of retrospective list about the media I've been enjoying over the past year, and since most of the media I've consumed this year happens to be Japanese anime, I decided to focus on something near and dear to me: sweet, slappin anime opening themes. I've compiled 18 of the best opening theme songs from 2018 into a list of Japan's best TV bangers this year.

NOTE: While I did give extra points to some songs for fitting the tone of their show or for enhancing the show experience, this list is not really focused on the quality of the shows these songs are from but rather on whether the song is great to listen to. Also, I am by no means an expert on the genre, just a lady who watches too much anime.

Listen to the full playlist

18 - "Kiss of Death" from Darling in the Franxx This song always stood out to me as a terrific moodsetter and got me more excited than the plot did during those first few eps of Darling in the Franxx. Sexy, melodic and upbeat, with those moody moody vocals, "Kiss of Death" did its job as a worthy hype man for this mecha anime.

17 - "Heading to Over" from Free! Dive to the Future Free! has always, always, ALWAYS had these wonderful, insanely aggressive, and super catchy power rock songs as their openings...despite the fact that the show's plot is constantly running on the lowest stakes. The opening songs always feel like some terrible lie about what you're going to watch, in my opinion. That it even made my list despite my dislike of Free! is a testament how good this opening song really is.

16 - "Power to the Dream" from Fairy Tail This is not the best Fairy Tail opening. It's probably not even top three, but that's because Fairy Tail has an absolute embarrassment of riches when it comes to catchy openings. The long-running series’s final season starts off with another good one.

15 - "Adabana Necromancy" from Zombie Land Saga This opening has been cited by many as one of the best of the year. It's a madcap zany opening credits sequence that's as wild and entertaining as the show itself. "Adabana Necromancy" is catchy but maybe not as much of an ear worm as some of the other songs on the list (or other songs within Zombie Land Saga). However, it's sung by Franchouchou, the fictional zombie girl band at the center of the show, and I'm a sucker for songs by fake bands.

14 - "Dark Sun..." from Persona 5 the Animation The one constant between all the Persona games and series is incredible genre stylization. While the first opening "Break In to Break Out" was a nod to the mood and style of Persona 5, I think the second opening embraces this more fully and is the superior song because of that. It is a cool, cool bop.

13 - "Spatto! Spy & Spyce" from Release the Spyce I have yet to start Release the Spyce, but this opening is so terrific. It's catchy and cute as shit. This type of girly pop tune definitely doesn't dominate my Best of 2018 list, but that genre of opening has its place in anime. I had the option to include the Magical Girl Ore opening, for example, but I kept that off the list because it's funny and cute but not 100% easy on the ears. This hits every note of being cheeky and charming and catchy AF.

12 - "Deadly Drive" from Bungou Stray Dogs DEAD APPLE Yes, this is technically a movie opening, and yes, maybe that's cheating. But! DEAD APPLE really functions like a long episode of BSD, complete with integrated opening credits. This song rocks so hard and fits well in the canon of Bungou Stray Dogs openings by being a little bit grim, a little bit rough and very, very catchy.

11 - "Fighting Gold" from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure Part 5: Golden Wind This is the James Bond opening of anime theme songs. It is Dramatic with a capital D, and I love it.

10 - "Howling" from Seven Deadly Sins This marked the second collaboration between shonen music all-stars FLOW and GRANRODEO, following their successful team up on the Seven Deadly Sins season one closing song. And just like that song "Howling" does not disappoint. A song to get you real hype about full-blooded adventure. Hey! Get low! Hey! Howling!

9 - "Lonely Go!" from Boruto: Naruto Next Generation I am really mad that this opening is so catchy and the animation is so wonderful because I don't want to give this show the free press, but here we are. This is a fucking good opening. *grumble*

8 - "katharsis" from Tokyo Ghoul:re Tokyo Ghoul has struggled in the past to capture the perfect tonal match that their first opening found in "Unravel," so the clear solution was to get another song out of the same artist. While I am also a big fan of the first :re opening, this one is just flat out better.

7 - "Guess Who is Back" from Black Clover BRB, starting a petition to have Koda Kumi sing every anime opening forever. I was a huge fan of the water temple arc and its funky little banger of an opening theme.

6 - "Freedom" from Banana Fish I had a really hard time choosing between Banana Fish's two rock influenced angst anthems, but at the end of the day, only one of them regularly makes me scream sing along to the chorus.

5 - "Clear" from Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card Peak sweet shoujo tunes. Maaya Sakamoto at her very best. I swear this isn't my CLAMP bias showing--I think Clear Card arc was more than a little boring in execution, but this song is great.

4 - "Winding Road" from Golden Kamuy I have yet to watch Golden Kamuy, but I have heard a lot of good things. When researching options of this list, I was pleasantly surprised to hear this song since it has everything I want in an adventure show opening. With a driving drum line and catchy melody you can really wail along to, the music perfectly compliments the stunning opening visuals. The credits have me convinced that this is one I need to get on my watchlist immediately. (And I've already listened to it a lot of times on loop :X)

3 - "ODD FUTURE" from My Hero Academia I KEEP MY IDEALS BLAAAALAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

2 - "Man Human" from Devilman Crybaby If anything had a chance of slapping as hard as the number one song...point deduction for having only two lyrics. But I refused to let my friends skip it when we watched through.

1 - "Flashback" from Kokkoku It's been a long time since an anime opening slapped this hard. Even if that anime was a weird-but-interesting one off with a lackluster ending.

#anime #anime openings #2018 anime #just my thoughts and opinions ho hum

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courage-a-word-of-justice · 7 years ago

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Idolish7 17 (FINAL)

The culture clash here is hilarious! It’s pretty obvious this unknown guy is Douglas, though.

I can’t believe they’re doing these songs! I’ve known about these songs for a while, since they made waves a few years back – I think Memories Melodies’s music video was animated by Studio Bones and Leopard Eyes by NAZ.

Come to think of it, they never really show idol shows from the fans’ perspective, so this girl’s shots (Aya’s?) are a new thing for the entire genre…

Huh? Wait…this is the real Aya! Oh my gosh!

Well, that’s the end of another show. See you around.

Hinamatsuri 8

Where is “home” for Hina, though?

Geesh, the continuity on this show…what they’re saying right now means the opening of the episode was in medias res, dangit. Stop being so confusing.

I don’t really care about Ikaruga, I care about the “Standing Sushi Bar” in the back more…sorry, Ikaruga.

A few episodes, Hina really was homeless…hmm, continuity’s back in action here.

“Hurray for Psychic Powers” – I was reminded of a book that once appeared in Kado. Unfortunately, that book’s name is Ningen Manzai with all kanji, so it’s not a very close reference if it’s intended to be one…

“Ma Monthly” – Well, wouldn’t you know it? Boueibu collabs mean something here! See, this magazine is a parody of Monthly Mu, which (for some arbitrary reason) decided to team up with Boueibu back in 2016. Hinamatsuri even parodies the magazine’s logo properly! Amazing!

More namahage gags. C’mon, they wouldn’t escape me. They’ve been appearing for a while now, those.

Last time an anime character had a master the same age…*thinks back* That would be Ore Monogatari, with Saijou! Man, that was a while ago. If you don’t count the “same age” bit though, you have OPM and BnHA, which are a lot more fresh.

Jojothan’s (sic)? Is that a Jojo reference, a Johnath…aww, it doesn’t seem to exist. Dangit.

Hitomi’s going to take the dog in, isn’t she?

Even Hina’s shirt says “byebye”…geez, this is kinda saddening already.

Now Hina’s shirt says “sayonara”…why did they poke a hose through her nose, anyway? It made me laugh, sure, but…it’s stupid anyway.

What does Hinamatsuri do without “Hina”, anyway?

Oh, so that’s the significance of that part (post-credits sequence, ep 1)! I didn’t like that part, so I wished to never see it again, but now that it has some significance…it can stay.

I don’t think I’ve seen that image of Nitta with the hand to his head, with the vases on the side before…it must be new.

Normally Hina’s in the seat next to Nitta, right? Oh dear. Also, Utako’s missing and you can see Nitta’s sister in the bar shot as well. The rock singers who wanted to go to the Budokan with Hina are in the back, too, although there may be some people I don’t recognise in the bar shot as well…

Jinsei wa Survival = Life is Survival, not Life is About Survival…

Boueibu HK 8

Summer episode! At least it doesn’t sound as bad a fanservice episode than episode 7 did…(for Astral’s sake)

Karurusu brought back En’s old “What did you say?!”, but now there’s a rakugo background! (small LOL)

I can’t believe Manza tried to push his glasses up in the bath (LOL). Is this what glasses-wearers have to go through?

These seem a little too specific…and to Wakura’s sadistic taste for that last one…to be anything Kyoutarou thought up on his own. (i.e. They probably actually happened.)

Huhhhhhh…I think we finally had an actual woman appear on this show…amazing! (The Osomatsus’ mother, she has a name but I forgot what her name is.) Must be Osomatsu-kun from the ‘60s or ‘80s though, because that sure as heck ain’t the “gets episode 1 pulled from Crunchyroll” Osomatsu-san. I watched the entire season one of that thing, remember?

That dot point looks like a shell for some reason. It’s just two circles put together though. My brain must be in a summer mood from the episode, eh?

I know there’s one jellyfish where you have to cure the sting by peeing on it…oh sorry. I’m falling into Mahou Shoujo Ore’s “crass jokes” trap…

Dougo…likes natto? Weird. Plain weird.

I almost thought they were going to go camping just to fulfil the gap left by YuruCamp, but I guess the audience for YuruCamp and Boueibu doesn’t really cross over. I’m such an anomaly in that case, huh? I still want to know Pinecone-chan’s VA, come to think of it…

Like, c’mon! I can’t even break down that joke (Rashio Taison), it’s too obvious from looking at his name in furigana!

So Rashio is like the snowman from season 2…and the volleyball guy from season 2…maybe Kurotori? I don’t remember his school circumstances anymore…

They used CGI on the plane…? If they did, I barely noticed it until I played the scene again.

Oh wait, that’s a Studio Comet plane…ahaha…(look at Studio Comet’s logo for the joke explanation)

*crashes head on wall* Martha Shirahone…*eyes blank*…Martha Shirahone…Martha’s a girl’s name!!! Does that mean Astral wins?! My pride and the Boueibu status quo have both been wrecked if Martha (sic) really is on the non-binary spectrum…and it’s not some weird Engrish typo…Poor boy though, he spent 4 years depriving himself of one of his favourite things to prevent himself from being teased. (Okay, this “Martha” spelling’s going to annoy me for a while, so I’m going to revert back to “Maasa”…)

Interestingly, Maasa seems to be using a standard vinyl umbrella and not a “student-council-worthy” one. Update: Nope, this one’s sanctioned by the British Royal Family.

Eh? What’s with this monster’s face? He doesn’t have one, does he? I know what the kanji on his face is, but…I think this might be a first. A monster without a face whatsoever.

Is it just me, or did they get CGI for those clouds as well…?

Wait, so even Karurusu is against the idea of fighting this monster? Mr Enthusiastic’s kinda selfish, eh?

Kyoutarou’s still wearing his school swimsuit. But this definitely reminds me of Dark Aurite with the lip coloration...

Wakura so obviously followed Ryoma’s voice instead. It’s pretty much what Astral termed a “nutshot” for MSO ep 8, only it’s…meant to be kinky (I’m not feeling it, y’know?). I’m just vaguely miffed right here that they could be trying to put a cheap joke in Boueibu.

Ooh, nagashi somen with its bamboo…thingy…looks cool. Oh, but Ibusuki…no wonder Ata likes this kind of noodles.

Karurusu’s flag says “summer” on it.

It’s a bit blurry, but the bus says “campground” as its destination.

I wonder if that “spirit of fear” thing was a joke? I’ll come back and find it later. Update: There’s no joke there in Japanese…the word for “spirit of fun” sounds like kyuuki and then “spirit of fear” is just dokidokishiteru (which is just a word for the heart pounding, suggesting nervousness in this case).

Hey, someone (Ryoma) noticed Taishi’s angry outbursts for once!

What, the monster has a mouth, so he does kind of have a face…? (I’m confused…what constitutes “face” with this guy anyway?)

Karurusu…he dab! (…Kind of.)

Full transformation sequence again…*sigh*

Noticeably, you can only see Ryoma nodding when the Rajio Taiso monster asks if you can do rajio taiso outside of summer. I’d assume this is because Ryoma’s the one with the grandpa who does it all year round, but it might just be a space constraint. You never know with these things.

There’s another pun I need to go back to – “I feel radio calis-cleansed”. That can’t have worked in Japanese…Update: Uh, there was actually one here. It seems to be a pun on taiso.

Aw, Rashio’s so happy. Even if I think the staff have reached a new low with the “petty” on the monsters this time around, just seeing that smile lights up my face too.

Why do I feel a Madoka moment coming on right here with Karurusu’s promise?

It’s a Kagerou Project-style time loop, but for August 31st! Yikes! This is going to get confusing…

Yeah, it’s better not to think about time loops, Kyoutarou. You’re right.

Is “firework” a verb? Or is that wasei-eigo? Or slang? Or both? More things to not think about there…methinks. Update: Dougo says “hanabi taikai shimashou!” (literally “let’s do a fireworks tournament!”), so it’s not wasei-eigo, nor is it a verb. It’s just an unconventional subber’s choice.

They censored a big sign in the preview! But Crunchyroll doesn’t have episode 9 yet because of the French Open! Dangit!

I love how the blue bars randomly go “La la la laaaaa!”…LOL. But it also says “they find party dice in the clubroom…” (because it’s bushitsu kara dete kita no wa party saikoro).

BnHA 46

“Those acts are the same as those of villains.” – Actually, that would be the acts of vigilantes…*thinks about the Vigilantes manga*

Because Kouta’s letter was in hiragana, I could understand most of it…eh, my skills are pretty shabby after all. I couldn’t even understand the last line much.

“like a pair of tight jeans” – LOL, Best Jeanist seems to love a good jeans pun, eh?

Come to think of it, Gran Torino doesn’t have a number to his hero status, right? He’s just an ol’ fart after all, even if he’s mighty skilled.

We haven’t seen Mt. Lady or Shinrin Kamui (“Forest Kamui” would probably be his English name, but it’s in katakana…and it sounds stupid, to boot) in a while, come to think of it.

I didn’t think Iida was going to go with them! Wow, what a twist!

I always thought having two Kirishimas in the same season was funny enough (Ryoma from Boueibu and Eijirou).

Kamino? Because the subbers spelt it with a C, that seems like it should be a reference for some reason…Update: Yep, it is!

What’s up with the roses around Todoroki? Are you trying to make the fangirls squeal like this is some shoujo manga? Yeah, right! (laughs in the background anyway)

Aizawa looks really different in a suit…hmm, I normally like men in suits but I’m kinda iffy on suit!Aizawa. *ponders for a second* I prefer his old style more, actually.

MSO 9

Noticeably, Michiru uses koitsu (“this guy”) to refer to Ore. It does tell you something about how Michiru views her enemies.

What’s up with Mohiro in a dress? Princess Peach parody?

Even Saki’s ahoge goes “Oh!”, LOL!

A heart shake for the yuri fans…and stupid glasses for my entertainment. (Thank goodness you’re still catering towards me, show…)

That joke about murdering Hyoue completely went over my head…I get what it was trying to do, but…not funny, man. Not funny.

Michiru uses the –ssu ending that Dougo and Yumoto use, too…

Oh…dear. I think we have more than enough of the word “Happy” with Happy Kiss…now this mascot, too???

I thought Hyoue’s surname was “Kuroda”? Or is that just my imagination? Update: It seems I made it up…

U-Uh, hey…so this was their real intention with those eyecatches, huh? Another “draw me like one of your French girls” memes is in order! Wait, but Ruka’s magical girl form isn’t doing the right pose…aww.

It seems Ruka isn’t into the Magical Girls (it’s implied she’s into Michiru instead), but Michiru’s into Ore…just as Astral guessed.

If that sentence didn’t make sense, it wasn’t meant to! It was just a bunch of long English words thrown together…although “jihad” certainly isn’t English. I wonder if any religious people will get angry at that word being used so casually, though? (I didn’t expect to laugh so hard at these guys. Konami’s my favourite character – of course he is, considering the karaoke episode - but I think I have an appreciation for these guys now.)

LOL, me and Astral like to complain about how thinking up new attack names takes an hour or so…so we totally know your feel, Michiru.

If you look at the scene where PRISMA are shown to attack, it says bokasuka, which apparently means “lots of hits and punches in succession”. It’s basically like subbing it “fistfight!”, “kapow!” or something.

Happy-chan doesn’t even have a body in tiny form!!! What??? (LOL)

Can we please stop with the montages?! A show is better when people bother to animate stuff, alright?!

Happy-chan went “doukashira?” (-kashira is a female sentence ending) which made me laugh because it’s a contrast to that head of his.

Happy-chan doesn’t even have hands…I’m not sure how he’s meant to live like that, y’know?

That catchphrase has less impact the second time around, it seems.

Hmm…so it was actually foreshadowing for Michiru’s love, huh? I thought it was pandering to tsundere stereotypes…

As much as I laughed at the ol’ kick to the face, are Happy and Kokoro really brothers? Or is this just filler after all?

Oh, this new ED is “We’re Not Magical Girls” by the Mahou Shoujo unit (Saki/Sakuyo)!

You can spot a tiny magical girl figurine with pigtails on Yamo’s desk if you watch at the right time.

PRISMA’s song is called “Love/Attack!”

They actually got a next episode preview narrated by demons?! (LOL) This is a new level of weirdness, and I’m actually glad to have heard it with my own ears (because I’m trembling with laughter right now because of it). But…they talk at the end! They can speak?! Whatttttttt?!

Rokuhoudou 8

Gure’s got stud earrings. Don’t think I’ve noticed them before…

It appears to be a florentine and not a “florentin” like the subs say. It is just missing an “e” though…

Happy, happy! I think Karurusu got me into the spirit of being happy all the time…or at least happier than I used to be, anyway.

Seriously, this middle school kid acts like a Boueibu monster, it’s hard not to make a comparison.

Gure’s so goofy, I’m laughing as much as I normally do for Boueibu or MSO…Rokuhoudou isn’t normally like this, that’s all.

“good way to sober up” – It sure doesn’t seem that way for Tsubaki, though…poor soul.

That style with the lips…it’s so un-Rokuhoudou, and yet it still works! I can’t think of what it reminds me of, though, because it seems to remind me of another anime or manga and I can’t put my finger on it. Update: Maybe MSO? That’s the closest thing I can think of that matches right now.

Hey, come to think of it, doesn’t this guy look like Shishigami from Inuyashiki? Their outlook on life is mostly the same, too! (from what little I know about Shishigami in passing)

Uh…Gure? Didn’t anyone teach You about stranger danger?!

The delinquents…are in the duck boating club?! Well, that was a surprise…

This pretty much became my favourite episode, even though Tokitaka’s still my fave Rokuhoudou boy, LOL.

Code:Realise 13

Since I don’t know whether to denote this as the final episode or not, I won’t note it as anything…

Isn’t Cardia Lupin’s girl? Hands off, Impey!

The newspaper Herlock’s holding has an ad for animators…wuh? In the Code:Realise Victorian era? No way, Jose!

#simulcast commentary #binan koukou chikyuu boueibu happy kiss!#binan koukou chikyuu boueibu happy kiss #Happy Kiss anime #mahou shoujo ore #code:realise #rokuhoudou yotsuiro biyori #idolish7 #Chesarka watches Idolish7 #hinamatsuri #Chesarka watches Hinamatsuri #boku no hero academia #Chesarka watches BnHA #Chesarka watches Yotsuiro Biyori #Chesarka watches MSO

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douchebagbrainwaves · 4 years ago

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INCLUDING, I HOPE, THE PROBLEM THAT HAS AFFLICTED SO MANY PREVIOUS COMMUNITIES: BEING RUINED BY GROWTH

But though I can't predict specific winners, I can offer a recipe for recognizing them. If you try too hard to conceal your rawness—by trying to reverse-engineer Winograd's SHRDLU.1 Grad school is the other end of a trade loses a dollar. After a while this filter will start to operate as you write. I know are professors, but it is the irreducible core of it, but thoughtful people aren't willing to use a forum with a lot of thoughtful people in it, and focus our efforts where they'll do the most good. I was writing this, my mind wandered: would it be useful to have an automatic book?2 Number one will be your own confidence in it. I told you so. Or perhaps the frontpage protects itself, by advertising what type of submission is expected. But only some of them will be a minority squared. An individual mine or factory owner could decide to install a steam engine, and within a few years he could probably find someone local to make him one.3

The Model T didn't have all the features previous cars did.4 I'm not saying spoken language always works best. And when my friend Trevor showed up at my house recently, he was carrying a Powerbook identical to mine.5 Apparently only recommendations really matter at the best schools. Never say we're passionate or our product is great.6 You meet a lot of trolls in it.7 On Demo Day each startup will only get ten minutes, so we were pretty excited when we figured out what seemed to us the optimal way of doing shopping searches. If you disagree, try living for a year using only the resources available to the average Frankish nobleman in 800, and report back to us. All previous revolutions have spread.

But will people pay for information otherwise? People who think the labor movement was the creation of wealth seems to appear and disappear like the noise of a fan as you switch on and off.8 At Rehearsal Day, we have a dress rehearsal called Rehearsal Day. Off, quiet. Wealth is defined democratically. The evolution of technology is captured by a monopoly, it will go to work for you without giving them options likely to be worth something. And if there are people getting rich by creating wealth. A free market interprets monopoly as damage and routes around it.9 It takes a conscious effort to remind oneself that the real world: they're small; you get to start from scratch; and the problem is usually artificial and predetermined.

Not because it's causing economic inequality, the former because founders own more stock, and the granary the wealth that each family created. But that isn't true.10 You can demonstrate your respect for one another in some way. And because startup founders work under great pressure, it's critical they be friends. But there will be more room for spikes. When we describe one as smart, it's shorthand for smarter than other three year olds.11 And yet half the people around you are out of their heads. Will people create wealth if they can't get paid for it. The most dangerous thing for the frontpage is stuff that's too easy to upvote.

Bad comments are like kudzu: they take over rapidly.12 People reply to dumb jokes with dumb jokes. Intelligence and wisdom are obviously not mutually exclusive. But the really striking change, as intelligence and wisdom too, but this predisposition is not itself intelligence. The information needed to conduct such studies is increasingly available. When people say something substantial that gets modded down, they stubbornly leave it up. You have to know what an n 2 algorithm is if you want to attract hackers to write software that will sell your hardware, you have to choose between several alternatives, there's an upper bound on your performance: choosing the best every time. I suppose that's worth something. I expect them to be written as thin enough skins that users can see the evolution of species because branches can converge.13 If you buy a custom-made car, something will always be breaking.14 It's pretty clear now that the things we build are so complicated, there's another rapidly growing subset: making things easier.

What a disaster that would be of the same curve. For most of us, it's not made equally. But that's like using a screwdriver to open bottles; what one really wants is a bottle opener. But it would be some kind of fundamental limit eventually. But the really striking change, as intelligence and wisdom too, but this predisposition is not itself intelligence.15 And from my friends who are professors I know what branch of the tree to bet on now.16 Do you, er, want a printout of yesterday's news? YC founders presenting at Demo Day, because Demo Day presentations are now so short that they rarely include much if any demo. Wise means something—that one is on average good at making the right decisions about language design. So it's kind of misleading to ask whether you'll be at home in computer science. But now that I've realized what's going on, perhaps there's a third option: to write something that sounds like spontaneous, informal speech, and deliver it that way too. And the way to ensure that is to ask what you need as a user.17

I'm sure most of those who want to decrease economic inequality. I say let's aim at the problems. They use different words, certainly. But only graduation rates, then you'll improve graduation rates.18 It's more important to grow fast or die. This was an era when small firms making everything from cars to candy were getting consolidated into a new kind of farming. Much of what's in the sage's head is also in the head of a 1950s auto executive, the attitude must have been dismayed when I jumped up to the whiteboard and launched into a presentation of our exciting new technology.

Notes

But if you do. The Roman commander specifically ordered that he had to for some reason insists that you should at least some of those you can send your business plan to make a fortune in the sort of pious crap you were doing more than the 50 minutes they may introduce startups they like to cluster together as much income. You could also degenerate from 129. This technique wouldn't work if the statistics they use; if there is one of them is that you'll expend a lot of face to face with the earlier stage startups, you may as well, partly because companies then were more at the fabulous Oren's Hummus.

Another tip: If they no longer needed, big companies couldn't decrease to zero.

Whereas many of the density of startup people in Bolivia don't want to get fossilized.

But a lot of the resulting sequence.

If the Mac was so violent that she decided never again.

The function goes asymptotic fairly quickly, because the money. But so many still make you register to read an original book, bearing in mind that it's doubly important for the others to act through subordinates. Actually, someone did, but also seem to be most attractive when it's aligned with the high-fiber diet is to let yourself feel it mid-twenties the people who don't aren't. Instead of no counterexamples, though.

The average B-17 pilot in World War II had disappeared.

Strictly speaking it's impossible without a time. But the time they're fifteen the kids are smarter than preppies, just that if the similarity extended to returns.

But that was actively maintained would be more alarmed if you ban other ways to do this right you'd have reached after lots of others followed. Maybe at first, and one didn't try to get fossilized. That's probably too much. Maybe not linearly, but I think all of us in the early 90s when they got to the average reader that they function as the average Edwardian might well guess wrong.

Please do not take the line? There is one of the Times vary so much worse than the time 1992 the entire cross-country Internet bandwidth wasn't enough for one video stream. 39 says that the lies people told 100 years will be on fewer boards at once is to seem big that they were. How many parents would still send their kids rather than just salary.

I grew up with only a few months by buying an additional disk drive. Seneca Ep.

I knew, there is money. Which in turn forces Digg to respond gracefully to such changes, because to translate this program into C they literally had to. They're an administrative convenience.

But if so, why did it with the Supreme Court's 1982 decision in Edgar v.

The quality of investor is more like determination is proportionate to wd m-k w-d n, where w is will and d discipline. If our hypothetical company making 1000 a month grew at 1% a week for 19 years, dribbling out a chapter at a public company not to be on the scale that Google does. So although it works well to show them how awful the real world is boring.

Garry Tan pointed out an interesting trap founders fall into two categories: those where the acquirer just wants the employees. Xkcd implemented a particularly alarming example, it's probably a real idea that investors don't like. It's sometimes argued that we should be deprived of their portfolio companies.

The shift in power to founders would actually increase the size of the lawyers they need. Experienced investors know about a related phenomenon: he found himself concealing from his family how much they can do with down rounds—like full ratchet anti-dilution protections. But it will seem more powerful version written in C and Perl.

If Paris is where your idea of happiness from many older societies. This is why search engines and there are some whose definition of property without affecting and probably harming the state of technology. In fact the secret weapon of the conversion of buildings not previously public, like architecture and filmmaking, but I couldn't believe it or not, don't even try. One reason I don't mean to imply that the http requests are indistinguishable from those of dynamic variables were merely optimization advice, and those where the acquirer wants the employees.

They assumed that their prices stabilize. Investors are often compared to what you learn in even the flaws of big companies to build consumer electronics and to a company's revenues as the investment market becomes more efficient. In a country with a neologism.

0 notes

wknc881 · 7 years ago

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Top Ten Hip-Hop & RnB Albums of 2017

2017 may go down as the poopiest year of the ‘10s. Unless of course you’ve spent the whole year with the TV off and your earbuds plugged in your ears, in which case you may think of 2017 as a pretty solid year for Hip Hop & RnB music. Not nearly as good as 2015 or 2016, but 2017 has given us many new faces and many new favorites, while also reminding us just how much some familiar faces have grown. So what better thing to do than to torture myself by only picking out my personal Top 10 albums for this year. I’m not sure if it was harder picking my top 10 or ranking my top 10, but nonetheless I am a fighter so let us move on to the list.

10. Smino - blkswn

The first time I fell in love with Smino’s music was last year on the Monte Booker assisted track “Kolors”. The song was just a teaser of what could happen when Booker’s atmospheric, groovy beats mix with Smino’s eccentric flow and sharp lyricism. That blend of styles is what eventually would become the St. Louis artist’s debut album, blkswn. Running at 18 tracks long, blkswn can best be described as a long, but never boring, ride through space at 2:00 a.m. in a Honda Civic (and yes I am aware that there is no sense of time in space). Producing nearly the entire album, it is hard to ignore what Booker is able to bring to the table as an up and coming producer redefining the genre of hip-hop. Smino raps on various different topics that range from Netflix and chilling with his shawty to speaking on the black experience in America and delivers this with a very fresh and unique flow. Also, the sequencing on the album cannot be ignored. It’s is so good to the point where you don't know where one song ends and the next one begins, producing a very fluid album listening experience. For sure worthy of a Top 10 position this year.

Favorite Tracks: "Glass Flows", "Netflix & Dusse", "Anita", "Father Son Holy Smoke"

9. Goldlink - At What Cost

Goldlink impressed many critics, fans, and myself with his second mixtape And After That, We Didn’t Talk, which was released two years ago. Instead of continuing his career in LA or another major city, Goldlink decided to stay home and create an album all about home. At What Cost is all about, and for, the DMV (a popular nickname for the area surrounded by Washington D.C., Maryland, and Virginia). Goldlink raps about many DMV related topics, such as go-go music and the increased gun violence and death of many black youth in the area. It’s easy for Kendrick Lamar or Drake to rep their hometown because their hometowns are so popular already. The DMV is a city often underlooked as a major hip-hop city and Goldlink wanted to prove that on At What Cost. With features from many popular DMV artists, like Wale, Mya, and Shy Glizzy, and songs that feature go-go production, At What Cost is a fun, dancey, and entertaining album that let’s the world in on the sounds of the DMV. Also, it would be remiss of me not to mention that “Crew”, with its infectious hook sung by Brent Faiyaz, is one of the best songs of this decade. Don’t @ me.

Favorite Tracks: “Have You Seen That Girl?”, “Meditation”, “Crew”, “Kokamoe Freestyle”, and “Some Girl”.

8. SYD - Fin

Despite the name of the album, Syd’s career in music is far from over. Syd (formerly Syd da Kid) has been around making music since 2011 with Odd Future. Her band, The Internet, has put out 3 albums, including the Grammy-nominated Ego Death released in 2015. In 2016, Syd delivered a few features for artists like KAYTRANADA, Isaiah Rashad, and Common. It was 2017, however, where Syd established herself as an independent and confident voice in R&B. Fin is Syd’s first solo project and she sounds as fierce as she has ever been. Leaving the familiar neo-soul sounds of Ego Death behind, Syd goes for a more contemporary, 90’s R&B flavor on Fin. Focusing on topics of success and relationships, Syd delivers a fresh R&B album in a time where R&B is beginning to become stale in lyrics and trap heavy in production. Syd has struggled with stage fright and anxiety for most of her career, but these past two years, and on Fin, Syd has proven that she is here to be a confident, sexy, and bold R&B artist. Syd’s songwriting ability and magical, lush voice make for a stellar debut album.

Favorite Tracks: “Shake em Off”, “All About Me”, “Smile More”, “Body”, and “Dolla Bills”

7. Princess Nokia - 1992 Deluxe

A few things caught my eye when i first saw Princess Nokia’s 1992 Deluxe: it was an album titled after a year (those albums are proven to be better), her bright smile on the cover, and her totally New York tomboy outfit. New York City’s Puerto Rican culture is huge and is one of my favorites. Unfortunately, there haven't been many representatives of Puerto Rican culture in Hip-hop (Fat Joe is the only one to come to mind). But have no fear, Princess Nokia is here and she is amazing. You may know her from that video of woman throwing soup on a man’s face in a subway after he was screaming racial slurs and two young black males. Yeah, she’s the one who threw the soup. That same attitude is what makes 1992 not just a great, gritty album, but also a very classic New York album. Nokia’s bars and verses are vicious and unapologetic. Nokia raps about her mischievous upbringing (“Bart Simpson”), her tough personality (“Tomboy” & “Mine”), and the beautiful city she grew up in (“Saggy Denim” & “ABCs of New York”). She mixes modern trap production with classic NY boom-bap and clever, illustrious lyrics to create a wonderful peek into the life of Princess Nokia.

Favorite Tracks: “Bart Simpson”, “Mine”, “Saggy Denim”, “Green Line”, “Goth Kid”, “Brick City”, and “Chinese Slippers”

6. Brent Faiyaz - Sonder Son

If Brent Faiyaz’s name sounds familiar it’s because it should. I mentioned him earlier when I was talking about Goldlink’s explosive hit “Crew” that really made Brent Faiyaz a popular name. He also worked on a project with his group Sonder, which was a very soft and smooth RnB album. But Sonder Son sounds completely different from anything he has released before. Sonder Son is the proper introduction to Brent Faiyaz himself and proof that he is more than just a really good voice. Sonder Son is filled with personal narratives and introspection, which is pretty different from most RnB albums you hear nowadays. It does, of course, come with a few love songs as expected on almost any RnB album. But what makes Sonder Son stick out to me the most, and why it’s on this list, is the throwback 90’s RnB production and 90’s feel it has. Faiyaz was born in 1995, but Sonder Son sounds like it was made in 1999. The 22-year old’s clever and mature songwriting and production with beautiful guitar riffs and slow drums makes for a very solid debut release.

Favorite Tracks: All of them but I want to say that “Talk 2 U” is my absolute favorite.

5. Vince Staples - Big Fish Theory

Vince Staples is young, black, intelligent, and loud and Big Fish Theory will not let you forget that. Vince came out with his strong double-disc debut Summertime ‘06 two years ago and in the last two years, Vince has drop any guest features for a wide range of artists (ScHoolboy Q, Gorillaz, Kali Uchis) and even dropped the Prima Donna EP last year. These last two years highlight how much Vince has grown as an MC and has even strayed away from his usual sound and Big Fish Theory is a good example of that growth and change. Vince is still rapping about topics concerning race and politics, but this time in more curt and direct manner than before. With shorter verses and repetitive hooks, Vince wanted to get straight to the point on this album. Fans of Vince Staples will no doubt the huge difference in production this time around. Giving off Yeezus vibes, the production is very industrial-EDM heavy with maybe only one or two songs that actually sound like a traditional hip-hop beat. With features from artists like Kilo Kish, Ray J, Ty Dolla $ign, and a killer verse from Kendrick Lamar, Big Fish Theory is the backdrop to a dark, apocalyptic future. Kind of imagine if Tron was set in Long Beach, California under a corrupt system and that’s what Big Fish Theory sounds like.

Favorite Tracks: All of them

4. Tyler, The Creator - Scum F*ck Flower Boy

Tyler’s debut studio album came out over six years ago and Mr. Creator has come a long way since his roach eating days. Released two years after the experimental album, Cherry Bomb, Flower Boy is Tyler’s most mature album to date from his writing to his production. The first single “Who Dat Boy” (featuring a verse from his buddy A$AP Rocky) was a very excellent return from his two year hiatus and “911/Mr. Lonely” is one of the best (and most fun) songs to come out this past summer. From the very first track, it is clear that Tyler’s production has been highly influenced by very bright and sunny sounds, which matches perfectly with the sunset and sunflowers on the front cover. You can also tell that, from the very beginning as well, that Tyler is getting more personal on this album than he has on any other album he’s put out. Discussing topics of fame, loneliness, nostalgia and his own sexuality, we get a very good look on what’s really going on inside the mind of Tyler, The Creator. As usual, the entire album was produced by Tyler himself and it is some of his best production. With lush strings and vibrant keys, it is very clear that Tyler has been learning how to incorporate more sophisticated instrumentation into his work. And despite the list of popular names that pop up in the features (Rex Orange County, Frank Ocean, Kali Uchis, Lil Wayne), it still feels like Tyler’s show and he is shining brighter than ever.

Favorite Tracks: “See You Again”, “Who Dat Boy”, “Pothole”, “911/Mr. Lonely”, “Boredom”, “November”, but really all of them

3. Kendrick Lamar - DAMN.

I think I speak for most people who listened to DAMN. that the title is more than appropriate. Once I finished listening to this 55-minute project, all I could say was “damn”. From beginning to end this album slaps. And it slaps hard. The transition from the suspenseful intro “BLOOD.” into the Mike WiLL Made-It produced “DNA.” is rush of bars and beats as we are reintroduced to much angrier Kendrick Lamar that we haven’t heard for a few years now. DAMN. is a pretty good painting of what 2017 turned out to be as far as politics and social issues go. Lamar discusses what’s going on his life (“FEEL.”, “LOVE.”, “FEAR.”) as he is becoming even more of a superstar, while also reflecting and commenting on the current state of the people (“LUST.” and “XXX.”). As expected, Lamar’s pen game is as vicious and intricate as ever and the production on this album has been taken new heights. Sounding nothing like his last two LPs, DAMN. further shows how Lamar has probably grown the most among his peers and is definitely one of the best.

Favorite Tracks: All of them let’s be honest it was pretty fire

2. SZA - Ctrl

Ctrl is one of my favorite albums of the year (it’s my #2 duh), but my sister loves the album even more than me and has her own personal connection to the album. So the following review will be told by sister, Carmen. Enjoy.

"This album is one of the most empowering albums of 2017 for women. Solána Imani Rowe is a badass woman who is not afraid to sing what she really feels. SZA released her debut album this past June, after months of delays, and it debuted at number three on the Billboard 200. The types of things she sings about mainly on this album are the empowerment of women, demanding respect from men, sexual acts and behavior, the intimacy and heat of relationships, and just the grimy truth of how people are in today’s society. The first song on the album is “Supermodel” and it is about how SZA slept with her ex-boyfriend’s friend because her ex did her wrong and left her. This was such a dope way to start an album off because she comes straight out and says basically “yeah I’m leaving and slept with your friend oh well that’s what you get”. Not many women in the industry will say something so straightforward. SZA’s lyrics and the way she sings them so confidently is what makes this album very strong. The following track on the albumis the Travis Scott assisted “Love Galore”. SZA wrote this song to tell the story of a man hitting a girl up saying he’ll be down and how he’s a real one but then after he gets what he wants he leaves. This song is one of the most popular off the album because of the boppy vibe it has. It’s something that as soon as you hear the beat and what she’s talking about you just go “ahhh sookie sookie now” and just dance. My personal favorite off the album is “The Weekend” because she sings about the role of the main chick and the sidepiece in the relationship. Many women, and myself love the vibe that the song gives off because the feeling of having someone trying to play and take advantage of you but then the tables are actually turned and you’re the one who’s playing them is like no other. Also it explores the high people get off of sexual behavior because for SZA to be a woman and to tell that man you are only here to give me what I want to please me sexually and that’s it, incredible."

--- Carmen

Although it is not her first album under Top Dawg Entertainment, Ctrl is the proper introduction to SZA and proves she is ready to be a superstar.

Favorite Tracks: “The Weekend”, “Go Gina”, Drew Barrymore”, “Doves In The Wind”, “Garden(Say it Like Dat”

1. Joey Bada$$ - ALL-AMERIKKKAN BADA$$

Personally, I think Joey Bada$$ is the best MC in the game right now. While some people may give the “Best MC” award to Kendrick Lamar, I think if Joey can make 3 more albums like ALL-AMERIKKKAN BADA$$ (ABBA), then he would definitely deserve that title. Joey has put out three solo projects, one of which was his debut album. All three of his previous projects were solid, with clever lyrics and an old school boom-bap aesthetic. However, on his debut album, Joey never really switched things up and basically released another mixtape. I’ve always compared to Joey to Biggie in how he has the ability to sound effortless when rapping and has never really had a bad verse or song in his career. Since we know that Joey is a good rapper, I was really looking forward to ABBA in hopes that he would also be able to construct a good album with a message and a concept. And boy did Mr. Bada$$ deliver. Running 12-tracks long, ABBA is Joey’s most political album yet. Splitting in down the middle, we see in first 6 tracks that Joey takes on a Superman role in addressing racial issues in America and provides lots of hope. The production is rather light and joyful, and Joey has a very calm tone throughout. That is until the last 6 tracks on the album. Starting with “Rockabye Baby”, Joey switches the flavor and starts to release his own personal anger over the issues in America by rapping with a voice that is much more aggressive and production that slaps. Most importantly, though, this album is relevant and could not have come at a better time. Being so young, it is impressive to see an artist like Joey Bada$$ take on political rapping and while also making a good and cohesive project. ALL-AMERIKKKAN BADA$$ is one of Joey’s strongest projects and it was my personal favorite for the year of 2017.

Favorite Tracks: All of em fam

Honorable Mentions:

A$AP Mob - Cozy Tapes Vol. 2

Rapsody - Laila's Wisdom (honestly have not given this a thorough listen or else it might've been top 10)

J.I.D. - The Never Story

Daniel Caesar - Freudian

BROCKHAMPTON - SATURATION II

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absolutebl · 4 years ago

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Paranormal BL

In the romance fiction world this would be called, PNR, or paranormal romance and it usually means a contemporary setting but with magical elements or fantastical monsters like vampires, werewolves, ghosts.

Here’s a list of all the one’s I’ve encountered in order of my personal preference.

Color Rush (Korea) 10/10

Korea does PNR really well, it’s just mostly het. Their concepts are always clean, bright, and well written, Color Rush is no exception. I love this BL so much I wrote a whole post about how amazing it is.

Cherry Magic (Japan) 9/10

Definitely one of the best sweetest PNRs to ever happen. The paranormal elements is an audio conceit allowing for voice over, but a good one that doesn't rely on CGI and it’s a great story well acted. Can’t ask for more, really.

He's Coming to Me (Thailand) 9/10

One of GMMTV’s most underrated BLs about a boy who can see ghosts and falls in love with one. They move in together and try to uncover that ghost’s murderer. Good friendship group, great plot, and one of the best coming out sequences in all BL.

Close Friend (Thailand) the KimCop episode 7/10

Kimmon & Copter did a really fun idol meets and falls in love with fan only through the medium of VR. Technically this is sci-fi not PNR but I really enjoyed it and it’s only a short 30 minute episode.

The Guardian (China) 6/10

Guardian is an urban fantasy with a procedural framework. It's completely censored obviously BL to the point where there is even a secondary BL couple. But nice production values and fun supernatural elements. Buffy level CGI.

Great Men Academy (Thailand) 6/10

As body-swaps go this one is actually one I liked. Also I really enjoyed the story, support cast, and filming techniques. Frankly, of all the actors to portray a girl in a man’s body James is one of the best. However, technically this isn’t BL because, ya know, gender.

HIStory: My Hero (Taiwan) 6/10

Body-swap is one of my least favorite paranormal tropes, mostly because the actor has to have a VERY strong sense of physicality to actually take on the mannerisms of someone else. This one isn’t the best. Also not sure if it qualifies as BL, see previous entry.

So Much In Love (Thailand) 5/10

It might not be rated high because it is pretty low level pulp and the subs are terrible, but the paranormal concept is actually quite strong. A boy who can see ghosts encounters one at the swimming pool and they fall in love, although the ghost might not actually be dead,. Has a touch of horror but it all ends happily.

Y-Destiny (Thailand) Ep 7-8: Thurs and Ep 11-12 Sat 5/10

Ep 7-8 Thursday, is a ghost story about a boy who pretends to see the dead to con his friends, then starts actually seeing a spirit and falls in love with him. Ep 11-12 Saturday is a timeslip friends to lovers story a little bit like the movie Big.

PickRome’s Our Skyy episode (Thailand) 5/10

You need to know the OffGun characters from their previous series Puppy Honey to get this episode. It is cute, but do I believe they swapped bodies? Not even a little bit.

PeteKao’s Our Skyy episode (Thailand) 5/10

A sort of serendipity/luck based episode so only sort of qualifies. Will probably only make sense if you already know the TawyNew couple from their previous Kiss series.

The Fairy Fox (China) - 3/10

Kitsune sort or warrior spirit comes to live with ordinary high school boy because he is the reincarnation of a king he once loved. Well cast but very censored and really odd ending.

Youths in the Breeze (China) - 3/10

Three different PNRs one of which features a cat that turns into a human. Korea has done this one het and it didn’t work there either. It’s an odd concept to make romantic. This one ultra censored and there’s two other PNR stories in the series that I can’t remember.

Close Friend (Thailand) the JaFirst episode 3/10

See above, cat boy not really my thing, much as I like cats.

My Dream (Thailand) - 3/10

Some spirits/fae creatures get involved with some ordinary boys, for odd contrived reasons, including one that can be either a man or a woman depending on the bathwater. Very confusing ending.

The Cupid Coach (Thailand) - 3/10

The spirit of cupid comes to life to learn about love, falls in with a boy, disappears. One of the worst of the pulps with terrible pacing, crap production, and mostly piss-poor acting.

Hidden Love (Thailand) - dnf

A group of students trapped together get embroiled in the tragic love story of two ghosts.

Wuxias are not included on this list as they are kinda their own thing not PNR.

I made a My Drama List for this.

(source)

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alexanderking · 5 years ago

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Another top 20 albums of 2019

This is another tough list for me as there were quite a few standout albums this year, as well as some I’ve still yet to check out. With that being said...

“Have I left anything out?” – Albums of 2018:

Chris Dave & The Drumheadz – Chris Dave and The Drumheadz: While I can’t say I was blown away by this project (hence it not making my honourable mentions list last year), there are some truly standout moments on here. Those being ‘Dat Feelin’’, ‘Spread Her Wings’, and the fantastic cover of ‘Lady Jane’...

Georgia Anne Muldrow – Overload: I paid very little attention to Georgia Anne Muldrow’s output after 2010, despite it being consistent. I checked this project out due to its grammy nomination and was impressed by the more complete and focused selection of tracks, while keeping those quirks that I loved about Muldrow when I got into her earlier work. This would have made the honourable mentions. I no doubt have a rabbit hole to venture down in the future...

Alex Isley – The Beauty in Everything Part 1: While ‘La Brea’ is one of my favourite Soul/R’n’B tracks of the decade, and I love the work she’s done with Brandon Williams, I haven’t loved a lot of her full projects. I really enjoyed the music on here however...

Ashley Henry – Easter EP: Henry’s growth as a composer continues to grow. While the more jazz-leaning pieces appeal to me the most, I love the tinges of hip-hop influence appearing through the stylised cover of ‘The World is Yours (I love Music)’ and the sampling on ‘St Anne’s (Remix)’...

Dame Drummer – Loveloution: I DESPERATELY wanted to have this on this year’s list, but alas, this was released in October of last year (according to Bandcamp). This project covers politically conscious aspects like racism, self-worth and police brutality, as well as loving ourselves and each other. What’s more, all of this flows really well with the tracks being in alphabetical order! This would’ve got an 8 or a 9...

Ray Angry – One: I loved the work Angry did with ‘The Roots’, particularly on ‘How I Got Over’. Sy Smith had shared ‘Bjork City’ on Twitter, which caused me to check this album out. ‘Really enjoyed the compositions on here. I think this would have got a 19...

Mac Ayres – Something to Feel: Despite constant plugs of this artist on my Twitter feed, I STILL ignored this album last year. I have no idea why I did this...This album has a slight throwback to the borderline slow jam/neo soul sounds of the late ‘90s and early ‘00s. The subject matter covers love and relationships on the whole but the real standout here is the composition. This would’ve got a 6...

...2019:

20) Flying Lotus – Flamagra:

This is probably Flying Lotus’s longest project to date, but it stays as musically consistent as its predecessors. Not only are there strong moments in tracks like ‘The Climb’, ‘Heroes’ and ‘More’, there are also a lot of callbacks to earlier pieces later on to tie this project together. This will be one I appreciate more and more on each listen...

19) Little Brother – May the Lord Watch:

Phonte and Rapper Big Pooh reunite after (at least) eight years apart, blazing their own respective trails may I add. Each emcee brings their frequent collaborators on board to deliver some head-nodding and some soulful beats, well-delivered flows and some great in-jokes for Little Brother fans. And apparently there’s EVEN MORE to come...

18) Solange – When I Get Home:

This album takes on a way more positive and celebratory theme than the highly acclaimed ‘A Seat at the Table’. While this can be seen as a sequel to the aforementioned, I personally consider this a side quest taking off from the “intermission” track ‘Borderline (An ode to self care)’; this is literally what I would think a whole album in the vein of that track would sound like. This project also reminded me of Thundercat’s ‘Drunk’ in how all these short pieces are put together to create a fully cohesive album. My stand outs are ‘Way to the Show’, ‘Dreams’, ‘Almeida’ and ‘Jerrod’...

17) Anderson .Paak – Ventura:

Not even six months after ‘Oxnard’, we get ‘Ventura’! This can be arguably seen as the more soulful side of a double album, the first side containing more rapping. Despite this being so low on this list, I enjoyed ‘Ventura’ way more than ‘Oxnard’; these are the kinds of melodies I vibe more with these days. ‘Reaching’ 2 Much’ to ‘Chosen One’ is the strongest part of the album for me...

16) Rapsody – Eve:

Rapsody becomes more and more focused with each project! Much like ‘When I Get Home’, ‘Eve’ takes on a celebratory theme, but this time using each track to highlight one of her personal heroes, all of whom are women. My favourites are ‘Oprah’, ‘Maya’, ‘Iman’ and ‘Afeni’.

15) SEED Ensemble – Driftglass:

The Jazz Re:Freshed label deliver yet ANOTHER quality project via the SEED Ensemble. The subject matter on here is pretty dark as it deals with race relations in the UK; a narrative which I feel was becoming increasingly dismissed with the “but at least you’re not Black American” argument when discussing racism in this country, passive-aggressive or otherwise. The piece ‘Interplanetary Migration’ closes the album with a more hopeful message through the bouncing thump of the drums and the blaring burst of horns. My favourites are the ‘Stargaze’ interludes, ‘The Dream Keeper’ and ‘Mirrors’, although the piece ‘W A K E (for Grenfell)’ must be noted...

14) Raphael Saadiq – Jimmy Lee:

I’ll be honest. I was not a fan of the ‘Modern Soul’ era of Raphael Saadiq. I cautiously gave this a listen, keeping in mind that his last album was in 2011. I was impressed, not just with the selection of musicians that brought their sound to the table, but with the narrative it follows. ‘Jimmy Lee’ is the story of Saadiq’s eldest (and favourite) brother and his battle and eventual defeat with drug addiction. That being said, ‘Jimmy Lee’ doesn’t entirely take a sombre note. There are moments of hope in tracks like ‘So Ready’, ‘I’m Feeling Love’ and to a far lesser extent, ‘My Walk’. Not only is this (for me) Saadiq’s best project since ‘As Ray-Ray’, but it’s his most personal album in his entire career so far...

13) KAYTRANADA – BUBBA:

I was genuinely surprised at how much I enjoyed ‘BUBBA’. This project takes on the similar bouncy, dance-tinged groove that KAYTRANADA is generally known for, but also includes some elements of Afrobeats to give it an edge. This album also gives ‘Teedra Moses’ another iconic track through her feature on ‘Culture’...

12) Resolution 88 – Revolutions:

Resolution 88 have fully come into their own on this project. While there are still clear influences of the Headhunters/Weather Report era, the music feels a lot less like a direct homage. Each track is inspired by a sequence or nuance when dealing with vinyl records. My favourites are the title track, ‘The Matrix’ and ‘Warped Memories’. It’s also worth noting the ‘Butcher Brown’ shaped rabbit hole I went down after hearing the Marcus Tenney feature on here (well...this and their feature on Mac Ayres’s ‘Juicebox’...

11) Mac Ayres – Juicebox:

This is one of the many recommendations Dan has sent me over the past few years. There was something about the opening track ‘I Wanna Give Up’, nothing to love right off the bat but something. It was the following track ‘Shadows’ that made me want to hear the rest. ‘Juicebox’ has less of the throwback element of ‘Something to Feel’, which for me is most welcome. While this project stays on a high from ‘Where do we go from Here?’ to ‘Come Thru’, my favourites are ‘Jumping off the Moon’, ‘S**t Covered in Gold’, ‘Caught Up’ and the closing track ‘Something More’, which has an extended closing that I can't help but hum/sing along to...

10) Zo! – FourFront:

I’m not sure of my mood had anything to do with it, but ‘FourFront’ marked a return to form for me after ‘SkyBreak’ (I liked it, ‘didn’t love it). The Soul, Jazz, R’n’B and Disco influences are a-plenty, all which lend themselves to this album well. Devin Morrison and Madison McFerrin are welcome additions to the FE+ friends of family. And might I add, the interludes are as strong as some of the tracks here...

9) Dego – Too Much:

I’m thinking and hoping that the pattern for a specific Dego album release will be every four years as this has been the case with the last three (along with the myriad of releases under different pseudonyms and with different artists over the years...). ‘Too Much’ delivers some good old broken vibes while leaning more on the vocals for the first two thirds of the album. There’s a nice revisit in ‘You Are Virgo’, referring to the 2011 track ‘We Are Virgo’. It’s only the last few tracks that wane for me a little bit, but not enough to put this any lower on the list...

8) Shafiq Husayn – The Loop:

After about a nine year wait, Shafiq Husayn releases his sophomore solo project !! I would say this album feels a tiny bit less cohesive than ‘Shafiq En’ A-Free-Ka’, but the tracks are individually stronger. My favourites are ‘May I Assume’, ‘On Our Way Home’, ‘Cycles’ and ‘Hours Away’...

7) Ashley Henry – Beautiful Vinyl Hunter:

I. Am. KICKING. MYSELF. For missing the Ashley Henry show at Jazz Re:Freshed on December 19th!!!! I love this album! There’s some great contemporary jazz as well as hip-hop and orchestral influences to make ‘Beautiful Vinyl Hunter’ really shine! My standouts are ‘Realisations’, ‘I Still Believe’, ‘Sunrise’, Lullaby (Rise and Shine) and ‘Battle’...

6) Kendrick Scott Oracle – A Wall Becomes A Bridge:

This album was the result of a bout of writers block, which musical director Derrick Hodge helped Kendrick Scott work through. The result is effectively an off branch of the Robert Glasper Experiment, through its use of echoed recordings and DJ scratches to deliver themes or words of wisdom. Much like 2013′s ‘Conviction’, ‘A Wall Becomes A Bridge’ plays seamlessly, so seamlessly that I either forget to skip to my favourites, or I let the filler play as it introduces my favourites so well...

5) Devin Morrison – Bussin’:

A tweet from ‘KING’ (or ‘We Are KING’) put me on this album. For anyone wanting to fill that classic R’n’B void, Devin Morrison is another artist keeping that era alive. Even the funk inspired jams that I wasn’t too hot on have become growers. My favourites are ‘Guaranteed’, ‘The Call (407)’ and the slightly smug ‘No’...

4) Lucky Daye – Painted:

My sister put me on Lucky Daye. And how glad I am she did!! ‘Another crooner filling the R’n’B void (and helping us forget how hard Daniel Caesar ****ed himself in Feb...). While Lucky Daye has been behind the scenes as a songwriter for a while, it’s great to see him step to the forefront with his own blend of vulnerable lyrics, as well as the occasional blunt rap verse, delivered with an impressive flow might I add! ‘Extra’ is one of my favourite R’n’B tracks this past decade...

3) Daniel Casimir & Tess Hirst – These Days:

The sounds of Daniel Casimir kept me company during my walk on the Capital Ring trail back in 2017. Hearing ‘What Did I Do’ had me itching to hear the rest of this album. And I wasn’t disappointed! ‘These Days’ also has Soul, Jazz and some big band influences throughout. Tess Hirst impressively delivers vocals touching on race relations in the UK and the effects of gentrification in the capital...

2) Esperanza Spalding – 12 Little Spells:

The first 12 tracks were actually released in 2018, but the full release came in March of 2019, hence why this is on the list. I see ‘12 Little Spells’ as an amalgamation of Spalding’s musical journey so far. Tracks like ‘All Limbs Are’ and ‘Readying to Rise’ calling back to ‘Chamber Music Society’, tracks like ‘Touch in Mine’ and ‘The Longing Deep Down’ calling back to ‘Radio Music Society’ and tracks like ‘To Tide Us Over’ and ‘With Others’ calling back to the more recent sounds of ‘Emily’s D+Evolution’ and ‘Exposure’. This continues in the experimental vein as each track is part of a long sentence and touches on the nuances and subtleties of various parts of the body. This was nearly my album of the year but...

Brandon Williams – The Love Factor: Despite ‘matters of the heart’ being a sore spot for me at the moment, I couldn’t deny how much I enjoyed the offerings on ‘The Love Factor’, one of those being a cover of one of my favourite George Duke pieces, which opens and closes the album. As the title suggests, each track covers a facet of love, including our resilience toward desiring love, trust issues, vulnerability and the dream-like state love can create. While there are many vocal and musical features on here, Alex Isley takes the MVP spot for her work on the album’s centrepiece ‘Say That You Love Me’...

Honourable mentions:

There are many honourable mentions, but I only have space for 10...

Tyler, the Creator – IGOR: I was as taken aback as a lot of people on initial listen. I also can’t pretend that the narrative concept doesn’t still go over my head. But I can’t deny Tyler’s progress in his music writing and composition, nor his skill utilised on the various verses throughout the second half of ‘IGOR’

Steve Lacy – Apollo XXI: ‘An enjoyable debut from who has become one of the most prominent members of ‘The Internet’. As well as the sounds we’ve come to expect from the band, Lacy gets a chance to delve into more of the rock influences on tracks like ‘Lay Me Down’ and ‘In Lust We Trust’. There’s also a potential anthem in the coming out suite ‘Like Me’ and a beautiful moment in ‘Amandla’s Interlude’...

Matt Martians – The Last Party: ‘Martin’s second solo project (’something closer to his 12th project overall). ‘The Last Party’ has a theme of being accepted as we are this time around, but keeps the format of having hidden tracks in each song. My favourites are ‘Off My Feet/Westside Rider Anthem’ and ‘Look Like’...

C R O W N – Unlearning: After a number of EPs, C R O W N graces us with her debut LP. ‘Unlearning' utilises Jazz-tinged soul instrumentals to ultimately deal with addressing our needs and letting go to help ourselves grow. My favourites are ‘15 Summers’, ‘S**t To Do’ and the acoustic track ‘Lines’...

Moonchild – Little Ghost: This was a strange one for me. All the elements that I love about this group is present. But I wasn’t feeling this as much as ‘Voyager’ (2017′s #1). I’m not sure what’s missing for me here...there are still glowing gems in ‘Wise Women’, ‘Got To Know It’, ‘Whistling’ and ‘Still Wonder’...

Bree Runway – Be Runway EP: It’s criminal that Bree Runway hasn’t quite gained the recognition she deserves just yet. Bree is easily one of the most interesting vocal artists the UK has to offer right now. I found myself head nodding uncontrollably to ‘2ON’ and ‘X2C’! I’m looking forward to even more in the future...

Quelle Chris – Guns: Quelle Chris returns so soon after ‘Everything’s Fine’ to touch on race relations in the US through the love of guns, at times to people’s detriment. The head-nod factor of the slightly odd-ball instrumentals, along with the various reflective and celebratory moments in the second half had me return to this album a lot...

YBN Cordae – The Lost Boy: This was another recommendation from Dan and yet another welcome surprise! It’s emcees like this, who integrate the trap rhyme style with storytelling and punchlines that will progress the genre even more. Standouts are ‘Have Mercy’, ‘Thousand Words’ and ‘Been Around’...

Alex Isley & Jack Dine – Wilton EP: I found out about this EP through someone who liked my tweet listing my top 10 R’n’B songs of this decade. I recognised Jack Dine from his collaborations with Mac Ayres. His production allows Isley to delve even further into soulful slow jam territory. Check out ‘Wait’ and ‘There was Love’

Joe Armon-Jones – Turn to Clear View: I loved ‘Almost Went Too Far’ from 2018′s ‘Starting Today’. This caused me to investigate this 2019 project. ‘Turn to Clear View’ takes a departure from the Dub influences of his previous offering to venture into electronic jazz and west African music to an extent. My favourites are ‘Yellow Dandelion’, ‘(To) Know Where You’re Coming From’ and ‘Self: Love’...

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