#Especially his sorta teaming with the empire is like :// okay so now you have a sort side in this ?

[leafatlaw]

See I agree with like zero of what Kab was saying, but she did bring up an interesting point about who Zam considers “innocent” players. Because that’s been an issue I’ve had since the beginning with the new oath. Because morality is very complicated and I feel like in this case kab IS innocent because she didn’t go looking for the fight and lost two hearts to him. BUT it’s zams own positive relationship with derap that keeps him from being objective, which is a fatal flaw with the oath in the first place. If Zam cannot be objective about who is or isn’t innocent than the entire oath is useless. And worse it’s debatably impossible to say wether or not people are innocent or evil, because individual ideas of morality is just a subjective thing !!

Anyways this is basically all to say that Zams oath and ideas are fundamentally flawed and it’s a little worrying that he’s so set in these ideas that he refused to listen to Kab on this outright.

[neutral-emerald]

SILVER THE COSMIC TIME-JANITOR (or: dude, what's with all the alternate futures)

silver the hedgehog has a very simple backstory. he's a kindhearted, sorta-naive but altogether very driven psychic hedgehog here to save the world by time-traveling to the past (also known as present-day) to prevent the apocalyptic future he was born into from coming to pass!

[ID: A screenshot of Silver from Sonic 06. He’s glowing with cyan energy as he flies over a dark, post-apocalyptic city.]

...wait, if he's time traveling 200 years into the past to completely change the shape of the timeline, how do the stars manage to align such that he manages to be born at the exact same point in the new timeline with the exact same genetics? how are his parents born? does silver have parents?? and how does he do this no less than THREE SEPARATE TIMES??!

hey everyone, i'm tumblr user neutral-emerald here to make good on the idea i vaguely gestured at yesterday and point out silver's wildly inconsistent backstory(s) and then explain to you how this isn't just sega playing hopscotch with the concept of time travel, but actually TOTALLY EXPLAINABLE if you don't mind a whole lot of conjecture and "fuck dude i just think it'd be cool."

LET'S GO.

before i get started, a few things to establish.

first, this is about… half serious, tops. it’s less of a theory and more of an observation of something that’s weird and then throwing some possible explanations at it because i am a massive sucker for time-based nonsense. if you wanna take my observations and build your own conclusions, go for it. i’m not your boss.

second, i'm basing my conclusions off of both the games and the idw comics. the conclusions i draw are applicable to either continuity, but the logic does rest a decent amount on the comics, so just a heads-up in case you were expecting pure game canon from this.

and third, i'm working off like half a brain and very intermittent checks of the wiki and cutscene compilations, so there's probably many things i'm missing! if you notice something i said was wildly off-base, go ahead and correct me in the replies and i'll either edit the post or explain to you just how that detail doesn't actually matter, depending on whether it. y'know. matters.

with that out of the way, let's get into the first topic of discussion!

part 1: the future is inconsistent, y'all

now, i'm not sure if you've heard, but in the year 2006 sonic team released this little indie game creatively entitled Sonic the Hedgehog. it was a smash hit, won countless awards, and for some reason went down in history as a messy, incomplete bugfest. but that's not what matters. what matters is that it introduced Silver the Hedgehog.

silver hails from 200 years in the future. the world is a bleak, fiery place, and has been since the monster iblis was unleashed after princess elise's death. silver was born into this world, which we know since it's literally the first thing he says in his story.

[ID: A cropped line from Silver's story in Sonic 06. "This world was devastated before I was born."]

i'm not going to drag you through a beat-by-beat summary of the entire plot of sonic 06, you should know it already. silver meets mephiles, gets lied to about who caused the apocalypse, mephiles yeets him and blaze into the past, he tries to murder Sonic the Hedgehog™, and so on. eventually he helps kill god, and then sonic and elise travel further back in time to kill god even deader so that none of the game ever happened, and the bad future into which silver was born never happened, thus thoroughly scrubbing silver's existence from the timeline!

...until.

sonic rivals.

i'm not going to speak much on sonic rivals, mostly because i'm not super familiar with it. but what matters is that silver is back! he's still from the future, he's still here to change the past, and most importantly he wasn't deleted from existence by the destruction of solaris, unlike everything else from sonic 06 including everyone's memories of it. and obviously, whatever state his future is in, it's not the same as it was in sonic 06.

now, i don't have a single clue what is going on in rivals 2, so do inform me if there's some big information i'm missing from that one. all i know is he's fixing yet another possible apocalyptic future, like always. correct me if i’m wrong, i don’t have the patience to trawl through it myself.

then we've got sonic colors, in which silver is again from the future. notably, he’s definitely not from an apocalypse!

[ID: Some screenshots from the DS version of Sonic Colors, again cropped to just the text. Tails and Silver are talking to each other.

Tails: What's the future you came from like, Silver? Silver: A lot brighter than this. Silver: The sky is blue, and everybody's got a smile.]

sonic generations doesn't add much. again, correct me if i'm wrong, but i don't think we learn anything about what kind of future silver is from, and he's definitely not here to fix it this time. that's sonic's job! he's just hanging out like everyone else.

now, up until this point the future has been reasonably consistent, setting aside my somewhat abstract understanding of the rivals games. there's nothing to say that silver's not coming back in time from the same point in a single timeline, which is the one and only version of the future ever since the destruction of sonic 06.

UNTIL.

[ID: Two panels from the comic Sonic Forces: Stress Test. In the first panel, Silver looks worried as he lands in front of Knuckles, who looks skeptical.

Silver: We've got big trouble! Eggman— Knuckles: How can you be here? I thought you returned to the future?

In the second panel, Knuckles looks away with a self-assured grin, while Silver looks more panicked.

Knuckles: Oh wait— I must be dreaming! Silver: What? No! I've come back with a dire warning from the future!]

i have a lot of issues with sonic forces, especially with how its story is written. something i do NOT take issue with is the supplemental comics, mainly because they are WONDERFUL evidence for my crackpot time travel theory.

like i said, up until this point we don't really know whether silver has been experiencing separate instances of the future, or simply traveling back in time to prevent an also-time-traveling eggman nega from messing things up in the past. but here, we get some very juicy information:

[ID: Knuckles and Silver again. Knuckles has his arms crossed and is looking at Silver, who has a nervous look on his face as he slams a fist on the palm of his other hand.

Knuckles: Come again? Silver: Something happens that brings the world to ruin! But the historical records are sparse or make no sense. I came back to hopefully head off whatever's about to happen and save the future.]

silver travels back in time to prevent a terrible apocalypse. this is not the beautiful future silver came from in sonic colors— but this is the same silver. everyone recognizes him. he recognizes everyone. and yet, the future he came from is different.

part 2: silver is a walking paradox

allow me to remind you of what i pointed out when i was talking about sonic 06. silver was born into the iblis-apocalypse. considering no elaborate timeline nonsense happened to him before the events of the game (by his reckoning) i think we can safely assume he was born like a regular person with parents.

in the first post-06 timeline, silver was probably also born. let's be charitable, acknowledge that sonic team doesn't overthink the butterfly effect like i do, and say that silver was born to the same parents, because the universe likes to keep things nice and simple and contrive itself to make this particular character exist in this time period.

so, it's entirely fair that silver comes to exist in a post-06 timeline at the equivalent point in time, aka 200 years in the future. it's also fair that he travels back in time to prevent some kind of apocalypse, because that's his narrative role! it's what he does. when it's time for him to exist in the story, that's what he's there to do.

what isn't fair is the fact that it keeps happening.

[ID: A panel from the IDW comics. Sonic is stretching his legs while looking faintly exasperated at Silver, who is nervously holding his arm.

Silver: Er… No. I came back because defeating Eggman didn't save the future. Sonic: Couldn't even play along. Had to bring the mood down. Sonic: *sigh* Okay, what happened this time?]

[ID: The following panel, cropped to just Silver's text bubbles narrating over a starry sky.

Silver: When I left, my time had been conquered by the Eggman Empire. Everyone lived in fear, choking on polluted air. Silver: When I went back, the Eggman Empire was gone— but so was everyone else. Silver: There was nothing left. No people, no animals, no machinery. Only water and sparse, metallic plant life.]

allow me to summarize my understanding of all this: silver is from the future. normally, the future is good. sometimes it isn't. when it isn't good, he goes back in time and fixes things, then returns to the future to check if that fixed things.

the least conjecture-y interpretation i can come up with is that sometimes silver will go into the past, then go back to the future but end up in a Bad Timeline and thus go into the past again to fix things. there's no weird warping directly between bad timelines, he only gets there by way of the past.

but that's boring, so here's my PREFERRED interpretation.

silver hails from a good future, but sometimes it just changes. he's unstuck from time— if something weird happens in the past, he's the only one to know that the passage of fate was changed, because he went to bed in one timeline and woke up somewhere categorically worse, and the only way he can fix it is by figuring out just what caused this and going back in time to fix it.

or, to say it in a meme:

[ID: A picture of someone lying in a hospital bed with a nurse standing next to them, edited so that Silver is in the bed.

nurse: sir… you've been asleep for 2 hours silver: oh boy i can't wait to wake up in the same timeline i went to sleep in]

part 3: how did this happen?

it's one thing to point out that silver doesn't experience time like a normal hedgehog, and another thing to explain how and why this happens.

fyi, this is the part where i go wildly off the rails and start saying whatever i want. there's a ton of explanations one could come up with, most probably stemming back to sonic 06. i'm just going to go with my own, and probably not come up with a whole lot of concrete evidence because i'm just spitballing. this is me having a fun time. going "heeheehoohoo time traveling hedgehog go brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

so. something i haven't touched upon is that in all games after sonic 06, silver can time travel. we never see him do it, it's never explained how he does it. all we know is that he's doing it under his own power.

which is kinda odd, don't you think? should he be able to do that?

in sonic 06, we see three mechanisms for time travel. first is the chaos emeralds. if two people perform Chaos Control with a chaos emerald apiece, they open up a swirling rift in the air which can send them to different points in time and space. silver can't be doing that, for obvious reasons— he's only one hedgehog, and he's not exactly running around with a chaos emerald at all times. that can't be how he does it.

second is a time machine eggman built. that obviously can't be it; the machine doesn't exist at all after the timeline gets wiped, and again, silver is doing this on his own. he's actively antagonistic towards eggman, even. absolutely not this one.

third and finally is mephiles, who can make big purple orbs to take himself and passengers to different points in time. this obviously can't be it either, for similar reasons to number 2, right? after all, mephiles is one half of solaris, who was destroyed before he could be split off. he doesn't exist to be silver's time-traveling uber driver.

...right?

well, obviously. i'm not going to try and tell you that mephiles is secretly alive and shepherding silver back and forth between timelines for no reason. that's ridiculous. no, i'm going to try and tell you that silver is mephiles.

or rather, he's solaris. or RATHER, he's the new solaris, sorta-ascended to the role of Time God after the old one got blown out like a birthday candle.

like i said, i'm going wildly off the rails and as such don't have any concrete evidence to explain why it's this instead of something else, but hear me out. after elise blew out the flame of hope, the universe was left in an interesting situation. someone needs to be in charge of the flow of time, but the previous time-god was just unceremoniously destroyed. but all the power and energy of a time-god has to go somewhere, in some form, in some time.

with nothing else to go off of, the role of time-god starts flipping through every notable being it had interacted with. they're all solidly accounted for in the timeline, except for one. silver the hedgehog was born into a timeline that cannot exist. silver the hedgehog does not, and cannot exist. silver the hedgehog interacted quite a bit with both sides of solaris— he spent a substantial amount of time fighting back iblis, and associated with mephiles, even being one of the few people to directly experience his time travel abilities. silver the hedgehog tried and failed to absorb iblis into himself.

here's my theory: after sonic 06, the universe reasserted itself such that silver was the new Solaris. silver is not consciously aware that this is what he is, but he knows that he can time travel. sometimes the timeline will rearrange itself around silver. he is unaffected by this because he is a higher being unaffected by such petty trifles as "an origin" or "paradoxes".

silver the hedgehog probably doesn't have parents. he sprang into existence one day and everyone just kind of went with it, himself included.

oh also something i thought was neat but couldn't think of where to put:

[ID: More cropped dialogue, this time from Team Sonic Racing.

Silver: I'm fine. It's just, something bad is gonna happen. I can't explain it. I just feel it. Blaze: Have your travels through time given you precognition? Silver: I don't know. Maybe they have. Or maybe I'm just thinking too much.]

silver might be becoming psychic in a future-vision kinda way. that, or he’s riddled with anxiety. possibly both.

TL;DR

silver hails from no less than three separate timelines, his existence is a tangled web of who-knows-how-many grandfather paradoxes, and i choose to believe that he's god.

if anyone who cares more about evidence wants to gather up like, little one-off clues that support or conflict with my conclusions, go right ahead. or just throw your own arbitrary headcanons for what's going on with this at me. or incorporate these ideas into an au or something! i just want more people thinking about what the Fuck is up with silver post-06, because by god there is a WHOLE lot of potential packed in there

anyway thanks for reading make sure to like comment and subscribe—

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Pissed

A little Au-ish in where Lisa also joined the Legends. Might be OC like but then again they are in private...? Idk but I felt like some Snart siblings fluff is needed so here it is.

It had been two months since Lisa had join the Legends and admittedly Leonard had been rather pleased to have his sister by his side again.

He would never tell anyone but he had worried about her back in Central while he was traveling around and he was more than relieved that the ever hanging threat of the villain of the week threatening her was gone.

Now, he was remembering how hard it was working with her. For whatever reason, she woke up in a bad mood and when she was in a bad mood, she showed it. And brought it to everyone around her.

Now with Rouges it had been okay because let's face it after a fist fight it was generally over and during heists it wasn't like anything would go exactly as planned so her bad mood didn't affect them.

But during this mission with the Legends, Lisa was just uncooperative, talked back to Rip, didn't listen to anyone and did her own thing, stealing the Hope Diamond with Mick.

Rip had been furious, sure no one got killed (that they knew of), but he didn't like things going so off kilter especially since Mick was getting a partner in crime and hell knows how much energy it took making sure he didn't torch the Empire State Building's Lobby, he didn't want to deal with the Statue of Liberty having a gold crown.

Rip had been about to go to the training room to lecture her but he had stopped him, and offered to talk to her instead.

He knew after years of dealing with her awful temper that she was looking for a fight and if Rip lectured her, she would yell or more likely punch him, there would be a fight, punishment and her mood would get even worse and she would make things happened. Things that Leonard would rather forget.

As Leonard walked into the training room he encountered Lisa beating up a punching bag. "Hey," Leonard announced his arrival and Lisa stopped and scowled "What do you want?" Lisa hissed.

"Rip wanted to grill you about your attitude today."

"If he didn't like it, he should deal with it," Lisa replied with a roundhouse kick.

Leonard tried to go over the situation with his mind, he wasn't used to these kinds of "We must work as a team" pep talks.

"Well, Lisa it.. It's just that this matters, it's important to follow the plan in order to succeed."

"The plan should be more flexible." "You still should cooperate." "I'll decide on that."

Leonard rolled his eyes. These moods were really annoying and worse, she didn't listen to reason until she got over them. She didn't usually listen to reason in a good mood but during these time she was all out deaf.

"No, you work at the mission and then you can get your little pissed child routine to your room."

"You cannot be serious Leonard. Why don't you go read Kafka or something old man." She hit his shoulder hard.

"Once you actually start acting like an adult I might," Leonard growled back. Leonard had a strange sense of déjà vu. The whole thing reminded him of when he used to take care of her. When she was a eleven or nine, she would come to his apartment angry and hit him whenever she got annoyed by him. He just had to make her smile at something, anything and then it would be gone.

He looked at her, a thirty something woman, glaring at him like he was Hitler or Lewis. She was more or less the same, definitely had the same course vocabulary. Leonard shook his head. How did he make her smile, he wasn't one to carry around 5001 Snart jokes book.

Then he remembered. It was stupid and incredible childish but damn the results would be hilarious and bodily harm, guaranteed.

"Shut up," Lisa tried to hit him again. Leonard caught her arm and put her in a lock.

"Remember what you use to get if you tried hitting me?” Leonard smirked.

"I don't remember what I got, but YOU got your ass kicked," Lisa flipped him over.

"Like you could beat me after all your my baby sister." Leonard teased.

She charged at him and he used her anger to his advantage. A few swift moves later, she was pinned and he straddled her legs.

"Get off of me,” she grunted. "Make me," Leonard challenged. "You have a heavy beer gut." That was a low blow even for her.

"Enough with the piss, smile it will make you feel better." Leonard commanded.

"Says who?" "Says science," Leonard shot back. "I'm not in the fucking mood."

"I figured." He trailed his fingers down her legs "Now do you remember what would happen when you tried to hit me?" She glared.

"You get a visit from the you-know-who." He squeezed her knee caps to no success. She rolled her eyes.

"You got to be kidding me," she mumbled, "This is stupid and childish. I'm too old for this crap. You are way too ancient for this crap. And Len I'm not some kid anymore, I freeze people in gold and seduce speedster's engineer. We're serious people, Lenny. We are hardened criminals. Besides I'm not even..." Lisa stopped her rant and squirmed as his hand shot into her armpit.

"What was that? I think you still are" he smirked as he lightly traced circles. "Just smile and I'll stop.”

Lisa squirmed, pushed, bucked to no avail "No. I'm not ticklish." She stammered as she used her one free hand to futile pull his hand away from her.

"I think you are. You can't hold it in forever." He could tell that she wanted to break, it was laughingly obvious. Her grinding her teeth and biting her lip was almost akin to constipation.

"Smile Lisa. As your big brother I just want to make you happy and not in such a shitty mood all day" Leonard taunted as he used his left hand to squeeze her stomach.

She was being stubborn about it. He could just see it, her mouth was twitched up but she wouldn't break out into a smirk or half-smile.

She just squirmed and hid her face in her hair or against the floor. "I didn't think you would be this difficult. Fine you wanna play, we're gonna play."

Lisa eyes widened as she felt his fingers tap up her ribcage, "If I remember correctly, your ribs were your worst spot. Hmm?"

"Len, no I'm no..t" She stopped. "If you're so not, you can finish the sentence." Silence.

"I'm giving you one chance. Smile voluntarily and I'll let you go" He waited a couple of seconds before deciding the silence was a definite no. And he proceeded to emit the most surprising sounds out of the younger Snart.

Leonard almost started laughing himself. The girly, bubbly, giggly laugh didn't fit at all with the image of a villainous, leather clad woman who thought nothing of killing a man for the money. He swore that if he closed his eyes he would have thought it was coming from some vapid model especially as it went higher a few pitches when he climbed up her ribs like a piano.

Though the squeals were followed by more Lisa-like obscenities on how he would die a horrible death by fire.

She was spending way too much time with Mick.

What Leonard was most surprised was how much fun he was having. He felt like some dumb kid, and the whole situation felt normal. Nothing of Lewis' abuse or juvie or the next big heist sorta like a normal childhood activity in a regular family.

He stopped every once and awhile to allow her to breath in air and a chance for mercy.

"Are you done with your attitude?" He asked as she gulped a breath of air.

"No." Then with a battle cry she tackled him, pinned him down and dug her fingers into his shirt. He blinked.

"Stupid parka!" She cursed and tried to take it off.

Ohhh. He realized she was trying to turn on the tables on him. He calmly pushed her down and resumed position. "Sorry sis, but I'm not ticklish. There's more than one reason why my name's Cold."

He bend down to blow on her ribs and her laugh went up almost three octaves. Honestly, he thought Lisa looked adorable right now.

She looked so carefree and happy, and there were freakin dimples coming out. The laugh was just icing on the cake. Too often he just saw her as the little girl in the hospital getting stitches, refusing to talk about Lewis or a girl having nothing going on in life except the next big thrill. No dreams. No big ambitions.

"Lisa, if you want me to stop you have to start fighting." Leonard drawled as Lisa tried to squirm and bang her fists against him.

"LENHEHaNo!" Lisa screeched when he managed to get his hand under her shirt, scratching at her ribs with his nails.

"This is the third rib right? Or is it the fourth? I should count them don't you think?"

"NOHAHANOFUCHAHADON'THAHATHE TEASING MAKES IT WORSE!" She managed to screech out.

It went on like that for awhile. But eventually she bended over into curled ball, banging the ground.

"YOU WIAHAHAHAHAN YOUHIHAIHAHAHAHIAHAHIHIHAHAH" "And you'll stop your shitty mood?" Leonard asked as she unfurled herself, panting heavily.

"Yes, for the love of whatever God, yes" Lisa answered, nodding her head eagerly.

"Good," Leonard scrambled off her legs and helped her up.

"So we're good" Leonard asked cautiously. He knew it would work but he didn't think she would be so so calm afterwards. Maybe she didn't take enough air in.

"I guess. But know this" Lisa placed a hand firmly on his shoulder "I will get you back. You're not the only one with a good memory. And anytime as soon as you take off your shoes and parka. I will get my revenge. In public, in private, in front of the team it doesn't matter. I will do it.”

Leonard would have laugh if he didn't know how serious that threat was.

"So, any reason why you were pissed?" Leonard asked.

Lisa froze and then frowned "I heard Mick and Jax talking. How you took me because you were worried that some villain was going to hurt me.”

"Yeah so?"

"I don't want to be chosen just because I need protection. I can do stuff, Lenny. I don't want to follow the Team around so you could keep an eye on me. Like how you and Mick were a package deal. What am I? The back order?” "Lisa, if we had only chosen you so we could protect you Stein's wife would be here. Sara's dad would be here. Jax's dad would be here. Rip's family would be here. We chose you not just because of that but because you would actually be useful to the mission. You know how to work a crime scene, you know how to plan a mission, you know how to fight. You can do something with the Team, you can help. That's why you're here."

Lisa stared at him, disbelievingly "No bullshit?" "No bullshit."

A few nights later, Leonard was in the kitchen putting away his late night drink when he got tackled with a vicious screech.

The rest of the Legends woke up and ran to the room to see the two Snart siblings rolling around the floor, laughing, growling and almost knocking over the table.

"What the hell?" Sara asked.

"Just walk away slowly and maybe they'll stop" Jax muttered.

They took his advice, slightly worried for the next day and still wondering what the hell was going on.

"Admit it!" Lisa yelled. "NOAHA" Leonard croaked.

[starshinewriter]

New Chapter of Bonding is up!!

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24316399/chapters/59471014#workskin

Chapter Title: Della

Alternative to ao3:

                                                            Dewey

Hanging out with Dewey was always so easy for Della ever since she got back, he was like her in almost every single way. Which meant that they shared a lot of the same interests, like their love for adventure. But she was beginning to realize there was more than one kind of adventure. It didn't always mean going to a new and exciting place in search of something, sometimes it meant just hanging out at home doing nothing in particular. Like this one.

The two of them were currently sat on the deck of the mansion just watching the houseboat sway in the water. They were quiet -which was weird for both of them- but it wasn't awkward, it was kinda nice actually. It gave her time only with her thoughts.

...Okay, enough of that.

"So what have you been up to lately, anything exciting?" She asked her second oldest child.

"Not really." He replied without looking away from the houseboat. She could understand why, it was very calming. But before she could ask him to elaborate he continued, "Just hanging out with my bros and Webby for the most part. Nothing you would consider exciting." Wait, what?

"I think that's very exciting."  

He looked at her surprised, "Really? I just thought... that doesn't seem like the kind of thing that would excite you." Did he think he wasn't exciting or worth hanging out with? She had to fix this, now.

"You guys are my kids."

"Oh, right, that explains it." Okay, she was missing something. "It's just, you're this great adventurer! You're not interested in doing boring, family stuff."

She made him look at her, "Dewey, I'm a great adventurer because of my family. And come on, this family is not boring." He smiled slightly. "Honestly I've been gone for so long I missed family stuff, especially just hanging out! None of it is boring to me, I'm with you all- how could it be?"

Dewey beamed and hugged her, "Thanks, Mom." Sometimes he had felt bad that he liked just lounging around with his brothers, that it was probably his favorite thing to do, when she liked things that were much cooler. But if she liked being around her family then it was definitely cool. And even if it wasn't, did he really need her approval to do things he liked? No, his Uncle Donald had taught him that one.

"No problem, honey, in fact- moments like this are ones I enjoy the most." He hugged her tighter, yeah, she definitely enjoyed these moments the most.

_______________________________________________________________

                                                            Huey

If there was one thing Della despised it was libraries, but if her oldest boy wanted to go to one then she would put it aside to be with him. But boy would it be hard. She wasn't even there yet and she was already bored!

This would be a long day.

Once they got there Huey immediately made his way towards one of the sections and she quickly went after him. "Hey, honey, which section is this one?" She asked, trying to be interested.

"The reference one." He said with a raised eyebrow.

"I've never been inside a library before." She flatly admitted.

Huey's eyes bugged, "You've never been to a library?!" He exclaimed, as loud as he could've. At first he was shocked but then he got more and more excited, there was so much he could show her! And they had all day to do it! This would be the best! "I have so much to show you!"

Della perked up at her son's enthusiasm, "Lead the way!" And off they were, exploring different parts of the library. She had to admit it was pretty fun actually. She still didn't like libraries, but she could see why Huey did. It was full of information of all kinds, it was perfect for him. Once he got occupied with his books she looked towards the section on parenting, maybe it would be good for her too. Cause she wasn't the perfect parent, far from it, but she wanted to get better- for her boys, for herself. And with that resolution she made her way over there.

But not without attracting the attention of her kid. "Mom? What're you doing?" She looked at him,

"Oh just peeking around, can't hurt after all. I want to get better at this whole, parenting thing."  

He smiled at her, "I think you're doing pretty good."

She smiled back, "Thanks, honey." She turned back to the books anyway and Huey left her to it, he got it, she was gone for so long and felt like she needed to catch up. Even if he didn't feel that way she did so he let her. They were in no hurry after all. They had all the time in the world.

_______________________________________________________________

                                                           Webby

Playing games was something that Della didn't realize she missed, but she did, especially ones this exhilarating! But then Webby's war games would do that for you she quickly learned. Especially especially when you were paired with the maker of the game herself. She didn't really know how it happened, the start of the game had -started- and the boys had run off leaving just the two of them alone. But she wasn't complaining.

"Ready to take them down, Webs?"

Webby looked at her determinedly, "Let's do it!" They quickly ran up the foyer stairs and started looking for spots the boys could be in. Webby was better at it than her, for obvious reasons, and for some not-so-obvious reasons. Like the fact that she was crazy good at tracking- well, she was raised by Mrs. Beakley, it wasn't too surprising when she thought about it.

So she decided to follow Webby's lead on this and let her lead them to victory- which, come on, was basically a guarantee. The two of them were incredible in their own right but put them together and they were unstoppable. Even in something as simple as a game. Then again, nothing was really simple with this family. But, that's what made them awesome, at least in her opinion. "This is fun, why don't we team up together like this more often?" She asked as they checked down a hall, she thought she heard footsteps but couldn't be too sure. Webby looked at her,

"I think they would complain that we're cheating."

Della laughed, "Probably." She paused for a second, then continued as if voicing her thoughts. "But why don't we team up for other stuff? Like, I don't know, like mother-daughter bonding stuff. We'd probably win at that too, somehow." She noticed Webby had stopped moving. "Webs? You alright?"

Webby shook herself out of it, "You think of me as your daughter?" She couldn't believe it, the Della Duck thought of her as her daughter. This was the best day ever! If she actually thought that and it wasn't just a slip of the tongue.

"Of course I do! You and the boys are a package deal, right?" Webby nodded. "And the rest of my family adores you as well, and well, that's all I needed to know. You've been my daughter ever since I got back, if that's not overstepping anything. I'm not trying to replace Mrs. Beakley, I don't think anyone can do that, but I think of you as one of my own just like Donald does." Della gave her a small smile, and was swept into a hug not two seconds later.

"Thanks, Mom. And yes, we should totally team up for other stuff." Della laughed.

"Great, but for now, let's focus on winning this!"

"Yeah!" Webby took off again and Della followed after her, she had the best daughter ever. One that she thought was perfect in every way, just for being herself. But then again, she thought that way about all her kids.

_______________________________________________________________

                                                          Louie

It was safe to say Della's relationship with Louie was... rocky at best. She loved him, she loved him with all her heart! But after everything that happened between them they were a bit, awkward- for lack of a better word. So hangouts with just them were not something that happened often, and never really by choice-they sorta just got thrown together.

They had a lot they had to talk about, they both knew it, but they were also in no hurry. The longer they could put off that conversation the better. But it made times like this hard.

Everyone else was doing something else, they were the only ones left in the mansion and one of them thought that being together was better than being alone. The other did not- but to be fair to Louie, he really liked his alone time. There were only like, four people he wouldn't mind interrupting it, she was not one of them. So when she did he was a bit miffed.  

"Hi, honey, what're you watching?"

Louie didn't look up from his phone, "Ottoman Empire."

She sat next to him. "Can I watch with you?"

"If you want." They sat for a few moments, the only sound being audio from Louie's phone. Until he suddenly spoke up, "Why are you doing this? It is just cause no one else is here, am I just your last resort?" She looked at him surprised, how could he think that? Were things that bad between them?

"No, honey, of course not. You just never seem interested in hanging out with me, I didn't wanna make you do something you didn't want." She tried to reassure him but he wasn't having it.

"You've already done that!" Oh. "You took away something I really cared about! You tried to make me change a huge part of me! Did you even think about how that would make me feel?!" Oh.

Oh no.  

"I, I'm sorry." Was all she could think to say. He looked at her apprehensively. "Louie, I can't even begin to describe how sorry I feel. When you did those things I was scared, terrified. I had just gotten you guys back and I almost lost all of you again, all I could think of was making sure that never happened again. But I didn't consider how you felt, and that was wrong of me. I shouldn't have done that. And I definitely shouldn't have tried to change you. I'm sorry, I just want to be a good Mom to you kids." She looked down.

Louie sighed, "I'm sorry too. I didn't mean to get everyone lost in time, that was the scariest moment of my life. I thought for sure that I could fix everything, when I should've asked for help- and that was dumb of me, really dumb. And then you tried to be Uncle Donald and I just, couldn't. You overstepped, and you overstepped hard, but I get why. I'd be mad too if my idiot son almost messed everything up for me."

And that made her whip her head back up, "You are not an idiot." She said fiercely. "You made a mistake, and you've more than made up for it. But I haven't." She gently grabbed his face. "And that changes now. Louie, honey, I love you, I love you and Huey and Dewey and Webby so much that it hurts- nothing will ever change that and I will do everything I can to prove it to you."  

He smiled softly at her and she ran her hands down his face then kissed his head. "Thanks, Mom." It didn't fix everything, and they still had a lot to talk about, but it was a start. For both of them.

[zonerz]

Zone tries to explain her Sonic AU thing– The actual Worlds P2 (Earth and Mobius Conclusion)

So to explain Earth, I feel like I need to briefly (haha sure) explain ol Shadow. So in year w/e, the Earth and more specifically Gerald Robotnik made the Space Colony Ark, a top secret research facility for the world’s most dangerous weapons and such. G.U.N. also funded good ol Project Shadow to be made on the Ark and thus Shadow. Shadow was made on Earth (sorta, close enough to get the point)

Now in the comics they say that Mobius is like the exact same planet as Earth but with this secret species of mutant animals living on it and like yeah okay sure but Im not going with that. Im going with the idea that Mobius and Earth are, yes, the same planet but from parallel universes, a pair of universes where their barrier has weakened tremendously. So skip to present day. We have seen Sonic and friends on multiple occasions have their adventures in exclusively human locations so Im thinking that after incidents such as the Chaos monster and Sonic and co. make their first big jump into Earth’s uni, humanity realizes, ‘damn, they could help us out.’ Especially with the threat of Eggman seeing a new possible stomping ground for his Empire. So they start hopping back and forth from Mobius to Earth, albeit at first it’s very difficult.

Then Shadow comes in. And with him the ability and new horizon of Chaos powers and Chaos Control. So we all know how SA2 goes and everything continues on as they would’ve in the games, except on the sidelines technology after SA2 is advancing to make travel from these two planets much easier.

So fast forward, Shadow’s joined G.U.N. and Team Dark is well established and they get assignments to help protect the Earth and has also taken it upon himself to help keep Mobius safe when Sonic needs his help or assistance. So both of these planets by the present are thoroughly connected with some Mobians probably taking up residence on Earth and vice versa (though it’s less common since there are more common and more dangerous threats on Mobius)

And that’s Earth and Mobius really basically explained!!!

Mind you, this is the Prime Zone.

[breeeliss]

Oh no, why was the season so bad in your opinion?

i mean, there were a lot of reasons, but if you want the short version a lot of this season felt very all over the place. and by that i mean a lot of what was set up in season 3 in terms of character development, character motivation, and allusions to future important plot points were pretty much abandoned during this latter half of the season in favor of focusing on the coalition and this big blow to the galra empire they dealt in the last two episodes (which, after the finale of season 2, this didn’t even compare). 

i’m probably gonna go episode by episode for this because there’s just so much that bothered me so if you want to read the rest of it just peek under the cut

tl;dr: this was by far the weakest season 

episode 1so admittedly the blade of marmora stuff was just aesthetically cool. i got really excited when it was keith on one of those missions. the get up looks great on him and he just does so well with their fighting style. seeing the brief fighting moments with him and how BOM functions in general was really cool and i liked that bit. 

the only problem is that it came out of nowhere

at no point in the entirety of season 3 did keith indicate that he was thinking of going to train with the blade. we learned that because shiro told us that. and like….keith training with them isn’t a bad thing. but it certainly becomes a huge thing when he’s pulling away from the team so much that shiro had to hop into the black lion and take control of the team again. and then once shiro is finally back in the black lion, keith straight up decides to leave team voltron because he wasn’t meant to be the leader anyway. 

there’s so much about this that’s weird and it has a lot to do with the character development keith was set up with in season 3. he was a reluctant leader. this wasn’t the job he wanted but it’s the job he has to do because there’s no other choice. he’s learning to listen to his teammates. he’s becoming more comfortable leading. he’s taking shiro’s direction and using the advice of a more seasoned leader to try and improve his own leadership. he actually did a really good fucking job of it and i was excited to see that improve. …..and then it all gets shot to hell because, oh well, keith can’t lead, shiro’s back in the lion, guess it’s time for me to peace out. 

there was not enough of a look into keith’s motivations so it all felt very sudden. and it’s also at this point that the lion switching that happened before feels even more useless than before. 

why bring shiro back and have him not be able to pilot his lion if you were going to give it back to him anyway once keith left the team? why give keith a character arc to develop his leadership if you were just going to have him leave the team? why make lance go through an emotional arc where he has to put aside his ego and trust in his skills in order to pilot the red lion and become a better supportive teammate for keith if literally none of that is going to be referenced in the new season? at this point, it feels like the only reason this lion switching happened was to give allura a lion and develop allura. 

anyway, the group hug at the end was cute i guess. 

episode 2perfect. so perfect. and not just because i love pidge. the flashbacks to her brother, her search for him, that fucking heart breaking moment with her at the rebel cemetery, their reunion, them fighting together, all of it was perfect. best episode in the season. no complaints. 

episode 3so, positives out the way first. the kaltenecker scene is still genius. pidge showing matt around the castle was precious. not super warmed up to matt yet but i like the relationship that he has with pidge and i love how much happier pidge is now that he’s here. that’s wonderful. 

zarkon is darth vader now i guess. also his return was the single most anti-climactic part of this season. i literally almost forgot he came back as i was typing this. he seems to be obsessed with finding lotor while his wife fucking does everything as usual. 

this episode was pretty tame although it starts to show why i’m annoyed with lotor this season. beforehand having his motivations and intentions kept secret was cool. he seemed to be going against his father’s methods while also trying to act in the interest of the empire – like a “i’m going to do this my way” kinda guy. that’s starting to fall apart this season in a way that’s not mysterious or appealing but in a way that’s just flat out confusing. 

he has so many different plans doing on. the trans reality comet to make those ships. trying to go through the rift. and later on in the season, actually trying to help the voltron coalition for reasons we’re not totally clued in on yet (but more on that later). i don’t know what lotor wants. i don’t know what’s driving him. i don’t know what he’s after. i don’t know why he hates his father so much. i don’t know……literally anything about him. and it’s been a whole season. i know what he’s doing, but i don’t know why and it’s making him a very confusing character. 

also….his generals ditched him very quickly. killing narti i actually kind of liked (even though, fuck, i liked her) since it seems he values his personal goals more than his generals. and based on how much his generals practically worshipped him before (especially acxa) i would’ve though they’d take that as a warning. except, the minute lotor became a fugitive they totally abandoned ship bc they wanted to save their own skins. that’s a…..huge 360. and of course lotor escapes anyway so their fates are in limbo and for now they’re not in the story anymore. that whole thing just seemed rushed and like it should’ve taken more episodes to accomplish. 

episode 4hated it. i can’t believe i sat through it. ignoring the fact that hunk got demoted down to fart jokes (except let’s not ignore that fact because what the fuck) it was a useless episode. the coalition stuff in general was an interesting detail to place in the first episode but after that it seemed heavy handed. to devote an entire comic relief episode to a heavy handed process of putting on performances to gain coalition support seemed really useless. it also didn’t help that….we didn’t see….anyone really join. we’re told they are. but there was no emotional speech. no shots of people signing up. like it was stripped of all emotionality and therefore became annoying. it was campy and childish and honestly really fucking annoying. 

episode 5 +6just gonna add these together since it’s essentially a two parter. 

matt’s role sort of really delved into the background in a way that i didn’t like. he’s kinda just there now – could’ve been easily replaced with literally any random rebel officer. i expected him to be a captain and i expected him to run shit. instead he spent days of his life just listening to radio frequencies and he answers to this mysterious captain of the resistance (olia? who are you? what’s your deal? we’re not told? okay cool?) and that’s p much it. sorta expected him to play a bigger role in things but whatever. 

it was a cool couple of episodes but so much of it was fighting. what made the end of season 2 so amazing was the emotional aspects of it brought in. the BOM agent sacrificing himself. the fight with zarkon where the stakes were incredibly high. voltron almost dying. shiro talking everyone up. everyone literally willing to die to take zarkon down. it was done really really well. 

this time for some reason the big “oh my god we might die” moment didn’t feel as dire. and i think it’s because everyone was so fucking calm with the reality that they were going to freaking die. there was no emotional impact in this part of the episode at all and it’s what makes these sorts of fights cool. when things get bad, that’s the time when we need to see people’s emotions and honestly the end of this season felt so effing stale. about the only really great part was the allura and lance bit at the end of the episode. and even though it kinda came totally out of left field, it somewhat saved what was an otherwise bland final battle. i mean come on they were on a fucking bomb that was going to blow up five solar systems you’re telling me they were just cool as a cucumber about that? bullshit. 

keith gave me a heart attack for half a second i’ll admit, although the power of his almost-sacrifice was lost because he was fucking gone this whole time. now had he done that as the black paladin/leader of voltron, hell yeah i would’ve started crying. instead i was anticipating his death and planning to be fucking livid about it later. but hey! no problem! because lotor came and saved the day. and…..is trying to cozy up to the coalition. 

which is the single most random thing that happened this entire season. it makes no sense. why is this happening? i know we’re not meant to know and i know he probably has his own plans as to why he’s doing this, but again. because his motivations are completely shrouded, lotor helping keith isn’t interesting. it’s just confusing. he’s a black sheep that just runs on his own agenda and we don’t know why and we don’t know what that agenda is. so that episode ended and i was just really really perplexed. 

final thoughts: all the interesting character arc set up from season 3 was scrapped, any further character development was also sidelines this season, idk what the fuck lotor is doing and it’s annoying now, why is zarkon back he’s literally so useless now, fuck the coalition i don’t care about it give me exposition instead, and i want keith back on team voltron….

AND WHAT THE FUCK IS PROJECT KURON? DID WE FORGET ABOUT THAT? WHAT IS SHIRO’S DEAL? WE TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT THAT!

i’m……..going to rewatch season 3 and pretend none of this ever happened. 

[fairytail-whathesays]

So uh, I don’t know how coherent this will be (forgive me, it’s almost midnight here) but I’ll try anyway.

I’ve been rereading FT after not touching it for years (I am in the middle of the Galuna arc, btw, so anything after that is not as fresh to me) and I was struck both by how much better than the latter canon the early parts were (if only for the lessened fanservice, and the still believable situations) and by how a lot of what I hate about FT is already rearing its ugly head.

That they are. The real problems behind Fairy Tail start with Phantom Lord, and I honestly enjoy Galuna Island a lot more than other arcs.

Case in point: what is basically the first friendship-nakama-etc speech, courtesy of Makarov himself. (I am not 100% sure it is the actual first, but it is probably the first to be that overt and long.) And honestly, this, coupled with what Makarov said to Romeo way back in the Balkan/Vulcan arc, already makes me hate him.

Rebelling against authority is cool if that authority is corrupt. Saying “fuck you” against authority that really wants you to quit destroying property and punching people is not cool at all. Especially if your longtime friend is a member of that authority and catches shit for all of your wrongdoing.

And, having read your post about the reasons you hate Makarov, I noticed that - chronologically - it starts with Gajeel. So, uh, I wanted to add something about him that you had not written about yet, as far as I know? (and, I mean, I might have missed it if you had since I only discovered this blog today! Though i have been binge-reading it for some hours…)

It is often said -and shown- that Makarov believes FT mages to be his “children”, and tbh this shows the kind of father he is…

What I consider his “first offense” comes with his reaction to Romeo’s plea (that someone PLEASE look for his dad, since he took on a job he said would take 3 days and it’s been a week) : he literally brushes him off with the worst words he could have said. “No way! Your dad is a mage! We have no mage here who can’t take care of himself! Go home!”, and later on, to himself: “if he goes to help Macao, it will only hurt his pride. No one can decide what he should do, just leave him alone.”

Fuck, I never remember that until people bring it up–but now that you mention it, I remember thinking that was really shitty, too. 1) A man’s pride is not worth less than his safety and life or the damage it causes his child to see that life in danger, and 2) that just fucking stupid. “Mages can take care of themselves”? He was up in the mountains and it was below freezing. Makarov acts like mages are immortal and infallible and that not returning from a three-day mission after a week is cause for no concern.

Then of course, when Macao is rescued by Natsu & Lucy (and he was very much in need of rescuing), he is grateful, and his pride is not damaged at all, as he tells Romeo of how he managed to defeat 19 monsters by himself.

Thanks, Makarov. Now we know who to trust.

Mirajane, in her exposition mode, says he is actually quite worried - I can believe that, but his reaction is not good at all. And I can understand where he comes from - his words clearly come from some bad experience - but still: he is the guild’s master. Is “everyone here can take care of themselves, and thus nobody should help them, and they should be left alone” the right attitude to take with this kind of things? …Nope, no it isn’t, especially when he is dealing with literal children (whom we know have been part of FT and will soon be again. Since they were FT mages, I expect they, too, would have been considered capable of taking care of themselves?).

Right you are.

The best thing about this? Laxus later on fucking calls him on it, when he refuses to go looking for Natsu and Lucy and drag them back from their stolen S-ranked job: “Don’t be ridiculous… I have another job to take care of. ‘There isn’t a single mage that can’t take care of his own stuff’, right?”

(This, btw, is the exact moment this character became my favorite)

Translation: Double standard? Not on my watch.

Which makes me wonder, how many times has Makarov said that?

Still, I suppose that -as Hiro Mashima does show some self-reflection for once- he did not actually think what Makarov said to do was the best course of action. Although it does not really excuse him pretty much using it for years before Natsu stole that S-ranked quest…

Imagine if that had been the guild’s reaction when considering whether to rescue Makarov from the Alvarez Empire. “Eh, Makarov can take care of himself. He can handle it”. And Makarov, of all people, should’ve been able to. 

Anyway, going back to the whole maybe-first friendship speech (or at least the first one I noticed) : that speech was particularly appalling, at least to me, for being awful both in-canon and out of it.

Let’s start with the out of canon (uh, Doylist point of view I think?):

Yep!

It was bad writing. Pure and simple. The situation is: Kageyama, our resident Eisenwald Shikamaru-expy, has been saved by Team Natsu but has subsequently betrayed them, escaping with Lullaby. He manages to get to the regular meeting of guild masters, and attempts to play the cursed flute in front of Makarov. At that point, though, flashbacks start to happen: at first to the reasons his guild is doing it, then to things Team Natsu said to him - that what they are trying to do won’t accomplish what they truly want, some positive stuff from Gray - anyway, sorta standard stuff, but still effective. He’s sweating and hesitating - and at that point, the dreaded Speech commences: it is, tbh, a mess that boils down to “Alone, we are weak. Together, we are strong” ™ - which ends with Makarov revealing he Knew All Along, and Kage admitting his defeat.

From a purely storytelling point of view, I was - devastated, honestly. I had really gotten into that character (Shikamaru-expy and all), and was legit tearing up a bit at how Team Natsu’s words had had such an effect on him even when they weren’t even trying to Make Him Good or anything. It would have been very powerful, imo, if what had actually happened was that he simply gave up after having those flashbacks, realizing that he never really wanted to kill the guild masters and that he was just lashing out at what he believed to be an unjust world and system etc etc. You know, character development and all - all the more powerful since he never received a Friendship Speech, but simply was impacted by a few comments.

Instead…well, Friendship Speech™, which didn’t even fit into the whole thing (I mean, what has “having nakamas” got to do with what he was doing? Eisenwald’s whole problem is that they were kicked out of the League and made illegal & dark, and that they consider it to be unjust and want to get back at those who did it. That’s… that’s his guild’s issue. His nakama’s issue. The problem with him and his guild wasn’t that they were, Idk, loners without friends or whatever: it was that they were going to kill innocents and people barely connected to those who made them a dark guild, and also that they never quite examined why they were kicked out, and why they were not blameless at all, and did deserve it*), and lessened SO MUCH the impact of a villain deciding that he was on the wrong path mostly on his own, with just a bit of help and without that help being so over the top and condescending.

Way to hit the nail on the head. There is an external problem and an internal problem. The external is their perceived unjust treatment; the internal problem is their extreme reaction to it, nor merely a lack of unity or family attitude. 

Then we have the in-canon problems and- I might repeat myself, you’re warned (it’s almost 0100 uuugh). Okay, so: I can accept Makarov knowing what that flute is and what it does (since even Lucy did), and being confident enough that he could stop that kid if he truly seemed to be ready to play it (he can be fast, and he simply had to extend his arm and take it). But- that speech. Man, that speech.

He is going off an infuriatingly vague and cliched speech, basing it off- what? What does he even know about Kageyama? Does he even know about Eisenwald? Probably not, since he was simply leaving because he got worried about Team Natsu being, well, a thing. Why, then, is he lecturing this person - who, for all he knows, might belong in a guild as nakama-y as FT? (oh, wait, my bad: only the good guys are allowed to have True Nakamas ™. Bad guys get the False Nakamas, if any, who would gladly kill you for power. Always. At all times. For any reason.) He just sounds arrogant, full of himself, and very much trying to do the all-knowing wise mentor routine. With an added bonus of straight up manipulation - telling him that he should not rely on tools but on friends (insert sparkly), and thus should not use that flute (what, not because he would kill innocent people in it? Because using it would be weak? Wow, thanks Makarov, so deep). There is no way in hell this could work if Mashima hadn’t really, really wanted it to. If I was Kageyama, I’d play that flute just because of that speech. That’s how much I hated it.

So if he had followed through with Makarov’s advice, he’d have returned with allies and then slaughtered the guildmasters? Nice advice. It’s doubly stupid because Kageyama is an example of relying on friends–Erigor fell down on the job and cannot complete it, so Kageyama is picking up the slack and completing it for him. Yeah, their end goal might be murder, but the principle is the same: relying on one’s friends.

*Ok this is going to be a really weird rant, but hear me out: the plight of Dark Guilds, and mages from them. For Eisenwald, it wasn’t really explored whether or not all of them were taking up assassination requests or it was just Erigor (or idk, Erigor and a few others). There must have been at least some members of the guild who never killed anyone - and at least some who were unaware of it happening in their guild. Then the guild was ordered to disband and declared dark. …We don’t really see this in canon, but IMO mages from dark guilds probably find it at least somewhat hard to find a good guild to join. And anyway, it does mean giving up your guildmates, and the guild (which, if it happened to FT, would never be supported by the narrative). Honestly, I am not condoning the things dark guilds do - but declaring a guild dark like that is not only harsh but also actively encourages the members of that guild to do Fucked Up Shit, even if they weren’t doing it before. Couldn’t there have been some inquiries, those truly responsible be arrested and the guild, without the worst members, allowed to go on? Only arresting the guild master and declaring the guild dark and ordering it to disband is the worst course of action the council could have undertaken.

That is a weird rant. I didn’t ask this question because the feeling I got while watching the Erigor arc was that most of the members overall didn’t have a problem with murder, but perhaps I’m wrong for assuming that. But generally, I wouldn’t consider that an ill response, since once lives are taken you have to take measures. Dark guilds can be forcibly disbanded when the Magic Council hire light guilds to do so, so it would make sense that they aren’t worried about backlash. 

I… probably have more to say, and what I did say I wanted to say better, but I’m tired as heck and I’ve ranted long enough now. I hope you can glean something halfway coherent from this, and also wanted to let you know your analyses are brilliant and I love them <3 Thanks for reading all this, and please maybe let me know what you think?

I think you made a lot of good points. I’m now stewing in my hatred both for Makarov and for Mashima’s tired, exhausted narrative choices. Thanks for sending!

[techouspeaks]

A Review of Something: Voltron: Legendary Defender!

Roar!

This Review Will Contain Some Spoilers.

So with the new season out, I thought I finally give my thoughts on it since I haven’t before. Before we get to the plot of this series, I’m going to dive into the history a little bit, like I do when reviewing any kind of media. I do this because I do put tags that are similar to that media that I’m reviewing such as Power Rangers, Legend of Korra, ect with this review so more people outside the fandom can maybe check it out.

With that being said, the original series “Voltron: Defender of the Universe” was aired in 1984 and ran until 1985. Series that features a team of astronauts who pilot a giant Super Robot known as "Voltron". It was based on the Japanese anime “Beast King GoLion”. It became an instant hit and possibly the one that also inspired Power Rangers later on in the 90s, as both series feature a team that’s divided by a color and pilot their own robot to form a giant robot. So yeah, kinda the early, animated version of Power Rangers.

The series would have multiple spin offs but most not really up to par with the original series. That is until January 2016 when Netflix and Dreamworks Animation announced the reboot called “Voltron: Legendary Defender”. As time went on, it was revealed the same team behind Legend of Korra and the Avatar series would be working on it. It premiered in June 2016. 

Because I’m too lazy to write a whole summary, here you go from Wiki.

“ For millennia, the evil Galra empire has plagued the universe by destroying other civilizations and enslaving various races. The only known threat strong enough against the empire's power and plans is the legendary "Defender of the Universe" Voltron, a 100 meter tall robot warrior composed of five lion mechas whose pilots are known as the Paladins. At the crux of the war that ended with the destruction of planet Altea, Voltron was separated by King Alfor of Altea in order to protect Voltron from falling into the Galran Emperor Zarkon's possession. King Alfor bonded the five lion's energies to his daughter Allura's life force and sent them across the universe to different locations until the time for the next generation of Paladins to appear and pilot Voltron arrived. Princess Allura, her retainer Coran, and the Altean Castle of Lions were hidden on planet Arus along with the Black Lion.

In the present, the Galra Empire's path of conquest and search for Voltron has led them to Earth's solar system. A group of space pilots – Shiro, Keith, Lance, Pidge, and Hunk – discover the Blue Lion and immediately get swept up into the Galran War. They meet Princess Allura, become the next Paladins, and reunite the five lions to form Voltron and combat Emperor Zarkon's nefarious schemes, with the hopes of ultimately defeating the entire Galra Empire.”

Okay well the last paragraph doesn’t mention that, Shiro was captured by Galra first, rescued by the lone wolf Keith and then found by Lance, Pidge and Hunk first. They don’t all know each other right off the bat.

So, what do I think of it? Well, be honest, I barely remember the original Voltron. I remember catching it on Cartoon Network when I was younger and being sorta invested. I thought it was a bit more interesting than Thunder Cats and a lot of the other classic cartoons back then. I think I even watched some of the spin offs that I thought were decent. So yeah, I don’t remember much of the old series. 

So naturally, I wasn’t invested with the thought of the reboot. I thought “Meh, okay that’s happening”. Then I started seeing clips and animated gifs of it in my tumblr dashboard and when I found out that the same folks that made Legend of Korra were the staff members, that peaked my interest a little bit higher and went “Okay, I’ll give it a look.”

 I went in completely blinded, like I didn’t read what it was about. I knew it was based on old Voltron and that the Korra staff was behind it, that’s it. I gave it a watch and....Well I binge watched it until the middle of the first season. Took a break and finished watching. (Again the first season back in 2016.)

The series does what a good show, let alone a reboot should do. It ups the animation, story and characters, but also respect the original series and plot without the need to know the first series.  The main characters are awesome. They have some quirks like the lone wolf, the goof off, the smart one and the big guy with heart but they are more than that. They do question themselves, they do act out of their quirks, they’re relatable and they’re all really entertaining to watch. 

The animation is perfect with a mix of mostly 2D but they do well when they blend 3D with the 2D. The 3D is used as a stylish gimmick than enhances it, which is what 3D is meant to do when mixing with 2D.  The music again is awesome. Fits with the tone. 

If there is one complaint about the series is that I think the main bad guy, Zarkon isn’t that interesting. I know people would hate me for saying that and highly disagree with me, especially since in the new season, we are given more of his back story, but I dunno. Compared to the other baddies they meet, including the witch beside him, Zarkon is pretty weak in terms of being an interesting character.  He’s just kinda “I’m the big bad guy that wants more power! Fear me!” I mean Myotismon from Digimon was like that too, but Myotismon enjoyed being evil so much at times, that it made him more interesting to watch and that’s one of the reasons why he’s memorable.

We are introduced to Zarkon’s son, Prince Lotor who is way more interesting and menacing compared to his father. He enjoys doing what he does, has a sophisticated and almost honorable side to him and is completely badass in design and voice. Also, I swear if Maho Tsukai Precure ever gets dubbed, I want Lotor’s voice actor to be Orba in that series! He would nail it!

Speaking of bland, I didn’t like Keith at first. He kinda starts off as the typical lone wolf and it takes a little while before he starts developing more into an interesting character. I like him now that he’s got an arc to develop him more so least they improved him.

Also, while we’re on it, I don’t think any of the characters are in love with each other, like so many fans believe. Yeah, there are moments here and there and I wouldn’t mind it if there were couples in this. I just think there really isn’t anything going on between the characters. (Gay or straight). They’re just this big family and I love them all. My favorite being Shiro, Pidge, Allura and Hunk. Lance and Coran are good. They get a laugh out of me so it’s not like I don’t like them. I just have my favorites just like everyone else does. There are no horrible characters, minus the major bland villain.

So yeah, This is a great series that I highly recommend for adults and kids, even if you’re not a fan of the original Voltron or anything like Power Rangers. It’s got a great story, great characters and beautiful animation. I proudly give Voltron: Legendary Defender 9 Stars out of 10.

Check it out if you haven’t!

9 Stars

Level: Awesome!

[techouspeaks]

Precuruary: Doki Doki Precure and Happiness Charge Precure

Killing two birds with one stone as I review Doki Doki and Happiness Charge Precure!

I’m reviewing two seasons at once mainly because I don’t have too much to say about Doki Doki and well I thought I kill two birds with one stone by adding Happiness Charge. I know I was going to do these in order, but I really wanted to get Go Princess Precure reviewed and then review Mahou Tsukai Precure when it’s finally finished. After these reviews, I will presume the order. That and I still need to catch up on some seasons before reviewing them.

 At least by reviewing the seasons that are still fresh in my mind, I can get some stuff done at least. Also I feel it’s best to at least explain what I truly think of Mahou Tsukai now that it’s ending tomorrow (tonight if you’re in the west of the US) and both reviews, I’m going to be referring to these two seasons, so I felt it was important to do this. That and believe it or not, Doki Doki and Happiness Charge do have one thing in common with each other and that will be revealed at the end.

So without further a due, Doki Doki and Happiness Charge Precure. I’ll start off with Doki Doki. 

“The Trump Kingdom is a magical world where everyone's hearts live happily with the guidance of their ruler Princess Marie Ange. However one day, an evil force known as the Jikochu has attacked the Kingdom. But a warrior who served to Marie Ange, known as Cure Sword, fended the Jikochu by herself before being sent to the human world with her fairy partner to find the missing princess. 

Cure Sword also brought with her three other fairies who are to find three chosen girls to be her allies.One of the fairies, Sharuru, finds a girl named Mana Aida who is her school's student council president. Whilst visiting the Clover Tower's observatory during her school's orientation day, Mana encounters a Jikochu who attempts to manipulate her heart but being found by Sharuru as she gives her the power to become Cure Heart. Joined by Cure Diamond, Cure Rosetta, and Cure Sword, the DokiDoki Pretty Cure must fight to protect everyone's hearts from the Jikochu.”

Doki Doki is one of the seasons where fans have a mix bag but most lean towards well “Meh...” and that’s sorta what I feel about this season...”Meh...” It just really doesn’t stick out much in terms of Precure seasons. It doesn’t do anything new or different. The cures are pretty much the stereotypes of before. The yellow cure is cute and dainty, the purple cure is kinda stuck up but has reasons, the blue cure is supportive of the pink cure, who is optimistic and happy and loves helping people and everyone loves her.

I don’t even remember any of the names of the cures other than their cure names, other than Mana, not only because of the summary but also because people complain that she is a Mary Sue and I kinda agree. There’s not one thing interesting about her. In fact, she seems to be a copy of Love from Fresh Precure with Nozomi as style reference.  She’s just forgettable, just like the rest of them!

Then you have a surprising red cure with a very confusing story plot but has a bad ass transformation at least.... What about the bad guys? Yeah....they’re not any better and I don’t even bother remembering their individual names either. They have a lazy design and just the lazy villain stereotype personalities.

The series has some neat ideas, like I really like how the cures are based on card decks, like Cure Sword, Cure Rosetta (Shouldn’t she be called Cure Club though?), Cure Heart and Cure Diamond. I even took this idea to use in my fanfic/alternate story with Jhonen Vasqueze characters, as a magical girl/boy team and of course I like Cure Ace’s transformation and attacks.

Another thing, that’s fondly remember about this season is the songs. The songs, especially the ending themes are really catchy and the same people who worked on the songs will be returning for Kira Kira Precure A la Mode, so we’re sure to get some nice tunes at least.

Other than that, this is a bland boring season with a very overly confusing story line for Cure Ace and the red eye’d mean girl somehow being the same people..They’re like the Queen in different incarnations but...they somehow split. It’s just weird. Oh yeah, they have to take care of a baby...Hell this show...At least Chiffon was kinda cuter and Ha-chan grew up! 

There’s just hardly anything to remember or care about this series! It’s just so boring that not even what would be interesting, is not that interesting!

I remember when this series first came out, I’m like “Okay is it February again, because season is putting me to sleep!” 

So when the newer season came out finally, after being bored to death,(thank god as an adult I could get out more besides watching this...)  I was happy to accept the new season with open arms.

“The ruler of the evil Phantom Empire, Queen Mirage, begins her invasion on Earth using an army of Choiarks and powerful monsters called Saiarks. All across the world, Pretty Cures are dispatched to fight against the Phantom Empire threat. Hime Shirayuki, a princess from the Blue Sky Kingdom, which was taken over by the Phantom Empire, joins the fight as a Pretty Cure named Cure Princess, but always finds herself running away scared.

Given a Crystal of Love by the Spirit of Earth, Blue, and told to seek out a partner to fight alongside her, Hime goes to the city of Pikarigaoka  and randomly throws the crystal in the air, deciding to partner up with whoever it lands upon. This person turns out to be Megumi Aino, a kind-hearted girl always looking to help others, who is recruited by Hime to fight by her side as Cure Lovely. Using the power of the Pretty Cards and their changing forms, alongside Cure Honey and Cure Fortune, they form the Happiness Charge Pretty Cure team as they are given the task to collect all of the Pretty Cards and protect the Earth against the Phantom Empire.”

So do I like this season better? Well...Let’s put it short. You know how everyone’s been wanting Mahou Tsukai Precure to end because of how badly plotted and childish it is? Well that’s how I felt after watching Happiness Charge! Omg! Do I HATE this season!

This was the season that made me nearly want to quit watching Precure and for the most part, everyone felt the same way, until of course, Go Princess Precure came and saved the fans, that felt betrayed and insulted from Doki Doki and Happiness Charge!  Even after Mahou Tsukai, I still consider this series to be the worst, with Doki Doki just being bland and forgettable! This series is the insulting epitome of children’s anime. 

The characters range from bland to wanting to punch them in the mouth, with exception of one. You have Hime, who is basically a copy of Cure Marine/Erika except dull down to this winy, annoying girl. Cure Honey is once again the sweet, friendly supportive character that can sing and is talented. That’s it and while, I should like Cure Fortune, especially for hating Hime and wanting to get her sister back, I just find her another stuck up, bitchy purple cure. I like her design a little bit and she is pretty but again, not much to her other than the bitchy purple show off with personal reasons. I didn’t even care if she was reunited with her sister again. I wanted to be, since I have an older sister but again, I just couldn’t.

Megumi was the only character I find sorta decent and that’s mainly because she reminded me of Tsubomi/Cure Blossom, in which she’s kinda insecure of herself. She was an improvement because she wasn’t a Mary Sue, like Mana. She did have her own issues. Seiji was cute too but as cute as they can be, the love between them is about as interesting as watching paint dry.  I also like Cure Sunset and Cure Wave, aka The Aloha Precure!

See that would have been more interesting! Have Precure be set in Hawaii and Megumi could be a supporting character from Japan! I would have loved this and would have forgiven it! This would have been way more better and interesting! The sad thing is though, those two Hawaiian cures are basically Cure Melody and Cure Rhythm without her angry attitude. 

The rest of the series falls flatter than a pancake! The villains and some of the fight scenes are so childish! There’s one scene where Cure Honey and the girl villain (like hell I would remember her name!) sing an awful duet about eating food! I was astonish about how stupid that was! I couldn’t even comprehend what I just witnessed! Than you have a filled in plot regarding Hime having a crush on Seiji and yeah...It’s about as predicable as it can be. Seiji likes Megumi, blah blah blah! Really don’t care!

But the worst and I mean the worst part of this series is that Blue...Yeah, I’ll just up and say it. It’s all his fault! Right down to why the villains attack in the first place! It is his fault. The reason why the first main villain, Mirage attacked was because Blue didn’t return her feelings, at first because he was scared! The second main villain, Red, the younger brother of Blue attacked because stupid Blue, didn’t realized that his brother’s planet was destroyed! Blue ignored his brother who was upset and was calling for help and in the end, Blue did nothing! He didn’t even apologize to his brother or anything. He let Cure Lovely and the other cures fight for him, not doing a dang thing! Some God you are Blue! Actually both are at fault because, Red is supposedly strong enough to destroy a world and yet couldn’t destroy a freakin meteor that hit his planet!

Also heck with these lazy names! Someone bitched about how Mother Rapapa is a bad name. Calling your gods Blue and Red ain’t any better! That just sounds more trying to tie in with the Matrix series somehow and failing miserably, of course, because what does Matrix and cute magical girls have in common? Absolutely nothing!

Same with “Phantom Empire”. WTF? Were they trying to add Star Wars reference as well despite, it’s the same with Matrix. It has nothing to do with magical girls???

Not to mention but the power ups for the cures are awful! They look like little kids, that put on way too much make up, in ridiculous Easter egg colored costumes and once again, instead of a team effort to save the day in the end, it’s up to the lead cure to save everything. This series is just an insult! 

I dunno which is honestly worse? Doki Doki for being bland and forgettable or Happiness Charge for having mainly annoying characters you want to punch in both the stomach and the mouth, while having the plot be the fault of one of the supporting leads! Yeah, that one thing both series had in common, its all down to just being the worst two seasons of Precure! I’m serious when I say that these two seasons had a lot of fans wanting to leave the franchise and just quit.

Say what you will with Mahou Tsukai, but I’ll make a point in my review of it on why I like Mahou Tsukai, over these two series.

Over all, I rate both Doki Doki Precure and Happiness Charge Precure, 3 stars out of 10. With very few redeeming qualities, not so likable or memorable characters, stupid bland villains and for Happiness Charge, a plot that wouldn’t have happen if it weren’t for a certain character, these two series are without a doubt the WORST Precure Series ever made and the only recommendation I have for it, is if you like some catchy tunes or for maybe a few fight scenes here and there. Other than that, feel free to skip these two! You’re not missing much! Just go and watch Go Princess Precure or any other precure series! You’ll be happy you just did that....

***

“No Way! Horrible series!”