#I also have most hated characters per team but let’s not get into that

[lnmei]

The Prince of Tennis! 🎾💥

[bibiana112]

There's nothing wrong with people having their dearest most specialest blorbo be Eric ztd it is unironically good for the ecosystem and I always love seeing the different perspectives from other fans but what I am here today to ask is why is no one like that about Mira. whatever happened to feminism.

[getsuuna]

KNY Fandom so fucking insufferable I'm gonna start behaving like those GiyuShino and SaneKana shippers and go around spreading misinformation and say "no you don't get it SaneGiyuu was implied!!!" /j

because I'd actually have more content to mention without even mischaracterizing them

wanna talk about how they're a two-faced mirror? almost as if they were written to parallel each other and there's so much to talk about on this matter

or, since not everyone in this Fandom can dive into analysis, wanna mention how Shinobu figured Sanemi could've made Giyuu smile by inviting him to eat his fav dish with him? why not ask him directly instead? why Sanemi out of all people?

wanna mention Sanemi's pseudo-obsession on that man? he disliked his ass, but if we go back to analysis, his intolerance to someone feeling superior can be tied to a multitude of factors and one of which is being low-key reminded of himself, and he loathes himself while at the same time he puts on that strong façade. he can't face it though. and he wanted to understand why Giyuu felt that way SO BADLY he went to him for training and tried to speak with him, he wanted a contact, he wanted to understand, he needed Giyuu to speak up but he didn't.

on the other hand don't we wanna talk about Giyuu's perspective? Giyuu never hated him nor did he really feel sad knowing he disliked him, contrary to how he felt towards Obanai. not to mention he even got to be sarcastic towards Sanemi's dumb ass at least twice.

and the iconic ohagi scene? idk about y'all but between the hashira I think that's THE iconic scene, alongside Giyuu and Shinobu beefing and Shinobu almost stabbing him (don't get me wrong platonic GiyuShino has my whole heart)

the first time we saw Giyuu smile in the series is while imagining to befriend Sanemi??? and out of everyone he chose Sanemi? the hashira who is canonically the most difficult to talk with?😭 he only ever smiled either for food, for Sanemi or Tanjiro

oh and let's not talk about how Tanjiro, after getting knocked up, wakes up and the first thing Giyuu says is "yeah Shinazugawa left" ..? or the whole novel chapter in which they end up talking about him (supposedly right after that scene in the manga) and Giyuu cheered up. what

anyways, likewise, the first time Sanemi was seen smiling genuinely outside of his family was with Giyuu. Obanai and especially Masachika were both closer to him, not to mention the most important person in his life, Genya...yet here we are ig?? (after Giyuu he also smiled more in general, the scene of him smiling at Nezuko was one of my fav panels ever so keep in mind I'm taking in consideration the chronological events and not the impact of the scenes per se)

or let's talk about the most important part in their development which is when they fought together.

Sanemi saving him, telling him not to zone out while throwing the sword at him, it made Giyuu realize he's the water hashira, it was the first time Giyuu acknowledged it. Sanemi influenced Giyuu's character positively, and so far Tanjiro was the only other one who managed to. Sanemi saw him as his ally (rightfully so), and hopefully seeing him fight also made him realize he wasn't that much of a conceited guy, he was just like him, as he initially wanted Giyuu to understand (despite the fact it was a miscommunication)

Sanemi teaming up with Giyuu out of everyone, in such an impactful panel.... idk, if it was a straight ship that would've felt like a confession for the Fandom 💀

they impacted each other's character, they were the only two hashira surviving after facing the same war, they faced similar struggles during their lives (but let's not get into analysis, once again...), they could've understood each other better than anyone else would ever have, and they ended up bonding and eating together

that panel was there, in the middle of other panels all portraying important bonds, whether canon romantic bonds or platonic and sibling-like ones (Tanjiro and Nezuko, the Kamaboko squad, the swordsmiths etc.)

if it wasn't important it wouldn't have been there, but the funniest thing is that if either of them was a woman it would've been considered canon since it also included TanKana, ZenNezu and InoAoi🙏🏻

but oh, if we try to name either of these things and more, people will rightfully say "can't they be friends anymore?", which is valid, but I wonder why this doesn't apply to equally fanon straight ships.

a show so peak has so many fans that are so dense😭😭😭

[oddeyecir-cle]

 ✶ ˖  ࣪  📹 .  ぅ

lee donghyuck enemies to lovers fic ideas (all fics are haechan × reader)

haechan who is your rival coworker + secretly deadpool

for the sake of this story, lets assume deadpool does hide his identity. he works at a tech company and is constantly beefing with his coworker that he's lowkey attracted to. and the plot could maybe be something like you accidentally finding out his identity and then using that information to slightly/ kind of/ in a non-toxic way blackmail him. eg: making him run errands for you, asking to tag along on his quests as deadpool. then the pair gets closer through all the time they spend together etc etc.

✶ note : hyuck HAS to be the sassiest, funniest, most sarcastic, cocky human being ever. also include some spidermark maybe

haechan as the prince of the neighbouring kingdom

historical au. very basic ik but hear me out. your kingdom's glory and power is gradually draining and it's threatened by multiple rivaling kingdoms. that is when your mother, the queen, tells you there is no choice but to turn to hyuck's kingdom for help. you hate the idea but you know everyone's counting on you so you go through with it anyways. (this is historical so there could be a very cool scene of the reader riding on a horse in battle armour to neighbouring kingdom's palace themself but whatever). they're good, kind people so they agree to help you. they send over a part of their military along with some weapons and of course haechan himself, their most prized possession who, like you, is skilled with a sword and is a wise leader. there's lots of quarrels between the both of you when it comes to the topic of which one has more power over the other and about who should be leading the troops. but you soon put your animosity aside when you realize that you have to work as a team to win. (insert dramatic battle sequence with swords and arrows flying around. at one point, you and haechan lock eyes and suddenly he drops to the ground. the world starts to blur around you when you realize he's been stabbed in his back. you frantically rush to his aid but he falls limp in your arms. its now upto the writer to kill him there itself and end the story. very angsty, i love. or they could also save him somehow and give main characters the happy ending they deserve).

 ✶ note : sloooooowwwww buuuurn. i mean this should be a long ass series with 7k+ words per chapter. should be so heavy on the angst and the hate that it makes you wonder if they do actually end up loving each other in the end. please include sword fighting scenes with sexual tension i beg you. (im big on bollywood, can u tell).

haechan as a stranger/ tour guide you meet on a family trip

you've just gotten out of a 3 year long relationship after your boyfriend cheated on you with your best friend. things get worse when your family, unaware of your breakup, forces you on a 2 week trip to *insert destination of choice" . here you meet the annoying, sarcastic, a-little-too-happy-for-his-own-good donghyuck. he is with the group your family is touring with (him being the tour guide is a pretty cute plot too but it could kind of complicate things later) and instantly wins everyone over with his charm, except you of course. in classic hyuck fashion, he tries to keep getting your attention and eventually succeeds. his company helps ease the pain of the heartbreak he didn't even know about. its bittersweet when it's time to part ways. you realise after you come back to your college dorm that you never exchanged phone numbers and you fail to find him on social media as well. but fate has strange ways of bringing people together. which is why you cant stop smiling when crash into a certain someone during a regular grocery run.

✶ note : more on the fluff and less on the angst for this one. and maybe a dash of slice of life as well.

haechan as captain of the football team.

there is no actual plot for this other than the fact that you're a cheerleader and also his academic rival (there is no trope i love more than this). my vision for this is very 2000s romcom. ik this isn't a lot to work with but there could be some sub trope like fake dating mostly.

✶ note: nothing much just make it cute

+i have a few more ideas, will probably make a part 2

++if in the future, by some miracle, people do find these interesting enough to use, please dont forget to credit me!!

[funishment-time]

long DR post of the day

everyone is free to have their own DR Opinions forever, but it hurts my heart a bit when people say Kodaka hates or favors X character because half the time it's...Patently Wrong. i mean objectively.

like, as an example per the DR1 art book, Hifumi's his (and Komatsuzaki's) absolute favorite, hands down. i don't expect everyone to go looking for the fan translations of the art books or anything but i also wouldn't seriously say something like "yeah so i know Hifumi's just there to be the Fat Comic Relief that no one likes" without doing a bit of research first. that is not a thesis that holds

Kodaka created all these characters with love by his own admission. these are His Blorbos and he is the main person directing all the writing on them. (seriously. go look up the DR credit rolls on the main franchise games. this isn't a team in a board room Doing Things For Marketing, this is him overseeing people teasing out his outline with his little guys.)

anyway. to him, they are all main characters: i'm not making shit up and assuming something about a Random Middle Aged Japanese Guy, this is fact. see his BlueSky stuff, see the fact that he does birthday Tweets in-character for almost every character still every year, or see his lecture from 10ish years ago on character creation. (it's online, and translated as it was done here in America. i'll have to find the link and add a reblog when i do)

now: this doesn't mean the characters' writing isn't XYZ Problematic Thing in execution, no pun intended. but in terms of intent, sometimes the fans' assumptions aren't right, esp if it's kind of a rude one.

another example: the one that makes me the most sad is when folks genuinely assume Kaede was there just to be a sexist girl death in service to Shuichi's character development and nothing more. in execution? we can debate all day 'n' night about it. that's fine, that's worthy of essays. as for intent? Kodaka STILL gets emotional when her birthday trends. her Japanese VA was his friend (source: V3 artbook), was Junko's stage show actress, and unfortunately committed suicide in 2021. let's not contribute to the attitudes of the folks that spam him demanding he apologize for murdering Shuichi's girlfriend for his Man Pain, huh?

i fall victim to making Serious Assumptions about creators too! no one's perfect! but i think we could all stand to see if our initial theses actually hold first

[the-monkey-ruler]

hi, do you have any recommendations for adaptations that explore the brotherhood/companionship relationship between the pilgrims, if possible also including Bailong (in the adaptations I saw most of the time he is in the form of a horse and they don't interact much)?

I also wanted to ask you if you have heard about the new animated series of Journey to the West that was recently presented at the animation conference “Power of National Comics-Drawing the Future Together” 国漫力量-共绘未来. At the moment they only showed a small animation showing the new designs. Supposedly it will have 104 chapters and will combine hand-drawn animation with AI technology (not sure in what way).

A lot of Journey to the West adaptions have great versions of the pilgrims but don't completely explore their relationship. They do show how they use teamwork to come together.

I would say my personal favorite interpretation is the 1996 Xiyouji series, this tv show is very much driven by character development and see how these three guys are forced to be together to start hating each other, or at least not liking each other, as each trial, they slowly learn how to open up to one another and learn how to trust each other and learn from the mistakes. This really made me fall in love with each pilgrim, but sadly there is a lack of Bailong moments except when he is Wukong’s roommate in the Flowing Sands River and when he saves Bajie from killing himself.

Another I would say is Monkey King Reborn, but they don’t explore Bailong's character as much as I wished, but we can see through the interactions how much they trust each other, especially in the final fight scene where they all agree to fight together and refuses to let Wukong fight alone. Sadly again Bailong is mostly a horse or playing in the Ginsing Fruit Garden rivers. Also another solid one is The Monkey King 2 from 2016 as which shows Wukong, Bajie, Wujing, and Sanzang and testing their faith in each other. I thought that it was a quality movie but it still lacks Bailong scenes.

I would say there is a good count in Journey to the West Sequel from the 2000 series as this series has Bailong as a prominent protagonist in a TV show continuation. This is actually the series where he gets his iconic “name” Ao Lie! I have never seen a series personally, but from the sounds of it, it really allows for each pilgrim to shine. This one is also isn't really a retelling per say could be the Westward series. It is kinda meant to be a 'continuation' of a sort in an action anime series where Wukong, Sanzang, Bajie, Wujing and Bailong (in this series Ao Xue) have to get together to fight heaven.

Also a lil but AU verse but Saiyuki the video game, this one is a Japanese game, and there are a lot of changes, considering that they have the world has Were Monsters rather than Yaoguai I think is still this one also really explodes each character and shows how it goes from a ragtag group of people until like of working team. Super cute and if you have a chance to watch a walk-through or play through highly recommended.

OMGGGG PLEASE

THIS IS AMAZING

104 CHAPTERS PLEASE

LOOK AT THEM

LOOKS AT THESE DESIGNS

LOOK AT THIS 2D DESIGNS!!! And if that animation is HALF as good as it looks then I'M GOING TO LOSE IT!!!!

And -reads article- AND A NEZHA TRANSFORMERS ANIMATION SERIES?! WE COOKING THIS YEAR BOYS

[manikas-whims]

Things we can still get in a possible SoC Spin-off

now that i'm done ranting about the things that annoyed me, lets talk about this.

1: Some light on Inej's backstory, the abuse and exploitation she suffered, her own struggles with touch, her vulnerable side, her fun side especially when she's around Jesper and Nina, her fears and how she rises above them. According to this article by tvguide, showrunner Eric Heisserer states that a script has already been written about her incorporation back into the Dregs. Let's just hope they stop reducing Inej's personality to a mere “knife wife” and “girlboss” , and address her actual depth.

2: Tante Heleen's return! Since we never actually see her body onscreen and her death is merely mentioned twice and shrugged off, I'm hoping she's alive and that the production team is keeping her for the spin-off. She's an integral part of Inej's character arc.

3: The Dregs. I wanna see Rotty, Specht, Anika, Pim, Per Haskell, Big Bolliger and the rest of the bunch. Also Dime Lions, Razorgulls, The Liddies, and other prominent gangs. And a shot of the entire Merchant Council would be nice.

4: Since Inej will return and Matthias is still in Hellgate, we'll get the entire Hellgate breakout and Ice Court Heist. (I'm assuming during Matthias's breakout, Pekka Rollins will also manage to escape from Hellgate 🤔) So we can still have the entire book 1 ending at Vellgeluk where Wylan's face has been tailored and Inej gets captured by Van Eck.

5: Crooked Kingdom plotline till they rescue Inej— Kaz throwing off a rapist from the lighthouse after gaining intel, Kaz threatening a little girl, Jesper and Wylan going to receive Colm Fahey and the whole “people pointing guns at each other is basically a handshake” 😂, Nina's struggles with Parem and Matthias trying his best to be there for her, the iconic Kanej reunion at Goedmedbridge,..

I'm not sure how they'll proceed after retrieving Inej, because alot has already been adapted in this season of SaB. But we'll still have the showdown against Van Eck. Not sure what they'll replace the plague thing with but we'll see..

6: Wylan's backstory! Aside from Inej, we also have Wylan's heart wrenching backstory and we'll witness it all. His early life, the moment he lost his mother and his world became gray, his escape from the men who try to kill him, his realization that they were sent by his own father, his struggles with it all, his conflict with being a good person and working with criminals, his reunion with his very alive mother and Jesper being there for him, and so much more..

7: Kuwei! I'm a big fan of this sassy boy. He absolutely hates having to be with Crows and he chooses not to use their language simply so he can avoid conversations with them 😭 We'll see him cause conflict in Wesper's relationship but also slowly accepting and being thankful of the Crows. And I really hope, the show adds a sort of camaraderie between him and Wylan too. But despite it all, I still wanna see Wylan threaten to drown him 😆

8: The Bathroom Scene ♡ If we take into consideration the wound cleaning moment in season 2 of SaB, its a lot different from the bathroom scene. For starters, they're on Black Veil and not an actual bathroom, and Kaz didn't actually tie any bandages for her. Most importantly, the neck kiss didn't happen. So bathroom scene can still happen and it can serve as a beautiful callback and a parallel to this scene in season 2.

9: Kaz can still find Inej's parents, meet them and well, gift her a ship. Wylan and Jesper can still have their happily ever after, living at the Van Eck Mansion.

10: Since they've made so many changes to the source, can they fucking not kill off Matthias and let him and Nina have their happily ever after too? Like they can act as delegates for Ravka and Fjerda 🤔 Or they can help Hanne claim the Fjerdan throne 🤔 Anything aside from killing him off please.

if you guys have something to add or correct me on, please do so in replies/reblogs ☺

[pinkrangersarah]

I REALLY hate that Hazbin Hotel was only given eight episodes per season. Like, that is definitely not a lot of time for a story like this to flourish so a lot of it ended up feeling rushed to me. I can't really blame the creators for this as the time constraint wasn't their fault, so I have to cut them some slack.

Final thoughts:

I'm a sucker for themes of gray morality, love that here. It is fascinating that not even angels know what allows a soul to be granted entrance into Heaven, so they come off as very hypocritical when Adam can behave like a blood hungry, sexist jackass but the second Charlie lets the F-bomb slip she's looked down on. Excited to know what becomes of Pentious being redeemed and allowed into Heaven whilst Adam was slain in Hell.

I am so glad the Overlords are not the pompous pricks I was prepared for them to be. With a cast consisting of many assholes, I'm glad that most of the Overlords actually seemed pretty diplomatic and have a mutual respect for one another, minus the Vees. Rosie is an absolute delight and Carmilla won me over in "Hello Rosie". It is absolutely hilarious that Rosie's domain, Cannibal Town, is the most pleasant and charming place in all of Hell.

I do hate to be that person, but I actually thought the finale was sort of underwhelming. Again, there were time constraints so it's hard to criticize them for that, but everything was just thrown at me and I wasn't given the time to let moments sink in. (To be fair, I did accidentally spoil myself for Sir Pentious, so that one is mostly on me, but the scene still came and went very quickly.) Lucifer sort of shows up out of nowhere, but it's hard to complain when I enjoyed watching him go ape shit on Adam.

I don't know if it's another hit by the time constraints or if I just find Vaggie to be too boring (which I do), but I am not invested in the Chaggie romance at all. Their duet felt empty because I personally don't feel the chemistry between them, which is a shame because I want to like them. I love the dynamic they're supposed to have, but it feels so shallow.

I am glad they're allowing themselves to take on certain slow burns, though, like the budding romance between Angel and Husk, and the fact Alastor's soul belongs to somebody. I was prepared for them to reveal what Alastor's deal with, but I'm glad they didn't because it makes me eagerly anticipate next season.

Lilith's reveal pissed me off, and I'm trying to remind myself that there's still a whole other season to see what her game is, to not jump to conclusions. I am literally begging her not to be a secret antagonist. I don't think the theory of her owning Alastor's soul is completely out the window; my sister speculates that she sent Alastor to help Charlie because she couldn't (she seems to also have some deal in place) or wouldn't. My theory is that she got fed up with Lucifer doing nothing, allowing the extermination to happen, succumbing to selfishness and abandoning them. VivziePop herself said Lilith and Lucifer were madly in love, so I'm hoping it's family drama that will be given the attention and time to heal.

Despite its flaws, this show feels worth the wait. The animation is great; it's very fluid, the characters are expressive, and I really like most of the character design changes from the pilot. It's wonderful to see how far this team has come from the pilot. I've been a slut for shows incorporating songs since Phineas and Ferb, and Hazbin has so many great songs. The amount of times I've listened to many of them on Spotify is starting to get embarrassing.

It's still early, but I think Hazbin Hotel has earned its spot as one of the most anticipated shows of 2024, and will earn its place as one of my top ten shows of 2024.

[the-black-bulls]

4, 5, and 6 for the salty ask game please? Thank you!

Salty Ask List

you really want me to talk about ships, nice 😆

4. Do you have a NoTP in your fandom? Are they a popular OTP?*

I already talked about yamifin and zorakirsch in another ask here, but as a rule of thump most of the yami/bbs ships and zora/royalty ships count as notps in my book, as I find it clashing with my vision of their respective characters.

so let's be daring here and talk about a popular canon ship, Yami and Charlotte. I find it boring. I find it harmful to their characters. I find it a waste of screentime. charlotte is an exmaple of how women in love done poorly in shonen, IMO, and yami is also an example of how men in shonen tend to have their feelings brushed off or played for laugh. their interactions stopped being funny and grew frustrating as soon as charla took over charlotte's body and teamed up with yami, I know this ended up hyping charlotte anyway but it's pathetic that it wasn't her in the first place, and it didn't even get better afterwards with the spade kingdom and her confession... now I'm supposed to deal with the fact that yami will end up with charlotte even when he has been convinced she hated his guts thus never held feelings for her before.

Yeah. I just can't like YamiChar when it's written like this. NOTP.

5. Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?

not ruined per say and more of a case of the fandom being small and half dead right now, but I usually tend to quickly lose interest in ships that overwhelm the individual characters... for example, Grey/Gauche are rarely talked about outside of a shipping context and it's harder to find arts or fics of either of them without the other.

on another note, seeing some charlotte fans discredit characters like charla and vanessa to hype Yami/Char might've played a big part on putting me off the ship, if I see one more person referring to charlotte as luck's sister when vanessa is right here I'll snap lol.

6. Has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated?

Finral/Finesee... used to hate it, and hate finesse too, but a couple of good fics changed my opinion, now I'm neutral for the most part and cool with finesse even if I'm disappointed with the direction of finral's development.

[accio-victuuri]

CPN : XZS vlog chapter 5.5 Rome & Paris 📺

just some bits and pieces that we picked up from the recent vlog shared by xz and his team. honestly, their work just keeps getting better and better. no one does it like them. some people may hate on him for the ‘vlogs’ but at this point, the production quality is on par with something you can show on tv or a streaming app. xz’s travel show when….

as usual, everything is fake and interpreted with turtle/cpn glasses on. if you don’t like it then feel free to scroll — no one is forcing you. ‼️‼️

Let’s start with the date of posting which 3/29, out of all the days he could have shared this, why now? They usually go for Thursdays but not this one. We think it’s a late 3/28 gift, that day is Wuji recording and also when WYB came home from his Rome trip. What a nice coincidence, cause the vlog posted had Rome in it too. These two are really so particular with dates! I can’t. 🥹🥹🥹🥹

1. One thing that stood out to me was when he was looking at a design book. He was talking about designing typeface and letter, and how there are different formations in writing or presenting them. I don’t think that it was ever CPN that he likes to play with letters/ characters to give a different meaning. or to hide something. think : yibo’s motorcyle suit. this just confirms that.

( i have talked about most ( if not all ) of the design bits and hidden meanings per the photos above and more. it’s too much for me to link each one so just feel free to explore this blog. )

2. The way he was eating the lollipop and his pose is so WANG YIBO. I’m sorry, but that’s the first thing that came to mind. Yibo and his oral fixation is real and we see it on SDC most of the time. 😂 They really mirror each other’s habits now and do certain things that make you go “wait… that’s totally xx behavior and not his..”

people are wondering if they saw the fanart of them eating 🍭 at some point and copied it unconsciously.

3. The element of romance in this vlog makes me wanna scream! honestly. Sure, you can argue that the place ( especially paris ) is romantic or that he is doing fan service to the viewers — like, you’re in a romantic weekend with me in Paris. Yeah. Sure. that’s a plausible explanation. but for a clown like me, the elements seem deliberate.

The lines in Moon River:

I'm crossing you in style some day // Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker // Wherever you're going, I'm going your way // Two drifters, off to see the world // There's such a lot of world to see // We're after the same rainbow's end.

He sang the line ‘ i’m crossing you in style some day ‘ — yeah, ZZ. you will be with WYB one day in Rome and Paris. and the mention of a Rainbow. 🌈 I need someone to make a fan video with this as a BGM please.

Next is JVKE’s golden hour. This one has more 👀 lyrics. The whole “golden” and “see you shine” just screams his love for anything about the sun. the sun and his sunflower ☀️ and the mention of summer.

We were just two lovers // Feet up on the dash, drivin' nowhere fast // Burnin' through the summer // Radio on blast, make the moment last // She got solar power

I also don’t really buy it when people say “he doesn’t understand the lyrics, don’t think to much..” i mean. are you really lowkey insulting him at this point? he may not know like the details, but i’m pretty sure he understands the general meaning. and like, it’s not that hard to understand english words. come on.

The style for the intros were also reminiscent of the movie Roman Holiday. Maybe they looked up a movie and watched it. but anyway, the story of this is also a romantic movie.

Yes we know you’re not single. ☺️☺️☺️☺️

4. He wore a long wooyoungmi coat which I talked about here. So looks like that’s where the paper bag was from? but if he already wore it, why bring the bag like that? it’s not that precious of a cargo to hand carry anyway. i’m still eating the candy.

5. Same place, but years apart. ⏱️

6. How he was trying to ride the scooter makes me soft. I feel like the influence of riding things like this ( and even the hoverboard he owns ) is from WYB. 🥹 He can’t do motorcycles, but he is willing to try everything else. The whole image of him riding it reminds us of the loyiboard character design too!

7. When you see what’s on screen during the 2:28 timestamp, it’s a dog. Lol. thinking of your puppy back home? There are also two other shots where a dog is there, but not as deliberate as this one.

8. It looks familiar 🤔🤔🤔🤔

9. It depends on how you see it, 8 or infinity. I’ve really been up in arms with this CPN and feel like we will see more of it.

10. The message ZZ brings in this vlog is the best thing tho. from the caption of the video on weibo :

The best time is on the road, to listen In the heart, to draw inspiration, to travel far, to find a different self. Feel free to do what you want👣

I love how he is encouraging people, in a way, to get out there. which was always his message to fans, to have time to go outside and build themselves up. Don’t spend too much time online. Also the bit about feel free to do what you want. I really hope he gets to do that more. I hope he gets to make choices that lean more towards the things he wants. 💕

and this bit : ( to native speakers, feel free to chime in too )

“in the long run the straw weighs” = despite the light weight, everything becomes heavy if you bring it for too long.

-END.

[foolsocracy]

I love felicia. Why is she written like that. How is she so badly and well written simultaneously. I hate it. I hate her. Its bad. Its good. Why did they make her sleep with noir. Why is she reduced to an object. She's so much more than this and I know it. She's more than her relationships with men. But also they're so vital to her in ways no one understands. I'm crazy about her.

felica is unknowable. she is an enigma but ive been itching to talk about her.

There's a lot about her that I do really like! She has great bones for a complex character and if there was more source material I feel like she could have had more time to be understood and explored.

I really really wish that there was another woman present she could have riffed with. Spider noir is a man-fest which makes her really man-centric because thats all she's got to work with. Its a huge disservice! I do understand that nightclub life and working with powerful NY politicians and criminals will lend itself towards men, but come on now. Easy spot to throw Gwen into (fanfics love to do it lol), or even swapping the gender of someone else like they did with Jean DeWolfe.

I love that she runs a speakeasy which lets her get right in the middle of soo much information. And historically this can pull really well from 1920s hostesses.

In fact, one of the most highly developed skills of nightclub hostesses in New York was their ability to fleece unsuspecting customers. Trained by their bosses "to get as much information as possible from prospective suckers regarding their bank accounts and business," hostesses come on to male patrons with the express goal of "mounting the check." "After enough money is spent," one hostess recounted [...], the goal is to get "the sucker drunk and the works [will] follow." (Dry Manhattan)

[at high end speakeasies] these hostesses earned tips and commissions on the checks they mounted, often as much as one-third of the total, which could bring them from $150 to $400 a week. (Dry Manhattan)

And this was during a time when the average yearly income was $3,269.40. I could totally see her finding her way like that in the early 20s before opening up a place for herself w/ all that money. The only shitty part is it makes her an accessory to men, plus w most of the story being told from Peter's POV we aren't privy to her thoughts. I think because she's basically the only woman with agency that her narrative relationship with men is so bad tasting.

Her character has so much beneath the surface. She knows everything about everyone!! and we never get to see it because she's jaded and secretive and doesn't trust anyone like that, especially not a dumbass teenager with a death wish.

AND HER RELATIONSHIP WITH PETER. don't even get me started. 1) WHY? They didn't have to go there. I know I know its a noir trope. As per the BBC the first rule of Film Noir is "A Dame With a Past and a Hero With No Future." And the Spiderman Noir team committed to it. If only they didn't commit so hard to Felica making multiple comments about how much of a kid Peter was after she was introduced as his mentor's ex. There has to be at least like 15yrs of an age difference between them.

but theres also the flip side that the noirverse is obviously fucked. Media doesn't have to be 100% moral and whatnot (especially in a noir setting), but it doesn't mean i have to root for pete and felica as a romantic couple LMFAO. Ive seen people rewrite their relationship as the strangest, oddest, most fucked up dysfunctional family and you know what i'll take that.

even having that aspect of her character being something where its telling of her past/present, where she doesn't know how to separate pete, a (frankly) dangerous person she needs to keep tabs on and know his secrets, from everyone else she works with. She's been so deeply enveloped by her need to keep herself one step ahead, to have physical power over another in any way (the only way) she knows how, that this is the means she resorts to. but of course we dont know any of that because they didn't bother delving into her more. it does make for a dimensional character at the very least. now if only she wasn't the only main woman.. so that character arc doesn't seem so sexist. and if only pete wasnt so fucking young my gooodddd. but thats what we're working with. such is life

[wack-ashimself]

Liking the first season of 'Torchwood' BUT...

See, I knew of the show 10 years ago. Watched some of it. Hated it. Forgot about it. But was watching like top 10 most shocking tv deaths (or something like that) and they had season 4 (did NOT know they had that many) of 'Torchwood' on there, saying how the latter two seasons were SOLID AF compared to the first 2 seasons.

And I am getting into it. On the 1st season finale. But I gotta say this show has so many plot holes (record setting for just 1 fucking season), and characters who make the wrong call EVERY TIME, you wonder...who am I supposed to cheer for? Cuz, by the numbers, Torchwood has hurt far more than it helped so far.

The lead-she cheated on her boyfriend (with EASE. It felt weird how easy it was for her being in a committed relationship), drugged him, erased his memory, lied to him, and then (Spoilers) got him killed. Also thru negligence, released an alien that killed a BUNCH of dudes.

The butler-he literally chanced cyber men taking over the world, and got an innocent genius doctor killed, cuz he was too much of a COWARD to let his clearly dying gf go.

Tech lady-She reads everyone's deepest darkest thoughts, then got mad when Jack sent an alien who had been murdering for centuries into the sun. She's not bad, per say, more...neutral. She's harmed the least, for sure. That's such a low bar, tho...

Captain Jack-The original reason I watched the show. I LOVED his character on Dr Who. But...this is not him. Not the same guy. Not the free spirited, happy, goofy, witty, always ready, near-god. No. This is an immortal having a mid mid mid life crisis cuz he's lived so long and WANTS to die. Seriously, cuz of his shit, and the lead's, this is like a partial drama. I will say, tho, he has had to make some TOUGH calls which did not make him well liked, but I respected him cuz you knew, deep down, it had to be done, and no one else was gonna do it*.

The doctor-In the finale I am on, he was fired. And I hope his character dies. I fucking hate him. I hate his face, his voice, his actions, his brain; everything. He convinces the noobie to cheat with him, after he basically mouth rapes her. He's angry ALL the time, yells at people thinking he's a genius when he's like the 3rd smartest. He 'falls in love' with a women, tries to demand her to stay, and gets all pity party after ONE WEEK WITH HER. Can you fall madly in love in a week? Sure. But suicidal and a threat to others cuz 'you're sad'? Go fuck yourself, you bitch. Oh, and he basically openly chooses to chance ending the world NOT because he wants to save his team mates (tho he claims that) but because he's tired of being a bitch to the time tear (or whatever the fuck they call it).

So...WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU CHEERING FOR? Jack is the only semi cool character, and he's still kinda an ass. They're ALL kinda...selfish, short sighted, fuckers.

But I will finish this series. Because, storywise, the themes and plots they got going, are HIGHLY original and almost always have 1-3 good twists I don't see coming. You don't understand: I have been exposed to so much media, I can predict most things I see within a short period of time (even whole movies from trailers). I'm SO good (or writing is THAT predictable) I actually can, based on context, guess, WORD FOR WORD some lines. Sometimes in real time. Not usually. But not too far off, either.

*I will say, the call the writers/show/characters are supposed to hate was Jack giving the child to the faeries. NO. GREAT call. Best call you could make. Every other call would have sucked. See-the girl was fucking evil. Sociopath. Straight up. Like the faeries. She hated everyone. Talked to no one, but the faeries. She was borderline evil. And the faeries straight up said if you don't give us the kid, we will kill en mass, starting with HER ENTIRE SCHOOL. And the girl WANTED to go. So...where's the problem giving up the kid? Her mom's sad? Who gives a shit. You just saved TONS of lives, an evil fucking kid is gone, and the fairies disappeared. Only one who really lose was the mom. Her long time boyfriend (he was an ass) and her kid: BOTH GONE, SAME DAY. That is cruel, but long run, genuinely, it's even best for her. Her boyfriend was abusing her kid behind her back, and her kid was cheering on the torture of kids. It's a win-win-win. Fuck you for trying to make me feel bad for him giving up the kid. She wanted to go, and I wanted her to go. Fuck her.

[rachelberryy]

Santana Lopez, Gender Performativity, and the Gaze-Death Dichotomy

For @tuiyla

This is a follow-up from this essay on Santana and Bejewelled by Taylor Swift. It also probably looks the way it does because of this post that I read recently.

(I dug out my old university notes for this, because Judith Butler is a GOAT and I felt like going big brain mode)

i.

The top line of my notes on Butler’s gender performativity theory reads, “Gender may be naturalised and taken for granted, but it is still socially constructed and created through the repetition of everyday acts”. As far as I can tell, that isn’t a direct quote, so I’m going to presume it’s a paraphrased summary on my part. It’s the ideological descendant of an idea from Simone de Beauvoir, probably the most influential feminist philosopher of the twentieth century: “One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.” (Incidentally, the idea of gender as a social construct in western feminist literature goes at least as far back as Mary Wollstonecraft. As per usual, TERFs don’t have a clue what they’re talking about.)

Okay. Let’s talk Santana.

Santana is an Afro-Latina lesbian, and a woman. All of those things are relevant in one way or another. We learn that when she was young, Santana was quite the tomboy, until she was socially conditioned into abandoning that particular persona. Given what we know of her family, I think it’s a reasonable assumption that her abuela had something to do with that. That delivers us to the version of Santana we get for the first season and a half of Glee. She’s a bitch, she’s aggressively sexual, she’s notoriously promiscuous, she’s a cheerleader - the feminine high school archetype. In other words, she’s both a stereotype of the idealised high school popular girl, and a whole bunch of things for which women are typically demonised.

Patriarchy, like all reactionary ideologies, is deeply idiosyncratic, almost by design, and creates these catch 22 situations where women cannot conform or rebel enough, it will hate you anyway, because that is its point. That is complicated by the fact that Santana is a fictional character (and one created by a team of male writers, at that), and therefore is also a construct of the male gaze without any agency of her own. This is doubly true for Santana, who starts out as a side character whose first proper story is as Puck’s ‘woman on the side’, and whose second proper story is sleeping with Finn.

The whole thing is a mess of contradictions, an ill-fitting mess of female stereotypes. Slut, bitch, queen bee (once Quinn is deposed). She’s the opposite end of the ‘fucked up ways in which patriarchy constructs female sexuality’ spectrum to Quinn. She’s also, as we later find out, completely fucking miserable. She’s acting, all the time, allowing the only emotions that slip through the cracks of her walls to express themselves as anger. It’s all, you guessed it, a performance. A version of her that didn’t exist until society forced it to. Those aspects of her - so many of them distinctly gendered - are entirely constructed, against her actual nature.

ii.

And then she quits the Cheerios, realises that she’s a lesbian, and begins to deconstruct herself. Glee is an exceptionally manic show, with so little time afforded to monologues by anyone not named Will Schuester. And yet, at the end of Sexy, Santana is given quite a lengthy one, explaining and exploring her character up to that point. (I can think of one other single moment where the pacing of Glee gives Santana specifically a second to breathe: the pause in the middle of RHI/SLY.) The promiscuity, the bitchiness, the anger at the world. The knives turned out so that they don’t cut inside. So much repressed self-loathing.

Part of the reason that sapphicism broadly and lesbianism in particular are such an affront to patriarchy is because they don’t abide by the rules of the game. In other words, it challenges the way in which patriarchy has determined that womanhood and femininity should be performed. That doesn’t mean, however, that it isn’t a performance, if only because, within Butler’s framework, performing and lying are not the same thing.

As I explained in the previous essay, Prom Queen, conceptually and functionally, is about gender roles in a lot of ways. Kurt bucks gender norms with his outfit choice, by embracing the prom queen title, and by dancing with Blaine at the end of the episode. Quinn, in her desperation to be popular, and validated, and feminine, chases the prom queen crown ruthlessly, because it’s the ultimate prize for a popular girl. Again, like the cheerleading, it’s one of the classic high school archetypes. The whole idea of prom king and queen is so aggressively gendered, obviously. It’s binary, and heteronormative, and rooted in about seventeen different forms of social hierarchy. It’s gender performance taken to the extreme.

The conclusion of Santana’s storyline in that episode is her reconciliation with Brittany, and Brittany telling her that part of why she lost was because people could tell she was hiding something. Exactly who and how many people knew about Santana’s sexuality and when they knew it is something the show can never quite seem to be able to make its mind up on (side eyes at Finn Hudson), but the conclusion in this moment seems to be that the performance has, to some degree, gone awry. Because what use is a performance if nobody believes it? In that moment, it’s Santana’s worst fears about being punished for her transgression come to life - she is performing femininity incorrectly, and therefore she is denied the title that represents patriarchy’s feminine ideal.

iii.

Santana comes out is outed early in season 3, and we finally meet the person who has probably shaped her character - and her performance - more than anybody else we hadn’t met to that point (so, basically, more than anyone but Brittany). Alma Lopez. Abuela.

With some of the crumbs we’re offered up to that point, I don’t think it’s too unreasonable to see Alma’s treatment of Santana to be emotionally abusive - and this is only doubled down upon by her reaction to Santana coming out to her. It’s pretty explicitly stated that Alma is one of the main reasons that Santana is as vicious as she is. In other words, she shaped the performance. She’s clearly a pretty big female role model in Santana’s life, which is why the rejection hurts as much as it does.

The Glee subreddit is home to a wide variety of deeply stupid opinions. That might seem slightly mean, but one can only read so many defences of Finn Hudson objectively bad actions before one becomes slightly cynical. One opinion I’ve seen bandied about on there that I usually don’t have much time for is that Alma herself is a deeply repressed lesbian, largely stemming from the fact that Alma’s main issue with Santana’s sexuality seems to be that she’s willing to live it openly. Its slight difference from the usual ‘hate the sin, love the sinner’ line. I do think it’d be interesting to touch on it here, though. Santana, in many ways, learnt her performance from Alma, which is why her open embrace of her sexuality here - after so much angst and drama - is such an act of defiance, and that’s only doubled with this particular reading of Alma’s reaction.

iv.

While we’re on the subject of Santana’s family background, I’d like to talk briefly on the stereotyping of women of colour in particular, and the way that intersection plays into the idea of gender performativity. Santana’s race and ethnicity are a little ambiguous in certain ways. She refers to Mexican heritage, and Alma has a Dominican flag in her home, if I remember correctly. However, since it’s never explicitly stated otherwise, I’m going to run with the idea that Santana is Afro-Latina, like Naya herself was.

Santana, particularly in her initial presentation (read: performance), very much fits into some of the stereotypes often assigned to Latina women. She’s sexually aggressive and promiscuous. She has a ‘fiery’ personality type. (I’m not overly fond of that word, especially in this context, but I think that’s really kind of the point.) As she says herself, ‘My job here is to look hot.’ Of course, that line can be read shallowly, because I really don’t think Ryan Murphy or any of the lead Glee writers thought that deeply about these things, but most of this essay relies on Death of the Author theory and my reading far more into this story than its creators conceived. It also speaks to Santana’s lack of agency, both in and meta to the narrative itself. She also is hot but w/e

A worthy point of comparison here, I think, is Mercedes, who of all the main characters is probably denied agency the most; who is so infrequently allowed to be much more than a foil to Rachel, both by the writers and, perhaps more depressingly, by much of the fandom, particularly back in Glee’s original heyday. She is also frequently desexualised, again by both the writers and sections of the fandom. There is probably an essay to be written on the variety of reasons that Quinn (thin and white) is read as a lesbian and Mercedes (fat and black) is often read as asexual or earnest in her religious reasons for her celibacy when Quinn’s canon reasons are basically the same. I don’t think all of those reasons stem from those differences, and I definitely don’t want to criticise people for sexuality headcanons that offer them representation - because an asexual, fat, black woman would be kind of revolutionary, if indeed that was what Mercedes was. I also really don’t think I - a white person with half a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science and a Sociology A Level taught by a person for whom I once had to define intersectionality - am the person best suited to write that essay.

Which brings us back to Santana, and the ways in which her ethnicity impact her performance of gender, especially in the first two seasons when that performance is inauthentic. Death of the Author is, again, critical here - and I’m going to talk more about that at the end - but so is Gaze theory and Santana’s multi-layered lack of agency. As with all of the people of colour on Glee, Santana’s race and ethnicity are often ignored until it’s comedically convenient. I’m not saying the jokes don’t always work - Sam’s ‘Quinn once had sex with a Latina lesbian - learned that in glee club!’ comes to mind (I think part of why that works is that it’s one of the only times that it’s explicitly shown that homophobes are often deeply racist as well) - but I think that is notable that that’s often the only time it’s ever seen as worth mentioning. Santana, though played by a woman of colour in Naya, is ultimately a construct of the white men who created her, and it is through their Gaze that she exists. She has no agency in the real world, because she’s a fictional construct, and a distinct lack of agency within the narrative as a queer woman of colour.

So how does all of this relate to gender performativity theory? Said theory might be pithily summarised thus: “Gender is something we do, not something we are.” (I promise I do have a degree, I’m not just copying buzzy phrases from the inside cover of a sociology textbook lmao.) This, then, might fairly easily be mapped onto other socially constructed categories of being. So, how does one do their gender, or race, or ethnicity, or sexuality, when one has no agency of one’s own, when one is entirely a construct of the Gaze of others? When the puppet strings of the performance are juggled and manipulated entirely by someone outside the self? Ironically enough, things become even more of a performance, in multiple ways a construct. Santana the character is constructed, in the same way Santana the person, the queer woman of colour, is. Which is, of course, why critical literary analysis is such an apropos way to explore these ideas, because everything is a constructed performance anyway. And, in this way, we see how Santana’s character is flattened, whether it’s in the vaguely afterthought-like quality to any consideration of her ethnicity, or the wholesale ignoring of her blackness, or the fact that Santana the character, as opposed to Santana the person, is herself a construct.

And then the author dies. More on that in a bit.

v.

Santana has parallels with a lot of characters. Quinn is the obvious one, which is very well-trodden ground analytically speaking - narrative foils, both craving popularity because they can’t just up and admit that they want to be loved, both very gay and very repressed, both in love with Rachel - and season 2 makes Santana’s parallels with Dave quite clear. There are also certain parallels present with Kurt, though - and it’s not just because they’re the two principal queer characters - the two token McKinley gays, as someone put it once.

The relevant mirror here is on expression. Kurt starts out as very experimental, as far as his dress-sense is concerned. It’s also fairly androgynous. “Fashion has no gender,” he tells us. Over the course of the series, however, his fashion becomes more conventionally masculine - not overly so, but certainly more so than at the beginning. In Santana, this shift is even more pronounced. The main windows we get into her fashion is late season 2 and then season 4 and 5 in New York, and while it’s not exactly like her season 2 choices were all that transgressive, they were certainly more experimental than her tight dresses from later on. Now, this isn’t me hating on this style - because girl looks good - nor is it me saying that lesbians can’t adopt a more conventionally feminine sense of style. I would hope that goes without saying. Regardless, I think there’s something worth discussing here where agency is concerned.

Because, of course, Santana isn’t a real person - a real woman and a real lesbian; she’s a construct of a team of male writers. I think the easy explanation here is that the producers got lazy, on a whole range of fronts where costuming was concerned. And that is, at least to an extent, a reasonable line of thinking. To gesture to a fairly straightforward example, after a point they just started having Rachel... mostly just dress like Lea. However, I think there’s a more interesting lens of analysis to be had here where Santana is concerned when we recall that scene where her mother informs us that she was a tomboy growing up. The three points we have, really, are that snapshot of Santana as a small child, season 2, and season 4-5. In season 4 in particular, Santana is portrayed as feeling generally directionless and unsure of herself; of where her path is headed now that she exists outside the rigid hierarchies of McKinley High. And, so, her performance of femininity is exaggerated. It’s a continuation of what the cheerleader role represented for her earlier on: burying herself in the typical female role to hide from internal conflict.

I think there’s also more to be said, at this stage, on the way we can see this in Quinn as well. In season 1, she’s the church girl: babydoll dresses, sundresses, and, of course, her Cheerio uniform - something that she uses as a wall of self defence in a similar way to Santana. In season 2, her wardrobe is largely a more mature version of that - she’s been through the ringer, and being homeless and having a child have forced her to grow up, but, as we see in her determination to be Head Cheerleader again, she’s still desperately clinging to the version of herself from Before. The biggest departure is obviously Skank!Quinn, where she briefly leans fully into a more androgynous punk look before adopting, again, a fractionally more androgynous version of her season 2 appearance, namely the addition of her blazers - which might be read as something as a symbol of male soft social power. Her story in season 3 obviously continues to bring the angst, but it’s also a period of self-actualisation. The most traditionally feminine we see her presenting after that is in her brief appearances in season 5, where it is pretty explicitly established that she’s behaving inauthentically. It’s all fairly on the nose, especially on that latter point. Obviously we can’t map that onto Santana directly, but I think it’s an interesting lens of analysis, given that, as I established at the beginning of this section, the two characters parallel each other pretty strongly in a whole smorgasbord of ways.

vi.

I’ve been dancing around the whole ‘death of the author’ bit for a while now, so let’s get into it. The post that I linked at the top of this essay describes DOTA as 'once a work is complete, what the author believes it to mean is irrelevant to critical analysis of what's in the text’, and I think that’s a reasonable definition to work with here. In other words, the fact that this essay takes Santana as a person with agency of her own, outside of her creators’ intentions, is not necessarily incompatible with my argument that we might use the fact that she’s a fictional character to explore the idea of social constructs, because the former exists outside of the latter. Santana is a construct of fiction, and the author is dead. The two lenses of analysis go hand in hand, inverted as they may seem.

I don’t think it’s too controversial a statement to say that Glee isn’t a particularly tightly written piece of fiction. (Maybe it is controversial on the subreddit. Shit’s wild over there.) Santana is no exception to that. Her character is messy and inconsistent, and the writing varies in its willingness to explore her depth. It would be trite to say that within that uncharted depth lies the DNA of a brilliant character. I also don’t think that that’s entirely accurate, because Santana Lopez is brilliant. The brilliance, which I think I’ve explored quite widely in this essay, is in the margins, in the unsaid, the unexplored. It’s in the performance. Reading between the lines, we see the carefully constructed image that Santana herself created. That is the foundation upon which the character is built. And from that, we can analyse her in myriad ways - along with the myriad ways in which she is, herself, a constructed performance, both within and outside of the narrative, constantly deconstructing and reconstructing itself.

The author is dead. Long live Lopez.

[none-prob]

I write about a character per day

Day 20: Viney (Finale)

Healer. Beastkeeper. Anarchist.

How many things I can say about a character who had her fair share of 2 episodes with 4 more in the background. Oh boy let's go.

Alright getting this out of the way, and the only time I do this because it's Viney. As my favourite character of the show and 2nd favourite of all time (behind a water witch), I want to headcanon so many things for Viney. She's aroace, because everyone is aroace until proven otherwise :P. My favourite ship to Viney is Luney, in a platonic way, that I would like it even more if I didn't know about Lumity too early. She's an engineer in both biology and chemistry. She opens a veterinarian clinic for mythical pets, while also studies medicine and other methods of healing.

Okay, I gotta admit I like Luney more because of Viney being too awesome and their first interaction were pretty cool. Viney has healing and beastkeeping, two of the most underrated coven of the show. Healing potential looked quite awesome, as she even used a shield made out of the coven sigil. As a diehard fan of Steven Universe, I loved that moment so much.

(yes this is the only writing post I will put images on, screw me)

Beastkeeping may have destroyed the class and got her in detention, but who cares, Puddles is the coolest friend a veterinarian can have. And it is so nice that she chose Healing with Beastkeeping, specifically to heal all the pets she got.

I'm going on a limb and say this. Viney is the perfect successor of Eda, maybe with less rebellious intent than her last generation. The tunnel she used? Eda used it before. The Troublemakers Wall? Eda is the Queen. Viney looks up to Eda, as the pioneer of anarchism in the school. Baby Anarchist Viney is so incredible and I love it.

Viney's outfit is also torn like Eda, in fact her uniform is actually more unique than any other students. Her shirt pin points out, unlike other students, her shirt was torn in a way no one does that. And of course the hook earring. My baby anarchist is so determined to rebel.

Side note: I can take a whole day just talking about her hook earring.

The hate between Viney and Jerbo really is incredibly funny tbh. She just decided to hate him. And when Jerbo joined the other time, she just saw all hell broke loose, gave him that death stare in the eyes. That's just awesome lol.

The First Day is her debut, and also her best episodes (so much injustice for my baby). The idea of using a griffin as an assistance is cool enough, but property damage and multi-track studying got her into trouble. Oh hey, just like Luz heh. One day in and Luz already was in detention with the troublemakers.

Having to live in the shadow for a while, with not many companies on her side, she developed a lot of skepticism. Which is why she was so mad at Luz when she saw Luz's friend coming, thinking Luz is above the troublemakers, or that interaction with Jerbo. But when Luz was in need for help, she and the students that the school deemed as troublemakers have saved the school, and forced Bump to change the law for multi-track studying. Eda might be the pioneer, but Viney and co are the revolutionists.

Her next appearance is in Hunting Palisman. No comments here, I just want to appreciate this moment. Very mystical manticore for a very mystical girl.

Any Sport in a Storm is the episode with her iconic "Now I'm only scarred emotionally". Despite having more screen time, she still doesn't have that much more lines, she was outshined by Hunter and Willow. She's now a member of Emerald Entrails, she got along well with the team, and her powers got stronger. Good for her, good for her.

And of course the group selfie.

Labyrinth Runners is when we see a bit more of her. And Puddles' second battle. Not as successful as the first, but it's precious enough for me.

The last episode she had a line in was For The Future. Again, very brief moments. Although she got a new drip with the scarf. It's a scarf, alright girl. A moment when my kin (Willow) met my favourite (Viney), it's so incredibly precious.

Her finale design is so cool. She got long hair, cool outfit, but the hook earring must stay. And she was helping in erasing the sigils.

Puddles say bye.

[lateleviathan]

just finished pretty cure splash star and goddamn did this show stick the landing. the whole season really just felt like the writers saying "okay we've done this twice already, we know what we're doing now"

(info dump below the cut)

basically every aspect of the show was refined from futari wa and max heart, especially the fights. the fights in futari/max could be good but they tended to have the problem of nagisa and honoka just whipping out the marble screw whenever they wanted and winning instantly, making every fight feel like this.

(there were exceptions, like the final fight against poisony where she kept dodging so they had to use her hair as conductor to finally hit her. that fight impressed me so much its permanently burned into my brain).

splash star sidesteps this question almost completely by always having saki and mai be winning BEFORE they use their finisher. they have to create an opening or the splash blast wont hit, which makes each episode's monster of the week fight that much more interesting. (though in the second half of the show they do have a similar problem with their super forms, where moop and foop sometimes just forget they exist to be power ups until the writer decides pretty cure is done getting their asses kicked, making every other fight feel like this)

the villain minions were also consistently interesting, as opposed to futari wa where the first set of villains were interesting but the set in the second half were boring as hell, or max heart where the villains were better than the second half of its predecessor but still pretty boring for the most part. it also helped that the villains were rolled out one at a time and were the only threat until they were killed, at which point the heroes could restore one of the fountains. this really helped to give the series a sense of progression because something tangible was being accomplished every 7 or so episodes. futari wa had this in the first half with the prism stones, but completely lacked that in the second half. max heart tried to do this with the heartiels but they were so disconnected from the villains that they felt more like a side plot as opposed to like the point of the show. it also made it fun when the last batch of episodes had them all revive and team up and we finally got to see how they played off of each other as teammates. that bossrush finale really let splash star have its cake and eat it too in that regard.

also michiru and kaoru are just a way better version of kiriya, like that whole plot was just so much more thought out and satisfying. i still have no idea whats going on with kiriya after his "death" but michiru and kaoru had me crying in the last episode. their addition to the team in the last 8 episodes really felt like practice for the bigger group fight the franchise would focus on going forward, and you can tell from the choreography that they didn't really know what to do with double the heroes. thankfully they figured it out for the final battle. (awkward team choreography pictured below)

speaking of, goddamn those last 2 episodes really were just dragon ball z with magical girls, down to the big bad growing super muscley when he powers up to 100%. this is not a complaint, in fact its high praise that they did this while still feeling congruent with the rest of the show. honestly, i was on the edge of my seat the whole time. like max heart's finale blew me away and i think this was at least on par with that.

all that said, i do think saki and mai are weaker characters than nagisa and honoka. i dont hate them, in fact i grew to love them and am sad to see them go, but they still didnt quite measure up.

for mai it doesn't feel like she gets a lot to do outside of being saki's friend. like she joins the art club but thats only relevant in two maybe three episodes, as opposed to honoka's science club which probably had 6 or more episodes per show (though maybe im misremembering). i thought her being an artsy girl as opposed to honoka's stem girl swag would help differentiate the two, and her art in general does come up often enough, but she still plays the smarter, quieter one next to saki so it doesn't really change much of the protag pair's dynamic.

saki feels even more like nagisa, basically all their personality traits are identical. sporty, big eaters, has the obligatory straight crush, kinda dumb but social and fun. really the biggest difference is that saki isnt as good at her chosen sport (and i love that her team loses the championship, great episode, but even getting to the championship makes this distinction smaller). i like her obligatory hetero crush slightly more if only because it gets less attention than nagisa's, with i think only three dedicated episodes (that said, he should have had a girlfriend instead of it being a fakeout. they dont actually get together anyway and it would have made a good pair with the championship episode for the theme of "you dont always get what you want but thats okay").

still i think splash star was a stronger show overall than futari wa or max heart. i think those first two had a few higher highs, but splash star had less lows. its more consistently good.

so if you for some reason read all this but haven't watched Pretty Cure Splash Star, i definitely recommend it if you enjoy kids' shows. honestly its probably even better if you haven't watched the original futari wa pretty cure, since my main complaints were it not differentiating itself enough from its predecessors.

now to see how yes precure 5 stacks up

[isablooo]

Aaaa!!! forgive me, I simply couldn't pick one... if you'd prefer to separate out the answer per character, please feel free to do so! Heehee 🙈💦

Assana, ✂️🍩🌺

Umbra, 🎹🍀🥊

And for both Tatiana and Clemence, ❤️💼

Thank you for all the questions Bee, I'm beyond happy to get to talk about my OCs hehe!!!

Assana:

✂️ - What is one of your OC’s worst memories?

Hmm this might be getting into spoiler territory but let's just say, when things started to change in her home town.

🍩 -Who is your OC’s arch-nemesis or rival?

Crabs. She is deathly afraid of them (but she loves how they taste in dishes...). Also hair bands. Do NOT get her to tie her hair up unless you're her father. In all seriousness she is not too keen on Willow at first but i wouldn't call him her arch nemesis- Assana is just a hater at heart but doesn't have a rival LOL

🌺- Do they have any love interest(s)?

Assana doesn't have a love interest atm, shes just a peculiar lil guy. But she's no stranger to having crushes, especially on physically stronger and more confident girls!

Umbra:

🎹 - Do they have any hobbies?

This emoji choice is a fun coincidence as Umbra's hobbies are in fact the pianoforte and the organ. She's fascinated by mortal arts because that's something previously unknown to her as a goddess. The idea of a 'hobby' itself is a very mortal conception but now that shes in an earthly body she can't help but indulge in them.

🍀 - What originally inspired the OC?

This one is hard because Umbra is such an old character 😭 I must've been 12 or 13 when i first made her. Originally she wore gothic lolita fashion and had twintails which was most definitely came from my interest in lolita fashion at that age (I desperately wanted to wear it but was too young to buy any myself). She was a bit younger and her personality was very different then too, a lot more cheeky! Eventually she pivoted to a more mature, femme fatale aesthetic and that was likely inspired by Lust from FMA (the manga) if I had to guess. Umbra's personality isn't particularly femme fatale-ish at all but she definitely has that aesthetic- she has a more of an anachronistic/modern look to her clothing style compared to the other characters which I think helps to make her appear more uncanny and out of place, as though shes from a different plain of existence. I'm trying to juxtapose this with inspo from faded/desaturated Minoan frescoes for the murals in her castle and for her makeup- she is at once ancient and brand new. Memento mori imagery is also a huge inspo for her whole aesthetic.

Currently I'm particularly inspired by Ichiro Tsuruta's illustrations for Umbras' sleek look:

🥊 -What do they love to do? What do they hate to do?

She loves to play music, to explore new mortal fashions, and to reward her loyal subjects with boons. She is loth to supplicate to anyone.

Tatiana and Clemence:

❤️ - What is one of your OC’s best memories?

I think both Clemence and Tatiana would say their wedding. But individually:

Clemence- One summer when her and Séverine were very little children and made perfumes together by filling jars with petals and water. It didn't smell great but it was fun! She misses that childish joie de vivre and spending time with her cousin

Tatiana- first using a cross bow with her father!

💼 - What do they do for a living?

Neither Clem and nor Tatiana currently work! Tatiana used to be a huntress in her village, Crescențiu, as part of their elite team of hunters but after she married Clem they've basically been getting by on Clem's ancestral family wealth. The family have been around for centuries so there's not much of that left and castle de shoulières is completely in disrepair since they can't afford servants or upkeep... Tatiana is really handy and spends a lot of time try to do DIY upkeep of the castle. She will also occasionally do odd jobs for people for cash, especially when she travels in to the city.