#I know my comics are goofy but like I’m genuinely really sad | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sammysdewysensitiveeyes · 2 years

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I have posted a little bit about this before, but I finally read some very old X-Men issues to learn the brief history of the Changeling, the character who got retooled into Morph my beloved.

Changeling was absolutely an unambiguous villain back in his first appearance, and he talked basically the same way most comics villains talked back in the 60′s.

That’s Changeling in the goofy-ass purple helmet, Kevin, wtf are you wearing, bro? Are you okay? (Of course, he wasn’t Kevin back then, he didn’t have a name other than Changeling.)

Changeling was part of a group called Factor Three that wanted to heat up East-West tensions in order to trigger WW3, and destroy humanity to create a society ruled by mutants. This was a pretty short-sighted plan given that most mutants could die in a nuclear blast just as easily as humans, but whatever. The group consisted of old X-Men enemies like Vanisher, the Blob, and Unus the Untouchable, with the mysterious Mutant Master as the leader, and Changeling as his second-in-command.

The only interesting thing about Changeling in this first (and mostly only) appearance is that he starts to question Mutant Master’s actions. Not in a “maybe this is morally wrong,” kind of way, more in a “I don’t trust your motives” kind of way. Xavier also attempts to appeal to Changeling while he is captured by the group. It apparently works, because Changeling winds up freeing Xavier and Banshee, then confronting Mutant Master in Xavier’s form to call him out. Why that callout required Xavier’s form, I don’t know, but it was a fairly anti-climactic reveal of Changeling’s previously unspecified shape-shifting powers.

Mutant Master turns out to be an alien who actually wants to destroy ALL life on Earth, not just humans. The other Factor Three members are wisely not down with that, and help the X-Men defeat him. Then the groups just kinda awkwardly part ways.

That’s the last we see of Changeling until the retcon. Next is the story in which Xavier dies, and which was apparently originally intended to be the actual death of Xavier, until they wanted to bring him back and realized that they had a convenient shape-shifting character running around.

In the story, Xavier is acting weird, and sterner than usual, while making apparently irrational decisions and spending a lot of time alone with Jean. Meanwhile, the X-Men fight some dude named Grotesk, who is the last survivor of an underground society, and wants to destroy the world with an earthquake machine, and it’s all so dumb I really don’t care. But in the end Xavier stops Grotesk’s machine, and is mortally wounded in the explosion, Then as he dies, he reveals that he was already dying of an illness, and he pushed the team so hard because so they’d be prepared to fight on without him.

It’s a sad story when you read it as Xavier, but even sadder when you re-read it as Changeling going through all this, while wearing another person’s face. He’s genuinely heroic here:

“There’s no need for you to want to see the Earth destroyed! No reason!” Changeling, buddy, you were trying to start WW3 like three weeks ago. But I’ll call this character development.

Changeling takes “commit to the bit” to another level by dying as Xavier. He was already terminally ill, but since he’d only been leading the team for a few weeks, it’s safe to say his remaining time was shortened here. He basically sacrificed himself to save the world, and was buried and mourned under another man’s identity.

In issue 65, Xavier’s death is retconned and Xavier shows up alive and explains the switch.

Changeling now talks like a gangster from the 1920′s, and I’m somehow imagining him with a Brooklyn accent. You can see where Morph’s character design came from, although I’m pretty sure TAS series Morph is meant to be much younger. Changeling here looks middle-aged. Although maybe it’s also because he’s dying?

Given that the Xavier’s death story was originally written to be actual Xavier, this sad little one-page retcon is all we get of the Changeling redemption story. He was basically just a plot device to bring Xavier back. And I have so many questions, the biggest one being:

He was in the basement? Xavier let another man die in his place and let his team mourn his death, and the entire time, he was in the fucking basement?! When I first heard about this story, I assumed that Xavier had to go away somewhere to do something really important to prepare for the alien invasion, and left Changeling as a temporary stand-in. But apparently, he just really needed time alone to concentrate, because he let his team of teenagers cry over his supposed dead body while he was in the fucking basement of the mansion the entire time.

Putting a former terrorist in charge of his students was already a pretty bad idea, even if Xavier could read his mind to know that he sincerely wanted to reform. Was Xavier monitoring things at all down there? Was he available to offer help or advice if Changeling or Jean came to him? Would he have done anything at all if Changeling changed his mind and went bad again? I feel like the answer is, “Probably not.” If Xavier needed absolute, uninterrupted time alone to plan, letting Jean or Changeling pop in to ask questions every day would kind of defeat the purpose - he may as well just keep leading the team.

More important, did Xavier intend to fake his own death? He knew Changeling was terminally ill, but the time frame was six months. He presumably couldn’t have predicted Changeling being killed by Grotesk. Was he going to come back and let Changeling retire for a peaceful death, or was he going to let him die as Xavier. Was Changeling’s death part of some messed up plan to force the X-Men to stand on their own, or just some unfortunate wrinkle in Xavier’s strategy that he ran with? Xavier actually had a “final message” to the X-Men that he had pre-recorded, which they play in X-Men 43 after the funeral. Who is speaking on that recording? Is it Xavier himself? Changeling? Were they really planning on having Changeling die while still in Xavier form?

And that’s not even getting into poor Jean. Jean was the ONLY one who knew the truth, and to hide it from the rest of the team. She was basically a teenager, and had to bear the burden of helping Changeling as fake Xavier, and watching all her team-mates mourn and struggle after Xavier’s death, never revealing the truth. There was an interview with Chris Claremont where he said that he thought Xavier’s retconned actions in issue 65 were really messed up. He doesn’t get into the isolating of Jean, just that it was an absolute dick move to fake his own death (either deliberately or unintentionally) instead of just telling the team that he needed to go off somewhere alone and they’d have to fend for themselves for awhile. In an issue retelling the X-Men’s history after Jean’s Dark Phoenix death, he wrote Cyclops as actually being somewhat resentful of Xavier’s decision.

If Changeling ever does get resurrected on Krakoa, I’d actually like to see some interaction between him and Jean. Jean was the only person who knew the truth, and the only person he could confide in or ask for advice during his tenure as Fake-X, assuming that Xavier was totally locked away. What did they talk about in private? Did he ask Jean for advice on how to properly be Xavier? Or was Jean just like, “I understand that you’re dying and all, but could you be a little less cranky? The team is starting to notice.” Jean also seems to be the only one who maybe mourns him. She appears to be just as upset as the rest of the team as “Xavier” dies, even though she knows the truth. And her comment on Changeling is “He....was a fine person, at the last.” Jean seems to care more than Xavier, who brushes the death off pretty quickly. “Yes, team, I let someone else die in my place while I hid in the basement, but that’s all water under the bridge. Now lets train to fight the aliens.”

Anyway, this is a weird story, and some of the weirdness is partially just due to the retcon. Changeling would have been a footnote in X-Men history if he hadn’t been adapted into the happy-go-luck Morph, who is so completely different, whether in TAS, AoA or Exiles. I still want to know Changeling wound up being such a cold-hearted and ruthless character compared to his alternate counterparts.

Also, Professor Xavier is a jerk.

#changeling #kevin sydney #morph #sort of

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childofaura · 1 year

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Sorry If I'm going to complains too much but I wanted to her your opinion on Ivy

For me She was wasted

When I looked at Engage at First I expected characters over the top and there are many of them and you know I couldn't complain

Damiant was a pretty normal dude but I was okay with It because I imagined him the only sane one in the friend grup of royals

Then Ivy came and eeeeeeh her First introduction came as an enemy and I wasn't impressed in fact I was more charmed by her retainers

Then I continue the game and complete It (yay) and I look at all my units and Ivy didn't left an impression on me, She wasn't neither a favorite and neither One I hated. Like I said earlier I expected "wacky" character like Chloe, Alfred, Timerra, Panette, Rosado, etc but you know there where normal characters Who I liked because both of these had me charmed and got me wanting to know more about them but Ivy? Nah I basically I got her whole characters by Just playing the story

I mean what can you Say about her? Princess of an enemy Kingdom Who Is actually sweet and gentle and shy and her only quirk Is that she's scared of Ghosts?😴😴

And you know I was in peace okay a bit sad but wathever THEN WE GOT THE DLC

I'm not going to spoil but I Just want to Say I wanted THAT Ivy, you could had keep the same story a sweet princess but with this Ivy It would have worked Better bc lmao She sounds like she's joking when She says something nice and It would have worked Better for her character

Rip Ivy and what you could have been

Btw this Is Just my opinion you don't have to agree have a great day

Hi anon, no need to apologize. I always love hearing people’s opinions (so long as no one is rude or mean, and you aren’t being either one so don’t worry) and I’ve heard some pretty interesting or really well-composed thoughts come into my inbox.

I agree that Ivy felt like wasted potential. And I most certainly agree that Zelkov and Kagetsu have more charm to them, lol. But now you’ve got me curious about DLC Ivy, so I’ll have to make some time this week to watch it (I’m not dropping any more money on this game). But I also feel like Ivy needed something more to her character. The reason why I was so enamored with Hortensia was because she was just OVERFLOWING with personality. She comes off as spoiled, bratty, and somewhat malicious when you first encounter her as an enemy, but later on you can see there’s a genuine love for her family and friends and a desire to fix her broken family. And then once you recruit her, you find out she’s surprisingly and incredibly mature to a certain extent, you can especially see it in her supports with Fogado (and that FogadoxHortensia comic WILL be coming, mark my words!!!). I don’t necessarily think a character always needs to have some kind of goofy or wacky trait (though it helps sometimes), but golly the game needed to write some of its characters with just a bit more personality.

#Fire Emblem Engage #spoilers

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spyrkle4 · 3 years

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Top Ten Reasons why I like Season 3 of Big Hero 6 the Series

yeah Ik that most of us wish it was more developed n’ stuff. But I see it as like some fun epilogue stories as Season 2 was a really good way to end the show, and Season 3 is just some wacky summer adventures!

And with the manga out at this point, well who knows if it’ll get to future seasons like 2 or 3! But thought I’d look back at the series bc it’s amazingness is what kept me still going as a bh6 fan And watching a funny Season 3 ep always brightens your day

And it’s best to look at the bright side of things so this is why I’m typing this n.n (this is isn’t in order from best to least best its just me ranting about 10 things)

List will be under the cut, hope you enjoy n.n

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1. The chibi clips. I mean I wish they did more of them as they’re one of my favorite comedy segments of this comedy-heavy season of the series, and it’s really cute seeing the gang in chibi style. Not to mention the chibi ep of the series was just SO funny and the fact that they used the word “chibi” and even made a chibi-themed song that’s so catchy it’ll get stuck in your head XD

2. The singing and 4 2 Sing. They’re both musical related so *shrug* And I LOVE it! The goofiness most of the songs have is just hilarious, and even the Kara--*cough* I mean Krei-Oke episode had some callbacks to bh6-exclusive songs! And also 4 2 Sing are just so funny, I was a little worried that in their preview we saw, they would be malicious in their ways (and no one likes an evil boy band) but I’m glad they’re just genuinely dense and silly to boot! Although now I have the idea for an evil boy band that would be their dastardtly rivals...

3. The robot family. NBB as a main villian would be odd in a normal season, but it’s fitting for a funny season! And his 3 sisters each are amazing. I’ve actually written a one-shot about the potential family dynamic of the bots, and I just love their little quirkiness and relationship with eachother! I’m glad that they’re still together at the end!

4. Mini-Max character development! I know some people aren’t the biggest fans of Mini-Max, as he’s kind of more of a token marketable character ig... he does have funny lines. But I’m rly glad they gave him character!

5. Villain redemption arcs! Not just Sparkles, that was interesting (and led me to my theory that Sycorax was so... Sycorax that it made everyone involve quit villainy or lesson their villain stuff in Momakase’s case) but in the ep “Gogo the Woweroo” it was nice seeing how some of the other villains are doing. LIKE HV! OMG I WAS SO HAPPY THAT ITS CANON THEY’RE REFORMED! (It was a little tiring seeing fics of them as villains after COM, no offense or anything n.n;)

6. Karmi! This one is obvious bc OMG it was SO good seeing her again! And she and Hiro have a goofy friendship. I like how its up to interpretation if their feelings are platonic or romantic (I’ve become more of a platonic shipper) and the fact she helped save the day against Hardlight! If the series continues, maybe there will be a character arc of Karmi becoming Lab Lady and being a superhero!

7. Cheers you up! Whenever I’m sad or a day has been really bad for me... a season 3 and it will guarantee putting a smile back on my face, say what you will about the excessive comedy in S3, but it always makes me happy after a rly long day or a bad moment

8. The new characters. Sure they didn’t show up long, but they made a good impression! Cobra was a another long-time villain who’s got some charm and conniving schemes. Olivia’s a comic dork who enjoys the non-mainstream stuff and that’s a mood. Rishi: gremlin and also precious dork who probably has consumed too many memes and is just a gremlin kid and I love him XD.

9. Seeing what other characters are up to. Like seeing how Globby is, (and him and Felony Carl still being roomies aaaaa), the ep with Wendy,,, even seeing Granville again twice (including her fur babies so cute!) It was nice getting closure for those characters before the series ended, sure not everyone we know and love showed up in Season 3, but it was nice seeing how the others in San Fransokyo were doing this summer

10. The found family. Obviously my favorite. I just cried at the part where Baymax told NBB that Hiro was his family and asked him to help save his family, NBB might’ve hated Big Hero 6 at that time, but he understood the important of family. And basically Baymax and Mini-Max have a brotherly bond!! and also the nerd gang friendship omg ;-; and Aunt Cass says it herself, you don’t have to be related to be a family! I still love and cherish my bio family, but I really see a lot of my close fandom friends and other ppl I know as family too, and it’s nice to see that with Hiro and Aunt Cass, they still have each other as fam, but they also love and cherish the new members they have, like the nerd gang and even the robot fam (wonder what kind of shenanigans Hiro would get into w/ his new robotic cousins)

Hope you guys enjoyed my little list, and it helped you think on the good stuff season 3 had. Sure it could’ve been better, and it deserved to have a proper season and it was unfair the show got cancelled, but there’s always a silver lining n.n

#big hero 6 the series #bh6 the series #season 3 #big hero 6 #just sparks things

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feralnumberfive · 3 years

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The Rewatch Academy: Episode 4 of Season 1

“Man on the Moon”

I am in no way a good analyst so my little analysis and speculations probably sound a bit goofy or pretty wild and probably mean nothing at all. Everything I put into this post about each episode is purely what I noticed or thought, whether it’s funny or serious. I will be making jokes, so please just leave it at that (in no way am I trying to make fun of an actor and or character!) I am also in no way saying I noticed this stuff first. This is just what I noticed while rewatching these episodes

☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂

1x01 | 1x02 | 1x03 |

☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂ ☂

☂ So at that point Luther had already been alone for about five years (due to his siblings leaving when they were 18 or even 17 according to Diego), and by alone I mean he did’t have his siblings with him. I’m not counting Reginald, Grace, or Pogo because I’d imagine they weren’t the best company. There was a two year gap between Luther getting the serum and then being sent to the moon. He had already been “alone” for five years before he was sent away to be completely alone for four years. He hasn’t had really any social/outside interaction besides going on missions for almost ten years, which means Luther is an awkward dude and he hasn’t been a true leader because he hasn’t had anyone to lead. I don’t think people really realize this and I think that’s where some of the hate towards him comes from

☂ We see that Luther looks into Allison’s and Klaus’s bedrooms as he makes his way down the hall, and I’m willing to bet he did that for all of his siblings. Makes me wonder how many times the siblings went to Five’s room to visit it or to even check with hope that he had come back

☂ I wish I could ride my bike around my house and chug a gallon of milk :[

☂ I can’t believe that Reginald still made him wear that leather battle suit 💀

☂ Why are there posters of animal anatomy in the infirmary?

☂ Apparently it takes between two to four months to grow a full beard, so that’s about how long Luther had been lying there

☂ *suffers through the Allison and Luther scene*

☂ “HoPe I wAsN’t BeInG tOo LoUd”

☂ Vanya and Leonard were really sweet in the beginning. Screw you Leonard

☂ It’s really sad that not one his siblings notice that Klaus is gone. Not. One.

☂ Are you telling me that Klaus and Five are certified freaks? At least I’m sure that’s who Cha Cha is referring to, or maybe it’s Luther

☂ I tried looking up tortures in Trinidad to see if Cha Cha was referring to any specific event, but I think it’s just a random thing in the show

☂ It’s only when Diego mutters “The boy” that it reminds him either of Five’s superhero name “The Boy” or his new appearance as a teen again so it finally clicks in his head that that’s who the mystery kid is

☂ Diego admitting that he doesn’t really know how to process his feelings!

☂ He’s very protective of his family and that’s something that I love about Diego. He doesn’t know who Hazel and Cha Cha are but all he knows is that they are searching for Five for some reason and that his siblings almost got killed last night

☂ Five doesn't realize the suffering that he’s putting his family through at this point since he’s only focused on finding who’s responsible for the end of the world. It’s ironic that he’s doing all of this to keep them alive and safe and yet him not being with them almost got them killed. Five buddy, you should have included all of your siblings from the start no matter how much they annoy you

☂ Also where has Five been this entire time? He left the van at night and now it’s the next morning. He’s been following the guy but why did it take him so long to corner him?

☂ Ope, and there’s a continuation error! When Luther takes his arm out of Five’s dresser, he takes part of the wood panel with him. When it cuts back to Diego talking there’s just a fist size hole

☂ “We barely got out with our lives.” Okay but where were you, Pogo?

☂ It’s funny how quickly they revert to child-like shame when Pogo scolds them. At least they still respect him I guess

☂ Is Hazel eating potato chips with ketchup?

☂ I think one reason why nobody notices that Klaus is gone is because none of them saw him that night during the attack. They possibly assumed he already had left the Academy??

☂ Looooove the “Shingaling” scene. They are straight up vibing

☂ I don’t know why Luther was frustrated with the van door being locked. It’s not like he could rip the door off or anything.......

☂ I have a two questions here:

Why did Diego know where to find Five based off of the book? Sure he saw that it came from the library, but that doesn’t mean that he’ll be there

Wouldn’t Luther and Diego have seen the smoke coming from the Meritech building? Unless they left immediately and weren’t able to see the smoke even though they probably were still in the vicinity when it began to burn

☂ Five is holding the man’s arm to make sure that he doesn’t get away (hard to tell in the pic below though). He needs that sense of security that this lead isn’t going to escape his grasp, but I’m sure that if he were to run he wouldn’t get far when you can just teleport after him

☂ I got a nice pic of Five (also the dude on the bike that was riding behind Five as he runs up in this shot just does not care that this building is on fire)

☂ When it shows Five on the ground, it at first starts off with light and slightly comedic music before it quickly switches over to something dramatic. I always thought it was funny that they play the light stuff as we see Five just laying there 💀

☂ You can see just how quickly Five’s face changes from shock to disbelief and disappointment as his only lead is literally blown away from him look, you can pinpoint the exact moment his heart breaks. Also Five definitely would have had hearing issues since we can see that the windows on the building behind him were shattered. He’s staring into your soul....

☂ There’s nothing really significant about this at all, but Whippets are racing dogs and in the comics Five goes to watch a dog race at one point

☂ “I hate sprinkles.” Hey, me too!

☂ I love that Griddy’s is still open despite the damage that was done to it

☂ Diego left home at 17 (which is illegal so I wonder if he was emancipated or maybe Diego ran away and Reginald didn’t care to look for him) so I wonder if the others left when they were 17 too or if they waited until they were 18

☂ Luther I don’t really think you’re one to talk about being “grown up” my guy. In fairness none of the Umbrellas know how to be fully functioning adults, not even Five who’s about twice the age of his siblings and is almost a senior citizen

☂ “I stayed because the world needed me.” Hey that was basically Five’s reason too, but more so for getting to see his family again. Anyways, like brother, like, uh, brother!

☂ "And things are never gonna go back to the way they used to be.” You sir just predicted the next week(s) (and technically years in the 60s) of your life and the lives of your siblings! This also applies for what happens after those weeks/years, but we haven’t gotten there yet but it’s certainly not the way things used to be!

☂ How was Luther upset enough that he wanted Diego to stop talking after he said something genuine and a bit sad?

☂ This whole relationship talk isn’t exactly relatable......

☂ He’s just chillin’

☂ Reginald can ✨perish✨ Oh wait, he already did

☂ Here I am taking any little scrap and running with it, but when Five says he’s going through puberty twice does that mean that he didn’t get his aging altered by The Commission? In the comics, Temps Aeternalis/Commission stopped Five’s aging but here it sounds like that didn’t happen. Since we haven’t heard anything about Five’s DNA in the tv show we don’t really know much about his aging alteration either. I think that they really do have to leave that part out due to Aidan himself, who is a growing teen, and for the fact that they would need to come up with an excuse for Five’s aging (Aidan already looks different in S2 and he’s taller too). I wish they would bring this stuff up in the show!

☂ Five deflects answering the question of what he’s the best at most likely just because he’s just distracted but also possibly because he doesn’t want his brothers to know at this point

☂ First the feral chimp smile and now this

☂ Five actually sounded serious when he was talking about how many people he has killed and how he’s the ”Four frickin’ Horsemen” which is more so an exaggeration but it still shows us that he views himself as dangerous and powerful. He revealed this to them while he was drunk, even though they don’t really understand, but I wonder if Five ever actually planned on telling his siblings what he did and how much blood he has on his hands. I feel like he would have told them after he had saved the world from the apocalypse, but yet again I could also see him brushing off questions in relation to what he just said to Luther and Diego to hide his past from his family

☂ ✨”Little Psycho”✨

☂ As eerie as all of those ghosts are, it’s a really neat scene

☂ It’s not really meant to be funny, but Klaus denying the duct tape just reminds me of a little kid refusing to go into timeout

☂ I guess Cha Cha got out through the door next to the bathroom when Klaus was banging his head on the table?

☂ It’s a shame that Patch died right away, I really liked her

☂ Klaus, where you’re going really isn’t any better

☂ It’s sweet that Diego puts Delores down gently and doesn’t just toss her somewhere. Even though she’s a mannequin, Diego knows that she means something to Five

☂ Well Luther I think it’s pretty self-explanatory what he meant. You just need more context

☂ Diego: *signaling that someone, possibly a threat, is approaching and to be alert*

Luther: 🕴👁`👄’👁

☂ Even if they did think that Klaus had left the Academy before Hazel and Cha Cha attacked it, it’s sad that it took them this long to think about him

☂ Luther patting Delores is so cute

☂ Say it with me kids, “Patch deserved so much better!”

☂ My heart breaks to see Diego so heartbroken and upset, especially when he says “I gotta go, okay? I can’t be here when they come, okay?” Ugh, that gets me

☂☂☂☂☂☂☂

Feel free to comment or reblog with things you have noticed too!

#tra #the rewatch academy #tua #the umbrella academy #umbrella academy #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #allison hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #number five #five hargreeves #ben hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #hazel and cha cha #eudora patch #reginald hargreeves #man on the moon

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madlilsongbird · 3 years

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Watching The Amazing Spidernan movies so that I’m all caught up before No Way Home. Will add my thoughts as I have them. Note I am not some big Spider-Man fan nor have I read the comics so if my thoughts sound kinda stupid they probably are.

First movie:

That’s a good trick with the broom. Making a mental note as we speak.

Actually seeing Peter say goodbye to his parents is horrible and I would like to never experience it again

SALLY FIELD IS AUNT MAY?! Why does this one have the good cast? (not good as in better but good as in more well known)

The sexual tension in “good morning flash…good morning Peter” (this is a joke I’m not shipping him with his bully)

Jesus roid rage much?

Shut your blinds! I don’t know who would be looking in your window at this exact moment but close them anyway!

First careful, you never know who is watching what you search (when did I become this person)

Second…curt connors is ableist.

Poor Rodrigo Guevara

Oh internalised ableism. And that is the only comment I will make going forward because my disabilities do not include limb difference and I dont want to overstep.

Stop following the man, you are not subtle…wait wtf how’d he do that?!

This is where he gets his powers right?

Okay but when would 5 men make that much of a fuss over a woman that only 1 of them seems to know?

Same. (This is in reference to smashing the alarm clock)

Oh my god is it really necessary to show all the different kinds of spider bites.

Actually just going back to the internalised ableism thing…he is allowed to feel whatever type of way about his own disability that is his right. But insinuating that all disabled people are weak and wanting to breed out the weakness is eugenics and just kinda gross. THIS is the final comment I will make on the matter.

No but seriously he is way more aggressive than regular teen boy aggressive so either he’s on something or he’s overcompensating for something

The way he looks at him doe (again all jokes am not shipping flash and Peter)

Why is this so awkward? And not like teens navigating a crush awkward just genuinely awkward. I feel no chemistry between them.

I like the song, it’s an interesting choice for this scene but I like it.

Stop does uncle Ben die now? Like I know uncle Ben dies at some point but I was really kinda hoping he just wouldn’t in this iteration. I was going for a ninth doctor moment “just this once everybody lives”

MOTHERFUCKER

God Sally is incredible

Don’t show me moments of Flash being human I might accidentally start shipping them for real and that simply can’t happen.

Oooh he’s a fashion designer

I just really enjoy how he takes the piss out of his victims? Arrests?

Is Gwen aware that the school nurse can’t cure everything? Both legally and just like generally doesn’t have the knowledge to cure everything. She suggests going to the nurse a lot.

This family gives me bad vibes

This is a long movie…it’s not even half way through

Well that’s one way to tell her

NOT GEORGE FOYET!

I think with what I remember of SpiderTobey and what I know of SpiderTom, Andrews Spider-Man is definitely better with the people he’s rescuing. Smoother, good bedside manner.

His sons name is Jack. Why does that make me angry?

So he’s just not gonna rescue the other people hanging off the bridge?

It’s almost poetic that the son of the man tried to stop him the first time will be the one to stop him now

Now how is he getting enough power in the sewer

No means no Peter

Does she die in this one or the next one? I don’t imagine her dying will help captain stacey see him as a good guy

Stan 🥺

This movie is exhausting and I don’t know if I mean that in a good way or a bad way.

MoThEr HuBbArD aRe YoU sErIoUs

He managed to get three whole words out and you didn’t think to ease up on the trigger a little to hear what those words might be?

She’s very clever and I will be sad to see her go

That wasn’t her scream. Or it was but from a different take.

Foyet about to be coming in clutch

I’m going to cry.

He’s so ugly. Some lizards are really cute but lizard + human, kinda gross looking.

Well shit. I didn’t know that happened. I guess what I said about him being upset with Peter about Gwen is irrelevant. Unless it isn’t, like if you believe in the afterlife, imagine how pissed he’s gonna be when Gwen arrives.

He finally got the eggs 🥺

As someone who’s boyfriend at the time didn’t go to her fathers funeral I feel ya Gwen. I mean I don’t care now but at the time it sucked.

Dr Connors was just in a silly goofy mood. He seems to show genuine care for the boy (this is mostly sarcasm).

Second movie

Oh we’re going back to peters dad.

How do they have access to a private jet?

Miss Honey is badass

Ngl I’m actually quite relieved they both died before the plane crashed. Stil devastating though.

Okay so this is first up on the list of potential mystery villains in No Way Home…he looks like a tool.

HeLLo PeDeStRiAnS

He really just let Spider-Man put his hand on his tongue. Sir do you know where his hand has been? Not to mention just in general the feeling of spandex on your tongue. I feel ill.

No respect for the proper care of plutonium.

Please don’t ever say “come to daddy” again 😂

I’m kinda sad Jamie Fox becomes a villain, his character seems kinda sweet so far from the 2 seconds I’ve seen of him

You mean to tell me he missed his girlfriend’s fathers funeral AND her valedictorian speech?!

Stan x2 🥺

Because you can’t lose me you’re going to lose me? 😂

I love her jacket

Why are they still pretending like she doesn’t know?

I may have spoken to soon about Max

See I would be speeding up daddy’s death if he told me he’d passed down a genetic disease and just decided not to tell me.

Friendship.

Okay max is still a little bit nutty but you gotta feel bad for the guy. He must’ve been so scared.

Don’t smile that’s not cute, if he was a regular boy you’d file a restraining order.

Oh I see Spider-Man is gonna fight him which will make him turn and become the “bad guy” whether he will actually be a bad guy is still unknown.

This scene is actually kinda just making me angry (the time square scene)

Cops suck man. Peter was talking him down just fine.

Did nobody teach these people not to touch metal when there’s electricity about.

Interesting that I didn’t pick up any chemistry from them in the first movie weren’t they an actual couple for a while?

Another good song with an interesting placement

I’m sorry did the caller ID not say Mary Parker? How was it Harry on the phone?

Run Gwen!

This version of Harry is kinda creepy I’m sure the actor is swell but the character is terrifying. Original version Harry was swell whereas the actor is…

“Maybe everyone has a part of themselves they hide” gives him the eye

This movies shorter or at least it feels shorter

An excellent show of what happens when you tell a rich daddy’s boy no for the first time.

This makes me very sad. She’s so excited for the possibility of Oxford.

As much as Harry disturbs me, I want him to burn his entire team.

His daddy really did love him!

I think it’s mostly his eyes, his behaviour can be explained by trauma (why I find Harry creepy)

Okay most of his behaviour. The taking joy in killing people that’s just him being nutty and not a trauma response.

This is fucked up. And where is Peter? he is off chasing a girl who has broken up with him twice now.

PLANES NEED THE POWER!

I really like SpiderAndrew, the movies are fine but as a character I thoroughly enjoy him

Sorcerers apprentice who?

Captain Stacy can’t blame him! She’s clearly stubborn as hell and her own free woman

I quite literally stopped breathing (in reference to the almost plane crash)

Is this why they made it Gwen and not MJ so that he could kill her and be an actual bad guy? From my little knowledge of the comics and what I’ve seen from the movies Harry would never hurt MJ so it had to be someone else important to Peter but not super important to him for him to a real bad guy

I like that Harry actually looks like a goblin.

What was the disease he’s supposed to have?

This poor family. I know I said they gave me bad vibes in the first movie but nobody deserves this.

He looks less like a tool with his suit on…but only slightly less

Baby you better get back behind that baracade!

Nobody talk to me I’m very emotional. This child looks very much like a magical mix of all 3 of my brothers put together and seeing him stand there so brave but so scared is doing something to me.

Final thoughts:

So I think SpiderAndrew might be a close second favourite for me. I like the relationships of the original the most, the comedy of the mcu version the most but this one was like a nice in between. Im a little disappointed there won’t be a third not cos I think I would have enjoyed it just cos the original had 3 movies, the mcu version will have at least 3 movies and this one is left out with 2. Don’t think I would have loved Shailene Woodley as MJ though so I dunno. I think the only thing I would have wanted from a third movie is to know who fedora guy is…and for Peter and May to acknowledge that they both know that he is Spider-Man. Apart from that it was fine and I now feel fully prepared for No Way Home.

#the amazing spider man #the amazing spider man 2 #the amazing Spider-Man #the amazing Spider-Man 2 #the amazing spider man spoilers #andrew garfield #emma stone #sally field #criminal minds #george foyet #spider man no way home

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softer-ua · 4 years

Note

in regards to what you pointed out a few posts ago, ngl one of my least favorite fandom things is when they make Kaminari the Har Har Stupid Joking ADHD Bi Playboy Who Is Never Serious Trope. like, he's very smart, 'worst in ___ area of a UA course' is very impressive and I don't remember if it even said that or just that he was studying with some other students, worried about his grades overall, calls himself stupid with implied insecurities about it, and didn't think he was very smart compared to the other people in the course. quirk overuse makes him loopy, incoherent, and think everything's funny. and yeah, he's a bit of a flirt and made a few perverted comments and actions that he clearly didn't think through that well. I'm pretty sure he's not ever stated to be bi in the manga because it was written by a coward, so I think people should think more about why they're associating and pairing together the idea of "hot flirty playboy who if legally able would sleep with everyone he meets" with emphasis or joke in the captions of whatever the content is on him being bi. I don't think this is inherently bad, even put together, but the execution feels kind of :/ and shallow. and I mainly just wish they'd pause to consider if there's any reason (subconscious or intentional) why one of those makes them think about the other, and at the very least lean back to see if they're blatantly making those traits centric around each other and tweak how they're showing them a little. Part of this is also because it's basically his fanon sexuality, but then they stick together "oh he's bi and everyone thinks that" and "he's made flirty or perverted comments and actions in canon at some point" and then mentally exaggerate and have this Canon Image of him as *waves hand at above* and I don't think that's happening consciously in most cases but. again. Cookiecutter Bi Party Playboy Who's Made a Date Offer to Everyone In The Building. not a flirty Person or a Playboy who is bi and flirts with more than one genders

I myself headcanon him as adhd and while the exact sexuality depends on my mood I think of/have him as bi in a lot of my content, but it's the same thing with why non adhd people see how he acts and label "adhd!" Especially about comprehension speed and derpy acting and intelligence and attention span jokes/tropes. Again, not bad in and of itself, but the specific parts of his behavior that make them think he's adhd, or that they start making jokes about or Ha Ha ADHD'ing, or that they think is why we project ADHD on him, (which they aren't necessarily wrong about, but like right in a really disrespectful look at how funny this is oh look squirrel way that's only funny when adhd people are doing it and it isn't all mocking like that) when they see other people calling him adhd, are the wrong ones, I think, and it shows in their characterization of him.

I'm not saying that any of those traits are bad in a character, but as a queer adhd girl with very high annual test scores and Gifted Kid Intelligence but extremely poor grades, focus, and brain damage (admittedly nothing like his, it was a longterm passive thing that mainly just made me have a Lot of Really Bad headaches, and closest thing it did to me was make me sluggish and emotional on bad days and also techincally have the potential kill my language bit if left untreated or the surgery messed up, which it didn't, and it won't be a problem again. but even after explaining that it wasn't cancer or any sort of tumor, and after seeing it do very little at all to affect my behavior outside of irritability and performance, because y'know, constant migraines, gone after the surgery but this was before that, Certain People I Was Vaguely Kind Of Acquaintances With started to treat my like I was a fragile glass thing going to to drop dead and revive myself speaking like a comic relief cartoon crazy person at any moment which was. patronizing.) I've since had surgery for, the way the fandom combines them into stereotypes and portrays them really just rubs me the wrong way- "Flirty Bi(tm) Playboy" "Har Har ADHD Can't Focus Or Get Things After They're Explained To Him, He's Still Confused And An Idiot" "Stupid Person With Brain Damage Who Can't Take Care Of Or Think For Themself And Acts Stupid And Funny For People To Laugh At" which tbh is super ableist even and especially when people irl do fit that description, and also reminds me of the Autistic Person Freaking Out And Being Dramatic sense of humor. And I know it's not helped by canon, because it done for comic relief and to limit his powers, but explored more I think it as a limitation could have been used way more interestingly than canon did and also call me biased but that quirk induced brain frying sounds at least as concerning as Izuku's quirk's backlash.

And it's a shame!! Because he's so much more interesting than that! Instead, the fandom gives me the Cookicutter Funny Bi ADHD Flirt Who's An Idiot and I am sad about it.

tbh it reminds me of what happened to percy jackson, esp with the ADHD Idiot Trope thing. which sucks because apparently it originated in the author making up stories around characters like his adhd and dyslexic kid inspired by Greek myths to tell him after running out of actual myths because it was his special interest and he wanted more. and then the series got kind of all over the place and the fandom processed that the adhd and dyslexic main character who does dumb things sometimes but is very combat smart and great at strategizing and leading gets bad grades and has trouble focusing and has, y'know, adhd, and made him the ADHD Idiot and erased his Gifted Kid girl friend's traits and ADHD and dyslexia into No Nonsense Calls Him an Idiot And Thinks He's Stupid And Has To Tell Him What To Do And Manage His Life For Him and honestly that just kind of sucks and it reminds me of what happened to fandom Kaminari. and now that I think of it people have jirou like that around him a lot too.

im fine with you answering this publicly if you want or have something to add but probably tag as ableism and maybe a biphobia mention content warning for people who don't have the energy to deal with thinking about those kinds of negative things rn because I kind of Went Off About It

I love this! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and experiences 💚(and double thank you for tag suggestions)💚

I couldn’t agree more that a lot of fandom has messed up Kami’s character, which is why I’ve kinda been posting more about him cause he’s just stuck in my head.

I think a lot of fandoms have trouble with characters like this, people have a hard time with duality in characters and fast/fun posts are easier to make if you flatten a character down.

The did it to Kami, they did it to Percy, they did it to Ron Weasley, they do it to Thor, the list goes on. If being the Smart One ™️ isn’t your thing and you can be goofy than you get pigeonholed into the idiot trope.

I feel for Kami a lot(probably because I have adhd/brain damage too)

It sucks when you’re smart but it’s not the traditional, measurable kind of smart(even if by national comparison Kami technically is).

I got terrible grades growing up, and I pretty much got the absolute lowest gpa you can get and still graduate. But absolutely no one would have known if I didn’t tell them, because I’m not dumb.

(It’s okay if you are “dumb”, I love me a head empty just vibes friend. You’re 100% valid, stil worthy of joining discussions, and should be listened to and taken seriously. This just isn’t about that tho)

I joke sometimes that I’m clever and witty but not smart, because that’s exactly what it feels like.

I have lots of thoughts and ideas that I think I articulate pretty well, I am excellent at finding the humor in things and expressing it in a way that’s funny to others too, and there is almost zero problems I can’t find a work around. And the people in my life love it, and they love to use it.

But eventually everyone in my life finds out that I’m not smart. They see the way I have to pause to Google how to calculate a tip, that I don’t know the name of all 50 states or even where to find them on a map, or I legitimately just can not spell (if you ever see a post where it looks like I used a weird word choice it’s probably because I tried 4 times and autocorrect+Google couldn’t help me and voice to text wasn’t an option)

No one ever questions my intelligence until they find out about my adhd and/or catch me struggling with it. After the mask comes off it’s like they can’t even hear me anymore, nothing I say could be true or matter because I’m now just the goofy accident prone spacy girl. My family literally calls me Spacy

And ya know what sometimes I just let people think that because it’s easier, it’s easier than explaining that I’m dyslexic and that I didn’t have a single geography/history clas until 10th grade and shocker the capital of Iowa doesn’t come up much by then. And it’s easier for me to laugh off losing my keys again than dwell on the fact that sometimes it feels like I’m losing my marbles.

And I wouldn’t be at all surprised if after this post I get a lot more “fact checkers” and push back on anything else I post.(not talking about people who want to genuinely engage,y’all are always welcome, I’m talking those people who don’t wanna look it up themselves but no longer trust me to know what I’m talking about)

Kami is a sweet brilliant boy. He’s in a nationally high ranking school, he loves the weather channel, he’s careful about his quirk that could easily hurt his friends in combat, he has a very high emotional intelligence level, he wears dorky shirts with electricity puns on them, and he pays attention to his friends and remembers a lot of little things about them.

He wants to be a hero and he takes that seriously, and the series has tried time and time again to tell y’all that smiling and laughter are an important part of that. Kami excels at this part! So what if his history grades don’t rival the top of the class, the top 5 students would struggle hard to do what Kami does.

Iida can’t relax, Momos rather shy, Todo struggles with social cues, Midoriya is canonically not funny, and jfc where to even begin with Katsuki. I’m certain they’ll all grow up to be excellent heros in their own right, but none of them are going to bring the level of joy and camaraderie that Denki can. You can’t test that into someone.

Kami also just notices people differently and has any easy way of joining in with them, he doesn’t struggle approaching Katsuki or Shinso. Sure he doesn’t hit the the nail on the head the same way Deku does but he’s the only one who has the guts and skills to try. Also he’s not that kinda friend, he’s not looking to a save these guys but pal around with them

I think Kami 100% realizes what a special case and tough nut to crack Bakugo is, I don’t think he’s just careless or too dumb realize his life’s at stake or whatever.

I think he’s purposely testing Bakugos boundaries all while trying to not be a threat to Katsukis actual ego and calling Bakugo out when he needs it in a way that not to serious. Kami knows how to be just goofy enough that he’s approachable. He’s also keyed in that the way to Bakugo is through Deku, meanwhile everyone else is stuck believing the opposite.

Kami also realized how important music is to Jiro and saw an opportunity to let her display her skills and combin the two worlds she lives, and he wasn’t afraid to get some back lash from her for it.

Like Deku Kami isn’t afraid to be uncomfortable. You really can’t teach that level of social ease, you can teach the posture and feed people a couple of lines but it’ll never hit the same. Funny approachable people have spent a lifetime learning the craft, usually out of necessity.

It’s actually what gives me the biggest adhd vibes from him, because adhd is (speculated to be) a dopamine deficiency disorder. People with adhd are constantly trying to raise their dopamine levels, and that means looking for praise and reward and nothing makes the human brain light up faster than postative human connections.

Adhd children struggle a lot with connecting with peers and often find making people laugh a fast way into people’s circles and makes it more likely people will overlook being interrupted or spaced out on.

Also adhd people are pretty much forced by their own brain structures to be genuine in all they do, low dopamine levels make it very hard to do things you don’t enjoy because there no promise of dopamine from the activity and you don’t have enough to spare, plus impulsiveness makes it really hard to not show when you do or don’t enjoy something.

I agree that Kami is also painted as overly perverted at times, he’s a little flirty but in a fun casual way but it’s not the foundation of his personality and it’s really mellowed out over the course of the series.

And while I subscribe to the bi hc from his interactions with Jiro and Shinso, we should all be very mindful that we don’t lump these characteristics together. The are separate facets of his personality that are not dependent on each other in anyway.

Kami deserves all the respect and love, I can’t wait to see our electric king again 🖤⚡️🖤

#tw ableism #ableism #tw biphobia #biphobia #softy answers #I have a sorta sad one shot about Kami and his quirks effects #should i post it?

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oc-factoids · 3 years

Note

Bug man back at it again

IGHT Lily and Julia

Let’s start with Lily

She is probably the only one who has an ok ish relationship with her parents? They’re kind of in that gray area of like not bad but not exactly good either and also she left em at age 11 to be a sword lady so she wasn’t that attached🤷‍♀️

So There’s this like training place for young sword people who want to become knights and shit to like go and train and shit It’s like boarding school but medieval and for knights I haven’t thought of an official name for it yet so if you want feel free to throw some suggestions at me

Anyway so lily be vibin and got invited to it because she’s very good and swording and she travels there and she ends up in this place just full of cishet jock dudes (🤢) and has to deal with ✨sexism✨

but she’s still super passionate about swording so she pushes through it (I have a short writing peice just of her dealing with this and then just popping off and holding a guy at sword point cuz she’s a girlboss ❤️)

and also she develops gifted kid syndrome because I have to project that onto someone

Must a characters backstory be fleshed out? Is it not enough for me to project my emotional issues onto a cool lady. She has a heart on her sword hilt. Because I designed her when I was 10 and I kept it because I think it’s cool. Fuck you. She’s a Mary Sue I admit this.

ANYWAY

basically her whole arc is about learning how you can’t be perfect at everything and healing and perfectionism issues and how people can love you in spite your flaws

I low key want to give her a dumb ass hobby like knitting or something like that and I want it to actually be super symbolic. She starts of fucking hating it and hating herself because she’s bad at it. but then slowly learns that you don’t have to be good at something for it to have worth. And so she loves it later. But still sucks at it because that’s the fucking point. But she’s improved a jus lil bit. As a treat❤️

I was gonna do Julia in a separate message but I still have room soooo

Julia was raised in an @bus!v3 household with a shitty mom witch like I have details but i don’t wanna trigger anyone so I’ll leave those out and a dad who genuinely loved her but couldn’t,,didn’t know how to child,, so needless to say shit was Not Good for her at home and she kinda learned to put on this fake “haha no I’m fine :))” mask to survive

the only real relief she got was her granddads house where she got her signature lute and when playing said lute

She like would go out and just wander the town sometimes and try to be forgotten but someone would always recognize her and bring her back so she learned to be really good at simple disguises

She never had the courage to full on run away though, it was more like “maybe if I just sit in the town square and don’t move I’ll waste away and become bones :))” and then her dad would go out looking and she would be like damn not again

Her arc is more about learning what healthy relationships look like and also learning that always being “the happy one” or “the comic relief” doesn’t actually help.Repression is bad kids don’t do it

She’s the chaotic one™️ partially to hide the sadness behind goofy shenanigans and partially because sometimes you just gotta shove 20 marshmallows in to ur mouth. It’s self care. Do not question it.

As for the relationship between the two

The way they met was Julia was pulling one of her “haha I do not exist” shit and practicing her lute meanwhile lily is just out strolling after training finishes and Lilly is like “shit good music bro” and Julia is like “yo thanks bro” and they start meeting up every day and hanging out and there’s a ~connection~ there

I’m constantly switching between love at first sight and slowly and unintentionally falling in love until your up at two am like “FUCK” for the two

Currently Julia is love at first sight and lily is slow but that may as well switch at any moment

So at one point they’re like “I think I love you” “me too” but they can’t be in a relationship because homo of the sexual is illegal (that kinda ties into jaspers arc of like “shit we cause so much pain and suffering”) so they decide to run away together with Julia using her ol bag o disguises to mulan that shit and goes by her last name Charles so everyone thinks she is very straight ™️ and Lily has survival training so together they camp out in the woods hiding from the police robin-hood style with lily pretending to be Charles occasionally when they need to buy food and stuff

The whole thing is about different forms of self love and learning that your worthy of love and self recognition through the other but in a good way and they help each other work through their flaws what not

Sometimes I feel like It’s too trope-y because I’m aro and have no experience of my own in romance so it all just based of my friendships and tv romances sooo

Feel free to criticize any of my writing I want

🐞

Ooh I love them!!! I don't think it's too tropey but that's just me, I think it sounds great!

#🐞 anon #not a prompt #oc stuffs #asks

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popculturebuffet · 4 years

Text

The Three Caballeros Ride Again Review!: And Ladies (Ride of the Three Caballeros)

Saludos Amigos! I’m back with yet another comics review! And we’re back on The Ride of the Three Cablleros! Thanks again to WeirdKev27 for commissioning this retrospective. It’s going to get pricey and I greatly appreciate it. PREVIOUSLY ON RIDE OF THE THREE CABLLEROS

In short.. a bunch of short segments of varying quality, a very thirsty Donald hitting on ladies, the first appearance of Panchito and some very good music. A fun time was had by all. Along with a LOT OF drugs by the Disney Animators. The film wasn’t a huge success, but out of the 6 package films, it was a fan faviorite alongside the Mr. Toad and Ichabod movie, and thus was rereleased quite a bit, as well as being one of the first of this era to end up on VHS due to it’s cult popularity. As for Panchito and Jose they’d get plenty of success overseas, with both getting solo series in their respective home countries, Jose himself having just resumed having comics again this year, and being rightfully massive characters. But despite being a hit with fans across the world.. in the US... they were pretty much shoved in the Disney Vault for a few decades. Jose would show up on the Wonderful World of Disney, in it’s various forms, three times after the Three Caballeros while Panchito just vanished aside from reuses of the Three Caballeros footage. Their careers in the US just sorta vanished for a few decades. But as suddenly as they vanished, our boys returned triumphantly. Naturally being the most used out of the duo, Jose would show up for the first time in decades during Mickey Mouseworks, a show full of new late 90′s produced Mickey Mouse shorts, all but two of which would end up being recycled for the much more popular and well loved House of Mouse, which would feature the triumphant return of the Cabs to animation after so long away. We’ll get to that next time, as just a year before the Cabs had already reunited in the pages of Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories in one of Don Rosa’s best loved tales. The Ride of The Three Caballeros was something Don Rosa had wanted to do since he got the job writing Duck Comics in the first place. As he explained in the back of the complete library edition named after this tale, Uncle Keno isn’t the biggest fan of the Donald Theatrical shorts. Having experienced the Carl Barks comics first, and having built his career around them later, he just wasn’t a fan of the goofier, angrier, less nuanced theatrical short Donald, often feeling like he was an entirely different character from the one he loved. And.. honestly he’s not wrong. Both were built for entirely different kinds of comedy: While both did slapstick, Slapstick, along with standard comedy shenanigans, was the main weapon in Shorts Donald’s comedic arsenal. Barksian Donald, while not immune to slapstick, was more like a well built sitcom character: Multi layered, sympathetic when he needs to be, but still having tons of faults to be exploited for laughs and to play off other characters. As a result while I like Donald in the shorts I do prefer Barks version of him, and the shorts Barks did are usually the best of both worlds, combining Donald’s everyman schtick with his slapstick schtick. Of course later cartoons would pick one or the other or combine both, but I do get his point and at the time he wrote this story the only cartoon show starring Donald was.. Quack Pack.. which I can only imagine his reaction to seeing that train wreck.

But as you can probably guess there was one exception and it was The Three Caballeros. Don genuinely enjoys the beautiful music and the wonderful chemistry the three have. So after a trip to Mexico gave him the perfect setting and the fire in his belly to finally do it, he finally wrote the story. And since they weren’t Barksian characters and hadn’t had any other apperances in decade, Don also took a dive into their comics. Since Jose was more of a fancifial freeloader in his comics, Don decided to ignore this characterization and go with his own based on the film: A latin playboy and lounge singer. And i’m okay with him doing that, as unlike say with Marvel and DC when they destroy a character, Disney characters are both more fluid continuity wise and his is still rooted in a version of the character, and he’s fully accepting and apologetic that some fans hate him for this. Also for some damn reason they redesigned Jose at some point in his Brazil to look like this:

This is far from the dumbest comic book costume change i’ve seen, but it’s certainly one of the most lame, as his original outfit is dapper, stylish and fits the Brazilian version of him well. And it’s not like you CAN’T update the classic Disney characters with modern appearances. Quack Pack, which has somehow come up twice in this review, did so great with Donald and Daisy, giving them new clothes and a haircut in Daisy’s case but both still look great. Same with Goofy for Goof Troop who just wore a dad sweater and bow tie, which puts him in the small but significant club of “Bow Tie Wearing Characters who have defined my life” with Opus the Penguin and the 11th Doctor. You can update a classic character’s’s appearance without coming off like...

Which given Jose’s outfit there is horrifyingly similar, says something. Anyways, Rosa had more use for Panchito’s stories, which had him as a cowboy protecting small towns with the help of his trusty steed Senor Martinez. Rosa loved both aspects and thus used them here, with Martinez getting a makeover to fit Rosa’s style better. Rosa is also the one to popularize Panchito’s last name, having found it on a scrap of research, not realizing the character’s last name was not at all widespread and thus giving him a canon one that has stuck to this day, and sighing in relief when he finally got conformation from another fan this name was indeed something Disney had used after loosing his research scrap. So with the two boys characters set, a plot set up and a whole sequence planned we’ll talk about on the way “The Three Caballeros Ride Again!” was born. How good is it? Well join me under the cut and i’ll tell you.

We open in Mexico, specifically near the Barranca Del Cobre, aka The “Copper Canyon” of the Sierra Madre, a natural land formation simlar to the Grand Canyon that Don Rosa saw during his trip and thought would make a great setting. While larger than the Grand Canyon, Rosa figures in his notes it simply isn’t as popular because it’s more isolated than the Grand Canyon and that, combined with it having trees inside distracting from it’s rugged beauty, makes it much harder to build a tourist industry around. The four are headed to El Divisadero, because this comic is determined to kill me with it’s difficult to spell names apparently, where Huey, Dewey or Louie spouts off for no particular reason about the currently being built Chihuahua El Pacifico Railway. Seriously the boys might as well be the security guard from Wayne’s World in this comic, their role for most of their brief page time is just to set up stuff for later. I mean i’m fine with setting up your setting but there are better ways than just spouting off tons of exposition apropos of nothing.

Donald has driven the boys here for a Woodchuck Jamboree. I did actually look into Jamborees, as before this it only had ever come up in one of my favorite movies of all time, Moonrise Kingdom, and mentioned occasionally in the Ducktales Reboot. Jamboree was first used for a worldwide scouting Jamboree but has gone on to mean a huge gathering of scouts, with the Boy Scouts of America having one every four years, so odds are it’s just a big yearly or quarter yearly thing for the woodchucks. Still it would be nice to see a big gathering like this in the series, especially since several of our cast are involved in them, including the possible power trio of Huey, Violet and Boyd, and Della and Launchpad could easily be slotted into the plot as seen in this season’s premiere.. as could Dewey and Louie if they really want to since according to Frank their members.. they just aren’t nearly as invested as their brother, and thus don’t do Woodchuck stuff unless he drags them into it, as seen with “Day of the Only Child” in the series itself. It does make sense: Dewey doesn’t have the survival instinct or patience for camping, and Louie hates effort, the out doors, and doing things for anything but profit. Scouting is all of that. So the boys have driven all this way for the Mexican Jamboree, as they’ve been carefully raising their tarantula Tara, and the Tarantula Breeding Badge is only given out in Mexico, which is plausible: Different branches of a worldwide organization would have different awards and what not in different countries. And Tarantula’s are also native to mexico so that makes sense.. and I want you to apricate that I’m afraid of spiders, not cartoony ones, for instance, this is adorable.

Galvantula4Life. But real life ones or realistic looking ones? Yeah no fuck that. So I had to go to the Wikipedia entry and see several horrifying looking sizeable spiders for this one tiny fact. Your welcome. Tara ends up on Donald’s face with the boys assuming Donald is sad to see her go instead of you know FUCKING TERRIFIED A GIANT SPIDER IS ON HIS FACE. This gag does not work.. but probably because as I said i’m afraid of spiders and this is my nightmare, you little sociopaths.

The boys however worry about what Donald will do for the weekend as they prepare to board the bus to the Jamboree... why it’s meeting in an out of the way town like this I have no idea, but i’d guess plot convince. They realize he has no friends, which Donald shrugs off, and they REALLY shouldn’t say to his face, but ruminate on it once he leaves to do whatever after vaguely talking about friends he had in the past.

I like this scene even though it annoys me a bit: Ilike it because it does set up how Donald really DOSEN’T have any friends in the comics. It’s part of WHY Rosa was drawn to the Cabs: Their one of the few equal relationships donald’s ever had, people who treat him as a partner, in both sense probably, a friend, a true amigo. As the boys point out Scrooge is a monster to him in the comics, paying him 30 cents an hour which I actually put into an inflation calculator to get an accurate read on how little that was by 2020 standards.. and it’s 3 dollars an hour. Hence why I call him a monster, why that bit hasn’t aged well, and why Rosa REALLY, REALLY should’ve retired it. It dosen’t help reading that knowing Disney largely treated Rosa the same way is cringe inducing at best, if not for any fault of his own. It being cringe inducing for an employer horribly mistreating and underpaying his employees though is his fault, he’s a grown ass man, even in the 90′s this had to be a problem, be better.

And yes i’m being hard on Don Rosa but just like with the comics thing, I simply expect better from the man given just how much respect I have for the guy. His art is gorgeous, his research is immaculate, his knowledge of old films is wonderful and his love for them so infectious i’m tempted to seek the ones he’s mentioned in notes out. He’s a truly wonderful guy and one of my faviorite comic writers.. but I have to treat him fairly like I do ANY of my idols. Just to prove that, I love Grant Morrison, especially his run on New X-Men, but a lot of it hasn’t aged well including some of the language and the entire subplot with Emma manipulating Scott into having an affair when he wasn’t in the best mental place and she knew that and was acting as his therapist, and treating that as a regular affair REALLY doesn’t play well nor should it have. I love Al Ewing, with all my heart and soul, but his run on Ultimates, while having some great worldbuilding and a spectacular cast, ultimately wasn’t very good after the first arc. Not terrible but not good. John Aliison, of Scary Go Round and Giant Days fame, while impressive has had plenty of stories I just didn’t like for various reasons and will probably get into some day and some parts of his stories haven’t aged well. It’s the hard but necessary part of being a critic: You have to be objective and see all the parts of a creator’s creation, not just the ones you like and call them out when they screw up. To me being a fan isn’t about just blindly loving something, it’s about knowing WHY you love it and being willing to call out faults while still thoroughly enjoying the work. There’s a fine line between being blindly loyal to someone, which has created Zach Snyder's awful cult of personality that I hate so much, and being an overly critical shithead and I hope I’m straddling that line.

Back on the scene after that filibuster they point out Gladstone, who himself is a monster to me for how he doesn’t lift a finger to help his nephews or cousin, and constnatly flaunts his luck to Donald, and is a bit more than teasing especially since he tried to, you know, steal your house once boys. That’s canon.. that’s a barks story so it’s canon here. You.. You remember that right? He tried to steal your house. And we will be getting to that one next month, just you wait. Finally the Daisy part that annoys me slightly. The boys being sexist.. was sadly the style at the time this story is set, the 1950′s, and thus plays better for me than it does in Ducktales, as their just little boys and don’t know better. Them assuming Girlfriends aren’t like having friends, while accurate though does bother me a bit, but only because the way this story treats Donald’s relationship is PRETTTTTYYYY bad and this sets that up. But we’ll get to that. Thankfully this foreshadowing of terrors to come is quickly forgotten as we get a GENUINELY great two panels of Donald lamenting his lack of friends. It just works really well, selling his loneliness and how isolated he truly feels without any, which while I have friends I can relate to as I only really hang out with on regularly.

This is what I was talking about. While I will point out Rosa’s flaws.. their truly outweighed but his artistic mastery. In just three panels he really has a truly emotional and heartrending scene, and just that one close up among them is all we need to get the true depths of Donald’s loneliness. I can be hard on the guy, but it’s because he’s one of the best there is, best there was, and best there ever will be and thus I hold him to a high standard. But with that we transition to...

Or rather first his boss at the hotel, whose pissed his headliner has skipped out on him again to woo a lady, and while he plans to fire the guy, only isn’t throttling him because he figures one of his “Senorita’s” boyfriends will do that for him. And while I do like Jose as a playboy i’m not really fond of him trying to have sex with someone in a relationship, as it puts both him and the person he’s having an affair with in a really bad light. It does fit the character, I just don’t have to like it. As for this particular Senorita, it turns out her boyfriend is a notorious Bandito and is thankfully out of town. So yes, Jose is essentially acting out Come A Little Bit Closer by Jay and the Americans.

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Naturally just like the song, said Bad Man returns, Alfonso “Gold Hat” Bedoya, a machete wielding baddie who while understandably pissed about another man making time with his girlfriend, is less understandably about to murder Jose. Though unlike the song, Alfonso’s Lady, rather than help Jose, encourages her boyfriend to murder him and clearly has a fetish for cheating on her boyfriend with various men and watching as he kills him which.. Jesus. This is why while I don’t LIKE the idea of Jose hitting on women in a relationship it does work here, as he’s still not nearly as bad as either of these two, so it evens out. Jose escapes with his umbrella but crashes.. right into the back of Donald’s car. Rosa, Alfonso’s lady, encourages him to murder both of them for funsies, and being a brutal thug, Alfonso obliges and shoots at the car. And since, to quote the duck himself, Donald doesn’t like being killed “Even a little”, he books it out of there.

Alfonso doesn’t peruse them though. He’s on the trail of a treasure hunter who has a map to the lost town of Tayopa, which contains untold silver, but before he can do that he has important buisness to get to.

I fucking love that gag and that Rosa snuck more adult gags in there knowing plenty of Duck Fans, such as myself, are grown men, women and others who can handle this sort of thing, while still slippnig it past the kids.

Donald, once the fear’s worn off a bit, starts to wonder WHY he’s running when he’s not the one who pissed off the guy, and ignores Jose’s good point about the fact Alfonso really dosen’t seem like a guy who sees nuance.. until Donald sees a wanted poster for Alphonoso and keeps driving. He eventually gets far enough away to feel safe.. and confront the guy who got him into this mess.

Now kiss. While sadly, they do not, we do get a lovely warm reunion between old pals. Rosa keeps their past vauge as, correctly, he pointed out in his authors notes that the Cabs movie really had no plot, accurate, so instead just vaguely alluded to Donald having known the two in his pre-daisy and boys past and likely had similar adventures to the movie, but adapted more for Rosa’s barksian universe. Jose explains he often finds himself cash poor and thus hits the road to drum up some money, and Mexico is a great place for that as it has plenty of tourist money.

Though as Jose talks about their past we get the most uncomfortable running gag of the story.

While Donald’s paranoia here is played for laughs.. it just.. isn’t all that funny that Donald’s relationship with Daisy in the Rosa canon is apparently sooooo deeply unhealthy that just HEARING about him having a romantic past before him, as Rosa confirmed this was pre-daisy in his notes, causes Donald to panic and worry she actually somehow heard this. It just isn’t funny.. it speaks of MASSIVE relationship issues and some form of domestic abuse on Rosa!Daisy’s part. It’s stuff like this why there’s only a handful of Donsy relationships I like: Her treating him like shit is reduced to a punchline, instead of being used for character growth. It’s also why I’m deeply dreading covering “Legend of the Three Cablleros” at the end of this retrospective. I just don’t like when Disney media treats Daisy expecting too much of Donald or being hyper jealous of him as hilarious and while I take this more as the story not ageing well rather than barks fault, as since then Domestic Abuse against Males has become a more widely known and talked about issue, it still doesn’t’t make it plesant. It just makes this not entirely his fault. Just like it’s not Stan Lee’s fault this panel is both deeply hilarious and uses a now kinda racist term.

I named an entire youtube channel after that.. we all have our regrets. I also bring it up since currently Harry’s become terrifying villain Kindred... and thus the current big bad of an entire Spider-Man run and the being hopefully bringing one more day into the light and hopefully leading to it’s undoing.. once had a goofy mustache he genuinely referred to a “Fu Manchu Face Fuzz” that for all we know he regrew under the mask.

Donald fondly remembers the old days of being a badass adventuring team and decides, screw it, let’s go show that Gold Hatted Paloka whose boss.. but being Donald ends up driving them into The Copper Canyon instead. Our heroes end up lost in the canyon and , fitting for Donald get shot at. I can only imagine his thoughts right now.

Their mysterious attacker threatens them.. before revealing himself to be Panchito, whose glad to see his friends having mistook them for Alfonso. Turns out HE’S the mysterious treasure hunter Alfonoso was after, to no one’s surprise. We get another deeply unfunny “Daisy’s only a thousand miles away gag” as the boys reminisce and get introduced to Panchito’s horse, Senior Martniez. He also tells the boy about his map.. but how he’s hit a snag as the lost town where the silver, from a silver mine.. is now buried under pounds of volcanic rock, a volcano having erupted. This is artistic license as Don Rosa admits there aren’t any known volcano’s in Mexico, but that they also still haven’t found that missing town, so this was his explanation. All is not lost as Donald’s globetrotting with Scrooge meant he knows his history.. and thus spots an old mission which, at the time, were used by preists as cover for secret mines. Donald naturally bungles his way in and we get the much better running gag of the Cabs thinking Donald did something amazing when he really just wondered into slapstick. They end up down the shaft, with Jose deciding Donald can’t do all the work, and finding a secret entrance under a sanctum sanctorum.. a religious thing I have no idea what it ii s but is clearly where Dr. Strange got the name. Regardless they find some old kegs filled with pure silver. As Panchito puts it:

And he did ideed. In a nice moment that shows off his character, Panchito has no hesitation for sharing the wealth: He wouldn’t of got this far without his friends, and he wont get the Silver cashed in without their help. He also fires off his guns in celebration.. forgetting their in a cave, a gag I genuinely like.

After some off screen loading and hoisting, the boys are slowly on their way out of the canyon, with Donald’s Car and Senor Martinez pulling the cart with the silver together. With some downtime the three talk about what they’ll spend the money on.

About what you’d expect. A big beautiful music venue

For Jose, and a nice ranch to retire at for Panchito. Both despite being wondering souls would love a simple place to call home, in their own personal styles. While they are BIG goals, their also likeable and understandable ones: Jose just wants to stop having to do all these tours and carouse and party and perform at home. Be his own boss, and live his own dreams instead of working for whoever will put up for him. Panchito just wants to retire from being a wondering hero to a peaceful life of farming, an honest reward he well earned. And Donald?

This is easily one of my faviorite moment’s of Rosa’s, one that really cuts to comic donald’s character: Sure he can be lazy, a trickster, hot tempered, and overconfident.. it’s why we love him.. but at the end of the day he genuinely loves those boys and their his first prority and I can see why the reboot took that trait and made it his defining one. They may annoy and frustrate them and he may pull a switch on them, 50′s after all.. but he loves his boys and knows they’ll do great one day and despite his spendthrift ways when given big money.. their all he can think about. Sure Donald probably has his own personal dreams, but instead of going big and retiring he’d probably just take only a small sliver of that money to open a humble hot dog stand or something, so he could have something of his own to provide them, while still giving most of the money to their college. Scrooge is who we all want to be.. Donald is who we are at our core: Flawed people who just want to do our best. It’s why I love the guy so much. The boys rest in the small town of El Divisadero, which like the town we started in is a real place, though both are much smaller, even as of 2000 when Rosa made his visit, so he had to embelish slightly. THey stop at a local watering hole only to find Alphonso. While Jose is naturally worried, Gold Hat has moved on to Panchito and wants to know why he’s here. However Donald thinking quickly says he’s part of their nightclub act, and we get a rousing version of the three cablleros, which when reading this I synched up to the song. I won’t put it here, as it’s too big for tumblr and it really works more as a whole, but needless to say, it’s the highlight of the comic. While Rosa did have doubts about putting a musical number in a comic, and it’s often trickey, he makes it work with the energy, vibrance and number of gags, that compensate for the music not being there. There’s tons of great gags, from Donald getting thrown out window, to the stone faced crowd who only cheers when Alphonso ends the number by whacking the three with one of their own guitars. Alphonso quickly realizes what’s goin on, finds the silver, and then hyjacks the train. The boys take off after him in the car, as Donald triumphantly states “The Three Cablleros Ride Again!”. The three head after Alphonzo, who finds them when trying to release the other cars to increase speed, and then shoots at them. It seems hopeless... until donald gets launched into the air, into a cactus then back into Alphonzo knocking his guns out in a great bit of slapstick. The Conductor, likely not knowing about the others or not carring, detaches the cars though, so our heroes and villian are now sent rocketing through the world’s most dangerous railway. Which, as you’d probably already figured out, is very real and what inspirited rosa to use this setting and thus indeed wind through dangerous mountainsides and over thin cliffs like a real life Donkey Kong Country level. Eduardo still has his machete though and easily beats Jose’s umbrella, but some more Donald slapstick and him apologizing to daisy about the senioritis as he wishes her goodbye seriously GET SOME COUPLE’S COUNSELING IF THAT EXISTS IN THE 50′S. It puls his sombrero down over his head, and with jose’s umbrella top landing on it, carries him off where he ends up in a lazy asshole sheirff’s jail for a gag. The boys however continue going back.. and the railway is unfinished at this time in history and while they save the silver, their fucked. But Donald has a plan, running to the back of the cars to get his car, and while it has trouble starting, Panchito throws some chilie’s in the tank to get it moving again. The boys find the silver.. but when one barrel spills they find out it’s not actual liquid silver.. but quicksilver, which was used for silver refinment. So while i’ts shiny, and toxic so of course Jose sticks his hand in before knowing what it is, it’s worthless. Probably. The boys.. all have a nice laugh over it. I love this moment. Sure the boys lost their dreams.. but like Scrooge, the three belivie theirs always another rainbow. What matters is the journey they had and the reunion that restored their friendship. Donald also muses the boys are smart enough to get their own scholarships anyway, so it’s no big loss.. but he does have to get back to Disvadero as the jamboree ends tonight and Jose agrees as he now needs a job again. The owner balks, understandably since Jose missed a performance to get laid and then disappeared overnight.. but the Hotel Owner is visiting so as long as he can provide a big act he’s good, and while Jose is worried as he already gave them his best, the boys naturally pitch in to be the cablleros once more. After all

So we close on Huey, Dewey and Louie returning, still worrying about donald, when they find him on stage. We then end on a truly heartwarming and great last few panels.

Final Thoughts: What else can I say? This story is beautifully drawn, as usual for Rosa, well paced, fun and really fleshes the Cabs out from the movie. It has a warm, fun adventurous tone and it’s nice to see Donald in the lead since Rosa usually did Scrooge stories and thus Donald was the justifiably surly sidekick instead of the main man> here he’s in the spotlight and gets to show just what he’s made of, while still being the hilarious mess we all know and love. The story honors the original film well, while forging it’s own path and is beautifully built into history. My only real complaints are the nephews being annoying, Alphonso’s somewhat overwrought accent, and of course the daisy gags.. but it’s all HEAVILY outweighed by one of Rosa’s finest hours and easy enough to ignore. Check this out if you can. It’s a classic for a reason.

If you liked this review, you can commission your own by messaging me on here or at my discord technicolormuk#655 for five dollars a comic story or animation episode. Whenever the ride resumes next, we’ll coming on down to the house of mouse to see the boys return to the screen. In the meantime keep an eye on this space for regular Ducktales reviews every Monday, including once this run ends as I intend to start playing catchup, loud house reviews whenever, my tom retrospective that’s returning soon, and my retrospective on the Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, with chapter 2 of that also coming soon. Until then, there’s always another rainbow.

#the three caballeros #jose carioca #panchito pistoles #donald duck #don rosa #ride of the three caballeros #the three caballeros ride again #huey duck #dewey duck #louie duck #daisy duck #mexico #comics #reviews #elmo keep

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straightfacedstrangeness · 3 years

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Not that anyone asked (but seriously I’d LOVE for someone to talk to me about PokeSpe (just no spoilers past vol 13)) but since I made an offhand remark about my Top 5 favorite characters, it occurred to me that I actually DO have approximately 5 top favorite characters, and I’m procrastinating on work, so I’m gonna ramble

**just in case, note that a lot of this will revolve around my childhood experience with gender in a “I’m AFAB (and present-day me still identifies as a cis girl) but I don’t fit in with what media is telling me girls are like” way, a brief childhood feeling of homophobia, and probably general TMI about my opinions and emotions throughout my life, haha

1. Yellow

Okay, so, I was a little kid when Pokemon Adventures started coming out in English, back when manga was released as single-issue monthly comic books instead of complete volumes. So I was rereading the same chapters over and over while anxiously awaiting the rest of the story (and wound up missing a bunch of issues anyway)

I enjoyed the RGB arc, I thought it was fun, but I didn’t LOVE the series until Yellow showed up. At that age my ideal crush was “a cute boy my age who would be nice to me” and Yellow was presented to the reader as a cute boy my age who was sweet and kind and gentle, but also good in a fight, as all shounen protags must be. Extra bonus points because they had just a few physically weak Pokémon and tried to fight battles in a way that minimized damage to their own and the opponent’s Pokémon, which meant they fought in a particularly smart and clever way. And I was considered “smart” for being good at school, so being a SMART cute “boy” my age who would be nice to me, Yellow was PERFECT. I mean, I loved the arc in general because of the clever battles, and the mystery of what had happened to Red, why these people were after Pikachu, why Yellow was so secretive about themself and their mission, etc was really engaging. But also I adored Yellow as a character and partly in a “I wonder if ‘he’ would like me??” kind of way X’D So to my tiny child self who didn’t even know it was possible to like-like someone of the same gender (because I hadn’t read Cardcaptor Sakura yet XD ), the reveal that Yellow was a “girl” was devastating—I had to cross out floating hearts on at least one drawing of us holding hands (scandalous!) and, while kind of stunned and shaken for a while, decided that what I’d felt all along was a deep, intense desire to be friends X’D (which probably wasn’t too far from the truth since I was pre-puberty and later turned out to be asexual)

(Also note that I never got the RGB issue that had the chapter where Red helps a little ‘girl’ capture a Rattata—later proven to be Yellow’s backstory—so the gender reveal really came out of nowhere for me.)

But anyways, I still love Yellow as a character for all the above reasons, without the crush aspects because I’m way older than them now.

Also when I reread the series ten years ago, I finally realized “wait, aside from surprising the reader, there’s no real plot reason for Yellow to pretend to be a ‘boy’ except that Green told ‘her’ to—so why did ‘she’ do it?”...and because at that time I didn’t even know that nonbinary genders existed, I decided it was cus they had low self-esteem and pretending to be a different person gave them courage (the same reading I had for Mulan at the time). These days I’m more inclined to “yeah, I think Yellow’s nonbinary,” but that other interpretation was deeply relatable to me and only made me love Yellow even more.

2. Bill

Bill’s definitely a character I’ve grown to love more as an adult, since I’ve gone from seeing myself as “a protagonist doing cool things” to “a side character just living their life who hopefully gets to do something once in a while.” But as a kid and now, I like him mostly for the slapstick and goofy expressions and the (early chapters Viz translations) outrageous accent X’D My brain desperately craves endorphins and the best way to get em is through a good laugh.

But also, I liked that he was introduced as a goofy character-of-the-week who got into ridiculous trouble and had to be rescued, but then kept being brought back, was slowly built up to be the “smart sidekick who explains things,” and eventually got to the point where he was participating in big battles (the Yellow finale on Cerise Island). I rambled about this in the tags of another post, but I liked that he was a character who was “weak” without being “useless.” As a kid who was good at school, I was obsessed with being good at things and had developed a black-and-white view of the world where either you were “strong/smart” or “weak/stupid” to the point that failing or just being not-so-good at anything was devastating (it still kind of is), because that meant I was actually “weak/stupid” when I was supposed to be “strong/smart.” So it was kind of awesome that this guy who kept getting into trouble and having to be rescued—and didn’t even want to BE part of the final battle—managed to hold his own and get through it and help out instead of being a burden that dragged everyone down. Seriously, he used a MAGIKARP effectively—the Pokémon everyone makes fun of for being “useless” and he used its one attack to save his life!

(Bonus points for all this happening in contrast to my devastating childhood experience of stanning The One Girl Character in every popular shounen series, waiting desperately for her to get to do something in battle, and then her one spotlight episode revolved around her struggling because she was so weak...not only was that actually happening to a boy for once, it was actually happening in a more satisfying/empowering way :’D )

3. Gold

I have extremely specific tastes when it comes to “the dumb shounen/action movie protag,” because as a kid I hated it when the main character was “dumb” because I was “smart” (re: good at school) and people who were “dumb” shouldn’t deserve to be the main character and have all the cool powers and save the world and stuff. As an adult, I hate it when male characters are dumb and/or jerks but it’s treated as fine or even sexy(??) and the other characters fawn over them, and I generally still kind of hate it when characters who are dumb and/or jerks get the big important role when there’s a female character RIGHT THERE who’s more competent (and OF COURSE she has to wind up falling in love with him)

But anyway, I have extremely specific tastes, and Gold is it X’D He’s the perfect combination of “unshakably confident in his own stupid/egotistic views” and “treated as annoying and/or comic relief by the rest of the cast” with a bonus dash of actually being really clever in battle (so my inner child goes “Ah yes, technically, he is ’smart,’ and therefore...worthwhile“) Making me laugh while also impressing me is like the key to my heart.

4. Crystal

I’m too lazy to look it up, but when Viz was publishing Pokemon Adventures as monthly comics, they must have switched to publishing it as trade paperbacks only and/or had a huge gap between the end of Yellow and the start of GSC, because for YEARS I’d thought Yellow was the end of the series and was shocked the first time I saw later volumes. (My dad was buying us the monthly issues at the local comic store, and either they wouldn’t have ordered the trade paperbacks or he wouldn’t have thought to check those shelves.)

Anyway, that’s a long lead-in to the statement of “Crystal would automatically be my #1 or #2 if I’d read her arc as a kid.” She’s a girl, she wears pants, she’s EXTREMELY smart (genius-level “book-smarts” about every Pokémon’s behaviors and weaknesses PLUS being clever in a battle), was tough as nails (she KICKED her Pokéballs!!), had no interest in romance or her appearance, AND had a short arc about losing her confidence and training herself back up to full power. I would have KILLED for a character like that when I was a little girl being told that “girls don’t like action shows like Dragon Ball Z” (but I was a girl and I did???) and that girls were supposed to be pretty and obsessed with fashion and dating, and that girls were never the main character of action series, just side characters who either did nothing or got one chance to do something and were pathetically weak (see above, and/or Sakura’s fight against Ino (Naruto), those couple filler eps where Téa/Anzu played Duel Monsters (Yu-Gi-Oh), Videl getting pummeled by Spopovich (DBZ), etc).

So anyway, she’s awesome, she’s exactly the type of character I would’ve loved as a kid. The only reason she’s behind Gold here is because at my age, “makes me laugh” > “the kind of main character I used to wish I could be”

5. Green (the girl trainer...I’m just too loyal to the Viz version to call her “Blue”...)

I’m trying not to rehash the same “I’m a girl but none of the girls in my shows/comics are like me!” childhood woes over and over, haha, but as much as I always enjoyed Green for being extremely clever and outsmarting the boys and being funny when she did so, she always lost points with me for being “pretty” and flirting to get her way, because that put her in the box of “girls are supposed to be pretty and desired by boys and obsessed with their appearance and romance” that was so foreign and disheartening to me as a kid.

But her staredown with Ho-oh at the end of the GSC arc TOTALLY got me. As a sad adult with anxiety, watching characters who are absolutely terrified overcome their fear, watching characters who are completely beaten down struggle back to their feet and keep fighting, is like my ultimate power fantasy. That sequence genuinely had me in tears.

Also her bond with Silver is super precious, especially since that’s like the first time in the series we’ve seen her be genuinely emotional and vulnerable with someone instead of teasing or manipulating them.

Honorable mention: Sapphire

I haven’t gotten up to R/S in my reread yet, and I only read that arc once over like a weekend ten years ago, but I’m pretty sure she’s gonna be a Top Fave cus again there’s that “I'm not like other girls!” childhood feel (last time I’m saying it, I promise)

It’s a story arc where one protag wants to fight the gyms and the other protag wants to win the beauty contests, but the one who wants to fight the gyms is the girl!! And she’s the typical “dumb but extremely good at fighting” shounen protag but she’s the girl!! She’s feral and illiterate and a total tomboy and wins all her fights and she’s a GIRL!!!!

Anyway, those are my kids and my dude and my probably way-too-personal reasons why. If you wanna reblog, reply, or send an ask about your own faves...please

#pokemon adventures #rambling #crackpotawesomes #spent like an hour and a half on this oops

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mrpenguinpants · 4 years

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Alright, I finally read Reincarnation no Kaben

AFTER MONTHS (it’s probably been a month? My mind doesn’t keep track of the days) I FINALLY CAUGHT UP TO RNK. Ty to Okita anon for the recommendation (*￣3￣)╭💕💕💕 I absolutely loved it.

After this I’ll start on the other recommendation you gave me. I kept a bit of a log of my reading journey under the read more tag.

Major spoilers for literally everything in RNK up to ch 53 “Withdrawal”.

Oh, and I’ll finish answering all my leftover asks and I SHOULD have a fic done by tomorrow. I was so ready to write and then I got up. Now I’m back to bed.

I’m just gonna write this as a log since I read super super slow and I’m only on ch 7 at the start of writing this but I’m really liking it already. Though to be fair. I love everything okita anon recommends haha. I remember you saying you were simping over Kouu and I haven’t gotten to the part where he appears but I wanted to quickly google what he looked like to prepare myself and I see this:

Well. That’s reassuring.

I was actually kinda surprised by how many western figures were in the manga since I know there are only like 7? Around 7 western figures that pop up in any anime/manga but seeing people like Albert Fish was kinda surprising but I really liked it. Also, at the end of certain chapters they write little bio’s on them so you get to know more about them was such a nice touch. I also love that the tradition of making males -> females still stays strong even outside the fate universe hehe.

---

Literally, the next chapter I see him. AHHHHHHHHH. Well maybe not him but his eyeballs.

This guy lowkey reminds me of the MC’s brother but it’s 99% because he has the same long ponytail. I wouldn’t be surprised if the brother was apart of the the Greats. Honestly, Ein reminds me of those really hard headed girls that are actually really kind on the inside but aren’t good at expressing themselves (maybe because that’s pretty much her character). I also like that Ein doesn’t like males but she’s hiding behind this guy. At least, I’m..99% sure this is Ein.

I FUCKING KNEW IT. AS SOON AS I SAW HE GOT A THEIF TALENT I COULD FEEL THE SOLO LEVELING VIBES IN ME. HE CAN STEAL TALENTS I FUCKING KNEW IT!!! I’m surprised that Neumann didn’t say anything and Haito seems to be aware of it.

Edit: Ah okay, I understand a bit now but it almost seems like Haito is the only one aware of Toya’s second talent.

Edit 2: Okay, as much as I love power hungry MC’s I’m really glad they didn’t make Toya into that. I am such a softie for sympathetic and kind MC’s like these even though it’s been done so many times. I’m really glad this didn’t feel like a rehash. I mean, some points some of the stuff Toya says it does but it’s fine, I don’t mind that. I actually gave a crap about him since I usually prefer the side characters (I UNDERSTAND ANON, I CARE ABOUT KOUU SO MUCH AHHHHH) but HAITO?? AHHHHH.

---

I like that Izo always has the same hat in every adaptation he’s in lol. Istg, cats are always op. Schrodinger seems so strong and the parallel universes are my absolute shit. Sometimes I think, in one universe I did this and in this universe I’m not. Would I rather stay in this universe or be in the one where I am actually productive. Usually I pick the productive universe and actually work but sometimes I’m a bit of a slacker haha. I think this is my approach to a lot of things in life. But I digress, I don’t wanna get too deep into my life.

I can sorta sympathize with the sinners. At least the ripper guy to say the least. I love love love unhinged characters that just want to basically destroy the world or at least have fun. But then you find out- wait they are actually sympathetic oh no. That’s how I felt about Djoser in “im the great priest imhotep” (please...i beg...someone read this...I’m so starved).

As much as character development and rooting for the hero is cool and all, I just want to simp for the crazy “let’s burn the world to the ground” kinda character. I’m also so glad Toya doesn’t automatically become evil and try and steal everyone’s talents because he does seem like a good person and I really don’t see him suddenly switching fields so when he saved (I don’t remember names I’m sorry), the undead solider it was really nice. Proves that he still has his humanity and isn’t strictly relying on the branch of sin.

It makes sense that he wants to steal talents since he never had one (and it was kinda out of left field when he killed Vlad and we just never addressed that ever again haha) but to see him actually consider his actions and if he actually want’s to steal his teammates talents feels right to me. Poor guy doesn’t seem to have a lot of friends so this is the first time he’s ever seemed to have companionship, aside from Haito, so I really hope he doesn’t attempt to steal their talents. I think I’m thinking of the slime? That time I got reincarnated as a slime manga/anime. Where he’s the pokemon catcher of skills. I thought that was where it was going.

But I do kinda like how selfish Haito and Toya’s talent stealing relationship is (I mean, later it develops but my first draft of writing this I wasn’t there yet). I’m not sure if selfish or like self-gratitude/pride is the right word but it’s kind of a breath of fresh air. Rather than Haito trying to contain or “help” Toya’s inferiority she’s actually encouraging it and using her own talent for her own...acknowledgement? Er, yeah let’s go with that.

---

This. This interaction. I love this. Like, genuinely love this. We need more of this. Two people from opposite sides finding some common ground and their fight to the death is less about morals or whose on whose side but for themselves. I love that. This is actually some wholesome stuff.

Edit: AHHHHH CATCH MY UGLY CRYING IN THE BACK BECAUSE ALL THE “SINNERS” ARE ACTUALLY AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. IM DEAD. YOU’VE KILLED ME.

---

I KNEW IT! YOU CAN NEVER TRUST THESE KIND OF PEOPLE!! I’m going to slap the whiteboard on this but if I see any “goofy” character I’m immediately sus of them.

As much as I hate that Hitler is getting drawn as a small child I really like this. I know the whole, oh I killed your friends but I’m letting you go because you express humanity but I’m gonna finish my death with a sympathetic line, can be annoying to people but idk I really liked this.

Honestly this and the undead soldiers death hit me hard ngl. This manga might not have my favourite art style during some points compared to like main stream manga but it has some really beautiful scenes.

BOOM CALLED IT, though it’s pretty obvious lol.

THE PONY TAIL NEVER LIES AND HES DA VINCI IT MAKES SENSE NOW

He looks so cute lol. I like that Seiya has the talent of being talented in everything while Toya has the talent to steal other talents. Seiya can probably only cap his power by his own physical/mental abilities with Toya can pull a solo leveling and go further beyond. Thinking of it like jack of trades vs master of none type deals. Though, I might be thinking too hard on this. I like that this man is actually humble but I really wish there was a tiny bit more to him since we only get this one interaction/backstory but the manga isn’t completed yet. I really hope we get to know about Seiya more;; like how he became da vinci or etc.

Everytime I see Neumann I look at that comic sans type and it kills me on the inside. But I love that her eyes are 01 just, mwah perfection. These little details that aren’t that big but it’s soooo nice. I also ahem, unhinged character heart be still. It’s really nice reading manga in bursts because you can see the art progression and damn does she look good.

tiny fang appreciation post.

ngl i’M HARD SIMPING FOR THIS MAN. It’s the pony tail, I have such a thing for guys with long hair (and this is why genshin broke me) but man the art really picked up here.

I didn’t get into it but OKITA ANON I GET IT. KOUU??? AHHHH. WHY DID YOU HAVE TO DIE??? As much as his whole “war” was a bit questionable in the beginning and tbh I still don’t really get it I like that he knows he’s not the same as the other Greats but still tries to help the other “sinners” in a way only he knows. That’s why Seiya was so important;; I get that he wanted them to have a fun death and to be understood but idk, the whole war idea and having them kill each other (especially the Hitler fights because I understand the others since they reached some kind of acknowledgement) but nonetheless, what a great guy.

Nightingale gives me mad masaki vibes from chainsawman. I hate them and I can’t wait for you to fail, but the inner part of my is cheering for you because unhinged characters are my shit. I feel really bad for Neumann, I had suspicions she wasn’t actually like that since it’s sooo out of left field but I’m really glad the manga seems to know what it’s doing. I really wish we got more Kouu interactions with everyone tho.

NOW THIS. THIS IS SOME WHOLESOME STUFF. I WANT THIS. I REALLY WANT SPIN-OFF OF REALLY SAD ANIME/MANGA/STORIES WHERE ALL THE DEAD PEOPLE HANG OUT. That’s how I’m feeling about JJK and the scroll segments or BSD WAN that just came out. IT’S SO WHOLESOME TO SEE EVERYONE NOT TRYING TO KILL EACH OTHER.

UGLY SOBBING IN THE CLUBBB AND KOUU AND CHARLOTTE AHHHH. I hate how this is phrased but the respect I have for Hitler?? YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW HARD THAT IS TO TYPE?? Kitazuka is cool tho, I really like him. Some god given talent. I’m hard simping over him but I really hope we get to know more about him later.

Getting smug mona vibes, I love this.

AHHH IVE NEVER FELT THIS UPSET OVER AN APPLEEEE. I’M ACTUALLY UPSET. IF HE DIES IM ACTUALLY GOING TO CRY MY HEART OUT.

THE FAMOUS SLAP

I’M SORRY WHA- SLENDERMAN?

Oh..wow. Okay, be still my heart. When I first saw her I thought she was really pretty but now I’m absolutely smitten. God damn, can I please have some more crumbs on these characters before they die;;

AHHH SAME GIRL FUCKING SAME????? I adore these small panels and translator notes. It’s a real breather after the sad 3am hours talk these characters go through.

Yagyuu. Jesus christ. WHY ARE ALL THE DEATH SCENES IN THIS MANGA ACTUALLY SO PRETTY AND STABS ME IN THE HEART??? that’s it. goodbye. im fucking out. im actually so upset rn. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO ME?

---

In conclusion, and I should probably re-read what the characters say and not go off on memory because I’m about to get really deep. I really like how they phrased why they wanted to stop the branch of sin. That there are people just like Toya and Haito who, if they never found the branch of sin, could still probably lead respectable and okay lives. That there was a “them” in another universe that didn’t go down that road and that they want to be in the same universe as “them”. I know this sounds really confusing if you haven’t read the manga but going back to what I said about the parallel universe stuff.

There was a universe where Toya and Haito didn’t rely on the branch of sin, that even without their talents from becoming a returner, they could still live a happy life given their own personalities and attitudes. It was kinda moving since in the beginning, Toya wanted a talent so badly and now that he has one. He’s realizing that wait, I don’t need a past life talent in order to live. Honestly, I hard relate to that because I totally agree with him. If you have a talent you can probably live a very happy and comfortable life that other factors wouldn’t matter if you just have that incredible talent. Thinking of it as a painter or artist, if you had actual god-given talent you wouldn’t need to worry about other factors since people would naturally seek that talent. So you end up comparing yourself to others and setting that limit on yourself.

But that’s okay, it’s completely natural and I’m not saying it’s horrible if you do this. Fuck, I do this all the time. I’m not saying the manga is changing my life but it’s kind of refreshing that it get’s talked about since other adaptations of this just make the character super OP. I understand wanting to have that incredible talent, fuck who doesn’t? but you don’t need it in order to live earnestly in the bigger picture sense. Not everything you do has to be productive and honestly, learning to be okay with having fun is nice. Just being okay with who you are right now, even if it isn’t perfect in your eyes, you still have time to build upon yourself and your own talents but doing it for yourself.

But I probably missed the point and I’m going way to deep haha. But I really enjoyed reading this and thank you once again to okita anon for the recommendation^^ I always love everything you send me and I’ll start reading the next one. If anyone else has any recommendations let me know!

#WOW WHAT A FUCKING TRAIN RIDE #AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH #ALRIGHT TIME TO GO CRY MY HEART OUT #JESUS THIS ACTUALLY SO BEAUTIFUL???#PLEAE PLEASE PLEASE READ IT #IK THE BEGINNING MIGHT SEEM A BIT WEIRD WITH SO MUCH INFORMATION THROWN AT YOU BUT DO IT #IT GETS SOOOO GOOD LATER #ITS GETTING SO GOOD RN BUT I NEED TO WAIT FOR UPDATES #OKITA ANON YOU ARE SUCH AN MVP FUCK I LOVE IT #BUT YOURE ALSO KILLING ME #super duper fucking i love you i actually love you mwha #okita anon #lovely anon #anon ask #reincarnation no kaben

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starfiretheninja · 4 years

Text

BBRae- Shaking Off the Dust

This was originally a piece for the BBRae Zine, but that got cancelled. Regardless, I was proud that I got another piece done for these two and still want to bring it into the world. Enjoy!

Despite being part demon, a creature associated with darkness, Raven had a standard sleep schedule. The headaches induced from staying up too late tended to aggravate her powers and often required a longer meditation session to alleviate. On this particular night, however, the trilogy Raven was close to finishing was simply too much of a cliffhanger to leave until morning. Her extended reading session paid off, as the book ended on a surprisingly non-cliché and satisfactory note and she was only suffering from mild thirst.

Nothing a little tea can’t cure, Raven thought as she stood up, stretching her tense legs.

Leaving the quiet of her room, she noticed a dim light down the hall. Shuffling past Beast Boy’s room, she blinked wearily at the light that peeked out from under his door. Only unintelligible mumbling sounded from inside. Raven shrugged, figuring he was up late playing a tough level of Mega Monkey: Apes Rising on his GameDude console again. He hadn’t done that in some time, but old habits die hard.

With that, Raven continued on her way. Having made it to the kitchen and satisfied her parched throat with warm herbal tea, she came back past Beast Boy’s room. This time, she heard a yelp, followed by the crashing of Beast Boy and what sounded like a stack of comic books hitting the floor.

Raven sighed. She couldn’t let that go uninvestigated. At the very least, she felt she had to know if Beast Boy had managed to break a toe tripping over his massive collection of nerdy treasures again.

Opening the door, she spied Beast Boy rubbing his face. Around him were his possessions, pulled from his closet and tossed around the room in what, to her eyes, was a haphazard mess. The garbage can in the corner was stuffed well past the brim with dolls—action figures, as he insisted—that Raven was certain he had had since the Tower was first built. Beast Boy caught sight of her. Surprised, then sheepish, he attempted to stand amidst the scattered pile surrounding him.

“Care to explain what you’re up to on this once peaceful night?” she inquired as he morphed into a hummingbird, flitted over the pile, and returned to his human form right in front of her.

“I’m, uh, cleaning up a bit,” he said, clearing his throat.

“If by ‘cleaning’ you mean ‘purging your room of all of your cherished comics and collectibles’.”

“If you’d like to help, then it would get done quicker. Heck, you could pick it all up with your powers.” He gestured towards the remaining work. Raven didn’t take the bait.

“I’d rather not be partially responsible for the post-cleaning regret you could have.” She took a pointed look at his belongings, as if to emphasize just how much he was suggesting tossing out.

“Aw come on, Raven.” He picked up a random comic by his feet and waved it. “Do you really think I’ll miss Goo Goblins #37? I think I’ve moved on past that one.”

Raven shrugged in slight agreement. The admittedly campy-looking comic was certainly goofy enough to make a seventeen-year-old question if he was engaging in appropriate level material. Still, Beast Boy was always one to cling to childish endeavors.

“If you insist,” is all she could comment. If he was truly ready for such an adjustment, she wouldn’t be the one to stop him.

Grinning satisfactorily, Beast Boy took to scooping up his disheveled comics and setting them in lumps just outside his room. Raven stepped further into his room to allow him through the open door.

“I’ll just set these out here for now. Then I can get them into boxes and maybe even pass them out to some kids at their schools. I know a few Dirty Dan fans who would kill for some of these issues,” Beast Boy thought out loud, already beaming at the thought of making a kid’s day.

“Just as long as their parents don’t object,” Raven snarked, hoping that Dirty Dan wasn’t about a kid who refused to take a bath. The last thing Robin would want was a surge of complaints from parents claiming they were bad influences on the youth.

Watching Beast Boy’s slow progress, Raven’s curiosity got the better of her and she leaned down to investigate what kind of reading Beast Boy had invested himself in for all of these years. There were plenty of brightly colored covers of fictional superhero groups. Why these were written when literal superheroes saved the world was beyond her. Beneath that was a handful of light horror, with cartoonish monsters chasing hapless teenage victims. Perfect for a demographic who hadn’t witnessed literal demons in their lifetime. Next was . . .

Raising it up for a closer look, it dawned on her just what she was holding.

“Wait, is this-?”

“Crud! My bad!” Beast Boy rushed over to carefully take the book from her hands. “This must have been mixed with my Deranged Daredevils collection. I wasn’t going to throw this one out, promise.”

Beast Boy reached over her to place the book on the singular chair in the room. So far, the supposed ‘safe’ pile consisted of childhood classics, Insect Care for Dummies, 1001 Drop Dead Puns, and a few wildlife encyclopedias. The newest addition was gifted to Beast Boy by Raven for his first birthday after the team had formed. Back then, she hardly knew him, but didn’t want to deny him the joy of receiving a gift from someone he always reached out to. So, she decided on something that could either come across as a gag gift or a genuine appeal to his interests, despite her complete uncertainty on whether or not he would appreciate it.

When he ripped open the packaging and read the title, The Essential Calvin and Hobbes, he lit up.

“Oh, cool! I’ve read some of these before! I don’t know half the words that come out of the kid’s mouth, but the tiger is pretty cool! Thanks, Raven.” He gave her a classic toothy smile and Raven was admittedly relieved that he didn’t reject the gift or feel any disappointment.

That was years ago, though. Was he still so attached to that particular book? Raven had given him far more personal gifts since getting to know him on a more familiar level.

“Why is that one an exception?” she posed the question as he squatted next to the pile she was looking through.

“Hmm?” Beast Boy looked back for clarification, and a light bulb went off.

“Oh! That’s easy. Because you gave it to me. You probably knew I wouldn’t get half the jokes, but you took a chance anyway. Maybe I’d get it eventually, you know?” His voice trailed off at that last statement.

There it was. Something truly was nagging at him, then. That something had pushed him to embark on a spontaneous cleaning spree to either distract or remedy. While Beast Boy was, oddly enough, the toughest one on the team for her to read empathetically, he was normally easy to understand by his actions alone. However, she had noticed a pattern with him over the years. He was the best at wearing a mask. Robin attempted to remain stoic, but one could still tell what he was feeling. Beast Boy, on the other hand, played pretend. Concealing aggravation and hurt with a stream of jokes was his fallback. This left him with buried sadness, which was never good for the long-term psyche.

Considering how to approach the situation, Raven supposed prodding him a bit would perhaps bring more clarity as to the cause of his distress.

“Hmm. I figured your vocabulary would expand.”

“When, though?” Beast Boy let slip out. He asked so sullenly, the way that a child would when they were seeking approval. Raven recognized this tone from her time spent with Melvin as she began her early teen years. The girl wanted more independence, but a part of her still sought to know that Raven was proud of her in everything that she did.

Upon realizing his slip-up, Beast Boy’s eyes darted around the room. He nabbed a toy from the pile before him and held it up.

“Does this one bring back memories or what?” he chuckled, beaming a large smile. It was the singing monkey with the cymbals that sounded while Raven’s manifested fear chased the Titans throughout the Tower.

Raven sighed softly. That was a poor diversion and he knew it.

“Beast Boy, why are you doing this?” she queried, gesturing around the room. “This ‘spring cleaning’ is too out of character to come out of nowhere.”

“Can’t a guy want a little more walking room?”

“Not when it involves pretending that nothing’s wrong.”

Raven’s eyes met his. He held contact for mere moments before the façade cracked.

Beast Boy’s false smile slowly dropped. He knew he shouldn’t be hiding from her. Raven was one of his best friends, after all.

“’s not a big deal,” he mumbled, looking away.

“It is if it’s bothering you,” she responded, gently touching his shoulder to get his attention. Beast Boy turned back to her, setting the monkey down.

How would he start?

“It’s kind of complicated.”

Raven had the time for him.

“Then start from the beginning.”

With that, Beast Boy sat back, leaning his cheek on a propped-up knee. Raven lowered herself into a crisscross, fully facing him. He took a few moments to collect his thoughts, memories reflecting clearly in his eyes.

“Back, ah, with the Doom Patrol, I was just a kid when Mento started training me. He saw that my powers could be controlled and used for the greater good. And I wanted to be a hero! I wanted to help others. But I wasn’t used to getting shot at or transforming so much I passed out. It was rough for a while. And I messed up. A lot.

“Mento never let me forget any of the mistakes I made, even long after I learned from them. Sometimes, it took longer than it should have to learn, but I eventually got it. But that wasn’t good enough for him. It was for Rita, but Mento was the one in charge, so there was never an end to it.”

Beast Boy exhaled, stopping for a moment to likely push away memories that were crawling out of unpleasant depths of his subconscious.

“And that’s part of why you left?” Raven prompted.

“That was a big part of it. Just one day decided that I had enough, and I thought I could grow stronger if I became the sidekick of someone who could actually help me build on when I did something right. And when I met you guys, things were finally different, and everyone could rely on me in a fight. That felt good and I thought that maybe I wasn’t a total screw up after all. But today, with the mission I just- I messed up really bad and I knew what I did wrong right as it was happening.”

Oh.

Raven and Starfire had split off from the boys to tend to another emergency and didn’t hear back from them until after their mission was complete. Robin had seemed somewhat frazzled, but otherwise they had been successful as well. She hadn’t heard about any particular difficulties on their end.

Beast Boy continued on, his frustrations spilling out at this point.

“I mean, Robin and Cyborg were able to fix it, but Mumbo almost got away. We had him, but I slipped up and he did a lot more damage before we nabbed him again. That’s the kind of dumb mistake I made when I was just a kid, except back then, people died.” He nearly choked on his last words.

Raven’s thoughtful expression instantly morphed into a mixture between solemnity and shock. She had no idea he carried such a weight.

“Beast Boy . . .”

He let out a humorless laugh, his eyes unfocused and unwilling to meet hers.

“Do you ever just . . . get frustrated that you haven’t changed at all? Sometimes I still feel like the kid that can’t follow an order without screwing something up. I’m trying to get better at my job, but that’s not enough when lives are in danger,” he agonized, reaching up to grip his hair in his fist.

His emotions were beginning to overwhelm him. Beast Boy was so used to holding these demons in that he didn’t know how to handle them when they reared their ugly heads. And he hated himself for dumping his worries on Raven. She didn’t need to be dragged into his problems; he should be able to handle them on his own by now.

However, one fact that Beast Boy forgot was that Raven was a healer. She knew that part of the healing process included recognizing the hurt so one could fully recover.

“Beast Boy, you’re right to feel frustrated over this.” Raven began gently, so as to properly acknowledge his despair. “But you have grown up through the years that I’ve known you.”

“Today might prove you wrong,” he sighed defeatedly.

“One bad day doesn’t always indicate a pattern. Failing to react well under pressure happens to even the most disciplined of people.”

“Does it happen to you?”

Raven blinked. Where did that come from?

“What do you mean?”

“You’re always so in control and know what to do. I just don’t know if I can ever be as level-headed as you are.” Truthfully, though he complained about her supposed standoffishness when they first met, Beast Boy always admired her ability to remain calm. She could be cranky at times, but Raven was the Titan to turn to when you needed sage-like wisdom and a calming presence.

“. . . Not always.”

Beast Boy paused. He met her earnest and somewhat hesitant eyes. Where did that come from?

Raven pressed her lips tightly together, then, ever so slowly, began to speak.

“Sometimes . . . I think that I’m still as much of an isolated shut-in as when the team formed. You guys understand my snark, but I still go too far at times and I can tell the others don’t want to tell me that I hurt their feelings. We all struggle with insecurity, Beast Boy, no matter how well we hide it.”

Beast Boy leaned toward her, resting a hand in the space between them.

“You’ve grown so much though, Raven. I’ve noticed how much more you smile nowadays, and you actually talk to us about what you’re thinking about. I don’t think you would have been caught dead in my room like this when we first met,” he cracked a small smile, realizing just how intimate their situation was.

Raven relaxed, quietly grateful that the Beast Boy she knew was reemerging.

“No, I wouldn’t have.”

Now it was her turn.

“But the same goes for you. You take initiative when it’s called for and frankly, some of your strategies are the reason we make it through rougher battles.”

“Name one time,” Beast Boy held up a finger, still not entirely convinced.

“The initial charge against the Brotherhood. Morphing into a jellyfish to filter Scarecrow’s fear gas. Disabling that bomb as a cockroach so you wouldn’t be detected or incinerated,” Raven listed off confidently.

Beast Boy looked down, pondering her words. His shoulders relaxed and a soft smile slowly crept up onto his cheeks.

“Huh. I guess that was pretty mature of me,” he chuckled.

“You know,” she started, peering her head down to catch his eyes once more. “If you’re so worried about making mistakes, maybe talk to Robin about changing your training routine. Having variety might help your ability to react appropriately to any situation.”

“Yeah. That’d probably be a good place to start.”

“Also,” she began, gesturing to the mess around them. “Growing up doesn’t mean getting rid of your childhood joys. It just means you step up without being asked to.”

“I suppose you’re right. But I’ve been meaning to clean up for a while. Kind of hard to stay focused with so much clutter in your room.”

“Maybe leave it until you get a good night’s sleep,” she suggested.

“Eventually, but first there’s something I want to try.”

“And that would be . . .?”

Beast Boy reached back and grabbed the treasure that had sparked their night of revelations.

“Giving this book a try.” He waved the Calvin and Hobbes compilation before her. “You’ve granted me so much wisdom just now, I must have aged a few decades mentally. That is, if you’re not too tired.”

His hopeful expression was too much to pass up, especially at a time when he had opened up so much to her. It was out of character, but Raven was willing to give it a shot.

“I think I’m up for a little humor.”

Beast Boy mock grabbed his heart.

“Such an anomaly only comes once every other blood moon, so I’ll have to cherish you discovering your sense of humor.”

“The anomaly will pass faster the longer you talk about it.”

“Got it.”

They sat on the floor together, each holding one end of the book. Page by page, Beast Boy laughed outwardly at Calvin’s incessantly precocious dialogue. His eyes lit up as he brushed Raven’s shoulder, giddy to share the joke with her. Raven, in return, chuckled at Hobbes’ playful antics and allowed Beast Boy to see her rare carefree expressions.

What happened next truly made their night. The punchline was perfectly worded and timed for the both of them and they shared a singular moment of genuine laughter. Raven’s only a brief chortle and Beast Boy’s a lengthier guffaw, but the laughter of two friends nonetheless.

Raven could have denied the moment and blamed her increasingly delirious state. But she wasn’t about to deny Beast Boy the rare opportunity to have made her laugh. After all, sharing this moment with him was the best feeling she had all day.

#bbrae #beast boy #raven #teen titans #fanfic #i write

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craveher · 3 years

Note

So we've heard a bunch of sexual stuff so now a bit for the nitty gritty: what things make you happy, besides the unconditional love of your bf of course?

Aw this is cute 💖 I actually have a lot of little things now, things I never thought I’d have because my life is so different than when I was at my worst.

-this one Chinese place where Brendan grew up that has the absolute best vegan options. I literally go crazy for them haha

-my sketchbooks, I go through them all once in a while and I have about 7 now!

-picture of me and my adopted mom on my desk

-our new couch, it’s green velvet and we love it

-pretty much everything in our apartment. No room is really complete yet but we’re slowly filling it up

-my bio dad and family on his side. Now that he’s in my life I feel a lot better about my family. I understand where I get certain traits, physically and emotionally. And having pride in my Puerto Rican heritage is new and interesting to me! we’re all planning a trip to Puerto Rico once quarantine is done and more people are vaccinated

-Taylor Swift, Hozier, Bleachers, Lorde, all some of my favorite musicians I listen to daily. My whole Spotify makes me happy tbh. I make playlists for like everything

-Diet Pepsi. Favorite drink, obsessed and I will never not love going through a drive through and getting one, I think it’s just a childhood thing haha

-Harley Quinn, love the character and collect soooo much harley stuff, it’s slowly filling our office haha.

-snow globes! It’s dorky but I collect snow globes, one day I want to go to the first snow globe store that is being run by the family of the man who invented snow globes ☺️

-clothes, I love expressing my style because I grew up so afraid to. I wore what I thought looked cool (although poorly so I didn’t haha) and not what I liked. I used to have such cute outfits, like this vintage suspended pink striped skirt from the 70s that my great grandma made. But I was too scared to wear it to school, I just wore it at our house.

-I mean Sparty of course but that’s a given, like Brendan is 💖

-video games! My favorites are, Animal crossing, Stardew Valley, Deep Rock Galactic, Skyrim, the Sims, Beholder, lots of random indie games, Etc. I just started Stardew and made my farm cute so I’m happy about that!

-whiskey. Maybe that’s bad but I love good whiskey and a cigar once in a while. Brendan’s dad started it, now we all sit on the porch and smoke and drink together. He’s seriously a great person, I love Brendan’s family.

-movies, I watch soooo many movies. I can’t keep track of all my favorites because there’s so many at this point. Studio Ghibli ones are my go-tos for whatever mood I’m in. I’ve also watched Into the Spiderverse well over 30 times now, I just love the animation, story, and music so much.

-speaking of which, comic books. I read a lot, books in general but also a ton of comic books. Junji Ito, marvel, and DC are my favs but i do occasionally find some online I enjoy too.

-my siblings. I have 11 siblings and I’m close with all but one really. They mean a lot to me and I invite them over when I can but quarantine has been hard so we all have to wait to be vaccinated for them to be able to hang out indoors really.

-I know you mentioned Brendan but I have to really mention him myself. Our first place just to us and hes wonderful. He puts up with all my stupid shit, irrational jealousy and sadness, he just makes it all go away. He encourages me in therapy and helps me eat and he doesn’t expect anything in return. I do give him everything, my whole world. I spoil him endlessly in every way haha. We’ve really changed each other for the better. I met him a few days after my suicide attempt. I was giving up on dating for a while but fuck if I didn’t ignore that entirely when I saw him. I told everyone I was going to talk to him, and he came up first and I asked if he wanted to listen to some music with me and he agreed. It’s our favorite album to listen together now. We’ve been best friends since. I run around the house pantsless and dancing and chasing Sparty and trying to make him laugh in embarrassing and goofy ways and he just smiles and I feel great. Sorry for the rant, but I’ve realized that although I’m struggling with my ED, I genuinely have so much to be happy for and I’m so grateful.

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tfw-no-tennis · 4 years

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mtmte liveblog issue 22

oooh man, its time to feel some EMOTIONS!

I'm BACK after a hiatus, which was due in part to me getting my 1st dose of the covid vaccine! woohoo!

anyways, starting here w/issue 22....we have a great cover w/thunderclash, the legend himself

oof. the covers made me forget how much I don't like the art this issue...I hate to be mean to the artists but this art style just isn't doin it for me chief

god I love this issue though. the framing device of rewind’s movie is so so fantastic

tailgate listing off all his fake awards/accomplishments....ily

rodimus my boy, you're a prime in my heart

the ‘not a decepticon’ label for cyclonus is so much hvbhkjfbskjf

I literally wanna comment on every single panel bc I love all the characters so much but then id be here forever...that being said whirl ily sm

hvbjdfbhsfjhdfshja BRAINSTORM ‘according to perceptor - ships genius’ hvhdkjhbfhjs ily dumb gay idiot

and then the cut to perceptor after brainstorm like, blew up his lab vjbkdsfnbksjf dude

GODDDDDD drift ‘your name...defines you. it’s your soul expressed in syllables. hm? oh, yes, sorry. it’s drift.’ GOD he’s so fucking funny. I love early story hippy drift

god I cant stop thinking about how good this whole issue would be as an animated show...like, specifically rewinds film, it would be SO FUCKING GOOOOOOD mtmte show WHEN

rewiiiiind ;_; I fuckgin love rewind god. fellow video editing enthusiast....

ohhhh rodimus being embarrassed about his big speech at the beginning of mtmte....my boy I love u so much

gjhnbgehjsrkfbjksf magnus being suspicious of rewind oh my god. magnus ily but please, look at the lil guy, he’s a good boy, most of the time

the fuckgin footage that magnus removed hbvhakjbfhskf god. wasn't that intended to be footage of magnus dancing? I love him

minibot squad.....

and here it begins, the mystery stick rung question...

poor rung oh my god he’s just trying to polish his lil spaceship and people r throwing shit at him. taking Ls as per usual it seems

hand grenade tag hvbfjksdnfbkjdf love that callback

noooo rungs ship :(

magnus’s censorship vhbhadkjfhdbhjsakjhfn

oh man I forgot about how they met that race of Transformers But More

the one-upsmanship hbvkajsbehfjks

whirrrrrl lmao I love whirl sm

goddddd whirl just killing that other alien and ending the 16 million yr long civil war bvkjsdbfhjjkafs so fucking much

oh god oh god the ‘are you happy’ page, I'm not emotionally equipped to handle this like, ever

but I will say I feel like it would be EVEN MORE oof if it were milne or someone drawing it bc I feel like this art style takes away from some of the impact bc the expressions aren't really that...expressive? idk how to put it

anyways. every single answer destroys me!!! like even the happy ones, like chromedome and rewind and tailgate - well, in present time, none of those three are doing so hot, so that makes this just hurt

and rung....that is so fucking depressing. jesus. this guy is so fuckng sad, somebody get him a friend stat

and swerve...ouch. this readthru I've really noticed how much early-mtmte swerve is not-so-subtly like, crying out for help bc he’s so alone and shit. jesus

also brainstorms response is just plain ole sad w/context, but at this point in the story without context, it just seems very foreboding lmao. I'm realizing this readthru that brainstorm is very sketchy and ominous in a particular ‘is he evil?’ mad scientist sorta way in early mtmte

and then everyone else is also just so OOF in their own unique sad ways, but I think the worst out of everyone is drift....GODDDDDD. especially considering that at this point in the story, drift is this kinda goofy hippy guy, so seeing him just sit there with his face in his hand, not even answering the question...AND knowing that shortly after this he’ll end up banished...IT FUCKING HURTS M8!

meanwhile, the more upbeat ‘quest to see rungs alt mode’ continues...with an ‘alt mode party’ vhbadkjsdfnabskjf it looks so silly with a bunch of cars just sitting around a table lmao

I cant even tell who everyone is bc they so rarely turn into cars n shit lmaoooooo

rodimus with the bucket on his head hbvhakjbfskjf I CANT

everyone’s reactions to thunderclash...i fucking love it

the fact that TAILGATE doesn't hate him, even though we’ve seen that tailgate tends to dislike people who are universally liked/who have achieved a lot of impressive things

rodimus you petty thot vbdkjbfdjhsakjdf ily

RODIMUS IS SO FUNNYYYYYY ‘I'm not making all these sacrifices and leading these guys into battle and being inspirational - I'm not doing that because it makes me look good’ RODIMUS VBHSKJDFNBKSJF

thunderclash talking about magnus’s article on typefaces....hdbksjfsdbkjgfb bro

AND THEN MAGNUS HUGS HIM....HGBSKJFDSHFKD I CANT

POOR DRIFT bvhajkdfbhjkjsfd rodimus saying he ‘rehabilitated him’ oh my god

the whole spectralism thing...im sorry I cant get over how funny all this is vbakdjfbksjf thunderclash rlly b out here charming rodimus’s entire crew

and then ratchet comes in, calling tc ‘thunders,’ and tc immediately notices ratchets new hands (somehow) hvbkjfhbskjf truly amazing

it cracks me up that rodimus is all 😒😒 at thunderclash, even though as we come to find out, tc really IS That Perfect, and him complimenting rodimus isn't sarcasm at all lmao

AND THEYRE LOOKING FOR THE KNIGHTS OF CYBERTRON TOO HVSDHFJBSHKHDFJS OF COURSE

the vis vitalis being a life support machine spaceship is a really cool concept tho

‘rescuing some orphans from an exploding sun’ I fucking cant

evil guy: [holds a gun to thunderclash’s head]

rodimus: :D finally something doesn't go his way!

he’s so petty I’m..........dkdjhfdabhduifadijgl

and its the aliens from earlier! oooh

GODDD I forgot that swerve used rung in mystery stick mode to SCHWACK the guy

rung casually dropping the fact that the functionists like, experimented on him...there's a lot of implications there, and that'll certainly be explored more later...

the fact that his ID card says ‘rong’ hvbhjakhdsbfakhsjfn

oughufadkfujbsfk the circle of light throwing wrenches n shit at skids...guys cmon vbhsdjkfnslfd

the circle of light is like ‘wtf you all have trauma and a bunch of weird unhealthy coping mechanisms this is wack byeeeee’ lmao

skids calling the lost light his home is rlly sweet tho

cant believe the religious space hippy cult is being so rude about a film made by a guy who died like a week ago. unreal

cd finally figured out how to make the pffft sound, good for him

AUGHHHHH the fact that rewind used ‘little victories’ as the title of the film and that's something that chromedome said in the video ;_; I'm fucking inconsolable

rodimus, despite his obvious posturing for the camera during the whole issue, comes off as surprisingly genuine when he says that he hasn't thought about his own future much, but wants the crew to have a happy ending....im gonna cry

��who knows what's around the corner?’ tailgate, PLEASE don't say that, oh my god,

OUGHHHH GROUP SHOT

OHHH mannnnNNNNN i love this issue SO MUCH. what a good fun emotional rollercoaster wrap-up to mtmte s1. god.

like, this issue has it all - humor, drama, crippling sadness, intrigue, worldbuilding...it’s so excellent

and getting to see rewind again hurts so bad but also I love him

ok quick mtmte s1 retrospective...god s1 is so fucking good. I'm gonna have to read more to say which chunk of mtmte I liked best but s1 is so fucking excellent that it might be my favorite. though its hard to pick bc there's so much good stuff later on too...whatever, the point is s1 is so so good

the plotlines and characters are fucking stellar. like I cant even believe how well Everything works, its very impressive. I cant really think of anything major that made me go ‘yeah could've done without that plotline/character’

I love how dedicated jro is to connecting everything. I've mentioned it before but basically every single moment in the series has payoff - what you initially think is just a funny moment, or a fluffy character establishment bit, ends up ALSO being an important plot point later, in some way

an example would be here w/rung and his alt mode - it just seems like a fun little B-plot for this issue, and seems to pretty neatly conclude with the reveal that rung was eventually classified as an ‘ornament’ (lmao)...but we later on get to see a lot more about this, both here and in the functionist universe

and like, stuff like tailgate’s autobot lessons w/magnus - at first that can be seen as purely character establishment stuff, showing that magnus is a strict rule-lover and tg is a loveable try-hard good boy - but that becomes plot relevant in remain in light, with tailgate saving the day due to his knowledge of the autobot code (and its also character relevant, with magnus’s arc in remain in light).

and I know this is like. a normal regular thing in writing, but I'm just very impressed about how cleanly jro pulls it off, and how many things he’s juggling at once, especially in early mtmte - it’s very ambitious!

and we gotta remember, this is a comic book. I've read a lot of comic books, and the quality is all over the place. a lot of writers bite off more than they can chew, and the story ends up kinda scattered as a result.

another thing I see a lot in franchise writing like this is a lack of strong early character establishing due to the author assuming the readers are at least somewhat familiar with the characters already - which can be totally fair depending on where it is in the continuity, but other times it can come off as lazy

in mtmte, the cast is extremely well fleshed out, and not only that, the cast itself is unique in that there are a lot of relative unknowns (franchise-wise) - which I think was an absolutely brilliant move, because then jro was able to essentially create The Definitive Version of these characters - characters like swerve, brainstorm, chromedome, rewind, tailgate...mtmte is their baseline characterization, because they haven't really appeared in much else

this also allows for deviation from the franchise norms - again, a comic book classic is good writing being stifled by a need to stick to a certain status quo regard the characters, the world, the powers, relationships, etc

(I've mostly read DC comics, and some marvel, so I'm thinking superheroes w/all these comic comparisons)

so mtmte had a good recipe for genuine creativity in that the characters were relative unknowns, the plot was basically ‘space road trip,’ the status quo of ‘autobot vs decepticon war’ had been demolished throughout the entire franchise...so jro was able to take all that and run, and it turned out so fantastic

and luckily it isn't over yet! so many comics suffer from premature cancellation...and sadly mtmte/ll isn't exempt from this, as we’ll see later, but I've seen some awful ones, where comics are forced to wrap up in like 2 issues while in the middle of an arc. yikes.

but another comic staple...one of my least favorite things about comics books in general...something that was basically responsible for driving me away from comics after reading a bunch...the dreaded crossover event

yep, even mtmte isn't immune to this unfortunate plague on the comic industry. crossover events are the absolute worst, and I'm saying this as somebody who adores crossovers (in concept more than execution usually). they SHOULD be my favorite, but unfortunately they p much always completely suck

they're essentially a ploy to get you to read the other ongoing titles, but they usually only serve to bog down whatever story you're reading to the point where you don't even wanna read that one anymore, let alone read all the other ongoings. at least, that’s been my experience

it doesn't help that reading orders tend to be hard to find/keep track of, and that you need to go read the other series to know what's going on. I just hate it, like, I came here to read THIS series, I don't want a bunch of other series showing up too - even if I was reading two series, I wouldn't want them crossed over, because they're separate stories! augh!

I'm totally losing my focus here but my point is...crossover events suck, and mtmte unfortunately is involved in one. I have not read dark cybertron, and I'm not about to. I've heard nothing but bad things so I have no desire to inflict that upon myself

soooo ill be reading through the tfwiki articles for those issues to give myself a better understanding of what went on - which is more than I've ever done in the past - and maybe ill even make a single post summarizing my thoughts on what I read in the wiki, lmao

but yea ill be skipping to the mtmte s2 stuff next

phew ok I'm super tired, my vision keeps blurring out and stuff lmao. its time for bed, I probably have more thoughts but ill save them for later. for now...peace out!

#lj rereads mtmte

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hudsontfreeman · 4 years

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Noticing (or a Case for Seinfeld Living)

It’s really impossible to know definitively, but I’d say I’m about halfway through the fourth or fifth season of the second reboot of my life’s tv show.

This is more of an estimate - I’m not really sure how I’ve been dividing up the seasons. Obviously, the first season was the 3-4 years at the beginning where nobody really knew what was going on and the protagonist was kind of just there. He was arguably, more of a blank canvas for the audience to see themselves through, as the real protagonists (his mom and dad) did all the expository heavy lifting. To be fair, this was just an introduction to the series and audiences were at least impressed enough for it to be renewed.

The formula found its bearings in the second season, as most successful shows tend to do, and stayed more or less on track for ten seasons till adolescence prompted a hard reboot. I can’t stress enough how much the show changed: episodes varied widely week to week, multiple characters were booted, the previously so-called co-protagonists of the show (those rascally parents) occasionally became outright antagonists, etc… It was quite frankly, not that great of a show, and in many ways traded the lack of conflict of its predecessor, with an abundance of conflict rarely resolved. It was not a show anyone was enjoying and the second college reboot was a welcome return to form.

This latest season is not half bad. We’ve got a lot of good series-wide story arcs going. There is a fair amount of midseason conflict, reoccurring characters that are staying relatively fresh (with the exception of Trevor), a decent theme song (it’s currently some experimental jazz from hell), and I’m really feeling like the protagonist is “starting to figure out what his deal is”, so to speak.

It is important to note that the protagonist has “started to figure out what his deal is” many times before this season, so I wouldn’t necessarily trust his judgement, but the confidence is remarkable.

He, at the very least, seems to finally be able to admit that he is not a cool person, which is certainly progress. Naively, though; he is convinced that this admission might very well be the first step to eventually becoming cool.

Most engaged viewers know this is a misstep.

“Life’s not like a movie” might be as useless of a phrase as it is pervasive. The assumption of the phrase implies that everyone is going around living their lives like the main character in a blockbuster comedy - cartoonishly pursuing their dreams, accidentally falling in love, and somehow, repeatedly being surprised when things don’t work out the way they think things should.

This is clearly false. No one thinks like this.

No one thinks everything will work out. No one thinks they’ll get everything they want. No one thinks their life is simple. No one thinks they’ll find the complete answer to the question they’ve been asking all along.

No one is nearly as naive about their existence as we seem to think they are. And I don’t think people watch movies and TV shows because they want these things either.

Sure, maybe there is someone out there who says they want life to be this uncomplicated, straightforward thing, but no one actually believes them. Nearly every person I’ve ever met genuinely believes that they are the true pragmatist. Has anyone ever actually met a consciously sincere idealist? Who wants to be the sucker?

Perhaps I’m generalizing, but I don’t think people watch television or movies, read books, and tell stories because they are innocently convinced of the simplicity of their narrative structure or because they want to vicariously live through that simplicity either. People are not starry-eyed, gullible children, nor do they wish they could be. People reflect their lives through story, not because they make life seem simple, but because these stories make life seem meaningful. I would go as far as to say - they don’t just make life seem meaningful, they remind them that it already is.

My friend Trevor and I believe genuinely, that we are this latest generation’s reincarnation of the 90’s sitcom, Seinfeld. He is George and I am Jerry, respectively. We’ve drawn out many of the parallels over the course of our friendship and I will list them here now:

- Trevor is short and stocky (George), while I am tall(er) and lanky (Jerry).

- My friend, Sam (Kramer) often walks into my house unannounced, hair lopsided, looking to “borrow” things from my kitchen.

- We routinely complain about our lives at various diners/coffee shops loudly and with little sympathy for the people around us. (The plot of the show)

- We improvise neurotic standup routines about the absurdity of mundane life and our own selfishness. (Much like George and Jerry, these routines are more sad than they are funny)

The only thing we’ve failed to find a direct parallel for is Elaine, as perhaps the most unrealistic aspect of the show, was the fantasy of anyone staying good friends with their ex.

All of these specific comparisons aside, I think what Trevor and I really like about this joke, is the idea that the only difference between our lives “in the real world” and our lives as tv characters, is the perspective that comes with observing rather than experiencing. What I mean by that is to say, there is something inherently and beautifully constructive about observing years as seasons, days as episodes, and people as characters. They become features of the life we are actively noticing, not just necessities of the existence we are passively being forced to endure.

As many sad, 90s-sitcom-obsessives like myself know, the significance of the creation of the Seinfeld rested in the catchphrase Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld sold the show on - it’s “a show about nothing.” The idea of it was, if you take a comedian like Seinfeld and put him in a variety of mundane settings, the jokes will come, not from heightening his experiences, but by letting him endlessly interpose his observations on the absurdity of the mundane itself. But I don’t think that’s significant in the way people may think it is.

Yes, George/Jerry/Elaine/Kramer are funny, goofy people with above average neurotic tendencies. Yes, it is a situational comedy written by professional comedy writers, building narratives out of the ways standups get their material. Yes, it broke many mainstream television conventions and historically broke the formula of the sitcom. But I think the most brilliant thing Seinfeld did, is definitively inspire the tacit belief that everything is worth paying attention to. Maybe, it’s worth noticing because its infuriating, or ridiculous, or hilarious, or disturbing, etc… But absolutely everything demands to be noticed.

In the fourth season of Seinfeld (arguably the best and most influential season), George and Jerry begin developing a TV show in much the same way Seinfeld and Larry David did four years prior. Throughout episode after episode, they go back and forth trying to come up with some fresh idea to wow NBC executives. This goes on with some degree of expected laziness and hijinks till George finally has it. Ever the meta-self-referential goldmine, George decides it should be “a show about nothing.” NBC executives are neither wowed nor thrilled, but the pilot get’s made, and all the characters in Seinfeld get remade in the show-within-the-show - “Jerry”. This was genius for two reasons.

It justified itself as a show by explaining its own concept directly to the audience through the show itself. (Perhaps the reason why this season skyrocketed the shows viewership)

It explained how television works, and more importantly, it explained how stories work.

The characters of Seinfeld, much like the characters of any story where the writer takes the time to describe them, are just bizarre people living in our bizarre world. Brought to their logical conclusions, television characters are human beings incapable of not observing the particularities of their existence. They go to the same coffee shops, they hang out with the exact same people, and they can’t stop scrutinizing the smallest detail of, or change, to that reality. Television shows remind us that the details of our existence are interesting.

The characters we surround ourselves with can be the funniest people in the world when we notice why they do what they do. The job we spend thirty to seventy hours a week at can be the weirdest thing in the world when we notice how ridiculous it is. This year can be a not-so great season. Tomorrow can be a particularly great episode. The television show we’re participating in can be surprising and disappointing and funny and sad and predictable and strange, but its a show we choose whether or not to watch - just watch it!

Sometimes, when I have a bad day, I go home, I go to bed, and I narrate out loud, “Hudson was not having a good day.” It almost always helps. Not because it reminds me that I am an insane person and that’s funny, but because it reminds me that I am a character in a movie I am watching, not just playing a role in. I am the protagonist of my own movie, playing a character in other people’s movies, learning how to notice why we’re in a movie at all. Any moment that we don’t realize that, that the story is meaningful, whatever it is, is a moment lost to ourselves.

"Life’s not like a movie” is a pointless phrase that doesn’t mean anything about anyone. We know life is not simple, but we want life to be consequential. Stories tell us it is. So we remind ourselves by telling the stories and listening to the stories and vice versa and on and on till we're dead and death is always a pretty good story too. (Almost always a great tv show or movie)

Life may not be painless or easy, but it is certainly interesting. Movies, television, novels, myths, comics, plays, etc… Those things are at their best when they remind us that the only difference between letting living pass us by and actively choosing to experience existence, is the amount of attention we pay to it. The latest season of the tv show that is my being is sometimes pretty rough, especially when I’m arguing with Trevor about who the main character is, but it is not boring. I can’t ask for much else.

#writing #in this essay i will #essay #personal essay #seinfeld #existentialism #existential humor

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