#I think her arc this season will be about regaining that power and agency - but not in the way she had it before
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On a more important note, SHE LIVES
#SHE LIVES#YESSSSSSS#MEL MEDARDA LIVES#TAKE THAT âMEL IS DEADâ THEORISTS#AND I FUCKING KNEW SHE HAD MAGIC#I NEED TO SEE HER KILLING PEOPLE#(or screaming at them if that's her preference)#OH MY FUCKING GOD#it's super interesting to me how in season 1#Mel was one of most powerful characters#She was rich and she had extremely strong political power#But now in this season#Mel has had that power taken away#By her mother non the less#Plus being kidnapped?????#I think her arc this season will be about regaining that power and agency - but not in the way she had it before#In a new way#Probably tied to her golden powers? Who knows#mel medarda#Mel arcane#Arcane#Arcane spoilers#arcane season 2
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Iâm a chronic lurker here but imo Rafe hasnât changed and Sofia isnât the catalyst for subdued Rafe if you think so youâre very naive? Cus youâre right Rafe is same (ish) but with the removed selective pressures of Ward, Sarah, the Pogues and gold/cross. To claim he's miraculously cured while alluding to him having a mental disorder is very bad then not making any genuine strides to get better a calling it his âredemption arc" is worse. Iâm looking at the Pates. Because life isnât frictionless and he'll always run into obstacles while he's literally burying his head in the sand and surrounding himself with people who don't know anything about his past, it can catch up to him or new issues may arise and BOOM heâs manic. Isolating yourself cus of how triggered you get anytime anyone mentions your crimes isnât healthy. Can he even admit what he's done without deflecting, losing it or excusing it? The showrunners arenât commit to making him the villain or actually doing the work to be better instead just weirdly titter in the middle flirting with both making the character a lil insufferable sorry. But at this point all the characters are insufferable.
His move to reunite with Wheezie and "save" her from Rose with Sarah's help was imo clearly an attempt to regain control of the family again. It was giving Ward cosplay! I see Sofia as an extension of that as Rafe definitely picked a pogue girl instead of a kook girl cus she'd be financially dependant on him. Him telling her to quit her job after proposing (only romantic to a certain demographic no offence) and her telling him she didnât go to college last season; Iâm sorry like I have no faith in him but I think it all clicked for him. He now has his trophy wife who he keeps in the dark. Running off after getting engage and not letting her know were solidified that. Youâre right he is dismissive of her, but heâs not a good person so what do their shippers expect. Sheâs also no Rose as she knew of Wardâs dealing, helped him evade the authorities and did a lot of dirty leg work (remember when she sedated Sarah). I saw her somewhat as an equal despite Ward also being dismissive of her concerns too. Itâs clear when Sofia tryna get him to reconcile with his sister while she doesn't know he shot and tried to drown her, this is no fault of her itâs laughable writing but also serves to show how she donât know him. So anyone who believes that Sofia has somehow changed him is naive. I was so glad she scammed him tho cus she's obviously a smart and nice girl with no clue what she's gotten herself into (I'm not infantilising or removing her agency sheâs obviously oblivious to his dealing and past her Rafe literally admits to not telling her about the bad things hes done, he clearly putting on a facade).Â
In fact I think he's still the same person as S1 and S2 you can see multiple times this season he's on the cusp of losing it or there's something literally bubbling beneath the surface. Seeing him get in that girls face at the party was also hard watch, I'd hope the writers would have him regress just to actually get him help (or kill him off irdc about him sorry) cus there's no way they want me to buy this. I also don't believe for a second that he's sober or not moed to other vices either. It's delusional to think that an ex coke addict that is drinking brown liquor from the bottle multiple times this season is in recovery? But for some reason between S1 and S2 the writers thought it was a good idea to change Rafe's from a coke addict with daddy issues to apparently having untreated mental health issues for "depth". And what did they do with that depth? Apparently it's curable by the power of love, family or friendship. The writers weren't brave enough to actually put him through withdrawals, recovery and therapy. They had his character hit rock bottom and somehow instead of getting him help (or lithium) they decided he'd just transition from a low to high functioning addict due to the power of âloveâ. It's irresponsible and obscene. Iâm also pissed Sarah hugged him cus it felt unearned it was a beautiful moment with great acting but he should have had a moment like in that bedroom with Kie admitting his struggles cus it just seems like Sarah did it to lull him cus heâs done nothing to help them besides the boat to morocco but that was self serving too.
This is way too long actually, sorry.
oh my God. youâre a poet. i canât even add onto this rn but you ate with every word and i have to postâ
#thank you for this ask this is the most raw brutal real take about rafe and sofia possible#i may come back to expand more on parts i really agree with but for now i just wanna share these takes đť#also itâs never too long. i wanna see a full ask with 1/? in it#rafe cameron#rafe obx#sofia obx#sofia outer banks
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How would you like to see Adrien learn the truth? What would the consequences be?
Hi!
I honestly haven't thought about it. I think ideally that Marinette and/or everyone else who is hiding the secret should come clean to him. If it does end up happening, it should be in a way that prioritizes Adrien's perspective first and foremost. So none of this "Marinette having a breakdown about having to keep this a secret and Adrien finding out this way" business (cough cough Strikeback) that this show loves to pull. That would place more focus on Marinette's pain than Adrien's valid hurt, because Adrien would once again put aside his own feelings to comfort her. Marinette should be telling Adrien because she's realized that she shouldn't keep secrets like this from him and that she should respect his autonomy, and she should make that choice with thought and care, not because she's having a breakdown about it and just blurts it out without thinking because she can't take it anymore.
Marinette has the tendency to think she knows best and to make things about herself (not in a malicious way, it doesn't make her a bad person). Like when she confessed to her mistakes in Strikeback, it was less because she was apologizing to Chat Noir and more that she was berating herself. The same thing happened in Kuro Neko, where she was more focused on her failure as Guardian than Chat Noir. And like in Illusion, when Gabriel pulled Adrien out of school and Marinette's first thought was about how she is a curse for Adrien and that she should stay away from him rather than about Adrien himself (again I want to make it clear that this doesn't make her a bad person, it's a realistic flaw). And I don't want any of that here. She and the narrative should focus on Adrien first and foremost. That would be the character development that she needs, to learn to listen to the people around her, and maybe this time it will stick.
I don't want any of this "Lila tells Adrien" business either even though I know that if the show does deal with this, the Lila thing is how it will go down because it would make Adrien's problems all about Marinette once more. And I don't want Adrien's right as a human being to be just another part of the Lila-Marinette feud that is used to cause conflict between them. If Adrien finds out, the focus should be on him.
As for the consequences, I've said before that I think Marinette and Adrien should break up, and I still stand by that. Canon has proved that Marinette and Adrien can't heal and grow if they are around each other. Marinette will just continue making decisions for him because she wants to protect him, and Adrien will just continue to forgive her over and over because he puts his feelings last. I think that growth for Adrien would be to realize that he doesn't need to accept poor treatment from anyone, even if they love him, and that his feelings of hurt matter and deserve to be validated. I think that him wanting space from Marinette and everyone else in his life who lied to him and not forgiving them instantly would be the best way for him to regain control of his agency. Because what they are doing to him honestly isn't something that can be forgiven immediately, not without losing so much trust in them. And their actions are actively preventing Adrien from healing, and I think he needs to leave so that he can heal before he tries to rebuild and heal his relationships. And this is also time which Marinette can spend healing from her traumas so that she and Adrien can mend their relationship.
That's what I think, anyway. In terms of plot, my ideal Season 6 would have Adrien go back in time, beat Gabriel's ass, use his powers of destruction to sever the link between him and his amok thereby making him a real boy, and smashing the Peacock Miraculous to bits. But that's just wishful thinking. The other thing I'm thinking is that it doesn't matter what happens after, because Adrien's arc was ruined the moment he was denied the opportunity to face Gabriel, and that I think it's bad writing that his arc about breaking free of an abusive father is reduced to being a conflict between him and his girlfriend, because Adrien doesn't get to have anything that doesn't involve Marinette in some shape or form, because he doesn't exist as his own character so much as he exists to meet Marinette's needs.
Anyway, I hope that answers your question anon. Thank you for your ask!
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Usagiâs Evolution as a Healer Goddess
The other day I saw a post discussing the evolution of Usagiâs fuku and it occurred to me how Eternal Sailor Moonâs costume was her first Senshi uniform to ditch the tiara.Â
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That in turn led me to consider how that kind of makes Usagi weaker as it removes a very useful weapon for her. After all, if you include the movies, Usagi uses some variant of Moon Tiara Action in practically every season prior to Stars.
However, dwelling more upon it I realized how this tiny change was all too appropriate for Usagiâs character development.
Firstly, by supplanting the Tiara with her Moon planetary symbol, Eternal Sailor Moon more closely resembles both Queen Serenity, her own Princess Serenity form and her future self as Neo-Queen Serenity.Â
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Since all three are objectively more powerful than Usagi typically is as Sailor Moon I think the change emphasises how she has âlevelled upâ in her Eternal form. When combined with the angel wings, Eternal Sailor Moon shifts Usagi visually closer to her future self as NQS, which in the anime is implied to be her most powerful incarnation.* It is almost as though the visual was communicating that the Divine Miracle Magic that sheâd previously drawn upon as Princess Serenity in Classic-SuperS had now become ingrained in her standard Senshi form and thus was more accessible to her.Â
It was in thinking of her previous efforts as Princess Serenity that I inevitably recalled her duel with Metalia/Beryl in episode 46 and realized that Eternal Sailor Moon was the first time since Classic that Usagiâs default attack was a healing technique not a destructive one.Â
Moon Healing Escalation was Usagiâs first healing technique but until Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss (and itâs later upgrade, Silver Moon Crystal Power Kiss) it was also her only healing technique.Â
Between regaining healing techniques and ditching her tiara/other destructive attacks/weapons, I think this represents her subtle growth in both her power and status. After all, it is a sad fact of life that it is easier to destroy something rather than fix it, thereby making the latter far more impressive.**
This skewing towards healing power rather than destructive power is also (arguably)Â thematically appropriate given the nature of Sailor Moon as a female power fantasy as (rightly or wrongly) the act of healing is typically coded as feminine.Â
We can even take this further by examining things from the âopposite directionâ as it were.
Consider that in the climactic final episodes of Sailor Stars, Eternal Sailor Moonâs healing technique actually fails her when used against Galaxia. In later episodes, upon adopting her Princess Serenity form (complete with larger and more obviously angelic wings), she uses a sword to duel Galaxia.
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Obviously a sword is, at least predominantly, an offensive weapon and can therefore be viewed as symbolic of aggression; letâs leave any Freudian or gendered interpretations alone for today. Her use of the sword is highly uncharacteristic (in the anime). Even her explicitly offencive weapons (like the Cutie Moon Rod or Spiral Moon Heart Rod) werenât as clearly aggressive nor obviously violent. Desperate times calling for desperate measures? Perhaps, but we might also speculate it was her subconsciously reacting to grief. Not only can grief make you act in ways you wouldnât normally, but a sword after all was a weapon wielded by her lover in his Prince Endymion incarnation. Her lover whom Usagi had just learned Galaxia had murdered. In other words, amidst her grief she reacts by going too hard in the other direction after healing her enemy proves ineffective.
However, when all is said and done the sword fails her.*** Ultimately is simply escalates the conflict by prompting Galaxia to become Chaos Galaxia and thereby make Usagiâs chances of victory all the slimmer. If we wished to stretch things, you could perhaps say that this is a commentary about how war and violence ultimately begets yet more war and violence.
Even if that is an over extrapolation though, it still served to emphasis the point that a sword is not befitting of Usagi, that she was doomed to lose if she continued to battle with destroying her enemy as the end goal.
In fact, her road to real victory begins when she not doesnât attack Galaxia but makes it easier for herself to be attacked. In the end, Usagi doesnât confront her most powerful enemy as the God-Queen of the future, the demi-goddess Princess of the distant past, the sailor-suited soldier of love and justice in the present, nor even a humble school girl.
She does it by literally stripping herself of all those things, of stripping herself of everything in fact.
Her weapons? Gone.
Her other items, like her Tiare? Gone.
Her comrades? Gone, and theyâd be powerless against Galaxia anyway.
And finally, even her clothes? Gone!
Beyond the Silver Crystal (an outward visualization of her heart/soul) and the angel wings (symbolic of her role as a saviour) she is completely (but tastefully) naked.
Usagi visually and quite literally is more vulnerable  than sheâs ever been, even more so than on her first night as Sailor Moon.
And yet this is Usagi at her actual most powerful.
It is her distilled to her absolute essence as a person, all other trappings removed. Sheâd just one person showing another they will categorically not harm them, that they bear them no malice and they have nothing to hide. That openness and compassion is what ultimately enables her to connect to the good within Galaxia and pull her away from the darkness that had corrupted her.
Usagi in this moment completely fulfilled her character arc.
¡      In the Dark Kingdom arc Usagi destroys (or seals away depending upon your POV) Beryl/Metalia.
¡      In the Hell Tree arc, Usagi resolves the over all plot via a healing technique (although it is functionally similar to a destructive attack). However, that only happens because the Hell Tree both instructs Usagi to do that and because it lets her. It is the equivalent of a sickly doctor instructing a nurse on what to do to make them better. The nurse might have the power but their agency as a healer is limited.
¡      In the Black Moon arc, Usagi, with help, destroys Wiseman/Death Phantom.Â
¡      In the Death Busters arc, Usagi does save Hotaru and âpurifyâ her. However, like the Hell Tree, that was something Hotaru wanted. Additionally, her purification functioned as a way to heal the body of someone sick and who wanted to sacrifice themselves, not someone actually evil. The evil in question was Pharaoh 90 and it is presumed that Usagi destroyed him (although it mightâve been Hotaru or the pair of them together).Â
¡      Forgive me for skipping the Dead Moon Circus arc as Chibiusa is the real protagonist there, and Usagiâs role is chiefly as a rescuer. It therefore doesnât really apply, although the Nehelenia mini-arc from Stars is a different story. There, Usagi was a healer again, but she did it with the help of her loved ones and with the aid of her Tiare device. Nevertheless, we can see by this point Usagiâs capacity as a healer heroine had been gradually growing until we get to the battle with Galaxia.
By the end of series, Usagi has successfully healed Galaxia and it is neither with the aid of her comrades, nor with the power of a weapon or device, nor with any instructions from her âpatientâ or any other third party.
Additionally, Galaxia (unlike Hotaru) wasnât someoneâs who was saved from a noble self-sacrifice or had a physical ailment that needs to be addressed. In Galaxiaâs case, her very soul had lost itâs way and become corrupted. She had lost who she was supposed to be and her purpose in life had been perverted.****
When combined with how powerful Galaxia always was, how Chaos and the Star Seeds empowered her further, Usagiâs victory here cannot be understated.
Her âpatientâ was more powerful than all her other adversaries, was in need of more healing than her other âpatientsâ and was more resistant to being healed. Not to mention, since sheâd directly murdered her beloved friends (and indirectly aborted her future daughter), Usagi wouldâve been forgiven for not even trying to salvage GalaxiaÂ
And yet, with no weapons, no backup and just the power of her heart and soul basically, Usagi succeeded.Â
After Stars the idea that Usagi could heal the entire planet after a global catastrophe and reshape it into a fairy tale crystalline utopia was all too believable.
Whatâs healing one planet when her ability to empathise had already healed a whole galaxy?
Who needs a tiara to reduce evil to dust when you can simply convince evil to be good?
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*This is arguably symbolized by baby Hotaruâs vision of NQS transforming into Eternal Sailor Moon in episode 1 of Stars.
In fact, we might argue that a low-key subplot running through all of Stars (both the Nehelenia and Galaxia portions of it) is gradually transitioning Usagi closer to the person she is destined to become as Neo-Queen Serenity, hence why the first episode features the most explicit reference to her fate as Queen since R.Â
**Personally I am an atheist, but nevertheless I and others like me can grasp why  deities in most major religions through history werenât simply capable of mass scale destruction, but also of essentially manipulating reality to create  things too.
By that same token, itâs little surprise that perhaps the widest spread religious figure in history was Jesus Christ who rarely (if ever) engaged in aggression or destructive acts, predominantly employing divine healing powers.
I suspect the attraction of such figures to human beings lies in the fact that on some level we know that, given the right time and resources, we mere mortals would be capable of destroying anything. Given time itâs all but certain we will develop the technology to even destroy planetary bodies. On the flipside, I think we also intuitively grasp that  reversing  such damage, of reattaching a limb, of stanching bleeding, etc, is far more difficult if not impossible. Hence we attributed the ability to do such things to larger than life Divine Entities.
*** Now that I think of it, itâs also poignant that Usagi tries and fails to defeat Galaxia with a sword when we take Sailor Uranus into consideration.Â
Uranus is of course associated with her weapon, the Space Sword and, like Usagi, tried and failed to use such a weapon against Galaxia.
![Tumblr media](https://64.media.tumblr.com/4dde473d7dc3c0ad346ce87160361c24/248dcfd5631dabd7-e1/s540x810/5c5f3e763e0bed34761ac9285b0ac192f810e2dc.jpg)
Giving Uranus a sword is symbolically appropriate given her role as the leader of the more aggressive branch of the Sailor Team. Having her fail against Galaxia and Usagi consequently fail by in some way âmimicking her tacticsâ is equally symbolically appropriate. Not only because of their ideological conflict in Sailor Moon S but also their tensions in Sailor Stars itself. In both situations Usagiâs more open, less aggressive, ideology was ultimately proven correct.Â
Thus in using a sword against Galaxia it represented how Usagi was always doomed to fail by taking the aggressive/destructive route and how she was arguably not being true to herself in that moment.Â
****Itâs not to dissimilar to Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker now that I think about it.Â
#My Essays#Sailor Moon#bishojo senshi sailor moon#pretty guardian sailor moon#pretty soldier sailor moon#usagi tsukino#tsukino usagi#princess serenity#neo queen serenity#Neo-Queen Serenity#eternal sailor moon#Sailor Galaxia#Galaxia#queen nehelenia#nehelenia#Sailor Uranus#tenou haruka#HARUKA TENOH#Queen Beryl#Dark Kingdom#Hell Tree#Wiseman#Death Phantom#pharaoh 90#Sailor Saturn#hotaru tomoe#professor tomoe#Queen Serenity#Darth Vader#Anakin Skywalker
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Hey talk to me about your top three favourite kdrama women. What makes them special? What's a fic you would like to write about any one of them?
Mystery anon! :D What a lovely ask.Â
Iâm going to cheat a bit and divide my answer into characters I loved a lot, but do not want to write fic about, because I think the canon gives me what I need; and characters that I loved a lot but NEED TO BE RESCUED ZOMG. (My fic writing impulses are 50% spite and 50% fix-it )
Caveat being that Iâve still watched only maybe a dozen kdramas, so Iâm pretty limited in my knowledge!
Characters that I love a lot, but have very zero fic impulses toward:
Han Yeo-jin from Stranger/Secret Forest: What a delight! What an iconique character! Is there anyone like her? NO. LSY-nim gives us a delightfully complex character, and Bae Doona knocks it out of the park in every single scene, so Iâm just happy to be along for the ride. I think what makes Yeo-jin special for me is the intrinsic place of empathy that she operates from. I think ârighteousâ is a word that often comes with negative connotations (self-righteous, for eg), but I do think sheâs one of the most righteous-in-the-good-way characters Iâve watched in kdrama or any drama. Iâm tired of stories that portray goodness as âboringâ , as unworthy of narrative breadth or depth, and I love that Han Yeo-jin comes to us like a breath of fresh air in our particular dystopian narratives hellscape. Sheâs good, but never naive. Sheâs righteous but never cruel in her moral certainties. I think that LSY nim, in the second season especially, gave Yeo-jin the kind of arc that character deserved when sheâs forced to really dig deep into herself to figure out how sheâs going to live in the world in the face of a deeply cutting, deeply personal disillusionment, and Iâm really hoping for an S3 to see how that plays out further.Â
Goo Hae-ryung from Rookie Historian: Ok, I will admit this may be rose tinted glasses view due to this show being my gateway drug into kdrama, but câmon! Sheâs a reader! and a Thinker! And loves her wine! Sheâs plucky! Sheâs cute! Sheâs got a wry sense of humour! Sheâs got principles! Sheâs got a solid common sense to her that somehow doesnât get in the way of her dreaming BIG! Oh dear, doesnât she sound like the Mary-est of Mary Sues? Good for her.gif, I say! Anyways, Shin Se-kyung is unutterably charming in this (AS IN EVERY SHOW OMG GIRL) and I just have a huge fondness for free-spirited heroines who get to tramp through the narrative changing the world as they do!Â
Lee Ji-an from My Ahjussi: Iâve never had my heart broken more OR restored by any single character. IU is *phenomenal * in this, I think she really stepped up to what the script demanded from her. Ji-anâs weariness, her fear and vulnerability, her prickliness, her anger and her bitterness, and how, despite everything, she fights : GOD. Just. Again, what I love about the writing in this show is that itâs deeply empathetic without being cloyingly sentimental. I think a less, hmm, imaginative writer/PD might have focused on the Lee Ji-an the victim, and while the show definitely tells you in no uncertain terms that she is one, of both circumstances and a cruel society, I think it refuses to take away her agency over her own life.(Lee Ji-an when we meet her is too busy hanging onto life by tooth and claw to indulge in self-pity, but we also see the toll it takes on her not to be able to say âthis is too heavy a burden for me to carry myself and it isnât my faultâ; the show I think approaches Dong-hoon from the opposite side- his emotional isolation is partly a result of his own choices, but he doesnât see it yet, and so his journey is also about letting people in and sharing the burden, but also recovering his own agency over his life. Itâs an interestingly gender-bent arc, which is one of the things I love about this show. )
Ok, can I please add one more?
Hwang Han-joo from Melo is my Nature: She just felt SO real to me. Sheâs someone who doesnât have the spectacular brilliance of either Jin-joo or Eun-jung, and struggles with accepting her limitations but not allowing herself to be defeated by them? I love her struggles as a mother, as a working woman in a sexist industry, a woman whoâs perhaps having to rethink and reimagine what she wants from romance. I love that sheâs a little silly, a lot kind, and an optimist, and just. I just think sheâs the bravest of the three, tbh, and I LOVE HER AND I WOULD WATCH A SPIN OFF ABOUT JUST HER (i shouldnât have faves among the three i know, BUT I DO, ITâS HER, ITâS HER.)
Ok! On to the next section! And Iâm going to cheat again because I canât stop at three. SORRY. NOT SORRY.Â
Characters I love and SHOULD write fic for if I werenât such a tired and lazy bunny:Â Â
Song Sa-hui from Rookie Historian: Oh, girl, girl, GIRL. I love how she fights to snatch her freedom from the jaws of the patriarchy. I love that she unapologetically centers herself while doing that, because she knows that nobody else will. I love that sheâs prickly and calculating. I love that sheâs smart and knowledgeable. I am SO HAPPY that she got to carve out a little bit of freedom for herself, even if it also is exile to some degree. She *should * be Emperor Jinâs Prime Minister and steering the ship of state, while also carrying on a tumultous affair with Queen Min Woo-hee, while ALSO commiserating with Emperor Jin about his boyfriend Historian Min Woo-wonâs regrettable tendency towards Principles (TM) and masochism-but-not-in-the-fun-way. (This takes up much of his time which is why Song Sa-hui is running the country, of course. It works out well for all concerned, well, except her dad, of course.)
Song Ga-gyeong from Search:WWW: Whatâs NOT to love about our brilliant, beautiful, emotionally tortured gay icon? Nothing, absolutely nothing. I loved how the show allowed her to be flawed and make bad decisions, and then allowed her to make better decisions and regain control of her life. What I do need to do, of course, is see the CANON LOVE STORY between her and Cha Hyeon through to the end. It must, of course, include at least one baseball game, a lot of tequila and messy beach kisses.Â
Oh Ji-hwa from Beyond Evil: Oh boy, this yearâs runaway hit cleared the extremely low bar for standard crime/ thriller shows by leaving more than one of its female characters breathing and with all limbs intact, and got called feminist for it BUT it didnât do justice to any of them in any meaningful way and that never hurt more than in the way they sidelined Kim Shin-rokâs talent by not giving Oh Ji-hwa anything much to do. Sheâs a tough as nails cop, a loving sister, a devoted but unsentimental friend-and by rights SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE HEROINE OF THIS SHOW. My secret fic fantasy is to rewrite the show entirely by making her , and the two other female characters in non-antagonist roles- Yoo Jae-yi and Im Sun-nyeo- as the central characters, as they investigate a serial killer who targets women.  Itâs the only acceptable version of this done-to-death (ha!) genre, I have no idea what the Baeksang jury and tumblr fandom is smoking when they hype the show so much, I want none of it.Â
Jung Sun-ah from The Devil Judge: I love her rage, her spite, her passionate defense of women, her style, her sexiness, her rage, her rage, her brilliance, her tenaciousness, her smartness, her clothes, her refusal to hate herself for everything she is and chooses to be, her ambition, her comfort wielding power, her EVERYTHING. Dead, her? NOT IF I HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT. Hereâs what *really * happened at the end of canon- she gets out of the building by planting that lady-like but still deadly gun against Kang Yo-hanâs temple and making him lead her through his own âsecret escape routeâ or whatever the fuck it was the show wanted us to believe. From there on out, itâs all sunshine and beaches, and scheming and waiting for the right moment to strike again-though of course, this time around, she also has to reckon with vigilant, tenacious cop Soo-hyun -another character who REALLY didnât die for manpain reasons and had the good sense to leave her gay best friend to follow his psychopath boyfriend to Switzerland or wherever it is that star crossed lovers in kdrama land meet up on the regs these days- anyways, Soo-hyun and her are in this catch-me-if-you-can epic transnational honest and cute cop-and-beautiful sexy villain chase and yes, they WILL kiss (and more) AND IT WILL BE GLORIOUS.Â
*whew *
Thanks for coming to my TEDTalk.
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Castlevania kinda had a pacing problem
spoilers for all of Netflixâs Castlevania. I havenât seen much analysis for the show on tumblr, im honestly curious if discussions I had with irl friends mirror what fandom talks about
tldr: Castlevania seems inconsistently paced from season to season, and within season as well, leads to a lot of characters motivations feeling unclear so characters repeatedly explain why they are doing something while theyâre doing it
overview of the seasons:
S1 I know somewhat of a test for Netflix but it has good main trio character establishment and sets the scale of the conflict
s2: pretty complete emotional arc for most characters and resolves the plot of killing Dracula while setting up additional characters to continue the story. Isaac, Hector, Carmilla all established with the audience as characters whose story would continue
honestly I would bet this is the most popular season
S3: s2 did a bit of worldbuilding, but this season really fleshed out the world with both a wide range of locations and exploring the question of âwhat now, Dracula is dead but vampires and night creatures remainâ.
There were basically 4 plot threads: 1) Sypha/Trevor investigating the cult & Saint Germain; 2) Hector & Carmilla (also introducing Lenore, Striga, Morana); 3) Isaacâs journey of revenge & self discovery; 4) Alucard sits around the castle and is betrayed.
overall characters roughly feel like they are in the same place if not worse. A big criticism I saw at the time, which hold up after rewatching this before s4 is nothing felt resolved for the main characters
I would say this season is where the pacing issues start to become apparent, juggling 4 plot threads that lack a central theme or even mutual character connection. If there was a central theme it would be âhumans are awful to each otherâ. The Judge doing Hot Fuzz style murders, The Wizard in the tower, Sumi & Taka
S4: it starts with the same 4 plot threads, though upfront it is made clear that the plot theme is âpeople are trying to resurrect Draculaâ, and the progression of the plot works to resolve unrelated plot threads until the main trio reunites for the boss fights. To me and my friends watching it was obvious that the show would reunite the main trio, the question was how and how far into the run time.
Season 4 is why Iâm writing this essay, for the past 2 days Iâve been like, yeah that character sure explained their motives repeatedly maybe with some philosophical discussion, but itâs just such a weird place considering where they were in s3
Alucardâs arc:
Where he was left in season 3, it was after killing people he had trusted in self defense and impaling their corpses. It was clearly meant to parallel Draculaâs dislike of humanity. However overall his character lacked a proactive motivating force.
Honestly the most interesting thing I found in s3 was Alucard clearly misses Sypha and Trevor, however they donât miss him or refer to him
One reason Sumi & Taka betray Alucard is for the secrets and power of Castlevania. After inviting the village including St Germain who Alucard was warned of into the Castle, Alucard makes 0 effort to secure anything, not even his personal childhood room. Guess he really learned nothing
Discussing St Germain, I think itâs funny that they had a several minute flashback sequence for his lost girlfriend (who doesnât have a name or a voice actor), to remind the viewer of who he is, and to justify how heâs suddenly back and down for murder.
In s4 there is the call to help the village, and the walk back to the castle is a montage of Alucard opening up to Greta and becoming friendly literally overnight. He laughs off the impaling, and basically all of the darker things he went through in season 3, which has me asking what was the point of his season 3 arc then?Â
Honestly writing this I realize the biggest parallel he has with Dracula is the call to action from a bold woman with a dramatic entrance speech which then leads to a romance
Isaacâs arc:
in s3, with all the other themes of âhumanity sucksâ I was always unsure if the townspeople were meant to appear irrational while attacking a larger force instead of letting him pass through an leave, or him not caring about how heâs provoking them is meant to show his insanity
ive seen the discussion elsewhere, curious about the Discourse here
is s4 Isaac has the whole monologue about how he now has agency but him gaining that agency was his s3 arc. In s4 heâs already at the point of accepting it. By the end of s4 heâs one of those who comes the furthest from his first character appearance to his last.
s4e5 where of Isaac attacking Carmilla in Isaacâs 2nd appearance had him resolving like 4 plot threads at once (Carmilla, Striga& Morana, Hector, and Isaac himself).
but i do wonder if Trevor, Sypha, or Alucard even know any of these people exist. I think not
I was honestly confused if I missed a scene from his dialogue about building something and what is inherent nature, to âMy plan has evolved, my plan is now conquestâ because he only conquests the one castle and the rest is left unclear
Upon rewatch the connection there is âkilling [the wizard] felt just ... I liked that feelingâ, so the show says that Isaac in the end attacked Carmilla for the sake of justice and not revenge.
Isaac in his last conversation expresses the theme of s4 âbuild something new on these old bones, where people can live for the futureâ
however, his arc honestly feel scenes were cut, and then dialogue was written around it. Heâs the only living character who doesnât show up in the epilogue and the sentient night creature âwhat if I could empty hellâ dialogue was some of the most interesting worldbuilding. Night creatures with sentience and possibility of regaining memories!!!!
The Council of Sisters & Hectorâs arc:
oh Iâve already seen s4 discourse about Lenore/Hector while searching for character analysis, a chunk of it seems to be rationalizing the absolute difference between how s3 ended with these characters and s4. It was extremely confusing for me and my friends; wondering if 1) was Hector showing more emotional intelligence than before and putting on a facade to cover up hatred? Nope 2) did more time pass than 6 weeks for there to be some kind stockholm syndrome? No, Hector seems fine to let Lenore kill herself
The slave control ring: played up in the climax of s3 and easily solved s4. s3 Lenore says if he tries to harm them, flee, or take it off it would cause crippling pain, in s4 Hector just easily cuts off his own finger.
for a control ring that they take time to show a version being on the Rebus, it doesnât do much controlling of Hector
also guess the definition of âdo harmâ just refers to direct action
Lenore in s4: has no purpose in conquest, has that useless remarked on by multiple characters, is imprisoned, then kills herself after a genre aware philosophical discussion. This essay is long enough, but what the fuck happened to this character who ended s3 clearly physically and sexually abusive? Seriously this was one of the biggest writing changes to the point where she was treating Hector as an equal. Compare her last words in s3 âshh the real people [vampires] are talkingâ. The change in the relationship is actually something I would have taken being shown, or atleast told of what exactly caused this change other than the vague âyou adopted himâ
Striga&Morana get the best arc of the Council. 3 scenes: the tent argument, Daybreak armor fight & argument resolution, declaration of feelings and turning away. You could argue Castlevania is plot to be connective tissue between fight scenes, but for all the dialogue about human resistance in different seasons it was nice to see it. Overall the scenes were short but had a lot of showing what their relationship is not just telling,
unlike Carmilla. For as much hyping up as they did with her, and as much power as she had, she only appeared in 2 episodes and no other group except Isaac knew about her military conquest.
the map scene where she states her motive for conquest of wanting to take things from old men is the key example of how characterization became tell not show. How interesting was that monologue compared to the past seasons flashback to her murmuring the old vampire lord, or all her repeated insults of men/man-children that shows how she judges people??
That monologue had to carry the weight of justifying the Sisterhood bonds falling apart as well as why her motivation changed from building a human pen from Styria to Braila to world conquest. I think it did so poorly
Sypha & Trevor
really Sypha & Trevor have the main plot in the show. I checked and post season 1 the only episode they donât appear in is s4e6, which is entirely devoted to the Isaac, Hector, and Council of Sisterhood arc. Their partnership and adventures are the main plot of the show.
Its easy to see what Trevorâs arc was over the show: coming to peace with the deaths of his family, taking up the mantle of being a Belmont, and starting a new family with Sypha.
With Sypha I actually had to scroll through tv tropes for what is her character arc, and I guess hers is disillusionment from adventure and life outside the speakers? My friends joke that Syphaâs magic is what the plot demands to look cool in a fight, which isnât necessarily a bad thing.
Tangent: the ending of their arc was easy to guess: as soon as Trevor went to fight the final boss alone I literally said âoh i bet Syphaâs pregnant, Trevorâs doing a heroic sacrifice, theyll use the unexplained magical dagger mcguffin, and 60/40 odds that he goes through an infinite corridor to outright come back vs just the implication he might come backâ
I guess my final thought of the show, was overall the SUPER Final Boss got my by surprise. It was a good twist I enjoyed. Not that Death appeared, I had guessed that from the heavy foreshadowing, but I was surprised by who it was, because I had thought I thought the characters involved feeling shoehorned into the plot was just more bad writing. The Alchemist who put St Germain on the path or murder for no discernible motive for helping? Sure gotta move the plot along. New Dracula court member Varney who has a whole introduction with almost every character he meets and banter about his smell? Sure thats basically how all characters talk with a snarky and acerbic voice.
#Castlevania#castlevania spoilers#castlevania meta#castlevania season four#overall i enjoyed the show#id love to find some discussion of the show#this wound up being more of a recap than a persuasive essay#but i think my tldr thesis statement stands
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Analysis on the MHA Girls
(Part I: Uraraka & Momo)
I know that the fandom tends to dislike these queens and push them aside, and I know Hori doesn't really know how to write women, but what he has given us is great and I wish the fans would appreciate these awesome ladies more. So here's an analysis for my girls, I wanna do an analysis on the three musketeers (broccoli, popcorn, & candy cane) so that'll be posted soon too :)
Uraraka
BEST. GIRL. I love Uraraka so much, she is the reason why I started watching MHA and she's such a sweetheart, I wish she wasn't so hated amongst the fandom.
We first meet her as this wholesome, bubbly girl who saves Midoriya from falling, and it's pretty clear that she's gonna be the main love interest. Honestly, I was a little disappointed during her first few scenes. Like I said, she was the reason why I started MHA, and she turns out to be the typical sweet girl the main dude has a crush on. I didn't have high hopes tbh. What first intrigued me was when she admits her reasons for becoming a hero. You would never expect the innocent girl-next-door love interest to be doing something for money. Even she herself says it's "such an unwholesome motivation" in comparison to Midoriya's and Iida's reasons, and she gets praised for "looking out for herself." This is the first misconception I see often on her character; she wants money for herself because she's poor. If you look into her reasons, she just wants to make money for her parents, not for her, so that her parents can take it easy. She is just as selfless as Midoriya and Kirishima, but I don't see her get praised for her selflessness nearly as much as for those two or other characters. I also really like the small flashback they included; her father tells her to not worry about them and to follow her dreams. Whether at the start Uraraka truly wanted to be a hero or solely did it for the money is up for interpretation. I personally think she started solely for the money, which I'll get into after I talk about the Sports Festival.
Uraraka vs. Bakugo is one of the most emotional fights in my opinion, and it's one of my favorites. EVERYONE in that stadium underestimated her. I'm not going to say that the reason was because she was a woman, but rather, Bakugo is pretty ruthless and powerful, where as she is not, and people knew that. The fact that she was a "small young girl" just added more fuel to that, if that makes sense. And this best girl did what she could to prove EVERYONE wrong. This is where Uraraka proves that she isn't a typical sweet shonen love interest and I wish people took notice in that. People think of ambitious, determined, driven, cunning, and powerful women as dark and mysterious, femme fatale so to speak. But this fight shows that Uraraka, a pretty extroverted, kind, and bubbly person, is all of those qualities, just as ambitious and determined as the strongest male characters in the show, such as Bakugo and Todoroki.
And when she loses the fight (after basically passing out btw, queen didn't stop until the very end), she doesn't just mope and quit and wait for encouraging words from her love interest, she 1. GIVES the encouraging words TO her love interest and 2. she understands that her quirk alone isn't going to be enough to get her to the top, so she carefully chooses a hero agency where she knows she will be taught combat, AND SHE LEARNS. The next time her class is attacked by villains, she single-handedly takes down one of the more dangerous members without a quirk, just with the fighting skills she took the time to learn.
Back to what I said earlier, Uraraka started her hero journey solely for money. This plays directly into her development in seasons 3 and 4, which is criminally underrated. She sees her entire class working harder than ever, and even though she's dealing with unfamiliar emotions, she decides to push those emotions aside to not fall behind, determined to be a good student and hero like her classmates. During the events at Shie Hassaikai, Uraraka finally learns the true environment a hero works in. Failing to save Nighteye, she realizes that what she truly wants for herself isn't money or Midoriya, it's being a hero who saves people. I believe Nighteye's death directly ties into the "who protects heroes when they need protection?" line. This recent chapter in the manga makes me think that she's gonna do something big and go through a character arc. I said this on Twitter and I'll say it here, I want Uraraka to become a hero who protects heroes (whatever that could mean, it has a nice ring to it lol). Honestly, her character has sm potential, I'm excited for what Horikoshi has in store for her.
Momo
God is a woman and that woman is Momo Yaoyorozu. I'm tired of people calling her annoying because of one episode, as if you've never had self-esteem problems before đ so now I'm going to talk about why she's amazing đ
My initial impression of Momo was the typical smart girl, stern, formal, and aloof, but still caring. And as I rewatch the series, I believe this is what Horikoshi was going for at first. I think her voice was deeper in the first season too. As much as I love the Erza type of characters, I love where Horikoshi ended up going with Momo. As a teenage girl, I find the arc she went through during season 2 very relatable. It's obvious that Momo was raised to have full confidence in herself. While she may not show it like Bakugo does, I think it's obvious that she's not used to losing, she was probably praised for having an amazing quirk growing up, like Bakugo, but is a way more humble about it because she was raised differently. So at the Sports Festival, she experiences losing, seemingly for the first time, in a place where she just can't afford to lose. But she does. And this takes a huge toll on her.
She's rich, pretty, the top student in class, and admired by her peers, but obviously that's not what mattered to Momo. What mattered to her most in that moment was looking good in front of agencies, what mattered most was to be a worthy hero, and she feels like she's failed. She seeks guidance from a female hero, hoping to have a female role model guide her through issues she has as a 15 year old girl, but instead finds herself being used for her looks. Again, Momo doesn't care about any of that, she just wants to be considered a worthy hero, and her defeat at the Sports Festival made her completely lose the confidence she needed to accomplish that goal.
Now we have the Yaoyorozu Rising episode. Fans who hate her often refer to this episode as "evidence for Todomomo", "her being annoying by not knowing what to do," etc. etc. etc. đ
I like Todomomo. It's a cute and healthy ship. There are WAY more Todomomo scenes, not in this episode. Todoroki is a side character in Momo's story in this episode. This episode is MOMO'S. Sorry but sheâs not sharing the spotlight. I know that seems a little aggressive, sorry, but this episode shows a lot of development in Momo, and it just gets brushed off as Todomomo content when it's not. She did know what to do, btw, she has a plan. She didn't know how to communicate that. She didn't want to communicate that. She was scared that her plan wouldn't work. She was scared that she'd fail. All of that stems back to her defeat at the Sports Festival, she has lost a major amount of confidence, and Aizawa and Todoroki notice this. Aizawa even says that her actions are of a normal 15 year old girl's, and even though he wished to help her, he couldn't, so Todoroki does it in his place. This is something I notice about Momo that is one of the most relatable things I've ever seen in a teenage girl in not just shonen, anime but just in fiction in general: she knows she has a good plan, but she doesn't have confidence in it until someone else gives her the validation. Upon seeing that others trust her, she regains her confidence and fulfills her plans with excellency. She is a REALISTIC 15 YEAR OLD GIRL which is honestly SO refreshing to see in a work of fiction. It's what I love about her character: she represents many teenagers, girls, boys, and theys alike.
And yeah, it might've been annoying if she had stayed the "has good plans but only executes them if she gets the validation from others" type of character. But she doesn't. By season 3, she has shown a significant amount of growth. She is shown to be more of a leader now that she's more confident in herself, and she's still dealing with it (that one scene with Sero & Jiro đ), but she's gotten a lot better after realizing her worth, after realizing the trust others have in her, after realizing that others see her as an intelligent leader. So in the forest, she quickly comes up with a plan and executes it quickly. Had she not done this, had she not thought and acted quickly, who knows how long it would've taken before the heroes found Bakugo.
Another thing I want to mention before I finish Momo's section- at the hospital, All Might calls her a worthy hero because of her actions. It was her inability to act quickly at the Sports Festival that made her doubt her worth, and it's her ability to act quickly that makes All Might see it. I think this plays a major role for her character, maybe why she ultimately decided to go on the mission to save Bakugo. She's gonna have some of the spotlight to herself during the Joint Training Battle.
I also want to mention something from the manga, if you don't want spoilers then don't read this part.
Some of Midnight's last words in the manga are "Yaoyorozu's going to make a fine leader someday," which shows how her peers and mentors alike notice her potential. Additionally, she proves this statement right by quickly coming up with a plan to stop Gigantomachia. I'm very excited to see how Momo develops into an even more inspiring leader as the manga continues.
#mha#bnha#boku no hero academia#my hero academia#momo yaoyorozu#ochaco uraraka#character analysis#anime
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Continuing my reactions to Avatar: The Last Airbender
This post is about Book 3. See my overall impressions and thoughts on Book 1 here. See my thoughts on Book 2 here.
ETA: crap i forgot the keep reading line initially SORRY if anyone saw this before i edited. anyways. please see the tags as a disclaimer before reading. gosh itâs late i need to go to bed.
General
Starting S3 now and dang Katara & Toph have gotten so powerful!!!!!
I literally recorded ZERO reactions from Chapter One through Chapter Twelve. And my first reaction is basically my excitement that Zuko is finally with the Aang crew! But let me try to skim through an episode list to recall my reactions.
You may have already seen my post expressing shock that MARK HAMILL voiced the Fire Lord. Still not over that revelation.
So, ultimately, I binged this show in less than a week. I think I started on Monday? And finished Saturday afternoon. That alone should speak to how much I enjoyed it!Â
Aang
Okay, a bit weird to have barely any thoughts under Aang when heâs literally the protagonist, but I think (since I wrote other sections before this) that I touch on some of my thoughts on him under other characters.Â
I will say, his journey really intensifies in this season. First, when he awakens after being unconscious for several days and has no idea whatâs going on, and is still healing and more helpless than heâs probably ever felt in his life. I did really like his arc in this season, but what a stark contrast to the Aang of Book 1. He has to grow up so fast. I gotta say, a lot of Aangâs journey reminded me just a little of Ender in Enderâs Game.Â
I do say this later, but his final decision about how to handle Ozai was amazing. I loved every second of his journey to get there, and I was rooting for him to find a path that felt true to him â and not what everyone else kept telling him he had to do.Â
There was one small thing that bothered me, which was that his eventual regaining of the Avatar state did not really seem to come about through intentional action of his own. After he goes down at the end of Book 2, sorta feels like they never even talk about him going into the Avatar state again and he doesnât until the final moment. That moment doesnât seem a conscious choice on his part; the scar on his back collides with a rock jutting out and seems to jolt him into the Avatar state. I would have liked to see a little more agency on his part in regards to the Avatar state.Â
Sokka
My boy! My boy Sokka! Truly the mother of the group. IDK why they pretended in the beginning that Katara was the mom because itâs definitely Sokka. His maps! His scheduling! He is ridiculous and I love him for it.Â
I adored that he got his own training master episode! He got to learn some sword stuff and even got to make a fancy space sword! Everyone else got super powerful with their bending and Iâm glad Sokka got his own arc of self-improvement. He has come a LONG way from episode 1. He couldnât really hold his own at all that early, and now look at him! Planning battle strategies! Taking down the Fire Lordâs air fleet! Heâs come so far and Iâm so proud!
Oh, you know, I just realized that I didnât really talk about ships with Sokka in Book 2 but he did continue to have the most active romance arc. It was nice to see Suki return in Book 2, and I am glad we found out what happened to her. I liked Sokka and Suki, I have nothing against it. I was very surprised that so little happened with Toph and Sokka. There did seem to be moments where it seemed like Toph might actually harbor a crush on Sokka, but nothing came of it and she certainly didnât say anything about it. That felt a little odd to me. Why hint at something but then make nothing of it?Â
Katara
Sigh. This is early in the post, but probably one of the last parts of it that Iâm actually writing. Iâve definitely been putting it off. Unfortunately most of what I have to say about Katara is about shipping, and Iâm really not happy about that, but then itâs what comes to mind over anything else. Which is sort of ironic considering some of her lines in the theater episode...
So in the theatre episode, Aang confronts Katara about how nothing has happened in their relationship after they kissed. She responds by saying she is âconfused.â I had some issues with the script here, to be honest. It seems to imply that sheâs confused about her feelings for Aang. But she also says that sheâs been more focused on the war, and that totally makes sense. I really would support this moment if thatâs where they left it: âI donât have time to think about romance, my mind is preoccupied with the war.âÂ
But no, they say she is âconfused.â
This is pretty baffling to me, and honestly seems to come out of nowhere. Book 1 it was very obvious that both Katara and Aang have feelings for each other, and Book 2 might have backed off a little from that but then we get moments where Katara is so keyed in to Aangâs struggles with the Avatar state and also the only one who can bring him out of it. Now, all of a sudden, she is saying she is confused? Where is this coming from?Â
I could definitely see people argue that itâs because she has feelings for Zuko. If I shipped them (I donât, but I also Get It), I could point to numerous moments in the series as âclues/supportâ for this ship. Zuko and Katara have a moment at the end of Book 2 where they talk about the loss of their mothers. (âWeâre both sad about what happened to our mothers!â not really a foundation for a relationship, but Katara is the most betrayed and distrustful of Zuko when it comes to the idea of letting him join their crew and it is because of this moment. She obviously begins to feel some kind of connection â Iâd argue platonic but ship and let ship.)Â
And yeah, Zuko and Katara have their bonding adventure, but again I donât think this has to be read as romantic. Clearly the idea here is that Zuko âunderstandsâ a part of Katara that Aang doesnât â except that in the end, Aang is the one who is right about her. She cannot give in to revenge. Itâs not her, and Aang knows that. I mean, theyâre both right â Katara had go to on the journey to learn that about herself, and it was important that Zuko was the one who helped her. But still.Â
Finally Zuko and Katara go together to face Azula. Again seems like plot is pushing them together for Tension. They definitely work together here and Katara heals him and all that but sheâd have healed anyone. (Like yeah if you ship it of course youâre gonna be excited over those moments.)
But.
Like. The thing is. When the dust settles? Zuko and Mai return to each other like moths to a flame. I could believe that Katara might have had feelings for Zuko, but I donât think he ever returned them. I think it was always Mai for him.Â
I donât really want to fan the flames of ship wars â Iâm trying to walk a fine line of âI totally understand why people ship this, but I donât,â and hopefully Iâm succeeding, but Iâm sorry if Iâm not.Â
My main gripe is how the show handled this dynamic. It seemed like they half-heartedly thought about creating a love triangle, but then they didnât follow through. I donât particularly like love triangles, so Iâm not actually mad that there wasnât one. But what bothers me is that the Aang and Katara moments are so heavy handed in the beginning, that a sudden subtle take on how Katara feels in Book 3 feels strange. It feels like if she was having feelings for Zuko, it should have been more blatant. The depictions are inconsistent â if the writers were even ever intending for Katara to have feelings for Zuko in the first place.
Like, I really canât tell if those moments implying Zuko and Katara were intentionally trying to start a love triangle OR if it was just sort of a mistake OR if it was maybe creators trying to address and then negate Zuko and Katara as a ship? I mean itâs weird because the play episode really emphasizes Zuko and Katara but then that play is really supposed to be all levels of inaccurate and get under the charactersâ skins.Â
So, I donât know. Obviously we all bring different interpretations to a piece of media and I am by no means saying anything here is a âcorrect opinionâ (because I hate that attitude when it comes to story interpretations). Sorry if you donât agree, hope I didnât make anyone mad. Ship what you like! You do you, man.Â
On that note, please see further disclaimers about shipping and canon at the end of the âZuko and Maiâ section below.
Toph
Loved how Toph was the first to warm up to Zuko. It made a lot of sense. I mean obviously they were looking for a fire bender to teach Aang and it was like âHello, powerful fire bender on a silver platter!â but also, Toph is someone who joined the crew later on. The group had to adjust to her, and she probably knows what it feels like to be an outsider. Now, granted, she was never alienated from the group in the same way that Zuko (rightfully) was. But she can also understand Zukoâs position as someone who comes from a wealthy family, the sort of pressure that comes from that. None of this was really addressed explicitly, and it might not have really fit then and there, but it was what I was thinking as she was standing up for Zuko.
Um, and also, on that note? Huge bummer Toph did not get her special bonding adventure with Zuko. Toph, Iâm with you on that one! Why did Sokka get two episodes for his?Â
Zuko
No â& Irohâ on this post because â Iroh spent much of this season in jail, and then the next half just ??? who knows where.Â
So, I believe I stated in the last post how shocked I was at Zukoâs betrayal. Knowing he eventually joins Aangâs crew, it seemed like his time in the prison with Katara would ultimately lead to that, and then NOPE! He has this nice heart to heart about his mother, and then⌠it really shocked me.
But.
As I watched this season, it became clear that this has to be Zukoâs journey. He has to go back to the Fire Nation. He has to win the approval of his father. He has to get everything he wants in order to realize that it really isnât what he wants. This is integral to his ultimate revelation and redemption and he couldnât have stayed truly good without verifying and knowing how empty the win of his fatherâs approval is.
Realizing this, I loved it and appreciated the moments we get. Zukoâs visits to Iroh. Even when Zuko is being cruel, you can see how hurt and lost he is. And Iroh gives him the cold shoulder he deserves, even though of course this is breaking Irohâs heart, too.Â
Now, I absolutely must discuss the Fire Kids Beach Party episode! Because as ridiculous as parts of it are, it provides such an important and necessary insight to all four characters (Zuko, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee). You see the privilege that theyâre all used to, itâs good that no one knows who they all are. (although maybe a little surprising because Zukoâs scar certainly reveals who he is but anyways.)Â
and itâs funny how you almost end up rooting for them before youâre like âno no no. they are bad people doing some bad things.â I mean, almost rooting for them. And sure, the campfire scene is a bit Breakfast Club-y but I do think itâs important. And I just loved the moment Zuko admits heâs angry at himself, how his burst of fire as he says it almost covers it up, itâs so hard for him to say. Fabulous character development going on here, fabulous.Â
[Uh, side note, so apparently Zuko is descended from Avatar Roku! This is ridiculous but can we get Zuko calling Aang great-grandfather, mainly to get on his nerves?! O:-) this would amuse me greatly]
And GOSH the catharsis when Zuko finally realizes his fatherâs approval is not what he wants and not worth it! Itâs so well earned. Itâs so satisfying. I was so excited and just like, so anticipating Zuko going to meet up with the crew. Zuko practicing his speech in the woods to the frog? Amazing. Endearing. I love him so much.Â
And despite that and because of it, I also loved how difficult it was for him to earn their trust. It had to be difficult. It would not be believable if it wasnât. Every character regarded him exactly as you would expect them to, exactly as he deserved. And Zuko tried so hard to be sincere and contrite, and it was hard for him, but he was doing pretty well all things considered! And still, they distrusted him. Yes. This was good and right. And I loved it.Â
AND ANOTHER THING I LOVED was that once that initial barrier was surpassed, Aang actually warmed up to Zuko pretty quickly. This is not surprising; heâd reached out to Zuko in the past. First when Zuko (masked) rescues him, and Aang says they could have been friends. Later, at the end of Book 1 when Zuko again kidnaps him, thereâs just a moment⌠I think when Aang spares him. Itâs like, my impression is that Aang can sense that their destinies are connected, and heâs not really sure how but he knows that Zuko is important. Also, I mean, Aang just doesnât kill people and revenge is not his way.Â
Each character getting their own side story with Zuko was also integral to his arc â perhaps moreso, theirs, though. Because it was necessary for them to overcome their distrust and forge the bonds necessary for the Avatarâs crew to function. Bummed he didnât get one with Toph. Toph was robbed.
And side note, but I really would have like an Aang and Sokka bonding episode? Like, Book 1 is all Aang and Katara and Sokka, but some 1:1 time would have been nice. There was almost a chance when Aang flew Sokka to his father and the water tribe (and at the time I was like, âOh? Aang and Sokka bonding?!â) But then it was really only a few minutes. But yeah, that said, it does make sense to focus on carving out 1:1 time for Zuko and each member of the crew to ease him into the group.
Sokka: You happy now?
Zuko: Iâm never happy.
This made me sad. And also made me go âclassic Zuko.â
Every time Zuko was like, âWhat would uncle say?â And then say the most ridiculous thing? Fantastic. Amazing. Fuel for the fire that was my love for this show.
Zuko and Mai
Mainly the Beach Party episode was important in helping me warm up to Mai. Once Zuko is back in the Fire Nation and theyâre together, I was of the mindset that Mai would have to do something pretty big in order for me to enjoy seeing their relationship become canon. This episode is not that episode, but it is an important insight into Maiâs character that explains some of her actions. The fact that sheâs basically internalized apathy because sheâs been forced to repress her emotions. It wasnât enough for me but we get more later, this is an important stepping stone.Â
Itâs also important in establishing just what Zuko and Maiâs dynamic is. Itâs a bit shaky in this and they end up breaking up but then they just get back together like immediately (moths to a flameâŚ) In hindsight, I just think theyâre behaving like normal teens who care about each other but are still navigating what it means to be in a relationship. At this moment in time, their relationship is not good, but by the end of the show I can believe as they mature that it could be a good relationship.
So the actual moment that I was like, âOkay, officially supporting Mai and Zuko nowâ was when she helps them escape Boiling Rock. I donât think weâre ever told the full contents of Zukoâs letter to her, but considering what she says to Zuko earlier in this episode, it doesnât seem likely he explains himself very well. At least not for Mai to understand. And he still isnât able to explain himself well to her as they talk face to face. Then he locks in a cell and flees! He leaves her again.Â
You wouldnât blame Mai for hating Zuko. You wouldnât blame her for actively working against him. But is this what happens? No. Not at all. She helps them get away. She betrays Azula for Zuko. Azula!!! Azula who is very powerful and very scary! This is a clear and distinct line in the sand, and ⌠it almost comes out of nowhere, but what it demonstrates is how she really feels about him. Sheâs decided to trust him and put her faith in him when she really would have been justified in not doing so.Â
Iâm also going to say that despite some rather odd implications of Zuko and Katara in parts of the series (namely with other characters who really donât know them), I never feel like Zuko is interested in Katara. I would buy interpretations that Katara might have considered Zuko, the way some parts of her story are portrayed, but I donât get anything on Zukoâs side and that is all the more reinforced by how he acts around Mai, especially in the end of the series when theyâre reunited.Â
(Now, that said â because I donât abide ship wars, ship and let ship, and power to multi-shippers â I can totally 100% see the appeal of shipping Zuko and Katara, and I would contend there is even some canonical implication of it. And I canât blame people for not totally loving Zuko and Mai. Now, I do think the canonical implications are sort of muddied and confusing, but though I have actually not written it yet, youâll have read my thoughts there in the Katara section already. OH, and OF COURSE, MORE IMPORTANTLY â ships being canon should not matter! Ship what you love! Who cares if itâs canon! Finding canon justification for ships should not be necessary for shipping! It can be a fun exercise but should never ever be a reason for approving or disapproving of a ship, itâs just a cherry on top!)
Azula
We get some pretty interesting insights into her character this season. Iâve already mentioned the Beach Party episode, and there was some good stuff in there for her. I particularly appreciated the moment that she admitted she knew her mother thought she was a monster, that she even admitted to being a monster, and then admitted that it still hurt anyways. Honestly thatâs probably her best moment.
I also thought her breakdown at the end was well done. Mai and Ty Leeâs betrayal just broke her. She probably knows her attitude puts people off, but those two were the only ones she ever really got on with. And it turns out, she really didnât get on with them, theyâd only ever been intimidated and manipulated into being her friends. She has no one, she pushes everyone away. Literally â and it is ultimately her downfall.Â
Itâs an interesting contrast to her brother. We literally get an episode âZuko Alone,â and then it turns out the theme of âAzula Aloneâ is such an integral part of her arc, as well. The last person she has is her father, and he leaves her, too. Sure, he tells her itâs because sheâs to stay behind as the new Fire Lord, but honestly Ozai was never truly close to anyone, either. But yeah. Iroh spends a lot of time and effort trying to help Zuko redeem himself. He never tries with Azula? I think, maybe it would have been nice to see him try with her, and be just utterly rebuffed. Now, Zuko also rebuffed him a lot, too. So Azulaâs rejection of Iroh would really have to be something. This is the kind of stuff Iâd look for in fic. Speaking of fic: I mean, Iâd really love Zuko to find his mom, mom to come back, and then maybe some kind of attempt at reparations between mom and Azula. It doesnât have to work, I just want to see the effort, you know?
Final Thoughts: Ending & Denouement
I loved Aang finding a different way to defeat the Fire Lord. I loved how every past Avatar he talked to was like âno dude just kill him.â And I loved that that was not enough for Aang. Heâs pushing himself and ultimately the spirit of the Avatar to think harder, to try harder, to seek a different way. And that mercy was so integral to Aangâs character, and important to his arc that he struggled so much with it. And heâs just a kid! Oh, Aang. And I loved that he was able to find the answer he needed, the fact that it was taking away Ozaiâs fire bending. Yes. Perfection.
I was a little disappointed by how little we got post-Ozaiâs defeat. I was hoping the epilogue might have shown a little more in the years and decades following. It would have been nice to see glimpses of everyone prospering as they got older.Â
Also, as I was watching Zukoâs coronation, I was sorta like, âuhh wait thatâs a little too easy.â Now we donât know when that happens so itâs possible some bit of time has lapsed and Iâll take that. But I thought there would have still been some trouble with some of the Fire Nation troops. Some of them would have remained loyal to Ozai. Many of those general had probably committed war crimes and would have needed to be rounded up and put on trial and put in prison. Thereâd be so much work to do!
That said, I do understand that we want to see our heroes with a happy ending, ultimately. I guess just a simple like âX years laterâ before the ending scenes would have sufficed for me to be satisfied that enough time had passed for those things to have been dealt with. IDK, I can probably suspend disbelief enough to headcanon that myself. Iâm just saying. Some acknowledgement of resolution and reconstruction as a *process over time*, albeit unnecessary, would have been nice to have!
On that note, we donât actually find out what happens to Azula. Presumably she is also in prison with her father.Â
More importantly, we were Robbed of a Zuko and Ursa reunion scene!
#avatar the last airbender#avatar: the last airbender#a:tla#atla#i'm gonna tag my ships now#so you know what to expect before opening the CUT TAG#if you don't like reading posts about ships that you do not support then you should probably not read this#i'm warning you now#if you make the choice to click the read more tag even tho u don't like the ships i'm tagging#well that's on you#katara x aang#zuko x mai#sokka x suki#(the last one is honestly pretty brief and the lesser but warning just in case)#now in this house we support multi shippers and i have nothing against anyone ships other ships#because that would be ridiculous#ship and let ship i say#the tags are here so that people can protect and curate their own fandom experience
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â seven of nine (god if I got the numbers wrong I'll die bc I am too lazy to google it)
good news you got it right otherwise i would have texted you and been like, giselle, GISELLE.Â
Ok so this is going to be kinda long because there are three points I am going to touch on: The way that Seven of Nineâs agency is depicted, The dynamic between Seven of Nine and Janeway, and Finally the romance written for seven of nine.Â
1) Agency
Seven of Nine was assimilated in the borg collective when she was around 8 or 9. By the time that Voyager finds her, she is in her 20s. She has been in the collected for pretty much all her life. She is used as an representative for the borg queen when the crew of Voyager encounter her. Uh I think thatâs right, The last time I watched voyager was in 2016.Â
The Voyager crew, particularly Janeway, decide to rescue her from the borg collective without her say in the matter because you know sheâs assimilated by the borg so surely she has no agency. Which is pretty much the same thing essentially since she is not given the choice by the crew of Voyager to join them or stay with the borg. There is this focus on Seven reclaiming her humanity which I honestly fucking hate.Â
So basically, the Crew of Voyager separates her from the collective and basically figures out how to deborg her which they do. All this time, in the brig Seven is begging for them not to do it because it hurts her. It is essentially torture for her to be unassimulated. It could kill her. But despite Sevenâs cries of pain and begging for it to stop and for them to let her go, Janeway refuses. This is painted as some heroic act of saving this girl from the horrible horrible borg and teaching her to regain her humanity and culture. But itâs not that. Itâs literally conversion therapy.Â
They remove most of Seven of Nineâs external nonorganic parts and the only things they leave is literally the hand veins, the thing on the side of her face. Not only that but they put her in a cat suit thatâs supposed to mimc the borg nonorganic parts that were removed so that Seven doesnât get sick? This choice honestly can be blamed on Rick Berman because everything is LITERALLY his fault. Seven wasnât given any choice of clothing to wear regularly basically. They completely take bodily agency from her in choosing how she presents physically.Â
Seven is treated as a child in many occasions because she is learning to be human again. Despite the fact she is human and a capable being. Itâs infuriating that they are basically trying to recondition her.Â
Did the borg do wrong? Yes, they forcibly assimulated Seven of Nine as a child. Did the crew of Voyager do wrong? Abso-Fucking-lutely. Neither groups fucking gave Seven agency over her body.  The two episode arc was so upsetting that I cried during it because it was horrid and disgusting the way the writers treated the matter.
2) Seven of Nine and Janeway dynamics
Seven/Janeway shippers you are not going to like my thots in this section. One, I know that Seven of Nine and Janeway was an huge ship when the show was running and fans were lobbying the writers and RICK BERMAN THE EVIL for it to happen because you know in DS9 there was the girl kiss in reunion. But yeaaaah Rick Berman being the giant piece of poop from a dumpster he is, was like nope never happening. So thatâs the context. It remains a popular ship.Â
So hereâs the thing. There is a huge power imbalance between Janeway and Seven that makes the ship really squicky for me. As you see above in the agency section, Janeway REFUSES to listen to Seven when sheâs literally crying and sobbing and asking for them to stop the process. Janeway is so focused on this idea of saving this girl instead of fucking listening to the girl. Furthermore Janeway takes on this teacher / mother role for Seven. She gives Seven lessons on how to regain humanity. She is always acting as a guide or older more experienced source that knows best even if it is not the best for Seven. Seven quite honestly was her most vulnerable after the deborging and Janeway stepped in the teacher/mother role. Seven also turns to Janeway for emotional support which completely baffles me. Like this is the thing, I literally do not understand how Janeway and Seven have this positive relationship dynamic. Janeway literally ripped Seven away from her family and her life. It just ugh bad WRITING.Â
3)Seven of Nine and Romance
Seven of Nine is probably one of the MOST sexualized star trek characters. The costume required Jerri Ryan to not only wear a skin tight suit, but also a corset (badly made at that), and stilletos. The costume took some time to get into and it caused Jerri Ryan back pain (because the corset was TOO TIGHT. They normally do not if they are probably fitted). This once again Rick Bermanâs fault.Â
So first off we have the emh doctor being incredibly creepy to Seven of Nine because he has romantic hots for her. Seven has to tell him she only wants a friend but he doesnât stop being creepy until a big fight between them. So That romance subplot sure doesnât make any sense.Â
Then there were the special borgs that could maintain individuality outside of the collective, there was one that Seven had a crush on. Honestly that part really wasnât that badly written.Â
Then the fucking final straw, the complete out of the blue, no previous writing support, pairing of Seven of Nine and Chakotay. Backgroun, Chakotay was Janewayâs love interest for the first couple seasons and it was quite good chemistry until I guess the writers just completely dropped it. And then the lobbying of the Seven/Janeway shippers got really intense toward the end of the show so you know what happened? Seven suddenly gets shoved with Chakotay which is the most what the FUCK out of all characters. Seven had never viewed Chakotay as an romantic interest or anything beyound colleague until the second to last episode of voyager when she starts to have like fantasies about him and turns out he is into her which like was never written in any of the other plots. It just was like WHAT THE FUCK where did this come from. Answer: Rick Berman cockblocking the femslashers. It was a bad decision and honestly made the finale arc disappointing. Like Star Trek ending arcs tend to be lackluster (donât @ me tng, tos, and VOY fans). DS9 was probably the most decent one because at least it had followed the previously established relationships instead of bringing this out of the fuckin blue.Â
So tdlr: Seven of Nineâs character was treated pretty crappy despite all the interesting angles that could have been pursued. I am hoping that the writerâs Star Trek Picard treat her character better, which may be a really good possibility since Patrick Stewart was heavily involved in the story writing. Historically he has stood up for his female colleagues when they had to deal with sexism from the producers (RICK BERMAN). However, If I hear Seven of Nine utter, âMy husband Chakotayâ I will literally drive to Rick Bermanâs house and egg and tp it.Â
Anyways I also have lots of parallels that can be talked about Seven of Nine, Breq, and Murderbot but I already probably wrote like a thousnad words at this point and its midnight and i have early morning work tomorrow.Â
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Season 1 Thoughts
There were a lot of creative decisions (storylines, editing, pacing) that I didnât agree with when it came to Roswell, New Mexico, but instead of focusing on the negative Iâm going to go over what I did love about the first season. (Rest assured that if theyâre not renewed for a second season, I will then make a post to roast the shit out of everything I didnât agree with, including the events of the finale).
Things I loved about the various characters/storylines (omitting all of my gripes):
Liz - Jeanine gave such a powerhouse performance as Liz. Sheâs so strong and smart. Half the things that needed to be solved on the show were solved by her. Sheâs warm and kind. Throughout the series sheâs given so many opportunities to be bitter and not do the ârightâ thing - but she does it anyway. Liz is a good person and Iâm so glad she was able to open her heart up to love again. With that said, I love that so much of her storyline was focused, not just on Max, but the love she had for her sister. Sister love is POWERFUL and unless youâre a girl who has a sister, you might not fully understand what kind of sacrifices they would make for each other but this show got that love right.
Isobel - Isobel is a person who has been used and abused since she was a young teenager. Her abuse may not have been physical and known like Michaelâs or Alexâs, but it was mental and present. She allowed herself to love and she was ultimately betrayed for it more than anyone else. She may not have made peace with the situation yet, but she was able to stand up for herself in the end and now sheâs going to start exploring her own abilities. For someone who always just wanted to be ânormalâ sheâs accepted who she is. Sheâs going to figure out exactly what she can do and become stronger than ever.
Max - Max loves with his whole heart. He makes mistakes (BIG ones), he carries guilt for those mistakes, but in the end he tries to make up for them. His love for Liz and his want to help correct his mistakes ultimately cost him his life. For someone who is largely deemed as selfish, it was a selfless act. He didnât try to save Rosa to be a hero. He tried to save her because he thought he could, because he wanted to give back a life that was stolen, because he wanted Liz to have her sister again.
Jenna - Badass with a heart of gold. Another great example as to the profound amount of love one can have for their sister. The show could have turned Jenna in to a villain, but they didnât. She had feelings for Max but she recognized that Maxâs feelings for Liz were greater. She knew what they were to each other and instead of inserting herself in the middle, she removed herself from the situation and wished them well. She could have helped Jesse but instead went to Alex. She protected the aliens, she protected Max, at her own expense. She wasnât used. She always knew what the deal was between the two of them. She had the bravery to tell Max that, that would be the last favor she ever did for him because she knew itâs what would be best for her. I hope we see her back one day.
Michael - Michael has been through A LOT. Despite everything heâs been through, he might love more deeply than anyone else on this entire show. I also think that terrifies him. He closes himself off to accepting other peopleâs love because of his trauma and itâs realistic and valid. Despite what he says, Michaelâs actions and behavior always speaks more to what heâs feeling. He says he doesnât have family, but he loves Max and Isobel like they are. Michael will never have a relationship that works until he reaches the point where he accepts that other people can and do really, truly love him. Itâs that age old âyou can never really give love until youâre ready to receive itâ thing and thatâs so fucking relatable to me because Iâm the exact same way.
Kyle - Kyle, like Jenna, they also could have made into a villain and they didnât. He loves Liz, he supports Liz, even knowing she loves someone else. He didnât try to insert himself into their whole thing or try to get back together with her. Instead he basically stepped up and asked what she needed from him. It took him on a journey that changed his life and his view of a parent he idolized. Even at the end when he was breaking down, he had every excuse to revert back to something ugly, but he still took the higher road. Kyle may have used to be a homophobic bully, but heâs the proof that we all look for when we ask if itâs really possible for a person to change. Kyle changed and Iâm proud that he continues to surprise me.
Maria - Mariaâs love for her mom is so beautiful. Watching someone you love slowly lose themselves is one of the MOST difficult things, and seeing them show just how much stress it really puts on her life was wonderful (even though it was difficult to watch). I loved the little insight we got regarding Mariaâs feelings of growing up in a town where everyone was white and how it was her mother that taught her to love her skin and her voice. The scene with her and Liz sitting on the billboard was so important. I also love that we know Mariaâs family is involved with the aliens in some way (we just donât know how yet). Also, on a more shallow note, Heather Hemmens is crazy beautiful so Iâm grateful to the show for introducing me to her.
Alex - I mean....I honestly donât know what to say about Alex. At this point I feel like I could write a dissertation about him. Alex has affected me in ways that I was not expecting. I didnât really understand him at first. I was intrigued, but it took me a while to really see him. To truly see him. Alex is smart. Ridiculously smart. Remember when I said that Liz solved about half the things on the show? Alex solved the other half. Heâs kind. Heâs so freaking kind, and loving, and loyal. He stands up for his friends and calls them out when need be. Seeing his relationship with Kyle this season has been a blessing. They may not be âfriendsâ (yet) but heâs willing to not look at how they were shaped by the past to instead concentrate on the present because itâs whatâs needed. He has this capacity for love thatâs so deep which is all the more amazing given by the fact that the two people who should have loved him unconditionally didnât. He was abandoned by his mom and left to be raised by an abusive, homophobic man. He had every reason to turn out hateful like his dad, but he didnât. His trauma cost him so much of himself, but this season heâs started to regain those pieces that had been chipped away. He confronted his abuser, he stopped running away from the man heâs in love with. He wants to be free. Free to live and love the way heâs always wanted to. Alex has spent this season regaining his agency, and itâs easily been my favorite character arc.
Extras:
The fashion choices on this show (at least regarding the women) are A+. Mariaâs outfits were my favorite. The song selections were also amazing. Nothing makes me happier than some quality 90âs music so it was basically a fantasy brought to life to have a show that showcased it every episode. I even loved all of the cover versions of popular songs. I also had this idea of âwhat if they end the season playing Here With Me?â and they did, so Iâm glad that at least everyone agrees that it was the only song choice that made sense. The show had a lot of great one liners, especially from Michael, Alex, Kyle, and Isobel. I truly believe theyâre the snarkiest characters and lord do I want to see more of that.
So those are my positive thoughts on Season 1. Will I watch Season 2 if itâs renewed? Yes. There are a lot of things I wish I could change, but the one thing that the show did (relatively) well is create a multitude of characters that were easy to love in different ways and I *want* to know what happens to them next. So, hopefully, weâll all get to have our weekly freak out moments again next TV season. Weâll see. đ¤ˇđźââ���
#roswell nm#roswell new mexico#echo#malex#shoutout to Noah who got screwed over so heâs been left out of the list
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an inexhaustive list of things i love* about "meet the parents":
david throwing this party and continuing his season-long arc of going out of his comfort zone and doing things he wouldnât otherwise want to do, all for patrickâs benefit
âi had to quarantine the camels for a monthâ (in case you ever forget how ridiculously rich this family was once upon a time)
johnnyâs just SO proud of david and how well his relationship is going!
âthere will be tears, even if theyâre just my ownâ thanks, dan, for writing this line knowing full well youâre about to make all of us weep
*i was tempted to say âthings i love and one thing i have incredibly complicated feelings about,â but that just wasnât as catchy. but honestly i donât love johnny outing patrick to his parents. i donât. i probably yelled âoh noâ at my laptop about fifteen times during this scene. i donât love it and it will forever break my heart a little bit when i watch it. BUT. i also understand why you might choose to write it this way, and i love the places it leads. without giving david a reason to confront patrick about whether or not his parents know about them, you donât have that whole conversation in patrickâs apartment. in an ideal world, thatâs a discussion that would happen in a different episode, but if youâre going to try to tackle all of this in one go, there has to be a way into that particular conversation. if you think about the episode without johnny making what was really an honest mistake, david has no reason to panic and therefore no reason to tell patrick his parents are coming, they donât have their conversation about patrickâs fears and we donât get david aware that he needs to at least initially play it cool at the party, and in an episode where that doesnât happen, then patrick shows up to the party, where david is expecting that his parents already know about them, david probably leans in to give him a big ol birthday kiss or something right in front of his parents, and any agency patrick could have had goes entirely out the window. and even if david doesnât do that, patrick is put in a place where he has no time to prepare for the conversation he obviously is going to have with them; it turns it into something much more immediate and stressful and uncomfortable, and no one wants that. so if youâre going to go this route that patrickâs parents donât know about their relationship, you have to have a way for patrick to know theyâll be there in advance so that he can choose if this is the situation in which he wants to come out to them and have time to work through that himself. so you have to have that conversation in his apartment, which means you have to give david a reason to tell him his parents are there in the first place. so while iâll never love this scene itself, i can appreciate why you would choose this as the way into the rest of the episode, and i love the space it provides for important conversations to be had, for david to be so fiercely protective of patrick and his ability to actively choose whether or not to do this now, and for patrick to regain control he otherwise might not have had over such a personal moment. like i said, iâve got [long and] complicated feelings about it lol.
alexis literally putting her foot down
johnny full-on sprinting to the cafe to correct his mistake. he at least took what he did very seriously and tried to start fixing it as soon as possible
âromantically in business with each otherâ âewâ
david talks to patrickâs parents on the phone at the store. thatâs real cute. even if they didnât know. (and i think thatâs a fairly valid reason for why david would assume they knew without patrick expressly saying so. who puts their parents on the phone with their business partner???)
FLOWERS! he brought patrick a big beautiful bouquet of flowers for his birthday. heâs so sweet, and i love him.
noahâs acting. noahâs acting. NOAHâS ACTING!
that little hnng patrick does after he says he knows his parents are good people. it breaks my entire fucking heart
this whole conversation is SO REAL. so real. like i canât think about it without tearing up. itâs what makes this episode what it is. itâs important and beautiful and respectful and resonant, and iâll forgive the setup that got us here because it gave us this.
davidâs mm mm mm mm mm as he wraps patrick in his arms
that david never once thinks patrick hasnât said anything because heâs ashamed of him
the fucking closet joke in the middle of this conversation, GOD
the offer to be just his business partner if thatâs what patrick needs
patrickâs smile thinking about telling his parents about david
all these touches and kisses and hugs. so. much. intimacy.
david groaning and taking a big deep breath on the walk to the brewersâ motel room. heâs so nervous. he wants so badly to fix this for patrick
âoh no i very much amâ he isnât apologizing for their relationship. he isnât sorry to love patrick
âand... itâs his birthdayâ that little bit of pleading made me sob
wiping away the tear. dan levy, i hate you.
johnny still trying to fix it. heâs a good dad. heâs such a good dad.
â75 for one, 150 for the pairâ
clint kissing marcyâs temple just before patrick arrives at the party
moira still says happy birthday, despite david just telling them all that theyâre saying surprise
âi thought you guys were out of townâ âwell we areâ theyâre cute! theyâre a cute family, and i love every one of them
every single time david calls them mr and mrs brewer makes me smile so hard
HE WORE THAT SWEATER. he wore that sweater knowing full well that the power of love made this party, that it saved this party. that his love for patrick and clint and marcyâs love for patrick were going to make this the night it needed to be. how can you not believe in the power of love after that? hell, iâd proclaim it on my sweater at that point, too.
clint giving davidâs arm a squeeze
the way david reassures patrick theyâll get through this together and his soothing little thumb rubs on patrickâs shoulders
the worldâs tiniest i love you (my new 100% favorite moment of the entire show)
marcy the overenthusiastic ally
âdavid is my boyfriend. and iâve never been happier in my life.â my sweet button-faced son!!!!
clint gets teary-eyed, and i could just die
âi like him. i like him a lotâ âme tooâ what a cute moment for patrick, already joking with his parents about loving david!!
âyou will in timeâ patrickâs thinking about their future and iâm never gonna stop screaming
SLOW DANCING AND NECK KISSES
patrick knows. iâm so glad that itâs something that doesnât have to be a secret between them and that he can see how much david tried to make it right for him
the watery way david says âa very messy day.â again, dan levy, i hate you. so much. by which i of course mean i love you for giving us all of this.
love burns brighter than sunshine
DID I MENTION THE SLOW DANCING??
AND THE NECK KISSES???
AND THE SLOW DANCING????!!!!!!!
#i haven't done one of these since rock on#but i had a lot of feelings#and sometimes you just have to write them down to figure them out#especially that complicated bit up there#s5#meet the parents#s5 spoilers#long post
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I havenât actually watched the last season of game of thrones but Iâve certainly seen enough memes and summaries to have a good idea of it
I think people comparing Daenerys to Anakin arenât right in their comparisons
or at least, not based on the arguments Iâve seen which is essentially that Anakinâs fall to the dark side was out of left field and baseless which isnât even an accurate analysis of the prequel trilogy even if you hate them and think theyâre bad
the only similarities Daenerys and Anakin share are that they both started off as victims and both fall to the dark side
differences include:
a) while Daenerys started off as a victim she did eventually gain power and become a leader whereas Anakin began life as a slave and despite becoming physically powerful/powerful in the force he was never a leader and remained a victim/servant until he killed the emperor
b) they had completely different character arcs, Daenerysâ arc was focused on regaining power and breaking abusive cycles both in her own life and on a historical/cultural level until bad writing derailed it, Anakinâs arc was about lack of agency and falling and eventual redemption
c) Daenerys though a series of circumstance involving people pulling away from her and bad writing chose to set her dragon loose on a city as a conqueror, Anakin was manipulated into falling to the dark side by Palpatine and the Jedi on a whole individually and in their creed failed to help or protect him
like Anakin did make terrible choices but everything was set up by Palpatine to make him fall from orchestrating the war pushing him to ethical and emotional limits to portraying himself as an advisor concerned for Anakinâs welfare whose advice actually isolated him from his fellow Jedi to ultimately setting up Anakinâs choice between light and dark to be between saving Mace Windu who had never liked or respected him and saving Palpatine who claimed to have knowledge to save the wife he loved, there was no choice, Palpatine would have always manipulated circumstances so that Anakin would fall
d) Daenerys had no set up to her fall to the dark side and family history of madness doesnât count, Anakin had 3 movies setting things up for his fall and if you think it was abrupt you werenât paying attention, in the first movie they set up how the Jedi wonât ever quite accept Anakin, the potential he has for falling to the dark side, and how Palpatine will have an eye on him to manipulate him going forward
So yeah, Daenerys got shafted in the finale season and people compared it to the prequel trilogy because everyone thinks theyâre bad, but Anakinâs fall actually had time and effort put into it not to mention completely different circumstances between the two charactersâ fall
it even shows in how they died with Daenerys being killed by Jon killing her character arc (and also misogynist) whereas Anakin sacrificed himself to save his son and satisfying his character arc
#the prequels aren't as bad as you think they are#Anakin Skywalker#daenerys targaryen#I have watched a few seasons of GOT and a few of the books
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Even tho the writing is sloppy, I feel like they should remember to never take anything the characters says at face value. Like you said, when people use the âIâm not here to be queen of ashesâ excuse, they forget that Tyrion was the first to say it (advice: pls watch that scene). So when she said it, it felt empty and insincere to me. Visual storytelling is also important, there was a thunderstorm in the background when she talked about Viserys burning KL if he had 3 dragons
You and me nonny might read into it, and I think there is a WHOLE bunch of people that saw Danyâs arc coming, but a lot of the GA is well.........not that critical of thinkersÂ
Dany has been a fan favorite since season 1. A lot of that has to do with her freeing the slaves etc. (but that was in s3, so her support started before), or for women the fact that she was an abuse survivor who regained her agency, but i also feel like a solid faction of her support (re: freefolk for example) has more to do with the fact that she used to show her breasts a lot and shes young and pretty with cool ass dragons. Just reading their discussions, seeing how they talk about other female characters, and reading their âtheoriesâ, I really dont think they were as interested in her as a complex, thought provoking character like you or I. They werenât thinking about how GRRM wrote her as a philosophical warning on the dangers of willful ignorance, imperialism, and power.
So for that part of the fandom, which makes up a good chunk, I think it needed to be spelled out more explicitly bc as long as there were some positive scenes to point to theyâd disregard or justify any hints or darker aspects of her character. Like those âqueen of ashesâ scenes for example. They needed those debates on her character - with examples - to happen on screen, not just implied by âim worried for herâ. They needed to be shown and hear why. Lead a horse to water and all that.Â
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VLD1x02 â âFrom Days of Long Agoâ
1x02 â âFrom Days of Long Agoâ
(Note: With the large amount of characterization/Lion-lore in this episode, the following is kind of long.)
With the second episode, we get the actual opening sequence. The sequence that never changes at all despite significant changes in the show that should have resulted in it being revised (the Lion pilot switch, Zarkonâs death, the destruction of the Castle of Lions). Itâs good for now, but they really should have changed it, or at least the relevant shots within it as the show changed content.
The group bickers a bit during the descent to the planetâs surface, most notably Lance and Keith, until Shiro, again demonstrating his authority to be leader of the group, tells everyone to focus. Shiro uses appropriate team management skills by recognizing the division of labor and asks Lance, in his capacity as pilot, where theyâre heading. Lance canât help getting in another joke before turning back to being serious.
We arrive at the Castle of Lions. Shiro, ever the protector, advises caution. The Blue Lion roars open the Castleâs doors. The Castle eventually reacts, saying âHold for identity scan.â This is very much a minor complaint but how does the Castleâs systems know English? Space shows with aliens all have this issue; sometimes shows handwave it with a quick line or moment about the use of technology or other methods allowing for instantaneous translation, but this show gives nothing. If this was my only complaint about this show, everything would be golden. But I still would have liked it addressed, or at least have something that indicated that the producers and writers of this show realized the challenge of language and communication that comes with the setting of a story in space with aliens.
Our team wanders through the Castle until they get to the stasis pods holding Allura and Coran. Allura emerges first, and the first word she speaks is: âFather!â The presence of patriarchy in this show begins early. Her focus on her father is literally the first word we ever hear Allura speak. Lance then canât help himself but to try to flirt with her (learn some timing, man). She doesnât return his interest. Allura does display some prejudice by being disgusted by human ears. Sheâs bound to have seen plenty of non-Alteans before, so why recoil so significantly over someone having slightly different ears than she has? Sheâs really not making the best introduction of herself.
Shiro, the one with any sense, tries to get Allura to recognize that they are as much in the dark about what all is going on as she is, and that they need her to provide answers but are also willing to work with her.
Out comes Coran, and immediately shows himself to be in charge of the department of comic relief on the show. âHow could you do that when Iâve already come at you like this: Ha! Ha! Hai!â I laughed.
Allura introduces her and Coranâs 10,000-year time gap. Having reflected on this detail over the course of watching the show in the past, I think 10,000 years ended up being a ridiculous, overly large time frame. That our major antagonists now (Zarkon, Haggar) are the same as the antagonists from 10,000 years ago, itâs too much.
Flashback to King Alfor, who has a disagreement with Allura over whether they should fight Zarkon. Alfor uses the magic of patriarchy to touch his daughter on the cheek and render her unconscious. Nothing says that, as a father, you love and value your daughter like depriving her of agency and knocking her unconscious indefinitely.
The sides of this conflict are clearly established. Team Voltron, our heroes, and Altea versus Zarkon, Haggar, and the Galra. Haggar introduces herself with her cryptic behavior. Her being cryptic now is okay because this is the beginning of the story, but that behavior from her becomes more and more bothersome, distracting, and disruptive of the development of the narrative the more seasons of the show we get. We then get the introduction of Sendak.
We also have the introduction of the mice, who have more presence and significance in the show than Shiroâs âsignificant otherâ Adam or his last-minute husband ever got.
Lance and Keith continue to bicker, and Shiro again uses his authority to get them stop. I miss Shiro as a leader.
âGood, let them come!â Allura declares. At this early stage of the show, Alluraâs prejudice depicted earlier and this angry, brashness now feel like the show is setting her up to be naĂŻve now but to grow in wisdom as the show progresses. By the end of the show, sheâs not naĂŻve, but sheâs not the beacon of wisdom that it feels like she was supposed to become.
Allura gives the team, and thereby the viewers, a major presentation of the showâs lore. She tells us, âThe Lions choose their pilots. It is a mystical bond and cannot be forced. The quintessence of the pilot is mirrored in his lion. Together they form something greater than science can explain.â This is the establishment of rules on the showâs system; this is a promise the show is making to the viewer that this is how things work. Iâm not personally fond of the mysticism âgreater than scienceâ aspect though, especially since the Lions were built by Alfor and the Alteans of long ago. This lore from Allura, until revealed otherwise later, made me think that some other super ancient and very powerful aliens built the Lions and that the Alteans had only acquired them. How Alfor could build the Lions without understanding how they work defies the nature of the process of engineering and construction. Also, if Alfor created the Lions, then where did their consciousness and personalities come from?
That last line aside though, the premise that the pilot and the Lion mirror one another is intriguing. It creates a narrative framework that allows us to understand the characters through their bonding with their lions.
âThe Black Lion is the decisive head of Voltron. It will take a pilot who is a born leader, and in control at all times. Someone whose men will follow without hesitation. That is why, Shiro, you will pilot the Black Lion.â I do object to the idea that anyone is a âborn leader.â Leadership is a skillset; you learn and practice and grow as a leader. No one is born a leader. That aside, this proclamation cleanly assigns the position of the leader of the group to Shiro (until the show decides to unceremoniously take it from him in later seasons to shove him off to the side as no longer a member of the team). The qualities Allura ascribes here â decisiveness, leadership, self-control â those are all qualities weâve already seen demonstrated by Shiro in the first two episodes of the show. Shiroâs discipline is what gives him the authority to tell Lance and Keith to stop fighting. His decisiveness is what prompts Lance to ask Shiro for orders at the end of the first episode, and it is what enables Shiro to diplomatically manage Alluraâs initial freak-out when she comes out of stasis. Shiro is the leader of this team. The Black Lion says so. (The show never gives us a reason for Shiro to not be in the position of Black Paladin and leader of Voltron despite his removal in later episodes.)
âThe Green Lion has an inquisitive personality and needs a pilot of intellect and daring. Pidge, you will pilot the Green Lion.â And weâve totally seen this in Pidge. Sheâs clearly inquisitive as shown by her constructing her own equipment so that she can gain transmission and observational data from Kerberos toward her goal of busting the GGâs lie about the Kerberos mission. We saw it in this episode in a quick, subtle two-part moment where she first sees the computer interface in the stasis pod room, expresses a wonder how it works, and then, once Allura activates and uses the terminal, declares, âThatâs how that works.â Itâs a small moment, but itâs one of Pidgeâs in the first three episodes that really gets to me. Itâs not just about intelligence for her, but also curiosity. Also identified in this proclamation is the need for daring in the Green Paladin. Thatâs definitely a quality we see very prominently in later episodes, sometimes much to my annoyance (because in those moments it makes Pidge incredibly short-sighted).
âThe Blue LionâŚâ Alluraâs interrupted. Lance makes a declaration of his own. Heâs cocky. Alluraâs annoyed and moves on without providing a description for the Blue Lionâs preferred qualities. This gap in the lore is never actually filled in, so we, as viewers, can only ever make suppositions ourselves. I wonder if the Blue Lion might like what we got from Lance in this very moment. Rather than allow Allura to make a proclamation about his qualities, Lance engages in an act of self-definition. With Lanceâs story arc (at least before this show ceased to understand its characters) set up as him struggling with his sense of self-worth in light of the skills and reputation of others, I could see the Blue Lion with a value of self-determination as setting Lance up to come to terms with his insecurities through the process of self-definition.
âThe Yellow Lion is caring and kind. Its pilot is one who puts the needs of others above his own. His heart must be mighty. As the leg of Voltron, you will lift the team up and hold them together.â This makes it seem the show is setting Hunk up to function as best able to ensure the team remains unified or regains unity in stressful, fractious situations. It also suggests Hunk can be self-sacrificial, with placing othersâ needs above his own. Unfortunately, Iâm not sure any of this ever really manifests narratively for Hunk as the show goes on. Maybe in a few, smaller moments here and there, but never anything narratively significant. While the show does retain Hunkâs skill with engineering/technology, I mostly feel heâs reduced to an ongoing joke about food. Thereâs nothing wrong with loving food, of course, but that should be a comparatively minor detail in defining Hunkâs character. Most of the description associated with him proclaimed here feels forgotten/lost as the show goes on.
âThe Red Lion is temperamental and the most difficult to master. Itâs faster and more agile than the others, but also more unstable. Its pilot needs to be someone who relies more on instincts than skill alone.â Keithâs the hothead, the aggressive one. Yup, definitely have seen that in him so far. The declaration that Red is difficult to master implies that Keith has an aspect of himself that he isnât in control of, part of himself that he hasnât mastered yet. The problem with the show abandoning the lore that there are qualities each Lion expects of its pilot is that Keith no longer has to master himself as part of being the Red Paladin. Lance replacing Keith in Red does not connect Lance to the qualities ascribed here. It also invalidates the idea that Lance in Blue is about self-determination; rather than finding his own value, Lance always remains a substitute to Keith â he only got into the fighter pilot program because Keith was no longer in it, and he only got into the Red Lion because Keith was no longer in it. Keith in Red was about him learning to harness himself, to hone his instincts (aka his wildness) and find mastery over himself. Any of that kind of character growth happens for him offscreen and never as a result of his piloting the Red Lion.
The team splits up to track down and acquire the other Lions. The Green Lion is in some jungle environment. There is a really nice peacefulness to this location. âIâve been locked up by aliens for a year. This is nothing,â Shiro says. I love this line. Shiro has been through some severely traumatic events in the past year, so his calmness here in the face of an expedition to another planet, itâs all good to him. Can someone let Shiro have two weeks of vacation on this planet please?
Lance and Hunk have less easy of a time getting Yellow. Lance literally throws Hunk out of Blue, further demonstrating Lance as being an instigating influence. We saw that in how he was responsible for the group coming together in the first place. I love Hunkâs little monologue while heâs trying to hotwire the platform: âOh yeah sure, just drop me off on an alien planet. Thatâs cool. Itâs only occupied by big, mean, purple aliens that want to kill me, but whatever. Just ignore them and go connect with a big, yellow, mechanical cat.â This is a moment of Hunkâs voice acting that I really love. The sarcasm, the quick-fire delivery. Itâs fun.
Shiroâs retelling of Commander Holtâs comment, âIf you get too worried about what can go wrong, you might miss a chance to do something greatâ is so nice. Shiroâs so supportive. Can I have one of him in my life please? The quiet calmness of Shiroâs voice in this part is so nice; I could listen to him talk like that all day long.
Lance ends up in a precarious situation and Hunk and the Yellow Lion come to the rescue, though apparently by accident. Conveniently, Alluraâs ability to hold the wormholes open begins to fade just as the Lions are acquired. Also conveniently, theyâve located Red. Inconveniently, Sendak issues his threat. How does communication systems for the Castle Ship work? Sendak establishes communications and makes his demand without anyone in the ship having to activate the system; really?
Part two of what functions as a three-parter complete.
#voltron legendary defender#voltron#vld#voltron criticism#vld criticism#voltron critical#vld critical#vld season 1#vld 1x02#commentary
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Thoughts about Spn 13x22
SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!
This was⌠an episode. I donât really have an opinion on it. It wasnât bad but it wasnât outstanding either. And strangely enough I got the feeling that not much happened. Or rather the things that did happen were to be expected at this point in story. The one thing however that I noticed is that Bucklemming still have a problem with the pacing. And something that keeps happening with all of their episodes, that I never noticed with any other writer, is that their episodes always feel incredible long, and despite the fact that they try to cram in as much plot/characters as they can at times also incredible boring. Or maybe it is the fact that most of the screentime went to Lucifer, doing what he likes best, talking about himself, but somehow I couldnât warm up with this episode.
The other thing I noticed is that we end the episode in a relatively happy place. The family is reunited, everyone is safe in the bunker. Last year the penultimate episode ended with a Winchester family hug. We all remember however how season 12 ended, so if there is a pattern to be seen, 13x23 will leave us in tears. Iâm scared.
Until then though letâs have a closer look at this weekâs episode.
Make Room For Daddy
The meeting between Lucifer and Jack has been inevitable all season long. And though Lucifer has been the one actively looking for his son it makes sense that Jack has an interest in meeting his father as well. So far he has only heard stories but he wants to form his own opinion. Naturally Sam, Dean and Cas want to avoid this. They know that if anything Lucifer has his way with words and can be very convincing. We have seen in the past the way he was able to bring several people to say âyesâ to him. But with trying to keep Jack away from Lucifer they only play into his cards. Lucifer portrays himself as the victim, the way he always did, and by trying to keep Jack away from his father they confirm this story. I think that Mary, who by now has spent several months with Jack, is right here. It is impossible to keep Lucifer from Jack, and Jack has a right to get to know his father after all. She trusts Jack however to come to his own conclusion about the true nature of Lucifer. Mary knows Jack, knows his good heart, and that Jack in time will see right through Lucifer.
One of the problems is that Sam, Dean, Cas and Gabriel tell Jack how truly evil Lucifer is, but they leave it at this very vague point, without giving him concrete examples. Lucifer has (seemingly) killed Gabriel, killed Cas, tried to kill Kelly, has tortured and abused both Sam and Rowena, and of course killed the later even twice. Iâm sure I forgot something, but the point is does Jack know about this? Did they sanitize the stories about Lucifer for Jack, keeping them as vague as possible? Because somehow I doubt Jack would have had an interest in talking to him if he knew about all of this.
I also think we can officially stop worrying about Lucifer getting a redemption arc. There are quite a few characters who did get a redemption arc this season: Ketch, Gabriel, Rowena. What they all have in common is their will to change. Ketch redeemed himself in the other world, risking his own life to help strangers. Both Gabriel and Rowena stopped running away, both stopped acting selfish. And that is exactly what Lucifer is incapable of doing. The entire time he only talks about himself. He never shows responsibility for his actions. Instead he blames humanity, who in his eyes is flawed and weak, and asked to be corrupted. He blames his father. He plays the victim because that is the only role he knows.
In the end it is Gabriel who tells him who he truly is. Someone incapable of love and empathy, a cancer cell that ruined humanity forever. We see that Gabrielâs words do affect Lucifer; he starts crying. But by the end of the episode he once again proves that he has learned nothing. He is willing to let Michael destroy another world, not caring about the humans in it, just to be reunited with his son. And it shows that he doesnât know a single thing about his son either, because all Jack wants is to keep these people save that Lucifer has now doomed.
Speaking of Michael I still wonder what his goal here is. Does he want to destroy another world? What for? I hope the season finale will give us an answer what Michael really wants. The only way I see Jack working together with Lucifer is also because the two together could be powerful enough to kill Michael. Â But will they? Say we get Michael!Dean that could be a reason why Jack wonât kill Michael yet, because he would kill Dean as well. To be honest I rather see Lucifer gone and Michael as the big bad next season.
And then of course there is also heavenâs current situation that will play a role in the next season. Cas suggested Gabriel as a new leader, but it is possible AU!Michael will be in charge next season. He and Jack are the only two powerful enough to create new angels (besides God, but I wouldnât count on him). The question though is not the power but the âhowâ. Itâs not that a manual for creating new angels is lying around.
I am also not surprised that we saw Gabriel dying again. Iâm still not sure why they brought him back in the first place to be honest. His entire arc has been in the end very similar to how his story once seemingly ended in season 5. He stopped running away, took humanityâs side, faced one of his brothers, and paid with his own life, all to help the Winchesters. It is a repeat of his season 5 storyline (minus the torture & abuse), but then again so much about the apocalypse world is a parallel to season 5 and especially 5x04. So much that even Sam & Dean said âWeâve been where you are. Hell, we are youâ. We will always end up here.
There must be some kind of way outta here
Right at the beginning of the episode Sam and Dean have to face a moral conflict they havenât really thought about yet: the fate of the people in the apocalypse world. Until now their plan was to get Mary and Jack and bring them back to our world. What they didnât consider was the fact that by now both Mary and Jack have become part of the resistance, found their purpose in that other world and are not willing to leave their friends behind.
Because I have already seen some hate towards Mary for her decision to stay: she doesnât act selfish, rather the opposite. She gives up the chance to be reunited with her sons because she couldnât live with herself if she would abandon the people she fought with over the past months. She gives up her own chance of happiness in order to help others. Which is basically what Sam & Dean have been doing their entire life. Giving up their own chance to live a normal life, to be safe, so that others can.
It is interesting then how different Dean & Sam react. Because Dean is tired of giving up, tired of sacrifices. And we canât blame him. This season alone he has lost Cas, his mother, Jack, and minutes ago Sam. He sees everything they have lost and it doesnât match up. This is also another instance of want vs need. Dean says they need Mary, but the truth is that they donât. They are no longer children and they have lived the biggest part of their lives without a mother. He wants his mother, and that is the difference. Wanting something or someone for your own, acting selfish for once, is not a bad thing, at least not for Dean, who always prioritized everyone elseâs needs over his own. It is okay that he for once wants something for himself.
Sam on the other side sees Maryâs perspective. He has been the one suffering the most under her loss, finding her was his win. He should be devastated to learn that she doesnât want to leave, yet he comes up with a plan. (And you can see Dean doing the maths, coming to the conclusion that with so many people in the bunker, he has to share a bed with Cas now, there is no other way) Overall this has been a positive episode for Sam. Dean takes the blame from him for bringing Lucifer to the camp, telling him there is nothing to apologize for. And he regains some agency towards Lucifer, as he is the one in the end making sure Lucifer wonât come back with them. He also for once wore some nice clothes, so thatâs another bonus. And he got to hug Charlie, before he remembered that she doesnât know him, resulting in one of the cutest Sam scenes we have seen lately.
The other thing that by now was kinda inevitable was that we would see an alternative version of Cas. There had been already some speculation after 13x18 if one of the angels we saw could have been Cas, but it makes sense that Cas has the same vessel, given that Jimmy Novak was a devout man. However⌠the accent. Which I honestly donât get? Why would this Cas speak with another accent than our Cas? My first thought was that he sounded Russian, but the term that I have seen the most on my dash by now is âNazi Casâ (which basically means Hitlerâs speaking pattern, with a huge focus on the ârâ because the normal German accent doesnât sound like that). So maybe the accent was used that we would associate the angels in the other world with Nazis? Making a political statement as the US becomes more right-winged every day. I would love to know if this was mentioned in the script or if it was Mishaâs choice. Still, I think they could have done without the accent. Different outfit, different behaviour, we would have already knew that this wasnât our Cas. And remember 4x20? Within seconds we knew it wasnât Cas talking to Sam & Dean. Misha is a good enough actor that he can do without the accents.
What I love is that they did keep consistent with the AU characters. Bobby and Charlie are pretty much the same as the ones from our world, because the Winchesters didnât influence them as much. Bobby was already a hunter when he met them (and John), Charlie was always a rebel. Kevin and Cas however were influenced a great deal by Sam and Dean. Cas has fallen in every way imaginable, has rebelled against his angelic family and chosen the Winchesters as his new family time and time again. However we did learn in 8x21 that Cas has always been a rebel, that he never did as he was told. He has never been in fact a perfect soldier. But in that episode we also learned that Naomi brainwashed him multiple times and it is possible that exactly this happened in the other world. Cas was always a rebel, but it took Sam & Dean for him to finally break free from heaven.
The one line that stood out to me was AU Cas saying âDonât think you are better than meâ in reference to Cas supporting humanity. Which is odd considering most angels see humans as weak and flawed. So why would AU Cas think of our Cas as someone above him, knowing our Cas is helping humanity? Is it possible that AU Cas was jealous of our Cas? That he wished he could have been strong enough to step away from heaven as well, to help the humans in his world? I like to believe that AU Cas had some rebellious nature as well, but that centuries of brainwashing resulted in the cold torture machine that we saw.
And AU Cas torturing Charlie by invading her mind mirrors of course the scene where our Cas does the same with the traitor in the camp. The only difference is that our Cas stopped before the damage would be too much. But looking back at 13x14 we know how far he is willing to go to protect the people he loves. AU Cas says they are the same, and in some ways they are. They are both ruthless when it comes to their individual cause. In the end however Cas killing the other version of him, the angelic soldier Cas, was a huge metaphor for Cas killing his old self. Not subtle but nevertheless satisfying.
And that is all for this week. So long and good night.
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Lotor?
ngl, i squealed when i saw this. i get to talk about My Boy!!!
thank you for the ask
(send me characters and iâll give thoughts on them!)
general opinion: fall in a hole and die | donât like them | eh | theyâre fine I guess | like them! | love them | actual love of my life
sorry, anti-lotor half of the vld fandom, but i love this guy to pieces and nothing yâall say can change that because 1. yâallâs attempts at critically saying heâs Bad are poorly done imo lmao, 2. iâm not so preoccupied with morality and purity culture that i stick my thumbs in my ears and try to shove plugs into other pplâs ears, and 3. opinions are subjective.
like personally, i love complex characters set up as parallels and foils to major protagonists that are inherently anti-imperialist, archaeologists, and conservationists; are representative of a not-so-palatable reality of abuse survivorship; have issues of trauma, paranoia, and interpersonal defeatism; and are clearly being set up for a future arc that will be closely intertwined with said major protagonistsâas well as driven by a deep, internal conviction and strength that has persisted against absolutely ridiculous oddsâ
but idk. your loss, i guess.
hotness level: get away from me | meh | neutral | theoretically hot but not my type | pretty hot | gorgeous! | 10/10 would bang
aesthetically: gorgeous. but i am very ace.
hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff
donât harangue me for not calling lotor a slytherin in case you support that side lol, but i read a really good meta on this a while ago that i agreed with here.
(gonna put the rest of this under a readmore since this gets to be A Lot.)
essentially, one of lotorâs core traits is the search for knowledge and scientific advancement for its own sake. thereâs no way he doesnât love learningâhe spent centuries studying a culture that was extinct, a culture that by any imperialistic measures was worthless and weak because it opposed the empire and it was destroyed. one could hardly believe he began searching for the last remnants of altea for power or ambition. he studied them because he wanted to, for the sake of it, to connect to something thatâs part of him.
in a lot of ways, he does exemplify slytherin traitsâhe can be exceptionally ruthless when he believes he or things/people he cares about are threatened, he is unusually preoccupied with a need for power and control, and his goals could be considered lofty and ambitious. however, much of these traits and desires can easily be linked to his trauma. one might make an argument that heâs still similar enough to honerva to qualify as a slytherin, but personally i think the story sets him up as opposing haggar without hypocrisy in too many ways to be persuaded.
(honerva wanted to continue her research despite the risks, endangering an entire planet and potentially the universe, because she saw the research as empowering. she saw her researchâher own ambitionsâas more important than anything else, and abandoned ethics like some burdensome shackle. but lotor is seen multiple times as unwilling to endanger people and planets for his goals without either being reasonably assured of their survival (such as voltron) or their consent. he despises cruelty and the taking away of othersâ agency.)
in an ideal world, i think lotor would be an obvious ravenclaw. but his trauma has encouraged him to act like a slytherin.
best quality:
superficially: HIS NERDINESS. as soon as lotor started talking about ancient ruins, learning other culturesâ customs, and rattled off an entire poem he memorized off some old-ass cave wall he probably saw like 3 centuries before, i was absolutely done for. i had been trying to maintain my skepticism of him for skepticismâs sake, but god. you canât just throw a goddamn archaeologist in my face and expect me to not fall deeply in love.
more seriously: i love lotorâs conviction. lotor has a strong sense of self, morality, and personal drive, especially for someone with his experiences.
he accepts and embraces both sides of his heritage as defining parts of who he is. in an empire that despises altean blood, he wields an altean broadsword, spends centuries studying whatâs left of the culture, and openly admires the peace, people, and traditions of altea past. and in a castle of paladins and alteans, he demands to be judged âby [his] actions, rather than [the] preconceptions of [his] race,â knowing full well that team voltron perceives him as galra, and failing to inform them of his altean blood despite the clear benefits that wouldâve come from doing so.
he has a code of conduct thatâs repeatedly shown in sharp contrast to the ideals of the empireâeven from his very introduction, when he stands in front of an entire arena of galran soldiers and refuses to compromise his own morals for a more rhetorically effective argument. lotorâs small, four-person team of generals (compared to the typical galran fleet) seizes an entire planet while killing no one and causing virtually no destruction.
he is also incredibly self-motivated. lotor has lived for centuries relying almost completely on himself, and he will ruthlessly protect himself and his own.
his inner strength is ridiculously admirable, and i love his self-assurance.
worst quality:
idk? usually ppl say flaws or some such here, but the problem is that flaws are more complicated than just âthey do dumb things because of this adjective.â
also i love flaws. theyâre born of the essence that makes a character who they are. hating their flaws is ridiculous.
with that saidâŚâŚ..
fucking hate lotorâs hair. seriously, wtf? he can tuck all of it into his helmet and have it all fall back out nice and neatly. HOW. itâs the biggest lie of the entire show alongside alluraâs bun. itâs just not possible and i hate that lotor defying reality just to look beautiful is Canon.
his butt cape. like akjhdkhgkghjgk,,, a genuine BUTT CAPE. for what purpose?? preference??? drama???????? iâve seen comparisons to honervaâs own butt cape back when she was a normal empress-consort scientist on daibazaal, which makes sense since lotor loves making Fashion Statements, but god. a butt cape.
what on godâs heavenly green earth is up with his swordsmanship? the acrobatics and the flourishing are positively ridiculous. who the fuck actually tries killing a powerful emperor and their abuser by smashing them from above with a purple final fantasy sword like theyâre the hammer and zarkon is a nail. lotor is unrealistic.
ship them with:
:)
recovery and happiness.
brotp them with:
his generals. DUH. itâs clear that theyâve had a strong history together, and itâs impossible to have their relationship end here without any sort of resolution or confrontation about nartiâs death. let them reunite under conciliatory terms. let them be friends again. (and let sincline return.)
allura for sure!!! their relationship development has been beautiful so far and i want to see that continue.
coran. theyâre both Nerds. plus, one of them got to experience a full and long life on altea. let them talk.
the paladins in general. it might be difficult, slow-going, and hesitant/full of suspicion on both sides, but godâjust imagine if they were friendly. (plus it would do worlds of good for lotor. heâs a lonely man, and it would even more clearly distance him from comparisons to zarkon.)
the blade of marmora (and keith). the show has said nothing so far, but i refuse to believe that in the past centuries, lotor and the blade have never interacted or crossed paths before. i can imagine why they wouldâve been uninterested in alliance with each other, but i can also imagine what would make each appeal greatly to the other. let them interact. (as for keith, he and lotor have a lot of similarities. itâs real funny how similar allura, keith, and lotor all are to each other, really. hm.)
needs to stay away from:
haggar. sheâs fake as hell and evil to boot. some ppl think that sheâs reawakened some kind of dormant love in her for lotor after regaining more memories in s5, but thatâs far from the case. someone whoâs become and lived as she has for 10,000 years doesnât suddenly care well about someone sheâs abused horribly because she realizes she gave birth to them, and doesnât suddenly become sympathetic in the good way because sheâs âmotherlyâ now. (not if the writingâs supposed to be decent, anyway.) she realizes lotorâs about to die and does absolutely nothing else except turn on the magic shiro television in her lab. she only finds out after the black bayard exchange has already happened, and sheâs haggar. if she really wanted to stop what was happening, she couldâve done a lot more than just watch through shiroâs eyes. sheâs a horrible person, folks, and lotor would do best to never see her again. (unfortunately, itâs much more likely that she will fuck his shit up some more next season. rip.)
zarkon. hopefully he actually stays dead this time, but iâve seen some good points on how sketchy his ability to stay dead is. nevertheless, all memory of him deserves to be banished to the nether realms. lotor should never have to deal with that assholeâs legacy again.
misc. thoughts:
anyone who talks about lotor getting/not getting/deserving/not deserving a redemption arc makes me lose my shit because he hasnât even done anything to warrant a redemption arc in the first place like tbfh. evil deeds whomst?? trying to kill voltron when?? where are these receipts of malice??? heâs never done an evil damn thing but yâall humoring the concept anyway. smh.
anyway, lotor needs a therapist, healing, and some good fucking friends. @dreamworks give lotor a recovery arc 2k18.
#luanna801#ask#voltron#voltron meta#lotor#prim post#i talk a fucking lot about one of my favorite boys#in regards to the :)#i am trying to avoid siccing the tumblr shipping demons on myself#sorry
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