#I tried rewatching the 90s anime when I watched the live action the first time and couldn't get through it | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sirenalpha · 3 years ago

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Part 2 to this post

Before we start discussing the RK adaptations, I want to note that we’re basically only talking about two men who made them, Kazuhiro Furuhashi directed the anime and all three OVAs (though they all had different writers) and Keishi Ōtomo directed and wrote the live action adaptations

I’m also working off mostly fan translations so grain of salt compared to analyzing English language material

Anime

first things first, I am naturally biased against anime because I read faster than watching so I prefer to read the manga and I don’t like filler so it has to have really good animation to be worth it and the RK anime does not

I’m also not going to address the filler arcs in this post, I shouldn’t have to explain myself past the Feng Shui zombies but I’m also ignoring it because I’m trying to focus on what was adapted from the manga and not new stuff because this is a tumblr post

that said, the anime is the best adaptation when it comes to Kaoru of RK and that’s super sad because the anime has a lot of problems generally speaking and because it doesn’t actually change anything major about Kaoru’s arc in the first 2/3rds of the manga

maybe it’s just the dub (yes I watched the dub it’s from 90s and I first watched it in the 00s you find subs) but like whatever issues I had with the manga’s shonen-ness, the anime leans into it more and is extremely 90s anime like having Kenshin walk in on Kaoru in the tub even though it’s set in the goddamn 1870s and it kinda warps everyone’s personality towards the goofy and selfish in some respects with the filler warping them further

but in the Tokyo arc they do try to have her be more involved (after making her faint after the first fight against Hiruma rather than having Kenshin fake a groin injury then run off with her) like she tries to rescue Yahiko and she to Kanryuu’s mansion in the anime when she doesn’t in the manga and it also showed her as physically stronger than in the manga

and they don’t change much in the Kyoto Arc, just keeping it as it is in the manga though they do go for a little more drama like with Kenshin’s fight with Saitou and his departure for Kyoto

so I consider those early changes good but superficial and kinda countered by the anime’s tone, like it’s nice Kaoru is more involved as it speaks better to her abilities and also her morals in terms of how much she’s willing to involve herself to help people (though it’s limited by the 90s anime warping) but she’s still kidnapped by Jin-E and she’s still not shown to be that effective as a fighter compared to Kenshin and Sano and even Yahiko down the line

but it doesn’t deal with the biggest issues concerning her character arc and the themes of the series as it never gets to the Jinchuu Arc so I can’t say if they might have tried to fix things in terms of trying to let her fight more or something like that but even if it was the same as the manga that probably would have been better than the adaptations we have gotten for that arc

OVA

the less said about Reflection the better, nobody comes out of that OVA looking good whether you’re talking about any of the characters or any of the people that worked on it, maybe we were expecting too much from director that gave us Feng Shui zombies but that’s only his own fault for making Trust and Betrayal so good and of course Kaoru can’t be part of the good OVA

anyways, I’m basing this off memory as I refuse to rewatch this shit and you can’t make me, but Kaoru doesn’t do anything, like there’s brief flashbacks to Jinchuu but she doesn’t do anything in Jinchuu to begin with in the manga and Reflection doesn’t fix it, she marries Kenshin, and has Kenji at some point, and from then on out is basically a doormat, like she who chased after Kenshin to Kyoto and spent all her time trying to get him to stay in the manga lets him wander off to get a deadly STD then asks him to infect her with it for some reason and then just waits around for Kenshin to get back to die in her arms, pretty sure she never picks up a bokken the entire OVA

nobody asked for that, nobody liked it, and we all pretend we’ve never heard of it for good reason because whoever those characters were they were not the ones from the manga

but it somehow still has an edge over the New Kyoto Arc in two ways

first, its animation is still good even if I think the eyes in that art style are super freaky

second, Reflection at least had a point to being made and a reason to watch, everyone wanted to see Jinchuu animated, we didn’t really get it and it was a depressing shit show, but at least there was a point

there was no point in making the New Kyoto Arc, it was literally too cheap and too short to even be worth the attempt and effort and I think we all would like to apologize to the animators for having their efforts wasted like that

and Kaoru’s only good in it on account of it not being Reflection where may I remind you she asks Kenshin to infect her with a deadly STD

Kaoru honestly doesn’t have much of anything to do with the plot on account of them deciding to give more weight to Misao as she’s the new character for the arc, like they have Kaoru and Yahiko visit Hiko so people know who he is when he shows up against the giant later, but it’s completely meaningless because they’re not the ones that need to see Hiko, Kenshin is, and Kenshin literally never talks to him in the OVA

And because Kenshin isn’t the one meeting Hiko, they set Kenshin and Kaoru meeting together again at a lamplit road in Kyoto which sure is a romantic atmosphere and I think it was meant to be a scene that draws the audience into watching, but I feel like something is lost in the relationship when Kenshin says he’s angry she came but doesn’t sound or look angry and also doesn’t refuse to look at her while he’s walking away when he says it like in the manga

I feel like that scene in the manga was underutilized in their relationship in terms of making it a believable romance as it’s never brought up or addressed again to resolve it and have them get closer for it, it’s just ignored and forgotten, and the OVA does the opposite of attempting to improve it

as for fighting, Kaoru is shown with a bokken, but only holding it over unconscious goons not actually fighting with it, and like I said they decided to keep Hiko fighting the giant despite Hiko having no connection to Kenshin really in this OVA and all Kaoru gets is kicked into a building and then she’s just there in the wall for the rest of the scene, and obviously the entire high point of the manga, her fight with Kamatari, is totally removed

also in the manga, it felt like Misao and Kaoru had an actual friendship because they liked each other, but in the OVA they’re like suspicious of each other and Misao’s like I guess I’ll have to trust you since Himura does which I guess comes of the time constraints but it felt weird to literally just shove Kenshin in the middle of their relationship and I did not like it

Live Action

boy does this director hate Kaoru, I honestly think I would have preferred he just cut her out entirely than make her incidental and then have her get with Kenshin anyways like I stg she’s just there for fanservice like kenkao is only happening because he believes he needs to do shallow facsimiles of major moments in the manga like they’re little tokens he has to pay in order to get to do what he wants

and Kaoru is incidental in the movies, she could be entirely removed from the series without changing the overall narrative for a shorter run time and improved narrative flow

the first sign of this is the fact that she is not the second introduced character in the movie

the list of characters introduced before her in the movie include:

Saitou, Jin-E, Kanryuu, the oniwabanshu, and Megumi

all of whom are more minor characters than Kaoru and includes one who doesn’t even show up until the second arc in the manga

they’re all considered more significant to the movie than Kaoru to the point of choosing to introduce them before her

like regardless of how Kaoru ended the manga and regressed as a character, there are in fact reasons she starts the manga and not anybody else and it has nothing to do with being the love interest for Kenshin which the director entirely forgets

first, she creates the inciting incident where Kenshin chooses to stay even if he means for it to be temporary

second, the first thing they do after Kenshin rescues her (so the third scene in the whole manga) is discuss her and her father’s sword style and Kenshin telling her not to get herself killed to protect an ideology NOT Kenshin’s use of a sakabatou, this shifts the manga’s discussion concerning swords and not killing away from Kenshin’s personal idiosyncrasies and whether or not people think he can change to Kenshin’s not the only one thinking about how to change sword use for the new era and shows that Kenshin knows he only gets away with not killing his opponents due to overwhelming individual strength, this is the start of a discussion that is carried through the rest of the series

and a variation of this scene is in the movie

at like the halfway point when the focus of the movie has already been put on Saitou criticizing Kenshin specifically for not killing

it’s not even connected to other scenes Kaoru is in and it matters when and in what context you put scenes and this is something that they consistently disregard with the scenes Kaoru is in over the course of the movie series

scenes that are adjacent in the manga that serve to build momentum and result in an emotional payoff of some kind are separated out weakening the follow through in addition to changes to the scenes themselves

for example, Kaoru and Kenshin meet (like a quarter of the way into the movie but like whatever) and Kaoru still has a bokken and attacks him for wearing the sakabatou

but it’s in the day time, Jin-E who is standing in for the Hirumas in the movie is not there, there’s no stakes in this meeting, nothing to move the relationship forward, essentially a one off encounter in a bubble

so now that that isolated scene ends with Kenshin and Kaoru and Jin-E separated, they have Kaoru wandering around scenes later and petting a cat so she can be in place for her to stumble upon one of the policemen Jin-E attacked to look for Megumi so Jin-E can spot her and attack her and then have Kenshin come out of nowhere with no explanation to rescue her (instead of the building full of policemen he could have tried saving idk)

and that’s basically every scene they have together in the movies, completely disconnected and watered down in an attempt to make it inoffensive in a new narrative timeline that doesn’t need Kaoru

like they made the Jin-E fight the climax to recreate a kenkao scene but it makes no sense for him to leave to get Kaoru to force a fight with Kenshin…when Kenshin is literally already fighting his employer Kanryuu and the oniwabanshu to rescue Megumi and in the manga Jin-E took Kaoru out of convenience as she was right there trying to get Kenshin not to wander off

either get Kaoru to the mansion so Jin-E freezes her lungs there to recreate the kenkao or don’t bother as Megumi is already there in the position Kaoru was in

and the reason I say that about Megumi is because the only scene with emotional depth Kenshin has is with Megumi right before she leaves to go back to Kanryuu not Kaoru, he even brings up Akria and Tomoe with her

and it continues into the sequels

when Kenshin leaves for Kyoto, their parting happens in daylight again and this may just be translation but Kaoru’s argument for him to stay is that he could be happy here with them rather than fighting Shishio but in the manga she argues Kenshin can come back from being the Battousai if he gets near the edge (a fear he’s expressed to her already) and Kenshin says he can’t trust himself and the argument in the movie feels like much more shallow concerns

like in the manga Kaoru is clearly not saying you have no responsibility in regards to Shishio/defending the new era (which is more Sano’s argument because he thinks no one should do anything for the Meiji government he hates) but that Kenshin doesn’t need to abandon them to do it whereas in the movie it sounds like she is asking him not to take action when he has the ability to defend people and pretend nothing is wrong

and she doesn’t react at all when he leaves, she falls and cries in the manga but just looks kinda confused in the movie and it continues in later scenes with Megumi basically having to tell the audience/Kaoru actually you do give a shit about Kenshin go get him when she’s going about daily life totally normally when Megumi only did that in the manga because Kaoru refused to get out of bed or eat

In the reunion in Kyoto, Kaoru shows up during the Chou fight but there’s a time skip and a flashback before Kenshin gives his line about being half mad and half relieved, like that’s no longer his first reaction to her, he’s had like half a day to think about it like you couldn’t make up your mind by then?

also Shishio kidnaps Kaoru so they can get Kenshin to Hiko and for Kaoru to do nothing in the third movie when that makes no sense for Shishio to care about Kaoru when he knows Kenshin is coming for him and Kenshin should want to see Hiko to finish his training, why does he need to be forced into it?

and it makes it 3 out of 4 movies where Kaoru is kidnapped for the finale which is annoying as hell and also why should we give a shit by the 4th movie when she’s taken by Enishi and her death not even faked, Kenshin has no bsod or character growth so it’s cheap and useless to kidnap her when she hasn’t done anything for an entire movie at this point and barely even saw Kenshin

also they have Kenshin propose to Kaoru in the third movie which annoys the shit out of me as Kaoru was the one to propose to him in the manga, it doesn’t make sense for either of their characters based on the manga

it actively damages the narrative and themes of the movie series to include Kaoru but not care for her or what she brought to the manga’s narrative and so shift her around arbitrarily to do shallow versions of iconic kenkao moments and nothing else

there’s no romantic tension or believability, it removes Kaoru’s development entirely as she literally never changes and just gets dragged around as needed for fanservice, and kneecaps Kenshin’s character arc as there’s basically never the inciting incident from the manga or the final BSOD that is the climax of his character arc due to Kaoru’s absence and complete gutting as a character

like in terms of a fix to make the movie series a better movie series, the easiest thing to do would be to remove Kaoru entirely and make Megumi the love interest, she’s the one that has a personality and actually acts like she loves Kenshin as she repeatedly gets between him and the police and says to kill her first and has the emotional moments in the series with him like the one I pointed out in the first movie and another in the 3rd when Kenshin returns to the dojo

it wouldn’t fix the live action as an adaptation as that wouldn’t fix the everything they did wrong in Kenshin’s character arc, but it would be a better overall product

and then moving from the narrative to specifically discuss how they treat Kaoru as a fighter is I think they gave her shit to make up for trashing her narrative presence and it’s just as shallow as everything else

in the sequels she gets adult students and it’s never addressed or shown how she gets and keeps them as Kenshin tells students off that he’s not going to teach them like in the manga except that they were already learning from Kaoru and they don’t leave after he says that which just makes Kenshin look like an arrogant ass and still doesn’t explain where they came from, Kaoru also magically starts teaching at a fancy academy in the 4th movie when they literally never show her teaching just walking around and observing

Also she takes one whack at Jin-E in the first movie with her bokken and then never fights with it again and not only do they cut the Kamatari fight, they give her a NAGINATA to fight with!!!! I don’t know how many people are familiar with the naginata being considered a woman’s weapon in Japan and the katana a man’s but the director surely knew, Kaoru specifically learning kenjutsu and not naginatajutsu is narratively important because like I’ve said, she needs to know kenjutsu to get that inciting incident going but it’s just as important to her characterization as a tomboy

samurai women learned martial arts that is normal and expected as members of the warrior class

a woman choosing a katana specifically (or a bokken in Kaoru’s case) is going against the grain

it pisses me off so much that they would take that from her after everything else they did to her

I fucking hate the live action movies and they get extra spite compared to the OVAs because at least everyone considers them bad, but the live action is well reviewed and made a lot of money and is credited for raising the interest in live action adaptation of mangas, but they’re bad adaptations and not just for Kaoru, reviews of the series say it respected the source material but they completely fuck up Kenshin’s character arc at every step of the way, how can you claim to respect the source material when you disregard the protagonist like that?

I’m not spending any time on RK adaptations in the future as there’s clearly no reason to believe they’d be any good especially not to Kaoru in addition to them supporting Watsuki, it’s just not worth it

#rurouni kenshin #kaoru kamiya #adaptation #meta #long post #I actually think this is longer than the last one rip me #no wonder it took like a month to do jfc

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newnitz · 4 years ago

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Howl's Moving Castle & the Power Narrative Holds Over Reality

Like most 90s borns, my first anime was Pokémon. I watched the first three seasons diligently, and my tooth fairy gifts were always VHSs of memorable episodes. But like most Millennials and even Gen-X before us, my first real entryway to Japanese culture was Hayao Miyazaki. On the tiny TV screen, behind even for 2002, where my mother would watch her TV shows as she worked out, I watched Spirited Away. Chihiro/Sen's coming-of-age story and the movie's numerous themes deserves their own essay, and one I think better bloggers, vloggers and ordinary people have written before me. But after such a masterpiece, I jumped at the chance to see the next Studio Ghibli movie, Howl's Moving Castle. I rushed to the local library to read the book before it aired in the nearby city's bus station mall's small cinema. 18 years later, too nauseous for schoolwork and mooching off of my dad's Netflix account, I decided to rewatch this film. ***Spoiler alert for both book AND film*** The film itself is a staunch anti-war message, released around the same time as the invasion of Iraq, informed by Miyazaki's own childhood in the final years of Imperial Japan and the horrors inflicted on his home country to set the stage of the Cold War. The exposition includes a bombing of Sophie's hometown with...banners. The citizens of Ingary are terrified of the flying machines descending upon their skies, they expect bombs and destruction and untold death and unspeakable horrors. So when they instead get rained down paper pieces with pictures and words we are never privy to, they treat it with suspicion. They refuse to so much as touch them, since it's of the enemy. And the day after, when Ingary soldiers distribute their own country's propaganda banners, they drink it down without a second thought. Again, we are never privy to what they say. Perhaps it was meaningless. Perhaps, to the common contemporary viewer, the content would be incomprehensible. But for me, it got me thinking: What if this was the "enemy" spreading missing posters of their prince? What if this was a warning for the townspeople to evacuate, as they expect to take point there? And if it was, what the hell did it accomplish, outside of everything BUT what it tried to? The people are too scared. They see it as psychological warfare, whether intentional or not, and therefore the papers become a terrorizing presence, whether they were filled with graphic threats or pleas for cooperation, all it ended up doing is scaring the population into a deeper layer of hatred. I personally disagree with the film's apparent message, but I agree with how much of war is the matter of spinning the truth. No character represents a better allegory for spinning the truth than Sophie Hatter, the main character of the movie. The first thing we notice about her is how intricate and colorful all her creations are, while she sticks to a plain hat with minimal detail. We see her displeasure with her own appearance even when trying it on in front of the mirror. She dresses plainly for she thinks herself plain - wearing a mousy dress in both the source book and the film adaption. The book elaborates on this narrative and its subversion: In Ingary, fairytale tropes are accepted as divine truths. Sophie and her sister Lettie have had their mother die as toddlers, so when their father remarried and produced a third sister(briefly referenced in the film), Martha, Sophie and Lettie were doomed to be wicked, hideous stepsisters. But not only did their stepmother raised them as her own, but both all the Hatters were stated to be beautiful, with Lettie in particular having the entire town's male population vying for her affection in both book and film. In fact, the cunning one is the designated "Cinderella", Martha, who uses her guile to warn her half-sisters. See, another trope specific to Ingary was that the firstborn of three siblings will never find their luck - if they ever dare try, they will encounter disaster after misfortune and end up poor and miserable. According to Martha, her mother wanted to enjoy a life of luxury, so she sent Lettie to work in a bakery where she will surely find a man of her liking to start a life with, and shipped her own daughter off to be a magic apprentice far far away from her. Sophie is the only one she kept close, because she knew she buys into the tropes and will make her fortune for her, preferring the safety of her late father's shop to the dangers of the unlucky life of a firstborn. But in both film and book, this blissful avoidance of any exploration is torn away in a chance encounter Sophie has with the notorious wizard Howl. While her sister(s) are terrified for her safety, Sophie has no fear of the 'heart-eating monster' as "he only eats the hearts of beautiful girls", believing her plainness protected her. But oh, how she was wrong. Or was she? In both book and film, the Witch of the Wastes barges into the hat shop. In the book, she seeks Lettie whom Howl is taken with(like literally every man in town) and enters the shop where an overworked Sophie loses her temper at her, and mistaking the hatter for her sister, she curses the girl to become old. In the film, she's explicitly exacting revenge on Sophie, whom Howl is interested in, and follows her and invades her shop after closing time, cursing her to be ninety years old. This is supposed to devastate Sophie - rob her of her youth, beauty and health, ending her life before she started them. But in both versions, Sophie acclimates to the change rather well, constantly noticing the perks of living as an old lady - she can mumble to herself and be seen as normal, she can be assertive and commanding without being inappropriate and/or bossy, and since she has nothing to lose, she might as well go exploring the world, if only to lift the curse. To revisit this as someone who didn’t expect to have the option of growing old, this is an empowering message on its own - growing old is what you make of it. But despite subverting the Witch's narrative, Sophie remains a helpless victim of her own narrative. Book Sophie is explicitly said to be a powerful sorceress unaware of her own powers, even enchanting her hats into the client's shape with her words alone, while in the film it's only implied. But in both versions she Unconsciously Maintains Her Own Curse: She reverts to the eighteen year old in her sleep, or when something silences her insecurities enough. In the film, she's explicitly shown to de-age as she gains confidence in herself under the role of the household maid, going from the frail ninety-year-old into someone who looks and acts as a woman just past middle age - I don't think this is incidental, as many women are at their most confident at that age, when they no longer feel pressured to worry about trivial matters such as beauty and childrearing, and retreat back into the original cursed form when Howl calls her beautiful - a compliment she can never accept. In the book, Howl eventually comes to the conclusion that she likes being old and gives up trying to guide her out of it. The book takes narrative subversion even further. Remember cunning Martha? Turns out, the Hatters didn't conform to their mother's narrative either - Martha was bored by wizardry while Lettie craved it. The two concocted a plan to glamour as one another, which of course the mentor witch saw right though, and preferred Lettie's genuine interest to Martha ghosting the craft. This stings extra once Fanny is shown to be a caring mother who attacks who he thought cursed her stepdaughter - perhaps she fell for the same sort of thinking Sophie did, and wanted her stepdaughter to have the best life possible for someone doomed to fail, thought extroverted Lettie enjoyed the attention and choice of men and wanted Martha to be a powerful, self-sufficient young woman who led a life more glamorous than she did, as someone who lacked magic? That Fanny was a real parent - a well-intentioned woman who completely misjudged her children and their future? Is it possible Martha’s own narrative has poisoned her relationship with her mother, perhaps beyond repair? As for Sophie, in the book she breaks her own curse by breaking the contract between Calcifer and Howl. But the film gives it more nuance - Calcifer and Howl are clearly in a codependent relationship: In both versions Howl gave Calcifer his heart in exchange for magical powers (as well as saving the fallen star's life, depending on your interpretation of the character), but by the time Sophie employs herself at the Castle, Calcifer feels more like a slave than a powerful demon. Howl himself has his own internal struggles, and many online have made convincing cases for BPD being among them. Calcifer is an essential part of his support system. Each one of them believes that if Calcifer isn't fed properly, or gets dunked with water, they'll both die. And once Sophie does so to stop the wizened, depowered Witch of the Wastes from literally being consumed by her obsessive desire for Howl, she too believes to have killed them both with her rash actions. But they live, because Sophie's part in a time loop led her to think otherwise and refuse to give up on them. Within the film’s universe, this ties into Sophie’s innate magical powers talking reality into her perception. But I know real-life, ordinary people who’s own narratives have changed grim fates. Now, I don’t live in Ingary. I don’t believe the world around me has literal, reality-warping magic. I’m not a spiritual person. But this is precisely why Howl’s Moving Castle appealed to me - because the characters’ thoughts don’t perfectly dictate reality, but the way they act on their perceptions does. I know a man who is alive because his (now ex-)wife changed the narrative of his deathbed to one of optimism and efficacy. When I stopped trying to have my self-image reflected in the eyes of others, I transformed into a more confident, capable person practically overnight. I’m not delusional - I’m well aware of the Dunning-Krueger effect, of how reality exists whether you live in it or not. I’d like to think I live strictly within the boundaries of what is proven beyond reasonable doubt to be real.

But your spin on reality dictates your life. It can dictate parts of the lives of your close ones. But the message isn’t one of just changing your own view of a situation around you to become happy, oh no. Lettie and Martha didn’t just choose to be happy in apprenticeships they had no passion for. Sophie didn’t just relocate to some quaint cottage to live the few years that weren’t stolen from her as an old hermit. They acted to transform the existent reality within their means, but they could only do so because they felt empowered enough to question their life’s narratives.

#howl's moving castle #movie essay

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hippychick006 · 4 years ago

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12.06 - Celebrating the life of Asa Fox Episode Review/Recap

Honestly, I see a picture like this on a promo and I have no hesitation diving straight in. Okay, you all know I have a hurt!Sam fetish, complete with writhing on the floor padabooty, let’s not bang on about it.

Official episode summary: THREE WINCHESTERS ARE BETTER THAN ONE – When hunters gather together to celebrate the life and tragic death of one of their own, Sam (Jared Padalecki) Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Mary (guest star Samantha Smith) must take action when a demon starts picking off hunters one by one. John Bedham directed the episode written by Steven Yockey

My optimum number of Winchesters is two but yeah, I don’t mind a buy two get one extra free here and there.

Overall, I do really enjoy this episode, even after rewatch but putting under a cut to save space.

There’s a lot of things I don’t like about the Dabb era, and in terms of this episode, retconning Mary to be a hunter after parenthood is one of those things that niggles a little (I know she was a hunter before parenthood which also irks for different reasons) so there’s a lot I have to shake off from my mind in order to be able to enjoy an episode. And on rewatch, I had less issues than I did the first time (but given I’m coming at this straight from season 15, it could be a case of me just grasping onto absolutely anything that isn’t terrible).

Aside from the Mary thing, I love so much about this episode, not least because there isn’t a single mention of feathers who I am seriously going to struggle watching in any episode going forward thanks to 15.18 debacle.

Anyway moving swifly on…

First up is the intro and I love the introduction of Asa Fox as a character. We first meet him as a child, who Mary saves from a werewolf attack. And then we see him become interested in hunting (as Mary tells him she’s soon going to retire, and he’s worried that if she does: who’s gonna save people like me?)

Asa decides it’s going to be him and through a montage set to Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s Roll On Down The Highway, we see Asa grow up to become a pretty awesome hunter. Throughout all this time, he writes postcards to Mary, but doesn’t send them (no address) so he has quite a collection by the end and I think it’s all his hunts.

I’m so caught up in how awesome Asa is and how much I like this new character, I’m completely jarred when he comes to a sudden and unexpected end via hanging which also brings the music to an abrubt halt.

Great intro, Asa said very few words but I’m already mourning not getting to know him more.

After the opening titles, we switch to Jody who is chilling out at home about to watch Netflix when there’s a knock at the door. Turns out it’s Sam and Dean who have just finished up a hunt and stopped by to visit. Unfortunately the cardboard cutout “just add water” instant girl hunters are at a concert. Jody offers to feed them, and Dean lets her know that he killed Hitler since the last time they saw her.

Sam: *huffs and walks away Jody: *blank stare “thank you?” Dean: You’re welcome

Love it.

They have pizza and watch Netflix and have a debate about rom coms. Sam says Dean is more of “an animated Japanese erotica chick.”

A little oversharing on your brother’s habits there Sammy, but Sam is not concerned in the least. In fact, I love how totally relaxed Sam is sitting here. He’s clearly comfortable at Jody’s slumped on her sofa.

The phone rings and Jody goes to answer it, Sam and Dean have a conversation about Sam oversharing which Dean’s uncomfortable with.

Sam: Dude, be proud of your hobbies. It makes you who you are.

Supportive Sam encouraging his brother!

Jody returns and walks past them, she’s clearly upset. The boys follow to watch her start packing. They ask what’s wrong and Jody says a friend of hers died – it’s poor Asa from the opener and I wasn’t expecting a link from Jody to Asa.

The name is familiar to Dean and he’s trying to figure it out when Sam says it’s the guy Ellen used to tell stories about at the Roadhouse. Asa apparently killed five wendigos in a single night and now I’m even more mourning his loss. Seems Jody met Asa when he came to town on a hunt, she caught him out when he tried to pretend to be an FBI agent by the name, Fox Mulder. He’s worse than the Winchesters! Anyway she helped him out on a ghoul hunt and they kept in touch.The boys decide to go with her to the wake, John didn’t let them go to hunter gatherings outside of bars as he always said they were trouble.

Turns out Asa lived in Manitoba, Dean says “oh Canada” when he gets out of the car on arrival. Sam is impressed with the house which yes, nice digs for a hunter.

We meet Asa’s mother, Lorraine and she knew her son was a hunter. She’s heavily in to the drink but she’s just lost her son, so I’m cutting her some slack as I can’t imagine anything worse.

Dean finds his way to the kitchen (and the beer) which has no label. He’s concerned but “Bucky” homebrewed it himself and it’s strong. Dean introduces himself which gets the attention of the several hunters in the room,

Randy: No freakin’ way. Aren’t you dead? Like, four times? Dean: Yeah. It, uh, didn't take.

Just wait till they hear about Mystery Spot where he died over a hundred times in a single day!

Sam fanboy hunter: Wait. Your brother here? Sam? Dean: Yeah, he's still alive, too. He's –

Fanboy doesn’t even wait for Dean to finish, he’s off to find Sam. Same fanboy (named Elvis), same tbh

While Dean’s making friend’s in the kitchen – and learning not to say the name ‘Wendigo’ which turns out to be a trigger word to take a drink - Sam’s homed in on hotboy Max and his equally hot sister Alicia. Turns out their mother is a good witch who taught Alicia how to hunt bad witches.

Sam (to Max): What did she teach you? Max: Uh, mostly how to seduce men. Alicia: She also taught him some magic, which is actually more useful. Max: Eh, mostly the men thing.

Max is definitely getting his flirt on, making sure Sam knows he’s into hot men, and we cannot deny, Sam is a hot man. Before Sam can flirt back, Elvis interrupts and introduces himself and then makes Sam feel awkward when he asks Sam about being possessed by the devil. Bad Elvis!

Max (and Alicia) are both pissed on Sam’s behalf,

Alicia: Dude, you don't just ask someone about something that messed up. Max: Seriously, back off.

Protective!Max alert, I’m going to need a few minutes with my new ship Samax, though to be honest, the way Max and Alicia are sitting together, it might need to be Samaxia, which no issue other than it sounds like a drug that gets advertised on television with all kinds of side effect warnings, like may cause death...)

Elvis makes Sam feel so awkward that he runs off to go find a beer. Elvis then tries to talk to Max and Alicia and they outright just tell him to go away. Love them.

Aww, Sam got his beer and then went off to find his big brother. In fairness, I think they’ve been separated five minutes at this point and in that time Sam was accosted by Elvis. Dean’s looking through Asa’s office and discovers he has a real angel blade. Sam asks if Dean knew people tell stories about them.

Dean: Yeah. Apparently, we’re a little bit legendary. Sam: Yeah, but, I mean, so was Asa. Then a hunt went bad, and he ended up hanging from a tree, alone in the woods. Dean: He died on the job. No better way to go. Sam: You really believe that? Dean: Yeah. What, you don’t? I mean, come on, Sam, it's not like we're in the “live till you're 90, die in your sleep” business. This? [Dean points at Asa’s hunting wall] This only ends one way.

It’s difficult watching this knowing the ultimate end as I know Sam’s never agreed with this, being the one to want to see an end to hunting at some point; but you can’t deny Dean has been consistent in how he thinks he’s going to go out and has always seemed at peace with that.

Sam says they should get back and Dean agrees but warns Sam not to say “wendigo” to anyone. I love that he warns Sam. Every time Dean is a good brother, it just reminds me how much of a bad sister I am as I would not have passed on the warning. Sam’s confused about why he can’t say it but seems to just accept it.

Only a few people are around by the end of the night, still telling stories of Asa’s epic hunts - mainly Bucky. Why show, why give us this amazing man and kill him off in the first five minutes?!.

Anyway, turns out that the “ghoul story” from earlier had more to it. Asa and Jody got together for some “sweet sweet time alone”. Jody plays it down, says it was more of a casual thing. Turns out Asa could beat Dean in the ladies game and I think even Alicia and Max mother was one of his conquests (we saw this in the opening montage as well, Asa kissing a different woman in his car in between hunts).

Randy asks if people want a beer and heads to the kitchen, and I fear Randy is not long for this world as he walks down the hallway alone. We stay on him as he returns and my anxiety is kicking in, even with expecting something, it’s sudden when his throat is slit and he’s dragged off down a side corridor by someone wearing black.

Alicia walks back into the living room carrying two beers – and we’re reminded she’s dressed all in black?! Alicia? Surely not.

We see someone enter the door and only see their boots as they walk, they stop just outside the living rom where everyone is talking. Loraine hears the footsteps stop and tells the stranger to come in and not hover.

Turns out it’s Mary. Awkward Winchester family reunion, given I think from memory Mary walked out an episode or so ago.

Sam, Dean, Jody and Mary go somewhere more quiet to talk.

Mary: What are you doing here? Dean: What are you doing here?

I love the reversed dynamic of Sam being go between Dean and Mary (where it was the reverse between Sam and John). Sam introduces Mary to Jody as their mother.

Jody: I thought– I thought you were... Mary: I was. Jody: [quietly] Wow. Wow! [She hugs Mary excitedly] It is so nice to meet you!

She belatedly sees the awkward tension and ships out to give them “some family time”

Dean asks where Mary’s been and she responds she’s been using John’s journal to work through a few things.

Dean: You could’ve just asked us, you know. Sam: Dean, come on. Dean: She could’ve. Mary: It’s okay. He’s right. But… This is something I needed to do alone. I… Listen, most of the people I knew are dead. And then I remembered Asa. He was so young when I met him, I thought he must still be around. And then… I saw an article about his death, and, uh… Dean: So you’ll text us once a week, maybe, but you’ll drive all the way to Canada to see some dead guy? Well, that’s awesome. I’m gonna get some air. Mary: Dean, wait...

Mary tries to go after Dean but Sam stops her. Sam knows his brother.

Jody on the other hand stops Dean at the door and pretty much says she’s here if Dean wants to talk about anything other than killing Hitler (which Dean spent the five hour drive telling her in excruciating detail.). She talks about giving anything to have her dead husband and son back but at the same time she would be worried it wouldn’t be the same which gives Dean some food for thought in regard to his complicated relationship with Mary.

Mary’s in the kitchen getting a beer, Lorraine introduces herself as Asa’s mother. Mary introduces herself as Mary Winchester, which Lorraine can’t believe as Mary should be her age. Mary: It’s a long story. She says she’s sorry. Lorraine says she should be, Mary’s the reason her son didn’t become an astronaut. She’s very bitter and hands Mary the box with the postcards Asa wrote to her. Mary defends herself and says she saved Asa’s life.

Lorraine: [scoffing] What am I supposed to say to that? After you, Asa got so… Hunting was his whole life. He never married. Never had a family, kids. And now… enjoy the wake.

I love this next scene between Sam and Mary. Sam finds Mary and asks if she’s all right. She thrusts the box of postcards at him and says she’s fine. She goes into Asa’s office and tells Sam she saved Asa when he was a kid, and this is all on her.

Sam: Well, no. Obviously, mom, he made his own decisions. And he helped a lot of people, you know?

Sam and free will and then we have Season 15 debacle. Pfff

Mary tells him that everywhere she goes and everything she does just feels wrong, but she’ll get used to it.Sam tells her he understands, she just needs space and so does Dean, (who we see outside drinking from his flask), He says Dean is just scared they are going to lose her again,

Sam: “that – that because we're (Sam and Dean) hunters, you're gonna walk away. But I know that’s not true. Even looking at these… [Sam holds out the box of Asa’s postcards to Mary] I mean, you saved Asa in 1980, um, after Dean was born. After everyone thought you quit hunting. Seems like you couldn’t stop then, and… I’m guessing you can’t stop now, either. This job, this life, is crazy and insane. But it’s in our blood. Come on. [Sam puts his arm around Mary] Mary: Where we going? Sam: To say goodbye to Asa.

I love that Sam understands more than anyone the desire to have normal/safe, pulling against the need to save people/hunt things so I love this scene between him and Mary and I like Mary a little bit more because of it. Damn you Jared! You even got me to like Claire once!

They go to say goodbye to Asa and I like when Mary undoes the cover over his face and we get blood dripping onto Asa’s forehead. It’s interesting to have both Sam and Mary in this scene in a callback to Sam’s nursery scene. They both look up and it’s Randy, tied to the rafters, dead and bleeding from his neck wound.

Back in the living room, Bucky is still telling stories about Asa. Sam and Mary rush in and Sam tells everyone they need to leave because Randy is dead. I like this, it’s like a murder mystery now. All of a sudden, water is shut off (this is new canon?), and the twins can smell Sulphur. Lights are flickering. Demon alert!

Bucky tells them it’s Jael, a crossroads demon who hangs people, which is his thing, snaps necks (Asa), slits throats (Randy). Turns out Asa exorcised the demon but now it’s back. Bucky tries to open the door, Elvis helps but it slams shut.

Max (trying to impress Sam): you’re wasting your time [he waves a hand in front of the door and we see red symbols] Max says the entire house has been warded.

Not sure if that impressed Sam or not but Max had me at “Seriously, back off” and now this? *Fans self

Anyway, it means they are trapped inside.

Back outside with Dean, he’s still drinking from his flask. He hears footsteps and doesn’t bother turning around, just tells the person to “go away”. I think he thinks it’s Mary, but turns out to be Billy saying “you’re not the boss of me.”

Dean: Billie. What’re you doing here? Billie: My job. [Dean chuckles] Well, I’m not dead yet. Billie: Shame. But actually, I just finished inside. I was reaping a fresh soul.

Wait, what? But Dean’s brother is in there! Dean’s pissed and marches to the door.

Inside, Bucky is telling the group more about the demon Jael. Asa exorcised the demon but not before it killed a first nations girl by tying a noose around her neck.

Outside Dean is rattling and banging on the door

Dean: Sam. Sammy! Hey! Billie: You can huff and puff, but that house is on supernatural lockdown. They can’t even hear you.

Bucky is still expositioning and Dean is still trying to get past that old Winchester nemesis “the door”, even throwing a solid statue at it, but nothing is happening.

Okay, we’ve now reached the only part of this episode I have an issue with. We’ve got a group of hunters standing around wondering who the demon is amongst them and not one of them can remember the tests for a demon. Sam come on! You knew Christo in season 1 and you performed a reverse exorcism in season 8.

Anyway Elvis accuses Alicia of not being in the room and Max says Dean wasn’t in the room either (uh Max buddy, accusing Sam’s brother isn’t going to win you any points in the whole wooing thing, just fyi - of course wooing Sam in the first place is pretty dangerous terratory)

Finally Alicia remembers about holy water but they are all out. Elvis says they can just make more but Mary reminds them the water is off. Uh? The toilet bowl?

Dean’s stopped attacking the door and turns to Billie and asks, What did you do? Billy says it wasn’t her, she’s just cleaning up the mess but “it’s always nice to see a Winchester who can’t get what he wants.”

Dean: You think this is funny? Huh? Hunters are dying in there. Billie: Everyone dies.

Dean is pretty much losing his shit and I’d like to remind people that at this point, he doesn’t know which hunter has died.

Back with the group, Sam finally remembers his brother is outside so all focus is on Alicia who starts coughing. I think she’s faking it to screw with her brother (totally what I would do) but no,

Alicia/Jael: Alicia’s not here right now. [Her eyes glow red] Leave a message. [she punches Max] Oh, you’re a fun group. We’re gonna have a good time tonight.

Jael leaves Alicia in a cloud of demon smoke and flies into the fireplace. Sam and Max get Alicia up (Samaxia forever – warning for side effects which may include internal bleeding and even death)

They now need to figure who in the house Jael has jumped into. Jody gives the orders (I’ll forgive this, she’s a cop) and they pair off to search the house (why not sweep room to room?), Anyway, Sam’s with Mary and Jody’s with Bucky.

Dean’s worked out that Billy got in to reap the soul so if she can get in, she can get Dean in.

Billie: I could, I suppose. But– Dean: Do it! Billie: But it’s a one-way ticket. And you’re gonna owe me one.

Billie, Sammy is in there, do you think Dean cares about “cosmic consequences” at a time like this? There is a door between them right now ffs! Sammy may even be dead and Dean does not want him decomposing before he can find a crossroads to make a deal!

Elvis who was supposed to be partnering with Lorraine, left her briefly to get her a double (vodka I presume?). Anyway Dean comes flying through the door like the overly dramatic bitch he is whenever Sam is in danger.

Dean (whipping out demon knife): Where’s my brother? [he’s already marching past them btw to go look]

THIS IS MY SHOW! What moron thought this show was going to end with DeanCas? Come on, don’t be shy, show yourselves so we can point and laugh because you are going to have an epic tantrum approximately 3 and a half years from this episode which could have been prevented if you’d watched the damn show, instead of wallpaper. By the way, in this episode, Castiel was played by the statue Dean threw at the door. [It represents the violent nature of the Destiel relationship – I have a 500 page meta on this if anyone is interested].

Lorraine accuses Dean of being the demon.

Dean: Demon? Lorraine: Kill him! Dean: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy, lady. Look, I’m not a demon, okay? I’m one of the good guys. Now stick with me, do what I say, and everybody’ll get out of here, okay? Everybody!

Elvis – making far too much use of his screentime matches Dean’s dramatics by pulling out his own knife and saying ominiously “well, not everybody” [complete with red flashing eyes].

In this episode, Dean is allowed to be a proper hunter and is able to fight. He taunts the demon, “You’re kinda slow for a demon, aren’t you?” which, he seriously is, no idea how this demon got my wonderful favourite side character “Asa” killed (if he’s not in the final watching Kansas play at the Road House along with all my other favourites, I will be pissed and have a full week meltdown on Twitter – just fyi) [*I won’t really because I’m not insane. Please don’t report me.]

Dean tells the demon to go to hell. The demon tells Dean that Hell is a “complete train wreck” (uh, no, what is a “complete train wreck” is most of season 12-15) Hell is much more pleasant. Dean repeats for the demon to go to hell and starts reciting an exorcism (finally, the smart brother is in the room). Love hearing Dean recite the exorcism. Demon says nuh uh though and snaps Elvis’ neck complete 180 which causes Lorraine to scream, the black smoke escapes from Elvis still standing body. Elvis collapses on the floor and Lorraine is wailing. And I can say “Elvis has left the bulding” which I’ve been waiting the entire episode to be able to say. I’m marginally disappointed Dean didn’t.

Dean helps Lorraine up while shouting “Sammeh!” which brings Sammeh running to the living room.

Mary: Dean. We thought you were outside. Dean: Yeah, I got back in. Sam: How? Dean: It was a one-time deal. Won’t happen again.

Thankfully, there’s no time for Sam to initiate the Spanish inquisition on THAT right now. They account for everyone – except Elvis obviously. The lights go out and everyone puts flashlights on (Max and Alicia have the phone torch on – me as a hunter!) but Dean pulls out the knife which Alicia and Max look at.

Alicia: Mm, impressive. Dean: Demon blade. Kills ‘em dead. Max and Alicia in unison: Nice.

While I try to work out a Sam/Max/Alicia/Dean ship name, Bucky suggests lighting candles, Dean says they need a devil’s trap. Sam says “on it” and Dean is right there with him “yep”. My boys working in sync!

Dean’s plan is for them all to stand in the devil’s trap. The person who won’t get in, is the demon. Clever plan. Mary is impressed and it’s nice for her to see how well one of her sons turned out as a hunter and the other is a cute dumbass – at least Sam had a flashlight.

Mary goes off on her own for some reason and goes to get the angel killing blade from Asa’s office.

Max tries flirting with Sam again, asking what kind of pentagram they are doing

Sam: Standard pentagram. Nothing fancy. Max: I like a Fifth Pentacle of Mars. It’s got more character.

Max bringing his A game to the flirting, I like it. Alicia doesn’t like all the flirting: “Because character is really what matters right now.” They are just like Sam and Dean! Spin off of codependent witch siblings right tf now. Please and thank you.

Jody sees Mary return and is suspicious she was off on her own. She whispers to Sam that she thinks Mary is possessed, she gets increasingly worried which draws the immediate attention of Dean who comes over and asks what is going on (demon knife drawn out and ready once again). Sam quietly tries to tell Dean that Jody thinks their mom is a demon, but Jody shouts, No, I don’t think, I know! I know she’s a demon. [points accusingly at Mary] which prompts Bucky to steps away from Mary and reaches for his knife.

Mary: Hey! Jody: Kill her! Use the knife! Kill her now! Sam: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait. Hold on a second, [turns to look at Jody] Jody, you… You don’t sound like yourself. Dean (not even looking around):That’s because she’s not herself. Are you?

Oh my poor Sam Dumbchester, on rewatch, this episode did you dirty, I was sucked in by my love of Asa Fox and the whole door thing and the Sammeh! I’m so ashamed. Hands my bitter Sam girl platinum membership card back to the bitter Sam girl club in recognition I am no longer worthy of holding it Jody turning into the red eyed demon is in the running for worst “playing of a different character ever” but it’s up against stiff competition from Casifer, Empty!Castiel, Gestapo!Castiel and gayforpay!Castiel and is mercifully short. My main issue with this demon is there is no real consistency through the different bodies it inhabits. They should all have agreed how to play it imo and I do think Kim goes Disney villain OTT but not enough to cause embarrassment, just would have been better if the performance had been toned down some.

Demon Jody had hoped they would kill their mom “wouldn’t that be a riot?”

Dean (sarcastically): Yeah, super fun

Sam tries to attack Jody and is thrown. Big brother is pissed and tries to attack but is thrown too. Uh, how come the lame demon can fight now?

Anyway, Mary attacks and tries to kill Jody with the demon blade and manages to scratch her arm, but Sam says no and pulls Mary away. .

Mary: What are you doing?! She’s a demon. We kill demons. Sam: No, but she’s Jody.

I like this that Mary doesn’t know you don’t just go around killing people, you try to save them first.

The demon is bored and claps her hands, and everyone collapses onto the ground and cannot move (where was this kickass power earlier?). The demon says she’s heard so many stories about the Winchesters, she stands over sam and says, “The idea that he left a meatsuit alive is just so deliciously weak.” Sam gives his “bite me” face.

As for the rest, she’s been inside their heads and starts spilling out secrets – the twins are Asa’s children (I forgot about this detail), Lorraine apparently tried to sabotage Asa’s truck to stop him going out hunting (which is a nice call back to him trying to fix the truck in the episode earlier). She says Jody fantasized about a life with Asa. Bucky manages to get up to attack but Jody grabs him and holds him on his knees.

Jody/Jael: And you. Bucky. Brave, brave Bucky. I was there that night. Tell these nice, stupid people what you did. Tell them what you took from me. Asa was mine.

I like this next scene, Sam manages to stand up and start the exorcism before he’s thrown across the room again. Dean picks up where Sam left off, until he’s thrown through a glass door, the twins are next and get pinned to the wall.

Bucky finally confesses that he killed Asa [and the way he’s dramatically thrown to the floor would never have made it into a scene in seasons 1 to 5]. Oh show, weeps for the quality that once was. Season 12 (heavy sigh).

Mary stands up and finishes the exorcism which sends the demon back to hell.

Sam rushes over to help Jody who says, “That… sucked”

[Try re-watching your performance Kim!]

Lorraine: Bucky, what did you do?

They all turn and look at Bucky.

Bucky says they were hunting in the woods for Jael and he wanted to go back and get the angel blade. Asa wanted to keep hunting but Bucky pushed him and Asa fell and cracked his head and died, which I feel kind of sorry for, not like he did it deliberately and he lost his best friend [and lets be real, it’s not the worst thing a supposed “best friend” has done on this show]. It’s a very tragic end for a great hunter (don’t fast forward to 15.20)

Bucky asks what they are going to do to him.

Alicia: Tell everyone, every hunter we meet. They’re gonna know your name, Bucky. Know what you did. Max: You like stories. This is the story everyone’s gonna tell about you. Forever

I guess I get Max and Alicia’s anger, Asa being their dad and all. It’s just tragic all round because I do feel it was an unlucky accident and Bucky clearly misses his best friend.

I like the setup of the funeral pyre, now 3 hunter bodies being burned, Jody, Lorraine and Mary are standing in front of the pyre. Alicia and Max are resting against their car and Dean and Sam are doing the same against baby.

Lorraine tells Mary she was wrong, “Asa did have a family. He even had kids. I’ve got grandchildren. Suppose I should go meet them.” She walks over to hug Alicia and Max.

Jody and Mary are left at the pyre,

Jody: I don’t know what’s going on between you and your boys, but I gotta tell you, mom to mom, they are good men. Best I’ve ever met. Mary: I know. They’re not the problem.

Jody walks away and leaves Mary on her own, which is Dean’s opportunity, he taps Sam and they both go over to Mary. They ask if she’s okay but Billy appears and says, “She’s really not.” Mary asks who she is and Dean says she’s a reaper that got him back inside.

I would like to have much preferred to have seen Sam’s reaction as well as Mary’s but we don’t get this and it’s a bad choice of angle for me. Billie says Dean owes her one and looks at Mary, “This one. This one right here.”

Billie is still on her “what’s dead should stay dead” kick. She’s a stickler for the laws on that (and never really changes tbh, I don’t really get Billie’s overall arc.)

Mary says she didn’t ask to come back, Billie agrees but says the dead man’s look in Mary’s eyes says she hates it, that she feels she doesn’t fit, like she’s all alone.

Dean: Well, she’s not alone.

Billie (still looking at Mary): Tell me I’m wrong. [Sam and Dean turn to look at Mary and kudos to Jared once again for saying so much with no words as to how he looks at Mary here]

Billy says she’s not here to hurt Mary, “I’m here to offer you mercy. A one-way ticket upstairs, away from all of this.” [Again poor choice of camera for this scene as we see Dean but not Sam]. Mary asks how it would work.

Sam: Mom. [My poor boys!] Mary: You just kill me again? Billie: Reapers don’t kill people. Rules. Mary: Well… then… [she looks up at Sam and Dean] Me: Don’t you dare break my boys fragile hearts! Mary: Then I guess you’re just gonna have to wait. Billie: Winchesters… Me: Same tbh Billie Billie: …if you change your mind– if any of you change your minds– you know my name. [she disappears]

Sam asks if this means Mary is coming home. Mary says yeah, but follows up with: Not quite yet. I just need a little more time.

Sam looks disappointed ☹ but he understands

Dean: Can we buy you breakfast at least? Mary: Bacon? Dean: All the bacon. Mary: I would love that.

I love that Dean and Mary can find a common bond through food. Sam hugs Mary as they walk together towards the Impala

Despite a couple of wobbly bits sprinkled here and there and my poor Dumbchester Sammeh, I still really love this episode overall, the good far outweighs the issues I have and I’ll happily re-watch it as a stand-alone MOTW. I loved the introduction of the witch twins and wish we’d got to see a lot more of them *coughs* and a lot less of other “fan favourite” characters.

It will be interesting where this one will ultimately fall in my definitive list.

#spn rewatch #12.06 #celebrating the life of asa fox #episode review #episode recap #Dabb era actually has some quite good episodes to enjoy #if you ignore being repeatedly punched in the face with Cass is best friend/brother

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welcome-to-green-hills · 4 years ago

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Is it weird if I ask for celebrity (or Hollywood) headcanons? Like how Sonic would react meeting celebrities in real-life and how they interact? Personally, I headcanon Sonic being good friends with “Ben the Schwartz“ and finds his voice charming yet so familiar...but has no clue why...

Pfff! Not at all, my friend!❤️

That’s a very creative ask! I have a few ideas on how Sonic Wachowski would react to his favorite celebrities if he’s met them:

One day coming home from their shift, Sonic literally screamed at the top of his lungs when he saw Keanu Reeves walking around town. He begged Tom to pull over the police cruiser—Tom crashed into a street light pole—and Sonic sank to his knees and cried in his presence. Shortly after passing out into Mr. Reeves arms out of pure joy, he found out that Keanu Reeves has a vacation house in the wealthy section of town. Sonic makes sure to run by there every day during the summer months and waive to Mr. Reeves in the morning.

Sonic has a soft spot for Sir Elton John. He has every album, ever vintage magazine with him on it, and he even owns the white overall and purple-star shirt and pumps that he loves to wear in the house. (He loves to wears the outfit and rock out to some tunes when he’s home alone). He wrote a letter to Sir John to tell him how much he appreciated his music, as well as how it helped him in the past. A few weeks later, Sonic received free VIP tickets, signed t-shirts, and got a video chat call from him to thank him for saving the world.

To thank Sonic for his service, Lorne Michaels reaches out to the Wachowski family to see if the three wanted to guest star on Saturday Night Live. Sonic went on stage and the cast came to thank him for saving the day from Dr. Robotnik. He also got to act out a skit towards the end of the show.

Vin Diesel is one of two big inspirations as to why Sonic wants to learn how to drive a car. He loves watching the Fast and Furious movies with Tom on Guy’s Nights and they rewatch the explosions from the film. And the second is to fight crime with Tom. He would drive the truck and Tom would beat the snot out of the bad guys.

Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson is the President of the United States, serving 3 1/2 years, as well as running for a second term. As a “thank you,” the president invited the family to dine with him in the White House, did a round of bowling, and took a selfie with the Space Hog.

Sonic would paws-down be friends with The Flash. Once he saw an actor on the street dressed up as his favorite comic book hero and begged to go on a run and spend the day with him. He has many photos with the actor, he tries very hard to convince other that The Flash is real.

As much as Sonic loves Jim Carrey’s work, such as In Living Color and his many movies, he can’t help but get a little unsettling feeling about him on screen. He can’t quite put his finger on it, but his cackle, face, and voice remind him of a certain mad robot scientist with a mustache from the civil war...

Ben Schwartz and James Marsden are famous actors that Sonic and Tom love to admire. Tom and Sonic love James from The X-Men series, they are die-hard Cyclops fans. Sonic and Tom also worship Ben’s stand-up comedy on Netflix and from T.V. shows. The two met Ben and James once, almost crying tears of joy meeting them both. All four realized that they had a sort of familiarity to their auras, such as voice and appearance, and joked that they could be doppelgängers. Ben and Sonic sing in perfect harmony as well.

Sonic also thinks that it would be very cool to be friends with Alf the Alien, they’d play video games all day and watch cheesy action films from the 90’s.

Sonic is a celebrity to the kids in Greenhills. Kids of all ages come up to him on the street and ask to take photos, play games with them, and they comes to give them flower crowns. There’s one kid that he likes to visit when he goes with Tom to do the DARE program at school. His name is Miles Per-Heures, a kid who suffers from paralysis from the waist down and dreams of competing in the Paralympic for the wheelchair racing. Every time he goes to visit, Sonic will keep pace with the young athlete and take a few laps on the track. Miles thinks that Sonic is a rockstar and hopes to be as fast as him one day.

And finally, Sonic sees both Tom and Maddie as his heroes. He had grown up watching from afar, vowing to be just like the two of them when he was an adult. They were always quick to help people first and make sure that everyone was seen and heard and loved. He saw them both with golden hearts and loved how they also were quick to help the animals in town. More importantly, when he moved in with them, he thanked them for accepting them in their hearts and for saving his life.

Thank you for the suggestion! I’m sorry that this took a while, I wanted to make sure that I had some good ones to share. I’ve been getting some really interesting HC ideas recently and I want them to appear good! Thank you for stopping by, I absolutely LOVE your headcanon! Stay safe for me, okay? You matter.❤️

#sonic movie #mystery anon #off topic #space hog #donut lord #pretzel lady #my headcanons

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jippy-kandi · 5 years ago

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Digimon Adventure: 2020 – Yamato “Matt” Ishida & Sora Takenouchi

Thoughts on the new Digimon reboot series, Yamato, Sora, and the potential for Sorato . . . before it airs on 5 April 2020.

Which . . . is actually today in Japan. Yeah, I’m cutting it really close! But I wanted to write a post about it before it airs. The new Digimon Adventure: series will broadcast several hours from now in Japan -- and then be released online via Crunchyroll “worldwide” (select countries) a few hours after that. Which is great!

I’m going to refer to the series as Digimon Adventure: 2020 just to make it more obvious I’m talking about the reboot. Toei, please fire the person who suggested simply adding a colon to the original title was OK. Thanks.

So, when I first heard about the reboot, I did sigh and think, CAN DIGIMON PLEASE JUST DIE ALREADY?

I was thinking primarily of my wallet, because I have this irresistible urge to purchase almost every single Digimon merchandise with Yamato’s face on it (and usually Sora’s face, too -- as well as Taichi’s, to a lesser extent). So the fact that Digimon was still going? Well . . . yes, my wallet has continued to bleed.

I also thought Toei Animation were being really tired and greedy to reboot Adventure. No new ideas? Really?

But that was when the last Digimon series I watched was Digimon Adventure tri. in 2018 -- which I wasn’t particularly impressed with (save for Chapter 3: Confession).

Now?

I’m actually pretty excited about the reboot -- thanks largely due to having seen Digimon Adventure: Last Evolution Kizuna a month ago. It even fuelled me to rewatch tri.! Which is quite a feat, because it was such a slog for me to get through the first time (. . . and still a slog on a rewatch). But Kizuna made me hungry for more Digimon!

So Digimon Adventure: 2020 has turned out to be a godsend (so far . . . that could change after it airs). I haven’t thought so much about Digimon in well over a year -- and Kizuna has made me think about it quite a bit this month.

My first thought about the first Digimon Adventure: 2020 key image was that, from the little we can see of it, Yamato’s purple top looked awful (I focus on Yamato a lot, if you couldn’t tell). Thankfully, it does look a lot better now that we can see it properly! In fact, I quite like Yamato’s reboot outfit.

But it really feels like this conversation happened in the Toei Animation offices:

Staff A: “Let’s modernise Digimon Adventure for a 2020 audience.” Staff B: “How about, instead of Yamato wearing a green turtleneck . . . he wears a purple turtleneck?” Staff A: “BRILLIANT!”

I’m sure they came up with the title for the series in the same meeting. *cough*

So I guess “modernising” the kids means tweaking their outfits a bit. I think Taichi, Jou, Koushirou and Mimi look fine, because their new outfits most resemble their old outfits. I also like Yamato’s, as I said. Sora’s took me back a little at first, because there’s just too much pink, but I’ve since gotten used to it and thinks she looks cute. Takeru and Hikari’s outfits are the worst, I think.

But I like that Yamato’s purple turtleneck “matches” quite nicely with Sora’s pink everything. And that they’re both wearing wristbands on opposite wrists! Sora’s appears to be a normal red sports wristband, and Yamato’s is a green handkerchief (obviously a throwback to his green turtleneck). Cute!

I also like that Sora is being “motherly” over Takeru in the first key image . . . because that was part of the Sorato foreshadowing in the original continuity. ;)

We can assume that the reboot is targeting two different audiences: the primary audience being adolescent boys (and girls, to a lesser extent) in 2020, and the secondary audience being the generation of children who grew up with the first series -- and are now adults.

Us.

So they want to sell more Digimon toys to a new generation of kids, because kids buy (or force their parents to buy) the most merchandise and generate the most money. Simple.

But they’re also betting on the old generation to be interested in it as well, and generate even more money on merchandise sales (as has been the case for tri. and Kizuna). That’s why they’re using the original Adventure characters, instead of just creating an entirely new Digimon series from scratch.

So while they’re going to aim to introduce a new generation to Digimon with an updated world, I think they’ll be aiming to “please” us old fans, too -- so I don’t think they’ll stray too far with the characterisations.

From what little information we have so far, it looks like it’s pretty much the same characters, placed into a modern 2020 world. It’s an entirely new story (canon), and there are modern updates to their clothes and accessories (tablets, smartphones).

But Yamato and Takeru still live apart due to their parents being divorced, and Taichi and Sora are still childhood friends . . . so it looks like their character backgrounds are still the same in the reboot.

Even so, a different staff can reinterpret their characters completely differently to the original staff. So even if the aim is to keep the characters the same, I think they’re going to end up being at least a little bit different, just because different people are involved in their creation this time around.

Is it possible Yamato won’t even be my favourite character in the reboot?

Yes.

It’s highly unlikely, because of my sheer 20-year attachment to him (HOLY FUCK I’M OLD T_T), but the possibility exists.

This has actually happened to me once before. Yamato has been my favourite fictional character of all time since I was introduced to him in, I think, 2000? It might have been late 1999.

But before Digimon aired on Western shores, my favourite fictional character was Raphael from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ‘90s movies (and the cartoon series, to a lesser extent). As a kid, I was completely obsessed with the very first TMNT ‘90s movie.

However, in Nickelodeon’s 2012 reboot of the TMNT series, my favourite character was Leonardo (best fictional leader of all time, people). He’s my favourite in the most recent reboot movies, too. But Raphael is still my favourite in the ‘90s movies -- I wish they hadn’t changed his character to that of a super typical brute in the reboots (which is what tri. almost did with Yamato, too. SIGH. MY EMO BOYS ARE NOT BRUTES).

It’s such a fine line between someone who pretends to be brutish to hide their emotions, and someone who is an actual brute -- because just having deep emotions doesn’t cancel out a character being a brute, if they’re just being a complete brute with their actions . . . it’s a really fine line! The TMNT ‘90s movie and original Digimon Adventure series got it right, but the TMNT reboots this past decade and tri. got it wrong.

But I don’t “force” myself to like things. If Toei screws with Yamato’s characterisation too much, he might not be my favourite character in the reboot. Tri. Yamato came close to making me dislike him in a few scenes in the first two tri. movies -- but thank god he got a lot better as the series went on, otherwise I might’ve dropped him, lol.

Just going off the official Toei Animation profiles, the 2020 characters appear to be pretty much the same with the same backgrounds. But there is an entirely new cast of voice actors for all of the kids (the digimon cast are the same from the original series, except Tailmon’s VA).

I think the reason the original voice cast for the kids didn’t return is because Taichi and Sora’s original VAs, Toshiko Fujita and Yuuko Mizutani, have unfortunately passed away (RIP), so it was an “all or nothing” thing. It would’ve been nice to have Yuuto Kazama back as Yamato, though.

Reboot Yamato will be voiced by Daisuke Namikawa (Daigo in Digimon Adventure tri.), and reboot Sora will be voiced by Ryoko Shiraishi (Akari in Digimon Xros Wars). I haven’t seen Xros Wars, so I have no thoughts on Sora’s new voice, but . . . Daigo as Yamato? Really?

I rewatched a scene where Daigo and Yamato converse in tri., and Yamato definitely has a lower voice than Daigo (who has a low voice himself), so I guess it makes sense for Daigo to be younger 11-year-old Yamato. (Although . . . Yamato has always had a too-low voice for a kid, lol.) But I’m really looking forward to hearing the entire new cast!

But if it’s possible that I might not like reboot Yamato, is it also possible I won’t even ship Sorato in the reboot?

Yes.

I don’t think I’ve ever said this before, but the very first time I watched tri. (Chapter 1: Reunion), I thought to myself: If Yamato is going to act this way, Sora should just ditch him for Taichi.

Yep.

And this was because Yamato and Taichi switched roles in tri. (especially in the first two movies). I just don’t see Sora being attracted to guys like Yamato in Reunion (who was acting like Taichi in Adventure), but I do see her being attracted to guys like Taichi in Reunion (. . . who was acting like Yamato in Adventure). Thankfully, Yamato and Taichi go back to their usual roles/characterisations by the end of tri., so I still shipped Sorato in tri. and all is well in the world. ^_^

But if the reboot characterises Yamato and/or Sora a bit too differently that I just don’t like them together . . . I’m out. Again, I’m not going to “force” myself to like Sorato if I don’t think their personalities are compatible, or if there is zero connection shown between them in the reboot. There’s no point to me, personally, to ship what’s not there. For example, I actually like Mimato -- but I don’t “ship” it simply because it’s completely non-existent in Adventure.

But I guess, if there really are zero connections shown between Yamato and Sora in the reboot, I might still “like” them together anyway (casually) just from the fact that I have an attachment to them from the original continuity. But I hope there’s an actual connection shown in the reboot so I can ship Sorato harder, lol.

Hiroyuki Kakudou, the original series director of Digimon Adventure, told Misato Mitsuka, the new series director of Digimon Adventure: 2020, to do whatever he likes because it’s an entirely different canon. So Kakudou doesn’t feel “protective” of his old series from the new series, because he knows it’s not touching his canon.

(FACT: Yamato and Sora got married and had two adorable babies together in Digimon Adventure. The reboot can’t change that.)

At the moment, I think it’s likely that Digimon Adventure: 2020 will just be one season -- but who knows how greedy Toei will get? Maybe there could actually be a 02 where the original cast are the main characters!? (I personally would have wanted that, instead of the 02 we got with the 02 cast. :P)

Can you imagine if this reboot got a new season 15 years later a la tri.? Poor reboot Yamato will be forced into purple tops for the next 20 years, lol.

The reboot isn’t being narrated by a man this time (at least, a woman was hired to do the narration . . .), so Takeru is definitely not telling the story this time. I also don’t think they’ll do an epilogue, simply because it was done last time -- and they wouldn’t want to “restrict” themselves to staying true to it, like the original continuity did. But . . . what if the reboot wants to follow and frame the series with a similar narrative, and there is a reboot epilogue?

If that’s the case, I think it’s highly unlikely they would go with “another” canon couple/s, because it would be odd and disrespectful to the old continuity.

Can you imagine if Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask never hooked up? But Tuxedo Mask and Sailor Mercury were canon instead?

Yeah, insane.

Let me be blunt: I don’t think Taiora has a chance in hell of becoming canon in the reboot.

Will Taichi and Sora be portrayed as close childhood friends? Yes.

Will they have shippable moments? Probably.

But will they date and end up together? Nope.

As I said, I think it would be really weird (and even disrespectful) for there to be an original canon where Sorato is official, and a reboot canon where Taiora is official instead of Sorato. I just really don’t see it happening.

But, having said that . . . I could end up shipping Taiora in the reboot, and hoping like all Taiora fans that it does become canon, lol. The irony would be amazing. XD;

I think the reboot was/is being worked on as a one season idea. So even if they choose to do a second season for it later, that shouldn’t affect their plans for this first season (until towards the end, anyway, when the possibility of a second season can come to fruition). So let’s accept that the staff have worked on it as a one season concept for now.

It won’t have “romance” because it’s a shounen anime aimed primarily at prepubescent boys and the characters are 8 to 12. I think we’re going to get exactly the same treatment as the first Adventure -- and people worldwide will just naturally ship all the friendships between the kids.

Since the reboot is not the brainchild of Kakudou, I doubt they’ll be foreshadowing anything. But they could?

But if they don’t foreshadow Sorato, it does open up the possibility that they might make Sorato more overt instead? Even with no romance, they could make them better friends . . . because, remember, they do have knowledge of the original continuity. And I just don’t see them swaying from it (or against it) -- but that doesn’t mean they need to make it “official”. Especially as they’re just 11-year-old kids and there’s probably no epilogue. (But it would still be really amazing if the reboot made this a reality.)

But Sorato or no Sorato: I hope Digimon Adventure: 2020 is a good children’s anime, even if I’m way too old to be watching it. I hope they don’t just rehash all the old growth of the kids shown in the original continuity . . . I can’t handle another tri..

I guess I’ll make another post with my first impressions of the first Digimon Adventure: 2020 episode a day later. Maybe. It’s only 20 minutes, right!? But I don’t think I’ll be writing about it every week . . . that’s too much Tumblr for me (especially after I ignored Tumblr for a year). ^^;

Or maybe I will write a weekly post . . . because the world has gone crazy with the coronavirus pandemic. Stay safe, everyone!

#digimon #digimon adventure #digimon adventure:#digimon adventure 2020 #sorato #chosen children #taichi yagami #yamato ishida #sora takenouchi #koushirou izumi #mimi tachikawa #jou kido #takeru takaishi #hikari yagami

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skyhopedango · 4 years ago

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anime I’ve been watching recently

Oh hey, I’m alive. Sorta? Between work being overwhelming and my schedule being kind of out of whack my energy to do anything in my off time, other than staring at the screen, has been at an all-time low... so low I can’t even throw words on the screen to make some posts.

But hey, I’ve still been staring at the screen, and I do have some opinions that I really need to get out of my system. So, this is the stuff I’ve been watching in the past months:

Listeners: No screenshot for this one because I don’t have any lying around anymore, but anyway, yeah, this was fun? Sure, the ending was stupid and didn’t make any sense, but then again, I wasn’t watching this show for the story, or with any expectations of it being “great” or “worthy” or whatever. It was a fun way of turning off my brain for half an hour every week, and I really enjoyed the music references which were much better-informed/researched and executed than in most anime or manga (where they usually just throw the reference in your face and be like “get it? huh? getit??? aren’t we smart?? you should feel smart, too!”). So what if it ended with “Uh, we actually never planned this far, let’s just do every mech anime ending ever”, the journey was worth it.

Nami yo kiitekure: No screenshot for this one either. Nami yo kiitekure was... meh? It started out well, with Minare being a fun and relatable lead, but then it kind of... stalled. And to be honest I got really annoyed with all the shouting. I don’t mind shouty comedy at all (some of my favorite anime comedies are like that) but here the pacing didn’t really work. And I never got the appeal of the live radio segments either (even though I do actually listen to a lot of radio!), perhaps because the seiyuu was just hamming it up instead of delivering a convincing performance, which I kind of expected to be the point. Anyway, I dropped this halfway through. Nothing technically wrong with it, but it’s not my cup of tea.

The Great Pretender: I actually wrote about this previously, and I haven’t seen any new episodes since then. Are they already out? :O What’s going on with this show’s release schedule?

Appare-Ranman: Oh, this is back! And I... don’t really like it as much as I did the first 3 episodes? I dunno, in the recent episodes it kind of lost its swagger and instead settled comfortably into that “Show That Could Have Been On Adult Swim In When American Anime Fans In Their 30s Were Watching That” routine that has been so prevalent in the recent Netflix-backed shows that I seriously believe it’s on purpose, to emulate popular shows in the US and appeal to viewer nostalgia. And this means that to me the show has become kind of... boring, really. Like, again, there’s nothing actually wrong with it, it’s by far the best of PA Works’ attempts at trying new things, and I am still watching it and derive enjoyment from it. But I don’t find it particularly interesting, it’s just going through the motions without adding anything exciting, visually, story-wise or character-wise. Like come on, it’s The Year of Our Lord 2020, do something new or interesting! Like for example...

Deca-Dence: Oh yes. See, when the first episode came out and people were raving and doing the “anime is saved!” thing, I was like “...huh? but this was like every damn fantasy adventure anime ever.” I mean it looked nice, sounded nice, but it was soooo derivative and boring. And then the second episode rolled around and I was like “OK, now you’ve got my attention! :D” and my attention has stayed with the show ever since. See, here’s the difference between this and say, Appare-Ranman: it’s not that Deca-Dence is doing anything revolutionary either, but it’s at least doing something instead of just following a template. Its ambitions don’t stop with having cool visuals and cute character designs.

And another plus for Deca-Dence vs Appare-Ranman: the female characters in Deca-Dence don’t have that stupid PAW “cute anime girl” permablush. God that’s so annoying.

Gibiate: And on topic of shows trying for a retro appeal... yeah. There’s this one. You know those snobbish anime fans who always bemoan the decline of anime, and talk about how back in their time anime as such was better? Yeah, you can tell those people have had a very curated experience of anime “back in the days”, because back in the days, in our case in the ‘80s and early ‘90s, “anime as such” was actually more like this one. Really, Gibiate feels like it’s a zombie of some early ‘90s action show resurrected for some weird experiment, and now it just kind of shambles along aimlessly, not knowing what it’s doing in the present or how it should handle the changes of time. It’s kind of embarrassing, really... well, it was for the three episodes I watched. I dropped it out of secondhand embarrassment, more than anything.

GITS:SAC 2045: Oh yes, there’s this one as well. As I predicted, it was crap. It kind of feels like the creators were contracted to do a new series, but they had no actual ideas for a GITS:SAC sequel, nor any inspiration, and also nothing particular they wanted to say with the new show. Hell, apparently they didn’t rewatch GITS:SAC to refresh their memories of the show they were ostensibly trying to create a sequel for. OK, Imma rant about this a bit (copy-pasting something I wrote elsewhere).

1. The visuals are shit. Look, I'm not biased against CG, a lot of shows I enjoy have CG, a lot of them have bad CG. I tend not to care a lot about animation quality be it amazing or crap, as long as I enjoy the rest of the show. But this show looks like shit. The characters are rubber dolls floating in virtual space, physical character interaction is distracting, and all the action is hilaribad. Character animation is fucked up so often, like, they tried to give the Major a sexy hip sway but the result has her walking like she has a stick shoved up her butt. Hell, often they couldn’t even animate lip flaps properly, which doesn’t make the soulless masks the characters have for faces any more expressive. Also, character design-wise, the Major sticks out like a sore thumb, looking like a Sexy Dollfie among all the semi-realistic character designs. It’s kinda offensive, really. 2. Again, I could have lived with the visuals, if the rest of the show was any good. But it's not. With the exception of that one episode with the bank robbery, that was good and felt like real GITS:SAC, this is like someone's subpar fanfic, which is sad considering the writers behind the show. Characterization is weird and fucked up and doesn’t follow SAC. The worldbuilding went from the rather well thought out backdrop of SAC to a mess of ~edgy~ concepts mixed without any particular depth given to them. "Sustainable war!!! Thinkpol!!! 1984!!!!!" 3. The concept of post-humans is such a huge missed opportunity. Paired with the whole "ThinkPol" thing (as eyeroll-inducing as that is) there was a pretty good chance there to explore the dehumanizing aspect of the internet, and tie it into the "anon vigilante crowds" thing the story seems to be trying to get going. But nope, they just went with the stupidest routes. Also, the whole idea of "post-humans" doesn't flow organically from the worldbuilding of SAC, it just feels like something they came up with because they had to do something new. It also kinda feels like someone watched Darker Than Black one too many times.

So yeah, so, so disappointing. I’ll be watching S2 when it comes along because eh, more GITS, but I’m not gonna pretend this is anything but a subpar attempt to cash in on the franchise.

#appare ranman #deca-dence #listeners #gibiate #gits 2045 #the great pretender #appare-ranman #Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex #nami yo kiitekure

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burritodetodo · 5 years ago

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Burrito’s Guide To Survive Coronavirus Quarantine

We got to keep social distance (1 or 2 meters each other) or stay home during coronavirus outbreak so I thought I can share with y’all some things I’m gonna watch or do doing quarantine (this is a very long post, REBLOGS ARE VERY MUCH APPRECIATED!).

BUT FIRST SOME RULES:

Wash your hands: do it for 20 seconds or a while, but ALWAYS do it. It prevents the virus from spreading. If you don’t have sanitizer, water and soap! The cheapest and best ally against the disease.

Buy everything you need: if you can, try to buy stuff so you can stay some days at home. If the place is crowded, go back home and come later when it’s more empty. Same as medicine.

You can go for a walk: stay at home all day can be overwhelming for your mental health, but unless the goverment puts a curfew or gets strict about it you can go walk outside for a while always respecting the 1 or 2 meters from other people and without making contact (chatting) with other people. This ain’t my rule, a CDC professional says. DON’T go visit your friends or to crowded places such as bars, restaurants, shoppings, etc. If you want to buy something, ask for delivery or take away.

If you have coronavirus sympthoms (high fever, diarrhea, cough, feeling tired, breath difficulties) DON’T GO TO THE HOSPITAL YET, CALL TO YOUR PUBLIC HEALTH ORGANISATION OR WHATEVER YOU GOT AND THEY’LL TREAT YOU.

(credits to whoever made this meme)

SO YOUR LIFE IS ON QUARANTINE

Let’s say your boss or your school told you can stay at home. Okay then, you gotta prepare for some days inside *Isolation by John Lennon plays in the distance*. The first thing you think is you have to prepare a batch of series and movies to watch in order to kill some time. I’m gonna recommend you some you can find on VOD or cable, if you don’t have it don’t worry because I got you covered!

Infinity Train: a yet two seasons saga about people who got to face their problems aboard an endless train. The protagonists are joined by creatures who have different nature and help them, or not, to acknowledge their issues and leave the train. It’s on CN, it will continue on HBO Max.

The Owl House: a teen girl who daydream a lot was going to be sent to a down-to-earth camp but then she crosses a portal to the Boiling Isles, a magical world where she is taken care by a powerful Owl witch/saleswoman and her adorable demon. Lots of fantasy, some action scenes and many many puns. It’s on Disney Channel, it’ll be on Disney+ in some weeks.

Primal: Genndy Tartakovsky delighted us with the alliance of a caveman and a dinosaur, two rivals in a wild world who ally after facing a devastating event. It IS brutal and beatiful, has no dialogue and keeps you watching closely. Five final episodes are set to premiere this year. It’s on Adult Swim, maybe on HBO Max.

Tuca and Bertie: for the critics, one of 2019 best shows. For Netflix, a show that had to be cut off because the studio unionized. Two friends in their late 20s face changes in their lives: from living with a boyfriend and plan a life to look a way to stay sober and get a job. Deals with trauma, ptsd, anxiety and more harsh moments very well. In fact, the creator is a vital part of Bojack Horseman! It’s on Netflix.

Aggretsuko: red pandas are cute eh? But what about a antopomorphic red panda who releases her anger and frustrations by singing at a karaoke? This awesome comedy by Sanrio & Netflix is one of anime’s big hits lately. Like T&B, has a good handle of adult problems but not going too deep just to not break the comedy. You can watch it on Netflix.

Regular Show: yeah-uuuuhhhh! Eight seasons, a movie, five Halloween specials and some others. The adventures of a racoon and a blue jay with their co-workers/friends that relies on psychadellia and 80s and 90s nostalgia. It begins good, gets better, then lowers the quality (they were producing the movie at the same time tho, give some credit) and with and after the movie ends awesome. It’s on CN web, dunno if on Hulu (US only) and proably on HBO Max.

Evangelion: it’s a classic at this point, but addictive to me because I end rewatching the series or the final movie many times. A post apocalyptic future where the world has to deal with strange creatures known as the Angels and a boy with lots of traumas has to get on a mecha to save the humankind. All the characters have traumas and issues, the interaction between them or the action makes it worth. The End of Evangelion is a movie that ends the unfinished series. Warning: at some point it becomes very twisted and there are scenes which are too much violent. Viewer disclosure etc. It’s on Netflix worldwide.

Steven Universe & SU Future: this is the tale of the gem boy who ends a galactical tyranny and brings democracy to the universe. A acclaimed show that broke through many topics like gender, identity, ptsd, relationships and many more. Besides it’s got the best scores of the Milky Way and beyond thanks to the talent of Rebecca Sugar, Aivi Tran and Surasshu. And the actors and acrtresses! I don’t forget the movie, a musical that is an introduction to the epilogue: Shippuden Future. The show is available on CN and will be on HBO Max. Worldwide? No news.

Adventure Time: something that began as an innocent boy and a magical dog having adventures in a post apocalyptic world turns into the journey of Finn Metens from childhood to almost adulthood. There is a lot of fantasy and comedy you enjoy, but there are dark moments and serious ones through S6 that find a balance with early seasons form S7 to the finale. It also has great music, memorable moments and colaborations. And guess what? There is going to be a special set to premiere on HBO Max in some weeks! You got plenty of time to catch up or rewatch before that on CN or only (!!) S5 on Netflix.

Final Space: a dude tries to save the universe with their friends, where we can find his love interest, a cat-man and his kitten son, a intersexual alien, an AI then robot that is the best of them, two particular siblings and an annoying bot that prevents insanity that makes you insane. Crazy adventures in space, lots of situations, sadness, an evil smol bean who is a space emperor, a dude who looks for revenge, space deities that can destroy the universe. Is this a lot or info? It is not, because there is more and you can watch it on TBS, Adult Swim and Netflix (the world except US).

Rick and Morty: the most powerful, smartest human in the universe has adventures with his grandson. It’s awesome, but has a very toxic fanbase. Anyway, you can enjoy it on Adult Swim or Netflix (which is up to date!) and the rest of S4 is set someday.

Bojack Horseman: a Hollywood satire about human relationships, fame, traumas with a pour of comedy. Alongside the previous series, the best adult animation of the decade. Sadly cut by Netflix because the studio unionized (see T&B), said by both the creator and Aaron Paul. You can watch the six amazing seasons on that platform.

I’m not an animated movies guy, but here are three I really like and you can watch:

Porco Rosso: a handsome Italian combat aviator turned magically to a pig has a face off with an American pilot hired by pirates to get rid of him before WWII in Fascist Italy. It’s entertaining and, like every Ghibli movie, nice to watch. It’s on Netflix and will be on HBO Max for US.

Lego Batman Movie: Batman is depressed and has to get over it. It’s wacky and has lots of comedy. Plus Will Arnett is top 3 Batman. On Netflix (Latinamerica).

Spiderverse: Oscar winner movie about your friendly neighbour Peter Parker Miles Morales. Miles sees Spiderman die and feels bad after being transfered to a private school. Then a radioactive spider from a Fisk compound bites Miles and he’s Spiderman... among other dimensions’ Spiderpeople: Gwen, Peni, Peter Parker, Noir and Peter Porker. It’s visually amazing. On US it’s on Netflix (I guess), on Latinamerica on HBO.

Some interesting live actions I watched lately

Atlanta: Donald Glover is Earn, a dude who struggles to find a job for her baby girld and sees an opportunity when his cousin, Paper Boi, has a hit and uses him to make his cos famous. Sometimes a comedy, sometimes a social satire with touches of drama. And all protagonists are now big shots, like Zazie Beetz, Brian Tyree Henry or Lakeith Stanfield. There are two seasons and two seasons set for 2021 (2022 possible beacuse of coronavirus). It’s on FX, Hulu (US) and Netflix (world)

Avenue 5: this is brand new. On 2060 space cruises are a thing, and one cruise (the Avenue 5) has an accident that leaves the crew and passangers stranded for years. The captain (Hugh Laurie) has to solve this shit with a bunch of incompetent crew, bosses like Judd (Josh Gad), except one female engeneer who is very smart. Lots of crazy things happen in this series from the creator behind Veep. It’s on HBO (it’s free in the US!).

Peaky Blinders: it has some years but damn it’s epic. A gang from Birmingham makes their way to the top during the late 1910s after the Great War and extends through the 1920s. S5 is right in the ascension of fascism in Britain. ALL THE CAST acts spectacular, names like Cillian Murphy, Tom Hardy, Anna Taylor-Joy and a long etc. But my fave is Paul Anderson, that ultra violent junkie Arthur Shelby is splendid, then is Tommy and aunt Pol, the baddest badass woman in Britain. Blinders is going to have seven seasons, there are two left. You can watch it on BBC or Netflix.

Sex Education: speaking of Britain, excellent teen comedy. Horny, doubtful teenagers going through those hard years. Stories of sex (duh!), abuse situations, abortion, there are gay relationships either, Gillian Anderson! It’s on Netflix, go go go!

Watchmen: despite not having Alan Moore on board, Damien Lindeloff did a tremendous job with the comic. Way better and less misleading than Zack Snyder’s 2009 film, Watchmen is again at the gates of the world’s end (like today) and handles the problem of racism and white supremacy quite well. Just 9 episodes, but worth to watch. On HBO.

CAOS: Sabrina the Teenage Witch is over. Warner and Netflix made a revival of the Archie Comics character and brought her to XXI Century. But gorier, hornier, dark and magical than the nice 90s sitcom. Sabrina Spellman goes from a doubtful teen who has to decide if she has to be a witch or a powerless woman to rule Hell. How she does it? Find out on Netflix! Note: S1 and 2 take some episodes to start properly. Don’t get bored too easy.

There are A LOT MORE to recommend and I make a list: Harley Quinn (DC Universe), OK KO (Hulu -US only-), House MD, Young Justice (DC Universe/Netflix), Ken Burns’ documentaries (Netflix), Titans (DCU), Over The Garden Wall (CN), Seis Manos (Netflix), Thundercats Roar (CN), Easy (Netflix), GLOW (Netflix), Star Trek Discovery (CBS, Netflix) and Picard (CBS, Amazon Prime), etc.

- You named cool shows, but I’m not from the United States or I don’t have a subscription to (insert VOD here) because I can’t afford it

- Glad you asked, I have the answer here

Introducing Stremio. It’s an open source platform where you can watch shows, movies or even live TV on Windows, Linux, Apple or Android. You create an account, install some addons and start looking for what you want to watch.

Stremio is based on torrents, you should install addons from many known torrent sites. So maybe you find an old show, but there aren’t many seeds to watch. And it could be frustraiting, so make sure there are people sharing so you can watch it.

You can download Stremio here and check the FAQs which is very clear.

NOTE: Stremio is note quite “clean” way to watch, but if you do please support the shows you watch by posting, commenting about them, making memes, thanking the creators and crew for their work, buying merchandise if you can. They put a lot to make the shows we love, let’s give ‘em back that love and effort.

You’re tired of the same music, the same movies or need to leave something to make company? There is Vaughn Live, a streaming page where are lots of channels with movies and series on strem (not VOD). For example, there is a channel that streams Adventure Time, other Regular Show, other Sci-Fi shows, another with DBZ and so on. Take in count that if the channel has +70 viewers, the free access is cut and if you want to watch it you have to pay.

En Vaughn también hay canales en español, como Simpsonmanía, Dragon Ball, Futurama, dibujos viejos y muchísimo más. Anyway, go to https://vaughn.live/ and enjoy yourselves!

Y hablando de canales en español, pueden ir a SeriesLan donde está el mayor reservorio conocido de series animadas de entre 1960 a 2010 en español latino. Pueden encontrar tesoros desde Don Gato, los Halcones Galácticos o Street Sharks a Flapjack y Mechas XLR. Otra alternativa para que pasen el rato.

Some interesting facts:

Epic Games releases a free game per week in their store. This week will be two games. You can check in https://www.epicgames.com

Steam has good prices on games and some free ones. There even is the latest Football Manager for free until March 25th. Check on https://store.steampowered.com/

If you’re interested,

I got this playlist I made on Spotify

with songs I liked in more than one year. More than 1200 songs.

And that’s pretty much it! You got resources for a lot of days, 14 initially since that’s the quarantine time in my country. Remember: obey the indications of the Health authorities, this is no time to play the “fuck the goverment” game. We will overcome this pandemy together, helping and caring for each other. That’s why I did this guide, to keep your minds busy in these tough times! Wash your hands, keep social distance, stay at home, go outside if necessary and have some patience please. This has been a PSA.

Stay strong!

Burrito

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liskantope · 4 years ago

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Some not-so-brief reactions to major Disney films 1968-1988

A little while ago I wrote another collection of quick commentaries on major Disney films (which I’m watching one by one through Disney+) from their inception with Snow White in 1937 to The Jungle Book in 1967. I was planning to round off my next collection at another 30-year mark, but the little mini-reviews I’ve been writing are beginning to look so long-winded in aggregate that tonight I decided maybe I should stop at this point. Also, last time, without fully being aware of it, I stopped at the end of what is considered Disney’s Silver Age (coming after Disney’s Golden Age, also included in the last set of commentaries), and apparently 1968 to 1988 is considered Disney’s (Bronze and/or) Dark Age (the Disney Renaissance kicking off with The Little Mermaid in 1989), so there’s another reason it makes sense to cut it off here.

I’ll keep watching the major Disney features, one a day, through the 90′s works, but whether I’ll find time to keep writing about my impressions of each film I watch, I can’t guarantee anything.

The Aristocats, 1970

This is a beloved favorite of mine. I got the video in later childhood, having previously admired the main number “Everybody Wants To Be a Cat” (still the highlight of the movie, from my adult point of view) and having read the story in a Disney book. After seeing it many times in childhood, I rewatched it only a few years ago when it showed up on Netflix. Around that time (or maybe just afterwards), I noticed that my favorite cartoon/Disney reviewer YouTuber Phantom Strider occasionally mentions that he dislikes The Aristocats -- he doesn’t put it on his top 10 worst Disney movie list or anything, but he’s made some disparaging remarks without going into detail. Watching it once again this month on Disney+, my verdict is that, yeah, it’s subpar in quite a few ways, but my more critical adult sensibilities will never override the fond feelings I have for this movie.

Since this is the next movie on the list after The Jungle Book, I couldn’t help constantly comparing the two, and I did see some parallels. In both cases, the story is pretty weak: this time, a family of cats gets kidnapped and stranded far from home by the greedy butler villain and have to pass through several adventures to get back to their owner. In both cases, the plot is a very linear one involving small adventures and minor characters having little bearing on the overall arc (this is perhaps slightly less the case with The Aristocats, where the new acquaintance Thomas O’Malley stays with them the whole time, and at least Scat Cat’s gang makes a return at the end -- minus the unfortunate and entirely unnecessary character of the Chinese cat -- to fight for the protagonists). In both cases, the voice acting is great and includes Phil Harris and Sterling Holloway. In both cases, the villain’s motives are rather flimsily stated -- the butler villain is more comical and slightly more rounded out, and the fact that his motive doesn’t make a lot of sense is perhaps meant to be part of the comedy. The Aristocats has far more filler material, including a useless but somewhat amusing and ultra-cartoonish sideplot about our butler villain losing his hat and umbrella and having to return to the countryside to get them (it’s more amusing than it sounds, trust me).

The Aristocats is simply weaker in almost every way than The Jungle Book. Although I like all the music, including “Scales and Arpeggios” which I only just learned was written by the Sherman Brothers and I appreciated a lot as a kid who practiced the piano every day, the only truly memorable song was “Everybody Wants To Be a Cat” (not written by the Sherman Brothers), whereas in The Jungle Book there are multiple numbers of that caliber written by the Sherman Brothers at nearly the top of their form. This film can also be compared to One Hundred and One Dalmatians and again comes out looking worse -- Dalmations sort of perfected the whole “animals coordinating a rescue” type plot, and The Aristocats only seems to make a feeble attempt at it.

One interesting thing about the pacing of the film that as an adult I’m a bit taken aback by is how quickly the ending of the movie runs. I was shocked when I rewatched this for the first time as an adult on Netflix, got to the ending of “Everybody Wants To Be a Cat”, and saw that there were only 15 minutes of running time left: that includes the late-night discussion between the romantic leads, the arrival at their home, Edgar re-kidnapping them, Roquefort going for help and nearly getting himself killed by Scat Cat’s gang, the whole action sequence of the actual rescue, a final scene with Madame welcoming O’Malley and rewriting the will, and the final song. We don’t even get to see Madame’s reaction at seeing her beloved cats alive and well, which is one of the ways this movie compares unfavorably with Dalmatians. There is some real artistry in The Aristocats, but the amount of effort put in is clearly not up to the standard of Disney’s finest.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks, 1971

I mainly knew this movie through the song “Beautiful Briny Sea” growing up. Eventually I did watch the film one time; I also read the book it was based on (I can’t remember which came first). I remembered very little outside of that one song, the fact that the characters travel in a bed, and David Tomlinson (who I knew well as Mr. Banks) being in it as an jarringly un-Banks-like character. I had entirely forgotten the fact that the story takes place during World War II and that this is crucial to the plot. I knew this as the Disney movie that tried to be Mary Poppins and failed to be anywhere near as exciting or resonant. However, I was still very curious to rediscover, two decades later, what the movie was really all about.

The story is really quite good on a level that appeals to grownups as well as children -- not as deeply as Mary Poppins, mind you, but distinctive and captivating. (I think this has something to do with the story being as much to do with the adult characters as with the children.) The acting is also solid. It only increased my respect for David Tomlinson’s versatility as an actor, in fact, and it was fun to see the likeness of the dignified and proper George Banks display so much awkward vulnerability and eventually get himself into so many slapstick situations. Unfortunately, the only memorable song is “Beautiful Briny Sea” -- I mean that quite literally, as sitting down to write this a couple of weeks after watching, I’m finding it hard to remember much about any of the other songs.

Also unfortunately, the song “Beautiful Briny Sea” is sort of a beacon in a murky area as, halfway through the film when we switch to the animated portion, the movie suddenly gets... quite bad. The live-animation hybrid is consistently done to weak effect, first of all. For some reason, only Mary Poppins made this effect believable, ahead of its time. Secondly, I understand that we have to suspend our disbelief to enjoy a children’s fantasy film, but having the group plunged into water without themselves or their book appearing wet or having any issue breathing is pushing this a bit far. Thirdly, the writing gets rather silly. As soon as they come across an animated codfish who welcomes them to the area, the oldest kid Charles (always the skeptic) says, “Now I’m hearing things! Fish don’t talk.” Nor do fish “walk” along the bottom of the sea with a cane while fully clothed and smoking a cigar, Charlie, so what was your first clue that you’re in a story where things you thought impossible are happening?

The whole crew later gets up onto the animated island of Naboombu, where Mr. Banks Professor Browne is forced to referee a soccer game between teams of anthropomorphic animals as part of his efforts (somehow) to get his hands on the lanyard of the island’s arrogant monarch (who rather resembles Prince John from the next film on this list) which winds up evaporating as soon as they get back to their own world anyway. The ensuing soccer match is by far the most bizarre part of the film, or of any of these films really -- it feels much more like some wacky Saturday morning cartoon than Disney animation. Browne the referee winds up getting (literally) dragged into the game; the live/animation hybrid is done especially poorly here. Once the characters get back to the “real” world, however, the movie becomes good again, with a fantastic climactic conclusion that left me smiling at the overall effect of the film despite its weaknesses.

Robin Hood, 1973

This was a Disney classic that we owned from the time I was fairly small, and that I watched more times than almost any other one, with Alice in Wonderland being the only possible rival I can think of. I went what was probably close to a twenty-year period without seeing it or missing it until a couple of years ago, on a transatlantic flight when it was one of the movie options on the plane. I was taken aback on that rewatching by the fact that... Robin Hood just isn’t that good. When I later saw my parents (I think this was on the way to visiting them), I told them of this revelation, and they told me, “We never thought it was that good either, but you seemed to like it.” I guess I can see some of the appeal to my much younger self, but less easily than I can see the appeal of the some of the other so-so films like The Aristocats -- there is something about Robin Hood that is eye-catching on the superficial level but ultimately shallow. At the same time, I’ll always have to feel a bit sentimental about this one because of the role it played in an early period of my life, introducing me to words like outlaw and in-law and taxes (I vividly remember thinking in early watchings that Taxes was just the name of the unpleasant wolf character), helping to develop my understanding of what poverty looks like, and also introducing me to the concept of political satire (under an anti-free-speech monarchy no less. The scene shown in the video just linked is my favorite scene of the movie, by the way.)

I think my main criticism of Disney’s Robin Hood could be summarized by saying it oversimplifies what could have been a nuanced story, way more than it needs to. This shows most starkly in its clearly-marked division between good characters and evil characters. Naive Good-vs.-Evil plots are very much part of the Disney brand, but I can’t think of any of their other films which takes that aspect to this much of an extreme in developing the characters, so that the entire cast is very openly divided between the white caps and the black caps and (this is the most important part) to the detriment of individuation between the characters. The personalities of all the characters on the Good Side seem pretty much interchangeable throughout the film. Oh sure, Robin Hood has Plucky Hero stamped on him with Designated Sidekick Little John, and Maid Marian has Love Interest stamped on her, and so on. They get into different situations because they all play different roles in the community. But there are no deeper differences between them. Friar Tuck, for instance, is the local religious leader, and you think he might present a more thoughtful, pacifistic, and spiritual point of view to his comrades and enemies. But no, he shouts at the Sheriff and chest-bumps him out of the church and engages him in physical combat just like all the other characters do. All of the people on the Good Side are in complete lockstep throughout, and this makes their part of the story deeply uninteresting.

King Richard is never developed as a character; he is a faraway abstract entity throughout the film, which makes his sudden appearance at the end (which is what really saves Nottingham and finishes the story) very ineffective. (Let’s not get into the fact that he’s described as heroic for going off to participate in the Crusades -- “While bonny good King Richard leads the great crusade he’s on” -- talk about sugarcoating history!) This is part of what I mean about oversimplifying: they could have injected some complexity into the political story beyond “usurper taxes all the money out of the people because of his personal greed until the real king returns and makes everything lovely again”. I strongly believe it is possible to present real issues in a way that is both mature and engaging to children and that it has been done even in other Disney features. Disney didn’t try very hard to do it here.

I’ll give the writers credit in that the three main bad guys, Prince John, Sir Hiss, and the Sheriff of Nottingham, are somewhat individuated, partly I think out of necessity because the Bad Side of any story has to consist of people who quarrel amongst themselves. Prince John is actually well enough developed as an insecure, petulant child with no idea what it means to lead a country that I enjoy watching him even as an adult. The parallels between him and President Trump are unmistakable, and I’m surprised that I haven’t seen more memes about this. Still, by the end of the film, even he was starting to wear on me.

Another aspect of the movie that bypassed my attention as a child but bothers me as an adult is its blatant American-ness in retelling a very old, extremely British story. As in One Hundred and One Dalmatians, all of the accents, except for those of two of the main bad guys, are American. The rooster narrator of the story sounds particularly American and plays folk music throughout of a style that strikes me as the epitome of American.

The way the script and animation deal with bodies and obesity is particularly interesting in this one. Four of the characters I can think of are portrayed as fat, including one of the main bad guys (the Sheriff “Old Bushel-Britches” of Nottingham) but also three of the good guys. Minor quips are made about this by some of the characters, but overall it could arguably be considered a rather positive, good-natured treatment of this issue for its time. It is the source of some physical humor, and some of the body-related physical humor in general slightly raises my eyebrows as an adult -- there is a boob grab, for instance (well, fake boobs as part of a disguise, but still).

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, 1977

I had avoided watching any Disney rendition of Pooh for a long time before watching this one last week. I got to see a lot of Pooh in earlier childhood because of videos given as gifts by other kids’ parents, which my mom (who loves the original books by Milne and hates Disney’s interpretation of them) let me watch only with great reluctance. I soured to the Disney Pooh franchise as I got older and remember in high school getting sick of how many things were decorated with animated Pooh characters, and how few people knew the original books.

Starting to watch this film, I had no idea which of the Pooh stories would be included or whether I would remember seeing them before. As it turned out, I remembered almost none of it: I knew the theme song well and was slightly familiar with the early song about Pooh climbing the honey tree (it must have been on one of the Disney Sing-Along videos) but didn’t remember anything else until vaguely recalling some of the later Tigger stuff (I remembered, before it happened, that Tigger escapes from the tree by sliding down a paragraph of text in the book, one of many instances of extreme fourth-wall-breaking that runs as a theme throughout). As it happens, although The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh seems to go along pretty smoothly given that it makes no pretense of having a unified story arc -- something I give it credit for -- it is actually composed of four short films produced throughout the decade beforehand. This explains why I only remembered the Tigger stuff near the end: we must have had the quarter-length film Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too at my house for a while, but not the other three. (What I actually watched the most, I think, was a video of TV episodes called “Newfound Friends”, which I’ll look up on Disney+ out of curiosity but probably won’t include in this list.)

I remain anti-Pooh[Disney_version], but this anthology film wasn’t as bad as I had thought it might be. The first story about Pooh and the honey tree was actually pretty good. I am not opposed to Sterling Hollaway’s portrayal of the title character. Eeyore’s voice is way too flat, but otherwise most of the characters are portrayed okay. I distinctly remember reading Rabbit as a female character as a kid, and on hearing his voice again I suppose I can understand why. Tigger is the most offensively adapted: he is one-dimensional in a very obnoxious, not-so-amusing slapstick way. His portrayal would have come off better if they had given him more of a child’s voice, which is more appropriate to the book version of his character anyway. The gopher character is pretty annoying as well; he’s rather useless and unnecessary given that he’s not in the books (he even has a fourth-wall-breaking line about not being in the book). Some of the stories from the book are meshed together in a way that does a disservice to each of them, and the movie might have been better if it had committed to adapting fewer of Milne’s chapters. The story about Pooh getting stuck in Rabbit’s front door is done in a distasteful way, with Rabbit turning the back half of his body into part of the upholstery (an idea that Walt Disney had himself when he first read the book!). The songs weren’t great, and I wish that some of Pooh’s poetry from the books had been adapted to song instead.

Leaving those details aside, this is an earnest attempt at turning Pooh into an animated feature which turned out to be not too terrible given my low expectations.

The Rescuers, 1977

I remember watching this once as a kid and almost nothing sticking with me apart from the fact that the main villain (who I remembered nothing about, not even really the gender) had two pet crocodiles. I watched it a second time on Netflix a few years ago, I think within the same week of watching The Aristocats on Netflix.

I have one word for this Disney animated classic: weak. The story is not all that interesting. Having watched Dalmatians and The Aristocats in the few weeks before hand, coordinated animal rescue plots were starting to wear on me. There is no music except for a few forgettable songs not sung by the characters. Eva Gabor makes Ms. Bianca a beguiling character, but the rest of the characters are completely forgettable. The main male character, Bernard, has the blandest voice ever. Even the little girl being rescued, while sympathetic, is not very unique or interesting. (There is something subtly heavy and haunting about having her teddy bear as her best friend through most of the film, though.) At the time of writing, I’ve already halfway forgotten what the villain’s sidekick was like. There are a bunch of other animals who are fun to watch in animation but don’t stick in my mind, apart from Pat Buttram’s drunken rat character (because it wouldn’t be a Disney film of the 40′s-80′s without some alcoholism in it).

The villain, Medusa, is a particular fail here. She is basically a lame Cruella de Vil 2.0: modern, non-fairy-tale-ish, greedy and materialistic, drives like a lunatic, etc. After watching, I found out that the story writers initially thought of simply bringing Cruella back as the villain in this movie, but decided against the idea of it being in any way a sequel to Dalmatians (remember that at this point no Disney sequel had ever been done -- the 1990 sequel to this film was the very first!). I think they should have gone with that idea: bring back one of the most celebrated Disney villains, rather than come up with a new one who is a lot like her but with subtly less pizazz.

Random observation: this has to be one of the only classic Disney stories where the animals can talk to exactly one sympathetic human (the girl) but no other human. If I remember right, I don’t think even Cinderella can understand the words of her mouse friends.

Anyway. Some people say the sequel is much better than the original here. I haven’t seen The Rescuers Down Under yet, but I hope it’s true.

Pete’s Dragon, 1977

This is the first movie on this whole journey that is so obscure that I don’t think I’d even heard of before, let alone seen, and that’s despite the fact that there was a remake in 2016. (The one thing that rang a bell for me while watching was the idea of a dragon playing tic-tac-toe on its belly, an image I possibly saw in an isolated context.) I questioned whether I should watch yet another 1977 Disney film at all, when it would be mostly live-action and was obviously so obscure. In the end, I’m glad I watched this, partly because the story did grip me on some level, but mostly because this film is so very entertaining in how badly done it is.

Pete’s Dragon, in almost every way, is bad -- hilariously bad -- the sweet spot of Bad: the kind of bad that’s actually interesting to examine and yet also shallow enough to make for good Bad Movie Night watching. It’s hard to know where even to begin. The consistently terrible acting of almost everyone, especially in every single line of the boy protagonist (I hate to trash a child actor like this, and part of it was probably bad direction: for instance, someone should have taught him to go easy on the pointy finger). Almost none of the right emotional notes are hit at the right time in what is a very heartfelt story. Only Helen Reddy as the female lead and Jim Dale as the charlatan doctor strike me as good actors doing the best they can with a terrible script and bad acting around them. Then there are the cheesy, poorly-written, often poorly-sung songs. (Did I mention that in one song, each of Pete’s main abusive guardians continue to sing, each in an unperturbed, full-throated voice while being flung in the air by an invisible dragon and plunged into the water?) The awkward choreography. The weak visual effects (as with Bedknobs and Broomsticks, they really didn’t know how to pull of hybrid animation well. I’d go easier on them for this if Mary Poppins hadn’t nailed it 13 years earlier.) I could go on and on.

It made a lot of sense to me when I read afterwards that Pete’s Dragon was originally written as a stage musical, because there is something unusually stage-musical-ish about how the songs are written (for instance, having subsets of the ensemble throw out response lines in unison) and the way the choreography is done. I’ll say as someone who has been in stage musicals that these elements can feel a bit awkward even on the stage; they look to me more awkward in the medium of film; and they’re especially awkward when the songs, choreography, etc. is as poorly written as it is in this film -- someone who hates musicals wanting to teach a friend to hate them too might well choose to show their friend this movie and pretend that it’s a representative example.

Even through all this, I was able to appreciate that the story is pretty good, and I came to care for the sympathetic characters, however badly acted they were. I also enjoyed the atmosphere of a small coastal village in northeast US (called Passammaquoddy, apparently a real bay in Maine). So, by the time I was partly through watching this (fairly long) movie, I felt very committed to continuing, enjoying it as I was just as much for its entertaining badness as for anything else.

I want to end by mentioning one musical scene in the movie that took me by surprise because it was actually good, and funny and catchy and overall entertaining. It’s our introduction to the charlatan Dr. Terminus, and so it’s self-contained. If you want a taste of a part of the movie that I think is head and shoulders better than the rest while reflecting exactly what I mean by a stage-musical-style musical number (not making any claims about how good in absolute terms this scene is, though), here is a YouTube video of it (the song “Passammaquoddy”) (warning: mildly off-color taste on body type and disability stuff). I would actually enjoy leading a song like this in a musical.

The Fox and the Hound, 1981

These more obscure Disney films are getting more and more interesting. I distinctly remember knowing about this one as a kid, seeing VHS boxes of it at friends’ houses, etc., but I never had much interest in actually seeing it. I watched it for the first time on Disney+ with great curiosity, coming in knowing literally nothing about what the story would be about except “a fox and a hound are friends”. I was pleasantly taken aback by the new setting of backwoods American farmland and by unusually quiet, low-key tone.

The main thing I can say about this movie is that it’s far and away the least Disney-ish of the animated ones I’ve seen so far. If nobody had told me which company made this movie, it would never even occur to me that it was done by Disney, except for the presence of Disney icon Pat Buttram’s very recognizable twangy voice (perfect for this movie, not really appropriate for the setting of Robin Hood). It’s hard to explain just why I feel this way. Maybe it’s something to do with the pacing and the sort of quiet story. Or maybe it’s the fact that none of the animals seem to be drawn in the traditional Disney fashion (that is, we’ve seen fox and owl characters before in Disney, and for some reason their counterparts in The Fox and the Hound aren’t recognizable to me.) Or maybe it was the almost complete lack of songs. Honestly, trying to write this, I can’t quite pin down what made this a slightly offputting Disney-watching experience.

Despite feeling affection for the characters from the get-go, I actually found myself rather bored throughout the first half of the slowly-progressing movie. Then I perked up in the middle, actually thinking there might be a death, and of a rather morally ambiguous character too (this didn’t feel like a Disney film, so it might break the rules?). After that I felt enthralled to the point of breaking down and finishing it after having previously decided to leave a bit left over for the next day. I’m really not used to not having any idea how stories will end when going through Disney movies, and I guess I couldn’t handle even that small bit of suspense.

In the end, I thought the story, and how the story was rendered, was pretty good -- not stellar, but genuine. I don’t know about how overly-neatly everything was wrapped up with the main antagonist Amos Slade doing a complete 180 at the end, but after all this is Disney even if it doesn’t particularly feel like it and I shouldn’t be surprised at a happy ending.

Random side note: I wonder if Big Mama (the owl character) could be criticized as sort of an African-American stereotype and thus what Disney+ would call an “outdated cultural depiction”, or if it will be in another ten years.

The Black Cauldron, 1985

We continue with our sequence of more obscure Disney flicks. I guess this era is called the Dark Age of Disney for a reason, and one could say that this movie epitomizes such an era both in its role in the evolution of Disney and in its actual content. I don’t recall even hearing about this one as a child. I’ve heard it referred to as an adult only in the context of its successor being advertised as fun to provide a contrast with the overly-dark box office failure that had just come out, so I came in expecting a not-very-worthwhile movie that would be uncharacteristically dark and un-fun.

All I can say is, wow! The Black Cauldron, while indeed uncharacteristically dark (in ambiance at least, less so in subject matter), is genuinely, seriously good!

Within literally the first two seconds of the film, I knew that I was in a Medieval setting (not having known anything whatsoever about the story prior to watching) both from the music and from the backdrop. This remained the case throughout the movie. Everything in its style is boldly, wholeheartedly Medieval, not like some other Disney movies where the Medieval setting is watered-down and phony *cough*swordinthestone*cough*robinhood*hack. The only other movie on this list so far which comes close to succeeding at this was Sleeping Beauty, but that is such a different type of film, with such a different animation style, that comparing the two is like comparing apples to oranges. Honestly, I don’t think that the flavor is so thick even in Sleeping Beauty. The art of The Black Cauldron actually feels closer to that of Magic the Gathering than anything else I can think of from Disney. The effects of the animation are absolutely gorgeous -- in a rather dark way, mind you, not bright and colorful like what is usually associated with Disney.

The story is complex by Disney standards and I had zero familiarity with it beforehand, so for the first time I actually had to check myself to make sure I was paying attention. The characters are reasonably developed with engaging dialog (though slightly hesitant and sparse, with unusually little humor). It was a little jarring to hear “the Forbidden Forest” mentioned by one of the characters and remember that Harry Potter wouldn’t be around for over a decade. The main villain is one of the scariest ones of Disney and I would imagine may have been somewhat influenced by Ian McDiarmid’s Emperor, who had made his debut only a couple of years earlier.

I said that the last film on this list seemed distinctly un-Disney-ish, and I can say the same about this one in its own way -- maybe this was an experimental trend at Disney studios during the first half of the 80′s. The Black Cauldron has even less music in it than The Fox and the Hound and may be the only animated feature I’ve seen here with nothing resembling a song at all. One strong impression I got throughout, especially when the dungeon sequence started and the princess was introduced -- and this isn’t exactly a compliment -- is that something about the pacing, dialog, body movements, etc. seriously makes this movie feel like I’m watching a video game. (For personal context, I’ve never been a gamer, and most of my exposure to video games comes from watching college roommates play during the late 00′s.) I can’t justify exactly where I get this feeling. Also, the princess is strangely voiced and feels particularly like a non-player (video game) character somehow. I’m now curious as to whether there have ever been any games based on this movie or whether it had faded too much into oblivion by the time gaming reached the right level of progress.

Anyway, The Black Cauldron may not be especially fun or enjoyable to kids, but for an older person in the mood for some spooky Medieval fantasy animated entertainment, I recommend it as a fine movie.

(Fun trivia: I had believed that the successor on this list was the first animated feature to use computers to assist in animation, in the clock/gear sequence, but apparently this one actually was. Also, to date it was the most expensive animated film created.)

The Great Mouse Detective, 1986

Now for a classic that I had been greatly looking forward to. We didn’t have The Great Mouse Detective at my home growing up, but I know I saw it a number of times and later remembered liking it so much that on a whim in college, around the time I revisited Mary Poppins, I borrowed it from the local Blockbuster. I distinctly remembering feeling a little sheepish checking it out, but the young guy at the register actually said something like, “Yeah, that’s one of the best ones.” Years later, one of my best friends during graduate school was hanging out at my place and the conversation went to us agreeing on how excellent The Great Mouse Detective is and musing over the fact that nobody ever seems to talk about it, and we decided to watch it together as it was on Netflix at the time. We didn’t bother to log out of my roommate’s Netflix account to watch it, and he was later very irritated at me about the fact that Netflix was now constantly offering him children’s animated features. Anyway, it seems I’m far from the only one who has often viewed this one as perhaps the most underrated Disney classic of all time. (Further evidence: it comes second in WatchMojo’s list, with their winner being its predecessor!)

The Great Mouse Detective was billed as “All new! All fun!” to assure audiences that it would be a departure from the heavy seriousness of its predecessor, and in this it generously delivers all the way through. It’s based on the just-silly-enough-to-be-delightful premise that in late Victorian London there was a mouse version of Queen Victoria living in Buckingham Palace and a mouse version of Sherlock Holmes (our title character) living under the human Holmes’ flat in Baker Street. Our villain, the dastardly Ratigan, is hatching a plan to take over all of Mousedom via a plot which is incredibly silly, but the movie, which is consistent in its unpretentiousness, is able to pull this off just fine. All of the characters are nicely fleshed out (there’s a case to be made about Fidget’s character reflecting ableism but let’s leave that aside). Ratigan is the juiciest villain we’ve seen since Cruella de Vil. The plot is actually pretty complex, not at all like the predictable fairy tale / fantasy type plots we’ve often seen, yet not so complicated that it would lose the audience (or if it loses some kids, they will still be entertained by the great voicing, music, and animation). The action is, bar none, the very best I’ve seen so far on the animated movies of this list, and the movie is somehow packed with action -- every single sequence of it is superb, and the climactic scene inside of Big Ben is a revolutionary masterpiece of animation (by the standards that existed at the time). The abrupt transition to that scene, beginning in near-silence, is one of the more delightfully, deliciously chilling Disney moments for me.

This is not one of the great Disney musicals, but all three of its three musical numbers are still very enjoyable. I remember learning in college that the same person wrote “The World’s Greatest Criminal Mind” and “Goodbye So Soon”, but I only just now internalized that the composer was Henry Mancini who I love from The Pink Panther and Victor Victoria. There is a certain type of wit and humor in the lyrics of both of those songs which I don’t know how to characterize in words except to say that it’s sprinkled with phrases either containing self-contradictons (“You’re the best of the worst around”, “You’re more evil than even you”) or redundancy (“No one can doubt what we know you can do”) or just plain wordplay (“Even meaner? You mean it?”, “With time so short I’ll say so long”). None of it makes a pretense of being extremely witty or anything; it’s just mildly dry. I don’t know what to call this kind of humor and can’t think of another example of it, but it consciously (though subtly) influenced the vibe I was going for with the section headings in certain of my earlier Wordpress essays.

Perhaps Lady and the Tramp can make a case for winning the Most Underrated Disney Animated Feature prize, as it seems more mature and elegant, but I’m not ashamed to say that I find The Great Mouse Detective every bit as enjoyable and that I still have enough inner child in me that I can rewatch the movie in my early 30′s and come out of it smiling broadly.

Oliver and Company, 1988

The first major Disney feature that came out in my lifetime! As with The Fox and the Hound, I always knew about this one growing up but was never really interested enough to watch it (even despite the fact that it was somehow loosely based on Oliver Twist, whose musical adaptation I was raised on pretty heavily) -- at least, I don’t think I ever saw any of it until one day in my young adulthood cable days when I caught it on TV. By “caught it on TV”, of course I mean that I probably didn’t see all of it, and it was interrupted by commercials and I was probably doing something else at the same time and not paying much attention. Literally the only thing I could remember was the line “Don’t want to mix with the riffraff?”

It’s just as well because in the grander progression of Disney creations, Oliver and Company turns out to be pretty skipable. Now I will say that I appreciate the variety of locations and cultural backdrops in Disney films and the amount of effort the creators put into carrying them out (something that was mostly lost on me as a kid). In this case, we are transported for the first time to contemporary New York, and it’s clear that the writers, voice actors, and animators went full throttle on making everything seem as in-your-face New-York-ish as possible. I don’t fault them for doing this, but it’s all done in a slightly brash way that doesn’t at all attract me to late-80′s New York culture.

I was struck in the first few minutes by a change I don’t quite know how to describe in words, except to say that the animation and even more the music feel palpably distinctly more modern than anything I’ve visited so far. The animation is simpler and more generic (luckily I have a fondness for kittens and they do succeed in making Oliver look adorable, but otherwise the visuals left me cold), and the music is a sharp reminder of the blander forms of pop music I remember growing up hearing. “Why Should I Worry?” triggered a recognition of the song that I had long forgotten -- apparently I used to know it very well but I’m not entirely sure how. The other songs are forgettable enough that I’ve already forgotten them. Interesting to find out that the principal voices were done mainly by Billy Joel and Bette Midler, marking another step on Disney’s road towards featuring more big-time celebrities in their voice acting (culminating in Robin Williams’ role in Aladdin several years later).

The story is very watered down compared to either the book or the musical version of Oliver -- understandable, I suppose, but I didn’t find it very interesting. The characters were lackluster, and the main villain Sykes managed to be even more forgettable than What’s-her-name from The Rescuers. This movie normalizes hitting on women by making catcalling noises, as done by two of the non-evil characters -- I wonder if this was put in because it’s considered a distinctive feature of New York culture, but either way I found its presence in the film obnoxious. I will say that the character of Georgette (played by Midler) stood out as very funny, and I enjoyed all of her scenes, but I don’t have much else positively positive to say about this one.

#disney films #the aristocats #bedknobs and broomsticks #robin hood #body issues #winnie the pooh #the rescuers #the black cauldron #Harry Potter #episode vi #the great mouse detective #ableism #oliver twist #catcalling #Our Current president #alcoholism

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violentviolette · 5 years ago

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@starrystarberry tumblr fucked up and deleted ur ask cause i tried to switch over from mobile to my laptop to answer it so im just making a post lol

also it got a little long so i stuck it under a read more for u guys who arent into seeing fandom stuff on here

oh man okay I'll try to not write a novel for each of these lmfao

Lucio

Why I like them: hes a cocky bastard but also a giant idiot

Why I don’t: theres actually nothing I don't like about him akshsgsj like yea I know he imprisoned Asra's parents and made him an orphan at like 6 and everything but who hasnt made a mistake or two in their life?

Favorite season/movie: from what we have of his route so far I really like book 9: the hermit. it's got a lot of good hurt/comfort and that's my shit

Favorite episode (scene if movie): I'm a sucker for the steamy scenes so probably the makeout session in the winter woods

Favorite line: honestly all of them anything out of lucios mouth is gold

OTP: ME lmfao but no for real the mc in the game i dont think lucio is right for any of the characters even if i do ship him and julien for the angst

Favorite outfit: i actually really love his piratey outfit he wears in the flashbacks before he lost his arm.

Brotp: Julien 100%

Head Canon: i dont really have any for him

Unpopular opinion: Lucio is a switch and a service top the only True Top in this game is Nadia and i will die on that hill

A wish: none really, im happy with his route and where its been going and im excited to see the end of it!

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: I really hope his reverse ending is something other than him dying

5 words to best describe them: angry bratty baby boy

My nickname for them: baby boy

Light Yagami

Why I like them: cause he was one of the first really good protagonists whose actually the villian of the story and i love that shit

Why I don’t: Light drinks his own cool aid and is way to arrogant and i cant stand that. hes very much a holden caufield type character and i absoutely hate those

Favorite season/movie: i liked the anime but i only watched it once when it was airing and i never saw any of the movies so i dont know.

Favorite episode (scene if movie): same as above, this is making me think i should toss it in my que and do a rewatch. hmmm

Favorite line:ah man, i dont actually remember any but im sure its something gay

OTP: Light x a therapist

Favorite outfit: doesnt he only have one? that ugly ass tan suit or some variation of? lol

Brotp: light & ryuuk i loved their dynamic

Head Canon: none, i was never super invested enough in death note to have head canons

Unpopular opinion: none that i can think of, tho its probably somthing about misa lol

A wish: none

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: honestly the live action netflix adaptation already exists so like it cant get any worse

5 words to best describe them: someone id never wanna date

My nickname for them: bitch boy

Shaoran Li

Why I like them: omfg i LOVE shaoran cause hes just such a good boy? he tries so hard and he cares so much and he just wants to protect the world and its adorable

Why I don’t: theres genuinely nothing i dont like about Li

Favorite season/movie: while im loving blushy sweet shy Li in the new clear clard arc, i have a soft spot for angry sassy Li who was competing against sakura in season 1

Favorite episode (scene if movie): the episode with the tree and the time card

Favorite line: i dont think i have one

OTP: i mean is this even a question? sakura all the way

Favorite outfit: i lovelovelove his green fighting robes

Brotp: him and tomoyo being #Teamsakura all day every day together is the best thing

Head Canon: none really

Unpopular opinion: what even is an unpopular cardcaptor sakura opinion??

A wish: clear card anime s2 where are u????

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: i dunno, this series never betrays me so i dont have many fears

5 words to best describe them: strong brave and loyal boy

My nickname for them: i like to call him Li tho thats not rly a nickname

Haruka Tennoh

Why I like them: oh man. i was in. fucking. love. with Haruka as a young tiny queer. i love everything about her

Why I don’t: there is nothing not to love

Favorite season/movie: their original appearance arc is my fav so S

Favorite episode (scene if movie): the one in crystal where she kisses Usagi

Favorite line: i mean the obvious one is “does it really matter if im a man or a woman” because enby rights but also i fucking love every bit of sass ridden dialog between her and Seiya

OTP: Uranus and Neptune are soulmates and thats that on that

Favorite outfit: oh man she had so many Iconic Looks but im gonna have to give it to her racing gear.

Brotp: I love her and Mars as brotp’s dont ask me to explain it lol

Head Canon: nothing like substatial or series just stupid/crack personality ones

Unpopular opinion: none i dont think? again i dont even know if ive ever really heard an “unpopular opinion” for her

A wish: more crystal before im 90 pls

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: i mean once again the dub and the cousins sitation already exists so ive lived my nightmare. because framing them as incestuous cousins is somehow better than letting them be gay

5 words to best describe them: a gay enby queen

My nickname for them: my wife

#jack.speaks #thank u so much for these im sorry tumblr is fkn dumb

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recentanimenews · 5 years ago

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Why Eggman Is the Only Good Thing to Come out of Sonic X

There’s a saying that all great heroes need a great villain, and in the case of Sonic the Hedgehog, that really couldn’t be any more true; after all, where would SEGA’s iconic mascot be without his equally great villain, Dr. Ivo “Eggman” Robotnik? While everyone is hopping on the Jim Carey train thanks to the new live-action movie, we figured now was a great time to remind everyone of the one true shining Chaos Emerald of the Sonic X anime: Eggman himself! That’s right, the rotund and robust professor of pain is, really, the only thing Sonic X did that’s worth remembering. So, for this momentous movie event, we figured there’s no better way to honor the legacy of Eggman than to talk about why he single handedly made Sonic X worth watching.

Chances are that if you grew up in the US sometime between the '90s and '10s, you watched a lot of your anime on TV during your childhood. For many anime fans, that meant healthy doses of WB and 4Kids inspired treatments of shows, and Sonic always featured prominently in those Saturday morning blocks somewhere. But the first real Sonic anime to hit American television, Sonic X, took a departure from the Archie comics inspired weirdness of previous Sonic cartoons to present a modern, updated, post-Sonic Adventure 2 vision of Sonic: Sonic X! And boy, was it not very good!

Now, we get it, we aren’t trying to assassinate your childhood or anything; we thought the show was kinda fun too when we were younger. But looking back on it, the weird story of Sonic and company being transported to Earth and living with a generic, no-name character and his weirdo family certainly wasn’t the type of Sonic storylines we expected to be seeing (although the opening song was pretty legendary). Even worse, the show tried to balance the absolutely bloated cast of Sonic Adventure, including appearances by Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Shadow, Rouge, Amy Rose, Cream the Bunny, Big the Cat, and even the Chaotix team for some reason. But the true star that made the show entertaining was the good doctor himself, Eggman! Without Eggman, the show was frankly boring and pretty flat, with storylines like Sonic trying to beat a racecar driver (which we all knew he could do anyway, right?!). No, Sonic X owes all of its greatest moments to Eggman: blowing up the moon and making a new, better moon, awakening Shadow, and even defeating the intergalactic horror of the Metarex were all only possible because of the ingenious skills inside that beautiful brain.

And, yes, Eggman is the villain of a kids show; most of his plans aren’t very complicated or evil, but they propelled the entire plot of the series in most cases; heck, he even draws his own money while pretending to be President instead of doing anything really evil or creative with the idea. But without Eggman’s schemes, most of the first two seasons go absolutely nowhere, and it’s only due to his determination to defeat Sonic and take over the world that Shadow is even discovered in the first place.

But perhaps Eggman’s greatest single accomplishment in Sonic X is the story of how he blew up the moon. Yes, you read that correctly: the sphere in the sky responsible for controlling tidal flow and other things was “accidentally” destroyed by the great doctor; we know, he probably didn’t mean to cause any real harm. After all, he invented a NEW moon to take its place! What a great guy!

The moon saga of Sonic X remains one of the funniest memories of the entire series (and, personally, the main reason I even remember the show at all). It features all of the general ridiculous ideas you might expect in a Saturday morning cartoon, with the cast acting almost entirely out of character, save for Eggman, who of course is working a long con of helping the people of Earth after he LITERALLY BLEW UP THEIR MOON ON PURPOSE by selling “sunshine balls,” and when Sonic catches on that this plan isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, gets the President of “a country” to agree to take martial action against Sonic.

Honestly, rewatching it, the entire sequence feels like it’s borrowing cues from the conclusion of Devilman, with the main cast being harassed and swarmed by angry mobs of random people, lusting for the blood of Sonic, while Eggman simply reclines and bides his time before finally gagging the President and… drawing money with his own face on it. That’s it. That’s his final, real idea for this caper. Assuming that he’ll become the next President once Sonic is dead and the world is at his fingertips, Eggman simply ties up the current President and… doodles fake money, before, of course, Sonic comes and ruins everything by saving the day. Nerd.

Almost every story in Sonic X works in this fashion when Eggman is involved, and the 70+ episode-long series really owes it to him for carrying all of the weight of the show on his back. The Earth-based storylines, like the race car driver and other goofy things, are barely even worth watching, let alone remembering, and it isn’t until Eggman makes some sort of appearance on screen that anyone should even care about the show. Eggman is reverse Poochy: everyone should be asking where Eggman is at all times, but unironically.

In the climactic ending of the third season, Super Sonic and Super Shadow can’t even defeat the Metarex without Eggman’s help, and literally no other character is in any way more useful than the doctor that they’ve all been negging on for the entire series. Shows how grateful they really are! Frankly, this type of villain reversal was always a common, but fun, trope in Saturday morning TV fair, and Sonic X really nailed it by taking advantage of how awesome Eggman really was in order to pull it off effectively.

Honestly, maybe that’s what makes Eggman so great in general as far as a villain and a character is concerned. Although his plans usually amount to being totally ridiculous (seriously, just… going to turn animals into robots? That’s your big plan?), when Sonic series media wants things done or explained, it generally falls to Eggman to do it. Shadow? Eggman. Chaos? Eggman. Chaos Control? Also Eggman. The entire point of Sonic in any game, comic, show or movie has no momentum unless Eggman appears to push things along and get the blue rat to lace up his sneakers.

Even the final episode of Sonic X requires Eggman to intervene in order to send original character and human protagonist, Chris, back to Earth, because no one else is smart enough to get the dimensional machine working again. Without Eggman, Chris would have just been stuck in Sonic’s world as a 12 year old forever, but you didn’t hear Eggman begging to be thanked for all of his hard work! Instead, Eggman simply takes it all in stride, claiming that Chris makes Sonic too strong, and sends him home. What a secret softie!

As Sonic’s movie hits theaters and people start to fondly reminisce on what they loved the most about the franchise, we hope that this little PSA has reminded you of what’s truly important: that Sonic X was a pretty whatever show with one of the best characters of all time: Dr. Eggman! Doctor, we salute you in all that you do!

Are you an Eggman fan? Did Eggman write this? Let us know what you think in the comments!

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Nicole is a frequent wordsmith for Crunchyroll. Known for punching dudes in Yakuza games on her Twitch channel while professing her love for Majima. She also has a blog, Figuratively Speaking. Follow her on Twitter: @ellyberries

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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magicalgirlagency · 5 years ago

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What made you love magical girls so much? I’m very curious to hear your story. This page honestly made my love for magical girls grow 💕💕💕💕

Firstly, thank you very much!

And to be honest, I can’t really explain how I came to love magical girls; I’ve been enchanted by the genre since forever!

My first magical girl series was actually one of the grandmothers of the genre: Bewitched. It was pretty popular in the 90′s. I also watched lots of I Dream Of Jeannie (and I’ve never understood why there aren’t many genie-themed magical girls...)

As for anime, I’ve started with Sailor Moon and CardCaptor Sakura, just like (almost) everyone else. I used to twirl some random stick around the house, pretending to cast spells and fight against evil. My mom used to nickname me “Serena” (that’s how Usagi was called in the brazillian dub, btw), and of course, the pretty warrior of love and justice grew on me and shaped my character.

Of course, my exposure to the genre went beyond animes, as I also watched Sabrina the Teenage Witch (the 90′s live-action show and The Animated Series); and besides “Serena”, my other nickname was “Sabrina”. Nowadays my mom calls me “Bruxinha” (”Little Witch” in portuguese) when it’s Halloween.

Then later came Winx Club, and I’ll be honest here, it has made me question my sexuality. The girls were so pretty! And it felt like a fresh breath of air at the time, because I’ve never seen a magical girl show about an academy dedicated to the mystical arts (at the time, this kind of trope was only seen in series like Harry Potter).

Then I came back to anime with Tokyo MewMew (my first exposure to the series was through its dub MewMew Power, so I had to desintoxicate myself years later with subs; never was a fan of dubs, tbh). My favourite Mew is Pudding/Bu-Ling Huang, btw.

Still on my anime journey, I’ve found Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and it has rubbed me the wrong way since Day One. I wasn’t sure why it was so popular, I even tried to rewatch it, but nope! It still sucked rotten eggs to me! I didn’t had a properly formed opinion on why I disliked it, but I surely disliked it!

At the end of the tunnel, I’ve found a light, and this light was called Smile! PreCure. I watched it, and I fell in love with it; it was basically the girly Power Rangers I always have dreamed of! Then I discover it had other seasons before SmiPre, and I fell deeper into the rabbit hole.

I think the reason why I love magical girls is because it puts girls in the spotlight, in a unapologetically feminine way. I grew up with Shounen series and they also helped me shape my character, but the fact that there was more men than women in fantasy tales always has annoyed me.

Like, I want to be a hero, but I don’t want to sacrifice my femininity! We live in a society where feminine traits and softness are seen as bad things, and we have to choose between Femme Fatale or Pretty Princess! The media constantly says that you can’t be strong and soft all at once!

And I sit here like: “Screw you, I’m gonna be both. And if you have a complaint, then die mad about it”.

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theravenouswriter514 · 4 years ago

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Day Eighteen of the 30 Day Writing Challenge

The prompt today is actually a more difficult one for me, because I don’t think a lot about myself. The prompt today is, “Write 30 facts about yourself.”

1. I’ll start with physical features. I have blue eyes.

2. My natural hair color is sandy blonde, but I dye it to a brown-red color.

3. I wear glasses because my left eye is significantly weaker than my right eye, making it difficult to see things far away. It also screws with my depth perception.

4. This one is kind of funny, my nose is slightly crooked. When I was born my mom told me I looked like I had been into a fist fight. It straightened over time, but it still is slightly crooked. No one can tell unless I come out and tell them.

5. I have two tattoos. The one on my left forearm is an opening set of quotation marks. My best friend has the closing set on her right arm. We got them when we turned eighteen. Then I have a sail boat on my right wrist. My two best friends and I went on a girls’ trip in 2019, during which we all got tattoos pertaining to the ocean. One friend got an anchor, one got waves under the sun, and I got a sailboat. Corny right?

6. This one is known already by my previous posts, but it is a fact that I am proud of. I have a two-year-old Corgi named Sirius. He is tri-colored, meaning he is black, white, and tan. I’ll put a picture to show him off.

7. I have two favorite authors. One classic and one modern. They are Ernest Hemingway and Rainbow Rowell.

8. My favorite flower is a Tiger Lily. They grow outside my old house every summer.

9. I live in a rural town in Tennessee. It’s home and I’m a proud Tennessean.

10. My favorite super hero has always been Iron Man, even before I knew about the movies. It’s actually for a funny reason. Tony Stark is known to have that great facial hair, in the comics as well as in the movies. Growing up, and even now, my dad always kept a beard and mustache. I associated facial hair with trustworthiness, because I was a kid and I didn’t know any better. I saw that Iron Man had facial hair, and he just became my favorite. I could trust him.

10. I used to collect snow globes as a kid. My collection wasn’t very big, but I was proud of it.

11. I’m not a musical fanatic, but my favorite is “Oklahoma”.

12. I played the marimba in high school marching and concert band. Our percussion section won first place state championship in competition my junior year.

13. The farthest I’ve ever been from home is when I went on a band trip to Chicago.

14. I got my first college degree in August of 2020. I have an A.A. in English.

15. My writing pseudonym is J.H.Hope. Hope is actually my middle name.

16. I had braces for almost two years when I was 12 and 13. My mouth was too small for all the teeth in my head. I had to have seven pulled out all at once before I could get braces put in.

17. I was in my friend’s wedding as a bride’s maid in 2019. I’m also going to be a bride’s maid in another friend’s wedding later this year.

18. My favorite color is olive green. That’s also what color my car is.

19. My sense of style can be described as casual t-shirt and jeans mixed with 80s. I’ll let my readers imagination try and figure out what I mean by that.

20. When I last got my hair cut, I showed my hair dresser pictures of Brooke Shields from the 80s, so now I have feathered bangs that resemble young Brooke.

21. My friends sometimes think I’m crazy because I give myself essay assignments. I’m not in any classes right now, but I genuinely enjoy writing research and persuasive essays. I’ve written a few essays just for my own pleasure.

22. I have not fallen victim to the plague on Earth that is Tik Tok. You can disagree with me, that’s fine, but Tik Tok (along with other forms of social media) has turned people into mindless, thoughtless, conforming, zombies. Social media has caused so many people to just stop thinking for themselves. If they see that one train of thought is popular in the media, then they adopt that thought as their own, even if they don’t understand it. We have become the generation of reading headlines and taking them for truth. Do your own research! Stop mindlessly jumping on bandwagons! Another thing is that we now have a whole generation of “celebrities” who are famous for no reason. I’m sorry, but showing your ass on the internet and calling it talent is not a reason to be famous. I have an ass too, but you won’t catch me flaunting it on the internet and begging for people to make me viral. It used to be just the Kardashians who were famous for absolutely no reason, but now that has grown into a whole generation! Lets go back to making people with real talent famous, shall we?

23. My friend and I have a blog where we post writing advice and feature writers and their stories to help them gain reads. We haven’t been as active lately because we have both been busy with other things, but we will hopefully update it soon. You can find it here: https://writingandtips.com/#site-header

24. One of my all time favorite Disney movies, if not my top favorite, is “Oliver and Company.” Mostly because Billy Joel voices Dodger the dog, and he is my favorite singer.

25. I love the “X-Files” tv series from the 90s. I rewatch it from the beginning all the time. I even picked up chewing on sunflower seeds like Mulder does while I’m writing.

26. I have a collectible action figure of Jareth, David Bowie’s character in the film “Labyrinth,” hanging on my wall. I also have a retro poster of Harrison Ford, a picture of River Phoenix printed on a page from a dictionary, a picture of “Joe Cool” Snoopy also printed on a page from a dictionary, and an antique tin advertisement poster of James Dean advertising “Kist Kola” for five cents all hanging on the walls of my room.

27. I love Red Pandas. They are the cutest animals on the planet, aside from dogs of course.

28. My sister and I love watching paranormal and ghost hunting shows. We sort of believe in ghosts, but we love to watch them mostly to laugh at and make fun of them. Our favorite is Ghost Adventures.

29. This one seems like self promotion, but it’s an important fact about me. I am not a huge fan of the Wattpad platform anymore, because the community has turned into only promoting super popular authors or fanfiction. It has gotten increasingly difficult to get any reads on your stories if you don’t write popular fanfiction or your story isn’t already popular. But since it is the only platform with any sort of following, I post there in hopes that my stories will get read. So far I haven’t had much luck. But I post my stories over there, if you like my writing here and want to read what I am actually super passionate about. You can find me at the username J_H_Hope. my pride and joy story is called “Grim’s Cliff” and I would appreciate anyone who reads it or any of my works. https://www.wattpad.com/user/J_H_Hope

30. I love writing, even if no one reads what I’ve written. I write and write in hopes that at least one person finds it and enjoys it. This one is obvious, but a fact none-the-less. Writing makes up an important part of my life. It is the reason I work so hard in other aspects of my life.

There you have thirty facts about me. I was really struggling all the way through this one. I wanted to make them interesting, but I’m just not all that interesting of a person. I also don’t enjoy writing so much about specific things pertaining to me. Some of these, especially number 22, make me sound like an old lady. Am I turning 21 or 61 soon? Either way maybe this list was informative and at the least entertaining. Happy reading!

#writing #My writing #my thoughts #writing challenge #30 day writing challenge #facts about me #stories #reading

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crowdvscritic · 4 years ago

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round up // OCTOBER 20

Hubie Happy Halloween, friends! I’m not sure what October’s been like for you, but here’s a quick summary of my month:

Re-acquainting myself with my collection of (mostly gray and navy blue) sweaters

Ordering an embarrassing—like, I lost count kind of embarassing—number of lattés

Alternating between enjoying the ombré of the fall trees and cozying up with the first logs in the fireplace

Revisiting all-time favorite stories like The Scarlet Pimpernel by the Baroness Orczy, the extended Lord of the Rings movie trilogy, all three seasons of Stranger Things, the 1995 Pride and Prejudice miniseries, and several Harry Potter movies

In short, this month has been all about finding joy in the little things, which is the essence of our search for coziness in autumn. Since these monthly Round Ups only focus on pop culture that’s new to me, that means this month’s list is shorter than usual, but many of the movies and shows feel like warm blankets I’ll return to again. Though, as you’ll see, a few are not…

October Crowd-Pleasers

Enola Holmes (2020)

A movie so charming, I’m on the verge of rewatching even though it’s only been a few weeks. (It’s a rare occurrence for me to return to something so quickly.) It lets a stacked cast of performers known for dramatic roles flex their comedic muscles, including Henry Cavill, Sam Claflin, and—most spectacularly—Millie Bobby Brown. You can read my full review of the new Netflix movie at ZekeFilm. Crowd: 9/10 // Critic: 8/10

Murder, She Wrote (1984-96)

This entry comes with a bit of an asterisk* because Kyla and I watched this murder mystery procedural in 2018 for our podcast, SO IT’S A SHOW? At the time, I was open to watching more episodes, but it was never so easy as with the launch of the Peacock streaming service. All 12 seasons are available in the free tier, and I never thought a show about murder—and in the procedural format, which I don’t typically love—could be so enjoyable. Angela Lansbury’s mystery writer/amateur detective Jessica Fletcher has become a non-ironic role model for me—I aspire to be as gracious, intelligent, humble, uncynical, and assertive. Also, who says I’m not aspiring to spending my 60s writing, traveling, and solving crimes while wearing a fabulous collection of cardigans?

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The Return of SNL

When Saturday Night Live returns in the fall, I always squeak out during the premiere’s opening credits, “My friends are back!” It’s a silly thing to say about an ever-rotating group of people I’ll never meet, but when you’ve been watching Kenan Thompson do his thing for close to two decades, you can only be delighted to see him after months of absence. While the “At Home” episodes this spring were a treat I didn’t think possible, it’s even better to have my friends back at it in their usual environment with the high production value of Studio 8H. These were the skits that made me laugh the most month:

“VP Fly Debate Cold Open,” mostly for the Jeff Goldblum tribute (4602 with Bill Burr)

“New Normal” (4602)

“Dr. Wenowdis on Weekend Update” (4602)

“Enough Is Enough,” a bit which explains my feelings about almost all celebrity political takes (4602)

“Canadian News Show” (4603 with Issa Rae)

“Election Ad” (4604 with Adele)

“The Bachelor” (4604)

For more on how this season has come together back in the studio, you can read the Vulture interview with Lorne Michaels about it.

Coach Carter (2005)

A based-on-a-true-story movie about an unconventional basketball coach (Samuel L. Jackson) who wants his players (including a baby Channing Tatum) to succeed on more than just the court. It’s a straight-down-the-middle story that shares DNA with many of the inspiring sports movies that came out in the wake of Remember the Titans, but it’ll scratch that itch if that’s what you’re looking for. Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 7.5/10

Double Feature — Early ’90s Halloween Classics: Edward Scissorhands (1990) + The Addams Family (1991)

Both of these movies start at Christmastime, but both are spooOOooky movies in their bones. Not all Halloween movies are Tim Burton movies, but all Tim Burton movies are Halloween movies, including Edward Scissorhands (Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 8.5/10). Tim Burton is hit-or-miss for me, but I was pleasantly surprised at how moving this idiosyncratic fairy tale was. Johnny Depp is at his most tortured as a Frankstein’s monster whose inventor (Vincent Price) gave him scissors for hands, Dianne Wiest finds the heart and comedy in your local Avon representative, and Winona Ryder is a queen. The Addams Family (Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 7/10) might be even more idiosyncratic. I’ve never watched the TV series, so it took me a minute to warm up to its twisted sense of humor (“Are they made from real Girl Scouts?”), but once I did, I started laughing as often as my nostalgic parents.

The Magic iPod

A nostalgia kick you didn’t know you wanted. I have no idea why or how this site exists, only that it brings me joy. Try mashing up “Ms. New Booty” with “A Thousand Miles,” “Get Low” with “Float On,” “Tipsy” with Bring Me to Life,” “99 Problems” with “All Star,” “Country Grammar” with “Complicated,” or any other combo that brings your favorite songs from your first iPod together.

Hubie Halloween (2020)

You know those dumb movies that just hit you in the right spot? Adam Sandler has a knack for those kind of movies, and Hubie Halloween fills the void of Halloween fun you’re probably missing this year. Sandler plays Hubie, a not-very-bright do-gooder with a very big heart whose self-proclaimed purpose is to keep everyone safe in his hometown of Salem. But there are spooOOooky threats on Halloween night this year, and only Hubie and his thermos (which rivals a Swiss army knife in all its functions) will be able to save it. Don’t miss it you’re like me and love a good celebrity cameo and a Hollywood-designed Halloween costumes. Crowd: 9/10 // Critic: 6/10

Double Feature — Are We Sure These ‘80s Movies Are for Kids? Gremlins (1984) + Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)

After seeing Gremlins (Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 7/10), I know why parents were clamoring for the PG-13 rating—this movie may be short on the scares for adults, but I have no idea what I’d do for a tyke not expecting the cuddly Gizmo to spawn homicidal ghouls. In what may be the most ‘80s movie I’ve watched yet, we get a legit bonkers story, both in premise and execution—and it might also be a brilliant and scathing satire of consumerism? Perhaps another spoof of consumerism: Who Framed Roger Rabbit (Crowd: 8/10 // Critic: 8.5/10), which creates an impressively specific world that’s part animation, part live action. It’s a parody of classic film noir with no shortage of innuendo or just plain weirdness—its artistic achievement makes it worth watching, but since when have kids cared much about any of those things?

Double Feature — So-Bad-They’re-Good Action Flicks: Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000) + Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012)

If Gremlins is one of the most ‘80s movies, then Gone in Sixty Seconds (Crowd: 8/10 // Critic: 5.5/10) is one of the most Nicolas Cage movies. He’s a good guy caught on the wrong side of the law in a ridiculous plot engine where he has to steal 50 cars in less than a week. His pent-up frustration lives just below the surface, and his performance is so committed, you’re not sure if he’s knows the dialogue and plot twists are zany—in fact, you’re not even sure he’s acting at all. Also committed to whatever the heck it’s doing is a movie that’s exactly what it sounds like, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 6/10). An over-qualified cast (Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Anthony Mackie, Rufus Sewell, and more) just goes for it in a story with the premise that Abe Lincoln fought oppression caused by slavery and by immortal blood-suckers. I think my favorite part is when a vampire throws a pony at our 16th president—I couldn’t make this up if I tried.

October Critic Picks

Triple Feature — ‘60s Horror Classics: Village of the Damned (1960), The Haunting (1963), Night of the Living Dead (1968)

In Village of the Damned (Crowd: 8/10 // Critic: 8/10), everyone in a British village passes out at the same time for hours, and weird events continue for years, centering around a mysterious group of children. In The Haunting (above, Crowd: 8/10 // Critic: 9/10), a group is studying events at a haunted house, but it may be the house that’s in control. And in Night of the Living Dead (Crowd: 8.5/10 // Critic: 9/10), the zombie genre dawns with a group huddled away from the undead in a farmhouse. All of these are thoughtful, well-made films, but I recommend them with asterisks* because I’ll never watch any of these groups again. The Haunting made me scared of bumps in the night as I was falling asleep, and Night of the Living Dead gave me zombie-filled nightmares. If you’re looking for a dose of heebie jeebies, these are the movies you’ll be needing!

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

I’m not sure I understood any of it, but I think I liked it? If you don’t mind a film that feels more like poetry than a plot, this visual stunner is worth the long runtime and straight-up weird sequence of scenes. Fortunately, I was prepped for my viewing with the help of Turner Classic Movies host Ben Mankiewicz and writer/director Brad Bird, who selected as part of this season’s Essentials lineup. While Bird loves the film, Mankiewicz admitted it’s not one of his favorites because it’s such an obtuse head-scratcher. Both acknowledged it’s an important one to cinema, so unless The Tree of Life is still making your brain hurt almost a decade later, it’s worth trying to parse through a story that covers the dawn of man, man’s fight against machine, and, um, a lot of other things I couldn’t explain if I tried. Crowd: 5/10 // Critic: 10/10

The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)

If you’re a fan of Aaron Sorkin’s idealist monologues and ideological pitter-patter, then pause your latest binge of The West Wing to watch his latest writing/directing outing, now streaming on Netflix. Based on the true story of protesters who clashed with the police outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968—which, yes, doesn’t seem to difficult to imagine these days—it captures the spirit of a wild trial about political activism, healthy debate, fairness in government, and even the importance of grammar. If you watch it and think there’s no way this really happened, be sure to read up on the real trial to see how the film toned down the judicial circus. While this Oscars season will be unusual, we can predict this film will be in the awards conversation. Crowd: 9/10 // Critic: 9/10

Also in October…

My fellow ZekeFilm writers and I collected our favorite Halloween movies and TV specials for your enjoyment. Not-a-spoiler-alert: My pick is not very scary. In fact, it’s a zom-rom-com I’ve only come to love more since reviewing it upon its release.

Though Kyla and I always talk about Gilmore Girls on our podcast, we don’t just talk about the murder mystery TV shows it references like Murder, She Wrote. This month we talked about an ‘80s prime time soap full of shoulder pads and catfights as well as a ‘70s movie starring Rocky and the Fonz. Then we decided there were so many confusing pop culture references in an episode we couldn’t pick just one, so we researched a mish mash of topics like Punk Planet magazine, workout guru Jack LaLanne, singer Blossom Dearie, Manson cult member Leslie Van Houten, and a whole lotta board games.

540 movies and counting! You can follow real-time updates in what I’m watching in quarantine on Letterboxd.

#Round Up #Enola Holmes #Murder She Wrote #SNL #Saturday Night Live #Coach Carter #Edward Scissorhands #The Haunting #Village of the Damned #Night of the Living Dead #Hubie Halloween #2001: A Space Odyssey #The Trial of the Chicago 7 #The Addams Family #Gremlins #Who Framed Roger Rabbit #Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter #Gone in Sixty Seconds

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