#I was thinking of using the Heroes version of the image but eventually went with this one

[cheeseandcake-from-ao3]

Behold,

Dain:

[class1akids]

The current conversation is really interesting about the importance of framing in the story. For the savior squad, why do you think Horikoshi went towards drawing the child versions of each duo? Do you think that it represented how the hero & villain saw themselves/ each other in their clashes or was that more to sway the audience to the emotional stakes in the battle?

I think it's a bit of everything:

The story seems to tell us that heroes and villains in their current form can't understand each other because their lives are two different.

2. But that if you look deep enough, every villain is eventually a human with something inside them - an origin.

3. So even if it's impossible for heroes and villains to understand each other, they can dig down to that "humanity" (which by implication is deeply dehumanizing of the villains) and try to reach that.

I think that's partially what the kid images try to reflect - that human origin that can be recognized (but apparently not necessarily saved).

Having said that, the kid images I think in the 3 fights functioned a bit differently.

Dabi vs Shouto

This fight by far has the least kid imagery, and some people think that it's because Touya is the least redeemable.

But I think, for me, it has more to do with each stage of the fight.

In stage 1, Shouto asks Touya to reveal his backstory, which ends with Touya talking about how when he want home, "Touya died and Dabi was born". So the stake in the rest of part 1 is to see if there is still a Touya inside. Which evidently there is. But showing them like this, also draws attention to their backstories, to how it was Endeavor who did this to them which helps frame the Endeavor fight.

2. In stage 2, we get kid Touya image, to show Touya regressing mentally, but also to emphasize Endeavor's crushing guilt.

3. This again is emphasising Touya's regression and his child-self's need being filled. He's at Sekoto peak, but this time the family is here.

4. The most ambiguous child-self image is crying Shouto, which I think is clearly Touya's pov. And I'm guessing, that's Touya internalizing that Shouto is his brother, desparate to reach out and save the family. It's meant to show some kind of perception flip of Touya.

I'll do the other fights in a separate post.

[petite-guignol]

hoo boy OK

didn't want to dump this in the fan week tag because it's TECHNICALLY not FFIV but "crossover" did make me think of it.

this also isn't technically a "crossover" given that its entirely in-universe and just happens to be directly RELATED to FFIV but i wanted to talk about it and i figured out how to use my 6yo chromebook as a drawing tablet last night so here goes

i have this FFXIV OC who is quite literally "Edward but an evil bug demon" and i got so attached to him i'm making a whole-ass doll, with some help from my friend for some of the more complex engineering parts. here's some of my design sketches and color tests and what will eventually be his torso (he's being made out of a kind of butterfly-skeleton lookin BJD). It's mostly head shots because i was clearly struggling a lot with how to do the hair and the placement of the eyes, though i think i've sorta figured it out. the final outfit will have a diadem that kind of incorporates the eyes and antennae.

the strings-between-arms idea was from before i was offered the doll with the hollow torso, and i ended up abandoning it for structural reasons anyway. he still has four arms, though, two with human hands and two that are more mantis adjacent, which will have those white-and-blue stripes found on the Antlion's mandibles in Amano's concept art. It will be a bit difficult to rig on the torso, given it's just a ribcage held up by a spine, but i think it's doable as long as the additional arms are smaller

i'm not sure on the actual SHAPE of the antennae -- was kind of thinking something feather-like, but that might be too far into moth territory.

i was like "oh i definitely need the hairstyle to resemble Edward's so it's obvious who he's supposed to be riffing off of!" but as it turns out: Edward does not have an "iconic" haircut. Most every image of him has something different.

the character's name is Prince Orfeo of the Heartless Harp, once the sovereign of the Golden Principate of Damcyan before the world fell into darkness, now a voidsent whose beautiful face and enchanting voice mask the rapaciousness of a predatory insect.

He has a heart of gold, they say, but when has gold ever loved anyone back?

FFXIV lore and how it relates to FFIV lore under the cut but the short version is: i saw the words "damcyan antlion" in a dungeon and went fully insane

OK SO the 13th/the Void ended up with a lot of FFIV inspiration. That's perfect for me as the Void has been kind of my Thing since i started playing

the basic concept of the Void is kind of like, it's a world where the heroes failed -- one way or another, by deception or hubris or simply dying and being reborn as twisted monsters, they all became the villains. to this end we get the hero version of Golbez, of course, but like...

in the Lunar Subterrane dungeon, you delve into the hero Golbez's memories of his final moments, in which he and Durante are struggling to repel an invasion of Baron. the environment is a little...desert-y to be a one-to-one match for the FFIV Baron, which i already thought was interesting, but then Durante laments "nothing is exempt from their avarice" right before we get to the second boss fight of the dungeon: Damcyan Antlion

i thought it was really interesting that it was specifically a DAMCYAN antlion, because that immediately made me think -- wait, if this is effectively the "opposite" of FFIV, is Damcyan the invading force here? the antlion's boss mechanics involve dragging you into sand pits and crashing into pillars to bring them down, so it sure does make an effective siege weapon... hey, didn't they mention "avarice"? Some supplemental FFIV stuff mentions that Damcyan is extremely wealthy, to the extent that money is literally named after their ruling dynasty...

oh my god is there an evil version of Edward on the 13th

given the lack of permanent death once the laws of physics were broken enough over there, does that mean there's specifically a DEMON version of Edward that exists in the Void right now

so i immediately mapped out a basic concept for Bugward, gave him an Italian mythological name to go with all the Dante's Inferno stuff, and somehow got so fixated on it that now i'm balls deep in an expensive doll project.

transcription of the COOL BUG FACTS i scribbled on one of the earlier sketches

That is not his face

palace full of shed skins [was imagining like a cicada here]

don't listen to his words, he is incapable of love

not because he's a voidsent though, he was like that before

originally prince of the world's wealthiest nation

corrupted by Durante after his invasion of Baron, an act which fused Golbez's armor to Durante's body permanently [direct revenge for the death of Golbez obviously]

favorite methods of execution: quicksand, carnivorous worm pit

known to disguise himself as a commoner, seduce peasant girls, then feed them to his pet antlion when he gets bored of them

"i'd die for you" "then perish"

summoning method -- murder your lover and allow the corpse to be consumed by blowflies

[queenofsliferred]

*crashes through the ceiling* Hello, hello ~💜

So, not an ask game question, I'm just curious af. Would you mind telling me more about Sora Kurohoshi? And Rin Amamiya? And Dolores "Lolita"? And Jeff the Pom?

Also, how do Kitana Garrison and Nerissa look like? (description, picrew, whatever you prefer!)

hewwo!!

sora was originally made for a death note RP forum that i made with my friends. she was really egotistical and was the catalyst for one of the "big events" of the thing. she at first killed a bully of hers then went on to kill her family to get more attention from kira. she threatened to kill her cousin who was testifying against her and smuggle in a weapon to her court case then she would somehow steal it and then cause an even bigger scene that kira just couldn't ignore. she really wanted to die by kira but light winds up having her kill herself by using the death note (like writing in the fact that she commits suicide, not like giving her the note and then lol.)

i used this anime girl as a face claim. you just dont see anime girl pics like this anymore :')

Rin Amamiya is basically a female version of Joker Persona 5. i got super attached to her as i fleshed her out and wrote more about her. i rp as her a lot on a ERP site and have done crossover stuff which led to her MHA AU counterpart.

MHA!Rin is a petty criminal. she isn't super serious about actually committing crimes and is lowkey kind of a coward despite the showiness of her heists and costumes (which is a revealing leotard). like the traditional phantom thief, she sends a letter announcing that she is going to steal X thing and that the police better catch her and stop her. i personally think that she does all this for attention because she's so unassuming and considered really plain outside of the Joker persona.

she has beef with Neito because she couldn't use the name Phantom Thief due to him. the two butt heads a lot because he always wound up having to chase her and stuff when he was on his internship.

(art by nemirutami)

Dolores (though she wants you to call her Lolita-chan! its totally more cute that way!) is a trainer born in Paldea but had to move to Galar for most of her life. she has a huge fangirl crush on Raihan (and Bede when he becomes a gym leader) due to his amazing charisma and impeccable social media prescence. he inspires her to try to become a champion and idol as well. she has a HUGE fascination with sinnohian and hoennian culture, finding them really cute and aesthetically pleasing plus the animation that comes from there is really cool.

she has a tendency to get new crushes ALL THE TIME even if she's in a relationship atm. her girlfriend goes to another school (naranja while she is an uva student). you don't know her. (the girlfriend is real and is named maria, she belongs to my partner). her biggest crush is probably professor jacq, her biology teacher, but she doesn't pursue it.

jeff the pom isn't the most fleshed out tbh. he be my dog, jeff who is a pommeranian, but as a sonic character. i imagine him being a 'speed' type character in a sonic heroes setting. he's a doofus who wears his heart on his sleeve and sleeps all the time.

i dont have a ref image for him yet sadly gshfhgsdfh

when i originally made kitana, i used this anime girl as a face claim.

i eventually drew her in 2014 and lol its kinda rough to look at.

nerissa looks like this!

on the left is her current design and the right is her old design.

thanks for the questions!

[localdadu]

What would you think if Chloe and Audrey heard rumours about the way they were going to be portrayed in Astruc’s new movie, so they went back to Paris in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the movie from being completed? Then an evilized villain (maybe a wishmaker-like villain or maybe even a villain that's unrelated to the butterfly miraculous) caused Chloe and Zoe to switch bodies somehow, and nobody fully understands what's going on, so Zoe (in Chloe's body) is taken by Audrey back to New York, despite Zoe desperately trying to explain things. But Chloe enters a fugue state (heavily due to trauma caused by the neglect of her parents) and genuinely thinks she's Zoe, and is even able to recall many of the things Zoe did due to being in Zoe's body. The class thinks “Zoe's” change in behavior is due to the psychological effects of method acting, since “Zoe” is playing Chloe in Astruc's new movie, but they gradually convince “Zoe” to let them help her relearn how to be “herself” again.

Zoe is not able to gain access to Chloe's memories while in Chloe's body, because unlike Chloe, Zoe knows she's in the wrong body. In New York, Zoe is trying to get back to Paris, but when she gets there, “Zoe” thinks she’s there to try to hurt Marinette. Eventually, after listening to “Chloe”, Marinette starts to suspect that “Chloe” might be telling the truth, so she decides that she must test “Chloe” and “Zoe”. She fakes being in danger to see how they react. “Zoe” reacts slightly faster than “Chloe”, so Marinette comes to the conclusion that “Chloe” is lying and that “Chloe” has an evil and manipulative plan. Marinette thinks that “Chloe” must have picked up a few tricks from Lila, because she thinks no version of Chloe could possibly react faster than Zoe when it comes to protecting her. So Audrey takes “Zoe” back to New York again to “correct” her after “Zoe” fails to convince anyone of the truth.

10 years later, “Zoe” gets seriously injured after fighting a villain when Ladybug isn’t around, which causes “Zoe” to not have long to live. Then Ladybug accidentally stumbles upon the truth about “Zoe” while trying to help “Zoe” using magical powers. Ladybug decides that the moral thing to do is to switch Chloe and Zoe back to their original bodies. Once Zoe gets her body back, she blames Chloe for her impending death and for leaving her with 10 years of loneliness, while Chloe got off scot-free. When Lila gets defeated, Zoe steals the Butterfly Miraculous to get her hands on Ladybug and Catnoir’s miraculouses, hoping to “make things right”. Zoe gets defeated by the heroes (including Chloe, who has gotten her memories back) and Ladybug manages to cure Zoe’s injuries.

Tbh I was confused for a sec here but with the alternate universe thing we just got with the new special, it would be prettay cool. For Chloe, those rumors about the movie would be sort of a wake up call, for Audrey it would be purely about saving her image. For Zoe to become an antagonist and for Chloe to become a hero would be such a cool concept and there would be a lot to explore!

[lamuradex]

My Tales of Hero City Banners: Part 4

All were made in Photopea, using stuff from Google Images and my own hamfisted attempts with image editing.

I'll be posting them in short story order, so my skill level will jump up and down drastically in places, but oh well. Some of them are a mess, but I'm still proud of them. Enjoy!

16. Conflict of Interest

And the cloud squiggles are back. And they're red this time. I was trying to added ominousness for the approaching finale, but I think I failed. Reused Judgement, as usual, but then I had to make both Cosmo and Henchman 14 from scratch. 14 would later be reused for the remade Last Resort, back in part one. I think I did well on them both, Cosmo in a standard business pose, and I'm very happy with 14's gear themed Hawaiian shirt. Had to make the pattern myself. But, he is also doing the Justice Man pose, reused base again, which feels wrong somehow. 14 should never mimic Justice Man.

17. Cosmo's Story

I originally planned to have this one be just symbols, not people, Lucy's badge and Cosmo's logo. But, I forgot to put Cosmo's brand on the previous one, so I hadn't introduced it earlier, and so... I just didn't. I lessened the cloud squiggles, which is good, but Lucy flipped looks off for some reason. It's the hair and the legs I think. She looks like she's levitating. Passable but not great.

18. Final Retreat

I think I forgot to mention in the Post Match, but Final Retreat is a play on Last Resort, my first Tales story. Retreat as in a holiday. Anyway. This was just a big collage piece again, the background from Apocalypto Incident, and heroes from all the others, and I darkened the letters for drama. The hardest part was deciding who went where, to try and keep some balance. And I had to give subtle prominence to Henchman 14. I think it came out very well, ominous and busy, but I also don't know why Justice Man looks sorta blurry. It's odd. Maybe it's that backlighting I gave him.

19. Epilogues.

There's no story here. Take it back to basics for the end, use the red cape, done. The hardest bit was aligning some stuff. It all felt off.

20. Old Justice

And here we come to the end, or perhaps the beginning. The original was maybe the third banner I made, just going with a duller version of Last Resort. Remade however, I faded Justice Man's look, and even gave Henchman 14 a new shirt, harkening back to Last Resort with the layout. Nothing ground breaking, but I think it works. Solid B.

And that's it. All the banners I made for Tales of Hero City, apart from the one used for the W.I.P pages.

I still think this base one looks good. Quintessentially heroic.

And at least I caught that bloody typo that made its way into some of the early designs... eventually.

I'd posted several of these before I spotted that. Had to go back and fix them all. Maddening, I can tell you.

So, yeah, this was my foray into art to help advertise my stories, I have no idea how effective it was, but it was sort of fun. I'll most probably keep doing it if I ever get around to posting collection two... or finish writing collection two.

But that's all for now. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Toodles.

[negative-zerospore]

Hello, hello, my Crickets!

No horny this time.

Been working on some sketches! I'm not super great, but it's for my current DnD character named Alice!

She is An Aasimar Paladin with an oath of Vengeance.

She used to be sworn to an oath of the crown to a hugely rich CEO of a mining company she basically had to sell her soul to because of the shitty Circumstances of her Husband Leaving her mid pregnancy out of nowhere so she had to raise her already 7 yr old son and give birth to another entirely alone. Eventually after years of struggling to get by both her sons caught ill with something even she couldn't heal or cure and she went to the local Mega Corp CEO and sold her soul in return for him helping and promising to keep her sons safe. in short She broke that oath, and tried to kill the CEO and due to the terms of said oath, she lost all her powers and is starting back from level 1. She's in her 50s, but in this world, Aasimar age is more like elves, so she was still plenty youthful. The point is that she was an established hero for a good time and a major celebrity of the world, but now that she's broken her oath, she's a shell of who she used to be.

She under him basically acted as his enforcer and took direct orders and as another part of the oath she could put on her helmet and gain additional strength and blank out on her tasks at hand so she could basically auto pilot and feel a dull pleasant distorted version of events to get her days over with so she could fast forward to being home with her kids at the cost of not being fully aware of what she did nor the orders that were given and not being able to take off the helmet till her orders were complete. With this situation, she unknowingly committed atrocities mostly in the form of union busting and collecting debts, though she did knowingly participate in corporate sabotage against rival mining companies.

One day upon completing an order she removed her helmet and found both her sons dead at her feet in her home and their blood dripping from her sword. She had unmistakably been responsible for their murder and she doesn't know why or for what reason and cannot remember the order given to her and in a psychotic snap and an attempt to preserve part of them so they could be revived at a later date because she no matter what she did couldn't bring them back made the incredibly terrible decision to skin their corpses and line the inside of her armor and helmet with their faces and skin so she could preserve a piece of them and in her own fucked up sense of repentance bear the weight of her sins every moment of everyday till she can bring her babies back.

(The party has yet to know about this bit of her backstory because that's dark shit they just know she never takes off her armor and keeps her helmet in a bag on her hip and that she smells like actual death. She explains the smell as a side-effect of breaking her oath.)

Currently, it's been about a week since this incident, and she just met the party because a god pulled them all into a fetch quest, so she has taken up the role of group leader as a major distraction to cope and mentally if she spends too much time thinking she goes to really dark places really quick.

I'll happily go more into if anyone is curious or until I decide to yap some more lol but the original sketches of her come from my dm!

And I made these follow ups to try and get a clearer image of her in my head!

And then when I got a bit more confident I used a reference to give her a bit more life!

And beyond that I drew up another little peice as a Propaganda bit that her old employer would have made constantly to basically hype up his new chief enforcer.

Reference included!

[notacatdown]

Those are all good reasons! Since the drama ties self-love to a pre-requisite to loving others, I would have liked it if Ziqi finds out that his mom did love him before his favorability went to 99%.

The novel and drama is too different. In the novel, the rise in Ziqi's favorability/affection % is mostly from Miaomiao and Ziqi's conversations. The drama shows it through these stunningly picturesque scenes with sparse dialogue and really good acting.

"I think the main thing about Miaomiao vs Ziqi when it comes to falling in love is that Ziqi is trying so hard to deny it. Miaomiao mainly just needs to stop seeing him as a novel character, and she is pretty much down"

"I think at that point, for her, it was less about what Miaomiao actually wanted, and more about how to get rid of her?"

Agree to all these things. When I watched these episodes for the first time, I thought the Resentful Woman had taken control of her body and that's why she's driving the group away. On a side note, I think the screenwriter did a great job foreshadowing that the Resentful Woman was hiding in Mu Yao's body.

"It's not that far fetched given her perceived background as someone from a rich family who generally always has gotten what she wanted."

They've spent so much time together, and she doesn't know Miaomiao well. Although... I don't think the drama shows the audience knows what Miaomiao wants - beyond the nebulous idea of world peace, equality for demons, and the Four Bamboo Heroes - so how could Mu Yao know.

The novel shows Miaomiao gathering clues, figuring out which of the witnesses is lying, and bouncing ideas off with the others. She's also learning more about the demon hunter world by asking Liu Fuyi and Mu Yao questions (has nothing to do with Ziqi) and getting used to the physical hardship of the demon hunter profession. We're shown that her true love is puzzle-solving.

I like this novel scene where MiaoMiao zones out while looking at Mu Sheng's face. She's thinking about all of his good points (his intelligence, his lie-detection skills, her thoughts go down this line for a while, basically how he's the perfect demon hunter.) We can easily see that she's very attracted to him and her interest in demon hunter profession. Meanwhile, he gets increasingly flustered why she's been looking at him for so long. 

And now that I think about, I'm not sure if any of that holds true for Miaomiao in the drama because the screenwriter chose to omit certain details when using novel scenes to create a different image of Miaomiao.

For example, in the drama, she knows how to defeat the mirror monster's because of what she read. In the novel, she figures out the logic behind the mirror monster's power and its limitations. Her intelligence is what impresses Liu Fuyi enough that he's supports her joining the group. He thinks she would be a good demon hunter. That short scene is the starting point to their eventual friendship.

Idk what to say about Fuyi though🧍‍♀️... Even when he tries to express his opinions, he isn't very good at it lol.

Lol, Liu Fuyi. I like all of his head nods. I wonder why his friendship with Miaomiao was removed. I wish we could have seen his goofier personality getting revealed as they becomes better friends. Every meal and travel time, its just Miaomiao reiterating the idea of them being the Four Bamboo Heroes. I think a few dialogue lines from the novel would have made those scenes more interesting, and it would show Miaomiao's interest in wanting to be friends and curiosity about the demon hunter world.

I'm not sure how much they aged her up though, she still seems quite young?

Oh, I meant I think its easier to be happy in college than the first few years at a office job because she won't have work responsibilities and would have more free time. Miaomiao went from someone who is majoring in a subject that she loves, is planning on taking the post-graduate exam to study that subject further, and her parents are alive (novel version) to someone that's so preoccupied with listening to an audiobook that she doesn't hear what her boss is saying at a meeting - so I assume she doesn't like her job - and has lost her dad when she was young and feels guilty over his death (drama version). In the novel, Lin Yu 16, Ziqi 18, Miaomiao (last year of college so 20/21), Mu Yao 20, Liu Fuyi 28.

Love Game in Eastern Fantasy is undoubtedly a happy ending for Fu Zhou. He survived his brain surgery, all of his wishes came true, and the person he has had a crush on since middle school came to his fan meeting.

Is it any sort of ending, happy or sad, for MiaoMiao? Not really. She's back to where she started in episode 1. We see how the past 32 episodes have changed Fu Zhou in real life, but we don't get to see any of MiaoMiao's mental or emotional progress. At best, her efforts have led her favorite author to fix a story she didn't like.

I simply want to see a concrete scene of MiaoMiao being happier at the end of the drama than she was at the beginning. It can be something as small as her calling her mom and saying she dreamed about her dad and how that made her feel.

[mytvjunk]

Some random notes on Young Royals

Young Royals was an unexpected delight. Based on the trailer, I thought it was going to be another version of the show Elite, but instead it gave us a beautiful & complex love story between the main characters Simon and Wilhelm. Their relationship was well developed, the slow burn build up was so perfectly done and the actors have amazing on screen chemistry, which helped enhance the story telling experience. You find yourself immediately rooting for the ships success....they were so kind, soft and affectionate towards each other that you can't help but be emotionally invested in their relationship, every step of the way. I hope Young Royals gets picked up for a second season cuz we need to see what transpires of their relationship...especially now that it's in a bit of a limbo situation, due to the Monarchys interference. I'm happy that at least an "I love you" was said before parting ways; and tbh I'm fine with Simon not saying it back to Wilhelm because 1: we all know that he does in fact love him & two: it would give Wilhelm false hope, so I'm glad Simon stayed reserved & stood his ground. I hope the writers don't try to mess up this couples narrative too much in the upcoming season because it would be a total shame to mishandle and destroy all of the magic they developed on season one ❤ But lets be honest, we all know that they'll most likely introduce a new conflict. I can totally see them going the route of giving Wille a girlfriend & him trying to really live up to his new title and then with some time, eventually going back into the arms of Simon. But our boy Wille has a lot to work through

- Felice had a great arc to her story. It felt like she was initially painted out to be your typical vapid mean girl, but with time you got to see many layers of her & you get to understand why she is the way she appears to be to the world versus who she really is. I was a bit weary when she started to develop a more intimate relationship with Sara, especially after how poorly she treated her during the 1st few episodes..TBH I thought she was going to backstab Sara at some point, but it turned out that she genuinely liked Sara; so much so that she gave her clothing, accessories & makeup. She invited her to sleep overs and to be a part of her world. She withdrew herself from the Swedish Lucia and passed the crown to Sara (even though that was more of an FU to her mom, but still!) Felice also went out of her way to figure out who leaked the sex tape in hopes that it would help keep Sara at the school....so the connection there was alot stronger than I thought it was. And I believe that's in part due to Sara dropping the bombshell during the parents dinner party that she was the one who actually rode Felices horse. I think that started to help free Felice from this grip of having to withstand an image of perfection to her parents (especially her mom) and her peers. I think this was the push she's been looking for all of her life and Sara helped her get there. And even though Felice didn't necessarily vocalize her gratitude, her actions paid it forward. In a lot of ways Felice ended up being the unsung hero of this story and I look forward to seeing what else she brings next season.

- Sara also had a pretty impressive arc to her story. She practically went from social pariah to seamlessly climbing up the social latter and becoming one of the popular kids. When she was crowned the Lucia, all I kept thinking to myself in that moment was "looks like we've got a new Supreme" haha. However this new lifestyle did bring a change in her behavior, especially in relation to her home dynamic. You saw her become more judgmental towards her family and her current living conditions in which she felt superior to...and it was ever so present than during their dinner times. She started to transform & carry herself as if she was Felice...from wearing her dresses, to the hair pins to ultimately seducing August; she was a new person. The biggest power shift we saw in her was when she realized that August was the one who recorded and leaked the sex tape. Instead of reporting it to the school, the authorities, her family or Wilhelm, she went straight to August & threatened to tell on him unless he used his influence to get her a dorm room in the upcoming school semester. So she sold her brother in order to get a residency spot at the school....cold blooded move! But now that August is aware that Wilhelm knows it was him who leaked the video, will August stay true to his word and actually get Sara a residency? Especially since at this point August might be under the impression that Sara snitched on him, so it kinda seems pointless now. And even if that's not the case, I don't think August still has much pull left at the school as he initially did...so I don't know if this will work out for her at the end. Either way, I did not see Sara metamorphosing into a bit of a villain but it sure was entertaining watching it play out! At her core, I still believe that she is a sweetheart, but she is letting too many outside influences change the way she is. And I hope these power trips are short lived and she gets back to living like her true self.

- August was an absolute pain to watch. He is an entitled, insufferable, garbage of a person. He should've been expelled from the school and charges should've been pressed on his ass for leaking that sex tape. Unfortunately his privilege let's him get away with anything. The entire time he let his hurt ego & jealousy for Wilhelm cloud his every move. It was one of those "If I can't have it, then no one else can" situations, so he went out of his way to hurt Wilhelms reign. However he's an absolute idiot if he really thought that the monarchy was not going to spin and deny the story on the sex tape. Also how dumb was he for using the school computer to download the video from his phone? As if that wasn't easily going to be traced back to him. Maybe had he focused his energy on bettering his own problems than perhaps he wouldn't be so far deep in crap like he's gotten himself unnecessarily in to. And it wasn't like he was in bad standings with the monarchy, he was a trusted party and now he's lost it all. I hope karma gets his ass good!

- Overall, I really loved this series. I honestly went into it with low expectations, but this show had so much depth and you can tell that this love story was handled with so much care, on all sides of the production. I hope Netflix picks it up for a second season and we get more than 6 episodes 🙏🏾

[shining-magically]

so I’ve wondered this since the trailer came out years and years ago and Chloe defended the movie - was the red shoes teaser written by the same team that made the movie? were they forced to market it like that, was that based on an earlier draft, etc?? not sure if you know but you seem like the leading expert!

Sorry, this is gonna be an absolute novel because you know I’m an animation fan and the history and production of Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs is SO interesting and insane. Like, Tangled levels of insane. Thanks for calling me an expert, no one else was gonna do it so I just kind of took up the helm lol.

Here’s the low-down... The timeline of the movie’s production is an absolute mess and kind of an extremely wild ride. It was in production for ten years, went through a lot of different crew members, and went through at least two other major versions of the story before landing on the final version.

Since there’s not a ton of info on the movie’s production, a lot of this is pieced together from different interviews and context clues, and also a lot of what I’ve read and what I am quoting has been translated from Korean, sometimes pretty roughly. But yeah.

Here’s the story of why the Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs teasers and poster were so, so bad and fatshame-y and the actual movie was so, so good and body-positive. (With pictures and production artwork!)

(This is a beast of a post so I’m putting it under a cut.)

All right, so. After its conception originally as a short story by the South Korean studio Locus Creative in 2009-2010-ish, Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs was being worked on and was set to come out in Summer 2017, as evidenced by this poster at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, featuring a different logo and very different character designs for most of the dwarfs.

In early-mid 2016, the first teaser (in which we see Snow White undress and then two dwarfs recoil in horror at her fatness when she takes her magic shoes off) was released, after the film had kind of been slowly chugging along for 6 or so years. (I am having such trouble pinpointing when the second teaser was released (in which one of the dwarfs basically attacks Snow while she is sleeping to steal her shoes), but I believe it was around the same time.) The teasers didn’t get that much traction because this was a small film from a small indie studio in South Korea.

None of the final actors had been cast yet. At this point in the production, the story was different, one of the many versions that the movie went through. As in the final movie, the dwarfs were actually cursed knights/princes and Snow White switched back and forth between two body types due to her magic shoes, but in this version, the dwarfs needed to steal the shoes from her in order to break their curse (rather than needing “a kiss from the most beautiful woman in the world” like in the final movie).

The weird thing is, I believe they had JUST changed the movie’s story when the teaser came out. I’m almost positive it was released more as a proof of concept than as an actual trailer for the movie. They had just recently combined two separate characters (seen above), a typical pretty, skinny princess character (Snow White) and a cute chubby girl character (’Bonnie’), into one single character that switches back and forth between the two appearances when she wears the magic shoes (also they had just dropped literally half of the movie taking place in the real world, with a magic mirror portal, it was a whole thing). 

They didn’t have the details of this aspect of the new story hammered out yet, and the first pass at presenting Snow’s magically changing body type, was, yeah, not good and super offensive. This was a really inexperienced indie studio making their first film on a low budget, so even the animation and voice acting wasn’t great. I think they just wanted to get SOMETHING out there because it had been 6 years and they wanted to have something to show for it.

But here’s the thing. Despite how the teasers make it seem, this was always supposed to be a movie about body positivity, letting go of appearance-based prejudices, and loving yourself and others for who you are and for who they are, which we see in the final film.

I like to think of our film as a kindhearted one. Our intentions are nice.

- Director Sung-ho Hong

It’s important to keep in mind that this movie was made in South Korea by a 99% Korean crew, and, as I understand it anyway, in Korean culture, ‘fatshaming’ is not really a thing that is seen as overtly offensive. Also, children’s media there seems to have more adult things in it than in the US, which probably accounts for the more risque parts of the teasers. That said, I really believe that at this point in the timeline, the movie was on-track to be bad (or at least not very good) when it was released, and it would have ended up bad IF a few key players hadn’t signed on (which I’ll get to in a moment).

Interestingly, the movie’s producer, Sujin Hwang, said in a 2017 interview:

“[Both teasers] were solely produced to induce curiosity. They’re completely irrelevant to the actual story.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

I think what she was trying to convey was that neither one is a scene in the actual movie, because while the teasers didn’t reflect the revamped story as it existed in summer 2017 (the time of the interview), they DID reflect the earlier version of the story where the dwarfs wanted her shoes, which is what the story was at the time they were made.

Now that we’re in post-teaser 2016, HERE’S where things start to turn around. After the teasers were released, my guy Disney veteran and native Korean Jin Kim joined the project. He and Red Shoes director Sung-ho Hong had been buddies for about eight years and Sung-ho had been trying to get Jin to come to Seoul and work with him at Locus for a long time, and he finally succeeded.

Jin and his twenty years of Disney experience as an animator and senior designer on films like Tangled, Frozen, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, and Moana, had a HUGE HUGE HUGE influence on the movie. He redesigned almost all the characters, oversaw all the visual development from the moment he signed on, and heavily (HEAVILY) supervised the animation, literally going frame-by-frame through preliminary animations and drawing over them, teaching the inexperienced animators at Locus everything he knew. (Literally almost everyone except him either only had TV experience or had no professional experience because they just gotten out of school.)

From an outsider’s perspective, it really seems as though Jin joining the project (and his gargantuan effort) made the quality SKYROCKET. Not just in character design and animation, but also in things like effects animation, story, etc. After he joined, Locus really started pushing HARD to make a good, high-quality movie, and his influence and experience from being a prominent figure at Disney was absolutely key. The studio also began to really study Disney films and other well-made animated films from other studios to really try and pinpoint what the DNA of a good animated movie really is.

I don’t have any solid evidence, but I’m pretty sure that Tony Bancroft (an animator and the co-director of Mulan) then joined the project because he’s good friends with Jin Kim. He is only credited as the voice director (the movie was recorded in English and the characters were animated to the English dialogue), but I am SURE that he probably also had a pretty big influence on the movie, because like... How could he not? I really really think there was more to his role than his title would have you believe, even though there’s almost no info out there about it.

So now the movie goes through a gigantic metamorphosis. Character designs, visual development, and animation quality are all rapidly improving, the story is tightening, and the themes of the movie (which, again, were always the same and intended to be positive) are being presented in a more sincere way. The movie is becoming the sweet, self-love-encouraging and body-positive movie that was eventually released.

I’m putting a gif from the credits of the final movie here. As we move into 2017, when the giant eruption of backlash occurred, please keep in mind that the story was finalized at this point and that THIS was the movie people were so mad about:

Chloe Grace Moretz accepted the role of Snow White immediately after she read the script and she recorded her lines (I think) in early-ish 2017. Her co-star Sam Claflin also immediately accepted the role of the romantic interest, Merlin, after reading the script and recorded his lines in (I believe) July 2017.

In the summer of 2017, the story and script were more or less the same as in the final movie. Promotional images from that time show that most of dwarfs had been completely redesigned by this point and didn’t have their teaser designs anymore.

They also released a few screenshots that look exactly like the final film. The movie was advertised as coming out in ‘2018′ at this point. Here’s a promo image from 2017 that is MUCH more tactfully worded than the infamous Cannes poster:

So now we’re in summer 2017. The Cannes Film Festival. The movie’s script and story have been basically nailed down, animation is underway, and the Korean film company Finecut is beginning to market and sell the movie to worldwide audiences. They are planning on showing some footage to potential buyers at the festival, and they make a poster to advertise the film there.

Unfortunately, it’s THIS POSTER:

Now here’s where there are some unknowns. By this point, the movie is basically in its final form, which is an adorable, body-positive story about loving people for who they are, loving yourself for who YOU are, and that provides commentary on society’s standards of beauty and how they affect how people are treated/viewed. So why this poster??? All I can really tell is that someone (I think Finecut) really, REALLY messed up and either horribly mistranslated the tagline, or didn’t do enough research to know that this kind of thing is REALLY NOT OKAY in western culture.

The above picture is shared and the internet backlash begins, fueled by tweets from prominent body-positivity activists like Tess Holliday. Even Chloe Grace Moretz speaks out against it, because she of all people KNOWS that that’s not what the movie is about. The internet then finds the old teasers from before the movie was revamped and it makes things worse. Producer Sujin Hwang profusely apologizes and says that that is NOT the message of the movie. Locus pulls the advertising campaign, and takes down the two old teasers.

“Our film, a family comedy, carries a message designed to challenge social prejudices related to standards of physical beauty in society by emphasizing the importance of inner beauty.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

Voice director Tony Bancroft also tried to explain the situation:

“The truth is the film has a body-positive message as its core theme–it’s the opposite of what reports are saying. The problem is one poorly translated movie poster that has been taken dramatically out of context.” 

- Voice Director Tony Bancroft

And then... There was nothing for a while. The movie didn’t come out in 2018 and was delayed. From what I can tell, I DON’T believe this delay was related to the Cannes backlash. I think it was mostly due to Locus’s limited budget and resources, because as we know, animation is difficult, time-consuming, expensive, and easy to do badly but hard to do well. Also, probably with Jin Kim and Tony Bancroft’s influence, they REALLY wanted to make sure to do a good job with the animation because they now had a great story and they really wanted the movie to be a quality, worldwide hit that would kind of put South Korean feature animation on the map. Just take a look at how nice the final animation was:

The movie was released in South Korea on July 25th, 2019. Unfortunately, the damage was done in the English-speaking markets and it was not released to an English-speaking audience until June 22, 2020, when it was released digitally in the UK. At the time of this post, there is no set US release date, but the distribution rights were recently bought by Lionsgate and the MPAA gave the film an official PG rating.

So who’s to blame? There’s no good answer. You could blame Locus for making those old teasers. You could blame Finecut for the competely tonedeaf Cannes poster. You could even blame cancel culture for raging against the movie based on one poster and two old teaser trailers without researching what the movie was actually about.

All I know is, it’s a damn shame.

[beardedmrbean]

One thing I don't get about the whole batgirl movie fiasco is that the comics are still there? You can even read them online for free? Batgirl doesn't need Hollywood to show she's famous, she's needs fans who like her as a character not as a brand.

I went ADHD again, super short answer at the bottom, ADHD response begins below

____________________________

It's a way to pick up some new fans for one, a lot of people that don't engage with the characters in the comic books and such.

You can really tell when you go and see how Batman is played in some of the movies, one of the better lines I've seen about him is 'if you can't picture this version of batman comforting a small child, then the writers didn't write Batman they wrote, I can't remember,

hang on I need a moment to look

Don't know why I always say hang on, not like you're gonna see it till I publish it anyhow.

Only saw the one with Afleck as Batman, was Justice League he was good there I think, Christian Bale kinda failed this particular Batman test imho, but people liked it and it let different writers try and take him in a different direction.

Really liked Michael Keaton.

Back around to the subject at hand, the movies and cartoons, tv shows, all that good stuff that happens outside of the comic book crowd it diversifies the fandom.

People that don't have the time or money to start in on the comics can sit and watch a 2 hour movie or a TV show every Tuesday evening staring a hero from their childhood that they don't have any other reasonable way of interacting with anymore.

It's also a great way for them to introduce their kids to the world they love without a whole lot of pressure or need for backstory.

The Toby and Andrew Spiderman incarnations gave you enough to be going on with, the MCU one came in and assumed we already knew about the bite and uncle Ben so they skipped that bit and gave us hot aunt May in exchange.

I think a lot of people are bummed about this particular Batgirl getting pulled because of the actress's ethnicity which is something they'd like to see happen.

It will eventually, hopefully in a way that doesn't reek of tokenism.

Fuck man into the Spiderverse was genius, I don't know enough about the different universes in the comic world so it may have been something going round for a long time.

Remember Stan Lee commenting about the costume don't recall if it was on purpose at first or not, but it was noticed that anyone could be a spider person they're fully covered so who would know.

And now I'm having mental images of some kind of time warp sending a black Spiderman back to 1920's NYC, but they're still your friendly neighborhood Spiderman, so the racists don't know they're cheering for and toasting a black man.

and I'm gonna stop because I just realized adhd brain took over again and I need to get a better handle on that at some point.

_______________________________

TL:DR; it's a bummer for people that were looking forward to this incarnation for one reason or another, and because movies are a great way to introduce new fans to the fandom.

[bluebeetle]

Issued covered: Batman #357-359, Detective Comics #524-526, Young Justice #44

Doing this in multiple reblogs because of images. 

I have been toying with the idea of writing a retelling of Jason’s time as Robin for my own amusement for awhile now, and part of my plan was to read a bunch of his comics and compile a bunch of interesting things mentioned in them, especially from his time as Robin--because I take some things way too seriously. Plus, I have toyed with the idea of reading every coming Jason appears in before…I may try, but may skim ones where he’s a bit player lol. 

So, here is a little liveblog/review thing I did of the first arc Jason ever appeared in back in 1983.  I hope to do more in the future, roughly in chronological order, and hopefully not all as long as this. Mind you these are Jason centric, so plot points not relating to him may be glossed over.

Starting us off is Batman vol 1 #357--the very first appearance of Jason Todd! …sort of.

For those unaware, let’s go into some backstory--not Jason’s backstory, no, but the backstory of how he was created.

In the early 80s, Dick Grayson--the first Robin--started appearing in the New Teen Titans as the team leader. This meant that because of how the comics were written back then, the writers for Detective Comics and Batman--the books Dick had previously been a protagonist in during the 60s and 70s--weren’t able to use him very often, leaving Batman as the sole main character.

This was a new problem. Writing in the 70s and 80s differed from writing in the 60s, where plot and continuity didn’t matter, but as time went on, characters tended to stick to only a few books at a time. Plus, by this point, Dick had been aging, being around 18 now, but the Batman writers (or editorial, I can’t remember which) supposedly wanted to de-age Robin back into a younger child, like he had been for decades, until the more mature (compared to before, anyways) writings of the Bronze and Copper age in the 70s and 80s rolled around.

That left the writers wanting to give Bruce a younger, pluckier sidekick, one iconic like Robin (so Batgirl, being around Dick’s age, didn’t count) for Bruce to bounce off of--and so there was a compromise: the Batman writers would get a younger Robin, and the Titans writers would get college age Dick Grayson! So Dick hung up the old pixie boots, became Nightwing--a reference to an old Superman story where the name is used for a legendary hero of Krypton--and a new character was created to take up the mantle of Robin. 

Enter: Jason Todd. He’s like Dick, but younger! In fact, it seems Jason as a separate character from Dick was mostly an afterthought; while Dick got to develop in the Titans run, Jason was there to be the Robin for Batman first and foremost; so his design, backstory, and personality were all formed heavily around that.

Which is not to say he’s bad, per say, but Jason was infamous for being disliked by older fans (younger fans, however, generally seemed to like him based on the letters I’ve read). But this has more to do with the writing he got later, especially from Starlin, who hated the concept of Robin--and in fact part of fan dislike can be attested to just a general disinterest in sidekicks by the 80s; This can best be seen in the New Teen Titans cast, where some of the character’s have no close relationship with a pre-existing hero, and the ones who do eventually take on new names (Troia, Nightwing, etc) to further separate them from their mentors as they grow and become adults on their own. 

As a result, much of the dislike for Jason at the time came from a dislike of Robin as a concept, not him as a character, especially as Batman comics would continue to become darker, grittier, and more ‘grounded’ as the decade wore on, culminating in The Killing Joke, A Death In the Family, and The Dark Knight Returns.

 I’ve heard a lot of back and forth on if the early Jason was hated or well liked, and vice versa; I think it’s best to say all versions of him were divisive for various reasons--mostly stemming from him just being Robin, as many people didn’t like that he was ‘usurping’ Dick along with the above. Despite his role as a soundboard for Batman to bounce off of, something that's been integral to the Batman comics since 1940--less than a year after the character was created--and such a fact is why Tim Drake was introduced no long after Jason’s death. Batman, as a character, often works best if there is someone else like Robin for him to contrast off of. That is not to say all stories need a Robin or similar character, merely that in the long run, it’s good to have a Robin around for when you need them.

That is, of course, not to say every adult hated Robin; Jason was still pretty well liked by readers--when we get to it I’ll even share some of the letters in the issues I own that criticize Starlin’s obvious dislike of Jason--and the vote to kill him off was actually pretty close.

But that is a story for another Jason Todd; for now, let’s focus on Pre-Crisis Jason.

For those not in the know, ‘Pre-Crisis’ refers to versions of any DC character prior to the 1986 story, Crisis on Infinite Earths. Originally, DC’s comics existed in a multiverse, where not every book was in the same universe but others were. For example, a story about Barry Allen’s Flash meeting Jay Garrick’s Flash--the first Golden Age Flash--involves Barry traveling to another universe using his powers. Similarly, the Superboy in various Superboy and Legion of Superhero stories lives in a world distinct from that of the Superman from Action Comics. 

 Instead, the plan hatched by Teen Titans writer Marv Wolfman was to combine all these universes into a single one. A shared continuity and universe for all the characters they own--not just a select few--was a pretty novel idea at the time. 

This event also gave the writers a chance to hit a soft reset--changing characters backstories, tweaking events as they see fit, and bringing in newly acquired characters from Charleston and Fawcett comics. DC had bought them out, getting the likes of Blue Beetle, the Question, Captain Marvel, and Captain Atom. It gave the writers an opportunity to start fresh without willing away everything; many Krypton related characters were killed off to better establish Superman as the last of his kind (most famously Supergirl’s death) or killing off Barry Allen to allow his sidekick to become the Flash in his stead, as well as writing off Superboy’s adventures forever, so that Superman only became a hero in adulthood. 

One of the characters changed drastically as a result of that was Jason Todd, who was stripped of many of his similarities to Dick backstory wise, once he reappeared in the Batman comics after the event.

However, this hasn’t stopped people from pulling from or enjoying bits from this early version of the character; he was around for around the same time as the post-crisis Jason was before his death, after all.

 Most famously was Batman and Robin writer Grant Morrison referencing Jason’s original red hair colour and him dying it black. Though they instead changed it to Bruce forcing Jason to dye his hair, instead of a choice Jason made on his own. 

This is a change I don’t care for, but I have always been amused by the idea of Jason lying about this to his siblings after dying his hair because of a breakdown; Bruce was believed to be dead at the time, after all. Going farther, I have also been very amused by the idea of pre-crisis Jason’s backstory as being how Damian imaged Jason’s time as Robin--complete with the dyed hair lie, with Jay’s backstory being like Dick’s because Damian only knew that one, and a cool femme fatal mom (Nocturna), because Damian cannot imagine a childhood without one.

Back to the point at hand: Issue 357, the first appearance of Jason Todd.

Despite this having our new Robin, he is absent from the cover, instead showing Bruce deciding to become a hentai model.

Get used to this. 

Jason not being there, I mean--not the tentacles.

Plot starts off with Bruce digging around trying to stop drug trades and deal with mobsters; nothing groundbreaking. 

Interestingly, Gordon is 60 in this continuity; matches with his design and the fact that Barbara was supposed to be closer to Bruce’s age than Dick’s originally, but definitely a fact that was changed in most other versions of the character.

And this brings us to Dick visiting Haley’s Sloan’s circus; Cleveland Brand is notable as he is the brother of the hero Deadman, Boston Brand, if I remember correctly. Anyone familiar with Jason nowadays may be confused as to how a circus factors into Jason’s backstory--well, see, as alluded to, Jason used to be Dick Grayson 2.0.

Like, down to the letter. If you told me the early script was half copy pasted from a comic about Dick’s backstory, I’d believe you.

I never got why, however, they decided to do what they did with Jason. A similar personality and design, I get, of course; but why the same backstory? Why the red hair dyed black? Why is Croc their killer (as we’ll get to) when Tony Zucco was just a mob guy, other than the shift in Batman’s villains being mobsters to monsters from the 40s to 80s? It just seems like such an odd choice, to me. 

At least they learned their lesson by the time Tim Drake was created. Could you imagine if he also had circus parents with a high flying act, who also came to Gotham (a historically terrible place to bring a circus; seriously, that place is cursed) only to have their lives tragically ended by Condiment Man because Jack Drake said his mustard was too spicy? Tim would probably be blond, too, so that Bruce can have a whole array of small acrobatic children whose hair he dyes with blue panther manic panic every week. Chills. 

Back to our plot:

That’s the trauma, Dick. Go to therapy. Also loving Jason’s stupid little bowlcut.

Are lame mobsters actually an alien species of pineapple heads? Discuss.

Also yes, he does talk like that the entire time.

Didn’t get the memo that having a gimmick is the new way of doing things in Gotham, huh fellas? Anyways, Bruce hatches a plan to trick the Squid, who wants revenge on both Batman and a mobster named Falco due to previous events, at the trial for Falco. 

I love Pre-Starlin run Bruce. He’s such a delight.

Early 80s Batman is a comedy. Anyways, Bruce gets captured and thrown in the tank like in the cover, yipee! 

Anyways, that little cameo is about all we get of Jason in this issue! Onto the next--358! Oh wait, this is comics--we’re actually going to Detective Comics #524! ...In a reblog at some point because I have to re-add all these images painstakingly slowly and I gotta head home soon

[shyrose57]

AU(s) where all the mod videos Tommy does, along with some other videos, are all alternate universes, and their residents end up in the SMP. Chaos ensues. 

Voice Mod AU:

Universe where nobody talks aloud. They telepathically communicate, and the closer you are, the clearer and louder you are, unless you have the control the lower your mental voice.

Why?

Post-apocalyptic world(because Tommy said welcome to the new world at the start, and I too that and ran with it). They’re the new versions of humans, created after life returned on the planett, and the telepathy is a survival method, because outward noise draws predators, inner noise does not. 

This also means they possibly have some other features similar to that. Like maybe Quackity’s duck wings being from some newly evolved duck species in the new world, Wilbur being a bit abnormally tall, or similar. I’m not sure. 

Oh hey, no, Wilbur can be like a tree hybrid or something, cause Treebur. 

Basically, evolution and telepathy.

Wilbur has a horse named Bert, he is speedy, and spends just as much time dragging his owner out of trouble than he does riding him into it.

The gang is basically just traveling the lands, exploring what’s about.

There are fish-horses, ender-horses, spider-horses, silverfish ponies, and horses that are somewhat like a breed between llamas and sheep in the world.

There are a lot of new horse breeds.

The Quackity of this universe wears clothes a lot like Manhunt Dream’s, hoodie-wise, but it’s all bright blue, and his mask has the :] face on it.

Size Mod AU:

Universe where people can shift and change sizes, though only to certain ones.

For example, Wilbur’s stuck small. He can shift to the size of a small dog, height wise, or that of a flower, but he can’t get big. Quackity can go smaller than Wilbur, or literally bigger than the Enderdragon. Both Tommy can be normal sized, or big, and Phil’s can be about the size of a tree, or become the size of a small mountain. 

They all live in a nice house in the plains and spend their time terrorizing the locals.

Wilbur has a little house within the house, and he uses his size to cause havoc more often than not. Quackity is equally guilty of this.

Sometimes when the kids are being particularly bad, Phil puts the smaller ones in a compost bin and holds Tommy off the ground until he starts behaving. 

Quackity’s a follower of the Blood God. Not to Techno’s length, but he goes and kills rabbits for him, and dedicates the chaos his giant form causes to the guy. In return, the four always have a flourishing harvest, and Quackity’s absolutely mean in battle. 

Wilbur sleeps in one of Tommy’s old shoes that he stole and made into a bed.

Honestly, Wilbur’s kind of like the house mouse. He steals stuff and vibes in his little home in the walls. The cats that occasionally slip in try to eat him a lot too.

Wilbur and Quackity are bird hybrids, Tommy’s a zombie hybrid(cause he’s fighting a zombie and saying ‘I burn’ at that little bit), and Phil’s an iron golem hybrid.

Quackity and WIlbur have little bird-houses set up around the area for them to dart into and hide if anything comes after them.

They all met when tiny Q and Wilbur tried to rob Tommy and Phil. They succeeded with Tommy, but Phil was less than impressed at the attempt. Somehow it resulted in them all sharing a house.

Dragon Mod AU:

Universe set in more medieval-themed world. Phil, Quackity, and Tommy are dragon hunters. Wilbur’s a mischievous dragon sorcerer who enjoys shapeshifting into a dragon to mess with people. The hunters were originally sent after him, but spent more time frantically running for their lives while he laughed at them.

Wilbur’s actually good friends with the actual Enderdragon, who he calls Keithette. It was with her blessing that he decided to pick on the hunters.

He just spends all of his time messing with them. That’s all he does. He messes with them. It’s originally more malicious, which means they had a ridiculous amount of deaths, but they eventually all grew fond of each other, so now it’s more playful. 

He helps them find treasure and scares off rivals. 

Tommy’s a trained medic. 

Quackity and Wilbur are...something? It’s a Skephalo situation. They could just be very affectionate friends, or they could be dating, or they could be messing with everyone. Nobody knows, and everytime they think they’ve figured it out, the two seem to magically know and do something to throw them off.

They’ve confused many, many people with their antics. 

(They’re probably messing with people though, because they definitely know what they’re doing)

When the actual Enderdragon and her egg mysteriously went missing, Wilbur rounded up his friends and asked for their help in finding her-so now the group is on a quest to find her and return her to the End.

Natural Disaster Mod AU:

Universe where world ending natural disasters just keep happening. It killed off a lot of people, but honestly, at this point, it’s been going on for years, and those that remain are pretty used to it.

Tubbo and Wilbur are followers of the Mule God, and were brought together by him. Jack and Tommy are two good friends who came together to survive. And Phil’s a top-tier survivalist who keeps an eye on the four, mostly because he’d feel bad if they died too often while they live in the area.

Though they’re all three different groups, they stick together and help each other out.

Tommy and Tubbo were childhood friends before the disasters separated them. A young Jack found Tommy and took him in, and Tubbo was saved and blessed by the Mule God. They’re still friends, but have somewhat grown apart with their differing lifestyles. 

Tommy’s a penguin hybrid. 

Tubbo and Wilbur have been known to try and scam people passing by, and they have tried this with everyone in the area too-the difference is the ones who stick around know better than to buy it. 

Whenever Tommy wants to hang out, he declares he’s rescuing Tubbo, and steals him from whatever he’s doing. Wilbur has long since accepted that occasionally Tubbo is going to be stolen, and doesn’t even blink anymore. 

Tommy wears green, and Tubbo wears red. 

Storm riding is a favored sport of Tubbo’s, where you grab a hang glider and get swept up into the storm. Jack hates it, but often gets dragged along anyway. 

Morph Mod AU:

Universe where shapeshifters are more common, and Tommy, Charlie, Phil, Schlatt, and Wilbur are all a clan of them. 

They co-exist with humans, and actually protect the local villages they live close too. 

They also spend a lot of time messing with people outside said villages, but that’s unimportant. 

Charlie and Wilbur prefer to be aquatic creatures. while Phil transforms into whatever works better for the environment he’s in. Schlatt just does whatever, and Tommy usually sticks to human form, only shifting when he’s bored or he needs too. 

Wilbur tried to transform into a horse once, while in fish form. He’s not sure what exactly happened, but long story short, he’s the reason for the myth of the hippocampus.

They have a house in the village, one out, and then general little areas meant for them in animal form. 

Because shapeshifters are strongly group-oriented, they prefer to shift in pairs or groups. Charlie and Wilbur typically pair up, as do Schlatt and Tommy. Philza doesn’t really have that instinct as strongly, so he just stays close to them instead. 

Laser Eye Mod AU:

Universe set in a futuristic setting, where, due to an ancient void deity becoming malicious, Tommy, Phil, Charlie, and Wilbur are selected to become plasma wielding cyber warriors(futuristic magical girls, basically) to fight back against such threats.

These four’s cybernetics were embued with magic to produce specific plasma that would be effective against threats.

Phil wields divine plasma, and it’s fired out from his cybernetic wings, which were implanted as a military experiment. He can even detach a feather to act as a plasma covered sword.

Tommy wields phoenix plasma, and it’s fired out of his cybernetic eyes, which were transplanted into him when he was in an accident young, rendering him blind. They allow him to see by scanning out the outlines of objects and areas, and feeding the image into his brain.

Wilbur wields soulfire plasma, which is fired from his prosthetic legs, which have a kind of mermaid-motif, with fins and all, and make him a fast swimmer.

And Charlie wields greekfire plasma, fired from his cybernetic arm-it can also fire slime-like globs that rapidly grow and incase the area they’re attached too. 

Wilbur was actually the first selected for the program, but he went missing shortly after, stolen and controlled by the void deity, who turned him into quite the obstacle for the others.

They eventually rescued him from it’s control, and after he recovered, he joined the fight. 

Endermen and endermen hybrids are common minions of the void deity-it seems to have End-based origins, being able to control them.

Lava Ravine Mod AU:

Universe where Phil, Charlie, Wilbur, and Tommy are all strangers, who get a mysterious invite to an unknown world. It seems like a lovely vacation at first, strangers aside, but things turn deadly when a seemingly normal ravine in the ground begins to grow, the lava inside it begins to rise, and our heroes find themselves unable to leave the world.

They soon realized they may have been selected for their ability to survive, but to do that, they’re going to have to all work together.

Tommyinnit originates from the world of RLcraft, Phil grew up in Hardcore Mode, Charlie is a fallen god from a world of chaos, and Wilbur has lived through a world like this before.

They build a giant glass and stone dome, and live within there, using their various skills to survive. 

Wilbur pretty much knows how this world works to a T, and is able to predict when the lava will raise and how quickly. He knows how to survive and work around the heat.

Tommy and Phil have a variety of skills from their lives before, not limited to first aid and cooking.

And Charlie’s got a bit of godly power he can put to good use here, as well as many out-of-the-box ideas for what to do.

Charlie brought a card-game from his old world, and teaches Wilbur how to play. It becomes a favorite past time of theirs. 

Jump Mod AU:

Universe where enhanced individuals have recently begun to exist. Tommy, Wilbur, and Quackity are some of many who choose to use their new abilities for their own gain, becoming thieves. They were taken under the wing of master thief Philza, who was in the game long before he gained his new powers.

Or, well, they were thieves. A job gone wrong resulted in them being caught by authorities, and forced into a deal. Once thieves for their own gain, now they’re agents for the government, stealing back what was stolen from their country. 

All of them are generally more physically enhanced, with agility, endurance, and all that jazz. But they also have other abilities. 

Tommy’s faster than anyone. Wilbur can refract light, essentially becoming invisible. Phil can communicate with birds. And Quackity can change the density of anything he touches, himself excluded. 

Philza was actually caught because he stayed behind for his new partners. He had realized someone was looking into them, and didn’t want the younger ones going into that alone. 

TNT Mod AU:

Universe where everyone is a mob hybrid, and they live divided in tribes. Tommy, Phil, Charlie, and Wilbur are a tribe/keg of creeper hybrids, who protect their territory, and cause havoc for any trespassers who happens upon them.

No one dares settle there, because these four are just as likely to swear a village’s protection as they are to laugh as they set it ablaze. It’s purely up to how they feel at the moment, finicky keg that they are. 

However, there is a reason some do venture here. 

Every tribe/(name for grouping of specific mob) guards a certain treasure. For the creeper boys, it’s an orchard of apple trees that grow, not only red apples, but gold ones too-and rarely, a god apple.

If you do happen to stumble upon their territory unintentionally, your best bet is to appeal to Wilbur, as he does have a soft spot for people-of course, you’ll need to make sure none of the others think you’re taking advantage of that soft spot, lest they slowly and painfully kill you for even considering it.

Creepers are very friendly to them, and see them as one of their own. Other mobs, not so much.

The orchard is surrounded by a dense forest, that’s abruptly lets up to a clearing that rings around it. This is where the keg lives, in high tree houses all connected to one another.

Their forest is their pride and joy, and it’s filled with many exotic trees and plants from around the world. Bringing them an addition for it is a sure way to assure your survival, and even gain an alliance, if it’s a really good addition.

Likewise, messing it up even slightly will immediately get you murdered.

Black Hole Mod AU:

Universe where the sun exploded and became a black hole that’s slowly consuming the world. Though many perished, some survived, with the advanced technology in the future.

Wilbur, Charlie, Phil, and Tommy are some of those survivors. 

Charlie is a scientist, studying the black hole to see if there’s anyway to perhaps stop it, or survive within it once it consumes them.

Phil’s a former mercenary who came to the lab with Tommy, after finding the young student stumbling about the remains of a city.

Wilbur’s the former on-board scientist from the crew that first encountered the black hole. He was originally presumed dead, but suddenly reappeared one day, and was found nearby by Phil, who dragged him to the lab. He’s...different. He’s seen things.

Charlie and Wilbur graduated from the same university, and were actually working in the same lab before Wilbur joined his crew in space for an up-close study.

Philza has a bad habit of adopting any creature he finds, and it’s become something of a joke by the four. He adopted Tommy, he’s adopted Wilbur and Charlie, and he has quite a few birds and other creatures that followed him back.

Body Shuffle Mod AU:

Universe where glitches a common sight, and humanity has evolved alongside them.

The world basically...well, I wouldn’t say revolves around? But glitches are a large part of life at this point, and players have specifically evolved to be able to work with them.

A common glitch includes the Body Glitch, where random body parts will seemingly vanish off a person without causing them harm or effecting them.

Tommy and Charlie are Takers, people who have a special, glitch-specific gene that allows them to take a glitch effecting a being or item, and pull that effect from said being/item, and upon themselves.

They’re equally loved and hated, considering the rarity of the gene, and what uses it could be employed for.

The two have a business that they use this ability to take and relocate glitches for various purposes.

Philza and Wilbur are the two’s bodyguards turned friends, who protect them from less savory people, and suss out the ones with bad intentions.

Gas Mod AU:

Universe set in a modern fantasy world where a mysterious gas suddenly overtook the planet. Many died. A few survived-but for some of them, that was the crueler fate, as the mysterious gas began to make them monsterous creatures that sought flesh and blood.

Tommy, Charlie, Phil and Wilbur are the scattered survivors in a city overtaken by the gas, banding together to fight back the monsters born from the green fog, and stay alive. 

Wilbur was formerly a cartographer on a ship. He’s also half siren, and his most priceless possession is a diamond dagger given to him by his former captain.

Charlie is a doctor, as well as a wizard. His magic pet is a slime-like dragon. Yeah, he’s not sure where the little guy came from either.

Phil got a whole cocktail of heritage, but most are sky-related, so he’s got a strong grasp on air magic, which he uses to create safe bubbles for the gang to breathe freely.

And Tommy’s a low tier human-turned demon after death- an imp, basically. He causes havoc.

They all have to wear gas mask, which are heavily enchanted to keep the gas from affecting them.

The group basically just has a weirdly domestic life in the abandoned city, after they cleared out an abandoned apartment building to chill in.

Surgery Mod:

Universe where the gang are the experiments of a mad scientist having escaped.

Tommy is a poison-based experiment, Wilbur is a Nether-based one, Philza is an End-based experiment, and Charlie is an Over-world based one.

They were all grouped together in a cell because the older three are part of the Dimension Project, and Tommy accidentally imprinted on Wilbur when he was created, meaning he would have died if he was separated from him.

The four eventually decide that they hate this life, and stage a break out with the rest of the guys experiments. 

Once they escaped, they decided to travel the world as a family, exploring everything they’d never had the chance to see, and finding where they belonged in this place.

Lava Floor Mod AU:

Universe where all the oceans in the world have been replaced by lava. For Ninja, Tommy, Wilbur, and George, their get-along vacation goes south when they’re stranded alone on a chain of distant islands, far from any sign of civilization. 

If they ever hope to survive, they’ll have to put their issues to the side and work together to get to the one place unaffected-the Nether.

Tommy ‘Smokes’ Notfound, and Wilbur ‘Soot’ Fortnite are the two children of the struggling couple George ‘Specs’ Notfound and Ninja ‘Bow’ Fortnite, who haven’t seen each other in years, despite still being married.

The two, knowing how close their kids were, agree to meet up so the two can hang out, which is why they ended up on this vacation on the first place. 

Wilbur and Smokes would really appreciate if their parents could get along too-it’d make vacation a lot nicer without all the tension. And yes, they could worry about all the oceans turning to lava, but they won’t. Instead, they’re going to be gremlins who try to get their parents to make up, whether that means divorce, or becoming a happy couple again.

Rising Void Mod AU:

Universe where the planets are being eaten by the void. Tommy, Philza, and Quackity are all aliens who managed to escape the demise of their home planets, and crashed landed on Earth, with the intention of warning them of what was coming.

Unfortunately, the only guy around for miles is Ranboo, a conspiracy theorist who prefers his isolated mountain cabin to the city...and also is in complete denial about the existence of aliens, even if they’re standing right in front of him. 

Quackity is from a planet where ores and gems have a large part of fashion culture.

Tommy’s planet was the first to fall. However, Quackity was the one who was closest to be touching, and it leaves side effects-like him occasionally hearing it’s eldritch whispering calling for him to surrender himself to it and stop fighting-

But, y’know. It’s fine. It’s all good.

(Although he does happen to be the most aware of their inevitable fate, and uses humor to cope with the knowledge that no matter how hard they try, he and these people he’s grown to care for are going to die, and there’s absolutely no way to stop that)

Sky Grid Mod AU

Universe where Ranboo is a young, lonely god born to a grid-formed world. Though he has made many interesting creations, he decides he wants someone like him. Who can listen, and answer, and love, and hate.

And the universe loves him, so it answers.

It finds two souls who’ve died too young, and puts them into his hands to mold as he wishes. One, he creates in colors of green, like grass, and emeralds, and poison alike. The other, he creates in colors of red, like lava and poppies, and warm beds.

Their names are Tubbo and Tommy, and they’re different than what he thought they’d be. They cannot be controlled or remade, but they can bleed, and they can laugh, and most importantly, they can make choices.

And they choose to love him, taking him in their embrace as a friend, treating him kindly, and as one of their own, regardless of his power or abilities. 

The three make a home in the gridded world, finding themselves and never fearing the fall, because the world loves both it’s godling, and the people made within it.

Terraforming The Moon AU:

Universe where the remains of humanity have fled to the moon upon the destruction of earth. They unintentionally awake age-old space deities, who, luckily for them, feel like lending a hand-mostly. 

Wilbur is the only actual deity of the moon, but the rest of the SBI spend more time there than they don’t, because humans are interesting.

Tommy’s the youngest god, a deity of the stars within their young galaxy-it’s a position that was passed onto him by the former star deity, Clara.

Technoblade is the deity of both Mars and Venus. He’s actually been to Earth a few times before it’s destruction, and finds their cultures fascinating-particularly the Greek and Romans.

Philza is the god of the End. The oldest, he’s not just a deity, he’s a primordial of the end of all things. Truthfully, it was the very end of Earth that awoke him from his slumber, and it’s former inhabitants interesting lives that keep him awake.

They all pick a human to favor, and help out. Changes on the day.

Honestly, they aren’t necessarily malicious? They don’t really consider the fact that humans don’t have the same limitations and powers as them, so occasionally they fuck something up that somebody worked hard on, and don’t understand why they don’t just fix it already, not realizing that the humans actually have to take awhile to do that.

One Hundred Player Laboratory AU:

Universe set in modern time. 

Wilbur and Technoblade are two university students trying to do a study for their finals-unfortunately, the rats they were supposed to use are both oddly sentient, and incredibly chaotic.

Techno and Wilbur are doing a study of behavior, and other scientific things. To do this, Techno has built a large, complex maze/building thing.

And Wilbur purchased a bunch of rats-except, he probably should have been a bit more careful who he bought from, becomes these rats definitely understand human speech, are all not normally colored, and desire to be as annoying and detrimental to their grades as possible.

To put it lightly, it’s not going well.

George’s If You Laugh You Lose Rematch AU:

Universe set in a chaotic, light-hearted world.

Sapnap, Karl, George, and Dream are some of the world’s residents.

Karl and Dream are chaotic shapeshifters who enjoy messing with George.

Sapnap’s a mischievous nether spirit who likes to team up and help them do it.

Karl can shift into objects, and Dream can turn into animals. 

The whole world is comedic, and all it’s residents have a permanent case of the giggles-to the point of making a game of how long one can hold off laughing.

Sapnap usually takes the form of an enderman or enderman hybrid 

[aion-rsa]

Doctor Who: Perfect 10? How Fandom Forgets the Dark Side of David Tennant’s Doctor

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As recently as September 2020 David Tennant topped a Radio Times poll of favourite Doctors. He beat Tom Baker in a 2006 Doctor Who Magazine poll, and was voted the best TV character of the 21st Century by the readers of Digital Spy. He was the Doctor during one of Doctor Who‘s critical and commercial peaks, bringing in consistently high ratings and a Christmas day audience of 13.31 million for ‘Voyage of the Damned’, and 12.27 million for his final episode, ‘The End of Time – Part Two’. He is the only other Doctor who challenges Tom Baker in terms of associated iconography, even being part of the Christmas idents on BBC One as his final episodes were broadcast. Put simply, the Tenth Doctor is ‘My Doctor’ for a huge swathe of people and David Tennant in a brown coat will be the image they think of when Doctor Who is mentioned.

In articles to accompany these fan polls, Tennant’s Doctor is described as ‘amiable’ in contrast to his predecessor Christopher Eccleston’s dark take on the character. Ten is ‘down-to-earth’, ‘romantic’, ‘sweeter’, ‘more light-hearted’ and the Doctor you’d most want to invite you on board the TARDIS. That’s interesting in some respects, because the Tenth Doctor is very much a Jekyll and Hyde character. He’s handsome, he’s charismatic, and travelling with him can be addictively fun, but he is also casually cruel, harshly dismissive, and lacking in self-awareness. His ego wants feeding, and once fed, can have destructive results.

That tension in the character isn’t due to bad writing or acting. Quite the contrary. Most Doctors have an element of unpleasantness to their behaviour. Ever since the First Doctor kidnapped Ian and Barbara, the character has been moving away from the entitled snob we met him as, but can never escape it completely.

Six and Twelve were both written to be especially abrasive, then soften as time went on (with Colin Baker having to do this through Big Finish audio plays rather than on telly). A significant difference between Twelve and Ten, though, is that Twelve questions himself more. Ten, to the very end, seems to believe his own hype.

The Tenth Doctor’s duality is apparent from his first full appearance in 2005’s ‘The Christmas Invasion’. Having quoted The Lion King and fearlessly ambled through the Sycorax ship in a dressing gown, he seems the picture of bonhomie, that lighter and amiable character shining through. Then he kills their leader. True, it was in self-defence, but it was lethal force that may not have been necessary. Then he immediately topples the British Prime Minister for a not dissimilar act of aggression. Immediately we see the Tenth Doctor’s potential for violence and moral grey areas. He’s still the same man who considered braining someone with a rock in ‘An Unearthly Child’. 

Teamed with Rose Tyler, a companion of similar status to Tennant’s Doctor, they blazed their way through time and space with a level of confidence that bordered on entitlement, and a love that manifested itself negatively on the people surrounding them. The most obvious example in Series 2 is ‘Tooth and Claw’, where Russell T. Davies has them react to horror and carnage in the manner of excited tourists who’ve just seen a celebrity. This aloof detachment results in Queen Victoria establishing the Torchwood institute that will eventually split them apart. We see their blinkers on again in ‘Rise of the Cybermen’, when they take Mickey for granted. Rose and the Doctor skip along the dividing line between romance and hubris.

Then, in a Christmassy romp where the Doctor is grieving the loss of Rose, he commits genocide and Donna Noble sucker punches him with ‘I think you need somebody to stop you’. Well-meaning as this statement is, the Doctor treats it as a reason to reduce his next companion to a function rather than a person. Martha Jones is there to stop the Doctor, as far as he’s concerned. She’s a rebound companion. Martha is in love with him, and though he respects her, she’s also something of a prop.

This is the series in which the Doctor becomes human in order to escape the Family of Blood (adapted from a book in which he becomes human in order to understand his companion’s grief, not realising anyone is after him), and is culpable for all the death that follows in his wake. Martha puts up with a position as a servant and with regular racist abuse on her travels with this man, before finally realising at the end of the series that she needs to get out of the relationship. For a rebound companion, Martha withstands a hell of a lot, mostly caused by the Doctor’s failings. 

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Series 4 develops the Doctor further, putting the Tenth’s Doctor’s flaws in the foreground more clearly. Donna is now travelling with him, and simply calls him out on his behaviour more than Rose or Martha did. Nonetheless the Doctor ploughs on, and in ‘Midnight’ we see him reduced to desperate and ugly pleas about how clever he is when he’s put in a situation he can’t talk himself out of.

Rose has also become more Doctor-like while trapped in another reality, and brutally tells Donna that she’s going to have to die in order to return to the original timeline (just as the Doctor tells Donna she’s going to have to lose her memories of travelling with him in order to live her previous life, even as she clearly asks him not to – and how long did the Doctor know he would have to do this for? It’s not like he’s surprised when Donna starts glitching). Tied into this is the Doctor’s belief in his own legend. In ‘The Doctor’s Daughter’ he holds a gun to Cobb’s head, then withdraws it and asks that they start a society based on the morals of his actions. You know, like a well-adjusted person does.

What’s interesting here is that despite presenting himself as ‘a man who never would’, the Doctor is a man who absolutely would. We’ve seen him do it. Even the Tenth Doctor, so keen to live up to the absolute moral ideals he espouses, killed the Sycorax leader and the Krillitanes, drove the Cybermen to die of despair, brought the Family of Blood to a quiet village and then disposed of them personally. But Tennant doesn’t play this as a useful lie, he plays it as something the Doctor absolutely believes in that moment, that he is a man who would not kill even as his daughter lies dead. It’s why his picking up a gun in ‘The End of Time’ has such impact. And it makes some sense that the Tenth Doctor would reject violence following a predecessor who regenerated after refusing to commit another double-genocide.

In the series finale ‘Journey’s End‘, Davros accuses the Doctor of turning his friends into weapons. This is because the Doctor’s friends have used weapons against the Daleks who – and I can’t stress this enough – are about to kill everyone in the entire universe. Fighting back against them seems pretty rational. Also – and again I can’t stress this enough – the Daleks are bad. Like, really bad. You won’t believe just how mindbogglingly bad they are. The Doctor has tried to destroy them several times by this point. Here, there isn’t the complication of double-genocide, and instead the very real threat of absolutely everyone in the universe dying. This accusation, that the Doctor turns people into weapons, should absolutely not land.

And yet, with the Tenth Doctor, it does. This is a huge distinction between him and the First Doctor, who had to persuade pacifists to fight for him in ‘The Daleks’.

In ‘The Sontaran Strategem’ Martha compares the Doctor to fire. It’s so blunt it almost seems not worth saying, but it’s the perfect analogy (especially for a show where fire is a huge part of the very first story). Yes, fire shines in dark places, yes it can be a beacon, but despite it being very much fire’s entire deal, people can forget that it burns. And fire has that mythical connection of being stolen from the gods and brought to humanity. The Time Lord Victorious concept fits the Tenth Doctor so well. Of all the Doctors, he’s the most ready to believe in himself as a semi-mythic figure.

Even when regenerating there’s a balance between hero and legend: the Tenth Doctor does ultimately save Wilfred Mott, but only after pointing out passionately how big a sacrifice he’s making. And then he goes to get his reward by meeting all his friends, only to glare at them from a distance. His last words are ‘I don’t want to go’, which works well as clearly being a poignant moment for the actor as well, but in the context of Doctor Who as a whole it renders Ten anomalous: no one else went this unwillingly. And yet, in interviews Russell T. Davies said it was important to end the story with ‘the Doctor as people have loved him: funny, the bright spark, the hero, the enthusiast’.

It’s fascinating then, that this is the Doctor who has been taken to heart by so many viewers because there’s such an extreme contrast between his good-natured front, his stated beliefs, and his actions. He clearly loves Rose and Donna, but leaves them with a compromised version of happiness. They go on extraordinary journeys only to end up somewhere that leaves them less than who they want to be, with Russell T. Davies being more brutally honest than Steven Moffat, who nearly always goes the romance route. Davies once said to Mark Lawson that he liked writing happy endings ‘because in the real world they don’t exist’, but his endings tend towards the bittersweet: Mickey and Martha end up together but this feels like they’re leftovers from the Doctor and Rose’s relationship. The Tenth Doctor doesn’t, as Nine does, go with a smile, but holding back tears.

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It’s a testament to how well written the Tenth Doctor is that the character has this light and shade, and with David Tennant’s immense likeability he can appeal to a wider audience as a result. It’s not surprise he wins all these polls, but I can’t help but feel that if the Doctor arrived and invited me on board the TARDIS, I’d want it to be anyone but Ten.

The post Doctor Who: Perfect 10? How Fandom Forgets the Dark Side of David Tennant’s Doctor appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[hologramcowboy]

Hey, how you doing? Since you are a viewer of The Boys can I ask you a series related question? Please don't read ahead if you haven't watched episode 7 because it might contain a little wittle spoiler 😅

So The Legend told Hughie in the last episode that Soldier Boy being WW2 hero is always a publicised myth which they created for his image. He didn't take any significant active part in the war, went two weeks later in Normandy for a Photo Op etc... But we have seen in a season 2 conversation between Stan Edger and Homelander where Stan tells Homie Fredrick Vought- the founder of the company was in Germen camp, changed side in 44 and his practical test subjects like Soldier Boy killed a lot of Nazis and helped a lot in the war, which is why he was pardoned by the president. That got me thinking... Vought of that time was not like today's big superhero company, Fredrick Vought needed to prove his element by showing how great weapon his Supes could be. That means Soldier Boy must had to give some performance other that bad acting, right? I had thought he was really a soldier who fought in the war, but was corrupted all along and with time became nothing insufferable. His activities are not like a PR element or a performative actor, rather looks like a toxic veteran. But the reveal of The legend confused me. Was Soldier Boy only used to as an icon by American Govt too without using him in the real field? What is your take on it?

Also in my opinion season 3 is doing great with everything and have a gripping storyline which is the strongest of all seasons, but I expected to see a little bit more insight about American war History and the story of Vought's foundation via Soldier Boy.

I'm good, thank you. I hope you are having a wonderful summer! This new season of The Boys has been very exciting! Thank you for pointing all of that out because I was wondering about the same thing. The answer I've been able to come up with is that the writers wrote Soldier Boy by mixing a couple of characters from the comic. In the comics, Soldier Boy Mk. 2 is a different superhero than the original one who fought in the war but everyone believes him to be the original. The original Soldier Boy causes some pretty serious mayhem and is eventually terminated to then be replaced by Soldier Boy Mk. 2, his much cowardly version. So clearly the writers created a plot hole without even realizing and later wrote Soldier Boy incorporating Soldier Boy Mk. 2's impostor persona. I am glad to learn I wasn't the only who noticed the discrepancies. I too am still confused by the way but hopefully the finale will clear some thing up though I doubt it given the rushed way some plot lines have been handled this season.

[snakeassassins]

Rabbit Dad Theory: A Weapon to Surpass Dad for One

okay so. I know that the theory about local big bad of the series being the protagonist’s father , but I’m pretty sure the real reason that midoriya’s dad hasn’t shown up in the plot is because he’s a rabbit

no really

[ WARNING: LONG post under the cut ]

Part 1: Rabbit Motifs

To get this party started properly, let’s begin with a bunch of the rabbit symbolism regarding Midoriya himself.

The most notable of which being that his hero costume is literally him dressing up as a rabbit

His freckles are even stylized to look like little rabbit whiskers. fuckin naruto kinnie

It bleeds into his fighting style too

Two big innovations he has that aren’t based on previous users of one for all

are hopping from place to place

and his big, rabbit-like kicks.

(which would also go a ways to explain why the plot thought Midoriya having legs was a big deal)

A lot of this goes into his characterization as well. The most notable bit being how much the first chapter of bnha parallels the story of the moon rabbit.

(Sometimes referred to as the jade rabbit which. Green)

Anyway, the story goes that a rabbit, along with a bunch of other animals (it varies depending on region) decided to gather food for the full moon as an offering, believing that the best one will bring a reward from the gods.

All of the animals bring plentiful amounts of food, sans the rabbit, who brings only grass.

Eventually, a starving old man comes along.

The other animals have food to give him, but refuse to do so to meet their own ends.

The rabbit, sympathizing with the old man,throws itself into a fire he was kindling so that he can be fed.

The old man, touched by the rabbit’s actions, reveals himself to be a god and saves it.

In honor of the rabbits deeds, the god imprints his image on the moon, bestowing special gifts to him.

Along with this there are a number of other mild rabbity traits tho.

Such as his skittishness.

Not to mention his general resourcefulness.

The show regularly conflates Midoriya being himself with him looking and acting more and more like a rabbit. This isn’t too hard to understand from a Doylist perspective; Horikoshi blatantly just likes bunnies. (I mean just look at Miruko)

What’s interesting here is that we’ve never been given an in-universe explanation for why midoriya himself identifies this way. In a series that is otherwise really invested in dissecting the ideal versions of themselves that characters want to live up to, the show doesn’t provide any justification for a character motif Midoriya has that is almost as present as all might himself.

Judging from the title of this post, you can probably guess what my reasoning for this choice is.

**Part 2: Hisashi’s Quirk **

“But snake,” you may be asking yourself, “We already know what Hisashi Midoriya’s quirk is. He breathes fire.”

This is true. he probably does. Consider what we know in-universe, though.

Characters with heteromorphic quirks don’t have their physical attributes listed as a part of their quirks if they have a secondary characteristic.

Tokoyami is the most obvious example. He’s a bird person, but his quirk is dark shadow. The fact that he’s a bird man goes unmentioned because as far as anyone is concerned, the shadow monster is his power.

Characters like Spinner have their animal attributes listed as quirks, but that’s only because he can’t do anything a gecko wouldn’t. If he didn’t make his lizard powers his quirk he’d have nothing to put.

If Midoriya’s dad happened to be, say, a rabbit that could breathe fire, the fire quirk would be listed while the rabbit bit went unstated. In fact, in a roundabout way, the fire quirk makes rabbit dad even more plausible.

You see, most of the animal character designs in bnha are actually recycled from an old series horikoshi did called oumagadoki zoo. Mind you this isn’t a knock at horikoshi or anything. A lot of mangaka do this sort of thing. I’m mostly bringing it up because one of the main characters is a rabbit called Shiina

and one of the early gags in the series is him smoking a carrot like a cigar.

This would be very easy to translate to my hero academia’s setting if said character happened to breathe fire.

I should also say for those keeping score at home that I don’t necessarily think Hizashi is a Shiina expy specifically (tbh I kinda imagine him being more like a fluffy spike spiegel). At most I think it’s probably just some design motifs and some VERY loose plot points.

There is also the somewhat mild rebuttal of Midoriya never attempting to do anything rabbit-like while trying to see if he had a quirk, but I think that’s self explanatory. If Izuku was a rabbit he’d notice right away, so of course he didn’t bother checking.

**Part 3: Why He’s Absent **

Of course, another big question that might be on your mind is why he’s not present if that’s the simple truth of his identity. Why have him fail to show himself for what has now been 300 chapters?

I can think of two simple reasons:

1) It’s really funny

Just fuckin. The Mystique of it all. You can’t tell fans a character is going to show up eventually and fail to have them appear without piquing someone’s interest. It’s bound to make fans speculate, especially with the canon dabi twist hanging in the air. Years to imagine what his presence might entail if it was something big enough to be worth planning ahead for.

And then. Boom. Bunny.

Fucking. Hysterical.

2) The themes. Oh god the themes

You might have noticed by now but Horikoshi has a tendency of making like. The Shounen Jump equivalent to that rpg character you make as a joke that then has like. an undeniably tragic life when you’re actually forced to tackle with the implications of your own character building.

I would not be surprised if the Midoriyas ended up falling into that category.

So let’s get into that.

One of the big things that my hero academia attempts to tackle is the concept of normalcy.

Mostly how it’s kinda bullshit and, in many cases, outright harmful.

What makes this bit interesting within the context of Midoriya family is Izuku’s sort of. Artificial Plainness.

He is a character deliberately designed to look as normal as possible. The key word there is look. Basically anyone who’s been following the series long enough to be reading this post knows that the kid often struggles to keep his head down

which also makes it interesting that the only two scenes where Midoriya wears his rabbit cowl are scenes where he is actively questioning the status quo.

Methinks there is some symbolism here.

Which I guess brings us back to square one.

At the end of the day, the concept of Midoriya’s dad being a rabbit is funny because it’s so unexpected. Without him around, the Midoriyas look like a normal family.

But that’s also the kicker.

Without him around, the Midoriyas look like a normal family.

A lot of people are quick to call Izuku’s dad an absentee father, but technically speaking, we don’t quite know that yet. We’ve only been in a position where we don’t see him as the audience.

And, well, when your kid is being bullied for something as banal as being quirkless, you might not want to give society more ammunition to use against him.

It wouldn’t strike me as strange if he just avoided being seen in public with his son to keep him safe in his own way.

They say that the nail that sticks out gets hammered down the most. Under those circumstances, it’s not too hard to understand why the loosest nail might just feel safer wriggling out of the wood altogether.