#They're supposed to be the romance but the writers are cowards

[wusopiejung25]

— "I think Hwi and Seon-ho were the sun and the moon in their past lives. That's why they seem so inseparable in this lifetime."

[manwiththemagic]

The writers of s11 were cowards. If IIIIIIIIIII was in charge I'd made Lucifer's weird obsession with Sam show up more. Like the writers have very obviously included it and yet when Lucifer is processing the same vessel as cas, and therefore pretending to be cas, he just fucks off and tortures Crowley with fucked up bdsm pet play.

Like the few times casifer and Sam interacted were GOLD. because Sam sees it as his best friend cas, and Lucifer (who keeps talking about Sam like they're toxic ex's) is pretending to be him!! Although not to well. Like his freaky smirk when sending Dean into the past and coming back to harass Sam? Dude lives off of sadistic pleasure.

The way he full on LAUGHS when Sam says he trusts him bc Sam thinks it's cas?? Like gold!?!? Don't know why the writers didn't do more with that.

Also why not do more with the 'lucifer sent Sam visions to get him down to hell'. Like Lucifer is Obsessed w/ sam because that body/vessel is "supposed to be" his. And yet after revealing himself he doesn't try and convince Sam anymore?

He's just given up? Like nah man I don't believe that. I feel like he woulda fucked with Sam more in cas' body. And like it woulda been a way better not-romance-romance plot then whatever the fuck Dean and Amara were..

Like that came outta no where... I mean I get it.. but ew?? We saw her grow up, and maybe id argue "well there were two versions of her!! One physical on earth, the other her actual form and memories as a celestial being!!" BUT NO. SHE CALLS CROWLEY UNCLE CROWLEY.

cause he like raised her for a day or wtv..

Idk s11 is better than s10. Like the episode from baby's prospective?? PEAK CINEMAAAA!! also not that I dislike s11, no I quite love it, I just wish the dean plots were more fleshed out, and that it was more "Dean and Sam vs the world!!" Then Dean vs Sam yk??

Like where's my dynamic duo??

That's part of why I didn't like s10. Like no I loved the IDEA of Mark of Cain dean, and demon dean was hilarious (although I HATE him) but it was just Dean vs Sam, Dean vs cas, Dean vs the world. And idk I liked the idea, cause this time it was sam doing everything to save Dean, but man I just didn't like the fighting..

Also s11 had a mention of TMNT, S10 did not so... points!!

S1 and 2 of spn were peak ofc, and s3 was good but not really memorable for me?? Idk I'll go back and rewatch once I finish the series (just finished s11)

S4 and 5 were also really good, we got Castiel who is peak, blood junkie Sam, which was one of my favorite plots!! And of course a lot more bobby. Rest in peace king!

And unlike some I loveeeed s6-7 like.. the soulless plot, and death? Dean dealing with soulless sam?? Chefs kiss I mean mwah. Then Sam tweaking because of hallucinations. NOT TO MENTION GODSTIEL?? loved him sm stg.

8-9-10 is where it kinda fell off. I mean idk the leviathans?? Weak. Hated them ngl. Idk if they were s7 but either way.. mid. I didn't like purgatory bc no way Sam would do that?? But I did like how it developed deans character..

I don't remember what happened in what season but I lovedddd kevin, hated metatron (but in the "it's because he's well done" kinda way), the tablets were aight, Mark of Cain was uh... something.. (I hate demon dean but he was peak..)

So like idk.. show is peak though, I'm just at that point in the hyperfixtion where it's like "BUT I COULD DO IT BETTER!!" ykwim?? NVM I'm sick with a fever, supernatural is all I have going for me man.

[countlessofvoids]

Talking about/analyzing the warlords is pretty much meaningless since they're kind of a nothing characters but I'll do it anyways:

Firstly, I feel like three of them is too much. With Grimmel, that makes four antagonists in one movie. Of course it's not impossible to write all four well - but with other things the film focuses on such as The Hidden World and the fury romance - even with enough screentime, one of them is bound to be underdeveloped.

I've seen people say there's no reason for them to exist at all. I disagree, I think removing them is arguably worse. They are Drago's allies, him being defeated puts a dent in their plans and makes Hiccup a threat in need of elimination. They have a reason to be there. Defeating Drago should have consequences; building all this up then having no sign of it in the next installment - while the villain is a hunter with zero connection to anything - doesn't make sense for the worldbuilding and would be a backwards progression.

Another thing is the personalities given to these characters. I do like how even though with their limited screentime and depth, we can see they all have their own, unique personality rather than everyone being the same angry brutes. But do said characteristics make sense for their role?

Chaghatai Khan is who I consider the best fit for his job. He's smartest of the three, calm and collected. Unlike Griselda, he doesn't let his frustrations with Grimmel get to him. He seems to know when someone's useful and when they need elimination. All the attributes you need for a succesfull leader are present.

Griselda is what you'd expect from this character archetype. Quick to anger, doesn't respect failure, harsh and a ruthless fighter. I don't think Griselda's dumb, but with how easily irritated she gets, she'd probably start few extra conflicts on her own if it wasn't for Chaghatai stopping her. I kinda wish there was more of her interactions with Grimmel, the tiny bit of their dynamic that we did get sparked some interest in me.

Ragnar makes the absolute least sense to me. He's shown to be cheerful, a bit of a coward and even childish. Not the personality I'd write for this character trope. You're telling me he raided villages, possibly enslaved both people and dragons, build an army and went on a succesfull conquest so barbaric it earned him rank of a warlord? An explanation for this could be him being in a nepo baby situation. But we can't really speculate on that, since there are no canon implications for it.

Now I don't wanna sound like a snob who thinks they know better than THW's writers, because I definetly don't. So feel free to ignore this part. Personaly to avoid having characters who are/should be important to the plot then end up with no development or arc whatsoever, I'd either:

A) Get rid of one or two warlords, making the cast less bloated - which means there are less characters to focus on, allowing more exploration for the remaining antagonists.

B) Have one of them takes on a role akin to Drago. Whoever that would be stays a warlord and becomes the driving force of conflict, meanwhile the other two are reduced to generals. Grimmel has a role similiar to Eret, as in he's under the warlord's command. This way it's clearer that he works for them and is not a warlord himself. You know, instead of like in the movie where he just walks in and bosses everyone around like he's been their leader all along. Seriously, why were the supposed brutal conquerers letting him treat them like insignificant soldiers while they're just standing around pouting?

C) Remove the trio entirely and leave only Grimmel. Either he's a warlord who disguised himself as a hunter, or he used to be a hunter who then became a warlord. Why am I insisting on not keeping him just as a hunter? Like I mentioned above; to me, going from armies and wars to simpler dragon hunters feels backwards.

So in conclusion: The Warlords should've been given a lot more importance to the plot because they have connections to the previous film's antagonist and I believe both them being empty characters and not existing at all is a waste. Think of the possibilities that could've been done with them, like making them pararells to Hiccup's friends/family.

(Feel free to correct me if I got any information wrong!)

[eisforeidolon]

I always see this phenomenon. Do you also find it strange that mentality also trickles down to the actor? Jensen gets treated the same way. Which to me brilliantly highlights how stans are unable to disengage from media and get back to reality. Jensen isn’t actually Dean. He’s not supposed to be dying for Jared. He’s not supposed to be catering to Misha. SPN actually isn’t real life…. To your point, the Misha/Cas stans are actually losing the small territory they thought they owned. There’s so much actual representation in media now that their wails and whines don’t carry any weight (not that they carried much to begin with) I’ve seen people outside of SPN fandom rail on destiel for being total bait and not even good bait.

@holding-out-for-hea

Addressing this in a new post because I go on a bit (as per usual).

I have always found fans who treat actors like they're fictional characters rather disturbing. Whether we're talking in the sense of seeing them as actually being their characters (it's a job, ffs) or in the sense of thinking the RPF fans write must be trufax (you don't know these guys, ffs). Or both! It is an indicator of someone who has problems separating fiction and reality and strikes me as just creepily dehumanizing at its core. To be clear, I'm not talking about fans who are genuinely joking around, but I feel like sometimes the line can get so easily blurred between joking and “joking” I personally prefer to avoid even that for the most part.

As to the latter, yeah, that's why I've always scoffed at the assertion SPN's legacy was going to ultimately be heller positive in any significant way.

The first problem is that to believe D/C was ever a thing (or going to be a thing) in the canon pretty fundamentally required a deep dive into the fandom for the ship. Even if you wanted to, it's a lot harder to take meta whose underlying thesis is predicated on the existence of totally real signposts about the obviously intended ending of the show seriously when the ending of the show has aired and was so hilariously Not That. It's a lot harder to fully immerse yourself in an echo chamber of true belief when there's no active and prolific new reinterpretation content to be surrounded by on a weekly basis. It's a lot easier to see how cynically bait-y and baseless Misha's statements about the canon and Castiel's final scene were, given the nothingburger that's actually there. At the heart of it, so much of the necessary credulity relies on there being an active community to bolster it with years of sunk cost investment and ready-made nonsensically elaborate conspiracies to explain why it was totally going to happen but didn't.

The second problem is the hellers remain hung up on insisting D/C was some kind of uniquely important cause that NEEDED to be canon because it was fundamentally more important than not only SPN's actual premise on the strength of platonic love, but better representation than any other show's potential LGBT+ romances … because reasons. Aside from the usual arguments why that's absurd, i.e. it's just their personal obsession speaking and they constantly insist their ship is "proved" through toxic stereotypes which actually underlines the opposite of what they intend? They have also really showed their asses by vocally and obnoxiously crying it's totally unfair and doesn't measure up to what SPN could totes have done if they weren't cowards when other media canonizes popular ships like with Good 0mens. As you say, the more time that passes the more common it's going to be to have genuine, well-written LGBT+ love stories incorporated into new canons to be contrasted against D/C fandom's 'two dudes who were never each other's first priority, often treated each other like shit, and explicitly stated their feelings were familial … but looked at each other + obvious jokes = the greatest love story (n)ever told and the writers owed me!'. Even to someone completely unfamiliar with SPN and therefore unaware they entirely queerbaited themselves despite the show's content? The longer ago the show ended the more irrelevant and unimportant to good representation the ship not being canonized becomes, when it wasn't particularly relevant to begin with. Sure they got some sympathy from the unaware about That Scene followed by an angel-free final two episodes (though a lot of the buzz was just memeing the scnee because it was That Cringe even sans context), but now? Why not go watch something else that actually has representation instead of whining about a show from 2005 that ended in 2020, after all? It's old news, if you hated it that much there's newer better LGBT+ content out there being made every day!

So yeah, not only is there no there there, especially in comparison to any real love story? But the most obnoxious shippers continuing to loudly make genuine real life issues and other canons' legitimate LGBT+ representation about their bestest realest most totally canonest ship ever D/C that they were also totally cheated out of? It can only become even more obviously ludicrous and self-serving - and it was pretty blatant to anyone with a modicum of discernment and familiarity with shipper behavior to begin with.

[renapomissing]

Comic Sonic Study 5

I promise there's plenty of positivity in this one... Just that it's more toward the bottom.

In issue 17, Sally kicks a robot that is several stories tall

I'm not sure what this is supposed to illustrate about her character, but we'll be talking more about it, in like five seconds from now.

In other news, as of issue 16, we've finally made it to red-hair Sally. Now all she needs is the vest that she had on the cover of that issue, and she'll have reached more-or-less her final form, until the Super Genesis Wave. Sonic's buckles, on the other hand, are still missing, after their singular appearance in the birthday story where he ate all those chili dogs. You know the one. I highlighted it in one of the other posts; it's the only time the buckles have appeared, up to this point.

Also, here's another thing about Sally is that in one of the Sonic-Grams letters, she's explicitly referred to as a squirrel. And then, in this issue,

She's called a squirrel again. So, when did she become a chipmunk? Actually, let's go on to the exact next panel, because I wanna complain.

Sally has been rather out-of-character, ever since Kanterovich and Penders showed up. Like, this is just downright stupid. Remember the girl power issue I couldn't be bothered to source in the last post? Well, pettiness is my greatest motivator, so I went back and checked. It's issue 14.

The story "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" introduces Sally and Bunnie out for reasons not specified, and which, to be honest, are not very important. But they spot searchlights, and are immediately suspicious. However, all that suspicion goes straight out the window when it turns out to be a shopping mall. They just go right in. I know it's not entirely clear what they were doing outside, before this, but come on, doesn't getting back to it take SOME sort of precedence? Bunnie's arm extends, by the way, Kanterovich and Penders. She could just grab Sally, and Reach up to the floor they dropped from. Whatever. Between these two examples, and that damn issue with the bomb where Sally gushed about Sonic with the heart eyes, I'm starting to get annoyed.

And here's the thing:

I don't have a problem with these character traits. Not at all!

But that's not the way she was set up! She had a previously-existing characterization, especially with the presence of the Sonic Saturday morning cartoon that I know for a fact was airing by this point, and Kanterovich and Penders just threw it out for what I think they found funny (I'm dancing around the elephant in the room so hard here, but know that I am not an idiot, and I am aware these characters are female, and what might be at play in the heads of the writers).

If you wanna write... whatever they're going for here... then go ahead! But don't change a pre-existing character for the sake of it; make a new one!

Oh jeez, is this what I'm in for when I get to the

M A X I M U M P E N D E R S

era?

Probably. Anyway, let's keep going. Like how I said in the last post that I wouldn't have much to talk about, and then proceeded to write a mini-essay on two panels?

Anyway, my frustrations continue when the next story opens up with Sally managing to go from gushing about romance while looking up at the stars to getting distracted from that by thinking about her disappeared father in what I find to be an incredibly graceless transition. The crew finds a metal orb that Sally decides, for reasons known only to Kanterovich and Penders that this could probably grant her wishes.

Remember how I chose to suffer in silence about the Sonic and Sally romance? Well, what I meant was the concept of it, not the execution. That being said, I look at the cover of issue 18, and I know I'm going to have to hold back quite a few thoughts on this one.

UPDATE:

As of issue 18,

The vest has arrived. Sonic's buckles, however, are still missing.

Time to complain, some more

This is the first instance of Antoine being depicted in the books as a coward. Before this, he was plenty brave, but he had competence issues. The cowardice trait is taken from the Saturday AM cartoon, and as far as I'm concerned, never should have been adapted into the comics. But it's here. Yay. I'm trying not to complain so much, but I really dislike this issue.

Nothing much to say, going forward, except that Sonic: In Your Face seems to establish Sally getting the vest... The vest that she already has. These guys were not in communication with one another, were they?

Now, let's end this on a positive note:

I enjoyed Sonic: In Your Face quite a bit. Probably the highlight of the series so far, for me.

I love this panel out of context. Aside from how odd it is, the art is fantastic.

I like Sonic: In Your Face, even if it's the conclusion to a story that I didn't care for the beginning of, with it being rather odd, as far as I saw it, and I didn't really care for anything before Nicole's introduction.

Wow, they really are capable of writing Sally in-character. Y'know, when they're not doing the romance stuff.

YOOOOOOOO, TAILS IS GOING TO SUMMER OF SONIC!!

Overall, I felt good about Sonic: IYF. I also felt good about the next comic in our reading list: Sonic the Hedgehog 19. Aside from the fact that the book seems to paint the picture that there are a limited number of universes, and that's not how multiverse theory works. Good thing that won't be a mistake that fiction writers keep making for decades to come, right?

...

Right...?

Regardless, one thing I particularly liked was:

Looks like Archie beat Sega to the punch on this one.

[bitchesgate3]

Was supposed to do a run with only Lae'zel recruited, but got distracted testing out mods including the origins mod. It reminded me that we gotta start asking the important questions. Now.

When we play as the Origin characters, who are they going to romance?

While playing the janky Origin mod as Lae'zel here were my thoughts at 1 in the morning on who I might pair her with:

No one - What? Don't be a coward.

Wyll - The practical choice. They both have the same writer so I'm sure he's done the leg work of getting this pairing to work. Assuming Lae figures out what her version of "love" is. If she doesn't then you'd probably lead poor Wyll to whatever the bad ending of his story is. And end up replacing Mizora for a short stint... or two... maybe more... That's messed up tho.

Gale - Lae approaching Gale is funny as hell to me, and the fact it can happen in canon is even funnier. They get along well enough, but I'm ok with them not being even fling material. But... I could probably write a serious crack fic about it.

Astarion - I am so averse to this. I've gotten so used to NOT seeing them have a fling. Not gonna stop any time soon. I do not want to see this with mine own two eyes. 🙈

Shadowheart - Romancing Lae is already like an enemies to lovers thing for a non-gith MC. The added tension of fighting Larian every step of the way as they try to make these girls kill each other adds to the both meta and (imagined) in-game sexual tension. I mean, yeah they're fundamentally at odds and that rivalry is built into the plot - Yeah their romance scenes are the complete opposite of each other. Yeah Shadowheart appreciates a lighthearted jokester and Lae takes things literally and murders every joke you give her... Yeah SH needs love and Lae... ??? But hear me out - Lae doming arrogant men? Psh. Easy plot. Satisfying but predictable plot. Lae having power struggles with another woman?

Honestly I don't know how it would work, - I just like what I like. Because god was it hard trying not to thwart the narrative-cohesion-gods-that-be by having Lae and SH flirt.

[katsukis-bakugo]

I've been replaying final fantasy xv and, other than the poor storytelling, the games worst aspect for me is by far the apparent "romance" between noctis and lunafreya.

I cannot for the life of me invest myself in their relationship. firstly, it feels very forced. the game gives them no substance outside of the words of third parties voicing how much the two supposedly love each other. for instance, a random child runs up to noctis just to tell him the player about how lunafreya felt. there's no escape from this happening either, which further forces their romance into the player's face and down their throat

(image: "she really loved you, prince noctis").

(image: "she was really excited to marry you! she looked so happy the day her dress arrived!")

who are you? how do you, random child, know how luna was feeling and how she reacted to seeing her dress? what purpose do you serve other than to yet again remind the player that noctis and lunafreya love each other?

any well-written romance would have absolutely no need to include ridiculous scenes like this as well-written romances show the audience the love between the characters rather than telling them through random npcs. the fact that the game doesn't go beyond anything other than this to build anything concrete or convincing for their relationship shows not only bad writing, but also lazy writing. quite frankly, it's insulting.

now, noctis and lunafreya met once as children; noctis eight years old and lunafreya twelve. they had no interaction over the following twelve years other than being pen pals. the whole idea of their little notebook is like texting someone from primary school until after secondary then deciding to meet up and get married. it makes very little sense. yes, you can still learn about someone by writing to them, but you won't truly know them as you would with in-person interactions. flaws are pretty much absent due to the writer being in control of the knowledge they give of themselves, which would lead to being placed on a pedestal. without any face-to-face interactions, neither could really know the other. they don't have the chance to see their quirks, what makes them tick, how they treat other people and situations. their love for each other appears to be nothing more than the idealisations they've created of one another. they don't truly know each other; they just think they do.

I'm just going to say it: noctis and lunafreya should've shared a platonic relationship. the fact that they're both nostalgic for the time they spent together as children coupled with luna giving advice and approval like a mother/older sibling gives the relationship a more comfortable fit to be platonic. a big indicator of this is luna's death scene in which the two appear as children.

despite it being a tragic event, it was still an opportunity for the supposed romance between the two to shine through. but instead, the main focus of their dialogue is duty. during the scene, luna does her usual of preaching about his destiny before it shifts onto her dying. noctis begins to cry and tells her "it's not right. all I wanted was to save you." luna then turns into her older, current self, and offers noctis - who is still presented as a child - words of hope and wisdom and tells him that she will always watch over him.

only at the very last second of the scene does noctis become his older, current self when the realisation of the situation sets in and he tries to reach out to her. instead of telling noctis that she loves him, luna simply says "farewell, dear noctis." this scene was not romantically coded at all.

personally, I don't see their personalities being a good match romantically, either. it's a little unfair to say so since luna doesn't exactly have a personality, but from what we're shown throughout the game, I can't imagine noctis having fun or joking around with luna like he does with a lot of other people, even those outside his group. noctis loves to fish, to play games, to adventure and live his life. whilst you could argue that his attitude changed when he seemingly matured after his decade-long nap, he's still human with a personality. to me, luna seems like she would simply spend all day every day devoting all her time and energy to nothing but her role and to her lover, rather than having her own interests and life as well. sure, opposites attract, but sometimes two people are simply too different and are romantically incompatible.

a big weakness of the romance between notcis and luna is that luna is a very bad character. she's given nothing outside of her duty and noctis, which is pretty much the same thing. she's a classic "too pure, too good for this world" character who is presented as perfect and serves as nothing more than a mere plot device for the main protagonist/love interest. she's cast away when the story has no use for her anymore and her purpose is fulfilled. this makes it very difficult to care about her and her fate because she feels like less of a person and character and more of a catalyst for the story. the writers merely use her as a push for the protagonist. from my perspective, luna convinced herself she romantically loves noctis - she has a duty to uphold and it revolves around him and seeing his destiny through.

as for noctis, he clearly cared about luna and they did love each other - but I'm not convinced of it being in a romantic sense. they seemed more reliant on each other for comfort and hope rather than anything in relation to romance.

without the supposed wedding scene between the two, I think I could've swallowed their relationship a little easier (and lived pretending that their love for each other was platonic/familial). but it comes out of nowhere and is shoved in the player's face as if to say "see! they're in love! even though they didn't have to get married anymore, they still did because they really did love each other!" okay, but it doesn't make up for the poor writing, the lack of chemistry and romantic connection and the fact they still don't really know each other. let's not forget the fact that luna is sitting on the floor at noctis' feet like a dog. at her own "wedding"?

the same occurs in artwork in the dawn of the future book where, not only luna, but also their daughter is sitting on the floor whilst noctis and his son sit nice and comfortably on the throne. and the two of them gaze up at them as though their only purpose in life is to love them

why? who thought this was a cute idea? to me, it simply reinforces the idea that luna served nothing more than a role to noctis, whether it was as oracle, his love interest or just a plot device to push him forward.

also the fact that their children resemble noctis and luna exactly as they were as children themselves, down to the daughter being older as well, is just strange...also?? noctis has his hand?? on his wifes head?? she really is a fucking dog huh. I'm not a fan

in conclusion, I think square enix were complete cowards to not have the bond between noctis and lunafreya that of a platonic and/or familial one which, in my opinion, would have been far more suitable. I can't and never will get behind their romance, no matter how many updates, dlcs or books are released in order to fix it. some things are just broken beyond repair, and noctis and luna's romance is one of them.