#almost an interesting character arc

[the-mpreg-guy]

Idk it's just exhausting to watch a show reward the fascist cop, punish the suicidal mentally ill "terrorist," and then watch an entire fandom go "you're stupid and media illiterate for being annoyed with this choice and also you hate sapphics you stupid sapphic."

I support womens wrongs but Aracane was soooo copaganda it was honestly embarrassing for them.

[royaltea000]

YO! Being a drawing, what’s there to be afraid of!

[aroaceleovaldez]

tbh my latest biggest theory for why HoO and onwards is such a dramatic drop in quality and consistency is just. Rick stopped making teaching guides.

Like, the Lightning Thief teacher's guide is SUPER in-depth with even stuff like sources about middle grade child psychology and exact specifications of where he's applying that, explaining what different character's goals/motivations are, their dynamics with each other and their environments, etc etc. Even specifying which specific myths certain plot elements are supposed to reference or be about.

That stuff just doesn't exist for later books. There's activity guides and smaller, significantly more simple teacher guides for later books but they don't go into anywhere NEAR the same level of depth. The TLT one is a full lesson plan that breaks down the book at every level and explains what's going on and more or less why Rick did that. The others are all basically just glossaries of terminology and some simple question guides.

And they didn't even use the TLT teacher's guide for the Disney+ show because they clearly aren't adhering to any of what's discussed in that breakdown of the book.

By creating a teaching guide alongside writing the actual book, that's forcing you to document what you're doing, why, your sources, and information about your characters and the story they're in. It's like an even more in-depth version of a series bible. But that's lacking for later books (and etc) and it shows because that level of thought and depth and attention just isn't there anymore.

[rawliverandgoronspice]

The big problem with Rauru Tears of the Kingdom 2023's writing is that he acts as if he's owed everything and owns everyone --even when he cloaks it with the veneer of care, selflessness, or tragedy.

And if only this had been a conscious writing choice, explored and unearthed through the course of the game, he could have been the most interesting and layered Legend of Zelda character of all time. 😔

[beedreamscape]

This has to be the last thing I say on C3 finale because otherwise, I will not stop, it simply baffles me in its mediocrity. And obviously, this will be negative, if you loved it, good for you, this is my takeaway as someone who loved this campaign and was severely let down.

This finale changes everything that came before and not for good, better yet, it emphasizes all the faults in the structure of what c3 tried to be, it made most of the campaign feel like a true exercise in futility — How far can we go in a campaign that is meandering and unsatisfying? How long can we have the same discussion over and over and over again despite everyone knowing how this will end? How long can we drag out characters that don't change without anyone noticing? (spoiler everyone noticed)

Can't say I was emotionally invested in the finale because I tapped out back in the 70s, came back for Aeor/Downfall shenanigans, and left again. But in experiencing the finale something became clear to me:

THIS STORY NEEDED TO BE SHORTER.

WITH ANOTHER PARTY AT THE HELM.

If the objective from the very conception of C3 was to wipe out the gods, that had to be clear from the very start. And it wasn't clear, at all — not in the characters, not in the starting city, not in theme. This was a completely different campaign at the start! That clarity was what made Calamity so great, it was short and precise, and every pc SERVICED THE THEME, filled with hubris and contempt, not to mention the setting.

Even Ludinus went in circles for convenience of the campaign length and became a weaker opponent for it, more of a nuisance than a villain. The threat he posed at episode 50 was much stronger than now at 120 something. The battle against Otohan was more nail-biting and emotionally engaging than fighting Ludinus and Predathos, a god eater!!!!

This campaign would've benefited from three to four acts instead of one overarching objective like the past campaigns because urgency is the name of the game and we can't carry urgency for 70 episodes straight (and they didn't).

The constant inclusion of the other parties made it clear how easy it was to detach BH from the story, how easy and fun it was for them to tell it through another party's eyes (one of the main reasons why I walked away back when I did, but that's more of a personal preference).

Which is not to say Bells Hell's didn't deserve a long story! They could very well have existed in a more intimate campaign which these characters were clearly built for! Their premises begged for closer looks in slow moments, something tragicomical, exploration of the inner world while developing MARQUET and its microcosm of injustice and politics which was left in the dust mid-campaign (pun intended).

And I'm not suggesting this just for our enjoyment, I know it's them playing and their enjoyment comes first blah blah, though this is a multi-million company therefore their jobs but this would contribute to their enjoyment! You could see several moments in the campaign how tapped out they felt and acted. I doubt it was "fun" discussing the gods situation ad naseaum, trudging through landscapes they barely cared about, with empty arcs.

I could nitpick every fault I see in the finale but it would be pointless, these issues have been dragged from ages ago and poor character matching, and now this is a culmination of everything and it barely fazes me anymore.

(And yeah it's their game and it's "free", but that doesn't undermine its weight as a story, stories were made be analyzed, and it was a poorly structured one no matter how much I still like and admire them as people.)

WHICH is not to say I had no fun at all ever, I did! several times! and that's what makes me upset, it could've been great instead is just meh.

[sskk-manifesto]

Bungou Stray Dogs: Dead Apple and how “ability users” (opposite to “normal people”) learning to accept themselves through the acceptance of their own abilities is a queer metaphor of acceptance of own's sexual orientation and gender: an essay by me

[vic-does-battlecats]

I drew all my warriors protagonist designs in 5* minutes from memory for the funsies

*some had a few extra minutes cause I knew how to do them perfect and I couldn’t leave them Wrong

[maxlovespigeons]

Genuinely hoping Peri's blowup will convince people to give A New Wish a chance honestly it's such a good show

[amaranthdahlia]

god i will never stop fawning over how absolutely SPECTACULAR afo vs bakugou was. genuinely one of the best fights in the entire manga in terms of art, the themes, the pararells, the gayness, the fight itself, and just. everything about it makes me wanna scream into my pillow and chew on it

[1000sunnygo]

Do you ship lawbin?

I don't exactly ship them but I don't hate the ship either.. Just neutral, I guess? It's such a harmless ship but massively hated for no reason lmao.

I discovered it was a thing only after Sawyer7mage talked about them in a chapter review (good reviewer btw! some sarcasms he made here reminded me that he's a professional therapist pfff) Initially I didn't like the idea but some valid points have been raised in favor of the ship by him and others. Law/Robin don't have a lot going together so far, but public opinion can be easily swayed if Oda lets them interact more. Given the recent developments in late Wano, the chance is quite high.

Only problem is that these two seem to be drawn towards the type of people that are opposite of each other. Robin had flirted with larger and older men who aren't "conventionally attractive", and Law's buddies are all silly little fellows with little pride who like to pamper him all the time. But fanarts like this by @/takara_op did a great job convincing me that they'd be pretty fun to follow as a duo 👍🏼

Oda's depiction of Law and love and his character dynamic with women is an entirely different topic and I have a year old draft meta on this,,,,maybe I should post it some day 🫠 doesn't have much Lawbin in it though

[twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat]

i still haven’t written out my 261 metapost but i can’t stop thinking about the stsg subtext in that chapter . the parallels between geto slaughtering the village and gojo slaughtering the higher ups…. the fact that gojo does it right after declaring that he has to “catch up” to geto

[the-mpreg-guy]

also the people who are like "if you can't handle cait/vi, you would have never been strong enough for catradora" ARE INSANE bc the entire narrative of shepop was constantly saying that catra was WRONG for the shit she pulled and made her go through multiple episodes where she had to win adora's trust again AND she actually apologized. CAITLYN COULD NEVER

[icharchivist]

sometimes i forget people didn't read the books and don't know Illario was extremely dumbed down in Veilguard, and i see takes and i have a double take like "well no that's not true he's not l--" and then i remember that i have a total different understanding of Illario than someone who only played the game because I consider Book!Illario better and have a very complicated headcanons to try to connect Book!Illario and Game!Illario together but if i had a choice i'd disregard Game!Illario in a fucking heardbeat

and then i see takes based solly on his Game characterization and i get scandalized for a second before the grief of "right the Game made 0 effort with this character" really hits me and i feel sad again

[iveb33nthe4rcher]

Yuji itadori: What makes a good protagonist?

Today is yuji itadori's birthday (aka my personal favorite and, in my opinion, one of the best new gen anime mcs) and i just wanted to come on here real quick to talk about his character.

Yuji, in my opinion, is the perfect example of how experiences can change your personality. At the start of jjk we see yuji as this cheerful, kind of naive teenager who has a positive look on life, right? By the end of s2, some of these traits are still there, but not all. The events that happened in shibuya obviously took their toll on yuji, and you can see that he's lost his "happy" demeanor and has matured a lot while learning about the jujutsu world and its brutalities. He also stops trying to humanize sukuna and recognizes what kind of cruel monster is inside him. He is very obviously not the same person he was at the start of jjk and i really love how gege wrote that.

Next i want to talk about his role in the story. Obviously, since he's the protagonist, there's bound to be a lot of plot points involving him, but jjk goes a different way. While there is a lot of scenes, fights, or anything else involving yuji (obviously), the entire focus doesn't remain on him. Every character gets their own spotlight at some point as we learn more about them, and i personally believe this is very important when writing media. Because you cannot have the entire story focusing on one character or it'll all fall flat.

Lastly, because it's late, i want to bring up yuji himself. Yuji is a character who's in a pretty dark situation right now: At this point, the entire world is against him. And it's a little funny to think that, the one responsible for all this in the first place is none other than yuji. Everything that happened with sukuna and him becoming his vessel happened because of swallowing sukuna's finger, which he swallowed to PROTECT HIS FRIENDS, knowing damn well there'd be some sort of big consequence coming with it. He had no knowledge of the jujutsu world at all and he still decided to swallow the finger.

His character from the shibuya arc and forward makes me so sad for some reason, because at the end of the day, he is just a former happy kid whose life turned upside down and lost almost everything in THREE MONTHS, yet he still refuses to stop fighting. He has lost so many loved ones in front of him. He has died TWICE. Yet he doesn't give up yet. He knows he has to save people, and that is what he is going to do.

I just think that yuji itadori is amazing.

[rawliverandgoronspice]

anyway to end the series on ganondorf tp's writing, my take (which isn't canon but arguable as a valid "death of the author" read imo) is that he is at his most iredeemable AND that's because he has zero things left to lose and no community left and his goal doesn't even make sense anymore he is parasitic and a ghost and pathologically obsessed by his own godlike legitimacy because that is the only thing he still has and it has prolonged his life in a horrible diminished state in a nightmare dimension so SURELY it must mean something right right RIGHT

[instinctsxbad]

*scratching at the walls thinking about how no one has adapted Peter’s college arcs in a consistent and satisfying way.*