#also there was a dream sequence that i thought was really inspiring because it actually felt like a dream with dreamlike continuity

[sirompp]

the autism urge to create a blog archiving and sorting the entirety of something nobody wants not even me

[melrosing]

so stuff I’ve not liked about the finale and S2 more generally…. unfortunately it’s a lot and i'm thinking i might need to say this in several parts but first and foremost: the pacing really was shit and i don't just mean there weren't enough action scenes i mean the whole season they've had almost nothing to say about these characters and have just been making us think they do by having them repeat the same ham-fisted monologues about power and peace and the cost of war and whatever whilst moving at a glacial pace from one minor plot point to another and by the end of it most of these characters STILL haven't changed, and where they have it feels undeserved, and yes they really are at roughly the place they started so what have they even got to show for these eight hours of TV?? like damn

and I do get that the writer's strike has really effected them here and HBO hacking two eps off their season affected them too and that really can't be helped. but the pacing has been pretty poor from kick off and I can't just put it down to this being a more 'internal' season. i do not care about big battles. it's fine to have a season of a show that’s more about the characters’ interiority rather than plot action. that’s the exact reason why I like AFFC so much.

but these characters barely have interiority like idk what to say. some like Rhaenyra, Jace and Alicent have been spouting the same monologues every episode about wanting peace/wanting agency/wanting peace again etc etc, and the more interesting moments like Alicent's apparent suicide attempts, Rhaenyra's butchering of the dragonseeds etc... I mean where IS the interiority here?? unless they are spelling out a character's thoughts in the most literal way they can (as per Jace's diatribes about the dragonseeds), they leave their audience to do absolutely all the work by showing us nothing, and just leaving us to figure that the characters must be having some kind of thoughts but y'all can decide what they are.

and even Daemon, whose entire ARC was about his interiority.... like look I was so so ready to love this arc. i love fucked up little dream sequences. i love harrenhal. i was really enjoying the angle they took with alys. i was here for it. but now we've seen the whole of his S2 arc, im going to say yes, it was intended as a redemption adjacent kind of arc, and it isn't a very good one. Daemon has a handful of weird dreams, gets shouted at by some Riverlands folk, and he's a changed man.

consider the character everyone compares Daemon to (and who I'm always more than happy to talk about) and that's Jaime. and look at the sheer ground covered in ASOS: Jaime breaks out of a dungeon, Jaime meets a younger version of himself, Jaime gets his hand hacked off, Jaime reveals his anime villain backstory in the bath, Jaime deals with Roose Bolton, Jaime has a weird weirwood dream, Jaime fights a fucking bear - and at this point we're still only about halfway through.

now in contrast, what have they actually managed to do with Daemon this season. where has that finale moment with Rhaenyra been earned. this is not slow pacing for the sake of powerful character development, it's slow because they don't have anything else to say.

and also look at the state of characters like Aemond who seemed really promising in S1, yet in this season he barely reflects on the fact that he hadn't meant to kill Luke, and this war is an accident that he started, etc etc - he's just a killing machine lol. there were some nice touches in there, like i say i enjoyed Helaena telling Aemond how he'll die in the finale. but I no longer trust these writers to do anything with their more inspired ideas because they just consistently fail to do so.

look at Baela!!! like my god, has Baela had the opportunity to do anything except A) what she's told and B) counsel men on their feelings. she has like one moment looking at Daemon and you feel like the series is going to explore how complex it is to be Daemon Targaryen's daughter.... but my god they never do!! so where IS this interiority we've spent eight episodes on! what have they got to show for it!!

and i talked more weeks back about how frustrating i've found the writing of women more generally in this series and as of the finale I am finding it so egregious and so condescending. women want peace. women want to protect their children. women are tired of men. women are tired of war. women are trying to end this war peacefully. women are pacifists. women hate violence. and so on and so on and so on like jesus christ who am i even talking about here. even i don't know. it's so boring. it's so dry. and it requires female characters to always be the paragons of virtue, never do anything truly condemnable, never be unlikeable, never fucking anything except stand around saying how much they hate this. im bored of it and it makes me angry that they would do this in a series that specifically seeks to make everyone grey and everyone complex - they keep suggesting that might extend to the women before abruptly shutting it down again. see Alicent and Rhaenyra even STILL, after EVERYTHING, trying to peacefully shut down the war for the sake of love and friendship in the goddamn finale. I don't believe it anymore!! it's not cute! it's just dull!!!

and finally that just kind of brings me to how shortsighted a lot of the plot developments seem, when you see how the characters fail to reckon with their pasts or shit that just happened. Rhaenyra and Mysaria make out, and then that's never mentioned again and the tone never changes between them. Rhaenyra is done thinking about Luke. Helaena is done thinking about Jaehaerys. Aegon actually didn't mention Jaehaerys in the list of things he's 'lost' in that finale. Alicent's relationship w Viserys was just now condensed to 'we were fond of each other but he always liked your mum better'

like idk it's just. if this season's pacing is all about giving characters the chance to change and grow into the people they'll be when this war REALLY kicks off.... do it. write it. do not just write the same monologue a dozen times and hope it'll hit harder with each. doesn't work like that. sorry.

[hailqiqi]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers (except me because obvs I have done it). Spread the self-love ❤

Thank you for the ask!! Also thank you for the ask @womaninwinter and @menina89 -- yes I have three of these (sometimes I think with us lot it's now a game of 'who gets to tag everyone first' ak;ljd;akd)

I'm scanning my list on AO3 now...

the world is out there, my dear, but we're in here (VLD) This fic is really short & I'm a little bit surprised it gets my #1 spot, to be honest, but every time I look at even just the title I hear the rain. It's an inspired bit of writing, and I have no idea how the hell I did it. (Trivia: Somebody wrote it a comment that was longer than the actual fic and I adore that person.)

these secrets beneath your fingertips (Lockwood) I really enjoyed writing this, but i have no idea how it ended up like this. I think it's known by people as the murder fic? But I really enjoy how much tension there is in the first part, and how meltingly, exhaustedly warm the second part is by contrast. Funnily enough I thought it was just a very tense detective/action sequence but didn't think the content was too bad; then the ladies beta-ing for me said 'Qiqi, what the fuck is this' and a lot of the comments also said 'Qiqi, what the fuck' so apparently I watched too much SVU as a teenager.

Worse (Lockwood) This was close with secrets for #2, but I reread secrets more often so I think that gets the higher spot for enjoyability. I'm extremely proud of this one; I'd always been a bit scared to attempt a George POV but I think I did really well, and I also think I nailed the action here (which VLD friends may remember that I was always a bit too nervous to attempt action!). Trivia here: Worse contains the line ‘Lucy! Please, come on! The place is tearing itself apart!’ and literally everybody who beta-read this fic said 'Hey, that line's a bit redundant. It's such a weird thing for him to say. You should cut it.' Alas, I couldn't cut it as that line is lifted directly from The Hollow Boy (and, funnily enough, Lucy immediately points out in her narration that it's a bit redundant). This little factoid always makes me giggle.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like a Christmas Carol (VLD) Ahhhhhhh I think we knew this had to be on here, right? This fic was so much fun to write, it was like a fever dream. I still can't believe that @sp4c3-0ddity, @rueitae and I co-ordinated and banged out almost 20,000 words of fic in the space of what, five days?? And yes, that five days is from 'Hey, wouldn't it be cool if we...' to posting. And we all have vastly different writing styles and slightly different characterisation habits, yet somehow we managed to share a single POV and keep it pretty cohesive. At the time I was proud of us, now I'm older and (supposedly) wiser I'm even more proud of us. We did great. @fromageinterrupted likes to say she reads it every year in the holiday season and I do the same (and then just every so often...) because it's a fun fic.

A Handy Excuse (Lockwood) | Sunshine and Phone Lines (VLD) | so it turns out I kind of missed you (VLD) | Here (VLD) OK I'm kind of cheating here, because I couldn't pick a favourite for fifth. - A Handy Excuse was a blast to write -- it was fun having 6 people in the same google doc, all writing out separate parts -- yep, we all wrote in the same doc to put our shame on full display. Which was really cool (I think most of us have the instinct to write in a separate doc and only contribute to the shared doc when we have a finished draft to polish, but we were all very brave and wrote from scratch in the one). I love how the pieces come together; my part was an absolute blast to write (can I admit publicly now that I did Kipps? I got to find out the name of the circus tune!) and the story itself is a really cute read that always makes me smile. - Sunshine and Phone Lines is my one foray into a modern AU and I had a lot of fun writing it. It's probably the one thing that I can throw at somebody with no knowledge of any fandom and say 'hey, I wrote this'. I like how it feels sunny, just the vibes are very positive in the whole piece, and I am an absolute sucker for a bit of dramatic irony. I always end up smiling when I reread this, too. - so it turns out I kind of missed you is another really fun piece. It's short, it's funny, it's sweet -- honestly it's another one I could probably file the serial numbers off of if I wanted. Lance's brother makes me laugh every time I read it, it's another one of those stories that you reread and end up smiling -- though this time it's the big, the-sun-just-came-out type smile. - Here is going to ruin the vibes of all these sunny fluff fics I have in at #5 becuase it is angst. But it's angst with a lot of love and comfort. Evidently I had a thing with water falling when I wrote plangst, because the world... has rain and this one is in a shower. I love how quietly intimate it is, and how it demonstrates how strong the bonds of friendship and care can be. (I feel like it was originally supposed to be a shippy fic but part-way through writing I threw that out the window? It's Gen, really, but I tagged it with the ship so my friends would see it.)

This is supposed to be an ask game but I've now got two hours to knock out about 8 hours' worth of work so.. tags it is!

@rueitae @sp4c3-0ddity @uptoolateart @fromageinterrupted @almostlikequake @worldofkaeos

[ndrayton]

Ghost Stories Postmortem!!!

It’s me, FieryGaze!!! Now that Chapter 13 is out and posted and my brain has freed up about 75% of its RAM, I wanted to make a post just to reflect on the journey, drop some fun facts, & explain the intent behind some of my choices. Here they are in no particular order.

Spoilers beware, obviously. I'm going to be talking about the whole fic here.

Episode Titles

Each episode title refers to two things at once – the monster or challenge the group is facing, plus one other important thematic element. “The Demon King” is the simplest one, referring both to the actual Demon King and then to Kim Dokja gaining that power for himself. The others are a little more open to interpretation, but were chosen with the intention of referring to 2 specific things.

Constant reappearance of the number “Thirteen”?

I’d like to say there was a lot of thought behind this, but there wasn’t. I just went “ooo, unlucky number” and ended up repeating it as often as possible. 13 years since KDJ and HSY met; 13 years spent in the spirit world chasing the Endless Cycle; 13 loops before KDJ met YJH. It was a lucky coincidence that the chapter count also happened to be 13 (I’d initially planned for twelve, and everything that happened in Unseen World was supposed to be squished into the end of Infinite Loop Part II. When I realized that was absolutely NOT going to give me enough space to resolve everything, I was delighted to realize that I could make the chapter count 13 and have it be thematically relevant and Not just a case of poor planning).

Lee Seolhwa also states that the number 7 is significant for certain spirits. I just think it’s fun that the total chapter count ended up as 13 and the total Episode count as 7.

Perspective and Tense Changes

From the beginning, the use of first person was actually a bit of a false flag—it’s meant to represent the ghost of Kim Dokja, trapped in the loop, imagining himself as the living version of himself going on these adventures. Kim Dokja as the narrator states this outright.

It was about time I stopped pretending that “I” was really this person called Kim Dokja. (Ch. 11)

Maybe I pretended for a while, for a long while, that it was really “me” who was fighting at your side. (Ch. 13)

The first person narration also tends to flip between present and past tense, especially in later chapters when Ghost!KDJ begins using second person to refer to Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk, but also when he’s making general observations about the world. It’s not technically grammatically correct, but I was trying to grant a small step of separation between him and the other characters, whose perspectives are written more strictly in third person past tense.

The final monologue is also in present tense, unmooring it from the sequence of events of the story, hopefully making it feel a little more dreamlike/internal. I feel like I’m allowed to mess with tenses this much only because it’s an orv fic and I’m not afraid to get meta.

I also used present tense during almost all of chapter 10. I wanted it to feel like a whole separate fic-within-a-fic, and a lot of fanfic is written in present tense, so I was deliberately evoking that (including See You Yesterday, undeniably a MAJOR inspiration for this chapter). I also wanted to provide a sense of immediacy—Yoo Joonghyuk truly believes that what he’s experiencing in the dream is really happening to him, right now—that I could pull back on once he realized he was dreaming, returning to past tense and the main flow of the larger story.

As a side note, by the time I finally finished chipping away at chapter 10 I thought it was awful, so I was surprised and delighted when it became everyone’s favourite chapter, lmao. This is probably why people have beta readers, to get a little bit out of their own heads. Anyway, the positive response to that chapter really brightened my week.

… My favourite scenes 😊

The first scene I really had a blast with was probably the possession scene—what can I say, you don’t make a “Paranormal investigation AU” without wanting to play with a few of its standard tropes. That’s when I realized I could happily keep writing this fic for as long as it took to finish it (I initially planned for 2 months. It became 4.)

I also had such a fun time writing all of “Blank Message”, from the kids bullying poor Dokja to what amounts to me basically just drawing hearts around Yoo Joonghyuk’s name as he fails to use technology but also gets to be the most specialest boy in the world. That episode practically wrote itself, honestly. I accidentally wrote like 12,000 words of it in my phone notes app because I kept having ideas at work and had little else to do during our slow season.

My actual favourite scene, though, might be Yoo Joonghyuk cooking in Han Sooyoung’s kitchen in Ch. 12? I just thought it was sweet. Maneuvering those two into a position where they could be emotionally vulnerable with each other was a challenge. My notes for that section are funny to me, I’m just struggling to get to the heart of the scene and yelling at them to please be emotionally vulnerable.

... There was like 500 more words of this.

I can’t help but feel the yoohan corner of yoohankim got a little neglected in this fic, but it’s because they had so many unresolved issues that I couldn’t just leap ahead to the romance angle without first addressing them… and by then the fic was kinda over. Please understand, however, that they love and understand each other deeply despite (because of??) being the way they are. Maybe I’ll explore that more in future stories. Who could say.

Most challenging part to write?

Wrong Room Part II, Forgotten Boy Part II, and the first bit of Devourer of Dreams Part II before Kim Dokja showed up (it was way easier to write once he was there because the joongdok dynamic really pulled the plot along).

All three of these had significant rewrites and Forgotten Boy Part II took me like… an entire week to figure out. The Part II’s tended to be tricky because that’s when I was making all the setup from Part I pay off, but I wanted it to be engaging and exciting and not feel too paint-by-numbers. I learned a lot writing these!

What was Yoo Joonghyuk saying at the end of Blank Message that got censored?

“▪▪ ▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪”

“Do you really not remember…”

Well, maybe you can intuit the rest from context clues (what Mia was saying just beforehand).

There was a bunch of other censoring when Kim Dokja was trying to explain to Yoo Joonghyuk where all his special knowledge of the time loop came from, but I didn’t actually note it down as it was all pretty much able to be inferred, like “the loop is actually based on a book series”.

There’s certainly more to find, but that’s all I have to say for now!

I fun with foreshadowing, but I’m not going to call out anything specific, because I think it adds to reread value. There’s an especially mean bit of “foreshadowing” in one part that had me absolutely cackling. Let me know if you find it.

Anyway!

I had no plans to put so much time and effort into writing fanfic this year, and yet here I am with 120,000 words in four months, which is… FAR AND ABOVE my normal writing pace, especially lately. What can I say? Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint is a really special story and I don’t have any friends who have read it, which put my brain into an absolute pressure-cooker for which the only release could be writing orv a novel-length love letter.

I’m seriously thankful for everyone who read the story and left so many emphatic, excited, and kind comments. The readers absolutely transformed this experience from something I was plodding away at by myself just to see if I could do it into something I was really excited to share with others, and as a result I put a lot more effort and care into the story.

I do have a few other ideas for this AU—for which the seeds are actually already planted in the story—but, as I mentioned in my author’s note, I desperately need to take a fanfic break for a while. I can’t promise if/when I’ll get back to it, but I would definitely like to at some point.

IN ANY CASE, FOR THE LAST TIME ON THIS ADVENTURE….

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[mariacallous]

Your use of Reaction Images from the new Feid is inspired. Do you have any particular take on the new season? Personally I thought it was a bit melencholy and less campy that I would expect from a Ryan Murphy show (I know he didn’t write or direct this one).

I think it had some interesting things to say about the complex real life and media trope of the Gay Best Friend, and the resentments that build on both sides of that relationship but also the joys of it, but the structure and timeline of everything was kind of off putting.

Thanks for reading! Love your blog!

Aw, thank you!

My sister and I were talking about the series last night, and here's where we landed:

-The story or narrative was vague and/or undecided. At no point did Murphy and the others writing and directing ever decide, really, how they felt about the characters involved, and, by extension, where the audience is supposed to land or approach the characters. There's a difference between "these people are flawed and complex but ultimately we should be [sympathetic/unsympathetic] towards them" and "they're complicated and flawed!"

-The characterization, and indeed the writing in general, was very clunky and...not great. Lots of cliches, lots of stereotypes, lots of generalities, and at times the characters all had the same kind of voice.

-There was SO MUCH Telling as opposed to Showing. It was the only way viewers would be given any kind of indication what sort of stake or element was involved. It was lazy and detrimental.

-There were also what felt like Obligatory Virtue Signal Moments put in because it was expected or necessary and then things could progress. The sexism/misogyny element which kind of gets introduced in the first/second episode gets dropped very quickly and is almost never referenced again. The homophobia and Gay Best Friend element is mentioned sporadically throughout, with the heaviest concentration in the James Baldwin episode) but doesn't really come to any conclusions about how we're supposed to feel.

-The pacing and timeline *were definitely* off-putting - I think the jumping around was a detriment (especially because a lot of establishing moments for the friendship of the swans and Capote were scattered about). Starting with La Cote Basque 1965 was the wrong choice, because you have the explosion up front and then have to figure out how you're going to build up and progress from there. There's also, because of the Telling versus Showing, a lot of build up for certain events and moments, which don't pay off or get pulled off - the Black and White Ball is an example of that, I think.

-Additionally, the shifts in the kind of framing for the show hurt it - the first two episodes are a conventional set up, then you have the shift to the black and white documentary, then you're kind of back to the conventional set up, and then the last two episodes are weird dream sequences and kind of shoddy conjecture?

-As much as I like Molly Ringwald and Demi Moore, choosing to include/elevate Joanne Carson and Ann Woodward to this extent was a poor choice, as was not including what I feel are the more actual interesting swans (Pamela Harriman, my personal fave, as well as Gloria Guinness and Marella Agnelli) and making Babe the primary Swan wasn't necessarily the best choice.

-So much time was spent on Babe's cancer and Truman's alcoholism, to the detriment of fleshing out literally any and all of the other characters and stories, and both of those story elements were handled poorly.

-The James Baldwin episode was probably my least favorite because of how all-around bad it was, which is really unfortunate because there could have been potential there.

-Going into this series, Murphy and the others seemed to have made what my sister and I are calling the "Somehow, Palpatine returned" choice, aka the Marvelization Maneuver. In order to really follow along, you either had to be familiar with Truman Capote and the Swans and 1970s New York society, *and/or* have read Laurence Leamer's book, which the series was inspired by. So much was not explained or depicted, and so you have a higher bar to clear to engage with the material. And if you do have that background, because of the other choices, you would be disappointed because you *do* know the background and saw what was chosen to be used.

-I also think that an emphasis on the aesthetics versus the story was involved, which is also unfortunate.

I was excited and there were moments I *did* like, but there was a lot to be disappointed about.

[vannahfanfics]

One Piece Live Action: Review

Well, I came home after work yesterday and immediately binged the entirety of the live-action One Piece adaptation. Now that it's morning, I thought I would collect my thoughts (which I rambled to several friends and also into my handy-dandy phone notepad app) and write a review, for anyone who's interested. I'll be honest, it's mostly for me; I have so many feelings as someone who actually loves cinematography and the artistic analysis of film with regard to storytelling—because we all know how much I love my stories—that I just have to rave about this honest-to-goodness masterpiece of a show. Obviously, it will be very spoiler-heavy, so read at your own discretion!

So, I'll start with a blanket statement and reiterate that, again, I thought this show was a masterpiece. Given the history of live-action anime adaptations, I was cautious in not having terribly high expectations, even after learning that Oda was intimately involved in the production; I also went in looking to respect it as its own entity, though, and willing to look past certain things provided there were no egregious insults to the source material. And y'all, when I say I was blown away—I damn near had a smile on my face the whole night watching it. It wasn't just the nostalgia; it was the overbearing feeling that so much love was poured into this show, which I find to be unfortunately lacking in a lot of Hollywood films these days. I found myself thinking of the Peter Jackson adaptations of the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. Though there were changes, some of them large, none of them felt averse to the source material; in fact, the changes felt like they came from an admiration of the source material and a strong desire to bring them justice. I dunno, I was just amazed by the pervading feeling that each and every person involved in making this show had a dream to bring One Piece to life, and they poured every ounce of effort into bringing that dream to fruition—which is what One Piece is all about. This has set the standard for live-action anime adaptations, and I finished this show so desperately hungry for more, to see how they could go bigger and better when bringing the subsequent arcs to life in a nostalgic but refreshingly new way. Goda has delivered yet again, and honestly, I will never be the same. Words aren't going to be able to capture the depth of my feelings about this show, but I must ramble on nonetheless because I am just so awed and inspired and emotional about it.

Episode 1: Romance Dawn

First of all, it's a no-brainer to have the first episode of the series titled "Romance Dawn," but it still made me giddy. The opening sequence was sick. Michael Dorman absolutely sells it as Gol D. Roger; his absolute blitheness in the face of his impending death is so spot-on, and his rendition of the "Wealth, Fame, Power" speech was so rousing. I loved that they kept the fact that Dracule, Shanks, Smoker, and Dragon were in attendance, too, and though they were the briefest of blips, their appearances hinted at the personalities and relationships with Roger that manga/anime followers already know well: Dracule, simply intrigued and stoic; little Shanks, distraught at the looming death of his captain; young Smoker, mystified at the downfall of such a legend but not necessarily sad; and Dragon, who is shown only in his green cloak, shrouded in mystery as he is. I liked the inclusion of Garp at the execution, especially given his expanded role in this adaptation of the series, but also because of his close relationship with Roger in canon; it only makes sense that he would be there at the end. I was also pleasantly surprised that they showed Roger's death on-screen. It immediately established that the tone of this version of One Piece would be darker, with the stakes higher, and I honestly love that. Finally, the overhead scene of all the people rushing out of the square to take to the seas was so breathtaking; it really drove home the impact that this one man and his words had on the world, to the point that his legacy is still going strong twenty years later.

I loved the way we are introduced to Luffy, with this new scene of him rambling to the mail pelican while shoveling water out of his sinking dinghy. It was very Jack Sparrow-esque, which was a nice nod to another defining powerhouse of the pirate adventure genre, but also so Luffy. And I maintained that feeling throughout the show. I mean, even down to the little things, like Luffy smiling every time he was in a fight, him holding onto his hat while fighting to keep it from falling off, him cheering and screaming and crowing with glee—all the little nuances were just so Luffy! I'll probably say it a thousand times throughout this, but every single member of the cast is astounding in their roles and how they embody the characters. Iñaki is no exception; he is Luffy, through and through, even if not exactly the same as the anime/manga Luffy that we all know and love. Also, the CGI effects of his rubber abilities are really cool! I imagine that was so hard to pull off, but they really do a good job of trying to make it as believable as possible.

I will scream from the rooftops about how much I love the treatment of Alvida's character. There was not even one single quip of her being "fat" or "ugly"; everything pertaining to how she is "bad" was geared to her cruelty, and I love that we've broken away from that stereotype in this show. Also, Ilia Isorelýs Paulino slayed as Alvida. She was every ounce of strong, brutal, and callous as canon Alvida, and honestly, she looks gorgeous doing it.

Also, I lived for Koby and Luffy's friendship in this series. Morgan Davies did such a fantastic job portraying Koby and his growth, and his chemistry with Iñaki was just so... yes. Every time they are on screen together, I have the biggest, stupidest smile on my face because you can just see how deep their friendship is despite not knowing each other for very long. Their goodbye scene was so, so, so touching; with the lighting, and the music, and the expression on Koby and Luffy's faces... I got misty-eyed in a way I didn't reading the manga. Given how Koby's friendship with Luffy is such a defining part of his character in the manga, the fact that they evolved it after this initial arc made me incredibly happy. If this show goes on, I'd love to see how they continue to show Koby's growth alongside the Straw Hat's adventures, given the pivotal roles he goes on to play in the narrative.

Another thing I love is the fact that the Straw Hat's backgrounds are shown in pieces throughout the narrative at key moments in the present, such that past and present parallel. It's so good and so much more impactful than just having it shown as one big chunk. Since this is largely Luffy and Shanks' background, I'll focus on it. Peter Gadiot did such a compelling job as Shanks. His portrayal of Shanks carried a tenderness and care for Luffy that just tugged at all my heartstrings. Like, his expression when he realized that Luffy ate the Devil Fruit was just so amazingly haunting... The guilt, the horror, the realization that Luffy's life will never be the same, and there's nothing he can do... Simply spectacular. Also, I will comment again on just how amazing the casting was. Even the background characters, such as Shanks' crew, just shined in their brief moments. Like, even Makino—her minimal reactions with Luffy and Shanks were just so her! She and Shanks really had that "husband and wife" energy, and I lived for it. I also have to give a round of applause to the dialogue in the series. The small changes from the manga/anime defined these portrayals of the characters as distinct from those we've come to love, but in the best way. I was on the FLOOR when little Luffy yelled "Why didn't you get his ass?!" at Shanks because it came out of left field yet was so believable and so Luffy with what we'd been shown so far. Iconic.

I loved the introduction to Zoro's character! It was so him, but also, I was amazed by the inclusion of Baroque Works so early on! His fight with the previous Number 7 was badass, and the fact that, again, the show didn't shy away from on-screen death really highlighted how dangerous this world really is. And it contradicts so well with Nami's introduction, which is so playful, with her jaunty little theme in the background. It's just so One Piece, adrenaline-pumping action and high stakes balanced with lighthearted energy and fun. Then, the bar sequence was just... chef's kiss. I love that the original three came together in the first episode; I was so excited to see what it meant as far as changes to the story and how their dynamic develops. The way they wove in scenes from the manga/anime into this new narrative was so clever; we still got Zoro eating the little girl's rice ball off the ground, establishing how good of a character he is despite seeming so ruthless. But also, can we talk about the choreography of Zoro's fight scene against all those Marines? Just... The fact that he didn't even draw his sword once because he didn't even feel them worthy opponents, the languid nonchalance of his movements when he stepped away from the bar interspersed with his crisp agility in cutting them down, the guy he took out with the cup?! Amazing. Mackenyu read the goddamn assignment. Also, Nami using her wiles to flirt with a Marine, then knocking him out to steal his uniform as soon as he's distracted... Classic Nami. And then Luffy, getting super excited at seeing Zoro fight... while Koby immediately crawls under the table to hide, LOL.

Also, props to Aidan Scott for his portrayal of Helmeppo, like, he perfectly captured the whiny bitch energy. Crawling on his hands and knees away as soon as Zoro gets one hit in on him is classic Helmeppo lmao. I also liked that they didn't shy away from hinting at how terribly Morgan treats him, though I do wish we could have seen a little more of it, if only for the sake of rounding out Helmeppo's character to make his growth throughout the show more impactful (and I will rant and rave about his growth because, my gosh, I love what they did with his character!). I died at the infamous naked sword-practicing scene, but like, it was also so perfect? Like, it just gave even more depth to his character, showing that he does desire to be strong and taken seriously, and how much his mistreatment by his father affects him. The fact that Zoro is the one who gave him his curly-bob haircut sends me, though, just... so hysterical. I screamed.

Langley Kirkwood did a great job at playing Axe-Hand Morgan, too; he totally captured his swagger, self-confidence, and tendency to exaggerate his own accomplishments. I liked that they changed the narrative a bit to where Zoro ended up in the yard because he refused to join Morgan rather than just him beating up Helmeppo; like, it just added such a neat spin to his character, showing that he is devoted to being a bounty hunter simply because he is searching for strong opponents for the pursuit of his dream and nothing else.

I also loved the changes to how Zoro, and Nami, end up joining up with Luffy. My heart swelled when Luffy untied Zoro simply because he wanted him to be able to follow his dream, and that's all, not as a means of pressuring Zoro to join him. Then Nami, sneaking around the Marine Base and stumbling upon Luffy, who almost gets them caught time and time again. It's just so them. I was so overjoyed to see Nami get some action with her Climatact, too! It was so nice to not see her overshadowed by the guys, but right there in the thick of it with them. And, speaking of in the thick of it, the fight with Axe-Hand Morgan was so good! The choreography was amazing, and the music accompanying it just made it that much more heart-pumping. I literally starting pumping my fist and whooping when the bandana and third sword came out, like, iconic Zoro moment brought to life.

Finally, Buggy's introduction at the end was so spot-on. The drama. The excessiveness. The madness. It made me so pumped, alongside seeing that Garp going after Luffy was going to be put at the beginning of the series. Some people didn't like the change, but honestly, it made more sense to me that he would go after Luffy immediately, seeing as he was intent on testing Luffy to see if he was ready to take on the world. It's evident that Garp deeply cares for Luffy, and it just makes sense to me that he wouldn't wait.

Episode 2: The Man in the Straw Hat

Honestly, this is one of my favorite episodes, and all because of Jeff Ward's portrayal of Buggy. It was so amazing. But, I also like the beginning segment showing Zoro, Nami, and Luffy's dynamic. There really is tension among them; they are not a crew yet, and seeing them come together over adversities and genuinely beginning to see each other as a crew and a family just gives me the warm and fuzzies. Because trust isn't just immediately given; it's earned, and it takes time, and seeing them slowly realize how special Luffy is and become compelled and inspired to follow him is so special.

Okay, but onto the main act: Buggy. Buggy. BUGGY! I loved the changes they made to this whole thing, honestly. Setting it in a whole circus tent where the audience is kidnapped town members rather than just... a concrete slab in a ruined town, was so smart. Like, as silly as Buggy is, he is still a menacing pirate, and the way they set up this encounter really reminded us of that. And y'all, I cannot praise enough Jeff Ward's Buggy. So amazing. Like, he's so demented yet pathetic in that Buggy way that it blows my mind, and yet, he still brought his own spin to it by really leaning into the fact that Buggy is the way he is because of his insecurities, to the point that he is totally delusional about what really happened between him and Shanks. Like, the personality switch when he realizes that Luffy knows Shanks, and he full-heartedly believes that Luffy was abandoned by Shanks, too, and is an outcast like him, and offers to have him join his crew, but being so spine-chillingly twisted the whole time is just so, so, so good. Also, again, the CGI for his Devil Fruit abilities was so cool and slick. It captured that perfect balance between horrifying and comical that's so Buggy. Finally, again, I love the changes to the dialogue that came with the show. Buggy's "Surprise, shitheads!" is just so him but still had me rolling because I didn't expect it.

And, in true One Piece fashion, Luffy's perilous plight is countered with the relative light-heartedness of Nami and Zoro escaping to rescue him. Seriously, I love the sass that Mackenyu brings to Zoro. The "Yeah, that does sound like me" was just so perfect.

The water tank scene was... oh my gosh. I will say it again and again throughout my review, but it was so clever and symbolic of them to put the flashbacks in places in the present that parallel each other. I knew it was coming, but the scene where Shanks saves Luffy was just so emotional and raw. Again, Peter Gadiot brings such a softness to Shanks that I love; the tenderness when he hugs Luffy and tells him that he doesn't care about his arm, that he's just glad he's okay, looks like it really comes from the heart. I was in tears at the end of the flashback when Shanks bequeathed his hat to Luffy; it was so emotional, and the choice to have Shanks tell Luffy to "Be good" almost killed me. Because it isn't just him telling him to behave... It's telling him to be a good person, and that's the core of Luffy's character: he's just, he's compassionate, he's truly good in a world so corrupt. Literally, that one small moment took my breath away. Finally, just a small note, but God, did I love the way that they showed Conqueror's Haki! I was interested as to how they were going to do it, and it delivered.

Finally, Iñaki has Luffy's "Don't mess with my friend or I'll kick your ass" glare down pat. When he looked at Buggy, I lost my mind with excitement because I knew shit was about to get real!

Episode 3: Tell No Tales

I really like the title of this episode, too. Not only is it clever because it's Usopp's episode, but it foreshadows the horror movie-esque vibe that Kuro's personage brings to the show by bringing to mind the saying "dead men tell no tales."

I love that the episode starts off with another scene of Luffy, Zoro, and Nami on the boat to show how they are coming together. The banter is different, somehow, with an undercurrent of growing care and trust. Also, of course, I love that they kept the janky Jolly Roger and the details of paint splatter on Luffy's face. It was just a classic cute, funny Straw Hats moment. I also loved all their interactions in the mansion, especially the changing room scene. Like, I love that they kept Luffy's acespec overtones by having him totally not react to Nami asking for opinions on how she looks at all.

I love the changes they brought to Syrup Village! Like, it was so clever to make it a shipwright's town with Usopp having a job in the shipyard, which gives more weight to his abilities as a shipwright and inventor plus the deep bond he develops with the Going Merry. Also, I adore Jacob Romero Gibson's rendition of Usopp! He makes his character so funny, so charming, so lighthearted like the comic-relief Usopp we know, but with some slight changes that really define him as a distinct Usopp. His chemistry with Kaya is so good; I loved the treatment they got in this adaptation. You could truly feel the love and deep bond between them.

Again, the side character casting is amazing. Celeste Loots makes the sweetest, most adorable Kaya. Her look of inspired wonder when Luffy was talking about a pirate's love for their ship and how it's a home was so simple, yet so defining for both her and Luffy's characters. I also loved that she and Nami bonded! It was a clever way to give insight into both of their characters. Alexander Maniatis played such a great Kuro; like, the instant I saw him, I got chills down my spine because he seemed such a prim and proper butler yet had such an edge of malice about him. Also, he nailed the Kuro glasses gesture. Also, Sham and Rika were so well done; they really nailed that whimsical horror vibe going on. Finally, Merry was done well, too! Though I adore him, I was glad that they chose to actually kill him this go-around. First of all, from a medical perspective, it's hard to survive that kind of wound LOL; but also, it again showed just how high the stakes are and how frighteningly ruthless and cold Kuro is.

I was fascinated to see the addition of the Marines to this arc, but honestly, I loved it. The scene of Usopp running through the streets screaming for help was so heartbreaking; Jacob killed it, especially with the expression of disbelief, terror, and desperation on his face as he slowly sat down whispering "Why won't anyone believe me?" Again, so clever to superimpose this with the crux of his backstory, with the reveal that his chronic lying stems from the trauma of his mother's illness and believing that if he just kept up this ritual every day, his father would come home and everything would be right again in the world; sympathy for Usopp hit me more than it ever had. Then, for it to pan to Koby leaning over him earnestly saying, "I believe you," I got chills. Absolutely stupendous way to end the episode.

Episode 4: The Pirates Are Coming

This one is also one of my favorite episodes, for multiple reasons, all pertaining to character development.

The scenes of Zoro in the well will haunt me forever in the best way. It was just such an amazing choice, symbolically, to parallel his scenes of backstory with Kuina with him struggling to get out of this well, a deep, dark hole from which he seemingly cannot escape, just like the deep, dark hole of insecurity he struggled to climb out of with Kuina, and the deep, dark hole of trying to honor Kuina's memory that he struggles with early on. Him slipping each time he is defeated by Kuina or something happens to knock him down... Him climbing higher as his childhood self grows and bonds with Kuina... It was just so artistic, so beautiful, that I still get chills thinking about it. The amazing score that accompanies the scenes also has a lot to do with it. I haven't touched on the score much, but honestly, it's so amazing too. Also, shoutout to the actor who played Kuina's dad. Like, the way he delivered the news of Kuina's death to Zoro was so powerful; him trying to be the stoic sensei, but still crying a tear, and them embracing at the end... My heart hurted.

There is a lot of good Koby growth in this episode as well! This is where we really see him struggle with his sense of "justice" that he gains and grows throughout the anime/manga... Wanting to follow orders, but wanting to follow his heart, but not yet having the courage to stand up to authority, all foiled by Helmeppo, who is jaded by the reality of the Marines and lacks empathy for others secondary to his own self-hatred... It's so good, and a wonderful addition, in my opinion, because I hate that a lot of the growth of the other characters in One Piece happens behind the scenes sometimes.

Again, I love the changes to Usopp in this adaptation, and it peaks with him choosing to stay with Kaya in the mansion. It just gives a glimmer of the Usopp we come to see, the one who refuses to run away when the things he cares about are truly threatened, and drives home the fact that Usopp loves Kaya enough to face certain death for her, despite his cowardly tendencies. Just amazing.

But again, I have to give props to the actors of the Kuro crew, and the whole team behind this sequence. It was so creepy! Like, it had such a maliciousness and element of horror that the anime/manga just couldn't capture. I knew what happened in the end, but I was still on pins and needles the whole time because there was just so much tension! I did laugh at the Zoro and Luffy moment out in the woods, though, referencing Zoro's nonexistent sense of direction. And Zoro's fight with the lackeys was amazingly choreographed, as always, with Mackenyu really nailing Zoro getting enraged when Kuina's sword was stolen.

The ending scenes! What a way to end such a tense episode! I screamed at the UsoKaya kiss; it was so unexpected yet delightful! But also, the Straw Hats' reactions were so them. And then, the bliss and exhilaration as they sailed away on the Going Merry, while notes of "We Are" played in the background. Even the small details hit me, like Zoro finding a place to sleep and sleeping with Kuina's sword, and Luffy and Usopp arguing over who's captain, and all of them laughing together... just really captured the world I love. Then, an amazing cliffhanger with them being attacked by Garp and Luffy dropping the "Grandpa?" bomb. Perfect.

Episode 5: Eat At Baratie!

I was so hype for this episode because Sanji was my first One Piece love, and I was so excited to see the takes on his character and arc. I was not disappointed.

I liked howGarp's relationship with Luffy was given slowly over the course of the series. The flashback of him destroying Luffy's boat and hauling him off, with no regard to his dreams, really hit home because of how much value had been placed on dreams up until then. Garp as a character really started to shine here, with him hurling a cannonball with his bare hand, then laughing when Luffy bested him (because we all know how intertwined laughter is to the One Piece narrative, especially with regards to Luffy). The simple bit of Koby saving Helmeppo's life, too, and the look of bewilderment he gives him that heralds the change in his character and impending growth, was just so good, too! And of course, the interactions of the Straw Hats were great; they are coming together, but they still have a long way to go, and that just makes what follows in the Baratie arc that much more meaningful. They aren't a crew yet, but they will be.

So appropriate that Luffy's nose and gullet leads him to the Baratie. And, oh, I love what they did with this set! It's the most magnificent, in my opinion. I love the addition of a lighthouse, since the Baratie is supposed to be a refuge for hungry sailors of all kinds. I thoroughly enjoyed everything about the crew and how they interacted in the restaurant, too; it had so many good moments of them bonding. However, I have to take a moment to acknowledge Usopp, who just killed it throughout this episode; like, strutting into the restaurant tits-out? "I can't eat anymore, but it's so good?" The fishbowl? The dancing? The blabbing to a complete stranger only for it to turn out to be a legendary badass here for his captain? Iconic behavior. But, seriously, so many good character moments here. Luffy ordering milk like the innocent cutie he is. Zoro struggling to sit in the booth with his swords but refusing to check them. Nami being totally unimpressed with Sanji's flirting. The boys teasing Nami for Sanji's flirting. 10/10. And Zoro and Nami bonding by trying to learn more about one another! The shift in her character really is fantastic; Emily Rudd did a bang-up job of showing that Nami truly is a good person, but is so damaged by her childhood and is scared to get close to anyone because she inevitably hurts them. I loved that she called Zoro her friend while trying to dissuade him from fighting Mihawk, and the switch that happens in her debating on betraying them in secret comes from him rebuking her by throwing her own words back in her face.

Also, speaking of Sanji, I adore Taz Skylar's Sanji with all my heart. Like, first of all, I love that they toned down his flirtatiousness. It's still there, but it is at such a more tolerable level because it isn't overbearing or uncomfortable. Then there is his smile. My God, every time he smiles, my heart sings. Like, he just captured the essence of Sanji that is part dapper gentleman badass, part snarky, foul-mouthed asshole, and part pathetic wet beast of a man. I have fallen in love with Sanji all over again. I also loved his relationship with Zeff. It was so them; bickering incessantly, antagonism belying the genuine love they have for each other. Finally, I adore the relationship he gains with the crew. Like, it is so obvious how much he comes to care about Luffy after them talking about dreams and later while helping Luffy process what it really means to be a captain. Also, it's so badass that he did all his own stunts. Him fighting so screams Sanji! I just cherish this Sanji, I really do.

I knew going in that they condensed this arc, and honestly, I'm pleased with how they did it. I thought it was so clever to introduce Mihawk differently, with him absolutely decimating Don Krieg's crew single-handedly and calling it "Killing time." Also, he's so hot, it's honestly unfair. Again, the amazing casting shines through, because Steven Ward made such a spectacular Mihawk, totally encapsulating that devil-may-care attitude of his and his interest in powerful people. Phenomenal. And to pair this with more Koby growth, with him being appalled by Garp using pirates to do his business and that the World Government has the Warlord system. I had to laugh at Helmeppo's "You don't know shit about how the world works" because it was just a funny line in general, but funnier coming from him, who also doesn't know shit about how the world works in a different way. It was sad not to see Sanji shine in combat against the Don Krieg crew (though I loved the Gin appearance and that he lives this time!), I think it was a smart narrative choice to have this episode center around Mihawk vs. Zoro, given what follows. Speaking of, that fight was amazing. It was a dead ringer to how it goes down into the manga, down to the pose at the end when Zoro points his sword at the sky and vows never to lose again. I also love that Nami didn't flee in secret like she did in the manga; she stayed, and there was that tender moment of her holding Usopp's hand for comfort. I just think it does so well to illustrate how Nami is changing, but also, the sheer power that Luffy holds in making people who have given up all hope believe again. Nami stays because, deep down, she has hope that she can be a part of this crew, that she can have the courage to tell Luffy the truth and have him help her save her home, that she can be free of Arlong, and that is so powerful in a way that is different and new than the way things originally go.

Episode 6: The Chef and The Chore Boy

I love that there is so much weight in this episode on Zoro's injury. It was glossed over in the manga, honestly, but this adaptation goes into how grievous it is and uses that as the crux of Luffy's growth as a captain and how they come together. It's amazing, narrative-wise, enough for me to be content with the large plot changes they made to the Baratie arc.

The Mihawk and Garp interaction is so gold, honestly. It really captures Mihawk's thing about doing whatever he wants despite being a dog of the World Government, and the keen interest he takes in Luffy. Also, again, Garp laughing while losing his shit at the fact that his grandson is out there tearing up the East Blue as a pirate is so awesome.

Sanji's backstory is the only one told as a full, uninterrupted narrative, and the fact that it's different because of the circumstances and the fact that Sanji is telling it to show Luffy, who is obviously doubting himself, what it means to be a captain is again so clever. Again, Sanji is one of my all-time favorite characters, and his backstory was always the most gut-wrenching to me; seeing it come to life was so heartbreakingly beautiful and sad and inspiring. Props to the kid that played him, like, he did a stellar job. The way he attacked Zeff with unhinged rage over his food; the way he slowly unraveled throughout the time on the rock, starting out as determined to survive and having the optimism that only a child can have and slowly transitioning into the terrified little boy he is, curled up and sniffling as the days drag on; the look of shock, guilt, and disbelief when he realizes that Zeff gave him all the food and ate his own leg (especially with knowledge from the manga, knowing the way Sanji grew up and how he has never known any sort of love, so the idea that someone would sacrifice for him, especially as a stranger, just shatters his entire world view)... It's simply spectacular. And comparing that to the present Sanji, who is so full of energy and life and hope for finding the All Blue, is just so impactful.

But, seriously, I love the whole thing of the characters' growth revolving around Zoro and his recovery. I was touched by Nami reading the story of Noland to him (and also excited by another crumb for potential sequel seasons), and Luffy struggling with what to say because he is struggling with himself and his ability to captain.

Again, I really enjoyed how they handled the transition from Baratie to Arlong Park. First of all, I loved that they kept Buggy a part of the narrative. It encapsulates that spirit of One Piece in which events and characters hundreds of chapters back can still return to have profound effects on the narrative. Also, Buggy is just downright hysterical in this show, and I enjoy his presence. The fishmen are so intimidating, and I like how they used the Baratie to set that and Arlong's motivations up. Getting to see Sanji really fight was great, and when he lost his shit because Zeff got hurt... Yes, just yes. Finally, I love that Nami just "betrayed" them in person. The fact that it went down like it did made Luffy emotional intelligence and his belief that Nami isn't just a traitor that much more impactful to me. Emily Rudd did such a good job of showing Nami as someone who is callous on the surface but clearly has that undertone of hesitation and guilt about what she is doing, though she knows she is doing it to save their lives. Also, Sanji being shirtless while saving Luffy? Like, I will take the fanservice, but it was just so funny to me LOL

But the end of the episode was so hopeful! After everything going wrong, Luffy finally finds the words he needs to say because he knows now what it means to be a captain; he needs his crew as much as they need him. And Zoro waking up at that moment, and Luffy being so excited to see him that he crawls all over him and flings his arm around LOL, it's so Luffy. And I loved that we got official acknowledgement of Zoro as his first mate! It was so good! And finally, Sanji and Zeff's goodbye. It was so emotional, Taz's voice breaking as he thanked Zeff for everything and putting up with all his shit over the years... I cried. TT.TT And of course, ending it with the twist that Buggy will lead them to Arlong is just so exciting LOL

Chapter 7: The Girl With The Sawfish Tattoo

I was so ready for this episode because some of the scenes in the Arlong Park arc are still some of my favorites. I'll admit that this is the arc that had a few changes that I wish weren't there, but overall, I still like how it was handled, and it kept the spirit of the manga.

Again, I like how Nami's backstory is interspersed with key moments of the present narrative. The initial scene of childhood innocence with her and Nojiko and Belle-mere, so light and happy, and coming to a jarring end as she snaps to reality in Arlong Park... Perfect. Also, I thought it was cool that they turned Arlong Park into an amusement park; it's a clever nod to Arlong's twisted notion of making the world a "paradise" for fishmen. Again, I have to commend the casting. Arlong is so savage in this. He practically radiates bloodlust, and it's so good, even though I know what happens, I was worrying for Nami the whole time because he could so easily turn on her on a whim. Then, pairing the conflict of Nami having to go collect money from her village with the conflict with Belle-mere, her hating that she's poor and weaponizing the fact that they aren't a "real" family, as a frustrated child would... So clever. I will admit that this is where the changes that I don't like come in. I really don't like that they made it to where the town had no clue about the fact that she was trying to buy back the village the whole time, and they pretended not to know to try and keep Nami safe. Like, they kept the idea that Nami felt sh deserved to be hated because she felt guilty for not cherishing Belle-mere as she should have and somehow responsible for what happened to the town, but still, what was special about Nami's arc is that she believed that she hurt everyone around her and that she didn't deserve to be loved, but she had been loved the whole time, and this show completely abolished that. In the same vein, I hated the cuts they made to Genzo's character. Belle-mere was her mother figure, and Genzo was her father figure, and that was largely unseen here. They had the nods to the pinwheels (it was cute that they used the tangerine skills), but, again, I felt it was a disservice to Nami's story and character to make changes like this, and I honestly don't know why they felt the need to do it at all, aside from maybe driving home the fact that Nami felt she deserved to be hated and so let the village hate her.

Again, very interesting how they wove in the Marines here. I honestly loved the dinner with Garp and Zeff; them talking about the old days, and Zeff hinting at the times changing and the upcoming generation that becomes a crux to the overall One Piece narrative, is so good. Also, love the Helmeppo and Koby bonding. Their friendship has become so important to me.

But, seriously, props to Iñaki, and the scriptwriters, for just perfectly capturing Luffy's emotional intelligence. Because Nojiko has no idea that Nami is trying to buy back the town, the cast is left believing that Nami genuinely betrayed them, but Luffy just refuses to abandon his gut feeling that there is something more, and he won't stop until he hears it directly from Nami, whom he knows is not being honest with him. Though I don't like the changes to the story, I do like the scene of Nami and Nojiko's reconciliation. It's very heartfelt and heartbreaking, especially when followed by Nezumi arriving to take Nami's money away; everything finally seems to be going right for Nami, and then it all falls apart. I loved the cinematography of her running through the tangerine fields; it truly captured the desperation, all the way up until her falling to her knees at the sight of her village being razed to the ground. Emily Rudd and Iñaki truly nailed the next sequence, which is my favorite in all the manga; Nami's screaming with rage as she stabs her tattoo, Luffy standing there, waiting for the ask for help that he instinctively knows will come, Nami turning around and whispering a broken "Help me," and then, in a perfect parallel to the manga panel, the rest of the crew, despite still not knowing the full context, all immediately being there for her... It will live in my head rent-free until I die.

Chapter 8: The Worst in the East

A good conclusion to the masterpiece that is the adaptation, but again, I am starving for more. Despite my problems with the changes in the previous episode, I thought the condensation in this episode was pretty all right.

The battle of Arlong Park was much shorter, obviously, but I still enjoyed it a lot! I like that they kept Usopp's first solo fight, and all-in-all, it lined up well with the manga. I am, however, so deeply disappointed at the omission of Usopp Hammer and Rubber Band of Doom. Like, I remember the first time I watched this episode of the anime in dub, and I had to pause it for five minutes because hearing Usopp trill "Rubber Band of Dooooooooom!" had me in hysterics, on the floor, laughing until I cried. They kept him pretending to be dead with hot sauce "blood," but not that? How could they do my boy like that? I did laugh at the whole, "I did it! ... Aaaaaaaaaand there was no one there to see it." That aside, the Zoro and Sanji team-up fight was awesome. The ZoSan banter really begins, and it was gratifying to really get to see Sanji shine in a fight since he didn't get to in the Baratie arc as much, as well as Zoro clutching at his wound throughout the fight! Also, I love that the singular "fuck" in the show went to Zoro, and it was directed at Buggy, "that fuckin' clown." Like, so iconic, so perfect, 100/10 moment right there. And, of course, Luffy's fight with Arlong. The teeth-shedding thing was so horrifying and gross, but again drove home the savagery behind Arlong's character. Obviously, they made some alterations to the fight because it would be hard to replicate in live action, but I was more concerned with them keeping the core of the fight: Luffy bringing down Arlong Park because it was all built upon Nami's pain and sacrifice, and that was rendered beautifully. I loved the shot of Arlong Park collapsing. It was so devastating and destructive in a way the anime wasn't, so the horror of the crew looking on as it came crumbling to the ground, wondering if Luffy was okay, and Luffy emerging from the rubble to validate Nami as their friend and a member of their crew gave me goosebumps.

Of course, it won't be a Straw Hat story without a party. I love that they used it as a way to tie the loose ends of the story together. Koby not only reaches the crux of his character arc by finally standing up to Garp and what he believes in, but Helmeppo begins to, too, but joining him, really cementing their friendship. We finally get to the meat of the tension between Garp and Luffy, and I loved the scene where Luffy grins and laughs, and Garp sees Roger in his head. It's a recurring theme in the manga/anime, and to see it here was gratifying. Also, the fact that Luffy got totally bodied by Garp was a good reminder that Luffy still has a long way to go; he will encounter stronger and stronger enemies henceforth, but will face them with a smile and unshakeable confidence and determination.

I loved the ending. I cried tears of joy at Koby bringing Luffy his wanted poster and them hugging and saying their true goodbyes... Luffy telling Koby to be a good marine, and Koby telling Luffy to be a good pirate. It was just so satisfying, so powerful, so solidifying of the friendship that will persist throughout the manga. Then, of course, it was exciting to see all the little scenes with the poster: Makino reading it, Kayagushing over Usopp in the backgriund, Zeff hanging it on the "Employee of the Month" board, Buggy seeing it and voicing that he'll kill Luffy and Alvida chiming in, hinting their team-up... And of course, the scene where Mihawk brings it to Shanks and they all celebrate. So nostalgic, but also so dripping with the overtone that the adventure doesn't end here; that the Straw Hats are only beginning. And that's paralleled by Koby and Helmeppo, too, beginning their training under Garp. And all of it topped off with the crew sailing forth on the Going Merry, with their sail unfurling to reveal the Jolly Roger, them making their vows on the barrel with it flashing back to their childhood selves... I truly felt like I had been a part of something special and was setting out on a new journey with the Straw Hats, and I can't wait to see where they're taken next, even if that never makes it to the screen.

[givemethepage]

Layers of Fear 2023 Initial Playthrough Impressions, Part 1.

[SUPER LONG POST AHEAD, LIKELY FULL OF SPOILY BITS] (All my posts in this blog probably will be.)

Obviously I love it and my obsession with this world has been reignited, burning twice as hot as it did the first time around. So far I've played through Painter's Story 3 times, Daughter's Story twice, and I'm about to start the Musician's Story. Meanwhile in story mode, the Writer is about to sit down and begin writing the Actor's Story after a harrowing return to the lighthouse during which she's made an attempt to reject her earlier pact with the Rat Queen. I know. I tend to do things in weird sequences. I just want to see everything there is to see before I finish.

I love love love the additions and changes to the first game and its DLC, insofar far as I can remember the details of the original. The completionist in me is sad I can't find the Dust Mice sketch or whatever is meant to be behind the pipe on the secretary near the front door, and there may perhaps could possibly might be another whisper object that goes on the upstairs table.

But THAT'S not important. What's important is the story and the creation of the story! This new ending seems like it's missing a cutscene, but I really like that before you walk out the door, you're still surrounded by messages of failure. The intrusive thoughts don't disappear just because you've opened a path to healing. I'm not sure if I liked seeing what was beyond the front door, or maybe I just wasn't pleased with what they chose to put there, especially given what I did after I turned the game off.

For the first time in however many playthroughs since the original game came out, I stopped to examine the origins of the house's design. I came across Steep Park House/Potter's Manor. So many urban explorers have documented and photographed this mansion. Must remind myself to make a full post about it! This place seems to be just one of the inspirations for the couple's house, but an important one, given not just how close the architecture of the house's common areas are mirrored (literally) by the Painter's mansion, but also how many of the basic narrative details of LoF are shared with the former owners of Steep Park House, i.e. the painter who abandoned his home after the death of his wife, leaving behind many portraits of her, himself, unknown subjects, still life, etc., along with countless notebooks, letters, publications, and other possessions that provide clues to the lives they led. Seriously that's all actual circumstance from the real life house. I really want to ask the designers about it since all I can find right now is Reddit speculation about whether it's even the right house. But even green tinge of the wife's diary pages and the font on some of the mail can be found in the photographs of Steep Park. It HAS to have been instrumental in dreaming up the very concept of Layers of Fear. At least I choose to believe it is.

Gonna save the full spread for a Steep Park/Potter's Manor post.

Back to the game, though, the growth of the Rat Queen's role for the 2023 version doesn't sully the universality of the game's allegory like I was worried it might based on some Steam reviews. She remains a symbol of the despair that accompanies memories of trauma, and explicitly making a pact with her seems to me to be a commitment to using that despair as a wellspring for creativity, at the expense of any ability to see truth. The despair will only further twist your memories and warp your perspective. We see all 3 members of the family fall prey to the subjectivity of their memory, even moreso in this version with the addition of voiceovers and I think a few more notes(?). And choice still carries just as much weight in the new game, even with a supernatural force pulling strings from behind the curtain. One heartbreaking thing the Rat Queen has said this time around was that the Daughter was "mine from the moment of her birth." Wow. I went straight for the True Ending, so that statement did turn out to be true for me, but what of the Forgiveness and Resentment endings? Do those also necessarily reflect a Daughter trapped in the Rat Queen's grasp? Are these messages from the Rat Queen, (which I presume are spoken to the Writer,) set in stone? Are they reliable? Are they true? So many implications. One of which is:

What will happen to the Writer??

Will she have multiple endings like the others? Will she be able to break her pact with the Rat Queen? And will that depend upon the outcomes of the other stories along with which collectibles I found during her scenes in the lighthouse? That might be a problem because I am just scooping up everything and devouring every bit of lore my cursor passes across.

Other questions:

Have any works of art been added to/subtracted from the family's portion of the game? I want to do a symbolic analysis of all the real works within the context of the timing of each painting's appearance during gameplay. I know that's a huge task with what, 38 works? But that's a future post and it's why I made a whole separate blog for this in the first place. To be honest I'm shocked that I haven't found anything like this online in the 7 years since the original Layers of Fear when there are a million channels dedicated just to deconstructing the lore of one Zelda game, (which I also love.)

Are there any easter eggs in the family's stories? It's been fun to read real critiques of the first game planted all over the lighthouse, but I wonder if anything like the lemons or the ouija board event are going to pop up in this.

Is the Musician more culpable than I thought? I also went back and did the Dad ending in Inheritance and I don't remember Mom being quite as paranoid or short tempered. It made me see her writings in a new light, and it makes me excited to go through her new story a few times. I must see everythinnnnnnnnngggggggggg.

What does the writer mean by "bring him back" in Chapter 3? Did her son die? Did they have a falling out? Does she believe the Rat Queen or her agency has the power to fix this? Do they?

And then ultimately, is the Rat Queen an invention of the writer? Is her fascination with these stories and the mysteries behind them only leading to flawed adaptations tainted with themes of insanity because she has projected the insecurities of her own fragile mind into the events she's depicting in her books? (Nah)

I dunno I dunno I dunno I dunno I dunno

[batbeato]

thoughts on witch's heart so far?

I'm partway through Bonus Stage right now, not entirely done with the released content yet. I'm going through the Wilardo section at the moment. So this will have spoilers for all of Witch's Heart that I've consumed.

Anyway with that caveat given. WH is interesting because we have the yume nikki inspired (?) dream logic fucked up surreal demon requests and fantasy scenery mixed with the horror (fantasy) elements. It does and doesn't work, because the requests are very charming, but their tone is very different from main story sections that mix cutesy or surreal imagery with horror (or at least, some sort of violence).

For example, a lot of the sections with Lime in the main story have a sweets or wonderland theme, but also often the lingering threat of violence. But even if some violence is present in the requests (those evil eyeball mazes, monsters wanting to burn shit, etc.), since there's often no human dialogue/reaction, you mostly are left with just surrealism.

Both sections of the game are good, but I feel like maybe more work was needed to blend them together, and also for them to make sense in-game a bit more? I do like that the reason more and more demons appear over time is because of Noel's time loops, though. It's a nice touch.

Something I liked a lot about the base game is that you're told most of what you actually need to know there, excepting specific details and some confirmations. Ashe wants the Heart because of his family, who is probably dead. Wilardo wants it because he's immortal. Noel is Patricia, which was obvious from the start (for me) but is also confirmed.

Unfortunately Bonus Stage is making me sit through extended backstory sequences. Sirius' is nice enough, and cute, but it... doesn't really add much. I guess it answers some questions if people really wanted to know more details about that era? I'm on Wilardo's now, and it feels the same way. I don't feel like the fact that his grandfather betrayed him (haven't seen it yet, but it's obvious) and needing to watch this entire extended sequence about his life with his adopted grandfather and how he became immortal/cursed is important. Even the backstory sequences for the demons didn't bother to really flesh out characters besides the demons, or give them sprites, excepting if they were relevant to the main story (like Claire's mom).

Meanwhile, every single flashback about Noel/Patricia is incredibly relevant and interesting and adds more to the character. I am definitely not at all biased in any way.

Another issue is that Noel-Sirius-Claire are so tied up in the big Dorothy/demons narrative, whereas Wilardo and Ashe... aren't. Wilardo had a chance to be, given that he's after the Heart due to a curse, but as far as I can tell it's not really going that way. Not sure if Ashe will go that way either: it doesn't seem like he has a personal vendetta against witches or demons, just that he really wants the Heart and will do anything for it, including kill witches.

This means that Noel-Sirius-Claire backstory is tied to the bigger picture in a way that Ashe and Wilardo aren't, which lends itself towards me sidelining them in my thoughts about the story. Which... is a problem, given that Ashe/Wilardo are the primary reason that Claire keeps dying, which perpetuates the time loop. Yes, their own individual reasons/traumas are definitely deep and worthy of being such powerful motivators for murder, but it does detract from things when they come off as total outsiders compared to Noel-Sirius-Claire. We're supposed to believe that Noel is just genuinely so kind and sees so much good in these strangers that he can never bring himself to kill them, or at least that it's motivated more by him caring for them as people than by fears of being like his father? We're supposed to believe that Sirius, who is shown to be capable of killing if completely thrown off/terrified, wouldn't be able to protect Claire in even one time loop from Ashe/Wilardo, who are strangers that he mistrusts? There is no time loop where, after killing Ashe, Sirius grabs Claire and locks them up in his study, or uses the secret room in Noel's room that he is shown to know about to protect Claire?

If Ashe/Wilardo had some personal history with the others, there might be a way to better make sense of how the time loop can go on in perpetuity (almost 10,000 times!!) and also to unite the cast more, instead of breaking the human characters up into insiders relevant to the mansion/Dorothy/demons and outsiders who want the Heart.

Then again, this might be my biases coming from stories like Umineko where all the characters are deeply entwined with each other. There are others ways besides giving everyone these past connections to fix this issue, I'm sure. For one, I really like the present moments that Bonus Stage has that explore Ashe/Wilardo's characters and backstories, like Ashe taking care of Noel but being reminded of his little sister, or Wilardo sort of trying to warn Claire about himself. Those are a lot more enjoyable for me than seeing their backstories relayed to me 1:1 by the demons.

Speaking of the demons: they're one of my favorite parts of Witch's Heart. I really love the concepts of born demons (which I really hope will be explored more, not betting on it though) and Haters who are humans that become demons and must relive their deaths/trauma every day in order to continue being demons/hating humans. I love how the demons act very playful but in the end they're happiest when people are suffering because that contrast is my bread and butter. I love the overall theme of how witches are humans who are made out as scapegoats and punished arbitrarily, which creates demons/monsters and a cycle of abuse.

I also love Noel. He is transmasc (to me) and I love a man who is just like his mothers and experiences sexual abuse from his father. The amount of appeal he has for me specifically is too high.

Overall Witch's Heart plays with some interesting stuff but honestly for me it just has the most incredible vibes/me-specific appeal and can coast by on this energy alone regardless of some gameplay-story mismatch, some plot holes or at least unexplained contradictions, and the fact that Ashe and Wilardo do not fit into the rest of the game very well for me. Ashe has Nagito energy though. Good for him.

[applejuiceyjuice-art]

copacabana: parasocialite style

hi. the setting and story is kinda inspired by depression era films, though the copacabana started after the code. the song is about a showgirl and a bartender, but what if it was like this…

showgirl - twitch | bartender - yt | line cook - kik

kik admires from afar because she's always hidden in the kitchen and working in a kitchen sucks. she takes a smoke break whenever twitch is on stage and is able to watch through an open door from outside. he also frequents the bar so has some kinda acquaintance with yt and has proximity to twitch aside from watching on stage ig.

kik is a writer bc its the obvious hobby imo. here she writes little notes and leaves them in twitch's dressing room as a way to express herself without actually being outted (i was also thinking this is similar to sending twitch sub messages).

twitch goes to the bar whenever its empty enough to have a drink and talk to yt. of all the people he knows in the nightclub, yt is the only person he thinks could be leaving the notes. so she thinks of him as a sensitive guy who puts up a front.

one night she brings up the notes, and youtube is like. what notes. he thinks the idea of leaving notes is creepy and suggests that twitch might have a stalker, which she didn't consider before. after asking around, twitch concludes that nobody they know is leaving the notes, so it must be the case...

youtube confides in kik at the bar about the situation, talking about how a totally creepy stalker guy is following twitch and leaving weird notes in her dressing room every day!!! he says that he's been watching the patrons, suspecting one of the mob guys to be the culprit and is like "let me know if you got any leads, right buddy."

kik gets self conscious and depressed about it. when the notes stop coming in, twitch is relieved at the prospect of the stalker disappearing, but still misses them bc she thought it was cute :(. yt isn't exactly what they thought he would be. meanwhile, kik begins writing a full on confession, but keeps rewriting it and mulling over it because he really doesn't want it to come off as any more creepy.

that part of the song where rico shows up... idk who it would be, i mean if anything i guess it could be a company like the filmscore one. worldstar or limewire maybe haha. there's probably other mafia members around them. youtube tries to save twitch, but gets scared and hesitates. kik dives in and fights, gets shot.

twitch finds the confession or is given it, maybe kik actually says something to them before dying. maybe they should’ve interacted before this point too idk this isnt a movie pitch. anyway things don't work out between twitch + yt either, and she just forever wonders about kik.

at the same time i really like the idea of kik using a second hand suit to try to pretend they're rich w/ twitch (who is also working class, hence why shes “trying to be a star”). maybe it can be a dream sequence after kik dies. to drive home the doomed yaouri LOL. ok im done here.

[havendance]

I was going to do a whole comics roundup post since I finally went out to the comics store, but I'm lazy and I really don't actually have that many opinions on this weeks birds of prey anyway. (I like the old artist better. I think this week's artist was doing some neat things and was nicely dynamic, but also I don't like the way that they draw faces and I miss how solid all the characters were when Romero drew them. The moments between Sin and Dinah were nice. Still figuring out how I feel about mageara.)

So what this post is really about is the comic I polled out of the dollar bin which I have much more opinions on!

Vertigo: Winter's Edge #1

This is the Vertigo holiday special which, while a little late to be truly seasonal (and also contains no santa appearences), I thought I'd do a write up on anyway.

This is a solid 96 pages of Vertigo stories and you can tell! Compared to the superhero side of DC/more modern holiday specials, this is much denser and well, filled with the funky little strange stories that DC created Vertigo to tell. There's no christmas carol retellings here! Just about every story here is filled with verbose, introspective monologues (at least that's what it felt like).

(Also, I have no idea who half these people are.)

The framing story here is that a bunch of Rain's (the girl who lives in the house of secrets I believe) friends show up for the holidays and she goes up to a room in the house to find a gift, finding a room with a man who shows her a bunch of paintings which connect to our stories.

The Flowers of Romance -- a Sandman story, featuring a horny satyr who is dying alongside the rest of his island from being forgotten or whatever. Desire shows up and uses their powers to have it so a young couple comes to the island on the night before Christmas eve so that the satyr can have one last night of pleasure before he dies.

I'd actually read this one before as it was collected in one of my Sandman Omnibuses. Honestly I thought it was one of the weaker stories in this (though far from the worse *sideyes the Invisibles story*). It just felt like it could use something more. It feels like Gaiman cut out down story that could've been an entire issue and it suffered for it. (Also the story itself is kind of eh to me. I don't really have sympathy for the dying horny satyr.)

Mazel Tov, Leo -- A story for some comic called The Minx which I have not heard of. Tom, boyfriend of the Minx, goes to meet her family (who's jewish) for the holidays.

I can't say I recommend this one if you (like me) have no idea what's going on in The Minx because I certainly felt lost.

Spirit of the Season -- A Wesley Dodds Sandman mystery! This was one was really good. Wesley goes to a synagogue to remember his dead mother for the holidays and stops some young hooligans from robbing the place.

Deck the Halls -- A story for the dreaming. The closest thing to light hearted we really get in this. Able is really into celebrating christmas and Cain is not. And since this is about them, while no actual murder happens during the story, it's certainly alluded to and implied!

Tell Me -- Our Hellblazer story. Constantine takes a break from spending the holidays with his current girlfriend's family to visit a bar, where the man sitting next to him tells the story of couple. The man disappears after telling it and it turns out he was actually the ghost of the man from the story (he'd died at the end.) Constantine passes on a message to his widow who just walked through the door.

I also recommend this one. It was touching.

Piss on Earth -- The holiday story for a comic called Nevada which I had never heard of before. This one features a irreverant, las-vegas themed nativity story retelling dream sequence.

It was much more approachable if you haven't read the comic than the Minx one. It also did fun stuff with the panel layouts during the dream sequence.

Thanks for Nothing -- A Books of Magic story. This one's a little matchgirl inspired only instead of selling matches our girl is selling acid (or maybe not). Also her father might be winter and he can only visit his kids while they're about to freeze to death? Anyway, I did enjoy his one, but also there's quite a few things that are ambigous about it. But that's what makes it Vertigo.

And We're All Police Men -- I am not even going to try to explain what happens in here because I have no idea. This is by Grant Morrison for The Invisibles and this story in no way motivates me to go check it out. It feels like Morrison is just stringing words and phrases together and occasionally they're even ones that make a coherent sentence. I started reading their Animal Man comics and those told a compelling story. This was not that.

Look, here's a sample:

(I'm sorry, I'm not going to transcribe this, but the whole story goes on like this for 8 whole tedious pages) Worst story of the bunch imo hands down.

[coolcattime]

3, 20, 22, 24!

Quick warning, this is probably gonna turn into a ramble about my hyperfixations! Question 22 is under the read more section and will contain spoilers for Telltale's The Walking Dead. Question 24 will also be under the read more, because I want to post some pictures with and and also this post is getting a little long 😅

3. 1-3 games you’ve played in the past 12 months that you really enjoyed

First! Your Turn to Die: Death Game By Majority. January 2022, my best friend came to my room and told me that we were going to play this together, a game at the time I had heard of but didn't really think was my thing, and I'm so glad they did because my god do I love this game so much. It's a horror adventure game where you play as Sara Chidouin who, alongside her best friend Joe and 9 strangers, finds herself in a death game where they will all be voting for who will die. I highly, highly reccomend this game if you find the concept interesting at all, especially because it's free. There's a Steam release coming soon (which I think is coming along with the last part of the game), but right now you can download and play for free or even play it in browser.

Second! The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles! I finally branched out from just the original Ace Attorney trilogy and I'm enjoying it! I'm currently on the 5th case of the 1st game and genuinely I missed playing Ace Attorney. Ryunosuke very quickly became another favourite messy... I would say lawyer but he isn't a lawyer for the first three cases so he became that slowly. But jokes aside, I love all the characters and also it was really fun to (by coincidence) read the Sherlock Holmes The Adventure of the Speckled Band a few days after playing the case inspired by it and retroactively realising they joke about the solution of the book in the game.

And third! The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me! I love The Dark Pictures games and this one has my favourite type of character in it: mean lebsian! So clearly it's a 10/10 best game!

20. A boss you think is really cool

I don't play a lot of games with boss fights but I really like the Mr. Freeze boss fight from Batman: Arkham City! I think the concept of a boss literally adapting to what you do so it won't work on them anymore is awesome, even if it wouldn't work outside of the more stealth focused boss like this one. I don't actually remember if I've ever played this boss fight (gonna be honestly, I cannot remember the sequence of events in Arkham City, other than the Catwoman sections), but I have a distinct memory of watching my dad play this fight. He tried to do the same thing twice, and when it didn't work was genuinely shocked because he didn't think the game meant it. And honestly that memory stuck in my head.

22. A game ending that’s really stuck with you

So I thought about this for a little while, because there's a couple of different game endings that I think about a lot but there's only one ending that legitimately made me nervous to replay a play with my bff and that is Telltale's The Walking Dead Season 2. It made me turn Jane from a character that was kind of okay to one of, if not my most hated character from a video game; and god was I really scared to play season two with my friend for fear of them really loving Jane (note: they did not, they also do not like Jane).

To give a little context: I played Episode 5 when it went live, like 11pm at night, achievements still not unlockable. And I was excited. By the time of the finale of the episode, I had already cried once (damn beautiful Lee dream sequence) and was not ready for the baby to be dead. I was not ready for the fight between Kenny and Jane and like, gonna be fully honestly, the first time I played I shot Kenny. I shot my 4th favourite character from the series and cried and had a tearful goodbye. And then the baby started crying.

I think this is the biggest betrayal I'd ever felt in a video game. Like to this day, I really can't gel with the idea of leaving a baby in a car in a snowstorm in a zombie apocolaypse to prove a point. I think it's genuinely very messed up and could never really fathom the idea of staying with Jane after that.

I played through the Alone with AJ ending, though I liked both the Kenny endings a lot more and ended up getting an ending with him when I did my replay for achievements.

Being fully honest, I think this ending stuck with me not just because it made me just so angry with a fictional character but because it seems to come so out of nowhere for it to be Jane. Like I fully expected an ending fight with Kenny and Luke, but then it just isn't.

24. A game with a cool art style

Firstly! Darkest Dungeon! The first one, though I do also think the second one looks really cool, I just personally prefer 2d artstyles. I think this game is beautiful and frankly just looks how a game about gothic and cosmic horror should.

And second! Your Turn to Die (again). I think it has a kind of rough start art wise (like there is some very ugly pixel art in the first half an hour), but once it gets going, it kind of feels like playing a manga. Like there's some screens I would love to show, but they are definitely spoilers and, as much as I really want to make a full post just rambling about this game, I don't really wanna spoil the game when I don't have to. ((Also all my saves for this game are on my friend's laptop and I'm not playing a couple hours for one screenshot))

[libraryofjoy]

January 2023 Books read

For 2023 I'm trying a pretty achievable challenge to read at least 12 fiction books and 12 nonfiction books, ideally at least one each per month. I'm not counting books I had to read for school, and most of the books are going to be audiobooks I listen to during my commute. I also just want to pay attention to how much I'm reading and which books I tend toward.

Zephyr by Joan He. My first book this year was a Y/A Chinese historically-inspired fantasy novel. I read a lot of fan-translated Chinese webnovels so it was interesting to compare similarities and differences between this book and those. It's focused on immortals/gods--I think it could be classified as Xuanhuan. I noticed a lot more names were translated into English or changed to terms that wouldn't be as confusing for an American reader. The main character is so clever and mischievous and stubborn--she was really memorable! I really enjoyed this book but it didn't really feel like a whole book. I'd definitely want to read a sequel to get the rest of the story.

Little Weirds by Jenny Slate. I've seen this book quoted all over Tumblr, and it lived up to the out-of-context quotations. I think this toes the line between creative nonfiction and poetry--there are lots of colorful scenes and dream sequences that seem really inventive. So much love and loneliness in this book. I'm going to count it in my nonfiction tally because I think I'm going to naturally skew toward fiction.

Daughter of the Moon Goddess and then also Heart of the Sun Warrior by Sue Lynn Tan. These books also are Western-published Chinese-inspired fantasy about immortals/gods. This duology felt like a mid-rated Chinese drama (which is to say, a really good time, those are my favorites!) I really enjoyed the main character's journey, but the love triangle got really frustrating really quickly. If you like to see characters in terrible dilemmas again and again and again, this is a good pick!

Gender Trouble by Judith Butler. This one actually was school-adjacent: I listened to the audiobook the week my Research Methods class highlighted their work on feminist and queer theory. But it wasn't an assigned reading, so I will be counting it! Gender Trouble delves into the traditional feminist view of gender essentialism, and offers an alternative view of gender as performative. This book was incredibly dense and kind of assumes its reader is coming to it with some context, but I thought it was really interesting!

Fiction: 3

Nonfiction: 2

Total book count: 5

[isleofair]

This time, OP did say in the tag we could just reblog and answer all the questions, sooo...

1. What’s something new that you tried in a fic this year? How did it turn out and would you do it again?

I actually tried many new things! Chapters, POV changes, E-rated scenes... I think they all turned out at least okay, and I would definitely do at least 2 out of 3 again (I'm not committing to more smut, but I'm not ruling it out, lol).

2. How many fics did you work on this year? (They don’t have to be finished or published!)

I guess... 15? There were two I tried writing for the challenge but ended up substituting with other stories because I wasn't sold on them. (One of them is probably getting another try at some point, though.)

3. What’s something you learned about yourself as a writer?

That I can write more than I thought, faster than I thought, and a bit spicier than I thought. 😅

(And also that I have developed a problem with run-on sentences and I really need to do something about it. 🤦)

4. What piece of media inspired you the most?

Well, if this means what I wrote about, obviously Tiger & Bunny. But if it means additional/external inspiration, then I think it's a song: Two, by Sleeping At Last, which unlocked the mood for the whole central section of Intertidal, and one of its main themes.

5. What fandom(s) did you write for this year?

Only Tiger & Bunny.

6. What ship(s) captured your heart?

It's still FireSky all the time, all the way. ❤️💜

7. What character(s) captured your heart?

Nathan and Keith already had it and held it even closer; Kotetsu, Barnaby, Antonio and Ivan also had a couple of moments each in which I really wanted to hold them. 🥺

8. Did you write for a new fandom or ship this year?

Mh. Does making the background Taibani actually visibly romantic count? 🤔

9. What fic meant the most to you to write?

Intertidal was my love song to FireSky as a relationship; Second Song was my love song to Nathan and Keith individually, and I poured a lot of my heart into both of them.

10. What fic made you feel the happiest to work on?

Intertidal had me incredibly excited, but I think I might have been even happier to write Three-Step Turn, because it was a gift. 🥹

11. What fic was the most satisfying to finish writing?

Here, Intertidal definitely wins on its own. I spent a whole half of my summer vacation working on finishing it, and the feeling when I finally posted it was amazing (and not just because I was running a fever, I swear 😅).

12. What fic was the most difficult to write? Did you finish it?

To a Steadfast Heart and Gravity were both pretty difficult; they're angsty, and they have a delicate balance about certain issues, both in the way they're handled inside the story, and in the one I had to choose to present them in my writing. But I finished them!

13. What fic was the easiest to write?

Snowdrift is small and soft, and flowed easily; Three-Step Turn was also relatively smooth sailing, considering how long it is and how long it took me to write it.

14. What were your shortest and longest fics this year?

Snowdrift is 3,050 words and Intertidal is 28,828.

15. Rec a fic you wrote or posted in 2023

OMG. Okay. Okay. *deep breath*

Intertidal (28,828 words, rated E): Nathan and Keith have an accident that leaves them unable to use their powers, and they don't know when, or even if, they'll be able to be heroes again. Nathan's choice of coping mechanism is to take Keith (and his dogs) on a vacation to a secluded tropical beach.

This fic has so many things I love in it: deep emotions, fierce protectiveness, soft familiarity, (half-)naked beach shenanigans, meaningful dream sequences, moonlit flying lessons, and an exploration of how you need to recognize your own worth, along with that of the person you love, in order to allow for a true, full connection with them. 💞💞

16. What were you go-to writing songs?

This is where I share the Playlist for my 2023 Year of the OTP challenge again 😊💚

17. What were your go-to writing snacks?

Tea, Earl Grey, hot (with a dash of lemon juice and brown sugar).

18. What was the hardest fic to title?

Mh. An Honest Mistake gave me trouble, and is probably still the title I'm the least satisfied with.

19. Share your favorite opening line

Looking at them all together now, I think it's the one from Unscripted:

The whole thing starts, appropriately enough, with a wish.

20. Share your favorite ending line

There was some competition, but in the end (ha!) it's probably the one from An Honest Mistake:

John and Johnjohn let out two loud, celebratory barks; a flock of birds, startled, takes off from a nearby tree, and the mad flutter of their wings resonates under Keith's ribs, echoed by his heart as it thrums with perfect, feather-light joy.

21. Share your favorite piece of dialogue

I'm really fond of this line from Second Song:

"I remember loving you in both of my yesterdays."

22. Share an excerpt from your favorite scene

Mh. I think my favorite scene is the one on the hill in Intertidal, so...

"It's probably because I don't make air. I just move it." Keith thumbed his chin pensively, looking for the right words. "It's like... The floating part is the base of it, the canvas where all the colors go. You can paint without the canvas, but it's not as intuitive, so that's the first thing you end up reaching for." Nathan found herself smiling softly down at him. "Like you were made to fly, and the fighting is just an afterthought." Keith frowned, stepping closer until he was looking up at her with his head tilted back, like he had to do when she was in her highest heels. "Do you think you were made to fight?" he asked, serious and sad-eyed. She gave a small shrug, careful to remain nonchalant. "Fire is pretty destructive, as far as powers go." The tiny movement of her shoulders had somehow traveled down her whole body; she felt the ground slip away from under her soles, and wobbled slightly in mid-air, trying to compensate. Keith's hands wrapped around hers, tugging her gently back down to earth. "I don't see it that way," he said quietly, but when she gave him a questioning look, he didn't elaborate.

23. Share the final version of a sentence or paragraph you struggled with. What about it was challenging? Are you happy with how it turned out?

Ooo, boy. Let's pick this one, out of many (from Intertidal):

Because it was unnecessary; because Nathan didn't really bother to cover up the way other women would, because her body didn't have to play by those rules, and she had learned to find relish in that, instead of regret.

I'm still not 100% satisfied with that "other women", but finding a way to express this concept (of her not dressing or acting like she has a typically feminine body, essentially) somewhat elegantly and respectfully, from inside Nathan's own head, when she refers to herself as a woman, but is not just simply that, and has a history of dysphoria, was not very easy.

24. What's something that surprised you while you were working on a fic? Did it change the story?

It was Keith essentially asking for his own chapter, and then slapping me (politely, of course) in the face with the true theme of the story in the middle of it in Gravity. And it did change the story quite a bit; not only did it make it twice as long, but it also made me decide to add the E-rated scene I had initially been adamant about not putting in there.

25. What did you use to write? (e.g. writing programs, paper & pen, etc.)

Google docs, mostly on my laptop, sometimes on my phone.

26. If you had to choose one, what was THE most satisfying writing moment of your year?

Probably finishing and posting Intertidal.

27. Did you do anything special to celebrate finishing a fic?

I think I got myself pizza once or twice?

28. How did you recharge between fics?

By re-reading my previous fics and the comments I got on them, playing Pokémon, and sleeping.

29. If this were an awards show, who would you thank?

@nicoroni, first and foremost: I honestly do not know if I would have been able to keep writing so much without their amazing, tireless support. 💙💙💙💙💙💙

And then literally everyone else who ever let me know they had read and liked my fics, especially with comments. I will never stop being grateful. 💖💖💖💖💖💖

30. What’s something that you want to write in 2024?

I have at least 3 AU (or AU-adjacent) ideas I really want to try writing; one of them is a big project I've been thinking about since last spring, and which I'm incredibly excited about... but I have no idea how long it might take, or if I'll even be able to actually put it together in a way that's even close to how I envision it. So... wish me luck, I guess? 🤞💕

fic writer asks

What’s something new that you tried in a fic this year? How did it turn out and would you do it again?

How many fics did you work on this year? (They don’t have to be finished or published!)

What’s something you learned about yourself as a writer?

What piece of media inspired you the most?

What fandom(s) did you write for this year?

What ship(s) captured your heart?

What character(s) captured your heart?

Did you write for a new fandom or ship this year?

What fic meant the most to you to write?

What fic made you feel the happiest to work on?

What fic was the most satisfying to finish writing?

What fic was the most difficult to write? Did you finish it?

What fic was the easiest to write?

What were your shortest and longest fics this year?

Rec a fic you wrote or posted in 2023

What were you go-to writing songs?

What were your go-to writing snacks?

What was the hardest fic to title?

Share your favorite opening line

Share your favorite ending line

Share your favorite piece of dialogue

Share an excerpt from your favorite scene

Share the final version of a sentence or paragraph you struggled with. What about it was challenging? Are you happy with how it turned out?

What's something that surprised you while you were working on a fic? Did it change the story?

What did you use to write? (e.g. writing programs, paper & pen, etc.)

If you had to choose one, what was THE most satisfying writing moment of your year?

Did you do anything special to celebrate finishing a fic?

How did you recharge between fics?

If this were an awards show, who would you thank?

What’s something that you want to write in 2024?

[em0tionl0rd]

I think my mind just melted..

(personal nonsense below the cut)

Only recently did I realize that Daemon, my character, was probably inspired by Mulgarath from my favorite childhood book series; The Spiderwick chronicles.

Warning! Spoilers ahead for a show you may never watch:

_ _ _

My ex made me watch ALL of Mr. Robot, because for Some reason, he thought it would help me understand him better. But I ended up relating to the main character more than he did.

Elliot, in the show Mr. Robot, has an imaginary friend called "Mr. Robot". Mr. Robot is also shown to be an alternative personality of Elliot.

In the episode titled "da3m0ns", it is revealed that; besides being a literal interpretation of a "daemon" in coding language -

"In multitasking computer operating systems, a daemon is a computer program that runs as a background process, rather than being under the direct control of an interactive user."

Mr. Robot is also like a "daemon" in mythology -

"Daimons are lesser divinities or spirits, often personifications of abstract concepts, beings of the same nature as both mortals and deities, similar to ghosts, chthonic heroes, spirit guides, forces of nature, or the deities themselves"

(I recognize my character as the latter, because that is how they presented themselves to me) .

Now, I have issues with my father, and my past. Thankfully, I don't share Elliot's specific trauma related to his father.. But I did have a serious falling-out with my dad, where I ran away and refused to see him again. (our relationship is still pretty rocky now that I'm an adult)

Some time later I created a friend and paternal figure in my head. One that I tried very hard to 'imagine' into reality, by one means or another, all because I felt very alone.

This is where I struggled heavily with dissociation from reality, and plunged myself deep into my own fantasies and dreams as a form of escapism from my day-to-day life. A coping mechanism for depression that inevitably had dire mental health consequences. Another reason I can relate to Elliot's character.

I see myself 'slipping' into this other character sometimes. They appear in my dreams. I feel myself become them, in my dreams. We share a body. And this is still something I have a very complicated relationship with to this day.

At one point I was dealing with some pretty serious nightmares that were somewhat a result of this mild psychosis, but they have since been worked through and I don't really have them anymore.

I am, however, haunted by ideas of my father (specifically) and actively have to fight them off.

I made the mistake (out of necessity due to circumstances) of letting him back into my life 4-5 years ago, and have been miserable dealing with his utterly insufferable and obnoxious behavior ever since.

Part of me still really wishes Daemon were real and could (I beg him to) take me away so I can actually be happy and heal and not have to deal with this garbage nonsense anymore.

Before Daemon I had similar imaginations of The Doctor but that's besides the point.

Fantasy boy with a magic box (or muscle car) please whisk me away..

I feel like my life will be better soon enough though. I won't have to deal with my dad anymore, and I will finally be able to live my life and have peace of mind.. (I might add to this in another post)

_ _ _

In the Spiderwick Chronicles, there is a scene where Mulgarath turns into the children's father and tries to deceive them in order to acquire the field guide. It's a trippy sequence.

I have, for the life of me, never been able to understand why I have this distinct fear of things "becoming" like my father. Not that my mom's constant comparing me to him didn't help, because she couldn't face her ex and take responsibility, ever.. But because his behavior literally haunts me and hangs over me wherever I go. Like a hex.

For years, after I ran away as a kid, I would have dreams about being trapped at his house and having to tolerate his behavior and emotional manipulation/abuse. I ended up in an abusive relationship (ironically?) in order to escape him, again, as an adult.

I try to talk to him, now that I am so close to being independent, and he still refuses to understand that he was in the wrong. It's like he's terrified of letting go, desperately clinging on to his own make-believe ideas of reality; Of family, and of his kid(s). Everything he says to me, about me, just feels manipulative, and it's extremely annoying.

_ _ _

There is such a things as subliminal influences, whether we believe in them or not, whether we can see them or not, whether we're even aware of them, or not. No matter how hard we try to fight them, they will still have power over us, somehow, in some way.

I have a tendency to pick up things, forget about them, and somehow they later translate into my work. Especially characters from my childhood that I've mostly forgotten about.

I'm a staunch hater of when people's behavior so obviously directly reflects their influence(s), but it's like even I can't escape that recurrence. And I don't want to be a copy, or a clone. No matter how hard they want me to be like them. No matter how hard they pushed me and bullied me and groomed me to be like them. It's just not fucking fair.

Maybe this is why I relate so much with the villain(s).

_ _ _

In 'The Spiderwick Chronicles' (2024) Christian Slater plays the role of Mulgarath.

It All Comes Full Circle . . .

_ _ _

Anyways, Mathew Lillard's "Steve Ragland" (William Afton in the Five Nights At Freddy's Movie) drawn in street clothes and a ball cap reminds me of Christian Slater as Mr. Robot.

Also Rami Malek, yet again playing a character dealing with severe mental health issues; His role as Joshua in Until Dawn and his interactions with Dr. Hill were like a precursor to the events in Mr. Robot. Another, seemingly 'imagined' personality living in Rami's character's head.. As their mind slips to the brink.

My brain has been deleted. Good night.

[necropolismunro]

The Shoot - Day 3 (Graveyard scene and alleyway scene)

On the morning of day 3 we embarked on our most ambitious scene - the graveyard dream sequence.

We took all of our film equipment, the two prop house graves and the five homemade graves and carried it all up Blackford hill where we were going to be shooting.

This was absolutely exhausting, but definitely worth it in the end.

Originally, I had wanted to shoot up Caerketton hill. There was a specific location I had in mind which was so gorgeous that I was dead-set on it.

Here is a photo I took at that spot about a year ago:

I thought it was perfect for the scene. We would put the graves around the brow of the hill and possibly even play about with some SFX to make more graves way in the distance.

However, the climb up Blackford hill was gruelling enough with all the stuff. Normally, without stuff, Blackford takes about fifteen minutes maximum. The spot I wanted to get to up Caerketton takes about an hour and a half. So thank god people convinced out of that.

We got up Blackford and started setting up the production design.

Me and Robbie were quite anxious to see how the homemade graves would actually work.

The graves themselves up close did not look believable at all, so they had to be put in the background. We were also worried that they would simply fall apart if bad weather were to occur.

If they were to fail, we would only have two functioning graves - the prop house graves. And the scene would be pretty subpar if there were only two graves.

The ground was very uneven in places and so for them to not look like they were floating above the ground, we had to scourge the hill for dead plants and shrubbery to cover the bottoms of the graves with.

Luckily they actually worked really well and looked great on camera.

The shoot went very smoothly and we finished with an hour to spare.

I should have, however, been a lot more organised and thought more about the shot list that we had. There was not enough coverage of the entire scene. Most of it is just the one big wide shot, which does not build tension and was also very long. Because it was so long we had to edit in some inserts of graves so that we could speed up Fraser's ascent of the hill.

Overall, I'm quite happy with it, though. With sound design and score the scene works well.

The weather got worse when we finished the scene and started heading down the hill. A lot of the graves ended up falling apart on the way down - so just in time!

ALLEYWAY SCENE -

The alleyway scene (the scene where we meet the jakies) was quite smooth overall.

We had a few run ins with some locals who were wondering what we were doing, but aside from that had basically no issues at all.

I particularly loved blocking this scene. I've always really appreciated long ensemble takes, where every actor is in it and takes part and the scene progresses well because of their collective efforts, instead of just a two-shot where it gets closer and closer in as the tension rises.

I tried to take inspiration from the likes of Bong Joon-Ho:

Every character is doing a certain thing and has certain goals, and it is unfolds slowly and clashes and reaches a climax by the end.

I really wanted to capture Fraser's rising frustration and all the external irritating factors, mixed with his own withdrawal symptoms, that lead up to him taking that first drink.

Fraser's got Dawson chatting his ear off. Dawson is supposed to be his friend, however in reality he is trying to pressure Fraser into drinking. Dawson is spouting out nihilistic philosophy about how the world is awful and he is more than happy to die from drugs and alcohol. He is saying all of this in spite of the fact that he has had a very comfortable upbringing and does not at all comprehend the gravity of the things he's saying. Dawson is also pretty much oblvious to...

...Steenie. Steenie just wants a cigarette off of Fraser. However, instead of backing down like normal upon being told no, Steenie is trying to exert dominance over Fraser. Steenie is accompanied by his older friend whom he is trying to prove himself to.

Fraser just wants both of these people to shut up, however both of them keeping following him and keep irritating him. Eventually, he snaps, shoves Steenie, and marches off. Fraser gets to a breaking point with the pressure and finally caves in and takes a drink.

Something I thought that was interesting is that technically Fraser is the one who provokes Steenie. If Fraser had given him a cigarette, or even had just said no without shoving him, Fraser would almost certainly never have been beaten up. The reason Steenie beats him up is that Steenie feels emasculated in front of his friend.

The shoot went well and we again finished early. I made the stupid decision of not using that time to get more coverage, the same way I did in the shoot up Blackford hill.

The shot of when Fraser leaves the party is from really far away. Which, for a scene which is trying to build tension, is pretty ineffective. In retrospect I definitely should have got some more stuff.

Here's a nice photo we took of us all where you cannot see anyone's face.

[warningsine]

In Alice Lowe’s directorial debut, a coal-black comedy about a mum-to-be-turned-serial slasher, one scene stands out for its blood-soaked intensity. At once anatomically frank and oddly Cronenberg-esque, it’s a prolonged close-up of a belly being slit open and a baby pulled from inside.

“People often ask me if it’s a real caesarean!” says Lowe, who was eight months pregnant on the shoot for Prevenge, gently rocking a pram back and forth. “I’m like, ‘No, I think I’d draw the line there!’ But I’d always envisaged the scene as this total close-up, where you don’t get the chance to look away. We flinch about pregnancy and go, ‘Ooh, we must protect women from this experience,’ but the film is saying why don’t we look at his stuff properly and not flinch away from it?”

Lowe, star of beloved cult comedies such as Sightseers and Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, projected her own fears about pregnancy for the film, which sees her character, Ruth, avenge her husband’s death at the apparent whim of her unborn baby. “[I feel like] our generation has a fear of pregnancy,” she says, “because we’re so narcissistic ourselves that we’re like, ‘Someone else needs attention? Oh, that’s scary.’”

She also wanted, with her writing for Prevenge, to create a female antihero to rank with Walter White from Breaking Bad and Taxi Driver’s Travis Bickle. In Ruth, by turns vulnerable and unhinged, we get it. But what of the transgressive women that inspired the character? Lowe lifts the lid on some of her favourites.

Tina from Sightseers

“Tina and Ruth are like siblings, they’re related in a DNA way. Tina I see as a naif who comes to power, a latent psychopath whose powers emerge during the film. Some viewers see her as a feminist! She’s quite naive and selfish in the way that children can be, whereas Ruth is more of a grownup; the scales have fallen from her eyes and she feels like she sees the world for what it is, in this cynical light where everyone’s a monster. But all my characters are related because they’re all aspects of me. They’re like these weird, distant relatives that I feel could have been me in a parallel universe!”

Beverly Moss from Abigail’s Party

“People see Alison’s characters as sometimes monstrous, but I see a mirror. It feels so familiar! She’s such a warm, vivacious actor, and when you cast someone like that as a horrible character it makes it really watchable. I was quite conscious of that casting my film, with people like Tom Davis and Jo Hartley, who plays this annoying midwife character. I thought if I cast Jo no one will be able to hate her! It’s this thing of contrasts and tensions you’re trying to get with the audience where they’re being pushed and pulled one way or the other.”

Classical antiheroines

“I often think about classical female figures who would do bad things, like Medea, Antigone and Elektra. You could say that was a way of telling off citizens in ancient Greece, like ‘Don’t behave this way,’ but they’re also amazing works of art. And I often think, ‘Why don’t we see as many female characters like that now?’ When I was researching the Furies, the classical goddesses of vengeance, for the film, I came across this footage by a Czech expressionist director who directed a segment of a film called Crime Without Passion. He didn’t direct the whole feature, it’s a bit like Dalí doing a section of Spellbound. [The surrealist painter famously art-directed the dream sequence in Hitchcock’s 1945 thriller.] It’s this strange, symbolic sequence with these classical goddesses infiltrating 1930s New York and flying into buildings and springing out of spilled blood. I just thought, ‘This is such powerful imagery, it would be so cool for this to be Ruth’s influence.’ I had this idea that the baby is really a Fury, that she’s actually thousands of years old and hugely wise.”

She from Antichrist

“Lars von Trier is one of my favourite filmmakers, but his female characters are often totally punished and martyred; they’re either witches or saints or some mixture of the two. But I think there’s an argument to say women in our society do get punished, that that’s the reality of it. You have to show the dark as well as the light. If women were all really cool, sensible, amazing people on screen how much pressure would that put on women to be like that? I’ve had comedy writers say to me, ‘You’ll love this character because she’s the only one that’s got it together. Everyone else in the show is a total idiot but she’s attractive, she’s intelligent and she’s got a great job,’ and I’m like, ‘That is the most boring thing I could possibly play!’”

Margo Channing from All About Eve

“It’s [Bette Davis’s] stoicism, her implacability – she had such inner poise and strength. The 30s and 40s actually saw a lot of female-driven films about antiheroines, women who commit crimes, who commit adultery, who triumph over the odds, who put their careers over their husbands, possibly even more than now. I think cinema was seen more as a women’s recreation back then. And so amazing female actresses emerged who were more than just an age, a body, a face on-screen. Yes, there were beautiful actresses. But there were also strong characters who by sheer force of will defied categorisation. And their needs and wants are more complex than just ‘finding a man’.”