#also i saw some lore talk on like. the way the theatre is made By the witches & now w the witches bringing up name-destiny ties

[narwhalandchill]

also mistake not my silence on the summer event story now that its all out for not paying attention bc. well firstly not going to be the subject of this post but seriously just the . Overall implications of the whole thing when it comes to teyvat and genshin as a whole? wild stuff like are they rly out there revealing the entire cosmology now 😭 (tho i kinda have. Mixed thoughts as well)

anyway secondly and most importantly because of course i have priorities (its ajax we all know) . soooo simulanka and names eh?

HUH!

well not that i was any doubter to begin with in that it like. meant something when hit game jenshin impact featuring guy already foreshadowed and being set up for some real curious world-overturning and celestia torching business etc etc etc coincidentally named. ajax. among other things. that the same game happening to Also begin introducing this whole other ajax/aias as an actual historical figure featured within the games lore and legends. would very much be just a massive fucking thing we Should be taking very seriously in terms of his future development but like thanks very much for confirming it too uwu

anyway let us look at my favorite french cultist scribbled note for no particular reason once more just to celebrate the occasion

i mean what can i say man . truly the endgame relevance long term allegations continue undodged 😤😤

anyway whats kinda funny to me is the way a lot of ppls reaction to this name confirmation seems to be like. omg ajax is in trouble now bc irl mythology ajax died and ajax/aias of genshin also seems to have possibly had a shit fate by the end im so worried omg . when like. literally the second part to this whole "name = inheriting destiny" thing we see in simulanka is that . with the right circumstances . the one that inherits the name and destiny is not necessarily doomed to that exact same outcome as the original . like we all did see how we saved simulanka durin right?? and how the existence of mini durin may now open up the possibility of teyvats durin to receive a different outcome to his tale???? right??

like why do ppl have so little faith in childe im 😭 like if you ask me hes Already giving indication of defying his fate in a multitude of ways (vision malfunction being a big one) so personally i simply think we need to let him do his thing and see where he goes with it . i have faith in him like if Anyones abt to subvert the fate hes been set up with be it due to his name or any other reason . its gonna be him lmao

like. its not even new stuff kwdwdjkdwjk

either way tho . even if this fucker straight up "dies" or goes MIA im not even that worried bc. ppl worrying about this "tragic fate" his namesake seems to be conferring to him by default with simulankas explicit confirmation of a names meaning . and its just are we straight up missing the fact that this historical ajax/aias is Literally connected to that rent free narzissenkreuz note that EXPLICITLY aligns this "tragedy" with the theme of REBIRTH. and becoming a descender straight up .

like maybe its just me but this Really isnt giving "omg childe is going to die due to mirroring the fate of ajax" its giving "childe is Literally being set up to become sth descender equivalent one way or another AND theyre doubling down on it now" im sorry 😭

like. even the implications of phrases like. "forsaking the self" to be reborn in the abyss just reminds me of this. weird panic people have around childes vision malfunction as if its like. vision is GOOD ambition and his GOOD ending and his GOOD characteristics and it malfunctioning means BAD EVIL SIN ambition and WRONG characteristics is taking over!!!!!!!11! hes being torn into two different directions and the abyss is bad and vision (=celestia) is good!!!!!1

and its like. say we even buy that (but like dang what a sustainer sponsored take to have in a. gnostic inspired lore environment JWSJKJKSF) . that his. "correct" and "healthy" destiny as vision wielder (that Every single recipient of a "gods EYE" gets like forcibly and irrevocably bound to by design and surely this isnt problematic at all) . is a part of that "self" that is being forsaken and twisted as his destiny pushes against celestias control and his connection to said vision falters . lets say we assume that is a "bad" thing for his "intended" path and destiny somehow .

(which YES it prolly is. but only within the bounds of a world order set up by the heavenly principles!!! of COURSE the HP would force people into destinies and paths that Only serve the continuity of its rule!!! and doesnt shake up the system!! like yes a vision likely represents and assigns to people a "Good" ambition but thats not from the recipients POV thats from celestias POV and at this point its just. fellas. we are not supposed to buy into that at face value lmao)

which like. again. i v much dont buy anyway i think every single time genshin calls something sin or forbidden it should be assessed v critically.

but even with that assumption we can still see how this very note is already implicating that "forsaking the self" is Literally a prerequisite . in this grand destiny featuring ajax/aias . for reaching True rebirth as a holy infant and a descender and all that . for defying the shackles of the heavens . for gaining a will that rivals the world . right???

+ also if like. forsaking the self being mayhaps and perchance more of a GOOD thing in a world with preordained and unyielding destiny set up by false divinity wasnt already established enough

welp thank you rene narzissenkreuz.

oh "excising the self" you say?? that sure sounds a bit like "forsaking the self" doesnt it ??? how curious that it would be considered less of a "death" and more of a "rebirth" indeed . and that a vision to a cultist very invested in the methods available to Defy a prophecy and fate is very much a bad thing to receive . like what a coincidence that we would have a note like this as an established character already tied to a note you wrote about acquiring a descenders will is experiencing vision compatibility issues its very funny indeed.

so like ig what im trying to say is just idk for me personally if ajax is out there forsaking his self by any metric im just gonna be cheering him on <3

but yeah jkqjkwdjkwdjkwd dont mind me im just kinda rent free with how its now just even more confirmed by hoyo that this insane ajax/aias note stuff is Not meant to be coincidental At All (even tho its very funny ppl doubted the signifance to begin with at all). but also i just dont get the panicking abt it being some bad thing lmao like this is just genuinely hype as fuck for him 😭😭😭

[lopposting]

Hello Puppet pals + Romeo fans

would you like a fresh, fun new dose of pain tonight

On Romeo (long post)

So way back in april, in the taiwan event they showed some material from what looks like early builds of the game. this is the still i want to talk about today

It's gepetto (romanized to "zepeto" here) asking if we've "killed the beast".

In the released version, we meet him outside in rosa isabelle street after the KOP fight. It looks as though he's even beside the same lamppost. There's no other similar scene of us meeting gepetto like this, so it's likely referring to the puppet king. (When we meet him on the bridge, he's seen that the donkey has been killed, so we wouldn't need to lie.) but the thing is, this question is a YES OR NO ANSWER, meaning one or the other would be a lie.

So maybe in the early versions of the game it was actually possible align with/spare the puppet king (and by extension romeo) and then lie to Geppetto about it. (I mean, it's possible that it's simply just lying about not killing him to G, and we couldn't spare him to begin with)

I think they realized that they couldn't possibly make such a narratively important boss fight optional and that story-wise it wasn't linear enough to work. The story as a whole is not nearly as effective without his loss.

TLDR: I'm speculating that that image was from an early version of the game, and Romeo could've actually lived but the devs made the hard call against this.

[It's also possible that they just made that image for the purposes of presentation, and that it doesn't mean anything, or that it's another beast entirely.]

But still, somehow it makes it the more tragic. *stares blankly into space.*

(bonus fun notes below)

In this IGN interview before release, Director Choi dropped a big hint about romeo here.

"Yes, this is the king of puppets. And we want to call him a character and not a monster, because he will be the centre of the story. So if you play more and discover more about him, you'll find out more about what he is and who he is."

the puppet king being lampwick was also inadvertently leaked by IGN in this video:

I don't think people unfamiliar with the story would know anything, but pinoheads definitely would've and did recognize what "romeo" alluded to

They kept Romeo's ENTIRE EXISTENCE a secret up until launch. During the roughly two years of promotions before release there was never any mention of Romeo before release. Zip, Nada, so much so that the budding fanbase was starting to assume that he wouldn't even be in the game. NO ONE saw it coming when we found out who exactly we killed. Developers did consider that people who had read the book would catch on to particular things, so, bravo neowiz

And here's the other ingenious thing - they showed us the "Mad Donkey" boss early on in the demo and NOW I'm starting to wonder if this was a deliberate play. Almost everyone assumed this was already the game's iteration of Lampwick, so Romeo came as a surprise, and I think the proceeding story reveals about who the King of Puppets truly was were very effective.

also.. it's extremely cute what they did with the character. Of course, Romeo is the canonical name of Lampwick in Pinocchio, but the name "Romeo" is also probably the most heavily associated with Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet (which also takes place in Italy, as does Pinocchio!). And then we meet him in a theatre, and he puts on a play for us before we fight. Romeo supposedly had an affinity for acting, as Carlo did with the piano (I have heard this around on reddit, I don't know where this originates from, please lmk if you've seen these lore items). But most of all, Romeo and Juliet is a deeply remembered tragedy - like Lampwick in collodi's pinocchio. They are two young boys who didn't get away.

(maybe all of this was so obvious to everyone else but i love it still haha)

Fun to revisit this stuff after release with new clarity.

[To Reiterate - All of this is just my speculation]

[hematomes]

PLS RAMBLE ABOUT THE SCARA/FATUI LORE

OH BOY

tagging @the-doorless-grandma-of-puppets bc it asked me to talk abt it as well EHEH1VSJA

edit: also @diah-the-demon and @aetherisademigod!! :D

okay so. i made a post abt the fatui and how la commedia dell'arte kinda helped guessing which would be playable, which wouldn't and could give some clues abt the circumstances, but im gonna focus on scara for this one

BASICALLY. in la commedia dell'arte you have 3 categories of characters: the vecchi (rich assholes), the zanni (the poors/servants etc, not necessarily nice guys but still better) and the innamorati (the 2 lovers, and the most important characters bc thes goal in lcda is to reunite them). the vecchi are fiercely opposed to their union, either bc they love one of the innamorati or bc they're their parent, or just for asshole reasons.

the vecchi and zanni are the fatui, and the two siblings are the innamorati (obviously without the lovers' aspect). the vecchi are the one who won't be playable (like signora and dottore, for example, are vecchi) while the zanni (tartaglia and scara, but also arlecchino and some others) will be

enters scaramouche/scaramuccia. in lcda, he's a little shit, and the only reason he sides with the innamorati is to piss off the vecchi. he's also the one that helps them communicate in some cases, so that could mean that scara will give us some info abt the abyss twin - but im not sure

so that's the part abt lcda

now onto the kabuki theatre part. it's been mentioned in the HoOD lore, and it's also why scara chose kunikuzushi as a name; kunikuzushi, loosely translated to "destroyer of cities" (im working from memory so this is very loose), is an antagonist in kabuki theatre - however, and that's where it's really interesting, most of scara's outfit echoes with the hero protagonist, and there are also a lot of parts that symbolize protection, warding off evil. which could indicate instead that he'll become the protector of inazuma

AND FINALLY, for the actual lore, in the artifact set it says that scara's story is made of 3 acts, much like in kabuki theatre. the 1st act was what we saw in the irodori festival with the fall of the raiden gokaden. the 2nd act was in mondstadt, for the 1.1 event and the meteorites. and the 3rd act was him gaining the gnosis, the heart he's been looking for all along (assuming the fake/faulty heart was a delusion)

so this would mean that his story is coming to an end. now that he has the gnosis, he'll find some peace, and working from there... it's a bit hard to guess. with lcda, i guess one type of redemption would be to give the traveler info on the abyss twin, but it's a wild guess. and as for his role in our party, im thinking business matter/the whole "the enemies of my enemies are my friends" or smth like that

i expect something colder than childe, even though in the inazuma event with xinyan it wasn't exactly. friendly? and both the traveler and paimon were careful (tho they had to hide it bc of sweet sweet xinyan). EITHER WAY, my final assumption is that the next time we really see scaramouche (HOPEFULLY OUTSIDE OF AN EVENT. PLEASE) will be as he becomes playable and joins the party

[thweatted]

minor spoilers: I saw Sonic 2 because of course I did

Tuesday, 2 days ago, on the 12th, I saw Sonic 2. If not for Ghostbusters I would have seen both movies in the theatre back to back (I'm not a movie person). I was actually pretty hyped about this movie, unlike the first one where I was expecting pure cringe but at the same time I wanted to see how it played out, and it wasn't as bad as I expected. For this movie, as soon as Knuckles was announced I was ready for it.

The worst parts of the movie for me were the parts where main characters weren't on screen. The wedding stuff went on for too long, but I do appreciate the palm tree location. (I went back and looked at some Robotnik clips from the first movie, and he mentions a wedding out of town. Who knew that was foreshadowing.) There were also some things in the lore that got changed. I guess they did that for people who might not know Sonic lore, and it's just simpler with the changes. Still, I was like who protects what now? And how are these things also this other thing? Shouldn't this be floating? Some of the bar stuff seemed to drag, and ironically I found the dance off kinda cringe. I mean it didn't play out how I would've expected. I was like, breakdancing? Sonic's got this. But I guess it was more cinematic the way it played out, and you knew that cloning device was gonna be foreshadowing. Lots of foreshadowing here, but I do love a good payoff.

What I did like about the movie, Knuckles! He sounds like an old man, can't catch a break, but I thought they portrayed him well. I also like his CG model, his face is adorable. Cliche and cringe as that moment was when he says he thought Robotnik was his friend, I kinda felt bad for him. I also loved that moment where he punches the emerald out of Robotnik, like how he knocks the Chaos Emeralds out of Super Sonic at the beginning of the Sonic 3 game, and he's able to restore the pieces of the emerald later. Basically, any moment that referenced the Sonic games made me happy, like the snowboarding, the air bubbles underwater, we got our airplane, our mech boss fight, our Super Sonic. I love to see it. We even got a bit of a Sonic Heroes vibe in there, and another character teaser at the end. I thought Tails was portrayed well too, he admired Sonic, was tech savvy and super useful. When he made that comment about not being a field guy it made me think of the older games when Tails did more vs the newer games where he doesn't. And the credits, I enjoy those, but there's a moment that doesn't happen in the movie and I wonder if the story changed earlier in development.

Robotnik's character is still a little off for me. I like him but he's portrayed has sort of cold and uncaring, like a machine I guess or maybe just opposite Sonic's family, but the Jim Carrey-isms make him silly sometimes, and in the end he just seems kinda random. Like he's not so cartoonishly evil that the silly moments make sense. He's played straight as a threat and then does a silly thing. I love a villain with personality quirks, but this wasn't that. There were moments of that sprinkled in, but overall he seemed kind of random. Movie Sonic is what it is. He's still more wisecracking talking animal than an actual teenager, but I don't hate him so it'll do. I don't think we needed a moment where he calls James Marsden dad, but I get it, family bonds, old fam new fam, ok. I DO love to see him lose his rings though. How many rings does he have? Must be more than 50.

Overall, this movie, though it went on a wedding tangent, seemed more invested in getting game references in. I appreciate that even though the lore isn't exactly the same. And it managed to mention the Olive Garden without calling too much attention to the advertising. Right now I'm looking for audio clips from the first movie for something I can animate to, make some youtube content while I'm in job limbo. That last show ended recently, the next show starts in July. I dunno if I'm gonna stay in Canada to work on it or not, but I wanna use that time to get some fun stuff in.

[jade-it-queen]

Jade. The fate of female character in Mortal Kombat

It’s been a while since I posted anything on my blog cause I’ve been busy with my life and rapid changes in it. During this time, I’ve watched the new 2021 Mortal Kombat movie as well as the new animation Battle of the realms and also rewatched the Story Mode of MK11 a few times. As you probably can tell, I have a lot to say.

JADE. MILEENA. KITANA. SONYA.

Skip this if you don’t want to read my very important (and long as sh*t) rant about female characters in MK.

DISCLAIMER. This thing is going to sound extremely feminist and women-supremacist or whatever. By saying things that I’m going to say, I by no means think that male characters should be weak or lacking. If anything, it would be nice to have some godforsaken EQUALITY. I’ll explain further later.

Part One: Mortal Kombat (2021)

There’s no Jade in this movie. 

The end. That should be the sole reason I dislike it.

However, it might be better this way since the Nitara and Mileena portrayals in this movie are... questionable to say the least. Okay, y’all been robbed. If MY JADE would be brought into this movie to BE THERE for like 4 minutes of screen time only to get absolutely brutal FATALITY I. would. be. pissed.

More than I already am and that means something.

Sure, there’s a possibility that she’s going to be present in some of the upcoming movies because this one is definitely not the only one they’re going to make. But do I want that? Yes. And no.

Mortal Kombat movies (and Mortal Kombat in general) have a problem with women portrayal in general. The target audience for them are MEN, potentially heterosexual men, who want nothing more than bloody gorey fighting scenes with occasional sex scene here and there. To achieve that, they need a female lead, an attractive, kinda kick-assish but not too much, to not overshadow the absolutely badass men characters. Girls tend to be “independent” (because God forbid they’d want to express interest in the male leads before the time is right), sarcastic, laid back and sometimes even bitchy. Because, you see, they are fighters. And they are Sonya Blade. They need NO MAN. They just need plot armor, bigger than America itself. And if they’re not Sonya Blade, they are... non existent. They are there, but they are never really there. Here, let me walk on screen for a couple seconds. Let me sit beside Very Important Male Character (aka Shang Tsung) for a couple of seconds, looking absolutely gorgeous. Let me have a fight scene in which I make choices so f*cking stupid there’s no potential explanation to it. I exist in this movie to make people that love me (this character) to come into theatres in hopes to see some good action and interesting plot.

Now, I wasn’t born yesterday, I know how the world works. It’S bEeN LiKe ThAt FoReVeR, gEt OvEr here iT. Yeah, it’s been like that forever and the result is a mediocre movie that pleases neither the casual viewer, nor the actual Mortal Kombat fan. I don’t know, there might be guys who just saw Kung Lao’s fatality on Nitara, thought to themselves “Neat” and went on with their lives. But I exited the cinema with a sour taste in my mouth, feeling like I’ve watched one of the “fighting genre” films based on video games that had nothing worth remembering. Well, besides Kano. He was my favourite part of this movie and I  normally can’t stand the guy :’D

Would it really help if they changed the way the women were portrayed? I mean - is that the ACTUAL problem of the movie? No, women being the eye candy and barely something else (if they’re not Sonya Blade) are not the only problem it suffers from. It’s that MK has been going the same route, retelling the same goddamn story for the millionth time. It’s always THE SAME. The only thing changing is who’s gonna get brutally killed. But - of course - out of the “disposable” character pool. It’s never Sonya (because you need our female lead or else there would be no female characters in the story), who ya know could be killed by Mileena but magically WASN’T. Because Mileena FOR SOME REASON was like: Ya know what? Naaah. Even though Sonya’s from Earthrealm and is actively trying to stop you. If anything, kill her because she annoys you. BUT NAH. It’s never Liu Kang because he’s the Chosen One. But killing Kung Lao is fine, he can die so Liu can awaken or smth. It’s not the main character because how else can you portray THE MAGIC OF LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP? Ya, that’s what I thought, don’t even think about it.

You have an amazing universe, filled to the brim with SO. MUCH. POTENTIAL. Let go of the same boring plot line and show us Kombat from another perspective. Change something. F*ck, go all feminist route and make a story center around Mileena dominating the world. Try with different versions of the same story, making it center around different character each time. 

SURE, YOU’LL PROBABLY LOSE SOME VIEWERS BUT TIMES ARE CHANGING, AND MOST OF US ARE TIRED TO PAY FOR THE SAME STORY OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

Part Two: Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms

Jesus f*cking Christ.

To say this film was rushed is an understatement. While I was watching it, I was like: TF? Everything happens all at once, we have Kuai Liang-Scorpion story line, we have Outworld’s attack, the tournament, not to mention the final fight that should be whole another movie. I felt like no story line was properly laid out, some of the characters died before I got to even know them and the battles were... disappointing. I believe they needed to push this movie out so they squished in everything they had and just went with it. 

But, again, this movie just repeats the same things as its live action version. Let me lay it down for you:

Kung Lao dies (because yes)

Sonya Blade lives (because yes)

Jade is just there (more of it later)

disposable characters are disposed of

Liu Kang is badass and always wins

You watch it and feel like you’ve already seen it before. Sure, gore is fine, human Raiden is precious and need to be protected at all costs and adrenaline is pumping (I guess).

BUT NOW.

You know what’s coming.

JADE.

JADE.

My f*cking piece of sunshine, the gorgeous goddess of beauty and kombat, the woman who owns my heart.

She’s there for like not even a minute.

Words can’t describe how f*cking PISSED I am by this portrayal. These motherfrickers put her in EVERY SINGLE POSSIBLE SNIPPET OF THIS MOVIE. HER BATTLE WAS IN THE TRAILER, ONE OF THE SNEAK PEEKS WAS A SCENE OF HER AND KITANA.

TURNS OUT EVERYTHING I SAW BEFORE THE MOVIE WAS RELEASED... WAS EVERYTHING I WAS ABOUT TO SEE OF HER!!!!

THEY MADE ME HYPED UP FOR NOTHING!!!!!!

I know I’m not the only one riding this trolley. Li Mei was there just to be killed. Kung Lao had a f*cking single dialogue line and then BAM, fatality, buh-bye. But I was watching everything of this movie, being so enormously happy that I will finally see Jade in the movies, FINALLY! Only for her to be present in a single scene, get her ass kicked by Liu Kang (what’s new) and then she’s never seen again, even when the whole f*cking world is breaking apart.

Again. She’s just there. Ladies and gentlemen, one of the best Shao Kahn’s assassins, gets her ass kicked in fourty seconds. They NEVER let her speak ffs. She just spews some general villanous sh*t and proceeds to step on Johnny. Then, she just goes Observer mode as Kitana “betrays” Shao Kahn, gets tied to the column and then the world is ending. 

WHERE THE F*CK IS SHE?!

If you hype me up for her every chance you get, at least GIVE ME what you’re advertising. This is a scam. This is criminal offense. And homophobic. She is more than a revealing outfit and Liu Kang’s punching bag. I’m SO. F*CKING. TIRED. OF THIS. SH*T.

Kitana. The rebellious princess of Outworld... turned damsel in distress in this movie. Her role is so effing bad it hurts me to my core. You see her as a general being so badass and independent... oh right, we need Liu Kang to save her because he needs to maintain his hero look. And we need two kissing scenes. How do we get there? Oh, right, let him save her, because you know - that’s what makes wahmen kiss you. 

ARE YOU NUTS?!

The movie started just fine, with Kitana being in charge with her right hand, Jade. Then, obviously, they water her down and soon she is a princess in a tower (in this case, princess on a column) that needs her buffy sexy man to save her. Oh, and she can’t resist him - you know, every normal girl’s reaction to getting untied is to kiss a guy you’ve known for like a few hours but seen before and you’ve talked like three dialogue lines in total. Sure.

Kitana just gets the unfortunate role of a female main character. She’s Liu’s love interest and that makes her take the role of a strong (but surface level, only) woman who still needs her hero to free her. Classic damsel in distress story, with Kitana being the princess, Liu being the Prince charming and Shao Kahn as the dragon (lul). Of course, they try to cover this up by making Kitana a general, letting her win a few fights but it won’t matter in the end. Some say that women want to believe in fairy tales but the more I see fighting games’ lore, the more I say it’s the men who want to believe them. 

Is it necessarily bad? No. But it’s boring as fuk.

I would like to ask the directors to stop being so afraid of upsetting the target audience. Target audience can change and sometimes it comes out better than originally planned. My Little Pony was designed as a child’s cartoon but it was the creepy men who made it reach the top. Morally? Questionable at best. But business is booming, right? And that’s what they care for, right?

All I’m trying to say is these days women and gays are the future.

Thank you for today, more to come. I’m going to rant about the Story Mode.

[sad-little-ghost-hunter]

The Professor and The Genie: A Full Breakdown

Welcome one and all to A Comprehensive List of All The Genie Lore In Puppet History, With Theories. If you aren’t familiar with what I’m talking about, go watch all of Puppet History made by @wearewatcher on YouTube and come right back here. No dilly-dallying. For those of you who are, you’re probably also aware of the recurring character of The Genie on the show, whose role has been the subject of much speculation among the show’s audience. I couldn’t find a compilation of references/ theories, so I made one! 

The show, which tells somewhat obscure stories from throughout history, accompanied by a special guest each episode and a musical number at the end of each tale, is hosted by The Professor, a little fuzzy blue puppet, who commonly references The Genie, with whom he holds a deep-rooted grudge. I will be going through all the existing information on this guy so far, and discussing a few theories as to what all this is about. It’s like my very own BuzzFeed Unsolved except I’m just one very bored person with way too much time on her hands. 

Let’s compile all of the currently known information: on April 10, 2020, in the video entitled, “Surviving The Titanic: History's Luckiest Woman • Puppet History” the Genie is first mentioned, at 16:10, in a question about what Violet Jessop saw while peering off of the ship. The answer choice reads, “A Genie??????????????????” 

On August 14, 2020, in the video entitled, “How America’s First Female Detective Saved Abe Lincoln • Puppet History” the Genie again comes up, at 23:04, in a question entitled “What’s the matter?!?”. The answer choice reads, “The secessionists had found a magical genie!” The pattern was starting to emerge. 

On September 4, 2020, in the video entitled “The Disastrous 1904 Olympics • Puppet History” the genie is once again mentioned, at 5:06. The genie is referred to as “fickle” and apparently keeps making things worse, no matter what the Professor says. From this we can gather that the genie may have gone back on some sort of promise he made to The Professor, and is escalating the situation. 

On September 11, 2020, in the video entitled “Isaac Newton's Nemesis • Puppet History” the genie is mentioned in an answer choice at 6:45, reading “A genie that will stop at nothing to make my life a living hell, even though I followed his silly rules to the letter and I don’t owe him anything.” Clearly, things with the genie are only getting worse. The genie is harboring some sort of grudge against the Professor, be it the Professor’s fault or not. The Genie also provided rules for something-- we’ll return to this later.

On September 18, 2020, in the video entitled, “The World’s Greatest/ Rudest Samurai • Puppet History”, The Genie once again comes up in the answer choices at 24:52, as “A genie who insists I owe him, and I wish I had a wish left so I could wish Musashi were here to teach him a lesson.” Once again, we see evidence that the Professor may have made some sort of deal with this genie, and whether or not he fulfilled his end of the bargain is still up in the air.

On September 25, 2020, in the video entitled “Policarpa: The Revolutionary Teen Spy • Puppet History”, the Professor makes not one but three references to the genie! We get so much lore here! First up, at 1:05, Ryan Bergara asks The Professor how old he really is. The Professor responds with this: “Yeah, you know, you start jumping around in time and things get a little funky…”. Just a few seconds later, the Professor says, “Well, if you could ask the subject of today’s story, which, how could I, it's not like you can just wish to be able to time travel…“ The pain in his voice here is apparent, devastating, and very real. Lastly, later on in the video at 20:05, The Professor gives the following answer choice to the question, “What happened?” (to Policarpa). The choice reads, “A magical genie meddled once again with history, and turned Policarpa in, and tried to pin the blame on a bespectacled puppet, who is at this point starting to suspect he may have made a deal with the devil.” Now here’s where things get real interesting. The Professor is now alleging that not only is the Genie out to get him, but the Genie is actually influencing history. 

On October 2, 2020, in the video entitled “The Grisly Journey of the Donner Party • Puppet History”,  The Professor goes on a longer than usual tangent about the genie at 18:38, saying, “He had cached a trove of treasured items, including a magical lamp that only a creature about the size of a human hand could get to, and inside the magical lamp was a Genie, capable of granting any wish, up to and including turning a seemingly everyday item into a secret time machine, but that if you wished for that, THE GENIE WOULD BE A TOTAL PRICK ABOUT IT, SO MAYBE BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR.” The genie appears in a short montage of clips, with the professor’s above monologue in the background. The genie shown is just Shane in eyeliner and an Aladdin-style genie costume, cackling and looking mischievous. The professor rubs the lamp in the skit, and the genie does that evil villainous hand thing, and casts some sort of spell. There’s a lot to break down. First up, we may have gotten a glimpse into the Professor’s actual past here. It seems as though at some point in his life he was either told about, or found out about this cache of treasure deep in the mountains, that only a creature about the size of a human hand could get to. This is important because it debunks one of the most popular theories circulating the internet right now-- that the Genie somehow turned the Professor into an immortal, time-traveling puppet. The Professor was clearly already a puppet, as he had access to this treasure trove. Next we get the part about the time-machine. If we can assume that the Professor is projecting his past experiences onto the poor guests on this show, we can surmise that the Professor used his wish to wish for one of his ordinary objects to turn into a secret time machine. We will delve more into this later. 

Finally, on December 25, 2020, in the video entitled “The Story of St. Nicholas • Puppet History”, The Professor goes on another rant about the Genie in the answer choices, saying “The same curse that eventually befalls all of God’s creatures-- an evil genie was pursuing him through time and space to steal something the genie himself had made magical!” From this we can gather that, after the Professor wished for his time machine, the Genie gave him some rules and conditions he had to agree to. The Professor may have broken these, hence why the Genie is pursuing him across time and space. 

Now that we have all the existing information, assuming I didn’t miss anything, let’s get into the theories. 

My current, working theory is that The Professor happened across this lamp somewhere deep in the mountains, and wished for a Time Machine from the Genie inside. The Genie (who appears malevolent in the Professor’s flashback, but I’m gonna chalk that up to personal bias) agreed, but gave the Professor some conditions and rules to follow regarding the Time Machine. The Professor agreed, and promptly broke these rules. The Genie then demanded something in return-- This could be the Time Machine itself, but given Shane’s twisted mind I would assume the Professor owes the Genie something more. Perhaps… his soul?

Or maybe just a fine, I don’t know.

The Professor refused to pay up, possibly time traveling away to hide from the Genie, and is now on the run. A fuzzy blue fugitive. But, the Professor also mentioned that the Genie actually meddles with history, and tries to get the puppet in trouble for stuff he didn’t do. This begs the question; why would the Genie resort to a relatively harmless source of mischief to target the Professor, instead of just taking whatever is owed to him? This almost implies that whatever it is the Professor owes the Genie has to be given willingly. Hence, why the Genie is making his life “a living hell”. 

The puppet also seems to be immortal, or at least old enough to not remember how old he is. In his words, time is “funky” when you travel around it too much. 

We also don’t know which of the Professor’s objects could be the Time Machine. Some have speculated (some being me) that it’s his satchel, or hat. But, when you think about it, it seems most likely that it’s actually the theatre itself. The Theatre does often seem to transport you back in time to the actual stories, although that could just be Watcher’s killer editing skills. Either way, the Time Machine seems to be a source of great trouble for the puppet, so maybe just… get rid of it?

There are 2 main schools of thought here, in my own opinion. The idea that the Genie is in the wrong, and is relentlessly torturing this poor Professor for no good reason, or the idea that the Genie is actually justified in his anger at the Professor, and that the Professor brought this on himself. 

Theory #1: The Genie is a malevolent entity, and tricked the Professor into making an unfair deal with him. This is clearly what the Professor himself believes, or wants us to believe. The Professor says, and I quote, “starting to suspect he may have made a deal with the devil.” If this is true, and the Professor is actually on the run from the Devil himself, then that would imply that the Professor sold his own soul for this time machine, the most commonly referenced deal with the devil. However, since that would be a little far-fetched even for Shane (although, let’s be real- would it?) we could go with the second option- the Genie is just a Genie, but he did trick the Professor into making a bargain with him, and the Professor still believes he has held up his own end of the deal. 

Theory #2: The Genie is just doing his job, and the Professor’s the one at fault. Now I don’t want to take any sides here, but this does seem to be the most plausible theory. Even the Professor, on several occasions, has implied a set of rules that he agreed to when he wished for his Time Machine. What these rules were we may never know, but the Genie clearly thinks that he broke them and is now owed something. Historically, in folklore from all over the world, Genies are tricky creatures, and will try to deceive you into wishing for stupid stuff, or agreeing to things that you maybe shouldn’t agree to. However, in almost all cases, if you manage to outsmart them, or keep your word, they will leave you alone. Let’s say The Professor knew what he was getting himself into when he wished for the Time Machine. He agreed to the rules, and he understood that if he broke them he would owe the Genie something. Yet he went ahead with it, and now the Genie is after him. He clearly broke the rules and the Genie is just collecting on his bargain.  

All in all, we don’t have enough information yet to actually know what this Genie’s DEAL is (see what I did there). Is the Genie an evil being trying his very best to ruin the unlucky Professor’s life? Or is the Professor the one who wronged the Genie, breaking his word and escaping via Puppet TARDIS? The answer will remain… Unsolved.

[hecallsmehischild]

Recent Media Consumed

Books

The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien. About ten or fifteen years ago, I tried to read this and was totally overwhelmed by it. I kept it around, hoping maybe someday I might be able to read it. I finally have, and here are my impressions: WHY SO MANY NAMES. WHY YOU HAVE TO NAME EVERYBODY, AND EVERY TRIBE OF PEOPLES, AND EVERY INANIMATE OBJECT, AND EVERY LANDSCAPE FEATURE. WHY. *ahem* So. I have a general comprehension of the events of The Silmarillion, but I dealt with it by doing what you do for an impressionist painting. I (mentally) stepped way back and let all the names flow by me, and if there were names that were repeated a lot, then I mentally attached appropriate plot points and character details to those names so I could track with who they were and what they were doing. And, actually, I found myself able to hang on and enjoy the book for the most part. This is going to lead into a re-reading of the Lord of the Rings books, since I haven’t read those in about as long…

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien. I haven’t read some of these books since pre-teen years, with one required re-read of The Two Towers in high school (i.e. it’s been many an age since I’ve read these and my memory of the stories has been far more heavily influenced by the movies). In re-reading the first book, I was struck by the extreme tone shift for the Elves and Dwarves. Elves seem much closer to happy, mischievous fairies than these ethereal, solemn pillars of elegance and grace the movies show them to be. And Dwarves are far more bumbling and craftsmanlike than the movies show. Aside from that, The Hobbit was a pretty solid adaptation from the book, and the book also reminded me that this story was the first time I experienced “NO, MAIN CHARACTERS DON’T DIE, HOW DARE YOU,” and probably was the first book to make me cry. I must have been 8 or 10 years old. I FORGOT HOW MUCH THIS STORY INFLUENCED ME.

A Conflict of Visions by Thomas Sowell. I have a longer-than-usual list of things to say about this book. First is that it was just that level of difficult that I was struggling to understand while reading it (on Audible), but I think I got it. Sowell has several base concepts that I see repeated throughout his books, though he does like to dedicate whole books to specific aspects of the same topic. He is pretty damn thorough that way. So, for example, I would put this book in the middle of a three-book spectrum of similar concepts: Intellectuals and Society (most concrete and easiest to read), A Conflict of Visions (next-level abstraction, a little difficult to read), Knowledge and Decisions (root abstract concept, very difficult, I have not been able to get past chapter 2). The second thing I have to say is about a couple interesting concepts it proposes. Its whole point is to help readers understand the roots of two ways of seeing the world that come into severe conflict politically, and he calls them by their root titles: the constrained and the unconstrained visions. He traces the path of each back through the intellectuals that most spoke of them (tending to contrast Adam Smith with William Godwin and Condorcet). Though he leans heavily toward the constrained vision (based on reading his other works) he does his best to make this book an academic study of both, with both of the visions' strengths and flaws and reasoning and internal consistencies fairly laid out. In doing so, he helped me understand a few things that make this situation really difficult for people on opposing sides to communicate. One of them is that root words and concepts literally mean different things to different people. I had some vague notion of this before, but he laid out three examples in detail: Equality, Power, and Justice. It was kind of astounding to see just how differently these three words can be defined. It makes me think that arguing about any specific issues rooted in these concepts is fruitless until first an understanding has been reached on terms, because otherwise two parties are endlessly talking past each other. Another really interesting idea he brought up is the existence of “hybrid visions” and he named both Marxism and Fascism as hybrid visions. This was especially fascinating to me because I have seen the accusation of “Nazi” flung around ad nauseam and I wondered how it was that both sides were able to fling it at each other so readily. Well, it’s because Fascism is actually a hybrid vision, so both sides have a grain of truth but miss the whole on that particular point. In any case, this was a little difficult to read but had some fascinating information. For people who are wondering what on earth this gap is between political visions, how on earth to bridge the gap, or why the gap even exists in the first place, this is a really informative piece.

Movies

The Hobbit & Fellowship trilogies (movies). I mean, it’s definitely not my first watch, not even my second. But I went through it with Sergey this time and that means the run-time is double because we pause to talk and discuss details. This watch came about partly due to Sergey’s contention that Gandalf’s reputation far outstrips his actual powers, so we ended up noting down every instance of Gandalf’s power to see if that was true. Conclusion: Gandalf is actually a decently powerful wizard, but tends to use the truly kickass powers in less-than-dire circumstances. That aside, this movie series was always a favorite for me. I rated The Hobbit trilogy lower the first time I saw it but, frankly, all together the six movies are fantastic and a great way to sink deep into lore-heavy fantasy for a while. And I’m catching way more easter-egg type details after having read the Silmarillion so it’s even more enjoyable. (finally, after about a week of binge-watching) I forgot how much this story impacted me. I forgot how wrenchingly bittersweet the ending is. I forgot how much of a mark that reading and watching this story left on my writing.

Upside-Down Magic. Effects were good. Actors were clearly having fun and enjoying everything. Story didn’t make enough sense for my taste, but it was a decent way to kill flight time.

Wish Dragon. So, yes, it’s basically an Aladdin rewrite, but it’s genuinely a cheesy good fluff fest that made me grin a whole lot.

Plays

Esther (Sight and Sound Theatres). < background info > This is my third time to this theatre. There are only two of these in existence and they only run productions of stories out of the Bible. The first time I went I saw a production of Noah, the second time I saw a production of Jesus. My middle sister has moved all the way out to Lancaster, PA in hopes of working at this theatre. My husband and I came out to visit her. < /background info > So. Esther. They really pulled out all the stops on the costumes and set. I mean, REALLY pulled out all the stops. And the three-quarters wrap-around stage is used to great effect. I tend to have a general problem of not understanding all the words in the songs, but I understood enough. I highly recommend sitting close to the front for immersive experiences. This theatre puts on incredible productions and if you ever, ever, EVER have the opportunity to go, take it. Even if you think it's nothing but a bunch of fairy tales, STILL GO. I doubt you'll ever see a fairy tale produced on another stage with equal dedication to immersion.

Shows

The Mandalorian (first two seasons). Well. This was pretty thoroughly enjoyable. It felt very Star-Wars, and I’d kind of given up after recent movies. Felt like it slipped into some preaching toward the end? Not sure, I could be overly sensitive about it, but I enjoyed this a lot (though I did need to turn to my housemate and ask where the flip in the timeline we were because I did NOT realize that the little green kid IS NOT ACTUALLY Yoda).

Games

Portal & Portal 2. Portal is probably the first video game I ever tried to play, back when I had no idea what I was doing. Back then, I attempted to play it on my not-for-gaming Mac laptop. Using my trackpad. Once the jumping-for-extra-velocity mechanic came into play, I just about lost my mind trying to do this with a trackpad and gave up. Later I returned to the game and played it with my then-boyfriend on a proper gaming computer. Now, after having played several games and gotten better at "reading the language" of video games, I decided I wanted to see if I could beat the Portal games by myself. Guess what. I BEAT 'EM. Yes, I remembered most of the puzzles in Portal so that's a little bit of a cheat, but I'd say a good 2/3 of Portal 2 was new puzzles to me. It is crazy how proud I feel of myself that I could beat Portal 2, especially. Learning how to play video games at this age has really knocked down the lie, "You can't learn anything." Though I still suck at platformers and games that require precision. Since I find those types frustrating, I probably won't be playing many. Games are about enjoyment, so I'll push myself a little, but not to the point where I can't stand what I'm playing.

The Observer. I like the concept and the art but I don't think I could keep trying to play this game. It's really depressing. My in-game family members all died of illness or accident or committed suicide. I also kept getting executed by the state. In order to keep us all alive I'd have to do pretty terrible things that I have a hard enough time contemplating even in a fictional setting.

Baba Is You. Fun and interesting concept, but I got stuck pretty early on. Don't think I want to push as hard on this one.

[scaramoon]

OKAY SO LORE I’M TYPING THIS IN MY NOTES APP AS I’M WATCHING THE STREAM TO GIVE YOU THE FULL EXPERIENCE AND TO MAKE SURE I DONT MISS TO TELL YOU ANYTHING

there’s someone playing piano?? like straight up video of someone at a piano,,,,i think it’s yu-peng chen!! the song he’s playing is so pretty :( THEY HAVE A WHOLE INAZUMA THEMED SET HE’S PLAYING IN?? THERES AN ACTUAL INAZUMA ARCHON STATUE IN THE BACKGROUND AND EVERYTHING??

the stream is in chinese!! with subtitles!!

it will be 2.0 AND inazuma is now officially confirmed!!

now there’s a trailer! ITS ALL SO PRETTY AND OMG THE VOICE ACTORS?? GOROU AND THOMA WERE SHOWN!! oh my god the pyro cube?? looks so?? scary?? AAAAH THOMA THOMA THOMA??? STOOD NEXT TO AETHER?? IM SCREAMING rn they’re shaking ayaka!! and now yoimiya!! her voice actor is so cute i’m- SAYUUUU!!!! AGHH SHES SO CUTE BYE GOROU GORIU GORIU GOROU AAAAHHH HE EAS THERE HE WAS THERE AAAAAH

FIRST CODE: AS6BQKLY9GLD

now they’re back to the set!! they’re introducing some of the developers, right now there’s aquaria who’s the combat designer in genshin and rn they’re talking about the stages and joys of development and how the process works,,,i actually like this part!! it’s nice to see the people working on a game i’m so fond of talk so passionately about their thoughts while they’re working on it :> he said everyone at mihoyo loves the game as much as we do and that it’s all of us together in teyvat and i went 🥺 ngl

now he’s talking about inazuma and how different it was than mondstadt or liyue and how different the challenges there were! they put a lot of thought into the electro aspect of inazuma as well as the “eternity” part of it. there will be more dev talk later and now they’re just announcing the fan art contest that starts today

now they had a set change and there’s a different dev, and now they’re talking about the cultural and design aspects of inazuma! they say they love to see fan theories and that they often leave little clues in the game and that it brings them joy and motivation when people find and decipher them. they’re talking about the tea house now and the shiba inu that owns it; they hope players can discover all the little details the writers and designers put all over inazuma,,THEY JUST DRANK IN SYNC BC THEY STARTED TALKING ABOUT UNIFORMITY IN INAZUMA IM SOBBING,,,,ok wait it’s actually rlly interesting bc they’re talking about how they made sure every single detail in inazuma contributes/reflects the story and the “electro archon strives for eternity” story i’m- they’re currently talking about the real life inspiration they had, for example how the sacred sakura tree came to be and what it means

now they’re showing character combat (?) trailers!! ayaka is first, now yoimiya!! they’re actually showing the pyro cube in yoimiya���s!! THEYRE SHOWING SAYUUU MY BBY SHES SO CUTE they’re joking about how genshin players have been waiting for ayaka since the beginning of the game lmaooo bye 😭 they’re talking about the new characters now, what kind of people they are, what to expect from them and what their character traits are!! ayaka is elegant but also sweet and cute, yoimiya is creative and somewhat childish, enthusiastic and gets along with everyone, sayu sleeps a lot to grow taller and is a very well trained tiny ninja

we’re getting two new story chapters, act I and act II as well as ayaka’s and yoimiya’s story quests!!

THEYRE TALKING ABOUT THOMA, he’s observant apparently and has a very mysterious character!! they’re also talking about sara and kokomi AAHHHH GOROU GOROU!! they didn’t say much about him other than that he’s very dependable and fierce in battle!! they also mentioned yae sakura!!

SECOND CODE; GBNA9J5H9Y4H

another scene change and another dev, now it’s cissie!! she’s the one designing the inazuma map/landscape creator and they’ll be talking about geological design and the scenery of inazuma since it’s a archipelago as well!! she’s talking about the different uses of colour and shapes and how they’re using them to impact the player’s gaming experience; she also said that they tried to pay homage to classic ghibli movies with some of the design choices they made!

rn they’re showing “the shimmering voyage” which is the 1.0 ost w 68 songs which will me available soon!! now they’re talking to yu-peng chen THEY HAD THE LONDON SYMPHONIC THEATRE RECORD THE MONDSTADT SOUNDTRACK, THE SHANGHAI ONE THE ONE FOR LIYUE AND NOW THEY ASKED THE ONE IN TOKYO TO DO THE ONE FOR INAZUMA?? HELLOO?? they pay attention to the smallest details i swear i respect that so much wow

THE THEATRE MECHANICS EVENT IS COMING BACK IN INAZUMA!! we’re getting gardening for our tea pot too!! new enemies called “ruin senitel (?)” which is essentially a worm version of the ruin guard?? it looks weird and scary ngl,,,we get new fatui enemies, “the mirror maiden” as well as normal human enemies in inazuma, dressed like samurais,,

ayaka’s banner is first, then yoimiya & sayu,,,we get 2 new 5 star weapons as well 5 new craftable inazuma weapons. we get 2 new artifacts sets, emblem of severed gate and shimenawas remembrance, we get the ability to choose an artifact by sacrificing 3 5 star artifacts and creating an artifact strongbox; new system for the weapon banner: you pick which of the 5 star weapon you want and if you don’t get it, you get “fate points” and with those you can choose the one you want!

THIRD CODE: LS6T4L9ZZ7TH

and that was it!! yu-peng chen is playing the piano again as a farewell, i guess

AHH TYSM BBY ALL THE KISSES FOR YOU 😞🙏

i really like how much detail they put into it though :( like i’m ngl i am an impatient little shit but fr its so nice to know the devs love it as much as we do, i’ll gladly wait knowing they put so much detail in it :(

ALSO SJDJFJ kazuha and sayu sleeping on warm rocks together send tweet side note: big brother kazuha is v sweet me thinks, they’re related now i said so

i saw some stuff about thoma when i opened twitter a second ago and people are lowkey pressed that their characterizations of him are wrong 😞 that’s what they get for saying he got downgraded 😁

also,,, ruin sential,, y’know the “upgrade, go back, I SAID GO BACK” meme ?? that’s me w ruin guards, hunters, and graders so 😃 i stg if that thing can go underground i’m gonna cry. OH ALSO i heard about the garden thing a while ago and i don’t remember a lot of what was said but it’s really cool >:)

pov you’re me using kazuha to fight the samurais bc i think it’s funny

OOH WAIT THE ARTIFACT THING SOUNDS COOL THOUGH :0 do we just get to pick what type it is, or do sub stats and stuff carry over/give you a higher chance of getting certain sub stats? either way i’m v happy about that i have so much maiden stuff and uh. no one to put it on :”)

the weapon banner thing sounds cool too :> i don’t have a five star weapon bc i’m scared to waste primos but mayhaps if i can choose... >:)

also shout out to yu-peng chen for being amazing, thought one of the mondstadt songs would be easy to play and i was Very Wrong

[vanquishedvaliant]

The sidedish is scrolling your blog and not finding you talking about new anime

I must not be hip enough to recognize precisely what you’re getting at by ‘sidedish’, but I just don’t usually post it much on tumblr unprompted anymore because writeups are a pain, they don’t usually get much traction, and I’m more than satisfied talking about it in discord with people that are actually going to listen and respond.

I DO have thoughts on new anime I can serve if it’s that in demand, though. 

Here’s what I’m watching this season with some initial reaction ratings based on the first couple episodes

New this season;

Wonder Egg Priority 10/10

UraSekai Picnic 10/10

Kumo desu ga, nani ka 8/10

Kemono Jihen 9/10

Hortensia Saga 7/10

Soukou Musume Senki 7/10

Gekidol 6/10

Sequels;

Cells at Work 9/10

Cells at Work: Black! 9/10

Uma Musume Pretty Derby 10/10

Tensei Shitara Slime Datta Ken 8/10

Log Horizon 8/10

Dr Stone 10/10

Continuing from last season;

Higurashi ... Gou 10/10

Hanyou no Yashahime 6/10

Jujutsu Kaisen 10/10

I’m also watching the original Higurashi in between off days to catch up to where Gou is, since I’d never seen it before and it’s clear I’m not getting the full story in Gou anymore without it.

Deeper thoughts under the cut.

Wonder Egg Priority and Urasekai Picnic are the clear AOTS contenders. Both are at once extremely superficially similar but very different in practice, and both bring something unique and charming to the table.

Urasekai is extremely notable at being a well executed supernatural adventure anime that is also a yuri; as much as I love pure romances like Bloom into You or Adachi and Shimamura, it’s very rare that we get anime with lesbian main characters or WLW romance where the romance itself isn’t the focus, that includes a serious, intriguing plot alongside the elements of romance. You know, like straight people get without a question every single story ever.

It’s got this very classic cryptid / SCP / otherworld adventure feel and has the right comedic and tension beats to be quite good, though its long term impact will be determined by what kind of further message it has.

Wonder Egg Priority immediately comes off with extremely powerful vibes in the vein of things like Flip Flappers, which I mean in the highest compliment. A surreal, metaphor-filled story of dreams and desires and well laid subtext, with colourful, exotic action and a snappy pace. This one’s extremely interesting to me, and its first episode was masterfully efficient in setting up its premise both aesthetically and thematically.

The real test for Wonder Egg will come with time; this is a story that trades heavily in meaning; so it’ll have to run longer and come to a conclusion to really test what kind of impact it’ll have. For now, I’m VERY interested and cautiously optimistic.

Spider Isekai is a charming twist on the typical flood of fantasy game / isekai stories placing our protagonist at the extreme low end of the power curve, and quite UNLIKE Slime Isekai or most others on the market like last season’s Kuma Bear, this one seems intent on keeping her there rather than immediately granting her insane godlike powers and thrusting her back above the curve.

The parts of the show that focus on the spider herself are lovely; there’s a real tension and sense of stakes in her struggle to adapt, slowly getting used to her new body and gaining levels and abilities, making even simple conflicts against frogs or lizards seem life threatening and serious, giving us a real reason to root for her.

On the other hand, the show frequently switches focus to... the entire other classroom of isekai’d children which is by far less interesting. There’s potential in there somewhere for a story about mass isekai’d kids adapting, but other than some details like one girl being gender swapped, and another being the class pet, there’s just really not much interesting about them at the moment and these sections just feel like a waste of time while waiting for the Spider to come back.

I don’t doubt that they’ll eventually meet up and have their stories intertwine... but at the moment, I don’t think I actually want that to happen. We’ll see where this one goes.

Kemono Jihen took me by surprise, and I wasn’t planning to watch this one unti l saw some screencaps. But the first two episodes have been outstanding, giving us a fantastic supernatural mystery detective agency plot and characters with real emotions, eye catching action scenes, and a compelling mystery.

Definitely looking forward to more of this one.

Hortensia Saga seems like a fairly typical fantasy war chronicle RPG story. It feels very in the vein of early to mid era fire emblems, and I happen to like anime like this that are solidly executed, like Grancrest Senki a while back. It’s doing a good enough job so far to keep my interest. Nothing game changing here, but a decent offering.

Soukou Musume Senki; this one also comes across in the standard seasonal fare of superpowered teenagers fighting aliens, this time with power armor and mild isekai elements. The monster designs are good this time, and the second episode brought us some nice moral / political dialogue showcasing some level of self awareness and depth. It’s fun so far.

Gekidol this show wants really badly to be compared favourably to Shoujo Kageki Starlight Revue. They’re hamming up the theatre tropes, putting out specials, sliding in secret background lore. First episode was fairly interesting, but the second seriously dropped the ball with its half assed Idol episode, and incredibly tone deaf play at a heartwarming moment.

I’m gonna keep watching this one for now, but it really needs to prove to me it has some meat and isn’t going to just keep borrowing tropes from other shows to lend it superficial “deep” merits.

For sequels,

Cells at Work is as cute, wholesome, and info-taining as ever. I think the OP this time is missing a little oomph, but the show itself is still going strong.

Cells at Work: Black! is offering a new take on it with a slightly darker and mature setting with a stressed out alcholic smoker at risk of contracting STDS, with a little bleaker tone and harsher stakes. It relies on the background of the original Cells at Work to work both tonally and narratively, but with that support it provides something quite interesting and unique.

The usual Cells at Work metaphors and humanization of bodily processes are just as excellent as always, and I’m giving special credit to the sketch about alcholic liver damage being compared to drunken abuse of host club employees, displaying a perhaps obvious if natural juxtaposition of the physical and emotional damage the substance abuse is causing to both the body itself and others around them.

Uma Musume; Horse girls! Racing! Just as surprisingly excellent as last season, giving us a fantastic sports story anime with charming characters and balanced stakes, with a good helping of humour. Easy recommend.

Slime Isekai: This one’s still going strong but has diverged from it’s original premise quite seriously. There’s nothing intriguing about this being an isekai  about being reincarnated as a slime anymore; and he’s way too overpowered for any of the combat to have any stakes. What it DOES have however is a fascinating look at the birth of a fantasy nation of monsters, politics, science, and social development of a varied and multicultural monster nation. And THAT I’m still in for.

I will seriously never forgive them for making Bobcut Lizardgirl into a regular ass human though. It has a serious problem with de-monsterizing its character designs and seriously reducing their appeal.

Log Horizon the true king of MMO isekai is back after 7 long, long years, and it’s jumping STRAIGHT into the depth of its political intrigue and deep understanding and development of the socio political issues inherent to its setting. Somewhat dry as ever, but truly fascinating for those looking at a more serious exploration of what the concept of living in a game actually means.

Dr Stone: I don’t have to hype this up, do I? Mad science speedrunning the development of human culture from the stone age up! This time they’re going to war! They made cell phones and cup ramen out of rocks! It’s heartwarming, emotionally rich, entertaining and informative, and funny as all hell. A classic for sure.

Higurashi. Everyone knows higurashi. Thing is, I just never watched it. We thought Gou was going to be a remake, but then it ended up being Rebuild of Evangelion, so I stopped at episode 12 or so and went back to watch the original. Classic horror mystery.

Yashahime. Yikes. This one’s... well. I don’t have any especial nostalgia or affection for Inuyasha like many people, but Yashahime is clearly a very middling approximation of it. There’s things to like here, the main trio of characters are all great designs, Moroha standing even head and shoulders above them as a truly endearing goblin child, and it really does feel in ways like 90s toonami fare. But there’s some lack of depth going on here, and I just don’t even know what to say about the Sesshoumaru pedophilia thing. Extremely questionable plotting.

[a-student-out-of-time]

Twisted Sister Arc Review Part 1

Hi guys I’m the Anon who does the reviews around here…guess you could call me the Review Anon? Wonder what the lore behind me would be…anyway that doesn’t matter! Point is, I have an Arc to review and Jesus is this a big one. So big that A) I’m doing submissions (with permission from the Mod of course) and B) I’m splitting the review into 3 parts. Heavy Arcs are Heavy and a LOT of stuff happens here so let’s get right into it!

So, the parts of the Twisted Sister Arc are first the Massacre, second is the Mindwipe and third is the Prison Break. Last one doesn’t start with M but I’m not doing rhyming here, but that’s enough time wasting let’s get right into it~

Massacre

Easily the darkest part of the Arc but given the Arc is basically Kanade being a Slasher Killer here, what do you expect? While Danganronpa is a franchise about murder, and we had serial killers in it both canon and fanon the nature of the Killing Game means that a full-blooded mass killing akin to many slasher films hasn’t really occurred in the franchise before. This makes Kanade’s bloody rampage here even more disturbing, as while we have had mass killings before, see Mukuro’s rampage through Giboua Middle School in Killer Killer, those are established as backstory drops for the characters, we never actually see one being carried out in action. And going back to that massacre, Mukuro only did it because Junko thought her sister’s killer intent might have slipped and it’s to prove to her she is still a killer, but here Kanade is killing for cold blooded revenge. And she doesn’t just kill a bunch of randoms as she brutally murders Iroha, Peko, Akane, Nekomaru, Sonia and Kokoro very brutally and very effectively. I knew something was up given that the entire school went into lockdown and all the fighters from Class 77-B were geared to fight Kanade to the death, and Kanade is such a pansy of a fighter that Sonia beat the living shit out of here, and Syo was taken down by the QC, and we all know how terrifying Syo is. But once the bodies started to drop, I knew that the first time that Hajime would reset on purpose was coming up and there were so many questions. Who set Kanade up for this? Someone had to be helping her…. but who and why? Juu could have let her out but he couldn’t have supplied Kanade with her tools and intel (more on that later) so it has to be someone else.

Within the darkness of this timeline there is of course your heroes. There are those like Peko who got a lucky shot on Kanade which set a chain line of events leading to Kanade’s death, Mikako who made Kanade’s injuries worse and Kokoro who stabbed Kanade in the eye. But those small victories led to total loses as even if Peko didn’t die, she would be crippled for life and moreover she failed to protect her classmates from Kanade’s wrath, and Mikako lost her mother, just as she started to finally connect with her. You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned two names yet, and that’s because they deserve their own paragraphs, I am of course referring to Nikei and Hibiki.

I’m gonna start with the next person who attacks Kanade and that is of course our Journalist boy here. To say this day has been terrible to him would be a massive understatement as one minute he is suffering an energy crash from downing one too many Red Bulls and having lewd thoughts, to running faster than if he happened to be in Mexico (Seriously, if you happen to be a journalist just don’t go to Mexico) to Hope’s Peak and thanks to Ankle Effects, arriving alongside Hajime to a bloodbath. There’s his constant refusal to accept that Iroha is killed, even though we as the audience knew that given Iroha tried to stop Kanade as soon as she arrived at Hope’s Peak and that Kanade was seen by Sonia and co chopping up security guards, the likelihood of her survival was next to none. This carries on from the conversation Nikei had with Yoruko in the previous Arc where he still believes he is dangerous and that he doesn’t see the other Voids as friends or equals, but rather he took the role as leader because he wanted to have power for once in his life, something he alluded to in the Void Theatre during Chapter 5. However, his reaction to Iroha’s unknown safety, and eventually the truth that Kanade really did butcher the poor painter, proves otherwise. While Nikei’s relationship with his fellow Voids canonically won’t get revealed until LINIQ decides to get around to doing the Onmake mode, in which one of the stories in that is going to be about Void pre Mikado- with someone, most likely Nikei, being the POV character, here the fact his first thoughts upon finding out his ‘little sister’ is dead is to disregard the no-killing rule and just beat Kanade to death, proves that he does care about his fellow Voids, but is in several layers of denial. Out of all the Voids, Nikei is easily the most guarded and paranoid of the lot, and while the others have loosened up around Hajime and co, Nikei still has a lot of inner demons he has to deal with before he could truly open up to the rest of the QC. And Kanade chopping his right hand off, doesn’t help matters though I do give Nikei credit that unlike in the OG timeline, where upon his right hand been blown up by his exploding gun, he just broke down crying, here, he tries to carry on the fight regardless, or he would have had the other person I need to talk about didn’t show up. This is pretty important to establish that while most of the Voids now are pretty far removed from their canon selves and are unlikely to regress back in that, Nikei is still closely tied with his bastard canon self and more work needs to be done for him to detach from that.

But moving on from someone who needs to get some work done, let’s move onto someone who has seen the natural conclusion of their character development, Hibiki! Ever since Hajime and Chiaki rescued Hibiki from her twisted sister (*rim shot*) back in July, she has been making a ton of progress, firstly coming to terms with what Kanade did and her true nature, developing friendly healthy relationships with Class 77-B, the QC and of course a romantic relationship with Hajime. It seemed kind of cliché for Hibiki to fall for Hajime but then again a) Danganronpa can be cliché at times and B) As a Danganronpa Protagonist Hajime cannot turn off his swag. Then there is her officially joining the QC, learning how to fight and being a complete and utter badarse and a caring lover when needed as she confronted Hajime back when he died the second time. We all knew it was only a matter of time when Hibiki had to confront her sister and when Kanade broke into the school, we saw fully, how much Hibiki has grown in the past 3 months. The old Hibiki would have curled up in a corner terrified, crying and probably going into the Puppet State. Here though, Hibiki’s FIRST THOUGHTS upon finding out that Kanade is more dangerous now is to done some armour and get some weapons, and face her sister head on with no hesitation. All without going into the Puppet State at least once, which probably means that its more or less gone now. Kanade tried to talk her sister out of fighting her, but Hikibi isn’t buying Kanade’s insurance anymore and a fight breaks out. If this ever gets animated or becomes a visual novel, I would love to see the Hibiki vs Kanade fight animated as its brilliant, its epic and it’s just so satisfying to see Kanade getting the living snot beaten out of her. You could argue that Nikei’s mauling of Kanade was like that but there, Nikei was more or less in grief due to Iroha’s death and the whole thing was as painful to watch as the final fight in Captain America: Civil War, not saying what because spoilers ahoy. Here though is a glorious battle, as Hibiki gets to deliver justice onto her demonic sister and it is SO SO satisfying, given that a reset happens shortly afterwards.

And sadly, with that, we come to easily the weakest part of not only this part of the arc, but the arc overall, Yasuke’s multiverse theory. It could be written better, and even the Mod agrees that the way it was presented shouldn’t have been the way it worse, that having Umeko throw some ideas at Hajime and him coming to the conclusion that they might have been living in a multiverse be better narrative then Yasuke be like ‘Oh hey I am suddenly an expert on Time Travel now’. It would make Hajime breaking his no kill rule that much more impactful as he doesn’t have the excuses of not only Nikei’s who was currently going through a mental breakdown, and in the current plot where Yasuke more or less planted the seed of doubt in Hajime’s mind. Yasuke still has a role to play in this arc but during the Massacre timeline, I feel like he could have been removed entirely from the plot and not only would it have made no difference, but then most readers wouldn’t be complaining about it as much as Yasuke being a general A-hole wouldn’t tick them off. I’m not saying ‘THIS IS AS BAD AS ONCOMING STORM’ as that Arc was just a giant clusterfuck of a mess, and aside from this one part, the arc is very strong overall, but I will give criticism when due. I’m not mentioning my thoughts on Yasuke as a whole here because he’s more relevant in other parts of the Arc. However, Hajime killing Kanade and himself at the same time is brilliant and seeing Kanade begging for her life as Hajime throws her out of the window is so satisfying given not only all the crap she has been dealing up until that point, but also because in SDAR2, she was 100% fulfilled with the events at that point and given it was HIBIKI who was begging for her life then, let’s just say karma is a bigger bitch then Kanade is.

And that concludes the Massacre part of the Arc as Hajime kills himself and Kanade at the same time and he goes back to just before Nikei started to have indecent thoughts. No time to look at the 3rd page of the national newspapers’ boy, we got a serial killer to stop! And with that I’m stopping here as the Massacre part is finished. But this review is far from over, this is just here because otherwise my, the Mod’s and everyone else’s brains won’t be able to process all of this. Stay tuned for part 2 when we cover Kanade’s capture, a scrum debate among the QC and a bold move by the Mod which I do wish will come up more! Until then, Adios! - Review Anon

//Part 1 of 3

//Finally get to submit these

[probablyottrpgideas]

Tabletop Asks

In reference to the previous post: 1.) Game Master, Player or both? Why? 

I am currently lucky enough to be player in one game and DM in another (both 5e D&D), however ordinarily I am overwhelmingly the DM/GM. 

2.) When did you start role playing? How old were you? 

My first start with published tabletop adventures was actually quite late, in my second year of university when I was about 19, so 11 years ago now, with D&D 4e. However, I think my first freeform roleplaying experiences were with a mate of mine all the way back in primary school, where we had this quite extensive worldbuilding and characters. It was my first introduction to the idea that I wanted to be a writer.

3.) What was the first role playing book you ever owned? 

The 4e PHB, DMG and MM all at the same time. I had a job then, missed playing, decided “fuck it, I’ll start my own” and dived in.

4.) Describe the first game you ever ran or played in. 

A 4e Starters Box run on Keep on the Borderlands. I played a Dwarf Fighter out of the box, which I named Xzienne (which some of you know is my regular online handle). He was fun; in my oh-so-extra way, I kept my game notes as In-Character journal entries.

5.) Which system did you grow up with? 

D&D, all the way. Fourth edition and then Fifth, with a look at Third in between. But I’ve played about a dozen or two different systems all up.

6.) Which system do you play now? 

Predominantly 5e

7.) Longest campaign you’ve run or played in? 

My D&D “Empires Intelligence Services” campaign ran from 2016-2020.

8.) Where did you meet your current gaming group? 

I tend to throw my groups together from among various people I know from all over. My favourite group ever was the one formed entirely of cast members from our local theatre company production of Wicked.

9.) Strategic combat or dramatic plotlines? 

Does it need to be either/or? I feel like good drama gets you invested in the character’s outcomes, good combat (or puzzles or traps or whatever) gets you invested in the character’s actions. You want people to achieve their goals with emotional satisfaction but without just narrating to them; they need to feel involved in the process of making those goals come about. Challenges are not just there for the Power Gamers and the Slayers, they make the plotlines feel satisfying for everyone.

10.) Favorite RPG genre?

I love Science Fiction and I love Fantasy, and my own work so often smashes the two together. I write a lot of Contemporary/Urban Fantasy, and my D&D world is a magepunk magitech setting with spacefaring aircraft and so forth.

PLAYER CHARACTERS - Describe:

11.) Your first character. 

Xzienne the Dwarven Fighter, mentioned above. My first character I made though, on the other hand, not including NPCs, was much later. I think it was probably Tetsuo, my Shin-jin from a Dragonball RPG

12.) Your favorite character. 

Definitely Ortlinde. An Aasimar Witch who was the granddaughter of a Valkyrie, and was mad that the gods would be so callous as to bar her mother from Valhalla just because she wasn’t a warrior, and so tried to stage a coup against Asgard. Fuck she was cool.

13.) Your most ridiculous character. 

If not Ortlinde, then possibly Parian, my 13th Age Bard whose “One Unique Thing” (a 13th Age mechanic that I love) was that he could modify his spells on the fly by casting the verbal components as full poems, which I would write and perform in-session. I once got to add a Fear effect to a Thunderwave because I made it sound like the trumpets of judgement day, and I managed to cast Charm Person but with an allied player as the focus of the target’s charm by making the poem about their character.

14.) The best in-character line you’ve ever had. 

Not a lot of what other players have said have stuck with me, really. Possibly my favourite was Alice’s ranger in Castles and Crusades who said a whole lot of buckwild shit until my halfling begged her not to talk. 

Whereupon she shortly thereafter discovered a secret Dryad home inside a tree, and didn’t mention it to the party. When asked why?

“You told me not to talk.”

15.) Your most epic death. 

I haven’t died that often, to be honest. Probably the most memorable death was Parian, who got crushed in a moving wall trap and had to be scooped up in a bag and carried around as “bard soup” until a True Resurrection could be cast.

16.) Your most disappointing death. 

See above.

17.) Something that shouldn’t have worked, but did. 

Meliorn Metcalfe, Tiefling Spellbinder, orchestrating an ambush in a town square against the people who had been sending thugs to attack the party in their beds and stealing shit from the townsfolk. I set up traps (clay pots filled with caltrops and poison), used sunrods to blind the attackers while we had our backs to the light, and we greased the buildings around the area so that they couldn’t climb to safety. It went perfectly, even after they rocked up with a gargoyle.

18.) Something that went hilariously awry. 

Just recently I was playing in a Wildemount game which saw the party running Benny Hill style around an ancient lab from a Wight. In the process I got nearly killed by both flying knives and a very angry carpet.

19.) Your most memorable in-character moment. 

Ortlinde’s speech to Frigg, lambasting the Gods for their mistreatment of mortals. 

20.) The coolest item you ever got and how you came to possess it.

The Masque of Clavicus Vile, from the Elder Scrolls games, pulled from Niddhogr’s treasure hoard and buffing my Spell Save DC to 27 (including other stuff like class features for the Witch and another item which synergised with those). 

GAME MASTERS - Describe:

21.) Your favorite NPC and how the party reacted to him/her 

By far Celia Sapienza, Eladrin Kensai, who became the party Mum even though she was younger than a few of them. She’s now the head of the Empires Intelligence Services Northern Branch.

22.) A game you wish you could run or want to run someday. 

I’ve been eyeing off Dread, Skullduggery and Leverage for years, but I also recently got the Dishonoured game which looks sick as, and Blades in the Dark, and...

23.) Something you made up on the spot. 

So so much, but most recently I had a Marid sailor NPC who I had to improvise and entire story of his previous voyages. I did it in a Brian Blessed voice and the players, no shit, fucking applauded. 

24.) Your most successful game. 

The Wild Huntresses, finally figuring out who had killed the town alchemist and facing off against her and her pet Water Elemental in the caves beneath the hills. Such an epic game. God I miss that group.

25.) Your least successful game. 

Paranoia, but that’s just built into the premise.

26.) The craziest thing your players have ever done, and how it affected your plans. 

I had a player walk straight out the front doors of a castle under siege. I hit him with 2 dozen crossbow bolts. That guy was an asshole.

27.) Your favorite setting or game location. 

I massively love the idea of Eberron, and I love the MTG crossover settings like Ravnica and Theros. 

28.) Your creative process when you plan a game. 

Typically write about a page of notes for every 2-10 hours of gameplay, depending on the amount of combat expected. Things like important NPCs and what they want, where the party are expected to go in general terms and some ideas for things to throw at them when they inevitably wander off the path, that sort of thing. If it’s really plot important, though, I’ve been known to write pages and pages of lore and character info to hopefully seed into conversations. I also once wrote a full script that we did as a table read for a big conversation between a bunch of NPCs that the party were there to listen to but not be involved in. 

29.) The best / worst character concept you’ve ever heard. 

No character concept that fits within the rules is ever really bad, although sometimes the execution isn’t great. Some are very, very dumb, like say every character ever built or played by the asshole player I mentioned a few entries back.

30.) What makes GMing fun for you.

Players getting invested in the world and in each other’s stories. Nothing makes me feel better as a GM than being able to sit back while the players have a full in-character conversation with each other.

[fishoutofcamelot]

(for the ask thing) any book/tv show/movie/song recommendations?

BRO! I heckin got you man! Now, I’m gonna skip the song and book recommendation bit because that sorta thing isn’t really my scene. BUT! In terms of TV? My rec list is like a mile long. I’m gonna include a read-more line, actually. 

BBC Merlin: You know I had to put this on the list. But the fact that you’re on my blog means you’ve probably watched this one, so I won’t go into detail about it. Available on Netflix

Mob Psycho 100: Just a cute, sweet story about a bunch of psychic kids trying to kill each other. A story with this much fighting has no right to be so wholesome. Mob is just a good boy, he doesn’t deserve all this! Fair warning, its messages about identity, self love, and growth WILL make you feel Emotions. Available on various anime pirating websites

Red vs Blue: The found family game is SO strong in this one. By far the best found family plot/dynamic I have ever and will ever experience. The characters are all so solid, yknow? Like it took me three rewatches to understand the plot, but I didn’t even care because I loved the characters SO MUCH. It’s also really, really funny (although some of the jokes have aged a bit poorly tbh). Basically about a bunch of space marines who goof off and accidentally dismantle corrupt governments along the way. Available on Youtube

Supernatural: Is it cringey? Yeah. Does the fandom suck? Also yeah. Is Destiel overrated? BIG yeah. But it’s got monsters, magic, family, and a plot that doesn’t revolve around romance - and really, what more could you ask for? And sure, a lot of people don’t really like the later seasons, but idk I actually prefer them. Season 15 has me THRIVING. I mean come on - character vs author?! Fighting the guy who literally wrote you into existence because he doesn’t want to give your story a happy ending?! Say what you will about Supernatural, but it’s one of the most imaginative shows I’ve ever seen. Available on Netflix

Avatar the Last Airbender: You like stellar animation, intricate worldbuilding/magicbuilding, and a perspective on war that is surprisingly mature for a kids show? Check it out. This show is without a doubt one of the best animated series of all time. Go on. Watch it. It’ll change your life. Available on Netflix

The Umbrella Academy: Time-travelling assassins. Superheroes. Ghosts. Talking monkeys. Murder mysteries. Baller soundtracks. This show will never give you what you expect. I don’t even think I could properly describe it to you. Available on Netflix

Detective Conan: An anime. It’s about a teen detective - think Nancy Drew but bloodier - who witnesses a crime and is fed an experimental poison in order to keep him from telling anyone. But instead of killing him, the poison turns him into a 6-year-old. So now he’s got to solve crimes and take down a criminal organization while in the body of a child. Naturally, shenanigans ensue. Fair warning, the main character becomes a bit of a Mary Sue in later episodes, but the first 300 or so are pretty fun. A few episodes are available on Netflix, but not any of the good ones. You’ll need an anime pirating website for that

Knives Out: My favourite movie ever, of all time. It’s a murder mystery that both subverts and pays homage to its parent genre in all the right places. It’s funny, it’s intelligent, and has a spectacular ending! Although I do wish the fandom would stop being so horny for Ransom, I mean he’s literally racist...No clue where you can find this tbh, I saw it in theatres

Derry Girls: Now I’m not normally a big fan of realistic fiction/sitcom stuff. Despite how funny they are, I’ve not even watched The Office or Parks and Rec because that normal daily life stuff just doesn’t peak my interest. And yet, somehow this story about a group of Irish high schoolers just has me enthralled. Very funny, very well-written, give it a watch. Available on Netflix

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood: Another anime. Phenomenal animation? Check. Fascinating plot and characters? Check. Detailed magic system that gets my lore-obsessed heart fluttering? Big heckin check. So basically two kids try to use Fantasy Science to bring their mom back to life, only the experiment fails and has some pretty nasty consequences - one boy loses his arm and leg, while the other loses his entire body and has his soul bound to a suit of armour. Now they gotta go through government conspiracies, ethical dilemmas, and Daddy Issues to try and get their bodies back. Available on Netflix

The Disastrous Life of Saiki K: Yet another anime. I know, I know, I’m a nerd, get over it. This show doesn’t have a complex plot or even complex characters, tbh, but what it does have is some amazing humour. It’s extremely funny, and it’s also just a nice show to kick back and relax to. Basically this guy who’s so op that he could rewrite the laws of reality on a whim is stuck dealing with relationship drama in high school despite being very, very asexual and very, very tired. Mostly he just uses his powers to avoid people and eat junk food, which is honestly a mood. Available on Netflix

Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated: Honestly I’d recommend almost anything that’s Scooby Doo-related because that was my childhood obsession. I used to have like 20 of the movies on DVD before my mom gave them all away. To this day I still love Scooby Doo, and watch it whenever I get the chance. But if you ask any SD fan, they’ll probably tell you that Mystery Incorporated is the best, most intelligent, most creative installment in the franchise. And they’re right (although I do wish there was less relationship drama...) Available on Netflix

Evil Genius: This is a documentary series about the Collar Bomb Robbery. Now, despite what the above list might indicate, I actually watch a LOT of documentaries, and if I were here to recommend all of them then we would be here all day. Not really ‘funny’ like the other entries on this list, it’s actually rather tragic, but definitely a cerebral viewing experience. Available on Netflix

Screwball: Now this is a documentary that IS funny. It’s about drug scandals in baseball. But the dramatic scene re-enactments are done with child actors that are all wearing fake beards and pretending to be drug dealers. It’s not only a fascinating subject, but it’s got amazing editing and visuals that have me in awe. Available on Netflix

Behind the Curve: Yet another documentary. This one’s about the rise of the Flat Earth movement. You’ll spend most of the time on the verge of having a stroke because of how stupid it all is. Available on Netflix

The Movies That Made Us: Okay okay okay last documentary on the list I swear. This one’s exactly what it says on the tin. It’s a series talking about the behind-the-scenes production of iconic movies like Home Alone and Ghostbusters. I eagerly await the second season. Available on Netflix

Monster Factory: If you’re familiar with the McElroy brothers and their brand of humour, you’ll love this. Griffin and Justin team up to make the most disturbing avatars they can create using video game character creators. The origins of the Final Pam meme. If I had a shirt with a quote from Monster Factory on it, I’d die a happy man. Available on Youtube

Baman Piderman: The dumbest show I have ever watched, but it’s so adorable and stupid and I love it so much. It doesn’t really have a plot, but later episodes allude to the presence of one and I’m upset because there are so many mysteries/questions hinted at and we’ll never get answers because it’s been abandoned. PLEASE watch it. Available on Youtube

Stranger Things: Okay, season 2 was a bit of a let-down imo, but season 1 was ICONIC and the Scoops Troop subplot in season 3 deserved its own freakin spinoff. I’m not joking. I didn’t even like s3 all that much, but the only reason it’s my favourite is because the Scoops Troop plot was so great. People call this show ‘horror’ but I don’t think it’s scary enough for that, although it is admittedly kinda spooky. If you like 80s nostalgia and the horror aesthetic, then I’d give it a watch (Do it for Scoops Troop. Do it for Robin). Available on Netflix

Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart: Despite my overwhelming love for this film, I’ll be the first to admit it’s kinda mediocre. The plot is weird and the romance feels forced, but despite its flaws it manages to be one of my favourite movies. Mostly I just like it for the unique concept and beautiful ending. Also the music is off the par man. Probably because the writer/producer of the movie was the lead singer for a French band called Dionysus (what? I do my research). Available on Netflix

Wakfu: I haven’t seen past season 3, but so far it’s pretty good. You go in thinking it’s just a wholesome action/adventure show about a kid who can create portals - but then it just. Sucks you in. From its bopping theme song to its fantastic found family to the unique worldbuilding, you very quickly fall in love with it. It’s got a cool plot and also talking dragons, and it doesn’t get better than that. Available on Netflix

Mystery Skulls Animated: Technically not a TV show so much as it is a series of animated music videos with a plot, but I’ll be damned if this isn’t one of the greatest things of all time. It’s basically Scooby Doo but if Shaggy got possessed by a demon and killed Fred, causing Fred to become a ghost hellbent on revenge-killing Shaggy in return. And if Scooby was an ancient Japanese spirit that bit off Shaggy’s arm, forcing him to wear a metal prosthetic. Yeah, MSA is wild. It’s only got three videos out so far, with a fourth one coming out this October, but there’s already so much lore! Available on Youtube

Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared: Ah yes, yet another cringey entry on this list. But you know what? Cringe culture is dead!!! And despite its fandom being...like that...DHMIS really is a cool show. Think if Sesame Street was like haunted or something. The episodes about creativity and telling time remain the most unsettling, imo. Definitely worth a watch. Available on Youtube

Inanimate Insanity: Oh boy. Am I seriously recommending you dip your little fingies into the object fandom? Yes. Yes I am. This show is so obscure it makes freakin Detective Conan look popular. At its core it’s a parody of Total Drama Island and Survivor but with anthropomorphized inanimate objects as characters (hence the name). Season 2 is actually really, really good and surprisingly competent. You just gotta get through season 1 first. Available on Youtube

The X-Files: Wow, a live action series on this list? Who woulda thought??? But seriously, this show is really fun. Memes and jokes aside, I love it. Scully and Mulder are fun characters with great chemistry (both platonic and romantic), the Lone Horsemen are hilarious, and every episode is a unique adventure into the most creative acid trips the human mind could conceive of. Phenomenal from start to finish (if you ignore the last season). I have no clue where you would watch this. Pirate it, probably

Buzzfeed Unsolved: Two idiots investigate cold cases and haunted locales while being utter dumbasses about it. You know the “hey demons it’s be ya boi” meme? That came from these guys. Available on Youtube

Kingdom: Ngl, I didn’t go into this expecting zombies. Or for it to take place during Korean feudalism, for that matter. But mediocre dubbing aside, this show has such a clever concept. It takes the zombie apocalypse genre and gives refreshing, unique twists to old tropes that they feel like something new. Seo-bi is my wife and she deserves all the love and appreciation in the world, and those are just Facts. Available on Netflix

My Hero Academia: Superhero high school anime. I personally am not a fan of later episodes/arcs, but the first three seasons are pretty dang good. Diverse, colourful ensemble cast that you easily grow to adore, interesting commentary on disability (although I’m not qualified to give any actual takes on that), and a school curriculum that makes me very, very concerned for the wellbeing of these children. Plus all the superpowers - aka ‘quirks’ - are super imaginative and, well, quirky! I just wish people would stop shipping the main character with his childhood bully...You’ll need to pirate this one too lmao

Danny Phantom: The highlight of this show is its ‘phandom’, because unlike someone (*cough* Butch Hartman), we’re not a bunch of cowards. It’s about a guy who messes around with his parents’ lab stuff and accidentally acquires the ability to die! Well, half-die. He can turn into a ghost and fight other ghosts. Although the show never explores the existential, traumatic fallout of being kinda-sorta-dead, the potential for something deep and emotional is there. Plus there is a LOT of accidental subtext for a Big LGBT+ Metaphor. So much so that the Trans Danny theory is basically canon. Uhhh not available on Netflix anymore so it’s time to whip out your pirate hat, matey

And there you have it! Like I said, I have a lot of TV recommendations. And I just KNOW I’m forgetting a ton, but this is already really long so we’ll have to cut off here. 

Thanks for the ask! <3

[quarktrinity]

Black Friday for musical asks?

the last time i watched black friday was when it first released on youtube so i dont really remember it well so i had to consult my commentary of it in the pms with my friend

Favourite Character: lex. shes hilarious in every damn scene, i have a weakness for alto leads, and she has all the best songs. also shes just very compelling and works well for starkids target audience to see themselves in a lead character.

close second is that guy who works for the president whose actor made the amazing choice to do an obama impression, he was hilarious. i genuinely expected someone to call him barack.

Least Favourite Character: idk if this is a hot take or whatever but i dont like toms character at all. his whole arc is something ive seen in every movie about a man whos wife died in the history of ever. the whole concept is overdone, all his songs last way too long and are boring, and i found myself mentally checking out whenever his Feelings were in focus. i cant even remember what else he did in the show other than freak out about his son and the doll and fuck a nurse.

Favourite OBC Cast Member: not broadway lol but lauren lopez always steals every damn scene shes in. 

Favourite Current Cast Member (If Applicable): N/A

Favourite Song: “our doors are open”! GOD that song made me laugh. sums up the message of the show too

Least Favourite Song: i just. really dont like any song where tom had a major presence. all his solos last WAY TOO LONG, i CANNOT SAY THIS ENOUGH, and theyre way too boring to justify that length, and every song about his romantic arc failed to show why hes even interested in this girl so it just made me dislike hetero romances in fiction more. “do you want to play” is not in this category bc its amazing.

Favourite Act (If Applicable): act 2

Favourite Ship: uh, idk i dont ship anyone in this show lol. consumerism x dying a grizzly death is p hot though

Least Favourite Ship: tom and the nurse lady whose name escapes me. im sorry im still dying on this hill i cant even begin to care about tom

If There is Something I Would Change about The Musical: it needs to stay on one fucking story-thread for more than 5 minutes. there are more protagonists than i can count (why do we need to follow the damn president???) when it should stick to one, and that one is lex. if we followed lex through the entire show, with brief parts focusing on our villains (im kinda fine with the holy trinity of antagonists, it works), the story would be infinitely better.

also, starkid needs to stop this whole deep lore trilogy of hatchetfield shit. the thing is... the guy who didnt like musicals was a good story, and it was fine on its own. we didnt need answers to any mysteries because there were NO MYSTERIES. any theatre in the world could perform tgwdlm, but literally no theatre could perform black friday because it requires the context of tgwdlm for the story to 100% make sense, and it only serves to confuse starkids fandom and make them froth at the mouth for the hopefully-final entry in the trilogy to figure what the fuck is going on. black friday isnt a strong story on its own merit. it requires the fact that its part of a trilogy to make the audience care, which doesnt justify a story existing, shocking i know.

like... i get it. consuming lore and filling out wikis and experiencing the worldbuilding is exciting, but that excitement only lasts like a month. by now, no one talks about black friday except in anticipation for starkids next project. on the other hand, i just saw some firebringer fanart a few days ago, and tgwdlm content is interminable at this point, because it was just so good. it seems like the starkid writers saw the things that made tgwdlm good (strong protagonist, amazing humor, not taking itself seriously, the clever usage of musical theatre as a storytelling medium, etc), and ignored all that, threw it all away, and pandered to the 10 youtube commenters who were making ~Theories~ about the ~Lore~ of the show.

basically, black friday needs a complete rewrite.

Ratings: 4/10, at least it does horror well

[duhragonball]

7 Comfort Movies

Tagged by @pandemicpicnic . List your seven favorite comfort movies, then tag 7 people.   

This is a good thing to pass around, since I could use the diversion, and as I think about this list, I realize how long it’s been since I last saw a lot of these movies.  

In no particular order...

1) Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn

I dunno if these are necessarily comfort movies, as opposed to just movies I like the best, but I don’t watch movies a whole lot, so I’m guessing my all-time favorites are probably close enough.   Movie 12 is good watchin’, period.   This is a movie about everyone working together.    Friends, enemies, strangers, the living and the dead, the damned and the divine.   I watch this movie and wish that we in the real world could put aside our differences so easily and blow up all the Nazis.

2) Superman IV: The Quest for Peace

People say this is the worst Superman movie, but fuck that noise.   This is the only one where Superman throws all the nuclear weapons into the sun.    But one of them has a chicken nugget attached to it, which grows into a clone of Superman with scratchy fingernails, his only weakness.    So Superman has to kick his ass on/with the moon, and then tell everyone that nuclear war is too big a job for Superman, because we’ll just re-arm the minute his back is turned. 

This is a story about high school physics, Luthor.     Sometimes the things we fear the most are only the darker side of our greatest strengths.   If humanity has the power to destroy itself, then doesn’t that mean we have the power to save ourselves as well?   The choice is ours.  

3) Spaceballs

Some killjoys actually hated this movie, and point to it as evidence that Mel Brooks lost his touch.   I respectfully submit that those people are dumb.  Spaceballs came out during the dark years between Return of the Jedi and Phantom Menace, when we all wanted more Star Wars but thought we would never get more.    Brooks heard our pleas, and gave us this movie, which is basically Star Wars with dick jokes all over it.   People always go on about how Star Trek predicted smartphones and the Simpsons predicted the Trump administration, but only Spaceballs was prescient enough to declare: “Fuck!    Even in the future, nothing works!”

This is a story about following your heart.    If all you care about is duty, and obligation, and profit, you’ll end up marrying some dullard, or owing your soul to a talking pizza, or roaming the universe in search of air.   

4) Batman: Mask of the Phantasm

This is the best Batman movie ever, and maybe even the best comic book movie period.    In 1994, Batman the Animated Series was popular enough that they made a feature film and ran it in theaters and everything.  I remember some smartass article at the time questioning whether parents would see the point in taking their kids to watch a movie of something that’s on TV for free, which is just dumb.    It’s not like they ran four episodes of the TV series for this thing.   It’s an original story!   Anyway, Batman has to figure out what the deal is with this new vigilante who fights crime with murder, which is also a crime.   He also gets very sad in place and it’s very emotional and I bought the soundtrack as soon as I could because I wanted to listen to it and feel things.

This is a story about the future, and promises, and the roads not taken.   And when all is said and done, maybe the choices we made were the right ones after all, in spite of our second-guesses.

5) Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

I considered putting Revenge of the Sith on this list, since that’s usually the one I look up clips from on YouTube, but there’s no topping Jedi.   I saw this in the theatre when I was six and everything was awesome.    Jabba the Hutt, wint-o-green lightsabers, speeder bikes, Ewoks breaking stuff with logs and rocks, it’s just a pleasure to watch.   Also, this movie introduces Emperor Palpatine, and lays the foundation for the Sith lore that made me love Revenge of the SIth in the first place.  Not long after we got home from seeing this movie in 1983, I tried to draw this scene in the screencap above, because it left such a deep impression on me.   

This is a story about feelings.    Every butthole in Star Wars is always telling everyone else what to feel and how much they should feel it, and don’t get too attached to this or that.     But in this movie Luke has to exercise restraint and then cut loose, give into his passions and then reign them in, care for his friends and family but also be willing to let them go.    Everyone can give him advice, but he’s got to hoe that row himself, and figure it out as he goes.   He doesn’t always get it exactly right, but he still gets it.   

6) The Transformers: The Movie (1986)

The historians will say that cartoons like the original Transformers were nothing more than glorified toy commercials, made possible by the deregulation of children’s entertainment in the 1980′s.    I find this incredibly unfair, because that analysis ignores the fact that Transformers was a fucking awesome cartoon.    They’re all robots, so they could shoot and punch each other without any guff from standards and practices. And since the show was designed to promote an entire toy line, there were literally dozens of characters, each given a surprising amount of character and personality.   Starscream (center) and Ramjet (right) are practically the same toy, but kids wanted both of them because Starscream is a whiny, shitty drama queen, and Ramjet is a dumbass who likes to hit things with his head.     Astrotrain (left) is just a cool dude who can be a train or a space shuttle. 

This movie is the height of the franchise, where they could raise the stakes even higher, and introduce even crazier concepts like planet-eating monsters and robots actually killing each other for keeps.    I see fans from my generation acting all traumatized over all the deaths, like they never should have done that in a movie marketed for children, but this was a story about renewal.   The old order changeth, and it falls to the newcomers to rise up and carry on.    I’ve always taken a lot of comfort in the way these characters pass the torch.    The Smurfs were never brave enough to have Papa Smurf name his successor.  

7) UHF

Geez, I haven’t watched this one in forever.    I’d have to double-check to see if I even have it on DVD.    UHF was the ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic vehicle from the late 1980′s.   I want to say ‘89.    He plays a guy who takes over a TV station and runs all these ludicrous shows on it until it becomes the most popular channel in town.   It’s basically a bunch of sketch comedy stitched together into a movie, and it doesn’t try to apologize for this.  

This is a story of the importance of imagination, and of being true to yourself.   Al’s character has trouble finding a steady job, and its’ easy to conclude that there’s something wrong with him, but it’s really just that he hasn’t found the right opportunity for his passions and skills.   Once he finds his place, he rises to the occasion.  

And that’s my list.   Now I gotta tag people.   @auralime, @ediblenonsense, @semercury​, @twobellsilence​, @drowning-in-this-starry-serenade​, @cozymochi​, and @glintea​.

[kindredsoulsoftimesofold]

Incoming TROS rant

yes, there will be spoilers as I will be breaking down everything I saw tonight. If I manage to type choking on my tears well after the movie finished.

----

FINAL WARNING IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILERS

Let’s start with a few opening words, this rant will indeed be a long one.

ALL THE LEAKS ARE TRUE. And I mean ALL of them. To a T. As soon as I saw the first half was exactly as I’d read, I was crushed. As I knew what was coming. On that note, i was probably the only person in the theatre who was crying like 15-20 minutes before we were supposed to, I’ll get to that in a bit. I’m saving the WORST for last. Let’s break this shit down.

1. The plot is a mess. An actual mess. I feel like every five minutes I was shaking my head and mumbling ‘what kind of nonsense is this’. The breaking of lore or COMMON SENSE really is substantial. But that is definitely not what I cared about, as I already KNEW this even without the leaks. When you can’t get your two directors to FUCKING WORK TOGETHER TO MAKE A COHESIVE STORYLINE it is bound to grasp for straws and make shit up. IT AIN’T NOTHING NEW.

2. Here’s the kicker. THE DIALOGUE WAS SO BAD, it makes Anakin’s AOTC speech seem like a hymn, or poetry or whatever. They CONSTANTLY say what they’re doing, they’re literally reciting the exposition to each other and it comes off as extremely annoying and makes you feel like a toddler. No hate against toddlers, but I’d rather not be one right now. It feels unnatural, forced and STUPID to the point where I would start WISHING for 3PO to come back on screen because Anthony Daniels somehow managed to snag some actually decent lines for once? I love the man, but the droid usually really annoys the crap outta me. He was literally the highlight of the film. Don’t get me started on the stupidity of all of Lando’s lines, poor Billy. Daisy has to stare angrily most of the time so I don’t really care to recall her lines. Adam, my dear Adam, he tries SO HARD to make do with what he was given but even his lines 90% of the time come off as stupid and out of place. Or the worst type in this movie, EXPOSITIONYY. Don’t get me started on Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford. Boys looked like they didn’t sign up for this shit and were literally force choked to be there. I feel you guys, I feel you. ALSO FOR THE LOVE OF THE FORCE THE TIMES THEY REPEATED WORD FOR WORD LINES FROM OTHER MOVIES I WANTED TO SCREAM. Once is too much, THIS MANY TIMES IT IS A FELONY. And it needs to be punished somehow.

3. Let’s get the positives out of the way because there were FEW. The two scenes I actually REALLY enjoyed watching, for different reasons were:

Ben and Palps meeting. The scene was much longer than the clip and SUPER badass. Sheev’s voice echoes, Ben looks fucking cool and the whole scene is GORGEOUS.

The other is when Ben fights as a Jedi in the end. I’ll get to Ben later BELIEVE ME but without overexplaining, he fights with Anakin’s lightsabre, he’s really speedy and is doing all the Jedi spins and whatnot. I fucking ATE THAT UP. Replay that scene forever please CAUSE I LOVED IT. But I was already crying here so we’ll touch more on that later.

To conclude this segment, the visuals were SUPERB, the sound was AMAZING and (some) of the fights were jaw droppingly cool. But that about concludes the positives!

4. I will comment, as I know a lot of people will care even if I don’t particularily. Finn, Poe, Rose and the merry gang aside from our Jedi are reduced to EH this movie. If you thought you’d never miss Rose boy were you wrong. They introduce new characters and expect you to care about them when they SIDELINED the ones they’d hoped you’d care about BEFORE. And it made me care about NO ONE. Not to mention that, sadly, they are ALWAYS reduced to the boring side plot that really isn’t interested or key to much of ANYTHING. Sure they roused the people and all but would’ve been TOAST if Rey didn’t go all Jesus on the fleet. So at the end of the day, you MAY find some enjoyment with the side characters but their lines were some of the worst, you WILL be force fed new people and you might not really enjoy your previous faves here because even I found myself being completely indifferent this time. (I actually really ENJOYED Finn since TFA. He had a compelling storyline and John Boyega was alright. Couldn’t give two wits about him in this movie. Not a single one. But again, I may not be the perfect person to ask if you really,really like any of these characters.

5. Finally, we have arrived to the main event. THE REYLO.

The backbone of this clusterfuck of a new trilogy. The last Skywalker and Palpatine, coming together instead of apart. The arguably BEST actors (legacies aside) Disney managed to get. Now, I will start this off that I didn’t HATE Rey before this movie. I loved her in TFA, enjoyed her less in TLJ but the novelization fixed that. I was BACK ON BOARD to be her number one stan. In this movie, I couldn’t STAND her. Her lines are basically the director walking you through things, her plotline was obviously made last minute so almost none of it makes sense,  I literally wanted to curl up and DIE from cringing so hard every time someone said ‘you’re a Palpatine’. I thought I was looking at a very expensive rendition of terrible fan fiction. (Not to diss fan fiction in any way, you guys will be my heroes after this catastrophe.) ‘Empress Palpatine’, COME THE FUCK ON AND GET OUT WITH THIS SHIT. Bring back crusty old Snoke for crying out loud! Or even HUX! Who got killed off in a second and had three lines of dialogue, not important I guess? Like a great many things I guess, JJ. But, EVEN Palpatine aside, it was great seeing him again and every scene he was in I got chills, who cares that it makes zero sense at this point. Back to reylo.

Ben. Ben Solo Organa Skywalker. The last hope. The final remnant of something I have loved FOREVER. I grew up with Star Wars, like many others just in a different, post prequel era and they are still my favourites. This might sound ridiculous but Star Wars was part of my heart, my happiness. It brought me joy to watch it, read it, fantasize about it and have it in my life when times were dark or miserable. It MEANT something to me, as I am sure many of you will agree. And Ben was part of that. He was part of something that MEANT something to all of us. He was the last line of the characters we all grew up with and loved. The GRANDSON of Anakin, my favourite character of all time. This was their chance to stop the trend that Loki’s death in IW and Daenerys’ death and turn and many others started and STOP killing people who did wrongs. PEOPLE can change, they can grow and they can learn. Hell, to not stray to far from this franchise REY has killed A LOT of people in this movie alone. She DECIMATES the room full of Palpatine’s followers and never blinks an eye. SHE NEARLY KILLS CHEWIE, DOES KILL BEN (for a minute) and SHE DOESN’T NEED TO DIE. Of course she doesn’t but BEN DOESN’T EITHER. After all that YOU JJ, YES YOU, show me that the LAST SKYWALKER has gone through, suffered, alone and frightened. I would’ve ENDED you if you’d suggested killing him off to me, EVER. He was your chance to do a reverse Vader, AS YOU CLAIMED YOU WOULD. To show a character can come back to the light and be worthy of it WITHOUT DYING. You even set it up as such, which is my next and CRUCIAL POINT.

I’ve been a reylo since 2015. Their dynamic has always been fascinating to me and beautiful. I LOVED all the moments in TLJ, LOVED THEM. In this one, every time they force bond (terrible dialogue aside, again) I was happy. I had a hope that she would bring him back from the darkness and he will keep her balanced. WELL, JJ, guess fuck me huh? And anyone with common sense and human decency. JUST WHEN you shove Ben’s turn in my face, you make him talk to Han, you make him strut in to fight alongside Rey in full Ben Solo Jedi mode, hair blown and casually dressed. It was when he runs onto Exegol that I started weeping. Because knowing that he dies as I did, it broke my heart how it was done. You give me the scene where he fights and you give me hope of what his future could’ve been if only you’d listened to reason and done what was supposed to be done. He is chucked into the pit, WHICH MIGHT I ADD WOULD’VE MADE ME MAD IF THAT WAS HIS END BUT WOULD’VE BEEN SOOOO MUCH BETTER THAN WHAT WE GOT, comes back. And now comes the scene that cemented this as the ABSOLUTE WORST insult to me as a fan, possible. Ben is heartbroken that Rey is dead, the moment is sad and he cradles her dead body and hugs her desperately. Which would’ve been a beautiful and GOOD DIFFERENT type of ending. Or rather not having her die at all and being NEAR her death and him saving her and both living happily ever after BUT NO. JJ AFTER THAT has her come back, smile happily when she sees it’s him, her love her hope and the other half of her SOUL literally (the diad or whatever it’s called is so rare that Palpatine was thrilled they’d formed such a bond, basically space soulmates), he has them kiss, then hold each other and smile at each other with genuine feeling of joy and belonging both of them had sought all their life AND THEN YANKS IT FROM UNDER YOU. The scene where Ben falls flat onto his back is quite comical and I couldn’t help but laugh in my misery and sobbing. Rey doesn’t even cry, we don’t even LINGER on his body or mourn him afterwards or even mention it or EVEN SEE her, THE PERSON WHO LITERALLY FOUND HER SOULMATE AND WAS SO HAPPY WHEN SHE KISSED HIM AND WAS LITERALLY SAVED BY HIM, but no guess that doesn’t require a scene, sure, fuck it LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE. The cheery music that plays up until the moment of his fall, YES THE FALL OF SKYWALKER MIND YOU NOT A FUCKING RISE, was an insult to every fan everyhwere, lifelong or recent or otherwise, it was a punch to the gut, a slap in the face and after this happened I no longer paid attention to the movie. I’d been crying for some time leading up to the moment, I knew what was coming and the execution only made it worse and a more desperate cry rather than only sad, I was hoping it wouldn’t happen somehow. I choked back tears until I finally got home and cried. One of the things which MEANT so much to me, was dead. I no longer have any doubts, that this was intentional. Look at Game of thrones, that was this year. It seemed intentional to make series stop, right? Everyone agrees. They wanted to finally bury the Skywalkers so they could make something unrelated? They kill off all the Skywalkers. Well guess what disney? YOU DIDN’T HAVE TO BRING THEM BACK IN THE FIRST PLACE, YOU MONEY HUNGRY PIECE OF SHIT. No one would have minded a new trilogy, with new characters doing NEW things. Why even drag the Skywalkers and the leagies into this if YOU DON’T WANT THEM HERE? All you got was millions of lifelong fans of the old movies who have already felt or are only now beginning to feel BETRAYED. I swear it disney, I don’t want to feel this misery again. You won’t take Star Wars away from me and the joy it brought me. I will without a care in the world dismiss this new trilogy as something completely separate from canon. You’ve killed your own fanbase. You could’ve had us but you LOST us. You dangled something we wanted in front of us for our money and then you ripped it apart.

If you are anything like me, anything like me at all and have loved SW for however long. if it MEANS ANYTHING TO YOU, I beg you not to see this movie or at the very least, pay for it. You WILL feel betrayed, insulted, heartbroken, devastated and miserable, as I am feeling right now. I was supposed to go see this movie another two times but i cannot and will not spend another CENT on a company that chooses to alienate me. Fine, have it your way. I’m done.

This concludes my rant as I am tired and upset. If I missed out on anything and you are interested in anything else, please do DM me or leave a comment :) We’re all in this together now, the reylos the antis the new fans and the old. We’re all in the same heartbreaking boat, I love you all. And I will love Star Wars. The REAL Star Wars forever. I wasn’t even sad the ‘FRANCHISE’ was ending because it wasn’t. It had ended a long, long time ago.

[ethanlivemere]

Nobody asked, but here’s my opinion on the CATS-trailer

So it’s been about three months since the CATS-trailer came out and somehow I thought NOW would be a good time to express my opinion on it. It’s quite controversial, but have you ever wanted to hear what a long-time hardcore CATS-fan who has been wanting a CATS-movie for years thinks about it? Probably not, but I went and made this very long post anyway.

1)      Cast

Can’t spell ‘cats’ without ‘cast’ and there’s some big names in the list of actors they’ve released. Some are excellent choices, some are more… questionable.

Ian McKellen as Gus: Now this is something that makes me profoundly happy. Sir McKellen honestly seems perfect for the role, I mean, he practically IS Gus the Theatre Cat (maybe a little younger, and less feline). Great choice, looking forward to it. Judi Dench as Old Deuteronomy: Now here’s one of the more questionable ones. I love dame Dench, that isn’t the problem; it’s just that Old D is supposed to be a large, old, deep-voiced male cat, and dame Dench only fits one of those characteristics. Of course, they could very well change Old Deuteronomy to be the matriarch of the tribe rather than the patriarch, and that would probably be fine. I’m more worried about whether Old D’s singing parts (like The Ad-dressing of Cats) would work as well with a higher, female voice. And of course, they would have to do tweaks to the song Old Deuteronomy itself, and ‘Old Deuteronomy’s buried nine husbands’ doesn’t sound that great. Idris Elba as Macavity: Here’s one that I’m very interested in. I think they might give Macavity a larger role in the film, which is a big ‘heck yeah’ for me, and Elba seems like he could portray the Napoleon of Crime like the menacing figure it’s supposed to be very well. I look forward to both the portrayal, and what the writers do with him. Jennifer Hudson as Grizabella: There’s an old saying that goes: “a CATS-performance is only as good as its Grizabella”. Will this one be any good? I don’t know, we’ll have to see. The bits of Memory we have heard so far sound decent, although nothing will ever top Elaine Paige for me (as you will notice further in this post, I’m a bit of a ‘1998 video version’-purist) It should be noted that her design doesn’t look a whole lot like Grizabella, but that’s a different category. As long as she can deliver a Memory that almost makes me cry, then it’s fine. James Corden as Bustopher Jones: I know a lot of people hate Corden, but I personally don’t mind him. He’s okay in my opinion (I have never seen his late night show, so that might be the reason). Whether he’ll be able to pull of BJ’s almost opera-like singing is something we’ll have to wait and see, because I very much doubt he did the singing in One Chance himself. Taylor Swift as Bombalurina: I have no idea how this will turn out. She can certainly sing (something we can’t say for sure about a lot of other cast members) but I have no idea if she’ll make a good Bomba. Rebel Wilson as Jennyanydots: I’ll go ahead and say it: I wasn’t too fond of the Jennyanydots bits in the trailer. They were a bit too slapstick-y for my likes, and Rebel Wilson isn’t exactly known for subtle humor. Once again, we’ll see how it turns out. Jason Derulo as Rum Tum Tugger: Recent CATS-productions have been changing the classic RTT we know and love to some sort of rapper abomination, and many fans (including myself, as you may notice by that wording) don’t like it. It’s unclear which version the movie will be going for: Derulo certainly resembles the rapper version more, but what we saw in the trailer looks like neither, though slightly leaning towards the classic version. Let’s hope we don’t have to hear RTT rap his own song. Ray Winstone as Growltiger: Look, I have never seen or heard of Ray Winstone, but just seeing Growltiger on the cast list fills me with profound happiness, because that’s the one big complaint I have about my beloved 1998 video version: no Growltiger. Hurray for Growltiger’s return!

That’s the main ones I wanted to discuss. Munkustrap seems unimportant in the trailer (we’ll get to that in a bit) so I won’t discuss him. Victoria mainly just has to be a good dancer, and Francesca Hayward seems to be just that, so no further comment (though more on Victoria later).

2)      Character design

Alright, let’s address the elephant in the room: the CGI. Yes, some of the characters make me very uncomfortable. Yes, I hope they change some things before the final product. But what I want to discuss is the designs themselves.

First of all: head shapes. Apart from some exceptions (Grizabella, Old D, Gus) all cats seem to have a human shape of head, and this bothers me. Usually, Cassandra stands out by her head shape, and so do Cori and Tanto, but here they all have that shape. Usually, RTT has a very wide head to go with his mane, but here? This is my biggest problem with RTT in this trailer (ignoring the threat of rapper-Tugger): the combination of his thin head, kind of small mane and completely different colors make him barely recognizable as Tugger. Many cats look very different: Old D, even ignoring the fact that it’s a woman now, has completely different colors. The same goes for Bombalurina. Maybe this is the ‘don’t you dare change anything’-fanboy side of me talking, but in cases where fur color is the only way to recognize a character, this is a big deal. Macavity also looks completely different, although cool. The hat looks be a bit weird on him though. Also Mistoffelees has black patches on his eyes, not sure how I feel about that.

Overall, the awkward CGI and many changes make character design one of the things I’m less happy about, but oh well.

3)      Sets & backgrounds

I think the backgrounds look gorgeous, although some are very obviously CGI (here we are at the CGI again). But there’s one problem: CATS takes place on a junkyard. I know, obviously they would want to expand a little in the film and include more different settings, and I completely agree: I would’ve been disappointed if they hadn’t. The problem is that I haven’t seen a single junkyard in the trailer. We see streets, a theater, a fancy house, a square, a graveyard, a bar… but no junkyard. Some shots may look like they’re on a junkyard, but trust me: they’re either in the theater, graveyard, or the alley at the back of Bustopher’s favorite club. Again, this is basically me going ‘they changed something reeee’, but come on. It’s like if the Les Mis movie was set in Italy. Tom Hooper, do me a favor and include at least ONE scene on a junkyard.

4)      Story

The musical is, much like Les Mis, 100% singing and talking with music accompaniment, and 0% regular dialogue. From the line said by Victoria at the end of the trailer, we know that they won’t do like Les Mis and completely sing the movie, and I’m perfectly fine with that. CATS’ story has always been a bit unclear for a casual patron who doesn’t know the lyrics and deep lore of the musical, so I’m glad they’re putting in some regular dialogue. If anything, it’ll give us a chance to see the Jellicles’ personalities better.

But speaking of Victoria: it seems like she and Mistoffelees will be the main characters in the movie. This is odd, but understandable. CATS doesn’t have a clear main character. You could say it’s Grizabella, but she’s only in a couple of scenes. You could say it’s Munkustrap, although he is regarded more as the narrator than the main character. However, the trailer has a disappointingly small amount of Munk, and his name is very low on the IMDB cast list. The same goes for Skimbleshanks, who I’m not sure if he’s in trailer at all (unless he’s the cat with the pants) and is even lower on the list than Munkustrap, plus there are no trains or train stations in the trailer. Odd.

Anyway, back to Misto and Vic. Normally, Victoria’s only role is performing a couple of amazing ballet routines, but that doesn’t seem to be case here. I personally would’ve picked Jemima over Victoria as a main character, but I guess her design isn’t as easily recognizable as Victoria’s (have I mentioned how many of the cats look pretty much the same in this version?)

Someone who also seems to have a much larger role is Bustopher. Normally he only appears during his own song, but here he seems to be a more general presence. We’ll see how that works out.

Anyway, if Munkustrap is reduced to just being the cat who sings about the Old Gumbie Cat and maybe Old Deuteronomy, I’ll be mad. (AND THEY BETTER NOT REMOVE HIS FIGHT OVER DEMETER WITH MACAVITY OR I’LL BE VERY MAD) Speaking of Demeter, she’s also very absent in the trailer and low on the cast list. Guess they made Bombalurina more prominent because they got a big name to play her.

5)      Background characters (specifically Tumblebrutus)

As I said in the previous bit, it looks like many characters will be reduced to minor characters, so cats who already were background characters in the musical (like my boy Tumblebrutus) will probably have very little time to shine. I guess that’s inevitable, but I hope they at least make an effort to include the various background characters rather than replace them with generic OC’s. Luckily, I already recognized Pouncival in the background of one of the shots, so there’s hope. But if they don’t include my boy, my all-time favorite Jellicle, the best character in CATS, known as Tumblebrutus, then I’ll be even more mad than if they remove the Munk vs. Mac fight. He’s not on the IMDB list (unless he’s one of the ‘ensemble’ characters) but neither is Pounce and I definitely saw him so fingers crossed I can spot Tumbles when I watch this movie.

Conclusion

Am I excited for this movie? Heck yeah! Am I scared this movie might turn out shit? Heck yeah! There’s really no telling how good this will be (a lot depends on whether the final product has better CGI cats), but I think my viewing experience will be a mix of “Oh my god I’ve been waiting so long for a CATS movie oh look I recognize that character this is awesome oh here comes my favorite song I literally know this entire 2 hour musical by heart” and “Oh my god what is this RTT design where is Tumblebrutus why is there no junkyard why did they slightly alter this one lyric why isn’t this EXACTLY like the 1998 video version I love so much when I get home I’m just gonna watch that version again it’s much better anyway”.

Yours sincerely,

Ethan Livemere, certified CATS-expert and Tumblebrutus fanboy