#and now he's come back and he's spent half the screentime being sad and he will only get sadder and then he'll die AGAIN | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ccliffjumperr · 2 years ago

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Okay let’s go. Feel free to answer for as many or as few as you’d like

Romeo

Xara

Petra

Aiden

Cassie

Jack

Ivor

Stella

Lulu

Oh boy this is a lot of guys. Putting them under a readmore haha.

XARA

Favorite thing about her

How she's allowed to be angry. A lot of depictions of grief in media don't include anger. It isn't pretty, it doesn't fit the whole "poor, sad, grieving person" vibe. So her being allowed to show her grief through anger is really important to me. She shouldn't have to bottle it up because "ohhh getting angry isn't the right way! talk about your feelings!". No. She gets to be angry. She gets to grieve.

Least favorite thing about them

Not enough screentime? Idk

Favorite line

Replacing with scene because lines are difficult. Her introduction. I thought it was great, especially because I knew nothing about her.

brOTP

Her, Fred, and Romeo. They were friends they cared about each other so much. But that's just a memory now.

OTP

shrug

nOTP

shrug. i dont really go looking for any ships with most characters.

Random headcanon

I don't know 😭 I haven't thought of any Xara headcanons before

Unpopular opinion

Again, I don't really interact with the fandom enough to know what the unpopular opinion is. I guess that I don't think Romeo should go find her. At least not for a very long time. She just escaped from prison. She needs time. A lot of time. And I think seeing Romeo again would end... badly.

Favorite picture of them

PETRA

Favorite thing about her

How excited she got about meeting Jack

Least favorite thing about her

She needs to learn to talk about what's bothering her instead of avoiding it until it becomes worse. This doesn't really annoy me too much because. It's just a character flaw, it's part of who she is. But it's also something she needs to fix. Communicate!!

Favorite line

I'm so bad at remembering lines. It isn't a line from her but I like how it says that her favorite food is swords.

brOTP

Honestly her and the entire New Order. Their friendship is really important to me. Especially her, Jesse, and Lukas.

OTP

Jesse and Petra. Literally the first time I played I asked "is she asking us on a date" when she invited us to go to the Nether, and half expected them to kiss when they were falling towards each other in the episode 1 credits.

nOTP

shrug. i dont really get involved in shipping enough to have a ship I dislike aside from shipping her with any of the older cast.

Random headcanon

I spent awhile thinking of something and got nothing- I may come back to this later.

Unpopular opinion

See what I said about Xara and not knowing enough opinions to know what's unpopular

Favorite picture of her

I'll come back to this later. Images are hard to find.

AIDEN

Favorite thing about him

When he falls over in episode 1 he just lays there. I thought it was funny. He doesn't get back up. Even though the lava is slowly moving towards him.

Least favorite thing about him

annoying little bitch, that's what he is.

Favorite line

I'm changing this to scene again. The Sky City fight. What else.

brOTP, OTP

Him and Cassie (platonic or romantic). I don't have any strong feelings about it but Clover likes it and I think it's neat.

nOTP

This is complicated because I don't ship him and Lukas, but I do think Aiden had feelings for him and that was one of the many reasons why he was so angry and jealous about Jesse and their friends.

I don't want them to ever be in a relationship though.

Random headcanon

He sewed all the blazerod patches (and the ocelot patch on his own jacket before that) onto each jacket because he's stubborn and didn't want to paint it and kept stabbing his fingers with the needles. And refused to cry about it because he wanted to be tough.

Unpopular opinion

I think an unpopular opinion is liking him at all. I like him.

Favorite picture of him

CASSIE

Favorite thing about her

I like her design

Least favorite thing about her

WERE YOU JUST GONNA LEAVE YOUR DOZENS OF OTHER CATS FOR DEAD??? CASSIE!!! Also why was she so mean to Lukas before she even attempted to frame him? Rude!

Favorite line

"Winslow, you know I love you but you make me very tired sometimes."

brOTP

I really, really like the headcanon that her and Romeo are siblings. Yes, it's not canon at all, but I still like it! Clover and I have so many ideas for it.

OTP

Same as what I put for Aiden. However since Aiden wants to be a better person and Cassie does not... she will make him worse.

nOTP

shrug

Random headcanon

This only applies to the "her and Romeo are siblings" headcanon, but she learned about redstone from Xara. She was her brother's cool friend, she looked up to her.

Unpopular opinion

shrug

Favorite picture of her

pictures are hard to find

JACK

Favorite thing about them

I like a lot of things about him. I'm having a hard time narrowing it down though.

Least favorite thing about them

I genuinely have no idea. I'll have to replay season 2 to really pick apart his character.

Favorite line

I'm changing this to favorite scene again- and that scene is when he saw Sammy's inventory. It felt like an actual punch to the gut. I didn't start crying until after I had finished the episode and left voice call, but ouch. He had never stopped grieving and going back there was like opening the wound again. That scene hurts, man.

brOTP

Him, Sammy, and Vos OTP

Jack/Nurm, what else?

nOTP

shrug

Random headcanon

As much as Jack loves to tell stories of his adventures, you can't get him to talk about exactly what happened in the Underwater Temple or what happened when he was Romeo's champion.

Unpopular opinion

I think picking him to be the champion works a lot, even if it feels like it was meant to be Petra (like with Nurm getting brought to Sunshine Institute and the parallels between Romeo and Petra). It really adds to the trauma conga line he went through in the short span of a day or two as well :(

Favorite picture of them

I don't have a lot of pictures of him but this one is funny. Romeo is going to crash. This ain't about him.

IVOR

Favorite thing about them

He's funny. I like watching in real time him getting dragged into the found family. He has no choice.

Least favorite thing about them

It took me awhile to warm up to him thanks to the whole Witherstorm incident.

Favorite line

Anything he says. His voice actor is great.

brOTP

Him and Jesse. OTP

Harper and Ivor, 100%

nOTP

Soren and Ivor are EXES they should NOT get back together I think that would go badly.

Random headcanon

The reason why he looked so neutral and unfazed about everything after he reunited with Jesse during the Sky City fight is because he was fighting to hide his reaction of being happy and relieved that Jesse was alive.

Unpopular opinion

I don't know. I curate my content very strictly I hardly ever see opinions I dislike. Or ones that I remember.

Favorite picture of them

STELLA

Favorite thing about them

Oh you hate me? Enemies to lovers then?

Least favorite thing about them

I wanted to punch her when I first met her. She was awful.

Favorite line

I don't remember season 2 well enough to pick one :(

brOTP, OTP, nOTP

I haven't gotten invested enough in her character yet, I gotta do that before I find ships

Random headcanon

The earpiece mic thing she has is fake and plastic. She doesn't even know what it is she just thought it looked cool. There is no electricity in minecraft.

Unpopular opinion

I don't know!! Favorite picture of them

The one doodle Clover did, the "enemies to lovers?" one

I'm answering for Lukas in Azzie's ask because this is long enough!

#story mode posting #this can go in the tags actually #i wanna share at least the first thing i said about xara #mcsm #ask game

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thealexchen · 4 years ago

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One Year On: Life is Strange 2 Critique

December 3rd, 2020 marks a year since Life is Strange 2 ended. I was inspired by @smitethepatriarchy‘s text posts (here, but there are several other answered asks worth reading) and @suhaplays’s text post (here) criticizing Life is Strange 2 to write a critique about how Life is Strange 2 handled certain themes and social issues.

(tw: gun violence, police brutality, animal death, incarceration, racism. In this essay, I use the word “queer” in a reclaimed sense, as a queer person myself. Of course, spoiler warning for all five episodes of Life is Strange 1 and 2).

A year on, my feelings about this game have soured... a lot. When the game was first announced, I was overjoyed that our new protagonists would be two Latino boys. Finally, we would have a culturally meaningful, groundbreaking video game with people of color and their experiences at the forefront!

Then the game was met with immediate backlash and I utterly exhausted myself defending it for weeks on Reddit and Tumblr. Throughout 2019, as the episodes came out I became increasingly disillusioned, frustrated, and disappointed with where the story was going. I couldn’t figure out why I felt so damn miserable while playing this game.

Then in the summer of 2020, when Tell Me Why began rolling out pre-release material, I noticed that they posted a Q&A about transphobia, gave content warnings, and discussed at length about their collaboration with GLAAD, Checkpoint, and the Huna Heritage Foundation to make the game with sensitivity and proper research. I cannot speak for trans and gender non-conforming people on whether Dontnod succeeded at doing so with Tell Me Why. But Life is Strange 2 did… none of that.

Essentially, I realized that the reason why I was so frustrated with LiS2 is because it focuses way too heavily on a trauma narrative. This comes off as insensitive to players of color without any content warnings or extensive research.

Sean didn’t have to get kidnapped, kicked in the face, and called a racial slur by a gas station owner. Daniel did not need to watch his puppy get mauled by a mountain lion for the sake of a “difficult choice.” Sean didn’t have to lose his eye for the sake of heightened drama. Sean didn’t need to get called a racial slur and humiliated by his native language/beaten in the desert for refusing to sing. Daniel didn’t need to get shot— twice. Hell, all of “Faith” probably could’ve been cut— how is a church cult that brainwashes Daniel and beats Sean half to death relevant at all to the story?

Even if not all of the game’s violence was racially motivated, the consistent trauma that Sean and Daniel endure does not make for positive representation— or even good characterization. There is a difference between sympathetic characters and well-written characters, and trauma does not make Sean and Daniel any more complex or likable-- just more fucking traumatized.

LiS2 is more grounded in reality, but that also makes plot holes that much harder to excuse (Daniel’s powers being spotted, most of the Parting Ways ending, Sean’s prison sentence). But most of all, it grounds all of Sean and Daniel’s pain and trauma in reality.

There is no magicking away a town-destroying storm with time travel. Sean can’t keep his dad alive by ripping up a Polaroid. After Max unlocked her powers, she was still a Blackwell student, reconnecting with Chloe, taking photos, saving lives, and uncovering a murder mystery. After Daniel unlocked his powers, the Diaz brothers lost everything.

The game never lets you forget that Sean and Daniel are homeless, wanted, constantly in danger, and that they are never getting their old lives back. It permeates the entire game, and for players of color, just reinforces a sad, miserable, grim reality about living in the United States. It is, as @smitethepatriarchy said, potentially triggering for players of color, and it is certainly not something I needed to be reminded of.

And the representation of POC? It feels shallow and ill-researched. It would only take a Google search to find out that Dia de Muertos (a holiday to honor the dead, no less) was from October 31 to November 2 in 2016, the year the game takes place, but Daniel only talks about Halloween in episode 1. Sean and Daniel never discuss any Mexican customs, foods, or holidays. Sean doesn’t speak Spanish with his immigrant father, only during a scene when he’s traumatized (again!) by two racists, and again when talking to Mexican immigrants— in jail. Daniel doesn’t speak Spanish at all. Most of their allies throughout the game are white, including Finn and Cassidy, who appropriate Black culture with their dreadlocks.

So what’s left? Sean and Daniel’s existence as people of color is, at worst, just a narrative prop to justify everything that happens to them. They are people of color on the surface only. In a meta-sense, the game only considers the color of their skin and their last names as what is narratively important… yikes.

I don’t have anything against people who genuinely loved the game and were moved by its messages and story. But I can’t help but feel bitter that white players have the luxury of only thinking of this game as a work of fiction and not feeling any personal reliability to Sean and Daniel’s racialized trauma.

I don’t regret playing LiS2, but I do regret all the time and energy I spent defending it in the beginning. I understand now that I shouldn’t let people’s opinions get to me, nor should I feel obligated to like or defend a game for its attempts at representation. But now, I think I understand how queer fans must have felt in late 2015 when Polarized released. After following the game for 10 months, to see that Chloe’s ultimate destiny was to die and Pricefield is another ship plagued by the Bury Your Gays trope (in the ending that the devs clearly put more work into) must have been just as disillusioning and infuriating. I understand why some fans were so quick to unfollow LiS or develop mixed feelings about the series, because that’s how I feel too after following LiS2’s development from September 2018 to December 2019.

Before I end, I will admit that Life is Strange 2 arrived at a time when I needed it. I still stand by my belief that DN did a great job characterizing Sean, Daniel, and Chris without toxic masculinity, which is the best thing they could’ve done for a male-focused follow-up to a game about queer women. I love that Sean is still a canonically bisexual man of color in a major video game and that DN didn’t forget their queer audience. I love the world and characters that DN built, but I still prefer AU fanfictions of their normal lives, without all that trauma.

So, I will continue to treasure Lyla and her 10 minutes of screentime (aka the only shred of Asian American representation I can get from this series). I still reblog LiS2 fanart to support the artists. I still support Dontnod, because as Tell Me Why has shown, they are capable of researching and writing stories with more sensitivity. And let’s be honest-- I’m still gonna be hella excited if Life is Strange 3 is announced.

But so many aspects of Life is Strange 2 were bungled that it came off as a remarkably average and forgettable experience. A year on, I don’t hate Life is Strange 2, but I am writing this to move on from it.

Thank you for reading.

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andsmile · 4 years ago

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i think it's funny how the bugheads are suffering. it's been one episode 😭

i wish i didn’t agree but i think it’s sweet and a little bit funny too. that’s not me hating on bughead, but imagine being a varchie!

we’re part of the core four, so we’re supposed to be a main ship too, with main characters, but veronica is treated like whatever most of the time.

varchie broke up every season since they started dating. we’ve had to go through veronica not saying i love you back, to b*rchie kissing, to hiram interfering, to people absolutely hating every second of our screentime and storylines because it took away from bughead (or any other ship), to them being apart for basically an entire season while dating other people, to them being back together only spend a row of six entire episodes without any meaningful scenes in season four, to have the only episode of season four a little more focused on them also shared with choni/bughead (as it’s meant to be but ok, no one complained but the others), to the cheating storyline where the whole thing was pinned on archie for a moment, and then the pandemic nine months without knowing his point of view.

then in season five it’s been six episodes and bughead has had big significant moments in the first three and even though they broke up in a sad way and have a lot to unpack, people are acting like it’s been so hard and i’m like---guys, c’mon. i know it’s always hard to see your ship not interact because they’re at odds and most of all, i know it’s hard to see your ship not getting screentime while focusing in other stuff, but it’s been one episode of bughead not interacting and two episodes of them broken up.

i know everyone is eager for a resolution but people need to be more patient and to be less eager, to be honest. it’s the first time in SEASONS that varchie has any focus, and still, we’re sharing it with archie and betty “paralleling” some of our scenes and it’s like... half the crying. i follow a lot of buggies because a) i ship them too and b) i love these people, but i see them complaining about varchie or archie getting focus and screentime and it makes me just sad, to see people talking about it like we’re stealing the screentime and resolution that was meant to be theirs or something. i don’t say this to start a war, but,

archie and veronica are also part of the core four.

veronica is imporatn and should be as important as betty, whether people want it or not.

archie is imporant and should be as important as jughead, whether people want it or not (the discourse about him ‘turning into jughead’ is something else and kind of hilarious to me and i will not go there)

varchie is also a core couple that needs fixing, whether people ship them or not.

it’s going to be OKAY for bughead if their shippers have PATIENCE and WAIT. i know everyone is pissed at archie because he’s with betty right now (”with”) or becaus they’re isolating jughead, but it’s what they did to veronica in season three, they only ever allowed her to talk to reggie and her father. it’s what they did to archie in that dreaded episode of season four where he could interact with betty and his father’s grave, while betty got advice from her mom, cheryl, and scenes with jughead.

so i like bughead, i LOVE my bughead friends, and i want them back together too, but i think people need to be patient and try to let this storyline breathe for a second. jughead and betty spent at least seven years thinking the other was over the other, so they just think they don’t care, right now. it’s gonna come with time and everything will be okay, but you guys haven’t had episodes without interaction since 1.02 and now it looks like the end of the world and i’m like---please, try to be considerate of other shippers for a minute?

(that’s not even to mention the lgbt couples or the other couples that were paid dust through the seasons because of both bughead and varchie, but anyway)

#bugvarchie endgame 2k21 #it's gonna be ok #it's ok to be sad and all but it's been not so long y'all i promise #anon #reply #i don't think this is anti so i won't tag it as anti

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capricornsicle · 4 years ago

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I have a feeling your ask box and I are going to be familiar. You might be hot-taked out after that killer Satomi discourse. But whenever you’ve got it in you, I’d sure love to hear what you think about Kira and her Jeff-deemed-absolutely-necessary departure.

Oh, definitely. And I do love content, so...

Kira Yukimura was done so dirty by the writers and Jeffrey “I’m not racist I’ll prove it by arguing to poc calling me out for it on twitter” Davis. Her treatment was racist, tokenizing, and it wasn’t even high-brow racism. It was sloppy and lazy. If you’re gonna write all your characters of color off the show, commit to it. She went to the desert like 5 times before she stayed. Cowards.

Kira was only meant to be on the show for the Nogitsune storyline in 3b. However, fans liked her so much that, as with Theo in season 6, she was brought back for more episodes. The difference is that Cody Christian is white-passing and male and Arden Cho is not. Female characters don’t exist on Teen Wolf without a relationship to a male character. Hayden existed for Liam. Tracy existed for Theo. Melissa existed for Scott and Argent. Allison existed for Scott. Lydia, the female character with the most screentime of all of them, spent a lot of her time existing in relationship to Jackson, Stiles, Parrish (shudder), and other male main characters. Women on the show were reduced to love interests and mothers more often than not, and Kira was the same.

I loved her character. I loved her arc. I loved Arden Cho, who in real life is as sweet and kind as her character. I enjoyed her parents, both Noshiko, who’s surprisingly funny and a total badass, and Ken, who’s the most wholesome man in the universe. The only straight man we stan. I love him.

Anyways, Kira was getting a fun arc outside of being Scott’s girlfriend, with her parents and her powers and all, and then wham, white-passing boy shows up and no more main character status for Kira. Guess there wasn’t enough room to keep the only interesting plot line of all the ones happening in s5. Personally, I would have chosen Kira over the Marrish garbage fire of underage relationships, but that’s just me.

Then. The Skinwalkers. I could write a whole essay about them, but this is a Kira post, so I’ll limit it to her. At least Luther got sent to the moon for a reason. Kira got sent to the desert for “rEaSoNs”. There was no indication that her power was out of control, but every indication it wasn’t. She was growing and learning. Then, suddenly, she was “too powerful” so she had to go to the desert and disappear for a few episodes and then go back and forth for a while before they wrapped up sending Theo to the upside down or wherever he went and she could finally go... hang out with the people who we were told could help her control her power but who only threw spears at her and gave her a season finale ex machina. Then back to the desert with you!

You can tell something was going on backstage in her treatment. Arden Cho wasn’t informed she was being cut, she had to be told by fans. Her departure was carried out as swiftly as possible, and not for any real reason. Kira would have been tremendously helpful against the hunters and in a lot of later scenes, against the Ghost Riders (and let me remind everyone that KIRA WAS THE ONE WHO TOLD LYDIA ABOUT THE WILD HUNT), against pretty much anything. Immune to electrocution? Don’t help with the hunters who love electrocuting people. Sloppy writing through and through.

And what’s more is that Kira was cut just in time for the Scalia thing, which was so fucking rushed oh my GOD nothing has ever been less natural- this is a Kira post, calm down capsicle. Anyways, Kira got replaced as Scott’s love interest and not much else by a white girl, no hate on Malia or Shelley but much on the writers. I loved Malia and Kira’s friendship, and if anyone should have gotten with Malia, it should have been Kira. (The first time I saw Malia I wondered if we were getting another ambiguously brown character, actually, but no, just Georgian and well-tanned. But I bet not all my followers knew Tracy was played by a Chinese and Cherokee actor. Or that Nolan was played by a Mexican and Caxcan actor. Or that Theo was played by a Penobscot Native actor. The list goes on of white-passing POC who got to stay marginally longer than Black or brown characters.) The “Scott ends up with a white girl he has no chemistry with” threw me for many loops, especially after I was surprised to find myself liking Scira, even though I’m usually bored by straight relationships because of their one-sided focus and nonexistent chemistry. Kira got to be a character outside of Scott, and I liked their romance better for it, and then desert for a thousand years!

TLDR on the canon end of things is that Kira and Arden were done dirty by a group of powerful white men who wanted to tell a cishet white story.

Now, on the fandom end of things, I’m stepping into the real hot water. It’s safe to say that Kira’s story was sloppy and Arden didn’t deserve that ending, but it’s less safe to say that this fandom doesn’t treat her that well either. Here’s the most popular x Scott ships on Ao3, under the Teen Wolf tag with no other filters.

Scott and Allison. Scott and Stiles. Scott and Isaac. Then Scott and Kira, in dead last. Scott and Malia don’t even make the top ships list, probably because of how rushed and sloppy it was, but I digress.

People love Scott and Allison a lot, and I get that. I liked her too. I was also sad when she died. But, unlike a lot of sentiment I see in this fandom, I don’t think she should have been brought back to fight the beast in season 5 and get back with Scott. Not only do I think bringing characters back to life without very good reason and explanation (which they wouldn’t have, come on) cheapens their death, and that bringing characters back to life is weak storytelling in general, but let’s recall that Scira is still a thing in season 5. They’re still madly in love when Kira leaves. Allison should not have come back and love-triangled so Kira could be written off for a different white girl or so the massive amount of young white girls in the fandom who love Allison would be angry at Kira for breaking up their OTP. That would have been the one thing that could have made season 5 worse. (Well, they could have made Marrish a thing or killed Mason, but Jeff Davis thought about it and a shiver went down his spine because the ghost of Christmas future hears my name in its nightmares.)

Even if people aren’t “bring Allison back” campers, they largely ignore Kira’s entire existence. People who post gifsets and posts about Allison or Lydia don’t give anywhere near the same amount of attention to Kira. I see more Malia posts, actually. And while all of them had more runtime than Kira, none of them paired with Scott quite as perfectly, or had such strong independent storylines. Lydia almost did, but it kept petering out and she kept going back to main plot only. I see lots of appreciation posts for Allison and Lydia and Malia and the men, obviously, but NOTHING for Kira or Arden Cho. We all know what happened backstage because we read the same post in 2016 or whenever and then we all stopped talking about it.

Even the racism in this fandom skips Kira. Scott antis, I’m looking (controversially) at you. I’m glad Kira isn’t the subject of a bunch of obvious racism (as much as “bring Allison back!” makes it subtle), but not because she’s a forgotten side character. Kira made the main credit sequence! She has a sword! What else could you all POSSIBLY want?

And here’s where I burn at the stake: Kira was written off her own damn “look Fun Japanese mythology” storyline half the time so it could center around Stiles. A white boy. There were numerous issues with the mythology before that — “Oni” means demon, not “firefly samurai ninja”, and it refers to a similar mythology as the western “fae”, a large collection of creatures benevolent, malevolent, and in between, with different traits and origins. Kitsunes are meant to be red or white, not gold, and they’re foxes, not cats, animation team. “Nogitsune” refers to the malevolent class of “low” Kitsune, or “wild” Kitsune, who didn’t align themselves with the goddess Inari and do divine and pious work. There are many of them and the most they really do is harass people at shrines, not murder indiscriminately for funsies. They’re only malevolent in that they like doing bad deeds, not that they’re serial killers. And they’re not one of the usual 13 low Kitsune, two of which are bad of their own accord! (Spirit and Air. Google it!) They are meant to be dealt with by Inari-aligned high Kitsune, not your average tricky fox. Among other things.

So Stiles. Outside of the Kira storyline, he’s used in a lot of fandom discourse about racism and sexism. And queerbaiting. Y’all love a scrawny white boy. Anyways, Stiles gets possessed by the Nogitsune (that’s NOT how that works but okay Jeffrey) and suddenly s3 is about him. Kira’s not evil, now let’s look at Stiles being tired and messy and killing people. Dylan #1 did a great job playing that part, no hate on him, but the fact that a white boy became the main character in a Japanese (or Korean, if you’re Jeff, same thing) girl’s storyline is. Hmm. How do you call it? Blatant racism. And erasure. Which is racism. YIKES, Jeff. There is so much wrong with Stiles being the Nogitsune and controlling the Oni and his whole story (and oh my god the other guy who got possessed was also a white boy instead of a Japanese character played by the same actress Jesus fucking Christ). I’m not going into that, because that’s its own essay.

Anyways, because of how much this fandom loves Stiles, it’s easy to ignore how Kira and Japanese characters were treated. People project onto Stiles with glee. He’s white. He’s awkward. He’s (supposedly) not super attractive. (Yikes.) He’s ditzy and bouncy and all that fun stuff, but he also always saves the day. He got written off for most of 6b and he still saved the stupid day. And hey, dark!Stiles (let’s not get into calling him dark instead of Nogitsune that’s just too much wine we’d have to crack open to say it) is a fun trope and people like posting and creating about him. Except that he’s the white boy who took Kira’s storyline. Her independent story about Kitsune and the like was all given over to him, not just by the show, but by the fandom. So now every post about Kitsune is a Stiles post, even if it started with Kira. And because it’s Stiles, and this fandom loves him, and is easily offended by people leaning too hard on the glass house around them and him, Kira gets forgotten and swept aside. Everyone would rather talk about Stiles. Who is incapable of bad. Or cultural appropriation. But if you attack him you’re being ableist because he has ADHD. This is why I relate to Nolan for anxiety feels instead.

TLDR on the fandom end, y’all don’t treat Kira better than the show did. I see a few posts here and there from some dedicated users — typically the same people posting about Boyd, Deaton, Morrell, yeah that’s it I’m the only one posting about Kali. (Un-fun fact: Kali was not played by an Indian actor, but by a half-Black actor. Jeff Davis, when called out on twitter, said “wow ok idiots we tried to find an Indian actress but it was hard actually SUPER hard so shut up and stop telling me how to write MY show”, which is paraphrasing with intent to make fun, but exactly what he said.) Y’all who know about Arden and Kira should diversify your blogs to include more POC, especially ones where the actor AND character were rudely sidelined for vague white people reasons. Post gifs of Kira along with Allison, Lydia, and Malia. Post ship stuff of Scira too. Post about kitsunes, the origin story of the Nogitsune, when you post about the white boy who became the main character of that arc. Call the show out. Call the fandom out. Stop making every bit and piece of her story about Czechoslovakia White Boy. Demand Kira in any future runs of the show, if season 7 or whatever does happen. Include her in your fanfictions, in your headcanons, in your art. You don’t have to love her, but you have to remember that she’s as there as any of the white characters are.

This take is very hot. If I receive racist asks and/or messages about this, I’m going to make fun of each and every sender.

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gra-sonas · 5 years ago

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malex as important as echo? since when?

They have been important since the pilot, but imo they are not treated with the same importance as Echo.

I’m grateful that she fought for the kiss, that there never was a shadow of a doubt that Malex had history, and that their love is far from over. I’m also glad she’s finally acknowledging that Malex actually are as important as Echo.

But the fact is: so far they've been treated very differently from Echo. And not just in the sense that Echo are front and center on billboards and in promo pics (ahead of S1 they used romantic!Echo pics to promote RNM, long before they even got together on the show), while we had to photoshop our own Malex promo poster with a pic Jeanine shared bc there isn’t a single official Malex promo pic.

So far, Malex have been denied any attempt at an adult relationship (I don’t count those few off screen days between 1x02 and 1x03 they supposedly spent together, if anything they reconnected and fuckedmade sweet love, but it wasn’t a relationship), while Echo were in a relationship for almost 2 seasons (sure, Max was dead for a hot second, but Liz didn’t stop loving him and focused everything on bringing him back).

Malex got thrown into a triangle, while Liz/Kyle and Cam/Max ended before Echo even started, and their love for each other hasn’t been challenged by other possible romantic partners since.

Malex had an entire season of one of them in a relationship with someone else, and in all likelihood they’ll go through at least half, maybe an entire season of the same with the roles reversed in S3.

Echo so far got lots of romantic screentime, while Malex mostly struggled, “broke up”, were forced into a triggering threesome, and overall have been denied real happy moments. In the S2 finale Michael stated “It’s a sad story, me and Alex.”

He isn’t wrong tbh, the writers have done everything in their power to keep them miserable and pile more trauma on them (hello Caulfield), when so far they didn’t even have a meaningful discussion about what happened to them all those years ago, and how they could possibly overcome it.

Which is also something that is often forgotten: Jesse and the shed happened to them, they didn’t bring that onto themselves, but the shed, and subsequently Michael’s role in the cover up of Rosa’s murder, made them carry a weight the size Echo never had to deal with - in fact Max, who decided to cover up the murders instead of calling the police (Michael’s suggestion), didn’t face any consequences other than “losing” Liz, which, all things considered, was unpleasant, but not exactly traumatic.

Michael on the other hand lost so much more that day/night:

a real shot at starting a better life by going to university, and towards Isobel he carried the burden of the lie that it had been him who killed the girls to spare her the pain.

the ability to play guitar, the one thing helping him to make things go quiet. His crippled hand a constant and painful reminder of what had happened in the shed.

Alex. The shed incident made Jesse force Alex to enlist. And due to Michael handling the murder cover up trauma badly (+ his abandonment issues stemming from his childhood), he didn’t even get to say goodbye (his decision, but still)

Don’t get me wrong, Echo’s love is not without complications, they are not together atm for a reason (or rather a number of reasons), but Malex have been deemed “unhealthy”, “not good for each other”, even “toxic” from the beginning, and we’re constantly told they have to develop further (apart from each other) before there’s even the possibility of them getting a shot at a relationship.

Because that’s what people who are in love do? Instead of trying to make things work, they decide to date other people for a while to get better for each other? I don’t think so.

It also makes no sense since the issues that are keeping them apart won’t ever be properly addressed or solved while one or both of them is/are in a relationship with someone else. It’s also unfair to the third party. It shouldn’t be their job to “fix" their partner so that they can move on to the person they actually love.

The mantra of Malex “not being good enough” for each other [yet] is one that is repeated ad nauseum by the writers and even some fans to justify that they still haven’t started their journey of getting together (all in the name of “but it’s a TV show, it’s how they work”. Yeah, well, I call BS on that. It doesn’t have to be like that. They could tell an amazing slowburn story without involving other romantic partners for either of them. I’ve read a million fanfics where that was done rather beautifully).

Malex are always reduced to their shared trauma (which is actually QUEER trauma caused by homophobia, something the show has also failed to address in detail yet), and no matter what they do, it’s never good enough for them to earn a shot at a relationship. Even now, after Jesse’s finally dead and they destroyed the shed together - a symbol of their shared pain - and Alex sang his heart out and declared his love for Michael, they are sent in different directions again.

The bar of when they will finally be “good enough” for each other is constantly moved. They are measured against some unspecified “relationship ideal” they never seem to be able to reach. On a scale of 1-100, how far do they both have to make it to be deemed “good enough” for each other?

It’s a writing choice to keep them apart. Probably bc it’s less work than writing a meaningful “moving towards each other” story. Instead there’s yet another relationship thrown in the mix as an obstacle (CAMs words, not mine) that has to run its course before they can start their “moving towards each other” journey (maybe, no promises, I’m sure they can come up with another dumb reason to delay that).

Either way, are they important? 100% yes! Are they as important as Echo? To a degree. They are undoubtedly the second OTP of the show. But the way their relationship (or rather lack thereof) is treated, differs vastly from Echo, who don’t have to jump through a million hoops to be together.

And so far it doesn’t look like S3 will change that.

#rnm spoilers #you can probably tell that i'm bitter #nonnie asks #malex

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milkovich-mickey · 5 years ago

Text

10×06

I have so much to say about this episode and how disappointing it was:

as a mickey fan, the lack of screentime and disregard for the character hit me harder than it should. Like he's somehow only been in 3/6 episodes now, and even in eps 2 and 3 there were some scenes that made me cringe for its characterization of mickey (for how ooc it was, ie him talking to terry's old friends for advice about ian ugh). But today's episode just cemented how out of touch the writers are about mickey. Willing to do anything for a cheap laugh (the escape attempt), and just how the other characters somehow didn't seem to care that he was back or question it at all. I know that they knew he was Ian's cellmate BUT Ian thought he was going to be in prison for a few years longer. So what's up with the total lack of any meaningful reaction from the other characters???

I think that just goes off to show a deeper issue for shameless now. How little the characters interact with each other, how separate their story lines are and how little one character's story line affects another character. The Gallaghers just don't interact with each other, and at least in my perspective seem to have lost that strong bond they used to share. It's honestly really sad to see that happen because in earlier seasons, that was the whole point of the show.

I think Lip and Tami were the best part of the episode for me. I like how they were able to talk about their relationship and actually come to a meaningful resolution, for both of them. And as someone who truly did not find Tami likeable in season 9, I think I'm warming up to her and like her much better now.

As for Frank and Liam, well there goes another Gallagher scam gone wrong. I like that they spent time together at least, but they literally had a baby kidnapped after trying to sell it...

Carl's sl made me genuinely upset at times. As a child of immigrant parents, let me tell you, immigrants don't need a white boy coming to tell them how to survive. To survive in America, they will find any job that is willing to take them and work their asses off. And selling tamales being the only source of income for that huge family? That is simply not realistic. But then again, shameless has simply stopped caring about what is realistic for a long time now so I guess I shouldn't be too upset.

I don't want to comment much on Debbie bc I just have lost any kind of hope for her character or story lines.

Lastly, Gallavich and their complete lack of screentime. I now see why they didn't release any scenes for them for this episode, seeing as how they had already pretty much shown us half their interaction in the teasers for this episode. I truly tried to come in with very low expectations for them this episode bc I didn't want to be too disappointed if the writers didn't deliver. But somehow I still did. They literally had 2 mins of interaction in a 56 min episode. At this point, halfway through the season, I have lost hope that the writers can somehow write in their wedding and not let it feel rushed or just as fan service. Somehow even knowing how this season (hopefully) turns out for them, I have now lost about half my excitment about seeing it happen bc of the writer's shitty writing. I know we're supposed to see more of them the second half of the season, and maybe the writers will surprise me with more screentime in future episodes, but as for now I just feel a bit defeated. Noel and Cam deserve so much better than this. Hell, all the actors deserve better.

As whole, this episode just felt off and I'm very sad tbh. The first couple of episodes made me think that this season could redeem Shameless and have some of that magic from earlier seasons, but nope. My only hope now is that this season doesn't turn into as much of a mess as season 9.

Sorry for the long rant, I might put it under a read more later when I get on my computer.

#shameless #gallavich #mickey milkovich #ian gallagher #lip gallagher #carl gallagher #debbie gallagher #liam gallagher #frank gallagher #10×06 #spoilers #sorry for rambling #i just had so many feelings after watching

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takaraphoenix · 5 years ago

Note

So... Why do you think Tangled the series is crap?

*blinks surprised* Well, this was defininitely not what I expected in my inbox this morning. Okay. xD

EDIT: So answer under the cut. If you still end up reading it and don’t want to hear criticism of the show, I really don’t know what to tell you…

1. Eugene/Rapunzel

What really didn’t do it any favors was the fact that before I started watching Tang/ed, I had just finished watching Tarzan the animated series for the first time. And, I’ve gone on a lengthy praise-rant about that one but the sum of it is that Tarzan is a beautiful portrayal of a healthy relationship and its growth.

Tang/ed flat-out forgot Eugene existed for the majority of season 1. Like. He was there. Occasionally. More in the background. Showing up after the adventures. And even when he was prominently featured, he didn’t get any romantic scenes with Rapunzel. They severely cut back on the Eugene/Rapunzel interactions in season 1.

Most of Rapunzel’s screentime was spent with New BFFOC #1, while most of Eugene’s screentime was spent with New BFF OC #2.

And I love Eugene/Rapunzel, I love their tenderness and how they got together in the first movie. I had expected a Tarzan level of romantic growth, development and focus on their romance. I mean, seriously, the whole movie had little going on that could have been continued, what with the hair cut and the witch gone, there was only “Rapunzel gets to reunite with her family and her and Eugene’s relationship gets to grow and develop while Rapunzel learns what it means to be a princess”.

Holy shit would I have loved a TV show with that premise and focus.

Instead, they sidelined Eugene for most of season 1 in favor of focusing on the new OCs - and yes, I admit, the Eugene/Rapunzel got better and got more screentime and actual development in season 2, but that’s… a whole-ass season too late in my opinion.

The Eugene/Rapunzel dynamic was what carried Tang/ed the movie, but the show put Eugene on the backburner to focus on its new shiny things. He should have been right there, at her side, every step of the way, not her sneaking off with only Cassandra all the time. He should have been her rock, her number one fan and supporter.

2. The Parents

Rapunzel’s parents? The freaking trauma of the whole thing? The loving reunion, the bonding time? Barely there and even then it sets in relatively late and very much only in between. This should have been one of the main angles of this show; after so many years, a whole life-time in fact, they are reunited with their daughter, now it’s time she learns what you love and what you’re like and you learn what she loves and what she’s like, you get to show her her kingdom and tell her about her family. It does however end up more like the… D story of the cartoon, really.

Half the time, they just Exist. And most of the times that they are prominently featured, it’s for dad to somehow royally screw up, really… Which only made me sadder, because I usually love Disney Dads. Like, Disney creates beautiful dads. Instead, this show continued making him mess up.

The missed opportunity for bonding time, real bonding time, in actual character arcs, not just in throwaway episodes maybe every now and again, is just… so infinitely sad to me as someone who loves a good family dynamic and who, looking at a movie that literally was about “long-lost daughter is reunited with her parents”, absolutely expected that to be in the focus somewhere, not in the background.

3. The OCs

In number 1, I already mentioned New BFF OC #1 and New BFF OC #2, so lets give them names and let’s also dive into them.

I love Lance Strongbow. He is genuinely the one thing about this cartoon that I absolutely adore. He’s the type of personality Eugene absolutely would have gotten into trouble with as a kid. Their dynamic is so well-captured and he’s a delight.

My problem is Cassandra. I really hate that character, hated her even before the reveal that ultimately made me drop the show.

Look. Rapunzel is this incredibly positive sunshine girl. And they… gave her a pessimistic, sarcastic, snarky best friend. That’s a really hard clash and it can work brilliantly, or it fails. In this case, it fails, because Cassandra constantly channels her sarcastic snark into mean comments and insults aimed at Eugene.

Who, the actual ever-loving fuck, would stand for that?

Who would let this new chick just constantly insult your partner, stab at your partner with words, put your partner down, and then decide “Yes. You are my New Best Friend!”. If someone would treat my girlfriend, who is absolutely amazing and whom I adore, the way Cassandra treats Eugene? I would definitely not befriend that person, what the fuck.

And that’s not taken into consideration Cassandra’s side of things. She seemed to think of Rapunzel as her best friend, but she still had to constantly vocally insult Rapunzel’s boyfriend. Who does that? You don’t like him, okay fine, shut up about it though, no reason to always be extra mean to him, especially not while Rapunzel is right there to hear you.

It’s just… I get it, I get when you don’t like your friend’s partner. But… Cassandra has no actual reason to be that way with Eugene? He literally never did anything to her. He saved Rapunzel, he was ready to die to save Rapunzel, way before Cassandra even knew Rapunzel. If anything, he should have her respect, but at the very least he should have the benefit of the doubt.

I don’t like this unfounded hostility toward Eugene and I don’t like how Rapunzel just smiles and ignores it and never calls Cassandra out on it.

And then the point where I stopped watching the show. When Cassandra, who is supposed to be Rapunzel’s best friend, betrays her because of Gothel. Because of course it’s revealed that she’s Gothel’s daughter - they really had to retcon her into being Gothel’s daughter, they really had to do that cheap dump trick, never mind who would have slept with her, when, oh how convenient that her kid is Exactly The Same Age as Rapunzel despite Gothel being literal centuries old, and like fuck that woman would have raised a child on her own like that, the only reason she tolerated Rapunzel was because of her powers. But no, now Gothel had a secret toddler before stealing Rapunzel and instead of ever, at any point, getting her daughter back, she just traded her for superpowered Rapunzel. Which is just such bullshit writing and so cheap and cringey, but to then make Cassandra, who was supposed to be Rapunzel’s best friend and who knew of the abuse, who knew of the trauma that Rapunzel had suffered at the hands of Gothel, betray Rapunzel because “mommy liked you more!” was just… the ultimate Fuck You to me, personally.

And while we’re at OCs and cringey bullshit writing - they really had to retcon Eugene into being A Prince All Along. And not just… any prince, no, no, since she is the sun and her kingdom watched over the sun drop, he is the moon and his kingdom watched over the moon drop and isn’t that super poetic? But that’s beside the point, that comes later, for now just the fact that they couldn’t even let Eugene stand on his own either, they had to also retcon him.

That’s like if the Aladdin show had decided to introduce the sultan of the neighboring kingdom and oh no wait he’s Al’s father now, Aladdin was a prince all along after all actually! No, that show at least kept Al’s suddenly alive father also a streetrat and thief.

That’s what Tang/ed should have done, if they had to retcon Eugene out of orphanhood. Make his dad a supposedly Big Bad and thief until at the season finale it is revealed that they’re father and son and dad maybe never even knew Eugene existed or whatever.

But to make him a prince just like that and have Eugene act so… nonchalant about it all and take it all in such stride, after all these years… it was bullshit.

Also, before we get into the big issue (because yes, so far, this was the small stuff that bothered me), let’s talk about Varian. Man was that a heap of bullshit too. Cute adorable kid who could have become an ally… had to… turn Angry And Bitter and feel betrayed by sunshine protagonist because something happened that was absolutely out of sunshine protagonist’s control. I hate that plot-tool so incredibly much. And then he’s just… redeemed and immediately forgiven and All Is Good. Pff.

4. The Moon

Fuck this. Fuck this. Fuuuck thiiis.

Gods, I can’t put into words how much I loathe the fact that they took “so she had a sun drop, right? Let’s now add–A MOON DROP! *gasps*”… It’s so stupid, it’s so stupid, it’s so stupid.

And badly handled, man.

The contradictory powers would have been cool. The moon drop as the shadow side to her could have had like… potential. But what they did with it? With the weird black stones, with the weird sudden black hair (why in the world would the moon incantation work on her, she is literally the sun drop and has no attachment to the moon drop). Why would the moon drop black stones cause her magic hair to grow back, that was bullshit too.

Like, yeah, the whole hair thing is questionable at best in the movie already, I know - why would cutting it have an effect on the magic, since the magic is inside of her, that was nonsense.

But that it now just… grows back. And like. the full length. For no reason. Not that she just turns blonde again and her hair grows back the normal way, nope. Sudden 10 meter of hair. Because… I mean, you can’t make a Rapunzel show without Rapunzel’s classic long hair, I guess.

That whole sun and moon thing was so… stupid, yeah, and badly handled and executed because the powers just make no sense and the cause and effect there are just so weird. It was very much just “it does whatever the plot requires it to do” and I hate that kind of writing, I prefer set rules within the magic that make sense.

Also, watching this parallel to Elena of Avalor, who also had a sun and moon balance plotline and handled that on a way more evened out playing field? Yeah, that only made Tang/ed look even worse.

5. The Animation

We’re taking the part where I personally think the art style is ugly as fuck out of the equation here, because I know that’d be an unfair point and that others find that style… pretty… for some reason.

The main problem here is more that good gods do I miss 2D movies when I have to sit through these kind of tie-in shows. Because back in the day, a tie-in show actually tied into the movie, in art and animation style too.

I hate that style-break, it’s dumb. It’s dumb on Big Hero 6 too.

Seriously. You’re Disney, you have the freaking budget nowadays, if you make a TV tie in for a movie, at least try to find an animation style that is vaguely in line with the movie…

Like, the argument that 3D animation would be more expensive - or, you know, more easily looks cheap as fuck - doesn’t even count if you consider that this is DISNEY. I’m serious, look over at DreamWorks.

Sure, sure, many were bothered with the cheaper animation of the How to Train Your Dragon series, but it was at least 100% in line with the movie and let’s be real you can’t expect the same animation budget for a show like you got for a movie and that was always the case. But it was close enough.

They could have done this for Tang/ed. Especially considering it’s Disney and they literally have all of the money.

I mean, again, look at DreamWorks - Trollhunters may just be the prettiest 3D animated series out there. That looks gorgeous, in animation.

There’s no reason why Disney can’t do that, can’t put that much effort into its tie-ins of its 3D movies. No reason at all.

Instead, they went with what I assume is a cheaper way of animation and just a huge fuck you to the gazillionaire corporation that has the budget to book its movie stars into whole-ass MCU tie-in shows and would have the budget to fully animate a Tang/ed show in the same quality level as the movie if they wanted (and I’m not even asking for that, really).

It’s cheap. It looks cheap. It’s a jarring clash with the original movie and if you make a tie-in for a movie there should be no clash between the two.

–

Well, there you go. The five reasons why I personally think this show is crap.

I was really excited for a tie-in to this movie and I had really low expectation - like, literally I just wanted to see Eugene/Rapunzel be cute and Rapunzel bond with her parents, that was literally all I expected. And I only got half-assed attempts on both of those, while the focus got completely derailed by a newly added OC and a whacky, very forced plotline.

#Anonymous #so time to ramble #in the tags #to make sure #this doesn't pop up #in the show's tag #because let's not go there #I know there's people #who actually...#enjoy this #so like #...resist the urge to read it??#Disney #Tangled the Series #Tangled

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sabbathism · 6 years ago

Text

People don’t like season 2, and here’s what they have to say :

tl;dr: I answer the web’s most vehement complaints about season 2 of American Gods. If you happen to recognize yourself in one of those, then I suggest thinking about it really really hard and, perhaps, giving the show another chance. If you recognize yourself in several of those, please drop the show. It’s not worth wasting your time and especially not ours. (I put a list of helpful cast and production related facts at the end.)

Hi, Nelle here, I’m but a humble fan who wishes to have fun seeing gods bicker and argue among mortals, complete with the craziest of situations, stellar cast and great visuals. And yet I can’t help but hear things when I start browsing this hellsite in quest of juicy fanworks.

Although I’m no Joan Of Arc, I hear voices from above and here’s what I have to shout back (lest I get burned at the stake) :

“The pacing is all over the place ! It’s too slow !”

Is it tho ? Pacing has been “all over the place” (really meaning: different from what we avid show-viewers are accustomed to) since season 1, we’ve never gotten straight answers out of anything unless we started listening and paying attention to details.

The book (you know, the source material) has four parts, the fourth serving as an epilogue to the whole story, season 2 is most definitely meant to close part 1 which, allegedly, had the slowest of pace to begin with. And it doesn’t even have half the new narratives the show has been creating. So no, it’s not slow. I promise you things are happening.

“It needs to follow the actual book more !!”

What’s a good adaptation ? Is it something that is 100% truthful to the source, down to every word ? Is it something that should offer something for people who don’t know the source ? Or, on the contrary, be something inseparable from it ?

American Gods as a TV show offers new things for people who have read the book and for those who haven’t, while keeping the beloved moments and aspects from the original material.

Why add or change stuff ? Well because, if you’re a book reader, you get welcomed into the state of existential dread that comes with not knowing what happen next, I promise it’s part of the fun. But also because author Neil Gaiman believes that he can do more, do better, with something that was written 20 years ago and needed the changes in a lot of places. He’s aware that he has, in fact, a show to make, and not a carbon copy of the book, as well as a fanbase that deserves to be challenged and entertained.

“Why taking the focus off Shadow ? He’s barely the protagonist anymore !”

Because there are..... characters ? who are also part of the story ? Like, actual stories need characters ? But alright, I know it can get confusing when you have a lot of those, here’s how you can still tell Shadow is the protagonist : months of advertising and the entirety of season 1 which was spent following Shadow with only minor breaks allowing other characters to breathe. Trust me they need the development too, or then we’ll really have reasons to complain.

You want a narrative focusing solely on staying in Shadow’s head ? Alright. Try the book. But here’s my take on its narrating choice, as a graduate in english literature : it’s boring. To the point where Neil Gaiman himself got sad that he couldn’t follow other characters.

“They’re not giving the POCs enough space ! Where are the coming to america segments ? At least they gave actual insights.”

Out of every piece of fiction, I truly don’t think you want to get angry at American Gods for how much room it’s giving POCs... (a 20% white cast ensemble, POCs and especially WOCs writers and directors on production, ethnically accurate casting and writing, diversity positive messages, etc) Really I’m sure there are many other places in the fictional industry were the question of diversity is more than legitimate. American Gods has yet to be one of them, by far.

As for the Coming To America stuff, well, there’s not that many in the book to begin with. There are a whole bunch for sure, but we’ve got over quite a few of them in season 1. If there’s more believers you want, we’re served with the latest episode 4, with humans worshiping both Old and New, and interacting with gods. I’m sure we can review that point again once the season is over.

“Those white directors don’t even know how to read or write POC characters !”

*cough*

here’s a list of the POC directors and writers on episodes 2 to 5 of season 2 only :

Deborah Chow (director)

Aditi Kapil (writer)

Salli Richardson (director)

Rodney Barnes (writer)

Orlando Jones (writer)

That’s half the entire director-writer team for these episodes, with Neil Gaiman being involved. You’ll have to point out to me exactly what you mean by “not writing right”.

“New Media ? 1. she’s a bitch, 2. her actress is just plain bad, 3. she’s a hurtful stereotype.”

And here comes perhaps the trickiest one of all... I’m gonna have to bear with you, as much as you’re gonna have to bear with me :

1. Yes. 2. No. 3. Yes, and it’s a problem, but not for the reasons you think.

First of all, and let’s get it out of the way : actor =/= character nor writing. You think the writing is bad and/or that the character is annoying ? Well, it’s certainly not on the actor. You wanna know the actual level of Kahyun Kim’s acting ? Starring in an Alan Cummings play alongside him. We’ve got a lot to discuss but please keep her out of this.

Second, New Media is an absolute bitch of a character. She’s mocking, manipulative, and too ambitious for anyone’s good. A lot of people seem to love her tho and to that I say good ??? I mean, great if you like her, because she’s got as much potential as the rest of these crazy characters, I’m not here to tell you who you should hate and who you should love.

But there’s a problem you shouldn’t ignore, and that its so far she’s not well written. It’s a terrible thing to say in such a show but she’s really not : because we barely see her talking, because we barely got any scene with her (remember what I said about letting character breathe ?), and because what we’ve seen of her so far is the stereotype of the hypersexualized naive asian girl. Complete with tentacle porn scene. (Whether you felt weirded out, amused or utterly disgusted by this is your own valid opinion.)

The character has been officially described as “the goddess of global content”, “a cyberspace chameleon” and “a master of manipulation.” In recent addition to that, actor Bruce Langley (Technical Boy) has said : “New Media’s willing to be perceived as naive because if she’s being underestimated, when she does make her move, you’d never see it coming, but she knows way more than she lets on.” He then goes on to compare her to Gillian Anderson’s Media.

This proves that the way New Media comes off isn’t a problem of intent (the naive part is calculated and they want the character to be duplicitous, falsely seductive), but of handling, and it’s just as bad. Sure, Gillian’s Media also knew more than she let on for about as much screen time -I’m sure New Media will get to her four scenes in one season-, but she had been grounded in the narrative as her own character, she’s had her exposition speech and time. (See her meeting with Shadow in S01E02) We’ve yet to see that much of Kahyun’s New Media.

Because they do not give her what she needs to be more than a two dimensional character, we find ourselves with a shallow character who doesn’t give too many signs of the thought process everyone seemed to have put into crafting her beforehand, including Kahyun’s acting. This is a serious issue that needs to be handled before the season ends, or she will just stand out like a nasty spot in an overall incredible piece of fiction. Hell even Laura (another very unlikable character) manages to be a great addition to the narrative. Come on people.

You can of course argue that they could have gone for another type or personality for her, other than naive and sex-oriented, for a korean actress to play. You’re right, there’s a lot of aspect of social media that could have been put to work, but not only are we gonna need more than two scenes (at least the tentacles aren’t a regular occurrence so far), but it’s just like they could have not made the Technical Boy hang Shadow.

The New Gods appear as the ‘general bad idea’ we promote through and associate with their element. Mr. World is gonna be the creepy looking government dude, Tech is gonna be the lanky rude geek, they’re gonna be cold, insensitive and selfish. They’re gonna be the things we don’t like. Throughout season 1, Tech Boy was in the same place we find ourselves in with New Media : he was the loud white racist teenager hating on anon on the net, he was unlikable from start to finish, and it’s only once we got inputs from his actor, the writers, and then now that they’re showing more of his story and personality well after season 1 that we see him as the fully complex and interesting character he is.

Let’s all keep our wits about us, not engulf ourselves in blind hate or love, and encourage the writers to prove us all that this character is worth the while like her actress says.

(I still won’t forgive the bitch, but at least she won’t stick out like a sore thumb.)

(if you want Kahyun’s input on her character and experience, here’s a lengthy interview)

"They don't even know how to write their own character, period !"

By all means, tell me your basis of characterization to declare that characters who didn’t even have enough screentime to have much substance in season 1 (except Shadow, but strangely no one complains about him) aren’t written right when their creator is literally hovering over the writers and actors shoulders, because he wants them to be developed and written right.

It’s not Harry Potter, Neil isn’t making up facts about them to make himself look better, maybe accept that the vision you had in your mind wasn’t entirely accurate to the truth of the characters and that’s okay ? You can still write them yourself however you want, tell the stories you want to tell, Neil has made it very clear that he doesn’t consider fan ideas less valuable than his.

“Bryan has such as specific, unique vision ! They’re just trying to copy it and they’re failing.”

Definitely. No really, you’re right, I’m a big fan of Bryan’s work, I lost my mind like everyone else when he said he wasn’t giving up on Hannibal season 4.

But you know who else has a unique vision ? The seven directors who took over (four of those are women) and the show-runner who had already worked with him beforehand. They’re not trying to copy his style, they’re trying to make a smooth transition so fans like you don’t have a hard time mourning the terrible loss of Bryan and Michael. And for every person who noticed the changes, there were just as many who haven’t even paid attention to it.

Concept : some people may watch shows/movies for the story and the characters, not just for who’s behind the camera. (As far as I’m concerned, I actually like the image better. Everything was killer in season 1, and I think it’s even nicer in season 2.)

“Bryan gave us Salim and the Jinn, and now they’re just gonna be cast aside because those directors lack the LGBT+ sensibility Bryan has !”

Alright, yup, sure. As a member of the community myself, I totally recognize that someone who’s also part of it will know firsthand of the subtleties and details to give the best representation possible on screen. The example of Salim and the Jinn is perfectly fine, since the entire segment was indeed beautifully made. But if we cannot allow people from outside to ponder and think about our lives through writing (which is probably the best way for them to start understanding and broadening their mindset), how can we expect wide representation to improve in any meaningful way ? Especially considering that the show has been casting LGBT+ actors, in an environment where the cast is listened to and solicited on their opinions.

And especially when Bryan was not the one who gave you Salim and the Jinn. (Because I’ve seen people genuinely believe it.) Neil Gaiman did. He wrote a gay muslim couple in his book 20 years ago, way before it was considered a political statement. He’s also the one who gave strict and specific directions as to how these very characters should be handled. Because if he expanded Salim and his fire boyfriend Jinn’s story from a one-shot to a full story integrated into his entire narration, then it’s certainly not to pull a “bury your gays” or make them miserable. No need to be LGBT+ to be a decent writer and human being.

“Production was a mess anyway, I knew it’d turn out like this. It sucks without Bryan.”

Define “mess”. Because all the incendiary reports we got throughout early production had been utter bullshit.

Showrunners being “fired” ? Bullshit. “Disastrous” organization ? Bullshit. “Screaming matches” between directors and actors ? Bullshit. Actors “refusing” to come back ? Bullshit.

Every report that wasn’t made through direct input of the cast or production team was not only wildly exaggerated, but also fake ? But please, hear it from Neil himself :

It was weirder for me to read some of the stuff online that said, “Oh, my god, American Gods, behind the scenes, is all falling apart.” I was going, “But they just shot four episodes, and everything is fine. They’re doing some re-shoots, but they’re doing less re-shoots than they did in Season 1.” [...]

I was reading Steven Bochco’s biography on the tube, going into work on Good Omens, every morning, and learning about what went down on Hill Street Blues, and then on NYPD Blue. That was worse, by a factor of thousands, than anything that happened on American Gods. A showrunner came, and a showrunner left. That’s not even an unusual thing. [...] The weirdest thing for me was putting out a thing on Twitter on Season 2, and having a bunch of people go, “We thought this was canceled.” No, it’s not canceled. In its own mad way, it’s on schedule.

(Source)

The show was never in any danger, much less in jeopardy. It's overreactions to false rumors and dramatic assumptions that can kill a show faster than a showrunner leaving. You want to be critical of a production ? Go ahead, and check your sources and facts. Please. I promise most of the time it’s not worth the worry, much less losing all hope.

“Bryan cared, they’re just ruining what he’s built.”

I dare you to watch any cast interview and tell me these people don’t care about the show, and that they do not value the work everyone else (from hair department to makeup artists, producers, writers, directors and costume team) puts into it as well.

I’ve watched my fair share of shows, I’m curious about production and behind-the-scenes material in general, and I’ve never seen a group of people being so genuinely happy and passionate about what they do and create together.

Neil took time out of preparing Good Omens (which he was showrunning himself) to be more active because he knew things would be different between season 1 and 2. Ricky Whittle (Shadow) had his contract reviewed to better accommodate shooting and planning. Orlando Jones (Nancy) contributed to writing episodes (especially regarding Black history and representation) and brought inputs on characterization. Ian Mcshane (Mr. Wednesday) participated in directing when he explicitly said during season 1 that he wasn’t interested in working as a director on this kind of show.

And that’s for the well-known names only. Go on the American Gods hashtag on instagram, you’ll find all the various artists who participated in crafting all the details found in new episodes. They’re out there talking about how excited they were to work on it all, how they did it, the love they have for the show and crew. They’re active and positive in every way you can be, please tell me how much they don’t care.

Production made the choice of taking its time making this season rather than rushing it when it’s been very clear that delaying can cause massive loss of viewers, because they care more about how the show comes out than what people actually think. They took in stride whatever problem a show of this magnitude could naturally encounter (again guys, no disaster happened) and worked to solve it the best way they could because they were perfectly aware that we fans care. And somehow that’s what made some of yall disappointed ??

If you seriously think Bryan (and Michael, some people forget about him smh) cared more about American Gods than these people -when he, in fact, cared just as much-, then by all means, leave right with him.

(Also uhm, idk if you noticed, but they’re both still credited in the fucking opening. Because, you know, they’re going by the bases they’ve settled.)

Some (hopefully) helpful facts :

+ Bryan and Michael weren’t fired, they walked out of the show after mutual understanding with the rest of the production that they weren’t agreeing on budget and realization. They concluded that pushing it would just be harmful to the show.

+ Likewise, Jesse Alexander (second showrunner) wasn’t evicted but stepped out once disagreements rose as to how to handle the end of the season. Again, they found a solution fairly quickly.

+ Gillian Anderson had only signed for season 1. Whether her character will ever be seen again (probably in flashbacks) is entirely up in the air. No promises, no impossibilities.

+ Both Kristin Chenoweth (Ostara) and Chris Obi (Anubis) have not been able to contribute to season 2 due to conflicts in their schedules.

+ Neil Gaiman has been much more involved in the production of season 2 as he had finished shooting Good Omens, something which took up most of his time when season 1 was produced.

+ Taking time producing a show =/= production being a disaster.

+ Always go for the reports/articles involving interviews and/or inputs of the persons actually working on the project (cast members, producers, writers, directors). Those are the most reliable sources you can fight. (Just remember that there’s always a possibility for fake news/drama online !)

#please do message me if you want clarification/to discuss #summary + facts in the tl;dr and at the very end #american gods #starz #freemantle media #american gods season 2 #neil gaiman #bryan fuller #michael green #ricky whittle #new media #gillian anderson #kahyun kim #rant #my writing #bitch this is so long

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dykedteach · 6 years ago

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okay so, a liveblog.

i know i haven’t done one of these in a while but it’s the last opportunity i had so, a pure as-i-watch-it liveblog for my own future enjoyment? horror? who knows

(also - last night i dreamt that jaime was still alive after all, and that he and brienne made up but then he poisoned sansa? anyway)

“I’ll find you later.” bitch........no

greyworm don’t you fucking dare babe

please don’t turn greyworm into a villain right at the end just to spite him i will be so mad

i’m so so nervous about tyrion walking through the rubble of the keep because if the twins are dead i absolutely do not want to see visual representation of the fact

the book of the kingsguards deeds im....asdjaskda

they’re going to make me see the fucking bodies aren’t they

okay that scene was so powerful and genuinely one of the saddest i’ve seen on the show and peter dinklage is incredible but i honestly struggled to watch it and i am crying A Lot

they, separately, have been two of my favourites since i started watching and this fucking hurts, i have honestly spent the last week kinda forgetting that they’re dead? and now it’s like. there they are.

also, jaime lannister clown club, my apologies, i so wanted to believe you

if tyrion does something like gives brienne his gold hand i s2g

i miss when jon used to look like he had life in him

he’s going to have to kill greyworm isn’t he

maybe davos will, actually, he’s never had a big kill

ooooooooooooooh the cinematography of the dragon rising behind her

imagine a regent that actually had wings how cool would that be

repeating her promises to/from the dothraki from like s1 is...a Move

“the queens master of war” ohhhhhh fuck me

god he really does need to die doesn’t he

literally what is she going to do?? march on every fucking city and kill them all? HOW are they “suffering under the wheel” the monarchy is the wheel and you? killed it??

arya use a face

aRyA uSe A fAcE

despite the fact i’ve seen leaks saying otherwise i’m so worried tyrion is gonna die

“I freed my brother” god the regret in his voice im dying

why is jon just chilling

JON BEING A TENDER BIG BROTHER why wasn’t 80% of his screentime this season doing exactly this

i love this version of arya that’s serious but not cold

“did you bring any wine?” oh babe

oof the whole afterlife discussion

oh for fucks sake what is it with the lannister men and laying out their bad deeds at the worst time

jon and tyrion arguing is just the two different halves of twitter arguing all this week

“why does it matter what i do” because you’re a good boy, jon snow!!!

god the acting in this episode so far is phenomenal

am i going to cry every time my dumbass golden idiot is mentioned from now on? bitch i might!

is he REALLY a member of the nights watch anymore? do the nights watch exist anymore? there’s no fucking WALL

is he really gonna just be like.....byeeeeee!!

YES bitch EMOTIONALLY MANIPULATE HIS LOVE OF HIS SIBLINGS its what he NEEDS

also, just his sisters?? there’s a bran also

i know we kinda forget about him (which will be hilarious by the end of this episode, if the spoilers i’ve seen are right) but

ooooh snowy dragon

shit, i forget, ashy dragon

ITS THE PROPECY

god the score is gorgeous

she’s literally queen of the ashes, fuck

“i imagined a mountain of swords too high to climb” so, like, the book throne then

oh god my upset puppy

this is it oh fuck

oh god

oh i feel so sorry for emilia clarke

oh jon

oh no drogon!! oh no

god that was quick

oh god when he’s nudging her body i’m so sad

why.....why the throne and not jon....

how does he know the throne is bad i’m?

god the VISUALS

but also....”mom died i’m DESTROYING the CHAIR” feels like a weird jump

god i fucking hate that her story ended like her father’s

we’re halfway through and no brienne, i’m disappointed

how many times now has tyrion had to contemplate his imminent death? bless him

ok so now she’s dead we can please let greyworm go safely to naath or something yeah? he doesn’t have to die or be evil this is fine just user him away

WAIT ITS MY BABY SHES HERE

how the fuck did they get down to KL so quick

WAIT EDMURE

hold um im pausing and rewinding

sam, ?, edmure, starks, WIFE, davos, LORD GENDRY LOOKING FINE, ?, a nights watch i guess? MY LESBIAN, a dornish prince i guess?

oh okay so obviously this is a little while later, and jon and tyrion have been imprisoned while they wait right?

YARA SHUT UP

god sansa looks stunning

edmure tully gets to do something! yay!

oh my god robin is huge now

“a veteran of two wars” where have you BEEN THOUGH BUDDY

“Uncle, please sit” GOD IMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

robin and royce trying not to laugh, sam trying not to laugh, sansa trying not to laugh, this is too much

“Why just us?” BABEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

SAM CHAMPIONING A DEMOCRACY LIKE A BABE

oh fuck off the lot of you

“who then?” well, brienne obviously

make her queen

i want it

give her a crown of sapphires

“bran the broken” that seems....reductive?

“who has a better story than-” well, you see, lots of people.

“and he can’t father children” i mean, he absolutely probably can?

where’s pod, i miss him

i love my diplomatic daughter

ARYA LOOKS LIKE SHE’S ABOUT TO CRY IM

bran being firm with greyworm i LOVE IT

he will be a good king, i agree with that. some emotion would be nice also.

oh god my poor baby

“there’s still a nights watch?” MOOD

“no one is very happy.” also a mood

he truly is ned’s boy, isn’t he.

show him saying goodbye to his family you FUCKING COWARDS

he’s sailing for naath after all i’m!! emotional!

where the fuck does arya think she’s going

i hope she has like, a few years travelling and then comes back

oh god arya crying is just

i’m so emotional

oh fuck

oh no i hoped and predicted for this scene weeks ago and wanted it to be in better circumstances but

why isn’t she wearing her blue armour

i can’t count the number of times i’ve paused this scene already to just solidly cry

“Escaped imprisonment and rode south in an attempt to save the capital from destruction. Died protecting his Queen.”

brienne baby i’m so sorry

okay i’m going to distract myself by questioning how the fuck they rebuilt so quickly

HOLY FUCK PEOPLE WERE KINDA RIGHT ABOUT SAM WRITING THE BOOK

fuckin bronn

oh god she’s HEAD OF THE KINGSGUARD

oh wow i’m so down for bran occasionally warging during meetings and everyone else just being like.......um....excuse us...

SER

PODRICK

FUCKING

PAYNE

“you’re master of grammar now too?” somewhere, in purgatory, a baratheon smiles.

i swear to god, if brienne’s last line is a comment about brothels

(at least she’s not pregnant)

my crack ship came out of this better than my hardcore otp

where’s GHOST

a king, a queen, an explorer, and a pariah.

god but i do love the starks

GHOST

OH god arya’s ship is gorgeous

sansa’s crown is nice but a little too cersei reminiscent for me

i’m just happy tormund is here

okay so actually. overall. and maybe it’s because i saw the leaks for most stuff weeks ago and had time to process it.

i kind of.....enjoyed that for the most part?

certainly the second half.

anyway. that’s it.

fuck me.

#laura watches game of thrones #for the last time #god this had me in my feelings

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calliecat93 · 6 years ago

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RWBY Volume 6 Season Review

It's been a Hell of a ride dear readers. From train wrecks to zombie Grimm to mech battles, Volume 6 has had many twists and turns that have held absolutely nothing back. Now that it's over, it's time to look back and answer some important questions. Was this volume good? Did it improve the problems of the last volume? And how does this volume stand against the rest? We have a lot to go over and this is already several weeks later than it should, so for the final time lets get into RWBY Volume 6.

Visuals

Do I even need to say that the animation was good? Of course it is. The animation improves with every single season, and they knocked it out of the park here. If anyone was still doubtful about the change to Maya after Volumes 4 and 5, then this will show you that they have absolutely mastered the engine. Character animation and expressions are lively and energetic, which again isn't a surprise anymore. I have nothing new to say about the general animation. It's good. Really, really good..

The backgrounds and set pieces have greatly improved. A big problem with V5 was that we were mainly restricted to Qrow's Mistral house. It's a nice house, but being stuck in one setting for so long gets... well, boring. The other settings were either ones we were now familiar with (Menagerie) or nothing all that special (Raven's camp) with the exception being the Spring Maiden Vault. But the upside to V6 being a journey based volume like V4 means that we get more settings, and all of them were good. Brunswick Farms was cold and eerie, Lil' Miss Malachite's bar very much felt like a criminal hangout, and of course the beauty that is Argus. It's a massive city clearly based off San Francisco and they DON'T use 2D stills to get the point across. We get one episode where we get to see the city in full, and it makes us engage with the location as a result. And that's not even getting into everything in Chapter 3. The sets were all visually appealing, unique, and I very much loved everything.

There's also the effects. Oh gosh, the effects. Snow is very prevalent in this volume, and it looks beautiful. Just watch the opening shots of Chapter One, the falling snow against the trees looks freakin' great. Compare the trees to the ones in Volume 1, you WILL see the massive improvements that Maya have provided. In the effects department though, Chapter 3 wins. The blue smoke effects during Jinn's flashback just look so good and really give it a mystical feel. Hell, Jinn herself looks freakin' great. Other-worldly and kind of God-like, very fitting for a being made by a God and based off a genie. Which the character designs for the new characters also look great. Salem's human form making her look like a graceful maiden in a sharp contrast to her current form, Ozma looking knightly and regal, Saphron and Terra both look beautiful and their designs say a lot about them (Saphron is a fun-loving but caring person, Terra looks a little nerdy but also mature), it's all really good and diverse. I love it!

Finally, there is the big one. The fight animation. This was by far one of, if not THE biggest complaint about Volume 5, especially with the Battle of Haven...ugh... battle. They were too slow. ‘’characters just stood around. It was clunky and un-energetic. In short, people had problems. Well, I think it's safe to say that they listened. The fights are all fantastic. Chapter One alone addressed the concerns with the train battle, going very fast, had a badass fight song, and it’s fully utilizing every character involved. Same with the battle against Cordovan, again utilizing everyone effectively and giving all the characters a moment to shine. The one on one fights, which I thought were fine in V5, are also very good. Cinder vs Neo is very fast and has Neo using her Semblance very effectively, Maria vs the Grimm and then Tock truly demonstrated Maria's past skill and managed to make one minute truly tense and engaging, and of course Bumblebee vs Adam. It was badass. The entire thing. So... while I was pretty okay with V5's fights, I think it's safe to say that they redeemed themselves here.

So when it comes to visuals, the volume was very strong. Great expressions, nice and unique designs, beautiful set pieces, great effects, and epic fights. All of the visuals looked great. I cannot think of one bad or nitpicky thing to say about it. Even the opening looked badass, but that's no surprise. Once again, CRWBY stepped it up, and they perfectly hit the mark.

Voice Acting

Before we go any further... lets go ahead and address the elephant in the room to get it over with. Lets briefly go over Vic's performance as Qrow. AKA, that guy that I no longer have any respect for. For those unaware, not long after the volume ended Vic Mignonga was fired for accusations of sexual misconduct and will no longer be involved in the series. But putting personal opinion aside and just looking at his performance, he was very good and Qrow's feelings of self-loathing and bitterness was very well conveyed. While I WAS upset at Qrow through most of it, his conflicted feelings were clear and very well acted. Vic did good, but he still utterly screwed himself and I am sure that Qrow's new VA will be even better. Alright, got that out of the way. Lets talk about everyone else now.

The cast all did a very good job. Even just the guest actors, like Colleen Clinkenbeard as Jinn and Luci Christian as Lil' Miss. They get little screentime, but they very much bring their characters to life. Coleen makes Jinn a straight-forward but playful being who is clearly amused by everything, and Luci makes Lil' Miss a very confident, very unflappable info breaker who commands respect. There's also Mela Lee as Cordovan, and she does a delightful job in making the old woman a stern, grumpy jerk who is boisterous and egotistical. You can just tell that she was having a lot of fun with her lines, haha. Lindsay Sheppard did a great job in making Saphron fun, bright, and a comforting sister figure and same for Jamie Smith as Terra.

The villains VA were very good. Not too much to say about Hazel and Watts', so lets do everyone else. This was the epic return of Tyrian, and BOOY did Josh Grelle do a great job once again at making me feel utterly terrified of the character. The guy got back into the role seamlessly and once more gave an unnerving, but fun performance. Yuri Lowenthal got to display an emotion that isn't smugness for Mercury, who finally let out some frustration and hurt over his past and circumstances. You can hear the anger in his voice when he lets it all out to Emerald, and Yuri did a great job in conveying it. In turn, Katie Newville as Emerald did a fantastic job in conveying the thief's growing fear and uncertainty over everything that just makes you want to hug her. And of course, Jessica Nigri continues to be deliciously egotistical and smug with Cinder. I wanted to kick her in the face, but I'm pretty sure that's the intention so good job Jessica!

The standout among the bad guys though is Jen Taylor. Up to this point, Salem has been in one mode: very calm and mother-like. She would raise her voice a little, but normally she remained in calm mode and that was it. This volume? Ho boy, do they FINALLY let Jen show off her talents. She NAILED every single line. The despair, the hatred, the intimidation as her calm mask slips away. Jen's performance is as heartbreaking as it is terrifying. You go from feeling horrible for her in Chapter 3, to hiding under your bed in Chapter 4. Jen got to pull the kiddy gloves off, and she did NOT hold back.

Now onto the main cast. Ren and Nora's VA's did very well especially when they comforted Jaune. Speaking of, Miles performance in Chapters 8 and 9 were just heartbreaking. You could feel Jaune's anger, pain, sadness, and finally acceptance in Miles' delivery. He did great. Aaron Dismuke and Shannon McCormick did very well when they each did their incarnations of Ozma, as well as of Oscar and Ozpin respectively. Garrett Hunter got his final hurrah as Adam and while he has been... meh at times, his final go was utterly chilling and terrifying. We also had the addition of Melissa Sternenburg as Maria, and she was just great. Maria was a super fun character, and that is very much in part due to Melissa. She was always energetic, but also greatly conveyed a sense of wisdom and experience in her delivery. She's a very welcome addition to the cast and, given her old lady roles in Nomad of Nowhere and Camp Camp, I think she has a great career as animated old ladies of Rooster Teeth ahead of her!

And finally, onto Team RWBY. Kara as Weiss was good. Nothing else to really say there. Arryn did a great job with Blake, greatly expressing her guilt, new comforting side, and fears very well. Her entire performance in Chapters 10-12 were by far the best that she has given, perfectly coming across as emotional but determined especially when she finally broke down once it was over. Barbara as Yang also did very well. Yang spent the first half very angry, frustrated, and kinda stand-offish and Barb did a great job in conveying that. She lightened up in the second half, which was nice. Her best delivery was in Chapter 12 when she truly beat Adam. Her delivery conveyed much strength, and I loved it. But I must say that the best performer by far was Lindsay as Ruby. Say what you want about the pitch, but Lindsay did a fantastic job. In this Ruby got more serious and no-nonsense, and Lindsay did a great job in making her sound much more mature and decisive but still fun and energetic. She has always done a great job, all of them have. I fully expect them to be even greater in the next volume. They all really showed how far they come, even Kara despite not having much to say aside from her being good.

So yeah, great voice acting across the board! Five stars!

Music

WHERE DO I EVEN BEGIN?!

Do I need to say that all of the music was good? Is that a surprise anymore? The one thing that everyone has ever agreed on when it comes to the show is that Jeff Williams music is good. He doesn't disappoint here. His and Alex Abraham's scores are all perfect. The epic score in Chapter 3, the horror music in Chapter 6, the flute rendition of Red Like Roses and This Will Be the Day in Chapter 9, every single score was VERY good. Even the one piece done by Casey at the very end of Chapter 2 sounded great, so kudos to her on her first try~

Then of course, there are the vocal tracks. Going into each and every one in detail would take up too much of this post, and it's long enough as it is. But each of the tracks are very well performed. From the rocking opening theme Rising, to the emotional heart-breaker that is Forever Fall, to the massive 'f*** you Adam theme of Nevermore in the credits. All the tracks perfectly fit their scenes and the characters that they are meant to represent. I may do a full analysis of the songs once the soundtrack comes out. But, going off what we’ve heard of them so far, here's my current rankings of the tracks and which episode they played in:

Rising (Opening Theme)

Nevermore (Chapter 13 Credits)

Forever Fall (Chapter 9)

Miracle (Chapter 1)

One Thing (Chapter 5)

Indomitable (Chapter 13)

Big Metal Shoe (Chapter 11)

Lionized (Adam Character Short)

We’ll see if those change when the soundtrack is released. But either way, all of them are great songs that are once more performed perfectly by Casey. Her range continues to be impressive as Hell, being able to do hard metal songs like Big Metal Shoe and somber ballads like Forever Fall without skipping a beat. The girl is an insanely talented vocalist who, being a singer myself, I continue to envy but admire. Jeff of course also did great on the songs he sang in such as Lionized, as well as guest singer Adrienne Cowan in her badass duet with Casey on Nevermore. I REALLY hope that Jeff will bring her in for future tracks. And going back to Jeff, once more the writing and composition for these tracks are all badass. The fact that the man has delivered six quality soundtracks in a row that just keep escalating in quality really speak of his talent and dedication. Something that I imagine will only continue into Volume 7.

Characters

Now we get to the long part! Yay! There's a lot to talk about, but my main focus is going to be on Ruby, Blake, Yang, Qrow, Ozpin/Ozma/Oscar, Salem, Maria, and Jaune in greater detail. But first, we'll get the ones I don't have much to say on out of the way.

Lets talk about the villains first. Namely Emerald, Mercury, and Neo. They all came out much stronger in this volume. Emerald has already been the most sympathetic, and now that everything is sinking in, her being uncertain and scared is no surprise. What she mainly needs now is to both gain the courage to finally leave and finally realize that Cinder has not, and will not, ever care for her. Mercury, despite keeping up a smug front, also becomes a lot more likable. He defends Mercury against Tyrian, reveals his motivations and some of the trauma his father inflicted on him, and despite that smugness we can see through the cracks. IDK if that makes him as redeemable as Emerald, but it's a good start. Cinder... is still a heartless bitch who if anything we hate even more now, but at least she's still trying. Then there's Neo, who I found incredibly overrated in the past... and still do. But now that she has actual motivation with Roman dead and her quest for revenge, she comes across as a better character and not just some psycho girl with a cute design who's just... there. Hopefully we'll see her fleshed out more in the Atlas arc, but as someone who really didn't give a shit about Neo, I'm much more interested in her now.

The villain who came out the best however is Salem. She doesn't change or anything, but now we understand who she is and what she is after. She began as this tragic maiden, locked away until she found love. She lost that love and went through a ton of tragedy and pain all because she wanted him back. She got screwed over, but refused to accept that death happens and... it's understandable. She went to the extreme, but her past self comes across as very sympathetic and human because of how harsh the Gods are to her. Then she gets Grimmified, and she becomes terrifying. She gains a God complex, yet we see that she still has the ability to love and care as she was to her children. But after Ozma 'betrayed' her, she threw that away. Salem went from this mysterious Big Bad, to a figure defined by tragedy. Someone who went through so much torment and grief and it twisted her into a monster. But we also see that, while sympathetic, she IS still a terrifying wicked witch who will not rest until she has wiped out all of humanity and gained her revenge on both The Gods and Ozma. Those who stand in her way be damned. She's still a force that has to be stopped, but at least now we understand how she became that way.

Since we're on that topic, lets talk about Ozpin. Holy Hell... Ozpin. This guy has gone through Hell and back. We finally find out everything about the man. His past, the reason for his motivations, the reincarnation deal, his connection to Salem. The guy was just a good-hearted person who found love, died... several times, and then got roped into serving the Gods to make sure that humanity didn't die the second time. You can understand why the guy is so secretive and just how cruel his existence has been. He is an equally tragic figure... but he too has done bad things. He's lied to people, lead them to their deaths for a cause that seems hopeless, and has essentially lead people on a suicide mission. While I do have some issues with how this was played out and what the show wants us to think of Oz, he ultimately was shown for what he is: human. He isn't evil, but he's not 100% good. He's done bad things, but it's all to try and save Remnant from something unfathomable. The world broke him, and he’s struggled to save that world. But now, with everything out and all of his allies turning their backs on him, he did what he did prior to the Maidens: lock himself away from the world.

Which brings us to Oscar... and how his arc was sadly not as good as it should have been. Not that it was bad, but it... really did not get the attention that it required. But the kid's fears over his identity are understandable. Who wouldn't be terrified, especially now that he's seen how this mess happened to begin with? But even so, he still tries. He still tried to help at Brunswick, he still tried to help keep spirits up in Argus (prior to Jaune's outburst), and while I wish we SAW him come to terms with his situation, he still did and proved beneficial in the airship mission. He really has taken Ruby's advice in V5, to keep moving forward despite the fear and pain. Because even at his lowest moment and more than enough reason to just give up, he doesn't. He still has plenty of growing to do, and I imagine that he still has things with Oz to sort out, but he's shown his potential and I think that he's going to go far.

Onto JNR. Not much to say about Ren and Nora sadly. Only that Nora was at her funniest here, and their support for Jaune was super sweet and really shows the team's unity. Now Jaune.... HO BOY. We all knew that it was gonna come to this eventually. First, Jaune's really matured. Chapter One alone showed him being able to quickly go into leader mode, how he's already gotten the hang of his Semblance, and despite his fear of losing more loved ones he understands what has to be done. It was also really cute to see his interactions with his sister and him getting to be happy again... until Chapter 8 hit. Jaune finds out the truth, and he is by far the most justified in his reaction. He lost Pyrrha, his friend and mentor, because of all of this... and it was for nothing. We all know that he's been struggling with Pyrrha's death and trying to move on, and we already know that he's got issues with all of this as Volume 4 demonstrated once he came to understand just what was wrong with Pyrrha. As such, I just felt horrible for him, especially once he realized what he almost did to Oscar and how bad he felt.

But of course, the biggest step is in Chapter 9. Everything is weighing on Jaune. His guilt, his pain over his loss, his uncertainty about what to do now. Then he's lead to the memorial, and he meets who I still assume is Mama Nikos. We see him process everything as he looks at the statue, that pain still shining through. Then he and Mama Nikos talks, and he finally starts to find comfort. He remembers what a Huntsman and Huntress is supposed to do, protect others no matter the price. He realized that Pyrrha knew what was going to happen, but if she could save even just one person, it was worth it. It as hopeless, yet Pyrrha fought anyways. It inspires Jaune to continue, and to finally find peace in his situation. Will he forget Pyrrha? Never. But now that he's been able to talk to someone, now that he's been able to let it out and have assurance from Ren and Nora, he can finally move forward. Which he does, creating the plan to steal the airship, defending against Cordovan, and he seems much more serious but happier as well. The paladin has grown a lot throughout the series, going from a buffoon completely out of place to a good-hearted warrior who will do whatever he can do wherever he is. Something that he learned from Pyrrha Nikos.

Next we'll go into WBY (I'm gonna bring up Ruby in a little bit) I don't have a ton to say about Weiss. She's afraid and uncertain about going back to Atlas since... well, she'd pretty much be going back to her abusive home that she just escaped from. It's all pretty subtle, but very clear and very much build up for her upcoming arc now that they made it to Atlas. So not much going for her development wise, but still she was great in this volume. Especially when she shattered the alcohol bottle and burned the Apathy to death (seemingly anyways). As for Blake and Yang... ho boy, where do I start?

This volume is very much the next step for Blake as she tries to fix relations with her team, though mainly Yang. We see small things like her comforting Weiss after she and Yang found the bodies, which it's just sweet to see her trying to be better and there for everyone. But of course, the biggest obstacle is with Yang. The girl is trying. She tries to help Yang with her stuff, talks about how Adam made her feel powerless, tries to be comforting... even if she said the wrong thing, but still she's trying. On Yang's part, she's also trying. It's good that she's not just angry at Blake like she was the volume prior, showing that she DID take Weiss' words to heart and is trying to let Blake back in. I... have my issues with Yang, like being hypocritical of secret keeping when she's yet to talk about Raven and I really think that her anger at Oz, while justified, was uncalled for and done at the worst possible moment. That being said, we do see that she's still struggling with her PTSD, the realization that things look hopeless, and I was okay with her by the second half.

Of course the final moment for their character arcs that has lasted since the end of V3 is the final fight with Adam. Blake confronts her demons for the final time, and Yang confronts the source of her fear and trauma. Regardless of what you think of Adam, he was very much the one who brought them pain, and it was only fitting that he be the one who brought it closure. Blake already took control back from him in V5, but this is her being forced to bring it to an end and affirm her promise to never leave her loved ones again. Yang had gained back the will to fight, but now she not only showed that she had become smarter with her fighting and her Semblance usage, but had her rip control back from Adam and at last exterminate the ghost that had haunted her. As much, the two fixed the damage to their bond that V3 caused and have come out stronger and much more supportive of each other. So do I think they're officially together? Mmm... not yet. I think at this point it's gonna happen, but IDK... I think we need more happy stuff between them first. But hey, the season got me to finally subscribe to the Bumblebee ship (even if I still hate people using it to harass CRWBY) and their arcs got the closure that it needed. It left me immensely satisfied and ready to see what happens with these two next.

Onto Qrow now and I was... mixed about him. Him finding out the full story about Oz and the seeming hopelessness? Yes, his anger was understandable. What made me lose sympathy however is how he punched Oscar (yeah it was directed at Oz but IDC, Oscar still felt it) and then told Ruby to not lie to the kid about not just being another of Oz's lives. He reverted to drinking himself stupid, which nearly got everyone killed, and just quit once things got too hard at Argus. I get that Qrow's struggling and I do like that his drinking is being put in a more serious light... but it just made me lose ANY sympathy or liking to him. I got some back once he expressed fear of the kids getting killed but in many ways it's too little, too late. IDK, I just did not like him at all in this volume because of how much of a downer and hindrance he was and he never so much as said that he was sorry. He kind of acknowledged his mess ups in the end, but it just wasn't enough for me. I hope that V7 makes amends for this and overall I guess it's good that this happened now. Plus hey, I lost my sympathy for Blake in V4, then loved her again in V5 and here, so I guess that might be the case with Qrow. We'll see.

Now lets talk Maria! Dear Lord, I LOOOVE Maria! She is such a welcome addition, especially with Ozpin now out of the picture. She's wise, experienced, and takes shit from no one while also being silly, sassy, and incredibly petty. She brought a lot of much needed levity to the darker stuff, like making everyone get their acts together after the massive flashback. Really in general she was the funniest character this volume. Her “Maybe she's dead!” line got the largest laugh out of me all volume. But as I said, she's also wise. She's stern, but friendly. She's screwed up and been through Hell, which she recognizes and longs to do something to make up for it. She does what she wants, but also recognizes what's important like say... getting out of a snow storm and THEN deal with your various emotions over the traumatic flashbacks. She is a strong, experienced, and optimistic figure and very much provides the guidance that Ruby really needs. She was a delight and I assume that she's going to stick around, so yay!

Which finally brings us to by far the best character this volume: Ruby herself. This was EVERYTHING that I have been wanting for SO LONG. Last volume, I was NOT happy with how she was shafted, got the Silver Eyes ignored, and just... did nothing. It pissed me off as a Ruby fan and was the one thing I was hoping to see them make an effort to improve in this volume. Which I am very happy to say that they GREATLY redeemed themselves with her character.

This is very much Ruby's volume. She steps up as a leader, she tries to keep everyone on their feet as things just get bleaker and bleaker. She goes against Ozpin when she questions if he meant what he said about the good in humanity, and even goes against Qrow when she finally gets fed up with his quitter attitude. She comes up with plans and faces every threat, such as The Apathy and Cordovan's mech head on because hey, someone has to. With Maria around and her now starting to understand her Eyes power, Ruby shows interest in learning it. Which all of it culminates n her facing the Leviathan, knowing that her power is their only hope. She may not have killed the Leviathan, but she now has a grasp on her power and it is because of her that Argus was saved. And all of this without losing the optimism and cheerfulness that we love about her.

Many say that Ruby hasn't grown at all since the beginning, and I have to STRONGLY disagree. In the early volumes, she was an awkward girl who's goal to be a Huntress was genuine, but her view was very idealistic and naive. She wanted to be like the hero of the stories he was told of as a child, but didn't understand all the pain and regret that would come with it. She knew that bad things happened... but she hadn't really experienced it aside from losing her mom, which she was too young to comprehend fully then. But now? She understands pain. She understands loss. She understands the importance of her job and just how bad that the world can be. But it doesn't bring her down, it only strengthened her resolve. Now, in this volume, shes had to step up since people like Ozpin and Qrow are incapable of leading. She's faced threat after threat, refusing to back down until she and her friends have achieved their goals. She used to be a girl asking Glynda, a Huntress, for her autograph. Now? She is that Huntress. It's not a naive girl's fantasy anymore, it is her duty and she will do everything in her power to make things better. Because that is what she signed up for, and she will see it through to the end.

As far as characters go, this volume did very well. It brought many character arc to a close, while leaving plenty of others open. Many got new layers of depth and had questions about them finally answered after so many years. New additions like Maria and Jinn were very welcome, and the new supporting characters like Saphron, Terra, Lil' Miss, and Cordovan were just really nice and fun to have around... even if Cordovan got off far too lightly, but meh. There were some good welcome backs, like with Tyrian and of course Neo. Even if I was annoyed at some, like Yang and Qrow, overall I thought that all the characters were great and I really have a new appreciation for pretty much all of them. Excellent work CRWBY!

Story

Back at NYCC, Miles and Kerry didn't say what the season's theme was, but that it would be clear to us by the time it was over. Well... it's over. What's the theme then? How about we take a look back and find out.

The main goal of the season is for our characters to reach Argus, and subsequently get to Atlas. Seems simple enough, but of course the road has many bumps. Grimm attacks, train wrecks, corrupt authority figures, nothing was simple to get accomplished. Even worst, the team get fed up with Ozpin's secrets and discover the truth: Salem cannot be destroyed. It sends them into despair, causing them to be tired of all the bad things that have happened and keep happening. They struggle to find hope and to continue on, especially with Ozpin locking himself away and Qrow just giving up. What do you when everything seems hopeless? Where no matter what you do, nothing changes and you just keep dealing with bad thing after bad thing? Do you keep going on? Can you move on?

To quote the fourth opening:

“Do we just go home? Can we follow through? When all hope is gone, there is one thing we can do... Lets just live”

The entire volume's message is to rise up and continue on, despite the despair and fear. In the beginning, the heroes get brought down form their triumph as the Grimm attack, they get sepearted and wrecked in a snow storm, find out all of Oz;s dirty secrets and just how bad of a place they're in. Which results in nearly all of them feeling broken. They're left in the cold, ready to give up. The Apathy make sit worst, causing them all to lose the will to do... well, anything. Even Ruby, the only one still trying to keep spirits up, nearly gives in. She's tired. They're all tired. They want to just be done with it and go home.

But they can't

Soon, they find hope. Maria helps Ruby unlock her Silver Eyes. They're able to escape Brunswick and make it to Argus and find their friends. But then Cordovan refuses to let them through, breaking Qrow and soon Jaune. But that doesn't last long. Jaune finds comfort by discovering Pyrrha's memorial and is reminded of what his duty is. Oscar, despite all his fears, decides to use the time that he has left to do what's right. Ruby, fed up with Qrow's attitude, finally decides to take over and defy his wishes. They survived everything thrown at them. Despite all the odds and obstacles, they are a breath away from getting to Atlas. It is their duty to help people, no natter what. So they're going to fight. They're going to make it to Atlas. And even if Salem can't be destroyed, they will stand against her to protect all of humanity. It ultimately leads to Ruby facing down the Leviathan, both herself and everyone else refusing to leace because it’s their jobs to fight, and she’s able to defeat it through her hope and love powering her.

Volume 6's story was overall very well executed. Every episode was well paced, moved things forward in some way, and always had something to invest our time in. A big plus side to this volume compared to 4 and 5 is this time, we don't have multiple main plotlines. We have one: get the Relic to Atlas. We have subplots of course, like Cinder being confronted by Neo and the stuff with the villains, but they don't get in the way of the main story. The main story is where the focus stays and what is the most important. Nothing ever felt like it was dragged or like it was just a massive exposition dump. And when we DID get exposition, they kept it interesting like using magical flashbacks to show us what is happening, for example.

Speaking of, this volume gave us the lore dump that we have been waiting for YEARS. We finally find out the history of Salem and Ozpin. We finally understand their respective goals and motivations. We find out that Remnant was magical until the Gods left. We get to SEE the Gods. We find out why the Relics are such a big deal and what will happen if brought together. We even get to see how the moon got broken! And even then, while we don't get full on explanations on the Silver Eyes or about Team STRQ, we get at least a little bit. Enough to re-ignite investment, but they're left open for future volumes. With those revelations, it can explain even more. Like Ozpin making the Vaults so that the Relics were as secure and far away form each other as possible and how, as the King of Vale, he ended the war. So many revelations came from this volume and it left me very satisfied.

I thoroughly enjoyed the story. It wasn't perfect, mind you. Oscar got shafted too much and his arc felt rushed, Cordovan got off FAR too easily for her actions, and I have issues with HOW Oz's secrets came out and how we're supposed to view the whole thing. I think the girls were justified in demanding answers... but forcing them out I think was wrong. Or at least considering the circumstances, it was wrong to do then. Also, they don't really suffer any consequences for it, but we may see those pop up later. And IDK what the narrative wants us to think of Ozpin. Are we supposed to feel bad for him? Be angry at him? I guess both, but due to the lack of consequences and the outright enraged reactions from Yang and Qrow being unadressed... it feels like it's saying that the girls were correct and that Ozpin is the bad guy, even though one can make a VERY good argument for why he was justified in his actions. IDK, I don't like that the narrative was saying that getting angry and violating people's privacy was right and suffering no consequences due to it. IDK how it could have been better, but... it just bothers me.

But nevertheless, we return to the question. What is the theme of this volume? Well... judging from the plot, the opening, and how it ended, this is my answer: keep moving forward. Okay, that might seem weird. Let me explain. Everything looks hopeless and bleak. Everyone is broken down or ready to give in. But in the end, they find the will to keep going. Ruby refuses to give up. She keeps moving everyone on, rising to take charge. Jaune is broken by the revelation that Pyrrha died for nothing, but soon realizes that she did what she knew was right, and he rises back up. Qrow is at his lowest, but Ruby finally tells him that he isn't responsible for them and pulls him back to his feet. Oscar knows that he may not be himself sooner or later, but he still decides to face the inevitable. Adam comes back, the person who broke both Blake and Yang, and they rise up against him for the final time.

Look at the characters who didn’t move forward. Qrow gave up after learning the truth/once things got hard and Ozpin also abandoned his responsibility while giving into his own despair. Due to it, things got worst for them. Adam abandoned any good and righteousness that he once had, now blinded by hatred and his desire to seek vengeance against Blake. Salem is still consumed by her God complex and hatred of Ozpin, which has caused her to lose whatever humanity that she still has. Maria was once a famed Huntress, but once she lost her Eyes she abandoned her duty and is now left guilt-ridden for it. Cordovan was blinded by ego and power, resorting to VERY severe actions that cuased lots of panic/damage and initially refused to accept her fault for it. These are all people who gave into their negative emotions and either gave up, abandoned their duties, or were warped into monsters. Some pulled themselves back, like Qrow and Maria, while others like Adam died for it. They gave in to negativity, and because of it things only got worst for both themselves and for others.

This volume is about how you have to keep going and NOT give into the negativity. Yes, things may be hopeless. You may not win the fight in your lifetime. You may either do horrible things, or find out that those you trusted did. Your entire worldview may crumble apart, and you're left to deal with the despair and pain. And yes, you may very well feel tired and like the best thing to do is to give up. But you can't. Others will help you stand back up. You can help others stand up. You can face those bad things and break through them, becoming stronger and better as a result. And no matter how the world looks, you HAVE to keep fighting. Even to the bitter end. It'll hurt, but you CAN do it, and you will. Because if you don't, who will?

I think the best way to sum it up is with these lines from the volume's opening:

“The lightning doesn't take advice from anyone. The willow doesn't need to learn to stand As sun meets day, we'll find out way, And we'll catch that dream together someday soon. We're rising like the moon.”

Final Thoughts

This has become my favorite volume of the series. Yep, even above Volume 3. What more can I say? The animation was great, the music was great,t he voice acting was great, everything was great! So many questions got answered, story arcs came to a close while leaving new ones open, everything that needed to be addressed for this volume was addressed while perfectly leading us into the next one. When the finale was over, I was left immensely happy and satisfied with everything. Even my couple of issues really weren't that bad. This was a fantastic volume and really shows how far that CRWBY has come since the beginning. I am very much looking forward to Volume 7, and again thank you CRWBY for an absolutely amazing Volume.

So once again, RWBY has come to a close until the Fall. Thank you everyone who has read my reviews, and I'm sorry that this took so long. Life sucks sometimes. If you want to see more stuff from me, I'll be reviewing RvB17 when it starts on March 9th and while I'm not reviewing Gen:Lock episode by episode, a season review for it will be made once it concludes. I'm also planning to do some more RWBY stuff before V7, like some character analysis and maybe even going back to review past volumes. We'll see how things go. But I had a lot of fun reviewing this volume, and again to all of those who stuck with me, thank you. I'll see you again for Volume 7~

#rwby #rwby reviews #callie reviews

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rickrakontoys · 7 years ago

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INFINITY WAR Spoiler talk

Random spoilery thoughts and rating of the movie

Things I liked:

- Thanos. This is his movie. A sad, lonely, yet terrifyingly driven villain. His relationship with Gamora helped humanize him, but he’s still a genocidal monster through-and-through… One of the best MCU villains (though I feel Killmonger is more relatable since his motivation is grounded in our reality, and Loki since we’ve spent so much time with him and witness his struggles) - Loki saying “we have a Hulk” - The various team-ups throughout the movie in general. - Tony butting heads with Dr. Strange, and his continued mentoring of Peter Parker. - Dr. Strange demonstrating more of his mystic arts powers, and going toe-to-toe with Thanos and holding his own quite well. - Ebony Maw is the only member of the Black Order worth remembering…. creepy and intimidating. - Thor managing to remain humble and mostly-level headed despite losing everything he was protecting and fighting for in Thor: Ragnarok. His bonding with Rocket of all people was endearing. - Kevin Bacon in the Avengers - Rocket matured a bit since GOTG vol. 2. He’s still Rocket as we know him, but more willing to step up and “be the captian” now than before. - The Invisible Drax. Stupid… but i liked it. - Gamora’s flashback to her homeworld and meeting Thanos, and her scenes with Thanos on his ship. We finally get to see her confront her father directly, and the dysfunction lends weight to both their plot threads. - Thanos to Quill: “I like you” - Seeing Vision and Scarlet Witch’s relationship play out on the big screen. - Hulk not coming out to play due to the beating he received by Thanos. He’s still got a child-like mind, and it’s totally believeable that he’s pout and whine and not want to come out. Banner still gets some heroism in nonetheless in the Hulkbuster. - Seeing Wakanda again with the Avengers there alongside Black Panther and Okoye. - All the cameos… always good to see Pepper Potts. Peter’s friend Ned. “Thunderbolt” Ross has an obligatory scene. The Collector appears. M'Baku returns to help T'Challa and the Avengers. Shuri gets to banter with Banner. - the Red Skull’s return… even though he has only a brief scene, it confirmed he was only teleported away and not killed by the Tessaract. - The entire battle with Thanos on Titan. It’s just cool to see heroes all battling a single enemy as opposed to another faceless army. - Nebula confronting Thanos on Titan, and her inclusion at all in the film. I hope she plays a bigger role in the next part. - Thor’s adventure with Rocket and Groot to get a new hammer. He is still obsessed with hammers…. - Giant Peter Dinklage… - “Thor, you’re about to take the full force of a star… it will kill you.” “ONLY IF I DIE!” …“Yes, that’s what killing you means…” - “WHY IS GAMORA?!” - Thanos getting more and more somber and depressed as the movie went along, especially after sacrificing Gamora, the only person he cared about. - "Tell them about the dance-off to save the galaxy." Footloose. - Quill’s angry reaction to Thanos killing Gamora and screwing the heroes… it’s perfectly in character. He’s always been an immature man-child, even with the development he received in the previous films. Part of his curse of being raised by the Ravagers. Likewise, who would NOT have an emotional outburst like that? Stark had one in Civil War. - War Machine back in action. Blowing shit up. - Winter Soldier/White Wolf alongside Rocket Raccoon……. - Thanos throwing chunks of a moon at the heroes. Tony: “If you throw another moon at me…” - Thanos’ admiration of Stark. “I hope they remember you” - Later he tries to comfort Scarlet Witch after she kills Vision. If he wasn’t a maniac hellbent on universal genocide with a history of child abuse, he might be an ok guy… - Thor’s heroic return with Stormbringer. Seeing him back to full power was great, though… it takes away a bit from his development in Ragnarok… He’s not a god of hammers… why does he need one so much? - Thor keeps calling Rocket “rabbit” and Groot “tree”. Didnt bother to learn names - “This is my friend, Tree”, “I am Groot”, “I am Steve Rogers” - Okoye + Black Widow + Scarlet Witch vs. Proxima Midnight - Vision sacrificing himself, and Wanda having to witness him die twice. - “You should have gone for the head!” - The ending… the fingersnap. The dissolve into ashes… The character’s reactions to these deaths is what makes it all work, even if we the audience know it probably won’t be permanent. - “Mr. Stark, I don’t feel so good…” and “I don’t wanna go I don’t wanna go… I’m sorry”…… - Knowing what Tony must have felt when Peter disappeared… probably adds a whole new level to his current PTSD… - Dr. Strange clearly playing the long game, even at the sacrifice of himself and half the universe. “Tony, it was the only way”… Witnessing their deaths 14 million times must have been rough. - Cap gets the last words in the movie: “Oh god….” - The simple end credits, playing almost like an “in mermoriam” - The fact that we have no idea where the heck Avengers 4 is going plotwise…. will those who became dust in the wind return? Seems likely since Homecoming 2 and GOTG vol. 3 are filming soon… and like they’d kill off Black Panther after he made ALL THE MONEY before this movie made all the money again. - “Motherfu-”

Things I didn’t like:

- Heimdall again gets kinda shafted… after getting such a prominent role in Ragnarok. At least he got a last heroic gesture by sending Hulk home. - Loki dying so early to be motivation for Thor. Unless he has more up his sleeve in a long play, having him try to stab Thanos in the face felt like sloppy storytelling. What if he succeeded? The Black Order is RIGHT THERE. They would’ve killed both him and Thor anyways. Loki probably knew death was imminent and wanted one last act of defiance and proof of loyalty to Thor and Asgard. I don’t mind him dying early on, but I feel the writers should have been smarter about his actions. - The GotG felt a bit flanderized. I get it though since they need to share screentime here. Quill remains immature and childish and it leads to disaster. Drax merely spouts comedic lines and is generally useless. Mantis is not much of a fighter but at least managed to subdue Thanos a bit. Groot barely registered at all until he makes the handle for Stormbreaker. Groot meeting Captain America was amusing though. - No one during the Wakanda fight calls attention to the talking raccoon… - Cap, Falcon, and Black Widow also didn’t get a whole lot to do. Their fights seemed to devolve into shakey-cam BS. - Vision was nerfed for sake of the plot. Guess he’d otherwise be too OP. - What was the point of Red Skull being there at all… if you replace him with someone else, would it have affected the plot in any way? Why was he floating like a spectre of Death? - Rocket just gives Thor a new eye…. guess they got tired of CGI-ing that eyepatch on Thor. - The fake-out of Gamora killing Thanos in Knowhere… of course they’re not killing the villain in the first third of the movie. - Gamora’s death… when she asked Peter to kill her, I knew she’s probably going to die. Of course not by Peter… the scene of her, Peter, and Thanos was a good one though. - Something about the scene on Vormir felt… heavy-handed. Maybe the music? The silly fade to Thanos’ crying face when Gamora is falling to her doom? Something just took me out of the moment… maybe the awareness that i was looking at a purple, ballsack-chinned, CGI space man crying CGI tears. - The Black Order… generic looking scary alien people… They didn’t amount to a whole lot. Just excuses for more fight scenes. They all die inglorious deaths. - The final battle in Wakanda was another giant brawl with faceless alien monster people… there’s nothing creative about it. - There is no build-up to that battle either… it just happens. Take a page out of Peter Jackson’s The Two Towers… the build-up is just as, if not more important than the battle itself. - Hawkeye and Ant-Man being convieniently written out of the movie… - Where is Valkyrie? and Korg? Not even enough time to give them a mention? Valkyrie might’ve been helpful in the ensuing fight… - Thanos didn’t seem to use the Gauntlet to its full potential despite demonstrating some wild powers. He mostly just shoots purple beams at people… - Thanos is “burdened with knowledge” and thus knows who Stark is…. ok…. what. - The pacing of the movie felt too relentless. Let the movie breathe a bit dammit. - The CGI in some scenes screamed of “reshoots”… Banner in the Hulkbuster comes to mind. Iron Man and Spidey’s Iron suits looked very cartoonish. The Black Order’s CGI looked very off in a few scenes. Could they not have achieved Proxima, Corvius, and Maw using prosthetics? Thanos looked very convincing though, even if his look was a tad simplistic. - The music… you hear the Avengers theme occassionally… but there’s no memorable new music. We don’t hear any of the respective themes of the various characters. No Guardians theme, no Dr. Strange theme, no Iron Man or Captain America or Spider-Man or Thor themes…. Music should factor into this “culmination movie” as much as the characters. Least we got the Black Panther theme when we see Wakanda again. If somehow the different themes get interwoven into a new melody…. plz Avengers 4? -Knowing that this was a part 1 of a 2-part finale sort of robbed the movie of a sense that the deaths will be permenant… but I would like to be surprised in Avengers 4. The question is seemingly “how” they will defeat Thanos and revive their allies, and not “if” they do…

Overall, there is a lot of good in this movie. It’s not as… “fun” as the previous Avengers movies or even Civil War. They tried to be a lot darker, and for the most part they succeeded. The issues I have are mostly nitpicks to the plot, and minor issues with the craft involved.

After two viewings, I don’t feel the need to really watch it again… until Avengers 4 next year.

8.25/10

#avengers #infinity war #infinity war spoilers #avengers spoilers #mcu #marvel cinematic universe #marvel #avengers infinity war #spoilers #movie review

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shineyma · 3 years ago

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I watched an interview segment where Daniela describes the day her water broke (during her first pregnancy I think) and Eric was out with his brother, so Daniella went over to Eric's house, and Eric's wife had to call Eric and ask him to buy Daniela some pads to avoid a big mess for the ride to the hospital maybe, and Eric asked, "Tampon pads?" Daniella's recount was hilarious.

I've written a whole lot beyond this point, do maybe a second ask is in order. That way you could ignore it (you really could), post only your reply or put it under a read more. It's more work for you but I still feel bad about the space that ask about Sam's family takes up on your blog. I did not think it through. (1/2)

lol, I appreciate the consideration, nonnie! Part two of your ask is under the cut. And lol to that interview quote!!

Kensi is back before the end of S05 turns out. I thought she gave birth in the spring, so I figured we had sevedal episodes to go with her on the special assignment. Then I read she gave birth in December, when things seemed to come to a head during the episode the team rescues her and it seemed just too soon. It's amazing that both she and the show's team managed to give Kensi as much screentime as they did. This Afghanistan storyline had me hooked actually. I was a bit sad that it was over as quickly. Despite the limitations and the fact that I love the team together, seeing Kensi star in a side story running parallel to the main plot, without the others stealing into it, was great. The story was fascinating, Kensi's dynamic with Granger and Sabatino was interesting to watch, the connection to her past a nice touch. Bonus points to the writers for not attempting a love triangle and for writing Jack becoming a Muslim and saying he found peace in it. I do also appreciate the few times immigrants they've interrogated have told them off about the U.S. 'intervention' in the Middle East and Callen, Sam or whoever it was just kept their mouth shut and you could see they did so because they couldn't deny those accusations. It's quite surprising and nice. Back to Kensi, I wish they'd taken a couple more episodes to give her Afghanistan storyline a slower closure. It seemed too rushed. I would have liked to see her more in action, trying to save Jack and herself, parallel to the team's rescue attempt. It could have at least been a two-parter. Still glad we got it at all.

One complaint I have is about Deeks. I don't know if I'm being dramatic here but I feel they've been mistreating him far too much. It's not so much about Kensi because they've developed their own kind of banter and Kensi shows him how much she cares. Although, remember right before Kensi left for Afghanistan, the day after the night we're supposed to assume they slept together, she was hostage to someone they were chasing and he was using her as a human shield, and Deeks didn't take the shot. Remember how she punched him? I'm still angry and bitter she did that, let alone that she didn't apologize, let even more alone that she acted as though what she did was right. I fully understand what the reasoning behind it all is or is supposed to be, but it was so wrong. And then, to circle back, I hate the way Callen and Sam have been treating Deeks since the moment he joined the team. It took Deeks withstanding torture and not giving up Michelle, torture that left him traumatized, for Sam to let up on the 'teasing'. I'm not even touching Callen, who actually tried to get Sam to stop being soft on Deeks 'just because of what Deeks did for Michelle and because he misses his partner who's gone on a dangerous special assignment'. Maybe I'm being dramatic but I really think the line on the teasing they give Deeks has been crossed a long time ago and I don't think they're ever going to show any remorse for it.

There was this show I got into when it was already on S14. One of the main characters that was there since S02 left and it wasn't the actor's choice. It was my favorite character out of the entire show. Anyway, I was binging S11 when the news broke. I finished it and that was it for me. They were my comfort character and I tried to watch the next two seasons they were still in but two episodes in, I stopped. I don't know why? Keeping new content of them for the future? Not wanting to watch about 40 hours more of them knowing they are the last ever and it sucks? It's been a few years since then and I haven't regretted it so far. It somehow feels right that I didn't reach the end of that character. And I've done it with other shows too. Once I got past my obsessive need to see shows and franchises through, quiting things became easy and a good tactic when something you loved decides to change the things you love most about it.

I'm sorry about Nell. It sucks. And hopefully the drama in your life is not too bad. I had some of it too, so my binging turned slow as molasses (is it even binging any more?) when it started off so well. And then the drama was capped with that very final, very irreversible bad thing that happens and the world just turns a little dimmer, the colors and just all of it a bit duller. Hence, also, my rudely late replies. Hopefully, your drama is at least a few or several steps away from that.

Oh, chef's kiss for Nell and Nallen in 5x05 ('cute girls with guns') and 5x14 or 5x15 (you know, with Nell fighting that guy in the boatshed's interrogation room and then Callen lowering her gently to the ground and brushing her hair back and all that Nallen goodness). I'd actually seen gifs of the second thing before but none had the fight and I hadn't paid attention to the episode number or even season, so I was very pleasantly surprised and miiiiight have replayed it a half dozen times. (2/2)

I also enjoyed what they did with Jack, although I feel like they never really resolve Hetty's part in things. Like....dick move, Hetty. Very dick move. And minor spoiler, but Sabatino returns, and while the entire team seems to hate him 5ever, I actually really like him lol. He's funny! And cute.

You are not alone in feeling that Deeks is mistreated by the guys, nonnie! There are whole communities of Deeks fans that hate it a LOT. I definitely feel like they cross the line sometimes....but conversely, I feel like Deeks crosses the line pretty often himself. I think in general the writers aren't great at judging when too much is enough, you know? But yeah, that doesn't stop anytime soon, I'm afraid.

Awwwww, I'm sorry you had that experience before with a show, nonnie! But yeah, sometimes quitting is the best thing you can do. It's better, I think, than continuing to drag it out and watching when you're not enjoying it anymore....then it's too easy to become bitter and then you can't even enjoy the earlier parts you used to love.

I'm also sorry you had drama followed by something worse! I hope things are getting better for you <3 For myself, things got very busy at work and then I was impacted by Hurricane Ida, which chased me out of state for two weeks while I waited for power and water to be restored to my apartment. I spent those two weeks living minutes from my mom and brother, which was nice but has had the impact that now I miss them a lot more than I did before.....like somehow I got used to living away from them and being close erased that adjustment? And now I'm not as good at it as I used to be. In fact, I'm actively hoping for my employer to have an opening there so I can transfer back. So I've been very emotional lately, on top of which the ongoing recovery from Ida meant more work for me at my job.

Whew, didn't mean to rant about that! Sorry.

And yessssssss, those are some of the BEST Nallen moments!!! I loooove him tenderly brushing her hair out of her face. That's probably my second favorite--or third favorite, there are two things coming that are tied for first favorite. So you've got that to look forward to!!

Sorry this took so long, nonnie! I hope life is going well this week! <3

#amy communicates #anonymous #my nonnies are the best nonnies

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dajoezenone · 7 years ago

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TEXT REVIEW OF INFINITY WAR

UNFOLLOW ME IF YOU DONT WANT TO READ THESE SPOILERS I DONT USE THIS ACCOUNT SEE IF I CARE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Seriously this is gonna have spoilers go away if you dont wanna see.

I liked it. Kinda want to see it again and may change my mind on stuff at a later date but I want to get these thoughts out while they’re in my mind.

1. STORY STRUCTURE: The structure of this film is weird? But not really. It makes sense once you realize Thanos is the main character. Act One we’re being introduced to all the different heroes, which is done masterfully and paced really well so we never feel overwhelmed despite the sheer size of the cast. Act Two starts once Gamora tells Star Lord he may have to kill her, and then Thanos is re-introduced. I’ll come back to this later but I dislike that there’s a good couple scenes where its just GotG characters interacting with each other with no Avengers around. Like this is an Avengers movie. Couldn’t SOME Avengers character have been around for this Like this is a crossover why are these characters still with just their regular crew? Anyways from then on Thanos’s POV takes center stage. Once Gamora is dead Thanos, like Thor, has nothing he really cares about left to lose. He’s at his lowest, despite also being 2 stones away from infinite power. Act Three begins with him this way, recalling to Doctor Strange his origin, and reasserting his resolve to go through with this. He beats both of the split forces of the Avengers, one on Titan, and the other in Wakanda, and despite nearly being beaten three different times, he manages to snap his fingers. We see the results of the world he’s created, while he sits back and watches the sunset.

I like that they decided to let Thanos win and kill half the universe. I know it’ll traumatize a lot of kids watching the movie, but like, these things are rated PG 13. There have been sex references and character deaths and such in these for a long long time. Its the big bad final battle for the Avengers and they needed a cliff to hang on and so they hung people. I dont believe the people turned to ash will stay dead, but I didn’t expect a happy ending either. PLUS this gives us time to really focus on the characters that need more room to finish their arcs in the real finale.

I like the way the movie is structured. It doesn’t feel overcrowded and it makes a lot of sense when you realize its Thanos’s movie not any of the heroes’. And it helps make Thanos the most developed bad guy in any MCU film. SPEAKING OF WHICH.

2. CHARACTERS: (the long one)

-THANOS: The best bad guy in any MCU film. Not my FAVORITE bad guy in an MCU film though. Loki still holds that title, and if we’re counting the Netflix shows, Fisk and Kilgrave are still PRETTY dope. Thanos is WONDERFUL. But I neither love him or love to hate him. I appreciate what was done with him though. He earns his place as the biggest threat in this universe, despite a lack of real competition. You feel his struggle, even though you really want him to fail. Its really well done. Cant help but wonder why no mention of his love for Lady Death though? I at least expected Hela to show up and be like “SURPRISE IM LADY DEATH” or something idk. We never saw her die in Ragnarok. Is that really not something they’re gonna at least do something off of?

-THOR: despite spending MOST of the movie on what is basically a side quest, he’s the hero who gets the most development. I figured that the way Ragnarok was handled was done specifically to set this up and I got what I expected to fall out from that and then some. I love his arc in this. I love his conversations with Rocket and I love how powerful he is now. He’s just really well handled and I love how he’s developed as a character. Also, side note, I like that each Avengers movie changes which of its members gets the most development. Cap was the one who was still finding his place and going through an arc in the first one, Tony is dealing with paranoia and being the one to create Ultron in AoU, and Thor is still dealing with the death of his people here.

-TONY: I have less to say here. I hate nanite tech being used in pretty much anything. idk why it just bothers me. It always feels dumb. but it was fine here actually. I love his conflict with Strange and Peter and the other Peter. I love that he has to deal with watching everyone else die. The whole movie plays on your expectation that Tony is going to die in the end and then COMPLETELY subverts that and I love it.

-DOCTOR STRANGE: Great. Comes off a little more of a jerk than he does in his own film but we also mainly see him through the eyes of Tony, so I think thats why. I love his magic and how smart and calculated he is in combat compared to the other characters. The Russos are VERY aware and very good at showing the characters’ character traits via how they fight which is good considering how much action there is in this movie.

-SPIDER-MAN: I swear he’s more competent here than in his own movie. Also we see SPIDEY SENSE GO OFF which we NEVER SEE HAPPEN IN HIS OWN MOVIE. He still doesn’t REALLY feel like Peter Parker though which is weird bc he almost did by the end of Homecoming and now here he just kinda reverted back out of that.

-GAMORA: Really great. Somewhere in between Guardians 1 and now she stopped being every single one of Zoe Saldana’s characters in anything ever to being a pretty fleshed out character. Though its kinda weird that Thanos’s other children in this movie are so much more loyal to him than her and Nebula are? Like whats up with them? Why is Gamora the favorite when she openly hates him?

-STAR-LORD: Great. Not much else to say.

-ROCKET AND GROOT: ALSO great. They’re especially great as sidekicks to Thor. They have some great exchanges, even if their screentime was primarily spent on a side quest. I nearly squealed when Groot used his arm to create the Stormbreaker Axe. I’m annoyed Groot died again at the end. WE’VE SEEN ROCKET MOURN GROOT’S DEATH BEFORE THIS ISN’T INTERESTING OR NEW.

-DRAX AND MANTIS: pretty good. I like them both. If anything there’s probably too much of them. I love them so I cant complain too much but like idk I feel like we saw more of these Guardians side characters than some of the Avengers main characters in an Avengers movie.

-WANDA AND VISION: Wanda has always been one of my fav characters in the MCU and that doesn’t change here. Her romance with Vis is great. Honestly I love her whole arc and I love how its foreshadowed by Gamora telling Quill to kill her earlier in the film. Wanda having to lose the closest person to her AGAIN is emotional and sad and everything and idk Elizabeth and Paul give great performances and both do a great job playing some good characters. Vis is basically a damsel in distress the whole film, which seems disingenuous because he’s like the most powerful avenger prior to Thor’s buff over these last couple movies. But I guess it makes sense in context. They’re not GREAT but like I said I like them so I’m biased.

-CAP, FALCON, AND NAT: Kinda useless tbh. They dont do much. They dont even have many lines. Like they fight in the Wakanda battle. Thats it. They’re tired and grumpy because they’ve been on the run for TWO YEARS. Something we dont see at all. Not that thats what I want to see, but... they’re basically just there to shuttle Wanda and Vision to Wakanda and then fight a bit.

-T’CHALLA, OKOYE, SHURI, AND M’BAKU: Even quieter and less notable than the Cap crew. Which really cheapens how much of the film takes place in Wakanda. Like, why does the Cosmic stuff feel authentic to what James Gunn built in the Guardians movies, while this stuff feels so underwritten and underrepresented? We have four Wakandan characters here and they do so hecking little. AND THEN T’CHALLA IS ONE OF THE PEOPLE WE SEE TURN TO ASH. WHAT? WE ALREADY GOT A FAKE OUT DEATH WITH HIM IN HIS OWN MOVIE. I HATED IT THERE. WE GOTTA SEE HIS FAMILY DEAL WITH HIM BEING DEAD AGAIN??? Shuri better become black panther in avengers 4 man. thats the only way I’ll be ok with him dying a SeCONd TiME.

-BUCKY, RHODEY, NICK FURY, MARIA HILL, LOKI, RED SKULL AND HEIMDALL: all play really small parts but manage to do their jobs and be really notable anyways. Shoutouts to them.

-BRUCE BANNER: meh. Bruce has finally kind of accepted the Hulk but Hulk is scared of Thanos so he wont come out. So Bruce spends the whole movie in his head having conflict with himself and not really engaging with whats going on? Kind of a dumb choice imo like if CAP is a minor character whos mainly there to banter with other people so should Banner. We dont even really see him interact with Ross or Rhodes once he gets back to Avengers HQ. dumb but not a big deal.

3. SMALL DETAILS:

-Music was weirdly lacking from a lot of the movie. Like it feels like Silvestri only orchestrated like half of the film. So much of it is just left.. quiet. Empty. This is INFINITY WAR. IT SHOULD BE ALL ABOUT THE SPECTACLE.

-Are Valkyrie, Korg and Miek still alive? We dont see them at all on the Asgardian ship?

-What happened to Sean Gunn’s character? Also wasn’t Nebula still with the Guardians at the end of Vol 2? Did I miss something or...?

-How did Thor know to go to Wakanda? He should have been going to Titan to meet up with Quill, right?

-How does the Bifrost work if the Bifrost is broken? That was a big thing in Thor 1 wasn’t he?

-They didn’t get Hugo Weaving back to play Red Skull but thats fine I still geeked out when he showed up.

-Peter Dinklage was good but he was in the movie too long. Thor’s stuff really felt side questy even though its the best stuff in the film.

I think thats about everything it was good but not GREAT k bye

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zoeology31 · 7 years ago

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On Star Wars: The Last Jedi

So I saw Star Wars last Sunday. Between critics bowing down to it and plenty of people on here mourning it’s train-wreck qualities, I was pretty apprehensive, but I wanted to at least see for myself.

The verdict: Most of the movie is a giant mess and I’m glad J.J. Abrams is coming back for IX, but it does pack a punch in some parts. Once my life gets a little less busy, I’ll probably join the growing number of fans and write a fix-it fic.

Major spoilers below. Seriously, I’m about to spoil pretty much everything.

I get that this movie was trying to comment on the hardships of war and how people have to keep their priorities straight and make sacrifices, but did they have to kill so many people? The bombers, all the X-wing pilots except for Poe, the Resistance leadership, everyone who wasn't on the main Resistance cruiser, half the transport vessels, and half the skimmer pilots? None of those were even a fair fight, because they couldn’t fire back. It was just slaughter, and it got painful to watch after a while. The deaths that had the most meaning were the individuals who directly chose to sacrifice their lives for the rebellion: Paige, Holdo, and Luke.

Speaking of fair fights, where were my iconic Star Wars battles? The only fighter-to-fighter combat was at the very beginning and ended with the bombers destroyed and Poe demoted. Rey spent more time fighting Luke than the actual main bad guys, and while her tag-team with Kylo Ren against the guards was cool, I couldn’t really enjoy it because I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. And of course Luke’s battle with Kylo Ren, while awesome, doesn’t really count.

A lot of moments felt unnecessary, if not extremely uncomfortable, and took away from the story, including: Rose electrocuting Finn (she could’ve just waved the taser in front of his face and let him explain the tracking situation, with the same overall result), the porgs, the pointless alien nuns, Luke milking the alien seal slug thing, Luke’s comment about Jakku being “pretty much nowhere”, Luke slapping Rey with a leaf, shirtless Kylo Ren in high-waisted pants, 90% of the shots of Kylo Ren looking sad, Rose and Finn (again) getting electrocuted for a parking violation, that opera alien at Canto Bight that looked like someone’s fetish, BB-9E, 75% of DJ, Hux slapping Finn with no consequence, BB-8 driving the AT-ST, Leia slapping Poe, Holdo saying “Godspeed”, Holdo stroking Poe’s face, that thing with Rey and the time dilation in the cave, Yoda’s weirdly corporeal Force ghost, the golden dice from the Falcon, Poe saying “you’re not dead”, that one dude tasting the salt on Crait, Rose kissing Finn, and the awkward introduction between Poe and Rey (weren’t they introduced at the end of TFA?).

What happened to the Force in this movie? The whole Force bond idea felt incredibly shoehorned, and since we don’t find out that Snoke was behind it until much later, we’re expected to believe Rey and Kylo Ren share some “special connection” because plot. It did wind up being pretty cool when Luke used it at the end to trick Kylo Ren, but I’m not clear on why he died immediately afterwards. Was it too draining? Did Kylo Ren running his projection through have a physical effect on him? Did he just voluntarily stop existing? And if Force ghosts can summon lightning, what’s stopping them from intervening further in the world of the living? Why hasn’t Anakin just showed up and killed Kylo Ren? Then of course there’s Leia floating through space despite never demonstrating any abilities beyond emotion sensing before.

Kylo Ren. I am unimpressed with the movie’s repeated attempts to create sympathy for him to the detriment of other characters. Your uncle drawing a lightsaber on you is not in any way an excuse to try to kill him, burn down his temple, and murder all his students who refused to join you. Besides, doesn’t this contradict canon in Bloodline or something? He’s still just as whiny, manipulative, and flat-out evil as in TFA, but now he’s responsible for even more deaths (remember, he fired the shot that blew up the X-wing hangar).

How are we supposed to buy Rey suddenly believing “there’s still good in him” or whatever when Kylo Ren killed her father figure, gravely injured her best friend, tortured her, and is in the process of racking up an even higher body count? TFA Rey is too smart for that, and she would never compromise her new family for the tiniest chance of redeeming a grown man who’s clearly made his choice and whom she owes nothing to. Luke didn’t start trying to redeem Vader until after he learned Vader was his father, what excuse does Rey have? Not only does Rey Nobody make no sense in the context of this movie, it ignores all the parallels and setup of TFA and turns Rey from the rightful Skywalker heir to some random girl who is arbitrarily powerful and arbitrarily the main character.

Because Rian Johnson lives under the delusion that Kylo Ren is somehow the male lead, Finn was forced into an extraneous sideplot and romance that repeated his character arc from TFA. Between getting electrocuted twice, falling into racist stereotypes at the casino, needing Rose to explain everything to him, getting slapped by Space Hitler, and being cheated out of a full-length, emotionally emphasized fight scene against his lifelong oppressor, Finn generally suffers some of the worst treatment of any character in the movie. The casino plot was tedious and its moral felt forced, and the undercover scene aboard the Star Destroyer was disappointingly short and ended in failure. Being sidelined meant Finn wasn’t written as wildly out of character as Rey or Poe, and John Boyega’s acting ensured we still saw the Finn we all know and love, but it was still an incredible disservice to his character.

Even though he got quite bit more screentime, Poe was almost a different character in this movie than in TFA. In the movie, comics, and tie-in novels, he had very clear strengths and flaws: charismatic, selfless, loyal, and an excellent strategist, but too willing to sacrifice himself and not good at thinking long-term. This is all thrown out the window in TLJ, making Poe instead a stereotypical Latino hothead who’s reckless ideas cost dozens of lives and who constantly battles his (white female) superiors. When he mutinies, we’re expected to agree with Holdo and be happy when she lectures him about hope and honorable retreats, but Holdo’s smarmy attitude and refusal to tell Poe the plan makes him seem like the reasonable one. Not only was Poe’s arc a lesson he didn’t need to learn, it was insulting, frustrating to watch, and poorly executed.

The three new characters were unnecessary and stretched the story too thin. DJ was practically useless and his verbal tics were more annoying than quirky. His only role was to show the grey morality of the war, but it would’ve been smoother for Finn to just observe and make his own comments, rather than have DJ and Rose give clunky exposition. Rose was a sweetheart, but her character was completely static and acted more as Finn’s morality pet than an independent person. Her tasering Finn at the start and kissing him at the end was probably supposed to be character development, but both felt forced. Holdo was a terrible leader and difficult to root for until her death scene, which was incredible but would’ve been more impactful with a character we had time to get attached to.

There were some things I liked about the movie. The cinematography was gorgeous when sets were properly lit, especially on Ach-To and Crait, and it had some truly stunning scenes, like Holdo wrecking the First Order fleet, Luke seeing the twin suns on Tatooine, and Rey lifting the rocks for the Resistance. The main cast was as attractive as ever, helped by some top-notch costuming. Despite exchanging zero words, Rey and Finn’s strong relationship was clear as day, and their reunion was fantastic. When Rey swooped in on the Falcon to give the skimmers cover fire and Finn cheered, that was my “I’m watching Star Wars” moment.

Luke’s arc was comparatively decent; he was too surly and irreverent at the beginning, but his criticisms of the old Jedi order made sense and his stand against Kylo Ren was the closest this movie got to iconic. Luke and Leia’s reunion was one of the most emotionally touching moments, and it doesn’t surprise me that Carrie Fisher wrote it. I liked the ending; everyone was together and getting along, the Resistance was safe aboard the Falcon, and Rey literally shut the door in Kylo Ren’s face. Even with the weird sympathy track, it’s clear he won’t be redeemed and it’ll be interesting to see him as the main villain.

#star wars #the last jedi #analysis #rey #finn #poe dameron #rose tico #luke skywalker #leia organa #amilyn holdo #kylo ren #my stuff

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