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king-of-wrath · 8 months ago

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📖

Not that this would ever happen, but I've thought about it many a few times

Previously, I've headcanoned that the definition of an overlord has changed over Hell's history: previously, an overlord was someone who captured and controlled territory just like a feudal warlord or "robber baron" did. But dramatic technological and social change happened during the industrial age, which contributed to humanity's population booming, more people having access to goods that were previously exclusive to the upper class and the rise of organized crime. Not only did this result in much more people entering Hell (thus causing overpopulation and the "need" for an annual purge), but how overlords were made had changed

Instead of needing to seize power through conquest or amass resources through raiding, an overlord could gain power economically---either producing their own materials or having the sheer wealth to buy it. Overlords were businessmen who could monopolize an industry, forcing people to pay respects, acknowledge their authority and work for/with them because they had what everyone needed. This is best demonstrated by Carmilla and the Three V's, who each control a vital piece of Hell's economy

But this presented a whole new problem: if an overlord truly controlled the entire industry, what happens when they're gone? If their factories are destroyed or their workers are killed, how can production be maintained? Killing an overlord was one thing, but taking their place was an entirely different affair---because if you did too much damage to the industry, took too many people's jobs or couldn't give the people what they want, then your reign would be very short-lived

However, this presented a unique opportunity: if you could get into the industry, rise through the ranks, earn the overlord's trust and learn their secrets, you could betray them and maintain production fairly easily. Of course, the new overlord would have to do something to earn the loyalty of their employees AND prove to the other overlords that they're just as good as (if not, better than) the former overlord. But this is a long game to play and very dangerous, so an overthrow didn't happen too often---not nearly as often as one overlord would lead an army to crush a rival

All that being said, what if the Three V's became enemies of the Hotel? If any or all of them get angelic weapon'd, then someone would have to take the throne---keeping the business alive. In the case of Vox, he's literally part of the power grid: if he blows a fuse (as he did during his failed dissing contest with Alastor), then the whole city goes dark and society screeches to a halt

So this brings up a good question: who could replace the V's? In a number of ways, Angel Dust is best suited to overthrow Valentino, but what about the others? Alastor seems to have power over electronics just like Vox does (conjuring a camera and projecting his image onto Vox's personal supercomputer), though he insists that radio is the superior technology and hates photography and film

But if we assume that whenever an overlord is defeated, the victor takes everything (ownership of all contracts and therefore souls), then who could be trusted to not only void those contracts once they succeed (and refrain from making more), but also make the industry somewhat fair? Charlie and Vaggie would be prime candidates, but what if...

What if Charlie couldn't because she was Hell's princess? What if Angel didn't want to be the manager---honestly enjoying his actual job, minus the abuse from Valentino? What if Alastor just couldn't pull his head out of his ass and/or nobody trusted him to NOT become just as bad as Vox (if not, worse)?

But you know one person who IS trustworthy and fair (though lacks the relevant experience)?

Who else but good ol' Ramon?

Imagine this millennium-old knight, sitting behind a big office desk and desperately trying to herd corporate cats. Imagine him inspecting the latest prototype at VoxTec R&D. Imagine him performing the same role as RuPaul or Tim Gunn in their respective shows. Or even worse better: Mr. Vanilla in charge of PORN

#ooc nonsense #character: ramon

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temtoni · 8 months ago

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pt.5

KAI KAI KAI!

so the main lineup of my doomed AU is done YAY

if there is anything you’d like to hear about tell me bc i don’t have any idea as to what to continue with…

Timelineee:

So first of all I might get this completely wrong since I haven’t watched crystallized in a while but i will try

-Obviously the start of crystallized already has some major changes with Nya never turning into a human again

-Therefore they also never become the public enemies nr. 1

-In the meantime it’s mostly the new ninja that figure out all the crystal king stuff and boast it all around Ninjago

-Lloyd seeing everything still pretty rational at least compared to Kai (who to be fair just lost his sister and his brothers)so he decides to check this whole crystal thing out he infiltrates the council gets recognized and so on

-Kai after a while realizes that Lloyd hasn’t been checking in as he normally would so he decides to head out to find him

-Kai finds Lloyd yada yada everything as it is in canon

-The big fight starts but the other elemental masters are already there because otherwise they wouldn’t have a chance

-Lloyd and Garmadon go on to fight the Overlord while Kai pretty much leads everyone on the ground

-More and more people show up fighting on their side, people from prime empire, the ocean even some ghosts :)

-But even with all this support the fight seems to be a stalemate until the crystal army start pushing even further

-Kai watching allies and friends alike die in front of him is able to unlock the dragon form and turn the table in their favor

-Lloyd is also successful and wins his fight

-The citizens have a big celebration through the entirety of Ninjago in honor of the Ninja and their great victory

-Sadly ever since the big battle Kai has been growing incredibly tired to the point where he can’t stand for longer than 15 minutes

-At first Wu and Misako believed that it had to do with the dragon form but then decided that it couldn’t be the cause because Lloyd also unlocked his Oni form and while being a little shaken he is completely fine

-So they decide to set of to try and figure out what exactly is happening to Kai

-What they didn’t account for was that Lloyd had Oni blood in him which allowed him to use his Oni form

-Kai on the other hand is fully human and the dragon form that he took back then wants back the control of his body

-Slowly but surely he is transforming into a dragon and not the kind in the finale of crystallized but into an actual dragon

-Things start changing his hands growing bigger, horn breaking through his skull, his pupils changing shape and color…

-And while all this is happening all Lloyd could do was watch, watch as the last brother of his slowly looses hisself

—————————————————————————

Kai even once transformed into a full dragon (the lil sketch in the top left corner) never leaves Lloyds side. Heck, he seems even more protective now or at least more threatening with his fire mane, glowing eyes and black to red scales. Lloyd believes that Kai thinks that he is his clan especially since he has dragon blood in him. But he also thinks it’s weird that whenever Misako, Wu or anyone really tries to get to the monastery without him inviting them in, Kai will either pick them up and fly them to the bottom of the mountain or just throw them off it.

—————————————————————————

Angsty enough?

Just wait till dragons rising starts and people start hunting Kai :D

If you’re wondering why Nya and Kai aren’t digitally drawn but only traditionally… digital art is hard and exhausting

I’m not sure if I’ll do dragons rising but if the interest is there I might

I mean just imagine Aryn having the wildest theories about where the Og’s went and Lloyd just standing there trying not to destroy this little boys entire world view (like he would be pretending that kai isn’t kai and so on)

Or Zane actually being able to get to Lloyd now since the realms have merged

OH the possibilities

#ninjago #ninjago fanart #lego ninjago #ninjago au #ninjago kai #kai smith #ninjago kai fanart

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sonadowwiki · 3 months ago

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I don't believe that this game was supposed to be telling his story all over again. I believe it was supposed to be about revisiting his memories and that's it, so not reverting his character and trying to "build it up" again. But as I explained in another answer, the employees who took care of this game aren't doing these changes with permission. As I said with the other answer:

"Other SEGA games are doing very well and are cohesive. (Persona 3 Reload, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, Unicorn Overlord, Metaphor: Refantazio, Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble, Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance) Things aren't a random jumble of things put together or inconsistent for even remakes. The reason why things aren't a mess with those branches is because they listen to the higher-ups when making their games; they listen to directions like an employee for a company is supposed to do.

When it comes to the Sonic branch, that's not the case. They are purposely not listening to the higher-ups compared to the other branches within SEGA. So blaming the company for not wanting the two together despite putting so much content to show the two of them together, is not correct. There's the movie that's focused on Sonic and Shadow, there's the well made merchandise for the Sonic x Shadow Generations game, there's the title for the Sonic x Shadow Generations game, there's Sonic Prime, there's advertisements made everywhere of Sonic and Shadow due to the game and there's also collaborations with the two of them that bring in money because Shadow is so popular that he brings in so much money along with Sonic. The both of them are the pillars that uphold the franchise, after all.

So there's a lot of stuff with the two of them that do make money, but as I said before, the issue lies with the employees who are taking care of the production of things within the Sonic branch without following directions from their higher-ups. It's not the company that doesn't want them together or doesn't like it, it's employees who are doing all they can to prevent them from being together or even friends. After all, even Iizuka lied about Sonic and Shadow not being friends despite official materials showing they are friends and the company constantly keep on calling them friends.

The employees think they know better and even lie to the public and in the materials they make. They go through the effort of changing things to their own interpretations that conflict with official lore without even an official statement explaining why they decided to make things completely different. The reason why is because they don't have the permission to change things like they've been doing. But the product was already promised, it's already made, it's already ready to be given to the public despite the mistakes and inconsistencies within it. So what can be done at that point? A promised product has to go out, even in the state it is in. If these employees even lie to the public about their products, who's to say they also lie to others they work with or for?

Employees are humans like you and me. They also can do wrong, just like they did for this game out of selfishness and arrogance. They're not doing these things out of goodwill and they're not doing what they're supposed to be doing as a job. They're biting more than they can chew and are forcing others to believe in what they want you to believe, which is no different than those who erase history to manipulate it in their favor."

So all in all, I don't think it's supposed to make sense because they made it without the thought to make it make proper sense. They did things without direction and without proper execution, therefore, that's why things don't make sense. One blatant example of this is Shadow being on Chaos Island from Sonic Frontiers despite not being in the game itself or him going to Sunset Heights from Sonic Forces despite not going there yet because this is a game in the past. Does those things in the game make sense? No, so already one should be able to immediately tell that things don't make sense and they're making this game to not make sense in the first place.

Proper direction and listening to it can help things a lot when producing a product with actual professionals and not those who only claim to know what they're doing out of arrogance and pride. This game, or any game/product, is supposed to made with a team effort with the company at the front of things, but these employees are not being true team players (or company employees who are supposed to do their job description they applied for when getting hired in the first place; nothing extra) since they are trying to exclude the owners from the content they're making and do things without their say/permission that result in this mess and inconsistencies. The owners or superiors are supposed to have the absolute say in every project since it is their content and series, not the employees'. These employees thought they knew better for several projects and each resulted in more confusion, inconsistencies and nonsense. This resulted in confusion among the audience, uproars, disputes, arguments and overall chaos, all because they chose to think they knew better than their superiors, disobey them and act as if they can be or are the company despite all the problems their actions have caused.

Because I tend to see things on the internet when researching, I'm aware of what some of the things in the game are because people are sharing it illegally. But as I stated before, I wouldn't take this game to heart because of the issues surrounding it. That's what I would advise personally if asked.

What do you think how it is going to be sonic x shadows generations?

I wouldn't hold my hopes up about it. It seems that the only good thing about this game is the title and the merchandise that comes with it. Other than that, it seems that Western employees made a mess of it to the point they just added in random lore that makes no sense or certain narratives to push their interpretation of things onto others.

I also wouldn't be hopeful of it since they lied about the game being a port and changed things that weren't needed to be changed in the first place. A port means that things are copied and pasted onto another system. Some graphic enhancement might be done, like with Sonic Colors Ultimate, but that doesn't mean that whole dialogue and scenes are supposed to change. That's not a port, and changing things to that degree isn't a faithful remaster either.

I wouldn't be hopeful about the story either. It sems to be very out of character, inconsistent, just trying to be a copy of other standard or cliche stories and filled with fanfiction. I wouldn't recommend people playing it... but that's my opinion.

#SWAnswers

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sparkles-and-galaxies · 2 years ago

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elaboration on the Crystal King Lloyd au bc I'm bored as fuck

(I’m sorry this is so long I never learnt how to shut the fuck up)

Everything is the same up until the building collapses under Harumi in s9. She miraculously survives, although is injured, and having just relived her greatest trauma her first reaction is to call for help. When nobody comes, she gets herself together and manages to escape on her own, running away and hiding. She watches the final battle between father and son from afar and starts planning her revenge after Lloyd's victory.

Of course there's the pressing question: how could one even defeat the Green Ninja? After all, he fought off not just Garmadon but the rest of the Oni and then later Aspheera, a powerful sorceress - so if they are no match for him, what could be? Harumi realizes the greatest strength of the ninja are their elemental powers and therefore their biggest weakness is losing them (as evidenced by Kai's reaction to getting his fire power stripped away).

But the only thing that could nullify elemental power is vengestone, something that is hard to come by. She searches night and day until she comes across the Kingdom of Shintaro, where she goes on to negotiate a deal with King Vangelis - she is still technically the Jade Princess, having inherited all of her parents’ wealth, so money isn't exactly an issue. She also contacts the Mechanic, asking him to build a robot army from the vengestone, something he is more than happy to help with.

But of course, first the Mechanic has to run after the events with Prime Empire and then later the ninja come and defeat Vangelis, putting a stop to the operation. The army is not nearly big enough to be a threat to the ninja, the few robots that have already been built are barely functional, and Harumi might be good at planning but she is no technician to finish the job herself.

Harumi retreats for a while, trying to come up with ideas that haven't already failed under other villains' hands. She watches the ninja fight Kalmaar and Wojira and then Nya leave to be one with the ocean, and that’s when it strikes her. Although their powers are their greatest strength, it is also their greatest weakness – and Lloyd is partially Oni, after all, so what if instead of searching for ways to defeat the Green Ninja, she could turn his own heritage against him? What if instead of pushing Lloyd, the hero, down to the ground, she could raise Lloyd, the villain, to the top?

And it’s not like Lloyd doesn’t have the seeds of villainy in him either. He used to want to be just like his father, and although he claims to have grown out of that mindset, he did leave Harumi to die under that collapsed building.

Then comes s15 blah blah Harumi collects the cock Council of the Crystal King blah blah Lloyd comes and gets captured. He keeps telling Harumi that she doesn’t have to do this and it’s not too late to turn back (thinking that Harumi is trying to resurrect the Overlord idk I haven’t thought about this too much) to which Harumi replies well, you don't have to be a good guy either. You don't have to sacrifice every part of your life to the people who don't even have an ounce of respect for the work you do and the effort you put into it. After all, they did throw you into jail even though you were only trying to help your friend, didn't they?

And Lloyd obviously tries to disagree but Harumi doesn’t stop. She brings up all the things Lloyd has lost to being the Green Ninja, his childhood, his innocence, his father, his friends (multiple times, welcome to Ninjago where death is meaningless but just as traumatizing) – the list could go on and on. So when Lloyd finally does manage to escape, he keeps thinking about how much being the Green Ninja is a burden and how deeply he does indeed wish he was never chosen for this job.

They still go get Garmadon (even though the Overlord doesn’t return in this au – as I said I haven’t thought everything through) and Lloyd still gets Oni training to combat the Vengestone Army, but now Garmadon’s words of focusing on his anger mix with Harumi’s insights. So when failed attempt after failed attempt they are still losing and Lloyd can feel the frustration in his friends and all of Ninjago is counting on him – something breaks in him. He never asked for this, he never asked to be the hero and savior of the world! He never asked for his childhood to be taken away (even though it was technically his choice, but he was a kid how could he have known to make the good decision?), he never asked to be in constant battle with villains where every victory only means an opportunity for another evil to rise in their place!

Finally out of ideas, Lloyd gives in to the despair the husk of his father has been advising to weaponize. Maybe all this hero talk and doing the right thing isn’t enough to defeat the enemy. Maybe Garmadon was right when he said that the only way to protect Ninjago from the Oni was to allow him to take over the city.

Maybe the way of defeating the villains isn’t to be the hero, but to be the greater bad. And nothing is worse than an Oni at its full power.

Lloyd, finally having had enough with the world constantly throwing shit at his face, lets go of all the morals that have been holding him back. In his place emerges the Crystal King, embodiment of hatred and loss, an undefeatable foe of both Oni and Dragon powers – with Harumi, a friend who he once trusted and cared for, as his right hand and closest advisor. She did make him realize the truth of his situation, after all.

#ninjago #ninjago au #ninjago crystalized #i am far too tired for sensible sentences im sorry if none of this makes any sense #although tbh i am kind of motivated to do a crystalized rewrite based on this #it's been so long since i wrote fanfiction the amount of trivia knowledge required is just too daunting #half the time of me writing this was just checking the wiki page bc i forgor

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etchbee · 2 years ago

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Tell us the SG LL ideas

OKAY! SO!

Shattered Glass Lost Light. Here's what I'm thinking.

First of all, it's Megatron's ship. After the war, he'd want to leave Cybertron (just like Optimus did in canon.) Cybertron is already divided enough without the faction leaders around polarizing people, and he figures staying would only make it harder for the Autobots to assimilate into society. (Mentioned here)

But he loves his people, and he's not about to give up on them because the war is over. So! He starts a postwar unity initiative in the form of.... bababanah!!! The Lost Light!

Their official mission is to find and contact all the colony worlds of civilians sent away at the beginning of the war. (Mentioned here) Their unofficial mission is to serve as an example of (ex) Decepticons and (ex) Autobots working together. A beacon of hope for a new age!

(And also, if they just so happen to find the Knights of Cybertron, gosh, that would sure be a great way to try all those war criminals they have!)

(Megatron keeps that in mind)

It... only kind of works out.

See, the current leader of Cybertron just so happens to be our main man Prowl. (Mentioned here). And he most definitely is not excited about this. For one thing, a divided populous is an easily controlled populous. Paranoia is power. And while he does want what's good for Cybertron, he's not about to make things harder for himself. So he'll be having no symbols of unity or peace, thank you very much.

And for another, he doesn't want anything to happen that's going to paint Megatron in a favorable light. Megatron, who is currently the biggest challenger to his right to rule. (A right in which Megatron has no interest in- but better safe than sorry.)

On the other hand, of course, sending Megatron out into the dark reaches of space for years on end is certainly an appealing idea.

With this in mind, Prowl does three things.

The first being to compose a crew list filled with the biggest failures, write offs, crazies, criminals and crackpots in Autobot history. Megatron is a great leader but... well, a Commander is only as strong as his weakest subordinate.

The second being to attach a certain infamous Decepticon to the bottom. One that is holding a rather violent grudge towards Megatron. One that's supposed to be in prison. One that is one of the strongest megalomaniacs in the decepticon repertoire, who will definitely be causing some problems later.

And the third, to demand an Autobot addition to the command of the ship.

Rodimus Prime, who is under strict instructions to make the mission as big of a failure as physically possible.

(The fact that Rodimus is heir to the Primacy, and therefore the heir to Optimus is not a small part of his decision. The more threats to his crown off Cybtertron, the better. Or as the humans would put it, two birds with one stone.)

At launch, the ship's command looks like this:

Megatron, Captain.

Rodimus, Second in Command (Contested Co-Captain)

Drift, Third in Command (Previously Deadlock, an Autobot combatant. Now, loyal to Megatron)

And Ultra Magnus, (who has no idea what Prowl is planning. He just needs a job now that the war is over.) Ship Enforcer.

Prowl sends the ship off with a smile and a wave- He's confident in Rodimus, and if all else fails, Overlord should work as a fine backup.

My thought process writing this was definitely inspired by the Scavengers- because what I really love about the Lost Light is the found family aspect, and you kind of can't enjoy that as much if everyone is just an asshole (more so than already). So, I just wanted to take everyone's character, and shift it slightly to the left, and then change the outside circumstances and then BINGO! You've got a shattered glass.

The main point here is not to be an evil LL. The Lost Light goes through most of the same major story beats, and the end point is the same. But by taking the negative character traits of the Autobots, and turning them up to 100%, we make that same end so much more impactful. (For example, Rodimus's screw ups being just as bad, but purposeful! Spicy.) Less evil, more.... angsty.

(I think that's just my tagline for SG! at this point.)

Anyways! So that's that. I might expand upon some individual character's changes later on. But for now, the rest is up to your imagination :)

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nikethestatue · 3 years ago

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Rhys' tendency to make emotional based decisions regarding the IC is one of the prime examples of why you shouldn't appoint family or people you care deeply about in political positions

That's true. That's why nepotism is usually frowned upon. :)

I think the issue is that SJM also doesn't quite know how certain thigs work, in RL, and that doesn't help the case of how the IC operates.

Like, Rhys doesnt have a GOVERNMENT.

He has friends and relatives. But not a government, which would include everyone--High and low Fae, Illyrians (obviously), Fae from different walks of life, etc. Every time she writes something about Rhys ruling, it's like this medieval notion of an overlord sitting in a castle and hearing the complaints of his subordinates. Or Rhys going to 'talk' to someone--whether it's Nesta's landlord, or the heads of all the markets and guilds.

That's not....governing?

"he stole my goat, I want restitution!' is not what the HL should be doing with his time.

Mixing conversations about finding the trove, Nesta's 'bad behavior', petty squabbles between sisters, and 'we are having a baby!!!' all in one sitting isn't governing?

I think that's the problem. When Rhys tells Cassian 'I am your HL and I gave you an order' during the war, it's a problem, because the tactics and the plans should've been discussed prior. Cassian should've said 'And I am the Commander General of your Armies'--this is MY JOB and my expertise. Cassian should know BETTER than Rhys. Rhys should've relied on Cassian then.

Same with Mor or Azriel--why is Rhys up their business? Mor is either a 'queen' and a representative of his crown in Hewn City, and therefore, should make all decisions and have complete control, and why is Keir even involved at all? OR, she should just be the 3rd and not be involved in hewn city at all.

I totally blame SJM for this. If you want Rhys and his court to be the height of Prythian's magnificence, then you either add a TON more magic, where everything is just handled via magic and the IC has a lot of time to chase after Troves and stuff, or you make him a kind of bureaucrat, with an actual court/government, where he is sitting in meetings all day.

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ironborealis · 10 months ago

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I've been thinking about this and I'm pretty sure that Hell's youth slang and culture is at least 20+ years behind the human world.

1. Older people are more likely than younger people to die. Depending on Heaven's criteria, likely most younger people (under 18s) qualify for Heaven over Hell with few exceptions.

2. Survivorship bias -- Hell is a tough place with a lot of ways to get yourself killed, especially during Extermination days. The more life experience you have would be an advantage, and the longer you've survived Hell the better you get at staying alive, but you're also more likely to die just by the amount of risk you're exposed to.

3. Large scale war -- this also tips the scale so that certain generations are disproportionately represented -- from 1900 onward, the top 10 largest casualty wars (minimum 1 million reported deaths) have been:

A. WW2 (1939-45) 80 million dead

B. 2nd Sino-Japanese (1937-45) 20 million dead

C. WW1 (1914-18) 17 million dead

D. Chinese Civil War (1927-49) 8 million dead

E. Russian Civil War (1917-22) 7 million dead

F. 2nd Congo War (1998-2003) 2.5 million dead

G. Korean War (actively 1950-53) 1.5 million dead

H. Afghanistan Conflict (1978-present) 1.4 million dead

I. Vietnam War (1955-75) 1.3 million dead

J. 2nd Sudanese War (1983-2005) 1 million dead.

(I went with the lower end estimates when possible). We can see from the data that Hell has historically been disproportionately populated by those who died between 1914-1949, with 1930-1945 taking the lion's share.

Assuming that casualty rates between civilians and military are approximately equal in all wars, but since children don't typically go to Hell this tips the scale towards a slightly higher number of military deaths going to Hell over civilians. Assume prime military age is between 18-45. This means people born between 1900 and 1932 are most prevalent, which makes them predominantly the pre-Silent Generation (1900-28) and the early Silent Generation (1928-32)

4. Baby Boomers due to the sheer size of their generation have been slowly trickling in, so Hell's probably a Boomer and Silent Generation heavy place, with Gen X probably starting to start replacing the Silent Generation in the next 15-20 years.

Therefore, popular culture in Hell is likely heavily Baby Boomer influenced, likely taking influence from the 1960s to the 1990s, and skewing more 80s and 90s as time goes by. Youth culture probably skews more Gen X and Millennial due to one overlord -- Velvette.

Given what little we know about character ages and dates of death:

Zestial, Sir Pentious, and possibly Rosie and Alastor are all likely outliers for being born pre-1900. They're likely the few survivors of their Hell generation left.

Angel, Husk, Niffty, and Vox are all Silent Generation, who's generation is shrinking in size and influence.

Valentino is likely a Baby Boomer, but died earlier than the rest of his generation making him a former outlier whose generation is growing in strength, and since he's survived Hell this long, makes him fairly powerful in her own right amongst his generation.

Now Velvette we know the least about but given her social media savvy and the fact that she looks like a Bratz doll, I'm going to guess she's likely Gen X or Millennial -- she's a significant outlier because she's one of the few of her generation in Hell AND she has amassed power very quickly in that time and seems to have cultural power.

If I were power ranking characters, I'd say fear Zestial/Sir Pentious/Alastor/Rosie because they're battle-hardened survivors and Velvette because she's absolutely ruthless in her ambition and smart enough to succeed without getting killed

i know that canonically angel seems to keep up with all the latest trends (hell, he probably inspires a bunch of them), but i also really want. old man angel. angel who's mystified by the kids. potentially angel who gets confused by queer-as-on-earth terminology making its way properly into hell.

#hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel meta

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bathsaltsmcgee · 3 years ago

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Alastor and why he actually avoids tech, and especially mobile phones

Alastor’s dislike of modern technology probably stems from a reason deeper than just because it wasn't around when he was alive. While there is no denying that Alastor is, without a doubt, the fustiest of all grandpas, people are too accepting of the suggestion that his aversion to technology is merely because he doesn't know how it works and/or can’t figure it out. He’s already shown that he’s a sharp, shrewd man and if he wanted to, he could probably learn how to use it with little issue. Rather, his dislike of technology is likely due to where it came from and, more importantly, who is responsible for it.

As has been stated in previous interviews, Vox, the overlord in charge of numerous industries in Hell, including television, advertising, and an alliance with the adult film and social media firms , has large influence over most technological innovations in Hell. Unlike Alastor, he believes that innovation is the key to staying relevant in the modern market and thus prefers to keep his thumb in multiple pies in order to maintain his position. This predilection for gaining power and an edge at any opportunity may, in fact, cause trouble at 666 news when he finds out that Charlie, the princess of Hell, who was in a vulnerable position at the time and primed for manipulation, was spurned by the news anchors and allowed to slip out of his reach, but that’s not relevant to the point, so let’s get back to why Vox is so important in Alastor’s inherent aversion to modern technology.

Vox, as most fans of the show know, is obsessed with Alastor. The reason why hasn’t exactly been stated, but considering that he has been claimed to lust after Alastor too, one can cobble the answer together with very little effort. Moreover, he’s also been stated to stalk Alastor whenever given the chance, which has already been showcased in the comic ‘A Day in the Life of Alastor’ when Alastor stopped to look at a screen through a window and Vox showed up like a creepy Wizard of Oz knockoff so he could stare down at him like he was the last piece of cheesecake left on the dessert table.

Alastor might have brushed off the run-in and then waltzed off in a mood, but the encounter proved that all screens, no matter where they are, are under Vox’s immediate control. He can go through them whenever he wants and actively manifest himself through all of them, like the worst CCTV cop ever.

Basically, all screens are a portal for him to peer into anyone and everyone’s lives, and that’s where mobile phones come into the equation.

If it’s true that all screens are linked to Vox, he would be able to spy on anyone he wanted to through those phones, scanning photos, watching videos, listening to phone calls, reading texts, tracking their location via signal towers, and just being an all-around nosy, nibbing little pervert.

That’s probably the precise reason why Alastor refuses to get, or be anywhere near, a mobile phone. He knows what Vox is up to and he knows what he can do, so he’s trying to take steps to protect himself from being stalked so much, although he’s probably too proud to ever admit that he’s being harassed like this out loud.

Thus, the excuse that he just doesn’t see the appeal of modern day inventions then comes into being, when, in reality, he’s being seriously hassled on the daily.

Additionally, Vox is in league with Velvet, the overlord of social media. So, if, say, someone posted something that had Alastor’s picture on it as he happened to be walking by, or they caught him unawares, Vox would be able to know about it through a specifically designed creeper algorithm and therefore would be able to pinpoint Alastor’s actions, his location, all of it, even if he didn’t have a phone of his own.

Hence why he always ruins photos of himself that have been posted on social media via Voxtagram.

It’s not that he doesn’t like pictures of himself.

He’s just trying to throw Vox off his track.

So, it isn’t the technology itself that is the main issue here as much it is who’s watching from the other side of the screen.

Alastor’s response to this is understandable, though.

Our devices already track and pay attention to every little thing we do.

Imagine if they were sentient and thirsting after us, too.

#passing observations #hazbin hotel #alastor #vox #I can already tell I'm not going to like him very much #He's probably going to be just as huge a hate sink as Valentino in a great many ways #Being in a bad relationship is no excuse for stalking somebody who has made it very clear that he's not interested

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eliotquillon · 3 years ago

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HIVE TIMELINE TWO, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO (Updated and reworked for Bloodline; spoilers ahead!)

It's a year since my original HIVE timeline (which you can read here and is obviously pre-Bloodline), and how things have changed. Well...kind of. I was expecting more of my timeline to crumple under the weight of eight years' worth of continuity errors but, unlike most of my pre-Bloodline fic, my 2020 timeline has stayed somewhat intact. However, in light of Nessa's excellent post that used the Bloodline prologue to figure out Raven's birthday with a scary amount of accuracy, I've decided that somewhat intact just isn't enough. Lo and behold...find the C ottomalpense new and improved H.I.V.E. timeline under the cut. This is just my interpretation of the canon timeline; because Walden contradicts himself constantly when it comes to age and continuity, most of these dates are educated guesses and any other interpretations are more than valid. Bloodline spoilers below.

PART ONE: RAVEN

In my original timeline, I used two anchor dates: Otto's 13th birthday being August 29th 1993, and Raven being 16 in the 'fifteen years earlier' Hong Kong flashback, making her 31 in Aftershock/Deadlock. Using the age difference between her and Otto, I counted backwards to give Raven a birth year of 1979. Otto's birthday still holds up, but Bloodline has since made it clear that Raven was 15 in Hong Kong. Therefore, several options presented themselves in order to salvage the rest of the timeline.

Option 1: Raven was indeed born in 1979, and Hong Kong takes place in 1994. This would make her 27 in H.I.V.E., given that she has a September birthday and H.I.V.E. takes place between September-December 2006. However, this means Raven that if Raven is 30 in Aftershock/Deadlock, there are only three years between the first seven books....something that canon vaguely supports given Shelby's "I've waited three years for you two to get together" comment to Laura and Otto in Deadlock, but feels very, very unrealistic given the number of time skips and the sheer volume of things that happen in the first seven books. My original timeline was created to get rid of the stasis in canon and give a better sense of the progression of time between books. Keeping Raven's birth year as 1979 undermines that.

Option 2: Raven was born in 1981, Hong Kong takes place in 1996, and she is 25 in H.I.V.E., meaning that there's exactly five years between H.I.V.E and Aftershock. This supports my earlier placement of Aftershock being the start of fifth year, but 25 feels kind of...young? It also hinges on Raven knowing her exact birth date before she finds out that Nero is her father, which I personally don't think Bloodline supports - Nero didn't know her birthday, and I think if Raven did know, she would've told him pre-Bloodline.

Option 3: Raven was born in 1980, Hong Kong takes place in 1995, and she is 26 in H.I.V.E., but, because she doesn't know her birth date, she celebrates her birthday on New Year's Eve. So while Raven would technically be 31 in Aftershock, she would still consider herself 30 until the end of the year, as would Nero. This gives a little bit more leeway with her age, reduces the number of changes in the overall timeline, and accounts for the overall unreliability of both Raven and Nero's narration in the flashback scenes - given that one of them had been traumatised so thoroughly that she had recurring psychotic episodes just months before that scene, and the other had his memory tampered with to the point where he misremembered the date of worst day of his life.

I personally opted for Option 3, making Raven's new birthday 3rd-6th September 1980. She is 33 in the Bloodline epilogue. Therefore Hong Kong still takes place in 1995.

PART TWO: OTTO

This is just a rehash of my last timeline, but for clarity's sake: Otto being an August 1993 birthday makes him one of the youngest in his year, meaning that everyone else (Lucy, Wing*, Nigel, Franz, Shelby, Laura, and Penny) were all 1992/3 babies. Bloodline takes place right at the end of his final year (meaning I correctly predicted that it would be set in 2012), making him 19. Something I forgot to mention in my original timeline is that Tom is described as being a few years older than Penny in H.I.V.E., but given that Tom isn't really alive for long enough to present me with an issue timeline wise, I'm just going to let that one slide. The Bloodline epilogue thus takes place in 2013.

As always, I am ignoring Rogue's claim that Otto is 13, because it doesn't make sense in any context (if Otto really is 13, it means he magically ages three years in Zero Hour and Aftershock according to Walden's own implication that Otto is 16 by Aftershock...which I'm also ignoring, but whatever). Laura still choosing between universities in September 2013 is weird, because either she is very, very late for the 2013 academic year, or very, very early for the 2014 one, but, again, I am ignoring it. Essentially, nothing meaningful has changed for any of the student ages between this timeline and the 2020 one.

PART THREE - NERO

This is where it gets interesting. This time last year, my Nero section was just speculation. I was, uh, very off, and did not account for how early Nero knocked Elena up. That was on me. My bad!

Nero is in his early 20s when Elena is murdered. If we take the year to be 1980, and early 20s to mean anything between 20-24, we can get an approximate birth year of 1956-1960. I'm going to average that to 22, making Nero's birth year 1958. He's a practically spritely 48 in H.I.V.E, and 55 in the Bloodline epilogue.

(Also, I am treating the 'thirty years' in the 'thirty years ago' flashback to be an estimate. Nero has memory issues and also thirty years has a much better ring to it than thirty-two.)

PART FOUR - DIABOLUS

We can't talk about Nero without mentioning Diabolus because I, for one, have been haunted by the knowledge that Nero taught Diabolus for years. However, assuming Nero immediately joins the H.I.V.E. teaching staff in 1980 following Elena's death, he is 22. If Diabolus is a first year student, we can give him a birth year of 1966/7. That said, I tend to think Diabolus is a little bit older than that, given how close he and Nero are in Hong Kong, so if we age him up to a third year in Nero's first year of teaching, that makes him 15/16 with a birth year of 1964/5. There's only 6/7 years between him and Nero, leaving plenty of time for them to become close friends by Hong Kong, during which Nero is 37 and Diabolus is approaching 30. That means Diabolus had Nigel at 27/28.

PART FIVE - THE OVERLORD INCIDENT AND XIU MEI

The Overlord Incident (henceforth the OI) is the bane of my existence. There's no mention of Raven in the original flashback in the Overlord Protocol, implying that she wasn't around yet, but it's referenced as still being a work in progress in Hong Kong. Again, this is a rehash of my previous timeline, but the Deadlock interpretation doesn't work; regardless of anything else, Wing was definitely born in 1992/3 in order to be in the same year as Otto, and either Wing or Raven would be too young for the OI to occur after Hong Kong (Raven was only 13 in 1993 in this interpretation of events, and this is one that puts her on the older side - there's an argument to be made for her being born in 1983, which would make her 10). Ergo, in this timeline, the OI precedes Hong Kong.

As mentioned, Wing had to have been born in 1993 at the latest, and the evidence suggests that he's most likely one of the older kids in their year, pointing to a 1992 birthday, meaning Xiu Mei got pregnant by January 1992 at the earliest. There must be time allowed for the following to occur between Wing and Otto's births and the OI: survivors of the OI to start going missing, Xiu Mei and Wu Zhang /Cypher to marry and move to Japan in order to escape persecution, and Overlord to get enough soft power over Number One to convince him to start trying to produce a clone of himself to be his successor. At earliest this can be 1991. I, however, think that it's more likely to be January 1990, given Overlord's comments about how much Number One initially resisted having his brain hijacked. This is the same as my previous timeline.

Unlike my previous timeline, however, I'm also going to attempt to estimate the year of Xiu Mei's death. While the Overlord Protocol does not explicitly state this, it can be inferred that Nero receives Xiu Mei's locket and letter after she is murdered by Overlord for investigating the Renaissance project. Nero receives the locket "many years" before Overlord Protocol (which takes place roughly in Spring/Summer of 2007), but Xiu Mei was also presumed "long dead" already when he received it as a result of the OI. This puts 17 years between Xiu Mei's faked death and Nero's reminiscence over the locket and letter in 2007 after the assassination attempt in Vienna. Xiu Mei can't have died before Wing was at least 5 years old, given the strong memories he has of her and the fact that he made a promise to her not to kill anyone, so I'm tentatively putting Xiu Mei's real death at 2001, when Wing would've been 9. This leaves just enough time for Cypher to establish himself as a thorn in Nero's side, and for his relationship with Wing the deteriorate to what we see in the Overlord Protocol.

PART SIX - OTHER

I've been meaning to do the maths on this for a while, but H.I.V.E.mind was officially brought online April 10th, 2006! (He'd been online for four months, three weeks, and two days by September 1st.) Nero really was paranoid after the OI.

Brexit doesn't occur in the H.I.V.E.verse, because Duncan Cavendish (David Cameron) resigns in 2010, AKA way, way, before the rise of UKIP and the 2016 referendum. The Iraq war, however, does - Tony Blair is heavily, heavily implied to be the prime minister in 2006.

Not really timeline related, but the fact that both Otto and Raven are Virgos is enough to make me shudder.

TL;DR - THE (FINAL???) TIMELINE

1950-59: The Furan siblings are born at some point. Two siblings are twins, presumably Elena and Anastasia or Anastasia and Pietor. At some point, they are owed a blood debt by the Sinistres.

1958: Nero is born.

Early 1960s: H.I.V.E. is founded, most likely by Nero's mother.

1964-5: Diabolus Darkdoom is born.

Late 1970s: Elena and Nero start their affair.

1980: Elena is murdered by Pietor. Raven is born. Nero has his memory of Raven's survival forcibly erased by Francesca Sinistre, clearing the blood debt between the Furan and Sinistre families.

1980s: Diabolus Darkdoom and Duncan Cavendish attend and graduate H.I.V.E. Diabolus and Nero become friends.

1989: Raven runs away from her orphanage.

1990: The Overlord Incident takes place, leaving three named survivors: Nero, Xiu Mei, and Wu Zhang. Overlord begins to assert control over Number One.

1991: Raven is found by the Furans and brought to the Glasshouse. Wu Zhang and Xiu Mei marry and immigrate to Japan after survivors of the Overlord Incident start going missing.

1992: Presumably the year Raven claws out Pietor's eye and gets shot in the woods, it is also the point at which Overlord/Number One most likely starts considering cloning himself. In the final quarter of the year, some students - most likely Wing, Shelby, and possibly Laura - are born.

1993: Otto and the rest of the students in his year are born.

1994: Likely the year Dimitri's escape attempt fails, and Raven is forced to murder Tolya. Also presumably when H.I.V.E.'s Icelandic location became dangerously compromised, and Nero starts seriously considering plans to move. At this point his mother is dead.

1995: Nero and Diabolus go to Hong Kong to meet with the Architect, and thwart Raven's assassination attempt. Raven eventually defects to G.L.O.V.E., and the first Glasshouse burns.

1996-2000: Construction on H.I.V.E. 2.0 is completed. Nero starts work on the emergency Zero Hour protocol.

2001: Xiu Mei is murdered by Overlord for asking too many questions about the Renaissance initiative. Wu Zhang becomes Cypher. Nero receives his half of the amulet, and Xiu Mei's letter.

2001-2005: Lucy's parents die of unknown causes. Diabolus Darkdoom falsifies his death to escape execution for getting too close to the Renaissance initiative, possibly after divorcing his wife first. Otto drops out of school and starts scamming local business to repair St Sebastian's. At some point Pike convinces Nero to try AI again. Number One's will is entirely consumed by Overlord.

2006: H.I.V.E.mind goes online. Pike's experiment to give Ms Leon the same reflexes as her cat goes horribly wrong, leaving them both trapped in the wrong body. Shelby becomes the Wraith and makes headlines for stealing millions of dollars' worth of jewellery. Laura is caught hacking the nearby American air base's early nuclear warning system. Otto hypnotises the current prime minister, allowing Duncan Cavendish to come into power. During a failed escape attempt from H.I.V.E., several hundred million pounds' worth of damage is caused to H.I.V.E. by Nigel's experimental crossbreed plant, Violet.

2007: Cypher fakes his death as Mao Fanchu in order to lure Wing to Tokyo, and the Contessa betrays Nero. Nero keeps Cypher alive, unbeknownst to Number One, and starts to have suspicions about Number One/Overlord for the first time. By the end of August, everyone is fourteen, and first year is over.

2008: H.O.P.E. is formed, and Nero is captured in either April or May whilst meeting with Gregori Leonov. Three months later, he is rescued by Otto, Raven, and the gang. The Contessa and Number One/Overlord die. Laura and Otto kiss, but nothing comes of it. Diabolus resurfaces from the dead to be elected head of G.L.O.V.E.'s ruling council. At some point in late August to early September, Otto, Wing, Shelby and Laura first encounter the animus fluid on a train to Paris whilst on a mission to recover a stolen thermoptic camouflage suit. As a result of the Contessa's death, Lucy Dexter is transferred to H.I.V.E. at the start of third year, at which point everyone is fifteen. Following the hijacking of Dreadnought, and an encounter with Pietor Furan, the animus fluid, and the Disciples, Otto is captured by American forces after saving Air Force One and the US president. He is then turned over to H.O.P.E.

2009: Assassinations of key members of G.L.O.V.E.'s ruling council take place at the hands of Otto, now under the influence of animus. Raven is given executive privilege to kill him if necessary. Otto confesses his love to Laura. Following a confrontation in the Amazon jungle, Cypher, Ghost, and Trent all die. H.O.P.E. is destroyed. Otto feigns memory loss of everything that occurred under animus. By the end of the year, everyone is sixteen.

2010: Laura's brother, Douglas, is born. Otto has continual and repeated nightmares and is the subject of rumours. Overlord takes control of the Advanced Weapons' Testing Facility in Colorado. The Zero Hour protocol is activated. Wing and Shelby get together. Chief Lewis and Lucy Dexter die. Pietor Furan is killed by Raven. Nero becomes head of G.L.O.V.E. Duncan Cavendish is forced to resign. The Architect is contacted by Anastasia Furan through a proxy, and construction of the new Glasshouse is completed. Following the appointment of Security Chief Dekker, Laura is blackmailed into betraying the location of the Hunt after Tom and Penny's recruitment to H.I.V.E. Joseph Wright and several former members of the ruling council are offered the help of Disciples'. All of the Alpha stream save Shelby, Otto, Franz, and Wing are taken captive. Otto is expelled, and joined Raven on the hunt for the location of the new Glasshouse. By the end of the year, everyone is seventeen.

2011: Raven and Otto take down several Disciples, most notably visiting Dubai, London, and Paris. In Venice, they are pursued by the CIA after tracking down the Architect with the help of Diabolus Darkdoom. Tom dies. The new Glasshouse is stormed and destroyed, again. Laura is given the choice as to whether she wants to stay at H.I.V.E. or not, and decides to stay. Anastasia Furan is taken hostage in Nero's basement storage facility. The Disciples' countdown for the new batch of hostages starts at 99 days. By the end of the school year, everyone is eighteen.

2012: The majority of Otto and the gang's final year goes smoothly. Franz starts working out and loses weight, becoming conventionally attractive. A few days shy of graduation, the clone known as Anna becomes loose. Otto reconvenes with the CIA and is allowed access to the last remaining batch of the animus fluid. Francesca Sinistre dies. It is revealed to Nero by Anastasia that he is Raven's father. Raven kills Anastasia. Otto stays behind to destroy H.I.V.E. and dies. His consciousness is transferred to a cloning vat by H.I.V.E.mind. Everyone is nineteen.

2013: Construction on the new H.I.V.E. facility is already underway. Raven finds out her birthday. Shelby and Wing set up an orphanage, implied to be in Africa, for war orphans in Otto's honour. Franz is an instructor at the temporary facility. Laura gets in to MIT and Oxford. In early September, Otto shows up on her doorstep.

#h.i.v.e #h.i.v.e.#h.i.v.e. timeline #bloodline spoilers

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ask-prime-starscream · 4 years ago

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Siege Review Episode 1

I can’t get this out of my head, so there we go: I’ll review the series so I can finally move on and do the things I actually planned to do.

While I’m no fan of the Siege toys (too much kibble, same boxy body type for everyone, not very poseable, absolute no buy for me...), the character models are easy to look at. They aren’t overly bright or hard to make out like in RiD or Cyberverse (gotta call that the R’lyeh effect). I think Bumble Bee here looks pretty good! It’s as if I could pat his head.

But this isn’t cute Bumble Bee the eternal scout who somehow is also Optimus’s strongest fighter. Yeah, seriously. The way he kicks even high ranking Decepticon aft easily in recent series, he should be Optimus’s right hand bot. HOWEVER, being mute usually turns Bee into a toddler, so I guess mentally he isn’t fit for the job...

But as I said, this isn’t the usual Bee, this is edgy Bee! He can talk! (Thank Primus!) He doesn’t want anything to do with either side because they both suck! (Understandable.) He collects energon just for the money! (Uhm...) ... By the way... what is money even worth here in this dystopian, pile of junk world? Shouldn’t energon be the one thing anybot wants? Or spare parts? Relics from the past? Bee, what do you even want to buy? We don’t know, but if I was him, I’d try to get a spacecraft together and leave this garbage planet!

While edgy Bee has to deal with his client, the not very survival-approved Autobot Wheeljack, they get caught by the seekers. And there he is: Jerkfire, commander of the seekers! Jerkfire is really great with keeping his troops’s morale up. He slices Starscream’s arm off as teaching lesson (Starscream needs to respect his authoritah!!) and... brings up his own bots against him that way... uh... WHAT AN IDIOT! (At this point Wheeljack, who really wants to sell the Autobot cause to edgy Bee, could say something like “Wowie, if this is how Decepticons treat each other, it’s hardly surprising we don’t want to surrender and be assimilated by you!” But he doesn’t. After all this is still Starscream’s arm which got sliced off and everybody’s meta knowledge tells them that Jerkfire is actually the good guy, therefore... eh, rather crack a joke at Starscream’s misery.)

Then Megatron shows up and he is really imposing, you can almost hear the menacing smacking of his Overlord lips! What he wants though, is not to kill the Autobots, he rather wants them to join his cause while Starscream is more the genocidal kind of guy. Jerkfire on the other hand probably wants to make them prisoners of war, I assume. He never outright tells what he wants.

Wheeljack doesn’t wanna live in Megatron’s Cybertron and spouts the “Freedom is the right of every living being, yadda yadda” stuff and at this point it would be interesting to know why Megatron’s rule would be so bad for them. Cybertron looks as gloomy as if it was thrown into the Jupiter, but that’s the fault of both factions. I guess, Megatron is bad because once more our meta knowledge tells us so. We never see enslaved Autobots being worked to death. Something that used to happen to Decepticons. We just see Megatron wanting the war to end and the Autobots refusing to surrender which will lead to their extinction.

Optimus Prime rolls out before Wheeljack and Bee get executed and fights the most pathetic fight against Megatron. Their boxy, kibbly bodies make them already sluggish and clumsy and here it’s as if we’re watching two turtles lying on their backs. At least they can hit though, unlike Cyberverse, and there is no stupid slow-motion like in RiD.

Because Optimus can’t do shit, Elita has to save all of their asses. Elita looks a little bit like a ladybug and never transforms throughout the show.

“We have no chemistry.”

I also find Optimus’s and Elita’s relationship to be very... cold. She is usually nagging for him to do or not do this or that and he is dismissing her. She is not his equal. Unsurprisingly she is like “fuck this, I’m outta here” at the end of season one.

Inside the Autobot headquarters, Optimus talks to Ultra Magnus.

Mags: I think this war is lost...

O.P.: But we still alive.

Mags: We got to eat though...

O.P.: Hmmmmmmmmm... (<-- 90% of his replies)

Meanwhile, edgy Bee takes a look at the junk pile headquarters and can’t wait to leave. Optimus tries to recruit him, but edgy Bee doesn’t want to join the losing team. Elita wants to execute Bee then and there, but Optimus is against such Decepticon methods.

Somewhere else in some kind of stadium, Megatron releases some Decepticon propaganda to the masses and everybody claps. Even Starscream who got his arm replaced. Jerkfire rams into him and asks, if he wants to lose that arm too. Bruh!

What a bullying asshole.

After that, Jerkfire tells Megatron that his seekers are out there hunting Autobots (because sometimes he is cool with killing them all) and Starscream rightfully claims that Jerkfire sucks at his job. Jerkfire is pissed, but Megatron reveals a tiny boner for Starscream’s arrogance (and that’s the only thing mattering about the entire show to Megastar shippers, lol!)

Well, and that was episode one!

#War for Cybertron #Siege #Spoilers #Spoiler

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travllingbunny · 6 years ago

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The 100 6x07 Nevermind

Season 6 of The 100 has been fantastic so far, and 6x07 is not just the best episode of the season so far, but also one of my favorite ever episodes of the show. Nevermind is, in many ways, a dream come true for me: this is exactly what I was hoping for at least since the promos for the show started promising the theme of characters “facing their demons”. At the time, I couldn’t have guessed that it would be about Clarke battling a centuries old woman who has taken over her body after her parents had decided to bodysnatch Clarke in order to bring their daughter back, but I was hoping for trippy, mind-bending, character-based storylines. Most of all, one focused on Clarke Griffin, the main character and hero of the show (oddly enough, this needs to be pointed out, since there are fans who keep forgetting it), her psyche, her traumas and emotional issues and character development.

After the wonderful last scene of 6x06 and the promos for this episode, my expectations were really high, and they were met. There was a little bit of fear that the whole “which characters will make a cameo”, “who will be mentioned how many times” thing would distract from Clarke’s character exploration, but that was not the case. This episode was almost entirely (except for the last scene) set in Clarke’s and Josephine’s mind space rather than the real world. The walk down the memory lane that the drawings we saw on Clarke’s mind-wall was there, but it was, above all, a great character study of the show’s protagonist, a battle of wills between the hero and the villain, and it had some big revelations – for the audience or for the characters. It had brilliant dialogue and acting, and was emotional, dark, intense and even funny at times (mostly thanks to Josephine, who is evil and detestable but also incredibly funny and charismatic).

And what particularly made me happy is that it addressed some long-standing questions of morality that the show had been ambiguous about. The show’s moral complexity/greyness has long bordered on moral relativism, and allowed (mis)interpretations in the fandom, to the effect that “There are no good guys, the protagonists are as bad as the villains, therefore it’s all the same and it doesn’t matter if someone does bad things, since everyone does it”. The unfortunate motto “for my people” has been overused and abused by many morally ambiguous or straight-up villainous characters on the show, to justify their own actions (the classic “who are you to talk, when you killed all the Mountain Men! Therefore I get to do whatever I want ‘for my people’’ – as if doing the only thing that could have stopped the evil society of technological vampires/overlords from killing and cannibalizing all your loved ones, is the same as killing people with no remorse to get power). By season 5, Clarke herself seemed to start buying into that view. Josephine Lightbourne again try to use that against Clarke in this episode, and nearly made her give up. This time, however, Clarke and the show both finally said “f*ck you” to that worldview.

One of the reasons why Josephine is such a great villain is that she is both a parallel and a striking contrast to Clarke. On the surface, they seem similar – their looks, background, family. When we first saw her in the flashback in 6x02, the similarities were obvious – another intelligent, capable, beautiful blonde girl with loving parents (Russell, in both versions, even matches the same physical type as Jake), a princess from a privileged background. But Josephine is everything that Clarke-haters (in and out of the show) claim Clarke to be, but that Clarke most definitely is not: selfish, narcissistic, with a god complex, remorseless, sociopathic, completely ruthless, pampered, classist, treating people as disposable. A start contrast to Clarke’s compassionate, caring, self-sacrificing nature.

Various thoughts about this episode in bullet points under the cut.

One of the many contrasts between Clarke and Josephine is the disorganized, beautiful way that different memories fill Clarke’s mind space, as drawings all over the walls of her room, unlike Josephine’s highly structured, organized mind. Just like “Monty”, I also like Clarke’s better.

I’m overall very happy with how this episode included references to various people and events from Clarke’s past, through a combination of drawings, flashbacks, mentions and objects. Most important people in Clarke’s life were referenced – both dead ones like Jake, Finn, Lexa, Jasper, Monty, and living ones like Bellamy and Madi (not so many mentions of Abby, but that’s because she’s both alive and, unlike so many others, not a source of guilt for Clarke).

The only exception is arguably Wells, and it’s really unlucky that the planned appearance by Eli Goree didn’t work out. We still got a confirmation of his importance in Clarke’s life (which should be big – he was her best friend since childhood and died tragically, even if he didn’t last long on the show) through several drawings (and the Chinese version of the idiom “A friend in need is a friend indeed” under one of them), and, more importantly, a close-up of one of them. Let’s be honest, the drawings are generally little more than a cool Easter egg for the fans, if the show doesn’t focus on them through close-ups and flashbacks or mentions – something that the general audience would notice.

I love the way that Clarke’s outfit and hairstyle kept changing depending on which memory or part of her mind space she was in at any given moment. For instance, she started as Ark Clarke from the Pilot, then turned into Eden Clarke when she visited her safe space of the life there with Madi for those 6 years – which was far from perfect (what with being isolated from everyone else, without any adult with her, without other friends or any chance of love or sex life, and waiting for Bellamy to come back and talking to him without answer to keep sane), but was still the most peaceful time she’s known. Except maybe for her childhood, which she did spend in a not-happy space (life on the Ark was difficult, if not for her, then for so many others who were less privileged, and we know Clarke was aware of that), but she had a happy family life, so it makes sense that her father is the first person she would see in her mind-space. Jake and Eden stood for safety and family life and peace, which Clarke thought she got when she briefly believed she had really died – before Jake (aka her own mind) told her it wasn’t true. It’s the sign of her being upset – the rain and storm outside that happened due to her mood – that alerted her to the fact she was still alive.

Every character, other than Josephine, who appeared in Clarke’s mind space was, of course, an embodiment of a part of her.

Although I’m not sure about ALIE, whose code may have remained there, and who delivered information that Clarke may not have already known. It was the one cameo in this episode that really surprised me (since the rest had been revealed or guessed on social media). She was there for the big revelation that the neural mesh from the time Clarke was in the City of Light is what ended up saving her. This made this episode’s link to 3x13 Nevermore even stronger. (Funny that the erased memory of ALIE!Raven is what gave rise to that awful amnesia theory. Glad that this has been shut down now.) I guess this means that I was wrong about other hosts being savable, and that Delilah is gone forever? A big part of why I wanted it to be true, apart from liking Delilah, was to give the Earthkru more incentive to fight the Primes. But we have been given a lot of other reasons why they should make the decision to so that.

ALIE also had a conversation with Clarke about the nature of life and humanity, which, however, could be just Clarke talking to herself. Clarke has been tempted to run away from pain, she’s even tempted to run from it by accepting death in this episode, but she’s still insisting that pain is a necessary part of life and that there’s no joy without it. At the core, Clarke is not someone who gives up.

The revelation that the darkest and most painful memories are those that aren’t even on the wall and that Clarke keeps hidden, explained some things, such as why there were no drawings on the mind-wall of such huge moments as Jake’s death or Finn’s death (Clarke’s trauma from this was a subject of an entire episode – one of my favorites, 2x09, Remember Me)... However, while I don’t want to criticize the prop department, who did an incredible job drawing those pictures from scenes, they did make an error - one of the drawings of Lexa is actually from the scene of her right after being shot, which doesn’t really fit (her death is one of the “darkest place” hidden memories) – though you wouldn’t know that by just looking at the picture and not knowing the scene.

I’m glad that Josephine called out Clarke on child abuse, and that the drawing of Madi in pain in the shock collar was so prominent on the wall. Season 5 had Clarke at her lowest point, and that was certainly, IMO, one of the worst things she’s done.

We know (from 6x04) that Clarke’s biggest regret is leaving Bellamy in Polis in season 5, and this episode confirmed that this weighs so heavy on Clarke’s heart that she can’t even face Bellamy in her mind space (which fits with the fact that the darkest and most traumatic moments are those she did not put on the wall). She is afraid that he hasn’t really forgiven her in his heart, and that he can’t, because she can’t forgive herself. Even if Bellamy is alive and well, Clarke’s feelings for him make her betrayal of him unforgivable in her own eyes (even though, at the time she did it, she had been heartbroken and furious because she felt he had betrayed her). Octavia, or rather Blodreina, was the right embodiment of her guilt in a weird way, since she was the danger that Clarke left Bellamy to, the one who threw him into the pit in the first place (kind of like Jaha was the embodiment of Bellamy’s guilt over the culling in 1x08). She reminded Clarke of some of her other sins, those that involved Clarke being ready to sacrifice Octavia (while trying to protect Bellamy) – letting the bomb drop on the people in Tondc, stealing the bunker in season 4, but she was there mostly to talk about Bellamy, because the relationship between Clarke and Octavia has always mostly revolved around their respective relationships with him. Even in her own mind, Clarke is still deflecting when confronted with her feelings for Bellamy (“I care about both of you”, just like she said “I care about all of them” when called out on her feelings for Bellamy by Lexa in 2x14). Octavia is also the embodiment of the unwillingness to forgive, so her refusal to fight for Clarke makes sense.

Not that Clarke needed any help to kick Josephine’s arse. It was satisfying to see, but expected. Josephine is an actual pampered princess who’s never had to fight for anything, while Clarke has been fighting and surviving in adverse circumstances for 7 years.

Maya’s appearance made perfect sense, but she was the most OOC character of all the “mind space” characters – maybe because Clarke didn’t get to know her that well, but mostly because she was the embodiment of Clarke’s guilt over the innocent deaths she’s caused. Maya was a good person, someone who helped them against her own people because it was the right thing to do, and because she knew what the Mountain Men were doing was wrong. She is also linked in Clarke’s mind with her feelings of guilt over Jasper – Clarke didn’t know Maya well, but Jasper was one of her closest friends, and Clarke feels deeply guilty for indirectly causing his downward spiral that ended with his suicid4. I was happy to see him referenced so much in this episode – through “Maya”, the case Clarke found in 5x01, and his goggles that she found there, which all played a big role in this episode. The accusations that “Maya” (Clarke herself) made sounded a lot like the repertoire of Clarke-haters: that she likes being a savior, has a god complex, has killed more people than she’s saved, is no better than the Primes… This is a confirmation that Clarke herself has agonized over all of these things. But it’s not what the real Maya would have said – the real Maya died acknowledging the responsibility all of the Mountain Men had for the evil things their society was doing, saying “None of us is innocent”. When Clarke made her “Maya” character be helpful against Josephine, it was the closest thing to what the real Maya had been like.

Clarke’s darkest place, the most painful and traumatic memories she has, are the deaths of Finn and Lexa, the only two people she has had romantic relationships with – relationships that were both extremely brief and tragic, and ended with deaths that traumatized Clarke a lot and made her feel guilty – even though she doesn’t really have, IMO, objective reasons to feel responsible for either of them, it’s not hard to see why she would feel, on the emotional, irrational level, that she is the one causing people to die. (The show and especially the fandom have tended to ignore one of these relationships post-season 2 and to over-focus on the other, so I was pleasantly surprised that they were both acknowledged in a similar way for their role in Clarke’s development and emotional traumas – with the visual references with Lexa’s throne and the pole Finn was tied to and the knife Clarke used to mercy kill him, combined with the flashback of Finn’s death, a different flashback of Lexa seen before, and Josephine’s indirect mention of her death – which was probably the most elegant solution, since I don’t think the show would ever dare replay the footage of her death for fear of more backlash.)

It’s certainly no coincidence that this dark place that’s about Clarke’s traumas of her tragic romantic life is the place where Josephine breaks Clarke by convincing her that Bellamy has given up on her and that he and everyone are better off with her dead. Josephine didn’t technically lie – she told her he took her death hard but in the end made the rational choice of agreeing to the deal with her murderers. But, by showing her an out-of-context memory of Bellamy taking the deal, she showed her a skewed version of the truth. Clarke didn’t see Bellamy’s grieving, despair and anger, and didn’t realize that Bellamy saying that she would do the same was out of admiration for her, as a leader who’s not just smart but also selfless and caring. She probably took it as another sign he sees her as a monster, doesn’t care that much about her and is better off without her, because it fed into her own insecurities.

Josephine: “Have you considered sacrificing yourself?” Bitch, watch the season 4 finale. She didn’t just consider it, she did it.

I loved the fact that the case Clarke used to hide the important memory was Jasper’s case, that it contained Jasper’s goggles alongside Jake’s video, and that the lock password was “102”. More confirmation of the importance of the initial Delinquents community from season 1 in Clarke’s life and the show. “You forgot Bellamy and Raven” may be my favorite line from this episode.

Monty’s return (which the show tried to hide by not putting Chris Larkin’s name in the credits until the end credits, but it revealed it through not cutting enough of one of the promo pics) was not a complete surprise, thanks to the detective work of some of the fans, but was still my favorite part of the episode. Monty was most in-character, because Clarke knew him so well, and it makes perfect sense that he was the voice of Clarker’s reason and moral compass, which is what made her change her mind after having given up and given Josephine the victory. (You want a great platonic friendships between a man and a woman on The 100? Here it is!)

The ‘Monty” part of Clarke’s mind fought back, against all the BS – the “bear it so they don’t have to”, “for my people” mottos and moral relativism and Josephine’s half-truths) and reaffirmed Clarke’s resilience and will to live, and reminded her that what it all comes down to is not just saving your people, but doing the right thing. After Monty told them to be good guys and be happy. Both of these messages are what Clarke had to remember. As I’ve been pointing out, doing better is not just standing by and not killing people. It’s also actively fighting against evil. They are not being good guys if they let the Primes murder, bodysnatch, oppress, brainwash and sacrifice the people from their community, just because it doesn’t affect them. As “Monty” (Clarke) pointed out, it’s not doing better if you let the Primes murder people to live forever.

Clarke’s trip through Josephine’s memories (of being killed by Kaylee, and of killing Isaac and sacrificing a baby) helped her fully realize that Josephine is truly evil and needs to be stopped. Really, if killing babies is not enough to make you classify someone as true evil on a whole different level, what can?

Josephine tried to pull the “for my people” motto with Issac, but she was full of s*hit. She only does things for herself and maybe a few other people (not even all the Primes, since she murdered four of them). We learned that Children of Gabriel are literally the children that the Primes tried to sacrifice to the trees and that Isaac saved and brought to Gabriel. We also got another confirmation of the cruel caste system of Sanctum, where “nulls” (people who are not Nightblood gene carriers) are treated as lower life forms, and routinely sacrificed, and that Josephine would rather kill them all, if she was allowed to by her father. Not that having the NB gene is so good, as it means your child may end up as a host, and obviously, the “honor” of being a Nightblood means you get bodysnatched at the age of 21.

When Isaac said “if only we were allowed to be more than your janitors and guards”, it felt like it was the writers’ way of reminding us of the class system on the Ark, where Bellamy was a janitor and a guard-in-training. It’s also another reminder of how different Clarke and Josephine are – Josephine would have considered someone like Bellamy expendable and useless, whereas Clarke quickly showed in season 1 she valued people based on their personal qualities rather than their origin or class.

It was cool to see a flashback to the time before the apocalypse, complete with references to Diyoza and Becca, but this memory was my least favorite part of the episode. I guess I just wasn’t that interested in Josephine’s traumatic memories, since I don’t think they’re enough to explain her sociopathic nature. On second thought, you could say that this guy was her Finn, and that her response to that trauma was completely different from Clarke’s – genuinely shutting herself down to any compassion or remorse.

I love the fact that what saved the day was the fact that Clarke and Bellamy were both good students of Earth skills (taught by Pike!) and that they are, once again, so well attuned to each other that they can communicate this way. Or the fact that Bellamy was watching JC so carefully, even though it must have hurt him emotionally to look at her, that he noticed her movements and read them correctly.

Nice to see Miller back, but did he have to be so… not-bright? In any case, it’s great to see Bellamy as determined to save Clarke, as he was despondent in the last episode. This is maybe the first time that Clarke really needs saving, but a huge and crucial part of that rescue was Clarke deciding that she wants to live.

Rating: 10/10

#the 100 #the 100 season 6 #the 100 6x07 #nevermind #clarke griffin #josephine lightbourne #bellamy blake #monty green #jasper jordan #maya vie #jake griffin #wells jaha #octavia blake #madi griffin

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nikkiwriteswords · 6 years ago

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My friend @cherrybombbecky and I are, first and foremost, nerds. So typically, we each had something to say about this article. To summarise, it compares a ‘limited’ Western view of humanity with the Shinto concept of monism, with regards to robots and artificial intelligence. Westerners, the article claims, separate machine from man because its artifice renders it a ‘lesser’ being for not having a spirit or soul:

The West [...] has a problem with the idea of things having spirits and feels that anthropomorphism, the attribution of human-like attributes to things or animals, is childish, primitive, or even bad.

Therefore, to raise something artificial, like a doll or machine, to the level of mankind is incomprehensible to Western doctrines. It does not have a soul; it cannot be spiritual.

However, to the Japanese:

Nature doesn’t belong to us, we belong to Nature, and spirits live in everything, including rocks, tools, homes, and even empty spaces.

As such, even robots have a form of spirituality. To this end, the article goes on to make the case for a less human-centric view of emotional and spiritual consciousness. To continue to ‘dehumanise’ AI as it develops more and more ‘human’ traits is to reinforce the hierarchical systems of mankind's spiritual and ecological superiority that have been in place for centuries.

If anyone has played Detroit: Become Human recently, you could perhaps empathise with the message of this article. Inequality is a theme tightly bound with mankind’s inherent superiority in the game. Depending on how you play, the androids seek equality or revolution from their human creators, because the humans do not recognise their own ‘humanity’.

This existential crisis of spirituality vs. scientific progress has played out in the domain of sci-fi and fantasy for decades. Think Data from Star Trek: Next Gen. Think the Force in Star Wars (and the backlash towards midichlorians). The article sites Atom Boy as a manga that understands the relationship between Buddhist beliefs and robots to this end. I would go one further, and claim Ghost in the Shell is a prime example of the blurred lines between AI and ‘humanity’, wherein ‘humanity’ relates to the having of a spirit/soul. To my Western eye, it is influenced greatly by Descartes’s mind-body dualism, or the ‘ghost in the machine’, wherein the mind can exist without a body, and vice-versa. The Major and the tachikoma are prime examples of this philosophy (to my layman’s understanding, I should point out). The tachikoma gain a ghost (or spirit) despite their artificial intelligence.

Interesting as the debate is, as yet I can’t decide why I, as a Westerner, would not embrace artificial intelligence. The answer is in there, but it is not teased out:

Wedged in among the talk of mankind’s superiority over Nature and the natural world, our innate arrogance that raises our image alongside God, is the fear of our own obsoleteness. When faced with a being so similar to ourselves, we trace the trajectory of its potential in the fall from our own pedestal.

It may be a gross simplification of the issues at play, but I also think Fullmetal Alchemist touches on this same crisis of humanity, which contains echoes of science vs. religion. Again, very novice speculation here, but aren’t homunculi to alchemy what AI is to science? The pinnacle creation that places us alongside God?

In contrast to this matter of phenomenology, the structures of consciousness and subjective experience, @cherrybombbecky proposed a different outlook. Having lived in Japan for a number of years now, and being an armchair sociologist, she points out that artificial intelligence could encompass a social ideal for the Japanese. In a society governed by strict rules and hierarchy, which arguably fears disorder and chaos, an entity ruled by logic and protocol is an enticing prospect. This is a notion that ties in with the aforementioned human ideal. Again, a lot of sci-fi deals with this idea of the ‘perfect human’, whose rationality and cool logic makes them superior to humans themselves.

(NB: I would like to point out that this ‘superiority’ positions this second reading firmly within the hierarchy outlined by the first point.)

Of course, it is therefore implicit that emotions are a human’s weakness. One anime that explores the ramifications of such an ideal is Psycho Pass. The Sybil System seeks to police society by rationalising emotions and assigning them a moral value.

Granted, though Japanese, it is based on notable Western narratives. However, the idea that emotions can be ascribed a numerical value, a ‘criminal coefficient’, which can be used to measure morality or ‘mental beauty’, is an interesting concept. The coefficient therefore ties emotionality to criminality, ascribing moral instability to the emotionally damaged. By implication, artificial intelligence is the perfect neutral value. Emotionlessness - artifice - is purity. The human ideal.

Granted, it does not deal with the phenomenological issues of the original article or the other anime mentioned above. However, Psycho Pass does explore issues of existentialism (free will and authenticity), and ideals of moral beauty as applied to science-fiction and artificial intelligence.

Ultimately, within this lens of man’s superiority, it seems to me that ‘humanity’ is tied up with emotional intelligence and empathy. The ability to connect on an emotional level. I connected with the tachikoma that’s for sure; they broke my heart. That is the factor that the Sybil System lacks. Empathy is the genius behind Detroit: Become Human also. The game exploits the very egotism that lens is based on: the idea that humans are unique for their emotional capacity to love and feel and connect. This, in turn, leads to the fear of humanity’s obsoleteness that arguably underpins the fear of artificial intelligence in the Western world.

(Also I have been dying to point out that humanoid robots that look exactly like ourselves, but lack the crucial capacity for ‘humanity’ or empathy, is full-on capital-U Freudian Uncanny. And can be pretty damn scary, so. OP probably didn’t consider that when writing the article.)

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duran-duran-less-official · 6 years ago

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I saw Johnny English Strikes Again yesterday. I'm not going to rank the films in any kind of order, because they are all good in their own right. But the third one contains an element of social satire which genuinely elevates it above the other two in some respects, and I'm not even sure it was intentional. Spoilers, for the record.

So someone has stolen the plot of both Spectre and Skyfall. That is, someone has hacked into MI7's database and revealed the names of all their currently active agents, except for Johnny English, Albus Dumbledore, Tywin Lannister, and M from the James Bond film nobody cares about, who were retired from the service. While Johnny is on a mission, Britain's traffic lights and rail networks are also [HACKED], forcing them to do improbable things like direct all trains to terminate at the same station, or making all traffic lights stay red.

We are introduced to Jason Volta. He is the Actual Worst Tech Bro you can imagine, some kind of unholy hybrid of Mark Zuckerberg, younger Steve Jobs, and Jeff Bezos. He himself owns a practically omnipotent AI who is a combination of Alexa and Siri, named accordingly.

Now if you're thinking "Ergh, this sounds like a REALLY obvious villain", then yes! But here's the thing. At no point in the entire film does Jason Volta make the slightest attempt to conceal his villainy. It's not that English and Bough were the only people to notice "hey wait, this guy might be the hacker!", which very much WOULD have been beyond my suspension of disbelief. Instead, they are the only ones to perceive it as a bad thing.

Here's a scene for you. The Prime Minister of Britain, Emma Thompson definitely not trying to be Theresa May, likes Volta because he is hip and young and tech-savvy, "everything she's not". So she invites him for a meeting and praying to God he doesn't notice that her country is in crisis. Obviously he does notice, because he's got an omnipotent Alexa on his side AND he caused it in the first place. So he hacks into the government's secure networks, right in front of the Prime Minister, to solve the problem. He does so in about 20 seconds, and she, being dazzled by his tech-savviness, thinks this is amazing and not at all extremely scary. Volta and the PM work out a vaguely worded deal which, upon its signing at an upcoming political summit, would grant him control over literally all public and government systems in Britain.

See, the PM thinks this is a great deal because she is obsessed with moving the country forward, and automating everything is supposedly a positive step in that direction. She is obsessed with the idea of being seen to accomplish something in the eyes of her voters to the extent that she boots Johnny off the case for daring to contradict her vision. But of course, the summit rolls around and she signs Britain's future away to Jeff Zuckerjobs. Only AFTER she has signed the deal does she realize his villainous intent, as he gives the entire summit a speech about how he can abuse the deal to control the entire world (internet, electricity and so forth). And how, therefore, he is going to use his AI Mad Hacking skills to send everyone's technology to hell unless all other political leaders sign the same agreement as the British PM.

It's like "Wait! I was on board with giving you unrestricted access to and control over the mechanisms that are fundamental to how our society operates, but now you're doing things with that power that I DON'T want you to do!"

The reason the reveal doesn't feel like a reveal even by Johnny English standards, is because nothing about the villain's demeanour or language has to change in the slightest when switching from "awesome messianic saviour of our country" to "Actual Tyrannical Autocrat Overlord".

Overall, a piece of social commentary which cuts much closer to home than I thought JE was capable of.

Oh, and the rest of the movie features Rowan Atkinson

disco dancing

getting into a virtual reality fight with half of London

spending the entire climax of the film wearing a suit of armour

burning down a restaurant

teaching small children how to handle deadly weapons

and many other things besides, so 8/10, you should go and see it.

#Johnny English Strikes Again

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