#and further proving that you do not understand character growth or development in the least

[seyaryminamoto]

hello! I really like your meta about Zuko, and I'm so glad that I finally found a person who also thinks that Zuko in book 3 is a much worse person than he was in the book 1. I always thought that something was wrong with me, since literally no one sees this obvious fact for me! But I would like to ask you: What do you think about Katara in book 3? the fact is that she was my favorite character in books 1 and 2, and the way she was written in book 3 upset me a lot. it seems to me that they spoiled her character, but I can't explain why. Please share your thoughts!

Glad you've enjoyed my extensive meta on the fandom's fave, haha. I did write a lot about him, always nice to know my thoughts on the subject are still deemed relevant.

As for Katara... well, I have thoughts on her, too. My experience with her character is quite similar to yours, I'd say, because I too felt a lot better about her character in the first two seasons of the show compared with the third. I don't usually give this a ton of thought, but after your ask, I figured I'd try and figure out what exactly went down with her that made people like us feel so uncomfortable with Katara's portrayal at multiple points of Book 3...

For starters, I'll say I vibed with Katara a lot when I started the show for reasons beyond her being a great character or being written wonderfully: she could very well have been written mediocrely and I would have loved her anyway simply because I ran away from anime to ATLA in an era where anime kept shoehorning incest undertones into every sibling relationship, even in shows that didn't have that as a core subject. It happened at least twice that I can remember, I kept seeing people raving about shows where it WAS the core of it (I still do not understand the Oreimo deal, like, the minute I read that show's title I puked in my mouth and knew I'd never watch it), and I just needed... safety from that concept, I guess?

So when I went into ATLA, and the first sibling relationship you're exposed to is Sokka and Katara, two siblings who very much act like siblings? I was thriving. It was thrilling. I felt so refreshed that I think I didn't care much about the flaws of Book 1, despite my inability to sense direction for most of it, because thank the universe, it was a sibling relationship that made sense to me!

With that as an opening, I'd say that, initially, I thought Katara was fine for most of Book 1. In Book 2? She fell off the radar for me a bit simply because other characters are introduced that just appeal to me so much more than she does. I vibe better with characters like Azula, who tend to be the type of female character I just LOVE, and with characters like Toph, she's a tomboy, I was a tomboy (... was? x'D maybe I shouldn't use past tense...), so I gravitated much more towards those two by no real fault of Katara's core personality traits. Back in Book 1, there aren't as many main characters, so you don't have a lot of variety to choose faves from. It's not that strange, I think, that once the cast broadens, people's interest in certain characters can scatter too.

But then Book 3 happened, and I just couldn't enjoy Katara outside of episodes where she wasn't that important. The Katara-centric episode of Book 3 stand among my least favorite episodes of ATLA altogether, and among the least likely episodes I'd ever want to rewatch. I literally skipped over The Painted Lady in my first rewatches of the show, every bit as much as I skipped The Great Divide or Avatar Day, both of which annoy me a lot in the first two seasons. The Puppetmaster? Not even close to being an episode I could enjoy. Even the Runaway, that's supposed to be Toph-centric, ends up making me count down the minutes for it to end and I'm not even going to get started on The Southern Raiders and the absolute can of worms that episode is...

So, with all this being said, if we peel this particular cabbage open little by little...

After mulling it over, I've grown to suspect that Katara has major inconsistency issues since day one that most people don't particularly like to acknowledge, and that flew over most of our heads from the beginning of the show. She's pretty much portrayed to us as an empath, someone who has so much heart that she can't help but feel everyone's pain and suffer with them all the time. The fandom 100% acts like that's who she is (while also obsessively adultifying her unnecessarily, and forcing her into the mom!friend role, which... we'll talk about that later)

But this is also the same character who, when her brother banished Aang from the Southern Water Tribe as early as in episode 2, protested in a very particular way once Aang was gone. Which one of these statements sound more accurate to Katara's character, and a suitable protest for her to proclaim upon witnessing this injustice against Aang?

"Aang is alone! How could you send him away on his own? He could be in danger, Sokka! He's just a kid!"

"The Air Nomads are gone, Sokka! Where do you think he'll go? He doesn't have a home to go back to and you just sent him away!"

"You happy now? There goes my one chance at becoming a waterbender!"

If you ask the fandom? They'll most likely think that her reaction was either #1 or #2.

Surprise surprise: it was actually #3

I'm not saying she didn't show empathy towards Aang while Sokka was ranting at him, because she did. I'm not saying she wasn't willing to be banished along with Aang until Sokka asks if she'd choose pretty much a total stranger over their family and tribe, because she was. She absolutely did all those things.

... So why would she focus only on how he represented her one chance at becoming a waterbender once Aang is gone?

This feels off to me. I've never particularly liked that line. And you could absolutely say that Katara has every right to be mad at losing her chance to reclaim an aspect of her culture that she cannot connect to, but the way it was framed here? It absolutely makes Katara look more selfish than she actually was. The wording is not good. The show doesn't emphasize, at this point, that bending is such a core and crucial part of their culture and that Katara feels a major responsibility in being the ONLY person in the South Pole that can keep it alive. So it just comes off as a child's tantrum. Sokka's concerns were 100% valid too, even if he went about them while being a jerk (he is, indeed, an older brother...). He wasn't even wrong in the end about how dangerous Aang was to their tribe, since Aang's mishap with Katara on the ship gives away his position to Zuko, and it results in Zuko ramming a huge ship into their home and nearly killing people in the process. But you DON'T see the show fully framing it as though Katara and Aang did something wrong -- it was an honest mistake. We know it was. Sokka is framed as unreasonable for being so paranoid even though later events in the very episode prove he wasn't.

And that's... the crux of the issue with Katara's writing. If you ask me.

There are far too many instances where Katara makes mistakes that she's not held accountable for, that she doesn't apologize for, that run against the core logic and principles of her character and they either get shrugged off or overlooked. There are far too many situations where she acts out, and is a jerk at her jerk of a brother, even unprompted on occasion, and it's supposed to just be funny. One particularly stood out to me when I revisited it a few years ago, I can't really remember what for (maybe when I was writing Jeong Jeong's arc in Gladiator and I had a look at the fishing village...?), but it's the famous flashback episode in Book 1: The Storm.

The scene in question is... humorous. Supposedly. Katara is trying to buy fruit in the market but then realizes they have no money to pay for it. Not only does Katara piss off the vendor, but the vendor actually takes her rage out on Sokka once she realizes these kids won't give her any business: he gets kicked in the rear, as the transcript's description says. No one protests the woman's violent reaction, not even Sokka. Katara most certainly doesn't do it. But that's not all there is to it: Sokka doesn't hold what happened with the fruit vendor against Katara, they have a conversation on how they have no money and no food... and Katara offers him the golden ticket solution to their problems:

"You could get a job, smart guy."

Am I too feminist for thinking it's insane that Katara expects her brother alone to get the job? That she's not saying the THREE of them should get jobs? She and Aang are BENDERS! That's an asset most people aren't likely to find in any would-be employees in the central Earth Kingdom! So... wouldn't it be logical for all of them to do it? But no, instead, Sokka alone has to get the job?

And yes, I know, Sokka is the provider, Sokka is the protector, Sokka would do ANYTHING for his sister and the people he loves: you ask the fandom, though, and that's Katara instead of him. Moments like these simply do not exist in the fandom's eyes and, if they do, they're just excusable because Sokka is boring/weird/annoying/insert-demeaning-nonsense-here and Katara is a queen who can do whatever she wants.

Then, the consequences arrive once Sokka gets a dangerous job on a fishing boat and nearly gets killed in a storm. Aang is the one who shows concern about the potential storm when the fisherman's wife brings it up: from all I can see in the transcript, there's nothing from Katara. Sokka says they told him to get a job, so that's what he's doing, and there's no manifestation of concern from either of them about maybe joining him on this fishing trip to ensure he's safe. Instead, Aang is haunted by his past and Katara goes with him when he leaves, which, yes, is very important for context on the Air Nomads and Aang's life... and yet we don't really NEED for this scene to be Katara and Aang only. It could've included Sokka too. The plot of the second half of the episode would change? Likely. They could've come up with another idea, and not shown us a Katara who doesn't show concern for her brother's safety or any remorse when her unfair demands or expectations from him could result in catastrophic outcomes :') yes, she worries about Sokka's safety once the storm hits, but there's no sign of her feeling responsible for Sokka being out in the storm at all. No apology. Which is ironic, because Zuko apologizes to Iroh in that very same episode, hence, an apology from Katara to her brother could have mirrored that side of the story well, and they REALLY loved doing Zuko-Gaang parallel scenes like that, so it would have fit perfectly! Didn't happen, though.

Point being... Katara's compassion and empathy are not absolute. It's important to keep in mind is that they don't need to be! But precisely because she falters with them in moments where she REALLY shouldn't, with people as important to her as her own brother? It becomes very difficult to believe that she's the empath the fandom is convinced she is, and that the show's narrative tries to push her as.

The real reason why her failure to show compassion to Sokka in "humorous" situations feels so unnerving isn't because she's a typical little sister who takes her brother for granted (which is a perfectly logical/believable behavior!): it's because there are no consequences for it. Maybe at some point or another there were? But I for one can't remember many instances where Katara failed Sokka and it was framed as her fault and her responsibility. Let's look at other Book 1 instances that exemplify what I mean:

She freezes him to the deck of Zuko's ship, which puts Sokka in MAJOR danger, and she just tells him to hurry up as if it weren't her fault that he's frozen in the first place. We don't even see her making efforts to thaw him out of there when she IS the waterbender so it seems logical that she should be able to help with that (and if she's too inexperienced to do it? The least she can do to help her brother out of a dangerous situation is to TRY???). But apparently it's funny that she doesn't help him when it's her fault! So this is fine!

She endangers the entire group over the waterbending scroll, which, of course, the pirates had no right to have anyway and it's reasonable that she'd want it for herself... but she antagonized a group of fully adult, dangerous, potential murderous pirates, against Sokka's constant warnings that they shouldn't pick that particular fight. As far as I can remember? Her apologies on that episode are exclusively about how she hurt Aang's feelings by being jealous over his greater talents as a bender. Basically, nothing for Sokka, no apology for not listening to him about danger, making it worse when the very final moment features Katara proudly telling her brother that she won't steal things... unless it's from pirates. So lesson not learned because it's funny, again, to never acknowledge that Sokka has a point.

She actually cares about Sokka's fate in Jet! But the thing is... the narrative doesn't frame that as Katara's fault. Because it's not. Jet made his choices and he did awful things and he captured Sokka, lied and gaslit everyone, because he had a goal to fulfill and he used Katara to make that happen. As angry and upset as Katara is, it's not exactly shown that Katara is sorry for having trusted Jet when Sokka could have ended up paying a deadly price for it. She's angry at the betrayal, even in Book 2 it's constantly framed as though Katara is upset at him as an ex-girlfriend would be upset at her ex-boyfriend for lying to her rather than, you know, being pissed at him for nearly killing her brother + an entire village. My point is, the narrative framing never holds her responsible for Jet's choices. Which, again, she's not. But she IS responsible for her own choices... and one of those choices was disregarding Sokka's warnings about Jet. THAT was her fault, and her responsibility. She jumped to conclusions and assumed that Sokka was bitter and jealous that Jet was the charming cool leader Sokka could never be. There were no apologies to Sokka over that, either.

I could go on, and on, and on. The truth is, I bring all this up to show with solid evidence that Katara's writing was always a little... unstable. Weird. Disconnected from logic in many regards, I'd say. It's not logical/compatible to tell us that this character has the BIGGEST heart of the entire cast when she fails to show that heart to none other than her own brother, who is inarguably the person who she knows best and with whom she should share the closest relationship, even as her friendship with Aang grows and thrives. That makes no sense, thematically speaking.

Is it meant to be comedic? Yes, every bit as much as Iroh sexually harassing June was done for comedy's sake. That's not an excuse for characters behaving in ways that are thematically contrary to what they're supposed to be portraying... and along with that? No excuse for them facing zero consequences for that behavior. Which is, in fact, my main issue with these flaws from Katara: I have no issue with the writing choices in the scenes I listed just now! I take issue, however, with the lack of follow-up and consequences that you can BET, 100%, would have befallen Sokka if it had been him instead of Katara acting that way. He faced consequences even for things he didn't do, for comedy's sake: he wouldn't have gotten away with disregarding Katara's safety as often as Katara did with him, no chance at all.

Ultimately, these scenes in Book 1 are kind of ignorable in the larger scheme of things (or at least, that's how the fandom has always acted). Not a lot of people take any of this as major proof of characterization for Katara. You won't see a lot of fic writers showing her acting like this. Canon, though, often would go down this route for funsies, and the comics certainly did it plenty too, that I can remember. Part of the issue here is that, as funny as it is, it also makes Katara feel stale as a character, as does the Sokka-Katara dynamic, at large, because there's no progression for it. That's probably my greatest gripe with the Great Divide, believe it or not: it fakes being an episode where Sokka and Katara are going to be confronted over their conflictive tendencies, and the ONLY potential development in that basically-filler episode SHOULD HAVE BEEN Sokka and Katara learning to be a bit more harmonious and respectful of each other? ... And that's just not what happened at all. The status quo remains exactly the same after that episode, and it continues to be like that until the end of the show.

The real reason why Sokka and Katara are deemed the healthy siblings is because, of course, compared with the other main set of siblings in the show, these two appear to get along wonderfully. But the truth is, their relationship is not as dynamic as it deserved to be. And that's part of why Book 3 ends up failing in ways Book 1 might not have, while having similar flaws: Book 1 is when you're still getting to know these kids, and that's why I find its flaws far more forgivable than anything that comes later. When there's basically no development for that connection at all, Book 3 winds up falling flat with characters like Sokka and Katara and the bond between them.

All this being said... I'm not saying that Katara is terrible in Book 1. I still stand by the fact that I really enjoyed her character in many instances of this season, there absolutely are situations where she sasses Sokka that still make me crack a smile, and genuinely humorous situations that don't paint her in a questionable light over her lack of concern for her brother's safety. Her fight to earn the right to be trained as a waterbender is deeeeeply flawed but it's not her fault, it's more the misogyny of the writers/creators that decided that a betrothal necklace from his past would make Pakku unlearn all his sexism and get over his bullshit right after beating up a girl who was fighting tooth and nail to make him acknowledge her. That he only acknowledges her because he wanted to marry her grandmother is... uh... fuckboi behavior even when he's well over 70 years of age? XD

So, yeah, Book 1 still has my favorite Katara of the entire show even though I REALLY wish she wouldn't get away with things that other characters wouldn't get a pass for (... well... other than Zuko...). I can't enjoy her as much as I enjoy other characters because I really don't like it when characters aren't held accountable for serious mistakes they made.

Moving on to Book 2, though, and leaving behind my greatest gripe with Katara's Book 1 writing (lack of direct consequences/self-reflection on her part), Book 2's biggest sin when it comes to Katara is the beginning of the "mothering" trope. I honestly did not feel motherly vibes from Katara towards anyone in Book 1. Sokka is very often the one playing the responsible role, while Aang and Katara are seeing the world, practicing their bending, doing reckless and fun things. The entire thing about Katara being the mom friend started in Book 2 when she suddenly becomes the epitome of responsibility (well... kinda) when Toph joins the group. She still does sketchy stuff with zero consequences (I'll forever complain about how ice is not cold in this show, the kids she froze to the wall may have been dicks, but freezing someone alive that way should have resulted in serious health repercussions, just as ANY case of freezing someone alive should have, ffs, be it Zuko in Book 1's finale or Azula + Katara in Book 3's...), but once Toph is part of the group, she becomes the cool girl who's "one of the boys", and now Katara is "the mom". This dynamic gets forced into the story pretty much right after Toph joins the group. And after that? It doesn't really change for the better often. There are only a handful of instances where Katara wasn't acting wholesome and comforting and kind and compassionate in Book 2 (... particularly with Sokka, ofc), but the point where her dynamics, even with Aang, start to feel motherly is definitely Book 2.

And this adds to the issue, in the end: Katara's appeal as the main girl in the show is suddenly gone because Toph is here, and she's a way more unique character that the writers definitely were having fun working with, probably more fun than they had with Katara. So they had to find a new niche for her, I'd dare guess. Thus, instead of actually building up an awesome and solid friendship between Katara and Toph, they mostly just clash and collide. Toph is basically the ONLY character who gives Katara grief and isn't framed as in the wrong for it, which is its own set of issues (namely, Toph not being challenged enough by the narrative, which stunts her character growth), but among many things, we suddenly get shown that Katara is a girly girl who likes makeup and she ropes Toph into this when nothing we've seen so far suggests that Toph would be comfortable with that. Katara pushes her into doing things because they're the "girls of the group"... and it doesn't often look like Toph's feelings on anything are important when Katara is pushing her around for whatever purpose. I'm not saying Toph hated the spa day, she certainly had fun eventually, but even when the comics made a "Katara and Toph's day out" story, where Toph got to choose what to do for once, the story devolved into Katara's show anyway, and things concluded with Toph deciding they're better off doing girly things together when they want to hang out because Katara is just too intense for the things Toph would like to do.

This isn't even in the show, but it's basically a response to Tales of Ba Sing Se to try and even out Katara and Toph's one-sided dynamic, where Katara calls the shots of their entertainment... and even then, Toph doesn't really get what she's looking for. But Katara does get that out of Toph because all she wants is a girl to do girly things with and Toph provides that in the end, no matter how much of a tomboy she may be. Toph might just want a friend who loves the things she loves, and who knows, Katara could be that person! But the story never leads her in that direction so we never see that happen. And that's why that particular friendship never really... clicked for me. Their dynamics don't really feel enjoyable to me as they were written in the show, even though they very much could have been.

That's one thing I'll always give ATLA: the character potential and synergy they captured with that cast could be absolutely incredible. Team Avatar is so iconic because they really could work well off each other. A lot of teams in other media just aren't this good (... one of my main reasons to not enjoy Voltron and drop it in season 1 was my absolute failure to find any synergy between those characters, it felt like they all hated each other and I honestly did not enjoy their dynamics in the least), but Aang, Katara and Sokka have great synergy due to their different personalities in Book 1. Same when Toph joins them in Book 2. Zuko ABSOLUTELY could have been better in the group than he was if Book 3 hadn't devolved into the Zuko Woobifying Show by the second half, where the only writing priority was making him friends with everyone, and making them all feel sorry for him and have compassion towards him. But, broken down to his core traits, Zuko's personality would have resulted in solid chemistry with everyone else's if they'd gotten off that agenda anyway! So ultimately, ATLA has a big win in this respect that a lot of TV shows would LOVE to recreate but they simply haven't struck the right kind of balance in character traits.

Hence why the way they wrote Toph and Katara's dynamics kind of feels like a betrayal to me. Those two could have been a lot of fun, they have EVERYTHING it takes to be entertaining characters with not a ton of things in common and yet building a solid friendship that hinges on their differences. I've seen a fair few examples of that kind of dynamic in other media, and it absolutely would be possible with Toph and Katara. It's really unfair that they couldn't capture their dynamics in such a way that both characters would SHINE, rather than constantly resorting to conflicts between them that never seemed to truly be resolved.

So: Toph should not be a problem for Katara. She should enhance her character and doesn't because of writing failures. One of the core failures is "mom friend Katara", of course: there's nothing inherently wrong with Katara stepping up and taking care of people she loves, but there's something very wrong with it when she's suddenly portrayed as this motherly figure when she's doing things that Sokka had been doing just fine in Book 1. Main reason why this is the case? Sokka got dumbed down to full-time class clown for whatever reason in Book 2. While he has good moments, a lot of times they went WAY overboard with making him a source of comedy this season and that, too, contributes to mom friend Katara. Since Sokka is being so meh? We even feel relieved that Katara is there to keep things together because nobody can expect the other three to do it, right? But... Sokka was doing it in Book 1. And there's no real development to explain him NOT doing it anymore once Toph joins in besides "Katara is now the mom friend and Sokka is just here to be funny". It's not organic development: it's forcing tropes that just don't fit. And while Katara's mothering doesn't feel as unpleasant as it could here, it ultimately forces a new interpretation and portrayal of her character that honestly isn't all that interesting, most of all when the other characters are constantly portrayed as "more fun" while she's just here to keep them in line.

It just isn't the same Katara we met in Book 1, and it shows in spades. Book 1 Katara would have been hyped to join Aang and Toph in chaos while Sokka screams at them to behave themselves. Book 2 Katara is the one trying to keep the other three in line, and there's genuinely zero development that led things to that stage. It's not organic storytelling. There's no growth that leads to that, and so, it feels off.

But the core problem of all these flaws in Book 1 and Book 2 is that they roll together and snowball into something far greater that then proceeds to just... disrupt everything we thought we knew or understood about Katara. We've been told she's a kind person above all else, someone who cares about people close to her, someone who embodies hope and strength and love...!

... And then Book 3 starts, and we're actually facing a Katara who shifts into a wholly different person with the speed of a whiplash that we're left not knowing who tf this is anymore.

"Mom friend Katara" absolutely comes back in Book 3, why lie? She takes care of people, she tries to provide, she tries to be nice and sweet and then also enforces discipline on Toph (particularly) when she's being irresponsible!

But the reason why The Runaway is such an unpleasant episode is because Katara's behavior is dialed up to a thousand, and the conflict between her and Toph feels WAY too similar to what it was when they were barely getting to know each other in The Chase. Why are they STILL clashing over such things? There are occasional glimpses of friendliness there in The Runaway, sure! But they're not so strong that you actually feel like that friendship supersedes their conflicts and their propensity to bicker and argue and hurt each other. Toph blatantly calls her out on her mothering and fully canonically confirms that Katara is The Mom Friend™. Where Toph is annoyed but eventually complies with doing what Katara wants to do in Tales of Ba Sing Se, this time Katara makes a huuuuuge fuss over Toph's misbehavior and her scamming Fire Nation people. And you could argue that Toph has every right to do it, or that Katara is right to be worried, just like Sokka used to worry about such things in Book 1...

But what we get is a stale dynamic that repeats the same problems we saw in Book 2, as well as Katara coming off as rather hypocritical because she, too, did dangerous shit and picked dangerous fights where she shouldn't have, and ignored everyone who told her not to do it: she gave Toph that kind of grief over things Katara was willing to do back when Toph wasn't in the group (see the pirates thing), and she will try to stop Toph from having fun on her own terms when nobody has ever tried to stop Katara from doing that in hers. Of course, any Katara advocate would read this and go "you're missing the point: Katara was sad and upset that she was being LEFT OUT! That's why she was so mad about this!" Then the irony of the matter is that this argument STILL reflects poorly on Katara. She gave her friend a tough time, called her a wild child and a crazy person, went through her personal belongings because "she could tell Toph was hiding something from her", so she fully disregarded Toph's privacy... all because she couldn't say "Wait, you guys went scamming Fire Nation people? Damn, why didn't you wait for me! I would've gone too!", and there you go, problem solved! Katara's not left out anymore!

Yes, of course, that's not how it WORKS, people can struggle to identify what they feel...!

... And now it's my turn to say that that's not the point.

The point is that Katara said and did hurtful things to her friend. Things she eventually regrets, yes, but that she didn't have to do at all. This is the same person who fed Appa a bunch of food that made it look like he was sick, all be it to keep the group from leaving the Jang Hui river village so she could go out of her way to heal the injured and sick without telling anyone what she was doing. That, too, was a choice she made with no concern regarding how the rest of her team might feel about it: was she doing something nice? Sure! But it's not fundamentally different from Toph doing whatever she wants with zero regard as to Katara's feelings on the matter. Katara KNEW she was stalling their journey and that Sokka wanted them to move on: she didn't care about his feelings or priorities, and the story eventually frames Katara as being in the right for feeling that way. Here, she's in the inverse scenario, only it's with Toph rather than Sokka, and instead of realizing that she, too, has made choices that were irresponsible/dangerous/risky and STILL went all out with them, down to fighting whoever opposed her choices? Katara just doubles down until she, again, breaches boundaries and overhears Toph and Sokka's conversation, WHICH IS ANOTHER CAN OF WORMS DUE TO THE SOUTHERN RAIDERS FOLLOW-UP...

The thing is, Katara as a mom friend is not even a good thing. It's not conducive to fun or interesting storytelling, not in Book 2, not now. It doesn't make Katara a more interesting and dynamic character. The way she's portrayed isn't so she looks tragic for taking this role, it's all about forcing these kids into tropes that don't necessarily add up to who they have been so far. Katara's mom friend status is NOT treated with any compassion. It's not handled as a sore, difficult subject outside of the ONE conversation Sokka has with Toph that Katara overhears. And it's not centered on Katara's tragedy, on how she overcompensates for her mother's absence, it's centered on Sokka accepting her as a motherly person and encouraging Toph to do the same thing. The people who saw further depth in it probably haven't looked at the script itself in a long time: you CAN see more to it, but that's not the point of the scene. That's not where it's going. And the fact that such a tragic situation is what conduces Katara to take up the mom friend role actively makes it look like... she shouldn't have it. Why would she be the mom friend if she's just overcompensating for Kya's death? If she's taking up responsibility by thinking that no one else will (a blatant lie because, again, in Book 1 there's NO SIGN of this behavior and it's Sokka who's in a role of responsibility compared to her), it suggests that EVERYONE ELSE ought to step up and stop "relying" (and Sokka very much uses that word) on Katara being the mom friend. It's not a healthy thing. It's a coping mechanism that seems to be actively damaging Katara: and the story doesn't acknowledge it that way.

So... "mom friend Katara", dialed up to a thousand in Book 3, absolutely has a connection with why her character loses its sheen by this point in the story. There's no attempt to deconstruct this coping mechanism by Katara. No indication from the rest of the team that maybe Katara should get to be a kid just like them and stop being so uptight (even though VERY often she's not that uptight but the show very much tries to pretend she is). It's Katara's initiative to do a scam, it's not Toph or Sokka or Aang who think she needs to join in on the fun, she basically inserts herself in it. So basically, those three take the route of saying "that's what she's like, we just gotta bear with it", instead of actually helping her. If we'd seen that? Mom friend Katara would actually be a fun element to witness deconstructed by the story. And I'm not blaming either Katara or the other three for this:

This is EMINENTLY a writing problem.

Mom friend Katara is not a good trope. It could be if the point was to help her break free from it. It's not. It's simply weak writing that can't handle two girls with proactive, aggressive personalities and a ton of agency, a lack of creativity in realizing how much potential there could be in making Toph and Katara the absolute best of friends. It's seriously a disservice to the two of them that this trope literally blooms over Toph joining the show and then NEVER gets resolved or chased away. And when you have characters like Sokka or Aang kind of joining the bandwagon of "yeah, Katara's a mom!" when the two of them traveled with her in Book 1 and she WASN'T that at all? It makes matters infinitely worse.

So, if you ask me? This is the first thing that makes Katara feel more unpleasant than ever before in Book 3.

The second thing is even worse.

We return to accountability, as well as to illogical flow of thought when it comes to the writing of Katara: in Book 1, we see a hopeful girl who never speaks ill of her father or betrays any manner of displeasure or distrust towards him. No sign of her being conflicted by what Hakoda is doing: the focus is entirely on Sokka's feelings on the matter once it finally comes up in Bato of the Water Tribe, and Katara is a secondary matter, if even that.

This would be fine if Hakoda hadn't come up at all as a subject throughout Books 1 and 2. If Katara had never had the potential opportunity to see her father in any of these instances and had backed out from them for bigger reasons than... plot reasons.

For reference: she's excited, just as Sokka is, when Bato says he can bring the kids to meet their dad again. They're HYPED. We see no sign of Katara being upset at Hakoda for leaving at this point. The only portrayed reason why she and Sokka decide not to go see Hakoda is because they think Aang needs them more and they decide to forgive him for hiding the map. Katara, from the get-go, is not as angry at Aang for hiding the map as Sokka is. Clearly, Sokka wants to see Hakoda far more intensely than Katara does: even so, there's no sign anywhere here that implies that Katara harbors resentment or dissatisfaction towards Hakoda.

Book 2 gives us a similar situation: Katara declines going to see Hakoda and offers to be the one who stays in Ba Sing Se so Sokka can go see Hakoda himself. Sokka is soooo thrilled and thanks her and calls her the best sister ever and Katara very much says she is, indeed, the best. Which she's allowed to, worth noting, I'm not saying her reaction to Sokka's praises was bad, it's actually funny: but what I AM saying is that she knows how much this matters to Sokka and that's why she makes the offer she does. It's also VERY convenient! Because logic dictates that, if Sokka stays behind, he realizes the Kyoshi Warriors aren't themselves far faster than Katara does (even though, to be fair, Katara didn't really have much time to realize it at all), and we wouldn't have Aang suffering over Katara's imprisonment because the one in chains would be Sokka and then Aang might just go "oh okay it's just Sokka, I can go cosmic if it's not Katara"

... yeah I'm being sarcastic I actually don't think Aang wouldn't have saved Sokka, but they very clearly had Katara stay behind first and foremost for this specific purpose...

But Katara's acknowledgement that this is a good thing for her brother makes you REALLY wonder how much of a secret grudge she was supposed to feel towards her father at this stage of the story. The truth, in my opinion? She wasn't actually supposed to resent Hakoda as she did, let alone quite so harshly.

My sister personally told me that she thought Katara's anger at Hakoda was a fine storytelling choice when I told her I didn't like it. She told me Katara herself most likely didn't realize how hurt she had been by her father's leaving, that it wasn't until she was around Hakoda again that she understood she resented him at all, and that she had a lot more pent-up rage and frustrations than she had EVER acknowledged, and they burst out frequently in Book 3. Which, you know, is one possible explanation that tries to make this whole thing more palatable. From a human standpoint? This is valid.

... From a writing point? Not so much.

A Katara who struggles to understand her heart (which... is odd, tbh. As far as they portray her, Katara tends to know exactly what she's feeling, why she's feeling it, and she acts on her emotions rather than brains more often than not) would be portrayed as confused over her own rage at Hakoda. She would not have been written as a snappy teenager who hates her dad. She would have snapped at him and then apologized by reflex, unsure of what's come over her. We would see Sokka trying to mediate between them too, probably asking Katara what's her deal, and she would have no idea how to explain it. Katara would be avoiding Hakoda, knowing she loves him, not knowing why she seems to hate him now, afraid of saying things she shouldn't. Every time she snaps at him, she should worry about what she did, she should fear for Hakoda's feelings, she should reflect on what's going on inside her heart...!

... But that doesn't happen. And that knocks SO HARD on the concept of empath/compassionate Katara that it basically turns her into a whole different person.

As I've said countless times so far: it's not about Katara being perfect. I don't WANT her to be perfect. But I DO want the show to acknowledge that she's not. I want the flaws to REALLY read as flaws. I want other characters to react to those mishaps on Katara's part, and I want HER to reflect on what she's doing and realize she's messing up, just as she does when she hurts Aang's feelings in the Waterbending Scroll, which is most likely the best situation where Katara actually owns up to the exact mistake she made and feels genuine, palpable, obvious remorse for it. But when you feature Katara lashing out at Hakoda, and everyone just staying quiet because "uuuuh, awkwaaaard...", it feels off. Aang asks Katara, outright, what's her problem with her dad! And Katara goes "What? What problem?" She's acting like she's not even aware of the fact that her behavior is out of place, basically gaslighting Aang into pretending that she didn't do anything rude or mean to Hakoda. Aang literally saw it with his own eyes and is the ONLY person to bring it up.

To make matters worse? Katara has been with Hakoda for WEEKS. It's not like they just crossed paths two seconds before Aang opened his eyes. The implication is that she's been behaving like this, or her behavior has been deteriorating towards Hakoda with no one worrying about it or trying to make her reason with it. for that long. Sokka didn't do anything. Hakoda just took the teenage rants and left her alone because that's what she wants. And when the one person brings up that she's not acting like herself? Katara pretends nothing's wrong and acts like everything's fine and she's not acting any differently from herself. Whether she actually is just lying to Aang or ALSO lying to herself is a matter of debate... but what it suggests is she's unwilling to confront the gravity of her choices and how she can be hurting her father with them.

This is NOT to say that Katara has no right to be angry about Hakoda abandoning her in the Tribe. She has every right to be upset and feel forsaken. Their mother died, and Hakoda left with all the men of the tribe, and Sokka was left behind, tasked to protect everyone, and Katara apparently felt responsible for the whole village too: as valid as Hakoda's quest to fight in the war might be, it's not out of this world for Katara to harbor frustrations and resentment over what happened.

What IS out of this world, and particularly, not appropriate to her character, is that her way to convey those feelings was something she gave herself to, completely, only to reason with it once Aang was missing so that the episode would conflagrate her problems with Aang and Hakoda into the same thing.

This is basically a dark expansion of what we've seen in Katara's treatment of Sokka since Book 1: where it was typically "humorous" when she was a jerk to him and paid no price for it, this time it's not humorous. This time, you're supposed to see her being a jerk and then go "aaaaw, poor dear," even if you're not supposed to get mad at Hakoda because he is very much a decent dad. The show was trying to have its cake and eat it too with this situation, because Katara DOESN'T apologize to Hakoda for being unfair to him: HAKODA APOLOGIZES TO HER. Hakoda acknowledges the pain he caused Katara and the damage his leaving has wrought upon his children by apologizing and explaining how much he missed them... but Katara does not acknowledge the pain she inflicted on her father by acting out when he wasn't doing anything wrong. Is this teenager behavior? You could chalk it down to that, but that's precisely why teenagers can be a pain in the ass! And that's very much how Katara is being portrayed if she's unwilling to acknowledge she acted out and hurt someone she loves!

Her problems and resentment towards Hakoda magically go away after that single conversation. After this? She loves him. No hard feelings left. If her problems with Hakoda were this deep and difficult to navigate and work through, either she bottled them up in the rest of the show and stopped them from affecting her father... or she just got over it that quickly. Which would be very unrealistic because Hakoda apologizing for leaving doesn't change the damage Katara suffered through because he was gone. A single apology doesn't fix everything that people read into Katara's deep anguish in this scene and episode. And yet that's very much how the show portrays it: Katara is 100% fine in every single other interaction with Hakoda she gets past the first episode of Book 3. Does that make sense? Is that good writing? No, actually: it's literally digging up a problem, making it up last minute with zero lead-up to it, where the ONLY way to read "lead-up" is to pretend that Katara always had ulterior motives to avoid going to see Hakoda, even though we NEVER were shown that she was hiding anything, something that could be VERY easily shown in the story if they'd always had this in mind. The truth is that they didn't. They made it up for this episode, forced it in there, didn't even write it right because nobody reacts to Katara's behavior reasonably except Aang, and she gets away with it without even having to apologize. That's... not good form for any character, let alone Miss Responsibility and Empathy, is it?

This is why it's such a problem that Katara acted as she did towards her father. It's not because this is an unthinkable flaw: it's because there's very much no lead-up to it, kind of like there's none with Korrasami's big reveal in LOK's finale. It's because there's no follow-up to it either. It's because we don't see Katara living up to her supposed core character traits, where she should have a realization that her choices and actions and behavior have hurt someone else, someone she cares about. None of that happens.

And I will say: it's different when it comes to her clashes with Zuko and her reactions to him in the second half of Book 3. This is basically the MAIN thing the fandom gives her grief for and I hate them for it: she has every right and reason and justification to show no empathy or compassion towards a person who, as far as she could tell, took advantage of her compassion in Ba Sing Se, of Aang's compassion frequently across Book 1, and paid them back for all of it by joining forces with Azula and showing no concern to help Aang when Azula almost killed him. I am no fan of Iroh's... but Iroh jumped in to help Katara and Aang escape, at risk of being captured. Zuko stood beside Azula and did NOTHING to help those two leave. He showed zero concern for Aang's survival. He saw his sister potentially murder someone and had ZERO REACTION. So, no offense but full offense: Katara's unwillingness to trust Zuko is JUSTIFIED. Not only is it justified? It's CORRECT. It's the only writing choice that makes sense. Sokka getting over it relatively quickly feels off to me, no matter if the Boiling Rock adventure isn't as bad as others might be. Aang not holding a grudge for too long kind of fits because it is Aang... but Katara being that mad at Zuko? That's 100% fine. It fits. It works. And anyone pretending that what I said about Hakoda applies to how she treated Zuko is just completely biased in Zuko's favor.

Katara and Zuko do not have a secret magical powerful soulmates bond in canon. Their one instance of bonding comes after multiple instances of the exact opposite thing. Katara and Sokka were 100% down for leaving Zuko to freeze to death in the North Pole, and the ONLY reason why Zuko survives is because Aang can't let that happen to him. It's AANG'S compassion that saved Zuko. Katara felt none, AND SHE DIDN'T HAVE TO FEEL ANY. Let's not forget that!

Moving on to Book 2, Katara actually makes her first offer of kindness to Zuko and Iroh in the Chase when she offers to heal Iroh after Azula's attack. Zuko's reaction is to lash out violently and yell at her to leave: who, exactly, would feel inclined to think this poor beautiful sad boy just needs love when you OFFER HIM kindness and his reaction is, in a manner of speaking "go fuck yourself I'll handle this on my own"? And it's worth bringing it up because it feels like the fandom is hilariously misled into thinking the Gaang magically knows what Zuko is up to and how he's growing and evolving, as if they were part of the audience: they're not. The last time Katara saw Zuko before Ba Sing Se is literally when Zuko refuses her help. We're also talking about Fire Nation people: Katara has every right and every reason to believe that Zuko is refusing her help, not out of personal, internal strife he's dealing with and has no idea how to handle... she very much can read this as "inferior Water Tribe peasant, you will not heal my uncle with your wretched waterbending!" Because... let's be real, that's what Zuko looked like to Katara across Book 1. She has no real reason to think he's any better or different from that until their catacombs scene...

... And he stabs her in the back and joins Azula there. Right after "bonding" with her.

So let's be VERY clear on that respect: Katara has no real reason to forgive Zuko. She has no real reason to feel empathy outside of the show constantly trying to push that she's kind and compassionate with no boundaries, even if she forsakes that kindness and compassion at random whenever the plot requires it. But her death threats to Zuko? They're completely fine by me. I'd be pissed if she had acted any differently, and if anything I hate how easy Zuko had it to befriend everyone but Katara.

... Not to say I'm happy with how he befriended Katara either, but anyway...

As this isn't Zuko meta, we're not going to get into the true core glaring issues in The Southern Raiders, because ultimately, that episode paints Zuko in a disgusting light that his fans are constantly gaslighting themselves about. He was not beinga heroic good dude helping someone he connected profoundly with. His behavior leaves so much to be desired and proves he hasn't unlearned a lot of toxic things he had internalized. He didn't unlearn them in this episode, either. But the GREATEST sin Zuko commits in this episode, without a doubt, is bringing Katara on a journey that ultimately did NOTHING for her. The only person benefitting from it was Zuko himself. I've seen people pretend that Katara finally found closure: she did not do such thing. She learned what kind of scum killed her mother, but she did not forgive him nor did she kill him. Closure would mean peace. Katara did not find peace with the situation. She's shown troubled, sitting at that pier, miserable, when Aang talks with her, she's STILL angry. That's not closure. It never was.

What it was, however, was the journey where Katara thanked Zuko and forgave him because..! Uh... because...

... Why, exactly, did Katara forgive Zuko here?

He brought her to her mother's killer: she found no closure from it. In fact, she learned the VERY disturbing truth that she hadn't realized so far: HER MOTHER DIED SPECIFICALLY TO SAVE HER. Her mother sacrificed herself for Katara's sake. She CANNOT find peace with this reality in a single afternoon because holy shit, who would? Katara KNEW her mother had died. It's not until Yon Rha tells her what happened that she understands what happened in the igloo. Katara herself, her waterbending skills, and the target she painted on her own back because of something 100% out of her control, something that is NOT evil and that the Fire Nation was hellbent on destroying, are the reasons why Kya was murdered. This is DISTURBING SHIT to deal with. And the show completely sidelines this revelation and the dark impact it could have on Katara, which, seriously, is HUGE, way worse than what happened with Hakoda, because it very much could have triggered a profound self-hatred by Katara towards her own skills because how tf could her bending cause her mother's death?! Not to mention the obvious: who was that source? Who told the Southern Raiders that there was a waterbender? Who the hell is responsible, beyond the Fire Nation, for her mother's death?

There's A LOT to unpack here.

And none of it matters because Katara is just supposed to forgive Zuko for exacerbating and worsening her trauma regarding her mother's death :') funny how that works.

This IS the point where Katara should make a display of darker sides of herself that she didn't know or understand. THIS is where Katara turning dark like Aang did after Appa vanished would make PERFECT sense. With this revelation about Kya that's beyond disturbing: not with Hakoda... and certainly not with Sokka.

The cusp of Katara's worst is, by far, her behavior with her brother in the Southern Raiders. I know a million excuses have been made for this moment: my problem is NOT the fact that she lashed out at him as she did and said something DEEPLY hurtful. It's the fact that KNOWING, SEEING HE'S IN PAIN...

... does not matter to her one bit.

Instead of a trite scene with Zuko spouting shit he does NOT mean (aka "violence wasn't the answer... but lol go kill my father okay??"), we deserved a scene with Katara and Sokka talking this out. People pretend it's fine as it is: it's not. Katara has spent the ENTIRE show disregarding her brother's feelings in a myriad of ways: this time, it was way more painful and way more hurtful and SHE KNOWS IT. It's not funny. She's not amused. She's not being a shithead little sister. She's ANGRY. She's UPSET. She has every right to be! What she DOESN'T have a right to do is hurt her brother DELIBERATELY and then escape every consequence from doing that.

There's very much no way to spin that moment into making Katara a decent sister. There's no way she remains true to her core values of being empathetic, kind and wholesome when she will insidiously, vindictively hurt her brother this way. And what I said earlier about her overhearing Toph and Sokka in the Runaway? It actually gets a follow-up in this scene: Katara telling Sokka that he didn't love Kya as she did is basically her WEAPONIZING the information that was NOT meant for her as her alleged evidence that Sokka didn't care about Kya as much as she did. As if his inability to retrieve Kya's memory was NOT a manifestation of trauma, as if it were something he's FINE with! He's not! How guilty must he feel for that? Does that matter to Katara at all? Why... nope. Because all that matters at that point is her own rage, her own feelings, her own fury. Which is, then, entirely against the character we've been told she is.

The lack of apology or follow-up to this horrible moment will never stop being one of the absolute biggest misfires in one of the WORST written episodes of this show. Yes, I said it. The more I ponder The Southern Raiders, the more I realize it's an immensely flawed speedrun to establish a friendship that simply doesn't add up. Katara and Zuko becoming friends after this journey requires some wild, absurd leaps of imagination that, boiled down to basics, don't make any sense. There's no reason for Katara to decide she'll forgive Zuko after she regains enough clarity. Why does she forgive him? Because he proved he'd rather make her happy than defend his nation anymore? Ironically, at no point does Katara show any appreciation of the fact that Zuko is setting aside his firebending supremacist attitude completely for her sake. So maybe that's not it.

Ah... is it because of how he, and he alone, was ready to help her go on this journey of revenge...?! Why, ironically, the only reason why ONLY Zuko goes on this journey is incredibly artificial and fake: this IS intended as Katara's "field trip" with Zuko. None of the field trips make sense, from a logical standpoint, as duo journeys. I've mentioned it to a few people: Sokka and Zuko could have brought Toph with them to the Boiling Rock, a metal location where her abilities would be VERY useful, used her as a false prisoner and turned her in as a captured ally of the Avatar's, who 100% will bait him into coming here to rescue her so that the Fire Nation can get him next! A cover as strong as that one might actually get them further along on that rescue attempt than what they did in canon. But this CANNOT BE... because it was Sokka's field trip with Zuko so nobody else is invited, even if they're very much not doing anything else (as is the case with Toph). Aang? Why didn't everyone join the firebending discovery with Zuko and Aang? They weren't doing ANYTHING in the Western Air Temple at the time. They very much could have gone with them too. But they don't. And that's exactly why Katara's trip works exactly as it does: it's the solo journey with Katara and Zuko, and the ONLY way to make it work is to show Sokka and Aang completely opposed to the concept of finding Yon Rha. I'm not saying I think Sokka and Aang would have been on board if they're allowed to remain IC... but they could have wanted to go on this trip with Katara regardless of not agreeing with what she wanted to do. Hell, as is OBVIOUS: Kya is Sokka's mom too. His opinions, his feelings on this subject, should matter just as much as Katara's do, and fuck anyone who pretends otherwise. These two are NOT supposed to be the well-known unhealthy siblings Zuko and Azula, who each got one parent in their corner and therefore the other parent treated them like they were worthless or a monster. Hakoda and Kya were parents to BOTH their children, and any narrative or interpretation that attempts to say that ONLY Katara's opinion on Kya matters is immediately ruled out, for me, as absolute bullshit spouted by someone not worth listening to. Point blank.

Also, the fact that Zuko USES Sokka to gain this information about the southern raiders, and then doesn't even extend the chance to Sokka to join them? When Sokka is basically his new best buddy? That... does not make sense. It basically portrays Zuko as a disloyal asshole who takes advantage of his friends for his purposes and tosses them aside, disregarding their feelings whenever it suits him.

So Sokka's treatment at the hands of this episode is just deplorable. Both Zuko and Katara are HORRIBLE to him... but Katara is our focus here, she's actively hurts Sokka and then proceeds to not care. Because that's how she has operated so far, and that's how she always will.

Hence: we have a long, long tradition of Katara not treating Sokka fairly all across the show. The reasons why it's not a fair or balanced relationship at all is because Sokka typically pays the price for being a dick to Katara: either she inflicts the punishment herself, such as when he's disrespectful in the Drill and she smacks him with the slurry, or the narrative inflicts some magical punishment instead that CONSTANTLY proves that Sokka is not allowed to be a dick without facing consequences for it. Does he ALWAYS learn the lesson? Sure he doesn't! But the consequences for it NEVER stop. He doesn't get away with being a jerk to his sister. That's forbidden. But Katara? She's allowed to get away with it every single time! And the reason why it gets worse and worse is because we went from relatively silly/comedic things, in which Katara did not apologize because "it's funny that she didn't apologize", to NOT funny things at all, such as this scene in Southern Raiders. Even just a troubled glance at Sokka, or a slight hesitation after seeing how hurt he is, would be enough for me: there's NOTHING. She doubles down and keeps charging ahead. Zero thoughts or concerns given to her brother.

If this isn't why you have issues with Katara, well, I don't know why it might be the case in your case x'D But I absolutely attest that the combination of "mom friend", "selective compassion particularly when it comes to her brother" and "absolute imperviousness to consequences for her mistakes" are the things that fully caused my initial appreciation of her character to shift into ambivalence and then into full blown dislike once I reached Book 3.

Worth noting: THIS IS A COMPLAINT ABOUT THE SHOW'S WRITING. Boiled down to basics, written by any more competent hands, I don't think Katara would have acted the way she did often, ESPECIALLY in episodes like The Awakening or The Southern Raiders. I categorically refuse to write Katara in my stories as someone who gets free passes for EVERYTHING she does. I also refuse to portray her as the mom friend, particularly in Gladiator. There's a lot of depth you can give this character! So much you can do, so much worth exploring... and canon just settled for stunting her and then only bringing her out to play in ways that make her unpleasant, not particularly bright and extremely resistant to character development even after allegedly learning lessons (see how her initial behavior around Hama, who shows red flags often, isn't all that different from how it was with Jet? There's only a handful of moments where it looks like Katara MIGHT be wary, and yet they're quickly overcome by her excitement, which Hama manipulates in her favor until she does the bloodbending reveal). So I'm NOT saying Katara had no potential... but I am saying the show itself failed her, big time, because of how she was written. A quick glance through the transcript of the Puppetmaster to confirm my memories that Katara shows no sign of concern over Hama when Sokka finds her suspicious reveals that, after Hama shows them her comb and that she's from the Southern Water Tribe, Sokka, and Sokka alone, apologizes for suspecting her of being sketchy. Nothing from Aang, even though he was part of it too. Nothing from Toph, either. And certainly nothing from Katara. Only Sokka apologizes. As usual.

So... what does this tell you? What does this tell any of us? That Katara's development is... erratic, at best. That it's not linear isn't a bad thing, but that it contradicts itself non-stop, that her core traits come and go willy-nilly as the plot demands it, that her motivations to do things (like forgiving Zuko) don't add up to her experiences or to any lead-up we've witnessed, is most certainly not good.

If I were to rewrite ATLA, the main characters I'd want to rewrite into making a lot more sense than they do, and making their arcs actually logical, are Zuko and Katara. I'd definitely add a few rewrites for Iroh, particularly to make him WAY more accountable for shit than he ever was, and to show he's not universally loved and shouldn't be, since people would have very reasonable grievances with him. I'd also rewrite a handful of things with Aang, too. Toph, full-stop, deserves a growth arc of her own beyond getting stronger and getting used to having friends. Girl has the range. They just never let her explore it. And of course, I'd change a fair few elements of Azula's writing as well. But I feel like no characters would warrant a deeper intervention than Zuko and Katara, precisely because they constantly fail to live up to all the stuff people keep pretending they're flawless exhibits of.

And this is one more issue we've got going on with Katara:

The fandom ABSOLUTELY has been unfair to Katara. A lot of people hate her for no reason. A lot of people who potentially have unexamined racism making their hearts' choices for them and they despise her just because she dared not have fully-white skin. A lot of people pick completely ridiculous things to get angry at her, such as people who HATE HER because she's "rude to Zuko". Just, fuck off. That's about the stupidest reason to hate this character and stupid reasons for that have been heard plenty.

But Katara's fans have become... reactionary. They appear think that any criticism to her character NEEDS to be fought off with "she was right tho" or "she has every reason to act this way" or "she's HUMAN she's allowed to make mistakes you heathen!! That's what a flawed character is like!"

Here's the kicker, though: if you have justifications and excuses for every little unpleasant thing Katara EVER does? You're basically taking a dump on her character yourself and saying she IS flawless.

Flaws in characters are bad things that cannot be justified. They can be funny! They can be annoying. They can be infuriating. But they're things that inconvenience other characters, that hurt them, that show they're not above or beyond doing harmful things! All of what I listed in this crazy long post are Katara's flaws. The reason why I don't like the way these flaws were handled are all the things I already have talked about: no accountability for flaws is basically saying that these flaws don't matter. No follow-up, no lead-up, means Katara is allowed to be as much of an ass as she wants to be and nobody cares: THIS IS NOT FAIR. This is not how ANY character should be written. This is the core reason why I've spent years feuding with Zuko and Iroh: they get away with shit they should NOT get away with, EVER. They're not held accountable for so much they should be. This happens to Katara too. particularly in her dynamcis with her brother. And when people see those flaws and just start listing reasons why it's actually okay? All you're doing is dehumanizing these characters to pretend everything they EVER do is fine.

Also worth noting... character flaws are the way characters grow. If a character is DEEPLY flawed, you know what kind of work you have cut out for you as a writer. If you're writing a story heavily steeped on character development? Then those flaws are VITAL to the work you have to do in order to develop these characters!

But when Zuko is unnecessarily violent and you're told "it's because his culture and family are!", you rightfully assume that as he drifts away from Fire Nation ideology, Zuko WILL grow less violent. Then, you watch how he picks an unnecessary fight with Aang in the finale because everyone's being lazy, an EXTREMELY violent fight at that, and you contrast his earlier behavior with it and... where's the difference, exactly? How did he grow or learn better if violence is STILL his immediate reaction to anything he doesn't like?

Thus, when Katara's flaws get overlooked, ignored, disregarded? What kind of development does Katara get, if none of her flaws are addressed in a way that makes it look like she's genuinely learned any lessons? At least, none of the worst, biggest, glaring flaws were addressed. None of the things that she SHOULD be troubled by and that she shouldn't be happy with herself over, especially after seeing how she hurts people with her actions. This isn't cool. This isn't a fun way to write a character. And it's so glaringly unpleasant when you can so very easily contrast this with the well-known terrible flaw Sokka displays early on: sexism! And then he gets his ass kicked by Suki and he learns to respect the Kyoshi Warriors... and we never see him displaying that particular flaw again. THAT is what growth looks like! What can we point to with Katara that remotely compares to this? That she accepted Zuko? Yeah, no, that sincerely could not count any less. Her personal arc CANNOT be about Zuko. That she got over her mom's death? She didn't. So that's not it either. That she helped Aang save the world? So her personal arc was about Aang and not herself? Was her whole role in the story to play Aang's cheerleader, then? Because if that's it... she was doing that just fine at it since day one. She's the only person who faithfully believed the Avatar would return well before Aang turned up in her life, if the first episode's introduction is to be believed.

So... what, exactly, was Katara's arc? If it's just her waterbending skills, then she's as stunted as Toph, unexplored and underdeveloped and left to just strengthen her fighting skills while Aang and Zuko and Sokka are getting full character arcs, even if very lowkey but very much effective in Sokka's case, where they develop and grow (or they should) into the men they're supposed to be to end the war! Why don't Katara and Toph get similar arcs? Why aren't they challenged on a level that actually provides them with lasting, solid, provable growth, where you can look at them where they started out and see how they ended up and conclude their journey was beautiful?

I insist... writing. Weak writing. Failures to understand/develop characters properly. And of course, lack of accountability in storytelling. I wrote that one focusing mostly on Zuko... but it's very much applicable to every character who fails to own up to the things they should and deserve to face consequences for.

Anyway... this is what I'd say about Katara atm. I'm not 100% sure this is everything because I might have overlooked some stuff that also made Katara's character kind of backfire (while I'm no Kataang hater, I 100% agree that the ship should have been written better too, and after writing them whenever I have, it's honestly kind of ridiculous how such an easy ship could get fucked over so badly by weird writing choices...). Whether you agree with these assessments or not, ultimately, there are valid reasons to feel offput by Katara and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Most of all when you DID appreciate and cherish the character once before, but her fans just jump to the conclusion that you must be a mindless hater to think she's anything but flawless (this, while claiming they love that she's flawed, then they proceed to reveal they have no idea what a flaw is...).

(final note: SORRY IT TOOK ME FOREVER TO ANSWER! Super lengthy answer to make up for it, I hope :((( sorry)

[indiacater]

Wow. You had a lot to unpack, and I love it. I agree with everything you stated. I really don't understand why they didn't build on the lore they had established. Especially with the whole Sun King Iriv, who journeyed to the forbidden west and was never heard from again. That could have been an interesting quest.

The game promos hyped up Regalla and the rebel tenakth being the main antagonist focus in the game but they were barely in the game and served to be a misdirected filler with no real payout in the end. Regalia dies no matter if you choose to spare her, but at least she dies more honorably.

I liked Zo, I just didn't like how her character starts out already with Varl and no explanation of the timeline of how they met and decided to be together. I could accept that they first met when Varl went looking for Aloy in the prologue, or Aloy met her first and asked her to go be a distraction for Varl as she went to the proving lab. Also, she seems more fit to be with Erend than Varl. Then, ending her story in the game being pregnant, these type of arcs usually have them dying after birth. Others would have her being even less of a prominent character.

I agree with the choices that were made in HZD not being carried over in HFW. I hope that the developers recognize that in the next game. Another thing is those emotional choices I can't stand that they have only three instances of you have Aloy make emotional dialogue choice. In HFW, they do it a few more times, but it really doesn't affect anything.

Now on Elisabet and Aloy relationships. With Elisabet, we only have Tilda's account of events. We even hear Tilda say that she wanted more, but Elisabet didn't. And while that could have been her depression, her losing her mother, but it does tell us that their relationship wasn't healthy. Now for Aloy being able to open up and have intimate feelings for another person was great but it was a bad direction to go for a lot of reasons. One being that this was done in a dlc. Two it was with a new character that we are kinda forced to be with. Three it literally comes out of nowhere. After the second or third main quest of the dlc Aloy suddenly has feelings. The queer fandom of the franchise became very aggressive and argumentative because of this and it ruined anyone getting to enjoy an emotional growth in Aloy's character. The world of horizon doesn't have sexuality. I still hope that we'll get to have romantic options for Aloy in the next game, but if not at least make Seyka better, because I still would never make her a romantic choice.

The Zeniths were a choice. Entitled billionaires who fled a dying earth, built a colony, achieved immortality with biomedical supplements and cybernetics. Then just because they weren't satisfied the digitized themselves into an ai entity and let it fester. Come back to earth to steal a copy of Gaia, to recreate a new earth, which served no purpose because they weren't going to establish a civilization they where just going to do nothing except horde themselves in immortality and luxury. Then having that cliche of a zenith escaping as the main story of the dlc, was ridiculous. They should have used Vast silver, another separate AI. It was ridiculous that it was laughable.

I really don't know what to make of Beta. Another clone was expected, but her character being so isolated and kept merely as a tool. Now if her character was more like the Zeniths then there would be more to work with. One obvious theory is that Tilda had something that had Elisabet's DNA on it, other is that they had access to the lighthouse keeper protocol through Hank Shaw before he was discovered and kicked out.

Ted Faro, like you, I wish they kept him in hzd, but it did make sense to further his lore to see how it ended. That whole quest made me feel uneasy. From the voice recordings of Kanya, seeing that statue of him, seeing the Ceo dressed liked him, the chair in the medical bay. Hearing Ted's recordings. Seeing that mass for the first time and realized what it was. Going forward there won't be much said about him. So there is some comfort in that.

The tribes were good. Yet there was a political element in each tribe we came across. For the Oseram it was Ulvund trying to gain concessions while abusing any authority he had. Opening a mine that was shut down due to being dangerous and causing the duant to be overrun with bristlebacks thus causing the work stoppage.

With the Utaru, an elderly member ordered her apprentice to murder a joining member of the chorus, because she didn't like her ideas and didn't want things to change.

For the Tenakth there's both Hekarro and Regalla, but there's also Yarra and Drakka. Yarra only cares about being in charge that she kills anyone who challenges her authority. She becomes so paranoid that she's ready to blame everyone else and keep the low water supply a secret. Drakka, while also self serving, is more opened to finding new solutions that pleases everyone.

With the Quen it's more with the split colony that got separated and diverted to Los Angeles. They no longer live in rule under their empire and should have access to focuses.

I was upset about what they did with Talanah and her whole arc with finding Amadis. It's so infuriating that I am not going to talk further about it.

And that is my pov so far.

Well I finished Horizon Forbidden West (dlc included) today. The quality of life improvements were very good, I have absolutely abused the bottomless storage space. Not sure how I feel about the story though. I have... issues with it.

[kiisaes]

seeing the "bakugou literally hates deku and will always hate deku, also he can never be forgiven from what he did in season 1" argument in the year 2021 and in the context of literally everything that has happened within the series is the funniest thing ever

"bakugou will always hate deku" when bakugou canonically

sees deku as a worthy rival (on the same level as/possibly higher than todoroki) and since UA, has never particularly considered deku to be weak

has been watching deku since the very beginning. he also pays very close attention to deku's moves when they fight

is the first student outside of deku to know about one for all and promised not to tell anyone about the secret, when he easily could if he really hated deku that much

actively helps deku with his training and figuring out more about the OFA holders

is capable of holding a normal conversation with deku now and is considerably more understanding, even after their awful history

has only genuinely broken down emotionally in front of deku, and has only been moderately comfortable with deku (and all might) seeing him as weak. as far as I'm aware, no other student has seen him cry before

is willing to die for deku. he is willing to lose everything - his quirk, his privileged life, his future - for deku

cares about deku and wants to keep him safe/alive because "something about him makes [bakugou] want to keep him at arm's length" (284)

doesn't seem to mind at all when deku, someone he supposedly "hates", calls him kacchan, an endearing, innocent childhood nickname even though they are both 16 and training to be mf heroes

loves deku platonically thanks to all the recent chapters, even if his own dumbass brain hasn't caught up to that yet. argue with the wall lmao

"bakugou can never be forgiven from what he did in season 1" when bakugou canonically

addressed that the shit he did to deku was terrible. he's taking full accountability for his past actions, which is something lots of kids his age IN REAL LIFE can't do yet. if you're gonna judge a fictional character by irl morals and ethics, at least be aware that plenty of bratty irl 16 year olds don't take the full blame when they fuck up because they're under the mindset that they're young and can afford to make big mistakes.

is actively trying to atone, and has probably been trying to do that since as early as deku vs kacchan part 2, which is fully animated in s3 and has been out for years now

doesn't want to take the easy way out of his wrongdoings (aka just asking for forgiveness and moving on). he told all might that he wants to atone, not deku. he wants to prove to deku that he's changing without deku automatically forgiving him

"bakugou literally told deku to k*ll himself"

yeah, when he was 14. lol. I know that doesn't excuse something as extreme as a death threat but have you MET middle schoolers? I've had my fair share of shitty bully experiences throughout my adolescence and now that I'm older, I recognize that they were young themselves and have probably been going through their own troubles. still doesn't excuse it, but just take his fucking age and his background into account. he's also trying to atone for that shit so what else do u fucking need from this 16 year old trauma magnet lmfao

in CHAPTER/EPISODE 1 OF THE WHOLE SERIES??? dawg that was YEARS ago. we are completely past that, keep up!

it's heavily implied that this comment was super out of nowhere, and nothing like what bakugou usually says to deku. his friends said that was really out of line. bakugou was probably also aware of how harsh it was. it's further shown in the small heroes rising promo manga, "deku and bakugou rising" (I think that's the name), that bakugou typically ignored deku and let him do his own thing, with only a couple mild verbal jabs here and there (the insults aren't even special to bakugou - deku was quirkless, meaning that he was getting teased by literally everyone in the messed up quirk society)

deku didn't take this comment to heart and canonically cared more about BAKUGOU'S reputation after saying something so insensitive. he never once thought about actually "taking a swan dive". he may have low self esteem but he's not THAT swayed by outside opinion. in fact, he's really fucking stubborn and nobody has phased him from his hero dream except all might, his literal childhood idol, in the second chapter/episode. and even that lasted for like 5 minutes lol

people are allowed to grow and change into better people, janica. that's called character development. it's called growth in the real world.

like shit dude you don't have to romantically ship bakudeku - hell you don't even have to like them as a duo - but at least acknowledge that horikoshi is putting bakugou through a real character arc. I promise you, the current bakugou/deku dynamic is much more appealing than your season 1 echo chamber. we've moved on from the "bakugou and deku can never be on good terms" boat. we passed that ages ago LMAO

[bicheetopuff]

Battle Trial Arc Dissection

Deku vs Kacchan Pt. 1

This one is gonna be a little different. I know my other posts are separated by individual characters but I think it’d be stupid to analyze this fight in separate posts (by character at least). Because of that though, I’m gonna switch between their perspectives a lot so, buckle up.

Before we start, let’s look at our boys costumes:

Katsuki looks sick as fuck. His costume is meant to stand out and be practical. He made sure his costume was perfect from the start in looks and usefulness (a reflection of his personality). He considered his quirk from the beginning and as a result, never had to make drastic mods to his costume (aside from his winter costume of course). I’d also like to appreciate the originality. (Also I’d like to point out how Katsuki mentioned dynamite on his form despite drawing a grenade based costume… foreshadowing)

On the opposite end, we have probably the ugliest fit I’ve ever had the displeasure to lay my eyes on. It’s not that bad in black and white but in color… good lord. It’s impractical and not pretty. However, there’s sentiment behind it and leaves obvious room for growth. It was designed to take after All Mights appearance and it was tailored by his mother. He didn’t consider it’s practicality because he still doesn’t know how his quirk works and doesn’t have techniques that he’d need gear for yet. He’s wearing it because of the meaning and not because of the looks.

Their costumes are reflections of how they see themselves and they’re being presented to appear as opposites of one another down to their costume designs.

Contents:

I: The Misunderstood, Misunderstands

II: Izuku Doing His Best Again

I: The Misunderstood, Misunderstands

So this quarrel starts out with battle training and it’s team A: Heroes: Izuku and Ochako vs team D: Villains: Katsuki and Tenya. Right off the bat, they made the Indoor Anti-Personnel Battle Training… personal. Iida even asks Katsuki to refrain from targeting Izuku.

This is our first telling evidence that Katsuki has misunderstood Izuku at some point. If he knows and accurately understands Izuku, why would he think he’s ‘punking’ him? That doesn’t sound like him at all. Why not consider any other explanation first? We’ve been shown already that Katsuki is smart which further proves that Katsuki simply loses all reasoning when it comes to Izuku.

Meanwhile…

We get nothing but praise on Izukus end. He’s putting himself down and putting Katsuki on a pedestal. We get a semi official indirect declaration of rivalry. He sees Katuski as a goal instead of an obstacle whereas Katsuki sees the opposite.

II: Izuku Doing his Best Again

Izuku can’t use OFA in this training exercise because he has no grip on it. Using it would mean incapacitating himself and putting everyone in the building in danger so he depends on his natural strength to hopefully get himself through this. After a predictable sneak attack from Katsuki, his natural strength and knowledge of Katsukis fighting style works in his favor for a bit and lands a few hits. Katsuki realizes, and is surprised, that Izuku was able to read his moves and predict his attack. He’s told why directly after.

Quotes I find semi-important to bring up and talk about:

I’ve analyzed heroes I think are awesome: this isn’t that important but Izuku basically just admitted to having at least a few pages dedicated to Katsuki in his notebook…i know what you are

I’m not gonna be your worthless punching bag Deku forever… I’m the Deku who always does his best!!: he’s already proved this when he stood up to Katsuki a few chapters ago. But he’s saying clear and direct this time which proves the change even further and sets it in stone for good. Further development of his confidence.

…It just screams “do your best!!”: this is Ochako realizing how much her words meant to Izuku. She unintentionally changed the way Izuku sees himself.

You spout that crap… all while scared out of your mind: he thinks of the time they were kids. I think he’s telling Izuku that although his perspective of himself changed, he still sees Izuku as the scared little kid he used to be while also recognizing his new strength and the contradiction of the two thoughts is pissing him off. He’s refusing to see Izuku as anything else but a scared little kid but is upset that Izuku is attempting to see himself as something different.

What could he be thinking?: Iida, we have no clue… well, we do. It’s just that Katsuki is a difficult character to read and understand. He’s using this opportunity to make sure his ego is still intact after seeing Izukus new power and he doesn’t know how to express anything unless it’s masked with anger.

DvK

Next>>

Dissection Series

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[eugene-not-flynn]

Reframing Cassandra

So maybe this is a nonsense idea, but I’ve been thinking about it the past couple of days re: Cassandra. Specifically... what could have happened if Cassandra had been assigned as Rapunzel’s personal guard, rather than her lady in waiting.

Some thoughts and wonderings below the cut. Warning for negativity in terms of how Cassandra’s canon arc unfolded over the course of the series. Disclaimer that these are just my personal thoughts, and should in no way make anyone feel bad for disagreeing. This read on the changes is also in-keeping with canon ships. 

Without further ado... 

I think it had the potential to change a great deal about what I, personally, didn’t really like about Cassandra’s canon arc and development. 

Cassandra as an Individual

This is strictly a personal opinion... but I just don’t find the “she always felt like she was chosen second to Rapunzel” as a particularly meaningful or powerful narrative choice for her. I think it... functionally paints Rapunzel has a naive victim of Cassandra’s ambition, which I don’t think is fair to either female character.

I don’t mind the notion that Cassandra feels like she has something to prove. But I feel like pitting that sense against the Lost Princess of Corona is a disservice to both. I’d rather see it stand in contrast to the other guards. 

I think it would be a stronger framework for that subplot of her character arc to be that she feels like a second-rate guard because she’s been assigned to protect one person rather than be an actual guard/given a leadership role. (Of course, this is no actually small task, and I think Cass would come to understand that with time).

I think also that it would feed into her overarching plot and role and relationship to other characters, which I’ll more about in a sec. 

Cassandra and Eugene Tension

For the most part, I didn’t have a problem with that Cass and Eugene argued/bickered a lot. (I do wish there was more moments that counterbalanced it, but I digress)

But I didn’t quite understand where the animosity was coming from, and I kind of wish it had been explored more. 

And I think that if Cass had been Rapunzel’s personal guard assigned by the king, then Cass’s distrust of Eugene (and Eugene’s corresponding frustration with her distrust of him) would make sense and also provide room for interesting growth between them. 

Because now Cassandra’s literal job is protect the princess, and what evidence is there that Eugene isn’t just playing some kind of long game? 

Meanwhile Eugene feels like time and time again he tries to prove how much he has changed, and everyone seems willing to believe him but Cass? And can he really blame her? Or fault her? 

I just think it would also have that much more impact to hear Cassandra tell Rapunzel in season 2 that there’s no way Eugene would betray her like that (when Cass harbored that distrust of him for so long), or that moment in Season 1 when Cass gets knocked down and Eugene goes charging in to the fray to help her). 

Cassandra and Rapunzel Tension, Fall Out, and Reconciliation

So Cassandra has plenty of moments already in canon where she tries to protect Rapunzel because she’s her friend. But I think coloring those moment by a sense of obligation rather than just friendship could help develop the growing resentment towards Rapunzel that Cass starts to feel, especially pressing into Season 3. 

You also get the added dynamic of them both often being at fault for miscommunications and the disintegration of the relationship because Rapunzel almost certainly has issues with accepting “protection” because a lot of her childhood trauma is wrapped up in a neat little bow with the label “its to keep you safe”. So she doesn’t always want Cassandra to protect her, and she can take care of herself.

Meanwhile, Cassandra didn’t ask to be Rapunzel’s guard, and she doesn’t listen very well, so when Rapunzel does stupid stuff and is reckless, that puts Cassandra at a certain level of risk as well. (She also might see Rapunzel’s recklessness as a slap in the face in the sense of reading it as “I don’t need you”, even though Rapunzel is the one person that she’s supposed to protect?)

And I think directing that anger and resentment towards Rapunzel makes more sense--at least to me--if it’s not about other people and their reaction to the two of them. Because one thing that always bugged me about her canon arc is that while some of her anger towards Rapunzel is justified... I think a lot of it just... isn’t. 

I just think there could be an interesting story to tell where Cass feels like she’s always trying to protect others (specifically Rapunzel) and nobody is trying to protect her. So Cassandra eventually starts seeking power as a means of self-protection. 

I think Zhan Tiri can still play the roll she does in Cassandra’s betrayal in the sense of telling Cass what she most wants to hear as a means of manipulation. But I think fear is a powerful tool in that respect, and turning Cass’s main motive as a villain to be one of fear (like Varian’s is grief to an extent) makes her a more sympathetic villain than her canon arc. 

I think also that such a turn makes it easier/more believable, in my opinion, for Rapunzel to hold on to that hope that Cassandra is still a good person. Because Rapunzel would understand what it’s like to be afraid and to feel like you need protection, and if she can recognize that Cass is scared--and that’s what’s motivating her through her villain arc--then I could understand why Rapunzel refuses to turn her back on her. 

I also think that makes for a stronger reconciliation moment for them, and even if Rapunzel still uses her power to bring Cass back, I think the idea of “Rapunzel now chooses to actively protect the life of someone who did that so often for her and felt it was never reciprocated in full” a more powerful end to their friendship arc. 

[derekfoxwit]

Doctor Dorpden’s Critical Tips of Prestige

Note: This post was made with satirical intentions in mind. I’m only emphasizing because I’ve had a couple of comments on previous joke posts I’ve did take it seriously. With that said, here we go.

Tip 1: For starters, remember that when looking at the work, if the Mystic Knee twitches fast enough to punch a hole in a wall, this suggests that the work should be near the lowest of the low. No further development of opinion is needed.

Tip 2: For an equal degree of sophistication, give the warm comfort of nostalgia at least 5 times more chances than the new thing that MAY seem actually poggers.

Tip 3: If you have the anecdote of encountering shitty fans, then use them as a scapegoat for the show they flaunt over being shitty. Clearly, they’re always making the show the way it is.

Tip 4: If you haven’t heard much about a newer film or show you’re yet to watch, there’s an 85% chance that film or show is actually not worth your time. The Father (2020) isn’t as widespread as Joker (2019) for a reason.

Tip 5: At this point, just go for the Asian Artist Dick. I’m actually in the mood to see merit in that because I want to look edgy against cute doodles. Stop attacking Uzaki-Chan, you cowards!

Tip 6: Avoid the electronic tunes. They’ll make you smell like a bum, for there’s no structural in a music album that’s nothing but wubs.

Tip 7: If you see a Tweet that looks dumb, use it as a means of generalizing all the fans of a work as sharing that same opinion.

Tip 8: If the cartoon I’m given doesn’t provide me with mature ideas such as slicing an Arbok in half or fake boobs, then the cartoon might as well be on the same level as Teletubbies.

Tip 9: You know the music is (c)rap when it brings up drugs, regardless of lyrical context.

Tip 10:  Raw mood is the indicator of quality cartooning. If you’re quick to assume the worst in the newest HBO Max original cartoon, then you got thyself a stinker. Same thing if you were super bummed out when watching a new thing, regardless of anecdotal context.

Tip 11:  When you’re not given continuous throwbacks, ensure you’re as reductive and over-generalizing about the works shown as possible.

Tip 12:  If your hazy and imperfect as hell recollection of a children’s film, whether it’s Wall-E or Lilo & Stitch, would describe said film as “too sugary” or “key-waving schlock”, then that HAS to be the case. No meat on that bone whatsoever.

Tip 13: Simpler, more graphic style that isn’t as realistic as old-school Disney or Anime? You got yourself a lazy style with zero passion put into it.

UPA? Who’s THAT?!

Tip 14: Don’t trust anyone saying that western children’s cartoons had any form of artistic development after 2008 (with, like, TWO exceptions). If it did, why didn’t we go from stealing organs in a 2001 cartoon to showing opened stomachs in a 2021 cartoon?

Tip 15: Big booba is always important to the strong female character’s quality.

Tip 16:  Only MY ships count, for they provide me with a feeling of intelligence.

Tip 17: “PG-13″ and “R” rating just simply mean you’re not caring for expressing themes in a sophisticated manner. It’s just THAT simple until I dictate otherwise.

Tip 18:  In this age of smelly radicals, “Death of the Author” is more important than ever. Without it, this’ll imply that a classic like The Matrix was secretly toxic, due to what the Wachowskis have to say about it being an “allegory of trans people.”

Tip 19: Turn the fandoms you hate into your torture porn. Ask in Tweets to Retweet one sentence that’d “trigger” them. Go out of your way to paint all of them as blind consoomers. That’ll show them, and it’ll show how much more intelligent you are compared to those clowns.

Tip 20: Whatever the Mystic Knee dictates upon the first viewing of a work is what shall indicate the full structural extent of the film.

Tip 21: The mindset of a 2000s edgelord is one that actually understands the artistry of the medium of animation. Listen to that crazy but ingenious man.

Tip 22: Because sheer ambition makes me feel manly, the high pedestal you bestow upon a cartoon work should be based mostly on the mere mention or mere suggestion of serious topics. This means that pure comedy is smelly.

Tip 23: Is the new work tackling subjects that you’ve loved a childhood work of yours for covering? Just assume it’s super bare-bones in that case compared to the older case, for there’s nothing the older work can do to truly prove itself otherwise. Seriously, Letterboxd. Stop giving any 2010s cartoon anything above a 4/5

Tip 24: If the Mystic Knee is suggesting that the work is crummy, then consider any explanation off the top of your head for why the work in question is crummy.

Tip 25: Sexual and gender identity is inherently political, so don’t focus on them in the story. It’s no wonder why Full Metal Alchemist has caught on more than the She-Ra reboot.

Tip 26: Since I got bothered by a random butt monkey type character in a crummy cartoon, I’m now obligated to assume that having a butt monkey will only harm the writing integrity of the cartoon.

Seriously, Mr. Enter....what?!

Tip 27: We’re at a point where pure comedy for a kids’ cartoon is doing nothing but dumbing down the children. Like seriously...... I doubt Billy and Mandy would ever use farts as a punchline, unlike these newer kids comedies.

Tip 28: The difference between the innuendo in kids’ cartoons I grew up on and the ones Zootopia made is the sense of prestige they give me. Just take notes from the former instead.

Tip 29: Wanna make a work of artistic merit? Just take notes from the stuff I whore out to. It’s just THAT simple until I dictate otherwise.

Tip 30: Always remember this golden rule: If the newer work, or a work you’ve recently experienced the first time, was truly great, why isn’t it providing the exact emotions from your younger, more impressionable years?

Tip 31: If the Mystic Knee aims to break the bones of a character doing certain things (.i.e. having body count of thousands; lashing out to character; etc.), that means the character is bad and deserves no redemption.

Tip 32: If you want me to believe there’s any intrigue or depth in your antagonist, give them redemption, for I am in need of that sorta thing being spelled out. Looking at you, Syndrome. Should’ve taken notes from Tai Lung.

Tip 33: In a case where you’re going “X > Y” (.i.e. manga compared to western comics), ALWAYS CHERRY PICK! Use the recent controversies of the “Y” item while pretending that the “X” item has never had anything of the sort.

Tip 34: BEFORE you bring up those comments that shat on the original Teen Titans cartoon back when it was new, whether for making Starfire “more PC” or whatever.......the DIFFERENCE between them and me is that THEY were just bad faith fools that couldn’t see true majesty out of blind rage. I, however, am truly certain that calling any western TV cartoon from 2014-onward a work that transcends its generation suggests a destruction of the medium.

Tip 35: Based on fandom growth, it shows that any newer show isn’t being watched much by kids, but rather loser adults that act like children. Therefore, there’s more prestige in what I grew with.

Tip 36: The focus on children is bad at this point since the children of today have attention spans that flies would have.

Tip 37: A select few screenshots (or even one) of either a less elaborate attacking animation, less realistic game graphics, or a less on-model image in a cartoon indicates EVERYTHING about the work’s quality.

Tip 38: Consuming or writing media where characters go through constant suffering is little more than gaining pleasure out of it. YOU SICKOS!

Looking at you, Lily Orchard!

Tip 39: Whether it’s a sexual awakening story or just simply a romance, focus on a character being lesbian, trans, bi, etc., then it shouldn’t be in a kids’ work. It’s too spicy for them by default. Kids don’t want romance anyway.

Tip 40: The very idea of a western cartoon with no full-blown antagonist (i.e. Inside Out) is a destruction of animated artistry. Sorry, but it’s just THAT simple until I dictate otherwise.

Tip 41: Unless it’s my fluffy pillow, such as Disney’s Robin Hood, it should be obligated to assume the inserting of anthros is only there to pleasure the furries. Looking at YOU, Zootopia!

Tip 42: With how rough and rash The Beast was, it shows that he was more of an abusive lover. Therefore, I refuse to believe that Beauty and the Beast has any of the meticulous moral writing that most of Disney’s other 90s films has.

Tip 43: When you suggest one work should’ve “taken notes” from another work in order to do better, BE VAGUE! Those who agree will be shown to be geniuses.

Tip 44: Remember how morally grey Invader Zim was? That really goes to show how little the Western Animation scene has been trying since that show. Really should just be taking notes from that series (and of course anime).

Tip 45: Even if I have a radar that clearly indicates such, hiding the item I look for inside an enemy is always bad, for I refuse to believe it would be inside the enemy.

Goddamn it, Arin!

Tip 46: People struggle understanding your gender identity or pronouns? All there is to see in that is a giant cloud of egotism that reads “My problems” zapping another smaller cloud that reads “other people’s problems”. Seriously, kids are starving, so WHAT if you identity confused someone. Grow a spine!

Tip 47: Stop pretending that adaptations should colorize how a story or comic series should be defined. No way in FUCK can a cartoon or film incarnation become the definitive portrayal of my precious superhero idol.

Tip 48: Enough with your precious “limited animation” techniques, YOU WESTERN HACKS! All you’re doing is admitting to sheer laziness and lacking artistic integrity. Now if you excuse me, I’ll be watching more anime, since that gives me a sense of prestige.

Tip 49: If getting five times more detail than the 2D animated visuals have requires someone getting hurt, so be it. No pain, no gain after all.

Tip 50: Yes, I genuinely struggle to believe there’s this majestic level of layered material without having the most immediate yet still vague re-assurance practically yelling in my face. But that’s STILL the work’s fault, not mine.

Tip 51: Every Klasky-Csupo cartoon has more artistic integrity than any of them cartoons with gay lovers such as Kipo or the Netflix She-Ra show.

Tip 52:  If Sergio Pablos’ Klaus is anything to go by, we have no excuse to utilize those smelly as fuck digital animation “styles” found on Stinky Universe, Suck-Ra or Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turds.

Tip 53: Stop projecting your orientation onto works of actual talent. Seriously, how does Elton John’s I’m Still Standing expel ANY rainbow flag energy?

Tip 54: Hip hop and electronica have been the destruction of music, especially the kind that’s actually organic and not farting on the buttons of a beeping or drumming gadget.

Tip 55: The audience for cartoons has become significantly less clear over the years. We should just go back to Saturday mornings of being sold toys or shit kids actually want.

Tip 56: PSAs for kids shouldn’t be about ‘woke’ content. They should be actual problems such as doing drugs; not playing with knifes / outlets / matches; or acceptance.

Tip 57: The instant you realize a detail in a childhood work that’s better understood as an adult, you’re forced to paint that work as the most transcendent thing in the world. It’s just THAT simple until I dictate otherwise.

Tip 58: Before you lash out on ALL rich people, remember this: #Not All Rich People.

Tip 59: There’s nothing to gain out of the (c)rap scene other than becoming a spiteful, gun-wielding thug that sniffs weed for breakfast.

Tip 60: Since the Mystic Knee told me to get anal about prom episodes in several gay cartoons, this shows that writing about one’s younger experiences just makes you look pathetic.

Tip 61: Another smelly thing about Zootopia is how it was painting a police chief as stern and exclusive. #Not All Chiefs

Tip 62: Me catching a glimpse of Grave of the Fireflies as a kid and turning out fine shows that you may as well show kids more adult works without worry. No amount of psychological questions being asked will suggest otherwise.

Tip 63: There’s a reason why the Mystic Knee keeps leaning more toward the 90s and early 2000s than most decades. That knee KNOWS where there’s a sense of true refinement.

Tip 64: The BIG difference between rock and electronica? Steward Copeland actually DRUMS. All that the likes of Burial, Boards of Canada, Depeche Mode and several others did was push drum buttons.

Tip 65: One exception to the golden nostalgia is when the work in question doesn’t stuff your face with fantastical, bombastic stories. At which point, there can only be rose-colored blinds covering Nickelodeon’s Doug. Nothing of merit or personal resonance to be found.

Tip 66: Remember that the sense of nuance in the work comes down to there being everything including the kitchen sink, whether it involves multiple geographic landscapes; giving us hundreds of characters; etc. Only through the extremes will I be able to tell there is nuance.

Tip 67: Once you see a joke that has an involvement with sexual or violent content, just ignore the full picture and just reduce it to having nothing to it but “sex, violence, gimme claps.”

PKRussel has entered the chat

Tip 68: With all the SJWs messing up the art of comedy, lament the times where you could be called a comic genius, NOT a monster, for shouting out the word “STAB,” calling a gay weird, painting Middle Easterns as inherently violent, etc.

Tip 69: Guitar twang will always win out over (c)rap beats. There’s a reason your grandma is more likely to listen to Lynyrd Skynyrd than Kendrick Lamar.

Tip 70: Once the Mystic Knee notices a lack of squealing at the video game with linearity, that shows there’s more artistry in going full-blown open world.

Tip 71: Related to Tips 66 and 68, ensure your comedy gets as much information and mileage out of each individual skit as possible. EMPHASIZE if you need to. Continuously spout out your quirky phrase of “STAB” if needed.

Tip 72: Based on the onslaught of TV shows with many seasons and episodes, animated or otherwise, it shows that there’s more worth going for that than simply having a miniseries or a 26-episode anime.

Tip 73: Building off of the previous tip, you’re better off squeezing and exhausting every little detail and notable characterization rather than keeping anything simple and possibly leaving a stone unturned, especially if there’s supposed to be a story. 

Tip 74: Playing through the fan translation of Mother 3 made me realize how much some newer kids’ works just try too hard to get serious. Why even make the kids potentially think about the death of a family member?

Tip 75: The fear I had over Sid’s toys from the first Toy Story and similar anecdotal emotions are the be-all indicators of what kind of show or film is fitting for the children.

Tip 76:  Seeing this British rapper chick have a song titled “Point and Kill” just further exemplifies the fears I’ve had about rappers being some of the most harmful folks ever.

Tip 77: The problem with attempting to make a more “relatable” She-Ra is that kids aren’t looking for relatability. They want the escapism of buff fighters or something similar. This is why slice-of-life is so smelly.

Tip 78: Based on seeing the rating of “PG-13″ or “R,” I can tell that the dark humor is little more than “hur dur sex and guns.” Given the “TV-Y7 FV” rating of Invader Zim, the writers should’ve taken notes from that instead just so I can sense actual prestige.

Tip 79: The original He-Man has more visual intrigue in its animation than any of those smelly glorified doodles found in the “styles" of the 2010s and early 2020s.

Tip 80: It’s always the fault of the game that my first guess (that I refuse to divert from) on how I have to go through an obstacle won’t work.

Tip 81: Zootopia discussing prejudice ruins the majestic escapism I got from my precious childhood films from 1991-2004. Them kids might as well be watching the news. Now to watch some Hunchback after I finish these tips.

Tip 82: There is no such thing as an unreasonable expectation, and there’s especially no wrong way to address the lack of met expectations! For example, if you expect some early 2010s cartoon on the Disney Channel to be a Kids X-Files, yet you get moments such as some girl getting high on stick dipping candy, you got the right to paint the worst out of that show for not being “Kids’ X-Files.”

Tip 83: Related to my example for Tip 82, if you get the slightest impression of something being childish, you know you got yourself a children’s work that does little than wave keys and has basically nothing substantial for them. In this situation, those malfunctioning robots found in Wall-E are the guilty party.

Tip 84: Without the extensive dialogue that I’m used to getting, how can one say for certain there was any amount of characterization in the title character of Wall-E?

Tip 85: Ever noticed yourself gradually being less likely to expect an upcoming work or view a work you’re just consuming as “the next best thing”? That’s ALWAYS the fault of smelly “artists” (hacks really) and their refusal to give a shit.

Tip 86:  It’s obligatory for your lead to be explicitly heroic just so there is this immediate re-assurance that they’re a good one.

Tip 87: Without the comforting safety net of throwbacks, one cannot be for certain that there has been an actual evolution of a series or the art of animation and video games.

Tip 88: Don’t PSA kids on stuff they give zero fucks about. That means no gender identities or pronouns, race, etc.

Tip 89: Don’t listen to Mamoru Hosoda saying that anime women tend to be “depicted through a lens” of sexual desire. He’s just distracting from the superior prestige found in anime women.

Tip 90:  If you’re desperate to let others know that your talking points are reasonable, just repeat them over and over with little expansion on said talking points.

Tip 91: 7 or more seasons of art is better than 26 episodes of art.  EVERY TIME!

Tip 92: Always remember to continuously talk up the innuendo and mature subject matter of the childhood work as the most prestigious, transcendent thing of all time. With that in mind, there’s a high chance that your favorite childhood work will be better known than Perfect Blue (1997), and there’s likely a reason for that.

Tip 93: An art style that gives many characters relatively more realistic arm muscle details will always shine through more than any sort of art style done for “simplicity” (laziness, really).

Tip 94:  Seeing a few (like, even VERY FEW) people show more enthusiasm for Steven Universe over Invader Zim really shows the lower bar that has been expected out of the western animation scene compared to anime.

Tip 95: Electronic music makes less conventional time signatures cheap as hell. REAL music like rock makes them the exact opposite.

Tip 96: If your Mystic Knee suggests that the 90s cartoon being viewed doesn’t showcase a vague sense of refinement or artistic integrity, then every related assumption of yours is right. EVERY TIME!

Tip 97: Doing everything and the kitchen sink for one series or movie shows a better sense of refinement and prestige than any form of simplicity. THIS includes character design as well.

Tip 98: The advent of that Star Wars: Visions anime really shows just how stinky western cartoons have become.

Tip 99:  For those wondering, no, Europe isn’t being counted in my definition of “western animation”. Doing so is a complete disservice to prestige.

Tip 100: If even less than half of these tips aren’t being considered, you can kiss that prestige badge goodbye. After all, I SAID SO!

[itsonlystrange]

First off, I am not sending hate to any Mileven shipper. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I will only be providing actual facts and evidence, and hopefully will be staying relatively unbiased. As always, this is a PRO-BYLER account. If you do not ship Byler you do not have to read all the way through :).

This will be a 2 part series. The first part will address MILEVEN and how they will not be endgame. The second part will address the likely hood of BYLER being endgame.

So, I’ve been sucked into the Mileven side of Instagram after liking ONE Mileven edit, which is besides the point. Recently I’ve noticed a lot of people say that “They were love at first sight!” Or that “Why would they break up now if they’ve had 3 seasons of development?!” So I’m going to go ahead and supply you all with:

MILEVEN VS BYLER.

PART ONE (MILEVEN)

To start off with the first statement, “They were love at first sight!”

May I remind you how utterly mortified Mike was when he found Eleven. As any 12 year old boy would be. He did not give her any form of “heart eyes”. He looked genuinely scared. He took her home as a courtesy, not because he was “madly in love with her!”. Obviously not everyone would take home a random 12 year old bald girl, but El being taken to the Wheelers was not meant to be seen as a romantic gesture, it was literally just a plot device for the Kids to figure out she had powers.

May I also remind you that Mike wanted to get rid of her. He stated multiple times that she was just a weapon, and a device to find Will. He only let her stay BECAUSE she knew who Will was. He was fully ready to let her go, and send her back to wherever she came from. In the end of it all, he only cared about Will and finding Will. El was simply used as a device to find him. Obviously, now, I do think Mike cares about El. But not in a romantic way, more so a “cute puppy way”. I think he loves her, but that he’s not IN LOVE with her, romantically.

The show has shown constantly how horribly they work together. El’s most confident and prideful moments were when she was AWAY from Mike. Mike’s most loyal and selfless moments was when he was AWAY from El. They do not compliment eachother like that.

Second of all, they have nothing in common. In season one when Mike was explaining his figurines to El, she looked genuinely disinterested. Now some may say that this could be because she didn’t quite understand what she liked back then, which just further proves that she shouldn’t be in a relationship! If she can’t decide if she likes a dinosaur toy or not, how is she supposed to decide if she likes Mike! And we also know that she did have the ability to differentiate between things she liked as she seemed genuinely interested in Nancy’s clothes and photos. The only thing they have in common is shared trauma! Notice how all the other couples share something:

JANCY: love for writing and adventuring

LUMAX: both are comical and enjoy the cinema and the outdoors

DUZIE: science

Along with most of the other couples. But what does Mileven have In common? Can anyone please name ONE good memory between the two when they weren’t in danger. All the “good memories” they have are from when the world was ending.

If you said “Oh, but they make out a lot!” That’s not a ‘good memory’, hell, that’s hardly memorable at at all. Hoppper, Will, and Lucas even admit that for those 6 months in between season 2 and season 3, all they did was make out. That is not love, that is infatuation. Infatuation is a strong desire for someone, mainly romantic, that focuses on the physical aspects of their relationship rather than the emotional. Love is a deep rooted feeling. You do not need to make out all the time to be in love. Love is emotional, of course it can be physical, but you need that strong feeling before any physical aspect of love can be genuine.

Mileven have nothing in common. It’s very clear that Mike is still into D&D and is a nerd. Especially as he might be in the Hellfire Club next season (a D&D club) and also because we’ve seen that D&D is going to be a big aspect of season 4, meaning he’ll most likely be infatuated with it again. It’s obvious that El needs to figure herself out first. She needs to develop into her own human being. She’s still learning. She’s into poppy colors and magazines and makeup (which is great!), but even on a more basic level, they still share nothing in common. Mike is a nerd, we have established that. And notice how in s3 (when he was with El) he felt the least like himself. He acted so out of character. He didn’t use weird Star Wars analogies or gush about the new movie coming out like previous seasons. Now of course one could say that he’s growing up, but we see that he is genuinely still a nerd as when he’s in time of crisis he goes back to those analogies. He goes back to gushing about the new toys he’s getting at Christmas, he goes back to being a nerd. It’s almost as if he’s wearing this mask, and at the end of s3 he forgets to put it on. And then El kisses him, and he realizes that he didn’t enjoy that. So we know for a fact that he is very much still into D&D and those other shenanigans atleast to an extent, considering how happy he was to hear that Will wasnt giving up the party or D&D. Shouldn’t Mike be with someone who is atleast a little similar to him? Regardless of his sexuality, shouldn’t he be with someone that allows him to be his true self? He was incredibly Cocky and arrogant in season 3, almost like he had to be a “man” for El, and in his mind, being a ‘man’ was giving up all of the things he loved, and only kissing El, almost as if she was an object he had to obtain more than an actual human. Which Max agrees with! He treats her more so of a mask he has to wear to cover his true self. Shouldn’t el be with someone who likes the same thing she does? But then again, what does el like?! Exactly! She needs to figure out who she is before she dates anyone. She didn’t even know what shirt she would like to wear!

Now I just find this silly. Development? Really? Okay let me show you their “development”

SEASON ONE: El could only speak 4 or 5 words. They had essentially zero romantic interactions besides the kiss at the end. If El and Mike never kissed (excluding the time they almost kissed in the bathroom), people would most likely only see them as a friendship. Let’s flip the tables a bit. If El was a boy and Mike and El never kissed, this would further prove that they don’t have any romantic tension. Lucas says it the best: “You only like her because she’s the only girl who isn’t grossed out by you!” Which I agree with completely. It’s more of an infatuation. Mike is infatuated with the idea of finally having a girlfriend. Because he knows something is wrong inside him and wants to ‘fix it’ by dating a girl, as if suddenly his sexuality identity issues would disappear. El doesn’t know anything about Mike, and to El, Mike is a hero. To El, Mike is fearless warrior. And Mike knows that isn’t true. But with el, it gave him the chance to start fresh. It gave him the chance to start and become a different person. He puts on his persona of being “strong” and being able to stand up for himself, yet in the end, it’s El who does the saving. The reason he ‘likes’ El so much is because she isn’t disgusted by him. But mike is afraid that if he shows his true self, El wouldn’t like him anymore, and he’d lose that mask. And without a girl to cling to, he’d finally have to confront his sexuality. Which is why we never see Mike being his true self around El. In every single season, he is this false person. He’s wearing a facade, to keep up with these lies. Because he fears that If El knew how nerdy he really was, she’d be uninterested, and he ‘can’t lose her’ because he knows that El is most likely the only girl who will never be grossed out by him. Because all the other girls in this town know who he is. That nerdy guy from the AV club. And he needs a girlfriend. He feels safe that way. Because if he doesn’t have a distraction from his sexuality then he might take an extra step on accident and accidently act on those feelings

Ep 1: making out

Ep2: breaking up

Ep 3-6: fighting

Ep 7: neutral

Ep 8 ½ : neutral

Very end of ep 8: together?

How is that romantic? So from what we know, Mileven got a kiss in season 1, a kiss in season 2, 2 make out sessions, and then they fought. HOW IS THAT A GOOD RELATIONSHIP?

90% of their relationship throughout all 3 seasons has been kissing and fighting. That’s literally it. Not once have we seen them just hanging out and talking. Not once have we seen them go on dates. And as Hopper, Lucas, and Will put: that’s all they do! The Duffer’s purposefully put that line in to show that, it’s really all they did for those 6 months. There was no emotion to that. Just kissing. That’s it. Kissing and fighting is all Mileven has been. And honestly they would have been pretty cute in season 3 if the Duffer’s hadn’t messed it up. But the duffers aren’t stupid! They did this on purpose! Because they wanted us to disagree with Mileven. They wanted us to find it obnoxious. Because they know that they don’t have chemistry! Finn and Millie are brilliant actors and could have definitely pulled that off, meaning the Duffers had to have specifically said to “not act in love”. Mileven is a summer fling, Finn said so himself. They are their true selves when they are apart, and when they are together romantically, they stunt each other’s growth. They’re way better as bestfriends. El needs to figure herself out before she can date anyone.

Thank you for reading part one! Part two will be up soon, and will follow why I believe Byler will be end game!

Heavy inspiration from @kaypeace21 & @hawkinsschoolcounselor

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Back here with another episode of:

Read Part 1 here!

If you’re on mobile, and tumblr hates this post, follow along on this google doc!

Rules/overview this rewrite in the beginning of Part 1

Alrighty then, so let’s just jump into it!  

- - - - - - - - - - 

Recap! So when we last left off, we had just finished off Act 1 of the story. We’ve used the character introduction segments and the gambit feature as a means to give more life to everyone, without sacrificing too much cutscene time. Allowing us to save and focus the major story details and set up on the more cinematic cutscenes.

I had forgotten, but after Part 1 came out, an anon pointed out that Impa’s character introduction could use some work, and while you don’t need to read it right now to understand the rest of this post, I encourage you to look at it eventually to see the strengths and flaws in the original Impa introduction, and the reasons for my rewrite changes! All you need to know is that eggbot was lying around, deactivated, but when in proximity to the Sheikah Slate, was turned on like other Guardians. Eggbot being activated by the Sheikah Slate is kinda brushed over in the original game? But in my rewrite it’s gonna have some later significance. Also during the Royal Lab cutscene, I want Robbie or Purah to mention how Zelda’s control of the Sheikah Slate is quite exceptional or something. It’s a bit obvious already in Hwaoc, but I need it to be verbally said in a story scene for, again, later significance. Alright that’s it for my added details, moving on now. 

After Chapter 1, we moved into the characters accepting the Call to Adventure, whether by the general external reasons of wanting to save the world, and developed a little bit further with more internal related reasons to give nuances and identities to different characters. Revali wishes to prove that his hard work earns him better merit than a sidekick, Urbosa wishes to protect and help Zelda on an emotional level, Mipha wishes to get closer to Link and come back to her family proud, etc etc. 

Then, the climax of Act 1 ends with the Yiga ambush, and the characters get a first taste of leaving their areas of comfort, and journeying into the unknown world. Although the gameplay and the successful defeat of the Yiga establishes the Champion team’s strength, our interaction with Rhoam shows us that they still have a ways to go. The momentum into the full story now has a bit of tension and conflict. 

So now we crash into the beginning of Act 2, the longest Act in a story, as it’s the part where the....story, happens. Let’s take a look at changes to the Hollows, eggbot mysteries, Zelda character growth, and our first real dip into the character of our antagonist, the Prophet of Doom himself, Astor…

So in the game, Chapter 3 opens on the flank of Death Mountain, our heroes overlooking the view of Korok Forest.

There are a few problems I have with this scene. It’s really stale, there’s no movement, nothing dynamic about it other than the opening shot. They just kinda stand there and say words until Revali’s done ranting and summons Medoh. Also Revali’s dialogue is a bit “much” to say the least, and uh, spoiler alert, he’s gonna be reworked a bit more than the other Champions. Finally, this scene doesn’t have a lot of purpose or substance. Sure, it has some character conflict with Revali and Link and the team, but that’s kinda established already, plus it’s something that I’ve already fleshed out in the last scene with King Rhoam, so it’s a bit redundant. So that leaves this scene serving only as a boring current draw to the Medoh fight and nothing else. This is the opening set up for the Chapter where important story stuff goes down! Needs a lot more substance. So! Here’s my rework. 

We open on the sound of running. Link, along with Zelda, Urbosa, Daruk, and Mipha are running upwards on a path by Edlin. They’re chasing a small group of bokoblins and it looks like it’s the end of the fight. Urbosa is more near the back, with Zelda, but Daruk and Mipha both kill a bokoblin, their bodies of the monsters exploding in a cloud of malice upon their demise. When the camera shows each of their kills, the shots are quick, but I want the angle of the camera to be in such a way that the malice evaporates center frame, with Daruk and Mipha being behind the malice. This is because for a split second, it looks like the malice lingers around them like smoke. Huh, I wonder if that’s foreshadowing or something.

Anyhow, Link chases the final red bokoblin uphill, boots pattering against rock. However, we’re now seeing this from a moving, flying, bird’s eye view [quite literally wink wink] 

Cut back close to Link, he kills the bokoblins. Stands there for a sec as he sheathes his sword. And then...

“Well I’ll be plucked. You defeated it, eh?” 

Reveal Revali flying from above, and he lands in front of Link, but faces away from him. “Who would have thought that some little knight, amongst a group of chosen heroes, would get some action. You must be pretty proud of yourself, hm?” Cue that classic Revali head turn with a glare. Also when Revali says “heroes” I want him to flick his scarf dramatically, while staring at Link’s armour, as if internally he were judging Link on a runway.

Zelda runs up and starts speaking. “Oh Revali, I apologize our meet up with Medoh got a bit delayed. I assume that you’ve already positioned them by now for the attack?”

Revali hums a yes, but doesn’t bother to entertain a more fleshed out answer. Instead, he flicks his wing (as if to say, “come on”) and turns his back to walk up the trail. The others follow.

“I was informed that only the Champions and yourself would be present. What are…” Revali flicks a wing in the direction of Link and eggbot, like a Karen shooing a waiter. “...they, exactly contributing?”

Zelda says some stuff about Link being her bodyguard like: “Well, my father was impressed enough with Link’s actions from the other week that he’s assigned to give me further protection.’ She can say this a bit grumpily, to Link’s ignorance. Daruk can pipe in like “And a good thing too! Always great to have little guy at our backs.” and Mipha can nod sheepishly or something. But their dialogue is cut off by another rude interjection (because hell if Revali wants to listen to more rambling about Link)

“Right, right. And this thing is still around?” Revali gestures to eggbot. 

Zelda: “Well, This little one's technological prowess has been quite useful in battle, allowing us to access the rune functions and all. So I figured it’d be a big help should something unexpected happen. Plus...” cute shot of Zelda staring at eggbot, “it just...feels right.” Then the little eggshit can like, chirp happily or make some cute whistle or whatever. Just shove in a bit of that egg fanservice, might as well since I need to better establish its presence for later.

Revali mutters something about “big help,” before gesticulating with his wings as he continues walking up the trial. “Mooore like a big liability should anything happen to your little pet, and one of us be forced to risk our lives just to save it from becoming scrap. Honestly, when it comes to you, and you.” Revali points to both eggbot and Link, “Your presence is an entire waste of time. ‘Backup?’ Help?’ Tsk. Humouring.” Eggbot can make a noise or something while Link just tilts his head. Revali continues: “You’re only here because of a non-existent, fantastical, imaginary hypothetical in which I somehow fail, and I don’t, fail.” When he articulates that last part, he stops walking and does another little head turn/glare, but he still doesn’t bother to fully face him. “I’m sure that your duty will no longer be of importance once your reputation...is nothing but a memory overshadowed by today’s great feats. A forgettable knight, heh heh!”

“Revali,” Urbosa sighs, “How long do you expect us to put up with your showboating and prattle?”

That when Revali finally turns fully to face the group, with a more grim glare. They’ve reached the top of the ledge anyhow, so they’ve stopped walking. This is where the camera can view the Lost Woods in its fullest as it zooms on Revali. Then, that ending is the same as the game with the pan up to Medoh’s presence. 

“Fine. I’ve said enough. The time has come to show you what I’m made of. Now witness...Vah Medoh’s divine power!”

So that’s that. Revali is toned down a bit, and his rude remarks have more of a precision as to their point. It’s a bit hard to explain over words alone, but the fact that this scene takes place as the Champions are walking up the trail, means it’s a lot more interesting to look at. (Kinda like the walk and talk premise that you see in The West Wing) Plus, the trail being uphill establishes that hint of power dynamic as Revali is above everyone else. Also there’s just a bit of some botw dialogue connection, not only in just the opening, [Hwaoc Revali vs Botw Revali “Who would have thought” is put in different context based on their development, so it’s a good establishing point to show where this Revali is at in dynamics with Link in comparison to botw, all in just one line rather than in a more longer explanation] but I also scattered a few dramatic irony pieces in there heheh. There’s a lot more reasons why this scene is an improvement [and hopefully to you, it already *feels* better] but I’m not going to explain them until near the end, as its importance is connected to the later scenes of this Chapter.

In fact, that's the overarching change that I’ve made to these cutscenes, I’ve actually connected them and related them to the other scenes. This is the very first introduction to Chapter 3, after all, so it’s important that this introduction serves to be of more significance than “ok here’s the champions, here’s revali, there's medoh. Now go wreck stuff.”

Medoh’s fight is the same, the cutscenes after are mostly the same. Except here, when everyone runs into Korok forest and you see Astor, I want this scene to end not on Astor’s face (because it’s not as significant anymore since we’ve already see Astor in full in Chapter 2 with Urbosa’s stage) but it should end with Astor reaching out a hand towards the camera. The camera angle would be just a bit below Astor. This is because I want the implication to be slightly more clear that he killed those two Yiga underlings to craft the Hollows. It’s a nice little “watch it for the first time it doesn’t mean anything” but watching again it’s like “ohh how did I not notice that” kind of thing. 

Then, Hestu’s introduction is roughly the same. I don’t think I really need to rework it too much, since Hestu as a character doesn’t serve anything major to the plot, so it’s fine for it to just be fun and cute. I will however, change just a few pieces of dialogue. 

Revali: “Are we even making progress? We could just be going in circles.”

Daruk: “Good point. If only someone could fly above and scout the way.”

Revali: “As though I could see anything through this muck. Honestly, do you even think before you speak?”

Revali!!! Don’t be so rude to Daruk. Like yes it’s a bit funny, but that last part with “do you even think before you speak” is a bit much, because honestly Revali doesn’t really have a reason to hate Daruk. He’s characterized as being rude to Link and those he deems unworthy of respect, but Revali respects Daruk, Mipha, and Urbosa fairly well, considering they were chosen alongside him. So personally, I’d just tweak this to

Daruk: “Good point. If only someone could fly above and scout the way...”

Mipha snickers at this. And Revali mutters more quietly to himself, “As though I could see anything through this muck.” and gives little “hmph!” at Daruk, moving away.

There we go! It still serves it purpose of showing how the Champions are still not completely in sync (which is what I can assume was the original purpose of Revali’s rude comment line) but it’s played a bit more comedic (which makes sense considering this is in the context of Hestu’s introduction) and we get to poke fun at Revali, since just early we had spent so long boosting up his ego. Also Mipha laughing a bit with Daruk while Revali broods adds to that point of them being too busy to see Hestu right behind them.

Another small change, I don’t want Zelda to discover Hestu first. I want eggbot to discover Hestu, maybe they shake their maraca and eggbot notices and gives a little curious whistle. When Zelda notices eggbot not walking with her, she looks right, and that’s when she notices Hestu. It’s almost insignificant, but I really want to establish the eggbot’s presence for this chapter. Especially since this game writes him out of cutscenes a lot. 

Final small change. That Hestu scene ends, not with Revali wordlessly shaking his head and following the group after hanging back. But with Mipha actively turning back, saying something like “Come, Revali. We should all stick together. It wouldn’t do for us to get lost.” and then a reply like “As far as I’m concerned, when it comes to mystic swords, magic trees, lucky knights, and walking eggs...I already am.” I’m just trying to keep intact that Nintendo “vibe” of flicking the character stances right in your face, especially since this game's only forms of telling the story are through these less than a minute cutscenes. 

OKAY! Gameplay stuff. There are no real mechanic or level design changes to the Battle of Korok Forest, BUT there is one important change that I want to make here. 

When the party splits up to take on the bosses in order to get rid of the malice. I think that the Hollows should speak.

Not like full on sentences and stuff (yet) but I think they should mumble and groan and be able to speak a few simple words. Now why do I say this? Well, let’s take a look at how I think we should introduce them. 

First off, I think it should be a cutscene. Not just some 2 second animation where the Hollows spawn in. Nonononononono, this needs to be a cutscene, because it needs to be acted, because we need to see the character reactions. Like, if you’re gonna have that cliche “dark evil clone of the protagonists” thing, then you might as well go all out with the angst. In fact, personally, I would have rewritten is as the hollows actually *being* the champions and astor can temporarily control them but then when he sees that fail later in the game that can be his motivator for making the blights to kill them off since they’re no longer of use to him alive or whatever but we’re scrapping that idea because like I've said I want to try to keep the integrity of the original story.

Ok, so you have a character come up to one of the map points, and when they get there it fades into a cutscene. It’s not gonna be super long, but here’s the vision. 

Character is in the lost woods, they killed a stalbokoblin or whatever. Just some low tier enemy, and then it dies and becomes that whisp of malice. Great. Character turns to leave, but then they hear something. Like a snicker, or laughter. Cut to this angle from behind the trees, but instead of astor it’s the character you’re playing as.

They go over to investigate, creeping closer with caution, until they see a shadow. The shadow of a small figure, about no higher than Link, with a long, trident weapon. 

FWOOSH! An explosion of malice, almost like a fountain behind the character. They turn just in time to block the attack, the Lightscale Trident, but yet...it’s not the Lightscale Trident, because it’s covered in malice. Hollow Mipha is striking from the air, because this is basically her fountain teleportation thing, but malice. Once the character blocks the attack, time slows just a bit so you can see Hollow Mipha’s face, and then cut to the other characters face to give them a reaction. And that’s it. 

Then you can pop back into gameplay, but there should be textboxes on the bottom where you can see the character’s surprised reaction like

[Unimportant detail, but if Daruk fights his Hollow self I want his reaction to be like “Woah! I sure look grumpy. I look like I skipped breakfast.” and then his gambit attack is like “eat THIS!” Also Revali can say something about how imitation is a form of flattery]

Through that fight, the Hollows also have like one textbox and a line of Evil™ mumbling and/or laughing once they’re defeated. The laughing is kinda used in a later scene, but it’s never really seen again so I just want that to be more prevalent. You all could probably think of more angsty “evil version of you” lines that are specific to each character, but I’m just thinking stuff like “You...won’t...last” or even just *muttering*. In fact, this is another thing that I want to flesh out with my gambit feature. It not only serves as interaction between whatever two characters you’re playing as, but also as interaction between your antagonists. So if you use a gambit on Kohga, he’ll say something specific about the characters he’s fighting. Same idea with Sooga, or Astor, and now here, the Hollows can say stuff to you.

There’s gonna be someone out there more creative than me out there that can think up some cool dialogue for them, but basically what I want to establish is that we know that these Hollows are made from people’s like, souls? Or life force or whatever you wanna call it. So it wouldn’t be farfetched to give them the ability to speak. Over the course of the game, I want their textboxes/dialogue to be more and more lifelike, like without the pauses or muttering. This is because the entire point of the dialogue is not only to serve that trope of “I’m the evil you I’m gonna say stuff that emotionally impacts you mwahaha” but it also makes them just a bit more menacing in my opinion. Also overall gameplay wise, I think they need to become stronger with the Champions because idk if it was just me, but they were so easy that I just forgot about them. 

So! Korok Forest Battle introduces these creepy mumbling Champions, people react and are a bit freaked out, but they eventually clear the malice and we hit the next cutscene. 

This is where the shit goes down.

You all probably remember how this scene goes down so I’ll try not to spend too much time explaining it. But here’s my two cents as to why I’m gonna rewrite it a bunch. I think it’s not a good villain reveal. 

Like first off, it doesn’t establish Astor as a threat. His memorable action here is the summoning of the Hollows, and while yes, they do beat up Link and that’s very good, it also let’s Link easily beat them and Astor as soon as he gets the Master Sword IN THAT SAME SCENE. There was no time to let the threat of Astor linger, and when we see Link instantly beat him once he gets his Mcguffin, it really hinders the effect of this reveal.

Secondly, everyone is just silent during this??? Like, obviously Link doesn’t say anything, but Zelda doesn’t do stuff? Astor just kinda says “kill her!” and thats about it. Zelda never says “who are you?” or “what do you want?” or anything because as far as she’s concerned this is just some random dude, he’s not Yiga or anything. Also Astor never even introduces himself?? Throughout the entire game??? So while we the player know who he is because of his fancy title card, as far as all the characters are concerned he’s just a Mystery Clown.  

It’s just super weird how no one asks any questions during this scene like no one acts like a human being with common sense. In fact, one could say that no one asks any questions for this entire game. Things just happen, and happen, and happen, and everyones just kinda chill. And then Zelda just kinda receives 17 flashbacks over the course of two minutes at the end of the game like she’s speedrunning botw memory%. Obviously having an aura of mystery over the course of your game is fine, it’s good to keep questions lingering over the audience’s head. Just so long as you answer them in a satisfactory way later on. Like, that’s not something I need to spell out for you right? If you set up a question, give the audience a good answer. If you set up a mystery, give a cool explanation. If you set up an interesting character you have to give the people a pay off that was worth their investment into them, right? Right? Right? You understand right? Cause as the writer for a story, it’s you’re to explain the significance and importance of why things happen in a creative way. It’s almost as if that’s the entire purpose of storytelling, you know, an explanation of events in a compelling manner. Like please, this is a concept that you are able to grasp right? This isn’t just me right? See that’s how writing works when setting up anything ever, you gotta give an explanation to the choices you make in the plot. You gotta explain why. You gotta explain why. Explain why. Explain why. Explain, why? Explain, why? Why? Why? WHy? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WH

Sorry I got carried away. Anyhow, here’s the rewrite. 

Link and Zelda don’t enter the forest at the same time. They run through the wooden tunnel thing, and Link makes a gesture like “go!” while he stays back a bit to hold off some monsters like stal-lizalfos or something. So Zelda runs into the center of Korok Forest.

As far as any of the characters know, this is a safe haven now, this was their destination, so there’s no monsters here, so they’re good. The princess is safe, the Champions are just cleaning up in their respective corners of the forest with the Hollows, and Link is fighting off the monsters by the entrance. So while there is still tension from the battle, Zelda lets out a sigh of relief once she sees the Master Sword. 

She approaches it, cautiously, but doesn’t step onto the stone pedestal, still staying a ways back in the grass. “We’re finally here,” she says to herself. “Now we just have to protect the sword, await for the hero to retrieve it, and await for destiny to arrive.” She looks down at the ground, and then at the back of her hand (fuck what hand was the one with the triforce, her left hand? I’m gonna say left hand). So she looks down at the back of her left hand, before letting it fall. She turns away from the Master Sword and to herself she just mutters, “I only wish that I could make as much progress in fulfilling my own role...in making myself to be of actual use, like the others.”

There’s a moment of silence as Zelda wraps her elbows and closes her eyes. Then,

“If that is what you wish,” a sudden voice echos, and Zelda spins around to face it, “Then perhaps I can be of some assistance.”

Cut to Astor, standing in front of the Master Sword, facing Zelda. Roughly where he is shown here, but Zelda is a couple feet away from him, standing on one of those rocks.

Zelda steps back in shock for a moment. “W-Who? Who are you?”

“Me?” He takes one step down the stairs. “Oh, I am just someone, same as you, who wishes to see destiny fulfilled.” Zelda takes another step back, and seeing this, he stops approaching. “Ease your mind, Your Highness. There is no need to be frightened. You may call me, Astor”

Cut to title card on his face, it can be like this, BUT, no malice or glowing magic around him, it’s all still lush green forest, and I don’t want as much focus on his astrolabe. It’s just his face, and he’s giving a warm, yet chilling smile.

Zelda is still stammering. “Y-You...do I……. how did you—”

“It doesn’t matter. What matters now is taking every step towards stopping the Calamity, correct?” Astor starts to take a step towards her again, and this time Zelda doesn’t flinch.

“Y-Yes. Yes of course. But I’m afraid I’m still a bit confused. ...What exactly do you...want?”

Astor doesn’t immediately answer. He steps off the pedestal and starts to circle around Zelda, eyeing her, but still with that creepy smile. “Tell me, Princess, how fares your recent training? Adequate progress, I presume?”

He continues circling around her, still a few feet away. Zelda looks to the ground, defeated. “I’m afraid not. I’ve been trying to aid the researchers with the Guardians and Divine Beasts. But when it comes to this power…” she looks down at her hand again. “...it seems despite my great efforts and restless hours of prayers, they have yet to awaken.”

Using his free hand, Astor places a hand on his chest, tilting his head in a sorry pout. The gesture seems exaggerated. “My...you poor thing. How harrowing this must be for you.” He continues walking, eyeing her as he circles behind. “But, I am certain it is not your fault. You are but a child, after all.”

“I…” Zelda is still staring at the ground in front of her. Astor continues.

“I mean really, have you ever stopped to think about how absurd this all is? A collection of mis-match warriors, demanded to pilot gods. A sword for an unseen hero. The lives of us all, in the hands of one girl. Expected to lead us all, awaken a divine power, and save the world, all before her 17th birthday…”

After a beat, Zelda finally looks up at him, confusion and suspicion back in her eyes. “What did you say?”

Astor stops walking, he’s back directly in front of the pedestal. The camera is on him center frame, so that when he turns to face Zelda, his figure blocks the sword. 

“Now Princess, is that truly what you want? Do you really believe yourself prepared to live up to such a monumental task?” He’s walking directly towards her now, arm outstretched. 

“I—” Zelda pauses, before shaking her head. “Of course not, but that doesn’t mean—”

“Yeesss. Precisely! You needn’t not let yourself live like this, like some beggar to the gods, like a failure.” Astor is walking more quickly towards her, and Zelda is stepping back.

Zelda lets out a gasp of fear now, as Astor approaches, there’s a swirl starting to form around the astrolabe in his hand. “I don’t understand! What’s your point, what do you want? Who are you!?”   

He stops walking, he’s so much closer now, just a foot or two away from her. “It’s quite simple my dear.” He gives another smile. “I’m a man who wants to live.”

Fwoosh! The air around them is now tinted purple, the astrolabe’s power surrounding them both. Zelda gasps again. 

“If we truly wish to see this realm prosper, we must accept the indisputable truth.” Astor reaches out his hand. “You are not worthy of saving this Kingdom. You do not have the power to oppose such an unimaginable enemy! Therefore I shall relieve you of your burden, for the sake of us all. I will steal, your, destiny!”

Astor is seconds away from touching her, before suddenly...the sound of a sword unsheathing.  

Astor flies back, crumpling on the steps of the pedestal, he looks up to see Link, sword at the ready. Link had pushed astor back with the pommel of his sword [because no stabbing or blood for our PG Nintendo game] and the motion has cause him to drop his astrolabe, which now lies a few feet in front of him in the grass. 

“Link!” Zelda says, relieved. From behind, eggbot also appears. It walks infront of Link and gives a little whistle and does that sassy pointing thing in the direction of Astor, as if telling him off. 

Astor frowns when he sees Link, but when he sees eggbot his face morphs into confusion. “You…? But I…” he glances at his astrolabe. Astor gets up to retrieve it and stands.  

“It doesn’t matter how you’re here again. You can’t stop this.” Astor summons the Hollows, and they appear in front of him. It was harder to see in the lost woods, but here in the lush grass, its undeniable that the Hollows are draining the plant life around them. 

“Kill whoever he is. Fight the Guardian if you must, though I’d prefer it intact. But don’t touch the girl.” He narrows his eyes. “Her thread shall be cut by my hand alone.”

Then it goes into that action sequence. Link is desperately fighting off the Hollows, while also trying to keep eggbot close to protect it. The hollows are laughing, even taunting him, as Astor is just walking calmly forwards towards Zelda, and Link can’t do anything to stop it. 

Then it’s roughly the same, Link flies back as his sword breaks. Zelda is kinda helpless. And then just as Astor is about to reach Zelda again, Link cries out, the Master Sword glows. Everyone looks back, confused. Link pulls the sword. Boss fight. 

After the fight and after Link defeats Astor, he’ll say something like. “That sword...is too powerful.” and blah blah blah. He looks up at Zelda. “Should you come to your senses, Your Highness,” he hisses the words, “I will delightfully accept an invitation with your company again.” He glares at Link. “Perhaps one day, when we have more time, you will fully come to understand where your arrogance is leading you.” He stands, though clutching his side in pain. “Until then, I shall make certain we meet again.” Link charges him, but he disappears in smoke and malice. End the Korok Forest arc.

Okay so! Why is this scene better? Uhhhhhhhh because it fucking is that’s why. We got 1) A villain introduction that’s more menacing 2) an establishment of character goals, but a mystery of character motivation to keep suspense 3) a more insightful look at different character’s feelings and thoughts 4) a much more interesting interaction with dialogue that raises tension and properly climaxes to the action and 5) the story’s momentum moves forward with ascending action, and new story details that set up later scenes. 

I find it absolutely absurd that in the original game, these scenes are not written with more impact. This is the first look into the real mystery and substance that the story has to offer, and the first real look into the prime antagonist’s head. The actions and stakes throughout Act 2 have to properly ascend and rise in order to truly keep the audience engaged. You can’t just rely on mystery alone, you have to make use of character goals. 

Reiterating Zelda’s internal struggles means that this can more easily connect and flow into the later segments where she doubts her ability and sees Link and the others grow stronger. In addition, Astor’s presence is a direct foil to Zelda’s arc. You can already see it a bit based on his dialogue, but I will more fully explain the true depths of how his is a direct foil to Zelda further down the line when all the aspects of his character are revealed. It’s almost as pacing the amount of information you give about a character can properly incite your audience to be more invested in the story, hmm. Anyhow, all you need to know for now is that good antagonists have similarities and aligning viewpoints as the protagonist in the beginning of the journey, much more, than you might think.

= = = = = 

That is it for now! I can’t believe I had to dedicate an entire section to just one battle. But! That is how the story must go, as I need to flesh out as much as possible in only a few cutscenes without ruining the pacing. Tune in next time for flashbacks, backstory, Yiga husbands, token Zelink hours, aaand perhaps just a bit of Impa simping. 

[mx-shirogane]

Persona 4 and LGBTQ+

Ah yikes, an opinion piece. These are just my thoughts and I’m more than open to hearing other people’s opinions and thoughts on the matter. 

When I first found the Persona Fandom, I was introduced by Game Theory. Not the “Teddie is Yu’s Shadow” video, rather their video on LBGTQ+ represention in video games. MatPat threw around the word “Persona” and as someone who was just learning about the LGBTQ+ community, I became interested in what I thought to be a game with character development around sexuality and gender identity. While I can understand Kanji’s shadow being used as an example for this in their video due to Persona 4 being recent and how it appears at a first glance, I think a better example would have been Jun and Tatsuya from Persona 2: Innocent Sin. In this post I’ll be covering Yosuke, Kanji and Naoto.

Sexuality, Kanji and Yosuke: From the beginning, there were created issues with the idea of Persona 4 being an LGBTQ+ game, this was with Yosuke being removed as a romance option. Had they kept him as a romance option, I personally feel they could have explained his behaviors as internal homophobia and suppression of his own feelings for the protagonist. However, with this removed, Yosuke’s cracks at Kanji’s sexuality lack the reasoning of insecurity and projection and instead comes across as ignorance and fear. The anime made no attempt at fixing this, having more negative connotation around Kanji as the party is hesitant to save him. Another scene that comes to mind is the camping trip, where Yosuke asks if they’ll be safe alone with him. In the anime, the protagonist also joins in on this interrogation. Kanji’s clearly uncomfortable as he eventually runs off to sleep in the girl’s tent at an attempt to defend himself. In the game, Yosuke does express concern for Kanji as he fears he might be expelled. This at least shows that Kanji is a friend regardless of the feelings Yosuke harbors towards his sexuality. This exchange portrays Yosuke as quick to flip sides from being worried about Kanji to worried for Kanji and still maintains their friendship. This does have a bit of karma as Chie insinuates the same thing when the girls sneak into their tent. Where as in the anime, Yosuke and the Protagonist just watch Kanji leave and there are no later comments made on the matter. Overall, Kanji’s homosexuality becomes more of a punchline than a sexual orientation and was more so fueled by hyper-masculinity and Naoto. A later scene in the game that shows his perception change of Naoto from male to female is during the group date cafe when describing his ideal girl and Yosuke calls him out sarcastically for being obvious. During this same event, if you choose to be on the girl’s side, you have a few options. If you pick Yosuke, he’ll freak out but then begin flattering himself, the protagonist noting that he seems “proud for some reason.” Meanwhile if the protagonist picks Kanji, Yosuke will note that they’re a perfect match to which Kanji refuses and even threatens Yosuke if he keeps bringing the matter up. Instead of there being any snarky remarks following from Yosuke, he compliments Kanji saying it’s due to his manliness which Kanji does take well. This could come across as Yosuke trying to protect himself, however his remark is more positive than that in the tent and does signify a growth towards trying to understand. If you sit on the guy’s side and ask if Yosuke likes any of the guys, he’ll respond saying the protagonist before stuttering and calling him out for making him play along. With factors like Naoto’s reveal taken into account, Kanji’s shadow becomes less focused on his sexuality and more so on bullying and hyper-masculinity. As for Yosuke, he comes across as ignorant and fearful. Had he remained a romance option, this could have been played off as an internal conflict Yosuke was dealing with and projecting onto Kanji.

Gender Identity and Naoto: I’ll be using They/Them pronouns to refer to Naoto. Naoto Shirogane was originally thought to be a male which greatly fueled Kanji’s Shadow. However, Naoto’s arc referred more to sexism in the work place and their struggles with being a child detective and idolization. Side note: Props to Kanji in the shadow scene for realizing Naoto had to confront their shadow in order to stop hurting. After the fight, Yukiko asks Naoto if they dislike being a girl and if that’s the reason they dress like a man. Naoto responds saying their sex doesn’t fit their ideal image of a detective and notes that the police department is a male-oriented society. They express that if anyone knew Naoto was biologically female, they wouldn’t be needed anymore. Kanji and Yukiko both make remarks on this, Kanji saying that they didn’t know how others would react, and Yukiko remarking that Naoto didn’t want to become an adult or a boy. This is followed by Naoto saying “What I should yearn for... No, what I must strive for isn’t to become a man. It’s to accept myself for who I really am...”  From this point on, Naoto is referred to with female pronouns terminology, even by their close friends. While Naoto continues wearing the male uniform, they say it’s what they’ve become comfortable in and are show to be generally shy about their body, key examples being in the bath house and the beauty contest. My opinion on how to portray them as LGBTQ+:  These are small notes on how I would portray and shape them based on contradictions and hints in the game.  Yosuke: Have Yosuke identify as bicurious. It’s cannon that he likes girls and there are scattered remnants of him liking the protagonist littered throughout Persona 4 and the other spin offs. His internal conflict over liking guys as well as girls could prove to be an interesting story premise when done properly. As well, him projecting his insecurities onto Kanji would shift his character from being ignorant and fearful to being insecure about his own feelings and not knowing how to deal with them. If you want to have someone in Yosuke’s life that shaped his views on homosexuality, create someone like a friend, parent or even bully who caused him to see homosexuality in a negative light. Try to avoid having him instantly fall in love with the protagonist and present more of a struggle as to figure out what’s right and what’s wrong. Even if you end up having him identify as straight in the end, allow for some wiggle room for experimentation due to the small hints throughout the games.  Kanji: Have Kanji identify as pansexual and focus his shadow around him questioning his sexuality and not hyper-masculinity. Keep in the fact Kanji was called queer by female students because he liked cute things and knitting. This would serve as a starting point for him questioning his sexual orientation. However, when it comes to his shadow, have the repressed self trying to figure out who he likes whether it’s guys, girls or if sex just doesn’t matter instead of flat out calling him gay. That way, when it comes to the reveal of Naoto, his entire shadow arc doesn’t get cancelled out.   Naoto: Have Naoto identify under the transmasculine umbrella. As much as I love Trans!Naoto in fanworks, Naoto does say that they should strive to be true to themselves and that what they want wasn’t to become a boy. Transmasculine, acording to the nonbinary wiki, is an umbrella term that refers to those who were assigned female at birth, and whose gender is masculine and/or who express themselves in a masculine way. Transmasculine people feel a connection with masculinity, but do not always identify as male. This way, you can still have Naoto identify as male for the first majority of the game and have the shadow reveal Naoto felt pressured by the police force to negate any feelings they had and portray themselves as strictly male. They said themselves that both their parents were detectives, which contradicts Naoto saying that they’d get tossed aside if the department knew they were biologically female. Focus less on their age and have the repressed feelings focus on how they felt like an outcast for not fitting in the gender norm which contributed to an anxiety of shutting people out and obsessing over masculine stereotypes as an attempt to fit in. Naoto identifying as masculine would allow for more wiggle room in terms of pronouns and the variety of honorifics used (Chie and Yukiko use Kun, Rise, Yosuke, Kanji and the Protagonist don’t use any, and Teddie uses Chan) whilst further supporting Naoto’s preference for masculine clothes and body insecurities, mainly their chest.

[dappercritter]

Invader Zim: Taller Tales of Terror - The First Fic That Wasn’t

This was going to be my first fanfiction that I ever published, but things came up and I found other story ideas and fandoms to get into. However, because there’s nothing I hate more than leaving a story untold and forgotten.

 So like a writer jilted by a big name studio working on a big superhero movie that went terribly wrong after they left, I’m going to share it with you good folks to see if you still think there’s hope for it in some capacity. If so maybe I’ll choose to revive it in some capacity, or one of you kind folks can adopt it. Whatever you think of the once untold tale I’m about tell you, I hope you enjoy it.

The fic would have been either a mini-series/anthology or a movie-esque sequel—or two—to Enter the Florpus.

It would have followed the stranger further misadventures the kids would go on as teenagers, all of which have at least something to do with getting taller, literally or metaphorically.

 Although I'd do my best to recreate the series' darkly comic tone, there'd be more to the story than just that. I'd like to do a sort of character study with my fanfics and explore what they would do as they got older, how they would change if they could change, if they'd mature and try to connect with each other more, or if they really do just hate each other. It'd be like a coming-of-age story but done in the style of Invader Zim.

 But don’t be fooled, folks! It's not going to be one of those big dramatic fanfics with high stakes (nor any smut) thrown in. At it's core it's still just a fun, dumb, mildly disturbed "What if?" sort of fic. There would be a bit more emphasis on character and plot than normal, because I do love me a good character-driven plot, but still plenty of room for (what I hoped would feel like) the usual weird dumb creepy fun that original series excelled at.

 The story is set in basically the same continuity (or at least the closest thing to a continuity that can exist in Invader Zim) as the show and comics. The only difference is that the Battle of Meekrob actually happened—but not really.

 Long backstory short, there was a big showdown between the Irken Armada and the Meekrob-allied Resisty, but Zim and Dib missed it because a food fight got them stuck in detention. Zim tried to get Skoodge (who was rooming with him at the time because the scrapped Season 2 episodes were sorta canon here) to cover for him until her got there, while Dib tried to get Gaz to take Tak’s ship to provide support against the Irken. By the time they got out, however, the battle was over, Gaz blew the whole thing off to get a new game, Skoodge and some other Invader became the war hero Zim always aspired to be, and The Almighty Tallest decided to cancel Operation Impending Doom 2 because after the big exciting space battle they felt like they couldn’t top anything after that. Suffice to say, Zim took it pretty hard. Dib however would have seen this as something of a win since Zim still failed in a sense. Albeit it was a very anticlimactic win, even to him.

The actual story would have taken place about 5 years after the Battle of Meekrob, where Zim, Dib, and Gaz have made it to high school (or “hi-skool” as this is the Invader Zim universe, after all). Setting wise, things haven't changed much but the characters have made a few surprising or not-so-surprising developments. The most important of all, so important that it would be the focus of the entire story, in fact! would have been Zim developing a brand-new disguise utilizing an exoskeleton, based partially on the Almighty Tallest, in attempt to make him look like a normal teenager AND impress superiors. Naturally, things go horribly yet amusingly wrong for everyone involved.

 Now just where and what has everyone been up to/going through in those five years? Here’s a rundown:

-Zim spent those 5 years obsessing over his crushing failure, begging the Tallest to give him another chance, which they refused every time. Being stuck on a planet of smelly, stupid, and increasingly annoying creatures for so long without any real victories has left him bitter and frantic with more shmoopiness than usual. Even the little "VICTORY FOR ZIM!" moments he used to have got harder and harder to come by. By the time he reached high school, he was so messed up he didn’t realize his classmates had all had growth spurts until Dib easily overpowered him in one of their petty fights and points it out to the whole school. Thus, leading to the new exoskeleton and subsequent schemes to redeem himself in the eyes of the Tallest while looking normal in the eyes of his human classmates. Unfortunately, due to his desperation and general lack of understanding about the human body, the exoskeleton comes out looking like a lanky robotic nightmare with clawed fingers that jerks around like a big cybernetic marionette.

-Dib meanwhile has been doing slightly better. He and his paranormal research are still looked down upon, but he's persevered through the hope that someday he'll prove he's right. After (indirectly) stopping Zim from joining the Battle of Meekrob, Dib got a small confidence boost, thinking of it as a big step to exposing for Zim real now that he’s effectively trapped on Earth with him now. Although, following a rather blunt intervention from his family, he's started thinking about what he’ll do with himself once Zim is gone. He still hates his guts and he's still hellbent on beating him, but he's also started getting out more and trying to socialize more—however awkward his attempts may be. That he's also gotten taller and his head isn't quite as big compared to the rest of his body has been good for his self-esteem too. But make no mistake—when he's not going for runs, working shifts at his dad’s lab, or looking into a “totally normal” science major, he's toiling away on improving his array of anti-Zim strategies and defenses.

-Gaz is doing pretty good but she is totally done with Zim and Dib's junk. Although she's still her old apathetic self, she's doing everything in her power to broaden her horizons so she doesn't end up in the same, stupid rut that they ended up in. She would have gotten into indie art and game development; although her work is still fairly obscure, it's quickly gaining attention for it's macabre, edgy, punishing and geeky nature. (Imagine the works of Jhonen Vasquez, Toby Fox, Hidetaka Miyazaki, and Hideki Kamiya mashed together.) She also participates in e-sports tournaments on occasion, if only because crushing countless so-called “gamers” brings her amusement. Her psychic powers have also gotten stronger with her age, and she likes to experiment with them whenever she can—usually when somebody really annoys her. She's doing fine in the story until, after a run-in with a certain unkillable spoiled brat at an e-sports tournament, sends her over the edge and she trashes the place in a Carrie-esque episode. This gets her sent to anger management therapy, and now she's trying to find a way out to avoid sitting through an endless slog of "sappy" sessions.

-Gir would still be insane.

-Minimoose would still be the ultimate techno-lifeform Minimoose.

-Zim's Computer is still tired.

 -Prof. Membrane is still the greatest and most powerful scientist who ever lived but he’s also trying to make time for his family more and mentoring Dib to be the successor to his legacy he always thinks he was meant to be. That is if is experimental new immortality machine doesn’t work out. May or may not have to fend off Clembrane whenever he comes to visit.

-The Almighty Tallest are still living content, tyrannical lives. They didn't take canceling Operation Impending Doom 2 very hard because, as it turns out, they just got bored with it after a while. (Of course, Zim's repeated interference didn't help keep their spirits up either). However, they'd come up with the perfect plan to obtain absolute control of the universe AND get the feeling back: by making Operation Impending Doom 3 a thing and setting up a huge hype campaign for it. Thing go pretty well for them until Zim calls them and tells them about his new exosuit. They believe that Zim is trying to make himself look like a Tallest so he can lead a rebellion against them and get revenge for treating him like garbage. (He's not, obviously, but they're too dumb and paranoid to realize this.) So, they pretend that they're ok with it and let him carry on his merry way while they figure out how to dispose of him without making him look like a martyr figure of some sort, thus giving the other Irkens they mistreated any ideas.

-Tak would show up again in the second half and this is where it gets spoiler-y. She would come to Earth on the Tallest’s orders with a squad consisting of a reformatted Mimi, rogue SIR units, as well as Tenn and Skoodge who she had recruited to aid in her vendetta against Zim. She would subsequently reveal that after drifting through space in an escape pod, she crashed landed on Meekrob just as the battle was about to begin, and using the element of surprise, rescued Tenn from captivity and assisted Skoodge and the Tallest in devising a battle strategy so brilliant that it crushed the Resisty and Meekrob’s alliance and earned her the status of Irken Elite. She grew comfortable in her new position but could never get over her fear that Zim would eventually ruin it all again, so she waited and prepared for the day she would strike back. I don’t know how or if she would adopt an updated disguise (perhaps a hologram of her older humansona projected over her, Tenn, and Skoodge standing on top of her shoulders?) or hide in the shadows while Tenn, Skoodge, Mimi and the berserk SIR squad did her dirty work.

 -Skoodge would have gone from aspiring to be Zim’s friend to being his worst enemy after Tak turned him to her side by digging into his past with him, making him realize how little his supposed old friend cared about him. Despite this he still keeps an unusually cheerful disposition—even repeatedly apologizing to Zim whenever he attacks him—and acts as the heart of Tak’s squad. He thinks of them as his real friends, so he always goes out of his way to help them out or keep the energy up. Even though Tak looks down on him because of his size, she appreciates his gullibility and unquestioning loyalty. Tenn just thinks he’s nice, especially since he’s good at keeping the SIRs in check.

 -Tenn has recovered from the traumatic escapades she endured on Meekrob at the hands of the rogue SIR units and imprisonment under the enemy, returning to her usual competant Invader self—something Tak values quite a bit in an armada largely composed of egomaniacs and morons. Tenn values Tak’s companionship even more, viewing her as a conquering hero who not only won the most important battle of Irken history, but also, her heart. …Not she’ll ever act on her feelings. That would inconveniance the mission! (Although Skoodge has picked up on this and gladly supports her, thinking they’d make an adorable couple.) After investation revealed that Zim was supposed to receive the rogue SIR units instead of her while he trashed the Megadoomer that was rightfully assigned to her, she bought into Tak’s view that Zim’s very existence was a threat to all Irkenkind, gladly assisting her efforts to eradicate him.

 -Mimi and the rogue SIR units have been reprogrammed to be less insane and follow orders again thanks to Tak and Skoodge’s efforts. However, Tak also had a berserk mode installed specfically for eradicating targets with optimal, brutal efficiency. Mimi still tends to glitch though. In addition to Mimi retaining her cat holo-disguise, the berserker SIRs would gain new disguises resembling either feral cats or rabid teacup poodles. (I hadn’t decided yet.) Tenn still gets anxious around them.

 -Gretchen might show up again and would possibly get to reconnect with Dib, maybe even finally be honest with him about her feelings for him when she surprises him with her surprising new position at Membrane Labs: the janitor.

 -Keef will… er, uh… actually, don’t get your hopes up.

 Well, I think that’s everyone important. Okay back to the plot now!

 So, right up front, the biggest part of the plot as well as the biggest reason why I got uncomfortable with the whole thing was there wiould be some romance in here between a few couples and that it would have figured into the plot. The most significant of all: ZAGR (a.k.a. Zim and Gaz Relationship). But I wanted to make it feel organic and even sweet without sacrificing the feel of sardonic madness but also keeping it in the wholesome zone.

 I always felt like Zim and Gaz were a natural fit for each other (like quite a few other people, admittedly) because I always felt like their personalities were a good fit and they could have a lot in common. The story would follow them as they unexpectedly developed a romantic friendship, bonding over their resentment of the Earth and humanity, their absent family members, a love of technology of questionable intent, and subjugating those who anger them. It would all start with Gaz agreeing to help Zim improve his suit and his unassuming human act just to get back at Dib for annoying her. At first they’d be acting entirely out of spite and necessity, but as they spent more time together, they’d start to enjoy each other’s company more.

 Gaz would be the first develop feelings, since she voluntarily rejected the concept of love instead of being programmed to reject it like Zim, as she slowly realizes how much they have in common—much to her horror. Zim would take more time but when he begins to understand how he feels about and just what these DISGUST feelings are, he’d handle it just as poorly. (e.g. I pictured a scene where Zim has such a hard time admitting his feelings for Gaz that he ends up vomiting black goo like he’s possessed or something. For comedy of course.) But they’d both start to open up to each other in the end, if only because they’re the only two people in the universe they can stand. Gaz would try to help him overcome his anxiety and stop caring as much about what humans think of him, while he would be someone that she can actually relate to.

 Dib, however, would take sincerest offense to it. He’d be totally freaking out, nearly diving off the deep end to put his plans to defeat Zim into action and expose him before he could be exposed. He’d also make a point of demanding what Gaz could see in a monster like him, even reminding her of everything that Zim had done. Probably in an exchange like this:

 DIB: He stole our organs! He tried to crush the planet with Mars! He kidnapped me and threatened to turn me inside out! He tricked me into helping him teleport Earth into outer space so his rulers could destroy it! He turned me into bologna, Gaz! (*holding back tears*) BOLOGNE!

 GAZ: I thought you got over that.

 DIB: Well, physically I did, yes, but not mentally.

 Gir would be pretty on board with it though.

The other biggest plot of the series would have been Tak’s return and the reveal of her and the Tallest’s master plan to destroy Zim once and for all: kick off Operation Impending Doom 3 by placing Zim on trial, executing him, and completing Tak’s plan to turn the planet Earth into a snack bowl for the Tallest (which she still insists is a good plan, she just never got to complete it) big enough to feed them while they watch the conquest of the rest of the universe in style. Zim and the Membranes get through to her and her squad, and possibly the other Irkens, by turning them against the Tallest to stop the Irkens once and for all. Maybe.

Finally to wrap this little nightmare up, here’s a vague outline of the stories I had planned for this wannabe whopper:  

 -A Whole New Nightmare – Following an amusing prologue about how Zim and Dib ended up missing the battle of Meekrob, Zim finally realizes that his natural Irken height threatens to expose his façade to all the classmates who have reached proper adolescent human height. He creates his exosuit then proceeds to cause a scene when he calls the Tallest and goes to hi-skool. Meanwhile, Gaz bugs Dib about still wasting his time bullying Zim. Zim then challenges Dib to a contest of normalcy: a series of challenges that are just overhyped normal teenage things like loitering, hanging out with friends, and finally a dance-off. Whoever loses has to admit they’re a complete weirdo and admit they’re most embarrassing secret. Dib wins the first round, but after he blows off Gaz to hang out with the other kids, she and Zim strike up a nice conversation and he wins the second round. The final dance-off ends in a draw when Zim and Dib both end up looking like total dorks. The story ends with Dib and Zim standing up for themselves against their judgemental peers, but Zim ends up overtaking his big speech and convincing his classmates to completely forget about his bizarre new appearance.

-Gaz the Befriended - Zim and Gaz make a deal: Gaz helps him fine tune his suit while posing as his "NORMAL HUMAN!" friend, and in return he helps her figure out how to control her powers while posing as her friend so she won't have to go to anger management counselling. While they do drive each other nuts, they eventually learn they have a lot in common and start acting like real friends. Dib grows suspicious of their "friendship," sets out to uncover the truth.

 -They Follow - Dib goes on social media to share his findings on Zim with the world in an attempt to verify all his evidence via wisdom of the crowd. Zim finds out and retaliates by joining social media as well to make himself look like a hard luck case in an effort to gain sympathy from the (basically ignorant) public. As their war of words escalate and their follower bases grow, they end up starting a flame war that threatens to destroy society itself.

-Star Dib - Hoping to find some real help, Dib sends a message to outer space looking for reinforcements. He ends up with what remains of the Resisty, who dissolved after their crushing defeat on The Battle of Meekrob. Taking pity on them, he volunteers to become their new leader. Shenanigans ensue on a galactic level.

 -C for Conspiracy - Dib stumbles across a mysterious conspiracy involving Earth tech being backwards compatible with alien tech. He wants to take it on himself, but realizes that he might actually need Zim’s help. So he has to swallow his pride and ask him for help, and as if that weren’t enough he has to put up with his and Gir’s (who tagged along) antics.

 -Night of the Living Prom-goers - Prom night comes along and all the hormonally-imbalanced kids are ready to go, except for Zim, Dib, and Gaz. Until Gaz works up the nerve to ask Zim out, which he actually accepts. While Gaz prepares for her perfect tolerable evening, Dib desperately tries to convince her that Zim’s up to something while trying uncover his true motives, only for her to snap at him and challenge his views on Zim. Little do either of them know, Zim plans to use the prom as an experiment to harness Gaz’s power for his own ends. But at the same time, he ponders whether his friendship with Gaz is just a means to an end or something more. Either way it will be a night they will never forget. Or survive! Probably.

 -The Return of Tak’s Revenge Rises - Tak finally returns to take her revenge on Zim and the Membrane siblings. Striking them when they least expect with the aid of an upgraded MiMi, a squad of berserk SIR units, and two fellow invaders Zim had wronged in the past.

 -Doomed Together - Following Tak’s strike, the Almighty Tallest kick off Operation Impending Doom 3 with a mission of utmost importance: sending in the Irken Armada to ensure Zim is destroyed once for all so they can finally proceed with absolute universal domination. Now, Gaz, Dib, and some unlikely allies must come up with a plan to save their even more unlikely new friend and the rest of the universe from the most fearsome force in the universe! It’s basically the grand finale.

 And that is all there is, or was, to Taller Tales of Terror. I can’t guarantee I’ll ever revisit it, what with all the other stuff on my plate right now, but I’m glad to have finally shared the story of my first fanfic with y’all.

 So, tell me, my filthy monkey maggot mutual friends. After all that horrible rambling, what did you think?

[thejustmaiden]

Unfortunately, if Sunrise makes Sessrin canon, it won't bring much issue to them, the japanese fans love this ship, and in Japan there's this whole lolicon culture, 10 year old idols and schoolgirl pin-ups which are also accepted there. I still can't believe Japan doesn't see any issue with child grooming and exploiting underage girls, and seeing the series that put a mark on my childhood going through the same direction, makes me sad and concerned.

Howdy, nonnie! Happy weekend. 😚

Even though there are many Japanese fans out there who are antis like you and me, I'm well aware of the fact that there's an overwhelming number of fans there who not only celebrate this ship but are quite fanatical about it, too.

Of course I acknowledge that culture plays a role in how people learn to perceive certain relationship dynamics as they grow up. Their fans appear to think we're naive on that matter, but obviously we're more than familiar with Japan's infatuation with lolicon. Why else would we be so enraged over this ship in the first place? Because of shipping wars?! How many times must we repeat that this goes beyond petty fandom squabbles. This is about real life, and this is about protecting our kids and their future. Tell me, what could be more important than that?

What some of their fans fail to realize is that culture shouldn't be the only deciding factor we take into account when determining right from wrong. Culture isn't the ultimate form of defense either, and it's unethical to use it as an excuse to justify glorifying the sexualization of underage girls. It's ridiculous to believe that culture is "above our morals" so to speak, as if past and present cultures haven't tried to pass off messed up ideologies as mere differences of opinion.

At first glance it may not appear to some like it's a serious issue because "it's just fiction," which must mean people putting this content out there can get away with it then, correct? Oh, well sure they can since they've already been doing so for the longest time! The thing is just because it's "acceptable" and has been around forever doesn't make it right.

I urge you Sessrin shippers to please reflect on that for a moment and try and imagine what the future holds for our children if we persist in normalizing these harmful tropes where girls continue to be placed in highly inappropriate sexual contexts. How do you think putting a positive and romantic spin on a relationship like that will bode for them if they were ever to encounter a situation resembling it in real life? I know it's not exactly the image any of us want to picture, but can't you at the very least admit it's a possibility that a child/teen may potentially mistake a predator's intent as romantic because of what they've been exposed to in the media? I'm not saying that's proof every single child will be susceptible. But truly consider this: isn't one child risky enough?

It's engrained in girls at an early age, especially in places like Japan, that we are but visual appreciations for men AKA what you may know as the "male gaze." It's supposedly natural for men to look upon us women so it should be expected and even sought out. Phenomena like lolicon only take it further by romanticizing it and in turn validating this kind of predatory behavior in society.

Fiction has the power to remove all the questionable and ambiguous areas and focus on the super unrealistic flowery parts instead. But guys, just because a particular culture has found a loophole to portraying a relationship synonymous to real life grooming in a positive light does not mean they can and should get away with it. And especially when we got literal children watching!

Please please please read this short meta on this subject I'm addressing now. I recommend you read the comments section too, because there you'll hear from so many people who can relate with their own personal experiences. It's quite harrowing to see how many of us are out there.

This just goes to prove that it's crucial everyone understands this because we gotta start calling out the people responsible for this content and holding them accountable. That includes the authors, the screenwriters, the animators- you name it! We can't allow these sexualized images of young or pre-pubescent girls to be the norm anymore. I don't care how much it's a part of your tradition, because bear in mind that many immoral things were once tradition.

Now that you've read this far I want you to ask yourself this: Why do you think Rin- a character we've only ever known as a young girl in this series, mind you- is automatically associated with sex right off the bat? I mean, how do we know that she'll even be married or want to be married? Or hell, that she even likes boys?? What if she grows up and likes only women or perhaps both?! Or maybe she's not attracted to either!!

The point I'm trying to make is that we have absolutely no information on adult Rin, and she does not exist as far as we know. I hope she's alive, but what I meant to say is that I don't believe it's been officially confirmed that she's in the sequel yet. (Please correct me if I'm wrong though!) So the real question we should be asking ourselves right now is why are we so concerned with her love life? Why is this ever the only subject of importance in Rin's future? It's not for Sesshomaru but why is it for Rin? Don't you think it's sad that the first thing we as an audience associate a young girl around an older male figure with is sex and romance; like that's all she's good for and as if there's no greater purpose for her to serve.

We really oughta stop perpetuating these demeaning and inaccurate beliefs of what a woman's life should amount to. This idea that Rin doesn't want anything more than to be with Sesshomaru wherever he is no matter what completely diminishes her character to nothing more than ironically enough that little girl he once traveled with. Essentially the only reason you're aging her up is so she can have sex with him, but you still expect her to have no agency and follow him around blindly. A child may do that but not a full grown woman. Nope, not even in feudal times.

What that basically tells me is that you believe her character growth is non-existent and she's only in this story to serve Sesshomaru's plot and never her own outside of him. He needed to learn to think of others besides himself? Rin did that! He needs romance now? Well, that's what Rin is there for!! To satisfy his every need. Because apparently his character development only extends to her and her character's significance doesn't go beyond him.

Wow, such an honor to be reduced to nothing more than some pretty little sex object. But as long as Sesshomaru is happy then I suppose that's all that matters, right?

I could go and on, but best I stop. Lol Thanks again for the ask, nonnie. Here's hoping one of our favorite childhood memories will be salvaged! 2020 has already been shitty enough as is. 😆

[twentiethcenturymoviesandtv]

Dead Poets Society: The Characters

No matter how good a story is, how great the cinematography, or how subversive the genre-usage, a movie cannot stand without use of characters.

Characters are perhaps the most vital element of any story ever told.  An interesting plot helps a movie greatly, but without a use of compelling characters, it falls flat on an audience who doesn’t care about the well-being of the people pushing the story forward.  Viewers need flawed, interesting people, moving the story and trying to overcome conflict, in order for a movie to feel satisfying.

Fortunately, Dead Poets Society has no shortage of flawed, interesting people.

Today, we’re going to be taking a look at some of them, starting with our protagonist: Todd Anderson. (Spoilers below!)

Todd is introduced as a character many of us can understand immediately: he’s the new kid at school, the younger sibling of a big-shot.  Todd is part of a legacy, his older brother held in high esteem at Welton, and Headmaster Nolan seems to immediately put great stock in the fact that Todd is another Anderson.  Todd is living in the shadow of greatness, pressured to fill the same position as his brother, or fail.  

On top of that and clear parental favoritism directed at his brother, Todd is a naturally nervous, shy person.  He’s quiet, withdrawn, the total opposite of his roommate, the outgoing, laid-back Neil, and the two continue to contrast each other throughout the whole film.

Shy characters as protagonists aren’t completely unusual, and can, in fact, be kind of hard to pull off, to the point where audiences don’t always realize that they are the protagonist.  They run the risk of being mistaken for a supporting character, or dismissed as ‘not strong enough’ to carry their own story, and indeed, it can seem like this is exactly what happens to Todd.

For most of the film, it can be very easy to be under the impression that Todd is not the protagonist, rather that he plays a supporting role to Neil.  However, on a closer inspection, the truth becomes clear:

Todd is the one who is doing the growing and changing.

Throughout the film, the audience witnesses Todd grow into his own as a poet, following his journey as he learns to speak out.  Todd is the main beneficiary of Mr. Keating’s English class, the one who takes his lessons to heart and lives them out in the best way.

As I’ve mentioned before, every protagonist has to have a problem, and early on, it’s easy to see what Todd’s problem is: He’s the Un-Favorite, on the receiving end of Always Someone Better.  As he says to Neil:

“I’m not like you, all right? You – you say things and people listen. I’m – I’m not like that.”

Todd’s Problem is that he is living in the shadow of everyone around him, and as a result, has to struggle to find his voice.

And it is a struggle.

Todd is practically dragged into the Dead Poets Society revival, under the condition that he doesn’t have to read out-loud.  He’s terrified of speaking in public in general, and it is when he is forced into the situation by Mr. Keating that a transformation begins to take place.

In many films, (and stories in general) the Aha! Moment is an important one for a protagonist.  It is the moment that sparks change, that signals growth beginning.  For Todd, it is the scene where Mr. Keating forces him to create a poem on the spot, in front of the entire class.

Whether his poem is ‘your thing’ or not, the moment is crucial to Todd’s development: he becomes a poet, something different from his brother, and begins to grow out from under the shadows, into his own person.  Through Mr. Keating’s class, and his friendships with the other boys, especially Neil, Todd finally shows some backbone.

Until tragedy strikes.

In moments like where Neil helps Todd laugh at his family’s pressure on him (with the flying desk), Todd’s more confident side starts to emerge, slowly becoming more outspoken, until Neil’s suicide.  Completely broken by it, Todd runs off into the snow, and when he returns, he’s very much like he was at the beginning of the film: quiet, nervous, and unwilling to speak out, most notably when he’s questioned by Headmaster Nolan.

But he doesn’t stay that way.

When Mr. Keating returns to the classroom one last time, Todd finds his voice again.  Unable to remain quiet any longer, Todd becomes the leader, filling in Neil’s place, leading a few of his classmates against the grain, standing up for himself and his teacher, informing both Mr. Keating and the audience that Todd will not be living under a shadow any longer.

This is Todd’s ‘dragon slaying’ moment, his ‘hero’ scene.  Throughout the film, we see him grow and change, which protagonists are supposed to do, and finally, at the end, we see him overcome his internal obstacle, becoming a stronger person for it.  At the end, the audience feels satisfaction, even if the consequences for his actions may be unfortunate, because he did the right thing and proved himself a heroic character, fulfilling the arc set in motion the moment he created an improv poem and realized he was good at it.

Unfortunately, not all characters get even this bittersweet ending.

Much like Todd, Neil Perry is the subject of high expectations.  Headmaster Nolan is seen early on telling Neil how high his hopes are for him, and instead of Neil answering, his father announces that Neil won’t let him down.  Even in the first few minutes of the film, it’s easy to figure out what Neil’s problem is: his father controls his life as though it were his own.

Both Neil and Todd are both introduced speaking to Mr. Nolan with their parents, instantly setting up the pressures put on them by both the school and their family, establishing their common ground immediately.  

As I’ve mentioned before, Neil is set up as an instant contrast with Todd, with one exception: When Neil is around his father, he essentially becomes a version of Todd, subdued and quiet.  Around every other character, Neil is the life of the party, further emphasizing the extreme reaction he has to his own family.

And it’s not on purpose.

Neil wants to talk to his father.  He wants to explain his passion for acting, and his frustration with his life being controlled and pushed in a direction that Neil has no interest in, but unfortunately, he doesn’t know how.  His father shuts down any conversation direction that he doesn’t approve of, and makes sure that Neil cuts out everything that isn’t directly linked to the plan that his father hasn’t already set out for him.  Neil feels completely trapped in his role as the ‘dutiful son’, unable to break free in a way that ends happily for him.

Neil’s relationship with his father is extremely jarring in comparison with his role in the rest of the story, as I mentioned earlier.  He’s a natural leader, the first to be on board with Mr. Keating and his unorthodox teaching styles.  He throws himself into the new English class, loving the chance to take the lead by reviving the Dead Poets Society.  He drags Todd into it, as well as the rest of his friends, because again, Neil is a leader, and he’s finally found something he wants to do.  As he tells Todd:

“For the first time in my whole life, I know what I want to do…and for the first time, I’m going to do it! Whether my father wants me to or not. Carpe diem!”

Neil wants to live his life to the fullest, to seize life and make it extraordinary, as Mr. Keating suggests, giving him confidence.  But again, his confidence deflates when confronted with his father, even after a successful performance proving his abilities as an actor.

He doesn’t put up a fight, knowing it’s useless.  So after his father shoots his dreams down, Neil shoots himself, with his father’s gun, rather than give up and succumb to a life he doesn’t want.

Until this point, Neil could easily be mistaken for a protagonist, and although he isn’t, his importance is keenly felt through the remainder of the movie, even though he’s no longer there.  It is his death that kicks off the investigation into the Dead Poets Society, that sends Keating into a spiral of depression and his classmates into confusion.  Welton, aware of the scandal that could emerge, shuts down any non-conformity, bringing it back to status quo, giving Todd the opportunity to buck it for the right reason, picking up where Neil left off.  Neil was left as a tragic inspiration, and his imprint is necessary for the film to work as an emotional, impactful story.

But neither Neil nor Todd would have been able to change anything about their lives if not for the teacher himself.

Mr. John Keating is the quintessential Cool Teacher, and a Blithe Spirit, a foil to Welton’s traditionalism.

Keating is actually from Welton, which may explain his zest for changing things up.  He takes his students from their classrooms, showing them new ways to interpret poetry, yes, but also life.  “Seize the day,” he tells them.  “Make your lives extraordinary.”

He’s an outsider among the faculty at Welton, clearly looked down upon for his methods that are considered disruptive.  He argues with them, explaining that without dreams, without free-thinking, there’s no point to life.  He wants these boys to think for themselves, to become their own, best versions of themselves.  It’s a noble enough goal for this Reasonable Authority Figure, and yet…it doesn’t work out.

But it’s not for lack of trying.

Keating is a father to his students, dispensing wisdom that goes beyond ‘rebellion is cool’.  On the contrary, he actually advises a few of his students to not rebel, or at least, not go that far, especially just to do it.  He may be blithe, but he’s not stupid, and he knows his students aren’t, either.

He teaches them about poetry, love, and life, and he wants the boys to live their own lives true to themselves.  He teaches them to look at everything from a new perspective, and that it’s okay to be an individual, but he also tells them how to do it safely, by living out his own values as well as explaining them.

What’s important to note is that, while it seems the boys’ tragic outcomes are linked specifically to Keating himself, as a matter of fact, Keating’s advice is always solid, and usually ignored, ironic, considering that the boys wholeheartedly embrace him as their ‘Captain’.  His advice to Charlie about when to be daring and when it’s just stupid falls by the wayside after Charlie decks Cameron, getting him expelled.  His suggestion that Neil speaks to his father and tries to explain is similarly ignored, as Neil feels he can’t.

Even worse, despite the fact that none of this is his fault, he feels like it is.

Keating clearly feels responsible for Neil’s death, for encouraging him, shown by his breakdown in his own empty classroom.  He’s tried his best to improve these boys’ lives, and he feels that he has failed in every way, sending him into a depression as he is fired, only lifted by one final act of his remaining students.

As Todd leads a few of the boys, standing on their desks and shouting out: “O Captain, My Captain”, they tell him with those words that they will not forget him, that his teaching hadn’t been in vain, that it had meant something, that he hadn’t failed them.  It is in that final act that Keating feels redeemed, and that his attempts to teach the boys something important had meaning.

And more than just Todd took it to heart.

Charlie Dalton, a classic Class Clown prankster, was one of the boys who took to Mr. Keating the most zealously.  A mischief maker to the core, he’s not dumb, but he is reckless, Hot-Blooded to the point where it can get him in trouble.  He can come across as a bit of a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, brash and excessively rebellious, but good-hearted under it all.  He’s free-spirited before Keating comes on the scene, and as a result, really takes off under Mr. Keating, albeit needing some guidance in order to do it right, in a way that’s daring, not stupid.

Granted, he does screw up.  But after he screws up, he takes ownership of it.

Charlie’s loyalty is unquestionable.  Even after disciplinary actions taken by the school, Charlie refuses to sell out the rest of the Dead Poets, and in the end, after Cameron does sell them out, Charlie’s hot-blooded nature results in an action that ends with him expelled from the school.  A bittersweet ending, for sure, but there’s no question that he’d rather that than betrayal.

As would Knox.

Knox Overstreet is very much a Charmer wanna-be, a Stalker with a Crush to Chris, a girl he meets early on in the film and who he is determined to woo.  Most of his individualism in the cast comes from his totally love-struck behavior after meeting Chris, as beforehand, he’s kind of just one of the guys.  After falling in unrequited love, however, he takes on a hugely individual personality among the boys: extremely dramatic.

His growth in confidence from the Dead Poets Society and Mr. Keating leads to him pursuing Chris, despite all signals that he probably shouldn’t, ranging from her having a boyfriend already to her literally telling him off.  Although he definitely goes a bit far, Knox becomes a very passionate, determined young man, and finally does end up winning Chris over to him, and overall possibly ending up better for it.

Which is more than we can say for Cameron.

Richard Cameron is a Dirty Coward to the core, very much the Friend Nobody Likes.  His concern is tradition, the status quo.  He doesn’t want to tear out the pages of the books, and he clearly doesn’t enjoy Mr. Keating as a teacher.  He’s skeptical of the new and unorthodox, a young version of the older administration.  Cameron is a suck-up, a Turncoat, the Informant, who turns his classmates over in a heartbeat rather than face any consequences himself.  He is the first to tattle to the administration and blame Keating for everything, and he never changes.  He doesn’t stand with Todd and the rest.  Keating’s teachings have fallen on deaf ears, and Charlie ends the film much as he began it, completely unchanged.

And then, of course, there’s the closest thing this film had to an antagonist: Neil Perry’s father.

In contrast to Headmaster Nolan, who was at least just doing his job, Mr. Perry is a Control Freak towards Neil for little reason other than what appears to be selfishness.  He ignores Neil’s goals and dreams, imposing his own on the boy and acting as though Neil’s life is his, forcing him to give up extracurricular activities and indeed, anything that isn’t directly connected to medical school.  He crushes any protest or mild argument, trapping Neil in a cycle of silence and misery, simply because Neil’s goals aren’t in Mr. Perry’s plan.

Mr. Perry views Neil as a vehicle for himself.  All of their interactions are based in how Mr. Perry thinks Neil reflects on himself, to the point where Mr. Perry cannot see that he is the cause for his son’s suicide, choosing instead to pin it all on the person that he blames for Neil’s ‘rebellion’.

With all that said, as awful as Mr. Perry seems, his goals are genuinely what’s best for his son.  A lack of communication and different values drives the two so far apart that they genuinely cannot communicate.  Mr. Perry thinks he has done right by his son by giving him this opportunity, and cannot understand that he needs to consult Neil on what path Neil wants to choose, inevitably leading to his son’s suicide.

None of these characters are black and white.

While some are more on the side of wrong than others, it’s interesting the way that Dead Poets Society plays with ideas of rebellion against a system, showing healthy and good ways to do it contrasted with bad ones.  These people are shown to us as human as we are, capable of making huge mistakes and having to live with the consequences of them.  Every character is here to hold up an idea and ask the audience to think about it, to evaluate it.

The drama of this film is in that there is no clear answer.  Extremes in either direction lead to disaster, it is up to each of us to find the middle ground between tradition and individualism, and for each of us, and each situation, that middle road may look different.  Through these characters, the film actively encourages thought from an audience to look at each choice made by each person and question if they were right, and if not, what exactly went wrong?

Like many dramas, Dead Poets Society is, if not a realistic film, a film designed to be real, a mirror held to a culture that is constantly wavering between two extremes, asking its audience what to do when we glimpse the systems that we live in.  In that, the movie’s characters come across as genuine, confused people in a world with no clear answers.

And more importantly, we care about them.

The reason “O Captain, My Captain” has stuck around thanks to this film isn’t just the message, it’s the complex people with motivations and personalities and reasons for being the way that they are, and for wanting what they want.  We connect to them instantly for that reason, and we want things to work out for them.

Every character in Dead Poets Society is there for a purpose, to fill out a cast of people with personalities that audiences grasp and relate to, to the point where generations of youth still gravitate towards this film set in a time past.  These people and their different beliefs and styles all carry their own stories, making us care about them all.

And in the end, that’s the mark of a good character.

Characters exist to make you care, whether in a good way or a bad way, and with that in mind, the characters of Dead Poets Society more than live up to the task.  They leave a strong impact, letting us as audience members remember each one of them, their goals, and how they tried to go about them, long after the movie is over.

We remember these boys, and their teacher, and how they tried to make their lives extraordinary, inadvertently asking us how we’ll do the same.

In the articles ahead, we’re going to be taking a look at some of the other important elements of Dead Poets Society, so if you enjoyed this one, stick around and join us!  Don’t forget to leave a comment, like, or some other form of love if you enjoyed it, and follow for more!  Thanks so much for reading, and I hope to see you in the next article.

[gofancyninjaworld]

Why do you think Genos isn't weak? I agree that he can fight monsters but he won't stand a chance against strong monsters. He has been with Saitama for the longest time but he never learned anything. His naivety is the reason why he is weak, he is still consumed by the "normative awareness". His reaction to Amai Mask's transformation is a proof of that. His mindset never grew. He respects Saitama but does not understand him, which is why he is weak.

Please let me apologise in advance. First, this is long. Second, I do have a lot of thoughts.

Yeah, But

There isn’t a character in this series where the fanbase disagrees with the writer so deeply as this guy.  When interviewed, ONE insouciantly said ‘Genos is rather strong, even for a Class S hero,’ and fans went, ‘huh? You could have fooled us!’  It’s not without cause.  No matter how well his fights go, ONE always makes sure that we can append an asterix to it, that we can go yeah, but*

Right from the get go, every victory is downplayed. He thrashed Armored Gorilla, but we had no idea how strong Armored Gorilla was. Not for many, many chapters, until a much-shrunken, unarmored Armored Gorilla killed a tiger-level monster with one punch.   He clears a city and defeats two troublesome demon-level monsters in a matter of minutes? Yeah, but look at the state of his arms and oh! see, see, he just got flattened by that other monster!  Bang needs to save Garou from his clutches?  Yeah, but what if Garou was well?  He’s turning monster after monster into Cubist expressions without getting a speck of blood on him? Yeah, but it’s not like we can see what’s going on – the camera pans everywhere else.  He does the unbelievable against Elder Centipede?  We start going wow, followed quickly by – yeah but the monster regenerated, he’s fated to always lose.  He destroys G-5 without effort?  Oh My GAWD!  The Honour of Atomic Samurai [1] Has Been Besmirched!  (me: huh how does that follow? No, don’t explain – I do understand. Because Genos is seen as weak, if he does what another character couldn’t, then it’s seen as a disgrace to the other character, not an achievement for him.)

battle without honour – if he beat Garou, then he’s a bully, if he didn’t, then he’s a wimp

Of course, the converse is also true. If Genos is having a bad time, the camera lingers in 4K with extra slow-mo. And if the action switches, like when he went from struggling against G-4 to working out how to shut the robot’s lasers down and pull it into punching range, the camera pans away, returning only to feast on the grisly aftermath.

The final clincher is Genos himself, who never reacts with the slightest sense of celebration or triumph no matter how well a fight goes.  His lack of joy in fights is something that ONE has emphasised to Murata.   Being able to celebrate with characters is half the joy of watching them fight.

by contrast, hell yeah, Metal Bat! The story leaves no room for doubt that Metal Bat’s to be found awesome. And he is!  :)

The reason I go into all this is that I get it: Genos is presented to us in a way that gives us cause to doubt his strength.  In that, he’s like the opposite of Saitama, who is presented to us so we can have no doubt as to his strength, but to the internal audience in a way that keeps raising doubts in their minds.

But Genos is strong. He’s physically very strong, very fast, and versatile.  And he’s far less fragile than he is popularly made out to be. There is no reason he shouldn’t be able to take on very strong monsters, subject to match up (like almost every other hero [2]). However, ONE will make damn sure that Genos does not get to appreciate how much more powerful he has grown. What’s it going to be? What’s it going to take this time to knock down Demon Cyborg? Are several cadre going to attack him at the same time? Or will the super-insane monster that looks like the lovechild of Smaug, better-looking Sauruman and a hydra perched at the top of the mile high tower do him in first?  What’s going to *keep* him down? Place your bets, folk: the outcome is sure to be gruesome.

Which actually brings me directly to addressing your assertion: “…but he won’t stand a chance against strong monsters.“  Because it presupposes that Genos MUST be weak, any monster he defeats can’t possibly be strong.  A more honest rephrasing would be ‘I’m not prepared to accept that any monster that Genos could defeat is strong.’

No mental growth? Really?

That’s the physical part.  Let’s go onto mentality.  Annoyingly, I have to treat the manga and webcomic as separate entities at this point.  If you like the detail, I’ve written an extensive side-by-side comparison essay: link. You can skip it for this answer. :)

You know what would have made me think Genos weak?  If Saitama’s fears for what might be happening to him the morning he caught up with Garou had come true:

Before Elder Centipede showed up, Genos had told Garou that he’d finally begun to understand what Saitama had been saying to him about strengthening his spirit.  And then ONE put that to the test when he put Genos in the worst pinch the latter had ever been in: chopped in half and about to be devoured by a monster, with the only heroes watching those who’d proved impotent [3] to do anything to the monster.  Instead of giving up the way he had against Mosquito Girl, Genos dug deep and not only saved himself, but counter-attacked and burned the monster from stem to stern.  That is excellent: there is no place for a character who cannot find self-efficacy in a pinch.  

Without doubt, Genos has further to go, but in the manga it is wilful blindness to claim that he hasn’t developed mentally.

Now, let’s move onto the webcomic.

Even though ONE has done far less with his character in the webcomic than he has in the manga, Genos is back and fighting when most of his classmates are still rolling on the ground, unable to come to terms with losing. There is a real strength to getting up again and moving forward. 

It’s not that Genos doesn’t have any doubts: he does.  From his crushing realisation that he had made a mistake in giving up his human body to asking if he can really become stronger by changing his parts, Genos is very aware of a sense of stagnation and appears very worried by something.  But still, he’s not giving up and he’s not stopped looking to make progress.

even as Saitama despairs of being able to help, he cannot fault Genos for his determination

Still, why cheer for a loser?

There’s a real cognitive dissonance in fans who praise to the high heavens and write as inspirational Saitama’s words to keep trying and moving forward, no matter what, and yet are happy to mock Genos for doing exactly that.

There’s no honour for you if you laugh at characters taking Saitama’s advice

It’s amazing.  Does anyone imagine that before Saitama became too strong, he never failed? Really?  Saitama himself will disagree with that!  Sometimes success looks like reaching the summit of a mountain, but often, it’s only visible in the rearview mirror.  We saw it took Saitama a long time to finally accept that yup, he was just the strongest.

Something I came to realise a while back, people say they love seeing struggle, but real fights don’t sell well in mass media (yes, I have more extensive thoughts on this, here). We like the struggle, but we want the assurance that the underdog has something in their favour that will guarantee that we’re backing a winner.  At one level, we know we’re just watching *how* Garou is going to succeed… at least until Saitama body-checks him to great dramatic effect.

Goodness knows that everything is arranged against Genos and success. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble recounting most of them:

His lack of a biological body to train up.

His dependence on a mechanical body with its set in stone limitations.

His dependence on the cleverness and resources of others.

His lack of innate talent or heritage (and if he had any, they’ve long since been binned).

His stubborn persistence on a pathway we’re sure cannot possibly succeed.

His mentality, which is getting better, but isn’t there yet.

His persistent psychological problems that put him at high risk of turning into a monster instead.

The unresolved mysteries surrounding him, which make lots of fans think there’s a devastating revelation at hand from which he cannot recover.

And oh, he’s not the most likeable or relatable character out there. It shouldn’t be a factor, but it totally is.

And yet, Genos hasn’t stopped moving forward.  No idea how far he’ll get, but so far, Genos has not set himself a limit to the number of times he’s willing to get himself up and try again.  Not only that, he’s raised his sights higher, not lower.

For that and more, I’m not only happy to call Genos strong, but I’m willing to follow along with him however far or short his journey ends up being.

The risk of heartbreak is worth the excitement of seeing a real fighter working out his uncertain destiny.

no one can accuse him of lacking ambition. Gambatte!

Asides

[1] I know there’s a meme going round about Atomic Samurai being weak, but it’s as much in jest as the one about King being strong.  Anyone believing Atomic weak has piss-holes for eyes.

[2] There’s a reason Phoenixman highlights four heroes in particular – Blast, Tatsumaki, Metal Knight and King (Saitama).  They’re the heroes who are so strong that they’ve broken out of the tyranny of match up.  Everyone else has something they can’t deal with.

[3] You’re calling two old men impotent? Have you no shame?! In general, no, I haven’t much shame.  In this specific instance, it is entirely warranted.

[celialestial]

Okay. Well, if I’m being honest, this episode was not the greatest. This is also the first analysis I’ve made for a show, at least that I’m posting. We’ll see how this goes. Strap in, this is going to be long. 

I think we have all learned by now that Jamie-focused episodes are never the strongest. I find it a bit ironic that in a show called Jamie Johnson, the least interesting character is Jamie himself. 

We finally saw the end of the, dare I say, idiotic Under-13s subplot. The classic “arguing friends are trapped in a room together until they make-up” trope was used to its, not fullest, but decent potential. The greatest part of this episode was the fact that their eighth-grade drama was resolved; that and the ten seconds of screentime Dillon received. Liam continues to prove that he has still not grown. Here’s my analysis of his development:

[I was going to insert a clever chart of his nonexistent growth, but I’m too lazy, sorry. Here’s a paragraph about it instead:]

Liam needs to learn that manipulating people and pretending to have changed is not maturity, it’s being an asshole. He has a terrible father, that’s true, but Dillon managed to change. Nothing has ever truly been at stake for Liam. He’s been able to lie and manipulate others to get out of all the trouble he’s caused. He was given a second chance to play with the Under-13s and has continued to use those around him in order to seem, I don’t know. Big? Powerful? All he has done is made the Three Musketeers dislike him even more. He has done absolutely nothing to earn their trust. I could go on and on about Liam Simmonds, which I suppose proves he’s an interesting character (that’s more than I can say about some people *cough* Jamie *cough*). 

Eric learns that Aisha has feelings for him too. Yay! He also learns that Aisha is much smarter and more mature than him, choosing to step back and give him time to be with his friends. Yay? Freddie has been incredibly weird this season. I can’t tell if he genuinely liked Aisha as more than a friend, or if he thought he was supposed to, given how much Eric liked her. This entire storyline comprised of way too much unnecessary drama. Looking at Instagram comments, however, it seems that it was very popular among younger kids. I suppose I am a bit too old to be criticizing middle school relationship drama in a children’s show. Poor Alba was practically thrown to the dogs in favor of a petty love triangle. All of their problems were wrapped up so neatly, it felt a bit uncomfortable. Like they didn’t deserve this ending. 

I don’t know if it’s just me, but something about this episode seemed off. When comparing it to other episodes with similar premises, the lack of emotion and genuineness becomes obvious. Take episode 10, for example, there were many (and I mean many) subplots. It was a little all over the place. And yet, the end of the episode left me feeling bittersweet, intrigued, and wanting more. This episode didn’t do that. I am sick of Jamie’s bullshit and tired of this dumb love triangle. Thankfully, the latter is complete now. 

Onto Jamie’s storyline:

1) I told y’all Jetpac11 would be Jethro! These are some big brain hours.

2) This boy is supposed to be the TITLE character. His storyline is meant to be the most in depth, the most interesting, and, above all else, the most entertaining. It is none of those things. The stakes are supposed to be high, and they are, but they don’t feel like it? He supposedly lost his place at Hawkstone over a goddamn video game. Why don’t I feel anything except contempt? If not frustration at Jamie, then frustration at Ian, who I suppose I should be used to by now. Everyone says Jamie should know better than to trust him after all he’s done. That he should just listen to Mike. Obviously that’s true, but Ian was on his side, not the other way around. Ian enabled Jamie and allowed him to make a stupid decision, one that has huge consequences. Ian didn’t tell Jamie to keep playing for his own gain, well, kind of. He let Jamie keep playing because he though it would make him happy and regain his trust. It’s the same reason Mike lied to Hawkstone. Both adults displayed extremely poor judgement, Ian just far more so, as always. I must admit that I have zero interest in video games. I also have zero interest in soccer (or, rather, football). Yet this show keeps me interested in the matches and invested in the characters. They have failed at maintaining my interest in this video gaming storyline. Part of this could be because I find Jamie boring and repetitive, or maybe he simply seems that way due to the plethora of vastly more compelling side characters. All I have learned from this is that Jamie is a pretty terrible friend, a poor judge of character, and impulsive. These are all faults he has had since season 1, except he used to be a genuinely decent friend. He has grown more self-involved and one-sighted (and one-sided, as in one-dimensional, or you could take it literally, seeing as one leg is currently out of commission). I get that he was hit by a car and his leg is broken. He doesn’t see a future in soccer for himself anymore. Mike is right, though, he should be focused on getting better and being able to play again. I don’t even like Mike most of the time -- I honestly find him fairly annoying, although this may be due to the acting -- but he is the only sane one in the Johnson family right now. Both of Jamie’s parents are enabling him and Mike has too, though only for around an episode and a half. I am so happy this storyline will be resolved next week. I am sure we will still be left with a cliffhanger at the end, as with every season. 

Dillon also got a bit of screentime in this episode (wow, a whole twenty seconds!). I really do like the way the writers are portraying how conflicted he is. He is torn between living a lie or risking his future as a professional player. I understand why they introduced Elliot. He was Dillon’s first crush and I think he was necessary for Dillon to come to terms with his sexuality. Where they messed up with Elliot, however, is by entirely removing him from the show after he fulfilled his purpose of giving Dillon the strength to come out. Just as @mcustorm said, he was a plot device and it was out of character for him to out Dillon. I could probably write a whole essay about how dirty both Elliot and Kat were done. The only way using exclusively Ruby to further Dillon’s storyline would’ve worked was if they kept the whole “Ruby has a crush on Dillon” thing from season 4. Doing that would likely ruin their entire dynamic as best friends and make things awkward. If they had done that and made, say Harry or Michel his first crush, they wouldn’t need Elliot to be Dillon’s first real crush. Although, Dillon was only around 11 or 12, and most real crushes don’t hit until 13-14, at least in my experience. Also if they had ruined Dillon and Ruby’s dynamic, then Dillon would have no real support system. I can’t really see Ruby abandoning Dillon over this, though, even if she had an unrequited crush. 

Next week should wrap up both Jamie’s and Dillon’s storylines. It will also be the final episode of season 5! A lot to look forward to and a lot to be absolutely terrified of, not to mention the fact that season 6 production has been postponed for obvious reasons. 

TL;DR:

It’s the end of the Under-13s drama! And possibly the end of Aisha, knowing how JJ deals with its newly irrelevant characters.

Jamie is being stupid and probably lost his chances of getting into Hawkstone. Or maybe not, considering he’s the protagonist of a kid’s show. JJ does have a habit of dealing out real consequences, though, so who knows.

Dillon got... something? He’s feeling conflicted, which is entirely natural, especially at this stage in his coming out. 

Next week is the last episode! Stay tuned for more, I guess. Let me know if you guys enjoyed this type of proper analysis. 

[marshmallowgoop]

Brand New Animal...

So, the last few episodes of BNA: Brand New Animal dropped on Netflix Japan last week. I was initially really hyped for this anime—I devoted several hours of my life to translating and summarizing the Winter 2020 Otomedia interview concerning it—so I intended to write a lot more about the series, especially upon a wider release.

But having now seen every episode, this is another Kiznaiver and Darling in the Franxx for me. There’s a lot of potential, and I was incredibly invested at the start, but the narrative quickly goes directions and makes decisions that don’t sit well with me at all.

For those interested in BNA, my (mostly?) spoiler-free opinion is that it’s visually beautiful (especially in regards to its colors), but the story feels scattered, and there’s so little time devoted to positive interactions among the leads that their friendships fall flat. Further, speaking as a very character-oriented person, I finished this anime annoyed at the entire main cast. Their growth comes across as dissatisfying and undeserved.

Of course, it is more than worth noting that my understanding of Brand New Animal is indeed limited at this point; I don’t have much of a grasp on Japanese, there are no official English translations yet, and I watched with Japanese subtitles. (At least until episode 12. While there are thankfully subtitles available now, there weren’t when I watched, which is a huge disappointment in terms of accessibility.)

I recognize that my feelings may very well change if I have a better sense of everything that’s being said. But given what I do know, I—at least at the moment—have no desire to rewatch this series. I’m always open to requests to talk about BNA, but I don’t think I’ll be blogging much about it otherwise.

All that said, I do want to share some spoiler thoughts under the cut. As my sister noted, I am “very upset about this furry anime.”

First things first: I cannot stand Nazuna. I’m sorry. I think it’d probably be too much to say that she soured the whole show for me, but she definitely comes close.

Now, I got a (minor) degree in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, so, yes, I can’t help but wonder if my strong negative feelings are related to sexism. Would I feel so strongly if there were a man in Nazuna’s place? There’s been a lot of investigating myself these last few days, let me tell you.

Still, I can’t say I know the answers. But I do have some Thoughts that are maybe best illustrated with another anime I’ve started watching lately: My Hero Academia.

Do note that I’m only on Season 2, but there are also characters I strongly dislike so far in My Hero—characters who are arguably much worse than Nazuna, as far as their actions and behavior go. Bakugo is an angry, abusive bully, while Mineta sexually harasses women. I hate both of them, but—especially regarding Bakugo—it’s a different kind of hate than what I feel for Nazuna.

Why? Well, I won’t deny the possibility that sexism plays a role, but there’s also a profound difference in how these characters are treated by their stories. Bakugo initially gets away with his bad attitude, but upon coming to high school, he’s a pariah. He’s called out for being a jerk, time and time again. Mineta, similarly, is not adored for his actions. These aren’t nice dudes, and the narrative makes this point clear. Regarding Bakugo, I hate him, but it’s not exactly a bad kind of hate. Because I hate him, I’m rooting even harder for Deku to prove him wrong.

But what about Nazuna? She pretends to be another culture’s god, but much of BNA seems dedicated to treating her as a poor victim who was manipulated into manipulating others and needs to be rescued. While Nazuna’s situation is indeed a frightening one that I don’t at all intend to make light of, episode 6 makes abundantly clear that this girl adores masquerading as a goddess and fails to see any moral problem in tricking thousands of people into believing that she’s their savior.

And that, to me, is absolutely horrendous. Nazuna is not in kindergarten. She is not a small child still in the preoperational stage of development. She is an older teenager. I find it disconcerting to paint her as someone in a rough place who was simply desperate for love when she pointedly relishes her false godhood because it makes her feel like an idol. That is so unbelievably gross and disrespectful.

Of course, Nazuna truly doesn’t see what she’s doing as wrong, and I recognize that she is young. In the end, as I hope the Bakugo example highlights, my issues are really less about Nazuna herself and more about how she’s written and depicted. Just as there’s nothing inherently despicable about portraying a smug, selfish teenage boy in a cartoon, there’s nothing inherently despicable about portraying a smug, selfish teenage girl in another cartoon. But while Deku and Bakugo were also past friends just as Michiru and Nazuna, Deku never defends Bakugo’s awful behavior as Michiru does for Nazuna.

And that bothers me. Michiru—our protagonist and so the person viewers are pushed to empathize most with—never really seems to grasp just how disgusting Nazuna’s actions are. More importantly, neither does Nazuna herself. She’s instantly forgiven, and her dream comes true seemingly without any apology or understanding of wrong whatsoever.

Brand New Animal is filled to the brim with social commentary, but one message that stood out to me actually has nothing to do with the human/animal-human conflict. It’s instead that this cute girl never has to face the consequences of her actions because she’s cute.

I know, I know. This is some pretty over-the-top negativity. But I was so excited for this series. Especially considering the ending conflict around being “mixed” and “purebred,” I felt like BNA was an opportunity for writer Kazuki Nakashima to more thoroughly explore concepts he wanted to examine in Kill la Kill but didn’t because a talking outfit just ain’t gonna garner the same amount of sympathy as cute animal-humans. With my recent(ish) Wolf Children posting in mind, I also love that Brand New Animal ultimately pushes for diversity instead of away from it as I feel that film does, even if there are some... unfortunate implications along the way (that I don’t know if I’m personally capable of analyzing).

But 12 episodes simply couldn’t do this show justice. I’m supposed to care for a girl who calls being an animal-human a “disease” and never seems to really reconcile with how messed up that is? I’m supposed to care for a man who dismembers others in the name of “honor” and never seems to really reconcile with how messed up that is? I’m supposed to hope that two friends/lovers get back together when one is rude and dismissive towards the other for the majority of the show, and the other idolizes her and overlooks her truly terrible misdeeds?

Maybe I just don’t get it. Maybe I missed something (or a lot of things). But there is so much here that gets resolved too quickly or never receives the full exploration it deserves. As I said in the start, characters fall flat, their friendships fall flatter, and any good themes or messages that I do recognize in the series hardly impact me because the rushed development of the players soured my positive feelings for them.

I would have loved to see Michiru acknowledge that she’s in love with someone who does bad things. I would have loved a heart-to-heart where she admits this to Shirou, where he then admits that in his long life, there have been times when he’s been in the same boat. I would have loved to see Nazuna truly question her actions, where her declaration that she’s Nazuna instead of a cult leader actually means something because she’s recognized that she’s been wrong and is ready to be loved for herself, not someone she’s not. I would have loved to see a moment where Michiru expresses to Shirou that he shouldn’t control his violent tendencies for her approval but because it’s simply the right thing to do. The list goes on and on.

At the end of the day, I can admit my own garbage tastes. Bakugo is apparently the most popular My Hero character, and I don’t think I’ve seen anyone else express such a harsh opinion regarding Nazuna’s portrayal in BNA. Episode 5 of the show (with the baseball) seems to be its most adored entry, but I thought little of it. My favorite things in anime—and what I’m specifically looking forward to in Studio Trigger anime—are maybe anomalies.

But, gosh. I really wanted to love this.

[limitededitionsanderssidesblog]

Virgil’s Hidden Past

I just wanna take a sec to thank @winnie-the-patton​ for helping me with this theory.

Since February of 2018 a large group of fanders have head-cannoned Virgil of at one point being a dark side due to the entrance of Deceit and the knowledge that more (sinister) sides exist within Thomas. In Deceit’s introduction video, Can LYING Be Good??, Virgil was the first to realize who ‘Patton’ really was and had shown suspicion throughout the entirety of the video, going through different stages of speculation portrayed through the way he looks at ‘Patton’.

First there’s a peak of interest. Next there’s confusion and wariness. Then, lastly, realization and contempt.

Not only this but it is intriguing to take into account the reaction Roman elicits from Virgil when he mentions the existence of ‘the Dark Sides’:

There is most definitely annoyance is his response, but also a sort of sadness and emptiness to it. Roman said himself that he had made up that name on the spot, meaning that the other sides hidden away from Thomas aren’t (or weren’t) commonly called that. Virgil’s reaction could very well be a hurt reminder of who he once was or what he used to be a part of. Remember, Roman has given him similar nicknames before, such as “Dark and stormy night,” and even “Dark, strange son” by Patton, albeit without malice.

These fact and these looks alone were enough to act as a starting point for theories, but the trail often ended here. Until the recent past two videos.

In EMBARRASSING PHASES: The Nightmare Instead of Christmas! the entire purpose of the video was the fact that the other main sides had come to terms with who Virgil was now, which is a good thing, but consequently disregarded who he used to be and what he had been through while he was still the series antagonist. 

I found this to be really odd as I thought Virgil himself would want to forget about what he had been subjected to as a villain and would want to appear as less harmful to the group. Then the end credit scene came and Deceit made an unexpected appearance, and do you know what the first thing he said was? 

“Very well done Virgil. You’re so evolved.”

This line by itself holds a lot of meaning depending on whether or not it’s interpreted as a lie. Deceit could either be mocking Virgil for having not actually changed at all, or admitting that he has in fact grown. However what he says next leans the meaning more towards the former option.

When Virgil questions Deceit’s reason for being there his response is: “Hm, a bunch of talk about Halloween. A season for dressing up and pretending to be someone or something else.”

Note Virgil’s facial reaction to his saying this:

First he roles his eyes in irritation, but then he gives a sadder look off to the side before turning back to Deceit with possibly the softest look he has yet to give him, as if he’s really thinking about his words and taking them to heart.

Adding this in to his earlier statement Deceit's words could then be translated into meaning that he sees Virgil’s evolution was nothing more than a season of dress up and pretending; and as all seasons do, that it will end and he will eventually return to how he used to be.

What truly stuck out in this out of the blue appearance, and confused a lot of people, were the words, “just be sure to.. keep up that personal growth, Virgil. Who knows? Maybe soon... you could be rid of us all...” 

Again, the meaning behind these lines depends on where the lie is held, or if there is one at all. Looking at it straight forwardly Deceit is telling Virgil that if he continues to distance himself from who he once was he’ll lose them (whether [them] is the dark sides or the main three is hard to tell.) But if you add emphasis on the “rid” and the “us all” then the meaning is rewritten into Virgil’s attempt to change being the trigger that will cause him to recede back to what he was.

This all could be just wild ideas being thrown, but if you reverse the video and put the end credit scene at the beginning then what you have is not Deceit reacting to Virgil’s development, but rather Virgil’s retaliation to Deceit saying that he hasn’t, or rather can’t, change. The video then makes so much more sense. Instead of Virgil randomly trying to scare the others to show that his past hasn’t been erased, we have Virgil proving that his dark past won’t erase his progress and future with the others.

The fact that Deceit would say that Virgil is “evolved” implies that he knew what he used to be like, meaning that the two of them had interacted closely in the past. But is a simple statement or a few looks enough to confirm their history, or at least the depth of it? Well that’s why I’m going to be analyzing not only their interactions with each other, but also their similarities.

First off, the mother load of Virgil v. Deceit content, Selfishness v. Selflessness. In this video I noticed that Virgil was 1000% more hostile towards Deceit than in any of their other shared interactions. Back in LYING and EMBARRASSING PHASES Virgil still held a cold attitude towards Deceit, but there was defiantly a more mellow (but still tense) atmosphere as they talked. In S v. S Virgil was ruder and more abrupt, even interrupting him the second he was revealed and spending most all of his screen time trying to convince the others to get rid of him, such as when he yelled “Why is he still here?” He literally looked as if he was second away from throwing hands. 

Skipping forward a bit, one of the stronger bits of their interactions in this video is when Virgil tried to defend Patton when he tried to bribe Logan with a Butterfinger, saying that the whole set up was already rigged since Deceit, a liar, set it up. Which lead to this interesting part.

“Takes a liar to know a liar.” said Deceit, glancing from Virgil to Thomas. Virgil then looks around with heated suspicion, not yet understanding what he’s implying.

He’s thinking, pondering. He looks around in confusion before it hits him, that Deceit could expose his secrets at any time. He always knew he was a threat, but here it really hits home.

As it goes on and Patton consistently fails to put up a good fight against Deceit, Virgil realizes that he’s losing, Deceit might get what he wants, and his anxiety goes up.

He looks on in horror, shock, and disbelief, and recluses in on himself.

After that Virgil is called to the stand to be the next witness, to which he makes a face at Deceit refusing to go, not wanting to be used as apart of his scheme. Deceit in turn says, “Very well, you don’t usually have anything helpful to add anyway.” 

Sound familiar? It should, as it’s what Logan, Roman, and Thomas had told him on multiple occasions back before his redemption arc. Deceit played perfectly on one of Virgil’s insecurities of being useless to Thomas and manipulated him to play the game he didn’t want to be a part of. Then during his interrogation Virgil says something rather interesting:

“He’s a liar. You literally know him as Deceit.”

This stands out for several reasons. Why didn’t Virgil say “we know him”? Does the fact that he didn’t include himself mean that he know something the others don’t? Also, when he says “as Deceit” is he hinting that another name exists? Later in the video when Patton interrogates Deceit he asks if that is his real name, and Deceit answers “It is.” That could be a lie, or it could be true. 

After Virgil says this, Deceit then stops him by saying, “Glass houses, Virgil. You you’re self said you’re not a beacon of truth.”

The ‘glass houses’ part is what tripped me. Coming from the saying “people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.” this means that you should not criticize other people for bad qualities in their character that you have yourself. Touching back on when Deceit said “It takes a liar to know a liar.” This is followed up on with a layered, almost vague, back and forth conversation between the two of them. 

Deceit: So you’ve never been reluctant to share anything with the group then?

Virgil: Don’t.

Deceit: What? I just meant your name!

Virgil: Don’t!

Deceit: Maybe that’s why it’s so easy for you to recognize me for what I am. Like I said before, it takes a liar to know a liar.

This conversation is further analyzed in my other theory [Virgil Isn’t What He Seems] and for the sake of time, I won’t repeat everything glossed over in there, but I will bring something back up.

As I see it, the purpose of Deceit saying these things and aggravating Virgil is because he knows who Virgil truly is inside and wants him to stop denying who he is, just as he did in the end credit scene of EMBARRASSING PHASES when he spoke of him dressing up and pretending to be something he’s not. Virgil can recognize what Deceit for what he is because they are both pretending.

A hop, skip, and a boat later, after Deceit loses and leaves, Virgil tells Thomas “Do not allow him [Deceit] or any of his... friends to stick around that long ever again. Ever again!” When he speaks of his friends, he hesitates and pauses for a moment, as if he’s trying to find a correct term to describe the other dark sides. 

Out of everyone in the video Virgil was the only one strongly against Deceit’s presence. Sure Patton didn’t want him there because he was trying to get Thomas to act dishonestly, but Virgil didn’t want him there under any circumstances. As Deceit pointed out, Virgil didn’t want to go to the wedding either, but he was willing to put his feelings aside just to get rid of him. The fact that no one else was worried about his being there shows that the dark sides and the light don’t really interact with each other that often in the mind palace, except Virgil; maybe not presently but definitely in the past.

Moving away from specifics of interactions I found that Virgil and Deceit held several similarities to each other, and a few other important notes:

They both want to protect Thomas from what they represent, but cannot help who they are. 

Deceit didn’t want Thomas to fall victim to a society based on a lie, even though he’s literally the embodiment of deceit. While Virgil wants to protect Thomas from feeling anxious and feeling panicked, yet in the video he admitted that he told Thomas that a drink would poison him after sitting alone for 10 seconds.

Deceit makes an interesting foil to Virgil

Back when he was still Anxiety some fanders had issues with him due to their own anxiety, but it was never that extreme. On the other hand, while it’s perfectly alright and understandable, a lot of fanders have issues with Deceit on a much larger scale then there ever was for Virgil. Highlighting what could have been if Virgil wasn’t so lovable and stayed a villain.

both hiss (silly but true)

Both have inhumane characteristics

Deceit’s scales and snake eye and Virgil’s deep, demonic voice that he gets when he’s overly anxious.

Unique powers: Deceit’s ability to silence the other sides. Virgil’s ability to summon darkness around him.

Notice that these two powers of their’s creates 2/3 of the well known proverb of the Three Wise Monkeys, “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” which, in some scripts, lead to the fourth “do no evil.” Deceit can mute the sides and Virgil can blind them. Which just so happened to be foreshadowed back in MOVING ON Part 2/2

It’s possible that the other dark sides complete this proverb.

Virgil may possibly have naturally heterochromia eyes, just like Deceit, but has hidden them away.

This moment at 38:24 of S v. S has been speculated as Virgil having two differently colored eyes, or it just being an optical illusion due to the light shinning on his hair. But after looking over the video I found that it never happened other than then, which if it had been due to the lighting it would have happened at least twice.

Also, notice that both Deceit and Virgil were the only ones to not go under oath, as if both of them have something to hide

What exactly he may be hiding was brought to my attention by @my-analogical-romance

All the sides have multiple functions except for Virgil Unless he’s hiding them from the others because those functions may appear malicious or harmful to Thomas because of his core purpose as Anxiety. Anxiety in itself manifests and changes as people grow up and come out more as individuals (which as said in MOVING ON Part 1/2 was while Thomas was a teenager.) Anxiety could just be an umbrella for all that he represents, such as Logic and Creativity are just blanket names for what Logan and Roman contribute and manage in Thomas; or because there’s something he wants to keep hidden, something that could link him to Deceit and the Dark Sides.

There is a very high probability that Virgil was once a dark side and rather close to Deceit and the others before he decided to make a change and go to the Light sides. He could have been an accomplice to whatever it is that they did or do. When he was Anxiety he wasn’t truly welcomed by Thomas or the sides. He wasn’t seen as helpful and appeared as just an evil bad thought that had his heart set on ruining Thomas’s life, even though they now know that’s not true. Based on the analysis, in my opinion, Deceit, and possibly the other dark sides, want Virgil back to how he was, or how he seemed, which may tip the scale in the balance of power in Thomas’s head because they believe, as Deceit made claim to, the way the light sides are running things are putting Thomas at risk.