#and hans is a foil to anna right like they both grew up in a home void of love but both let it affect them very differently

[thecomet-and-themeteor]

Hi okay so this was originally supposed to be about the fact that I think he's a cool character that has a lot of potential that Disney ultimately fumbled but I just finished reading the novel adaptation of the movie and can someone please explain to my why they Cinderella-fied him if they didn't want me to root for his fucking redemption in the end????

Guys, it's been 11 years, and I had to finally start being honest with means, and that means being honest with y'all too by extension

I!!!!

Am a Hans stan 😔

[megashadowdragon]

I’m not a big fan of character hate period, and it’s idiotic that it occurs because of romance-related reasons (The ‘Die/Demonized for Our Ship’ trope is only one of them). Even in Twilight, I can give you a whole host of reasons why Bella is a bad character that have absolutely nothing (or very little) to do with her relationship with Edward and/or Jacob (or if they do, it’s related to how she treats other people while she is in a relationship with said guys). Ships and romance are not legitimate reasons to hate a character. If that romance is an ABUSIVE one, then obviously you can dislike/hate the abusive party. That’s not in question. But if you hate a character simply because they made some stupid relationship choices and/or 'get in the way’ of your ship, that’s stupid, and I don’t agree with it.

A better example is what happened in Young Justice with Miss Martian/Superboy and L'gann. L'gann is outright demonized by the fandom because he dared to date M'gann after she and Superboy broke up and he has a corny catchphrase. It also happens in the Teen Titans with Beast Boy and the Robin/Raven shippers (though to be fair, Starfire gets a LOT of hate over that ship as well). Also in regards to Snape, probably a better example is the demonization of James Potter from the Snape/Lily shippers (which is a whole other basket of apples considering Snape’s canon characterization).

And sorry, I wasn’t clear on the Hans/Anna/Kristoff thing. I meant that Hans gets VERY DESERVED flak for being…well, Hans, but also that Kristoff for whatever reason gets completely demonized by the Hans/Anna shippers. And then they BOTH get demonized by the Elsa/Anna shippers. Yeah. The main reason I think that was unreasonable is that there are plenty of reasons to hate Hans outside of the 'he gets in the way of Kristoff/Anna!’ Like the reason he’s a homicidal psychopath that wants to kill both sisters and get the crown and manipulates Anna into thinking she loves him. That’s a much better reason to dislike him than simply, 'I don’t like him because it means Anna can’t be with Kristoff!’ You see my point yet? Hating and demonizing a character because they 'get in the way’ of your preferred ship or made some idiotic relationship choices is dumb. People and characters are more than their romantic relationships.

I’d like you to take a look at the ’Die for our Ship’ and the ’Ron the Death Eater’ tropes and then get back to me. It’s what happened to Mako in-fandom. It’s not that uncommon, and happens just as often with male characters as it does with female characters.

On the rest of your post:

And Mako’s dismissal of Asami’s feelings was treated as wrong by the narrative. Asami called him out on it and said something to the effect of, 'you are in the wrong here and this is not okay, and blaming Bolin for telling me something you didn’t isn’t okay either.’ And Mako recognizes that his actions were wrong and that he went about the entire triangle issue the wrong way. Reiterating again, it was a jerk move, but Mako recognized that his actions were wrong and has been trying to atone for them. See: the tail end of Book 2 and literally the entirety of Book 3. It’s not like Mako was just given a free pass.

Do I deny that the love triangle could have been handled better? Of course not! Of course it could have been handled better. But whether it was due to mediocre writing or an 'art imitates life’ situation (because teenage romance is often a very messy and complicated thing IRL), the fact remains that hating and demonizing Mako because of his mishandling of the love triangle is like hating and demonizing Asami because she 'gets in the way’ of Makorra. Neither are okay. All of the characters have flaws and deal with situations less than perfectly because surprise surprise…they’re not perfect people. They make mistakes. Sometimes huge mistakes. And they ALL try to correct and atone for those mistakes. It’s something called character development. They’re all interesting and complex characters. Including Mako. You don’t seem to acknowledge that Mako has had quite a bit of character development since S1.

He needs to take responsibility for kissing Korra in front of Bolin? Korra kissed HIM! While on a date with Bolin! Please explain how Korra kissing Mako is somehow Mako’s fault. He may have reciprocated initially, but he was not the instigator. Korra does not get a free pass in this discussion. She is just as guilty as Mako for mishandling their relationship and the love triangle, both in Book 1 and in Book 2. Book 3 has been a refreshing change because it’s let them both have some character development independent of each other.

To be completely fair, from Mako’s perspective, what other reason could Korra have to accuse Hiroshi Sato of being an Equalist? Korra had shown jealousy and aggression towards Asami before that point and had actively attempted to mess up their relationship. Tenzin and Lin’s investigation brought up absolutely nothing that would indicate that Hiroshi was guilty. Korra’s only proof was an overheard conversation. And Mako DID take responsibility for it He sought Korra out afterwards and apologized for thinking that her reasons for accusing Hiroshi were related to his relationship with Asami. How long ago was it that you watched Book 1?

Book 1 and Book 2 had a six-month gap in between them. It’s implied that Mako and Asami worked out all of their issues (concerning the events of Book 1) in that time, as they are shown to be working together and being quite friendly in the first half of Book 2 (when he and Korra are still together). Korra and Asami had also worked out whatever lingering issues they had as they had become good friends (which was only furthered in Book 3). And they even explicitly talk about the Mako/Korra kiss while Mako and Asami were still dating. Where were you during that whole car conversation? The second half of Book 2 placed the blame solely on the shoulders of Mako within the narrative. Mako talks to Korra about his and Asami’s kiss right before they break up. He owns up to the mistakes he made, and Korra owns up to the mistakes she made. And then they break up.

And you’re being ridiculous about Mako’s other attributes. I’ve already discussed the Mako/Korra kiss. Him dating Asami has nothing to do with his ability to lead the Fire Ferrets. His relationship with Korra has nothing to do with his ability to raise and take of Bolin in the difficult circumstances they grew up in. His job as a cop has nothing to do with Korra until Korra’s actions intruded on his duty as a police officer. Some of Mako’s attributes that may be shown in relation to his romantic feelings for Korra and/or Asami, but have functionally nothing to do with either one. He’s incredibly protective of those he loves. This shown towards Korra and Asami, but also towards Bolin, Lin, and anyone else he happens to like. He loves Bolin to death and is very protective of him. His aloofness towards Bolin in Book 2 directly led to him trying to be closer and more attentive to him in Book 3. He’s a bit of a control freak and is pretty level-headed. He’s Korra’s foil narratively, which means that he attempts to ignore and avoid his problems instead of facing them head-on like Korra tends to do. Mako literally ACKNOWLEDGES that he is a hypocrite during the 'Harmonic Convergence’ episode when he and Bolin talk about how he is unable to take his own relationship advice.

What’s terribly ironic is that Bryke has stated a couple of times that Mako was intended to be 'a lighter, softer Zuko’ (while Korra was meant to be Aang’s antithesis). And we all know how much everyone loves Zuko.

Mako’s other attributes tying into his relationship issues don’t negate the fact that he has other attributes, nor do they negate that he had stories and character development separate from his romantic relationships with Korra and Asami. His role as the leader of the Fire Ferrets in Book 1, his life as a cop and trying to figure out what Varrick was up to in Book 2, his family subplot in Book 3…Mako had a life outside of his romantic relationships. Trying to pretend otherwise is blatantly ignoring the narrative.

[randomkposts]

A good villain is relatable

A good villain is relatable. It reminds us not to go there.

Take Hans from Frozen. Up until the pivotal moment, Hans made himself relatable and charming to Anna and the audience. How the reveal was done, jarred with the rest of his portrayal, but then again it's very Disney to have a villain motive rant. I feel he would have kissed Anna, and let her freeze into despair, but then the audience would think him the good guy, and he would have gotten away with it. That's what makes him scary. He wasn't obviously evil. He was manipulating her, and the audience through Charisma.

Gaston, is another good example, because he wouldn't be out of place in any time or day. He could fit in as a citizen of Bioshock's Columbia, just as easily as he could fit into modern AU. He is charismatic, he perpetuates discrimination, and objectifies women. He has followers, and enough public sway to whip the people into a frenzy.  

A lot of villains are dehumanized, and dehumanizing is dangerous. It prevents you from thinking of them as people. It separates you from them, by making them less Human. Take words like Nazi, or rapist. These are bad things to be, and you would kick the ass of anyone who was one, but would you be able to recognize one, if it was a friend or family member?

Often we are blinded to the things people close to us do, because we don't want to think they are that kind of person. We don't want to see them as that.

Let's take Severus Snape and Lily Evans as an example. Snape was a racist. He grew up and joined a group that killed and tortured muggles, and a lot of wizards. He was also, someone who came to her house, with her muggle parents and sister a lot, who had eaten dinner with her, and worked on potions with her, and hung out. She put energy and time and emotional investment into him.

It took him calling her a mudblood before she pulled back. Lets equivalent that to Nigger. Or Chingchong. Whatever word relates to You. Ok, sorry, about that those.

The point is, someone she knew, and trusted, and was best friends with, called her a slur in public when she was trying to help. That's kind of shattering. And maybe he was in a bad place, but what does that mean for the other muggleborns, about her family, the neighbors that live around them back home? If it can call her that, if he thinks that about her, what does it mean for all those other people. Scary thoughts, the longer she thinks on it.

It's a betrayal of what she thought of him, because she thought he was a friend, and here he is, revealing himself a racist, and that's not friend behavior. All of his other actions were friend behavior, and he was a friend, but he was also a racist against her, and that's not something she can have in a friend.

So Lilly had a choice. She could keep being his friend, turn a blind eye, keep being his exception to his hatred of Muggleborns.

Or she could step away from being his friend, and look at the person he's become/becoming. And it's not going to be someone she necessarily likes.

Ultimately, I think she did the right thing, stepping away. Snape is a fascinating character. It is relatable to screw up, to drive people away with thoughtless and cruel words and actions. Snape did, and rather than try to change his behavior, he kept digging his hole further. Peter Pettigrew tried to hide, tried to avoid the consequences, and in doing so, escalated things further, and closing any escapes behind him. They are relatable, but without changing their behaviors they are unable to have a redemption arc. They are good for reminding us not to go there.

Pettigrew, avoided the consequences by framing someone who actually was not guilty, hiding away, and when found, ran away from the consequences again, which lead to further crimes, such as murdering innocents. The unforgivables are called such, because they need intent to perform. That  means, Peter Pettigrew wanted Cedric Diggory, a kid he had barely met, to die strongly enough that he was able to make it a reality.

Snape stayed bitter and angry and became an abuser like his father he hated.  Not necessarily physical, but emotional. He tormented the kids he was supposed to teach, and despite being capable and innovative with potions, taught them in an anxiety inducing environment. He let his grudges colour the world he lived in, let his hatred of James colour his perception of Harry, took his anger out on other people.

To borrow a line from Dirgewithoutmusic about Snape.

“Love may have made him brave, perhaps. It had killed him, but it did not make Severus good.”

I wish we knew more about James. We know he went from a bullying teenager to a man Lily Evans could respect enough to marry. Maybe his turning point was when Sirius got Snape almost killed, or given an incurable ailment, and his friend was almost expelled or killed. Maybe it was realizing that Lily would never respect the person he is now if he kept this up. We don't see it happen. We only hear he straightened up.

We also see these reminders on Allies. Sirius Black is reckless. His reckless behavior lead to him putting both his friend, and a fellow student in danger. Snape could have been killed, and had Remus guilty of murder, and at worst killed. Snape could have been given the werewolf ailment, which could have at best led to Remus getting expelled or at worst killed. Sirius's reckless behavior led him to immediately tracking down Pettigrew, which ended with him in jail. Sirius's hatred of his house elf, and reckless words lead to his betrayal, and later his death.

He was someone who Harry considered a friend, but I don't feel I see a redemption arc. Has he changed? Does he regret it? What is he doing to fix things?

I think there is someone in the books who does a good job of fixing their mistakes. Ron. He doesn't do anything horrendous, but he is still hurtful. It hurts Harry when Ron leaves him. When Ron lets his jealousy, and insecurities rule him. When he and Hermione get into a fight over their pets. But unlike the other examples, Ron does something about it. He comes back. He apologizes. He makes up for them. It doesn't mean he won't mess up again and hurt people, but he will also come back with time and mend his bridges.

I've seen Neville compared to Peter Pettigrew, and while I understand the comparison, I see Neville as Remus Lupin. Someone who learns confidence in his time at Hogwarts. What If Ron is Peter Pettigrew's foil, and rather then run away and try to avoid his mistakes like his predecessor, he faces them and apologizes for them, reaches his hand out if the hole he has dug, and takes someones hand, not to pull them in with him, but to let them help him get out.

I started this by saying Villains should be relatable to remind us not to go there, and I want to end it by saying should be relatable to remind us how to get out of there. The art we have in our lives be it books, painting, movies, music, are all stories that teach us lessons. The best art makes us emotional, speaks to us, allows us to be sad, to be angry, or joyful, or to reflect on things. Stories teach us lessons we will use in our lives. How to deal with sadness. How to forgive. How to mend things. And yes, where the lines are.

[biofunmy]

Back to Basics for a Designer Whose Business Got Too Tight

Scott Sternberg would prefer you not call him “quirky,” as has happened many times before. It’s “a word people like to use for me a lot,” Mr. Sternberg said, “which I don’t love.”

So we will not repeat the offense, further than to note that, while Mr. Sternberg may not be quirky, there he was, in all his Peter Panish youthfulness, with his penchant for stripy shirts and Polaroid film, seated in a geodesic dome of his own design as vintage monitors played the funny little videos he creates, ruminating about utopia.

If Mr. Sternberg has a quirk — let’s say for a minute that he does — it is for ginning up not just clothes (which he does) or videos (which he does) or even geodesic domes (which he has, for his label’s first-ever pop-up, in the SoHo branch of the furniture seller Design Within Reach), but also an entire world in which all of these things come together, with its own rhythms, cadence, colors and meticulously designed aesthetic.

Mr. Sternberg, 44, is what is usually called a fashion designer, insofar as he is in the business of making and selling clothes. If you know his name, it is most likely that you remember his former label Band of Outsiders, which, from 2004 to 2015, had a profound impact on the way stylish American men dressed, squeezing them into slim shirts and skinny ties and Sperry Top-Siders: prep-school style in quotation marks, self-aware and self-effacing.

Mr. Sternberg thinks of himself less as a designer or a creative director than as a world builder. He and Band of Outsiders parted company, and his new brand, Entireworld (aha!), is less exclusive and less niche; a collection, essentially, of basics. It is clothing considered from the bottom up — one if its founding garments was a pair of underpants.

Now with a few more staples to round it out, Mr. Sternberg hopes for nothing less than to dress the entire world. A year into its life, the question is: Can he?

The Entireworld world, a fantasyland in Disney colors (Disney World is an acknowledged influence), is a cheerful, welcoming one. Mr. Sternberg’s Band of Outsider tailored jackets could once run $1,800 or more; Entireworld’s T-shirts are $32.

The same sensibility — Mr. Sternberg’s cinematic adorable — animates both. Many of the same friends who posed pro bono for guerrilla Polaroid ad campaigns are now in Instagram videos, singing, mugging or prat-falling: Jason Schwartzman, Kirsten Dunst, Andrew Garfield, Spike Jonze.

Over a series of interviews beginning in April 2018, at its inception, and continuing through Entireworld’s first year, Mr. Sternberg explained his vision of this world and how it was built on the ashes of its predecessor. In so doing, he offered a view into the tectonic shifts in the fashion industry, the instability of the high-fashion, runway model he left behind and the traditional gatekeepers who perpetuate it.

Mr. Sternberg had been featured in every fashion magazine, won the industry’s top awards, hosted Anna Wintour and Kanye West at his fashion shows. Still, he said at a public conversation at Design Within Reach with Deborah Needleman (the former T Magazine editor), “the fashion system can feel like jail.”

Band of Outsiders did $15 million in wholesale business its height, but Mr. Sternberg, overstretched and under-resourced, who sought and received investment, couldn’t keep up with the immense pressure to grow. He found out that his last hope for additional funding passed on the morning he opened the first Band of Outsiders shop in the United States, in SoHo. (The first-ever store had opened in Tokyo.)

He received a loan from CLCC, a Belgian fashion fund, for $2 million, but soon clashed with his new backers. Ultimately, Mr. Sternberg’s company defaulted on the loan and Mr. Sternberg himself walked away from the Band. CLCC assumed ownership, and Band of Outsiders continues without him, with a new design team in place. Mr. Sternberg called their first collection “a disaster.”

The challenges of designing and producing collection after collection of men’s and women’s wear are significant, and Band of Outsiders eventually grew to encompass several lines. The collections were well received but also vulnerable to the whims of trend and timeliness, and the vagaries of inconsistent production.

Even Band’s signature slim cuts were in part a self-fulfilling prophecy: After an initial run of shirts were (correctly) snug, other orders arrived from the factories in similar style. “Everything just came in a little bit small,” Mr. Sternberg said. “I’m not kidding.”

Band’s cuts — like those of Thom Browne, whose shrunken suits were a more conceptual foil to Mr. Sternberg’s easier Americana — helped convince curious young men to embrace a snugger silhouette. But that fit made democratizing and expanding the brand nearly impossible. In any case, high-fashion esotericism had never been Mr. Sternberg’s intention.

“That’s just not me,” he said. “That’s not how I see my legacy.”

If fashion is by definition exclusive, Entireworld is inclusive; fashion segments the world into groups of like-minded (and like-dressed) cohorts, but everyone wears underwear. In a video announcing the creation of Entireworld last year, Mr. Sternberg faced the camera and, as his face dissolved into a montage of stylish men and women (Mick Jagger, Sade, The Dude), acknowledged his past failings and vowed to take a different tack.

“I started thinking about what it would be like to create something more democratic this time, without compromising anything about the design or quality,” he said. “About the stuff we live in every day.”

But now, instead of staging fashion shows and courting the fashion press, instead of depending on the patronage of department stores and boutiques, Mr. Sternberg’s Entireworld is sold primarily from its own website.

Mr. Sternberg runs the entire business out of a bland commercial office building in the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles, from where he conjures a utopia only he can see. He is the man behind the curtain. Entireworld, and the thousand tiny windows onto it offered on Instagram posts and its cheeky, sunny website, is Oz.

Of course, the thing about Oz is that the man behind the curtain is pulling the levers, working to convince you to buy a $32 T-shirt from him, rather than a $10 three-pack from Hanes. He will tell you that his feels better, fits better and wears better; he will not be wrong.

But a basic is a basic, and to many, the difference is hard to parse. Mr. Sternberg is under pressure to make Entireworld so appealing that even its basics have ineffable magic that coaxes credits cards out of wallets.

Mr. Sternberg has to capture that market with less of the support he once enjoyed. “Have we captured the attention of traditional media outlets the way I expected to, the way I did at Band? Eh,” he said, giving a grunt of not-really. He has skipped the fashion shows and presentations he once staged. As a result, Entireworld has made a smaller splash.

But those who love it — those who may be rising to replace the old gatekeepers — have vouched for it. “Basically have not taken this sweatshirt off since I got it last week,” Leandra Medine, better known as the Man Repeller, posted to her Instagram not long after the label’s debut.

At Design Within Reach, Mr. Sternberg had his first real-world test, hanging racks of Entireworld clothes among Alexander Girard dolls and Man Ray chess sets and Hans Wegner chairs. Pegged to New York’s NYCxDesign programming, the Entireworld shop stayed open for 11 days, and customers came away with hot-pink sweatsuits and cotton sweaters.

“It was definitely something we had never done,” said Kim Phillips, the head of public relations and events for Design Within Reach. “It was sticking my neck out there for sure.”

Mr. Sternberg called the experiment gratifying. “An idea like this, I really believe more than ever has a place, especially when I see the sales and repeat sales,” he said. “I think the real challenge is — I know the real challenge is — that the amount of capital it’ll take to get where we need to getis formidable.”

To start Entireworld, Mr. Sternberg raised $1.5 million from a group of private investors, and he has sought further investment to grow and scale it. Within its first year, he said, the company has sold more than three quarters of its initial inventory and reached more than $1 million in sales without paying for any advertising.

Numbers like these, while impressive, mean Entireworld is dwarfed by many of its competitors, limited by finite capital but not in an ideal position to attract more. “There’s a real disconnect,” Mr. Sternberg said, between his values and the goals of the investors he is hoping to attract.

“Investors want a return, and they want a return in a certain amount of time,” he said. “I understand all these things, clearly, but they still don’t change my view that sticking to my guns in terms of what this is and what it should be shouldn’t bow too much to the pressure of what investors think it should be right now.”

And while the signs have been good — Ms. Phillips said that she and Mr. Sternberg were talking about the pop-up traveling to other Design Within Reach locations, and sales continue to climb online — the economic reality of keeping a fashion business afloat is a chilly reality intruding into utopia. The world isn’t Entireworld, yet. But Mr. Sternberg said there had been no question of not trying his hand in the rag trade again.

“Unfortunately not,” he said with a laugh. “I am an entrepreneur by birth. I am at my most ebullient, excited, energetic when there’s a big challenge and a huge bucket that needs these ideas to fill it out. It’s painful. It’s not easy. There’s just this unexplainable, probably illogical urge to do this stuff.”

Sahred From Source link Fashion and Style

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[hannahhook7744]

That's what I'm saying.

Guys, it's been 11 years, and I had to finally start being honest with means, and that means being honest with y'all too by extension

I!!!!

Am a Hans stan 😔