#and i can totally forgive her for a really shoehorned in conversation

[fictionadventurer]

Me: Is this Farmer Boy sequel written in 2012 really going to be able to feel like a legitimate follow-up to the style and atmosphere of the original, or is it just another modern cash-grab?

Heather Williams, on page 2: Best of all, he knew that fall meant crispy spareribs and sweet cider and hot roasted potatoes with melting butter and all the pumpkin pie he could eat.

Me: ....it looks like I can trust you. Carry on.

[moonlightreal]

Deep Dive: Diaspro!  Part one

Ah, Diaspro, the source of shoehorned-in shipping drama we love to hate! But what’s her real deal?  Is she a villain or a victim?  

We start sixteen years ago, in season one.  Bloom just arrived in the magic dimension and met a handsome blonde specialist named… Brandon. While Stella’s been shippy for the past year with the brown haired Prince Sky. Remember, Stella is repeating her first year at Alfea.  She met the boys during her first first year, so the two of them have been swapped for an entire year!

The truth doesn’t come out until episode seventeen, “Royal Heartbreak” in 4Kids and “Secrets Within Secrets” in Rai. Yeah, we’re gonna look at all the dubs.  

Bloom calls Sky to fix their relationship after the Trix tried to convince Sky that Bloom was a witch and he flipped out.  But Sky ends the conversation abruptly, and we see a hologram of Diaspro on his bookshelf.  I think this is the first time Diaspro appears in the series.

Sky asks Timmy for help.  In Rai he says straight out, “The girl I’ve got to marry, I don’t want to, I love Bloom!” 4Kids Timmy tells Sky to get out of town but Rai Timmy is more sensible and tells him to come clean to Bloom.  And wow, Riven comes up and tells Sky that Bloom isn’t worth it and they have a fistfight.  This show was more violent back in season one!

It’s the day of a big exhibition at Red Fountain, and everybody who’s anybody will be there.  In 4Kids it’s called the Day of the Royals. “Brandon” didn’t invite Bloom and “Prince Sky” didn’t invite Stella, so the girls sneak in. In 4kids Stella is talking about how when she and “Prince Sky” get married the alliance between Eraklyon and Solaria will create a huge and mighty empire.  Yikes.

Bloom literally runs into Diaspro, making her drop a hologram disc of Sky. The disc seems to be her phone, Disa’s literally on the phone with Sky. Diaspro sticks her nose in the air and forbids Bloom to even look at the hologram of “My boyfriend.”  She berates Bloom for ruining her entrance, calling her ‘peasant’ and assuming she’s a clumsy servant.

Bloom realizes this must be a trick by the witches!  Not totally irrational; the witches have been after Bloom this whole season

She delivers a note to Diaspro, calling her away.  A servant goes with them but Bloom casts a sleep spell on him and accuses Disa of being a witch.  When Diaspro’s just confused, Bloom transforms and attacks! She knocks Diaspro through a wall!  That’s assault, I think.  ^^; Diaspro transforms too.  They fight!  Bloom keeps accusing Diaspro of being one of the Trix and Diaspro defends herself and says who she really is.

The fight busts up through the ceiling which is the ground of the stadium where the boys are doing dragon wrangling.  Bloom and Diaspro appear in the sky where everyone can see them, still yelling and zapping away at each other.

Bloom knocks Diaspro to the ground and Sky runs to her.  And it alllll comes out.  This one is Sky and he’s the prince and Diaspro’s fiance.  Bloom sinks to the ground in defeat.  Sky does the “let me explain” thing but he doesn’t actually explain.

Erendor yells at the real Brandon, calling him a failure as a squire for not keeping Sky safe.  Oh, and Stella’s watching, the Winx are all hidden under the stands.  In 4Kids Erendor says, “We pay your tuition at Red Fountain so you can protect our son!”

In Rai we cut to Bloom moping and deciding to return to Earth and then the episode ends; in 4Kids we go to the Winx getting yelled at by Faragonda and Grizelda, then we get some more explanation from the girls.  Brandon and Sky switched identities before starting school at Red Fountain.  Musa says, ‘Word is he wanted to see what it’d be like to be a regular guy.  Like that’s a reason to be disrespecting my peeps.”  remember when Musa talked like that?  Stella declares she’s over “Sky.”  Bloom says she’s over boys, and the episode ends.

So far, Diaspro’s only guilty of being a stuck up jerk.  Which she IS, but she’s about to redeem herself.

Next time we see her is in episopde 19, as Red Fountain is under attack by the Army of Decay.  She come sin a flying ship with warriors from Eraklyon to rescue Sky.  She reminds him that he’s a prince and has duties to Eraklyon.  She throws down a rope for Sky, but he cuts the rope and shouts that his place is at Red fountain fighting to protect the magic dimension.

This Diaspro says, “Let these peasants fight for you!” but she’s not particularly mean.  Privileged as all get out, but not evil.

In episode 21 the boys rescue the girls on frozen Domino.  Stella forgives Brandon and hugs him.

Sky spills the beans.  

4Kids Sky: “I just wanted to see what it would feel like to be a regular guy for once.  I didn’t mean to hurt you, I care about you.  That’s why I broke off my arranged marriage to Diaspro.”

Rai Sky: “Sorry about what happened.  I broke it off with Diaspro. To be honest I never really cared that much.  But Bloom you always said to me that I was your friend and nothing more and so I just… well… it doesn’t matter now.  Because I know what I want.  In any case I’m sorry about the Brandon/Prince Sky thing.”

So who’s the villain here?

Diaspro is a stuck up mean girl with no respect for “peasants” which probably means she and Sky aren’t a great match, but she didn’t do anything actually bad.  And later on she was right to try to rescue Sky and remind him of his responsibility as a prince.  So she’s a mean girl who can also be quite noble.

Bloom accused Diaspro of being a witch and attacked her, which is pretty bad but Bloom is also dealing with witches who have been messing with her all season so she has reason to be paranoid.

Sky gets most of the blame in my view.  I wouldn’t call him a villain, but he does seem a bit spineless.  Sky swapped places with Brandon, to see what a nonroyal life is like and it didn’t cause any trouble until both boys got in relationships.  But now Sky is two-timing his royal fiance and he’s let Princess Stella fall for the commoner Brandon under false pretenses.  The right thing would be for Sky to explain it all to Bloom and Stella. Sky could have put things on hold with Bloom while he ended the engagement with Diaspro honorably.  But he didn’t do that.  Sh let things slide… how did he think it was going to turn out?

I wish we’d seen more of Sky and Brandon discussing this.  Did Brandon want to come clean to Stella?  Was Sky scared to dump Diaspro for political reasons? How did they end up engaged in the first place?  Did Sky have feelings for Diaspro once?  Was she less of a mean girl when she was younger?

So that’s season one.  What do you think of Diaspro?  Villain? Victim?  Both?  I’ll continue tracking her character arc through the Winx universe… eventually.

[miasswier]

miasswier’s ultimate glee ranking: no 15

15: The Break-Up

Written by: Ryan Murphy Directed by: Alfonso Gomez-Rejon

Overall Thoughts: This is one of the strongest episodes Glee ever did. It’s also one of the most emotional. It’s kind of strange, ranking it so high, though, because I actually rarely watch this episode since it makes me both furious and so, so sad. Let’s get into it.

What I Like:

My absolute favourite aspect of this episode is Brittana. We’ve seen Brittany explicitly missing Santana for three episodes now, and it all culminates in that scene at Breadstix. When Brittany tells Santana that she left her behind and it really hurt, I think it’s one of the most honest and emotional things Brittany has ever said. Although she didn’t want to break up with Santana, I think Santana was right in doing so. She didn’t shift any blame, she didn’t try and play the victim, she didn’t even excuse herself. “I haven’t been a good girlfriend to you” and that’s that. She isn’t what’s best for Brittany right now, and so she’s not going to keep dragging Brittany down. I think this is also one of the greatest character development moments for Santana; the Santana we saw in “Prom Queen” would never have thought of Brittany’s desires before hers. They’re growing up, and they’re doing what’s right. But, oh, god does it hurt to watch.

That scene between Finn and Rachel at the end is one of Lea Michele’s best acting moments in the entire show. Not that she’s a bad actress most of the time, but the emotion of it all is so real. It’s no secret that I’ve never been a big Finchel supporter, but I feel for her. I sobbed while watching this scene, just as I do every time, because she just blows me away.

The scene between Finn and Kurt is another personal favourite. We rarely got any scenes between these two, and it’s nice to see the comradery that they have.

Someone pointed out when this episode first came out that after “Don’t Speak” Blaine is always seen alone, sectioned off from the group. Even his first shot in “Don’t Speak” is him alone, the camera zooming in on him. Now, I really hate that Blaine cheated, like, more than anything, and I hate that they then spent the rest of the season focusing on his emotional journey rather than Kurt’s, but, that being said I think the imagery of this is lovely. It really shows his isolation, his loneliness, his state of mind. It also builds up in the next few episodes, and culminates in “Dynamic Duets”. It’s interesting how they can show so much about a person’s headspace with just cinematography.

Brody isn’t a douche. He shows up to Callbacks, and he greets Finn first. He’s nice to Finn, and he doesn’t ask Rachel to sing with him, only agrees to do so when Finn suggests it. He respects the boundaries that have obviously been raised by Finn being there, and I really appreciate that. Honestly, I feel like they could have done so much more with Brody if they hadn’t decided they were tired of him mid-season and offed him in one of the worst ways possible.

Kurt is so genuinely excited to see Blaine. It’s hard, because you know what’s coming, but it’s also refreshing to be reminded that even though Kurt is caught up in his new life that he still loves Blaine just as much as he did before he came to New York. It just sucks that the only nice scene we got between Klaine in this episode lasted .02 seconds.

Emma standing up for herself, and making it clear to Will that just because he didn’t get his way doesn’t mean the conversation isn’t over makes me so happy. People rarely talk about Emma’s character development, but she’s seriously come so far since season one. She made it very clear to Will that she wasn’t just going to bend over and do whatever he wanted, which is such a far cry from the Emma we met in the pilot who was basically following Will around like a lost puppy.

I know I already said it, but seriously. Brittana. They blow my mind.

What I Don’t Like:

The way the Klaine story plays out has always bothered me, and will continue to bother me until the day I die. They set it up so perfectly in the previous episode, and the beginning of this episode plays the same way: Kurt is too busy, and Blaine feels alone and neglected. THAT WAS ENOUGH OF A REASON FOR THEM TO BREAK UP. If a significant other made me feel the way Blaine was obviously feeling throughout this episode and the last one, I would break up with that significant other. He would have been completely justified in doing so. But no, apparently Kurt’s not allowed to be the bad guy (I love Kurt, I do, but he wasn’t being a good boyfriend), so instead of just going with what they set up, they pulled a cheating storyline out of thin air that made zero sense and honesty almost made me give up on Klaine. I just… ugh. I hate that they did that, and I will always hate that they did that.

The whole Kitty/Jake/Marley thing was stupid and unnecessary, as were most of their storylines throughout season four. Cut them out and give Brittana and Klaine, or even Wemma for fuck’s sake, more screen time. Please and thanks.

That being said, I really don’t understand why they tried to shoehorn Wemma into this episode as a “potential break-up” thing, when really all they had was a fight. By doing that, they basically brought them back down to high school level, like they’d been all throughout the first season, which isn’t what their relationship has been like for ages. It felt wrong and unnecessary, and I wish they’d played it more like the fight it was than as if it was some huge relationship ending drama that was literally never mentioned again.

While having all three main couples break up in one episode packed a huge punch, it was also frustrating because Finchel got the A plot, while Klaine got the B plot, Brittana the C, and then Wemma + Newbies a tiny D plot. Yeah, they tried to act like Klaine and Finchel got equal screentime, but most of the time both couples were on screen Finchel was touching, and cuddling and kissing, while Klaine were either in different cities or standing ten feet away from each other. Also, Finchel gets like a five-minute break-up scene at the end (which don’t get me wrong, I love that scene, I do) but we don’t even know if Kurt and Blaine are broken up. It just doesn’t seem fair to break every couple up in one episode if you aren’t going to give every couple their dues.

In “The Scientist” when they show Finchel and Wemma’s first kiss, and then scenes of Klaine and Brittana barely touching. WE GET IT FOX, YOU HATE GAYS. Jesus Christ.

Songs:

Barely Breathing: What I like about this song is how Blaine and Finn are in total different headspaces, but somehow this song manages to portray both perfectly. They sound awesome together, too. Plus, I love seeing Kurt in his fake Dalton uniform. Cutie.

Give Your Heart a Break: If I had to cut one song from this episode, it would be this one. I like it, don’t get me wrong, but it feels unnecessary. Every other song packs such an emotional punch, whereas this one is just sort of… there. I don’t know.

Teenage Dream: Although it breaks my heart, I really do love this version of the song. Slowed down versions of pop songs are my kryptonite, and Darren sounds so incredible singing it. Plus, again, the cinematography really does a good job of showing how isolated and claustrophobic he’s feeling. There’s also the crack in his voice when he says the last “let you put your hands on me”, which breaks my heart. He’s clearly thinking about Eli, and how desperately he wishes he hadn’t done it. All that being said: WHY DID YOU FUCKING CHEAT (im literally forever mad about it).

Don’t Speak: Again, emotional. Great harmonies. They all sound fantastic, and it’s really heartbreaking to watch. The one shot that always gets me is the one where Rachel and Blaine are alone at the fountain. Ouch.

Mine: Seriously, Brittana in this episode. Holy fuck. The first time I watched it I didn’t even ship Brittana (I didn’t really start shipping them until season five), but I still sobbed when Santana sang this, and I’ve sobbed every time since. It’s so fucking raw and emotional. So beautiful and amazing. I love it.

The Scientist: This is an awesome finale, and a really strong song. My only issue is how it’s pretty evenly split until right at the end when Rachel comes in and literally takes over the entire fucking song. I hate when they do that, it drives me crazy. But other than that, a great song to conclude a really strong episode.

Final Thoughts: Klaine is my otp, and I nearly lost faith in them during this episode. I’ll never forgive Glee for that. I still think that Blaine cheating was beyond unnecessary, and I will continue to think that until the day I die. That being said, it’s one of Glee’s strongest episodes ever, and that can’t be discounted. And seriously. Brittana. Holy fuck.

[eisforeidolon]

Episode: Atomic Monsters

I watched this at least a week ago, but just didn't get around to rewriting my notes into a post 'til now.  I did actually find this the best episode so far, but lets be real, that's such a low bar to clear at this point it says basically nothing.

The opening sequence is really fun!  I found the whole thing genuinely enjoyable, both the action itself and that it included exactly the kind of return cameo I can actually get behind.  No retcons or resurrections that make death somehow even cheaper or ruin the original finish to the character's story!  Not even to mention that, instead of existing just for the sheer fanservice of it?  A sequence like this is actively improved by giving us a familiar face we have investment in to keep it from being all just random unfamiliar cannon fodder getting offed.

Unfortunately, this isn't the rousing endorsement it could be when we know that both expanding to a big action sequence and bringing Benny back for it were actually Jensen's ideas.  Not even to mention that the thing which really works best in the episode?  It's the dream sequence that's not actually connected to anything else and doesn't have to worry about continuity to work. This is my surprised face.

I enjoyed the exchange between Sam and Dean in the kitchen.  The meat man conversation over the bacon was rather silly, but in a fun way. I've seen some people reading things into it (it's insulting Dean doesn't know the slang, Sam is randomly vegetarian now) that I didn't really see there.  I did appreciate how Sam was weirdly jumpy and had trouble meeting Dean's eyes after the creepy alternate world dream.  I thought it worked really well for both slice-of-life and Sam’s reaction.

In terms of the Winchester's case, well, for the most part it could have been worse.  I don't honestly believe even if I hadn't been spoiled that I wouldn't have immediately suspected the parents from their introductory exchange about how Billy playing in the big game was more important than a cheerleader's death.  I think it was supposed to be a retroactive subtle clue, but it was more of a clue-by-four.  So the “mystery” of tracking down the monster was pretty lost on me.  I did like that the one girl having braces was a clue!  But I also thought the scene with her rehearsing her speech on a live mic in an empty auditorium was weird and contrived.  I straight out cannot forgive that a girl was literally abducted from the school campus and NOBODY checked the security footage near her car fucking IMMEDIATELY well before Sam & Dean.  C'mon.  Then, of course, a couple random middle-aged suburbanite humans get the drop on Sam and Dean, because Dabbernatural really just loves to make them incompetent so plots happen.

Then the big reveal and blah blah blah, kid accidentally ate his girlfriend.  WHAT WERE WE SUPPOSED TO DO???  Um, maybe try not being scumbags?  Idiotic scumbags at that, abducting a second girl from their son's own school instead of somebody that wouldn't be missed or even, hey, maybe encouraging him to try harder not to eat people.  Don't try to sell me on this pseudo hallmark 'but they just love him so much' bullshit.  At least the kid has more self-awareness and conscience than his fuckwad parents.  

Then we get to the infuriating character assassination part of the programme.  Having Sam and Dean say that they'd do the same thing as the dad for Jack their “son”?  Fuck you very much, show.  I could maybe, maybe, see Sam or Dean kidnapping and draining the life out of an innocent to save the other at their most desperate worst.  Though I think the only time they even really get close to that kind of an actively, knowingly evil choice is with Doc Benton.  Not only do I not buy for a second that they would do that for the totally-really-their-actual-child-for-reasons albatross Dabbernatural has shoehorned into their lives?  Struggling to do the right thing even when it hurts used to actually mean something – it was always a very important qualifier that while Sam or Dean might make that choice, the other would not let them.  So having them both agree this kind of straight up villainy would be a-okay for oh-so-totally-loveable-no-really-woobie-blob Jack ...

Like carelessly assassinating every human in the BMoL headquarters, it fundamentally fails to understand what it is that keeps Sam and Dean from being the monsters.  Hint: it's not just that the show centers around them.  “We do the ugly thing so that people can live happy” - these moronic hacks seem to be actually trying to parallel Sam and Dean saving innocent victims and the world to human monsters that were going to selfishly help their son eat his way through the entire goddamn cheerleading squad.  Am I getting this wrong somehow?  Is there some other, less appalling, reading here that I'm missing? This whole scene honestly made me nauseous.

They talkity-talk on for a while longer, but it's really not much better.  Sam declaring that God was totally done with them was the writers putting those words in his mouth based on nothing.  At it’s very best, it was Sam’s bad habit of convincing himself conclusions he’s come to are true because he wants them to be.  So them both just deciding to believe it's true after Chuck has admitted to orchestrating their entire lives … I'm not sure if we should conclude the Winchesters have brain damage or if that's just the writers.  Especially when the underlying reason for it is nothing more compelling than , “Watch the Winchesters see-saw on the angst fulcrum completely at random!  Yay!”  If this was actually well written, there would be some precipitating reason for Sam to suddenly be the one being all fatalistic while Dean is accepting.  Instead, the writers  just slap some coin-flipped angst angst angst on the page and meander on in a supposedly forward direction.

So then there's the other half of the episode, the Becky storyline. Am I the only one a little disturbed that Becky's first reaction to seeing Chuck was to look scared and try to run away?  Like, they're exes and all, sure, but she doesn't know any of the god stuff yet – I think the only thing she even says about their breakup is that Chuck dumped her.  Is that reaction supposed to be yet another bit of “new canon” showing how Chuck was just that terrible all along? But then she does let him in, so maybe we're just supposed to take it as Becky still having a tendency towards dramatics?  I honestly don't know, but it was weird to me.  

I do genuinely love that they had Becky go to therapy and realize just how absolutely fucked up what she'd done was and ultimately sort herself out to become someone who seems to be a well-balanced adult. A well balanced adult that didn't have to give up being a fan for that!  Seriously, kudos to the writers for this, because 7.08 is such a loathsome episode that otherwise ruins Becky as a character.   Though I do have to nitpick a bit – while I get that they wanted to put SPN merch in Becky's home as a callout to her still being a superfan?   In the show's universe, Chuck's books were never that popular, so I'm having some suspension of disbelief issues that there would be Funkos for them.  We could pretend they were customs, but she's got at least one Impala, so even that doesn't quite work.  I'm not entirely sure who “people only want them sitting around doing laundry anyway” is a dig at, but I'm giving it the side eye.  

I also am not entirely sure what to make of Chuck's whole no one needs me I kinda hate me I'm all lost and don't know what to doooooo shtick.  Is this a game he's playing?  Is he really that wishy-washy? Did some of Dabb's sad internal monologue as showrunner somehow end up in a script by accident?  

He goes on like that and laments he's lost the Winchester's trust and had words with them or whatever, and then he zaps Becky and her family away at the end.  Like, if he cared enough about Becky to care about her opinion, why does he turn on her, too, just like that?  I guess we're supposed to see it as him having found his mojo in her space and vanishing her because taking over her space that's working for him currently is his latest whim.  I suppose they're intending to show Chuck as just being that capricious and flighty, but I don't know that it works for me.  The way they've been writing him he's acting so randomly and impulsively that it's kind of unbelievable he can even sit still at a keyboard long enough to write another Sam and Dean installment.  Again, I definitely find it unbelievable that the Chuck they're giving us now would be capable of playing the long game that he would have had to for him to be actively behind everything.  Until he suddenly got impatient and lazy and popped up in the cemetery at the end of the last finale ... for reasons … and is now just … like that … because.

Not to mention that his powers are, big shock, just as arbitrary as everyone else's in the current show.  He can't actually see what is happening to Sam and Dean because of the bullet sapping his power or whatever, but we're supposed to be worried about the ominous ending he's writing for them because … he's got those god powers to make it happen, I guess?  Uh...

I will grant that the ominous bobbing of Sam and Dean Funkos' heads to Chuck's furious typing was a wonderfully foreboding shot to end on.  

[vecna]

For fandom meme-swtor?

Send me a fandom!

This one isn’t as spicy as the Dragon Age one, but I still got Wordy.

Also there’s lots of KOTFE/KOTET/etc spoilers in here, so don’t read if you don’t want to see em. (Looking at you, Chignon.)

The character(s) I first fell in love with:

My own OCs haha.

But more seriously: It was actually Darth Malgus! I was always going to play a Star Wars MMO, let’s be real. But when they started posting promo videos and cinematics for the game, my Sith-loving ass immediately gravitated to that guy haha. And then, it turned out he had the same VA as The Architect from Dragon Age, and that was it for me.

If we’re talking about companions, then it was probably Malavai Quinn. Sith Warrior was the first class I got to 50, and Quinn was the first companion that I really got overly attached to haha.

The character(s) I never expected to love as much as I do now:

Most (not all, but most) of the “new” companions that came in with KOTFE and beyond. I was initially really sour when I realized we were losing all our class storyline companions, and they were being replaced with a new crew of Lana, Theron, Koth, my mother-in-law Senya, etc. Especially when they – at the time – said we’d eventually get our class companions back, but it would be a while. So I started KOTFE sure that I would hate the new crew because I would rather have the old one…. and ended up liking them quite a lot! Mostly, lol.

The character(s) everyone else loves that I don’t:

Doc is the main one, jesus christ. If you didn’t read my last post, I just really really really do not mesh well with overly sexual and Adult Humor-y characters who scold you with a “You’re no fun.” if your OC isn’t into it. Doc is the worst example of it that I’ve ever encountered. I always play a male JK, and the fact nearly all of his convos amount to, “Boy, you and me are going to be up to our eyeballs in vagina when this war ends, amirite?” “You don’t want that? Come on, the Jedi Code doesn’t say you can’t FUCK, live a little.” “You’re no fun. Well, more for me.” drives me NUTS. This combined with how he interacts with Kira just does me in. Shoves him out an airlock.

Dark Side Jaesa is another big one, albeit mainly for OOC reasons. I just hate the fact that she even exists, really. I get the appeal of a story where a Sith corrupts a Jedi to the Dark Side, but the way she does a total 180 into gross hedonism while Serving You always just makes me cringe. Plus there’s the fact that straight dudebro gamers are really nasty with her, and she’s the main companion I always see men put into the slave bikini outfit, and just yikes.

Also just a lot of one-off NPCs that everyone goes crazy for and ships their OCs with, but I  constantly forget who they even are lol. Attros Finn comes to mind. I don’t hate them! Just don’t get the appeal I guess.

The character(s) I love that everyone else hates:

Lord Scourge, although I’m not sure he’s really hated as much anymore. I just remember at launch, when all of the overly invested Revan stans absolutely HATED him because of what he did in the Revan novel, and then flooded the tags with vitriol over being “stuck” with him as a Knight, and having to hear about Revan in his companion convos. It was really, really tiresome! Maybe it’s because I never really cared that deeply about Revan as my personal character, but I could not understand the backlash.

Anyway, Lord Scourge is my favorite companion in the game by a long shot. I love the conversations you can have with him about the Jedi vs Sith, and I love the mutually respectful tone those conversations take. (Where other Bioware companions who disagree with you have a tendency to just go, “You’re wrong.” and shut you down.) The fact that he’s so tied in with the plot just makes me love him more, really.

The character(s) I used to love but don’t any longer:

Cytharat, Koth and Theron mostly. Although this takes a bit of explaining, and is a bit Discourse-y – because I really appreciate them as characters, but their role and Bioware’s decisions with them is what made me no longer love them.Here’s the thing: Bioware has a bad habit of introducing male characters that are bisexual, and then having them betray you, leading to situations where they either get murdered or vanish from the narrative entirely. Meanwhile, bisexual women like Lana are untouched and around forever.

I was overjoyed when I first saw Cytharat. Y'all know I’m a ho for purebloods, and the fact that he was Malgus’ apprentice was fascinating to me – and then he turned out to be a bi romance. I got very hyped for him, only to find out he dies like 5 minutes later – or if you save him, he’s never seen again. Huge letdown.

Koth was the first character I fell in love with of the new KOTFE crew – I even initiated a romance with him! – but it quickly became obvious there’s no way to play the expansion without him turning on you judgementally at some point or another. And then, hey big surprise, you can kill him or else he’s never seen again.

Theron I’ve loved since we first got to know him in the Forged Alliances content, but that whole storyline where he seemingly betrays you out of nowhere, only to later reveal he didn’t actually, idk. And then, once again, you either kill him or he disappears from the story. It felt like a weirdly shoehorned in plot for shock value, and robbed us of a second bi MOC character.

You see the trend here? I want to love these characters, but Bioware continually electing to do this shit with bi dudes is tiresome and makes me unwilling to invest any interest in the characters anymore.

The character(s) I would totally smooch:

None.

The character(s) I’d want to be like:

None really come to mind? I just want to be a Jedi, come on.

The character(s) I’d slap:

Hunter all day every day.

The pairing(s) that I love:

Haha, this question is hard, because most of the SWTOR ships I’m invested in are between my OCs and my friends’ OCs.

However.

SCOURGE / KNIGHT IS THE BIG ONE, THE ULTIMATE, THE ALL-TIME FAVORITE. It’s really hard to describe just how much I love this ship, and just how much time and energy I’ve invested into it over the past… 8 years wow……….. To the point of being almost territorial. And it’s also near impossible for me to talk about why I love it, because the version I ship is so personalized with my specific Jedi Knight, especially since it had to live exclusively in headcanon land for so long. Scourge is, more or less, my Knight’s support pillar and the thing that grounds him and keeps him humble, in a world where my Knight is surrounded by people who expect him to be a pure flawless messiah. But, I mean. How can you have a man look at your character and say, “I’ve waited 300 years to see your face.” and not immediately ship it. And then I finally got vindicated after all these years when it was made canon!

I really love Arcann / Knight for a lot of the same reasons as the above, but I just really adore his one (1) romance convo haha. Granted, yes he did a lot of fucked up things, but I was so grateful when he had like… a Zuko-esque redemption. Where he comes to your character and firmly believes he doesn’t deserve forgiveness, and especially doesn’t deserve affection, and is instead met with acceptance and a chance to grow and heal. That’s the good shit.

Others:

Lana / Warrior and Lana / Inquisitor are my particular jam. I endlessly enjoy the mutual respect between Lana and those particular PCs.

Malavai Quinn / Sith Warrior is a longtime fave, and although I DO love him with a female Warrior, I really do with he’d been an option for dudes as well. And I feel the same in reverse about Vette / Warrior – I do like her with a male Warrior, and it’s so sweet and wholesome and endearing, but man I wish she’d been an option for female Warriors.

I ship Risha with every woman – especially Vette and Sumalee – and will be salty until my grave that Risha / f!Smuggler isn’t possible, because I love Risha with the Smuggler but she gives me powerful WLW vibes.

Agent / Watcher Two is also a lowkey favorite, but I ALSO wish it could be done with a female Agent instead. Same with Agent / Raina Temple.

Agent / Vector is very sweet, but again, I will be salty until my grave that it couldn’t be done with a male Agent.

Can you guys sense a running theme here?

Finally: NGL I love Valkorion / Senya, even though that ended in pure disaster.

And people around here used to ship Keeper / Lokin, and tbh, I still kinda love it lol.

The pairing(s) that I despise:

In general terms, I fucking hate every single romance that involves the male PC romancing his padawan or underling, especially since most of them seem like very young girls. I don’t know why this is so pervasive in the game, but yikes Bioware. Consular/Nadia is the worst offender, but they’re all just cringe central for me.

But the big one is Agent / Hunter. This would have gotten me run off Tumblr back in the day, but god I hate this pairing. I mentioned in the last post that I just will never enjoy ships where the two characters actively want to murder each other, but. This just gets magnified for me with Agent/Hunter, where all the mind control and blatant abuse comes into play – and people have a tendency to write noncon rape fic of the two and present it as ~sexy rivalmance~, which is awful. Add to this the “no homo” reveal where Hunter turns out to be a woman, after getting everyone hyped about a dude flirting with their male character the whole game, and it’s just a huge No Thanks from me all around.

And for largely personal reasons I just don’t like seeing female Knights with Scourge. Listen, for YEARS  I was treated like a pariah for shipping Scourge with my male Knight, while being unable to find Scourge content that didn’t have a female Knight plastered all over him. Even though he wasn’t even a romance option one way or another, the way the fandom treated m!Knight/Scourge with disdain while ardently shipping f!Knight/Scourge was offputting as shit. And then, after years, he was made a romance option for women AND men, and all these awful people acted like they were robbed, the way people reacted when Kaidan and Jaal were made bi in Mass Effect. I’m so tired. I never want to see Scourge with a female Knight again.

[fizzingwizard]

I started this on my lunch break, still gotta rewatch to be coherent but wanted to put down some bullet points of Feelings!!!

The bottom line is I did like Bokura no Mirai, because I think the Tri writers are good, BUT I think half of the issues in BoM were their hands being tied by the limited time left, and the other half simply planning way too much. Both are amateur mistakes and yet anime movies routinely make them, so I’m not as strict as I should be.

As an aside, my personal theory for this movie was that Taichi would let the two worlds merge. I thought he was going to shock everyone by choosing not to stop it, letting the worlds merge sans reboot, and that would result in humans and digimon living in harmony. It’s an unfinished theory obviously, since it supposes a different outcome of the merge than Yggdrasil believes will happen, and also because even if the world was fine after, we’d lose the future where there are two worlds and Taichi needs to be an ambassador between them. But that’s what I was expecting, something of that nature anyway, let’s say. I suppose I’m overly influenced by Tsubasa Chronicle lol.

k now for some highs and lows!!!

HIGHS

TAKERU, MAGNAANGEMON AND DEVIMON!!!! There is NOTHING like Takeru angst. omg. Not for me anyway. No other character’s trauma hit me the way Takeru still carries the burden of what happened to his partner in their very first boss battle.

People predicted Nishijima’s death but I did NOT. I thought of course he was going to be reunited with Himekawa. So this will figure in my “lows” section as well, but as for his apparent death itself, I was moved. But it’s also totally unfair and it’s more of a low than a high for Reasons. But it still deserves a mention here.

Mimi telling Meiko (and the others) to stop blaming themselves. I like Meiko, I do, but I was really annoyed with her when Hikari was feeling guilty and Meiko just had to feel guilty for that. It’s par for the course with her, and I was really defensive of her last movie - I think it was the way it felt like she was using Hikari’s distress to vent her own feelings that bothered me this time around. That being said, I certainly empathize with her and with Hikari, and I’m glad Mimi was so nice and caring about it. (Her line would have been perfectly suited to Sora - our Mimi is growing up!)

The cute moments with the Digimon - glad we still got some of those.

Yamato and Gabumon’s conversation on the balcony was UGH. So great. They’re probably my favorite partner relationship since Adventure. It was so IC and so perfect. I could cry at how sweet and sensitive and full of resilience Gabumon was. Just like his partner.

Also Yamato’s heartbreak over Taichi was sOOOO strong!! And then we they reunite he’s just like, “You’re late.” And you know what I thought of? Rini in the dub Sailor Moon movie. Hahahaha. I had actually hopped for a sweet moment between Taichi and Yamato but... well they stared at each other dramatically for a while, I guess that counts *cough*

KOUSHIROU was MAGIC. Part of me is like “fake science is fake!” but the other part is like “lol but if anyone could make fake science real it’d be Koushirou!” I love that, even when the others weren’t being forward about rejecting the reboot, and Yamato even implied that if Taichi thought it was the way to spare the most sacrifices he would do it, Koushirou was the one who emphatically said “NO!”

Hikari and everything about her. I love that she told Taichi she might not be able to forgive him. And I love that she said “thats why i’m going to fight alongside you.” And her expression during that last battle. It was the same determined look as Taichi’s. There are still a billion questions about her and Meiko as well, why what happened happened, maybe on second viewing I’ll understand more, but... I think it’s mostly “digimon lore” stuff that may never get explained.

Taichi’s phone call to Meiko at the end and the way the other kids acted. Of course I always love flustered and embarrassed Taichi. For the first time, I thought I could ship Meichi after the way Taichi called her and then did nothing but grunt and made her do all the work of carrying the conversation herself xD That boy is hopeless!

Also, Taichi in general. I’m still..... not quite sure what happened. Not quite sure what the takeaway is supposed to be. He was rescued by Nishijima after Yggdrasil’s life or death survival game, and came back to the real world... and chose to kill Meicoomon. In Kyousei, I was sad but on board because there did not appear to be any other day. I didn’t know what they’d do in Bokura no Mirai. Finales are often the age of miracles,  but on the other hand, as much as I wanted Meicoomon to reunite with Meiko, it would have been so underwhelming if everything just went back to normal with no sacrifices (oh yeah, Nishijima). So mixed feelings on how things played out. But one thing I do know is that I loved Taichi the entire time. I love that he’s not a straight up hero. He can do things that make his little sister say she’ll never forgive him. And he can be the kindest bravest person around. Right or wrong, I can’t help but like him.

LOWS

One thing - a lot of my lows result from things that went unanswered or at least I didn’t understand it last night. 

The story quite simply does not feel complete. It’s not even a feeling - it isn’t complete. What the hell was Yggdrasil’s comments about Daemon and whatever at the end. A joke? I didn’t really get the feeling. Was that dark cube some variety of dark spore? Or the one from Adventure? Also, we don’t get to find out what happened to real Gennai (or did I just miss it)? Up till now I never believed it was really him... maybe that was wishful thinking... but why tho

Taichi’s character development arc. He got a LOT. And I do love it overall, but I’m not quite sure I understand it. I suppose the simple answer is, he’s going to be an ambassador, and an ambassador needs to be able to negotiate, to see things in shades of gray, and (ok waxing poetical here but) to understand that life and death are a balance. Idk. I’m a Star Trek fan, “the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many” usually results in intergalactic shenanigans to steal whales from a different time. And who doesn’t love that?

Part of me just needed more... Idk, closure I suppose? about Meiko and Meicoomon after everything they went through. I wanted Meiko to be a bigger character in the finale movie. I’m surprised by that since I wasn’t warm to her in the beginning, but it feels wrong that in the end, all she got was a sweet farewell. It was very sweet! And heartbreaking! And I’m not exactly angry that Meicoomon was lost, but after 5 movies leading up to it, it just felt... i dunno, it lacked the sense of relief I was looking for. (However, I sometimes feel these things differently on rewatch. This is a scene I’ll be looking out for.)

The 02 gang’s been missing... like the said in Saikai. OK fine. Why didn’t the kids ever try to contact them beyond that one visit to Ken’s house?? Why weren’t they concerned that none of them were like “Hello, we heard digimon are raising hell, can we help?” That is the question folks. Tri definitely did NOT need more characters to juggle, but heck, “they’re all camping in a remote island with no electricity!” would have been a better excuse for why no one notices they’re not around.

Daigo’s death. Like I said, it was a hero’s death, and for that it was awesome. But a lot of the reasons why it was awesome were inferences. Like, Taichi was just like “whoa?” when nishijima was like “oh yeah maki’s disappeared she lost her mind searching for her dead partner.” This should have been way bigger news. I don’t see why they wouldn’t be intensely curious about their predecessors - yeah big world shaking battle is gonig on so I get it not being on the back burner, but it was totally just shoehorned in. No thank you! Daigo deserved better.

MAKI DIDN’T EVEN APPEAR. I had been so worried about her but I thought the worst that would happen would be she’d do something to redeem herself and die! But nope! She’s not there AT ALL. And Daigo’s DEAD! Honestly it wouldn’t be SO bad if we could be sure this wasn’t the end... because it just feels like there’s so much story left to tell, including theirs. The Original Chosen in Tri are more like a summary of “a fanfic I’d like to write someday.” Better to just not have included them. Found some different way to cause the reboot. They were treated worse in the end than the 02 kids, frankly.

one last quibble... Essentially no Taishiro. :( :( :( I mean just platonic moments. Just one would have been good! Oh well.

i’m totally leaving things out but that’s all I’ve got for the moment. rewatch imminent