#and ngl the first part of the new season was just not fulfilling to me like I need more yknow?

[queencvbra]

not me saying I'm going to be here more and then disappearing again lol

[astrobydalia]

Solar return observations

Virgo season is here which means my birthday is coming soon!!! I thought it would be fitting to share my first Solar Return observations with you. These are based on my experience, feel free to share yours!

Btw Ariel is my fave Disney princess I love her sm

work by astrobydalia

Fire rising in SR - these years were characterized for being SO SO chaotic and all over the place tbh. It was always a mix of good and bad things like damn I couldn't catch a break. So many rollecosters, STRESS, situations were I was at the edge of my seat, unpredictable and random stuff happening...

Air rising on SR - one word: fresh. Total opposite from fire risings. Air risings were years that felt so light and fresh! I felt like I was floating through the year in a good way! Just going with flow. And I've said this before the best most chill years where I've found myself thriving were Libra risings on SR (also venus in the 1st house)

Moon-Lilith conjunction in th SR - I felt like my life being sucked out of me and overall felt kinda unlucky that year. I felt so empty inside during this year it was insane. Also I was having mayor issues and conflicts with my mom

Chiron is in SR is a bit catastrophized imo. It can not only mean areas in your life that can "break" but also areas that could find healing or resolutions as well. Whenever I've seen the breaking or ending manifestation of this asteroid it was always from a place of reconsideration and healing rather destruction, like making peace with something. For example, Chiron in the 7th house could mean ending a relationship on good terms or unlearning unhealthy relationship patterns. On time I had Chiron in the 6th house and during that year I got a nice job after a long period of struggling to find a job. Of course it's nuanced and it can often be painful and disappointing process but I think people don't mention enough how Chiron is about finding relief as well

One time I read the SR for a client who had Pluto in the 6th house for that year and turns out she was planning to undergo surgery during that time for health reasons

Leo rising in SR - These years were TERRIBLE for some reason. Maybe it was due to Cancer 12th house but I was really struggling to find happiness and fulfillment in my life during these times

Cancer mars in the SR - So emotional!! Like truly it was years that were clouded by emotion. It was either due to family stuff, friends or relationships, but I was running on emotion all the time and I couldn't act on logic to save my life. However it's not like I was in my bed crying all day but rather these emotions were giving energy and motivation in some way. Somehow being emotional was always making be feel.... alive?

Moon in 12th house of SR - I was getting ready to move and separate from my family during this year

Taurus rising in SR - these years were surprisingly.... intense, specially with my relationships. A lot of patience, resisting and enduring. Every event that happened felt like I was going through a 10-year-long process and really had a strong impact in my life. Years were I reconsidered my priorities a lot and was really faced with what is it that I truly value

Uranus in the 1st house of SR - literally a few days prior to my bday I received shocking news that turned my entire year (and life) upside down so you can imagine how this energy played out. Life forcing changes on my life that I was not ready for but had to make it through one way or another

Virgo rising in SR - I started a new job!

Look at Part of Fortune and Vertex in your SR chart, these will be significant themes!

Capricorn rising in SR - I was.... borderline depressed here ngl. Those kind of years that never seem to end ever. I was receiving pressure from both my career life and my family life. Overall earth rising in the SR were years that felt very 'heavy' if that makes sense.

Juno in the 1st house of SR - these were years were I meant new people!!! I significantly enlarged my network

^Same thing with Venus/Libra/Vertex in the 7th house of SR. I didn't get into a relationships or had anything romantic going on, I met new people and made new friends in general. I also bought lots of new clothes and invested a lot in my image

Scorpio rising in SR -you know when you go through a very intense experience out of nowhere and then come out of it soon after like nothing happened and you're left feeling like "wtf was that for"? That's this.

Yod configuration in SR - very karmic life-changing and ground breaking events in my life. Before and after vibes

Moon in Capricorn in the SR - my girlboss era!!!! These were years were I began new professional opportunities like my first job or my first year in college

Moon in the 8th house of SR - you guessed it: trauma. I'm talking canon event kind of trauma. A family member died.

Vertex in the 8th house of SR - this was playing life on hard mode honestly. Not necessarily traumatic, but very complicated events and situations here that put you to the test

work by astrobydalia

[yan-randomfandom]

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

I wish you guys nothing but the best! Please take care of yourself (⁠っ⁠˘⁠з⁠(⁠˘⁠⌣⁠˘⁠ ⁠)♡ Let's go thru more & more years!!

Also, I decided to do a summary post for every end of a year! I'll be talking about the fandoms I've written for, my experience with them & list of anons!! (our own personal wrapped lol)

If you don't remember me, I write yandere, or not, stories for a bunch of characters!! :D

2024 — This one is special because it's the first year -4°

You just gotta Keep Reading 😺

[If you don't wanna be tagged, please tell me!]

— ⚠️

Gravity Falls!!!

STANLEY PINES.

Remember that name. If not, then I will. He's my very first muse to write for, who eventually gets posted on Tumblr. I owe this man my life, so thank goodness he's not real 😭

The GF fandom... gosh... my first tumblr fandom interaction, and I love you guys. So much. You're all so engaging, encouraging, endearing, and every other positive 'E' adjective that can describe you all!! 💛

I had so much fun writing the characters, geez.... Stan, Ford, the twins... AAARRGHH I MISS THEM

But you guys also made me realize how much I struggle at writing part 2s for one-shots LOL Having said that... there's a lot of requests I haven't answered, and ones that I was going to, but unfortunately lost motivation. And I rlly wish I could 😮‍💨 I'm sorry guys! but they're still safe in my inbox!

You're all so supportive and active, it makes me wanna cry 😭 My fics received so much wonderful arts and I just love how creative you all are 💕💕 [Godling!Reader was so loved!!]

ARTIST LIST:

@tyrannastar

@ctghost

@thebrokenmechanicalpencil

@thewaywardwanderer

ANON LIST:

Ikan anon

™️ anon

🐲 anon

🪴 anon

PLEASE TELL ME IF I MISSED YOU 😭 I DONT MEAN TO 😭 i fr just realized how messy my navigation is .. still, thank you all for stopping by my blog!! omg!!

TOTAL FICS: 18

— 🧚

Fairly Oddparents: A New Wish

PERI FAIRYWINKLE-COSMA.

I searched for "yandere peri x reader" and i remember seeing nothing 😩 that was lowk a surprise—so I had to do a traditional method of 'write what u want to read' LOL

This might be the most chill fandom ever and it's so endearing (⁠´⁠ε⁠｀⁠ ⁠) I loved writing for you guys, genuinely!!

My first ever request came from you guys too, specifically saying "More yandere peri" WHAHHAHAH REAL— LET'S BE VERY HOPEFUL AND PRAY FOR SEASON TWO OKAY GUYS???

We only have one named anon for this fandom— 💘ficto anon !! You're also my very first named anon ... heheh (⁠ʃ⁠ƪ⁠＾⁠3⁠＾)♥️

TOTAL FICS: 10

— ✨

Arcane

EKKO.

I love this guy, but I didn't expect to write and post him as my first arcane fic 😭 THE BOY SAVIOR FR!! MY INSPIRATION

This is the most miserable fandom I've been active in 😭 Arcane show is leaving us in pieces and its showing by y'alls comments LMAOOOO

But this is also. the hardest fandom i wrote for. ngl. the characters.... the world building... I had to wait for the whole season to come out just because,,, pulls my hair out in a very demure way

I wish I could have written more for you guys but I had a specifically busy month with Arcane rippp ｡⁠:ﾟ⁠(⁠;⁠´⁠∩⁠`⁠;⁠)ﾟ⁠:⁠｡

I CANT BELIEVE I FORGOT BUT—— THAT ONE ANON WHO I RECOMMENDED @reareaotaku TO OMG!! that was lowkey amazing and even better that u actually did it rea !! lets goooooo

There are no named anons unfortunately, but I did name some myself!

ANON LIST:

Mage anon

Age Gap anon

Jinx anon

I think Age Gap anon is the same one as some of my other reqs, hi anon XD u keep coming back wahahah—so sorry i couldn't fulfill all your requests tho 😭 ESPECIALLY your Viktor requests. I had to stop because idk,, it felt like i was doing something wrong w Vik's character every time I tried 😔

— HOWEVER, i have a bunch of drafts. kinda long tbh, you can personally message me if u want to read them :)

And Jinx anon, I'll hopefully get back to your request someday.... I wanna take it more seriously this time ⊙⁠.⁠☉

TOTAL FICS: 10

— ⛏️

Minecraft Story Mode

ROMEO, THE ADMIN.

Bruh this guy LMAOOOO He was just so pathetic in the game that I had to write for him (⁠.⁠ ⁠❛⁠ ⁠ᴗ⁠ ⁠❛⁠.⁠)

This is the smallest fandom I wrote for, but it did get four requests! By 💘ficto anon following me from FOPANW,

and @skykaykay !! had 2 more additional parts with Romeo 🛐 glad u liked it enough to request for more 😭

For the yandere!Aiden, we got fanart from @sumthinganarchy ! Here's the link, and gosh... I'm pretty sure you're 💘ficto anon (tell me if you want me to not mention it!) and I just want you to know that,, thank you for sticking around 🙂‍↕️

AND LASTLY, an unreleased request—Isa, the founder. It's written, but incomplete still!! i'll post it this january 2025 🫡 btw anon yes i love your energy too WHAHAHAHA

TOTAL FICS: 4 (+1)

— 🥠

Independent

We got two requests for fandoms I'm not exactly in, but did see!

That would be...

Tinkerbell

Cars

The Amazing Digital Circus

By these two anons...

Nyx anon, who requested for, well, Nyx and another for Ada Wong! It sucks that idk resident evil so I'm not confident enough to do it😭 AND,,, SCOUTFAIRY READER X NYX,,, IM SORRRRYYYYYY but if you're still interested you can remind me !! i might be able to.... yesss....

Anon that did not name themself, but I'm naming them to 👑 anon. Hilariously requested for Finn McMissile and I don't know why I didn't question WHO it would be 😭 (i know her irl. sigh)

Now for TADC, I'm actually in the fandom but only made one work for it. Absolutely spontaneous after hearing the music video of "Happy Place" it's a fun listen and watch btw, I recommend it if you like TADC!! the actual voice actors are there!

And after allat,

Thank you so much for reading my writing, everyone :D Made a lot of good memories this year, and hopefully my work did the same for you!

I have a lot more to say but my brain suddenly forgot everything I wanted to say, so now I'm speechless.

But, I'm also planning to become a bit more,,, inactive? hiatus-ish? in this account to focus on my bigger projects. only getting to post spontaneous writing rn

However, requests are still sort of open, and you can see my active fandoms in my sideblog, @pokepokee !!

I'm so much more active there!!! I reblog all of the fandoms I'm in.

Although for requests, it's going to be more rare for me to answer now. Just keep them coming though, who knows, I might suddenly have an idea.

Thanks for your support! Happy new year!!

[left4denver]

hey y'all! this is peyton [sh/th, 21+, cst—also the mun of dylan, selena, mouse & hyeon] and this time i'm bringing you guys hakgojae gallery's foh manager, oh dabin :~) you can view his stats here, his pinterest here & read all about him under the cut! i prefer discord so pleasssee hit me up at #seamonkeydefender

born and raised in seoul, dabin is a city boy to his core. his parents aren't "rich", but they're pretty damn comfortable—as a result, dabin is... a little... spoiled...

picky, difficult kid. not necessarily mean, but does have an attitude that seems to suggest he thinks he's above other people; his parents have him spend a lot of time with his maternal grandparents in jeju-do to kind of combat this problem as they're very hard workers and very humble people. worth noting that his grandmother is a haenyo/female diver, very much the breadwinner of their household and after dabin gets past all the judgment and whiny ass "you smell like seaweed! i hate you!" tantrums, she instills a very strong admiration/respect for women in him

anyway, as if that doesn't put him in his place, his parents having another kid when dabin is already 10 does LMFAOOOO... no longer the baby of the family, has to step up and help his parents out (as much as a 10yr old can) with the baby. it's a bummer. he fuckin' hates that kid for the first two months of her life, and then all of a sudden he loves her more than he's probably ever loved anything

sparknotes: by the time he's reaching his teenager years, dabin is mostly humble but extremely wild / daredevil, likes to do shit just for thrills / gets in a lot of trouble, is arrested a few times in his late teens & early adulthood and ends up being assigned community service hours as part of his sentence / becomes very compassionate in this timeframe as he learns about world issues and what he can do to make a change / ends up enlisting and then going to college a bit late (paid for in full by his parents who just want to see him improve his life), undecided major at first but eventually settles on art history (useless ass degree if you ask his dad LOLLL) / gets his bachelor's degree in 2018 and then his master's in 2021, by the time he finishes his master's he has drastically mellowed out / gets a job at hakgojae gallery as an art handler, eventually works his way up to being the foh manager oh yeahhh...

so here he is now. a 30 year old man who's Been There, Done That and just wants peace now. he's extremely smart, but also is well aware that he doesn't know everything and is always happy to learn something new. passionate about things such as animal rights, climate change, women's rights, etc etc, still volunteers often even though he fulfilled his requirements a while ago. reads a lot of books about self-improvement and various informative topics.

still kinda pretentious ngl... but i'm sure that vibe carries through enough in this intro that i don't even have to say it, LMFAO. that said, he is a very well-meaning dude; his intentions are pure, and he's trying every day to be better than he was yesterday.

other info: type to drink wine at 2pm on a wednesday / passionate about south korea and especially about seoul, has a side hustle/hobby of giving newcomes or vacationers personalized tours / his favorite season is autumn if u even care / really warm guy, strives to be a pillar for others to lean against and a friend for them to confide in / has a russian blue cat named willow, humoring the idea of getting a second cat so willow isn't alone when he leaves for work / king of making lists, very organized man!

plot ideas

y'all already know, but if you don't: i love extensive plotting and building storylines together from scratch, so if you're into this too, hit me up! let's talk about every little detail <3 but i'm also 100% down to jump into a base idea and just see where it goes. that said, here are some ideas:

friends of dabin's younger sister. she's about 20/21, so these friends would probably be in that age range but rly it could be anyone who knows her from uni as well—regardless, dabin will be a surrogate big bro to them :~)

also just random young adults he's taken under his wing... he acts like he's 50yrs old the way he's always like "i was young once. i get it. but because i was young once, i can also tell you you're being dumb as hell and you're gonna be embarrassed when you look back on these years" like dude... chill

aspiring artists who want to get their work showcased at hakgojae gallery and figure the best way (re: shortcut) to do that is to make nice with the manager

someone kind of new to seoul who dabin had a mutual (npc) connection with and as a result, welcomed them very warmly into the city/gave them a tour and helped them get settled in and all that

similar aged friends... people he met in uni, people he went absolutely wild with in his early 20's and now they're (probably?) both kind of settled down - but man, ain't it fun to reminisce?

pretentious art buddies, film buffs, whateverrrr

a budding artist who dabin is actually a big ass fan of

someone who volunteers at the same animal shelter as him

some girl who thinks he's stupid and fake as fuck 'cause he's soooooo loud and proud about "being a feminist" JDJFHBSDJ

etc etc... down for anything!

[monstress]

any korean variety show recs?

alright so saddle up because this is long

 for new watchers who know next to nothing about the korean entertainmentindustry, wants to learn more abt culture:

abnormal summit, esp s1. group of semi-diverse expat panel discussculture/issues and how it pertains/compares to south korea and their owncountries. also ngl some of the panels are hot so shoutout to sam oykere anddaniel from australia.

first time in korea. changing guest of long-time expats bring their friendsover to south korea to experience the culture for the first time. you getrambunctious friend shenanigans and crash course of interesting places to visit+ eat.

korean food table. long-ass running, well-beloved food show. im hungry.

for new watchers who want to get into it because of the hallyu wave:

x-man. the start of it all. fixed members and guests play games and try tofigure out who is the spy among them. the precursor to running man. it endedyears ago but it’s LEGENDARY. i can’t tell u how many clips from some eps thatare still being played on other shows today. see your favorite stars at theirmost humble of beginnings. introduction to the dominating MCs of today: yoojaesuk and kang hodong.

happy together s3 (the sauna version). the only talk show of its kind withequal number of male and female mcs (sad ik). funny as hell, even withnon-celebs guests. way back when even jun hyun moo, the MC with the most showson his belt right now, was a nobody and made his bread and butter dancing toshinee’s Lucifer. great talking segments which i’m sad they got rid off in thelater iterations.

strong heart. a talk show where celebs share interesting stories from theirlives. if you can manage through kang hodong’s overly boisterous MC style,there are some absolute gems from this show but imo just watch based on theguests. also lee seunggi!

knowing brothers. popular talk show with a school-like setting. imo watch it based on the guests, again if you can manage through kang hodong lmao

i can see your voice. celebrity guests try to guess if a person is a good singer or tonedeaf.already multiple versions in asian countries. honestly surprised americansdon’t get in on this.

masked singer. a panel try to guess who the voice from an unknown, masked singer belongsto. i don’t know why they made an american version since the formula is onlythrilling with a tight-knit industry but ok!

weekly idol. if you’re into kpop, surely you’ve seen random dancing segmentsby now. watch it based on who you stan i guess.

doesn’t care about idols, just want to have fun:

new journey to the west. cast travels to a country and needs to win gamesfor food/sleeping place/dragon balls. fuckinnnn??? hilarious?? established cast and production team chemistry (from their previous show, 1night2days) so even the pilot doesn’t have new cast awkwardness. stellar editingand ingeniously entertaining yet simple games. they’re not afraid to rip eachother apart (some of the members’ have some…interesting past which is fun tobring up).

i live alone. a clip show of an average day of celebs who live alone. while it does haverotating celeb guests, the major draw of the show is the permanent panelmembers established in 2017, esp park narae (who is a legitimately talentedentertainer and tbh deserves better! you’ll get what i mean when u watch theshow!!).

omniscient interfering interview. clips of daily lives of celebs and their managers (who in the industry arealways in the shadows but now it’s their time to shine). wildly popular thateven most of their managers have shot for commercials. watch for the fooddescriptions from lee youngja which was a career-defining talent for her thatshe won the channel’s top entertainment award. the first woman to have everdone so across all three major channels.

infinite challenge. this show has a LOT of episodes but imo watch these specials: the ballroom dance eps, the summer music festivals, bobsleigh challenge, calender model challenge, extreme part-time job, history x hip-hop, the jack black eps, saturday saturday i am a singer, and the (very incredible, very powerful) express delivery special. iconique.

running man. i’m amazed that this show is still airing. the choi minsoo eps and sherlockeps are one of the show’s stand-out. again, if you’re into the cast chemistry,check this out.

2 days 1 night (s1, skip to s4). where the new journey to the west’s cast chemistry and production team isfortified! season 1 was very popular but it ended because the director wantedto pursue his studies. season 2 and season 3 tried to capture its magic with new casts and directors but it just wasn’t the same. when season 4 came ploddingalong, people thought it’ll be canceled soon enough. the newest director was amentee of the original director though and with great luck in the new cast, season 4was herald as the show’s comeback. the ‘no smoking’ episode was brilliant. edit post chatroom scandal: from the bottom of my heart, don’t watch s4 because of one member who is an honest-to-god piece of shit.

what on earth??. an underrated show! a limited series of four men who embarks in a dangerouscross country trip. the first few eps was set in a Qatar desert, the next inthe wetlands of Scotland. educational, good chemistry btwn the members, sharpediting. also not gonna lie part of the reason i did watch this was for ji jinhee. sue me i was in a jtbc misty withdrawal! shares the same director as 2d1n season 4!

sister’s slam dunk. a rare show with an all-female cast with the premise of fulfilling eachmember’s dream with the help of the other members. honestly just watch seasonone for min hyorin’s dream of debuting as an idol (hence dragging in the othermembers too, much to the chagrin of the older members). if you like thechemistry between members enough, stick around! the cast is funny andcharismatic and it’s just (sniffs) i love women! i still bop to the songs onthe regular too.

doesn’t care about guests, just want to relax (my fave kind):

lee hyori’s bed and breakfast. popstar lee hyori and husband opens up their home as a bread and breakfast. depression? cured! streamit on netflix!

little house in the forest. this show is glacial…in the best waypossible. it’s like an ingmar bergman film. honestly best to watch when you’rein bed ready to sleep

youn’s kitchen. legendary actress youn yeo jung opens a restaurant in a foreigncountry with season one in indonesia, season two in italy. idyllic af.

hodong’s kitchen. a spinoff show with the cast from new journey to thewest (they won a bet that if they win a game, their wish is to shoot a showlike youn’s kitchen since they share the same director). if you like the njttwcast and want to see them run a small restaurant, here’s your show!

blind date cafe. what it says on the can. blind dates are done in a cafe withwaitservice that consist of musician lee juck, actress yoo inna,comedian yang sehyung and sf9 member rowoon. it’s very…cishet lmao buti love yoo inna and will watch her wait for paint to dry. some of the couplesare EXTREMELY valid tho (if anything, watch for the webtoon artist andchildrens horror book author! i STAN their love!)

coffee friends. actors set up a cafe. fulfill your coffee shop au daydreamwith yoo yoon seok here!

may food bless you. a team of close female friends that consist of actress hwayeong and comedian lee youngja, song euni, and kim sook gives advice and suggest food to aid for submitted concerns while having a meal. a great show to watch while having dinner.

note: these shows…aren’t perfect. lemme be upfront that there can be elements of casual -isms in them (the relaxing shows are generally okay tho) and i’m just gonna leave it at that.

[chromsai]

i didnt want to answer this using the actual ask because since the full, untagged name is there, i just know that tumblr will find a way to get it into its main tag and just out of courtesy to its fans, i don’t wanna be that person.

that said, and out of courtesy to any of my followers that like it, i’ll put my actual opinion under the cut as extra precaution because, again, i dont wanna be that rude ass person.

(long rant ahead tbh)

it’s my least favorite ygo. i mean, setting vr aside for now just to be fair since it’s still not done yet, it is without a doubt my least favorite ygo because its writing is just that piss poor. 

tl;dr: it’s a fucking mess of a show, it doesn’t appeal to me, i find it to be (ironically) superficial (in terms of themes and messages), i dont like the decks, character arcs? god they’re wasted, the writing is just a bunch of asspullery nonsense, and “foreshadowing” is actually just spoon fed self-fulfilling prophecies. it’s my least favorite show and it almost made me quit yugioh altogether. but i still don’t discourage anyone from watching it. because maybe it didnt appeal to me or click with me, but maybe it would for someone else, and i’m not afraid to admit that. because people have different tastes.

its characters overall get little to no development, what little development most of them get (like shark and ........i wanna say kaito, but i dont wanna include kaito in here because i think his development was the only one that was actually decent, but idk who else to put here since... most characters didnt actually get development? as/t/ral, i guess?) is completely ruined sooner or later when the plot decides to inevitably asspull. i will admit i did like where shark’s development was going but the fucking moment he was revealed to be na//sh is when his development went completely down the fucking shitter. oh so JUST cuz some “destiny” says you’re “destined” to fight against yu//ma you just... go with what it’s telling you? you don’t even like your own destiny or some of the people you’re working with but... like... just cuz you remembered some memories of your past life you gotta finish the mission? even tho... 1) you didn’t actually want to, 2) you can just talk this all out (seriously this plot CAN be resolved with just talking things out, the card games are notably forced up this plot’s ass), 3) wtf happened to yu//ma being your friend??? you don’t wanna fight him but you will because you must, it’s your destiny?!? what kind of fucking non-explanation is that. fygdshbjkl honestly there are so many more questions that can be asked about just na/csh’s logic for fighting ALONE and i am still left dumbfounded. the amount of utter STUPID going on in this writing is incredible, honestly that i’m left without words.

ze//al’s plot & writing is NECK DEEP in allll that kind of stupid nonsensical logic, literally i could probably go on all night asking so many questions about where the fucking common sense went while writing this show. like i have so many fucking issues with ze//al II’s writing i just don’t understand how people think of it as legitimately good? it was all drama for drama’s sake with no real consequences since everything was reversed back to normal anyway??? fuck, i have less issues with ze//al’s first season and i actually liked it better. but anyway, moving on....

the aesthetic... is ... well before vr, i would say it was horrid, but at the very least ze//al gives us colors... it’s very colorful and the animation is pretty nice, ngl... but do i care? not really. not when i didnt really like almost any of the character designs... IV, Kaito, Mi//sael, and A//lito, Du//be, Rei/Vec//tor’s designs imo are nice... the rest... “what about the other arc//ights or [insert character here]”. no, if i didnt mention them by name just now, i didnt like their design. Yu//ma’s design... it’s... it’s very generic shounen protag. he is definitely, imo, the worst design of all the ygo protags, but i don’t think he’s HORRIBLE to look at. at least not most of the time, anyway. and actually you know what, i’ve never been into alien stuff but As//ral’s pretty, i’ll give him that. i guess perhaps that’s why i didnt like the aesthetic... too... alieny for me (gross, imo....... i just... absolutely hated the Ba//ians).

the little foreshadowing it gives us from the beginning through the end is spoonfed to us, and you literally gotta be foolish to not understand what it means straightaway. not only that, some of it uses retcon as a mechanism to seem like it’s foreshadowing (that fucking door from the first episode telling Yu//ma that he’ll lose his most important thing... and then at the end it turns out it was As//ral?? did Yu//ma not have anything important to him at the time he dreamt of the door??? or like... wtf is this door a prophet or smth or is it trying to make a contract, which is it??? make up your damn mind!!)... so yeah... it doesn’t actually give us any real “foreshadowing” as much as it uses self-fulfilling prophecies...

leading us to my next ironic point: this show is superficial af. as i just said, everything is literally spoon fed to you. literally all of its themes are plainly spelled out to you and laid out on the surface, you don’t really need to actually think to to get its message, and there is certainly no point in digging deep to find richer subtext... because there is none. there literally is none. and you know what? i know this is a very subjective preference; i personally love to delve deep into the symbolic and get analytical with the stories i enjoy because my brain is just naturally curious like that... but... even with a naturally curious brain... i just... no matter how much i try... this show is all bones and no meat. there is an established foundation of a message and it’s nice but it’s... way too straightforward and, as i said, spoon fed for my liking.

if you like that kind of story-telling, that’s completely fine, i get that. we’re not all here to watch YUGIOH, of all franchise, trying to give us some deep, meaningful message. hell, that’s not even the reason why i’ve enjoyed yugioh ever. i’m here for the same appeal that everyone else is here for: teens saving the world with stupid ass card games. but i just strongly prefer when a story, ANY story, shows enormous amounts of attention to detail and hints at deeper meanings in its context that i can use my brain to work around with and delve into. ze//al doesn’t give me even a hint of this. past ygos have, but ze//al doesnt even try. it’s meant for a younger audience tho, even for ygo’s usual demographic, so i get it. but... it’s because of this that i find it so lackluster.

speaking of the card games.... this show literally... has my least favorite decks. i’m not so into the OCG/TCG that i’m an expert about it so i dont wanna delve into something idfk much about, but just... that’s my taste... this show’s decks are terrible for the most part. the card effects are all too particular and disturbingly OP (one OP card after another... it always happens and it always makes the duels a drag to watch, even if they’re just one or two episodes long at the most)... plus... aesthetically... i guess they’re not all terrible, but still none of them wowed me either...

i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again... this show nearly made me give up on yugioh. my logic was “if they’re just gonna keep making ze//al after ze//al, i’m just gonna stop.” thankfully... well i think you know what happened next...

even after all that’s said and done and i’ve pretty much ranted and ripped this show a new one, I STILL DON’T WANNA DISCOURAGE ANYONE FROM WATCHING IT IF THEY REALLY WANNA TRY IT. because i know that maybe this show just wasn’t for me and it didnt click with me, but it might for someone else. i’m not here to tell you that it’s a piece of shit abomination that should never have happened and it should be whipped out of existence and you should go watch something else instead (HUR DUR GO WATCH VANGUARD INSTEAD) . i’m not here telling you what you should and shouldn’t like. if you like this show, that’s awesome. tbqh with you, i still enjoyed some of it and i’m not afraid to admit that. but overall? it was super lackluster and unimpressive, IMO. at best, i’d say it’s forgettable so for the most time i’m just like... “oh ze//al? yeah it happened i guess” and move on without a second thought and let its fans enjoy it as if its the best thing in the world even tho i personally do not see it that way at all. 

but again, i’d say watch it and make up your own opinion over it. i think that’s honestly the best course of action for any media that might even slightly interest you. don’t let people spoon feed their opinions to you. this was all MY experience of the show. go have your own.

p.s. (more of my opinion) i LOVE music and soundtracks of things. they’re always also a big factor of my enjoyment of the media i consume. the soundtrack for this show is decent at best. no track really stood out to me (like maybe one did) but for the most part... the soundtrack is just... i wouldn’t say it’s bad, it’s just... again not memorable... not my style... and my biggest gripe is that a lot of the tracks have this pseudo-grandiose feeling to it that just ultimately fall flat and don’t convey actual emotion. it mostly just seems like it’s music for music’s sake. personally, i think good soundtracks should be able to tell a story or convey an overwhelming feeling without the context of its source material being present. i... i just never got that with ze//al’s soundtrack. maybe once, as i said, but... even then i dont remember it.

on a more positive note tho... i have to admit all of the ED themes are really good (Challenge the Game was literally too good for this show, who the fuck allowed this). i’d listen to them way more often if i didnt associate them with ze//al tbh. not a huge fan of any of the OPs tho. no, not even the second OP. like it’s nice for the first few times but then, to me personally, it starts getting really grating and wangsty.