#and that plotline was boring and kinda dumb

[laniidae-passerine]

I’m finding that the laziest moments of Doctor Who’s writing are the ‘retroactive twists’ - when the show runner reveals something happened way back over there, in the past, before they were even running the show. And we swear it happened, way over there, far back, and you didn’t see it because of reasons but it’s definitely been happening! And it totally makes sense and I absolutely didn’t just pull it out my ass to justify my paper thin plotline! All this kind of writing does is make me miss self contained season length plots. We’ve had people complaining that Moffat was guilty of the “this thing is big and scary and it’s going to happen, oh god it’s showing up, we’re going to discover what it truly is….. next season!!!!!!” plotline (and yes. he was. twelve is my fav doctor but yeah Moffat loved a mysterious horse and a big stick) but now suddenly when RTD gets out his own mysterious horse and a big stick, it’s got to be genius! everything is eventually going to make sense! and we’re absolutely not being had by a man who used to be able to write this show and is now a hack!

[vimesbootstheory]

Cobra Kai S6 Part 2 Thoughts

just a big ole thought dumb after the cut

THOUGHTS on 6x06-6x10

as with part 1, I tended to note down things that pissed me off; when things I liked happened, I kept my eyes on the show and my fingers off the keyboard. so expect some bitching, but I didn't HATE it.

lawrusso hotel roommates potential predictably squandered :\ I missed the hell out of chozen but c'mooon they couldn't have had ONE (1) night with just the two of them?

am I here, at this part-season, mostly for zabka being pretty? maybe. maybe so.

I did like that they drew explicit parallels between how johnny has responded to kreese's return and how daniel responded to silver's return, it's a low bar but I didn't expect them to clear it

I knew the new kids would pull focus and be boring and I was right, there were a ton of full-length fight scenes that I was just looking at my phone for, 'cause they were asking me to care about iron dragon or kwon or the… Dublin whatevers

zabka with the nunchucks was a special moment just for me and my ilk, thanks very much show

is the eunjangdo going to keep being a thing in the final ep drop? because that was a ton of lead-up for not a whole lot, like I was yelling "what does it MEAN what is it FOR" multiple times at my screen and then…? I'm gonna be so honest, I do not care that kwon shanked himself.

deeply funny scene at the rainforest cafe or whatever it was, all the non-americans bullying the americans. they're so Oppressed. on the same note, unintentionally hilarious line from Daniel when he's in the dog cage, "You can't do this! I'm an American!" oh ok ok dog cages are Not Okay for americans, noted.

not only Kreese's but ALSO silver's charges are just, poof, gone? what is this

I still do not have my talk between tory and johnny and I feel like it might be too late for that to land :((( disappointed

6x07 was ROUGH but that voice mail… leave me alone for some time with just that voice mail for comfort. "I need you, too"!!!! OH OK OK OK listen! it won't take much to bring me back to lawrusso, I can survive on crumbs and this is more than crumbs

the Dog Cage of Character Development is the best thing to happen to daniel's character since season 3. love him siccing hungry dogs on some guys. love him choosing a johnny-style exercise for their last practice session. LOVE the scheming with johnny and chozen to sic kreese on silver. yes we love an unhinged daniel! they even let him say fuck!

otoh the Miyagi plot continues to be very boring and predictable. I do not have time for it. except when it leads to dog cages.

I called baby complications back in the first ep drop of s6, thought they would be a more serious thing. ultimately disposable in terms of plot some really good acting moments from zabka and mariduena in this plotline, zabka is so good at the trying-not-to-cry face. and I loved them bringing back some bonding for johnny and miguel, that was really missed in part 1.

I had some high hopes for the plot development of robby dipping into drinking, they could have done something really interesting with that re: his family hx with addiction, but it just led to teen drama, blah.

I was not pleased at silver showing up -- I don't say much about it, 'cause I don't wanna yuck anyone's yum, but I'm not really a silver fan. didn't end up hating his role, though, it was fine. the only thing I didn't care for was that it turned kreese's role into an enemy-of-my-enemy thing, and tbh I was hoping for a more sustained villain arc for kreese. I don't want a redemption for him at all, although from some bts quotes it sounds like that might be where they're going. hrmph.

wolf ended up being kinda disappointing, making him a silver lackey is boring. so much for johnny/wolf.

I've already mentioned the voice mail but the scene where Daniel thanks Johnny for it was !!!! so much! the heart eyes from both parties in that scene, they were healing all my wounds

I had assumed that this ep drop would tie up the tournament. and maybe it did, idk, maybe that's the end of it right there. but I am a little worried they're going to draw it out more. I want them back in the valley with a more focused, personal mini-arc in the last five but them still being in spain at the end of 6x10 makes me think it won't be as tidy as that.

VERY annoyed that the johnny/daniel hug was in the BACKGROUND of a shot, come ON

laughed my ass off at cobra kai being eliminated and then immediately coming back. extremely funny.

it's the most manufactured drama that kim da-eun is apparently pissed just 'cause chozen said they ran into each other by mistake? they both agreed to keep their one night stand between them, this is dumb

the sekai taikai brawl was ehhh not the most interesting to me, felt like the show trying to recapture the school fight. the school fight was great because they felt like kids and the setting had nothing to do with fighting, it was like karate breaking into the real world. also we cared about everyone involved, and the kid who got hurt at the end was MIGUEL, not this one-note villain we just met. a lot of flash, no substance for this round. although I was SEATED for silver vs kreese and the silver vs johnny rematch.

if NONE of the rivals end up as lovers on the rivals-to-lovers show then what was the fucking point

overall, this was all over the place, some high points, some groan-worthy stuff, nowhere near what we had in s1-s2 but we knew this. still looking forward to the end.

[colekinnie-4life]

Ranking Ninjago Seasons Pt 1 (F and D Tier)

Part 2…

Yeah, I’m doing this.

Why? I’m bored as shit and also I just reread a post that was ranking Ninjago seasons, so why not?

And the title of “Worst Ninjago Season in my Opinion” goes to….

Rebooted!

I hate this season.

It’s. So. Fucking. Boring.

Barely anything happens at all! In the 8 episode runtime, which makes this the second shortest Ninjago season from the Wilfilm era.

Ok first, positives.

Pixane is cute and Zane’s sacrifice was done excellently. His character is also made a bit better, which I appreciate.

Uh- we get 3 minutes of Lava interactions.

Welp time for my negatives!

This season takes forever to go anywhere, like I said. Then once they deal with the Overlord in the Digiverse, erm actually that did jack shit and he’s still alive by the way! Pythor just ate him!

(Now that I’m typing this out I sound crazy)

Lloyd and Garmadon’s story is done decently, sure, but Lloyd is a complete egotistical moron throughout the whole thing.

“Oh I’m the Golden Ninja I can do anything! I’m God himself!”

Sure he had the powers of God and he “destroyed” the Overlord in season 2, which kinda justifies his behavior, but he’s so annoying and unbearable to watch.

Sensei Garmadon is good. Nothing else to say about that plot line.

Time for the worse plot line, aka the stuff the main ninja are doing.

Honestly I barely remember what they were trying to do because of how forgettable this season is. I’m pretty sure that they’re just screwing around trying to get the Overlord out of the computers and keeping Lloyd away from him, but that’s all I remember besides…

THE LOVE TRIANGLE.

OH MY JOHN SPINJITZU.

I DESPISE THIS PLOTLINE WITH EVERY FIBER OF MY BEING.

THIS. THIS IS THE MAIN REASON I HATE REBOOTED.

It ruins Nya’s character, makes Jay unlikeable for this season, season 4 and the beginning of season 6, and Cole- I mean Cole’s not all that innocent but he’s just kinda standing in the middle of all this. His character doesn’t go through the meatgrinder of character assassination.

Nya’s whole character in the past 2 seasons was being an independent girlboss who did whatever the fuck she wanted.

But the second that a computer AI tells her “you should like Cole instead of Jay!”, she decides that “I’m gonna listen to a computer despite the fact I’ve been dating Jay for 2 seasons now!”

She and Cole have no chemistry whatsoever. In season 1, Cole said he wished he had a sister like her, clearly only seeing her as a friend.

Luckily in canon he was just confused by all the attention and didn’t actually like her. But still, the whole “don’t tell Jay” thing makes me mad, and Cole rarely makes me mad.

Jay, oh my gosh.

He’s not as bad as Nya but he’s still thrown into the meatgrinder of character assassination.

The second that Pixal says that Nya’s perfect match is Cole, he immediately pins the blame on him and tackles him to the ground for no reason. Cole was only fighting back for self defense.

As Tom Critic put it:

“WHY IS THIS COLE’S FAULT?!!”

He and Cole’s beef is so dumb. And Nya ain’t making it any better.

“This macho stuff is making you both look like fools!”

EVEN THOUGH ITS YOUR FAULT THEY’RE FIGHTING IN THE FIRST PLACE BECAUSE YOU LISTENED TO A FUCKING COMPUTER YOU BITCH-

*ahem ahem*

What else is there to hate about this plot line?

How about the fact that it goes absolutely nowhere? There was no point for adding this. Absolutely no reason besides the fact that Jay, Cole, and Nya don’t get anything to do this season.

EVEN THOUGH KAI DOESNT GET ANYTHING EITHER!

He’s shown to hate futuristic technology and that’s literally the only thing he gets this season! So what’s the point of the love triangle to get them to do something?

Oh yeah! There is no point!

Back to Kai. All he gets to do is flirt with a random girl at a gas station and get tied to a rocket.

Oh yeah he got tied to a rocket ship. That doesn't sound traumatizing whatsoever/sarc.

Waking up after being knocked out for who knows how long and finding out you're tied up underneath a rocket ship that could set off at any time, burning you to a crisp in one big firey explosion.

That totally wouldn't scar you for life.

Ok back to a positive, aka Zane's sacrifice.

Some people say the saddest part of Zane's death was the fact that Nya gave Cole a hug afterwards and Jay looks sad, but that's not the saddest part to me.

The saddest part was right before he died, when everyone is crying out at him to stop.

More specifically, when Kai cries out:

"LET GO OF HIM ZANE! WHAT IS HE DOING?!"

The way that Vincent Tong voiced that scene literally brings tears to my eyes and shivers down my spine every time. He poured so much energy into that oh my gosh.

Alright, no more complaining about this season before this becomes a 27 page essay. Next!

Crystallized…

WAIT WRONG POSTER-

Ok, there we go!

Yeah, Crystallized sucks in my opinion. Bite me.

I’m not like Crusty783 where I hate this season with every fiber of my being, but I still don’t like it that much.

First part was decent, ig. The Skybound callback with the whole fugitive storyline was a nice idea, and the ninja actually committing a crime instead of being framed was cool.

Nya could’ve come back a little later than 6 episodes after turning into water, but oh well. At least she’ll add something to the plot later, right?

…right?

(We’ll get back to that…)

Fugidove is the bane of my existence. He’s. So. Annoying. Just. Shut. The. Fuck. Up.

I mean he’s supposed to be annoying and I get that but still. He’s a worse character than Dareth and I hate Dareth with all of my being so that shows how bad of a character Fugi-Dick is.

Dareth is fine this season ig. He’s actually not an idiot during the court case and doesn’t try to bust the ninja out of jail using a cake.

What else is there in part 1?

Mr. Kabuki Mask was a neat idea. If he wasn’t Harumi then I’d actually like him. But unfortunately, it was Harumi.

I didn’t like her before she died, what makes you think I’ll like her now, ninjago writers?

Alright, since barely anything happens in part 1, time for part 2.

Oh my gosh this is the main reason I don’t like Crystallized.

This season is the embodiment of the meatgrinder of character assassination I talked about. Everyone gets butchered.

Ok not everyone. Kai, Jay, and Cole mostly stay the same. To be fair they don’t really do anything though-

Lloyd is no longer Lloyd. He is La-Lloyd, as Knightly called him after s8 (I don’t see what his problem is with Lloyd in season 8). He has the “Harumi you don’t have to do this”-itus, meanwhile when it comes to Garmadon who is TRYING TO BE A BETTER PERSON AND BECAME A GOOD GUY, he shuts him down because “you’re an Oni, and Oni are incapable of caring”.

(Even though Mystaké existed and she fucking died to save your life but ok La-Lloyd, sure.)

Like he thinks that Harumi, the girl that gave him PTSD for 4 seasons in a row before this, has a better chance of becoming a better person than his father, someone who is clearly becoming a better person and is actually trying to be nice to you now? Puh-lease.

Oh yeah, Harumi!

She got shoved into the character assassination blender before being put into the meat grinder. Her character is 100% ruined because of the Overlord saying she has feelings for La-Lloyd.

*inhale*

NO SHE FUCKING DOESN’T!

THAT WAS THE PART OF HER CHARACTER THAT MADE HER SO GOOD IN SEASONS 8-9! SHE DIDNT GIVE TWO SHITS ABOUT LLOYD SHE WAS JUST USING HIM GAHHHHHHHH-

Alright, who else is there?

Oh yeah, Nya! What’s she up to after being water for a full year?

Absolutely nothing. Like she does jackshit besides be a Samurai X themed taxi.

Yes I stole that line from Crusty783.

Her and Kai, her BROTHER, have one single interaction this whole season after she was gone for a year. The show only focuses on Jaya angst because we need more of that shoved down our throats! Seasons 6, 9, and 14 (Seabound, don’t @ me) weren’t enough, we need MORE!

Zane.

Return of the Ice Emperor makes me want to shove my head into a meatgrinder.

I fucking loathe this episode.

With a title like that, you’d think they’d give him some trauma/PTSD when it comes to the fact that he, y’know, COMMITTED GENOCIDE FOR 60 YEARS??

But no. Zane gets taken apart for the 10485792742874387492749273947482773747374387447th time and he acts like the Ice Emperor because this show treats trauma like a joke most of the time.

The whole “emotionless arc” from part 1 was decent ig. He was pretty funny when he was talking like a toaster, and the moment when he starts screeching when he turns on his emotions for 2 seconds was funny.

The Benefit of Grief was a good episode. Sally was a bit annoying but eh whatever. Dareth didn’t get on my nerves for once and Hot Dog McFiddlesticks or whatever his name was was really entertaining.

Ok, one more point to make about Crystallized, that’s the villain.

Say hello to the Crystal King!

Oh? What’s that? He’s not a new villain? What do you mean-

It’s the fucking Overlord. Again. This is the 3rd time he’s reappeared, just let him die already!

I hate the Overlord. He’s such a nothing burger of a villain. His entire motivation is just “I’m evil and dark so I make everyone else evil and dark.”

I get he’s the embodiment of evil but give him some personality, oh my gosh.

Make it so he likes seeing people in pain. Have him laugh whenever someone got turned into a crystal zombie or something, idk!

That’s how he is in my Golden Hope au. Sure that’s not canon, obviously, but I wanted to give him *some* personality besides “me evil.”

Ok, is there anything about this season that I like besides Benefit of Grief?

Actually, yes!

SAFE HAVEN IS THE BEST EPISODE OF THE ENTIRE SEASON.

LAVA NATION UNITE!!

The whole thing is just Kai being a bisexual disaster. I love it so much.

It gives us this screenshot, which gives enough context tbh:

It’s just “GAH I LOVE THEM SO MUCH” for 11 minutes, and that’s basically it.

The episode gives Skylor some character, hallelujah. Last couple of seasons she’s been in did not do her any justice.

Pythor was funny. And he gave us the scene of:

“Ninja~ where are you?”

“We’re over here!”

So yeah, Safe Haven is the best episode ever. Ok, not the best episode of all time, but it’s definitely a personal favorite of mine, solely for all the Lava brainrot I get to indulge in.

(Fun fact: Cole was originally going to say that Kai was handsome when he was acting all loopy. I hate homophobes.)

What else is there in this season-?

Ronin’s return was nice. Glad he went back to his previous personality rather than being a full time criminal like he was in The Island. I get that he’s like “I do whatever the fuck I want” most of the time, but he doesn’t give off the vibes of using the criminals he’s hired to catch just to swindle a bunch of islanders.

Alright, that’s it for Crystallized.

Next!

Secrets of Forbidden Spinjitzu: Fire Chapter

Yeah I’m considering this a separate season for this tier list. Bite me.

This is the main reason why (mostly) everyone hates season 11, you cannot convince me otherwise.

Nothing. Happens.

The main reasons for why I hate certain Ninjago seasons is because they’re boring/assassinate characters.

The latter doesn’t happen, thank the FSM, but the first point still stands.

Assphera is a dumb villain. Only redeeming quality about her is the joke where she screams “REVENGE” every two seconds in the most ear-splitting voice ever.

Props to her voice actress, RIP.

Anyways, back to the actual season.

Like I said, nothing happens in the beginning. Just 4 or 5 episodes of the ninja dicking around looking for something to do, then they free Assphera from her pyramid and then finally, they start doing shit.

Ok but this line from Lloyd made me laugh:

“Who opens a possibly cursed tomb without checking it out first?”

…you-?

The paperboy episode was- pointless. But it was still dumb fun ig 🤷🏼‍♀️

Snaketastrophe was a really funny episode. I actually like that one.

But that doesn’t mean I like the first couple of episodes.

Too many burp and fart jokes in the first episode, the second episode is just boring, same with all the other episodes about being stuck on a rock with Barney the Dinosaur Beetle.

Kai’s powerless arc was just a repeat of Lloyd’s powerless arc from season 9, but done worse imo.

(I mean Firemaker is one of the best ninjago episodes ever created besides Safe Haven but that’s not important rn)

Overall this half of the season is boring as shit and I just want to get to the ice chapter when ever I watch it.

Alright, that’s it for today!

Here’s the tier list so far:

Next part will be C and B tiers.

See you in 10 years when I make that/j

[thecat-inthehat]

7.1 msq done. Under a cut because it's a bit negative, also kinda rambly and talks about 7.0 stuff.

I am. So fucking bored. This shit is so stupid and I am tired of the same (the same!!) plot about families trotted out for the fifth time! DT has this incredible world and culture on both sides yet refuses to actually do anything with the characters that it has or the plot and politics that could be there.

I am so, so, so fucking tired of the "well daddy had a good reason for abandoning you" plot that's shown up so many times and having every character just. Be okay with it. "Oh, it's for a good cause? I'm not mad then, all my complex feelings about family are resolved :)". Individually each one could be interesting, but having this be compounded by all three Promises, Krile, Erenville, and Gulool Ja...? This shit is getting so fucking old, and it isn't even using the similar stories to draw out the differences, it's just ... the same? Every time?

DT as a whole was... not really an enjoyable experience for me, but less in a way that's personally upsetting and just "frustration bordering on indifference." And 7.1 is just more of the same...? A lot of DT feels as though it isn't actually in conversation with what it's about, with like... Yeah there's some touches on Alexandria's imperialism and colonialism, but it refuses to engage with that on a meaningful level and instead coddles the people of Solution 9 to a batshit degree. There's also something to be said about generational trauma with regards to all these Bad Parent Plotlines, but then it's swept under the rug for "oh dad had a good reason" and then not explored at all.

It does not help that I really dislike Sphene for reasons that are hard to fully articulate but can be dumbed down to "this is a bad take on a well trodden sci-fi archetype, Stargate did most of this in 40 minutes and did it better". The second I saw the regulators and watched them erase the memory of a woman I groaned so long and loud because I knew it wasn't going to be handling it well.

Wuk Lamat is... fine? For the most part? But it really bothers me that her selfishness (Seeing WoL as a new toy and Koana feeling left behind before the ceremony; Refusing to engage with Erenville's grief in Living Memory) isn't actually recognized as like... a real problem. The story is doing that thing where it's not actually engaging with the things that's its presenting -- it doesn't even acknowledge that Wuk Lamat is selfish with regards to that, or that it's a character flaw that she has. I don't mind if characters are complex or bad or whatever, I just want the narrative to actually know what it's talking about.

It's also extremely frustrating to watch the Scions, well established characters, not act like themselves. You cannot convince me that Alisaie fucking Leveilleur would look at the regulators, the erasure of memory, and just go "I don't like it, but it's not my place to judge! :/", not when she pioneered the cure for tempering out of a desire not to lose anyone else in her life the way she lost her Grandfather. Y'shtola would not have mildly sat back and let us go through the gate to Living Memory without her, she just wouldn't have. It feels like the characters we know are being forced to go along with what the DM wants at the cost of their actual character arcs just because the plot needs them to get from A to B.

Sighs. Man. It's really fucking dire when I legit considered asking someone else to tell me when the story was getting good again and just unsubbing for a while. And like... I don't like this feeling. This game, this story, has meant a lot to me over the years, I've been playing it since 2015. I want to like Dawntrail, I was even enjoying myself during the Rite of Succession! I love the areas that we go to, the culture and the quests that you can do, etc. But this just... feels kinda bad.

I dunno what I'm gonna do about all these feelings, I just needed to get it out of my head. Maybe I do need a break from XIV, but it's not the game itself that I have an issue with, just the story? And the story is still going to be there when I come back... I'll think about it.

[gale-gentlepenguin]

Did you finish the S2 of the Total Drama Reboot (all the eps are out already) ? I did and while the season started strong the ending flopped badly imo.

Incoming spoilers (and long rant) if you haven't watched it yet:

The winner is not it I'm sorry. Wayne is a cool character but he had zero stand outs moments to justify his win. They tried to recreate Owen's win in Island but at least Owen was really strong in some challenges (including destroying the main villain Heather in the final 3 challenge). Wayne literally flopped hard in almost all of the challenges this season and then got hard carried by his best friend's boyfriend in the final 3 for his win. Also I don't understand how he got so many enthusiastic supporters when Raj and Bowie were the only characters he interacted with from that group, especially cause he didn't even need them as Bowie literally did almost all the work for him by himself.

Julia dominated this season but it felt hollow, she quite literally had no opposition left after she got Bowie booted off. Imagine if Heather got booted in the middle point of World Tour and Alejandro just freely dominated his way into a final 3 with the likes of DJ and Cody (which he somehow would've still lost just to have one of the good guys win). That's pretty much how I felt about the final 3 from this season. Mkulia (and their cheating conflict with Bowraj) did carry the first half, so I'm gonna give them that.

Priyaleb literally got turned into a Skave 2.0 with their flip floppity mess drama just without the "Keith" plot point at the end to bomb out their relationship completely. They turned Priya into a Courtney knock-off who's more obsessed with revenge and winning (even tho she already won a season) than her own boyfriend. She even seems to despise Caleb's personality and is only in love with the idea of having a hot boyfriend (just like Courtney seemed in love with the thrill of being with a bad boy than Duncan himself and we know how that relationship ended up). Honestly if they bring up this couple for another season they're def gonna have a huge messy break up, I just don't see them lasting with the way they've been portrayed in these last S2 eps.

Ngl but I actually enjoyed Ripaxel, even tho they were just the gross comedic relief side couple. Surprisingly Ripper treated Axel like a Queen (unlike Caleb who just kept embarrassing his girl over and over on international tv) and Axel stopped abusing him completely after they started dating, so they're unironically one of the healthiest TDI couples so far. And even tho they're the horny couple at least Ripper really does seem to have genuine feelings for her unlike Priya for Caleb.

And I really hated the Hockey Bros flanderization this season. Last season they were dumb himbos but they were still very competent in the team challenges, heck arguably the best overall from their team. But this season they literally got turned into man children who probably wouldn't be able to cross the street without Bowie around to take them by their hands. Which literally didn't make sense at all when this season was supposed to focus more on them than the last one.

They really had Millie go crazy in that one ep and almost kill Damien just to win a challenge, but honestly I kinda dig that. Her team was so boring that they needed at least one (secretly) unhinged member.

Bowie was clearly weaker as a character this season but he still served. Scary Girl was technically in only 2 episodes and you know she still SERVED. I didn't really care about the other characters this season tbf.

So overall it might still not be the worst season (I mean All Stars and Pahkitew still exist) but season 1 of the Reboot was def superior imo. While I'm not opposed to at least some of this cast coming back in a future season I really hope they create a new cast beforehand if they get the greenlight for new seasons cause they're already exhausting all the plotlines for this one and some of them already started to become flanderized. At the very least they should add new characters and change the location to shake things up if they still want to go ahead with this cast.

So Yes, I did finish Season 2

And much like season 1 I found it mid. I think Season 1 ended stronger, but started pretty weak. While Season 2 was the reverse

I did think it had a promising start, I even liked how Priya and Kaleb were set up for the drama. But after the reveal it kind of... fizzled out. Like they could have milked the drama more and Priya had a right to want revenge but Priya was never such a super angry revenge person before and it felt weird.

They turned Caleb into a complete idiot after they resolved the arc. He was smart, just not game show savvy. That was his thing.

I wouldnt call it anywhere CLOSE to the atrocity that was Skave. But it was a lot less fun. At least Priya calmed down at the end.

But the moment the season went down hill for me was when Damien got eliminated.

I really felt they were setting him up for something good in the character arc department but they didnt. I knew he was doomed the moment he found the immunity idol but it would have been a nice inversion to have HIM use it.

And lets be real, I didnt care about the final 3 at all, I knew Julia wasnt going to win because lets face it she is basically Diet Heather.

They even did something to her hair like Heather.

As for Wayne winning. I didnt care, it was going to be him or Caleb.

Season 2 could have used more Scary Girl. Every scene she was in was gold.

I also appreciated the tasteful cameos of Owen. MacArthur and the Tennis pros.

It wasnt anything awful, but i did find it fizzled out in the later half.

[dinosaursatemymom]

rant about heartstopper for a little

just a word of warning, this isn't going to be extremely positive, but it's not hating on the show

Also all of this is just my opinion, but I'm very open for disagreements, as long as it's respectful

Right off the bat, I have to say, I absolutely hate Nick and Charlie together. I just think they are the most bland boring relationship in the entire show(I also don't think the actors are the best on the show which might have something to do with my dislike of them together) I have to say, my dislike of them together likely also stems from fluff not being my favorite (but I did like them in the books). Just looking at the relationship itself, it kinda feels like the writers weren't sure what to do with them after, like the first three or four episodes. All of the drama and conflict felt extremely forced, just for the sake of needing the main couple to be compelling. In the books, the majority of the plot took place in one or two books;but the show obviously had to stretch out the plot, which didn't work great. I feel like I might've liked the relationship more if they just dealed with all the conflict right off the bat, instead of trying to stretch in out. If they had done this, then all of the disgustingly sweet scenes could've happened without forced conflict, and the conflict(which is basically necessary for entertainment) could've been saved for other characters where it wouldn't have felt forced. Also, all of their scenes together just feel so... loud(?) To me...?(idk if that's just me)

I also have to say I do like the way they handled Nick and his getting comfortable with his sexuality. I also really enjoyed Tara and Darcy(for the most part), as well as Tao and Elle in general. I absolutely loved Isaac and his storyline of realizing hes ace and stuff (although I think it's absolutely ridiculous that hes always reading, and it felt a little bit like the creators were saying that ace people can't even enjoy being around their friends)

I also think that s2 was so much better than s1. Pretty much the only thing I didn't like about s2 was the stupid fricking hickey plotline, it was just completely unnecessary. I feel like the hickey could've just been replaced with, like, a video of Charlie kissing someone or something like that. (Idk?? The plotline was dumb is what I'm saying)Other than that, I really liked how Nick and Charlie took a little step back from being in the constant spotlight, and let the other(imo more compelling) characters/storylines shine. It was good, and the extremely disgustingly cringy akward scenes that made me dislike s1, seemed to leave for the most part(which might be due to the actors just getting better at acting and getting more used to being on screen) only one or two moments made me yell at the screen this season, as opposed to s1 where I was yelling every two seconds at something. Also I just love Imogen.

I just feel like, the show is good, not great or horrible, it's just a good show. I feel like that it really should just be taken for what it is, it's nothing revolutionary(I understand it has a lot of queer characters, but so does DC legends of tomorrow and all of those characters are fleshed out better; whilst I feel as though the heartstopper characters are fairly one dimensional) but it is just a good show. I just think that the show wanted to give the exact same vibe as the book and it just didn't translate well to a TV show. Also I'm gonna admit to being extremely biased here because I absolutely HATE Charlies character and portrayal (not so much in the books though), but that's for another rant.

If you'd like, please feel free to share your opinion! I would love to understand what people see in heartstopper, other than representation.

[liliallowed]

Imagine if the player got bored or something and used Y/N as a vessel to flirt with Dust.

That would be so out of pocket.

hmmm. well that is a good idea but...

I was thinking something even more interesting.

I won't elaborate since that plotline is for my Thornbound souls fic but yeah I've had this idea before. just... with a plot twist or... two

in the meantime though enjoy this short little fic!

you were in the lion's den and one mistake could cost you your reset.

but you liked to gamble. going all in on a bet made your heart beat fast with excitement.

how good WAS your y/n impression actually? you were fairly confident you could mimick their behavior and personallity...

though... it would be even more natural to have the vessel be in full control... while you simply observed and felt things from their perspective. let them take the lead.

or maybe they would? as long as they made the same choices y/n would've made anyways, there was no distress in the soul and they'd be completely in sync and unrecognizable. but?

one missed heartbeat... a TINY BIT of indecisive behavior and they KNEW he'd pick that up on the MOMENT their soul studders.

they knew he had his senses hyperfixed on this humans pathetic mushy soul.

what did he see in them anyway?...

you sigh feeling a slight throb in you head but it disappeared the moment you open your eyes.

you can't help but notice a familiar hooded figure is watching you, his eyelights observing you silently.

🩶[close your eyes again and pretend to be sleeping so he'll go away. it's just a dream y/n you're still dreaming.]

"stop staring at me."

"... why are you still here... am I still dreaming?"

you close your eyes swiftly as you try to ignore the sound of your definitely NOT real paralysis demon strapping closer... closer...

he's right there you don't dare open your eyes you KNOW his face is only millimeters away from yours cuz you can FEEL his eyelights digging into your soul.

nope. you aren't seeing him. he's fake. you're just tired. he's not real. you just need to MOVE your hand and see if you can touch air.

... your hand... slips through the air. there's actually nothing there?

🩶[check]

you open your right eye squinting... nothing there.

you open the other one to get jumpscared by his face against.

🩶"EEP! "

[eye roll]

[stare into the void. maybe he'll go away???]

you let out a small scared squeak ducking under the comfort of your pillow... then look back.

yep. still there. still VERY MUCH THERE.

/your ears barely pick up the sound of a small chuckle./

/.../

/you're starting to see the appeal actually... this vessel is kinda adorable./

before you can make a choice however,

you find yourself glaring at the skeleton as you step out of bed, walking up to him with a stubborn face.

"why are you here?"

/huh... without input? they're pissed hehehehe./

"just checking up on you" he shrugged.

"don't you have some... demon thingy to catch or something." you mutter half heartedly.

"lost their trace. soooo knowing that freak YOU'RE the most likely person they'll cling onto"

/PFFFFT- *spits out coffee*/

/HOLY FUK... dude... dude I'm not sus. I swear./

"... I think I would KNOW if I'm possessed." you roll your eyes.

"I can tell" his grin sharpens.

"can you stop giving me vague threats!? I'm NOT GONNA... GO ON SOME DUMB... cosmic black hole time warping... WHATEVER THE HELL YOU SAID!" you glare at him.

"it's okay. take your time. either the mask slips or you're right and I'm just paranoid. the more we talk the more I'll get to... test your answers."

"you're fucking crazy."

"I know what I am."

🩶"just leave me alone... last thing I need is you telling me my choices aren't my own. FUCK off."

his sockets squint... as if he's looking for something in your stubborn face...

but... he doesn't find it.

he sighs.

"I'll look around again. DO NOT LEAVE . I WILL FIND YOU."

he warps away.

now was your chance to get out! yet... you feel inclined to stay. you don't want to leave-

stay??? why should you stay? HE KIDNAPPED YOU? why did you hang such a silly though+

*PING

a skeletal hand pulls at your soul TEARING it through the vessel.

"GOTCHA" he chuckled.

💔

GAME OVER.

[x-neurotoxin-x]

thoughts on the new BNHA chapter if you've seen it

Imma be so real, i haven't been all that invested in the recent chapters. I've kept up with them but I don't find them all that interesting to me personally. I'll share my thoughts, just fair warning i may have some unpopular opinions;

First of all Izuku losing is arms is crazy. That panel is brutal. I do think there's a possibility of it being reversed/healed/etc bc I don't see Hori committing much when it comes to maiming or killing off the students, so I think he'll be okay

I'm also 100% positive Shigaraki is not dead, won't be permanently possessed, and will be fine. He's basically the only safe villain that isn't going to be killed off and will be given a redemption no matter what.

Those two points are kinda why I find this fight boring. There isn't any real stakes imo because neither of them will die and they're just kinda doing the same "fight, talk, fight, talk" thing the whole time. I find it uninteresting.

I also have no idea why afo is here again. Didn't he reverse to a fetus? Why are you here? That being said, he's silly and dramatic and i kinda love his evil mastermind swag, he makes it a little more bearable between Tomura "woe is me" shigaraki and Izuku "I need to be Morally Right even if I'm killing myself to do it" Midoryia.

Afo being revealed to have a hand in literally all of Tomura's upbringing down to his birth is SUCH a dumb plot point imo. It takes away all of the responsibly factor from Tomura's villainy, shoots a HUGE hole in the "one bad day" theme with the rest of the villains since it wasnt his choice - something that makes every other villain relatable and complex, they all (Dabi, Toga, Twice, Spinner, etc) were dealt terrible hands and subjected to horrible upbringings too but they fell into these paths of villainy by their own choices, and let it shape them. It makes them all very deep while Tomura... Just kinda ruined that theme by making nothing his choice. It's lame and unnecessary, imo.

Speaking of the other villains and plotlines, I really wanna go back to them and I DO NOT WANT them to be pulled into the Shigaraki vs deku thing. None of them are in the place for that physically (they're all half dead), none of its necessary since Shigaraki *is* being saved and has been met with more sympathy from characters/narrative than the rest of the villains, and their character plotlines are still not finished. Toga's fight was rushed, the "acceptance" she received was forced, and we don't know if either of them are okay. Last we saw Dabi he was possibly dying while cursing the entire family and saying he wants to die, none of the todofam stuff is resolved at all and if it gets off screened for the main fight I'm gonna be upset because there's so many complex layers to everything there. Last we saw Spinner he collapsed on the ground somewhere, he may very well be dead. No villains arcs have been finished, properly handled, or wrapped up and it's unnecessary and stupid to have their stuff be tossed aside for "saving Tomura." THEY need to be saved. How about Shigaraki vs deku gets wrapped up and Shigaraki saves THEM. That would fit the narrative better then them being used for more Tomura man pain.

That was a rant wow

Uh what else???

Idk. Im hoping everything gets wrapped up in this chapter bc this war arc has been... Shitty tbh. I wanna hope the aftermath arc is better.

I know everybody freaking out that my hero is coming to an end but I think we still got at least another arc to tie things together and wrap up all the mess of the war arc.

[cats2019forthenintendoswitch]

So do you guys remember when netherrealm rebooted mortal kombat and they made a kinda weird competitive game with some pretty janky animation and they talked about how cool the story mode was but then it was sorta just recycled the story from the first three games with a couple of dumb twists? Most notably, THAT scene with no buildup? And how instead of the hero being the classic archetype it was his literal godly mentor and how stupid the way he defeated the main villain was? And also do you remember how they strived for realistic fatalities so they started the lovely custom of having the dev team look at car accidents?

Also remember how Mortal Kombat X had THE jankiest animations ever seen on a AAA game of its generation and a button used to turn your character with no gameplay effect? And how half the consequences of the first game were almost inmediately undone? And how there was a 20 year timeskip for no reason that introduced characters that no one liked because either they were already conceptually lame as hell (by that I specifically mean the four kombat kids) or the story mode made them unlikeable? With maybe the exception of the Mad Max ripoff duo because they do literally nothing. And how the story is about Johnny Fucking Cage and his selfie-obsessed zillenial daughter? And how much the game jacks off the US military industrial complex? And how many characters were cut for no apparent reason? And how the fatalities stopped being B-series-style gore and now it was just gross and no one was having fun anymore?

And remember how mortal kombat 11 was first of all A LIVE SERVICE GAME? Remember how you had to unlock Jax's fucking blue pants and red wristwratch and SPECIAL MOVES? Remember how the animations only slightly improved and you still have that dumbass useless turnaround button? And also remember how they took a bunch of potentially interesting storylines and retconned them all in-universe for THE most generic multiverse plot ever imaginable, in THE most abrupt and unsatisfying way possible? Remember how the plotlines that were hinted in MKX that weren't retconned or forgotten about had the impact of a dead fly on the empire state building (looking at you Jade)? Remember how even the multiverse time travel bullshit wasn't interesting in its own way, because they didn't even interact with the REAL original universe, and the interactions mostly didn't go any farther than "wow, I've got some wrinkles!" or whatever? Remember how there were like 3 gods that controlled causality and each was less interesting and had more nonsensical motives than the last? Remember how the DLC took an originally interesting character and commited character assassination in a way that made her boring and generic? Remember how the end of the DLC established that not only do consequences in the mortal kombat not matter but they will not ever matter again? Also remember how despite having a plot centered around multiverses and time travel they got rid of like all of the interesting characters from the OG other than like the two main ninjas? Also remember how the other legacy characters did nothing? Oh and remember how the fatalities STILL were traumatising the dev team?

So no I'm not hyped for Mortal Kombat 1

[bojackhorsemanobviously]

Plots in bojack that annoy me

Anas being treated like Bojacks victim in too much man despite sexually abusing him in his house , using him for sex, then dumping him on the night of the oscars. The whole lifeguard speech is good but man anyone but ana should have done it .

. Flip forcing bJ to disrobe/ PC not seeming to care if this upset him .. sure he said he hated the script but i think you should support your friend of 20 years not wanting to get naked on camera. Bojack has to work with a broken back on pain killers for a month and that is ... kinda fucked up. Ana bojacks abuser telling Diane about the penny situation as if she has a moral leg to stand on when it comes to abuse in the industry. (if only diane was sober enough then she would have known in dog days instead of this way sigh..) showstopper being used to preach to audience that bojack sucks. Yeah he did a lot a of shitty things most of aren't dumb it just came off as patronizing through diane and im not big on characters being mouthpieces /talking down to the audience. Diane/ Guy: Boring Pickles/ PB: Boring PC/ Judah: Boring (didnt care for any of the romances in s6 ..)

17 minutes. Okay I'm suppose to believe the man high on drugs who blacked out like four times in the episode could suddenly have a whole master plan to hide his tracks? Really? i get it show bojack sucks but man this plotline has plotholes to me am i suppose to believe he sobers up that fast to think anything through cause i just dont.

[fatesdeepdive]

Entry 112: A Rare Moment of Corrin Being Smart

Revelation Chapter 21: Going Forward

As the gang stops to rest, Anthony whines about how nobody trusts him. He suggests he sneak in through the castle's front gate and unlock it for everyone. That way, everyone will trust him for doing something dangerous. Corrin suggests they go along with him, because Corrin is stupid. At least, I thought Corrin was stupid. I wrote this whole tirade about Corrin being a dumbass, then I moved to the next line of text where Corrin reveals that they knew Anthony was sus and told the rest of the gang to follow. This plotline is still mediocre, but at least Corrin isn't as stupid as I initially thought.

Xander and Gunter kill Anthony, who as a reminder is taking the form of a small child. To be fair, it's not like Xander normally has a problem with killing children. Anthony transforms into a generic faceless and the battle begins. This map has an interesting and very exploitable gimmick: half of the map is made of red rooms and half of blue rooms. Enemies are unpromoted in the blue rooms and promoted in the red ones. It's actually a fun map, but I did all the Paralogues between this chapter and the last one so the promoted enemies weren't hard anyway, kinda making the map pointless.

After battle, Corrin apologizes for being too trusting and almost getting the gang hurt. The big brothers say that actually Corrin being trusting is a good thing, Xander pointing out he wouldn't follow Corrin if Corrin wasn't so kind and trusting. Honestly, this chapter is dumb, but it does have Corrin act smarter than normal while still acting in character, which is a good thing.

Support: Hinoka/Leo

C: Leo tells Hinoka that she's a strong warrior, but her fighting style, charging blindly into battle, is hard to plan around.

B: Leo says that Hinoka is far too reckless, especially for a princess. Hinoka says she likes head on fights. Leo suggests coming up with plans, but Hinoka says the only thing she puts faith in is her own power. Leo says she can't win the war all by herself.

A: Hinoka says that she trusts her allies, but knows her limits better than theirs and is afraid of ordering her allies into harm's way. Leo calls her novle and says that's why people trust in Hinoka.

S: Leo tells Hinoka he loves her because of her courage and kindness. Review: A really good Support that gives great characterization to Hinoka.

Support: Hinoka/Ryoma

Hinoka finds out Ryoma is preparing a surpise party for her, but doesn't know what the occasion is. She talks to Xander about this for some reason. B: The party doesn't happen. A: Xander arranges a party to cheer Hinoka up. SL Xander explains he planned meals between the two families to bring the kingdoms together, and that he now has feelings for Hinoka. Review: This one is dumb and boring.

Support: Laslow/Orochi

Laslow and Orochi hit on one another. Orochi asks Laslow to appear in an act with her. B: Orochi uses her fortune telling to divine what to do for the act. She draws a bunch of flowers, giving Laslow the idea to use fire. A: Laslow puts on a firework show. S: Laslow proposes with flowers and a ring. Review: Any chemistry the duo have is killed by the complete lack of interesting plot.

Support: Kagero/Peri

Peri says she wants to be like Kagero because Kagero is pretty and cool. Peri attempts this by copying everything Kagero does, including drinking matcha tea. Peri cries because it's too bitter. B: Peri tries the tea again and gags. Kagero gives her sweets. A: Peri explains she wants to be like Kagero because she watched Kagero assassinate an enemy soldier, ending up covered in blood in the process. Kagero is not proud of this, as it is dishonorable. Peri thinks it's cool and asks to learn how to sneak around. Review: Actually not bad. Peri's awful traits are toned down, while Kagero is able to show a darker side of herself.

[wikiangela]

911 lone star 4x02

spoilers ahead

aw I missed Grace so much 😍

loving Marjan getting a moment, I hope we'll see more of her this season, maybe she'll get an actual storyline 🤞

also, lmao this is so funny, why is this woman so difficult 😂 istg ls is a drama only sometimes, mostly it's a fucking comedy 😂

unpopular opinion but: I actually enjoyed Owen in s3, and I'm still enjoying him haha, tbh he was only really insufferable in s2, now I kinda like him, and his scenes are hilarious, and I'm kinda interested in his storyline this season 😂 (more interesting than tarlos that's for sure, and that's still so weird to even think lmao)

Grace and Tommy have the best friendship in this show 💯 lmao I love them

"just my wife" lmao okay that was funny - it's still not the best plot ngl, it's just so... low stakes, so low basically nonexistent - I already said that in a post before, but like, so what if they can't get married in a few weeks? 😂 like, this is just such a dumb reason jfc, we know they're gonna stay together, this is just drama for the sake of drama - I'm still gonna try to enjoy it tho, maybe they'll make it fun 💁🏻‍♀️😂

I was about to say this convo is annoying, but them recalling TK's accidents and the "how many comas have you been in" 😂 😂 lmao this is so funny

oh wow... she didn't sign the papers, who could've seen it coming..... just about everyone but okay 🙄 it's just such a boring storyline I'm sorry but like, it might've been a funny convo, but the overall plotline is just so boring, and making Iris just annoying tbh

OH MY GOD WHO CARES ABOUT THE VENUE 🙄🙄🙄 like, seriously, I can't express how boring I find this, they can literally find another place or wait a little longer

why is tarlos' storyline the most boring this season, please can this be over and can they get something more interesting?

Tommy being awkward with the pastor oh my god I love her so much, but someone shut her up pls 😂😂😂

okay, that leather jacket and hair kinda ruffled by the helmet - it's working for me, why is Rob Lowe so hot, I wasn't prepared to be (this) attracted to Owen this season 😭

thank god that was just Tommy's dream, because the dialogue was really making me cringe lol

I'm loving Tommy and Owen's friendship too 😂

I'm sorry, I guess I'm happy they're getting an annulment, and we're adding some drama now, but like.... I really don't fucking care, what is happening, tarlos were my fave part of this show and now I just wait for their scenes to be over, what have you done writers 🙄

okay, that tarlos scene was adorable and I love them - im still already over that whole marriage and Iris thing tho

oh, now Iris disappeared? okay, now it's getting interesting

that was a good episode, it flew by so fast tbh haha

loved Tommy and I'm lowkey here for the pastor storyline, but it seems to be going well, and we're only on episode 2, so I wonder what's gonna get fucked up

pls tell me Grace and Judd will get some story of their own because so far they're kinda to the side

same with Mateo, Marjan and Paul and Nancy - like, please give them something, they each had like an episode about them (aside from Nancy I think) and we're in s4, give them some longer storylines pls

(also, can we get begins episodes for them? that'd be so cool pls)

I kinda like Owen's story, it's interesting, and it's taking surprisingly little screen time for Owen 😂 (also, Rob Lowe has always been hot, but this season it's like, really standing out, almost as much as the beginning of s3 with the beard 🥵 wtf)

and finally, tarlos.... I was kinda over their whole story, but Iris disappearing makes it interesting tbh, so far it's been boring - hope it'll get even better!

so, tbh I liked this one more than 4x01 and I hope that now it'll get better and better haha

(tho was there literally like only one emergency this episode?)

[letters-i-threw-in-the-fire]

Im so done with my life that i have decided to open tumblr so i might as well let you know my thoughts, opinions and viwes you didn't ask for.

Here we go

I've started watching the good doctor (I'm on 1.13) and it's quite terrible autism rep from what I've read. I feel like the show would be geart if mc wasn't autistic (lot of plotlines and eps would be lost but it'd be great). I kinda hate Shaun Murphy (MC) and so I just watch it for everyone else. Everyone else is so AMAZING ahhhhh like -:

Shaun (1 resident) - hate they guy quite annoying but cute sometimes

Claire Browne (2 resident) - she's fine ig - tbh i find her boring but not exactly - she's meh, average, mid

Jared Kalu (3 resident) - I liked him but after the thing he pulled in 1.12 to get his job back is dumb - hot af, love british accent

Dr. Arron Glassman (Hospital President) - father figure to shaun, took him in & all- he nice - worried abt shaun a lil too much

Dr Marcus Andrews (Head of surgery?) - against shaun and glassman - wants to be persident - becomes better as show goes on - cool wife (love that he's married didn't expect it)

Dr. Neil Melendez (Attending) - he hot - Absolutely in love with fiancé - so hot it's insane - wants kids - did i mention hes hot and I'm completely gone for him

Jessica Preston (legal head?) - fiancé of Melendez - only fought w/ him in 1st few eps - made me belive she hated him - she's madly in love with him - relationship gets better - they're so in love - what she pulled in 1.12 made me think she's insane

NOW HERE’S THE KICKER. WHAT I REALLY WANT TO RANT ABOUT

Spoilers for the show

Jessica dosent want kids so this lady breaks up with the guy she's insanely in love w/ who loves her just as much cuz she thinks he'll regret being with her w/o kids.

The break up scene is the saddest ever

i made some deductions after the first few eps, most were right (incase ur wondering, ps. I dont think u were) and i knew they'd break up but that's cuz they fought a lot, i didn't know they were madly in love. Next thing I knew Melendez was gonna end up w/ Claire, his resident. I hate this pairing, idk why but i do.

ergo, this insane women has completely devestaed me for the rest of my life

TLDR ; neil Melendez is hot, Jessica Preston is insane and that evil woman has completely devastated me and she should not be allowed

[icharchivist]

Oh, can I complain about something then?

This whole "destiny is fixed" thing from the Remake reminds me of the "fixed causality" they keep bringing up in GB Versus Rising

Lucilius can't beat Djeeta head-on because she beat him before, meanwhile he will always triumph over Beelzebub because he's beaten him before. This is mentioned multiple times in the story

It's determinism all the way down, it doesn't matter if you train, if you beat someone before and face them again, you will win anyway, even if you don't put in any effort

Now, Lucilius himself does mention that this is "lazy" and another sign that God can't be bothered with His creation

But imo it's so dumb

It feels pointless, just something to waffle endlessly about, but it destroys the concept of free will and it's sooo boring

You're welcome to disagree with me, but I personally hate this and I choose to ignore it

Totally, you can definitely complain, and i 100M agree with you.

I think like... stories about fates really need to be threaded carefully if you're going to do it, and understand that Fate, ultimately, is extremely rooted in tragedy in the Epic sense of, there is no other way it could have gone, the odds are against your favor from a God like perspective.

So unless you really have something to say about the cruelty of Gods, it's kinda unwelcomed, and it's especially unwelcomed imo when there are extremely antithetical themes in the center of the story you're reading about.

I think it doesn't work with ff7 for various reasons, one of which that one of the major theme of ff7 to me is "grief and the major negative impact of denial" or "you can't deny what happened to you because you're stopping yourself from healing and making yourself susceptible to being hurt even more instead", and it's why i find it extremely jarring to add a plotline about fate on top of that, where the whole thing is about "do not deny the hardships" and then when the remake ends up getting rid of the Specters it's so it can go "tee hee maybe things will go different this time ;3c", because the remake is forcing you in the situation of having to be in denial about the direction the game should take if it adapted the OG faithfully. If it's meant to add to the theme itself, i think it's just. genuinely insulting to insert it just to manipulate your audience because you don't trust the Original Plot to do it for you.

Granblue is in the same bag for me, and it's why, despite liking Cosmos' event, i really disliked the idea that the Singularity Can't Die Else It'll Cause An Apocalypse. I find it so damn jarring especially in the realm of how much of Granblue is about Free Will (that it's the main thematic linked to any Primal Beasts especially).

I think Orologia's event managed to balance this idea more on showing how the butterfly effect would affect things and all, and even there the Singularity managed to break from the fate Orologia had seen, and this is how you can deal with fate in a way that's interesting.

but Versus and the "Singularity Can't Die" plotpoints seem antithetical to the way Free Will shows itself.

And now with the addition of Sahar's FE recently about how his biggest crime was to refuse the Skydwellers from their Free Will, taking it away, the fact it is a Set Thing in the Versus Verse is just extremely jarring and i think goes against the way the themes have been built in GBF.

Stories about Fate CAN be done interestingly. I think FF15 for instance work it in a very interesting way because it starts out with a prophecy about the King of Light, who will bring the light again on a world that fell into darkness, and as the world is falling to darkness and Noctis takes on this path he's been propheticized, once it's too late and only then will the Gods make clear that they made the whole thing up and that they specifically made matter worse on purpose to punish the mortals who tried to find a loophole to their prophecies, and therefore you feel the fate as being the cruel game of the Gods itself. It can work well for tragedies like that. But it has to be baked into the plot itself (a Prophecy generally works) and the Gods at play being capricious beings who are the ones setting things into motion, and you're left having no choice but playing your part to finish it.

But ultimately, i think this level of Fate is totally antithetical to FF7 and GBF in particular and i find it jarring the ways they try to shove it into plots where it shouldn't exist.

[cowlovely]

controversial character hmmmmm ok RORY gilmore. and ummmmmm. argyle stranger things. truly no idea if he’s controversial in public opinion but i flip flopped back and forth on him for a while dkcjdjkdkd

OKAY SO. i genuinely was not aware of the general opinions that people had of gilmore girls characters until i was already pretty far into the show, and i was SHOCKED to find out how many people hated rory?? like. okay so to be fair i never actually finished the show so i didn’t see her worst years i guess, but still!! she is literally just autistic! and she was raised by a teenager! and she’s still a teenager herself!! of course she’s not the most well adjusted person! god forbid women do anything 🙄

i do think she suffers from having too much screentime though because i feel like it made the writers feel like she was getting to boring or predictable or whatever and just started to throw plotlines at the wall even if they didn’t make sense for her character. also! it’s not that nothing i like about her is technically canon, just that i like to ignore the canon things that are dumb and rewrite them in my head <3

and argyle! he’s fine? idk like. they didn’t really give him enough time or depth, so as it stands rn he just…isn’t really much of a character? i really hope they give him more dimension in s5 because he’s sort of just a caricature :/

he’s sort of on par with murray a bit? like they’re both very fun to watch and i like them! but my feelings just kinda end there. i saw a lot of people being like “well you can’t expect them to flesh out EVERY character in the cast, there isn’t enough time!!” and it’s like…maybe have a smaller cast and stop adding people then? akdjsnzk (also that’s a bullshit argument anyway because they added other characters to s4 that WERE fully fleshed out characters so like. get fucked maybe?)

[lawisnotmocked]

I Read The Court of Miracles And Now I Am Going To Scream!

The Court of Miracles is a young adult historical fantasy Les Mis and Jungle Book retelling that was published in June 2020. It’s set in the criminal underworld of an alternate revolutionary France and follows Eponine ‘Nina’ Thénardier of the Thieves Guild as she works with the other criminal guilds of the Court of Miracles to take down their common enemy - Lord Kaplan of the Guild of Flesh. A longer summary of the book can be found on Goodreads!

I started reading this book at the beginning of the year, stopped in the middle to finish my dissertation, then finally finished it the other day to present you with a very long and slightly incoherent review! My review does contain spoilers and a lot of rambling you have been warned 😌💞

Just to get this out of the way first, I did genuinely enjoy reading COM. I thought it was a really fun book and I think if I’d read it when I was 14 it would’ve probably been one of my absolute favourite books! There’s animal symbolism and imagery everywhere, political drama, an awesome criminal underworld and a cast of really fun main characters! Sure it’s kinda dumb sometimes in a ya fantasy kind of way but that’s part of the fun!

I am however reviewing this book on my Les Mis blog because it’s also a les mis and jungle book retelling, so the les mis aspect is going to be the main focus of this review. I think court of miracles is a good book (or well bad in a good way ;3), but a bad les Mis retelling.

The way Kester Grant veiws Les Mis has the same energy as a 2013 Enjonine shipper? She thinks Cosette is a boring bland character, she identifies with Eponine in a not-like-other-girls kind of way, Enjolras is reduced exclusively to his revolutionary enthusiasm and she hates Marius because he loves his girlfriend, he’s a little bit pathetic and he doesn’t care about the revolution as much as Enjolras does. (I’m getting all of this information from an interview she did with scifinow btw) She’s clearly read the brick but the way she views the characters feels like she’s looked at mainstream musical interpretations of them, shook them through a sieve then taken the remaining one character trait and built her les mis-based characters around said single character trait.

The COM characters themselves are more than just one single character trait they all have their own personalities and character arcs! But because of this they also end up being nothing like their les mis counterparts. To make things even more complicated, the main characters Nina (Eponine) and Ettie (Cosette) are also Bagheera and Mowgli respectively. Even Thenardier is also Tabaqui! I think the only characters who are solely based on les mis characters are St. Juste (Enjolras - yeah I know I’ll get to it ^^’), Grantaire, Montparnasse, Javert and Valjean.

Despite my criticisms I actually think COM is a really good ya jungle book retelling! In my opinion the strongest parts of the book were the parts that were inspired by the jungle book! The worldbuilding itself was super fun and engaging and the idea of the guilds was something that was inspired by the jungle book too. The main storyline of the book, and the strongest and most engaging one, was also part of the jungle book retelling! And Lord Kaplan (Shere Khan) was one of my favourite characters and one of the most interesting to read about! At some points it even felt like the Les Mis inspired plotlines took away from the story. The Les Mis inspiration mostly just appeared in the names of a few characters and the setting being Some Point In Fictional Revolutionary France, but even the French nobility were part of the jungle book side of the retelling as the bandar-log.

I think the last kind of general thing I could put here is that the story is broken up into sections with pretty big time skips in between, and I think this was meant to be similar to the way the jungle book is written but it did make the story a little bit hard to follow at the beginning ^^’

COM is clearly Kester writing something very self indulgent for herself - and this isn’t a criticism you go girl write that borderline self insert enjonine jungle book au! It’s just a comment about how it reads to me ^^’

Okay I’m gonna get more into the les mis side of COM now bc that’s obviously what people following me want to read about most and what I want to talk about most too 😌

Aside from perhaps Montparnasse and Thenardier, all of the Les Mis characters were so out of character that some of them didn’t even bare surface resemblance to the characters they were based on. I am. Having some Especially Strong Feelings about Javert in this book But I’m gonna start by sharing some thoughts about the amis!

Okay first I have to just. His name is Enjolras St. Juste. He gets referred to as St. Juste the entire book. St. Juste. The man’s a dumbass your honour I rest my case 😌 He’s clearly supposed to be Enjolras, but he feels more like Enjolras from a 2010s canon era enjonine fanfic that someone wasn’t really taking too seriously and present day modern au fanon Enjolras got smushed together then got handed some cue cards with some facts about canon Enjolras on them. He’s an obnoxious revolutionary student who wears a red coat and lives eats and breathes The CauseTM 😤 St. Juste is actually a pretty fun character and I did genuinely enjoy all the scenes with him in! But as the story progresses he ultimately starts to feel more and more out of place and his RevolutionaryTM side story begins to feel like it’s more for The Les Mis Aesthetic than being properly integrated into the story. There’s a plot to overthrow the government but it gets called off at the last minute because it turns out it was a trap laid by the royal family. There are barricades but all the barricade fighting happens off screen and St. Juste and his friends are never really involved in it. He has a will they won’t they kind of thing with Nina so I really wasn’t kidding about the enjonine thing either :’3 He survives to the end of the book though and apparently this is supposed to be a trilogy so I really hope he gets to be his own character a little bit more instead of just providing the Les Mis Revolutionary Aesthetic because as much as he’s kind of sheltered and obnoxious and dumb as a brick I liked him! He’s a terrible Enjolras but a really enjoyable character!

This one’s going in my St. Juste cringe compilation though lads

Okay moving onto Grantaire! Literally the only similarity between Les Mis Grantaire and COM Grantaire is that he’s an alcoholic. But he’s a fun alcoholic y’know! Liver failure but make it charming! It’s romantic and he’s less of a bummer now! See what I said about it reading like bad fanfic sometimes :’3 COM Grantaire is St. Juste’s Vice President and is also Fully On Board With The Cause 😤 even though he sometimes gets on St. Juste’s nerves by being drunk or teasing him 🤪 Can you tell I’m not a fan? :’3

The only other named ami is Feuilly, but the character is more like Combeferre and Jolly combined. A background character is also referred to by the name Jolly in one scene.

I don’t think I really have much to say about Nina and Ettie. I really like Nina!! She’s a lil bit edgy and a lil bit not like other girls in a transgender kind of way and she really loves her sisters and I’d like to giver her a hug 😌 I love Ettie too and I really enjoyed reading about both of them! They’re not Eponine and Cosette but they also weren’t supposed to be just Eponine and Cosette in the first place and I can see where the different les mis and jungle book inspirations are in their characters so I’m more forgiving of the fact that they’re pretty different to their les mis counterparts. They also get to be their own people more than St. Juste does and I think that was good for their characters too! As always Montparnasse is my sweet baby murder boy and I love him and I’m team ninaparnasse out of Nina’s three very handsome and talented love interests who drink respect women juice hashtag young adult fantasy 😌 I also really liked Thenardier!! He’s just the same asshole but he gets quite a few scenes and some awesome animal imagery so I was totally on board with that!

Okay. Now it’s time to talk about Valjean and Javert :’3

Jean Valjean, also known as Monsieur Madeleine and le Maire, is a member of the Guild of Letters. For the most part I really love his character!! The guild of letters specialises in record keeping, extortion, forgery, etc. and Valjean is infamous among the criminal underworld for how good he is at disappearing into different roles whenever necessary. We first meet him when Nina helps him escape from prison and he shows up at different points in the story to help Nina and Ettie out in order to repay the debt he owes her. I love him and I would maybe give him a little kiss 👉👈 One thing that bothered me a lot though was the absolute lack of positive relationship Ettie and Valjean had. They’re not even just indifferent to each other - at one point in the story, Ettie spends two literal years living with Valjean in order to hide from Lord Kaplan and they both actively dislike each other. Ettie even thinks she’s been kidnapped and spends a full two years trying to escape because no one ever bothered to explain anything to her and it’s just?? The coldest possible take on a Valjean Cosette relationship?? He’s not some random man who kidnapped her he’s her dad and they love each other how could you do them both so dirty like this!! Two years and they just hated living with each other and didn’t talk to each other at all!!

This take also bothers me a lot?? Like I know Valjean isn’t Actually a predator in COM but I don’t like the implication that their relationship Could be like that being in any kind of Les Mis adaptation or retelling! It annoyed me a lot when the same implication was put in beebmis and it annoys me a lot here. Valjean and Cosette’s story is one about radical love and healing and I don’t think we need any grimdark predatory Valjean content anywhere at all! Don’t slander my Valjean like that >:// If I just pretend that scene didn’t happen though Valjean’s a really great character and I did enjoy most of the scenes with him in 😌

Mm Javert though...... Kester Grant where are you I just want to talk 🙂 Javert is a white woman with red hair and blue eyes. Okay, fine, you can genderbend Javert if you want I don’t really care, but what I absolutely Do care about is that Javert’s one (1) character trait is that she’s Valjean’s bitter heterosexual ex who’s obsessed with capturing him because he broke her heart. Genderbending Javert just to make her boring and heterosexual is a hatecrime specifically against my gay ass you could’ve at least let them be gay!! I don’t care if you genderbend both of them or leave them both as men gay people can have boring petty character arcs too!! Why is Javert the one who always gets genderbent so they can be het too?? If you have to make them het at least give me a buff lady Valjean I can simp for sometimes :/

I still can’t get over this Kester Grant girlbossed Javert :’3 Miss Javert isn’t like other girls she’s an obsessive misogynist uwu

This is just genuinely embarrassing for me to read how could you do this to me :’3

Anyway Miss Javert would call me the f and t slurs gaslight gatekeep girlboss 💞 /j

Hsvsnsvsv bullying aside, I really did enjoy reading COM. Sure it works by ya logic and Nina has three love interests and awesome thief powers and people just kind of shake off gunshot wounds sometimes but it’s fun! This dumb book managed to pull me out of months long reading slumps twice and it’s one of the most enjoyable things I’ve read in ages! Don’t read COM if you want a good Les Mis retelling because that’s not what it is, but as long as you know what you’re getting into and you don’t take it too seriously then it’s a super fun read that you can both laugh and scream frustratedly at 😌