#and the villain alien was interesting as a character i enjoyed his scenes

[vulcanhello]

[thedrunkenreadersreviews]

Regarding Alastor's Hallway Scene in Episode 5 of "Hazbin Hotel"

Good day, folks! As sweet Mimzy said, "...pour a few fingers of rye and he turns into a kitten" so let's do that. Let me set up my Redemption, and let's get into this.

*Sip, sip*

Now, this is quite an interesting thing; the phenomenon of the reactions I have been seeing particularly regarding Alastor in episode 5 of Hazbin Hotel has been ... curiouser and curiouser.

*Sip, sip*

The big question that I think we should be asking after this episode is who Alastor is leashed to---but there seems to be something else on people's minds and that is the interaction Alastor had with Husk in the hallway of the hotel. I mean, every great character needs an epic hallway scene. For Star Wars it was Vader and Luke. For Hazbin, it is Alastor. Let's explore this.

*Sip, sip*

As a society, feasting on entertainment, whether it be through books or films or a series, fans often say that they enjoy the "villain" or "morally grey" character as opposed to those who are set on their compass of goodness. I find this to be a lie that we often tell ourselves and believe completely.

Sure, we find them more entertaining and thus we favor them, but then we try to find excuses for their behavior, make it a despicable act that is done for righteous reasons. Or because we desire to see someone who is tremendously struggling or has a rather horrid reputation overcome this and prove to be a fantastic character underneath all the layers of darkness. We don't like them because they are bad. We may pity them for they often have the most tragic backstories, or we see the potential of their goodness. But we like them because we believe that everyone in their universe has the wrong perspective of their wickedness while we, outsiders looking in, see the potential of their heroics. What they can do despite everything.

That is not liking a character because they are the villain. That is liking a character because of why they are the villain and how they can overcome it.

A few examples:

Rhysand dressing Feyre up like a whore and tattooing her without her consent: well, he was doing that to protect her and help her.

Darth Vader: Mass murderer and second in command of an empire built on absolute control; but he fulfilled the prophecy of the Chosen One and had originally fallen because he wanted to save the love of his life and his unborn children.

Loki: Yeah, he slaughtered 80 people in 2 days, attacked NYC with an alien army killing hundreds if not thousands in the process, and committed genocide prior to that, BUT that's because he was severely broken and now he sits all alone at the end of time, saving an infinite amount of people.

Granted, I love 2/3 of those characters because of the reasons provided. But also because in their prime they were WICKED!

*Sip, sip*

Now let's look at Alastor.

Alastor, the Radio Demon, and one of the most feared overlords of Hell ... threatened one of the souls he owns. And now, I see people comparing him to Val or saying they hated him at that moment or now have a poor taste for him in their mouths. But ... this is exactly what you asked for from him.

*Sip, sip*

Val, who ACTIVELY tortures Angel Dust, is being used as the comparison for Alastor because he THREATENED and scared Husk after Husk stepped over the line.

*Sip, sip*

Alastor, when alive, was a serial killer. Alastor in Hell captured overlords, tortured them, broadcasted the torture throughout Hell, and became one of the most feared overlords.

He didn't do that by being "nice" or "charming." He did that by being vile and not for a greater good. He did it because, as far as we know, he wanted power. And, damn, he got it.

Demons KNOW to be afraid of Alastor. Granted, his reputation may have faltered because he has been away for 7 years but before his departure and even upon his return, for the most part, demons avoid Alastor as though he were death incarnate.

*Sip, sip*

Now, let's examine him in episode 5. Only the scene that is getting the most traction; I'll talk about Alastor and Lucifer in another post. But let's look at this scene:

Alastor and Husk in the hallway.

*Sip, sip*

Let me put some quotes here real quick:

From the Pilot:

Husk to Alastor: "Don't you [Alastor, the owner of my soul] 'Husker' me, you son of a bitch!"

Husk to Alastor: "Are you [Alastor, the owner of my soul] shitting me?"

Husk to Alastor: "You [Alastor, owner of my soul whom I have just shoved off of me] think it must be some big fucking riot just to pull me out of nowhere? You think I'm some kind of fucking clown? [even though I am contractually obligated to obey your summons]"

Husk to Alastor: "I [the one contracted to serve you and obey your commands] ain't doing no fucking charity job [even though you told me by your order that I have to]."

Alastor to Husk: "Don't worry my friend [you, who sold your soul to me so that you could keep your power because you almost gambled it all away], I can make this more welcoming [providing you with something that you enjoy even though you are contractually obligated to obey my commands without payment/reward], if you wish."

From episode 5:

Alastor to Husk: "It's nothing I can't handle, don't worry, Husker. [Proceeds to walk away, leaving the conversation] Who in their right mind would cross me? [Continues to walk away, posing the question as rhetorical and not requiring an answer]."

Husk to Alastor: "... You've been gone a while. And it's not like anybody knows why---"

Alastor to Husk: "They don't need to know. [And it does not need to be discussed further, so leave it alone.] And don't you worry your fuzzy head about it. [Drop it. Drop it now. Don't pick it up]"

Husk to Alastor: "You may own my soul, but I ain't your fucking pet!"

[Personally, I think Val would have instantly backhanded AD for that alone.]

Alastor to Husk: "Hmhm. But you are [So stop talking, just let it go, I'm letting a lot slide here]."

Husk to Alastor [the owner of his soul, who has slaughtered overlords of Hell]: "Big talk for someone who is also on a leash."

Alastor to Husk: "Aha. What did you say? [Now you have tested my patience too much!]"

*Sip, sip*

In the pilot, Husk openly and without fear insults and cusses at Alastor. And what does Alastor, the owner of his soul, do? He lets it slide.

In the one scene between them in the hallway, Alastor essentially still does nothing even though it is evident that Husk struck a nerve. At least twice over in this scene alone, Alastor gives subtle hints to Husk that it is best he just stops. And it is not like he even dismisses Husk's worries about Mimzy or even his absence. It's more along the lines of, "Oh, I know she is in trouble and came here for me to clean up her mess, but I am a bit occupied at the moment dealing with the actual King of Hell, so I'll get to it when I get to it. Just keep her busy for now." And in regards to his absence, he makes it abundantly clear that Husk is better off just not mentioning anything about it. He cuts Husk off, and essentially says, "Look, just keep quiet about it. It's no one's business but mine and I'm fine, I can handle it, so let's just leave it alone."

All the talk people say of Alastor having a big ego, oh undoubtedly, but it makes sense why Husk is in pride in this one scene alone. Alastor tells him "let it go," and moves to walk away from the conversation.

But Husk pushes. And pushes. And on that final shove, I think Husk even knows before Alastor got mad that he went TOO far.

*Sip, sip*

And Alastor still, for the most part, does nothing.

He reminds Husker that he owns his soul, pulls on the chain just to knock Husker off-kilter, and then, rather demonically, tells Husk to not EVER mention the fact that he is leashed again. Honestly, with what Alastor COULD do to Husk ... that was letting him off SUPER easy. Like, Husk should be kissing his feet that that threat was the only punishment he received for that comment.

Val? Forget it. AD would probably be filming for 3 days straight. Alastor doesn't even touch Husk.

This move is also a sense of security for Alastor, I think. Husk probably thought this was just another comment that would result in Alastor just ignoring it. But it takes Alastor by surprise and destroys his comfort. He loses himself in a fit of fury and pulls on Husk's leash to remind both Husk and himself, "Yeah, I might be leashed but I still own YOUR soul, Husk! So do not test me!"

*sip, sip*

So, yeah, Husk gets scared, as he should. Alastor is terrifying.

Should this lessen our opinion of Alastor as it seems to have done with so many fans?

No. Absolutely not. If anything, this scene provides balance to that paradox I supplied earlier; how we like the evil characters because of the good they could do but we should also like them because they are evil and should be expected to do evil things.

Alastor IS evil. He owns Husk's soul.

And yet, this evil overlord allows Husk to get away with soooo much. And when Husk oversteps, as he absolutely did, to not even be smacked by Alastor speaks volumes of Alastor's opinion of Husk.

*Sip, sip*

Here is my speculation:

Husk obviously knows more about Alastor than most. But Alastor owns hundreds if not thousands of souls. Husk is someone he calls on often, obviously. Husk knows Alastor is leashed. Faustisse, a former employee of Spindle Horse, and one of the original teammates beside Viv for the Hazbin project said that Alastor regards Husk as one of his closest friends. Perhaps not friend, but maybe one of his closest confidants. Why else would Husk know that Alastor is leashed? Granted, we cannot tell from the dialogue if Husk knows where Alastor was for 7 years or even if he knows who Alastor is leashed to. To some extent, though, Alastor must trust Husk.

In this scene, Husk violates that trust. He deserved to be threatened, reminded, and terrified. I adore Husk. He is one of my favorite characters and when I saw the hallway scene, I thought Husk deserved way worse than what he got.

And Alastor still takes what Husk had to say about Mimzy into consideration. He still tells Mimzy, a friend he has had since he was alive, that she needs to leave.

*sip, sip*

Yes, Alastor is evil. And it is soooooo good to see him BE evil. And not for a good cause but just because someone got under his skin. He owns Husk and he lets Husk off very easy. So to see him lose his temper and not even physically hurt Husk allows the nugget of possible, minuscule glimmer of somewhat kindness to linger.

I loved the hallway scene. It did a fantastic job of showing us what Alastor COULD be if he really wanted to, why you shouldn't mess with him, and how he elicits fear.

Val lords over his souls through physical abuse. Alastor does it mentally when called for. They are two totally different overlords with really no comparison to be made between them save for this: they are both evil.

*Sip, sip*

Alastor ate in episode 5 and left no crumbs. He remains, quite possibly, the most interesting character in the show. I cannot wait to discover more of him and watch him be absolutely wicked towards others.

Cheers to you, Radio Demon. If I were in Hell and had to be leashed to anyone, I would want to be leashed to you.

*Sip, sip*

[yakuzacanons]

Yakuza Headcanons: Watching Spooky Movies

Oooooo it's the spooky season ain't it. Hello hello I rise from the grave to bring you some fresh headcanons for the season. For those with asks still in the inbox, I SEE em, just been busy with my horror movie marathon. Anyways, some headcanons below da cut to tide you over. Also welcome bouncing baby boy Ichiban to the gang!

Kiryu Kazuma

Isn't scared easily by much of anything so it's really easy to get him to watch horror movies. Mostly watches them because someone else is too scared to watch them alone. He's the person they can hide behind or who will tell them when a particularly horrifying scene is over.

Gore doesn't bother him as much as something or someone looking creepy or offputting will. Kiryu still won't get scared but he will get uncomfortable. Most of the time he just reacts by going "Ah... oh!"

Fond of the classics and will gravitate towards movies with a strong and likable protagonist. Likes The Evil Dead, Aliens, and Halloween. Directors don't matter much to him.

Majima Goro

He's a mixed bag. If a movie is well put together, then it can scare him pretty easily. He's most scared of ghost stories or paranormal things. Least afraid of slashers because he thinks he could just beat them all up.

Cannot stand jump scares. Sometimes he evens yells at his TV at home in irritation, saying things like "Oi, whaddya keep makin' loud noises for? Sheesh!"

Honestly, the weirder the movie the better. It might seem stereotypical for someone who looks and acts like Majima but he thinks the whole point of horror is to be interesting. Fond of Takashi Miike movies like Ichi the Killer, Audition, and Over Your Dead Body.

Akiyama Shun

Doesn't watch a lot of movies because he totally falls asleep during most of them. He'll at least give it a shot if you ask nicely though. Honestly more motivated by the fact you might cling to him during the scary parts than anything.

As much as Akiyama is a total ladies' man and romantic at heart, he always laughs whenever characters start being intimate during horror movies. He makes jokes out of it, saying things like "Babe, would you still love me if we were in a spooky movie?"

Movies with a good soundtrack actually help him stay awake. Jump scares annoy him though because if he falls asleep, the noise makes him panic. Fond of monster movies or movies about animals like Jaws, Shin Godzilla, and The Host.

Saejima Taiga

Genuinely not scared of a single darn thing. If you want to watch it, he's down to give it at least a try. He might nod off if he's tired or bored, but he tries his best not to. Horror comedy is okay with him too although he might not get all the jokes.

Most of the time he sits with his arms crossed, paying full attention. He's kind of funny in that he makes noises like "Heh" or "Hmph" when a character is caught off guard by something. Makes an occasionaly "Tsk" sound at jump scares. Otherwise he's not reactionary.

Particularly fond of slashers, probably because those usually have villains that are actually kind of his size. He enjoys the Friday the 13th series, particularly Jason X.

Tanimura Masayoshi

Type of guy to be like "Ooh let's watch this, I heard it's really scary" and then proceed to either get scared out of his wits or say something like "Wait, that's ALL?" at the end. Bases most of his movie choices off of other people's recommendations since he's usually too busy to randomly go see however many movies he wants to.

Doesn't really like horror that's super in your face. Gets more scared by the tension itself than anything. Always has movie snacks on hand.

Found footage is probably his most favorite type of horror. Likes The Blair Witch Project, Noroi, and REC. Fond of director Koji Shiraishi.

Ryuji Goda

Doesn't watch a lot of horror movies but like Saejima he's not scared of anything. He's also the type of guy to drop everything to spend time watching a movie with his partner. Gets a kick out of being a shield or protector during scary parts.

Likes movies with a lot of personality and campiness. Slow burns or psychological thrillers just put him to sleep. It doesn't matter if it's good or bad, as long as it's entertaining.

Didn't think he'd end up being much of a horror fan but he's quite partial to John Carpenter. Likes The Thing, They Live, and Christine.

Nishikiyama Akira

One of the bigger scaredy cats of the group. Won't suggest a horror movie but will totally act like he's not at all afraid if you ask to see one.

Honestly, the two of you end up just kind of holding onto each other during scary parts or pulling up the blanket almost over your eyes when a character is about to die. Violence doesn't necessarily bother him but excessive gore kind of annoys him.

Enjoys a good ghost story movie but only if you'll watch it with him. Anthologies are also good too since it offers so much at once. Likes Ju-On, Ringu, and Tales From The Crypt.

Mine Yoshitaka

Likes certain horror movies. Not scared of much but he does get noticably uncomfortable with torture movies like Saw or Hostel. He just finds it to be weird more than entertaining.

Fond of more classic monsters like vampires or werewolves. Mine's the type of guy to actually have a decent home theater setup, even if he doesn't get much time to use it, so he doesn't go to the movie theater much.

Has a soft spot for some of the really old classics in the 30's like Frankenstein or Nosferatu. His favorite horror movie is Interview With The Vampire.

Daigo Dojima

Probably the only one of the boys who actively enjoys slow burns and more psychological horror. He doesn't get opportunities to watch movies much but he does have an interest in the medium as a whole.

Particularly loves anything with spectacular cinematography. Good directing, lighting, or costumes really impress him. Kind of interested in some of the technical aspects as well. Also probably the only of the boys to ever look something up on IMDb.

Especially fond of movies by Kiyoshi Kurosawa. His favorite horror films are Kwaidan, Cure, and Pulse.

Tatsuo Shinada

The biggest scaredy cat of all of the boys. Will attempt to watch a spooky movie with you at least once just for the sake of trying but will honestly just close his eyes if he feels overwhelmed. You HAVE to hold his hand though.

Probably the only one of the boys who actually gets squeamish easily. Gore and blood make him uncomfortable, although he has SOME tolerance in general. He'd just rather watch something that's not super heavy on bloodshed.

Horror films with a particular visual style, especially super colorful ones, make it a lot easier for him as he can actually see what's happening and he feels less worried. Movies like House or Suspiria are good for him. Also likes super over the top movies like The Lost Boys or Killer Klowns From Outer Space as they're so hilarious to him that he forgets to be scared.

Kasuga Ichiban

Somewhat easily scared. He gets more shocked or surprised than scared, honestly. The movie HAS to be interesting to some degree or he will just conk out and there will be no waking him. Doesn't mind jump scares since they help keep him awake at least even if the movie's bad.

Having said that, he does enjoy taking the time to see a movie that's genuinely just really good and talking about it with you afterward. Movies with really good effects tend to impress him a lot. It's also more visually memorable.

Tends to like movies where the main character has special powers. Partial to zombie movies since a lot tends to happen and involves multiple characters. He likes 28 Days Later, The Dead Zone, and Carrie.

[bluesyjean]

It's the last one, so I might as well do this. Very big thanks to @c0ffeeb1ack for organizing a rewatch. I really enjoyed all the commentary and going through the series one episode at a time rather than binging the whole thing, and it made me appreciate it so much more. (Especially s3, which got infinitely more fun on a rewatch without my Big Nerves about what was going to happen. s1 is forever my girl, but there are some genuinely great moments in s3.)

Extra hot takes for Oblivion:

SO HAPPY LUTHER AND KLAUS GOT TO DO SCENES TOGETHER. The entire Void sequence was quality. Knowing these two are such good buddies irl it's about damn time they got to hang out more on screen. They must have had so much fun doing this.

It took me a long long time, but Sparrow!Ben grows on you. He's hilariously trying SO HARD to be an asshole every time he opens his mouth you just have to laugh. So extra.

I forever wish Lila wasn't pregnant. I'm sorry, it just doesn't do a great service to her or Diego because now everything has to be about this. My relief when Stan wasn't theirs was so short lived.

Five whispering conspiracy theories with Viktor is so good. I missed them being besties, so happy he's still the one Five trusts. (In a "I'll kill you myself" if you fuck up again kind of way, but that's just Five for you.) We love paranoia.

Also was so happy to have Five and Allison actually talk to each other, even if it's just to fight. I've waited so long.

This episode had a lot of interesting character combos. Sloane and Ben with Five, Luther and Klaus, I could have had more of this.

Didn't notice before that the sigil thing is on the back of the guardians. Which means...? Nothing, but I did notice.

Love that they always turn blue when life is being sucked out of them. Just a bunch of little blue aliens.

The first time I watched this I was convinced that Five would eventually lose that arm again when they fix the universe. I hope not, poor left-handed little guy. He loves to write. :( But that might also mean deaths happen again. Fully prepared for bummers in s4.

I was not as enthralled with the soundtrack of s3 as I was in past seasons, but I will say the closing song is the only one that made its way into rotation on my playlist. Great choice.

Desperate for Abigail to be a horrific villain in s4. Please give me this, it's all I ask.

Anyway I might end up watching the last season this way. (One episode a day.) Great idea! Taking time to enjoy something, what a concept. Thanks all!

[flameshadowconjuring]

I am currently rewatching and rereading Parasyte. I'm really glad that I watched the anime before I picked up the manga when I first came across the story. Otherwise, I would have enjoyed the anime a lot less. The anime, in the first episode alone, made three changes I really dislike.

The first is one that happens a lot in TV which I hate, which is where the first episode shows scenes in non-chronological order. It is just unnecessarily confusing. The original showed them in sequence and I see no reason to deviate from it. Its not like the original took too long to get to the gory stuff that grips attention.

The second is that they added an accidental boob grab. I must have excised it from my memory, because it caught me completely off guard. It adds nothing to the plot or the dynamic between the characters and just makes the show more awkward to recommend to non-weebs since it is in an early scene of the first fucking episode. I think my initial opinion of the show would have been lower if I had been introduced to it via the first episode rather than midway through.

The third is adding a 'zero to hero' plot. Shinichi in the original manga was just an ordinary dude. He wasn't scared of bugs, and he wasn't awkward around Murano. They even gave him glasses in the anime to up his Peter Parkeriness. They must have thought 'oh no, our protagonist is not a loser, he won't be relatable to our audience!'. Fuck off, that is insulting. Okay, look, I get it. They probably added it because that way there is more of a contrast between the before and after in his character arc. Put I think they missed the point. Parasyte is not a story about a loser boy becoming an awesome action hero. It is a story about an ordinary high schooler thrust into a dangerous situation, losing both his ordinary life as well as his humanity, only to regain both by the end of the story, but having grown through the trials he overcame in between. In the manga, the initial scenes with him focus on how Migi disrupts his ordinary life. Migi morphs into various things which Shinichi has to hide, including a giant Phallus while he is in a restaurant! Its pretty funny actually, and sadly missing from the anime. The manga already has the main character go through enough change (its probably the best part of the story). It didn't need more.

I don't really mind them changing the setting to contemporary modern day rather than the nineties when the original manga was written, though I do think that it is a bit unnecessary.

I do actually like the anime. The animation, music (dubstep is cool) and voice acting are all great. Well, except for that one shot of really bad CG they used for random students walking to the school.

Also, Migi is just the cutest little psychopath. I luv it. Speaking of, diversity win! The cold-blooded alien parasite, by virtue of having no apparent capacity to reproduce or interest in human values, is nonbinary! Migi and its relationship to its host Shinichi is definitely the best part of the series for me. Its a fascinating situation, where a very rational but completely amoral alien and a conscientious human have to share a body and cooperate despite their differences. What I find very endearing about Migi is that it is actually very reasonable and always wishes to work together with its host when possible. All of the evil aliens in the story are actually very cooperative in nature, which I really like. Smart villains are great.

One final remark: Its funny how my view on the body horror in the story has changed. When I first saw some scene or ad for the anime, I was convinced I would never watch a show that disgusting. When a friend of mine was watching it though, I actually really got into it, and basically watched it in spite of the gross body horror. At some point, I watched it because (but not only because) of the body horror. Tastes change, huh.

[darkstarofchaos]

Ten years ago today, I posted Chapter One of my first real Transformers fanfic: a delightful little G1 story in which Megatron finally had Starscream reprogrammed, at the behest of Soundwave. It started out okay, but eventually I found myself getting tangled up in plot threads, and every chapter was increasingly more difficult to write than the one before it. In 2020, I finally decided to do what I'd been tempted to do for a while, and discontinued the story - albeit with a promise of a rewrite.

I started this year hoping I would have the rewritten version finished and ready to start posting for the 10th anniversary. When that became an impossibility, I'd hoped I could finish a shorter prequel that I had lying around in my drafts in time. Unfortunately, that didn't work out either. And now this post is what I'm left with for commemoration.

The first version of the story had a lot of issues in the background. One of the biggest, which might not seem like an issue at all to some, is that I knew the characters better from fanfic than from canon. I was inundated in Starscream redemptions where Megatron was an evil rapist and at least some Autobots became sympathetic the moment they discovered that Starscream was being abused. In fact, one of the earliest ideas for the fic in its conception stages was for Starscream to eventually get help from the Autobots (and, yes, for Megatron to be the main villain. Minus the rapey bits, I had no desire to do that).

The thing is, I love canon, and I love rooting my stories in canon. Even in the early chapters, when I had only seen most episodes once, I was making references to Starscream's Brigade, The Revenge of Bruticus, and of course, Fire in the Sky. After Hook inserted himself as a supporting character, I started planning a retelling of events from The Secret of Omega Supreme. A whole minor plotline involved the Decepticons planning to steal the Matter Duplicator from Cosmic Rust. Taking a bunch of unrelated one-shot episodes, some of which contradict each other irreconcilably, and forcing them to exist in one logical narrative, is one of my favorite things about writing fanfic.

Which is why, the more time I spent with canon, the harder it became to write characterizations that no longer felt right.

Starscream, of course, is an example of this. While I don't regret his portrayal after being reprogrammed, the few scenes beforehand take a fairly flat, if admittedly canon-typical approach. He fights with Megatron, he wants leadership. And there's not much to him beyond that. Canon-compliant in the most soulless way possible. But while my approach to him has changed considerably, he's not the one whose characterization feels the most off to me.

I mentioned that Megatron was originally conceived as the main villain. That plan changed early on, with Soundwave taking the role, but Megatron was still meant to be a major antagonist. I leaned into emotional abuse over violence, but he was still terrible to Starscream. He still had him reprogrammed, and still enjoyed having control over him. He cared a little, in his own way, but he was still abusive and cruel.

Here's the thing. I was not comfortable writing Megatron back then. He was freaking intimidating, and I actively avoided writing his POV for three chapters. Every time he interacted with Starscream, it felt too intimate. And this wasn't an erotic story. It wasn't even (explicitly) gay. But he was just not capable of being in the same scene as Starscream without my wanting to depart the premises. And it took me literal years to get past that.

Turns out the solution was to throw up my hands and let them be gay. Yes, your honor, the evil alien robots have an abusive, mutually destructive relationship. They also care about and trust each other in ways that would make no sense to anyone else.

I don't think I need to explain why this creates an issue with the core premise of my story. Figuring out how to make this work has been. Interesting.

Getting anything ready to post for the anniversary didn't happen. But as I mentioned, there's a short prequel in progress, and I plan to have it out sometime before the end of the year. Y'all can find a little sneak peek under the cut if you're interested.

Megatron turned his gaze to Bruticus. "Once we finish reprogramming Bruticus to obey only me, he will be unstoppable." The look on his face as he surveyed his prize said everything. He didn't care about having Starscream back. All he cared about was his powerful new toy. That was all he ever cared about, and Starscream knew that. It had been made so painfully clear on so many occasions that it hadn't even occurred to him to hope for anything else. So why did it still hurt? Starscream looked at Bruticus as well and wondered if he should even bother saying anything else. It seemed pointless. Besides, Megatron had indirectly told him to get back to work. To do otherwise would only make him mad, and Starscream was tired of people being mad at him. If he returned to Earth, everyone would be mad at him. Mad at his actions against the Decepticons, at his being taken back despite those actions, at… everything. He couldn't think of a single bot who wasn't mad at him right now, unless Megatron had truly decided to forgive and forget. And they would stay mad for a long time, in all likelihood. He already deserved it. But he was about to deserve it a whole lot more. "I should get to it, then," he muttered, sinking back down next to Bruticus' head. He hoped Megatron would take the hint and leave him alone, but the warm weight of a hand on one air intake told him he wasn't going to be that lucky. "I wonder," Megatron said, as though the thought had just occurred to him. "How can I trust you to actually do what you're supposed to?" Doubt? He had been praising Starscream for a successful plan not even ten seconds ago and they were already back to doubt? Maybe Starscream should have expected the crumb of approval to be taken away immediately, but like the realization that all Megatron wanted was to control Bruticus, it hurt. "And who would you assign to the task instead?" Starscream asked bitterly. "Shockwave?" "Still jealous?" Megatron said. His thumb slid along the edge of Starscream's intake. "Have you already forgotten that your jealousy is what got us here in the first place?" Starscream hunched his shoulders, staring at Bruticus' exposed processor without seeing it. He hadn’t forgotten anything. Their argument about Shockwave and his own subsequent attack on Megatron was all he’d been able to think about since being cast out from the Decepticons. And he still didn’t understand why he’d been cast out. They argued all the time, and he’d attacked Megatron on numerous occasions. What made that last fight different? What had he done? His chest throbbed. But it wasn’t just emotional hurt this time, or the anxiety that still threatened to build into panic. This was a phantom pain. A reminder that the last time Megatron got mad at him before all this, he’d torn a hole in Starscream’s chest. Whatever had changed - whatever Starscream had done - it had happened a while ago. “Fine,” he muttered tonelessly. “Let Shockwave do it. Who cares.” He made to stand, but his legs buckled, spilling him back to his knees. He caught himself with trembling arms and shut off his optics, head swimming from the sudden drop. Humiliation prickled over his armor, or maybe it was just neural lines shutting down to conserve energy. At this point, he couldn’t tell. Metal creaked beside him and Megatron’s hand settled on his back, gently rubbing along his spinal strut. “You blasted fool,” Megatron scolded, though without much heat. “When was the last time you even had access to fuel?” Starscream was tempted to comment on the barren nature of most asteroids, such as the one Megatron had seen fit to dump him on. But it would be a waste of energy he didn’t have, so he settled for turning his face away, silently rejecting the false concern.

[starleska]

just finished watching Megamind vs the Doom Syndicate and i have some thoughts!! please do take this with a grain of salt as i'm just one person; i absolutely do not want to rain on anyone's parade!! if this is your favourite movie, don't worry about the gripes of some stranger on the internet 🥰

let's start with the positive!! despite what some people are saying there are things to enjoy about the film, and i think that lies in the fun of Megamind's old crew. although Behemoth looks a little phoned-in and Pierre Pressure was an easy joke, i really enjoyed the designs for Lady Doppler and Lord Nighty-Knight. the scenes they were in with Megamind were definitely the most engaging!! but that's...about where my enjoyment of the film ends. i think the film's biggest sin is the enormous amount of exposition-dumping and telling rather than showing. there were so many times where characters just...stated things about themselves, or spoke aloud why they were feeling the way they are. they're like...character notes that a writer jots down to keep track of emotional journeys. it really breaks the immersion and makes the characters feel mechanical, clunky, and a bit of a hivemind. Megamind and Roxanne in particular feel quite stripped of their original personalities, which is such a shame. then there's drastic reduction of chemistry between Megamind and Roxanne. canonically, this movie only takes place a couple of days after the events of Megamind, but the two are barely affectionate with one another to the point that it's weird. perhaps it was written as them being comfortable with one another, but at times it almost felt like there was dislike between the two of them...especially from Roxanne's side!! Megamind is hardly recognisable compared to his lovestruck counterpart from the first movie, and Roxanne's bold, caring nature seems to have evaporated. it makes it very hard to get invested in their relationship at all 💔 speaking of Roxanne, i find it such an odd choice to make Roxanne have an existential crisis about being dissatisfied with her life just a few days after the events of the previous film...you'd think she'd want to take it easy for a while! i feel this characterisation of Roxanne does her a lot of disservice, and reduces her more to plot functionality. Roxanne doesn't strike me as the kind of woman who'd be starstruck re: some kid's online following and decide she's inadequate by comparison. again, a lot of the things we love Roxanne for were just quite...absent, from this movie. you could predict what she was going to say well ahead of time, because she was just following the beats of the plot 😓 and the time-retcon...isn't it a bit weird that Megamind is a complete Internet n00b? it's one thing for him to be a bit out-of-touch with Gen Z (as he's relatable to us neurotypicals given his alien grasp on certain concepts), but he seems completely baffled by the concept of streaming and followers at all, and this movie takes place in a post-2020 timeframe. it's odd because Megamind is already established as a tech genius in the first movie, and we know he's somewhat affiliated with Internet slang by his use of LOL : ) when texting Roxanne!! perhaps this is a small nitpick that can be explained away, but it seems like a baffling choice and an excuse to write in a trendy character for the kids to relate to 😵 then, moving onto Keiko...she wasn't terrible by any means! but i wish she was more than a social media influencer to get Megamind with the times. if she's Megamind's number 1 fan, surely she would have been his fan while he was a villain...couldn't that have made for an interesting moral dilemma along with the return of the Doom Syndicate: having a child trying to follow in his previously-villainous footsteps? what about Keiko being taken under the wing of the Doom Syndicate after Megamind became a hero? 👀 those are my thoughts for now...i do hope all those talented Megamind fans will build upon these flaws in the movie and create more compelling stories from it 🙏💖

[picturejasper20]

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur The Beyonder analysis (Season 2-A)

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur Season 2 A brought a lot of interesting changes for the series, one of them being the development that the Beyonder gets as character in some episodes from this part of the season, where we get to see a new side of him and his dynamic with Lunella changing as result.

In this post i'm going to talk about this development and where i think it his arc it is going to go from there:

The Beyonder made his character debut in Season 1 Episode 6 ¨The Beyonder¨. He introduces himself by shapeshifting into Lunella's family members and other people she knows, making Lunella believe for a moment that her secret identity as Moon Girl was found out. Then he changes into his normal form while laughing about how he scared off Lunella.

Beyonder's introduction scene leaves clear that, at his core, he is a troll. Someone who enjoys pulling pranks up on others and laugh at them. He uses his divine like powers to do this, usually altering reality or shapeshifting himself.

His divine powers also allow him to avoid having to face the consequences of his actions most of the time since he is an immortal being thanks to them. He can simply snap his fingers to make himself disappear. In general he seems to be untouchable for his enemies.

Unlike other villains in the show, The Beyonder doesn't have desire to commit crimes, get more power or get revenge on someone. It is easy to assume he isn't interested in these things since he already is ¨all powerful and all knowing¨.

He is on Earth because he was casted away from his own planet/species and he was sent to study humanity as species and see how they operate. While it is his ¨job¨, he shows certain interest in learning about human culture and psyche, which usually involves getting Lunella dragged to take part in his ¨experiments¨.

Lunella's relationship with Beyonder is quite unique since the Beyonder, when not trying to put Lunella into some form of trial, seems to be amicable to her. The way he interacts with Lunella at times gives off the impression that he sees her as a sort of friend, in his own way.

The Beyonder is, in plenty of ways, amoral. He doesn't seem to care about principles nor morals when it comes to messing with other people. Being an immortal semi-god, his moral code is very different from the mortals', seeing the universe as his own playground to do whatever he pleases. For example, he didn't care about making Lunella believe that he erased humanity for a minute just to reveal that he was faking it.

¨The Great Beyonder¨ (Season 2 Episode 1) explores deeper how Lunella isn't the only person he likes pulling up heavy pranks on since many aliens come to the planet Lunella and him find themselves stranded in to get revenge on the things that Beyonder did to them. He fully admits in one point of the episode he likes going to other universes just to mess with different versions of Lunella, such as it is the case of Devil Girl.

It wouldn't be out of place to assume that the reason he got casted from his own planet was because of the way he abused his powers on mortal beings, if not his own people. He doesn't seem to take his job that seriously and prefers to go around starting chaos.

In ¨The Great Beyonder¨ he sees Lunella going through an interdimensional vortex and takes her to planet that it used to be a sort of vacation-relax spot instead of her own home. When Lunella demands to Beyonder to take her back to Earth, he tries using his powers, only to realize he that they aren't working and they are both stuck on this planet.

Lunella proposes the Beyonder to work together to get out from the planet by using a black hole: She builds the spaceship for them to travel while Beyonder shows her the way to where the black hole is since he has been in this planet before. Beyonder says that he doesn't need the help from someone like Lunella and he can find his own way out.

Suddenly he gets attacked by an alien he trolled time ago by changing her spaceship into a polo stick. Since he doesn't have his divine powers, he gets beaten down by this alien. Lunella offers getting rid of his enemy if in exchange he helps her with finding the black hole. Beyonder is forced to accept the offer and Lunella sends the alien flying, followed by taking Beyonder with her. Unfortunately, without them knowing, the same alien sends a message to many people throughout the galaxy telling tjem about how the Beyonder is without his powers and vunerable to attack.

For around half of the episode (what would be a day for the characters), the Beyonder is reduced to someone who is pretty much helpless. He isn't used to having to walk for hours. He doesn't know why he gets thirsty nor why he yawns, because with his powers he doesn't have to worry about these things. For the first time he gets to experience what is to be a mortal, or a ¨human¨ as Lunella puts it. He has to rely on Lunella to hide and defend himself from people who are searching for him to get back at him for pranks he pulled up.

It could be said that he gets to experience what it is to be like to be the people he often messes with, not being to fight back or defend himself. Not only that but having to deal with the consequences of his chaotic actions, which he doesn't have to face when he has his powers.

During their battle against Devil Girl and Moon Dinosaur Devil Girl makes fun of Beyonder by telling him how he is useless without his god-like powers, something that hurts Beyonder's pride and self esteem. Lunella manages to get them away by causing a distraction to Devil Girl and Moon Dinosaur.

At night, while they are resting and Lunella is trying to build a spaceship using the remains of a bigger one, Beyonder asks to Lunella about how she is able to fight and ¨do all this stuff¨ without any powers. Then he starts to break down about how he can't do anything and that Devil was right about him being useless. He doesn't know who he is supposed to be without his own powers, having a bit of an identity crisis.

Lunella feels sorry for Beyonder and tells him that he can do great things without any special powers. She shows him how to braid his own hair, something that he tries doing by himself and is able do one braid. He gets happy that he can do something for himself. Then he goes to sleep, being tired of having to walk all day.

Next morning, Beyonder wakes up Lunella to show her that he made more braids in his hair and grabbed some vines and tied them around the spaceship so they would have a way to take it with them to the black hole. Beyonder is back to his confident self, indicating that he learned from what Lunella taught to him last night.

There is a montage of Lunella and Beyonder working together to take the spaceship to the black hole ride. In these scenes they are in better terms with each other, even laughing together at one part. They take several days until they are able to reach their destination.

They are finally able to finish their journey when they arrive at the black hole ride. They both get inside the spaceship and Lunella checks that all things are working, ready to take off. Lunella tells to Beyonder that she is proud of him by how much he helped, to which Beyonder replies that he is proud of being able to do things without his powers and thanks to Lunella for teaching him that.

However, before they are able to take off, they are stopped by Molecular Man. It turns out that he has been waiting to get revenge on the Beyonder all this time since he was the one that caused the planet, the one Molecular Man spent years building, to become a wasteland by him playing a golf space game and accidentally throwing asteroids to the planet.

This is a good metaphor of the way Beyonder usually abuses his own powers, not considering how he can hurt other people. He didn't consider that he was the reason this planet got destroyed. Since he is a god like cosmic entity, he sees himself above others, in the sense that makes him hard to empathize with mortals.

Lunella tries taking on Molecular Man and gets a terrible beat down, to the point it is traumatic for her. However, while Molecular Man is distracted by giving a speech to Lunella, Beyonder tip-toes and takes the opportunity to take the wand from Molecular Man. He gets his powers back by breaking the wand, transforms Molecular Man into a baby and saves Lunella.

He makes the ship appear near them and asks Lunella to test it out to see if it works. The spaceship goes through the black hole without any problems and Beyonder takes Lunella to Morlak's lair, where the portal opened in Season 1 finale.

In this episode Beyonder goes through an important change in character, as he is forced to experience what is like to be without powers and face the consequences of his own actions. He learns that he is capable of doing things on his own in spite of being powerless. His relationship with Lunella ends on better terms in some ways, having a new found respect for her.

While Beyonder appears a few times to narrate the episodes that followed, it isn't until episode ¨Wish-Tar¨ that he truly shows up again by popping out of a wishtar machine and scaring Lunella and Casey. Although he still has his troll tendencies, He expresses regretting the way he brought chaos to Lunella's life in the past and that he wants to make things right. He admits he sees Lunella as his friend after the events of ¨The Great Beyonder¨ but she doesn't totally feel the same way because of the times he antagonized her.

When walking down the street, Lunella and Casey notice how the wish that Lunella asked for the wishtar became true. They decide to go back to Roll With It and see that Beyonder is the one behind the wish becoming reality. Beyonder wants to grant Lunella's wishes to prove that he can be a ¨good friend¨. After getting the shoes she wanted so much, Lunella agrees to Beyonder's idea.

In the sequence ¨Switch it up¨ Lunella and Casey try to constanly keep up with new trendings in social media by asking the Beyonder to give them all the things they want. Beyonder doesn't seem to have any problem with this, as he assumes he is being a good friend by giving them anything they ask.

The problem is that the Beyonder doesn't a clear understanding of how human friendships work because he believes that giving a person anything they want is enough make them his friend. He doesn't realize that in reality Lunella and Casey are taking advantage of his powers.

Around half of the episode Lunella wishes for Bobby the Myth singer to show up in Roll With It so she is able to get all the attention from her school. Bobby accepts Lunella's offer of hosting his concert on Roll With It but he says that he needs a cooler piano than his competition. Lunella goes again to Beyonder to wish for the ¨baddest¨ piano in the world and he grants her wish.

When the concert starts all seems to be going well... until Bobby plays the piano that Lunella wished for him. He gets posessed by an evil energy that comes from it and endangers the audience. Lunella changes into Moon Girl and people are lead to the exit of the skate rink.

Then Beyonder appears on the rink, observing what it is happening. Lunella calls him out for summoning an evil piano. Beyonder explains to her that he made the "baddest piano" (as in evil) just like she asked and they shouldn't let a mistake get away in the middle of their friendship.

Lunella snaps at Beyonder by telling him that they "aren't friends", indirectly revealing that she had been taken advantage of his powers during the events of this episode and she didn't see him as a friend. In her moment of anger she says some awful things to the Beyonder and wishes that he was gone.

Because he isn't sure what he did wrong, Beyonder is left confused by Lunella's words. He is heartbroken upon learning that Lunella didn't see him as a friend in return like he assumed she did and sadly disappears, calling Moon Girl "former friend".

At the end of the episode Lunella realizes that she was really mean to Beyonder, regretting the way she lashed out at him for something that was her own fault.

In the rest of the episodes from Season 2 A that followed Beyonder isn't seen narrating the villains backstories like he used to before Wish-Tar, leaving clear that he is truly gone, at least for the moment.

In this episode Beyonder's development involves him trying to be a "good friend" to Lunella and make amends for his previous misheeds. The problem is that he still has quite a lot to learn on how to be a friend and that he can't just buy friendships from others by using his powers. He is forced to learn this lesson the hard way after learning that Lunella took advantage of him to get what she wanted.

It's a bit hard to guess Beyonder's whereabouts for the rest of Season 2 A. Nevertheless, it's worth of pointing that it has been confirmed by the crew that there is going to be a resolution for this fallout between Beyonder and Lunella, meaning that Beyonder won't probably go back to his old ways of causing problems for others.

Source: https://twitter.com/e1n/status/1754972244206665910 (The Op account who posted the tweet got deleted but Ben's response is still there)

My speculation is that in Season 2-B there is going to be an episode about Lunella finding out where Beyonder is and she apologizes to him for the way she treated him and lashed out at him in ¨Wish-Tar¨. They are likely going to make up but it isn't possible to tell if they are immediately going to become friends again or just start over.

Another thing i think it is going to happen is that Beyonder is going to learn better how friendships and human relationships work, gaining a better understanding of them. Maybe he would learn from the mistakes he commited in the past and try not repeating it again in case he wants to form new connections with people in the future.

I don't necessary believe that that he is going to become an antagonist again or trying to get revenge on Lunella for what happened. If anything, his expression in ¨Wish-Tar¨ after Lunella yelled at him was a heartbroken one. His body language before leaving read as he was going to left Lunella alone, just like she wished in her outburst.

It is going to be interesting to see what happened to his character after the events of ¨Wish-Tar¨ and how he is going to change in Season 2 B. This part of the season already did some really good things for Beyonder in terms of character evolution and i'm intrigued to see where it goes from here.

[ladyofthewolfsbane]

In which I rewatch Alien: Covenant

Well, I rewatched Covenabt tonight. My thoughts are below but TLDR; I liked it a bit more than the first time I saw it, but I still don’t really enjoy it. Full review/thoughts below:

I genuinely wanted to like this more than the first time I watched it and that … sort of happened? I can’t say I enjoyed this as a whole, but I did like the last 50-ish minutes more than I did the first time I watched it. The last time I saw this, I didn’t even like the android stuff, which is surprising because normally I’m all in for plots heavily involving androids. 

Thankfully, I genuinely enjoyed all the android stuff this time around. All the scenes involving David and Walter (separately or together) are really interesting and engaging. 

But that doesn’t make up for the overall negatives. 

Almost all the characters here are basically interchangeable and uninteresting — just slasher movie fodder. Now, I enjoy slashers. It’s one of my favorite subgenres of horror. I can enjoy a dumb, fun slasher easily. Fun being the key word here. Because I could more easily accept Covenant if it went all in on being a dumb slasher-ish movie/creature feature. For a comparison, AvP isn’t a good movie, but it knows what it is and has fun with it. That doesn’t really happen here. 

Covenant feels like Scott was actually interested in the android stuff but was obligated to shove in a bunch of xenomorph destruction and his heart wasn’t really in it. There’s some good creature stuff but … overall it just feels half hearted. 

I’m still mad about Shaw being killed casually  offscreen. It’s one thing if a character from a previous film dies in a sequel and their death means something. Nightmare on Elm Street 3 does that well. This doesn’t. Shaw is just unceremoniously killed off and used as a plot device. Honestly, it’s insulting to an interesting character and feels like everything she endured in Prometheus meant nothing. 

Also, while I enjoy David in this, he’s definitely a much more straightforward, classic villain here than he is in Prometheus. That’s not bad per se, but I find his more gray motivation and morality in Prometheus more interesting than what’s going on here. 

All in all, I really wish we’d gotten a proper Prometheus 2 and not the confused mess that is Covenant.

[doctorwhonerdadi3]

Ranking New Who Villains

When you go onto google and type in "top Doctor who monsters", you get given a handy little list. Now, obviously there is a lot more than just monsters/villains on this list in doctor who, but for the sake of trying to keep this blog post a bit shorter, I am only going to be ranking the ones on this google list. I'm going to remove a couple of them as well as they are old who villains. So now that's established, let's begin!

Number 21: The Great Intelligence

What a waste of Sir Ian McKellen. So the Great Intelligence starts out as a dome full of snow, making evil snowmen in New Who. Then it moves on to making whisper men and taking the Doctor to Trenzalor. Safe to say I am not impressed.

Number 20: Cybermen

A classic villain, which did honestly used to scare me as a child. Then they made it all sleek looking and it just didn't read as scary any more. They made a wooden Cyberman... This villain is just over used now and if they aren't going to do anything new with it then they should just stop bringing it back- however I do like the cyberman design for Bill.

Number 19: The Autons

A great way to revive a show. As a child I was scared of shop window dummies thanks to these creatures. Looking at it now though, that bin scene was a bit crazy wasn't it? Also... plastic Mickey. Either way though, these creatures still give me the willies a little bit.

Number 18: Clockwork Droids

Unique and imaginative. They were never scary in any way to me, but the episode they are in is a great one. The way they drive the plot forward works wonders. I'm so glad they never brought them back- oh wait... they brought them back for Capaldi's first episode and sort of ruined them...

Number 17: Ice Warriors

Another Classic who creature brought back and revived. I have always loved the design for Ice Warriors, and I love that they are from somewhere as simple as Mars instead of having to create a new planet for them. But I don't remember what happened in the Ice Warrior episodes very well for New Who.

Number 16: Davros

All the creatures and villains on this list have some merit, and Davros is no exception for that. When he was revived for The Stolen Earth and Journey's End, I got chills. And I still cringe a bit when he opens up his top to show where he made the new Daleks from. But I think they ruined him a little bit in Capaldi's episodes.

Number 15: Zygons

It was interesting when Doctor who brought these creatures back, because they are so fun. Shape shifting aliens give you a lot of wiggle room to play around with, and I think they had fun with them.

Number 14: Slitheen

I could argue that the Slitheen are below Zygons, but frankly I just enjoy them a little bit more. Call me childish, but fart humor is funny on occasion. Plus Boom Town is a great and underrated episode. The Slitheen kind of steals the show there.

Number 13: The Beast

The Beast, or Satan. Terrfying. The idea that the Doctor is facing off against the actual Devil is a great concept, plus this episode gives Rose a chance to shine as a companion. If you have read my previous posts you know I don't like her very much, so her impressing me in this episode says a lot.

Number 12: Judoon

Space Rhinos. Space police rhinos. They don't really do very much but they are just fun. We all know that the old lady was the scary one in Smith and Jones. But they are in all leather like some kind of biker gang, and use white board markers to show that people are human. Its just classic Doctor who... Lets ignore Fugative of the Jadoon.

Number 11: Sontarans

New who does like to bring back its classic villains. They then like to milk said villains if they do well. The Sontaran Stratagem and the Poison sky are great episodes and the Sontarans are brought back in a great way.

Number 10: The Master

Each actor who plays the Master, brings something new to the role. And the character is fun... and hungry.

Number 9: The flood

Terrifying. No notes.

Number 8: Midnight Entity

I feel like I have to start justifying why I like these creatures over others. The midnight entity is scary because you never actually see it. It causes so much chaos- but most of it is just humans being scared.

Number 7: The silence

A creature that you forget as soon as you turn your back could have been incredible- and it was. It was fun the way they tied it into the moon landing as well. I enjoy the slenderman vibes they have.

Number 6: Gas Mask Zombies

Are you my mummy? The first actually scary episode of New who. Also the scene where the gas mask comes out of that doctor's mouth and eyes lives rent free in my head.

Number 5: Daleks

They are classic. They are iconic. They are a little bit over used and that is why they are not higher up in the list- but given that theyve been around since the 1960s they must be doing something right.

Number 4: Silurian

I love the design of these creatures. I love their stories, and Madam Vastra is one of my favourite New Who characters.

Number 3: The Ood

Making it into the top 3 spot for me means 1 of 2 things. 1) I love the creature and everything theyve done with it or 2) it is just a terrifying villain. With the Ood it's both. I both love them and are scared of them. Even Nephew was scary. And the scene where the guy turns into an ood- so unsettling. I love it.

Number 2: The Weeping Angels

I bet a few people reading this was wondering where they would turn up. I love them, especially when they were first introduced in Blink. The idea of them snapping your neck was offputting for me at first but I still don't think you can go too far wrong with stone statues. I even liked when they turned the Doctor into an angel.

Number 1: The Vashta Nerada

This creature had me counting my shadows and freaking out when I had 2. I'm glad they haven't returned since the Library because what we were given was perfection.

Hey, Who turned out the lights?!

[smhalltheurlsaretaken]

I love the jedi but enjoy the sith, mostly vader,new republic sith and old republic sith, do yoi have a lost of your favorite star wars villains.

In order, Dooku, Thrawn, Palpatine, Vader, OT-era Tarkin, Maul - and TCW!Hondo right after Dooku if that counts.

Pretty vanilla lmao. I like the Son as a concept but he's really not hardcore enough to really embody what he's supposed to represent. (There's not enough of the slimy slithering madness and viciousness that makes the Sith do stuff like sacrifice Jedi on altars and do blood magic rituals, among other things.) He's too tame for something supposedly worse than the Sith, though he'd be horrifying if he'd been more Dark-Side-y.

So, Dooku, because he's a disaster and a mirror to Anakin's garbage and because there's a lot of genuinely interesting things about a character who was among the wisest and noblest and who knows what the darkness is and willing embraces it anyway. he's Star Wars' Saruman and I love Saruman. It certainly helped that he was played by Sir Christopher Lee. The man was just that good.

Thrawn, because of the smooth, calm demeanor - much like Dooku's. That scene where he slowly explains what a kalikori is without revealing right away who is Hera, toying with us with his incredible score in the background, gave me shivers the first 4-5 times I watched it. I love sophisticated and collected villains. Brutish villains feel too simplistic and not nearly as frightening. I also love Star Wars aliens.

Palpatine because he's a delight to hate. He has no redeeming qualities whatsoever - he's just absolute selfishness embodied and that makes if very fun. Also love the 'frail' old man whose power is in his insidiousness. I love how maniacally happy about his plans he always is and I love to think of how completely bored he must have been during the Empire days, before Luke showed up and gave him something to plot about. Sure I wish the Zillo beast could have flattened him to a Sheev pancake - or that Dooku would have just punted him into the sun before Naboo, but hey, at least he got thrown down a reactor and exploded twice and was never ever heard of again, right?

Vader because he's a powerhouse and that's always impressive. James Earl Jones' voice was always magnificent as well and there's something so expressive about faceless characters.

OT Tarkin because- smooth, calm and collected old villain. I really have a type ah ah. There's something so maddening about that complete confidence that they're right, that end-justify-the-means mentality they confuse for wisdom, that dismissive way they see the hot blooded righteous heroes as so beneath them...

Maul mostly for the times he goes completely crazy and either turns into a spider or a Temple-dwelling Sith cockroach and runs around painting Kenobi on the walls with his blood. I love his arc with Obi-Wan, I love what it says about the light and the Dark, the Jedi and the Sith, and the Florrum and Twin Suns duels are my favorite ever.

Finally, Hondo... Well, is Hondo. Much smarter, much more ruthless, and much saner than people give him credit for - just spectacularly greedy and ballsy. I wouldn't call him a villain so much as the true example of what a 'morally gray' character is. It's not good guys in impossible situations like Mace, it's not complex villains like Dooku, it's not the image people have of a tortured prince of darkness that deep down feels really sad about all the murder he's doing and it's not the selfless hero who angsts about quickly killing a monster that one time - it's Hondo.

I'm generally pretty indifferent to Ventress, Jango, Boba, bounty hunters like Cad Bane, the Hutts, villains of an episode, or more minor villains and/or reformed antagonists like Bo-Katan, Kallus, etc - as characters anyway. I might like them when they're onscreen or like their place in the story but they don't do much for me individually beyond that.

And a special mention goes to Miraj Scintel - the Zygerrian Queen and only Star Wars villain I truly and deeply loathe. I hate seeing her onscreen, I hate hearing her talk, I hate watching her move, I hate her aspirations, I just detest her. Everything about her is infuriating.

[whovianwatchingstartrek]

A Whovian Watches Star Trek for the First Time: Part 048 - The Borg Awaken

On the Advice of a few of you, I've decided to ignore that the list I've been following skips this one until much later.

Star Trek: Enterprise - Season 2 Episode 23 - Regeneration

So the episode opens with some scientists discovering a person buried in some Ice. The Borg are one of the few Star Trek aliens that I new about before starting the series, so I did recognise it. That said, I don't know much about them. I read that one Star Trek Doctor Who crossover comic years ago, and while I don't remember much about it, I do remember the borg went up against the Cybermen in that one, so I know they're very similar in concept. The comic didn't really do much to differentiate the Borg and Cybermen from each other though, so I'm interested to see where they differ. The Cybermen are my absolute favourite Doctor Who villains, so I really have been looking forward to these guys showing up.

Anyways, the Borg quickly start waking up. I loved how these opening scenes were played basically like a horror movie. After loosing contact with the scientists, and a ship was documented leaving the planet, so Star Fleet sends Enterprise.

It's fascinating how little the borg have to actually do to begin a conversion. Just one small injection, then the process is automatic. And now, there are two ongoing convertee's on Enterprise. And They infected Phlox. Plus, the crews weapons are completely useless against them. The two Borgs that Enterprise picked up do get ejected into space, but Phlox is still being converted.

I love moments where Phlox's happy exterior is replaced by a more serious demeanour when it's called for, because that's how you can tell things are really serious, and this episode is full of that.

T'Pol and Archer have a mini debate about destroying the Borg's transport vs Trying to save the infected people aboard, and while I would normally be up for a heroic rescue, We literally just saw the damage even two of these things can cause less than 5 minutes ago. I'm 100% with T'Pol on this one, that transport needs destroyed.

Phlox has a minor breakthrough on finding a treatment, but it's a very risky one. However I admire his conviction. "I have no intention of becoming one of them" indeed. Seeing his movements slowly become more and more robotic over the course of the episode was beautifully terrifying.

I'm going to be honest, when we eventually heard the Borgs' voice they didn't sound anything like I expected to. I don't know, they sounded too Human, but maybe that's just a lifetime of expecting threats of cyber-conversion sounding more like this:

I do still want to see more of the Borg. This episode mostly focussed on how the Enterprise deals with them as a unknown threat, but I really want to deep dive into how exactly they operate. Just how similar to the Cybermen are they? How did the Borg start out? I want answers, and sadly from the way the end of the episode sounded, I'm probably gonna be waiting a while for those answers.

Comparing my Enjoyment of this Episode with a Doctor Who Universe Story of the Same Title

K9 - Season 1 Episode 1 - Regeneration

With a core concept to the Whoniverse called "Regeneration" you would think there would be more than one story with that title. Unfortunately not, so I've finally been forced to watch the Australian K9 Spin-Off.

I want to give this series a chance, and luckily the episode is the series's pilot but it doesn't do a good job at setting up it's premise, or introducing it's characters. This was Bob Baker's second attempt at giving K9 a spin off series, and there's a reason why neither of them really took off. K9 just isn't main character material. I love the metal dog, I always have, but seeing him played seriously doesn't work. Also not a fan of the redesign this series gave him. I don't really even have anything to say about the episode itself. Nothing really stood out.

I definitely enjoyed Enterprise's Regeneration a lot more, not even close. Enterprise's Regeneration was a such a good episode, I'm glad you guys convinced me not to follow the viewing guide's advice on this one.

[jacquelinemerritt]

Dragon Ball Z: Revenge of Cooler Abridged Review

Originally posted December 11th, 2015

Derivative plots can be more entertaining than you’d think.

This is my second review of one of Team Four Star’s abridged films (because I’m saving Christmas Tree of Might for a very special occasion), and I gotta say, I’m noticing that they might be a tad repetitive.

I mean, the plot for this film is pretty much exactly the same as the last. An evil alien comes to earth with his team of bad guys (a pretty one, a dumb tough one, and one with a weird power, all of which are defeated by Piccolo) and attempts to destroy it, only to be stopped by Goku, who pulls out a victory at the very last second with a power boost (last time it was energy from Piccolo, this time it’s Super Saiyan Kamehameha). Given that clear a formula, you’d kind of expect these films to be pretty boring.

But Team Four Star, as we know, loves defying expectations. As writers, they are keenly aware of the plot similarities shared by all the films, and while they can’t abandon those similarities, they build a very specific story onto that basic plot in order to give us a compelling experience.

To cite an example, Team Four Star draws on the similarities between Cooler’s goons and the Ginyu Force by giving them all ridiculous accents or voices. We get to meet yet another Space Aussie as well as Salza, a Space Frenchman who, like any good Frenchman, refuses to let you forget he is from France by constantly referencing the superiority of his people’s culture. And in one of the coolest moments from this film, Salza, emits energy from his arm which sounds like a lightsaber, and proceeds to attack Piccolo in a chase sequence that looks like Return of the Jedi.

This is cool not only for the nerdy crossover value, but for the fact that man who lavishes French cinema, where auteur theory originated, has an attack in a Japanese anime referencing a series of Western films developed by an auteur who drew heavily on the works of Akira Kurosawa, who is generally considered the greatest auteur in Japanese cinema.1

Cooler himself is also a damn interesting character, and General Ivan does an excellent job of imbuing him with a charismatic professionalism that makes him clearly distinct from Freeza, while still serving as a good foil for Goku. We even get treated to a reaction from Goku just after Cooler shares his entire life story during a brief dip underwater, and it gives us a solid foundation for both Freeza and Cooler’s ultimate motivations: to please their father.

Cooler’s voice transformation and subsequent The Dark Knight Rises reference are also excellent, and what’s more, the comparison to Tom Hardy’s Bane is fairly apt, as Cooler’s physical and mental fortitude is the closest to Goku’s we’ve seen yet in the series.

In addition to the strong characterizations given to the villains in this film, there’s one scene in particular that sticks out as a favorite of mine. It’s the scene where Gohan goes to Korin and Yajorobe’s house to get Senzu beans for Goku. When he arrives, we see Korin and Yajirobe fighting over kitty treats and a clogged toilet drain. This scenario, I imagine, was probably used in the original as a short delay to Gohan receiving the Senzu beans and flying away, with the bickering ultimately being pointless and adding nothing to the story.

Here though, Team Four Star takes the fight between Korin and Yajirobe and elevates it to a glimpse into the complexity of a loving relationship. The argument here isn’t about the treats or the drain, it’s about how two people who love each other can clash when forced to live in the same space for a long period of time, and even after we see them argue, we’re still shown a moment of tender conflict as Korin reminds Yajirobe that he’s not ready to have a child yet. It’s this kind of specificity that Team Four Star uses to elevate itself from the source material, and it is damn compelling to watch.

Rating: 4.5/5

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Stray Observations

1It’s so meta it hurts.

I also don’t want to neglect how Goku and Gohan’s relationship in this film feels like such a natural extension of the development it got in Season 2. Here though, we do get a little evidence that Goku, you know, actually cares about his son, since he takes a hit from Cooler to save him at the beginning (conveniently ousting him from the plot).

Fish: “Halt, stalwart stranger! If you let me go I will grant you one wish.” Goku: “I wish for you to be my dinner.”

Goku: “I am having the worst case of Dijon Mustard right now.”

Salza: “Le suck it, bitch!”

Goku: “Cooler than Freezer? You must be ice cold.” Cooler: “No, that would be my father.”

Goku: “Oh, that’s right Chi Chi. Pour that maple syrup. All over my breakfast. You beautiful lady who lives in my house.”

Piccolo: “Gohan, you know what to do!” Gohan: “Yes, sir!” *runs away* Piccolo: “I meant back me up!”

I still don’t quite understand the Toriyama bird joke. I love the callbacks made to it later of course, but if he’s alive, then why is Goku freaking out about him through the death of a bird?

Goku: “Sun, you grow my food, you kill my enemies. You’re totally worth the skin cancer.” Yet another excellent callback.

[volfoss]

MT-007 → MT-008: The Adventures of Rock

TW: A few appearances of racial stereotypes, depiction of a genocide (of slightly humanoid aliens)

This volume has 2 short stories at the end (kind of. they're summer/new years specials) so the tws for THOSE are here):

Skyscraper Kid: attempted suicide (of a mouse, the mouse was okay :)), a few appearances of racial stereotypes, animal death (not graphic, played off as a joke if anything)

Volcano Boy: fire (solely because of well. volcano) and simulated child abuse (it is part of a movie but is upsetting, it's not super graphic)

this is also very long. i had many thoughts on the politics handled in The Adventures of Rock so. thank you if you read to the end :)

Summary of Plot: A planet named Dimon (discovered by a scientist of the same name) causes a very damaging storm on Earth as it begins to orbit Earth itself. In the middle of the storm, Dr. Dimon signs the rights over to the planet to his son, Rock (the same Rock Holmes who is pretty famous within Tezuka’s works). Many people want these rights, and once Rock has come around to the fact he does want them, he becomes more curious about Dimon as a planet. With some pressure from the media, he agrees to go on the mission to explore Dimon. When he and the crew land, they discover no resources that would sustain human life, but a mysterious disease begins to spread along the crew. They end up leaving Rock and Daisuke (his friend) behind on the planet, in their rush to get back to Earth to be cured of this mysterious sickness. With the two boys abandoned on Dimon, they fight to survive, rationing their limited resources to live as long as possible. They run into two species on the planet and get entangled into a war soon after finding peace.

Characters: I will NEVER complain about Rock Holmes centric manga. Never. So seeing him before Vampires (where he was the villain) and where he’s just a kid and decently nice (minus him really being shitty about his friend’s vanished parents in Chapter 1) is really funny and interesting. He’s just a very good character overall and always a pleasure to read about. With his role in Tezuka’s other works typically being more evil/he is VERY clearly the one in charge, seeing scenes like the one in Chapter 1, where he’s being threatened to hand over the rights to Dimon as a planet, really gives him a lot of depth, as you do truly get to see him grow and change throughout the course of The Adventures of Rock. I really also enjoy his friend Daisuke as a character, I feel there’s a bit more depth to this one than there was in a work like Kimba/Jungle Emperor.

Art: With The Adventures of Rock releasing from 1952-1954, it’s one of Tezuka’s earlier works, and I do find a lot of charm in his earlier art as well. The environmental scenes are gorgeous, and the cute way he draws characters works really well to juxtapose the serious topics being discussed. I do really enjoy how, when they are on Dimon, the creatures and atmosphere is drawn in such a haunting way. He does slightly veer into a specific type of horror with his art (of people being formed in the cave walls and coming out to grab Rock being a primary example in this) and I do really always enjoy his clear skill at being a visual storyteller. Even though I did translate all of it, most panels were pretty clear what was happening, especially when it got into the war (see under the Misc section for more discussion on this).

Ending: The ending was really good, as Tezuka did change it from the original release (when it was being serialized). I think it did end with a sad note but it works very well for the media and the general somewhat dark tone of the piece.

Misc: This was the first untranslated series (160/400 volumes) that I will be reading via machine translation, so forgive me for any small details (such as names) being incorrect.

Onto actual details with it, starting with the gripes: on the top of page 15 of volume 1 are some very stereotypical depictions of African and Chinese people being impacted by the storm. More of these stereotypical depictions are on the big spread covering pg 16-17, as well as on pg 18 (these are all in the background but still present). It is also on page 21-22 as a background character and as a character (quite literally) named Dr. Uganda (and yes, he is from Africa). This character speaks in pure gibberish and has another character who is translating for him. It’s pretty fucking bad. The art for this character is also pretty vile, with it being to the point where I can confidently say this one example is (visually) worse than Kimba’s portrayal of Africans. Another stereotypical background character appears on pg 29. These do go away for the rest of Volume 1 once they go into space on Chapter 4 (pg 36) but it is something I want to mention (although with it not being translated, I would imagine that less people may seek this one out, compared to the other ones on this list). In Volume 2, these background stereotypical figures appear again on pg 13. This is not something that is remotely as bad as it was in Kimba but is something I would like to note for anyone who would like to seek this one out.

The space war subplot is not one that was super interesting to me at the beginning, but I do think the idea of going to a new planet and discovering life there is one that is executed very well. Overall, it ABSOLUTELY gets better once they head into space but it’s just not something that I (as a guy that isn’t super big on science fiction most of the time) would count along some of his best work out of everything I’ve read. I will say that the way this handles Rock dealing with his trauma from his dad dying (specifically around the events of another father dying on pg 102-105 roughly) was really well done for this being an earlier work of his. Him stepping up to father the child of the character who died and being so excited about that really comes full circle with how upset he was about his father dying. Rock as a character (in the works that he has appeared that I’ve read (in Vampires and Black Jack)) isn’t a character that is often awarded sympathy and kindness, so it was very neat to read one of his original stories (before he went a bit more evil). The themes of caring for people, even if they are unlike you or not family by blood was one that I think Tezuka was always very good at, and was a very big part of what worked for me in The Adventures of Rock.

The discovery of oil on Dimon becoming a way of showing how people on Earth are so greedy for it that they want to drain Dimon of it is interesting commentary on that topic as well. A lot of the works in Black Jack (and bits of Astro Boy) are also reliant on Tezuka’s very strong pro-environmentalism messaging and I think this one is really an earlier version of those themes. It worked very well here, solely because of how Rock was very open to becoming integrated in the Epumu (one of the alien races) and how he did pretty much start living with them. His dual citizenship (in a way, as he did live with the Epumu for a year and was considered one of them, but also was a human) was part of the central conflict towards the end of Volume 2, with which side he would choose. The ending specifically worked excellently with Rock dying FOR the Epumu (as he did quite literally stop them from being hurt by using his body as a shield) and saying that neither race should have gone to the other’s planet. Both races caused destruction when on the other’s planet, and that lends a lot to the way that Tezuka handles a lot of war and environmentalism messaging in The Adventures of Rock.

Another thing I find very charming is with the Epumu (who are bird people) that most of their dialogue is just various chirps and cheeps, and with the Ruborooms (who are basically clay people) are speaking with katakana to show how they are struggling to speak the language.

I feel that some of the politics are handled a bit more clumsily just due to how early of a work it is, so it doesn’t really work as well as some of his later stuff that handles similar stuff does (specifically thinking of Astro Boy, which isn’t a LOT later but is a bit). This story feels very much like older sci-fi (I’ve been watching a lot of the classic Dr. Who recently, and this has very similar vibes), and minus the issues, if that is your cup of tea, this one may be worth reading. It’s a lot darker with the subject matter than some of his very early works.

The politics in this are mostly focused around the war between the Epumu and humans on Dimon and how the Epumu get exploited by a second group of humans. The running theme in The Adventures of Rock that stuck out to me the most was how it parallels human exploitation of resources in the real world. First, before Dimon as a planet was explored, the immediate leap to action from the humans was to explore it and see if it could be used for resources for Earth. After Rock’s group makes it to Dimon and then leaves, another group (lead by an oil baron) tries to make it. Dimon as a planet, instead of having seas, has oil all over it, so it was a natural jump to try and take that as oil for Earth. Their rocket ends up exploding as it takes off. The third group that makes it to Dimon is initially curious of the Epumu’s existence but does end up shooting at them (this group was specifically retreating from the war going on before this third group landed) and capturing some of them. One of the humans gets a blood clot and a donation of blood is forced from one of the Epumu, who later dies from this. The blood transfusion is successful (from the humans side), and Tezuka shows that the humans realize that they can also exploit this resource and plan on doing so. In a truly horrifying moment, in the middle of one of the humans giving a speech about how good of a resource the Epumu are, he explains how good of workers they are and how good of livestock they are. He then goes on to say that the meat they are eating now is the meat of the Epumu that died from the transfusion and Daisuke’s father (who is part of the third group) is visibly nauseated. The speech ends with the announcement of the plans to export the Epumu to Earth because of these reasons. Meanwhile, Rock, who is still on Dimon has helped the Epumu grow as a society and is living peacefully among them. It’s a stark contrast.

This is arguably one of his very early anti-war manga, and I do think he handles it with grace. I also feel a lot of the anti-colonialism messages in this land a lot better than in Kimba (if there were even really any there, it was all really badly handled in that), with the humans very clearly parading around an Epumu that has been to Earth as proof that the humans are okay and the Epumu being on Earth would be a benefit to them. They even have obtained a company to try and force the Epumu on Earth that they use as part of this parading to try and coax the Epumu onto Earth. After Rock is convinced to return to Earth (partially by his son and because he’s very excited to be able to return), the humans attack the Epumu that are trying to flee, saying that none of them must be allowed to escape and using violence when they deem it is needed. After capturing them, the humans determine which of them would be good for meat or any other purpose they might want the Epumu for, before cramming them all into a capsule. On the rocket, Rock catches one of the scientists abusing the Epumu that was paraded around the rest of them and asks him what is going on, only for him to reveal that trying to get them onto Earth peacefully was a lie and that they were being hunted down on Dimon. Tezuka does not shy away in the slightest from showing the camps that they are being kept in and how they are very blatantly abused and mistreated by the humans, who see them as much less human than themselves. When the Epumu retaliate with a disease that attacks some of the humans, they are then immediately treated as the enemy of the humans that must be wiped out. Rock begins to work on stopping the war and ultimately dies as a consequence of this. His death is ultimately the cause of the war stopping, and I do really think that both of these topics were handled very well.

As for the two short stories at the end of Volume 2 (Skyscraper Kid and Volcano Boy), I’ll review them both in this section.

Skyscraper Kid:

Summary (since I can’t really find one for this short story in English): Skyscraper Kid follows a boy named Kozu who previously was unhoused and living on the lot where the Empire State Building was built. When it was built, he was kicked out of where he was living, and as compensation, moved up to a small apartment at the very top of the building. He makes his living cleaning and has a best friend (who is a mouse) named Hatsuda Mouse. His mouse friend ends up jumping off of the building and Kozu has to call emergency services to report the suicide attempt so Hatsuda can be saved. They arrive in time and save the mouse, although Kozu is chastised and made fun of for calling emergency services for the mouse. The mouse and an older man (named Dr. Gamma) are both very appreciative of Kozu and his kindness. During the night, some watchmen are patrolling outside the ground floor of the tower and are startled by a cat’s shadow (which makes it appear to be much bigger than it actually is due to a lamp shining on it). They are intrigued by how the shadows work and start playing around before a burglar team knocks them both out. The team is in search of a stone and succeed in finding it, leading to the leaders in control of the Tower being upset at how poorly the night watch did to prevent this.

A rich business man offers to buy the tower, and this news is very concerning to Kozu and another hotel worker. Kozu spots the thieves planning out their next heist and asks for Hatsuda’s help to stop it. The stone they are looking for is part of the foundation of the tower, so Hatsuda digs into the stone and eventually finds it. The burglars wish to just blow up the foundation of the tower to easily access the stone, as they do not care about what happens to the tower. Hatsuda emerges from the foundation, having eaten the stone so the burglars cannot get it, and he and Kozu flee as the burglars examine the hole. They notice that there is a smaller hole in there and wonder if a human could fit through, before deducing it was a mouse (due to the mouse hair left behind).

Kozu flees to Dr. Gamma’s office and explains that they found the stone the bandits wanted. Gamma points out a certain squelching noise that he is making with his slippers and that makes Kozu realize that Gamma’s slippers have the exact same kind of mud as the burglars outside were standing in. Kozu also notices that the same cat that caused the guards issues the other night was Gamma’s cat and that he MUST be the boss of the burglars. Gamma pulls off his disguise and pleads for the stone from Kozu, holding the boy at gunpoint. He tells Kozu that it all ties into politics from XX Country (Tezuka often censors country names like this, in Kimba there was Country A and Country B) and that the wrong foundation block (that had the stone in it) was used for the tower. Gamma moved to the building and disguised himself so he could get the stone back. Suddenly, he jumps and starts giggling, as something tickles on his neck. It’s Hatsuda, who has grabbed the key to the room and urges Kozu to run away. They head for the elevator, but the burglars who are chasing them destroy the motor of the elevator so they cannot head up. They begin running up the stairs, as Kozu realizes their only option is going up to the roof.

Once they reach the roof, Kozu redirects a pipe to flood the stairwell, causing the bandits to get caught up in the water. The boy and his mouse begin scaling down the building with a rope, but unfortunately their path is right by the window that Gamma’s cat is sitting at. The cat obviously informs his owner and he shoots the rope right under where Hatsuda is climbing, severing Kozu’s connection to the rope. They are only worried about getting Hatsuda, since the mouse swallowed the stone they needed. Hatsuda moves fast and uses his tail to keep Kozu from falling. The thieves try to persuade Kozu to join their efforts and offer to save him if he gives them Hatsuda. At hearing his refusal, they put the cat on a stick and dangle it very close to Hatsuda, as a threat. The cat very nearly grabs at Hatsuda’s tail, which causes Kozu to cut it off and climb up the rope a bit further (while holding Hatsuda in one hand). With a quick hand movement, he moves Hatsuda to his back pocket, which makes the burglars think the cat ate Hatsuda, only leaving the tail behind. The cat tries to tell its master that it was a lie but the burglars all surround it (one even suggesting to give it a laxative).

Kozu mourns his situation, as he is still hanging there and his hands are getting tired. He looks down at the many stories below him and lets go, explaining it is hopeless. A helicopter swoops by and saves him just in time. The burglars are all caught, and the owner of the building contributes all of this to Kozu. They were about to dissect the mouse to remove the stone when the person carrying the mouse tripped and dropped the container down the stairs, causing the mouse to (seemingly?) die, as Kozu comments on the fact that they can do a dissection now.

Thoughts (doing shorter formatting for these): My main thoughts with this was it just felt sort of confused as to where it wanted to go plot wise throughout all of it. I feel it was slightly more adjacent to his gag strips, where comedic things just happened and didn’t have a super clear plot (which, to be fair, it being a pretty short story (only 18 pages long) would make it hard to have a very cohesive plot with THIS much details). I feel the mystery elements worked well, and I did really enjoy Kozu as a character, he is very spirited and is a fun protagonist to follow along in the story. I do always enjoy a little rambunctious scamp character, and I think the team of Cozu and Hatsuda really worked for me for that reason. The ending felt very strange to me, given what happened to Hatsuda (and how similar subject matter is dealt with in the Black Jack story “Guinea Pig”) and just sort of rushed. Given how short it is, the shortcomings make sense but it’s just an odd little story. Heads up for (yet another) poorly drawn Black character on pg 142-143. I’d say this one is definitely a decent story, just a bit odd (and maybe I’m missing cultural context in some way here, as Tezuka tended to put those in his works a lot). 6/10.

Volcano Boy:

Summary (since I can’t really find one for this short story in English): The story begins with explaining the seven mysteries of Panana* Island, which include the sun rising twice, people cannot see other people but can hear their voices, if a bird dies, humans will die, anyone who sees the 3 AM eruption (of the volcano on the island) cannot ever leave the island, and a few others that are not elaborated on. The man is explaining all of these to none other than the character commonly known as Kenichi (he appears a lot, given Tezuka’s Star System, he doesn’t seem to be named in this one though, so I will keep referring to him as Kenichi in this summary). Kenichi wants to go and visit the island (on summer vacation) but the older man worries for his safety. A man offscreen calls for them to “Cut!” and try a new take. It then reveals all of this takes place on a film set and they start a new take of the same material shown in the first take. This time, Kenichi gets hit hard enough that the director yells “Cut!” again and worries over his star. Kenichi tells him that he is going home with how bad his face looks and the director calls after him to please come back. The director panics and one of the other helpers behind the set tells him that it is all the fault of the director. The new suggestion is finding a cheap replacement for Kenichi. As Kenichi is leaving the studio, he’s approached for an autograph from Daisuke and Rock. Some of the film crew oversee this interaction and realize Rock is the perfect replacement for Kenichi. They return to the director and reassure him that everything will be okay, even if the replacement isn’t a professional actor.

The star of the film approaches Rock as he and Daisuke are leaving and begins asking him about Panana Island. The film crew are filming the interaction, although it doesn’t seem Rock is aware of this. They reveal the rest of the secrets of Panana Island (The bottom of the crater has blooming flowers, there is a singing pumice stone, and a great Nyudo comes out). Rock is very enthusiastic and says he wants to go to that island, but Daisuke disproves. Rock proclaims again that he wants to go to that island and the film crew are overjoyed, as it is just how the script was written (even though Rock is clearly not aware of the script). The man warns Rock that the island is uninhabited and would be really dangerous for him. Rock brings up that he wants to go because it would be good to study it on summer vacation, which also perfectly aligns with the script. The director himself has arrived and is very happy to hear how perfect it’s going. The scene that had the older man worry for his safety and then hit him is up next, and Rock is very startled. Thankfully, Daisuke is there and throws the older man right onto his jaw. Just when everything was going right, they had to cut the take again due to Daisuke’s actions. The director rushes to explain that their company wants to do a documentary on Panana Island and shows them the script. He shares the casting trouble that they had (given how Kenichi was punched too hard to really have a useable take) and both boys are enthusiastic about helping, now that they know it is for a movie.

A boat takes the crew out to Panana Island, and Daisuke worries about the superstition about the bird. He takes the bird out of its cage and replaces it with an octopus, taking the bird with him. Another crew member comes by to inspect the cage and gets inked. The crew member gets in a fight with another, as they do not recognize him now that he has been inked. The bird thanks Daisuke for saving it and promises to give him good luck. Mysterious circumstances start the second that they land on the island, with a ton of rumbling on the ground. One of the camera operators realizes it is a volcanic eruption. They end up abandoning the camera, but the bird that has befriended Daisuke urges him to go back for it, so he does. He tries to take a photo of the volcano, but the active eruption is making it hard. Daisuke is scolded for being so dangerous.

They start waiting for the second sun to rise, but the bird that Daisuke set free comes by to give him corks to put in his ears. Everyone but Daisuke and Rock (who covered his ears) are affected by the sound. The sunrise happens, but from Daisuke’s position, he can see two suns, and Rock cannot. He is much lower (elevation wise) compared to Daisuke, so that explains the illusion. The film crew are approached by a large hairy man, who claims to have lived on the island for thirty years (as he witnessed the 3 am volcano eruption and so cannot leave). They all rush to record the volcano’s eruption on camera. They get slightly buried under the rocks and then head closer to the crater. They notice the flowers at the bottom of the crater. While they’re busy focusing on that, the giants appear and everyone is scared, Daisuke most of all. The bird urges him to calm down and film the giants, which he does. Rock reassures Daisuke that if he looks closely at the images, he will realize it’s just their shadows.

The boys go to sleep (although the bird is being shooed for being too noisy) until an eruption at 3 am wakes Rock up. The director insists he will be the one to go up and see the eruption the night before and sneaks up on his own. Rock and Daisuke follow him. They go to the crater and see some jewels coming from the bottom. Rock realizes that instead of flowers at the bottom, it was actually jewels. The director insists that even if it takes him a lifetime, he needs to get that jewel. The old man who had been on the island for 30 years approaches them and explains that the jewels are his and that they will never be able to collect the jewels. Thieves fall into the crater, which explains why people stay on the island forever. The bird died and the director, Rock, and Daisuke panic about it. The director is beat over the head by the old man and Rock tries to bring him down the mountain. The old man, in agony, pleads out for help, and no one comes to his aid as he is dying.

1 week later, Rock summarizes it up to the director (who is recovering in bed). There is science behind the singing pumice stone and every other superstition. He also tells the director that Daisuke’s cut of the film will be available today, and the director thanks them both deeply. The preview of the film starts, as it is presented as Daisuke’s desperate filming of the island. It’s revealed on the last page that Daisuke had accidentally filmed his face for the ENTIRE film. The director is so upset over this that he faints.

*translated literally, the official site has it as “Banana” but it’s pretty distinctly starting with パ(pa) and not the バ(ba) when you first see it mentioned on pg 154 of this volume. Not an important note but something I did want to point out.

Thoughts (doing shorter formatting for these): This one worked a bit better than Skyscraper Boy for me, namely because it felt like a more cohesive story than the previous story. I really enjoyed the mystery elements of it, as well as the comedic twist ending. Tezuka is very good at telling a story with many threads and letting it all unravel and tie back together as it goes and I think that’s very clear here. It was very nice to see Daisuke and Rock again after the very sad ending of Adventure of Rock. I don’t have a ton to say here other than as a person who LOVES legends and stuff like this, I did really enjoy this one. What other manga will you nearly see Rock Holmes blown up by a volcano. None (although I hold out hope ok). I also really enjoyed the film set framing at the start, it was really neat! 7.5/10.

Overall Thoughts: For one his earlier works, The Adventures of Rock finds its footing pretty strong in Volume 2 and really did let the themes that Tezuka put into his later works shine. This one had a lot of moments where I did enjoy bits and pieces of it, but overall, it just was one that I was not enjoying reading in Volume 1 but Volume 2 was much more enjoyable. I’m not letting the horrors of having to translate all of this get in the way of my opinions on it, but it was just really a mixed bag in Volume 1. Volume 1 had a lot of focus on stuff that I feel paid off a lot later in the second half of Volume 2, but it didn’t work as well while I was reading Volume 1. It was stuff that definitely did make Volume 2 better, but I feel it was sort of clumsy in Volume 1, and it did not keep my interest as well in Volume 1. Minus the couple glaring issues, this was a pretty decent story but not one that is up there with my favorites of his. It was one I did enjoy a lot more once they got into more of the politics in Volume 2 (as Tezuka does truly shine in handling political topics that he had experience with and then incorporated into his writing). The short stories were both pretty good, and overall, for my first untranslated experience, it was a pretty good one. I’d say overall, it’s a 7/10, it was very good in some parts but I wish it was just slightly more polished in other parts.

[rockybloo]

i like the way you draw zeke's gashes and gore, do you like horror/have horror recs (any media)

As much as I like to draw mushy wholesome romance between two characters...I love horror to an almost unhealthy extent. It is my favorite genre of anything honestly (I have spent days binge watching horror films back to back to back on Netflix, even the bad ones)

I've never really done a recommendation list before for anything so I can only list my favorites that I could spend a day rewatching no problem. I also need to add that I am a gore hound and the gorier the film or series is, the higher my chances of enjoyment so please keep this in mind.

My FAVORITE horror films are:

Brain Dead/ Dead Alive: I need to state that this film basically has EVERY trigger in it and did not age well AT ALL in terms of some of the jokes. However, having watched it when I was young, it was a crucial part of me becoming a horror fan and I love this trainwreck dearly...for its special effects. Mainly just the special effects. I do appreciate how the film is kinda split in two. The first being funny zombie comedy stuff and the last half being...well a shit ton of blood and gore. Also it has stop motion in it at some points which I love as someone who also adores stop motion.

The Final Destination Franchise: Not recommended for the paranoid but I love this 2000s ass film franchise. The premise is creative as well as the deaths. I also love that Death is super petty in this series and refuses to just kill someone up front and instead chooses the Rube Goldberg approach to offing people. Plus the original voice actor for Kratos pops up in one of the films which is a bonus if you are a God of War fan like me. If I had to pick a favorite out of the franchise, I'd say it's a tie between the first and the last. HOWEVER, the last film is oh so more rewarding if you watched the entire franchise-I will not spoil why but just trust me.

Candyman: The original film specifically. It's so interesting how the antagonist is a living myth and is so poetic in his words that sometimes I kinda forgot he was the villain. I love his design and the fact this film deeply touches on certain issues and not just being focused on being a typical slasher.

The Haunted Mansion: Yes the...original Disney live action film with Eddie Murphy. I count it as a horror film because it was genuinely scary to me as a kid. There's still some horrific stuff in it now. I mean, you got the opening credit scenes leading up to a dude straight up hanging himself, the zombies looking like straight up corpses, A DUDE GETTING DRAGGED TO HELL. The music still haunts me to this day.

Nope: A recent addition but this is def one of the best horror films I've seen. It is filled to the brim with so many details that you don't catch on the first watch. Plus, the "spaceship" is such a well designed element that I still think about how it works and how smart of a concept it was. I love the protagonists in this film as well and the bit of humor sprinkled in. I actually enjoyed this film so much I read the script for it since it was online (which I've never done for any film before). Cannot recommend this film enough.

Us: This film is just a level or horror that I only feel when reading Junji Ito stories. The idea of a doppelganger never scared me until this film because the entire concept is your other self hunting you down to kill you. There's a murder spree scene in this film that is so well framed and done because you see both everything and nothing at the same time because of the camera angle. The Tethered are underrated as monsters.

The Thing: The old one with the husky dog. The original Among Us and the best "WHO THE FUCK IS THE KILLER" film. The special effects are amazing and the fact that the audience cannot tell who the alien is is so great because we feel just as scared as the crew members. Plus...the alien absorbing people is just straight horrific.

This list is getting long and I have so many horror films I got jingling around in my brain but my last one is Pet Semetary. I was gonna put Poltergeist, which is also a favorite and is the only paranormal film I enjoy (I am not a big fan of ghost movies but that's because I love gore and carnage), but I kinda...don't really see it as a horror film. It certainly is one but there's so many cute and funny moments and it's kinda more whimsical than scary to me.

ANYWAYS BACK TO PET SEMETARY-There's an unsettlingness to it that I can't really explain. It's not just the dead pet aspect, it's just the vibes in it. The happy music becoming twisted as well as the always foreboding mood where you know something bad is gonna happen. There's a couple things that are left up to the audience's imagination but there's enough context that you just KNOW something terrible happened (like that ending). Plus, the little kid actor going on a killing spree is...kinda funny. He's just a little fella with a knife having a good ole time before bedtime.

ANYWAYS-I'VE RAMBLED ENOUGH ABOUT HORROR FILMS!

[kitkatt0430]

Spike for the character bingo

He was one of my favorite villains of the show and I really enjoyed his wet cat of a man villain era. Spike's at his best when he's getting to intersperse complete screw ups on a hilarious level in between moments of pure badassery. And I found his whole transition from villain to hero really interesting, though these days I do wish there was more 'him doing it for himself' and less 'him doing it for Buffy' going on there. That said, he does get that growth to some degree when he joins up with Team Angel.

That said, S6/S7... I tend to prefer fanon Spike over canon. For a multitude of reasons, but most especially knowing that certain writing decisions were made out of pure spite towards fans. That is a bad reason to write a sexual assault into a show. Though I suppose at least they weren't playing the SA to make him look edgy and cool. (Looks directly at Torchwood where Owen's establishing moment is drugging two people with an alien device so they'll have sex with him. And a character I otherwise like, but my gosh I hate that establishing scene so bad.)

Setting aside some seriously bad decision making in the writers rooms in later seasons, Spike is an interesting example of what happens when a fan favorite character is successfully expanded on both to make the fanbase happy and expand the show's lore. But as a result, we also know Spike has been through sooo much trauma and - so long as he's not in a bitey mood - could do with some hugs to help deal with it all.