#and then the random mook guy that is just kind of an asshole but still a problem. idr his name i think its albrecht????? lmfao

[grimmjowjaegerjaquez]

thinking about changing uriel's resurreccion from the. pavo real/fenix idea i had and just makin him paloma instead.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S4 Ep 24: Someone Actually Called the Cops.

So recently I was like, “I should do something different than my usual” and I decided to open up a little thread for critiquing ppl’s short stories, and I kid you not, the very first story I got was someone’s Seto Kaiba erotica. Which, even in erotica form, did not have very much romance in it. So, now that Yugioh will apparently haunt my every waking move forever until I die, lets get back to S4. Lets desperately get back to canon. I miss canon.

Last we left off, Kaiba lost KaibaCorp...again. Really feels like he loses this company once every couple of years (weeks if we count season 1-3). Except, this time, Dartz didn’t read the fine print in the legal files that says the company must be run by a member of the Kaiba family. While that was a huge plot point with Pegasus, turns out that Seto and Mokuba’s memories have been blended so thoroughly, like a very fine Shadow Realm smoothie, that they just...forgot.

And like I’m positive that Roland remembers, but Roland’s not gonna say something and accidentally reveal he’s the 4th Kaiba brother and have to get abducted all the time and actually work for a living. Anyways, they forgot why Pegasus abducted them in the first place in Season 1, and honestly, so did the writers of this season 4 years later. Not like it mattered, because if Seto and Mokuba did take Dartz to court, the world would end before their case would even start.

Which is how, after one talk with Roland, Seto and Mokuba just sort of laid prone on the metaphorical ground and let it wash over them that yes, KaibaCorp is gone.

I really like this extra-long helicopter, PS.

Both members of Kaiba’s Sunglasses Army decided to align themselves with Kaiba, although honestly, I don’t think anyone else in this company has realized that they’ve been bought. It happened...1 hour ago. Like what do you even do if your company randomly gets bought in the middle of a workday? Like no lead up, no indication, just BAM you’ve been bought?

And if Duke works for Pegasus who got bought out by Dartz and then Dartz bought Kaiba Corp-------What does that make Duke? Is he gonna have to start wearing sunglasses inside?

Anyway, Roland knows better than to tell Seto Kaiba he doesn’t work for him anymore while still in the same helicopter as Seto Kaiba, who already crashed one plane today and will crash yet another plane before this episode is through.

(read more under the cut)

Seto decides to align with Yugi since he needs to confront Dartz eventually. Which is when we find out that Seto always planned to align with Yugi and was just giving him a really hard time.

Because over the last several episodes, Seto has had an entire team at this random museum in Florida in order to take some pictures (that really should have already been on the internet but wtv, it was 2003 so maybe it wasn’t?)

It’s like most of the way through s4 and the biker ninjas still send me. How did he make SO MANY biker ninjas? At what point was Dartz like...and now...all my mooks...will be ninja bikers. Or orcs. Mostly Ninja bikers.

Did Alister or the others ever tell him “hey, Master Dartz, I get that your 10000 years old but like...do you not understand what a biker is?” and was Dartz like

“clearly bikers are the most evil thing in the world, obviously.” completely unaware that most bikers are just 45 year old accountants.

In these scenes we also get a gander at their laptops and, if you ever want to see high level life crippling OCD anxiety in picture form, it’s illustrated very clearly right here:

Not only did they draw this keyboard in 1 pt perspective, they used like a ruler to draw all those letters so they were the same size. Some artist put so much time getting this nice and crisp and smooth...and then this happened.

And I’m pretty sure they died after that. I’m pretty sure this scene killed an artist.

It’s at this point that Yami kinda puts two and two together and was like “WE BOUGHT PLANE TICKET’S, YOU ASSHOLES.”

(It’s been such a long time since we’ve seen Mokuba smile like this, and it’s because he’s been hiding the fact for So Many Episodes that he and his brother prepped like hours ago to get this huge dunk on the rest of the party. He just wants to dunk on them so bad. Look at him. His company was bought today. BUT he gets to spend time with his bro dunking.)

Serious question, will Delta refund your flight if the Great Leviathan appears in the sky and tries to eat your soul to reboot the world from the ground up?

Of course not. They will never refund your flight. Trick question.

We switch back over to Rebecca and Duke, who have been absent from this show for so long, I actually forgot what Duke’s name was and had to think for like...5 entire minutes until I remembered that his nickname sounds like a poop and I was like “oh man, what name of poop would it be???” and then I recalled “Dookie. Yes. His name is literally Dookie. Wow that took way too long!”

Then we start a story arc I’d to call “My Kingdom For a Sharpen Filter” where, much like King Lear, the Yugi crew splays themselves on a battle field just strewn with different ways to sharpen an image, but can’t for the life of them use any other one, but the one deep in the heart of what is now DartzCorp.

And so yes, we are going to fly to San Fransisco, hop into ye Olde KaibaCorp, and log into proto-Noah in order to read a language that Arthur Hawkins can already read.

This is nonsense, but they put it there because it’s something to do. And honestly, it’s not a card game, so I’m down for this change-up. Lets go visit a version of Noah’s brain. At least they won’t drop an orichalcos for the 12th episode in a row.

On the way, Seto decides to try and egg on Yugi.

This backfires as you expect it will because Yami doesn’t freakin care. Like he’s not Yugi, he doesn’t care who the King of Games is, he harnesses freakin Dark Magic. The Wizard never cares if he’s King Arthur or not, and in fact, he probably prefers it....

..................Except in that spinoff where they had Yugi as a reincarnation of King Henry VII.

...................................................never mind.

And then Seto Kaiba says this actual line and I just...

WH.

WHHH

WHAT?

This entire show is just watching Yugi desperately cling to his scary ass hobbies. The tagline of Yugioh is “1001 reasons to go back to school and get a real job.”

What does Kaiba think Yugi does when he’s not around? Does he actually think Yugi attends school or sleeps at night or works an actual job? Like...he thinks Yugi has...NO HOBBIES.

Very interesting insight into what Seto considers a hobby and not hobby.

Especially since this Yami, who spends most of his spare time farting around his scary ass brain castle and getting lost. Occasionally he is forced on a date with Tea and wipes minds. That’s it. That’s all the things Yami does outside of hobbies.

Anyway, what is Dartz doing during all of this?

After this, Dartz pulls back the literal curtains on this room to reveal these candles that each hold the soul of someone he’s murdered.

There are not NEARLY enough candles for this segment.

A very brave man to have candles littered on the floor when his hair is down to his ass and all of his mooks have floorduster coats.

I really want to know what the local arts and crafts store thought when Dartz strode in there and bought every single tiny styrafoam skull during the Halloween sale and was like “can I put souls in these? You sell the kind I can put souls in, right?” and then immediately pulled out like a dozen 50% off coupons like a complete asshole.

Anyway, using this candle hocus pocus, Dartz uses the Orichalcos powers to take advantage of something Yugi did in the first episode. We distantly recall there was a giant eyeball in the sky--turns out if you bust up the eyeball with, lets say, a card that has a dragon on it, the eyeball will explode into many tiny Orichalcos pieces that will fall all over planet Earth.

So apparently Yugi didn’t save anyone at all when he busted that eyeball, because he instead set in motion Dartz’ evil plan to eventually use these many tiny Orichalcos pieces like the one seen here, to kill the hell out of people.

Good job, Yugi. Too bad you missed the Actual Bakura.

In fact, actual Bakura is probably the only one who survived this incident because I guarantee that Ryou Bakura is too busy eating all the contents of his fridge out of stress. He’s probably opened his window at this point, seen the crazy lights in the sky and in the street and was like  “Blooooooody nope nopenopenopenopenope” and just locked the windows and doors, turned up Hercule Poirot to max volume, and stuffed his face with cookies.

(Or biscuits, I guess.)

WELL.

I don’t know how to tally that.

Yugioh not only broke the tally I was using to measure the distance they spent commuting this season, it also broke the tally on the amount of people who have died on this children’s show.

That’s a really big number.

We’ve had real duel monsters for a couple weeks but youknow...this time they’re extra, extra, extra real. More so than the last times. Also they’re all Orichalcos versions of their cards so their extra edge now. They’re the hot topic versions of what were already pretty hot-topic ass cards.

MMM. We come full circle, back at a dock, a warehouse, and some huge ass boat.

Right where we belong. Where all friends meet, where we can all finally be one.

Yugioh found one of the only cities that has a very famous and tourist heavy pier/warehouse district in it just so the Yugi gang could finally feel comfortable in their natural habitat. HOWEVER, there’s just one tiny problem in this scene, and it’s that it’s not overlaid with the actual soundscape of a SF pier, which is that of 100000 screaming seals

I don’t have a seal problem, you have a seal problem.

Anyway, the only healthy adults here attempt to follow the children into danger but someone on the animation team was like “we just lost the keyboard drawing guy to that capslock! We cannot lose any more interns to a crowd scene with 9 people in it and 2 dead bodies!” and they uh...

And we immediately eject Roland and whoever that weird sunglasses guy is out of the script. Mokuba gave them a longing glance as they helicoptered away. Maybe because he missed his Dad stand-ins that he went through such efforts to call in the first place. Or more likely, because Mokuba would have preferred to be on that helicopter and far away from whatever the hell is going to go down on this dock.

Honestly the rest of Joey’s storyline this episode is him going rogue because of Mai rage, and it both comes out of nowhere and also seems very on point for him.

Meanwhile, Rebecca’s unbridled rage towards Yami Muto is still low key hilarious to me.

Witness the only character here who thinks Yami should suffer actual consequences and witness Yami just appear to not give a single damn about it.

Nearly spat out my own drink watching this.

The...

...police...

...exist in this universe?

Anyway, while Tristan and Tea try to locate a payphone to dial 911, Seto and Yugi decide to invade Seto’s own company by going through an elevator that you have to reach through the sewers.

Straight up I don’t think SF even has sewers. At least, not in the sense that you can walk in em like New York or Paris or other cities that have sewers. Our sewer systems are very small cuz we got something called “liquefaction” which means our ground is so soft (and artificial--a lot of the land is fake), that when there is an earthquake, certain parts of the city will...liquefy. It’s Terrifying. We kind of...avoid going and building underground except in certain stable places. (like even BART gives me the heebies.)

I just have a very strong distrust of basements, caves and other underground places in general and it’s not because of spiders, or ghosts or whatever, I’m just afraid of faultlines. It’s like having an active volcano, but you just don’t see it, and we haven’t had a Big One since 1989 so...any day now (I mean, 2020 has been such redic content, that I think we’re finally ready)

Again, Japan has way more intense Earthquakes than we do, and yet they have a billion underground subways and very, very tall buildings, so like, this is mostly a big cultural difference between the two of us. And the bedrock. They probably have better bedrock than we do (honestly, I just have no idea).

MASTER HACKER SKILLS.

Almost as good as that time he hacked into Pegasus’ company by dropping a satellite on it. I’m starting to think Seto actually doesn’t know how to use a computer.

Anyway, Seto is faced with...real cards, real monsters, indisputable evidence, and he decides, it’s time. It’s time to finally face facts.

So, while these two are just flinging cards around willy nilly, Tea and Tristan are ...actually talking to police.

4 seasons. They’re actually doing it.

Although, TBH, they probably should have gone to the Japanese Embassy first? Just throwing that out there.

Ah Yugioh, the only kids show around that tells you point blank not to trust cops. Timeless.

U.S

In some weird underground earthquake hazard, Rebecca proves that she is smarter than Seto Kaiba. She’s maybe even the smartest person on this show. Nice that we gave her nothing to do this season but pine over Yugi who is already taken by Tea who he is also not even dating.

Not that I love Rebecca or anything, I actually have a hard time with her voice, but like...they really dropped the ball on Rebecca.

If she does end up joining Kaiba corp as their back up Felicity Smoak while Seto just runs around aimlessly punching stuff that really is just offbrand Arrow but with cards. And with slightly less resurrections.

So, lets get a gander at that computer.

We didn’t get to see Kaiba pull out 12 other discs to complete the installation process for these all these Hard Discs. Maybe the lure of throwing a very aerodynamic CD across the room like a paper card was so strong that his dev team forced him to switch to these defunct squares?

PS, I am a true millennial, OK? But, I don’t remember Hard Discs.

Hard Discs were SO long go. I stopped using these damn things in Elementary school. The last Hard Disc I ever touched was in college, when I had to put my art portfolio on a disc to submit it to my degree. I don't know even why. Everyone had a mac, so I knew no one’s computer in the department even...HAD a disc drive so it was like...whomst among you has this damn computer from 1997? Whomst among you is still using Windows 95? WHY would I put IMAGES on a floppy when I can just email them to you?

Anyway, I had to get a USB hard disc reader, and to get that reader, I had to call my Dad who had legacy software because he’s a computer engineer, and he had to mail it to me.

In that same portfolio review, PS, I also had to submit my portfolio as slides.

I didn’t even know where to produce slides so I had to ask all these old people and go to the last photo processing store on earth to get digital pictures turned into negatives and then turned into freakin slides.

SLIDES.

I honestly think they just did that to weed people out of the art degree.

Anyway, I tell you this story just to say that there is no way in hell that Kaiba was using a hard disc during the height of the CD era. We were CD or go home since 2000. We had pretty decent jump drives at this point. We had wifi. It was realllly bad wifi, but we had it. Your phone could connect to the internet. It would charge you 50 bucks, but it COULD connect.

Who on the Yugioh team DID this?

Anyway lets see these pictures that for which, we spent thousands of dollars in unused plane tickets, destroyed a Caltrain, killed 2 ancient Atlanteans (and their dog), killed 3 random mid-villains, walked across the entire Peninsula, crashed an international plane, and left both the plane and the train to rot gas fuel into the nearest lake which is right next to a ghost graveyard?

Yeaaaaaaaaaah!

Like he reads it and is all “They’re gonna resurrect Atlantis” and it’s like WE KNOW. Dartz and his hooligans have talked about starting their Utopia to reboot the world since Gurimo. Since Day 1.

Man.

Anyways, there was one plus to the pictures, and it was that Seto Kaiba recognized the Oricalchos logo.

just...

The Oricalchos logo is...

...This logo, Seto?

You...didn’t recognize...seriously? Not until just now? You have been inside of this logo, rearing to lose your soul to Alister 2 times, and he only recognized it...just now.

I mean Seto takes a while y’all. He’s a genius, but his memory is so, so bad, that he will Eventually get smart, but you have to wait until like episode 24. But he’ll get there. Just gotta be patient.

And, when he saw it, he wigged out in a way I wasn’t prepared for.

Y’all I feel like I’ve seen to many weird zooms on Kaiba’s crotch in this show. Or just in life in general, especially after that surprise fic. That’s all.

I don’t know why everything exploded, but maybe the logo is cursed in the same way as God Cards? I dunno.

Anyway, this is when Dartz shows up with his brand new dog.

So they run outside onto the roof.

Now listen, does every Kaiba Corp building need the same weird ass roof? Is it like a McDonalds?

Because I’m just picturing this type of roof in SF and I’m having a time.

Forgive me if I made this lemming joke already. He’s just stood on a cliff’s edge so many times I can’t keep up.

RIP Dragon Jet, who took us from S3-S4, you’ll always live on in our memory, you glorious, wasteful, beautiful death trap.

Seto and Yugi are fine by the way, they just kinda jumped out, as you do when you’re an immortal god possessing a small boy and a...whatever the hell Seto is.

It’s at this point we reintroduce Valon because Joey went rogue and has decided to take on Dartz by himself. This is what happens when Tristan leaves the party. You always need Tristan to hold back Joey by his armpits to keep him from fighting random people.

So I guess Valon’s gonna die next episode. That’ll be nice.

What’s great about this show is each arc is just watching each villain die. You know they’ll die. But...how much?

Anyway, that’s all for today. I’m still drawing a hell ton of stuff so I don’t know when the next update will be...but just now I haven’t dropped off or something. I’ll...eventually get to it.

And if you just got here, this is a link to read all of these in chrono order.

Anyway, I mentioned Hercule Poirot, (because watching a hell ton of BBC was how I spent time with my family when I was a kid, and my very Southern Grandma freakin LOVED Hercule Poirot) So here is the best subplot of that show, which is David Suchet eating stuff.

And which doesn’t want to embed for some reason. Probs can’t embed more than one video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17antzzJrzQ

[wahbegan]

The Batman trailer

The victim’s name is Don i guess nyehehe and yeah speculation is he’s the Mayor

I haven’t seen any trailer breakdowns that mention this but apart from wrapping the victim’s face in duct tape, his hands appear to have been encased in bricks as well. I can’t fathom why, but I imagine it’s symbolic in some way.

Yeah the cipher on the card does spell out HE LIES STILL as evidenced by the symbols for L, I, E, and S all repeating ha weird wonder if that was on purpose wouldn’t put it past Eddie i mean…….you know how he is.

Yeah so obviously there’s some huge web of corruption Riddler wants uncovered, and rather than just…y’know, telling people, he’s doing this whole murder-Riddle-zodiac killer schtick thing, because, to quote Arkham City: “Why doesn’t he just tell you what he wants?” “Because he’s insane.”

Oh yeah so the cops by this point clearly work with Batman, particularly Gordon, but the rest of the Gotham PD and the FBI guys are clearly kind of awed and unnerved by his presence

Okay it COULD just be a lens flare, and I COULD be wrong, but it looks like Eddie set up a tripwire across the murder scene? Probably reveals a clue, I doubt it’s gonna blow the apartment

Batman watching a press conference about the Mayor’s death incognito (read: in a motorcycle helmet and Winter Soldier make-up), seemingly given by who i think plays the current Police Commissioner, who does a great job looking like a real sleazy piece of shit with a single-second shot of his face, i’m sure he’s exposed by Riddler and/or murdered as well

Oh I heard a rumor about the “Batcave” being an abandoned/disused transit station accessible by Wayne Manor, that looks to be what Robbat Battinbat’s riding his motorcycle into here

Riddler CRASHes ha classic the Mayor if that’s who it is’ funeral with a car with DOA written all over it and flowers and a civilian with a ringing phone duct taped to his hands and a bomb around his neck in a VERY “Joker in The Dark Knight” kind of way

Catwoman’s breaking into a safe in the murder scene for some reason, she might be working for someone or trying to uncover something but either way didn’t notice that the first time, doesn’t just look like it’s a random robbery

COLIN FARRELL?!?!?!?!

Yeah Batman apparently it takes the entire police department and Gordon to stop him fucking someone up in an interrogation room lmao

I love Catwoman’s little ears d’aw

I guess whatever the funeral riddle is, Batman doesn’t get the answer right cause he gets blown the fuck up

Now these mooks in the grease paint I don’t think are actually Joker mooks cause some look Joker-esque but one only has half his face done up, one has a really noticeable inverted cross thing going on, they may be garden variety juggalos or some kind of rogues gallery idolizing gang i do not know. One looks like Art the Clown from Terrifier

Oh yeah this Batman, in case the hair and the facial expression like he’s constantly about to snap and beat the living dog shit out of the nearest human being didn't clue you in, is clearly a bit fucking unhinged based on the way he just gOES ON when he’s taking down the one who’s dumb enough to attack him lmao Penguin seems genuinely terrified of how unhinged he is

Yeah cops are shooting at him so something clearly happens to put him and the cops at odds which i mean isn’t really surprising doesn’t it always? They punch for a bit and then they’re mates.

It seems like…so like I said in another post, Riddler seems very Hush-inspired in this, and of course spoilers but the crux of that story is that Riddler figured out who Batman is and orchestrates this entire massive plot including this new villain Hush and yeah anyway, based on this last line and the way he’s specifically coming after Batman, i think he does know who Batman is and the Wayne family is somehow involved in whatever BIG SECRET he’s trying to reveal. I’m a little sad about this because like look I get it, it’s the zeitgeist, I really don’t like this recent trend of making Batman’s parents/at least his dad a TREMENDOUS ASSHOLE before they died it just ugh

I also hope it doesn’t make their murder something important because it kinda undermines the whole theme of y’know why he became Batman and decided to fight crime, not just cause his parents were killed but specifically because they were killed in a completely senseless crime by just some nobody for no reason but anyway now i’m just rambling so that’s all i’ve got for now

Eddie wants to look menacing but he can’t see without his glasses the fucking dork…stop trying to make Green Zodiac Chic happen, Eddie! It’s not going to happen!

[pxiao]

Reasons I’m glad V///R is dead and gone forever

So V//R is dead and cancelled and my only reaction is FINALLY. Since VR is gone and we can finish forgetting the forgettable show and get rid of all our salt. You’re free to add to the post but there are rules. 

1. DO NOT TAG IT SO THE FANS CAN SEE. As much as I hate the show and the fandom even they don’t deserve to see people bashing the show in their tag. 

2. Don’t write the name of the show or the characters. Use /// or ---- in the character’s name like Yu///saku so the tumblr search can’t pull them up

ok good? Good. 

Everyone but Yu///saku is worthless. 

Seriously when have any of the characters actually progressed the story? Potentially only SB have done anything truly worthwhile. Everyone else was just to die to build tension for Yu//saku. And if you’re asking for RE///volver. OHHH I have a section just for him, don’t you worry.

Sto//rm Acc/ess aka Yu//saku is such a shitty duelist that the MINORITY of his duels has him not cheating. 

SERIOUSLY it’s written that Yu//saku can get a random extra deck monster with his skill BUT the issue is despite it being “random” Yu//saku ALWAYS gets the monster he needs to win. NOT ONCE IN THE 100+ EPISODE HAS HE GOTTEN A USELESS CARD. ALWAYS THE ONE HE NEEDS. Totally doesn’t seem like plot armor. And you know it wouldn’t be as big of an issue IF HE DIDN’T USE IT FOR EVERY SPE///ED DUEL!!!!!!!! For a character that the show likes to say is “invincible” he sure isn’t good enough to win with the deck he built. It got ridiculous with his duel with G/oo in season 2 where G//o countered his skill BUT A//i revealed it had a secondary effect that let him draw a card AND still get a new extra deck monster. 

Plot twists: 

They fall into two camps, “we already knew you dumbasses” or “THE HELL WERE YOU GUYS SMOKING!” Essentially the twists are obvious like A///i was based off of Yu//saku’s data as why wouldn’t he be. Or the dumb ones like Spec///tre beating A///oi or somehow Spec//tre had CONSCIOUS TREE AS A MOTHER. There have been a few twists that I can count that surprised me but they lead to other twists that fall back into stupid.  

the “Plot” just plain doesn’t exist.

 It’s just things happening with some connecting plot lines BUT they rarely lead into each other. Light///ning revealed that his plan was happening THE EXACT SAME TIME as season 1′s finale. A//i being the villain is more due to Light//ning’s simulation somehow proving that A///i will destroy humanity than the fact that A/i’s the only Ig//nis left. And each season’s arc has no connecting plot either. Season 1 can be broken down to Yu//saku gets A//i which has him meet the “main cast” and then Yu///saku go to S//OL for info that was TOTALLY pointless. Which is isolated from Re//volver setting a virus that traps you on the internet which leads to Re//volver learning Yusa//ku’s face AND MEETING HIM but does jack shit with that info. And then Re///volver’s final plan happens that was based on timing than anything else. 

Does that seem disjointed? YEP because there is no narrative at all, things are just happening. There is a vague connection at best but none of the characters’ actions actually affect how the story goes. THE FRUSTRATING PART IS THEY SET UP MOMENTS WHERE THEY COULD HAVE BUT THEY DIDN’T. SEASON 2 AND 3 IS THE SAME THINGS JUST HAPPEN AND THEN YU//SAKU HAS TO SAVE THE FUCKING DAY. V/R has no rhyme or reason why things happen, they just do and let me tell you, that’s fucking boring.

The Yu//saku praise

 My fucking god. Look the protagonist getting praised isn’t new, it happens with each series BUT the issue is the volume that Yu//saku gets and how early he gets it. Most protagonists have to wait till at least the second series before the population love them. Yu///saku got it by the THIRD EPISODE. BY. BEAT. A. MOOK. He was called a hero, people were saying he was hot, people were copying his avatar. AND IT NEVER STOPPED. EVERY OTHER EPISODE HAS SOMEONE SAY HE’S AMAZING, STRONG AND SOOO IMPORTANT. 

An A//oi episode in season 1 has a less than five minute section just to show that a kid HERO WORSHIPS YU//SAKU AND WAS IT. The kid appears with an avatar based on PM, PM saves him and tells the kid to trust him to save and then the kid logs out. AND THIS HAPPENS CONSTANTLY. “YU//SAKU IS INVINCIBLE”, “YU//SAKU IS MY HERO!”, “EVERYONE DEPENDS ON YOU YU//SAKU”. IT’S BEEN AN ENTIRE SHOW OF PEOPLE SINGING YU///SAKU’S PRAISES AND THE WORST PART OF IT IS, HE DESERVES NONE OF IT.

The setting. 

Let me ask ... THE FUCK IS IT. What even is Link Vr//ains? Is it a game, a site, a program? WHY IS IT ONLY IN DE///N CITY? WHY IS DESTROYING IT WILL LEAD TO THE ENTIRE INTERNET CRASHING???????? Link Vr///ains is something that NEEDS to be explained but the show NEVER DOES. HELL IT NEVER EVEN TRIES. 

The girls

Jesus christ ... the girls are .... just sad. A///oi ... my fucking god A//oi. A///oi’s personality starts and ends with “onii-sama”. NEARLY EVERY MOTIVE OF HER’S IS I WANT TO DO SOMETHING FOR MY STEPBROTHER. Everything else is a passing fancy. Mi///yu? Yeah nice motivation but that’s why her two duels as BM in season 2 is more about her relationship with Ak//ira than her “friend”. 

Em//ma’s backstory was absorbed into BS’ despite the fact he was a new addition when Em//ma was around since season 1. 

Vir//ya is just a bit character meant to fill out the remain KOH, since their return in season 2, she haven’t done anything of value. 

Qu///een ... why is she there? I mean she appeared in a Bikini ... in virtual reality. seriously there is no point in that shit, and then did nothing besides watch over Ear//th’s death and then lost to A//i when her skill was named honey trap. 

Mi////yu is so unimportant we haven’t gotten a scene of her out of flashback despite being a lost chi//ld.   

Back to A//oi, it’s not even that A//oi isn’t important,sadly that’s not uncommon in YGO, it’s the fact EACH TIME SHE TRIES TO DO SOMETHING, THE SHOW PUNISHES HER FOR IT. She tries to be a symbol for people, it’s stupid why she trying but still, Spec///tre reveals he was toying with her the entire time and she had no chance. She tries to get stronger in season 2, SB beats cause she doesn’t have an Ig//nis and then she does nothing for half the season. She tries to save her “childhood friend”, Bow//man beats her and takes her consciousness so Yu//saku has to save her ... again. She tries to protected Ak//ira, A//i beats them and only takes A//oi to taunt her over her failure. THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE SHOW, ANYTIME A//OI TRIES TO DO ANYTHING, THE SHOW BEAT HER UP AS IF TO SAY, YOU SHOULDN’T DO ANYTHING EVER. Great message there. 

Simulations

You know as people there are plenty of reasons that conflict starts, greed, hate, anger, lust, desperation to survive, hunger. And how does conflict start in V/r? FUCKING SIMULATIONS. EVERY SINGLE CONFLICT IN THIS SHOW IS BECAUSE OF A SIMULATION. K//OH are a thing cause Kog///ami did a simulation that showed that the Ig//nis are learning TOO FAST AND WILL CAUSE THE END OF HUMANITY. Ligh///tning turned evil because he learned no matter what he can NEVER BE FRIENDS WITH HUMANITY CAUSE OF A SIMULATION. A///i turning “evil” because he’s doom to end the world cause of you guessed it a SIMULATION. Simulations are just tools and are NEVER THE FINAL RESULT. There are too many variables to truly make an 100% accurate simulation BUT HERE THEY ACT AS IF SIMULATIONS ARE A FUCKING GOSPEL. IT’S STUPID AND INCREDIBLY LAZY THAT THE CAUSE OF ALL the conflict in this show is because of independent simulations.  

Mental illness

As a person with a mental illness and went to therapy I can say this, VR doesn’t deserve any brown points for covering mental illness. If anything VR touching mentally illness takes points away. I have already said my piece on how poorly VR tackles mental illness. But my take away is this when it comes to mental illness VR is a absolutely horrible.

Rev///ovler

Re//voler is in all honestly a shitty character despite what his fans think. He’s an asshole that has no drive of his own. He admit he does this all BECAUSE OF HIS DAD. The one time he did do something of his own accord, turn his dad in, he later regretted so much that he refuses to do it again. LOOK I can understand missing your father despite the fact he’s trash, human relationships are complex BUT RE///VOLVER BEING “FATHER I WILL NEVER EVER GO AGAINST YOU AGAIN DESPITE THE FACT YOU KIDNAPPED KIDS AND THEN TORTURED THEM BECAUSE YOU FELT SAD HUMAN WILL EVENTUALLY GO EXTINCT ONLY TO TURN ON YOUR CREATIONS” IS FUCKING STUPID. And then he goes the EXTRA MILE OF ASS and says to Yu//saku’s face that he REGRETS SAVING HIS LIFE TWICE. And he never apologized either. 

Also his “development” is forced as shit, Revo//lver never develops onscreen or shows signs of changing, just the show and characters say OH YES RE//VOLVER CHANGED.... IN A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME.  Honestly after his return in season 2 where he showed he DIDN’T CHANGE, then he tries to help Hom//ura despite telling Yu//saku he regrets saving him. WHY THE CHANGE. HE HAS SEEN NOTHING THAT MADE HE FEEL SYMPATHY FOR THE LOST KI//DS. BUT HE’S ALL OF A SUDDEN KIND TO HO///MURA. AND THEN AFTER HE LOSES TO LIGH//TNING AND SAY’S A/I NAME, ONLY TO SNAP BACK IN SEASON 3 AND WANTS TO KILL A///I. What I’m saying is, he has no real character development, you can tell what the show WANTED him to become but my god they were too lazy to actually show him changing. 

Yu//saku

OH BOY this is going to be long. Yu//saku is by far the WORST WRITTEN PROTAGONIST IN YGO HISTORY.  He has no personality and no real background besides HE WAS TORTURED, POOR HIM!!!!! Seriously what was his life like before the Lo//st Incident. What did he like to do, did he have friends, where the fuck are his parents. There is no information about him, past or present. Like his current “personality”, WHAT IS IT besides he’s stoic/emotionless. He’s not nice or even mean anymore. He has no likes or even dislikes. All we know is he’s determined ... and that’s it. Yu//saku is a blank slate for the viewers to project on. Yu//saku is honestly NOTHING. 

Honestly, Yu///saku isn’t strong as he cheats the MAJORITY of his duels, he isn’t smart as rarely does he do anything that’s smart, wanting to brutal force the solution and he doesn’t follow his own advice. 

Yu//saku: Bonds are important and the only thing that are absolutes

Yu//saku then fucks off for 3 MONTHS NOT TELLING ANYONE

And like Re//volver, his “development” is forced as hell. He just says things that make no sense for him to say. Yu//saku shouldn’t say revenge doesn’t help WHEN IT OBVIOUSLY DID. The show was supporting him and he got the guy that kidnapped him killed and then he got better. HELL JI//N WAS SAID TO GET BETTER ONCE THE K//OH WERE BEAT.   

[mst3kproject]

608: Code Name: Diamond Head

 This is probably the beigest movie I’ve ever seen.  The cars are beige.  The costumes are beige.  The landscapes are beige.  Even the actors are beige.

Johnny Paul is a wealthy, carefree bachelor living it up in Honolulu – when he’s not doing the government’s dirty work as Agent Diamond Head.  His new assignment is to track down rogue agent and master of disguise Sean Donovan, code-named Tree, who has come to Hawai’i to steal a deadly bioweapon.  By posing as a Colonel, Donovan is able to sneak into a secret research facility and find the formula.  Can Diamond Head, with his fellow agents Tso Tsing and Zulu, stop him from leaving the island with it?

If you were curious, Diamond Head is a reference to a 1963 film of that title, which starred Charlton Heston as a rich asshole living in Hawai’i.  France Nguyen was in that one, too.  I’ve never seen it, but I’m sure it deserved better.

Beyond that… this is another movie I’m gonna have trouble finding anything to say about. It’s pretty blah.  Part of the reason was probably because it was so obviously made for tv (complete with built-in commercial breaks) and they were trying to sell it to a network by making it as inoffensive as possible.  The result attempts to appeal to everybody and therefore actually appeals to nobody, except for people who are interested in unappealing movies.  Even then, I’m gonna have a hell of a time filling two pages with my thoughts on this.

Much of the reason it’s so bland is because for a film in which the fate of the world is at stake, Code Name: Diamond Head is remarkably lacking in any sense of urgency.  It feels like a business-casual movie: the people in it may be saving the world, but they’re doing it because that’s the job they’re paid to do, and that’s all.  Even Tso Tsing, who supposedly wants revenge for the deaths of her family, doesn’t look all that committed.  Actress France Nguyen looked way more into it when she was playing Kitty Tsu in Dimension 5 – in Code Name: Diamond Head she just looks bored.  At the end, even the villain just gives the fuck up, which is disappointing and yet so totally appropriate for this stupid movie that I feel I should have seen it coming.

The movie also makes Hawai’i look extremely shabby and unappealing. This is perhaps intentional, a dark-side-of-paradise thing, but it’s not a menacing type of unappealing.  Instead, Honolulu just looks like a giant trailer park.  The buildings are old, the hotels are cheap, and everything looks like it’s in various states of disrepair.  It just feels like a place you wouldn’t want to go, where there’s probably a lot of crime and drugs, never mind all this espionage stuff.  I guess that would have given Diamond Head plenty of work to do in future episodes.

Nothing in the movie is at all impressive and parts of it are barely even competent.  The music is mostly unremarkable, although it sometimes does weird things like break into a funky bassoon track, or just bang on the piano like a three-year-old when the goons show up.  There’s only one special effect, when vegetation melts into a mass of goo on contact with the gas weapon, but that’s just red lights superimposed on footage of rocks and it looks like crap.

I guess this movie has some kind of point to make about the arms race. What the scientists call the ‘Gold Cross’ was created by combining two of nature’s most finely-honed weapons – cone snail venom and some kind of poison gas – into a single substance that dissolves any living thing on contact.  This weapon is so terrible that even the people who developed it are all in favour of destroying it so it can never be used.  Instead, it’s stolen for use by terrorists or something.  As metaphors go it’s pretty blatant and not really worth analyzing.

This horrifying weapon was just about the only interesting thing in the film, and the fact that we only see it in action the once was definitely the most disappointing.  There were enough clichés in Code Name: Diamond Head to make me expect that the villains would be destroyed by the very weapon they sought to possess, and even though I knew it was gonna look stupid I was all ready to see it.  As Paul, Zulu, and the Salty Old Sea Dog chase the villains out onto the ocean I was channeling Mike from The Incredible Melting Man by shouting, “just blow up and melt!”  Instead, the stuff was recovered safely and that was a terrible letdown.

A villain who’s only in it for the money and gives up as soon as the situation becomes truly life-threatening is a terrible villain, anyway, because it retroactively sucks all the life out of the film up until that point.  Donovan was never a real threat, because he wasn’t actually fighting for anything besides a payday.  The only time this works in a movie is when the weaksauce quitter villain then rats out whoever he’s working for, allowing the heroes to go after the real bad guy.  Maybe this would have happened if Code Name: Diamond Head had been a series rather than a movie, but it wasn’t, so we’re left with this.

In order to be credible, action movie villains need conviction.  They need a cause to believe in so that we know they’re just as determined as the good guys. If they’re going to surrender, it should be either a trick or because they know they’re thoroughly beaten – in The Avengers, Loki does both.  Having your bad guy just give up, right when we’re expecting a big fight scene or a superweapon explosion, mostly makes it look like the writers couldn’t figure out what ought to happen next.  It’s like ending a story by having the protagonist wake up and realize it was a dream, or the narrator announce that suddenly, there was no monster.  It’s a cop-out.

Alternatively, a surrender could be part of the villain’s character development.  Maybe he realizes that he’s on the wrong side, maybe he’s changed by developing a relationship with the hero, all kinds of things could happen.  Darth Vader realizes that Luke is right and there is still good in him, and switches sides to throw the emperor into a bottomless pit. That’s character development.  That’s Luke Skywalker succeeding in what he’s been trying to do ever since he learned that Vader was his father.  When Donovan gives up, we haven’t been inside his head enough to know if he’s had any development over the course of this story.  He just throws in the harpoon and goes, “eh, fuck it.”

I’m sure this sort of thing happens in real life, when criminals decide that lying to the police just isn’t worth it.  In fact, I can think of at least one instance when it did, when serial killer David Berkowitz was arrested for a parking violation and decided he might as well just tell them he was also the Son of Sam.  It doesn’t make for good action movies, though.  Real life can run on coincidences, but we don’t like it when fiction does.

Is there anything in this movie that didn’t annoy me?  Well, I do have to admit, it avoids those Glamorous Secret Agent tropes I complained about in Secret Agent Super Dragon and Danger!! Death Ray.  Johnny Paul does seem to hang out with beautiful women when he’s undercover as a hip bachelor, but he doesn’t go around sleeping with co-workers, enemy agents, and random passers-by.  Instead, interestingly enough, it’s Tso Tsing whom the movie implies has multiple lovers, at least some of whom may have paid for the privilege according to Donovan.  The movie has no opinion on this, never even bothering to say whether it's true or not, and Paul seems to trust her to be romantically faithful to him even if not sexually, so that’s refreshing. It's also nice that Tso Tsing is around forty and looks it, but is still the movie's 'pretty girl'.

There are also no stupid death traps.  When Donovan decides Paul needs to go, he has a buddy sneak up on him and gas him in the face with cyanide.  Paul survives mostly by luck.  Later, Paul and one of the mooks beat the shit out of each other with whatever they have to hand.  It’s much less contrived and frankly, much more exciting than a death trap.  When the hero is strapped into a death trap, we know he’s got lots of time to get out of it.  When somebody is actually pointing a gun at him… well, he’s still gonna get out of it, being as he’s the hero and all, but there’s more adrenaline when there’s less time to think.

Code Name: Diamond Head really does feel like an episode of a tv series you probably watched once and weren’t interested enough to come back for next week.  The characters are dull and the plot feels pretty half-assed.  The other secret agent movies on MST3K were pretty dumb but they were at least amusingly dumb, ridiculous enough to make you want to keep paying attention.  This one just left me feeling like I was going to fall asleep.  If Danger!! Death Ray is the best of MST3K’s spy movies, I’m pretty confident I can declare Code Name: Diamond Head the worst.

[tumblunni]

ANOTHER REPETITIVE POST! I love Spectacularverse Doc Ock like I love breathing oxygen, ok bye

I mean seriously WHAT a good character design and backstory and personality and just seriously rescuing a critically underrated character concept that’s been varying degrees of camp in EVERY OTHER ADAPTATION EVER and seriously this time he looks even more goofy and cute than ever before yet is also the most genuinely intimidating?? and this dude has had plots about being like an uplaoded conciousness separated from his graphically depicted mutant cancer-ridden body and possessing spiderman, and shit like that, and IT ALWAYS COMES OFF AS CAMP AND BADLY WRITTEN and then they can friggin make me terrified of a four foot tall middle aged office worker with a world’s best evil boss mug. And like FOR ONCE he’s actually shown as being remotely smart, geez, its not just He Can Invent Literally Anything The Plot Requires but he never does any form of badass master planner shit even though he should be able to. THE MASTER PLANNER EPISODE WAS THE FUCKIN BEST. They somehow made the sinister six actually sinister! THEY RESCUED THAT CONCEPT TOO!!

but seriously just fuckin LOOK AT HIM

he’s THE MOST ADORABLE he like.. ACTUALLY looks like a normal nerdy mid 30s or 40s science dude who stumbled into evil by accident. he isn’t just some abnormally ripped generic superhero in skintight spandex with just glasses and a generic bowl cut or curly hair doodled on top I actually REALLY like the redesign of his villain outfit, seriously! Its the least actual ‘villain outfit’ villain outfit. He just pulls on a vaguely practical jumpsuit and swaps out his work labcoat for a comfortable cardigan overcoat thing. HE LOOKS LIKE MY GRANDMA! It works a lot better to have the crazy robot limbs be shooting out from some disarmingly normal guy, and seriously why did he ever NEED to be fuckin buff when he has robot limbs?? seriously this version is like a miniscule adorable uncle being dragged along entirely by the limbs yet he somehow managed to be the most physically orientated incarnation of doc ock because WHY WOULD HIS NORMAL ARMS NEED TO BE BUFF, SERIOUSLY IT WILL NEVER STOP BEING DISTRACTING TO ME And like, the reimi movies were one of the earliest successful attempts at making him sympathetic, but man it was Also Distracting how he was again really kinda ripped but also like supermodel handsome?? he looked like some rich heiress to a french duchy or something. and his costume was all Trying Too Hard To Be Badass with the Fashion Trenchcoat (tm) and like seriously i do like how this version is like a colourscheme tribute to that one while also changing stuff to fit with this version of him and just seriously man i love all the doc ocks even if i’m a critical bastard oh and also underrated but good is how many costume changes he makes, and how they succeed at never changing the way he’s meant to be perceived because of it. Some of his most serious scary moments are with him topless aside from the robo harness, and we don’t get a bunch of ~ha ha fat man~ jokes, seriously this is his INTRODUCTION and as much as spidey quips around its still hella intimidating and really tragic sad. And its happening to this random half-naked Old Dadman wearing nothing but a vest and shorts. oh and the episode where he wore a cool tuxedo!! that was!! really good!! why did it even take place in fancytown if not to give us an excuse for Dapper Ock Day. When your defining concept is being basically a flesh suit dragged along by a robot thing slowly taking over your personality, I dont see why anyone needs to follow ANY ‘rules’ or cliches about what that flesh suit looks like. THE INTIMIDATING THING IS NOT THE PEOPLE PART. Yet somehow in this show it IS, I’m more scared by Nice Dadman’s loss of his humanity than I am of getting stabbed in half by his Nice Dadman Robo Hands

MAN I JUST FUCKIN REALLY ADORE THIS DOC OCK

like just LOOK AT HIM he wins the sympathetic plotline thing way more instantly just because this time HIS DESIGN is also made with that in mind right from the beginning him being a super normal relateable huggable shy nerd with a sad office life and a lil bowtie is all deliberately engineered to NOT ONLY make him relateable and sad but ALSO make him more intimidating?? like, its planned ahead of time to give you this established personality for his pre-transformation self that cameos in a few episodes before it actually happens. So the huge change in his personality is shocking and terrifying and you still know there’s some normal guy stuck inside it all, and really this could have happened to anyone, it could have happened to you! and its just like ONE EXTRA CHUNK OF BADASS ON THE BADASS CAKE that like.. his design.. doesnt change?? he doesnt stop being short + round + cute + traditional shyman design even when the shyman personality pretty much evaporates into eternal rage. You’re still getting your ass kicked by Someone’s Embarassing Dad At The Christmas Party. Its a total abandoning of all ideas of who can and can’t be a superhero/villain and seriously i know its such a minor detail but this is why i love how Spectacular diversified everyone’s body build and stuff. Also, having way more distinct silhouettes makes them more memorable, and makes the characters who’re supposed to be defined by being buff actually look it! but seriously imagine being fuckin rolled in an alleyway by The Most Harmless Dad weilding a giant bioweapon and an interlinked criminal empire of other villains under his control because even in his deranged state he keeps his massive intellect that was never recognised back when he was good ITS SO FUCKIN TRAGIC BUT SO FUCKIN COOL

and seriously HIS PLOT his PLOT his personality, his backstory, his very brief yet really well developed foreshadowing before his origin story AAAA its SO GOOD

I think the best part of it in my opinion is like.. he’s sympathetic but he’s NOT redeemable? Well, he might be redeemable but he never gets a redemption plot, he ignores all his damn epiphanies, and like.. Spidey doesnt even know the poor sod’s backstory so he never even tries, and its REALLY FRUSTRATING but also realistic too He was 100% The Nicest most innocent good natured guy and now he is 100% a villain who never even remotely tries to go down that redemption plotline yet the show keeps it hanging over our head forever as a goddamn tragic thing He was just... a really good guy who did nothing?? He didnt deserve anything?? He just got turned into a monster against his own will after tHE WORST DAY IN HIS LIFE and basically broke and decided to abandon all that goodness in one big moment. And man, I say ‘decided’ like it isnt an intriguingly ambiguous theorizeable constant question of how much of his old self is actually left in there and how much is the arms talking. I kinda like to interpret it as like Spidey and the black suit? Its a shame they didnt take the opportunity to use any parallels when it happened. but like ok SERIOUSLY like.. even the sympathetic Ocks of times past weren’t THIS pure

he wasnt JUST a good guy, he was a really shy chronic doormat who’d been ordered around by assholes all his life and had all his accomplishments stolen and just fuckin DIDNT DO ANYTHING WRONG EVER and manifested his super doom powers not through any normal accident even but from his asshole employer trying to murder him and he would have legit died in the most horrible horrible way. the last we get to see of Good!Ock is his ‘oh umm, sir, I think the door lock is broken’ turning into a horrific realization, and then him fuckin... CURLING UP IN A FETAL POSITION CRYING and “this can’t happen, I’ve been good’ THATS LITERALLY THE LINE like HOW MANY OTHER TIMES have people betrayed this man in his life?? he’s so fuckin buried in respectability politics that its no wonder he went COMPLETELY NUTS as soon as he got powers. he’s spent his WHOLE LIFE being good for NO REWARD, being TOO GOOD and having villains take advantage of him again and again, like no fucking wonder he’d give up on the whole concept of virtue being his own reward when LITERALLY IT NEVER WAS like seriously aside from the part about him inventing a magic super arms suit and his boss trying to murder him this is JUST AN ORDINARY STORY OF CORPORATE AMERICA this is the kind of ‘tragic backstory’ thats completely fuckin normalized in our society all his suffering was just cos of money and academic elitism and terrible employers n shit, his grand reason for becoming a villain is just because HIS JOB IS BAD and its not even SUPERNATURALLY bad until the point where it tries to kill him. its a supernatural sci fi corporation whose worst points are its SUPER REALISTIC BEAUROCRATIC BULLSHIT. And seriously this could have even ended the same way in real life, it’d just be more likely the mistreated employee would become homeless and die on the streets, or collapse from overwork, or something... so seriously this fuckin CINNAMON ROLL WHO DID NOTHING WRONG whose intro episode is ENTIRELY JUST DEVOTED TO CONVINCING US HE’S GOOD AND NOT LIKE ANY OTHER OCK EVER, this fuckin SHY DADMAN THE HUGS with his TINY BOWTIE he gets fuckin destroyed and killed offscreen before spiderman ever even meets him, and we get to see it but he doesnt, and then we enter in at already the point of no return where ock’s decided to never trust anyone ever again except The Machine, and NOBODY IN-UNIVERSE even gets to find out that he was once good!

and i love how the show actually explores the underappreciated flaw of spiderman, that sometimes the people he’s quipping against aren’t really The Mook of The Day but a sympathetic human being who might have been able to be talked down instead. Early on in this show he gets a bit carried away in having fun with his hero job, and makes a few mistakes like this. As well as just times that he did know the villain before they turned, and he’s REALLY trying to help them, but he still fails for other reasons and its just like AAAAA maybe if he had a bit more experience he could have figured out what to do but you know he’s not gonna realize that, he’s just gonna blame himself forever. Spiderman is allowed to have Kind of A Douche Move flaws, yet also be sympathetic and good at the same time?? So good! Its more clearly shown with the Electro episode, I think? Just look at how much more serious he gets when he realizes this isnt like Electro, The Guy Who Donned A Super Suit One Day And Decided To Commit Crime, but Literally Max You Just Met The Other Day, Who Escaped From The Hospital And Is Having A Mental Breakdown In A Public Coffee Shop. Seriously Electro here is really underrated! We don’t get as much time with pre-villainy him and he’s a bit snippy and such, but he was still just a normal good person who fell into bad luck, and he still has this scary loss of personality afterwards. He’s possibly even more tragic than Doc Ock cos there isn’t even any deniability ~ooh but maybe he’s controlled by the arms or maybe not~ and he didnt have a really long backstory that convinced him to change his perspective in life after one big bad day. His change comes out of NOWHERE after that one big bad day, and even he seems really scared and confused about it! Its like whatever the fuck is going on with this magic electricity infection has amplified all his emotions to a point where they physically pain him, he’s suddenly really obsessed with minor jealousy things and seems unable to rationally process them like he was seen doing just five minutes ago. He’s even kinda LESS snippy than he was before, he’s like he can’t even string together a complex enough train of thought to manage it. He goes from a pretty world-weary and down-to-earth electrical worker to like.. uncomfortably childlike, and the series uncomfortably making fun of him for it. I found it very relateable as an autistic person, even though it was 99% likely unintentional, and like.. if it was intentional it would be pretty bad representation anyway cos its like some guy being turned autistic by magic science, but yknow Whatever. Still goddamn coffee shop scene was literally Several Days of My Life laid bare on the screen for all to see, poor goddamn relateavle Electro AND LIKE Not to mention the sensory deprivation body horror aspect, like HOLY SHIT imagine how scary it must be to have to wear this full body armour thing and NEVER TOUCH ANYTHING EVER AGAIN because you’re MADE OF DEATH NOW. Seriously his fuckin turning point was after a day of slowly discovering all the different ways he was Completely Fucked, he just wanted a damn cup of coffee and ended up crying in the starbucks, and then spiderman comes in assuming he’s a villain cos well he looks like a weird electro creature and seriously HE JUST WANTED HIS COFFEE. its like an uncomfortably realistic depiction of a panic attack that some poor guy is having after developing a major disability in an accident. Amplified by crazy lightning powers ruining his brain, and some dumb spider kid punching him while he’s trying to figure it all out. I think this is kinda why I really like the subtle hints of a fatherly relationship between doc ock and him? He’s surprisingly patient with him compared to the other sinister six members, and Electro treats him with a huge amount of respect and admiration he isn’t shown giving ANYONE else! like seriously, his brain meltdown made him think all his old friends were conspiring against him at the slightest misinterpreted evidence, so it says a LOT that Ock is able to actually keep this status as a trustable person in Super Paranoia Man’s brain across two whole seasons. And its kinda adorable how he’s like ‘wow, electro just jumped the gun and misunderstood my plan YET AGAIN’ but at most he just chastises the dude and actually explains what he did wrong. And electro actually does change slightly over the series, developing from this mentorly treatment when nothing else ever seemed to work for him. Tho I mean, its never made clear whether Ock really sees him that way or if its just like ‘well this guy is easy to manipulate if you offer him the most minimal kindness’ which is SAD IN ITS OWN RIGHT! thatd be so depressing cos it’d mean ock is becoming like how osborne used to treat his old self. i prefer to hope its just a shred of his old good guy self relating to Electro’s situation.

and MAN the question of whether doc ock is in control, or the arms! ITS HANDLED REALLY WELL!!! the one thing that bugged me about the reimi movie ock is that its always a bad ‘redemption story’ when the guy never even chose to turn evil, he’s just being mind controlled or something. they made it too clear that he was 100% mind controlled by the evil arms and yet tried to blame him 100% for his actions and then he dies in the end. And seriously, why was he even able to regain control of his senses in the end if he couldnt before? it would make so much more sense if he was a guy who actually made a bad choice in life, saw the consequences, and took the decision to change. THIS IS THE BEST PART OF REDEMPTION PLOTS and like.. the interesting part about Spectacular Ock is how he’s just gone 100% full hog into his evil and expresses no interest in taking any offers of redemption plot. He isnt all divided and doubting because of his old goodness, he legit went from 100% good to 100% evil in one scene. ‘I should sacrifice my own health and confidence and life just to be useful to other people’ to ‘EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING FOR ME. NEVER TRUST ANYONE EVER. GIVE ME THE RECOGNITION I WAS DENIED!’ It sounds like it SHOULD be a jarring change but they wrote it so well that it COMPLETELY works! we dont see the entirety of his life beforehand but we see enough to know that this was his absolute despair horizon and he’s emerged on the other side as someone tragically unrecogniseable. And every single thing about this wildly different new evil personality is ABSOLUTELY derived by something that was already evidenced in his old good one. Its dark reflections of personality traits that were one some of his greatest virtues. And its like.. a deliberate decision on his part to become the kind of villain who’s the opposite of the weak things he despised in himself, cos as much as he’s all ‘dont trust anyone’ now he still blames himself for not being good enough, as if he somehow deserved what happened and could have avoided it if he acted differently. Its a very performative kind of ego that’s critically fragile deep down. And also HOLY SHIT I love how well developed that was as a flaw!! They gave us an actual reason for why Ock could be ‘a genius’ yet still make mistakes when necessary to allow our hero an opening to defeat him. They make him WAY more competant than he ever was before, and now his mistakes stem from an established character flaw so its far less obvious deus ex machina. Its not ‘stupid moments’ anymore, even if its still a genius at some things showing a lack of basic common sense at others. Now its because he loses rationality when angered or insulted, due to the circumstances of his depressing backstory. Just act like mr osborne and all ock’s cool composure falls away. Heartlessly weaponize those memories of his abuser, our hero! (SERIOUSLY THIS SHOW DOES MORAL AMBIGUITY SO WELL)

ok ok ok okay WHERE WAS I oh yeah THE ARMS QUESTION cos seriously it is SO GOOD and its one of the biggest reasons i’m sad the show got cancelled before reaching a resolution. i wanted to have the question answered!! or at least give us enough evidence to draw a conclusion one way or another! Ok so like.. its left TANTALIZINGLY vague whether Ock’s vast change in personality was JUST due to snapping after one terrible day, or if the accident with the arms actually affected his brain somehow. like, we know from other continuities that ‘the arms’s AI is fused with my personality’ is a thing that can potentially happen to a doc ock, but did it happen to this one? Honestly its so vague we dont even know if ANYTHING happened to them in the accident really. Could he have actually taken them off at any time? is his story less about ‘oh god im stuck as a cyborg freak forever, i will take it out on humanity’ and just a guy who stole this bioweapon tech when he decided to become a villain, and is using it normally as intended? Cos seriously when you briefly see him in prison like.. how did they remove the arms? And how did they so easily attatch again afterwards? it doesnt seem like they were stabbing into his flesh like in the reimi movie, just however the spinal attatchment was normally intended to function. Also: another underrated moment! Its a great interpretation to have the arms be something he invented himself as a morally neutral laboratory aide, and never intended them to be a weapon at all. they do seem weirdly battle equipped for simple prosthetic limbs, so it feels like maybe osborne modified his original design because He Is Evil Fuckface In Every Possible Way. Then again you could probably say that stuff like the saw functionality might be necessary when you’re working with building complex robotics n stuff. Anyway, it was cute and creepy and creepycute to see good!Ock just casually using the same Death Arms for ordinary lab work way before he gets his origin story. it was kinda endearing how he seemed to not even realise how unintentionally creepy their design was, he was just super proud and affectionate about this cool invention of his. The awkward handshake with the robo arms!! that was cute!! But then like THE MOMENT. Th e DAMN MOMENT. That was SUCH GOOD WRITING but in light of there NEVER BEING AN ANSWER I kinda wanna spitefully call it bad writing, lol They have that One Scene of (apparantly) prologue good guy ock finally coming back for like 15 seconds?? I was so excited and happy and proud of him?? You see him going through prison therapy and.. ITS HIM!! I cant even BELIEVE how much I mourned this poor guy until they really drew attention to it. He changed so much you legit outright MOURN all the good guy potential he had, and how much he didnt deserve what happened. And then the Fiendish Writers bit is what happens next, you see the cyborg arms acting independantly of him and breaking free of their restraints to return to their master. And then YOU SEE HIM NOT WANTING TO GO. You see him SCREAMING. You see him dragged out a fucking window horror style. And then you see him perfectly calm five seconds later. You get post-reattatchment Ock saying ‘haha i was just pretending to be redeemed, I was just hiding my true intentions while I waited for my robo arms to come back’. But like.. like.. why did he keep the act up even when his plan was complete, then?? He would have no reason to act afraid when the arms showed up! He could just reveal his deception with a fancy flourish and ride his train to freedom. Why did he keep screaming even as he was already out the window and around the corner, with nobody there to be fooled? its just SO tantalizingly vague and seriously FUCKING HELL I wish the creators at least gave the answer in interviews or something after the show got cancelled before the final season. Tho personally my headcanon is kinda somewhere in the middle and fitting with the comparisons to the symbiote and such. i think maybe there is indeed something going on with the arms gaining some degree of sentience after the accident, and fusing with their host to influence them into making decisions they might not have. Tho I also think that this hypothetical machine hivemind isn’t really like the symbiote where it has an active sense of self and is shown being sneaky and manipulating its host actively, with a huge amount of awareness. I just feel like this form of sentience is a pure instinct mess of malfunctioning programming that amplifies people’s obsessions in like.. an eternally expanding feedback loop with no limit and no end goal in mind. Its just ‘PROTECT HOST = ??? = PROTECT HOST MORE’ and ‘UPGRADE UPGRADE UPGRADE’. i think if the arms actually were acting independantly of him then they also actually were trying to rescue him, that would kinda explain why the reinstituted dual conciousness thinks of it that way. i mean, if it’s not outright a sign that doc ock is completely dead and thats the arms talking through him and lying. Cos that would be the more boring option, like I said I prefer sympathetic villains who arent brainwashed and actually made bad choices so they can actually be redeemed of them later. So like, I’m seeing this as like ‘what if you got stuck with a good-natured genie who grants your every wish entirely wrong and will NEVER LEAVE’. His arms AI only intends to serve him, it just... Goes Very Wrong. JOIN THE SINGULARITY, MASTER. You should totally upgrade me very much so I can protect you more. I WILL KILL ALL THE PEOPLE WHO MADE FUN OF YOU And then its similar to the symbiote as like a metaphor for drug abuse, when the drug is ‘power’. Or like.. the potential to have success at the cost of other things. Its not inherantly evil and its not like it takes control of you outright, its just like a thing that amplifies your worst vices and at the same time does damage to your health and is Generally A Bad Decision. Its a temptation to do bad stuff you already had the potential to do on your own. I think if either the arms or the symbiote possessed a genuine 100% flawless good person, they would have no effect on them. But like.. not many people like that really exist, and its not like people who have flaws are any less good. So its tragic that we’ve seen these definately good people who’ve fallen apart under the influence of The Magic Superpower Drugs Metaphor, and like.. Doc Ock and Venom are the tragic story of people who couldnt manage to escape from it and develop out of their flaws like spidey did. And I think maybe Doc Ock is somehow even more tragic because he DOESNT HAVE A CHOICE TO LEAVE. this has just shown that like.. his one decision to metaphorically take the one cocaine has already doomed him. Even though he said no to it the second time, the arms still forcibly reattatched to him, and probably will keep doing that until either one of them ends up dead. Like, its so tragic that he actually seemed completely normal when they were removed?? He seemed to have come to his senses and be working past his issues that caused the whole freakout, with that prison therapy. But NOPE! Tho on the other hand it was also REALLY DEPRESSING in its own way that poor Eddie was still irrecoverably broken even after he lost the symbiote, and then actively sought it out to be reinfected no matter how many times it shows it has no damn loyalty to him and just wants to eat his damn soul and fuck off to the next host. Another reason for good comparative metaphors! It could be a really epic battle between him and venom cos the show could actually clarify a lot of stuff about how on earth each respective symbiosis works, and maybe have like a battle of The Good One vs The Bad One even though both are bad? Like, neutral not-entirely-sentient arms thing that just wants to give its inventor the power he needs to get what he wants, inadvertantly exploding his damn brain into evils. Then we have creepy manipulative love-em-and-leave-em alien with an actual voice and personality and stuff. Yet both equally harmful to their hosts! Comparison time: FIGHT!!

god i have like SO many fuckin ideas of where the story could have gone, i wish i knew what the creators had planned if it wasnt cancelld, god i wish we could have had some damn sweet funky cool resolution for Badass Cute Bowtie Dad and his Doom Squiggles Also electro! give electro more sympathy and development! give him a dad! why did u make me care so much about these villains aaa

[titleknown]

A Sampling Of The Members Of The Game Bosses Union:

King of Spikes: You know those bosses that’re the king of minor mooks, like King Moblin or Goomboss? Yeah, this guy is that for death spikes. Complete with crown and pompous mustache and buffoonish; blustering personality. And he has ultimate control of his “subjects,” and wants to ultimately cover the world in spikes. There’s a reason he’s considered creepy and unsettling by everyone despite his demeanor

Cephimani Prime is, you know those head-n-hands bosses that’re just a giant head and hands, usually mechanical or inorganic in some way? Like Gholdan from Zelda, Wham Bam Rock from Kirby, Andross from Star Fox, ect?

Well, Cephimani Prime is the first of those from across the multiverse, skeletal in the way machines without a covering tend to be, at once a machine that’s at once incredibly advanced, but also shockingly simple to produce, designed to work with simple technologies in innovative ways to produce the base for any number of impressive fighting machines.

It’s not the strongest at its base level, in fact it has several glaring weak points unarmored, but it almost always comes armored in whatever advanced-level tech the surrounding area has to offer.

It’s constantly getting destroyed, but also constantly getting rebuilt, as its basic blueprints are scattered all across the multiverse, and even may have been the ones the creators of those others ripped off (Whether consciously or unconsciously) there.

Tho, weirdly, nobody really knows who first designed it, and the fact that each instance somehow seems to share memories has some unsettling implications, despite its robotically obsequieous personality…

Thelemas Rotas comes from a world where a structure called The Wheel of Fate keeps creating these random magical events, that always seem to come in a cycle of rise and ruin but with lots of little things randomly shifted. One Queen from an ancient kingdom decided to find out why, running her kingdom ragged to try and find the reason why; ultimately  and found out about the wheel. And became stockholm syndromed to it. And ultimately fused to it, despite a group of her most loyal soldiers and court members trying to stop her in the end. And then she kept coming back, reincarnating in different bodies that slowly grew aware of their previous incarnations and their connection to the wheel and their destiny to keep it going, doing so with its dread powers and the armies of monsters coming from that age’s zeitgeist to her, until one group of prophecy-breaking heroes went to break the wheel,

But that is for another story. As of now, she wanders the multiverse as a monster-for-hire, commanding biological abomination sand using the random powers of her wheel, both changing to fit the zeitgeists of the places she goes. She beautiful but cruel and is deeply haughty and conceited about her metaphysical role in things, even when she barely applies to the world she’s on, even if she has little relevance to, going bonkers and stabby and resorting to wildly dangrous shit when her plans begin to fall apart, with snow-white hair and porcelain pale skin, usually wearing a wildly-overdesigned but strangely memorable outfit. Her god-monster form is suspended across a gigantic Wheel Of Fortune with various occult symbols on it, her eyes constantly changing colors like card suits and her body flickering through space like a Jacob’s Ladder monster.

Cosmos Ophiuschus is a magically powerful model of the planets in an ancient kingdom repurposed by an invading despot into a war machine, which they kept around despite her defeat because of its usefulness, and it stayed around even after the empire fell. She looks like a serpent with a body made of spheres, with a head of fire representing the sun and the sheres making up the rest of her body being based on planets, with them each granting it a power based on the planet, IE Mercury creates speedy meteor shots, Venus emits poison gas, Saturn shoots buzzsaw rings, Jupiter creates storms, ect.

This can be troublesome when the spheres are cracked by attacking enemies, and thusly can no longer be used until she goes to heal. And she can heal, via the magic of the planets that make it up, as well as having the ability to shift those planets to the abilities of any planets it might encounter in any other solar system, with related abilities.

She’s about animal intelligence; and in general is not a very smart noodle, but it does always show up wherever its services might be called upon, including Union meetings, and the most likely theory is that it is compelled by the music of the spheres…

Boss Benkei was once a great gangleader robber-king of a world-spanning crime empire who fell deeply in love with a former rival-turned-partner, a man by the name of Moto. Moto was cursed to death after they killed the wrpmg, and he became a little… off after that. Now the might of his empire is focused on creating “power-ups”, items with the ability to enhance (Whether temporarily or permanently) the subject’s abilities, and has their production and use by his legions as the main focus of his operations, renting them out to those who can afford it.

His ultimate goal is to produce the one thing that can bring a person back from not just death, but a state beyond death with which Moto was sent. He looks like a beautiful; muscular middle-eastern man, with a boisterously dour personality. He only uses a permanently-shining super-sharp sword of bronze his main weapon/casting implement, because ultimately with his power-ups that’s all he needs.

Nobody really has any idea where The Bulleteer comes from, or even what gender they are, all they know is that they’re eerie, a slender figure in a red leather suit with a long flowing cape; a bullet-shaped helmet and the ability of flight, speed and to control “bullets”. Well they call them bullets, they’re more like glowing, living spheres. They do not consider morality much, only challenge, and mainly exist to challenge people in the art of racing and bullet-dodging.

Xerex, The Mirror Machine, is essentially a giant ancient technolgy mirror/copy-machine on legs who can copy from reflections of anything in its viscinity, and Mimess; the humanoid beetle with a very soft exoskeleton who can alter her physiology to mimic any being in her viscinity via a complex system involving a large array of senses, even electromagnetic sensitivity.

Xerex is very pompous, being made as “The Ultimate Weapon” of a decadent empire, while Mimess has an explosive finicky temper due to being insecure about her own physical fragility due to the same malleable anatomy that allows her her powers. That, and the fact their powers overlap, means they can’t stand each other…

Hookhead is just a giant asshole fish, bane of fisherman and swimming beast alike. A huge mean mixture between alligator gar and some kind of coelocanth with pblack scales, this thing’s been mutated by decades of pollution in his home stream into a vicious thing that practically oozes a rainbow of pollution and toxins, with the ability to control it thanks to the likely psionic powers gained from the place in his brain altered thanks to the massive goddamn hook in his brain.And, to clarify as his creator, yes he was concieved as an idea for a fishing-game-y boss, as well as one for @pettamapossum’s special-interest-cult-classic Finny And The Seven Waters.

Shin Rung is one of the greatest living masters of Ryuken Martial Arts, it is said this red-bearded bald-headed old man once defeated death itself after he was betrayed and murdered by a student of his, and as a reward; his hands and feet are invincible; even as they constantly bleed.

His weapon of choice is as unorthodox as it is deadly, namely a ladder made entirely of blades, from the rails to the rungs, razor sharp and utilizable in thousands of different ways; and that is before the ki attacks through it are used. It is far too heavy for most people to pick up even if they could touch its razor-sharp blades, but to see Shin Rung use it, one would think it is light as fog on a lighthouse-beam.

He fights not for money or for power; but only for self improvement and to one day find a worthy opponent. It is said that in training under him; the final test is to land but a single blow on him. Almost none have succeeded...

\\*Edge Hellblood 666: Antichrist Primadonna*//

The 666th attempt at cloning Satan from a vial of his blood and a single feather, who escaped in a conflagration of blood and fire five whole minutes after his vat was opened, this charmer is what one would call a lord high edgelord.

His left horn is a tiny nub while his right is massive on his head in a way that recalls a waxing moon, he has five wings that form a pentagram-like shape on his back, his hair streams like rainbow glitching VHS footage, his left eye is white while his right eye is black, his claws are bright silver and he is as beautiful as he is pretentious. Which is very.

He’s very much petulant; picky but bombastic in his plans and in his lifestyle, working to “strike back at a world that rejected him,” despite the fact that honestly he has endured far less hardship than a lot of the beings under his employ. Though as much as he rants and raves at the failures of his employees, he’s quite good to them, providing them many favors and second chances; and even what little sympathy/emotional support a stunted being like him can for their hardships. Basically think Bowser/Skeletor meets Sephiroth and you’ve got a pretty good idea of what working with him is like.

In addition to the powerful magical and occult potential and knowlege he has as a clone of Satan, he can command demons and dark spirits. Granted, they do not respect him at all and say they are simply “humoring” him, but they do still follow orders.

He also has a pet called Wormy, who looks like a pitch black bug-eyed tsuchinoko with a bright red apple-like growth coming out of the top of his head. Wormy is actually the 616th attempt at cloning Satan, and if you know your tropes you can probably guess he’s far more evil/powerful than Hellblood…

A curiously concealed knight whose armor looks like a neon sign, complete with blank spaces in between the tubes despite being fully three-dimensional, the enigmatically bombastic Neon Knight travels around working for whoever will hire her, with abilities usually based around the flashy neon/city-lights aestetic and Holy damage and lairs (Which she’d developed some clever tricks for quickly gussying-up) based on a lit-up city at night. She’s generally morally good but usually ends up either easily mislead or working for the good guys who happen to be on the wrong side of a “hero”.

Her most distinctive ability is her Neon Lance, which she uses while riding her neon-looking horse/motorcycle-hybrid to dash quickly into foes; once it’s clear the fight is getting serious. When asked about the reasons for her work, she simply says “I’m on a mission from god…”

These characters and members of the Union; collected here from multiple posts with a few new ones, are all free to use as long as I, Thomas F. Johnson, am credited as their creator. One of these days Imma have to draw ‘em, tho y’all can feel free in the meantime…

[ridiasfangirlings]

I've had this headcannon for a while, what if in Return of the King Fushimi knew he was going to die after fighting Sukuna and told Yata to go help Anna and that he could make it to the surface alone but ends up dying (Munakata doesn't pay off Hirasaka). What do you think would be Yata's reaction? What about Munakata's?

Maybe in this version Fushimi’s hurt worse than Yata realizes butFushimi kinda knows the odds of him making it to the surface arepretty slim. He knows that if he says anything to Yata though it willbecome a big emotional scene that Fushimi’s not really equipped tohandle (and if anything he’d probably think that he’s doing Yata afavor here, if he tells Yata that he’s dying Yata will just getemotional and he’ll probably start to cry and will refuse to leaveFushimi, thus jeopardizing the entire plan and maybe even leadingYata to be hurt or killed because he stayed behind to help Fushimirather than escaping when he could). So instead Fushimi just tellsYata that his most important person right now is Anna and waves himoff, unable to stop the small pang in his chest when Yata smiles athim and says “We’ll talk later!” As soon as Yata’s out of sightFushimi just slides to the ground, hands against his wound andfeeling the blood seep through. Maybe he hears the other randomjungle guys coming for him too and this time he just lies therebecause he has no weapons and he’s too weak to move so there’s reallynothing to do but wait for them to come kill him. He can’tdeny that he’s a bit pissed off about it though, like how pathetic tobe killed by the hands of random mooks after everything he’s beenthrough. He kinda laughs softly to himself and maybe here at the lastmoment he admits that he was happy, when he saw Misaki had come forhim, even if it was too late.

So then the Slate is destroyed and jungle’s hideout crumbles and inthe aftermath Yata comes rushing up to where Scepter 4 is stillsecuring the scene, trying to ask about Fushimi. Most of the clandoesn’t know that Fushimi’s betrayal was fake so they’re all confusedand Yata’s getting increasingly pissed off and frantic, like noseriously assholes where the fuck is Saruhiko. That’s whenMunakata comes up behind him and admits that Fushimi has not returnedfrom the secret mission Munakata sent him on. The other members ofthe squad are shocked to hear the truth about Fushimi’s ‘betrayal’but Yata’s too busy being angry, just grabbing Munakata by the coatlike what do you mean he hasn’t returned, I saved that assholenow where is he. Yata’s worried sick for a good week before Scepter4’s able to start clearing some of the rubble away and eventuallyFushimi’s body is found (and for maximum angst, say it’s relativelyunharmed from the collapse, like he ended up being shielded from thecollapse by a fallen beam or something and it’s clear that Fushimiactually died before the hideout caved in. Or extra superextreme angst, not only is it clear he died before the cave in but hereally did get killed by the random jungle mooks and his body iscovered in stab wounds and bruises and all kinds of marks thatsuggest he took quite a beating before he died).

Yata I think would really be inconsolable and he would absolutely betorn up with guilt, like especially knowing that Fushimi died beforethe collapse I’m sure he would feel convinced that if only he’dstayed with Fushimi or brought Fushimi out himself this wouldn’t havehappened. I think the circumstances would make it an even bigger blowthan before too, because here Yata carried out his part of the planfeeling suddenly energetic and hopeful because after all this time heand Fushimi finally connected again and they were going to workthings out, Fushimi was going to talk to him and maybe they could’vebeen friends again and Yata was so happy about that, so ready to moveon to something new and better for the two of them. And instead helearns that Fushimi died and Yata’s sure that he could’ve savedFushimi if only he’d gotten there sooner, if only he hadn’t leftFushimi behind, if only he’d done more or been faster then Saruhikowould still be alive.

Munakata’s grief I think would be quieter but definitely there, Ithink it would be a heavy burden on him knowing that Fushimi died onthe mission that Munakata sent him on. Especially since I think eventhough Munakata knew this might happen he’d already assumed that hehimself wasn’t going to survive so it wasn’t as much of a reality tohim, like Munakata assumed that either Fushimi would survive orneither of them would and having it turn out this way instead,Munakata alive and Fushimi dead, this was for once something entirelyoutside his calculations. I could see him not really talking toanyone about it, bottling up his grief a little and probably lettingYata scream and curse at him about being the one who sent Fushimi tohis death because Munakata feels like he deserves that, he didsend Fushimi there after all. Also imagine like one night he’s upsuper late just staring at nothing and Awashima comes in to check onhim, Munakata says he’s fine and tells her to go to bed. But then asshe’s leaving he stops her for a moment and says quietly 'I imagineyou all must blame me quite a bit, for Fushimi-kun’s loss.”Awashima’s eyes start to tremble as she moves hesitantly over to puta hand on his shoulder, telling him that Fushimi took the mission ofhis own free will, and Munakata just nods and puts his hand overhers, the two of them standing there in silent grief thinking aboutthe precious person they’ve lost.

[ghostsonabiketonowhere]

Ghostman: The council calamity retrospective

Well christ, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? I know literally nobody follows this blog, but as of this writing, i’m waiting on the steam direct fee i paid to be fully processed (Basically, in a week i’ll be able to publish the game)

I’d like to take a second and stroll down memory lane for a little bit, and why it took so fucking long to make this game, this is basically going to be a list of every time i tried and failed to make a game, so strap in, these aren’t in chronological order either, and i’ve kinda forgotten the proper order.

Bill’s excellent adventure:

There’s incredibly little to say on this one, after reading a 4chan thread on games development i downloaded GM:S, tried making a platformer, saw my art, didn’t see any progress after trying a little bit, and gave up.

Mugman:

Mugman was the first time i tried making an adventure game, other than the main character, i had no ideas for the game and dropped it like a rock.

Radiation Seat:

Radiation Seat, for the more dedicated gamers in the audience, is just a synonym for nuclear throne, i tried messing around with random generation in GM:S, realised i’m not very good at coding and gave up, the game actually kinda works though, so theoretically if i’m a moron/psychopath i could try working on it again.

Asterodis:

First real game i ever made, it’s an asteroids clone, but with a bunch of the stuff i saw in Vlambeer’s game feel talks crammed in, it’s essentially idenitcal to a tutorial on youtube except shooting takes away points and there’s a limit to the number of bullets on screen.

Poltergeist (Aka: Ghostman when he was a person)

I posted a lot about Poltergeist (the version of ghostman with good art and a completely different setting), the secret to this was having a good artist, Robert Thomas helping me out, we never finished it, and Bobby got caught up in school work, but that’s almost over so if he’s willing to pick up the pen again, i’m willing to do the coding and fix the reall weird bugs (randomly the game would massively lag for a reason i never figured out, i assume it had something to do with the way AGS handles characters over non walkable areas)

Grall and Foegart goto whitecastle:

I’d had the idea of wanting to make a high fantasy adventure game after reading a couple of discworld novels, these games didn’t get far, but it did have an interesting character switching mechnic similar to DOTT, this also appeared in a couple of other half finished games i’d made, why i thought it’d be funny to make a game based on it when i’d never seen Harold and Kumar go to whitecastle? Iunno.

H.E.L.L:

H.E.L.L (Hyper Energetive Love Lab) was a shot at making a VN, i’m probably going to still do this, so i don’t know if putting here’s sensible but eh, fuck it, i’d had the idea of a reality show crossed with a death game for ages, and tried writing a short story about it, which went nowhere.

Gender Girl:

Gender Girl was the first video game i ever made, it was a scratch program with the cat repainted to be pink, moving left killed you by a spike, moving right displayed a message that gender girl had liberated herself (Hohoho, very ludonarratively insync, 12 year old me), i uploaded it to the scratch website, and it, containing swear words(such a rebel was i) it was deleted 5 seconds after publication, truly, a light gone from the world, what did it have to do with gender? If i remember literally nothing, or you were supposed to cut your dick off with the spikes.

Yeah.

PAGAN:

Pagan was a pokemon rip off i was making, i didn’t get far beyond changing sprites and types, world design is hard, as of writing it’s still on my site, i ought to take it down buti just don’t have the heart, poor Pagan.

BORB (Ghostman 1)

Borb, as it’s affectionatly called in the files, is ghostman 1, it’s the source of the Alien King sprite, and the Ghostman sprite used in Ghostman: The council calamity, and was distributed amongst my friends for like, 5 seconds, it’s 4 screens and one “Puzzle”, which doesn’t actually work because the last time i did work on it, it’s fun to see how my humour changed, in GM1 we’ve got the classic line “It’s locked up tighter than a jewish bank” and a character named Snil, whose ribbing snarky asshole persona was basically every persona i used to write until i started playing dnd with my friends, and had to make more than 1 character, i don’t really like anything about GM1, but i find it oddly charming, it’s terrible perspective and total lack of story or theme (You’re kidnapped by bandits and the game ends in leaving on a spaceship having never seen a single bandit.) just makes it like lenny from of mice and men, it probably should die, but i can’t help shooting a game that thought the way to add taste was to remove the words “Fuck off” from a wall.

Rebet:

Rebet’s the first time we see the actual character “Rebut” appear, in some weird tron like backround, i remember wanting to make something that looked like tron, and failing, other than that Rebet remains a total mystery, even to me, andi made the fucking thing, looking at the code, i remember a little bit more about the game, the main gimmick was having a variety of ray guns that could effect peoples emotion, the example in the tutorial was a “calming ray” to prevent a drill seargeant from screaming at you, this didn’t go anywhere.

Wing Wang:

This is literally an empty ags game, there’s nothing in it, i don’t know why i haven’t deleted it.

Ye Men of Valour:

Ye Men of Valour was a weird idea, i’d read a book called “The decline and fall of the British Empire” (Based upon the work, the decline and fall of the roman empire) and decided to make a game based upon a variety of British figures from across time entering into a house they must escape, only to be killed by Aliens, the goal of the game was to get players to reload the game with the knowledge that following the puzzles as they were laid out would kill them, and use a different method to escape, Ye Men of Valour really ended up going nowhere because i was in a pretty dark place and wasn’t motivated, like at all, i’m gonna put this in the “Might come back to it” pile.

Ghostman 2:

Ghostman 2, like Grall and Foegart, had a character switching thing, this ended up breaking the game, so i scrapped it, Ghostman 2 was when the idea of Ghostman being a space adventure comes from, following from Ghostman 1, where you leave on a ufo with an alien, it’s what i thought would happen next, if i remember there was literally no story, just the characters, and switching gimmick.

I.A.C.M

I.A.C.M was a project i worked on with Bobby very breifly, the idea was to make an adventure game set inside a mentally disturbed girls mind, this basically didn’t pan out due to AGS engine limitations, the sprites sent in were too big and ended up looking kind of lame squashed down.

You cannot name this file, insect.:

This wasn’t a game, this was shit poetry at a time in my life where i knew my poetry was godawful, there was no story here, just a Shodan like figure who’d insult me, like personally, i’d write insults about myself into a script and then play it.

Robot Initation:

Adventure game, starring “some random guy named mike”, drew the first character sprites, hated them, didn’t want to improve them, gave up.

Assault and Battery/BatteryMan:

This was a go at 3d platformers made in unity, fell apart because the models i’d made in blender weren’t done properly at all, breaking practically everything.

PirateTextAdventure(ActualTitle):

Sounds exactly like what it is, never got a single line down for this.

Shield Slide:

A rip off of free ski based on the idea of riding a shield i think i saw i a lotr movie? Never got to prototype.

AAAH!

AAAH (Aimless aeronautical adveture, huzzah!) was an experiment i wanted to make, an adventure game that was procedudrely generated, every game would involve a one minute timer, which upon reaching zero, would result in the player dying, the story was the player had just survived a plane colliding with another plane in midair, and had to find a way to live without a parachute just using debris, lessons learned: Random generation is hard, i also ripped off the title from AAAAAAAAAAAAh for the awesome.

Sweet Goodnight:

Sweet goodnight was an rpg i planned to make about dying alone in a spaceship, it never got far beyond idle doodles and some game design docs that i’ve since lost, may go back to this in future.

Spaceman and Woodboy:

A mario and luigi superstar saga ripoff, never got to properly playable state, GM:S is hard.

Quest of Halden:

Shit rpg.

Ghostman: CNC :

Ghostman: CNC (Caverns and creatures) was a weird idea, i wanted to make an Rpg based on my dnd campaign, but for some reason i felt the need to justify it with a weird ghostman shell, may go back to this one.

Legend of Negro:

I don’t know why the fuck this is on my computer, i tried pissing around with a legend of zelda game maker thing.

Generic Units:

Supposed to be an xcom like, fell apart.

Airman/Pacifist run:

Something i still want to do, an fps with non violent weapons and stage hazards that you have to use to defeat enemies, got as far as modeling a single gun.

Sepsis man:

A 3d platformer starring a drinks machine, modeled main character, gave up.

Slime Game (actual title, again.)

Slime game (Or Slime Quest) was going to be an incredibly clever subversive take on the Rpg genre by having the grand villain actually be a low level mook, think cave rats and dungeon bosses, that kind of thing, stopped making it because i thought “Woah, that’s dumb, and lame, and i really don’t like making art for ideas that are dumb and lame!”

Zug’s Glorious road trip for the glory of the party and wealth of the nation:

ZGRTFTGOTPAWOTN for short, this was a text adventure based on wormhole shenanigans and Soviet propaganda films, never really got that far, fun little fact, Zug’s the name of the alien in my twitter profile pic.

Ghostman: The council calamity:

I didn’t quit, i made the game.

THANK GOD FOR THAT.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S1 Ep28: Bakura Can Still Kill Everyone If He Really Wanted To

First off--my apostrophes work again! Many thanks to the tumblr staff who helped out and will never see this post. Now I can update without looking like my computer is encrypting itself as I go.

So guys, I’m all about weird TV and weird movies. I watched the entirety of Color of Pomegranates. I just want you to know that because when I say that “wow this got weird real fast” we are going by my metrics. It’s not as weird as Color of Pomegranates, because well...it has a plot that isn’t under four layers of symbolism and esoteric Armenian poetry, but whenever we have a Bakura episode, stuff just gets UNEXPECTED.

But first, the most wonderful thing has happened:

I mean kind of a weird choice to put some of these things together, but this was about .5 seconds of screen time, I’m just special and can pause to realllllly take it in. Mm.

(Read more under the cut for EVEN MORE FOOD)

Man!

MAN!

What did I do to deserve all this good anime food in the same episode as Bakura doing something completely nuts (again)?

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and we have to go back to cards, which for some reason is still the crux of this show...I think. This is still a show about cards, right? I’m no longer completely sure.

At the start of the season, Yugi was gifted these two cards as entrance tickets to the Island of Regret where they are now hanging out. These cards are how you collect your prizes if you win. The one with money is the prize of 3 million (or is it 300 million? It’s been a while since I’ve heard the number). The blank one is the chance to beat Pegasus. I assume your soul will go in the blank one after he beats you.

Youknow, it’s really a shame we never got to see the stats on Grandpa, Mokuba, and Seto cards. I don’t think they even had any. I mean, when Bakura turned his friends into cards, at least they had stats.

Anyways, some of our contestants have suddenly remembered that they actually have no right to this contest.

But, turns out Pegasus also has an interest in anime food, so he’s done something a little extra for...some reason.

DEAR LORD. I mean it’s not a real eyeball but think about the eye grease for a moment. Firstly, I don’t even know if you have to grease up a false eyeball and I want to look it up but I am too afraid. Secondly, now my mind is thinking of every unctuous substance that may or may not grease up a false eyeball. It does not pair well with pumpkin soup.

There’s eyeballs...in the soup...

This is when you go home. This is when you say “sorry Gramps, but...I am pretty sure that guy is a cannibal, I gotta goooooo.”

I mean, again, it’s not a real eyeball but freakin A are they having a weird halloween dinner party? Why would you do this? Why would you EVER put your own eyeball facsimiles in the soup? Is it like “eat my ass” but “eat my eyes” ?

Pegasus doesn’t get many guests and I can start to see why Kaiba hated him so damn much. Can you imagine working with this guy on a daily basis as the head of a large corporation while constantly getting pranked with his weird ass eyeballs?

Does it say “I open at the close?”

Why did they do -- what?!

This was all about a stupid bracket? What the hell, Yugioh?

The boys decide to throw caution to the wind about what may or may not be in this bizarre dinner that not even Pegasus wants to eat and they fully gorge themselves and get a real good food baby belly going.

I guess Yugi didn’t really eat because he is fully alert and his empty beacon eyes are still one of the most spooky things on this show.

Yugi decides to hand off his card to Joey right in the view of Bandit Keith, and Joey only takes it when Yugi convinces him that now they’d have twice the chance to beat Pegasus. I mean, not really, actually, but it was still a nice thing to say. Yugi is a kid of sooo many good intentions.

Mai goes to bed and says this actual line from the show.

Despite the fact that she’s so acidic about...eh...75% of the time, she really is the nicest person they have met on this horrible, terrible island. In fact, everyone is ready to tuck in to the most clearly haunted murder castle as if eyeballs weren’t just hanging out in their soup. What a bizarre heartwarming round of goodnights, as if there wasn’t clearly several people out to very much kill them living in the same castle as them.

This is how Agatha Christie novels start.

This episode does not actually dive into Joey’s gigantic donut dream, which is a shame.

Because this episode, it’s time for our B-team to shine.

I love the implication here that Tristan first knocked on Bakura’s door, woke him up with this and then Bakura clearly answered along the lines of “Bollucks, Tristan, I am not doing this right now” to which, Brakura dragged him down to Tea’s door in the hope that Tea would be at all reasonable.

Which backfired him in a major way because Tea and Tristan are desperate to chase some snipes and prove themselves useful.

I honestly can’t tell if Bakura even likes these guys. I mean, I get that they’re school friends but, this guy was introduced as totally murdering them and then getting magically “cured” with the same cure that failed on Seto Kaiba. The fact that this meek little fake-british accent can get so easily snowplowed by Tea and Tristan is never clearly just an act or just him getting snowplowed.

But, apparently there’s some part of him that is still that tiny little nice-side-of-Bakura, so dutifully, he decides to babysit, since the only other psychic they got around is currently having an eyeball-soup induced dream.

Back at the dueling arena, Tea decides to stand guard/do nothing as usual.

Tristan reveals why he has a grudge against Psychics.

Tristan’s character is pretty flat. It basically revolves around mothering everyone elses problems and pining about Serenity who is barely a character on this show. I always figured that Tristan was at least smarter than Joey and Yugi, who can be kind of...dumb, but it turns out Tristan is just as empty between the ears.

He gets completely fascinated by a beam of light shining through a window. Forget looking for cameras. Forget the fact that this room was full of Pegasus’ mooks, some of which were standing right behind Kaiba. Na. He’s gonna Sherlock Holmes straight to this window.

During Bakura’s desperate pleas to get these two assholes back to bed, Yugi is getting some crazy as hell conspiracy theories from Grandpa.

Oh, so he’s like a normal grandpa then? Once my Grandma told me that the entirety of San Fransisco would fall into the ocean during an Earthquake and she was EXTREMELY concerned about my safety (despite the fact I live inland, not in San Fransisco), so this dream Yugi’s having sounds like a pretty average dinner conversation with your Grandparents.

No one expects Bakura, not even the colorist.

And then for some reason they want Tea to go first in their climb up the tower although no reasonable girl in a mini skirt would do this in front of two boys.

Isn’t she a freakin dancer? Maybe she’s not as strong as Tristan but she’s certainly the best balanced of the two and could climb way easier because she’s lighter. And Bakura is clearly the weakest but, whatever.

Back in dreamland, Yugi’s grandpa join’s up with the other cards in card hell as if they’re some sort of Grandfather, asshole son, and ghost child card hell trinity

Oh yeah, I nearly forgot I was watching an anime for a second. Nothing like devilish blue fire to make you remember oh yeah, that’s a fine anime fire choice.

But rather than dwell too much on that artistic direction of blue fire, lets see if anything at all was inside of the red herring tower.

They’ve been slipping a picture of this chick all over the place. I’m surprised it took until now, when she’s like 15 feet tall, for them to finally notice “Hey maybe there’s something up with this random chick who is clearly a dead person Pegasus was close to”

Now I gotta get a little art nerdy on you for a moment because this storyboarder is really good at sneaking in people’s reactions right near the focal point without making them the focal point. This whole framing of Bakura’s tired face happens so quickly and I just want to spend a little moment for us to appreciate our storyboarder’s sense of humor.

Now, somehow. SOMEHOW things are going to get weirder.

Because with all this dream sequence stuff happening this looks like it’s a dream but I’m going to come out and say no, this is actually happening. They have, indeed, fallen into some tomb under the castle covered in Egyptian murals and people are chanting about sacrificing souls as offerings.

This happens SO QUICKLY.

THE HELL????

Like remember when I was like “How did all these skeletons get here? what’s up with these skeletons?” I didn’t actually really want them to tie up those loose ends but here we are.

So this has been going on this entire time!? For the past 28 episodes? When Kaiba was like “man Pegasus is the worst!” He didn’t feel like bringing up the crazy killer cult that was living under the island?

And to top it off, Bakura already knows what’s going down. He knows and is quickly getting more and more urgent to get away.

Oh, and PS, The cards we’ve been using these past 28 episodes are now giant stone tablets. Bakura mentioned once that the millennium ring was supposed to work alongside Duel Monsters. And he was like “but duel monsters is like ten years old so whatever” but it turns out that was a complete lie because there’s an ancient version that uses 10 foot tall tablets instead of cards. Their decks would be like 6000 lbs.

Also you die at the end of Ancient Duel Monsters, that part is different, too.

I have so many questions.

I mean you find out when you’re a kid that Ring around the rosies was actually about people dying of the plague and go “eh that’s sad” but it’s nothing like Ring around the Rosies killed people and made serial murderers into magical evil psychics.

I mean it’s never actually said, but there’s enough evidence here that I’d like to think Yugi was sleep running all over the castle during half this episode saying “grandpaaaazzzs” while Bandit Keith was like “OMG are any of them going to go to bed so I can finally steal their stuff?”

But back to the stuff that is actually not a dream and definitely happening. Pegasus pulls back his hood and decides to give them a quick Q and A before he outright kills them.

And so, Bakura, who has been playing dumb for...I dunno, 10+ episodes, who has been doing nothing spectacular and who has been clumsy and sort of a space cadet finally reveals that “yeah, that mind wipe did literally nothing, I’m a still an evil son of a bitch”

And they have a...shine off. Or something. It’s very hard to look directly at.

Thing is, from what we’ve learned, Pegasus is super duper powerful because he’s been killing people under here for many, many years. Every time he does a murder, his power grows. Which means...Bakura should be at a loss since he’s like 12 and...how many people can a 12 year old really murder?

Says a lot about your relationship if you can’t take 2 steps forward without getting Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind-ed 4 steps right back where you started.

Welp that’s it, guys! that’s Season 1! Bakura did it! He beat Pegasus! Why Bakura decided to retcon the REAL ending of Season 1 and just put everyone (including the villain) back as if it never happened is a little weird, but hey--at least I got through it. I did it. I recapped all of Yugioh Season 1. I’m proud of me!

Bakura will go back to playing dumb probably for another 10-15 episodes until he can steal that eyeball off of Pegasus. Apparently there wasn’t a good enough opportunity for eyeball theft when he was doing the weird laser show thing.

I assume somewhere, Pegasus is also sitting on his bed in his day clothes and thinking “the hell just happened?” but rather than look at one of his zillions of security cameras is like “well, that’s psychics!”

I’d like to think that Bandit Keith saw Bakura dragging Tea and Tristan’s bodies down the hall and they just nodded at eachother like “crazy evening, amiright?”

Also, a lot of this episode would have been different if any of these people locked their own doors. Like this, for instance, wouldn’t have been able to happen.

Then five minutes later the sun rose.

I mean it’s the only explanation for all the nuts stuff that went down last night.

Next week, on Yugioh:

Will Pegasus have a splitting headache for all of tomorrow and be wearing sunglasses the whole time? Will Pharaoh reveal that in his time off he got really into All My Children? Will they seriously go the third day without washing their clothes? These kids must SMELL.

The hell just HAPPENED?

[tumblunni]

Ok just... just... GIVE ME A SECOND to talk about the spoilery monster rancher stuffs, okay? Why THAT ENDING hurt so much but also fit so well with the rest of it, and why the third season kinda sucked so much despite being the continuation we all desperately craved. And why its still gonna have a place in everyone’s hearts, even the haters, JUST because it gave a conclusion to THAT FUCKING ENDING! I dont care if people say it would be more deep or whatever to leave on the downer cliffhanger, I still think it SHOULD have had a third season, just that it should have been better. Or I mean... maybe it would have worked better as a movie or a short ten episode season or something. Just there should have been SOME sequel to that ending, but a very very lighthearted season about a goofy tournement kinda wasnt what it should have been.

OKAY THE ENDING THE SEASON 2 ENDING the giant and damn awesome subversion of everything about the genre, which fit so well with everything else the show ever did, GAHHH Like.. there were SO MANY subversions and just interesting detailed twists on common ‘mon show’ tropes. One of the earliest episodes begins with an asshole trainer treating his Worm monster the same way a lot of people honestly might do while min-maxing in one of these videogames. He’s disgustingly abusive and feels like he’s justified because he’s making his monster stronger, and that’s all that it’s good for. And the show establishes its tearjerker tone early on by having this guy only repent after his horribly abused monster sacrifices itself to save him from the baddies, even after how badly he’d treated it. And he’s begging apologies to its dead disc stone, while it’s too late to do anything about it. But the show STILL gives him a chance at redemption, because our heroes trust him to raise a new newborn Worm, and to do it right. That’s just... what the show is. It went really REALLY dark, but it did this with this kind of determined optimism! And even the funnier episodes could have high stakes, and there was always the reminder that we were living in this dystopia and just trying to keep our smiles during it, because otherwise how can we change it?

And thats why season 3 fumbled by like.. not introducing its stakes early enough. Or.. at all. it was good that they finally introduced some good comic relief villains and generally villains with more motivations and backstory, but it combined badly with the no-intial-high-stakes thing to give a season that just felt way too happy. In a show that certainly had happiness in it before, but I mean it never felt hollow?? It kinda felt disrespectful to follow up a super depressing cliffhanger with such a badly explained and rushed flip back to the status quo, and then such a sparse plot with so few incentives to keep watching. Its only initial good point was that it resolved the cliffhanger AT ALL, but it could have done it WELL, and also established a new reason to wanna watch the show now the one big huge main plot has been resolved. Following up after the bad guy is defeated is always a hard thing, you cant just put no effort into it... Tho I feel bad even saying that, cos seriously season 3′s villains were the best part. They just might have fit better in season 1, or just if the plot kept up the slack surrounding them...

BUT YEAH JUST THE SUBVERSIONS!! I could fuckin ramble forever about how great they were! Seriously it was just THE BEST ‘ending’ to a ‘stuck in another world’ story, ever! Having the main kid finally get back home, but at the ABSOLUTE WORST MOMENT, after all his friends have sacrificed themself to save that world and he’s the only one left alive. And he doesnt even get enough time to process the shock, he barely even sees the rescued world before he just wakes up home as if nothing happened. And he’s stuck feeling like he can’t adjust to being part of this world anymore, and he’s mourning people he can’t even talk to anyone about. Imagine how worried his parents must have been when he became depressed seemingly overnight and refuses to tell them why! And then it just ends on him crying in the rain and the ghosts of his friends trying to motivate him to get back up and find a reason to live again. That was ONE HELL of a cliffhanger, yo! So yeah OF COURSE people were cheering for a new season, but also OF COURSE that new season would fail if it insufficiently followed up on the emotional impact of the cliffhanger and then had a bazillion episodes of barely anything emotional ever happening again, when the first series had you crying your eyes out as early as episode 4...

oh and like DEAR GOD all the OTHER really good subversiony episode plots aaaaa like even down to little stuff like how genki actually fights alongside his monster pals. And he’s a total badass who does succeed in doing more than most humans could do, but still he’s just a human going against monsters. he knows what he’s doing is rash, but he does it anyway because he cares about his monsters and couldnt just let them die without throwing himself in front of the bullet. And every battle in this show is life or death rebellion against an oppressive regime like that! Random low risk tournement episodes used to be.. like.. FILLER in this series. It was a terrible idea for the entire third season’s plot... And I also loved how the team actually did help people along the way as they journeyed to defeat the baddies, and it wasn’t JUST fighting. They had a whole tearful episode about everyone struggling to hold back a dam that the baddies had sabotaged to wipe a village off the map, and it was INFINATELY MORE INTENSE than half of the things Pokemon has ever done, lol! (not that I dislike pokemon, just the anime in particular is a bit naff) God, how they were all strangers to this village and how they actually had bickering between the team members on whether they should really do this, and all the different ways they tried to save the dam and how they made it way too clear that they were gonna die from friggin holding this thing back with their bare hands. And how they organized the whole town to work themselves to the bone trying to divert the dam, and how a bunch of their attempts failed and they came so close to not having enough time! You had me weeping for the potential deaths of a hundred nameless faceless npcs just from putting me in the shoes of our heroes reacting to it! You made a little kid understand the complexity of civilian casualties in war! And OH MAN, Golem’s backstory! How he was a former war soldier who just shattered mentally after being forced to kill so many other monsters. And he was so gentle at heart, and he sat there guarding this church full of disc stones for god knows how many decades, blaming himself for what happened. Like.. it showed that even when you’re fighting villains, killing still breaks you. Dear GOD, his face when he came back down from his friggin ptsd flashback anger episode saving the heroes from the baddies, and he saw all the dead baddies, and just... you could not talk to that man and tell him that killing was justified just because they were BADDIES. Even if its in self defense, he still has to look at his hands that just murdered people. I’m so damn glad the heroes managed to befriend him and take him away from that place, cos that moment came so close to sending him back to his guilt spiral! If anything, I think that the dub calling them ‘baddies’ actually made all these moments way more effective. The childish terminology makes you think this is gonna be a paint by numbers story, so it hurts more when its anything but! Even in a world with a concept like ‘the bad guy magically turns people into his bad minions’, they still managed to deal with complex grey morality, and that’s one hell of a crowning achievement!

...plus it allowed for a happy ending after all. God, i cried for all those poor minor mooks getting brought back to normal in the end. Honestly, even though it hurt, I would have accepted it ending on all of the hero monsters being dead forever for the sake of bringing back all the dead civilians and brainwashed baddies. Sacrificing yourselves to save so many others! God, this show’s characters are too goddamn pure. AND COMPLEX TOO! man I loved how grumpy and selfish half of the hero cast is, yet they’re still heroes despite it, and god just HOW THEY ALL DIED TOGETHER AND OUR PROTAGONIST IS THE ONLY ONE FORCED TO KEEP ON LIVING that was such a fucking cliffhanger thank you terrible season 3 for fixing it man i can forgive anything you do because you did that baby mocchi lived and ate some mochi cakes and tiger and hare lived to bicker with each other once more and golem could find some peace knowing all the people he saved, even if he might never be free of the guilt of those he failed to save and suezo and holly didnt have to be apart again, he didnt have to end his life finally proving his ‘usefulness’ at the cost of everything else (SERIOUSLY SUEZO LOW SELF CONFIDENCE EPISODES KILL MY HEART) and genki didnt have to have his childhood completely destroyed by his ‘magical adventure’ plot ending on so much of a trope subversion even if still it was good that it happened it was a really fuckin good plot all that suffering just made the happy ending that much happier! GOD I miss this show very much...