#anyway. would i fuck hbomberguy. well-

[ghostcrows]

almost 2 hours into new hbomberguy video and ive started to get distracted by his chest hair

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Clownfall: Endgame - Hello December

I am late writing and posting this, because it's nearly the end of term and I am mega busy (I have leave in two days and I am counting the hours...) BUT some stuff happened last week so let's dig in!

Also quick note before we do: I would like to politely request that you stop tagging this with "England" or "English politics". This is about British politics, not just England, and I am not English. Please do not erase me it takes SO LONG to write these thank you all and goodnight anyway ON WITH THE SHOW

Saturday, 25 November

12.01am

We begin our tale with Oliver Wright of the Times, who reports that … no hang on, wait, I've fucked it, okay. To understand this story, you first need to understand Simon Case.

Simon Case is a civil servant, and current Cabinet Secretary and head of UK Civil Service

He was the highest ranking public official implicated in the Partygate scandal, though he didn’t resign nor was he fined

In the Telegraph’s published WhatsApp messages from Partygate in which Tories all chatted to each other (seriously HOW do those keep getting leaked), Case made fun of holidaymakers stuck in hotel rooms by Covid regulations

In the same messages he also described some opposition to Covid restrictions as “pure Conservative ideology”, which is. An Own Goal

He also described BlowJo as a “nationally distrusted figure” whose isolation rules the public were unlikely to follow, which is true but also the Quiet Part

This information is from Wikipedia, which I’m openly admitting here, so my esteemed colleague hbomberguy can stand down.

Why am I mentioning him! Well. Case was supposed to give evidence to the Covid inquiry in October this year, but didn’t because of medical leave (ironically). In November, he still wasn’t back (should have isolated better, eh, Si), and the inquiry was given private medical information relating to Case (presumably evidence that he’s not just faking it so he doesn't have to be shouted at by angry judges and MPs and that).

So! On Saturday the 25th, eighteen and a half hours before Beep the Meep’s spectacular TV debut, Oliver Wright of the Times reports that Simon Case – uh, before his medical leave - advised Prime Minister Rishi Sunak that he should authorise pre-election talks between the civil service and Labour. Sunak - I suspect obviously - ignored this suggestion, in case it signalled that an election is now imminent.

According to Wright, it’s now questionable whether Case will ever return to his role.

Shame.

Monday, 27 November

2.44pm

House of Commons time! Let's see what our elected representatives are up to.

Tory MP Jill Mortimer says international treaties written 70 years ago "are not fit for purpose" to tackle illegal immigration, so we need to return to the "Deport the browns to Rwanda" plan. Ugh.

2.50pm

The following was reported by Matt Dathan of the Times, so CALL OFF YOUR DOGS hbomberguy.

James Cleverly – the newest Home Secretary, chappie who described another MPs constituency as a shithole in the House of Commons in his second week on the job – says the Rwanda policy isn’t the “be all and end all”.

Robert Jenrick – the Minister of State for Immigration – says the policy is an "extremely important component" of the government's small boats policy.

So! James Cleverly and Robert Jenrick disagree on this matter! Exciting! Hey, Tumblrs, just for fun...

Let’s remember those two names.

2.58pm

Robert Jenrick says boat crossings have been reduced by more than a third in the last year, but that numbers are still unacceptably high.

FUN SELF-STUDY ACTIVITY: Take a moment to form an opinion of Robert Jenrick! It’ll be worth it.

Here is some information to get you started: Jenrick this year ordered some lovely murals of cartoon characters (Mickey Mouse, Tom and Jerry, etc) to be painted over at a children’s asylum centre in Kent. His explicit reason is because he thought they were "too welcoming" for lone refugee children arriving in the UK, and such children should not feel welcome here.

Have you formed your opinion yet? Then I'll continue.

8.13pm

Rishi Sunak cancels a meeting with the Greek Prime Minister in a row over the Elgin Marbles.

Uh, there's a lot going on here - this is about the stolen marble frescoes that should be in the Parthenon in Athens, that gross British thief Lord Elgin stole decades ago and plonked into the British Museum. Greece has been asking for them back ever since, but a small handful of old white men who are in charge of the British Museum don't want to give them back and keep stating that Greece wouldn't look after them properly, which is a hell of a claim given that Elgin literally broke one when he nicked them, and also, he fucking stole them. Anyway, it turns out to the surprise of no one that Sunak also doesn't think we should give them back, and so when the matter was raised in an Anglo-Greek meeting recently Sunak literally walked out of it, even though the meeting was actually about something else.

So HERE HE IS refusing to do any diplomacy with Greece now i.e. his actual fucking job.

This is a big deal for the immigration-obsessed though! According to a Labour source, Greece is an essential ally for any agreement on illegal migration.

And even the Prime Minister’s supporters think he’s got this one wrong.

Wednesday, 29 November

Prime Minister’s Questions!

This is the (televised) point in the week where the PM has to appear in the Commons and be grilled by anyone who wants to put the boot in about anything at all. Keir Starmer decides today is the day to do some actual opposition, pushes Sunak on several fronts, and pretty much everyone reckons this is Starmer’s best ever performance at PMQs. People especially enjoy Starmer calling Rishi the “man with the reverse Midas touch”.

This is not, strictly speaking, actually funny. But it's political humour, which is like office humour. It doesn't actually have to be.

12.22pm

A former cabinet member tells the press that the Greek government are furious at Sunak’s snub. Uh oh!

Thursday, 30 November

Disgraced former Secretary of State for Health and all round human 1950s meat blancmange Matt Hancock talks to the Covid inquiry today. Specifically, to explain why he, the then-Secretary of State for Health, led the government so badly in the pandemic that we developed the second highest death rate in the world. To hear him tell it, he was an underdog hero doing his best to fight a toxic culture at Whitehall to get the pandemic handled responsibly.

The only problem with this is that it is contradicted by everyone else’s accounts.

He is called a “proven liar” who was “unfit for the job” by proven liar and unfit for his job Dominic Cummings. Former civil servant Helen MacNamara says Hancock displayed “nuclear levels” of overconfidence and said lots of things that later turned out to be untrue. Sadly for HandCock, he said these things to cameras that were recording him onto the telly, and so we do actually know.

Monday, 4 December

Keir Starmer talked about the economy today. He won’t rule out cutting public services, and it looks like he’s trying to tell disenfranchised Tory voters to jump ship to Labour.

Hope it’s a bluff! Very depressing if he’s serious. This is nowhere near as much fun as Tories being humiliated.

21.47pm

GOOD NEWS EVERYONE!

(This is from the Mirror, you can’t destory me on your YouTube.)

Labour MP Diana Johnson proposes an amendment to the Victims and Prisoners Bill to compensate thousands of patients infected with HIV and hepatitis C through contaminated blood products in the 70s and 80s, to the tune of billions of pounds.

And it WON!  Narrowly – 246 votes to 242.  A huge deal, because that includes 23 Tory backbenchers.  That is very bad for Rishi Sunak. He he he.

Tory MP Edward Argar had tried to sort this in adance, by saying the government would provide their own similar amendment to the bill.  Basically, he realised this was a controversial bill for the party, and wanted to present a version that could be a Tory victory rather than a Labour victory and Tory humiliation.

Didn’t work.

And neither did a THREE LINE WHIP for Tory MPs to vote against the Labour plan?!?? YES KIDS YOU READ THAT RIGHT Sunak didn't want people infected with HIV and hepatitis C through contaminated blood products in the 70s and 80s to receive compensation in case it made him look bad, so he imposed a three line whip to force Tories to vote against it.

And 23 of them rebelled.

And now he looks even worse.

Lol.

Tuesday, 5 December

Have you done your homework, Tumblrs? Have you remembered those names? Have you formed an opinion?

7.38am

Home Office minister and children's cartoon hater Robert Jenrick is interviewed on Sky News.  It’s ugly stuff.  He refers to small boats “[breaking] in” to the UK.  He insists asylum seekers WILL start being deported to Rwanda before the next General Election.  And generally does big talk about cutting immigration.

What a hero.

1.27pm

James Cleverly is in Rwandan capital Kigali, as the UK signs a new treaty designed to help score the Supreme Court’s approval for the Rwanda plan.

1.40pm

So!

Cleverly’s doing pretty much what he said he’d do.  He’s trying to legislate to make the Rwanda plan safer, rather than try to disapply human rights treaties. This, of course, is the Sensible Plan, if your plan is still to get people killed, but you want it to actually succeed.

But former Home Secretary Cruella Braverman is driving a load of Tories to push to disapply human rights obligations – and she’s joined in this by Robert Jenrick!!!!

That’s RIGHT!  Hope you remembered his name, because now he’s a VILLAIN!  Or, well, more of one, and in a more immediate way. After disagreeing with Cleverly in the commons on 27 November, he’s joined Team Suella.  Tonight he’ll be part of a meeting between three different right-wing groupings...

1.46pm

The new treaty guarantees that, if these plans go ahead, asylum seekers won’t be returned to countries where their lives or freedom are threatened, and creates a requirement for an independent monitoring committee.

This treaty would be great if we lived in a world where the Supreme Court trusted the Rwandan government to honour treaty obligations.  But we live in the world where NOT having this trust was part of the reason the Supreme Court ruled the plans unlawful.

Even if this wasn’t the case, we still need new legislation, and that’ll be way more controversial than this new treaty.  The legislation was said to be ready by Thursday, which is a very short turnaround that only a lunatic would believe, but in a SHOCK DISAPPOINTING U-TURN the government now refuses to commit to this.

In any case...

This is causing cracks in the Tory party.

10.33pm

The Parliament's Christmas tree lights are turned on! 

It goes as well as anything else in Parliament:

A visual representation of the Tory Party schism.

Wednesday, 6 December

8.21am

Boris Johnson arrives at the covid inquiry.  He will be questioned for two days.

He he he

10.26am

Johnson is asked why around 5,000 WhatsApp messages were lost on his phone from January to June 2020.

Steffan made this brilliant meme. Please do not grass me up to hbomberman.

11.33am

It’s clear by now that Johnson wasn’t alert to the danger of covid by February 2020.  Johnson says it wasn’t declared a pandemic by WTO yet, and he wasn’t asked about it in PMQs. Gosh! What a good point, maybe!

Until the KC points out a troubling fact: “You were the Prime Minister.”

Ah. Yes. PMQs are irrelevant, you see – the Prime Minister is allowed information that the opposition aren’t. 

And, indeed, he probably would have had, if he'd actually attended the five Cobra meetings about it that would have briefed him on it just as the virus was being discovered.

12.49pm

2.24pm

I’m skipping most of this stuff, since it’s normal lies and non-specific apologies from BJ.

But this one’s interesting.  Matt HandCock claimed he told Johnson on 13 March to call a lockdown.  There’s no written evidence of this happening.  Johnson outright contradicts it.

Lol

5.43pm

Cruella Braverman rejects Sunak’s Rwanda bill.  It fails the five tests she claimed his bill would need to pass.

These are tests she made up and published in a newspaper, I should stress, like they don't exist and she is not an authority. This is a bit like if I marched into your house, dear reader, and went "You are not allowed to celebrate the holidays this year because I personally said you have to pass my tests first and you haven't", and I'm pretty sure if I tried that you would drop me in a bin and laugh at me.

But, she has many supporters on the Tory right...

5.48pm

The Sun’s political correspondent says that if the Lords try to block emergency legislation, some Tory MPs reckon Sunak should call an election, fighting on Rwanda.

I desperately want this.  I DESPERATELY want this. They’ll lose that election so badly. SO badly. God, likes charge reblogs cast.

6.53pm

The villain Robert Jenrick … RESIGNS!

Oh no!  This is not good news if you’re the Prime Minister.

Fucking fantastic for the rest of us, though

7.26pm

Jenrick publishes his resignation letter on Twitter.  It’s two pages long, claiming the PM’s Rwanda plan basically won’t work.

Jenrick’s not wrong about that, but I speak as someone who doesn’t want any version of the Rwanda plan – not the monstrous Sunak one, and certainly not the hypermonstrous Braverman one. Good. Thanks for confirming, Darth Bell-end.

8.31pm

I enjoyed this tweet.

8.52pm

Sunak writes back to Jenrick, claiming the new plan WILL work.

Which is not normally what happens?!? Normally they yell about their current madness in a letter, publish it on Twitter because no one else cares or will agree, and get roundly ignored. But, desperate times! Here, Sunak’s challenge is to try to win over the Tories who don’t believe in his ability to deliver the plan.  It’s a big ask.

So what are we left with?

10.37pm

A senior figure on the Tory right is asked whether their side will kill Sunak’s bill. 

And they’re not sure! If it’s the only offer on the table, it seems sensible to vote for it. 

BUT the right wing of the Tories aren’t famously very sensible.  They’ll probably try and add amendments at the very least, but it’s genuinely possible they’ll reject it out of spite, because they are LUNATICS.  Or as a political move to weaken Sunak.

And that's what you missed in the Tory Civil War!

(Up to last week)

[lgbtlunaverse]

I honestly truly don't want to hear a single word about James Somerton in my life ever again. And I mean that in an "all of you need to stop talking about him right now and forever" way.

Every single time I've heard about him doing anything in the past weeks I've just thought "Please James for the love of all fuck log off for your own good" because I know the internet well enough to realize that despite Hbomberguy's very insistent request to please not fucking harass the guy, people would anyway.

I don't know what he thought he was trying to save, because there wasn't anything to save anymore. Every second online was just another second exposing himself to the worst part of the online audience that will completely ignore any request to not harass people.

And I do think that was worsened by the fact that a way larger chunk of people, who wouldn't ever send someone death threats themselves, do openly take a voyeuristic pleasure in watching someone's life get ruined as long as they've done something wrong enough to "deserve" it. Like. I noticed the shift in response to the plagiarism video going from anger to glee at watching someone get their comeuppance pretty quickly.

I'm not saying if you dunked on James recently you drove him to commit suicide. Besides the fact that we don't even know if he actually did it yet, I know what schadenfreude is and I'm certainly not immune to it. And trying to find a new bad guy to blame is the exact opposite what I want to do. I am saying that you should take this as a sign to stop posting. Because what did it do, exactly? Do you think any of the plagiarized writers feel better watching this happen? Do you think Hbomberguy does? Hell, as part of the audience, do you feel good right now? I don't.

I hope James is alive. I hope he never logs on again. And I think that even if he does he shouldn't find a single soul talking about him. I'm serious. Even in the most egg-on-my-face scenario where all of this was a complete fabrication, which isn't out of the question, and which I honestly hope is the case: stop giving him attention. He's never gonna have an online career again, and he shouldn't. You don't need to keep dunking to ensure that. All you need to do is ignore him completely.

[zombiepedia]

it's a shame that the hbomberguy video has more views than these two video essays about pathologic. "bla bla bla don't pit two bad bitches against each other" well honestly i watched codex entry's videos first ages ago, then hbomberguy's, and codex entry's RUINED his for me. these videos are so fucking in depth, so fucking well done, and take the exact same tone (as in it's a play, even these video essays are treated like theatre) as pathologic would as a video essay. the girl behind everything has a theatre degree and It Shows. quality voice acting, genuinely valuable insight into the bachelor's character that maintains both a critical and symapthetic lens (which I feel hbomberguy's video lacks in favor of taking cheap shots at him), and an in depth look at EVERY aspect of the BACHELOR'S ROUTE. (edited as some random hbomberguy fanatic who can't use tags to save their life found this untagged post and wanted me to be more specific as she doesn't cover the haruspex or changeling route) ANYWAY these are the videos that deserve millions and millions of views. i literally cannot sing their praises enough. i have never watched better video essays

[zapsoda]

hullo love. as i may quote les mis, Tell me quickly what's the story / Who saw what and why and where / Let him give a full description / Let him answer to Javert!, what is going on with the essayists/hbomberguy/plagiatists? im not familiar with that side of usamerican youtube game but im all for the tea

so hbomberguy is a youtube man (i am not an avid viewer but he is leftish and makes long video essays so hes PRETTY popular on here) the other day he dropped a long ass video about plagiarism on youtube, totally pwning an assortment of youtubers ranging in popularity.

among them, the most notable are illuminaughti, internet historian, and james somerton.

illuminaughti is/was a youtuber who would shift from popular topic to popular topic for clout. eventually she landed on video essays which she would churn out on the regs

she was/still is in a contraversy which started because she accused another youtuber of "stealing" her "editing style," because HIS editor asked HER editor how to do some fucking generic video effects. this, obviously, was stupid.

hbomberguy took the opportunity on twitter to point out her directly lifting words from a documentary she based one of her own videos on, without direct credit (it was just a fucking link to the documentary in a google doc in the description), thus making it appear as if those were her own words.

then, her former friends started calling her out for weird vindictive shit behind the scenes, but its 3 peoples word against hers and not interesting enough to be anyone elses business.

anyways, hbomberguy covered all her plagiarism stuff (she has done this several times lol) in further detail within the video.

the next one was internet historian.

you might have heard of him, he makes videos i think. (i am... less familiar with him lmao.) i think hes known for his distinct matpat-esque animation style and his collabs, making him pretty well respected among youtubers i think?

so he made a video called "man in cave" which was VERY popular. he went all out with the animation and told a vivid tale of a certain man who got trapped in a cave.

suddenly though, this VERY popular video disappeared without a trace. it had seemingly been taken down for youtube copyright reasons... as you can imagine this is very vague, and Usually when this happens its over some complete and utter bullshit, so people were inclined to side with him, yet, strangely, he made no efforts to rectify this "mistake" on youtubes part.... hm....

later, he silently reuploads it, unlisted. yet. somethings different.... this isnt quite the same video. the language has been changed in many places, the writing is significantly worse. some bits have been cut entirely. and in the description, he thanks a certain mentalfloss article written by lucas reilly for "inspiring" him....

upon a cursory look through the article, something becomes readily apparent. the structure of the youtube video, an hour by hour retelling- the vivid descriptions which made the original video what it was, they all originated in this article published years ago.

i cannot relay this without mentioning how much worse internet historians writing was despite it being stolen. see, he would embellish and change certain things to make it less blatantly obvious he was lifting the whole thing (including... facts about the story.... lmao) and he would do so BADLY. very badly.

hbomberguy went into FAR more depth about this, even doing side by side comparisons of the article to his video with animations pointing out the bits he altered.

but the video wasnt really about any of those people, they were just setting the stage. they were giving you a taste of plagiarism in action, how and why people do it, and how they try to cover it.

by far, the main event was a gay youtuber who talks about gay things by the name of james somerton.

im actually only like halfway through his section lol.

it seems to me that he plagiarizes every aspect of his videos, like he googles the topics he wants to talk about, finds an article, and then reads that but changes the words here and there.

the only original words in his videos that ive seen were REALLY odd transphobia and misogyny that he would pepper in or go off in tangents about. he misgendered two trans writers (Rebecca Sugar and ND Stevenson) and called becky abertelli straight, specifically calling them straight women writing about their cutesy idealized version of gay mens lives. actually fucking identical to the shit open transphobes say about transmasculine people.

whats worse is becky abertelli CAME OUT because she was forced to by people harrassing, doxing, and threatening her for the crime of being a closeted woman writing about gay characters!

after being called out multiple times (and sending his fans after the individuals calmly addressing his plagiarism) he started OCCASIONALLY using credit in the descriptions, or saying he "based" his work on theirs.

he doesnt do this when he thinks he can get away with it though

hbomberguy does these incredible visuals dividing up transcripts of james videos based on where each section was lifted from

thats as far as ive gotten anyways!!

[weaselbeaselpants]

How and why Lily is a bad fan and an even worse critic

I want to get this rant thing over and done with as it's not about Lily Orchard being an actual depolorable person, just more rants about her bad takes and bad criticisms;

In case you didn't know, Poppy and Zena of TransGirlTherapy have interviewed Lily's sibling Courtney and a few other victims; I saw someone in their chat for the stream of it try and post about Lily's infamous writing tips and I just really REALLY want to put a big divider up right now between mine and other people's comparatively lowstakes beef w her and these very serious allegations. I'd be horrified by them even if they were of a creator I loved; these are not funny and ranting ontop of Lily's rants should be a few steps down from the really important stuff that needs to be addressed w her. So with all that being said:

I think her outdated "SU is Garbage and here’s Why" video is a great encapsulation of everything wrong with Lily Orchard’s critical theory, attitude, and brand. 

The whole video lacks a real thesis statement for an essaybreakdown. It feels really just like a woman having a giant fan rant at a show she used to like but now doesn’t-- because, that is what it is. BUT, that isn’t easy to listen to. Lefttuber or not, other essayist/watchalongs/media analysis-channels who talk about a thing for five hours will at least try and make their feelings actually collected. Hbomberguy’s Sherlock vid, YMS’s Kimbaspiracy debacle, Lindsay Ellis’ Hobbit three parter; all these vids are glorified fan rants extended to hours long and flowered with essay reasoning and research. They work because they're self-aware that they're taking the thing they are looking at too seriously but are committing anyway and preferably having some kind of fun or skill doing so, which is why I love to watch these kinds of videos. Lily Orchard’s thoughts all feel way too sporadic and focused on being spicy rather than coming together, and that hurts her point because it makes even her most serious call out against SU feel petty. 

She gets stuff wrong. Concrete was designed by black artist Lamar Abrams, not Rebecca Sugar who is white. Ftr I’m not pointing that out as some kind of “got you/can’t complain/Sugar never did anything wrong”-clap back; It’s just a fact. AND a missed oppertunity on Lily's part bcuz she could have pointed out how, even if Concrete wasn’t designed by Sugar, it was her in control of the artbook+ Rebecca’s drawn questionable depictions of black people before w she herself is not black and doesn’t get a ‘my friend is-’ clearance just because, and finally just the fact that +the white SU fandom dismissing this problem because they don’t want to be critical about their show.

That Lily doesn’t go into this counter-counter argument whatsoever tells me Lily’s true intentions: and that’s not to point out potential racism in the show, but to dunk on Sugar even more. Lily’s entire point about Concrete, as well as her handling of the poorly handled subjects in the show like the Human Zoo, which other critics, fans and critical fans have done a much better job at breaking down, all of it feels less like a beatdown of how problematic something is but her trying to spin Sugar into the worst fucking person because she wants to hate her. Nowhere is that more clear than in her now infamous ending shade abt Sugar being a fascist.

No, Lily did not literally call Sugar an actual Nazi. Her exact words on screen were a joking “do I think she is one, nah; would I think she is one w/o context? Yeah”.

In an alt timeline I wouldn’t think anything of this take. I get that Lily was trying to hyperbolic and relishing in her self aware pettiness -kinda like how Hbomber is with his over-the-top hatred of Steven Moffat- The issue is we don’t live in an alt timeline. Lily didn’t see how people were taking her too seriously and/or acting like Sugar was a nezi on her behalf +care that her edgy joke at the end of her rant could do some real damage, or even care that it just didn’t look good on her. She didn’t reupload the vid with a disclaimer tacked on, she didn’t tack on a pinned comment; she didn't write down a longer video disc to explain herself.

Instead she threw everyone who might have gotten perturbed by this comment under the bus, said it was all our own faults, and made it very clear she was not going to apologize for it.

Do u dislike ppl treating Sugar like she’s a Nazi and want to discourage that behavior, even in small ways? Fuck you. You’re a stan cuz Lily said so.

Are you Jewish and maybe think implying those exact words are uncalled for? Eat shit! Lily knows better than you and can talk about your life and issues better than you can because other gentiles who aren’t her have failed to do so….which means she’s actually speaking truth????

Lily Orchard could never eat a slice of humble pie and admit that she made a mistake because the only people who’ve ever criticized her and gotten real attention for it are part of the problem (i.e. 4chan, ED). Vaush type commentary bros who keep fucking misgendering her and taking more issue w her leftism that her authoritarianism.

'If obviously she has nothing to apologize for and she is totally over the accusations or her making accusations…which is why she keeps alluding to SU being fascist as a “joke”. The 'joke is on Sugar and all the people who could possibly be offended by Lily’s coining of what’s fascist so…it’s not really a self aware joke at all. She’s still going “harr harr, it’s YOUR fault that you read my comment that way and also who cares it’s not serious. RSugar is tumblr famous which means she’s a millionaire and can’t face harassment.” Tl;dr : Lily got flaq for going too far with a point and rather than just apologizing like a grown up, doubled down.

The reason Natalie (who doesn’t even cover media why is Lily so invested in Contrapoints???wv) and Lindsay will always be better yts than Lily is because they at least try to take some ownership of what they say. Does that always excuse them? No. Are they maybe still a little too apologetic of those on their side? Maybe. But all that is leagues above what Lily doesn't even attempt to do.

Fandoms, people, creators, ships and characters are punching bags to Lily Orchard. She can’t just dislike Rebecca Sugar because for the valid reasons ppl have w Sugar, which there are a LOT of- Lily has to make Sugar, and anyone who doesn’t find her joke at Sugar’s expense, into the worst possible thing. 

Lily can not make a joke or a real criticism to save her life. She is only venom and she has to double down on her points until they have no meaning. Lily Orchard’s activism and analysis aren’t about the things she says she’s fighting against; they’re about her and how everyone who dislikes her is the same kind of awful person and deserving of scorn for disagreeing with her. Lily’s the kind of person who abuses selfcare that good people get from watching Monica Lewinski’s Tedtalk, and basically came out the other end with an “I’m right and shouldn’t apologize for anything EVER”.

[tanadrin]

@iracher

Tumblr recommended me your post and I just got really interested in what game writing do you think is good? (im really interested bc I love rpgs) I think pillars of eternity did a good job to let you roleplay whatever. I hate inquisition tho, I dont understand why would MC help chantry =\

i’m gonna use this opportunity to vent about inquisition for a sec, because although it has features i like, it also has features that bug the shit out of me.

i like that the DA franchise doesn’t have a single protagonist--having multiple main characters you play as lets them tell discrete stories and keeps you from omnicompetent hero syndrome, where a characters feels like a mary sue just because they have the lifetime accomplishments of like six people (i’m look at you, Star Wars Expanded Universe). the worldbuilding isn’t great--it’s mostly ISO standard fantasy--but it’s OK, it has some original bits (the qunari are great for this), and it’s a fun enough place to run around in.

but they clearly want the chantry to be the local catholic church expy, with all that entails for a modern popular audience--dogmatic, often militant, strictly hierarchical. as a result, they’re sort of intrinsically organizationally unsympathetic. and then in DA:I they borrow the name “inquisition” to continue the medieval aesthetic, except the actual historical inquisition is monstrously unsympathetic, especially to a modern audience, and the name doesn’t even really make sense? and why should an independent organization trying to save the world from disaster be affiliated with the chantry anyway? and why are you the head of it? just because you have a magic hand? idk, it’s all quite weak justification to get the setup they want, and even then it takes way too long to establish all this in-game. it would make a lot more sense if you were already a minor-but-significant political or religious figure of some sort, but mostly you’re just Some Guy/Girl.

boring fantasy writing by committee is the worst kind of fantasy writing.

my absolutely favorite all-time RPG is the original Deus Ex. it’s so old now it’s probably hard to look at unless you’ve got some intense nostalgia goggles on, but it had extremely fun gameplay (the genre is sometimes called “immersive sim,” i think, and it’s one that’s kind of rare nowadays; hbomberguy talks a little about its history in his hilariously long video on Human Revolution), and i thought the writing was great.

not to say it doesn’t have weird bits and bits that fall flat. but it had ideas, and it was willing to try them, even if they didn’t always work. it’s a heady mix of 90s conspiracism, cyberpunk, and weird political tangents and digressions that you don’t get anywhere else, not even in its direct sequels. it also prefigured in a dreamlike way the next 20 years of political and social development with uncanny accuracy, as if Warren Spector had a vision of how the 21st century would go but could only half-remember it in the morning. and the soundtrack slaps so fucking hard it’s unreal.

otherwise, i generally prefer RPGs with tons of visual character customization and dialogue. which is to say i liked most of Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 (never played the third one). the character-level interactions often felt strong and satisfying, even if the plot as a whole wasn’t super well-written. i actually think that lower-level element of writing is more important--i can forgive a dumb plot around a macguffin or a threat to the universe, but not boring character interactions. this is something skyrim was bad at; for open-world RPGs, Fallout: New Vegas does it considerably better, although my only real complaint about that game is that i like having a fully-voiced protagonist.

[aceofshitposts]

oh lmao well worth a shot I guess. ty for the polite response though. any particular reason for hating it, just out of curiosity? 💞💞

honestly this video explains it better than i could in a fun engaging way: sherlock is garbage and here's why by hbomberguy

but spoilers for the series. a too long didn't watch of non spoilery stuff:

over produced (we do not need that many arc shots, we do not need a matrix journey into sherlock's 'mind palace')

bad faith interpretation of sherlock holmes in. several places

irene adler. just. all of that

moffet's favourite thing to do at cons is make fun of how much fans like and want to engage with the show

cumberbatch is acephobic (to be fair, this is potentially old information. it was [checks notes] over ten years ago lmao but as far as i know he hasn't said anything against his previous stance on asexuality so.)

i just do not like freeman. the vibes do not jive with me

treats the viewers as ultimately stupid, we never get a chance to solve the mysteries in the show ourselves, instead sherlock will eventually say he has the answer, then he'll refuse to tell anyone until the moment that would make him look best lmao

like. listen i just hate shows that are about mysteries or like... chess, just for example and no reason at all, and they refuse to treat the audience with any faith. they don't SHOW us why the characters are smart they just continuously TELL us the characters are smart and expect us to be impressed

queer baiting (this feels weird to say because of the actual watering down of this phrase by younger fans using it to mean 'any time my ship wasn't canon' and the like no it was real this time)

moffet loves to tease something interesting and then it'll never happen because he got another season and therefore doesn't actually have to answer the question he posed at the end of the last season that got you interested in watching the next season in the first place

anyway. i did enjoy the first.... two seasons when they first came out but even by the end of season two i was starting to see things that just. weren't engaging. the writing wasn't there. and i already knew about moffet and cumberbatch's disdain for their fans so. sour taste and all that.

the more i say things about sherlock the more i realize sherlock was just the warning for what would become the mcu. god. rest in fucking pieces.

[sync24]

re: steven moffat i really think that that hbomberguy video about sherlock did incredible damage

That seems extremely likely to me, yes.

His writing during (sections of) Sherlock as well as season 5, 6, 7 of Doctor Who had sexist moments, no-one would or should deny this. But particularly hbomberguy's video on the final Christmas Special (Twice Upon A Time), I feel, showcases that hbomberguy's criticisms of Moffat's final run of Doctor Who are "making up a guy to be mad at" or more specifically "making up three seasons he didn't watch".

This video made me lose my marbles so this is about to get long. Strap in if you'd like.

Most of the criticism of TWUAT itself is... acceptable. The things he says about season 8, 9 and 10, I cannot make sense of whatsoever.

Story arcs are presented as overambitious terrorism: > How dare authoritarian Steven Moffat eat away at half a page of dialogue from the writers he hired to introduce a 'villain' over time? > Why are we questioning the Doctor's morality, referring to "am I a good man"? > As a result of Moffat having particular arcs in mind, the Doctor's relationship with Clara could not develop and they couldn't change as people, "at best Clara sometimes realizes the Doctor's not always the best guy and they just get back together again".

My eyes are rolling out of my skull. What a bizarre suggestion, that a season should have no arc if it sacrifices a minute of screentime; that the Doctor's morality and goodness is not worth interrogating; that the core narrative of season 8 and 9 is not Clara and the Doctor's relationship and how they change as people, for better and worse. The season 9 finale includes the Doctor saying, we always come back to each other to the point of destroying the universe, this has to stop (through self-induced memory loss) or we'll be the end of the universe -- that they "just get back together again" regardless of what happens is not a good thing, but that is the point. He literally becomes a teacher in season 10, for fuck's sake.

We should have had an entire season about the Doctor becoming a teacher! Season wasted!

Just starting with the Doctor teaching is a silly complaint, it doesn't matter because Moffat has him start here so we can meet Bill because that's the point of that first episode and the center of this season. We don't hang out with just the Doctor (almost) ever. We hang out with him when he has a companion and we tell their story because the Doctor is 2000+ years old and we don't have the time to cover everything else. The companions are the point. They are what delineate seasons.

[as a part of his regeneration] the Doctor says goodbye to Clara, who he forgot because of time bullshit.

Doctor Who is all time bullshit? And again, the fact that someone had to forget someone to put an end to the intensity, toxicity and potential universe-ending nature of Twelve and Clara's relationship, is what season 9 spends nearly every episode addressing. Which is, what might happen if they were to lose each other -- but I guess he hates story arcs, so there's some consistency to this argument.

Season 10 is poorly paced.

No? This one is especially hard to disprove in a paragraph or so, but it's not like hbomb provides any real evidence here. It's not any worse than RTD era pacing, though Moffat and RTD have different flaws. It's much better than Chibnall and RTD2 (so far, anyway).

Capaldi's farewell speech suckz

No. "Never be cruel, never be cowardly. And never ever eat pears! Remember – hate is always foolish…and love, is always wise [...] Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind. [...] Doctor – I let you go."

Onto TWUAT. Might as well.

Steven Moffat is trying to give himself an epic sendoff like RTD but he doesn't have enough iconic characters to do this with

Then why would this episode have the the First Doctor (William Hartnell from SHEIN) in it?? Why not bring back literally any other characters we've met over the course of it all? The theme isn't random NPCs Moffat wants in his sendoff, it's reminding the Doctor of the good things he's done and the need to keep going, to keep helping, to move on. As in the final episodes of S10: Good is good in the final hour, in the deepest pit, without hope, without witness, without reward. If anything 'Rusty the Dalek' is there as a nod to the consistent question as to whether or not Twelve is a good man or not. The answer is, I don't know, but you try, and I think that's probably the point (thank you, Clara).

Speaking of Rusty,

Into The Dalek is actually a metaphor for Moffat taking over the show by messing with Rusty T. Davies' work!

Absolute crackpot theory. Like, this is how I knew he had actually gone off the deep end and was experiencing QAnon-style mania about Moffat's writing. Beyond the fact that it's genuinely absurd -- First, season 8 is approximately 3 years after Moffat took over the show. Why then? Second, Into the Dalek's concept was originally for one of those Matt Smith era games they made, so it is not his own metaphor. Third, if that comparison is true, it is an extremely self-deprecating one, and I don't buy that Moffat would be like thanks to me the show went from being good to technically being on the right side of history but actually still being bad. Fourth, if Rusty the name itself is a reference, writers do that all the time. They're literally showrunner pals. They email. It's not that strange.

Steven Moffat is not allowed to write sexist characters (SHEIN William Hartnell) to parody the sexist beginnings of Doctor Who.... because he once wrote sexistly

....................................................................................................................................................................... Don't ever improve and don't ever mention or shed light on an -ism if you've ever once partaken in it. That's an argument, I guess.

He even mentions that Moffat wrote the Doctor regenerating into a woman as a joke once. Buddy, I've got news for you: Clara, River and Missy (the Master) are characters that are, at several points and in several ways, functionally the Doctor. The groundwork for Twelve turning into a female Doctor (Thirteen) is laid with the introduction of the Master having regenerated into a woman; Moffat jokes that "if the Doctor was a young woman living in London, he'd be a bit like her"; again the two-season arc of 8-and-9 is that Clara and the Doctor become each other, codependent, begin to mirror each other, to the point that it leaves them more vulnerable than ever. River, of course, being a timetraveller herself.

Like, I'm so sorry, but we can't keep holding people accountable for things that are simply no longer relevant in their writing.

[corpsegirl-sephie]

favourite content creators?

Video essays are more or less my bread and butter when it comes to online content so don't expect much else from this list, and tbh my tastes are pretty basic, mostly people whose numbers are above a million, so don't expect to find much of anything you haven't heard before (but I will include short pitches and specific video recommendations anyway, just in case)

Jacob Geller is by far my number one and I highly doubt there's anyone out there that can surpass him for me, I basically always come out of his videos with a new perspective on some topic or another (especially his video on modern art that made me do a complete 180)

Everyone was talking about him recently cause of the plagiarism video but hbomberguy is pretty cool outside of that too. He does media analysis too, I really enjoy his video on Pathologic, but I will admit I find his documentary style videos more interesting

I can also recommend Super Eyepatch Wolf, who has the skill to make me actually care about wrestling, if that's what he chooses to cover, if only for the duration of the video's runtime. Generally I would describe him as "guy rambles about his interests (most of the time video games or anime) at you for an hour in a way that makes the excitement infectious". There is some analysis, it's not just plot synopsis type stuff, but it's not the most in-depth thing out there.

My 4th shoutout is going to the only thing I regularly engage with that isn't video essays, music, and it's gonna be someone I've mentioned a good few times before. Check this out, try to solve the very difficult mystery of why someone whose whole identity revolves around the concept of undeath would vibe with it, and then listen to the rest of GHOST's music cause it all fucks

My 5th and final recommendation is back to video essay land and is gonna be Maraganger (who's the only one mentioned here I wouldn't consider all that well known), and I will suggest not one but two videos this time because of the relative obscurity of the channel: this video on Hylics and this video on my favorite set of visual novels, that I often call the bag of milk games. The channel often covers niche and/or obscure games, often in the horror genre.

There, that's like 4 hours just from the videos I specifically told you to watch, go have fun and check out everything else on their channels if you aren't familiar with them already

[otteroflore]

extremely stupid things from the movie belle (2021) that made me go "well a lot of people also liked Clerks 2 so humans aren't really viable as a species" -hbomberguy

spoilers ahead

-starts in media rez, followed by immediate flashback to protags childhood and how she got here. literally "i bet youre wondering how i got here" and its long

-extremely confusing timeline of events. did the protag go viral just once? has she sung multiple "concerts"? why does her friend describe herself as a "producer" when it wasn't obvious she was involved?

-literally its like you see her have her first "concert" singing in public, 2nd concert on a whale, and then 3rd concert in a big dome

-the way her mother died is extremely silly to watch. it feels like a parody. literally everyone is standing and watching as she apparently gets swept away by a river. its just nonsense and embarassing

-THE POPULAR GIRL PLAYS THE SAX its very funny and kind of good actually but its also ridiculous

-exactly no interaction between her and Dragon before she goes to find him

-she's like "i want to know you" about the Dragon when she has literally like never spoken to him before??? all he did was break into her concert??? its not even clear why hes there and it doesnt seem like it has to do with her specifically??

- "when i studied abroad in ohio" line which was funny but then transitioned to "he was in eighth grade" which later felt like extremely weird foreshadowing

-the guy she eventually has a crush on (that all the other girls love) is like not a character and barely says anything for 75% of the film

-the scenes with the high school social media risk board was fun but it waws also like. a comical parody of what adults assume high school is like when teens have phones.

-THE PLOT TWIST ABOUT CHILD ABUSE???

-i mean id figured it would be about abuse i just didnt think it would be that some random fucking kid was being abused and theyd see it all on camera

-the whole time im watching im like CALL THE COPS

-"you have to wait 48 hours to do a wellness check" um i call bullshit, they have video footage of a guy threatening a child, they could have tried harder to like. tell cops to go there. i mean i know its not american cops but jesus christ they probably have child protective laws in japan right

-anyways and then they do a fucking CONCERT. a fucking CONCERT while there are children who are being abused to convince the kids to trust them. god its so uncomfortable knowing that. also more uncomfortable that they dont just??? explain that to the "internet cop" guys??? like "hey we really need to help this abused child can you assist since you know the Voices"

-anD THEN. AND THEN THE ADULTS LET THE TEENAGER GO ON A TRAIN. BY HERSELF. i was literally screaming the whole time WHY ARE YOU LETTING HER DO THIS. theyre like "we trust you :)" um why are you letting a teenager go alone to the house of a violent, unstable man in another city

-its insane there are 5 adults and 3 other teens with her and she goes ALONE

-after the dramatic standoff scene the kid says like her singing made him feel stronger or whatever but like.. nothing materially changes in his life

-in fact she just goes home and its unclear that literally anything happened with that man who did actually assault her.

-the film did not give any evidence that child protective services (or whatever the equivalent is in japan) is helping those kids

what the fuck did i just watch

tonight me and my partner watched Belle (2021)

it was so impressively, astonishingly bad, badly written, paced, literally the only good thing about it was the special effects

it apparently has a 95% on rotten tomatoes

literally how

[kob131]

Hbomberguy and RWBY Part 1: “Anime Homework”

“Well, how about you actually attack Hbomberguy’s actual point?”

...Okay then.

Let’s do his ‘Anime Homework’ section then shall we, since that seems to be the one everyone points to as his best one.

His point here is that RWBY effectively rip offs other anime and shows and thus has no identity. He even brings up specific examples in the timeframe like Adam being similar to Amon from Legend Of Korra, Ozpin to the Avatar and Jaune to Sokka.

... Thing is-

A. The similarity between Amon and Adam is ‘Masked man with scar beneath who is a part of a political movement going against discrimination’. But anyone familiar with Korra would know that Amon’s scar is FAKE, that he is a part of the so-called ‘oppressors’, that Amon genuinely believed in his movement’s cause, his movement was original, the non-benders are never actually shown to be oppressed whereas Adam is NONE of these things. The only thing they have in common is they were a mask, are revolutionaries and have a dick. I didn’t know Amon was ripping off V from V for Vendetta too.

(Even their MASKS are different for fuck’s sake)

B. Ozpin and King Piccolo is that they ‘reincarnate into a different form upon dying’.

... Wait, I said ‘King Piccolo’, didn’t I? I meant to say Kid Buu. ... No wait, that’s actually Naruto and Sasuke ... No wait, that’s the Sailor Girls from Sailor Moon. ... Actually it’s the cast of Yugioh-

Are you starting to see my point? This is a BASIC trope that is used in a multitude of ways, to the point the trope itself is no longer a point of comparison. Just analysis HOW the trope works: The Avatar reincarnates from death into a new person at birth in a specific order as a natural part of their existence while Ozpin reincarnates into an existing person with no set rules on who as part of an outside force.

C. At first, the Sokka and Jaune comparison seems to actually hold water, given both are targets of abuse by the narrative, who want to get stronger for reasons related to family (vastly different in purpose, effect and meaning), have strong tactical leanings and-

BTW I am doing this all on my own here- Harris doesn’t connect them in anyway other than ‘SOKKA WAS A SEXIST!’ and concludes that’s the point of Jaunedice. ... Even though Jaune’s arc was that needing help wasn’t a negative trait (which the show all but SAID but Harris doesn’t even understand why someone would want to prove themselves so...)

And even then, Jaune and Sokka develop differently and would live different live given Jaune’s love interest is DEAD. Sokka keeps his comedic elements and mixes them with his growth whereas Jaune more becomes a voice of reason, an opposition to Ozpin and a grounded leader as his comedic elements are phased out.

This is Harris’ criticism in a nutshell- shallow and ill thought out that’s dressed up in a British accent to sound good. His whole point is ‘RWBY DOESN’T DO ANYTHING ORIGINAL!’ while blatant ignoring RWBY’s own use of these tropes in differing ways. He just points to general tropes most of the time (other examples include ‘girl with scythe’ using Maka from Soul Eater and ‘Travel the world’ with Avatar) and paints it in a coat of ‘Fuck Miles!’ to disguise how bullshit this is.

And you can’t excuse it by saying I just attacked him.

[storm-of-feathers]

Alex hi coucou I just had - not an epiphany but some kind of realisation. I have not watched RWBY I do not plan on watching RWBY the only things I know about RWBY come from Hbomberguy's video and your posts. Now I watched his video before I saw you post about it, so my first instinct was "well Hbomberguy has good points on lots of other media so...?" but well you're talking about the whole thing and he's talking about the first few volumes so that probably changes things and also. There's the way you talk about RWBY. You talk about it like people with Correct Opinions™ in my little Star Wars bubble talk about the Jedi. So I know nothing about RWBY and I will never know anything about it. But your posts evoke a deep kinship in me because going "[name the fandom has given the group of people who don't get it] will say that [wild misinterpretation of canon a 10 year old would not make] and explain it with [one (1) singular cherry-picked moment that is also misinterpreted] and then act like they're good at analysis?? Did we watch the same thing???" just reminds me of home. For all I know you have terrible opinions but I actually will never know and your plight resonates with me. I think it's the fact you so clearly love the show despite anything it might not have executed well? I'll automatically side with anyone with an attitude of love towards something because that's what's fun. Why would you spend your time saying so and so sucks when you could find the things you like and have fun with them in your corner. Why shit on stuff you don't like all day long. People who try to understand what the story is about and wants to tell them and love it despite its flaws my beloved. We do not know each other's fandoms and yet we have the same attitude of love. I am waving at you from the other side of the Tumblr. Hope you have a great day.

I never did watch HBomberGuys video </3 Joe said he had some valid points but I love RWBY far too much to yk. Listen to it. Anyways.

Yeah. RWBY means the WORLD to me. And while there is a lot of valid criticism (especially for volumes 4 and 5) a lot of the criticism I do see is just. Not valid. Like at all. It's a lot of "I sure do hate women" in more words than that.

My most recent argument was about the protagonist herself, Ruby. One of the STRENGTHS of RWBY is the fact that Ruby is presented as a "smaller, more honest soul." Her kindness and genuinity and true belief in doing the right thing BECAUSE it's the right thing is among her best traits as a character. And the show absolutely shows that, over and over.

So when people say she's "screwing people over" it's genuinely just BAFFLING. Especially about characters like ironwood, who absolutely screwed himself over and is also a military dictator.

And yeah the RWDE people are just. Equally as baffling. I get it, they hate the show, but holy shit don't they have?? Idk lives??? Something to make them HAPPY????

I feel you bro. Idk much about star wars outside of the memes but I feel you. I feel what it's like when you love a media so fucking much and people hate on it for generally invalid reasons. I feel it.

I love you <3 coucou!!

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Weird q..but i really dont understand why most fans hate season 4, especially the last episode. Why? I think it gave us a deeper look on both sherlock and mycroft! I felt it tells a lot about mycroft how he had to step in and take control of things ever since he was a kid himself. Also he is not a robot or a killer. Also redbeard thing. It was an appropriate deep psychological trauma (cause most shows usually disappoint in that area). I am not trying to impose my opinion. Just want to understand

Hey Nonny!

It’s all good, and I totally respect your opinion and how you enjoyed S4! It’s totally okay! I know that there are quite a few who got a lot of of S4, and who genuinely enjoyed it.

Sadly, I am not one of those people, and I’ll try to be as diplomatic a possible in my response, but PLEASE know that I don’t think you’re “terrible” or “stupid” for liking S4 because I DO get passionate sometimes in my responses, and I’m just merely speaking as someone who studied the series very closely for quite a long time before S4 aired, and as someone who knows Day-One-ers (ie., people who watched Sherlock on its day one airdate) who also are a large majority of the people who did not like S4. This is just me simply stating why I didn’t like it, but it’s different for everyone.

Stating what I DO like: The acting and cinematography of the first two episodes were brilliant for what they had to work with, and I’ve never faulted any of the actors for the flaws of S4. And for TFP, they did the best with what they had to work with.

That’s… pretty much all I really liked about S4.

Now, here’s my problems with S4:

Nothing made a LICK of sense to the narrative that they were telling in Seasons prior. 

This series was always based a bit in reality, and suddenly everything became comic-book rules: X-Men villains, shitty “redemption” arc, destroying favourite characters just for drama, ludicrous physics, explosions that only destroyed one small room in an apt where in previous episodes one explosion destroyed an entire block, etc.

Sherlock was OOC.

Mary was being built up to be a fantastic villain? Ah, nope, here’s the lacklustre twist where tee hee Mary’s just an assassin with a heart of gold that still emotionally abuses Sherlock and John and just won’t fucking stay dead.

And speaking of this, the DVD’s make NO LOGICAL SENSE unless she was planning to kill herself

AND she tries to make her death equatable to Sherlock’s??

Everyone was RIDICULOUSLY out of character in TFP, I’m so sorry: Mycroft is a bumbling coward for the most part, Sherlock disregards John when he gives the Vatican Cameos warning, the Holmes Parents are assholes because Mycroft COULDN’T SOLVE A PROBLEM WHEN HE WAS 12?? ARE YOU SERIOUS???? And that creepy Moriarty / Eurus thing, and LITERALLY they’re implying that EVERYTHING HAPPENED BECAUSE EURUS DIDN’T GET A HUG. Like, I’m so sorry, but that’s lazy writing.

And don’t even get me started on the ridiculousness of the entire character of Eurus. She LITERALLY had X-Men powers, and like… just nothing made sense. Her involvement in the entirety of S4 MADE NO SENSE. Why go back to prison if you can get out?? WHAT IS THE POINT?? AND I repeat: She did all this because she didn’t get a hug. Yes. I’m oversimplifying, but at the base level, that’s what it was, because she wanted Sherlock’s attention. Welcome to the club, kid, stand in line, everyone on the SHOW wants his attention.

The ENTIRE plot of the first 2 seasons got wiped out all because it wasn’t Moriarty who was interested in Sherlock, but Eurus?? What… What about Carl Powers?? Like…. the ENTIRETY of season one and TGG makes no sense now, because of that one 5 minute scene where Eurus “enlists” Moriarty. I… ugh.

The SUDDEN tonal switch from kind-of Sherlock to James Bond, for some fucking reason.

And on that note, how terribly lazy and cheap TFP looks in comparison to the other two episodes. The whole episode looks like it was filmed in a small house with 4 identical rooms.

EVERYTHING that was etablished in 2 episodes prior were COMPLETELY forgotten when Mary was “shot”.

The complete character assassination of one loyal blogger John H Watson in favour of Mary for some fucked up reason, even though AT HIS OWN WEDDING HE COULDN’T STAND BEING AROUND MARY. I’m sorry, but I don’t believe for one damned second that John would EVER forgive Mary for murdering his best friend after seeing what it did to him. That’s not love from her, and that’s NOT John’s character EVER in the ENTIRETY of the series.

And speaking of character assassinations, Molly’s character being devolved to S1E1 Molly, where instead of giving her agency like they were doing with her the ENTIRE series, so much so that Sherlock picked up on her dominance enough to give her a big role in his mind palace in HLV and TAB, only to make her a sad little self-insert Mary Sue pining for the main character, and in turn made Sherlock a TERRIBLE human being for MAKING HER say what she did. It’s gross.

AND speaking of Molly’s character, they’ve been setting up Mollstrade since as early as ASiB, but I guess that plot line got shafted. Look I LOVE Hopkins, and I am ANGRY they didn’t give her more than 3 fucking lines in the entirety of ONE episode after HEAVILY promoting her actress and character, but they essentially reduced her to a piece of ass for Lestrade to chase. AND THAT’S NOT HIS CHARACTER EITHER. EW GROSS.

The constant plot holes being gaped wide open, and the Chekov’s gun moments where they bring up shit but do nothing with it!! 

TD-12? Nope, just a lame reference to a story we like. 

John got shot at the end of TLD with a VERY REAL FUCKING GUN? Nope, it was a dart gun. 

John not suddenly knowing how to be a doctor.

The TGG one I mentioned up above. 

What was in the letter? And who was Anyone??

Moriarty essentially being erased as anything other than a hired thug and had no part whatsoever in Sherlock’s history. 

Eurus… Just all of her character is asinine. 

Everyone in T6T suddenly not knowing John’s the blogger, which is in direct contradiction to literally the entire series. 

The AGRA plotline was ridiculous, in the end.

Baby? What baby? It was only there when convenient.

They dropped whatever plotline they were going to do for Mycroft: He was being set up as either dying, or the villain.

Redbeard. I’m sorry, I disagree with you on that. Mofftiss is trying to tell me that a little boy fell down a well and went missing, and that WASN’T the first place searchers / the police wouldn’t have looked? Sorry, no. And then. AND THEN his parents just… go along with this thing where Sherlock shuts down and they DON’T get him therapy? Yes, I agree the mind is a funny thing, and we can be traumatised into forgetting or dissociating from traumatic events. I GET IT. But… like I don’t believe the Holmes are so heartless as to just never grieve or have memories around about their supposedly dead daughter. It’s another OCC thing for me.

John’s cheating.

Disappearing and reappearing characters, like this scene, and the entirety of the aquarium scene.

Mary and John being terrible parents

OH GOD THIS FUCKING SCENE. That bomb SHOULD HAVE DESTROYED THE ENTIRE BUILDING.

What… who was this girl on the plane? What? Like I know WHO, but if she’s supposed to be Eurus talking to Sherlock, why don’t we see Eurus… talking to Sherlock? I … Ugh.

NORBURY. 

The glass SUPER SECRET GOVERNMENT ROOM THAT NO ONE SHOULD SEE INTO in T6T.

Sloppy camera work that some believe was intentional, but if it wasn’t, jesus c’mon.

The RIDICULOUS amount of 4th Wall Breaking. Like… even the actors didn’t give a shit.

Essentially, everything on this list here and in this blog tag here.

And everything mentioned on these three posts:

T6T: 10 Revealing Things That Haunt You Late at Night 

TLD: 10 Revealing Things That Haunt You Late at Night

TFP: 10 Revealing Things That Haunt You Late at Night

There’s SO much more I can go into, but please go through my “something’s fucky” tag in that last link.

Notice how probably 90% of that has NOTHING to do with “johnlock not becoming canon” because the Johnlockers get MONSTROUS accusations as to THAT being why we didn’t like S4, even though it was, like critically panned by the GENERAL AUDIENCE who have NO investment in the series other than “I liked it in the past”.

Two of my fave YouTubers have interesting (not perfect, but still good) takes coming at the series as casual viewers:

‘The Day Sherlock Died’ by The Closer Look

‘Sherlock is Garbage, and Here’s Why’ by hbomberguy

So it’s NOT just Johnlockers. I’ve talked to Sher1011ies at 221B con who didn’t like S4 either, because most of them realized how shitty Molly was treated in the last episode. So yeah, a big middle finger to those who think I dislike S4 because of  “no Johnlock”. No, I disliked it because I need my stories to make logical narrative sense. I disliked it because I love John and they ruined his character all for the sake of drama and because Moffat has a “hurting Ben” kink. I disliked it because Mary should NOT have been “redeemed” because she was an abuser. I disliked it because Moriarty was turned into a cartoon villain, even though he was already overused in the series. I disliked it because the core of the show – the FRIENDSHIP of Sherlock and John, and their solving mysteries together – did not exist at all. I disliked it because John got sidelined. I disliked it because TFP was a ridiculous episode that, if you replace ANY of the characters, it wouldn’t make a difference, because it didn’t feel like an episode of Sherlock. I disliked it because everyone was OOC.

Anyway. Sorry. One too many accusations my way over the past 1100+ days LOL.

As for your assessment of TFP, I’m going to have to respectfully disagree with you. There was no growth and actually it implies something far more sinister: That the Holmes are and were terrible parents that gave no shits about their daughter, their traumatized son, and expected their eldest to essentially be a parent. It implies that Mycroft, at 12 years old, orchestrated the ENTIRE Sherrinford thing… Look I can suspend my disbelief, but there’s limits, and this is one of them. A LITERAL CHILD. Perhaps Uncle Rudy had a hand in it somehow, but then why not shit on Uncle Rudy? Why is Mycroft blamed for it all?

Look, I don’t doubt Sherlock had a traumatic experience regarding “Redbeard”. But then why play into the fact that he was a dog? Why bring another character into the series just to have a gotcha moment? Because Mofftiss wanted a “Shyamalan twist”, that’s why. They threw EVERYTHING away for a twist ending either because they GENUINELY thought it was good, or they got tired of doing Sherlock. ALL of TFP is LITERALLY a really bad plot twist because reasons. TFP makes no sense to the ENTIRE narrative structure of the previous 12 episodes. It erased EVERYTHING from the previous episodes, and coated it with a gross closing by a character no one wanted in the series, and then tried to convince us that it’s a new beginning – “a journey they had to go through” – but it SOLVED NOTHING.

Anyway. I have big feels about S4, and the only way I can enjoy it is to watch it subtextually, but even then, I cannot sit through TFP without cringing. 

That said, Lovelies, please do not attack Nonny for enjoying S4! I know you guys won’t, but Nonny came out with an olive branch and they just want to understand why the fandom is passionate about S4′s… whatever it was. We can have a civil discussion about it, and point out – without attacking – why S4 is universally panned. It’s okay to like things no one else does, and Nonny was respectful to me in this ask! 

So with that, feel free, lovelies, to express why YOU didn’t enjoy the series, or why you did! I’m interested in both “sides” / pov’s whatever :)

[firelxdykatara]

Jenny Nicholson posted a 2 1/2-hour Vampire Diaries overview on YouTube today and you were the first person I thought of. I watched the entire thing despite only having seen about two episodes five years ago, so you'd probably get a lot more out of it than I would (although spoiler alert she was positive about the series finale, so... proceed with caution??)!

I just finished watching it, actually!

It’s funny, because I’ve been like... deep-diving into the depths of youtube and watching a lot of Jenny Nicholson videos (and also SarahZ and that ‘when posting goes wrong’ dude and hbomberguy, sidenote but i now know much more about the johnlock conspiracy and destielgate and various tumblr controversies and like msscribe shit than i ever needed to lmfao), but I took a break today to do some writing and then a friend of mine was like OH JENNY NICHOLSON’S TVD VIDEO IS UP, and I was like ‘her what???’

Anyway, needless to say I rushed right over to watch it. (I fucking screamed about like, the China Beach shit and also that weird af point-and-click game??? that was so fucking weird lmfao) I will say that while there’s a lot I disagreed with, I do have to give her some latitude because from the sound of things she watched the show almost entirely divorced from the fandom (insert ‘god i wish that were me’ meme here) and had a very surface-level reading that, I think, comes from watching it all at once and not getting embroiled in deeper meta analysis and just not caring that much about getting Deep into the show. Which I can understand, like if I hadn’t been watching tvd since fucking.... 2009 oh god I actually remember this because I started watching around when episode 5 of the first season was airing... I probably would be a lot more casual about how I read the show.

As it is, I’m an Elena stan first, last, and forever, so....yeah I don’t agree with her on everything. But I did agree in a lot of broad strokes, and I think even her ‘Elena’ section had some points to make, she just came to somewhat different conclusions than me, and part of that probably comes from my attachment to Elena and how much of that whole Situation that I saw through that lens. (And also I think she skates right around ‘Elena is a depressed and suicidal teenage girl’ but never quite arrives at that particular point and misses some of the finer points of her overall character arc.)

We did agree on some major things (like season 5 being objectively The Worst), but then she had to say things like ‘Stefan is the guy you would actually date’ (and also ‘it’s better than buffy’ which, like, careful jenny, them’s fightin words), and that was the point where I went ‘hmmmmm someone didn’t actually take time to think through his relationship to Elena and put a lot of the not-so-great points together’, which again I attributed to missing the fandom (and therefore the fandom infighting, so again I have to say I somewhat envy her experience) and not really caring to dive deeply into the source material. Which I can respect! But as someone who spent four years obsessed with the show, and another two angry at it but clinging for the sake of one (1) character, finally freed when she left (and so I do have to admit that Jenny’s actually seen more of the show than me, since I never watched seasons 7 or 8 [except the finale] and don’t intend to ever), I can’t help but be like ‘WELL ACTUALLY -insert list of things she’s wrong about-’.

And then there were things that I couldn’t technically disagree with, like her opinions on Jeremy, but I was also like ‘you don’t have all the facts, I love him’ so I was just that angry ‘I GUESS’ meme for a few sections.

Then again, pointing out that Caroline was metaphorically gay and being tortured by her gay dad who was metaphorically homophobic made me absolutely lose my shit laughing, so she also had some very good points, and watching the video was well worth the time.

I did have to laugh at the very end when she was like ‘I stan Julie Plec’ bc that, more than anything else, made it eminently obvious that she watched the show well after it was over and never engaged with the fandom in any meaningful sense. Which, again, I can respect, bc the fandom was batshit especially in those middle years, but Plec ran the show into the ground and I still haven’t forgiven her for it.

[briek58454521]

Cancel Culture?...

Okay.

I’ve seen this shit going around for a while. I feel obligated to correct the record.

In the wake of multiple Breadtube users being eviscerated by the public in the last year, I’d like to talk... about “cANceL cULTurE”.

But first, some back-round. I’ll be brief.

Over a year ago, Youtuber Lily Orchard’s video about Steven Universe blew up the internet, invoking praise from many facets of online culture, as well as a sizable backlash, as any video criticizing Steven Universe will invariably do. In an attempt at a response, Breadtuber Sarah Z uploaded a video titled “Bad Media Criticism”, which around 17 minutes in, talked about said video.

The response was filled with, let’s face it, lies and actual bad faith criticisms towards the content, misinformation, omission of context in important bits, and general shoddiness in action (yes, I’m biased. Reality is biased, sometimes). Criticism was swift to arrive, and the video provoked Lily herself to respond. And in the face of the factual corrections, and legitimate criticisms... Sarah doubled down, and in her infamous Twit-Longer, decided to continue to assure herself and others that her criticism was valid because regardless of whatever Lily actually said, it was still bad faith criticism.

A short while after that, fellow Breadtuber Lindsay Ellis uploaded a video discussing Black Ariel, claiming that the decision to make Ariel black was entirely a decision made because of “Woke Branding” to make more money off of people and continue raking in more and more cash, citing HBomberGuy’s “WOKE BRANDS” video essay. Many commented that this was rather racist, considering that Cartoon Network is just as much of a greedy bastard corporation as Disney was, yet, denounced criticism of Steven Universe, a show of Cartoon Network’s body of work, because “support minority voices”, with the same people commenting that this looked rather selective.

Lindsay doubled down on the criticism, and would continue defending it and publicly shitting the bed as more shitstorms (PLURAL) would erupt (lol).

After THAT, Breadtuber CONTRAPOINTS/ NATALIE WYNN would publish many videos that kept pissing of trans and non-binary viewers with a fuck-load of back handed remarks and general derogatory comments about them, as well as getting pissy that people ask for her gender and pronouns in public safe-spaces. In “The Aesthetic”, Natalie had a character playing the role of the people who make the CORRECT claim that gender is eternal and that you are what you say you are, and ANOTHER who was a truscum who would repeat the arguments that “kinda hypothetical” and, “kinda a weak argument”. This would create a backlash, and Natalie would respond with a thread that, contained a lotta shit, but also contained THIS BULLSHIT. Straight from the horses mouth, fam.

“I’m sure this is not the experience of many NBs. I’ll leave it to them to articulate what NB existence looks like in a binary world. I do not and cannot speak for them. But surely(sic) an account that begins and ends with “I’m not a man because I don’t identify as one” is pretty weak”

Later, after deleting the thread and getting more shit for it, she would upload an absurd non-apology video called “Pro-nouns”, where she would dress up like a fucking clown-ass Oompa-Loompa who just escaped from Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, and make several dumb-ass claims and a fuck-ton of truscum arguments, including stating that she “wants to be a convert” to “believe” NBs, and that she would listen and respect NB people’s beliefs “so long as those beliefs are valid” After more backlash to that happened, she would continue this trend, platforming actual truscum like Buck Angel, selling anti-semetic reptilian agenda merchandise, and hosted a Patreon stream where she just... basically shat on everyone. She shat on people like HBomberGuy, for performativity in regards to the meme “Donkey Kong said Trans Rights” (yes, she is that desperate. She will accuse people who raise 340,000 fucking dollars of performativity and virtue-signaling), stated that older trans people would be considered truscum, and even that most of her friends were truscum.

The one thing that was consistent in these stories was the insistence that the criticism was just an attempt at Cancel Culture.

Cancel Culture is essentially the point where in an attempt to either exclude, harass, or target others for political views, religion, ethnicity, race, sexuality, gender, etc., people will devolve into many forms of online harassment and abuse of the media outlets, among other things, in order to silence the target, or deter the target from making an argument. It can even happen just because people don’t like someone.

For Sarah, this took the form of accusing the people criticizing Steven Universe of having a dishonest double-standard, because if a straight, white, cis-dude made it, no one would be saying shit about it. Even though the show is historically praised by WHITE progressives, and criticized by EVERYONE else.

For Lindsay, it was that the people making this claim were just fooled by the “Woke Brand” train.

For Natalie, it was “the Left is eating itself”.

I would like to say this right now. The only time I actually saw Cancel Culture in action was during the shitstorm that erupted with VivziePop and her pilots for Hazbin Hotel, and Helluva Boss came out and everyone was looking for a bunch of shit to bring up about Vivzie personally, her apparent “transphobia”, “homophobia” as understood by Steven Universe fans, and generally just a bunch of bullshit that Rebecca Sugar got away with when she pulled the same shenanigans.

That is Cancel Culture.

And the only reason I can see for it was just because Vivzie (to my knowledge, at least) isn’t a member of the LGBT community. (Those same people would respond to her stating that she plans on having Alistor, the Radio Demon, be ace with “Hey, did you hear something?”, btw)

(EDIT: I initially stated, as shown above, that Vivzie wasn’t a LGBT community member. She is. She’s bi. Apologies for getttin that bit wrong. I’d also like to mention that she’s Latin as well, but is also shit-talked for apparently being too white to be Latin. 

So......yeah. Can’t begin to imagine why all of those mentioned weren’t given the same treatment.... Was there any doubt when Lindsay said she was Native?......)

And that wasn’t the case with any of the aforementioned. Natalie wasn’t “cancelled” until she kept shitting on people for the fiftieth (hyperbolicly fiftieth) time. Sarah was never cancelled. She got away with slander, and was quickly forgiven just because she’s a leftist. Lindsay is getting away with excusing away, and flat out DEFENDING PEDOPHILIA, AND IS STILL POSTING. She ain’t cancelled.

Cancel Culture may happen sometimes, genuinely, like with Vivzie, but those are the exceptions that prove the rule. It’s mostly just “this person said I sound completely contrary to what I believe, it must be (insert cause)”

It’s Lily’s fault, it’s a dishonest double-standard, it’s the radicals, it’s Woke Brand brain-washing, it’s “bAd faITh cRitISIsm”, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah...

Let me tell you something. In Sarah’s case, not all criticism is because there’s a dishonest double-standard. And even if it were, that doesn’t make doing something horrible because of your identity the right thing to do. Because NO ONE should be putting in the most racist, bigoted, and frankly gross and disgusting shit in their work, regardless of whether you’re white, black, gay, lesbian, trans, NB, Gen Z, Boomer, etc. Like the human zoo, the Amethyst-Garnet fusion, Bismuth, the Pearl-Rose dynamic, the Nazi woobification, and the blatant disregard for the very people the show claims to be an ally too.

See also, the N-Word.

Despite the belief that white people can’t say it while black people CAN, black people don’t use it in a conversation formally, and can’t really use it ANYWAY because it’s still a fucking slur. And if you say it in public, there will be consequences, whether it be social repercussions, or legal action. And people have been saying it less and less as a result of this attitude becoming more present.

In regards to Lindsay, we know, bitch. We fucking know. We know that Disney wants our money like crazy. We know that this could be just another woke branding thing. We know that brands aren’t our friends, we know, we know, we know, we know. We know, Lindsay, we know. But, don;t chat shit about it if you aren’t going to criticize Cartoon Network for Steven Universe, Amazon for selling Pride merch, and Target for Pride clothes. Because then we know that you’re being very selective about what you’re labeling as “woke branding”.

In regards to Natalie, SHUT THE FUCK UP. SHUT THE FUCK UP. That is literally all you have to do. Just SHUT. THE FUCK. UP. And accept that you aren’t as woke as you like to think you are. The left isn’t eating it’s own by disowning shitty people. It’s doing itself a favor for it.

Remember R. Kelly? Everyone said that black people were just turning on each other when actual, legitimate evidence came forward, showing that he;s a FUCKING PEDOPHILE. And that attitude would continue for almost three decades before someone FINALLY said, “No, this man is dangerous, lock him up”. You know the phrase “A few bad apples?” People only say that, and just ignore the rest when defending shitty people on the Left, mostly because they don’t want to disown them. The phrase, however is ACTUALLY “A few bad apples SPOIL THE BUNCH”. If you don’t weed out the bad ones, they’ll spoil the tree.

Most of this bullshit would have been solved easily if ANY of the aforementioned had looked at their behavior, ACTUALLY apologized, expressed due diligence, and STOPPED FUCKING DOING THE SHIT.

The only reason people get away with this is because A LOT OF PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET HAVE FUCKING TERRIBLE PRIORITIES.

People take more offense to someone shutting down an opinion rather than someone being a scumbag.

People jut decided not to care about Sarah’s lies ENTIRELY because “It’s Lily”.

People defended Lindsay entirely because “Fuck Disney”.

People defended Natalie because “The Left is eating itself, we need to support minority voices”.

Because the myth of Leftist-Cancel Culture is just an excuse to not have to change. To not commit. To not put in effort. To not expand time to bettering yourself or the environment around you. To jerk off to how woke you are while criticizing others who tell challenge that. To wax poetic because it’s good for your ego.

It’s not just them. It’s many of their fans, and hundreds of thousands, if not, millions of people on the internet. And by far, their worst deeds aren’t that they inadvertently or otherwise attract Nazis, keep sucking off incels, truscum, TERFs, pedophiles, and other facets of human garbage while disemboweling others for far, FAR lesser crimes on the basis that they aren’t woke or nice enough for their liking, or EVEN the harassment that they’ve engaged in, caused, and instigated.

It’s that they’ve convinced themselves that by doing all of the above, that they are in any way superior to the people they cry foul against. The people who call them out on their bullshit when it arises. The people who raise $340,000 for their OWN people while the most they’ve done is play dress up and recycle Eddie Murphy’s shtick for the 500th time. The people who are part of the very minority voices they claim to support yet disregard on the basis that they said some mean words, or argued in bad faith, or just have a personal grudge against the people that they criticize. The people of color who FLAT OUT know better than them, yet, who they write off at every possible opportunity as just believing that companies care, or that Disney is good, or even just write ‘em off as having the wrong priorities or being stupid, as if they are in any way super clever and superior for coming to a conclusion that many more talented, creative, intelligent, and just frankly BETTER people came to years ago. 

They are MORE PERFORMATIVE, more ENTITLED, more ARROGANT, more IGNORANT, more UNAWARE, more BIASED, more SELFISH, and more SELF-INDULGENT than a good 98% of the people they criticize.

They hate these people so much...because they hate looking in mirrors.

And Leftist Cancel Culture is just a manifestation of that psychological projection. Simple as.

If you skipped to the end, fuck you. No TL: DRs in this neck of ‘da fuckin woods