#bc movies are a different medium and their was no way to keep the pacing and the backstories of a lot of characters

[jesse-pinko]

One thing that really worked for me w The Hunger Games trilogy was the attention to detail given toward developing even the most decentralized of background characters and how it doesn’t detract or distract from the story as a whole but enhances it, by driving home the theme of every life being precious and worth protecting and every human person being just that, fully, indomitably human. Esp the female characters!! When does that happen with female characters? Every character could in theory get their own book no dice, and that’s that’s how I want to write

[rata-novus]

‎‎‎‎‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎better late than never!

༄₊ ⊹🎃✧˖°. ☾ october/horror 2024 watches ☽ ༄˖°.🍂.ೃ࿔*:･

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

🎃 Senritsu Kaiki File Kowasugi (10/7-x) overall, not what i expected, but not bad. only got thru half the series in spooky month, will finish eventually.

ep1 (10/7): kinda slow, but not boring. the final shot of the woman in the doorway gave me goosebumps.

ep2 (10/10): first third/half SUPER effective for me, esp the whole part where ichikawa's flashlight would turn off at the same point in the room. creepy. but then the last part was genuinely ?????? super intriguing but idk really what happened? the metaphysical/scifi aspects weren't ~scary~ to me but i keep thinking abt the episode so

ep3 (10/10): monster horror isnt my thing so eh, but the revelation at the end that those 2 characters are slowly turning into kappa like its an infection was neat.

ep4 (10/11): favorite so far, loved the spatial/time manipulation. but the scene of them time traveling. lol. lmao even.

ep5 (10/11): really liking how each episode is its own thing but clearly pointing to something bigger connecting everything. real curious abt what kudo "sees" since his coma incident.

ep6 - 10: DNF. didn't grip me compared to other stuff i wanted to watch, will finish at my own pace eventually.

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🎃 milk and serial (10/12) liked. flew by, didn't feel like an hour+. mc was super creepy & unhinged. acting felt real & natural. liked the twists. i think naomi & link finding milk's box w/ address to his torture shack was by his design. sequel maybe?

🎃 the void (10/12) liked. FANTASTIC practical effects, wowzers. kinda okay story, more aesthetics than plot but w/e. BIG silent hill vibes though a cult facilitating a "god" to be born, resurrection/reincarnation, physical manifestations of guilt and grief, etc. but like.... spacey/cosmic horror. v different from most mid-2010s or even modern day horror and i appreciate that.

🎃 the empty man (10/13) idk. intriguing but i really dont get the whole part about the people committing suicide. i feel like this is one of those movies i need to deep dive ppls meta analysis to really ~get it~. bc i don't really. honestly my favorite part was the very beginning w the freaky skeleton. what is he transmitting............

🎃 noroi: the curse (10/13) eh. kinda slow. unclear on certain plot points: what was the significance of kana being psychic and drawing that symbol/face/mask? what's up with the boy - another medium? hori was v distracting and borderline exploitative. liked how the seemingly disjointed segments started to connect together, but unfortunately didnt go all the way (see ? above) and too much unresolved. seen better japanese horror and found footage horror tbh sorry

🎃 late night with the devil (10/14) first off -1000000 for using genAI fuck that. second, god the beginning was as boring & cringey as a real late night talk show. which like, yeah ofc but also. i dont want to watch that so no ty. but lilly's appearance at the end was v cool, split head, coursing electrical energy. really liked that a lot. overall better than i thought it was gonna be, but just to the side of okay.

🎃 lake mungo (10/19) quite sad. being haunted by your future death reminds me of nell from haunting of hill house. alice meeting with the psychic and seeing from the perspective of her ghost in the future, paralleled with her mother in the future doing the same and not sensing alice anymore.... big sad. :( some of the spooky stuff did get to me. the recording of alice seeing her future dead body and the reveal that the neighbor was lurking in the house in one of the recordings especially. wtf grossssssss. overall more sad than scary, but i liked it. more effective for me than i thought it would be after reading reddit posts hating it. i feel like i need to be a defender of it now lmao

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🎃 midnight mass overall: forgive me father for i have sinned 🫦 -- dunno if it unseats hill house as my favorite flanagan show but damn it was fantastic.

ep1 (10/19): interesting. if i didnt already know it was abt vampires id be scratching my head rn. the final shot of the cats on the beach was laughable, and thats coming from a sensitive bitch who cant stand animal deaths in horor & frequently uses doesthedogdie lmao ....... rahul kohli can absolutely get it tho

ep2 (10/20): ok first off that whole bit about "pregnant people" was weird af and completely unnecessary. coulda just normalized inclusive language but instead we gotta draw attention to "umm actually ☝️🤓 its usually pregnant women". w/e. -- i think the cats were killed as sustenance (neck wounds), but idk abt the dog being poisoned? the vamp(s) just trying to get rid of the animals on the island so they dont act odd/pick up on the vamps? or smth specifically targeting that one guy, by the nun lady? hmm. -- was the (i presume) vamp stalking the pregnant lady from her house to the clinic bc it could sense her breakthru bleeding??? uew. -- the mimic of the voice near the end was a banger omg so creepy, and i love the reflective eyes v v v good. -- re leeza walking, something in the wine???

ep3 (10/20): is monsignor pruitt this new father paul????? fountain of youth ayoooo. but is he the vampire? nah hes the renfield aint he. what was with the trunk of dirt? ohhh ancestral soil ofc -- theory: the sheriff is gonna be the one to cotton on to smth being wrong bc he doesnt go to the church/drink the wine -- the scene between leeza & joe was so powerful, wow..... -- was father paul poisoned like the dog? kinda bummed if hes dead for good i thought for sure he was gonna be one of the (the only?) antagonists nvm lol, immortal? -- also comparing a vampire to an angel, esp in this context, is sick as hell, love that -- honestly getting big salems lot vibes which i do NOT hate at all tbh, also a bit of exorcist thrown in with the middle east and ruins and smth ~evil~ there

ep4 (10/21): ohhh is monsignor turning into a vampire? sun sensitivity.... -- noooo poor joe :( -- what is up with erin's "miscarriage"/never having been pregnant and her blood reacting to the sun when afair she never drank the wine? -- and riley too damn........

ep5 (10/21): oh hey well guess thats where the title comes from lol -- not, like, super duper crazy with the loooooong chunks of monologue tbh. sometimes it hits like with riley & monsignors back and forth over guilt but other times ehhhh -- speaking of, anyone else down bad for the priest or just me? ok nvm -- so far it seems the og vamp only ate from the stray cats, bowl (bill) and riley so far (maybe the mayor & wife but unclear), and it seems like its been a couple weeks since it arrived so the hunger must not be THAT insatiable, for like 99% of the town population to remain (relatively) unharmed? like, if everyone or even just MOST of them are turned, who they gonna eat? -- on the one hand riley being greeted in death by the uninjured form of the girl he killed in a car crash is beautiful. oh the other hand subjecting the love of your life to watching you burn to fucking death and now shes gonna row back to land with ur smoldering corpse is like. supremely fucked up riley. like i get that erin has to ~see to believe~ but what the hell man. the credits rolling and listening to her screams..... D:

ep6 (10/31): so it's not just the consumption of a vampires blood that makes one a vampire, but death as a catalyst for resurrection. holy shit i love that, flanagan you mad man. -- oh shiiiiit mildred shooting former lover priest in the head damn bitch okay -- bev you pussy ass bitch wont even drink the poison smh my head

ep7 (10/31): "it never felt like a sin, you never felt like a sin and our daughter was never a sin" aoughhhh this got me cryin -- was really rooting for the sheriff to make it out alive :( -- never been religious and have 0 religious trauma but god damn this show got me good, weeping all thru the end

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🎃 rosemary's baby (10/22) regrettably by roman polanski, but 🏴‍☠️ so eh. overall i really liked it. i had seen bits and pieces and i feel this is one of those medias that you kind of know through osmosis, but it was still an enjoyable watch, if not disturbing at times. tho minnis voice and mannerisms reminds me of vic's nana from very important people lmaoooo i cant unsee/hear it

🎃 event horizon (10/22) so far INCREDIBLE visuals, giving big hellraiser vibes with the disfigured/cut up bodies & the elaborate incomprehensible yet decorative engine brings to mind a mix of the lament configuration and biblically accurate angels. incredible. -- why only trauma hallucinations from a few of the crew? the rest were just peachy keen? not a smidge of trauma? bummer tbh -- hot damn the gore visuals are blink and u miss it but sick as hell -- but what happened with justin? rescue crew said he was alive but like.... mentally???? -- pacing felt just a titch off, like shtf so close to the end i feel like the descent could have been smoother, but otherwise i really loved this one

🎃 the exorcist (book) (10/1 - 10/23) liked WAY more than i thought i would. gonna be 4 stars for reference. 2 things i disliked: chris' internal monologues were annoying and shes more than a bit of a yuppie (the point i guess), AND the fact that psychokinesis is just a FACT in this world (ie possession can't be concluded by moving objects / mind reading bc those are observable in clinical settings in ppl with mental issues) bothered me so much!!! like..... if a DEMON can read your mind, move objects, as established w regan, you can't just chalk it up to NO WAY being possession. wtf???? anyway, everything else was great. really liked the reveals (regan's paint found at the church desecration, regan speaking backwards & mentioning merrin before he's even seen on page). the foreshadowing of karras' demise. very disturbing scenes iykyk, and even the detective parts were fun in the end. dunno if i'll read the sequel (legion) but i've heard the show is v good? 👀

🎃 hell house llc (10/25) 1 (10/25): love, it's a classic at this point, most of the scares dont get to me but surprisingly a few still do, solid ending 2 (10/25): kind of worse acting than the first but still liked, enjoy where the overarching plot is going re drawing people to the house 3 (10/25): definitely upped the production value, the scene of the actress in the basement with the clown is top tier but otherwise it was okay. first is still the best tbh, feels like they explained too much and im more of a fan of ambiguity. since the first 3 films take place in the same building, there's a weird feeling of familiarity & coziness lmao, i could see this series being a comfort rewatch fr origins (10/26): margot was definitely at the fair where tully/cult was kidnapping ppl for the abaddon hotel sacrifices, huh. -- did NO ONE think to check rebecca's cam w/ the body on the bed???? like they've seen other proof of the supernatural but cmon -- ohh that whole scene of rebecca screensharing w her boss and the pictures leading right up to her bedroom door grossssssss bleghhhh i love it -- overall liked this one a lot. still confused abt some stuff (where was the dad's body? why was patrick's arm better? his place in the cult, are the souls (patricks?) bound to the clown costumes etc), but super effective horror for me. sometimes i dont need all the qs answered u know?

🎃 the outwaters (10/26) ppl on reddit said they hated this as much as skinamarink & both are deathly boring but i LOVED skinamarink so lets gooooo -- 38 minutes in. is like...... no one going to aknowledge these sounds???? -- i get the bugs being creepy but are these donkeys supposed to be ominous? bc they just look like sweet cute babies 2 me -- these are the WORST flashlights in the entire world my GOD. -- suddenly, screaming flesh snakes. sure why not -- ooohh space time fuckery? is robbie the axe man? -- i literally cannot see what's happen 90% of the time, its like trying to watch a movie through a pinprick. like near the end he could have been pointing a flashlight at a bbq beef brisket for all i could tell. certainly a choice meant to invoke the claustrophobia and isolation and confusion of the pov, but missed the mark. by a lot. -- theres some neat ideas in here (time travel/time loop where robbie is the one killed and also the killer, with cosmic horror to boot), if i could see anything. loved skinamarink, super effective for me and though it was grainy at least you could SEE, this was. eh. i will say the sound design was great. would have loved to see literally any part of the entity near the end that's making it! the end itself was actually good imo, grotesque but better than seeing a 90% black screen tbh. potential.

🎃 lovely, dark, and deep (10/29) very interesting visuals, kinda cosmic horror in the woods. reminiscent of the "stairs in the woods" and "search and rescue" nosleep stories. also big PT vibes, especially in the scenes in the house, very cyclical/loop in nature but different traumatic events each go thru. love a horror movie that doesnt hold your and and leaves the interpretation up to the viewer. backrooms-esque liminal space? purgatory? mc processing her grief and trauma? dream sequence? hell? are the woods just real fucked up in this natl park? yes. (unfortunately?) it was kinda explained at the end, but i still really liked it. i dunno now the mc could keep working as a ranger, knowing that they just.... let this shit happen. and to perpetuate it....... i do wonder abt the ranger in the beginning, making the choice to get taken. what was his story?

🎃 a house at the bottom of a lake (10/29 - 10/31) 4.5 stars. idk what exactly happened, but i really loved it. great atmosphere (dark, under water, claustrophobic - frankly do not understand people who say this isnt horror lmao), easy to read in a day, perfect for halloween (when I read it). i interpret the ending as james and amelia still being under the obsession of the house, possibly still underwater. like the past 12-or-so days was a "test" of some sort. what finding the house in the real world means, i dont know, but i'm all for horror not holding my hand and it just being about ~the vibes~ which this one nailed for me. the scenes where the flashlights go off? and then house lights turn on? chilled. incredible what you can enjoy when u dont have a hater yappin in ur ear that it sucks <3 

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[ * = re ]

(series) • alien (alien*, aliens*, alien 3*, resurrection*, prometheus, covenant, romulus) • hell house llc (1*, 2, 3, origins) • midnight mass

(films) • nightmare on elm street • the thing* • the outwaters • noroi • the void • event horizon • rosemary's baby • lovely, dark, and deep

(youtube) • backrooms (kane pixels)* • gemini home entertainment*

(books) • the exorcist • uzumaki*

(next year, or b4 next halloween) • smile 2 • the substance • in a violent nature • horror in the high desert • leaving dc

[smol-warrior-1258]

Sooooo I was gonna hold off until the full season was done, kinda give the TV show time to play out as an adaptation instead of being distracted by the alterations being made for this version. Because alterations are okay! I think if you're going to adapt anything from one medium to another it should be to express the content in a new way based on the different limitations & possibilities of one medium vs another. You can't do PJO [the TV show] exactly as written in PJO [the books] - it doesn't work and shouldn't be the point - and I think the show is doing a great job to consciously avoid that trap. (My personal opinions on how several first-person narrated book-to-movie adaptations have fallen somewhat flat is a post for another time.)

And so, I was planning to wait. This is a franchise I hold very dear to my heart and have cared about for more than a decade, I recognize that I will be protective about how a story like this is being shown to a whole new generation and may influence them. I wanted to see how the shifted motivations, etc would progress objectively even if I couldn't see how it would get its way back to the story I know from the book. Let this new version run its course and go from there. You can absolutely shift some things and let the narrative move on a slightly different path without losing the heart of it - it's something fanfiction has really helped me embrace despite my initial impulse to bristle at changes to the stories I love.

But I just watched ep 3 and . . . I'm frustrated.

Everything just feels so shallow?

And I want to be clear: I don't mean bad acting. There are a lot of moments where I enjoy the delivery and the emotions the cast are putting out, and their portrayal is a separate thing from what they are portraying.

I am talking about the plot & the relationships & the characterizations & jfc the PACING. I don't know how to be cohesive about this because there's so many things that just make me so apprehensive about this show hitting deep enough emotionally by the end. It is so empty at the moment and I haven't been convinced that that will change as of yet.

Without further ado, an incomplete list of my thoughts thus far:

Oh uh . . . THIS IS MADE OF SPOILERS . . . so yeah

Gabe. I genuinely do not hate - or even really care enough to dislike - Gabe? What? I just. Just how? How can that even happen? This is such a distracting point because Gabe is a character that is supposed to be fundamentally irredeemable. Full stop. So plainly a nasty, abusive, toxic, utter dirtbag that Percy making the "warding-off-evil gesture" designed for monsters causes a reaction to a mortal. He is such an integral part of Percy's (let alone Sally's) character through a good chunk of the first book in particular, and even later on in PJO & HOO Let's be real here: Tartarus smells like Gabe to Percy even after years and I don't think you could get more on the nose than that. I really just don't understand how the show can drop the ball like this. I can - and might, once the season is complete - go on a whole separate rant about Gabe, but I think I've made enough of a point for now.

Let's talk about blue food. This show has done A LOT of verbal exposition all over the place. About everything. Like maybe kinda too much at times if we're being honest. So where is the explanation for the blue food? You have this poignant Thing about Percy burning the blue jelly beans as a sacrifice bc it's precious to him and yet give 0 reason why beyond the fact that his mom gave it to him? This isn't some fun easter egg for book fans to squeal over in the background bc it's a tiny fun reference you'd only notice as a reader - this is a developed plot point that (again) is recurrent throughout PJO & HOO oh and also ties back to Gabe being a dick for no reason but moving on not to mention a specific example of the bond Percy shares with his mother specifically in the abusive environment she endures to keep him safe. I would not be surprised if they do this bit of exposition later on, but the omission really made it feel hollow.

Which brings me to Sally Jackson, our queen. I like a lot about the portrayal that's been shown so far in terms of her alone, but I really didn't feel like we were given enough to show the relationship between her & Percy. This relationship is so so SO important - and I think the show recognizes that on a surface level to the point that it's altered the plot to confirm that she's not dead from the beginning and make that Percy's openly stated motivation for the quest - and yet I feel as though we've been 'told not shown' that fact? Sally is actively present for such a short amount of time to begin with and it's therefore even more important that her significance to Percy is given sufficient weight for the audience to buy in quickly.

Something that threw me off right from the beginning was the pacing. I think I actually did a sort of shocked double take after Mrs. Dodds went down because it's, presumably, the crux of that episode and yet was a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of scene. Then again with the toilet scene! There was no real build up or follow up; it just kinda happened? It's like all the important pieces are there but nothing is being given the space it really needs, no room to breathe, no time to let the audience be drawn in to the story & it's characters. Emotional/plot beats go by so fast you hardly have time to absorb them while other scenes are longer but still empty. Percy's introduction to the Hermes cabin & the montage (which was very fun btw) of him during capture the flag come to mind in that regard. Scenes where you have time to take it in but there's not much there to take. I don't really know what to do with that I guess? It makes it hard to judge what I'm supposed to find important and that throws me off.

Maybe this is kinda still pacing, but I feel like many of the opportunities for suspense/surprise/tension have been totally missed (if not outright sabotaged). There are instances earlier, but I am still reeling from the Aunty Em scenes. I'm trying not to be stuck on "in the book" rhetoric because that's a different beast, but I really have a hard time understanding the benefit to altering the reveal in that way. Same thing with the formal announcement that Sally was not killed - Percy barely has time to grieve before being told she's alive, and any suspense that might have built by Percy mulling over her fate is ruined. Other scenes, like the Furies on the bus, feel like they have no stakes because they're dispatched so quickly. (Okay yeah this is clearly still tied to the pacing lol). There are smaller moments where I also felt the 'told not shown' rearing it's head. Places where they say something is important but don't show anything to back that up. It's like despite all the stuff about how their quest is dangerous and how dire the circumstances are, there's no actual evidence that that's true? They're in a cab and then the bus and then strolling through the woods and then killing Medusa - all with no visible damage or noticeable repercussions to them. I just haven't felt any payoff from their successes because their successes aren't made to look like actual accomplishments.

Look. This isn't the movies. I saw The Lightning Thief [movie] in theatres (quite possibly on opening weekend) and went from exhilarated anticipation going in to actually literally ranting with my friend on the way out. Those movies were barely based on the source material and that is infuriating as a fan of such a quality series. The main frustration there *was* that MANY significant things were missing and/or different from the book not to mention the flagrant disregard for the basic plot. That's not what's going on here, at least not for me.

This is disappointing in a different way because I'm (mostly) able to step back from the fact that certain moments in the book aren't being show here (looking at you, hacky sack scene) or are being adjusted for this newer version; there are elements I'm definitely enjoying for themselves, and I can see potential in some of the changes long term. I'm going to watch through because I am willing to put some faith in a wonderful cast and Uncle Rick that this will come to a place that does the story justice.

But at the moment? I'm just not there yet.

[claymotif]

hypothetically if you had the possibility to adapt tsh and sky sea into any other type of media what would you adapt them as?? what parts of the story would you focus on in the adaptation and what parts would get left behind (would overall themes change at all? character interactions? worldbuilding and plot? etc etc)?? how would telling the story in a visual medium change them for better or worse?? how would people online horribly misinterpret the story or what do you think theyd say about it?? (this is a longass question answer as much of it as you want LOL)

your MIND okay

mixed feelings on sky sea tbh because i think from a worldbuilding/aesthetic standpoint an animation of some kind would be better BUT a live-action thing would let a lot of dialogue get flattened into significant Looks that are exchanged (which imo works best with live action but CAN be done w animation too). i also think that sky sea could be adapted really well to an episodic style in that their shenanigans could easily be translated to the mini self contained plots with overarching seasonal themes. buuuuut on the other hand u could in theory cut out a lot of the fluff and make the core plot into a standalone movie. i personally think i’d prefer the episodic thing (the character development that could happen here… muah) but hollywood would eat up the standalone movie concept bc of its tendency to flatten characters into What Sells.

i think whether it’s episodic or not an audience would flatten the characters the same? u know. rugged adventurers, snotty princess, Troubled (tm). the difference is that with a series there’s more room for character development so i like to think that there’d be like a portion of the audience devoted to gifsets of parallels and how characters have changed!! with a movie it’d be more about how shippable the characters are.

also because a huge huge huge part of sky sea is. yknow. relationships and old history. a LOT of that tension is portrayed via aderyn and keldan’s internal monologues, which you’d lose in pretty much any screen adaptation but could keep in a comic format. in a screen adaptation the only way to convey that history would be overzealous use of flashbacks (yes i have brainrot but leverage has like. the best use of flashbacks in any show/film ever so i’d probably do that style if anything).

i do kind of think that any adaptation would be more humorous, which tells me that either my book needs to be funnier or something something literature is weightier. idk but i do love the idea of sky sea as a comic book series/webcomic and i think the worldbuilding lends itself well to dramatic “camera” angles so to speak.

tsh HAS to be a live action mini series. like i would simply refuse anything else. there’s enough plot there that trying to cram it all into a movie would be overwhelming and it wouldn’t allow for any downtime or slower moments. the pacing would be so fucked. episodes would let there still be some fluff and softer parts (which are also critical) without sacrificing the plot. it’d be the kind of show with like one season of 8-10 episodes tho; unlike sky sea, tsh has a very definite beginning and end, and it would be a lot more difficult (read: impossible) to pad out with shenanigans the way u could with sky sea.

the live action is an absolute requirement for me. tsh is ultimately a story about humanity (fun fact: originally some of the characters were vampires and fae and the like, bc urban fantasy, but then i realized that the whole 'morality' theme wouldn't hit as hard with monstrous characters aka the ppl the readers expect to have dubious morals anyway), which means seeing real humans do the things the characters do. like idk i love animations but the ‘real’ aspect would get lost in the art style if that makes sense.

as far as worldbuilding goes i would probably simplify the magic system? or at the very least i think it isn't particularly necessary to explain it in a lot of depth. u know. soft magic systems.

also tsh would be the kind of show where ppl would be like "you have to watch it, it's got gay people" "okay what's the plot" "..... there's gay people" BUT there would be a select corner of fandom where everyone is as insane as you and i are. they're writing essays about themes and analysis and symbolism and i love them for it. mwah

idk what else to say even tho im sure i missed stuff so tl;dr (even tho i know you read everything anyway): sky sea would be an ongoing tv series with ideally a game of thrones-style fandom (except imagine if got didn't have the worst series ending in television history) doing the like. gifsets and parallels and in-depth meta analysis. tsh would be a one-season mini-series and most of the fandom would talk about literally anything except the important themes and character development <3

[syncogon]

What do you think about S2. Idk if it’s just me or does it seem really fast. Maybe it’s bc I read the novel and I do think both s1 and S2 skip a lot of the novel

Honestly so far I think it’s fine. Any adaptation has to adapt to its new medium, and it’s just not feasible in terms of budget or time or resources or anything for them to adapt every arc and every single detail of the novel. Remember, TKA is 5 MILLION Chinese characters long, filling out 19 novels in print - that’s around 3.6 million English words, or over three and a half times the entire Harry Potter series. 

That’s why I think (so far, 3 episodes in) they’re doing a fine job of choosing the major plot points and story beats to hit while still setting up important details, making sense, and being entertaining. If someone wants that full-detail 1:1 experience, they can always go to the novel (or, say, check out the radio drama if they have access). Different versions of a story serve different purposes! An adaptation that tries too hard to keep everything the same just can’t really be a good or successful work. Text and visual animation are just so different and subject to different constraints that the material itself has to be changed in some ways. All things considered, the donghua is still staying pretty faithful. Sure, we’d all want more episodes to get more details (imagine a full 24 in a season, how beautiful!), but when you have constraints, you have to work around them. 

Like. I really really really want to see Happy winning the Challenger League in animated form. That’s a HUGE milestone for our protagonists. I don’t want to have to wait a decade to see that happen. And that’s assuming there’d even still be a fanbase by then - the longer this drags out, the more likely it is that this’ll get dropped before we ever get to that point in the story.* (This is also why I only say Challenger League; it’s a good stopping point, and I don’t even dare hope yet that we’ll get Season 10 properly animated.)

I’ve heard some people comparing S1 and S2, but like you say I don’t think S2 moves significantly faster than S1 did. Just consider, S1 was 12 episodes and we barely scratched the surface of what TKA is really about; we meet like less than half of Happy’s to-be members and only at the very end affirm the goal of creating our own team. You could barely talk to a donghua-only fan without spoilers. Even if comparing the donghua to the novel makes it seem like the donghua skips a lot, I don’t think the pacing of the donghua story feels too rushed when considered as an independent entity.** That’s important too, considering an adaptation on its own merits. And also consider that we’re already a quarter of the way through material took 3 years to come out. 

TL;DR I’m still having a great time with S2. Everyone is free to have their own thoughts; these are just mine. Let’s hope things keep getting better, and let’s hope S3 isn’t too far out :’)

* Happens even in the more-established Japanese anime industry. At least no matter what, we have the completed TKA novel and we know what happens. Rainbow Sea 星游记 took 3 years to release the second part of its S2 movie series, had it end on a taunting cliffhanger, and then like two weeks later announced that due to various circumstances (not enough money) they couldn’t finish this series. And now we’ll never know the conclusion of this story. Maybe it wouldn’t have hurt so much if they figured out how to write a good story that only required two movies to tell. 

** People are in fact criticizing that too much time is spent talking and explaining. However I think most of such sections are important for understanding what’s actually going on, what the stakes are, etc - if we rushed through those, then the donghua would be much more confusing, and that, in my opinion, is especially important to avoid. Moreover, we get some good character moments through such “talk” scenes.

*** Disclaimer: I like liking things, I’m biased toward positivity especially wrt TKA. I don’t really appreciate dwelling on the negativity of disliking something, or the kind of complaint circles that tends to generate. Why bother? Why choose to stay in that mindset? If someone doesn’t like something, then they should just move on, find what they like and let others have their happiness. 

[void-official]

Sarazanmai! was a fun anime with a lots of emotionally resonant moments and even more dumb potty humor but would I say its Ikuhara’s best anime? probably nah BUTT we’ll see how it ages. And I mean!! I really did like it and it’s worth a watch if you share general taste with me, but what I liked most about it and what I think it offers most above his other stuff is that it felt condensed and fast-paced in a way that made it very watchable and entertaining for someone with a short attention span like me. compared to like, a 24 episode anime where the themes are more carefully paced and constructed and might be harder to just dive into watching. I often drop shows by the third episode even if I think i’m gonna like them, bc i just don’t always have the energy to watch more than one season of something. Even the best anime tend to have slow arcs or bad episodes, and Sarazanmai just didn’t seem to have time for that, or I didn’t notice them bc there was just too much going on at any given point for me to ever feel bored by it.

Does that + the constant slapstick make it less emotionally resonant than Utena or YuriBears or Penguin Drum? Maybe? But that would be sorta assuming those things were absent from those shows, which they definitely weren't, and at least in Sarazanmai its tonally there for practically the entire time, whether you want it there or not, so its feels less jarring than Nanami getting turned into a cow episodes or the 3 cartoon penguins doing human things in the background of a show that otherwise feels like a child’s interpretation of Film Noir. I at least had a decent emotional reaction to Sarazanmai, all things considered, but I’m aware some people don’t really enjoy mood whiplash and might find it distasteful that you can literally have Butt Jokes and Plot Progression taking place within the exact same frame. comparatively its a lot like. having silly dumb goofy Sidekicks piping in with their weirdness during serious moments of a Disney film, but I mostly found it entertaining bc i wasn’t exactly. watching with the expectation of it being 100% serious anyway. Like after the first episode you already have a good feel for how this show will be. The themes here were pretty simplistic and easy to grasp, a lot of the meta stuff is embellishment and not necessary to enjoying the show’s basic plotline and even then its fucking silly and lighthearted in its approach most of the time in a way even haters of Ikuhara’s heavy handed ~symbolism~ might be able to tolerate due to its utter like. irreverence towards it? The fucking otter that is an abstract concept who keeps reminding you that its an abstract concept is the clearest example I have. It’s literally feels like someone appending ~It’s Symbolic~ to a shitpost in execution and I lost it nearly every time it happened.

I guess like, people have this association w/Ikuhara shows that he’s always trying to be like SUPER DEEP and make complicated, difficult to understand stories. Hes High Art, using anime as a medium or whatever. But even if elements of this are like that, and I can appreciate it that way/want to re-watch to see what more I get out of it next time, I don’t think Sarazanmai necessarily wants to be seen as #Deep to the average viewer or expects you to need to engage with it that way, and that’s why i say its very Watchable. Honestly I laughed more than I cried white it was airing bc Sarazanmai basically just throws so much shit at you at once, sometimes its metaphorical shit, sometimes its deep shit, but mostly its just Literal shit butt balls. and you kinda just have to deal with it as it comes. its actually going above and beyond to make itself accessible to the point im sure some people might find it low brow, ridiculous or distasteful as a result. Also it might make you uncomfortable if you can’t stomach the mild sexual themes involving teenagers but I’d argue its literally the tamest example of it out of literally any Ikuhara anime to date, sexual themes involving teenagers have literally always been there in his work and imo despite Sarazanmai being like. a butt joke anime where teenage boys transform into kappas to probe peoples butts to free them of their worldly desires every night its utilized in a far less uncomfortable way than like literally anything else he’s been involved with (and I’m one of those people who argues the sexual themes 100% are necessary to his work bc they’re often about the end of adolescence and the different types of love you can feel for a person. and showing where the line is crossed between different types of love and particularly when love becomes toxic or abusive is integral to those themes) I mean there are lots of things I could ‘warn’ for but its all the kind  of stuff you’d find in literally any other Ikuhara show. Do you like Ikuhara’s other stuff? Congrats you’ll probably like Sarazanmai. Does Utena transforming into a car at the end of the Utena movie send you into a blind rage bc WHAT DOES IT MEAN? Probably dont watch Sarazanmai. Would I recommend it as your first Ikuhara show? Idk Maybe? Like I personally still think Utena and Penguin Drum are better but I think Sarazanmai is maybe more watchable if you just want to get your mind fucked and also potentially laugh/cry a lot in as few episodes as possible

[yiulee999]

Hey! What do you think of OPM season 2? I still love it & am looking forward to next weeks new episode but i just wish Saitama had more screen time ;-(

hey nonny~! 

apologies for the late reply, its a combo of not getting notifications (tumblr u useless trashbucket) and being on surgery rotation (i miss sleeping so much) 

firstly, i am truly glad you still love it and look forward to the new episodes!!! 💖💖💖please dont let anything i say from this point on dissuade you from that enjoyment 

THAT BEING SAID 

///cut for length 

ive only watched up to the second episode, and i am having Such Difficulties convincing myself to keep watching. i know my rxns to ep 1 were overall pretty positive and I stand by it but the more i watch the more the Cringe/Hypercritique starts take over. 

Turns out, the art style had a bigger impact than i thought on the length of which i enjoy shows. personally, i just really like when anime/shows have a happy marriage between writing and artwork. and when show directors know how to interpret writing, how to set up a scene (the angle, the music, the pacing), and then communicate with artists who have the skills to bring that idea to life using the medium they’re given -- that’s when writing becomes storytelling. OPM’s writing is still fantastic since they’re going off ONE (whereas GoT has the opposite problem where the production value is 4K and the writing is early 2000s livejournal/fanfiction lol god why is everyone dropping the ball in 2019??)

As for the art, since opm switched to jc staff and shingo natsume & co. left for other projects ( ;;_____;; im emo ), its inevitable we would see a drop in animation quality and i find myself constantly getting distracted by things i never used to get concerned about in the first season (bc of the high bar of expectations set by s1 artists/directors, like theres just no way jc staff would match up it to all of that and i feel bad for them, they’re trying their best but that doesn’t mean theyre immune to critique on the artistic liberties that they’ve taken that i feel as a viewer, may not have been the best choice?) 

the shading: no, just, unnecessary and distracting and why is it the center of saitamas face, im by far no expert in lighting but a bish can tell something doesnt look right??? 

the shading pt II: color choices. just gonna say i was not expecting sai’s ‘hair shirt’ in ep 1 to be bright-ass neon green, it was a little jarring at first and i miss him in red ;-; i get hes supposed to have poor fashion choices but i dont see him as the type to pick something that stands out so much in the crowd, like he likes to be left alone. NEON doesnt really relay ‘hi dont mind me im just barely existing here lol’ 

the shading pt III: genos arms/neck. okaY so the bby looks good in screenshots. like he’s shiny and nice to look at when nothings moving. bUT this is animation?? movement of objections is different from still life manga so making every single scene almost 99% like murata’s panels translates a little awkwardly to the screen (like staff is lucky bc murata’s a force of nature with his panels playing out like a movie for ref). but when genos moves, the arms are just distracting bc everything around him is drawn simply without shadows so they stand out by themselves and i (visually) forget about the rest of him haha. 

the pacing: it feels scripted, person A says this so we’ll show person A in the shot, then person B is saying something so we have to cut to person B, etc etc like keeping pretty steady to manga lines to the point where i was starting to get bored bc i knew what was coming. it was really intervaled? like someone had to be saying something at a certain effect and i think s1 had more dramatic pauses (lol) but thats how you can place emphasis on scenes to have an emotional impact if the character doesnt say anything and just let the soundtrack do some talking and the cadence of the script will change too (im 10000% talking about the sunset scene in s1 god bless. like it was slow, there was MOOD there wasn’t any rush and really gave the viewer time to think about the relationship between the two characters and what that moment meant to each of them) i feel like there were several scenes that could have been more like in the scene where sai protected fubuki, could have been a little more dramatically emphasized (aka just a pause) so the viewer could get a chance to understand that he purprosefully shielded her or when genos says that strong heroes are drawn to saitama--bUT nope its the same pace, like c l o c k w o r k just like my t eARS--

the fight scenes: how do i even start. the one scene that got me INTO opm (like watching the anime, reading the manga, drawing fanart, writing fanfic, reading fanfics etc) was kickstarted by the fight scene between genos and saitama in s1 that was circulating on tumblr a while back. i thought the characters were interesting and the fight was badass and it just looked SO COOL. (also the forehead flick at the end just kinda sealed my fate). going from that to s2 fight scenes where its mostly cut scenes and freeze scenes?? where theres a cut out behind the characters back?? during a fight scene????? this isn’t a calling card or an anime opening??? i dont understand. when they dont do cut scenes, its interesting but my initial impression is just underwhelmed. i can find good parts but it feels like i have to replay the scene to notice it? theres also an overwhelming amount of graphics/cgi manipulation that overpowers the actual art sometimes. its lacking some of the fluidity that comes from hand drawn fight scenes from first season. OTL

the sound directing: so i thought that the mood just felt off for certain scenes and the sound didn’t seem to support the scene as well (unless it was like the character’s theme or smtg) and i looked it up and the sound director was also replaced (Yoshikazu Iwanami replacing Shoji Hata). i have no idea if the sound director is also in charge of character lines but there were parts were fubuki was monologuing and i had no idea she was inner monologuing, i thought she was talking out loud and that just took extra effort on my part to re-orient myself (im nitpitcking i know but its just how i watch shows lol) 

there are still some parts i like about the animation:

fubuki looks bangin and i love her👌👗

all of this just made me realize how insanely lucky we were to have an amazing s1 and just have it exist and how i really could not care less if they had just waited forever to make s2 as long as we had the same crew come back. but anime is still a business and the quicker they dish out merch/seasons, the more money they can bring in. which they do in the short run but they would bring in more if they spent a little more on quality in the long run and it becomes one of those classics that ppl will rewatch and keep recommending to ppl who want to get into anime and oh my god we’re never gonna have that now, are we. if im gonna rec it to a friend its gonna be ‘read the manga!’ or ‘just watch s1!’ uGH. its just an unfortunate situation, its not one person’s fault either, so many factors go into what made opm s1 so spectacular and seeing s2 just made me appreciate s1 more. i guess im happy to have a s2 regardless? 

i’ll still watch to support (and bc i like suiryuu and wanna see sai in a karate gi and wig lol). maybe i just have to get used to the new style. 

so in summary,

[theticklishpear]

I want to include a heist scene in my story (about a nice guy who got roped into a drug trafficking ring), bc they're really cool. I'm not sure how it would go, but I want the scene to include receiving the drugs, and some elaborate plan to move them across the border (like hiding them in a vegetable or something). I'm just not sure how to go about it without making it sound boring. I want it to be just as captivating as a scene in a movie... How would I go about that?

Before you can begin trying to lay the heist out on paper, you’ll want to make sure you’ve thought through as much of the actual logistics of the event as you can:

The Team: Who’s leading the team? They’re usually a charismatic person who has gained the respect of the rest of the folks in the team. Each member of the team has some special knowledge or ability that they bring to the team. The  ever-fun Honey Heist tabletop RPG rules lay out the roles as: the muscle, the brains, the driver, the hacker, the thief, and the face. While your group might have a different make-up of skills, it’s a must for you to know what they’re contributing. In groups like these, if they don’t contribute, they aren’t on the team.

The Motivation: Why are they pulling this heist? What are they after? There needs to be a compelling reason for not only your character to participate but also for the leader to want to risk something potentially very visible.

The Plan: How do they think they’re going to pull this off? What are the obstacles they know they’ll have to overcome? What are some complications they don’t know about?

The Execution: How do things actually go? What things were they prepared for? How do things go wrong? What kinds of consequences do they have to deal with from their actions, and are they ready for them?

Now, in terms of your tools for actually writing the words on the page, first remember that unless you’re writing a screenplay/script, you are not writing a movie. You’re writing a narrative story. There are tools available to filmmakers that aren’t available to writers, and tools available to writers that are not available to filmmakers. With the prevalence of visual media today, we all struggle with how to get our visual imaginations onto the page in words. They’re two different mediums and the way you tackle them have to be fundamentally different. Be willing to try things to see if you can get the feel of the scene right and when they fail, try again differently, and when that fails? Try again in another way.

Put your words to work. Any kind of action scene requires all the words you choose to pull their weight. Make sure they’re sharp, dynamic, full of movement and purpose. Use strong verbs that stand on their own. Vary your sentence length and structure throughout the scenes to emphasize the mood and pacing you want for each moment. Keep your descriptions short while focusing on action and speech when your characters are more worried about moving quickly, and lengthen the sentences when they have a moment to breathe. Let your pacing and sentence syntax feed your characters’ anxiety or level-headedness into your audience.

Decide what scenes you need out of the classic heist format. Do you want to show your characters planning and prepping before the heist? Do you want to intersperse the planning scenes throughout the heist instead? Do you want to just depict the heist itself without the planning?

Scenes where the team talks through their intentions give you the opportunity to show the audience just what’s at stake (not just for your character but for this team they’ve found themselves an accidental part of), the obstacles they’ll face, and the risks they’ll have to take. They’re particularly helpful scenes because when you show or tell how the heist goes down, your audience has the juxtaposition of what was supposed to happen and what actually happened. The audience immediately feels their stomach drop when an alarm blares that wasn’t mentioned in the plan. Play with how these scenes read on the page to see what feels right in terms of pacing.

Build tension by threatening failure. Audiences expect heists not to go the way they’re planned; it’s a genre trope but also just good storytelling. Failure can happen at any time: a part of the plan could go wrong, or something unexpected could happen, or a consequence they didn’t foresee could bite them in the butt. Use that expectation of failure to your advantage. Let them get through the hard bits without too much fuss only to fail something they didn’t expect or to run into another complication. Playing to the tension that the characters are laboring under themselves while keeping surprises in your pocket to raise the stakes as the heist unfolds will give the audience that wild ride they come to expect.

Forgive yourself when it’s not perfect the first time around. Throw out version that don’t feel right and try it over again afresh. If it takes you 20 drafts, so be it. There’s nothing wrong or unusual with that when there’s something you’re trying to really nail a specific pace, mood, or tone for. Just keep trying.

Throwing Open the Vault: Tips for Writing a HeistWriting The Heist Novel: 7 Character TipsWriting a Heist: 5 Tips for Picking the Perfect LootHeist plots: How to write a breathtaking heistAny advice on how to write a heist story?6 Quick Tips For Writing Gripping Scenes

[bedbathandbeyondv67]

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