#because the moments like that are the best parts of those episodes and i wish there was more of that

[sonknuxadow]

sorry i feel kinda bad for saying negative things because i really do like sonic prime but the pacing in certain episodes of season 2 feels a bit off? like whats with the nonstop really long robot fight scenes.... and i know the first season had a bunch of fight scenes too but some of the ones in season 2 feel really repetitive and not as interesting for reasons i dont know how to explain? its like the writers knew they couldnt move through the plot too fast so they just dragged out the fight scenes for as long as possible

i have to wonder if it would still feel like this if they had just released one episode at a time instead of a bunch at once

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

Pick One: Magical Girl Show or Rom-com. You cannot be both.

Early in season four we get the episode Gang of Secrets. An episode that ends with Marinette outing her secret identity to Alya. A touching moment that sparked outrage across the fandom because it meant that Marinette had made the choice to reveal her identity to her best friend while keeping her hero partner in the dark.

This choice spat in the face of the exceptions that many fans had for the series. Thousands of pre-season-four fanfics feature moments where Ladybug and Chat Noir promise each other that they'll be the first to know each other's identities. After the Alya reveal, scores of fanfics were written to salt on Marinette's choice to tell the "wrong" person.

Most of these fics feature a betrayed Chat Noir quitting or otherwise punishing Ladybug for breaking their promise to be each other's first, thereby destroying his faith in their partnership. But that promise was never made on screen. It only existed in the realms of fanfic and, when Chat Noir finally found out in canon, his reaction was largely neutral. He never once blamed Ladybug for her choice or pushed for a reveal or even asked for the right to tell one of his friends.

So what happened here? Why did the fans have such wildly unrealistic expectations of canon? Were their expectations even unrealistic or did canon betray them? The answer to that is not as straight forward as you might think because it all comes back to one of Miraculous' many, many, many writing problems: Miraculous is trying to be both a Magical Girl Show and a romantic comedy, but those are not genres that mesh. You can only be one (or you can be a third thing that we'll get to at the end as it's the easiest way to fix this mess, but I want to mostly focus on where the anger is coming from and why the writing is to blame.)

To discuss this mismatch, we're going to do something that breaks my heart and talk about some of Origins flaws. While I love that episode and unironically refer to it as the best writing the show ever gave us, it's not perfect and its flaws are all focused around trying to set up both genres. Do note that I'm going to use a lot of gender binary language here as magical girl shows have a strong focus on gender segregation and rarely if ever acknowledge gender diversity.

Let's Talk Magical Girls

Magical girl shows are shows that center on young women and their friendships. While male love interests are often present in these shows, the boys tend to take a backseat and function primarily as arm candy while the girls save the day and carry the narrative.

A great example of this is the show Winx Club. This show features a large cast of teenage girls who save the magical universe from various threats with their magical powers. Each girl has a love interest, but the boys are usually off doing their own thing and only occasionally show up for a date or to give the girls a ride on their cool bikes or magical spaceship. I don't even think that we see the guys fight or, if we do, it's a rare thing. They are not there to save the day. They are there to be shipping fodder.

Like most magical girl shows, Winx Club starts with the main character making friends with one of the girls who will eventually become part of her magical girl squad. This brings us back to Miraculous.

Did you ever find it weird that Origins implies that Marinette has no friends? She doesn't even have a backbone until new girl Alya shows up to become Marinette's First Real Friend:

Marinette: I so wish I can handle Chloé the way you do. Alya: You mean the way Majestia does it. She says all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing. (pointing at Chloé) Well, that girl over there is evil, and we are the good people. We can't let her get away with it.

This is a bizarre opening because Miraculous is not about Marinette making friends or learning to stand up for herself. If you skipped Origins and just watched the rest of the show, then you'd have no clue that Marinette wasn't close with her classmates before this year. You also wouldn't know that Alya was new in town and you definitely wouldn't know that Marinette had never stood up to Chloé before this year. So why is this here? Why waste screen time setting up elements that aren't actually important to canon?

Miraculous did it for the same reason that Winx Club did it: magical girl shows traditionally start with the main character making friends with at least one of her eventual female teammates because Magical Girl shows are all about the girls and their relationships. The boys are just arm candy.

But Miraculous isn't a magical girl show. The writers have explicitly stated that it's a rom-com and romantic comedies aren't about female friendship. They might have female friendships in them, but that's not where the focus is. The focus of a rom-com is on the romance and Origins is very clearly all about the romance.

Origins as a Rom-com

Origins has a lot on its plate. It has to establish the villain's motivation for the first time, show us how the heroes got their miraculous, show us how the heroes first met on both sides of the mask, show us how they met their respective best friends, and show us how the heroes dealt with their first akuma. It would be perfectly understandable if this 40 minute two-parter didn't do anything with the romance. They have a full show to give us that!

In spite of this, Origins has some incredibly touching moments for both Ladynoir and Adrienette because romance is the heart of Miraculous. It is the main focus of the show. The driving motivation for both of our leads and the majority of the show's episodes. To tell the story of how their journey started without at least one of them falling in love would feel wrong. That's why we see both of them fall in love!

First we get Chat Noir giving his heart to his bold and brilliant lady, then we get Marinette's heart being stolen by the shy sweet boy who never once thought to blame her for her snap judgement of his character. We even get a touching moment where Chat Noir inspires his lady to accept her role and be Ladybug, leading her to boldly face their enemy and call him out:

Roger: I have a new plan, unlike you! Move aside and let the pros do their thing. You've already failed once! Ladybug: …He's right, you know. If I'd captured Stoneheart's akuma the first time around, none of this would have happened! I knew I wasn't the right one for this job… Cat Noir: No. He's wrong, because without you, she'd no longer be here. (they look at Chloe) And because without us, they won't make it, and we'll prove that to 'em. Trust me on this. Okay? Ladybug: Okay.

I love this moment, but it does lose a little of its power when you remember that we had an Alya-driven variation of this exact same thing five minutes prior:

Alya: HELP!! (Marinette suddenly gets filled with courage. She gets the case out of Alya's bag and puts on the Miraculous. Then, Tikki appears, happy to see Marinette again.) Tikki:(raising her arms) Mmmm! Marinette: I think I need Ladybug! Tikki: I knew you'd come around! Marinette: Well, I'm still not sure I'm up for this, but Alya's in danger. I can't sit back and do nothing.

This scene initially confused me because - if Miraculous is a rom-com - then why would you make Alya the reason that Marinette became Ladybug? Why wouldn't you have Chat Noir be the one in danger so that Marinette chose to fight because of her love interest and then encourage that bond with the later scene of him encouraging her? Why split the focus like this? Why give Alya so much attention?

In case you haven't figured it out, it's because Origins is trying to establish two different genres of show. Two genres that will continue to fight for the rest of the series (or at least the first five seasons).

Magical Girls Vs Rom-com

Why is Alya the one to shake off the nightmare dust and inspire the others during the season five finale? Why is Alya the one that Marinette trusts with all of her plans while Chat Noir is kept in the dark? Why does Alya and Marinette's friendship get so much more focus than Adrien and Nino's? Why was Alya the only temp hero who got upgraded to full time hero?

It's because Alya is Marinette's second in command in a magical girl show and magical girl shows focus on female friendships while the boys are just there to be cute and support the girls.

Why do most of Marinette's talks with Alya focus on Adrien? Why is Chat Noir the only other full time holder of a Miraculous for the first three seasons and then again for the final season? Why do Marinette's friends become more and more obsessed with Adrienentte as the show goes on? Why is the love square's identity reveal given so much more narrative weight than any other identity reveal?

It's because Miraculous is a rom-com and the love square is our end game couple, so of course the story focuses on their relationship above all else!

Are you starting to see the problem?

Circling back to our original question: no, it was not unreasonable for the fans to expect that the Alya reveal would have massive negative consequences for Ladynoir. That is what should happen in a rom-com and Miraculous is mainly written like a rom-com. But the writers are also trying to write a magical girl show and, in a magical girl show, Alya and Marinette's friendship should be the most important relationship in the show, so it makes perfect sense that the show treats the Alya reveal as perfectly fine because the Alya reveal was written from the magical girl show perspective.

When it comes to Miraculous, if you ever feel like a writing choice makes no sense for genre A, re-frame it as a thing from genre B and it suddenly makes perfect sense which is fascinatingly terrible writing! It's no wonder there are people who hate the Alya reveal and people who will defend it with their life. It all depends on which genre elements you've picked up on and clung to. Neither side is right, they've both been set up to have perfectly valid expectations. Whether those expectations are valid for a given episode is entirely up to the mercurial whims of the writers!

How Do We Fix This Mess

At this point, I don't think that we can, the show is too far gone, but if someone gave me the power to change one element of Miraculous, that element would be this: scrap both the magical girl stuff and the rom-com stuff and turn Miraculous into a team show where the friendships transcend gender.

At this point, I've written over a quarter of a million words of fanfic focused on these characters (the brain rot is real) and one thing I've discovered is that it is damn near impossible to keep Adrien and Alya from becoming friends. They're both new to their school while Marinette and Nino have gone to the same school for at least a few years. Alya and Adrien are both obsessed with Ladybug plus Adrien is a natural hype man who loves to support his friends and Alya loves to talk about her blog. Alya is dating Adrien's best friend. On top of that, Alya, Adrien, Nino, and Marinette are all in the same class, meaning that they pretty much have to be spending time together five days a week unless French school don't give kids a chance to socialize or do group projects. If so, then judging them for the first issue, but super jealous of the latter.

Given all of that, why in the world is does it feel like Alya is Marinette's close friend while Adrien is just some guy who goes to Alya's school? Along similar lines, while canon Marinette barely talks to Nino, I've found that Marinette and Nino tend to get along smashingly, especially if you embrace the fact that they have to have known each other for at least a few years.

If you embrace this wider friendship dynamic and scrap the girl squad, replacing it with Alya, Adrien, Marinette, and Nino, then the fight for narrative importance quickly goes away. It's no longer a question of is this episode trying to be a magical girl show or a rom-com? Instead, the question is: which element of the friend group is getting focused on today? The romance or the friendship?

A lot of hero shows do this and do it well. I think that one of the most well known examples is Teen Titans. That show has five main characters and the focus is usually on their friendships, but there is a very clear running romantic tension between the characters Robin and Starfire with several episodes giving a good deal of focus to their romance. I'd say that this element really starts in the show's the 19th episode - Date with Destiny - and it all culminates in the movie that capstones the series: Trouble in Tokyo. The character Beast Boy also gets a romance arc and, while it's more short lived, it's further evidence that you can have strong romances and strong friendships in the same show and even the same episode. You just have to own the fact that boys and girls can be friends with each other, a very logical thing to embrace when your show has decided to have a diverse cast of heroes instead of imposing arbitrary gender limitations on its magical powers.

I couldn't figure out a way to work this into the main essay, but it's relevant so I wanted to quickly point it out and give you more to think about re Origins. Have you ever found it weird how Origins gives both Adrien AND Marinette the "I've never had friends before" backstory and yet wider canon acts like Marinette has this strong amazing friend group while Adrien doesn't seem to care about making friends and instead focuses all his energy on romance? Why give both the protagonist and the supposed deuteragonist this kind of origin if it's not going to be a major element of the show? It makes so much more sense to only give one of them this backstory and then focus that person's character arc on learning about friendship.

[lost-and-ephemeral]

Series: In Her Shadow, pt.2 (ft. main trio)

Part 1 | Part 2

Slowly but surely she replaced you in his heart.

Pairing: Xavier x reader, Zayne x reader, Rafayel x reader (seperate)

Tags: angst, hurt no comfort, reader is not MC, breakup

A/N: I recieved a lot of comments and request asking me to continue, so here we are! I've tried my best. Ty everyone, I appreciate every message, even if it would be hard to mention every single one of them in this post. Also, if you want to be tagged in future fics, let me know!

-`♡´- MASTERLIST -`♡´- 

Rafayel

You began to notice that Rafayel was spending less and less time with you, choosing his bodyguard over you.

It wasn't obvious at first, yeah, but as time went on, everything became so noticeable that you couldn't ignore it anymore. Especially when he forgot about your plans with him and didn't even consider apologizing for it.

The smell of someone else's perfume in his studio, the way Rafayel would leave you at home and take her to all the important events because "you probably don't like spending time among journalists and annoying guests." It seems that he didn't even notice the moment when you were completely estranged from each other.

And all your attempts to talk to him about it ended with nothing.

"She's my bodyguard," he'd say. "No wonder I take her everywhere I go. Is there anything wrong with that?"

Yes, a lot of things were wrong.

But he was completely unwilling to notice it, and you were tired of collecting the shards of your broken heart from the floor day after day. Those warm feelings that brought a sense of lightness and happiness in your heart suddenly turned into pure torture.

You had to end it all, even if it'll hurt so much.

When you arrived at his studio this morning, you came face to face with "Ms. Bodyguard" herself. She was just about to leave, and didn't even hesitate to embrace your beloved. Right in front of you.

Maybe you would've exploded from all these negative emotions, if you had any strength left to be mad or to cry. But there was only emptiness in your heart.

You became strangers to each other.

"I'm breaking up with you," you said without any regret and pushed him away as he tried to hug you. "I don't want to be a second choice after your precious bodyguard."

"W-wait, why? What... But I didn't do anything!" he replied confused, apparently not realizing how much he's been hurting you all this time.

"Maybe that's the point. That you'd do anything for her, but not for me."

He looked at you with the same confusion in his eyes, trying to figure out if it was a joke, but you continued before leaving this place forever.

"You were everything to me, Rafayel. But for you, I was just a small episode of your life. I'm tired. You've been spending all your free time with her, like I didn't exist. It'll be better this way. Goodbye."

No matter how long he was calling your name, asking you to stop, to come back and talk with him, you didn't.

Zayne

Loving a cardiac surgeon with his busy schedule is hard.

But it's even harder when he no longer cares about your existence and spends a significant amount of time with his childhood friend.

After Zayne forgot about your reservation at the restaurant, making you feel like you were the last fool in this world, some more time has passed.

Yeah, he apologized. No, he didn't start spending less time with his "friend".

It's hard to count how many evenings you spent alone when he stayed late at work for her or was invited to a "friendly" dinner with her. But it happened often enough so finally your love turned into suffering.

At first you tried to convince yourself that you're too jealous and he's just happy to finally reunite with someone close to him from his youth. You care about your friends too, don't you?

But it only got worse.

All your plans were constantly adjusted to his friend's wishes. She wants to take him to a cafe at the same time you were planning to go to the cinema? "Sorry, love, let's reschedule our date for another day". You've made him his favorite dinner? Too bad, his friend already brought him dinner at work and he's not hungry.

Eventually you started feeling like he stopped enjoying your time together and just continued to exist in the same apartment with you out of habit.

Talking didn't get you anywhere, because Zayne didn't notice how much he was hurting you (or he simply didn't want to notice it) with his actions and only distanced himself from you even more.

At some point you felt like he put an ice wall around himself again.

He stayed late again this evening, completely forgetting his promise to spend time with you. You packed your things with tears in your eyes, ready to say goodbye to life with Zayne once and for all.

And he showed up at the doorstep of his apartment just as you were ready to leave.

"What's going on?" his voice didn't betray a shred of emotion. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to leave you and your lovely friend together so I don't have to be an unwanted addition to your life."

Zayne was taken aback at this statement and was about to say something, but you interrupted him.

"You were the one who brought happiness and comfort into my life. You were the one who made me feel loved and wanted. But now I realize that I wasn't good enough for you. Goodbye."

You walked away and closed the door behind you, leaving him all alone.

Xavier

Before, you without a doubt would've said that your relationship with Xavier was the ultimate dream.

But now it wasn't actually true.

Yes, your beloved still showed care and attention every spare minute he had. Just not to you. It seemed as if his colleague started to occupy his every thought.

During dinner, on a walk, after missions. He was always talking about her, how strong she is, and how lucky he is that she chose him as her partner. His eyes were shining with delight you had never seen before.

You were happy for him, but only until it crossed the line. Only until you started to feel like he was in love with her, not with you.

One day you found yourself completely miserable. Xavier texted you that he would be late because they had "decided to celebrate another successful mission". Except that you were usually the one he shared his joy with. But things have changed.

Even though you were the brightest star in his world, you were inevitably lost behind the glow of the Moon.

You were trying to be better, to be more interesting. Trying to reach an unattainable ideal. But you couldn't. After all, maybe you were never meant to be together if it turned out like this. Maybe you weren't enough for him.

You couldn't remember the last day you didn't cry. Sometimes alone, sometimes locking yourself in the bathroom after another conversation about this "super-strong collegue". But Xavier didn't seem to notice it at all.

"I thought maybe you'd be interested to know what happens during missions," he said when you brought up this painful topic.

And, yes, you were interested. But all you heard was, "She took down that Wanderer so easily, I couldn't take my eyes off her." Or, "she's so good with her weapon, it's amazing."

He distanced himself from you so much that you hardly spent any time together.

He wasn't even home the day you left.

Xavier sent you a message saying he'd be late again. As usual, with her. Even though he promised to have a movie night and you had already prepared everything you needed for it.

Maybe it's even better if you don't see the look in his eyes the moment you tell him you're breaking up with him. You packed your things and left a note on the table, next to the snacks you bought.

"Maybe in another universe I would be worthy of you so you could look at me with the same adoration. I can see that you enjoy spending time with her much more. And we should break up so you don't torment my heart anymore. Goodbye."

You glanced around his apartment one last time before leaving it forever.

♡ tags: @skyowlz @prettytemis @aishasreality @randompersonwhoexist @kreishin @reni502 @moonyzstarz @chin-chii

[myfairstarlight]

Alright, let's talk about Colin's entrapment line and why Penelope offering an annulment was significant, shall we? Arguably the most controversial part of this season, isn't it?

I'm not going to delve too long on the entrapment line again actually, but to summarise, Colin has been traumatised by a similar situation before, and right now, he's hurt. And the thing about being angry with your best friend is that you know what to say to hurt them the most. We see it in Eloise's and Penelope's fight, as they threw each other's insecurities in the other's faces. Colin, two episodes ago, was defending Penelope against Portia, who was accusing her of entrapping him, so yes, his mind will jump to that first. But also note that the whole time he refuses to look at her, because he knows his words are cutting and will hurt and he knows his resolve would break if he looked at her, which is contrasted by Penelope directly looking at him to tell him she loves him and did not mean for this to happen like this. He does not look because he knows she loves him, this is not Marina's situation exactly who only wanted a way out and did not see him as much else than a means to an end, and that's why it's so much more difficult to deal with for him. Penelope loves him.

And he's already almost lost her once, as angry and hurt as he is, he cannot fathom the idea of letting her go, when he remembers how empty he felt without her letters, or at the idea of her with Debling. So he's still here, determined to marry her.

So now we get to e8. The marriage was not technically consummated, and the Lady Whistledown business is finally settled. So Penelope offers the annulment, to set him, and his family, free from her mess.

They never directly address Colin's entrapment comment again, but with Penelope offering the annulment, it is now implied she's been thinking about this the whole time. It is a very real possibility that by that point, Penelope already knew she was pregnant, and it's been speculated if she told Colin in that scene after Francesca's wedding or not (I personally don't think she did, to not add to his guilt at that moment, and perhaps to not influence his decision, knowing she would be offering the annulment soon) and it parallels Marina's situation again, except in this case, Penelope does not wish to trap Colin with a baby, even if it is his. She knows how much Marina impacted Colin, and does not wish to do the same thing she had prevented Marina to do. The best part about this though? Colin is stunned (Edit: I changed the adjective here as someone rightfully pointed out I was exaggerating by saying "flabbergasted" when his reaction is more on the subtle side the English language is the bane of my existence). Frankly, he probably forgot he even said that, the same way he forgot about his "I would never dream of courting Penelope Featherington" comment - those were words said in the heat of the moment he never actually believed. Not once has Colin thought of either breaking the engagement, or get an annulment even after the betrayal.

He could have still eloped with Marina even after learning the truth, but he didn't because she was not honest with him from the start. He learns Penelope has been living a double life this whole time, and yet he stays.

It is significant that Penelope listened and acknowledged Colin's point of view, the same way she asked him to simply stand by her side and support her. Also note that she never says "our family", she says "you or your family".

Despite already being married, this whole time, it did not feel like they were, and she knew that as long as there was still this barrier between them, she could never truly be part of that family, but it's alright, she could live with that, she has mended things with her own after all, and she can support herself. Whatever the outcome, she'll be alright, she believes.

Fortunately for her, she does not get to find out what that future would entail because Colin absolutely hates the idea of letting her go.

Because after all, she's a mess, but she's his mess.

[slaaverin]

I watched AYS for the first time since the show ended today as I was off work sick, and it hit me. They are together.

As in truly and utterly together.

Objectively speaking if anyone was to watch the show, at least the Japan episodes out of context, without knowledge, without prejudice, without malice, they would see a couple. I do know how this isn’t widely seen in the fandom, I’m assuming cult hate and delusion, and ignorance/homophobia, but it’s so so obvious, and I think Jimin and JK knew certain people would see them. I think they wanted that.

In the interest of finding said objectivity I got a friend to watch with me on Disney, and she asked if they were together. Case in point.

They went to a romantic and safe place, one which holds precious memories, where they saw their first snow, walking around like in a hallmark movie, eating good food together, and just being together. I’m not even talking about the train ride, or the hot tub, it’s just how they are. So entwined, they literally move together. They are so in sync, so domestic. This doesn’t come from thin air, or not seeing each other, this level of intimacy is not born of friendship however deep, it’s more.

Take the meal they have in their pjs. Who does that on a bros trip firstly? And then watching them there, it’s so cosy and cute. Jimin only has to pout about wanting more of one of the dishes, and it suddenly appears. Friends don’t do that, or not any that I know, it would be an individual decision, you’d be paying for yourself kinda vibe, not pouting and getting your own way. Same as in the grocery store in CT, Jimin points and rubs his tummy, and gets his way. It’s so cute and endearing.

The constant need to touch, I know about skinship, but this is so different, it’s innocent in someways like they are holding back, but the eyes don’t lie, and there were many moments you can see it truly in all it’s glory.

It’s just so romantic, none of the last three episodes had a bro vibe, neither did CT honestly, and the jeju episodes serve to highlight just how coupley they are.

All this to say I love their love.

Aahh anon what you say is music to my ears I agree with you 100% 👏🏻

I think most people from outside would see them as a couple. That's why it is so wild most people in the fandom are still in denial about this.

The level of intimacy, domesticity, the touches, the looks, the words, the tones, the way their personality are complimentary, the way everything matches between them, how happy they are together, how flirty they get, the little soft moments as well as the loud shocking ones; everything about them screams couple and long-term, stable love relationship.

Why people still do not see it is beyond me. I think it comes down to that they do not want to see it. Simple.

Because everything has been there for years if PEOPLE SIMPLY PAID ATTENTION and I had so much fear about AYS, because it would be blatantly obvious and it was. But I underestimated to which length and mental gymnastics people would do to stay in denial. Some people still managed to try to belittle their bond. How far are they willing to distort reality? How far are they willing to go for reality to fit their own fantasy or fit this fucking bro agenda bullshit? (I'm sick of it)

They are in love.

A part of me wishes everyone would see it. That everyone would get it and support it. But I know this is very selfish, an egoic way to prove everyone we were right all along. But there is nothing to prove. And it would not serve them. If everyone knew it would put them in danger. Because a lot of people aren't loving, and their own country would give them hell.

So maybe this is all a blessing, that just some of us see it and support in our own corner, maybe it's best it does not get too noisy.

I think jikook suspected it. I think a part of them counted on it. They observed the fandom and know how it operates.

Which all keeps them safe.

Those with open hearts and a clear vision saw how incredibly romantic AYS was.

Jikook even repeated it several times.

It was all so gentle and soft, funny and cute, with an ease and a comfort only truly loving partners can convey.

It was joy and happiness, seeing them together.

It was love in it's purest form.

They really bring out the best of each other.

Anyone not seeing this is a fool but to each their own I guess

I'm in love with their love too. It's only natural to be attracted to beauty, and with these two pure souls having a love such as theirs? It's simply magnificent.

AYS went beyond my expectations. There were many things that did not suprise me. But what truly surprised me is seeing..how to put it...the passage of time? The feeling that yes they have been together FOR A LONG TIME and it showed.

Because there was no rush. There was not the visceral need of young love. It was slow, careful, assured, known, tender. It was simple and natural. As easy as breathing.

They are completely intertwined with each other like it's supposed to be this way. And it is.

Isn't it all perfect? It's perfect. It's beautiful. It's pure love. They have butterflies. I have butterlies too.

They don't have anything to prove anymore. And I think there's no need for us to prove it either for any other part of the fandom that don't want to open their eyes to something that is STARING AT THEM IN THE FACE. Let them in their own lies. We know what is true and what is just and it's ok.

Jikook are happy so it's all fine with me.

They know some of us fully support their relationship and I guess it's enough for them.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts anon 💜

[kajaono]

A+ Writing: Character growth done right

AKA: How the Netflix show "The Law According to Lidia Poët" wrote one of the best character growth-arcs I ever witnessed on screen

AKA: The long promised: Enrico Poët character meta

I think many shows centering around feminism - and especially period pieces - struggle to write feminism and the situation women lived - and still live in - a realisitic and relatable way. You either have male character saying stuff like: "Women belong in the kitchen" or male character being absolutly pro-women. Nothing in between. And even when sexism is addressed... a real character arc where a male person grows into realizing what women suffer from... often in silence... is hardly anywhere to be found. In a way thats not staged, but just human. Flawed and raw and relatable

And then Enrico Poet walzed in and just delievered. Its insane.

Short summary: The Law according to Lidia Poet is a show about the first female italian lawyer who had to fight against alot of prejudice, as well as a occupational ban. Enrico is her brother.

When we meet Enrico he is a mirror of the society surrounding him.

Whats really interesting about the way he is written is: He is more nuanced then your typical period piece sexist: "Go and bear babies." Instead he respects her intelligence and her intellect. He respects her wish to work... but not as a lawyer. If his sister really wants to work and earn her own money why not in a traditional female job?

Interestingly, and very telling for his character, is what he says next

He hesitates before he says that. And he doesn't look at Lidia. He looks at his daughter. So yes... he considers marrying a valid option for a woman. But not for Lidia, because Lidia is not "normal". Nowhere in the whole show he tells Lidia to marry. He maybe not agrees with her, but he always shows a certian kind of respect for her wishes.

Later he says:

So does he says all those things because he truely believes them... or because his father - a higher male authority - used to say the same things and he just repeats them?

But Lidia insists on being a lawyer so Enrico eventually agrees that she can be his assistent (he is a lawyer himself) and help with cases, but only if:

So already here the show overcomes the boring cliché trope of: "Women belong in the kitchen"-sexist. No, Enrico is much more nuanced then this. Already in the short conversation we see that there two sides: What Enrico was taught to say and what he really believes.

When we enter episode 2 Lidia starts working for Enrico. The power dynamic is clear. He is in the leading position. Nevertheless Lidia is taking every opportunity she gets to keep on working as a lawyer, independet from her brother. When Enrico finds out about her "side business" he is angry. But interestingly he doesn't try to stop her.

After Lidia solved the ep1 case really sucessfully a certain kind of trust grew between these two. Enrico doesn't want to get involved in trouble, but he trust his sisters abilitiy to solve the case.

But then - from one moment to the next - the really real danger occurrs that the public might find out that he is working with his sister, his sister who is not allowed to work in law anymore. And he snaps:

Here he only thinks about himself. Every trust between them is lost. In this moment Enrico only thinks about his career. This moment Lidias professional success is not to him... because she will not have any anyway.

But you don't think the show lets him get away with that, right? Oh our boy will learn his lesson.

He and Lidia meet a lesbian who had to hide her relationship with another woman. The following conversation takes place.

THIS! This is the first time he has to look into a mirror and realize he is part of the problem. Until this point he probably thought that he is a good guy. He lets his sister work with him, he lets her solve her own cases. But now he is forced to realize that he also judged his sister, every day. He has to realize that his sister suffers and he is one of many reasons. He is not one of the good guys. We see him being ashamed and he starts to think.

The show ends with Lidia not being allowed to ever work as a lawyer or lawyer assistent ever again.

When Enrico and Lidia are called to court, Enrico says this to Lidia:

But his tone has changed. He doesn't try to muzzle her anymore. He tries to protect her. Because he knows that whatever she will say, it will become worse... for him, but also for her.

And when the judge announce the sentence, Enrico shortly looks to her sister. Checking how this sentence will effect her. He starts caring. Because the conversation with the lesbian character - him being forced to look in the mirror - slowly starts changing him.

Episode 3 marks a turning point in Enricos character development

In epsiode 3 Lidia is solving a murder. The victim is the father of a guy she was supposed to marry when she was younger. The engagement was arranged and Lidia ran away because she didn't wanted to marry him. While she is solving the murder Lidia finds a letter from her own father to the father of her arranged-ex-fiancé.

It turns out that Lidia was only supposed to marry so that her father gets his debts canceled. Lidia shows Enrico the letter. He is horrified.

While he is reading the letter he is so ashamed he can not even look into Lidias eyes.

His voice breaks while he keeps on reading, he panics and is still not able to lock eyes with Lidia.

And now comes the quote that - imo - shows his character growth: "Thats a cattle market".

In this moment he realizes that the life of his sister, a woman, is worth nothing. That she can be easily auctioned off like a cow. That she is at the mercy of her own family... men... who can drop her any moment and cause harm to her. Because legally she has no protection and can not speak for herself. A cattle market indeed.

When Enrico hears how calm Lidia is... sad, broken... but super calm like she isn't surprised, Enrico is horrified. Because he realizes that this is what Lidia is confronted with every day. For him thats shocking, for her? thats the reality of her every day life. And being confronted with that, changes Enrico. He realizes that he can not longer close his eyes and pretend that his sister is some kind of "freak" for wanting to make her own voice heard

Its time for him to step up, to do something. To fix all the injustice that happened to Lidia, just because she is woman. Not standing in her way, but standing alongside her.

And Lidia smiles, with hope in her eyes, because it is the first time a man stood up for her and fights for her rights alongside her.

Because Enrico now knows what it means to be a woman. He saw the injustice and he can not be quiet anymore.

He grew so much. We came from Enrico telling Lidia that she shouldn't work in law to him seeing them as equal.

To him eventually waiting outside her house, neither saying goodbye to her nor trying to stop her from leaving to America. Just respecting whatever choice she will make.

This is character growth doen right!

TL:DR

This show takes a really raw and human approach to Enrico character growth: want to work along side a woman? Then you have to face the reality women are suffering from. And eventually this reality will change also your perception of the reality surrounding you. Is this character growth idealized? Sure but that’s not the point.

The point is too show how the reality of women can effect and change a male character, in a positive way, that’s also human and relatable. And they just nailed it

[thoughtsonkm]

Hot spring buddies

It was a perfect balance of a fun episode but with a lot of domesticity and quirks and all around softness. Their day to day life when they finally found some free time is truly so peaceful and harmonious. They're just attuned to each other. Mischievousness and teasing is always present, they just can't get enough of having fun together.

Where?! Who?! You been where?! With who?!

JK was like: "Excuse me? You went with MY friends? Not ME? What am I chopped liver? 7 years ago you say? OK FINE

GODDAMMIT it's criminal to not do a original song together! It's criminal to not do an album together! Criminal offense! Judge lock em' up!

And Jimin lulling Jungkook to sleep..ah that angel voice 🥹

~

"This is our last moment of relaxation" - JK 😭 😭 (I know everything going on was looming on their minds obviously but their hunger to enjoy and live to the fullest until the last minute makes me emo)

~

NAH the damn haircut 😂 The way he has perfected the boba ball cut. The juxtaposition of his face/hair with his body is so funyyyy.

*Going to the hair stylist* JK: so.. I did a thing Stylist: fuck, okay let me think, I CAN FIX THIS

~

He brought his cards cause he wanted to play only with Jimin since CT. Why do they have to be so adorable about these little supposedly insignificant details 😭

~

Look at us. Look how far we've come. Who would've thought?

Okay testosterone calm down, OR DON'T (This was low-key hilarious af tho tbh)

I saw ppl hyperventilating because they were suddenly showing too much (Jimin I'm looking at you) but more than that I think it's nice that they were so relaxed and in their own world, so much so, that they didn't really think much about their every movement.

But also they need to stop with the moaning and grouting every 2 sec tho. Like I get it but? cmon

~

Sorry but I live for the little funny details like Jungkook drenching the sea urchin in soy sauce and then putting it in vegetable soup to salvage it.

~

As if you can deny this face anything??

Cause you know there's AYS stash but there's a personal stash too obviously.

Oh twin beds? Let us start our lights foreplay

Jungkook's semi romantic struggles continue. Feed yo man Jimin pls!

The whole ski part of the episode looked so fun. I'm sure they had a blast. This is officially the best activity they've tried during this series.

It was so adorable them continuously falling and getting up. Even the crew kept on falling. The snow must've been so thick.

Snow angel

~

What in the meta shit is happening next week? I'm not ready to see them react to themselves. In the last episode to the first two episodes? Oh they're out for blood. And I know they're not gonna show what we want to see (ASS SLAP) but still those 5 minutes should be fun.

I wish sapporo would last forever. Weeks passed by so quickly. Why is it only one episode left? And then we're never seeing them again until next year (at least we have hobis discharge and the bts eps)

[vole-mon-amour]

2x09, part 2. Jayvik edition.

i love him and his soft smile, and how gorgeous he is. damn dude, you gave Jayce that Hextech dream all those years ago. "our dream."

well, Jayce. are you happy now? :)

partners in crime, partners in misery, I guess.

ooohh, the new height difference. i hope they have some fun when they off into another universe or whatever.

i hope they have freaky mental sex or whatever while they're gone after this.

siiigh. pretty, though.

And where WERE you? Oh, i'll tell you. You were fucking Mel while Viktor was working.

And you haven't kissed even ONCE. Maybe then you'd be more or less okay.

Oh, they're having a moment. I wish there was way more Ekko this season. :(

his design is so pretty :(

"now, all I want..."

#married

hey, seriously, can they pls kiss?

Viktor saw Jayce and though, "This one. I want THIS one. He's going to be my best friend, my lover, my partner."

CANON!!!!!

The way Viktor pushes himself away from Jayce 'cause he's overwhelmed and it's too much, too intimate, and their minds are intertwined. CANON.

"We finish this together."

s c r e a m i n g.

hey. that's forever. MelJayce? i've never even heard of them. this is their destiny. to be together forever. in all timelines.

nothing like holding hands with your eternal husband.

that's not what I expected, but I'm not complained. Jayvik keeps winning, I guess? for once in their life.

i REALLY hope Ekko's device didn't undo all the talk of "let's finish this together". i'd watch another season/show just for these two. because, while I think the ending for the sisters is incredibly weak, these two? ooohh. i liked how they found a way to kind of end it on a promising note? it's not all death and suffering.

i mean, look at all the jayvik scenes we have this episode and what their final moments are like. amazing.

[cera-writes]

"Ma chère, you are mine." 🃏

Part Two

Pairing: Remy "Gambit" LeBeau x F!Reader Tags: slow burn, angst, jealousy Remy never thought there'd be someone else besides Rogue who'd just waltz into his life, but there you were. A/N: This fic is based on episode 5 of X-Men 97. There may be future nsfw themes in later chapters. I'm thinking of making this into three parts at least. Tagged: @lokislittlemouse @give-jack-a-lightsaber

That night, the sky was lit in a cacophony of bursts and particles of light exploding in an array of beautiful colors cascading over Genosha. The fireworks were a sight to see, but so were you.

You had just finished getting ready. You stood in front of a grand mirror in the room you were sharing with Rogue while on your trip in Genosha. A grand window with a balcony overlooked the city below, illuminated by the chasms of light pouring down from the fireworks overhead.

Your dress was a shade of midnight, sparkling with diamonds like stars enmeshed into the fabric. Spaghetti straps adorned your bare shoulders as a plunging neckline accentuated your breasts. The dress fit you like a glove. There was a split up the dress that stretched all the way up the length of your right leg to your mid thigh, daring to show a little skin. It screamed Eclipse, much like your name.

You let your hair fall loosely around your face and wore a tad bit more makeup than usual, to which Rogue helped you with. You were in a state of a much more glamorized version of yourself. Lastly, you slipped your matching black heels on before Rogue walked up behind you.

"Goodness me, if I were a guy I'd be all over you faster than a buzzard on roadkill. You are gorgeous, sugah!" Rogue gandered at you, fanning herself.

You smiled, not helping but to blush at her open-handed compliment. "Thanks girl, but honestly you did most of the work. I was just your canvas."

Rogue scoffed. "Puh-lease. Don't be so hard on yourself. Those men will be all over you tonight. I'm gonna have to practically fight em' off of you." She meant to strike up light-hearted banter with you but you could tell there was something deeper going on that she wasn't opening up about. You could always tell when your best friend had something eating away at her.

"Hey...is something the matter? I can't help but notice that something is off with you tonight, Rogue." You placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

Rogue sighed but shook her head. "Don't worry about me sugah. Now, you should get down there. I'll be right behind ya," she tried reassuring you.

You frowned but decided not to pry further, even though you wished she'd open up to you.

You could practically hear the music blaring downstairs in the ballroom even as you sat at your vanity ten floors up.

There was only one man's attention you wanted tonight, but that thought just seemed like wishful thinking.

You checked yourself out in the mirror once more, admiring the shade of rouge that Rogue had adorned your lips with. She really was a treasure and you would never dream of getting in the way of her and Remy if that's what caused her mood to be so sullen.

You also noticed she hadn't slipped into her dress yet. "So...why haven't you gotten ready yet? You know the celebration starts in an hour." You asked Rogue with curiosity lacing your voice.

"There's uh, somethin' I need to talk to Gambit about first." She sighed. You knew it. Your heart sunk. I mean, what'd you expect? Gambit was only here because of Rogue and you were just here because she wanted you to come. But shouldn't she be happy? Maybe something had happened that you had no business interfering with.

You sighed with a breath of indignation. You should be happy that they'd finally get this moment, but you still couldn't help but feel bitter about it all. Rogue was...well, Rogue. She could get anyone she wanted. Even if she weren't able to be physical with Gambit, you knew deep down Gambit didn't care about that even if that was important to Rogue. He was in love with her.

Even so, there were ways of bypassing that kind of situation, even if it was frowned upon by your kind. Honestly, if the two of them were going to be together finally, you would at least make an attempt to drown yourself in liquor with Kurt at the bar. At least you'd forget about it if you drank well enough into the night with your other best friend.

Before you could even glance back at the southern belle, she was already gone. A gust of wind blew through the open window she must have slipped out of while you weren't looking. The curtains bellowed softly in unison as you did a once over in the mirror before heading out of your room.

"It's okay Eclipse...just be happy for them." You told yourself as your heart broke with every step toward the elevator down to the gala.

You reached the bottom floor, making your way toward the grand staircase leading to the open bar and dance floor. The room was grand with numerous glittering chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. You could even spot a few guests hanging around on top of them, idling away in conversations with champagne flutes in hand. There was lively music flooding the open space as you watched people dancing and just overall having the time of their lives.

Despite the fun atmosphere happening around you, you could've waltzed right back to your room and played hermit and pretended that this night hadn't even happened. You felt the complete opposite akin to the atmosphere displayed before you.

And you would have thrown that dress off and undone the pins holding your hair in place if Rogue hadn't already spent an hour on your makeup. You cursed Morph in the back of your mind, knowing they were probably worry free watching crappy horror movies right about now. Gosh how you wished you were back home at the mansion.

You made up your mind that were going to find Kurt and spend the rest of your night dancing and drinking your feelings away. The faster you could forget, the better. Your eyes started scanning for any sign of the blue furball amidst the crowds of people there.

"Who is that? She's gorgeous!" You heard whispers as you descended the staircase. You felt everyone's eyes on you. Were they really talking about you? You weren't used to the attention at all like this. You couldn't help but smirk at the gawking but quickly shook your head. It didn't matter what they thought.

You weren't there tonight to find someone lucky enough to take back up to your room. No one else mattered to you. The only man that held your heart in his hands was breaking it anyway. You could live with yourself if that meant Remy was happy no matter how bad it hurt.

You had to suck it up. There was no point wallowing in this self pity bullshit anymore tonight. At least you'd convinced yourself of that much.

Your heels finally collided with the smooth tiles of the bottom floor. You nearly sighed in relief upon seeing a mop of black hair and blue skin cutting it up on the dance floor. "There he is," you smiled, making a beeline straight for Nightcrawler. At least he seemed to be having a blast. You needed some of that energy he was exuding.

"Eclipse! Oh Mein Gott! You look...breathtaking!" He immediately found you, eyes wide at your alluring appearance before teleporting right in front of you as you joined him over on the dance floor alongside a few others who were moving to the beat of the music.

"No, really! You are stunning tonight!" He grinned, taking your hand a placing a kiss on top of it. You face couldn't deny or hide the sudden heat from his sweet comment about you. "Thanks, Kurt."

"Gern geschehen," he bowed, offering a kind smile in return. "I thought you'd be here with Gambit, no?" He looked puzzled as he glanced behind you for any sign of the cajun man.

"Guess he's still getting ready," you shrugged indignantly, but you knew the truth anyway even if that was a half lie. You wanted to change the subject but you saw the concern in Kurt's expression as he watched your face.

"Look, meine Freundin, I know things with Gambit can be-"

But he didn't get to finish that sentence before you pulled him back into the crowd of people dancing, much to his surprise.

Nope, you did not want to have that conversation tonight.

"Let's just dance, okay?" you changed the subject as you started swaying to the beat of the music. Nightcrawler merely nodded, not wanting to pry but nonetheless twirled you around on the dance floor in compliance as you simply just let loose and tried forgetting about everything even if just for a moment.

The two of you danced for a while, just having fun. You were actually having so much fun in the moment with Kurt that you almost didn't notice that familiar reddish brown hair slicked back so handsomely, or the way his white suit clung to him in all the right ways. He was sitting at the bar having a drink just as Madelyne Pryor had made her way over to stand next to him.

Nightcrawler noticed you, too distracted to continue your dance with him and smiled. "You should go to him. I'll be right here if you need me." He cocked his furry head towards where Gambit was at the bar.

You sighed and swallowed the damn near painful lump in your throat as you started taking that first step towards Remy. But as soon as you did, you immediately paused to look up.

There, flying gracefully in as a grand gesture, was Rogue.

Her hair was done up around her face with a few loose strands hanging down and her dress was a scarlet shade accentuated with off shoulder straps of baby pinks that hung loosely down her arms.

But what you really noticed was that she wasn't wearing her usual gloves for some reason. It didn't matter because she was absolutely stunning.

You were sure she was going to find Remy and meet up with him below, but nothing could have prepared you for what she did next.

You watched as she flew directly towards Magneto, meeting him skin to skin as their hands touched, electricity igniting at their intimacy. Your jaw slightly slackened at the scene above as if they were dancing like two star crossed lovers for everyone to see. It was if it was a deliberate display of affection between them.

You dared to look at Remy, who was still standing over by the bar. And boy, did he look pissed. He was watching them with nothing but pure hurt and anguish behind his eyes. Even Madelyne had turned to cast him a look of pity.

You were just as confused.

Your eyes glanced back towards the two lovers trapped in what seemed like an intense tango of sorts. Then it happened. Their lips were locked in a passionate kiss.

You placed a hand over your mouth in disbelief at what you were witnessing, surely having thought Rogue had spoken to Gambit earlier to confess her feelings.

Apparently you were way the hell off about your assumptions.

When you looked back in Remy's direction, he was already gone.

You had to find him.

Your feet quickly shuffled through crowds of onlookers as 'Happy Nation' continued playing loudly through the expansive room. You never were really a fan of Ace of Base anyway.

You needed to find Remy and fast.

The air inside was becoming too hot and stifling. 'If I were Remy, where would I run off to?'

The gardens.

You knew he'd have gone outside to get some air and clear his head so that's exactly where you were headed.

You ran out into the open cool air towards the giant fountain settled in the middle of a courtyard of square hedges and roses.

The fountain was lit up in blue lights, just enough to make out the man sitting alone with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth as he sat perched on the side.

Remy.

"Hey stranger," you timidly spoke up, easing your way towards him.

He blew out a puff of smoke and glanced in your direction.

"Hey chere," he couldn't help but smile softly upon seeing you, even if he felt like absolute shit in that moment.

"Mind if I pop a squat next to you?" You inquired, approaching the matter with as much gentleness as you could knowing what just transpired.

"I ain't stopping you," Remy simply remarked.

You delicately sat next to him, feeling the heat radiating off of him as your shoulders touched slightly.

You were about to bring up how he was feeling but he was the one who initiated first.

"Can you believe it?" He scoffed, taking another drag of his cigarette as the ashes singed.

"Honestly, no." You replied, shaking your head incredulously as you gazed up at the night sky as trails of smoke drifted upwards into the balmy night air.

"I'm so so sorry, Remy."

You laid your head on his shoulder. You knew the pain was still fresh and still stung so you didn't want to talk about anything unless he wanted to initiate that conversation first. You just wanted to be there for him like you always did in the past. He was your best friend and you never wanted that to change.

He shook his head once more before tossing the cigarette on the ground and stomping it out with his shoe.

"That flame has long since died I think...but there's somethin' else too. It made ol' Gambit realize that he's been runnin' from his past too long. He was chasin' somethin' that wasn't ever meant to be his in the first place. They always say you find peace in the most unsightliness of places."

You didn't know what he was getting at but your heart was beating ninety to zero right now. You couldn't dare look at him in fear that you might say something you'll regret. Your head stayed rested against his shoulder as you played with your hands on your lap.

"I think I've had peace this whole time. It was always there, offering a shoulder to cry on or just a hand to hold," He laughed softly in disbelief as if finally coming to a revelation.

"Ma chere, you are mine."

Your eyes widened, heart hammering in your chest, and your relaxed posture had gone rigid as he confessed those words. Those words that held so much meaning. Your eyes pricked with tears as you slowly leaned away to finally face him.

He was smiling at you so tenderly that you could've melted from his gaze right there.

But no sooner did you have time to react to his meaningful words before the sound of ear piercing screams filled the air and everything came crashing down in a literal cloud of smoke and dust.

All you could see was darkness as chaos ensued.

Sentinels.

A/N: I hope ya'll enjoyed part two! I'll be working on part three tomorrow! Leave me comments <3

[dramaticviolincrescendo]

For me, the award for character growth has to go to Jin Xiaobao. 🥇

I know Huai’en has developed so much with regard to emotions—it’s like night and day going back to the first episodes—but overall he’s still mostly the same person. He was always smart, and his moral code was always questionable at best because of his upbringing. The biggest difference there now is that he cares about Xiaobao and makes decisions based on what will hurt him. He’s still okay with watching things burn or sacrificing himself if it will help Xiaobao, though. Not a criticism, just an observation. It’s not entirely fundamentally different from the early Huai’en who said that the world beyond his father’s plans wasn’t his concern and fought like he had a death wish.

Xiaobao, on the other hand, is fundamentally different. He has changed at all levels of development. Hear me out.

At the start, he would throw his affections at anybody who caught his eye in the moment and was extremely fickle. Now, he has been told people will set him up with lovely ladies so he can start a family at least twice, but he doesn’t entertain the notion because he knows there are bigger priorities, like his illness and taking care of his family and friends. Given that one of those offers came at the height of his disdain for Huai’en, it’s unlikely that it boils down to simply being lovesick, though that’s surely part of it. He’s been burned badly by that fickle attraction of his this time, so he’s far more discerning about his priorities. He doesn’t leap back into a relationship with Huai’en; even finding out about him giving up his title and getting the emperor to pardon them sent Xiaobao running to warn him about the trap, not running into his arms. His forgiveness isn’t so easily won anymore because instead of acting on a whim, he’s setting aside emotions and willfulness to emphasize prior experience. He knows his emotions and how he acts on them don’t just impact him anymore, so now his willfulness is tempered by his sense of responsibility.

On the subject of emotions, they were also far less stable and more manipulative before. If he didn’t get the responses he wanted, he’d toss a small fit, and his emotions could be like a rollercoaster at times. (“Pour me some water,” anyone?) He even planned to use that tendency to convince his mother their relationship was all right by turning on the waterworks. Now, he’s far more stable even with everything happening to him. By all accounts, this guy should be an absolute mess. He should have flipped his lid when Que Siming insinuated that he wanted to take Jinbao away—permanently. Instead, he doesn’t fly off the handle at things and takes a moment to think rather than base his responses on assumptions, especially self-centered ones.

Speaking of, he’s not at all self-centered anymore. He has repeatedly made mention of the fact that he can’t be a spoiled young master forever and that there is no going back for him. When confronting his feelings about Huai’en, he mentions his parents now being impoverished and homeless before his own struggles; he even talks about Xiaoyu being taken away and glosses over any sense of betrayal in their relationship in favor of focusing on the general betrayal of taking the account book. Even in moments when he could be justifiably angry with Su Yin for trying to keep him from doing whatever he wants with regard to Huai’en, he takes a step back and seems to consider why Su Yin is doing all this. He doesn’t expect Su Yin’s approach to change with his emotions or whims, given how unreliable he knows those have been before, and tailors his arguments to make it about logic and reason instead.

Another segue! Intellectually, Xiaobao has grown so much. On two occasions, he’s had to ask people to basically use smaller words; he passed the brain cell around with Jinbao and Zhaocai and was quite happy to take custody of it as seldom as possible. He still has moments where he doesn’t pick up on things, like not knowing his idioms or Su Yin’s sarcasm about selling Jinbao going right over his head, but he thinks now. He’s so insulated and protected that sometimes he needs a hint to spark his suspicions, but he thinks. All Que Siming had to say was “dahlia” and “Yuxia,” and Xiaobao was able to put together that something in Su Yin’s story didn’t add up. For someone who was teased about not understanding when he asked what Prince Li wanted Su Yin to return to Annan for, he’s repeatedly put together the intricacies of court politics in light of Huai’en’s identity and Su Yin’s plan with Shaoyu. His reaction is a culmination of all the aforementioned changes: not self-centered enough to make it about him even when he knows it really is, not overly emotional enough to be angry about it when he has plenty of reason, and smart enough to know how to address it in conversation. (Does it stop Su Yin from knocking him the hell out because he didn’t come this far for his little brother to hop back into what he perceives to be an abusive relationship? Nope, but you can see that it still means something to Su Yin to hear him speak that way all the same.)

I’m excited to read the book because a story like this really can’t be fully told in twelve episodes, but as far as his portrayal in the series goes, Xiaobao gets the gold medal in development for me. All of the characters have grown immensely from the start, but for me, Xiaobao is the one who has become the most well-rounded as a person through his experiences—including those unrelated to his relationship with Huai’en. He’s still the sunshine boy, but he knows when to rise and set now rather than burning himself and everyone around him out.

[battlekidx2]

Hazbin Hotel Episodes 5 and 6 Thoughts

Wow. These two episodes of Hazbin Hotel were easily the best out of the series so far. They’re still working at a breakneck pace, but these episodes were so much more focused than the first 4 that it worked significantly better. The A and B plots of both these episodes were cleanly tied together so that no one part felt insignificant.

One of the biggest problems with the first four episodes was the fact that the split focus pulled the episode in different directions and made it so that reveals didn’t get the build up they needed to really feel impactful and pushed the Hazbin Hotel to the background so it felt insignificant in its own show. 

The second biggest problem in those episodes was that Charlie’s wish for her people, for redemption, and attempt to get into heaven to avoid extermination felt like it wasn’t the driving force it should have been. 

But these two episodes really fix that and expand on the characters really well. I’m just going to go through what I loved the most.

Alastor

I absolutely loved what we got from Alastor in episode 5. He really is the highlight of the show for me. There’s just so many layers to his character that the show isn’t rushing to peel back like it is with everyone else and it makes his character so intriguing.

I liked the fact that this episode hints that he truly does care about the hotel and wants it to succeed. It’s not only entertainment like he initially claimed. That moment where he sends Mimzy away was really telling. There isn’t even a hint of sinister subtext, sarcasm, or a joke in his voice or face when he tells her she can’t stay if she isn’t going to take redemption seriously.

The way his eyes twitch when she says he can’t seriously care about the hotel is such a great little detail.

I really like this point. The main theme of the show is redemption and showing that even someone like Alastor can care about the hotel is a direction I wanted the show to go in from the pilot, but something I wasn’t sure we would actually get. But I liked that it’s getting hinted at this early, especially since we now know there’s a season 2 and it can get fleshed out much more and can probably get to the point where he might grow into an actual mentor for Charlie instead of it being performative to spite Lucifer like it was in this episode.

(side note: I like that Charlie defends his actions against her father. She sees it as protecting the hotel, which we learn is the truth. He did do it for pride, but he also cares about the hotel and does want to protect it. I like to see that Charlie’s ability to see the best in people does pay off at least somewhat.)

That little hint of care to his actions with the hotel isn’t all we get to see of Alastor's layers. He is still the infamous Radio Demon after all, so we also get to see his pride at play.

It’s his pride being hurt by Lucifer that causes him to play up his role in Charlie’s life. It’s his pride being hurt that leads him to taking on the loan sharks alone both to remind everyone of his power and to show what else he brings to the hotel.

It’s also what causes him to go off on Husk. Husk is the only character willing to call Alastor out. He knows Alastor better than anyone else at the hotel because of their past and his ability to see through his facade. And he hurts Alastor's pride when he calls him out with the truth: That he's on a leash just like him.

The reveal that Alastor is also on someone’s leash was expected, but well executed.

This episode let Alastor’s mask slip a bit and we got to see more of his real emotions/feelings about things.

Alastor was the character I thought would have the most layers to them. Characters like Charlie, Angel Dust, and Vaggie wear what they feel a bit more openly than a character like Alastor (or at the very least their true feelings come out more frequently). There are motives and mysteries behind Alastor’s actions that aren’t clear with him like they are with everyone else and his demeanor, words, and actions can conflict with his true feelings and that’s what draws me to him so much. His usual (kinda) goofy and cavalier attitude, cold and ruthless demeanor that can come out at the flick of a switch, and infamous past make it so learning about Alastor's true intentions and introducing the idea of him changing and coming to care is very intriguing to me.

I just think that Alastor is the character that is working the best in the show right now because his plotline and development is not going at a breakneck pace. We’ve only gotten hints about why he was gone for seven years, who he sold his soul to, why he appeared to help with the hotel, etc. His character progression is also taking its time. This is the first real hint we get that he does genuinely care about the hotel in his own way and it’s 5 episodes in. This is the kind of pacing and development that the whole show would benefit from. 

This isn’t meant to be a shot at the show. I think it was put into a complicated situation because it was picked up initially for only 8 episodes (this is the type of show and large cast that needs at least twice as many) and was only renewed about halfway through the production of the first season, which I think explains why these episodes felt more coherent and fleshed out than the first four.

I really can’t wait to see where his character heads. He's still a walking question mark as of right now and every time we get a glimpse at his true intentions it's always fascinating because it's never clear cut where he stands.

Side note: I find it hilarious that Alastor created a rivalry between himself and Lucifer. The literal king of hell. Lucifer hurt Alastor’s pride and he immediately decided he would be as petty as possible towards him.

Charlie

I was always in the boat that Charlie was an interesting protagonist. The pilot set up a character that was very intriguing for the setting she was placed into. I didn’t think the three episodes necessarily handled her the best, but I think that was more a result of the rushed pacing and bloated plot. She’s handled significantly better from episode 4 on.

Episode 6 is where I think Charlie really came into her own as the protagonist of this series. The song where she stood up to heaven really sold me on her character. 

“If hell is forever then heaven must be a lie. If angels can do whatever and remain in the sky. The rules are shades gray when you don’t do as you say. And you make the wretched suffer just to kill them again.”

Up until this point Charlie felt a bit limited in her actions. It really amounted to trust exercises and the hotel residents acting out made up situations. She seemed naive and well meaning, but ill equipped to actually address the mental health issues her people had due to the fact her upbringing was so sheltered. There was the potential for more, but it wasn’t given the time I felt it deserved.

But this is where she really got to step up and call out the inequality and hypocrisy of heaven. This is where we got to see her backbone and the true extent of her care for her people. She won’t back down or accept the flimsy excuses they use to persecute the denizens of hell.

I also really liked her belief in Angel Dust. Yeah, he made some mistakes (at least from heaven’s point of view), but Charlie had complete faith in the fact that he would meet their requirements. It’s this characteristic of her’s that is intrinsic to bringing out the best in the residents of the hotel and before this point it was on the periphery (like with Angel Dust in episode 4) or implied. 

Episode 6 showed how important that characteristic is, especially to people who feel like they’re damned. (I like that Charlie is a good judge of character. It’s easy to take someone that’s privileged and naive and make them too trusting, but these two episodes show her belief in the best in the people at the hotel is founded.)

Another point I liked is that she was getting through to some of the angels. It’s a recurring gag that her presentations aren’t great. They’re written in crayon, flowery, and a little basic, but it’s the passion and critical thinking that she expresses in her presentations that shows that she can be a capable leader. 

She effectively poked holes in their argument that the sinners in hell deserve to be there and had their chance.

Her duet with Emily was really good. The way she brought back “Hell is Forever” to call the angels and exorcists out was the best (as you could probably tell from the fact that I quoted it). It also introduces a theme that the next generation will work to change things. Both Emily and Charlie want things to be different and clash with their parents who are both afraid that their child might end up like Lucifer. It’s a very clear parallel that sets up a lot of plot potential.

Charlie really was great in these episodes.

Angel Dust

I will admit I think aspects of Angel’s arc are rushed. Him standing up to Val is a big moment and I like the fact that it happened while Charlie is trying to show heaven that they are wrong about sinners, but I wish that we had gotten more time to build to Angel Dust being able to “stick it to the man” because of how powerful I think his arc is and the themes it deals with.

Episode 4 was the first time we really got to see beneath Angel’s mask and truly see the potential for change that Charlie does. We only really got hints that Angel wanted to change, but was scared to try in the first 3 episodes. We also know that he doesn’t feel safe even when he’s not around Valentino. 

Episode 4 is the turning point for him. When Val was abusing him he asked him not to hurt Charlie. His concern was solely for her in that moment despite the fact he was in the more tenuous position. He even forgives Charlie at the end because he knows her intentions are good. Plus his connection with Husk helped him find understanding so that he could come to feel like he could change. 

It was the real start of his growth and it was well done in my opinion. 

I just wish it had gotten a little more breathing room because while I do really like the plot points that occur in this episode I feel like they happened a bit too soon. (I know that it's been a few months in canon, but we didn't get to see that, so that slow progression doesn't have the impact it should)

I also liked that it called back to the pilot where she told the news that he was their patron and he ended up making them look bad because he was indulging in all his bad habits from before, but now it’s almost the opposite. Yeah, he drinks and does some drugs, but he shows his growth and proves Charlie’s point about sinners and it makes the angels argue among themselves.

Vaggie

The reveal that Vaggie was an ex-exorcist was something a lot of people made theories about. It was one that I wanted to be true because of what it would mean for Charlie and the dynamic of the hotel. I liked how it was revealed to Charlie.

This is another plot point that I think is rushed, but I think the execution is better than a lot of the other reveals that happened earlier in the series.

I feel like this reveal was a bit necessary for Vaggie’s character and the episode’s focus wasn’t split and I think that’s why I’m not as hard on it being rushed as I am on earlier plot points. Vaggie was the member of the hotel I thought suffered the most from the limited time/episode count.

The only focus she got was episode 3 and her arc in that episode was a bit clunky, which wasn’t helped by the fact that the other half of the episode with the overlords of hell was more interesting because it set up what looks like it will be a long term conflict and revealed a major plot point. 

The rest of the hotel residents got slower paced, less cluttered focus. Alastor has been subject to quite a few plot lines and is a slow burn mystery with a lot of potential for growth. Angel Dust is the hotel’s first patron and the character positioned to be the poster boy for redemption, so of course his development is given the spotlight. Husk has a unique dynamic with everyone (Alastor and Angel in particular) and is a foil to Angel Dust which makes him a central figure/mentor in Angel getting himself together. Etc.

I think this creates a lot of potential for her character leading into the last two episodes and gives her depth that I really want to see explored. I don’t really know what to say about the reveal beyond the fact that I’m really excited to see how this shakes Charlie and the hotel. How will this effect the other residents? Will Vaggie take a stand against the angels when they come for the hotel? Will we see her grief/conflict over her past actions now that they’ve been revealed?

There’s so many directions they can take this that I can’t wait for episode 7.

One smaller note is that I wish that the threat of Adam telling Charlie about Vaggie's secret had played more of a part in the episode and Vaggie actually had to choose between standing beside her girlfriend or stopping her. She just excuses herself to the restroom instead of making that choice and it felt like a missed opportunity.

Lucifer

Lucifer is a very interesting character in the limited screen time he’s had so far. The direction they took him is different from most of the other dads in Hazbin Hotel/Helluva Boss. The fact that he does care and was the person that was the original motivation for Charlie to open the Hazbin Hotel is a refreshing direction to take after all the bad dads this series has. 

He’s so afraid that Charlie will end up like him. That she’s putting her faith in the wrong people. That hell’s denizens aren’t capable of redemption. All these fears stem from his own crushed dreams from his fall at the hands of heaven. 

It’s a nice change of pace.

I also love how he’s just as petty as Alastor, taking any shot he can at the Radio Demon to one up him when it comes to their respective relationships to Charlie.

Extra Thoughts

Sir Pentious having a crush on Cherry Bomb, but being absolutely horrible at acting on it was really funny. Sir Pentious is such a fun character.

I love that the theory that Alastor made a deal with Lilith seems more and more plausible with every episode. It certainly would explain the fact that they were both gone for seven years and how Alastor was such a dominant force in hell from the start. I want Alastor’s backstory asap.

I like that Alastor’s overwhelming power among sinners is re-established here. He’s someone that you don’t mess with. And I like that the way that people don’t react to him as much as before is because of his 7 year absence. I did think it was strange that he’s so infamous for brutally toppling powerful overlords, but people don’t go running like you’d expect in the first few episodes.

Alastor and Husk have such a complicated dynamic. I really want to learn more about their history. Alastor has no problems tearing overlords that come across him apart, but Husk ended up with a deal to keep his power. Why is that? And while Alastor does own his soul Husk will call him out on things and can read him so much better than anyone else. Alastor lets these slide until he points out that Alastor is also on a leash like him. And Alastor had to have told Husk that he sold his soul because how else would Husk know that. All these things make for one of the most interesting and complicated dynamics of the show.

I do want to make clear that I think Alastor is a character of duality and contradiction. There's a hint that he does care about the hotel and the possibility of him growing to care for the residents, but he's still the sadistic and cruel Radio Demon. There's just a glimpse of change there now.

I really like the parallels between Emily and Charlie. I really like the idea that this seems to set up that the next generation is going to step up and take a stand against the mistakes of the previous generation. This one episode set the groundwork for a really interesting arc for Emily and her potential dynamic with Charlie.

I love Angel Dust. That's it. I just wanted to say that.

[perfectlyoongi]

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who has matching socks with you. Jin liked socks; and if the socks were colorful or had interesting patterns, Jin loved socks. so, as proof of his love for you, Jin would buy matching socks for you and him, innovating in colors and patterns, making it his personal mission to find the most extravagant socks. “guess what! today i found some socks with cows on them! and they are spotted like cows! of course i had to buy it for us. we need these socks.”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who watched every episode of totally spies with you more than three times. Jin still remembered coming to your house at the end of high school classes and watching two episodes of totally spies before diving into his studies. in a way, that series brought back to Jin memories of the comfort of your couch and your laughter; as such, you and Jin constantly got lost in the series’ episodes, rewatching your favorite episodes more than six times, the remaining episodes being replayed two, three times. “today everything went wrong. i’m so tired... do you mind coming over to the house so we can watch totally spies together? i really need you and this comfort.”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who always brings you a dandelion when he finds it just so you can make a wish. when the petals had turned to hope, Jin was quick to pluck the dandelion and carry it carefully to you. the elders said that each hope of the dandelion brought with it the power to make a person’s most complicated dreams come true. as such, the first thought that popped into Jin’s mind when he saw a dandelion was how you deserved your dreams to come true. so, with a proud smile and shining eyes, Jin held out the dandelion in front of you and asked you to close your eyes, blow and make a wish. “look, look, look! a dandelion! quick. make a wish. i’m sure the stars will hear you today and bring you the happiness you deserve!”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who has a polaroid of you on his phone case. the photograph was old and a little out of focus. against a dark background that you couldn’t recognize, Jin took the photo at the right moment when you were going to start laughing. in a fluke of the universe, Jin had found the perfect photograph. you were simply beautiful. it was your natural beauty that shined through in that old photo, the memories of that dinner in the park making Jin smile every time he picked up his phone. you were beautiful and Jin loved you — he would never part with that photo. “until i take a perfect photo of you again, this one won’t leave here. i like you too much to keep you away from me.”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who sends you a photo of pingu on all your birthdays. you didn’t know why, Jin didn’t know why, but every year, on your birthday, accompanying the heartfelt message that Jin wrote to you, there was always an image of pingu. it was a small tradition that had come about somehow and it seemed strange if Jin didn’t send it to you. so, every year, in contrast to all of Jin’s kind words, you always received a pingu who was too involved in his adventures to notice you. “happy birthday, my little pingu penguin. first of all, i want you to know that my life is only bright because you are in it. if you knew…”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who plays tic-tac-toe with you in the fogged-up window of the bus. on the coldest winter nights, when you and Jin would snuggle in the comfort of the bus, Jin would always start a game of tic-tac-toe in the window. never winning you, but not losing to you that often, Jin made that bus trip something interesting, even if only mere minutes had passed. “it’s today that i’m going to beat you and that’s a promise. if i win, you’ll have to cook for me today. those are the rules.”

BEST-FRIEND!JIN who says that the answer to the question ‘what is love?’ is you. ever since he met you it was love. sometimes disguised as curiosity, sometimes bordering the line of friendship, what Jin felt for you was always love. so it was only logical for him to answer that age-old question with your name. so many years spent by your side, knowing all your facets and secrets, Jin didn’t see any imperfection in you that wasn’t worthy of being loved. for years, you were the answer to all of Jin’s questions and it was only now that he was able to confess to you. “whenever people ask me what is the meaning of love, my mind always runs to you. to our memories, to your person, to you. and i think it’s not a simple love of friendship that exists in me. i’m sure i love you.”

[lurkingshan]

Another week, another struggle to wrangle my complicated thoughts about this beautiful show. In a way it feels fitting that we ended up watching and discussing this at a time when there was just so much happening around us in the real world that we are struggling to cope with. This story is, after all, mostly a meditation on grief and failure and finding small bits of hope among some truly bleak realities.

I've been thinking a lot this week about the pretty significant changes to this part of the story in the TV adaptation. This part departed the most from the novel, which makes sense since in the novel it was largely Young sitting in quiet introspection about his choices and regrets and where things went wrong. Not only was it emotionally dense, it was very interior in nature, necessitating some changes for the screen. Back when I first read it, I found hope in the fact that Young was finally processing his emotions rather than hiding from them despite the gut wrenching nature of this thoughts. The TV version doubled down on that bit of hope and amplified it.

The inclusion of the T-aras throughout continues to be the most consequential change to this story, and this week went even further in giving one of them, Eun Su, his own story. I've noodled quite a bit on Sang Young Park's purpose in adding this subplot about Eun Su's doomed engagement (and many indicators of his general disdain for marriage as a means to find happiness and security). The best interpretation I can offer is that, given the overall message in these final episodes that we can only find hope and true happiness by living wholly as ourselves, he wanted a parallel story that was about getting out of a relationship alongside Yeong wanting to be in one, to make it clear that his message is not about romance fixing anyone.

I also really enjoyed the Eun Su plot for keying into a very real dynamic of long term friendship group dynamics: those times when you suddenly grow closer to one person in your friend group because you are having a similar experience, or because you're the only ones in the group who can empathize with each other about a specific situation. Eun Su knew that among his friends, Yeong was the one who would understand his unhappiness in this relationship and not judge him for it, and for this period of time, their shared discontent and regrets brought them closer.

The way this thread came together with Yeong's regrets over Gyu-ho to prompt his reflections on what went wrong worked really well, and I liked the choice to end the show on a more explicitly hopeful note than the novel, as it felt fitting for its lighter tone throughout. Instead of leaving Yeong on a moment of deep regret as he thinks back to the lantern with Gyu-ho's name on it falling from the sky (Gyu-ho. My only wish.), we end with him celebrating with his friends on a rooftop, gazing up at fireworks in the sky, thinking of Gyu-ho with sadness but also naming his enduring wish for love with a smile.

[thefrogdalorian]

I know there is this widely held perception that Season 3 of The Mandalorian had silly moments and made some comically strange story choices, which I can totally admit myself. I mean the bit in 03x04 where they all scatter to eat, but Bo is allowed to remain sitting by the fire was kind of hilarious and blatantly just because they wanted a helmetless scene in that episode.

And I won't complain too much because more Katee Sackhoff on my screen is never a bad thing.

But come on! The Mandalorian has always had goofy, unserious moments that if you contemplate for more than a second, your head threatens to fly off because of how daft it can be, at times.

For instance, in 1x04 Sanctuary, when Din removes his helmet on Sorgan in froNT OF AN OPEN WINDOW?!!?!

I know they did it for dramatic effect, to demonstrate how long he has worn his helmet, but if one of those kids looked around it would've been CURTAINS FOR HIM. Okay it might have been dark, sure, whatever but I cannot imagine someone as devout as Din would even take that risk! The Creed is everything to him.

Also, this man who we have seen for an entire season being such a competent and capable warrior has apparently never had a jetpack before Chapter 8. The best bounty hunter in the parsec cannot fly?! Then, immediately after getting it from The Armorer, with no training, he conveniently uses it immediately to blow up a TIE fighter and (seemingly) defeat Moff Gideon?!!?!

Not to mention how silly it is Gideon survived that initial skirmish... and probably survives in Season 3 too but we'll deal with that when it comes to it.

It isn't just Season One, either. There are also some parts of Season 2 which leave me scraching my head slightly, like in The Believer when the terminal needs to scan a face. Not a specific face, just any face. It doesn't make much sense. Again, not complaining, more Pedro Pascal on my screen is never a bad thing.

Not to mention how convenient Din getting the beskar spear was right before his duel with Gideon for the Darksaber. A weapon which is coincidentally one of the few which can parry the sacred blade!

Anyway, I don't hate any of these moments at all, I just feel like fans used to be so much more lenient.

Of course season 3 has some hmmmmm moments too, but there have always been questionable decisions right from the start. Star Wars fans are always going to nitpick and it mostly comes from a good place. I just wish there could be a bit more of a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ attitude sometimes.

Nothing is perfect, but this show has had so many enjoyable moments and such compelling characters that I can let some silliness slide. Star Wars should always be a little goofy and silly and for me, long may that continue!

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 大理寺少卿游/White Cat Legend.

White Cat Legend is the 2024 live-action adaptation of a funny historical manhua about a country bumpkin who winds up working with a bunch of mystery-solving officials led by a beautiful boss whose tragic past means no one can know he's also a kitty.

This is one of those cases where television comes in to adapt something that has both unfilmable elements and a very non-cinematic storyline that hasn't even been finished yet, and as such mostly just takes the characters and the basic conceit, then creates an entire vaguely nonsensical 36-episode AU fanfic of it. To call this show tonally inconsistent would be an insult to shows that are only merely tonally inconsistent. It is full-on tonal whiplash, the kind you should go see a doctor about. This shit is all over the place. It has arcs and situations that are genuinely emotionally moving, and then smash cut! to wacky nonsense happening with the B-plot. It does not know if it wants to tell a Serious Story or just have bonkers antics, and it will deal with this indecision by doing both at once.

So if you're in the mood for something fun with charming characters that won't tax your brain parts, let me give you five reasons this could be exactly the junk food you're looking for.

1. Just a family of all boys

If you're looking for a show rife with female characters, go watch Legend of Fei or Story of Yanxi Palace. Over here, it's Boys' Night Out.

The show is set in the Court of Judicial Review, which solves crimes. The boy in charge of all of them is Li Bing, who is secretly also a cat for reasons he doesn't understand. He picks up naive yokel and total sweeheart Chen Shi and brings him back to work with the Court's current occupants: a sad-eyed scribe with catastrophically bad luck, a former soldier who wishes he'd been born recently enough to be into Crossfit, a generic "foreigner" whose superpowers are spending his parents' money and pronouncing things badly, and the 8th-century Chinese equivalent of a mediocre white man.

And I'm going to tell you right now, up front, above the cut, that these boys' character interactions are the #1 reason to watch this show. You watch it because you like to see them bounce off one another like the unsupervised toddlers they are. They all love and care for one another in the best ways they know how, which sometimes aren't very effective, but darn it, they're trying!

What's especially cute is how they're so touchy with one another -- and not in any kind of sexual or creepy way, but in a sincerely affectionate bro way. There's lots of hugging and supportive arms around waists. Sometimes when they get scared, they hold hands. They grip one another when walking across unsteady ground or climbing over walls to break into yet another house. There's never any gay panic or no-homo reassurances. It hits that sweet spot right between brothers and boyfriends, where you can read their interactions as fraternal and/or romantic as you like (see below).

I mean, who needs a plot when you have half a dozen charming boys canonically working, eating, and sleeping side by side? That, my friends, is quality television.

2. Jam-packed with goofball nonsense

White Cat Legend is a show that will make you laugh out loud, and mostly even on purpose.

About 2/3 of this show is silly, and the other 1/3 is trying so hard to be emotionally resonant. But you know what? Screw emotional resonance for the moment -- let's embrace the antics!

There's a lot of silliness happening even at the production level. The show also starts out doing some very cute visual things, like breaking shots into multiple "panels" that give everything a real comic feel. It's especially effective during fight scenes and other visually confusing setups. ...And then about 1/4 of the way in, it forgets about this gimmick and stops almost completely. This is a shame, because I liked it! I liked that VFX tomfoolery that paid homage to the story's webcomic roots! (Also, someone behind the camera clearly got told that the way to make a scene more visually interesting is to slowly pan in during every shot. Once you notice it, you can't unsee it.)

The main villain is ... well, he's a lot. He's just a whole lot. I'd call him Evil Garfield, except Garfield is already kind of Evil Garfield, so this guy's Eviler Garfield. He's not chewing the scenery, but is instead treating it like a cat with a vendetta against some drapes. He's just hilariously over the top at all times. It starts out vaguely entertaining, then gets annoying, then wraps right back around to entertaining again.

Also, his wig is terrible -- and it's not even the worst wig in the show! White Cat Legend has decided that the way you style foreigner NPCs is just to jam unbrushed women's wigs on extras' heads and call it a day. There are indeed a lot of foreigners in the show, and the show has chosen to handle them by assuming everything beyond the borders of 6th-century Chinese territory is a great undifferentiated vaguely Persian-flavored mass. Who's that shady-looking guy? Oh, he's Foreign. What country is he from? A Foreign one. What language does he speak? You know, Foreign.

You are not ready for the score. This is a show that spent its entire musical budget on a handful of middling pop songs, realized it still needed ~40 minutes of music to put in each episode, and decided that it could just pull things at semi-random from whatever the Chinese television equivalent of the YouTube royalty-free sound library is. The result is some laugh-out-loud hilarious soundtracking. Do you know why they usually pay people to do things like score television shows? It's because when you don't, it sounds like this.

True story: During one antics-filled scene, I frowned, listened a second, and asked my wife, "Is that ... 'Deck the Halls'?" It was!

The mysteries are -- and I'm quoting myself here -- the celery that gets the cute boy peanut butter to your mouth. Not only can you, the viewer, not solve them, I don't actually remember what most of the resolutions were. Hell, I barely remember what most of the actual setups were. The individual storylines are mostly unimportant pieces of fluff that kinda sorta tie into the big mystery of the show: Why is that boy a kitty? ...And if you think you're going to be satisfied by the resolution to that one, honestly, you haven't been paying attention to what I've been saying in this post.

Basing this on absolutely nothing but vibes, here is my guess: The original vision for this series was as an ongoing thing, something that might hew a little closer to the comic storyline in later seasons. At some point in the production, the decision got made that there would be no further seasons made. The resulting drama is something that's technically self-contained, sure, but has a lot of little lingering weirdnesses that look like foreshadowing.

As just one example, the way they frame and shoot the empress is bizarre, and she might as well have a big SHE'S GOING TO TURN OUT TO BE EVIL neon sign above her head. ...Except that, no, she's fine! Perfectly fine, mostly normal empress, mostly normal levels of evil, nothing to see here. She is, however, evil as heck in the source material (and that's not a spoiler, she's a little pink thing who's clearly sinister all the way from the get-go), and I have to wonder if the showrunners weren't planning some future heel-turn villain arc for her. Well, we'll never know now, so whatever you choose to believe, the show won't contradict you on it!

Your reaction to all of this will 100% depend on how charitable you are feeling toward staring down a firehose of (mostly) intentionally slapdash shenanigans. If you go into this demanding coherence and substance, you will wind up disappointed. If you go into it expecting nothing more than a fluffy good time, you'll probably enjoy yourself tremendously -- and you'll maybe even be moved by the rare times it does work out to being something of substance! Such as...

3. We are never ever getting back together

The first thing you can tell about Qiu Qingzhi and Li Bing is that they are as divorced as two dudes in a c-drama can be. They aren't just a little divorced. They are nuclear divorced.

Except -- and this is the juicy part -- they obviously still work really well together. If it's just the two of them head-to-head, they will be assholes to one another with no mercy. If circumstances change and they have a shared target, God help that shared target.

The unspoilery version of their backstory goes like this: They were adorable little tween besties who grew up into adorable little teen besties, until Qiu Qingzhi went off to join the army and came back a real cold bitch, and Li Bing has no idea why. Now the two of them control state agencies that should work together but actually wind up competing more often than not (think the FBI and the CIA), a competition not helped by how the Jinwu Guards (Qiu Qingzhi's group) are actual professional soldiers in very nice armor, while the Court of Judicial Review is, well, [gestures to points 1 and 2].

And yeah, baby, this right here is The Ship.

I spent a nonzero amount of time while watching this series laughing out loud because Wei Zheming's face is just too beautiful to be believed. With his sculpted jaw and his perfectly practiced looks of disdain, his Qiu Qingzhi looks like a damn Disney prince. His face could not be more perfect if you'd assigned a team of animators to draw it. This actor is the reason I found this show in the first place -- he was so beautiful in Word of Honor that I found myself wondering what else he might be getting up to. Turns out, he is again being a smug bitch and capturing the heart of a doe-eyed younger man.

Don't let me oversell how much these two are together in the show, because they're not. Qiu Qingzhi is not part of the main crew, so he's not in most of the episodes. Most of his screentime comes in flashbacks during the last story arc, to a time in his past when Li Bing wasn't even around. But when they're together, oh, the sparks do fly.

I think it helps that the actors seem to have understood the ship, even if in that video, Ding Yuxi (Li Bing's actor) is trying so hard to do the Please Do Not Cancel Us dance of plausible deniability. I honestly don't even think this is the show's doing; after all, the source material (see the section near the end) is not BL in the slightest. I'd believe the show meant to create a normal platonic bro-relationship between these two. I'd even believe that it thinks it succeeded.

Still, if you're not the biggest fan of Lovers To Enemies? That's fine! Here's the relationship that's the real core of the show:

4. Here comes a special boy

All the boys of the family of all boys are special and wonderful, but truly, Chen Shi is the specialest and wonderfulest of them all.

He is your everyman character, the little country bumpkin overwhelmed by all the big-city dealings he's stumbled into. With his cute little twang and his natural inclination to trust everyone he meets, he's the perfect cinnamon roll, too good, too pure. I want to pinch his angelic little cheeks.

Fun fact: I have been informed by someone who speaks with the same dialect he does that said dialect is very sweary, which brings to mind the wonderful image of Chen Shi just casually and sweetly dropping f-bombs while everyone else stares in shock.

In a show where the characters are way more important than the plot, having a good POV character is key. Your audience lives or dies entirely on how much they want to see that POV character put into situations. To me, Chen Shi is a rousing success at this. He's not stupid! He's just extremely sheltered and on his own for the first time in his ife. He's the bravest little toaster, the goodest boy who's not going to let the little things stop him -- like, say, illiteracy, or a lack of familiarity with city living, or an inability to give any substantial details about the brother he's looking for beyond 'he looks just like me.' That's why he's got his friends help him out!

You better believe that when it comes time to save the day, Chen Shi will do it through the power of how everyone loves him.

And he and the kitty are ... romance? Kind of romance? Romance-adjacent? I could burn even more wordcount explaining the dynamic, but @uovoc has already said it best:

cdrama Li Bing is like: I've taken an inexplicable liking to this simple country boy so I'm going to entrust him with my life's greatest secret because I'm whimsical like that. And cdrama Chen Shi is like: this man is the most beautiful cat I've ever seen.

No matter how romantically you slice it, it's a dynamic I absolutely love: where a guy weighed down by his own past meets another guy who could not care less about that. Chen Shi is Li Bing's chance to figure out who Li Bing is, without the burdens of his family history, connections to the court, job, status, or any of the other things everyone else sees when they look at him. Chen Shi looks at Li Bing and sees Li Bing, whiskers and all.

I mean, Chen Shi makes Li Bing an entire office full of human-sized cat toys. If that's not love, I don't know what is.

And if you're not into besties-to-worsties or the pure and purrfect love between a man and his cat who is also a man? That's okay! I've helpfully made a chart to demonstrate the many flavors of exciting relationship dynamics White Cat Legend makes available to you:

Imagine the possibilities! Make your own fun! And then get over to AO3 and share it with the rest of the class! The White Cat Legend tag is sparsely populated and mostly not in English, and that's a shame, because there's so much smooching potential.

5. Not as dumb as it looks

Wow, that's kind of a backhanded compliment, isn't it? Well, no, not actually. You saw my earlier points about what a bag of goofs this show is. What's easy to miss, though, is how unexpectedly clever a whole lot of its dumbassery is.

A lot of this, I'm going to chalk up to the actors, who on the whole turn in some comedic performances way better than they have any right to be. That's the thing about comedy: to do stupid well, you have to be smart. They're all very funny, and they've got some great chemistry in combinations and permutations. It's a testament to their abilities that you can take any two of them, give them a scene together, and get something worth watching out of it.

Of course most of this is the main boys, but the major supporting characters largely have the same clever sense of comedic timing. Their actors know they're not performing some great work of literature, so they've decided to have some fun with it. I'm not going to praise anyone's performance here as particularly great, but by and large, the recurring cast members are doing solid work.

The aforementioned goofball nonsense also does a fair job of distracting from how creative the show can be. For example, the fact that many of the fights and chases are comedic makes it easy to miss how the fight choreography is often really tight. I don't think the show is trying to hide its moments of cleverness, so much as it's just grabbing them where it can without drawing attention to them.

I know a lot of people gave up on this show only a few episodes in, and I suspect I know why. It's not even that it just takes a while to find its footing -- it never quite finds its footing, on account of being such a patchwork creation. It's an adaptation of an incomplete story, forced to make changes because of budgetary limitations, promising things it's not allowed to deliver on, and further cut down between filming and release. That's what you call having the deck stacked against you. The fact that the final product is not only watchable but downright enjoyable is a testament to how the production got some critical fundamentals right.

In short, it's not just dumb fun -- though it is a lot of dumb fun. But it's dumb fun with just enough to sink your teeth into that it eventually becomes a compelling ratio. I don't blame the people who bailed, but I'm glad I stuck with it.

bonus: It comes in other flavors!

If you like the series and you want more, you're in luck! There's a whole ongoing comic and animated series!

The comic is the original version of the story: a tall vertical webcomic with a cute, distinctive style. It's still being published, and it's very different from the drama. There's a great ongoing translation project at @whitecatlegend, so if your Mandarin skills are as bad as mine (or worse!), you can follow along in English as well!

The donghua is a pretty close adaptation of several parts of the comic. You can find the whole first season at this YouTube playlist, though please note that the playlist is out of order, so you don't accidentally start with episode 8. The translation is ... eh, it's a little rough in places, to put it charitably, but it also makes some charming localization decisions, so I'm all for it. Oh, and here's the second season! It's even prettier and better-translated than the first!

Also, hey, furries? Li Bing's a perma-kitty in both of those versions of the story, so have fun with that.

The drama's casting is spot-on. Whoever picked these boys went out of their way to keep the original artistic vibe as much as possible, to the point where if you'd told me the drama had come first and then someone had drawn a comic starting from the actors' likenesses, I would've believed you.

(And yes, if you've read it, Qiu Qingzhi and Lai Zhongshu aren't technically Qiu Shenji and Lai Junchen, but I'm declaring them close enough for the purposes of this demonstration.)

I have heard that some fans of the comic are unhappy about the live-action adaptation, and I get that, I do -- they are not the same thing. There are plenty of things the drama leaves out where, okay, I understand why that person/event/factor got cut, but at the same time, dammit. In the end, I like them both as very different stories featuring the same(-ish) characters. Still, the drama is definitely not one of those situations where you get to tune in to watch the same things you loved on the page, just in a different medium. The delightfully accurate casting is about where the similarities end. Everything beyond that is its own legend.

Kitty.

Here, kitty, kitty?

The drama's an iQiyi exclusive, so that's where you'll get it.

It's a fun show, not a perfect show. It has some captivating elements and lots of promising nonsense worth thinking about. And like I said, it's a tiny-ass fandom -- a paltry 277 works on AO3, a mere 44 of which are in English. Somebody get in there and make some combination of those boys kiss!

Also, it is criminal that Kitty Li Bing has fabulous red eyeliner that Person Li Bing does not get to wear. Call makeup and fix that.

[yams-here]

So I like thinking about franchises that disappointed me in some way

and after watching too many reviews I redesigned the High guardian spice characters (and thought of how the plot could work way too much)

Rose in this version isn't a complete idiot, and may not be so book smart, but she is very good in combat because she's kind of a fangirl. Like, "she studies attacks and can probably name pretty much every guardian" fangirling. While she is still kind of a dumbass, she's the one that always brings Sage down to earth whenever she gets too stressed. Although she is mostly the source of that stress. Her mom was taken by the rot, but she isn't really sure what it is, so when Thyme mentions it devastating her home she's like "!" so they can actually have something that might bring them together. She decides to take on forging and weapon enchantments so she can have a moment where she steps out of her mom's shadow to do her own thing teehee Sage here is still kind of an ass (her sexist discourse to snap was NOT a Girlboss Moment) but here I think it would be interesting if it was something that other characters think its weird too. Like its a belief ingrained into her together with the more traditional upbringing by her family (thus her only knowing old magic) so it can be part of her character development learning how those thoughts should be changed and that not everyone thinks like that, But she still tries her best to be respectful and kind. (also, her parents sent her to the academy because new magic is VERY new, so the fact that it was being implemented in the curriculum was not widespread, specially in a small town like where she was raised in.) she's an overthinker to the core, so sometimes she needs her friends to calm her down, although sometimes that anxiety is what prepares them for something they weren't even expecting.

Parsley is honestly well written enough in the original show, so the only things I would change is that the progress with the conflict with her parents is stretched a little through episodes, and the conflict is that while her parents want her to be a blacksmith and take on the family business (and help take care of her three thousand simblings) she wishes to go out and do something for herself as a warrior, because she wanting to go to school to become a blacksmith and her parents fighting her on it because they want her to become a blacksmith is kinda dumb. also her short ass hammer feels so weird to watch in the series, so I think that a longer handle would make it a little better. also tiny irony of her weapon being taller than her. Thyme feels like she should be written better because shes the only one that actually has any correlation to the plot, but she kind of... isn't?? I like her backstory of being ran out of the woods she lived in because the rot was devastating it and her dad staying behind to try to solve it, but I think it would be more dramatic if her dad was killed in the conflict but she doesn't know so dramatic moment when she finds something that belonged to him (maybe a little charm she made? for protection? in the way children do that stuff for their parents) and she connects the dots. Also the rot here is because the overuse of the power new magic is able to draw out without the control of old magic is taking too much energy from the earth, and woodsy areas thrive on it, thus the root like structures of the rot. The trees are basically oysters for the magic energy of the world. When its bad, they turn bad too. Also make her more of a "expresses affection through favors and actions, not words" person. She, Rose and Sage took wayy too long to become friends. Amaryllis stays the same because she is perfect and I love her and if you disagree to talk to the wall I personally think Snapdragon is good too but I would make him genderfluid instead. I think that the idea of Caraway THINKING he might be a trans girl but that ending up not the correct answer would reinforce his "there's always more options than you think" speech. And someone needs to point out how he's drawn to women that scream at him. Also we need a better arc with his dad instead of the raw carrot that was the canonical "his dad reinforces toxic masculinity hurr durr" thing we got (that wasn't even well made btw) NOW TO THE SIDIES

Slime boy is now named Slime boy because of an accident he had in potions class the previous year (he's one year older than the main cast) which caused him to continuously produce a slime like substance instead of stuff like spit and sweat. It doesn't inconvenience him a lot other than him making bubbles when he speaks every now and then. He's just an assistant in the terrasphere shop, and the owners are Alloe and Anise (wow they actually do something else in the story!!) but he's mainly just a more experienced student that sometimes knows things the main cast doesn't like secret entrances and cool rooms and stuff. He's a full on bard because that was barely explored in canon and music based attacks are cool. He has the tiniest little crush on parnelle cuz I thought that would be fun Parnelle is ENBY because I SAID SO (and cuz cal is stablished as transphobic and I like payoffs) and since whatever they're doing at the academy is never really clarified, I made them kind of an animal whisperer, like they call on animals to assist them in battle and other stuff. (Maybe then we actually get to see the trixies again after their prolongued mating dance that lead to literally nothing in episode 1) being an animal whisperer is a very rare "old magic" hability thus why they entered the academy one year earlier than expected. They sew their own clothes and are still the generally weird little guy they are in canon, except this time its explained as them preferring to communicate with animals ever since they were a child. They are still very polite and friendly tho, always happy to help. Cal is (his full name is calamagrostis and like if I was named that I'd be an asshole too) still parnelle's cousin, but he doesn't outright bullies them. in fact, he isn't an outright bully, he just tends to look down on other people that don't follow what he believes in, which is a more traditional view on the world, kind of like sage, so I thought of him maybe being a catalyst to her being like "wow I can see why my way of thinking may be bad now, I don't want to be like him" which pushes her to grow and stuff. And I want him to grow as well, so I thought, maybe he and Snapdragon used to be friends, but recently they drifted apart and he started to kind of resent him after he came out as genderfluid, but deep down he still misses his friend, so maybe that pushes his character development. And other people saying that hes kind of a prick. idk I just really hate the trope of a bully character just being there to be the mc's punching bag instead of getting development.

In general, the lore would be (I think, I'm not the best at lore) that Guardians are generally like soldiers, but in a more captain america type of way. they're more like beacons of hope and symbols or power and peace than soldiers are, (thus rosemary knowing a bunch of them as they're usually famous) but they are still required to know combat. High Guardian Academy is known as a guarantee to become a good soldier, and a high chance to become a guardian. They VERY recently implemented new magic in the curriculum, but are experimenting with mixing its high power output with old magic's control of it, (thus why caraway knows how but why none of the students are being thaught it. It's a fairly new tecnique they'd rather get a good grasp on before teaching a bunch of children how to use it) because since they're expertly trained guardians they can tell that a terrasphere takes too much energy above what would be considered okay. They just aren't aware of how much tho, the extent of the rot is a secret held close to their chests by witch country, which is where the terraspheres come from, which has brought them tons of profit and advancements. So when someone knows about the extent, or tries to stop it, they are eliminated, (thus why thyme's dad died. People that stayed in the fairy woods and knew how bad new magic could be were all "silenced" so they could keep profiting out of it.) (Any letters or research about the rot, or from the people that knew, were burned and interfered with, thats why no one else knew about it.) idk what else to talk about cuz this show had such little things to explore but there's so much filler that almost none of it got explored but I think it had potential, even if I prefer to focus on character interactions and how they change eachother. Again, I'm not very good with lore. and plot.