#but i think we have more than enough 'insanely evil man to a sometimes comical degree' with ghetsis

[taffybee]

not that anyone's asking BUT my hot take on giovanni is he should be retired rn. not from like a "the pokemon company should stop talking about him" (weeeeelll that's sort of part of it but. hear me out) kind of way BUT in a. he should LITERALLY not be doing team rocket shit in ANY canon universe anymore. and it would be TOTALLY in-character of him to do so if the medias still using him characterized him the way he should be. welcome to my ted talk let me explain myself

FULL DISCLOSURE: i like giovanni. like, a not normal amount i fear. all of that opening sounds like i don't but i totally feel stupid emotions about this guy. anyways:

GEN 1. gen 1 games are like... NOT known for their compelling dialogue. and in cases like archie and maxie in gen 3 getting remakes in gen 6, their characterization and dialogue gets (kind of subjectively but i feel this is a popular opinion anyways) Much Better. i think that goes for a Lot of stuff where they give old guys new dialogue in spin offs (gestures at masters ex which i think is Great for making characters Actually Interesting)

but i feel like with giovanni there's been a DOWNGRADE in character since his appearance because he no longer Progresses.

i WILL say masters ex does Some Work to try and make him Deeper than just "I'm Evil for the sake of Being Evil grahgghh 😈" but it's like. overshadowed by All The Other Stuff.

plus he IS rainbow rocket giovanni in masters and i'm like OBSESSEDDD with team rainbow rocket. but i also don't think it should. Exist. I'M GLAD IT DOES but i find it out of character for giovanni to do At All. I CAN EXPLAIN I PROMISE.

team rocket's goals as an organization are and always have been: make money via stealing or otherwise exploiting pokémon. that's all it NEEDED to be. because it was gen 1 and no one needed to be ripping apart the universe yet.

giovanni himself sees pokemon as a means to an end. that much has stayed consistent in all of his appearances. but what CHANGES things in what happens when he LOSES for the FINAL TIME in r/b/y:

I WILL DEDICATE MY LIFE TO THE STUDY OF POKEMON. that's like CRAZY sort of redemption. and you Could argue against me to say "well have you considered he was lying" and i Have but i think it's SO much cooler if he was being legit. if he was so Changed by losing So Many Times to a little boy who just cared So Much for his pokémon that he needed to experience that for himself.

I mentioned in my previous giovanni post that pokémon origins has characterized giovanni "right" and THAT'S because via continuously fighting red and seeing his passion for battling as well as his love of pokémon firsthand, giovanni rediscovers his lost passion for pokémon that he had when HE was younger, and he sees HIMSELF in who red is and decides to disband team rocket after their gym battle so he can turn his life around. i HIGHLY recommend watching episode 3 of origins if you haven't seen it. it's freaking Marvelous.

ANYWAYS. THIS is the characterization of giovanni i support the MOST because it's not terribly complicated but still has nice depth to his character that you could read into.

BUT if we're going by this characterization of him, he should. NOT BE DOING TEAM ROCKET STUFF NOW! he SHOULD have been retired storywise by game freak after that and retired job-wise. studying pokémon and touching grass.

but THEN. gen 2 happens. (... well, gen 2 and the first gens 1/2 remakes.)

gen 2 introduces the concept of "let's bring giovanni back". which i wouldn't complain about if giovanni wasn't ALSO trying to get back. WHY. WE ESTABLISHED IN THE FIRST GAME HE'S DONE. and gen 2 didn't DIRECTLY SAY giovanni was up to come back (as far as i'm aware, i did NOT play gsc, someone correct me if i'm wrong). but when frlg released, they Changed dialogue from the original to FIT this idea:

NOW "studying pokemon" has become "training". there IS no character development for him here, he JUST wants to get stronger to be a Better mob boss. and this is supported by the celebi time travel event where he's ABOUT to rejoin team rocket before you beat him

the big problem with this (and any giovanni dialogue in the time travel event) for me is that it frames everything that happened to him in gen 1 as "giovanni wasn't a good enough mob boss then but now that he's had some time to Train he's ready to be a Better Mob Boss" WRONG! THAT WAS NEVER THE ISSUE!! part of the pros of team rocket at its peak was that giovanni was Unknown to most and could direct operations in the shadows AND he could keep his business as a gym leader because NO ONE KNEW. but now EVERYONE knows and team rocket can LITERALLY NEVER REACH THAT PEAK AGAIN. the ONLY CORRECT thing to do in this situation is Disband and Do Other Shit (cough cough study pokémon and touch grass cough cough)

this seems obvious to me that this desire to keep dragging him back into things is the games way of being like "woaahh!! callback time!!" and then later down the line "woaaahh!! nostalgia time!!!" (because they wouldn't have retconned that final gen 1 dialogue if it wasn't) and while i can Appreciate it to a degree (because i am Not Immune to getting STUPID EXCITED when old blorbos show up) i think continuing to make giovanni show up to Be Evil isn't the way to go about it. or at LEAST not canon timeline giovanni.

and the gen 1/2 remakes for ME is like... the beginning of the issue, but as we've gotten Further Away from gen 1 in time, the more i feel they stray from where he ended in the original in favor of making him More Blandly Evil. he feels constrained to one-liners about how the worlds an EVIL PLACE and he's just playing the game or whatever alpha sigma shit he's on in the masters trainer lodge

rainbow rocket is kind of CRAZY to me because they take this mob boss who likes exploiting pokemon and scientists for money and they make him start. opening interdimensional bad ending au wormholes to take over the world with aliens. (also having him willing to share the power with all the other evil bosses, some who have in their universes Successfully taken over the world??? heeeellll no. not even my proposed toned down characterization of this guy would be cool with that realistically.) it all just seems to be Way Beyond what team rocket SHOULD be doing. they're The Mafia. making The Mafia open wormholes is CRAZY. but giovanni HAS to be the main guy because. Nostalgia.

idk how much sense i make when i say this but when you make team rocket less cunning and less focused on doing their work in the shadows and running their shady operations stealthily. you get. a more ambitious team skull. and there's nothing WRONG with team skull but it's NOT WHAT TEAM ROCKET IS SUPPOSED TO BE. they've got more of a reputation than that but modern depictions of giovanni and the organization as a whole water him down to "i love Causing Problems" and less "i love Good Business"

whatever. giovanni in modern depictions MAKES SENSE if you followed along the slow regression of his character in real time. but i feel like if you look where he is now and look where he Ended in r/b/y you have like. Two Different Characters. and i think having a redeemed or even kind-of-half-redeemed giovanni could be SO much more interesting in showing up again than having him be Generally Evil

AND IT'S NOT LIKE THAT REALLY POSES ISSUES FOR MASTERS EX. cyrus is half-reformed WITHIN the story. archie and maxie too (although they were already kind of like that). lysandre HAS an evil moment but he DOESN'T DIE like he does in canon and THEN he's FINE. he still "runs" team flare but he's NOT LONGER A THREAT TO THE PROTAGONISTS

what i think COULD'VE been cool in some hypothetical scenario is have giovanni come back for cameos but Not as team rocket's leader. have him Turn Down the rocket admin radio broadcast. hell, having him come back to help the player Stop Them if he feels particularly annoyed. LET THAT MAN GO ON VACATION. WHATEVER. there's SO MUCH you can do with him the way cameos are done for the Other non-evil characters and there are options where you could Still battle him as a Test Of Strength but THERE'S JUST. SO MUCH WRONG WITH HIM STILL BEING OVERTLY EVIL.

i understand keeping giovanni evil for nostalgia. i Get it i PROMISE i do. i just think it makes him a weaker character, and the companies sacrifice character development for sales. but if you wanted to have a bad guy who was JUST BAD and would CONTINUE to be bad if given the chance,

GHETSIS IS. RIGHT THERE.

that's the end of that for me i think. i'm SO down to discuss or debate this take for fun. i just think giovanni should retire and pet his cat because it's funny.

[lizlives]

I genuinely don't understand what people actually mean when they say that they prefer the Boys comic to the show. What about the comic works better than the show? No genuinely, explain in detail, what actually makes the comic more interesting and compelling.

It's clearly worse written. It barely functions as satire because for some reason the author decided that all the expies should just be rapists for some reason. Like, he just ignored all the other possible ways you could demonize existing heroes that actually makes some semblance of sense.

Like some of these are no brainers. If you were lazy but not insane, you could write the Aquaman expy to be a monarchist, you could write the Iron Man expy to be a hedonistic billionaire and weapons dealer, and you could make the x-men ineffective neo-liberals. Now, I hate every single one of these ideas, but if someone wrote them, I would at least understand what they were trying to say. It would be boring and trite garbage, but it would seem like a person who lived on earth wrote it.

But for some reason the author decided that he would just make all of them some variant of sex-pest with hardly any other deviations. Maybe once in a while he'd make them a junkie if he was feeling spicy, but predator was definitely his go to for some reason. Hell sometimes the comic wouldn't even make them a predator, they'd just make them gay or crossdressing, as if that's enough justification to make the audience feel good about brutally murdering them.

Like just think, he went down a list of heroes to construct expies of, and instead of actually interrogating ways he could deconstruct each hero or team of heroes, he just made them all predators, disabled stereotypes, and junkies.

"It's just dumb, edgy fun!" Oh it's dumb and edgy for sure, but what about both of those things together makes it fun? I'm only partially joking, I actually want to understand why someone would willingly sit down and read a comic that for it's entire lifespan is about a bunch of miserable cynics going around and brutally murdering evil caricatures of existing superheroes where the gimmick is essentially exactly the same every time.

Idk the author's mind or views and I don't want to people to harass or attack them about it (not that I have that kind of power) so I'm not using their name. But idk, something about just the way the comic seems to think making every superhero a rapist is a no-brainer feels... idk revealing of something? Like what did they know that we don't know, or maybe the opposite of that? It it just spite? Did the author think, "Oh I hate superheroes and want to show everyone how terrible they are, so instead of substantively deconstructing what they are, I'll just make all of them cartoonishly terrible and irredeemable sex offenders," Genuinely what was the logic? It completely stumps me. The comic feels more than just cynical, it feels like you're reading something that was just pure undirected anger. It feels like you're reading Qanon but instead it's about how all superheroes are secretly part of a pedophile cult instead.

You can't even claim the comic has good anti-corporate themes, because the show is a thousand times better at actually being clear satire of corporatism and even capitalism as a whole. The comic operates on a backdrop of corrupt companies and gestures towards the idea of anti-corporatism, which honestly feels like a distraction from how absurdly xenophobic the rest of it feels without even needing to always distinctly target a specific group, but most of the comics energy is focused on the repetitive and miserable pattern of revealing what new horrible caricature of an existing superhero they'll reveal.

I could go on, but honestly I think I've covered exactly why I'm genuinely confused when people say this, so I'll just leave it at this.

[jupitermelichios]

you know, riverdale really doesn't get enough credit for its queer representation

sure there's a bunch of memeworthy cringy moments (mostly from the first season, when it was functionally a different show, but i can't give "it's not queerbait if it's to save the world" a completely free pass even if it is one of the funniest lines ever said on television), and we absolutely should be side-eying them hard for erasing jughead's asexuality (although we might finally be getting that in the current season)

but for all that, there's so much stuff i love

Toni and Fangs being explicitly a queer couple, despite being opposite gender, because the show didn't just forget that they're both bi when they got together. I geuinely cannot think of another example of that on tv, and it really meant a lot to me to see it

Cheryl having lost her childhood to her mother's emotional abuse and homophobia immediately agreeing to foster Britta when Britta's parents throw her out for being gay. (everything season six did with Britta was insane, but for season 5 at least her and Cheryl and Nana Rose were a little gay family and I loved it sm)

Betty figuring out she's bi while in a relationship with a man and that just being some new self knowledge she has, rather than it being seen as a threat to her and Archie's relationship

Kevin continuing to be refered to as Anthony's dad and having a relationship with him, even though he's not his biological father and he and Fangs split up before Anthony was even born. (They were using a friend as a surrogate, the relationship ended before the birth, later a DNA test is done that shows fangs is the biodad, but when he's not being mindcontrolled by evil wizards he continues to have a relationship with the baby - he chose to have this kid, and that's the thing that counts, not whether he's on the birth certificate)

And yes the Abigail episodes are all very silly, but they're also all about how queer people have always been here and will always be here, and no attempt to erase us will ever succeed. and yes sometimes we're immortal witches driven mad and evil by the loss of our one true love, but afterall, don't my evil immortal wlw witch girlies deserve some representation too?

And yes the hedwig episode is so dumb, it's maybe the dumbest of the musical episodes and I'm including the american psycho one in that, but at the same time, it's an epsiode about how drag is important art and teenagers should if anything be exposed to more drag than they are because queer art is important, yes even the stuff with sex in it, and in the current political climate i can't help loving it for taking that stance, even if the songs are all really bad

the show's representation isn't perfect by any means, and yes the fact that it look them 7 seasons to even think about acknoledging that jughead is ace in the comics really sucks, but it also does a lot of things really right, and i just think those should get the same level of attention as the cringeworthy stuff

also "it's not queerbait if it's to save the world" is still an incredibly funny line

[theowritesfiction]

I'm trying to think of things we haven't already discussed at length lol...here's one I was thinking last night 'cause my siblings & I were doing fan art & choosing screen caps or comics panels to copy. the atla comics were unforgivable plot wise but sometimes the character designs could be really cute on a purely aesthetic level

Okay here's a more character interpretation based one: I can't remember who posted it but someone posited recently that maybe Ozai favored Azula because he saw himself in her - the underappreciated younger siblings. Ozai & Ursa already had a male heir so it's not like they had to have another kid. The most reasonable explanation is that for the first 2 years or so, they actually liked being parents & wanted another family member. It was only with time that Ozai started projecting onto his children. Iroh was the golden child & Ozai felt underappreciated. As a girl, Azula would be underappreciated by most until her father started giving her special treatment so maybe it actually started out as him trying to make things more even & grew toxic for both kids with time. I can't remember who posted the meta on this but I like this interpretation

Okay, you get a Buffy one too now. I honestly wish Buffy could've had more heel moments. Not because she's a mary sue or lacking complexity. Just to be clear, I think Buffy is a very complex & interesting character, she's one of my favorite characters in any media ever. But it feels like the show intends to give her some moments where she's wrong & every time it falls flat because she's not wrong. Instead, what we get is a situation where it feels like the other characters fault buffy unfairly again and again. It would've added dimension to all the other characters if Buffy could've actually made mistakes that hurt them more. I think there were in character ways to do this, & the writers didn't, for whatever reason & it led to a disappointing main cast at times. (I still love many of the other characters too, that's why I said "at times." I just don't think the show ever successfully made it look as though Buffy was in the wrong any of the times it attempted to - dead man's party, the end of season 7, anytime during season 6, etc. & your main character should be wrong sometimes, especially if you're trying to make your other characters sympathetic)

So, on the comics, since I read the whole lot of them in like 2 days more than a year ago and have been trying to forget ever since, what I remember most is that the art style was wildly inconsistent. Some of them definitely had a slightly higher budget feel to them than the others. And I agree that some of the character designs could be quite nice. Although the way they drew Azula was leaning way more into the evil/insane side so I wasn't a fan of that. But the panels where she was kicking the crap out of everyone were very satisfying, because everyone else were literally so unlikable!

The theory about Ozai preferring Azula because he saw himself in her, it's an interesting one, and I could accept it as a credible explanation, there's nothing unbelievable about it. However, from my interest in history and the way autocratic rulers generally think about succession, I think Ozai's favorite child would always be the one he could more easily shape into what he wanted/needed them to be, provided they were talented and capable enough. Unfortunately for Azula, she was both the better firebender and also possessed the qualities that Ozai deemed necessary in a leader (so basically saw himself in her / Ozai's narcisism meaning he saw himself as the perfect leader, obviously). The interesting question is how would Ozai have acted if Zuko was the superior firebender? Would it matter that Ozai saw himself more in Azula than Zuko? I'm not sure. But in that case I could also imagine Ozai trying his best to separate Ursa from Zuko, and then really sink his fangs into Zuko. Maybe Azula and Ursa would grow closer in such a scenario - an interesting AU idea perhaps.

Okay about Buffy, I can really speak about what I've seen during my re-watch, and I do agree that it feels like Buffy doesn't really make bad mistakes, and yet the writers are trying to shape and present some of her actions as mistakes when they really don't feel like that at all, and then when she's publicly called out and shamed for these decisions, it just feels totally unfair and makes all the other characters look like massive jerks. It would all feel a lot more satisfying if they would allow Buffy to make an actual bad mistake and then call her out for that. I think that Buffy keeping the news about Angel's return in S3 was kind of bad, but they completely botched the way it was handled, because you can't just turn that into a Xander-led bullying session, it just makes Buffy immediately sympathetic. The one episode where I thought Buffy's mistake was handled well was her one on one talk with Giles when he told her that she had disrespected him and that was effective, because Buffy rightfully felt bad about her actions. But yeah, I completely agree, the writing in btvs at times can be very odd, about this and other things.

[ordinaryschmuck]

What I Thought About "Yesterday's Lie" from The Owl House

Salutations, random people on the internet who absolutely won’t read this! I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons!

Here it is! The midseason finale of The Owl House Season Two! An episode featuring Luz going back to the human realm, is hyped up to heaven about how painful it'll be for the audience, and features more anxiety by how Creepy Luz is a thing. And BOOOOOOOOY howdy were fans not ready for this. I'm sure as hell not ready for when I wrote this intro at *checks time* thirty minutes before watching the official premier. Yup, the words you're reading right now are from me in the past, when everything was still pure and simple. Whereas future me is still probably destroyed by the events that transpired. Isn't that right, future me?

Future Me: Actually, it wasn’t that bad. The ending hurt, sure, but other than that, it wasn’t too painful.

Wow, that is some neat input! At least, I think it was. I wouldn't know because I literally wrote that after watching the episode. With the words you're currently reading being written at *checks time* twenty-six minutes before the premier...this whole intro is confusing, isn't it, future me?

Future Me: Sure is.

Yeah, it's definitely confusing. In any case, let's dive into this spoiler-filled review as we find out together just how painful this episode was! Take it away, future me!

Future Me: Will do! Major spoilers ahead, folks!

Now, let’s review, shall we?

WHAT I LIKED

Luz’s Room: We only see it for a short time, but everything about it just screams Luz. The pile of weird-looking stuffed animals, the witch hat in the center of the floor, and the fact that she has bunk beds, a single child's dream (Or so I've heard). It's a small thing, but I love it.

Vee: Here she is! The character previously dubbed Creepy Luz who now turns out to be yet another new addition to the ever-growing list of characters that we, as a fandom, would give our lives for. Because holy s**t was Vee the best type of expectation subversion. Showing us all the ominous ways of how she basically took Luz's place made fans assume that Vee was an evil doppelganger. Turns out, she was just a tortured soul that was desperate to live a new and better life and lucked out in finding Luz's. What Vee does is...questionable at best, but seeing what she went through with the experiments Belos pulled on her, you understand why she would do it. And I personally love it's that same background information that makes Vee resentful of Luz of all people. Luz's life is a relative dream come true, and running away from that would be insane to someone who spent most of their existence through imprisonment and experimentation. It's an intriguing point of view, even though it's admittingly flawed given how it's mostly Camila that seemingly made Luz's life bearable. But the flaws don't matter. What matters is that you can see where Vee is coming from, and to me, personally, I think she's understandable enough to make me root for her to have some kind of happy ending. Whether as Luz or as herself, I'm hopeful to see Vee get some semblance of peace.

Camila: *Round of applause* Don't mind me! Just taking the time to love how all them sons of b**hes who thought Camila was a bad mom are now heavily invalidated. 'Cause, guess what? Camila is a fantastic mother, both to her daughter and her daughter's doppelganger! Allow me to walk you through the highlights:

How Camila looks like she’s not okay with the fact that "Luz" is clearing out her weird stuff, seemingly acting too different to the Luz she knows. Added to the fact that Camila doesn't like it.

How Camila drove Luz to camp whether than letting her take the bus

The fact that Camila takes that box of junk back in, not willing to part with the tin foil sculpture Luz made.

The way she was willing to play along with the game she thought Luz was doing, supporting her daughter's creative mind that Camila admits to being glad to see.

And, best of all, the willingness Camila had to help this poor creature, despite the lies it lived.

It's that last part I really want to touch upon, though. Because an action like that shows just how much Luz's heart comes from Camila. The kindness and generosity of helping this poor creature, who she has every right to run out on, proves how Luz learned to be everything she is today through Camila's own loving heart. Vee was scared and hurt, and the second Camila saw that she was then more than willing to help because of it. It's something that Luz would do, and it proves that even though Camila didn't exactly get everything right, she's still a great mom where it counts.

“A new life”: A perfect line.

Initially, it makes audiences think that it has everything to do with replacing Luz. It's only through future context that we know it's about escaping the s**t show Vee once lived through that it's clear she's talking about starting over. It hits us with intrigue on the first viewing, only to hit harder with the feels during a second. Really well-done.

Luz in the Mirror: A well-done surprise that makes fans curious about how this even happen in the first place. Kudos to you, writers.

The New Portal: I don't mind that they found a way to build this off-screen. Showing Luz and the gang slowly building a new portal would have been a little too tedious to watch, and it's so much better to just start this episode out with it. Besides, maybe we'll get the slow and steadier version now that we've seen how quickly building one might not have been the best way to go, given how fast that thing fell apart.

Luz Between Dimensions: I have no clue what the hell that place she was in is called, but it's awesome! The overall design of the realm is the correct type of unsettling, like it's oozing with mystery, but it's somewhere that you probably don't want to be in for too long. Whoever designed it deserves all of the credit because I don't want to even think about all the hard work that went into making this look as well-made as it was.

Luz Resisting to See Amity: What? Luz and Amity are adorable, and seeing Luz's immediate thought about seeing Amity makes my shipping heart scream with glee. Don't judge me!

Hiding Luz’s Dad’s Face: Well, that was a fun story while it lasted.

So, it turns out that Luz's dad really was a part of Luz's and Camila's life at some point, but not anymore. As for why remains to be seen, as we don't really know yet if we'll see him make an appearance. I'd say that the odds are high that he will, given how much of a point this episode made about keeping his face hidden. Shows don't usually do that unless the goal is to hype up some official reveal, and I can't wait to see what comes of it.

Luz Telling Herself to Count to Five: Hey, more evidence for how I relate to Luz! I know how it feels to be all panicky about a specific situation, and I only got better when I took the time to calm down for a bit. Sometimes, I even tried the "count to x" method that Luz used...it never worked, primarily because it made me feel worse when people told me to do it, but I still tried it! Plus, there's also some narrative foreshadowing when after Luz says five, the realm shows her Vee, or Number V, which is a pretty cool detail you'll notice on a rewatch.

Luz Helping Vee: I gave Camila praise for helping Vee in the end, but that doesn't abstain Luz from her own set of recognition. The second that Luz realized that Vee wasn't really a threat and is far from evil, our favorite human does what she can to help and even makes a deal where they're both happy. Because, of course, Luz is that perfect of a protagonist who is more than willing to help others in need. And it's why we love her so.

Looking for Magic that Eda Left Behind: A pretty cool idea that gives Luz and Vee a chance to bond and giving us an insight into Eda's past antics and misadventures in the human realm. Not much I can add to it, though.

Gravesfield: It's surprisingly not as jarring as I thought it would be to spend an episode in the human realm. I thought for sure, after all that time in the Boiling Isles, there would be something off about walking around a normal environment for a change. Turns out, it's almost easy to get used to. Or, for me, it is.

But I will say that there's this neat use of colors when comparing Gravesfield with the Boiling Isles. In Gravesfield, the coloring looks dulled down and standard, which is a stark contrast to the bright vibrancy of everything we've seen in the Boiling Isles. It's a subtle way of showing how things are different, aside from the major discrepancies we could come to expect. And I think that's why I appreciate it much more.

Eda’s Called Herself Marylynn in the Human Realm: Hang on...hang on...do you mean to tell me that the crack theory about Eda being Stan's ex-wife is actually true?

...

...What even is this show?!

Vee Making Friends with Camp Members: This shows the most apparent difference between Luz and Vee. Where we see Luz is already fearing the many ways that could go wrong with interacting with teens, Vee revealed that she adapted to her situation and had a chance to make friends. The implications of this are worth discussing another time, but for now, I'll say that it's pretty intriguing that we gain this much insight into both Luz and Vee through such a small thing.

Belos Wanting to Learn How Basilisks can Drain Magic: ...Didn't Raine say that Belos was taking away magic? If so, I think we can figure out how he's doing it. The question now is: Why?

Jacob (The Curator Guy): This guy was a riot. At first, Jacob seemed like a threat with the way he trapped Vee and was apparently stocking her, but the second he goes off about his conspiracy theories, it becomes clear what type of character he is. And was it a blast seeing how much of a crackpot this man is. It wasn't cool seeing him wanting to dissect the precious angel that is Vee, but I still chuckle about things like his "Flat Eather's Certificate." So while he's not that much of a threat, he's still fun to watch.

The Owl Beast was in the Human Realm: ...How did that happen? When did it happen? And how the hell did Eda get out of a situation like that?! Who knows, but it's still a shocking piece of news to learn.

Luz Telling Camila the Truth: Hey, she faced her fear after all! Although, the results aren't as pleasant as when Amity faced her fear two weeks ago.

Camila is a Veterinarian: ...One insignificant reveal...managed to destroy so many fanfics. I mean, we probably shouldn't have just assumed Camila was a nurse...but what the f**k else were we supposed to think?! Sorry for seeing the scrubs, and the first thing that came to my mind was "nurse" and not "vet."

By the way, that had to have been intentional, right? There's no way that Dana Terrace didn't think we'd assume Camila was a nurse. She'd had to have put off a reveal like that just to trip up her fans. And if that's the case, then that is a major d**k move...but that's why I mildly respect it.

Two Human Brothers went to the Demon Realm: Turns out we don't have to be in the Boiling Isles to learn more about it. Because now we have more information about how two humans were taken to the Isles with the help of a witch, thus setting up a grander reveal if it turns out that one of the humans was Philip and the witch was Belos. Because if that's true...then there's more of a history between those two than we thought.

Jacob has a Training Wand: This helps me believe that it's highly likely for Jacob to make a return and to have a power boost for when he does. After all, focussing all that attention on the training wand is way too convenient for it not to come up again in the future. Meaning we're most likely going to get more pain from Jacob if he shows up again.

Camila Beats the Crap out of Jacob for Vee: ...Writers, don't make me choose between Camila and Eda on who's the better cartoon mom. I know Eda's technically not a mom...BUT I STILL DON'T WANT TO CHOOSE DAMNIT!

Also, the sandal...just...

Why the f**k does Camila have a sandal in her purse? I don't know. Is it still funny that she does? Most certainly.

Camila and Luz’s Talk in the Rain: Ooooooooh, I was not ready for this...

I wasn't ready for the crying.

I wasn't ready for the hurt in Camila's eyes when she found out Luz chose to stay in the Boiling Isles.

I wasn't ready for Camila asking if Luz hates being with her that much.

I wasn't ready for Luz profusely stating how it was never Camila's fault.

I was not ready for Camila to tell Luz that she'll try to do better.

And I definitely was not ready for Luz to barely have enough time to promise that she'll come back.

This episode wasn't the twenty-two minutes of nonstop angst that I thought it was going to be...but this short scene more than make up for it.

Luz Tries to Stay Strong: Yet another thing she unwittingly learned from Camila. Camila tried to keep a brave face when Vee was with her and Luz, most likely not wanting to tear either of them down in the process. Luz does the same thing here as she avoids talking about the details of what went down in her sort-of journey back home. And seeing her clearly fake smile slowly droop into an uncertain frown, it uh...it definitely tore me up inside.

WHAT I DISLIKED

I want to say it's perfect, but there's one major issue that really bogs this episode down.

Continuity Error in How Vee Replaced Luz: Having Vee take Luz's place the same day Luz appeared in the Isles is a smart idea on paper...if it wasn't for the fact that it's impossible.

Because Eda closed the portal door the second that she saw Luz, meaning that there's no way for Vee to go to the human realm. It's a major plothole that makes no sense, and it might just be the first time ever that this series wasn't so closely knit with its story. Which ends up taking a dive in quality in the process.

IN CONCLUSION

I'd say that "Yesterday's Lie" is an A-. Everything about Luz, Vee, and Camila is incredible, combined into a story that ends in tragedy and uncertainty for the future. That plothole may drag things down a bit, but everything else is handled so well that I'm not lying when I say it's easy to forgive and forget.

(And that's ten episodes in a row without a single stinker. HOW THE F**K DOES THIS SEASON KEEP WINNING?!)

[nighttimepixels]

TALK TO US ABOUT MASS EFFECT I HAVE BEEN AN INSANE MASS EFFECT/SHAKARIAN TRASH PERSON SINCE 20-FUCKING-11 AND LEMME TELL YOU THOSE FEELINGS HAVENOT TARNISHED A SINGLE FRACTION IN THOSE TEN YEARS OH MY GOOOOOOODDDSSSS!!!!!!!

I DEMAND A PLAY-BY-PLAY UP TO THE MINUTE OF YOUR REACTIONS TO EVERYTHING!!!!

you are so valid and I totally see why everyone I've ever mentioned it to loves the hell out of it

aksdjlsdfj I meannnn if you want to hear my rambling about it then hell yeah

Okay, gonna put this below the cut to save everyone else XD also- since I'm not leaving this Mass Effect obsession anytime soon, if you're not interested in seeing occasional posts about it, please feel free to block the tag "night plays ME"~

(mild spoilers ahead??)

((also for real I mean it when I say this is rambling as hell lol, apologies and no stress if absolute no one reads all this))

OKAY SO Mass Effect 1-

Stars help me, I was honestly hooked right from the start?? Like even in Legendary Edition (the combined trilogy just re-released in one "can play it on one system + minor improvements", for anyone who doesn't know) where it's smoothed out, of course it's obvious that ME1 is a decade old... but the foundation for these relationships are all there and gods I love them already.

Like - Kaiden right off the top is a delightful good fightin lad, what the hell. I've heard that he's viewed as 'bland' by a good portion of the fan community but I dunno, he's a delight and even more complex by the time 2 rolls around and you encounter him on Horizon, it was honestly Ashley I was way more meh about - mostly because before you can learn about her family history/etc, she comes off as hella xenophobic and I was immediately offended for my growing space family that she didn't like/trust all the aliens around, pfff.

(she gets redeemed a bit through further actions/evolving thoughts, but I thought in retrospect it was a bummer that they didn't flip the order there, give her a chance to be liked before the complicating factor of being so rude about aliens >:c that then she could grow from... ah well. Apparently she has a good arc but uh, let's just say I chose Kaiden at the "key junction" in the latter part of the game so I won't be seeing anymore of Ashley uh... anytime soon, haha.)

Garrus??? Is??????? The ABSOLUTE best???????????

I liked him from the start, I'm always a bit of a sucker for a rogue-detective "the system won't bring this bastard to justice, so I've got to" type and all their moral shadiness XD But he just gets better, honestly, and where I'm at in ME2 (right before the Reaper IFF mission, as of typing this, with everyone's loyalty!) I am only digging myself deeper into this hole-

-*wheezing* okay anyways -

Wrex is AMAZING I love fightin' middle-aged krogan bastard, gods. Liara is great too, I'm a sucker for a wlw relationship (playing fem!Shepard, so) - buuuut I'll admit she's a bit more one-note in ME1. Last week while I was still on ME1 I remember hearing (while trying to dodge spoilers) that her arc is really good, though. I think they leaned a little hard on the 'innocent but sexy' sterteotype on her (so despite the yikes aspect of a few of the things I've learned in ME2, lol, I actually really like the complexity that's been added to her character.)

Saved Liara first, so by the time I got to Noveria and had the standoff with Benezia there was the chance to have emotions over Liara having to face her TwT and of course, I made the questionable but quality decision to free Queen Rachni heheh. no ragrets

More than a blow-by-blow of my choices though I totally wanna take the chance to say that even in the mild jankiness of ME1 (goddammit, the Mako.... please..... please just go up this impossible cliff I just want to resource hunt-) the way that the lore, both obvious/key to main plot and the lesser/filler/background/world-building kinds... I just love it. It incorporates it well, you can go ham in the codex learning more, or just dive into the basics - it's clearly a complex galaxy (and they do an even better job in 2 of fleshing it out further), and it never really felt overwhelming. It was pretty natural figuring it all out-!

Plus the interesting implications of resource hunting amongst the sapient races, and the little side missions you better bet I did every one of- there's so much rich depth in the story if you do 'em!! (And that lead with that Keeper side mission...? Looking back, damn, clever foreshadowing-!!!)

And oh my gods, Ilios??? hell yeah. I loved that mission so much, especially having Garrus & Kaiden with me when talking to the hologram/computer, and more than anything, that last sprint in the Mako trying to get to the jump before it closed-???

yeet the boi-

Also mannn I love a good setpiece, and having to go up the side of the elevator, space-side?? such a cool setup!!

Plus it felt good having been Paragon enough (as simple as the good v bad vibe system is, I don't hate it, lol) to avoid one of the Saren fights, ngl. And the er, "second fight" with Sovereign-Saren.... hell yeah

... I'll admit I had to double check my choice re whether to save the Council. I did in the end, but I swear, sometimes the way they phrase things I'm like ".... okay but Garrus is right, defeating Sovereign is more important than these few leaders??????" woops. Listen, priorities, is all I'm saying..... (￣ヮ￣|||)ゞ

'Course later they emphasize (in ME2) that there were 10,000 people on that same ship and I was like well I wouldn't have second guessed if I'd known that, I mean c'mon-

Also I did indeed romance Liara in this one, so I got that scene ;Dc But,,,, I also knew by the end that I was totally gonna romance Garrus in 2 since he's an option then finally,,,,, lemme tell you the guilt as I waffled over whether to romance Liara bc of it. hahaha.

Aaaaand Mass Effect 2-

So I'm only up to right before the Reaper IFF Mission, so I don't know the ending, etc etc lol. That said, I've just finished every side mission I've found with the exception of the Shadowbroker Quest and the Arrival Quest (I've heard the latter basically leads into ME3, and the former is best either right before the Omega 4 jump or in postgame).

So from the start - fuck yeah fuck yeah what a high adrenaline start Shepard noooooo but also yes save Joker aH-

The motion comic too hot damn nice job

I loved this setup, seriously - especially forcing Shep into this situation, having to work with/for Cerberus, and the compelling reasoning given behind "why" they do what they do (I especially found it a good point that the Salarians have the Task Force, the Asaris the Commandos, the Turians the- etc... like, true, when you put it like that, having a similar group advancing human interests/solving human interstellar problems is pretty reasonable...). That said, I love too that it really isn't shied away from how Cerberus is nonetheless fucked up - or its at least done fucked up stuff.

Listen, I still think some messed up stuff is gonna be revealed in 2's endgame......... after that Horizon mission and the Collector's ship???? TIM I SEE YOU YOU SHADY MF-

aaanyways lol...

I'm so so glad on a gameplay level they nixed the Mako style exploration. A few Hammerhead missions are fine and a lot more focused than the slippery ass navigation in that glorified ATV, pfff. The probes are a neat way of getting after similar resources - and more importantly, having good levels and some good hubs (the Zakera Wards, Omega, Ilium, etc) is way way more fun than having a more 'sprawling' space that is.... a lot of empty nonsense, lol.

Then there's the fact that we get Joker right off the bat and you can interact with him so much - and him and EDI??? Get out gods I love them. Kasumi is so right when she says they sound like a bickering old married couple lol. I have a terrible feeling that some shit is gonna happen with EDI..... but I don't think she's evil as-is, at least.

Side-eying the hell out of those "access forbidden" parts of her that she doesn't even know.... and the fact that her AI core has a locked door access................... something's gonna happen gdi LEAVE OUR ADOPTED AI ALONE.

(Also Joker pls stop fracturing your thumb on the mute button)

Also please save me there are so many hot aliens in this game,,,,, the xeno/monsterfuckers really comin' through strong in the sequels............... doin' the lord's work........................................

In general, I love how many levels ME stepped up in two with complexity and interwoven narratives!! Like, to the point it'd be almost a drag to replay ME1, even though it was fun going through it (if occasionally a bit tedious with the cookie cutter rando planet science/mine facilities, lol). Like, just from how fun and interesting ME2 is, mostly! more of all the pre-introduced races, plus new ones, plus more filling in of intragalactic politics, and more interesting implications of all these space-faring races mixing....

Also gods WREX and his planet holy shit,,,,, fuckin' hell yeah my man get their shit together and also adopt Grunt yes good-

And Mordin??? My singing semi-evil scientist best friend forced to confront his choices more than he thought he ever would have???? With some of the best ongoing general report chatter of all the companions??

(when I tell you I choked on my coffee when I talked to him after confirming romance choice w/ Garrus and that 'pamphlet' and 'anaphalactic shot if ingesting-' kajsldkfjsldfjk)

Like, fuck, the fact that they actually dive into the mixed morality and horrors of the genophage, and you can confront Mordin on it, for good reason, yet he still stands his ground, until finally some bits of his loyalty mission seem to... affect him, and I'm guessing might set up things for 3 with him? Unsure, but either way, damn, the fact that they start to dig into it...

And Taliiiii my beloved forbidden alien wife TwT her loyalty mission was SO GOOD. I love how varied they all are?? Getting to defend her and discover what she'd unwittingly been a part of-!!

Zaeed is a bastard but tbh I love that he is and that he's unapologetic in him - and Kasumi omg, best thief. A heist?? Gods, yes- I love our couch lounge chats XD

Samara is..... illegally.......... she's an illegally powerful and beautiful and eloquent MILF...........................

(.... listen I'm sapphic as hell and I'm kicking my own ass for picking her up last aksjdlfksjdfl - but her loyalty mission, damn. And seeing how there's this interesting cultural subset, and the struggle with the Asari in that they unquestioningly accept/respect justicars, but also know that the impact outside their culture is a diplomacy nightmare waiting to happen-)

,.,,,,,T,,, Thane,,,,,

I am weak for morally implicated murder dads okay?? And that voice??? His mannerisms?????? How you first see him, and that prayer after assassinating her...???????? And his history/his people's history with the hanar, gods I love how messy it is, it feels so much more real!

Also Jack is a mess and I love her (and want to get her some therapy, omg), and her and Miranda nearly duking it out after you've done both their loyalty missions??? so good and makes a lot of sense-! Honestly I would love more interactions between teammates on the ship, but there's already so much the devs had to balance I can't blame 'em for minimizing, heh. But suffice to say I also love Miranda and Jacob, even if I'm softest for my alien crew XD Hell yeah Jacob, we'll get loud and spill drinks on the citadel indeed TwT

.... I could write a whole essay on how much I love Garrus oTL Perhaps because he and Tali are the throughlines from 1 on your 2 crew, I have some of the strongest feelings about them... but genuinely, he was one of my favorite companions in the first game, and how you find him as Archangel in two? Getting to help him fight his way out after he's gone nearly 48 hours straight fighting off three gangs alone, jfc. His vengeance quest and what can happen there.... That line? fuck me, that line -

It's so much easier to see the world in black and white. Grey? I don't know what to do with gray...

How DARE you come for my heart like this, devs holy shit

(also, some other choice faves so far from the series from him include We can disobey suicidal orders?? and This wasn't in my training manual... [in 1, if you have him with you @ th Thorian fight] and his whole.... pop the heat sink - in his romance ;Dc)

asdasdfksadjfkl like I said I can write an essay on him PFFF suffice to say I'm very looking forward to his romance scene and where things go in 3

But yeah gods I'm just gonna keep rambling if I'm not careful lol. Gods I don't even know what to talk about it's all so good and while I can understand people roasting the obviousness of Paragon V Renegade (v neutral) choices/alignments, I think they do a pretty damn good job in 2 of pushing it further - to the point that there were some times that I accidentally got renegade points and I wasn't that mad, haha. There's so much fun in the interactions that I just have a good time anyways~

I have so many thoughts about TIM (The Illusive Man) and Cerberus.... theories evolving galore............... and like, what the hell!! Omega 4 going to the center of the galaxy is such a cool twist, goddamn - though my heart still breaks at losing Kaiden (his line if you haven't romanced him?? about feeling like he lost a limb when he lost you??? holy shit.... but I also can't blame him for not trusting Cerberus to the point of it affecting his ability to trust Shepard... like fuck Shep go after himmmm) I'm really excited to see where that goes since he comes back in 3, and what the fuck happens with Cerberus bc while I love the fact that obviously there are a lot of people in it for the right reasons, doing good work, there are those that are doing the opposite, and I have a very bad feeling about where TIM will end up landing....

All that said though I need to do the Reaper IFF mission (where I'm lightly spoiled as to getting That Boy, but not how/what happens to make it so - just that it's apparently wise to have all your side missions done before getting him...) and the actual Omega 4 jump. So we'll see what happens and what I think about it from there heheh!

.... major kudos and genuine props if you made it here to the end, I am so sorry for not editing on condensing all this, and appreciate you so much ;w;

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales Review: The First Adventure! or Baby Donald Says Eat the Rich

Welcome back. I’d been looking forward to this one for some time in the hopes of getting one thing i’ve been waiting for.. sadly that thing didn’t come, we’ll get to that, but this was still a fun episode so let’s hop right in. Spoilers in a second but my tag is spoiler tagged soooo.  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We open in the 1960′s. Austin Powers just went into Cryo Freeze to prepare for Dr. Evil’s eventual return, The Marvel Universe was in full swing, a teenager in baltimore was battling racisim via a dance show, and Black Heron had just been caught by Agent 22, aka Beakly when she was young and just as gorgeous then as she is now. Heron once again engaged in her usual cartoonish supervillian, and now SHUSH has her.  Meanwhile in a nearbye room a young accountant by the name of Bradford Buzzard is outlining his plan for Director Von Drake: The way he sees it every time a villian costs chaos Shush “Wastes” billions causing MORE chaos to stop it without controlling things. He proposes taking over the world, weeding out the chaos and ruling from the shadows. Naturally, Ludvig isn’t on board with any of this and points out they aren’t super villains. It’s here this episode fully defines something about Bradford’s character. Back in “Let’s Get Dangerous!” when Huey called him a villain, he said he’s not one... at least from his point of view. It’s here, in his youth we get a clear understanding why he dosen’t think so: So far most people we’ve seen in the world of Ducktales take the chaos and insanity of the world in stride: Either just numb to it like most of the citizens, Rolling with it like Daisy and Violet, or diving straight into it like.. pretty much the majority of the cast, either for the love of adventure and treasure like the McDuck/Duck family, or for their own ludcrious ends like Glomgold, Mark Beaks or Magica. To them the world’s fine the way it is and there’s to explore, take or whatever.  To Bradford.. this is madness... he feels all these people are just a bunch of overgrown children, and in some cases actual children, are just making the world worse and worse until one day their going to break it. One day skill, intuition, wit, and knowledge just wont’ be enough. Someday Scrooge, SHUSH or whoever’s standing in the way of evil will fail and the world will fall. This simply can’t go on, and SOMEONE has to control this, someone has to take this world, shake the chaos out of it and MAKE it sane. Make it work the way it’s SUPPOSED to. And to Bradford that’s him. Someone has to, no one else will, so he will. To him SHUSH doing this is just the logical thing: They want peace right? Their fighting for good right? Then what’s better than making the world a utopia? Ending these conflicts and remaking it.  The thing is.. that’s not what Heroes do. As we’ve seen in various stories where the superheroes, the Good Guys take over they do improve things.. but at the cost of free will. At the cost of free thought. At the cost of their morals. They become what they were fighting all those years and have to bloody their hands and keep them bloody just to make THEIR world right. And that’s not Utopia, that’s a dictatorship. The example I always come to, even though there were ones before and after this including Marvel’s incredible Squadron Supreme maxi-series, is Justice League the animated series’ two parter, like most of their episodes really but that’s not the point, a Better World, about an alternate reality where Superman kills Lex Luthor after Luthor kills the flash and hte League take over the world. The thing is.. the world isn’t BETTER. It’s just crime free. You can sweep the chaos and the crime under the rug.. but your not making a better world, your just making YOUR version of it. No one person is a god even if they have a power of one and no one person can or SHOULD be able to decide what’s best for everyone. It’s up to each of us to MAKE the world better, to fight for a better world. That’s what Ludvig knows full well and what Bradford just can’t see. You can’t control the world, you just have to accept the things you can’t change like it being chaotic and change the things you can like injustice. 

Bradford however, who was hired as a favor to his grandmother, can’t though Von Drake lets him off with a warning.. and a laugh about an accountant being able to be a super villian. Bradford however realizes ther’es some truth to that.. he needs someone to teach him out to operate outside the law, and if SHUSH won’t take the world and remake it.. maybe it’s time someone else did.  So in the prison cells of SHUSH, which are conveniently empty outsdide of Heron, Bradford outlines his plan to her. To create a massive orgnization to steal the world and give it the order it needs. To combine their skills: Heron’s for grandeur and crime, and Bradfords for strategy and focus, to take the world. The Orginzation for World Larceny, or OWL, fitting bradford’s hatred for theatrics. Heron objects, adding an F for fiendish, and Bradford relucntantly agrees to get her on board, lets her loose and fakes like he just saw her escape. FOWL is born. And the world would never be the same. Cue credits and cue the rest of the review under the cut. 

After the opening we cut to 1994-5.. sometime around then as it’s hard to get an exact year, and that’s how the crew likes it. Point is it’s the 90′s, and Scrooge is.. busy running his company. We’ll get into the weeds of that in a bit, but this is a different Scrooge, one who while no less capable, has no thirst for adventure or drive. He’s not nearly as miserable as the Scrooge we saw back in Woo-Ooo but he’s still a much less complete man. Anyways alongside him for his planning is Duckworth, whose very much alive at this time, and who tells his boss his sister Hortense left something in his office for him.  To no one suprise, that thing is the twins, at the tender age of i’m guessing 10. Since your probably curious, Della is still voiced by Paget Brewster, just using a slightly different voice like the Triplets and Webby’s voice actors do. It’s just a bit more jarring here since unlike those characters, we’ve seen adult della and thus are used to this voice coming out of a grown woman. It’s not bad and I got used to it eventually but it was jarring at first especially since once again Donald has a completely diffrent voice ACTRESS doing his voice.  This time around it’s cristina valenzuela, of Miraculous Ladybug fame, who I know more for her song work and twitter than her actual work ,but am delighted to see her here and she does a terrific job. I genuneily did not realize it was her, and while not exactly like the late great russi taylor, it is just similar enough to work. 

So we get to see what the Twins were like when they were the Triplets age: Della is about the same, but with more of Dewey’s impulsiveness, and Donald, much like he’d be a few years and some dead parents later, is a bitter, grungey musician whose constantly on his guitar and railing against the man.. which is Scrooge in this case which is fair. Hortense left a note.. which bothered me as I genuinely expected her to show up and was majorly disappointed she did not. We are in year 4 of this series, season 3 and STILL no appearance of Hortense or mention how she died, as she and Quackmore are still alive by the end of this. Given she’s easily my faviorite part of Life and Times, this bothered me, and the only reason i’m not more upset.. is the clever way they wrote around actually using her. The letter she leaves for Scrooge explaining things is the same one Della herself used in the comic strip, and using a bit of the postcard she left in the cartoons, when leaving Huey, Dewey and Louie with Donald, down to the Twins having left a firecracker in their fathers seat, thus leaving him in the hosptial. As disappointed as I am my favorite Ginger is completely absent once again, this is a brilliant reference, and I have to give them credit for it, so it’s a fair enough trade off.  As for his “Angel Nephew and Niece”, Della wants to dive into adventure while Donald struggles to write a song, singing throughout the episode. It varies in tolerablity, though mostly due to the writing, Cristina is doing fine. Della however is disappointed to find her legendary uncle views his past exploits as merley a means to an end to get his fortune and now he has it he can just focus on building it in the boardroom. This is an intresting take.. and one I could easily have seen happening to the Don Rosa version seen in Life and Times. The Scrooge there himself saw building his wealth as the most important thing until his encounter with Teddy Rosevelt, who taught him experince was what mattered and the having isn’t as fun as the getting. It works for me: This is a scrooge who never got that lesson so once he got to be richest duck in the world, having achieved his life’s goal nothing was left. He’s not miserable like the Scrooge we saw at the start of the series, having lost his love for adventure after loosing his niece/daughter, and having lost his fight. This one has retired.. but because he likely just sees no point in going on. He’s the richest duck in the world, has a vast empire.. no amount of treasure is really going to add to that like it used to, and as he points out in a second Shush has tons of agents at this point to clean up what’s left of FOWL. He’s the man who has everything, so why keep going. It’s weird to see a scrooge without the hunger to keep going, but it makes sense when his belly is full. Without someone to get him to see there’s always another rainbow, he just stopped chasing them. Also a fun nod to the comics I almost forgot to mention is when hearing about the “Gift”, i.e. the twins, Scrooge dreads it’s another surprise party, a nod to life and times where Hortense threw Scrooge one that went.. badly and lead to their entire relationship collapsing. Though Donald did get back at Scrooge for screaming at his parents and Auntie Matilda

However his busy day is disrupted with a call from Beakly. They’ve found the last known cordinates of Captain Yellowbeak, but FOWL is on them and Scrooge is the only one Beakly trusts for this since they have a leak. Beakly is also director of SHUSH at this point, with Von Drake having retired or died or both at this point. Scrooge reluctantly accepts, while Della is excited at the prospect of a real adventure and Donald ends up sharing her enthusasim as it’d make a good song. Scrooge, naturally, has no intention of bringing them with him to their disapointment and leads Donald to sing another “Suck it the man song” which totally isn’t about Scrooge.... spoilers: It entirely is, he’s just a little dumbass grunge baby and I love him.  We then get a cute sequence of Della popping up in Scrooge’s Luggage and Trunk to try and convince him to let them tag along, before we cut to the Limo, driven by Duckworth at this point, which solves that mystery. Scrooge is firm in having his butler take them back and have them work with him and Duckworth’s fine with that.. but wants overtime, which is fair. Scrooge, being Scrooge, grumbles about not being made of money, proven wrong by gold spilling out of him. Though I do like the update of Scrooge’s classic cheapness when it comes to pay: INstead of barely paying his employees like a monster, he’s simply reluctant to pay extra if he dosen’t have to, and would rather drag two 10 year olds with him on a dangerous adventure than pay overtime, which tracks. It’s also clear if he had to he WOULD actually pay it, either due to legal reasons or his moral standards, he just isn’t happy about it. So he agrees, though he wants Donald to leave the guitar behind which.. given the most Donald’s been able to come up with is “Suck it THE MAN” and “This guy’s a greedy asshole”.. he’s extremely correct and when Donald tries to pull a “YOU CAN’T CENSOR ME MANNNN”, Scrooge just chucks it out of the car.  At the airfield while Della is excited like an rabid chipmunk, and genuinely thinks she can fly a plane because she’s played Outrunner 2.. which I have only vaguely heard of before now. And is apparently just a pc game where you run a lot so I genuinely do not get where Della gets piloting from that.. but she IS Dewey’s mother. So with that in mind the family take off and Scrooge explains what their after: The Papyrus of Binding. It’s a dangerously powerful magical artifact from Ancient Egypt that will make whatever’s written on it happen. The dangerous part is that it’s incredibly literal: As Bradford puts later in the episode, ask for unlimited power, it might zap you dead with a million volts, ask for infinite wealth, prepare to be crushed underneath it. It’s a nice twist on a Monkey’s Paw or Jackass Genie situation. Instead of either the source of the wish granting magic just being inherently evil, or some dickhead screwing with the hero.. it’s just an object that has no ability to interpret nuance, just like your phone with the goddamn autocorrect. It can’t judge intent or tone or meaning, it just gives exactly what it’s asked. It’s a thoroughly interesting concept. 

Something I really like about this episode is the fact it answers some little questions. While none were Hortense related, and I am still grumpy about that even with this coming out a good 17 hours after I watched it due to getting caught up with other stuff, it does have little touches that explain small parts of the lore: Who drove Scrooge? As just mentioned, Duckworth. Who flew scrooge? Paid pilots. Did he have a plane before the sunchaser? Yup. It fills in some small gaps in the world. Stuff we weren’t dying to know but’s stil lintresting. Said pilots in this case however are Heron and Bradford. This episode also fills in Heron’s character, as while we’ve already seen bits and pieces this season she LOVES being a classic, take over the world james bond type villian, like she stepped out of a duck version of kim possible.. and i’m just now realizing there probably IS a duck kim possible somewhere in this world as while far after disney afternoon, it fits too neatly to not be wedged in there with your tailspins and goof troops. I wouldn’t be suprised if there were brid versions of every human based disney afternoon and one saturday morning show. My.. my head’s swimming from this. I could be, and probably am wrong but the sheer idea of this... it’s amazing.  Back to Heron, she just LOVES being evil and destructive, letting the world know she exists and operating on a grand scale. Now we’ve seen more of her while she’s Beakly’s nemisis.. she’s really an evil scrooge.. yes another one. Like Scrooge, at least how he normally is,  she simply gets how the world of Ducktales operates and can take advantage of that to the best of her ablility. Just like adventuering, cartoonish supervilliany is about risk and reward.. sometimes you faceplamnt hard, that’s the risk, but the rewards and rush is worth it. She’s as addicted to grandoise villiany as Scrooge is to adventure by this point. And like Scrooge, and unlike her partner Bradford, she sees the world as it is: Chaotic and one big sandbox to play in. She contrasts Scrooge by the fact that while Scrooge is willing to bust down doors, he still has morals, as well as the wisdom to not go overboard Heron often lacks. It also makes her a good contrast ot the equally skilled Beakly: While Beakly is taciturn, controlled in all things especially her emotions, Heron is bombastic, gloating and borderline insane, and while deadly in a fight, dosen’t exercise any control in her plans, preferring it big and loud despite her partner usually being right about reiging it in.  So Heron evacuates dramatically, taking a grumpy Bradford with them, and sending the plane into a tailspin. 

I can’t wait for Next Year’s Tailspin episode. I swear to god. I’m hoping for Shere Kahn but this episode has taught me to be okay with disapointment, if a grumpus. Della however shows her natural talent and despite having no real experince with planes, lands it gracefully. While that’s going on, Bradford berates Heron for her plan, pointing out that they COULD have simply landed the plane, then captured the McDuck family and executed them quitely, versus leaving a chance they’ll survive which they do. They AREN’T supervillains.. or at least he thinks he isn’t. Heron does show off her competence though, pointing out that this way they can simply stay low, and FOLLOW the Ducks to the treasure. Bradford is impressed for a second.. till Heron’s evil shows as she plans to use the Papyrus. Bradford loudly objects to this, listing the possible risks shown before. If not used CAREFULLY, it could kill them, and she balks and wants him to just embrace being the Villian already. It’s what I love about their dynamic set up here: While they are equals, Bradford is a better strategist, able to think and plan way in advance, and prefers subterfuge, and if present day is any indicatoin probably used Heron’s flash to distract from the real mission or goal often or to do something on the down low while she kept SHUSH busy. His last two plans, while again requiring some pizzaz, relied on misdrection: having the ducks take care of an immidate threat like their used to.. while he gets exactly what he wants while their busy and whatever they get out of it is either nothing (Impossibin) or something he couldn’t use just yet and thus if he didn’t get it, no loss, but if he did it just moves up the timetable. Not only that but he’s outlasted all three other big bads, lying in the shadows till it was too risky to leave scrooge and play and even THEN, only coming out into the open when forced out. IT’s why he’s Scrooge’s most dangerous opponent: He knows how Scrooge’s other enmities operates as well as Scrooge himself. And since he knows everything he can maneuver Scrooge exactly where he needs him to do exactly what he wants. It’s unknown how the family will beat him, but he’s easily the biggest challenge they’ve had. 

But back to the show and the past, Scrooge bonds with his niece and nephew, retelling stories of his past as they get closer, with Donald ending up high at one point and thus seeing the ship stranded on a mountain. As he recounts a fight with El Capitan, the villian from the ducktales 87 pilot, he counts the story as as a loss: He didn’t get anything from it, no treasure no new contracts. But Della shows him the point he’s been missing; He got a story. Sure he lost.. but he got experince, a tale to tell and a legend grown.Just because you don’t get everything dosen’t mean it wasn’t worth the experince and you can’t hold it in your heart. And this episode shows why this scrooge needed his family: Without Teddy to mentor him, he simply never got that adventure wasn’t about gains or what you get.. it’s about the thrill of it, the enjoyment of discovery and the memories you make.. it’s about the Journey not the destination. 

As Scrooge starts to warm up to that, he finds a gap, with Della volunteering Donald to jump but Scrooge just having the kids hop on his back and pogo caneing across. The family find the Papyrus, and find out why the ship is all the way up here: Captain Yellowbeak, who’s a character from one of barks stories and the one who had the scroll last, wished to escape.. but that just stranded them. He asked for water.. and it drowned his crew.. and finally with the document hteir reading he asked for release... and thus is now a skelington. The kid are happy to have reached the goal.. while Scrooge is back on his Zack Morris phone trying to reschedule things and schedule a SHUSH evac, to the kids annoyance. However Scrooge raining on their parade gets interupted by Heron and Bradford, as Heron can’t resist popping out dramatically and Bradford is UTTERLY furious since she blew his cover, and Scrooge recognizes him from his christmas party, a nice callback. Scroog being scrooge figures out he’s the mole and Bradford runs , furious at Heron. Their conflict is an intresting one: Both have a point but both will not back down. Bradford is right this showboating nonsense has only hindered Heron’s plans.. and Heron is right that Bradford needs to accept he’s the bad guy. Even if he has well meaning motives, he’s the villian, he works with them, he leads them.. he is one.  He just can’t accept he’s wrong or dosen’t have the answers... huh.. I wonder who that reminds you of. And that’s 100% intentional as Frank has outright compared Huey and Bradford and like last season it’s neat to have the main vilian contrast our chosen Duck for the season. 

Heron outfoxes the kids and gets the papyrus and being just an enitrely black hearted bitch, plans to kill them just to spite scrooge.. writing that “his sidekicks will perish on this mission.”.... but Scrooge’s character development, and her choice of words, means nothing happens. As Scrooge outlines, “Their not my sidekicks their my FAMILY, and this isn’t a mission, it’s an ADVENTURE”. Scrooge has finally accepted his life for what it really is.. and the thrill of the chase over what lies at the end. There’s always anothe rainbow.. and he’s finally become the man who will chase every last one. 

OF course this is interupted, and Heron escapes with the papyrus, when a skeletal pirate attacks.. why is Yellow Beak alive, why’d the scroll do this?

But we get a neat fight as Scrooge fights the skeleton while he sends the kids after Heron. Scrooge gets a cool looking swordfight, while Bradford gets the papyrus, and Yellowbeak even terrifies me what with his bestial roll and fucking centepede crawling out of him.. jesus those things freak me out.  Meanwhile the kids battle Heron, who throws della overboard... and thus for the first time, Donald taps into his beserker rage, snikty snoink, and easily incapaciates the more experinced and fully grown adul, though Della since we’eve been following her kids for the past three seasons, is fine, if suprised by her brother being the goddamn wolverine. 

While heron is out for a second, Scrooge heads after Bradford, and vows to tell Beakly and chase him all across the world. However Bradford gets an utterly awesome moment.. he admits scrooge may be right and probably would.. but since he has the papayrus and is careful in everything he writes his request carefully and perfectly “As far as the ducks are concerned, I was never here.” Grante dit COULD have left scrooge out.. but since he didn’t sday duck family or specificy, and likely knew it’d do that, it instead just means the three bilogical ducks. Bradford dissappears, turning invisble and leaving the papyrus for scrooge, who foils heron by simply writing that this scroll will be lost until one day found by his heirs.

So Heron takes a fall and looses an arm, again.. or for the first time.. the family is triumphant and despite loosing his goal, Scrooge is convinced he and the kids will find it again. See above. Scrooge then pulls out his phone and tells Duckworth to rework his schedule.. but it’s so he can find someone to run his comapny so he can spend more time with the kids. As for why Hortense would allow this before her still mysterious passing.. i’m guessing A) she notices her brother is happier and more alive than he’s been for a while and B) they just blew up their dad’s ass with a firecracker, and she won’t be able to use it for a while, so she’s double mad, so if it means she gets a moment’s peace and is with someone she trusts.. why not?

So we end on Scrooge packing up, preparing for further adventures.. i’d love a spinoff of this one day. I mean Disney plus needs it, and since Frank is probably going over to Darkwing.. maybe matt could take a crack at this. Just saying. You have the cast ready, a giant world to explore, and 15 years worth adventures. Run that baby damn you! But yeah the inevitble happens and Bradford further proves his magificent bastardry.. by appling for the position of running the company as head of Scrooge’s board, and setting up said board. So now FOWL has unlimited resources, he has a direct eye on what he now realizes is his greatest threat, and the complete trust and faith of both Scrooge and Beakly. It also puts Beakly’s breakdown in context: We now see WHY she went as far as she did: While the revelation was bad for Scrooge, finding out one of his most trusted allies was a traitor the whole time and knew everything about him, for Beakly.. it had to be worse. Finding out one of your best employees, one of the FEW people you ever trusted, and someone you DIRECTLY RECOMMENDED TO SCROOGE, was not only the man who set up your greatest enemies, but had compromised your organization for most of your career. IT’s no wonder she broke down so hard.. while I already gave several reason adding “This level of betrayal and self doubt to the list” only makes it that much harder on her. But for now a partnership is started.. one that very well may end scrooge. 

Final Thoughts: A pretty good episode overall. It’s well paced, to the point I probably forgot a LOT, has some good jokes, and fills in a lot of the gaps in the lore, while giving us a nice insight into bradford and heron. Even without hortense this was a pretty good episode. 

Upcoming Reviews: LIfe and Times; Master of the Mississippi Ride of the Three Cabbleros: The Three Cablleros (House of Mouse) Tomtrospective: Lava Lake Beach

[noah-moth-cursed-chaos]

Museums and Abstract Paintings: A quinnby fic, chapter four

Quick disclaimer: Chris’ amnesia is not modeled after any real world type of amnesia, please don’t base any understanding of real world amnesia off of it. Tw for mentions of murder and implied mentions of murder, along with guilt and anxiety.

Trilby didn’t quite know how to take what he’d learned on his mission with Chris. He’d noticed the ministry was always short staffed. He hadn’t before recognized the constant influx of new faces, or how there was usually no explanation to what happened to the old ones. They were all just hear to get tossed into the fire in the fruitless attempt to protect a few civilians. There was a better chance of ending up dead or insane than making it through their job. Why did so many people stay? Did everyone come in the way he did? Wanted by the law and under threat of imprisonment if they didn’t work for the government? He sighed as he got up from his desk, his report wasn’t as detailed as his usual work but it was good enough. Time to turn it in.

Despite the small staff there was no lack of the normal office gossip in the ministry building, usually about the results of another agent’s mission. Trilby overheard a snippet of this as he walked past.

“Yeah, came in covered in blood, again, think most of it was his this time.”

“Good grief, Chris really is trying to cost the carpet cleaners a fortune isn’t he?”

“Is he okay?” Trilby had stopped, glancing at his two coworkers.

“Not sure, he’s in the infirmary. But he’s always bounced back before so I’m sure he’s doin’ fine.” One of them said.

“Starting to doubt he *can* die he’s done this so many times.” The other said.

Trilby changed his route after that, heading up to the floor the infirmary was on, the report could wait.

Chris hated when he had to get stitches. Oh well. He was alive, a bit worse for wear, but alive.

“In no point did it cross your mind to, I dunno, *run*? There’s no shame in not coming in here a bloody mess after every other job, y’know, plenty of agents manage it quite well.” Claire walked in, an expression of concern and exasperation on her face.

“Not demonslayers.” Chris said, “Besides, it’s not *that* bad.” He shrugged.

“You have too much pride in your mission record, you can fail one mission.” She shot at him.

Chris could’ve laughed, he couldn’t give less sh^ts about his mission record, “It isn’t about that. With some of the jobs other people here have, if they slip up someone else comes in and it’s fine, if I slip up people could get hurt, good people.”

“You already saved the world once y’know, it can be someone else’s problem now.” Claire sighed, “... but I guess I get where you’re coming from.”

“Saved the world?” The two turned to the doorway to see Trilby, who looked thoroughly confused with what he just heard.

“Yeah I saved the world from a henweigh.”

“.. a henweigh?” Trilby asked.

“Yeah.”

The thief paused, clearly having expected clarification, “And what’s a henweigh?”

“‘Bout ten pounds.” Chris smirked. Claire chuckled and rolled her eyes.

“You know one day someone’s gonna ask about it who’s already heard that joke.” She pointed out.

“So you didn’t actually save the world?” Trilby asked.

“Who knows.” Chris smirked at the other’s annoyance, “Maybe I did maybe I didn’t.”

“You can just say you don’t want to answer.”

“I know, but it’s funny to watch you get annoyed. I do think I’m gonna leave you in the dark though, mate.”

“Well, at least you’re alive to do that, heard you ruined the carpet coming in.” The ex thief leaned against the wall, Chris couldn’t help but laugh.

Trilby had tried to brush off what he heard in the infirmary, maybe they were just joking around. Really, Chris saving the world? Sounded about as likely as a beaver running for parliament. But he also barely really knew anything about Chris. Just that he took more dangerous assignments and was known for being reckless and unpredictable. But for some reason he couldn’t shake his intrigue. Couldn’t hurt to ask around.

Turns out it couldn’t help either. The answers people had just raised more questions. Chris stopped something horrible, nobody knew what it was or how he did it. Some people even suspected it was just some delusion, seeming as apparently he was supposed to be in a mental hospital during the time.

Trilby guessed he wasn’t quite as sneaky about his prying into the matter as he assumed, because Chris did find out eventually, and did confront him.

“Ya know it’s kinda rude to go asking about someone’s personal business behind their back.” Trilby couldn’t tell if the redheaded man who’d walked into his office was upset with him or not.

“... pardon?” The idea of being found out hadn’t crossed his mind, so he wasn’t quite sure what Chris could be talking about.

“You *really* wanna know what Claire was talking about in the infirmary don’t you?” The taller man raised an eyebrow. A younger Trilby likely would’ve turned an impressive shade of red at realizing he’d been caught, or would’ve tried to think up some half baked excuse as to why he’d been snooping. But now Trilby held his composure, despite the slight panic he felt inside.

“Oh, yes I have been looking into that.” Trilby said, turning his attention back to the file he was reading, “Is that a problem?”

There was a short pause before Chris spoke again, “... I guess I could tell you.” He said, “On two conditions.” Trilby couldn’t help but look up, intrigued to hear whatever conditions the taller man wanted met. “You meet me at the museum tonight at 4, and you don’t call me crazy.”

Chris was more than anxious as he waited outside the museum. Why the hell had he agreed to talk about it? Why here? Trilby would just think he was insane or he still belonged in the mental hospital or-

“Quinn?” He was snapped out of his thoughts, finding Trilby standing a small distance away, “Are we going in?”

“Oh uh-yeah.” Chris cleared his throat and got up, “.. how long have you been standing there, by the way?”

“Nearly ten minutes.” Oh. Oh sh^t. He just let him stand there for ten minutes. God Quinn you’re stupid.

“Sh^t, sorry mate.” Chris lead him inside. There weren’t many people here, and those that were seemed caught up enough in their own exploration of the building to pay no mind to the two men. Chris showed Trilby his favorite exhibits, talking about the history behind them and why they caught his eye. Trilby seemed more interested in Chris’ words than the museum itself, but his eyes lingered on more valuable exhibits, and Chris wondered if he was thinking of what it’d be like to have possession of them. Eventually they wondered to a part nobody was in at the moment.

“Why did you want to meet here?” Trilby asked, “Why not your apartment or my office or.. anywhere more secluded?”

“Uh, stupidly enough I figured it would be. Sorta a neutral ground. We’ve both made fools of ourself in front of each other in a place like this.” Chris explained. He walked over to a bench and sat down, “So how much did you find out eventually?”

“Not too much I think. Something happened when you were in a mental hospital, you stopped it somehow. Nobody knows what it was. Well, Claire might, but when I asked her she told me to mind my own business. Hey! Don’t laugh at me!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I just-“ Chris managed to calm down, “You sounded so offended.” He said, “Well, I’m uh, not really sure if my version of the story is even the whole thing.” He said, yeah that’s a good way to start Chris, set yourself up as an unreliable narrator. God he probably already thinks you’re nuts.

“What do you mean?”

“I Uh, don’t remember anything really before uh. The night my parents died.” He began, “Sometimes things feel familiar or I think I *should* remember something but I just... don’t. That day I was heading to their home after a book signing. I was stressed and they’d left a voicemail asking me to come over and I just.. I thought maybe seeing them would make things a little better. But they were dead when I got there, murdered. They never found the killer.”

“Oh I’m... sorry.” Trilby didn’t expect the story to start off with dead parents, Chris figured. It sounded like a cliche. He sounded like a sh^tty comic book hero.

“It’s fine, nothing that can be done now.. I checked myself into a mental hospital, I’m pretty sure it was a last straw thing for me. I didn’t react the way I thought I should’ve. Figured I should get help.” He was pretty sure the hospital f^cked him up more, but he didn’t say that, “One day I woke up and there was just a guard, dead. I didn’t really know what to do, so I took his gun and went out to investigate. The place was crawling with zombies, which I know sounds insane but it’s true, I recognized some of ‘em, other patients, guards, they smelled like rotting flesh and I remember wondering if I breathed in too close if I’d catch it. At first I didn’t really think about what was going on, I mean what are you supposed to think? I had to get out. That’s what I thought. I had to get out and I had to find out what was causing this and I had to get rid of it because otherwise I’d die. It was kind of a blur until I got shot.” Chris glanced at Trilby, trying to read his face for a reaction to what he’d said so far, he couldn’t find one. The other agent was just.. listening. Chris paused before he continued, “I killed this big lard^rse looking thing and then one of those walking corpses shot me. I woke up in a graveyard, I was one of them but.. somehow I wasn’t. Gone. Not like they were. I went to my parents house to see if there was anything there that might help. I don’t really remember everything I grabbed. I fought my way through the rest of ‘em, I killed it, the evil, the thing that was doing it all, at least I think I did.. I remember the life leaving my body and thinking it was my time.”

“But you’re not dead. Or a zombie.” Trilby now sounded confused, Chris didn’t blame him, this was all so odd he could barely make sense of it half the time. He sometimes wondered if maybe he was just delusional.

“Yeah. That’s what doesn’t make sense. I died a zombie and woke up a human on the side of the road with a bunch of guns and the book of transformations. Everything was normal and nobody knew anything about a zombie apocalypse.” Chris said, “But there were. A lot of people dead. Really quick. A lot of them looked like the zombies I killed. Nobody could figure out what did that to them.”

“I actually remember hearing about that on the news.” Trilby admitted.

“.. sometimes I wonder if there could’ve been a better way. If I’d known I swear I would’ve found one but- but... yeah.” He sighed, why was he saying this? Why had he agreed to talk about it?

Chris looked so uneasy, Trilby wondered if his mind was taking him back to what he went through, or thought he went through. He wondered how to break the tense silence, and silently realized why Chris chose this place to meet. Last time both of them were in a museum was lighthearted and fun and honestly ridiculous. Despite how quickly Trilby left it behind and forgot about it, the few times he had thought about it it was never a *bad* memory. As absurd as what Chris was saying sounded to an observer, to the demonslayer this was a personal hell. A shroud of guilt and uncertainty that he couldn’t shake. “... I’m not going to say I know what that’s like, because I don’t, I don’t think it’s *possible* for someone else to go through something like that. But I do know what it’s like to only realize something you did after it was done.” He didn’t know why he said that, or why Chris talking about the people he’d killed stuck out so much to him.

“.. what do you mean? If you’re okay saying it?” Chris’ voice was soft, quiet.

“There Uh, was a mansion, some things happened... it was my body but.. it wasn’t *me*, I never would’ve done it if I had control.” Trilby elected to keep details sparse, he was sure trying to explain what happened at Defoe Manner wouldn’t do either of them any favors. Besides. Chris had brought him here to share something. This wasn’t show and tell, and he didn’t want it to seem like he was trying to upstage the other.

“.. I don’t think it really counts against you then, you didn’t want to do it.”

“I don’t think what you did is your fault either. You had no clue what would happen.” He paused before adding, “I won’t say a word of what you told me. I swear.”

Chris paused, before grinning a bit, “Hey, maybe this can be a thing, but, less morbid in the future. Museums could be like our Las Vegas.” He had effectively dispersed the tense mood between the two with that.

“What?” Trilby had to hold back a laugh, what the hell was the other saying?

“You know, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas? We can hang out in museums and do whatever we want and say whatever we want and when we leave we don’t tell anyone about it.” Trilby had to admit, it was a nice idea, if a bit silly. A place where both of them could be vulnerable yet also maintain complete privacy the moment they left.

“That sounds nice.” Trilby said, “Next time let’s go to an art museum. They’re less boring.”

[heraldofzaun]

//Still lurking.

Some thoughts below the cut. A little melancholic. A little ranty. Many thoughts on how Viktor is perceived by the fandom at large. It got away from me.

I think I’ve mentioned it elsewhere, but I have followers here and this is also a Viktor blog... I think it would be nice if people stopped making fun of Viktor’s accent - I saw T/BSkyen’s (I think that keeps me out of the tag) shorts video on Viktor, and it was disheartening that he chose to make fun of Viktor’s accent several times throughout a one-minute video. No other character with a hammy, over-the-top accent, as far I know, receives this treatment. No one makes fun of Caitlyn’s British accent in character analyses of her. No one makes fun of Fiora’s French accent in character analyses of her. (I just checked his videos on them, actually, and guess what - no mocking their accents by doing them! Although Fiora’s accent does get mentioned, at the least.)

Just... stop doing it? We know the accent is cartoonishly bad and not accurate to actual Russian accents at all. But why, specifically, are people - T/BSkyen, in this instance - compelled to make fun of Viktor by putting on an accent and saying “Get reed of all emotions“ and “GLORIOUS EVOLUTION” and “BEEP BOOP ROBOT BRAIN”? (The misspelling in the first is not mine. It is in the actual subtitles for the video.)

I mean, we all know that the answer is the fact that American (and other countries, but we can focus on America for now) media spent the Cold War convincing Americans that Russians and Eastern Europeans were mindless followers of ideology and/or Crazy Insane Scientists, instead of like... people with diverse thoughts and feelings who may or may not agree with their government, but like... I have to ask the rhetorical questions here because no one else is going to apparently. Anyways it’s 2021 stop conflating people and the governments they live under, I guess.

Anyways, also very disheartening that I just checked the pinned comment on that video and he is now saying that Viktor’s endpoint is the Battlecast universe, which is not a canon fact even in current lore. It’s an assumption. I can’t even say that Full Machine Viktor is Viktor’s endpoint, because that was retconned into being a janitor skin that randomly breaks into Spanish in the skin bio for a... “joke”? (Because that’s a cool thing to do. I’d ask how that got past anyone, but that’s a pointless question.) But Battlecast is not stated anywhere to be the end result of canonical Viktor, as far as I know. I suppose it’s not stated to not be the result, but... Like, what other character gets an AU skinline that people then say has to be their canonical endgoal when it is not said to be their canonical endgoal by any official source?

Quothe the loremaster... “The endpoint of Viktor's quest is the Battlecast universe. In case y'all forgot. Read between the lines of his stories even a little bit before stanning him, I'm begging you.”

The entirety of the pinned comment is frustrating. It is frustrating not only because it clashes entirely with the funny comical tone of the minute-long short, which also decides to yet again conflate transhumanism with being trans (we have heard my thoughts on this before. Please stop doing this), but because it is unfortunately true in aspects about current Viktor. He is really not a good man, even though you may be able to argue that Riot’s biased narrator choices mean that a canonical version of the Viktor-Jayce fight does not exist. (Because both lores tell their sides of the story. Biasedly.) But as the story stands, his character getting filled out didn’t make him more morally ambiguous than his original counterpart. The ambiguity that existed originally was due to us not knowing a lot about him and thus being able to interpret things the way we wished. (I’m sure that there is still room for interpretation in the new lore, but it seems lesser to me. Also, his color story is framed atrociously. It’s going for warm and fuzzy when the content of it is giving a kid drugs but this is a long enough post already...)

Riot does not know what to do with Viktor. They’re content to portray him as a Russian mad scientist and buffoon in LoR and in some other media, because... [gestures at the struck-out paragraph above]. But then they have his lore which... could be interesting, maybe, if it weren’t convinced that the way to tell a morally grey story is to have narrators more unreliable than a pull-start lawn mower. Like, they just don’t know what to do with him.

Any analysis of him needs to come with that caveat, not someone deciding that the best way to spent a minute of analysis is to make multiple jokes about Viktor’s accent being stereotypical via... feeding into it being stereotypical... and saying that transhumanism is related to trans rights in any inherent way.

Also, T/BSkyen says that Viktor only has an augmented hand and the third arm, which conveniently ignores the fact that Prototype is probably supposed to be taken as semi-canonical considering its name and the fact it was made when backstory-related skins were a more common thing. (And also because it hasn’t been retconned into being a janitor.) It also conveniently ignores the fact that Viktor’s lower legs clearly don’t look like armor on his model, but this is a side tangent that doesn’t really matter, so...

Whatever, right? I’ve clearly put more thought into this than League’s local loremaster put into that video and subsequent “no guys he really is a baddie stop stanning him and grow critical thinking skills” comment. Sorry if I sound jaded here or am taking this far too seriously or whatever, it’s just... man, it’s a lot. It makes trying to do my take in any public capacity feel kind of like shit, because it’s clear that the general perception of Viktor is currently 1) Haha Funny Accent Man, 2) Trans Rights!1!, and/or 3) He’s Evil :(, and it sucks. I already am writing for a niche audience who will accept a Viktor who never went to Piltover and who exists in old Zaun. I know that that’s niche. I’m okay with it being niche, I think.

But it sucks to build up all this character and do all this writing and try to... I don’t know, present a nuanced view of someone, and then just get another fucking joke about his accent or his design tropes or about what transhumanism is. Especially when those jokes are what people remember, right?

Sorry. This got whiny. But I think it explains why I’ve lost so much steam on writing our favorite Machine Herald, because stuff like this just keeps kind of... happening.

Thank you to the folks that send in anons about my analyses or who like my posts about my artistic endeavors or just... well, interact in general. It does mean a lot to me that you guys are invested enough to hang around and read 2k words of me doing the Pepe Silvia scene from Always Sunny as I connect dots that might not have been meant to be connected. It’s just hard to keep doing it, sometimes, and I guess this is one of those moments.

[darkshadow90]

When people say Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker isn’t the Joker, I (somewhat) disagree

Hey guys. I thought I’d do another fun little meta post since it’s been awhile. I wanted to talk about something a little different, something that isn’t entirely about Arthur Fleck. This is more about the people who say Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker isn’t the Joker because he’s different from the Joker we know from the comics and and other interpretations we’re familiar with. I don’t think it’s entirely fair to say Joaquin’s Joker isn’t the Joker just because this interpretation is different.  I think it’s important to keep something in mind. Joker is a possible origin story for the Joker. It’s about how Arthur BECOMES the Joker. He’s not gonna be like Heath Ledger’s Joker, or Jack Nicholson’s, or Mark Hamill’s (yes, Mark Hamill absolutely counts) Joker. There’s also what Todd Phillips said. He said he wanted to use a comic book villain origin story as a way to make a character study. He didn’t want to make a movie about the Clown Prince of Crime. It was more about how someone could wind up becoming like the Joker, not the fully developed Joker who fights Batman, robs banks, deals with mobsters, ect.  Yes, I agree. This Joker isn’t really a criminal mastermind. But there are a lot of great Joker moments in the movie. There’s the scene when Arthur disguised himself so he could sneak into the theater Thomas Wayne was attending. The Joker does things like that all the time. There’s all the scenes when Arthur is delighting in the chaos. I think there’s two scenes that hint to the Joker’s budding intelligence. While it was unintentional, Arthur led the detectives to the train when they were chasing him. When he saw all the people in clown masks, he smirked to himself knowing that escaping would be relatively easy because if he was wearing a mask like everyone else, and because there were so many people it would be easier to hide in the crowd and make his escape. He knew the detectives would have to shuffle through all those people to get to him which would buy him more than enough time to escape. And while we don’t know for sure, there’s a possibility he may have shot the protester that was fighting with detective Burke. We know Burke didn’t shoot him. He was confused, but to everyone else on the train, it appeared Burke shot him. I’m not saying Arthur definitely did it, but I think it’s possible. He could’ve snatched someone’s gun and shot him and then got rid of it. There’s no way to know for sure, but I do think it’s interesting the camera is on Arthur when the lights come back on, and then pans to a confused detective Burke. It’s almost like it was a possible hint that Arthur could’ve shot the protester knowing people would think it was Burke so he could escape.

Sure, for the most part Arthur doesn’t commit acts of evil for the sake of being evil. He doesn’t hurt random people for no reason (with the exception of the psychiatrist at the end but I’ll get to that in a minute). He isn’t a maliciously evil person (what he does is still wrong and yes, bad no matter how shitty those people were to him) He doesn’t cause chaos for the sake of causing chaos. He doesn’t plan elaborate schemes. But he does delight in the chaos and unrest in Gotham. He was happy when he heard about the detectives ending up  in critical condition. At that point, Arthur believes pretty much everyone in Gotham is a bad person and he just wants the whole city to burn. Although he might feel bad if he were to find out good people were hurt. It still doesn’t change the fact that he was enjoying seeing a city on fire.

Yes, I agree with people when they say Arthur Fleck isn’t the Joker. I agree when they say he wouldn’t be able to take on Batman. But I don’t think Arthur would want to fight Batman. Everyone says Arthur becomes the Joker when he’s out of the police car and he smears blood around his mouth to create an exagergerated smile. That’s another cool Joker moment, but no, that’s not when he becomes the Joker. He’s not the Joker until the very last scene in the movie.  The reason it irks me when people say Joaquin’s Joker isn’t the Joker (keep in mind this has nothing to do with the people who have different opinions about the ending or Arthur. You’re good fam, love y’all) is they say he isn’t the Joker from the comic books, or he’s not like Heath Ledger’s Joker. Or they say this Joker sucks because he’s different. I don’t need something to be exactly like the comics to enjoy it. I like that we have a realistic Joker. I love Heath’s Joker. He did a wonderful job and absolutely deserves all the praise he has gotten from the role. Heath gave a chilling performance too. But here’s the thing, it’s obvious he’s a threat. What made Heath’s Joker scary to me wasn’t that he was a psychopathic anarchist. What made his Joker scary to me was the scene where Batman was interrogating him, and he told Batman that once the chips are down and things get bad enough, the “civilized” people of Gotham will do whatever they can to survive, and moral code is out the window. He’s not entirely wrong about people and society. Also the fact that he could still get into Batman’s head and was laughing as Batman was beating the shit out of him. Yeah, that’s chilling, but there are still things in the movie that remind you it’s a comic book movie. There’s nothing like that in Joker for me. I felt like I was watching a real person go insane. This Joker is terrifying because he’s realistic. Now onto my last point, the man in Arkham at the end of Joker.

I mentioned earlier that Arthur didn’t kill people for no reason, or he didn’t hurt or kill random people, but that’s Arthur, the man we came to know throughout the movie. The man at the end is not Arthur. He is the real Joker. Arthur wouldn’t hurt a random person for no reason. The Joker would, and he has in pretty much all of his interpretations. Unlike Arthur, the Joker doesn’t have a reason for hurting or killing people. He doesn’t need one. It doesn’t matter to him if that person is good or bad, has personally wronged him or not. The Joker does whatever he wants, sometimes to whoever he wants based on what he feels like doing in the moment. There’s no way to know what he’s gonna do. He’s unpredictable and that’s what makes him terrifying. The man in Arkham is the same way. He much more malicious than Arthur was. He’s capable of doing things Arthur wouldn’t do. It’s that scene that makes me disagree with people who say Joaquin’s Joker isn’t the Joker. Yes he is. We’re only able to see a small glimpse of the Joker, but he’s definitely there. Everything in that brief scene is full on Joker. I think it’s very possible he was manipulating us to make us feel sorry for him and he knows it worked. I absolutely can see him as a master manipulator, a genius schemer, someone who can hold his own against Batman. And I do think it’s possible he killed the psychiatrist or he was thinking about killing her. There’s no way I can look at those eyes and not think he has bad intentions. He truly felt dangerous in that scene. If he did kill her, was it because she deserved it? Or was it just because? I think it’s the latter. Arthur made me uneasy at times, but I always thought as long as no one messed with him, they’re safe. Even though the scene with Gary in the apartment made me really nervous I still had some reassurance he wouldn’t kill him since Gary never hurt him in anyway and thankfully those feelings were right. But the Joker? No, he’s far more malevolent than Arthur ever was, truly dangerous. Gary wouldn’t be safe from him, no one would, and that’s why he’s truly scary to me in that scene. So yeah just wanted to write about this and share it with you. Hope you enjoyed it 🙂

[thefilmsimps]

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (dir. Destin Daniel Cretton)

-Jere Pilapil-

I feel like I should start with a little bit about the “representation” angle that Marvel and Disney have been pushing with regards to Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Marvel has finally done it and made a movie starring a mostly Chinese cast. I’m Filipino-American, and I’m pretty sure that specific movie isn’t coming any time soon, so I gotta live vicariously through movies like this and Crazy Rich Asians. I’m not going to lie, though - on a pure representation level, it seems to me that it’s not that progressive that the first Asian Marvel Cinematic Superhero’s power is “He is good at martial arts”. I’m sure this is deeply meaningful for some people who wish to “see themselves” standing shoulder to shoulder with Captains America or Marvel or whoever (eventually, one assumes), and I wouldn’t want to take away from that.

But it feels at least a little unimaginative, no? Like Marvel’s creative endeavors aren’t really creating a new definition of Chinese or Asian identities; they’re just absorbing existing imagery and ideas, polishing them up and selling them back to us. I can’t think of a better example of the limits of big-budget spectacle as a vehicle for representation. Marvel and Disney have thousands of characters, ideas and stories that they could choose to adapt, and yet, they apparently find themselves limited to updating hoary tropes, tweeting “We did a progress!” and calling it a day.

The biggest challenge in adapting Shang-Chi for a movie would be the source material. Sure, it’s been well-covered how the Shang-Chi comics are insanely orientalist. They’re not “racist” in a cruel way, but every, say, 2 pages you think “Right, yes, this was created by white guys in the 1970s”. The more insidious issue is that Shang-Chi is… not much of a character. Partly as a result of the cultural blind spots of its creators, most Shang-Chi stories are either “Shang-Chi must stop his father’s evil plans” or “Shang-Chi’s father has sent assassins to kill him” (we get a little of both in the movie). The narration provided by Shang-Chi tend to be goal oriented (gotta stop dad), or pseudo-philosophical riddles. There’s just not much personality there.

The core concept has a stench of rot to it, but Marvel went ahead with it anyway, retrofitting some of the central idea to something palatable to a modern audience. They come away with a movie that at least fixes the Orientalist sins of the past. As for the hollow innards of the titular character, well, they’re smart enough to surround him by heaps of supporting characters. Shang-Chi (Simu Liu) floats through his own movie, not as goofy as his BFF Katy (Awkwafina), nor possessing the gravitas or emotional arc of his father (Tony Leung), nor as interesting a backstory as his sister Xialing (Meng’er Zhang). I can’t really tell you much about this iteration of the character other than, well, he must stop his dad’s evil plans.

Simu Liu is very likable in the role, though. His chemistry with Awkwafina and Meng’er Zhang is solid. It just feels like large chunks of the movie are big setpieces meant to distract from the character being thin. That said, the setpieces are mostly knockouts. And as seen in other action movies (shout out to The Night Comes for Us), character depth can be overrated if the action is cool enough. The strength of the old Shang-Chi comics is true of the movie, too: the action scenes are very well-realized. The choreography is tight and creative. A fight scene on a bus featured in the trailer is fantastic. A fight between Shang-Chi’s parents is deeply romantic. Shang-Chi deserves credit for understanding that martial arts movies treat fighting as its own language. This manages to still be true on the very Marvel climax, which is high on CGI bullshit but manages to at least do some almost subtle nonverbal communication between its main characters.

This is especially thanks to Tony Leung’s Wenwu, who steals the movie as the most fully realized character (probably true of the recent MCU movie characters stretching back to at least Spider-Man: Far From Home). I’ve said before that Marvel’s spectacles might function better as award shows than as movies, where the best actors get to sleepwalk through roles with a big stack of money at the end of the road. Leung’s sad eyes do more work than most villains’ monologues can, letting us in on the emotions of a man who has lived with infinite power for thousands of years and has finally found something he can’t have. There’s more than a little Neon Genesis Evangelion influence to his character, but given more humanity. It’s beautifully realized performance.

Ultimately, this is a Disney/Marvel production. Several of the normal flaws apply. The darkest stuff happens off screen. The action can sometimes be too reliant on CGI (disappointingly obvious CGI, considering this studio has infinite resources). But the action on the whole is stronger than the average Marvel movie, echoing and aping the martial arts greats in equal measure. As with all of these, it’s at least partially an ad for more adventures with some of these characters, and it succeeds on that level and as its own standalone film. And hey, now that we’ve ripped the bandage off the “First Asian-led MCU movie”, maybe we can finally get somewhere more interesting next time.

7.5/10

[fyrapartnersearch]

Chapter 1; In Which Death Awaits and a Plot is Hatched

"You're fucking persistent, I'll give you that," Izar growled, planting his foot in the snow and pivoting around to face the wards. He slammed his hands on the wards, causing a deep resonance to sound across the snowy grounds. He was lifted off his feet and sent flying. Izar clenched his lips together before he gave a delighted laugh, not even stopping as he was deposited harshly onto the ground. He spread his arms out around his body, making tracks in the snow beneath him. Odd… he never had made a snow angel before.  Izar leaned his head into the snow, ignoring the eerie quiet that reverberated across the grounds. The army was flabbergasted at what had just happened, Izar knew. Though, hopefully they were impressed, because he was even impressed with himself. Sadly, it didn't take long for the fighting to continue for he heard magic and curses being passed back and forth between the crowds a few yards away from his current position. Chaos would erupt shortly. The two groups were still in quiet surprise over the areas lack of magic. Soon, the students and the professors would either herd together inside the castle, escape, or join the fray. Until that time… Izar kicked his arms and legs out, creating a snow angel beneath him. His green eyes stared at the sky above him, observing the snowflakes as they slowly drifted into focus. Without the soft and yellowed glow from Hogwarts, the only thing left to light the grounds was the half moon and the curses being released from their owners' wands. He smiled thinly, finding himself feeling rather numb despite the situation that transpired earlier. He issued a controlled moan. "What… are you doing?" Izar gave the towering man a look of disdain. "Exactly what it looks like, My Lord." Voldemort's lips thinned as he watched Izar create a deeper snow angel. "They did warn me that the insanity was strong within you. Obviously, I hadn't given it proper consideration." A pause. "Until now." While his Master’s tone was light in his mocking, Izar could see the man deeper than that. There was a knowing glint in the crimson eyes as they watched Izar in the snow. The Dark Lord believed Izar was averting his focus and attention away from reality in order to avoid thinking about his near-death experience. Was he? Possibly… no, most certainly. He had almost been absorbed into the castle’s wards. Izar had been taken off-guard. There was this nagging feeling that Izar could have prevented everything that transpired in the last few minutes.  -- Did the above introduction catch your interest? I sincerely hope so. I also hope that, from there, your eyes continue on, trifling through this post, absorbing the information I offer and nurturing a growing interest that will lead you to my door. Writing is not just a pass-time. It's an adventure, an extravagant and deeply fulfilling world created for our very own enjoyment - this is the reason I am now here in search of partners. Optimistically thinking, I have not scared too many of you away with my mutterings and lavish vocabulary! Let's move on, shall we? Who am I? Online I go by the alias Ariikos Melanthios, but Ari or Arik is just fine. I'm a 19+ British Roleplayer employed by a fabulous company that sometimes requires my absolute attention and - at other times - lets me relax within my home while they look for something for me to do.  I can reply a minimum of once a day, often more, but attempt to always assure my partner when I need to delay a response. I play both male and female characters (as well as those between and far from that spectrum) and am open to all pairings, with experience thereof. How do I write? Usually over email or google docs, but I could always give letters a try! Sorry, that was a poor attempt at humour. My posts tend to cross the line of 1000 words as a constant, but can sometimes dip below when replies require a faster-paced thought process, such as in combat or conversation. They also have a tendency to far surpass that, such as in the case of a recent roleplay in which my starter post was over 5000 words! Fear not, weary traveller! At no point will I expect you to match these lengths, only wishing for a response that carries your half of the story. I'd be happy to share some examples upon contact - just ask. Am I missing anything?  Probably. Almost definitely, so feel free to ask any questions. I'm not particularly shy! So, what do I want from you? - 3rd person, multi-paragraph to novella, eligible responses.  - Active participation in the musing and creation process.  - Uses Google Docs or Email for roleplay reponses, and either Google Hangouts or Discord for musing (sorry the Discord word limit is too much of a hassle). Fandom's or Originals? I enjoy roleplaying in both, so let me know what you're interested in. I will not play a Canon for your OC, or a Canon/Canon relationship 99% of the time. However, you may be the single person to convince me of otherwise if the plot is juicy enough! - Harry Potter; please bring me your ideas. This is my favourite series (if you couldn't tell from the opener) and I can do anything from starting with kids in their first year, to Professors or Aurors. Good guys or bad guys. AUs, Crossovers or Canon!  - Dragon Age; huge nerd of this game, please send any ideas my way, including obscure settings in the general universe but separate from the canon storylines. All of the games are fantastic! - MCU; comics and films, preference towards X-Men but generally open to anything. - The Witcher; books, games or TV series! - Telltale The Walking Dead; a little more obscure, but believe it could make for an interesting take on the original story.  - Star Trek; new or old generation, or our own take! - Resident Evil; preference towards the films, but familiar with the games too.  - Sword Art Online - Doctor Who; any doctor, or our own. Honestly, I'm missing so many here, but just ask and I probably know it! If not, I'm always willing to do the research and put in the effort.  Onto original plots - in general I want to create a world with you! - Fantasy - Sci-Fi - Urban - Dystopia - Mythology - Medieval - Superpowers - Darker Themes - etc I'm usually up for anything though I'm not a huge fan of slice-of-life. Anything with action and I'm in. Well, I think that's about everything. If you've made it this far, congratulations! Please introduction yourself upon first contact, letting me know what you're looking for! If you can provide information about yourself, your likes and dislikes then you'd gain extra points in my book! You will absolutely be judged by your introduction, aha.  Find me @ Ariikos#3683 AriikosMelanthios@gmail.com Looking forward to hearing from you!

[thedeaditeslayer]

INTERVIEW: The creative team behind DEATH TO THE ARMY OF DARKNESS chats about making multiple Ashes.

Ash Williams is a larger-than-life character, but is the world ready for more than one of him? Readers are going to find out in Death to the Army of Darkness #1 from Dynamite Comics. Taking place just after the Army of Darkness movie, a bad translation of the Necronomicon is at the heart of the problem, leading to versions of Ash such as the female Ashley Williams, the erratic Lil’ Ash, Dash aka Doggie Ash, Skeleton Ash, and Chainy, Ash’s now sentient chainsaw.

At the helm are writer Ryan Parrott (Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Batman: Gates of Gotham) and artist Jacob Edgar (Savage Tales: Red Sonja), with colorist Kike J. Diaz (Sherlock Frankenstein, Ether) and letterer Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (Red Sonja, Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt) completing the creative team.

The Beat chatted with Parrott and Edgar about the upcoming comedy-horror book.

Deanna Destito: What inspired the premise of this new series?

Ryan Parrott: My editor, Nathan Cosby, actually called me up one day. He’d read some of my work on Power Rangers and was tossing around the idea of doing a “Team Ash” book. Ash is such an iconic character and I loved the idea of trying to surround him with his own team of misfits. At first, we talked about it being Ashes from other realities, but we realized there was already a precedent set for clones and dopplegangers with “Evil Ash” from “Army of Darkness.” And character-wise, we started to really gravitate toward forcing Ash to come face-to-face with different parts of his own personality and it slowly started turning into a story about responsibility and what it means to be “The Chosen One.”

Destito: How big of an Army of Darkness fan are you?

Parrott: Have I read Bruce Campbell’s autobiography If Chins Could Kill? Yes, I have. Have I been playing exclusively with “Ash” for over a year on the horror game, Dead By Daylight? Yes, I have. I actually saw the trilogy backwards in college because of a friend and, I will argue that to this day, there is no better horror hero than “Ash.” Being able to put words in his mouth and add a brick to the legacy wall of a character I love is an insane pleasure.

Jacob Edgar: I came to it late. Right when I took on this project, if I’m being honest. I’ve been familiar with the franchise for a long time, I had seen a lot of Bruce Campbell’s other work (can we do a Brisco County Jr comic next??) but not Evil Dead and Army of Darkness. So immediately after signing on I got to dive in and binge the movies, the Starz show…it’s been a blast. I don’t have the history with it that Ryan does, but I loved it immediately.

Destito: Where does this fall in the mythology and can new fans jump in easily?

Parrott: My approach to nearly every comic series is to try and make it accessible to both hardcore and casual fans alike. And since you can’t guarantee everyone has seen every movie or read every comic series beforehand, I built this story so a person could pick up the first issue only knowing that Ash was the hero of Army of Darkness. Now, since I’m also a fan, there are definitely elements and Easter Eggs for people who are paying attention… but this one is its own story that simply takes place in the world of Army of Darkness.

Destito: Do you find it easier or harder to illustrate something so well known and played by such a distinct, animated actor like Bruce Campbell?

Edgar: I think it’s easier in a lot of ways. Ash as a character is already built for me, that work is done. I know what he wears, I know what he drives, I know what kind of guy he is which informs set design and character acting. I love Bruce Campbell, and I love how expressive Ash is. That’s definitely something I’m trying to translate into our book.

Destito: What was your process for designing each Ash?

Edgar: For Ash himself, I wasn’t ever interested in trying to make a realistic depiction of Bruce Campbell. I don’t think my style lends to that, but also…you really have to nail that EVERY panel, or the panels that are off are going to take the reader out of it. The other thing I wanted to be conscious of was not exaggerating his chin too much, or his build. I think that’s a pitfall sometimes. Ash is fairly fit, but he’s not Batman.

When it came to Ashley, I really wanted her to have a unique look of her own. Reminiscent of Ash, but with some twists. And those twists were never going to be cleavage and booty shorts, which is another pitfall for something like this. Ashley is probably the most tactical and dangerous of the bunch, that’s what needed to come across.

The others are pretty straightforward. Dash is a Boxer dog and we gave him a blue bandana to echo Ash’s shirts. Bones is based on that famous Evil Dead 2 poster, the skeleton with eyes. But I’m getting to add costuming to him in issue #2, which is making him much more fun (and easier to draw!). Then we’ve got Lil Ash who is an exaggerated and extra crazy version of the Ash gremlins from Army of Darkness. I hope readers will love all these weirdos as much as we do.

Destito: How has it been working with the creative team to bring the series to life?

Edgar: This has been especially fun for me because it’s my first time doing multiple issues of something. Ryan’s scripts are a blast to draw and Kike is going to be a superstar colorist, I love the energy he’s bringing. Hassan is one of the best letterers around and I just hope I don’t make his job harder than it has to be. Nate’s been my editor since 2017 and he always gets the best out of everyone, we’re in great hands.

Destito: Of the Ashes, which clone is your favorite?

Parrott: Oh man. I have to tell you which one of my kids is the favorite? This won’t come back to bite me. Oddly enough, it has kinda depended on which issue I’m writing. In the second issue, it was Ashley, Ash’s feminine side because I loved that she wasn’t afraid to call Ash on his tricks. In the third issue, it was Dash, the dog version of Ash, because he started to become the leader, but in the fourth, it became Bones, the walking Skeleton version of Ash, because I started to realize just how in over his head he felt, and that was fun to write. Maybe that’s me dodging your question… but I like the voices of all the characters, it feels almost unfair to choose.

Edgar: At first I was telling everyone Dash, the dog. Because dogs are always best. But I’m really starting to love Bones, the cowardly skeleton. His character is so different from everyone and everything else, he’s really fun to play with.

Destito: What can fans expect in future issues?

Parrott: I think if you love Army of Darkness as much as I do, well… I tried to put in all the hallmarks of the series: Action, adventure, horror and humor. We’ll have Deadite possessions and chainsaw decapitations, and it wouldn’t be complete without a little time travel. For hardcore fans, we’ll get into some of the reasons behind the creation of the Necronomicon Ex Mortis and even the philosophy behind the Deadites themselves. Hopefully, if people like it… this will be the first step into some epic mythological Army of Darkness storytelling, because… we have plans… but if not, I hope people will be happy with a lot of blood, guts and boomsticks.

Death to the Army of Darkness #1 can be preordered at your local comic shop this month. The issue hits shelves in February. For digital, head over to Comixology, Kindle, iBooks, Google Play, Dynamite Digital, ComicsPlus, and more.

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: The Grinch

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)

What can be said about the Grinch that hasn’t already been said a million times by a million different people? The Grinch is easily one of the most iconic Christmas characters of all time, up there with the likes of Scrooge, and he even has a similar character arc in which he learns the true meaning of Christmas and becomes a better person. The original Chuck Jones animated short has gone down as one of the most beloved Christmas specials of all time as well as one of the best Dr. Seuss adaptations ever (if not THE best), and it gave the Grinch his iconic theme song which every other adaptation has seen fit to use.

The Jim Carrey live action take and the Illumination version which featured Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role both tried to bring a fresh take to the world’s most beloved classic Christmas curmudgeon, but did they succeed in making him entertaining and engaging as a villain is the real question?

Actor: In the original Chuck Jones short, none other than Frankenstein’s monster himself, Boris Karloff, portrayed the Grinch, but this is mostly due to the fact he was the narrator of the story and the Grinch is the only character who really speaks due to the tale being mostly shown from his POV. Still, let’s not pretend like Karloff isn’t the definitive voice here, especially considering his competition.

Carrey and Cumberbatch are both good actors, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think they really do the Grinch all too much justice. Carrey, bless his heart, at least comes fairly close, with his Grinch being in line with the original, but at the same time this is a comedic Carrey character coming off of his 90s run as a wacky comic actor. Carrey injects that manic Carrey energy into the performance, and while I think it’s a good performance, I don’t necessarily find it to be a good Grinch,

Cumberbatch faces a similar issue, not helped by his decision to use a weird American accent as opposed to his natural British one, leaving his Grinch sounding like a nasally dork. Again, he doesn’t do a terrible job by any means, but his performance certainly does nothing to convince you the Grinch is a mean, rotten soul.

Motivation/Goals: The Chuck Jones Grinch sticks to the original book to a fault; the Grinch is just a cranky jerk who hates Christmas for some inexplicable reason, and so decides to ruin it for everyone out of petty spite. Yes, it lacks any sort of depth, but the Grinch is a character from a children’s book and he just puts so much darn effort into his plan that it’s really easy to forget he’s just doing this because he is just a miserable bastard.

The two other attempts at the Grinch have gone a long way to giving him some sort of tragic backstory explaining his hatred for Christmas. And… I actually really like that. Yes, yes, villains can just do villainous things because they’re jerks, but I do appreciate the other adaptations attempting to do something interesting with the character and make him a bit more engaging in a feature-length product. In the Jim Carrey film, the Grinch becomes bitter and evil due to a childhood of constant bullying, while the Benedict Cumberbatch Grinch was a lonely orphan who never got to celebrate Christmas. While obviously it’s up to the viewer to decide whether or not these backstories add any sort of interesting element to the Grinch’s hatred of Chrtistmas, it’s hard to deny that it makes a bit more sense than the Grinch suddenly and randomly deciding after half a century that this Christmas was going to be the last ever.

Personality: While this section of Psycho Analysis is going to be semi-retired, the three Grinches are actually a perfect example of where examining the personalities of the characters can actually show a lot about the overall quality. Obviously, the original Grinch is exactly what a Grinch should be, at least in my eyes: a bitter, miserable curmudgeon who takes great joy in bringing misery to others with his selfish, senseless acts of holiday thievery. He’s a mean one, Mr. Grinch.

The Carrey Grinch does still have these elements, but it’s a bit outshone by Carrey’s hammy performance. His Grinch is about as wild as Ace Ventura or the Riddler, and while hammy villains are always fun – and there’s no denying the Grinch is – it makes it a lot easier to see him eventually turning to the light side, especially since he’s actually shown to have some redeeming qualities.

These issues are continued into Cumberbatch’s Grinch, and in fact here the problems peak. Cumberbatch’s Grinch from the start comes off as more as mildly irritated jerk, yet one who really doesn’t seem evil at all, and as the story continues he seems far more like a depressed, unhappy man with undiagnosed mental illness who is suffering due to childhood trauma. You don’t want to say this guy has termites in his smile or that he’s slippery as an eel or that you wouldn’t touch him with a thirty-nine and a half foot pole; you just want to give him a hug and tell him that things are going to get better. He just seems like he needs a friend, not a total life-changing epiphany.

Final Fate: We all know how it goes; his heart grows three sizes and he learns the true meaning of Christmas. Each of the adaptations keeps this in, though obviously to diminishing returns as each successive adaptation has made the Grinch nicer from the get-go in some regard due to the tragic backstories and whatnot.

Best Scene: At least for the original, his best moment is, of course, the montage during “You’re a Mean One Mr. Grinch,” in which we get to see all of the slippery ways this green meanie is ruining the holidays. Of course, this is matched by the epic moment at the end where the Grinch gains super strength from his heart growing three sizes and lifts the sleigh of stolen goods, which is equally awesome whether it’s te animated one or Jim Carrey doing it.

Cumberbatch’s Grinch manages to have a different moment to call his best: after he has redeemed himself, he gets invited to dinner in Whoville, and the scene where he nervously goes to the house and makes small talk is just very sweet and endearing. It’s easily the best scene in the movie and shows that even watered down there’s still plenty of heart to be mined from this timeless tale.

Final Thoughts & Score: I think that the fact that the Grinch is constantly being reimagined is a sign at how impressive and enduring he is as a character, and he’s easily the greatest Christmas villain of all time (with apologies to Hans Gruber, Mr. Potter, Burgermeister Meisterburger, and Kirk Cameron). The original special is obviously the definitive portrayal of the character, to the point where the Grinch became a household name and got himself two more specials, one in which he once again terrorized Whoville (this time with a wagon filled with nightmarish hallucinations) and one where he faced off against the Cat in the Hat, the latter being especially notable for beating Zack Snyder to the punch at making “Crossover Versus Movie in Which One of the Title Characters Is Redeemed By Mentioning His Mother” by 34 years.

The original Grinch even effected himself; his iconic green, almost goblin-like appearance was a departure from the book, where he sort of resembled a more mischievous Who, and it has ended up sticking for the character ever since. Throw in that iconic villain song about how foul he is sang by Thurl Ravenscroft AKA Tony the Tiger, as well as the fact that “Grinch” is up there with “Scrooge” as shorthand for someone who hates Christmas, and it’s easy to justify letting the Chuck Jones take on the Grinch steal not only Christmas, but an 11/10.

Carrey’s take on the character is different, but not bad. I’m not going to say it’s good either, though; I still think Carrey hammed it up too much and just let loose his manic energy. And it’s really weird, because I have a soft spot for the film and I love the performance, and I think the insane energy of Carrey’s performance is what elevates the film and has helped it become a sort of holiday cult classic, but I think that it kind of misses the point of how the Grinch should be. It really boils down to the usual thing with these adaptations that try and add complexities to characters that just work better when they are simple: Jim Carrey’s Grinch is a great, fun character, but he just isn’t a great Grinch. Still, the makeup and costuming is so amazing that I’d feel like a Grinch myself if I stole too many points, so I think a 6/10 is a solid score for a performance that manages to be a bit above your average villain.

And then we get to Cumberbatch. I’m just going to say it: I barely consider his Grinch a villain. He’s just too nice and sad and cranky to really be evil. Sure he has wacky inventions, sure he is a bit passive aggressive to the Whos, but god this guy is just not mean enough. The fact he can just walk into town and interact with the townsfolk and they don’t even bat an eye says a lot about how watered down and toothless this take on the character is. Not helping is the safe, soft design Illumination gave him, as well as Cumberbatch’s weird American accent. Still, I don’t think this Grinch deserves worse than a 4/10 when it comes right down to it. In this case, it’s more that what’s interesting about him as a character saves him from sinking any lower than just being subpar as opposed to the problem with Carrey being that what made him interesting as a character made him less appealing as a Grinch. This guy does still try and steal Christmas, after all… It’s just that he’s so nice to begin with that you really aren’t too shocked when he does end up turning over a new leaf.

While it’s obvious the Grinch has had his ups and downs over the years, the fact he is such a legendary figure and an enduring cultural icon really says a lot for his staying power, as well as that sometimes a simple villain that lacks any complex motivation beyond “he’s a jerk” can really resonate with people. Maybe all of these other adaptations don’t quite measure up to the original animated special, but they don’t need to; it’s just interesting to see what different visions for the Grinch look like from different creators. Whether it’s good or bad, one thing is for sure: he’s a mean one, that Mr. Grinch, and we all love him for it.

You know what we don’t love him for, though? His dental hygiene. 

Merry Christmas!

[ice-cream-nekogirl]

What am I now? What am I now? What if I'm someone I don't want around? I'm fallin' again I'm fallin' again I'm fallin'

-’Falling’ by Harry Styles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRDKoMcgavw

I’ve seen and read a lot of fanfictions where it’s told from the POV of one character and that inspired me to write this but... it’s not happy... much... and Harry Styles’ song just also inspired me to write out this fairly sad piece because that song is such a tearjerker man..

I like to this of this as an inside look of the witch's mind and thoughts as well as her opening up about her issues.

WARNING: This small piece contains mentions and/or references to suicide and intrusive thoughts. Reader discretion is advised.

Interestingly... I've come to realize that Amy's behavior makes sense if you know what Borderline Personality Disorder is and what the symptoms are. Many of which she actually checks out for. I study a lot of psychology in my spare time and to my surprise, Amy ended up showing some symptoms even though I swear to God it wasn’t my intention, it just kinda... ended up like that.

For more info or insight on BPD: 

https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/comic-perfectly-shows-jealousy-looks-232343129.html

https://psychcentral.com/lib/loving-someone-with-borderline-personality-disorder/

Amy’s POV:

Apparently most children get their quirks at the age as early as 3 or 4, but when I was 4 years old I didn’t get mine. 5, 6,7,8,9, still nothing. That was it, I guess that just meant I was going to be quirkless forever, on the bright side at least I would be part of a minority that I could one day fight for I thought. If I’m gonna be quirkless I would own it. That’s what I told myself.

But then one day when I was 9 years old I woke up over my bed, floating around my room until my mom came in to make sure I came down safely. She told me everything, how her side of the family has a bloodline of witches that dates all the way back in the 1800’s and one of my great great great grandmothers or something had the same genetic affliction. Just like that everything became different, when I thought it was awesome at first, started to learn just what I am and who I am, and the history of all the great witches of the past. Slowly but surely I discovered more powers about myself, more powers I would one day learn.

Everything was brilliant… until the following year my parents were killed by witch hunters. Dad wasn’t even a witch, he was just an ally, he loved my mom and I more than anything, and they killed him for that. Worst part? When the heroes got to me before I could get barbecued, they didn’t even kill them.

I suppose that’s where it all begins though, after that they decided I wasn’t going to be safe enough here and that my new powers that were manifesting would be too much for them to handle. And because they didn’t want to deal with me, they called on the other witches on the other side of the world. From then on out, I had to leave my old life behind, my best friend and his family who treated me like family. I went from orphaned, to abandoned, to a bloodbath. 

As soon as I got to New Orleans everything else was just as unsafe. Asshole frat boys, an actual Minotaur man, fucking zombies, voodoo witches and of course MORE witch hunters trying to kill us. And also an immortal racist, a Frankenstein Frat boy, a tongueless butler who has tea parties and sex with dead teenage girls, a wicked voodoo deity and an old, axe-wielding serial killer that was once a ghost in Robichaux. Yup. But that’s just a perfectly average day at Robichaux, and a perfectly average day in my fucked up life.

At least I had my sisters like Zoe, Madison and Misty, and Ms. Cordelia and how can I forget Ms. Myrtle? That woman needs to be a fashion icon and I will do justice by her and make sure the world knows who she was. And even Ms. Fiona. The bitch who used to be in charge was pretty badass, I mean if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be the strong, independent witch bitch I am today. Yeah I have a ton of issues because of the borderline emotional abuse she dished out on me and the other witches but still...

My new sisters were by far the least terrible part of the entire thing. Which is why it still breaks my heart to think about how some of them died, because not all of them came back... 

Through all of that I kept myself up though. I learned how to fight back and fight alongside my sisters. I learned how to be strong, how to rely on myself and my sisters because we knew that no hero was going to come to our rescue. I had to be strong, I had to have thick skin and an elastic heart. Yeah that’s right I referenced Sia, she’s an awesome singer, just like Stevie Nicks. Amazing women, inspiring...

Sorry, getting off-topic. Anyhoo, I’ve realized though that it’s better that way. Being with the witches showed me the truth of the world, how the world looks at us and how it wants us to look. We have to be perfect, we have to be charming, we have to smile and look pretty. Why? Because the heroes have to be there to save the cute and pretty damsel in distress so they can feel powerful. 

This idea of heroes and villains is really all just bullshit... all of these villains I’ve seen thus far... they’re kittens compared to the evils and horrors I’ve seen here. It’s not just New Orleans, but I mean Bloody Face was a monster back in the 50′s, then the man who made the Hotel Cortez, he was pure evil and still haunts that hotel to this day. James Patrick March. Evil. Pure Evil and he murdered just to feel something, innocent people who didn’t deserve it. Dr. Arthur Arden, a.k.a Hans Gruper, the Nazi doctor who hid under a disguise and performed horrifying experiments on humans in the insane asylum of Briarcliff. Instead of helping those poor people, he just murdered, butchered and tortured them for his sick experiments. So many lives ruined, mutilated. The victim’s last moments were nothing but pain and a desperate wish for death until he put a bullet through their heads.

Murders, monsters, all of them. They all murdered for fun, and then even normal people were evil, the ones who valued their pride and selfish desires over anything and destroyed innocence itself just to achieve that. 

Those are the real evil people. All For One? Overhaul? Shigaraki? They couldn’t slice a loaf of bread with the amount of sharpness they had all put together. 

Those ‘villains’ that All-Might and my friend Midoriya have fought thus far are nothing compared to the monsters I’ve seen. They’re all a bunch of kitty cats, but I’ve seen and known killers. Real killers. Real monsters. 

A woman from an old asylum once said that ‘all monsters are human’ and she was right, because the monsters I’ve seen were humans. The worst of humanity and I've seen it all. What heroes choose to ignore though is that it's in all of us, and that those who choose not to do shitty things is what makes a hero apoarently. What a crock of shit...

But I guess monsters are just another thing that the heroes like to glamorize so they can fight and save the world from what they deem as the real monsters of the world. When I showed that I wasn’t a sweet and gentle girl as he believed, Midoriya looked at me like I was a monster, which just proved to me that he’s a part of what I’m fighting, and that that’s what this society wants, a good little girl who does good things all for the sake of this society. And I’m a monster because I’m not a good little girl, my sisters aren’t good little girls, no, we’re not a bunch of sad girls who are just waiting to be rescued, we’re witches. We’re not giving those motherfuckers the satisfaction of saving the poor damsels in distress because we’re not, we’re powerful and we don’t owe them anything, not a thanks, not a hug, not a flash of our tits and especially not a goddamn smile that men just love to see on women. 

Men like that are afraid of women like us, they’re afraid of women who aren’t afraid to get ugly and dirty our hands with blood. Afraid of women like me. And I learned how to fight, I was able to keep myself flying, because that was my first power, flight. I can fly based on how I feel, or on how much willpower I put into it. My power comes from my emotions and no fucking misogynist can tell me my emotions make me weak because I can do anything I want based on how I feel and how much willpower I have.

Lately though, it’s been nothing but willpower, as the older I get the more I realized that I’m not loved in this place. I wouldn’t be missed if I disappeared and I know it. I know it. But in life young people like me have to keep going even though we’re also gifted with the power of being painfully aware of all the bullshit that adults try to tell us is the truth, but we know better than that, they just don’t get that we’re not as stupid as we look. Although the sad part is, some of us ARE and they buy into the bullshit and try so hard to be the perfect little shitheads these assholes want us to be.

I can’t do that though, that’s not me. I wish it was sometimes though, who knows, maybe if I was that kind of person then maybe I would be liked by everyone, but that’s not me. Maybe that’s why I won’t be missed, maybe that’s why I’m forcing myself to fly every damn day just to make it through. Forcing myself to pretend that everything’s fine and smiling like a fucking idiot just to make everyone happy and not let them be miserable as me, but this shit’s hard, it’s hard to act like you’re okay when you’re not.

And I’m too aware of this shit, too aware to be truly ignorant and I call people out if I think they sound ignorant. So I’m not surprised when they end up leaving me or trying to tell me to be nicer and that I shouldn’t be blaming anybody or anything just because I’m a cynical and miserable bitch. Yeah, I’m a bitch but I can’t help it. At least I know my shit, I’d rather be a miserable bitch than an ignorant one.

Yet here I am, constantly miserable, constantly thinking and constantly aware that I’m nobody’s favorite person.

That’s just it. I’m not surprised by anything, because everything I do, everything I say, there’s always something bad behind it, that’s the idea I give everyone. I know it, it shouldn’t bother me but apparently, I can’t bring myself to fly because I’m happy, because I’m not. And then there’s always something that shows up in my life, something to make me feel some type of way, not a good way though. I can’t help the way I react to some things, I wish I could though, a normal person would be able to just go out and live life the way everyone else does. But I’m not normal. I never was. And every single day I’m reminded of it, every single day I remind myself it.

Every time I fly it’s through willpower alone, not because I’m so excited that my feelings can make me fly. No, lately I haven’t been able to feel a goddamn thing, and ironically that’s what hurts the most.

For someone who’s first gift was flight and for someone who’s powers allow them to fly, I’m just… falling. 

Constantly, every time I fly, I just feel like I’m falling as the weight of this world just keeps beating me down until one day I eventually hit rock bottom.  I don’t expect anyone to catch me, not even my loved ones. I feel like I’ve hurt them enough. Everyone I love, I end up hurting in some way because I’m just a jealous, overzealous, toxic and cynical bitch. I don’t deserve them and they don't deserve this. All this poison, all this anger and problems, I don't want that for them.

So I don’t tell them that I’m falling when I’m flying. If I’m gonna fall, I’m not going to drag them down with me.

Rock bottom almost doesn’t sound like a bad idea at this point. There are times where I get so frustrated with everything, so angry and so pissed off that I need to get away from everything and everybody and I let myself fly upwards. I just fly as high as possible, so high that I’m in the clouds and I can no longer see the rest of the world beneath me. 

God... sometimes I get so high that I just want to stay up there. I want to stay feeling so high and so powerful like nothing can stop me. I’m invincible when I’m up so high. And yet that honestly terrifies me too, because when I’m up so high I forget everything, even the things and the people I don’t want to forget. How could I ever want to forgive some of the people I love the most? 

When I remember them, that’s when I regain my vision and I start to see how high I’ve gotten, and how far it is to go back down. Everyone can see me and they can see how far I’ve gone, even up that high I can still see their disappointed faces and that just no longer makes me feel so invincible anymore. Because then I start to think ‘here I am’ up on top and yet I’m all alone up here. 

Sometimes when I’m up that high is when I start to think about just letting go of the willpower and letting myself fall from such a distance, close my eyes and just let everything go. Let the gravity just bring me back down until I hit the ground.

 And then I wonder, would that matter at all? Would it be better that way?

But as usual, I can never think of a fucking answer… other than that I should probably just go back home because I have people waiting for me. Ashlen, Hitoshi, Katsuki, Madison... I hope they're not too worried about me... I know they want to see me come home even though I’m the last person I want around, and I honestly don’t know how they want me around. 

Yet I guess it’s enough to make myself fly a little more, just to go back to them, because in the end I feel a little bit of something when I’m with them. They’ve moved my wicked heart, even when I think I’m better off dead, they make me fly. 

I don’t know if I saved myself, or if it’s them who saved me, because frankly it’s too late to save me, but I’m still here. I’m still here so I can go home and see them.

God... I haven’t been home for a while, but I’m on my way back home, I know they’re waiting for me, probably worried about me too.

Ash, Toshi, Katsu, Mads... You guys don’t have to worry, I’m coming home now. After all, I wouldn’t miss seeing your smiles for the world. 

[theurbanologist]

Yo Ho Ho And A Bottle of Early Literary Influences

Many years ago, I wrote this piece for a Prestigious Literary journal.

Yes, you are correct that the phrase "Prestigious Literary Journal" is a type of short-hand for "Oh, we could not possibly pay you for those words you have assembled into sentences that became paragraphs, ever so fully formed and articulated."

It is the way of the world.

As it is intimately related to my book project, I share it with you now.

I hope you enjoy it.

Treasure Island: An Appreciation

My family moved to Seattle from Madison, Wisconsin when I was nine years old, and I remember being terribly upset. What would I do in the Pacific Northwest, away from my friends?  I would also be quite distant from the many pleasure of Wisconsin Dells, with its multitude of water parks and low-rent haunted houses.

My mother reminded me of my many books, and I was promised several new books upon our arrival in Seattle. She knew me well, and the promise of more books was certainly enough to occupy my thoughts on the long Amtrak ride from Columbus, Wisconsin to Seattle.

When we arrived in Seattle, there were in fact new books already waiting for me. My grandfather had sent along a collection of "Great Illustrated Classics". These books were essentially illustrated Cliff Notes for juveniles., as they resembled the garden variety comic book.  As I made my first foray into this trove, I passed over the Scarlet Pimpernel ("What's a pimpernel?") and The Man in the Iron Mask  ("Is this like Iron Maiden?") and settled on Treasure Island.

Treasure Island sounded good from the start. First there was "Treasure" in the title, which implied some type of great wealth, potentially in the form of gold, gold, and more gold. Then there was the word "Island". I had not done much traveling by age 9 (no Geneva, Switzerland, just Lake Geneva, Wisconsin) and so I remember thinking "There must be travel involved. I want to travel."  

I opened this Treasure Island-lite and I found a map. Could it be? By this point in my life, I had already spent many hours drawing my own maps that detailed the location of hidden treasure in our front yard and fantastical war-room style military maps that detailed the struggle between a dream-battle between the Evil Empire (in the Darth Vader fashion) and G.I. Joe. I looked closely and saw names like "Spyglass Hill", "Skeleton Island", and finally "BULK OF TREASURE HERE", finished with a large "X". This. R.L. Stevenson knew me, I could tell, or at least he shared a love of maps and buried treasure.

As I started to read, I was drawn in by the language and in particular, the description of Billy Bones as "a tall, strong, heavy, nut-brown man; his tarry pigtail falling over the shoulders of his soiled blue coat; his hands ragged and scarred, with black, broken nails; and the saber cut across one cheek, a dirty, livid white." I remember thinking that I was terrified after reading this. "Who is this man?", I thought. Is he insane? Why is his cut white? I paused a moment to think about all of this before eagerly continuing on.

Over the next few pages, Bones proceeds to meet the whole family at the Admiral Benbow Inn, including Jim Hawkins, the young boy and sometimes hero of this tale. I remember being very envious of this Jim fellow, as he got to help out Bones with all sorts of errands. Would I have fetched a tankard of rum for him? In a heartbeat. Keep my "weather-eye open for a seafaring man with one leg?" If only we had such characters in our bland 1970s apartment building! I could have done without some of Bones' less savory habits, like yelling out sea shanties and slapping his hands on the table, but that all seemed like a small price to pay for such excitement and intrigue.

I made a habit of trying to work in the lingua franca of Treasure Island into my conversations at this point, with little success. Enamored of naut-i-cisms like "old salt" and "true sea dog", I felt that I could be bring these key phrasess into the everyday life of Madrona Elementary School. Suffice it to say, an inner-city school in Seattle near the conclusion of the 20th century was probably not the best place for such an experiment. The setting was less than ideal (no boats and not many sailor-types in my school) and it was the wrong century.

After finishing this comic-book version of Treasure Island, I picked up the real deal and read it in an evening while thinking about my own potential future, which would hopefully involve buried treasure, colorful old salts, and a largely benign and peaceful form of piracy. I was in the wrong century once again, of course, but I still dream of moments where I am wandering around Spyglass Hill, hiding in an apple barrel, or in a battle of wits with Long John Silver.

Since reading Treasure Island for the first time twenty-five years ago, I have met a few Billy Bones-esque characters and I hope to meet many more.