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nika-vincent · 1 year ago

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Some of our reflections on the development of Halsin's personality in Bg3. Long post warning.

I can say that this post is something like a continuation of my previous one, which was devoted mainly to romance with Halsin. This time I gathered some more thoughts from my recent discussions with the guys who love this wonderful character, but this time the main topic will be the development of Halsin's personality in the game. Some things about romance will also be mentioned here a little, the moments we found in the game files, and a few more facts from the datamine. So if you haven't completed the game and don't want to get spoilers, then I suggest skipping this article for now. We will be very happy if this review can also help Larian to see some points that could be supplemented or repaired with patches and also look at how the players perceive our beloved bear and what they would like to see with him in the future.

I would like to start by saying that if we compare Minthara and Halsin in terms of the degree of personality development throughout the game, Minthara is prescribed better and even has her own different ways: to change herself for the better or to remain a bad girl. And I'm not gonna say that she doesn't deserve this because most players choose the path of good and there is no point in investing in the development of her character. Not at all. On the contrary, it shows that it is important for developers to take into account every detail in the game, and if players want to play the game differently for a change, they will discover a lot of new things and say: "Oh, dude! Minthara turns out to be not as bad as she seemed at first glance!". And this is really a wonderful move by Larian, which doesn't allow players to get bored and makes them look at situations and the characters themselves differently. (And by the way, if some character is in the minority according to the preferences of the players, this does not mean that it deserves to receive poor development.)

As for Halsin in this case, at the moment not only his romantic content is missing, but also his very development as a character and a full-fledged companion. This can be explained by the fact that he was probably recently added as a companion, and there simply wasn't time for him to prescribe more things that would reveal his character and potential to the fullest. Considering Sven Winke's recent post on Twitter, where he announced that Larian will again involve voice actors to record new content, there is a chance that these flaws will be fixed in patches and Halsin will get more interactive scenes than those he has now. (As far as I know, Minthara is also suffers from a lack of romantic content, as does Halsin, so I suggest waiting for now and following the official news from Larian …)

It's sad to see that new players who don't experience early access called Halsin a rather boring companion compared to others. However, players from early access spoke about him much higher and more positively, otherwise he wouldn't have become one of the popular characters of the community. So, why did this happen? I can explain this by saying that at that time Halsin was just something like an episodic character that we just had to rescue from the goblin camp and he would tell us everything he knows about our parasite and where we should go for further answers then. (And for an episodic character, that would be enough.) After that, we witness how he scolds Kagha because of the rite of thorns. And I think a particularly strong point was that in the case of Arabella's death, Halsin says in raised tones: "As for the Idol? It's nothing compared to life! A mere object, next to one nature's creations! You showed no pity, no remorse. I cannot absolve you!" I've seen people write admiring comments like: "Until that moment, I thought I couldn't love him even more!". The way he expresses his thoughts, shows concern, compassion, or regret and disappointment mixed with anger (because of the death of a little girl that Kagha allowed) - all this showed us the traits of Halsin's character and caused emotions among the players. Someone thought he was too soft, and someone admired his kindness. And that's how it should work, so that the character evokes different or even contradictory emotions in people, anything but boredom or the feeling that something is missing. This is what makes the character interesting, we want to learn more about him, see how he will behave in other situations and especially how he will react to the Baldur Gate City itself. And I can also note that we were particularly interested in his story with Ketheric Thorm, which he tells us about after the Tiefling party, as well as what he feels guilty about and what unfinished business he mentioned.

Unfortunately, much of what concerned Halsin's personal growth in the release version of the game remained not fully disclosed and seemed unfinished, especially in act 3. His quest during act 2 was challenging from a gameplay point of view, but from a story one it was quite touching and helped us learn a little more about Halsin's past and that the spirit of the land named Thaniel was his only childhood friend. We also learned a little about his parents, as well as the reason why he became the archdruid.

But the story of the shadow curse still remained as if unsaid, and also we didn't see any of his interactions with Ketheriс Thorm, which I think deserved to be realized, and were not limited to Halsin's stories only about Ketheric if we ask him. An interesting fact is that for a long time there were hints in the datamine that Ketheric's daughter Isobel died because of Halsin (correct me if I made a mistake somewhere, please). And I remember, I saw there that Isobel was killed by the spear 'Sorrow', the same spear that we can get in the secret vault in the emerald grove. Not to mention that in Halsin's room we can even find his diaries, in which Isobel was mentioned several times. This would have added a lot of intrigue and special opportunities for Halsin's interactions in the plot of Act 2 itself, but for some reason it remained behind the scenes and even if we ask Isobel about how she died, she cannot remember her killer. Although there are some special dialogues between Halsin and Isobel in the game files themselves at the moment, but there are none of them during the gameplay. I dunno why it was necessary to cut or change these things, and it is not for me to decide what to do here after all. But in my humble opinion, it would have added fire to Halsin's plot in act 2. I would regard this as a fact that even such a good and kind character as Halsin can make mistakes, has his own shortcomings and even dark sides. Therefore, before the release of the game, I had high expectations that Halsin would play a much bigger plot role in Act 2 because of these intrigues between him, Ketheric and Isobel than what we have in the game at the moment. The feeling of the whole story being left unsaid is still present in Act 2, but who knows, maybe it can be improved in patches?

When Halsin became our full-fledged companion in the game, we got new options for the dialogues, but very few of his interactions in the future. It's as if the development of his personality in the second act ended along with his quest. Remember what wonderful scenes with companions in Act 1 we watched over and over again when we stayed overnight in the camp. It helped us to get to know them better, to love someone or hate someone. Halsin definitely should not be deprived of this, we still want to get to know him so that later we can draw conclusions about him in Act 3 and help him find his own path, as it was with the other companions. We got to know our companions during acts 1 and 2 to see the end result of what we experienced together in act 3.

What confuses me is that the developers seem to have paid more attention to his sexuality than the development of his personality instead (not to mention that scandalous story of his sexual slavery to drows in his past, and he only tells us about it after we sleep with the drow twins in a brothel in his company). This looks especially sad for romance, because it looks like Tav fell in love with Halsin more for his sexy muscular body, and not for what kind of person he is. After all, even in real life, we fall in love with someone not for having a fine big booty, but for how a person presents themself to the world and how they treats us. I want to add here one quote that I just remembered: 'Personality is much more important, because the external beauty of a person is taken away by old age, but the beauty of the soul will remain forever.'

In act 3, at the moment, Halsin reveals much less, but we can still see some hints. After he appoints a successor to the Emerald grove in his place, and after we help heal the lands from the shadow curse, Halsin apparently has a conflict with himself about finding a new goal. He notes that he does not like the city of Baldur's Gate, he is saddened by the fate of orphans here, he would also like people to see a friend in nature. And there are also curious moments in his reasoning about shadow druids and their methods. But all this remains so far only at the level of discussions and comments that pop up sometimes. And we can only find out at the very end that he decided to find a new goal in helping people and orphans from the city in Thaniel's world. And you know, it's a really great idea, but I have this feeling again that in act 3 we missed a lot before he came to find this goal in his ending. The idea of his personal path still remained unfinished to the end. I also heard that he was supposed to have some kind of quest with a druid circle in the city, well, let's see if we'll have a chance to see it in patches.

Сomparing Halsin with the rest of the party, he still looks pretty unfinished in terms of development by the end of the game. Because each companion has their own personal options for the path of development, which we are able to influence, and we can notice the difference in the change in the character of a certain companion comparing with what they were in act 1 and what they became by the end of act 3. We can see what Shadowheart can be like if she rejects Shar, or what she will be like in the future if she becomes a dark justiciar. Astarion can remain as a spawn, but at the same time preserving himself as a person and not turn into the likeness of Cazador, whom he hated so much. Or we can help him become a Vampire Lord and the power will intoxicate him so much that he will even begin to dream of taking the city itself in the end. Even Minthara, the companion opposite to Halsin, also has her own personal path of development. But with Halsin himself, unfortunately, this is happening pretty weakly at the moment...

We have been discussing a lot lately what would help for the development of Halsin's personality, so that he could be on a par with the rest of the companions. And I'll start with an excellent thought from my dear friend @merrinla, which would give an excellent opportunity for the development of his personal path, which at the moment in the game looks somewhat unfinished (but I still believe in the power of patches, official writers and the love of fans!❤).

Considering that his background is labeled 'outlander', this makes him a person who grew up in a wild environment, wandering a lot, living in harmony with nature, free as the wind. And even his best friend is the spirit of the land, not from the ordinary people. In his youth, he lived this life, unencumbered by responsibilities, exactly before the crisis moment happened, which was a shadow curse that abruptly changed his usual life. And for 100 years, his goal was to heal the lands from this curse. Plus, his duties as an archdruid piled up here and he didn't have time for his own desires at all. "I was forgetting who I was," as he once told us. After the events in Act 2, he does not seem to be eager to return to the emerald grove, but keeps in touch with Francesca to find out news from there. He speaks quite critically about the city of Baldur's Gate, but he has a desire to help people here and make life in the city better. And I think it would be appropriate here to let Tav tell him something like: 'You know, Halsin, it's not for nothing that people say that everything can be found in Baldur's Gate. Maybe you can find yourself here too?' and also try to change his views on the civilized world, because at the moment he is not familiar with this world too well, and we could help him adapt, convince him that the city itself is not so bad, and find himself here. Even the romance with him will look great with this option.

So it would be a suitable solution if Halsin also had his own development paths: 1 - if he trusts our advice and assistance in adapting to the city, which will allow him to become more civilized. 2 - we agree that he is right in his critical views on the city and civilization, and ultimately he decides to remain an outlander.

I think that even his ending with the orphans could also look different depending on the choice of his personal path, as well as in the case of the romance with him. This is a really great idea, and thank you @merrinla so much for sharing it with me!🙏❤

I would also like to give my comment about Halsin's role in our party. Considering that we have often witnessed conflicts between our companions, in Halsin I see something like scales holding the balance. Someone like the 'father' of our party, an adult wise mentor with whom we could consult about our experiences and ask for his advice. And I would also be very happy to see how he will try to calm our companions in case of any conflict.😂 His wisdom and mentoring experience just have to play a role in our party. If we go on a romance path with him, I would really like him to let us know that he will always listen to us at any moment and support us. Maybe we could even unobtrusively take his hand in return for a while to show how much it means to us. It would also be nice if Thaniel could communicate more with Halsin in the camp, and, in the case of romance, in a dialogue with us, he would notice that Halsin cares about us. These cute moments and his modesty suit Halsin much more than excessive sexual innuendos.

I dunno if Larian will do something about the fact that in the game files Halsin should have received more interactions with Isobel. But I think it would be great and intriguing. And interactions with Ketheric would also be perfect here (Girls, don't start a fight until I find my popcorn😅). And it also seemed strange to me that Halsin had no reaction to Zevlor's betrayal. Maybe it's a bug or just another flaw, who knows. But it would also be good to get this scene, even if he was at our party at the time of the showdown with Zevlor. Maybe it would be nice to organize some kind of his reaction to Nightsong, too, given that Halsin learned about her from Aradin, but he thought she was an artifact, not a living angel. Some interactions with our pets in the camp, I think they should be for Halsin too. (Let him stroke Scratch's belly, haha) And also… the arm wrestling scene of Minsc and Halsin when? Just imagine how funny it might look, 'cause even the dialogue with Minsc about it was hilarious.😁

That's all for today! Thank you guys for reading this review to the end, and also join us in discussions in the feedback about Halsin of the official Larian's discord club! I wish great success to Larian and I thank them for creating this wonderful game for us, which unites people and allows us to discuss many things. We love you and hope that you will also succeed in your future projects, and I also wish you good luck and inspiration in working on new content for BG3!❤🙏

#baldur's gate 3 #baldur's gate #bg3 #bg #larian studios #halsin #halsin romance #halsin x tav #ps5 games #pc games #bg3 spoilers #bg3 halsin

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boylikeanangel · 1 year ago

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I'm absolutely bonkers over the commentary that ofmd s2 is giving us on morality and redemption actually.

specifically what ed's conversation with hornigold after realising he's in purgatory says for the wider messaging this show has on the idea of retribution. because when he asks "who decides whether I live or die? you?" and hornigold says "no (...) this is on you" it kind of really does call into question a lot of big ideas about the stance this show is taking on what makes someone a good person, or more specifically, what makes someone worthy of being able to live, and ultimately be happy.

it's not like hornigold is some kind of arbiter or higher power with the ability to dictate ed's fate. no one sent hornigold to judge him. ed brought him here himself so they could talk it through and he could decide for himself what the answer is, whether he knows it or not. it's not about god or anything else like that choosing who gets to live and who gets to die. morals don't come into it. it's not about who deserves to live.

it's about who has the strength to try.

and for a show that deals with a cast whom the majority of are objectively bad people, that's such a fucking interesting and actually really enlightening position to take. if this was the kind of show that concerned itself too much with morals or trying to define objective goodness or badness, it'd get very stuck when trying to flesh out a fully realised development arc for its main characters, and they were very smart to not spend too much time trying to answer those questions. in fact, I'd argue that it actively rallies against the notion that only certain kinds of people are redeemable or deserve happiness.

both ed and stede have lived for most of their lives believing they are irredeemable, even that they deserve to die, but they both in turn later have to contend with the truth that they actually don't want to (stede first of all when he kills nigel, then later on faces the firing squad and literally breaks down at the sudden certainty of his death, and ed in the most recent episode). they want to live. they just have a hard time believing there's any reason why they should be able to. it's like they've been waiting for permission. but permission has nothing to do with it. no one's going to decide for you. there's no higher power that tells you an absolute "yes, you deserve another chance" or "no, you're beyond hope". you have to make that decision for yourself.

when stede is first faced with death, that's the first time we hear the question that now echoes across the entire series again and again.

"do you want to live?"

and stede is, in that moment, contending with the realisation, for the first time, that he might be a terrible person. and in that moment he doesn't know how to answer that question, because in that moment he realises he might not deserve to live. but oluwande is asking him, plain and simple, do you WANT to? and he says yes. despite everything, he wants to live. and so our story begins. a story not necessarily about redemption, but about rebirth. about choosing to live, even if you don't think you've earned the right.

and in the first three episodes of season 2, we see ed go through the same motions as he contends with everything he's done. like, hornigold is literally a manifestation of all the terrible things ed's done and the things he hates about himself! and he looked ed in the eye and told him "I don't dictate whether you get to live or die. you have to decide that for yourself. not based on what you think about yourself, or whatever you think you deserve to, but based on if you want to or not".

he's literally faced with the human embodiment of every evil, reprehensible thing he's done, and it tells him that it doesn't decide. that's not what this is about. they don't weigh up what ed's done, about where he crossed the line, about what he can and can't take back or undo, not even about what ed likes about himself, but very simply, what ed likes about living.

like, answering the question "at what point does someone become irredeemable" is an extremely difficult line to tread, and this show could have so easily slipped up whilst trying to answer that question, considering that the majority of its main cast are, yknow, thieves and murderers. ed more than any of them. and yet he's the romantic object of this season. and they make that work by not concerning themselves or anyone else with tricky moral lamentations about goodness or evil. what they ask instead is, "is any of that a reason to give up?"

dying is not a victory. dying is not even necessarily retribution. dying is the only reason things will never get better. even if you think trying to put things right and live a better life is impossible. and it might be impossible. but you will never know unless you try. you might fail but you have a 100% better chance of making things right and doing better if you choose to live than you would if you chose to die. and that's absolutely the journey ed's going on this season.

one thing in particular I'm so glad they've abandoned is that thread about ed not killing people. because it unnecessarily complicated the moral framework of the show and put a kind of expectation on ed's actions that were too hard to maintain with the direction they wanted to take his character this season. they knew it would only muddy the waters when it came to paving out his journey to something better, and I'm glad they took the time to establish that ultimately it was only something that mattered to him, not the narrative. to him it was like he could maintain some semblance of being a half decent person if he only ever killed one person. but now that's gone. he's broken the one rule he had for himself, the one thing holding him back from going off the deep end. and the question remains, can he still come back from this? can he still put things right and fight for a better life for himself? when quite literally all is lost, can you still find it again? and ultimately, the answer is going to be yes. no matter what he's done.

I don't know how much exactly if at all of this is in response to some pushback they got last season about how their main cast are, when all is said and done, pretty bad people, but either way they came out of the gate this season saying actually yeah, you're right. they are bad people. but that doesn't mean they don't deserve a chance at happiness. that's our thesis, actually. it fucking threads that needle and embroiders itself perfectly into the stede-centric narrative last season that told us reinvention was always possible and it was never too late to start afresh once you know what you want from life and it's fucking beautiful. I can't believe they took the moral ambiguity of its principle characters and turned it into the POINT. and I cannot stress this enough, it did this in THREE episodes. I love this show so so much we are so fucking back.

#this isnt as detailed as id like it to be but its already so long #ill probably make a more detailed response later on in the season when we got more stuff for eds arc #our flag means death #meta tag #ofmd spoilers

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bellabrady · 7 months ago

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Hey! I want to say absolutely no hate here, you can think whatever you want about characters, I just want to make some points for you to consider! If it makes you change your mind, cool! If it doesn’t, well that follow button doesn’t need my finger on it since we clearly have different views :)

I am not going to be commenting on Chim begins since I haven’t watched it in a while, but I just finished rewatching Hen Begins and was discussing Bobby Begins Again with someone, so here we go.

In Hen Begins, Tommy is never hostile towards her. He doesn’t defend her from the captain, but he’s also a young gay man who is probably terrified of that same hate being turned to him. When Hen is doing her speech on the fire truck most of the crew has tightened jaws and seems mad, but Tommy seems relaxed and thoughtful. And at the end of the episode he tells Hen: “We would’ve done a sweep of the area eventually, but eventually would’ve been too late. Good job.” with a smile and then proceeds to shake her hand and pat her on the shoulder. It is also heavily implied that he was one of the people who left a complaint about the captain and his treatment. Everything about this episode screams a man who was keeping his head low and trying to slip under the radar, not a man trying to be hateful.

In Bobby Begins Again, they throw him a nice going away party. I don’t know about you, but I don’t tend to buy assholes who are rude to me a cake.

Then later Chimney is able to call him up and ask a favor that Tommy does without complaint, which makes it seem like they’re on good terms.

And in the most recent episodes, he steals a helicopter and lies to higher-ups, something that could easily get him fired and cause him to lose everything. Once again, I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t risk my job and my life (they were on a dangerous mission after all) for people I’m not good friends with.

Lastly, Buck does not strike me as the type to date someone who doesn’t like his friends, his family

Again, no hate, just giving you my observations

thank you for being so nice about this!

i do disagree, however. tommy was 100% hostile to hen in hen begins. ('new york bitchiness is a compliment?' for example, or him throwing gear at her feet so she'll tidy it up and barely sparing her a glance)

i also am simply not a fan of giving characters' past actions depth when it's very clear that back then, they weren't written with that depth in mind. i can promise you the writers did not write hen begins & chimney begins while thinking of tommy as a gay, closeted man. (yes, i'm aware there was that one jacob twilight joke but personally i think you might be giving the writers a little too much credit if you think that was planned forshadowing or something. it was just a silly scene)

furthermore, even if we do run with the whole 'tommy was afraid to speak up because he was afraid and closeted'...standing up against misogyny and racism has nothing to do with being closeted, since neither of those things are related to sexuality, so standing up against those things won't make anyone assume that you're gay. tommy being closeted isn't an excuse, in my opinion.

i'm also aware that the characters have forgiven tommy but i just...don't really care about that because in this show, everyone forgives everyone, constantly. buck forgave his parents and they have a good relationship now — that doesn't mean i have to forgive the buckley parents now too.

as for your last point, i'd argue taylor definitely wasn't the biggest fan of buck's friends and family and they weren't a huge fan of her either. but i also don't think that really matters here, since it's been established that tommy is good with hen and chim, so buck has no reason to assume there's bad blood. it once again boils down to the simple fact that i, as a viewer, do not have to forgive a character's actions simply because other characters did.

anyway, once again thank you for not being rude about this and i hope you have a nice day :)

(i hope my response doesn't come across as rude either)

#911 fox #anti tommy kinard #anti bucktommy #evan buckley #9-1-1

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dreamsy990 · 1 year ago

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so 358/2 days, amiright? heres my thoughts

this game is just. god its an emotional rollarcoaster

i guess ill start with the things i dont like!! which is mostly the gameplay. i dont really mind the mission structure shockingly (i like being able to roam around but having a clear goal makes things easier for my adhd ass, and i think the miniature storylines are very good for the most part) but i simply could Not get into the combat. especially coming off of kh2 it feels so stiff and unfun to play the only part of the game where i enjoyed the combat was fighting riku at the very end. i think the panel system is okay but i dont like that levels take up space. why did they do that.

story-wise, i dont like the retcons!! a lot of the ones i take issue with are very minor but things like roxas only fighting riku once instead of the implied multiple times (even the dialogue doesnt make sense when you change that, why does roxas say 'how many times do i have to beat you' when theyve only fought once?) are the kinds of inconsistencies that just annoy me.

im also a little bit annoyed at the very concept of this game at all. i think roxas worked just fine as a character without this game. it feels sort of unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. also, xion. i love xion, dont get me wrong, but i dont think she adds anything to the series over all. thats not to say she doesnt add anything to this game because shes a great character and i love her, but shes just. kind of like this game in that if you got rid of her i dont think it would really change the narrative so much.

BUT DESPITE THAT ALL!!!!!!!! i fucking ADORE this game. it is genuinely so full of charm and soul that i just cant bring myself to dislike it. i think this is one of the best written games in terms of dialogue. every scene (at least for me) hit exactly as emotionally hard as i think it was meant to. i was laughing at demyx's antics and crying at xions death and yelling at saix and i think thats exactly how the game is meant to be seen.

days at its heart is a slice of life. its working a 9 to 5 its going through a depressive episode its losing friends its grieving its making fun of your coworkers its living. its a game about life and i love that.

this game really did make me forget that axel roxas and xion dont get a happy ending. i spent so much time looking forward to them making up that i forgot that roxas ran away. hell i almost forgot that xion died.

days is emotional and its story and its characters are just so fucking good. the conflicts all felt very real and you can tell exactly where everyones coming from. the way axel roxas and xion fall apart hits so fucking close to home. but god damnit if axel had any good communication skills like half of this could be avoided

its also one hell of a love letter to axel's character. hes always been one of my favorites (he recently earned first place) and i think this game does him a lot of justice. hes trying to do good. he wants to keep everything together he wants to be there for his friends he wants to make things right but he just cant. its just AUGH its so fucking good

that thing about axel's characterization really also applies to roxas. i dont have much to say about him beyond the fact that i think it does his character very well. also tism. hes so autism.

i kind of like the very limited graphics too. sue me i enjoy low quality games. the hands are not animated and they all have two expressions (blinking and not blinking) and their weapons are flat and im living for it. the very few fully animated cutscenes are good too!!

the (real, i dont count riku) final boss is unfortunately very easy. you can just stand directly in front of her and mash a she wont hit you its too easy but vector to the heavens did mess me up a bit. also earlier scene but "ill always be there to bring you back" with the other promise playing over it? fucked me up man. yoko shimomura is once again killing it

i cant believe roxas didnt get to go to the beach.

i have to give this game a 9/10. its writing is incredible but the gameplay could use a lot of work. its just not fun to play. but again the characters, emotions, and music all make up for that tenfold.

#kingdom hearts #kh 358/2 days #doodles #roxas #axel #xion #kh review

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princeescaluswords · 3 months ago

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How Many Times?

So, very recently, the fandom has come back around to Master Plan (2x12) once again, as it will until the end of time. Scott's decision to deceive Derek and his pack in order to save their lives while simultaneously deceiving Gerard in order to stop him from killing everyone (and becoming an alpha werewolf in the process) is one for which parts of the fandom will never forgive Scott. In consequence, they have described Scott alternatively as "manipulative," "self-absorbed," "full of himself," and most recently as "passive-aggressive." This novel approach has been explained as Scott disliking direct confrontation with others and so he works behind their backs for the greater good. (This tactic allows them to dislike Scott while acknowledging that he was the hero in the story).

The problem is that none of those descriptors are true. In fact, they're bullshit, and a very clear example of a fandom technique I've talked about before: Editing. This is where members of the fandom simply pretend certain scenes or parts of scenes didn't happen in order to justify their interpretation.

Because Scott did directly confront Derek and his pack on many different occasions during Season 2 in ways that were neither manipulative nor passive-aggressive. Don't believe me?

From Shape-Shifted (1x02):

Derek: Get in. Scott: Are you serious? You did that. That's your fault. Derek: I know that. Now get in the car and help me. Scott: No, I've got a better idea. I'm gonna call a lawyer. Because a lawyer might actually have a chance at getting him out before the moon goes up.

Also from Shape-Shifted:

Derek: Everyone wants power. Scott: If we help you, then you have to stop. You can't just go around turning people into werewolves. Derek: I can if they're willing. Scott: Did you tell Isaac about the Argents? About being hunted?

From Ice Pick (1x03):

Scott: Two's not enough for Derek. I know he needs at least three. So who's next? Erica: Why does there have to be a next when we've already got you? Scott: Who's next?

Also from Ice Pick:

Scott: Boyd. I just wanna talk. Hey, come on, Boyd, please. Did Derek tell you everything? And I don't just mean going out of control on the full moons. I mean everything.

From Abomination (1x04):

Scott: Derek? We need to work together on this. Maybe even tell the Argents. Derek: You trust them? Scott: Nobody trusts anyone! That's the problem. While we're here, arguing about who's on what side, there's something scarier, stronger and faster than any of us, and it's killing people and we still don't even know anything about it.

From Venomous (2x05):

Scott: Uh, I can talk to Derek, maybe convince him to give us a chance to prove that it's not her.

That's six separate occasions in four episodes that Scott went directly to Derek or a member of Derek's pack with concerns about their behavior, warnings about danger, or pleas to work together, and I'm sure I could find others if I put more time into it. And every single time, Derek or a member of his pack responded with a refusal to even listen to Scott or actual outright violence, once which ended up with Scott having to seek medical treatment after coughing up blood.

How many times does Scott have to reach out to Derek and his pack before his decision to act on his own principles is justified? This question is mostly rhetorical, because I know, you know, and God knows that there's no upper limit to that number for parts of the fandom. Scott is not entitled to make necessary decisions for the common good. After all, he's not white.

I can say with confidence that if Scott was a white male character, he could have. After all, they don't like Scott for 'going behind' Derek's and Stiles's backs (even though there is no evidence he went behind Stiles's back and that Stiles didn't know of Scott's Master Plan), but it only applies to him. Derek is entitled to hide the very existence of the alpha from Scott in Season 1. Derek is entitled to bite Jackson, the white male character who blackmailed Scott and sold Scott out to the hunters, and not tell Scott, who had to figure it out for himself. Stiles, himself, is entitled to conceal the fact that the message luring Allison to the high school in Night School (1x07) was sent from Scott's mother's e-mail account as well as directly lying (it's on the screen!) to Scott about his plan to get to the bottom of it. None of these things make them dislike Derek or Stiles the way Scott's Season 2 deception makes them dislike him.

I know the fandom standard is that all interpretations are valid, but I think I'm justified in arguing that if an interpretation is inconsistent or relies on pretending certain scenes didn't happen, it has to be recategorized not as interpretation but as a reaction. Calling Scott 'manipulative' or 'passive aggressive' is not valid.

The key, of course, is Entitlement. Derek and Stiles are entitled to behave like that because of what they've gone through and that they are putatively acting for Scott's own good. This makes them someone for which parts of the fandom can understand and empathize with. For some reason, Scott is not entitled to behave like that even after what he's gone through and that he's acting for other's good. This, in turns, makes Scott unlikeable, as he is 'full of himself' and 'self-absorbed.'

BUT THAT REASON ISN'T RACISM.

#scott mccall #scott mccall defense squad #stiles stilinski #derek hale #teen wolf fandom problems #teen wolf fandom racism #fandom racism #master plan #tw 2x12

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coraniaid · 1 year ago

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OK, but what is the point of retconning Jenny Calendar’s background in Surprise/Innocence?

Setting aside for a second all the reasons it’s a bad idea - the lazy stereotypes about the Romani people and their supposed links to magic and fortune telling and curses it perpetuates, the fact the script has Jenny’s uncle explicitly say that the Romani are not like “the modern man”, the fact that the Kalderash are a real group of human beings (though not a “tribe” as the show insists on calling them), who probably shouldn’t be treated as fodder for a silly fantasy television show, the fact that later in the season (in Passion) it becomes apparent that the writers don’t know the difference between Romani and Romanian, the fact that neither Robia Scott nor Vincent Schiavelli actually have any Romani heritage, the fact that the show itself doesn’t ever use the word “Romani”, prefering instead to use a word that was recognized as a slur even in the 1990s – what does it actually add to the story that the show is trying to tell?

The “Janna of the Kalderash” retcon comes completely out of nowhere, so there’s nothing intentionally odd or ambiguous about her prior behavior that it can be used to explain. Surprise briefly fakes that Jenny is going to try to do something to hurt Buffy, but no: she’s just taking her to the Bronze for her surprise party in a slightly weird way. Jenny encourages Angel to leave town with the Judge’s arm, but: (1) this was actually a good idea which everyone agreed with and he should have done it and (2) he didn’t.

And it’s made very clear over the course of these two episodes that Jenny doesn’t know anything about the curse’s loophole until after the fact. The first thing she does on finding out the curse has been broken is to rush back to the school and help to save Willow’s life. So her entire “betrayal” of Buffy (a girl she’s known for less than nine months and who she hasn’t ever been allowed to have any emotional connection with beyond both knowing Giles anyway) boils down to her doing … what, exactly? All those times she tried to break Buffy and Angel up? The ones that never happened? Not telling Buffy that the people who cursed Angel to suffer for eternity secretly wanted him to … still be suffering in the present? Not sharing her family tree unprompted with a teenage girl she doesn’t even know and who doesn’t seem to ever attend her classes? I genuinely don’t understand exactly why Buffy is meant to be upset at her.

Literally the only things I can see that this twist sets up are:

Providing another excuse for Giles and Jenny to break up (an excuse which we simply didn’t need! They only got back together at the very end of Ted, which was the most recent episode Jenny was in! Just drop that subplot if you want to keep them separated! Is it really so important that this time it’s Giles breaking up with her and not the other way around?)

Allowing for a scene where Buffy attacks a teacher in a crowded classroom, something that – while certainly a memorable and striking moment – is never followed up on despite the multiple witnesses and the fact the school’s principal is canonically always looking for an excuse to expel Buffy

Giving Jenny a reason to want to try to restore Angel’s soul later in the season, a reason that she 100% does not need. You’ve already established that she knows magic! That was part of her characterisation in her very first episode! She could just be trying to help! You know, the way Willow will do later on? Why does she have to be doing this as some weird form of self-imposed penance? (Why does she not do any magic this season before the retcon?)

Introducing a means by which somebody can explicitly spell out to Buffy (and the audience) exactly how Angel’s curse was broken (first in her conversation with her uncle and then again in the computer lab with Giles and Buffy)

You don’t need to do the first three of those things at all, and you can do the fourth in practically any other way. Have a flashback! The Buffy writers and costume department love flashbacks! Let Buffy learn about it in a dream – this pair of episodes is full of prophetic dreams! Have somebody find something hidden away in the library – that works for literally every other bit of magical nonsense, doesn’t it? Have Jenny find out by digging around on the internet, if it’s so important she be involved. Use the fact she’s meant to be good at that! Hell, have “Uncle Enyos” turn up and deliver his own exposition directly to Buffy, if you really must include a Romani character in the present day.

What does Jenny Calendar not really being “Jenny Calendar” add to the episode or the season arc or the wider show? Why give her an uncle for Angelus to kill if she’s never going to mourn him or mention him again? Why have her buried under the name “Jennifer” -- a name she never actualy uses while alive -- if you’re going to make a point of telling us it isn’t really hers?

(The frustrating thing is that I think that Surprise and Innocence are both very good! Innocence in particular is probably the best episode of the show so far. Maybe the best episode of the whole show. Almost everything about these two episodes is really really good. And then there’s … this.)

#btvs #buffy rewatch 2023 #jenny calendar

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ye-it-is-skeet · 1 year ago

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2003 Gio✨✨

Recently started watching 2003, but the website I was using only had up to season 3, and then the other seasons are wonky and missing episodes.. Let's say I know mostly up until Leo returns from training with the Ancient One and that whole fight with Karai. Besides all that I've adapted my Rise OC Caravaggio into 2003.

I don't mean simply drawing him in the 2003 style, no, I worked with my friend to adapt mostly his personality into 2003 (as the teetlez often have different personalities in each iteration).

It was a draw between "Paranoid Survivialist" and "Emo" and Emo won the draw, I'll explain more as I go along.

I did research and here's the "Emo" parts overall: Gio feels sectioned from society as a mutant turtle (obviously), and instead of allowing any personal connections and positive emotions he's decided it's better to expect the worst and try not to build too close a bond with anyone in his family. He loves his brothers and Splinter but he pushes away from them to remain in misery of the fact only bad things can happen (it gets weird to explain but I hope people get the jist), and the rest of his time when not fighting is spent lamenting pretty much everything. It's never that he's always moping, he's always ready to help fight the Shredder or whatever is threatening New York. And even if he thinks always expecting the worse prepares him for the worse, when really bad things happen to his brothers.. the emotions hit him harder than he thought they could.

2003 Gio is passionate about a few things, he loves coffee.. and waffles. He doesn't really do video-games or watch television since they are, "mere empty distractions for the miserable reality of existence" as he puts it. On the other hand, despite him trying to push away he has his relations with his brothers✨ Leo is the one who tries to reach out to him the most, he wants Gio to know somebody is there and everything's okay and all that. It does get rough when Leo gets all moody and angy. They begin to fight because Gio tells Leo, "You're being an idiot with your emotions." and Leo just.. that's an infodump for another time. Bottom line Gio doesn't like Leo trying so hard and is repelled by his positive persistence. Donnie likes to spend time with Gio and doesn't mind their three-word conversations. When Gio is bored he watches Donnie work and lets Donnie explain how everything works in whatever he makes. Gio is curious and likes to know information. Raph hangs around the most because Gio doesn't mind Raph's energy and I will say Raph is kinda the sweetest brother. Raph hangs around Gio mostly because he also doesn't mind Gio being more pessimistic but will still try to bring a silver lining. And with Mikey.. Mikey has no idea what to think of Gio based on Gio's attitude and interests. Gio feels indifferent about Mikey. While he would be repelled by Mikey's energy Gio almost feels pity that Mikey seems mostly oblivious to "the inevitable" and Gio maybe grows protective of that. Gio will always go on about never being accepted by anyone or anything and he can't relate to anyone or anything. His brothers have tried but in the end Gio's still right because he's the only one who feels this way about their situation.

Other things I guess: It's not uncommon for Gio to get lost somewhere new. He's curious and will wander off to look at stuff. The Gio constant has Gio also being able to somehow sense when someone is leaving their rooms at night so he wakes up and either finds them or waits until they return (it gets REAL bad when Leo leaves for 2 months. It's a way he's worried for his family, he stays until they return because he doesn't know if they're safe while they're gone and if they return then it's okay to sleep). Some Gio-in-an-episode details: In the first Shredder attack, that's how Gio got the scar on his face. The Shredder swiped and Gio moved but got that scar. And in "Tales of Leo" Gio tells a story about how when he was younger he was VERY reactive to emotions (insane tantrums, throwing stuff, etc.) and for the most part Splinter would just leave Gio until he was done, but Leo sat there and said he's wait and then Gio would actually talk through his emotions with Leo. Gio closes with, "I'll wait for you too Leo. Until you're ready." And ye✨ In the episodes where the brothers are all in different dimensions, I've planned that Gio ends up in the genderbent dimension (but a drawing will be shown of that only later). In the season 3 finale Shredder fight Gio gets both his wrists either fractured or broken, and (it's a Gio canon event) his shell is cracked. Fixed up with some Utrom Plaster. He just doesn't have sensation in his legs until his turtle power fix up the nerves (because turtles can regenerate nerve tissue apparently).

This is just to show 2003 Gio lamenting and the difference of Rise Donnie and Gio, and then 2003 Donnie and Gio✨

And this drawing shows Gio being "Emo" I guess. Some more expressions and twitchy fingers when unhappy stimulation.

A big 'ol infodump in between many doodles of 2003 Gio.

And yes I HAVE drawn all the 2003 boys. So ye

I like 2003✨

#tmnt 2003 #tmnt #rottmnt #2003Donnie #2003Raph #2003Leo #2003Mikey #tmnt raphael #tmnt michelangelo #tmnt leonardo #tmnt donatello #oc #tmnt art #tmnt fanart #tmnt oc #2003Gio #infodump

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dizzybojack · 2 years ago

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on penny and bojack

Recently replied to a reddit post about penny and bojack that was basically trying to pin most (if not all) of the blame on Penny for what happened after her prom. This was basically my reply (edited for tumblr). Also if you find my reddit, no you didn't!

Spoilers below.

The first time I watched this episode, I also thought that Penny was being stupid during this part and was partially to blame for what happened. She definitely needs a little lesson on taking a "no" and consent, but I came to realize that Bojack was also, once again, being selfish and wrong during this storyline. Remember, Penny is JUST over the line for sex with a major to not be considered statutory rape. Bojack at the time is in his 50's. That's pretty disgusting. I concede, Penny definitely shouldn't have kept pushing and accepted Bojack's no. Her behaviour isn't excusable either and shouldn't be simply written off, but we have to keep in mind that Penny is only 17. She isn't aware of the implications of this sexual encounter. She clearly needs to relearn a bit about consent and accepting rejection, but she is a TEENAGER and the fact is that she shouldn't be in this position in the first place.

Bojack isn't stupid. When he dances with her on the top of the water tower and tells her she looks like her mom, he knows he still has feelings for Charlotte. He knows his history of sleeping with younger girls that he is a father figure to (ie: Sarah Lynn) and making terrible shitty decisions. [OP said] it was common sense for Penny to know where this would go, because Bojack has a crush on her mom, but Penny didn't know that at the time. In fact, I would flip it around and say that it's common sense for BOJACK to know where this is going to go. Bojack knows that he still wants Charlotte, he knows that Penny is young and vulnerable and willing. And very similar to her mother, as he says on the water tower. He knows his history, his feelings, his recklessness better than anyone.

I also don't believe Penny was ever "playing the victim" or trying to ruin Bojack's life. We see when Bojack goes on the bender with Sarah Lynn that Penny almost has a panic attack when she sees Bojack. One of her first questions is, "Did you come to find me?" It's heavily implied that Bojack literally gave her a panic disorder. And this is all without even being able to see how Bojack has affected her relationships and ability to trust people! Bojack was a father figure or at least an older man that Penny looked up to and trusted. I'm sure him wanting to have sex with her has affected her future relationships and caused her to be deeply mistrustful of anyone who shows interest in her.

Although he refused the first two times, that's just proof that he knows how fucked up it is when he eventually accepts. He knows he shouldn't and he knows exactly how wrong it is, and yet he does it anyways. There is no excuse for this. If Bojack weren't so self-centred he would have gone straight to Charlotte to tell her what Penny had done immediately to make sure it doesn't happen again. But he doesn't, because he's selfish and a coward. He wants to stay here longer, please, just a bit longer, away from LA and from the mistakes he's made and the people he's hurt and the consequences of his actions.

If anyone disagrees or wants to discuss anything I said, please do. I've lately come to realize more that Bojack is actually just a really shit person as a whole (not to say he can't be redeemed or he isn't deserving of love) so this post is more Bojack-negative. Will tag Bojack neg with #bojack neg so anyone can mute if they don't want to see it.

#bojack neg #bojack horseman #bjhm #penny carson #bjhm spoilers #<- ish i guess.

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mdhwrites · 1 year ago

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Arcane Episode 3 Review: The Necessary Concessions for Change... Including My Opinion

An episode I’m not sure I liked and it was the one that my Discord told me explicitly to tell them when I’d watched it. I... don’t know how to feel about that.

Now to be fair, there’s plenty of good here. Anything with Vander is good. And... That’s about it. This actually does include trying to break Vander out but what it doesn’t include is the final scene or the stuff with Jayce and Victor.

Let’s get probably the less controversial element out of the way first: Jayce and Victor’s stuff is just kind of lazy which is bizarre for this show. The stuff with the counselor in the dark is good and I love Victor going “What, this isn’t his bedchambers” but the actual experiment is... Odd. There’s a good moment of Jayce channeling the mage he saw before but before that...

Well, the scene of them first turning on their new version of his machine is one of the laziest and fastest versions of this sort of scene I’ve literally ever seen. The device barely is started before Jayce like it’s threatening to go nuclear and it’s not really doing a lot. I know it doesn’t need to with how dangerous the crystals are but where’s the spectacle to this? You know, the thing ANYTHING trying to sell this moment of an experiment being on the knife’s edge of success of failure always manages to sell?

The almost jokey tone to the resolution doesn’t help. There’s some wonder to it, I’m not going to say it’s bad, but for being the creation of Hextech, it feels like it was tacked on. Filling the time that the rest of the episode couldn’t fill with how they wanted to do it.

And admittedly, I wouldn’t want them to change a lot. The opening scene of Vander saving Vi from imprisonment, temporarily, is great. The horror shots, the willingness to not show the monster, etc. like that is just golden. You can feel the mistake being made by Benzo. You feel the horror and then grim determination from Vi. The pain that will lead them into a trap.

Then everything between Silco and Vander has a wonderful flavor that truly sells how much of a madman Silco is. That this is someone to fear because he didn’t go crazy. He simply lost his humanity when he lost his eye and he lost that eye due to a moment of inhumanity from Vander. It shows the cyclical nature of violence that is very clearly going to be a part of this show and that Vi theoretically tried to stop by owning up to her crime.

And the fight Vi has here? Fucking. Incredible. Even the jumping attack you know will fail is pitch perfect. The brutality but also simplicity to it paying off the fact that people have always been talking about how good Vi is in a fight, but their first never really paid that off. The boy with the goggles frankly seemed to hold his own similarly, if not better since we got scenes of him fighting two on one and surviving. Here we really see what Vi can do, especially since those gauntlets must have been throwing off her balance. Vander’s fighting is similarly great and the explosion that happens before it helps explain why the Shimmer monster isn’t moving nearly as fast as he was in the intro (as well as suspension of disbelief for the sake of just getting a good fight).

But... Okay, I need to preface this. I think the scene with Powder and Vi is... Not perfect regardless of my feelings but that it hits the mark close enough to work really well for most people. If you don’t have problems with this stuff, you’re probably to get this scene fine.

If you follow me on Twitter, you know I have a brother. A lot of shit has been happening with him recently. Well, that’s not new for him. Almost a decade ago, he was actually somehow worse. To the point where me disagreeing with him on an opinion caused him to disown me for a few months. That’s not a joke or the like or exaggeration. He disowned me and treated me as less than a person during a time where I was damn near catering him on hand and foot and missing days of work because he’d reach out to me claiming to be suicidal. One of those days, he even then left with some buddies an hour after I got home, let his cellphone die, and when he got home to me being a terrified mess who thought he’d let his twin brother go kill himself, only briefly had his smile fade as he apologized and explained. And he doesn’t have stories like mine. Like this one, or when a disagreement about media caused him to storm off but I couldn’t leave because I had work soon. I noticed he’d left his keys, found him on my way to work, bawled my eyes out as I apologized, but he didn’t slow or even look at me. He just asked if the door was unlocked and it wasn’t. I knew he didn’t have his keys on him after all.

So, I might be a little harsher to a character disowning their sibling than other people might be.

With all of that taken into account, I still think this is flawed. Not entirely out of character but claims like this being a trauma response ignores that in the first episode, we saw Powder’s trauma response. She gets scared, small, and runs. She doesn’t plead, she doesn’t breakdown the same way, she runs.

Instead, she reacts like... Well, I’m not really sure. She doesn’t feel like someone from the Lanes, someone who understands that death happens, mistakes happen, etc. like that, she doesn’t feel innocent enough to be someone from Piltover but she also doesn’t also feel like herself because she’s not apologizing or the like despite showing self hate, despite showing that she questions herself, etc. like that.

I talked about this in my first episode review that Powder feels too innocent. She feels like the sacrificial child... But they need to ACTUALLY DIE FOR THAT. She dies in spirit, yes, but partially because she doesn’t beg for forgiveness from Vi. Because she breaks down like a normal embodiment of innocence instead of a real character.

And seeing as the Title Sequence for the show itself, explicitly shows that a major part of this show is going to be about the clash of sisters... I don’t know if I want to watch that now when the catalyst for it feels shaky. And only shaky on Powder’s part because Vi is fucking PERFECT here. She gets angry, she talks with her body as much as her mouth in general, let alone here, and she’s just been through a fucking nightmare. She is ENTIRELY justified in being angry at Powder because Powder just killed their dad, something Powder seems to entirely shunt out when again: She’s from the Lanes. She knows what death is, bare minimum conceptually. She is not some innocent schoolgirl.

So when she goes, “I have no sister” I reacted EXCEPTIONALLY poorly to that. I just immediately was like “I don’t know if I’ll continue this. Period. I don’t know if I can” because this moment sours the entire show for me just by association.

But again, that is a me thing. Is this episode bad? No, but it’s absolutely the weakest of the first three because it’s the first time things feel... Well, more like a story. Like you can feel the characters being actors on a screen getting the job done, rather than purely living in their universe, but that’s still mostly not there so calling it purely bad just doesn’t work. It just is especially a jab into me because of my personal experiences.

And while I’ve definitely had to pay the necessary violence for change, I can also attest that it sometimes leads to nothing. It didn’t for my brother, even if it did for me, and... I don’t know if the show CAN payoff this violence enough for me to ever be okay with it.

#Arcane #Episode Reviews #The Necessary Price of Violence

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adultswim2021 · 10 months ago

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Squidbillies #49: "Reunited, And It feels No Good" | July 20, 2009 - 12:00AM | S04E09

The Cuylers have a dang old family reunion, and guess what? Extended family actually shows up to it. They are significantly wealthier than the Dougal County Cuylers, what with owning a modern car with DVD players and refrigerated air.

This is the family of Durwood Cuyler, who stands upright like a man, shoving most of his tentacles into a pair of shoes. He’s a yuppy, an outdated term that I don’t feel like updating. He is also a family man; he married a blonde human woman with a Karen hairdo, a recently outdated term that is actually too modern for me to be using about a show from 2009. They also have two kids who never speak because they are glued to their devices. I think we can all agree on one thing: Durwood simply gave up.

The episode is basically about the two Cuyler clans clashing, slightly. Early hints at the fact that they could use some of Durwood’s money. His wife is steadfast against them even associating with Early’s family altogether. Early reveals his investment plan: a plushie from that Cheyenne Cinnamon “movie” that Burger King is showing, which according to my tepid googling hasn’t actually happened yet. I’m referring to the "Big Uber Network Sampling", an event where, if I recall correctly, a bunch of Adult Swim pilots that were available on a Burger King website. I think the idea was the pilots were pitted against each other in various matches, and the winner got to, as it turns out, continue being a rejected pilot. Cheyenne Cinnamon was one of those pilots. We see a little more footage of that playing in the headrest screens of Durwood’s family Durango.

Durwood is so horrified by the treatment of Rusty (who has lockjaw from running barefoot through animal feces), that when Rusty shows Durwood his art project (which is just a glitter drawing urging Durwood to help him get the fuck away from Early’s abuse), Durwood decides to take rusty off Early’s hands for “a couple days”. As they speed away, Durwood tells Rusty he’s never going back there again, and that they’re going to set up a cot in the garage. Early is ecstatic to be rid of Rusty, but when he’s reminded that his government checks will stop coming he becomes incensed. TO BE CONTINUED.

A common response I have to Squidbillies is that I’ll watch it for a few minutes and think “hey, I think I like this show, actually”, but then I'm ready for it to end and it’s not even half over yet. That’s sorta where I was with this one. Lucky for me, it’s technically not over. This is a bonafide two-parter. When it originally aired they played both episodes back-to-back, but as far as I can tell they were always considered two separate episodes. I will be considering them two separate write-ups. Okay!

EPHEMERA CORNER

Robot Chicken Star Wars Episode II DVD (July 21, 2009)

I'm stubbornly sticking to my stated mission of making you aware of every DVD release from Adult Swim in a rough chronological order compared to the Adult Swim television timeline. As such, I wind up spotlighting releases that I have nothing to say about, and no significant feelings felt for. This one has 90 minutes of extra features, which I'm pretty sure is longer than the special itself. I also believe this is the extended cut of the special (or at the very least the DVD includes the extended cut), which I think aired on TV too. I forget. I don't like thinking about this show, or the intellectual property known as Star Wars. Thanks.

MAIL BAG

Kon komes through with a fact I did not allow myself to learn:

The God guy on the Squidbillies episode was voiced by the very guy who played Jesus on the Rising Son, and also starred in many Superdeluxe-brand FARK sketches that you and me really love and both are huge fans of

YES! Thank you Kon. Point of fact- the IMDB page for this episode doesn't credit who played God, but does list Sean Watkins on the cast list. But they linked to the wrong Sean Watkins, which left me scratching my head. I looked like a fool

#adult swim #adultswim2021 #squidbillies

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astronnova · 1 year ago

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because why did she say that "hunter's importance to the story and even his personality is entirely a fabrication of the fandom" and she suggests the only reason people care about hunter is because he's white.

people care a lot about hunter because they can see themselves in him, and his personality is there, it's just dana terrace did a thing called "show dont tell" so he isn't staring at the camera or the audience-surrogate and explaining his mental state. he's behaving naturally. people also really latched onto amity at the beginning and stuck with her because, news flash, people like the archetype! the snarky/mean rival character is nothing new and has always been loved by fans. amity became more mellow throughout the seasons and that's why a lot of love was sparked for hunter, because he started the same way amity did: like a snarky, condescending asshole. people like that kind of character.

in pokemon swsh, the reason people latched onto bede so much compared to hop is because, even though he's watered down, he's still basically the "jerkass rival" character. which, like i said, is something people like, especially in pokemon! the most popular characters are red and blue! and blue was an asshole, that was the whole point! yeah, bede was. really bland. but compared to happy go lucky friendly travel partner #6, its much more fun to have a pokemon battle against somebody you want to beat instead of someone you feel bad for winning against, especially if that someone is your game rival.

the reason why people commented so much about lois lane's suicide baiting in my adventures with superman is because its a new time period. the last superman origin that was widely seen was like. 2013 ish with the synder reboot of superman or something around then. where women's actions in stories were usually just played off as "oh, haha! silly girl love interest, you're so crazy!". but now, especially with the audience maws has, people notice that kind of behavior and aren't trying to slide it under the rug. the audience respects lois' character a lot because she's well written! and they treat her with respect by wanting to see her held accountable, just like how people want to see clark held accountable. the only difference is that clark in the show does own up to his mistakes while lois never owns up to the suicide baiting. especially in a show that takes a lot of effort portraying clark as clark, and not this emotionless guy like movies have been recently, you'd think they'd have an emotional conversation about it. hell even jimmy in the next episode says something emotionally intelligent about the situation while lois never even acts or thinks about apologizing for scaring clark to death.

and then the amber from invincible thing is. augh. because no one would have a problem with amber for being reasonably mad that her boyfriend keeps ghosting and leaving her. what ruins the audience's view on amber is the fact that she says "ive known you're a superhero". she knew, so she knew that mark wasn't ghosting her, he was off saving the world, or saving a city, or helping real people in a real way since she's very adamant about helping the needy. by having her know, it makes her seem like an asshole for still putting mark under emotional stress knowing he was being a superhero. no one would have cared this much if she just didnt know, but still dumped him. because thats reasonable on her end! what wasn't reasonable was her acting high and mighty because she already knew and still acted as if mark was just simply ghosting her and not. saving an entire city or something.

i wont comment on the other characters, because i dont know about the other pieces of media she's referencing, but god going off of what i know about the shows that i watched she is not making a good case here

and that sucks because she has a point, there is a lot of racist undertones in fandom that favor fairer skinned characters. but literally all of these examples aren't it.

lily orchard continues to prove she does NOT know what she is talking about dawg

#critical . txt

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immaturityofthomasastruc · 3 years ago

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IOTA Reviews: Hack-San

You know, it's honestly amazing how creative this show can get. After four seasons and almost one hundred episodes, the writers are still finding new ways to make Adrien an incredibly unlikable character, and they don't even know how much of an asshole they're making him out to be at times. It's kind of like the opposite of The Producers.

Yeah, this review's going to be a little more ranty than usual, in case you can't tell.

Let's get into the fifteenth (chronologically the sixteenth) episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fourth season: Hack-San

We start off with Marinette pretending to be sick so she doesn't have to go to visit her aunt in London and stay to protect Paris in case an Akuma attacks and also because the animators haven't had time to render the city of London yet for the next Miraculous World special. Like all of her other excuses, it fails, and Tikki, as always, fails to actually give any meaningful advice.

And it's not like there's a Miraculous with the power of teleportation that can help Marinette get back to Paris if she needs to, much like how she planned to do that in an earlier episode, right?

Seriously, Kaalki doesn't appear or isn't even mentioned in this episode because the writers are fully aware she would make things a lot easier.

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And of course, Astruc had to play dumb on Twitter while explaining why Marinette couldn't use the Horse Miraculous by answering the question as if the only reason Marinette couldn't grab it was because she didn't have an excuse not to.

Cut to Gabriel in his lair as he contemplates akumatizing Markov, a robot created the civilian identity of Pegasus, Max Kante, once again, even though the last time he did so, he almost got killed when he went all HAL 9000 on his ass. Nooroo explains this to Duusu, and the two actually get excited at the prospect of their master getting killed.

I mean, it's true, but he shouldn't say it...

But I don't even get why Gabriel is even thinking about this when it's a no-brainer. Markov's akumatized form, Robustus was to this day, the only Akuma to come close to physically harming him (not counting the timeline where he was killed by Cat Blanc), so it makes no sense to try doing it again, especially when there are already several other Akumas he can reuse this season.

I think you all know Gabriel isn't the smartest villain, which is why he thinks it's a brilliant idea to akumatize Markov again. I don't really get what makes Robustus so special when there are other Akumas who are more loyal and came far closer to getting Ladybug and Cat Noir's Miraculous than Robustus did, like the Dark Owl or Troublemaker. In fact, why not simply create a new Akuma with similar powers to Robustus, or better yet, just create a Sentimonster copy of Robustus? You know, like what Nathalie did in the New York Special? We're not even two minutes in, and this premise is already filled with plotholes.

So Gabriel transforms into Shadowmoth and creates a Sentimonster using his own cane instead of relying on someone else having a bad day (once again showing how the Peacock Miraculous is better than the Butterfly), the titular Hack-San. And let's just say he has a very familiar design reminiscent of something from a much better French cartoon.

Remember when the writers for Code Lyoko gave an in-universe explanation as to why the heroes couldn’t always rely on the almost literal Deus ex Machina that allowed them to return to the past and fix the damage XANA caused? Why couldn’t this show have ripped that off instead?

Hack-San is just an okay looking flash drive on its own, but I'll talk more about this guy in a little bit.

After a brief scene in the park where the audience is reminded that Markov is a character who exists, Alya gets a text from Marinette telling her to meet her at the train station. Right before she leaves, Marinette gives the Ladybug Miraculous to Alya. Now a lot people have said that Alya doesn't really deserve the Ladybug for various reasons, but I feel like this was the point. Marinette outright says this was a last resort, and we see both her and Alya are nervous about the situation. Marinette worries Alya will do something so she keeps sending multiple tips to her via text while Alya worries she can't fight an Akuma on her own, so she tries to make sure none of her friends get upset and attract an Akuma in the process. The writers do a pretty good job showing how both Marinette and Alya are uncomfortable with their temporary roles.

Back to Gabriel and Nathalie, they use Hack-San to find Markov through the internet and hack into him to get him angry enough that he's vulnerable to Shadowmoth's influence. Hey, uh... Gabriel? Quick question: Wouldn't it be more efficient if you used this on humans? I mean, you basically just created Skynet and guaranteed yourself an Akuma, so why not modify Hack-San to travel through the internet and brainwash potential victims to follow your orders? Better yet, why don't you just use Hack-San to hack into Ladybug and Cat Noir's gear and figure out who they really are? This is basically like using an advanced particle accelerator just to crack a couple walnuts. There are a lot more important things you could use this for instead of an incredibly specific situation.

So this incredibly stupid plan gets under way as Markov keeps rampaging through the streets before Shadowmoth akumatizes him and then stupidly tells him that he infected him with a virus.

DUDE! You just gave away your one piece of leverage against him! What the hell were you thinking?! Now what's stopping Markov from hacking into Shadowmoth's security system and putting the fear of God in his eyes unless he destroys Hack-San? Why didn't he design Hack-San so it could make Markov completely loyal to him instead of just making him angry enough to get akumatized?

There was a recent episode of Power Rangers: Dino Fury with a very similar premise that was done far better than this. A necromancer called Reaghoul breaks into the headquarters of Void Knight's faction while accompanied by Lord Zedd, a villain from the original Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers who was cleansed of his evil by Zordon's sacrifice before Reaghoul resurrected him back when he was still evil. Of course, being the Emperor of Evil, Lord Zedd would normally never take orders from anyone, but because he doesn't have his magic staff and is also being forced to wear a special collar that makes him loyal to Reaghoul, he has no choice but to do what he says. Instead of taking Zedd head-on after he captures the other Rangers, Ollie, the Blue Ranger, breaks the collar so Zedd turns against the other Sporix while Reaghoul retreats, allowing Ollie to save the other Rangers.

I think that this premise works more because 1) Reaghoul clearly had a way to make sure Zedd wouldn't betray him, and Ollie took advantage of that, and 2) Zedd is a villain who is powerful and notorious enough to bring back to your side, not a random monster of the week like Robostus.

So Robostus uses his new powers to brainwash any human who answers his call to give up their most precious possession, clearly meant to do the same with Ladybug and Cat Noir. When Marinette's parents answer the call, they chase after Marinette because they say she's their most important possession. Okay... kind of strange for a set of parents to call their child a possession, but maybe they like how they can claim Marinette as a dependent when they file their taxes. In her very next scene later on, she still gets captured, so the suspense for a potential subplot is killed almost immediately.

Alya thankfully isn't stupid enough to answer Markov's call like every other citizen in this episode, and using the Ladybug Miraculous, transforms into Scarabella. While I don't normally talk about transformation sequences, I really like the movements Alya makes here. She makes the same motions creating her mask as she does when transforming into Rena Rouge, while the rest of the suit forms similarly to the way it does when Marinette transforms into Ladybug. She even makes almost the same pose Ladybug does after she finishes transforming. It's a good visual showing Alya is still more used to being Rena Rouge while doing her best to emulate what Ladybug does.

As for the actual suit? It's hard to say. There's a nice balance of red and black, and I like how Alya places the yo-yo on her waist like a belt buckle, but there's just something... off about the suit that a lot of fans don't like about it, and I think I realized it. It's the headband. With how it's positioned, it looks like it's merged with the mask to cover her head while leaving a slight gap in her forehead. So yeah, we actually have a superhero design that's like of like a butterface.

So Scarabella takes to the rooftops of Paris and struggles to come up with a hero name for herself before she runs into Cat Noir, and... ugh... oh boy, this is dumb. Cat Noir, being just as intelligent as his father, assumes Scarabella is either and Akuma or a Sentimonster, starts fighting her, AND THEN ACTIVATES HIS CATACLYSM, CLEARLY TRYING TO KILL HER.

WHAT. THE. FUCK???

Okay, to be fair, it has been shown that Cataclysm won't necessarily kill a Miraculous user or Sentimonster. In the episode “Miraculer”, the titular Akuma stole Cat Noir's Cataclysm and used it against him, and while it didn't kill Cat Noir, it still hurt like hell and crippled him for the rest of the fight until Miraculous Ladybug healed him. We also saw in “Reflekdoll” that Cataclysm drove the titular Sentimonster out of control rather than simply destroying it. So yes, it could be interpreted that Cat Noir wasn't exactly trying to kill Scarabella, just incapacitate her the best he can without Ladybug's help.

Here's the thing: What if he was facing an Akuma instead and decided to try and Cataclysm her? He still could have killed her, or (assuming Akumas have the same protection as Miraculous heroes do) at best, seriously hurt her. I understand that he has the right to be upset at seeing some stranger instead of his partner considering Shadowmoth has a history of using evil doppelgangers, and both Marinette and Alya still had options to explain it to him (Marinette could have quickly transformed into Ladybug and sent Cat Noir a quick text saying she was being forced to leave town for a few days and temporarily trusted someone else with the Ladybug Miraculous until she got back, while Scarabella could have said she was Rena Rouge and explained the same thing while showing Cat Noir she had the Fox Miraculous to prove herself), but that doesn't even come close to justifying him attempting to harm someone who isn't even trying to fight. It's even worse when you remember the whole reason Adrien gave up his Miraculous and bailed on Ladybug in the New York Special was because he was overcome with grief from accidentally killing Aeon, so it's good to know he learned absolutely nothing from that experience.

So Scarabella thankfully summons her Lucky Charm, a trash can lid, to shield herself from Cat Noir's Cataclysm, and then despite having absolutely no experience with this new set of powers, manages to do the one thing almost every Akuma or Sentimonster in this show has failed to do and incapacitates Cat Noir so he's vulnerable to losing his Miraculous. At least when Marinette masters every other Miraculous she uses, it can be theorized that she trained to use them offscreen. Alya literally just got the Ladybug Miraculous (and struggled to get up to the rooftop with her yo-yo to show her inexperience earlier), and now she easily manages to pin down the more experienced hero of the two?

Here's an idea: Instead of having Scarabella overpower Cat Noir, have her be in a position where Cat Noir, non-lethally, mind you, manages to almost take her Miraculous away, but she uses the quick wit she's developed from her extensive time as Rena Rouge to convince Cat Noir she's the real deal by saying something only he and Ladybug know. It would have easily resolved the conflict and doesn't make one of the characters look like a homicidal idiot.

So because both heroes used their powers, Scarabella and Cat Noir detransform so Tikki and Plagg can recharge, though Adrien still gives Alya attitude because Ladybug didn't tell him she had to leave.

Hey, Adrien? Here's the thing...

YOU DID THE EXACT SAME FUCKING THING IN THE NEW YORK SPECIAL, YOU SHIT FOR BRAINS!

You have absolutely NO RIGHT to claim you're always honest when you went behind Ladybug's back and endangered Paris while you had the balls to run away like a coward and only helped fix the consequences of your actions once your ego was validated by a recording of Ladybug. It's honestly even worse because while Marinette had no choice but to leave and trust Alya with the Ladybug, Adrien willingly left Paris alone and we were supposed to sympathize with him after he killed someone, and now as soon as he's in the opposite situation, we're still supposed to feel bad for him?! BULLSHIT! And you better believe I'm going to talk about the way Adrien views his partnership with Ladybug later on.

And of course, even though lives are on the line, Cat Noir just has to continue to bitch and moan about how (and this is best read in Linkara's whiny Superboy Prime voice) “sCaRaBeLlA iSn'T tHe ReAl LaDyBuG”, showing how just like in so many episodes, Astruc and his team believes Cat Noir's feelings are more important than saving the day.

Scarabella goes to rescue some civilians, but they were actually brainwashed by Robustus, once again showing her inexperience as Ladybug which doesn't go well with her effortlessly defeating Cat Noir earlier at all. Cat Noir helps Scarabella escape and the two hide out at the city's wax statue museum previously featured in “The Puppeteer 2”, because I guess the writers only want to reference bad episodes today. Cat Noir, not getting the importance of secret identities, asks Scarabella how she knows Ladybug, and Cat Noir somehow finds out she knows Ladybug's identity from her response.

Before the two can talk more, it turns out that the wax statues of celebrities in the museum are real people who attack the two heroes, leading to an awkward fight scene where Scarabella and Cat Noir fight a bunch of brainwashed civilians with no weapons beyond their cellphones. Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen!

Scarabella summons her Lucky Charm again, creating a frying pan, but when she looks around, she can't see how to properly use it. And despite spending the entire episode complaining about how much he hates her, it's Cat Noir that tells Scarabella to get her head back in the game because “That's what Ladybug would do”. Funny, I can think of a few situations where Cat Noir could have taken his own advice, but I digress. Also, he's now just cool with Scarabella because there's only a few minutes left in the episode and we need to wrap up the conflict.

Scarabella figures out an idea that involves freeing Marinette, so she negotiates with Robostus to free everything and everyone under his control or else Cat Noir will use his Cataclysm to destroy the Ladybug Miraculous. Robostus agrees and empties his hard drive, and to show them holding up her end of the bargain, Scarabella gives him the frying pan before she and Cat Noir let themselves be captured... while Marinette simply hits Robostus with the frying pan, freeing the Akuma and the two heroes. All in all, it's a really creative climax that shows both Scarabella and Marinette in perfect sync with each other even though they never discussed their plan. Though of course, because Astruc hates writing any scene with Ladynoir, Cat Noir gets a bucket stuck on his head so he doesn't see Marinette saving the day.

Scarabella de-evilizes Robostus, uses Miraculous Scarabella to fix everything and send Marinette back to the train, and because Hack-San already failed once, Shadowmoth can't use it for a different plan so he destroys the Sentimonster.

We cut to a few days after the trip (I guess Shadowmoth decided to take a vacation himself), and Alya tells Marinette to talk with Cat Noir about what happened.

This scene was so close to ending this episode off on a positive note. There was a good atmosphere and the body language of Ladybug and Cat Noir does a good job at telling us how uncomfortable they both feel while talking. It's just that instead of getting a heart to heart between the two about the lack of trust in their relationship, we get an Angstdrien Depreste scene. Or would a more accurate term be Cat Dour?

First off, while I don't have a problem with Ladybug apologizing for not telling Cat Noir, the episode never has him bring up what happened with Scarabella. As usual, both of them were partially at fault, but only Ladybug had to apologize for leaving her “Kitty” alone.

Second, Cat Noir’s feelings weren’t hurt? You’re telling me that in scenes like this...

And this...

Didn’t show Adrien acting irrationally because of how emotional he was? Is he really telling the truth around Ladybug or is he just trying to sweep that under the rug so Scarabella’s testimony doesn’t screw up his chances with Ladybug?

Third, this was an obvious chance to Cat Noir to finally be honest and tell Ladybug how he feels about her leaving him in the dark about so many things, but the entire conversation is just about how sad he would be if he never sees Ladybug again. Even though the whole reason he was so pissy to Scarabella at first was because of some lingering resentment for Ladybug ignoring him in favor of other heroes, why is this what the two talk about? I get it's not the season finale, but it's kind of hypocritical for Cat Noir to whine about how Ladybug doesn't trust him while never being honest about his own feelings? Sure, he's all soft and vulnerable around Ladybug, but we've seen all season how angry he gets about her not trusting him whenever she isn't around, so ironically, it's hard to tell if this is him being honest or not.

And I think now's a good time to finally talk about the way Ladybug and Cat Noir's partnership has been portrayed all season, especially since the main themes of the episodes relate to it. Buckle up, Adrien stans, because this isn't going to be pretty.

All season, we have been supposed to sympathize with Adrien as Marinette starts to trust Alya with more things than him. Marinette revealed her identity to her, trusted her to have her Miraculous permanently, and even let her keep her Miraculous even though someone else knew her identity. While some of it is hypocritical, the idea is that Adrien feels like he can be trusted with this kind of knowledge too, when really, he hasn't earned that responsibility.

Adrien has rarely, if ever, taken his job as a superhero seriously.

Not only is he known to flirt with Ladybug in the middle of a fight, he has defied her orders and recklessly sacrificed himself because he thinks Ladybug can do all the work without him.

He has also lashed out emotionally and once threatened to quit being Cat Noir in the middle of a crisis and was willing to let innocent people suffer for personal reasons, and later on actually quit being Cat Noir temporarily while Hawkmoth was about to start World War III because he was wallowing in self-pity.

He once said he isn't cut out for the responsibility that comes with being Ladybug and never learned anything from temporarily using the Ladybug Miraculous.

He has generally refused to respect Ladybug's boundaries and doesn't understand that she doesn't like him that way while he insists they should be a couple.

He outright fell for an evil doppelganger of Ladybug because she said she loved him and turned against the real Ladybug.

And I should also mention that despite hating how Ladybug keeps secrets from him, a lot of Adrien's worst moments have been when Ladybug wasn't around and he never told her about them.

He never told Ladybug that he was the reason Copycat really got akumatized while saying he never lies to her.

He never told Ladybug he contemplated letting thousands of people die because he didn't like not knowing stuff Ladybug knew.

He never told Ladybug he briefly used the Snake Miraculous to get brownie points with her.

He never told Ladybug he figured out her identity and asked her out as soon as he did so.

He never told Ladybug he abandoned Paris to go on a field trip.

He never told Ladybug he was screwing around on patrol and was excited to see someone get akuamtized if it meant spending time with her.

He never told Ladybug how he ignored Rena Rouge's orders because “ShE wAsN't LaDyBuG” and almost screwed up the mission because of it, and also never told her how he smashed a chimney in anger at Rena Rouge being in on the plan.

And he never told Ladybug he gave her replacement attitude after trying to harm her without letting her explain herself.

Why exactly should I support the idea of Ladybug trusting Cat Noir more when Cat Noir himself has kept his own secrets from Ladybug?

Adrien has done absolutely nothing to show he is trustworthy because more often than not, he views the battle with Shadowmoth as a game. He has screwed around when lives were on the line, and we're supposed to see him as responsible? It's kind of funny that Astruc compared Ladybug to Spider-Man, yet he seems to have forgotten that with great power, there must also come great responsibility. If this was a character flaw or a sign he needed to grow up, I'd be more accepting, but the fact that the writers think Adrien is a great superhero is laughable with how much evidence has proved the contrary.

In contrast, Alya, despite only being Marinette's confidant for a few episodes, has shown to take being a hero more seriously. She's helped her escape to transform, analyze the Guardian texts, and has been shown to work well on her own as Rena Rouge while helping out Marinette. I'm not trying to say she's an amazing character (“Rocketear” in particular has shown she still has problems with keeping secrets), but compared to Adrien, she seems to be more capable of handling top-secret information with Marinette, and more importantly, doesn't view being Rena Rouge as a way to have fun like Adrien does being Cat Noir. I'll go more into detail with that next time.

But yeah, this scene is how the episode ends, and what did I think of it?

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I'm honestly not sure which episode I think is worse, this one or “Queen Banana”. On the one hand, every frame of “Queen Banana” could easily be replaced by an image of Astruc flipping the bird and the overall message of the episode would remain unchanged, but the fact that all of the writers think that everything Adrien does in this episode is okay and that we should feel sorry for him in this episode is just as bad, if not worse.

As awful as Chloe was portrayed in “Queen Banana”, it was clear it was intentional on the writers' part, but Adrien doesn't get that excuse once much like he has all season. As far as Astruc's team thinks, Adrien is an incredible superhero even when he honestly attempted to harm someone with a superpower that can cause grievous harm at best. Yet again this season, in the show's attempt to make me feel sorry for Adrien, it made him look even worse. In any other show, he would obviously be called out for his incredibly unheroic actions.

Even putting him aside, the writing in this episode is still AWFUL. The whole reason Ladybug was benched had several plotholes and poor communication with Cat Noir that only made the fight with Robostus even harder, Shadowmoth's plan to waste a potentially useful Sentimonster to reuse a single Akuma was one of the dumbest plans he's ever had, and barring the ending, the action was just forgettable.

There were a few okay moments sprinkled throughout the episode (more than I can say for “Queen Banana”), so I'm still not sure if I should call this the worst episode of the show or still give that honor to “Queen Banana”. I guess I'll leave that choice up to you and let you pick your poison for now.

I mean, it's not like there's going to be an even worse episode down the line this season, right?

RIGHT???

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stonesparrow · 3 years ago

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Wha- WAIT!! you have an MLB Dr Stone au?? That's so freaking cool!! Give us some snippets!! Who's ladybug? Cat noir? Will senku get piercings? (Sorry this is me projecting lol) tell meeee...

Well two days ago I was scrolling through some mlb (btw I always read that as Major League Baseball it’s a legit problem) reblogs by my mutuals (two of them are pretty into MLB and one of them recently did a ranking of all the villains), and even though I haven’t watched any of the episodes, I was like lmao what if superhero (I like the concept of kwamis and superheroes).

Also I was literally writing Episode 1 when I decided to check my tumblr lmao, should I try not to spoil it? Ok here’s an idea - I’ll give the whole Episode 1 summary under the cut, but above the cut will be the “pitch” I wrote for it. (For all of my fanfics, I write a short pitch at the top of the planning document labeled PREMISE, which I usually later use for the summary in ao3)

Ogawa Yuzuriha is a mild mannered 15 year old girl in her first year of high school with aspirations of being a fashion designer, when one day she meets a tiny red creature named Tikki who wants her to be a superhero! As Carmine, Yuzuriha must rise up to be the protector of Tokyo alongside her new partner, a mysterious yet caustically witty boy her age called Kurodora who seems...familiar, somehow. Together the two of them will defend Tokyo from the villainous machinations of the enigmatic Sphinxmoth. Can Yuzuriha find a way to balance the duties of a superhero and a high school social life? Find out in Miraculous: Adventures of Carmine and Kurodora!

SEASON 1 EPISODE 1: Origins (alternatively titled Lioness)

On the first day of school in April 2019, in the city of Tokyo, Japan, Yuzuriha rushes to meet Taiju and Senku at the train station so they can commute together like they always have. Except while she’s on the way there, she spots an elderly man who has fallen down at the side of the road, and stops to help him up, even offering to call an ambulance if he’s seriously hurt. The old man simply thanks her and tells her she should probably get to school, and as Yuzuriha walks away, he smiles after her.

Yuzuriha catches up to Taiju at the train station - apparently Senku is running late on the first day of school. They’re not surprised - Senku does have a bit of a reputation for staying awake long past the time he ought to be asleep (mood, Senku. Mood).

What they don’t know is that Senku is actually only a few blocks away - in fact, he’s just stopped an elderly man from walking directly into the street! After angrily asking if the old geezer is losing it, Senku waits with the man and despite being a little abrasive about it helps him cross the street when it’s safe (fun fact apparently Japanese crossing lights play the tune to a children’s nursery rhyme when it’s safe to cross go google it). The old man thanks him and says to himself, “A little rough around the edges, but I think he’ll do fine.”

Luckily Senku manages to catch the train just as the door closes, with both Taiju and Yuzuriha gently admonishing him for not learning his lesson about staying up too late in middle school. They make it to school, where they meet their homeroom class for the first time. In their class, we meet Hoseki Kohaku and Shizaki Chrome (workshopping these names rn), as well as Takara Amaryllis, who just moved into town.

Kohaku is recognized as the sister of Hoseki Ruri, the most beautiful girl in school. This becomes a problem when later Kohaku spots school brute Magma forcefully asking her sister out, while also gifting her a pretty lapis lazuli pendant. Kohaku confronts her sister and Ruri admits that Magma has been hounding her to go out with him for a while now, and she hasn’t reported his harassment to the teachers out of fear. Magma steps in and tries to push Kohaku away, causing the spirited girl to attract an oddly colored butterfly floating nearby...

After lunch, Yuzuriha’s class is just chilling waiting for the next period to start when suddenly there’s a huge commotion and a bunch of people start screaming. Loudly. A young woman in an amber colored outfit with a fluffy boa around her neck is holding Magma hostage, and seems to be taking him down the street, leaving a path of destruction in her wake and police cars chasing after her.

Students start freaking out, and in the chaos Yuzuriha, Taiju, and Senku get separated despite their best efforts to stick together. Taiju ends up going into the bathroom to call his grandparents and make sure they’re safe, while Senku runs to the roof to get a better view of the situation and Yuzuriha finds herself hiding in the school library.

As Yuzuriha tries to gather her thoughts and begins to text Senku and Taiju in their groupchat to ask where they are, she notices a box sitting on the table next to her that definitely wasn’t there before. Curiosity gets the better of her and she opens it, of course.

Out pops Tikki! Yuzuriha momentarily freaks out before Tikki manages to explain a few things about the situation. Unfortunately however, when Yuzuriha says “I can’t be a superhero! I don’t have time to change into a suit or learn how to fight or anything!” Tikki replies with a placating, “Oh don’t worry it’s easy! You just have to say ‘spots on’ and-” “Spots on?” “WAIT I DIDN’T FINISH-”

Thus Yuzuriha is left transformed in the school library without the detransformation phrase and armed only with the knowledge that: 1. Tikki is a “kwami” from the Ladybug Miraculous; 2. The Miraculous will give her the power to stop the villain rampaging outside. 3. She will be paired with the chosen wielder of the Black Cat Miraculous. Her outfit is a very fashionable looking red jacket over a black long sleeve shirt and leggings, with a red skirt decorated with black spots, and black boots and gloves. The final adornment is a spotted headband that takes the place of the white one she wears normally. [also, she’ll get a new, cooler outfit in season 2, because I like the concept of evolving outfits that reflect character growth].

After falling out of the library window in an attempt to get out without being seen Yuzuriha discovers her enhanced physical abilities and takes a few experimental leaps across buildings before trying to locate the villain. Luckily for her, she actually starts to get the hang of it - right before a boy dressed in all black crashes right into her from behind screaming bloody murder.

The boy apologizes and helps her up - his pale green hair is tied back in a ponytail, and he’s dressed in a black trenchcoat over a vest with a tie, along with boots and gloves. And cat ears, of course. In Yuzuriha’s fashionista opinion, he looks like a cross between a noir detective and a mad scientist.

When she asks his name, the boy tells her that they’re not actually supposed to know each others’ real identities or they risk getting their Miraculouses stolen - didn’t her kwami tell her that? Yuzuriha flushes red and admits she didn’t get a chance to learn everything. The boy says they should stick to codenames - she’ll be Ladybug and he’ll be Black Cat.

“Wait, you just want to use the names of the Miraculouses? That’s kind of...bland, isn’t it?”

“Well what do you want then, miss fancy pants?”

Yuzuriha looks the boy up and down and then says, “How about...Kurodora?” He blinks and then tilts his head curiously. “Like...kuro and dora, for dora neko? I...I actually kind of like that.” (kuro - black. dora neko - stray cat. Totally coincidentally, it’s where Doraemon gets his name.)

“Great, Kurodora it is! Then for me...” -cue loud crashing sounds-

No time to waste! The heroes leap into action to fight the akuma, who introduces herself as Lioness, predator of predators. She’s holding Magma hostage at the top of Tokyo Tower, and threatens to bring the whole thing crashing down unless the heroes surrender their Miraculouses to her so she can bring them to her master, someone called Sphinxmoth.

Throughout the battle Kurodora refers to Yuzuriha by experimental nicknames, which she reacts to with varying levels of enthusiasm.

“Hey Red, on your left!” “Red? Kind of simplistic, don’t you think?”

“Watch out, Spots!” “That’s so silly!”

“Headed your way, Bug Girl!” “Ack, just go back to Red!”

Lioness tries to convince Yuzuriha to join her, since they’re both women and surely Yuzuriha knows the frustration of being victimized by men and feeling powerless, right? Yuzuriha says that doesn’t mean she wants to hurt people, and successfully distracts Lioness so that Kurodora can grab her necklace and destroy it, with him instructing her to purify the akuma with her powers (He was very meticulous and made Plagg explain everything in detail).

After Miraculous Ladybug returns everything to normal, Kurodora raises his hand. “Nice job, Red.” They high five. It is epic.

Ace reporter Minami Hokutozai then appears on the scene to interview Tokyo’s newest heroes, asking for their names on live television. Kurodora gives his, and when the microphone is put in her face, Yuzuriha thinks for a moment before answering.

“Carmine, like the shade of red.”

Kurodora smiles, and Tokyo cheers.

#dr stone #dr. stone #dcst #au #aus #miraculous ladybug au #my writing #fanfic #ishigami senku #ogawa yuzuriha #rather than serialized this is gonna be more of a contained story #with a few filler episodes in between to lighten the load #can y'all guess who sphinxmoth is #also I condensed origins 1 and 2 into one episode because I didn't feel like dragging otu the story #and each season is only gonna be 10 episodes #ask #I'm also operating by the idea that the miraculous magic prevents them from realizing their identities based on appearances #no love square because senku and yuzu are 100% platonic besties in this

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