#but like big credit for that one detail that like pretty much no major movie or anything about Jesus has managed to do

[johnsspacesuittight]

I'm just thinking about the fact that like all major hollywood movies cannot for the life of them portray Jesus as anything other than white, meanwhile a Danish christmas calendar tv-show from 2003 managed to have a non-white Jesus

[sidewalk-cracks]

In the wake of hearing that DC is making a Dick Grayson and Jason Todd movie and that they're supposedly gonna be screwing up Dick and Jason's backstories, I started thinking about what kind of Nightwing & Red Hood movie I would want to see, in addition to what kind of batfam movies in general I would want to see. I offer for consideration:

Nightwing and Red Hood: Last Defenders. While on patrol, Nightwing stumbles upon the hints of a truly diabolical plot taking shape to topple not just Gotham, but possibly the entire planet while the majority of Earth's heroes are presently indisposed, including most of the batfam. Batman and most of the JL are off world, the Titans are tied up, even Alfred's away, etc- leaving Nightwing and Red Hood as the only two people left to defend Gotham. This is set in a world sometime after UtRH; Jason's identity has been revealed, and he has an uneasy truce settled with the Bats ("you don't bother me, I don't bother you"). The movie follows them through their journey as Dick tries to convince Jason to work with him, they narrowly escape lots of explosions, and argue about Dick's failings as a brother and everything Jason has done since coming back. It all culminates in an epic 2v1 battle with the Big Bad and resolves with them saving the day and coming to an emotional understanding- a hopeful ending, looking towards a future in which Jason might be able to improve his standing with the Bats. BONUS END CREDITS SCENE: Bruce arrives home to a quiet manor. He goes to the kitchen and makes some tea. Goes to the den, and draws up short in the doorway. Dick and Jason are sprawled across the couch, half on top of each other, dead asleep. The credits of a movie are scrolling on the TV. Bruce buffers for a moment, before smiling and deftly whipping out his phone and snapping several pictures. Then he turns off the TV, drapes a blanket over them, and kisses both of them on the forehead.

The Waynes in: Mission Impossible. Bruce and his sons must attend the fancy gala of Evil Rich Man, and foil his diabolical supervillain plot while undercover as the Wayne family. Ideally, without ruining the gala. (Spoiler: they ruin the gala). This is firmly an action comedy, with maybe some sprinkles of family angst thrown in. Otherwise, though, this movie includes a gratuitous amount of puns, the Wayne Men in really sharp tuxes, Jason blowing up several things, Tim and Bruce holding the only braincells in the operation, Jason losing his suit jacket and tie 5 minutes into the gala, and Bruce being Tired. At a later point in the mission they need a distraction, and without hesitation Damian whips around and punches Tim in the face. They proceed to have a very loud and explosive fistfight. Tim YEETS Damian into the dessert table. Bruce groans into his hands.

The Battle of Wayne Manor. Dick, Jason, and Alfred are the only ones home to defend the Manor against a dangerous team of superhuman home invaders, Home Alone style. As soon as the three of them are aware of the situation, Alfred marches over to a panel in the wall, opens up a secret compartment, and pulls out an AK-47. "I have not spent three-fourths of my life at this Manor for a group of brutish, arrogant thugs to think they can just waltz in and lay claim to the place. As you like to say, Master Jason- let's light em up, boys." This can be a serious film or another action comedy. It's pretty much just Home Alone with some guns thrown in. They blind the invaders with several disgustingly bright glitter bombs and then Alfred whips out from behind a corner with his rifle, they've got booby traps on all the staircases, Jason's throwing pies at people, etc. The most important detail is that they successfully defend their home as civilians. No use of vigilante skills whatsoever. The news are baffled and the boys cheekily only comment that Home Alone is a cherished childhood film in their household. This plot could be edited to include Tim, Damian, and even Bruce as well, I just initially thought of it as just Dick, Jason, and Alfred.

[unhingedmarvelandclassicwhobuff]

Apparently at some point MCU fans collectively agreed that the Blip takes place on October 17th, 2023. Which is today. So I figured I'd take the time to detail the four biggest reasons why the time jump in Endgame was a universe-shatteringly horrible idea that should never have seen the light of day

the absolute biggest problem, of which there are many, is the fact that countless people died as collateral damage in the initial Snap. Hell, we are shown it in the Infinity War post-credit scene with those multiple car accidents and that helicopter slamming into a building. And that was just the tip of the iceberg; imagine how many planes crashed because the pilots were dusted, or how many babies starved because both their parents were dusted, or people who may have died on the operating table because a surgeon got dusted. All of these people are totally ignored. It's never so much as mentioned when talking about bringing everyone back, and Tony insisting that the last five years remain unchanged is implicitly saying all of those people remained dead when the dusted returned.

the second big problem with this plot point is that it's used as an excuse for every character except Nat to be totally unrecognizable. Bruce becomes Professor Hulk, Thor gets fat, Tony has a family (and I fucking love how the movie inadvertently says he just let the world rot for five years instead of using his billions of help. That is 100% in character for him), Clint went on a mass killing spree, and Steve... I actually have no idea what made him change so radically. None of this is shown to us at all, it's just told to us.

this is less a problem with Endgame and more a problem with Phases 4 and 5, but the other worse thing about this development is that absolutely nothing has been done with it. Far From Home played the time-jump for comedy, WandaVision had that one great scene in the hospital and then did nothing else, Shang-Chi had a singular throwaway line about the Blip, Hawkeye had that one neat visual of getting Snapped from Yelena's POV and then nothing else, Multiverse of Madness had a single conversation where Strange wonders if letting Tony have his way was the only way to save the universe, Quantumania had a single scene addressing the homelessness issue and then nothing else, and I think Secret Invasion tried to do a bit of a look at how Talos reacted to the Blip, but that show was so awful that I'd rather not think about it. The only projects to do anything at all with the Blip as a major plot point are Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Eternals.

the fourth and final massive problem with the Blip is pretty simple yet complicated; it ignores the absolutely insurmountable societal implications both the Snap and the Blip would have. Think about it; half the fucking universe disintegrates into ash. There are SO many things that would do to just human society alone. But even more importantly, five years after all those people were declared dead (meaning wills are executed, spouses remarried, jobs and homes redistributed, etc) those people suddenly reappear, and from their POV it's only been a second. Just to put it in perspective, the Snap happened on April 29th, 2018. Doesn't that feel like forever ago? If the Snap were real, all those people would have been gone until today. That is such a huge mindfuck that I'm shocked no one went insane. And even looking aside from the psychological impact, all those people are pretty fucking screwed. Far From Home had a single scene addressing this, then promptly forgot about it.

My final point is less of a problem and more of an amusing byproduct; since Tony directly forbids Bruce from undoing the last five years, that means the events of WandaVision, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Hawkeye, No Way Home, Multiverse of Madness, and Secret Invasion are on some level his fault. That’s fucking hysterical.

I suppose I'll be absolutely fair and say that rewinding time isn't a morally perfect solution either, as you would be erasing any maturity the survivors gained during those five years, as well as anyone born in that time. But that's just all the more reason to NOT HAVE A FUCKING TIME-SKIP!!! I still think the only reason it was done was for cheap shock value.

All in all, the five-year time jump is the single worst major plot point in the MCU. Fight me.

[pawnshopbleus]

Miller's Girl

Chapter Two - Professor Miller

Professor!Joel Miller x Fem!College Student!Reader Very Loosely based off of the new movie, Miller's Girl, starring Jenna Ortega and Martin Freeman

Summary - Your landlord decides to raise the rent in your studio apartment the day you are fired from your job. In need of money, you sign up for a babysitting service your friend suggested. You didn’t expect to get an offer so quickly, and you also didn’t expect to come from your professor.

Series contains - cursing, mature language, teacher x student relationship, age gap, smut, fluff, angst, non beta read chapters and everything else I forgot to mention

Authors Note - Sorry for the late update. My mom took my computer away and I physically cannot write on my phone.

College, no outbreak, and modern AU

Joel had been looking for a new babysitter ever since the last one had left. She was an older lady who had lost her husband in the Vietnam War. Joel respected her until she quit unexpectedly the Saturday evening before Joel had a big dinner with the president of the university. He had to beg Tommy and Maria to watch Sarah for the night.

You were the first person that caught his eye on the website. Your experience was subpar and your bio was brief but it contained just enough detail to get him interested. When he scrolled to see what else you did outside of babysitting, his smile fell from his face. You were a student and not just any student. You were a student at the university he taught at. He didn’t want to risk his employment for a simple babysitter so he kept scrolling. Each profile after yours looked plain and simple, something he didn’t like. No one seemed qualified enough to take care of his beloved Sarah except you.

His email to you was like your bio, brief but it contained just enough detail. He signed his name at the bottom and prayed that his position didn’t scare you away. He needed you to agree to this. You were perfect for the job. You were young and could connect with Sarah more than the last babysitter did. Judging from your bio, you were also smart. You seemed like a great role model for Sarah.

Your response came an hour later. Joel chewed on his bottom lip in anticipation of what the email would say. He let out a sigh of relief when you agreed to become Sarah’s babysitter.

└── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──┘

One word that you would use to describe yourself would be unlucky. You were sure that whoever worked high up in the sky had it out for you.

Your counselor called you into his office early Saturday morning to discuss your future after college. You told him that you hoped to become an interior designer once you graduate. He then asked why you didn’t major in interior design instead of architecture. You then told him that he should have asked you this when you were a freshman. You could tell that your counselor wanted to roll his eyes but he kept his composure. He clicked and scrolled away on his computer while you sat there in silence.

“You’re ten credits under the required amount to graduate,” your counselor said.

“What?” The scream you let out contrasted the monotone voice your counselor spoke in.

Your counselor let out a breath through his nose. “Look, you can either graduate next year or you can take another required class for your major.”

“But I thought that I completed all the required classes for my major? It’s the middle of the first semester and I’m pretty sure all the classes are full.”

“There’s one class open with two seats left. I can put you in that class and you’ll start on Monday. You’ll have to catch up on work but i’m pretty sure you’ll be fine.” Your counselor looks you up and down and continues, “You don’t seem like the type to get out much.”

Your left eye twitched at the comment. It was true, but he had no right to say that. You could report him to his superiors but that would be too much paperwork.

“Who teaches the class?” you asked. You hoped that at least the teacher was nice. Maybe they would be a little bit nicer than the asshole in charge of your future at this school.

“Professor Miller.”

└── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──┘

Mondays were never Joel’s favorite time of the week. Sarah had soccer on Mondays and Fridays which meant that he had to get up extra early to pack her bags. The last time she packed her own bag, she forgot her ball and her cleats. When the babysitter starts everything will be a lot easier for him.

A new student has just been added to his roster. Never in his twenty-five years of teaching has a student been added to his class in the middle of the semester. Just another paper to read and another packet of homework to grade. This is exactly what he needed! It’s not like he didn’t have a twelve-year-old daughter to raise all by himself.

The campus is stunningly beautiful in the mornings. The sun shines on the trees and grass, illuminating the green blades and leaves. The school spends a lot of money on its campus. They pride themselves on having one of the prettiest campuses in all of Texas.

Joel’s lecture room isn’t too far from where he parked. It’s nice outside. The October breeze sweeps his hair back and he has to smooth it down with his hands. The brown messenger bag slung around his shoulders dangles and hits against his outer thigh as he walks. Contrary to popular belief, Joel isn’t mean or rude. He’s just a simple man who prefers to have a little privacy once in a while. He is also tough on his students because he wants them to succeed. Professors who are “easy” get on his nerves. They crave the respect of their students rather than earning it. Joel has worked too damn long and hard to care about what his students think about him.

His lecture room is cold. Not the usual sixty degrees he likes to keep it at, but more like a chilly forty degrees. He can see his breath flow out in front of him like a ghost. He knows that his students hate being in a cold classroom, but none of them are brave enough to tell him what to do.

Students start pouring in and sitting in their usual seats. They can immediately tell the temperature difference. They hug their arms closer and rock their bodies, trying to preserve warmth.

The small hand of the clock hovers over the number nine and Joel walks over to the door getting ready to lock it. Just as his hand hovers over the knob, the door is thrown open and Joel stumbles back.

You enter the classroom, eyes wide. You look around at the vast array of students already sitting down in their seats. They all look at you with a look of horror. You don’t understand why they are looking at you like that until you turn around.

Professor Miller is standing at his full height, his arms are crossed, and he looks like he’s about to explode with anger. Then, he sees your face and realizes who you are. He must have recognized you from the website because his shoulders relax and he nods his head to the sea of students, prompting you to sit down.

The only seat open is in the back of the room. You walk through the sea of students all looking at you. Some look at you with a look of sympathy while others look at you with disgust.

You make yourself as small as possible when you reach your seat. Once you reach inside your bag, you realize that you have forgotten your laptop on your bed. No wonder your bag felt lighter today than it usually does.

You pull a pen and paper out of your bag and begin scribbling as much information as you can. Your usual neat handwriting looks more like chicken scratch as you try and copy down information thrown at you by Professor Miller. It would have been a lot easier if he talked a little slower.

Two hours have flown by and students practically skip out of the class, happy to escape the cold. Thanks to your seat being in the back, you were one of the last people to get to the door. Before you can exit, Professor Miller stands in front of you, his arms crossed once again.

“This was strike number one,” he said. You gulped and opened your mouth to explain yourself, but he put his hand up. Your mouth closed shut and you nodded your head.

The rest of the day, you walked with your head held low. It wasn’t until you got back to your apartment that you finally felt better. Being home meant that there wouldn’t be anyone there to judge you or give you dirty looks.

You flopped onto your bed. Bill went up in the air and fell back down onto the bed. Bill could sense your distress, so he curled up next you and the two of you fell asleep.

[gamerdog1]

Haikyuu: The Dumpster Battle Review

I am not a sports guy, never really was. I played baseball a bit as a kid, hardly keep up with major league sports, and couldn't really care less about who won the Stanley Cup. Maybe its the ridiculous amount of fanfare athletes get, or how male-dominated popular sports are, but I've never really been into sports.

Yet, I really like sports anime. Like anybody on the internet in 2015, I heard about Haikyuu, and got into it pretty quickly. Though I wasn't as obsessed with it as I was with shows like Naruto or Hetalia, I watched up to season 2, and fairly enjoyed it.

Smash-cut to this month, when a Haikyuu movie comes out, and is only out for a limited time. I think "Hey, it might be cool to go, but I'm not caught up with the anime...". But after getting assigned to make a tiktok covering an event for a journalism course, I knew that the stars aligned. It was fate: I had to see this movie, and cover it for marks.

And so, after struggling to film a 'stand-up' in front of the theater for 20 minutes, waiting in the lounge for an hour, and eventually getting to sit down and see the thing, I can say that Haikyuu: The Dumpster Battle was both an absolute delight to behold, and a bit of a disappointment.

The Dumpster Battle takes place directly after the last episode of the fourth season, and shows Karasuno's explosive match against their long-time rivals, Nekoma, and the Spring Nationals tournament. After coming this far, both teams are desperate for a win, and pull out all the stops just for any type of advantage.

Just like in the TV anime, the match is stretched out over the course of an hour and a bit, building tension slowly as points are won, strategies are formed, and flashbacks are shown. Without commercial breaks in between, what would normally be a few episodes comes together to form a cohesive whole that had me wondering what would happen next more than how much longer it would be.

Its also quite impressive how much content they've managed to squeeze into this 85 minute movie. It somehow compresses and stretches time, to make parts of the match more exciting while skipping over ones that aren't. All the while, it shows clips of characters' backstories, artistic moments for dramatic effect, and flashes back to key moments in the anime to make a point, while keeping within the runtime of just under an hour and a half, is absolutely mystifying. Its a testament to how good the writing of the source material is (since this is a direct adaptation), but also to the power of editing in film.

Though, that still doesn't hide the most glaring issue I have with this film: that it is pretty clearly multiple episodes stitched together. At least, it sure feels like it. Coming from a 5 day marathon of the third and fourth season, I've grown used to how the anime structures its episodes, and how its animation looks. Here, I could almost imagine the little bumpers playing at certain moments, or where it would cut to credits before the next episode. It doesn't really feel like its own piece, more like a few smaller ones put together without any openings or endings.

On top of that, the animation quality is on par with the TV anime, which is a bit disappointing. Usually, when a TV show gets a movie, the budget is upped, and you can see it in how the animation changed. Shading gets more complex, characters look more detailed, and there are sequences which would be too expensive to do on a tv budget. Here, I didn't really see much of a change. Its pretty surreal, watching something on the big screen that looks pretty similar to what you just watched on your computer at home.

Still, for the level of animation that's here, and the level that's usually in the anime, I can't complain much. Production IG really are the kings of sports anime, and this movie is just another jewel for their crown. The way they animate humans in motion is captivating, and I can't help but watch every set, spike, and block. Its quite realistic, and when they try to experiment more (like squashing and stretching limbs to make movements appear more snappy) it only enhances the beauty of the motion as a whole.

The characters, as well, look good here, but especially the Nekoma guys, who haven't been shown much in focus for a while in the anime. Kenma, of course, is a standout, with how varied his expressions are (ironic, for someone who is so detached and quiet!). I loved getting to see him react to stuff, just as much as the Karasuno guys, with every success or failure. Wacky expressions, snappy comedy, and quick one-liners got more than a few laughs out of me, and in my theater, I certainly wasn't alone.

I saw this in English, because I watch the English dub of the anime, and didn't want to get confused. I highly recommend this, as the voice actors did a fantastic job, going above and beyond in their respective roles. Hinata and Kageyama were and always are a joy, with their actors sounding exactly how you'd imagine from their faces alone. But (again), Kenma was a surprise stand-out, for how varied his actor's performance was. I haven't heard a voice actor yell like that since the first season of Attack on Titan, and for a character who is known for not being enthusiastic much, you can tell his actor was giving it his all in the booth.

But above all else, the main thing that got me invested in this is how it continued the story. Seeing the boys again, this time on the big screen, was an absolute joy, and knowing that whoever lost the match would be going home kept me on the edge of my seat the whole time. I, as well as everyone else in the audience, had grown with these characters, and watched them grow in turn, seeing them learn new skills, face challenges, and get stronger. This movie felt like the culmination of everything up to this point, and there was a palpable sense of anticipation in the air that is hard to describe. For what its worth, you couldn't have paid me to not see this movie.

I don't watch sports. But for a movie continuing an epic underdog saga, with epic highs and lows, realistic character animation, over two dozen distinct and memorable characters that have their own mini-arcs, and a stellar English dub, I'll be there in the crowd, eager to watch.

(Also shout-outs to that first-person scene with Kenma. Holy fuck... I couldn't fit it in anywhere, but know that it is ICONIC, and will forever be badass.)

[armentas]

WIP Questionnaire

Thanks so much to @orphanheirs for tagging me; this looks so fun and I loved your answers. I'll be responding for my main WIP, Haven!

What's the first part of your WIP that you created?

Easily my characters. Heather has existed since I was 12 years old, and Beau and Erin have more or less existed since I was 6! I would just daydream about them getting into random situations to pass the time, really. I'd tried putting them in badly written middle school fantasy stories before realizing that coming of age was the most natural thing for them.

If your story was a TV show, what would the theme song/intro be?

Oh, I have a whole playlist for songs I'd want to be used! I honestly haven't decided on an intro song, but I definitely know the theme song and end credits song. I'd consider the theme to be Last Chance by CHPTRS, both the vibe and the lyrics are just too perfect. "This could be my last chance" is pretty much the whole thing behind Haven, AND the line of "hold me in the grip of your arms" becoming more and more desperate because of how much Heather misses her brother and wants to cherish this miracle of being with him again... I would be lying if I said that hadn't made me cry a few times. Though the lyrics are more depressing than I'd want for the end credits, for that category, I would still easily choose i have no sense of what home is by ativansocial. It feels like a childhood hug on a warm, dark summer night where things aren't okay, but they will be, which is exactly how I'd want the end to feel.

What are your favorite characters that you made? Why?

Oh, can I answer for multiples WIPs? Because Heather is definitely one, but I could easily go on about Celio and Charity too lol. For Heather, the top thing is she's just a really raw person who's easy to relate to, to the point it may even be uncomfortable for the reader sometimes. I think a good example of me trying to utilize this would be an excerpt I wrote where she's reliving the time she was 13ish, Beau was still in the hospital for his car accident, and no one was letting her go see him yet. There's a paragraph or two describing how she's jealous of him for his accident, thinking how she wishes she'd end up in the hospital so people would get her flowers, too. This is the kind of thing where we know it's not great to feel that way, but most of us have probably experienced something similar. We want our own traumas to be louder so they're "heard", and we may especially lack that understanding of other people's issues as children. And that's a big part of Heather's journey: gaining understanding. She doesn't always think or do or say good things, but you get what place she's coming from.

I've decided since that was a big paragraph, I won't get into my other characters, but anyone's free to lmk and I'll drop some info!

What other pieces of media do you think your fanbase would share?

My first thought is Omori since that was a big inspiration when this project was still new. This is also an obscure movie, but if anyone's watched the movie As You Are, I think they'd like both Haven and my other story, The Day You Left. Honestly, I don't consume enough media to say in too much detail. If you like your heart being ripped out, you'll probably like Haven.

What has been your biggest struggle with your WIP?

The plotting!! I always know character arcs first and then weave a plot around where I want people heading, but I've been out of inspo lately, I guess? Or just lazy about brainstorming. That's most likely. I know the most major story beat of Beau's accident but that's practically it, though there's probably potential behind giving Heather some extra new childhood experiences, and being decisive on stuff (aka trauma) for Erin. Not too much is going on with Erin at this moment.

Are there any animals in your story? Talk about them!

Unfortunately not! For some reason, despite being a mega animal lover irl, I've rarely been good at giving my characters pets. If they aren't directly relevant to plot or theme, I usually end up forgetting about them over and over until I decide to just scrap them. It wouldn't work for Heather and Beau anyways; I know for sure Heather's probably tried to bring an animal home, and Beau would've told her it's too much responsibility.

How do your characters travel/get around?

Heather does have her learner's permit, but she doesn't get that much use out of it before she's sent to her child self's body and can't reach the pedals lol. One of her big hobbies is rollerskating, so she mainly relies on that to get around during the story's events. Meanwhile, for Beau, he avoids driving himself anywhere since his accident, so he usually hitches a ride from Erin or someone else.

What part of your WIP are you working on right now?

That's a good question, actually. Kind of just anything and everything, but like I said for the other question, extra plot beats and fleshing out Erin are my main priorities. I know who Erin is, but I only have vague ideas of why she is the way she is. I also get really indecisive with how I want her to be influencing the story exactly (sometimes she's a Heather antagonist, sometimes she's a helper, sometimes she's both), so nailing down core stuff for her would also automatically nail down her role and make that easier.

What aspects (tropes, maybe?) do you think will draw your audience in?

Coming of age is usually pretty grounded in reality and maintains a fairly casual/upbeat vibe even when some not-so-great events happen (at least in my experience with it), so I think people will be curious about the more intense subject matter, how I personally answer difficult questions, and the surreal twist on the genre. I use the word surreal a lot because I wouldn't personally call Heather suddenly waking up in the past "fantasy"'? The narrative isn't about explaining how it works in the first place, it's just supposed to be...weird lol. I also always lean a lot on complex character development, so I'm hoping that, from the blurb, people will think "there should be interesting characters in a story like this" and read it for that.

What are your hopes for your WIP?

My biggest goal is to make it a fully operational interactive fiction game! The reader would be playing as Heather, putting both her and Beau's fates in their hands for that extra stress. The game could even include some art, too, but I'd have to see what feels right once I actually got started.

I could probably write more on that last paragraph but my sleep meds are kicking in lol! Tagging: @themboty @sidhewrites @lavender-laney @nrivanwrites and everyone that's interested!

[piepeloe]

I posted 349 times in 2022

107 posts created (31%)

242 posts reblogged (69%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@gffa

@glimmerglanger

@legobiwan

@forcearama

@captaingondolin

I tagged 191 of my posts in 2022

Only 45% of my posts had no tags

#spoilers - 85 posts

#obi-wan kenobi - 60 posts

#obi wan kenobi series - 44 posts

#obi wan kenobi spoilers - 36 posts

#bucky barnes - 19 posts

#she-hulk - 9 posts

#she-hulk spoilers - 8 posts

#bruce banner - 7 posts

#book of boba fett - 7 posts

#bobf - 7 posts

Longest Tag: 129 characters

#the story they've given her does a disservice to literally every character from catfa: steve erskine bucky not to mention her own

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Movies release on Wednesday here, so I've seen it! Will describe some general vibes then go in deeper detail behind the cut and tag for spoilers to be safe.

It's an extremely entertaining movie. It's fast-paced, as in it starts with an action sequence, doesn't make a mystery about the villain or quest or whatnot, just bam, straight to the point. Love it.

It does mean there's some very abrupt shifts in tone. I feel like it adds to the whole unsettling vibe. It's not a rollercoaster of *emotions*, but it is 'one damn thing after another' so I feel it works.

Seriously though, it goes from really creepy to introspective to ridiculous to gross to sugary sweet to sad and back.

Like with NWH I was worried the movie would have too much fun with the multiverse to do any character exploration or development. But again like NWH, it was through the multiverse shenanigans that we got that development, which is fantastic.

I am curious what both movies were like before their release dates got switched. Because they would have been very different.

There's no typical final act massive battle against CGI monsters or lasers or whatever! There's definitely a bunch of fighting and CGI, but it's atypical for an MCU movie IMO. And the resolution is based more on the characters and their emotions.

There are 2 post-credits scenes: first one is something I still need to google because I have no idea what happened. Second one was a joke/call-back to an earlier joke.

More specifics behind the cut, definite spoilers!

There's a lot of focus on Strange's relationship with Christine, which is weird since they were exes and somewhat friendly coworkers in the 1st one. But they actually use that, and examine it, and move on. The movie could have worked without it, but it's fine.

Not enough Wong. Seriously. He had great moments and I love his friendship with Strange. Not nearly enough Wong.

America Chavez was really the MacGuffin here, so she didn't get that much to do. But I can see how she'd be fun in a Young Avengers line-up.

The Illuminati were pretty much the people that everyone has been guessing. IMO, they were used well, but I feel like a lot of fans will disagree. Basically they went up against Wanda and lost. Like, it wasn't even close. We meet them, and a scene later they all die horribly.

Because yes, Wanda is the villain. And the movie commits to it. She's freaking terrifying. In what she can do, but also why, and because we know her. Like a mix of the Winter Soldier and Thanos?

I'm not quite sure what the ending means for her. It's supposed to be a Darth Vader ending with one last selfless act before dying, but I don't trust it at all. It'd be cool if they stuck with it, but there's no way.

As far as I can tell there's no major shake-up of the MCU either? Fans had expected they'd use this movie to bring mutants in, or that something else 'big' would happen. I suppose it's hard to tell what would cause a stir, since no one seems that fussed about a Celestial breaking out of the Earth either.

20 notes - Posted May 4, 2022

#4

Obi-Wan Kenobi S1E1-2: Larses/Luke

We don't see much of them, but I love what we do.

Just enough of Luke, to definitely confirm that he's Anakin's son, really rubbing that in but not going overboard. I love Obi-Wan saving up for a toy he doesn't even hand over in person.

But Owen steals the show. The performance is amazing, and the character remains sympathetic. He's not made out to be a jerk. He's just looking out for Luke. After his encounter with the Inquisitor it's absolutely clear he doesn't actually hate Obi-Wan, that he knows Luke is safer with him around, that he understands the danger.

I hope we see more of him (and Beru!)

22 notes - Posted May 27, 2022

#3

Obi-Wan Kenobi S1E1-2: Clone trooper(s)

I had gone back and forth between hoping/expecting clones and not daring to. Because Temuera Morrison would have been filming Boba Fett, but would there be clones left after 10 years? And I desperately want Cody, except I don't because they might kill him off.

After the recap I figure we probably won't get a lot of clone trooper(s) featuring in the story, so having one show up was a shock.

Totally heartbreaking one too. Love that Obi-Wan didn't hesitate and just gave him credits.

I'm really curious about this trooper now. Why is he not with the Empire? How does he still have his clone trooper gear?

People have suggested he's 501st, but I think it's the wrong color blue for that. This seems more teal, like the one clone we met on S1 of Bad Batch.

I kind of think this is all the clone content we're getting but I hope not. Because this really makes me wonder once again about what Obi-Wan knows re:the chips and Order 66.

25 notes - Posted May 27, 2022

#2

As much as I love Captain Rex and would love to see Temuera Morrison play a live action version of him, I would be kind of miffed if it was (only) him that showed up in the Kenobi series.

We know where he winds up, plus he was Anakin and Ahsoka's 2nd, not Obi-Wan's.

Meanwhile we have no idea what happened to Cody after Utapau, even though he was ridiculously high up in the chain of command, Kenobi's 2nd, and apparently invented the Bad Batch. Plus, you know, it would make sense, as he's one of the only live action clones we've seen and he was the one to kick off O66.

34 notes - Posted March 10, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

LOL, @forcearama I think maybe you're onto something with someone on the show reading your blog:

Chow added: "I mean, there are of course more stories that you could tell. There's obviously another 10 years before we get to A New Hope and with a character like Obi-Wan Kenobi, I think even just watching him ride across the sand sometimes is interesting.

71 notes - Posted June 15, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #625

Top Ten People Who Could Play Doctor Doom

Hey, did you see that they finally announced the cast for The Fantastic Four?

The official MCU debut of “Marvel’s First Family” has been a long time coming, and very much anticipated. With the original roster of movie Avengers mostly checking out, fans have eagerly awaited the comic book Big Guns coming out to play; specifically, the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, two teams that are iconic in printed form and have vast storytelling potential.

The reveal – a beautiful piece of artwork showing the FF together in the Baxter Building, the actors’ likenesses rendered in brushstroke – was subtle but effective, and immediately had nerds poring over the picture to deduce plot details. The biggest takeaway was that the film appears to be set in the 1960s; possibly 1963, which was a Pretty Significant Year. If it is a period piece, what does that mean for established Marvel continuity? Are they somehow from “our” past, but lost in time and forgotten? Or – and this is my personal theory – are they in a parallel universe, another branch of the Sacred Timeline, and come Secret Wars they’ll end up in our universe too?

Anyway, now we know which actor will be adding flour to the sides of their head to play Mr. Fantastic, inevitably we all move our attention along to the next thing. Because the FF themselves are only part of the story; every hero needs a villain, and in the Marvel Universe Big Bads don’t come much bigger or badder than the Fantastic Four’s erstwhile nemesis, Doctor Doom. Presumably if we have the FF, then we have to have Doom, and that’s a hell of a big deal. Doom if such a huge, iconic, powerful villain, that Marvel have to get this right or the whole thing could fall apart. What happened with Kang – both the perceived disappointment of Quantumania and the sad fallout of Jonathan Majors’ personal behaviour – has, presumably, scuppered that character as a going concern; indeed, it’s all but certain now that the next Avengers movie – originally unveiled as The Kang Dynasty and heavily teased by Quantumania’s post-credit scene – is currently being feverishly reworked, and we could see both Avengers movies getting pushed back to accommodate the changes.

This can’t happen with Doom.

So, who can play Victor Von Doom, monarch of Latveria, technical genius, actual wizard, and wearer of the nattiest suit of armour this side of Stark Industries? It’s a tough one. Presumably – I mean, it’s an adaptation so anything goes – they need to be of an age with Pedro Pascal, who plays Reed Richards, as the two characters knew each other in college. But, y’know, that’s not a deal-breaker. All the same, I wouldn’t want some young whippersnapper in the role. So yeah, a guy in his late forties or his fifties, who can do menacing and imposing, who has some gravitas, but – crucially – can offer nuance and shade. Because Doom is a complex and interesting character, who’s not just a moustache-twirling supervillain. They have to have enough presence – and a cool enough speaking voice – to be able to emote behind a metal faceplate for, well, potentially the entirety of their time playing the character. It’s ironic that Pascal has already been cast as Doom’s great nemesis, really; he’s got form for essentially voicing a character in live-action.

One other wrinkle is Doom’s ethnicity. In the comics, he’s Romani; ideally, you’d want that to be maintained. Except I don’t actually know of any very prominent, A-list Hollywood actors of Romani descent. So how do you square that circle? Do a wider casting call to find less-known actors? Or just cast as appropriately as possible, hire writers or researchers with Romani heritage, and try to deal with it as respectfully as you can? I don’t know, really; I’m neither sufficiently knowledgeable about all of Hollywood, or the Romani to be able to answer that. So, well, I’ve kinda ignored it here. These are just ten guys.

(speaking of prominent Romani characters in comic books, Nightwing also has Romani heritage, on his mum’s side; as he’s probably going to appear in The Brave and the Bold before too long, and is of course a much younger character on whom less of the plot rests, I think you really could go all-out to cast a virtual unknown actor of Romani descent. That’d be cool)

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, ten guys who could be Doom. Just picture them arguing with Squirrel Girl and you’ll get the picture.

Nicolas Cage: he’s a superstar. He’s a comic book fan. He’s an action hero. He’s a fantastic actor. And look: he can just go for it. I don’t think I need to say any more; think about it. Picture it. Nicolas Cage, doing Nicolas Cage, intoning lines like “Doom shall be master of the Earth!” One. Billion. Dollars.

Keanu Reeves: he can be imposing physically, but he has a sense of serenity that can be menacing if required. He’s not played many out-and-out bad guys before; imagine him channelling his John Wick intensity into pure malevolence? Only downside is there’s probably a sizeable portion of the planet who’d be very annoyed if we never saw his face.

Jason Isaacs: Isaacs, of course, has form playing buggers and baddies – he’s Hook, for goodness’ sake. He can spit venom with the best of them – he’s Rickman-level in terms of being, well, a British bad guy. He’s tall, he looks tough, he can be thoroughly charming when he needs to be, he’s a very good actor, and I think he deserves a role that properly turns him into a superstar.

Adrian Brody: a very good actor who’s mostly shied away from large-scale blockbuster filmmaking, he could bring a sense of wiry intensity to the role. He could totally nail Doom’s sense of superiority and also his insecurities, and Predators showed how he can handle the physical side of the role (he’s a tank in that movie).

Peter Stormare: Stormare is a bit older than all these other actors. But given that Doom has his face covered most of the time, it’s possible (likely?) that a lot of the physical stuff could be done by body doubles, Mando-style (let’s face it, a Thing-vs-Doom fight scene is probably mostly going to be CGI). Stormare can deliver thickly menacing dialogue but is also incredibly funny when called upon, giving Doom a deliciously wry delivery that could make him as charming as he is threatening. Also, let’s discuss accents; I guess Doom should sound like he’s from Eastern or Central Europe? Swedish Stormare is often called upon to play Russian, I’m sure he could do Latverian. But I’ve not worried too much about accents; someone like Isaacs or Brody could change it up I’m sure, but even if Doom sounded like Keanu Reeves you could just say he was educated in the US or something. It’s, y’know… not real.

Joaquin Phoenix: is it a bit first-base to have the Joker play Doctor Doom? Whatever, we know Phoenix could do this; he excels at morally-complex characters where he can double down on shades of grey. He’s very funny. He can do snarling malevolence – his Commodus in Gladiator is a comic book villain for the ages. And his casting would be big news; he’d bring a real sense of gravitas and importance to the role. But would he want to commit to multiple films for maybe a decade or more?

John Hamm: one of the things about Doom is that we never see his face; we know he used to be attractive, but is he scarred and deformed, or is it vanity that causes him to cover up (different stories suggest both or either). So casting someone very good-looking would be interesting. Hamm can do mean and arsey, and he can be very funny and charming; can he be evil? It’d be interesting to find out.

Claes Bang: perhaps an outlier on this list otherwise filled with A-list Hollywood talent, Bang would be a very interesting choice. A Danish actor with a perfect English accent, he’s probably best known over here as Dracula in the two-thirds-good Moffat/Gatiss adaptation. So we know he can play charming, devilish evil. Frankly he deserves a shot at a big Hollywood bad guy.

Denzel Washington: now we’re getting into the realms of feverish fanboy speculation and/or wish fulfilment. Washington – again, a fair bit older than most of these guys – is probably the greatest living screen actor. He can do anything. He could play Doom in a heartbeat; the nuance, the foibles, the inner pain, the bravado. And then he could get all Equalizer when the time came for action. Wouldhe want to, though?

Tom Cruise: ah, here we go. Yes, alright, let’s get it out of the way: he’s not as physical imposing as some of these other guys. But he’s Tom Cruise. Imagine Cruise as a vainglorious, egotistical tyrant-wizard-king, utterly convinced of his eternal rightness, waging war on, well, creation itself. He’s almost perfect to convey that sense of the character. He’s not bad at accents, either (erm, ignore Far and Away). He’s a relentless action star. He seems to be trying to transition into more, I guess, sedate fair; perhaps he’s hung up his IMF badge. Would he take the jump into a franchise, playing a major role? It’d be fascinating.  

Something that’s worth stating is there are quite a few actors – Mads Mikkelson, say – who’ve been, I don’t wanna say wasted exactly, but who are already “used up” as a Marvel villain. It’s a shame, given the size and scope of the MCU nowadays, that certain actors cropped up in one film just once and not given the chance to shine as an ongoing character. I mean, Idris Elba – a relatively small supporting character in Thor movies -  would have been great as Captain Britain, y’know? Or really anyone.

[shining-magically]

so I’ve wondered this since the trailer came out years and years ago and Chloe defended the movie - was the red shoes teaser written by the same team that made the movie? were they forced to market it like that, was that based on an earlier draft, etc?? not sure if you know but you seem like the leading expert!

Sorry, this is gonna be an absolute novel because you know I’m an animation fan and the history and production of Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs is SO interesting and insane. Like, Tangled levels of insane. Thanks for calling me an expert, no one else was gonna do it so I just kind of took up the helm lol.

Here’s the low-down... The timeline of the movie’s production is an absolute mess and kind of an extremely wild ride. It was in production for ten years, went through a lot of different crew members, and went through at least two other major versions of the story before landing on the final version.

Since there’s not a ton of info on the movie’s production, a lot of this is pieced together from different interviews and context clues, and also a lot of what I’ve read and what I am quoting has been translated from Korean, sometimes pretty roughly. But yeah.

Here’s the story of why the Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs teasers and poster were so, so bad and fatshame-y and the actual movie was so, so good and body-positive. (With pictures and production artwork!)

(This is a beast of a post so I’m putting it under a cut.)

All right, so. After its conception originally as a short story by the South Korean studio Locus Creative in 2009-2010-ish, Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs was being worked on and was set to come out in Summer 2017, as evidenced by this poster at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, featuring a different logo and very different character designs for most of the dwarfs.

In early-mid 2016, the first teaser (in which we see Snow White undress and then two dwarfs recoil in horror at her fatness when she takes her magic shoes off) was released, after the film had kind of been slowly chugging along for 6 or so years. (I am having such trouble pinpointing when the second teaser was released (in which one of the dwarfs basically attacks Snow while she is sleeping to steal her shoes), but I believe it was around the same time.) The teasers didn’t get that much traction because this was a small film from a small indie studio in South Korea.

None of the final actors had been cast yet. At this point in the production, the story was different, one of the many versions that the movie went through. As in the final movie, the dwarfs were actually cursed knights/princes and Snow White switched back and forth between two body types due to her magic shoes, but in this version, the dwarfs needed to steal the shoes from her in order to break their curse (rather than needing “a kiss from the most beautiful woman in the world” like in the final movie).

The weird thing is, I believe they had JUST changed the movie’s story when the teaser came out. I’m almost positive it was released more as a proof of concept than as an actual trailer for the movie. They had just recently combined two separate characters (seen above), a typical pretty, skinny princess character (Snow White) and a cute chubby girl character (’Bonnie’), into one single character that switches back and forth between the two appearances when she wears the magic shoes (also they had just dropped literally half of the movie taking place in the real world, with a magic mirror portal, it was a whole thing). 

They didn’t have the details of this aspect of the new story hammered out yet, and the first pass at presenting Snow’s magically changing body type, was, yeah, not good and super offensive. This was a really inexperienced indie studio making their first film on a low budget, so even the animation and voice acting wasn’t great. I think they just wanted to get SOMETHING out there because it had been 6 years and they wanted to have something to show for it.

But here’s the thing. Despite how the teasers make it seem, this was always supposed to be a movie about body positivity, letting go of appearance-based prejudices, and loving yourself and others for who you are and for who they are, which we see in the final film.

I like to think of our film as a kindhearted one. Our intentions are nice.

- Director Sung-ho Hong

It’s important to keep in mind that this movie was made in South Korea by a 99% Korean crew, and, as I understand it anyway, in Korean culture, ‘fatshaming’ is not really a thing that is seen as overtly offensive. Also, children’s media there seems to have more adult things in it than in the US, which probably accounts for the more risque parts of the teasers. That said, I really believe that at this point in the timeline, the movie was on-track to be bad (or at least not very good) when it was released, and it would have ended up bad IF a few key players hadn’t signed on (which I’ll get to in a moment).

Interestingly, the movie’s producer, Sujin Hwang, said in a 2017 interview:

“[Both teasers] were solely produced to induce curiosity. They’re completely irrelevant to the actual story.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

I think what she was trying to convey was that neither one is a scene in the actual movie, because while the teasers didn’t reflect the revamped story as it existed in summer 2017 (the time of the interview), they DID reflect the earlier version of the story where the dwarfs wanted her shoes, which is what the story was at the time they were made.

Now that we’re in post-teaser 2016, HERE’S where things start to turn around. After the teasers were released, my guy Disney veteran and native Korean Jin Kim joined the project. He and Red Shoes director Sung-ho Hong had been buddies for about eight years and Sung-ho had been trying to get Jin to come to Seoul and work with him at Locus for a long time, and he finally succeeded.

Jin and his twenty years of Disney experience as an animator and senior designer on films like Tangled, Frozen, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, and Moana, had a HUGE HUGE HUGE influence on the movie. He redesigned almost all the characters, oversaw all the visual development from the moment he signed on, and heavily (HEAVILY) supervised the animation, literally going frame-by-frame through preliminary animations and drawing over them, teaching the inexperienced animators at Locus everything he knew. (Literally almost everyone except him either only had TV experience or had no professional experience because they just gotten out of school.)

From an outsider’s perspective, it really seems as though Jin joining the project (and his gargantuan effort) made the quality SKYROCKET. Not just in character design and animation, but also in things like effects animation, story, etc. After he joined, Locus really started pushing HARD to make a good, high-quality movie, and his influence and experience from being a prominent figure at Disney was absolutely key. The studio also began to really study Disney films and other well-made animated films from other studios to really try and pinpoint what the DNA of a good animated movie really is.

I don’t have any solid evidence, but I’m pretty sure that Tony Bancroft (an animator and the co-director of Mulan) then joined the project because he’s good friends with Jin Kim. He is only credited as the voice director (the movie was recorded in English and the characters were animated to the English dialogue), but I am SURE that he probably also had a pretty big influence on the movie, because like... How could he not? I really really think there was more to his role than his title would have you believe, even though there’s almost no info out there about it.

So now the movie goes through a gigantic metamorphosis. Character designs, visual development, and animation quality are all rapidly improving, the story is tightening, and the themes of the movie (which, again, were always the same and intended to be positive) are being presented in a more sincere way. The movie is becoming the sweet, self-love-encouraging and body-positive movie that was eventually released.

I’m putting a gif from the credits of the final movie here. As we move into 2017, when the giant eruption of backlash occurred, please keep in mind that the story was finalized at this point and that THIS was the movie people were so mad about:

Chloe Grace Moretz accepted the role of Snow White immediately after she read the script and she recorded her lines (I think) in early-ish 2017. Her co-star Sam Claflin also immediately accepted the role of the romantic interest, Merlin, after reading the script and recorded his lines in (I believe) July 2017.

In the summer of 2017, the story and script were more or less the same as in the final movie. Promotional images from that time show that most of dwarfs had been completely redesigned by this point and didn’t have their teaser designs anymore.

They also released a few screenshots that look exactly like the final film. The movie was advertised as coming out in ‘2018′ at this point. Here’s a promo image from 2017 that is MUCH more tactfully worded than the infamous Cannes poster:

So now we’re in summer 2017. The Cannes Film Festival. The movie’s script and story have been basically nailed down, animation is underway, and the Korean film company Finecut is beginning to market and sell the movie to worldwide audiences. They are planning on showing some footage to potential buyers at the festival, and they make a poster to advertise the film there.

Unfortunately, it’s THIS POSTER:

Now here’s where there are some unknowns. By this point, the movie is basically in its final form, which is an adorable, body-positive story about loving people for who they are, loving yourself for who YOU are, and that provides commentary on society’s standards of beauty and how they affect how people are treated/viewed. So why this poster??? All I can really tell is that someone (I think Finecut) really, REALLY messed up and either horribly mistranslated the tagline, or didn’t do enough research to know that this kind of thing is REALLY NOT OKAY in western culture.

The above picture is shared and the internet backlash begins, fueled by tweets from prominent body-positivity activists like Tess Holliday. Even Chloe Grace Moretz speaks out against it, because she of all people KNOWS that that’s not what the movie is about. The internet then finds the old teasers from before the movie was revamped and it makes things worse. Producer Sujin Hwang profusely apologizes and says that that is NOT the message of the movie. Locus pulls the advertising campaign, and takes down the two old teasers.

“Our film, a family comedy, carries a message designed to challenge social prejudices related to standards of physical beauty in society by emphasizing the importance of inner beauty.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

Voice director Tony Bancroft also tried to explain the situation:

“The truth is the film has a body-positive message as its core theme–it’s the opposite of what reports are saying. The problem is one poorly translated movie poster that has been taken dramatically out of context.” 

- Voice Director Tony Bancroft

And then... There was nothing for a while. The movie didn’t come out in 2018 and was delayed. From what I can tell, I DON’T believe this delay was related to the Cannes backlash. I think it was mostly due to Locus’s limited budget and resources, because as we know, animation is difficult, time-consuming, expensive, and easy to do badly but hard to do well. Also, probably with Jin Kim and Tony Bancroft’s influence, they REALLY wanted to make sure to do a good job with the animation because they now had a great story and they really wanted the movie to be a quality, worldwide hit that would kind of put South Korean feature animation on the map. Just take a look at how nice the final animation was:

The movie was released in South Korea on July 25th, 2019. Unfortunately, the damage was done in the English-speaking markets and it was not released to an English-speaking audience until June 22, 2020, when it was released digitally in the UK. At the time of this post, there is no set US release date, but the distribution rights were recently bought by Lionsgate and the MPAA gave the film an official PG rating.

So who’s to blame? There’s no good answer. You could blame Locus for making those old teasers. You could blame Finecut for the competely tonedeaf Cannes poster. You could even blame cancel culture for raging against the movie based on one poster and two old teaser trailers without researching what the movie was actually about.

All I know is, it’s a damn shame.

[xoluvx]

heart eyes; zendaya

(gif credit)

Word Count: 758

“Did you have Thanksgiving there in Atlanta?” Jimmy Kimmel asked. Zendaya nodded as she answered the question. “With Spider-Man?” he added trying to pry. Zendaya fumbled before smiling and denying any assumptions. You were standing near watching her speak into the camera. Her smile bright as she blushed looking in your direction.

The glances she gave you didn’t go unnoticed. Her face was composed when she’d speak to Jimmy and would quickly break into a smile when she saw you standing to the side. 

“With your girlfriend then?” He added slyly.

“Yes,” she smiled. “She joined me this time around for filming.” The smile on her face was bright as she felt her chest growing tighter, her heart expanding with every little mention of you,

“Come here,” Zendaya almost whispered as she outstretched her arm. Shyly, you grabbed her hand as she pulled you into the frame. You hadn’t planned on being in the interview. So you hadn’t done much; you were wearing one of Zendaya’s oversized t-shirts and your face was pretty much bare. In comparison to her, you were plain.

“Are there any Spider-Man details you can give us?” He asked trying to pry again cheekily.

“Unfortunately, I’m not allowed on set.” You said shrugging, trying to avoid the question as you leaned in uncomfortably into the frame. Glancing around for a place to sit, you quickly realized you were out of luck. With nothing to sit on, you were getting ready to kneel down so you were at eye level with the camera, but Zendaya naturally slid on onto her lap. Her arms wrapped around your lower torso as you sat.

“Well, what can you tell us about your future projects?” He asked, diverting the conversation from Spider-Man. “Anything coming soon?”

“I don’t really have any big projects right now,” you lied. You were going to be in the Spider-Man movie. It wasn’t a big role, but it was something. “I’m just enjoying the time off with this one,” you smiled cupping Zendaya’s face as your cheeks touched.

“And with the Spider-Men?”

“And Noon,” you diverted again picking up Noon who was at your feet. The three of you squeezed into the frame of the camera. Zendaya glanced at you both. Her smile the size of the moon. Her eyes shone with pride watching you and her son. Essentially, her world.

“How excited are you for the Euphoria episodes?” he asked now talking to both you and Zendaya. Motioning for her to go, Zendaya smiled as she started talking. Her voice strong as she passionately spoke about the bridge episodes. You leaned your body into hers after placing Noon down trying hard not to distract any attention from her.

Her arm was still securely wrapped around you as she finished her thoughts.

“Were you there when she was filming?” Jimmy asked now talking to you.

“Yes, I was there. It’s very interesting being behind the cameras and seeing her work. As soon as the camera turns on, she turns into this new person.” As you spoke, you felt Zendaya’s other hand resting on your thigh. Her thumb was softly drawing circles on your skin. Her face turned towards you, watching as your hands flailed with every sentence you uttered.

She was so wrapped up in watching you speak, she didn’t realize you weren’t saying anything anymore. Glancing at her, she was smiling ear to ear squeezing you gently with the arm around your torso.

The moment tender and soft. Just like your skin under her fingertips.

One of her thumbs was still rubbing circles on your thigh and you pushed your body back slightly to snap her out of it.

Clearing her throat, she tried controlling her smile as she turned back to the computer screen.

“There you have it,” Jimmy started speaking closing off the interview.

Zendaya smiled at the camera, but her mind was elsewhere. She was only hearing your voice, your answers repeating in her head as she gently squeezed you. The two of you waving goodbye before the screen went blank.

“You were so good,” you squealed cupping her face planting an array of kisses on her face, you were still on her lap. Zendaya scoffed, but laughed playfully. She always did interviews, but it was rare that you joined her. 

The whole thing was sweet and unusual for Zendaya. You know, being one to not really openly publicize her relationships. But you changed that.

She couldn’t help but give you major heart eyes.

idea from @moonflowcrr​

taglist: @moonflowcrr @lovehollandx @spider-trash

[your-brilliant-lady-m]

Part 1 - Basic Concepts of Miraculous Ladybug: Miraculous Jewels

Alright! I promised you meta and now I deliver!

I feel like people mostly watch Miraculous for the romance these days. Shipping is all everyone cares about. I wonder why? Probably because writers themselves don't take their worldbuilding very seriously and because they don't put much effort into making the audience care about something other than Love Square, like the mythology behind the Miraculous, or motivations of the main villain, or some pretty heavy topics for a kid's show that they bring up and then refuse to touch again. You know, all the good things. And this is coming from someone who is a passionate multishipper. I have lived through several shipping wars in different fandoms and came out victorious after all.

I am probably the only person out there who cares about the big picture, the overall storyline and the worldbuilding of Miraculous in addition to all details and implications that could develop into fascinating plotlines relevant to the main story. It is a rather lonely fandom experience, I must confess. But, hey? Who cares? I am here to have fun and bring to the table discussions no one wants to have.

So, let's talk about the basics.

If you, as the writing team, are capable of keeping only 1 thing consistent, then please, I beg you, let it be the basic concepts of your universe. Because in this case, one has to actively put effort into writing characters and conflict resolutions badly. And also because nothing can save bad worldbuilding.

I don't have high worldbuilding standards for Miraculous. They certainly aren't as high as the ones I had for Legend of Korra (which was a badly written trainwreck, that ATLA doesn't deserve as a sequel) or the ones I currently have for Dragon Prince. Therefore I won't be too harsh in my criticisms. Granted, I think that Miraculous has better worldbuilding and lore consistency than Winx Club for example (I haven't seen the reboot yet, so writers might have fixed their worldbuilding at least a little bit). Even though I enjoyed Winx when I was younger and some elements of this story still attract me.

Both serialised and episodic shows as well as movies to the lesser extent must have some flexibility in worldbuilding and plot because you can never be 100% sure where your story is going. Maybe, you'll get money for more seasons, maybe not. However, you must never lose sight of your basic concepts. They have to stay the same no matter what, because rewriting lore and retconning major developments every new season is not and never will be called good writing.

Forgive me for using architectural metaphors, but you need a solid foundation to build any kind of structure. Otherwise, everything falls apart.

I like to apply this logic to writing as well. When designing a world where your story takes place, you must lay a few ground rules. It's especially important if you have a magic system. What kind of ideas absolutely must exist? What kind of conclusion do you want your story to have? Does your magic system has limitations? Where is the grey area? Could you introduce new elements later on?

And I feel like the writing team of Miraculous Ladybug did not ask these questions. This may feel like I am nit-picking canon material and looking for problems that simply aren't there, but I promise that I am not. You see, things that I am about to point out only seem small at first glance. But these details are actually the source of the largest plotholes in the series. And their presence negatively affects character development, conflicts and resolutions of said conflicts.

That doesn't mean that I have nothing good to say about the magic system of the show and its elements. There are a lot of great ideas and concepts. And some of them have the potential to contribute to the delightful story.

Let's dive right into it, shall we?

Camouflage

I have to give credit where it's due because the idea of camouflage and shapeshifting for Miraculouses is brilliant. It seems like Miraculous can't fundamentally change its type of jewellery or accessory. The ring will always be the ring but with a different ornament, colour or shape. This is true most of the time (Monkey Miraculous is an exception since it transformed into earplugs/headphones/headband/circlet) It makes sense and avoids plotholes. Grimoire doesn't have the pictures of each Miraculous in disguise for identity protection. That was very neat too. I have no comments. This concept was very good.

Also, since Marinette wore a nose ring of the Ox in "Kwamibuster" without any problem and Adrien wore Ladybug's earrings in "Reflekdoll", we can assume that you don't need to have piercings to wear a Miraculous. Miraculous just magically passes through your skin.

I'm interested to know the following. Can Kwamis recognise a camouflaged Miraculous on a person? Can the holder order them to confess the identity of this person? This shouldn't be possible for identity protection just like with Kwamis sensing each other. But more on that in later posts.

Power Levels

For a long time, we assume that there are only 7 Miraculouses. Turtle belongs to Master Fu, Gabriel has Butterfly and Peacock, Marinette and Adrien have Ladybug and Black Cat. Everything is pretty straightforward. Then it's revealed that there are more jewels and more boxes. It makes the worldbuilding interesting, but it also majorly complicates things, making them inconsistent.

Their position in the Miracle Box implies their power levels. Creation and destruction are the most powerful forces in existence, therefore they are at the top. Moreover, it makes this Box the most important, the most powerful out of all others. Su Han in "Furious Fu" calls it "Mother Miracle Box". Fox, Turtle, Bee, Butterfly and Peacock have less power than the main pair, but more than the Miraculous of the lower Zodiac tier (since they correspond with animals of the Chinese Zodiac).

1. Ladybug can create anything out of nothing (Lucky Charm, which gives what you need the most at the moment). This Miraculous can resurrect the dead, reverse the effects of the Cataclysm. The power of Miraculous Cure or Miraculous Ladybug can work in several ways:

it simply repairs the damage (puts stuff back together, heals injuries and so on)

it reverses time for the matter, restoring things back to the state they were before the destruction occurred (however, the Cure doesn't erase people's memories of everything that happened unless they were mind-controlled, frozen in place or transformed by Akuma into something else - this is an important point that I'll discuss some other time)

How does Miraculous Cure work when there are no supervillians? In NY Special Marinette just says this.

Excuse me, what? What was that? You can't do anything when the villain is gone? What the hell?

*insert here every scene where Ladybug fixed Paris after destroying akumatized/amokized object (this action causes the Akuma victim to detransform/sentimonster to disappear - villain is gone) and purifying butterfly and feather*

It was such cheap angst. I couldn't even be upset when Adrien gave up his Miraculous, because that whole situation is just stupid. But, never mind. We aren't talking about that today.

Apparently, Lucky Charm and Miraculous Cure only work when summoned to battle a specific villain. What is the point then? Huh? You can't tell me that Ladybug has the power of unlimited creation and then say that she can't repair the damage without a special Lucky Charm that was magically synchronised with specific big bad of the week.

Ladybug also can purify Akumas. It makes sense for Ladybug to have the ability to reverse the magic of less powerful Miraculous. But this power can't be applied universally. How does this power of reversal apply to different situations where there is no evil Butterfly holder? Can Ladybug reverse the magic of any Miraculous?

The unlimited power of creation introduced in season 4 ("Mr. Pidgeon 72") is another fascinating thing. On one hand, it's logical and proves the status of this Miraculous as the most powerful. On the other hand, by introducing this power, you have created a plothole. Look, Marinette can create the charm which repels Akumas. If Ladybug can create anything then what stops her from creating a tool for finding Hawkmoth (like special glasses for discovering identities or a compass)? I mean, the show says that the power of creation is unlimited, it means that the creation of such tool is possible.

2. Black Cat can destroy anything with Cataclysm, even other Miraculous. He can kill living things and turn them into ash, but not himself. This Miraculous is supposed to have other special abilities that we don't see. And they should be equal to powers of Ladybug, both in number and in potency. Unfortunately, after 3 seasons writers didn't give us anything. It makes laughable the idea of balance between Ladybug and Black Cat.

Now, to the second tier. These Miraculouses have a singular ability, but they need a second one to keep the power balanced between Zodiac and the main pair.

3. Butterfly creates champions with different superpowers. But how does the time limit of children work for Butterfly? In theory, the countdown should start right after the creation of the Akuma since for Ladybug and Chat Noir countdown starts after activation of their powers even if they don't use them. However, if the countdown of the Butterfly begins after Akuma creation then there's no point because the holder has to stay transformed to guide their champion. The charged butterfly won't have time to even grant powers before the transformation of the child-holder drops. This issue is never explored because Gabriel doesn't have a time limit. However, I feel like it should be addressed in flashbacks of past Butterfly holders for example.

This Miraculous should be less powerful than Ladybug and Black Cat. It's often not. Some Akumas are too overpowered. Stormy Weather can move the Earth away from the Sun, Timetagger can send people through time and jump through time as well, Chat Blanc destroyed the world with a single energy blast, Miraculer could steal powers of those more powerful than her by default. These are the most notable examples. One could argue that Chat Blanc was a different case. Hawkmoth simply gave the most powerful Miraculous a boost. However, we know that even without a holder (the wildest and the most powerful form of uncontrolled Miraculous magic) Plagg's Cataclysm can't destroy the universe just like that (he presumably wiped out dinosaurs and sunk Atlantis on his own without a holder). I think that the less powerful Miraculous (Butterfly) shouldn't be able to increase the power of destruction to such a degree and give Black Cat the power to destroy celestial bodies and galaxies.

Writers want us to see Hawkmoth as the formidable villain. But it's not easy because he is less powerful than your main heroes by default of your worldbuilding. Sometimes writers make the Butterfly more powerful than creation and destruction to raise the stakes, breaking the laws of their magic system. So, how do you solve this? Let Ladybug and Black Cat keep their status as the most powerful and instead of giving Hawkmoth more magical power, make him smarter, more cunning, inventive. Gabriel is a fashion designer, whose creativity makes him a very good Butterfly holder. He has a life full of experience, he knows much more about things than the main teenage characters. Catalyst was very interesting for this very reason. Gabriel sort of discovered a cheat code to boost his powers. Show us how he experiments with his powers, how he analyses his past Akumas and tries to find the most effective ones. Maybe Gabriel tries to design Akumas that can specifically neutralise Ladybug and Chat Noir. This exploration could also give writers an opportunity to explain how the powers of Butterfly work. Can he control the type of powers he grants? Can he control the appearance of Akumas? There are many things to be explored.

4. Peacock creates sentimonsters. I remember that fans were very disappointed when the power of the Peacock was revealed at the end of season 2. I was one of them. The concept of Amoks is far too similar to akumatized butterflies. Other Miraculouses have unique abilities and keywords for their powers, while Peacock just looks like Butterfly 2.0. That glowing mask effect just adds insult to injury.

You have to start by figuring out the powers of the Peacock in a normal situation. If a holder is a good person, then how does their power work? For example, make them related to sight (because of the "eye" pattern on feathers). Maybe, Peacock grants the ability to see the several possibilities of the future, but only a few minutes ahead. Maybe, this Miraculous gives you the ability to see through someone's eyes for a few minutes (and the victim is completely unaware of the intrusion). Perhaps, Peacock allows the holder to use feathers (or tiny peacocks) as cameras one at a time and be all-seeing. These feather-spies can be destroyed by the holder or disappear on their own after some time. Such power could be devastating when used against heroes in canon.

5. Bee can paralyze. This power is pretty straightforward. Once I read a fanfiction focused on very vell done Chloe Redemption, where she fights alongside Ladybug and Chat Noir. Eventually, she grows and becomes a better person. This fic ends with an Akuma battle, where LB and CN are trapped and Akuma is ready to kill them. But Chloe uses a second power of the Bee on the villain - Miraculous Stinger. It's deadly both for the holder and for the victim (because bees die when they sting someone). Chloe kills the Akuma with a Stinger before it can get LB and CN, but she too dies making the ultimate irreversible sacrifice. I will add a link if I find it again.

6. Turtle can create a shield. I don't have much to say on this either. It feels underpowered compared to others in the second tier. Maybe Turtle can also slow down opponents (because turtles aren't the fasters animals out there).

7. Fox creates illusions and acts as their puppeteer. In order to create a balance between other powers, these illusions must hold for as long as the holder needs them to. I propose this mostly because we see that Venom of the Bee lasts very long, the shield of the Turtle lasts either until it's destroyed or the holder wants to remove it, same goes for Akumas and sentimonsters who disappear only when the holder wants them to or their affected object is destroyed.

Let's talk about Zodiac tier. Miraculous of the third tier shouldn't have the second ability like more powerful ones. These powers are the most inconsistent. Even if we haven't seen all of them yet.

8. Mouse can create many small clones of the holder. It is unclear how these clones communicate with each other and how many of them this Miraculous can create. The holder can control the number of clones. This power was very convenient in "Kwamibuster" and it makes sense symbolically for the mouse. What activates the time-limit for children? Marinette didn't have any problems with it when she became Multimouse.

9. Snake can create a 5-minute time loop and has the ability to come back in time. This Miraculous feels a bit overpowered for the Miraculous of the Zodiac Tier. The holder can reset the time as many times as he/she needs to. It's was a good source of drama and trauma in "Desperada". I was honestly surprised that Adrien was capable of fighting after spending months in a loop. But this doesn't change the fact that Snake is overpowered. You can give this Miraculous the power to hypnotise or keep the time ability but place a limit on the number of resets. How does the lyre work as a weapon? Who knows? No one!

10. Dragon can shapeshift into elements: water, wind and lightning. It has the coolest transformation words hands down (Bring the Storm and Open Sky). Apparently this Miraculous doesn't have the time limit.

11. Rabbit can time travel or jump through alternative realities, even writers aren't sure. Time-travel in this show is so badly written it gives me a headache. This Miraculous shouldn't exist just like its powers. Snake belongs to the same tier, but 5 minutes and whole centuries of time jumps aren't comparable in power levels. They are not and this is the hill I will die on. Give the Rabbit powers related to its symbolism in China like an ability to de-age people, heal them or give them a speed boost in contrast with Turtle who might have the ability to slow down.

This Miraculous is so special that its Kwami - Fluff can live separately from his Miraculous in a Miracle Box for millennia (Fluff lives in the Box in "Sandboy", but his Miraculous, pocket watch, was passed down for generations in Alix's family). This is a discussion for a separate post, however. There's a lot to unpack. We'll do that some other time. You will suffer with me but at a later date.

12. Horse can create portals. They could lead anywhere, which is pretty cool. On the other hand, this power is not very useful in direct combat, especially when it's used by a child since we can have only one portal per transformation.

13. Monkey can cause a malfunction in powers of other people. What is the point of this? This power was specifically created by writers to defeat Akuma in "Party Crasher". That's it. What if your target is not magical? How does this Miraculous work in different circumstances?

14. Pig shows people their greatest desire. Both the holder and the recipient of this power can see this desire. Chat Noir wasn't impressed in "Guiltrip" and neither was I. It's underpowered compared to other Miraculous in this tier. Also, why does the tambourine can shoot energy beams? Why?

That's all I have to say on the matter. I'll update the power analysis as needed.

[multimetaverse]

HSMTMTS 2x01 Review

New Year’s Eve was a great way to return to HSMTMTS especially after such a long gap. Let’s dig in!

Vladimir Lenin once said that, ‘’ there are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen". It’s been almost a year and half since S1 ended but this past week has seen revelation after revelation as the fandom has resurrected itself and promotion for S2 kicked into high gear: Joshua Bassett came out, Frankie and Joe confirmed that they are a real life couple, Larry seemingly confirmed that S2 will only have 11 eps rather than the 12 initially ordered, and perhaps most importantly Olivia revealed that she and the main cast are under contract for 4 seasons and made clear that she’s leaving the show as soon as her contract is up.

I really enjoyed this premiere, it felt like picking up right back where we left off. I’m guessing that S2 was originally supposed to premiere around Christmas or New Year’s but the holiday decorations and real Utah snow add a charming aesthetic to the ep. Tim Federle deserves credit for giving HSMTMTS more of an ensemble feel which is no easy feat with a cast as large as this show has. It likely won’t last due to covid restrictions  but at least for tonight we got to see all the characters hanging out together acting like a real group of friends.

The dialogue tonight really reminded me of Glee and I think I mean that as a compliment. Miss Jenn in particular seems to be doing her best April Rhodes impression minus the alcoholism. 

The rini scenes tonight were lovely. Perfect gift was a great song and I loved the rini duet during the music in me as the world faded around them leaving just the two of them. The Harry Styles reference is funny in light of Josh’s coming out interview. Of course, it’s hard now to separate Nini and Ricky and Olivia and Josh. Their chemistry shines through as 2x01, 2x02, and possibly parts of 2x03 were filmed pre Jolivia breakup which seems to have happened around summer 2020. Whether they can keep that same chemistry later on in S2, not to mention future seasons, remains to be seen.

A major theme tonight was communication and clearly Rini need to work on theirs. Poor Ricky had to learn that Nini’s moving to Denver the night before she leaves town which has to remind of him of his mom effectively abandoning him. Ricky saying that he’s never gonna breakup with Nini ever again sure sounds like foreshadowing for a disaster though the odds that this time Nini initiates the breakup are pretty good. 

I’m glad that the show is continuing to delve in the Bowen’s divorce story with their house being sold and Ricky and his dad having to move into an apartment. Divorce is expensive and the division of assets typically leave people less well off. Mike Bowen needs to work on his communication skills but he’s rocking that beard; it takes him from depressed divorced dad to depressed divorced daddy.

Seblos was cute and in a nice change of pace Disney doesn’t seem to be cynically teasing them then cutting their scenes. It was refreshing to see them just being a couple and to hear Carlos casually refer to himself as gay. In that regard tonight’s ep didn’t seem like it was a Disney show at all and it’s major progress that there are now two main gay characters on HSMTMTS. We learn that Carlos is rich which seems likely to be a source of conflict with Seb who comes from a large farming family.

Bet on It was really fun and I liked that Ricky apparently couldn’t stop singing it. The medley of HSM 2 songs was fun but I’ll be real with you wildcats, I never thought HSM 2 or 3 were nearly as good as the first movie so I’m not sad that they’re doing something else this year.

Wild that Big Red’s mom also calls him Big Red. Salt Lake Slices seems poised to be a big part of S2 both as hangout spot and work location for some of the characters. Redlyn are sweet together but sometimes Big Red comes off as a closeted gay guy which isn’t ideal for a het pairing that is supposedly a big part of S2.

Nice to see Gina so excited to have sleepovers with Ashlyn. We know from 2x03 that Gina contends with being single on Valentine’s day and from her glances at Ricky tonight she’s clearly not over him. Tim’s playing with fire and I can only hope he knows what he’s doing. I liked the little detail of Kourtney having AOC on her vision board, it feels true to the character (hopefully AOC gets elected president one day if the USA doesn’t collapse into a fascist dictatorship or civil war before then). EJ’s beard has got to go but I like that he seems committed to being a better version of himself; very doubtful his plan to go straight to Duke like his forefathers doesn’t change by the end of the season. 

Derek Hough did a good job of playing Zach as a subtly condescending man who managed to swiftly undermine Miss Jenn’s confidence, we’ll see what he and North High bring to the table.

Looking Ahead:

Next week are auditions for Beauty and the Beast, we know Ashlyn gets the role of Belle and EJ has conveniently removed himself from the running for Beast which presumably clears the path for Ricky to take the lead. There’s been some controversy over the casting choices and I’ll save my comments about it for the 2x02 review.

We get to see Lily who looks like a meaner version of season 1 Gina, we’ll see how much depth she actually ends up getting. Howie is introduced in 2x03 and Antoine likely shows up later on. Jack likely shows up towards the end of the season.

Howie seems to have a connection with Kourtney though the character synopsis does say he gets close to a wildcat or two which certainly leaves room to slide him into Gina’s plot. We know Antoine is into Ashlyn so that’s another love triangle to look forward to. Jack was described as having wanderlust and most of the cast seems not to have filmed with him so I think it’s likely that he plays a role in convincing EJ to take a gap year rather than head straight to Duke. 

A translation leak on TikTok reveals that in 2x03 Gina is sad that she’s only gotten a Valentine’s Day gift from her mom. A brief clip from the promo shows up her on her porch at night holding a heart shaped box of chocolates. If that’s supposed to be from a secret or semi-secret admirer than it has to be from either EJ, Ricky, or Howie. If it’s a platonic gift then it could be from anyone, we’ll see what Tim has up his sleeves.

Nini moving back to SLC is a question of when not if. It’s going to be very difficult to bring her back in a way that’s justified and also doesn’t leave the time she spends in Denver looking like a total waste. Frankly, I’d rather the show just bite the bullet and bring her back with as little fuss as possible.

We’re possibly around a quarter way through HSMTMTS given that the mains have 4 season contracts and presuming that the show is not cancelled earlier. At the very least the show will be radically different after S4 if they try to continue it as Olivia has made very clear that she’s going to leave asap to pursue her burgeoning music career full time (notably she’s only done the bare minimum of promo for S2). 

Looming over the remaining seasons of HSMTMTS is what the professional relationship between Olivia and Josh looks like especially since in many ways the show is built around Ricky and Nini. Off screen relationships have often caused on screen problems and dating a co-worker is rarely a good idea since even clean breakups leave lingering resentments. Obviously the Jolivia breakup was not clean, Driver’s License, Deja Vu, and Good 4 U (which is a certified bop) were clearly written from a place of hurt and in some ways were written to hurt. It’s no surprise that Joshua has dropped his duet with Sabrina Carpenter from his EP; someone on his team at least is trying to stop the damage to his reputation. There’s a decent chance that Olivia’s songs becoming such hits has irreparably damaged Joshua Bassett’s reputation among the same pool of largely young women that he’s targeting his music towards thereby cutting off his music career at the knees. If nothing else this behind the scenes drama should keep things entertaining for a while.

Until next week Wildcats 

[maxwell-grant]

OK, I know this will probably be painful, and I may be a bad mutual for asking but...would you be willing to identify what, in your opinion are the bottom five worst Shadow adaptations, and give a detailed breakdown of why they were so lousy?

Oh christ, okay. I don't think you're gonna get as much of a detailed breakdown for these compared to some of the others, because I take more issue with adaptations that do have good qualities but also big or deep problems to talk about.

For example, I can't include Garth Ennis's Shadow in this list because the comic has a lot of strong points to it, despite a deeply, deeply detestable take on The Shadow's character, where as the rest of the Dynamite run doesn't reach neither the lows or highs of his run. Likewise, Andy Helfer's run has a couple or a couple dozen moments every issue that make me want to tear something to shreds in frustration, but it's also at many points a really good comic with great art and some occasionally very inspired writing. Really, I'd just be repeating myself talking about what I hate in those.

But, fine, let's list some of the others.

I think I'm just gonna have to get the elephant in the room out of the way here, and address that I won't be including Si Spurrier's 2017 Dynamite mini in this list, and I think at least some of you might be angry it's not Number 1 by default. I'm doing this because I intend to one day really revisit it, think about it and it's reception and what it was trying to do, and talk about it on it's own, now that it's been 5 years and everyone has moved on and we can maybe talk about it without kneejerk hatred driving everyone nuts (your mileage may vary on how warranted it was).

I'm also not going to be talking about James Patterson's new novel, because I haven't read it. It seems to be considered a forgettable potboiler by mainstream critics and a resounding failure by everyone who likes the character whether they've read the book or not, and frankly I don't have it in me to learn what the fuzz was about anytime soon, I got my hands way too full as is.

And I won't be including the Batman x Shadow crossovers here, because again, they do have a lot of virtues that put them far ahead of some of the really worst Shadow media, and I've talked enough about how badly I think they mangled The Shadow, which is really the big problem I have with them (well, that and Tim Sale blatantly copying a Michael Kaluta cover, that was really shitty). I don't really hate them anymore, I just get tired and frustrated thinking about parts of them, I said my piece as is. Really, my frustration over this comic is what inspired me to start writing about The Shadow here, so I guess in a way I do owe it at least that much.

5: Archie Comics's Shadow

I think some of you might be wondering why this isn't ranked higher, but to be honest, I don't actually harbor any hatred towards this. I mean, I have to include it, but I find it kinda silly that some people even today actually care about the existence of this comic enough to hate it.

For fans back then? Oh yeah, obviously, but this dropped to such instantaneous backlash that it never really got to live past 6 issues. Really, everything wrong about it can be understood immediately from the covers, and I've actually read the comic in it's entirety to see if there was anything worth taking. I found only a couple of things of note but, no, this really is just a painfully mediocre superhero comic that happens to have a couple of Shadow names in it. If anything, it gets too much credit.

The actual contents of what it is are never going to justify it's reputation, but the existence of it and the disproportionate response to it is the funniest and most enduring legacy it could ever ask for. This whole comic is The Shadow's version of Spongebob's embarassing Christmas photo.

4: David Liss's The Shadow Now

This is another "The Shadow as an immortal in modern times" comic and I think you may have noticed the pattern with those by now. I may revisit this eventually and I do have some moments from it saved for reference, but overall: It sucks, and it doesn't even suck in a way that lets me talk much about it, it's a diet version of Chaykin's Shadow. If Archie's Shadow is a generic mediocre superhero comic wearing The Shadow's name, this is a generic crime story playing beats from movie. The Shadow is an asshole and not even a grandiose or sinister one, he just feels like a sleazy douche in a costume. The art is a 50/50 coin toss between appropriately moody and "Google images with a filter on them", I don't remember anything about the plot other than Khan had a bomb again and he had a daughter, and there were new versions of the agents and the Harry stand-in turned evil and Lamont shacked up with Margo's descendant which, uh, no. I don't really hate this but I really have nothing nice to say about this comic other than Colton Worley's art is nice sometimes. I can't really muster anything else to say here.

3: Invisible Avenger

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZ...

...uuh, wha-

Yeah, I remember nothing about this one other than it's painfully boring and nothing about it, nothing at all, works in the slightest and I drift off to sleep even now trying to give this a rewatch. To be honest pretty much every other Shadow serial not starred by Victor Jory sucks and I don't really have anything to say about them, this one is just the worst of the lot. I dearly wish there was a good Shadow tv series but, if it was going to be like this pilot? Good riddance.

2: Harlan Ellison's The New York Review of Bird

This isn't really a Shadow story as much as it's a Harlan Ellison story that happens to feature The Shadow, but man am I glad that Ellison's "Dragon Shadows" was canned, because holy shit what a goddamn nightmare Harlan Ellison writing The Shadow for real could have been, going purely by the one time he ever touched the character. New York Review of Bird is a purely farcical parody story that wears real, real thin even before "Uncle Kent" shows up, and we get to see in it what is by far the most detestable and irredeemable take on The Shadow ever put on print, and not even in a critique or deconstructive way or anything that could be remotely worth discussing.

I don't hold any particular affection for Harlan Ellison and his writing (despite liking some of it) and I've come to notice the major red flag that is finding someone who looks up to Harlan Ellison in any capacity as a person, and this story in particular really feels like Ellison aggressively trying to channel his jackass tendencies through every line, just him being nasty because he built a personal brand on being nasty. The only reason this isn't Number One is because it's a very short story that saw zero influence or reputation, and thus it only exists as a brief mention in The Shadow wiki, and a brief mention is all it really calls for.

1: Howard Chaykin's Blood & Judgment

I'm guessing most of you already knew this one was in the top spot before I started writing.

I would actually rather not write a big piece on Blood & Judgment, because I think (or at least I hope) it's influence on The Shadow has waned a lot over the years and I would prefer to draw it the least amount of attention possible, but if I HAVE to talk about this, I guess I'd rather just vomit this out of my circuits now instead of giving it it's own post.

I would prefer to use a less unpleasant image on my blog, but if I'm going to talk about this comic, there's no image to better convey it than this drawing of macho asshole Cranston holding a sexualized mannequin at gunpoint. By leaps and bounds, Blood & Judgment is the most misogynistic Shadow story I've ever read. It's ironic that Chaykin justified the rampant misogyny he gave The Shadow with the idea that this is just a man from the 30s would act like, when he admits in the same breath that he never even touched the stories, and he wrote a story more sexist and demeaning to it's female characters than anything, literally anything, written in the Shadow pulps. It's almost impressive even.

I'll paste some segments from Randy Raynaldo's review

In Flagg, he intended to present his own point of view on American society while keeping his work tongue in cheek and acessible. But this vision dimmed, and Flagg had become a vehicle by which Chaykin could play out fetishes and portray gratuitous and stylish violence.

In The Shadow, stripped of the political and social veneer which was supposed to make Flagg unique, Chaykin's sensibilities and excesses become disturbingly apparent. For all of his liberal posturing, Chaykin's work demonstrates zero difference from the same kind of mentality exploited and made popular by similarly violent popular culture icons like Dirty Harry and Death Wish.

More than half a dozen individuals are indiscriminately and violently murdered in the first issue. Although the victims are characters who played major roles in the myth of The Shadow, we feel little sympathy for them, even for those of us who knew these characters at the outset. Who dies is unimportant, it's how they die that is the fascination.

Chaykin uses sexual decadence as a means by which to establish villains, and undercuts this device by making the protagonists as promiscuous as the villains. For all of Chaykin's seemingly liberal leanings, he demonstrates very little sensitivity in his portrayal of women.

Because everything works on rules of three, this comic also follows the pattern with other works mentioned here, as this isn't Howard Chaykin writing The Shadow: it's The Shadow reimagined as a Howard Chaykin character. He looks and acts exactly like Reuben Flagg and the typical macho protagonist of Chaykin's other works, he's a cynical sleaze with an entirely new origin who half-assedly dons a garb to machine gun people, and I already wrote a separate piece on why the machineguns are kind of emblematic of everything wrong with this take.

I understand that Chaykin has, or used to have, a big following of sorts, and I've tried to wrap my head around this for years, but I genuinely still don't get why Shadow fans stomach this comic unless they happen to be Chaykin fans first and foremost, I really don't. Everything, fucking everything Shadow fans hate about modern depictions of the character can be traced right back to this. The parts that stuck and changed the character for the worse, like him being defined as an immortal, bloodthirsty warmonger who got all his skills and powers from a magic city in Tibet, or Lamont Cranston being a coward who fears and hates the Shadow, or his agents being expendable slaves, stuff that has been ingrained into the mythos through this and the Alec Baldwin movie and other comics, to the point that people now think of it as the norm, that it's the baseline of what The Shadow is, and I hate it, I genuinely fucking hate it,

I hate it so much that it's a big part of the reason why I created this blog and why I want so badly to get to write The Shadow, because I plainly couldn't stand not having ways to tell people that this is all wrong, that this is actively shooting down the character's odds for success, and that they are missing out on something really great, because the well has been tainted with garbage that won't go away and everytime I read the words Shambala in a Shadow comic, even an otherwise good or great one, I get just a wee bit cross.

The only semi-redeeming aspects I can think of for this comic is one or two cool moments, like when The Shadow hijacks a concert using his Devil's Whisper or when he tames dogs with a stare. Just breadcrumbs of "not garbage" amidst an ocean of anything but. I hate that talking about why I hate this comic in-length can almost feel like I'm still enticing people to check it out of curiosity, but if you wanna do that, fine, just know this: The worst part of Blood & Judgment, even if you don't care at all about what it did to The Shadow, is that it's boring.

It is a deeply boring comic. If you like Howard Chaykin to begin with, you'll probably like this okay (although even Chaykin fans told me that this is his weakest work and that even he seems to agree). If you don't, I plain don't see what you could get out of this.

The comic itself is just nothing. It's the comic book equivalent of a pre-schooler trying to get a reaction by swearing. It has nothing whatsoever other than half-assed attempts at shock value. The plot isn't there, the ideas are stale, the dialogue is needlessly oblique and comprised entirely of unfinished sentences, interrupted conversations and one-liners without build-up. The characters are all unlikable and uninteresting stooges with no personality, or joyless cartoons. There's no heart or emotion or logic, and it isn't even funny enough to succeed as just an outrageous exercise in 80s excess. There's nothing in here.

I get "why" it was popular enough at the time, a rising star creator penning a modern revival of an old character based on controversy that pissed off the old fans, it's an old story that still gets repeated today. But manufactured controversy is not a replacement for storytelling and it rarely ever exists to benefit the people who actually want to enjoy the stories, it only benefits those for the crude benefit of those who want to sell you something out of the controversy.

I guess they got their money's worth back then.

------------------------------------------------

Phew, okay, I did it, I finally vomited out a piece on Blood & Judgment and some others, allright, let's put this piece of negativity behind us now.

[ljblueteak]

Throwing my hat into the “Why did Paul and Jane break up?” ring. There have been fantastic posts on this already, but looking at the McCartney bios by Sounes and Salewicz back-to-back has given me a slightly different perspective (this could all need to be tossed out if anything else about them comes to light/there’s other material I’m not aware of, which is more than possible, but here’s what I’ve got for now!) 

The short version: I think they split up because of a lack of long-term compatibility that they both recognized as they got older. They also grew to prefer different lifestyles and possibly also had different ideas about whether/when to start trying to have children. By the time they split up, Paul had already realized, according to the joint interview with Jane described in Hunter Davies’ 1968 bio, that it was “silly” of him to have expected Jane to do what the other Beatles’ partners had done and give up her career after marriage (Paul describing his expectation as having been “silly” is in Davies 308-309. The observation that all the other women who had “married in to the band” had given up their careers because that was “expected by men of [the Beatles’ background]” is in Sounes 189). Jane having a career she wanted to continue after marriage seems to have been resolved as a possible impediment before the split. The Salewicz bio suggests that what *may* have been a factor was the question of children, with Jane not wanting them to interfere with her career. However, it’s not clear from that bio when this question came up for them--whether it was closer to the time of the split or whether it had been discussed and resolved prior to their engagement. I think these are the main reasons they split. I don’t think his many, many, many affairs helped at all, but I think the above reasons are the main ones.

Jane and Paul got together when they were quite young (Jane was 17 and Paul was 20) and their interests diverged in a few ways that really mattered as they got older. As the bios have suggested, Jane wasn’t really into rock ‘n’roll and really wasn’t into the drug scene. Paul was into both (understatement!). This likely contributed to the tension that people like Marianne Faithful witnessed between them. In addition to that, they both seemed to realize that they didn’t ultimately “click.” For bio excerpts and more, please see below!

In terms of not actually “clicking,”which would be enough reason to end a relationship on its own, imo, here’s what Jane Asher had to say (sourced from the amazing @thecoleopterawithana via @amoralto: 

“No, it wasn’t love at first sight on my side. It was several months before I felt at all certain. And of course, I was young. Only seventeen. Inevitably, one changes. After all, Paul himself was only twenty when we met.

“I knew in my bones that the break must inevitably come a long time before it actually happened. Although we had this emotional thing for each other, we found it difficult to be really happy together....”

Jane Asher, interview w/ Godfrey Winn for The Australian Women’s Weekly: Girl with a broken love affair. (April 23rd, 1969)

And here’s Paul in Many Years From Now: 

“During that period with Jane Asher I learned a lot and she introduced me to a lot of things, but I think inevitably when I moved to Cavendish Avenue, I realized that she and I weren’t really going to be the thing we’d always thought we might be. Once or twice we talked about getting married, and plans were afoot but I don’t know, something really made me nervous about the whole thing. It just never settled with me, and as that’s very important for me, things must feel comfortable for me, I think it’s a pretty good gauge if you’re lucky enough. You’re not always lucky enough, but if you can feel comfortable then there’s something very special about that feeling. I hadn’t quite managed to be able to get it with Jane....She was a very intelligent and interesting person, but I just never clicked. One of those indefinable things about love is some people you click with and some people who you should maybe click with, you don’t” (264, 452-453). 

In addition to their own words, there are differing takes from observers about Paul and Jane’s compatibility and reasons for the split. Artists like Jann Howarth, who along with Peter Blake made the Sergeant Pepper art and had known the Beatles for “four years” before that observes in the Sounes bio that:

“I thought [Paul and Jane] were adorable together. She was wonderful. She was a very calm person and, in the middle of all this, you felt she was a wonderful balance for him, and you felt she was his equal for sure. It didn’t feel to me as though Paul was the big deal and she was trembling along behind, whereas you felt that a bit with Pattie Boyd and some of the other gals. I mean Cynthia was left standing still, basically, by John. Whereas you felt Jane was an absolute equal to Paul and had a very supple mind” (131). 

Howarth sees them as “adorable” together and says that Jane’s “Paul’s equal for sure” and doesn’t suggest that this is a source of tension in any way.

Marianne Faithful, who frequently visited Cavendish with Mick Jagger, seems to imply in her autobiography that a major cause for the tensions she observed between Paul and Jane were related to Jane’s career aspirations and that Paul had wanted “an old-fashioned Liverpool wife,” which is what he got with Linda. However, I think it’s worth noting that while there had been tensions about Jane’s career, as detailed in the Davies bio (though Paul had also been really excited about and supportive of Jane’s career), Paul had already recognized that he had been being “silly.” Of course, there may have been continuing tensions related to it, but it sounds like Paul realized he’d been wrong on the whole. In addition to that, Marianne and Mick were part of the rock ‘n’ roll drug crowd Jane disapproved of, so these tensions between Paul and Jane that Faithfull observed may very well also have been related to Jane not being thrilled about more drug-using rock ‘n’rollers taking over her house.  

Here’s the bit from Marianne Faithfull’s book via The Guardian:

Visits to Paul and Jane Asher weren't quite as relaxed. They were a bit uptight, and there were constant little frictions, but that's what happens when couples start to come apart. In any case, I was in a very different position from the one that Jane found herself in. I'd done what Paul wanted Jane to do, and given up my career. I wasn't going on tour with the Old Vic; I wasn't taking any more movie roles and very few parts in plays. Jane was a serious actress and wanted to continue her career, but Paul had other ideas. That's why Linda was so perfect for Paul; she was just what he wanted, an old-fashioned Liverpool wife who was devoted to her husband. Whatever we thought of Linda - and she didn't make that great an impression on me - I think it was a credit to Paul that he didn't marry a model. Because that's what all the others have ended up doing, they've married these models. And they have children who also become models.

The Guardian, 6 October 2007.

In his bio of Paul (which doesn’t directly address Faithfull’s comments), Sounes doesn’t suggest that the perception that Paul would be happy to be with someone who was prepared to let their own career take the backseat, at least for a time, is wrong (I do think it’s important to mention that in addition to her Wings career and solo/with Paul songwriting work, Linda also did work that didn’t involve Paul’s career at all down the line, like working on her cookbooks and frozen food line). But Sounes does say that it was much more than that that drew Paul and Linda together:

“Anything Paul wanted to do seemed possible with Linda, or Lin as he called her affectionately. She had bucket-loads of American confidence, which he liked. Both were relaxed and open about sex...Lin dug rock ‘n’ roll in a way Jane never had and unlike Jane, this American girl wasn’t uptight about drugs. Although a modern, liberated woman in some ways, Lin wasn’t a committed careerist. She was already tired of scratching a living as a rock ‘n’roll photographer, more than ready to settle down with a man who could look after her and Heather” Fab (215). 

Paul was also ready to start a family. Indeed, John Lennon suggested that part of what drew Paul to Linda was the “ready-made family.” In the same interview where John pointed out that Linda could provide a “ready-made family,” he claimed that Jane was not ready for children: “If Jane was to have a career, then that’s not a cozy family, is it?” Chris Salewicz’s Paul bio also addresses this, saying:

“A source of considerable contention between Paul and Jane--perhaps the cause of those adverse remarks about the theatre to Joe Orton--was her insistence that having children would interfere with her acting career. Yet, now that Paul had everything he could possibly ever want, all that remained to fulfill his life was the presence of children, something he had always desired far more than the other Beatles” (199).

While we (or at least I!) don’t know whether Paul and Jane had discussed the issue of children before they got engaged, disagreements over whether or when to have kids contribute to a fair number of breakups to this day--and they had plenty of good reasons, from just not “clicking” in the right way to disagreements over drugs, to break up anyway. 

[whump-town]

Kittens

I wrote something along these lines as an idea a while ago and I finished it now in-between breaks I’ve allowed myself between an essay I have to write. I figured it’s not my best but no one gets hurt and Hotch talks to a cat for the majority of it so it’s not that bad

The creaking of the old floorboards stops Hotch from going down the hall and checking to make sure Jack is up. He stands for a moment at the mouth of the hallway, listening to Jack curse and mumble under his breath. Most of which, he can’t hear but there are dips in Jack’s voice which allow for only certain words to float their way down to him.

“Where-- that little motherfu-- he’s going to-- shit, shit, shit--”

Hotch huffs a little laugh, a chuckle that makes no more than the whisper of a breath of noise leaving his mouth. Parenting doesn’t make much sense and Hotch is certain he’s probably supposed to say something to Jack about the cursing but to his credit, Jack hasn’t spoken like that in Hotch’s presence. Plus, it would make him a hypocrite to get too frustrated over it. He cursed at sixteen and he still does. He also smoked and got into all kinds of trouble and, as far as he knows, the most Jack gets into on a Saturday night is too many energy drinks and a new book.

As curious as Hotch is about whatever it is that Jack is fussing with, Hotch has to get breakfast ready. He turns and starts to walk to the kitchen. That’s where he’s headed when he sees something small and orange bolts ahead of him. Glancing over his shoulder, in the direction it had come from, Hotch finds nothing. Just the light peeking out from behind Jack’s door.

Hmm. Odd.

Hotch continues down the hall, looking around the floor as he goes. Trying to see what it was and where it went. Until he gets to the kitchen. “Oh,” Hotch raises an eyebrow at the kitten he finds sniffing the floor near the oven. A tiny orange kitten. He picks it up, observing it as he turns it around to inspect the tiny thing.

It looks up and him and gives a little irritated meow.

“You must be motherfucker,” Hotch says, rubbing a finger over its head. “I think Jack is looking for you.” Hotch smiles as the kitten purs, pushing its head under his finger for more. He indulges it and, he has to admit, the thing is cute. He doesn’t mind it. “Are you hungry?”

He goes to the fridge and inspects the findings… slim pickings. “Cats are lactose intolerant, right?” He looks down as the kitten squirms his arms. Rolling over it attacks his fingers but cradled to his chest it’s safe. “I don’t know anything about cats.” He’s never had any pets. Haley had an old dog named Bailey when they first got together. A border collie her father bought for her birthday years before from a farmer in town.

Growing up in the country he’d seen plenty of stray cats and dogs but he’d never had his own. There was a porch cat he used to feed bread to but his father scared it off and kicked it once. Hotch had looked so much like his father that the cat wouldn’t come to him anymore after that incident. That was probably for the best.

“Here,” Hotch finally settles. He pulls the almond milk out of the fridge, setting it on the counter. He adds the container of blueberries beside it. “I’m having oatmeal but I reckon you can probably have almond milk, right?” With a frown, he makes a mental note to ask Emily or Garcia about that. One of them is bound to know. For now, a little almond milk is probably fine. It doesn’t have milk in it but he wants to be certain.

Taking a bowl out of the cupboard, he hums and reaches over for the measuring cups. He’s been making oatmeal for years so he’s mastered the eyeballing it technique. However, the half-cup measuring cup is the perfect size for him to use as a bowl for the kitten.

“Has Jack got you any food?” he asks placing the kitten on the counter. He pours a little almond milk in the half-cup and smirks when the kitten takes to it immediately. “Well… you probably wouldn’t drink that if it wasn’t good for you, right?” Probably… well, maybe.

This feels exactly like when they brought Jack home. He and Haley had been terrified of every little thing. They were constantly calling someone about something. He can easily call Emily or Garcia but… he’s an adult, he can handle a kitten.

“Stay,” he orders stepping away from the counter to grab a pan. The kitten doesn’t move just stands contently where it is drinking the almond milk. Hotch gets the oatmeal going, keeping an eye on the kitten out of the corner of his eye. “You’re hungry,” he notes, with a tilt of his head. And when it looks up at him, almond milk all over its face, there’s no way he can deny how cute it is.

His oatmeal doesn’t take that long to make and distracted with watching the kitten it’s a nice easy pace. Bowl of oatmeal in his palm, angry kitten trying to escape from where it’s tucked between his chest and forearm, and the little cup of almond milk pinched between his fingers he sits down at the kitchen table. “What has he named you?” Hotch asks, settling it all down on the table. It occurs to him it could be a little strange to let the cat on the table but it is a cat so if it sticks around he assumes there will be lots of table sitting.

Hotch can’t remember what book Jack was reading last week-- which is chronologically his best guess at when his little friend here made its way into the house. With hindsight, he can recall Jack having been just a little more distant with him, secretive. Jack is also significant with his decisions so maybe Hotch should think more along the lines of Jack’s favorite books, not his most recent reads. Then again maybe Jack hasn’t named the cat or he chose something out of a song or a movie.

Looking up as he hears Jack’s door creak open, he scowls back down at his lap. The kitten having stretched up at his chest and bats at one of the buttons on his shirt. He taps its little paw warningly, just enough to jar it a little, and judging from the look he receives this little warning tapis nothing something it was expecting.

“Hey, dad.”

Hotch looks up and hums back, nothing unusual because he certainly isn’t going to give up the advantage he has right now. His son is a snarky little shit -- purely Emily’s doing -- and Hotch rarely gets moments where he comes out ahead of whatever jokes Jack (or Emily) can make at his expense.

Jack comes around and nods his head, timidly going about making himself some cereal. Hotch doesn’t comment on his son’s socks -- one is teal with bright, highlighters yellow bananas and the other is beige with pink polka dots. Hotch had given up on Jack and socks. Jack gets a little thrill out of this rebellion and Hotch should just be happy that it’s not worse.

The two of them really have nothing in common. Jack loves science and math (Hotch has to use a calculator for simple multiplication). Hotch prefers for each of his books to look like they have never even been read (Jack has so many sticky notes in his copy that Fahrenheit 451 that it looks silly). Jack refuses to carry around a planner and writes everything down on the back of his hand (Hotch has multiple planners and color codes things in delicate details).

“Oh.” Jack turns with his cereal in his hands and sees the kitten in his father’s lap. That bright orange over his black dress pants. Jack knew his father wouldn’t be mad -- he can count on one hand the number of times he has seen Hotch angry. Though, he knows what he’s done wasn’t the right course to take. He’s not so sure what to do now, he hadn’t planned this far ahead.

Hotch hums again, nodding his head.

Jack looks down at the floor and timidly takes his seat across from his father at the table. Tucking his legs underneath himself to avoid hitting Hotch’s much longer stretched-out legs. Normally, he wouldn’t think twice about hitting his dad’s legs but today he’s sensing he should probably consider his actions a little more. “Am in trouble?”

Hotch raises an eyebrow and looks away from the kitten to his Jack. He’s looking down at his cereal, playing with it so he can avoid looking at Hotch. Jack’s never really been in trouble. Hotch is a little too lenient at times but even Jessica is pretty bad for that. Even so, Jack has turned out pretty okay, he’s still a kid (16 isn’t that grown, despite that being the age Hotch’s father kicked him out at -- well sent him to boarding school but that was only after he spent a month couch surfing and sleeping in a shitty tent he stole).

“No.” It’s a cat and he’s not mad and Hotch doesn’t see just yet where he could make this a learning opportunity so… he’s not going to make it a big deal. It’s hard, in situations like these, to know where normal discipline comes into play. His own father would have beat him senseless or locked him out of the house for a week, maybe longer.

“Oh.”

Hotch frowns, “do you think you should be?” He doesn’t mean it to bait Jack, he means it honestly. There isn’t a right answer.

Jack shrugs, “I mean, I don’t know.” Jack is aware that his father isn’t like most dads but they’re in a unique situation, the two of them. “You should probably lecture me about something, right? I mean, I don’t think I’ll be sneaking in any more cats but that’s not as a result of any lecture. I certainly wouldn’t do it with a dog.”

So maybe not a lesson learned but still sounds like there’s no point acknowledged. “Okay,” Hotch reasons. It sounds fair. “Well, next time we talk this sort of thing over, okay? I respect you and your decisions and so I ask for your opinions on things, right? I need you to respect my opinions.”

Jack nods.

“So, any names?”

[tidalcreek]

helloooo! here are google drive links (pt1 + pt2) to my 4hr cut of the hobbit trilogy :-) specs n more details under the cut!

runtime is 4hr 9m (including about 4m of credits)

all scenes have open captions in english (either screen recorded from hbo or manually added)!!

i didn’t have access to the extended editions for this but i was able to find some of the extended scenes i wanted on yt (hence the portuguese and turkish subtitles on a few scenes which makes it a little messy with the english caps sry!!)

it’s split in two parts so i could get the quality up to 1080p but the parts are not like. two coherent separate movies its just one big guy

i basically did this for one reason which is that the hobbit movies r incredibly nostalgic to me and i love them but i avoided rewatching them for years because i have adhd and i just could not be fucked to watch 9 hours of cgi when i only cared about half of it. so here’s the half!!

this is heavily informed by the tolkien edit! i have my own criticisms of that cut (which is why i made one lmao) but i absolutely used it as a roadmap of what the story could survive without so credit where credit’s due

but forewarning because i made this specifically for my own use it’s very tailored to Me and my favorite parts of the trilogy! im a tiny bit of a tolkien purist bc i love the book very much and for aforementioned adhd reasons i always want these movies to move SO much faster than they do. but if there’s a scene that seems pointless it’s there just bc i like it and if there's a line that's missing for no reason it's just bc it annoys me :) however i Did try really hard to make this a good movie experience bc i have terminal film major disease!

here are the most significant changes i made if ur curious:

in general this cut follows bilbo/thorin/the company’s pov pretty tightly! it’s the part of the story that i personally care about most and it’s where the most coherent and interesting arcs are in my opinion! 

i could not care less for peter jackson’s cgi action scenes so most of of them are trimmed significantly or sometimes just deleted. this especially applies to the orc chase/fight scenes..i simply cannot sit through the full six minute barrel scene again. the big smaug scenes and botfa battle scenes are also especially cut down

gandalf’s dol guldur plot is completely cut (including radagast, galadriel, etc); ive never liked how the extra lore adds such huge All Of Middle Earth stakes to the hobbit (that's not bilbo’s fight and it never was! he didnt know what he was starting when he started it and neither should we!) so i took the tolkien edit’s line on this one. sorry to galadriel but i know what gandalf was doing during dos i dont need to see it 

crimes against the kiliel community: this is my most dudebro tolkien opinion but i have never loved the tauriel/legolas/kili dynamic and they have SOOO many scenes that i Personally just do not want to watch every time. i love the version of tauriel that lives in my brain but i do not vibe w the movie universe >:-( to that end both tauriel and legolas are almost entirely cut and you ARE allowed to hang me in the town square for this. im sad about it

bilbo's prologue scene is moved closer to the middle of the movie rather than introducing that info immediately in auj. i like having the audience find out about thrain and dale only once the company has seen the lonely mountain for the first time! idk if it reads as well as i think it does so lmk what u think!!

iiiii recut thorin’s funeral scene with hozier’s version of the parting glass. this is simply because ive always thought the funeral music was boring and i wanted to have fun! it’s one of the biggest changes i made to a specific scene so pls tell me if u have thoughts....it's at around 1:50:00 of part 2 if you want to skip

there are about 4 minutes of (incomplete) credits because sitting and listening to the last goodbye after botfa ends is a ritual <3

ummm thats it! if you actually watch any of this and you have thoughts please come talk to me about it!! i want to talk to you specifically!!