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wishingicouldfly · 3 years ago

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Boston Katie's Top Ten

My friends Ash and Katie and I decided to share our favorite fan fictions.

In which I host my friend @BKatie617 on my blog. I LOVE Katie's choices and funny enough, none of ours overlap, even though her picks are phenomenal. We *do* have a talented fandom.

If you want to read my list: it's here: Rosann's Faves and if you want to read Ash's faves, they are here.

Take it away, Katie!

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Top 10 Fics of 2021, Or: The Year I Gave In To My Favorite New Obsession

Hello, I’m Katie - or, as some of you know me from the Twitter timeline, BostonKatie617. I’m a 40ish Larrie who has been a casual fan of 1D since their first album, became a Larrie to bond with my daughter, fell down the rabbit hole 2019ish (pre-pandemic), but then became part of the Larrie FBI to keep myself sane during the suckfest that was 2020. I fell into stan-Twitter to find a concert buddy for HSLOT, and somehow that lifechanging decision got me here: happily ensconced at my desk with a fresh mug of coffee, telling you about the story of how sSome of my moots and I were trading fic recommendations, which turned somehow in an insert-funny-story-here kind of way into all of us writing up our ten favorite fics.

Because I’m rather new to this wonderfully addictive world of fic consumptions (truly, only falling into it in the fall of 2021), I decided to shape my write-up in a countdown sort style. I drew the cut-off at the stroke of midnight, 2021 (sorry Green Room, I finished you in the wee hours of brand new 2022, so you’ll have to wait until next year’s party to claim your medal). Expect to see some big names and few surprises: Sorry - I’m new to this! Take advantage of the flip side and throw recommendations of what else I should read. I keep a running tally on a spreadsheet and there are big names already in contention for 2022, but I’m curious to see if anyone can topple ‘em. Maybe I should sort out a prize. Hmm…

But that’s next year’s countdown. I still have to reveal my winners for the Top 10 Fics of 2021! Here we go…

10. Got the Sunshine on my Shoulders, by Hattalove.

This fic was a bit different for me. It’s adult-Larry who are adult-aged (I can do that easily), is a tweaked-up version of their reality (only Harry’s the music star, okay fine), but Harry and Lou are separated, and Harry’s trying to get married to a new partner - yeah, that’s where the record dramatically scratches to a stop for me, too. Harry returns to Holmes Chapel to get Lou to sign the divorce papers, and through well-orchestrated plot devices, he and Lou fall back together. It’s a cute story, a nice way to re-integrate familiar faces and names without shoehorning every name we’ve ever heard into the story (pet peeve alert). I was pulling for everything to work out (oBviOuSlY), and the resolution was different and cute enough that the story felt complete in a Wow-that-was-a-big-meal-but-I-don’t-feel-overfull kind of way. Not the end-all be-all (I can’t remember all the details of the other lads, but I remember I enjoyed them enough at the time), but I know I would enjoy re-reading it.

9. To the Ends of the Earth, by mak.

It’s 2015. 2016? 2015. Eh - the infamous 18-month-break has begun. It’s not AU, a genre I enjoy if they know what they’re doing. The departure sets the scene: Lou and Harry have broken up (or taken a break, depending how you look at it). Harry has disappeared off the face of the earth. Niall tricks Lou into going with him to visit Harry in Idaho, where he’s hiding out to get away from it all and recover. Only: surprise! Niall “can’t make it.” Lou stubbornly sticks it out, and we see how he and H repair their broken hearts. I do enjoy a story with tension over how they get together (never an “if” but a “how”). There’s a few cute Original Characters, but minor ones; this fic is all H and L. Wasn’t drawn out too long, didn’t resolve itself too quickly. An original setting and not too much smut-for-smut’s sake (don’t oppose it; I just like a reason for it). It’s cute, if that can be said about heartbreak stories.

8. Unbelievers, by IsThatYouLarry.

I feel like I’m going to get flak for putting this so low on my Top Ten. This was only the third fic I’d read, and the first one that was smutty-smutty. Like SMUTTY. Also, the first one with an enemies-to-lovers plot, and while it works incredibly well (I just re-read and liked it immensely still), it bothered me that you start en medias res, never an explanation for how these enemies were screwing in the locker room. It’s a Lou-POV story (90% of the fics I’ve read are, for some reason), though I’ve heard the author is working on Harry’s POV right now. This is THE Soccer Story, for Larry fic readers, for good reason. The characters are strong, the smut isn’t gratuitous, nobody’s dead (though Harry’s fam are all assholes, which was kinda hard, poor Anne!). Extremely well executed. I’ve concluded after my re-read that the only reason this is so low on my Top 10 is because I like the other stories more.

7. Dreaming of You, by VelvetOscar.

I don’t hear a lot about this fic. It doesn’t get mentioned often when talking about Top 10 lists, and I don’t hear it rec’ed that often. It’s short(er); not smutty; no real cliffhangers or pining. What it does have: young adult OT5 members working at Starbucks, and Harry becomes their favorite customer. It’s different (although I read two Starbucks stories back-to-back and sometimes they bleed together); I enjoyed the way the OT5 members were written as true to themselves, but in a very different setting. I wanted the story to go on and on. Everything seemed believable and how our boys would really react in the story; VelvetOscar is an incredible author talented at AUs. I was genuinely mad I couldn’t jump into the story and that this AU was…well..an alternate reality. That’s why it’s this high on the list. Now I want to go back and re-read!

6. Young & Beautiful, by VelvetOscar.

Yeah. Y&B. A pretty big litmus test of where people fall on so many things. This was the fourth fic I ever read and it OWNED ME. It was the first fic I read that was angsty. And when I say angsty, I mean, you with LOATHE characters, the author, and the rest of the world for 1) making them like this, 2) making the real people have to be in the situations they’re in, and 3) the rest of the world for making you have to do things other than just read the story. So: angsty. VERY angsty. Long. VERY long. Smutty. VERY smutty. And AU. VERY AU. In their author notes, VelvetOscar explained that they wrote Y&B because they wanted to see what would happen if they made characters totally different and free from constraints. I hated Harry for the first half of the fic. In fact, I think I hated the fic for the first half, but the writing was so good I was compelled to keep reading. It became an actual addiction. Things I loved: The writing; Niall’s character; Lou’s POV; the visuals; the intricate back-stories; the tension between hating the story but loving the writing/story. Things I didn’t: Harry is an asshole (at first) and I hate hating Harry; Liam is way too camp; everyone is FAR too rich; Poor, poor Harry and what he went through. Of note: The story was published way before Fine Line, but soooo many themes are here. I’m convinced it’s connected to the Falling MV, and Sunflower Vol. 6 (flowers and their meanings are an important part of Y&B). It’s an insane theory, but just watch. Also of note: when I finished the story, I just left the tab open for four days. I couldn’t close it and shut off my connection to the story. That’s good writing.

5. Walk that Mile, by PurpleDaisy.

Oooooh, this was my palette cleanser after Y&B! I didn’t realize I read so many of my favorites as my first fics, and then chased those feelings the rest of the year. This was just what I needed. It’s a start-as-strangers, Lou POV, AU type fic that has young adult Lou about to start law school going on a road trip with graduate student photography-obsessed Harry. Niall’s friends with both (all hail captain of the ship!) and vouches for them. So it’s not quite strangers, not quite enemies-to-lovers, but a beautiful love story that stays mostly true to who we know H and L to be. I’ve read it three or four times, every time I need something fluffy-but-not-too-fluffy to clean out any bad tastes, and it’s held up every time I’ve read it. Not too short, not too long, smut isn’t too smutty (but still there), they don’t get together too quickly, and the required misunderstanding isn’t too fabricated. It’s the Mary Poppins of Larry Fics: Practically perfect in every way.

4. Escapade, by Dolce_Piccante.

HA! I have a funny story. Everyone (or nearly everyone) in the fandom knows Jack McQueen. I’d been reading quotes about Jack McQueen, seen memes about Jack McQueen, told jokes about Jack McQueen - he’s like the 6th member (sorry Shawn). So I finally start reading Escapade because I had said I needed fluff. I fully expect Jack McQueen to be a wonderful OC, and I go on and on about who I’m picturing as Jack while I read the opening chapters. I kept waiting for Harry to show up and vie for Lou’s heart! MOTHERFLUFFERS! Yeah, so that was funny. Details: it’s a Lou POV, AU, where Lou is a 20-something virtuoso at Closing The Deal, and is made to go on a month-long destination wedding (Niall and Zayn? NOPE. Took me out of the story every time.) with all their family. Tired of dealing with questions about settling down, he hires Jack to be his significant other. It gets smutty, but it fits the plot tastefully, and hey, it turns into a love story. The OCs are so well written that I miss them like they were real. I wasn’t crazy about how much they changed Niall’s character, and Ziall is too distracting. The rest of it needs to be made into a movie. Immediately. Absolutely holds up to several re-reads, and is well deserving of the most iconic golfing meme of all time!

3. California Sold, by IsThatYouLarry.

This might be the most surprising entry on my list, especially that it’s placed so high. I read this fic very early on. It’s quasi-reality: Lou isn’t in 1D, but the rest of it stays mostly true. Lou is Harry’s childhood absolute-best-friend. It’s a Lou-POV, and there’s smut but not very much and not til late. Lou’s demi (closer to ace on the spectrum; he needs to feel an emotional attachment) and he fills the role of Harry’s beard for a limited time until Harry can come out. Or that’s the plan. It’s executed extremely well, I love friends-to-lovers stories, and I like the tension of when-will-it-happen in L&H beard stories (as much as I hate the need for such stunts; it feels hypocritical writing that I enjoy the trope, jesus what’s wrong with me). Maybe that’s part of my attraction. It’s a cute story that lets Lou and Harry be there for each other in every way possible in a world that does everything but let that be true out loud. It holds up for me in re-reads, but I know this story won’t place as high for everyone else.

2. Relief Next to Me, by Dolce_Piccante.

Ohhhh. I’m re-reading this (third time) now. It’s VERY smutty. It’s Lou POV. The OT5 are there, and some other friends too. Lou and Harry are strangers in a just-sex-partners who fall in love. Lou is an advert bigwig; Harry is a baker turned pastry chef; it’s a Ziam story and Liam (Zayn?) is Lou’s roomie. Niall fits in somewhere - works with Lou or maybe is Harry’s roomie (stories bleed together). It’s a lovely love story that’s compulsively readable. Seriously my go-to when things seem wrong, because this one gets it so, so right.

1. Tired, Tired Sea, by MediaWhore.

Absolutely no one is surprised to see this here. How lucky am I that Tired, Tired Sea was my very first fic?! If you’re still unfamiliar, think Adore You MV come to life, except without the magic powers. It’s a Lou POV, with zero smut (though some is implied). I don’t like that Harry’s a recovering alcoholic, don’t mind the strangers-turned-lovers trope (though it takes them long enough), and hate the light angst at the end. It’s necessary to complete the beautiful, beautiful arc that is second only to the love story of the ages that Harry and Louis are actually living. TTS is absolutely worthy of its legendary status and is required reading for any Larrie.

That’s it! That’s my Top Ten. I’m already well on my way to filing up slots for my Top Ten of 2022. Come visit me on Twitter (@BKatie617) or Instagram (@BostonKatie_617). Tell me (respectively, please) what I got wrong and what I’ve missed. It’s possible I just hadn’t gotten to it in time and is already on the list for 2022. Must have for fics: must be Larry-centric (although that’s an elastic term); must be a completed fic (I’ve only broken this rule for one fic and one fic only!); I don’t do ABO (yet); time-travel freaks me out; I don’t do paranormal type stuff. And no defaming the Muppets. No, I haven’t encountered a fic that’s broken this rule; it’s just a general life rule. A good one.

Thanks for reading! Hope to see you around! Long live Larry, and please Lord God or whoever’s listening: Let them love out loud! xx

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ordinaryschmuck · 4 years ago

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Why I (Want to) Love Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Salutations, random people on the internet who most certainly won’t read this! I’m an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and draw comics and cartoons. I also LOVE the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Whether as a kid, or an adult pretending to be a kid, this franchise is one that I’ll always revisit no matter how old I get. So when I heard that a new version of the series was coming out in 2018, titled as Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I was excited about it. Then I watched the series...and most of that excitement went down the sewer drain.

Don’t get me wrong, there were some elements that seemed like there was some definite promise for a good series, but other aspects...I’ll have to explain.

But keep in mind, I am going to be spoiling a lot about the series. So if you haven't watched it yet, I highly recommend you do so to form your own opinions. Because while it may not have grabbed me as much, that doesn’t mean the same can’t be said for you. With that out of the way, let's get started with--

WHAT I LIKE

The Animation: If anybody ever tells you that Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has awful animation, they are objectively wrong. Rise of the TMNT has some of the best, if not the best, animated fight scenes I've seen from any action series in recent memory. Probably because the show understands the number one rule of action animation: Good animation is a requirement. Not an exception.

For an action-oriented animated series, the audience needs to feel the impact whenever characters punch, block, or dodge in each fight. Yes, even dodge. Because if you can feel even the tiniest gust of wind that passes by a character's face after a punch, then you know the animators are doing something right. And trust me when I say that is present in the majority of most fights in Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Are there moments when the movements are slow and rigid? Yes...during the dialogue and comedic scenes. Moments where good and quality animation isn't really all that necessary. You see this same technique in most modern anime: The animation is rigid and cheap for the dialogue-heavy scenes so the animators can give extra attention to the epic action set pieces. Not a single person complains about this happening in their favorite anime of the week. But when Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles does this, apparently it's a bad thing? Explain that logic to me!

The animation is phenomenal in this show. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise because those people are either blind or insanely stupid. Either works.

It’s Pretty Funny: And that's about it. It's nowhere near one of the funniest shows I have seen, and previous iterations of the franchise did a much better job at balancing humor and heart, but Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles did a great job at getting a laugh out of me from time to time. It has a very random sense of humor that works well with its manic energy, similar to what Star vs. the Forces of Evil did early on in its first season. Even if one joke fails, about ten more take its place, most of them funnier than the others. There may be an occasional issue where a joke spoils a dramatic moment, but Rise of the TMNT is one of the few shows where that issue doesn't happen often. Besides, the series sets itself up as more of a comedy than other reboots and reiterations, so it wouldn't look good if it wasn't funny. Thankfully, it is, and in a way, the show is a success because of it.

It Tries to be Something New: This is what I respect most about the series. The downside about a reboot is that writers have to find a way to tell the same story but with adjustments that make it seem different. That's the same way Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles operates as a franchise. The original concepts of the stories and characters are always iconic, and I'll love them with my whole heart, but I will admit, there's a point where the same thing over and over again can be a little tiring. Then there's Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which makes changes where other shows would ask "why," this is the one that asks "why not?"

Why not change the personality and backstories of characters that still fit with the spirit of the original?

Why not change the genders, races, and possibly sexualities of these iconic characters?

Why not make something new?

Now, some have argued that the show is a little too new. Which I can kind of see the point of. After all, what's the point of changing characters and concepts so drastically when you could just make an original series? But even then, most of the changes are pretty clever, that I think it’s worth remembering for future iterations. Like making Casey Jones a female. Casey is a gender-neutral name, and I legitimately thought this series would do it for that reason alone. So I feel bad that the writers never got a chance to allow the series to reach its full potential with ideas like this due to Nickelodeon screwing them over (Seriously, never pitch a show to Nickelodeon. It rarely ever works out, and it's not worth the risk). I can see how these ideas could result in an incredible show that might cement the series as one of the best iterations of the franchise. But I can't base a story on potential. I can only judge what I see, and what I see are brilliant changes that impress me from time to time.

The Creators Are Still Fans: Despite making something completely different, you can tell that everyone working on this show loves TMNT as the rest of the fans do. There are dozens of references to previous versions littered throughout the series. Whether it's shoutouts to the 90s cartoon to bringing back voice actors from the last one, there are moments where the crew behind the series emphasizes how much they care about the franchise. There are also times when a reference has such a deep cut to it. For example, the series has the previous VA for Splinter to voice the current version of Shredder. I shouldn't have to explain how that is a brilliant idea, especially given Shredder's relationship with Karai...which I can't fully explain due to it spoiling TMNT (2012). This might be a whole new experience, but it is clear that history is not ignored when it comes to Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

The Cast is Colorful: It's not precisely a diversity win to have half the Turtles voiced by black VAs, but it is unquestionably some good sign of progress. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are...accurately what they are called. So they are not defined by the skin tone of the VAs themselves. So having half of them be voiced by people of color makes me hopeful that maybe future reboots would consider more colorful castings. Hell, maybe one day we'll have a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot where all of them are POCs, to the point that we'll have an all-Asian casting for these timeless heroes (which makes way too much sense to me).

And it's not just the casting of the turtles that impresses me. Because the series making April O'neil black is an idea that I'm more than ok with. It's implied that she's black in the original comics by Keven Eastman and Peter Laird, so it works as another deep-cut reference that proves how big of fans the crew is. Plus, who cares? I mean, if we're still having issues of changing the race of a character who was originally white, all I can say is grow the hell up. You can complain if they don't grab you, but if the issue is because of one decision that shouldn't negatively affect anybody, I don't see the problem. Besides, at this point, a character being white is basically the base plate for someone in the future to change their race at another time.

Also, let’s give the people behind the casting a pat on the back for casting Asian VAs for characters who are, well, Asian. It’s the bare minimum of common courtesy and avoids the trouble of having white VAs do asian accents that have become quite culturally insensitive nowadays. So it’s a pretty cool decision if you ask me.

Diversity is never an issue, especially since representation always matters for people who demand to be heard. It's definitive proof that anybody can be anything, whether it's a hero in fiction or the voice of that hero behind the scenes. And you can't really do that when everyone is so white that it's blinding.

Donatello: This is the best character in the series. Not only because Donatello has the most consistent personality (more on that later), but also because I'm a sucker for the cynical super-geniuses. These types of characters always have a quick and dry wit that never fails to get a laugh out of me, and this version of Donatello became my favorite just for that factor alone. Most of the credit goes to Josh Brener, who does a phenomenal job at his performance and comedic delivery. As for the emotional bits, he's...fine, but the drama isn't the show's best strength anyway, so it doesn't matter as much. Because the fact that it's Donatello who earns the spot as best character in a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot is an impressive feat in itself that any criticism offered for him is moot in the process.

WHAT I DISLIKE

Leonardo: I'm willing to make half of this a personal issue because I have grown to despise Ben Schwarts in the last four years. No offense to the guy, I'm sure he's a really great person in real life...but he has done nothing but play the same character in FOURS YEARS! Whether he's Leonardo, Dewey Duck, Sonic the Hedgehog, or even M.O.D.O.K.'s son (yes, that's a thing), Ben Schwarts has practically played the exact same character each time. The highly energized, dimwitted, and egotistical character who slowly tries to learn to be a better person in the end. AND SOMETIMES, NOT EVEN THAT! I'm sick of it, as it always breaks the immersion of the series as all I hear is Ben Schwarts and not the character he's voicing. But it's not just the voice behind Leonardo that frustrates me. Because the thing is, I can see how this version of him can be incredible.

It doesn't take a genius to know that this version of Leonardo is meant to be more childlike and carefree so he can morph into the more mature leader we all know and respect him as. The issue is that the writers barely do anything with that idea. Sure some episodes make this Leonardo more like, well, Leonardo, but they're far and few between the ones where he's the same Ben Schwarts character that I've grown to hate. Even when he is at his most Leo-like, as seen in the episode "Man vs. Sewer," it's so drastically different from how he usually acts that it feels less like character development and more like inconsistency. It's a shame too because I really love this idea. With a little more polish, it could work out. As is, it's just a huge chunk of wasted potential.

Raph’s Too Good of a Leader: This is a similar issue to what I've mentioned about Leonardo. Because, again, I love this idea. Raphael, in multiple iterations, complained about how he should be the leader and just as frequently learns why the job rightly belongs to Leo instead. So starting with this role reversal should be a well-executed idea that gives Raph what he wants while eventually giving the fans what they want. And it would be if not for the fact that Raph seems to be too good at his job.

I get it. If Raphael was too incompetent, the turtles would have gotten nothing done, and it would get too tiring too quick as Leonardo constantly proves why he should lead and why Raph should follow. This actually happens from time to time, and it is already tiresom. The issue is that the intention was to make Leonardo the leader in the end. So why spend so much time showing how Raphael is capable at the job and barely any time showing why Leonardo is a better fit? There are even times when Raphael seems like he really is a better leader than Leo, which I feel as though it is contradictory to the point the writers are trying to get across. In the end, it's nothing more than another really great idea met with insanely poor execution.

Master Splinter (Early Season One): ...Did anybody like this version of Master Splinter in the first half of season one? Because this character was atrocious, especially compared to the previous Splinter from TMNT (2012). We went from what is easily the best interpretation of the character to what was, at the time, the worst. He was lazy, selfish, and emotionally distant with his sons to the point where he only acknowledges them by the color of their bandannas. I understand that the writers needed a more comedic version of the character due to leaning extra hard into comedy, but I don't think I laughed once with his antics in the first half of season one. Thankfully, he's been gifted with a softcore reboot during the second half and onward. This Splinter is awesome, serious, he works well as a straight man, and he has a backstory that's easy to follow while still being kind of heartbreaking. It's a tremendous improvement from what we've been given, but it still doesn't change how downright painful he initially was. I won't complain about the results, but I do have the right to complain about what we got beforehand.

Characters are Inconsistent: A common complaint you'll hear about Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is that the main characters are the same. That's not true because there are definite differences that separate each one apart from the other...the issue is that the writers are not consistent with those changes. I've touched upon it with Leo, but the truth is, everyone in the main cast suffers from inconsistency with their personalities. If Raph is supposed to be the meathead with a good heart, why are there times when he acts like the smart one who occasionally enjoys violence? If April is supposed to be as wild and carefree as the rest of the guys, why are there episodes where she seems to be the sane one? If Mikey is supposed to be kind yet somewhat stupid, why are there episodes where he's selfish and more intelligent than Leonardo? Even Donatello, who is the most consistent out of the whole cast, still suffers through moments when he isn't as clever and cynical as he usually is. These inconsistencies are annoying, and at times, it feels like their personalities are dependent on what the writers need for a joke or for the episode. Characters are the most essential aspect of any story for any medium. If audiences don't care about the characters, they'll find it hard to care about anything else. And how can we care about anyone if we're not one hundred percent sure what their personalities are in the first place?

The Pacing: I sort of expected this when it was announced that this reboot was swapping the franchise's usual half-hour runtime for a ten-minute one, but in all honesty, it isn't that bad. It is slightly fast at times, but that's just as quick to get used to. However, there is one strange phenomenon about this show that I can't let go of.

You see, this series somehow has worse pacing with extended episodes and specials than it does with its usual ten minutes. I don't know how this is possible either. Because despite having as much time as the writers want to establish each plot point, it still feels like they fly through them a little too fast than they regularly would. It makes no sense, but it's constant in every extended episode, especially the series finale (which, to be fair, is partially Nickelodeon's fault. AGAIN!). So keep that in mind when watching.

The Characters Are TOO Overpowered: It feels weird complaining about this. Because making the characters capable of doing anything and surviving much more leads to some of the most epic action sequences in animation history, not just the series or the TMNT franchise as a whole. Despite that, though, there is one crucial thing that is always missing from those fight scenes anyways: Tension.

To fully explain why tension is required in action, I'll have to use Samurai Jack as an example. You see, the titular character can, at times, be just as invincible as these versions of the Turtles and survive even worse. But regardless of him being victorious after nearly every episode, no matter how high the deck is stacked against him, there was always a sense that he fought hard, literally and figuratively, for those victories in the first place. Jack losing articles of clothing or getting cut up gives the illusion that he might not win in the end. He still does, and he always does, but showing the audience that he can and will get hurt makes seeing that victory feel earned. The only times the Turtles, April, or Splinter get hurt is either for comedic slapstick or because the story says so. This is why I consider Shredder destroying the lair is the best fight scene in the entire series. The second he starts destroying their weapons, it gives the tension required to believe maybe, just maybe, not everyone will make it out alive this time. Because if the characters aren't careful, they will face intense consequences as a result. Thus making an adrenaline-pounding moment in the process. Unfortunately, this is the one and only fight scene where that happens. Every action set piece is still epic, don't get me wrong. But there's a reason why writers make even Superman seem less invincible than typical in a fight.

Baron Draxum: THIS is the biggest issue that I have with the series.

As a villain, I didn't give a s**t about Baron Draxum. He was a dull antagonist with a generic evil plot, but other than that, he was perfectly serviceable for a series like this. Even getting a few chuckles now and again...but then the writers decided to make him REDEEMABLE!?

This guy?

The maniac who wanted to commit genocide on human beings, all because of insufficient proof that they'll do it to his species first?

Didn't we already learn how that's awful reasoning after Steven Universe?

Actually, that's not fair...because Steven Universe has a better explanation behind wanting to redeem the Diamonds than Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles does about Baron Draxum! And I'm not kidding! For Steven Universe, the characters believe that it's better to end things peacefully than killing anyone, even if they're the worst criminals. It's a flawed mentality, sure, but it's one you can grasp and understand. What's the reason for redeeming Baron Draxum? It's because he's the reason why Splinter and the turtles are a family...F**k all the physical torture Splinter went through on top of the social ostracization he experienced because of it. No, no, it totally validates the decision to forgive and forget...Oh, wait, no, it doesn't. BECAUSE THAT WOULD BE INSANE!

Who in the f**k honest to goodness thought that would be a good idea? I'm all for finding silver linings in a bad situation, but that is just flat-out lunacy! Because it's the equivalent of saying, "Yeah, this person was a complete a-hole, but they're still the a-hole that made you who you are today." But that is a very dangerous lesson to preach to kids. Because here's the--Hey *snaps fingers* Here's the thing: If a person treats you like garbage, you don't owe them anything for who you are. It's one thing if a person inspired you or cheered you on, but if someone basically ruined your life and physically harmed you and others, don't forgive them. They don't deserve it. ‘Cause f**k Baron Draxum. And whoever thought this was a good idea, you seriously need some help.

Man, is this how it feels to be Lily Orchard? IT SUCKS!

IN CONCLUSION

And that's what I think about Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

It's a fantastic series! I just like everything except for the execution of ideas, most of the characters, and the overall pacing of it...that means it's not a good series, is it?

Yeah, it's a real shame that I don't like this. Because I want to. I really want to. The pieces are there, and I can see how this could be a great and memorable version of a series I loved since I was a tater-tot myself. But I don't. I'm sorry, but I just don't consider this to be an A+ series. It's a solid C, for sure, because it's mostly just style with very little substance. I still respect the amount of effort everyone put into this reboot, but for me, it just never had its chance to fully rise to the occasion.

#rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the tmnt #what i thought about #why i want to like

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ellaofoakhill · 4 years ago

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My Thoughts on Boxes

Something has kinda been bugging me the last little while, that I like to think a lot of people can relate to. We live in a society that, generally speaking, likes putting things into boxes; we like analyzing and sorting and organizing. And there’s nothing really wrong with that in and of itself--frankly, I could stand to do a lot more of it in the more practical aspects of my life--but such a system only really works with things that easily fit into discreet categories, and the things that aren’t or can’t be easily sorted are either forced into a box where they don’t fit, or left adrift without any real place to be.

In particular, I’m talking about fiction. You have numerous genres that multiply by the day, and the age categories that stories within those genres are deemed suitable for. And don’t get me wrong, there are lots of practical reasons for those categories; they make advertising and the organization of bookstores and libraries dramatically easier, and for most stories, this system works great, with each finding the audience most likely to derive benefit from reading it.

But--again, solely my opinion here--this may have produced stories that are a lot flatter than stories written in previous eras (which had their own problems, I will NOT get into that today). By flat, I don’t mean boring, or a failure of the story. I mean that the story feels like it was changed to fit into the category it most closely matched. In the most egregious examples, I feel like things were either added to a story that did nothing for it besides make it fit its box better, or taken out that were either integral to the story or added a depth and breadth to it that improved the work overall, even if that made it harder to sort.

This makes me think of the Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch quote, “Murder your darlings”, but completely opposite to what he was getting at. The general interpretation is “Even if you like a given piece of writing/painting/sculpture/etc., if it does more bad than good for your work, you need to remove it for the sake of the art.” What I feel is happening is “You need to change your story so it fits the target demographic, no matter what it looks like at the end.” The former serves the story and its spirit; the latter sacrifices the story for... I don’t know, ease of advertising, perhaps? Certainly financial gain is involved there.

So my first argument against this jaded, greedy way of thinking runs thus. Look at the stories that are now considered classics of Western literature: look at Wuthering Heights and Pride and Prejudice; look at White Fang and Call of the Wild; look at Dracula and Frankenstein; look at The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia (no, I couldn’t resist throwing in two classic fantasy titles, and no, I won’t apologize for it). If you haven’t read these stories, you probably should. Yes, they have problems that mark them as products of their time, but every last one of them has one thing in common: none of them were written with a box in mind. We’ve thought of lotr as a fantasy staple for so long that we’ve forgotten that, prior to its popularity, fantasy as a genre wasn’t really a thing. There were fairy-tales, yes, and stories with fantastical elements, but a genre of story with precise conventions? Not really.

Let’s zoom in on Tolkien’s work, for a moment. Look at his world and its origins, and it draws heavy inspiration from Old English and Scandinavian myths and legends. Look at his characters, in particular his four hobbits, and he drew from his love of the English countryside, his respect for the common working man (Sam, the gardener, literally carries Frodo, the wellbred young gentleman, on his shoulders in the final leg of their gruelling journey to the Cracks of Doom), and his horrific experiences in the First World War. Hilariously enough, a big part of the reason he wrote the stories was as a self-justification for his indulgence in and lifelong love affair with language invention (look at the huge appendices at the back of The Return of the King and tell me I’m lying!). Read his work and any and all interviews with him, and a “genre box” seems clearly to have never crossed his mind.

Putting aside the genre box for a moment, let’s talk age categories. The Hobbit was a story he invented for his children, and it does show. Look at the Lord of the Rings, and it is clearly at a higher level of reading comprehension, and written for a more mature audience; there’s less silliness, though he keeps the wonder at this wild, magical world. But where to put it? The hobbits run a spectrum from basically teenagers (Pippin) to almost middle age (Frodo is in his fifties when he embarks on his journey to Rivendell), yet they’re clearly his protagonists, though we also see some narration revolving around Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli, all of whom are adults, though the latter two are somewhat younger for their respective races, whereas Aragorn is in his eighties (this being offset somewhat by the fact that he lives to over two hundred, but I digress...). We’re told today (falsely; VERY falsely) that the main character(s) should match the age of their target audience. Where does lotr fit, then, in terms of age category?

The answer you’re looking for is: not really very well anywhere; at least, not according to modern convention. As for my personal experience, I could and did read both The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion at age thirteen. I consider myself a fairly intelligent young man, but I was varying degrees of lost when I read those. When I re-read them as an adult I was fine, but that isn’t to imply that teens shouldn’t be reading lotr, far from it. There’s nothing in them content-wise one wouldn’t reasonably expect a teenager to handle, and there’s a lot of good, powerful story and commentary in there that’s relevant to this day.

My point is, the age category doesn’t really matter. If I may shamelessly plug my own work for a moment, when I was first writing tftem, and even as I’m editing and publishing it now, I wondered and still wonder about this age category business. There is nothing in these stories I’d consider inappropriate for kids, and anyone above the age of about 8, with perhaps a slight stretch to their vocabulary, could comfortably read every story beginning to end. Further complicating matters, my beta readers ranged from 8 to almost 80, and most of the spectrum in between. They all liked it; whether they liked it for the same reasons is moot.

Which leads me into my second argument against boxing and categorizing stories. The boxes aren’t very reliable. If I may change media for a moment, cultural convention says, as an adult, there is only a narrow sleazy strip of cartoon entertainment I should be watching and enjoying. That tiny slice of the cartoon pie is the only slice I avoid like the plague. Yes, there are stories that don’t appeal to me because they’re too simplistic, or are problematic in ways that I find repellent, or just aren’t executed very well, but aside from things aimed at toddlers and the aforementioned “adult” cartoons, any cartoon is fair game. Give me an interesting concept, or a fascinating character, or hell just give me a good laugh or line of dialogue or beautiful fight scene, and I’ll give it a try.

My point is (yes I had one, and no, believe it or not I didn’t forget it), don’t write or draw or create with a box in mind. You will murder the spirit of your darlings. The box does not exist to define what you, the writer, are allowed to do, or what you should do. At best, the box exists in hindsight, once the work is done, to tell your prospective audience whether your story was written for them. And even then, lots of fantastic stories don’t sit well in boxes. Some of them actively rip the boxes to pieces. Lotr is a story that transcends boxes, and as a result has many layers and rabbit-holes and nuances that you can pick up when you’re ready to appreciate them, however old you are. In many ways, it’s ageless.

I didn’t write tftem to emulate Tolkien, nor even as an homage to him, or C.S. Lewis, or anyone else. But I did want to write a similarly ageless story, a story that could be read and appreciated a hundred years from now, by an audience of eight-year-olds or octogenarians. Why did we ever start moving away from stories like this? They were the foundation of stories for as long as stories have existed on Earth. People are still reading and marvelling at The Epic of Bloody Gilgamesh!

Tl;dr: don’t try to force your stories into boxes; they suffocate. Write what you enjoy writing; chances are it’ll live longer.

#writing #my posts #the box must fit the story not the other way around #on writing #on publishing #tolkien #lotr #my thoughts on the industry and its flaws

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dafukdidiwatch · 5 years ago

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Movie #1: Free Willy

Week One and I start out with a Family Friendly picture from the 90s. Free Willy, the story about a troubled child (teen?) bonding with a captive orca. This movie is chocked full of Whimsy and Magical moments of whales swimming which to be honest, didn’t really think it diserved a Victory Score.

Because the movie REALLY wants to hammer in that Willy is a majestic creature because there is a LOT of nature Orca shots. I timed it, the end credits has 5 uninterrupted minutes of orcas swimming. Double that for the beginning and you have 10 minutes of an orca documentary. Plus, they have this weird inspirational music going on in the background to I guess make you Feel with Wonder and Aw! Except the footage was the same thing over and over, and I watch nature documentaries all my life I’m immune to this.

The movie also wants to hammer in that Willy is sad because as the evil redneck fishmen capture Willy with nets, you see the other orca longingly look at each other from the other side. And like..I get the intent, but try looking at an orca’s face and see if it’s sad. It felt more scripted than natural for “orca crying”.

So while Willy is being shipped to Not Sea World, we meet Jesse, a boy who I don’t know his age living on the streets and who I didn’t know his name until he gets into his new foster family. I want to point out that Jesse was stealing food and he literally grabbed the breadsticks and run. Anyway, while running from the cops he got caught graffiti-ing the whale pool (pen? Tank?) and as punishment has to clean it up.

Insert Orca bonding time here. Which, is pretty good. Granted I’m terrified for the child actor being that close to an animal like that, but in the movie it was nice. Jesse talks to Willy, buys him fish with his own allowance, plays with him. Like they are some genuinely nice moments here and you care that the kid cares. Which is good when you center a movie around an animal, the audience needs to care for said animal.

I still have concerns for the well being of this kid though, potential whale injury aside. This kid is left alone constantly. Seriously, his foster dad drops him off at the entrance of the Not Sea World and expects the kid to search around the park for the guy he needs to go himself? No one is watching him as he cleans the tank?? I get giving Jesse like space and respect, but what happens if Jesse decides to just decides to run out again or, I don’t know, gets fucking injured while on the job (Which, guess what guys! It happens!)

The 90s were a wild time.

Then there’s the other adults of this movie. First is Randolph, a guy who works at the sea world park who is from the Haida Tribe. Originally, I wasn’t sure about the character, because I was afraid they were going into the “Native Tribe Mentor To Protag” trope. And while it does play a little into it, it wasn’t anything disrespectful. He shares stories about whales to Jesse who loves them so much. He’s a good guy who takes a little bit to warm up to, just like Jess and Willy (you see the theme here yet?)

Then there are the foster parents and Jesse’s mom. Jesse’s birth mom, not his foster mom. Foster mom is cool and listens to Jesse. Jesse’s birth mom never appears in the movie, and it is made a big deal that she basically abandoned Jesse to Foster Care. But Jesse doesn’t give up hope for her. And everyone else is basically telling him to give up hope for her. Like??? The fuck??? Who tells a kid that??? Point blank aggressively that his mom isn’t fucking coming back and abandoned him?? You ass you’re a case worker you Don’t talk to a child like that! The kid was abandoned when he was 4-6, of course he is still going to be attached to the idea she is coming back! You don’t just push away trauma like that!

And then we get Glen. Fucking Glen. The Foster-mom, Annie, she’s chill and fun, but I do not like Glen. When the social worker came to drop off the paperwork for Jesse to stay in their care, Glen said it was more like “leasing” instead of “buying.” And yeah, Glen did try to bond with Jesse, like play catch and junk, but not good enough. In one full scene he implied that Jesse’s mom is never coming back (you don’t say casual shit like that to the kid), then got mad when Jesse came home late (gee I wonder fucking why), incorrectly told his wife why the hell Jesse was made (“I don’t know why the kid doesn’t like me” bullshit he got scared because of what you said), then they start fucking fighting about Jesse while Jesse overhears upstairs, and to add the nail to the coffin Jesse hears that Glen wished it was just back to him and his wife without Jesse. Like Fuck Off. I get you may be new at parenting, but the fact that you said so many bad shit so fast in one go, god you are such an asshole.

Back to the plot, of you know, protecting the whale. I thought that it would be, you know, environmental reasons or “protect the whales” reason. Not to say that the Other Sea World was perfect, they kept the orca in a dolphin tank for crying out loud. So it would be reasonable to think that they need to free Willy because he was slowly dying of depression or need to reunite with his family or something.

But nope, insurance fraud.

They need to save the Orca, and have their bond tested, because of Insurance Fraud.

Which weird, but also realistic?

I have no complains about the climatic end. It was fun, stressful, had heartfelt moments. My favorite line is the fact that there is no Theft Insurance on Willy, because it is something I specifically asked about literally 2 minutes before I got the answer.

And...this might be a moot point, but the movie cover is a pretty big fucking spoiler, if you think about it.

Final Thoughts: I liked the movie. Granted I was eyeing some of the tropes they did with caution and just Glen overall, but it was pretty wholesome. The kid is a troubled kid trying to find acceptance, there are good whale bonding moments which, while sometimes over-dramatic as hell, can pull at your heartstrings, and there was some decent emotions and acting here. It’s a good family film and something that I would recommend checking out.

#dafukblog #dafuking films #free willy #week 1 movie

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traincat · 6 years ago

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Hi, I'm thinking about diving into the world of AU's and I'd like to attempt to make a story featuring Villain! Spider-Man. If you don't mind, I'd like to hear your thoughts on some villain essentials like: What would his goals be? What would he do to achieve them? How far would his flaws expand? How would he treat his friends/ family, if he even has any left? And would it be different from the actions of the morally problematic Superior Spider-man? Thanks for your time ~

So for me, when considering villain!Peter, the thing is I don’t he would be that far a departure from regular Peter – as in, for me, Peter is a character who works to be good, but is not necessarily inherently good, which makes it very easy to imagine scenarios where he’s bad. For me, a lot of it comes out of Amazing Fantasy #15, Peter’s origin story:

“I’ll see to it that they’re always happy, but the rest of the world can go hang for all I care!” There is this great combination of selfishness, righteousness, and anger at Peter’s core where I think, if you tweak the origin story just so slightly, you can send him down a different path super easily. For instance, if you don’t kill Uncle Ben – fast forward a couple of years and Ben and May are living in a beautiful condo in Florida, so proud of their successful nephew and blissfully unaware of what exactly he does to come by all that money. I’m very partial to a Kingpin-ish king of crime type villain Peter, so I think that’s one way to go there, with a Peter who feels like he can just take whatever he wants because he’s entitled to it, unhindered by the doublesided coin of guilt and responsibility.

Alternatively, you could kill off Ben in a way where Peter feels no responsibility – only anger. Kill Aunt May, and you remove Peter’s guiding light as a young man and his biggest source of morality. Don’t kill Peter’s parents – or kill them when he’s much older – and turn his anger on SHIELD, so then you’ve got a villain interested through good ol’ parental trauma in taking down a secret agency. I’ve only mentioned origin story twists so far, but I don’t think that’s the only way to go. Not to sort of spoil my own WIP, but I was dissatisfied with Zdarsky’s take on a villainous Peter in Marvel Two-In-One (and I found the “he’s bad so he’s ~unhinged~” take somewhat offensive) – but I was very interested in the fact that this evil!Peter was spun out of Civil War, and I knew instantly what I had to do with his story to get him to go full evil warlord dictator (with bonus murder). For me, it’s all looking at the material and shifting the puzzle pieces around to get a Peter who is still Peter Parker, but who now fits the story I want him in, and sometimes it’s about figuring out what buttons would have to be pushed to get him there. What If? Back In Black, for example, has Peter kill the Kingpin with one punch after Mary Jane is shot and killed instead of May.

I don’t think this is the only way to write a villain!Peter AU, it’s just how I go about planning when I think about the subject.

To go back to the Amazing Fantasy #15 panel above – I think Peter would treat his loved ones quite well, even as a villain. Peter likes being a protector; I don’t think that would change, I just think that would shift. His possessive tendencies would probably be ramped up and I think he might be overprotective to a fault or downright smothering, which could chase people away, but in my opinion he would think he’s being perfectly reasonable. (This is why I tend to think Spideytorch works with villain!Peter because Johnny’s self-esteem isn’t good enough not to get steamrolled by a much stronger personality might kind of like the overbearing amounts of attention/being someone’s sole live-or-die focus, especially if you strip away his family and/or his powers.)

As for goals, I think you need to look at what you want for your AU. Peter’s very versatile here: he’s smart, he’s strong, he’s cunning, and you could use him in a variety of ways. While I’m partial to a kingpin of crime take, you could also easily have him as more of a traditional costumed criminal or use Peter’s love of science to plunge him into the evil scientist role. Doctor Octopus is interesting because he is in a way a twisted mirror image of Peter: an unpopular brilliant young student with an overprotective mother and a salt of the earth father who suffers a lab accident that transforms him forever. This is part of the reason Superior Spider-Man disappoints me in addition to my dislike of it: the parallel is right there. On the subject of Superior, to address your question, I think the point’s a little moot: unless your villain!Peter is snatching someone else’s body and posing as them, the premise is always going to be different than Superior Spider-Man, which featured Otto using Peter’s body and identity to trick the people in Peter’s life and to “be a better” Spider-Man than Peter. So imho that’s automatically just very different than a “Peter Parker, but evil” premise.

I’d start asking yourself questions about the particular villain!AU you want to tell with Peter: what are his goals? Money? Power? Control over New York, his home? The safety and protection of his loved ones, and he’ll do whatever he has to do to ensure that? Who do you want him to fight? Other heroes? Other villains? A power struggle between Peter and the Kingpin is going to look different than one between him and the Green Goblin. Is it a love story? Could Peter’s love interest live with what he’s doing? Do you want them to be able to? If so, do you have to shift the pieces around in their backstories to make it fit? (This is why I tend to put a villain!Peter with a powerless!Johnny who doesn’t have anyone but him. Unhealthy! But fun and dramatic.)

One thing to remember with 616 Peter is that, at the end of the day, he doesn’t really believe in anyone’s authority but his own – that’s what allows Spider-Man to function the way that he does. If you give that tendency over to someone who is out for himself, who never tamps down on that selfishness in order to embrace responsibility, who has the power and the ability to take what he wants, whatever that may be? You can end up with a very effective villain. In a lot of ways, as a hero, Peter stands in the way of succeeding for himself; that’s the trade off he’s made to be able to protect people on the ground, the people who matter to him. But villain!Peter wouldn’t feel that way towards strangers, and I think the flipside of that is that he would be incredibly ambitious -- which is one of the reasons I trend towards a Kingpin Peter. But ultimately I think a villain!Peter is going to do his best to accomplish his goals, without worrying about who is in the way.

If you want some additional inspiration, I have a villain!Peter Spideytorch aesthetic here, and @splendidnothings has a whole villain!Peter tag that I love. We both trend more towards the Kingpin!Peter type, though.

#*replies #peter parker #traincat talks comics #Anonymous

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katepapenberg · 6 years ago

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Flash Fiction From a Flat-Chested Broad: Big bang.

She stopped speaking; not for dramatic effect, but, well, that was really all there was to say.

“So,” she asked the group writ large, “now what?”

The silence was unsettling.

Then, one said, “That’s what you write. That’s your story. Your novel.”

And, then, one after the other nodded; a sort of collective bob.

“HA!” she said. Said. No laughing was harmed in the making of this comment. She continued, “If I tell it; tell it all, then how could I possibly ever expect, to go on a date, ever again.” And before they could interject with the bobbing of the heads and things, she pressed on. “I’m a hack. The only reason guys go on dates with me, no, wait, speak to me is I am something to be figured.”

She took a breath. Quickly, now, “Out. Figured out. They want to hack me and be done with me and...”

FUCK.

She realized. They were right, but tried another riposte.

“But, where would I, uh, begin?”

She hated when she, or anyone else for that matter muttered ‘uh’, but she gave herself a pass this time.

“At the beginning!”

And she blanked and then blacked out. That comment, which was meant as a suggestion, was as open-ended as her original question, which was, after a bottle of red, innocuous at the start: “What am I supposed to write about for an entire week?”

The conversation drifted toward the inane (A: Anything!) and then the obvious (A: Whatever you want to write about!) and then, finally, the scary: the memoir (counter-Q: Well, what do you know the most about? A: What we all know the most about: ourselves! Me! Myself). This is when the blurting and storytelling really began, which is ironic and laughable (now) since that’s what writing is.

But she hadn’t started at the beginning. Instead, like a wannabe screenwriter she dropped the collective into the climatic scene: the divorce. The refrigerator. The not breathing.

The relief.

The freedom.

Then forward: Arizona. Running. Dreams. Sickness. Fear. Failure. Falling apart. Crying in parking lots.

Going backward: The military. School. Abandoning all. Confidence.

Still more: Anxiety. Picking. Hating. Eating. Not eating. Crying. Fighting. Being born at the wrong time. Wrong era.

The other: Fish. Jeremy Wade. River Monsters. Keeping Up With The Kardashians. The Wizard of Oz. TV. Books. The big bang. God. Adam. Eve. Or, God. Big bang. Ancient Aliens.

What was the beginning?

Or worse, she surmised, why look back at all?

Bets said, “You’re not running away from anything; you’re running toward something.”

So, the memoir, she figured, was dead in the water. Moot.

Additionally, the speaking and meeting with men was a real concern.

Until it wasn’t.

She sat down. And wrote.

#flash fiction #writer #writeblr #excerpt from a book i'll never write

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dlamp-dictator · 7 years ago

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Allen Rambles About Fire Emblem (Allen’s Rambling XXIX)

I’ve reached my usual 30-hour mark with Fire Emblem Echoes, so I think it’s about time I actually talked a bit about my experience with it and the Fire Emblem series in general. For the last few weeks I’ve been saying I was going to dig deep into this game and more or less tear it apart while discussing why I like Fire Emblem Fates a lot more, but... I’m not. I thought about it while trying to finish the map against Jedah, and as frustrating a time I have with that map and the game as a whole, I’m not going to start whining about it. Well, not in a petty sense anyway. There are still a few issues I have with Echoes, but I won’t be a baby about them.. I hope.

Ah, but before I get onto that...

My History

I feel it’s only fair to discuss my history with the Fire Emblem series in general before getting to talking about Echoes, just so people know where I’m coming from. I’m gonna’ be honest, it’s not much of a history. Much like Dangan Ronpa (another series I need to talk about at some point), fandom discourse got me interested in this series. I heard a bunch of complaints about Fire Emblem Awakening when it first came out. Complaints about how anime-esque it was, how it’s “waifu-baiting” was ruining a serious game known for itself dramatic story-telling, how making it was easier and more accessible for newcomers with Casual Mode would kill what the made the series great, how easy it was to break the game and created no challenge for what was suppose to be an intense strategy game. Honestly... I was getting flashbacks of the Guilty Gear and SMT fandom complaining about Blazblue and Persona, so I ignored it and the series in general while that was going on.

That, and I didn’t have a 3DS at the time, so I honestly didn’t care. But then I eventually got a 3DS somewhere around the time Fire Emblem Fates came out. I originally got the 3DS to play Senran Kagura Burst and Burst 2, play a few of the Pokemon games I missed out on, as well as a few unnoticed JRPGs that I don’t feel like talking about. But anyway, Fates had came out at the time I finally started caring about my 3DS, and I heard much worse complaints about the newest entry at the time. I’m not going to go into detail on what the issues people had with Fates was, but I’ll just say from an outsider’s perspective it sounded like the Awakening complaints times ten.

And that got me curious. Was the game really that bad? Was the game that pandering? I had to find out for myself, so I did a bit of research on how to play the game, and bought Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright. Now, when I say ‘research’, I mean I went deep into how Fire Emblem gameplay worked. I studied which characters had the best growth rates for tanking and attacking, I looked at skills and how they’d help make each unit’s job easier, I studied which characters were worth keeping around until endgame, which units should be reclassed at which times for getting the optimal skills, and so on. If I was going into a series who’s biggest feature was perma-death, I wasn’t going in blind.

Anyway, Birthright had optional grinding in it, and as a newcomer I didn’t want to get destroyed my first time playing the series. I played it on Classic Mode at first like most of the fandom recommended, and I got use to the concept of perma-death. Since a lot of the fandom focused on optimizing party members and viewing most of the characters for there stats than their personalities I didn’t get too attached to many characters outside of Azura and Silas (who is best girl).

I have the say, playing this game on Classic Mode was a trip. I honestly couldn’t stand Corrin’s pacifist personality in a game where enemies permanently killed your characters. To just see him/her refuse to kill others because of his/her soft heart after they killed so many of my own units made me rage. THESE SCUMBAGS KILLED HINOKA AND RINKA. MY DEFENSIVE CHOKE POINTS ARE RUINED. CORRIN YOU USELESS WHORE, STOP SHOWING MERCY AND KILL THEM!

...

Ahem.

That aside, for a game that had perma-death being its most prominent feature, I was a little annoyed by seeing “dead” characters in cutscenes due to them being “vital” to the plot at points. Death didn’t seem to have much weight when characters were technically not dead and just unable to fight due to injury, and when the fandom kept saying how vital that aspect was when the game didn’t treat it that way, I felt cheated. I felt like my actions had no consequence outside of gameplay. No one berated Corrin for letting people die under his/her command, no one lamented in the base how certain characters were “critically injured” and couldn’t fight back. Hell, no one even brought attention to the fact that Corrin’s base was in basically the Hyperbolic Time Chamber between chapters. Things just... didn’t have emotional weight to it outside of gameplay. Still, I kept going while on Classic Mode, despite losing half my army. I didn’t know soft resetting was a thing so I just... dealt with it... by force.

And then Sakura died, and I lost my (main) healer.

So, like the filthy casual I am, I made a new file on casual mode and never looked back. Yeah... losing healers is kind of my sign for sucking the game so much I need a handicap for it. Around that time I figured out how to soft reset, but I still saw that as cheating, so I just stuck to casual mode. I found the game fun after that. Corrin’s pacifism made a bit more since when lost allies merely retreated at 0 HP instead of died. Every survives, no one was killed, and Corrin’s army didn’t kill in turn, so Corrin’s pacifism didn’t make me want strangle him/her, and I could tolerate the story a little better.

But moving onto the game itself, I liked all the strategies and crazy combination of skills you could have. I loved how you could break the game with the right skills and pairings around mid game. I loved the pair up system and how it could save you so many times in dire situations. I had a lot of fun with Fates, I even bought some of the DLC for it.

It’s got its flaws though. Some of the support conversations were just terribly written, the story felt like it was trying to appeal more so to thirteen-year-olds that an older crowd with how one-note a lot of the characters felt, and how... obsessed with Corrin they were. I mean, the game was rated Teen, but I’m 23 and I expect a game that had a perma-death system to have a better story than... Birthright. And honestly, for a game that was hated to the point of being call “Waifu Emblem” because of the anime style and marriage system, very few of the girls were written well enough or even looked hot enough for me to attach myself to. Honestly, Azura, Elise, Kagero, and Charlotte were the only girls I liked out of all the girls, and only 2 of those 4 had decent supports. Like I said, the game is fun, but the story... not so much.

So with all that out of the way, let’s get onto what I really wanted to talk about.

Fire Emblem Echoes

So... my thoughts on Echoes can basically be summed up as Echoes being the better story, but Fates being the better game. I’m more invested in Alm and Celica’s situation than Corrin’s, and I find their story more believable. Well, not as cheesy anyway. A bit of explanation on the Brand would be nice, but I kind of get the point of it so I’m not gonna’ whine about that too much. The only thing I’ll say against it is that Alm doesn’t seem keen on becoming king at this point in the game, yet his army pushes him to that role and he... doesn’t really react to it much. I find that a bit strange, but I’m still on Act 4, so... maybe I’m just missing something.

Something else I’m having trouble dealing with in Echoes, gameplay wise, is... well, how different it is from Fates gameplay-wise. It’s good gameplay overall, but it’s making me think in a way completely opposite of Fates. With how... well frankly, with how bland the maps are in Echoes gameplay can feel boring at times. Mountainous and swamp areas are especially annoying since it turns the map into a crawl. I’m down with a slower, more methodical approach to this game, but... eh, I’m not feeling these maps. Not to say Fates didn’t have its fair share of boring and uninteresting maps, but Echoes has it worse, and with spawning enemies and maps I have to cross through just to do things like upgrade weapons and class change, they feel less like optional grinding and more like unnecessary battles.

There are a few other issues I have with them, but I’ll save them for a later segment.

Speaking of my issues...

The RNG

Look, I’m just gonna’ say this flat out. The defensive, slow, strategic way I feel this game wants me to play feels moot when the RNG comes into effect.

I’m sure everyone that’s played Fates knows that infuriating feeling when Kaze's 97% hit rate misses and he dies when an enemy’s 2% critical comes in. I feel like Echoes has this even worse than Fates. Few weapons have a 100% hit rate, and even 30% enemy hit rates feel risky at times. I really feel that this higher focus on strategy is downplayed by the fact that a lucky critical can utterly destroy a defensive line. Alm died on the first turn of enemy phase to a 2% crit when I was playing defensively, and it sucked. It feels like the gameplay contradicts itself. This was an issues in Fates too, but since you could more or less break the game around chapter 16-ish with the right skills and pair ups it didn’t sting as much. Here? With Echoes? With how they do skills and with the fatigue system? With how skills are tied to weapon experience? Yeah, you can’t really break the game, you have to play smart, so every instance of RNG nonsense that kills off a character with a single-digit chance of a critical just... sucks.

So... with that out of the way, I’ll move onto to talking about...

The Good

The Story

Like I said, I find this story leagues better than Fates’ story. Alm wanting to save his country even if it means taking on a role he didn’t ask for, Celica wanting to be a devout servant of Mila to the point of near martyrdom. This is all good stuff, and the story highlights a little about war and what it can do to people, how politics can ruin friendships, how faith can be tested in unforseen ways. I like it a lot. Every character feels real and understandable. No one feels like an outright jerk without a good reason behind it. I read that Echoes was a remake of an older Fire Emblem game, and if this is the kind of quality of writing we missed out on in Fates then I am deeply disappointed in the writers of that game for not living up to the expectations of its predecessors.

The (Fully Voiced) Supports

In the words of TFS’s Vegeta:

“Never in my life have I needed something so much and never known until I received it.”

I lost my mind when I saw how these supports were being done. Actually chatting on the battlefield in real time (as real time as turn based RPGs get anyway), hearing characters actually speak their lines. I... I legitimately screamed when I heard Alm and Faye chatting with each other. It... it made so much sense, of course it should be done this way. I wanted to buy five more copies of this game just to see it done again in the future. It actually reminds me of how Disgaea 5 and D2 had certain characters chat to each other when they stood next to each other. I only wish it was an automatic thing like in Disgaea 5. And the supports are well-written as well. Character development is done solely in the story, while the supports are little extra bits of character relations and how they grow and improve over time. My only regret is that certain characters didn’t get supports with each other like Clair and Clive, but... I suppose it’s fine.

The Waifus

For all the talk I hear about Echoes breaking the “Waifu Emblem” stigma, this game has sooooo many girls I like in them. Genny is precious, Clair is a lovable and cheesily haughty noblewoman, Faye... is my second Pegasus Knight with decent defense and high mobility, Mae’s bubbly, tomboyish personality is endearing, Sonya X Genny needs to be a thing, and do not get me started on the GODDESS that is Matilda and her 10 resistance. No, this is Waifu Emblem as far as I’m concerned, and all it took was a decent writer to make me care about these girls.

The Bonus EXP

This really helps me out when trying to grind the weaker units. Forsyth and Python are actually useful to the army now because of it. It’s nice to get an extra reward for completing the map, and it makes all the spawning enemies and replaying of maps a little more worth it, as much as I don’t like doing it.

Upgrading Weapons

I really like how upgrading weapons is paid for with money instead of praying you had the right gem type like in Fates. Makes it so much easier to upgrade weapons. Now if only Gold marks came by a little easier... but that’s what DLC is for. The upgrades feel more optional if anything, an Iron Sword is good enough of a boost on itself, and so on, the boosts help though.

Leon the Mage Killer

I love Leon. I love Leon almost as much as Leon loves Valbar. In an army full of Mages and Dread Fighters, this man and his Steel Bow activated criticals on just about every mage on the map. For at least 6 maps he was the mage killer until Saber became a Dread Fighter. I think he does it solely to protect Valbar and his non-existence resistance stat, and that’s okay. You do you Leon, you magnificent Mage destroyer you.

Dread Fighters

Well, Celica’s army is made up of dread fighters for a reason. They’re just soooo handy to have, especially with all the witches and arcanist I have to face on her route. The ninja aesthetic is real man. It clashes with Saber’s design, but it’s real, and it feels good.

Zeke

Zeke is voiced by Patrick Seitz and has decent stat growths, this can only lead to good things.

The Not So Good

Celica’s route and her finding optional party members is so annoying... I swear, I picked up Catria and Palla AFTER I rescued Est because I figured that automatically join after I saved her... three maps later and they didn’t, and now I’m stuck grinding them... it sucks.

Again, the RNG in this game makes the more strategic way I need to play feel unrewarding when it can boil down to a lucky critical on enemy phase.

As much as I like how you upgrade weapons, getting the money to do it is a pain. There’s DLC maps, yes, but... it doesn’t feel worth it to mean unless you’re trying to break the game. And this isn’t really a game that’s fun to break.

Speaking of weapons, gaining skills through weapons doesn’t feel good to me. I can’t switch out weapon without sacrificing utility, and on Terror maps, Conrad and the Pegasus Sisters are the only useful units. I’m not giving anyone a Blessed Sword when they have fulled upgraded Brave Swords, Silver Bows, and Ridersbanes.

The fatigue system, dear lord. This isn’t Dark Souls, why is there a stamina system in this game? I just... I just can’t even man. The climb of Duma Tower was NOT FUN.

Arcanists with Death and Fortify. That’s... that’s just annoyingly unfair.

Witches and the fact they can teleport to my armored units without any cost on the first turn of enemy phase just destroys any strategy I can make against them, and it sucks.

Dracoshield enemies... Dracoshield enemies on maps where taking them out is optional and the game doesn’t tell you... Goddamn, need I say more?

So yeah, I still think I like Fates more to play, but Echoes is definitely the kind of challenge I need in my strategy RPGs, especially for my handhelds. I’ll probably try a Classic run of Echoes when I beat it on casual mode, but I’m having fun with it at the moment, so... yeah. I recommend you guys get it if you’ve got a 3DS and the cash. I might save up for Awakening too and see how that plays out since I love breaking video games.

#fire emblem #your dictator is speaking

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helloworlddemo1122-yahoopar-blog · 7 years ago

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Rita Moreno Is Playing a Dream Role 70 Years into Her Career (Exclusive)

After West Side Story won her a Golden Globe and an Academy Award for her lead role as Anita in the 1961 musical, Rita Moreno was sure she'd end up in film after film, thwarting Latin stereotypes in Hollywood. But even as the first Hispanic woman to earn an Oscar, the work offered to her was scarce and conventional, leaving the legendary actress crushed when the promising rush of stardom proved not so promising anymore.

Now, at 86, Moreno is having the last laugh, as the adored and very funny abuelita Lydia on Netflix's multicam family comedy One Day at a Time. The timely Latina-led update of the classic sitcom, which premiered in 1975 on CBS, is helmed by Gloria Calderon Kellett and Mike Royce, while the series' original creator, the now-94-year-old Norman Lear, executive produces.

The show is centered on a Cuban-American family living in Los Angeles, the Riera-Alvarez clan, including Lydia's daughter, Penelope, played by Six Feet Under alum Justina Machado, and her grandchildren, Alex (Marcel Ruiz) and Elena (Isabella Gomez) – as they work through a variety of hot-button issues relevant to today's gender paradigm and sociopolitical climate. Penelope is a divorced single mom and Iraq war veteran with PTSD, for one. But with plotlines including Elena's coming out, depression, gender stereotypes, immigration and religion -- and that's just season one -- One Day at a Time isn't afraid to speak its mind with ample heart and humor. Season two furthers its topical commentary by broaching gun control, nonbinary queerness, racism and Lydia's lack of U.S. citizenship.

One of only 12 performers with a coveted EGOT (an Emmy, GRAMMY, Oscar and Tony), Moreno recently opened up to ET about playing the kind of authentic Latina role she could only dream of after West Side Story. During the conversation, Moreno also reflected on how the beginning of her career left her "heartbroken," the current state of Latinx representation on screen, and how One Day at a Time is helping to break ground for Latinx actors.

ET: Why does a Latina-led One Day at a Time feel particularly important right now?

Rita Moreno: Norman Lear seems to have a clock in his head or something. It just seemed the right time. And it’s interesting, because there have been some other Latino-based shows, but there have also been some not-so-good Latino-based shows. Obviously, I'm not gonna mention anyone, because everyone needs their job.

What makes one Latinx show better than another?

Ours is authentic, ours is so respectful of the culture. We don't mess around. And my character could very easily be a Looney Tune and, in fact, we're always very, very mindful of that -- I'm certainly very mindful of that. And she can be theatrical and she can be dramatic, but Looney Tunes is definitely not a part of this series. I think it's extremely important to stick to what Latinos as Latinos recognize and laugh at.

The other great part of this show is that a lot of people who are not Latino are loving it. It's so universal -- that's the word that Norman keeps using. It's a family. And though some problems are strictly related to being Latino, many other issues are not. I mean, in the first season, we had a marvelous show about the United States Department of Veterans Affairs. It really took the VA to task without pointing fingers in any way, and it was hilarious. It was also very serious -- [Penelope] had her shoulder injury from the war and she couldn't get anybody on the phone. I thought it was a tour de force for Justina.

How did this season's racism-centric first episode resonate with you?

Oh, are you kidding? We loved it. One of the most wonderful touches that nobody has ever addressed in these kinds of shows is the fact that Alex is getting picked on because his skin is darker than his sister's, and their mom points out the difference in hue. I don't think anyone has ever even touched that.

The second episode addresses gender neutrality both in terms of the Latinx community and the LGBTQ community. I imagine that's been a lesson for a lot of people the way it was for Lydia.

Oh, absolutely. And you know, I love that there's just a bit of racist in Lydia. When she says, "Oh, no, no -- we're Spanish," and her granddaughter says, "Mom, we are all colors." But I say, "We're mostly a Spanish." Which to her means white. So, I love that she has this prejudice, because it makes her very real.

What are some of the hot topics covered on the show that have been personally important to you?

Last year, we talked about Lydia’s citizenship and her lack of citizenship, and the whole family was absolutely shocked that she was not a citizen. This time, not only does Lydia become a citizen, but also Schneider [the family’s Canadian landlord, played by Todd Grinnell] has become a citizen, which I thought was kind of neat. And, oh, God -- there are so many hot topics and I can't remember half of them because I'm 86.

The show challenges many stereotypes. After West Side Story, you were seeking to do the same, but studios were offering you a lot of stereotypical Latina roles.

Actually, I wasn't offered a lot of them -- I was offered some. There was such a dearth of roles. After winning those two awards, I was absolutely heartbroken. I couldn't believe it. I really thought, "Wow, an Oscar and a Golden Globe, what could be bad? My career is made."

The lack of roles -- what do you chalk that up to?

Oh, the same usual kind of thinking: "She's Latina, she played a Latina, and here are some gang movies if you want to do that." And I said, "No, I do not." Nothing came. It was just really, really absolutely devastating. It was hard to believe. I mean, how naive of me, but who knew?

So how did being cast on One Day at a Time feel?

Oh, my goodness, I can't even find the words for it. I'm so proud to be a part of it. I feel privileged to be working with Norman, whom I dearly love. He and I have a creative love affair going on, in the sense that he just thinks I'm the bee's knees and I thinks he's the cat's meow. We're the two old farts on the show, and I call myself the "fartette."

I wanna be a fartette when I'm 86.

No -- a fartette is a girl.

Oh, I don't care. We're all about gender-nonconformity here now, aren't we?

[Laughs] That's great. You've learned from the show!

This season's finale was really emotional. Was it a difficult day for you on set?

Not at all. No! It wasn't difficult. I did nothing but lay down!

Emotionally, though?

It was very hard to listen to some of the monologues -- it was hard to listen to Justina. But you know, she always kills me under any circumstances. She's just one hell of an actress and probably the best acting partner I've ever had. She's just sensational. And the granddaughter, Isabella Gomez -- her thing was very sweet and sad and moving.

Do you think this show will hopefully open the doors for more Latinx actors?

I think it will, it absolutely will. Gloria Calderon is doing her own show for a network [the upcoming History of Them on CBS with On Your Feet! star Ana Villafañe]. And you know, we can use two on the air! That would be nice.

We could use Rita Moreno on both, too.

I'll be sure to tell her that! [Laughs] So, it's terrific. Whenever we can we use Hispanic actors -- not just Hispanic, but black actors, East Indian actors, every kind of nationality, whoever is good for something gets the part, no matter what the nationality.

What are your thoughts on the diversity reflected in this year's Oscar nominations?

Viola Davis put it so succinctly when she said as long as there aren't roles for us -- meaning all nationalities -- there will be no awards possible for us. A lot of people say, "Well, why aren't you getting awards?" Well, you have to have the roles first. It's not just one-sided. You have to get the roles. And now I think the Hispanic community has to really start pushing and taking some very much-needed lessons from the black community. They really did it up. They did it up just fine. We have to start doing it, too. We have to unite more and we have to pull for each other more. Did you happen to read the very angry piece that John Leguizamo [creator and star of Latin History for Morons currently on Broadway] wrote for Billboard? He's one angry Puerto Rican. He was talking to his own people, [saying that it's] nice to say, “Well, I’m lucky to get this part,” but you’ve gotta do more than that as a Hispanic person. So I'm hoping that's gonna start to happen very, very soon.

At the SAG Awards in January, when you presented Morgan Freeman with the Lifetime Achievement honor, you were given a standing ovation.

That was so moving; I started to cry. That was astonishing -- who would expect something like that?

What's it like to be acknowledged in that way by your peers 70 years into your career?

Oh, that's why I started to cry, because they are my peers. And it was also my peers who helped vote for me when Morgan presented the award to me [in 2014]. It's just fantastic. What went around came around.