#especially when things are Different now and he's his own person who doesn't really mesh into a closed loop with them; instead of the baby

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

trying to lay out my interpretation of why brad and judy are simultaneously awful and really goddamn sad, beyond just having lost their baby under traumatic circumstances as already-traumatized autistic young adults with zero support system left but each other, is wild because it includes in full seriousness the word 'sheepnado'

[sir-phineas-lost]

MAWS S2 finale

The good:

The final fight

Showing Clark's dedication to non-violence. That sequence of him very calmly assessing the situation and doing really cool super-feats just to pull Kara into a hug is fantastic.

Staying true to keeping Lois and Jimmy involved

Finally bringing in the Sun-powered thing

Leaning into Clark and Kara bonding as kryptonians. This show is very good at developing releationships and showing why different character work together. Even if they never do the reconnecting with his heritage-bit having someone in his life that he can be fully himself with, including not worrying about breaking them because he didn't keep himself in perfect check, is interesting.

Speaking of different characters working together, I really do like how Clark and Lois resolve all their relationship issues. I love how pragmatic Clark is about the fact that he can fly to Gotham in a microsecond to be with Lois if need be and Lois still turns down Vicki Vale not only to stay with her friends and boyfriend but for her own reasons.

The Bad:

Brainiac just, doesn't work for me. At all. His design is really boring (when he isn't possessing Clark) and his personality is all over the place in a way that just doesn't make any sense. He is a complete drama-queen which doesn't mesh at all with his "I am following my prime directive of restoring the Kryptonian empire" schtick and his few bits of nuance (like his supposed fatherly feelings for Kara) go nowhere.

I really hate the revelation that he blew up Krypton. For a myriad of reasons, including several plot-holes.

It's unnecessary. There is already plenty of reason to fight Brainiac and it robs whatever this other civilization is of the responsibility for destroying Krypton. I know the general position on Krypton being destroyed has been "meh" so far but facing off against the people who annihilated their birthplace would at least be a somewhat interesting development for Clark and Kara in the future. Facing off against the people who fought a war but were about to announce a ceasefire, not so much.

If Krypton blew up because of Brainiac, why did Jor-El say it was because the empire finally picked a fight it couldn't win? Brainiac explicitly states that Jor-El knew what he was about to do so why would he program his holo-self to share false information?

If Krypton was on the verge of a ceasefire then why the fuck were those warrior-guys on Zero Day all geared up to fight and conquer Earth? It couldn't be Brainiac because he wouldn't have interupted his own invasion by blowing up the planet.

They somehow made Livewire's armor even more bulky and ugly. That is such an impressive feat I almost want to put it in the "good" list.

Speaking of which, all the villains from last season showing up to help should feel like a really cool and rewarding moment, except it isn't. Since there is absolutely no work done to develop them as characters it means nothing. Especially when they try to have playful banter about being friends now.

I know I keep harping on this, but all of the supervillains have really boring and ugly costumes and it is really noticeable when they are all in a shot together. Why are they all beige? Don't any of them have enough individual personality to at least accessorize?

Oh, and it turns out another downside to giving everyone the same "Kryptonian tech" explanation for their powers is that they all get the same weakness. Because why would we want our characters to be different from one another?

Sam Lane coming back to help goes nowhere. Him leaving again was a big deal for Lois but she doesn't interact with him at all. This wouldn't bother me so much (it could make for a good subplot in S3) if he wasn't right there at the celebratory BBQ chatting it up like he isn't a compulsive hardass and loner.

I sound more negative than I really am though. The good parts of MAWS are really good and they carry the show just fine. I just wish it was better than "just fine".

[variousqueerthings]

also, to be that guy who's obsessed with the mythologisation of dr james barry for a second (it's been awhile on this blog I feel), I was interested in how casanova the tv show felt like a deliberate play with myth through the framing and the anachronisms and the lighting and the blocking and and and -- and how casanova himself is a heavily mythologised person, to the point that my partner asked me if he was real before we started

I feel like there's a similarity in ideas in dr james barry and casanova -- they were both adored and reviled, talked up and talked down depending on the agendas of whoever was spreading their tale, both with larger-than-life personas and adventures that seemed to teeter out in the later years as the traits that served them in youth (brashness, stubbornness, laissez-faire attitude around money, very specific ideas around how to live that didn't mesh with the laws and morals of society around them, a genius that in youth is considered prodigy-like... etcetc) (the details, of course, are different) became something that others were embarrassed about/didn't respond to as they aged and lost their connections

(also this is tv-show, so I don't know until I read the diaries, but they both seemingly had a manservant with whom they were very close/came with them on their various journeys)

casanova has the distinction of having a set of diaries that allow one to peruse primary material at ones leisure, so despite being someone whom one might only know from a particular re-telling or history book or even just as an idea, there is some power in being the main teller of his own story

which dr james barry of course doesn't really have. I feel like I read somewhere that he had more private letters that were lost at sea (which whenever I have that memory of having read that, I squint and wonder if I'm not participating in the mythologisation myself), but certainly the majority of what we think we know about him is either from others' opinions of him or just plain wrong/written after his death

in my head though, I think out of the many many biography-type movies and tv shows I've seen, the casanova show might be the closest to something I'd imagine for barry -- not for the same story, of course (the years of their lives also barely overlapped, but my special interest brain did note that early napoleonic and post-napoleonic era), but for the presentation. the idea of indulging in the fantasy, of the playing with anachronism, of an interaction with present (our present) and past. and mostly of fun

I think in a lot of the narratives around barry, it's often hard for me to see someone I think would live the life that he lived -- who had fun, who made deliberate, conscious choices that he enjoyed making, who was very passionate about his ideals and medicine and who -- like casanova -- was very much his own man. they're so often so preoccupied with ideas of deception and being found out and imagined projected cisgender anxieties. they often lack fun, and when they do insert their modern lens (in whatever time whatever thing about him was created), it's not to bridge the gap between us and him, to imagine who he'd potentially be if he lived now, it's to inject their personal ideas about what is morally correct to them onto a symbol

and yeah, at this point dr barry is more figure than man, as happens generally to historical people, especially those we remember for Highly Specific Things (like casanova, like barry), and I think it'd be interesting to really engage with that, to go deep into the world barry lived in, and to make him a figure who was cognizant of that world and the structures he was defying, who felt good about the choices he made

there's a certain idk... thematic overlap between the two figures. and that was something I really really enjoyed while watching this

[lafiametta]

Is there any theory about the show that you dislike? Personally, I don't like the idea that Daniel is part of the simulation and doesn't exist. I found him so charming in how desperate and how much of a mess he was that I would love to have him in the later seasons (same for Elliot!). Now, one theory I have is that the show would jump from past (1899) to future (2099) to present (1999?), such as to follow the meaning that Cerberus the three-headed dog is meant to represent. Would also explain the vintage TV displays we see in Henry's "office" and the one where Ciaran sent Maura his welcome message being vintage.

And for curiosity's sake, are there common tropes about shipping that you dislike? I hate emotionally constipated couples that never talk about their feelings openly. It just creates the most ridiculous of dramas, and I'm too old to sit through that! And because of that, here's a question: how do Olek and Ling Yi open up about their feelings? Both in the modern and the 1899 the New York AUs!

There aren't any theories that I dislike per se, although, yeah, the one where Daniel is actually dead didn't seem to make much sense to me. (I wonder if some of the theorizing was based a little too much on whether people shipped Maura with Daniel or Eyk, and if certain characters were evil or dead, it meant that a particular ship would win out. I mean, whatever... ship what you like, and you can just as easily ignore the bits of canon you don't care for.) But almost all the theories about the show were so interesting — Were the characters on a long space voyage, with the simulation as a way to keep their brains occupied? Were they prisoners being transported, with the simulation as their punishment? Was Henry Singleton just an AI within the simulation or was he "real"? Was Ciaran ever an actual person or was he an AI gone rogue? — and it seemed very foolish to discount any of them when we didn't really have enough to prove any of them true or false. (I'm using the past tense, but I really hope that we all continue to post meta and analysis, offering more theories about the simulation and the spaceship "reality'" at the end.) And seriously, I like your idea a lot — it would make sense that there would be a middle stage between the historical past of 1899 and the spaceship future of 2099. If the whole thing is actually happening in a present-day 1999 (with some of the 70s and 80s-era furniture now only looking a little dated), it would add a whole new dimension to things and make them more familiar to our own experiences. (And, yes, the three-headed Cerberus! Such awesome symbolism, which also meshes well with the three points of the earth sign triangle!)

As for common tropes in shipping, like you, I'm generally not a fan of miscommunication as a vehicle for drama. (Like people overhearing things they're not supposed to hear, and then acting out based on it, without telling the other person what they overheard or giving them a chance to clear it up.) And while I'm such a fan of domestic fluff, I don't like surprise pregnancies, especially if they're used just to introduce more drama. Ironically, given that they're such a big part of 1899, I'm also not a big fan of love triangles. (But maybe it explains why I started shipping the one couple who aren't part of a triangle!)

I think that in the both the modern AU and the 1899 New York AU, Ling Yi tends to be the more emotionally expressive one. She definitely says what she thinks and even when she doesn't say it, most of the time it's clear how she's feeling. (In the 1899 New York AU, Olek does have to do a bit more to pick up on things, just because she can't verbalize it to him as easily. But even in the show, they seemed to understand each other fairly well, even when conversing simultaneously in two different languages, so it's not as difficult for him as it might seem.) Olek is more reserved and finds it harder to fully express how he feels, although he finds it much easier to do so in a physical than a verbal way. There are definitely times, though, when Ling Yi has to drag things out of him and get him to use his words! But ultimately he feels things really deeply (still waters run deep!), so part of their growth together as a couple is Olek learning how to become more open and expressive.

[oblivious-aro]

Wow! What a delicious essay!

Yeah I feel like with jerk characters the writers just want to have someone who makes snarky characters, and don’t really consider how said character meshes with the rest of the cast. Going back to the Jax example, he feels like he should get more push back from the others, but the writers use him as more of a one-liner dispenser than a character.

The point of Thief’s characterization is so that Lady Luck can bounce her quips off of him and tear him down like she does the other contestants. His jerky characterization is used as a tool for the story and characters, not just a tool for the writer's benefit.

“Do you remember when Rick and Morty was a thing?”

I try not to let fandom views sway my views too too much, but honestly with the disproportionate way fandom tends to jump on those kinds of characters, I can’t really blame anyone who’s sick of them because of that alone. Especially since writers themselves seem to respond to the popularity.

Ugh, reddit really does suck for media analysis. I made the mistake of looking up people’s opinions of Nya and Franziska von Karma there. That website's definitely better for stuff like cooking questions than opinions on characters.

“Throw in the way it only ever seems to apply to men…” Ha ha wow, isn't that a weird coincidence…

“It's not so much a twist as the objectively correct take on this trope, but it's still unique and genuinely insightful in a way I haven't seen since.” Oh my gosh someone put the feeling into words! Sometimes a character isn't “subversive”, they're just well written and happen to be adjacent to a known trope/archetype.

Yes! I love how in Reunion you can see how teaming up to beat Lady Luck to escape the dungeon formed a bond between the contestants. Theif's still his greedy self, but he's learned the importance of teamwork and stuff. Yay!

Yeah, a lot of Nya's writing decisions kind of send sketchy messages, but they also happen to make her really cool.

“You get attached to your best skill, because that's how you prove yourself as a person. It comes easily to you and you never really work on anything else, and when you're pushed to do it, you hate that it doesn't come easily to you.”

You get it. You've said it all here (and I think I posted about it a while back), but season 5 Nya was so freaking real for this. I will always have a soft spot for season 5 because of how much I saw myself in Nya's struggle, and I was an adult when I watched it.

“I didn't consider myself an artist or writer or programmer for years because I thought the stuff I made was ugly and awkward”

I know imposter syndrome is extremely common, and I deal it myself, but it still really catches me off guard when some people struggle to feel confident in their work. I'm sure your stuff was a bit rougher back then than it was now, but still…

“I'm reminded of Wu telling Nya that while earth is strong and air is fluid, water can be both. I thought it was just a thing they wrote in to sound wise back then, but on reflection, it's some really kind encouragement for her to branch out.” Ooh, good catch

I'm sure my feelings on Skybound are well known at this point, so I'll just say Ninjago can managed to put some really compelling into Nya, despite the misogyny.

Yeah, you're pretty spot on with Edgeworth. Starts off as your seemingly typical anime rival type, but then you slowly discover someone very hurt and human and watch him change and slowly turn back to the light, in large part thanks to Phoenix's slightly ridiculous levels of faith and devotion (/pos).

His journey strongly ties into and supports Phoenix's character (being his inspiration stand up for those no one else with stand for and find the truth) while still very much being his own story. He's been hurt, but that just person Phoenix was inspired by so many years ago was still in there, even if getting him back out is a…messy process. In the end his philosophy and methods notably differ from Phoenix, but ultimately they both share the ultimate goal of finding the truth.

Yes, one Ace Attorney's greatest strengths is exploring its character's goals and arcs. That final case with Edgeworth is probably the best in the series because of all the buildup, how you got to know Edgeworth in court, how much he means to Phoenix, what he's been through, it all culminates in a kick-ass redemption where you get to save your friend and take down the ultimate bad guy! So hype!

Requesting Nya, Edgeworth, and Theif for the character bingo!

(It didn't surprise me that you have good taste in characters. Also, I should watch The Last Unicorn...)

(asks about my favourite fictional characters in 2024)

Oddly enough you got me kind of going on a theme with this one - they're all characters I expected to be tropey in a bad way, who all turn out way more interesting than I could've ever imagined. Huh.

A lot of words lie below about Dicey Dungeons (up to Reunion), the first two Ace Attorney games, and Ninjago (up to the end of season 6).

Spoilers for Dicey Dungeons (up to Reunion), the first two Ace Attorney games, and Ninjago up to the end of season 6. A warning for a mention of a suspected suicide in a backstory.

I'll start with Thief since I need a bit of warmup for the other ask you sent me:

Thief is the only time I've genuinely enjoyed a protagonist that��� I'm not sure how to put it. Is shown to be a jerkass and a realist amongst a cast of otherwise very whimsical characters? Who's drawn to look roguish, sneaky, and clever, whether the writer backs that up or not. And for bonus points, is styled after D&D's aesthetics.

I usually hate characters like this. I think it's an oversaturation problem. Ronin's the closest example I have - a character that does nothing for his season's story and wins against the ninja purely out of plot necessity. Or consider Jax, who takes up a lot of screentime in TADC making the rest of the crew suffer, whose snarking really only makes the creators look insecure about the goofier elements of their own work.

And Jax has been confirmed to be a creator's favourite, which is… not concerning, but it's one of those things a creator can say to make you realise you see something very different in their work to them. Plus, a lot of people like him in the fandom. Which isn't technically part of the work. But it is annoying to see how so many people focus on this archetype even when it doesn't bring anything new to the table. This trope is always extremely obvious, and extremely obnoxious if you don't like it.

The worst thing is this isn't just relegated to the realm of fiction. Do you remember when Rick and Morty was a thing, and you had hordes of people looking up to Rick Sanchez as a role model because he was both smart and an asshole, and therefore the takeaway was that it was okay to be an asshole if you (thought you) were smart?

Maybe this is just because I made the mistake of using Reddit as a teenager, but I'm so sick of that attitude. Throw in the way it only ever seems to apply to men…

(as for the last point - I like the concept of magic and fantasy, but I'm not white and I'm fucking sick of how the genre is based in very strict archetypes when you could do anything with it. I won't elaborate on this or it'd be a whole 'nother essay; let's just say I dislike any aesthetic based off D&D.)

Thief is the only time I've seen a work dress this down: his whole arc is realising that he's been outclassed by somebody who knows the game much better than he does, and actually has the power to back it up (and is much funnier to watch too).

As Lady Luck so elegantly puts it:

"…Thief, who is so strangely proud of being clever and unpleasant! Do you think he minds that I'm so much cleverer, and so many times more unpleasant?"

You know that creeping feeling of dread you got playing the game? He's the character that embodies it best. I expected the game to play this completely straight like all those characters above, but it doesn't. It's not so much a twist as the objectively correct take on this trope, but it's still unique and genuinely insightful in a way I haven't seen since.

(Fun fact: it was actually seeing the episode 2 dialogue between Lady Luck and Thief that got me to stop playing the demo and get the full game! The streamer was fast-forwarding through all the text, but I paused and was like 'wait. this is good dialogue. I have to buy this.')

Reunion really drives this home. I love how he instead starts directing his snark outwards to keep his new friends safe. He actually does things now, as the tough negotiator of the group, rather than just claiming he's better than them. He's still kind of got his old greed in him with how he respects Lady Luck's plans to paint the moon as her face, and how he's here for profit first and foremost, but it's clear he's been forced to grow out of that previous obnoxiousness after being put through hell and back.

Dicey Dungeons has such good commentary on character tropes y'all. Seriously.

Nya's a character that had a personal impact on me growing up. I didn't notice it back then, but at least in the early seasons she's just. Objectively the coolest character in the cast. Albeit only because of misogyny reasons as you've noted, but a signifcant amount of Ninjago's appeal lies in its cool factor, so. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I always thought she was going to be Green Ninja as a kid.

I had to go back and check this, but we get the Samurai X reveal just before season 1 gets onto the full potential episodes. There's something about having to build your own power in a way that one-ups all your peers while keeping it secret from them that's so cool to me. While I have mixed feelings on whether it's a good thing or not, it reminds me of how I studied a lot of maths in my own time in primary school and did better than everyone else by a long shot. Plus you don't usually see girls straight up build mechs, so this blew my fucking mind as a kid.

It was cool to see representation like that. I really like how that specialisation then leads into her potential in season 5 - when she finally begins to branch into learning something new that doesn't seem to be her thing. I've seen people doubt how realistic that is, and while you can debate how well it was paced or whether it's a good decision for the series, that's a real problem you can run into when you're AFAB (or in any other oppressed group) and talented at one thing.

You get attached to your best skill, because that's how you prove yourself as a person. It comes easily to you and you never really work on anything else, and when you're pushed to do it, you hate that it doesn't come easily to you. I didn't consider myself an artist or writer or programmer for years because I thought the stuff I made was ugly and awkward; I knew a trans guy in secondary who straight up told me that he liked his subjects because they came easily to him (which good for him, but it still proves my point that this is a real thing people go through).

I'm reminded of Wu telling Nya that while earth is strong and air is fluid, water can be both. I thought it was just a thing they wrote in to sound wise back then, but on reflection it's some really kind encouragement for her to branch out. And I like how she quits angrily in her training and tries to run for ages. How she doesn't figure it out until the end. I can see myself in that. It's very nice.

And while Skybound's very. Divisive. I think it's a good 60% of a season for her. Her story up to the ending of episode 8 has been compelling - she wants Jay to respect her boundaries, she struggles to make herself known as a new part of the team due to her status, maybe she doesn't mind being in a relationship, but she wants to at least choose for herself. And the sheer amount of optimism encouragement and energy she has throughout the season for everyone is just great.

Yeah. She's great. She kicks ass. She's unfortunately stuck in a show lead by Male WritersTM but we sometimes stumble into some decent characterisation for her despite that. She's unfortunately lowkey but that means there's less parts of her to mangle over time.

…Ninjago was such a great show. It's such a shame it was capped at 6 seasons, but at least that means they treated Nya with respect throughout her runtime except for that one time…

Also I don't know how to tie this neatly into the essay. But a while ago LEGO released a really funny Ninjago explained video done by the Honest Trailers guy, and I still fucking love how he goes off about how talented Nya is for ages instead of making fun of most of the other Ninjas' archetypes (sans Cole), and just ends it with:

'so naturally she was the last one picked for the team. Seriously, they picked [Jay] over her?'

Edgeworth I have the least to say about - it's been a hot while since I've touched AA (and only the first two games at that) and I don't want to risk misremembering fandom concepts as canon.

But the main impact he made on me was that he seems so tailor-made to be your frustrating, comically evil anime rival for the entire plot. Opposing colour scheme, stupid animations, and all. You go in thinking he's made to be a smug bastard you can knock down, and you come out recoiling from that as soon as possible in horror.

And you feel so powerful when you finally get to team up with him against someone.

Yes he does pull out absolute bullshit like the updated autopsy report, and he's still pretty insulting even in later installations. But when you're working your way throughout the first game, and you start to poke at his motivations a little further? He has an iron-clad reason to want to become a prosecutor, even as potentially corrupt as his methods may be. He seeks to help Wright if it truly brings someone to justice, which is a better portrayal of the legal system than I've seen than from many other places.

And in the end, after he saves you, you have to go back and do the same for him. And it's the best case of the game. You not only blow open a decades-old case that's been hinted towards throughout the entire game, but you also finally cut your friend loose from the ghost that he didn't even know was haunting him for years. It ties the overarching plot and the main characters' personal endeavours together so well, which is the series' greatest strength, despite what the memes going around about its wacky hijnks would have you believe.

Plus, while it's not Edgeworth's doing himself, the amount of dedication Phoenix has towards this guy is great. Whether you read their bond as romantic or platonic (or otherwise), you get the sense Edgeworth must've been someone really special to Phoenix for him to try and chase him down through years of law school and all the bullshit you're put through in the previous 3 chapters. That's devotion right there, and it catches you entirely off-guard with what you go in expecting.

He feels very human. You learn about things like his Steel Samurai collection, you give him advice on how to grow beyond the mess that is DL6. You see him take that in the worst way possible by running off to a foreign country and implying that he might've killed himself. You expect none of it. It's very touching.

[thecottageinthedark]

#sdmi#scooby doo: mystery incorporated#brad chiles#judy reeves#tl;dr they are Like That in large part because pericles fucked them up in a very particular way#that made them dependent on him to give them cues for what to do and validation for the results#and when they suddenly had that ripped away they dealt with it by just making a closed loop where they follow each other in circles#in order to make one semi-functioning adult with a semi-functioning ability to actually choose to set out and do things#nothing else really *matters* to them outside of that fragile closed loop (and christ it is fragile); they set up a steady source of income#and then just fuck off to go effectively be alone together for 20 years; amassing and perfecting a bunch of random skills#because they are both very intelligent in some ways and Need to Stay Occupied; but what else are we gonna do#just aimlessly follow each other in circles and there's no room to actually choose a direction from there#and if anything breaks the closed loop; or doesn't fit into a hesitantly expanded version of it they had in mind#they freak out and they lash out at it even when they're pretending to be cheerful and unaffected#and the only real reason they *did* have to act on caring about something outside that feedback loop before--fred#ended up *being 'sit on your hands and do nothing for 20 years'*; when they are border collies climbing the walls without things to pursue#then suddenly that's gone and they can go care about fred again! except Oops now there is a force influencing them whose entire thing is#'induce artificial craving for Thing.' they try to love fred but they also resent him for being why they spent 20 years with nothing to Do#especially when things are Different now and he's his own person who doesn't really mesh into a closed loop with them; instead of the baby

#they could have imagined whatever they wanted about all that time. they are desperately exhausted with caring about fred#and deeply traumatized by having done it; & at this point when a ball is waved in front of them to go fetch that they aren't burned out on#they go 'fuck it sorry kid you come second this time.' and then he *very purposely* cuts ties w/them & therefore any possibility of a loop#and they stop caring completely and lash out instead; especially because the person who fucked them up like this in the first place#has waltzed back into their life and snapped his fingers for them to heel. now they're great tools for his agenda including abusing ricky#'he's a genius right brad' 'my loyal brad and judy' siding w/pericles despite ricky having been a more reliable choice who explicitly treat#them as equals and doesn't constantly insult them and talk to them like pets. and then when something as small as Looking Different breaks#that one last most supposedly dependable loop they had they break down and start lashing out at each other. they 'behave like children.'#there's so much here man. they suck so goddamn bad and they fuck me up. thinking about the oldgang for the rest of my life

trying to lay out my interpretation of why brad and judy are simultaneously awful and really goddamn sad, beyond just having lost their baby under traumatic circumstances as already-traumatized autistic young adults with zero support system left but each other, is wild because it includes in full seriousness the word 'sheepnado'